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The Proper Procedure Poor Richard's Retirement Trump The Establishment Weather Shop Click to inquire about rates. Dow Jones What They Say About SDA "Smalldeadanimals doesn't speak for the people of Saskatchewan" Former Sask Premier Lorne Calvert "I got so much traffic after your post my web host asked me to buy a larger traffic allowance." Dr.Ross McKitrick Holy hell, woman. When you send someone traffic, you send someone TRAFFIC. My hosting provider thought I was being DDoSed. - Sean McCormick "The New York Times link to me yesterday [...] generated one-fifth of the traffic I normally get from a link from Small Dead Animals." Kathy Shaidle "Thank you for your link. A wave of your Canadian readers came to my blog! Really impressive." Juan Giner - INNOVATION International Media Consulting Group I got links from the Weekly Standard, Hot Air and Instapundit yesterday - but SDA was running at least equal to those in visitors clicking through to my blog. Jeff Dobbs "You may be a nasty right winger, but you're not nasty all the time!" Warren Kinsella "Go back to collecting your welfare livelihood."Michael E. Zilkowsky Intelliweather Seismic Map Comments Policy Read this Best Of SDA Hide The Decline The Bottle Genie (ClimateGate links) You Might Be A Liberal Uncrossing The Line Bob Fife: Knuckledragger A Modest Proposal (NP) Settled Science Series Y2Kyoto Series SDA: Reader Occupation Survey Brett Lamb Sheltered Workshop Flakes On A Plane All Your Weather Are Belong To Us Song Of The Sled The Raise A Flag Debacle (Now on Youtube!) (.mwv Video) Abuse Ruins Life Of Girl Trudeaupiate Kleptocrat Jeans Child Labour I Concede Small Dead Feminist Protein Hoser: THK Interview The Werewolf Extinction Dear Laura (VRWC) We Wait Blogging The Oscars Jackson Converts To Islam Just Shut The HELL Up Manipulating Condi Gay Equality Rights System error error: Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. context: ... 21: 22: 23: % foreach my $c (@categories) { 24: <%perl> 25: my $category_id = $c->get_id(); 26: my @stories = Bric::Biz::Asset::Business::Story->list ( { element_type_id=>1148, category_id=>$category_id , Order=> 'cover_date', publish_status => 't' , OrderDirection=> 'DESC' , Limit=>10 } ); 27: 28: 29: ... code stack: /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html:25 /usr/share/perl5/HTML/Mason/Request.pm:948 /var/cache/mason/obj/2011159162/main/smetimes/dhandler.html.obj:17 /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/autohandler_template.html:149 Can't call method "get_id" on an undefined value at /usr/local/bricolage/data/burn/stage/oc_1027/smetimes/dhandler.html line 25. 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Gus was just one of 8300 students starting their first day of pre-school or kindergarten across the ACT's 87 public schools, with nervous parents and excited kids welcomed by ACT Deputy Chief Minister and Education Minister Yvette Berry. It was organised chaos: students everywhere talking and playing, parents taking photos of their children, and some kids nervously clutching at their parents or even the other way around. Soriebint Kallon, 6, begun school, escorted by her younger brother, Mamadu-Salieu and her father, Alpha. The Left Renewal splinter group stirring fierce division inside the Greens party met in Canberra at the Australian National University on Sunday night, with no policy platform emerging and attendees at loggerheads on several issues. One Greens member present described the movement as "a flash in the pan". The Greens faction, Left Renewal, met in Canberra as the group struggled to form any policy objectives or garner support inside the party. About 50 people attended, mostly young and Greens members. They listened to Holly Brooke, 22, and Andree Bosch, 23, Greens members from NSW and from Left Renewal, before questions and discussion. The pair criticised several Greens policies and leaders, including ACT Greens leader Shane Rattenbury, while pointing to global anger on various issues including capitalism, workers' rights and income inequality A wet spring, including severe storms and floods, resulted in crop damage and harvesting delays on potato farms throughout Australia. And an unlikely result of the harsh conditions has meant Canberra is currently experiencing potato scallop shortage. And it's proving to be quite an annoyonce for takeaway shop owners throughout the capital. Owner of The Corner Takeaway at Queanbeyan, Steve Salmon. The shop has not had any potato scallops since October. Credit:Jamila Toderas "Probably a lot of them have given up," Watson Takeaway owner Kerry Spanos sighed. "A lot of the shops are buying them frozen now. The prices have gone through the roof." QBE Insurance has denied it has received a corporate proposal from German insurance giant Allianz after media reports suggested the two insurers had been in "informal talks" about a potential takeover. German newspaper Handelsblatt reported overnight that Allianz chief executive Oliver Baete met QBE boss John Neal before Christmas and suggested an offer of $15 a share, which would value the company at $20 billion. John Neal, CEO of QBE. The company has been the source of takeover speculation. Credit:Anna Kucera The speculation saw shareholders push the share price up more than 5 per cent to $12.97 during trade on Monday. It fell back down after the company denied the reports, closing at $12.35. According to the German newspaper, talks between the groups were friendly but there were no concrete negotiations about a deal yet, according to sources. We might be on the wrong side of Australia Day when it comes to summer reading lists, but who wouldn't want to stretch their reading list a little to make room for the latest bodice ripper from Commonwealth Bank board member Harrison Young? The Daughters of Henry Wong is the fourth literary offering from Young, and is set in Hong Kong's world of finance. The protagonist is Jonathan Wentworth "Wendy" Lee whose life is thrown into chaos when his father-in-law the "most powerful banker in Hong Kong" goes missing. "Under the guidance of a comical investment banker, wise friends and alluring women, Wendy mounts a defence and races to uncover the layers of deception and family secrets right under his nose before it's too late," says the book blurb. "I set the book in Hong Kong because I was living there, and had found it an interesting city at once frantic and majestic," said Young, whose global wanderings have provided fertile ground for his literary work. Unofficially at least, the country goes back to work this week after the extended silly season between Christmas and Australia Day. That may seem a longish break. But for the economy, the fact so many of us have taken a domestic trip away in the last five or six weeks for a stay at the beach, the bush, or wherever, highlights an industrial bright spot: tourism. It gets little press compared with the swinging fortunes of the mining industry, but tourism is having its own boom, the size of which may surprise you. How's this for a changing of the guard: Australia now makes more money selling tourism services to foreigners than it makes from exporting coal. "We have had challenging and contentious projects in the past, but because there are dispute resolution and mediation processes built into all contracts that can be initiated by a client if necessary, including the ability to issue a breach notice, this has allowed for the orderly and professional resolution of disputes, without going public, which is normally in both parties' interest." Mr Di Marco said the council had not initiated any of those contract mechanisms. "TechnologyOne was not aware of a contract dispute until the detrimental media statement made by the BCC," he said. In the statement to the ASX, TechnologyOne said the project delays had been "fully documented and are due to the BCC". It also claimed a briefing by the council's independent review committee on the morning of Cr Quirk's comments last Wednesday was inconsistent with what the Lord Mayor told the media. "TechnologyOne has had challenging projects like the BCC in the past and they have been resolved to both parties' satisfaction," Mr Di Marco said. "Unfortunately, BCC has taken this into the public arena without first following contractual protocol and allowing us the opportunity to resolve the matter. "This has caused needless angst to our shareholders and impacted our share price, which is disappointing and totally unnecessary. "Having said this, I am confident that this project can be resolved and have no impact on our strong earnings momentum." The TechnologyOne ASX statement blasted what it described as "significant confusion and misunderstanding within the BCC executive" over the project and said the company remained confident of its legal position should litigation be instigated. It also said the company was willing to work with the council to deliver the project "in good faith". "Having said this, TechnologyOne has notified council that it cannot continue to frustrate our ability to complete the project," the company told the ASX. "For bureaucratic reasons, council is not engaging with TechnologyOne during the time-critical configuration state by not providing the business input we require to configure their new business processes in our software. "This bureaucratic approach will delay the project needlessly and contribute significantly to a blow-out in costs." When approached for comment, a spokesman for Cr Quirk did not address the criticism directly. "The Lord Mayor was made aware late last year that an IT systems replacement project was up to 18 months behind schedule with potential cost overruns, and in October halted payments to TechnologyOne and commissioned a review to get the project back on track," he said. "Following a briefing from this review last week, the Lord Mayor directed council officers to renegotiate the contract, with a six-month deadline for TechnologyOne to provide an acceptable IT system to council." Council opposition leader Peter Cumming said TechnologyOne's ASX statement took the dispute to a "whole new level". "It shines a light on the fact that the council's handling of this contract has been incompetent from day one," he said. "It's appalling that in council's haste to point the finger of blame at TechnologyOne, they have failed to follow the normal contractual process and attempt to resolve the problem." Cr Cumming said Cr Quirk's Liberal National Party administration was more concerned about "shifting the blame for its own failures rather than ensuring ratepayers money is well spent". Services Union secretary Neil Henderson noted the dispute came after the outsourcing of jobs in the council's IT department. "Our members have their jobs on the line for significantly less than the money we are talking about here," he said. "The loss of a huge number of IT jobs to India is also still fresh in our members' minds and for them this is another council IT stuff-up. A 50 per cent share price gain in three months has prompted analyst downgrades for Oz Minerals, as the miner is finalising development plans for a new project and amid optimism over its exploration profile. Argonaut Securities has a "sell" recommendation on the miner's shares and Morgans, along with Morningstar, "reduce" calls. "We think that Oz Mineral's recent +50 per cent re-rating has been driven by generalist demand for large, liquid, high margin copper exposures amid rising copper prices and new exuberance for global growth," Morgans analyst Tom Sartor told clients. "Such exposures are scarce on the ASX, helping to explain the premium. CEO of Oz Minerals Andrew Cole Credit:David Mariuz "However, with prices now well ahead of fundamentals, we think the market is overlooking Oz Mineral's inherent risks." Morningstar has a $4 a share valuation, arguing simply that "Oz Minerals is overvalued". Services group Spotless is facing a class action from shareholders over allegations it misled investors about its 2015 financial prospects. Listed litigation funder IMF Bentham will fund the action that is expected to be filed in the Federal Court by William Roberts Lawyers. Spotless CEO Martin Sheppard and chairman Margaret Jackson. Credit:Wayne Taylor Its the second potential class action the group is facing, the first is being investigated by ACA Lawyers with the support of funder Investor Claim Partner. Slater & Gordon is also investigating a claim against the company. IMF Bentham and William Roberts allege Spotless' financial results for the 12 months to June 30 were misleading and in breach of Spotless' continuous disclosure obligations. Banned asbestos and other dangerous building products are slipping past customs officials and being used in Australian homes and building sites, a senate inquiry has heard. The national construction union has made a submission to the inquiry saying building materials containing asbestos, formaldehyde and cheap glass that explodes are being imported and used in Australia. Half of the Mr Fluffy blocks auctioned in May have sold. Credit:Rohan Thomson Brad Parker, assistant national secretary of the CFMEU Construction Division, said the Australian Border Force was seriously under resourced to intercept the arrival of dangerous building products. "Non-conforming building products touch nearly every part of our daily lives. From asbestos that kills to cheap glass that explodes, to flat pack kitchens reeking of formaldehyde," Mr Parker said. When Genevieve Clay-Smith went to university to study filmmaking, she assumed her career would take a traditional path. Perhaps, she'd start out with a few television commercials before eventually working her way up to something more creative. But answering an ad in the university newspaper set the then 19-year-old onto a far more intriguing path; one which, in 2015, led her to being awarded NSW Young Australian of the Year. Genevieve Clay-Smith's work at Bus Stop Films saw her be awarded NSW's Young Australian of the Year in 2015. "Down Syndrome NSW wanted a filmmaker to make a documentary. I spent two years with the six families in the film, and it changed my life," Clay-Smith says. When the project was finished one of the participants, a young man with Down syndrome, said that he wanted to be an actor. Two weeks after marrying my husband in the US we re-enacted the wedding next to an apartment-block pool in North Queensland. Same vows, same tears, same suits more sweat. We'd used a licensed celebrant for the northern hemisphere affair but decided to have a friend man the microphone for our mock marriage in Australia. I didn't expect that the first person I asked to perform this privileged duty would refuse to do it. The refusal was on religious grounds. This person loved me, loved my fiance and was happy we were together but he just couldn't be involved so centrally in a same-sex wedding. And I understood. When I approached him, I let him know I would not be offended if he'd said no. When he did say no, I was disappointed but not hurt. He attended our wedding as a guest and, understanding the complications of that decision, I'll always cherish that he did. It's an exchange that plays on my mind as governments grapple with the question of whether religious folk more widely should be allowed to refuse involvement in same-sex marriages. In Australia, where gays and lesbians remain unable to marry, a cross-party committee currently considering amendments to the Marriage Act is discussing that question. Legislation proposed as part of the now-dormant plebiscite included protections for "conscientious objectors" from celebrants to cake bakers who refused to provide their services to same-sex couples. In the US, where same-sex marriage is legal, exemption is a live issue. Republicans in state legislatures continue to push for laws that would protect organisations and businesses refusing service for same-sex unions. Just last week, such a bill failed in Colorado for the third time. And the new Vice-President, former Indiana governor Mike Pence, rose to political stardom as the key defender of a restaurateur who declared that he would not cater for any gay couples who wanted to marry at his suburban pizza joint. The Productivity Commission's 2017 report on government service provision in the housing and homelessness sector this month came with encouraging results for the ACT government: the waiting list for public housing in Canberra in 2016 dropped 17 per cent on the previous year. Improvements of this magnitude not since 2012 has the list been this short are generally celebrated with gusto. On this occasion, however, there was silence from the Barr government perhaps because on other key performance indicators, the PC report was not so flattering to the ACT. Funding for homelessness services, for instance, dropped from $24.8 million in 2012-13 to $20.1 million in 2015-16 in real terms. The proportion of over-crowding in ACT public housing in 2016 was the third highest nationally, exceeded only by Victoria and the Northern Territory. (Perversely, the proportion of households in public housing with underutilization in the ACT was surpassed only by South Australia). Reflecting those figures, customer satisfaction with ACT public and community housing was poor: of the 717 household sampled, only 29.9 per cent said they very satisfied with their accommodation. Only NSW and the NT had lower rates of customer satisfaction. The ACT also performed poorly in terms of social and public housing efficiency. The net recurrent cost of providing assistance for public housing in the ACT in 2015-16 (including the cost of capital) was $45,443 per dwelling, a figure surpassed only by the NT, where the cost per dwelling was $49,405. The national average was $36,066. What is not spelled out in this PC report, but which informs all its analysis, is that no two Australian jurisdictions are alike: Tasmania, for instance, has a higher than average level of welfare dependency; the Top End's remoteness and its small, scattered indigenous communities ensure that building and maintaining public housing in the NT is very expensive; while the ACT's tight rental market and high real estate prices mean more low-income earners are likely to be seeking public housing assistance. Canberra's problems are also compounded by the fact that much of the public housing stock in the inner city areas is ageing (and therefore expensive to maintain) or has reached the end of its useful life. For the first time in my life, I strangely found myself agreeing with a statement issued by Iran's foreign ministry. The statement, in response to US President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily banning citizens of Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from travelling to the United States, read: "The US decision to restrict travel for Muslims to the US, even if for a temporary period of three months, is an obvious insult to the Islamic world ... Despite the claims of combating terrorism and keeping American people safe, it will be recorded in history as a big gift to extremists and their supporters." President Donald Trump has announced a ban on immigration from seven majority Muslim nations. Credit:Olivier Douliery Although I do not agree with Iran's tit-for-tat approach the ministry in the same statement threatened to reciprocate and stop US citizens from now travelling to Iran I live in hope that the US is going through a phase of temporary insanity and we can work to stop Trump's racist and hateful ban. I was born in Iran but raised in Australia. We came to this great country when I was a baby, shortly after the 1979 revolution. My parents, both from persecuted minority religions, like millions of other Iranians at the time, fled Iran in the late '70s and early '80s after the Pahlavi dynasty under Mohammad Reza Shah was overthrown (with the support of the US and Britain) and replaced by an Islamic republic. Len Tregonning was a humble man. He never would have expected an obituary or any public acknowledgement. He was a quiet hero, a teacher, an artist, a culture man, a truly clever man of contemporary times. Born in Yallourn on December 26, 1954, his life was deeply affected by federal government assimilation policies that forced Aboriginal people of mixed descent off the missions and then later allowed for the removal of children from their families, a policy now known as the "stolen generation". Len Tregonning, Aboriginal artist and cultural leader Before being taken away and put into a boarding school, Len lived within the community on the fringes of white society. "It was great," he said. "Just all yarns and noises and people coming and going, you know, it was real family. Wouldn't be just our family, might be other families moving through 'cause a lot of people were transient. "We had the beautiful river and just being kids, diving for tortoises in the long reeds and picking the mussels. It was lovely and pretty free." Students in years 11 and 12 returned to classrooms this week for more hard yakka towards the Higher School Certificate. Any young man or woman who can expand the brain across various disciplines, handle the pressure and still come out the other side as a well-rounded human deserves credit. Only a dangerously low proportion of our high school pupils, though, are attempting the toughest of HSC tasks: calculus. Maths get very hard when students reach calculus, but clearing that hurdle is essential for science-based university study. Credit:MIT Unintelligible to many yet artistic to others, calculus is the core of any science, technology, engineering and maths-based learning. Take calculus out of a child's education and you are considerably reducing their career options. As the trend continues, you are also threatening Australia's economic future. Between 2004 and 2014, the proportion of NSW students studying non-calculus practical maths courses at high school rose 20 per cent versus a 14 per cent fall for calculus-based maths. Australia risks falling behind neighbouring Asian economies and becoming an "unskilled enclave" unless it prioritises local jobs and reduces the use of low-cost foreign workers, Bill Shorten has warned. In a speech to the National Press Club on Tuesday that underlines Mr Shorten's plan to win back voters who have deserted the ALP for populist, nationalist parties such as Pauline Hanson's One Nation and the Nick Xenophon Team, the Opposition Leader will say that Australian jobs will be his top economic priority in 2017. It comes a day before Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull outlines his government's priorities for 2017 in a major speech at the National Press Club on Wednesday, and both men's speeches are intended to frame the political battlelines for the coming year. Both leaders have stepped up their rhetoric about the importance of protecting and prioritising Australian jobs in recent months in response to the rise in support for One Nation and the Xenophon Team, concerns about job security in the community, and in the wake of Brexit and the election of President Donald Trump. New research ridicules the Prime Minister's claim that cutting the company tax rate will boost foreign investment, pointing out that almost all of Australia's foreign investment applications already come from countries with much lower tax rates. The analysis by the Australia Institute finds that 97 per cent of the applications to Australia's foreign investment review board come from countries with lower company tax rates. By value, 71 per cent of applications come from countries with lower rates. "All of this raises the question if Australia is already successful at attracting foreign investment why would we give tax cuts to foreigners?" said the report's author David Richardson, a senior research fellow at the self-described progressive think tank. "History shows that when Australia's company tax rates were adjusted in the past, foreign investment did not go the way expected. When the rate climbed to 49 per cent in the 1980s there was a rise, not a drop in investment." Opposition Leader Bill Shorten has slammed US President Donald Trump's ban on immigration from seven predominantly-Muslim countries as "appalling", arguing Australia should not stay silent on the decision that has shocked the world. After Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull refused to condemn the immigration ban, which has seen visitors and visa-holders thrown off planes as they try to travel to the US, Mr Shorten said to remain silent could be "interpreted as agreement". "Wherever possible, I want the United States to be able to go about its business without interference from Australia. And I would expect the reverse to be true," the Labor leader wrote on his official Facebook page. "However, there are some issues where silence will be interpreted as agreement. For that reason, I need to say Mr Trump's ban on refugees based upon their religion or country is appalling and ought to be ended as soon as possible." Share your opinion on this topic by sending a letter to the editor to tctvoice@madison.com. Include your full name, hometown and phone number. Your name and town will be published. The phone number is for verification purposes only. Please keep your letter to 250 words or less. When Susan Kiefel was first admitted to the Queensland bar her brother sent her a telegram: "Dear sister. Welcome to the acting profession." Justice Kiefel thanked her brother but pointed out that she would be writing her own lines. The 13th Chief Justice of the High Court has spent her formidable legal career doing just that - rewriting the script for how to not just succeed in the most establishment of careers but to climb to its very pinnacle. On Monday, more than 113 years since the first chief justice of the High Court was sworn in and 30 years after the first woman sat on its bench, Justice Kiefel was sworn in as the court's first female chief justice. On a cool, damp night last weekend, Lauren Duca, 25, sat at a corner banquette at the Red Cat in Manhattan, sipping white wine. She had spent her day trekking around the city, getting a blowout in Chinatown, meeting some friends for brunch in the West Village and stopping home in Brooklyn for some relaxation time with her dog, a Shiba Inu puppy named Demi. Duca was a little nervous. "I need to slow down my heart rate," she said. She took a deep breath, closed her eyes and raised her glass. She had a big night ahead. She would be appearing on stage as a guest monologuist for the improvisation company Upright Citizens Brigade. Previous guest monologuists at UCB have included Gloria Steinem, Amy Schumer and the hosts of the "2 Dope Queens" podcast, Jessica Williams and Phoebe Robinson. So, you know, no pressure. In the past two months Lauren Duca has gone from a relatively obscure freelance journalist to a national newsmaker Credit:Twitter/Lauren Duca It might surprise some that Duca - who in the past two months has gone from a relatively obscure freelance journalist to a national newsmaker - is susceptible to the jitters. On December 10, Teen Vogue published a scorched-earth opinion piece she wrote titled "Donald Trump Is Gaslighting America" on its website. It went viral. On December 23, she appeared on Tucker Carlson Tonight on Fox News and managed to get these words in edgewise: "You're actually being a partisan hack who's just attacking me ad nauseam and not even allowing me to speak." The video clip went viral. While backlash grows against US President Donald Trump's immigration order, the Screen Actors Guild Awards' red carpet in Los Angeles on Sunday night seemed like a trivial affair. The only stars to use the opportunity to wear their heart on their sleeve about the injustice of a ban on immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries was The Big Bang Theory's Simon Helberg and his wife Jocelyn Towne. Nicole Kidman at the Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles this week. Credit:Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP The actor held up a placard that read, "Refugees welcome," while his wife wrote, "Let them in" across her chest. Many more took to the stage inside to voice their opinion, however, while Scandal's Kerry Washington also used the red carpet to speak out: "A lot of people are saying right now that actors should keep our mouths shut when it comes to politics, but the truth is, no matter what, actors are activists because we embody the humanity and worth of all people." Feminist writer Laurie Penny stirred up trouble last week by suggesting we treat a woman with compassion. Not, one would assume, a controversial concept especially among ostensibly feminist liberals but controversial nonetheless, as the woman in question was Melania Trump. Melania has presented herself as a cog in the Trump bulldozer, currently demolishing the social fabric of the U.S. with offensives against women, migrants and refugees. The justifiable outrage needs a target and here sits an aloof, privileged woman, flaunting her obscene wealth, her quiet adornment of proceedings lending an air of legitimacy. It's easy to feel resentment. President Donald Trump with first lady Melania Trump and Major General Bradley Becker review troops in Washington. Credit:AP I'll be honest. I'm not fond of Melania. I don't dislike her exactly, but I've been presented with little beyond an austere visual and sparse, unenthused words supporting her husband's goals. I don't feel I know Melania. What I do know, is that as First Lady of the U.S., the way Melania Trump is treated by her husband, the press and the left sets a cultural frame for how we treat women. In the wake of the inauguration, speculation was rife regarding Trump's well documented misogyny and how it may be playing out in his marriage. Spurred by footage of inconsiderate behaviour and uncomfortable body language, Women's March protesters insinuated abuse with signs asking Melania to "blink twice if you need help". The long-serving head master of Trinity Grammar, Milton Cujes, has announced he will retire at the end of the year after a 41-year association with the Summer Hill private boys school. Mr Cujes and the Trinity Grammar school council made the announcement ahead of this week's new school term. The announcement follows Mr Cujes' appearance at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse last year in which he said the school should have done more to investigate claims students were sexually assaulting each other in 2000. The commission has yet to hand down findings from the public hearing. Mr Cujes' retirement follows the sentencing of former Trinity Grammar teacher Neil Albert Futcher, who learned on Friday he would spend 11 years behind bars for sex crimes against six victims as young as 11. Babies vaccinated for hepatitis B at Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital may have been given an ineffective dose, after a fridge used to store the routine vaccines was discovered to be too warm. The South Western Sydney Local Health District is contacting all mothers who gave birth at the hospital between November 29 and January 22. Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital is contacting all affected mothers. Credit:SMH The same hospital was responsible for a catastrophic error in 2016 that led to the death of a baby boy and seriously injured a baby girl when nitrous oxide was given to the two newborns instead of oxygen in a resuscitation unit in June and July. The hepatitis B vaccine is given to all newborns in line with the national vaccination program and should ideally be stored at temperatures between 2 and 8 degrees. Vaccines can be less effective if they are kept at a temperature too warm or too cold. Hepatitis B among babies is rare in Australia. The NSW government wanted to "refresh and renew" its ministry, and judging by the average age of its new ministers, it was able to achieve it. On Monday afternoon at Government House, Premier Gladys Berejiklian called out the names of 22 MPs who each took the oath to perform the functions and duties of their portfolios "faithfully and to the best of [their] abilities". Including Ms Berejiklian, there are six women in the ministry. There are three female newcomers: Roads Minister Melinda Pavey, Minister for Women Tanya Davies and Early Childhood Education Minister Sarah Mitchell. The desire for "new blood" saw the purging of long-standing health minister Jillian Skinner and the entry of Matt Kean, Sarah Mitchell and Adam Marshall, aged 32 to 35. Millionaire property developer Ron Medich murdered his former business partner because he felt humiliated and angry that Michael McGurk was "making a fool of him," a Supreme Court jury has heard. Mr Medich, 68, has pleaded not guilty to the murder of McGurk, who was shot in the back of his head outside his Cremorne home on September 3, 2009. Ron Medich arrives at King Street Supreme Court on Monday to face trial. Credit:Nick Moir He has also pleaded not guilty to the subsequent intimidation of McGurk's widow Kimberley on August 8, 2010. In her opening address, Crown prosecutor Gina O'Rourke, SC, told a jury that Mr Medich and McGurk had once been close business partners but had fallen out over a number of soured business and property deals. Tuesday is off to a slow start for commuters already after a car and truck crash on one of south-east Queensland's busiest stretches. Paramedics were en route to the Gateway Motorway southbound at Deagon, already busy in the morning peak at the best of times, to treat the car driver after the 6am crash. Traffic is building already after a crash on the Gateway Motorway. Credit:Dave Andrews - @Chopperdaveqld Any injuries were unknown but the crash left lengthy delays on the Gateway Motorway and the Bruce Highway was already slowing heavily back to North Lakes by 6.30am. Traffic reporter Amelia Oberhardt told ABC Radio Brisbane listeners there were "massive delays". Kangaroo Bus Lines managing director Daryl Webster said the fire appeared to have started in the engine bay and the company would investigate what went wrong. A Queensland Fire and Emergency Services spokeswoman said a crew arrived about 10 minutes later and had the fire under control but not extinguished. Emergency services were called to the fire on the Redcliffe Peninsula's major arterial road about 8am but there were no reports of injuries. "The kids are all off the bus and safe, which is the main thing but other than that I have no details of what may or may not have caused it. I'm not too sure," he said. "They've already been transported as far as I know onto another bus and to school. "The driver used both the fire extinguishers in the bus to try and put it out but unfortunately he run out of powder before he could really get it out." Mr Webster said the bus was relatively new, from 2008, and was believed to be taking kids to various schools on the Redcliffe Peninsula. A Queensland Ambulance Service spokeswoman said there were children on board the bus but they were not injured. Regional Queensland will be front of governmental focus this week, despite Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk insisting she is "not at all" concerned about One Nation. Ms Palaszczuk is running the Queensland government from central Queensland, with her first regional community cabinet for 2017 meeting in Rockhampton on Monday. Regional Queensland will be a major battleground for One Nation, with the party eager to swing voters disgruntled with the major political parties. Beginning her week-long pitch to region voters in the Beef Capital, next to the Fitzoy River, just metres from the landmark Criterion Hotel, Ms Palaszczuk joined with mayor Margaret Strelow to champion a $14 million, 47-unit apartment building. Auditors are reviewing Queensland's official crime statistics amid allegations figures have been fudged. Police Minister Mark Ryan says Police Commissioner Ian Stewart has advised him of an audit office review into whether crime reports were manipulated to give false perceptions about the state's crime rates. Queensland Police Service Commissioner Ian Stewart. Credit:Jorge Branco "The commissioner has given me assurances that the Queensland Police Service will work with the Queensland Audit Office to get to the bottom of this matter," Mr Ryan has told the ABC. The ABC says it's been told two police crime managers on the Gold Coast have raised concerns that legitimate crime reports have been labelled "unfounded" in an effort to keep offences off the books. Convincing a person it is time to end their own life could become a crime under Victoria's proposed assisted dying laws, which are to be introduced to State Parliament this year. An expert panel chaired by Professor Brian Owler, a former president of the Australian Medical Association, is looking at how the state's physician-assisted death laws would work. Brian Owler chairs the panel looking at how dying with dignity laws would work. Credit:Janie Barrett Last year Premier Daniel Andrews' government backed a cross-party parliamentary inquiry that recommended Victoria create assisted dying laws that would allow a narrowly defined group of patients to be prescribed lethal drugs to end their lives. Questions around patient safeguards, and insuring the scheme cannot be exploited, will be closely examined and are the key to any laws successfully passing Parliament. Many MPs say they are supportive of the principle of assisted dying, as long as there are stringent safeguards. When 15-year-old Melbourne High School student Pouya Ghadirian turned up to Melbourne's US consulate on Monday morning for a visa interview, he already feared something might go wrong. Pouya, who was born in Australia but holds dual Iranian-Australian citizenship by descent, had plans to travel to the US for a school space camp, but had read about President Donald Trump's temporary visa ban at the weekend. He feared the ban would stop Australian dual citizens from seven largely Muslim countries from entering the US. His school trip was to have included visits to Orlando, Washington and the Space and Rocket Centre in Alabama. Last week's riot and breakout at the Malmsbury youth detention centre was the final straw for the town's overworked fire brigade, which has had to deal with more than 60 incidents at the troubled centre in the past six months. Malmsbury Fire Brigade captain Tony Stephens said the brigade's volunteers would always respond to incidents at all times of the day and night but members were "getting tired" of being called out to the youth justice centre. "The events of last week are the tipping point. It takes us away from being able to respond to other events," he said. Mr Sephens said the burden on brigades was increasing but the Malmsbury brigade's resources did not match the job. Bad news for Doctor Who fans - Peter Capaldi has announced the upcoming season of the show will be his last. Who do you think the new Doctor will be? The fate of three deaf people who planned and carried out a murder in Melbourne remains unclear as authorities try to figure out whether they should receive custodial sentences. Jake Fairest, Georgia Fields and her former boyfriend Warwick Toohey appeared in the Victorian Supreme Court on Monday, months after a jury found they had murdered a man by pushing him off a balcony. Warwick Toohey was found unfit to stand trial by a Supreme Court jury after just a few hours' deliberation. Credit:Eddie Jim Toohey, 30, has been in custody since 2015, while Fairest and Fields will remain on bail as prosecutors, defence lawyers and Justice Jane Dixon await reports about the suitability of custodial and non-custodial facilities for deaf people. "This is a very unusual circumstance," Justice Dixon said on Monday. At least one in 20 new teachers registered to work in Victorian classrooms have failed or have not completed a compulsory test that measures basic literacy and numeracy skills. As almost one million Victorian students return to school this week, new figures cast doubt over the rollout of a federal government test designed to ensure teachers can read, write and perform simple maths equations. Teachers are failing to complete a basic literacy and numeracy assessment. Credit:Virginia Star Victorian Institute of Teaching chief executive Melanie Saba confirmed that five per cent or around 150 new teachers had been granted provisional registration to work in schools, despite not having successfully completed the test. Sources say the figure could be much higher. WA Police are questioning a man in custody after an alleged assault on Monday on a security guard working at the Roe 8 road project site in Coolbellup. The incident followed the Western Australian Information Commissioner ordering Main Roads WA to release documents regarding government "deliberations" around plans for Roe 8 and the wider Perth Freight Link project. Police spokeswoman Susan Usher said one man was in custody assisting with the investigation and inquiries are continuing. "This is the third allegation of this nature at this site," she said. Police have vented their frustration on Twitter with a motorcyclist who they will allege was clocked speeding at a neck breaking 215km/h last week. Incredibly, police will also allege the motorcycle was unroadworthy at the time of the speeding offence because it had a bald tyre. Police have charged the rider with reckless driving. Credit:Rebecca Hallas Police will allege the rider was clocked doing 215km/h in a 110 zone on the Pinjarra-Williams Road in Boddington on Friday at about 2pm. The 38-year-old rider from Boddington will be summonsed to appear in court at a later date on a charge of reckless driving. A West Australian man has admitted sparking a 12-hour siege while armed with a speargun in 2015 after he was finally deemed fit to plead. David Charles Batty partly choked Bunbury laundromat owner Peter Williams with a chain as he held the victim hostage in a park in July 2015. Batty appeared in the WA Supreme Court via video link from the Frankland Centre at Graylands Hospital on Monday where he pleaded guilty to armed robbery, deprivation of liberty and falsely claiming he possessed explosives which indicated a threat to harm. The court heard Batty had chronic schizophrenia but psychiatrists believed he was fit to plead after receiving treatment and Justice Bruno Fiannaca agreed to accept the guilty pleas. London: The man who wrote the Trump administration's environment action plan says the environmental movement is "the greatest threat to freedom and prosperity in the modern world" and said the United States was about to change course on climate policy, including withdrawal from the Paris agreement. Myron Ebell, who led the Environmental Protection Agency transition for the new administration, said he gave the president three pathways for withdrawing from the 2015 Paris agreement on greenhouse gas emissions, at least one of which could be done "right now". President Donald Trump has pledged to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement. Credit:Bloomberg He also said the president had been clear he wanted to abolish the EPA - though it might survive as a channel for pollution clean-up grants to states. And he hinted at an end to emission standards for US vehicles, through abolishing the EPA's 'endangerment finding', which had given it powers to protect the public from the health threat posed by greenhouse gases. Washington: State Department diplomats on Monday circulated various drafts of a memo objecting to President Donald Trump's executive order last week to suspend the nation's refugee program and deny US entry to citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries. The document is destined for what's known as the department's "Dissent Channel," which was set up during the Vietnam War as a way for diplomats to signal directly to senior management their disagreement with foreign policy decisions. The communications are typically confidential, and may even be done anonymously if any of the signatories fear retaliation. Several versions of the draft are floating around the State Department, as diplomats weigh in and ask for revisions. Yet even as it was still being circulated, White House press secretary Sean Spicer said, "And these career bureaucrats have a problem with it? I think they should either get with the program or they can go." The memo probably will be submitted to Acting Secretary of State Thomas Shannon, a holdover from the Obama administration who will be in charge of the department until a new secretary of state is confirmed. The Senate was expected to vote on Rex Tillerson's nomination later Monday. Kansas City, Missouri: For the second straight week, people searching for a missing Missouri woman have found a man's body. Relatives of Jessica Runions, 21, found the second body while searching in fields and brush along a road in south-east Kansas City, Missouri, on Saturday. Jessica Runions of Kansas City is missing, while Kylr Yust has been charged with burning her car. Credit:Kansas City Police Department Police said the discovery was being investigated as a suspicious death, but no details have been released. Police said on Sunday they hoped to identify the body soon. Bangkok: Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has ordered a "cleansing" of rogue police and the disbandment of his country's anti-drugs unit after the abduction and killing of a South Korean businessman under the cover of his deadly drugs crackdown. Mr Duterte admitted he is embarrassed by the strangulation of Jee Ick-joo in a botched kidnap-for-ransom operation inside the grounds of the national police headquarters, Camp Crame, which shocked foreigners living in the country and is now the subject of a parliamentary hearing. Philippine police officer Ricky Santa Isabel, who was allegedly involved in the kidnapping and subsequent killing of South Korean businessman Jee Ick-joo, testifies at the Senate probe. Credit:AP "They could have killed, strangled him anywhere but to say it had to happen inside Camp Crame is really bad, we admit that. Something has to be corrected severely," he said. But Mr Duterte also declared he would continue to push ahead with the crackdown that has left more than 7000 people dead since July, saying it would be extended until the end of his six-year term in office. First, he essentially demoted the highest-ranking military officer in the United States, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the highest-ranking intelligence officer in the United States, the director of national intelligence. In previous administrations, those positions or their equivalent (before the creation of the director of national intelligence, the CIA director occupied that role) held permanent positions on the NSC. Trump's memorandum described the structure of his NSC - not unusual given that the exact composition shifts in modest ways from administration to administration. The problem lies in the changes that he made. The idea of the National Security Council (NSC), established in 1947, is to ensure that the president has the best possible advice from his Cabinet, the military and the intelligence community before making consequential decisions, and to ensure that, once those decisions are made, a centralised mechanism exists to guarantee their effective implementation. The NSC is effectively the central nervous system of the US foreign policy and national security apparatus. While demonstrators poured into airports to protest the Trump administration's draconian immigration policies, another presidential memorandum signed this weekend may have even more lasting, wide-ranging and dangerous consequences. The document sounds like a simple bureaucratic shuffle, outlining the shape the National Security Council will take under President Donald Trump. Instead, it is deeply worrisome. Steve Bannon is turning long-held ideas into policy. Credit:Bloomberg Now, those key officials will be invited only when their specific expertise is seen to be required. Hard as it is to imagine any situation in which their views would not add value, this demotion is even harder to countenance given the threats the United States currently faces and the frayed state of the president's relations with the intelligence community. A president who has no national security experience and can use all the advice he can get has decided to limit the input he receives from two of the most important advisers any president could have. The president compounded this error of structure with an error of judgment that should send shivers down the spine of every American and our allies worldwide. Even as he pushed away professional security advice, Trump decided to make his top political advisor, Stephen Bannon, a permanent member of the NSC. Although the White House chief of staff is typically a participant in NSC deliberations, I do not know of another situation in which a political adviser has been a formal permanent member of the council. Further, Bannon is the precisely wrong person for this wrong role. His national security experience consists of a graduate degree and seven years in the Navy. More troubling, Bannon's role as chairman of Breitbart.com, with its racist, misogynist and Islamophobic perspectives, and his avowed desire to blow up our system of government, suggests this is someone who not only has no business being a permanent member of the most powerful consultative body in the world - he has no business being in a position of responsibility in any government. Worse still, it is an omen of other problems to come. Organising the NSC this way does not reflect well on national security adviser Michael Flynn - whether the bad decision is a result of his lack of understanding of what the NSC should do or because he is giving in to pressure from his boss. Jakarta: After three years of life in limbo in Indonesia, Hazara refugee "Saira" and nine of her extended family members received wonderful news from the UN refugee agency in October - they would be resettled in the United States. "We were waiting for our [plane] tickets, we were accepted to go," the softly-spoken 22-year-old tells Fairfax Media from Cisarua, a cool, mountainous city outside Jakarta where many refugees make their home while stuck in transit in Indonesia. On Friday night she was scrolling through her Facebook feed when she read US President Donald Trump had signed an executive order suspending the entry of refugees into the United States for 120 days. Aghast, she contacted Khadim Dai, a film-maker from Afghanistan, who had lived for years in Cisarua but was last year granted asylum in Los Angeles. He confirmed the awful news. Demonstrators gather the LAX during a protest against President Donald Trump's travel ban on refugees and citizens of seven Muslim-majority nations, on Sunday. Credit:AP It's in his rhetoric on the plight of Christians in the Middle East and it's in his executive order, which states that despite a 120-day suspension on entry by refugees, most of whom are Muslims, those whose religion is a minority in their homelands, most of who would be Christian, were to be admitted on a "case by case" basis. The challenge for Trump in attempting to dress up his religion test as a national security measure is that the country knows what he really thinks from his unfiltered campaign rhetoric and from that of some in his team. Remember this February 2016 tweet, now deleted, by his national security adviser Michael Flynn: "Fear of Muslims is RATIONAL: please forward this to others: the truth fears no questions" Demonstrators block an escalator at the international terminal as protests countries continue at San Francisco International Airport. Credit:AP But some American Christian leaders don't buy it. Through the weekend, spokesmen for the evangelical, Roman Catholic and mainline Protestant churches most active in helping persecuted Christians criticised the order as discriminatory, misguided and inhumane. "We believe in assisting all, regardless of their religious beliefs," said Bishop Joe Vasquez, chairman of the committee on migration for the US Conference of Catholic Bishops. With an image of One World Trade Center in the background, people march in New York, against the new president's executive order. Credit:AP Jen Smyers, the director of policy and advocacy for the immigration and refugee program of Church World Service, which represents dozens of Christian denominations, declared Friday a "shameful day" in America's history. Church groups also rejected Trump's claim that the Obama administration discriminated against Syrian Christian refugees who make up about one per cent of last year's refugee intake despite an estimated five per cent of Syrians being Christian. One explanation for the disparity, they told The New York Times, was that vetting interviews took 18 months to three years and that many Syrian Christians got into the pipeline more recently. "We have no evidence that would support a belief that the Obama administration was discriminating against Christian populations," Reverend Scott Arbeiter, president of World Relief, the humanitarian arm of National Association of Evangelicals, said. Explaining that a network of 1200 evangelical churches, had helped it to resettle thousands of Muslim refugees, Arbeiter said World Relief was opposed to "any measure that would discriminate against the most vulnerable people in the world based on ethnicity, country of origin, religion, gender or gender identity. "Our commitment is to serve vulnerable people without regard to those factors, or any others." But was for reasons of national security that most critics, including prominent Republicans, challenged the soundness of the Trump edict raising questions of the extent to which Trump sought advice beyond the echo chamber of his own team. The thrust of the national security critique is that Trump is playing into the hands of extremists, because his executive order supports their claim that a "recklessly belligerent" Washington is at war with Islam and that they'll be more determined to strike US targets, hoping to provoke an overreaction from Trump; at the same time, US allies in the Middle East will be less willing to cooperate with an administration that vilifies their faith; and in Afghanistan and Iraq in particular, locals who provide vital assistance to US forces will be less willing after hearing Trump slam the door on any hopes they have of ever resettling in the US. Arizona Senator Jeff Flake, a Republican and a frequently Trump critic, argued: "Enhancing long term national security requires that we have a clear-eyed view of radical Islamic terrorism without ascribing radical Islamic terrorist views to all Muslims." Condemning Trump, Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham said in a joint statement: "We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defence, Justice, and Homeland Security. "Such a hasty process risks harmful results. We should not stop those who have served as interpreters for our military and diplomats from seeking refuge in the country they risked their lives to help. And we should not turn our backs on those refugees who have been shown through extensive vetting to pose no demonstrable threat to our nation, and who have suffered unspeakable horrors, most of them women and children. "Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. Our most important allies in the fight against ISIL are the vast majority of Muslims who reject its apocalyptic ideology of hatred. This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security." Experts agreed. Describing Trump's executive order as a huge mistake in terms of counter-terrorism cooperation," Daniel Benjamin, a formerly a senior counter-terrorism official at the State Department, said: "For the life of me, I don't see why we would want to alienate the Iraqis when they are the ground force against ISIS". And noting that the jihadist threat in the US was "largely homegrown", he warned that the order would encourage the resentments and anxieties that in rare cases fuelled American Muslim support for ISIS. "It sends an unmistakable message to the American Muslim community that they are facing discrimination and isolation," he said. Amidst head-scratching at the apparent exclusion of the Pentagon from consultation before the executive order was issued, Jon Alterman, director of the Middle East Program at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, told reporters: "After all the money and lives spent in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Pentagon knows better than anyone that terrorism is a problem of a small number of enemies embedded in a population of people you need to win over. I don't see the part of this that's meant to win over anyone." Vali Nasr, dean of the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, agreed - "It's very difficult for people to cooperate with the United States military when they feel humiliated by the US. The Iraqi situation is the most grievous - we are fighting a war with the Iraqis, against ISIS. How can we fight with them when the message from the White House is discriminatory?" Washington: The Trump administration has defended a reorganisation of the National Security Council that elevates the President's chief strategist, Stephen Bannon - a political adviser with no direct national security role - to full membership and while downgrading the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The alteration was contained in a memorandum issued late on Saturday defining the organisation of the National Security Council and the Homeland Security Council, the top decision-making bodies inside the White House on everything from diplomacy to counter-terrorism, crisis management, nuclear policy and cyber policy. Trump's document drew from organisational precedents in the Obama and George W. Bush administrations. But the ascension of Bannon, who until last year was the head of Breitbart News, and the diminishment of the President's top intelligence and military advisers took Democrats and Republicans by surprise. The new memo said that the intelligence director and the Joint Chiefs chairman would attend the "principals meetings" - the meeting of Cabinet-level officials - only when "issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed." PHILIPSBURG:--- A delegation from St. Maarten will be attending Caribbean Travel Marketplace, the region's largest and most significant marketing forum, in the Bahamas, from Jan. 31 - Feb. 2, 2017, at Atlantis, Paradise Island. The event is being hosted by the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association (CHTA). Caribbean Travel Marketplace affords tourism suppliers the vital opportunity to meet face-to-face with wholesalers from around the world selling Caribbean vacation packages over the course of two days of business meetings. CHTA will offer a full day of professional development opportunities for attendees on Jan. 31, 2017, followed by the Opening Ceremonies in the evening. The educational sessions will provide attendees with the tools for developing revenue-generating opportunities that will help them make money and cut costs. Due to urgent and pending matters on St. Maarten, Interim Minister of Tourism Rafael Boasman will not be attending the event. Instead, Boasman has asked his colleague Minister Emil Lee to represent St. Maarten. The St. Maarten Tourist Bureau (STB) will also be represented at the event along with Julian Lake, Senior Policy Advisor at the Cabinet of the Minister of Tourism. We have identified a number of key events in 2017 that we will be attending as we seek to boost business to St. Maarten which, in turn, will boost our tourism product. Marketplace is not new territory for us, but it remains vital for building short and long-term business for hoteliers and other companies, Boasman said. A key part of the event will be the meeting of the Council of Tourism Ministers and Commissioners of the Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO). Tourism Ministers from around the Caribbean has a packed agenda for this meeting. Points up for discussion include funding the promotion and administration of Caribbean tourism, using technology for more effective passenger facilitation, Public/Private Partnership Plans for marketing the Caribbean in 2017, Expanding the concept of a Caribbean Basin Tourism Initiative and Highlighting culture and the development of the Caribbeans Human Capital. Pond Island:---TelEm Groups Management Board, consisting of Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Mrs. Helma Etnel, Chief Commercial Officer (CCO) Mr. Brian Mingo and Chief Technical Officer (CTO) Mrs. Helma Etnel, officially hand over the reins of the government-owned company this week to new Chief Executive Officer (CFO) Mr. Kendall Dupersoy after filling the vacant CEO position for more than seven years. All three were personally thanked recently by Prime Minister and Shareholder Representative, Mr. William Marlin and also by Minister of Justice Mr. Rafael Boasman, a former Chairman of the TelEm Group Supervisory Board of Directors, for their diligent work of filling the shoes while the company was without a Chief Executive Officer. Speaking Friday, as the company prepares to welcome in Mr. Dupersoy on February 1, CFO Mrs. Etnel recalled that the appointment of the TelEm Group Management Board was only a temporary arrangement following the departure of Change Manager, Pieter Drenth in 2009. It was a tremendous responsibility, but one that we were proud to accept as a challenge to keep the company going and we can be very proud of what we were able to achieve together with our wonderful and dedicated staff, explained Mrs. Etnel. As Chairperson of the Management Board, she acted as close to being the companys CEO as anyone could be at the time, directing not only the companys finances, but also playing a key role in the overall strategic direction and decision-making process over the years, including major capital investments, the painful decision to carry out a restructuring program that may well have saved the company financially and maintained its status as a sustainable and viable telecommunication entity, also many years of annual profits, an excellent rating over 95% so far as compliance with the St. Maarten Corporate Governance Code is concerned and the annual presentation of timely audited financial statements that included positive auditors opinion. The list of accomplishments also includes a number of investments and steps taken to provide Country St. Maarten with the best state of the art fixed, mobile voice and data telecom infrastructure, taking into consideration the volume of its customer base and the continued drop in revenues because of free services such as Skype, Whatsapp Messenger, Facebook, Twitter etc. that is wiping away traditional revenue bases for telecommunication providers everywhere. During the past two years especially, we have put in place an impressive telecommunication infrastructure that will begin to meet its true potential this year and next year, continued the CFO. In that regard she points to the companys investment in a new Internet Core that will provide customers with the fastest internet connections, the installation of two new state-of-the-art multi-million dollar switches for the companys fixed line and mobile network (both promising improved features and flexibility for voice and data packages that will also be offered this year). The recent purchase of St. Maarten Cable TV is also a most significant undertaking along with a very important multi-million dollar investment only last week to provide redundant capacity to the island in the event future damage to the SMPR-1 fiber optic cable, a security camera surveillance project being developed in collaboration with the police and the Ministry of Justice wherein TelEm Group as, project manager, has purchased the hardware and will be installing the infrastructure to beef up security in key areas around the island in the coming months. There are also improvements to the companys Network Operations Center (NOC) to monitor the network and quality of services provided by the company. She noted that in the case of the companys LTE/4G project alone, major works have been ongoing behind the scenes for many months, first in the preparation stage, then with an installation phase, and now with a testing phase that will see customer use of a brand new island-wide LTE/4G infrastructure that will greatly enhance mobile voice and data communication on the island, as early as April this year. Other milestones include providing St. Maarten with a brand new state of the art Fiber to the Home (FTTH) network that will begin to go on stream in March this year, one month before the company plans to launch another major development IP television for St. Maarten consumers. The CFO highlights the companys continued focus on many training programs over the years company-wide to enhance the skill and efficiency of staff and managers as yet another major undertaking that the Management Board can be very proud of. I am extremely proud that together with our staff, that we have raised our presence in the St. Maarten community, especially during the past few years with excellent branding and good corporate citizen initiatives for the youth, the elderly and the infirm, not to mention the events we have held for staff and for customers to boost morale, increase job satisfaction and build trust with our customers and clients, said the CFO. The three of us are only well aware that a solid telecommunication infrastructure is a crucial requirement for Country St. Maarten if we are to continue to stimulate economic growth and development of the nation, so again we are very proud that with our own dedication and most importantly with the dedication of our staff, over 90% of who are local and who have made all of what we have achieved possible, that we have been able to steer the ship on the right path, continued Mrs. Etnel, on behalf of her fellow Management Board members. The CFO readily admits that there are still remaining challenges along the way, thanking customers for their patience as the company continues to improve its services to clients. There have been some other challenges beyond TelEm Groups control affecting services, like frequency interference and capacity issues, however, the company has always maintained its resolve to meet all of this head-on so that it can deliver what is expected from its business, residential and visiting customers. The CFO says one important indicator of the manner in which the Management Board and Supervisory board has operated over the past eight years has been recognition as a government-owned company that has complied 95% to the Corporate Governance Code. While we were in charge we ran a tight ship and we kept order and discipline in the house and we are most happy as a Management Board that our compliance to the St. Maarten Corporate Governance Code has also been officially recognized, added Mrs. Etnel. All three are expressing gratitude at being given the opportunity to serve the company and the country in sometimes difficult and challenging circumstances. All admit that they have grown stronger with the experience. Mrs. Etnel, Mr. Mingo and Mr. Louisa are welcoming incoming CEO Mr. Dupersoy and say they are meantime looking forward to utilizing their joint experiences while serving as Management Board members, to keep the company on a sustainable path for many more years to come. PHILIPSBURG:--- The House of Parliament will sit in a plenary public session on Monday, January 30, 2017. The continuation of the plenary public meeting with as agenda point, Discussion on the appointment of a quartermaster for the Integrity Chamber by the Dutch Government, is scheduled for 14.00 hrs in the General Assembly Chamber of the House at Wilhelminastraat #1 in Philipsburg. The Prime Minister / Minister of General Affairs, as well as the Minister of Justice, will be present for this meeting. Members of the public are invited to the House of Parliament to attend parliamentary deliberations. The House of Parliament is located across from the Court House in Philipsburg. The parliamentary session will be carried live on St. Maarten Cable TV Channel 120, via Pearl Radio FM 98.1, the audio via the Internet www.pearlfmradio.com and via www.sxmparliament.org. PHILIPSBURG:--- The 15th Sint Maarten/Saint Martin Annual Regional Trade Show (SMART) is slated for June 14-16, 2017, hosted by both the Dutch and French side of the island of Sint Maarten / Saint Martin. This fact was announced today by L'Association des Hoteliers de St. Martin (AHSM), St. Maarten Hospitality & Trade Association (SHTA) in conjunction with the Saint-Martin Tourism Office and the St. Maarten Tourist Bureau. Even though both sides have always closely cooperated on this regional Sint Maarten / Saint Martin trade event, it will be the first time both sides will co-host at the same time. The co-hosting builds on years of perfect cooperation between the four partners within the two countries. SMART is the event where the region comes together once again to support, interact and promote tourism to the Island. The four partners are expecting numerous Tour Operators, Travel Agents, Travel Writers, and Event Planners from the US, Canada, Europe, and Latin America to return to the island for this important event. The tradeshow provides a unique opportunity for local and regional hoteliers and activity providers to present their tourism product, network and negotiate prospective business opportunities. In addition to the pre-organized appointments, throughout the trade show, participants may also set up additional appointments. SMART 2017 kicks off on Wednesday June 14th, 2017 when delegates have the opportunity to meet and mingle with their peers at the Welcome Reception, before a full day of business where participants have set up appointments with travel partners and wholesalers as well as hotel and excursion operations for one-on-one discussions on potential business ventures. Although an impressive and memorable Farewell party will be held on Thursday evening the venue will stay open through Friday with workshops and guest speakers. In addition to Sint Maarten / Saint Martin, other islands attending this event have included Anguilla, Antigua, Barbuda, British Virgin Islands, Dominica, Guadeloupe, Montserrat, Saba, St. Barths, Statia, St. Kitts & Nevis, and Barbados. It has become a very significant event for the entire region in recent years, one that should not be missed. Last years SMART did not take place due to various countries organizing their events at the same time. To prevent this from reoccurring, the organizers took the initiative with the Caribbean Hotel and Trade Association (CHTA) to coordinate Caribbean marketing events to make sure all destinations have the ability to showcase their hospitality and trade. Registration forms and details will be available on the SHTA website www.shta.com or by contacting the St. Maarten Hospitality & Trade Association via email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or by phone at 542-0108, Monday to Friday. EV Battery Industry Market Research and Investment Strategy in China 2016-2021 Albany, New York, January 30, 2017: Market Research Hub has recently announced the addition of a new report to it broad database titled as Market Research and Investment Strategy of EV Battery Industry in China 2016-2021 Proposal. Lithium batteries, one type of generally used batteries, were born in 1970 and have occupied the majority in EV battery market with high density of energy and long lifespan. Request for Sample Report: http://www.marketresearchhub.com/enquiry.php?type=S&repid=928269 1. INTRODUCTION There are two kinds of lithium batteries for EV and they are Lithium iron phosphate batteries and ternary lithium batteries. From batteries to equipment, to manufacturing equipment and to cascade utilization, complete industrial chains have been established in China. Integration regions of power battery industry have been set up in Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta, Beijing-Tianjin Region and the Central Plain Region. The investment in the whole industry surpluses RMB100 billion and annual output is over 40 billion. With the driver of market and supports of polices, the output of EV batteries will increase by a large scale to 42.6GWh in 2016. However, the need for EV batteries will be only 30GWh. For the above condition, in five years after 2016, output of EV batteries will prevent from blind increase. But with the development of power automobile industry, the main trend of EV batteries will increase, of which, the output will break 110GWh. In this report, AskCI will further disclose market potential and commercial opportunities for EV battery industry in China. Recommendations will be given at the end of the report to describe the prospect and provide suggestions for strategy making. 1)The Aim of Report To provide readers with comprehensive and in-depth understanding of Chinese EV battery industry; To analyze current development of the industry; To analyze sales of the industry; To discover drivers and barriers of the industry; To reveal opportunities for EV battery industry in China. Make an Enquiry : http://www.marketresearchhub.com/enquiry.php?type=enquiry&repid=928269 2)Benefit from the Report Obtain latest info of EV battery industry, such as sales, supply and demand, key players, etc.; Find out how Chinese EV battery market will change and how your business can be involved in; Keep informed of your competitors/their activities in the globe and in China; Learn about key market drivers and barriers; Share this information within your organization using free global intranet license. 2. SCOPE OF INVESTIGATION The report will investigate Chinese EV battery industry from the following aspects: General situation Sales situation Supply and demand Key players; Future trend; Commercial opportunity. 3. Time Needed Five work days needed Check The Frequency of Discounts: http://www.marketresearchhub.com/report/market-research-and-investment-strategy-of-ev-battery-industry-in-china-2016-2021-proposal-report.html#discount-form Table of Content: Part Contents 1 Overview of China EV Battery Industry 1.1 General Situation 1.2 Techniques 1.3 Market Analysis 1.4 Environment Analysis 2 Supply and Demand of EV Battery Industry in China, 2013-2016 2.1 Status of Supply and Demand 2.2 Forecast of Supply and Demand 3 Analysis of Major Companies of EV Battery Industry in China 3.1 Camel Group Co., Ltd. 3.1.1 General Situation 3.1.2 Main Battery Products 3.1.3 Operating Situation 3.1.4 Sales Network 3.1.5 Strategy of Upgrading and Transforming 3.2 Dynavolt Renewable Energy Technology Co., Ltd. 3.3 Chongqing Wanli New Energy Co., Ltd. 3.4 Fengfan Co., Ltd. of CSIC 3.5 Narada 4 Analysis of Investment and Strategy Plan of EV Battery Industry in China Browse Full Info with TOC: http://www.marketresearchhub.com/report/market-research-and-investment-strategy-of-ev-battery-industry-in-china-2016-2021-proposal-report.html List of Table Table 1 Outputs of EV batteries in China, 2011-2015 Table 2 Values of outputs of EV batteries in China, 2013-2016 Table 3 Main products of Camel Group Co., Ltd. List of Chart Figure 1 Output forecasts of EV batteries in China, 2016-2021 Figure 2 Sales revenues of Camel Group Co., Ltd., 2012-2016 Figure 3 Sales revenues of Dynavolt Renewable Energy Technology Co., Ltd., 2012-2016 REMINDER: Stingray to Release its Financial Results for the Third Quarter of Fiscal 2017 MONTREAL, QUEBEC (Marketwired) 01/30/17 Stingray Digital Group Inc. (TSX: RAY.A)(TSX: RAY.B) will release its financial results for the third quarter ended December 31, 2016, on Thursday, February 2, 2017, before the market opens. Management will hold a conference call to discuss the financial results the same day a 10:00 a.m. Eastern Time. Details of the Conference Call Via telephone: (877) 223-4471 or (647) 788-4922 Via the internet at () Conference Call Rebroadcast A recording of the conference call will be available two hours after the calls completion and until midnight, March 2, 2017 by dialing (800) 585-8367 or (416) 621-4642 and entering passcode 49622331. About Stingray Stingray (TSX: RAY.A)(TSX: RAY.B) is a leading business-to-business multi-platform music and in-store media solutions provider operating on a global scale, reaching an estimated 400 million Pay-TV subscribers (or households) in 152 countries. Geared towards individuals and businesses alike, Stingrays products include the following leading digital music and video services: Stingray Music, Stingray Concerts, Stingray iConcerts, Stingray Brava, Stingray DJAZZ, Stingray Music Videos, Stingray Lite TV, Stingray Ambiance, Stingray Karaoke, Festival 4K, and Classica. Stingray also offers various business solutions, including music and digital display-based solutions, through its Stingray Business division. Stingray is headquartered in Montreal and currently has close to 300 employees worldwide, including in the United States, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Switzerland, France, Israel, Australia and South Korea. Stingray was recognized in 2013 and 2014 as a finalist in the Top 50 of Deloittes Technology Fast 50TM list, and figures amongst PROFIT magazines fastest-growing Canadian companies. In 2016, Stingray was awarded best IR for an IPO at the IR Magazine Awards Canada. For more information, please visit . Contacts: Stingray Digital Group Inc. Mathieu Peloquin Senior Vice-President, Marketing and Communications (514) 664-1244, ext. 2362 UC Irvine Division of Continuing Education Announces New Online Python Programming Specialized Studies Program IRVINE, CA (Marketwired) 01/30/17 With the increasing number of industries and applications adopting Python, the (DCE) announced today a new online . Python is the programming language of choice for high-demand job fields such as data science, machine learning, and predictive analytics. It is concise, easy to read, and can be used for a variety of industry needs including web development, data analytics, core software development and a wide range of scientific applications. The specialized studies program will feature three required courses and three electives for beginning and intermediate programmers and those in the data science, data analytics, machine learning, GIS analytics, web development, software development and QA, UX/UI design, engineering, and business analyst fields. The adoption of Python in the data industry has increased substantially since 2005 and is predicted to be more popular than the industry leading JAVA language in a few years, said Dave Dimas, Ph.D., director of engineering, sciences, and information technology at UC Irvine DCE. Through the Python Specialized Studies Program at UC Irvine Division of Continuing Education, students will be better prepared for the data analysis and web development domains. Python for Data Science, Web and Core Programming Specialized Studies Program participants will learn to program using a popular language that is fast, easy to use, and runs on all major hardware platforms. Participants will learn to code using efficient Python scripting and syntax tools, create user-defined functions and utilize a vast array of built-in functions. The three required courses offered include: Participants will learn basics of programming computers using Python including how to create a program from a series of simple Python instructions. Participants will also learn about variable types, flow control, and functions. This course will introduce the core data structures of the Python programming language and include topics such as data sourcing, web scraping, preparing, cleaning and joining data. It will explore how students can use the Python built-in data structures such as lists, dictionaries, and tuples to perform increasingly complex data analysis. This course will introduce data analysis using Python. Pandas will be covered which is the most popular Python package for general data manipulation. This course will also provide a fast paced introduction to basic Python syntax and the Python list, tuple, and dictionary data structures. By the end of this course, students will be able to ingest data, manipulate it, run some analysis, and visualize it. For more information about the Python for Data Science, Web and Core Programming Specialized Studies Program or to register for the courses, please visit or call (949) 824-5414. The University of California, Irvine Division of Continuing Education (DCE) provides lifelong learning opportunities to thousands of students worldwide each year fulfilling the schools 60-year curriculum platform to connect degree programs to the world of work and achievement after graduation. The Division offers a broad range of certificate programs, specialized studies, and sequential courses to local, regional and global markets through online, on-campus and on-site delivery. A leader in the open education movement, the Division offers free and content through the initiative. For more information about UCI Division of Continuing Education, visit . Founded in 1965, UCI is the youngest member of the prestigious Association of American Universities. The campus has produced three Nobel laureates and is known for its academic achievement, premier research, innovation and anteater mascot. Led by Chancellor Howard Gillman, UCI has more than 28,000 students and offers 192 degree programs. Located in one of the worlds safest and most economically vibrant communities, its Orange Countys second-largest employer, contributing $4.8 billion annually to the local economy. Vivian Slater (714) 573-0899 x 235 Image Source: New York Magazine Callum is a film school graduate who is now making a name for himself as a journalist and content writer. His vices include flat whites and 90s hip-hop. Follow him @Songbird_Callum Contact us on Twitter , on Facebook , or leave your comments below. To find out about social media training or management why not take a look at our website for more info: TheSMFGroup.com You have permission to edit this article. Edit Close What you need to know about Powerball's $1.6 billion lottery jackpot News 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. Donald Trumps surprise win in November lit a fire under Carolyn Clow, a county purchasing agent in Madison. On Saturday, she attended her first in a series of classes on how to run for office. If we learn anything as a liberal community, Id hope that its time to stop thinking Id like to do something, and time to take that action, said Clow, 43, who is running for a spot on the village board in McFarland in the April election with the help of an organization that recruits Democratic women candidates. Its fun and exciting to march and its boring to go down to village hall to vote, but we have to learn to do both, she said. Trumps election has sparked what liberal groups say is unprecedented activism. The most visible manifestations of that were protest marches the day after Trumps inaugural, which drew millions to Washington and other locations across the country and overseas. Those were followed by demonstrations at airports and in cities this weekend against Trumps executive order prohibiting entry into the U.S. by people from seven countries and also limiting refugees. Much of the discussion since the marches has revolved around how to turn that energy into an effective movement, especially through electoral politics. Building a network Democrats have been decimated in elections at the state and local level during the past eight years, and have their best chance to stymie Trump if they can seize control of the House of Representatives in the 2018 elections. The morning after the election, Ethan Todras-Whitehill embodied liberals dilemma in bright blue western Massachusetts no Republicans other than Trump were on the ballot to vote against. He Googled his nearest swing district and thought why not create a tool to help others like him? The day before Trumps inauguration, he and some friends debuted swingleft.org, which lets people find their nearest House swing district and register to help flip the House in 2018. Todras-Whitehill says 250,000 people have already signed up. Theres been some grumbling that the effort wasnt coordinated with Democratic party officials who are already trying to flip the House. We cant be waiting around for someone else to do something, Todras-Whitehill said. Everyone needs to be standing up and doing something on their own. That scattershot approach has taken hold everywhere. While the organizers of last weekends Womens Marches havent announced future demonstrations, there are already plans for scientists to march in protest of Trump and for nationwide protests on April 15 demanding the president release his tax returns. In cities around the country, people are marching on congressional offices, joining liberal organizations and lobbying their local representatives. Theres a battle raging on multiple fronts and you have the feeling of being surrounded, said Chris Newman, legal director of the National Day Laborers Organizing Network. The most important thing is to focus on whatever hill you have and hold your hill. Newmans group focuses on immigrant rights and has been using a strategy honed in fights against former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, whose immigration crackdown in Arizonas largest county is a possible model for the Trump administration. The group has been co-hosting community meetings and pushing state and local officials to step up protections for immigrants. The pressure for action will be felt more sharply on the local level, Newman said. There are increasing expectations for mayors and governors and state lawmakers. A duty to take action Neil Aquino, 49, has high expectations for his local elected officials in Houston. Texas may be a solidly Republican state but its cities are increasingly Democratic, and Aquino is writing all of Houstons elected Democrats demanding they stand up to Trump. I dont find the response from local Democrats is matching the anxiety people feel, said Aquino, an artist. Liz Merriweather is also contacting her elected officials, though they are Republicans. As part of a Womens March follow-up project shes writing postcards to her congressional representatives from Tennessee. Shes waiting for more direction this is the 56-year-old therapists first political activity. Over the past eight years, Ive kind of gotten complacent and felt things are in good hands and I can trust officials, she said. But people like me, your average citizen, have a duty to take action. A progressive group that Emily Barnes helped launch in her quiet suburb in Orange County, California, held a postcard writing party Sunday. The group started with six parents meeting in August hoping to increase multicultural education in the local schools. After the election its membership ballooned to more than 220. Every time we have an event, more and more people show up, said Barnes, 41. Welcome to SwanseaOnline - your home for the best news, sports and what's on coverage of the city. Never miss a Swansea story with our daily newsletter Sign up to comment on our stories here Follow us on Facebook and Twitter | Swansea City news | Ospreys news | InYourArea Alpha Centauri A and B orbit one another 4.3 light-years from Earth. To directly image planets orbiting either of the stars, researchers must cancel out the overwhelming light from both of the stars. Project Blue contributed this article to Space.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. It's always an exciting time to be involved in space exploration, and 2017 has already proved to be no exception. At Project Blue, we're on a mission to find and photograph an Earth-like planet around Alpha Centauri and as you probably saw in the news recently, we're not the only ones with that ambitious goal. Breakthrough Initiative, a private organization aimed at looking for other life, announced it also wants to search for planets in Earth's neighboring star system, and that group will tap the best telescopic technology in Chile in hopes of doing so. You might wonder how this affects plans at Project Blue, or why Breakthrough Starshot is using infrared instead of visible-light imaging. The answer is that we have so much to learn about the Alpha Centauri system, which is Earth's closest neighbor in space, and different imaging techniques can reveal different things. Breakthrough Starshot plans to use ground-based telescopes imaging in thermal infrared (detecting wavelengths of 10 microns). The group will work in collaboration with the European Space Observatory to retrofit and upgrade the Very Large Telescope in Chile. Our own plan at Project Blue is to launch a small telescope the size of a washing machine into low Earth orbit and capture a direct image of Alpha Centauri using visible light. Together, these methods can help paint a more complete picture of a planet that might exist around the star. [New Telescope Aims to Image Planets Around Alpha Centauri (Video)] Here's a more detailed breakdown of relevant imaging techniques and what they can add to the scientific understanding of the Alpha Centauri system: Imaging with ground telescopes in infrared: This direct-imaging method is the one Breakthrough Initiatives is using. It needs to be done at 10 microns (the wavelength of light at which the picture is taken) with an 8-10-meter (26 to 33 feet) ground telescope. This technique uses infrared light to help capture images of the thermal emissions that come from far-off stars and can pass through dust, gas and Earth's atmosphere (although at a lower resolution). This technique is a much less expensive way to capture an image than using a space-based observation. However, there are significant technological challenges, because the performance needs to exceed what's been possible to date. Space-based astrometry: As you can guess from its name, this method requires launching a telescope into space. The instrument measures the wobble of a star's position in the sky caused by a planet's presence. Although this method doesn't produce an image, it does measure the mass and orbit of the planet. A potential Earth-like planet around Alpha Centauri is expected to be around one-half to twice the diameter of Earth. Direct imaging with visible light: Like infrared imaging from the ground, this technique produces a direct image of the planet. Unlike infrared imaging, however, the method can provide a true-color image think the pale blue dot image of Earth that Carl Sagan described. Using such an image, scientists can gather information on whether a planet has an atmosphere with oxygen, along with other data complementary to infrared imaging. In some ways, visible-light imaging is easier than imaging in infrared. The image resolution is better in visible light, enabling the use of a much smaller telescope. However, there are some challenges. The brightness difference between the star and the planet is greater, for example, which requires a space telescope to distinguish between the two bodies. Of these methods, we focused on direct imaging, because we think it can provide the most complete information about a planet's composition. And thanks to recent technology, the cost is well within reach for a midsize space mission. Not to mention, we believe the human and emotional appeal of a visible-light photo would inspire the world and could change the course of space exploration. Nevertheless, the Project Blue team couldn't be more excited to see Breakthrough Initiative's latest announcement. The discovery of Proxima b, a planet around the nearby star Proxima Centauri, led to increased interest in exploring Alpha Centauri. Similarly, researchers finding and imaging other planets in that star system will certainly spark continued interest in searching for other Earths and in developing new ways to do so. Ultimately, researchers will use a combination of imaging tools to find and learn about nearby planets. We're thrilled to see a project like this that could advance humanity's understanding of its closest stellar neighbor. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com. U.S. President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Hall of Heroes at the Department of Defense on Jan. 27, 2017 in Arlington, Virginia. Trump signed two orders calling for the great rebuilding of the nation's military and the extreme vetting of visa seekers from terror-plagued countries. The International Astronomical Union (IAU) has joined the chorus of voices objecting to President Donald Trump's executive order that temporarily bans immigration from seven Muslim-majority nations. The IAU "is profoundly concerned by the impact the recent U.S. executive order, and possible reactions to it from other countries, could have on international collaboration in astronomy and the mobility of scientists," representatives of the organization wrote in a statement today (Jan. 30). The order, which President Trump announced Friday (Jan. 27), halts the admission of all refugees into the United States for the next 120 days, and all refugees from Syria indefinitely. It also bars entry by travelers from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Sudan and Yemen for the next 90 days, if these people are not permanent legal residents of the U.S. [Related: SpaceX's Elon Musk Speaks Out on Immigration Order] The ban has inspired protests around the world and has drawn rebukes from a range of influential lawmakers, such as Republican Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham, who represent Arizona and South Carolina, respectively. IAU representatives said the organization's objection is based on principle and concerns about the damage the ban could inflict on astronomy. "The IAU firmly opposes any discrimination based on factors such as ethnic origin, religion, citizenship, language, and political or other opinion and therefore expects U.S. officials to not discriminate on the basis of religion," IAU representatives wrote in the statement. "The IAU hopes that such actions from a country do not trigger a chain reaction in other countries around the globe, which would severely damage the science of astronomy, and encourages everyone to value cooperation, tolerance and peace." The IAU is an association of professional astronomers from around the world. The group is responsible for, among other things, giving official names to celestial bodies and their surface features. At the moment, 2,841 IAU members hail from the United States more than from any other nation, IAU representatives said. The group has hundreds of members from Muslim-majority countries, including 47 from the seven nations affected by Trump's executive order, they added. Scientists have raised concerns about other decisions Trump's administration has made since assuming power on Jan. 20 as well. For example, the American Geophysical Union (AGU), which has nearly 60,000 members from 139 different countries, recently objected to directives instructing federal agencies to stop or curtail the dissemination of information to the public. [6 Things to Know About President Trump and NASA] "We are concerned that such directives flout principles of sound scientific integrity, which includes transparency, and may even violate your agency's scientific integrity policy," AGU CEO and Executive Director Christine McEntee wrote Thursday (Jan. 26) in a letter to Catherine McCabe, acting administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. "Perhaps more importantly, science plays a critical role in advancing national security, a strong economy, public health, and food security, and as such, scientists must be allowed to share their work directly and openly with the public," McEntee added. Follow Mike Wall on Twitter @michaeldwall and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on Space.com. The moon up close as seen by Japan's Kaguya lunar orbiter. Scientists said the probe detected signs of oxygen that came from Earth and was present on the lunar surface. The moon may carry material produced by life from Earth dating back to when plants first filled the planet's air with oxygen, according to study of data from a Japanese lunar orbiter. A team led by Kentaro Terada of Osaka University looked at data from the Selenological and Engineering Explorer, better known as Kaguya. The researchers found that a certain kind of oxygen isotope was present in the lunar soil, an isotope that occurs on Earth. Almost all of the oxygen in Earth's atmosphere for the last 2 and a half billion years came from photosynthesis. That means the moon's rocks have been picking up small amounts of oxygen from living things on Earth; the moon is "contaminated" with the waste products of plants, the researchers said. [The Moon: 10 Surprising Facts] The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) launched Kaguya in 2007. The probe completed its mission and crashed into the moon in 2009. The mission was to study the origin of the moon, its surface and the local gravitational environment. Two instruments, the Ion Energy Analyzer (IEA) and the Ion Mass Analyzer (IMA), measured the ions (charged atoms) coming from the moon and the ions in the Earth's magnetosphere. The moon spends some time in two different environments; for most of its orbit around the Earth, the natural satellite is exposed to the solar wind and picks up ions from that. When the moon passes out of view of the sun, it is in the region where the Earth's magnetic field stretches out onto space, away from the sun (this is called the magnetotail). At those times, charged particles from Earth, and only the Earth, will reach the moon. This diagram shows how the solar wind and Earth's magnetic field funnel oxygen ions from Earth to the moon. Japan's Kaguya lunar orbiter detected the oxygen isotope on the moon. (Image credit: Osaka University/NASA) The ions get out of the Earth's atmosphere because when sunlight or the occasional cosmic ray hits atoms of oxygen (or any other gas) at the edge of space, those atoms can lose an electron, becoming charged. Earth's magnetic field captures the resulting ions, and some get flung out into space. Terada told Space.com that the evidence for where the ions came from was the isotope oxygen-16. Earth's upper atmosphere and the moon have relatively little oxygen-16, whereas the solar wind has more. The lunar soil's oxygen content has three components: One is rich in oxygen-16, and that is from the solar wind. Another is poor in oxygen-16, and it wasn't clear where that came from, until the team looked at the data and compared this component to the ions in Earth's atmosphere. "Interestingly, the isotopic opposition of the unknown [oxygen-16]-poor component of lunar soil is quite identical to that of ozone layer," Terada said. The third feature is that the ions from the sun are more highly charged. Neutral oxygen atoms have eight protons and eight electrons. Oxygen atoms from Earth usually lose only one electron (and are noted as O+). The ones from the sun are often stripped of more electrons than that; they will be O5+, for instance, meaning the atom lost five electrons. A highly ionized solar oxygen atom would be unlikely to duplicate the behavior of a singly ionized atom from Earth, the researchers said, because the ion from the solar wind would have to regain some of the electrons that got stripped off. It's unlikely that the electrons and the atoms would meet by chance to recombine, the scientists said. Another piece of evidence that this oxygen came from Earth was how far the ions penetrated into the lunar soil, the scientists said. The ions from Earth fell into the same range as the oxygen ions the team found on the moon: about 1,000 electron volts. Those ions originating from the sun carried much higher energies, and penetrated deeper, the study said. The research appears in the Jan. 30 issue (opens in new tab) of the journal Nature Astronomy. You can follow us @Spacedotcom, as well as on Facebook & Google+. Original article on Space.com. NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has detected the five most distant gamma-ray blazars ever (their locations are seen here in a NASA video still). The light from the blazars dates back to when the universe was between 1.9 and 1.4 billion years old. Monster black holes shooting jets of gamma-ray radiation right at us have been spotted farther away than ever before, dating back to when the universe was nearly one-tenth its current age. The five distant objects, called gamma-ray blazars, deepen the mystery of how black holes so large could have formed so early in the universe's history. Roopesh Ojha, an astronomer at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, presented the new results during a press conference today (Jan. 30) at the American Physical Society meeting in Washington, D.C. The results will also be published in The Astrophysical Journal Supplement. [Found: Gamma-Ray Blazars Powered by 'Supersized' Black Holes (Video)] "The light we observed from these five objects left when the universe was just somewhere between 1.9 to 1.4 billion years old," Ojha said. Based on the data, "you arrive at the conclusion that they're all home to really, really massive black holes. Two of them are so big that their black holes may be well over 1 billion solar masses." The supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy, in contrast, has a mass of between 4 and 5 million times the sun's. Blazars form extremely active cores of some galaxies. They consist of a supermassive black hole with a dense, whirling disk of material around it, which generates the energy for near-lightspeed jets of material aimed perpendicular to the disk. If one of those jets is aimed toward Earth, it appears particularly bright and the core is classified as a blazar. (Image credit: M. Weiss/Cfa) A blazar is a class of active galactic nuclei a supermassive black hole at the center of a galaxy with a large disk of material whirling around it (outside the black hole's point of no return), generating radiation that blasts out in hyperfast jets. Blazars are the most active, from Earth's perspective, because the jets of material are speeding right toward us at near the speed of light. The new study looked at a particular type of blazar that's even more active than usual, Ojha said and those blazars tend to spark from incredibly massive black holes, even compared to other galactic cores. Before these five blazars were detected, the most distant blazar that had been seen emitted its light when the universe was close to 2.1 billion years old. The team, led by two researchers at Clemson University in South Carolina, was able to find blazars even more distant because of a significant processing software update to the orbiting Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope's Large Area Telescope, which increased its sensitivity by about 40 percent, particularly at lower frequencies, Ojha said. NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has detected the five most distant gamma-ray blazars ever (their locations are seen here in a NASA video still). The light from the blazars dates back to when the universe was between 1.9 and 1.4 billion years old. (Image credit: NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger) The five newfound blazars are only a few of the many similarly powerful objects that must have existed that early in the universe's history after all, we only detected the ones whose fierce jets are pointed directly at us. "For a typical value of one of these objects, for the one object you see, there's something closer to 600 that you don't see," Ojha said. And that further emphasizes a major question about the early universe: How did black holes so large form so quickly? "We've probably just made this problem a little bit more difficult by finding objects that are so massive," Ojha said. Email Sarah Lewin at slewin@space.com or follow her @SarahExplains. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com. Optimization Are you frustrated with a slow pc or a hard disk not performing as it should? Try SLOW-PCfighter to speed up boot time on a slow PC, or try a free scan of FULL-DISKfighter to recover space on a full disk. The latest offering is DRIVERfighter to update your driver updater. Get complete PC optimization and extend the life of your PC with these must-have software tools. His advisers should understand this. Vice President Mike Pence and Speaker of the House Paul Ryan as well as White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus are veteran politicians. They should know the kinds of consequences the president's moods can have. As such, they are also equally responsible. Politics under Donald Trump have taken on a speed that has made it difficult for even experienced observers to constantly register effects the president's often impulsive words and actions will have. The fact that this has happened is also a product of the social networks which Trump, to an extent not seen in any president before him, has made a decisive tool in his political leadership. It was by harnessing the power of these networks that Trump became president. He understood how to exploit public sentiment to his advantage with his unscrupulous use of rumors, half-truths and lies. But it is also a power which cannot be tamed -- not even by Trump. This weekend, after only a few hours, social networks brought together tens of thousands of people who protested in the cold on Saturday night against Trump and again on Sunday. They were the second mass protests to take place against Trump in the United States in the course of a single week. The virtual is becoming real and is striking back. Donald Trump had better watch out. Last years event featured an 8m long x 1.5m deep soil pit, demonstrating the impact of different crops on soil structure. It attracted so much interest that this years feature will more than double in size to 20m long, with the addition of a new compacted area, to illustrate the impact of poor soil structure on rooting ability. Soil health is a really hot topic right now; there is a lively debate on how to best manage soil structure both with machinery and through crop choice, says Ron Stobart, Head of Farming Systems Research at NIAB. By drilling different crops with a variety of sowing dates and digging the soil pit just before the event, we can show farmers whats really going on beneath the surface. With plenty of expert advice on hand this will enable them to make more informed decisions about their own soil management at home. This years crops will include winter and spring beans, wheat and oats, as well as cover crops like vetch, radish and a radish/oat mix. Cover crops are an increasingly popular option to improve soil condition and reduce erosion, explains Mr Stobart. Last year visitors were surprised at how deep roots can go up to 1.5m in Cambridgeshires chalky soils - but different cover crops have very distinct rooting habits so farmers should choose appropriate species to tackle specific needs in their soils. The soil pit will also have experts on site to discuss varying cultivation and tillage options, says Mr Stobart. And visitors will be able to see the results of these different techniques used to alleviate compaction in the soil pit. Farmers who don't treat their sheep to avoid infection are often blamed for the national increase in disease. However an economic study, funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) has found that, in some scenarios, this is the most economically sensible decision to take. Prior to 1992, farmers throughout the UK were required by law to treat all their sheep to prevent sheep scab, an infectious condition caused by the presence of a tiny parasitic mite. At that time there were only around 40 outbreaks per year. After compulsory treatment was removed, the number of scab outbreaks rose dramatically and there are now around 5,000 - 10,000 outbreaks each year. This costs the UK sheep industry at least 10 million every year. The failure to reduce scab incidence, despite many industry initiatives, is often blamed on those farmers who are unwilling to use routine preventative treatments. New research, published in the journal Preventative Veterinary Medicine by Emily Nixon and colleagues from the School of Biological Sciences, shows that many of these farmers are being blamed unfairly. Information on the losses and treatment costs were analysed along with the risks of scab, to show whether it is financially better for a farmer to treat to prevent scab before any sheep are infected or whether it is worth running a risk, and only treating if the flock contracts scab. A Mexican restaurant called Los Atlantes opened last week in the Meadowood Shopping Center, in an area without a lot of dining options. "These guys make it, the neighborhood makes it," said Mike Leon, a longtime resident of the Jamestown neighborhood in Fitchburg, a half mile away. Nancy Barrera runs the restaurant for her husband Felipe Falcon. They came to Madison from Hidalgo, a central Mexican state north of Mexico City, 16 years ago. At one point, they moved back to Mexico, but returned to Madison with their 15-year-old son, who was born here and who missed Madison, Barrera said. Both Barrera and Falcon formerly worked for Culver's, cooking and prepping for four years. They live on the East Side of Madison, but saw an opportunity to open a restaurant and bakery in an under-served area of the city. "I have friends and they wanted me to have a restaurant," Barrera said, adding that they tell her she cooks well. Los Atlantes is at 5706 Raymond Road next to the Walgreens and near the Chinese restaurant Chang Jiang. There was once a sit-down Pizza Extreme in the same location. The new restaurant is pretty bare-bones in terms of atmosphere, but has an ample menu that includes tacos, burritos, enchiladas, tortas, gorditas, quesadillas, pozole, fajitas, a lamb plate, chicken mole and a cod or tilapia fish fry. Los Atlantes makes its own bread, but not the bakery items it sells. Barrera said the first days have been hard, "but it's working OK right now." Falcon said the name Los Atlantes comes from the Atlantes of Tula, four basalt anthropomorphic figures representing Toltec warriors found in an archaeological area of his home state. "Los Atlantes is perfect for the Southwest Side," said Leon, the neighborhood resident, after "wolfing down" five tacos. "Our neighbors have been talking about this joint opening up for months... These guys are can't-miss." The restaurant opened Tuesday and serves breakfast, lunch and dinner. Its hours are 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Saturday, and 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday. Its number is 446-1462. Youd think if anyone would know the importance of regular medical care, it would be a doctor. But Dr. Michael Ivy says thats not always the case, particularly when it comes to male doctors. Ivy, Bridgeport Hospitals chief medical officer, says he knows of two physicians in their 40s who died of heart attacks last year, largely because they ignored the symptoms. Ivy says these deaths put a spotlight on a tragic trend hes noticed for years: Men are often reluctant to have regular check-ups or engage in other preventative health care. Its got to have something to do with cultural expectations, he says. Men feel a pull to not show vulnerability. And physicians arent any better. We have male physicians who have told me they havent seen a doctor in 13 years. Internist and geriatric physician Dr. Taimur Habib agrees men seem less likely to tend to their health. Men do have a higher threshold for talking to doctors or going to physical exams, says Habib, whose office is in Stamford. They think I can delay it. I dont know why. Why do men have a higher threshold for asking for directions? Its a difference between the genders. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention backs that up. In 2014, the most recent year for which numbers were available, 61.5 percent of men surveyed reported seeing a doctor within the past six months, compared with 74 percent of women. Men were also twice as likely to have never seen a doctor, with 2.1 percent of men reporting they had never made contact with a physician, compared with less than 1 percent of women. Whether a coincidence or not, women still live longer than men. In 2014, according to the CDC, the average man lived to 76.4, and the average woman lived to 81.2. That life expectancy gap shrank for a while. Back in 1979, women could expect to live nearly eight more years than men. But the difference has stayed steady since 2010. Ivy says it is not surprising women are still living longer. He points out while women also tend to put off visits with their primary care doctors, most tend to see their obstetrician/gynecologist on an annual basis. While not a substitute, most ob/gyns do many of the same tests primary care doctors do, Ivy says. They take blood pressure; sometimes they order blood work, he says. That makes a difference. And there isnt an analogous service for men. Ivy and Habib say they are concerned about mens reluctance to seek medical care, but arent sure what to do about it. Ivy says Bridgeport Hospital has started a push in recent years to encourage its physicians of both genders to get regular health screenings. And he says the hospital is seeking funding for a mens health navigator, who would guide male patients in tending to their health needs. But, Ivy says, in the near future, he fears men will continue to neglect their health even those who, like the recently deceased doctors, should probably know better. Its a broad problem in our society, he says. And I dont know when were going to get it fixed. acuda@hearstmediact.com; Twitter: @amandacuda This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate DANBURY - The health network that operates Danbury and Norwalk hospitals has completed a deal with the nations fifth-oldest medical school to open a branch campus here in the hopes of training more Connecticut doctors. The deal between the Western Connecticut Health Network and the University of Vermont College of Medicine was approved last week by the state Office of Higher Education, over the objections of two other Connecticut medical schools. Medical schools at the University of Connecticut and Quinnipiac University argued that the deal would take training opportunities away from in-state medical students. The state found otherwise. The proposed program builds on an already successful clinical relationship with the Danbury and Norwalk hospitals, reads a Jan. 23 letter of approval from Keith Norton, the acting executive director of the Office of Higher Education. It has significant benefits for the hospitals, which gain from having a strong academic relationship with UVM COM, the letter continues. It benefits UVM COM students, especially those from Connecticut, who wish to pursue the clinical component of their medical education in Connecticut. The deal means that more medical students from the University of Vermont will spend time in greater Danbury and Norwalk to round out their education - especially in-state students with plans to practice close to home, officials said. The campus branch is expected to open in the fall with as many as 35 third-year medical students enrolled. The students could spend a year or more completing clinical work known as rotations at one of the network hospitals. Now students who are applying to the University of Vermont can apply to the Connecticut campus, and as a result of that, more Connecticut students will be here, said John Murphy, president and CEO of the health network. We would like to have students who grew up here train here and then ultimately say, This is where I want to practice, this is where I want to raise a family. Designation of the branch campus, which was accredited in February by a joint committee of the American Association of Medical Colleges and the American Medical Association, would not require the construction of dormitories and classrooms. Clinical work and course work will be conducted in the hospitals. Students would stay in rental housing near the hospitals, a university officer said. We have two great libraries in Norwalk and Danbury hospitals, said Dr. Jonathan Rosen, the associate dean of the Connecticut branch campus. Once we start the branch campus, students will find their own housing. The university and the network have been working for six years on the deal. The health networks Global Health Program and its urban locations gives the medical school access to a diverse and metropolitan base of patients and medical students, Rosen said. The health network in turn benefits from an affiliation with a long-established medical school. It is one of the top five most competitive schools in the United States, and as a percentage of graduating classes, it puts out more primary-care physicians than any other medical school, Murphy said. Communities that have an abundant supply of primary-care physicians ultimately deliver a high quality of care. Murphy added that the hospital could tap into the medical schools research resources. We can have research collaborations and pursue certain grants from the National Institutes of Health, he said. Murphy added that he was surprised the deal was challenged by in-state medical schools. We will have more students spending longer periods of time in this community - working here, taking care of patients here, boosting the economy here, Murphy said. This is an investment for us. The dean of Quinnipiacs medical school disagreed that the deal is good for Connecticut. Connecticut has three medical schools - UConn, Yale and (Quinnipiac) - and the students in those three medical schools should be at the front of the line when it comes to getting clinical experience, said Dr. Bruce Koeppen, dean of Quinnipiacs Frank Netter School of Medicine. Our small state can support three medical schools, but I dont think it can support a fourth medical school, which is what this is. The dean of UConns medical school expressed mixed feelings about the deal. We look forward to working with UVM, but remain concerned about the shortfall in available clinical rotation slots for medical students in our state, said Dr. Bruce Liang. We hope to develop a solution for this growing issue in near future that works for all our institutions and student training needs. rryser@newstimes.com; 203-731-3342 Dozens of people evacuated a Sun Prairie apartment building early Monday morning due to a fire, with nobody believed to be hurt in the blaze. The fire was reported at about 4 a.m. at 651 Schiller Street, authorities said. "Firefighters arrived to a 16-unit apartment building with heavy smoke showing," said Fire Chief Chris Garrison. "All residents had evacuated." Fire crews found an active fire in the building and started working on suppressing it. Crews remained on scene as of mid-Monday morning to eliminate any hot spots so investigators could enter the building. "Residents from 14 of the 16 units were displaced by the fire, with the American Red Cross and the Sun Prairie School District providing support," Garrison said. The apartment building could be a complete loss, a fire official told WKOW. Fire departments from DeForest, Dane and Columbus responded to help the Sun Prairie Fire Department fight the blaze. Residents who evacuated were taken to the Sun Prairie Middle School by bus to get out of the cold weather, WISC reported. S mall business agony aunt Jo Malone shares her tips about expanding. Dear Jo I set up my artisan baking business three years ago with my best friend and weve done really well, mainly supplying for corporate events and weddings. Were about to go out on a funding round to expand outside London but my business partner is terrible on numbers. Im ok but am worried an investor may tie us in knots on our forecasts. Should we be upfront or try to fudge it? Jo says... Everyone thinks expansion is just an extension of your business, but its not. Its often a completely different mindset and demands a whole new way of thinking. I understand numbers but am not always great at presenting them, so I can understand your predicament. I colour code any spreadsheet, using one colour for outgoings, one for overheads, one for income and so on. It makes the numbers easier to read and understand. I found this process really helpful when I had to take over the accounts as well as being creative director. It was challenging and I made mistakes, but it equipped me to understand my business at a far greater level. You really need to be up to speed with the accounts, know them inside-out and take responsibility. This is not the time for error or to fudge it. However, try not to stress out too much as people will understand that you are entrepreneurs, not mathematicians. Just make sure you do your homework. By examining your business thoroughly, youll appreciate your worth and the assets you need to bring in for this next step. Equity is your future treasure and giving up a piece of your company too early can be the wrong business move and the wrong thing personally. You have a great business. Dont put it or yourselves at risk by rushing things, and remember investors dont come with just a chequebook. ...and Jo asks Gordon Merrylees, head of entrepreneurship at RBS and NatWest, says: Sustainable businesses that grow are built on strong, dependable and lasting relationships. Good relationships are built on trust and value. It is essential that early-stage businesses instil the right principles and always act with integrity, building the foundations for growth. Cutting corners and trying to hide areas of development or embellish early successes will only be highlighted later and diminish any trust you may have built with the most crucial of audiences in customers and those that backed you without perhaps knowing the whole truth. Investors have so much experience, connectivity and know-how. very often, they can sniff out the untruths. Whether your fudge is found out early on or at a later stage, your reputation with what is a close-knit investor community will be at risk and thats not good business if you need regular rounds of funding from it. Be honest and youll build lasting partnerships and a network of supporters. D onald Trumps hugely controversial travel ban on largely Muslim countries sent tremors through global financial markets on Monday as worries mounted over the increasingly protectionist stance of the new US President. The 90-day ban on citizens from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen, as well as a four-month ban on refugees, compounded concerns over weak trade sapping the growth of the worlds biggest economy in the final quarter of last year. Investors dumped shares in London, leaving the FTSE 100 down 52.70 points or 0.7% to 7131.79, a risk-off trade echoed across Europes major markets as Frances CAC 40 and Germanys Dax sank by close to 1%. Traders instead sought protection in traditional safe-havens such as the Japanese yen and gold, which rose 0.5% to almost $1200 an ounce. The oil price fell to $53 a barrel and metal prices eased, while airline stocks like British Airways owner IAG, a major Transatlantic flyer, fell 2%. CMC Markets chief analyst Michael Hewson said: Theres certainly an element of risk off here, because it calls into question the safety of US assets. If you have somebody who is a bit of a loose cannon, it calls into question the investment case for the US. It is also not a good long-term economic strategy, although Congress can rein him in. The dramatic intervention by Trump comes after the US grew at a quarterly pace of less than 0.5% between October and December with trade making its weakest contribution to growth since 2004. The figures will give serious food for thought to Federal Reserve chairman Janet Yellen, who has pencilled in three rate hikes in 2017 to follow Decembers first tightening of monetary policy for a year. The Feds latest meeting comes this week amid the latest flurry of executive orders from the White House and March is seen as the most likely month for a rate rise. Simon Derrick, currency strategist at BNY Mellon, said: So much happened last week in terms of policy shifts, you have to look at this week and think what happens next?. Put that with the GDP figures and youre in a more risk-off mood than you would have been. The new Presidents ban has triggered outrage from parts of the business community. Starbucks chief executive Howard Schultz is planning to hire 10,000 refugees over five years in 75 countries in response, while bosses at leading firms including Apple, Google, Microsoft and Netflix have slammed the policy. T he kings and queens of Silicon valley united in condemnation of Donald Trumps shock decision to do what he said hed do if he got elected. Bosses of Google, Apple, Netflix, Twitter and others running the corporate laboratories of California voiced fury at their new president. Hed seemed so nice when we met him at Trump Tower last month, their outrage seemed to suggest, how could he have ignored us on immigration? They shouldnt be so surprised. For all the complaints of liberal celebrities, politicians and Silicon Valley aristocrats, many of Trumps 63 million voters will silently approve of the weekends travel curbs. Having whipped them up with his anti-Muslim rhetoric in the election campaign, Trump knows this only too well. And when his constituency of forgotten, laid-off and cash-strapped blue-collar workers hear Teslas Elon Musk, Ciscos Chuck Robbins, or Googles Larry Page telling them what to think, they might be tempted to conclude the opposite. The tech tycoons at the Trump Tower summit last month may have been worth $140 billion, but many Americans doubtless thought: congratulations, but what have you ever done for me? After all, each of those billionaires is in the business of automating roles done by humans. Five million industrial jobs have gone in the US in the past five years. Many of the 12.3 million workers remaining fear they will be replaced by robots before they reach the retirement finishing line. Its moving up the jobs value chain, too, as artificial intelligence eats middle-class service-sector posts. Of course, Silicon Valleys innovations have generated trillions of dollars for the US economy and created jobs, too. But thats a hard message to get across to the millions whove failed to benefit. For them, simpler, albeit wrong-headed, solutions look ever more attractive. Theres a similar fear abroad in most western countries, where automating businesses fail to spread their wealth, and populations look for simplistic scapegoats. Trumps travel bans may be done under the banner of anti-terrorism, rather than jobs or the economy, but they stem from the same populism that low living standards have nurtured against immigrants in Europe. Until business elites work out a way of spreading hope beyond the 1% benefiting most from the robotic revolution, we can only expect more radicalism. Apples Tim Cook opposed Trumps travel ban with a quote from Martin Luther King Jr: We may have all come on different ships, but we are in the same boat now. For many Americans, it doesnt feel like that at all. I t seems a good deal longer than 10 days since Donald Trump was sworn in as President: he has in that time generated more controversy than some presidents manage during their entire tenure. But the most controversial move of all trumping even his confirmation that he would approve the wall between the US and Mexico was the temporary ban on travel to the US from seven mostly Muslim states and a temporary ban on refugees indefinitely, in the case of those from Syria. In the face of protests all over the US and a flurry of legal challenges to the move 16 state attorney-generals have said the order is unconstitutional and several federal judges have temporarily halted the deportation of visa holders the President seems unperturbed. He has denied that the move is anti-Muslim and says visas will be issued again once secure policies are in place. Meanwhile, a backlash is under way. Iraq, for instance, is one of the seven states identified for the travel ban (interestingly, Saudi Arabia, from which most of the 9/11 attackers came, is not), yet it is a close US ally its government is in effect an American creation. If this is how the US treats its allies, it will end up with far fewer of them. Mr Trump will find his campaign against IS stymied if he manages to unite the Muslim world against him. If the move is damaging politically it is no less disastrous for US business in California, tech executives are incredulous about the potential effects of a travel ban on an industry which relies heavily on the mobility of a global workforce. Mr Trump can claim he has done nothing he did not promise on his campaign but few expected him to deliver on those rash promises quite so soon. The Government has made clear that it is standing by its invitation to the President to make a state visit to the UK despite so many people objecting to it; today the Mayor, Sadiq Khan, calls on Mrs May to rescind it. In fact, the situation may well change between now and any visit but in the meantime Mrs May must do what she can to make clear to Mr Trump that his ban is retrograde, notwithstanding the Governments success in negating its effect on British citizens with dual nationality. She has forged a relationship with Mr Trump at some political cost to herself; now she must use it. The alarming thing is, Mr Trump is only just warming up: whats next? A political Tube strike Commuters face travel chaos again next week, with the RMT union planning a 16-hour walkout from 6pm on Sunday evening, then another 15-hour stoppage from 10am on Tuesday. The timing of the strikes is particularly cruel: services will be affected throughout Monday and on Wednesday morning but striking staff will avoid losing four days pay. Any claim by the RMT that it has passengers interests at heart is laughable. The unions argue that the closure of ticket offices and accompanying job cuts has compromised passenger safety. Yet London Underground has already said it plans to take on 200 extra staff following an independent review. And crucially, LU is willing to talk as, indeed, is the TSSA union. The RMTs utter intransigence and its apparent unwillingness even to respond to LUs proposals is patently political. Londoners will, as ever, pay the price. A green black cab If there is one design that is emblematic of London it is the black cab, beloved of natives and tourists alike. The new design, therefore, is attracting huge interest. One thing is clear: this will be the greenest black cab ever, able to do 70 miles with zero emissions. Thats good for London. L ast September I visited Chicago and New York on my first overseas trip as Mayor of London. I went to strengthen the economic ties between our great global cities, to discuss shared challenges with two great mayors in Rahm Emanuel and Bill de Blasio, and to show the world that London remains open to business, people and ideas in the aftermath of the EU referendum. While I was in the US I was asked about the presidential election and I made my views clear: I wanted to see Hillary Clinton elected as the first women president to be a role model for my teenage daughters and for millions of girls around the world. I was also deeply concerned about Donald Trumps divisive campaign and his targeting of some people for no reason other than their faith or their country of birth. However, Trump won the election. And Ive done my best to avoid criticising him since the election on November 8 out of respect for the democratic will of the people of the US and in the hope that President Trump would govern more moderately and sensibly than he campaigned. However, in the aftermath of his shameful and cruel ban on immigrants and refugees from certain countries this week which will affect millions around the world I have no choice but to speak out. One million people call for Donald Trump's state visit to the UK to be called off Every country has the right to set its own immigration policies but this ban is both discriminatory and counter-productive. It will see the US turn its back on its obligation to refugees fleeing from violence and persecution and it will play straight into the hands of the terrorists and extremists who seek to divide and harm our great nations. I fear it will be used to act as a recruiting sergeant for so-called IS and other like-minded groups. Until a clarification obtained from the US State Department last night after diplomatic work by my predecessor as mayor, Boris Johnson, now the Foreign Secretary, it appeared that both the Iraqi-born Conservative MP, Nadhim Zahawi, would be banned from the US, as would the four-time Olympic gold medallist Sir Mo Farah, a dual national of Britain and Somalia. The clarification means that UK citizens who are dual nationals of countries named in President Trumps ban will not be stopped from going to the US unless they travel directly from one of the countries affected. This also appears to apply to dual nationals from other countries. But we should not kid ourselves that this makes everything all right. Far from it. Millions of people still face a ban from going to the US simply because of where they come from. It also means that many green card holders people who have lived and worked in the US for years are now banned from their home country. The self-defeating nature of the ban is shown by examining how poorer in every sense of the word the US would be if it had been in place years ago. To give just two high-profile examples: Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple who died in 2011, was the son of an immigrant who came to the US from Syria in the Fifties. The eBay founder Pierre Omidyar is the child of Iranian parents. Donald Trumps ban also sees the US turning its back on the global refugee crisis. This can only be tackled if all the nations of the world play their part and work together. As of December last month 65.3 million people around the world were displaced from their home as a result of war or persecution and that number is increasing faster than ever before. One in every 113 people in the world is a refugee. I fear this policy will make both the US and Britain less safe in the long run No one nation or even continent can manage this alone. We all need to do more including London and Britain and now is not the time for the great nations of the world simply to turn their backs and walk away. Worst of all, I fear this policy will make both the US and Britain less safe in the long run. It plays straight into the evil hands of Islamic State and other terrorists and extremists, who are trying to convince desperate young people across the world that Islam and the West are incompatible, that we are somehow their enemy. Our job is to show just how wrong they are to prove that Muslims can succeed, flourish and practise their religion freely and peacefully in the West. Protests erupt outside JFK Airport after President Trump's immigration ban Im relieved that the Prime Minister, Theresa May, has finally seen sense and joined the worldwide criticism of this ban. I will work closely with the Government to help and support every Londoner that has been affected. But by rushing to Washington, standing squarely with President Trump and being slow to speak out, the Prime Minister could be accused not unfairly of not doing enough to call out the dangerous and divisive attitude of the new regime in Washington. The UK-US alliance is rightly known as the special relationship. Our nations not only share a long and great history but an absolute respect for the values of freedom, democracy, tolerance and diversity. Britain and the US have so much in common they are seen the world over as beacons of freedom and liberty. But over these past few days something on the other side of the Atlantic changed. Great friends must warn each other when they are making a mistake. Its the mark of a genuine mature relationship The Prime Minister must be clear with President Trump that his actions are unacceptable for a liberal, open democracy. And we should not be seen to be endorsing them. That is why we must now rescind the offer of a full state visit for President Trump until this ban is lifted. I dont believe the people of London will support rolling out the red carpet until this happens. Great friends must warn each other when they are making a mistake. Its the mark of a genuine mature relationship. And we in Britain have an obligation and a responsibility to make crystal clear to President Trump that this ban is a mistake and to urge him to put it right. Sitting pretty between the Golden Globes and the Oscars, the Screen Actors Guild Awards are a sign that awards season is well underway. And with less than a month until it's all over, stars of the stage and screen were out in force last night at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles to celebrate the year's achievements in film and television. One star who stood out for not only her Best Actress award but also for her chosen gown was Emma Stone, who showcased a stunning Alexander McQueen creation which featured floral detailing and a lace corseted sash bodice. One to watch during this season's awards, the La La Land star kept her signature copper hair pulled to the side in a sweeping wave while her smokey eye had added impact thanks to her porcelain complexion. Another look we fell for on last night's red carpet came from a heavily pregnant Natalie Portman who was also nominated for the Best Actress award. Wearing a striking ecru ivory gown with billowing statement sleeves from Dior's SS17 couture collection which was debuted on the runway in Paris less than a week ago, the 35-year-old kept her hair pulled back in a sleek up-do and accessorised with dramatic diamond earrings. Other stars who impressed in the style stakes were Nicole Kidman in Gucci, Meryl Streep in Valentino, Kirsten Dunst in Dior, Thandie Newton in Schiaparelli Couture and Chrissy Teigen. Click through our gallery above to see all the looks from the event's red carpet. Follow Charlie Teather on Twitter @charlieteather Follow Lifestyle on Facebook and on Twitter @ESLifeandStyle W ounded veterans are being trained in theatrecraft to tell their stories and inspire hard-to-reach teenagers. The former soldiers, many of whom lost limbs in Afghanistan and Iraq, learned delivery techniques and how to command an audience in the workshop at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. Former Parachute Regiment Lance Corporal Jordan Beecher, 28, lost his lower left leg after stepping on an IED in Afghanistan in 2012. He said: When we first started speaking, it was like we were giving orders or a lesson in how to use a weapon. It was all very regimented. But the training has given us more confidence to take risks, be a bit more theatrical and make the stories more engaging. Mr Beecher, of St Albans, who has won four golds and a silver medal in rowing at the Invictus Games, had to rebuild his life after being discharged in 2015. He said: There were things I thought I was fine about but in hindsight I can see Ive been through a lot and probably pushed people away. This whole process has really helped me as well. The scheme, organised by military charity Blesma, The Limbless Veterans, is entering its second year. It hopes to run workshops for 7,000 children. The project members, including two triple amputees who have rebuilt their lives and careers, had no experience of public speaking or telling their story. Mr Beecher, who is training for a charity row across the Atlantic, said: I tried a bit of teaching and enjoyed it but it wasnt enough. I think this will give me what was missing from teaching. When I was a kid I didnt really care about school but it is important and I hope I can use my mistakes to steer people in the right direction. It is good to give back to people who need a bit more in their lives. The members are trained by National Theatre actors and professional story-tellers over a five-day course to develop their accounts. A pilot scheme reached 1,000 teenagers last year and won acclaim from teachers and pupils. The veterans, who range in age from 22 to 65, will be holding workshops from Hackney to Barnes from February to July. Former Royal Anglian Regiment Corporal Billy Drinkwater, 34, of Chingford, was injured in an IED explosion in Afghanistan in 2012. He now needs help to cross the road and get dressed. Ive been independent all my life and that was really hard to get used to, he said. I lost the sight in my right eye and my left is badly damaged. Ive lost my sense of smell and hearing in one ear. He has since qualified as a personal trainer, bought property and wants to learn project management so he can run a charity. He said: Ive never done anything like this before but if telling my story can help people then Im all over that. Alice Driver, delivering the scheme as head of the Drive Project, said: It has been such a success with fantastic feedback from the veterans and the schools. It has been particularly successful when the veterans work with pupil referral units or with challenging students. For schools wanting to book the workshops, contact bcp@blesma.org Visit standard.co.uk/arts for the latest news and reviews from Londons arts scene Follow Going Out on Facebook and on Twitter @ESgoingout A Madison man who went with a stranger to a parking lot so he could buy marijuana from the stranger was mugged by the seller instead, but the seller was located and arrested later. Raymone Cheffin, 26, of Madison, was taken into custody, tentatively charged with armed robbery, Madison police said. The incident happened Friday afternoon in a parking lot in the 1800 block of Portage Road. The 18-year-old victim told police he was robbed of his wallet and cellphone. "The victim planned to buy marijuana but instead of getting any dope, he was ordered to give up his property," said police spokesman Joel DeSpain. T he Harwood Arms has been crowned Londons best gastropub at the Top 50 Gastropubs 2017 awards, but the top spots were taken by pubs in Yorkshire, Kent and Bristol. The Fulham pub which is run by Brett Graham (also chef-patron of The Ledbury) and Mike Robinson, and has a Michelin star led a seven-strong line-up of pubs from the capital, coming in at number six. The Anchor & Hope in Waterloo was Londons second best performer at 12, while The Drapers Arms in Islington came in at 18. The Alma in Wandsworth was ranked at 21, while the 29th spot went to The Marksman in Hackney, which was named Michelin Pub of the Year 2017 in October. Rounding off the list, The Red Lion & Sun in Highgate reached 37 and Parlour in Kensal Rise made 38. The Star Inn in Harome, Yorkshire, pipped them all to the top spot, knocking last years winner The Sportsman in Kent down to second place. For more top pubs see our guide to London's best Sunday Roasts and the best places to drink craft beer in London. Visit standard.co.uk/restaurants for the latest news and reviews from Londons food scene. Follow Ben Norum on Twitter @BenNorum Follow Going Out on Facebook and on Twitter @ESgoingout E verybody's working for the weekend, but how you spend your two days off may say something about how successful you are. What you get up to doesn't really matter, per se. If you prefer lounging around the house to spontaneous adventures, that's great! You probably need that time to wind down. When it comes to weekends, the main thing that separates successful people from unsuccessful people is mindfulness. Are you planning ahead and truly thinking about how to spend your free time? Here are 11 things that unsuccessful people tend to do over the weekend and why to avoid them: They don't have a plan Not every minute of every hour of your weekend needs to be planned out, but it's good to have a general idea of what you'd like to do or get done even if you're just scheduling downtime. That will allow you protect your time, and maybe even schedule in some fun events. They don't make time for loved ones It can be hard to make time for the ones you care about during the hectic week. Make up for that over the weekend. They let technology take over Put away your phone. Shut off your work email and make it clear to your coworkers that you won't be responding. Don't get addicted to technology. 10 exhibitions not to miss in 2016 1 /13 10 exhibitions not to miss in 2016 Women: New Portraits from Annie Leibovitz Wapping Hydraulic Power Station, January 16 - February 7 This exhibition will update the collaboration between Leibovitz and Susan Sontag that first emerged more than 15 years ago. A series of extraordinary photographs taken by the incomparable Annie Leibovitz looks at the role of women in the world today. ubs.com Annie Lebovitz, from WOMEN: New Portraits Visions of our Solar System Natural History Museum, January 22 - May 15 Dramatic photographs from Michael Benson are paired with an original score from Brian Eno in an exploration of our solar system, showing it in all its stunning glory. nhm.ac.uk NASA SDO/GSFC/Michael Benson, Kinetikon Pictures/Natural History Museum Electronic Superhighway Whitechapel Gallery, January 29 May 15 More than 100 artworks feature in this exploration of how the computers and the internet have impacted artists over the last 50 or so years. Work comes from the likes of Cory Arcangel, Jeremy Bailey, James Bridle and Constant Dullaart. whitechapelgallery.org Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Surface Tension (1992) Courtesy the artist and Carroll/Fletcher, London. Installation photograph by Maxime Painting the Modern Garden: Monet to Matisse Royal Academy of Arts, January 30 - April 20 From the 1860s to the 1920s, gardens served as a heavy influence on artists across the world, especially in the Impressionist, Post-Impressionist and Avant-Garde movements. This exhibition will detail how, with a stunning collection of works from the likes of Monet, Renoir, Cezanne, Pissarro, Manet, Sargent, Kandinsky, Van Gogh, Matisse, Klimt and Klee. royalacademy.org.uk Claude Monet, Water Lilies, 1914-15/Royal Academy Vogue 100 - A Century of Style National Portrait Gallery, February 11 May 22 Iconic magazine Vogue will be showcasing the best of its British publication in this exhibition, which promises to be little short of stunning. It's part of Vogue's centenary celebrations. It will feature 280 prints from the Conde Nast archive, revealing the extent of the magazine's substantial influence on fashion, taste, and culture at large. npg.org.uk Vogue/Vogue 100/National Portrait Gallery The Clangers, Bagpuss & Co The V&A Museum of Childhood, March 19 - October 9 Oliver Postgate's voice and Peter Firmin's puppets, which include Bagpuss, The Clangers and Ivor the Engine had a dramatic hand in shaping the childhood of millions of children in Britain and across the world. This display will tell the story of the puppets, of Smallfilms and Four Corners books, and of how Postgate and Firmin developed their signature stop-animation process. vam.ac.uk Smallfilms & Four Corners books/V&A Museum of Childhood Exhibitionism: The Rolling Stones Saatchi Gallery, April 5 - September 4 The Saatchi Gallery will be taken over by never-before-seen Stones memorabilia, rare instruments, iconic costumes, album artwork and even the band's personal diaries. This exhibition will reveal their story from 60s blues band to the world's greatest rock n' roll band. saatchigallery.com Stones Archive/Gerry Images This Is A Voice Wellcome Collection, April 14 July 31 An exhibition for the ears: This Is A Voice explores how voices work, how we emotions are carried in our tone, pitch and rhythm of speech, and looks at non-verbal forms of communication, too. Paintings, manuscripts and illustrations compliment an acoustic journey featuring work from artists and vocalists including Joan La Barbara, Marcus Coates, Matthew Herbert and Imogen Stidworthy. wellcomecollection.org Enrico David, courtesy Michael Werner Gallery, New York and London Undressed: A brief history of underwear The V&A, April 16 March 12 2017 Worth going to for the pun-tastic title alone, this exhibition explores all things lingerie, from its practical use to its place in the world of high fashion and, of course, how its developed and shaped our attitudes towards sensuality and sexuality. vam.ac.uk Photographer Sebastian Faena, Model Eniko Mihalik Painters Painting: Van Dyck to Freud National Gallery, June 22 - September 4 Ever wondered what painters hang on their walls? On display here will be works owned by the likes of Lucian Freud, Matisse, Degas, Lawrence, Reynolds, and Van Dyck. It will explore why painters were interested in the work of others, and their reasons for building a collection, from personal interest to artistic inspiration. It should be a fascinating insight into what made some of our greatest artists tick. nationalgallery.org.uk Detail from Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Italian Woman, about 1870 They don't enjoy themselves Whether you're unwinding alone or going out with friends, make sure to do something that makes you happy during your time off. They sleep the entire time Maybe you drank too much on Friday and are recovering. Maybe you're just super tired. Either way, this could really mess up your sleep cycle, and you probably need to fix that. They rack up expenses You pinch pennies all week, and then blow it all over the weekend. Heck, you should treat yourself every once in a while. That being said, if you're overspending on the weekends on frivolities that you don't need, then it's time to consider some cheap but fun options, like staycations or free local events. They don't reflect During your busy week, it can be difficult to snag some time to just think about your life and goals. It's important to check in with yourself every once in a while. They can't stop thinking about work On Fridays, it's a great idea to set out an agenda for the next Monday. Being prepared is great; being a workaholic is not. Kick back and relax a bit on Saturday and Sunday! They laze around and regret it Chilling out over the weekend can definitely be a great way to unwind. But if your slothfulness is making you bored or bummed out or causing you to neglect important errands and chores then you may want to rethink how you spend your Saturdays and Sundays. They don't relax At the other end of the spectrum are people who pack too much into their weekend schedule. In order to be productive, and therefore successful at work, it's important to use the weekend to recharge your batteries. If your weekends include zero downtime, then you'll never feel rested or refreshed, which can be detrimental to your success. They don't prepare for the week ahead Sunday nights are the perfect time to plan for the week ahead. You can make a to-do list, update or review your calendar, or just think about what it is you'd like to accomplish in the coming days. Unsuccessful people fail to do any of the above. Jacquelyn Smith contributed to a previous version of this story Here are the 3 most common reasons why your flight is delayed Amazing pictures show the brutal living conditions in the highest habitable place on earth The 10 most visited cities around the world in 2016 Read the original article on Business Insider UK. 2016. Follow Business Insider UK on Twitter. W hen families are looking for an easy island break with a spot of sun, not too far from home, the usual suspects spring to mind the Balearics, the Canaries, the Greek islands. But theres another destination sitting quietly in the middle of the Mediterranean, with lovely warm spring and autumn days ideal for little ones who struggle in summer heat. Its home to some of the friendliest people you could meet, who without exception speak excellent English great for we lazy Brits abroad. The destination for our familys October half-term break was Malta and its sister island Gozo. As we came in to land, we realised we werent quite sure to expect. Malta was part of the British Empire for more than 150 years, so we knew a little about driving on the left and red pillar boxes. I also had a vague recollection from school history lessons about the island being a stomping ground of the Knights of St John. But would Malta be like Gibraltar, or more like Greece and Cyprus, or perhaps its neighbour Sicily just 60 miles away to the north? We discovered that its a bit of everything: a mish-mash of the cultures that have influenced the island over thousands of years. Like Greece, you have ancient ruins, including the Ggantija Temples in Gozo, a Unesco World Heritage site constructed 1,000 years before the Pyramids were built. And like its Italian neighbour it has a culture centred around church and the family, many of whom can be seen getting together to enjoy ftira a Maltese speciality somewhere between a pizza and a flatbread. Azure Window / Alamy Stock Photo We spent most of our visit on Gozo. At just eight miles long and four miles wide, its a convenient base pretty much everywhere can be reached by car within half an hour. The island is normally lush after a hot summer but there was little sign of grass anywhere when we visited unusual enough for the locals to tell us how they were wishing for rain. We werent, of course, and happily enjoyed sunny weather of around 26C each day. We stayed at Hotel Ta Cenc on the south of the island. Our bungalow was ideal; we never felt on top of each other and we adored the heated half-indoor, half-outdoor pool where we swam each night under the stars. Our favourite restaurant on Gozo was Ta Philip in Ghajnsielem, close to the terminal where ferries dock from Malta. The cuisine on both islands has a splash of Lebanese and North African influence; the Maltese national dish is fenek, a rabbit stew, and theres also imqaret, an Arabian-style pastry filled with dates and spices, and at Ta Philip we lingered over a delicious lunch, with melt-in-the-mouth baby goat roasted slowly in a wood-burning oven. Mgarr Harbour / Alamy Stock Photo We also loved that, served alongside locally baked bread at the start of almost every meal, was a sun-dried tomato paste called kunserva. It was delicious enough to keep the adults going back for more and sweet enough to appeal to the taste buds of our ketchup-loving four- and seven-year-olds. The Maltese people, who attach great importance to their cuisine, especially the inhabitants of Gozo, like to know exactly where everything comes from. Following their example, we visited a farm to see how proprietor Rikardu made the traditional hard goats cheese wed eaten in his restaurant, Ta Rikardu, in the main town, Victoria. Ggantija Temple Gozo is much quieter than Malta and small enough to cycle in a day. Visitors can also hop aboard a Segway to see the sights, or saddle up or have a carriage ride at the Dream of Horses rescue centre. We never encountered big crowds, although there were other sightseers at the landmark Azure Window a 50-metre high rock arch in the Dwejra Point cliffs. Its one of the most recognisable locations on the island, used as the backdrop for Daeneryss wedding scene in Game of Thrones. (Hotel Ta Cenc & Spa) / Hotel Ta Cenc & Spa Though there arent the golden expanses of sand of the Costas, there are hidden beaches and harbours to explore and clear waters to dive into. The 2015 film By the Sea was filmed in the bay of Mgarr ix-Xini, known for its dramatic, soaring cliffs. While we were perfectly happy on Gozo, the ferry trip to Malta takes only 25 minutes, so its easy to pop between the two. A visit to Maltas capital Valletta is a must, where theres a real buzz. We also took a boat trip around the harbour in a traditional dghajsa an elaborately styled rowing boat reminiscent of a gondola a fantastic way to appreciate the city from the water. Cheapest Holiday Destinations 2017 1 /14 Cheapest Holiday Destinations 2017 Valparaiso, Chile Shutterstock / f11photo San Antonio, Texas Shutterstock / f11photo Belfast, Northern Ireland Shutterstock / Kanuman Yerevan, Armenia Shutterstock / Stanislav Samoylik Las Palmas, Gran Canaria Shutterstock / ZM_Photo Sarajevo, Bosnia & Herzegovina Shutterstock / Photokanto Braga, Portugal Shutterstock / dvoevnore Kalamata, Greece Shutterstock / LMspencer Panama City, Panama Shutterstock / Sylwia Brataniec Sofia, Bulgaria Shutterstock / meunierd Lviv, Ukraine Shutterstock / Tainar Though the British influence makes eating out, shopping and getting around very straightforward you may see a supermarket stocking Waitrose goods or high-street clothes shops you recognise dont be mistaken into thinking this is a Little England-on-Sea. The people of Malta, and Gozo in particular, are proud of their culture and they will welcome you with open arms. The name Gozo means joy and as such an excellent, accessible destination for families, I wouldnt disagree. Details: Malta and Gozo Rooms at Hotel Ta Cenc start from 140 per room per night during low season and 196 during high season, B&B (tacenc.com). easyJet flies from Gatwick to Malta with prices starting from 36.49 one way (easyjet.com). visitmalta.com V enice is gorgeous. Its like somebody took all the intoxicating Italian charm of Florence and Rome and set it afloat on a luminous aquamarine lagoon. Its little surprise that this Floating City is one of the worlds most romantic destinations. Sadly, such beauty doesnt come cheap and the citys price tag is almost as famous as its canals. However, with a few tips and tricks, you can enjoy all the indulgent luxury of Venice without blowing your budget. Where to Stay The Bloom B&B is a stylish haven just 10 minutes away from Piazza San Marco, the citys main square. The rooms radiate rich Venetian elegance and the staff couldnt be more welcoming. (The Bloom B&B) / The Bloom B&B The crowning glory is the hotels private roof terrace, which combines perfect views with a romantic atmosphere theres even a Prosecco-stocked fridge to plunder. If you cant fall in love on The Bloom's roof terrace (even if only with Venice itself) you cant fall in love anywhere. Find it: Rooms start from 135, with frequent special offers throughout the year. Book here Its partner hotel Locanda Fiorita is equally charming and just around the corner. Al fresco breakfast and elegant 18th century furnishings make for a genuine Venetian atmosphere in this affordable hotel. (Locanda Fiorita ) / Locanda Fiorita Find it: Rooms start from 70. Book here Where to Go The impossible beauty of Venice may leave you perfectly satisfied to simply stroll the streets and drink it all in. If you find yourself thirsty for a little culture as well, however, visitors can enter the Basilica di San Marco (famous jewel in the Piazza San Marco crown) free of charge. St Mark's Square Crossing the Rialto Bridge is another of the citys free delights. If youre looking to take to the water beneath, inexpensive water buses zoom all over the lagoon. With tickets from 7.50, you can float down the Grand Canal without shelling out for a private boat. Who needs a gondola anyway? Where to Drink Rooms at The Gritti Palace can set you back up to 1000 a night but this shouldnt stop you visiting Venices most majestic hotel. For a slice of the luxury, The Riva Lounge bar on the Grittis terrace welcomes non-guests. Its set just on the edge of the Grand Canal, making it a prime spot to gaze at gondolas and soak up the Floating City. A coffee might set you back around 10 but its worth it. Riva Lounge Bar / The Gritti Palace If that sounds a little steep, head to Campo Santa Margherita, a buzzy square popular with students and locals. Here, there are plenty of informal cafe-bars which offer the ideal setting for pre-dinner aperitivo. Almost every hand in sight will be clutching an Aperol Spritz and, at as little as 2 a pop, it can be hard to say no to another. Where to Eat For a thrifty lunch, Antico Forno offers Italian pizza by the slice a stones throw from the Rialto Bridge. Grab a generous piece for 4 and perch at the waters edge for unrivalled views of this famous sight. For dinner, menus often feature three courses - antipasto (a nibble or starter), primo (pasta or rice) and secondo (meat or fish). However, in many restaurants, youre not required to go all out and a pasta course might well prove ample. At tiny Osteria Enoteca Ai Artisti, dishes are centred around seafood picked up at the market each day, so you can be sure of absolute freshness and astronomical flavour. With great wines by the glass and outstanding, distinctively Venetian dishes starting from around 12, it neednt break the bank. Go when youre not too famished, share a starter and savour the pasta. If that leaves you wanting more, take an evening stroll to La Boutique del Gelato, for homemade gelato widely regarded as the citys best. Breathtaking views: the Rialto Bridge in Venice / Getty Images/Moment RF Follow us on Twitter @ESLifeandStyle Follow Jessica on Instagram @jessica_burrell A group of squatters who have turned a Belgravia mansion into an unofficial homeless shelter have told how they came under attack from masked fascists. The Autonomous Nation of Anarchist Libertarians occupied the five-story home believed to be owned by Russian oligarch Andrey Goncharenko last week. But on Saturday, during a poetry workshop, they were allegedly disturbed by a group of masked and hooded men who appeared to throw bricks and bottled through the windows. Video footage taken during the disturbance show the gang gathered outside the building and shouting up at people sheltering inside. Squatters: The group occupied the building last week / YouTube One man is heard shouting come downstairs. Get the f*** outside now as his comrades appear to smash windows - setting alarms off in the property. Another video taken from inside the mansion shows occupants attempting to fend off the group with fire extinguishers. Others are heard shouting for them to keep away from the window as glass is heard smashing nearby. Thugs: The group were allegedly smashing windows / YouTube One person who had been taking part in the poetry workshop shared pictures of the alleged thugs and wrote: The moment you are enjoying a fantastic spoken word workshop and your attacked by Nazis....yes Nazis in central London today. There were children in the building too, as they smashed windows. And another member of the squatters posted on Twitter: We are being violently attacked by fascists, get to 102 Eaton Square immediately. Lives are at risk. Plush property: A Grade II listed 15m building on Belgrave Place, London, has been squatted by the Autonomous Nation of Anarchist Libertarians (Anal) / David Mirzoeff/PA Wire The mansion is being secured from inside after attacks by fascists, children are being moved upstairs, no reports of injuries, said another post. A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: Police were called to Eaton Square, SW1, just after 16:15hrs on Saturday, 28 January, to reports of a disturbance involving a group outside a non-residential property. The suspects made off before officers arrived. Officers have conducted local searches and are patrolling the local area. Squatters: Footage shows the group occupying the house trying to barricade the windows / YouTube There have been no arrests. Enquiries continue. The group of activists said it wants to use the plush property off Eaton Square to accommodate Londons rough sleepers but added they are likely to be turfed out after a court hearing expected on Tuesday. Members said up to 10 homeless people have slept in the mansion per night and that the group was working with charities to spread the word about the makeshift shelter. A man has been arrested on suspicion of targeting girls as young as 13 in a string of alleged sex attacks on London buses. Police arrested the 32-year-old in East Dulwich after women and girls in Lewisham and Southwark reported being assaulted whilst travelling around the area. The man is suspected of targeting five victims on buses four of whom were under 18-years-old. A 9:30pm on Tuesday January 24 a 22-year woman reported being sexually assaulted on the route 12 bus in Dulwich. She was travelling home when a man deliberately sat next to her despite there being numerous free seats. He attempted to engage in conversation with the victim and then allegedly assaulted her when she got up to leave. The same man is then suspected of assaulting a 17-year-old girl on Friday January 27. He allegedly sat opposite her on the bus before intentionally falling on her and touching her inappropriately. And later the same day, at around 5pm, a 13-year-old girl claimed she was sexually assaulted on a 363 bus. A second 13-year-old also subsequently reported a man trying to engage her in a conversation which made her feel uncomfortable on the route 197 bus near Dulwich Library. Then at 5.50pm another victim - a-15-year-old girl said she got off the 171 bus got off near Bromley Road after a man had sat close to her and touched her knee. As she disembarked from the bus, the suspect allegedly followed her, tried to engage her in conversation before groping her. The victim ran away. The man was arrested after police released an appeal about the assaults, believing them to be linked. He has been taken into custody at a central London police station. Police continue to appeal for witnesses, or anyone with any information about any of the incidents, to call police via 101 or tweet them via @MetCC or contact Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111. M ohamed Abrini, the man in the hat caught on CCTV during the Brussels airport bombings, is being questioned over the 2015 Paris terror attacks. Abrini was handed over to the French authorities on Monday for a day to face questioning relating to the deaths of 130 people in the capital city on November 13, 2015. He was captured in Brussels in April last year over his suspected involvement in the airport and metro bombings on March 22, which left 32 people dead. The attacks in Brussels and France were both claimed by the Islamic State. Suspect: Mohamed Abrini / Belgian Federal Police via AP Investigators in Belgium believe the attacks were organised by the same Brussels-based terror cell. Salah Abdeslam, a Belgian-born French national, is the main suspect in the Paris attacks and believed to be the only other survivor. Abrini was spotted in a car with Abdeslam when it stopped at a petrol station in Ressons two days before the attacks on the French capital. Loading.... Abrini was driven from Paris to Belgium on Monday in a heavily armed convoy so the case against him could be formally launched, BFMTV reported. He was not asked any questions during his court appearance in front of six judges, his lawyer said in a statement. P olice are hunting a man who allegedly sexually assaulted a woman as she walked through London Bridge station late at night. The woman, aged 33, was approached from behind shortly after midnight by an unknown man on the stairs leading down to the Jubilee Line. Police say the man then touched her inappropriately. The incident happened in the early hours of Saturday, December 17, last year. British Transport Police officers have released CCTV images of a man they wish to speak with in connection with the incident. Send a text to 61016 or call 0800 40 50 40 quoting reference 167 of 30/01/2017. Alternatively, call Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111. A crying toddler was left seriously injured after he was shot with an air rifle to shut him up, a court has heard. Harry Studley was 18 months old when he was shot in the head in July last year. It is alleged that Jordan Walters, a friend of Harrys mother, fired the weapon after his partner, Emma Horseman, said: "Shoot Harry, just to frighten him, to shut him up, shoot it at Harry." Bristol Crown Court heard that Walters has already admitted unlawfully and maliciously inflicting grievous bodily harm on Harry while mother-of-two Horseman is accused of the same charge on the basis that she aided or abetted an offence. Harry, who lived with his parents and brother in a block of flats on Bishport Avenue, Bristol, had been visiting Horseman and Walters - who lived in a nearby flat - with their two children. He had been taken there by his mother, Amy Allen, as the families were friends. Charges: Walters has pleaded guilty to GBH / Facebook Andrew Macfarlane, prosecuting, told the court: "The circumstances of this case are both simple and horrifying. "Parents in a block of flats in Bristol meet up on a Friday afternoon with their children and within the hour a baby is fighting for its life and is airlifted to hospital. "The Crown say very simply that Miss Horseman's participation was to tell her partner to shoot Harry." Mr Macfarlane said Harrys mother had known for some time that Walters had an air rifle that he kept in the kitchen. He had been cleaning the weapon and had replaced two gas canisters whilst Miss Allen tended to her two children who were both crying. "While the boys were upset Amy heard Emma say 'Oh Amy, how do you cope with them, crying all the time?'," Mr Macfarlane told the jury. "Amy replied 'It's easy, you just give them attention, sort of thing, I got to do it'. Family friends: The couple lived in the same block of flats as Harry and his family / Facebook "Seconds later whilst Harry was still crying Amy heard Emma say 'Shoot Harry, just to frighten him, to shut him up, shoot it at Harry' then Amy heard the sound of the gun firing." Mr Macfarlane added: "It appeared to Amy that Jordan had aimed the gun at Harry and fired it right into Harry's head, which is indeed what had happened as you will hear. "Amy immediately picked Harry up in her arms. There was blood on the sofa. Blood was gushing out of Harry's head and down Amy's arms. Harry kept losing consciousness." The court heard that Walters phoned for an ambulance and Miss Allen heard both Jordan and Horseman said they thought the gun was not loaded. Harry, now aged two, was taken to Bristol Children's Hospital where he underwent emergency surgery. The bullet penetrated Harry's skull. He was operated on as a matter of extreme urgency and fortunately his life was saved," Mr Macfarlane said. Miss Allen told the court: I heard Emma speak to Jordan. She said 'Jordan, shoot it and scare him'. After Emma said what she said, he aimed the gun at Harry. "I looked round and said 'No' and I heard the gun. I heard the noise and Harry screaming in pain. She looked around and said 'Jordan, he's bleeding'. I looked around and found him in tears." When police arrived at the flat, they found Walters crying and Horseman comforting him. Harry underwent emergency surgery at Bristol Children's Hospital and doctors discovered he had suffered a displaced skull fracture and swelling and bleeding on the brain after being shot in the right temple. Harry's speech is now developing normally but he suffers from several post-traumatic seizures a day and is being treated with anticonvulsant drugs. Horseman, of Oak House, Bishport Avene, Hartcliffe, Bristol denies the single charge against her.The trial was adjourned until tomorrow. A 32-year-old Madison man with ties to Chicago was shot several times Sunday night by a gunman who fired at him while he was leaving a South Side convenience store. Police initially thought two people with non-life-threatening gunshot wounds arrived at a Madison hospital Sunday night, but only the man was shot and his 24-year-old girlfriend from Sun Prairie had a bruised arm. It wasn't clear how she was injured. The shooting was reported by multiple callers to 911 at about 8 p.m. in the parking lot of a 7-Eleven store at 2201 South Park Street, Madison police said. "Officers arrived at the scene and discovered a vehicle with bullet holes in a window and a side door, along with multiple shell casings," said Lt. Timothy Radke. "A short time later, two individuals arrived at a local hospital with gunshot wounds, believed to be associated with the incident." No full description of the shooter was available, and police spokesman Joel DeSpain said Tuesday that detectives investigating the case have had little cooperation from witnesses. A doctor who devoted her life to helping others was knocked down and killed by a car on her way to work at a London hospital. Dr Jasjot Singhota, 30, was struck on a zebra crossing near her home in Tulse Hill, south London. The anaesthetist was rushed by ambulance to Kings College Hospital where surgeons battled to save her life for eight hours before she was pronounced dead from internal bleeding and head injuries with her family at her bedside. Dr Singhota had asked for her organs to be donated and her liver and pancreas have helped save the lives of critically ill patients. Surgeons battled for eight hours trying to save her The 30-year-old, who was based at St Thomas Hospital, studied medicine and physiology at the University of Edinburgh and was due to graduate from the Royal College of Anaesthetists in March. She was the second of three sisters, who grew up in Bedford. She had spent time working on conservation projects in Madagascar and childrens hospitals in New Zealand and had ambitions to work for Medicin Sans Frontieres helping people caught up in the worlds most dangerous warzones. Her sister Nicole, 22, a student, said: I dont know what to do now, we were best friends. I feel a lot of my own pain for losing her but Im more upset for my sister and what she didnt get to achieve. Her sister grieving sister paid tribute to her 'best friend' who was killed while crosssing the road She was so modest but her brain was amazing, she could have developed a cure for something. She was a role model and guided me so much through life. Its such a waste, she worked so hard to get all her qualifications and graduate and she said it was finally time to relax and enjoy life. My parents are broken and are really struggling. Its one thing to lose a sibling but worse to lose a child. Its so typical of my sister on her very last day on Earth she was helping others. She said that as well as pursuing a medical career, her sister was a grade eight pianist and a passionate netball player. Her elder sister Neha Santasalo, 32, urged witnesses to the collision at the junction of Thurlow Park Road and Birkbeck Hill at 7.30am on Wednesday, January 25 to come forward. She said: When we were little she was always getting into trouble for helping people she didnt know, everything she has worked for was always about helping others. We didnt realise there was so much love for her, we are completely overwhelmed by the amount of support of people pouring in. At the hospital where she worked they held a minutes silence for her, she was adored by her colleagues. Were at this point of absolute desperation. We need to know what happened to her. Hundreds of friends and colleagues have left messages and tributes on a Facebook page set up in Dr Singhotas memory. A former teacher wrote: It may be a cliche but Jasjot packed more into her own short life than most people manage in a lifetime. A formidable student, a natural leader and talented sportswoman but, more importantly, a warm, gracious and caring person. The medical profession have lost a special doctor. A colleague at St Thomass added: Jas was an absolute delight to work with: always smiling, friendly, quick-witted, efficient, and extremely competent. She was wonderful with patients, relatives, and staff alike. I always knew that it was going to be a good day on labour ward when Jas was on as well. She will be deeply missed by all of us here. A spokesman from Guys and St Thomas NHS Foundation Trust said: We are deeply saddened to hear about the tragic death of our colleague Dr Jasjot Singhota, and our thoughts are with her family and colleagues at this difficult time. "Dr Singhota was a dedicated, committed and well respected member of staff, as well as an excellent doctor with a bright and promising future. A Scotland Yard spokesman said the driver of the car stopped at the scene and is assisting police with their enquiries. No arrests have been made. Anyone who witnessed the collision or has any information is asked to contact police on 020 8543 5157. A cyclist is fighting for life in hospital after a crash with a car in south-west London. The man, aged in his 70s, was rushed to hospital after the collision in Kingston town centre on Monday afternoon. Police said his injuries are believed to be life-threatening. Officers were called to the crash in Fairfield North at the junction with London Road at about 1.45pm. Paramedics from London Ambulance Service attended and took the man to a south London hospital. The busy junction was closed to traffic as police investigated the crash. A London Ambulance Service spokesperson said: "We were called at 1.40pm today to reports of a road traffic collision at the A308, Kingston. "We sent an ambulance crew and a single responder in a car to the scene. The first of our medics arrived at the scene in under one minute. "We treated a man at the scene for a head injury and took him as a priority to a hospital in south London." P olice said they have a plan in place for this evenings anti-Trump protest which is expected to attract thousands of people including Lily Allen and Ed Miliband. More than 26,000 Londoners have said they will attend Monday evenings emergency demonstration against the US Presidents controversial new travel ban. Demonstrators have spent part of today making banners ahead of the march to Downing Street in a public show of solidarity with those affected by the policy. Several public figures including Baroness Shami Chakrabarti, comedian Shappi Khorsandi, Lib Dem leader Tim Farron and Bianca Jagger are expected to speak at the rally. Placards: Protesters began arriving at Downing Street on Monday afternoon. / Lydia Ruffles Other speakers include the joint leader of the Green Party Caroline Lucas as well as representatives from the Muslim Council of Britain, Black Lives Matter and the National Union of Students. The Met Police told the Standard on Monday they are aware of the protest, which is due to take place at 6pm, and an appropriate policing plan is in place. The rally, organised by journalist and author Owen Jones, is in objection to President Trumps executive order which was signed on Friday. Students from London's SOAS university preparing for the rally on Monday. / Ali Habib The order stops all travellers from seven Muslim-majority countries entering the US for 90 days with a further indefinite ban for refugees from war-torn Syria. His policy proved deeply controversial with mass protests erupting across US airports. British citizens who could have been liable in the ban before Boris Johnson negotiated an exemption for Brits included Somalia-born Olympian Mo Farah and Conservative MP Nadhim Zahawi. Owen Jones giving a speech during the March for Europe rally in Parliament Square before the EU vote. / PA Archive/PA Images On Monday afternoon Londoners began to prepare to march to Downing Street, sharing photos on social media of banners reading various anti-Trump messages. Jane Barrett posted a photograph of her homemade banner taken on the Tube which contained a quote from Martin Luther King. She said: "Last minute sign but I'm ready!!! Let's do this." Owen Jones wrote on the online event: There are moments of terrible injustice throughout history where we look back and rightly ask - what did people do? Protest: The demonstrators will march to Downing Street. / Lydia Ruffles Future generations will look back at the targeting of Muslims - as we look back at the targeting of Jews - with disgust, horror and shame. If we do not speak out, we are complicit. Let's stand in solidarity with those targeted by Donald Trump's hateful government, including the people of this country, outside Downing Street and all over Britain. A Downing Street spokeswoman told the Standard they had no further comment on the protest except an invitation for President Trump's UK state visit was "extended and accepted". M ayor Sadiq Khan today warned that Londoners will not support rolling out the red carpet for Donald Trump until the muslim ban is lifted, as one million people called for his state visit to be called off. Amid worldwide protests at his banning of refugees and people from seven mainly Muslim countries from the US, the Mayor of London said Britain must show that it did not endorse the US Presidents actions. That is why we must now rescind the offer of a full state visit for President Trump - until this ban is lifted, said Mr Khan, writing in the Evening Standard. I dont believe the people of London will support rolling out the red carpet until this happens. Great friends must warn each other when they are making a mistake. New leader: US President Donald Trump signs an executive order for the "extreme vetting" of visa seekers from terror-plagued countries / Getty Images An analysis of the parliamentary petition showed around a quarter of the names were from London. Over 6,000 people - one in 20 residents - backed it in Jeremy Corbyns Islington North constituency, according to the parliamentary website. Almost 7,000 in Diane Abbotts consituency backed it. Theresa May was "very happy" to extend the invitation to Donald Trump for the state visit on behalf of the Queen "and we look forward to hosting the President later this year", Downing Street said. One of the few MPs to defend the state visit, South Suffolk Tory James Cartlidge said a bandwagon to stop it just ensures a warmer bear hug for him in Moscow. Most London MPs were condemnatory. Diane Abbott called the executive orders racist while Tulip Siddiq said they were appalling. A formal invitation from the Queen to President Trump was handed over by Theresa May on Friday, a day before he signed an executive order closing Americas doors to millions of people. Protests erupt outside JFK Airport after President Trump's immigration ban He is currently due to arrive in July with wife Melania for a full VIP tour with banquets and a speech to Parliament. In a swirl of confusion and protest against the unprecedented presidential action: * A parliamentary petition calling for the invitation to be torn up passed the one million names milestone shortly before 10am, just a day after it was launched. * Tens of thousands of people were expected to join protests tonight being held in London outside Downing Street and in other cities. * London emerged as the greatest centre of anti-Trump feeling, with around 250,000 Londoners joining the call for his visit to be stopped. * Business leaders and MPs joined the protests - but Downing Street insisted the State visit will go ahead as planned. Heartbreaking stories of refugees being turned away in tears were emerging today, including claims that a US servicemans own mother was held in handcuffs when she tried to enter the country. An Iraqi translator who had helped the US military was also sent away. Airlines were forced to change pilots on some US bound planes, while businesses reported that key staff were unable to attend meetings. Mr Khan said the ban was shameful and cruel would be ultimately self-defeating because it would play into the hands of extremists. He writes: I fear it will be used to act as a recruiting sergeant for so called Isis and other like minded groups. He pointed out that Apple founder Steve Jobs, the son of a Syrian migrant, and eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, whose parents were Iranian, would both have been blocked. And Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai said: I am heartbroken that today President Trump is closing the door on children, mothers and fathers fleeing violence and war. Bosses at AirBnb, Twitter, Uber and Tesla all hit out at Mr Trump. Sir Martin Sorrell, head of WPP, said: As the grandson of Eastern European grandparents, who were admitted to the UK in the very late 19th and early 20th centuries, I have an instinctive dislike of such measures. Starbucks declared it will hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years in response, particularly immigrants who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel. Tory peer Baroness Warsi, who was the first female Muslim cabinet minister, said Mr Trump should not be given the honour of a state visit. We have to question whether, in Britain, this is something that Britain should be doing for a man who has no respect for women, disdain for minorities, little value for LGBT communities, no compassion for the vulnerable and whose policies are rooted in divisive rhetoric, she said. Former Foreign Office Minister Alistair Burt said the optics for the visit to London were very bad and called for it to be postponed. There would undoubtedly be serious demonstrations against President Trump, said the senior Tory MP. He urged Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, to find a reason to postpone it and negotiate a joint statement by both countries. He added: At the moment, the idea of having a visit would seem very uncomfortable to both sides. MPs on both sides savaged President Trump, while Labour accused Mrs May of failing to stand up to him. Green MP Caroline Lucas tweeted it was an attack on Muslims everywhere & Mays weak response shames us all. Downing Street upped the stakes by flatly refusing to reconsider the invitation. A No 10 source said: An invitation has been extended and accepted. It will take place this year, said the source. Boris Johnson said he would be making a Commons statement this afternoon. Whitehall sources made clear that the former Mayor was crucial in ensuring Britons would not be caught by the bans. The former mayor started phoning Trump administration contacts early yesterday and sealed the clarification in a call to Jared Kushner, Trumps senior adviser. Jeremy Corbyns aides claimed credit for the success of the petition to parliament calling for the visit to be cancelled. It stated: Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official state visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen. Just before 10am, it passed a million names and was rising at a rate of two thousand names each minute. It is already the fastest rising petition since online petitions were launched. The biggest was one calling for a second EU referendum which accrued four million names over six months. Mr Khans article makes clear that the visit would only be called off as a gesture since the executive orders are due to expire anyway before the visit. A ban on seven mainly-muslim countries is due to last 90 days, while a bar on refugees is for 120 days. C yclists and residents have called on council chiefs to reconsider road closures in a trendy part of east London which they say will make their lives a "living hell." Residents in Stoke Newington want Hackney Council to alter their plans to close roads around the CS1 cycle route, which links the City to Tottenham. Wordsworth Road, Matthias and Boleyn Road, Wordsworth and Bennett Road, Salcombe Road and Trumans Road were closed to traffic in a bid to reduce congestion around CS1. Campaigners say the closures has forced extra traffic onto already busy roads, such as Stoke Newington High Street, causing road rage rows to erupt between cyclists and motorists. They also fear the increased traffic will lead to a rise in pollution in Stoke Newington, a popular area for families with young children. At a meeting last week, a spokeswoman for one residents' group said: There has been an increase in traffic and congestion due to displaced traffic. Residents have reported multiple incidents of road rage, cars beeping and people shouting due to traffic jams, lay people directing vehicles, motorcycles and cyclists driving along the pavements to avoid the jams. Cycle superhighway: Residents have raised concerns about the cycle path / Shutterstock These are roads where there are lots of children living and nurseries and this is a major safety risk. Vehicle air pollution has been displaced to residential roads north of the closures. Longer journey times of around 10 to 15 minutes are being reported, inevitably increasing pollution. There are schools and nurseries on these roads which poses a danger to the health of children. Nevill Road - a core section of CS1 - is now more dangerous for cyclists due to an increase in the number of vehicles through displacement. In November 2016 a boy was knocked over by a cyclist while crossing the road. We would argue that Wordsworth road was never previously dangerous for cyclists. New mum: Anna Williams says the cycle superhighway has raised concerns over the health of her baby New mum Anna Williams, 29, who lives in Brighton Road, told the Standard she was concerned about taking her three-month-old daughter close to the route over fears pollution would affect her health. She said: When I take her out shes at the same level as the car exhausts in her pram, I worry about her health. There are also often angry drivers beeping their horns and shouting outside our window just after weve got her to sleep and it wakes her up. Its very frustrating. Painter and decorator William Howie, 69, of Cressington Close estate, described how he had become trapped in his own home following the road closures. He said: Its been catastrophic since the closures. People on the school run are blocking us in so we are trapped in our own homes. Its a living hell. I walk a mile a day to drop my grandchildren at school because its easier than driving. It now takes me an extra 15 minutes to leave my house. They need to re-open the roads. Cyclist Jean Morris, 65, of Brighton Road, claimed the new scheme had made the roads more dangerous for cyclists. She said: Its much more dangerous for cyclists and pedestrians. People cant cross CS1 because the cyclists come round too fast. Cars are blocking up the roads and cyclists are driving on the pavement. Its a mess. Responding to concerns Councillor Feryal Demirci told the council: The changes to Wordsworth Road have been designed with the aim of reducing motor traffic in the area. We understand that concerns of traffic displacement, driver frustration and increased congestion have been reported on the local roads north of Palatine Road. "We are holding site visits with residents and are going to carry out full traffic counts surveys from the beginning of February. We will also review parking the area. As already mentioned, we need to understand the full impact of the road closures i.e. analysing traffic counts and residents views before deciding on what to do next. Having dealt with the rat-running in Wordsworth Road, the Council will now look at options to develop something similar for the roads that are experiencing displaced traffic. Options might include measures such as point closures and banned turns. Any proposals will be subject to further consultation. W hen we heard that Donald Trump had signed a ban on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen travelling to the US, The Londoner thought how dull London would be without such people and got out the Smythson to ring a few old friends. First up, the fiery Somalia-born Nimco Ali, writer and campaigner. Unlike Mo Farah, the Queen has not honoured me with a knighthood, says Nimco cheekily. But she and her government gave us safety and a home. Ali arrived in the UK as a child refugee. Today my birth city is the capital of the self-declared independent State of Somaliland, linked to Somalia historically and therefore on the banned list. I am sure there will be some kind of attempt to exempt some of us because we hold a British passport, but as long as those who look like me are not welcomed I stand with them. Actor Andy Serkis, right also known as Gollum and King Kong is the worlds greatest motion-capture specialist and, aptly, great at capturing the emotion. His father was Iraqi. We find ourselves instead with a childish bully at the helm who has put catastrophic, heinous and brutal executive orders into place, one presumes to show off how powerful he is, he says. Many of my own relatives sought refuge abroad. Thank God the world is finally voicing its rage at the election of this hyper-egotistical narcissist. Comedian Omid Djalili, whose parents are from Iran, tweeted: Cant wait to congratulate the [La La Land] film-makers in the States when I see them. Oh, hang on... Editor supreme Tina Brown, whose mother was part-Iraqi, added: Cruelty and chaos are a deadly combination. The shame of treatment of refugees will take decades to expunge. We shall overcomb. Now The Donald has got Cara on his case Hours after Donald Trump announced his exclusionary plans, model Cara Delevingne posted a picture from a recent trip to Uganda, where she had met with Sudanese refugees through her work with UN initiative Girl Up. When I met Janet, Pauline, Florence and Ajah, they had just crossed the border into Uganda with their families, Delevingne wrote on Instagram. They shared their courageous stories of their journeys fleeing South Sudan and their hopes to continue their education. Is this the start of a model revolution? That's how you drown your sorrows Thandie Newton is a woman after The Londoners heart. The actress is back in the spotlight through her role in TV hit Westworld, and her stunning performance led her to be nominated for a Screen Actors Guild award. She failed to take the gong at the ceremony in LA last night she was beaten by fellow Brit Claire Foy but took the defeat with a pinch of salt. And a big glug of Taittinger champagne. How to lose graciously, she posted on Twitter after the event. Cheers, Thandie. Muttleys last laugh on Trump Legendary Spectator and Oldie editor Alexander Chancellor, who died on Saturday aged 77, proposed himself as Trumps assassin in a last, characteristic blast against all that was wrong in the world. Oldie publisher James Pembroke reported his proposition in a letter to Oldie contributors and noted: He would have been far more successful than The Jackal, charming his way past security guards, who would have been disarmed by his beautiful manners, engaging smile and Muttley-like laugh. Chancellor was every journalists dream editor, assembling excellent writers and letting them get on with it. Graham Greene described him as the best editor I have ever worked for, and Charles Moore called him world-class. The Spectator was in free- fall when Chancellor took over as editor in 1975. An ex -Reuters correspondent, he knew nothing about editing print but his mischievous personality transformed the failing title from busted flush to a funny, cynical must-read, notably pairing Takis High Life jet-set antics with Jeffrey Bernards Low Life chronicle of vodka-soaked Soho despair. Chancellors final Long Life column on Trump was in last weeks Spectator. ----- A hair-raising tale from uber PR boss Maria Boyle, who has just been named in Luxury Dailys Women to Watch 2017. Boyle recalls the time her client, colourist Jo Hansford, heard Naomi Campbell was on the way to see her. A Rolls-Royce pulled up with blacked-out windows. The chauffeur walked round the car, opened the door and picked up a box off the back seat and brought it in to the salon... with Naomis wig in it. Apparently she only wanted her fringe piece to be coloured. Eddie award, no kidding Congrats to Oscar-winning actor Eddie Redmayne: the Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them star received the freedom of the City of London on Friday. The honour was conferred at Guildhall, much to the pleasure of several staff, and is awarded after the recipient is nominated by two members of one of the Citys 110 liveries, or by being themselves a member. Freemen are allowed to drive sheep over London Bridge once a year as a celebration of the citys history as a global centre of commerce; it has been awarded to Sir Ian McKellen and Morgan Freeman. Given that Redmayne won the Outstanding Newcomer prize in the Evening Standards 2004 theatre awards for his performance in Edward Albees The Goat, is there a precedent for goat-herding instead? *The original article incorrectly asserted that Eddie Redmayne would appear in the forthcoming revival of The Goat. We apologise for the error.* ----- Page-turner of the day: Stanley Johnson, father of Boris, is to write a book on the skulduggery that may have gone on in the run-up to the Brexit vote. Dont tell BoJo. Follow The Londoner on Twitter and Facebook here. T he Government has rejected calls for Donald Trumps state visit to the UK to be cancelled even as a petition against it approached one million signatures. A spokeswoman for Number 10 told the Standard they had "extended an invitation and it has been accepted, stressing that the position had not changed. Downing Street is said to be worried the petition and threatened protests could undo everything after Prime Minister Theresa Mays talks with the US President last week. Mr Trump has accepted an invite from the Queen to come to the UK later this year but faces an intensifying backlash against his travel ban on refugees and people from Muslim-majority countries. One million people call for Donald Trump's state visit to the UK to be called off The US President signed an executive order on Friday which has halted all immigration to the US from Iran, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, Sudan and Yemen for 90 days. Theresa May visited Donald Trump's White House last week / EPA A petition launched on Saturday by Graham Guest, from Leeds, which states that Mr Trump should be prevented from visiting the UK because it would embarrass the Queen, was well over 980,000 signatures early on Monday morning. Mr Guest said he feared Mr Trump would use the state visit and accompanying photo opportunities with the Queen to bolster his image. He said: "A state visit legitimises his presidency and he will use the photo opportunities and being seen with the Queen to get re-elected. "The wording in the petition is quite precise as I actually say that he should come here as the head of government to do government to government business. "At the end of the day he is still the president and we've just got to live with that. But there's no reason why he should get all the pomp and publicity of a state visit. According to the Parliaments petition website, all submissions that attract more than 100,000 signatures will be considered for a Commons debate. London Mayor Sadiq Khan, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, Lib Dem leader Tim Farron and SNP foreign affairs spokesman Alex Salmond have all called for the trip to be axed, while a huge protest has also been organised for this evening outside Downing Street. The Foreign Office has confirmed Brits with dual citizenship with one of the seven Muslim-majority countries would be exempt from the controversial travel ban. T heresa May was today warned that the Governments obsession with cutting immigration was leading it into a very dangerous place. Scottish Brexit minister Mike Russell issued the warning ahead of crunch talks between the Prime Minister and the leaders of the devolved administrations. Scotlands First Minister Nicola Sturgeon is demanding that the Government carve out a special deal for Scotland to stay in the single market after the UK quits the EU. If Mrs May agreed to such a move, she would inevitably face pressure to support similar arrangements for London which also voted strongly to Remain. Mr Russell stressed that EU freedom of movement was strongly supported in Scotland. He told BBC radio: The obsession with immigration which is driving the UK government, is driving the UK government into a very dangerous place. He called for sensible discussions on Scottish proposals which would see it remain in the single market while quitting the customs union with the rest of the UK. Under the Scottish Governments plans, the documentation of EU migrants would show they are allowed to live in Scotland but not elsewhere in the UK. Ahead of the talks at a Joint Ministerial Committee meeting in Cardiff, Mr Russell warned that we havent got anywhere close to a joint position between the UK Government and the devolved administrations. However, Mrs May won a major victory when the Supreme Court ruled last week that Brexit is a matter for the Westminster government and it did not have to give a say to the Scottish Parliament or devolved assemblies. If she had lost the case, then the Governments timetable to trigger Article 50, to start the two-year process of quitting the EU, could have been thrown into jeopardy. Leading Europhile Tory MP Nicky Morgan today warned MPs against voting to block Article 50, as dozens of Labour, Liberal Democrat and SNP MPs are threatening to do. Failing to pass it wouldnt stop the clock on Brexit, she wrote on ConservativeHome. But it would stir up more public anger, create demand for more extreme views to be voiced, and be a nail in the coffin for our parliamentary democracy. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is facing a damaging revolt after ordering his MPs to vote for Article 50, which has led to a string of resignations including Hampstead and Kilburn MP Tulip Siddiq quitting as shadow education minister. Mrs May has sought to thrash out common positions on leaving the European Union with the devolved administrations. But while hoping that the meeting today would be constructive, she warned they will not agree on everything and stressed MPs from around the UK would get a say on Brexit at Westminster. The United Kingdom voted to leave the EU, and the UK Government has a responsibility to deliver on that mandate and secure the right deal for the whole of the UK, she added. Brexit Secretary David Davis, International Trade Secretary Liam Fox and the Secretaries of State for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland were also attending the talks. Proposals to remain in the single market have also been put forward by Welsh First Minister Carwyn Jones and Plaid Cymru leader Leanne Wood. Sinn Fein leader Michelle ONeill said the Conservatives were attempting to impose Brexit against the will of the people in Northern Ireland. Mrs May will also hold talks in Dublin with Irish Taoiseach Enda Kenny today. F irefighters had to cut free a man who was trapped for hours after faling into a cement mixer in County Durham. The man was cleaning out the machine when he slipped inside and became trapped, the fire service said. Photographs taken at the scene in the village of Quebec, County Durham, show firefighters crowding around the drum of the cement mixer in an attempt to rescue him. The worker was finally freed after two hours and taken by ambulance to the University Hospital of North Durham. Freed: The man was cleaning out the machine when he fell in. / CDD Fire and Rescue A spokeswoman for the County Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue Service said the man fell on his leg and was not able to climb out, Sky News reported. The call came in to the fire brigade at 11.45am on Monday. D ozens of firefighters tackled a blaze at Old Trafford stadium in Manchester as smoke billowed above the stands. Pictures were posted on social media of smoke floating above Manchester United's stadium early on Monday morning. Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service confirmed there was a fire at the ground. They said three fire engines rushed to the scene shortly before 7am to reports of a building on fire on Sir Matt Busby Way. Firefighters found a fire involving electrical equipment in a lift motor room. They isolated the electrics and extinguished the blaze. The fire brigade said the firefighters were wearing breathing apparatus and used a jet and CO2 fire extinguisher to put out the fire. Firefighters had extinguished the fire by 8.30am. The University of Wisconsin System is telling about 130 of its students not to leave the country as a result of President Donald Trumps executive order temporarily barring people from seven Muslim-majority nations from entering the United States. Campus officials have also learned that there is a student currently outside the country who could be affected by the order, spokeswoman Meredith McGlone said Monday. McGlone did not say what nationality the student is or where he or she is, but said UW officials are working with the student. Chancellor Rebecca Blank called for the Trump administration to reconsider the order, writing in a statement that it affects real people researchers, scholars, students and staff who are essential to our goals of providing a world-class education. We call on our leaders to search for a balanced approach that does not weaken our higher education system, the competitiveness of our economy and core principles of our democracy, Blank wrote. The order Trump signed Friday banned migrants and temporary legal U.S. residents from seven countries Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Sudan and Somalia from entering America for 90 days. It also blocked refugees from any country from entering the U.S. for 120 days. About 130 students from the seven countries attend UW System institutions. There are 72 UW-Madison students who fall under the order, campus officials said Monday, along with 16 faculty and staff members. Three such students attend Madison Area Technical College. In an email to affected students and employees Sunday night, UW-Madison Assistant Dean of Students Joshua Moon Johnson said officials dont know exactly how the order affects people who hold visas to study or work at universities in the United States. But Johnson advised that those individuals not travel outside the country, and that they talk with staff in the universitys International Student Services office if they do leave. Johnson said staff members from the office are available to talk with concerned students and employees about the changes from the Trump administration. U S President Donald Trump has said widespread chaos at airports in America was due to a Delta Airlines computer failure, and not his controversial ban on refugees from certain countries. Mr Trump took to Twitter to downplay the number of people affected by his newly-imposed immigration policy saying "there is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country." But he defended the policy saying "there a lot of bad "dudes" out there." It comes as scores of travellers were prevented from entering the US and dozens were detained at US airports after Mr Trump banned refugees from entering the country. Protests erupt outside JFK Airport after President Trump's immigration ban The US President signed an executive order on Friday shutting down the US refugee programme for 120 days and halting all immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries for 90 days. The countries subjected to the restriction are Somalia, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya and Yemen. Severeal well-known names such as Olympic medialist Sir Mo Farah, who was born in Somalia, and the British-Iraqi Conservative MP Nadhim Zahawi would have been affected by the ban but were granted exemptions because of their British citizenship. What did Donald Trump do in his first week as President? The order prompted confusion at Americas airports and triggered mass protests after reports flooded in of chaos at border control with many US residents left in legal limbo. One BBC reporter and Iranian national live tweeteed the moment his passport was allegedly confiscated when he flew into Los Angeles. But on Monday Mr Trump denied his executive order was the cause of big problems at airports blaming Delta airlines computer failure instead. Mr Trump wrote on Twitter: Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,. Bloomberg reported that a Delta Airlines computer breakdown grounded 170 flights leaving passengers stranded across the country. But the Federal Aviation Administration said international flights werent affected. In his flurry of tweets on Monday morning Mr Trump also blasted Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who protested, along with other Democratic lawmakers, at international airports and demanded for clarification of the new law. Mr Trump said: Protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. [Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly] said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN! He added: There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world! "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there!" Mr Trumps refugee policy is facing an intensifying backlash from across the globe with more than a million people signing a petition in protest of his planned state visit to Britain. But Theresa May has dismissed the petition saying she is "very happy" for Mr Trump's planned state visit to Britain to go ahead. Her comments came after London Mayor Sadiq Khan said Londoners would not support "rolling out the red carpet" for Mr Trump until the muslim ban is lifted. Mr Kahn told the Standard:"We must now rescind the offer of a full state visit for President Trump - until this ban is lifted." Delta Airlines have been approached for a comment. F ormer President Barack Obama has praised protesters who amassed across the country in opposition to Donald Trump's immigration orders, breaking his silence on political issues for the first time since leaving office. A spokesman for Mr Obama's said he "fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion". In his first statement on behalf of the former president, Kevin Lewis said Mr Obama was "heartened" by the amount of engagement taking place in US communities. Mr Lewis, a former White House official, pointed out that Mr Obama used his last official speech as president to talk about Americans' responsibility to be "guardians of our democracy," even in non-election years. Former president: It is the first time Obama has commented since Donald Trump took office "Citizens exercising their constitutional right to assemble, organise and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake," Mr Lewis said. Anti-Trump protest outside Downing Street - London Live Mr Lewis did not specifically invoke President Trump's immigration order. But he rejected comparisons between Mr Trump's recent actions and Mr Obama's foreign policy decisions. Thousands of protesters march to Downing Street in Trump rally 1 /48 Thousands of protesters march to Downing Street in Trump rally Caricatures: Unflattering pictures of the UK and US leaders. AFP/Getty Images 'No to racism': Protesters outside Downing Street. AFP/Getty Images Demo: Crowds packed out Whitehall to Parliament Square. PA Thousands: Westminster police tweeted this photo. MPS Westminster 'One nationality': Many signs carried pro immigration messages. REUTERS Dogs against Trump: One protester takes a break at the Westminster rally. REUTERS Speaker: Shadow Attorney General Shami Chakrabarti speaking to the crowd. Getty Images 'Full of garbage': A sign in Downing Street. Getty Images Prime Minister: Many banners carried messages targeting Theresa May, Getty Images 'Dump Trump': The signs carried personal attacks on the US President. Getty Images No Trump: Protesters chant and march. Getty Images Never again: Some posters looked back to the past. AFP/Getty Images Packed: Many protesters remarked at the amount of people. AFP/Getty Images Standstill: Buses had to divert because of the crowds. PA Anger: People demonstrate during a protest at Downing Street in central London. PA Crowds: Hordes of people took to the streets. Getty Images Anti-Trump: Thousands of people have slammed the President's policy. Getty Images Messages for May: Demonstrators hold placards as they protest outside Downing Street. Getty Images 'Never again': Demonstrators march along Downing Street. Getty Images 'Muslim ban': Londoners marched with placards with messages for the PM. Getty Images NO: The anti-Trump rally spilled onto the road. Getty Images Humour: A sign drawing on a Mary Poppins pun. Caroline Lee Chants: The crowds were heard chanting 'shame on May'. Getty Images Welcome refugees: Protesters on Monday evening. PA Landmark: The iconic London eye seen in the background. PA 'Dangerous': One of the anti-Trump protesters. Lydia Ruffles Anti-Trump: Signs carried harsh words for the US leader. Emma Gibson Blocked: Protesters said Whitehall was brought to a standstill. Garry Knight 'Resist': A sign in Whitehall. Spectrum SINO Radio 'Bridges not walls': Many of the banners carried pro-globalization messages. Jessica Voorsanger Rally: The first crowds forming at the protest, which began at 6pm. Garry Knight United: Stop the War Coalition joined the protest. PA Gathered: People listened to speakers who fired up the crowd. Getty Images We stand together: Among the figures who were expected to attend were Lily Allen and Ed Miliband. Getty Images March: Some of the protesters holding placards. Getty Images Together: People of all ages joined in the rally. Getty Images President Trump said he took cues from Mr Obama by temporarily banning travel to the US from citizens of seven countries that the former President's administration identified as places of terrorism concern. But Mr Obama's designation related strictly to eligibility to enter the US without a visa; he never considered a travel ban. Loading.... Mr Obama's office also circulated excerpts from a speech the former president gave in November 2015, in which he called the idea of a ban on Muslims "shameful". The Obama Family Album - In pictures 1 /64 The Obama Family Album - In pictures Michelle, Sasha, Barack and Malia Obama Michelle Obama/Instagram @BarackObama via Twitter Michelle Obama tweets out a photo on 18 January 2017 'Being your First Lady has been the honor of a lifetime. From the bottom of my heart, thank you. -mo @FLOTUS Michelle Obama tweets out an old family photo 'So proud of @POTUS and all that we've accomplished together. An incredible journey filled with remarkable people. I love you Barack. -mo @FLOTUS Michelle Obama tweets out a photo on 19 January 2017 'Thank you for the birthday wishes and for the greatest gift of all: the opportunity to serve as your First Lady. @FLOTUS 10 Jan 2017: US First Lady Michelle Obama (C) and US President Barack Obama greet supporters as daughter Malia looks on after the President delivered his farewell address in Chicago, Illinois Joshua Lott/AFP/Getty Images 10 Jan 2017: President Barack Obama wipes his tears as he speaks at McCormick Place in Chicago Charles Rex Arbogast/AP 21 August 2016: Barack, First Lady Michelle and daughters Malia and Sasha walk to board Air Force One at Cape Cod Air Force Station in Massachusetts on as they depart for Washington after a two-week holiday at nearby Martha's Vineyard Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images 4 July 2016: US President Barack Obama hugs his daughter Malia on her birthday during an Independence Day Celebration for military members and administration staff in the White House Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images 22 April 2016: Prince George meets the President of the United States and the First Lady Michelle at Kensington Palace, as the Duke of Cambridge looks on Kensington Palace/Pete Souza/The White House 22 April 2016: Prince George talks to his mother, the Duchess of Cambridge after meeting the Obamas Pete Souza/Kensington Palace via AP 12 May 2015: "The First Lady demonstrates her boxing skills during a #GimmeFive video taping" Amanda Lucidon/The White House 27 March 2015: "The First Lady snuggles against the President during a video taping for the World Expo in the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House" Amanda Lucidon/The White House 26 Nov 2015: President Barack Obama makes Thanksgiving Day phone calls from the Oval Office to U.S. troops stationed around the world Pete Souza/The White House 23 March 2014: "A great moment captured by Amanda Lucidon of the First Lady and daughters Sasha and Malia during their visit to the Great Wall of China" Amanda Lucidon/The White House 14 April 2014: A spontaneous moment is captured between the First Lady as she hugs the family dogs Sunny and Bo Amanda Lucidon/The White House 16 June 2014: Barack and Michelle walk across the South Lawn from Marine One following a trip to California Pete Souza/The White House 21 Jan 2013: President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama ride in the inaugural parade in Washington Pete Souza/The White House 4 Sept 2012: Obama with his daughters Malia and Sasha, watch on television as first lady Michelle Obama takes the stage to deliver her speech at the Democratic National Convention Pete Souza/The White House 9 July 2012: President Barack Obama plays with Sarah Froman, daughter of Nancy Goodman and Mike Froman, Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economics, in the Oval Office Pete Souza/The White House June 2012: Bo and Sunny, the Obama family dogs, on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington. Sunny arrived on this day from Michigan. Pete Souza/The White House 26 Oct 2012: "The President to be caught in Spider-Man's web as he greets the Nicholas Tamarin, 3, just outside the Oval Office. Spider-Man had been trick-or-treating for an early Halloween with his father, White House aide Nate Tamarin in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. I can never commit to calling any picture my favorite, but the President told me that this was HIS favorite picture of the year when he saw it hanging in the West Wing a couple of weeks later." Pete Souza/The White House 18 June 2012: "The First Lady reacts as she watches Laura Jarrett and Tony Balkissoon take their vows during their wedding at Valerie Jarrett's home in Chicago" Pete Souza/The White House 20 May 2012: "'How cool is this,' the President said after he threw a football at Soldier Field following the NATO working dinner in Chicago. I think he was especially excited to be on the home turf of his beloved Chicago Bears." Pete Souza/The White House 1 Feb 2012: The President holding Arianna Holmes, 3, before taking a departure photo with members of her family in the Oval Office Lawrence Jackson/The White House 1 Jan 2012: US President Barack Obama swims in the ocean in his native state of Hawaii Pete Souza/The White House 15 Dec 2011: President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama descend the Grand Staircase to greet guests at a holiday reception in the Grand Foyer of the White House Pete Souza/The White House 11 Dec 2011: The Obamas sit for a family portrait in the Oval Office in Washington Pete Souza/The White House 9 Dec 2010: President Barack Obama, with mother-in-law Marian Robinson, daughters Sasha and Malia, and First Lady Michelle Obama, push the button to light the National Christmas Tree during a ceremony on the Ellipse in Washington Chuck Kennedy/The White House 21 Sep 2010; President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama walk along the Colonnade of the White House Pete Souza/The White House 8 Aug 2010: President Barack Obama sits with daughter Sasha during a barbecue with family and friends in celebration of his 49th birthday on the South Lawn of the White House Pete Souza/The White House 30 Oct 2009: Barack Obama Playing peek-aboo with the daughter of one of his staff Pete Souza/The White House 13 Oct 2009: The President starts dancing to the music at the Fiesta Latina event on the South Lawn of the White House. Sasha is by his side. Pete Souza/The White House 26 Aug 2009: President Barack Obama plays basketball with White House staffers while on vacation on Martha's Vineyard Pete Souza/The White House 14 Aug 2009: Local fishing guide Dan Vermillion reacts as President Obama hooks a trout on the East Gallatin River near Belgrade. The President hooked about 6 fish, but did not land any during his first fly fishing outing. Pete Souza/The White House 29 July 2009: President Barack Obama eats a nectarine following a town hall meeting at Kroger's Supermarket in Bristol, Vancouver Pete Souza/The White House 7 July 2009: "Family dinner is usually private time. But I heard they were having dinner a the top their hotel in Moscow, which overlooked the Kremlin. When they first sat down, Sasha was just having some fun with her dad" Pete Souza/The White House 12 May 2009: Obama plays football with the family dog Bo on the South Lawn of the White House Pete Souza/The White House 3 May 2009: President Barack Obama walks down the Colonnade with his arms around daughters, Malia and Sasha Pete Souza/The White House 19 May 2009: "The President was leaving the State Floor after an event and found Sasha in the elevator ready to head upstairs to the private residence. He decided to ride upstairs with her before returning to the Oval Office." Pete Souza/The White House 4 April 2009: President Barack Obama plays with a football in the Oval Office Pete Souza/The White House 2 March 2009: "Washington had its first big snowstorm and I knew the girls were home from school. I suspected the girls might try to sled or make a snowman, so I asked the Usher's Office to call me if the girls headed outside. I got there just in time to catch the First Lady helping the girls sled down a hill on the South Lawn. This picture now hangs on the wall of the President's study" Pete Souza/The White House 20 Jan 2009: US President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama, with staff and secret service, ride a freight elevator to get to one of the 10 inaugural balls in Washington, D.C Pete Souza/The White House Sep 2009: President Barack Obama runs down the East Colonnade with family dog 'Bo' Pete Souza/The White House 20 Jan 2009: President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama ride in a golf cart at an Inaugural Ball Pete Souza/The White House 20 Jan 2009: Barack and Michelle dance Mark Wilson/Getty Images 20 Jan 2009: A close embrace from the Obamas as they dance Carolyn Kaster/AP 28 Oct 1992: Barack Obama and his bride Michelle Robinson, a fellow Harvard Law School graduate on their wedding day in Chicago, Illinois Obama for America/AP "That's not American. That's not who we are. We don't have religious tests to our compassion," Mr Obama said in the aftermath of attacks in Paris that prompted calls for the US to restrict Syrian refugees from entering the United States. President Trump and the White House have vigorously disputed the notion that Mr Trump's order is a "Muslim ban". The order halts all refugee admissions for 120 days, suspends the Syrian refugee programme indefinitely and also suspends entry to the US from seven majority-Muslim countries for 90 days. Protest: Thousands of demonstrators opposing the ban marched to Downing Street / AFP/Getty Images But the White House has stressed that dozens of other Muslim-majority countries are not included. Mr Lewis's comments mark the first time Mr Obama has weighed in on President Trump's actions since he left office on January 20. In his final weeks as president, Mr Obama said he planned to follow George W Bush's example by giving his successor room to govern without being second-guessed. Yet Mr Obama pointedly reserved the right to speak out if President Trump violated what Mr Obama called basic American values. He suggested a ban on Muslims or a move by President Trump to deport immigrants brought to the US illegally as children would cross that threshold. M ore than 1.3 million people have signed a petition in protest at Donald Trumps planned state visit to Britain. The new US president has faced an intensifying backlash in the UK after he imposed a travel ban on refugees and people from Muslim-majority countries. The Government petition launched by Graham Guest, from Leeds, passed 100,000 signatures on Sunday afternoon the target needed for MPs to consider holding a debate on it in the House of Commons. By Monday morning, it had been signed by more than one million people. And just before 4pm it had swelled to 1.33m. More than 1m people have signed the petition A statement on the petition's website reads: "Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen." Mr Trump accepted an invitation to visit Britain later this year, where he is due to be hosted by the Queen and would be treated to all the pomp and ceremony accorded to a state visit. Petition to ban Donald Trump from UK passes 1 million signatures / Getty Images Downing Street has insisted the UK will go ahead with the visit despite widespread outrage over Mr Trumps travel ban on Muslims and refugees. It said its position had not changed on the US president's trip as Theresa May came under pressure to downgrade or axe the visit. Donald Trump and Theresa May walk hand in hand / EPA "An invitation has been extended and accepted," a Number 10 spokesman said, stressing the position had not changed. London Mayor Sadiq Khan, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, Lib Dem leader Tim Farron and SNP foreign affairs spokesman Alex Salmond have all called for the trip to be axed. It is the second most popular government petition in history. A petition demanding a second EU referendum signed by more than four million people is currently the largest. Mr Trump's travel ban has been condemned around the globe. Protests have been planned around the world, including in major UK cities on Monday evening, while Hollywood stars hit out at the policy at the Screen Actors Guild in Los Angeles on Sunday. Up to 18,000 Londoners have pledged to attend an emergency demo and march to Downing Street from 6pm on Monday evening in protest at the policy. The executive order, signed on Friday, put a temporary stop to the US's refugee programme, indefinitely banned Syrian refugees, and suspended all nationals from six other Muslim-majority countries - Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. The US president's team told Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson that Britons who have shared nationality with one of the seven mainly-Muslim countries covered by the restrictions would not be stopped from entering America. But UK dual citizens travelling to the United States directly from one of the banned countries will face extra checks. Mr Johnson spent Sunday speaking to the president's senior adviser Jared Kushner and chief strategist Stephen Bannon about the implications of immigration curbs. B ritish stars led the protests as a host of Hollywood actors voiced their anger at Donald Trumps travel ban. On the red carpet at the Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles, actor Dev Patel branded Mr Trumps executive order as horrible and divisive. The Lion and Slumdog Millionaire leading man said he found it utterly devastating that the president has barred entry to nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries. I just flew in from India a day ago. When I heard the news it was utterly devastating, he said. SAG Awards get political as actors turn on Trump The first thing that came into my head was the children who arrive on these shores with hope in their hearts. Its horrible. Its divisive, he added. I hope something changes and something can be done because it really is terrible. London-born Patel, 26, was nominated for best supporting actor in the film Lion, the true story of Saroo Brierley, a young Indian boy who was separated from his family and adopted in Australia. The awards show was dominated by the number of stars speaking out against the new presidents immigration policy. Screen Actors Guild Awards 2017 - In pictures 1 /58 Screen Actors Guild Awards 2017 - In pictures Emma Stone accepts her award for Female Actor in a Leading Role for La La Land during the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards Mike Blake/Reuters The cast of "Stranger Things" poses with the awards they won for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama SerieS Mario Anzuoni/Reuters Meryl Streep and Ryan Gosling Rex Features Nicole Kidman, from right, presents Taraji P. Henson, and Janelle Monae with the award for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture for "Hidden Figures" Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP Nick Sandow, from left, Elizabeth Rodriguez, Selenis Leyva, Diane Guerrero, Jackie Cruz, Lori Petty and Yael Stone pose in the press room with the award for outstanding performance by an ensemble in a comedy series for "Orange Is The New Black" Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP John Lithgow, winner of the award for outstanding performance by a male actor in a drama series for "The Crown", left, and Claire Foy, winner of the award for outstanding performance by a female actor in a drama series for "The Crown" Invision/AP Denzel Washington accepts the award for outstanding performance by a male actor in a leading role for "Fences" Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP Emma Stone Christopher Polk/Getty Images Taraji P. Henson Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Nicole Kidman and husband Keith Urban Mario Anzuoni/Reuters Naomie Harris Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Thandie Newton arrives at the 23rd annual Screen Actors Guild Awards Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Kirsten Dunst Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Chrissy Teigen and John Legend Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP Meryl Streep Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Michelle Dockery Matt Sayles/Invision/AP Amy Adams Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Salma Hayek Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Brie Larson Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Emily Blunt Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images Dolly Parton Mike Blake/Reuters Viola Davis accepts Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role for 'Fences' Kevin Winter/Getty Images Mahershala Ali accepts the award for outstanding performance by a male actor in a supporting role for "Moonlight" Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP Lily Tomlin poses in the press room with the Lifetime Achievement Award Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Bryan Cranston accepts his award for Male Actor in Television Movie or Limited Series for "All The Way" Mike Blake/Reuters Millie Bobby Brown Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP Matt Smith and Claire Foy Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Kerry Washington Mario Anzuoni/Reuters Ariel Winter Frederic J BrownAFP/Getty Images Maisie Williams Mario Anzuoni/Reuters Natalie Portman Natalie Portman Kate Hudson Getty Images Kaley Cuoco Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Sofia Vergara Mario Anzuoni/Reuters Julia Louis-Dreyfus Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images Talulah Riley Paul Buck/EPA Simon Helberg and Jocelyn Towne display protest signs against the U.S. policy of temporarily barring refugees and citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Yara Shahidiand Tracee Ellis Ross Matt Sayles/Invision/AP Mayim Bialik Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP Jonah Hill Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Jeff Bridges and Susan Geston Matt Sayles/Invision/AP Rashida Jones Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Bryce Dallas Howard Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Gwendoline Christie Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP Star Wars actor Riz Ahmed, born in Wembley, urged people to make your voices heard and revealed he knew people hit by the US travel ban, which affects nationals from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Now is not a time for escapism, he said. If people care about the future of this country and the world ... its time to make your voices heard. Ahmed, 34, also said he had launched a campaign to help young Syrian refugees. The Rogue One star, whose parents moved to the UK from Pakistan, was nominated for best actor in a limited TV series for HBO crime drama The Night Of. Ashton Kutcher set the tone for the evening in his opening speech, saying: Everyone at airports who belong in my America, you are a part of the fabric of who we are we welcome you. Platform: Julia Louis-Dreyfus spoke out during her speech / Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images Veep actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus, whose father was an immigrant from Nazi-occupied France, added: The immigrant ban is a blemish and its un-American. We are grateful for them, we stand with them, and we will fight for them. Mahershala Ali, who won the best supporting actor award for his role in Moonlight, said: My mother is an ordained minister, Im a Muslim; she didnt do back-flips when I converted 17 years ago. "But Ill tell you now, we put things to the side, I was able to see her, she was able to see me. We love each other, the love is real, and that stuff in minutiae, its not that important. Actor Simon Helberg and his wife had a clear message for Mr Trump. The Big Bang Theory star held a placard with Refugees Welcome while Jocelyn Towne had Let Them In written across her chest. Emma Stone, named best actress for La La Land, said: Im so grateful to be part of a group of people that cares and wants to reflect things back to society. C laire Foy was among the winners at the Screen Actors Guild Awards as she picked up another gong for playing the young Queen in The Crown. The British star, 32, won the prize for outstanding performance by an actress in a TV drama series. It follows her win at the Golden Globes earlier this month. Her co-star John Lithgow, who plays Winston Churchill in the Netflix series, was overlooked at the Globes but won best actor at last nights SAG awards. However The Crown was beaten to the ensemble cast prize by fellow Netflix show Stranger Things. SAG Awards 2017 - the dresses 1 /54 SAG Awards 2017 - the dresses SAG Awards 2017 Kirsten Dunst, Emma Stone, Nicole Kidman, Chrissy Teigen and Natalie Portman Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Thandie Newton wearing Schiaparelli Couture Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Sophia Bush wearing Marchesa Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Salma Hayek wearing Gucci Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Nicole Kidman wearing Gucci Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Natalie Portman Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Claire Foy wearing Valentino Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Sophie Turner wearing Louis Vuitton Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Emma Stone wearing Alexander McQueen Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Michelle Dockery wearing Elie Saab Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Janelle Monae wearing Chanel Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Millie Bobby Brown wearing custom Emporio Armani Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Kaley Cuoco wearing Marchesa Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Taylor Schilling wearing Adeam Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Chrissy Teigen Getty Images for TNT SAG Awards 2017 Rashida Jones wearing Vivienne Westwood Couture Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Octavia Spencer wearing Tadashi Shoji Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Kate Hudson wearing Christian Dior Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Kirsten Dunst wearing Christian Dior Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Michelle Williams wearing Louis Vuitton Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Naomie Harris wearing Lanvin Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Rebecca Romijn Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Ellie Kemper wearing Wai Ming Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Julie Bowen wearing J. Mendel Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Taraji P. Henson wearing Reem Acra Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Kerry Washington wearing Roberto Cavalli Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Yara Shahidi wearing Naeem Khan Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Winona Ryder wearing custom Ryan Roche Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Felicity Huffman wearing Antonio Grimaldi Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Emily Blunt wearing Roberto Cavalli Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Viola Davis wearing Vivienne Westwood Couture Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Maisie Williams Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Gwendoline Christie wearing Vivienne Westwood Couture Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Meryl Streep wearing Valentino AFP/Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Brie Larson wearing Jason Wu Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Evan Rachel Wood wearing Altuzarra Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Sofia Vergara wearing Zuhair Murad Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Sarah Paulson wearing custom Vera Wang Getty Images for TNT SAG Awards 2017 Angela Sarafyan wearing Zac Posen Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Amanda Peet wearing Michael Kors Collection Getty Images SAG Awards 2017 Cara Buono wearing Georges Hobeika Getty Images The sci-fi programme, set in the Eighties, stars Winona Ryder and a young cast led by British star Millie Bobby Brown. Downton Abbey, which ended in December 2015, also missed out on the prize, its final chance for a SAG award. SAG Awards get political as actors turn on Trump At the ceremony in Los Angeles, Foy paid tribute to another co-star, Matt Smith, who played Prince Philip. Thank you for making this job a joy and making me laugh, she said. It was one of the few acceptance speeches that did not criticise Donald Trump. Big win: Emma Stone won the award for Best Actress / Getty Images In the battle for best actor, Denzel Washington, star of Fences, beat Manchester By The Seas Casey Affleck. Emma Stone was named best actress for La La Land. The cast of Hidden Figures were the surprise winners of the best ensemble prize, beating Manchester By The Sea and Moonlight after La La Land missed out on a nomination. Viola Davis won best supporting actress for her performance opposite Washington in Fences, while Mahershala Ali was named best supporting actor for his role in coming-of-age drama Moonlight. Bryan Cranston won the award for best actor in a limited series or TV movie for his portrayal of former US president Lyndon B Johnson in HBO film All The Way. Dolly Parton presented her co-star from Nine To Five, Lily Tomlin, with the SAG Life Achievement Award. She told the audience: Dont be anxious about missing an opportunity. Behind every failure is an opportunity someone wishes they had missed. E mma Watson and Miles Teller were originally lined up to star in La La Land but lost out on the roles. The stars are thought to have been in talks to play the parts that eventually went to Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling, but were unable to reach an agreement with producers. According to Page Six, British actress Watson needed rehearsals to take place in London, because of her schedule. They jumped through hoops to make it work with her, but she just didnt feel the film was right for her, a source told the publication. Lost out: Miles Teller was originally set to star in La La Land ( Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images for BFI) / Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images for BFI Watson is thought to have eventually pulled out of the film to take the lead role in Disneys Beauty and the Beast. Teller, who was the star of Damien Chazelles 2015 hit Whiplash, reportedly had a dispute with producers over pay. Ryan Gosling speaks to ES about the new movie La La Land Teller was offered $4 million to star in La La Land, but he wanted $6 million, said the insider. Teller has since tweeted to disagree with the claims, dubbing the reports alternative facts. Both stars are reportedly freaking out over the fact that they missed out on the parts, which have earned both Gosling and Stone Oscar nominations. La La Land has equalled the record for the most Oscar nominations ever for a single film, gaining the same number as Titanic and All About Eve. Evening Standard Online has contacted representatives for Teller, while Watsons representative declined to comment. Can the energy of last weekends post-inaugural march be channeled into electoral politics? This question becomes more urgent as President Trump lays the ground for wrecking-ball policies that will weaken America at home and abroad. Having recently returned from Hong Kong, I suggest that protest organizers study the approach of young activists there against a far more fearsome opponent the communist government in China. When their massive demonstrations failed to budge Beijing, they tried a very different tack. To understand their achievements, a little history is needed. Hong Kong, with its fabulous harbor and elegant skyscrapers set against Victoria Peak, was handed back to China by British colonial masters in 1997. China agreed to let the city retain its capitalist economy and many democratic freedoms for 50 years including legislative elections, an independent judiciary, and a free press. Under this one country, two systems dispensation, the chief executive of Hong Kong was ultimately supposed to be chosen by universal suffrage. Bit by bit, China has encroached on those freedoms squeezing educators, the judiciary, and the media even kidnapping four booksellers who printed books critical of the Beijing government. Beijings advance rejection of fully democratic elections for the chief executive in 2017 led tens of thousands of Hong Kong students and other pro-democracy activists to take to the streets in the 2014 Umbrella Revolution. For 79 days the activists peacefully occupied major thoroughfares, clearing their trash each day and using umbrellas to fend off tear gas and rain. Ultimately, the activists lost. China stood firm, the protesters dispersed, and Beijing further curbed Hong Kong freedoms. After the Umbrella Revolution, people were discouraged. They felt helpless, recalled Nathan Law, a slim, bespectacled 23-year-old. Then head of the Hong Kong student union, he was a key protest organizer. Support for the democratic movement had grown, but people were tired of expressing that by protesting. Distraught, divided among themselves, the organizers could have given up. There was much finger-pointing between more radical elements and traditional democracy activists. But finally, says Law, the various factions took the long view they would try to change the system from within. A core group of people became very active in electoral politics, Law told me. They organized new pro-democracy parties (including Demosisto, which Law chairs) to run for seats for Hong Kongs Legislative Council last September. This was David vs. Goliath without the slingshot, says Margaret Ng, a Hong Kong lawyer and longtime democracy activist. The young people helped organize the largest voter turnout since 1997, which handed pro-democracy forces 55 percent of the popular vote. Beijing-imposed rules prevented them from gaining a majority of the 70 seats, but the 29 they won are sufficient to block government changes to parliamentary rules or Hong Kongs constitution. Moreover, unlike previous pro-democracy candidates who sought to work within China-imposed rules, six people under age 40 were elected on platforms that called for self-determination for Hong Kong. One of them was Law, the youngest of them all. The story doesnt end there, however, and the struggle has only gotten tougher. Under Beijing pressure, two of the six young lawmakers have been expelled from the council for failure to swear allegiance to Beijing using the mandatory oath. Four others, including Law, have been taken to court on charges that they, too, failed to deliver the oath properly even though they had already been officially sworn in. I said every word of the oath, Law told me, in his legislative office whose windows look out at ships in the harbor. But I also quoted words from Gandhi, saying I will not obey a regime that murdered the people. If Law loses his case, he will have to pay onerous court costs and return all the salary he has received. His parents are blue-collar workers who dont have money to help him. I could be bankrupt before I graduate from university, he says. This is an example to others in the future. When I asked him how he sleeps at night, he responded with incredible calmness. Im not blindly optimistic, he said. But it is important to recognize that we are fighting a long battle and everything we do gains a little for the future. I am not afraid of being defeated as long as we have the courage to continue the war. Was he worried that the election of Donald Trump would mean less U.S. support for democracy movements elsewhere? People here believe in liberalism and freedom, he said, and are a bit disappointed in the U.S. elections but I still have to see how it goes. Democracy has a self-remedying capacity, checks and balances, and you can kick people out who rule badly. It is time for that factor to shine. Laws message should be taken to heart by those who fear a Trump presidency. Hong Kong activists swapped protests for participation in electoral politics despite immense odds. They were successful but now must keep struggling. They deserve our support, and U.S. government attention. As Margaret Ng put it: Hong Kong is not a sideshow. It is the only city in China with rule of law. More than that, with their determined entry into local politics Hong Kongs pro-democracy activists offer a road map for how their American counterparts should proceed. NEW ORLEANS U.S. auto dealers gathered for their annual convention in New Orleans said they want President Donald Trump to ease federal regulation of vehicle emissions and consumer lending, reversing action taken by his predecessor. Former President Barack Obama enacted rules requiring automakers to roughly double the average fuel efficiency of their U.S. car and truck fleets to 54.5 miles per gallon by 2025. Consumers, however, are buying more SUVs and trucks amid low gasoline prices and shunning smaller, more fuel-efficient cars. Mark Scarpelli, the National Automobile Dealers Association's new chairman and owner of General Motors Co dealerships in northern Illinois, said the technology needed to improve fuel efficiency can add $1,500 to $3,000 to a vehicle's price. "You inflate the price of the vehicle and a car that was maybe within reach of being affordable now may not be," Scarpelli said. He added that a "different phase-in period" for the rules could be a better option. U.S. auto dealers have a strong lobby in Washington, due largely to their engagement with and support for local congressmen. They are also aligned on the fuel emissions issue with U.S. automakers. "We need to lighten the load because the government is trying to force manufacturers to make cars people don't even want," said Sidney DeBoer, founder of dealer group Lithia Motors Inc Speaking at the NADA convention, Ford Motor Co. Chief Executive Mark Fields said that when he and other auto industry CEOs met with Trump last week they told him that "various studies showed that up to 1 million jobs could be at risk if we're not given some level of flexibility on that to align with market realities." Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, Trump's choice to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, has said he will review the Obama administration's decision to lock in the fuel efficiency rules. "They've got to make regulation more in line with consumer demand so (the automakers) can build what people want and not what the government's telling them they have to build," said Pete DeLongchamps, vice president of Group 1 Automotive Inc., which owns a networks of dealers. In interviews on the sidelines of the NADA convention, dealers also said they are keen to see a loosening of lending restrictions put in place by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The CFPB does not regulate dealers directly, but does regulate the lenders they partner with and has pushed banks and automakers' finance arms to institute policies aimed at preventing discrimination based on race. These policies could have the effect of limiting the potential profit dealers make on loans they sell. NEW YORK Most U.S. corporate bosses have stayed silent on President Donald Trump's immigration curbs, underscoring the sensitivities around opposing policies that could provoke a backlash from the White House. While the leaders of Apple Inc., Google and Facebook Inc. emailed their staff to denounce the suspension of the U.S. refugee program and the halting of arrivals from seven Muslim-majority countries, many of their counterparts in other industries either declined comment or responded with company statements reiterating their commitment to diversity. The difference in response shows the pressure large swathes of corporate America faces to avoid tussling publicly with the new administration. Companies such as aircraft maker Boeing Co. and automakers Ford Motor Co. and General Motors Co. have already had run-ins with Trump over other issues, and they have much at stake in policy decisions that the administration will make on tax, trade and regulatory matters. Before office, Trump attacked Boeing over the cost of the future Air Force One program. Boeing Chief Executive Officer Dennis Muilenburg met with him earlier this month and said he and Trump had made progress on the Air Force One issue and the potential sale of fighter aircraft. Representatives from Boeing, General Motors and Ford declined to comment on Trump's immigration curbs. Wall Street, meanwhile, is hoping the new administration will ease some of the regulations introduced in the wake of the 2007-08 financial crisis and adopt a lighter touch in their enforcement. Industries including banking, health care and auto manufacturing "see themselves on the cusp of a new era of deregulation, and they do not want to do anything that would offend the new emperor," said Cornelius Hurley, director of Boston University's Center for Finance, Law & Policy. Trump had targeted both the tech industry and Wall Street during his presidential campaign, but once elected, he tapped former investment bankers, hedge fund managers and private equity investors to join his administration. With friends in high places, Wall Street may have less reason to be as outspoken about the new restrictions. "Bankers have direct access to this White House," said Erik Gordon, who teaches at the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business. "They don't have to protest publicly." Representatives of Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Citigroup Inc., Bank of America Corp. and Morgan Stanley declined to comment on Trump's immigration order. Wells Fargo & Co. said in a statement that it was reviewing the executive order and its implications for staff and its business. JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s Operating Committee, which includes CEO Jamie Dimon, sent a note to staff saying it was reaching out to all employees affected and noted that the country was, "strengthened by the rich diversity of the world around us." To be sure, some CEOs were more outspoken. Nike Inc. CEO Mark Parker said the company did not support the executive order. "Nike believes in a world where everyone celebrates the power of diversity," he said in a statement. "Those values are being threatened by the recent executive order in the U.S. banning refugees, as well as visitors, from seven Muslim-majority countries." Brent Saunders, CEO of U.S. drugmaker Allergan Plc, tweeted: "Oppose any policy that puts limitations on our ability to attract the best & diverse talent." But many boardrooms kept quiet. Representatives for some energy companies, including Exxon Mobil Corp., for example, declined to comment. Good corporate citizens As the idea of corporate social responsibility has taken root, so companies have increasingly championed a range of causes, including gay rights, diverse workplaces and a global view. Many in corporate America are still trying to work out how to deal with a new government that takes a more conservative stance on some social issues and has an anti-globalization platform. Those non-tech companies that did issue statements over the weekend tended to emphasize their role as good corporate citizens rather than openly criticize Trump's policies. Starbucks Corp. CEO Howard Schultz has put the coffee chain in the national spotlight before, asking customers not to bring guns into stores and urging conversations on race relations. In a letter to employees, he said Starbucks was developing plans to hire 10,000 refugees over five years across dozens of countries, but he did not directly criticize Trump's order. "I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack," he wrote. In his statement, General Electric Co. CEO Jeff Immelt told staff that the company would engage with the U.S. government. "We will continue to make our voice heard with the new administration and Congress, and reiterate the importance of this issue to GE and to the business community overall," he wrote. One of the most immediate ways for corporate bosses to communicate with Trump about the immigration order will be the first meeting of his advisory panel of business leaders next week. Of the 19 leaders on that panel, only two, Elon Musk, who founded Tesla Motors Inc. and SpaceX, and Travis Kalanick, CEO of Uber Technologies Inc., have spoken out against Trump's immigration curbs. A spokeswoman for Stephen Schwarzman, the billionaire chief executive of Blackstone Group LP whom Trump tasked to set up and chair the panel, declined to comment. Additional reporting by Olivia Oran, Dan Freed, Lauren Hirsch, Lawrence Delevingne and Gui Qing Koh in New York, Joe White in Detroit and David Shepardson in Washington. SAN FRANCISCO Silicon Valley took the lead over the weekend in corporate resistance to President Donald Trump's clampdown on immigration, financing legal opposition, criticizing the plan, as well as helping employees ensnared by his executive order. In an industry that has long depended on immigrants and celebrated their contributions as well as championing liberal causes such as gay rights there was little initial consensus on exactly how to respond to Trump's move on Friday. But, while most in the tech industry stopped short of directly criticizing the new Republican president, they went much further than their counterparts in other sectors, who were mostly silent over the weekend. Most of the major U.S. banks and auto companies, for example, declined to comment in response to Reuters inquiries. Trump ordered a temporary ban on travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries and a 120-day halt to refugee resettlement. The action triggered a global backlash, and sowed confusion and anger after immigrants, refugees and visitors were kept off flights and left stranded in airports. Bigger companies such as Apple Inc., Google and Microsoft Corp. offered legal aid to employees affected by the order, according to letters sent to staff. Several Silicon Valley executives donated to legal efforts to support immigrants facing the ban. And Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk and Uber head Travis Kalanick both said on Twitter that they would take industry concerns about immigration to Trump's business advisory council, where they serve. Kalanick has faced opposition on social media for agreeing to be part of the advisory group. Kalanick in a Facebook post on Sunday called the immigration ban "wrong and unjust" and said that Uber would create a $3 million fund to help drivers with immigration issues. Among those affected by the ban was Khash Sajadi, the British-Iranian chief executive of San Francisco-based tech company Cloud 66, who was stuck in London. Like many tech workers, he holds an H1B visa, which enables foreigners with special expertise to work for U.S. companies. Sajadi said he hoped big tech companies such as Google and Facebook would take legal action to protect affected employees. That could help set a precedent for people in similar situations but at smaller companies. "Ultimately, I think them simply speaking up is not going to move the needle with people" who are not wealthy and do not live on the East or West coasts, he said. 'Tech against Trump' protest The response from tech companies has been "as forceful as it possibly can be," said Eric Talley, a corporate law professor at Columbia Law School. "One of the difficult aspects of reaction to the Trump administration in its first couple of weeks is trying to balance the interest of expressing legitimate concern ... against the potential cost of being out too far ahead of everyone else," he said. The tech industry also has other issues where it may find itself opposed to Trump, including trade policy and cyber security. The president of Mountain View, Calif.-based startup incubator Y Combinator, Sam Altman, wrote a widely read blog post urging tech leaders to band together against the immigration order. He said he has spoken with a variety of people about organizing but remains unsure about the best course of action. "The honest answer is we don't know yet," he said. "We are talking with legal groups and tech groups, but this is so unprecedented that I don't think anyone has a manual." At Lyft, co-founders John Zimmer and Logan Green pledged on the company's blog to donate a million dollars over the next four years to the American Civil Liberties Union, which won a temporary stay of part of Trump's executive order on Saturday night. Slack collaboration service co-founder Stewart Butterfield and Union Square Ventures partners Albert Wenger and Fred Wilson promised to match contributions to the ACLU. Michael Dearing, founder of venture capital firm Harrison Metal, started an effort called Project ELLIS, short for Entrepreneurs' Liberty Link in Silicon Valley, to help startups and smaller tech companies with immigration issues. "ELLIS" is a also a reference to New York Harbor's Ellis Island, where millions of immigrants arrived. In less than a day, the group has handled two cases, he said. Dearing said the idea was to "get people in touch quickly with the ... resources they would have access to if they were in a Google or an Apple or a Microsoft." Dave McClure, the founding partner of 500 Startups and an outspoken critic of Trump, said his venture capital firm will soon open its first fund in the Middle East and will shift its attention to supporting entrepreneurs in their native countries, if bringing them to the United States proves impossible. "Investing in entrepreneurs in other countries is probably one of the best things we can do to promote international awareness and understanding," he said. Rank-and-file employees were already prodding executives to go further over the weekend. Shortly after learning of Trump's order, Brad Taylor, a 37-year-old engineer for web analytics firm Optimizely, began organizing "Tech Against Trump," a protest scheduled to take place on March 14. In addition to holding a rally in Palo Alto, Calif., organizers of the event were urging tech workers at companies that have remained silent on Trump to walk out of their offices. Taylor said he was heartened by tech leaders' statements over the weekend but wants to see the industry go further. "The purpose of this is not to be against tech, but to urge them to be on the right side of history," he said. Gioachino Rossinis Italian take on the Cinderella story differs in some significant ways from the French variation most of us know best. Theres a wicked stepfather, instead of a stepmother; the Prince trades places with his valet so that he can better tell what his prospective bride is really like; and theres no fairy godmother, just a wise old tutor. The only magic involved is the magic of love and a kind heart well, and of Rossinis irresistible music. Winter Opera St. Louis production of Rossinis La Cenerentola, seen on Sunday afternoon at the Viragh Center at Chaminade, was a bit of a mixed bag, but the positives far outweighed the negatives. Among those positives were a leading couple who were vocally, dramatically and physically attractive. As Cenerentola/Angelina, mezzo-soprano Kate Tombaugh sang flawlessly and captured the characters essential goodness without making her sticky-sweet. She was well-matched with tenor Isaac Frishman as Prince Ramiro, a true Rossini tenor with fine coloratura and great high notes. Bass Andrew Potter sang well and was amusing as Don Magnifico, the spendthrift baron who treats his stepdaughter like a servant. His frightful daughters, Clorinda and Tisbe, were played to good comic effect by soprano Sharon Sullivan and mezzo Robin Bradley. Their voices didnt blend particularly well; Bradley didnt have much voice and seemed to be a little under the weather. As Alidoro, Ramiros string-pulling tutor, bass Nathan Resika looked like Franz Liszt, acted sympathetically and sang well. Baritone Joseph Ryan played the valet-turned-prince-for-a-day Dandini for delightfully well-balanced comedy; his voice frequently sounded dry, and his coloratura was inconsistent. Chorusmaster Nancy Mayos all-male ensemble sang strongly and executed director Matthew Haneys amusing choreography in perfect step. There were rough patches in the orchestras playing; the overture has never seemed so long. Conductor Kostis Protopapas demonstrated a fine feel for the score and tempos, and coordination between pit and stage was good. The wine cellar scene and other bits were cut and were not missed. Haney reused some ideas a little too often when swigging from wine bottles, less is more and could have made more of a storm scene, but his staging was an overall success. Scott Loebls scenic design was clever, switching almost instantly from dingy kitchen to dazzling palace; it would have been nice to have something resembling a blaze in the fireplace. Lewis Reeds campaign RV was parked in a no-parking zone outside the Busch Student Center on the St. Louis University campus. One St. Louis it said in lettering on the front, one of the themes the president of the Board of Aldermen is using in the race for St. Louis mayor. Its also the theme of Treasurer Tishaura Jones, who uses the hashtag #onestlouis on social media platforms. Similarly, Alderman Antonio French talks about being a candidate for both sides of Delmar Boulevard, a metaphorical divide historically between white St. Louis and black St. Louis. The three candidates, along with Aldermen Jeffrey Boyd and Lyda Krewson, debated Sunday afternoon before an estimated 1,500 people packing the student center to capacity. The debate, sponsored by a host of community and activist organizations including Forward Through Ferguson and ArchCity Defenders drew an engaged and diverse audience focused more than anything else on the social justice issues that have risen to the forefront in the St. Louis region since Aug. 9, 2014. In that regard, one thing became clear as audience members clapped or guffawed over more than two hours: There are still two St. Louises, and uniting them will be the next mayors biggest challenge. The divide here isnt entirely black and white though race is the biggest factor in the division its over how city leaders should address the crime that plagues certain neighborhoods, most of them north of Delmar, where too many African-Americans are living in concentrated poverty. The biggest symbol of that divide is St. Louis Police Chief Sam Dotson. On day one, French said, he would fire Dotson, who for some in the activist-heavy crowd is a symbol of the heavy-handed policing of a bygone era, the one highlighted by Department of Justice examinations of policing practices in Ferguson, in Chicago, in Baltimore and elsewhere. At one point, Dotson was a candidate for mayor in this race, but he dropped out before it began in earnest, perhaps recognizing that the tide was against him. At least hes not Jeff Roorda. The business manager for the St. Louis Police Officers Association, known for his fiery rhetoric, earned the loudest boos of the forum. His association, which represents most of the police officers in the city, has endorsed Krewson for mayor. Its a point that earned Jones one of the largest ovations of the night. I did not seek the endorsement of the POA, she said, because anybody who stands with Roorda, I cannot support. When it comes to actually reducing crime, each of the candidates talks about the need for police and the community to regain trust. They talk about implicit bias training, about diversion programs for youth, about improving job opportunities in poorer neighborhoods. But they start at different places. French and Jones, who seemed to have the most energetic support in the progressive audience, focus on city residents first, specifically the black residents that all the candidates agree have been left behind. We have to take care of the people who live in this city, French said. Krewson starts with police. She wants to add police, in part, she says, because theyre overworked now and thus dont have time to get the extra training she says they need to be more effective. Against a tough crowd predisposed to be opposed to her, Krewson showed poise. She held her own, even when challenged by a tough question from rapper and community activist Tef Poe, who wanted to know how the various candidates would respond as mayor the next time protesters and police face each other in the streets after a shooting of a young black man. I would hope that when I am in the mayors office that you and I can have a conversation, Krewson said. It was an olive branch toward One St. Louis by the status quo candidate in a room demanding change. They cheered Jones on raising the minimum wage, clapped for French when he called for a new police chief, and cringed when Krewson said Missourah in an ill-fated attempt to criticize rural lawmakers. I like Lyda, said French near the end of the debate. Shes a nice lady. But frankly, I dont believe she understands this city. Voters will decide whether hes right on March 7. Whoever wins, the challenge is this: Turn One St. Louis from slogan to status quo. TOWN AND COUNTRY Amid the protests, lawsuits and attempts on Sunday to clarify confusion created by an executive order that banned citizens from seven Muslim countries from entering the United States, Yousef Abdulnabi, a Town and Country cardiologist, was trying to learn the answer to what would have been a simple question a few days earlier: When was his mother-in-law coming home? Abdulnabi, a U.S. citizen, said his mother-in-law, Mariam, traveled 10 hours from Damascus to Beirut, navigating multiple government checkpoints and a snow storm to catch a flight back to the U.S. But an order signed by President Donald Trump on Friday prevented her from boarding the plane even though she holds a green card. All weekend, government officials had given contradictory statements about whether the order applies to permanent U.S. residents, or those with green cards. On Sunday, Trump Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, told NBCs Meet The Press that moving forward the ban wouldnt affect green card holders. But Priebus also said that permanent U.S. residents from the seven countries Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen would be subject to additional questioning at the discretion of immigration authorities. I heard somebody on the news from the White House this morning saying it should not apply to the green card, Abdulnabi said. However, I dont know if there is any guide to the airlines applying that. Some airlines are still applying the full ban on all Syrian citizens ... So I dont know. Trumps order banned citizens from the seven countries for 90 days and suspended the Refugee Admissions Program for 120 days. It repeatedly invoked the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorists attacks, though the order does not apply to the countries the hijackers came from, including Saudi Arabia where 15 of the 19 hijackers on Sept. 11 originated. For the second day, the order sent protesters by the thousands to airports across the country, especially in places where immigrants in transit to the U.S. had been detained. In St. Louis, roughly 1,000 people gathered at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport Sunday to protest the order. Organizers and Airport Director Rhonda Hamm-Niebruegge battled beforehand about airport restrictions on demonstrations. The airport initially said it would only allow 50 people at a time to protest. But the ACLU filed a federal lawsuit Sunday morning on behalf of the protesters. By the time the demonstration got underway at 1 p.m., the airport had softened its stance. About 100 people had already arrived and the crowd kept growing. Airport police directed demonstrators to the northeast entrance at the end of Terminal 1, then erected barriers so the protest did not stop traffic. Traffic at Terminal 1 was forced to merge from three lanes to one. But Hamm-Niebruegge said she had not heard of any passenger missing a flight because of the protest. An intermittent intercom message informed passengers that the peaceful protests was not against the airport but a new immigration policy. Airport officials allowed demonstrators to gather inside occasionally to warm up or use the restroom. After about an hour and a half of peaceful demonstration, Anthony Rothert, an ACLU lawyer, said that he no longer believed it was necessary to have a hearing on the lawsuit. We have had lots of protests in the past and we always work with the people, said Hamm-Niebruegge. We have had sort of the standard that says 50 at time and thats mainly not to obstruct... But an order signed by a man 800 miles away had forced her to make a concession one of many adjustments people were making all across the nation. The changes, however, weighed more heavily on some citizens than others. Abdulnabi said he wasnt just worried about his mother-in-law, but his own mother, who also has a green card and was staying in Damascus. Would she be able to return? Abdulnabi said he had always taken pride that the U.S. was a nation of laws. Now it appeared to him some laws were being cast aside. New rules were being written. No one seemed certain about how to carry them out. Chaos is all it is now, he said. GRANITE CITY Granite City Police are looking for three masked men who broke through the glass door of Hudson Jewelers, smashed display cases and took thousands of dollars in jewelry from the family-owned store early Saturday. Police have been given video surveillance footage of the smash-and-grab theft that happened about 4 a.m. at the store, 3249 Nameoki Road, according to John Hudson, president of the company. Hudson said the culprits ran off with rings, watches, necklaces and diamonds. "They destroyed everything they could and got away within two minutes," Hudson said. "It's makes no sense. It's very sad. It's disheartening that someone would attack a family-owned business." Hudson, 51, said the theft is almost to the day that their Edwardsville store was broken into last year. He said one person was caught in that theft. Hudson and his wife, Jane, operate the Edwardsville store and his parents, Virgil and Rosalie Hudson, operate the Granite City store. The jewelry store, which has been in operation for 75 years, plans to open Monday. Hudson said the bandits wore hoodies and masks similar to three gunmen who held up Simons Jewelers, at 8141 Maryland Avenue in downtown Clayton, on Monday afternoon. Nobody was injured in that holdup, which occurred about 1:45 p.m. The robbers took an undisclosed amount of jewelry, police said. Anyone with information regarding the thefts are asked to call CrimeStoppers at 866-371-8477. The state will audit the Hazelwood School District in response to the concerns of thousands of district residents who believe the district is making budget decisions that hurt students while indulging in "frivolous spending." It is unclear how long the audit will take and what it will specifically cover. The audit will primarily cover this current and past fiscal year, according to a letter sent to petition organizers last week from State Auditor Nicole Galloway's office. "The primary goal is just to take a look at how we're spending our money and determine if it's the best use of taxpayer dollars and if we're prioritizing student needs in the budget," said Betsy Rachel, one of the main parent organizers of the petition effort who is also running for the school board. Hazelwood spokeswoman Kimberly McKenzie said the district will fully cooperate with the state audit and has no comment on the parents' allegations of frivolous spending. Galloway's office informed Hazelwood that the audit will cost the district anywhere from $80,000 to $120,000 and that's concerning to the district, McKenzie said. "Of course it would be of concern, especially right now as we're in the process of trying to reduce our budget," McKenzie said. Over the past year, Hazelwood administrators and board members have been under close scrutiny and heavy criticism from parents. Parents have taken issue with Hazelwood administrators earning six-figure salaries and district leaders allocating millions to what parents believe are misplaced priorities, such as Chromebooks for every student. They have also scrutinized the district's credit card expenditures over the past year and found many examples of what Rachel calls "frivolous" spending, including sympathy plants for up to $80 apiece and $25 fees for early boarding when employees fly, according to Rachel. Residents can successfully petition for a state audit if they collect 5,000 valid signatures. Parents presented 7,135 signatures to the state auditor's office. The St. Louis County Election Board certified that 6,082 of them were of registered resident voters. Parents have been collecting signatures for at least 11 months, since the district announced, then rearranged plans to cut physical education teachers and music programs. The district did cut funding for field trips. The Hazelwood School Board is expected to discuss budget recommendations for the next school year this spring. Standing tall with twin spires of stone overlooking Interstate 70, Most Holy Trinity Catholic church has remained an anchor in the Hyde Park neighborhood for more than 150 years. A laminated black-and-white photo kept in the back of the church serves as a memory of a different time. The photo shows a microcosm of the churchs congregation in 1950: the parish schools graduating class. All are wearing graduation caps, holding candles and smiling on the front steps of the church. Every one of the 42 students in the picture is white. Today, 92 percent of Most Holy Trinitys students are African-American. All of the students receive need-based aid. Just one student is Catholic. Therein lies the key to the schools transformation one that comes at a challenging time for Catholic schools regionally. Catholic schools have lost thousands of students over the past decade, forcing the announcement of the closure of three schools this academic year. Those students who left have overwhelmingly been Catholic. But during that same decade, an encouraging countertrend has emerged. Even as Catholic schools in the 11 counties of the St. Louis Archdiocese have lost 22 percent of their Catholic students, they have seen a 23 percent spike in non-Catholic enrollment. That change is apparent at schools such as Most Holy Trinity in Hyde Park. In the past four years, the school has retooled its recruitment strategy and school design to address demographic changes in St. Louis city, which has become less Catholic. The school set out to cater to the largely low-income, African-American and non-Catholic population in the surrounding impoverished neighborhood. The results have been promising for the school. While other city Catholic schools have foundered in enrollment and face the prospect of closure, Most Holy Trinity has seen a 25 percent increase in enrollment in the past three years. Obviously, in our neighborhood, there arent as many Catholic families. We broadened our enrollment management and our perspective, said Jessica Kilmade, Most Holy Trinitys principal. As the neighborhood changed and the parish changed, there was a response to those needs. A NATIONAL TREND Whats happening in St. Louis is to some degree happening at Catholic schools across the country. Nationwide, non-Catholic student enrollment has increased from just 2.7 percent in 1970 to 17.4 percent this school year, according to the National Catholic Educational Association. In St. Louis, non-Catholic students now comprise about 13 percent of total enrollment, up from 8 percent a decade ago. Catholic schools also have racially diversified. Nonwhite enrollment in St. Louis Catholic schools increased to 15.5 percent this school year from 8.9 percent in 2006. Nationwide, its 37 percent, up from 11 percent in 1970. The St. Louis area has a reputation for a robust Catholic school system with a collection of elite college preparatory schools that attract enrollment across the region. But the system has been challenged in the same way as other parochial school systems nationwide. Urban Catholic schools, which once were brimming with children from large Catholic families, many of them immigrants, have now shrunk as families became smaller and migrated to the suburbs. There certainly are more opportunities and seats available for families who arent Catholic, more than in the past, said Kurt Nelson, the archdioceses superintendent of schools. Even so, St. Louis Catholic schools still do better at persuading Catholic families to enroll their children. According to the archdioceses pastoral planning office, 31 percent of Catholic high school-age children in St. Louis attend Catholic high school, compared to 12 percent nationally. Now, they also show encouraging figures with non-Catholics. Nelson says the increase in non-Catholic enrollment is partly a result of archdiocesan efforts to better advertise that its schools are and have always been open to anyone, regardless of religion. Weve done a better job of communicating that our schools are open to students of all faiths, Nelson said. Catholic high schools show the greatest increase in non-Catholic enrollment, which totals 17 percent, up from 9 percent a decade ago. Cardinal Ritter College Preparatory High School in the citys Grand Center has more than 70 percent non-Catholic students, while Bishop DuBourg in St. Louis Hills and Chaminade in Creve Coeur have about 20 percent each. Nelson said high schools have more non-Catholic students because they draw students from across the region, while elementary schools typically draw from local parishes and neighborhoods. At the elementary level, non-Catholic enrollment inched from 7 percent to 11 percent. A portion of that gain can be owed to the resurgence at Most Holy Trinity. A TRANSFORMATION To many Most Holy Trinity families, the school is a bright spot in a tired neighborhood. On the way to Mass across the street each week, elementary school students pass two boarded-up buildings. Inside the school, students have a plethora of activities: violin, percussion, choir, filmmaking and drama, to name a few. Four years ago, Most Holy Trinity leaders realized they had to change the school to better cater to the surrounding neighborhood. Around that time, the Archdiocese of St. Louis took over governance of the school from the parish. Most St. Louis Catholic schools are still run by their parishes. But that has increasingly been shown to be a weakness for Catholic schools in the city. Relying on parish funds and Catholic students to fill classrooms has simply not worked for many schools. Under new governance, Most Holy Trinity deliberately went about recruiting non-Catholic families. To persuade those families to enroll, the school had to prove it was affordable tuition is often the biggest factor that deters families from Catholic schools and that students did not have to be Catholic to attend. Thanks to the archdioceses scholarship programs and the schools fundraising, families at Most Holy Trinity pay on average just $600 a year. Typical Catholic elementary school tuition is at least $4,000. The archdiocese has prioritized increasing scholarships as its best chance of staving off enrollment loss. The archdiocese doled out $9.2 million in scholarships this school year to about 6,200 students, most of whom are from low-income families. Its working on increasing assistance to middle-income families, which Nelson says make up a large part of the enrollment losses. Most Holy Trinity made other changes. It adopted the NativityMiguel school model, a parochial school model developed in the 1970s to specifically target minority, low-income students. St. Cecilia, St. Louis the King, St. Louis Catholic Academy and Marian Middle School are other St. Louis schools that use this model. Under the NativityMiguel model, Most Holy Trinity employs a long school day students spend about 11 hours at school daily, including before- and after-school care and a 10-month school year. The idea is that the longer hours provide a safe, structured and productive environment for students, many of whom may experience instability at home. Most Holy Trinity also provides mentoring and high school tuition assistance to graduates, in accordance with NativityMiguel. A FULL DOSE OF RELIGION Many families who attend Most Holy Trinity believe the school is their only quality education option. The St. Louis Public School in the area, Clay Elementary, has had trouble keeping students. Only 13 percent of students who took state tests there scored proficient or advanced in English, and none did in math. Until earlier this month, St. Louis Public Schools had the unattractive label of provisional, not full accreditation. Accreditation plays a big part of it, said B.J. Jefferson, whose third-grade daughter and first-grade son attend Most Holy Trinity. We dont want our kids to have a bottom education. The Jefferson family is nondenominational Christian, not Catholic. But the parents always knew they wanted to send their children to Catholic school. The religious aspects of the school Wednesday morning Masses, twice-weekly devotion assemblies, religion class and prayers before every meal dont bother the parents or the children, and they say religion is not being forced on them. They teach them about God, and thats what we do at home anyway, Jefferson said. Editor's Note: This replaces an earlier version to give the proper name of the National Catholic Educational Association in the 15th paragraph. ST. LOUIS University leaders across St. Louis and Missouri scrambled through the weekend on a message for their international students who might be affected by a presidential executive order temporarily banning refugees and citizens from seven majority-Muslim countries. Among the first schools in the area to send out a statement was Webster University, which, like many schools nationwide, suggested students who might be affected dont leave the country as they might not be allowed back in. A federal judge ordered a stay against portions of the executive order, but the fluid situation has college leaders still in limbo in what to share with students. These legal developments give our community pause as they present challenges for universities like ours which attract international students, Webster University President Beth Stroble said in an email to students and employees Saturday night. At least five Webster students come from the seven countries listed in President Donald Trumps order, including Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Syria, Yemen and Somalia. The university has multiple international campuses, but none are in those countries. Webster University Provost Julian Schuster said he and Stroble are planning town hall meetings for students to address their concerns. This is a very fluid situation, he said. We need to be resolute in order to comfort our students. Whatever (happens), it will not change our mission of being a global institution, said Schuster, who was calling from an airport in Poland after visiting Webster campuses in Europe. Washington University Chancellor Mark Wrighton said Sunday that the ban should be withdrawn. This has a really negative effect on Washington University, and I believe a negative effect on the entire United States research enterprise, Wrighton said.. About 50 students at Washington University are from the seven countries listed in Trumps order. Similar to Webster, Washington University is advising students to consult with the international office on campus before traveling. Wrighton said he fully endorsed a statement against the executive orders published Saturday by the Association of American Universities. We value a long tradition of drawing talented people from all around the world to our community, and we must continue to vigorously encourage the open exchange of ideas and perspectives, Wrighton said in a statement sent out to students, faculty and staff Sunday afternoon. State school concerns Multiple Missouri public university leaders shared Sunday that they were still figuring out what to share with students. We could not do what we do without you, University of Missouri-Columbia interim chancellor Hank Foley said in a statement to students and employees Sunday. We will make clear to our representatives the value of your place here and the importance of your roles in our enterprise. The numbers of affected students vary significantly by institution. Fewer than 10 students come from the countries in Trumps order at Missouri State University and the University of Central Missouri, versus 117 at the Missouri University of Science at Technology and about 150 at Mizzou. Increasingly, both public and private universities rely on recruiting international students, who are more likely to pay full tuition costs. Chuck Ambrose, president of the University of Central Missouri in Warrensburg said if things continue and students from those seven countries and potentially more arent allowed to attend Missouri schools, that could create a double bind for universities that are already unsure about the outlook of state funding. He said companies in bigger Missouri cities seek out international students with degrees in subjects such as systems engineering, application design and cybersecurity, in hopes that they can secure extended visas to come work for flourishing companies. I talk with a lot of these students and Ive asked them if they want to go back to their home country or if they want to stay (after graduation), Ambrose said. They always say they want to stay and work here. An Iranian post-doctoral student from Mizzou, who asked not to be named in this story to avoid unwanted attention, said she isnt sure whether she will be allowed to stay until graduation this May. Her husband, who is also from Iran, has another year and a half of his medical residency program at Yale University, and hes in limbo too, she said. Were all kind of in shock at the moment, she told the Post-Dispatch Sunday. What do we do now? Weve invested so many years here. She is hitting the job market soon, hoping to work as a consultant to pharmaceutical companies in the United States and in Europe. Aside from uncertainty about whether her pending work visa will be approved, she said potential employers might skip her regardless. The cost of bringing on a new employee is expensive, let alone one who might not be allowed to stay here, she said. It will be a loss, and mainly for American people, she said, if the executive order is kept in place. I did my studies here, working on a (National Science Foundation)-funded study thats taxpayers money. I would love to stay and give it back. JEFFERSON CITY Despite spending Saturday in the nations capital meeting with Vice President Mike Pence, Missouris new governor is not weighing in on President Donald Trumps controversial executive order on immigration. Gov. Eric Greitens instead is staying mum amid criticism and praise of the temporary travel ban by other top Missouri officials and fellow governors across the nation. We are not commenting yet on the national immigration order, Greitens spokesman Parker Briden said Monday. We may later. Greitens made an unannounced trip to Washington D.C. on Saturday and posted pictures on social media of himself sitting with the former Indiana governor, who campaigned in Missouri twice on Greitens behalf during the election season. In a statement, Greitens said the two talked about challenges facing Missouri. I know that with a strong partnership between the White House and the Governor's office, we can take our state in a new direction with more jobs, higher pay, safer streets, and better schools for all Missourians, the statement noted. In contrast to Greitens silence on the immigration order, Republican U.S. Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., said he supports the idea. Our top priority should be to keep Americans safe, Blunt said. Democratic U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill panned the edict, saying she has serious questions about the decree. Democratic and Republican governors, as well as top university officials and business leaders have expressed concern about the order. GOP Gov. Charlie Baker of Massachusetts, for example, said the effects of the travel ban are "problematic." The order bans non-American citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Briden, meanwhile, said Greitens did not use one of the states aircraft to travel to Washington on Saturday. Rather, he said the governor flew on a commercial flight. Briden did say the administration is still working on a policy regarding the use of the taxpayer-paid airplane used regularly by former Gov. Jay Nixon. For the time being, he said the governor is attempting to use it as little as possible. Were going to try and avoid that, Briden said. Register for more free articles. 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 Courtney Purvin got a shock when she visited Facebook last month. The site was suggesting that she get back in touch with an old family friend who played piano at her wedding four years ago. The friend had died in April. "It kind of freaked me out a bit," she said. "It was like he was coming back from the dead." Facebook, the world's biggest social network, knows a lot about its roughly 500 million members. Its software is quick to offer helpful nudges about things like imminent birthdays and friends you have not contacted in a while. But the company has had trouble automating the task of figuring out when one of its users has died. That can lead to some disturbing or just plain weird moments for Facebook users as the site keeps on shuffling a dead friend through its social algorithms. Facebook says it has been grappling with how to handle the ghosts in its machine but acknowledges that it has not found a good solution. "It's a very sensitive topic," said Meredith Chin, a company spokeswoman, "and, of course, seeing deceased friends pop up can be painful." Given the site's size, "and people passing away every day, we're never going to be perfect at catching it," she added. James Katz, a professor of communications at Rutgers University, said the company was experiencing "a coming-of-age problem." "So many of Facebook's early users were young, and death was rare and unduly tragic," Katz said. Now, people over 65 are adopting Facebook at a faster pace than any other age group, with 6.5 million signing up in May alone, three times as many as in May 2009, according to the research firm comScore. That group, of course, also has the country's highest mortality rate, so the problem is only going to get worse. Tamu Townsend, 37, a technical writer in Montreal, said she regularly received prompts to connect with acquaintances and friends who had died. "Sometimes it's quite comforting when their faces show up," Townsend said. "But at some point it doesn't become comforting to see that. The service is telling you to reconnect with someone you can't. If it's someone that has passed away recently enough, it smarts." Purvin, 36, a teacher living in Plano, Texas, said that after she got over the initial jolt of seeing her friend's face, she was happy for the reminder. "It made me start talking about him and thinking about him, so that was good," she said. "But it was definitely a little creepy." Facebook's approach to the deaths of its users has evolved over time. Early on it would immediately erase the profile of anyone it learned had died. Chin says Facebook now recognizes the importance of finding an appropriate way to preserve those pages as a place where the mourning process can be shared online. After the Virginia Tech shootings in 2007, members begged the company to allow them to commemorate the victims. Now member profiles can be "memorialized," or converted into tribute pages that are stripped of some personal information and no longer appear in search results. Grieving friends can still post messages on those pages. Of course, the company still needs to determine whether a user is, in fact, dead. But with a ratio of roughly 350,000 members to every Facebook employee, the company must find ways to let its members and its computers do much of that work. To memorialize a profile, a family member or friend must fill out a form on the site and provide proof of the death, such as a link to an obituary or news article, which a staff member at Facebook will then review. But this option is not well-publicized, so many profiles of dead members never are converted to tribute pages. Those people continue to appear on other members' pages as "friend" suggestions, or in features such as the "reconnect" box, which has been spooking the living since it was introduced in October. Chin said Facebook was considering using software that would scan for repeated postings of phrases such as "Rest in peace" or "I miss you" on a person's page and then dispatch a person to investigate that account. The memorializing process has other quirks. Memorial profiles cannot add new friends, so if parents joined the site after a child died, they would not have permission to see all the messages and photos shared by the child's friends. These are issues that Facebook no doubt wishes it could avoid entirely. But death, of course, is unavoidable, and so Facebook must find a way to integrate it into the social experience online. "They don't want to be the bearer of bad tidings, but yet they are the keeper of those living memories," said Katz, the Rutgers professor. "That's a real downer for a company that wants to be known for social connections and good news." WASHINGTON When President Donald Trump nominates a Supreme Court justice, Senate Democrats and Republicans will immediately face intense political pressure, with liberals demanding that Democrats block the choice and the new president urging Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to blow up longstanding rules to secure confirmation. What happens depends in part on Trump's choice for the opening. Federal appeals court judges William Pryor, Neil Gorsuch and Thomas Hardiman are front-runners to fill the seat of the late Justice Antonin Scalia, according to a person familiar with the process who was not authorized to speak publicly about internal decisions and discussed the search on condition of anonymity. Trump said he plans to announce his court pick on Tuesday night. A look at what to expect in the Senate: ___ TO FILIBUSTER, OR NOT TO FILIBUSTER? Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York has said Democrats will oppose any nominee outside the mainstream. He will likely decide whether to try to block, or filibuster, based on the nominee's performance in confirmation hearings and feedback from his Democratic caucus, including the 10 senators who are up for re-election in states that Trump won last year. The advantages of trying a filibuster are clear make Republicans work to find the 60 votes needed to end it, including at least eight Democrats, and as a result, delay or block the nomination. Republicans hold a 52-48 majority. But there are also downsides. Democrats running for re-election next year in states Trump won in 2016 could face political consequences for their party's attempted obstruction. And if Republicans change the rules and eliminate the filibuster altogether, Democrats would have lost their most powerful weapon in future Supreme Court fights. Republicans did not try to filibuster either of former President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominees. The only filibuster attempt in the past few decades was by Democrats against Justice Samuel Alito, nominated by former President George W. Bush. The effort failed and Alito was confirmed. ___ FINDING THE VOTES If there's an attempted filibuster, Republicans would first try to woo eight Democrats to vote with them to overcome it. But those votes aren't a given. While there are several senators up for re-election in Republican-leaning states, some are loyal Democrats who rarely cross party lines. Gorsuch and Hardiman won broad Senate support when they were confirmed for their appeals court judgeships. Gorsuch was confirmed by voice vote in 2006; Hardiman 95-0 in 2007. Pryor, who backed a Texas law that made gay sex a crime, will face opposition. He was confirmed 53-45 in 2005. Conservative groups are ready. The Judicial Crisis Network has said it will spend $10 million to ensure Trump's pick is confirmed. "We will force vulnerable senators up for re-election in 2018 like Joe Donnelly and Claire McCaskill to decide between keeping their Senate seats or following Chuck Schumer's liberal, obstructionist agenda," said Carrie Severino, the chief counsel and policy director of the group. Donnelly, D-Ind., and McCaskill, D-Mo., both represent states that Trump won with more than 55 percent of the vote. ___ NUCLEAR OPTION? If Democrats decide to try to filibuster and McConnell can't get enough Democratic votes to overcome it, he'll have a major decision to make. Does he change the rules of the Senate and make it impossible to filibuster a Supreme Court nominee? A last resort, getting rid of the filibuster is dubbed "the nuclear option." Then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid changed the rules for lower-court judges in 2013 after Republicans had blocked many of President Barack Obama's nominations. McConnell, a devout Senate institutionalist, strongly criticized Reid for doing that and is seen as reluctant to make a similar move. Trump told Fox News' Sean Hannity on Thursday that he would encourage McConnell to go that route, however. ___ I took my children into the voting booth with me and later my grandchildren so they could learn the procedure and why it is so important. QUEBEC CITY A shooting at a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers left six people dead in an attack that Canada's prime minister called an act of terrorism against Muslims. Police initially arrested two men but later said just one remains a suspect. Alexandre Bissonnette was charged Monday with six counts of first- degree murder. He has also has been charged with five counts of attempted murder in the shooting at the mosque late Sunday. More than 50 people were at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre when the shooting erupted. In addition to the six who died, five were in critical condition and 12 others suffered minor injuries, University of Quebec Hospital Centre spokeswoman Genevieve Dupuis said Monday. The dead ranged in age from 35 to 65. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard both characterized the attack as a terrorist act, which came amid heightened tensions worldwide over President Donald Trump's travel ban on several Muslim countries. Trudeau said in Parliament the victims were targeted simply because of their religion and spoke directly to the more than 1 million Muslims who live in Canada, saying, "We are with you." "Thirty-six million hearts are breaking with yours," Trudeau said. "Know that we value you." Alexandre Bissonnette and another man were arrested in the aftermath, but police later said the other man was just a witness. Police did not give a motive for the attack. Trump called Trudeau to express condolences to the Canadian people and to offer any assistance that might be needed. The White House used the attack on Muslims as an example of why Trump's policies are needed. "We condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms. It's a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant and why the president is taking steps to be pro-active, rather than reactive when it comes to our nation's safety and security," White House spokesman Sean Spicer said. The victims were businessmen, a university professor and others who had gathered for evening prayers, said Mohamed Labidi, the vice president of the mosque. "'It's a very, very big tragedy for us," Labidi said tearfully. "We have a sadness we cannot express." He said the victims were shot in the back. "Security at our mosque was our major, major concern," he said. "But we were caught off guard." The shooting took place just before 8 p.m. Sunday. Witnesses described chaos as worshippers scrambled to find friends and loved ones, as police responding to the scene called for backup. Canada is generally welcoming toward immigrants and all religions, but the French-speaking province of Quebec has had a long-simmering debate about race and religious accommodation. The previous separatist government of the province called for a ban on ostentatious religious symbols, such as the hijab, in public institutions. Couillard said he would "not go there" when asked if he blamed rhetoric in in the U.S. for the attack. "Quebec is a good, generally loving society, but we have these devils as other societies have. We have to recognize that and fight them," Couillard said at a news conference in Quebec City at which he held hands with Muslim leaders. In the summer of 2016 a pig's head was left on the doorstep of the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre in the middle of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. Practicing Muslims do not eat pork. "The Muslim community was the target of this murderous attack," Couillard said. He said solidarity rallies would be held across Quebec later Monday. Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume, appearing shaken, said: "No person should have to pay with their life, for their race, their color, their sexual orientation or their religious beliefs." Worshipper Ali Hamadi said he left the mosque a few minutes before the shooting and a friend, Abdelkrim Hassen, was killed. He said Hassen, who worked in information technology for the government, had three daughters and a wife, whom he had to notify of the death. Majdi Dridi of the Muslim Association of Canada said he knew two of the victims. One was a work colleague who was a father of three little girls, he said. "I don't know what to say, I just hope that his family and his children can have the patience to accept what happened," Dridi said Trudeau had earlier reacted to Trump's visa ban for people from some Muslim-majority countries by tweeting Saturday: "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada." Trudeau also posted a picture of himself greeting a Syrian child at Toronto's airport in late 2015. Trudeau oversaw the arrival of more than 39,000 Syrian refugees soon after he was elected. The mayor of Gatineau, Quebec, near Canada's capital of Ottawa, said there would be an increased police presence at mosques around his city following the attack. The New York Police Department also said it was stepping up patrols at mosques and other houses of worship. ___ Gillies reported from Toronto. Associated Press writer Sean Farrell in Montreal contributed to this report. Almost certainly, the timing of the FDAs long-awaited deeming rule regulating cigars was influenced by a law passed two decades earlier called the Congressional Review Act. That legislation has long been interpreted to allow Congress to overturn agency rules and regulations within 60 legislative days of their enactment. The Review Act works like this: If simple majorities of both the House and Senate vote in favor of a resolution to overturn an agency regulation, it then goes to the presidents desk. Unless the president vetoes the resolution, the regulation is not only overturned, but the agency is barred from enacting a similar rule again unless Congress specifically authorizes it to do so. Because of the way the Congressional legislative calendar works, when the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) published the rule on May 10, 2016, the 60 legislative days were then guaranteed to pass in a way where even if Congress used the Congressional Review Act to attempt to overturn the regulation, such an action would land on President Obamas desk. Given that the Obama Administration had initiated the new rule and that Obama had signed the Tobacco Control Act into law that authorized the cigar rules, a veto was guaranteed. Had the FDA waited until later (June 13 turned out to be the cutoff, although the exact date wasnt known until later), the Congressional Review Act action might have ended up on the next presidents desk. Thus, by getting the cigar deeming rule published in early May 2016, it appeared it was insulated from being overturned by the Congressional Review Act by a waiting Obama veto threat. However, as detailed in a Wall Street Journal article published last week, one of the original drafters of the Congressional Review Act says thats not how the 60-day clock was intended to work and, in fact, numerous regulations going back years could still be overturned using the Congressional Review Act: Heres how it works: It turns out that the first line of the CRA requires any federal agency promulgating a rule to submit a report on it to the House and Senate. The 60-day clock starts either when the rule is published or when Congress receives the reportwhichever comes later. There was always intended to be consequences if agencies didnt deliver these reports, Mr. Gaziano [who was involved in drafting and passing the law] tells me. And while some Obama agencies may have been better at sending reports, others, through incompetence or spite, likely didnt. Bottom line: There are rules for which there are no reports. And if the Trump administration were now to submit those reportsfor rules implemented long agoCongress would be free to vote the regulations down. Theres more. It turns out the CRA has a expansive definition of what counts as a ruleand it isnt limited to those published in the Federal Register. The CRA also applies to guidance that agencies issue. If this interpretation of the Congressional Review Act is correct, could it be used to repeal the FDAs cigar rules? Opponents of the regualtuons say they are looking into the possibility. Inquiries to the FDAs media office were directed to the agencys Freedom of Information Act contact, but the FDAs Tobacco Products page listing reports to Congress shows no reports on implementation of the Tobacco Control Act since 2013. (Even if a timely report was submitted, guidance documents necessary for enforcing the FDA cigar rules could still be challenged under Gazianos interpretation.) For opponents of the FDAs cigar regulations, the benefits of this line of attack are two-fold. First, it would eliminate the Senate filibuster as a means of stopping Congress from sending the repeal to President Trump. And second, unlike new agency rule-making to undo the regulation, using the Congressional Review Act would bar the FDA from reissuing the rule (or something similar under a different administration). Of course, its hardly a given that the Republicans in Congress will try this strategy, which even its proponents admit is aggressive and would require significant intestinal fortitude. Still, an alternative pathway to permanent repeal of the FDA cigar rules has presented itself, if those who say they oppose out-of-control regulation are willing to back up their words with actions. Patrick S photo credits: Stogie Guys Something went wrong, please try again later. Invalid email Something went wrong, please try again later. Want Stoke-on-Trent news emailed to you direct from our journalists? Sign up to our newsletter Ambulance crews are being sent out of North Staffordshire to go to non-emergency and emergency calls as far away as Birmingham and Warwickshire, a union claimed today. According to paramedics' union Unison, staff are also facing a barrage of abuse and assaults, working without breaks, and receiving no support from senior managers. The claims come just as West Midlands Ambulance Service has been rated as 'outstanding' by the Care Quality Commission (CQC). But one paramedic, writing to The Sentinel, believes staff are at breaking point. The medic, who does not want to be named, said: "It has taken a very long time in this job for morale to hit rock bottom, but rock bottom it is." He claims the public and crews are being put in danger from an over-stretched and ill-managed service. And he alleges that problems in the north of the county are leading to many crew members leaving to find employment elsewhere. The way West Midlands Ambulance Service is at the moment is vile," said the medic. Staff have had enough of it and are taking any available opportunity." He alleges the most serious problems include the condition of vehicles. The mechanics are flat out. They never stop," he said. You'll come on shift and there isn't a vehicle available because they're either in the garage or out with other crews. You have to sit and wait, which puts pressure on mechanics. When you do take the vehicle out, within 20 minutes you're having to book it off as defective." Other claims include crews not being given adequate time to restock drugs, being dragged away from North Staffordshire to serve areas in the south and east of the county, and wasting time dealing with coughs and colds. How can anyone justify sending an ambulance for someone who's got back pain or diarrhoea?," he questioned. On other occasions, he says, they are being sent to deal with those who require specialist help. Crews are being sent to mental health calls for which they're not qualified. We have no experience of mental health issues. We're being sent to people who are threatening to take their own lives. They deserve someone who knows what they're doing. If someone was having a heart attack, would you send a mental health nurse to help them out? We're going to some of these cases and we're thinking 'this is ridiculous'. We're being left out on a limb." Staff morale, he adds, is at an all-time low, adding: There's no levy for the levels of pressure and stress people are under. I know a lot of people feel the same as me." The paramedic says he is saddened to see a job he loved reduced to one he believes is now poorly run and 'dangerous'. It's not a disgruntled employee thing," he said. I've done this job for a long time. It has its highs and lows, but now it's just a constant battle. It worries me where we are going with this service." A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokesman today refuted the allegations. They pointed out that WMAS's imminent new 19,000 square foot hub at Etruria is further evidence of its commitment to the area. The spokesman added: We are disappointed by the content of the letter as we do not believe that it accurately reflects the views of the vast majority of staff. The trust is busier than it has ever been. We regularly receive over 3,000 emergency calls per day and, at times, more than 200 calls per hour. Add to that the significant hand-over delays at hospitals and it is no surprise that our crews are working harder than ever before. That is why we have invested more than any other trust in increasing staff numbers (more than 300 per year) and having a higher proportion of paramedics than any other ambulance service in the country. Equally, we have one of the most modern ambulance fleets in the country, with no vehicle over five years old. The trust is also independently audited to ensure the safety of our vehicles and those that work on them. We strongly believe that sending the closest vehicle to every incident is the right thing to do for patients. No one in need of an ambulance would ever want to wait longer than necessary. We do not believe that holding an ambulance back 'just in case', rather than sending it to a patient, would be morally right. We have an enviable record in regards to encouraging staff to raise any issues that they might have so that they can be dealt with. We would encourage the author of the letter to take up this option to raise his or her concerns immediately so they can be resolved." However, a Unison spokesman backed the paramedic's claims. They said: Ambulance crews are being sent out of North Staffordshire to go to non-emergency and emergency calls as far away as Birmingham and Warwickshire, resulting in long distances travelled to get to a patient. Crews are regularly doing eight, 10 and sometimes full 12-hour shifts without proper stand down periods or meal breaks. The huge stress of the workload, being constantly abused and assaulted by members of the public and patients, is resulting in experienced and new starter staff leaving service. But the question 'why?' is neither asked nor answered. This then leads to more pressure on existing ambulance crews to give good patient care. Crews are totally demoralised, exhausted and tired of being pushed to the limit. Staff feel totally unappreciated by senior managers. They feel that they get no support when things go wrong and are guilty before being proven innocent." West Midlands Ambulance Service described the union claims as 'far from reality'. The WMAS spokesman said: For example, over 99 per cent of crews get their meal breaks every shift something that is not the case elsewhere. The number of ambulances from Stoke-on-Trent that leave the county is no more than a handful. Across the whole of Staffordshire, out of county incidents make up less than 1.5 per cent of their workload. Indeed, more than twice as many vehicles from outside of Staffordshire come into the county as leave it. There is no doubt that our crews are working incredibly hard. We have seen unprecedented demand. However, it is not just road staff; it is also the staff in our control room, the mechanics, ambulance fleet assistants and other support staff. We absolutely agree that attacks on our staff are abhorrent. The trust does everything possible to support staff attacked and pushes for a prosecution in every case. Only last week, a man was jailed for an unprovoked attack. As a trust, we hold exit interviews with leaving staff. However, we are the leading trust in the country for recruiting additional staff. One of the things that marks this trust out from others is the support that staff have, both from colleagues and managers. This can manifest itself in many ways, from providing crews with hot drinks while they wait to offload patients at hospital through to regular opportunities to talk about developments, whether personal or trust issues such as the new hub under construction in Stoke." Last week's CQC report highlighted how staff 'were outstanding in the way that they supported patients'. It also outlined that 'hard work of staff is exemplary and making a real difference to patients'. According to another report from the National Audit Office, WMAS also performed better than many of the other nine ambulance trusts, despite unprecedented pressure. West Midlands Ambulance Service covers six counties and has more than 4,500 staff supported by volunteers who serve a population of around 5.6 million. A team from The University of Warwick battled it out with Emmanuel College Cambridge last night on University Challenge. Sophie Hobbs, Sophie Rudd, Giles Hutchings and Thomas Van, from the Warwick University Quiz Society, lost the tie 90 points to 200, but will get the chance to compete again. Warwick will have to win their next two matches to progress to the semi-finals. The Warwick team has a good spread of knowledge with team members studying History, French, Maths and Computer Science. The university last won the prestigious quiz competition in 2007. (Reuters) - Activist hedge fund Land and Buildings Investment Management LLC has urged real estate company Forest City Realty Trust Inc to explore "strategic options". Land and Buildings said it believed Forest City had at least 40 percent upside to its net asset value, given its "enviable" collection of high quality real estate, which includes malls, retail centers and residential rental properties. The hedge fund blamed Forest City's "tangled web of nepotism", "self dealing" and failure of corporate governance for its depressed margins, bloated general and administrative expenses and "value-destroying capital allocation". Land and Buildings said it was calling on Forest City to convene a special meeting of its shareholders to put the company's 13-person board to a vote. Shares of Forest City, which had a market value of $5.76 billion as of Friday's close, were up 2 percent at $22.09 in late morning trading on Monday. (Reporting by Ankit Ajmera in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju Samuel) By Svea Herbst-Bayliss BOSTON (Reuters) - Raveneur Investment Group, the two-year old hedge fund originally backed by Blackstone Group, is shutting down, according to two people familiar with the situation. New York-based Raveneur was launched in September 2014 by Mark Black with startup capital from Blackstone and PAAMCO, both large hedge fund investors known for spotting rising stars. In the industry, Black was known as a talented distressed investor and he quickly raised $350 million from the two blue-chip investors. He kept a low profile and tried to distinguish himself by seeking longer investment horizons, people familiar with his portfolio said at the time. By late 2016 the fund was reporting losses and both PAAMCO and Blackstone decided to pull their money out, one source said. Calls to Raveneur were not returned. Representatives for Blackstone and PAAMCO declined to comment. Raveneur began trading in 2014 and ended the year with a small loss. Its returns improved in 2015 when the fund ended the year with a 1.6 percent gain even as most hedge funds lost money. At the end of 2015, the firm was managing $491.3 million in regulatory assets as measured by the Securities and Exchange Commission, according to a filing Raveneur made in early 2016. But returns stumbled in early 2016 and again in June 2016, taking a bite out of assets. By the end of September, Raveneur told clients that returns were off by roughly 10 percent for the year and that the firm was managing about $284.9 million. At that time some of Raveneur's bigger investments included Boston Scientific, Callon Petroleum, Constellation Brands Inc and Charter Communications, the firm told investors. Bets on Lowe's Cos and SunEdison hurt the firm. Black previously worked at Tricadia Capital Management and Eton Park Capital Management and had generated buzz when he was setting up in 2014. His track record of making money had been strong and he was able to recruit industry veterans, including former Fortress Group chief financial officer Adam Rockfeld, to the startup. But setting up a hedge fund has become increasingly difficult as investors show little patience for poor returns. Industry data suggest hundreds of hedge funds shut down last year, marking the biggest rate of closures since the financial crisis. (Reporting by Svea Herbst-Bayliss; Editing by Phil Berlowitz) VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA -- (Marketwired) -- 01/30/17 -- International Wastewater Systems Inc. (the "Company") (CSE: IWS)(CSE: IWS.CN)(FRANKFURT: IWI)(OTC PINK: INTWF) is pleased to announce that the Company is attending the annual International Air-Conditioning, Heating, Refrigerating Exposition ("AHR Expo") taking place this week in Las Vegas Nevada from January 30 to February 1, 2017. The AHR Expo is the world's largest HVACR (Heating, Ventilating, Air Conditioning and Refrigeration) convention. Over 60,000 industry professionals are attending from every state in America and 150 countries worldwide, along with more than 2,000 exhibitors. The AHR Expo provides a unique forum designed expressly for the HVACR community to share new products and technologies. In 2016, IWS's PIRANHA technology received the 2016 AHR Expo Innovation Award for Green Building Innovation, based on the PIRANHA's innovative design, application value and market impact (http://ahrexpo.com/awards-winners2016). The IWS team will be attending the AHR Expo and hosting the PIRANHA Global Launch Reception ("PIRANHA Global Launch") near the convention site in Las Vegas. IWS is actively installing projects worldwide and continues to develop new markets for its products. The PIRANHA Global Launch has registered over 150 guests from 12 countries, providing an opportunity for potential partners to meet with IWS management. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD Lynn Mueller, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer About International Wastewater Systems Inc. International Wastewater Systems Inc. is a world leader in thermal heat recovery. IWS systems recycle thermal energy from wastewater, generating the most energy efficient and economical systems for heating, cooling & hot water for commercial, residential and industrial buildings. IWS is publicly traded in Canada (CSE: IWS), the United States (OTC PINK: INTWF) and Germany (FRANKFURT : IWI). The CSE does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Contacts: Yaron Conforti CFO and Director (416) 716-8181 [email protected] Source: International Wastewater Systems Inc. SAN FRANCISCO and PALO ALTO, Calif., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Pacific Union International, Inc., a global innovator in bringing real estate technology to the industry, launched today a partnership with Nest Labs, Inc., the architect of the thoughtful home. Pacific Union will offer real estate professionals and clients a range of Nest's products designed to deliver more energy efficiency, safety and security to the home. As one of the nation's largest real estate brokerages with 2016 sales volume of $10.1 billion, Pacific Union has 38 offices throughout the San Francisco Bay Area and West Los Angeles through its recent merger with John Aaroe Group. The combined brokerage supports 1,161 real estate professionals who now have the opportunity to offer their clients Nest product packages created especially for Pacific Union. "This alignment of brands is ideal for Pacific Union," says Jessica Frushtick, Vice President of Marketing. "We continue to push technology forward in our industry, and Nest leads the world in creating thoughtful and secure connected home technology for the homes that our clients are seeking." According to findings from economic research powerhouse John Burns Real Estate Consulting, clients are willing to pay more for homes installed with smart home technology. Burns surveyed 22,000 home shoppers and found that 65% potential buyers said they'd be willing to spend more for smart home technology packages. The range of products produced by Nest includes the Nest Learning Thermostat, Nest Protect smoke and carbon monoxide alarm and Nest Cam Indoor and Outdoor security cameras. These products can be accessed and controlled through the Nest app. The app delivers software features that help make Nest products more thoughtful. The Nest app also delivers a new user interface called Spaces that groups Nest products by room and across multiple platforms, making it easier to access and control Nest products. Among the products available to Pacific Union real estate professionals for their clients are the Nest Thermostat to address home energy consumption, Nest Protect to help keep clients safe, and Nest Cam Indoor and Outdoor to keep an eye on what matters most in and outside of a home. About Pacific Union Founded in 1975, Pacific Union is the San Francisco Bay Area's premier luxury real estate brand operating in nine regions. With more than 25 Bay Area offices and nearly 700 of the region's top-performing real estate professionals, Pacific Union merged with Los Angeles-based brokerage John Aaroe Group in December 2016. This strategic business collaboration links two of the strongest residential real estate firms on the West Coast, supporting combined 2016 production of $10.1 billion with 1,161 real estate professionals in 38 offices throughout California. The company offers a full range of personal and commercial real estate services, including buying, selling, and relocation, and it founded a unique concierge program for Chinese homebuyers. In addition, the company operates joint-venture businesses that provide rental and commercial property management, urban residential marketing and sales, and insurance services. Locally owned, Pacific Union operates with an entrepreneurial mindset and unwavering commitment to deliver exceptional service and expertise. For more information, please visit us at www.pacificunion.com. To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/pacific-union-international-creates-strategic-partnership-with-nest-labs-300398532.html SOURCE Pacific Union By Jonathan Stempel (Reuters) - A new federal appeals court decision could clear the way for the U.S. government to turn over many documents sought by investors suing over its 2012 decision to seize the profits of mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac . The Federal Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday said a lower court judge mostly acted within her discretion in ordering the disclosure to Fairholme Funds and other investors of 56 documents, which had been sampled from roughly 12,000 that the government withheld on privilege grounds. Writing for a three-judge panel, Circuit Judge Kathleen O'Malley said eight of the documents could be withheld on the basis of either presidential privilege, or privilege of the deliberative process. Chuck Cooper, a lawyer for the investors, in a statement called the decision "a sweeping victory" that would lead to the disclosure of the "vast bulk" of documents his clients sought. "We are confident that many of these documents will further discredit the government's defense narrative," he said. A spokeswoman for U.S. Department of Justice said that agency is reviewing the decision. The government seized Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in September 2008 as mortgage losses mounted, and put them into a conservatorship under the Federal Housing Finance Agency. Both companies have since become profitable, and according to court papers have returned roughly $68 billion more to the government than they drew down during the financial crisis. Fairholme, overseen by Bruce Berkowitz, countered that such profit belonged to stockholders such as itself, and that the sweeping of that profit to the U.S. Treasury Department was an unconstitutional taking of private property. Its 2013 lawsuit focused on the companies' preferred stock, which threw off 10 percent dividends before being eliminated. Monday's decision stemmed from former President Barack Obama administration's appeal of an October ruling by Judge Margaret Sweeney of the Federal Court of Claims requiring the disclosure of the 56 sampled documents. The government said that ruling "casts a cloud" over whether all 12,000 documents were properly withheld, and in practice could chill White House deliberations on sensitive subjects. But O'Malley said the government did not offer specific objections to Sweeney's findings on most of the documents at issue. Monday's decision focused on the 16 documents that she said the government addressed "expressly" in its appeal. The case is Fairholme Funds Inc et al v. U.S., U.S. Federal Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 2017-104. (Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Andrew Hay and Lisa Shumaker) Iranian President Hassan Rouhani speaks at a news conference near the United Nations General Assembly in the Manhattan borough of New York, U.S., September 22, 2016. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson/File Photo By Parisa Hafezi and Tim Hepher ANKARA/PARIS (Reuters) - A row over U.S. visa bans may further weaken Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's efforts to attract foreign investors to Iran, particularly if it slows the implementation of deals for Western aircraft, officials and analysts said. The deals for 80 Boeing (NYSE: BA) jets and 100 from Europe's Airbus (NYSE: AIR) struck last year are seen by Western investors as a crucial test as they seek business in Iran in the wake of the nuclear deal that led to the lifting of most sanctions. People involved in the airline deals say it is too early to assess the impact of the U.S. visa ban but worry that hardening rhetoric in Tehran and Washington can only add to a list of complications that could slow, if not endanger, the jet sales. While Airbus planes come from Europe, the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump can veto the sale of all the planes to Iran because of the widespread use of U.S. parts in the aircraft which need U.S. export licenses. The visa ban could also prolong a hiatus in talks about financing deliveries of jets, with European and Chinese banks reluctant to put up money to back Iranian jet purchases for fear of a backlash against their U.S. operations. "It will make people more nervous, more risk-averse, more inclined to wait and see," said a senior Western financier, who asked not to be named. Iranian officials say that even before Trump imposed restrictions on travel to the United States from seven mainly Muslim countries, concerns about what the new U.S. president might do had already put the brakes on post-sanctions business. During his election campaign, Trump criticized the nuclear accord six major powers struck with Iran and his victory in November increased uncertainty around Iran's investment drive. FINAL RULING "The process has been very slow ... foreign investors were very interested to work in Iran, but since Trump's election the process has almost stopped. Investors are worried about possible U.S. punishments if they work with Iran," a senior economy ministry official told Reuters. Final decisions on whether the plane deals go ahead may well lie with Trump and Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the ultimate broker in the country's faction-ridden politics who has the last say on key matters. Since taking office this month, Trump has largely ignored the Iranian jet deals in public, even as he lambasted U.S. aerospace firms including Boeing about other projects. For now, at least, Boeing appears comfortable that Trump won't automatically block its deal, though questions also remain over further approvals from Iran, two industry sources said. Boeing and Europe's Airbus declined comment. Still, any long-term U.S. travel curbs could also undermine the case for long-distance jets capable of linking Tehran with expatriate communities in cities such as Los Angeles. Boeing plans to start delivering its large 777 jets in 2018. IranAir has already canceled orders for Airbus A380 superjumbos, initially meant to signal its ambitions to compete on equal terms with the hubs of Gulf rivals. Besides the Boeing and Airbus orders, state airline IranAir is planning to buy 20 small Franco-Italian ATR turboprops to help expand economic development to smaller Iranian cities. But officials say a final deal has been held up due to uncertainty over some licenses for engines made by a Canadian subsidiary of Pratt & Whitney, America's top military engine maker and supplier to the colossal F-35 fighter project. Pratt & Whitney is seen to be wary of the political risks of dealing with Iran, especially with the F-35 project at the center of Trump's criticism of aerospace firms for going over budget. A Pratt & Whitney Canada spokesman said it was, "working closely with ATR to ensure all necessary licenses are in place prior to providing any products or services". SHOWCASE FLIGHTS The renewal of Iran's unsafe, elderly fleet is also a major political battleground ahead of presidential elections in May as Rouhani's failure to boost the economy a year after the lifting of sanctions intensifies political infighting. Hardliners blame Rouhani for failing to deliver a swift improvement in domestic living standards following the nuclear deal, at a time when prices for oil exports are low and the promised foreign investment has yet to arrive. They have singled out long-range jets for particular criticism, arguing that they only benefit rich travelers. "The economy is the main factor for most of the Iranian voters ... Rouhani was hoping that the deal with major planemakers will encourage other investors to come to Iran," said political analyst Hamid Farahvashian. "That is why hardliners are mainly focused on criticizing this deal. Basically, Rouhani's political career depends on this deal." One senior Iranian official said he doubted the aircraft deals would be ditched altogether. "I don't think the deal will be canceled because Rouhani signed it with the approval of the Supreme Leader ... but he might be forced to cancel some of the orders to save the deals," said one senior official.Others were more cautious, saying foreign investors would avoid being targeted by Trump for doing business with Iran. "This is good news for Rouhani's rivals," said another senior official, referring to the U.S. visa restrictions. For now, IranAir appears anxious is get airplanes into the country as an urgent priority ahead of May's presidential election, demonstrating tangible results from the nuclear deal. But so far, just one aircraft has been delivered: an Airbus A321, paid for in cash. It was promptly deployed widely on domestic routes in an apparent effort to showcase the benefits of the lifting of sanctions. In its first 12 days, Iran's first brand-new jet in decades covered 46,000 km (29,000 miles) between 15 cities, from the Kurdish city of Kermanshah in the West to the Shi'ite holy city of Mashhad in the northeast, according to FlightRadar24 data. (Additional reporting by Allison Lampert; editing by David Clarke) SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION Washington, D.C. 20549 SCHEDULE 13G Under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (Amendment No: 2) GENER8 MARITIME INC -------------------------------------------------------- (Name of Issuer) Common Stock -------------------------------------------------------- (Title of Class of Securities) BXNSSC9 -------------------------------------------------------- (SEDOL Number) December 31, 2016 -------------------------------------------------------- (Date of Event Which Requires Filing of this Statement) Check the appropriate box to designate the rule pursuant to which this Schedule is filed: [X] Rule 13d-1(b) [ ] Rule 13d-1(c) [ ] Rule 13d-1(d) *The remainder of this cover page shall be filled out for a reporting person's initial filing on this form with respect to the subject class of securities, and for any subsequent amendment containing information which would alter the disclosures provided in a prior cover page. The information required in the remainder of this cover page shall not be deemed to be "filed" for the purpose of Section 18 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 ("Act") or otherwise subject to the liabilities of that section of the Act but shall be subject to all other provisions of the Act (however, see the Notes). SEDOL No. BXNSSC9 (1)Names of reporting persons. BlackRock, Inc. (2) Check the appropriate box if a member of a group (a) [ ] (b) [X] (3) SEC use only (4) Citizenship or place of organization Delaware Number of shares beneficially owned by each reporting person with: (5) Sole voting power 7891304 (6) Shared voting power NONE (7) Sole dispositive power 7968633 (8) Shared dispositive power NONE (9) Aggregate amount beneficially owned by each reporting person 7968633 (10) Check if the aggregate amount in Row (9) excludes certain shares (11) Percent of class represented by amount in Row 9 9.6% (12) Type of reporting person HC Item 1. Item 1(a) Name of issuer: ----------------------------------------------------------------------- GENER8 MARITIME INC Item 1(b) Address of issuer's principal executive offices: ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 299 PARK AVENUE NEW YORK NY 10171 Item 2. 2(a) Name of person filing: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- BlackRock, Inc. 2(b) Address or principal business office or, if none, residence: ----------------------------------------------------------------------- BlackRock Inc. 55 East 52nd Street New York, NY 10055 2(c) Citizenship: -------------------------------------------------------------------- See Item 4 of Cover Page 2(d) Title of class of securities: ------------------------------------------------------------------- Common Stock 2(e) SEDOL No.: See Cover Page Item 3. If this statement is filed pursuant to Rules 13d-1(b), or 13d-2(b) or (c), check whether the person filing is a: [ ] Broker or dealer registered under Section 15 of the Act; [ ] Bank as defined in Section 3(a)(6) of the Act; [ ] Insurance company as defined in Section 3(a)(19) of the Act; [ ] Investment company registered under Section 8 of the Investment Company Act of 1940; [ ] An investment adviser in accordance with Rule 13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(E); [ ] An employee benefit plan or endowment fund in accordance with Rule 13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(F); [X] A parent holding company or control person in accordance with Rule 13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(G); [ ] A savings associations as defined in Section 3(b) of the Federal Deposit Insurance Act (12 U.S.C. 1813); [ ] A church plan that is excluded from the definition of an investment company under section 3(c)(14) of the Investment Company Act of 1940; [ ] A non-U.S. institution in accordance with Rule 240.13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(J); [ ] Group, in accordance with Rule 240.13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(K). If filing as a non-U.S. institution in accordance with Rule 240.13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(J), please specify the type of institution: Item 4. Ownership Provide the following information regarding the aggregate number and percentage of the class of securities of the issuer identified in Item 1. Amount beneficially owned: 7968633 Percent of class 9.6% Number of shares as to which such person has: Sole power to vote or to direct the vote 7891304 Shared power to vote or to direct the vote NONE Sole power to dispose or to direct the disposition of 7968633 Shared power to dispose or to direct the disposition of NONE Item 5. Ownership of 5 Percent or Less of a Class. If this statement is being filed to report the fact that as of the date hereof the reporting person has ceased to be the beneficial owner of more than 5 percent of the class of securities, check the following [ ]. Item 6. Ownership of More than 5 Percent on Behalf of Another Person If any other person is known to have the right to receive or the power to direct the receipt of dividends from, or the proceeds from the sale of, such securities, a statement to that effect should be included in response to this item and, if such interest relates to more than 5 percent of the class, such person should be identified. A listing of the shareholders of an investment company registered under the Investment Company Act of 1940 or the beneficiaries of employee benefit plan, pension fund or endowment fund is not required. Various persons have the right to receive or the power to direct the receipt of dividends from, or the proceeds from the sale of the common stock of GENER8 MARITIME INC. No one person's interest in the common stock of GENER8 MARITIME INC is more than five percent of the total outstanding common shares. Item 7. Identification and Classification of the Subsidiary Which Acquired the Security Being Reported on by the Parent Holding Company or Control Person. See Exhibit A Item 8. Identification and Classification of Members of the Group If a group has filed this schedule pursuant to Rule 13d-1(b)(ii)(J), so indicate under Item 3(j) and attach an exhibit stating the identity and Item 3 classification of each member of the group. If a group has filed this schedule pursuant to Rule 13d-1(c) or Rule 13d-1(d), attach an exhibit stating the identity of each member of the group. Item 9. Notice of Dissolution of Group Notice of dissolution of a group may be furnished as an exhibit stating the date of the dissolution and that all further filings with respect to transactions in the security reported on will be filed, if required, by members of the group, in their individual capacity. See Item 5. Item 10. Certifications By signing below I certify that, to the best of my knowledge and belief, the securities referred to above were acquired and are held in the ordinary course of business and were not acquired and are not held for the purpose of or with the effect of changing or influencing the control of the issuer of the securities and were not acquired and are not held in connection with or as a participant in any transaction having that purpose or effect. Signature. After reasonable inquiry and to the best of my knowledge and belief, I certify that the information set forth in this statement is true, complete and correct. Dated: January 30, 2017 BlackRock, Inc. Signature: Spencer Fleming ------------------------------------------- Name/Title Attorney-In-Fact The original statement shall be signed by each person on whose behalf the statement is filed or his authorized representative. If the statement is signed on behalf of a person by his authorized representative other than an executive officer or general partner of the filing person, evidence of the representative's authority to sign on behalf of such person shall be filed with the statement, provided, however, that a power of attorney for this purpose which is already on file with the Commission may be incorporated by reference. The name and any title of each person who signs the statement shall be typed or printed beneath his signature. Attention: Intentional misstatements or omissions of fact constitute Federal criminal violations (see 18 U.S.C. 1001). Exhibit A Subsidiary BlackRock (Netherlands) B.V. BlackRock Advisors, LLC* BlackRock Asset Management Ireland Limited BlackRock Financial Management, Inc. BlackRock Fund Advisors BlackRock Institutional Trust Company, N.A. BlackRock Investment Management, LLC FutureAdvisor, Inc. *Entity beneficially owns 5% or greater of the outstanding shares of the security class being reported on this Schedule 13G. Exhibit B POWER OF ATTORNEY The undersigned, BLACKROCK, INC., a corporation duly organized under the laws of the State of Delaware, United States (the "Company"), does hereby make, constitute and appoint each of Matthew Mallow, Chris Meade, Howard Surloff, Dan Waltcher, Georgina Fogo, Charles Park, Enda McMahon, Carsten Otto, Con Tzatzakis, Karen Clark, Andrew Crain, Herm Howerton, David Maryles, Daniel Ronnen, John Stelley, John Ardley, Maureen Gleeson and Spencer Fleming acting severally, as its true and lawful attorneys-in-fact, for the purpose of, from time to time, executing in its name and on its behalf, whether the Company is acting individually or as representative of others, any and all documents, certificates, instruments, statements, other filings and amendments to the foregoing (collectively, "documents") determined by such person to be necessary or appropriate to comply with ownership or control-person reporting requirements imposed by any United States or non-United States governmental or regulatory authority, Including without limitation Forms 3, 4, 5, 13D, 13F, 13G and 13H and any amendments to any of the Foregoing as may be required to be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, and delivering, furnishing or filing any such documents with the appropriate governmental, regulatory authority or other person, and giving and granting to each such attorney-in-fact power and authority to act in the premises as fully and to all intents and purposes as the Company might or could do if personally present by one of its authorized signatories, hereby ratifying and confirming all that said attorney-in-fact shall lawfully do or cause to be done by virtue hereof. Any such determination by an attorney-in-fact named herein shall be conclusively evidenced by such person's execution, delivery, furnishing or filing of the applicable document. This power of attorney shall expressly revoke the power of attorney dated 1st day of October, 2015 in respect of the subject matter hereof, shall be valid from the date hereof and shall remain in full force and effect until either revoked in writing by the Company, or, in respect of any attorney-in-fact named herein, until such person ceases to be an employee of the Company or one of its affiliates. IN WITNESS WHEREOF, the undersigned has caused this power of attorney to be executed as of this 8th day of December, 2015. BLACKROCK, INC. By:_ /s/ Chris Jones Name: Chris Jones Title: Chief Investment Officer UNITED STATES* SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION Washington, D.C. 20549 SCHEDULE 13G Under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (Amendment No. 4)* Nuveen Global High Income Fund ------------------------------------------------ (Name of Issuer) Common ------------------------------ (Title of Class of Securities) 67075G103 -------------- (CUSIP Number) December 31, 2016 ------------------------------------------------------- (Date of Event Which Requires Filing of this Statement) Check the appropriate box to designate the rule pursuant to which this Schedule is filed: [ X ] Rule 13d-1(b) [ ] Rule 13d-1(c) [ ] Rule 13d-1(d) *The remainder of this cover page shall be filled out for a reporting person's initial filing on this form with respect to the subject class of securities, and for any subsequent amendment containing information which would alter the disclosures provided in a prior cover page. The information required in the remainder of this cover page shall not be deemed to be "filed" for the purpose of Section 18 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 ("Act") or otherwise subject to the liabilities of that section of the Act but shall be subject to all other provisions of the Act (however, see the Notes). - 1 - CUSIP No. 67075G103 1. Names of Reporting Persons, I.R.S. Identification Nos. of above persons (entities only): First Trust Portfolios L.P.: 36-3768815 First Trust Advisors L.P.: 36-3788904 The Charger Corporation: 36-3772451 2. Check the Appropriate Box if a Member of a Group (See Instructions) (a) [ ] (b) [ ] 3. SEC Use Only 4. Citizenship or Place of Organization of each Reporting Person: Illinois, U.S.A. Number of 5. Sole Voting Power: 0 Shares Bene- ficially Owned by Each 6. Shared Voting Power: Reporting Such shares are held by the following entities in the Person With: respective amounts listed: First Trust Portfolios L.P.: 0 First Trust Advisors L.P.: 0 The Charger Corporation: 0 7. Sole Dispositive Power: 0 8. Shared Dispositive Power: Such shares are held by the following entities in the respective amounts listed: First Trust Portfolios L.P.: 584,091 First Trust Advisors L.P.: 584,091 The Charger Corporation: 584,091 9. Aggregate Amount Beneficially Owned by Each Reporting Person: 584,091 10. Check if the Aggregate Amount in Row (9) Excludes Certain Shares (See Instructions) - 2 - 11. Percent of Class Represented by Amount in Row (9): 2.51% 12. Type of Reporting Person (See Instructions) First Trust Portfolios L.P. - BD First Trust Advisors L.P. - IA The Charger Corporation - HC ITEM 1. (a) Name of Issuer: Nuveen Global High Income Fund (b) Address of Issuer's Principal Executive Offices Attn: Legal Department 333 West Wacker Drive Chicago, IL 60606 USA ITEM 2. (a) Name of Person Filing First Trust Portfolios L.P. First Trust Advisors L.P. The Charger Corporation (b) Address of Principal Business Office or, if none, Residence First Trust Portfolios L.P. 120 East Liberty Drive, Suite 400 Wheaton, Illinois 60187 First Trust Advisors L.P. 120 East Liberty Drive, Suite 400 Wheaton, Illinois 60187 The Charger Corporation 120 East Liberty Drive, Suite 400 Wheaton, Illinois 60187 (c) Citizenship of each Reporting Person: Illinois, U.S.A. (d) Title of Class of Securities Common Stock (e) CUSIP Number 67075G103 - 3 - ITEM 3. If this statement is filed pursuant to Sec. 240.13d-1(b) or 240.13d-2(b) or (c), check whether the person filing is a: (a) x Broker or dealer registered under section 15 of the Act (15 U.S.C. 78o); (b) Bank as defined in section 3(a)(6) of the Act (15 U.S.C. 78c); (c) Insurance company as defined in section 3(a)(19) of the Act (15 U.S.C. 78c); (d) Investment company registered under section 8 of the Investment Company Act of 1940 (15 U.S.C. 80a-8); (e) x An investment adviser in accordance with Sec. 240.13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(E); (f) An employee benefit plant or endowment fund in accordance with Sec. 240.13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(F); (g) x A parent holding company or control person in accordance with Sec. 240.13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(G); (h) A savings associations as defined in Section 3(b) of the Federal Deposit Insurance Act (12 U.S.C. 1813); (i) A church plan that is excluded from the definition of an investment company under section 3(c)(14) of the Investment Company Act of 1940 (15 U.S.C. 80a-3); (j) A non-U.S. institution in accordance with Sec. 240.13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(J); (k) Group, in accordance with Sec. 240.13d-1(b)1(ii)(K). If filing as a non-U.S. institution in accordance with Sec. 204.13d-1(b)(1)(ii)(J), please specify the type of institution: _____________________________________________ ITEM 4. Ownership Provide the following information regarding the aggregate number and percentage of the class of securities of the issuer identified in Item 1. (a) Amount beneficially owned: 584,091 (b) Percent of class: 2.51% (c) Number of shares as to which the person has: (i) Sole power to vote or to direct the vote: 0 (ii) Shared power to vote or to direct the vote: 0 (iii) Sole power to dispose or to direct the disposition of: 0 (iv) Shared power to dispose or to direct the disposition of: 584,091 - 4 - Instruction. For computations regarding securities which represent a right to acquire an underlying security see Sec. 204.13d-3(d)(1). ITEM 5. Ownership of Five Percent or Less of a Class If this statement is being filed to report the fact that as of the date hereof the reporting person has ceased to be the beneficial owner of more than five percent of the class of securities, check the following [ X ]. Instruction: Dissolution of a group requires a response to this item. ITEM 6. Ownership of More than Five Percent on Behalf of Another Person This Schedule 13G filing is jointly filed by The Charger Corporation, First Trust Portfolios L.P. and First Trust Advisors L.P. pursuant to Rule 13d-1(k)(1). The Charger Corporation is the General Partner of both First Trust Portfolios L.P. and First Trust Advisors L.P. First Trust Portfolios L.P. acts as sponsor of certain unit investment trusts which hold shares of the issuer. The total number of shares of the issuer held by these unit investment trusts is set forth in Row (8) above with respect to First Trust Portfolios L.P. No individual unit investment trust sponsored by First Trust Portfolios L.P. holds more than 3% of any registered investment company issuer's shares. First Trust Advisors L.P., an affiliate of First Trust Portfolios L.P., acts as portfolio supervisor of the unit investment trusts sponsored by First Trust Portfolios L.P., certain of which hold shares of the issuer. Neither First Trust Portfolios L.P., First Trust Advisors L.P. nor The Charger Corporation have the power to vote the shares of the issuer held by these unit investment trusts sponsored by First Trust Portfolios L.P. These shares are voted by the trustee of such unit investment trusts so as to insure that the shares are voted as closely as possible in the same manner and in the same general proportion as are the shares held by owners other than such unit investment trusts. The difference, if any, between the aggregate amount of shares beneficially owned by each reporting person, as set forth in Row (9) above, and the number of shares of the issuer held by the unit investment trusts sponsored by First Trust Portfolios L.P. represents shares of the issuer which are either held in other registered investment companies, pooled investment vehicles and/or separately managed accounts for which First Trust Advisors L.P. serves as investment advisor and/or investment sub-advisor. Each of First Trust Portfolios L.P., First Trust Advisors L.P. and The Charger Corporation disclaims beneficial ownership of the shares of the issuer identified in this filing. ITEM 7. Identification and Classification of the Subsidiary Which Acquired the Security Being Reported on By the Parent Holding Company or Control Person See Item 6. ITEM 8. Identification and Classification of Members of the Group Not Applicable. - 5 - ITEM 9. Notice of Dissolution of Group Not Applicable. ITEM 10. Certifications By signing below I certify that, to the best of my knowledge and belief, the securities referred to above were acquired and are held in the ordinary course of business and were not acquired and are not held for the purpose of or with the effect of changing or influencing the control of the issuer of the securities and were not acquired and are not held in connection with or as a participant in any transaction having that purpose or effect other than activities solely in connection with a nomination under Sec. 240.14a-11. SIGNATURE After reasonable inquiry and to the best of my knowledge and belief, I certify that the information set forth in this statement is true, complete and correct. FIRST TRUST PORTFOLIOS L.P., FIRST TRUST ADVISORS L.P. and THE CHARGER CORPORATION Date: January 30, 2017 By: /s/ James M. Dykas --------------------------- Name: James M. Dykas Title: Chief Financial Officer of First Trust Portfolios L.P. and First Trust Advisors L.P., and Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer of The Charger Corporation - 6 - Exhibit 99.1 EXHIBIT 99.1 - JOINT FILING AGREEMENT The undersigned hereby agree that they are filing this statement jointly pursuant to Rule 13d-1(k)(1). Each of them is responsible for the timely filing of such Schedule 13G and any amendments thereto, and for the completeness and accuracy of the information concerning such person contained therein; but none of them is responsible for the completeness or accuracy of the information concerning the other persons making the filing, unless such person knows or has reason to believe that such information is inaccurate. In accordance with Rule 13d-1(k)(1) promulgated under the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, the undersigned hereby agree to the joint filing with each other on behalf of each of them of such a statement on Schedule 13G and any amendments thereto with respect to the equity securities (as defined in Rule 13d-1(i)) of the issuer, beneficially owned by each of them. This Joint Filing Agreement shall be included as an exhibit to such Schedule 13G and any amendments thereto. Date: January 30, 2017 First Trust Portfolios L.P., First Trust Advisors L.P. and The Charger Corporation By: /s/ James M. Dykas --------------------------- Name: James M. Dykas Title: Chief Financial Officer of First Trust Portfolios L.P. and First Trust Advisors L.P., and Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer of The Charger Corporation As the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on Monday submitted details pertaining to Finance Minister Ishaq Dar's confessional statement in the Hudaibiya Paper Mills reference, Dar's lawyer argued his client 'cannot stand trial again' on the basis of allegations against him. Presenting his arguments before a five-judge bench hearing the Panamagate case, Dar's counsel Shahid Hamid asserted that his client cannot be disqualified on the basis of these allegations because the money laundering case against him had been dropped. "He cannot be disqualified based on allegations," the advocate said. "Ishaq Dar did not hold public office when allegations of money laundering were made." Hamid maintained that Dar's confessional statement could not be used against him since he had been acquitted in the Hudaibiya reference. During the hearing on Friday, Advocate Shahid Hamid contended that his client had made the confessional statement under duress. Soon after the Oct 12, 1999, coup, in which the then Nawaz Sharif government was sent packing, Dar was put under house arrest and he had remained detained for 23 months. They (Pervez Musharraf government) even asked him (Dar) to cooperate by offering that if he plays ball with them he will be inducted into the then government, the counsel had claimed. The NAB Prosecutor General Waqas Qadeer Dar, who had been summoned to court Friday, today recorded a statement in court. The NAB PG told the court that Ishaq Dar had recorded a statement regarding the Hudaibiya reference before a district magistrate in Lahore on April 25, 2000. Dar had, in his statement, confessed to his alleged involvement in the money laundering of $14.86 million (about Rs1.2bn) on behalf of the Sharif family. Waqas Qadeer Dar told the court that Ishaq Dar had submitted a request for acquittal in the case on April 20. Justice Asif Saeed asked whether Ishaq Dar had written the request himself. The bench further inquired why no appeals were registered by the NAB, the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan or the State Bank of Pakistan. The prosecutor general told the the court that it was decided during a NAB session that no appeals would be registered in the Hudaibiya case. The prosecutor general was ordered to submit the minutes of the NAB session he was referring to in court. During today's hearing, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's counsel Makhdoom Ali Khan submitted a record detailing the distribution of the Sharif family's inherited properties. PM Nawaz Sharif's son's counsel, Salman Akram Raja, told the bench today that his argument had three aspects. Raja said he would argue that Hussain Nawaz is the beneficial owner of the London flats and that Nawaz Sharif has no association with them. He added that he would address accusations levelled against his client that Hussain was the benami owner of the family's London properties while his father Nawaz was the real owner. Justice Ejaz Afzal told Raja he would have to prove the properties belong to Hussain Nawaz. "The prime minister had said there is an abundance of evidence," Justice Khosa recalled. Hussain Nawaz's lawyer said the matter in court concerns "The matter in the court concerns four flats," Salman Akram told the bench. Touching upon the money trail of financing for the Sharif family's Gulf Steel Mills in Dubai, Justice Sheikh Azmat Saeed said that the prime minister's cousin Tariq Shafi in an affidavit submitted as evidence in court did not mention how liabilities for the purchase of the factory were paid off. In a second affidavit submit in court, Shafi had said that the 12 million dirham amount was paid off in instalments, the judge remarked, enquiring how the investment for the factory reached Qatar. "Was the money transported on camels?" he asked. The lawyer responded saying that business is conducted in cash all over the world and requested that the activity not be interpreted in the 'wrong way'. The lawyer was reiterating statements made in a second letter submitted by Qatari royal Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jaber Al-Thani in court last week. According to the letter, an investment of approximately 12 million dirhams by the prime minister's father, Mian Muhammad Sharif, in the Al-Thani family's real estate business "was made by way of provision of cash." The letter also said that the conducting business in cash, at the time of the investment, "was common practice in the Gulf region." Tired of those unsightly smudges and other dirt on your bacteria-laden smartphone?A Japanese firm has the solution with what it describes the worlds first smartphone that can be washed with soap and water. Waterproof smartphones have been on the market for a while. But telecom company KDDIS new Digno rafre phone launched in Japan in December is the only one that can withstand a soapy bath. Our development team washed the smartphone more than 700 times to test its durability, a company spokesman told AFP. An online commercial aimed at proving its credentials features a child dropping the phone onto a plate of food topped with ketchup. His mother assures her shocked family that those red globs are nothing to worry about as she soaps up the phone under a running tap. The 21,600 yen ($175) gadget is mainly aimed at parents who want to keep their smartphones clean for their small children, a KDDI spokesman said. But he also cautioned that only certain types of foamy soap could be used on the device, which will only be sold in Japan for now. online submissions IFTA Film & Drama Awards 2023 SUBMISSIONS FOR 2023 ARE NOW OPEN Please ensure that you have read the IFTA Rules & Guidelines before you continue with your application Click here to read these. Closing Date: Thursday, 8th December Below is some info with regards to what you will need to complete your submission. Before you proceed with this application form, you will be asked for the following information. Please ensure you have all the items listed below prior to starting the application process as you will not be able to complete your application without all of these items. After you have compiled this information please click on the relevant category type to proceed. 1. Full contact details of the person responsible for making this submission to whom IFTA will send all correspondence relating to this submission. 2. The name and contact details of each person you are submitting for nomination. 3. Complete and authentic production credits 4. A Digital Link (Our preferred platform is Vimeo) for Academy Members and Jury to access your project online. This MUST BE password protected. Be sure to include a username if necessary. 5. A brief biography of each person being submitted for consideration (less than 50 words - this should be a max of 350 characters including spaces). Please note the biography will be used in the Voting Pages for the Academy Members should your title/individual be shortlisted. Please do not submit a CV or Resume. 6. A Brief Synopsis of the Project (less than 50 words - this should be a max of 350 characters including spaces). Please note the synopsis will be used in the Voting Pages for the Academy Members should your title be shortlisted 7. Payment in full - online payment methods accepted Visa, Mastercard and Laser only. Costs quoted are net of VAT which will be added at a rate of 23% on the payment page. Prices quoted are in Euro and are equivalent to : 100 = 84; 60 = 50; 25= 21. 8. DVDs There is no DVD requirement for submission. 9.Images to follow by email (to images@ifta.ie); a Production Still, and headshots of people you have submitted. The maximum size of the email being sent should not exceed 10mb. 10. Confirmation that you have read the Rules & Guidelines document as supplied by IFTA PLEASE SELECT WHICH CATEGORY YOU WOULD LIKE TO SUBMIT IN TO: MUNDELEIN - With less than three weeks until the November 8th election that most pundits say will be an anti-Biden Republican Wave nationwide, Illinois is such a strong blue political island among Midwestern red states that it appears the state's Republicans are bracing to be crashed as it is once again passed by. The IL GOP simply cannot raise money - although Chicago financiers are a favored place for out-of-state Republicans to visit and fill their coffers to win races elsewhere. Why that is a reality is another story - but the fact is that while they are wooing qualified conservatives into the process, the IL GOP has a history of abandoning candidates that jump in to help the cause. Take, for instance, Republican U.S. Senate candidate Kathy Salvi. She's challenging Democrat incumbent Tammy Duckworth, whose voting history and comments show she is as Leftist and radical as the US House's "Squad" - which supports defunding police, unrestricted abortion through and including birth, Marxist ideology and - on and on. Yesterday, the Chicago Sun-Times' Lynn Sweet wrote about the $18 million Duckworth has raised in this campaign and the meager $1 million Salvi has raised. Salvi, who saved the Illinois GOP ballot from being headed by downstate conspiracy theorists Peggy Hubbard and Bobby Piton, has been abandoned and shunned by not only US Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and his leading fundraiser Senator Rick Scott, but the National Republican Senatorial Committee which raises funds for Republican candidates. Salvi has run almost half of her campaign on her personal retirement funds that she's loaned to run for the U.S. Senate. She's energetic, enthused, passionate and well-spoken. Her arguments and strategy are well-thought-out. She does well in discussions with supporters and opponents. There's no one than Salvi that could be a better challenger to Duckworth at this time. Kathy Salvi is a hard-working candidate. And still, she's unable to get support from either the NRSC or the IL GOP. Temperatures this weekend maxed out at 33 degrees in Napier, but it was still perfect beach weather at Mount Maunganui for the Auckland Anniversary. Metservice says the warm toasty days are going to continue during the next few days in the North Island at least. Tauranga is promised 25 to 27 degree C days, with a passing shower Thursday night. Few places saw any rain, the exception being Fiordland and the southern West Coast where Milford Sound clocked up 124mm of rain during the two days. But down south rain begins in earnest on the West Coast tonight as a front moves towards the country. A ridge of high pressure holds firm over the North Island, slowing the progression of the rain further north on Tuesday and Wednesday. This slow motion means that as much as 180mm of rainfall could accumulate on the West Coast over the two days. Strong northwesterly winds ahead of the front will bump up temperatures in the east, but it could rise to severe gale in exposed parts of Canterbury, Otago and Marlborough later on Tuesday. In the north the ridge of high pressure stays put, and although some rain will make it to the western and lower North Island on Thursday, the front is rapidly weakening by that point. There will be strong winds in the south, especially late Tuesday and Wednesday. The chance of any significant rain in the north and east is slim, although there will be more cloud around than at the weekend. Temperatures will be maxing at around 30 degrees in the Hawkes Bay from Tuesday onwards. This weather pattern due to occasional fronts weakening under a ridge, which is typical of New Zealand summer, is looking likely to hold into the coming Waitangi weekend says meteorologist Tom Adams. Tickets are selling fast to Whakatanes week-long Air Chathams Sunshine and a Plate Food Festival next month. From February 18 to 26, the festival celebrates the food and culture of the Eastern Bay of Plenty region. Celebrity chefs, including Nicki Wickes, Jimmy Boswell and wine expert Yvonne Lorkin, are hosting a number of events such as the Nicki Wickes ladies lunch and a master class series. Other feature events include the Gibbos Gourmet Markets at the scenic Whakatane Heads reserve, a whisky and craft beers tasting evening, Mile High Tea scenic flights on the Air Chathams DC3, brunch at Ngai Tuhoes award-winning sustainable headquarters and the gala event: a Medieval Banquet and charity auction. All funds raised go towards Hospice Eastern Bay of Plentys operating costs. Hospice EBOP spokesperson Rosemary Sloman says there was a shortfall in operating costs every year, which have to be made up from community fundraising. Demand for hospice services grows every year, so in hosting this festival we not only have an amazing array of events for locals and visitors, but the proceeds help pay for these much needed services. The popular Air Chathams Sunshine and a Plate Food Festival raises funds for Hospice EBOP. We aim to grow the event every year and put it firmly on the food event map for New Zealand. Its a great way to showcase the Eastern Bays food and lifestyle. Rosemary says tickets are almost sold out for a number of events. Once again, some of our events with limited numbers are almost sold out. We encourage people to book as soon as possible to avoid disappointment. The full event programme and tickets are available from www.sunshineandaplate.nz or from the Whakatane i-Site. Cudeca launched its twenty-fifth anniversary year this week with a look back at its history. During a presentation on Wednesday, founder, Joan Hunt, reminisced about her dream and how it all came together. The meeting was organized to thank all of the people, whether media, fundraisers or sponsors, for their help over the last twenty-five years. Also present were medical director, Marisa Martin, director of finance, Rafael Olalla, and nursing director, Susan Hannam. Joan Hunt explained why she had first decided to open the hospice; claiming that, "nobody could have known what was going to happen 25 years ago." She expressed her heartfelt gratitude to Marisa Martin, the person who not only helped set up Cudeca, but the woman who also cared for Joan's husband when he was ill with cancer. Joan said that the only thing she wanted to do was to spread the word about Marisa's wonderful work, so that other people could have the benefit that she and her husband had received. What began in a spare room in Joan's house in 1992 has turned into the only cancer hospice in Spain. The grounds on which the hospice now stands were donated by Benalmadena town hall in 1995. Joan laid the first stone of the hospice in 1997 and the building was finally completed in 2003. Joan said that she was not afraid of hard work, but she could not have succeeded without the help and support of Marisa and Susan Hannam. She also praised the work of the volunteers, fundraisers and staff. Cudeca now has 5 home care teams who look after more than 350 patients. They have 18 shops, a warehouse and an outlet, and there are plans to build new day-care centres in other parts of Andalucia. Nearly 170 events were organized in aid of Cudeca last year, and around 1,000 collection tins raised over 50,000 euros. The foundation also receives more than 1,500 monthly donations from supporters. The importance of these donors was emphasised by Susan Hannam. "Fundraising and donations are a very important part of Cudeca, and without the generosity of the public, we would simply not exist," Susan explained. She also highlighted the importance of media coverage and thanked the media in Malaga for their continued support. However Joan explained that her first press meeting, back in 1991, had terrified her, but she knew if she wanted to move forward with Cudeca she would have to get used to it. "If you are not used to the press they can be very intimidating, but here I am today, brave enough to sit here and talk to you all," she said, to the amusement of her audience. Joan thanked the local media, especially SUR in English, whom she said have supported Cudeca since they first began. She expressed her gratitude to the newspaper for being the first to acknowledge her achievements with an award in 1993. Looking forward to the future, Joan expressed her determination to continue supplying special care and attention to those who need it. She finished by saying, "Ambition without action is only daydreaming, and we are definitely not daydreaming." By Mark Rhoads - Donald Trump may have to learn the hard way the same lesson that other presidents learned when they thought they were above the law or could defy federal court orders. The same people who condemned President Obama for his lawless abuse of executive orders are now defending President Trump for his lawless abuse of executive orders. Only Trump's abuse already is rising to the levels of Nixon when he orders his Department of Homeland Security to defy several federal judges who have declared that Trump is violating the rights of American citizens with green cards by detaining them at airports. Trump is not a student of history, but he is about to get a history lesson by not learning from the lessons of other presidents who also thought they were above the tule of law. Craftsman The Craftsman Inn in the town of Manlius. The owner plans to renovate the hotel and also the Limestone Grille. (Photo by Steve Billmyer) Town of Manlius, NY - The new owner of the Craftsman Inn and Conference Center and the Limestone Grille near Fayetteville is planning major renovations to the hotel and adjoining restaurant. DeWitt-based Widewaters Hotels purchased the hotel and restaurant at 7300 E. Genesee St. in June for $3.2 million, according to Onondaga County tax records. This will be Widewaters' first hotel in the Syracuse area. "This is a well-known hotel that will have a whole new look and feel,'' said Robert Spoto, vice president of operations for Widewaters Hotels. The company plans to strip and update all 90 guest rooms, Spoto said. In addition, the lobby will be reconfigured and the restaurant and bar will have a new theme and look. Spoto said details of that new restaurant/bar concept are still being worked out. There are two buildings on the property, and they will be closed one at a time during the renovation work, Spoto said. First, the main building which houses the hotel check-in desk and the majority of the guest rooms will be temporarily closed. Once work is complete, the second building with the restaurant/bar, meeting and banquet space and 22 of the guest rooms will close, Spoto said. Exterior improvements are planed, along with new landscaping and expanded parking, adding about 27 additional spaces. A stone parking lot to the left of the restaurant, previously unused, will be opened, Spoto said. The hotel was built in 1995, and expanded in 2000. Work is targeted to start this summer, and be completed by the end of the year. Widewaters Hotels owns and operates more than 20 hotels, including three in the Rochester area and others across the U.S. and in Canada. Schmidinger arraignment 1.JPG A handcuffed David Schmidinger is escorted into Syracuse City Court in December 2016. (Samantha House) Syracuse, NY -- A Lysander man accused of murdering his off-and-on girlfriend by hitting her with a brick and strangling her inside a Syracuse motel room has been found competent to stand trial -- for now. David Schmidinger, 38, of 8653 Braewood Drive, was indicted last week on a second-degree murder charge in the Dec. 22 murder of Michelle Paterson, 44, of Brampton, Ontario. Defense lawyer Ralph Cognetti believes that Schmidinger suffers from mental illness -- a diagnosis that could send his client to a secure mental hospital indefinitely. But a prosecution expert ruled that Schmidinger was able to assist in his own defense, meaning his case can proceed toward trial, Cognetti said. Schmidinger is accused of fatally attacking his girlfriend the morning of Dec. 22 at the Hampton Inn and Suites off Erie Boulevard East in Syracuse. He called 911 about two hours later and told them he had killed his girlfriend and was waiting for police, Chief Frank Fowler has said. Cognetti has shown no indication that he plans to dispute that Schmidinger was the killer. But he's seeking treatment for his client instead of incarceration. Generally, there are two ways mental illness can factor into a murder case: Not competent to stand trial: Not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect: Right now, Cognetti said he is focusing on hiring a second expert to determine if Schmidinger is competent to stand trial. Prosecutors believe Schmidinger is ready to stand trial now. Schmidinger faces 25 years to life in prison if convicted. Once competency is established (down the road if Schmidinger is sent to a treatment hospital first) Cognetti can then explore an insanity plea if he chooses. Schmidinger remains in jail for now. He's due to be arraigned this week in felony court. Keith Seppi, right, is led into the Floyd Town Court for his arraignment in June. (Tina Russell/Observer-Dispatch via AP) SYRACUSE, N.Y. - Keith Seppi should've invested in a GPS device. He planted a homemade bomb in front of the home of a state corrections officer in Floyd, Oneida County, that severely injured the victim when he picked it up May 29. But the night before, Seppi was lost. He stopped at a hotel and asked a clerk for directions, according to an affidavit filed Friday by Harry Maxwell, a special agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. That clerk provided evidence that helped police link the bombing to Seppi, the affidavit said. Keith Seppi Seppi, 58, of Conneaut, Ohio, was charged federally for the first time last week in connection with the bombing. He's accused of transporting a bomb across state lines with the intent of killing or injuring state Corrections Officer Alan Dobransky. Seppi pleaded guilty in October in Oneida County Court to a state assault charge for the bombing. His wife and sister-in-law also pleaded guilty. Maxwell's affidavit, filed on Friday, reveals: Shortly before midnight May 28, someone was driving a pickup truck back and forth on Old Fly Road in Floyd, according to video surveillance cameras in the area. Around 11:15 that night, a man later identified as Seppi stopped at a nearby hotel and told a clerk he was lost. Seppi showed the clerk a set of directions to Old Fly Road. The man told the clerk he'd been driving around a while trying to find the road. "When the clerk asked him for the exact address that he was looking for, so that the clerk could Google it, he was reluctant to provide the address," Maxwell wrote. After the clerk asked again, the man gave the address -- which was Dobransky's. The clerk looked it up, printed out directions and gave them to the man. After the bombing, the clerk notified police about the man who'd stopped for directions. A surveillance camera at the hotel captured images of the man. Seppi admitted to police that he'd built the bomb as a way to intimidate Dobransky. The victim had discovered that Seppi's sister-in-law, Cindy Shields, had stolen money from Dobransky's mother while caring for her in Ohio over the past four years, court papers said. The bomb was designed to blow up as soon as someone picked it up, Maxwell's affidavit said. The bomb engulfed Dobransky in flames. He ran toward his home, screaming, and his wife used a hose to put out the fire, the affidavit said. Dobransky suffered severe burns to his hands, arms and "significant portions of his body," the affidavit said. He also suffered severe burns to his lungs. He's not expected to ever return to his job as a state corrections officer because of the injuries, the affidavit said. Seppi is scheduled to appear in U.S. District Court in Syracuse on Tuesday on the federal charges. SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- It took less than 18 hours for a loosely-organized group of activists to get 1,000 people to Hancock airport Sunday night. Those activists -- known as the CNY Solidarity Coalition -- are the local chapter of progressive opposition groups organizing across the nation in the wake of President Donald Trump's election. And they, like many such groups, are borrowing tactics from a right wing predecessor: The Tea Party. The CNY Solidarity Coalition is one of the most visible groups of local protesters to spring up since November. They've become an overnight political force, attracting the attention of Democratic leaders like Mayor Stephanie Miner and antagonizing Congressional Republicans like John Katko. They're a unified, motivated and angry group of people who are gearing up for a long-term fight. Grass roots In the last three weeks, protesters have staged several large events in Syracuse to oppose Trump. There was the Syracuse in Solidarity event (organized by New Feminists for Justice), a rally opposing the repeal of the Affordable Care Act and Sunday's protest at the airport. The origins of the CNY Solidarity Coalition, however, date back to November. Less than a week after Trump was elected president, members of the Syracuse Peace Council and the Workers' Center of Central New York convened a meeting about how to resist the new president's policies. Since then, the Coalition has met weekly, sometimes drawing hundreds of people. The hierarchy is loose and, essentially, leaderless. Different people assume different roles at different times. Sunday, for example, the group realized they didn't have a megaphone to address the hundreds of people at the airport. Joe Driscoll, one of the organizers, posted on Facebook: "Anyone know where to buy a megaphone in Syracuse?" Within an hour, he found one. After that, he went online and ordered one of his own. He expects to need it often. Some of the driving forces behind the group are experienced activists, organizers and Bernie Sanders supporters. Brian Escobar is an activist with the Peace Council who worked on Sanders' local campaign. The Peace Council and the Workers' Center, he said, have supported the Solidarity Coalition with resources like expertise, meeting space and office supplies. "We knew that after the election we were going to have to do some things differently," Escobar said. "We wanted a gathering of people who were ready to get to work and see what people were interested in doing." To date, the Coalition has hosted more that a half-dozen public events. There was a rally at Perseverance Park to protest the repeal of the Affordable Care Act. There was "The People's Inauguration" on Jan. 21. And, most recently, there was the massive demonstration at the Syracuse airport challenging executive orders on immigration. Through meetings and events, they've developed an email list of about 600 people and a Facebook page with more than 1,000 followers. They use those channels to spread word of their events. In the case of the airport rally, it took less than 18 hours to convene 1,000 people. Borrowing from the Tea Party Many of the group's tactics come from The Indivisible Guide, a strategy book developed by Congressional aides. That guide borrows heavily from the Coalition's ideological opposite: The Tea Party. "Their tactics worked," said Driscoll. "The squeaky wheel gets the grease." In 2009, Conservatives, enraged by the policies of President Barack Obama and a Democratic Congress, united in protest. Nearly 100,000 marched on Washington in September of that year. Similar events took place on the local level around the country. The group united under the umbrella of the Tea Party. The following year, bolstered by Tea Party backlash, Republicans retook the U.S. House of Representatives. In 2014, they took the Senate. Many viewed the swing as a nationwide rejection of the president's liberal policies. It began, however, with a small, very vocal group of activists. The similarities with the current movement are undeniable. With a Republican in the Oval Office and Republican control of both Houses, many progressives feel voiceless in Washington. They're making their frustration heard at the local level -- just as Tea Partiers did eight years ago. The Indivisible Guide offers strategies culled from the Tea Party playbook. Among those strategies: Make your local representatives into household names among dissenters and encourage people to call them. The CNY Solidarity Coalition made U.S. Rep. John Katko a frequent subject of its chants at the airport. They have thrice protested outside his office in the federal building. Thomas Keck -- a Solidarity organizer -- has developed an offshoot group called "Katko Watch" that urges Central New York's Congressman to stand up to Trump. Keck described Katko as "unresponsive" to petitions and requests for meetings with the Coalition. Nationwide, the Indivisible Guide lists more than 4,500 associated groups. Moving from words to action There exists still a gap between the grassroots opposition and the Democratic political establishment. Local organizers are wary of the group's efforts being co-opted by political ambitions. "I think we want kind of a firewall between electoral politics and actual people-powered organizing," said Escobar. "We can't let [Democrats] be the leaders of the resistance." Others see the Democratic Party as an ineffective means of opposition. "There's a widespread impression that Democrats are not resisting hard enough," said Keck, one of the organizers of CNY Solidarity Coalition. "[Sen. Kirsten] Gilibrand is getting out in front of it. There's lots of speculation as to whether she's going to run [for president] in 2020. Any Democrat who compromises is going to have an awful hard time in that Democratic primary." That sentiment echoes the strategy of the Tea Party in the early years of Barack Obama's presidency. Republicans seen as too cozy with the establishment were squeezed out of office by political newcomers who were less centrist. In 2014, for example, the House's No. 2 Republican, Eric Cantor, lost a primary to Tea Party candidate Dave Brat, despite outspending him by millions of dollars. The upheaval created by the Tea Party shifted the entire Republican platform farther to the right and away from the more moderate establishment -- a trend that would ultimately help Trump succeed as a populist candidate. Such could be the case with the new anti-Trump opposition, which may pull the Democratic Party farther to the left as it pressures Congressional leaders. Political activism meets politics Among the CNY Solidarity group is a hesitancy to identify with a political faction. "It's certainly not a Democratic Party group," said Andy Mager, a volunteer organizer and veteran activist. "There are people who are independents, Democrats, Greens or don't believe voting can make a difference. There may even be some registered Republicans. We don't ask." Mager was one of the organizers of the airport rally. He said he welcomed the Democratic Party members in the crowd, but they were not the drivers of the movement. Still, the proximity to the party is undeniable. Mayor Stephanie Miner, a Democrat and former co-chair of the New York State Democratic Committee, has been in contact with the group and gave an impassioned speech at the airport Sunday. Prominent Democratic Party members peppered the crowd as well, including mayoral hopefuls like Andrew Maxwell and Juanita Perez-Williams. Caught in the middle of the activists' goals and the Democratic Party are people like Joe Driscoll. Driscoll is a Democratic Committee member in Syracuse and a candidate for the Common Council. He's also an activist whose background comes in grassroots organizing. "I'm walking on eggshells because now I'm the establishment one," he said. "Democrats and grassroots need to work together to resist this presidency...As far as how that's going to work it's a social experiment, but it's worth trying." ducks.JPG A total of 29 illegally shot redhead ducks were confiscated by the DEC. (DEC) New York State Environmental Conservation Officers recently ticketed individuals in incidents involving duck hunters taking way over the daily take limit of birds and anglers catching and keeping bass out of season. These incidents and two others below occurred earlier this month. All specifics were supplied by the state Department of Environmental Conservation. The names of those ticketed, though, were not released by the DEC. Over-limit Duck Hunter caught by Off Duty ECOs - Cayuga County "On Jan. 15, off duty ECOs Scott Angotti and Josh Crain were waterfowl hunting on Owasco Lake in the town of Scipio when they observed three individuals shoot a large group of redhead ducks swimming into the men's decoy spread. The three subjects all emptied their shotguns into the flock, killing a total of 35 redhead ducks and possibly wounding several others. (The daily take limit is two redhed ducks per hunter). ECOs Angotti and Crain immediately contacted local ECO Scott Sincebaugh, approached the three hunters, and identified themselves as ECOs. ECO Sincebaugh arrived a short time later and issued the hunters tickets for taking over the aggregate limit of ducks, as well as taking over the daily limit of redheads. One of the hunters was also charged with possession of a loaded firearm in a motor vehicle, hunting without a license, and not participating in the Harvest Information Program." The illegally taken bass.DEC Bass Out of Season - Saratoga County "On Jan. 14, ECO Mark Klein received a call that fishermen on Saratoga Lake were catching bass and sneaking them into their vehicle although bass season was closed. When ECO Klein arrived, he checked the fishermen. All had licenses and there were no obvious violations of the Conservation Law, but when ECO Klein asked about the bass in their vehicle, they admitted to hiding additional fish and turned them over to ECO Klein. All told, seven bass ranging in size from 13 to 19 inches were seized and the fishermen were charged with Taking Bass out of Season." Illegal Doe - Orange County "On Jan. 11, ECO Chris Lattimer completed a month-long investigation regarding a hunter trespassing complaint. A Deerpark resident had a trail camera picture from Nov. 22 of two men dragging a doe off of his property. The resident was unable to identify the two men at the time. On Jan. 11, the complainant called ECO Lattimer and stated that he overheard one of the hunters bragging about the deer at a party. The man shared the name of the hunter with the officer. ECO Lattimer conducted some interviews and located the hunter, who admitted to trespassing on the complainant's property. He stated that he had shot the deer on a neighboring property and tracked it to the complainant's property. The hunter stated that he originally thought the deer was a buck and did not realize it was a doe until he found it. He then admitted to not tagging it, as he did not have a Deer Management Permit (DMP) for that zone. The hunter was issued appearance tickets for the Illegal Taking of Protected Wildlife and for Taking a Doe without a Permit, returnable to the Town of Deerpark Court. Both men were also given verbal warnings for trespassing on posted property." A Little Bit of Everything in That Fire - Erie County "On Jan. 15, while on patrol, ECO Chuck Wilson observed a man standing next to a large pile of smoking debris. By the time ECO Wilson turned around and returned to the residence, the pile was fully engulfed in flames. It was immediately apparent that the fire contained construction and demolition debris, including cabinets, plastics, linoleum flooring, cardboard, and painted lumber. The man tending the fire admitted that he owned a small construction company and the debris was brought in from one of his job sites, stating, "There's a little bit of everything in there." The subject was issued appearance tickets for unlawfully disposing of solid waste at other than an approved facility and unlawful open burning." Donald Trump President Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with business leaders in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. Joy Weatherup Anthis, fourth from left and sitting next to Trump, is the owner of JWA Construction Management in DeWitt. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci) (Evan Vucci) WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Joy Weatherup Anthis says she was surprised today when she found herself sitting next to President Donald Trump at the White House, offering him advice about cutting regulations on small businesses. Weatherup Anthis, the owner of JWA Construction Management in DeWitt, said she received a phone call from the White House last week inviting her to a roundtable discussion. But the Pompey resident said she had no idea she would be seated next to Trump as he met for almost 90 minutes in the Roosevelt Room of the White House with small business owners from across the nation. "He brought together 10 small business owners from all over to talk about the challenges in our day-to-day lives growing our businesses," Weatherup Anthis said after leaving the White House this afternoon. "I've got to be honest with you: He was extremely interested and listened, and chimed in when he thought it was important to say something," she said. "I left there feeling extremely optimistic that he is on a mission to make change. It was really encouraging." After talking about challenges her firm faces with financing and regulations related to the Affordable Care Act, Weatherup Anthis and the other small business owners were invited into the Oval Office. Joy Weatherup Antis, of Pompey, the last person on the right, watches as President Donald Trump signs an executive order in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. The order is aimed at significantly cutting regulations. White House officials are calling the directive a "one in, two out" plan. It requires government agencies requesting a new regulations to identify two regulations they will cut from their own departments. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) The group stood behind Trump as he signed an executive order that will expand regulatory review, with a goal of revoking two federal regulations for every new one enacted by federal agencies. The White House invitation came about quickly for Weatherup Anthis when Chris Christou, a cousin and owner of Gold Crust Baking Co. in suburban Washington, D.C. area, was approached last week by a small business liaison in the White House West Wing. Christou recommended his cousin as a good person to provide feedback on challenges faced by small businesses. Weatherup Anthis said it was clear to her that she wasn't just a prop to be used in a photo opportunity by the White House. "He spent significant time with us," she said of Trump. She reminded Trump that the two met in 2014 when Trump visited Central New York as the keynote speaker at a fundraiser for the Onondaga County Republican Committee. "I told him, 'I met you in Syracuse two years ago.' And he said I remember being in Syracuse two years ago. He has a memory like a steel trap," Weatherup Anthis said. Contact Mark Weiner anytime: Email | Twitter | Facebook | 571-970-3751 SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- Area colleges are reaching out to their international students in response to President Donald Trump's executive order limiting travel among non-citizens from certain countries. Trump's order, signed Friday afternoon, barred Syrian refugees from entering the U.S., temporarily halted all other refugee admission for 120 days and banned citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the country for 90 days. Local universities, which often attract international students, professors and other workers, are cautioning community members from Iran, Iraq, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen to avoid travel. Some have invited immigration lawyers to campus to help their students navigate the new order. Cornell University is providing legal services to its students, and even set up a hotline for students who run into any problems while they are traveling. The particulars of the order are being debated by lawmakers and in federal courts, but restrictions likely apply to anyone from these countries with a student visas or a green card. Still, the order appears to affect a relatively small number of students locally. Le Moyne College spokeman Joe Della Posta said that the college has so few students from these countries that officials are reaching out to them individually. Della Posta did not have an exact number of students affected but said officials have determined that students from the countries affected by the order have already safely returned to campus for the spring semester. He said the college would provide support and resources to those students as needed. The largest number of affected students locally is likely at Syracuse University, where international student enrollment has more than doubled since 2006. Approximately 4,123 international students attend SU this year, according to a report by the Slutzker Center for International Services. The Slutzker Center reached out to many international students over the weekend, according to the Daily Orange student newspaper. According to the D.O., Slutzker Center director Pat Burak advised certain students via email not to travel for the next 90 days, or risk not being allowed to return to the U.S. A receptionist at the Slutzker Center referred all questions to SU's communications office. A university spokesperson provided a letter from Chancellor Kent Syverud to the campus community. Syverud said SU was working to identify all students and faculty affected by the order. He pledged his support of immigrant students and said the university was reaching out to elected officials for clarity about the order and what it means for international students. Slutzker Center data suggests the university does enroll a large number of students from the affected areas this year. The largest group of students from one of the seven countries appears to be 30 graduate students from Iran, according to the data. There are less than a dozen undergraduate or graduate students from the other six countries, according to the Slutzker Center's report. The report measures the number of students with academic visas. It does not include professors, staff or green card holders, but helps provide an estimation of the situation at SU. Hamilton College President David Wippman said in an email to the campus that he was concerned about the travel restrictions and their impact on higher education. He joined other university presidents in speaking out against the order. "The college is named after one of this country's most famous immigrants and has a long history of welcoming community members from around the globe, including countries named in the recent executive order," Wippman wrote. "We will continue to do so." Wippman said Hamilton has invited an immigration law expert to campus next week to meet with anyone who has questions about the order. SUNY Oswego President Deborah Stanley advised students and faculty from the seven affected countries to be careful about travel in a message to the campus community. "This is a new order and there is considerable uncertainty about its implications, therefore, we advise great caution on the part of our international students, faculty and staff to consider carefully any travel outside the country or consider deferring travel until there is more clarity about how the Executive Order will affect us." Stanley urged anyone affected to seek advice from an experienced immigration lawyer before making travel plans. "We remain steadfast in our commitment to international students, scholars and programs for the creativity, intellectual rigor and cultural diversity you bring to our campus," Stanley said. Onondaga Community College President Casey Crabill also shared a message of support with the campus community, particularly students who immigrated from other countries. "You have our support," she said in the statement. "Whether you were born in the United States or arrived here recently, you are an important part of the OCC family." Reporter Julie McMahon covers Syracuse University and Syracuse city schools. She can be reached anytime: Email | Twitter | 315-412-1992 ALBANY, N.Y. -- Gov. Andrew Cuomo would like to amend the New York constitution to codify abortion rights, even if the United States Supreme Court should decide to overturn or weaken the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. The governor announced the proposal during a "I stand with Planned Parenthood" rally Monday in Albany. Amending the state constitution requires the legislature, including a Republican-led Senate, to twice vote in favor of the change, and then it goes to the public for a vote. If approved, the amendment would enshrine abortion rights for New York women under the same standard set by the United State Supreme Court. The governor's office said in a news release that an amendment might be necessary as President Donald Trump, who has said he opposes abortion, readies to name an appointment to the Supreme Court. He's said he make that appointment as early as today. The proposal is the governor's latest attempt to enhance and protect women's access to contraceptives and abortion services as a possible repeal of the Affordable Care Act looms. Last week, Cuomo directed state insurers to provide contraceptive coverage to women without co-pays, coinsurance or deductibles even if the ACA is repealed. Parents of students at an Upstate New York elementary school were shocked to learn last week that a registered sex offender was allowed into the school where he handed out "love notes" to students -- and that it was completely legal. "He started passing out napkins with his autograph, 'I love you,' and the date on it. We recovered five or six of those," Canajoharie Police Chief Bryan MacFadden told WNYT-TV. The incident happened at East Hill Elementary School in Canajoharie on Wednesday. The man, who has not been identified, was allowed into the school to have breakfast with his niece and her parents. This has been a common practice at the school in the past. When the man started giving out signed napkins to students with notes reading "I love you," some students became uncomfortable and reported it to officials. That's when it was discovered that he was a level two registered sex offender from a sexually violent offense in 2009, WRGB-TV reported. On top of that, there was no legal basis for preventing him from entering the school because he wasn't on parole or probation. "The subject is a level 2, but there are no restrictions so he can be at the school as long as he wants as long as he's not doing anything illegal," McFadden said. No arrests were made, but the man was banned from school property for causing a disruption, according to WRGB. "I was appalled," said East Hill parent Heather Murphy. "A lot of us didn't understand why he wasn't arrested and we were demanding that response, but unfortunately he didn't break the law." Now parents are banding together to try to push for a change in the law. In the mean time, the school has made some immediate policy changes. Canajoharie Central Schools Superintendent Deborah Grimshaw told WRGB that parents will no longer be allowed to walk children inside the school to drop them off. Doors will be locked, family members will not be allowed to share meal times with students and a greeter will screen visitors at the school entrance. Parents have also been invited to a meeting on student safety on Monday night at 6 p.m. Watch the WNYT-TV video report below. Donald Trump President Donald Trump signs an executive order for border security and immigration enforcement improvements, Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2017, at the Homeland Security Department in Washington. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) The State University of New York system issued a statement Sunday warning its 320 students from countries banned by President Donald Trump's executive order to avoid travel. "SUNY is reviewing President Trump's Executive Order and surveying its campuses to determine the impact it may have on our students, faculty, and staff both abroad and at home on our 64 college and university campuses," the statement said. Trump's order temporarily banned all refugees from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen from entering the U.S. Some people with valid visas traveling back to the U.S. from those countries were originally detained, but the Trump administration on Saturday said those people with green cards would be allowed into the U.S. SUNY's statement did not specify how the executive action could affect SUNY students, but they are reviewing any possible complications for students. The SUNY system said it will do what it can within the law to support any students from the banned countries. "As always, our commitments to diversity, equity, and inclusion are unwavering," the statement said. "Our founding principles and support for undocumented students, restated by the SUNY Board of Trustees at its meeting last week, continue to guide our actions as we review and react to new federal mandates with regard to immigration." SUNY has set up an immigration information website for students and families in response to Trump's order, which includes resources and information about legal rights for students. The system plans to update the site with new information as it becomes available. "In light of events unfolding as the Executive Order is implemented at airports across the country, we recommend suspending travel plans to the countries included, and urge individuals affected to keep in contact with their campus Office of International Student and Scholar Services, including widespread protests," SUNY said in the statement. Protesters have poured into airports across the country, including in Syracuse, Buffalo and Albany, to rally against the order and demand refugees be allowed to enter the United States. SUNY said it is working with Gov. Andrew Cuomo and New York's congressional delegation to assure fair treatment for any impacted students. WASHINGTON -- President Donald J. Trump's plan to use biometric checks -- such as fingerprints or iris scans -- for everyone entering or leaving the United States would cause massive backups at the Canadian border, according to the general manager of the Peace Bridge Authority. "This would just devastate Western New York," said Ron Rienas, general manager of the Peace Bridge Authority, after reviewing the provision requiring biometric scans. "It would shut down the border. It just makes no sense." In an executive order issued Friday, Trump calls for the biometric checks. It was included in tough new restrictions on immigration and refugee admissions. The executive order states: "The Secretary of Homeland Security shall expedite the completion and implementation of a biometric entry-exit tracking system for all travelers to the United States, as recommended by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States." The order does not give the Department of Homeland Security a deadline for implementing the biometric system, but it calls on the agency to report its progress to the president periodically. The commission mentioned in the order recommended such a biometric system after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, but Congress always rejected such a system because of the logistical problems and costs involved. Rienas said the logistical problems would be immense. Every border crossing would take longer, and the Peace Bridge plaza in Buffalo would have to be expanded to handle new booths where additional inspectors would perform biometric tests on those leaving the United States. The resulting traffic jams on both sides of the Peace Bridge would be so bad that Canadians would stop coming to Buffalo for Bills and Sabres games, Rienas predicted. "Our traffic would drop like a stone," he said. Rep. Brian Higgins, a Buffalo Democrat whose district includes the Peace Bridge, noted that implementation of the proposal would require the cooperation of the Canadian government. Asked for comment, Christine Constantin, a spokesperson at the Canadian embassy in Washington, said: "In support of a strong, secure and efficient border, both Canada and the United States already securely share entry records of approximately 16,000 to 19,000 travelers daily, with no impact on the traveler experience. We are aware of President Trump's executive orders and will continue to track them." Higgins appeared less concerned than Rienas about the proposal. "I know what's going on here," Higgins said of Trump's pending executive order. "This is a silly idea that's going nowhere. But it feeds the narrative of his that he's anti-immigration." A similar proposal surfaced in Congress two years ago. Higgins said research at the time determined that the cost of implementing such a system nationwide would be $6.5 billion, which meant the program would swallow 22 percent of the Department of Homeland Security's budget. "The president can issue this executive order and he can ask Homeland Security to implement it, but he will have to come to Congress for funding," Higgins said. "That's where it will stop." That's exactly what happened with that proposal from two years ago. House Republican leaders withdrew a bill that would require biometric tests at border crossings in five to seven years amid pressure from Rep. Chris Collins, R-Clarence, and other lawmakers that represent border areas. Collins did not respond to a request for comment for this story. But the congressman -- now a leading liaison between Trump and the House -- played a key role in killing the 2015 proposal, introducing an amendment that would have not allowed the biometric plan to go forward unless it was tested in a demonstration project first to determine if it would cause traffic chaos. "What we want is just to make sure that anything we do, number one, works, and number two, doesn't cause undue delays at our northern borders and for folks coming to Bills and Sabres games and going to the Galleria mall," Collins said at the time. "We can't have backups at the Peace Bridge or Rainbow Bridge or any of the others that would dissuade Canadians from coming into this country and also inconvenience Americans." -- By The Buffalo News, Buffalo, N.Y. A British petition is urging Queen Elizabeth II not to meet with President Donald Trump. More than 1.2 million people have signed the petition on Parliament's official UK website, urging British Prime Minister Theresa May to withdraw an invitation for Trump to make a "State" visit in London. According to Fortune, the new U.S. president is scheduled to visit Great Britain later this year. "Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the U.K. in his capacity as head of the U.S. Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen," the petition says. The author, Graham Guest, added that Trump's "well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales." He makes no mention of Trump's travel ban blocking U.S. entry to refugees and nationals of seven Muslim-majority nations, but momentum for the petition grew as thousands across the U.S. protested the order over the weekend. The New York Daily News reports petition data shows at least 5,000 signatures on the petition came from Americans, plus another 26 from residents of Iran, one of the seven countries restricted Friday. The petition is limited to UK residents. Parliament says it will respond to all petitions with more than 100,000 signatures, but a government source told The Telegraph that May will not withdraw because Trump's visit is "substantially in the national interest." Trump met with May Friday at the White House, his first meeting with a world leader since taking office. British government hailed the visit as a sign that the trans-Atlantic "special relationship" is valued by the new administration. Political opponents criticized May, questioning Britain's stance on torture -- the U.K. condemns it -- after Trump said he thinks torturing terrorism suspects works. Trump was also criticized for a White House memo that misspelled May's first name. "Teresa May," without the H, is a model and adult film actress best known in the U.S. for starring in The Prodigy's "Smack My B---- Up" music video. WASHINGTON - As the pressure mounts concerning President Donald Trump's recent executive order temporarily clamping down on immigrants from seven countries, the president released a statement following Sunday night in which he emphasized, "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." The new president battled with the mainstream media throughout his campaign, and continues to point to "fake news" as key in perpetuating what his closest advisers say is misinformation. Trump and his inside circles are bypassing the media and going directly to the public on Twitter and Facebook, where Sunday evening Trump said the countries included in the order were those previous identified by President Barack Obama. He then defended his actions saying, "My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country." The statement as posted on Facebook: As the chief legal officers for over 130 million Americans and foreign residents of our states, we condemn President Trump's unconstitutional, unAmerican and unlawful Executive Order and will work together to ensure the federal government obeys the Constitution, respects our history as a nation of immigrants, and does not unlawfully target anyone because of their national origin or faith. Religious liberty has been, and always will be, a bedrock principle of our country and no president can change that truth. Yesterday, multiple federal courts ordered a stay of the Administrations dangerous Executive Order. We applaud those decisions and will use all of the tools of our offices to fight this unconstitutional order and preserve our nations national security and core values. We are confident that the Executive Order will ultimately be struck down by the courts. In the meantime, we are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created. It's not often that you'll find the tech industry in agreement over something, but from Alphabet to Uber, the criticism against Donald Trump's immigration ban has been the same. Since the President signed the executive order blocking entry to the US for citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries, Silicon Valley has fought against the move with words and actions. Google was one of the first to react to Trump's actions. CEO Sundar Pichai told staff traveling overseas that may be impacted by the order to return to the US immediately. In a note to employees, Pichai said nearly 200 Google workers are affected by the ban. "It's painful to see the personal cost of this executive order on our colleagues," Pichai wrote. "We've always made our view on immigration issues known publicly and will continue to do so." That time I fled Communist Romania to a refugee camp in Austria, came to America, & years later became an exec @Google creating 10ks of jobs https://t.co/iaerM5gLHc --- Laszlo Bock (@LaszloBock2718) January 29, 2017 Google has now created a $4 million "crisis fund" that will be donated to four organizations: the ACLU, Immigrant Resource Center, International Rescue Committee and Mercy Corps. Apple boss Tim Cook said the company will do everything it can to support affected employees, adding that "Apple would not exist without immigration." Microsoft, meanwhile, has 76 employees under threat. CEO Satya Nadella, himself an immigrant, said: "As an immigrant and as a CEO, I've both experienced and seen the positive impact that immigration has on our company, for the country, and for the world. We will continue to advocate on this important topic." Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg expressed his concerns over the ban on the social network. He wrote that the firm is "assessing the impact on our workforce and determining how best to protect our people and their families from any adverse effects." After it was lambasted for refusing to show solidarity with New York City taxi drivers who were striking at JFK airport, Uber said it will create a $3 million legal fund to help its drivers affected by the ban. Rival Lyft is also helping by donating $1 million to the ACLU over four years. Its co-founders wrote: "[we] will not be silent on issues." Tesla's Elon Musk, who is part of Trump's business advisory team, tweeted that the ban is not the best way to address the country's challenges." Many people negatively affected by this policy are strong supporters of the US. They've done right,not wrong & don't deserve to be rejected. --- Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 29, 2017 LinkedIn, Amazon, Mozilla, Twitter, and many more have also spoken out against the ban. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings had some of the harshest words, calling the order "so un-American it pains us all." "Worse, these actions will make America less safe (through hatred and loss of allies) rather than more safe," Hastings added. Some big tech companies were noticeably quiet on the issue. Palantir refused to comment on the ban, though given co-founder Peter Thiel's relationship with Trump, that's not much of a surprise. IBM, Oracle, and Dell have also declined requests to comment. If you're in any doubt as to the rising popularity of ransomware, here's today's second piece of news related to the malicious software: It's been reported that the malware was used to prevent guests accessing their rooms at a luxury hotel after it infected the resort's electronic key system. Romantik Seehotel Jagerwirt, a four-star hotel in the Austrian Alps, ended up paying attackers $1600 to release its paralyzed systems, according to owner Christoph Brandstaetter. Initial reports stated that guests were locked inside their rooms, but this wasn't true. Motherboard writes that the 180 guests who had checked in before the attack were able to get in and out of their rooms thanks to the internal system, which wasn't networked with the infected computers. However, no new keycards could be issued to the guests checking-in during the 24-hour period that the reservation system was down, leaving no option but to hand over the ransom. "The police told us that we are one of many companies hacked recently," Brandstaetter said. "They are trying to figure out who made the cyberattack." The incident marks the third time in under a year that the hotel has been hit with ransomware. The frequency suggests that the attackers have been leaving backdoors on the system that allow them to mount new attacks whenever they need more cash. Brandstaetter said that system upgrades had been installed, preventing what would have been a fourth attack. But just to be sure, he plans to change the hotel's locks to "old-fashioned locks with real keys" when it undergoes its next refurbishment. "We made it public because we have many colleagues and other companies who have had these cyberattacks," Brandstaetter said. "It's not just our hotel at all." The disconnect between Donald Trump and Silicon Valley is likely to widen as his administration has drafted an executive order that intends to overhaul the work-visa programs that various technology companies rely on to hire tens of thousands of employees each year. According to a draft of the order obtained by Bloomberg, the proposed changes affect a number of visa programs including H-1B, L-1, E-2 and B1. Full details are unknown at this point but the intention is to tighten requirements so that businesses are compelled to hire American first, and if they recruit foreign workers, priority would be given to the most highly paid. Foreign work visas were originally established to help U.S. companies recruit from abroad when they couldn't find qualified local workers. The program indeed serves its intended purpose when companies hire for highly technical positions in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) fields. However, Bloomberg references allegations that the programs are also frequently abused to bring cheaper workers from overseas. The top recipients of the H-1B visas doing this are reportedly outsourcers from India like Infosys and Wipro, who run the technology departments of large corporations with largely imported staff. "Our country's immigration policies should be designed and implemented to serve, first and foremost, the U.S. national interest," the draft proposal reads. "Visa programs for foreign workers ... should be administered in a manner that protects the civil rights of American workers and current lawful residents, and that prioritizes the protection of American workers." It's not clear if the draft seeks to reduce the number of workers allowed to enter under such programs (currently 85,000 per year) of if will make it harder to get applications approved. However the concern is that it could also stifle innovation by limiting talent coming from abroad. The Trump administration is already under heavy criticism over its recent move to ban refugees from seven predominantly Muslim nations. Companies including Google, Facebook, Microsoft and others have rejected the ban claiming it violates the country's principles. Some of them also helped the American Civil Liberties Union raise over $24 million in online donations this weekend alone to fight the ban. Despite the backlash that Samsung had to go through after the company was forced to recall the Note 7 late last year, there's still a lot of fans eagerly awaiting the launch of its newest flagship phone. Early reports said that the phone will be launched at this year's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, but that has already been debunked by a Samsung executive. Samsung also had to deal with providing the public with an explanation as to why some of its Note 7 units exploded, which led to the recall. The Samsung Galaxy 8: Here's What We Know So Far Samsung's newest flagship phone will have a lot going for it. First off, instead of the usual 4 GB, the Samsung Galaxy S8 is rumored to have 6 GB of RAM. The extra bump in RAM can only mean one thing - a premium hardware will be needed to power up the phone. The Galaxy S8 will probably be the first Android phone to have the much-hyped Snapdragon 835 chipset. This is because Samsung helped Qualcomm build the 10nm chipset. Powerful Processor As a result of the long-standing collaboration between the two tech companies, Samsung will get first dibs on the newest Qualcomm processor. This is certainly bad news for the LG G6 as it nears its launch in MWC, as well as the other flagship phones that will launch ahead of the Samsung Galaxy S8. These phones will have to use a slightly older SoC, such as the Snapdragon 821. Improved Design Aside from its mighty processor, another highlight of the phone will be the design. It is expected that the company will continue with the metal and glass curved design; however, the new Galaxy flagship will probably have a lot more screen real estate with the removal of the home button and the pared-down top and bottom bezels. The bezels will be so narrow that the fingerprint scanner will be placed on the phone's back. There will also be an iris scanner that's similar to the one on the Note 7, and an artificial intelligence called "Bixby" that can recognize objects through the phone's camera. The phone will also be VR-ready and will support headsets such as the Samsung Gear VR headset and Gear 360 camera. In an earlier Tech Times report, we said that the flagship will probably cost around $900. So will the new phone be worthy of wait and price tag? Many pundits think so. Samsung has been busy the last couple of months trying to recover some of the trust and confidence it lost with the Note 7 debacle, and it is making sure that all of the phone's bases have been covered by the time it launches by late March or early April. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Many fans are already excited for the newest installment of Star Wars, the official title of which was recently revealed to be Star Wars: The Last Jedi. This revelation just heightened the excitement of many fans, especially considering the very secretive nature of the movie's production. So far, all we know are just bits and pieces about the upcoming film, including new characters we can love -- or hate. Very little is known about the film's plot, though the title gives a very intriguing clue about a possible focus on Rey's training with Luke Skywalker. Rumors about the film focusing on the new trio's background have also started to surface, as well a possible exploration of Kylo Ren's character. With little known about the film's plot, let's get to know some of the actors who may bring more colors to new characters in the upcoming film. Laura Dern Though Golden Globe winner Laura Dern is known for her part in HBO's Enlightened where she played a self-destructive woman, for many people she is more known as paleobotany grad student Dr. Ellie Sattler in Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park III. Rumor has it, Laura Dern will play an aristocratic resistance leader. What her character's relationship and dynamic with General Organa will be is unknown, but it will be interesting to see the two women leading the resistance. Benicio Del Toro Benicio Del Toro is known for his gruff voice and for usually playing serious and brooding characters. The Oscar winner is mostly known for his role in 2001's Traffic, for which he won an Oscar and multiple nominations. The actor's gravitas came in handy when he played notorious drug trafficker Pablo Escobar in "Escobar: Paradise Lost" and Alejandro Gillick in 2015's Sicario opposite Emily Blunt. Del Toro is rumored to be playing a role on the more villainous side of the force, though there is no clear statement on the matter. If rumors prove to be true, his 67 nominations and 44 wins from both major and minor awarding bodies promises an effective villain that many will love to hate. Kelly Marie Tran Young actor Kelly Marie Tran is mostly known for her parts in College Humor Originals from 2006 and the series version of the movie About a Boy in 2014. It is believed that the actor will play a more comedic role in close contact with John Boyega's Finn and Oscar Isaac's Poe Dameron. Rumors state that her character will be a little like a paid intelligence trader in the battle between the First Order and the Resistance. Where her loyalties will lie in the battle is unknown, but it looks like Tran is set to give audiences an interesting and colorful character. Warwick Davis English actor Warwick Davis isn't technically new to the Star Wars universe. He has since played various characters from previous Star Wars movies including Weazel and Wald in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, Wicket the Ewok in Star Wars Episode VI: Return of The Jedi, Wollivan in Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens and Weeteef Cyubee in 2016's Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. Very little is known about the character he might play in The Last Jedi, but with an impressive Star Wars history, it's not surprising if Davis gives audiences yet another character to love. BONUS: Word is getting around that Tom Hardy will make a cameo in The Last Jedi, though in the form of a storm trooper, similar to Daniel Craig's The Force Awakens cameo. The film originally set to be released in April has now been pushed back to Dec. 15, 2017. Daisy Ridley, John Boyega and Oscar Isaac will reprise their roles as Rey, Finn and Poe Dameron respectively, with Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker, and the late Carrie Fisher as General Leia Organa. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Samsung jumped into the VR craze with its very own Samsung Gear VR. This Gear was designed to work with Samsung flagship phones such as Galaxy S7 and Galaxy Note series. The biggest feature of Gear VR however is its voice search for web browsing. Using the Samsung Internet app, one can surf the web easily with few spoken keywords. But this tech is not without its hijinks. The voice search can be interrupted by other apps; others just won't start. But throw your headsets -- there's an easy fix for this. Samsung actually relies on Google voice search to do its webcrawling. So you first need to make sure the big G is updated. Open your Google Play and check if it is updated to the most recent version. Moreover, it can be a simple Text-to-Speech hiccup. Go to your phone settings and check the Language and Input. There, tap Text-to-Speech to toggle it. Moreover, make sure to switch to Google Text-to-Speech engine. Now, put your VR on and open Samsung Internet app. At this point, your VR should be working fine. Now enjoy your movie streaming or whatever it is you do on the web. To wrap it up, here are the quick and easy steps to fix your VR voice prob: Update your Google app Open up Google Play on your phone Search your installed apps and find Google Update the app to the most current version Enable Google Text-to-speech Open the settings on your phone. Tap on Language and input. Tap on Text-to-speech Tap on Google Text-to-speech Open Samsung Internet app and voila, voice search activated! Samsung Gear VR is a mobile virtual reality headset developed by Samsung in partnership with Oculus, the creator of the first commercial VR headseat, Oculus. Gear VR was released on Nov. 27, 2015. This product is positioned to work in tandem with Samsung flagship devices such as Galaxy S6, Galaxy S6 Edge, Galaxy Note 5, and Galaxy S7 series. The phones act as the display and processor, while the headgear is the "controller", done by moving the head, a technology enabled by motion sensors. As of February 2016, there are 185 apps available for Gear VR in the Oculus store. One popular use of the VR is the 360-degree panorama view using the Oculus 360 app. Netflix also released a streaming service to be used on Gear VR. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Tesla is suing its former employee, Sterling Anderson, for breach of contract. Anderson is the former Director of Autopilot Software for the electric car company. Tesla is claiming that Anderson attempted to steal proprietary information and recruit other employees of the company. Anderson, Christopher Urmson, and Aurora Innovation are listed as the defendants in the lawsuit filed by Tesla. The company filed the lawsuit on Thursday at Santa Clara, California, claiming that Anderson was planning to come up with his own self-driving car company even while he was still employed at Tesla. Anderson's Function At Tesla Anderson left Tesla back in December after three years of working for the company. He was replaced by 11-year Apple veteran Chris Lattner. While he was still with the company, Anderson was in charge of the Autopilot software. He helped the company remain competitive with Google's own autonomous driving technology by incorporating fleet data. In an MIT Tech Review conference, Anderson explained how Tesla was able to download driving data from its fleet of vehicles. Tesla Claims Anderson Is Poaching Its Employees Tesla says that Anderson is collaborating with Christopher Urmson, former lead of Google's self-driving program, to found their autonomous driving start-up called Aurora Innovation. The company said the duo attempted to recruit at least 12 engineers to join their company. Two Tesla engineers already confirmed they will be joining Anderson's startup. The company further says that Anderson attempted to recruit several Tesla engineers even after he already left the company. Anderson will be the one to identify the engineers, while Urmson will be the one who will attempt to recruit them. Tesla says this same tactic was used by the two when recruiting staff from Google; this time it will be Urmson who will identify which ones to recruit and Anderson will be the one to get in touch. Anderson Accused Of Stealing Properitary Information Aside from recruiting its employees, Tesla claims that Anderson also transferred proprietary information into his personal hard drives, and did not return them when he left the company. The company also says that Anderson modified timestamps on his files and erased others "in an attempt to conceal his misdeeds." When asked for a comment, Anderson has this to say: "Tesla's meritless lawsuit reveals both a startling paranoia and an unhealthy fear of competition. This abuse of the legal system is a malicious attempt to stifle a competitor and destroy personal reputations. Aurora looks forward to disproving these false allegations in court and to building a successful self-driving business." 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Unbeknownst to some, Mount Kilimanjaro and Mount Kenya house some of the world's centuries-old glaciers. Unfortunately, a large percentage of the ice mass has been significantly reduced due to warming temperatures. Now, however, new research is suggesting that the effects of future warming may even be greater than initially predicted. A team of researchers from Brown University has presented a 25,000-year reconstruction from Mount Kenya in East Africa, which shows that from the last ice age, the high elevation of the tropical mountain elicited a more rapid increase in mean annual temperatures as compared to temperature changes in areas at sea-level. To Validate the Data or To Validate an Error Thirty years ago, CLIMAP stated that that tropical sea surface cooled by a mere -1 degree during the peak of the last ice age between 19 to 26 million years ago. However, this statement could not be reconciled by some scientists with the climate modelling data gathered on tropical mountains at a much greater 5 to 10 degrees Celsius. This literature is where the current research builds on to either validate the data or validate an error. To validate the current data, Russel and his colleagues studied the sediment cores from the bottom of three lakes in Mount Kenya: Lake Rutundu, Lake Tanganyika and Lake Malawi. The purpose of collecting sediments from the volcanic lakes was to study organisms called GDGTs, which are temperature sensitive and could display an altered chemical composition when exposed to temperature change. The data they gathered concurred with the hypothesis built on the data thirty years ago, as the numbers suggest that Lake Rutundu, at 10,000 feet elevation, had a mean annual temperature increase of 5.5 degrees, while the two lakes at sea level, Lake Tanganyika and Lake Malawi had mean annual temperature increase of 3.3 degrees and 2 degrees respectively. Future Climate Models The results of the current study suggest a discrepancy in the accuracy of current, state-of-the-art climate models. This could mean that many of the current climate models may need to be adjusted to integrate the new data. Further, the data deficiency in high-altitude tropical mountains could mean that the current data has completely underestimated the future changes that could occur in these mountains. "These are very fragile ecosystems that house extraordinary biodiversity and unique environments such as tropical glaciers. Our results suggest future warming in these environments could be more extreme than we predict," said Russell. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Tech Times reported on Jan. 26 that Google took down 1.7 billion fake advertisements in 2016 and banned 200 publishers in the last two months of the same year. The number seems awfully high but it is actually believable considering many sites have been riddled with fake news and advertisements that compromise the security of its victims. Facebook is one of the social media sites that received a huge headache when it came to fake news to the point that its Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Mark Zuckerberg, considered using only curated news as a way to prevent the fake ones from proliferating. Google, however, approached the issue with the full strength of its engineers and policy experts and decided to dish out a punishment with a bigger impact to the wrongdoers. Scott Spencer, Google's Director of Product Management and Sustainable Ads, detailed how the company dealt with 1.7 billion advertisements that violated their policy in its Bad Ads report published on Jan. 25. Spencer explained that Google's successful action against harmful ads rested on two core actions: the first is the expansion of Google's Ad Policy and, second, the enhancement of its technologies. Here is how Google axed four types of bad ads in 2016. Ads for illegal products Google took action against advertisements for illegal products in 2016 by uprooting the main actors. That is, the company disabled ads for illegal pharmaceutical products for healthcare violations. If you can't imagine that, think of medications that have no approval from official drug administration channels. Likewise, Google took down advertisements for gambling and other gambling-related promotions in countries in which it is illegal to operate. "We disabled more than 68 million bad ads for healthcare violations [and] 17 million bad ads for illegal gambling violations in 2016," Spencer reveals. Misleading ads Now it's almost impossible for anyone to have missed these types of advertisements because these pop up in almost any website. Those miracle weight loss pills that would cause a person to lose a significant amount of weight in a short span of time without really doing anything is a huge violator. Even those advertisements for products that hold off on giving actual information and trick users into purchasing just by shock value alone were axed. "[We] require our advertisers to provide upfront information for people to make informed decisions [...] we took down nearly 80 million bad ads for deceiving, misleading and shocking users," Spencer writes. Bad ads on mobile Have you ever been shocked that your smartphone is suddenly filled with applications you have never even seen and are very unlikely to download and install? Google took care of that problem too because that occurrence usually happens when people encounter self-clicking ads. "In 2015, we disabled only a few thousand of these bad ads, but in 2016, our systems detected and disabled more than 23,000 self-clicking ads on our platforms," Spencer reveals. The huge increase could either be good news or bad news because, while it could mean that Google's improved system is a more potent bad ad killing machine now, it could also mean that there was a rise in malicious programs online in 2016. Then again, it could be both. Tabloid cloakers: ads trying to game the system Like the ads for illegal product, Google also pulled at the roots of tabloid cloakers. These types of ads intentionally attempt to game the system by riding on trending news stories and making their advertisements look like news articles, only for an interested reader to be redirected to their scammy advertisement. "To fight cloakers, we take down the scammers themselves, and prevent them from advertising with us again," Spencer writes. Google knows that scammers would try even more elaborate actions from hereon but the company promises to keep improving its system to fight harmful ads and protect its users from violators. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. The family website has revealed the details of an upcoming public memorial service for late Hollywood mother-daughter legends Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher. Both actresses passed away within days of each other last month. Debbie Reynolds And Carrie Fisher's Passing We recently brought you the sad and shocking news of the near-simultaneous deaths of mother-daughter celebrity icons Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher. Fisher passed away at age 60 on Dec. 27 of last year after having suffered a heart attack on an airplane flight. The following day, in the midst of making funeral arrangements for her beloved daughter, Reynolds too passed on, as the result of a stroke. She was 84 years of age. Although close friends and family had a chance to say goodbye in a private dual memorial service held on Jan. 6, the public, who showed an outpouring of love and grief for the simultaneous loss of the Hollywood legends following their passing, have not yet had the opportunity to pay their final respects. Todd Fisher, son of Debbie and brother of Carrie, promised details on a public memorial service would be forthcoming, and now they have arrived via the family website. Public Memorial Details For Debbie Reynolds And Carrie Fisher The memorial for the two actresses will be held at the Freedom Theater at The Forest Lawn Cemetery Hollywood Hills on Saturday, March 25, 2017, with a service commencing at 1 p.m. "We will be celebrating their lives with friends, family members, and the people who loved them, you," states Todd Fisher on the family website. The post adds that immediately following the service, "those who want to walk to their final resting place are welcome to do so." There are no tickets for the memorial service. However, seating is limited and will be on a first-come, first-seated basis. Those who will not be able to get a seat inside may stay in the lobby and outside the venue, where there will be screens set up to allow everyone to watch and hear the service. HBO Bright Lights Documentary Fans of the stars were also recently treated to the debut of an insightful and moving documentary that chronicled some of Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher's final moments together. The documentary offers a fly-on-the-wall glimpse of the loving and unique relationship between the iconic mother and daughter. As a tribute to the women, the HBO showing of Bright Lights was moved up from its projected spring airdate after the actresses' deaths. The movie is still available on demand on HBO, as well as streamers HBO Now and HBO Go. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Close on the heels of Mark Zuckerberg voicing his thoughts on the executive order decreed by the Trump administration, which debars people from seven countries from U.S. visas for 90 days, Apple's CEO Tim Cook has expressed his views. In an e-mail to Apple employees, Cook shared his views on the matter and expressed the concerns shared by several of the company's employees who are immigrants. Cook asserted the importance of immigrants and shared that without them, Apple would not be able to operate. "In my conversations with officials here in Washington this week, I've made it clear that Apple believes deeply in the importance of immigration both to our company and to our nation's future. Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do," stated the Apple CEO. The Declaration Cook revealed that he shared the concerns and did not support the new policy. Several Apple employees he noted were "directly affected" by the immigration directive from the Trump administration. However, the company's security, HR and legal teams were hard at work and were in touch with these employees to offer them assistance. The CEO asserted that the Cupertino-based company would do whatever is in its power to support its affected employees. In this effort, the company is offering those impacted by the immigration order resources on the AppleWeb to assist employees who have any concerns or queries on immigration policies. Cook also disclosed that Apple had "reached out to the White House" in a bid to elucidate the adverse impact this move was having on the company, as well the workers. He stressed that the diversity is what makes Apple's operations stronger. He added that the workers at Apple were compassionate and would support each other in times of need. Cook reasserted to anxious employees that this empathy was extremely important at such a trying time and he felt that he could count on his co-workers to ensure that Apple employees felt valued, wanted and respected. He reiterated that Apple was open to all and did not discriminate. It did not matter to the company what language a person spoke or what their origins were, or what faith they followed or practiced. Cook went on to say that Apple's employees are considered to be among the most talented across the globe. The ethnic diversity is what makes the company tick, and many people who are currently working for the iPhone maker come from different nations. He concluded that even though people were from varied backgrounds, they had the same purpose. Photo: Valery Marchive | Flickr 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. The announcement of the Apple AirPods along with the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus in September met with a negative reaction from the public. The frustration was further increased when there was a delay in shipment, pushing the arrival of the wireless headphones to mid-December 2016. Because Apple dropped the headphone jack in the iPhone 7, consumers were forced to either purchase a dongle that plugs into the lighting port or buy the white AirPods from Apple. Another major issue arose when customers found the white color of the AirPods not so appealing as it clashed with their Jet Black iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus. Some consumers even took the help of third parties in an attempt to color their AirPods black, but to no effect. To relieve customers of this issue, a company called BlackPods now claims it can deliver new black-colored AirPods and even repaint existing white ones. BlackPods BlackPods claims it has developed a proprietary coating system to specifically color the AirPods. The process of repainting is completed in three phases and gives a luxurious scratch-resistant finish to the earbuds. The repainted AirPods will complement perfectly any Black, Jet Black, or Space Gray iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus. "We love Apple's AirPods, but talked to many users who wished they could have them in other colors. (It) seemed that most AirPods owners wished they came in black to match their jet black/matte black iPhones," says Peter O'Petteri, founder of BlackPods. The website of BlackPods claims customized AirPods are "hand-finished" by a team of skilled artisans based in Brooklyn, New York and it takes three days to complete the process of customization. BlackPods Pricing And Availability Customized AirPods come at $249 and can be bought from the BlackPods website. For people who already own white AirPods, they can opt for the repainting service offered by the company. This will set consumers back by $99. BlackPods clearly states that a customer's credit card won't be charged until their order is ready to ship. Apple AirPods The AirPods came to being when the company decided to ditch the headphone jack on its current flagship model iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus. The AirPods, originally colored in white, came with a charging case and a Lightning to USB cable. Priced at $159.00, AirPods can currently be purchased from Apple's online store with free shipping. The AirPods can quickly access Siri by a double tap and has a one-tap setup for all Apple devices. The AirPods are compatible with iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch models running iOS 10 or above. It is also compatible with Apple Watch models with the watchOS 3 and macOS Sierra updated Mac models. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. A reconfigurable radio developed for NASA could allow tracking planes permanently, through a space-based tracking system. To send larger quantities of data faster, NASA engineers designed higher-frequency radios that can be programmed from a distance through software updates. The powerful radio communications network designed by NASA allows a series of operations and data transmissions, from Pluto images to tweets from the crew on the International Space Station. However, this type of informational transfer could be employed in tracking flights worldwide. Radio-Based Flight Tracking Engineers used to be reluctant when it came to designing reconfigurable devices for space, as it is highly complicated to test functions without entirely knowing how they will be employed. But recently NASA has started to finance research on reconfigurable devices, developing a new, reconfigurable, and higher-bandwidth radio. The project was created in collaboration with Palm Bay, Harris Corporation from Florida. The new device stands out because of its flexibility. Both its software and hardware were designed to be fully reconfigurable, so that the company could redesign it to correspond to any potential needs of its customers, in a cost and time-efficient manner. "A reconfigurable radio lets engineers change how the radio works throughout the life of the mission, if requirements change or when the environment does," noted Thomas Kacpura, Advanced Communications Program manager at NASA's Glenn Research Center. One of the biggest contracts of this new, revolutionizing idea, is with Aireon LLC, a joint venture that will employ the technology in what will be the first space-based worldwide control system of the air traffic. Aireon LLC has engaged Harris to develop a payload for new Iridium Communications Inc satellites. During the last 20 years, Iridium has operated a wide array of satellites in low-Earth orbit, which allows a series of data transmissions, such as sending data from the most remote regions of the world or making phone calls. The twist of this type of satellites is that all cross-linked orbiters can communicate with the others at any given time, which means that there is always full worldwide coverage. The Iridium NEXT constellation of satellites, including Harris AppSTAR radio has a higher bandwidth and better capacities, which will allow radio to be employed in the first space-based control system of the air traffic. Making History With The New Flight Monitoring System For decades, the monitoring system of airplanes has consisted of radar surveillance through land-based radar station. A huge issue of this means of controlling the air flights was not being able to monitor the entire network all the time. Over oceans, air traffic controllers are unable to transmit real-time information, which is why pilots had to work on very detailed flight plans that they had to respect. The system constricted the pilots when it came to prescribed lanes and the altitudes they were allowed to fly within, to avoid collisions. Unlike the previous system, the new, radio-based one can receive signals from airplane transceivers, as a result of which the flight's location, number, heading, and other details are instantly sent out. The new technology will make scheduling and monitoring flights easier than ever before. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Motorola's upcoming Moto G5 and G5 Plus have been making headlines over the last couple of days. Now, the specs of the Moto G5 have popped up in a major retailer's database. The high-end smartphone market is ruled by Apple and Samsung even though countless companies have tried and continued to release devices with the iPhone, Galaxy S, and Galaxy Note in its sights. This has led some smartphone manufacturers to shift some focus from expensive flagship handsets to less expensive mid-range devices. Motorola Finds Success With Mid-Range Moto G Motorola released its first Moto G series smartphone in November 2013, and after six months of being on store shelves, the company announced the handset became its best-selling smartphone in Motorola's history. The key to the Moto G's success was that it offered capable specs (at the time), including a 4.5-inch 720p HD display, quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, 1 GB of RAM, 8 GB of internal storage, 5-megapixel camera, and was sold unlocked for under $200. Motorola updated the Moto G in June 2014 by adding a 4G LTE radio, which upped its price to $219. Since then, Motorola has released multiple Moto G successors, including the Moto G2, Moto G3, and Moto G4. The company is now preparing to launch its next-generation Moto G5 and Moto G5 Plus, which are expected to be announced at Mobile World Congress 2017 in late February. Moto G5 Appears In Major Retailer's Database A new report claims a listing for the Moto G5 has made an appearance in a major retailer's database, which lists the supposed specs of the new smartphone. The Moto G5 is listed with model number of XT1672 and having a 5-inch 1,920 x 1,080 Full HD display and will be running Android 7.0 Nougat out of the box. The smartphone will be powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 processor and 2 GB of RAM. The Moto G5 will include 32 GB of internal storage and a microSD expansion slot that will support up to 128 GB microSD cards. Its camera capabilities will reportedly feature a 13-megapixel rear camera and 5-megapixel front-facing snapper for video chat and selfies. The listing claims the Moto G5 will pack in a 2,800 mAh battery, but a recent FCC filing suggests it will sport a 3,080 mAh battery. We'll know all the official specs and features of the Moto G5 when Motorola announces it next month at MWC 2017. The smartphone will reportedly be released in March. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Russia has decided to ground all its Proton-M rockets for three and a half months because of flaws in the engines. Progress MS-04 Space Cargo Crash The announcement followed the crash of the Progress MS-04 space cargo late last year that destroyed one of the rockets just minutes after liftoff. In December, the unmanned Soyuz-U vehicle with the cargo spacecraft bound to deliver supplies for the International Space Station broke up in the atmosphere over Siberia just six minutes after it launched from the BAIKONUR Space Center. The incident destroyed 2.6 tons of food, fuel, and other supplies. Components Of Proton-M Rocket May Have Been Switched Investigators blamed the incident on faulty engine parts. A report indicates that important components in the second and third stages of the Proton-M rocket may have been switched by workers during the construction process at the plant in Voronezh, where Proton-M and Soyuz rocket engines are built. Workers used materials that are less heat resistant instead of those containing precious metals. Although the replacement parts would cost cheaper in the short term, cutting corners eventually proved to be disastrous for the spacecraft. Proton-M Space Rockets Grounded For Three And A Half Months Safety inspections of other Proton-M rockets are under way, but the Proton M, a staple of Russia's rocket fleet, will stay grounded until these are finished. Russia's space agency, however, promised to inspect all its Proton-M rockets to ensure that these are all ready for launch in three and a half months. "Three Proton-M rockets will be dissembled and their second and third-degree engines replaced," Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said. Rogozin, who visited the Voronezh plant, revealed that the workers at the there were evidently directed to switch technology and documentation. Rogozin said that those who are guilty of switching document and technology will face harsh punishment. The head of the Voronezh factory already resigned last week, citing unsatisfactory work and product quality. Concerns Over Rocket Quality Control This is not the first time that concerns have been raised on Russia's rocket quality control. The Proton-M appears to be particularly prone to mishaps in recent years. Such technical issues led to crashes of unmanned rockets in 2013, 2014, and 2015. Tampering does not only affect Russia's space program. United States is affected as well since Russia is the only country that is currently capable of launching astronauts to the ISS, which it achieves using the Soyuz rockets manufactured at the Voronezh plant. NASA Taps Boeing And SpaceX To Ferry Astronauts Starting 2018 NASA currently has a contract with Russia's Roscosmos space agency to ferry U.S. astronauts on six Soyuz journeys this 2017 at a cost of $458 million. NASA will spend another $490 million for another six flights in 2018. Although it is still dependent on Russia for crewed flight to the ISS, the U.S. space agency is already working with private companies SpaceX and Boeing. It has granted contracts to these companies for crewed flights to the orbiting laboratory in 2018. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Bitcoin companies proffering virtual currency wallets often don't fuse well with legal matters, as such, they often face a difficult legal quandary: do they have to operate as a financial institution, likened to a bank, with all its regulations intact, or can these companies operate under a different type of outfit? In Switzerland, that question has been answered. Switzerland Issues Conditional Approval To Xapo Xapo, a bitcoin wallet provider said it has received conditional approval from Switzerland's financial market watchdog for its operations in the country, Reuters reported. The move is being seen as a regulatory breakthrough for virtual currency safekeeping companies. It took almost two years of effort and investment, according to Wences Casares, Xapo's CEO, to obtain conditional approval from the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) to operate in the country. The approval hinged on several key factors, which included a requirement for Xapo to enter a self-regulatory organization membership, among others. Casares, however, said that Xapo was optimistic of the conditions and successfully serving non-U.S. customers from Switzerland. Casares was quick to note that developing the product exhausted the application process, instead of entanglements with bureaucracy. "It was this product development, not bureaucratic indifference, that added weeks and months to the application process," he said. "[M]oreover, the tools that Xapo was required to develop will ultimately benefit our users by ensuring effective oversight of our company." Xapo Xapo was founded in Silicon Valley, and like many virtual wallet companies, it stores private keys allowing clients to have access to their virtual currency funds. At present, other crypto-currency companies are already operating in Switzerland, but Xapo's operation as a bitcoin wallet provider had raised questions whether it should obtain a banking license to operate, as previously stated. The Bitcoin Currency By extension, bitcoin is an internet-based currency sans a central authority for now, at least. It instead depends on a global computer network to facilitate and validate transactions, a process which has become quite a hot topic in regulatory and legal discussions. As of this time, Xapo is categorized as a financial go-between, and it doesn't need to secure a banking license in order to operate. Perhaps the company's insistence that it doesn't take deposits helped it brave through the ordeal. Xapo says that it won't serve U.S. customers, potentially because of the shaky ground beneath the whole bitcoin topic. The approval doesn't come as a total shock, however. Switzerland plays a key role in the financial community, and it has been pursuing courtship of bitcoin operations in a preemptive and proactive attempt to secure its future. The legalities involved with the grant, however, are of key importance. The move might echo across other virtual wallet providers, who in turn could see Switzerland as an attractive entry point for being approved. How the bitcoin conversation is sculpted is left to the lawmakers, companies, and regulators, vying, presumably, for common ground. If not for FINMA, Xapo's new inroad could have never existed. "Many regulatory bodies in similar situations would have rejected Xapo (and Bitcoin) entirely," Casares said. But Xapo is confident that "FINMA has positioned Switzerland as a hub for fintech innovation and ensured Switzerland's primacy in global financial services for decades to come." 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. If recent reports emanating out of Iran are anything to go by, Apple is allegedly removing various iOS apps created by Iranian developers and companies. For the unfamiliar, Apple opened its App Store to the country in September 2016 for a short period. Some of these limitations also got lifted during the same period. According to a report from TechRasa, DigiKala the biggest Iranian e-commerce app was removed from the App Store a few days ago. "Apple has been removing Iranian apps which facilitate transactions for businesses or entities based in Iran. Apple also recently removed DigiKala's app from the App Store," revealed the publication. The App Store Message Iranian developers have also been receiving a message each time they attempt to upload any app on the App store. The message reveals that no App Store is available for Iran. The message goes on to add that apps that are capable of enabling transactions for entities or businesses that are Iran-based may not be compliant to "Iranian Transactions Sanctions Regulations (31CFR Part 560) when hosted on the App Store." The App Store elaborates that it is not able to accept the application from the user presently. However, it asks users to resubmit their application. This can be done once the international trade laws have been reviewed to enable the feature. Iran currently has no App Store present in the country, although several establishments have registered themselves as being present outside the Iranian territory to use the facilities. DigiKala is also not too aligned with the international laws, given that it utilizes the Shaparak system for payment, which is in conflict with the terms and conditions of Apple. There are a few banks in Iran though which are believed to have apps based on the iOS platform. Gadget-Oriented Nation Iran is a very gadget-oriented nation with close to 40 million smartphone users in the country. Out of the number of smartphones, at least 6 million are said to be iPhones. The total population of this gulf nation is close to about 82 million people, with a mammoth 100,000 phones being reportedly brought into the country on a regular basis each month. Why The Decision? It is not clear why Iranian apps are being removed from the App Store and what has prompted this decision. The nature of apps which are being removed is also not specified, which makes it difficult to ascertain whether all the Iranian app startups and developers have been dropped or if it is restricted to apps which assist in financial transactions. Photo: Marco Pakoeningrat | Flickr 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has abruptly canceled the climate change summit it has been planning for months. But no need to fret, as former vice president Al Gore has stepped in to host his own conference in Atlanta next month. Last Thursday, Gore announced holding the Climate & Health Meeting in the state on Feb. 16 along with Howard Frumkin, former National Center for Environmental Health director, as well as health and climate groups such as the American Public Health Association, Harvard Global Health Institute, The Climate Reality Project, and the University of Washington Center for Health and the Global Environment. Make It Happen [Al] called me and we talked about it and we said, Theres still a void and still a need, recalled APHAs executive director Georges Benjamin in a Washington Post report. We said, Lets make this thing happen. The news came days after the CDC canceled its summit in the lead-up to the recent change in administrations in the White House. The decision was not explained in emails given to participants as well as invited speakers, the agency saying, when sought for comment, that the event might be held later this year. In a statement announcing the meeting, Gore said the conference will go forward anyway. Today we face a challenging political climate, but climate shouldnt be a political issue, Gore asserted, citing the urgent need for health professionals for the very best science to protect the public. He also mentioned current warming and how it worsens the spread of public health threats such as the Zika virus. The one-day Feb. 16 meeting will not involve government circles, and will be conducted at the nonprofit Carter Center rather than at CDC. Organizers are eyeing as many as 200 participants from around the United States. It also remains unclear whether previously involved CDC employees will attend. Climate Change And Public Health Studies continue to warn the major public health risks of climate change around the world, with experts implicating warming in millions of deaths from heat, disease outbreak, longer allergy seasons, and more extreme weather events. Research published in the journal Lancet in 2016 argued that failing to address climate change could undermine the last half century of gains made in global health and development. But Frumkin is no longer surprised by how political climate change could get. He pointed out the external political pressure faced by the CDC, and sometimes its self-censorship and decision to shy away from specific issues. Climate change has been that issue historically, the expert told E&E News. The Huffington Post cited federal agency sources saying that the Trump administrations efforts to limit access to climate change information from government have already begun. EPA sources, for instance, said they have been told to stop disseminating press releases and social media announcements, with the possibility of their climate change webpage coming down. The new summit vows to preserve the focus of the CDC conference and offer a platform for professionals and the community to discuss and provide solutions to climate change-related health problems. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. YouTube, the Google-owned video sharing service, has an insanely wide variety of content, including live streams, stunt videos, and whatever PewDiePie decides to upload. Cara Brookins, a mother of four, utilized YouTube in a manner that changed her life for the better, as through various tutorials uploaded on the website, she was able to build a home for her family. The House That YouTube Built The story of Brookins started in 2008, when she found herself in the middle of a family struggle after leaving a "violent and abusive" husband. She took her four kids and decided to rebuild their lives, though it seems that she took that idea quite literally. Brookins did not have the money then to outright purchase a house, nor to hire builders. However, what she did have was access to YouTube, where tutorials on practically every project can be found. While driving to a cabin that she had rented for a Thanksgiving vacation, she said that they passed by a house that was destroyed by a tornado. Brookins described the ravaged house as a "beautiful dream house," but she was able to see how its insides looked like due to the damage. Upon looking at the materials that were exposed, she thought that it looked simple enough for her to give it a try. She started researching the needed materials for the home that they want, and came up with the necessary expenses of $130,000. She sold a small piece of property that she owned to buy the materials, then purchased an acre of land in Bryant, Arkansas. She then started working, aided by the YouTube tutorials that she watches. The Rise Of Inkwell Manor "Once I had bought all these supplies and they were all piled up, there was no way out," Brookins said. She did not have any money to pay anybody else to help with the construction, so she took it upon herself to construct the dream home of her family. Brookins was not alone in her endeavor though. Hope, Drew, Jada, and Roman, her children who were aged 17 years old to 2 years old back in 2008, helped their mother in various ways. Brookins and the four children worked nonstop on the house for nine months, with each of them filling in various roles. "The entire process brought our family closer together and we learned that nothing is impossible. We found new hope," Brookins said. The feat is made even more amazing considering that almost a decade ago, YouTube did not have dedicated channels to content, which meant that Brookins and her family had to watch different videos and decide which one they would use for tasks. However, not everything can be learned from YouTube tutorials, which is why she had to hire a firefighter who had experience with building homes to help them out. Whenever she could afford to do so, she would pay the firefighter $25 per hour to help them with some of the things that needed to be done. On March 31, 2009, Brookins and her four children moved into 3,500-square-foot-house. She named it Inkwell Manor, as it was a house where she could practice her passion as a writer and because the name reflected her love for writing and books. Brookins has now released an autobiographical book, "Rise: How A House Built A Family," chronicling how her family came together for one massive act that changed who they are for the better. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. NASA has yet to release its unprecedented Twin Study, which probes the genetic differences between astronaut Scott Kelly, who spent almost a consecutive year in space, and his identical twin Mark. Now, early findings indicate that life in space dramatically changes human biology, including gene expression. Measurements from before, during and after Kelly's mission at the International Space Station already reveal alterations in a wealth of biological markers. Identical Twins In Space [A]lmost everyone is reporting that we see differences, said geneticist Christopher Mason from Weill Cornell Medicine in a Nature report. He said data are so brand new that some are still coming off their sequencing machines. Mason and other scientists reported the early findings on Thursday, Jan. 26, delving on data ranging from the chromosomes to the gut microbiome of the twin brothers. Scott spent 340 days in orbit from 2015 to 2016 and has a lifetime total of 520 says, while Mark stayed in space for 54 days in four space shuttle missions from 2001 to 2011. The brothers have nearly identical genomes and similar life experiences, so NASA is observing biological changes caused by extended stays in microgravity. Upon Scotts recent return to the planet, for instance, scientists discovered that his telomeres, the protective caps on each DNA strand, were longer than Marks. His telomeres have already returned to their usual length before the space mission, but researchers are studying how space travel may have caused them to lengthen. In space, too, Scott underwent less DNA methylation, or when chemical markers are added to DNA for affecting gene expression. In contrast, his brother had an increase during his time, something that puzzles scientists. Further, the team documented changes in genetic expression between the twins that normally happen in humans but appear more pronounced in Scott. This was probably because of consuming freeze-dried foods, sleeping while afloat in space, and similar stresses in long-haul spaceflight. Rich Mine Of Genetic Data NASA remains eager to know the effects of extended stays in orbit, as it currently works toward its manned Mars mission in the 2030s. For one, it might find its genetic tests useful for screening candidate astronauts for susceptibility to cancer. The Twin Studys official results may take time, with the Kelly brothers reviewing the data beforehand for any sensitive information they may wish to keep in privacy. In March 2016, the space agency said the first peer-reviewed study from the experiment may not come out for a year or two. A round-trip mission to Mars is expected to last more than a year, with astronauts likely to spend lots of time in weightless surroundings. Just recently, a team of six scientists four men and two women entered an isolated geodesic dome on a remote Hawaii volcano and are expected to spend the next eight months living there. This is done as part of human behavior research that could help in long-term space exploration, including NASAs planned Mars journey. During the eight months, the team will have no physical contact with the outside world and will experience a 20-minute lag in communications, the same period it would take for an email to get from the Red Planet to Earth. They will then be assessed for psychological conditions resulting from isolation and confined living. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Will normalizing its use end drug abuse? In an effort to address the disturbing epidemic of drug addiction, Mayor Ed Murray (Seattle) and County Executive Dow Constantine (King County) announced the approval for the first-ever safe injection sites for drug users in the country. First Safe Injection Site In The United States Safe injection sites or facilities, otherwise known as supervised drug consumption rooms, are legally sanctioned centers where addicts can use illicit drugs including heroin, cocaine, amphetamine, methamphetamine, and other known opiates intravenously in the presence of a trained medical staff who can swiftly respond in the event of an overdose. By providing sterilized needles, safe injection facilities also reduce the risk of spreading highly infectious diseases, such as human immunodeficiency virus, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, and hepatitis C. Although a first in the United States, safe injection facilities have long been existing in European countries, with the first one opening in Switzerland way back in the 1980s. Currently, there are more or less 90 safe injection facilities scattered all over the world. Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, Norway, Luxembourg, Denmark, Canada and Australia have them, too. Not A Day Spa For Drug Use Although a bold and brave move, not everyone is pleased with Seattle and King County's decision to give safe injection sites the green light. Critics believe that such sites promote drug use and will only worsen the state's existing predicament. "The real goal is not to open a day spa where people can come in and have a good time and use drugs, but to engage them in treatment," Dr. Jeff Duchin, the health officer for Seattle and King County, explained. Officials are hopeful that safe injection sites will slash the incidence of deaths from drug overdose, open drug addicts' minds about getting into long-term treatment and rehabilitation programs, and take drug abuse away from sidewalks and alleys. Brad Finegood, a task force member with the county Department of Community and Human Services, said over 600 used needles were found in Seattle's urban core in November. Deaths From Drug Overdose In The United States According to Dr. Duchin, drug overdose is a public health emergency, and novel tools need to be explored in order to effectively solve the issue. Based on a report by the University of Washington, at least 132 people died from heroin overdoses alone in King County in 2015. The deaths shoot up to 209 when overdoses from prescription opioids are added. Data from the Centers for Disease Control, on the other hand, show a heartbreaking record of 33,000 deaths from opioid overdoses across the country in 2015. Aside from illicit drugs, overdose from powerful prescription drugs and painkillers, such as fentanyl (a potent opioid analgesic up to 100 times stronger than morphine) was also cited. 2022 TECHTIMES.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. ZTE Blade A610 Plus May Launch On Feb 3 | TechTree.com ZTE has recently sent media invites for a launch event to be held in Delhi on Feb 3, where the company is expected to a launch a new smartphone; most likely ZTE Blade A610 Plus. While the company has not announced complete details of the smartphones launch yet, teasers and a couple of reports give us the needed hint. Accordingly, the smartphone will be featuring a 5,000 mAh battery, which is reported to be its USP. Additionally, we may see the smartphone in a complete metal body design along with a fingerprint sensor. The LED flash is present below the camera lens. ZTE Blade A610 comes with a 5.5 inch FHD display with 2.5D curved glass protection, while being powered by a MediaTek MT6750T octa core processor, 2 GB RAM, and 16 GB ROM. The device also comes with a 13 MP rear camera with FHD video recording and 8 MP front facing camera. On the connectivity end, the device supports 4G VoLTE, while it runs on Android Marshmallow out of the box. TAGS: ZTE The Venezuelan government will increase cooperation with Colombia's military and police forces to face transnational crimes caused by drug trafficking, announced Friday by the Minister of... | Read More In a first for Louisiana, state transportation officials announced Monday they will solicit input from private firms to fast track major improvements on Interstate 10 in the Baton Rouge area. Officials also said the request will make good on Gov. John Bel Edwards' campaign promise to find innovative ways to tackle the state's road and bridge problems, including a $13 billion backlog. "Private investors have their eyes on Louisiana and are eager to invest here," state Transportation and Development Secretary Shawn Wilson said in a prepared statement. "These innovative financing methods have worked in other states that have invested in infrastructure," Wilson said. He added in an interview, "We are serious about infrastructure. We are serious about long-term solutions." The stretch of I-10 targeted for improvements is the source of daily complaints from motorists, and is considered one of the most congested sections of interstate in the state. Projects could include the widening of I-10 from the Mississippi River Bridge to the I-10/I-12 split; work on the Pecue Interchange and widening I-10 between La. Hwy. 415 and La. 1. Also, work on the La. 415 interchange in West Baton Rouge Parish as well as improvements to interchanges at the La. 30 in Gonzales and La. 22 near Sorrento, are on the $600 million list. Those and other projects are being called the I-10 Capital Corridor Improvements. Any such agreements between the state and private companies are known as public/private partnerships, or P3s in transportation jargon. They generally consist of private firms supplying the money for construction in exchange for long-term payments from the state, such as toll revenue. However, firms could also reap dividends on their investments through yearly payments from state, federal or other sources, depending on the financing plan. "We will make payments to them," Wilson said. Companies that do such projects are part of the global market. A task force named by Edwards, which finished its work in December, said public/private partnerships should be pursued to help trim longstanding road and bridge problems. The panel also said the state needs another $700 million per year to start trimming Louisiana's $13 billion backlog, and its $16 billion list of "mega" projects like a new bridge across the Mississippi River in Baton Rouge south of the current "new" bridge. However, exactly what the governor will recommend during the 2017 Legislature is unclear. A state gasoline tax hike of 23 cents per gallon would be needed if that was the sole source of nearly $700 million per year in new transportation dollars. In addition, the state faces another budget shortfall of $400 million or more for the financial year that begins July 1. +2 Before funding for transportation overhaul becomes reality, three key questions must be answered While a special panel named by Gov. John Bel Edwards has called for $700 million a year in The session starts on April 10. Wilson said Monday's announcement will not affect what Edwards recommends to the Legislature on transportation. What state officials are sending out is called a Request for Information, or RFI, aimed at testing interest in firms teaming with the state and, if so, which projects and how the private companies think those contracts should look. Officials of the firms will be asked whether they have done similar work, what the initial financial arrangements would be and what would be the minimum time needed to submit such a proposal for I-10 work. Responses are due by March 31. The answers will help state officials decide on future solicitations for work on I-10 in East and West Baton Rouge parishes and Ascension Parish. DOTD won authority to solicit interest from private companies from a 2016 state law pushed by the Edwards administration. "This is the first step in positioning the state to leverage private sector resources in delivering major enhancements to the I-10 Capitol Corridor," Edwards said, also in a prepared statement. "We aren't likely to have the revenue needed to make a P3 work for the entire corridor today, but we will be ready to advance such a partnership if the Legislature acts in a meaningful way to fund transportation during the upcoming regular session," he said. Senate Transportation Committee Chairman Page Cortez, R-Lafayette, said Monday DOTD's proposal is worth exploring. "I think we need to look at all the options," said Cortez, who was a member of the task force. "Ultimately in the P3 you have to have a governmental funding source," he said. "But in many cases the private sector can do it maybe more effective and more efficient." The announcement could spur legislative interest in finding dollars for transportation if they could make a public/private partnership reality, and speed work on high-profile projects. How to repair Louisiana's roads and bridges has sparked pleas for bold steps versus political realities about tax hikes, especially when other state services are facing major cuts. Gasoline and other tax hikes require the approval of two thirds of the House and Senate. House Transportation Committee Chairman Kenny Havard, R-St. Francisville, said DOTD's plan holds possibilities. "Obviously we are going to have to start thinking outside the box," Havard said. 'It is an opportunity." Said Wilson, "We are asking the public and that industry to tell us what will be attractive." The widening of I-10 between the "new" bridge and the I-10/12 split would cost between $350 million and $400 million. It has been discussed off and on for more than a decade. The aim is to ease backups on one of Baton Rouge's most congested corridors. After two years of uproar surrounding the Spanish Town Mardi Gras parade, float riders, paradegoers and those who decided not to attend this year say they are anxious about whether another joke will surface next month that worsens conflicts already brimming in Baton Rouge. Will another krewe attempt a parody of someone who died at the hands of police officers? Will sexual assault victims become punch lines again? No parade rules prevent that type of humor from sprouting up again Feb. 25, when yards will overflow with pink-clad revelers, and flamingo decorations will be in vogue for Baton Rouge's largest Mardi Gras celebration. Spanish Town re-emerged in headlines over the summer after a Baton Rouge Police Department officer shot and killed Alton Sterling in July, which was partially captured on cellphone videos. Demonstrators flocked to Baton Rouge to protest police brutality, and the U.S. Department of Justice is investigating the shooting. National news outlets picked up pictures from the 2016 parade of a flamingo being beaten with the caption "I can't breathe," apparently a reference to Eric Garner, who died in 2014 in New York City after he was put in a chokehold by a police officer. Stories circulated about how the Spanish Town parade highlighted Baton Rouge's racial divisions. With the 2017 parade less than a month away, parade riders and organizers say they want to change the reputation Spanish Town has earned in recent years. But they also have agreed that they do not want to start a review or censorship process for floats after 35 years of treating krewes as independent contractors who can exercise their First Amendment rights however they see fit. Without a review process, there's no way to tell whether Sterling or another sensitive subject could be mocked in this year's parade until it rolls. And Spanish Town board member Bill Brumfield said he does worry about the possibility of it happening. "It would be senseless," Brumfield said. "But with the theme that we have this year, I don't anticipate that anyone will be going in that direction; we're hoping not." This year's theme is "Come Hell or High Water, It's Slippery When Wet," a reference to the region's torrential rains and floods in August. Jokes from the past two years have been enough to convince some past attendees to stay home this year. Donney Rose, a writer who spoke against the parade's jokes last year, said he wanted the board to take a public stance against floats making fun of the marginalized. He is not attending this year and is especially worried about what could happen if a float mocks Sterling, those who protested his death or another person killed by police in another state. "It creates a potentially very flammable climate if someone decides to do that," Rose said. "And I'm just not of the absolute faith that that would not happen." Spanish Town resident Marie Constantin also is staying away from the festivities, despite living on the parade route and usually decorating her home. She invited a black family to watch the parade with her last year and said the "I can't breathe" float left them speechless. She apologized to them, embarrassed about how it looked on Baton Rouge's part. When Constantin was recently hired to photograph a room for sexual assault victims at Woman's Hospital, she remembered Spanish Town's jokes about rape as well. A float in last year's parade had written on it, I prefer to call rape surprise sex." In 2015, former reality TV Sons of Guns star Stephanie Ford spoke out after a float carrying police officers made fun of her alleged sexual abuse by her father. Ford's complaint prompted an internal Baton Rouge Police Department investigation, and one officer received a letter of reprimand. Baton Rouge police officer reprimanded in Sons of Guns mocking on Spanish Town parade float The humiliation wasnt intentional, the police officers said. Ford's father, Will Hayden, faces sexual assault charges in East Baton Rouge and Livingston parishes, both for the incident involving his daughter and other allegations. Constantin said remembering the sexual assault jokes after she experienced a kind of reverence in the room at Woman's Hospital made her more determined not to support the parade this year. "You just have to take a personal stance and say, 'this isn't OK for me,' " Constantin said. Even some longtime Spanish Town participants were unsure about whether they would join in again. Erin Rolfes has been marching with the Prancing Babycakes for nine years, but her all-female krewe was especially concerned after last year's parade. They met with Spanish Town board members in November, along with a member of the krewe that made "Pink Lives Matter" jokes last year, and Rolfes said it was a helpful experience for everyone. Her group decided to march again to show the inclusiveness that they want the whole parade to embody, and the Spanish Town board recently shared a letter from the Prancing Babycakes about their hope to "let revelers of all backgrounds know Spanish Town is for them." Spanish Town 2017 queen Jenny Bourgeois, a BRPD corporal, asked that people recognize the good that the Spanish Town organization does. The Mystic Krewe for the Preservation of Lagniappe in Louisiana, the parade's nonprofit organization and focuses on charitable giving. The group's 990 tax form filed in 2015 shows it gave $97,440 in donations to charitable, educational and cultural groups that year. One way it raises money is by raffling off a unique pendant from Jack Hood Jewelers, and this year's diamond and pink tourmaline pendant recognizes the difficulties of 2016, with "LA, love, pride, courage, united" engraved into it. Bourgeois said it sums up her feelings about Baton Rouge and that she loves working in BRPD's 1st district, where she does not feel the divisions many talk about. She and others are hoping Spanish Town this year will be tainted in less controversy and more remembered for being a fun expression of free speech. "We're gonna be raunchy, we're gonna be shocking, we're gonna be borderline distasteful," said Jeremy White, publisher of the satirical Red Shtick website and a Spanish Town rider. "But in a fun way, and we're going to try to lead by example." After two years of uproar surrounding the Spanish Town Mardi Gras parade, float riders, paradegoers and those who decided not to attend this y Purchases made via links on our site may earn us an affiliate commission Send your questions to Ask The Advocate, 10705 Rieger Road, Baton Rouge, LA 70809; or fax to Ask The Advocate, (225) 388-0371; or email asktheadvocate@theadvocate.com. On the morning of Jan. 19, heavy rain began to fall on Baton Rouge, and the effect at Glen Oaks Park Elementary was immediate. You have to imagine, the bus pulls up and 25 kids come off at once crying and they are hysterical: My moms gonna die! The waters coming! recalled Tonya Bethly, assistant principal at the north Baton Rouge elementary school. They could not function until the rain stopped, Bethly continued. Every time it rains, these kids melt down. Every rain is a reminder for those children of the traumatizing days of the devastating floods of August. Glen Oaks Park Elementary is one of 10 Baton Rouge public schools that flooded. Within days, the school relocated five miles northwest to the former Banks Elementary School and its uncertain when it will be able to return. Many Glen Oaks Park faculty and students also had their homes flooded. Being at Banks isnt helping. The grounds have a tendency to turn into a small lake when it rains. Ill have to cross my fingers and hope it doesnt rain the first week of May, said Principal Bernard Williams. Because if it rains, I dont know what the kids are gonna do. Thats when the school is planning to take LEAP tests in math, English and social studies. Third- and fourth-graders will take these state standardized tests on paper. In fifth grade, for the first time, students will take them exclusively online. The online part is a problem. Its such a problem that the East Baton Rouge Parish Federation of Teachers is gearing up to demand that state leaders exempt flooded schools like Glen Oaks Park from testing. The teachers union is also seeking to exempt teachers at those same schools from their annual evaluations. Carnell Washington, president of the union, spoke to about a dozen teachers at Glen Oaks Parks after school Wednesday, one of a series of visits hes making to flooded schools. He said its unfair to hold flooded schools like Glen Oaks Park to the same standards as unflooded schools this year, especially when it comes to the time students have had to get acquainted with working on computers. Theres a good chance that Glen Oaks Park, a C-rated school, could slip to a D if it fails to get a waiver, he said. The flood waters left behind a lot of ruined technology at Glen Oaks Park, including interactive whiteboards and document cameras. The school had just used its own money to buy 110 Google Chromebooks but they were damaged. Their old campus at 5656 Lanier Drive also had ample internet bandwidth. Banks is a different world. The school had almost no internet access when Glen Oaks Park faculty arrived at the 72nd Avenue campus and it hasnt gotten much better. Its not clear what shape it will be in by the time testing arrives. Theyll do something and it will work a day or so and then it will go back to what it was, said Principal Williams. Teachers have worked much of the year with few computers and shortages of textbooks. Within the last month, the schools 60-plus fifth-graders finally received Google Chromebooks to partially replace the ones damaged by the flood, Williams said. (The students) havent had enough time to practice typing. This is a timed test, said Jamie Johnson, a fifth-grade English and social studies teacher. My kids will be held accountable for it, and its not their fault. Fifth-grade math teacher Natasha Briscoe said she relied heavily last year on technology to reach her students, many of whose minds wander when they experience more traditional instruction, but now shes struggling to keep their attention. Before you get to say, This is the objective of the class, youve lost about half of them, because youve said too many words, said Briscoe. Washington said other flooded schools hes visited have it even worse. I went to one classroom the other day, I swear to God, there were 80 students in the classroom and three teachers, he said. Now you tell me how can Mr. Williams come in and evaluate someone when there are three teachers teaching at once? Obtaining a testing waiver wont be easy. In October, the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education granted a series of waivers for other reasons but none connected to testing. Despite some talk in the days after the flood, no one has been requested a testing waiver since. Central Schools Superintendent Michael Faulk said BESE has been reluctant to grant waivers for what he feels were good reasons in the past, and doubts that reluctance has changed. +2 Some favor withholding school system letter grades amid flood aftermath The state should put a moratorium on issuing letter grades for public schools and other acco Both the Louisiana Department of Education and the Governors Office are saying no, at least for now. Sydni Dunn, a spokeswoman, said state School Superintendent to John White is acutely aware of the problem, but has no plans to suspend online testing at flooded schools or make other changes. But if the test results reveal real problems at the flooded schools, White is willing to consider making adjustments to the scores of those schools after the fact. We want to be fair to the kids, Dunn said. Shauna Sanford, press secretary for Gov. John Bel Edwards, said while the governor is committed to doing everything possible to help school districts deal with the aftermath of the flood, he does not have the flexibility to grant a waiver for K-12 schools for standardized testing or teacher evaluations. Washington disagreed, saying the state's law dealing with emergency relief after disasters gives the governor authority to waive a variety of education laws, including testing laws, in the wake of the flooding. As much as I respect the governor, thats unacceptable, Washington said. We need to go beyond that. In the meantime, teachers at Glen Oaks Park continue to work their way through a bad situation. Brigitte Wesley, a fourth-grade math teacher whose own home flooded, said she too felt a bit of panic when the rain fell on Jan. 19. I was in the mindset (the kids) were in, but I had to hold it together, she said. In a rerun of previous years, public school leaders are gearing up for crowded classrooms, program cuts and possible layoffs after learning that Gov. John Bel Edwards will recommend another freeze in basic state aid to public schools. "It's a broken record," said Hollis Milton, president of the Louisiana Association of Superintendents and superintendent of the highly ranked West Feliciana Parish school system. Donald Songy, education policy adviser for Edwards, told an influential task force Tuesday that the governor cannot go along with a $35 million hike in basic aid, one of three options offered by the state Department of Education. The decision, sparked mostly by recurring state budget problems, was not well-received by the panel, which includes longtime education backers of the governor. "There needs to be more dialogue with local stakeholders, with the Governor's Office and with legislators," Scott Richard, executive director of the Louisiana School Boards Association, said two days later. The proposed freeze a common theme since 2009 for public schools would apply to the 2017-18 school year. It would follow a $24 million cut in dollars for public schools in 2016, Edwards' first year in office. Louisiana public schools face millions in cuts for first time in decades; what it means for teachers, students For the first time in decades, state aid for public schools may actually take a dive. School leaders said that because of lean times for nearly a decade, the lack of any new dollars for basic services this time is especially worrisome. Districts face a $38 million increase in teacher retirement costs alone, which is $3 million more than the proposed increase in state aid Edwards turned down. The rising cost of health insurance is another common complaint. Michael Faulk, superintendent of the second-ranked Central school system, listed nearly $1 million in mandatory increases his system faces, including teacher retirement costs and janitorial and other contracts. Faulk said the district's reserves about $3 million were depleted by about $8 million in flood-related costs. Any federal reimbursement for those expenses is up to four years away. "Until the (budget) situation is addressed on a statewide basis, we are going to be in flux," he said. Public school financing will play out during the 2017 regular legislative session, which begins April 10. State services face another huge shortfall $400 million in an early estimate for the financial year that begins July 1, and both higher education and health care already have been battered by years of funding reductions. New fears that public schools won't emerge unscathed from Legislature's budget battles Persistent money problems resurrected fears Monday that public schools will face their first At stake is what the state spends on the currently $3.7 billion funding formula called the Minimum Foundation Program. Increases of 2.75 percent or more a year, or about $70 million, used to be common. But this time, the governor rejected half that amount 1.375 percent, or $35 million. What the state spends per student $3,961 has been mostly static for the past eight years. It was unchanged for six consecutive years, starting in 2009, before rising by $106 to its current level, where it has been for three years in a row. On the plus side, schools won increases of $69 million in 2013 and $44 million in 2015, but they were outside the Minimum Foundation Program, which means they are not recurring. Songy said Edwards will recommend an $18 million increase for high-needs students and dual enrollment, which allows high school students to earn college credit. Despite the governor's stance, the task force voted 12-6 on Jan. 24 to ask the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education to seek the $35 million increase from the Legislature. BESE is set to decide on that March 8. The basic aid increase is needed, backers said, because districts need flexibilit, and targeted spending increases will leave out some of Louisiana's 69 school districts. "The best way I can explain it is there are winners and losers the way those dollars flow out," Milton said. "West Feliciana may not get any dollars from that." Richard said putting the money into the Minimum Foundation Program is more equitable. Another freeze in state aid will spark a new round of reductions by local school systems. "It means systems are forced to make some very hard decisions," said Debbie Meaux, president of the Louisiana Association of Educators. "They begin laying off employees, they start overcrowding classrooms, they start eliminating programs." Brigitte Nieland, a member of the task force, was among a handful who said last week the governor's critics were being short-sighted. "These complaints about retirement are valid," said Nieland, who follows education issues for the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry. "But they have rejected all efforts for serious retirement reform," Nieland said of traditional public school groups. "They have not come forward with any proposals of their own." Caroline Roemer, executive director of the Louisiana Association of Public Charter Schools, said those classrooms face the same concerns as traditional public schools. "It is a very stressful time right now for everyone," she said. "Our state is in a hard spot financially." About 75,000 students attend Louisiana's roughly 145 charter schools. The state has about 720,000 public school students. Richard said years of static funding, and the $24 million cut last year, will affect classrooms. "It is going to ultimately reduce services to students," he said. "The cost of providing services has not gone down," he said. "Operational costs, just turning the lights on, that hasn't gone down anytime lately." The freeze is a setback for some of Edwards' most ardent supporters, including teacher unions. "We know that the governor doesn't want to do any of the cuts," Meaux said. Louisiana Inspector General Stephen Street is bracing for the threat of another round of budget cuts, and he said he sees his job as one that sets him up to be an easy target. "At the end of the day, people get mad," Street told the Press Club of Baton Rouge on Monday. "If you do the job right, it results in that reaction." Street has served as the state's inspector general, a job within the executive branch tasked with investigating public corruption and fraud, since 2008. His second six-year term will expire in 2020. During that time he's faced repeated threat of cuts. Street's office has shrunk from 17 positions to 13 in the past two budget cycles. Now the state is preparing for yet another mid-year budget cut. Gov. John Bel Edwards is expected to call legislators into a special session Feb. 13-23 to shore up a $304 million shortfall. Edwards, a Democrat, hasn't unveiled his recommended cuts, but the governor is asking the Legislature to pull $119 million from the state's reserves to lessen the blow. Already, some legislators, particularly Republicans in the House, have questioned whether that is the best route. Street said he hasn't heard of a specific threat to his budget this time around but worries because the corruption investigations his office leads are politically unpopular. "Whenever you have a very large and very real budget deficit, it provides political cover," he said. Street, who was joined by New Orleans Inspector General Ed Quatreavaux and Jefferson Parish Inspector General Dave McClintock at Monday's luncheon, said his budget, after years of cuts, offers little wiggle room. "We've explained to (Commissioner of Administration Jay Dardenne) what our situation is," Street said. "We're known for complex criminal investigations that take time to work." Street's office has been involved in investigations of allegations of misuse of funds in the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries and the Department of Corrections. +4 Inspector General responds to complaints about Bobby Jindal Gov. Bobby Jindal has been advised to avoid issuing some politically charged statements thro The Inspector General's Office typically doesn't comment on ongoing investigations, so Street declined to say what specifically could be at risk if his budget is further slashed. Meanwhile, Quatreravaux said that his term will come to an end during the mayor's election in New Orleans "not the best time." "We're very much concerned over that," he said of the potential to get sucked up into the political process. Quatreavaux pointed to the effort undertaken by Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport to improve its contracting process, following an audit. The airport is now saving $25 million a year on contracts. "That $25 million used to go to corruption, and they'd pass it on to the airlines," he said. "They're not doing that anymore, and we're getting record numbers of travelers." Quatreavaux noted that former President Ronald Reagan fired a whole slate of inspectors general shortly after taking office but quickly restored most of them. "It takes people to make these things work," he said. McClintock was appointed as the first inspector general of Jefferson Parish in 2013 a position created after a corruption scandal that led to prison time for former Parish President Aaron Broussard. "Inspectors general play an important and vital role in combating public corruption as well as inefficiency and waste," McClintock said. "What also comes with that is attacks on inspectors general." He said funding isn't his biggest problem at this point, as the office has a dedicated millage. But access has become a significant hinderance. "Access to data is vital to all of us," he said. McClintock said faced several hurdles when he joined the office from access to emails to reviewing security footage. He joked that the cleaning crew had more access than he was given. "Right now, I can't swipe into a single door in the parish," he said. Angela Lorio is tired of the begging, tired of the trips to the Louisiana State Capitol to plead to shield the services that provide for her disabled son and so many others like him. But she's gearing up to do it again. Lorio, whose 3-year-old son John Paul uses a tube to breathe and requires round-the-clock monitoring, is among the many parents who rely on the state for assistance to help them keep their children at home. "All we're asking for is to not have to bury some of our children because of budget cuts," Lorio said. "I am so tired, and I am road weary, battle weary, whatever you want to call it. It's beyond frustrating. It's unconscionable." Parents like Lorio are readying to pack House and Senate committee rooms, urging lawmakers not to cut those health programs as they look for ways to rebalance Louisiana's budget and eliminate a $304 million deficit. They're among an array of advocacy groups, business organizations, lobbyists and others who use state programs that are worrying about what the budget rebalancing will look like and who will end up on the chopping block. Gov. John Bel Edwards is planning a mid-February special legislative session to close the deficit, and he'd like to use $119 million from the state's "rainy day" fund to help lessen the pain of the reductions. Some Republican lawmakers are hesitant or have outright balked at the idea of tapping into a state savings account for a temporary fix, saying Louisiana needs to make permanent cuts to better match the state's spending to its income. That would mean steeper cuts and a greater threat to public colleges, K-12 education and health services for the poor, elderly and disabled, which are among the state's biggest spending areas. A first draft of a budget-cutting proposal, released by Rep. Lance Harris, leader of the House Republican delegation, got folks jittery suggesting nearly half the deficit should be eliminated by cutting the state health department and the rainy day fund money shouldn't be used. Lorio, co-founder of the group Trach Mommas of Louisiana, quickly got to work, hitting social media sites with pleas to protect the services her son and others with disabilities receive. She wants lawmakers to use the rainy day fund to lessen any cuts. "To me, that should be a no-brainer," she said. The Louisiana Hospital Association, worried about cuts to hospital payments, released a statement citing the jobs and patient care the facilities provide around the state. Individual hospitals did the same. "It's important to realize how cuts will further damage Louisiana's economy. Hospitals are one of Louisiana's largest private employers, employing nearly 100,000 people directly and 300,000 indirectly," hospital association president Paul Salles said in a statement. "Severe cuts to an industry so vital to both local and state economies would be short sighted." Health care isn't the only area to draw concern. Higher education leaders are privately laying out their cases to lawmakers, worried about a second cut after taking a hit earlier this state financial year. The education union Louisiana Federation of Teachers warned that cuts to K-12 public schools "would devastate our cash-strapped education system," a concern echoed by organizations representing public school principals, superintendents and local school boards. Nine coastal restoration organizations chimed in, suggesting that cuts to the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority could keep it "from effectively playing the essential role of restoring and protecting our coast," which is vital to the state's future. The onslaught of concern demonstrates the difficult task awaiting Edwards and lawmakers in closing the gap in Louisiana's $27 billion operating budget. No matter where the cuts hit, they will have real impact, compounded because only five months remain before the fiscal year ends June 30 to make the reductions. Lorio and other parents intend to be in Baton Rouge, reminding lawmakers about their worries. "We are not going away. We're going to be there. We're going to show up," she said. "We're going to show up in droves." Melinda Deslatte has covered Louisiana politics for The Associated Press since 2000. In this Monday, March 31, 2014 file photo, people line up to enroll for health insurance at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas, hours before the deadline in the first enrollment period of the Affordable Care Act. (Jerry Lara/The San Antonio Express-News via AP) There are many things that trouble many of us about Donald Trump, the country's new president, but none more than one essential question about NEW YORK (AP) President Donald Trump's immigration order sowed more chaos and outrage across the country Sunday, with travelers detained at airports, panicked families searching for relatives and protesters registering opposition to the sweeping measure that was blocked by several federal courts. Attorneys struggled to determine how many people had been affected so far by the rules, which Trump said Saturday were "working out very nicely." But critics described widespread confusion, with an untold number of travelers being held in legal limbo because of ill-defined procedures. Some lawyers manned tables at New York's Kennedy Airport to offer help to families with detained relatives. "We just simply don't know how many people there are and where they are," said Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Immigrants' Rights Project. Advocates for travelers say the chaos is likely to continue. The executive director of National Immigration Law Center, Marielena Hincapie, said "this is just the beginning." "We're really in a crisis mode, a constitutional crisis mode in our country, and we're going to need everyone," she said. "This is definitely one of those all-hands-on-deck moments." Meanwhile, protests continued Sunday, including one in suburban Chicago organized by Jewish groups to show support for Muslims. Other demonstrations were planned for Dulles Airport in Washington, D.C., Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta Airport and Detroit Metropolitan Airport. Two protests took place Sunday in the New Orleans metro area, WWL-TV reported. At least 200 people gathered outside of City Hall and a smaller crowd were outside the arrivals area of Louis Armstrong International Airport. Big turnout at the Muslim Ban Protest at City Hall. pic.twitter.com/bejfbYHMgR Diana Mirfiq (@Diana_Mirfiq) January 29, 2017 At the main Dallas-Fort Worth airport, an estimated 200 people held signs and chanted, "Let them go!" They awaited word on nine people detained at the airport, most of them Iranian, according to the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Large airport protests erupted starting Saturday, a day after Trump signed the order banning travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen. The president also suspended the U.S. refugee program for four months. A federal judge in New York issued an order Saturday temporarily blocking the government from deporting people with valid visas who arrived after Trump's travel ban took effect. But confusion remained about who could stay and who will be kept out of the country in the coming weeks. Federal courts in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state took similar action. A more decisive ruling on the legality of the Trump action by U.S. District Judge Ann M. Donnelly will probably take at least several weeks. Opponents and government attorneys will get a chance to lay out their arguments in filings and possibly in oral arguments in court, Gelernt said. Activists said their goal was to have Trump's order overturned entirely. University presidents criticized the ban and cautioned students and professors from the seven listed countries to beware of traveling outside the U.S. for now The president of the University of Notre Dame, Father John I. Jenkins, was among the sharp critics of the ban. "If it stands, it will over time diminish the scope and strength of the educational and research efforts of American universities," he said Sunday in a statment. And he added: "We respectfully urge the president to rescind this order." There was no sign the Trump administration might heed such calls. "Prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety," the Department Of Homeland Security said in a statement issued Sunday. Among those caught in limbo: Iraqis who had been promised a life in America because of their service to the U.S. military, frail and elderly travelers from Iran and Yemen, and longtime U.S. residents traveling abroad who did not know if they would be allowed to return home. "What's next? What's going to happen next?" asked Mohammed al-Rawi, an Iraqi-born American citizen in the Los Angeles area, after his 69-year-old father, coming to visit his grandchildren in California, was abruptly detained and sent back to Iraq after 12 hours in custody. "Are they going to create camps for Muslims and put us in it?" Trouble viewing video below? Click here. An official with the Department of Homeland Security who briefed reporters by phone said 109 people who were in transit on airplanes had been denied entry and 173 had not been allowed to get on their planes overseas. No green-card holders were turned away from entering the U.S. as of Saturday, the official said, though several spent long hours in detention before being allowed in. Abdollah Mostafavi, 80, was released six hours after his flight arrived in San Francisco from Frankfurt. Hameed Khalid Darweesh, a translator and assistant for the U.S. military in Iraq for 10 years now fleeing death threats, was among at least a dozen people detained at Kennedy Airport. He walked free after his lawyers, two members of Congress and as many as 2,000 demonstrators went to the airport to seek his release. After an appeal from civil liberties lawyers, Judge Donnelly issued an emergency order Saturday barring the U.S. from summarily deporting people who arrived with valid visas or an approved refugee application, saying it would likely violate their legal rights. Before Trump signed the order, more than 67,000 refugees had been approved by the federal government to enter the U.S., said Jen Smyers, refugee policy director for Church World Service. More than 6,400 had already been booked on flights, including 15 families that had been expected over the next few weeks in the Chicago area from Ethiopia, Eritrea, Iran, Syria and Uganda. The bulk of refugees entering the U.S. are settled by religious groups. All that work ground to a halt after Trump signed the order. ___ Associated Press writers Verena Dobnik and Karen Matthews in New York, Olga Rodriguez in San Francisco and Caryn Rousseau in Chicago contributed to this report. WWL-TV also contributed to this report. A teenager arrested for driving 140km/h through a 60km/h zone will face the ACT Magistrates Court on Monday morning. The 19-year-old Queanbeyan man caught the attention of ACT police on Bindubi St around 11.50pm on Sunday while speeding through a 80km/h zone at 107km/h. The black Holden Commodore utility was stopped and the driver arrested after police then clocked it travelling 140km/h in a 60km/h zone on Lyttleton Crescent in Cook. Police checks indicated the number plate appeared to belong to another vehicle and the utility was unregistered and uninsured. The driver was charged with dangerous driving, exceeding the speed limit, driving an unregistered vehicle and using a number plate calculated to deceive. A former investment banker who released "fake news" to the stock market about a small mining explorer getting a $100 million line of credit from China has been sentenced to one year in jail. Benjamin David Kirkpatrick, 44, the former executive chairman of Waratah Resources, was on Monday sentenced to 12 months imprisonment to be served as an intensive correction order. Six of the 11 major S&P sectors were higher, with technology index's 0.69 per cent gain boosting the broader index. Facebook, Microsoft, Apple and Nvidia propped up the S&P 500 index. Credit:Luis Enrique Ascui Mr Kirkpatrick pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting Waratah to breach its continuous disclosure requirements and to authorising the false information being released to the market. The charges related to Waratah's October 2013 announcement that it had established a $100 million trade finance facility with the Bank of China "when no such facility had been established or agreed upon", according to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission. Most US corporate bosses have stayed silent on President Donald Trump's immigration curbs, underscoring the sensitivities about opposing policies that can provoke a backlash from the White House. While the leaders of Apple, Google and Facebook emailed their staff to denounce the suspension of the US refugee program and the halting of arrivals from seven Muslim-majority countries, many of their counterparts in other industries either declined to comment or responded with company statements reiterating their commitment to diversity. The difference in response shows the pressure large parts of corporate America face to avoid tussling publicly with the new administration. Companies such as aircraft maker Boeing and car makers Ford and General Motors have already had run-ins with Mr Trump over other issues, and they have much at stake in policy decisions that the administration will make on tax, trade and regulatory matters. But for all the hand-wringing, Trump needs China's help to fulfil some of his campaign pledges. Here are five areas where he may find the carrot works better than the stick. From stealing US jobs to manipulating its currency to failing to curb North Korea's nuclear ambitions, Trump's accusations against China have come fast and furious. He's broken with decades of diplomatic practice by questioning the One-China principle, which acknowledges Beijing's claim to Taiwan. Since his election win, US President Donald Trump has put a bullseye on China. In one of the first policy briefs posted to the new White House website, Trump promised 25 million new jobs over the next decade. From stealing US jobs to manipulating its currency to failing to curb North Korea's nuclear ambitions, Trump's accusations against China have come fast and furious. Credit:AP While the plan contains few details, foreign investment can help. Trump recently heaped praise on Jack Ma, founder of Alibaba Group, who suggested he could create as many as 1 million new jobs for US small and medium-sized business owners. "For him to achieve his domestic aims around jobs and the economy, he's going to have to figure out how to work with China," said Paul Haenle, a China adviser to former president George W. Bush and now director of the Carnegie-Tsinghua Centre for Global Policy in Beijing. North Korea Always an innovator, Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk has asked the public for help in rewriting Donald Trump's controversial immigration bill. Trump's executive order late Friday (US time) temporarily blocked all refugees while also denying entry to citizens of Iran, Iraq and five other Muslim countries. The directives have already caused chaos around the world and have led to a global backlash. Musk, who serves on two of the president's business advisory councils said the ban was "not the best way to address the country's challenges." Later, Musk offered to take the public's concerns directly to the president, asking his followers to send suggestions of how they believe the bill should be amended. Those who might hold the deluded belief new US President Donald Trump is showing leadership by banning, in a blatant and pathetic anti-Muslim move, citizens of seven countries from entering the star-spangled land of the free and home of the brave should consider a few facts. Facts, not "alternative facts" the chilling description Mr Trump's counsellor and communications guru, Kellyanne Conway, gives to lies. Flighty. On a wing and a hair. Credit:Olivier Douliery Leadership is about asking one simple question is this right? As in, is this based on facts and knowledge and in line with unassailable principles including fairness and decency? It is not about bastardry and incompetence and bluster, three unfortunate elements that marked the Trump regime after only a handful of days in power. Mr Trump, who repeatedly targeted Muslims throughout his bombastic campaign, has temporarily banned people from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Somalia and Sudan. If television is for you a source of relaxing escapism, Ice Wars is not for you. If you look to TV to inform you of the pressing crises threatening to bust open the growing cracks in our modern society, this documentary is every bit as harrowing as you'd hope. Crystal meth is taking a devastating toll on communities throughout Australia, and the doco follows the police and emergency services struggling to reduce that toll, as well as those with personal experience of the ice nightmare. It's a difficult, but valuable, glimpse into a hellish world. BP Nat Geo's annual Big Cat Week always brings some interesting insights. The four adolescent cheetahs in this documentary, filmed during Botswana's stormy wet season, provide a striking image of the imperfection of evolved instincts. When their mother decides they're old enough to fend for themselves she disappears across the plain and the young ones find themselves in increasingly urgent need of a good meal. When they surround a helpless little antelope lamb it looks as though lunch is finally served. But then a strange thing happens the lamb doesn't run, and without a chase to trigger their killer instinct it looks as though the cheetahs will just stand around awkwardly until the opportunity is lost. Elsewhere, a lioness forced to leave her pride to protect her cubs from bigger, bullying cousins finds the going tough when the rains run late. The animals might be familiar, but their stories are absorbing nonetheless. BN NCIS: LA Ten, 9.30pm NCIS stands for Naval Criminal Investigation Service, and the stable of television shows bearing the name is based on an extremely simple and seductive question: what if people who meant to watch CSI didn't look too hard at the name of the show in the guide? The original NCIS has capitalised massively on the abbreviation craze in crime shows, and this spin-off, now in its eighth season in the US though we're more than a year behind here has skilfully built on the original premise, which was "incredibly well-funded naval police somehow fail to ever get on a boat". NCIS: LA, exploring the possibilities of naval police failing to get on boats in Los Angeles, packs a decent amount of star power, with ex-Robin Chris O'Donnell starring alongside ageless rapper LL Cool J and Oscar-winning collectible figurine Linda Hunt as fearless crimebusters cracking the toughest of vaguely naval-related cases. Everything is incredibly high-tech and so glossy it's sometimes hard to tell whether the ad break has ended, but for those who like their crime shows fast-paced and dumb as a box of hair, NCIS: LA is one of the top three NCIS shows you could ask for. BP pay Eagle Eye (2008) Action Movies , 10.25pm Most high-tech thrillers are preposterous they allow audiences to forget the human qualities required for betrayal and corruption, which reside in all of us but this effort by DJ Caruso (Taking Lives, xXx: Return of Xander Cage) is tightly assembled and well played by the two leads, Shia LaBeouf and Michelle Monaghan. The pair play a grieving university student and a single mother who are both coerced into criminal activities by an all-seeing entity that digitally reaches out to them wherever they are. A network of operatives comprising solely compromised individuals, all unable to go against orders, makes for an uneasy milieu, and as the plot moves towards a finale in Washington DC, the swift storytelling occasionally pauses to indicate the emotional duress. There's a supporting cast that includes Billy Bob Thornton, Rosario Dawson and Anthony Mackie, and a relevant theme of defiance against unchecked control. CM Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says the Turnbull government will support Donald Trump's "strong immigration and border protection policies", as the leaders of Britain and Germany criticise an executive order banning entry to the United States for refugees and citizens from a range of majority Muslim countries. Speaking in Los Angeles after events promoting Australian business and tourism, Ms Bishop said the Turnbull government was working closely with the White House to ensure Australians would continue to have access to the United States and consular officials were assisting travellers on the ground. "I'm confident that the Australian government and the US government will continue to support each other in ensuring that we can implement our strong immigration and border protection policies," Ms Bishop said. "The Australian government is working very closely with the administration and the US officials and we want to ensure that Australians continue to have access to the United States, as they have in the past, and people from the United States have access to Australia." A Melbourne schoolboy claims to be the first Australian denied a US visa following President Donald Trump's controversial entry bans. Pouya Ghadirian, 15, was born in Australia but holds dual Iranian-Australian citizenship by descent. He said he was planning to go on "space camp", a dream trip to the US with his school, where he would visit Orlando, Washington, and the US Space and Rocket Center in Alabama. His visa interview was set for Monday morning. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop is pushing for Australian dual nationals to get the same exemptions that may have been granted to other US allies under President Donald Trump's temporary ban targeting seven majority Muslim nations. Officials were on Monday still scrambling to determine how exactly Mr Trump's executive order will affect Australians, in particular whether those who hold citizenship in the seven Middle Eastern and African nations which the US has deemed terrorism risks will be barred from the US for the next three months. "I have directed our officials in Washington DC to work with US officials to ensure any preferential treatment extended to any other country in relation to travel and entry to the United States is extended to Australia," Ms Bishop said on Monday. The order appears to state that virtually all citizens from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya and Yemen will not be allowed into the US for the next three months. The US State Department has confirmed it applies also to dual nationals. 2. Trump petition Donald Trump has galvanised at least 1.4 million Britons... against him. [Alex Morales/The Washington Post] At the time of writing, that's how many people had signed a petition calling for the US President to be banned from entering the UK for his official state visit because it would "cause embarrassment to the Queen." [Petition] US President Donald Trump, right, and British Prime Minister Theresa May during a joint news conference in the White House in January. Credit:Bloomberg The invitation for a state visit was issued by May on behalf of the Queen during her Friday trip to meet Trump in Washington. Trump, the son of a Scottish-born mother and self-professed anglophile, accepted. He is expected in the British summer but no exact time-frame has been given. Unlike in Australia, the UK Parliament accepts electronic petitions and it considers all which garner more than 100,000 signatures. The government responds to all which gather 10,000 signatures. This is not the first time a petition has been lodged calling for Trump's ban from the UK. Last year the Commons debated banning Trump, who was then a candidate, after a petition called for him to be blocked over hate speech gathered half a million signatures. Back then May was the Home Secretary and described Candidate Trump's proposed Muslim ban as "divisive, unhelpful and wrong." She's toned down the attack now she's the PM and he's the President. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson was called before the Commons to answer questions. He condemned the executive order, said the UK government would not introduce it but also accused Labour of "pointlessly demonising" the Trump administration, which he said would damage British interests. A protest is planned outside 10 Downing on Monday night local time. 3. One Nation's rise and rise One Nation Leader Pauline Hanson. Credit:Lisa Maree Williams Now to Australia and an examination of the party most closely aligned to Trump - One Nation. The fringe party looks like it is on the cusp of being mainstreamed in what should terrify the Liberals first and Labor second. (Think UKIP's effect on the British Tories and then on British Labour). The WA Liberals are expected to legitimise One Nation in a preference deal, which Rob Harris reports is a "radical break" from John Howard's edict. [Herald Sun] A total of four Liberal National MPs have defected to One Nation in Queensland. [Rachel Clun/Brisbane Times] One Nation has struck a chord with indigenous voters, a Queensland indigenous MP claims, despite leader Pauline Hanson's infamous criticisms of indigenous Australians in her earlier foray into politics. Billy Gordon, dumped by Labor, is considering a preference deal with One Nation when he contests the next state election as an Independent. [Sean Parnell/The Australian] In other politics news: A poll commissioned by the free-market think tank the Institute of Public Affairs has found a small rise in support for changing the Racial Discrimination Act so that it's no longer unlawful to "offend" or "insult" a person based on their race - a test critics say is too subjective to be hauled before a court over. The three per cent increase is within the margin of error. [Philip Hudson/The Australian] Nice comment from an unnamed Liberal MP on how Tony Abbott enforced discipline on his team when leader, to make Labor their target, but as a dumped Prime Minister he now seems intent on making the government the story. [Sarah Martin/The Australian] 4. Sixth person dies after Bourke St rampage The Bourke St, Melbourne memorial. Credit:Jesse Marlow A 33-year old woman is the latest victim of the terrible carnage witnessed in Melbourne's Bourke Street 10 days ago. [Marissa Calligeros/The Age] 5. Quebec Six people are dead and two men were detained over a shooting at a mosque in Quebec City. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation is reporting though that one of the men who was detained may in fact be a witness and not a suspect in the attack. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has called the shooting an act of terrorism. [CBC] 6. Fake news inquiry Britain's parliament has launched an inquiry into fake news. It will be interesting to see if they think they will be able to recommend any solutions. [Gizmodo UK] And that's it from me today, you can follow me on Facebook for more. Prime ministerial rhetoric may have reached "peak grandiose" under Kevin Rudd, been oddly suburban under Julia Gillard, and bluntly combative under Tony Abbott. But under Malcolm Turnbull, it is drifting towards the vapid. The Prime Minister was decidedly tardy in confirming that he'd kept his refugee deal alive despite Donald Trump's discriminatory seven-nation immigration ban. When Turnbull did front reporters, his ostensibly positive announcement came in strangely desultory tones. I once heard that women who own a shoe rack take 30 minutes less to get ready in the morning, such is the compound effect on the rest of their morning routine. The point is, having a capsule work wardrobe, as opposed to choosing from your entire clothing collection each morning actually gives you more freedom, and therefore easier choices. Until Australia Day, most companies take a more relaxed approach to dressing, but as of Monday it's time to tackle the work year head on, which means you'll need the right gear to kick some professional butt. Think about your absolute favourite item in your wardrobe, even if it's NSFW. Is it the cut of a jacket that makes you feel confident, or a dress in a fabric that makes you feel both stylish and comfortable? Is there a garment that gets you compliments every time you wear it (and re-wear it)? As I neared the end of my first year back in the workforce after having a child, I sat down and calculated exactly how much money we had spent on childcare. The figure was staggering: we were $23,700 out of pocket for the year. Had the government's Child Care Rebate not existed, we would have spent $31,200 in post-tax dollars on childcare. And it's not because we were cruising on easy street and had expensive taste. Our daughter attended a terrific early learning centre in Sydney's CBD four days a week. Neither myself nor my husband worked in the city so the location was hardly convenient but it was the only spot we could get. The price tag of $156 a day was steep but, again, there was no choice: despite a comprehensive search we could not secure a position anywhere else. We don't have grandparents or family in Sydney who could look after our daughter on a regular basis and hiring a nanny was out of our reach. Four girls have been taken to hospital after they were hit by a falling tree branch at a high school in southern Sydney, on the first day back after the summer holidays. Emergency services were called to Heathcote High School, near the Royal National Park, at 1.30pm. The year 12 students were sitting under a tree in the playground when the large branch fell onto them, police said. Police, paramedics and fire crews rushed to the school, where they treated the girls as the branch remained on top of them. Mr Ayshow, 35, known by his friends as "Ziggy", is on trial in the NSW Supreme Court accused of murdering Ian Stanbury in his western Sydney apartment in December 2014. This is what Steven Ayshow allegedly told a friend some eight months after he had killed the man he was living with by bludgeoning him in the head with a wooden table leg. The scene of the alleged murder in Cartwright. Credit:NSW Police Force "... he died for nothing anyway." Ian Stanbury, here 29, was found dying of head injuries inside his Cartwright unit in December 2014. Credit:NSW Police In his opening address on Monday, Crown prosecutor David Scully told the jury that Mr Ayshow killed Mr Stanbury, who was known as "Snake", because he blamed him for losing his drugs. The court heart that Mr Ayshow and another man were staying in Mr Stanbury's small, one-bedroom housing commission unit in Cartwright at the time. Mr Stanbury's friend says two days before his death she saw Mr Ayshow in a rage claiming that ice had been stolen from him and demanding that it be returned. Neighbours are expected to give evidence that on the day of Mr Stanbury's death they saw him standing outside his unit, screaming and bleeding from the back of his head. He has barely put his feet behind the desk, but the state's new attorney-general Mark Speakman is already enjoying a victory of sorts. In her first days in the top job, Premier Gladys Berejiklian quietly restructured the justice department to wrest control from the police minister and install Mr Speakman as head. New Attorney-General Mark Speakman says he will be consultative but decisive. Credit:Jane Dyson It signals a more cooperative relationship with the legal profession, which cautioned against the creeping expansion of police powers in NSW after Mike Baird appointed deputy premier and police minister Troy Grant to lead a new justice super agency in 2014. Mr Speakman, 57, now steps into one of the most politically charged portfolios in Ms Berejiklian's new cabinet. Premier Gladys Berejiklian has been forced to defend her new minister for women, Tanya Davies, and reassert the government's position on abortion after she revealed that "personally, I am pro-life". Ms Davies, the MP for Mulgoa, was sworn in as a member of Ms Berejiklian's first cabinet on Monday as minister for women, mental health and ageing. Asked during a media conference for her view of on abortion on demand, Ms Davies said: "Personally I am pro-life. Personally." "But in my role I am there to support all women," she added. "And I will support all women. And I will listen to all women." Trains have resumed on the Redcliffe Peninsula line after more than three hours of customers being forced onto buses and waiting out delays. Customers were warned to expect residual delays of about 15 minutes when trains resumed just after 9am. The newly added line has been plagued with problems, from a months-long opening delay last year the increased demand it placed on Queensland Rail's understaffed driver rosters, resulting in mass cancellations and eventually sackings at the rail provider. The Moreton Bay Rail Link's opening was originally scheduled for mid-2016 but was delayed until October because the signals could not properly communicate with the network. Pauline Hanson says she's in control of One Nation and won't let her party fracture again, like it did after taking 11 seats in Queensland two decades ago. Senator Hanson has denied claims by a second sacked Queensland candidate that she's a puppet under the control of her controversial chief of staff James Ashby. Pauline Hanson says no one should be in any doubt about who is in charge at One Nation. "I have team players with me but when it comes to making the decisions for this party and driving this party, it is solely in my hands and I will take full responsibility," she has told the ABC. Peter Rogers on Friday became the third Queensland candidate to withdraw or be sacked since mid-December, when One Nation unveiled its first tranche of candidates for the next state poll. Require personal information to reset your password. This is the main tip that hacker WauchulaGhost recommended to the Trump Twitter team. It's also a tip that Twitter itself recommends in every password reset email. In Twitter settings, there's an option to require someone to put in a phone number or email address before they see your redacted password. Although your own Twitter account may not be as sought-after as the president's, the hubbub over the security of the White House's accounts is a good reminder for all Twitter users to take a spin through their settings. Below are some tips. President Donald Trump is arguably Twitter's most prominent user. But, as many outlets reported last week, the people operating his administration's Twitter accounts may not be using all their security options to the fullest. As CNN reported , a hacker specifically wrote to the president with tips on how to lock hackers out of his official Twitter account. Verify your log-in requests. Look at the above screenshot, and you'll see an option to "verify login requests," which is Twitter's way of trying to de-jargonise the phrase "two-factor authentication." Using two-factor authentication means signing in with a special code in addition to your password. The code can come via text, a login notification on your phone or by using an authentication mobile app that will automatically generate codes for you. Doing any of those things makes your account harder to hack, since it requires someone to both know your password and have access to your phone or text messages. Yes, it's a bit of a pain, but it's worth it. Also, if you receive your codes by text, don't reply to them. As my colleague Abby Ohlheiser reported, doing so will post whatever you reply straight to Twitter. Some theorise that this is how White House press secretary Sean Spicer ended up sending two apparently nonsensical eight-letter strings to his account two days in a row, though the White House's official response is that both messages were a "pocket tweet." Use an email address that doesn't have your name attached to it: If you really don't want to use two-factor authentication, then do your best to register your Twitter account using an email address that isn't easy to guess. Why? If someone is trying to hack into your Twitter account, the first thing they'll probably do is try to figure out your email address, via the "Forgot Password?" link that shows a redacted version of your email address. If your name is John Doe and your email address shows up as jd***@gmail.com, it's probably going to be pretty easy for a hacker to fill in the blanks. In fact, that's exactly what WauchulaGhost did with the @VP account. Per the CNN report: Bizarre and pointless that's how local government leaders have described a secretive vote by a Melbourne council that could prevent a female councillor being appointed president of the Municipal Association of Victoria for the first time in its 138-year history. Boroondara councillor Coral Ross had been a "hot favourite" to be elected to the helm of the state's peak local government body, and is already serving as its interim president. Boroondara councillor and interim Municipal Association of Victoria president Coral Ross. Credit:Penny Stephens But in a move dubbed "ludicrous", other Boroondara councillors last month voted not to appoint a representative to the MAV. The decision, made in a meeting closed to the public, means the former mayor cannot stand for the upcoming MAV board elections. Boroondara's Liberal mayor, Phillip Healey, informed the MAV of its decision through a letter sent to Cr Ross herself, in her role as interim president. The Bourke Street Mall has been too grim for music since that maroon sedan sped through the crowds on Friday, January 20. But this Friday, two weeks on from the tragedy, the buskers will officially return. The street musicians are planning a memorial benefit that will play for 12 hours, with all of the proceeds donated to the Bourke Street Fund. George Kamikawa has been playing on the city's streets for 15 years. His set had barely stopped ringing out that Friday when the mall's soundtrack suddenly became very different. A woman has been arrested after allegedly attacking a police officer at the homeless camp outside Melbourne's Flinders Street station. Police said the woman had been involved in an "altercation" with another person near the busy intersection of Elizabeth and Flinders streets about 11am on Monday. "She was approached by police and then allegedly assaulted one of the officers," a police spokeswoman said. The woman, of no fixed address, was arrested and taken into police custody for questioning over the alleged attack. Two motorcyclists who slammed into the back of a car that braked suddenly on a suburban road in Melbourne's south-west are in hospital with serious injuries. A man and a woman, both aged in their 60s, were injured when the motorbike they were on collided with the back of the car on Ballan Road, Wyndham Vale, about 6pm on Sunday night. Westgate Highway Patrol members are appealing for witnesses following the collision. Credit:Marina Neil/Fairfax Media The people in the car, a red Ford Focus, fled the scene. The two riders received serious injuries and were transported to hospital. Donald Trump is who we thought he was. The 45th President campaigned as a radical break from both politics and policy as usual in Washington, promising to restore strength to the White House and the country while ignoring all tradition and political correctness. He spent the first week of his presidency doing just that - beginning with an executive order triggering the United States' withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, continuing through a midweek executive order to begin the process of building a wall along the US' southern border and culminating on Friday with Trump's executive order temporarily halting refugees from entering the country and instituting a full entrance ban on visitors from seven predominantly Muslim countries. In between all of that, Trump again invoked his idea that millions of illegal votes had been cast in the 2016 election and pledged to get to the bottom of it. Paris: A struggling French left named its contender for the presidency on Sunday, in the midst of a highly contentious election campaign likely to shape the future of a deeply troubled Europe. The winner was Benoit Hamon, a one-time education minister under Francois Hollande, the historically unpopular Socialist president whose unusual decision not to seek re-election led the way to Sunday's leftist primary. Hamon beat Manuel Valls, Hollande's prime minister, with roughly 60 per cent of the vote. The newly anointed winner promised to unite all the warring factions of the French left in advance of the elections in April and May. "France needs a left that thinks of the world as it is," he said. Given Hollande's unpopularity, many were quick to explain the outcome as a rejection of the sitting president, who has struggled with stagnant unemployment figures and a series of terror attacks, which claimed the lives of 230 people in France over the last two years. That's the night the daughter of Mary and Jack Donnelly - whose speeches and rulings had rarely travelled beyond courthouse walls - became known across the world as the first judge to block Trump's order. Never before in her long legal career had Donnelly gained such attention. Nowhere close. Her old college roommate, Darcy Gibson Berglund, remembers the Ohio-raised English major starring in a campus rendition of Pippin in the late 1970s - but quickly leaving the stage for the law. "She's an intellectual, she was not going to pursue theatre," Berglund said. But she said her friend retained "a facility with language" after graduating from law school in 1984, which occasionally showed up in the papers. Donnelly spent the next quarter-century as a New York prosecutor. Her most famous case was against two executives who looted their company - a trial that The New York Times described as "six months of sometimes tedious testimony". The paper recounted Donnelly's closing arguments in the Tyco International case, when she "at times seemed like a schoolteacher lecturing her students". The executives "believed they were above the law, and they believe the rules that apply to other people do not apply to them", Donnelly told the jury in 2004. The men were convicted. This week, some of Donnelly's old colleagues praised her demeanour during that trial - one telling the Times she was "the calm centre of the spinning wheel" even then. She was made state judge a few years after her victory in the Tyco trial, in 2009, and for years handled mostly criminal trials. Donnelly would later tell senators that sentencing someone to prison "is one of the most difficult tasks a judge faces". However, some of her cases were so horrific it didn't seem hard. "Not only did you strangle this woman, you then chopped her up," she told a man in 2010, according to the New York Daily News, before sentencing him to 19 years to life for killing his former girlfriend and burying her in concrete. If the killer were ever released, the paper noted, he would be deported because he had come to the United States illegally. Several years later, a populist Republican would begin crafting campaign speeches around violent immigrants, as Trump and Donnelly approached intersection. But first, Donnelly had to wait. And wait, and wait, and wait after president Barack Obama nominated her to the federal circuit in November 2014, promising she would "serve the American people with integrity and an unwavering commitment to justice". The Senate Judiciary Committee did not hold hearings to approve her for months, a common theme in an era when White House and Congress stood divided. "I'm thrilled the committee is finally moving forward," Democratic Senator Charles Schumer said in May 2015. "I know Ann well." He spoke of her parents in Ohio, and her work in prosecuting sex crimes. He told his colleague of offices Donnelly had left long ago, where "her reputation is legendary". "She is, at her core, a kind, thoughtful, compassionate person," Schumer said. He asked her family to stand. "You'll see, it's a great sight." Donnelly's mother and a dozen or so siblings, children, spouses, nieces and friends all rose in the chamber. One woman wiped tears from her eyes after Donnelly took the table at the front of the room. The senators asked her only two questions, and only about criminal law. "It's a certain risk a judge takes," Donnelly told Democratic Senator Al Franken, speaking of times she had tried to rehabilitate rather than punish a young offender, hoping to "save someone from what is bound to be a life of crime". But mostly, Donnelly spoke of her family before ceding the table and waiting for the Senate's decision. Another half a year passed until the Senate confirmed her, nearly unanimously, with only two nays. Yet more months went by before Donnelly was sworn in, quoting Abraham Lincoln in Brooklyn, and speaking once again about her family. She made no great news for a full year on the federal bench - until Saturday evening, when protesters thronged major US airports and an executive with the American Civil Liberties Union tweeted directions to Donnelly's courthouse. "Go right now if you can," he wrote. It had by then been a full day since Trump signed an executive order he said would "keep radical Islamic terrorists" out of the country - but which turned out instantly to bar people who had spent weeks or years planning journeys to the United States, and in some cases were already there. They had names such as Labeeb Ali, who told The Washington Post he had sold his business and belongings in Iraq and obtained a US visa before finding out at the airport he couldn't even board his flight. And Binto Adan, who the Post reported had flown thousands of kilometres with her eight and nine-year-old children expecting to see her husband, but who ended up held all day by security at Dulles Airport near to Washington, DC, because her family were Somali. "I am looking for my parents! They are elderly!" a crying woman shouted in the same airport that night. And in cities from Dallas to Seattle, bewildered families sought missing members, and the ACLU's emergency request to stop the deportations found its way to Donnelly's courtroom in New York. She had once been a government lawyer herself, but that night showed little patience for their arguments, the Post reported. "Our own government presumably approved their entry to the country," Donnelly said, weighing the risks of sending unknown numbers of people back across the oceans. An ACLU lawyer interrupted the hearing to warn Donnelly that a passenger was about to be deported to war-torn Syria unless she acted immediately. Donnelly asked if the government could guarantee that person's safety, and, unconvinced by their answer, issued her order just before 9pm. Sending travellers back could cause "irreparable harm", she ruled. She had turned more eloquent phrases, but this time her written words were photographed and immediately shared across the world. "Stay is granted," the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union Voting Rights Project wrote on Twitter. On the same day as he announced a halt on entries from Syria and six other predominantly Muslim countries, President Donald Trump claimed the United States was discriminating against Christians in its refugee admission policy. Trumps executive order declaring the ban includes an exemption for persecuted religious minorities. In an interview with the Christian Broadcast Network, Trump explained : "If you were a Christian in Syria it was impossible, at least very, very tough to get into the United States. If you were a Muslim, you could come in, if you were a Christian, it was impossible." This is a claim we heard from Trump during the 2016 election, and its inaccurate . It rates False . Christians make up a very small fraction of Syrians admitted under the refugee program, but they have been able to enter the United States. There is no evidence that this is an outcome of discriminatory policy. Refugee admissions skew in favor of Christians in other countries. Admissions numbers From Jan. 1, 2012 (the year the first Syrian refugees began arriving) to Jan. 29, 2017, the United States admitted 19,324 refugees from Syria. According to federal data , this included 19,025 Muslims and 199 Christians. (Another 86 belonged to other religions or no religion at all.) So, right off the bat, Trump is wrong that it was "impossible" to enter the United States as a Christian. Christians do make up a small fraction of refugee admissions compared with their makeup in the overall population of Syria. (Well explain why that may be later.) But they did come in; it was not "impossible," as Trump said. Muslims made up about 98 percent of Syrian refugees, compared with about 87 percent of Syrias population, as of Jan. 12, 2017, according to the CIA World Factbook. Christians, meanwhile, were 10 percent of the population but just 1 percent of refugees. (The Pew Research Center meanwhile says about 5 percent of Syrians are Christians.) This pattern, however, doesnt exist for the other countries targeted by Trumps ban. In some cases, the reverse is true: The proportion of Christian refugee admissions are greater than the proportion of Christians living the country. Heres a breakdown of refugee admissions by country and religion in the time frame (Jan. 1, 2012 to Jan. 29, 2017): Christian refugeesChristian populationMuslim refugeesMuslim population Syria 1%10%98%87% Iran 49%0.9%*9%99%* Iraq 26%0.8%71%99% Sudan 13%5%*79%91%* Somalia 0.2%0.2%*99.8%99.8%* Libya 0%**2.7%100%**97% Yemen 27%0.2%*60%99.1%* *These figures come from the Pew Research Centers 2015 Religion and Public Life Project, given incomplete data from the CIA World Fact Book. **The United States has accepted a total of 10 Libyan refugees from Jan. 1, 2012 to Jan. 29, 2017. Experts say no evidence of religious discrimination When we looked into Trumps claim in July 2015, all the experts we spoke with said Trumps accusation is off base. A year and half later, theres still no evidence that Christians have a higher bar to clear for entry. David Martin, an immigration law expert at the University of Virginia who previously held posts at the Departments of State, Justice and Homeland Security, acknowledged that Christian Syrians make up a smaller number of admissions than they do the overall population. But he said, "there are many possible explanations and this certainly doesnt reflect a general hostility to Christians." One possible explanation for the few number of Christian Syrians admitted, the Washington Posts Fact-Checker reported , is an initial religious disparity at the United Nations refugee programs. (The long vetting process for refugees seeking entry to the United States begins with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugee.) The UNHCR reports that 1.5 percent of the nearly 5 million Syrian refugees it has registered are Christian. Agency spokespeople have warned against speculation but suggested this may be because Syrian Christians have the means to move without seeking assistance from the United Nations. In October 2015, then-U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees and current U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres offered a few other theories. Christians in Syria "have been less systematically victimized than they were in Iraq," he said . "Most of the Syrian Christians have moved to Lebanon. And in Lebanon, the first thing that happened to me when I met with the Lebanese president ... when I asked him to start a resettlement program from Lebanon, (he said), dont resettle Christians because they are vital for us." Ann Richard, then-assistant secretary of state for population refugees and migration, suggested in a congressional hearing in December 2015 that Christian Syrians arent looking to move out of the country. "A disproportionate number of Syrians staying in the country are Christian. Now why is this? Its because a higher percentage of them support Assad and feel safer with him there," she said during her testimony . Regardless of the disparity in Syria, experts did not agree with Trumps suggestion that Christians face additional hurdles. "The U.S. government does not discriminate on the basis of religion in refugee admission or resettlement, and if you look at refugee admissions by religion over the past 10 years, rather than just at the Syrian refugees in the past few years, there are likely more Christians than Muslims," Karen Jacobsen, a professor at Tufts Universitys Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy, told us previously. Martin pointed out that since 2004, Christians have made up about 46 percent of refugee admissions from Iraq . Thats disportionate to the countrys total Christian population by a factor of about 58. Geoffrey Mock, a Middle East specialist for Amnesty International USA, said Amnesty has documented a myriad of human rights violations in the refugee resettlement process, but not religious discrimination "because we havent see any of it from the U.S. side." Where do terrorists come from? Trumps executive order temporarily suspends the admission into the United States of people from seven Muslim-majority countries and indefinitely bans refugees from war-torn Syria. After its announcement, protesters gathered at the nations largest airports. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., said in a CNN interview from New Yorks John F. Kennedy Airport that it was important to protect the United States from people who want to harm the country. But he argued that refugees are heavily vetted by the U.S. government and that recent attacks have not been from nationals of the countries singled out by Trump. "The various people who have, in fact, committed terrorist acts in this country, from 9/11 on, none of them came from any of the seven countries that are the subject of the president's executive order," Nadler said in a CNN interview Jan. 28. "If you really want to protect this country, why are Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey left out of the order? Most of the 9/11 conspirators came from Saudi Arabia." Trumps executive order signed Jan. 27, called "Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into the United States," suspended for 90 days the immigrant and nonimmigrant entry of people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Individuals from those seven countries who are U.S. lawful permanent residents are also stopped from re-entering the country (though exemptions may apply), the New York Times reported , attributing the information to the Department of Homeland Security. We wondered if Nadler was correct by saying that since 9/11, terrorist acts in the United States have not been carried out by people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Experts told us no fatal attack has been attributed to nationals from those countries, but that there have been a few non-deadly acts by individuals from two of those countries. Nadlers statement rates Half True . Increased homegrown terrorism According to New America, a think tank compiling information on terrorist activities in the United States since 9/11, 94 people have been killed by jihadists in the past 15 years. But in its overview of who are the individuals committing the attacks, New America says the majority of attackers come from within. "Far from being foreign infiltrators, the large majority of jihadist terrorists in the United States have been American citizens or legal residents. Moreover, while a range of citizenship statuses are represented, every jihadist who conducted a lethal attack inside the United States since 9/11 was a citizen or legal resident," the New America study says . "In addition about a quarter of the extremists are converts, further confirming that the challenge cannot be reduced to one of immigration." "It's certainly the case that none of the major, deadly attacks carried out in the United States were carried out by people from these countries," said Erin Miller, who manages the Global Terrorism Database for the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism at the University of Maryland. Other experts agreed. "Since 9/11, no one has been killed in this country in a terrorist attack by anyone who emigrated from any of the seven countries," added William C. Banks, director of the Institute for National Security and Counterterrorism at Syracuse University College of Law. In June 2016, Omar Mateen , born in the United States to Afghan parents, killed 49 people and wounded 53 others in an Orlando nightclub shooting. In December 2015 , a Pakistani woman, Tashfeen Malik, and her husband killed 14 people in San Bernardino, Calif. The husband, Syed Rizwan Farook, was born in the United States to Pakistani parents. However, there have been at least three non-deadly attacks in which the perpetrators were from Iran or Somalia , said John Mueller, a political scientist at Ohio State University, expert on terrorism and a senior fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute. One of those examples includes the November 2016 attack at Ohio State University by a Somali refugee who had lived in Pakistan before coming to the United States. Abdul Razak Ali Artan , 18, was shot dead by a police officer after he slammed his car into pedestrians and injured others with a butcher knife. The FBI said it would investigate the attack as a " potential act of terrorism ." In September 2016, Dahir Adan was shot dead after stabbing nine people in a Minnesota shopping mall. Adan was identified by his father as Somali but born in Kenya , moving to the United States when he was a child. Another incident was in 2006, when Mohammed Reza Taheri-Azar ran a Jeep Cherokee into a crowd of people at his alma mater, the University of North Carolina. Thinking he would be killed during the attack, Taheri-Azar left a letter in his apartment saying he wanted revenge for the deaths of Muslims across the world caused by the United States, the AP reported . A naturalized citizen born in Iran, Taheri-Azar in 2008 plead guilty to nine counts of attempted first-degree murder and was sentenced for up to 33 years in prison . On ABCs This Week, Trumps press secretary, Sean Spicer, said the presidents order covered countries that the Obama administration had identified as needing further travel restrictions. "What the president did was take the first step through this executive order of insuring that we're looking at the entire system of who's coming in, refugees that are coming in, people who are coming in from places that have a history or that our intelligence suggests that we need to have further extreme vetting for," Spicer said Jan. 29. Starting in early 2016, individuals from countries that participate in the visa waiver program (that is, people allowed to travel to the United States without a visa) and who had also been in Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Syria , Yemen, Libya or Somalia recently (with exceptions for diplomatic or military purposes) were no longer permitted to come to the United States without a visa. They were not banned from traveling, but they did need to apply for a visa and be vetted. People who were nationals of Iran, Iraq, Sudan, or Syria were also no longer able to come to the United States without a visa. More than 20 years before his murder, Father Rene Robert pleaded to spare his future killers life. Robert, a Catholic priest in St. Johns County, Florida , was staunchly opposed to the death penalty . When Florida was scheduled to execute an inmate, Robert would gather congregants to pray for the prisoner, the Augusta Chronicle reported in July , and he prayed for Florida to abolish the death penalty. In 1995, he signed a notarized Declaration of Life, asking that, in the event of his murder, the killer would be allowed to live. Twenty-one years later, at age 71, Robert was murdered, allegedly by Steven Murray, a repeat offender Robert had hoped to rehabilitate. Now Murray could face the death penalty if convicted, and the sentence is the opposite of what Robert would have wanted, his fellow clergy say. Roberts Declaration of Life has no legal significance in the court. But Roberts family, his fellow priests, and his alleged killer hope the dead priests compassion will spare Murray. Church officials reported Robert missing on April 12, 2016, when the priest did not show up for a funeral service. The absence was unusual for Robert, whom fellow clergy described as intensely dedicated. His lifes work was with people struggling with drug addiction and criminal histories. He would give money to recovering addicts and even lend them his car, fellow clergy told the Associated Press . Days after Robert went missing, police allegedly spotted Murray driving that same car. After a car chase and Murrays arrest, police say Murray led them to a Georgia property where they found the elderly priests remains. Murray pleaded not guilty to Roberts murder in a September court appearance but asked for forgiveness during an earlier hearing in April. Im very sorry and if anybody really loves Father Rene, theyll forgive me because he was a man of God and forgiveness is forgiveness, Murray said during the April appearance. I have mental problems, and I lost control of myself, and I apologize. While a trial date has not been set, Murray could face the death penalty if convicted, his attorney told The Daily Beast. According to Roberts 1995 Declaration of Life, which he kept in a personal file at the time of his death, the priest would oppose capital punishment for his alleged killer. Should I die as a result of a violent crime, I request that the person or persons found guilty of homicide for my killing not be subject to or put in jeopardy of the death penalty under any circumstance, no matter how heinous their crime or how much I have suffered, reads Roberts 1995 Declaration of Life. This kind of document, which Robert signed in the presence of a notarized witness, is not unheard of in the church. Much of the language in Roberts letter can be found in similar Declaration of Life templates, which request that, in the event of the declarants death, their representatives will deliver copies of the declaration to the court and to their accused killers attorney. But the documents use in a murder case is rare. Ryan Swingle, one of Murrays two defense attorneys, has specialized in capital punishment cases for four years. In that time, hes seen victims families oppose the death penalty for killers. But Roberts Declaration of Life is a first in Swingles experience. Its really hard to say, ultimately, how much weight the Declaration of Life will have in the case, Swingle told The Daily Beast. I think its a really important indication of what Father Robert would have wanted to see happen. I think all parties involved should give it a lot of consideration. Roberts fellow clergy in Floridas Diocese of St. Augustine appear to have taken his wishes to heart. A St. Augustine bishops petition has amassed more than 7,000 signatures by people who oppose the death penalty for Murray, should he be convicted. On Jan. 31, the Florida diocese plans on delivering the petition to the Georgia court where Murray will be tried. It will put some public pressure on the DA in Georgia to reconsider her stance, Kathleen Bagg, a spokeswoman for the diocese, told Floridas WUFT radio station . Were asking her to take into consideration the wishes of the victim and the victims family. In the aftermath of Roberts death, his family has grappled with the wishes expressed in his Declaration of Life. Deborah Bedard, Roberts sister, cried when she first received a copy of the document, she told the Augusta Chronicle . She had previously wanted the death penalty for her brothers killer. The Declaration of Life meant accepting Roberts wishes. He doesnt know how much we loved our brother, how much so many people loved my brother, and I know my brother would be proud of me for saying this: I dont want him to get the death penalty now, Bedard told the Chronicle of Murray. We werent brought up to hate people and I dont hate Steven; Im very, very angry, but that is subsiding. While the Declaration of Life is not legally binding, Swingle said he hopes Roberts 1995 call for mercy will spare Murray, should he be convicted. I have the utmost respect for Father Roberts work, his efforts throughout his life to care for all sorts of needy and broken people, Swingle said. In Georgia, theres a strong emphasis on making sure victims voices are heard. I hope Father Roberts wishes are given great consideration. Julia Louis-Dreyfus was the first actor to speak out against Donald Trumps ban on refugees from majority-Muslim countries. But she was not the last. After winning her second Screen Actors Guild Award for her role on HBOs Veep, Louis-Dreyfus took the podium Sunday night and began with a timely joke. Whether the Russians did or did not hack the voting of tonight's SAG Awards, I look out on the million or probably even a million and a half people in this room and I say, this award is legitimate and I won, she said, channeling the president. I am the winner. The winner is me. Landslide. But then, Louis-Dreyfus turned more serious. I want you all to know that I am the daughter of an immigrant, she said. My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France. And Im an American patriot and I love this country. And because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes and this immigrant ban is a blemish and its un-American. She went on to quote from a statement issued by the Writers Guild of America earlier in the day. Our guilds are unions of storytellers who have always welcomed those from other nations and of varying beliefs who wish to share their creativity with America, she read. We are grateful for them. We stand with them. And we will fight for them. Later in the show, Orange Is the New Blacks Taylor Schilling, speaking on behalf of her cast, said, We stand up here representing a diverse group of people, representing generations of families who have sought a better life here from places like Nigeria, Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Ireland. She added, We know it's going to be up to us and all of you to keep telling stories that show what unites us is stronger than the forces that are trying to divide us. Mahershala Ali, accepting the Best Supporting Actor award for Moonlight, talked about how his Christian minister mother felt when he converted to Islam 17 years ago. We put things to the side and I was able to see her, he said. She is able to see me. We love each other. The love has grown, and that stuff is minutiae. It's not that important. The night ended with a triumphant speech from Taraji P. Henson, who was accepting the biggest award of the night for Hidden Figures. This story is of unity, she said of the film. This story is about what happens when we put our difference aside and we come together as a human race. We win. Love wins. Every time. In the intergenerational Sunday School class that meets in a musty basement room of a Northern Virginia church, there are three people battling chronic and terminal diseases right now. But when the first call went out for prayer requests this Sunday, a woman stood up and asked us to pray for the refugees. Fifty years earlier, she and her husband had spent time in the Middle East, and she was worried about the fate of people we might return to war-torn countries. Roy, an older gentleman (who I know voted for Trump), spoke up, too. He had recently been tasked with teaching a citizenship course for immigrants. I taught it earlier during one of the Bush administrations, and [I] was quite confident I knew everything about the government. Now, he says, Im not so sure. This was a bit cryptic, but understood to be a criticism of President Trumps travel ban. Across the room, George (who grew up a Maronite Christian in Lebanon) seemed to side with the president. He cited a chaplain to the Queen who resigned to protest the reading of the Koran in a Christian church; this particular scripture suggested that Jesus wasnt the son of God. These worldviews are diametrically opposed, George said. You cant coexist with them. After our class was over, he told me a horrific story that I somehow missed about Afghan migrants who were arrested for committing gang rapes in Sweden. What George was saying is that we live in a dangerous world. There are terrorists who would love to come here and murder us. Left unspoken is that our little Sunday School class wouldnt last long in the seven countries on Trumps travel ban list. Left unsaid is that George has probably seen things that many of the good parishioners who gather here havent. Left unsaid is that the Bible isnt a suicide pact. Interestingly, the church Im attending was founded by a martyr. The first pastor was an abolitionist who opened a school for freedpeople. For this sin, he was murdered by the Confederacy. Each week, sermons are given in diverse languages: Arabic, Spanish, Korean, Vietnamese, and English. This Sunday, however, the congregation was united across cultures: they were all disturbed and tornand I feel certain that this congregation is a microcosm of what took place in houses of worship across America today. Christians, having seen images of protestsand having heard stories of green card holders and interpreters being detained at airportsare distraught. Just a few days ago, Vice President Mike Pence became the first sitting vice president to personally address the March for Life. In a few days, Donald Trump is expected to nominate a Supreme Court Justice in the mold of Antonin Scalia. If you are a Christian conservative, there are reasons to be ebullient. And yet, there was no celebration today. In the main service, Sundays (pre-planned) sermon was on Daniel standing up to King Nebuchadnezzar, and the title was a take on Robert Heinleins novel, Stranger in a Strange Land. Roughly speaking, the theme was this: Christians are called to be countercultural. After stressing one issue where Mike Pence might agree (defending the sanctity of Life), the pastor noted that much of the Bible is also about refugees and migrantsfrom Moses to The Good Samaritan. We are citizens of heaven, he said, which doesnt mean Christians shouldnt be good, patriotic Americans. But it does suggest (as the old Hebrew National commercial used to boast), We answer to a higher authority. This may not be consistent with the Steve Bannon-ian nationalism that always puts America First. There are plenty of verses to suggest this executive action is not in harmony with Christian scriptures. Heres one: He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt. You can look it up. More and more, what Christians are reading in church and what Christians are seeing in politics are at odds. But what happens when your spiritual worldview and your tribal duties come into conflict? Choosing the right moral path is not always easy. But then again, that's what houses of worship are for. President Donald Trump, who says he will announce on Thursday his nominee for the United States Supreme Court, has promised to appoint someone like Justice Scalia. According to one recent study, being like Scalia means fealty to the Constitutions original meaning, devotion to Scalias writings, and a willingness to write ones own opinions rather than just signing on those of colleagues. This study, however, says absolutely nothing about Scalias two most important attributes as a Justice: His votes in actual cases and how he expressed disagreement with his colleagues. If honest attention were paid to that data, a Justice like Scalia would mean something very different than what most members of the public think that it means. The reality is that, when deciding cases, as opposed to off the bench rants and catty remarks in dissenting opinions, Scalia was not close to being an originalist. He decided cases based on his personal values (mostly though not always conservative) even though he denied that more stubbornly than any Justice in history. No doubt Scalia was the master of the show. He was a delightful extrovert and a genuinely unforgettable character. His law clerks loved him. He inspired an entire generation of conservative law students, legal academics and judges. He was a fun-loving, globe-trotting (on other peoples dimes), deeply playful personality. He was a great writer and a skilled questioner. But, as Justice Scalia once remarked about Justice Ginsburg, even good people can "have very bad ideas." To be like Scalia means to vote to strike down state and federal laws on a regular basis even when no persuasive case based on text or history supported those opinions. Off the bench he yelled at audiences that the Constitution is dead, dead, dead, but on the Court he voted for a living, evolving Constitution. The examples could fill a book. His obsession with a color-blind Constitution, which drove his rejection of every affirmative action plan he ever reviewed, was based on neither text nor history but Scalias personal belief that racial preferences designed to help minorities do more harm than good. He may have been right or wrong about that as a policy matter but nothing in the text or history of the Constitution remotely supports his view. His strong belief in cases like Citizens United that corporate spending on political campaigns was so important that it outweighed legitimate interests in stopping corruption and the appearance of corruption was based on neither text nor history. His view that injured citizens are not allowed to sue their own states under federal law no matter how serious the violation was based on neither text nor history. His view that government regulations of property (as opposed to physical invasions of property) could amount to illegal takings was based on neither text nor history. We could go on and on (one of us has) through virtually every area of litigated constitutional law. Scalia invoked judicial self-restraint in favor of the will of the people when the result suited him, for example in same-sex marriage and abortion decisions, but he often abandoned the same principle as in Shelby County v. Holder when voting to overturn a key section of the Voting Rights Act. He voted for a principle in that case that Congress must have a strong reason to treat different states differently that is flatly and wildly inconsistent with both the text and history of the Reconstruction Amendments at issue in that case (which were passed in part to specifically give Congress the power to treat different states differently when dealing with issues of race). A Justice like Scalia would also be one who treats his colleagues with little respect and always thinks he is the smartest Justice on the case. His vituperative attacks on other Justices were often both unnecessary and hypocritical to the core. For example, as one of us has written before, in his dissent in the same-sex marriage decision Obergefell v. Hodges, he lamented the practice of constitutional revision by an unelected committee of nine, and said that any system of government that makes the People subordinate to a committee of nine unelected lawyers does not deserve to be called a democracy. He also wrote that in that case, If I ever joined an opinion for the Court that began [quoting Justice Kennedys majority opinion], I would hide my head in a bag. Yet, just three days later, the same Justice who wrote those intemperate words penned a scathing dissent when the Court upheld a ballot initiative passed by the people of Arizona that created a bi-partisan redistricting commission. The case involved a decision by the people of Arizona on a core issue of democratic self-government. They were tired of partisan posturing when it came to the vital task of dividing the state into voting districts (who isnt?). Although Scalia stated that there was no proper jurisdiction over the case, he also wrote in his usual bombastic tone that the majoritys resolution of the merits is so outrageously wrong, so utterly devoid of textual or historic support, so flatly in contradiction of prior Supreme Court cases, so obviously the willful product of hostility to districting by state legislatures, that I cannot avoid adding my vote to the devastating dissent of the Chief Justice. In reality, Chief Justice Roberts dissent was only devastating to those Justices willing to freely and without cause replace the decision of the people of Arizona with the decision of an unelected committee of nine lawyers, on an issue where the constitutional text was ambiguous, its history contestable, and the prior case law on point truly mixed. Scalia, an originalist in rhetoric only, was also an arrogant jurist with little patience for disagreement or for that matter the rule of law as he often hid his policy preferences behind a facade of humor, insult, and catchy turns of phrase. Ironically, the legacy of such a person can only be to make more acceptable the notion that judges are ideological partisans. In fact, when the President says he wants someone like Scalia, what he really means is he wants a judge who will vote to overturn Roe v. Wade, and vote much of the time the way the Republican Party would prefer. Dont be fooled by the rhetoric. Scalia was a politician all the way down, and one more than willing to replace the decisions of other more accountable government officials, and the people of the states, with his own decisions whether or not that reversal was justified by the text or history of the United States Constitution. Theres something strangeexhilarating, certainly, but still strangeabout experiencing a great feeling of solidarity on the subway. Its usually the place where we are arguably most tucked into ourselves, made worse in Washington by the frequent why-is-this-happening delays that that keep everyone in a state of enervated irritation. But no sooner did I hop on the Metro at the Friendship Heights station headed into town for Sunday afternoons White House march than I felt that this ride was different. Many people held signs. It was packed, but this time no one minded. We were all going to the same place. Almost all of us. I chatted with a woman and her 15-year-old daughter who were headed to the Air and Space Museum to celebrate the girls birthday, although a quick exchange of views confirmed that both were simpatico. We detrained at Farragut North; everyone was patient. The chantingno hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here!started at the station. We walked through Farragut Square toward the White House. When I arrived, around 1 p.m., the crowd was big but not quite huge. The inaugural reviewing stand is still up, so people couldnt congregate directly in front of the White House. People gathered in Lafayette Park and in front of the Treasury Building, the very first building just east of the White House. There were signs of all kinds. People wearing yellow stars labeled Jude, making the obvious historical echo. Chants bubbled up and faded away; the best, the most unexpected one, went something like ho ho, hey hey, welcome to your ninth day. It meant, of course, that were going to be in President Trumps face the whole time. Weve got 1,452 to go, if he lasts four years. Its shocking, what has happened. I cant even list all the abominations perpetrated in those mere nine days, but I dont need to. You know them. To those who say, Well, this is what he campaigned on, why are you surprised, the answer is this. Yes, he campaigned on these things. But he didnt tell us he was going to execute them via slapdash executive orders cranked out of the West Wing office currently occupied by a white supremacist without anything remotely like the normal inter-agency review process. If changing the immigration laws is what you want to do, there are other ways to do it, ways that are normal, ways that tell the American people that you respect our institutions and processes. The State Departmentthe State Department!didnt even see the final draft of the immigration order. Neither, according to NBC, did Homeland Security or Justice. Trump also didnt campaign by telling people that if a judge issued an order blocking implementation of something he wanted, he would order his administration to ignore it, placing the administration in violation of the law on its eighth day in office. But Trump has done these things, and many more, because it is precisely his point, and Steve Bannons, to disrespect the institutions of government. Process and institutions mean nothing to him. He is a thug, and he knows only thuggish-ness. Adam Gopnik shared a profound insight in a recent New Yorker piece. He was reflecting on the question of how Trump can lie so brazenly, about thing like millions of illegal votes, even when everyone knows theyre lies. When he lies like that, Gopnik wrote, people arent meant to believe it; theyre meant to be intimidated by it. The more he can discredit the idea that there is such a thing as objective truth, the more he can convince enough gullible people that madness is sanity. So it is with orders like this one. It is meant to intimidate. And it is working, with one important group. Almost all Republicans have responded to Trumpismus (thats the German, which seems appropriate) with staggering cowardice. House Speaker Paul Ryan, who had denounced this idea back when people were laughing at Trump, endorsed it Friday. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell danced around it Sunday morning. The tragedy is that the rest of us are, of necessity, counting on them. They have the majorities in Congress. Democrats can block some things, but they cant call for investigations or subpoena anybody. Do Ryan and McConnell have any principles that mean more to them than maintaining power? Do they have any honor? We will surely find out. We will find out, too, about people like Gen. James Mattis, widely respected to this point, but a man who stood there behind Trump applauding as he signed the order. And well find out about career government people whove admirably dedicated their lives to the institutions that Trump will trample if need be without the slightest thought. Everyone cant up and quit a job, of course. People have kids to feed. But these folks have to know that the future stability of this country as the place weve known truly might depend on them saying enough. But there is another group, and a much larger one, that is not intimidated. On Sunday afternoon I was honored to be with some of them, who arrived spontaneously, as people had at our major airports the night before, with nothing but their voice and their conviction and their will to announce that they will not be intimidated. And I report to you happily that by the time I left, the crowd was much larger. I remember that when I started reading history seriously when I was 17, 18 that I was astonished that people could not recognize in the moment the enormity of the events they were living. No one in the United States today surely has any excuse, any reason not to understand that this is a clarifying moment. Let us all act with the clarity the moment demands. PARIS We are going to do something terrible to you, we will deprive you of an enemy, Mikhail Gorbatchevs diplomatic adviser told the West in 1989. The implication was that Europe and the United States would lose focus without the threat of the Soviet Union. Is Donald Trump, in 2017, doing the opposite to the Europeans: offering them an enemy against whom they can unite? Seen from Europe, the first days in office of the new U.S. president have been a very Trumpian festival of executive orders signed daily, decrees held up in front of cameras dealing with Mexico, abortion, free trade, and citizens from seven Muslim majority countries banned from entering the United States for 90 days. Europe, looking on, quickly realized that contrary to the secret hopes of many, the Trump of the White House is no different from the Trump on the campaign trail, tweets included. And that his immediate aides, starting with Steve Bannon, the former head of the notorious Breitbart website turned advisor at the White House and now a member of the National Security Council of the United States, are anything but a moderating influence on the impulsive new leader of the free world. The craze created by this weekends decree dubbed the Muslim ban on social networks pushed Europeans out of their diplomatic silence. German Chancellor Angela Merkel set the example, to the point of letting it be known she had to lecture Donald Trump, during their phone conversation Saturday, about the Geneva Conventions on asylum Two million British residents have also signed a petition, supported by the Mayor of London, asking that Donald Trump should not visit the United Kingdom as long as the Muslim ban is in force. This call was rejected by British Prime Minister Theresa May, who nevertheless was embarrassed by this decision announced without any advance notification shortly after her meeting with Donald Trump. In fact, Trump is doing what European leaders have been trying hard to avoid for years: pointing at Islam, as such, as an adversary and thereby falling into the clash of civilizations trap that is a key part of jihadist strategy and dogma. Donald Trump is doing it his own way, putting into practice his slogan America First, which means that U.S. allies, starting with the historical ones from the Atlantic Alliance, are warned that they will be facing a continuous barrage of faits accomplis that have serious implications for them. In this case, citizens from European countries, who may have been born in targeted nations but often came to Europe as refugees fleeing dictatorships or wars, have also fallen victims to the executive order. If Donald Trump is already being considered by several governments and a good proportion of public opinion in Europe as a dangerous and unpredictable character, he also has a fan club on the continent. The implementation of his program is definitely popular with populist and far right groups. Marine Le Pen, the leader of Frances far-right National Front, said that President Trump is merely implementing what her party had been advocating for years. The President of Italys far-right Northern League wished Trumps Muslim ban would also be introduced in Italy. Parts of the far-left probably also looks on enviouslybut in silenceat the way President Trump is twisting the arm of big American corporations to create jobs in the U.S., which is a far cry from the financial gifts without any commitments that the French Socialist government gave the business world in France But the way Trump acts is transforming him into boogey-man, particularly given the polarization he is creating in American society itself. Even if its too early to judge the economic or social impact of Trumps protectionist approach, he will create more hostility than enthusiasm in Europe, a continent that feels it is being treated with disdain and hostility by the White House, excepted, perhaps, in the case of the United Kingdom and its Brexit, which are promoted as a model to be followed. The recent statement to the BBC by Ted Malloch, Donald Trumps likely ambassador to the EU, saying he considered the European Union like the Soviet Union as a bloc to be destroyed, have surprised and shocked. But they reflect pretty well the hostile mood of the new team in Washington, as was reflected by the pictures at Trump Tower shortly after election day when Nigel Farage, Brexits guru, turned up as the first foreign politician to be received by the then-president-elect. Europeans (except the U.K. and a small group of increasingly illiberal democracies in central and eastern Europe) are now facing their moment of truth. They have accumulated failures and errors in the past few years without being roused to save them from disaster. Previously unable to unite to face the crises Greece, refugees, and terrorism, will they have the energy and resources to face an enemy who is more dangerous due to the fact that hes also, in principle, their main ally. Timing is obviously very sensitive. French and German officials have had numerous talks in the last few days to prepare their coordinated answer, but what is the weight in the Trump White House view of French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault who, whatever happens in the French polls in May, will no longer be relevant? The Germans, with less unpredictable parliamentary elections in September, are not totally free until then. Its always dangerous to talk of a last chance, since history is rarely as simple as that, but it is clear that the European we have builtour last reasonable utopia, as Spanish writer Javier Cercas called it last year when he received a European book prizeis being threatened with destruction if disunity and internal powerlessness is now exploited by blows from its two big enemies, Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. So, is it enough to have a good enemy to become coherent again? Its probably not, but its a first step; and, if only for that, Europeans might one day thank Donald Trump. Back in late December, before his exceptional new film, The Salesman, was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, and before ex-reality show host Donald Trump was sworn in as the 45th President of the United States to middling fanfare, I sat down with Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi at an office in Midtown Manhattan. He was warm, smiling frequently throughout our chat. But a sense of unease was palpable. Donald Trump had, one month prior, won the presidency in a baffling victoryone packed with enough espionage subplots (Russian hacking! The FBI! WikiLeaks!) to fill a Tom Clancy novel. Hed done so on a platform of ethno-nationalism, fearmongering, and deception, a would-be strongman afraid of steps. Among his campaign pledges: a Muslim ban, or a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States, and the dismantling of the Iran nuclear deal, which he maligned as one of the dumbest deals ever. Because I am in contact with journalists who are connected to cinema, I could see that they are very worried about it, Farhadi told me of then President-elect Trump. I am worried, toonot just because of the relationship between Iran and the U.S., and the Iran deal that happened. I like that we are going toward peace, not war. But I really hope that something happens that calms this down, and brings down this worrying that I have. In the month since our chat, President Trump signed an executive order effectively banning immigrants of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States for 90 dayswithout so much as running it by his Secretary of Homeland Security, Gen. John F. Kelly, reported The New York Times. One of the countries on the list is Iran, where Farhadi has called home his entire life. Not long after the order was signed, Trita Farsi, head of the National Iranian American Council, took to Twitter to announce that Farhadi wont be let into the US to attend the Feb. 26th Oscars, where his film The Salesman is nominated. Farhadi subsequently released a statement to The New York Times about why hes decided to boycott the ceremony in the wake of the extremism of President Trumps executive order, writing: it now seems that the possibility of this presence is being accompanied by ifs and buts which are in no way acceptable to me even if exceptions were to be made for my trip. I would therefore like to convey via this statement what I would have expressed to the press were I to travel to the United States. Hard-liners, despite their nationalities, political arguments and wars, regard and understand the world in very much the same way. In order to understand the world, they have no choice but to regard it via an us and them mentality, which they use to create a fearful image of them and inflict fear in the people of their own countries. The 45-year-old filmmakers oeuvre is one of transfixing social realism, providing a window into Irans struggle between tradition and modernity through micro-conflicts of class and gender. His breakthrough film, 2009s About Elly, confronted Iranian taboos regarding relationships and communication, while his Oscar-winning 2011 film A Separation touched on divorce, womens rights, and the pendulum of justice. The Salesman, whose Oscar nod for Best Foreign Film is well-deserved, tells the tale of a young couple in Tehran, Emad (Shahab Hosseini) and Rana (Taraneh Alidoosti), who are playing the lead roles of Willy and Linda Loman in an Iranian adaptation of Arthur Millers Death of a Salesman. All is well until they move into a new apartment whose previous occupant, they come to learn, was a prostitute with unfinished business. One day, Rana is violently attacked in their new home by an elderly stranger, and Emads conflicted, uncompassionate reaction to the assault causes tension between them personally, and professionally. This play is very well-known in Iran, Farhadi said of Salesman. Every couple of years theres a performance of it. Using this play, I had the benefit of people knowing the play. When I decided that I wanted to use the play, I tried to make the character of the old man who arrives at the end of the film to be as close as possible to Willy Loman, because the audience doesnt have a lot of time to get to know him, and since hes already invaded the home, the audience doesnt like him very much. But I wanted the audience to have empathy towards him. It doesnt mean that what he did was right, but I wanted the audience to put themselves in the shoes of that character. According to Farhadi, the relationship between Emad and Ranas aged assailant provides a commentary on the generational gap between older, traditional working-class Iranians and the younger, more modern intellectual classsimilar to the way Willys eldest son, Biff, sees his father, whos been humiliated by an iniquitous society. When her attacker is revealed, Emad erupts in a paroxysm of violence that, by American film standards, is tame, but feels positively earth-shattering here given the social constraints. At Cannes, the Oscar nominee said the film was in part inspired by his anxiety over the precarious state of the world. A lot of violent things are occurring for ideological reasons. Its becoming really disquieting as it grows so much. It is very difficult to withstand this violence, to eliminate it. Even if in the film we dont directly refer to whats happening, it is an illustration of contemporary society, he said. Iranian cinema has flourished despite strict censorship within the country that prevents nudity, sex, violence, feminism, or any anti-state messaging from overt cinematic display. It is in some ways reminiscent of the restrictive Hays Code, or the Motion Picture Production Code that governed American cinema from 1930 to 1968, and called for the abolishment of onscreen pointed profanity, licentious or suggestive nudity, miscegenation, willful offense to any nation, race, or creed, and much more. While The Salesman broaches the subjects of sexual assault, prostitution, and violence, it does so in a restrained, indirect way so as to abide by Iranian rules. One of the subjects of the film is sexuality, because its the story of a man who invades a personal space. When you look at it from the outside, it may seem strange how someone could make such a film in Iran, said Farhadi. Even if a good filmmaker from outside of Iran comes into Iran to make that type of film he cant, really, because he doesnt know how the system works. But when youre born there, youre raised there, and you go to school there, you learn step-by-step how to find your way around the system, and you find a new language, which is an indirect language. To give you an example, he continued, in the scenes where the couple is alone in their home and the wife is wearing a scarf, that was a little unbelievable for me. So the wound that she had on her forehead, I put a bandage on it that looked like a hat, so I covered her hair and passed the censorship like that. You can expand this example to any other thing, of course. He paused. I have this belief that you can expand to all of art, generally. Art is about giving something in exact doses to the audience. If you start to give the audience too much, then you sap the imagination from the audience, and theyre not involved with your film. One of the problems of cinema today, I believe, is that they give too much to the audience, and it becomes an exaggeration. One of Farhadis countrymen and filmmaking contemporaries, Jafar Panahi, was in December 2010 sentenced to six years imprisonment and a 20-year ban on directing films, writing screenplays, conducting interviews, or leaving the country (except for making the Hajj pilgrimage). He received the harsh punishment for allegedly attempting to make a documentary covering the protests against the 2009 re-election of President Ahmadinejad. When Farhadi spoke out at an award ceremony in defense of Panahi, the Iranian Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance temporarily barred him from making A Separation. It was only after he apologized, claiming his words were taken out of context, that production on the film was allowed to move forward. I dont see myself as a political person, Farhadi told me. But any film that talks about society is a political film as well. You can call a film political if you watch it and you dont feel its political. A film that talks about politics directly is, I think, less political than a film that approaches it indirectly. Throughout our talk, Farhadiwho speaks through an interpreteris very careful with his words, deliberating after each question. And though he doesnt see himself as a political person, his work has become a conduit into the everyday struggles of Iranian life for audiences around the world. One area he is passionate about, however, is the Iran nuclear deal with the United States, which he hopes will remain intact under President Trump. I think its very unfortunate if something hurts this deal, said Farhadi. The goal [of Trump and the GOP] is to break this deal so they can pressure the Iranian government, but if they do that, they are going to put a lot of pressure and cruelty onto the Iranian peoplebecause the Iranian people do agree with this deal, and are very happy about it. If they do otherwise, they will be going against the will of the Iranian people. There are so many radical people in the Iranian government that are against the deal, of coursejust like here in America. But if this deal doesnt make it, only the radicals will be happy about it. Towards the end of our talk, Farhadi stated how there was far too much focus on film censorship in Iran, and not nearly enough on the silencing of dissenting voices in journalism. He also expressed his desire to one day direct a project in America, even though hed turned down several film offers and TV series from Hollywood in the wake of About Elly. The censorship that is more bothersome is the censorship towards journalists in Iran. There, the censorship is very serious, and many journalists are very bothered by that censorship, and many journalists are in prison because of it. Unfortunately, there is less talk about that area, he said. I already made a movie outside Iran, and I will make another movie soon in Spain. Even now, we are talking about a project that maybe one day I will make in the U.S. But if my geography changes, my filmmaking wouldnt. Even if I come the U.S., I will make my films the way I was making them in Iran, because I like this kind of filmmaking where I communicate indirectly. I dont like films where everything is on the surface. President Donald Trumps executive order restricting citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from travel to the U.S. is unconstitutional because it creates favored and disfavored groups based on their faith, according to a new lawsuit filed by the Committee on American-Islamic Relations in a Virginia federal court on Monday. The suit against Trump, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, the Department of State, and the Director of National Intelligence names more than 20 plaintiffs, a dozen of whom are identified only as John or Jane Doe because of the precariousness of their legal position. It refers to Trumps order, officially known as Protecting the Nation from Terrorist Attacks by Foreign Nationals, as the Muslim Exclusion Order throughout. Our First Amendment is under attack. We, as attorneys, are foot soldiers of the American Constitution and took an oath to protect all from being targeted by the government because of their faith, Shereef Akeel, an attorney who is co-counsel on the lawsuit, said in a press release. The suit argues that Trump's executive order is both broader and narrower than the policy he proposed in December, when he promised a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what's going on. The executive order, the lawsuit argues, is narrower because it only applies to seven Muslim-majority countries. But it's also broader because it may interfere with immigration benefits for those who lawfully entered the United States from the seven countries on the list. While the order does not apply to all Muslims, the policy only applies to Muslims, the suit says. Non-Muslims from the seven countries listed, including at least one Yazidi Iraqi, have also been affected by the ban. But the text of the order cites the perpetrators of the September 11th attacks as an inspiration for the ban (although none came from the seven countries affected), and Trumps allies have admitted it is an attempt to combat what they term radical Islamic terrorism. The plaintiffs list is a who's who of Muslim-American activists, including Arab American Association of New York Executive Director Linda Sarsour and Rashida Tlaib, one of the first Muslim women to be elected to a state legislature in the U.S. But its the stories of the anonymous plaintiffs that pack the emotional punch. One is a Muslim American in Albany County, New York, who filed a marriage petition for his pregnant wife, a Sudanese national. Another is a permanent resident of Syrian origin whose citizenship application may be deniedeven though he is one of few critical care physicians servicing an underserviced area in the United States, the lawsuit said. In the event he is prevented from returning to the United States, the area he serves will be lacking an essential physician to provide critical care to a substantial population in the United States, it states. Another is a Syrian national who serves as an imam in Michigan. If he leaves the country, he will be prevented from returning to his home and to his congregation despite his lawful permanent resident status, pursuant to the Muslim Exclusion Order, and based solely on his religious status as a Muslim and his Syrian national origin, the suit states. Moreover, Plaintiff John Doe No. 1 will be denied citizenship in the United States, pursuant to the Muslim Exclusion Order, based solely on his religious status as a Muslim and his Syrian national origin. Other anonymous plaintiffs include Somali and Yemeni student visa holders, a Syrian asylum-seeker whose ability to seek lawful permanent residency is now in jeopardy, a Sudanese national whose application for citizenship is being held up and whose Sudanese wife (though she has never lived in Sudan) is waiting to come to the U.S. through a marriage petition. CAIRs lawsuit is not the first filed against Trumps executive order, but it is the broadest. Attorneys for two Iraqi men filed a class action suit in New Yorks Eastern District on Saturday, saying detaining people with valid visas is unlawful. Because the executive order is unlawful as applied to petitioners, their continued detention based solely on the executive order violates their Fifth Amendment procedural and substantive due process rights, they wrote. President Donald Trump wants to build up the U.S. Navy, a move that could help the United States counter Chinas aggressive expansion into the Western Pacific. But the new, bigger fleet will come too late to save America from a rising China. Thats because Trumps other initiativesrejecting foreign alliances, throwing up barriers to global trade and withdrawing from efforts to combat climate changeare creating a power vacuum that China naturally fills. Beijing will step into leadership roles that Trumps Washington has vacated quicker than Trumps Navy stands any chance of blocking Chinese ascension. The counterproductiveness of Trumps China strategy seems to make no sense, until you realize that Trump doesn't want a bigger Navy in order to deter China. He wants a bigger Navy for the same reason he wanted to include tanks and missile launchers in his inaugural parade: Trump is a chauvinist and aspiring autocrat for whom displays of strength are the same as actual strengthand whose primary audience isnt rising foreign powers, but the majority of Americans who voted against him and who strongly oppose his policies. As recently as the late 1980s, China possessed only a modest navy whose main role was to protect the Chinese coast from possible invasion by Soviet forces. As the Chinese economy expanded in the 1990s and 2000s, Beijings strategic aspirations expanded, too. The Chinese Communist Party needed a navy to assert and protect its increasingly global role. After 20 years of investment, today the Chinese navy looks a lot like the U.S. Navy does. It possesses more than 100 large, sophisticated warships armed with long-range guided missiles plus hundreds of smaller ships. It has nuclear-powered submarines. In 2012, it commissioned its first aircraft carrier. Today a second carrier is under construction in Shanghai. Emboldened by its new, powerful fleet, in recent years China has forcefully expanded into the China Seas, occupying isolated reefs in disputed waters and transforming them into armed outposts replete with guns and missile launchers, airfields and port facilities for warships. Meanwhile, the U.S. Navy has shrunk from its Cold War peak, and today numbers around 280 frontline warships. These ships patrol less often. In 1996, the U.S. Navy sailed two aircraft carriers side-by-side through the Taiwan Strait as a message to a belligerent Beijing. Today it's exceedingly rare for two of America's remaining 11 flattops to deploy together anywhere. It was the George W. Bush administration that first identified the need for a bigger fleet to counter the Chinese, among other potential threats. President Barack Obama mostly continued Bushs fleet plans, slowly adding a few, mostly smaller, vessels. Obama was constrained first by the global economic crisis and, later, by the 2011 Budget Control Act, which mandated across-the-board cuts in government spending. Trump has pledged to repeal the Budget Control Act and grow the fleet to 350 shipsa move Obamas outgoing Navy Secretary Ray Mabus actually strongly endorsed. With Republican majorities in Congress, Trump can theoretically accomplish both goals. But navies don't grow fast or cheaply. A new warship costs U.S. taxpayers $2 billion, on average, and takes several years to build and bring into the fleet. Even if Trump and Congress give the Navy every dollar it asks for starting with the 2017 budgetTrumps firstthe sailing branch won't receive the first of the new ships Trump promised until right around the time candidates start campaigning for the 2020 presidential election. Its for that reason that many outside observers are skeptical of Trumps bold pronouncements on the military front. The big issue for me is how long this buildup is going to last, Eric Wertheim, an independent naval expert and author of Combat Fleets of the World, told The Daily Beast. Russia, China, Japan, Mexico, all countries will respect the U.S. more than they have under previous administrations, Trump vowed during a Jan. 11 press conference. But if Trump is counting on a bigger military to drive that respect, he might be disappointed. And in the meantime, Trump is voluntarily surrendering ground to Beijing on economic, diplomatic, and environmental fronts, opening the door to an even greater global role for China that the countrys own growing military will only reinforce. In one of his first acts as president, Trump formally withdrew the United States from the Trans Pacific Partnership, a trade pact that Obama had initiated in the hope of getting regional economies to agree to U.S. rather than Chinese legal, labor, and environmental standards and tariff-free imports. Eleven countries have signed the TTP, but the pact loses much of its power without American participation. In November 2016, U.S. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) warned that Trump abandoning the trade deal will create an opening for China to rewrite the economic rules of the road at the expense of American workers. Trumps promise to effectively quit the Paris Climate Accord, Obama's signature environmental accomplishment, will have a similar China-emboldening effect. Halting U.S. investment in clean energy technology such as solar and wind will surrender a $1.35-trillion annual world market to China, which is set to pour hundreds of billions of dollars into new green tech over the next few years in a bid to sharply reduce its own, presently sky-high, carbon emissions. Trump doesnt seem interested in competing on the clean-tech front. And that benefits Beijing. There can now be no question that Chinawhile still leading the world in both coal consumption and carbon emissionsis also leading the way forward to the clean-energy future, wrote Barbara Finamore, Asia director at the Natural Resources Defense Counsel. Finally, Trump seems determined to undermine Americas longstanding Pacific alliances, surrendering what is arguably the United States biggest advantage relative to China. Note that America never planned to confront an assertive China on its own. U.S. military planning in the Western Pacific has long assumed close cooperation with friendly countriesmost importantly, Japan, which possesses the third-most-powerful navy in the region after the United States and China. But Trump began pushing away Japan even before he got elected. In March 2016, Trump said that Japan should develop its own nuclear weapons so that it can defend itself without American help. We cant afford to do it anymore, Trump said. As the worlds only victims of atomic warfare, the Japanese people and their government are deeply opposed to nuclear weaponry. Trump either didnt know that or doesnt care. But the effect was the same. Alarm. In the aftermath of Trumps comment, Japans Prime Minister Shinzo Abe rushed to reassure his country. Whoever will become the next president of the United States, the Japan-U.S. alliance is the cornerstone of Japans diplomacy, Abe warned. Abe signaled cautious optimism following a November meeting with Trump in New York City. The talks made me feel sure that we can build a relationship of trust, Abe said in a carefully-worded statement. But America and Japan already had a relationship of trust prior to Trumps entry onto the world stage. Its because of Trump that Abe had to reassure his citizens at all. President Trump must work hard simply to return U.S. diplomacy to where it was before candidate Trump started mouthing off. That creates an opening for Beijing to assume a greater regional leadership role, even amid China's own aggression in the China Seas. China's continuing commitment to free trade could more than make up for the countrys military bellicosity when it comes to aligning other governments behind itand Beijing knows it. Hence Chinese President Xi Jinpings recent trade-themed charm offensive. Pursuing protectionism is like locking oneself in a dark room, Xi said at the economic summit in Davos, Switzerland on Jan. 17. Wind and rain may be kept outside, but so are light and air. If Asian countries follow Chinas lead on trade and the environment, they could lend Beijing the diplomatic heft to firm up and legitimize Chinas recent military gains. When Trumps bigger Navy sets sail in 2019 or 2020, it could arrive in the Western Pacific too late to make any difference for Americas standing in the region. ROMEMore than 1,000 refugees and migrants arrived in Italy by sea on Friday, the same day U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order barring people from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the United States. The figure is small compared to what will be surely be yet another record-breaking year for migration in Italy. None of the new arrivals were vettedextremely or otherwisebefore they were rescued. Its rather inconvenient to verify documents and social networking activity when the potential refugees head is bobbing up and down in the icy water. Instead Italy, along with Greece, saves their lives and brings them into Europe thanks to the Coast Guard and rescue ships like SOS Mediterranee and Migrant Offshore Aid Station (MOAS) that trawl the waters for boats in peril. The alternative to these rescues is to simply look away and let the refugees and migrants drown and wash up on shore like the now long-forgotten little Syrian boy named Aylan Kurdi whose photo made the world care for one all-too-brief moment. What happens to those who survive the voyage varies. Some are eventually deported back to their countries of origin, but they all get a chance to exercise their right to seek and enjoy asylum, which is a fundamental clause in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights established in 1951 in response to the atrocities of the Holocaust. No one gets turned away without a chance to prove they might deserve to stay. Trump tweeted about the horrible mess of Europes migration plan as one of his justifications for his hard-line stance. Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the worlda horrible mess! It is no exaggeration that Europes migration crisis is a mess. There are Syrian refugees sleeping in sub-degree weather in Serbian train stations, burning fruit boxes to stay warm. There are Nigerian teenagers forced into sex slavery in Italy. More than 10,000 minors have disappeared in the last two years, no doubt sucked into crime and corruption rings that exploit the weak. Because of the sheer number of arrivalsmore than 300,000 people arrived in 2016 to Italy and Greece and more than a million the year beforeasylum applications take many months to be processed before people can join families or get settled. All of that costs Europe a lot of money and manpower. But Europe does it because, no matter how costly or inconvenient, it is still the right thing to do. And Europeans agree that picking and choosing which refugees to save and which to let die is just wrong. German Chancellor Angela Merkel didnt mince words in her condemnation of Trumps executive order, which she did during a phone call in which she reminded him of the Geneva Convention. Her spokesman then charged that the fight against terrorism does not justify putting people of a specific background or faith under general suspicion. Germany has taken more than 1.3 million asylum seekers since 2015. U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May, just coming off an American love fest with Trump and the Republican Party, seemed to have morning-after-regrets about holding hands with Trump. She is now suddenly under pressure to cancel Trumps planned state visit unless he reconsider the ban, which she now calls divisive, unhelpful and wrong. In France, which has Europes highest Muslim population, President Francois Hollande urged Europe to band together to offer a firm response to the new American president. Faced with an unstable and uncertain world, withdrawal into oneself is a dead-end response, he said. And when [Trump] refuses the arrival of refugees, while Europe has done its duty, we have to respond. The foreign minister of Luxembourg, Jean Asselborn, worried that the ban would spark hatred toward the West. The decision is bad for Europe, he warned. Because its going to strengthen even further the mistrust and hatred towards the West in the heart of the Muslim world. Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni also chimed in, tweeting that open society, plural identity, no discrimination are the pillars of Europe. He has called a cabinet meeting to discuss the issue and any potential security problems due to backlash that might arise at the upcoming G7 meeting in Sicily in May, which Trump is expected to attend. The United Nations Refugee Agency UNHCR took a more diplomatic approach, praising the United States for its historical role in refugee resettlement. The longstanding U.S. policy of welcoming refugees has created a win-win situation: it has saved the lives of some of the most vulnerable people in the world who have in turn enriched and strengthened their new societies. The contribution of refugees and migrants to their new homes worldwide has been overwhelmingly positive, the agency said in a joint statement with the International Organization for Migration. We strongly believe that refugees should receive equal treatment for protection and assistance, and opportunities for resettlement, regardless of their religion, nationality or race. The travel ban wont affect the majority of European nationals, though a handful of dual national politicians in Germany and the U.K. and several professional athletes are concerned. And most refugees in Europe have already been resettled or are waiting to make their homes here, not waiting to move to America, with the exception of family reunification cases that are now in limbo. Trumps edicts wont make a huge difference in Europes chaos. But Europeans are alarmed. This decision can only cause us concern, Jean-Marc Ayrault, the foreign minister of France said Sunday of Trumps first week in office. But there are also a lot of other issues that are causing us concern. That sentiment is echoed throughout the continent. Sunday was a day of strength for the Trump administration at Washington Dulles International Airport. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)the federal agency tasked with keeping people from entering the U.S. illegallysuccessfully deflected a federal judges court order and stonewalled three members of congress, in a display of executive branch muscle. The night before, Judge Leonie Brinkema ordered CBP officials at the airport to let lawyers have access to legal permanent residents of the U.S. who were detained because of Trumps travel ban. It was a court order from a federal judge, which meant it was enforceable by federal law enforcement. But immigration lawyers at Dulles said it didnt get adequately enforced. Instead, CBP kept the Dulles detaineesand it still isnt public how many lawful American residents were held there, and for how longfrom having face-to-face conversations with attorneys. Instead, probably as a gesture toward compliance, immigration attorneys told The Daily Beast that they had learned detainees were provided with a copy of Judge Brinkemas order and a paper listing contact information for pro bono immigration attorneys based in Northern Virginia. It isnt clear if those attorneys were on call on Sunday. It isnt clear if all the detainees had access to phones while they were being held. And it isnt clear why CBP barred the numerous volunteer immigration attorneys at hand on the airport from talking in person with people being held. And their need for attorneys was urgent. Slate reported that at least two detaineesa 19-year-old and a 21-year-old, both citizens of Yemensigned away their green cards while they were in detention without access to lawyers. It was the worst nightmare for the volunteer lawyers at Dulles: that CBP would be able to nab a public relations win by releasing detaineesbut without the public realizing that the agency may have bullied some of those detainees into ceding their rights to live in the United States. Brinkemas order, which was just a few lines long, directed CBP to permit lawyers access to all legal permanent residents being detained at Dulles International Airport. Lawyers at the airport, who spent hours waiting and hoping to be able to meet with travelers who were held by CBP, said they were deeply distressed that no one forced the agency to comply more fully with Brinkemas order. On Sunday morning, the Legal Aid Justice Center and Mayer Brown law firmwho filed the suitreleased statement saying they would monitor CBP to be sure it did as Brinkema ordered. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has recently confirmed that it has modified its practices with respect to LPR persons in response to the federal courts temporary restraining order, the statement said. We are monitoring CBPs new practices to ensure rigid adherence and to determine if they comply with the judicial directive. Some immigration attorneys at Dulles want CBP held in contempt of court. Hassan Ahmadan immigration attorney who carried a sign that said See something? Say something! (To me; Im a lawyer)told The Daily Beast he was frustrated that 24 hours after Brinkema released her order, CBP seemed to be defying it. We still havent talked to a client, said Ahmad, who is with the HMA Law Firm in McLean, Va. And that is proving serious Constitutional problems for access to counsel. Rights are being violated. He wasnt satisfied with the phone numbers that CBP gave detainees. I think thats gamesmanship, he said. I think thats semantic play. If thats their attempt at doing it, I think they would have a lot of explaining to do. I dont think thats going to sit well with Judge Brinkema. Officials with the agency were quarantined away from the public the entire time I was at Dulles (from about 8 p.m. to 1:30 a.m. on Saturday and then 3:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. on Sunday). Lawyers and police officers said the CBP officials were squirreled away in a room down a hall blocked off by police. When Sen. Cory Booker visited Dulles on Saturday night, he got past the police and down the hall. But a well-placed source told The Daily Beast that CBP officials refused to see him, instead passing notes back and forth about their understanding of Brinkemas order. Three Democratic members of CongressGerry Connolly and Don Beyer of Virginia and Jamie Raskin of Marylandall tried to get police officers to let them go back and talk to the CBP officials (an interchange the Huffington Post caught on video). Are people being detained? Connolly asked. Sir, I dont know that, the officer replied. Im part of the police department. Connolly asked the officer why he wouldnt let the congressmen talk to CBP officials. This is a secure area, the officer replied. Im trying to get them to give you authority to come back, permission to come back. His efforts failed. The members didnt talk to anyone from the agency at Dulles, and the lawyers didnt talk to anyone being detained. They have successfully managed to black out legal representation enough with regard to information so that its made it very difficult for us to know with certainty whether they are complying, said Brian Murray, an immigration attorney based in Fairfax, Va. We can suppose they are notwe dont know for sure. The agency had gone to extraordinary lengths to stiff-arm attorneys, he said. Murray added that attorneys looking to get CBP held in contempt could have trouble making the case in court if the agency blocks them from learning the names of the people being detainedand, thus, being denied their rights to an attorney. Its so fucked up, he said. So Sunday was a win for for the agency, he said, and a loss for travelers trying to access attorneys. Round one goes to CBP, Murray said. Were still fighting. Department of Homeland Security chief John Kelly spent the weekend trying to calm down angry and confused employees across multiple DHS agencies who received no warning about the Trump administration's executive order on immigrants and refugees, were unsure of their role in its implementation, and fearful of what else may come down the pike. The Daily Beast surveyed 20 DHS employees from a range of agenciesincluding Customs and Border Patrol, U.S. Citizens and Immigration Services, the Transportation Security Adminsitration, and DHSwhose job would be affected by the executive order in some capacity. Of that group, 19 of the employeessome of whom process refugee applications from the impacted countrieshad learned that Trump had signed the executive order from the news media. The other employee said they had learned about the EO about an hour before it was signed, and only because they happened to overhear a coworker yelling on the phone outside the bathroom. For example, a TSA employee found out about the EOand the pushback to that orderwhen protesters began rushing his place of work, a major airport. They knew there were protests but didnt tell us. Thats not safe to walk into the unknown, said that TSA employee. Its part of a pattern of chaos that unfolded in the EOs wake. According to the New York Times, Kelly himself only found out that Trump was signing the order when his staff saw the president doing so on television. In calls with senior Customs and Border Patrol and other DHS agency management, Kelly tried to assure his staff that the order was neither odd or illegaland that nothing of the sort would be rolled out under his watch. Rather he, added, according to two employees briefed on the calls, staff should "expect a return to Bush era policy." It appeared to several DHS employees that Kelly signaling that he wouldas much as possibleinsulate his staff from the craziness of the Trump executive orders and whatever else may come down from the White House. I think hes saying that whatever we hear, we should know that theres going to be method, procedure, tactics, said one Border Patrol officer. I think the general is saying, Were not going to be doing crazy shit off the cuff. Several employees across agencies directly involved with implementing the executive order heard this promise, but said they remained most concerned about being kept completely in the dark about the EO beforehand. Kelly is planning to bring better interdepartmental and agency communication, in part, by restocking the DHS press office. According to two sources with knowledge of the matter, David Lapan, who is currently director of the Defense Department public affairs office, is the top pick to run the DHS press shop. He didnt immediately reply to the Daily Beasts email for comment. For some, the changes cant come quick enough. I appreciate what Kelly said and if true, returning to Bush era policy would be fine, said a border patrol employee. But honestly, Im operating on the belief that this is all crazytown. This article was updated throughout at 5:15 AM EST, January 30, 2017 In one week, Donald Trump has made the United States a much, much more dangerous place for the vast majority of its peoplethose who live in citiesand terrorists are exulting. As the former head of Britain's MI6 intelligence operations, Richard Barrett, told the BBC on Monday: The narrative of the Islamic State is precisely what Mr. Trump appears to be confirmingthat Americans are against people of Muslim faith, they particularly discriminate against them in favour of other people. So it is this 'them or us' type picture that the Islamic State promotes. The divisiveness and anger spawned by the new American president may disturb the peace of other countries as well. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced on Sunday that he would take the refugees the United States turns away. But, ominously, within hours a mosque in Quebec City was attacked. Six people were murdered as they prayed and eight more were injured. The identities of the alleged assailants have not yet been released, but the mosque had a pig's head left at its door last summer, and suspicions have focused on anti-Muslim fanatics. Trudeau called the shooting "a terrorist attack on Muslims." The initial implementation of the Trump ban on refugees and visitors and immigrants and at first even green-card holders from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Sudan, Somalia, and Yemen has been wildly confused. Travelers from those countries with previously valid visas have been stranded around the world. People fleeing religious persecution in Iran and seeking U.S. asylumEvangelical Christians, Jews, and Baha'isare being turned back from Austria where they normally would wait, usually for many months, for clearance finally to reach asylum in the United States. (The echoes of the U.S. turning away a ship full of Jews fleeing Germany before World War II are not lost on historically minded Europeans, especially after Trump's White House issued a statement on Holocaust Remembrance Day that made no mention whatsoever of the six million Jews who died.) Inside the United States, where federal judges ruled those banned Muslims being held at airports must have the right to see lawyers, Customs and Border Patrol at Dulles Airport briefly opted not to comply with the courts. The American Civil Liberties Union reportedly was investigating other cases of noncompliance with the court orders in New York, Boston, Seattle, Los Angeles, and Chicago when the White House reversed course on green-card holderslegal permanent residentsand ruled they should be allowed in. Meanwhile, protests have broken out in cities across the nation. One's head spins, which probably is part of the Trump strategyin the face of chaos his administration already is claiming the travel ban is "a massive success." The alt-right's alternate facts take shape as a whole alternate reality. But many of Trump's critics, focusing on the evident racism and bigotry of his policies, are missing one vitally important point that is key to understanding not only his strategy but the danger it poses for the majority of the people of the United States: in the supposed interest of fighting terrorism, Trump and his Rasputin, Steve Bannon, are attacking American cities. Or, more precisely, the people who live in them and the way they live in them. And the security implications of this campaign are frightening. * * * In the real world, over the last 15 years American cities have gotten a lot harder for terrorists to penetrate and attack because federal and local law enforcement have come to understand and adopt some basic principles about working with, and sometimes monitoring, very diverse communities. About 40 percent of the population of New York City, for instance, was not born in the United States of America. According to Trumps rhetoric, including the language of his recent refugee ban and immigration decrees, that ought to make his home town a hell hole. But New York has rarely been more at peace or more prosperous. Thanks to Trumps new policies, it is unlikely to stay that way, but clearly Trump does not care. The cities never voted for him, and they were never going to. Trump was running against the cities, and it seems they knew it. His promised investigation of voter fraud will of course focus on urban areas, and if and when he gets the results, if they're honest, they'll probably show the cities where more than 60 percent of Americans live are the reason he lost the popular vote. As The New York Times pointed out just after the election, in ManhattanTrumps home borough in his home town and ground zero for his eponymous empirehe got a pitiful 10 percent of the vote. In Washington, D.C., his nominal new home, he got 4 percent. Trumps campaign against the ravages of globalization, echoing similar campaigns in Europe by the likes of Marine Le Pen in France or Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage in the U.K., is essentially rhetoric that draws on the anger of people who feel they dont fit in, or are being victimized, by the dynamic urban majorities in their own countries. In every case, arguments of the rising demagogues are based on what Adrian Monck of the World Economic Forum recently called nostalgic nationalism. Its opposite, says Monck, is cosmopolitanism, an idea defined by Merriam-Webster as having worldwide rather than limited or provincial scope or bearing. But in American and European politics these days, as Monck puts it, I dont see many people sticking up for cosmopolitanism. Which would all be rather academic if the terror threat to Americans and Europeans were driven by the kinds of factors Trump has claimed to address in this first week in office: too much immigration, too many refugees, too many sanctuary cities, perhaps not enough torture. But nostalgic nationalism is a very poor tool when it comes to keeping cities safe. Facts are more useful. *** As veteran counterterror analyst Brian Jenkins at the RAND Corporation points out, a study of all the post-9/11 terror attacks in the United States leads to the conclusion that the danger is posed by ideas not refugees, or, as Jenkins puts it, inspiration, not infiltration. There is no way of predicting how many fewer terrorist incidents there may be as a consequence of the presidents directivewe cannot know things that dont occur. Nor can we say how many American lives will have been saved, Jenkins wrote me in an email over the weekend. However, we can say that had this directive been in place since 9/11, it would not have saved a single life. (My italics) By Jenkinss count, 89 Americans have been killed in seven jihadist terrorist attacks since 9/11. These include the 2002 shooting at LAX, the 2009 killing of an Army officer in Little Rock, Nidal Hasans 2009 shooting at Ft. Hood, the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, the 2015 Chattanooga shooting, the 2015 San Bernardino attack, and the 2016 Orlando attack (which alone accounts for 49 of the 89). Others analyses show different numbers, Jenkins notes. This is always a problem, but no ones numbers get us over an average of nine deaths a year at the hands of jihadists in a nation that has an average of 15,000 homicides a year. If perspective were wanted, that should do it. And as was reported widely and correctly over the weekend, not one of those attacks had any connection to a Syrian refugee. Looking at these deadly attacks, its important to understand that most of the perpetrators were U.S. citizens, writes Jenkins. None were from the countries included in the directive. That is the prevailing pattern. Jihadist terrorists are not imported, they are manufactured in the United States. Inspiration, not immigration, is the problem we face. Jenkins notes that, The president has argued that some of the killings would not have taken place, even if the killer was U.S.-born as his family would not have been allowed in. That still would not have altered the outcome as none of the parents came from the proscribed countries. Anyway, I have no confidence in our ability to vet for the actions of future offspring, says Jenkins. No terrorist gene has been identified. If the actions of sons and daughters are the criterion, then no extreme vetting will suffice and the ban is absolute and permanent. One group of refugees on the list, those from Somalia, has been implicated by the actions of a few individuals. In addition to the seven cases above, there are nine cases in which Islamic extremists managed to carry out an attack; eight of these resulted in injuries, writes Jenkins. In the recent Ohio State attack, the perpetrator was a Somali refugee. And in the St. Cloud stabbing attack, the perpetrator was also of Somali origin, but from Kenya and therefore would not have been affected. As the former head of Britain's MI6 pointed out, Trump's policies are a boon to those who want to inspire terror in the West. And Republican U.S. Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham described this disaster succinctly. They called it a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism." *** In 2008, when I was researching my book Securing the City: Inside America s Best Counterterror Force the NYPD, I was struck by the delicate balance that law enforcement had to strike between force and persuasion in an urban environment a complex as Gotham. A city is not an abstraction like homeland, I wrote, it is home, full stop, to millions of people. And if you live here, and are part of it, what would you be willing to do to defend it? What wouldn t you be willing to do? The job of securing any big city seems at first glance almost impossible; the results obtained in New York almost a miracle. Whats required is an incredibly sensitive equilibrium among disparate and contradictory forces: coercion and finesse, political expediency and public interest; basic cop-on-the-beat police work and sophisticated intelligence gathering; respect for the law but a willingness to bend the rules; ostentatious spectacle and secret surveillance; lots of police on the street, but maybe a few outside the country, cooperation with federal agencies, but also competition. There is no indication that Trump understands any of those principles, and there is every reason to believe his executive orders and statements over the last week, item by item, will make that vital equilibrium harder to sustain. Consider his threat to cut off federal funding to so-called sanctuary cities. Why do they exist? Why do big-city police commissioners often support them? Not because they feel some moral obligation to protect undocumented immigrants, but because when you make crime-fighting police do the work of immigration agents, crime-fighting suffers: People do not report crimes, they do not cooperate with police, they avoid them at all costs. In that same vein, when you make the point, as Trump has done with his orders and declarations, that all illegal immigrants eventually should be booted out of the country, all refugees are suspect, and Muslims from seven countrieswith more to comeshould be regarded as a threat, whats the message? That a minimum of some 11 million people in the United States, and possibly many more, have no stake in its future. They are deemed outlaws. That does not mean they will leave. It does mean they will become much easier prey for organized crime, which will promise them ways to survive and, yes, for terrorists who would encourage some of them to take revenge. One of the factors that helps keep the peace in American cities is whats called the American dream, which is based on an immigrant ethicthe belief that a better world can be built in a land of freedomand is tied to basic respect for human dignity. Thats what has made America great. Period. But Trump shatters that notion every day. One terrible and conspicuous example: his insistence that torture works. He wouldnt name the experts who told him this, but its a fair guess theyre the little cabal of present and especially former FBI agents who saw defeating Hillary Clinton as a greater priority than investigating Russian hacking. Meanwhile the professionals who might question such policiespeople like the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the Director of National Intelligenceare being squeezed out of White House councils by an ideologue, Steve Bannon, who as recently as 2013 declared his desire to "destroy the state." All this breaks down the understandings that allow people to live together by the millions in peace and security in urban America. Trump's voters in small-town America and gated communities may be complacent, even pleased, about what he is doing. But they were never the ones at risk. In effect, Trump has turned a famous phrase of Abraham Lincoln on its head. What we are saying to the world now, and a vast swathe of our own population, is that this administration has malice toward many, and charity for none. That is morally reprehensible, yes. But more importantly, it is no way to keep our cities safe. FIUMICINO, Italy It is just before 11 oclock on Monday morning at Romes Fiumicino airport and Nour Essa is waiting anxiously in the arrivals hall of Terminal Two for a very special flight from Beirut, Lebanon. The 30-year-old Syrian refugee knows that in a few minutes, 41 other refugees like her will be crossing the threshold, essentially moving from a state of fear and uncertainty to one of hope thanks to Italys Humanitarian Corridors safe passage program. Like her, the refugees on the other side of the opaque doors have been hand-picked from refugee camps, vetted and invited to be resettled in Italy. And, as it was with her, they have no idea just what to expect on arrival. Essa, 30, shared the same sad journey from Syria to Europe as those coming today, even though the last part of her path from to Italy from Lesbos, Greece, last April was the result of very special dispensation: She and her husband and young son were among 12 refugees Pope Francis brought home to Rome with him from an apostolic voyage to the island. At the time, she told The Daily Beast that she was scared and nervous and didnt know what to expect. She and her family had been given less than a day to decide whether to go with the pope or wait and try to get to northern Europe to join other Syrians from their village outside of Damascus as they had planned. I hope we are doing the right thing, she said at the time. Now, she knows she and her family made the best decision. Thats why she is at the airport to offer the newcomers comfort and hope. Essa, who trained as a microbiologist in Syria, will start a new job as a biologist with the Bambino Gesu Childrens Hospital in Rome next month. She and her family have learned Italian and have moved into their own apartment after living in a shelter provided by the SantEgidio Catholic Community, which is sponsoring todays arrival along with the Federation of Protestant Churches, the Waldensian and Methodist Churches in Italy. When asked what she thought of Donald Trumps travel ban that would stop people like her from reaching safety, she was diplomatic. Of course we appreciate all that Europe has done to accept Syrian refugees, she said. It is hard to understand a country that closes its doors, but we will just be appreciative for those who keep them open. Most of Mondays arrivals were from Aleppo and Homs. The youngest was a baby born on December 12. Most were broken families like that of Kiamam Habat, a young mother with four children, age 13, 12, eight and 18 months in tow. Her husband died before her youngest son was born in a refugee camp along the Syrian border with Lebanon. She had no financial or other means to get to Europe on smugglers ships with her children. And she had no home to return to in Syria. It has been very difficult even though we have been helped so much, she told The Daily Beast through a translator at the airport. Habats eyes, red from exhaustion and emotion, seemed unable to hide the horror she has seen. As she spoke of hope, her children sat quietly around her, the older ones each holding small bouquets of flowers and notes of thanks they planned to give to the caretakers where they will be spending their first night in Italy. They will be moved to Palermo, Sicily, where they will live in a group home with other widowed Syrian families. I hope they can return to Syria one day in the future, Habat says, holding back tears as she looks at her children. But for now they need to go to school and be normal. And we all need to heal. The SantEgidio Community, working together with Italys foreign and interior ministries, has resettled 540 refugees from camps in Lebanon under Europes first-ever safe passage program. Italy could easily get by without hosting a safe corridor resettlement program considering how many hundreds of thousands of refugees and migrants land on its shores each year illegally. But representatives from SantEgidio and the other churches, along with other NGOs working in the camps, pinpoint the most vulnerable. Then they are vetted and given humanitarian visas that last three months. Their only requirement is that the refugees must apply for political asylum in Italy and not try to move to another country. All 41 of the arrivals on Monday filled out the paperwork shortly after they landed. I am here for the children, says Habat, the mother of four. If not for them, I would have given up a long time ago. But its not their fault they are children of war. What have they done wrong? What have they done to deserve this? Two Muslim men fleeing Yemen to live in the U.S. were coerced into signing away their visas by Customs and Border Protection officers acting on President Donald Trumps immigration executive order, according to a new lawsuit amended Monday. Brothers Tareq and Ammar Aqel Mohammed Aziz of Yemen flew into Washington-Dulles International Airport on Saturday morning on visas issued for immediate relatives of U.S. citizens. They came to be with their father who lives in in Flint, Michigan. When they arrived, the brothers were handcuffed and forced to sign papers they neither read nor understood that relinquished their visa status, the lawsuit claims. Agents then allegedly stamped Cancelled on the brothers visas, confiscated documents needed for green cards, and sent them back to Ethiopiaon their own dime. The Aziz brothers remain at Addis Ababa Bole International Airport on Monday and could not be reached. Their father, father, Aqel Mohammed Aziz, who was waiting for his sons to arrive in Flint, where they planned to live, could not be reached for comment. Everybody whos been affected by this is incredibly fearful to speak out and is concerned with their immigration status going forward, said Paul Hughes, one of the brothers attorneys. The brothers signed the I-470 forms, known as a Record of Abandonment of Lawful Permanent Resident Status, because officers allegedly told them refusal to do so would make them ineligible for entry to the United States for a period of at least five years, the lawsuit claims. Lawyers for the brothers contend this was a misrepresentation by CBP agents who were simply lying to get the brothers to sign away their rights. No copies of the forms were allegedly given to the brothers. Whats more, the lawsuit claims other similarly-situated individuals who did not sign I-407 were ultimately admitted into the United Statesthus demonstrating the falsity of the representations of respondents agents. The lawsuit also claims that as many of the 60 more people stopped at Dulles were unlawfully compelled to voluntarily renounce their U.S. immigration status. While lawyers for the two brothers do not have specific cases in which travelers signed away their visas, they expect more lawsuits with similar allegations to be filed in the coming days and weeks. The lawsuit names respondents as Trump, the Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection, and their respective chiefs, John Kelly and Wayne Biondi. Eight unnamed CBP agents at Dulles are also named. CBP did not respond to a request for comment, and the government has yet to respond to Mondays filing in court. Among the laws the government was said to have violated is the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, because Trumps order places a substantial burden on petitioners exercise of religion in a way that is not the least restrictive means of furthering a compelling governmental interest. While the lawsuit is the first time these allegations have been made in court, attorneys across the country have expressed fears that travelers were being convinced to sign away their visas. There are a number of anecdotal reports from advocates and allies at airports across the country over the weekend that CBP has tried to get people to sign this paperwork, said Zachary Manfredi of Yale Law Schools Worker and Immigrant Rights Advocacy Clinic. Manfredi was one of several lawyers whose work resulted in a Brooklyn judges decision to issue a temporary national stay on Trumps order on Saturday night. That same order also demands a list of the detained to be released. Dubbed the direct mail wizard of the New Right for his pioneering techniques in the pre-Internet age, Richard Viguerie helped elect conservative firebrand Jesse Helms to the U.S. Senate from North Carolina for five consecutive terms in the eighties and nineties. At 83, he has been around long enough to qualify as Old Right, and with conservative cultural values at the core of his politics, he and President Donald Trump dont appear to have much in common. Yet Viguerie is riding the Trump train for all its worth, and loving every minute. In an interview with the Daily Beast, he praises the movement conservatives around Trump: Kellyanne Conway, Jeff Sessions, Steve Bannon, Mike Pence, exclaiming, I know themWe know them. From August on, the campaign was run by movement conservatives, he says, and thats never happened before. Kellyanne is one of us, he exclaims. Viguerie attended her wedding more than fifteen years ago, and he recalls how her husband, George, secretly packed her wedding dress on their honeymoon trip to Rome so she could wear it when they had their marriage blessed by the Pope. Shes very Catholic, he adds. Theyll be in the meetings, Viguerie says of these movement conservatives, along with Trumps hard-right nominees to lead the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Health and Human Services, Scott Pruitt and Tom Price , respectively. Trump wont be in 99 percent of the meetings, he says confidently. Thats Trumps management style. You cant run something like he did, a worldwide corporation, and be a micromanager. You hire the pilot of the plane, and you pick the surgeon, and you let them go. 99 percent of the meetings he wont be in, but Pence will be there, and Scott Pruitt. Justice (with nominee Jeff Sessions as Attorney General ) and the White House are solid, says Viguerie. Who knows what course things can take, but every indication now is they are looking good for us. Personnel is policy, and the personnel while its not 100 percent is really, really goodand conservatives like me, were just wildly excited. Asked how cultural conservatives and evangelicals can support Trump given his checkered history, Viguerie says the media are consumed with Trumps personal behavior, while we conservatives are consumed with Supreme Court judges that could rule for thirty years. In the third debate, after Hillary Clinton said she would appoint Supreme Court justices that stand up for womens rights, Viguerie sent out some seven million pieces of direct mail targeting Catholic households in the states surrounding the Great Lakes: Minnesota, Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. A third of the people who live there are Catholic; 40 percent of registered voters are Catholic, and on Election Day, almost 50 percent of those who showed up to vote were Catholic, says Viguerie. Mitt Romney lost Catholics 50 to 48; Trump won them 52 to 45, according to the Pew Research Center . Unlike the evangelical vote, which is reliably Republican, but will turn out in greater or lesser numbers, the Catholic vote is a true swing vote, he says, and Trump carried it by 7 points. Viguerie had been building the case against Clinton among Catholics for some time. Her comment at a Global Womens Summit in New York on March 23, 2015, that deep-seated cultural codes, religious beliefs, and structural biases have to be changed for women around the globe to have access to abortion as part of their health care, was readymade. What that says to me, Richard, youre going to have to change your religious beliefs, says Viguerie. Thats lock and load and go to war. For movement conservatives, Trumps victory is even better than Ronald Reagans election in 1980. Reagan gave the religious right a seat at the table, and he had Ed Meese, a true conservative, among his top advisors. But he also had James Baker, Michael Deaver, and David Gergen, pragmatists and skilled infighters who saw their job as reining in the right. Viguerie remembers Washington Post reporter Lou Cannon, whose sources in the Reagan camp were unrivaled, writing a week before the Inauguration in a front page story that a high-ranking Reagan official, asked what the new President would give the religious right that was so instrumental in his election, replied, anonymously of course, Were going to give them symbolism. Truer words were never spoken, says Viguerie. Symbolism is what we got. And we got Sandra Day OConnor, really bad news, and Anthony Kennedy, two justices that were not rock-ribbed social conservatives, and who helped preserve the fundamental right to abortion set out in the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling. Last spring, before he wrapped up his partys nomination, Trump released a list of eleven potential Supreme Court nominees compiled by the conservative Heritage Foundation. In September, seeking to reassure the GOPs evangelical base, Trump put out an additional list of ten names, which included three minorities. Asked what he thinks of the proposed nominees , Viguerie says some are suspect on cultural issues, mainly gay marriage. There are not 20 Scalias on that list, he says. Maybe if were lucky there are one, two or three. Lots of people are going through those lists now. Antonin Scalia is the patron saint of movement conservatives. His death on February 13, 2016 was the most important event that happened last year, says Viguerie. It put the focus on the Supreme Court and the animating principle for so many conservatives of overturning Roe. In the third debate, when the abortion issue was raised, Clinton said that she would repeal the Hyde amendment. That was big, says Viguerie. The Hyde amendment bans the federal government from using Medicaid funds to pay for abortions for poor women. Asked how many voters even know what the Hyde amendment is, Viguerie says if you follow the new and alt-right media, you knew the significance of Clintons remark and how it would be received on the right. As president, Trump immediately reinstated a ban on federal funds to international groups that have anything to do with abortion services, and he is expected to sign the Hyde amendment into law. Trump is not a conventional conservative, or even much of a Republican, but for movement conservatives, what is there not to like? If Hillary Clinton had been sworn in as the 45th president of the United States just over a week ago, there is no doubt that comedian Samantha Bee would be at the very top of the list to perform at the annual White House Correspondents Dinner in Washington, D.C. this April. Instead, President Donald Trump is entering his second full week in the White House and the past two weekends have been dominated by national protests against his agenda. His press secretary is complaining to the press that his boss feels demoralized. And his chief strategist thinks the media should keep its mouth shut. How bad will relations between the Trump administration and their so-called opposition party be by the time this years White House Correspondents Dinner rolls around? And will President Trump really allow a comedian to roast him on live television? With all of this in mind, Samantha Bee, host of TBS Full Frontal, announced on Monday that she will host an alternative event to the official one in Washington D.C. this spring. "Not the White House Correspondents' Dinner, as it is being called, will be held on April 29th, the same night the White House Correspondents Association has told members to save the date for its event. "The evening is sure to bring plenty of surprises, music, food, and laughterand if you're not careful you just might learn something. Specifically, you'll learn how screwed we'd be without a free press, Bee said in a statement about the event, which will serve as a benefit for the Committee to Protect Journalists. "We're really doing this. This is not a joke, she added. In a conference call with reporters Monday morning, Bee confirmed that she has never been invited to host an official White House Correspondents Dinner and did not anticipate that she would be getting an invite this year given the nature of her comedy about President Trump. The morning after the election, Bee and her showrunner Jo Miller were sitting around the Full Frontal offices wondering aloud whether or not the event will still go forward under Trump. This is such an unprecedented time, who knows what form the event would take, if it even happens, Bee said. We thought, almost simultaneously, that we should do our own. Even though she didnt really think about the idea of hosting the event under a President Hillary Clinton, Bee joked, I did have my gown all picked out. However, things didnt work out as planned on several different levels, Bee continued. So this somehow feels even more glorious. Using the Twitter nickname for the White House Correspondents Dinner, Bee said, Its basically going to be a prom for nerds not invited to #NerdProm. As for the official dinner, Miller added, It will either be called off or it will probably be the most sinister, awkward event ever. President Trump, who has never been amused by his comic portrayal on Saturday Night Live, has a complicated and contentious relationship with the White House Correspondents Dinner. The 2011 event, hosted by Seth Meyers, is often characterized as Trumps presidential origin story. Instead of gamely laughing at the jokes about his birther crusade and reality TV career, Trump sat motionless and stone-faced in the audience. Among the jokes that seemed to get under Trumps thin skin the most was this one from Meyers: "Donald Trump has been saying he'll run for president as a Republican, which is surprising, because I just thought he was running as a joke." In his speech, President Obama ridiculed Trumps credentials and breadth of experience as host of The Celebrity Apprentice. Writing in The New York Times in March of last year, after Trump had won a number of Republican primaries, Maggie Haberman and Alexander Burns singled out the humiliation he felt as the jokes rained down from both Meyers and Obama as a pivotal point in his decision to run for president. That evening of public abasement, rather than sending Mr. Trump away, accelerated his ferocious efforts to gain stature within the political world, they wrote. And it captured the degree to which Mr. Trumps campaign is driven by a deep yearning sometimes obscured by his bluster and bragging: a desire to be taken seriously. Asked by his former speechwriters on the Pod Save America podcast if they should feel responsible for giving the world President Trump, Barack Obama admitted that it was a funny night but also said he thinks we give ourselves too much credit to say one night of comedy galvanized Trump to take his presidential run more seriously. He had churned up that whole birther thing prior to that night, which was one of the reasons why it was funny, Obama added, saying that Trump clearly had his sights on something long before he became a punchline at the White House Correspondents Dinner. It was just one month earlier that Trump subjected himself to being the target at the Comedy Central Roast, where he had similarly refused to laugh at himself. In fact, he insisted that jokes about his personal wealth and the square footage of his home be rewritten to make him sound more impressive. When the writers sent him a draft of jokes that he would perform at the end of the roast, Trump bizarrely crossed out a number of the punchlines. As one of the writers said later, eliminating punchlines represents a classic lack of an understanding of how a joke works. More recently, Americans got the chance to see how Trump handles a comedy setting when he appeared alongside Hillary Clinton at the Al Smith Dinner just before the election. Then-candidate Trump drew boos from the crowd when he abandoned the joke format altogether and began openly attacking his opponent for pretending not to hate Catholics. Is there any reason to believe he will be in better spirits at the White House Correspondents Dinner now that hes president? If his sore winner attitude thus far is any indication, Trump will be no more willing to laugh at himself and muster the energy to tell a self-deprecating joke three months from now. No one likes to deliver a monologue more than he does, Bee posited to reporters. So I assume hell be quite happy to stand up there and deliver it. Whether people find it funny or not is a different matter entirely. As far as which comedian the White House Correspondents Association will choose to roast Trump, they could end up going a number of ways. After Stephen Colbert delivered an unprecedentedly rough takedown of President George W. Bush to his face in 2006, the event swung in the opposite direction the following year by welcoming old-school impressionist Rich Little. Last year, Larry Wilmore shocked many in the room by affectionately calling President Obama my nigga. If Trump is looking for a comedian who will go easy on him, the most obvious choice might be Jimmy Fallon, who has never hosted the event. (His Tonight Show predecessor Jay Leno performed under three different presidents.) If history were a guide, I would look to that night before the inauguration to maybe get an idea of the level of excellence that we might see, Miller said, referencing the welcome concert on the Washington Mall that included acts like Toby Keith and 3 Doors Down. Is Rich Little still free? she wondered. Over the years, the White House Correspondents Dinner has been criticized for fostering a too-cozy and even unethical relationship between the press and the president. But as Trumps war on the free press ensues, those fears seem almost quaint by comparison. With their alternative event, Bee maintained that the focus will be on fun and joy amidst all the unnerving news to come out of the presidents early days. We are looking for all opportunities to put gas back in the tank and this really just gives us something to look forward to, she said. WILTON MANORS, FloridaThe hottest party in South Florida doesnt happen in a Miami nightclub. Hell, its not even on a weekend. It happens every Tuesday. At 10 a.m. In a room packed full of LGBT seniors. When I visited the Coffee and Conversation happy hour at the Pride Center in Wilton Manorsa Fort Lauderdale suburb proud to be known as the second gayest city in AmericaI could barely find a parking space. Eventually, I stowed my car on a patch of grass in the back and joined the stream of gay men rushing toward the building as if there were a private Cher concert happening inside. Alas, there was no Cher but instead an endless supply of coffee, bagels, and donuts in a hall so filled with the noise of chatty seniors that my voice recorder was useless. Its crowded today, Gene Majka, an adjunct nursing professor with snow-white hair and sparkling blue eyes, told me as we hovered awkwardly between tables. Majka started coming to the Coffee and Conversation program after his husband died 18 months ago. He attended a bereavement group led by Reverend Anne Atwell, whose local congregation is primarily LGBT, and discovered the event through her. Its difficult when a spouse diesmarried friends go bye bye, Majka said. I came here and, wow, these are really a bunch of nice guys. By a bunch, Majka means at least 150 people, most of them mena reflection of the demographics of Wilton Manorswith one table of women, where I sat with Reverend Atwell. According to SAGE, the nations largest organization for LGBT seniors, the Pride Centers Coffee and Conversation program is one of the largest weekly gatherings of its kind in the country and it could not be more essential. Seniors are already at high risk of social isolation and depression, and those problems are exacerbated if you are LGBT. According to a 2010 report from SAGE and the Movement Advancement Project (PDF), LGBT seniors are more likely to be single, childless, and estranged from biological family than their non-LGBT peers. They have also survived multiple generations of bigotry only to encounter echoes of that prejudice in doctors offices, assisted living centers, and nursing homes. Against that backdrop, a simple thing like an hour or two of weekly conversation can be life-changing, Serena Worthington, SAGEs Director of National Field Initiatives told me. Everybody wants to hang out, she said. Everybody wants to learn and grow and contributeand LGBT elders are the same as everyone else. Hanging out is indeed the main order of business at Coffee and Conversation. For a full hour, there ispointedlyno programming whatsoever. The vibe is somewhere between bingo night and gay bar in the best possible way. During that time, ex-marine Thomas Tomcat Pence, president of a local organization that holds gatherings for mature men and their admirers, circles the room, assuring each table that they are his favorite. These people are beautiful, Tomcat told me after he had made his rounds. These are the people who fought in Stonewall. The unstructured quality of the Coffee and Conversation program was the brainchild of Bruce Williams, the Pride Centers senior services coordinator who came to Florida from Houston, Texas, where he had spent 25 years in a top position at a retirement facility. Well, almost 25 years. A month shy of my 25th anniversary, the company had sold and I was fired by homophobes, Williams, now 70 years old, told me. After relocating, Williams started coming to Coffee and Conversation as an attendee but there were only about 20 to 25 people there every week, he estimated, because the organizers were dominating the microphone instead of making time for mingling. Once Williams took over, that all changed. I have real serious mic restrictionswe dont go on that mic until 11 oclock, he told me. They come in and you can see that they just bubble talking with each other and its in a no-pressure situation. Under Williamss tenure, attendance skyrocketed to the point that they got in trouble with the fire marshal for filling the room beyond capacity. (Isnt that a nice problem to have? he joked.) There are often lines out the door, especially when the snowbirds are in town. And the event is now a nationally renowned model for other LGBT senior care providers, as South Florida Gay News reported last fall. When Williams finally took to the podium on the day of my visit, the crowd was caffeinated and punchy. After telling some jokes that would have fit right into a late-night monologue, he welcomed each of the first-timersvirgins, they were called as if we were at a performance of The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The Pride Centers CEO, Robert Boo, came over to give an update on an affordable housing project, and everyone booednot, apparently, because they hate him, but as a pun on his last name. And Williams, I discovered, has devised an ingenious way to cut costs and help his attendees through the aging process at the same time. Each week, a sponsor helps to provide the treats and, in exchange, gets a few minutes at the podium. (This week, it was a local dentist who touched on the importance of oral health for HIV-positive people.) I sneak it in this way, Williams confessed to me later. They come in, they enjoy their company with one another, they enjoy the coffee and the goodies. And every week, whether they know it or not, theyve been introduced to a doctor, to a dentist, or to a long-term care facility manager. The 2010 SAGE report (PDF) noted that LGBT elders are more likely to delay getting needed care so connecting this demographic with LGBT-affirming physicians serves a valuable purpose. Although Coffee and Conversation at the Pride Center is certainly a unique event, LGBT seniors nationwide can build similar communities. SAGE provides programming through 30 local affiliates in 20 stateseven a thinly-populated one like Maine where Worthington says LGBT seniors participate in regular group phone calls, just to catch up. Last year, SAGE also launched a hotline to help LGBT seniors find peer counseling and local resources. After the crowd at Coffee and Conversation thinned and before I fetched my car from the grass, I stopped by Williamss office where he sat beneath a poster that said Growing Old Is Not For Sissies. It was there that the cheerful master of ceremonies waxed serious about the importance of this simple Tuesday morning activity. As an outside observer, I had seen dozens of people share a cup of coffee and disband. But Williams knows them alland he sees firsthand what it means for them to have a weekly milestone. It helps to keep everybody alive and kicking and active, he told me. Its a raison detre. We all need a reason to live. The SAGE LGBT Elder Hotline (1-888-234-SAGE) is open Monday through Friday from 4 PM to midnight EST and on Saturday from noon to 5 PM EST. The hotline can also be reached by email at SAGE@GLBThotline.org. KRAMATORSK, UkraineThe temperature dropped down to minus 12 C (10.4 F) in eastern Ukraine and continued to fall. On Wednesday afternoon over 200 vehicles packed with colorful plastic bags, suitcases, and exhausted passengers waited on the grimy road in the middle of a windy field to pass through Mariinka checkpoint to the part of the Donetsk region that is under the control of rebel militants. Some of the people in line had been waiting for longer than eight hours but none of them dared to get out and stretch their legs in the surrounding fields, which are sown with land mines. So they stayed among the armored vehicles and the troop transports full of Ukrainian soldiers and security service offices, waiting, and waiting to pass through the customs control toward the Russia-backed breakaway territory. Mines are not the only danger. Militants from the pro-Russian side often fire in the direction of Mariinka checkpoint. The Ukrainian army reported three wounded soldiers on Jan. 25, adding to hundreds of military and civilians killed and injured during the most recent months. The checkpoint was dangerous, the crossing exhausting but it continued to work, making smugglers richer and corruption critics angrier, but giving a chance to broken communities to connect. That could change. In a world of rising barriers, this one could get much worse. The idea being discussed in Kiev, Ukraines capital, these days is whether to build a real or a virtual wall and seal the 400-kilometer front line with the rebellious half of Donbas. Maybe that could be done, maybe notthe financial cost alone would be enormous for a solid wall; more land mines and closed checkpoints would be relatively inexpensive. But, in any case, the very idea infuriates Yevgeny Vilinsky, the deputy governor of Donetsk region. The now nearly three-year-old war has killed over 10,000 people. It has left almost 2 million without their homes in Donbas, and it continues to kill dozens every month. In the town of Mariinka some of the destroyed houses on Oktiabrskaya, Lenin, and Shevchenko streets have been repaired, but a sniper fired at one of the new windows. Its as if they are mocking us, the head of the towns administration, Alexander Teslia, told The Daily Beast. On Friday, the OSCE (Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe) mission warned about the humanitarian and ecological catastrophe in the conflict-affected areas of Donetsk and Luhansk oblast, as both Ukrainian forces and Russia-backed militants fired at water purification stations with Grad rockets and smaller artillery, leaving hundreds of thousands without water in this freezing winter. What would it mean to put half of them, the half controlled by Moscow-backed separatists, behind the wall? We do not even have to build the wall, the no-mans land along the entire contact line is mined, Teslia told The Daily Beast, then took a long breath and spoke forcefully: Would that wall be against old women, somebodys mothers and children? This is not a border between California and Mexico here, these are families who are part of one peopleonly idiots could think of that! Vilinsky told The Daily Beast the Donbas barrier in any form would be worse than Donald Trumps wall. The comparison comes to the mind of many Ukrainians these days. Whether rebel controlled or Kiev controlled, all of the nearly 4 million people in the territory of Donetsk are Ukrainian citizens. To split Donbas officially, on paper, to isolate thousands of pro-Russian people from their pro-Western country would also mean to betray and abandon those, whoVilinsky is surehave always stayed faithful to Ukraine. Moscow intends to implement a Chechen scenario of total fear, a terrorized, pro-Kremlin society, the deputy governor told The Daily Beast. But I am sure we could do better with gradually reintegrating the rebel regions into Ukraine. *** A leading supporter of the plan to isolate the rebel republics of Donetsk and Luhansk, vice speaker of the Ukrainian Parliament Oksana Syroyid, is firmly against soft reintegration for the breakaway territories. Her recently introduced legislation is supported by the Self Reliance Party in the Parliament, which was elected mostly in western regions of Ukraine. Syroyid has pushed for new legislation and insists that Ukrainian oligarchs, billionaires who were mostly from the eastern regions, have to stop supporting the separatists. Most notable among those mega-rich figures, according to Syroyid, is one Rinat Akhmetov, a billionaire who continued to benefit from producing coal in the rebellious republics and trading his goods both with Russia and Ukraine. We have to isolate the territories occupied by our eternal enemy Russia, both economically and politically, by law; we should build a virtual wall, to implement the customs border along this contact line, control all movements and all goods, Syroyid told The Daily Beast. Several international organizations including Global Rights Compliance criticized Syroyids law for being a blanket provision that, for instance, rendered all paperwork, such as birth, death, and marriage certificates issued by the occupying power as null and void. In our opinion the draft law is concerning and in many respects breaches Ukraines obligations under international law, Global Rights Compliance said in its opinion about the legislation. Refusal to recognize the rebel documents, it said, violated the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, as well as the European Convention on Human Rights. But the vice speaker insisted it is time for the legislation. Look, Putin and Trump underestimate each other, expect they can outsmart each other, but thats not possible and eventually, soon, there will be a clash between them, Syroyid predicted in an interview with The Daily Beast. That day will be the point where the new global insecurity order begins to take shape, and the world wont be able to do that without Ukraine, a permanent target for Russia. Syroid suggested that the line to stop Russia should be in Donbas. We know Moscow better than any other country in the world, that is where the world can stop Russia. *** Half of the population of the devastated Donetsk region, about 2 million people, lives in what Deputy Governor Vilinsky calls a black zone. The residents of the self-proclaimed and Russian-backed Donetsk Peoples Republic have no independent news coverage and no chance to protest against thousands of militia who are armed with tanks, artillery, and multiple rocket launchers. Donald Bowser, a United Nations Development Program consultant working in the Donetsk sees similarities between the way the Russians handled Chechnya and what they want to do in Ukraine. But he noted, Donbas is a much bigger territory than any of the post-Soviet separatist republics. Bowser has plenty of experience with Ukraines social issues and political issues, but he is hopeful based on what he has heard from officials in the Donetsk region, he said. The governors administration in Kramatorsk is genuinely fighting corruption. I believe Velinsky is an honest man, Bowser told The Daily Beast. One year before the war began, Vilinsky ordered a survey by Rating Group sociologists to see if Ukraine was ready for European integration. To our astonishment, we saw that 69 percent of Donbas population wanted Ukraine to merge with Russia and Belarus in one unified state, and only 30 percent wanted the countrys independence, so the split was obvious long before the war, Igor Tishenko, a researcher from Rating Group, told The Daily Beast. The sociologist also stressed that the same survey showed that about 90 percent of the regions population wanted Russian as the states second official language. With what many see as a pro-Russian Donald Trump in the White House, Ukraine is more torn than ever about the future of Donbas. The debates around what to do in the conflict heated up after one of the countrys famous billionaires, Victor Pinchuk, wrote an opinion piece for The Wall Street Journal with the headline: Ukraine Must Make Painful Compromises for Peace with Russia. Pinchuks statement was widely criticized, especially by the war veterans and victims of the conflict. Pinchuks father-in-law, former Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma, represented Ukraine in the Trilateral Contact Group talks in Minsk. And some asked whether the oligarch could articulate such an opinion without the approval of the current president, Petro Poroshenko. Others wondered if there had been a deal made by the billionaires about Donbass future, without taking public opinion into consideration. Looking at the way Trump made the wall annoucement in United States this week, people wondered what kind of arrangements the new U.S. president might make with Russia, perhaps ceding Crimea and approving a de facto division of the rest of Ukraine. *** One parliament member, Mustafa Nayyem, who was one of EuroMaidan revolution leaders in the winter of 2013-2014, wanted to send a message to the U.S. president in an interview with The Daily Beast. President Trump should realize that Ukraine will remain a mine field for many years and that if he tries to strike deals behind our backs, there will be a huge civil conflict and that once the Baltic Countries and Poland realize that the U.S. does not support them, they will form a coalition against Russias aggression, warned Nayyem, a strong believer in Ukraines chance to win its sovereign rights. Nayyems team together with Ukraines Ministry of Foreign Affairs is against losing any part of the territory of Donbas. We hope that Trump wants to stick to the Minsk agreement and we need the U.S. to be our mediator during the integration process, which will take years. *** Back in Kramatorsk, officials felt bad about things being decided behind their backs. We are confident that integration can gradually work, as we saw how young people from occupied Donetsk crossed the contact line and walked many kilometers to see the Ocean Elsy concert in Mariupol; but all the separatist militia who killed our soldiers should be punished, says Igor Stokoz, another deputy governor of Donetsk region. Both Stokoz and Vilinsky left their families in Kiev and moved to this region to make a difference in this devastated and still largely pro-Russian part of Ukraine. But they know that painful times are ahead, and that vendettas and lynching may be the dark side of the reintegration process, with thousands of Ukrainians eager to kill those who collaborated with Russia. Searching for optimism, one might hope that the hellish war that destroyed Donbas would also give Donetsk authorities, Ukrainians and foreign NGOs, volunteers and youth movements a unique chance to turn Donbas into a corruption-free place, transparent and attractive for young people. On Thursday evening, Kramatorsk students gathered at Vilna Hata (Free House) club, a newly opened hipster center with WiFi, free books, and tea. To fix up their space in the basement of a rundown apartment building, activists in Kramatorsk won a USAID grant. We welcome everybody here, no matter what side they were on during the conflict, says Aleksey Shott, a well-built Vilna Hata host with a friendly smile. Today we present a new cellphone application telling you about our citys cultural life. Shott, who is 24, never took a single breath in the Soviet Union, but the experience he had with the old empires mentality is enough to write a novel. From April 12 to July 5 of 2014 he witnessed battles between separatist and Ukrainian forces right on the streets of his home town. Shott and his friends, young and creative people with innovative ideas, are the best hope for the kind of Donbas that Vilinsky wants to build in a Ukraine without a wall. We now have a unique chance, budget, resources, so I dream that Kramatorsk could become what West Berlin was once for Eastern Berlin, Velinsky told The Daily Beast. I have a dream that the graduates of three IDP [internally displaced persons] universities that we now have in Kramatorsk, young professionals, would stay in the Donetsk region and develop it. Nike Cuts Ties With Kyrie Irving Over Hate Speech JUST DID IT The brand has suspended its relationship with Irving and will no longer release the Kyrie 8. Franziskaner Alkoholfrei released in the UK An alcohol-free version of Germany's Franziskaner Wheat Beer, Franziskaner Alkoholfrei, from brewer AB InBev, is now available to purchase in the UK. Franziskaner Alkoholfrei won a gold medal award at the World Beer Awards in 2015. The low and no-alcohol beer category has grown 19.5% in the UK over the past year, in line with consumer trends for moderation and balanced lifestyle. Franziskaner Alkoholfrei joins the portfolio of low-to-no-alcohol beers available in the UK from brewer AB InBev, which includes Becks Blue. This growing portfolio is part of AB InBevs Global Smart Drinking Goals, with the brewer committing to ensure that 20% of its global beer volumes are no-to-low alcohol by 2025. Isabelle Maratier, European marketing manager, AB InBev, says: We are delighted to bring Franziskaner Alkoholfrei to the UK especially at a time of year when we know many will be looking to cut back on alcohol and might be struggling to find enticing, authentic alternatives. This crisp, refreshing brew is the perfect choice full of German heritage and flavours with the added benefits of an alcohol-free beer. Brewed using natural ingredients and no artificial flavours, Franziskaner Alkoholfrei provides a premium alternative to soft drinks and other alcohol-free beverage choices available - supporting consumers drive towards healthier options. 30 January 2017 - Sam Coyne The Drinks Report, editorial assistant The current world population of 7.3 billion is expected to reach 8.5 billion by 2030, 9.7 billion in 2050 and 11.2 billion in 2100, as stated in a 2015 report from United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. In the 2012 Census of Agriculture, slightly more than 40 percent of the United States is farmland from which a large portion of the world is fed. Of the 915 million acres of U.S. land in agricultural production during 2012, 45.4 percent was permanent pasture, 42.6 percent cropland and 8.4 percent in forests or woodlands. The remaining 3.6 percent was land in farmsteads, buildings, livestock facilities and other similar uses. More than 600,000 farms and ranches received most of their income from producing cattle and calves; but the number of such operations declined 6 percent between 2007 and 2012. A burgeoning world population will require a tremendous increase in food production from a stable to shrinking land base. The only way to meet these requirements is through continued development of new technology that improves production efficiency. In beef cattle and other livestock industries, advanced breeding technics will play a significant role in enhancement of animal performance. One example of new promising breeding technology is gene editing. To understand gene editing, we might need to review some basic biology. Every living organism contains chromosomes which are two strands of DNA twisted together in a double helix. The DNA strand contains multiple genes that are made of nucleotide chains. There are four types of nucleotides: adenine (A), thymine (T), cytosine (C) and guanine (G). A DNA strand contains an ordered string of these nucleotides that is the genetic code. The genetic code dictates the type of proteins to be produced, and hence the traits of an animal or plant. Gene editing process Gene editing is a category of methods used to precisely edit or change genetic code, said Alison Van Eenennaam of the University of California, Davis. This technology enables researchers to add, delete or replace letters (A, T, C and G) in the code. In the same way spell check on a computer identifies and corrects single letter errors in a word or grammar errors in a sentence, gene editing is used to identify and change the letters that compose the genetic code within an individual. Targeting only one spot in one single gene was by far the hardest part of developing the gene editing process, said Stacy Wirt of Stanford University. Without the help of a plant bacterial gene called TAL (transcription activator-like), scientists could have struggled for years with this challenge. TAL is a protein injected into plants by a family of bacteria. These TAL proteins can recognize a unique DNA sequence of A, C, G and T. Scientists have cracked the code that TAL proteins use to find the right gene. TAL proteins are made up of different building blocks and each block recognizes one DNA letter: either an A, C, G or T. Geneticists can now mix and match the building blocks in the lab. The result is a TAL protein that can find and go to almost any targeted gene. The second step was to develop the cutting tool, Wirt said. For this, scientists turned to a second bacterial gene called endonucleases which are designed to chop any foreign, invading DNA. The primitive immune system helps protect bacteria from viruses. Scientists combine the TAL that recognizes the targeted gene, with the endonucleases that cut the target. This combination produces the editing tool, called a TALEN. Once the TALEN makes the cut and the desired letter sequence is added, a cell does rest of the work. Cells already can and do fix mistakes in their DNA using a process called homologous recombination. Geneticists are simply hijacking a system already in place. Uses of gene editing The currently available set of gene editing technologies have been used for a relatively small number of livestock applications to date, US Davis Van Eenennaam said. Gene editing was used to produce genetically hornless Holstein dairy cattle by replacing the horned allele with a naturally-occurring Angus polled allele. An allele is one of two or more alternative forms of a gene that arise by mutation and are found at the same place on a chromosome. In almost all animal cells, two alleles for each gene are inherited, one from each parent. Paired alleles (one on each of two paired chromosomes) that are the same are called homozygous, and those that are different are called heterozygous. In swine, gene editing was used to confer resilience to African Swine Fever Virus and to develop protection from porcine respiratory and reproductive syndrome (PRRS) virus, Van Eenennaam said. It was also used to introduce changes in the myostatin gene in sheep and cattle. Turning off this gene results in muscle growth. Naturally occurring mutations (alleles) in the myostatin gene have been historically selected by animal breeders, as exemplified by the double-muscled Belgian Blue breed of cattle. Gene editing actually mimics processes involved in selective breeding and natural selection, Van Eenennaam said. Breeders work with genetic variation that exists within a species to select breeding animals. Ultimately all of this variation has risen from naturally occurring mutations. Although the word, mutation, sounds negative, it simply refers to variations in DNA sequences. These variations, or mutations, are responsible for virtually all genetic differences which exist between individuals. For example, mutations are the reason for an individual having blue eyes instead of brown. Different mammals have many of the same genes; yet the genetic code in those genes differs among animals of different breeds, and even among animals within the same breed. Except for identical twins, there are literally millions of DNA sequence variations between two individuals of any species, Van Eenennaam said. An enormous number of genetic variants have accumulated within cattle since the advent of domestication and selective breeding. These variants are due to naturally occurring processes that lead to a small number of mutations occurring in every generation. Occasionally, mutations result in a genetic condition such as red or black coat color or an undesirable disease condition such as dwarfism. Gene editing offers opportunity to increase frequency of desirable alleles in an individual or a breed more rapidly than could occur through conventional breeding, Van Eenennaam said. Possibilities include editing several alleles for different traits at one time while using conventional selection methods to keep making genetic progress toward breeding objectives. Opportunities include selection for disease resistance, polled and corrections of known genetic defects. Through gene editing, we have an opportunity to develop breeding stock with desirable traits for improved performance at a more rapid pace than depending solely on natural selection. Innovations in animal breeding, like gene editing, are necessary to hasten the pace of providing an increased food supply for a rapidly growing world population. Rumors have been rampant since Bryan school superintendent Tommy Wallis abruptly resigned under pressure last October. Most of the rumors center on his performance or his relations with subordinates or the board. Some, however, are unsavory to say the least. The rumors exist because there are few facts known to the public. We do know that Wallis came to Bryan in 2011 from the Palestine school district, where he was superintendent. Last spring, the school board extended Wallis' contract a year to June 2019. We do know that on Sept. 19, according to a recording made public by the school district in late December, then-Bryan school board president Doug Wunneburger and then-deputy superintendent Timothy Rocka -- now interim superintendent -- sat down with Wallis, with Wunneburger directing him to resign. Wunneburger expressed concerns that Wallis had applied for at least 17 jobs in other school districts, which the board president termed a "betrayal of trust." Wallis refused to resign, to which Wunneburger responded that he was confident the rest of the board would support his position. He told Wallis, "I suggest that, to preserve your reputation and Bryan [school district's], that you accept it." In response to a question from Wallis, Rocka said things in the district "aren't good," adding, "They're not good, Dr. Wallis, when you apply for 17 jobs and you focus on yourself and not the best interest of the district. When you have your sole focus on 'what's next for me and what's my pay,' when you position yourself for your own benefit -- this district's too good for that." Rocka said, "We can't continue down this path." Wallis then took personal leave and resigned nine days later. We also know that Wallis asked for $280,000, but the school board refused. He was paid a little more than $83,000 -- his salary through the end of December. As part of the settlement between the board and Wallis, Wunneburger wrote a glowing letter of recommendation praising Wallis accomplishments with the Bryan school district that said, in part, "Dr. Wallis began his service in April 2011 and commendably served Bryan ISD until October of 2016. ... As you can see, Dr. Wallis is an accomplished leader, dedicated to children and learning." Wallis since has been named interim principal at Hightower High School in Missouri City in the Fort Bend school district. Both The Eagle and KBTX-TV filed open record requests for the Sept. 19 recording and documents related to Wallis' resignation. The new media and its lawyers contend the information should be made available under the provisions of the state's Public Information Act which says that unless specifically exempted, records kept by government agencies are presumed to be public -- available to the people who own and pay for the government. The attorney general agreed, ordering release of the recording and other documents relating to Wallis's tenure in Bryan. The district said it would comply, releasing the recording and preparing to release the requested documents. But Wallis sued to prevent the document release, saying it would harm his professional reputation if they became public. Of course, just by saying so, Wallis probably hurts his professional reputation in the absence of facts. A Travis County district judge issued a temporary injunction barring the release and, after a brief heard in Austin on Thursday, extended the injunction until a hearing scheduled for Oct. 2. That's just too long for the public to have to wait to see documents state law says we all are entitled to. By October, Bryan is bound to have a new superintendent -- Rocka has applied for the job and a search firm has been hired to seek other potential applicants. Any questions the public might have of superintendent candidates based on the Wallis "resignation" will be moot. And other school districts in Texas that are looking at hiring Wallis will not have all the information they need to make an informed decision. Simply put, public information that isn't made public isn't, well, public after all. Conscious, perhaps, that he is speaking to a citizen of 'Brexit Britain', Mr. Fernandez points out that the EU has been crucial to the recovery effort so far. In particular, money from the little-known 'Life+ Programme' - which distributes billions of Euros to support 'environment and climate action' - has helped fund initiatives and experiments in areas such as fire prevention, soil restoration and tree regrowth. Some of the most effective solutions have been relatively simple, for instance, the creation of 'barricados' - a series of dam-like structures, formed of the blackened remains of trees and designed to prevent the fragile soil from being washed off the slopes - and the decision to replace highly-flammable plants with native, slow-burning alternatives in critical areas. Other ideas are more high-tech. Mr. Fernandez tells me of plans to establish fire-response systems which make use of linked, automated water-cannons. These arrays, he says, will be moved rapidly into areas threatened by future fires and then used to block the path of the flames. Above all, Mr. Fernandez emphasises the complexity of the challenges faced by the people of La Gomera. There is no one-size-fits-all solution. "You cannot approach this as being a single problem," he says, leaning forward in his chair. "Instead we see it as lots of connected problems affecting particular areas. We are making good progress and in time the forest will recover, but a range of different actions will be necessary to protect the forest for the future." That complexity is made real for me the next day when I meet Ricardo, a park ranger who shows me some of the areas directly affected by the flames. We meet at Laguna Grande, a remarkable clearing high in the forest and the symbolic centre of the island. "It is actually like a miracle that this is still here," Ricardo tells me, smiling. When the fire was at its most destructive, huge walls of flame raged all around this area. In some instances the inferno was so intense that when it reached a barrier - a wider section of road, for instance, or a sudden rocky ridge - it simply leapt into the sky ("like a nuclear bomb") and then swept forward to consume a new patch of pristine, priceless forest. Yet amidst the destruction, the Laguna itself remained untouched, as though the heart of La Gomera had been somehow protected. Many other areas were not so lucky. Over the next few hours we visit a number of sites where the impact of the fire is visible at first-hand. The first stop is down a tree-lined path that drops from the roadside into the forest. "This part here is a sort of sanctuary, but just a little further... , " Ricardo says, leaving the sentence hanging in the still, early-morning air as we walk on. Minutes later it's like we've stumbled into another world. All around us the remains of thirty-foot heather trees stand, blackened and broken, the charred skeletons frozen in their final, terrifying moments, reaching up to the sky and calling out for help that never came. "Some of the burned trees had to be cut down but we have learned that it is better for the new plants to leave some standing, especially the heather. Even like this they bring water to the soil and allow new life." Other areas reveal similar themes but with different details. Echoing Mr Fernandez, Ricardo believes a range of approaches is necessary to treat the diverse problems that scatter the park. "In some places the trees are re-growing on their own and, in time, the forest will be fine. In others we have planted a lot of trees to help nature recover a little faster." A little later, and just a few miles down the road, we are walking through another of the fire-damaged sites when a familiar looking shrub catches my eye. It is a variety of gorse native to the Canary Islands which, according to Ricardo, is both a blessing and curse. "It helps to repair the soil by providing nitrogen," he tells me. "In some areas we have to let it grow because without it other plants will not be able to survive, but it is also dangerous. It burns very quickly and we are always worried about another fire." "We have to be careful to get it right." He pauses for a moment, looking out over valley below. Then, with the same blend of confidence and determination that I saw twenty-four hours earlier, he adds: "Some areas will take many years to recover but it will be ok. We will keep working." "The forest belongs to everyone and we must protect it for the future." This Author James McEnaney is a lecturer and writer based in Glasgow, Scotland. A columnist for the CommonSpace news website, he writes regularly for other publications including the Daily Record, often with a focus on education and politics. Follow him here @mrmcenaney. WITNESS is our new Blog series, which invites contributors to explore the ecological and social impact of issues currently on their radar Deadly flu is the 'collateral blowback' of industrial agriculture The industry's line of research omits addressing why multiple influenza strains, including H5N2 and many of the other new H5Nx strains, develop a deadliness in its poultry that isn't found in most waterfowl. Indeed, no cases of highly pathogenic flu in wild waterfowl were recorded anywhere before 2005. Deadly flu in waterfowl has since been discovered only as collateral blowback from outbreaks on farms. As agricultural production turns wetlands into farmland, migrating waterfowl that have traditionally visited wetlands along their flyways have switched to feeding on grain on industrial farms. That is, the expanding interface between waterfowl and intensive poultry production isn't caused exclusively by climatic changes, as the Cardona team suggests, as by the actions of the industrial agricultural sector itself. Focusing on wild waterfowl and climate change shifts scrutiny from an industrial model of poultry production that a growing scientific literature indicates is itself a potentially catastrophic public health danger. Mathematical models of pathogen evolution - reviewed here and here - show that intensive husbandry (raising barns of thousands of poultry in packed homogeneous monoculture) offers so much food for flu (and other pathogens), spurring the evolution of explosive deadliness. The models infer that a continual supply of cramped-in genetic clones removes a cap on how deadly influenza can evolve. With one new batch of birds after another every six weeks, thousands of immunologically weak clones are always available. The most virulent bird flu can be selected for, decimating fowl populations without running out of new hosts to infect. The now deadlier flu routinely spills back out among local smallholder flocks and wild waterfowl. But industrial scientists blame the resulting impact as the cause of the outbreak. Now H5 viruses are adapted to industrial poultry production near urban centers Now new research is showing that the broader environmental factors on which Cardona's team is banking as an explanation likely had at best only marginal effect on the emergence of the new H5 influenzas. In a peer-reviewed paper recently published in eLIFE, a team led by Belgian spatial ecologist Marius Gilbert introduced models explaining the difference in spatial distributions in influenza outbreaks between the H5N1 subtype and its daughter H5Nx. Gilbert's team showed that models including popular eco-climatic variables, such as land surface temperature, open water, and vegetation, added little in explanatory value. Instead, the study demonstrates, it's the combination of host species that best explained the distribution of outbreaks. As shown in Figure 1 (above right), Gilbert's team inferred the relative contributions the various variables made in explaining the global spatial distributions of old school H5N1 (blue) and newbie H5Nx (red). We see that, yes, duck density (DuDnLg) is a major contributor to both kinds of bird flu - although less so for H5Nx - but we should keep in mind that ducks are also raised as poultry in intensive conditions in many European and Asian countries. The headline news here is that the H5 virus shifted from extensive chicken production (ChDnLgExt) characteristic of mostly smallholder production, to intensive chicken production (ChDNLgInt); urbanized human populations (HpDnLg); and managed horticulture (CultVeg). This means that the new strains now appear to be adapted to industrial poultry production near urban centers. As shown in Figure 2 (above right), the Gilbert team globally mapped the resulting shift in influenza's environmental niche (the combination of factors supporting outbreaks) showing already documented hot spots for H5N1 (top) and H5Nx (bottom). As reported in the press, H5Nx is shown spreading in the US, Europe, China, and South Korea, among other hot zones. But the maps also show areas in potential danger of the new virus, albeit under the constraint of applying data from the early stages of an ongoing outbreak. Bangladesh, Indonesia, Australia, parts of South America, and, prophetically it turns out, the Nile Delta, are in danger of hosting outbreaks, should H5Nx migrate there. Virus evolving new infection mechanisms H5Nx's rise isn't just a matter of a shift in where the virus is spreading, however. The new strains have also molecularly adjusted. That is, the virus is evolving new attributes fit for infecting poultry. In another new paper, a team of virologists from Utrecht University and the Scripps Research Institute show an evolution in a particular molecule called hemagglutinin - the H of H5 - that the influenza virus uses to enter host cells. A rare amino acid substitution in the receptor-binding part of the molecule permits the new H5Nx both broader and more efficient binding to target cells. The virus has switched from binding specifically to receptors in waterfowl intestines to expanding to receptors found in poultry throats. That means the virus is able to infect a broader range of host species, now including the poultry global agribusiness raises in the billions. The molecular changes may also account for why there is a rapid rise in so many new strains of H5Nx, which swap gene segments by a process called reassortment. As the virus begins to evolve more efficiently to target its hosts, new versions of the neuraminidase protein - the N in Nx - are apparently being swapped in and out of the various strains of H5Nx. How much virus is shed as a result during an infection and the rapidity of disease progression may also be affected. Fortunately, the Utrecht team found no adaptation to mammalian receptors. So it seems no sustained transmission of the virus among humans is likely. But the researchers only tested H5N8 in this study and human cases of H5N6 have already been documented in China. As H5Nx diversifies and adapts to poultry that tens of thousands of human handlers care for and process every day, the likelihood of a deadly human-specific flu emerging increases. What agribusiness does not want us to know The immediate take-home is that we have here divergent ecological and evolutionary analyses converging upon the conclusion that the new H5Nx are increasingly influenzas adapted to intensively raised poultry. That is, a growing literature of scrupulously documented science is showing alarming trends that are beyond the control of agribusiness-funded research. These findings are in stark contrast to the rosy narrative presented by extremely well-paid researchers backed by Big Poultry in what the University of Minnesota describes as the "Silicon Valley of food". Those teams continue to blame anything and anyone for bird flu other than the economic model at the heart of industrial poultry production. Farmers around the world, and the populations they feed, deserve better. Growers are bearing the economic costs of a model of production that supports pathogens deadly to poultry and potentially dangerous to humans. The new research showing a newly adapted influenza must be heeded and adopted for a fundamental change in public policy. Safer models of poultry production now being developed here in Minnesota and around the world must be supported before the next deadly pandemic sweeps the globe. Rob Wallace blogs at Farming Pathogens. His new book is: Big Farms Make Big Flu. This article originally ran on the 'Think Forward' Blog of the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy. It comes to us via Independent Science News (CC BY-ND). Ministers are considering ignoring the assessment of the government's own independent climate advisers on how to manage the emissions from an expanded Heathrow, according to newly published parliamentary correspondence. In a letter to the chair of the Environmental Audit Committee (EAC), transport secretary Chris Grayling lays out two different approaches to dealing with aviation emissions. The current planning assumption from the government's independent climate advisers - the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) - would cap emissions at 2005 levels and limit the growth in the aviation sector to 60% to ensure this cap is maintained. Another option is to use carbon trading to buy emissions reductions elsewhere, effectively ignoring the emissions cap. Writing to Mary Creagh, Grayling says ministers "have not taken a view on whether to accept the CCC's [Committee on Climate Change] planning assumption", and goes on to note that "a future global carbon market would allow emissions reductions to be made where they are most efficient across the global economy." Indeed the minister goes on to suggest that "measures are available" even if the aviation sector grows by more than 60%. This goes against the CCC's own calculation that these levels of growth would require further emissions cuts elsewhere. "The government has said that Heathrow can be delivered within carbon limits", said Ms Creagh. "Yet this letter shows it has not yet decided what those international aviation emission limits should be. This implies it is considering rejecting the advice of the independent Committee on Climate Change." Higher emissions The issue is particularly sensitive because the government's central business case for a third runaway at Heathrow assumes emissions which are around 15% higher than the CCC's planning assumption. Writing to ministers in November the chair of the CCC, Lord Deben noted that recent agreements and technological changes do not alter the CCC's view that aviation growth must be limited to 60% or emissions will be higher than 2005 levels. It goes on to say that if they are - as outlined in the Heathrow business case - "then all other sectors will have to prepare for correspondingly higher emissions reductions in 2050." In his letter Mr Grayling says achieving higher than 60% demand growth "would not require any other sectors in the UK economy to make reductions." Carbon trading Relying on carbon trading to cut emissions has proven controversial because of the absence of effective carbon trading mechanisms and the anticipated global growth in the aviation sector. "The government is preparing to defy the guidance of the Committee on Climate Change, their own statutory advisers", warned Leo Murray from aviation campaign group Fellow Travellers. "They know that they can't expand Heathrow and still keep national emissions within safe limits. So instead they're planning to move the goalposts to make the massive increase in CO 2 from an expanded Heathrow the world's problem, instead of Britain's", he added. A spokesperson for the Department of Transport declined to comment on whether or not they would accept the recommendations from their climate advisers saying: "We agree with the Airports Commission's assessment that a new runway at Heathrow can be delivered within our obligations under the Climate Change Act. The Commission considered several ways in which aviation emissions could be tackled. The Government remain open-minded on this issue." The Climate Change Act does not oblige the government to reduce aviation emissions. Damian Kahya is an author at Greenpeace Energydesk. He tweets @damiankahya. This article was originally published on Greenpeace Energydesk, which is editorially independent of Greenpeace. Millennial Moms Review: 2022 Acura MDX is pretty close to the perfect family car I dont know if perfect is attainable, especially considering weve got the world of options when it comes to modern vehicles. Were spoiled and, as such, we have very specific needs and wants. Driving-wise, the 2022 Acura MDX is one of my favourite ... WACO rolled past Montezuma in a playoff game A collection of photos from WACO's win over Montezuma in a Class 8-Man quarterfinal playoff game Thursday at Wayland. Getting a detoxifying body wrap sounded intimidating. I pictured myself lying naked while someone cocooned me in seaweed and left me for 90 minutes. Luckily, that is not what happened. As we begin a new year, many people resolve to lead a healthier lifestyle whether its by eating right, working out or reducing stress. The spa, say three spa directors from around the state, can be a big help with this. A long time ago, (the spa) was considered a luxury, and now its truly a necessity, says Danielle Knerr, spa director at the Spa at Norwich Inn. Its really important in todays day and age to take time away from the constant chatter and social media and cellphones, says Cheryl Jordan, regional spa director at the Spa at Delamar in Greenwich and Southport. Spa directors say even a simple massage has benefits like helping lower blood pressure, relieving stress and muscle tension and promoting lymphatic drainage (reducing liquid that accumulates in the lymph nodes so the body can run optimally). I was told my treatment would eliminate any semblance of a cold I had. Amazingly, I did not cough once after leaving the spa table. Massages and facials are the bread and butter of the spa, as Victoria Boscarino, the spa director at the Mayflower Grace Inn in Washington, put it. They are the gateway treatments to many sophisticated wellness therapies available at southwestern Connecticut spas, including the aforementioned detoxifying body wrap at the Delamar Spa and Hotel in Greenwich. Delamar Spa and Hotel - Greenwich, Southport The Delamar Greenwich Harbor has a warm, antique feel and the spa mirrors it. The walls are handpainted with birds, tree branches and flowers; overstuffed couches and chairs welcome guests to relax. For my body wrap, which Jordan recommends as the best treatment to start the new year, I was brought into a dimly lit room with two beds and a large shower. Spa supervisor Stephanie Torres had me lie down on a heated bed, covered by an amethyst bio-mat that contains amethyst crystals with infrared light. For the first step, Torres rubbed a myriad of the spas French oils and creams onto my skin, starting with the stomach and then limb by limb. Products are very important; spa treatments are developed around them. The Delamar uses two lines, one from France and one from Switzerland. Each rubdown ended with peppermint-infused algae to promote weight loss. I then turned on my stomach and the process began all over again. The massaging and exfoliation are meant to stimulate the elimination of toxins, excess water and fat. Depending on what the guest wants, the body wrap can specifically target weight loss, cellulite, hydration and more by using a different combination of products. After I was covered head to toe in cool algae, Torres wrapped me in sheets and a heavy spa blanket and gave me a gentle scalp massage while the products soaked into my skin. Piano music, a scented eye cover and the aromas of essential oils lulled me into relaxation. After some time, Torres left the room and I rinsed off in the shower to get ready for my second full body massage using more of the French oils and creams to stimulate weight loss. After 90 minutes, my skin was softer than it had ever been, and I was ready to eat something. Of course, after a detox, Torres and Jordan recommend eating light fare like fresh vegetables and lean protein. Torres stressed the importance of drinking water before and after a detox. The Georgette Salad at the hotel's restaurant, L'Escale, was commissioned by owner Georgette Mallory who wanted something light and healthy on the menu. Made with kale, shaved Brussels sprouts, avocado, pomegranate seeds and pepitas, it is the best option for a post-detox meal. Spa at Mayflower Grace Washington Victoria Boscarino, spa director at the Mayflower Grace Inn, has been in the business for 20 years and worked at spas across the country and abroad. The Mayflower is her favorite. This is the most beautiful spa Ive ever managed, she says. Luxurious, low-key, very elegant in an understated way. The spa at the Mayflower is open only to guests and offers access to many Asian-influenced treatments, which are unique to the area. For example, the Elemental Body Treatment is inspired by Eastern medicine, which analyzes each persons specific body type and applies different energies. The treatment prescribes the best therapy including a soak, a scrub and a massage with medication based on a guests particular body constitution as determined by a questionnaire. If you are 5 feet tall and very fit, you are different from someone who is 5 feet tall and unfit, Boscarino says. You may like different colors. You may like night versus day and a particular season. The treatment, she says, leaves people feeling relaxed, yet full of energy. Mega information is coming from every direction, Boscarino says. We live in our head most of the time, rather than in our heart and in our body. Sound therapy really has the capacity to reunite the trinity: mind, body and soul. Boscarino is also working on implementing sleep therapy in the coming months to help people reach deep sleep without the use of medicines and sleep aids. The Spa at Norwich Inn Norwich The Spa at Norwich Inn is set up to be a daylong foray into wellness and relaxation. Guests can start off with a morning walk and then sign up for workout or yoga class, soak in the heated pool, meditate in the relaxation rooms and get a spa treatment. You can do a morning walk at 7 a.m. and stay until 8 p.m. or overnight, spa director Danielle Knerr says. For beginners, she recommends starting with a workout and a massage like the Blissful Body Brushing, which uses dry skin brushing to detoxify the lymphatic system. More advanced spa-goers might try a vitamin body wrap or a cupping massage, which uses a cupping tool to create suction on the skin, increasing circulation (you may have seen Michael Phelps with cupping marks on his skin during the Olympics). For overall wellness, Knerr recommends getting a spa treatment every six weeks and stresses it does not have to be an all-day affair. Even an hour is better than nothing, she says. Lidia Ryan is a freelance writer and relaxation connoisseur. NORWALK Earlier this month the Center for Contemporary Printmaking celebrated the receipt of a $15,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts that would revitalize its Artist in Residence program. But with the inauguration of President Donald Trump and a promise to slash the federal budget including reported plans to eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities celebrations have turned to concern for nonprofit arts organizations throughout Connecticut. Grants such as these are so important to us, and the arts in Norwalk and Fairfield County make this area strong, said CCP Executive Director Laura Einstein. Arts and culture makes us more humane people, and I would hate to see this vital funding for nonprofit arts organizations dwindle away. In addition to proposed cuts for the NEA and NEH, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds the National Public Radio and Public Broadcasting Service, would be privatized under the plan. All three agencies were established in 1965 by President Lyndon B. Johnson, and have been at risk of elimination several times since. In 2016, the total NEA budget was $147.9 million, about .004 percent of the total federal budget. And while its not the first time these relatively small federal agencies have come under fire the Obama administration cut the NEA budget by 6 percent in 2011 the elimination of the department as a whole could have huge implications for arts and culture in Fairfield County and statewide. More than 80 percent of the NEA budget is distributed as grants and awards to organizations across the country, and 40 percent of the NEAs grant-making budget is awarded directly to the states through their state and regional arts agencies. That funding is then dispersed through the state arts departments. More Information Federal grant funding The National Endowment for the Arts provides grants to arts organizations and individual artists. The following is the amount of federal grant funding the NEA has provided to Fairfield County municipalities plus Hartford and New Haven since 2000. It does not include the NEA's financial support for education, NEA initiatives or funding provided and distributed by the state. Municipality Funding since 2000 Bridgeport $329,895 Danbury $50,000 Fairfield $10,000 Greenwich $127,000 Hartford $17,361,155 New Canaan $25,000 New Haven $3,746,209 Norwalk $99,331 Ridgefield $62,000 Stamford $45,000 Westport $295,000 Wilton $27,500 See More Collapse Grants distributed nationwide In 2016, the NEA recommended more than 2,400 grants in nearly 16,000 communities in every congressional district in the country. A review of NEA direct grants showed the majority go to small and medium-sized organizations such as the Center for Contemporary Printmaking, which tend to support projects that benefit audiences that otherwise might not have access to arts programming. Fairfield University and CCP were the only two Fairfield County organizations to receive grants this fiscal year, but more than $1 million has been awarded through small, direct grants to Fairfield County arts nonprofits since 2000. Bridgeport has received the most in Fairfield County, earning $330,000 in grant funding for the arts. More than half has gone to Neighborhood Studios, a Bridgeport-based nonprofit that provides arts education to children at risk and those with special needs throughout Fairfield County. Art makes us able to see the beauty in the world, and if we lose funding for that and personal expression and artistic talent then I think its not a good sign for our culture, Einstein said. Funding for the arts in Fairfield County enlivens the extraordinary arts community in our area. Greenwichs Bruce Museum has also been awarded $88,000 in direct funding since 2000 to support the museum, and Danburys Aston Magna Foundation for Music and the Humanities has been awarded more than $42,000 for its music programs. The Silvermine Arts Center, located on the Norwalk-New Canaan border, was awarded $25,000 in 2015, and the Norwalk Redevelopment Agency was given $50,000 in 2013 for public art like The Gateway to Norwalk: The Vines sculpture on West Avenue, which was partially funded by the grant. And while direct grant funding is a significant component of the NEA, the agency also provides indirect support for arts education and collaborative programs like Poetry Out Loud and Blue Star Museums, which gives discounts to military and law enforcement families. More than 50 Connecticut museums participated in the program last year, including Norwalks Stepping Stones Museum. Federal agencies and departments also partner with the NEA to leverage investments in the communities they serve, with every $1 of NEA direct funding earning up to $9 in private and other public funds. This resulted in $500 million in matching support in 2016. For example, the Department of Defense partnered with the NEA on Creative Forces: NEA Military Healing Arts Network while the Department of Housing and Urban Development is involved with the NEAs arts-based community development activities. David Green, director of Programs and Membership for the Cultural Alliance of Fairfield County, which is based in Norwalk, said the impact of the NEA reaches far beyond its grant-making abilities. Just the very important fact of the leadership of the NEA, they really provide leadership in terms of whats most effective, Green said. They do a lot of research into the impact of the arts in local communities, and leaders like Jane Chu have been immensely inspirational, as shes been traveling the country and talking to people about the importance of the arts in their lives. So I guess its three levels of impact for Connecticut the leadership and inspiration, the direct grants to a few larger organizations and then the support to the state Office of the Arts. During fiscal year 2010, the most recent data available, aggregate nonprofit sector spending by both the state of Connecticuts nonprofit arts and culture organizations and their audiences totaled $653 million. Arts mean jobs in Fairfield County In Fairfield County, total arts and culture spending reached $130 million in 2012, and event spending alone generated $46 million excluding the cost of admission. Arts and culture organizations are estimated to provide about 4,000 full-time jobs in the county, and generate an additional $10.5 million in local and state government revenue. As of now, NEA officials are proceeding with business as usual thanks to a continuing resolution that protects their budget through April 2017. Like most federal agencies, the National Endowment for the Arts is operating under a Continuing Resolution for FY17, which goes through April 2017, an NEA spokesperson said via email. We look forward to participating in the usual budget process for the FY18 budget with the Office of Management and Budget and the White House. In the meantime, we continue to do our work; processing grants, advising applicants, convening review panels, and myriad other tasks. U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut and member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, supported robust funding for the NEA and NEH, and said via email that he was disappointed Congress failed to enact a full-year spending bill. He said he will continue to fight for full funding of the critical arts programs in Connecticut. I believe that federal funding for the arts is one of the best investments this nation makes, Murphy said. ... Each year, the arts generate approximately $135 billion in economic activity, employing over 4 million Americans and generating over $86 billion in household income. But more than their positive economic impact, the arts strengthen and build communities, helping to revitalize our cities and providing venues for people from disparate communities to come together and share a common experience. Connecticut's rich artistic heritage and vibrant artistic community are a source of immense pride and value to our state. kkrasselt@scni.com; 203-354-1021; @kaitlynkrasselt After President Donald Trumps victory on Nov. 8, many Trump opponents clung to the faint hope that the past promises he made to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border and crack down on sanctuary cities were mere campaign fodder and that once in office he would adopt a more moderate stance on immigration. On Jan. 25, that hope was dashed by a set of immigration-related executive orders he signed. Trumps proposal to build a border wall is best thought of not as an actual plan to build a 2,000-mile-long concrete wall running from Brownsville to San Diego. Instead, it is better thought of as a metaphor for his intention to enhance border security with a combination of expanded physical walls, fencing and sensors combined with more boots on the ground along the border. Along with his move to force sanctuary cities to cooperate with federal immigration authorities and plan to hire 5,000 more Border Patrol agents (in the midst of a federal government hiring freeze), the executive orders signal that the president intends to at least partially keep several immigration-related promises he made on the campaign trail during the 2016 electoral cycle. However, some perspective is in order in regard to the immediate impact of these executive orders. First, any actual wall covering a substantial share of the border will require an investment of $10 billion to $20 billion merely for its construction (staffing and maintenance will be extra), funding that will need to be approved by Congress. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Thursday that he thinks the cost of building the wall will be $12 billion to $15 billion. House Speaker Paul Ryan said he expects Trump to submit a plan for paying for the wall, but he refused to talk about details. In the short term, the most the Trump administration will be able to put together with available surplus funds is a feasibility study of different border security plans and a small demonstration project-type wall along a short segment of the border. Furthermore, it seems unlikely that Trumps broader proposal for a border wall will be met with as much enthusiasm in the U.S. Capitol once members of Congress digest its multibillion-dollar price tag. Democratic opposition to the proposal is nearly unanimous, and many Republicans will be reluctant to increase the federal deficit in order to finance the walls construction. And, Trumps plan for the Mexican government to foot the bill for the wall is pure folly. There is no way, shape or form that a Mexican president would pay such a bill, either directly or indirectly. To do so would be political suicide, and neither Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto nor his Institutional Revolutionary Party is going to commit political suicide. It would, in theory, be possible for the U.S. Congress to enact a tax on remittances to Mexico to finance a portion of the walls construction, but such a tax would be politically controversial to pass and in any event would not come close to covering the cost of the wall. Second, the federal government can punish sanctuary cities by cutting off some federal funds for law enforcement. For most sanctuary cities, however, the federal funds they would lose do not represent a significant share of their overall budget, and most are likely to suffer the potential consequences of a cutoff of funds (which they will probably challenge in court) rather than change their policies. Overall, the federal government is rather limited in its ability to force well-known sanctuary cities like Chicago, San Francisco and Seattle to end their current policies, which involve a lack of cooperation with federal immigration authorities as well as explicit policies prohibiting local law enforcement officials from inquiring about the immigration status of suspects or witnesses of criminal activity. As a result, while conflict between the sanctuary cities and the federal government will now increase, life on the ground in these cities for undocumented immigrants is unlikely to change notably in terms of their interaction with local law enforcement. HS Football: North Penn upsets Pennsbury in instant playoff classic With the game on the line, North Penn coach Dick Beck opted to go for the win with a two-point conversion attempt against Pennsbury. The Southern Illinois University Edwardsville School of Pharmacy, in collaboration with Alton Memorial Hospital, BJC HealthCare and the American Diabetes Association, is hosting the 11th annual Free Diabetes Education Program at SIUEs Morris University Center from 8 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 11. The annual free program provides information and features topics related to both Type-1 and Type-2 diabetes. Participants have the opportunity to attend speaker sessions, a vendor fair, receive free screenings and a free lunch, and speak directly with healthcare professionals. Wanted: women of distinction to be honored for their exceptional achievements, personal excellence and outstanding actions in the community The YWCA of Alton is seeking nominations for its 27th annual Women of Distinction celebration, and are asking for the publics help in finding her. Nomination deadline is February 6, 2017. Honorees will be recognized during a dinner on April 27, 2017 in The Commons at Lewis and Clark Community College. Since 1991, the YWCA of Alton has presented 252 local women with its Women of Distinction Award. The honorees are selected based upon their boundless commitment to community through their service to others and through their compassionate leadership help improve the quality of life for everyone in their communities. The women honored at this event represent the diversity of womens interests, talents and achievements and support the mission of the YWCA: eliminating racism, empowering women, and promoting peace, justice, freedom and dignity for all. A volunteer panel of judges will select this years honorees from nominations made by the public or organizations throughout the counties served by the YWCA of Alton. Honorees will be selected for significant contributions in areas such as, but not limited to: arts, business, professions, communications/media, community service, education, entrepreneurship, social services and government. Everyone is urged to nominate women who are making a difference throughout their communities. Nomination packets are available at the YWCA, online at www.altonywca.com, via email: frontdesk@altonywca.com, or by calling (618) 465-7774. The YWCA of Alton, established in 1918, is part of the largest and oldest womens organization in the world. For more information, visit the YWCA of Alton, 304 East 3rd St., Alton, IL, www.altonywca.com or call (618) 465-7774. The YWCA is dedicated to eliminating racism, empowering women and promoting peace, justice, freedom and dignity for all. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Tobias Basuki (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 12:49 2105 9b519824cb3263083aedb70a0bd4bb05 3 Opinion freedom-of-expression,speech,cyber-security,Blasphemy-Law,ITE-Law Free A recent dialogue with a colleague triggered a point to ponder. Were recent police moves against Islam Defenders Front (FPI) leader Rizieq Shihab and the banning of his social media accounts violations or restrictions of freedom of speech? Some activists and advocates of freedom of speech are often very wary of strong moves by the state to shut down websites or investigate inflammatory social media accounts. They say they fear that such moves will set a bad precedent for banning any dissent (including legitimate ones) against the government for the sake of security and stability. Personally, as a researcher I find the moves against firebrand preachers and individuals to be legitimate even from the most liberal democratic perspective. The only problem regarding the measures taken by the government and police is the legal framework they work within. Our legal framework covering freedom of speech and regulations surrounding speech, verbal or virtual, is practically a big hot mess. Indonesia enacted a freedom of expression and assembly law in 1999. It also ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). However, most of the laws that are associated with expression in any form are messy, to say the least. This problem reaches a wide range of issues that by theory and logic cannot be regulated. Amongst the many, one has to start with the problematic Blasphemy Law. Many other regulations include provisions based on the ridiculously vague Blasphemy Law articles. One of the most recent laws is the 2008 Information and Electronic Transaction (ITE) Law, which was amended last year. The Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is conducting research and its early findings show that the law has become a favorite tool of political and economic interests to attack their opponents. It did not regulate the internet or more precisely Indonesian cyberspace coherently at all. This ITE law includes defamation articles and articles that criminalize co-called blasphemy. In it the two batons, a duo blasphemy and defamation article, had been used to silence dissent. One immediately remembers the case of Prita Mulyasari, who stood trial for criticizing Omni Hospital in an email circulated among her friends. The ridiculousness does not end there. A housewife, Wisni Yetti, was prosecuted for filing for divorce (because of spousal violence) for adultery, with the lawyers using her private Facebook messages as evidence under the ITE Law. Luckily Wisni was declared not guilty, but the point is the fact that the law even brings cases to court, hence showing how the law can always be used to oppress anyone no matter how ridiculous the allegations. The core problem with this extremely precarious legal framework being politicized is the lack of clear conceptual differentiation by the government as the executors and legislators as the drafters of the laws. The current legal framework cannot separate matters that can be regulated and things that cannot or should not be regulated. A clear example is blasphemy. In political and philosophical arguments blasphemy, the interpretation and protection of religious teaching, is impossible and dangerous. Ideas and religious concepts, as well as beliefs, cannot be protected. People, groups and individuals, should be protected, but not ideas and beliefs. The practical implication of this problem is crystal clear. Just look at what the Blasphemy Law and its extension in the ITE Law have done. First it allowed the prosecution of the leaders of the Sampang Shiites and the Cikeusik Ahmadi group for incitement, although in reality they are victims of violence. Now, we see how the ITE Law and the Blasphemy Law in tandem had been used for very political purposes to attack opponents (see the Jakarta 2017 elections). Also, now we see a plethora of legal attacks going berserk all over the place. Rizieq is under investigation on multiple counts, from insulting Pancasila to blaspheming against Christians. These things would have not happened if the political climate was different. The point is the duo of the blasphemy and ITE laws can be used in any way without a clear reference point or concept. That is why it is such a favorite stick for political and economic conflict entrepreneurs to use. Back to the Rizieq case: Is it legitimate and dangerous for the government to move to shut him down? Yes and no. It is dubitable to prosecute and close social media accounts and associated websites while the only legal basis is simply a ministerial regulation that is open to change and interpretation. It is, however, by theory legitimate to move to silence Rizieq and his group because it is very clear that he had on hundreds of occasions in various media expressed either verbal hatred or virtually incited hate toward particular groups, individuals and the government. The solution to this is that the government has to apply clear conceptual frameworks to its laws. The first thing it has to do is to sift through laws that regulate unregulatable things like blasphemy, interpretation and belief. It should find issues that should be regulated like hate speech and maybe insults. The crazy thing is, the most important issue is that the authority to regulate hate speech at this point of time in Indonesia is only on the level of a police instruction, whereas this critical issue should be at least on the level of law. We do have the Law on the Elimination of Racial and Ethnic Discrimination (PDRE), but it has been left in the dust. The law is not clear enough about prosecuting hate speech either. The ICCPR, which Indonesia has ratified, conceptualizes hate speech in very clear ways that leave less to be open to interpretation to be utilized politically. It protects individuals and groups from hate speech. This is the provision in Article 20(2): Any advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence shall be prohibited by law. It is clearly stated that we would not be able to accuse Deden Muljana (Ahmadiyah) or Tajul Muluk (Shia) of inciting a conflict. It is the hate speech that precedes violent attack that has to be criminalized. Hopefully the government revamps this problem before political issues tear down the country using these two horns of the blasphemy and ITE laws. --------------- We are looking for information, opinions, and in-depth analysis from experts or scholars in a variety of fields. We choose articles based on facts or opinions about general news, as well as quality analysis and commentary about Indonesia or international events. Send your piece to community@jakpost.com. For more information click here. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official stance of The Jakarta Post. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Danny I. Yatim (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 09:49 2105 9b519824cb3263083aedb70a0bd42139 4 Art & Culture bali,Movie,Cannes-Film-Festival,wregas-bhanuteja,ubud-writers-readers-festival Free Floating Chopin is a short film by Wregas Bhanuteja, a young filmmaker who won the Leica Cine Discovery Prize at the last Cannes Film Festival for another short film Prenjak. I had seen this film before in Jakarta, but decided to watch it again, together with his other short films, during the 2016 Ubud Writers and Readers Festival. The film starts with a scene inside a car on a road in rural Java. A young dating couple, speaking in colloquial Javanese, are on the way to the beach, a secluded one on the shores of Yogyakarta. Why do we have to go there? asks the girl. Well, replies the guy, its much nicer than going to Bali. The beaches in Bali are crowded with tourists. A roar of laughter broke out in the viewing room, which was a dimly lit cafe in the center of Ubud. I did not hear this kind of laughter in Jakarta. Perhaps all these people were laughing at themselves, tourists who may have flocked to the beaches of Kuta, Legian, Sanur or Nusa Dua. The guy begins showing off to his girlfriend about his taste in music. We hear Chopins Nocturne Opus 9 no. 2 not only as background music, but as an important part of the storyline. The guy turns up the volume and we are all lullabied by Chopin while looking at the scene of a rural road in tropical Java. The guy then tells the girl about his trip to Paris. Ill show you later at the beach, he said. Then when they arrive, he opens his laptop computer and voila, we get to see a video of his Paris trip. He does not show her the Louvre, not even a shot of the Eiffel tower, as most travelers would probably do. Instead he shows his visit to a cemetery. The girl asks why. The tombs are all beautiful and artistic, he says. Look at the beautiful angel over there, and this magnificent-looking statue of the deceased person. Then he shows the grave of Jim Morrison of The Doors, on which he had placed a flower as a tribute to this famous rock musician. The camera moves and stops at another grave. We read the inscription on the tombstone: Fryderyk Franciscek Chopin. Now we know that Chopins Nocturne does have a significant meaning to the film and the title. Chopin, as we know, was one of the composers of the Romantic era. The guy asks the girl to imagine what would happen if Chopin had died in Bali. The girl looks puzzled, while the guy starts to hum a pentatonic melody, and this, when I first saw it in Jakarta, was when I became struck by a feeling of deja vu. Mind you, this is not a Balinese traditional song. It was written by Guruh Soekarnoputra as part of his album titled Guruh Gypsy. Five urban kids in Jakarta formed a band to play progressive rock music, heavily influenced by Genesis, and conducted an experiment, combining rock music with Balinese gamelan. That would not be too surprising these days in Indonesia, but this was 1977. At a time when young urban Indonesians were frequently accused by their elders and the government as being too westernized, and having no interest in traditional culture. But here they were experimenting with a different music genre that had never existed before. The guy in the film (who also happens to be the director) starts chanting, Yen Chopin padem ring Bali? What if Chopin had died in Bali? Two Balinese waiters standing close to me were stunned for a moment. They listened intensely to the words and started silently gasping, while the non-Balinese audience in the room, at least some of them, foreigners and Indonesians alike, laughed slightly nervously as they read the subtitles. Or was I just interpreting too much? This is how the lyrics go. If Chopin died in Bali, his ashes would float in the southern ocean, contemplating the soils of Bali now being destroyed by foreigners. A boat capsized, caused by the wrath of the gods of the ocean, and Chopin still may not believe that he could be the one destroying another culture. This was definitely a mild criticism of the impact of tourism on Balinese culture. The song ends by saying that Chopin in reality never reached Bali. He would never know that his race had taken over Kuta. The locals have forgotten the Supreme Spirit now. Chopins tune pierces my heart, with a strong sorrowful beat. Remember my brothers and sisters in Bali, to always be mindful. Maybe it was not the intention of Wregas Bhanuteja to send a message about tourism in Bali in this film, but I just could not help looking through the window to see a few coconut trees. I remembered there used to be a regulation that there should be no buildings higher than a coconut palm, to preserve the natural beauty of the island. And now? No, I am not against modernity. Many of the comforts of urban life are now readily available in Bali, which would not be found in the 1970s, like ATMs and transportation. But some other changes do often seem out of place, like building modern villas on land that used to be rice fields, or constructing so-called minimalist hotels amid a culture that adores elaborate decor and intricate carvings. And what happened to that regulation about no high-rise buildings? The guy in the film then asks his girlfriend to take a picture of him dressed up like Chopin, with his wavy hair being blown by the ocean breeze. The film ends and I begin to wonder: what if Chopin attended the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival? Just some wild imagination that came to my mind as I left the venue. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Jessicha Valentina (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 09:56 2105 9b519824cb3263083aedb70a0bd42fa7 1 Food bali,restaurant,#restaurant,Pepita-Cafe-and-Bakery,Panama-Kitchen-and-Pool,Waroeng-Dadong,Da-Maria,food,#food,#Bali,culinary Free Visiting Bali is always a good idea. In addition to its culture and beautiful landscapes, the islands dining scene is also interesting to explore. Those planning to visit Bali may want to check out the list below. Waroeng Dadong Da Maria restaurant has home-cooked style meals including pizzas.(Da Maria/File) Waroeng Dadong is suitable for those who want to sample Balinese cuisine but are reluctant to buy from street food vendors. Opened in December, the eatery specializes in the islands traditional dishes, including tipat cantok (rice cake with mixed vegetables and peanut sauce), tuna salad sambal matah (tuna salad with Balinese chili relish), sate plecing (meat satay with spicy sauce) and more. Jl. By Pass Ngurah Rai No. 20, Tuban, South Kuta Da Maria Deep fried mushrooms are among the array of dishes at Pepita Cafe & Bakery.(Pepita Cafe and Bakery's instagram/File) Nestled within the hustle and bustle of Jl. Petitenget, Da Maria is the brainchild of Australian restaurateur Maurice Ternizi. Offering an osteria (restaurant that serves simple home-cooked meals) concept, the dishes on offer include classic Italian delicacies like antica margherita pizza (pizza with parmesan topping), porchetta (boneless pork roast) and gnocchi Genovese. Jl. Petitenget No. 170, Badung (Read also: Jakarta's top 7 new restaurants of 2016) Pepita Cafe and Bakery Panama Kitchen & Pool offers various comfort foods, including fish and chips.(Panama Kitchen & Pool's instagram/File) Those planning to spend a day or two on Lembongan Island may wish to include Pepita Cafe and Bakery on their itinerary. Opened in November, the cafe offers a wide array of dishes like fire scramble, deep fried mushrooms, fajitas and steak. Moreover, despite its chic interior, the prices will not burn a hole in your wallet. Jl. Jungut Batu, Nusa Lembongan Panama Kitchen & Pool The interior of Da Maria restaurant shows off its dining concept.(Da Maria/File) Located in Canggu, Panama Kitchen & Pool offers a unique concept as the restaurant allows guests to take a dip, day or night. In line with its laid-back environment, the eatery offers various types of comfort foods, such as pulled-pork Benedict, fish and chips, breakfast burritos and classic French toast. (kes) Jl. Pantai Berawa No. 13, Canggu The government has begun making arrangements to set the upper limit for overtime working hours at 720 hours per year, or 60 hours on average per month, as part of measures to correct the problem of long working hours, according to sources. The envisaged policy initiative also will likely set an upper limit of 100 hours per month even during busy periods for companies. (Read also: Japan wants its overworked citizens to start weekends early) Full-fledged discussions on measures to correct long working hours are expected to begin at a meeting of the Council for the Realization of Work Style Reform scheduled for Wednesday. The council is chaired by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. For the upper limits under consideration, the government took into account conditions already set for a worker to be recognized as a victim of death from overwork. The conditions stipulate a worker who works 100 hours of overtime in the month prior to showing symptoms of brain or heart diseases or a worker who works more than 80 hours of overtime per month for two to six months prior to showing such symptoms. While requiring the annual upper limit to be no more than 720 hours, a certain degree of discretion likely will be given to companies by setting the monthly upper limit at 100 hours and the average overtime working hours for two consecutive months at 80 hours per month, the sources said. (Read also: How Japan's overwork culture leads to 'karoshi') Jobs related to research and development are likely to be excluded from the upper limit targets. Meanwhile, since transportation, construction and dismantling businesses are currently not covered by the Labor Standards Law, they will likely be subject to the envisaged regulations after a grace period. The Labor Standards Law stipulates that working hours should, in principle, be no more than eight hours per day and 40 hours per week. However, under Article 36 of the Labor Standards Law, if labor and management sign an agreement, employers can require workers to work overtime or on days off. Such agreements are commonly called saburoku kyotei (36 agreements), after the article that addresses overtime work. In addition, special provisions established as an exception to the agreement can completely eliminate limits on overtime working hours. Many people have pointed out that saburoku kyotei agreements have been unable to fully function as a brake on long working hours. The government has thus been working to introduce new measures to correct excessive overtime work. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Masajeng Rahmiasri (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 14:26 2105 9b519824cb3263083aedb70a0bd50ba8 1 Art & Culture Malang,East-Java,film,cinema,Australian-Indonesian-Cinema-Festival,festival,#film,#cinema,#festival,movies,#movies,short-film Free A film by Indonesian newcomer director Mahesa Desaga, Nunggu Teka (Waiting to Arrive), was named winner of a short film competition in the 2017 Australia-Indonesia Cinema Festival (FSAI) at XXI Senayan City cinema in South Jakarta on Sunday. The 14-minute film follows a mother who lives alone in an old traditional house. While waiting for her only son to come home during the Idul Fitri celebration, she prepares his favorite food dishes. Mahesa, who hails from Malang, East Java, said the story was based on his personal experience. I am now at the age where I often act busy. When my mother asks where I am, I usually answer that Im busy with work. Then, I thought, how does my mother feel about this? he said. (Read also: Australian film festival in Jakarta to feature Indonesian films, premiere of Lion) He added that the film did not intend to put a conclusion to the story. The audience must have their own background with their own mothers. They will perceive [the ending] on their own, the Brawijaya University alumni said. The film marked the first creation of 88 Mil Production, which was established by Mahesa alongside other members of Malang-based film communities in 2015. One of the competition's judges, Kamila Andini, described Nunggu Teka as a film that can touch the viewers' feelings. It has a universal theme about a mother, while at the same time it is authentically Indonesian due to the setting in Lebaran, she said. Kamila added that the film was consistent from start to finish. (Read also: Tearjerker 'Lion' makes you rethink your life) Kamila Andini (left) and Mahesa Desaga (right) pictured together after the Australia-Indonesia Cinema Festival's short film competition winner announcement at XXI Senayan City theater, South Jakarta, on Jan. 29.(JP/Masajeng Rahmiasri) As the winner of the competition, Nunggu Teka is being considered to be screened in the Melbourne International Film Festival slated for August. Mahesa said that he would use this opportunity to learn more about Australian films, as well as introduce Lebaran culture in Indonesia to the audience. Aside from Nunggu Teka, a one-take film by Happy Salma, Ibu dan Anak Perempuannya (A Mother and A Daughter), also received an award at the competition. Adapted from Happys novel, Pulang (Going Home), it has been recognized by both viewers choice and jurys special mention awards due to its great script writing, superb acting and elegant performance", as well as its meaningful ending, said Kamila. Alison Purnell, a counselor at the Advocacy and Outreach Section of the Australian Embassy in Jakarta, said that the embassy planned to hold another short film competition next year and add new categories, such as fiction, non-fiction and animation. (kes) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Mae Anderson (Associated Press) New York, United States Mon, January 30, 2017 Google, Apple and other tech giants expressed dismay over an executive order on immigration from President Donald Trump that bars nationals of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. The U.S tech industry relies on foreign engineers and other technical experts for a sizeable percentage of its workforce. The order bars entry to the U.S. for anyone from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The move, ostensibly intended to prevent extremists from carrying out attacks in the U.S., could now also heighten tensions between the new Trump administration and one of the nation's most economically and culturally important industries. That's especially true if Trump goes on to revamp the industry's temporary worker permits known as H-1B visas, as some fear. (Read also: Uber CEO challenged for Trump connection after immigrant ban) BITING BACK "I share your concerns" about Trump's immigration order, Apple CEO Tim Cook wrote in a memo to employees obtained by The Associated Press. "It is not a policy we support." "We have reached out to the White House to explain the negative effect on our coworkers and our company," he added. Cook didn't say how many Apple employees are directly affected by the order, but said the company's HR, legal and security teams are in contact to support them. "Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do," Cook wrote an apparent reference not only to the company's foreign-born employees, but to Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, the son of a Syrian immigrant. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings was forcefully blunt. "Trump's actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all," he wrote on Facebook . "Worse, these actions will make America less safe (through hatred and loss of allies) rather than more safe." "It is time to link arms together to protect American values of freedom and opportunity," he continued. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg criticized the order in similar, though more carefully couched, terms on Friday . Technology investor Chris Sacca, an early backer of Uber and Instagram, said on Twitter that he would match ACLU donations up to $75,000 after the organization sued over the ban and then decided to donate another $75,000 , for a total of $150,000. EBay founder Pierre Omidyar, the child of Iranians, complained that the order was "simple bigotry ." Tesla Motors and SpaceX founder Elon Musk, who has recently appeared to be cultivating a relationship with Trump, tweeted that "many people negatively affected by this policy are strong supporters of the US" who don't "deserve to be rejected." Musk is an immigrant from South Africa. (Read also: Google's Pixel phone shines despite misgauging demand) GOOGLE GRUMBLES Google told its employees from those countries to cancel any travel plans outside the U.S. and to consult with the company's human resources department if they're not currently in the U.S., according to a company-wide note described to The Associated Press. That memo was first reported by Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal. Google CEO Sundar Pichai told employees in the note that at least 187 Google workers could be affected by Trump's order. It is not clear how many of those workers are currently traveling outside the U.S. "We've always made our views on immigration known publicly and will continue to do so," Pichai said in the memo. Company representatives declined to discuss the memo or to answer questions about the affected employees. In an official statement, Google said: "We're concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the U.S." Microsoft also said it is providing legal advice and assistance to its employees from the banned countries, noting they are all working in the U.S. lawfully. (Read also: Facebook founder Zuckerberg says he has no plan to run for US president) A BIGGER ISSUE The tech industry may be bracing for further immigration-related hits. Leaks of draft executive orders, still unverified, suggest that Trump might also revamp the H1-B program that lets Silicon Valley bring foreigners with technical skills to the U.S. for three to six years. While the tech industry insists the H1-B program is vital, it has drawn fire for allegedly disadvantaging American programmers and engineers, especially given that the visas are widely used by outsourcing firms. Trump's attorney general nominee, Sen. Jeff Sessions, is a long-time critic of the program. Venky Ganesan, a managing director at venture capitalist firm Menlo Ventures, acknowledged that the program is "not perfect" and subject to some abuse, but noted that it provides an invaluable source of skilled workers and plays a "pivotal" role in the tech industry. "If we want to buy American and hire American, we do that best by creating companies in America," he said. :Having the best and brightest from all over the world come and create companies in America is better than them creating companies in India, Israel or China." ___ AP Auto Writer Dee-Ann Durbin contributed to this article from Detroit. AP Technology Editor David Hamilton contributed from San Francisco. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 AirAsia X has obtained a license from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to fly to the United States, AirAsia X CEO Datuk Kamarudin Meranun has said. With this achievement, AirAsia X becomes the first Asian budget airline to hold a license to fly to the US, said Kamarudin. It is an extraordinary achievement. Our expansion so far only focused on Asia, Australia and the Middle East. We are in high spirits to expand farther than just the Asia-Pacific, he said as reported by tribunnews.com on Monday. (Read also: AirAsia launches direct flight to Mauritius) With such a license, AirAsia X planes would be able to fly to any place in the country, said Kamarudin, adding that his company also planned to restart its flights to London and the relevant licenses were being arranged. The AirAsia Group has 120 flight destinations in the Asia-Pacific, including 60 routes within ASEAN countries. (bbn) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 State-owned airport operator PT Angkasa Pura II (AP II) booked Rp 6.65 trillion (US$498.5 million) in audited revenues in 2016, an 18 percent increase over the previous year, when it earned Rp 5.64 trillion. The figure exceeded the revenue target of Rp 6.57 trillion. AP II president director Muhammad Awaluddin explained that Rp 4.03 trillion of the revenues came from the aero business, while another Rp 2.62 trillion came from other businesses like advertising, cargo and properties. The increase of the revenues was in line with a 12 percent increase in the number of airplane passengers from 84.29 million to 94.63 million, he said. (Read also: State operator proposes to take over two more airports) In trying to boost the revenues, PT AP II has given incentives to aviation companies that opened new international flights and those that offer extra flights outside of the regular schedules, he said as reported by Antara news agency on Sunday. The revenue increase was also caused by the operation of new terminals, including Terminal 3 at Soekarna-Hatta International Airport in Tangerang, Banten and a new terminal at Husein Sastranegara Airport in Bandung, as well as the operation of Sultan Thaha Airport, a new airport in Jambi. Awaluddin also explained that his firm had established two subsidiary companies PT Angkasa Pura Propertino (APP), a property business, and PT Angkasa Pura Kargo (APK), a cargo business to boost the non-aero businesses. With the establishment of APP and APK, we hope that non-aero businesses will contribute 50 percent of the total revenues in 2018, he added. (bbn) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 Bintan authorities announced on Sunday that they have discovered 14 bodies in separate locations in Bintan waters within the past four days. Indonesian Navy Base IV Commander First Adm. S. Irawan said the authorities had yet to confirm whether the bodies were linked to a boat that capsized last week in Malaysian waters or to other boat accidents. "The bodies did not carry any IDs, which therefore makes identification difficult," Irawan said as quoted by Antara news agency. (Read also: 12 confirmed dead in Johor Bahru capsizing) He added that most of the bodies were found dismembered and in decomposed states. "All the bodies have been taken to Bhayangkara Hospital for identification," Irawan said. (dmr) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Grace D. Amianti (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 Bank Indonesia (BI) has warned unlicensed non-bank money changers to apply for a license during the ongoing transition period as a requirement to operate legally. The central bank has imposed the transition period since Oct. 6 last year when it issued a regulation and circular concerning the licensing requirement. The unlicensed money changers were given until April 7 to submit applications. BI will work together with the National Police, the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (PPATK) and the National Narcotics Agency (BNN) to crack down on illegal money changers that fail to comply with the regulation after the transition period ends. (Read also: Central bank monitoring money changers to counter terrorism financing) Applicants need only to submit a written application attached with several documents to Bank Indonesia. It is free of charge, said BI executive director of payment system policy and supervision Eni V. Panggabean in a press briefing on Monday. Money changers, formally called non-bank foreign currency exchange businesses, comprise transactional activities related to currency exchange through a trading mechanism of foreign currency banknotes as well as the purchase of traveler's checks. One of the requirements for non-bank money changers to apply for a license is to become a limited company [PT] that should be fully owned by Indonesian citizens, Eni said. The central banks warning came following findings by the National Police, the PPATK and the BNN regarding the rising trend of money laundering activities involving illegal money changers, which were used for transactions related to graft, narcotics and terrorism. (bbn) TheJakartaPost Please Update your browser Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below. Just click on the icons to get to the download page. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 A backer of the Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono-Sylviana Murni pair in the Jakarta election, the Democratic Party, said on Monday it was not worried about the questioning of Sylviana, who has been implicated in a corruption case. The party said it would not affect the pairs electability, saying that Jakarta voters were smart. Sylviana is being questioned by the National Police in relation to at least two corruption cases: the construction of Al Fauz Mosque in Central Jakarta and a social aid program conducted by the city administration in 2014 and 2015. (Read also: Sylviana obeys police summons) The former Central Jakarta mayor has been question at least twice, with the most recent session held on Monday. We are not worried about any legal process our candidate is facing, because people are smart, party chairman Didik Mukrianto said at the House of Representatives building as quoted by kompas.com. He expected the police to remain neutral and be accountable in handling the cases. We want to warn that the police should be neutral because the law stipulates that the force should not meddle in political affairs, Didik said. Party chief patron Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has called Sylvianas cases trumped up charges and his son Agus said they were a victim of false allegations fabricated by those abusing their power. (saf) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Farida Susanty (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 Grab Indonesia, a subsidiary of Southeast Asias biggest ride-hailing service Grab, has appointed former National Police chief Badrodin Haiti its new top commissioner. Grab Indonesia managing director Ridzki Kramadibrata said Monday that Badrodin was installed in the new position because of his vast experience working within various government circles. "Along with the evolution of the technology sector and of ride-hailing platforms in Indonesia, Pak Badrodin will guide and ensure Grab contributes constructively to the enforcement of transportation policy and new safety regulations," Ridzki said in a statement. Ride-hailing apps like Grab and Uber, along with their driver partners, have been in talks with the government over their business arrangements in Indonesia, leading to several disagreements over the regulations affecting their operations. Amid a backlash from conventional taxi drivers who blamed app-based transportation services for their dwindling incomes, the government previously declared that to operate legally the apps were subject to certain legal requirements. The transportation minister issued a regulation requiring drivers to have type A licenses for public transportation, to submit to vehicle roadworthiness tests (KIR) and to transfer their vehicle ownerships to cooperatives that partner with the app companies. However, the implementation of the regulation has not proceeded smoothly, with the drivers of the app companies staging protests, claiming that their operations were hampered by the requirements. Apart from holding the new position at Grab, Badrodin is now also the head commissioner of the state-owned construction firm, Waskita Karya. (lnd) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 Police in West Papua will continue the legal process against a former regent, who was arrested on Sunday for allegedly using drugs, even though several parties have tried to intervene with the case. Manokwari Police chief Adj. Comr. Christian Rony Putra said on Monday the police had named Teluk Wondama former regent Alberth Torey as a suspect for consuming crystal methamphetamine. Some parties have tried to intervene, but I will thoroughly process the case, Rony said as quoted by tempo.co. Drug cases cant be resolved through customary law, he added. Alberth was arrested at his house in Manokwari early Sunday with 0.02 grams of crystal methamphetamine. He is now being treated at Manokwari Regional Hospital. Alberth also faced drug charges with his second wife Viviani Idriyani in April 2011. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Prima Wirayani and Nurul Fitri Ramadhani (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30 2017 The hype of campaigns leading to the upcoming Jakarta gubernatorial election has forced an official with a top energy firm to resign from his position to start a new career in politics. Publicly listed energy company Indika Energy announced on Friday the resignation of president commissioner Wishnu Wardhana, following his appointment as campaign manager for Jakarta gubernatorial candidate Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono. Wishnu, who served as the companys president director prior to his appointment as president commissioner, is known as a close friend of Agus, the eldest son of former president and Democratic Party chairman Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,500/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Bandung Mon, January 30 2017 The Bandung Police have named six civil servants at the Bandung investment and one-stop integrated public service agency suspects for alleged practices of illegal fees in permit issuance. One of the six suspects, Dandan Riza Wardana, was the head of the agency, Bandung Police chief Sr. Comr. Hendro Pandowo said on Saturday evening. Each suspect [allegedly] had different roles in the illegal fees practices, he said in Bandung, West Java. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,500/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Indra Budiari (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 It was 10 a.m. when The Jakarta Post approached a group of fishermen who were sitting and chatting by boats moored in Kali Adem, North Jakarta. The conversation led to the hottest current political debate: which of the three Jakarta gubernatorial candidates is fit to lead the capital. The fishermen, who are registered Jakarta residents, have pledged to vote in the election on Feb. 15. However, they said they were still uncommitted to any particular candidate as they were unsure as to whether the next governor would improve their lives. Just like their past discussions about politics, that days discussion came back to two things: food and electricity bills. I just dont think any of them will make a change in our lives. We have been deceived by politicians for too long, one of the fishermen, Sude Sijan, said as he lit up his cigarette. He was referring to the three candidate pairs Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono-Sylviana Murnia, Basuki Ahok Tjahaja Purnama-Djarot Saiful Hidayat and Anies Baswedan-Sandiaga Uno. After living by the sea for 22 years, Sude said many gubernatorial candidates had visited his neighborhood and made lots of promises, particularly pledges to improve their welfare. The only change he has noticed over the years, however, is that there are less and less fish in his fishing nets. Things have become hard for Sude and other fishermen in the past two years after the Jakarta administration under Governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama gave the green light to the construction of several man-made islets in coastal area, which has forced them to travel extra miles to catch fish. In the past, Sude went on, fishermen could see fish a few hundred meters from the land. Now, they have to go further. Iwan, another fisherman who refused to reveal his last name, said gubernatorial candidate Anies Baswedan had visited his area and promised that he and his running mate Sandiaga would stop the controversial reclamation project if they were elected. Anies, he went on, told them that the fishermen would not have to share the sea with the man-made islets anymore. Iwan, however, did not buy his claim Stopping the reclamation means fighting against rich and powerful people. I am not sure any governor would want to do that, Iwan said. But one thing is for sure, I will not vote for Ahok. He has caused a lot of trouble for us fishermen. Besides issuing permits for the reclamation project, Ahok drew criticism from fishermen in January 2016 when he planned to evict them from North Jakartas coastal area and relocate them to low cost apartment blocks (rusunawa) in the Thousand Islands. The fishermen believe that the administration should take their opinions into account before it makes a decision. Separately, Marthin Hadiwinata of the Indonesian Traditional Fishermens Association (KNTI) said that none of the three candidates had so far presented any clear ideas about how they would support the livelihoods of the fishermen. For instance, Marthin said that while Ahok insisted on continuing the North Jakarta Bay reclamation project, the other two candidates had shown no detailed plan for how they would stop the controversial project that has seriously threatened fishermens livelihoods. We dont know if Agus will continue the reclamation project or not, and even though Anies has pledged to stop it, he has not revealed any details. So we do not have a lot of hope, Marthin told the Post. Marthin added that none of the three candidates had revealed their plans on how they intended to improve the livelihoods of people living in the coastal and small island areas. We need the candidates to look further into fishermens problems and offer some solutions. The Jakarta Bay contains a lot of toxic substances from all waste that finds its way there from the capital through 13 rivers. The reclamation project has worsened this pollution. According to the Jakarta Maritime, Fisheries and Food Security Agency, the number of fishermen in Jakarta is decreasing. In 2009, the agency recorded that there were 23,827 fishermen in the city. Three years later its survey revealed that there were only 17,405 fishermen. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Pontianak, West Kalimantan Mon, January 30, 2017 Landak regencys sole candidate, Karolin Margret Natasa, said she was ready to improve public service if she was elected the regent. Public service is a major concern of many Indonesians, including those in Landak, she said as quoted by Antara news agency on Monday in Ngabang, Landaks downtown area in West Kalimantan. Karolin is running with Herculanus Heriadi and they are the sole candidate pair in the regency. They are backed by eight political parties, including Karolins party, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P). Karolin was a legislator in West Kalimantan from 2009 to 2016 before she ran for office in Landak. To improve the service, I would enhance public participation in the decision making [process], compose guidelines for service standards, have [the public] express their opinion in a satisfaction rate survey, and process complaints and appreciation, she said. Karolin is the eldest child of Cornelis, former Landak regent for two terms and former West Kalimantan governor. (evi) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Viriya P. Singgih (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 State-owned energy firm Pertamina has started the licensor selection process for the development of the Cilacap refinery upgrade in Central Java and the new Tuban refinery in East Java, a company executive has said. The selected licensors are expected to provide the technologies needed by the company for both refineries, said Pertamina processing director Rachmad Hardadi at his office in Jakarta on Monday. There are 30 process licensors competing for the Tuban refinery project, while 15 licensors are involved in the selection for the Cilacap refinery upgrade. We will select companies with the best proven conversion technologies. We will consider several factors in their presentations, including consumption utilities, operational efficiency and maintenance simplicity before deciding which company should be the winner, he added. (Read also: Indonesia invites Iran to invest in refinery business) The licensor for the Cilacap refinery upgrade will be announced in April, while the one for Tuban refinery will be decided in June, said Pertamina senior vice president of business development Iriawan Yulianto. The Tuban refinery, which will be jointly developed by Pertamina and Russias Rosneft Oil Company, is expected to be completed in 2021 with a processing capacity of 300,000 barrels of oil per day (bopd). The project is estimated to cost between US$12 million and $14 million. Meanwhile, the Cilacap refinery upgrade is expected to produce 400,000 bopd, up 15 percent from the current capacity. Pertamina has sealed a deal with Saudi Aramco to jointly develop the Cilacap facility with an investment value worth approximately $5.4 billion. (bbn) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Fadli (The Jakarta Post) Batam, Riau Islands Mon, January 30, 2017 The number of undocumented migrant workers on board the boat that capsized over waters near Johor Bahru, Malaysia, has reached 45, with the evacuation of a total of 19 bodies, an officer said on Monday. Of the 19 victims, 16 were men and three women, Riau Islands Police spokesman Sr. Comr. Saptono Erlangga told The Jakarta Post. Three of the victims had been identified, while another 16 were still in the autopsy process at Bhayangkara Hospital in Batam. Seven of the passengers of the boat that capsized on Jan. 23 were declared safe. The police had also named the boat owner, referred to only as K, who was believed to have managed the transportation of the workers from Batam, on its wanted list (DPO). The secretary for the Agency for the Placement and Protection of Indonesian Migrant Workers (BNP2TKI), Hermono, said the agency had no data regarding the number of the boats total passengers. Malaysian authorities informed us that some were found safe and were thought to be hiding, but we have no evidence, Hermono said. We know about the transport of undocumented workers only if there are arrests or accidents. He also said the problems surrounding undocumented workers should be discussed and coordinated thoroughly between Indonesia and Malaysia. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Corry Elyda (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 Some 30 percent of 150 market buildings in the capital city need to be revitalized and meet safety standards, an executive with the market operator has warned following a recent fire in Senen Market in Central Jakarta. City-owned PD Pasar Jaya president director Arif Nasrudin said on Monday that his company would revitalize the buildings in accordance with national standards, especially with regard to fire safety. We will revitalize 11 this year and the new buildings will follow the SNI, he said, referring to the Indonesian National Standards. Arif said the revitalized markets would have fire-extinguishing devices like sprinklers, hydrants and fire extinguishers. He said his company would also hold fire drills more frequently. We will intensify fire drills for vendors, not only our companys personnel, he said. He added that the vendors would be taught to extinguish fires with simple equipment such as wet cloths or gunny sacks. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Rob Gillies (Associated Press) Toronto Mon, January 30, 2017 Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has a message for refugees rejected by US President Donald Trump: Canada will welcome you. He says he also intends to talk to Trump about the success of Canada's refugee policy. Trudeau reacted to Trump's visa ban for people from certain Muslim-majority countries by tweeting Saturday: "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada." Trudeau also posted a picture of him greeting a Syrian child at Toronto's airport in late 2015. Trudeau oversaw the arrival of more than 39,000 Syrian refugees soon after he was elected. A spokeswoman for Trudeau said he has a message for Trump. "The Prime Minister is looking forward to discussing the successes of Canada's immigration and refugee policy with the President when they next speak," spokeswoman Kate Purchase told The Associated Press. Trudeau is expected to the visit the White House soon. The prime minister has refrained from criticizing Trump to avoid offending the new president. Canada wants to avoid becoming a target like Mexico has. More than 75 percent of Canada's exports go to the US. Brad Wall, the conservative premier of the Canadian province of Saskatchewan, offered his support to Trudeau. "Sask has welcomed approx 2000 refugees this past year," Wall posted on Twitter. "We stand ready to assist fed gov't re: anyone stranded by the US ban." Toronto Mayor John Tory also weighed in, noting that the city is the most diverse in the world. "We understand that as Canadians we are almost all immigrants, and that no one should be excluded on the basis of their ethnicity or nationality," Tory said in a statement. Trump signed a sweeping executive order Friday that he billed as a necessary step to stop "radical Islamic terrorists" from coming to the US. Included is a 90-day ban on travel to the US by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen and a 120-day suspension of the US refugee program. Trump's order singled out Syrians for the most aggressive ban, ordering that anyone from that country, including those fleeing civil war, are indefinitely blocked from coming to the United States. White House National Security adviser Michael Flynn told Canada's national security adviser that holders of Canadian passports, including dual citizens, will not be affected by the ban, Purchase said. "We have been assured that Canadian citizens traveling on Canadian passports will be dealt with in the usual process," Purchase said. Trudeau later posted the statement on Twitter with the hashtag "ACanadianIsACanadian." Earlier the US State Department said that Canadians with dual citizenship from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya would be denied entry for the next three months. The Syrian refugee crisis became a major issue in Canada's election in late 2015 because of the haunting image of a drowned 3-year-old Syrian boy washed up on a Turkish beach. The boy had relatives in Canada. Tima Kurdi, the aunt of the boy who became a symbol of the Syrian refugee crisis, called the US ban on Syrian refugees inhumane and said she was proud of Canada. Trudeau's tweet quickly received more than 150,000 likes. "Welcome to Canada" trended on social media in the country. (dmr) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 The National Polices Criminal Investigation Department (Bareskrim) is scheduled to question former Central Jakarta mayor Sylviana Murni as a witness in an alleged graft case on Monday. Sr. Comr. Adi Deriyan, head of corruption directorate at Bareskrim, said Sylviana would be questioned regarding alleged corruption in the construction of Al Fauz Mosque at the Central Jakarta mayor office. [The questioning] is scheduled for 9 a.m., he said as quoted by kompas.com. The questioning of the Jakarta deputy gubernatorial candidate would be conducted at Bareskrims corruption directorate office, which is temporarily located at the Indonesian Ombudsman building on Jl. HR. Rasuna Said, South Jakarta. In their investigation into the case, the police have also questioned Jakarta regional secretary Saefullah. The Al Fauz Mosque was built in 2010 and 2011, when Sylvi served as the Central Jakarta mayor. The two-story mosque worth Rp 27 billion (US$2.02 million) was built using the 2010 city budget (APBD). In 2011, the mosque construction project got an additional budget of Rp 5.6 billion. Then Jakarta governor Fauzi Bowo celebrated the opening of the mosque on Jan. 30, 2011, after Saefullah replaced Sylviana as Central Jakarta mayor. It was later revealed in a finance audit conducted by the Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) that there was an excess of budget amounting to Rp 108 million in the development of Al Fauz Mosque in 2011. The Central Jakarta administration has reportedly returned the budget to the Jakarta administrations treasury. Bareskrim chief Comr. Gen. Ari Dono Sukmanto said it was suspected that there had been state losses caused by a shift in building specifications from the projects contract document and the construction process. (ebf) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 Press Council member Nezar Patria, through his lawyers, sent a legal warning letter on Monday to university lecturer and Muslim preacher Alfian Tanjung for accusing him of being a cadre of the banned Indonesian Communist Party (PKI). We rejected and deeply objected a statement by Alfian Tanjung, which has gone viral, one of the lawyers, Kamal Farza, said in a statement. In a sermon at Said Grand Mosque in Tanah Abang, Central Jakarta, on Oct. 1, 2016, Alfian said the Presidential Palace had been occupied by PKI members. The lecturer of Hamka Muhammadiyah University said that among the alleged PKI cadres, Presidential Chief of Staff Teten Masduki, Nezar Patria and House of Representatives member from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) Budiman Sudjatmiko had used the palace for daily meetings held before 8 p.m. (Read also: Presidential Chief of Staff reports university lecturer over PKI accusation) Kamal Farza said Alfians speech, which mentioned Nezar as a PKI cadre, was slanderous. Nezar, who was born in the New Order era [of former president Soeharto], of course has never been a member of the PKI nor a cadre, the lawyer said. As a Muslim, it is impossible that Nezar would fight against Islam, which has become his religion and cultural identity as he was born in Aceh, a region with a strong Islamic tradition in the archipelago, he added. Kamal urged Alfian to revoke the accusation and asked for an apology. But if Alfian does not revoke his statement, we will take legal action, he added. Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Hans Nicholas Jong and Andi Hajramurni (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta/Makassar Mon, January 30 2017 People in Gowa regency in South Sulawesi are experiencing substandard health insurance after the regent, Adnan Purichta Ichsan Yasin Limpo, canceled the regions participation in the National Health Insurance (JKN) program. By pulling the plug on the JKN program in the region, starting Jan. 1, more than 350,000 people who initially signed up for the national health insurance scheme, whether contribution assistance recipients (PBI) or non-PBI participants, have had their health benefits substantially reduced. From the beginning of this year, there have been many complaints from Gowa regency. The people there have complained that they cant seek treatment at hospitals in Makassar when hospitals in the regency cant take care of them, Healthcare and Social Security Agency (BPJS Kesehatan) spokesman IrfanHumaidi told The Jakarta Post. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,500/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 The Social Affairs Ministry is providing shelter to 55 Indonesians deported by several foreign authorities, including Turkey, following arrests conducted because of alleged links to the Islamic State (IS) movement. "We have received several individuals brought in by Densus 88 [the National Police's counterterrorism unit]. Currently, we are handling the third delivery," Social Affairs Minister Khofifah Indar Parawansa said as quoted by Antara news agency on Sunday. The deportees were now in a shelter arranged jointly by the Social Affairs Ministry, the Foreign Ministry and the National Police. (Read also: 220 Indonesians deported from Turkey) Among the individuals was Triyono Utomo, a former mid-ranking Finance Ministry official who was deported from Turkey for attempting to enter Syria to join the radical IS movement with his family. Khofifah said the deportees would receive counseling and trauma healing during their stay at the shelter before being sent home. (dmr) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 Former Central Jakarta mayor Sylviana Murni appeared at the corruption directorate of the National Polices Criminal Investigation Department (Bareskrim) on Monday to obey the summons to an interrogation over a graft case related to the construction of the Al Fauz Mosque. The police said the candidate for the deputy Jakarta governor position was summoned as a witness over alleged corruption in the building of the mosque located by the Central Jakarta mayor's office. Sylvi arrived for her first questioning in the case at about 9 a.m. wearing a white shirt, blue blazer and headscarf, kompas.com reported. Sylvi entered the Indonesian Ombudsman building, where Bareskrims corruption directorate is temporarily located, with a tight escort of three guards. Tension rose when the guards attempted to cut off journalists who tried to interview and take pictures of the candidate. Sylvi kept her head bent over as she entered the police office. (Read also: Police to question Sylviana as witness in alleged mosque graft case) The Al Fauz Mosque was built during 2010 and 2011, when Sylvi served as a Central Jakarta's mayor. The two-story mosque worth Rp 27 billion (US$2.02 million) was built using the 2010 city budget. In 2011, the mosque construction project got an additional allocation of Rp 5.6 billion. It was revealed in a financial audit conducted by the Supreme Audit Agency that excess funds amounting to Rp 108 million were allocated for the development of the mosque in 2011. Bareskrim chief Comr. Gen. Ari Dono Sukmanto said it was suspected the state suffered losses because of a change in building specifications from the projects contract document and the construction process. (ebf) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin News Desk (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Mon, January 30, 2017 PT Pelindo II has promised to make shipping containers out of Tanjung Priok more efficient in a bid to underscore the ports status as an international hub. The state-owned seaport operator would reduce the cost per container by up to Rp 1.5 million (US$112.49), PT Pelindo II president director Elvyn G. Masassya said on Monday. There will be some cargo consolidation. Large ships could stop there, and the logistic costs could compete with Singapore, said Elvyn on Monday, as reported by tribunnews.com, adding that the cost reduction could amount to between Rp 1 million and Rp 1.5 million. (Read also: Tanjung Priok Port sets dwell time benchmark) Previously, exported goods destined for places like Japan or Taiwan would need to pass through Singapore, but in the future, Indonesia want to ship goods directly to such destination countries. Because of the hub status, the shipment of goods will be more efficient, particularly for goods from Java and Sumatra, Elvyn said. He explained that PT Pelindo II did not need to invest to upgrade Tanjung Prioks status to that of an international hub, because both the facilities and the capacity already fulfilled hub requirements. We already have adequate terminals and equipment. We only need to coordinate with shipping companies to inform them that the cost of transit at Tanjung Priok will be lower, he added. (bbn) Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Tue, January 31 2017 Grab Indonesia, a subsidiary of Southeast Asias biggest ride-hailing service Grab, has appointed former National Police chief Badrodin Haiti its new top commissioner. Grab Indonesia managing director Ridzki Kramadibrata said Monday that Badrodin was installed in the new position because of his vast experience working within various government circles. Along with the evolution of the technology sector and of ride-hailing platforms in Indonesia, Pak Badrodin will guide and ensure Grab contributes constructively to the enforcement of transportation policy and new safety regulations, Ridzki said in a statement. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,500/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Tue, January 31 2017 Former Central Jakarta mayor Sylviana Murni appeared before the National Polices Criminal Investigation Department (Bareskrim) on Monday to undergo questioning over a graft case related to the construction of the Al Fauz Mosque. The police said the candidate running for the position of Jakarta deputy governor was summoned as a witness related to alleged corruption in the building of the mosque located by the Central Jakarta mayors office. Sylvi arrived for her first questioning in the case at about 9 a.m. wearing a white shirt, blue blazer and headscarf, kompas.com reported. Sylvi entered the Indonesian Ombudsman building, where Bareskrims corruption directorate is temporarily located, with a tight escort of three guards. Tensions rose when the guards attempted to cut off journalists who tried to interview and take pictures of the candidate. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,500/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Syafrizaldi (The Jakarta Post) Kerinci, Jambi Tue, January 31 2017 What goes around comes around in the forests of Mount Kerinci, Jambi, where local communities play a big role in preserving the environment. Lush green pine trees adorn hilltops that encircle a vast natural bowl where a major water channel, known as the Batang Merao River, flows down the middle. This river accumulates water that runs down the hills that are part of the communal forests being conserved through local initiatives in Kerinci regency, Jambi. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,500/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin (The Jakarta Post) Tue, January 31 2017 In Yogyakarta, where the monarchy enjoys privileges under its special region status, non-indigenous citizens especially those of Chinese descent are deprived of their right to own land. Although the Constitution guarantees the principle of equality before the law, without central government intervention, this official bylaw that smacks of discrimination is here to stay. The Jakarta Posts Yogyakarta correspondent Bambang Muryanto analyzes the complexity of the issue. Budi Setyagraha, a 74-year-old Chinese-Indonesian, is highly revered by local Muslims as the founder of Indonesias first private sharia lender (BPR), as a nationalist politician and as a philanthropist whose Rp 5 billion (about US$385,000) single donation became the talk of the town. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,500/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Stefani Ribka (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Tue, January 31 2017 Indonesia and the European Union (EU) have concluded the conceptual phase of negotiations for the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) last week, opening a new page for the third round of negotiations that will deepen into technicalities, especially on market access. Negotiations for the agreement, initiated in 2009 to improve trade, investment and training cooperation between the two parties, had been stuck at a scoping paper submitted in 2012 but was finally agreed upon last year under the President Joko Jokowi Widodo administration. Agreement of the scoping paper was then continued with the first round of negotiations in Brussels last September and the second round last Tuesday to Friday in Bali. However, both negotiations merely touched the surface and had yet to discuss trade technicalities. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,500/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Prima Wirayani (The Jakarta Post) Jakarta Tue, January 31 2017 Banks customer base offers lucrative marketing access for life insurers, especially with regard to the type of affluent customer that can jack up the life insurance business. Zurich Topas Life, a local unit of Switzerland-based Zurich Insurance Group Ltd., is engaging with Chinese commercial lender Bank of China to develop a bancassurance partnership on the basis of their shared customer segment. We focus on the mass affluent and affluent segments, Zurich president director Peter Huber told a press briefing recently. to Read Full Story SUBSCRIBE NOW Starting from IDR 55,500/month Unlimited access to our web and app content e-Post daily digital newspaper No advertisements, no interruptions Privileged access to our events and programs Subscription to our newsletters We accept Register to read 3 premium articles for free Already subscribed? login Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Nestor Corrales (Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN) Manila Mon, January 30, 2017 Amid the result of a recent poll showing that 8 in 10 Filipinos want the country to assert its right on the disputed seas, the Philippine government said that it is not giving up on the issue, but just taking a soft landing approach. The Philippine government is not giving up its sovereign rights over disputed territories in the West Philippine Sea, a Palace official said on Friday. What the President is doing is asserting it but in a different diplomatic style, Abella told reporters in a Palace briefing on Friday. Abella made the statement after a Pulse Asia poll showed that 84 per cent of the surveyed Filipinos believed the government should assert its claim over the disputed sea as stated on the ruling of the Permanent Court of Arbitration. The Palace official quoted a statement of Defence Secretary Delfin Lorenzana saying the government has chosen a soft landing approach in dealing with the issue after the July 12 decision of the United Nations Permanent Court of Arbitration favouring the Philippine diplomatic protest against China. If you remember, when the ruling was promulgated in July 12, we got a lot of bragging from countries that we should forcefully assert the ruling in favour of the Philippines. But our government chose instead to have soft landing. The President chose to have bilateral talks with the Chinese government, which gave us some advantage, Abella quoted Lorenzana as saying. The President has said that he is not giving up our claims in the EEZ [exclusive economic zone] according to UNCLOS [United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea]. It just so happens that the Chinese government has reclaimed three of the islands there and they also have a presence in Scarborough, he added, still quoting the defence chief. President Rodrigo Duterte has repeatedly said in his public speeches that he would not wage a war with China over the maritime dispute, saying he would seek soft landing in dealing with the issue. In October, Duterte embarked on a four-day state visit to China, engaging on a bilateral talk with President Xi Jinping. This article appeared on the Philippine Daily Inquirer newspaper website, which is a member of Asia News Network and a media partner of The Jakarta Post Share this article Whatsapp Facebook Twitter Linkedin Panca Nugraha (The Jakarta Post) Mataram, West Nusa Tenggara Mon, January 30, 2017 17:09 2105 9b519824cb3263083aedb70a0bd5c8d6 1 News Xplorin,state-owned-enterprises,tourism,#tourism Free The State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) Ministry has launched a digital platform that aims to provide an all-in-one tourism service at Killa Senggigi Hotel in West Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) on Friday to support the goal of 20 million tourists by 2019. Inaugurated by SOEs Minister Rini Soemarno, Xplorin is available on both website xplorindonesia.com and via the mobile app to assist tourists in Indonesia. Initiated by PT Indonesia Tourism Development Corporation (ITDC) and Pertamina's hotel operator PT Patra Jasa, the platform features tourism-related services, such as destination profiles, transportation access and hotel information. "Xplorin is a real breakthrough and a concrete example of SOEs synergy in supporting the national tourism industry's growth," said Rini. (Read also: Big plans in store for Indonesia tourist destinations) The target of 20 million tourists by 2019 is expected to contribute up to 8 percent to the national gross domestic product (GDP) and to the foreign exchange by up to Rp 240 trillion (US$18 billion), as well as open employment opportunities in tourism for 13 million people. The app is now available on Google Play and is expected to reach 3.5 million community members and travelers. During the initial phase, PT ITDC director Abdulbar M. Mansoer said Xplorin would be connected to hotels owned by SOEs across the country. "We will push this digital platform to include more SOEs, such as national flag carrier Garuda Indonesia, state-owned seaport operator ASDP Indonesia and SOE banks," he said. (kes) Over the last few years, Ive developed a certain pattern for whenever Jonathan Safran Foer or his writing come up in conversation. First, I admit that Ive read all of his books and liked them. Second, I provide the caveat that I was a teenager when read them and havent looked at them since. Third, I say that I still stand by Eating Animals and find it to be an interesting piece of literary journalism, but that, of course, I no longer have a high opinion of his fiction. Much of the literary community seems to feel the same way, if they were ever on his side in the first place. Cursory research indicates that even at the beginning of his career he was a polarizing figure, winning awards and making end-of-the-years lists alongside middling reviews in The New Yorker and The New York Times. This time around, it seems a little more universal. Here I Am received negative reviews from The Boston Globe, The Atlantic, The New Republic, and many other prominent outlets. Is the book that much worse than his others? Or are we just different? My first encounter with Foers work was in an English class my junior year of high school. After reading many of the canonical American works Catcher in the Rye, Beloved, etc. we closed out the year with Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. The book is about a nine-year-old boy, Oskar Schell, whose father passed away in the September 11th terrorist attacks. I was around that age in 2001 and had similar youthful difficulty making sense of what happened. Unlike much of the other work that I had read in English classes up to that point, I felt like I really understood what it was trying to do. The novel was also built on a series of formal techniques that I had not seen before. He dispersed letters from grandparents throughout the narrative and used photographs in contexts that seemed unconventional. These elements created the illusion of complexity, which dazzled me at the time. The summer after this class, I read Everything Is Illuminated. In it, a character named Jonathan Safran Foer sets out to Ukraine to learn about a woman who saved his grandfathers life during the Holocaust. Just like Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, it switches between two storylines, and just like Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, it resonated with me deeply. I had never read anything else like it. In the years since this, I have come to think about these novels as sentimental and emotionally manipulative works. It does not take a particularly good writer to make the story of Oskar Schell an emotionally resonant one. The same goes for the story of (the fictional) Jonathan Safran Foer in his first novel. Centering books around flashpoints of international trauma is a quick way to the heart of a reader, and there is something about the way he does it that does not feel earned. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, for example, uses 9/11 as a prop to make its narrative heavier and more believable. His father could have died any other way, and he still could have found the envelope with the word Black on the front, and he still could have gone on his adventure. Perhaps, outside the specter of international trauma, it would be unbelievable that all these strangers are willing to speak with this child, but it is unbelievable within the specter of international trauma, anyway. In fact, the collective trauma has nothing to do with why people are so open to him, because in the end the reader learns that it was his mother pulling strings for him the whole time that made it possible. Similarly, Everything is Illuminated relies heavily on the fictionalized history of the real town of Trochenbord, an exclusively Jewish shtetl located in Poland before the Nazis and the Soviets invaded during World War II. Almost all of the residents were murdered before the Holocaust ended. But replacing the real history with an imagined one turns a town that experienced tragedy into a device that coerces sympathy from the reader. The book takes the name and weight but leaves the substance behind, repurposing real-world suffering into a gimmick. Still, I couldnt deny that I found his books deeply moving, and if art is deeply moving, is it possible that it failed? If the impact is there, does it matter whether the writer earned it or not? They were gimmicks and tricks and manipulative, yes, but does it matter that they work? It has been six years since I read his fiction, and it has been 11 years since he has published any. I was curious to see how his writing has changed over the years, as my perception of his work also changed. To bridge the gap between perception and reality, I read his new book. Here I Am is a much more straightforward family novel than his prior two. The three central conflicts are also basically familial: Jacob and Julia, middle-aged parents of three, are spiraling toward divorce. Sam, their eldest, is 13 but does not want to have his bar mitzvah. Isaac, the great-grandfather, is deciding whether he wants to kill himself or be moved to a nursing home. These three conflicts are done well, or at least well enough. Foers dialogue is also strong, crackling with energy reminiscent of gatherings with my own Jewish family. He proves especially proficient in busy scenes with more than two speaking characters. However, there are long stretches of time when nobody is speaking, and interiority is not his strong suit by any means. Julias inner life is constructed particularly poorly. The writing is overwrought and leans on lists of superficial opinions to create the illusion of character depth, and sometimes it borders on unreadable. When he is willing to allow actions to characterize her, they are bizarre and unbelievable. Once, she asks Jacob to stare at her vagina in order to bring her to orgasm, which works. Another time, she masturbates with a doorknob she got from a hardware store. These moments are predictably unconvincing. As if to prove that his sexual misunderstanding is not sexist, he also devotes an enormous amount of page space to men thinking about their penises and talking about them with other men. These also fail to appear believably on the page. The major events of the book are similarly hard to believe. About 275 pages into the book, there is a major earthquake in the Middle East, causing devastation in Israel, Jordan, and other surrounding countries. This leads to a series of events that make sense if you squint and are maybe a little drunk, including a total and unconditional withdrawal of Israeli soldiers and citizens from occupied territories and the unification of Jordan and Saudi Arabia into Transarabia. All of this leads to pretty much every country in the region declaring war on Israel. The point of this, of almost starting World War III, is not to highlight the instability in the Middle East or the danger citizens of the region face or to even add to the conversation about Israel and its relationship with those around it. Instead, the point of this is to highlight the dissonance involved in being an American Jew, and specifically being Jacob, an American Jew who feels like a feckless wimp because he is a feckless wimp and struggling to bear the weight of how manlier men see him. And all of that is very bad. It feels wrong in the moment, and the more one thinks about it, the worse it gets. It is, in a lot of ways, exactly the issue I started to see in his work as I grew up a little and read a lot more. The tragedy that is supposed to give the book its power is a shortcut, a way of giving the book emotional muscle without doing any weightlifting. Still, I cant avoid the way I felt at the end. Once the utter bullshit of the war falls away, once we are back with the family, the ending works. It is sad, and it made me feel sad. In spite of Foers issues, in spite of the flaws wounding Here I Am, in spite of the fact that its at least 100 pages longer than it needs to be, when I closed the book for the last time, I was genuinely moved. It ends quietly with a scene that is inevitable, but no less excruciating for it. Foer is the writer I thought he was. I have a hard time saying the book failed. Maybe Foers project is bad, or too sentimental. But if he was trying to get me to feel something, Id be lying if I said it didnt work. Its been another banner year for independent cinema in Park City, Utah, and weve tried to round up all the best and brightest looking soon-to-be releases. And with Netflix and Amazon both spending record amounts at this years Sundance Film Festival, you can bet that 2017s indie greats will likely be hitting more screens than ever before. TV and computer screens that is, with the two streaming giants mopping up pretty much all of the biggest deals around, meaning that most of this next gen of festival faves may well be bypassing cinematic release altogether. Its a move that really goes to show just how much the distribution model has shifted. Either way, here are our picks, although its worth noting that it was difficult to whittle down, and you can see the full program of films that screened at this years festival here. I Dont Feel at Home in This World Anymore We already raved quite a bit about how Macon Blairs directorial debut is likely to be one of the hidden hits of the year, although now it seems destined to be a little less hidden, picking up the 2017 U.S. Grand Jury Prize, an award thats been won by everything from Primer to Damien Chazelles Whiplash. The plot itself, concerned with a depressed Melanie Lynskey seeking help from her obnoxious neighbour Elijah Wood to investigate her own burglary, seems simple enough, but Blair is the real talent to watch here. Creative sparring partner of new genre favourite Jeremy Saulnier, theres a lot of interesting ideas in the mix with this one, and having picked up the festivals top prize, now we know its likely to be a cracker. And whats more, I Dont Feel at Home in This World Anymore nailed a deal with Netflix for distribution before taking its first bow at the fest, meaning it should be coming to the streaming site in just a months time. Get excited. Ingrid Goes West Another oddball that picked up a top accolade - this time the coveted screenwriting award - this Aubrey Plaza-starring stalker comedy is another that deserves a look-in. Directed and co-written by first-timer Matt Spicer, Ingrid Goes West casts Plaza as a mentally disturbed young woman who chases down her favourite social media star (Elizabeth Olsen), only for things to get increasingly violent. Its a little too genius and current, and with a starring role for Parks and Recs infinitely talented Plaza, consider us firmly sold. With distribution already sorted with Tom Quinn and Tim Leagues new outfit Neon, hopefully well see it really quite soon too. The Discovery Much more of a head-scratcher, Charlie McDowells latest The Discovery boasts an incredible cast on top of an incredible premise. A love story set within a parallel world where the afterlife has been scientifically proven. With McDowells previous Sundance-starring effort The One I Love (on Netflix now and definitely worthy of a watch) already setting the tone for the young directors grounded realist sci-fi style, this looks set to be another home-run. And with Rooney Mara, Jason Segel, Riley Keough, Jesse Plemons and Sundance legend Robert Redford behind it, you know were in for a treat. Bushwick Another sure-fire genre fave in the making, Cooties Cary Murnion and Jonathan Milotts sophmore effort is a single-take extravaganza of home-front action, throwing Brittany Snow and Dave Bautista into a near-future American Civil War. With Texan military forces battling to gain control of Brooklyns Bushwick neighbourhood, the two pair up in order to survive and well, things get a little bloody. Almost entirely filmed at ground-level in long sweeping, invisibly edited shots, it looks set to be a bold and hugely exciting new take on a genre that usually finds itself very much cut to ribbons. And yknow, any excuse to see Bautista running and gunning again. A Ghost Story One of the festivals biggest hits surprisingly enough came from a super secret David Lowery project. Snuck into the festival after being shot quietly with his Aint Them Bodies Saints leads Casey Affleck and Rooney Mara on the money he earned for Disneys family hit Petes Dragon, A Ghost Story is something thoroughly different from the director, but well worth a look out. Almost completely dialogue-less, it tells oddly enough, a ghost story, about a man (Affleck) watching over his grief-stricken lover (Mara) from the spectral plain. Just about as indie as they come, and backed by American heavy-hitters A24 for distribution, this one might even see a jump into the awards-race. Time will tell. Wind River Recent Oscar-nominee Taylor Sheridan, screenwriter behind the likes of Sicario and last years huge hit Hell or High Water, takes the leap to the directors chair with this one, another thoroughly well-plotted thriller that sees Elizabeth Olsen and Jeremy Renner teaming up to investigate a murder on a Native American reservation. Early word is that its another tightly-written mystery from Sheridan, and with the Weinstein Company picking up the distribution rights, expect a potential awards push for this one, especially if Sheridan takes home the screenwriting prize from this years Oscars. Legendary British actor Sir John Hurt died last week at the age of 77. The Golden Globe and BAFTA winning performer, who graced our screens and stages with a series of iconic performances since the 1960s, passed away on Wednesday last week after a lengthy battle with poor health. Contemporary fans will most likely remember him for his turns as wand-maker Olivander in the Harry Potter series, or as the infamous War Doctor in some of the latest episodes of Doctor Who, but as expected, Hurts career charts back a lot further, all the way back to the early 60s. And whilst his first significant film role came in the 1966 multiple-Oscar winner A Man For All Seasons, his career really started to take shape some years later. In 1971 Hurt scored his first BAFTA nomination in a supporting role alongside the great Richard Attenborough in crime biopic 10 Rillington Place, and from there, things really kicked off. By the end of the decade he found himself both a Golden Globe and BAFTA winner, and an Academy Award-nominee for his now classic turns in Midnight Express and David Lynchs The Elephant Man. In between the two he even found time to voice the original Aragorn in Ralph Bakshis early animated Lord of the Rings adaptation, and more notably, to co-star in Ridley Scott and Dan OBannons crazed sci-fi horror Alien. At the time the space-bound creature-feature was something of a gamble, but one that paid off immensely, gifting Hurt with one of his most memorable roles to date. Hes not on screen for long as Kane, but Hurts turn ultimately gave the genre one of its most magnificent twists ever, firmly marking himself out a place in the sci-fi hall of fame. As the 80s took hold Hurt turned towards more thoughtful roles, starring alongside the legendary Laurence Olivier in a TV twist on King Lear, and following it up with a lead turn in Michael Radfords cinematic version of George Orwells literary classic 1984. Similarly around this time Hurt became more and more known for his exemplary voice work, lending his refined tones to the likes of Watership Down and Disneys troubled cult hit The Black Cauldron. This isnt forgetting his occasional slip-ups though either. Hurt himself was the first to admit of his own stinkers, playfully adding that you cant regret it; there are always reasons for doing something, even if its just the location. And even though his work with great directors like Jim Jarmusch, Robert Zemeckis, Guillermo del Toro and Lars von Trier continued all the way through to the 21st-century, he started to become a memorable face around Hollywood in all sorts of varied roles. From even more narrator work, to turns in Hellboy, Indiana Jones, Immortals and Hercules, Hurt never strayed away from the huge blockbusters that started to dominate the markets more and more, instead using them to fund his other pursuits in shorts and smaller projects like Snowpiercer and most recently, Oscar-nominee Jackie. And with four of his latest performances still awaiting release, including a much-hyped turn as Neville Chamberlain in Joe Wrights war-time drama Darkest Hour, were definitely yet to see the end of the acting legend, that is to say, if that is ever possible. No matter what youre watching, whether it be a seminal horror hit, a Shakespearean drama, or frankly just The Tiger Movie, John Hurts endless passion for acting in all its forms will always be present. To quote the man himself, paraphrasing Beckett: Its not enough to die, one has to be forgotten as well, and it feels true that no matter how many years ultimately pass, John Hurt is a name and a legend that will never, ever be forgotten. Many people headed to temples and fairs across China to wish for good fortune at the start of the Lunar New Year. Ethnic Chinese and others around the world have also marked the holiday with celebrations and visits to temples, with large crowds gathered in Hong Kong and Malaysia on Friday night as the holiday began. Here are some of the most beautiful photos of people just having the best time. Malabon Zoo owner Manny Tangco reacts as the giant red rooster from France named Mr Universe spreads its wings as part of the Roosters of the World exhibition to celebrate the Year of the Rooster. (Bullit Marquez/AP) A young girl recites prayers in the Philippines while lighting incense in front of an image of Buddha. (Bullit Marquez/AP) People queue to pray at the Dharma Bakti Temple in the Chinatown area of Jakarta, Indonesia. (Achmad Ibrahim/AP) Dragon and lion dancers perform amidst exploding firecrackers in the Philippines. (Bullit Marquez/AP) A family take a selfie at a temple in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. (Lim Huey Teng/AP) A fire-eater performs on the street during the New Year celebrations. (Bullit Marquez/AP) And finally, people try to catch red envelopes containing cash known as ampao and other items thrown to them following a dragon and lion performance. (Bullit Marquez/AP) Happy Chinese New Year! A white Donald Trump supporter left a $450 (roughly 350) tip for a black waitress along with a powerful note. Washington Post The dentist from West Texas, Jason White, 37, visited a Busboys and Poets restaurant in Washington when visiting for Trumps inauguration. In an interview with the, White said he knew he stuck out in a place where African-American art covered the walls. We rise by lifting others. A lovely act of kindness pic.twitter.com/S01SV3w8ts Busboys and Poets (@busboysandpoets) January 24, 2017 However, the waitress Rosalynd Harris, 25, arrived at work in cheery mood and chatted warmly to White and his friends. When the men finished their meals White left Harris the enormous tip along with a personal message on the bill which was only $72.60 (57.85). Then, after he wrote it, he left a $450 tip - nearly a 625% tip. The bill, posted to the restaurant's Twitter page, read: We may come from different cultures and may disagree on certain issues, but if everyone would share their smile and kindness like your beautiful smile, our country will come together as one people. Not race. Not gender. Just American. Many people have been commending his act of kindness. @busboysandpoets Very nice! random acts of kindness,can be rewarded with a smile or a really "large" gratuity!! Bless this person! Bruce E. McCrady (@mccrady_e) January 26, 2017 @busboysandpoets Great example and reminder to treat everyone with kindness & let each man/woman prove themselves. Thank you for sharing. Pro-Lifer For Trump (@MyPresidentme) January 25, 2017 Airbnb has offered free accommodation to those who could be affected by President Trumps travel ban. The companys chief executive Brian Chesky said that "Not allowing countries or refugees into America is not right, and we must stand with those who are affected. He Tweeted telling those in need of housing to contact him: Airbnb is providing free housing to refugees and anyone not allowed in the US. Stayed tuned for more, contact me if urgent need for housing Brian Chesky (@bchesky) January 29, 2017 This comes after President Trump signed an executive order that will temporarily bar entry to the US for immigrants and visitors from seven countries. This order will last 90 days, and affects Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. This isn't the first time that Chesky has spoken out against Trump. In an interview in 2016, the CEO criticised Trump's plans to build a wall along the United States-Mexico border. Chesky said: Anyone who tries to put up barriers against culture is going to be on the wrong side of history. Founded in 2008, Airbnb currently has over 2,000,000 houses listed in over 190 countries. The second season of "Making a Murderer" will be released later this year, according to Netflix. Cindy Holland, VP of original content for Netflix, spoke about a second season on USA Today: " The story is still ongoing, so you will see new episodes coming sometime this year as the story continues to unfold. We dont know when for sure new episodes will be coming. The true crime series aired on Netflix in 2016 and instantly became a hit. It follows the case of Steven Avery, who is now in prison for life for the murder of Teresa Halbach. Netflix is keen to release a second season following the way the story develops, especially since a new lawyer, Kathleen Zellner, got involved. Not giving the programme an official air date means that the filmmakers Moira Demos and Laura Ricciardi could keep shooting until they feel they have enough material to tell the next step of the story. Laura and Moira are shooting regularly and working on what the right story is to tell in the next set, so were deferring to them on when it will be ready, Cindy Holland said. Very few people inside of Netflix actually know the details of what were getting because were wanting to keep it really under wraps and it is an ongoing case so were trying to be sensitive to that. The first season of Making a murderer is available on Netflix. In October 2014, US premium cable channel Showtime announced that a 90s cult series would return for a limited series in May of this year. A show that not only changed the face of the decade, but television in general. It made weird good, and influenced shows that followed like The X-Files and American Horror Story. This surrealist, soap-operatic CBS drama was Twin Peaks. Aired between 1990 and 1991 and created by David Lynch and Mark Frost, Twin Peaks followed the investigation led by Special Agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) into the sudden and mysterious murder of homecoming queen Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee). The show takes place in the fictional town of Twin Peaks in Washington state, and became a show known for its surrealism, melodramatics and the underside of the American Dream. Twin Peaks was eventually cancelled due to a decline in ratings, but was followed by a feature film in 1992 named Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. From 92, the show has continued to have a strong cult following, making the announcement of a revival series this year even more exciting, especially since the revival is set to include the majority of the original cast members, alongside Frost and Lynch writing and directing. The announcement of a revival gives some semblance as to why Twin Peaks is an important show, but why was it as culturally significant as it was in its original run, and how did it influence television that followed it? The creators behind the series - Frost and Lynch - could be a reason on its own. Frost is known for writing the seminal 80s show Hill Street Blues, often cited as one of the catalysts for Quality TV. Moving away from television, Lynch had already made his name as a surrealist film director, with films like Eraserhead (1977), The Elephant Man (1980), Dune (1986), Blue Velvet (1986) and Wild at Heart (1990). Lynch often focused on exposing the dark side of American culture; Velvet being a major example of revealing the seedy underworld of American suburbia. In Twin Peaks' case, the perfect vision of suburban domestic bliss is disrupted by the murder of Laura Palmer. Frost and Lynch utilise the underbelly of American suburbia alongside a soap-operatic, supernatural surrealist thriller in a small, quiet American town in the early 1990s. Having two creators/directors/writers that occupy the television and film industry resulted in Twin Peaks being filtered through a Hollywood-esque lens with the experimentation within the trope of TV narrative. Whether it be cinematography, music scoring, aesthetics, casting or mise-en-scene, Twin Peaks creates a bridge between television and film; something that would be utilised in The X-Files a few years later. Composer Angelo Badalamenti, a long-time collaborator with Lynch, scores the series' unmistakeable ambience. From Laura Palmers Theme to Audreys Dance to the Twin Peaks Theme itself, they fit themselves within certain scenarios. As you proceed further into the original series, as soon as certain pieces slowly begin to play within scenes, you are instantly given a vague idea of what is about to occur on-screen. Its a unique, soap-operatic inspired trope that I dont believe has been used in any other television show before or since. And if it has, it has definitely not been to the extent that Lynch, Frost and Badalamenti have used it. The music fits hand in hand with the purposefully cheesy acting, dialogue and staging that the show encompasses. Twin Peaks both observes and reacts to the soap opera through satirisation; even including an in-show soap opera under the guise of Invitation to Love. The town of Twin Peaks is in its own bubble, as many towns in soap-operas are. Even without the murder investigation that spurs the entire series, a series on the town itself would easily run into the same surreal path of supernatural lodges and spirits. Throughout its two seasons and the 1992 film, the show kept to its tropes, defiant in the face of viewership figures that declined towards the end. Theres a glimmer of dissuasion with the upcoming revival that the show will be able to hold these tropes as it once did. Twin Peaks was a cultural touchstone of the 1990s, capturing a unique aesthetic for the decade that it formed itself within. Much like The X-Files revival last January, there is always going to be fear surrounding such a cultural touchstone when bringing it back not only to a new decade/century, but a new generation of viewers. But with Lynch, Frost and the majority of the cast returning for these 18 episodes, the worry is beginning to subside. The revival of Twin Peaks will air on 22nd May, a day after the US premiere, on Sky Atlantic. 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Im the great grandson of an immigrant, my great grandmother was from the Ukraine. I have been in contact with those that are helping these refugees and I will do whatever I can to help these people. There is no sense of anger at these protests. People are just standing up for their rights. I dont think President Trump understands the goodness of the American people. Acker said one of his biggest problems with the order is that its not narrowly tailored and that no inter-agency process was followed in reviewing the order before it was signed. The reason why you do that is so you dont have the chaos that we had at the airports over the weekend with the problems enforcing the order, said Acker. The secretary of Homeland Security, to my understanding, had no idea this was going to happen. This is government incompetence. Geoffrey Fieger, of Fieger Law based in Southfield, said the presidents ban is appealing to a specific group Its an incredibly ignorant and short sighted order that may have been appealing to a very narrow minded people that think in terms of black and white, said Fieger. This is an incredibly dangerous order and this falls into exactly what Al-Qaeda terrorists are saying in that we are an anti-muslim nation. When you start acting as a less inclusive country, you are actually promoting what youre trying to fight. President Trumps administration late on Sunday loosened a restriction included in the order allowing re-entry into the country for legal residents holding green cards returning from overseas travel. Homeland Security said those legal permanent residents would be admitted, subject to security checks. The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees customs, border and immigration agencies, struggled to interpret and implement the order over the weekend, according to Reuters. Ian Bolton, owner of Ian Bolton Law based in Southfield, said he would be willing to help. What President Trump is doing is wrong, said Bolton. I dont think the president was prepared for the support many are showing in opposition to this ban including his own lawyers. Religion is at the center of this order. Lawyer: Ban too broad Criminal Defense Lawyer Neil Rockind, owner of Bloomfield Hills-based Rockind Law, said he owes it to his grandparents to help those detained. My background in a way drove me to volunteer, said Rockind. My grandparents were Holocaust survivors and they had to try to beg, borrow and plead to find a way to get people in the United States to accept them when they were young to come into the country. Rockind said this blanket ban is painting with too broad of a brush. Ive always prided myself on the fact that the United States is a place where people who are refugees from oppression and discrimination can come and enjoy the freedoms that we have in this country, said Rockind. The blanket ban of all people regardless of age, race or gender but based on their country of origin is the sort of stuff that takes us back to the 1930s and 40s. He added that this extreme vetting notion is just a ruse in saying theres no such thing as extreme vetting. ACLU donations increase In response the immigration orders banning refugees, the American Civil Liberties Union has been seeing a steady stream on donations being made to their website, which includes $24 million this past weekend. Thats nearly six times the organizations yearly average, according to The Washington Post. Ive never seen anything like this, said ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero to Yahoo News. People are fired up and want to be engaged. What weve seen is an unprecedented public reaction to the challenges of the Trump administration. The ACLU has filed suit to challenge the executive order. The ACLU said in a statement, The suit was filed on behalf of two Iraqi refugees stopped at John F. Kennedy International Airport on the authority of the executive order, and it argues that the order violates due process, equal protection, international law, and immigration law. Ann Donnelly, a federal judge in Brooklyn, said the organization has a strong likelihood of success, according to Yahoo News! RELATED: Thousands march at Detroit Metro, airports nationwide in protest of immigration ban VIDEO: Protests at Detroit Metro Airport on Sunday RELATED: Local leaders, advocates react to Trump refugee executive orders Graft culture in state enterprises under fire BANGOK: The Democrat Party is calling on the government to turn the so-called transnational bribery crisis facing a number of state enterprises into an opportunity to revamp their anti-corruption policy. corruptioncrimeeconomics By Bangkok Post Monday 30 January 2017, 09:29AM Ong-art Klampaibul, deputy leader of the Democrat Party and a deputy chairman of the junta's reform assembly, said the flood of corruption reports is an opportunity to tackle graft at all state enterprises. Photo: Patipat Janthong Deputy party leader Ong-art Klampaibul said yesterday (Jan 29) that the agencies accused of being involved in the recent bribery scandals were all state enterprises, including Thai Airways International, PTT Plc, Metropolitan Electricity Authority, Provincial Electricity Authority and TOT Plc. This reflects a serious corruption problem affecting state enterprises, he said. Citing an observation by an unnamed former member of a subcommittee assessing the performance of state enterprises, Mr Ong-art said about 60%-70% of procurement and hiring activities in the state enterprises are tainted with the tea money payments. The news about the transnational bribery scandals involving the Thai state enterprises has damaged the countrys reputation and the government should consider turning the crisis into an opportunity to better tackle graft in state enterprises, he said. He suggested the government improve three key policy areas of state enterprises to better curb corruption. First, he said, the government should ensure transparency and accountability in procurement and hiring procedures. Second, the selection of high-level executives of state enterprises should strictly be based on the merit system, he said. Lastly, in case of future selection of board members for state enterprises, those chosen should be truly knowledgeable, capable and able to contribute to the betterment of the organisations, he said. Once they are free of corruption, the state enterprises will be stronger and become a crucial mechanism to bring about the nation's development, he said. Meanwhile, an opinion survey carried out by Super Poll found most respondents (76.2%) want the government to invoke section 44 of the interim constitution to wipe out corruption. The government has ruled out exercising section 44 specifically in the Rolls-Royce case, amid concerns British authorities are reluctant to hand over certain information, given the large number of agencies said to be seeking details of what happened. About six in 10 of the 1,256 respondents said they learned about the Rolls-Royce bribery scandal from media reports, while 84.6% said they thought the scandal would hurt Thailands reputation, said Noppadon Kannika, director of the Super Poll office. Pheu Thai Party Acting Deputy Secretary-General Anuttama Amornvivat urged the public to join the partys call for a probe into the accumulated budget deficit of B2.3 trillion. She said the people did not see any improvement in the economy despite such a substantial portion of the budget being allocated for government spending. Pheu Thais economic team found that in the next fiscal year 2018 beginning in October, the government plans to run a budget deficit of as much as B450 billion, she said. A vast portion of the budget has been set aside for financing the purchase of military hardware that will not benefit the country in terms of improving its competitiveness, she said. Thailand was recently downgraded for the presence of graft, going from 76th place to 101st in Transparency Internationals 2016 Corruption Perceptions Index, Ms Anuttama added. Read original story here. Motorbike crash in Phuket leaves Swedish man, 50, dead PHUKET: A 50-year-old Swedish man died in the early hours of this morning after crashing his motorbike into an electricity pylon on Sai Yuan Rd in Rawai. accidentsdeathpolicetransport By Yutthawat Lekmak Monday 30 January 2017, 01:32PM Rescue worker attend to the man at the scene of the accident. Photo: Chalong Police Lt Col Sakkarin Sangjaroen of the Chalong Police was informed of an accident at 12:20am today (Jan 30) where it was reported a foreign man had crashed his motorbike into an electricity pylon on Sai Yuan Rd, Rawai. We were told that the man was heading towards Nai Harn when he lost control of his bike on a bend and crashed into the pylon, Lt Col Sakkarin told The Phuket News. He had wounds on his head and his ankle. Nearby was the white Yamaha motorbike he was riding. He was not wearing a helmet. The mans body was taken to Vachira Phuket Hospital, he added. The Swedish Embassy has been notified of the incident. The Phuket News is withholding the mans name until his family have been notified. Phuket road rage incident leads to alleged threats of murder PHUKET: Police are on the hunt for two men who are alleged to have threatened to murder two Thai females following a road rage incident in Thalang earlier today (Jan 30). crimepoliticstransportviolencemurder By Eakkapop Thongtub Monday 30 January 2017, 05:40PM The two women report the incident to police. Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub At 5:25am today, two Thai women reported to Lt Col Sanit Nookhong of the Thalang Police that at 4am two men had threatened to kill them following a road rage incident. One of the women told police that while they were riding their motorbike home from a pub in Thalang, they arrived at the 7-Eleven at Tha Rue when two men, who they described as between 25-29 years of age and riding a pink Yamaha Fino, cut across them and started to verbally abuse them. They then threatened to kill us if we reported them to police, the woman said. We were very frighten and screamed which caused the men to drive away. However, the incident scared us that much that we came here to report it, she added. Lt Col Sanit said, We have made a record of this incident wrote and will search out these two guys so that they face legal action. Phuket Seduction disco fire started in staff change rooms, say Patong police PHUKET: The fire at Seduction disco on Patongs famed Bangla Rd on Saturday night (Jan 29) started in the staff change rooms on the upstairs level of the nightclub, police told The Phuket News today. patongaccidentspolice By Eakkapop Thongtub Monday 30 January 2017, 11:57AM Patong police question witnesses as to what started the Seduction disco fire on Bangla Rd. Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub Patong Police entered the Seduction disco building on Sunday (Jan 29) and carried out preliminary inspections in their investigation into the fire. Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub Patong police question witnesses as to what started the Seduction disco fire on Bangla Rd. Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub Patong Police entered the Seduction disco building on Sunday (Jan 29) and carried out preliminary inspections in their investigation into the fire. Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub Patong Police entered the Seduction disco building on Sunday (Jan 29) and carried out preliminary inspections in their investigation into the fire. Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub Police entered the building yesterday and carried out preliminary inspections in their investigation into the fire, confirmed Lt Col Jongserm Preecha, an investigator with the Patong Police. We have yet to confirm the exact cause of the fire but witnesses reported that the fire started in the change rooms on second floor, Col Jongserm told The Phuket News. We have yet to check CCTV from inside the club. The building has CCTV on every floor throughout the club, which is excellent and will help our investigations greatly, he added. The building is structurally safe, but the fire caused more than B4 million in damage, Col Jongserm said. The tourist-popular nightclub will be closed for months while repairs are carried out, club manager Wichan Phromthong told The Phuket News. The damage is covered by insurance, but the building must be closed for one to two months to carry out repairs and renovations, he said. In the meantime, no staff will lose their jobs, Mr Wichan assured. We have to take care of them. They will be paid while the club is closed and they can return to work when we reopen the club after the repairs are finished, he said. The fire broke out at about 7:45pm, with all guests and staff safely evacuated from the building. No injuries were reported. (See story here.) Additional reporting by Yutthawat Lekmak Russian tourist, 60, slips on rocks, drowns at Kata beach PHUKET: A Russian tourist has died, believed drowned, after witnesses reported seeing him fall from rocks at Kata Beach yesterday afternoon (Jan 29), Phuket police have confirmed. Russianmarineaccidentsdeathpolice By Eakkapop Thongtub Monday 30 January 2017, 11:00AM Tourists at Kata Beach looks on as police and lifeguards attend to Russian tourist Alexsey Hromov. Photo: Eakkapop Thongtub Tourist Police gave the mans name as Alexsey Hromov. Maj Patiwat Yodkwan of the Karon Police said he was informed of the incident at 3:45pm. The man was 60 years old. He was staying at the Kata Beach Resort on holiday with his family, Maj Patiwat told The Phuket News this morning. I was informed that lifeguards at the beach, likely with help from the Royal Thai Navy sea rescue centre there, recovered the man from the water, he said. They performed CPR on him on the beach, but it was too late, he added. Mr Hromov was taken to Vachira Phuket Hospital in Phuket Town, where he was pronounced dead on arrival. I have heard reports that people saw the man walking on the rocks and then vomit before falling into the water, Maj Patiwat said. I was also told that a foreigner snorkelling in the area and a Thai longtail boat driver found him floating near the rocks and pulled him out of the water, but I have yet to confirm all this, he added. Maj Patiwat confirmed that Mr Hromov had scratches on his body commensurate with falling down on rocks. There were no other injuries to his body, he said. At this stage we believe he drowned but we are waiting for doctors to confirm the cause of death, Maj Patiwat said. How many people have already voted absentee in South Dakota ahead of Election Day? elections Global coffee giant Starbucks has said it will hire 10,000 refugees over next five years as it vowed to not "stand silent" in the face of US President Donald Trump's order to ban people from seven Muslim-majority nations and assured it will continue to nurture the human spirit. "I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise. We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question," Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz said in a message in the wake of Trump's order that has upended lives in the US as well as across the globe. Schultz said the company will take specific actions to ensure people around the world that it will "neither stand by, nor stand silent as the uncertainty around the new Administration's actions grows with each passing day." The Starbucks Chief announced that the company has had a long history of hiring young people looking for opportunities and a pathway to a new life around the world. "This is why we are doubling down on this commitment by working with our equity market employees as well as joint venture and licensed market partners in a concerted effort to welcome and seek opportunities for those fleeing war, violence, persecution and discrimination," he said. Schultz said Starbucks is developing plans to hire 10,000 refugees over five years in the 75 countries around the world where it does business, including India. "And we will start this effort here in the US by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support," he said. Starbucks will also strengthen its business in the "critically important market" Mexico, which has been a target of Trump's policies. Schultz said the company has been open for business in Mexico since 2002, and have since opened almost 600 stores in 60 cities across the country, which together employ over 7,000 Mexican partners. "We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same," he said. He also outlined Starbucks' plans to ensure healthcare coverage to its employees in the wake of Trump's plans to scrap Obamacare. "We are in business to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time whether that neighborhood is in a Red State or a Blue State; a Christian country or a Muslim country; a divided nation or a united nation. That will not change. You have my word on that," Schultz said. Trump's executive order, which imposed a minimum 90-day ban on immigrants and refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries (Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen; refugees from Syria have been barred indefinitely), has sparked an outpouring of criticism. Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Sunday questioned Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal on tacit support given by Shiromani Akali Dal(SAD) to Congress party in fight against Aam Aadmi Party(AAP). AAP campaign committee chairman Bhagwant Mann attacked Badal and Sukhbir Badal for hobnobbing with Congress and targeting AAP for sacrilege of holy Guru Granth Sahib. "Sukhbir Badal was home minister of state and he was directly involved in the sacrilege incidents.Before accusing AAP, he should explain why he didnt arrest the guilty," Mann asked. Taking a dig on Sukhbir Badal, Mann said that Sukhbir Badal had vomited truth in his election meetings, though in a slip of tongue. "In Moga district on Saturday, Sukhbir said that SAD was involved in sacrilege incidents and also responsible for disturbing peace in Punjab. Last week he had told the audience in Amritsar that he wanted to make Amritsar most dirty city. Either it was his guilt conscience or influence of drugs, he said. Distinctly different from Mizos in more ways than one, the Reangs, now called Brus, are struggling and debating over a proper recognition of a culture of their own, something which is not only different from that of the Lushais but one that also has an autonomous administrative unit for themselves. The Bru-Mizo conflict originated in October 1997 after an ethnic violence following the killing of a Mizo forest warden by Bru insurgents. The result was exodus of an estimated 40,000 Brus to the adjoining North Tripura district. This episode virtually brought in mutual suspicion between the two Northeastern states. For most parts, the Centres role was that of a silent spectator or at best, sending central forces to help the state control the situation. For quite some time the Brus mounted pressures on the Centre for adequate protection and what was given out were respectable rehabilitation packages. But things moved very slowly. However, once the Modi government came to power in 2014 some changes were made to solve the longstanding problem. The reason, however, was not because of administrative or genuine concerns for the displaced Brus but for some supposed political intent. There are many versions now doing the rounds. One school of thought says both the Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh had categorical instructions from the RSS leadership to act on the Brus front and ensure their proper rehabilitation in the state. The RSS fountainhead believed the disgruntled Brus can be made use of for BJPs own political advantage. Otherwise, wedded to hardcore Hindutva ideology, the BJP remains a pariah in Mizoram. Even as there is an established BJP unit in Mizoram, political watchers in this tiny Northeastern state often jokingly say that lotus will never bloom in the rocks of the Mizo hills. In 2015, some RSS pracharaks from the region met central leaders and urged speedy rehabilitation of the Brus refugees. On this score, the RSS had even counselled the Union Home Ministry that steps need to be taken to give jobs to the dislocated Brus besides ensuring their respec-table rehabilitation in Mizoram. In such a meeting of RSS pracharaks from the Northeast, Union minister for roads and highways, Nitin Gadkari was the trusted RSS pointman assigned to talk to Rajnath Singh and other Central ministers concerned. Lately, the Union Home Ministry gave its nod to allow the Assam Rifles to initiate recruitment of able-bodied Brus evacuees biding their time in Tripura camps. Such a decision became pertinent as the refugees continue to live in camps even after several attempts to repatriate them. Sources in Mizoram say even generous monetary offer by the Congress government led by Lal Thanhawla has failed to persuade the Brus to leave the camps. The Congress sources in Mizoram often allege the RSS, or for that matter, even Narendra Modi regimes love for Reangs is linked to the tribal groups religious affiliation. Reangs have been traditionally animists and even as Christianity has penetrated, a large number of them still follow traditional religion and the local religious doctrine is similar to Hinduism in more ways than one . There are provisions of mantra to be used in socio-religious and cultural occasions. The latent confrontation between forces committed to the spread of Christianity and the traditionalist Brus (or animists) also played a part in widening the difference. In the 1960s and 70s, the Mizos were quite displeased over the presence of non-Christian Brus in their land and the church leaders gave unto themselves the assignment to work for the spread of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The church took initiatives by sending out evangelists and missionaries to the areas where Brus were scattered. According to a senior police officer in Mizoram, who worked among the Brus, the work of the Church paid rich dividends as many Brus embraced Christianity within a short span. In the late 1990s, more than 50 per cent of Brus in Mizoram became Christians. The church spread its influence by opening schools in the remotest areas where Brus stayed and even local Bru students were sponsored for higher studies in Aizawl. Strangely, at a later stage, it was found that most of Bru National Liberation Front leaders were the products of these Church-sponsored schools. It also needs a reference here that the influx of the Brus in the western belt of Mizoram turned into a blessing for some individual politicians and political parties especially the Congress. These disgruntled section soon turned into a powerful vote-bank and thus they were enlisted in the electoral rolls too. The local Mizo version is the Bru numbers in Mizoram increased manifold in 1970s as a large number of them migrated from north Tripura in search of greener pastures. Undoubtedly, the economic conditions in Mizoram for Brus were much better off than in Tripura. Mizos feel ditched and often let down as the Brus resolved in their conference at Saipuilui on 23-24 September 1997 to demand for creation of a separate autonomous district council for themselves inside Mizoram. Now, on the other plane, the Assam Rifles is a renowned anti-insurgency crack force and the government believes enrolling local tribals from the region would give the force an edge in its military operations. According to official forces, for a start, 75 tribal youths from three of the seven relief camps in North Tripura were selected. In fact, the Union Home Ministry mandarins feel a good beginning has been made as the selection of these youths now also fulfill the demand of a prominent and influential intra-tribal group of the Brus. The group has been insisting on such packages that also give respect to the refugees. But it ought to be stated here that repatriation and rehabilitation of Brus are not as simple. There are wheels within wheels. For quite some time, despite an ivory tower experts approach, it must be admitted that the Centre has been trying to help Brus. The home minister and his junior, Kiren Rijiju reviewed the Brus repatriation issue with Tripura Chief Minister Manik Sarkar at Agartala last year. But Lal Thanhawla gave the meeting a slip. However, Aizawl has had made its position clear that the Mizoram government will not accept any Bru who cannot prove his bona fide as the resident of Mizoram. There was an agreement on the issue between the government, all political parties and civil societie groups. It was agreed that only those whose names appeared in the voters lists of 1995 should be accepted, they say. This is another contentious issue. In September 2016, the Mizoram government deputed officials to visit relief camps in Tripura and conduct identification process in all the camps to ensure early resumption of the actual repatriation. Identification processes were carried out in Naisingpara, Asapara, Kaskau, Khakchangpara, Hamsapara and Hazacherra relief camps and steps were also taken to resettle Brus evacuees along the Mizoram-Tripura-Bangladesh border in Mamit district. Now, the official position is, while a number of families have returned, many who remain in the relief camps are merely dictating terms for their return to Mizoram. Employment in paramilitary was one such demand. At least, a beginning has been made. (The writer is a New Delhi-based freelance contributor and can be contacted at [email protected]) Ramesh Gohil, an undertrial in the 2002 Best Bakery riot case, died of heart attack at the Arthur Road Jail here, police said. Gohil died on Saturday, they said. The National Investigation Agency had arrested him in the Best Bakery case in 2013. In March 2002, a mob attacked the Best Bakery in Vadodara during the post-Godhra riots and burnt it down, killing 14 people. After the Vadodara Court acquitted a few of the accused, the Supreme Court ordered a retrial in Mumbai. Four accused, including Ramesh and his father Jayanti, were declared absconding after they failed to appear before the court for the retrial. The NIA arrested them in 2013. Ramesh collapsed while taking a walk inside the prison and was rushed to J J Hospital where he was declared dead before admission, police said. An inquiry would be conducted into his death, officials added. He was cremated in Vadodara. India on Monday handed over to Nepal a cheque for NRs.249 million to help four road projects in the Himalayan country. Indian Ambassador Ranjit Rae handed over the cheque to Nepal's Physical Infrastructure and Transport Minister Ramesh Lekhak in Kathmandu at a function. The amount has been released towards 25 per cent of tendered cost (including 10 per cent mobilisation advance) of the four contracted road stretches. The roads are Birendra Bazaar-Mahinathpur, Janakpur-Yadukuwa, Manmat-Kalaiya-Matiarwa (0-15 km road), and Manmat-Kalaiya-Matiarwa (15-26.660 km road). The projects are being implemented under Postal Highway Project in Nepal with the Indian government grant assistance of NRs.8,000 million, an official statement said. Two roads Dhangadhi-Bhajaniya-Satti road and Lamki-Tikapur-Khakraula road constructed with Indian government's grant assistance worth NRs.1,020 million were inaugurated on January 19, 2017, at Dhangadhi in western Nepal, jointly by Indian Ambassador Rae and Minister Lekhak. These roads are India's flagship assistance projects, while Postal Road Project is key for the development of Nepal's Tarai region. India has been assisting Nepal in upgradation of 1,450 km of roads under the Postal Highway Project. Identified as strategic road network, the first phase aims to construct 19 roads of 605 km length at a cost of $166 million. Winding up his tenure in New Delhi, US Ambassador to India Richard Verma recently hosted a dinner here attended by Union Minister Kiren Rijiju and Prime Minister of the Tibetan government-in-exile Lobsang Sangay, a move that has raised objections in China. The dinner was hosted by Verma on January 15 for his visiting friend and Hollywood actor Richard Gere, in what may signal prominence to the Tibet issue in international fora. The high-profile event was also attended by officials from both India and the US, besides a few Tibetan leaders. Rijiju, Minister of State for Home Affairs, tweeted about the January 15 event yesterday along with a picture showing Sangay and Gere among others. "Nice meeting my dear friend Richard Gere again. Thank you HE Richard Verma for a wonderful dinner & great tenure as USA Ambassador to India," Rijiju tweeted. "Both of them are great friends of India and contributed a lot in many areas," the minister said. Reacting to the event, Chinese Foreign Ministry told PTI in Beijing that "No country in the world recognises the so-called Tibetan government-in-exile". "We are firmly against any country's official contact with it in any form, and resolutely opposed to any country's interference in China's internal affairs by using Tibet- related issues as an excuse," the Foreign Ministry said. The presence of Tibetan leaders at the dinner has brought the focus back on the issue of Tibet's sovereignty as China routinely protests visits and meetings of Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama and his associates saying it constitutes meddling in its internal affairs. In October last year, China had objected to Verma's visit to Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh which Beijing claims as southern Tibet, saying any interference by Washington in the Sino-India boundary dispute will make it "more complicated" and "disturb" hard-won peace at the border. Last month, China took strong exception to the Dalai Lama's meeting with President Pranab Mukherjee at Rashtrapati Bhavan during a children's summit. Hearing in the defamation case against Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi, in connection with his alleged remarks accusing the RSS of assassinating Mahatma Gandhi was adjourned till March 3. The trial is underway at Maharashtras Bhiwandi court, where Rahul Gandhi was present on Monday. The court had in November 2016 granted bail to the Congress leader on the basis of personal surety. "Will be in Bhiwandi this morning before heading to Goa," Rahul Gandhi had tweeted earlier in the day. The case against the Congress Vice President was filed by a Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) functionary, Rajesh Kunte, over his speech in Bhiwandi on March 6, 2014. During his party's rally the Congress leader had allegedly then said: "The RSS people had killed Gandhi." The court had granted him bail after he appeared before it at the last hearing. General Bipin Rawat, the present Chief of Army Staff (COAS), brought up the cold start doctrine in his first press conference drawing adverse reactions from Pakistan. The reactions varied from the military being fully prepared to defend Pakistan against any misadventures, to employment of all resources, including nuclear, to thwart Indian plans. The doctrine was initially enunciated post mobilization following the attack on Parliament, wherein India took three weeks to be ready for operations, giving the Pakistani army sufficient time to deploy its defensive forces, hence losing any element of surprise. That mobilization remained an exercise in futility. The recent revival of the doctrine has been due to prevailing Indo-Pak tensions. Primarily, Pakistan has continued with its policy of supporting anti-India terror groups. Mumbai, the Parliament attack and more recently, Pathankot, Uri and Nagrota indicate that a time would arrive when the Indian threshold of patience would be crossed and there would be demands for action. The surgical strike, post Uri, did convey a message; however it may not always be the solution. In such a scenario, India would be compelled to act with greater force. Because Pakistan is nuclear-armed and is supported diplomatically and militarily by China, deep forays into territory could trigger panic, leading to a nuclear war which would be devastating for both nations. This is because Pakistan lacks depth to absorb an Indian offensive and is inferior in conventional forces. Hence operations need to be planned and kept below the nuclear threshold. Simultaneously, Indian troops need to mobilize and move into Pakistan before it has time to deploy its major defensive formations. In peace time, the borders are manned by the Border Security Force on the Indian side and by the Rangers on the Pakistani side. There are no minefields as farmers till their lands almost up to the international border. The army only moves in and occupies defences once war is imminent. Minefields and other war preparations are conducted thereafter. Thus, speed in launching the offensive is essential. Hence emerges the cold-start doctrine, implying launching operations with speed and secrecy, making forays into Pakistan and keeping the depth of incursions below nuclear threshold levels, and before Pakistan deploys its defensive formations. These operations, led by mechanized forces, are ideally suited for the plains and desert sectors. For such an operation to be successful, there are certain prerequisites. Firstly, most columns being armour-heavy would need to be quartered in cantonments close to the border, thus reducing mobilization time. Secondly, joint operations are an essential ingredient. Operations based on cold start, involving surprise and speed, require close coordination between the army and the air force. They should be employed in tandem, rather than at cross purposes. Hence, a unified command, wherein the resources of the sector of both the army and air force are under one commander, is essential. This would ensure synergy and optimization of resources. Finally, for such a capability to be effective, the maintainability of equipment and availability of ammunition to desired levels is essential. Shortfalls in either would hamper success. As per press reports, India has planned to deploy its latest and most lethal tanks, presently under procurement from Russia, in cantonments close to the border. Pakistan on the other hand faces problems. Many of its reserve formations are deployed on its western borders, battling militancy. For these formations to disengage and re-locate would take time, which would be crucial. Their defensive formations are deployed closer to their border than India, hence can move faster. However, the element of surprise is always with the attacker, who determines his area of thrust and timing, compelling the defender to react. Since Pakistan lacks depth, even shallow forays would indicate a failure for its military. Therefore, it continues to threaten India with a nuclear strike. Nuclear options, despite ranting and raving or even declaring a first-use policy, are serious decisions for any nation as retaliation in greater measure could be expected. While Pakistan has deployed tactical nuclear weapons at lower levels, it would seriously need to consider its employment. Decisions for its employment would flow after considerable territory has been lost. Since Indian forces would have crossed the border, and spread over a large area, tactical nuclear weapons would most likely impact their own personnel rather than stem an offensive. To target Indian cities would not be an easy decision. Indias intentions in case of such operations would be to convey a strong message to Pakistan, China and the international community, about Pakistans actions having crossed the threshold of tolerance. For conveying such a message, India need not foray very deep within Pakistan, thereby justifying use of nuclear weapons nor seek to destroy its domestic fabric. Shallow incursions would be sufficient. This would leave them in a quandary. In any case, world pressure to stall the offensive would flow almost simultaneously. For launching and ensuring success, perfect planning, coordination and seamless execution is essential. The structures necessary to ensure this as also the wherewithal need to be in place. Sufficient rehearsals must be conducted and plans finely tuned. The fear of nuclear fallout should be the last consideration, as the intention would not be to hold territory for an eternity nor for bargaining, as in previous wars, but to convey that India will not tolerate attacks on its soil supported by Pakistan. Initial tactical nuclear strikes, if launched by Pakistan in fear of failure, would be on their soil itself. If operations are correctly planned and executed, the military would have achieved its objective, before world pressure builds on India to stop and pull back. Pakistans rhetoric of nuclear strikes would then remain mere ranting and raving. (The writer is a retired Major-General of the Indian Army.) Indias general Budget 2017-18 will be interesting for a variety of reasons. It would be a first for two major reasons ~ inclusion of Railway Estimates in the General Estimates and abolition of the Plan and non-Plan distinction. How would each of these alter the complexion of the Budget? Are these the only challenges? Indian Railways (IR) currently runs operating ratios that are over 90 per cent. This leaves precious little for new capital projects and extension, even less for maintenance, additions to rolling and motive stock and accretion to reserves while deferred dividends would continue to multiply. With a general turndown in manufacturing activity, freight revenues would sag substantially. For instance, the declining demand from high-tension energy consumers has caused several major coal-fired thermal power plants to back down. In turn, this is reflected in Coal India's stagnant, even declining, production figures. The same holds true for almost all other ores and equivalents that account for perhaps half of the freight earnings. Although global commodity prices have taken a severe knocking and even anti-dumping duties are not too serious a deterrent, yet with an overall decline in manufacturing activity, reduction in bulk imports will invariably have a negative fallout on IR's freight revenue. At the same time, the commercial exploitation of Railway land and immovable assets has major limitations. For one, audit, vigilance and investigation can justifiably scare away proposing officers. Second, much of such assets, notably land, are located in areas where land prices are already low owing to lack of demand. Encroachment over the decades has substantially reduced the price and availability even more. On the passenger front, a rapidly expanding budget and feeder airlines are steadily gnawing at air-conditioned class travel. Volvo and long-distance sleeper buses offering dynamic fares on point-to-point connectivity between passenger railheads would probably add to the further diminution of Railway revenues. Safety and comfort remain standing bugbears for passengers. Inter-city bus services, run by states and private operators, have also been steadily adding to their fleets and augmenting the number of daily services, something IR is unlikely to be able to match. Clearly, all these will cast a tremendous negative impact on the General Budget. The second issue is a welcome step, having been proposed by the Dr C Rangarajan Committee about five years ago. However, there are several grey areas, notably in recognising capital and revenue items that are governed mainly by the woolly distinction between the two items laid out in Rule 79 of the General Financial Rules (GFRs), 2005. At present, there are several thousand project and contract posts that are funded from capital funds and get carried over from project to project, oblivious of their often eternal timeliness, assuring lifetime career opportunities. There are many revenue expenditure-based projects, such as in the R&D category, that include high-value project stores and several thousand personnel that ought to be classified as capital expenditure but are not, even though such R&D projects/establishments work to create permanent assets for India. If the revenue-capital divide is indeed genuinely enforced, shouldn't the governments permanent assets be valued and revalued every five years as well? These are national assets, after all. GFR 79 is so loosely worded that it is subject to convenient interpretation/re-interpretation. How would the new classification change the way business is done in the government? Would it result in more capital expenditure? Past practice is not very encouraging for a guide. However, there are other major challenges, far greater than these two issues. Several economic and policy factors may severely constrain public expenditure proposals in the forthcoming budget. The deepening manufacturing crisis (including the real estate and infrastructure sectors) would exert an adverse pressure on excise and other related revenues. With a large decline in business earnings by falling sales (such as the automotive sector by a fourth), the contribution of corporate taxation in real terms would decline. The gradually reviving global oil prices over the 2014 levels are already exerting pressure on oil PSU margins and will reduce dividends available for transfer to the Government of India. With manufacturing in the doldrums, non-oil PSUs too are hard-pressed to meet the rising demand for unsustainable dividend from the government and buy-back of government shares that would have added to non-tax revenues. Coal companies, for instance, have been hit by the backing down of many coal-fired power stations owing to low industrial consumer demand and the shift to alternative energy sources. The delay in implementing GST would only add, in substantial measure, to the dearth of the governments fiscal resources. Public sector banks (PSBs), that have been assured Rs 70,000 crore over 2016-20 by the Government of India, need much more for achieving Basel-IV norms of liquidity that is unlikely to be available. At the same time, recovery suits are bogged down in mostly understaffed Debt Recovery Tribunals while the volume of NPAs is steadily rising. If corporate debt restructuring (CDR) cases were added, the real volume of NPAs could potentially skyrocket. To these can be added the giant public deposits arising from remonetisation on which banks would have to fork out 4-5 per cent interest per annum. The lowering of lending rates for commercial borrowers seems to have limited takers owing to low consumer demand. In effect, the banks would be saddled with idle funds on which 4-5 per cent interest at least would be payable. Any further rise in US Federal bank rates carry a potential backward migration of foreign investments in India, particularly those that have no long-term moorings. A major set of reasons for the scarcity of government funds is the overweening emphasis on revenue generation by sale/lease of state/natural resources such as telecom spectrum and FM stations. The entire process of public auction to the highest bidder is ruinous, indeed antithetical, to the interest of the nation. Such assets are public properties to be devoted to the common good. A deliberate decision of the government to arrive at a minimum reserve price for spectrum, for instance, after factoring certain conditions, such as embargo on mobile call/data tariff plans beyond 5 per cent per annum, specified density/sq km of mobile towers, downtime/slow speed penalties, free Internet connectivity for educational and health institutions, 50 per cent tariff (of urban tariffs) for rural and semi-rural areas, etc., would have pegged the price of spectrum to more realistic levels as would a reverse price auction from such a benchmark. This would also have partly offset malfeasance in very large revenue-sharing deals and made monitoring of contracts relatively easier. This was a major reason why the recent spectrum auction was able to collect barely 10 per cent of the targeted licence fee and which left a gaping hole in the Centre's projected finances by nearly Rs 6 lakh crore. This plagued the auction of FM stations too. Furthermore, there are pending wage revisions, both in the public sector as also in states as a cascading effect of the partial acceptance of the 7th Central Pay Commission's recommendations by the Government of India. Another major sector is the defence services that need urgent upgrades in war material, technologies and provisions. Central and state police forces too need proportionate upgrades. Even the Make-in-India programme for the defence services would demand guaranteed defence purchase budget allocations and waiver of competitive bidding for a private entrepreneur to invest several thousand crore rupees in captive manufacturing facilities for at least 20-25 years (like the Maruti-Suzuki ancillary units in Gurugram in the 1980s and 1990s). The same would hold true of all sectors where government purchases alone would sustain private manufacture. Budgetary uncertainties would equally affect defence PSUs like GRSE, BEL, BDL, etc., that mostly live off government-funded orders from the defence services, more so if they have to compete with private manufacturers of military terrestrial transport and the like. In fact, the only way Make-in-India may succeed is by a giant scale of operation, akin to the Chinese model, from where it was evidently borrowed and given the Indian moniker. The challenges are gargantuan and solutions not facile. Second-hand bargain hunting, vintage solutions and accounting ingenuity are no longer options in circumstances that are not far less in magnitude from the 1990-91 crises. (The writer is a senior public policy analyst and commentator) Six people died and eight were injured after gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque, a shooting that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned on Monday as a "terrorist attack." Police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told journalists that two suspects were arrested following the attack, that police were also treating as an act of terrorism. Trudeau said in a statement that "we condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge." "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, city and country." According to witnesses interviewed on local television, two masked gunmen entered the cultural center around 7:15 pm yesterday. The motive of the attack was not immediately clear. Police quickly set up in the mosque's vicinity. Coulombe said those killed were between ages 35 and 70. Police did not rule out the possibility of a third suspect who had fled the scene. "It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence," Trudeau said. "Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear." Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said in a series of Twitter posts that the government was "mobilized to ensure the security of the people of Quebec." "Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence," he wrote. "Solidarity with Quebec people of Muslim faith." Police stationed near the mosque told AFP that they had been preparing for this type of attack "because it's happening all over the world." "I don't understand why here it's a small mosque," said a man who was inside the center at the time of the attack. "It's not Montreal or Toronto." The mosque has already been the target of hate: a pig's head was left on the doorstep last June during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Other mosques in Canada have been targeted with racist graffiti in recent months. The attack comes as Canada has vowed to open its arms wide to Muslims and refugees after US President Donald Trump's controversial immigration ban Friday sparked travel chaos and outrage around the world. Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of Trump's order, the immigration ministry said Sunday. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. Trump has suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The Afghan Air Force killed three Taliban militants in the country's northern province of Kunduz, an army source said on Monday. The air force struck on Sunday night at a Taliban hideout in Hajji Nawab locality, killing the three and injuring four others, Xinhua news agency reported. A Taliban bunker and some weapons were also destroyed in the air strike. Mohamed Abrini, the suspected "man in the hat" bomber caught on camera during the Brussels airport attack last year, has been charged in France over the November 2015 Paris terror attacks, the media reported. According to a BBC report on Monday, Abrini was handed over to French authorities by Belgium for questioning about the Paris attacks that left 130 dead, Belgian federal prosecutors said in a statement. He was detained last April for his suspected involvement in the March 22 Brussels attacks, which killed 32 people, and the Paris killings, both of which were claimed by the Islamic State militant group. "In the framework of the investigation related to the attacks in Paris on November 13, 2015, Mohamed Abrini was surrendered to the French judicial authorities for a period of one day," the prosecutor's office said in a statement. Abrini was spotted in a car with key Paris suspect Salah Abdeslam when it stopped at a petrol station in Ressons two days before the attacks on the French capital. His fingerprints and DNA were found in two "safe houses" in Brussels, as well as in a car used during the Paris attacks. Following his arrest, he also admitted picking up Salah Abdeslam after the attacks and driving him back to Belgium. Mohamed Abrini was driven to Paris from Belgium in a heavily-armed convoy so the case against him could be formally launched, BFMTV reported. Miss France took her first walk as Miss Universe after she was announced the winner by host Steve Harvey at Mall of Asia Arena in Philippines. India's Roshmitha Harimurthy couldn't even make it to the top 15. Former Miss Universe Pia Wurtzbach crowned the 23-year-old Iris Mittenaere who was born in northern French town of Lille. Mittenaere has kept herself busy the last five years by pursuing her degree in Dental Surgery. Mittenaere has also been always fond of extreme sports, travelling the world and cooking new French dishes. Miss Haiti was announced the first runner-up while Miss Columbia was named the second runner-up. The last time an Indian won the Miss Universe crown was Lara Dutta in 2000. Other Indians who won the title in the past includes Sushmita Sen in the year 1994, who was also the part of judging panel in the current edition. The 65th edition of Miss Universe pageant is definitely raising global issues that need attention, including Donald Trump presidency and the ban on refugees that TV host and comedian Steve Harvey asked the final six contestants. Trump's ascension as the US President has received both support and dislike from different parts of the world. Harvey asked the contestant of Kenya what was she most excited about and what most concerns her when it comes to the Trump presidency. In her reply she said: "Donald Trump having been elected as president of the US may not be the choices of many because of the divided support system for the outgoing president Barack Obama who was supporting a woman contender (Hilary Clinton). So many people oppose his position but I feel once Trump took over, he has a unified the entire nation. Thank you very much." Harvey's next question was for Miss Thailand. "Given today's worldwide refugee crisis, do countries have an obligation to accept refugees or do they have the right to close their border?" he said. To which Miss Thailand replied: "Government has the right to open or close the borders and people can choose. In Europe we have open borders and in France, we have biggest exchange of people. May be someday it will change but currently we have open borders. It allows us to travel more around the world and help people connect." Harvey also raised the question on violence and asked Miss Columbia: "Why do you believe that violence is so prevalent in today's society and what can we do about it?" She replied saying: "I come from the country where we don't have violence and this was my reference point and I know presidents who don't get along with others I feel,.. campaign, respect inclusivity and to be able to have social transformation that will educate our children (is important)." The United Nations' High Commissioner for Human Rights on Monday denounced as illegal and mean-spirited the United States' visa ban on citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries. The official Twitter account for the UN Human Rights agency quoted its Chairman Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein as saying "discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law", efe news reported. Donald Trump's executive order bans US visas to citizens of Muslim-majority Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Syria for a period of at least 90 days. "The US ban is also mean-spirited, and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism," al-Hussein added. Trump's immigration order on Friday also saw the US suspend its refugee programme for a period of 120 days with the aim of restructuring the process to prevent visas from being issued to potential terrorists. Visas for Syrian asylum seekers would be indefinitely put on hold, according to the presidential order. The policy drew immediate protest from international institutions such as the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the international organisation for migration (IMO), which on Saturday petitioned the US government to uphold its long tradition of offering asylum to those fleeing conflict. In a joint statement, the two agencies said they "hope that the US will continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution." UN sources estimate that since October 2016, the US has admitted 25,600 refugees. According to the nation's Refugee Processing Center, the US accepted 85,000 refugees in the 2015-16 fiscal year. The country is also the world's biggest financial contributor to the UNHCR, investing roughly $1.5 billion into that institution in 2016, much more than the European Union ($341 million), Germany ($284 million) and Japan ($164 million). 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. North Main Street is shown on Feb. 1, 2015: It was cold with plenty of snow. Job Title: Security Officer West Nile Organisation: World Vision International Reports to: Response Manager Duty Station: Uganda About Us: World Vision Uganda is a Christian Relief, Development and Advocacy Non-Government Organization dedicated to working with children, families and communities to overcome poverty and injustice. We currently work in over 41 districts in Uganda. World Vision is committed to the protection of children and we will not employ people whose background is not suitable for working with children. All employment is conditioned upon the successful completion of all applicable background checks, including criminal record checks where possible. Our Vision for every child, Life in all its fullness. Our prayer for every Heart, the will to make it so. Job Summary: The Security Officer will support the Response Manager in ensuring that effective security measures for WVU West Nile programs are both appropriately planned for and addressed within the national context. The incumbent will take lead in the optimization of organizational security and the mitigation of operational risks for ministry effectiveness by establishing security systems and mechanisms for institutionalizing an organizational culture and practice of safety and security. Responsibilities: Key Duties andResponsibilities: Implement the National Office security strategy in alignment with WV security policy so as to ensure the operational priorities of the WVU West Nile Programmes are appropriately supported. Ensure Security Risk Assessments, and Core Security Requirement standards, processes and procedures are completed in accordance with current Office of Corporate Security guidelines and training Provide leadership/ management of the security focal persons in the West Nile Region. Provide support and coordination to the National Safety and Compliance Officer as requested. Work closely with the National Director/Country Security Manager to carry out Security Risk Assessments as required/directed. Country Risk Ratings are established and updated as required Ensure Core Security Requirements are implemented in line with Country Risk Ratings Provide input and support to management in crisis situations and critical incidents Carry out security investigations when required. Build ongoing networks for sharing security information and coordination in the Region. Represent WV at local NGO security network meetings and ensure information from these groups is disseminated to relevant staff. Coordinate the assessment, development and implementation of the WVU West Nile capacity building plan for security management based on local security risk assessments. Seek to develop a culture of security awareness and monitor staff compliance in the region. Ensure that all security incidents are reported in accordance with WV Security Policy. Collect, analyze and disseminate security information appropriately. Experience: Qualifications, Skills andExperience: The applicant for the World Vision Security Officer West Nile job opportunity should hold a Bachelors degree in a relevant field A minimum of three (3) years experience in a proven security field (public, private, and government or NGO sectors). Choose appropriate: At least two years experience working with UN Agency / NGO plus field security experience Radio and/or Satellite phone communications experience, operations and management Demonstrated experience in designing and delivering training. How to Apply: All suitably qualified Ugandan candidates are encouraged to apply online by visiting World Vision Internationals e-recruitment jobs portal at the web link below. Please follow instructions on How to Create Account and Profile at World Visions e-recruitment portal. Qualified female candidates are particularly encouraged to apply. Deadline: 15th February, 2017 Still Standing: Four the Moments legacy honoured at Nova Scotia Music Week When a quartet of Halifax women began singing together a cappella in the name of social justice in 1982, there was little in the way of a music industry at play in Atlantic Canada. And even if there had been, its likely that Four the Moment would ... Former prime minister Manmohan Singh on Monday ruled out the allegations levelled by the Bharatiya Janata Party that the previous government led by him had favoured industrialist Vijay Mallya in getting loans. Singh said that the PMO during his days had received hundreds of representatives daily and that they were marked down to the officers concerned. Asserting that he did not plug for any loans for Vijay Mallya or the now defunct Kingfisher Airlines, Singh said he had done what anyone in his place would have done. "The letter(s) being talked about, is nothing else but an ordinary piece of letter which any government in my position would have dealt with. It was a routine transaction," he said. Singh's cabinet colleague and former finance minister P. Chidambaram also rejected BJP's charges and said that the real questions to be asked were who let Mallya go out of the country, who made him a member of parliament, and who helped off shore deposits on behalf of Mallya. Citing several letters written by Mallya to both Manmohan and Chidambaram, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra had alleged that the two had helped the industrialist get huge loans for bailing out the airlines. "If a letter to PMO is marked down to the Principal Secretary which is then forwarded to the department concerned, it is normal," said Chidambaram. He also sought to make a clear distinction between Kingfisher and United Spirits, which he said was a fine performing company. (With inputs from agencies) A global backlash against U.S. President Donald Trump's immigration curbs gathered strength on Sunday as several countries including long-standing American allies criticized the measures as discriminatory and divisive. Governments from London and Berlin to Jakarta and Tehran spoke out against Trump's order to put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily ban travelers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries. He said the move would help protect Americans from terrorism. In Germany which has taken in large numbers of people fleeing the Syrian civil war Chancellor Angela Merkel said the global fight against terrorism was no excuse for the measures and "does not justify putting people of a specific background or faith under general suspicion", her spokesman said. She expressed her concerns to Trump during a phone call and reminded him that the Geneva Conventions require the international community to take in war refugees on humanitarian grounds, the spokesman added. Merkel's sentiments were echoed in Paris and London; "Terrorism knows no nationality. Discrimination is no response," said French Foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, while his British counterpart Boris Johnson tweeted: "Divisive and wrong to stigmatize because of nationality." Along with Syria, the U.S. ban of at least 90 days affects travelers with passports from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, including those with dual nationality that includes one of those countries. Trump said his order, which indefinitely bans refugees from Syria, was "not a Muslim ban", though he added he would seek to prioritize Christian refugees fleeing the country. The Arab League - whose members include many of the countries included in the ban as well as allies of Washington such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan - expressed deep concern and said the restrictions were unjustified. The government in Iraq, which is allied with Washington in the battle against ultra-hardline Islamist group Islamic State and hosts over 5,000 U.S. troops, did not comment on the executive order. But some members of its parliament said Baghdad should retaliate with similar measures against the United States. In Baghdad, influential Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said American nationals should leave Iraq, in retaliation for the travel curbs. "It would be arrogance for you to enter freely Iraq and other countries while barring to them the entrance to your country ... and therefore you should get your nationals out," he said on his website. There was no immediate reaction to the curbs from Islamic State, although in the past it has used U.S. monitoring of Muslim foreigners to stoke Muslim anger against Washington. The Tehran government vowed to respond in kind to the U.S. ban on visitors from Iran, but on Sunday Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Twitter that Americans who already hold Iranian visas can enter the country. "Unlike the U.S., our decision is not retroactive. All with valid Iranian visa will be gladly welcomed," Zarif said. Authorities in Sudan, which is also targeted by the ban, summoned the U.S. charge d'affaires in Khartoum. They said the order sent a "negative message", coming two weeks after Washington announced it would ease economic sanctions on the country. Trump's executive order on Friday took effect immediately, wreaking havoc and confusion for would-be travelers with passports from the seven countries and plunging America's immigration system into chaos. The Department of Homeland Security said about 375 travelers had been affected by the order, 109 of whom were in transit and were denied entry to the United States. Another 173 were stopped by airlines before boarding. Fuad Sharef, his wife and three children were among the first victims. They had waited two years for a visa to settle in the United States, selling their home and quitting jobs and schools in Iraq before setting off for a new life they saw as a reward for working with U.S. organizations. They were prevented from boarding their connecting flight to New York from Cairo airport on Saturday, detained overnight and forced to board a flight back to northern Iraq. "We were treated like drug dealers, escorted by deportation officers," Sharef told Reuters, likening Trump's decision to the dictatorship of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. "I am broken, I am totally broken." A 32-year-old Syrian man, Nail Zain, was among dozens of people at Istanbul's Ataturk Airport prevented from flying to the United States on Sunday. He told Reuters he was supposed to fly to Los Angeles, but officials said his visa was canceled. "My wife and my son are in the United States. My son has American nationality. And we have been waiting for this moment for two years. Finally when I got the chance, they prevented me as a Syrian passport holder from traveling," he said. He was later taken out of the terminal by authorities. Trump, a businessman who successfully tapped into American fears about militant attacks during his campaign, had promised what he called "extreme vetting" of immigrants and refugees from areas the White House said the U.S. Congress deemed high risk. He said on Saturday of his order: "It's working out very nicely. You see it at the airports, you see it all over." The travel curbs, however, also drew criticism from several other countries around the globe. In Jakarta, Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi said the Muslim-majority nation deeply regretted Trump's plans for "extreme vetting" of people from some Muslim countries. Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni said "open society, plural identity, no discrimination" were the "pillars of Europe", while the Danish, Swedish and Norwegian governments also registered their opposition. Danish foreign minister Anders Samuelsen tweeted: "The U.S. decision not to allow entry of people from certain countries is NOT fair." Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his country welcomed those fleeing war and persecution, even as Canadian airlines said they would turn back U.S.-bound passengers to comply with an immigration ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries. "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada," he tweeted. Chelsea Clinton has joined mounting protests in New York City against US President Donald Trumps immigration ban, the media reported. The former first daughter protested Trump's refugee ban on Sunday, sending several tweets over the weekend suggesting she joined public gatherings to hammer the President for his controversial executive order, the New York Post reported on Monday. "#NewYork #NoBanNoWall," Chelsea said, including a picture of a protest. "Yes. We will keep standing up for a country that matches our values and ideals for all," Chelsea said in another tweet. Hillary Clinton, Chelsea's mom and the former Democratic presidential candidate, also spoke out against Trump over the weekend. "I stand with the people gathered across the country tonight defending our values & our Constitution. This is not who we are," Clinton, whom Trump defeated in the general election in November, said on Twitter. This past weekend - only Trump's second since being sworn into office on January 20 - was defined by chaos erupting at airports across the country as feds worked to implement an executive order that suddenly altered US immigration policy. US President Donald Trump's efforts to ban immigrants from Muslim countries kicked up a storm, with a large number of protesters blockading the JFK airport, calling for the ban to be repealed. Trump, however, stood his ground throughout the ruckus, stating that Christian immigrants were under attack all through Middle East. Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world - a horrible mess! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong - they are sadly weak on immigration. The two... Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 ...Senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 To make things worse, on top of the rampant issues of racism that were reported, a group of attackers carried out a shooting in Canada's Quebec City mosque. Five fatalities were reported. Here's how Twitter reacted: Shocked, afraid but refusing to cede ground. Some among the twitterati linked the Quebec mosque shooting to Donald Trump, which led to some pretty divisive arguments from either side. The night before Donald Trumps inauguration, five environmental lawyers filed a federal court brief defending an Obama administration clean-water rule that the new president and his Republican allies have targeted for elimination, considering it burdensome to landowners. The move served as a warning that environmentalists, facing a hostile administration and a Republican-dominated Congress, are prepared to battle in court against what they fear will be a wave of unfavorable policies concerning climate change, wildlife protection, federal lands and pollution. Advocacy groups nationwide are hiring more staff lawyers. Theyre coordinating with private attorneys and firms that have volunteered to help. Theyre reviewing statutes, setting priorities and seeking donations. Its going to be all-out war, said Vermont Law School Professor Patrick Parenteau. If youre an environmentalist or conservationist, this is indeed a scary time. Trumps first week in office only heightened their anxieties. He moved to resume construction of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines that the Obama administration had halted, while signaling intentions to abandon his predecessors fight against global warming, vastly expand oil and gas drilling on public lands and slash the Environmental Protection Agencys budget. GOP lawmakers, meanwhile, introduced measures to overturn a new Interior Department rule barring coal mining companies from damaging streams and to remove some wolves from the endangered species list. Theyve wasted no time in doing bad things, said Pat Gallagher, director of the Sierra Clubs 50-member legal team, which he said is likely to grow as environmentalists increasingly regard the courts as their best option, even though success there is far from certain. The Department of Justice, which represents the federal government in environmental lawsuits, declined to comment, while the White House did not respond to emails seeking comment. Doug Ericksen, communications director for Trumps transition team at EPA, said of the environmentalists that hes not sure what they think theyre preparing for but suspects they are stoking fear of Trump as a fundraising tool. Theyre more concerned about raising money than protecting the environment, Ericksen said. Jim Burling, litigation director for the Pacific Legal Foundation, a nonprofit property rights group that sues regulators on behalf of businesses and landowners, also contended environmental groups were exaggerating the Trump administrations threat for political and financial gain. The government bureaucracy is entrenched, Burling said, and, who happens to occupy the White House hasnt made that much difference. Environmentalists say their fears are justified by the new administrations antagonism toward governments role in keeping air and water clean and the planet from overheating. Donations began increasing after Trumps election, even before the fundraising letters were sent asking for support to fight the administrations actions, said David Goldston, government affairs director at the Natural Resources Defense Council. Earthjustice, which has represented the Standing Rock Sioux tribe in its fight against the Dakota Access Pipeline, has about 100 staff attorneys and plans to bring more aboard, said Tim Preso, who manages the groups Northern Rockies office. The Chicago-based Environmental Law & Policy Center is adding four attorneys to its pre-election staff of 18 and is coordinating with more than a dozen outside attorneys who would file citizen suits against polluters for free if agencies fail to enforce existing rules, said Executive Director Howard Learner. We cannot fully substitute and replace the EPA doing its job, Learner said. But on the other hand, were not going to default to zero if the EPA steps backward when it comes to clean air and clean water enforcement. On inauguration eve, five law professors filed a brief in support of a 2015 regulation giving EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers discretion to regulate tributaries and wetlands far upstream from navigable lakes and rivers to protect water quality. Dozens of states have sued to block the rule including Oklahoma, led by state Attorney General Scott Pruitt, now Trumps choice for EPA administrator saying it gives government too much power over private property. Shortly after Trump took office, his White House webpage listed the rule among harmful and unnecessary policies he would target. If the Trump administration wont defend the rule, I want to stand alongside environmental groups and do what I can to defend (it), said David Uhlmann, a University of Michigan law professor and former Justice Department prosecutor, who helped file the brief. Going to court is just one tactic environmental lawyers will use, said Erik Schlenker-Goodrich of the Oregon-based Western Environmental Law Center, which also plans new hires. They will monitor agencies for failure to enforce pollution law or cutting corners when writing permits for activities such as oil and gas drilling, he said. The Sierra Clubs Gallagher, who sued over oil drilling beneath national parks during the George W. Bush administration, said another tactic would be making liberal use of open-records laws to obtain scientific data and other materials that might otherwise be purged. The group already has requested records on climate change from the EPA. Were not surprised at what theyre doing, but maybe a little surprised at how fast and furious its all happening, Gallagher said. But we were bracing for it and were ready. (AP) To build his highly touted deportation force, President Donald Trump is reviving a long-standing program that deputizes local officers to enforce federal immigration law. The program received scant attention during a week in which Trump announced plans to build a border wall, hire thousands more federal agents and impose restrictions on refugees from Middle Eastern countries. But the program could end up having a significant impact on immigration enforcement around the country, despite falling out of favor in recent years amid complaints that it promotes racial profiling. More than 60 police and sheriffs agencies had the special authority as of 2009, applying for it as the nations immigration debate was heating up. Since then, the number has been halved and the effort scaled back as federal agents ramped up other enforcement programs and amid complaints officers werent focusing on the goal of catching violent offenders and instead arrested immigrants for minor violations, like driving with broken tail lights. Sheriff Joe Arpaio used the program most aggressively in metro Phoenix, and he became arguably the nations best-known immigration enforcer at the local level in large part because of the special authority. In a strange twist, he was thrown out of office in the same election that vaulted Trump to the presidency, mostly because of mounting frustration over legal issues and costs stemming from the patrols. In his executive order this week, Trump said he wants to empower local law enforcement to act as immigration officers and help with the investigation, apprehension, or detention of immigrants in the country illegally. The move comes at a time when the country is sharply divided over the treatment of immigrants. Cities such as Chicago and San Francisco have opposed police involvement in immigration while some counties in Massachusetts and Texas are now seeking to jump in. Proponents say police departments can help bolster immigration enforcement and prevent criminals from being released back into their neighborhoods, while critics argue that deputizing local officers will lead to racial profiling and erode community trust in police. Cecillia Wang, an American Civil Liberties Union attorney, said police bosses who want to get into immigration enforcement should consider what happened when 100 of Arpaios deputies were given the federal arrest power. The longtime sheriff used the authority to carry out traffic patrols that targeted immigrants. The patrols were later discredited in a lawsuit in which a federal judge concluded Arpaios officers had racially profiled Latinos. The lawsuit so far cost county taxpayers $50 million. There are people like Joe Arpaio who have a certain political agenda who want to jump on the Trump bandwagon, Wang said, adding later that the Arizona sheriff was most vocal and shameless offender in the program. When asked to comment on Trumps effort to revitalize the program, a Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman said the executive orders would speak for themselves. Traditionally, police stayed out of immigration enforcement and left those duties to federal authorities. But a 1996 federal law opened up the possibility for local agencies to participate in immigration enforcement on the streets and do citizenship checks of people in local jails. Immigration and Customs Enforcement trained and certified roughly 1,600 officers to carry out these checks from 2006 to 2015. The Obama administration phased out all the arrest power agreements in 2013, but still let agencies check whether people jailed in their jurisdiction were citizens. If they find that an inmate is in the country illegally, they typically notify federal authorities or hand them over to immigration officers. Today, more than 30 local agencies participate in the jail program. Alonzo Pena, a retired deputy director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement who once oversaw such agreements with police agencies, said some officers were using the authority in ways that didnt match the agencys enforcement priorities. He said federal officials need to closely monitor participants to ensure their actions dont veer away from the goal of catching violent offenders and confronting national security threats. Its hard to regulate to make sure its followed, Pena said. In California, three counties nixed the program after state legislation and a federal court ruling in nearby Oregon limited police collaboration with immigration enforcement. Orange County still makes the immigration checks inside its jail and flags inmates for deportation officers, but wont hold anyone on behalf of federal authorities out of legal concerns. The window has narrowed to a large extent, said Orange County sheriffs Lt. Mike McHenry. With Trump in office, the program has new life. Even before the change in administration, two Republican county sheriffs in Massachusetts said they were starting programs. In Texas, Jackson County sheriff A. J. Andy Louderback said two officers will get trained to run immigration jail checks this spring and nearby counties want to follow suit. Louderback said teaming up with federal agents will cost his agency roughly $3,000 a small price to pay to cover for officers while theyre on a four-week training course, especially in an area struggling with human smuggling. Once the program is underway, he said immigration agents will send a daily van to pick up anyone flagged for deportation from jail. It just seems like good law enforcement to partner with federal law enforcement in this area, he said. It takes all of us to do this job. Experts said Trumps outreach to local law enforcement will create an even bigger split between sanctuary cities that keep police out of immigration enforcement and those eager to help the new president bolster deportations. There is no question that in order to do the type of mass deportation that he promised, it will require him conscripting local law enforcement agencies, said Chris Newman, legal director of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. It is going to balkanize things and were going to see more of the extremes. (AP) Ministers Yaakov Litzman and Aryeh Deri along with MK Moshe Gafne have been pressuring Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to return the governments Shabbos authority to Deri, who serves as Minister of the Interior. The moved was approved during the weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday, 2 Shevat. One of Deris first moves is likely to disqualify a Tel Aviv City Council decision to permit opening a limited number of stores on Shabbos in non-frum areas. After receiving the authority, Deri announced he would study the matter in dept. The big loser is Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and his Yisrael Beitenu party, which as recently as last month continued expressing its adamant opposition of placing the Shabbos authority exclusively in the hands of chareidim. The ball is now in Deris court, who during recent months announced if given the authority, he will compel stores to shut their doors on Shabbos in Tel Aviv. Should Deri carry through, like everything else in the state, the next likely stop will be the High Court of Justice. So what led to the cabinet decision? Last week, High Court President Justice Miriam Naor hinted that regarding a petition on behalf of stores seeking to open on Shabbos in Tel Aviv belongs to the Interior Minister and not the Prime Minister. Without a doubt Justice Noars words sent a clear message to PM Netanyahu. (YWN Israel Desk, Jerusalem) Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Sunday denied that he has anything to do with the delay in moving the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. His comments come after the co-chairman of the republican in Israel, L. Marc Zell, said the delay I the move is Israels fault and not the United States. Zell told Haaretz that he is confident he move will occur, albeit not immediately. Officials in the Prime Ministers Office responding to Zells statements explained any allegations that the delay is being caused by Israel are delusional. At the weekly cabinet meeting, PM Netanyahu called on all countries to move their embassies to Israel. The position of Israel has been, and always will be, that the US Embassy should be here, in Jerusalem, he said. Its appropriate that all the other embassies should move to Jerusalem as well. (YWN Israel Desk, Jerusalem) [PHOTOS IN EXTENDED ARTICLE] A training exercise was conducted simulating a missile attack in the Tempo Beverage Plant in Netanya on Sunday morning 2 Shevat. The facility includes an ammonia tank used for refrigeration. Taking part in the training event was United Hatzalah, firefighters, IDF Homefront Command, Environmental Protection Ministry inspectors, Netanyahu City Hall officials and Israel Police. The drill simulation a rupture and explosion of the ammonia lines. (YWN Israel Desk, Jerusalem/Photo Credit: United Hatzalah spokesman unit) Prime Minister Theresa May went to Washington, and President Donald Trump extended the hand of friendship. Literally. May left Washington after a 24-hour visit as Saturdays British newspapers splashed front-page photos of the two leaders touching hands as they walked at the White House before a strikingly collegial news conference. May wanted her meeting, Trumps first as president with a foreign leader, to revitalize the trans-Atlantic special relationship. She got her wish delighting those who think Trumps presidency will be good for Britain but alarming others who loathe the brash Republican populist. She flew home after a stop in Turkey Saturday to meet President Recep Tayyip Erdogan with Trumps commitment not to abandon NATO, his praise for what he called this most special relationship and a prize she had eagerly sought the first steps toward an early trade deal with Britain once it leaves the European Union. Britain cant begin formal negotiations with other countries until it actually leaves the bloc, likely in 2019 at the earliest. But Mays office said Saturday that she and Trump had agreed to start high-level talks and joint working groups immediately to ensure a seamless transition to a new bilateral relationship. Trade between the two countries is already worth 150 billion pounds ($188 billion) a year, and May said a future trade deal could provide huge benefits to our economic muscle and will give businesses additional certainty and confidence. Trump did not come away empty handed from the meeting, either. He gets the seal of approval from a generally well-respected British prime minister. And theres an invitation from Queen Elizabeth II to come for a state visit later this year a treat for a president with Scottish roots and a taste for opulence. So there was satisfaction from Mays team aboard her RAF Voyager jet at how well the hastily arranged trip had gone. May also praised Trumps stunning election victory and declared that they shared a commitment to make government serve working people. Mays embrace of aspects of Trumps policies infuriated her opponents in Britain and could make other European leaders uneasy. British Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron said May clearly spent her time with Trump dodging his despicable comments on torture, on women, on Muslims and on Mexicans. Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn said May failed to challenge Trump and stand up for our values at a joint news conference with the president Friday. Trump, meanwhile, extolled Britains vote to leave the EU, saying Brexit would be a tremendous asset and not a tremendous liability. Those comments and the warmth of the visit drew approval from the pro-Brexit sections of Britains press. It was one of the most extraordinary days in the long history of U.K.-U.S. relations, said the Daily Mail under the headline Love-In at the White House and a picture of the hand-holding moment. Mays office said Trump offered his hand in a chivalrous gesture as the pair approached an unexpected ramp, and she took it. The trip will provide images for countless future stories about the trans-Atlantic bond. As well as the shoulder-to-shoulder press conference, May got a handshake in the Oval Office beside a bust of Winston Churchill that has become minor obsession for sections of the British press since it was moved to another spot in the White House by President Barack Obama. Trump restored it to a prominent place beside the Oval Office fireplace. At times it seemed the visit would be overshadowed by Trump-related headlines that had nothing to do with May, including his feud with Mexico over who would pay for the border wall. While May was in town the White House announced that Trump would speak by phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin Saturday, amid speculation he could be preparing to lift U.S. sanctions over Ukraine. May said Britain wants to see the sanctions stay in place. And at the news conference with May, Trump repeated his belief that torture works though he said he would defer to Defense Secretary James Mattis, who thinks otherwise. Britain, May stressed during the trip, is firmly against torture. May had scarcely left when Trump issued an executive order barring all refugees from entering the U.S. for four months and imposing a 90-day ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries. On the whole, May emerged from the joint appearance looking confident and controlled. Trump, too, was notably calm and measured in her presence. When May said Trump has assured her he was 100 percent behind NATO, a body he once called obsolete, the president muttered his agreement. Mays office told reporters that warm conversation had flowed during the pairs working lunch and that Trump told an aide to keep the menu card so he could remember the special occasion. Downing St. said conversation turned to Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, and Trump told May he wanted their relationship to be even better than that famously close and productive partnership. At the press conference, Trump said he was confident the pair were going to get along. I am a people person, Trump said. I think you are also, Theresa. (AP) The White House on Sunday said the addition of President Donald Trumps chief strategist, Steve Bannon, to regular meetings of the countrys top national security officials was essential to the commander in chiefs decision-making process. Trump took steps Saturday to begin restructuring the White House National Security Council, adding the senior adviser to the principals committee, which includes the secretaries of state and defense. At the same time, Trump said his director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff would attend where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed. Bannon served in the Navy before attending Harvard Business School, working at Goldman Sachs, starting his own media-focused boutique investment banking firm and later heading the ultraconservative outlet Breitbart News. He is a former naval officer. Hes got a tremendous understanding of the world and the geopolitical landscape that we have now, White House press secretary Sean Spicer told ABCs This Week. Spicer said having the chief strategist for the president in those meetings who has a significant military background to help make guide what the presidents final analysis is going to be is crucial. But to Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, the Democratic vice presidential nominee, the NSC sadly has some really questionable people on it, he told NBCs Meet the Press, citing Bannon among them. Breitbart has been condemned for featuring racist, sexist and anti-Semitic content. (AP) [PHOTOS IN EXTENDED ARTICLE] Russias Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev came to visit Moscows Largest Jewish Museum in honor of International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The Prime Minister was welcomed by the founder and initiator of the museum, Chief Rabbi of Russia, Berl Lazar, together with the President of the Jewish Federation of Russia, Rabbi Alexander Boroda. In his speech, Mr. Medvedev said: Of the six million Jews that were killed by the Nazis during the Holocaust, an estimated 2.7 million were killed on Russian soil. Therefore the tragedy of the Jewish people is one which affects all of us, regardless of faith. This incredible museum, built by the Federation of Jewish Communities in Russia, is not only one of the largest Jewish museums today, but is also the most technologically advanced, combining innovation with sensitivity. It is of utmost importance that children, youngsters and people of all ages visit this museum. On Friday, January 27, the world marks Holocaust Remembrance Day, as was decided by the UN. There will be a special ceremony at the museum on this day, with around 50 ambassadors in attendance. During this ceremony, Rabbi Lazar will pronounce the Kel Maley Rachamim prayer in memory of those who perished in the Holocaust. While Prime Minister Medvedev received a comprehensive tour of the museum, and all of its departments, he took great interest in the various exhibits. He was given explanations starting from the six days of creation until the present day, when Judaism is once again experiencing a revival in all of Russia. The museum is spread over thousands of square meters and includes many different halls dedicated to various periods in Jewish history. It is now considered the worlds premier museum and is hosts thousands of visitors each month. After writing about his impressions in the Guest Book, Mr. Medvedev spoke before the Museums administrators and dozens of media outlets. He expressed gratitude on behalf of the government for establishing this museum, and for the dedication of the Jewish community to Holocaust survivors in Russia, teaching the younger generation, and not allowing them to forget about the difficult times during WWII. Photography: Levi Nazarov (YWN World Headquarters NYC) Charles Koch first likened candidate Donald Trumps plan to ban Muslim immigrants to something Adolf Hitler would have done in Nazi Germany. The billionaire industrialist and his chief lieutenants offered a more delicate response this weekend when asked about President Trumps plan to block immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. They described Trumps plan as the wrong approach that violated its dedication to free and open societies. The criticism comes as the Koch network, among the most powerful conservative groups in the nation, works to strike a delicate balance in the early days of the new administration. The Kochs refused to support Trumps candidacy last fall, but they now see a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to influence the White House and the Republican-controlled Congress. Their optimism is fueled by strong relationships inside the administration, despite their vow to oppose Trumps policies if they deviate from the Koch brothers conservative priorities. Trump critics were easy to find at the California desert resort this weekend, where attendance at a semi-annual conference was limited to the 550 people who donate at least $100,000 each year to the various conservative political and policy groups backed by Charles and David Koch. The critics included Charles Koch himself, although the conservative patriarch did not mention Trump by name Sunday as he warned that the nation is facing a moment of tremendous danger. He said the nation could go the authoritarian route or we can move toward a free and open society. So this is our opportunity. Still, the Koch network says its confident about its ability to shape the direction of the Trump administrations policies from the inside. Many former network staffers that are in the White House now remain good friends of ours. So were in constant contact with them, said Koch spokesman James Davis. Conversations have been open and continue to be. There is perhaps no bigger Koch ally than Vice President Mike Pence, whose staff and ideology has been in close alignment with the Kochs for years. Charles Koch spoke directly with the vice president on the phone days before his inauguration as Pence considered hiring a Koch communications staffer, Stephen Ford, to serve as his chief speechwriter. Ford was soon hired, along with former Koch chief Marc Short, who now serves as the White House legislative director. The reason were optimistic is really Mike Pence, said Doug Deason, a prominent Trump supporter and major Koch donor. If you think Cheney had power in Bush White House, just watch and see what happens with Mike Pence. Several reporters, including one from The Associated Press, were invited to attend the weekend conference. As a condition of attending, photographers were not allowed and reporters were not permitted to identify any donors without their permission. Koch and his powerful allies insist they will challenge Trump when his policies dont align with their conservative vision. The network plans to spend between $300 million and $400 million over the next two years to shape policy and politics, much of it devoted to its nationwide grassroots network. While there has been much talk of Trump allies creating an outside group to help promote his agenda, the Koch networks capacity to communicate directly with voters on the ground in key states has no political rival. The Kochs secret sauce, Holden says, is the accountability play. Were principled. And if we cant get comfortable with the policies that are in place, then were not going to support them. But if we can we will support them, regardless of whos in office, he said. Like Trump, the Kochs favor efforts to cut government regulation and replace the federal health-care system. They do not share the presidents plans for a massive infrastructure spending or his crackdown on immigrants from Muslim-majority countries. The travel ban is the wrong approach and will likely be counterproductive, network co-chair Brian Hooks said Sunday. Our country has benefited tremendously from a history of welcoming people from all cultures and backgrounds, he said. This is a hallmark of free and open societies. (AP) Representatives of chareidi factions in Knesset on Sunday night the eve of 3 Shevat sent a message to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu calling on him to dissolve any plans for an egalitarian prayer area near the Kosel. They explained, in their strongly worded letter, the decision made by the cabinet is contrary to the Moetzas Gedolei Torah and therefore, a non-starter. The representatives, Minister Aryeh Deri and Yaakov Litzman along with Moshe Gafne, inform the Prime Minister that on Sunday, they met with the Chief Rabbis of Israel and they are all of one opinion, that any egalitarian prayer area near the Kosel is a non-starter. Also taking part in the meeting with the Chief Rabbis was the Rav of the Jewish Quarter HaGaon HaRav Avigdor Nebenzahl Shlita. They call on Mr. Netanyahu to announce on Sunday, the next weekly cabinet meeting, that Government Decision 1075 regarding the egalitarian prayer area is null and void as it is contrary to the position of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel Rabbinical Council. Given the urgency, added the chareidim, and because we cannot bear responsibility for the results of the governments decision that could harm the unity of the people and devastating blow to the sanctity of the remnant of our Batei Mikdosh, a place that the Shechina never left, in the words of our Sages in the Midrash Shemos Rabbah (2:2) the Divine Presence never moved from the Kosel, we ask you honorable Prime Minister to give the instructions, both regarding the cancellation of the governments decision and the representation of external independent Chief Rabbinate of Israel. (YWN Israel Desk, Jerusalem) Former Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger on Monday, 3 Shevat formally pleaded guilty to accepting bribes in the plea bargain agreement accepted by the court. The rabbi will serve a 3.5 year jail term in addition of paying a fine in the amount of NIS 5 million. During his tenure as Chief Rabbi of Israel, the rabbi accepted bribes, at times in the form of exaggerated commissions for tzedaka funds he collected on behalf of organizations. The money was used to purchase apartments for family members, thereby avoiding income tax. (YWN Israel Desk, Jerusalem) President Donald Trump on Monday denied his immigration order was to blame for the chaos at nation airports over the weekend, instead pointing to computer glitches, protesters and even the tears of Senator Schumer. There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter the country, Trump wrote in a series of early morning tweets. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world! Trump enters his second week in office amid a global backlash to his policies. European Union officials denounced U.S. policy as a dangerous embrace of isolationism and inequality, while the international aid group Doctors Without Borders accused Trump of keeping people trapped in war zones, directly endangering their lives. In Iraq, two lawmakers there said the Iraqi parliament has approved a reciprocity measure restricting the entry of Americans into Iraq. Meanwhile, its unclear how Trumps order would make the nation safer. The order does not address homegrown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. And the list of countries in Trumps order doesnt include Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. The president tweeted early Monday that only 109 out of 325,000 people were detained and held for questioning following his executive order to bar individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer, he added. Trump was referring to a Delta systems outage Sunday night that led to departure delays and cancellations of at least 150 Delta flights. However, the chaos started Saturday as protesters packed some of the countrys major airports to demonstrate against the executive order. Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer tweeted Friday that Tears are running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty over the ban. Trump has defended his order by saying its not a Muslim ban. In a background call with reporters Sunday, a senior administration official declared the orders implementation a massive success story, claiming it had been done seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism. Yet there appeared to be widespread confusion among authorities tasked with carrying out the order and how it would be applied to certain groups, like U.S. legal permanent residents. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday saying that, absent information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination. That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent U.S. residency green cards will not be barred from re-entering the U.S., as officials had previously said. It remains unclear what kind of additional screening they will now face. You have an extreme vetting proposal that didnt get the vetting it should have had, said Ohio Sen. Rob Portman, who urged the new president to slow down and work with lawmakers on how best to tighten screening for foreigners who enter the United States. In my view, we ought to all take a deep breath and come up with something that makes sense for our national security and reflects the fact that Americas always been a welcoming home for refugees and immigrants, he said. White House press secretary Sean Spicer on Monday morning defended the closed-mouth discussions that preceded Fridays announcement, saying that I think there are some people who might not like the way it was done, but they were all consulted in the process. Interviewed on MSNBCs Morning Joe, Spicer said officials put the safety of the American people first and said officials didnt want to telegraph what they were going to do. He acknowledged the secret way we had to roll this out and said that it was because of security reasons. A federal judge in New York has issued an emergency order temporarily barring the U.S. from deporting people from the seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trumps 90-day travel ban. The order barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. The Department of Homeland Security said Sunday the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. (AP) 4:31PM IL: A Jerusalem Fire Service spokesman reported a fire in a talmid torah at Yitzchak Tabenkin Street in the Nvei Yaakov neighborhood of the capital on Monday afternoon 3 Shevat. It is reportedly a large complicated structure the report states, adding firemen on the scene have located the cause of the blaze. There is acrid smoke emanating from the building and firefighters are still making sure no one is trapped inside as efforts to extinguish the blaze continue. (YWN Israel Desk, Jerusalem) Mexico has spoken out audibly against US President Donald Trumps planned construction of a wall between his country and Mexico. That countrys leader spoke out opposing the plan, as well as announcing he was canceling his planned visit to Washington DC to meet with President Trump. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was among the few who dared to speak out in support of Trump, stating it is a good idea, pointing out he built a barrier along Israels southern border to bring an end to the influx of illegal African aliens, a plan that succeeded. This angered Mexico, leading to state officials summoning Israeli Ambassador to Mexico Jonathan Peled to rebuke him, which they did. Mexicos Foreign Ministry its statement emphasized his country is a friend of Israel but nonetheless, expressed astonishment, rejection and disappointment over statements made by PM Netanyahu. (YWN Israel Desk, Jerusalem) One of two gunmen who shouted Allahu akbar! as they opened fire at a mosque in Quebec City was of Moroccan origin, a witness and local media reported Monday, revealing the first details about the attackers in the massacre that killed six men. The terror suspects were identified as Mohamed Khadir and Alexandre Bissonnette, the CBC reported. The two men were arrested soon after the shooting at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre Sunday night and were expected to appear in court later Monday, police told reporters. One of the gunmen actually turned himself in, calling 911 less than 20 minutes later and giving officers his location in dOrleans so they could arrest him, police said. The attack unfolded in the mens section of the mosque. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the attack, calling it a terrorist attack on Muslims. The attackers were students at Universite Laval, a school in Quebec, a source close to the investigation told Radio Canada, saying one was Moroccan. Police said the suspects were not on their radar. Five people were in critical condition and 12 others suffered minor injuries, University of Quebec Hospital Centre spokeswoman Genevieve Dupuis said Monday. The dead ranged in age from age 35 to 60. A possible motive was unclear. Police said they did not believe there were other suspects. One of the gunmen was armed with an AK-47, the Le Soleil newspaper reported. A witness who asked to remain anonymous told Radio Canada the two shooters were masked. It seemed to me that they had a Quebecois accent. They started to fire, and as they shot they yelled, Allahu akbar! The bullets hit people that were praying. People who were praying lost their lives. A bullet passed right over my head, the person said. It was with tremendous shock, sadness and anger that I heard of this evenings tragic and fatal shooting at the Centre culturel islamique de Quebec located in the Ste-Foy neighborhood of the city of Quebec, Trudeau said in a statement. Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country. The gunfire started at the Islamic center at around 8 p.m., Le Journal de Quebec reported. More than 50 people were attending prayer service at the time of the shooting. The centers president Mohamed Yangui said the shooters reloaded at least three times. Police ramped up security at mosques across the country after the massacre. An unidentified man looking for his friends, who were regular attendees of evening prayers, told Le Journal de Quebec, Ive tried to reach them, but I cannot. Its terrible. The French-speaking province of Quebec has been embroiled in a lengthy debate about race and religious accommodation. The previous separatist government of the province called for a ban on ostentatious religious symbols such as the hijab in public institutions. The CBC reported that someone left a pigs head on the mosques doorstep this past June, during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Islams holy book, the Koran, forbids them from consuming pork. We were told that it was an isolated act, but today we have deaths, Yangui told reporters. It is minutes and hours of terror and anguish. In the U.S., the NYPD said in a statement that officers have been told to give special attention to mosques in the area. Police said they were monitoring the situation in Quebec. (AP) The following details have been cleared for publication regarding the shooting attack in Haifa, on 3 January 2017, in which Muhammad Shinawi, a resident of the Haifa neighborhood of Halisa, perpetrated three shootings resulting in the murder of Guy Kafri HYD and the wounding of Rabbi Yechiel Iluz. Shinawi, armed with a Carlo semi-automatic weapon, went to lower Haifa where he saw an chareidi Jew, followed him and shot him, severely wounding him. As he fled the scene, Shinawi shot at a Jewish woman whom he had noticed nearby; however, she was not injured. As he fled toward his neighborhood, he saw a Jewish man, and shot and killed him. Shinawi continued his flight and hid the weapon, along with additional personal effects, in a wooded area near his parents home. It was learned that, after the shootings, Shinawi was aided by two friends: Khaled Adel Saliman Abu Kaliv and Ihab Ayoub Mahmoud Yusef. Shinawi met them and asked them to help him to Brenner Street in Haifa. He admitted to them that he had carried out the shootings and informed them of his intention to steal a scooter from a food delivery person whom he had invited to the locale. He also requested, and received, from Yousef a sharp butchers knife for self-defense. Following his arrest, Shinawi was investigated by the Shin Bet with the Israel Police. It was learned that he carried out the shootings for nationalist motives and hatred of Jews, that he deliberately targeted Jews. In the Shin Bet investigation, it was learned that Shinawis hatred of Jews had intensified in recent years as he had become more religious and based on his understanding that Jews were unbelievers who deserved death. During the investigation, a minor was detained and questioned on suspicion of having been sent by Shinawi, shortly before the shootings, to bring him the Carlo semi-automatic. The State Attorney (Haifa District), on Monday 3 Shevat, in Haifa District Court, filed charges against Shinawi for inter alia murder, attempted murder and use of a weapon to carry out an act of terrorism. Khaled Adel Saliman Abu Kaliv and Ihab Ayoub Mahmoud Yousef were indicted for inter alia being accessories to an act of terrorism and obstruction of justice. The aforesaid minor was also charged for aiding Muhammad Shinawi. (YWN Israel Desk, Jerusalem) A factory set up to produce an electric fleet of the iconic London black cabs is set to open in March. London Taxi Company and its Chinese owner Geely are investing 300 million in the factory near Coventry as it works to meet anti-pollution rules coming into force next year. They are also hoping to sell the TX5 electric black cab to Europe and possibly as far afield as Japan. Cabbie car production to commence: The TX5 taxi runs entirely on its battery, with zero emissions The factory is expected to create 1,000 jobs, with 600 workers already hired. London Taxi Company chief executive Chris Gubbey said the cab would be a world beater. He added: Its a huge responsibility, The black cab is known throughout the world. It is an international icon. People who visit London from around the globe have seen and used them. But the challenge of both setting up a factory and launching a new vehicle really lit my fire. It ticked every single box. The facility in Coventry is due to start making the new TX5 from March The plug-in hybrid taxi will have enough range for a day's shift, according to London Taxi Company. The batteries can be replenished at a charging post if the range does drop worryingly low The TX5 will be able to run more than 70 miles on electric power only enough, the firm says, for a days shift. As a back-up it will have a 1.5-litre petrol engine on board to generate electricity for the electric motors. The Government has further slashed its stake in Lloyds to less than 5 per cent signaling the near-close of one of the UK's biggest privatisations since the 1980s. Over the past three years, taxpayer stakes in the bailed-out banking group have been sold off and now UK Financial Investments - which manages the stake in Lloyds - has cut its holding in the lender by around 1 percentage point. It means state ownership of the bank now stands at 4.998 per cent, with more than 18.5 billion being returned to Government coffers since the lender's 20.3 billion bailout at the height of the 2007-09 financial crisis. On track: The Government has further reduced its stake in Lloyds to less than 5 per cent signaling the near-close of one of the UK's biggest privatisations since the 1980s It is the latest in a series of share sales by the Government, which said in October it hoped to offload its remaining shares in Lloyds within a year. UKFI is selling about 1 per cent of shares on average about every three weeks. This means at the current rate the bank should be fully returned to private ownership by around May. The slump in Lloyds shares at the start of last year forced the government to postpone a plan to offer cut-price shares to the public. The new Conservative government has signalled that it will call off that plan entirely, opting instead to offload the holding to institutional investors. Economic Secretary to the Treasury Simon Kirby said: 'Since our decision to sell the Government's stake in Lloyds we have recovered over 90 per cent of the money taxpayers injected into the bank during the financial crisis. 'This represents real progress and I am delighted that we are on track to return Lloyds to private ownership.' All proceeds from Lloyds group sales will be used to reduce the national debt. It signals the near end of what has been one of the biggest privatisations in Britain since Margaret Thatcher's premiership, when her government sold 3.9billion worth of shares in British Telecom and 5.6billion worth of British Gas shares. Lloyds has been trying to put its crisis-ridden past behind it. In November the company said it had set aside another 1 billion to meet compensation claims for the mis-selling of payment protection insurance (PPI) in an effort to draw a line under the scandal. The lender was by far one of the worst affected by the PPI scandal. The group was forced to fork out more than 16billion over the issue, around half the banking industry's total PPI bill that stands at more than 30billion. But in a bid to get things back on track, last month the bank said it would it would spend 1.9 billion buying MBNA, a UK credit card business from Bank of America, in its first major acquisition since its bailout. Last roll The final seventh-generation Rolls Royce Phantom will be rolling off production lines in Goodwood tomorrow. It was the first model under BMWs ownership of the iconic luxury brand. The next-generation Phantom VIII is due out later this year. Seventh generation: Rolls Royce Phantom series Snap deal The financial strength of social messaging app giant Snapchat is to be revealed this week as its parent company Snap discloses financial statements for the first time ahead of its US stock market float. Gas sale Shell is close to agreeing a deal with private equity backed Chrysaor to sell 2.4bn of its gas assets in the North Sea. It would mark a significant step in the companys plans to sell $23bn worth of assets to reduce debt after buying BG Group. EU support UK companies remain committed to trading relationships with Europe despite the UKs vote to leave the EU, according a British Chambers of Commerce survey. More than one third plan on putting more resources into exporting to the European market over the next five years. Rare offer Rainbow Rare Earths will list today on the London Stock Exchange to raise funds for its rare earth Gakara project in Africa. It expects a surge in demand for the minerals due to their use in car batteries and magnets. Tescos is to be scrutinised in Booker deal Web profits Online grocer Ocado is expected to announce a dip in profits when it announces its annual results this week. City analysts are pencilling in yearly pre-tax profits of 10.5 million, down from the 11.9 million recorded last year, its third consecutive year of profits. Takeover trouble Tescos proposed 3.7bn takeover of convenience store supplier Booker could face a lengthy investigation from the Competition and Markets Authority watchdog, retail experts have suggested. Jet power Defence giant BAE systems is being hired to work on a new Turkish fighter jet programme in a deal worth an expected 100m. After signing an agreement with Turkish Aerospace Industries for a future contract, BAE chief executive Ian King said it paved the way for a deepening defence partnership between the two countries. City superwoman Helena Morrissey is being brought in to help solve Britains pensions and savings worries. The 50-year-old mother of nine has been hired by Legal and General Investment Management (LGIM) on an undisclosed salary in the newly created role of head of personal investing. She will lead a team trying to encourage and support younger people and women to save and invest their money amid fears that many people are not doing enough to prepare for retirement. Superwoman: Helena Morrissey (pictured) is moving to Legal & General Investment Management Influential figure Morrissey shocked the City last year with her sudden departure after 15 years in charge of Newton Investment Management in search of a more meaningful career. She is now hoping to help individuals access pensions and other saving services quicker and easier. The Cambridge graduate and gender equality campaigner said: I wanted a role where I could make a real difference to how the industry engages with its customers. LGIM has the potential to be not just a market leader in this space but to develop a genuinely different approach. We are looking forward to building a savings business with strong and direct connections with our customers, including those who have never really thought about investing before or find existing offerings off-putting. We are looking to get to the point where we are all using technology to access funds in the same way that we use Amazon to access books. Our focus will be on building a service, not a sales process. Experts have warned that most workers and families are not saving enough for a comfortable retirement, particularly given the decline in final salary pension schemes. Helena Morrissey founded the 30% Club to increase the number of women on FTSE 100 boards LGIM is the UKs biggest asset manager, with 842bn on its books, and looks after the workplace pensions of more than two million people. Dubbed the billion-dollar babe due to her influence and the 51bn of assets under her management while at Newton, Morrissey has been a leading campaigner for getting more women into top jobs at City firms. Married to former financial journalist Richard Morrissey, she had her first child, Fitz, when she was 25 and has been dubbed superwoman after being made Newtons chief executive at 35. In 2010 she founded the 30% Club, which is calling for better representation of women on corporate boards. Prime Minister Theresa May spoke at its first major event while home secretary in 2011. Elaborating on her hopes to get more woman to invest, Morrissey said: All the research shows and it resonates with me that women tend to be more goal-orientated when it comes to money. Pay off the mortgage, put a child through school. While men on average tend to want to make money. Morrissey, who had argued the UK could do well outside of the EU, told the Mail: People talk about it as a divorce but I am trying to talk about it as moving house. You can just get on with enjoying your new views and growing into your new space. She is also writing a book, A Good Time To Be A Girl: How To Succeed In A Changing World. It is due to be published by HarperCollins. A former top regulator has sparked fury by joining controversial bank Standard Chartered as its head lobbyist just months after leaving her previous job. Tracey McDermott ran the Financial Conduct Authority until June - overseeing an in depth probe into her new employer. She will become head of corporate, public and regulatory affairs at Standard Chartered in March on a salary likely to be worth at least 500,000. New job role: Tracey McDermott ran the Financial Conduct Authority until June - overseeing an in depth probe into her new employer McDermott is the latest big name from the FCA - and its predecessor the Financial Services Authority - to take on a high-paid role at a financial firm. The move has been criticised as fresh evidence of the Citys revolving door culture, and the cosy relationship between watchdogs and banks whose behaviour they are meant to monitor. Standard Chartered, which is headquartered in London but does nearly all its business in Africa and Asia, has been hit with a string of fines since the Great Recession. The bank breached sanctions against Iran, failed to adequately protect against money laundering and now has to operate under round-the-clock monitoring by US authorities. Under fire: Standard Chartered, which is headquartered in London but does nearly all its business in Africa and Asia, has been hit with a string of fines since the Great Recession REGULATOR GRAVY TRAIN Sir Howard Davies, 65, FSA chairman from 1997 to 2003, now earns 750,000 as Royal Bank of Scotland chairman and 195,000 at Prudential Lord Turner, 61, FSA chairman from 2008 to 2013, makes 94,000-a-year as a non-executive at Prudential John Tiner, 59, the FSAs chief executive from 2003 to 2007, was chief executive of insurer Resolution Operations. He quit in 2012 Sir Hector Sants, 61, FSA chief executive from 2007 until 2012, was Barclays head of regulation before resigning that November due to exhaustion and stress Martin Wheatley, 57, was sacked as FCA boss in July 2015. He is not reported to have found new work FCA investigators are probing its financial crime controls in an investigation which was running when McDermott was in charge. In a letter to chief executive Bill Winters, the FCAs current boss Andrew Bailey said they had agreed she would not share confidential information she obtained while at the organisation. But George Kerevan, an SNP MP on the Treasury Select Committee, said: Its of deep concern that a former head of the FCA has gone through the revolving door to become chief lobbyist for Standard Chartered. We need much more robust protocol in place to stop regulators taking up lobbying positions with the banks immediately after theyve quit their post. McDermott, 47, was appointed acting head of the FCA after former Chancellor George Osborne sacked her predecessor Martin Wheatley for his combative approach to the banks. Insiders saw McDermott as a front-runner for the permanent top job but she was humiliated in January last year when Osborne used a radio interview to announce she had pulled out of the race. Bailey was appointed instead, leaving his role as a deputy governor at the Bank of England. By Press Trust of India: Dhaka, Jan 30 (PTI) A 72-year-old woman, believed to be a Sufi mystic, was found with her throat slit in her house in Dhaka, police said today, amid a series of systematic assaults in Bangladesh targeting minorities, Sufis and bloggers. Nurjahan Begum, who lived alone, was found dead in her tin-roofed house near the Martyrs Graveyard in the capitals Mirpur last evening, police officer Farukul Islam said. advertisement "Her throat was slit," the Daily Star newspaper quoted Islam as saying. The body was sent to Dhaka Medical College morgue for an autopsy. Citing locals, the paper said Nurjahan was known as Kheta Pagli and she had quite a following for the last eight years. Her followers considered her a "pir" or Sufi mystic. They built her the house and many of them gave her food and money. Locals said her followers had been looking for her since early afternoon. Failing to find her, they pushed the partly open door of her room in the evening and found her body covered in a blanket. There have been systematic assaults in Bangladesh in recent years specially targeting minorities, secular bloggers, intellectuals and foreigners. Over a dozen Sufi Muslims have been found with their throats slit in Bangladesh since 2013. The authorities blamed homegrown Islamist extremists for the killings. PTI ZH AKJ ZH --- ENDS --- AT the wake of the ouster of The Gambias former strongman Yahya Jammeh Zimbabweans must retroactively feel hard done by the Southern African Development Community (SADC) in 2008 for allowing Robert Mugabe to cling on to power in Zimbabwe after losing the election to Morgan Tsvangirai. The Gambias Jammeh was in fact not actually ousted from power but had lost the December 1, 2016 presidential elections to the oppositions Adama Barrow before deciding to cling onto power after having earlier conceded defeat. But all thanks to the resolve of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which massed troops on The Gambian border ready to invade if Jammeh remained recalcitrant and refused to vacate office. An almost similar episode unraveled in Zimbabwe in 2008 when incumbent President Mugabe lost the elections to Tsvangirai. Instead of standing firm by calling on Mugabe to relinquish power, SADC protected the leader of the ruling Zanu-PF party by painstakingly chiseling out the so-called government of national unity (GNU) in which Tsvangirai was installed as prime minister. Not surprisingly, the GNU proved to be an unworkable arrangement as Mugabe retained unfettered powers. But ECOWAS was not ready to tolerate another despot in its ranks as the West African region is steamrolling ahead with a process of strengthening democratic values. ECOWAS resolve to intervene militarily left little room for Jammeh, except to accept a last-ditch escape to exile in the Equitorial Guinea, the remaining island of dictatorship in a sea of burgeoning democracy in that region. As I see it, a number of dynamics were influential in the changing of the guard in The Gambia, that has been under the stranglehold of Jammehs iron fisted rule for 22 years. The foundation of the second liberation of the small west-African State was the unity of the opposition parties under the leadership of the new president Barrow to contest the December presidential elections. It is inconceivable that Jammeh would have been ousted through the ballot had the opposition parties not forged unity on the eve of the elections. The second dynamic was ECOWAS resolve after Jammeh challenged the legitimacy of the election results after having conceded defeat earlier on. This was also critical, given the perspective that losing long-time African rulers had been favoured with governments of national unity against the wishes of the electorate. Indeed SADC and the East African Economic Community have been exposed for their affinity for dictatorships. This has also been shown by the deafening silence from both regional blocks and individual member states on the crisis in The Gambia. Only Botswana from SADC had pronounced itself on the crisis by withdrawing its recognition of Jammeh. This the Kingdom of eSwatini, with a knack for befriending dictators, after having neglected to congratulate Barrow on his election victory came out after the fact to declare its support of the African Union (AU) position. The AU itself played an insignificant role in the Gambia crisis while ECOWAS courted the United Nations Security Council which passed a resolution condemning Jammehs refusal to step down and further endorsed any means possible to remove him from power. But it was muted diplomacy and no action for the AU. Another dynamic influential in resolving The Gambia crisis and forcing the hand of Jammeh was the decision by his military not to defend him as regional troops massed on the tiny countrys borders. Indeed ECOWAS has set a benchmark that other regional organisations and the AU must now strive to conform to. Yes, dictators and despots with a knack for trampling on human rights as well as gargantuan appetites for impoverishing their nations through looting of public funds must be confined to the dustbin of history. But perhaps the most important dynamic was the resolve of the people of The Gambia as epitomised by the mass celebrations immediately Barrow was declared winner of the presidential elections. The downside, however, appears to be an agreement to insulate Jammeh from prosecution for, among others, crimes against humanity and for looting public coffers. But that may be resolved by the people of The Gambia, themselves, through a truth commission that has been promised by the in-coming President Barrow. A section of the about 16 000 Red Gown Sect members under Bishop Khanyakwezwe Vilakati queuing to be cleansed by the bishop at Manganganeni Dam yesterday morning. (Pics: Sibusiso Zwane) MANZINI In line with His Majesty King Mswati IIIs order, the Red Gown Sect under Bishop Khanyakwezwe Vilakati is set to build its own church worth E10 million. This was revealed by the bishop during the churchs cleansing ceremony which started with a vigil at Gege and proceeded to Manganganeni Dam for the cleansing of the about 16 000 members who attended the ceremony. He said the luxurious church would have a sitting capacity of 5 000 people. He said initially, his church wanted to build the structure at the headquarters of the Jericho Church at Ngcoseni. The construction of the church came to me in the form of a vision. The Lord instructed me to construct the main church at Gege and they even showed me the area where I am supposed to build the structure. He said after the vision, he recalled what the King said when he intervened in the churchs impasse on who was the rightful leader to succeed the late founder of church, Melika Vilakati, between the two brothers; him and Bhekibandla. The bishop said he found that the vision he had was in line with the Kings verdict as he said both brothers should construct their own churches and leave that of their father. It is in this regard that I announce to you today (Saturday night) that our church will be built here at Gege and it will be our headquarters. The calculations which we did after seeing the drawings of the church amount to E10 million, the bishop told the church members. He said there were some funds which were already in place to start the construction of the luxurious church but the main account for the project would be launched during the Easter services. For now, we will start purchasing some materials while waiting to clear the land as some of it is currently used as fields. After opening the account, the construction will start and by the end of 2018, the structure is supposed to be complete and operating, the bishop said. Furthermore, the bishop emphasised that the church should be constructed because they were a church which respected visions. He said following the vision he had, everyone should accept that the church would be at Gege. MBABANE About 30 William Pitcher Teachers College students attended a 10-day political summer school where they were equipped with training on how to destabilise a country. As a result of the said training, two of the students now live in fear of being expelled from the college and being blacklisted by government so that they never work in the country. The 10-day camp was held in Mpumalanga, South Africa and was hosted by the Communist Party of Swaziland (CPS). The annual summer school took place between December 20 and 30, 2016 and was attended by activists from Swaziland and those in exile including the about 30 students from the teaching college. On January 2, 2017, a student in the college, who, however, did not partake in the summer school was allegedly paid a visit by a group of police officers while at the institution who asked about the whereabouts of the two students in question. The student was targeted because he holds a position within the Swaziland National Union of Students (SNUS), William Pitcher branch. The officers are said to have been carrying photos of the colleges students who attended the summer school together with one of the CPS national organisers. A well-placed source close to the matter reported that when the institution re-opened for the second semester earlier this month, a group of plain-clothes police officers allegedly paid a visit to the college and searched for two activists who were part of the group that attended the summer school. All students saw the police. They were moving in a group and asked some of us to reveal the names of the people displayed in photographs they were brandishing. Students interviewed said this happened on the day the college reopened for the second semester in January. When informed that the college administration had rubbished the reported raid, the students scoffed in disdain and said they were not at all surprised at the news as concealing information was how their administration allegedly operated. Also interviewed was a member of the CPS who is alleged to have recruited and further led the delegation of students to the meeting held in South Africa. The CPS national organiser confirmed that his organisations members, who are also students at William Pitcher Teachers College, attended the summer school in South Africa during the December holidays. PIGGS PEAK Crimes are normally reported once they have been committed but in a rare incident, a man managed to do it the other way round. Sicelo* (34) is alleged to have killed his girlfriend who worked at a bottle store after allegedly returning from the local police station to report his intentions to kill. In the past, Sicelo would go to Enkomazi Bottle to visit the woman who was his girlfriend, but on Saturday; he went there to kill her. After the alleged murder, Sicelo returned to the police station to hand himself over. His action has been likened to that of a US national, Esteban Santiago, who recently told FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigations) that he was going to shoot some people and did just that. Santiago shot five people dead and injured eight others. Sicelo allegedly stabbed Ntombikayise Mthimkhulu who had been employed at Enkomazi Bottle Store. The jilted boyfriend is said to have waited for Mthimkhulu, who arrived before 10am on the day and stabbed her. He is said to have used so much force that that the Rambo knife he is alleged to have used to stab the 23-year-old woman remained in her body. She died outside the bar. It is alleged Mthimkhulu screamed out the name of a police officer who normally frequents a nearby bar known as Entweni but it was too late to save her. She had already died when police and paramedics arrived at the scene. A bucket and some brooms used to clean her blood were still at the bar yesterday. Bheki Dlamini, who owns the Enkomazi Bottle Store, confirmed the gruesome incident which he said had left him very bitter. Bheki alleged that Sicelo had gone to the police station then returned and camped in wait for the woman he later stabbed to death. This was also confirmed by at least three officers whose names will not be revealed for ethical reasons. One of the officers was allegedly on duty when Sicelo arrived. Other eyewitness also confirmed this but they said they did not think Simiso was serious about stabbing the woman. When probed further about the incident, Bheki referred questions to Mthimkhulus family, adding that he was still in shock about the incident. Amulya Kumar Patnaik has been appointed the Delhi Police Commissioner. He will be replacing Alok Varma, who was appointed as the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) director earlier this month. By India Today Web Desk: Amulya Kumar Patnaik has been appointed the Delhi Police Commissioner. He will be replacing Alok Varma, who was appointed as the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) director earlier this month. Patnaik is currently posted as special commissioner (administration) in the Delhi Police. HERE'S ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW: Patnaik is a 1985 batch Arunachal Pradesh-Goa-Mizoram and Union Territory (AGMUT) cadre IPS officer. He succeeds Alok Kumar Verma, who became the CBI chief on January 19. Now posted as Special Commissioner (administration) in Delhi Police, Patnaik was one of the front runners for the top post along with two other senior officers, Deepak Mishra and Dharmendra Kumar. Patnaik, though a batch junior to Mishra and Kumar, was apparently chosen due to his "clean" image. He hails from Odisha. Mishra is now with the Central Reserve Police Force as an Additional Director General while Kumar is an Additional Director General with the Central Industrial Security Force. Both are 1984 batch IPS officers. Patnaik is also credited for launching special units to prevent crimes against women such as the anti-obscene calls cell and anti-stalking cell. advertisement (With IANS inputs) ALSO READ: All you need to know about the new CBI Director Alok Verma All about CBI director's appointment as PM Modi, CJI Kehar, Kharge meet to vet names --- ENDS --- Sign up for our amNY Sports email newsletter to get insights and game coverage for your favorite teams By Gina Martinez Queens College and six other CUNY schools made the top 20 for colleges that help move students from poverty to prosperity, according to a recent study from the Equality of Opportunity Project. The study was conducted by using millions of parental financial aid and tax filing records to track students from nearly every college in the country who were born between 1980 and 1991. The study then compared the students incomes after leaving college to how much their parents earned when the children started college. The median family income of a student from Queens College is $73,100, and 33 percent of students come from the top 20 percent. About 7.1 percent of students at Queens College came from a poor family but became a rich adult. The study found that the median income of Queens College students at age 34 was $48,200. Queens College President Felix V. Matos Rodriguez is glad that there is now data to support the value of attending affordable colleges. Its scientific validation of something we have known and have been sharing with anyone willing to listen, he said. Students who come from the most modest backgrounds are usually not afforded opportunities in higher education. CUNY provides the access. Were proud that when our students enter the real world, they go out there and do extremely well. We do transformational work and we are among the best at getting it done, but we never had the real facts. Now theres a study that looked at the data and its great validation of the work we do here. Rodriguez hopes that this new study shows the importance of CUNY This is the American story and now theres complete evidence, he said. So you have students, if we didnt exist, that would probably remain poor. Thats sad not just on a personal level, but a societal level. CUNY helps transform them into people who become richer, healthier and more civically minded. This should be music to taxpayers and elected officials ears. Rodriguez said his life has been directly affected by the benefits of public schools. Its the story of my parents in Puerto Rico going to a public university and then to a middle-class life and getting more opportunities. I have always been very aware of many opportunities Ive been afforded because they got their break. By Suhani Singh: A model from Nepal, Anjali Lama has crystal clear skin. Ask her the secret behind it, the 32-year-old blushes and reveals that water is her magic potion. "I can't afford pricey beauty brands," she says, adding her fondness for Patanjali's range. Lama is a transgender; the first from the 'other' category to walk at the Lakme Fashion Week. "I have heard he says that he can change gay people to straight," says Lama, referring to Ramdev Baba. "Woh marte dam tak koshish karle woh kabhi nahi hoga. [He can keep trying but that's never going to happen."] advertisement Lama has all the attributes to pass off for a top notch ramp model. She is tall, skinny (she attributes her figure to skipping 500 to 600 times a day), has high cheekbones and a poise that makes you want to straighten your spine. If anything, it's only the voice that could give her away. Still she has been hit on by men. For those who mistake her for a woman, she reveals her true self. "I never lie," she says. "It's one of my mother's diktats along with 'Don't give up'." Lama's resilience is inspiring and impressive. Born Nabin Waiba, the fifth of the seven children to a farmer residing in the tiny village Nuwakot, Nabin came out in 2003 after moving to Kathmandu. Nabin wanted to be called Sonali - after Bollywood actress Sonali Bendre - but her mother at the non-governmental organisation Blue Diamond Society recommended Anjali. After Nepal Fashion Week (NFW) crushed her modelling dreams by rejecting her for three consecutive years, Lama came to Mumbai last year to give LFW a shot. "It was my dream to walk for NFW," she said. "Because of my gender I wasn't picked." Also Read:Lakme Fashion Week welcomes a gender neutral model on its runway for the first time In the Maximum City, destiny deserted her initially. Failing twice, first in February and later in July, she was finally chosen from a competition of 120 models in November 2016. The response in Nepal to her selection, she says, is euphoric. So is she laughing at NFW now? "I'm a professional model so I will lay down my demands - good payment - and if they meet them, then I will do it," she says holding no grudge. Kathmandu though is not on her mind. It's Mumbai, which she hopes gives her enough opportunities, and her big break (from Feb 1-5). She spends more time indoors, watching shows like Indian Idol, Bigg Boss and Naagin. "May be people will laugh," she says. "Model hoke serial dekhti ho. Kaafi logon ka aisi soch hoti hai. [They say you are a model, how can you watch shows like this?]" She also follows Colors show Shakti - Astitva Ke Ehsaas Ki, which centres on a transgender albeit one played by a woman. "While I thank the makers, I wish they had trained a transgender actress to play the part," said Lama. advertisement Basking in all the attention she is getting, Lama admits that it is one of the rare occasions where her gender is working to her advantage. Says Lama, "If I was a normal girl from Nepal, then I wouldn't get it. Because I'm a transgender, it is a very new thing for people. I tell friends from my community in Nepal to come out. You shouldn't hide and lead a double life. Why live with the tension that somebody will know or tell a friend or relative?" --- ENDS --- Sign up for our amNY Sports email newsletter to get insights and game coverage for your favorite teams By Tammy Scileppi A Forest Hills wordsmith is celebrating the launch of his third mystery novel as a Kindle eBook but his fans may have seen it already if they follow him on Twitter. Robert K. Blechmans latest novel, I Tweet, Therefore I Am, is a laugh-out-loud whodunit that he originally posted in real-time tweets.It completes his hilarious and innovative Twitstery Twilogy, which the pioneer of the Twitter Fiction genre describes as a cornucopia of puns, word play and comic misdirection, stuffed with punny dialogue, clever character conditions, and a total lack of adherence to the old rules of storytelling. When Blechman got on board the Twitter train back in 2009, he wondered if there was an upside to the apparent limitations of communicating 140 characters at a time. I conceived a literary experiment: Was it possible to maintain a narrative structure and attract a reading public in Twitter? Blechman recalled. Then I coined a new term, Twitstery, for the Twitter mystery genre and created a Twitter account, RKBs Twitstery, as a container for my first detective novel, ultimately titled Executive Severance. For the sequels to that book, the linguistic alchemist said he decided to up his game. Starting on Jan. 14, 2013, he posted three tweets per day at 9 a.m., noon, and 9 p.m., and continued tweeting until he finished the entire tale on March 5, 2016. Since he nixed traditional storytelling, his audacious Twitter adventures seem to satisfy his growing audiences hunger for the off-beat and macabre, the hilarious and the surreal. Blechmans fans couldnt wait to get his fun, pithy tweets. Eventually, his account was overflowing with praise for his work, and fans were tweeting back that they wanted more. So he decided to repackage his tweets into a more convenient ebook form. I collected the hundreds of tweets, assigned them into chapters and decided to release them as two separate books, he said. His whodunits depict a continuum of mind-boggling exploits by his protagonist, who is the worlds only tweeting detective. The enigmatic Arkaby seems to channel Mickey Spillane and bits and pieces of other TV and movie detectives that the author likes. Unreliable narrator that he is, Arkaby tweets his experiences in real time. And the fact that he tells his story in tweets shapes his interpretation of the crimes he investigates, Blechman noted. He is a by-the-book procedural investigator so full of himself that he tweets every particular of his investigation. In Executive Severance, Detective Arkaby attempts to solve the strange murder of millionaire biotech industrialist and bleeding-edge scientist Willum Mortimus Granger, whose dismembered body perhaps a metaphor for the novels own disjointed format he discovers in the opening tweet of the novel. Arkaby meets up with several Granger family members and associates, including his business partner B who only speaks in consonants; Bs mysterious brother, Mr. X; as well as Grangers second wife Rachel Lehcar; and their attractive daughter, Regna Regi R. G. Granger, both of whose names are palindromes, according to Blechman. In book two of the trilogy, The Golden Parachute, our unlucky, now-suspended detective is going through a rough patch, until one day Arkaby gets a spooky visit from the murdered Willum Granger (or his ghost?), offering big bucks to find his missing daughter, Regi but only if Arkaby continues tweeting! Traveling to the Caribbean, Arkaby finally locates the ravishing Regi, but also stumbles across the now-reassembled body of Willum Granger in a Caribbean medical school autopsy lab. In book three, I Tweet, Therefore I Am, a new murder mystery unfolds after Arkaby and Regi return to the United States with her fathers body. It is up to them to solve this second murder and uncover the secrets of Grangers cloning hospital, Body Parts R Us. One problem: Arkaby is the chief suspect in the murder. The author said he began his mystery writing playing off the tropes of the tough detective genre. The hard-boiled detective who operates at the margins of society; the beautiful blond who becomes both his muse and his nemesis; various wealthy or well-positioned suspects who all apparently have reasons to kill; unlikely coincidences, duplicates and unexpected plot twists to keep the reader guessing, he said. Why a detective story? According to Blechman, the reader participates as co-author, simply because so much is left out of the narrative. The detective novelist plants clues along the way, as well as false leads or red herrings that draw the reader in to anticipate the solution to the mystery, he explained. Twitter is also intensely participatory and yet necessarily limited, and so it seemed a natural fit to adopt the detective genre as the driver for my story. Would my hero solve the crime? Would he undergo physical and mental trials? Would he get the girl? Blechman said that the through the spontaneity of writing with Twitter, he often discovered things he hadnt anticipated. Sometimes, I would sit at my desk not knowing what to write next. I had a deadline to meet, but nothing was written too far in advance, he said. Often, I discovered ideas, wordplay and dialogue that I hadnt intended when I started and didnt know where it had come from. I found the discipline, the poetic constraints imposed by Twitter and by my own rigid schedule, forced me to be creative, to call out my own muse. Sometimes, the result was as much a revelation to me as I hope it will be for my readers. Sign up for our amNY Sports email newsletter to get insights and game coverage for your favorite teams By Gina Martinez Hundreds gathered in Astoria Sunday afternoon to speak out against President Trumps decision to close the nations doors to Muslims from certain countries.. City Council Majority Leader Jimmy Van Bramer (D-Jackson Heights) held a rally outside of the anti-Trump exhibit He will not divide us at the Museum of Moving Image to denounce the presidents Muslim ban and the recent presence of neo-Nazis and white supremacists at the exhibit. The art project was started by actor and activist Shia LaBeouf and two collaborators. It is a 24-hour live stream that began the day of Trumps inauguration and will run for the next four years, or as long as Trump is president. LaBeouf invites anyone to repeat the phrase He will not divide us into a camera to protest Trumps presidency. The exhibit has recently attracted individuals who identify themselves as neo-Nazis and white supremacists on camera and want to disrupt the project. LaBeouf was arrested Jan. 26 and charged with misdemeanor assault after an altercation with another man. It was not known what provoked the altercation. At the rally Van Bramer spoke against Trumps recent executive order restricting travel for immigrants from Iran, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Libya and Sudan, predominantly Muslim countries. The executive order, signed on Friday, banned entry of U.S. nationals for 90 days and suspended the refugee program for four months. Hundreds of travelers were stranded at airports across the nation, sparking major demonstrations at Kennedy International and other airports, such as LAX is Los Angeles and OHare in Chicago. The Trump administration pulled back on the order, allowing permanent residents with green cards to enter. The president has mistaken fear mongering and scapegoating of Mexicans and Muslims as foreign policy that is wrong, Van Bramer said. Maybe thats being generous because its no mistake, after all, is it? He is stoking fear and bigotry on purpose. Its reckless, its dangerous and its wrong. We reject this hatred in all of its forms. We are better than this, New York City is better than this, this country is better than this. Together we gather again to say clearly to the world and to our neighbors that we reject hatred, we stand against bigotry and we embrace diversity in all of its forms. The crowd was fired up and chanted Loud and clear refugees are welcome here! On Sunday night Trump released a statement denying the ban targeted Muslims and defending the order. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting, he said. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. Van Bramer said the order flew in the face of Queens kaleidscope of colors. This is Queens, this is Astoria, this is New York City, we love our diversity, Van Bramer continued. We are all in one way or another immigrants. We are all the children, the sons the daughters of immigrants, Astoria resident, Emma Deweesa, attended the rally after hearing racist chants from the white supremacists the night before. I live in Astoria and its absolutely surprising, she said. Queens is the most diverse place on earth, filled with immigrants who make Queens what it is today. Its amazing seeing New York and around the country come together, I hope these rallies bring to light that people are angry and that we will not normalize a Trump presidency because its not normal. Also at the demonstration was Public Advocate Letitia James, who urged the younger generation to resist Trump. We have to take a page from history, she said. Remember it was the young people who stood up for womens rights, it was the young people who participated in the civil rights movement, it was the young people who took to the streets and demanded that Mandela be freed. It was the young people who stood in the way of tanks in Tiananmen Square. It was the young people who elected Barack Obama. Its the young people that have to resist this attempt from an illegitimate president. 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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 Beaver County preparing for robust Election Day turnout As the Nov. 8 midterm election approaches, nearly 114,000 people are registered to vote in Beaver County. By Press Trust of India: Hyderabad, Jan 30 (PTI) Apollo Hospitals would organise a conclave from February 2-5 to deliberate on ways to improve cancer management in the country. The third Edition of Apollo Cancer Conclave and the 7th Edition of Cancer CI 2017, an international conference, would be attended by 2,500 delegates and 400 faculty, including top cancer specialists, researchers and medical practitioners from India and abroad, Apollo Cancer Hospital director Vijay Anand Reddy told reporters here. advertisement The conclave is being organised with a view to "encourage a multi-modality approach towards raising the bar in cancer care," he said. Noting that the country is witnessing rising incidence of cancer, he claimed that India witnesses about one million new cancer cases every year. Observing that cancer care has transited at a rapid pace from broad-based cancer management to exceedingly precise personalised treatment, Reddy said practising oncologists need to keep abreast with the developments and the conclave would be beneficial for them. The highlights of the conclave would be - emphasis on the emerging and promising treatment option of immunotherapy and the sharing of knowledge and expertise by renowned cancer specialists, he said. Bollywood actress Manisha Koirala, who is a cancer survivor, would attend a panel discussion, Reddy added. PTI SJR RS GK GK --- ENDS --- This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Saratoga Springs An Albany police detective was suspended from work on Monday after being charged with aggravated driving while intoxicated over the weekend, city police said. His blood-alcohol content was more than three times the legal limit, State Police said. Eugene O'Hanlon, 50, was off-duty when he was pulled over at about 8:20 p.m. Saturday on Route 9 in Saratoga Springs by a trooper who said O'Hanlon was driving without his headlights on. O'Hanlon, a Delmar resident and longtime member of the Albany police force, will be suspended for at least 30 days while an internal investigation takes place, acting city police Chief Robert Sears said. Under a labor agreement, O'Hanlon's first 30 days on suspension will be without pay. He was charged with aggravated driving while intoxicated because of the high level of alcohol in his system and driving while intoxicated, both misdemeanors, police said. During the traffic stop, troopers noticed signs of intoxication and administered standardized field sobriety tests, which O'Hanlon failed, State Police said. A chemical test revealed his blood alcohol content was 0.25 percent, troopers said. The legal limit for DWI in the state is 0.08 percent. O'Hanlon has been a member of the Albany police force for nearly 30 years, Sears said. He was issued tickets and released following his arrest, and is scheduled to appear Feb. 10 in Saratoga Springs City Court. O'Hanlon and Albany Police Officers Union President Kevin Flynn did not return calls seeking comment. Earlier this month, Mayor Kathy Sheehan appointed Sears, a 19-year veteran, to oversee the department after former Chief Brendan Cox left the department to take a job focusing on criminal justice reform with a nonprofit group. For Sears, who has publicly stated his interest in becoming the next chief, the arrest of O'Hanlon marks his first internal challenge in a department that has come under fire in the past for numerous incidents involving off-duty officers arrested on DWI charges. emasters@timesunion.com 518-454-5467 @emilysmasters Kabul, Afghanistan The only insurgent leader to sign a peace pact with Afghanistan's government will return to the country within weeks, his chief negotiator says, in a move that could shake up Afghan politics and complicate the much wider war against the Taliban. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a former warlord who battled U.S. forces after the 2001 invasion and nursed a bitter rivalry with other Afghan factions, agreed to lay down arms last year. Amin Karim, his chief negotiator, told The Associated Press earlier this week that he would return to the capital in "a matter of weeks, not months." Hekmatyar is seen as a potential rival to President Ashraf Ghani and Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, who have governed the country through a shaky, U.S.-brokered power-sharing agreement since the disputed elections of 2014. His return could inject new political uncertainty as the government struggles to confront a reinvigorated Taliban that has been advancing on several fronts. The former warlord battled the Soviets in the 1980s and then took part in the civil war that erupted after their withdrawal, clashing with the so-called Northern Alliance, in which Abdullah was a leading figure. Hekmatyar was driven out when the Taliban seized power in 1996, but returned after the American invasion, vowing to resist the foreign "occupation." His forces were largely confined to just two provinces, however, and have carried out few attacks in recent years. He is believed to be in hiding somewhere in the eastern Kunar province, where he enjoys popular support, and to make occasional trips into Pakistan across the nearby border. Last year he became the only insurgent leader to sign a peace agreement with the Afghan government, in what many hoped would provide a model for a wider reconciliation with the Taliban. But he has yet to return to the fold. His Hezb-e-Islami party wants his name taken off the U.N. and the U.S. Treasury lists of wanted terrorists. Karim declined to say whether Hekmatyar would return to Afghanistan without first being removed from the lists, and there has been no indication that the U.N. or Washington is considering his removal. Both Canada and Britain consider Hezb-i-Islami to be a terrorist group. Hekmatyar, like Ghani, hails from Afghanistan's ethnic Pashtun majority, and a revitalized Hezb-e-Islami could become a powerful player in the 2019 parliamentary elections, says Andrew Wilder, vice president of the Asia Program at the U.S. Institute of Peace. "Hekmatyar's return to Kabul would certainly be significant," he said. "But the significance of his return, if it happens, will have a lot more to do with the impact of an influential Pashtun political figure who had been sidelined re-entering the political fray, and much less to do with moving the peace process forward. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate General Electric Co., which employs 7,000 people in the Capital Region, says President Donald Trump's executive order banning travel from seven Muslim countries is a risk to the company and its employees. GE does business all around the world and has employees from all around the world, including the Middle East. The nature of the company's global business and supply chain mean that its employees often travel to and from the Middle East and elsewhere. For instance, GE has 250 employees in Iraq, a country where GE has had a presence for 40 years. Iraq is one of the seven Muslim-majority countries covered by Trump's ban. And GE Power, which is headquartered in Schenectady, just announced a $1.4 billion deal to build power plants in Iraq. "We have many employees from the named countries and we do business all over the region," GE CEO Jeff Immelt posted on GE's internal employee blog Sunday night. "These employees and customers are critical to our success and they are are our friends and partners." Immelt, who has been named to a manufacturing council for Trump, said that GE will not be shy about voicing its concerns to Trump and Congress over the ban and other of Trump's controversial immigration policies. "We stand with them (our employees and partners) and will work with the U.S. Administration to strive to find the balance between the need for security and the movement of law abiding people," Immelt wrote. Another country that relies heavily on immigration and travel to parts of the Muslim world is GlobalFoundries, which operates the Fab 8 computer chip factory in Malta as well as two other fabs in Dutchess County and Vermont. Many of the workers at Fab 8 are here on visas, although it is unclear if any are covered by the travel ban, which bars travelers from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen over 90 days. However, GlobalFoundries is owned by the government of Abu Dhabi, which is not covered by the ban but may indirectly be impacted itself by Trump's immigration stance. GlobalFoundries officials at Fab 8 did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Trump's moves. Click through the slideshow above for a few statements that have been made by elected officials and others in New York since President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday temporarily suspending all immigration for citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries for 90 days. By Press Trust of India: from Indian Amb New Delhi, Jan 30 (PTI) External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj has sought a report from the Indian Ambassador in the US on the arrest of a Baroda-based businessman at an airport in the American state of North Dakota. "I have asked for a report from Indian Ambassador in U.S. @IndianEmbassyUS," she tweeted in response to a tweet by the wife of the arrested Indian man. advertisement "Sushmaji, my husband Paraman Radhakrishnan is an honest man with a passion for energy conservation," the wife tweeted to the minister. 53-year-old Radhakrishnan was taken into custody at the Grand Forks International Airport by police for allegedly making a bomb threat at an airport as he told a travel agent that there was an explosive in his bag. He faces terrorism charges. Congress chief Sonia Gandhis political secretary Ahmed Patel also sought Swarajs intervention for the release of Radhakrishnan. PTI PYK ZMN --- ENDS --- 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. "This is the news that Templemore has been waiting for and at long last we are ready to start work," said Deputy Michael Lowry this afternoon at the launch of the Templemore Flood Relief scheme in The Templemore Arms Hotel. After a number of false dawns, the diggers are finally set to roll into Templemore town to carry out 10.2 million of work on the Flood Relief Scheme which will benefit a total of 27 businesses and 77 homes in the catchment area. The project will commence in June, but the machinery will be in place prior to this with an expected recruitment of ten staff, the hire of local machinery and the sourcing of as many materials as possible from the locality, all part of the project which was outlined by Office of Public Works Minister Sean Canney. Deputy Michael Lowry confirmed that a tender has been accepted and funding sanctioned for the scheme and he described it as "a very significant and welcome project which will eliminate future flooding and give an economic boost to the local economy during its construction phase." The overall cost of the project including design fees, construction, property compensation, and environmental mitigation measures is 10.2 million. The Scheme was formally submitted for Confirmation to the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform in August 2016. And, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Paschal Donohoe has now formally confirmed the Scheme, Minister Sean Canney vising the town and stating that works will commence early in June with an estimated 2 year completion period. A property on Church Avenue, Templemore has been purchased for use as site office and project management. Deputy Lowry said, "The flooding incidents over many years in Templemore led to financial loss, personal hardship and inconvenience. The people who endured that trauma live in fear and trepidation of a reoccurrence. Since this Government was formed I have been in regular contact with the relevant authorities insisting that this project be given priority. After many years of slow progress and sporadic movement with a number of false dawns I am delighted that we now have clarity and certainty." Two previous announcement of progress with the scheme were referred to at the launch by Cllr John Hogan who was informed that the initial project submitted for approval has changed substantially and for the better by that which has been sanctioned for the go ahead. See this weeks Tipperary Star for more on this story. Intensive public lobbying and a massive outcry from the people of Roscrea have forced a reversal of proposed cuts to the towns swimming pool operating hours. A planned cut to early morning and evening times at the Roscrea Leisure Centre Swimming Pool met with fierce resistance from local politicians and two meetings were called last week, one in the Abbey Hall attended by dozens of local concerned residents, and another of the Board of Management of the Roscrea Swimming Pool. Chairperson of the Board, Ms Eileen Doherty, issued a statement on behalf of management this week clarifying the Board's position: The Board of Directors of Roscrea Swimming Pool Ltd. is positively disposed to exploring a suspension of the revised opening hours for the Leisure Centre for a period of three months. This time will facilitate the re-consideration of the options available to address the various concerns and will include consultation with customers. Prior to the implementation of this suspension, it is necessary to properly consult with the stakeholders who will be affected by this decision and this process will commence immediately. While the proposed regime of reduced hours will be reversed on a trial basis, its understood it could take another few weeks to restore the hours fully back to what they were in December 2016. Management of the Swimming Pool are now engaging in a process of rescheduling work rotas, combined with a campaign of public information. While the stay of execution was welcomed by Roscrea Leisure Centre Board member and local FF Cllr Michael Smith, Roscrea Chamber of Commerce President Seamus Browne, and Roscrea Credit Union Manager Brian King, sources indicate that its highly likely the issue could blow up again. Brian King commented: The Roscrea Leisure Centre is a project that remains passionately close to peoples hearts in Roscrea. The fate of the swimming pool is intricately linked to the town itself, heard the Abbey Hall meeting, and it would send out a very negative message about Roscreas future viability if the hours were cut. [January 30, 2017] ViON Receives Top Small Business Award for Greater Washington Heart Walk ViON Corporation, a market leader in the design, delivery and maintenance of mission-critical IT infrastructure solutions, announced today it was recognized as the Top Small Business Fundraising Company for the 2016 Greater Washington Heart Walk, which was attended by 120 companies from the Washington DC region. ViON raised $30,000 for the Walk, in support of the American Heart Association's $2.27M goal. The event took place November 5, 2016 on the National Mall, with a total of 12,000 participants. Elizabeth Anthony, ViON's Senior Vice President of Marketing, also chaired the 2016 Executives with Heart, a component of the larger AHA campaign that inspires executives to get personally involved in a citywide challenge to raise funds for the Walk. In 2016, the Executives with Heart campaign exceeded its goal by more than 15% for a total of $438,000, which is the largest amount raised to date under this portion of the campaign. "It was incredible to see the entire staff organize and participate in nearly a dozen internal evnts leading up to the Walk, from chili cook-offs to bake sales - all to rally our team and reach our goal," explained Anthony. "Heart disease and stroke is so personal to me and many of our colleagues and it's a powerful motivator knowing that our efforts as a team are directly supporting life-changing research." The annual Greater Washington Heart Walk is the American Heart Association's Mission in Action and the organization's premier event for raising funds to save lives from this country's No. 1 and No. 5 killers: heart disease and stroke. The annual celebration promotes physical activity and heart healthy living-and 90% of the money raised is put directly back into research. The American Heart Association (www.heart.org) held 107 Heart Walks nationwide in 2016. About ViON Corporation (News - Alert) ViON Corporation designs, delivers and maintains mission-critical IT infrastructure solutions on an enterprise scale for the military, governments and commercial businesses, while offering the highest level of security available anywhere around the globe. ViON is well known for its cost-effective compute, network and storage capabilities, delivered on premise or through the cloud anywhere on earth. Supported by cleared resources that are highly trained and armed with the industry's latest certifications and specializations, ViON has a legacy of helping its customers meet business goals and mission objectives, support warfighters and deliver citizen services and drive innovation and business growth. The veteran-owned business is located in Herndon, Virginia with field offices throughout the United States. For more information visit www.vion.com. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130006120/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] A look back on all of our reporting of the Delphi murders since 2017 crime By Anusha Soni: In further setback for Asaram Bapu, the Supreme Court today ordered the registration of a new First Information Report (FIR) against the self-styled godman for filing fake documents in connection with his health. The Supreme Court also levied a fine of Rs 1 lakh on Asaram, whose plea for bail on medical grounds was also rejected by the apex court, which said his condition wasn't such that he can't be treated in Jodhpur. advertisement Asaram is lodged in the Jodhpur Central Jail and is facing prosecution for a number of sexual assault cases, including allegedly raping a minor girl. Rejecting the plea by Asaram seeking modification of the October 24, 2016 order refusing him bail, Chief Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar and Justice NV Ramana referred to a report by the AIIMS medical board. The All India Institute of Medical Sciences board of eight senior doctors had said the evaluation of his prostate ailment remained incomplete because of Asaram's refusal to undergo required tests. "We can't overlook that the trial was unnecessarily prolonged and there were attacks on prosecution witnesses, two of whom have died," the Supreme Court noted. "The instant plea is devoid of merit and hence dismissed," the court said while refusing to modify its earlier order that had declined Asaram an interim bail. Also read: How devotees rushed to touch Asaram Bapu's feet, disbalanced flight --- ENDS --- Congress leaders including state Congress President Arun Yadav met DGP RK Shukla in Bhopal and demanded an inquiry into the incident. By Rahul Noronha: Congress MLA from Gandhwani in Dhar district, Umang Singhar on Monday accused the police of raping four tribal women in a hamlet in Dhar district while destroying and looting their property. Congress leaders including state Congress President Arun Yadav met DGP RK Shukla in Bhopal and demanded an inquiry into the incident. The police have registered an FIR into the incident. advertisement Singhar while alleging rape of four women said that a police party that had gone to Bhutiya and Holibayada villages on January 27 looted the belongings of tribals and raped four women. The four women also accompanied Singhar at a press conference that he held at the PCC office in Bhopal on Monday. IG, Indore, Ajay Sharma said that a police party of more than 100 personnel had gone to the villages to execute 92 warrants against the residents who have cases of loot and dacoity against them. "We have registered an FIR on the basis of a complaint made by women. A medical examination has been conducted and the police are open to a probe from outside the district too. The entire operation has been videographed," he said. Sources in the police claim they met with massive resistance while entering the village and were even fired upon after which they used teargas to disperse the irate villagers. The police had apparently not entered the village in the last 5 years. Also read: Delhi: College students protest Dalit minor's rape, murder in Bihar --- ENDS --- In Army parlance, affairs between officers with wives of other officers are known as stealing of affection of brother officer's wife and are considered to be court-martial offences. By Ajit Kumar Dubey: Faced with allegations of having an illicit relationship with a Colonel's wife, a Brigadier has alleged that his estranged wife was hatching a conspiracy to stop his career progression in the force. The wife of the officer is Principal of a leading school in Delhi NCR and she had written to the Indian Army that her husband posted under the Eastern Command near Siliguri in West Bengal was having an illicit affair with the wife of a Lieutenant Colonel and was indulging in adultery, sources told Mail Today. advertisement After the allegations were made by the wife of the Brigadier in a letter written to the senior authorities, the officer was attached for a Court of Inquiry by the Army for trying him on adultery charges. Also Read: Exclusive: Military court scraps IAF pilot's dismissal for having an affair with colleague's wife In Army parlance, such affairs between officers with wives of other officers are known as stealing of affection of brother officer's wife and are considered to be court-martial offences. However, recently the Supreme Court tried to adopt a practical approach in such cases as it said that a consenting affair between an officer and wife of another officer cannot be grounds for dismissal from service. The Armed Force Tribual (AFT) in one of its recent judgments had stated that the services should act according to changing times while dealing with such cases. In the inquiry, both the officer and the lady with whom he is alleged to have an affair denied having any such relationship. The Colonel, who is now posted under the Mathur-based 1 Strike Corps, has also written a complaint to the Army authorities against the Brigadier, who is facing disciplinary proceedings in this regard at Sewak Road military station in West Bengal. Also Read: Exclusive: Navy dismisses senior officer for affair with fellow officer's wife The officer is also being investigated for alleged misuse of sahayaks and other charges related to his responsibilities during the visit of a foreign military delegation. The Brigadier's wife has also submitted some whatsapp messages between the officer and the Lt Col's wife to prove her charges against the officer. The Colonel has also filed a case of adultery against the officer in a civil family court in Dehradoon in Uttarakhand, which is the native place for both the officers, meaning that the same offence is being looked into by two different authorities of the government. The officer has also approached a military court against the ongoing disciplinary proceedings against him alleging that his wife is hatching a conspiracy against him and the letter written by Lt Col says, "conspiracy has been hatched to deprive me from promotional avenue in the Army". advertisement Sources in the Army said the force is now thinking about moving ahead with the court martial of the officer. On the assertion made by the Brigadier in the court that the Army had not complied with certain provisions of the Army Act regarding his presence during the course of inquiry, the AFT said the Army authorities will have to look into compliance of all procedures while refusing to interfere with the proceedings --- ENDS --- By Press Trust of India: From Aditi Khanna London, Jan 30 (PTI) A group of influential UK British MPs today announced a parliamentary inquiry into the "growing phenomenon" of fake news, its sources and impact, stating that it is "a threat to democracy and undermines confidence in the media in general". The House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee said it would investigate concerns about the public being swayed by propaganda and untruths. advertisement "The growing phenomenon of fake news is a threat to democracy and undermines confidence in the media in general. Just as major tech companies have accepted they have a social responsibility to combat piracy online and the illegal sharing of content, they also need to help address the spreading of fake news," said committee chair Damian Collins. "Consumers should also be given new tools to help them assess the origin and likely veracity of news stories they read online. The committee will be investigating these issues as well as looking into the sources of fake news, what motivates people to spread it and how it has been used around elections and other important political debates," he said. The cross-party MPs will investigate whether the way advertising is bought, sold and placed online has encouraged the growth of fake news. They also want to address the responsibility of search engines and social media to stop spreading it. The committee is seeking written submissions from interested parties by the start of March and is expected to hold hearings in due course. Opposition Labour party had launched its own investigation into fake news earlier this month, led by former shadow culture secretary Michael Dugher. The issue was thrown into the spotlight especially during the US presidential campaign, when fake news like the Pope supporting Donald Trump gained social media traction. Stanford University had carried out research which suggested that fabricated news stories favouring Trump were shared 30 million times. However, new research suggests that online hoaxes and propaganda may have only had limited impact in the US presidential election. PTI AK AJR AKJ AJR --- ENDS --- You can sync your Microsoft SharePoint account with your local hard drive, enabling automatic uploads of new documents you file in the associated drive on your computer or mobile device. Files can be dragged and dropped to this drive, imported, or scanned via a compatible printer or scanner. Synchronizing Microsoft SharePoint is an easy way to access files directly from Windows File Explorer, making it easy for individual users to upload and edit documents without interrupting their existing workflow. Using the more advanced features of SharePoint, however, might require some additional training. From team site to team site, for example, admins can configure different metadata fields specific to each site and subsite. When it comes to collaboration, Microsoft SharePoint excels. Version control is reviewable down to specific edits. Users can see who made what changes when as well as review all previous versions of a document to see how it changed. Archived versions of documents can be downloaded to local hard drives, which is useful for creating redundant copies or quickly reverting to a previous version if edits are improperly made to a document. Custom notifications can be set so users receive alerts when a particular document is changed. While there is a check-in and checkout feature in SharePoint, you can also create a setting so that multiple users are permitted to simultaneously edit the same document; depending on your organizations workflows, co-authoring can be a useful feature. Microsoft SharePoint includes an audit log that makes tracking all activity easy. It provides an overview of past admin settings and how they have changed over time. The audit log is searchable, allowing users with access to review user activity, specific time frames, search terms and more. Audit logs are particularly useful for large businesses looking to improve transparency with the documents their organization produces and manages as well as businesses in industries that are subject to regulations that govern the production and transmission of sensitive information, such as healthcare organizations or legal representatives. As a Microsoft product, SharePoint seamlessly integrates with other Microsoft applications. These include all Microsoft Office 365 products (Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint) as well as Microsoft Flow and Microsoft PowerApps. It also integrates with many third-party software applications your business already uses on a daily basis. Microsoft SharePoint ranges in price from $5 per user, per month to $20 per user, per month depending on the tier you choose, and the add-on features you select. Microsoft SharePoint can be purchased in combination with Microsoft Office 365 or as a stand-alone product. There is a 30-day free trial available so you can test the software first before making a buying decision. This drives me mad. Were not a country buried under thousands of years of historical buildings like when when you go to Europe. So what we do have we should be trying to retain as some kind of character around the joint. This relentless march of anonymous apartments is just insane to me. These were the words of comedian and radio host Mick Molloy during a recent broadcast of Triple Ms Hot Breakfast. Molloy was responding the news, announced on Friday evening via Facebook, that the Mentone Hotel, formerly named the Edgewater Hotel and known to locals as The Edgy, would be closing this Thursday, 13th November, with the propertys new owners set to convert the historic 1880s Beach Rd. building into a residential development. [include_post id=421896] The news has met opposition from locals and Edgy fans on social media, with the State Government now vowing to try and protect the iconic venue from being turned into apartments. As The Herald Sun reports, yesterday morning Planning Minister Matthew Guy and Sandringham state Liberal MP Murray Thompson visited the Mentone Hotel, with Mr. Guy telling News Limited he and Mr. Thompson would write to Heritage Victoria to seek heritage listing for the hotel in a bid to protect it from development. We cant sit idle and watch this grand old building be turned into apartments, he said. It would be a huge loss to the whole bayside area. He added that the process to have the building heritage listed could take a couple of months, but said development was not imminent. There have been no permits issued, so people can be assured there is no imminent threat to the building, said the Planning Minister. Any person can request Heritage Victoria to consider a building for protection, and the hope is that heritage listing will protect the structure of the building and the interior, which would mean it could really only continue to be operated as a pub. Its a bit of shock that a beautiful old building like this is not already heritage listed, he added. [include_post id=416783] Over on social media, locals were incensed. At the time of writing, the Save the Edgy Facebook group has already amassed over 11,000 subscribers. Organisers insist the Edgy is a historic landmark within the Bayside area and a place which has played a significant part in peoples lives, directing them to a Change.org petition which is currently just 155 signatures shy of its 5,000-signature goal. The petition was launched by Sandringham independent candidate Clarke Martin. It calls on the State Government to introduce legislation to protect Victorias historic pubs. We have got to the stage where development is out of control when icons such as the Mentone Hotel are put up for the highest bidder, he said. As population increases it is more and more important that we maintain our social infrastructure such as our great historic pubs. Mr. Martin has also organised a protest rally to be staged at the Mentone Hotel this Wednesday at 7:30pm, with thousands expected to attend the hotels final instalment of their popular Edgy Wednesdays event considered something of a rite of passage for young Bayside residents. The weekly nightclub and live music event has become staple of the areas cultural landscape. Poke Perfect planning three metro locations. Poke Perfect plans to open the first of three Atlanta area locations in Decatur later this spring. The new restaurant will open in place of the beloved The Yogurt Tap, a locally owned frozen yogurt shop which closed this past November after just over six years in business. The roughly 1,200 square foot space is located on Church Street, across from the square in downtown Decatur. With U.S. headquarters in Atlanta, Poke Perfect has one location open in their European headquarters of Amsterdam, the Netherlands, with a second coming soon to the city of Utrecht. Restaurant veteran Hunter Satterwhite is opening the restaurant s in Georgia. A native of Lake Gaston, a small community near the North Carolina-Virginia border, Satterwhite opened Treylor Park, a southern fusion restaurant, in Savannah in 2014. L ast year he sold his stake in the restaurant to plan Poke Perfect. In addition to being co-owner and Executive Chef at Treylor Park, Satterwhite's chef credentials also include time as Chef de partie at the Playboy Mansion in Los Angeles. Poke , a traditional Hawaiian dish, is essentially deconstructed sushi, served in a bowl. In addition to traditional offerings such as tuna and salmon, Poke Perfect will also feature smoked chicken, tofu and shrimp. The restaurant will also feature lobster as an entree option in a sort of deconstructed lobster roll. The restaurant will also offer sushirrito (sushi burrito ). Beverage options are expected to include beer, wine and sake as well as Mexican Coke and Boxed Water, among other offerings. Poke Perfect plans to offer two bowl sizes: regular and large, with prices expected to range from $9-$12. Planned signage for the restaurant's exterior In an interview this past weekend, Satterwhite indicated that his original restaurant in the Netherlands, which opened this past October, recently set a worldwide record on UberEATS with 174 bowls sold via the platform over a two hour period. Satterwhite plans to offer delivery in Atlanta via the UberEATS platform, as well as select additional partners. Following the expected April debut of Poke Perfect in Decatur, Satterwhite plans to open additional locations on the Westside and in Inman Park near the BeltLine before the end of the year. After the three Atlanta area locations open, plans call for the chain to continue its corporate, non-franchise expansion into surrounding southeastern cities. With their exis tin g store in the Netherlan ds and Atlanta and others in the pipeline, Satterwhite fee ls Poke Perfect will be the first international Poke restaurant. In Atlanta, Poke Perfect joins a growing group of poke purveyors. Fish Bowl Poke, which claims to be "Atlanta's first p oke restaurant," opened this past summer on Broad Street downtown. Poke Bar Bar opened last fall in Sandy Springs with plans to add additional locations in Alpharetta and "Atlanta." Boruboru Sushi also opened this past fall at Emory Point, across from the CDC. Most recently, Budi's Sushi opened at the Pencil Factory Lofts on Decatur Street earlier this month offering sushi and p oke as well as other Asian dishes . Various other restaurants have added p oke to their menus, but few offer the variety of the aforementioned eateries. With their exis tin g store in the Netherlan ds and Atlanta in the pipeline, Satterwhite fee ls Poke Perfect will be the first international Poke restaurant. D espite the competition , Satterwhite feels the more people are aware of p oke, the better off all operators will be. Are you excited for the opening of Poke Perfect in Decatur? Where is your favorite place to get p oke in Atlanta? Where would you like to see Poke Perfect open next? WHAT DID THE KANSAS CITY OPPONENTS OF PREZ-TRUMP'S IMMIGRATION CRACKDOWN ACCOMPLISH?!?! - Kansas City lies in betwixt two Red States that OVERWHELMINGLY supported Prez Trump and a GOP political tidal wave that threatens to completely render the opposing and oldest political party in the world almost completely irrelevant beyond even their SUPER-MINORITY status in both houses after a slate of female and lightweight candidates where shut out. - Where were all these people when immigration authorities were snatching Latinos up left and right without much (if any) resistance??? Think carefully and then remember all the funny parts from Born In East LA!!! Of which there were many . . . And because nobody ever blew up a building with a leaf blower. - To the credit of protesters . . . This is a policy issue debate that's gonna get boring quickly. TKC is one of the very few people in this discussion that has actually wasted a few days at the immigration detention center out by the airport and all theoretical discussion is a nice distraction from the reality that sorting citizens from non is always an ugly process that's hard to defend when people get a close look at the inherently clumsy and broken undertaking that has ALWAYS been intrinsically unfair and completely random. Like it or not, it takes courage to get from behind the keyboard or mobile phone screen and get out into the real world in order to participate indiscourse.Whether it's a pro-Prez Trump rally or yesterday's Kansas City anti-Prez Trump immigration backlash . . . Generally, it's important to realize that the right to peacefully assemble and protest is one of the greatest and defining characteristics of our Democracy.And then there's the question of expediency . . .The struggle for social justice might be a reward unto itself but here's the reality . . .Now . . . Let's take another look . . .You decide . . . KANSAS CITY MAYOR SLY NOW LEADS DEMOCRATIC PARTY PROTEST WITH A BULLHORN . . . WILL HE WIN AGAINST PREZ TRUMP??? A Sunday night question for our blog community to ponder . . .Another sampling of cowtown rhetoric amid international immigration debate:All things considered as we take a pause for Sunday night, this is a bold move given that 2/3rds of Kansas City counties and most of Eastern Jack voted for Prez Trump . . . In addition to Red State dominance in both Missouri and Kansas State Houses . . .You decide . . . Much like humans, computers can contract nasty viruses that completely wreak havoc on their systems. Its believed that there are over 100,000 computer viruses, though some experts contend that there are over a million. The good news is that many of the viruses are not in circulation and are merely a part of collections. However, there are some that have been released, and in some cases, they caused massive devastation. These are 10 of the most notorious. 10. The Morris Worm Robert Morris, Jr. is the son of a famous American cryptographer and pioneering computer scientist, Robert Morris, Sr. In 1988, he was a graduate student in Computer Science at Cornell, when he wrote an experimental program called a worm. The worm was 99 lines of code and it had the ability to self-replicate and self-propagate. On November 2, 1988, Morris loaded his program onto the internet using a computer at MIT. However, Morris made a mistake in his coding and the worm spread quickly. Since the internet wasnt as widespread then as it is now, the Morris Worm managed to infect 10 percent of all computers on the internet (which was about 6,000). The program ran a bunch of invisible tasks and this caused computers around the United States to crash or become catatonic. When Morris realized what was happening, he contacted a friend at Harvard and they came up with a solution. They tried to send out an anonymous message on how to fix it, but it was too late and the message got lost in the traffic caused by the worm. Computer programmers around the country worked for days to figure out how to debug the computers. In total, it cost anywhere from $200 to more than $53,000 to fix an infected computer. After investigating, all evidence in the coding of the worm pointed to Morris. He was convicted of violating the Fraud and Abuse Act and handed a sentence of three years of probation, 400 hours of community service, and fined $10,050. 9. The Omega Time Bomb https://youtu.be/PsmGE8i3jRs Omega Engineering is a Stamford, Connecticut based company that designs and manufactures high tech instrumentation. On the morning of July 31, 1996, an employee in the Computer Numeric Control department started up the file server that controlled all the manufacturing machines. However, the server didnt boot up and instead a message popped up that said that the file server was being fixed. However, quite the opposite happened. Instead of fixing the files, it deleted them. Even worse, the virus destroyed any way of finding the programs again. Computer Security Journal said that the lines of code were scattered like a handful of sand thrown onto a beach. Omega was sure they had backups on tape and on local computers, but when they went to retrieve them, they could not be found. When the employees realized what had happened, the first person they called was Tim Lloyd, a former employee who oversaw the computer network. He had been with the company for 10 years, but lost his job three weeks before the server crash because of problems with his attitude. Over the course of a year, Lloyds personality had changed and he became an angry man who lashed out at co-workers. His attitude also led to him purposely bottlenecking projects, which slowed production. He was given several warnings before he was fired on June 10, 1996. When Omega realized how much information they had lost, they called the police who, in turn, called in the Secret Service. When they investigated, they found that the virus was just six lines of code that worked like a time bomb. When someone logged on July 31, 1996, it would delete all of Omegas computer files. The most obvious suspect was Lloyd and the Secret Service looked at his home computer and found the same six lines of code. They determined that Lloyd was planning on quitting and he made the time bomb virus at home. He then installed it at work after everyone had left for the night. However, before he got a chance to quit, he was fired. Lloyd was arrested and sentenced to three and a half years in prison, and ordered to pay $2 million in restitution. At the time, it was the worst act of work-related computer sabotage. It cost Omega over $10 million in lost business and $2 million in reprogramming cost. They also had to lay off 80 people. It took years for Omega to overcome the virus attack, but they are still in business today. 8. Melissa The Melissa virus started to spread on March 26, 1999, via email. The subject line of the email was Important message from [Senders Name] and the body of the email was, Here is that document you asked fordont show anyone else ;-). Finally, there was a Microsoft Word document labeled list.doc. When people would open the document, it would send out the same Important Message email to the first 50 addresses in the persons Outlook address book. The virus spread to hundreds of thousands of computers in the first several days. In some cases, it caused servers to shut down. Even Microsoft and Intel were infected. Microsoft chose to shut down their outgoing internet email service to stop the spread. In total, its estimated that the Melissa virus caused around $400 million in damage. The virus was traced back to David L. Smith, a network programmer who lived in Trenton, New Jersey. Smith had hacked an America Online account and launched the virus from his apartment. He was arrested less than a week after the virus was released. He said that he named the virus Melissa after a topless dancer in Florida. He was sentenced to 20 months in federal prison. When he was asked why he did it, Smith basically said that he did it to see if he could do it. Fair enough, we guess. 7. LoveBug aka ILOVEYOU On May 4, 2000, people in the Philippines started getting emails with the subject line ILOVEYOU. The body of the email read, Kindly check the attached LOVELETTER coming from me. Finally, there was an attachment with a file name like LOVE-LETTER-FOR-YOU.TXT. Many people who got the email couldnt resist the thought of someone sending them a love letter out of the blue, so millions tried to open what they thought was a text file. And as you probably have guessed, it was, of course, a virus. By todays standards, the virus was pretty tame. It would make duplicate copies of media files and documents. It would also email the virus creator the user names and passwords of infected computers, which would allow him to log onto the internet for free. However, the real problem was that it could email a copy of itself to every email address in the infected computers Microsoft Outlook address book. At the time, not many people saw the importance of having things like an up-to-date antivirus program. As a result, according to the BBC, the LoveBug (as it was sometimes called) spread to 45 million computers in the first couple of days. When programmers looked at the code, they found an email address embedded in it and the worm was traced back to 24-year-old Onel de Guzman, who was a student at the AMA Computer College in the Philippines. De Guzman had recently dropped out because his undergraduate thesis, which was to commercialize a Trojan horse that stole passwords, was rejected. After the virus was released, De Guzman went into hiding. When he reemerged several days later, he was arrested along with one of his friends, Reomel Ramones. However, there were no laws regarding malware in the Philippines so neither man was ever charged or prosecuted. De Guzman says that the virus was probably his creation and admitted that he may have accidentally let it out of captivity. The LoveBug became the first virus to successfully spread using social engineering, but it certainly wouldnt be the last. 6. Agent.btz In the fall of 2008, the U.S. Militarys computer network was hit by a variation of a SillyFDC worm. At the time, the SillyFDC worm was a fairly benign worm; before the attack, a SillyFDC worm was listed as Risk Level 1: Very Low. One reason the worm wasnt super effective is that it wasnt transferred through something like email. Instead, it was transferred via storage devices, like thumb drives. However, a new variation of the worm, called Agent.btz, infected a military laptop at a base in the Middle East when someone inserted an infected flash drive. The laptop was connected to the U.S. Central Command and the virus was uploaded to the network. From there, the virus spread undetected through both classified and unclassified systems. Once the virus was in place, data could be secretly transferred to different foreign servers. In a process called Operation Buckshot Yankee, it took the military 14 months to finally clear out the virus and it led to the formation of a new unit called the United States Cyber Command. The leading theory is that the virus was an espionage attack by a foreign country, most likely Russia. 5. Flashback Apple has long promoted that Macs are much safer than PCs because, Apple says, they are less likely to get viruses or malware. There are two big reasons for this. The first is that Microsoft Windows is used by a vast majority of computers. Even in 2016, Macs only account for 7.4 percent of home computer sales. This makes Windows a much bigger target. Secondly, it is much harder to make changes to Macs operating system, macOS (formerly OS X). There are areas of macOS that are walled off and you need administrative privilege to change it, meaning its operating system has a limited amount of points of intrusion. However, that doesnt mean Macs are invincible from viruses. The most notorious of them was discovered in September 2011. How it worked was that it was disguised as an Adobe Flash installer and it got around Macs security because there was an unpatched vulnerability in Java. The result was that 650,000 Macs, which was about 1.5 percent of all Macs at the time, were infected. The Trojan horse virus did two things. The first is that it created a backdoor in the system so data, like passwords, could be stolen. It also took control of the computers, making them a botnet, which is when one central computer controls a collection of zombie computers. By February 2012, Mac released a security tool to remove the virus and Oracle, who makes Java, fixed the vulnerability. 4. Sasser and Netsky-AC The Sasser virus was first detected on April 30, 2004. It was different from other viruses at the time because with other viruses, users needed to do a task to infect their computer, like open a file. Instead, the Sasser virus passed through the Local Security Authority Subsystem Service (LSASS). It would scan random computers until it found a vulnerable system and then it would copy itself as an executable file to the computer. When the computer was booted, the virus would install itself. Microsoft knew about the vulnerability and issued a patch for it on April 13, 17 days before the virus was first detected. However, not every computer had updated the patch and this left them exposed. In the two days after the virus was detected, a cleanup tool was downloaded 1.5 million times. One thing that really set Sasser apart from other viruses is that in the days after the virus was released, an email started circulating with a file that was supposed to fix it. Instead, it was another virus called Netsky-AC. The viruses didnt cause any permanent damage. However, it did cause computers to crash and reboot more often. In total, hundreds of thousands of computers were infected. After the viruses were released, Microsoft offered a $250,000 reward for information on the author or authors. Two people turned in 18-year-old computer student Sven Jaschan, who was responsible for writing both Sasser and Netsky-AC. He was arrested and faced up to five years in jail; instead, he got a 21-month suspended sentence. 3. SQL Slammer The fastest spreading computer worm in history, the SQL Slammer virus is also known as w2.SQLSlammer.worm, Sapphire, w32.SQLexp.worm, and Helkern. The worm started to spread at 12:30 EST on January 25, 2003. The virus would scan the entire internet for random IP addresses looking for vulnerable Microsoft SQL 2000 servers. The number of computers infected doubled every 8.5 seconds and within 10 minutes, 75,000 hosts, which was about 90 percent of vulnerable hosts, were infected. The virus didnt really effect home computers. Instead, it caused network outages, slowed down internet service, and denied some hosts access to the internet. This effected airline flights, interfered with electronics, and caused ATM failures. It is estimated that the virus cost $1 billion in lost revenue. A major investigation was launched, but the author has never been identified. 2. Storm Worm On January 19, 2007, computers in the United States and Europe started getting emails with the subject line 230 dead as storm batters Europe, and then there was an attachment called video.exe. Of course, the attachment wasnt a video; it was a Trojan horse virus. After infecting the computer, it created a backdoor which the author could use later to get data, and it added the computer to the botnet. The botnet was then used to post spam. One of the reasons that the virus was initially successful was because, at the time when it was sent, bad storms were raging in Europe. Later, the subject was changed to over two dozen different headlines including A killer at 11, hes free at 21 and, Chinese missile shot down USA aircraft, and President of Russia Putin dead, just to name a few. According to IBM, by February 2008 the worm had taken control of enough computers to perform spam attacks that were making the creators $2 million per day. As for who the creators were, its believed that the virus originated in Russia, but beyond that not much is known. 1. Code Red The first version of the Code Red worm was discovered on July 12, 2001, by several employees at eEye Digital Security. They spent all night analyzing the worm and while working on it, they drank Mountain Dew Code Red. So, they called the virus Code Red, and the name stuck. The first variation of Code Red didnt spread fast and didnt do much damage. Some websites were defaced and they said Welcome to China http://www.worm.com ! Hacked by Chinese! However, on the 20th of July, the virus stopped trying to infect other servers and a launched denial-of-service attack on the White Houses web page. Fortunately, the White House was able to stop the attack by changing IP addresses. Code Red version 2, on the other hand, was much more problematic. At the time, it was the fastest moving computer virus. It was discovered at 5:00 p.m. EST on July 19, 2001, and within 14 hours, over 359,000 computers were infected. In total, its believed that the worm infected 1 million of 5.9 million web servers. This caused internet traffic to slow but didnt do any damage to the servers themselves. Code Red version 2 was also one of the most costly viruses. In July and August, the virus led to $2.6 billion in damages. The virus is believed to have originated at a university in China. However, it has never been confirmed. Robert Grimminck is a Canadian freelance writer. You can friend him on Facebook, follow him on Twitter, follow him on Pinterest or visit his website, or his true crime YouTube channel. Other Articles you Might Like Greek Defence Minister Panos Kammenos is paying an official visit to Qatar with aim the strengthening of Greece's relations with the Emirate. Kammenos met with Prime Minister and Interior Minister of Qatar Abdullah bin Nasser bin Khalifa Al Thani and with Hamad Bin Ali Al-Attiyah Minister of State for Defence. They discussed matters of military cooperation and the further strengthening of the cooperation in the sector of defence industry. They also exchanged views on mutually beneficial action in Greece in the sector of education medicine and nursing. Read more here. RELATED TOPICS: Greece, Greek tourism news, Tourism in Greece, Greek islands, Hotels in Greece, Travel to Greece, Greek destinations , Greek travel market, Greek tourism statistics, Greek tourism report New Democracy leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis send a clear warning to the government over the completion of the second review of the Greek programme noting that it is a necessary prerequisite to secure that at least until July we will not face again a new credit event. In an interview to newspaper Macedonia, the main opposition leader said that if we do not secure the financing the Grexit scenario will return. "The government is playing with fire again" . The government's inefficiency gives ground to the extreme voices of Europe and offers them the opportunity to raise again the issue of Greece exit from the eurozone as the most suitable solution". 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Also read: Budget 2017: Tax rates may be slashed, says top Modi minister advertisement "The Prime Minister said that differences may arise between parties but democracy should win and there should be debate in Parliament," the minister said. "All parties, especially those in the opposition, said they wanted debate and both houses should function," the minister added. Also read: What India expects from Arun Jaitley on February 1 in first budget after demonetisation Asked about the opposition's demand to postpone the budget, the minister said: "This is the nation's budget, for the benefit of the nation. The Supreme Court has given its verdict." The budget session of Parliament starts on Tuesday. The budget will be presented on Wednesday. --- ENDS --- Entreprise : EASIA TRAVEL Ville : Hanoi au Vietnam et Lille (59) EASIA TRAVEL CO., LTD is a Vietnamese Destination Management Company (DMC) with 14 offices in Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Thailand. 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For more information, feel free to have a look at our website : www.easia-travel.com Today, we are looking for a SALES DEVELOPMENT MANAGER H/F FOR MICE DEPARTMENT for our MICE team based in Hanoi, Vietnam. Some of the worlds freshest and fastest growing financial technology solutions are coming to the GCC to demonstrate how they could help revolutionise financial services in the Mena region. Six leading solutions covering hot topics such as organisational profitability and efficiency, meeting customer needs regardless of their location, understanding digital customer preferences and methods of delivering financial products on digital channels will all be on show at the Meftech 2017, being held in Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre (Adnec) on March 13 and 14. The two-day exhibition will also showcase an innovative technology that tackles the tricky issue of testing products in a low-risk environment and an impressive solution that increase decision making speeds and accuracy by removing bottlenecks. More than 1,000 board level guests from some of the leading banks in the region will attend Meftech 2017. The delegates attending this years event are estimated to control 95% of the USD13billion spent on financial technology in the Middle East every year. The event organisers recently asked numerous board level executives which one product they felt would be of most interest to them this year and used the responses to help shape which financial technology firms would be invited to showcase their cutting-edge solutions. Chris Fountain, managing director of organisers Turret Media, said: From our discussions with industry leaders we sought to identify the industrys most pressing technological demands as we entered 2017. We believe these six solutions, as well as many others we will be announcing soon, cover off the various answers we received, therefore we know this years event will be of huge value to the executives attending and the financial technology providers exhibiting their solutions. They are a perfect example of the incredible innovation within the financial technology sector right now that will make a huge difference to financial firms and consumers in the year ahead and provide a snapshot of whats in store for delegates at Meftech 2017. The executives Meftech spoke to revealed that boosting organisational profitability, efficiency and growth is a top priority. Wolters Kluwer OneSumX, is a product designed to meet complex finance, risk and compliance challenges. Financial leaders who identified the need to meet customer needs, regardless of their location, as their top concern will be keen to see KALs Retail-Teller Machine (RTM). The system works like an ATM, but instead of dispensing cash, prints a secure ticket that is exchanged for cash at the shopping till. Modern financial customers, especially Millennials, are demanding that firms know their preferences before establishing a digital relationship. Suntec's Xelerate dynamically matches offers and combines products and services to increase transactional values. Meanwhile, ECSFin's offering of Try/Buy gives financial institutions a low-risk opportunity to test-drive a range of solutions, whether messaging, payments or processing another key goal identified by the executives. Another solution that will tackle a top priority is Enterprise Information Management from OpenText, which is a key technology to increase compliance and security, improve customer experience, and optimise business efficiency to achieve higher profits. A critical challenge identified by the finance leaders was the need to increase decision making speeds and accuracy through efficient process systems. The Loxon corporate lending system reduces lead time, provides analysis to mitigate portfolio risk and adds automation to remove bottlenecks. Board level guests from some of the leading banks in the region have already confirmed their attendance at Meftech, including FGB, ADIB, Qatar Islamic Bank and Bahrain Islamic Bank. The cast of keynote speakers includes three of the worlds leading lights on financial technologies: Chris Skinner, CEO of TheFinanser.com; Jim Marous, the owner of the Digital Banking Report; and Bank Innovation Consulting Expert JP Nicols. Meftech is an invite only event. - TradeArabia News Service Agthia Group, one of the UAEs leading food and beverage groups, today reported a net profit of Dh254.3 million ($69.23 million), up 10 percent on the previous year. The net revenues grew 8 percent to Dh2.01 billion, led by the groups flagship water business, the company said. Engineer Dhafer Ayed Al Ahbabi, chairman of Agthia, said: Despite economic headwinds, Agthia performed strongly in 2016 with our business strategy generating double digit profit growth underpinned by higher sales. While it is clear that the environment in 2017 will remain tough as we confront external cost challenges, our core business fundamentals are robust. We will continue to focus on regional expansion and investment opportunities to grow sales, increase market share and deliver on our ambition to become the leading food and beverage company in the region. Tariq Al Wahedi, acting chief executive officer of Agthia, added: "Led by the strength of our brand portfolio, we have again delivered strong profit and revenue growth in what continues to be a tough market. Our aim to deliver value for shareholders is best seen through the development of our water business, which continues to be a key driver of growth. Although we have a proven strategy and initiatives in place to maintain this growth momentum, we are realistic about the current economic environment and the challenges that lie ahead. In 2016, Agthias two other largest businesses, flour and animal feed, were subject to a change in the subsidy regime that has been in place since 2007 in Abu Dhabi. The group responded to these changes by immediately deploying initiatives to protect volume, ranging from the introduction of more competitive product lines to expanding distribution in especially the northern emirates and export markets, which helped partially mitigate the adverse impact on volume and profits, it said. Agthia is pursuing a five-year strategy aimed at becoming one of the Middle Easts leading food and beverage companies. The cornerstone of this strategy is expanding the groups water business. Accordingly, in 2016, the group entered into a joint venture with Kuwaits Al Wafir Marketing Services Company to establish a water bottling plant in Kuwait to produce Al Ain Water and signed a purchase agreement for a 100 percent stake in the water business of Delta Marketing Company, based in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, which produces Al Ain brand water. - TradeArabia News Service Irans Karoun Petrochemical Company recently sold several consignments of isocyanate to Peru, said a senior official. Iran has joined a select group of countries who produce the strategic petrochemical product following its pilot production of methylene diphenyl diisocyanate, Kazem Bastakian, commercial manager of Karoun, was quoted as saying in an Iran Daily News report, citing Mehr News Agency. The official added that following the easing and later removal of international sanctions, Karoon petchem products, particularly TDI (toluene diisocyanate), were exported to markets including those in Europe, Asia and even South America. Bastakian noted that in addition to Albania, Greece, Russia, Italy and Sweden, the company has shipped petrochemicals to South American states such as Peru and Uruguay. Speaking on the economic feasibility of exports to South America given the distance, the official stated that presently customers undertake the transfer of the purchased petrochemicals, as the South American buyers of the current consignments were responsible for transporting of the purchased items. Aluminium Bahrain (Alba), the Bahrain-based international aluminium smelter, is the strategic sponsor for the Aluminium Sector at the upcoming Gulf Industry Fair 2017, Northern Gulfs leading annual industrial expo. The event takes place from February 7 to 9 at the Bahrain International Exhibition and Convention Centre under the patronage of HRH Prince Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa, Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Bahrain. Alba will lead the Aluminium Zone at Gulf Industry Fair 2017, which reflects both, the upstream and downstream growth of the Aluminium sector in the GCC. Shaikh Daij Bin Salman Bin Daij Al Khalifa, chairman of Alba said: Gulf Industry Fair has established itself as the leading platform in the GCC to promote this Regions Aluminium Industry whilst also reflecting the growth of Bahrains growing economy. Alba is proud of its landmark Line 6 Expansion Project, which is one of the biggest Brownfield projects in the Kingdom of Bahrain. This Project will have a big impact on Bahrains economy as well as strengthen the Kingdoms position as the hub for the downstream aluminium industry in the GCC. Alba has shown excellent progress with its Line 6 Expansion Project. In October 2016, Alba announced the successful closing of a syndicated term-loan facility, the first tranche of the Companys funding plan for the Project. Alba has also embarked on Project Titan Phase II cost saving programme that aims to reduce cash-cost by $ 100 per metric tonne (mt) of aluminium and step-up its production capacity to 1,000,000 mt per annum by end of 2017. The other Bahrain-based companies joining Alba at the Aluminium Zone include Midal Cables, who manufacture their products from the aluminium smelter in Bahrain; Bahrain Aluminium Extrusion Company (Balexco), whose production capacity exceeds 33,000 metric tonnes and Ameeri Industries, whose Amgard Street light poles are manufactured from aluminium produced at Alba. The aluminium sector is the key industrial growth driver in the region. The Aluminium Zone promotes Bahrain as a leading global exporter of downstream aluminium products (Made in Bahrain) and services for aluminium smelters within the region, said Jubran Abdulrahman, managing director of event organisers Hilal Conferences & Exhibitions (HCE). Gulf Industry Fair 2017 is also strategically sponsored by the Bahrain Petroleum Company (BAPCO) in association with the National Oil and Gas Authority. Majaal and Naffco will be supporting the Industrial Facilities and Fire and Safety sectors respectively, while other supporting organisations include AHK Saudi Arabia, Indias PHD Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the German Saudi Arabian Liaison for Economic Affairs, the Saudi British Economic Offset Programme and Bahrain Industrial Association. TradeArabia News Service Dubai-based Albwardy Marine Engineering and Damen Shipyards Sharjah have officially brought both brands together under one umbrella Albwardy Damen. The newly-named venture will continue to provide its services with the same values as before putting safety, quality and reliability at the forefront of its offering, said a statement from the company. The change represents the ventures drive to maximise the efficiency of its operations and enhance its leading position during these challenging times for the maritime industry, it said. The UAE-based shipyard will continue to construct new build steel and aluminium vessels as well as provide the same trusted ship repair services to its marine and oil and gas customers in the Middle East, it added. The announcement coincides with the third anniversary of Damen Shipyards Sharjah, said a statement. Albwardy Marine Engineering was founded back in 1978 and has been a joint venture with Damen Shipyards Group since 2008. In 2014 the official opening of Damen Shipyards Sharjah took place. Albwardy Damen has facilities in three UAE locations: Dubai, Sharjah and Fujairah. In addition to shipbuilding and repair, the company also provides floating repair and diving services. Damen shipyards Sharjah and its state-of-the-art facilities has been successful in supporting clients in these challenging times by providing safe, efficient and high quality drydocking and repair services. In May last year, the yards efforts were recognised when Damen Shipyards Sharjah won the Best New Building Yard prize at Shiptek 2016 International Maritime Awards in Dubai. This year, to further strengthen its position as a high quality provider of ship repair services, Albwardy Damen will construct a new office and workshop facility in Dubai Maritime City, it said. This expansion will enable Albwardy Damen to offer our full portfolio of ship repair activities to customers in Dubai Maritime City and will seamlessly integrate with the existing business units in Al Jadaf, Sharjah and Fujairah, it stated. Lars Seistrup, managing director of Albwardy Damen, said: Bringing both brands together is a logical next step for us. We aim to be the best regional shipyard for building and repairing niche tonnage, and with our expansion in Dubai we are positioning ourselves in the best possible way to serve our clients in the region during these challenging times, he added. TradeArabia News Service Travellers using Bahrain International Airport now have even more reason to stop and spend at Bahrain Duty Free with the opening of Bulgaris new expanded fragrances counter. Located at the Perfumes & Cosmetics section within the duty free and travel retailers refreshed departures retail hub, Bulgari has grown its footprint from three to an impressive 12-sq-m. The leading Italian luxury goods house, which has a 130-year old pedigree, is a long-term partner of Bahrain Duty Free, and its iconic black and gold livery is a focal point for the Perfumes & Cosmetics passenger journey. Commenting on the opening, Bassam Al Wardi, general manager, Bahrain Duty Free, said: With the unveiling of the new Bulgari space we have added a further element of upscale excitement to our existing collection of internationally renowned fragrance and cosmetics brands. By creating a stunning showcase such as this, Bahrain Duty Free continues to demonstrate its commitment to delivering a world-class travel retail experience; adding value not only to the passenger and airport experience, but to the kingdoms tourism economy, he added. In partnership with Bahrain Duty Free and Aer Rianta International, Bulgari is proud to be the first brand to unveil its new interior design concept in the newly refurbished Bahrain Duty Free shop, remarked Loic Le Toux, area sales manager, Bulgari. Top selling products covering both women and mens fragrances, and including Goldea, Jasmin Noir, Omnia, Bulgari Man and Aqva, create a standout visual counterpoint to the companys elegant branding and gentle contoured fascia. A highlight of the new counter will be the exclusive high-end Le Gemme collection, which is only available at selective doors worldwide. Our luxurious counter concept will further intensify the visibility of Bulgari perfumes in the travel retail domain; and is equally perfectly aligned with Bahrain Duty Frees own premium strategy, said Le Toux. This latest opening supports other successful recent openings across its 1,500-sq-m footprint, including Aer Rianta Internationals proprietary Candy Cloud confectionery concept, the Middle Easts first Johnnie Walker House and new dedicated premium watches boutique. - TradeArabia News Service Speaking at Budget Aajtak, micro, small and medium enterprises minister Kalraj Mishra said that the Modi government is positive about bringing tax rates down. By India Today Web Desk: With less than 48 hours to go for the Union Budget to be presented, the government has dropped a hint that tax rates may be slashed. Speaking at Budget Aajtak, micro, small and medium enterprises minister Kalraj Mishra said that the Modi government is positive about bringing tax rates down. "We have received inputs on lowering tax rates. The government would like to incorporate some of the suggestions. The government is committed to keep the common man's interests in mind in the budget," Mishra said. advertisement DEMONETISATION A POSITIVE MOVE Responding to a question, the minister described the Modi government's move to ban circulation of old Rs 500, 1000 notes as a positive move which has actually helped people. "I agree there were issues initially, however, things have improved now. The move had nothing to do with elections. There was no political motice behind it," Mishra said. "The government's credibility has actually increased after demonetisation," he added. SAMAJWADI, CONGRESS AFRAID OF BJP Commenting on Samajwadi Party, Congress alliance for Uttar Pradesh Assembly election, Kalraj Mishra, who represents UP's Deoria constituency in Lok Sabha, expressed confidence that his party will form government in the state. WATCH VIDEO "The alliance between Congress and Samajwadi Party is the outcome of fear that these parties have from the BJP. Our party will be forming the next government in Uttar Pradesh with full majority," Mishra said. ALSO READ: Union Budget to be a challenging task for FM Arun Jaitley post demonetisation, says Assocham What India expects from Arun Jaitley on February 1 in first budget after demonetisation --- ENDS --- Saudi Arabia's King Salman and US President Donald Trump, in a phone call on Sunday, discussed joint efforts to fight the spread of Islamic State militants and agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, media sources said. "The president requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," a White House statement said. The Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said the two leaders discussed the historic relations between the two friendly countries and the latest developments in the region and the world, in addition to discussing the strategic partnership of the twenty first century between the two countries and the importance of improving the economic, security and military cooperation between them. The White House statement said the two leaders also agreed on the need to address "Iran's destabilizing regional activities." The statement said the two also discussed what it called an invitation from the king for Trump "to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future, economically and socially," for Saudi Arabia and the region. Trump also spoke with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. Groups that raise fake slogans and ideologies aim to hide their criminal truth by spreading chaos and destruction, the Crown Prince was quoted by UAE state news agency WAM as saying. The White House said Trump had also "raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative." The two discussed the Islamic State and the Crown Prince agreed to support safe zones to protect refugees in the Middle East, The Hill reported. Iran has signed agreements valued at around 10 billion ($10.7 billion) companies for the construction of new power plants with German, Russian, Chinese, South Korean and Turkish companies, a top government official said. The preliminary agreement with Turkeys Unit International is one of the biggest of its kind after the international sanction were lifted, Alireza Daemi, Deputy Energy Minister for Planning and Economic Affairs was quoted as saying in an Iran Daily report, which cited Mehr News Agency. Unit International signed a $4.2-billion preliminary deal with Energy Ministry in June to build gas power plants in seven regions in Iran. The power stations would have a combined installed capacity of 6,020 MW, the report said. "The deal with Unit International is an agreement in principle it is expected to be approved as a full and final contract by March," the deputy minister said. "The ministry will ensure that at least 50 percent of operations in all new power plant contracts, including with Unit International, will be carried out by domestic companies," he added. Germanys Siemens is also in agreement to supply turbines to Iranian power plants. Siemens signed a deal last year to deliver 20 F-Class turbines and also share turbine manufacturing knowhow. Russia's major energy company, Technopromexport, is due to start construction of a 1,400 MW thermal power plant in the southern Hormuzgan Province next month, the report said. A number of challenges are before the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries to meet the deadline for introducing value added tax (VAT), says an expert. Craig Richardson, partner and head of tax and corporate services at KPMG in Bahrain, explained that the current lack of certainty pertaining to the ratification and release of the GCC VAT Framework Agreement, as well as the lack of domestic legislation puts the implementation of VAT at a risk of delay against the original intended date of January 2018. VAT is a tax on consumption of goods and services levied at each stage in the supply chain and payable ultimately by the consumer. As outlined by various member states, GCC countries will introduce VAT at an expected rate of 5 per cent as part of wider development reforms. GCC countries have had regular discussions over the last several months to formulate and finalise the main principles under which VAT should be implemented; GCC countries are expected to ratify the VAT Framework Agreement this year. Once the agreement is ratified, each country can issue its own domestic legislation to implement VAT, including Bahrain. However, the current absence of VAT legislation gives the corporate sector less time to prepare. Member states cannot finalise their national VAT laws until they finalise and adopt the GCC VAT Framework Agreement. If the Kingdom of Bahrain plans to implement VAT starting from January 2018, following the steps of the other GCC member states, the corporate sector needs the national law at least eight months prior to the implementation to prepare for the new tax, Richardson added. Although VAT will impact all businesses in Bahrain, either directly or indirectly, it will have a neutral impact if managed effectively. Businesses will need appropriate systems and a qualified workforce to collect VAT and pay it to the tax authorities on a monthly or quarterly basis. Therefore, companies should review their procurement processes, operating models and systems, contracts and legal structure today, to be VAT ready and minimize the impact of this imminent change, he said. Richardson elaborated: The first step businesses must make is to plan and analyse their products and services for the impact of VAT. VAT is happening and if businesses are to maintain profitability, they must invest in understanding the impact of VAT on their business from an operational point of view. Before implementation, businesses can build and test systems and processes to help them comply with legislation and embed these within existing processes. There are also immediate measures which businesses can take today to avoid the impact of VAT, for example making any planned significant investments in business infrastructure and assets before implementation begins. Richardson also explained that the impact of VAT would also extend to the government sector. VAT requires monthly or quarterly filing of returns and payments of taxes. The tax authorities will also need to process refunds regularly and have robust IT systems in place to facilitate e-filing and e-communication with taxpayers. Since VAT is a new concept to the region, businesses and tax authorities in each GCC country will have to recruit and train sufficient staff. In addition, governance frameworks may also need to be reviewed and updated to incorporate policies, processes and controls that comply with VAT legislation, he added. TradeArabia News Service Russian tourists to the UAE will now be granted visa on arrival at all entry points to the Emirates, said a report. The cabinet decree proposing the granting of entry visas to citizens of the Russian Federation was approved by HH Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President, Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, said a report in WAM. Under the decree, citizens of the Russian Federation are granted an entry visa for 30 days for the first time, renewable one time only for another 30 days, as per UAE regulations. The decree will enhance strategic co-operation and the common ambitions of the two countries. It will also create new horizons of economic and touristic co-operation serving common interests and goals, as it strengthen the UAEs international competitiveness as a vibrant economic, commercial, and tourist hub in the region. The UAE ranks first in the GCC states as Russias most important business partner, and is considered the 10th largest foreign investor in Russia, with projects valued at Dh66 billion ($17.9 billion) up to 2014. During 2015, the non-oil trade between the UAE and Russia reached Dh9 billion ($2.4 billion), and the UAE is investing around Dh18 billion ($4.8 billion) in infra-structures in Russia. The average growth of foreign non-oil trade between the UAE and Russia over the past 5 years is 31 per cent. The UAE has received more than 600,000 Russian tourists in the past two years, and there are 56 weekly flights between the two countries by UAE National carriers. This number is expected to rise after the issuance of the decree and its positive impact on trade and tourism. The Bahrain Tourism and Exhibition Authority (BTEA) recently organised the inaugural meeting of the specialist team responsible for driving the joint vision to promote the tourism industry and boost business across the GCC countries. The meeting, which was attended by BTEA CEO Shaikh Khalid bin Humood Al Khalifa, hosted key representatives of the GCC tourism industry. The tourism industrys role as a key contributor to the revitalisation of the economy was highlighted during the meeting. Commenting on the meeting, Shaikh Khalid said: The collaboration between the participating GCC representatives in this inaugural meeting is paramount to the sustainable development of the GCCs tourism industry, increasing our joint opportunities to promote this sector. He added, Our next step will focus on strengthening the Gulfs identity through the launch of a joint marketing strategy. We similarly expect that the exchange of experiences and data between GCC countries will facilitate the attraction of tourists, stimulating the net contribution of the tourism sector to the national economy, which also falls in line with the overall economic vision for the kingdom. GCC representatives at the meeting discussed the strengths that encourage joint GCC efforts in the tourism industry, such as the Gulfs geographical location, the economic feasibilities, as well as future challenges faced in achieving integration and interdependence. Region wide tourism initiatives on promoting the GCC by driving tourism projects forward and encouraging governmental engagement with the private sector in support of this joint vision were deliberated. The development of a GCC tourist website was discussed, with the imperative to showcase tourist attractions in the different GCC countries and to promote exhibitions and conferences. The role of tour operators and travel agencies was also discussed and the need to enhance their involvement in promoting this industry. The discussion ended with a consensus on the prominence of the industrys role in the sustainable development of tourism across the Arabian Gulf. - TradeArabia News Service The Congress and JD-U have mocked the BJP over the issue of Ram Temple in Ayodhya during a pre-Budget discussion. The BJP, however, justified its promise to build Ram Temple in its manifesto for Uttar Pradesh assembly polls. By India Today Web Desk: The stage of AajTak was set for a serious pre-Budget discussion, but the political representatives from the BJP, the Congress and the JD-U turned it into a war of words over invoking Ram in elections. BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra raised the issue questioning Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi over his criticism of Prime Minister Narendra Modi for invoking Ram in his election speech. advertisement "Why did Rahul Gandhi question taking name of Ram in his speech in Punjab. Ram resides in every soul," Patra said. READ| Jayant Sinha hints at a populist Budget, says there'll be something for everyone Patra went ahead and slammed Congress and DMK leaders for asking which engineering college did Ram pass out before he built the temple (Ram Setu or Adam's Bridge). "Raising question over authenticity of Ram is wrong," Patra said. CONGRESS MOCKS BJP OVER RAM TEMPLE Reacting to Patra's reference to Ram, Congress leader Sachin Pilot said that it has become a habit of the BJP to resort to 'Ram ranting' whenever there are elections. Mocking the BJP over its promise to build a temple at Ayodhya, Pilot said, "What happened to your slogan- Kasam Ram Ki Khate Hain, Mandir Wahin Banayenge (We take vow in the name of Lord Ram to build temple at his birthplace)?" The name of Ram should not be misused to divide society, Pilot said. READ| Indian Railways working on Mission Zero Accident, says Manoj Sinha JD-U TOO RAISES PITCH While the Congress and BJP leaders engaged in verbal duel, JD-U leader Pawan Verma accused the saffron party of trying to build political capital out of the sentiments attached to Ram. "This is not a matter of faith but of strategy for the BJP, which has insulted Ram by invoking his name for creating a divide in society," Pawan Verma said. Responding to the sharp criticism by the Congress and JD-U, Sambit Patra said, "The BJP came to power in 2014 on the issue of development. BJP's manifesto talks about a lot of other things, why the opposition parties are worried over one-liner mention of Ram in it?" --- ENDS --- "Keeping up with the Kardashians" star Kendall Jenner's just recently shared to everyone her round-ups of world travels. Hence, it shows the most shocking 162,603 miles! The big number is immediately approximated by her fans to an amazing 6.5 times that she traveled around the globe. Everyone is now curious towards the Vogue cover girl's travel secrets; they will surely be good tips to take note. In the most recent news about the fashion model, Teen Vogue shares an in-depth review of her 2016 world travels. Kendall Jenner is said to have excitingly flown 346 hours within a span of 55 flights in 14 countries all over the year. The fans are surely going wild now with envy with all the thrilling adventures "keeping up with the Kardashians" star had. Although, the jet-setting Jenner isn't done yet! Her amazing travels in Rome, Barcelona, Cannes, Paris, and Costa Rica are also to be desired. On the other hand, Daily Mail also reveals more about the glamorous Hollywood personality's dashing strut all over the world. The reports mostly talk about Kendall's longest flight and her technique on travel baggage. From Dubai to Los Angeles, the "Vogue" cover model apparently had a long tiring 17 hours in the plane. Because of her globe-trotting job, this feat is nothing already for the beautiful lady. The other much talked about Kendall Jenner's world travels is her minimalist packing secret. She notably only brings two suitcases with her, all her possible vacation essentials are packed on the. Nonetheless, the star also shared she sometimes just ship others if she really needs them. With regards to another secret on Kendall's 6.5 time's world wandering, Travel & Leisure uncovers her way to avoid jet lag. "Countless - sleeping on the plane is my number-one trick for fighting jet lag!" she revealed. In all, Kendall Jenner's traveling can be really envious but her travel tips for baggage and jet lag is a real deal! For more Travel news, stay tuned always in Travelers Today. See Now: The U.S. had the highest number of Most Wanted properties, dominating the Hotels.com Loved By Guests Awards 2018 A massive two-mile-long fissure has opened in the dry earth in Arizona. Geologists claim that it will most likely to continue and it will likely continue to grow. A very recent footage from an overpass by an Arizona Geological Survey drone revealed the extent of the large fissure in Pinal County, between Casa Grande and Tucson, revealing the enormous tear fracturing the desert. The crack is so so immense that it dwarfs people treading along its edges in the video. AZGS is testing the drone technology as a tool for mapping fissures and other surface features, such as landslide masses. The massive fissure was formed between March 2013 and December 2014 and is believed to have apparently grown after heavy rains during the fall of 2014. According to Joseph Cook, a geologist with the Arizona Geological Survey, the southern part of the fissure is tens of feet deep. On the other hand, the northern fissure, partially older than that of the south part, is shallow and partly filled in. In a report by Live Science, Cook first spotted the massive fissure in Google Earth imagery around December 2014. He was quoted saying that upon checking out to map the fissure, he discovered that the fissure was longer than what was seen in the Google imagery by almost two miles. Furthermore, Joe Cook of the Arizona Geological Survey said that the fissures, which are apparently common in the Arizona desert, was formed after extensive groundwater pull out in the Sonoran Desert. Water withdrawal, primarily for agriculture, is the perpetrator. Once groundwater is pulled up, it leaves a void and the land above it subsides, generating cracks. Arizona is full of these cracks, Cook told 12news. "We see earth fissures forming around the margins of these subsidence areas and along mountain fronts within the subsidence areas," Cook said. In the previous years, a series of the cracks also exists around Eloy, as well as in Cochise, La Paz, Maricopa, Pima and Pinal Counties, with the first fissure opened up near Eloy in 1929. The fissures are unsafe to people doing off-road activities such as riding ATVs in the area. In addition, it poses a risk to roaming livestock who can fall in and get stuck. Moreover, it is perilous even to stand near the edge of a fissure due to a great risk that it could suddenly cave in. See Now: The U.S. had the highest number of Most Wanted properties, dominating the Hotels.com Loved By Guests Awards 2018 Auckland, New Zealand might be off the radar as a tourist destination. Other attractions found north of the island seems to steal the spotlight like the Lord of the Rings shrine. However, travelers need to stop by Auckland because it has so much to offer. New Zealand is quite an expensive place to travel to just like Japan, however, Auckland might be and exception. According to Metro, this city can be the perfect tourist destination for travelers who don't want to spend so much. The place is full of natural attractions, a wide variety of delicious food and stunning art collections. The Auckland Art Gallery Tio O Tamaki is one attraction that travelers must stop by. The gallery does offer free entry to some of its exhibitions where people can spend hours admiring art and culture. In a report by 100% New Zealand, the gallery is open to the public daily starting from 10am to 5pm except on Christmas. With around 15,000 art pieces, it's New Zealand's biggest art institution and you can see the famous The Maori Portraits being displayed until February. The gallery is just walking distance from Queen Street which is found in the middle of the city. The Maori is the native group of New Zealand and if travelers want to experience the culture of these people, Maori tours are being offered for one full day. According to Auckland, full-day tours would start around 9am to 5pm. Local Maori people will serve as your guide where you will explore historic sites and learn about the traditions of their culture. Travelers will also witness stunning landscapes like black sand beaches, towering volcanoes, and jaw-dropping cliff tops. Prices would range from $275 to $295 depending on the kind of tour package that travelers want. There are more reasons why it's a must to visit Auckland, New Zealand. It's not just the place itself but it's also the people and the culture. See Now: The U.S. had the highest number of Most Wanted properties, dominating the Hotels.com Loved By Guests Awards 2018 Buying so many things from abroad is never a great idea -- but there are moments where travelers just need to get so much intentionally especially if one considers it only a once-in-a-lifetime visit. Most travelers have a choice to have a shipping company deliver it to their home address for convenience or they can choose to have it considered as luggage -- which is a clearly impractical choice. Regardless of choice, travelers must know these five things to pay custom duties. The customs in each airport would tally and total the number of items a traveler has brought home from their trip. Americans are allowed up to $800 worth of items free of having to pay duty, says Independent Traveler. The travel tips website suggests if travelers chose to have a shipper do the honors for their packages from abroad, they only have $200 as a leeway before they pay duty. According to the US Customs And Border Patrol, the Harmonized Tariff System is the customs "bible" when it comes to categorizing items that are duty-free or heavy on tariffs. As current trade rules will apply on the tariff rates imposed on imported products, items from Mexico could be more expensive to bring into America while Israeli products may be cheaper. The US International Trade Commission has a tool that helps determine the amount travelers could possibly pay for duty for particular items and products. The Tariff Database takes into account the Harmonized Tariff System and current pricing with presumably regular updates. But this tool is only for estimation and the final amount is still subject to the Customs and Border Patrol's final decision. To expound more on tariffs: the definition of a levy or toll on the entry of an item depending on existing trade rules with originating country. There is no way to bypass this for regular travelers -- but some importers and shipping companies have arrangements that subsidize their profits with the government. The latter makes for cheaper international shipping due to possibly lower tariff. When dealing with international shippers, travelers are advised to take on a shipping insurance and pay in credit -- not with cash. Having a paper trail and ensuring your goods arrive in good condition -- this being the responsibility the shipper must uphold which the insurance reinforces -- makes the shipping and passing into customs for duty evaluation faster. See Now: The U.S. had the highest number of Most Wanted properties, dominating the Hotels.com Loved By Guests Awards 2018 For foodies, food festivals are their definition of paradise. Often held in different parts of the globe, traveling to all sorts of food festivals is surely a travel experience in its finest. All sorts of dishes or specialty cuisines are usually on display and up for grabs in a food festival. Of course, no meal is complete with a cold glass of beer or any delicious drinks! Here are some of the best food festivals in the world that you must experience: NYC Wine & Food Festival, New York City, New York. Home to some of the world's finest foods ever made, the largest food festival in New York will surely have your taste buds thank you with all the delectable cuisine laid in front of you for 4 days. It is a star-studded event, meaning famous chefs and food network hosts often mingle with the crowd during the event. Imagine sharing a plate with Bobby Flay and Giada de Laurentiis. Pizzafest, Naples, Italy. Oh, the universal love for pizza. But to those who want to go an extra mile and celebrate this delicious concoction's existence in the world, then head on to Naples, Italy and indulge in a one-week food festival full of pizza. The largest pizza festival ever, you'll get to taste all kinds of pizza in one place, with pizza makers often showing off their pizza making skills. Oktoberfest, Munich, Germany. They say no one can drink beer like a German, why not test it out yourself and join the locals in one of the most popular beer festivals in the world? Different kinds of beer are displayed here, and aside from that local German cuisine are also featured as well. Over millions of tourists join in the Oktoberfest every year. Pahiyas Festival, Lucban, Philippines. There are many patron saints in the Philippines, and during May 15, citizens of Lucban, Quezon celebrate the patron saints of farmers, San Isidro De Labrador by lavishly decorating their houses with food and local produce as well as hosting food parties in every block. In a typical day of Pahiyas Festival, you can go in house to house of strangers and eat to your heart's desire with genuine Filipino cuisine. And besides, you know what they say about Filipino hospitality. See Now: The U.S. had the highest number of Most Wanted properties, dominating the Hotels.com Loved By Guests Awards 2018 Mongolia Travel for most travelers is usually filled with picturesque landscapes and the unique culture of the country. However, this is not the case for the Mongolia travel of photographer Asher Svidensky as he is caught up snapping what most probably is the world's only 13-year-old huntress with a golden eagle as a hunting partner. The photographer said his Mongolia travel while watching the teenager hunt was an amazing sight. Asher Svidensky is a photographer and travel writer. During his Mongolia travel, he shot five boys learning how to hunt, and that's where he met 13-year-old huntress Ashol-Pan. He photographed Ashol-Pan in his Mongolia travel while the girl is hunting with a golden eagle. While most children are afraid of wild animals such as the golden eagle, this is not the case for Kazakh boys in western Mongolia. If you're lucky enough on your Mongolian travel, you might encounter these Mongolian boys as they start learning how to use the majestic birds in their hunt for foxes and hares. When the Kazakh boys hit puberty at the age of 13, they start training how to hunt with the eagles. Asher Svidensky told BBC website of his shoot with Ashol-Pan and the Kazakh boys on his Mongolia travel, "To see her with the eagle was amazing. She was a lot more comfortable with it, a lot more powerful with it and a lot more at ease with it." Ashol-Pan is the daughter of a celebrated hunter in Mongolia, and she is her father's apprentice huntress. Living in western Mongolia, the Kazakhs of the Altai mountain ranges are the only people that hunt with golden eagles. These days, you will find only around 400 practising falconers in your Mongolia travel. According to BBC, falconers "hunt in winter, when the temperatures can drop to -40C (-40F). A hunt begins with days of trekking on horseback through snow to a mountain or ridge giving an excellent view of prey for miles around. Hunters generally work in teams. After a fox is spotted, riders charge towards it to flush it into the open, and an eagle is released. If the eagle fails to make a kill, another is released." Fascinated with the falconer children during his Mongolia travel, Svidensky said the skill of hunting with the golden eagles lies in harnessing an unpredictable force of nature. He said: "You don't really control the eagle. You can try and make her hunt an animal - and then it's a matter of nature. What will the eagle do? Will she make it? How will you get her back afterwards?" To those worried about how the animals came into the hands of the Kazakhs, there is nothing to fret about as the eagles are not bred in captivity, but taken from nests at a young age. Female eaglets are chosen since they grow to a larger size. After hunting with an eagle for years, a hunter releases his mature eagle a final time, whilst leaving a butchered sheep on the mountain as farewell. Svidensky said on his shoot in his Mongolia travel, "That's how the Kazakh eagle hunters make sure that the eagles go back to nature and have their own strong newborns, for the sake of future generations." Mongolia travel for the photographer was not only memorable but spectacular. He said that Ashol-Pan was a smiling, sweet and shy girl, but his photographs of her while hunting with a golden eagle begs to differ. Hunting with eagles, a male activity for around 2,000 years is a new development in Mongolian culture in the 21st Century. See Now: The U.S. had the highest number of Most Wanted properties, dominating the Hotels.com Loved By Guests Awards 2018 The home-makers are looking forward to a reduction in tax slabs and more reliefs in day-to-day essentials. By Manogya Loiwal : If the industry is anxiously waiting for the announcements to be proposed in the Union Budget on February 1, home makers seem to be equally anxious if not more. Home-makers across the country have high hopes and expectations attached to the upcoming budget, mostly because of the limited source of income. The home-makers are looking forward to a reduction in tax slabs and more reliefs in day-to-day essentials. advertisement The main demands: 1. Jigna Damani, a housewife in south Kolkata talking about her expectations out of the budget said, "The prices of gas and electricity have shot up which I expect to be reduced at least." 2. Poonam Ajmera, another home-maker said, " Due to demonetisation, we housewives got severely affected while buying regular groceries, jewellery, clothes or any other daily essential for the families. We expect this budget in favour of us and tax slabs should also be reduced which will increase our savings." 3. "I am a mother of two daughters, whom I have to get married. The marriage expense of buying gold, silver and clothing is huge. I request the government to take out a scheme in our favour reducing the taxes, so that we can buy more and save also at the same time," said Apexa Vasani. 4. Considering the digitisation and demonitisation drive, many women are vouching for special accounts, easy banking system and rules for them with a priority. 5. "Allowing a separate bank account for women where we can keep aside our savings should be included in the budget," concluded another woman. 6. Shiela Parekh, a senior citizen and a widow said, "I request the Modi government to consider the reduction of taxes so that the savings that we lost after note ban will be re-accumulated. Being a widow, there is a bit more of pressure on me." --- ENDS --- Vice Admiral RC Wijegunaratne, Commander of the Sri Lanka Navy, is on an official visit to India from January 29 to February 2. The visit is aimed at consolidating bilateral naval relations between India and Sri Lanka and exploring new avenues for naval cooperation. By Manjeet Negi: Sri Lankan Navy chief Vice Admiral RC Wijegunaratne has assured India that the presence of Chinese nuclear submarines in his country was "purely economic reasons" even as India's views the development with suspicion. "The age-old tradition of Sri Lankans going to staff college in Wellington in Nilgiris district of Tamil Nadu has stopped. We are negotiating with India to try and resume this process", Wijegunaratne said. advertisement Vice Admiral RC Wijegunaratne, Commander of the Sri Lanka Navy, is on an official visit to India from January 29 to February 2. The visit is aimed at consolidating bilateral naval relations between India and Sri Lanka and exploring new avenues for naval cooperation. TOP SRI LANKAN, INDIAN NAVY OFFICIALS MEET The commander of the Sri Lankan Navy held bilateral discussions with Chief of Naval Staff Admiral Sunil Lanba and other senior officials of the Indian Navy on 30 January 2017. The Admiral is also scheduled to meet the Chief of the Air Staff, Chief of the Army Staff as well as the Director General of the Indian Coast Guard. Calling on the Honble Minister of State for Defence and Defence Secretary have also been scheduled as part of his official meetings in New Delhi. Also read | China defends deployment of submarines in Indian Ocean Naval cooperation between India and Sri Lanka has been traditionally strong, encompassing a wide range of issues including operational interactions through bilateral exercises, training, port calls, hydrographic co-operation, interactions among special forces, capability building and capacity augmentation initiatives. Two Advanced Offshore Patrol Vessels (AOPVs) are also being constructed for the Sri Lankan Navy at M/s Goa Shipyard Limited. In addition to New Delhi, the Admiral is also scheduled to proceed to Goa where he will be visiting Naval War College and the Goa Shipyard Limited, besides interacting with Flag Officer Commanding of Goa Area. The Admiral would further visit the Training Command of the Indian Navy based in Kochi, where he would be briefed on training aspects and would also visit various training facilities and professional schools. During his visit to Kochi, the Admiral would also interact with the Sri Lankan Naval personnel undergoing training in India. The Sri Lankan Navy Commanders visit follows closely on the visit of the Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Sunil Lanbas visit to Sri Lanka wherein he also participated in the 7th International Maritime Conference, Galle Dialogue 2016. Also read | 10 Indian fishermen, 2 boats taken into custody by Sri Lankan Navy --- ENDS --- advertisement Special Valentine's Day stays at IHA (TRAVPR.COM) UNITED KINGDOM - January 30th, 2017 - From the beginning of February, many lovers are searching ideas for Valentine's Day holidays. IHA offers those lovebirds a whole list of ideas for special Saint Valentine's stays and holiday rentals : See the list of Couple and Valentine's Day themed stays in the world >https://www.ihacom.co.uk/Saint-valentine-Theme-breaks/1e4/ https://www.ihacom.co.uk/Couples-Theme-breaks/7NL/ Breaks specially and directly concocted by the homeowners themselves. Indeed the holiday rentals website ihacom.co.uk allows its renters to prepare a personalised Valentine's Day stay for all lovers, with photos and special rate. Achievable from the owner space entirely at will, the solution is fast, easy and can be immediately published online. Ihacom.co.uk, acclaimed in January 2017 by the owners who prefer a direct contact with the holidaymakers, is one of the rare websites to offer them the possibility to publish a personalised stay, at no extra costs, with a photo of their letting and a special Valentine's Day rate. During the lovers feast day, many couples seek to reconnect with an unforgettable stay. No doubt that the homeowners will enjoy welcoming them with many unforgettable attentions, taking also advantage of the opportunity to offer this stay at no extra charge, all with a price specially adapted to the event. ### As an architectural preservationist my first reaction was that tearing down two houses was not exactly appropriate. But when you look at the standard, under Limits to Growth, the LBC prohibits the use of greenfield sites. So it does make sense. Desert Rain House When one looks at the Living Building Challenge, the Water Petal is perhaps the most challenging and the most troubling. It was tough to do; So they collect the water off all of the metal roofs with gravel filters on the downspouts, and After passing through the gravel filters, harvested rainwater is conveyed via underground plumbing to a centrally located cistern beneath the main garage. The 30,000-gallon cistern was built into the foundation of the garage with its roof functioning as the floor for the garage. Harvested rainwater flows first into an entry chamber where any sedimentation can settle to the bottom. Water then passes through an Orenco Biotube filter (designed to remove 2/3 of any remaining suspended solids) before being stored in the main cistern chamber. Collected rainwater passes through two additional filters before it is delivered to the house as potable water suitable for human consumption. First, microfiltration removes all remaining suspended solids and finally, an ultra violet (UV) disinfection unit ensures the water is sanitary and free of pathogens. Bend Water/Screen capture Meanwhile, the City of Bend Water department promises a precious, high quality supply of cold, clear water. We are the envy of many other communities because our exceptional water comes from both surface and groundwater sources. I do believe that the Living Building Challenge is the worlds toughest, most rigorous and perhaps best building standard, but continue to question the logic of managing drinking water on site like this instead of relying on the larger community resource. Timberline But it is all uphill from here; Desert Rain uses vacuum flush toilets and big Phoenix composting units with an evaporator system to handle all the black water. This is a great solution to the problem of wanting a conventional toilet experience with a conventional china bowl and no looking down at poop, but still being able to have a composting toilet. They believe it to be the first (non-institutional) vacuum plumbing system building approval in the U.S., but it likely isn't- Envirolet has been selling a vacuum toilet and composting system since 2005. Energy Petal Desert Rain House The house not only meets the net zero energy requirements, but has enough capacity to charge two electric cars. According to the LBC, "Singlefamily residences must demonstrate that sufficient back-up battery power is installed for emergency lighting (at least 10% of lighting load) and refrigeration use for up to one week for greater resiliency." However the Desert Rain page describes a 14.95 kW grid-tied array and makes no mention of batteries and backup. There is also a solar thermal system providing hot water and space heating, and a solar hot air system to evaporate excess liquid from the composting unit. (Lots more technical detail on the Desert Rain page here) Health Petal Desert Rain House This is where the LBC really shines a light on a subject to a greater level of sophistication than any other certification, from its long red list of materials, to its testing of air quality, natural finishes, elimination of VOCs. When you visit the site, Dotdash Meredith and its partners may store or retrieve information on your browser, mostly in the form of cookies. Cookies collect information about your preferences and your devices and are used to make the site work as you expect it to, to understand how you interact with the site, and to show advertisements that are targeted to your interests. You can find out more about our use, change your default settings, and withdraw your consent at any time with effect for the future by visiting Cookies Settings, which can also be found in the footer of the site. Police officials said the cameras will be linked with hi-tech tools that they will detect violation of speed limits, jumping of signals and automatically generate challans against the vehicle's registered owner. By Ajay Kumar: Delhi traffic police will soon install high-definition CCTV cameras with night-vision facility on select stretches and traffic intersections in the national Capital to tighten the leash on city's speed demons during night hours. The decision comes close on the heels of three road accidents in the NCR over last one week, each involving over-speeding luxury cars during late hours. Five lives were lost in these accidents, causing public indignation. advertisement "We have procured the cameras and the installations will be complete within a month," AK Ojha, joint commissioner of police (traffic) told Mail Today. "We will not disclose the locations where these cameras will be fitted. The idea behind such a move is to create fear in the minds of motorists who think speeding rules can be violated during night." Also Read: Over 9000 autos challaned for overloading, but not school vans WHAT HAS THE POLICE PLANNED Police officials said the cameras will be linked with such hi-tech tools that they will detect violation of speed limits, jumping of signals and automatically generate challans against the vehicle's registered owner. "With the help of three digital cameras, telephone cables and database of city's registered vehicles, a fully computerised system will be in place to take punitive action against violators," one of the senior officials involved in the exercise said. CCTV SYSTEM The system consists of three small 360-degree PTZ (pan, tilt and zoom) cameras placed in a box-like structure and mounted on a pole at some distance from a traffic signal. The cameras are connected to traffic signals and three sensors placed below the surface just after the stop line. "The moment a vehicle jumps the signal, the cameras will start rolling. All three cameras will take pictures of the violating vehicle from different angles. The wide range image will be used to identify the vehicle type, the midrange for verification, and telescopic image to identify the registration number of the vehicle," the official said. The images captured by these cameras will be transmitted via phone to the central office within two minutes. Also read: Traffic jams considerably reduce risk of road accidents in Delhi Police officials said the high-definition footage will also help them in building water-tight cases against the culprits in fatal road accidents. The unit will have video storage capacities of one month and a dedicated control room to operate these digital equipments. "These cameras have capability of zoom in - zoom out facilities and it would work even in night and foggy weather. It can detect traffic violators of particular violations and straight away recommend control room for challans," Ojha said. advertisement CAUSE OF ACCIDENTS IN DELHI-NCR He pointed out that most accidents in Delhi-NCR take place during night and morning hours in outer areas when motorists are less careful in following traffic rules. "Stretches like NH8 from Rajokri to RTR flyover, Karnal bypass and DND flyover are the most accident-prone areas where motorists have been found overspeeding in night. Luytens' Delhi is another place where the number of accidents reported during night and morning hours are high." "The aim of this exercise is to minimise loss of lives on roads. The numbers of fatal and nonfatal accidents reduced in 2016 in comparison to 2015 due to better traffic management. We now want to fix other loose ends and bring accidents further down," said a traffic official. "Installation of CCTVs will give an additional option to keep tab on violators more efficiently and would eventually help in shifting personnel from traffic to other departments. In addition, the digital method of issuing challans rules out possibilities of corruption." Last year, the Delhi traffic department prosecuted 39,35,832 motorists and recovered Rs64.50 crore as challans till December 15, 2016. The prosecution figure jumped by 12per cent against 2015's 35,94,168. The traffic department served notices to 1.68 lakh violators in 2016 which is around 37,000 more than 2015. advertisement DEATHS IN 2016 From January 1 to December 15, 2016, 1,519 deaths were reported due to vehicular accidents in Delhi. The figure is 63 less than the deaths caused in 2015. Since, road accidents are higher in number compared to people lost their lives in criminal acts like murder and natural calamity every year, traffic departments of respective states and cities allocate large number of police force. In Delhi, the traffic department has a total strength of 5,644 personnel and has allocated the largest number of men for the purpose. Last Sunday, a 32-year-old cab driver died after a speeding BMW car crashed into his taxi in south Delhi. Another Uber cab driver and two passengers were injured on Friday night, when a speeding SUV rammed their taxi in Civil Lines. The SUV driver was allegedly under the influence of alcohol. On Saturday, a speeding Audi luxury car hit an autorickshaw head on near Indirapuram in Ghaziabad, killing the driver and three passengers on the spot. --- ENDS --- By Press Trust of India: London, Jan 30 (PTI) The onset of diabetes, or a rapid deterioration in existing diabetes that requires more aggressive treatment, could be an early and hidden sign of pancreatic cancer, warns a new study that analysed data on nearly a million patients with type 2 diabetes. Researchers found that 50 per cent of all pancreatic cancer cases in Lombardy, Italy and Belgium were diagnosed within one year of patients being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes and being given their first prescription to control it. advertisement "In Belgium 25 per cent of cases were diagnosed within 90 days and in Lombardy it was 18 per cent. After the first year, the proportion of diagnosed pancreatic cancers dropped dramatically," said Alice Koechlin from the International Prevention Research Institute in France. The researchers found that compared with patients who were able to continue with oral anti-diabetic drugs, patients in Belgium and in Lombardy had a 3.5-fold greater risk of being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in the first three months after their first prescription for incretins (metabolic hormones that stimulate the pancreas to produce more insulin to lower blood glucose levels) This fell to a 2.3-fold risk in the next three to six months, to a two-fold risk for the next six to 12 months and 1.7-fold risk after the first year. Among patients who already had type 2 diabetes and were managing it with oral anti-diabetic drugs, the switch to incretins or insulin happened faster among diabetic patients who were subsequently diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. In addition, a deterioration in their condition that necessitated them being switched to more aggressive anti-diabetic therapy with injections of insulin was associated with a seven-fold increased risk of being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Koechlin and colleagues in Belgium and Italy used prescription data to identify 368,377 patients with type 2 diabetes in Belgium between 2008 and 2013 and 456,311 patients in Lombardy between 2008 and 2012. The data were linked to pancreatic cancer cases in the Belgian Cancer Registry and the hospital discharge databases in Lombardy. There were 885 and 1,872 cases of pancreatic cancer diagnosed during this time in Belgium and Lombardy respectively. "Although it has been known for some time that there is an association between type 2 diabetes and pancreatic cancer, the relationship between the two conditions is complex," said Koechlin. Pancreatic cancer is one of the most lethal cancers, partly because it is difficult to detect at an early stage and because there are few effective treatments for it. advertisement Less than one per cent of people live for ten or more years after a diagnosis. Worldwide there were an estimated 338,000 cases of pancreatic cancer diagnosed in 2012 and 330,000 people died from it. PTI NKS SAR SAR --- ENDS --- Tribune News Service Amritsar, January 30 The CIA staff nabbed two snatchers and recovered as many as 19 mobile phones besides a laptop, a tab, a camera and a sharp-edged weapon from their possession. The police also confiscated their motorcycle, which they used during the crime. They were identified as Balbir Singh alias Beera Nihang of Kot Mit Singh on Tarn Taran Road and Resham Singh of Gali Bohar Wali, Tarn Taran. They were arrested from near the Ghee Mandi area during patrolling. According to the police, the accused used to work in an orchestra and were drug addicts. A case under Sections 379-B, 411 413, 34, IPC, and Section 25 of the Arms Act has been registered against them. Investigations revealed that Balbir was earlier booked by the police in five similar instances while Resham was wanted in three cases registered in different police stations in Amritsar. With their arrest, the police claimed to have solved around four snatching instances while the accused confessed to their involvement in around 15 snatching cases. They were produced in court and taken on three-day police remand for further probe. Meanwhile, the Cantonment police have nabbed Maninder Singh alias Ninder of Veroke village and Jasbir Singh of Kohali village, both falling under the Lopoke police station in the Amritsar rural police district and recovered a stolen motorcycle from their possession. A case has been regisgtered under Sections 379, 411, IPC, against them. A retired police officer's son shot a neighbour's dog and assaulted the owners when they tried to save their pet. Despite filing an FIR, no action has been taken against the former DSP and his son. By India Today Web Desk: A couple accused retired Bhopal DSP and his son of 'animalistic behaviour' for shooting their pet dog for no reason. Bhupendra Singh and his wife were strolling around with their pet dog, Banjo, on January 26 evening. Without any provocation or any valid reason, retired DSP SK Dubey's son Ajay Dubey shot Banjo using an air gun. advertisement When Singh and his wife tried to save their dog Dubey and his son Ajay, assaulted the couple. The couple lodged an FIR against the retired officer for shooting their pet and threatening them with murder. Despite the FIR, no action has been taken against the accused yet. A charge for molestation and half murder will also be added in the chargesheet, said a Dainik Bhaskar report. Photo: Facebook/Adoptapet Photo: Facebook/Adoptapet Photo: Facebook/Adoptapet --- ENDS --- Nikhila Pant Dhawan Tribune News Service Maur (Bathinda), January 29 AAP leader and Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia today reached out to voters in the Maur constituency and promised that once voted to power, the Aam Aadmi Party will show to people of the state what the meaning of sewa is. He was in the constituency to campaign in favour of AAP candidate Jagdev Singh Kamalu. Taking a dig at the SADs slogan Raj Nahi Sewa, Sisodia said: Those reiterating such slogans are using the services of close to 5,000 security personnel for themselves and their leaders while the law and order situation in the state itself is going for a toss. Compare this with the way the AAP government in Delhi is serving its people. The party has ended the VIP culture in Delhi and aims to do the same in Punjab as well. Urging voters to use their discretion while casting their votes, he thanked the gathering for trusting Kamalu and assembling to hear what AAP leaders and workers had to say. Your presence here this evening reinforces that Punjab wants a change and is moving towards it. After forming the government in the state, AAP ministers and leaders will not use any security and will also not move around in expensive cars with red beacons atop them. We are common people and want to be amid you while working for you, he said. He claimed that the AAP government would not make the Police Department and administration officials work for leaders but would make sure that the government machinery work for people of the state. Taking up the issue of unemployment, drug addiction, deteriorating law and order condition and corruption in the state, Sisodia said: Development does not mean laying roads and constructing flyovers in the state. The present SAD-BJP government has neglected government education. Women are not safe under the rule of this alliance and agriculture saw a new low in the last leg of its rule. Rather than working in fields, farmers of the state staged protests outside government offices demanding compensation for their damaged crops, waiver of debts and loans and action against those involved in pesticide scams but the government did not budge and rather than taking its ministers to task, it turned away when the farmers committed suicides. The government has still not announced any relief package for families of such affected farmers, he said. Accusing the SAD-BJP alliance of sheltering its ministers and leaders accused of various scams and peddling drugs in the state, Sisodia alleged that the SAD-BJP played its cards well and made smaller scammers the scapegoats to save its skin. Sukhbir Singh Maiserkhana, Amritpal Kaur, Resham Singh, Gurpreet Singh, Karamjit Singh, Mukesh Singh, Chhinderpal Singh, Gurdeep Singh, Rajwinder singh, Murti Kaur were among others present. Kulwinder Sangha Mohali, January 30 NRIs have jumped on to the Assembly poll bandwagon in Mohali, enthusiastically bolstering the electioneering of candidates. They are not only going from door to door for votes but also participating in rallies and roadshows. Condemning the opponents of their parties, they are trying to convince voters in favour of the candidates in whose support they have come such a long way from other countries. They all claim they have spent entirely from their own pocket to reach here to campaign. Poll observers say NRIs interest in the Punjab poll this time round seems unprecedented. NRI supporters of AAP took part in a roadshow held in various phases here today while those backing the SAD canvassed from door to door. One of the NRIs has been accompanying the Congress candidate to rallies. Karanvir Singh, who works in IT security in California, has come with his wife Devinder Kaur in support of AAP. He said he was linked with the IT cell of the party in San Francisco which, in turn, was linked to the IT cell of AAP in Delhi. He said he was convinced by the ideology of AAP, which did not believe in the VIP culture. Moreover, AAP was governing well in Delhi. He claimed both the Congress and the SAD were like glasses of poison and thus harmful to Punjab. Another NRI supporter of AAP, Paramjit Singh Dhaliwal, who has come from Seattle, said he wanted a change in Punjab. He was unhappy with the Congress as it had given directions to the forces to attack Harmandar Sahib in Amritsar. In the case of the SAD, he said, disrespect was shown to Guru Granth Sahib during the Badal rule. Other NRIs who are putting their shoulder to the AAP wheel in Mohali are Devinder Singh from Chicago, Satwant Singh from Winnipeg (Canada), Gulzar Singh Chinna from Canada and Jaspal Singh from Melbourne (Australia). Gagandeep Singh Baidwan, a resident of Sohana, has arrived from New York to shore up the SAD electioneering. He had made some investments in Florida, but said he would come to Punjab if the SAD returned to power and also give up his PR of the USA. He said his son was born here even though he was based in the USA. Another NRI, Jaideep Singh, who works with IBM in New York, said he had come to back the SAD candidate from Mohali, TPS Sidhu. According to him, the SAD was the only answer to the problems facing the state. The Congress encouraged corruption and it was during its tenure that land mafia groups became active. Apart from going from door to door for votes, Jaideep Singh also looks after the SAD candidates party office work. Umrao Singh, who said he had been living in the UK for 40 years, has been taking part in rallies of the Congress candidate. A resident of Mauli Baidwan village, Umrao Singh alleged that the Badal government had failed to provide jobs, check corruption and solve the drug problem in the state. He said he was seeking votes for the Congress candidate in four villages, which had about 15,000 electors. Jayshree Sengupta IT is not President Donald Trump alone who is scaring India about trade with the US, there are problems in Europe also regarding trade and investment. The EU is keen to negotiate the Bilateral Investment Treaty (BIT) between the EU and India before it starts negotiating the free trade treaty the Broad-based Trade and Investment Agreement (BTIA) which has been lying in the cold storage for 10 years. Now there is an impasse in the BIT because India will not accept one of the clauses which allow EU investors to challenge the government in front of an international tribunal. For India, the various clauses regarding investment guarantee have been a bone of contention in the past. Recently in Davos, Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman categorically said India would not allow investors to drag the government to a multilateral investment court. The proposed revised model of the BIT starts from March 31 in which various contentious clauses like government procurement, compulsory licensing, subsidies, taxation and national security will be excluded to preserve the regulatory authority of the Indian Government. This is likely to postpone the conclusion of the BTIA between the EU and India. Like America, the EU is another important destination for Indias exports (16 per cent of the total exports go to the EU) and it may become less accessible. Currently, the EU itself is undergoing a turmoil which it has not witnessed before and its very cohesion is being threatened. Problems of unwanted immigration led to the unexpected Brexit vote which sent shockwaves throughout Europe. In a similar vein, many of the member- countries are seeing the rise of nationalist leaders who are talking like Trump. In Austria recently, most people expected the ultra-right wing forces to win which were gaining momentum, but unexpectedly such speculations proved wrong. Moderate and a liberal, Alexander Van der Bellen, defeated the strong right wing neo-fascist Freedom Party presidential contender, Norbert Hofer. It sprung a pleasant surprise for European liberals as Bellen was backed by Austrias Greens, a Left-leaning pro-Europe party. Hofer promised to bring Austria back to its past glory (the Austro-Hungarian Empire). He has a broad-based appeal and 46 per cent of the people voted for him for his expressed anti-immigration sentiments. Parliamentary elections are due in 2018 in Austria and the Freedom Party is leading in opinion polls claiming support of one-third of the total votes. In Italy, the anti-establishment Gold Star movement and the right-wing Northern League, which wants to copy the Brexit vote in Italy, are gaining ground. PM Matteo Renzi from the Democratic Party resigned because he had proposed controversial constitutional changes and he agreed to step down when the referendum went against his proposal. He wanted to get a rescue package from the European Stability Mechanism to bail out some of Italys debt-ridden banks and in particular the third biggest lender, Banca Monte deiPaschi di Sienna, the oldest bank in the world. But since he has been ousted and replaced by his colleague Paolo Gentiloni, the banks could remain in trouble. Italy has one of the slowest growing economies in the EU. Both Italy and Austria are facing rising unemployment. In France, Marine Le Pen, who is the leader of the National Front a party founded by her father, Jean Marie Le Pen in1972, is a strong presidential candidate in the 2017 elections. She is anti-Muslim, anti-immigration and is pro-exit from the EU. If elected, she said she would stop free education for illegal immigrants children who are mostly Muslims from North Africa. France has faced two terrorist attacks and people are tense about future attacks. It has the biggest Muslim population in Europe comprising 11 per cent of the population. In the Netherlands, Geert Wilders is a populist leader from the Party of Freedom, who, like the rest of the rising stars in the EU political scene, is an Islamophobe, anti-immigrant and a Eurosceptic. He is riding a wave of support in the Netherlands and the Dutch elections are due in March 2017 in which he is likely to win according to a recent poll, and his party was shown gaining 33 out of 150 seats in Parliament. The entire EU has experienced prosperity since World War II and the member-countries have been cooperating with one another which led to the birth of the 28-member EU and the European Monetary Union. Borders were abolished and the euro became the common currency for 11 Eurozone members in 2002. The US and the stronger members from Europe Germany, France, Italy, the UK became members of G7 which has dominated the world order since 1975. But today, most EU members with colonial pasts have turned anti-immigrant. They already have a substantial immigrant population like the UK, France, Holland and Germany. All EU citizens are used to a welfare system that looks after them from cradle to grave regarding education, housing, health and old-age security. This equilibrium has been upset by the new wave of refugees arriving from the Middle East in large numbers. Illegal immigration from Africa and Asia, including India, into the EU has been going on for a long time and news about the tragic death of boat-laden immigrants have hit the headlines often enough. Thus in a few years, the EU might become a formidable fortress in the future. There will be more racist attacks and their view of globalisation and inclusion of the third world in their trade and investment pattern may fade fast. Their long-term growth rate may however be compromised with this isolationist behaviour. The EUs policy of hiring software workers from India may also change and their mobility across the EU could be affected with more right-wing racist parties gaining strength. There are many hurdles that Indian exporters face as they have to adhere to laws and rules of the EU like the phyto-sanitary regulations for agricultural products. The EU-India FTA could have helped the ease of entry but there remain many sticking points. The EU wants India to open up its wines and spirits market and allow freer imports of new and second-hand cars. It wants India to open up the retail sector and India wants data secure status. With a change of governments in important member-states that are clearly anti-immigration and protectionist, there may be more snags in signing the EU-India BTIA. Robert Fisk SO Donald Trump is going to f*** them all. No excuses for such filthy words today. I'm only quoting the man whose Pentagon offices he just used to disgrace himself and America. For it was Secretary of Defence James Mad Dog Mattis who told Iraqis in 2003 that he came in peace he even urged his Marines to be compassionate but said, of those who might dare to resist America's illegal invasion of their country: If you f*** with me, I'll kill you all. There's no getting round it. Call it Nazi, Fascist, racist, vicious, illiberal, immoral, cruel. More dangerously, what Trump has done is a wicked precedent. If you can stop them coming, you can chuck them out. If you can demand extreme vetting of Muslims from seven countries, you can also demand a values test for those Muslims who have already made it to the USA. Those on visas. Those with residency only. Those, if they are American citizens, with dual citizenship. Or full US citizens of Muslim origin. Or just Americans who are Muslims. Or Hispanics. Or Jews? Refugees one day. Citizens the next. Then refugees again. No, of course, Trump would never visit such obscene tests on Jewish immigrants, for they would be obscene, would they not? And nor will he stop Christians from Muslim countries. America has always condemned sectarian states, but now Trump declares that he approves of sectarianism. Minorities will be welcome the Alawites of Syria, to whom Bashar al-Assad belongs, will presumably not count, and I guess we can expect all US embassies to have three queues for visa applicants. One for Muslims, one for Christians, and a third marked Other. That's where most of us will be standing in line. And by doing so, we will automatically give approval to this iniquitous system and to Trump. There's no point in wasting time over the obvious: that America has bombed, directly or indirectly, five of the seven nations on Trump's banned list. Sudan just escapes, but the US blew a packed Iranian passenger airliner out of the sky in 1988 and has raised no objections to Israel's bombing of Iranian personnel in Syria. So that makes six. There's nothing to be gained by reiterating that the four countries whose citizens participated in the international crimes against humanity of 9/11 Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the Emirates and Lebanon do not feature on the list. For the Saudis must be loved, cosseted, fawned over, approved, even when they chop off heads and when their citizens funnel cash to the murderers of Isis. Egypt is ruled by Trump's fantastic guy anti- terrorist president al-Sisi. The glisteningly wealthy Emirates won't be touched. Nor will Lebanon, although its tens of thousands of dual-national Syrians may have a tough time in the future. But no, this vile piece of legislation is not aimed at nations. It's targeting refugees, the poor, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free. The Muslim ones, that is, not the Christians. How can they ever withstand a values test? And what are America's values anyway? It's OK to attack sovereign states. It's OK to use pilotless planes to assault men and women in other countries. It's OK if your allies steal land from others for their own people, if you support Arab dictatorships that emasculate and execute and rape their prisoners, as long as they are allies of the USA. It's OK to fast-track Saudi visas as the Brits have been doing for years even if they are members of the most inspirational Wahhabi cult in the world: membership includes the Taliban, Al-Qaida, Isis, you name it. There's even no value in touting our own participation in this charade. Having just patted the killer governments of the Gulf on the head, and heading off to do the same to Turkey's autocrat-in-chief, our poodlet Prime Minister, fresh out of Washington, hasn't uttered a word about Trump's wickedness. Wasn't it Britain, and America, for heaven's sake that was weeping copious tears, buckets of the stuff, for the 250,000 (or 90,000) Muslim refugees of eastern Aleppo a couple of months ago? And now, so much do we care for them. They were almost all Muslims in eastern Aleppo, by the way. The Christians of Syria have, through no fault of their own, sought protection from Bashar. And what message did the Christian priests of northern Syria give when I interviewed them? They did not want their people to leave for the West, they said. Hard though it was, Christians should stay in the lands of their faith, the Middle East. In the West, they would merely be lost in a secular world. Trump is going to make sure they are. Thus America is henceforth going to protect itself from radical Islamic extremists Islamic note, not Islamist and we'll all be able to follow him. Is non-EU Britain not going to be able to march along the same awful path? If America is our economic lifeline, will it not also be our moral lifeline for the political buffoons of the United Kingdom? Sure, it's a long time since World War II But then, what did the US do before, or after, Hitler's evil? It prevented Jewish refugees from coming to America. Yes, even Anne Frank. And now they're at it again. The Independent Three conclusions can be drawn from the BJPs back-to-Hindutva manifesto released on Saturday. First, the party leadership seems no longer confident of facing the Uttar Pradesh electorate with a development agenda. Prime Minister Modis development talk appears distant and unexciting when compared with that of the local boy, Akhilesh Yadav, particularly after the strengthening of his hold on the Samajwadi Party and purge of some undesirables. His projection as a Vikas Purush coupled with the coming together of the Samajwadi Party and the Congress have apparently unnerved the BJP and forced a rethink in its election strategy. The party has returned to a Hindutva-centric agenda which is evident from the references to Ram temple, triple talaq and the alleged migration from Kairana in western UP. Kairana is remembered but Muzaffarnagar is not. Initially the BJP had taken a moral high ground deploring the caste play in UP while seeking votes in the name of development. The larger goal in reviving these dormant issues is to help the party shed its pro-upper-caste image and embrace lower castes through a carefully crafted narrative of polarisation. For bridging the divide within it is important to identify and attack the outsider. The strategy worked in 2014 and a repeat performance is hoped for. The BJP is trying to make people agitate about something they had happily left for the Supreme Court to decide. People are being assured temple and development can go hand in hand. Secondly, the invocation of Hindutva is an admission on the part of the BJP leadership that the two tactics used in the initial phase of electioneering surgical strikes and demonetisation have not played out as expected. All the dust kicked up by the surgical strike rhetoric has settled down. It has ceased to arouse passions or patriotism. The note ban too is not without its victims and critics. Finally, the resort to Hindutva is contrary to Modis statesman-like call made at a rally in Lucknow asking people to rise above caste and religion. This was on the day the Supreme Court ruled that politicians cannot use religion or caste to appeal for votes. And now this manifesto. What a climbdown! Saurabh Malik Tribune News Service Chandigarh, January 30 Criticised for its role during the reservation stir last year, the Haryana Police has received yet another rap, this time from a Mewat court for waving a magic wand to let go 12 accused in a murder case. The admonition came after Mewat Sessions Judge MM Dhonchak was told that the accused, against whom proclamation was issued, were declared innocent. Judge Dhonchak said the possibility of extraneous considerations playing role in the sordid saga could not be ruled out. The entire exercise was carried as if some magic wand falling from the sky landed in the investigating agencys hands and its wave revealed the accused were not offenders. The proceedings in the case by the investigating agency have not been carried out in a legalistic and prudent manner.. The way the investigation was conducted in the case, it was full of twists and twirls, finding someone guilty at one juncture and then one fine morning finding him innocent. The case was registered after victim Hamids body was brought to Khori Kalan police post in June last year. The police was told the victim had gone to hear songs when a fight took place following an exchange of abuses. Accused Mustafa was subsequently arrested in July, 2016; and a challan under Section 173, CrPC, was submitted in October, 2016. A proclamation against the remaining accused was also issued for declaring them proclaimed offenders. After the Nuh SP ordered further investigation in December 2016, CIA staff ASI Navdeep Singh found the accused innocent. It was claimed that the complainant had revealed their names due to some misunderstanding. Judge Dhonchak asserted it was a categorical case of the police in its October, 2016, report that the remaining accused were yet to be arrested; and the case was fixed for their appearance on January 6. But on that date another report was filed with a clean chit to the remaining accused. The same day the case was committed to the sessions court. The earlier report under Section 173 was prepared by Inspector Om Prakash. One fails to comprehend as to how the another person of the same rank can undo what was done earlier by a similarly ranked officer. Moreover, no permission whatsoever of the court was ever sought for conducting the investigation under section 173 (8) Judge Dhonchak added the earlier report indicated the accused were not innocent. Had they been available before the police at that point of time, they would have been put on trial. Invoking suo motu powers, Judge Dhonchak set aside the order of committing the case to the sessions court. Judicial Magistrate Tarun Chaudhary was asked to pass a fresh order and see the desirability of an effective and impartial probe by directing the Rewari Range IG to get further investigation by an IPS-level officer, possibly from another district. Majid Jahangir Tribune News Service Srinagar, January 30 Five soldiers who were rescued after being trapped for several hours in snow that caved in on them after an avalanche in north Kashmir Machil on two days ago died in an army hospital. The five Army soldiers, who had been trapped under snow after a track caved in Machil and subsequently rescued after a gruelling daylong mission, were sent to Srinagar today, despite the poor weather, for special medical care. Unfortunately, the brave hearts succumbed to their injuries, an army spokesman said in Srinagar. (Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd) The deaths take the toll in avalanches after last weeks snowfall to 25. The number includes five civilians. Meanwhile, the remains of 14 soldiers who died in avalanches in Bandipores Gurez valley in north Kashmir on January 25 were also brought to Srinagar in the Indian Air Forces helicopters on Monday. The bodies could not be evacuated before because of inclement weather, the spokesman said. Dinesh Manhotra Tribune News Service Jammu, January 30 Enraged over the decision of Speaker Kavinder Gupta not to admit their adjournment motion, member of the Opposition today staged a walkout from the Legislative Assembly raising anti-government slogans. The Opposition had moved the adjournment motion to suspend normal business in the Assembly to discuss the hardships being faced by the people in the snow-bound Kashmir valley. As soon as the House assembled this morning, opposition members were on their feet, demanding a discussion on the problems being faced by the people due to the failure of the authorities to provide basic amenities after heavy snowfall in the state. Legislators from the NC, Congress and CPM created ruckus in the Assembly over the power crisis, shortage of essential commodities, non-availability of health facilities in the areas cut off after heavy snowfall. NC legislator Ali Mohammad Sagar told the Speaker that they had moved an adjournment motion for a special discussion as the situation was going from bad to worse in snow-bound areas each passing day. Congress legislator from Banihal Vikar Rasool sought to draw the attention of the government towards the situation in his constituency. He alleged that no sincere effort had been made to clear snow from rural areas while pointing out that a large partition of his constituency had been cut off from the rest of the world due to heavy snow. Asgar Ali Karbalai, MLA, Kargil, said patients were bearing the maximum brunt of the non-serious approach of the government. Most of the people in my constituency have been trapped because road connectivity in a majority of the areas has been snapped, Karbalai said while demanding a discussion on the prevailing situation. As the Speaker disallowed the adjournment motion, opposition members resorted to raising slogans against the government. Shouting nakaara sarkar, lachaar sarkar hai hai, the protesting legislator trooped into the well of the House, demanding one-hour discussion on the issue. There is no power, drinking water, essential commodities available to the people and the government is paying no attention to their miseries, the member said. The Speaker repeatedly asked the members to be seated, saying that the issue could be raised during the grants of Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti in the second sitting but to no avail. The members kept shouting and creating pandemonium following which the Speaker disallowed the adjournment motion. The entire Opposition later staged a walkout from the House. Dinesh Manhotra Tribune News Service Jammu, January 30 Endorsing concerns shown by her arch-rival Omar Abdullah, Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti today said those people taking a legal course to get Articles 370 and 35-A of the Indian Constitution abrogated are anti-national as by doing so such elements are strengthening hands of radical forces in the Kashmir valley. In a veiled attack on the Sangh Parivar, Mehbooba termed Article 370 as a shield to protect uniqueness of the state. There are some forces in the country which are trying to create an impression that the Kashmir problem could be solved by the abrogation of Article 370, she said, adding, Article 370 protects uniqueness of the state which is shining example of communal harmony and brotherhood." Some groups, which owe their allegiance to the Sangh Parivar, have challenged Articles 370 and 35-A in the courts of law. Already notices have been served on the Centre and the state government on writ petitions and PILs filed by some groups and individuals challenging Articles 370 and 35-A. The abrogation of Article 370 is core of BJPs ideology but interestingly party legislators were seen thumping their benches during the Chief Ministers speech on departments under her. I endorse concern of Omar that some groups are hatching conspiracy to weaken our unique character by approaching courts to challenge Article 370, she said, adding, those taking legal course to challenge Article 370 or 35 A are also anti-national because such elements are providing an opportunity to the fundamentalist forces active in the Valley to rake up sentiments of the people." Omar had on Saturday warned Mehbooba that the BJP may use judiciary to scrap Article 370 as the saffron party has understood that they cannot use legislation to scrap it. Those who believe that the BJP is silent on the abrogation of Article 370 are wrong as the BJP will use the judiciary to attack Article 35-A. At that time you should not put blame on us that we raked up this issue but the government should hire services of professional lawyers and shouldnt be dependent on the Advocate-General or other officers, whose result we have seen in SARFAESI Act (verdict), Omar had cautioned. Mehbooba, however, seized this opportunity to attack radical forces which have been opposing satellite colonies for displaced Kashmiri Pandits. There are some forces in the Valley which are spitting venom by raising the bogey of demographic change to exploit sentiments of the people," she said. Regretting US President Donald Trumps decision to ban entry of Muslims in his country, she said the Islam had gained a bad image in the world today. NC members staged a walkout after the Chief Minister concluded her speech. Tribune News Service Srinagar, January 30 The bad weather in the Valley for the past 10 days has affected the academics and exams in universities. The Dean, Academic Affairs, University of Kashmir, said the classwork was resumed today after remaining suspended for the past 10 days due to bad weather. He said the exams had also been postponed. The classwork started today after 10 days. Even if it snows now there wont be any vacation, the official said. The University of Kashmir, Islamic University of Science and Technology and the National Institute of Technology, Srinagar, had decided to cancel the winter vacation this year due to the losses faced by students in the unrest last year. During the unrest last year, classwork remained suspended for more than five months. Though the NIT continued regular classwork despite snowfall, no classes were held at the two universities. The annual exams of the undergraduate final year of the University of Kashmir had to be postponed thrice in the past more than a week. They will now be held as per the newly notified dates. Our exams were postponed twice since January 1. There should be no delay now as it impacts our exam preparation, said Aqib Ahmad, a student of final year. The universities in the Valley this year have continued normal work in winter so that the students could compensate for the losses suffered in the unrest last year. We decided to compensate for the losses suffered last year and called off the winter vacation so that the current academic calendar is not affected, said an official of the University of Kashmir. The official said that despite the suspension of classes for 10 days due to bad weather, the admissions of new batches will be on time and the forms will be issued next month. Vice Chancellor of the IUST Mushtaq Siddiqui said the classes at the varsity were today after two weeks. The weather has improved and regular classes began today after two weeks, he said. Ever since the President of the United States of America -- Donald Trump -- signed an executive order blocking immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States of America, including green card holders, thousands of people across the country have been protesting against Trump. By India Today Web Desk: Last Friday, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order than bans people from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Librya, Yemen and Syria from entering the country for 90 days. Since then, thousands of protesters have been gathering outside airports across the United States of America and have been rallying against the controversial order President Trump sanctioned. advertisement Through the order, Trump temporarily suspended the entire US refugee program that applies indefinitely to the resettlement of refugees from war-torn Syria. The order also blocks all people from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Libya, and Yemen from entering the US for another 90 days. The American Civil Liberties Union (AUCL) took the American President to a federal court in Brooklyn on behalf of two Iraqi nationals detained at the John F Kennedy International Airport in New York City, and successfully blocked Trump's order. US District Judge Ann Donnelly who temporarily halted parts of the executive order told the government lawyers "nobody is to be removed," reported Buzzfeed. Also read: Detained, handcuffed and an uncomfortable pat down: Sudanese student describes detention at New York airport Here is a video of Anthony D Romero, ACLU Executive Director, addressing the media right after he stepped out of the court. WATCH: ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero coming out of the court where the ACLU just argued and won block of Trump's Muslim ban. pic.twitter.com/kvWDgWiUIn ACLU National (@ACLU) January 29, 2017 Calling Trump's decision to ban immigrants, especially Muslims, from entering America "Un-American" and "against American values", thousands of people rallied to airports where people from other nations were being detained and sent back to their countries. Also read: Unfazed by backlash, Donald Trump says immigration order "working out very nicely" Screaming "not my president", "no ban, no registry, **ck white supremacy", "let them in", "not today, no ban, no wall" among others, protesters have also been using placards against Donald Trump. Some of the placards read, "Welcome others as Christ welcomed you", "All huddled masses welcome", "America is a land of refugees". Photo: Twitter (@AGarlandPhoto) Social media platforms are now filled with Americans sharing their stories about being immigrant descendants and how America, as a nation, has always welcomed people from across the world. Actors, lawyers, politicians, and CEOs of top tech giants have spoken against Trump's executive order which has now been temporarily blocked by the ACLU. Amid these are some desi protestors, presumably from Indian or Pakistani origin. They were seen raising placards with Hindi written in English, and the photos of these have been going viral. Sample these: advertisement DONALD TRUMP IS A KUTTA Photo: Twitter (@joke_sparrow) BANCHODE Photo: Twitter (@zaarataara) YEH BIK GAYI HAI GORMINT Photo: Twitter (@alsheikho) FITTEH MOO ULLU KA... Photo: Twitter (@LisaBloom) DESI-CHAI LOVE Photo: Twitter (@SophieWaseem) --- ENDS --- Twitteratti went abuzz as Bollywood took a stand for Sanjay Leela Bhansali and Sushant Singh Rajput, who enjoys huge fan-following, raised questions about the obsession with surnames. Took off Rajput from my name for a day as they dont represent the entire community, he said. This gave way to a discussion does dropping surnames make us an all-inclusive society? Here is what youngsters from tricity feel. Mona Change the thinking Its not the surname, but thinking that needs be dropped. The need of the hour is to rise above the petty differences and make this world a better place to live in for all of us. Sania Dutt, engineer, Infosys Protest peacefully I do use my surname for it was a given, but sure there is no need for it. In India, it is a marker of social status. And so strong is the identification with our past that we have seen results in Jaipur incident. There are ways of peaceful protests. Naresh Kalia, Phd student Live in harmony We are an all-inclusive society; while surnames are a reflection of our standing in society, yet we know very well how to live in harmony with all our differences. I have friends with different surnames from different communities. Sourabh Rajput, sales manager Calm down We need to calm down as a society. A filmmaker has creative freedom; vandalism is no way to react.My identity goes way beyond my surname. Dropping surnames in country like ours can bring about a change, but the generation today does not take such segregations seriously. Vibhuti Verma, Architecture student Bhiwandi (Thane), January 30 Rahul Gandhi on Monday appeared before a magistrate court here in connection with the hearing in the RSS defamation case over his alleged comments blaming people from the saffron fountainhead for the killing of Mahatma Gandhi. The court adjourned till March 3 the hearing for recording the plea of the Congress vice president, who has preferred to face trial as an accused in the defamation case. (Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd) In a brief interaction later with waiting media persons outside the court, Rahul said that his fight is against the ideology which killed Mahatma Gandhi. The date granted for recording of his (Rahuls) plea is March 3, said Magistrate Tushar Vaze, adjourning the case. The case against Rahul was filed by a local RSS functionary Rajesh Kunte over the formers speech in Bhiwandi on March 6, 2014 in the run-up to Lok Sabha polls. During the rally, Rahul had allegedly claimed, The RSS people had killed Gandhi. Prior to the adjournment, Rahuls lawyers Ashok Mundergi and Narayan Iyer told the court that they have not received the copy of the entire newspaper (which published the news item on the Congress leader) but only the cuttings. Mundergi told the court that he will have to go through the entire documents and he will argue if needed, before the plea is recorded. He then, along with Iyer, moved an adjournment application. However, Nandu Phadke, advocate of the complainant in the case, urged the court that Rahuls plea may be recorded today but his request was turned down. Rahul arrived in the court here at around 12.30 pm amid tight security accompanied by senior Congress leaders Ashok Chavan and Sanjay Nirupam, besides party supporters. As the magistrate was dictating some order in another case, Rahul had to wait till 1.30 pm before his case was called out. He was also seen exchanging pleasantries and speaking with Kunte. My fight is against the ideology which killed Gandhiji. I remember Gandhiji. My fight is against the ideology which removed his poster from Khadi (KVIC) posters. Gandhiji is in the heart of every Indian. He was killed but his thought cant be erased, Rahul, who was headed for a rally in poll-bound state Goa, told reporters. At the last hearing in November, the Bhiwandi court had granted him bail in the case after former Union Minister Shivraj Patil stood surety. PTI Vibha Sharma Tribune News Service New Delhi, January 30 Ahead of the Union Budget and the much-expected storm in Parliament, the BJP today launched a two-pronged attack on the Congress. Ahead of polls in five states, the saffron party alleged that former PM Manmohan Singh and then Finance Minister P Chidambaram helped absconding businessman Vijay Mallya procure bank loans to save now-defunct Kingfisher Airlines. Saffron bombardment against top Congress functionaries came on a day the Opposition party made clear its intentions for the upcoming Budget and attempted to corner the Narendra Modi government with its very own assessment of the countrys state of economy. Top BJP leaders Piyush Goyal and Nirmala Sitharaman who are part of the NDA government that will present its Economic Survey for 2016-17 tomorrow termed the Congress effort a damp squib. It had been prepared without any proper analysis given the Modi governments successful and historic attempts to turn around a fragile economy it inherited in 2014, they said. It is just an attempt to divert attention from the real issue. The first loan to Mallya was granted in 2004, then again in 2008. Despite his companies declared Non-Performing Assets (NPAs), a restructuring of his loan was done in 2010, party spokesman Sambit Patra said, flashing the correspondence between Mallya, Manmohan Singh and Chidambaram as evidence. As per Patra, the then FM even forced the State Bank of India group, which was not willing to give a no-objection certificate for the issue of fresh share to raise funds, to issue the document and also directed bank officials to meet UBL officials. The question often asked is why Mallya was given a loan of Rs9,000 crore despite very poor rating of the company and its accounts not being in order. Were there certain hands pulling the strings from behind? Hands that were pulling the strings belonged to the then PM and the then FM, obviously at the behest of the Congress president. There are emails, letters and correspondence that expose these hands. Again and again, the kind indulgence of the then PM was sought by Mallya, Patra said. Meanwhile, Goyal and Sitharaman, who were fielded by the party to counter Congress allegations on the state of economy, maintained India was doing perfectly well under the Modi government in all aspects. India has been an oasis of economic growth, stability and opportunity in the world, they said, wishing that the Congress had done some work on facts and figures and gone through the statistics before preparing the report. Tribune News Service New Delhi, January 30 Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said the Indian economy was not in good shape and top global agencies were projecting a slowdown in growth. Unveiling a document titled, State of the Economy, produced by Congress research wing, Singh said, Tomorrow the government will present the Economic Survey. We are presenting a document today which sets out the real state of economy so that the country can assess for itself where the economy is, where it is going, what needs to be done to keep it in a good shape. That the Indian economy is not in good shape is now obvious. The IMF has projected a growth rate of 6.6 per cent in the current fiscal in place of the earlier rate of 7.6 per cent. Several other rating agencies have made similar projections, Singh said, adding that the Congress document would contribute to the ongoing debate on the state of economy. Supporting Singhs claims was former Finance Minister P Chidambaram who recalled the UPAs record of 7.5 pc average growth rate during the 10-year period between 2004 and 2014 which included the global recession of 2008. Any government should try and exceed the record of UPA which pulled 140 million people out of poverty during its 10-year rule. This government should also exceed our record but they are hiding behind the dazzle of GDP numbers whose very basis has been questioned, Chidambaram said asking where the fundamentals of a strong economy were. The former FM questioned the BJP on lack of jobs, poor new capital investment record and weak business sentiment. The credit growth rate is 5 per cent today and it is the lowest in several decades, Chidambaram said. Congress MP Rajeev Gowda, who oversaw the document, listed a host of indicators in the employment, railway safety and social sector to prove why the Indian economy is in poor shape. Congress leaders wondered if the governments Economic Survey would reflect these realities. Lahore, January 30 Jamaat ud Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed has been placed under house arrest in Lahore, the organisation said on Monday. Saeed, who has been suspected of engineering the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks, has been placed under house arrest at a mosque, a media report claimed. The organisation is also likely to be banned, the report said. Pakistan orders Hafiz Saeed under house arrest, a spokesman said, although details are still sketchy. (Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd) Pakistan is believed to be under increasing pressure from the United States to crack down on terrorist organisations on its soil. Agencies Simran Sodhi Tribune News Service New Delhi, January 30 The latest controversy to hit Nalanda University is the appointment of its new Chancellor Vijay Bhatkar, who is generally regarded as the brain behind Indias supercomputer development. However, his closeness to the RSS has raised questions on his appointment which many see as yet another pointer in the governments attempts to saffronise educational institutions in the country. Social media has been abuzz since January 25, when his appointment was confirmed by President Pranab Mukherjee, on his RSS affiliation. Bhatkar is at present president of RSS-affiliated outfit Vijnana Bharati which promotes swadeshi science. Bhatkar was awarded the Padma Shri in 2000. He also received Maharashtra Bhushan Award, the highest recognition of the Government of Maharashtra, in 2000. The controversy has dogged the workings of Nalanda University for quite some time now. Two months ago, George Yeo, the Chancellor of Nalanda and a former foreign minister of Singapore, resigned in protest. He alleged that he there was no autonomy in the workings of Nalanda and had two major grouses with the government. One: the governing board of the university was reconstituted in November and Amartya Sens long association with Nalanada brought to an end. The university board reconstituted by the President as its visitor on November 21 ended Nobel laureate Sens long association with the university he had helped set up. Yeo alleged he was not even informed or consulted. Two: VC Gopa Sabharwals extension which Yeo had approved of was terminated by the government. People privy to the developments say Sabharwal was appointed by the UPA government because of her proximity to Sen. Yash Goyal Our Correspondent Jaipur, January 30 Protests against controversial movie Padmavati today took a new turn with Rajput groups demanding that Bhansali Productions should change the name of the film. At a press conference here, Giriraj Singh Lotwara, president of Shri Rajput Sabha (SRS), said: A screening committee headed by a retired judge and historians should be set up to finalise whether to release the movie or not if anything from Padmavatis history is covered in the movie. Shobha Sant, CEO of Bhansali Productions, said it was a new demand of the Karni Sena and would be taken up by the authorities at senior level. Releasing a letter written to the SRS president, Sant claimed that there was no romantic dream sequence or any objectionable/romantic scene between Padmavati and Alaudin Khilji even before the Jaigarh incident on January 27. We have been carefully researching and making the film. We are confident that Mewar Rajputana would be proud of the film made on their revered queen. We do not want to hurt anyones sentiments and would appreciate if all social organisations and local people support us in making this film, Sant said. Lotwara said: Bhansali Productions has agreed on two main points there will be no intimate scene in any form, not even in a dream sequence; and no facts will be distorted in the episode on Rana Rawal Ratan Singh Padmini and Alaudin Khilji. Even in future if any films are produced on the life of any historical/national heroes, the facts on record should not be distorted. On resuming shooting in Rajasthan, Sant said it would be decided later. Karni Sena activists had allegedly assaulted director Sanjay Leela Bhansali and his crew members besides vandalising Padmavati sets at Jaigarh Fort on January 27. Five persons were arrested in this connection but were released on bail the next day. Bhansali had packed up shooting and went back to Mumbai on Sunday. Mumbai, January 30 The Reserve Bank of India announced on Monday that it was lifting restrictions on daily cash withdrawals, but a weekly limit of Rs 24,000 will remain. "On a review of the pace of remonetisation, it has been decided to partially restore status quo ante," RBI said. The order will come into effect on February 1, 2017. The RBI said it could review its weekly limit later. (Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd) However, banks could have their own limits, such as the ones that existed before the central government decided to pull 86 per cent of cash out of circulation in November. The order will be applicable to withdrawals from ATMs, current accounts, cash credit accounts, and overdraft accounts with immediate effect. "Limits on savings accounts will continue for the present and are under consideration," it said. Banks have been asked to encourage their constituents to sustain the movement towards digitisation of payments and switching over of payments from cash mode to non-cash mode". The RBI imposed limits on drawing money from banks because of the cash crunch that followed the central governments measure to invalidate old banknotes of Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 on November 8, 2016. The limits were gradually eased as the bank brought more of its newly introduced banknotes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 into circulation. PTI Balwant Garg Tribune News Service Kotkapura, January 29 Prime Minister Narendra Modi said today that a stable, capable and reliable government in Punjab was a must for the security of the country as the state shared its borders with Pakistan, which was always looking to stoke trouble in India. He warned that a weak government in the border state could spell trouble for the nation. He was addressing an election rally in Kotkapura in favour of the SAD-BJP candidates in Moga, Faridkot, Muktsar and Bathinda districts. When electing a government, dont think only about yourself, but of the whole nation, he told the crowds while seeking votes for the SAD-BJP alliance, which he claimed was strong and competent, capable of guarding the state and the nation and warding off threats from Pakistan. (Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd) In a veiled attack on the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), he urged the voters to neither trust those with an aristocratic lifestyle, nor those who were outsiders. He was particularly critical of AAP that has emerged a major challenge to the SAD-BJP alliance in the Malwa belt. Modi branded AAP as an outsider that was dreaming of creating its own world at the cost of Punjab. Reminding the people how in the Eighties the Congress had painted all young Sikhs as terrorist, he said: Now these outsiders are defaming the youth of the state" by portraying them as addicts. Those (AAP) who have failed Delhi are coming to Punjab to destroy it. Send them back and tell them to first honour their promises in Delhi, he said. The PM was highly critical of the language being used against the Punjab Chief Minister during electioneering Such language is unacceptable. Such threats (to throw the Badals in jail) are unacceptable. He said the CBI would probe the incidents of sacrilege at Bargari and other gurdwaras and those found guilty would be punished. Calling PPCC chief Capt Amarinder Singh a hankari (arrogant) raja, Punjab Deputy CM Sukhbir Badal said, You can make this raja a beggar by not voting for the Congress. He accused Kejriwal of having recently met two terrorists at Moga and Mohali. AAP is bent upon spoiling the hard-earned peace in the state, he alleged. And here's how they've decided to protest against Trump's decision to ban immigrants from seven Muslim-majority nations. By India Today Web Desk: Whenever Donald Trump decides to take a break from signing catastrophic excecutive orders, or watching "too much television", he might be able to see a swarm of protestors outside The White House. The man who, after all, IS the new President of the United States has enraged thousands worldwide after imposing a ban on immigrants from seven majority-muslim countries for 90 days while also terminating the Syrian refugee program indefinitely. advertisement Aside from the people stuck at airports, bearing the brunt of The Donald's shocking decision, there are many prominent public figures protesting the move, two of them being, renowned models, Bella and Gigi Hadid. Gigi and Bella spotted protesting against Trump. Picture courtesy: Instagram/ Yolanda Hadid Also Read: Protest against Donald Trump: These desi placards used in protest against US President say a lot Also Read: A group of American Sikhs served Langar at the Women's March Also Read: Women are making hijabs out of the American flag, and it's beautiful Sporting 'Love Trumps Hate' pins, the Hadid sisters were spotted participating in a protest rally at the Battery Park neighbourhood of New York City. The models also took turns at carrying signboards with 'We are all Humans' and 'Resist' scribbled on them. The models' parents, Yolanda and Mohammed are both immigrants settled in America. While Bella and Gigi's mother, Yolanda Hadid, moved from the Netherlands to LA, their father, Mohammed, a Muslim of Jordanian origin, moved to the United States of America as a teenager. Bella, Gigi and Anwar Hadid's mom, Yolanda, hails from Netherlands. Picture courtesy: Instagram/ Yolanda Hadid Whereas their dad, Mohammed has Muslim roots. Picture courtesy: Instagram/Mohammed Hadid "I wouldn't call myself a 'devout' Muslim..but I'm very proud of my heritage," Mohammed was once quoted as telling Modern Luxury magazine. Donald Trump's stand on immigrants, specifically Muslims, has been garnering criticism from left, right and center with several A-list celebrities including, Rihanna, Ashton Kutcher, Mark Ruffalo, Jennifer Lopez, Chrissy Teigen, Ellen DeGeneres expressing their disdain about the same. --- ENDS --- Kulwinder Sandhu Tribune News Service Moga, January 30 The Faridkot District and Sessions Court on Monday again issued a notice to Deputy CM Sukhbir Singh Badal for January 31 on a plea filed against him for cancelling his bail in an attempt-to-murder case, the appeal of which is pending in the sessions court. The applicant-appellant Naresh Sehgal, a Kotkapura-based journalist, moved an application before this court on Friday for cancelling the bail and exemption orders passed in favour of Sukhbir. As the District and Sessions Judge of Faridkot Satwinder Singh Chahal was on leave on Monday, the case came up for hearing in the court of Hira Singh Gill, Additional District and Sessions Judge. The ADSJs court has again issued notice to Sukhbir, who failed to appear in the court on Monday. The case will come up for hearing on Tuesday. The attempt-to-murder case was registered against Sukhbir at Kotkapura police station in Faridkot district on June 30, 2006. Sukhbir was acquitted in the case a few months back for lack of evidence but Sehgal, who had lodged the criminal case against him, filed an appeal before the district and sessions judge, which is still pending. Meanwhile, the Election Commission has asked the Chief Electoral Officer of Punjab to inquire into the allegations against Sukhbir for furnishing incomplete information and submitting a false affidavit to the Returning Officer, Jalalabad, while filing nomination papers to contest the assembly elections. Sukhbir allegedly did not disclose that he was released on a Rs-50,000 bail bond by the district and sessions judge and that an appeal was pending. BD Kasniyal Pithoragarh, January 30 The contest in Ramnagar in Nainital district is important for Chief Minister Harish Rawat since he has given ticket to one of his close associates and his industrial adviser former Salt MLA Ranjit Rawat. Ranjit Rawat has been pitted against BJP senior leader and former Ramnagar MLA Diwan Singh Bisht. Two other candidates, local BSP candidate Rajiv Aggarwal and Uttarakhand Parivartan Party (UPP) candidate Prabhat Dhyani, are also in the fray. Both leaders have their own pockets of influence. Ramnagar has the distinction of giving helping former Chief Minister ND Tewari in byelection of 2002. The Ramnagar seat was snatched by BJPs Diwan Singh Bisht in 2007. Diwan Singh received over 25,949 votes against the Congress candidate who got 14,843 votes. The constituency was won by Congress candidate Amrita Rawat in 2012. Amrita polled 23,851 votes against losing BJP candidate Diwan Singhs 20,122 votes. Ramnagar has several problems that have not been solved by any representatives in three elections after the creation of the state, said Ganesh Rawat, a social activist of Ramnagar. Rawat said the problem of 24 forest villages, which were established by the British to do rapid plantation work in the Terai region eastwards from Ramnagar, have not been solved yet. Having no revenue status, over 30,000 people living in these villages are living without basic facilities of road, education, health and communication, said Rawat. According to Ganesh Rawat, besides the problem of forest villages, Ramnagar has other problems of regularisation of new colonies of Pampapuri, Bharatpuri, Durgapuri and Kharshalya Puri due to which the basic facilities and ownership rights are not given to these residents. The long-standing problem of protection wall along the Kosi has not yet been addressed by any government due to which thousands of people are compelled to face problems of shifting during monsoon every year, said Rawat. Congress candidate Ranjit Rawat has been highlighting the achievements of the Harish Rawat government of regularising the colonies of Ramnagar. We have several achievements in Ramnagar on that basis of that people are fully with the Congress in this elections, said Ranjit Rawat. He said besides regularising all four colonies, the government had opened roadways depot at Ramnagar and sanctioned a bridge on the Saweldey River. The Congress government has also opened a hotel management institute at Saweldey and a polytechnic college at Pirumdara besides opening a degree college at Maldhamchaur, said Ranjit Rawat. The Congress candidate also claimed the construction of road linking Shivnathpur, Sakhanpur and Jiwanpur with national highway and providing electricity and drinking water in several villages, including colonies of Shivnathpur Kumbhgadar, Devinullah, Nathawali and Kargil. The BJP candidate linked these achievement with the BJP as the sitting Congress MLA from Ramnagar Amrita Rawat has now joined the party. The Congress government under Harish Rawat has only put obstruction in the development work in Ramnagar and shifted several tourism schemes like the Ramnagar Kosi tourism circuit scheme shifted to his native region, said Diwan Singh. The election campaign has taken an interesting turn these days while Congress candidate Ranjit Rawat is promising to make Ramnagar an town, Diwan Singh of the BJP wants to complete the developmental schemes that have been stopped by the Chief Minister. UPP candidate Prabhat Dhyani has promised to finish illegal mining from Ramnagar, the BSP candidate Rajiv Aggarwal is banking on his being local and with social contacts. The basic problems of the town and adjoining villages will remain unaddressed as no government seems to be committed to solve these, said Ganesh Rawat. Tribune News Service Mussoorie, January 30 Congress workers of Bhilangana block in the Ghansali reserved constituency opposed the candidature of Bhim Lal Arya who left the BJP and joined the Congress, during a meeting held at Vasu Lok Hotel in Ghansali today. They demanded a change in the candidate from Ghansali and raised slogans against Arya. They favoured the candidature of Independent Dhani Lal Shah. Arya, who had come to attend the meeting called by Congress leaders, could do nothing but sit silently and watched the drama. Congress workers alleged that Arya was opposed to the development in the area and accused him of neglecting Congress workers. The agitated Congress workers said they would not support the candidate who had been forced on them by the party and had done nothing for the region. They said it was sad that such person was made a candidate, who was not even a primary member of the party. They asked the senior leaders that how a person, who had betrayed the BJP, could help the Congress. Vijay Gunsola, the block pramukh, said he tried to pacify them but they demanded Arya to leave the meeting. Arya was shocked at the development. They demanded a change in the party candidate from the area. Former MLA Balbeer Singh Negi, block paramukh Vujay Gunsola, Congress block president Lakshmi Joshi, Surya Prakash Raturi, Bachal Singh, Purab Singh and others were present on the occasion. Neena Sharma Tribune News Service Dehradun, January 30 A stronghold of the BJP, voters of the Yamkeshwar Assembly segment falling in Pauri district have remained faithful to the party and its candidate in the last three elections. Now in the 2017 Assembly poll, reposing faith in the former BJP leader Shailender Rawat, who is now fighting on the Congress ticket, the Congress is hoping to bring a change in its fortune and wrest the seat from the BJP. On the other hand, the BJP preferred to dump its three-time sitting MLA Vijaya Barthwal and has replaced her with a novice Ritu Khanduri, who has her fathers, former Chief Minister BC Khanduri, legacy to fall upon. It remains to be seen if the voters remain loyal to the BJP and vote for Ritu Khanduri or Rawat who was denied twice a ticket from the BJP. A grassroot leader who remained a block pramukh for 12 years from Dugadda block and was BJP MLA from Kotdwar in 2007, Rawat has his task cut out for him. Here, I was preparing in advance in the hope that the BJP would nominate me from Kotdwar and when it did not happen, I was in a shock. Things happen for the good, I have just 15 days to prepare. There are 165 villages to cover, it is a huge area, said Rawat. Significantly, the Dugadda block, from where he was a block Pramukh falls under the Yamkeshwar constit- uency whose area was realigned after the 2008 delimitation. So in that sense, Rawat is in a familiar territory as the 20 polling booths and more than 60 villages that were part of Dugadda are under the Yamkeshwar constituency. The Yamkeshwar constituency comprises some portions of Lansdowne tehsil, Kotdwar tehsil and 165 villages. It has a total number of 83,484 voters (males- 43,919, female- 39,565). However, Rawat has another hurdle to cross, a former Congress contender Renu Bisht, who has filed nominations as an independent and she is not willing to withdraw her nominations. On the other hand, after initially recording her displeasure by filing her nominations from Yamkeshwar as an independent, Vijaya Barthwal has decided to withdraw her nomination against the BJPs official candidate Ritu Khanduri. So there is some relief for Khanduri. I am now the official candidate of the BJP and will do my best for the party, said Ritu. Problems galore The Yamkeshwar segment is beset with several problems and there is rampant anger against the sitting MLA Vijaya Barthwal, who is said to have not paid any heed to the needs of her constituency. An internal survey carried out by the BJP was not favourable towards the sitting MLA as there has been great degree of disenchantment in the public against her, said a BJP leader. The demand for roads, hospital and proper facilities for attracting tourists in the area as the Koteshwar Mahadev Temple in Dharkot attracts huge crowds during Shivratri and Sawan month are some of the demands that villagers say have not been addressed. Besides, there have also been frequent attacks by leopards and other wild animals. We have been demanding the upgrade of the only PHC in the area, but the issue had lingered on due to the absence of land. The government managed to acquire land, the issue is now pending with the National Green Tribunal for the clearance, said Jagmohan Negi, a resident. Further, villagers from Sayalinga, demanding the construction of the Ggharat-Mundala road, have threatened to boycott the elections. Tribune News Service Dehradun, January 30 The Dehradun District Election Office rejected nomination papers of 10 candidates after scrutiny while papers of three candidates were rejected in Uttarkashi district today. Today was the last date for scrutiny of nomination papers for the Assembly poll, slated to be held on February 15 in the state. The nomination papers filed by All-India Forward Block Party candidate Mohammad Atif were rejected due to insufficient information, while Independent candidate Amit Sharmas papers were rejected as he was found underage for contesting election. Similarly, nomination papers of Independent candidate from Dharampur Shahid Hasan and Safiq-ul Rahman, Bharatiya Antodaya Party candidate Balbeer Kumar Talwar and Bharatiya Sarvodya Party candidate Ghanshyam Singh were rejected in the absence of nominee name and not responding to notice served by the district election office. The district election office rejected the nominations of Mohammad Usman, a candidate from the Raipur Assembly segment, Independent candidate from Cantt seat Dasrathi Uniyal and Indian Business Party candidate Subhash Chand Bhatt from Mussoorie. An Independent candidate from Doiwala Hema Purohits nomination papers were rejected as she had forgotten to sign the nomination paper. Three papers rejected in Uttarkashi Mussoorie: Indudhar Baudai, District Magistrate, Uttarkashi, and District Election Officer in a statement today said two nomination forms, one from Devprayag and another from Ghansali constituency were rejected during scrutiny conducted at New Tehri. The nomination form of Shoorvir Lal, an NCP candidate from the Ghansali reserved constituency, and Gabbar Singh Bangari, an Independent candidate, were rejected by returning officers. Sixtytwo candidates filed nomination papers from the six Assembly constituencies in the district. Election observers Dr Saket Kumar and Beer Singh Thakur scrutinised the nomination papers filed by the candidates. The election symbols to the candidates will be allotted on February 1. Nomination form of Shiv Kumar, the Sainik Samaj Party candidate from the Yamunotri seat, was rejected by the returning officer during scrutiny today. The nomination forms of other candidates from the Yamunotri, Gangotri and Purola constituencies were found to be correct during scrutiny. London, January 30 An online petition seeking cancellation of US President Donald Trumps State Visit to the UK has quickly crossed the one-million signature-mark to be considered for a debate in British Parliament, amid international uproar over his controversial immigration ban on people from seven Muslim nations. The petition titled Prevent Donald Trump from making State Visit to the United Kingdom on the UK Parliament website had been created on Saturday and rapidly collected the 100,000 signatures needed for it to be considered for a debate in the House of Commons. The issue will be discussed in the House of Commons tomorrow for a date to be set for the debate. Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen, the petition reads. Donald Trumps well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore, during the term of his presidency Donald Trump should not be invited to the UK for an official State Visit, it adds. British Prime Minister Theresa May had communicated the invitation to Trump on behalf of Queen Elizabeth II during her US visit last week. Downing Street has indicated that it has no plans of withdrawing the invitation for the state visit, which involves lavish pomp and ceremony, often with a stay at Buckingham Palace. Theresa May would be failing the British people if she does not postpone the state visit and condemn Trumps actions in the clearest terms, Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn said. PTI Quebec City, January 30 A shooting at a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers left six people dead in an attack that Canada's Prime Minister called an act of terrorism. Police arrested two suspects, including one who called 911 to say he was armed but ready to give himself up. More than 50 people were at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre when the shooting erupted last night. In addition to the six who died, five were in critical condition and 12 others suffered minor injuries, University of Quebec Hospital Centre spokeswoman Genevieve Dupuis said today. The dead ranged in age from age 35 to 65. One suspect was arrested at the scene and another in his car nearby on a bridge near d'Orleans, where he called 911 to say he wanted to cooperate with police. Police said they did not believe there were other suspects but were investigating. Police didn't give a possible motive or release names of the suspects, who they said were in their late 20s or early 30s and had no prior police records. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard both characterised the attack as a terrorist act, which came amid heightened tensions worldwide over President Donald Trump's travel ban on several Muslim countries. "We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge," Trudeau said in a statement. "It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country," he said. Canada is generally very welcoming toward immigrants and all religions, but the French-speaking province of Quebec has had a long-simmering debate about race and religious accommodation. The previous separatist government of the province called for a ban on ostentatious religious symbols such as the hijab in public institutions. "The Muslim community was the target of this murderous attack," Couillard said at an early morning news conference. He said solidarity rallies would be held across Quebec today. Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume, appearing shaken, said, "No person should have to pay with their life, for their race, their colour, their sexual orientation or their religious beliefs," Labeaume said. Cultural Centre President Mohamed Yangui said the shooting in occurred in the men's section of the mosque. He said he wasn't at the centre when the attack occurred, but he got some details from people on the scene. Ali Hamadi said he left the mosque a few minutes before the shooting and said a friend, Abdelkrim Hassen was killed. He said Hassen, who worked in information technology for the government, had three daughters and a wife, whom he had to notify of the death. AP Ottawa, January 30 Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of US President Donald Trump's travel ban, the immigration ministry has said. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. (Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd) Also read: Trump deportations blocked, protests on Hussen did not indicate how many people could be concerned by this measure, but he said that as of early Sunday afternoon, the Canadian authorities were unaware of anyone stranded in the country by the US order. Trump on Friday suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iraq, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Hussen, who is of Somali origin, said the Trump administration had assured Ottawa that Canadians holding dual nationality with those countries would not be affected by the US ban. He said that people from those seven countries who have a valid Canadian permanent residency card can still enter the United States. However, under the US order, the ban will apply to people from the targeted countries who are passing through Canada. More than 35,000 Canadians with dual citizenship have citizenship with one of the seven countries, he added. Hussen also stressed that Canada would continue to pursue an immigration policy based on compassion while at the same time protecting the security of its citizens. On Saturday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcomed immigrants to Canada, striking a sharp contrast with Trump's sweeping executive order restricting immigration the previous day. "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada," Trudeau posted on Twitter. According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one out of five people in the country are foreign-born. Canada has welcomed more than 39,670 Syrian refugees between November 2015 and the beginning of this January, according to government figures. AFP New York, January 30 Many of President Donald Trumps core political supporters had a simple message for the fiercest opponents of his immigration ban: calm down. The relaxed reaction among the kind of voters who drove Trumps historic upset victory working and middle-class residents of Midwest and the South provided a striking contrast to the uproar that has gripped major coastal cities, where thousands of protesters flocked to airports where immigrants had been detained. In the St. Louis suburb of Manchester, Missouri, 72-year-old Jo Ann Tieken characterised the President as bringing reason into an overheated debate. Somebody has to stand up, be the grown-up and see what we can do better to check on people coming in, she said. Im all for everybody to stop and take a breath Just give it a chance. In the electoral strongholds for Trump, residents seemed nonplussed about the uproar flashing across their television screens. They shrugged off concerns about botched execution, damage to foreign relations and legal challenges across the country. Allegations of operational or administrative blunders may do little to dampen enthusiasm for a President who rose to power on a populist and protectionist platform, political analysts said. Louise Ingram, a 69-year-old retiree from Troy, Alabama, said she forgave the new administration a few glitches, such as widespread confusion over treatment of green card holders, as it moved to protect US citizens from attacks. Im not opposed to immigrants, she said. A senior Trump administration official said political considerations had little to do with the executive orders. The reality is that the situation that exists today in parts of France, Germany and parts of Belgium is not a situation that we want replicated inside the US, another official said. Whatever Trump ultimately accomplishes, his election has ushered in a new extreme of political polarisation to an already deeply divided country. Reuters New York, January 30 Global coffee giant Starbucks has said it will hire 10,000 refugees over next five years as it vowed to not "stand silent" in the face of US President Donald Trump's order to ban people from seven Muslim-majority nations and assured it will continue to nurture the human spirit. (Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd) "I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise. We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question," Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz said in a message in the wake of Trump's order that has upended lives in the US as well as across the globe. Schultz said the company will take specific actions to ensure people around the world that it will "neither stand by, nor stand silent as the uncertainty around the new Administration's actions grows with each passing day." The Starbucks Chief announced that the company has had a long history of hiring young people looking for opportunities and a pathway to a new life around the world. "This is why we are doubling down on this commitment by working with our equity market employees as well as joint venture and licensed market partners in a concerted effort to welcome and seek opportunities for those fleeing war, violence, persecution and discrimination," he said. Schultz said Starbucks is developing plans to hire 10,000 refugees over five years in the 75 countries around the world where it does business, including India. "And we will start this effort here in the US by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support," he said. Starbucks will also strengthen its business in the "critically important market" Mexico, which has been a target of Trump's policies. Schultz said the company has been open for business in Mexico since 2002, and have since opened almost 600 stores in 60 cities across the country, which together employ over 7,000 Mexican partners. "We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same," he said. He also outlined Starbucks' plans to ensure healthcare coverage to its employees in the wake of Trump's plans to scrap Obamacare. "We are in business to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time whether that neighborhood is in a Red State or a Blue State; a Christian country or a Muslim country; a divided nation or a united nation. That will not change. You have my word on that," Schultz said. Trump's executive order, which imposed a minimum 90-day ban on immigrants and refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries (Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen; refugees from Syria have been barred indefinitely), has sparked an outpouring of criticism. PTI In New York, Washington and Boston, a second wave of demonstrations followed spontaneous rallies that broke out at US airports on Saturday as US Customs and Border Protection agents began enforcing Trump's directive. People begin to gather before a rally protesting President Donald Trump's travel ban on refugees and citizens of seven Muslim-majority nations. (Pic: AP) By Reuters: Tens of thousands of people rallied in US cities and at airports on Sunday to voice outrage over President Donald Trump's executive order restricting entry into the country for travelers from seven Muslim-majority nations. In New York, Washington and Boston, a second wave of demonstrations followed spontaneous rallies that broke out at US airports on Saturday as US Customs and Border Protection agents began enforcing Trump's directive. The protests spread westward as the day progressed. advertisement The order, which bars admission of Syrian refugees and suspends travel to the United States from Syria, Iraq, Iran and four other countries on national security grounds, has led to the detention or deportation of hundreds of people arriving at US airports. LARGEST PROTEST One of the largest of Sunday's protests took place at Battery Park in lower Manhattan, within sight of the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor, long a symbol of welcome to US shores. Democratic Senator Charles Schumer of New York told the crowd that Trump's order was un-American and ran counter to the country's core values. "What we are talking about here is life and death for so many people," the Senate Democratic leader said. "I will not rest until these horrible orders are repealed." The march, estimated to have grown to about 10,000 people, later began heading to the US Customs and Border Protection office in lower Manhattan. In Washington, thousands rallied at Lafayette Square across from the White House, chanting: "No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here." SECOND PROTEST IN WASHINGTON It was the second straight weekend that Washington was the scene of protests. Last Saturday, hundreds of thousands of women participated in an anti-Trump rally and march, one of dozens staged across the country. On Sunday, many of the protesters left the White House area and marched along Pennsylvania Avenue, stopping at the Trump International Hotel where they shouted: "Shame, shame, shame." A crowd that police estimated at 8,000 people eventually arrived at the steps of the US Capitol, where a line of uniformed officers stood guard. As the crowd passed the Canadian Embassy en route to the Capitol, protesters chanted: "Hey hey, ho ho, I wish our leader was Trudeau." It was a reference to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's Saturday Twitter message affirming his country's welcoming policy toward refugees. Trump defended the executive order in a statement on Sunday, saying the United States would resume issuing visas to all countries once secure policies were put in place over the next 90 days. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," Trump said. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe." advertisement NEVER AGAIN MEANS NEVER Aria Grabowski, 30, of Washington, was carrying a sign that read: "Never again means never again for everyone." Above the slogan was a photograph of Jewish refugees who fled Germany in 1939 on a ship that was turned away from Havana, Cuba, and forced to return to Europe. More than 250 people aboard the ship were eventually killed by the Nazis. About 200 protesters chanted on Sunday afternoon at Washington Dulles International Airport in northern Virginia near the US capital. About the same number gathered at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, where anxious families awaited relatives detained for hours after flights from countries affected by the presidential order. At Los Angeles International Airport, hundreds of people had gathered to protest Trump's order, as chants of "refugees are welcome here" echoed through the arrivals hall. Organisers estimated that more than 10,000 people packed Boston's Copley Square to hear Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, a vocal critic of Trump and a leader of the Democratic Party's liberal wing, and other speakers. During the protests, dozens of Muslims, some of them kneeling on protest signs, bowed in prayer on rugs laid out on a grassy patch of ground in the square. advertisement In Houston, which was already filling up with visitors for next Sunday's Super Bowl, about 500 people marched through the downtown. Jennifer Fagen, 47, a sociology professor at Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas, said she hoped she did not lose her job for protesting. "I'm Jewish, and it's supposed to be 'never again,'" Fagen said, referring to the Holocaust. "Jews should be the first ones to defend Muslims, considering what has happened to us, and it seems it's being repeated under Trump." At Detroit Metropolitan Airport, police cordoned off sections of terminal as up to 3,000 demonstrators chanted, "No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here." Among the demonstrators were Wail Aljirafi and his wife, Samyeh Zindani of Ann Arbor, Michigan, and their three children. "We want them to feel that they're always included," Zindani, a Yemeni-American, told Reuters. In the Detroit suburb of Hamtramck, Michigan, home to a large number of Yemeni immigrant families and the nation's first Muslim-majority city council, at least 600 people rallied outside City Hall. Rama Alhoussaini, 23, a Syrian immigrant who lives in nearby Dearborn, said she and her family emigrated to Michigan in 1999 when she was 6 years old. advertisement "Now for us to see this kind of hatred and bigotry, it breaks my heart," she said. "It makes me feel like I am not wanted here." --- ENDS --- New York, January 30 Protests against Donald Trumps controversial travel ban on people travelling to the US from seven predominantly Muslim nations intensified today, with thousands of angry demonstrators gathering at many airports and streets amid mounting lawsuits and rumblings in the Republican Party over the Presidents executive order. Protesters in large numbers gathered outside the White House and raised slogans like This is what America looks like!, The people united, will never be divided and No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here, as they waved the American flag and held placards. The demonstrators were opposing Trumps order to block any visitors for 90 days from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Similar protests were held across the nation and at airports, where confusion continued to prevail over the order after a New York judges order temporarily halting removal of individuals detained in the country. People gathered at Battery Park in Lower Manhattan, within sight of the Statue of Liberty, Bostons Copley Square as well as popular spots across San Francisco demonstrating and extending their support and solidarity with refugees and those impacted by the ban. Hundreds of protesters had gathered at the Dulles International Airport, while at the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, scores of Muslims pulled out their prayer rugs and knelt, and at least 50 people were taken into police custody. In a joint statement, Arizona Senator John McCain and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham called Trumps travel ban a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. PTI Washington, January 29 In a significant blow to US President Donald Trump, a US judge has issued an emergency order staying deportations for people who have arrived in America with valid visas from seven Muslim-majority nations but were detained on entry due to the immigration ban. US District Judge Ann Donnelly in New York issued the emergency order after the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a petition on behalf of two Iraqi men detained at the Kennedy International Airport as thousands joined demonstrations at airports across America to protest over Trumps immigration ban on Muslims. (Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd) Judge Donnelly, appointed by Barack Obama, ordered that the government could not remove individuals with refugee applications approved by the US Citizenship and Immigration Services, holders of valid visas, and other individuals from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen legally authorised to enter the US. She ordered the government to provide lists of all those detained at US airports. The judge said sending those travellers back to their home countries following Trumps order exposes them to substantial and irreparable injury. PTI Ankara: Turkey on Monday opened the biggest trial yet over the failed July coup aimed at ousting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, trying 270 suspects including, in absentia, the alleged mastermind Fethullah Gulen. The suspects include ex high-ranking military officials like former Aegean Army Command Chief of Staff Major General Memduh Hakbilen. The "number one" suspect is US-based Islamic preacher Gulen who is charged with ordering the failed July 15 coup, an accusation he strongly denies. Turkey has repeatedly asked the United States to extradite Gulen, who has been living in exile there since 1999. AFP State Reps. Bill McCamley of Mesilla Park and Angelica Rubio of Las Cruces, sent a letter Friday inviting Pena Nieto to address the New Mexico House Chamber during the current legislative session. By AP: Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto has a new diplomatic invitation to visit the United States after cancelling a trip to Washington in response to President Donald Trump's plans to build a border wall this time from a trio of Democratic lawmakers in the heavily Hispanic state of New Mexico. Democratic state Rep. Javier Martinez of Albuquerque yesterday said that Trump's insistence on making Mexico pay for a border wall extension is a threat to centuries-old economic and cultural ties between Mexico and the state of New Mexico, including recent investments by taxpayers in the Santa advertisement Teresa-San Jeronimo border crossing that have spurred trade. Also Read: Mexican President Pena Nieto cancels meeting with Donald Trump ANOTHER INVITE? Martinez, with state Reps. Bill McCamley of Mesilla Park and Angelica Rubio of Las Cruces, sent a letter Friday inviting Pena Nieto to address the New Mexico House Chamber during the current legislative session. "If you look at the way Trump has spoken out against the Mexican president, the country of Mexico, his position to build this very expensive wall across the border and then his suggestions that it be paid for with a 20 percent tariff on imports those are all statements and actions that can only be detrimental to the state of New Mexico," said Martinez, an attorney and El Paso native who spent part of his childhood in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. WILL HE ACCEPT THE INVITATION? There's no word yet if Nieto will accept the invitation. The decision by Pena Nieto to scrap a planned Jan. 31 meeting with Trump in Washington has boosted the Mexican president's lagging popularity as he struggles to contain rising crime, a sluggish economy and a series of corruption scandals in his party. Republican New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez has avoided criticizing Trump on his executive action pushing a border wall along the US-Mexico border. A spokesman for Gov. Martinez said Friday that she "supports strengthening our border and giving the federal government a variety of tools" to protect residents, while declining to comment specifically on the border wall. The second-term governor of no relation to Javier Martinez said last year that building fences could impact the US economy and relationship with trading partners in Mexico and farther south. Martinez was a vocal critic of Trump during the presidential campaign for his derogatory comments about Mexican immigrants and women. Trump lost the popular vote in New Mexico to Democrat Hillary Clinton by about 8 percentage points. Also Read: Donald Trump says meeting with Mexican president would have been 'fruitless' --- ENDS --- Kejriwal's remarks came a day after Parrikar asked voters in Goa to accept money for attending rallies but vote only for the Bharatiya Janata Party. By Indo-Asian News Service: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday asked the Election Commission if it will "dare" act against Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and Congress leader Amarinder Singh for asking voters to accept money to attend rallies. Kejriwal's remarks came a day after Parrikar asked voters in Goa to accept money for attending rallies but vote only for the Bharatiya Janata Party. advertisement In Lambi constituency in Punjab, Captain Amarinder Singh, the Congress Chief Ministerial candidate, also reportedly told people that it was okay to accept money if offered by any party "but vote for the Congress". Also read: Election Commission orders FIR against Arvind Kejriwal for poll code violation, AAP says not aware "Will Election Commission dare take action against Parrikar... I urge PMO (Prime Minister's Office) to allow Election Commission to act against Parrikar," Kejriwal tweeted on Monday. Kejriwal had earlier alleged that the poll panel was acting on the directions of the PMO. "Will Election Commission register an FIR against Captain? Or should I say, would Election Commission be granted permission by the PMO to act in this case," the Aam Aadmi Party leader asked. Also read: Punjab polls: Modi targets Kejriwal at Faridkot, tells AAP to go back to Delhi The Election Commission on Sunday pulled up Kejriwal and told Goa officials to file an FIR against him for telling voters to take money from other political parties but vote for the AAP. Kejriwal's letter to EC. . --- ENDS --- There will be times when horrible things happen to our family and friends, or when we see someone we know in deep pain and grief. When this happens, most of us may not know what to do or what to say to make the other person feel better. Human nature makes us innately want to help when someone we care about is going through a difficult time. Although there are some who do not possess such empathy, the majority of us will feel this way, and we may even feel helpless when nothing we do seems to allay their pain. If you find yourself in such a situation, this article provides five simple pointers of what you can do. Do read and keep these methods in mind; bringing others relief from pain, whether physical, mental or emotional, is one of the core methods to develop true compassion and care in our being, Tsem Rinpoche How to Speak to Someone About an Unspeakable Loss Five Ways to Help When You Feel There is Nothing You Can Do Its not about saying the right things. Its about doing the right things. ~ Unknown Years ago, my family and I moved to a bucolic little town in New Zealand, where we were immediately swept up into a group of ex-pats and locals. We felt deeply connected to this community by the time I gave birth to a beautiful baby boy in the local hospital. When our son was three months old, a doctor heard a heart murmur. Twenty-four hours later, he died. In the days and weeks that followed, I wandered in my own fog of grief as I went about the necessary tasks of ordinary life: shopping for food, taking our other kids to school, doing the usual mounds of laundry. Meanwhile, my new friends kept their distance. I saw them take great care to avoid me: to cross the street, switch supermarket aisles, literally do an about-face when they saw me coming. Invitations stopped coming. The phone went silent. My grief was marked by a deeper isolation than Id ever known. Later, many of these people apologized. They told me they were terribly sad and distressed about what had happened, but hadnt known what to say. My loss was so enormous that words seemed inadequate, even pitiful. They said nothing, out of fear that they would say the wrong thing. This sort of experience repeats itself in many different forms: a friend gets dumped by the love of her life, a colleague is given notice at a job hes held for two decades, or a loved one receives the dreaded news that she has inoperable cancer. What can you say? While its not an easy question to answer, one thing is certain: Its worse to say nothing than to say the wrong thing. Here are five ways to respond helpfully to people who have suffered an enormous loss. 1. Manage Your Own Feelings First When we learn that disaster has befallen a loved one, we initially feel shock. Our heart rate increases, our thoughts either speed up or slow down, and we may experience nausea or dizziness. The anxiety we feel is real and personal. Our instinct, though, is to ignore it, find ways to numb it or minimize it. Thats a mistake. If we address our own anxiety first, well be in a much stronger position to respond well to the person most directly affected. Do the things you know how to do to manage stress. A walk in the woods, some meditation or yoga, or talking to a trusted friend can help. Make sure your own body and emotions are regulated before you turn to the person in grief. 2. Now Focus on the Other Person Remember that the isolation they feel is almost as painful as the shock and the sadness of the loss itself. If you avoid them because you dont know what to say, this avoidance serves only your needs. Our friends and other loved ones need our comfort, support, and involvement during times of sorrow. Although there isnt a right thing to say, there are some things to never say. They include the current favorite, Everything happens for a reason, or I know just how you feel. How do you know theres a reason, and what difference would it make to a grieving person, anyway? And you dont know how they feelonly they do. 3. Admit That You Dont Know What to Say Thats a good start. Try something simple that breaks the ice and starts a conversation, or at least sends a message to the other person that theyre not alone. Im so sorry youre going through this. I wish I could say the perfect thing, but I know theres nothing to fix it. I just wanted you to know I care and am here with you. 4. Listen If the person is willing to talk, listen. Its the single most vital thing you can do. Listen to their story without interrupting. Dont turn the conversation back to you with statements like, I know what youre going throughmy dog died last year. Dont tell them what they will, or should, feel. Simply acknowledge their pain and listen to what its like for them. We all have different styles of managing shock and distress. Some people are angry, while others seem numb. Still others turn to gallows humor. Your job is not to correct them but to give them space to be the way they need to be. 5. Rather than Saying, Let Me Know If I Can Do Anything, Offer to Do Something Practical and Specific Taking on an ordinary task is often most helpful. Offer to shop for groceries, run errands, drive the kids somewhere, or to cook a meal or two. Ask if you can call tomorrow, or if they want to be left alone for a few days. When Survey Monkeys CEO Dave Goldberg died suddenly, his wife, Sheryl Sandberg, wrote the following: When I am asked, How are you? I stop myself from shouting, My husband died a month ago, how do you think I am? When I hear How are you today? I realize the person knows that the best I can do right now is to get through each day. Today, as I recall the loss of my own infant son, I think about the one person who did truly comfort me. She arrived at my house with a bottle of fine brandy and said, This is everyones worst nightmare. I am so, so sorry this has happened. Then we sat on the lawn and she poured me a drink as she listened to every horrible detail. As I look back now, I still feel how much her gesture helped me cope through those early days of pain. She didnt try to fix me or try to make sense of what happened. She didnt even try to comfort me. The comfort she gave came through her being in it with me. You cant fix what happened, but you can sit with someone, side by side, so they dont feel quite so alone. That requires only intention, a willingness to feel awkward, and an open, listening heart. Its the one gift that can make a difference. For more interesting information: Copyright Disclaimer: Under Section 13 of the Malaysian Copyright Act 1987, allowance is made for fair dealing for purposes such as non-profit research, private study, criticism, review or the reporting of current events. The Operator and author(s) of TsemRinpoche.com, a not-for-profit blog, do not claim ownership on the intellectual property rights of the contents, images and/or videos reproduced in this article. Any subsisting intellectual property rights shall belong to the legal owner of the contents, images and/or videos. Something there is that doesnt love a wall, wrote poet Robert Frost in the opening line of Mending Walls. And on the American left there is something like revulsion at the idea of the beautiful wall President Trump intends to build along the 1,900-mile border between the U.S. and Mexico. The oppositions arguments are usually rooted in economics or practicality. The wall is unnecessary. It will not stop people from coming illegally. It costs too much. Yet something deeper is afoot here. The idea of a permanent barrier between our countries goes to the heart of the divide between our two Americas on the most fundamental of questions. Who are we? What is a nation? What does America stand for? Those desperate to see the wall built, illegal immigration halted, and those here illegally deported, see the country they grew up in as dying, disappearing, with something strange and foreign taking its place. It is not only that illegal migrants take jobs from Americans, that they commit crimes, or that so many require subsidized food, welfare, housing, education and health care. It is that they are changing our country. They are changing who we are. Two decades ago, the Old Right and the neocons engaged in a ferocious debate over what America was and is. Were we from the beginning a new, unique, separate and identifiable people like the British, French and Germans? Or was America a new kind of nation, an ideological nation, an invented nation, united by an acceptance of the ideas and ideals of Jefferson, Madison, Lincoln and Dr. King? The Old Right contended that America existed even before the Revolution, and that this new nation, this new people, wrote its own birth certificate, the Constitution. Before Washington, Madison and Hamilton ever went to Philadelphia, America existed. What forced the premature birth of the nation was the Revolution. We did not become a new nation because we embraced Jeffersons notion about all men being created equal. We became a new people from our familial break with the Mother Country, described in the declaration as a severing of ties with our brethren across the sea who no longer deserved our loyalty or love. The United States came into being in 1789. The Constitution created the government, the state. But the country already existed. When the Irish came in the mid-19th century to escape the famine and the Germans to escape Bismarcks Prussia, and the Italians, Jews, Poles, Greeks, Slovaks came to Ellis Island, they were foreigners who became citizens, and then, after a time, Americans. Not until decades after the Great Migration of 1890-1920, with the common trials of the Depression, World War II and Cold War, were we truly forged again into one united nation and people. By 1960, almost all of us shared the same heroes and holidays, spoke the same language and cherished the same culture. What those with memories of that America see happening today is the disintegration of our nation of yesterday. The savagery of our politics, exemplified in the last election, testifies to how Americans are coming to detest one another as much as the Valley Forge generation came to detest the British from whom they broke free. In 1960, we were a Western Christian country. Ninety percent of our people traced their roots to Europe. Ninety percent bore some connection to the Christian faith. To the tens of millions for whom Trump appeals, what the wall represents is our last chance to preserve that nation and people. To many on the cosmopolitan left, ethnic or national identity is not only not worth fighting for, it is not even worth preserving. It is a form of atavistic tribalism or racism. The Trump wall then touches on the great struggle of our age. Given that 80 percent of all people of color vote Democratic, neither the Trump movement nor the Republican Party can survive the Third Worldization of the United States now written in the cards. Moreover, with the disintegration of the nation we are seeing, and with talk of the breakup of states like Texas and secession of states like California, how do we survive as one nation and people? Old Europe never knew mass immigration until the 20th century. Now, across Europe, center-left and center-right parties are facing massive defections because they are perceived as incapable of coping with the existential threat of the age the overrunning of the continent from Africa and the Middle East. President Trumps wall is a statement to the world: This is our country. We decide who comes here. And we will defend our borders. The crisis of our time is not that some Americans are saying this, but that so many are too paralyzed to say it, or do not care, or embrace what is happening to their country. Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of the new book The Greatest Comeback: How Richard Nixon Rose From Defeat to Create the New Majority. To find out more about Patrick Buchanan and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators website at www.creators.com. COPYRIGHT 2017 CREATORS.COM The world's largest long-haul carrier, which flies daily to 11 US cities, has made "the necessary adjustments to our crewing, to comply with the latest requirements," an Emirates spokeswoman told Reuters by email on Sunday. By Reuters: Emirates airline has changed pilot and flight attendant rosters on flights to the United States following the sudden US travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries, highlighting the challenges facing airlines trying to deal with the new rules. The world's largest long-haul carrier, which flies daily to 11 US cities, has made "the necessary adjustments to our crewing, to comply with the latest requirements," an Emirates spokeswoman told Reuters by email on Sunday. She added US flights continue to operate to schedule. advertisement President Donald Trump on Friday suspended the entry of people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The decision caught airlines off guard, according to the International Air Transport Association. "I cannot think of anything comparable. This brings a mix of administrative confusion, impact and uncertainty for many travellers as well as practical operational headaches and complexities for airlines in planning their flight programmes," independent aviation consultant John Strickland told Reuters. UNCERTAINTY FOR AIRLINES The ban applies to pilots and flight attendants from the seven countries, even though all flight crew who are not US citizens already need a special visa to enter the country. Nicoley Baublies, from the German cabin crew union UFO, said the move was very unusual and meant uncertainty for airlines in terms of planning. "Lufthansa has always ensured it has very diverse crews, with staff of different nationalities and that means that we are for the first time in decades having to look at where people come from," he told Reuters at Frankfurt airport. A spokesman for Lufthansa said on Sunday it was too early to comment on the effects of the order but that airlines and passengers were required to follow the new rules. Another Emirates spokeswoman said the impact of the ban on operations would be minimal. The airline employs over 23,000 flight attendants and about 4,000 pilots from around the world, including the United States, Europe and the Middle East. Meanwhile, a spokesman for Etihad Airways of Abu Dhabi said the airline had "taken steps to ensure there will be no issues for flights departing over the coming weeks." SCREENING PASSENGERS Japan Airlines (JAL) on Monday said it had begun screening passengers from the countries affected Trump's travel ban before their departure for the United States. JAL officials would contact the US Customs and Border Protection agency to confirm whether passenger would be allowed entry, a spokesman for Japan's second-biggest carrier said. It is unclear if the ban applies to dual nationals - those who hold one passport from a country on the list and another from a non-US country that is not. advertisement Etihad said on its website that dual citizens could travel to the US using their non-banned passport. IATA have told its members that the ban does not apply to dual nationals if they have a passport not on the list, according to an email seen by Reuters. However, the Guardian reported on Saturday, quoting State Department officials, that dual nationals were banned. US officials said on Sunday holders of green cards need to check with a US consulate and will be cleared on a case by case basis.EFFECT ON TRAVEL DEMAND? On Sunday, IATA sent another email to member airlines, seen by Reuters, asking for examples of Green Card holders being denied boarding. It also said it was seeking more information from authorities in Washington. Baublies said the uncertainty over the rules was not helping. "Trump reacts in 140 characters, we don't know what it means - for people with the wrong entries in their passports or with dual nationality or married to someone from one of the countries affected, are they allowed to travel?" There are also concerns the restrictions could dampen travel demand. advertisement "Ultimately this could feed through to the role airlines play in the global economy in supporting business and tourism due to as yet unquantifiable impacts on demand and cost," Strickland said. Baublies said airlines were usually among the first affected by global crises. "We hope it doesn't mean that seats are left empty because people don't know where they can travel with which passport." COMPLYING WITH NEW RULES Dubai-based Emirates and Etihad Airways are both owned by the governments of the United Arab Emirates, a US ally and Muslim-majority country. Both carriers said they would continue to comply with the new rules on US immigration but where possible would offer to refund or re-book affected passengers. Emirates and Etihad have also said that passengers were affected by the ban over the weekend but their flight crews had not been impacted. Qatar Airways declined to comment on the impact of the ban on flight operations, although on Saturday it issued a statement on its website that passengers would need a green card or diplomatic visa to enter the U.S. Emirates and Etihad issued similar statements. --- ENDS --- PAWNEE Officials from multiple tribes came together Monday at the Pawnee Nation complex as part of a multistate, intertribal organization to discuss the potential impact of Donald Trumps presidency on Indian Country. Speaking before the United Indian Nations of Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas, National Indian Gaming Commission Chairman Ernie Stevens Jr. encouraged tribal leaders to focus on maintaining momentum, while acknowledging that the new president does not have an encouraging history with respect to tribal gaming. Yes, there are going to be some challenges over the next four years, Stevens said. We are trying not to look too long at his past, but to look forward instead. We have made it clear that we are concerned about his previous comments, but we are trying not to dwell on it for too long. Whether we like it or not, he is our president. Prior to taking office, Trump made unsubstantiated claims connecting Indian gaming to organized crime, including telling a House of Representatives subcommittee in 1993 that an expansion of tribal casinos would create the biggest crime scenario since Al Capone. With 31 of Oklahomas 38 federally recognized tribes operating at least one casino, tribal gambling exclusivity fees have contributed more than $1.1 billion to state coffers since 2006. It is on us to provide an education to the new president and new members of Congress, Stevens said. If we dont hear what we want to hear, then we will try again. If we dont get what we need, we will try again. That same attitude extended to discussions about health care and the future of the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare. Among the ACAs provisions is the permanent reauthorization of the Indian Health Care Improvement Act, which authorizes new programs and services under Indian Health Services. IHS officials declined an invitation to come discuss what the potential repeal and replacement of the ACA could mean for tribal health care, leaving those attending the conference to speculate on the future and hope for the best. You can dismantle what youre going to dismantle, but the federal government has a treaty obligation to provide for our health care, Pawnee Nation President Bruce Pratt said. They have an obligation to protect us. One of the most hotly debated education issues school choice is again on the agenda of the state Legislature. Three nearly identical bills filed Jan. 19 by Sen. Kyle Loveless, R-Oklahoma City, seek to create an education savings account system. Loveless is calling each bill the Oklahoma Parental Empowerment Act of 2017. Unlike traditional vouchers, which can be applied only to tuition, an education savings account allows families to choose from a list of qualifying expenses beyond tuition to include textbooks, tutoring, online courses and extracurricular activities. A fourth bill by Loveless would expand a program providing tax credits for donations to pay for private-school scholarships. Critics of education savings accounts and other forms of school choice say such programs threaten to dismantle public education by siphoning money from district schools and charter schools as well and channeling it to private schools, often religious ones and sometimes schools run by for-profit companies. Sen. Rob Standridge, R-Norman, proposed a plan very similar to Loveless with a key difference: It would go into effect only if the Legislature passes a raise for teachers. A Democratic leader, Sen. John Sparks, D-Norman, also introduced a bill that would create education savings accounts, but the money would not flow to private schools. Loveless could not be reached for comment for this article. In an op-ed article for The Oklahoman earlier this month, he wrote, Many are concerned that allowing families to make these decisions for themselves will cause chaos to the status quo. I dont see whats wrong with that. The current system isnt cutting it. We have too many school districts, too many superintendents, too much bureaucracy and not enough freedom. Gov. Mary Fallin supports education savings accounts, and in 2016 urged the Legislature to pass an education savings account bill for her to sign. The bill was not approved. The introduction of school-choice bills was anticipated this legislative session, but now comes after the election of Republican Donald Trump as president. His nominee for education secretary, Betsy DeVos, is a major backer of school-choice measures and could push policies and funding that help fuel some states expansion of those programs. Varying proposals Loveless proposals vary in terms of who would be eligible for the education savings accounts. Under Senate Bill 395, any student eligible for pre-K and students from kindergarten through 12th grade who were enrolled in public school for the first 100 days of the prior school year could apply. SB 396 maintains the prior public school enrollment qualification but adds that students resident school district must be in a county with a population of at least 50,000 and the parents income must be less than $250,000. SB 399 limits eligibility to students whose school district has adopted a four-day week schedule. The amount of funds deposited into each account would be 90 percent of the students state aid amount, although the state treasurer could retain 3 percent for administering the program. The 90 percent figure differs from the proposal Loveless outlined in his op-ed article. I am proposing legislation that allows qualified families to move their child from a public school and take up to 75 percent of the students funding with them, he wrote. This funding could then be used to help offset the cost of a private school, tutors, home-school supplies or other specified expenses all while allowing the local district to retain 25 percent of the funds for a student they no longer provide services to. Under all three of Loveless proposals: The number of participating students would be capped at 1 percent of all public school students each year. Applicants would be chosen first-come, first-serve. Eligible expenses would include online curriculum, private school tuition, educational services from a public school district (including a charter school) outside the students district, extracurricular activities, textbooks, tutoring, testing for college entrance exams, college tuition and fees for concurrent enrollment, technology center school fees and tuition for concurrent enrollment and advanced placement test fees. States allow more taxes to go to private schools Standridges proposal, SB 560, has similar components but contains a twist: Children of current legislators would be ineligible. Standridge said he added the provision because he has school-aged children and he didnt want the bill to appear self-serving. The provision, as well as one that caps participation at 1 percent of total students, would sunset after 10 years. The proposal would vary students fund amounts based on their annual household income, with low-income students receiving 90 percent of their state aid amount, a middle category receiving 60 percent and a high-income category receiving 30 percent. States are increasingly allowing tax dollars to flow to private schools through a variety of school-choice programs, but most are limited to students with disabilities or those from low-income families. Of the five states that have education savings accounts (Arizona, Florida, Mississippi, Nevada and Tennessee), only Nevadas is universal, with 96 percent of students eligible. Oklahoma currently has two school-choice programs that involve private schools. The Lindsey Nicole Henry Scholarship program, which gives students with special needs vouchers to attend private school, and the Oklahoma Equal Opportunity Education Scholarship, which offers state income-tax credits for contributions to scholarship-granting organizations that award the scholarships to private school students. SB 413, also authored by Loveless, would expand the latter program by raising the tax credits from 75 percent to 100 percent in 2018 for taxpayers who commit to give the same amount the subsequent year. The other education savings account bill, SB 461, offered by Sparks, would make district and charter school students eligible for accounts worth up to $2,000 a year. The funds could be spent on online curriculum, educational services from a public school, extracurricular activities, textbooks, uniforms, tutoring, technology, supplies, college entrance exams and concurrent enrollment. Robert W. Portiss, director of the Tulsa Port of Catoosa for 33 years, is ending a career that he says has matched his wish list from the start. He will retire Tuesday after guiding the port for 33 years. After a stint in the Navy, Portiss thought the key to being an industrial salesman was a degree in mechanical engineering, but he discovered it was not his cup of tea. He switched to economics with an emphasis in graduate school on transportation economics and commodity flows not knowing the role all those elements would play in his future. Portiss came to the 2-year-old port in 1973, which ended up being a significant year due to two events. The first time he attended a meeting of the City of Tulsa-Rogers County Port Authority was noteworthy, Portiss recalled, because the board was split on building a grain elevator. No member was opposed the concept, but some feared it would take the last of the $20 million in bond money approved by Tulsa city voters for building the port and there would be none left for further development. Depending on grain shipment was felt to be iffy. On the other side was port director Harley Ladd and board member Early Cass. They had traveled around Oklahoma and Kansas wheat country to get a feel for moving grain through the port from people in the business. It was all positive. Portiss said he understood Cass was such an advocate that he told other members in private that if necessary he would personally pay the $1.5 million cost of the elevator. Second was the ports first industrial facility. Portiss had a role in the negotiations with Universal Oil Products for a plant to manufacture catalysts for automobiles. The facility remains today operated by a unit of Umicore, a Belgian-based company. The UOP names remains at the port as UOP Russell, a unit of Honeywell UOP, which engineers, designs and fabricates gas processing plants. Portiss recalled that when he joined the port, Ladd said the UOP project would be a perfect project for you to cut your teeth on with the future port director making a presentation to the company. While a little overwhelming, Portiss said it was also an incredible experience. In later years as port director, he put a lot of work along with others, he noted in the successful program getting the Army Corps of Engineers to build the Montgomery Point Lock & Dam at the junction of the Arkansas Waterway with the Mississippi River. Without it, the 450-mile route would be out of business. Now 73, Portiss has recently been a strong voice nationally and regionally for allowing public and private entities to aid the federal government in speeding emergency repairs to the waterway to fix problems that are impeding navigation, urging federal funding to handle the backlog of critical maintenance on the waterway and deepening the route from nine feet to 12 feet, making water transportation more economical. He will be succeeded by deputy director David Yarbrough. After grad school: On completing his masters degree in his native North Dakota, Portiss found employment with the Eastern Oklahoma Economic Development District in Wilburton in 1970. From there he went to the port as manager of traffic and sales, leaving a little more than a year later for land development posts in Arizona and Louisiana. Portiss returned to the port in November 1977 and was promoted to director of marketing and transportation two years later. He then became deputy port director to Jacques Cunningham, whom he succeeded on July 1, 1984. In addition to running the port he was active often as an officer in a number of local, state regional and national organizations concerned with waterway or economic development. He was known for never being at a loss for words until he was honored at a number of gatherings in his honor prior to his retirement. When Portiss first arrived at the port there was no industry and just a couple of buildings. As he retires, there are 72 companies and nearly 3,200 employees with an annual economic impact of $300 million. Its 2,000-acre industrial park has gone from barren land to substantially filled. All seven UEFA Futsal EURO 2018 preliminary round groups have been decided, with Georgia, Moldova, Latvia, Albania, Denmark, France and Montenegro through to join the top seeds in April's main round. Denmark were the last country to qualify. Having defeated debutants Kosovo 2-1 earlier on Thursday, the Nordic side were confirmed as Group E winners ahead of their opponents on direct head-to-head by Cyprus's failure to overcome Norway. They progress to main round Group 6 in Kazakhstan. Among the earlier successes were Albania making it through a round for the first time and Moldova earning a berth in a main round group hosted by holders Spain. Latvia topped Group C but were held 3-3 by Kosovo's fellow newcomers Germany, who scored three late goals to draw before beating Estonia 5-4 in their last game. 2016 final: Spain v Russia Preliminary round summary Group A: Georgia Group B: Moldova Group C: Latvia Group D: Albania Group E: Denmark Group F: France Group G: Montenegro Main round groups: 312 April Group 1: Italy, Netherlands, Belarus, Georgia (hosts)* Group 2: Azerbaijan (hosts), Hungary, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania Group 3: Ukraine (hosts), Croatia, Belgium, Montenegro Group 4: Portugal, Romania (hosts), Finland, Latvia Group 5: Spain (holders), Serbia, Poland (hosts), Moldova Group 6: Kazakhstan (hosts), Czech Republic, FYR Macedonia, Denmark Group 7: Russia, Slovakia, Turkey (hosts), France *Switched from Belarus The seven main round group winners advance to join Slovenia in the final tournament. The seven runners-up plus the best third-placed side will enter the play-offs on 1013 & 2427 September 2017. The winners of the four two-legged ties will complete the 12-team line-up for the finals Finals: 30 January10 February 2018 at Arena Stozice, Ljubljana There were regrets aplenty among the UEFA Europa League contenders at the weekend as Roma and Fenerbahce lost ground in their domestic title hunts and Anderlecht spurned the chance to go top in Belgium. Roma's pursuit of Juventus took a hit as the Giallorossi suffered a surprise 3-2 loss at Sampdoria after taking an early lead through Bruno Peres. The result left the capital side four points adrift of Juve having played one game more, while there were goals too as fellow last-32 hopefuls Fiorentina drew 3-3 at home with Genoa. Bastian Schweinsteiger scored for United Getty Images As for Fenerbahce, they slipped to their first defeat in ten games in all competitions in a 4-1 reverse at Kayserispor. Their heaviest Super Lig loss since they went down 3-0 at Besiktas in November 2009, that left Fener seven points shy of leaders Istanbul Basaksehir in fourth. Anderlecht are a point off the Belgian summit, meanwhile, having been unable to build on a 2-0 victory for UEFA Europa League compatriots Gent at home to pacesetters Club Brugge. Instead, they could only draw 0-0 with nine-man Standard Liege. There was better news for the English contingent, as both Manchester United and Tottenham progressed through to the FA Cup fifth round. MONDAY Besiktas 5-1 Konyaspor SUNDAY Genclerbirligi 1-1 Osmanlspor Gent 2-0 Club Brugge Vitesse 2-1 AZ Ajax 3-0 Den Haag Ethnikos Achnas 2-3 APOEL Fiorentina 3-3 Genoa Sampdoria 3-2 Roma Panetolikos 0-1 PAOK Manchester United 4-0 Wigan (FA Cup last 32) Kayserispor 4-1 Fenerbahce Toulouse 0-3 St-Etienne Anderlecht 0-0 Standard Veria 1-2 Olympiacos Athletic 2-1 Sporting Gijon SATURDAY Villarreal 2-0 Granada Tottenham 4-3 Wycombe (FA Cup last 32) Lyon 1-2 LOSC Lille Hapoel Beer-Sheva 2-0 Ironi Kiryat Shmona Leverkusen 2-3 Monchengladbach Mechelen 1-0 Genk Leganes 0-2 Celta FRIDAY Schalke 0-1 Frankfurt NO GAME Astra Giurgiu: the Romanian Liga 1 is on winter break until the weekend of 4 February Kbenhavn: the Danish Super League is on winter break until the weekend of 18 February Krasnodar, Rostov, Zenit: the Russian Premier-Liga is on winter break until the weekend of 4 March Legia Warszawa: the Polish Ekstraklasa is on winter break until the weekend of 11 February Ludogorets Razgrad: the Bulgarian A League is on winter break until the weekend of 11 February Shakhtar Donetsk: the Ukrainian Premier League is on winter break until the weekend of 25 February Sparta Praha: the Czech First League is on winter break until the weekend of 18 February Farah Khan recently said that people who deride Bollywood films should be made to watch boring films, such as those from French and Polish cinema. Perhaps, she should not make boring films herself. By Devarsi Ghosh: Farah Khan does not like boring films. She likes entertaining films. That is a very natural preference to have. Any sane person would not like to be bored. She said that people deriding Bollywood films by calling them 'Bollywood masala film' for having item songs or suchlike should be made to watch boring cinema as a punishment. ALSO READ: Hindi cinema is 80 per cent Mastram, 20 per cent literature, says Anurag Kashyap advertisement "These people should be made to watch French or Polish cinema. Their punishment should be that they should be made to watch boring films for their whole life," Farah said. Why she picked particularly, French and Polish cinema is a mystery. Maybe, that's her way to slot European cinema in a box as something arcane, esoteric or inaccessible because she doesn't like them. There has always been an overtone of anti-intellectualism in her interviews if you have seen them. She has no patience for anything that demands some kind of engagement of the intellect i.e the mind. She comes across as a person who doesn't think much before she says something and that is, well, at times hilarious and fun to watch, at least, for as long as she is making something worthwhile. WATCH: Farah Khan talk about her life and filmmaking Here's the thing. Farah Khan has not made one decent or half-decent film in TEN YEARS! As much as any self-respecting Indian fan of cinema loves his or her Manmohan Desai, Prakash Mehra and Yash Chopra, he or she also does not shy away from seeing what international cinema has to offer, or for that matter, what India's finest filmmakers, from Guru Dutt to Satyajit Ray have to offer. The idea that one can't enjoy chicken tikka and coq au vin together is silly. Both can taste good as long as they are made well. OPINION: Shah Rukh's Raees is Khantastic but how do we make his films great again? In the name of making mass-entertainers, Farah Khan delivered the humour-less, brain-dead, script-less, gaudy, crass, third-rate turd-balls called Tees Maar Khan and Happy New Year. The latter was budgeted at Rs 150 crore by the way. Anyone who has seen the film, with above-average IQ, will accept that Happy New Year was a colossal waste of money, a complete headache to sit through. WATCH India Waale from Happy New Year Nobody dislikes item songs (unless they are looking at it from a gender studies-perspective, which is another story altogether). Both men and women love to watch good-looking men and women on screen, dancing to some catchy music. This part, called an item song is surrounded by two hours worth of something called a goddamn 'film'. If Farah Khan is not getting that right and spending like a bomb on nonsense like making Dubai look good, then that is just sad. advertisement Song-and-dance entertainers can be films that have all the elements necessary to make them wholesome and at the same time, they can be intelligent, and intelligence here does not mean Shah Rukh Khan staring into blank space for ten minutes before vaping into the abyss. ALSO READ: Who is the rudest Bollywood actor? These real-life incidents will make you decide Let's go into Farah Khan's oeuvre as a choreographer. Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar, Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa, 1942: A Love Story, the underrated Oh Darling! Yeh Hai India, DDLJ, Border, Virasat, Dil Se, Sarfarosh, Pukar, Fiza... an endless list of quality, memorable, significant Indian films. All with song and dance and the trappings of commercial cinema. Are they boring? No. Are they dumb? Not at all. WATCH Satrangi Re from Dil Se..., choreographed by Farah Khan advertisement Even her first two films which she directed - Main Hoon Na and Om Shanti Om - had a great sense of humour and the writing felt like Farah put effort into it. There's a small moment in Om Shanti Om where the Bengali filmmaker played by Satish Shah explains to his producer that he is shooting his film from three angles; a Bimal Roy angle, a Guru Dutt angle and a Ritwik Ghatak angle. The producer asks him to use a 'Manmohan Desai angle' because "woh kaam ayega (it will work)." A moment like this has some thought, some love put into it and any audience member who will get what Farah is trying to say is bound to chuckle. But Farah's defense of plain bad filmmaking is just a combination of denial, myopia, ignorance and pride, all rolled into one. It's about time Farah Khan stopped making boring films herself. (The writer tweets as @devarsighosh.) WATCH: Raees or Kaabil, which film should you choose? --- ENDS --- Hi, my name is Scott C. Waring and I wrote a few books and am currently a ESL School Owner in Taiwan. I have had my own UFO sighting up close and personal, but that's how it works right? A non believer becomes a believer when they experience their first sighting. You witnessed it, your perceptual field changes, so now you need to share it. I created this site to help the UFO community get a little bit organized. I noticed that there was a lot of chaos when searching for UFO sighting reports, so I hope this site helps. I wanted to support those eyewitnesses who have tried to tell others about what they have seen, yet were laughed at by even closest of friends. More and more each day the governments of the world leak bits and pieces of UFO information to the public. They have a trickle down theory in hopes of slowly getting citizens use to the idea that we are not alone in universe and never have been. The truth is being leaked drop by drop until one day we look around and find ourselves neck high in it. The discovery of alien species in existence is the most monumental scientific event in human history, suppression of that information is a crime against humanity. About me: I live in Taiwan. I OWN MY OWN ENGLISH SCHOOL, AND ONCE HAD 5 SCHOOLS. Am Former USAF at SAC base (flight line). Age: 42 Educ: BA in Elem ed. Masters in Counseling ed. I had two UFO sightings, (30+bus size orbs) in military and in 2012 personally saw the UFO over Taipei 101 building on New Years Day (and recored it). Many Thanks to our Advertisers When choosing between competing products and services, please consider our advertisers, who help support Brand New. Editors note: More information has become available since this statement was released on January 23. While many details of the Global Gag Rule policy are still unclear, it now appears to expand to other aspects of global health assistance in addition to family planning and reproductive health, potentially impacting U.S. funding for maternal and child health, nutrition, HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, infectious diseases, and neglected tropical diseases. The UN Foundation is deeply concerned about the Global Gag Rule, which may have devastating implications for millions of women and families. United Nations Foundation President and CEO Kathy Calvin today issued the following statement on the imposition of the Mexico City Policy, also known as the Global Gag Rule, last enacted in 2001. The policy, enacted again today through Executive action, prohibits foreign non-governmental organizations from receiving any U.S. foreign assistance for family planning if they provide information, referrals, or services for legal abortion or lobby for abortion. U.S. law already prohibits the use of U.S. foreign assistance to pay for abortion information and services as a method of family planning. Therefore, organizations that provide abortion information or services do so with non-U.S. government funding. The enactment of the Global Gag Rule means organizations that provide abortion information or services or lobby for abortion cannot receive any U.S. foreign assistance, even for their non-abortion work, including providing voluntary family planning services and reproductive health care. Calvin said: The United Nations Foundation does not support the Global Gag Rule, which jeopardizes the health and well-being of the worlds most vulnerable girls and women. This action will do more than change policy; it will make it more difficult for millions of girls and women to access the contraception and health care they need to determine their futures. When the policy was last enacted, health care clinics in many countries were forced to close and outreach services for the hardest to reach populations were eliminated, leaving many of the worlds poorest people without access to critical services, such as maternal and child health care, HIV testing and counseling, and contraceptives, including condoms. Without these life-saving services, more women and infants died due to pregnancy-related complications. In some countries, the Global Gag Rule led to increases in abortions as women had more unintended pregnancies. The Global Gag Rule also runs counter to long-standing bipartisan support in Congress and in the American public for U.S. leadership in providing voluntary family planning services to women and couples around the world who want it. U.S. funding for voluntary family planning programs globally has allowed girls to stay in school, pursue jobs, and have children if and when they are ready. It has helped to improve maternal and child health, decrease unintended pregnancies, lower HIV infection rates, and reduce poverty. Still, more than 225 million women worldwide who want to delay or avoid pregnancy are not using modern contraception and need our support. Now is the time to build on progress, not reverse it. The United Nations Foundation stands ready to work with the new U.S. Administration to continue Americas leadership in improving health around the world. Access to reproductive health care, including contraception, is a human right and enables girls and women to plan their lives, climb out of poverty, and achieve a more sustainable future. ### About the United Nations Foundation The United Nations Foundation builds public-private partnerships to address the worlds most pressing problems, and broadens support for the United Nations through advocacy and public outreach. Through innovative campaigns and initiatives, the Foundation connects people, ideas, and resources to help the UN solve global problems. The Foundation was created in 1998 as a U.S. public charity by entrepreneur and philanthropist Ted Turner and now is supported by philanthropic, corporate, government, and individual donors. Learn more at: www.unfoundation.org. GENEVA UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi is deeply worried by the uncertainty facing thousands of refugees around the world who are in the process of being resettled to the United States. This week alone, over 800 refugees were set to make America their new home, but instead find themselves barred from travelling to the U.S. UNHCR estimates that 20,000 refugees in precarious circumstances might have been resettled to the United States during the 120 days covered by the suspension announced Friday, based on average monthly figures for the last 15 years. Refugees are anxious, confused and heartbroken at this suspension in what is already a lengthy process. Refugees share the very same concerns about security and safety that Americans have. They themselves are fleeing war, persecution, oppression and terrorism. The individuals and families UNHCR refers to governments for resettlement are the most vulnerable such as people needing urgent medical assistance, survivors of torture, and women and girls at risk. The new homes provided by resettlement countries are life-saving for people who have no other options. The vast majority of the worlds refugees are hosted in developing countries, and less than 1 per cent will ever be resettled globally. Those accepted for resettlement by the United States, after a rigorous US security screening process, are coming to rebuild their lives in safety and dignity. UNHCR hopes that they will be able to do so as soon as possible. Resettlement has been a sign of tangible solidarity with the worlds most vulnerable refugees. It is also an important way governments and communities can help share responsibility with major refugee-hosting countries, which have been shouldering the brunt of the displacement crisis in recent years. For decades, the United States has been a global leader in refugee protection, a tradition rooted in the tolerance and generosity of the American people. UNHCR hopes the U.S. will continue its strong leadership role and its long history of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution. The High Commissioner underlines once again UNHCRs position that refugees should receive equal treatment for protection and assistance, and opportunities for resettlement, regardless of their religion, nationality or race. Media contacts: Earlier, a witness told Reuters that up to three gunmen fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center. Police put up a security perimeter around the mosque and declined to comment to reporters about the incident. An ambulance is parked at the scene of a fatal shooting at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre in Quebec City, Canada on January 29, 2017. Photo: Reuters By Reuters: Six people were killed after gunmen opened fire in a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers, the mosque's president told reporters on Sunday. Earlier, a witness told Reuters that up to three gunmen fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center. Police put up a security perimeter around the mosque and declined to comment to reporters about the incident. advertisement "Why is this happening here? This is barbaric," said the mosque's president, Mohamed Yangui. Two people were arrested after the shooting, and a Reuters eyewitness saw heavily armed tactical police entering the mosque. Police spokesman Etienne Doyon declined to say whether there was a gunman inside the mosque. In June 2016, a pig's head was left on the doorstep of the cultural center. Also Read: Canada's Trudeau welcomes all immigrants day after Trump signs anti-refugee order Yangui, who was not inside the mosque when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. He did not know how many were injured, saying they had been taken to different hospitals across Quebec City. Incidents of Islamophobia increased in Quebec in recent years amid a political debate over banning the niqab, or Muslim face covering. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of Quebec was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighboring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Watch Video: Five killed after gunmen opened fire in Quebec City mosque --- ENDS --- By Press Trust of India: San Francisco, Jan 30 (PTI) Tech giant Google has created a crisis fund that could raise up to USD 4 million for four immigrant rights organisations, including American Civil Liberties Union and UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Set up with an initial funding of USD 2 million, the campaign will see Google employees matching the amount in donations. advertisement The funds will go toward the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, the International Rescue Committee and the UNHRC. A Google spokesperson confirmed the development. The USD 2 million crisis campaign is the largest ever for the Mountain View-based company. Since 2015, Google has given over USD 16 million to organisations focused on humanitarian aid for refugees on the ground, WiFi in refugee camps, and education for out of school refugee children in Lebanon. The spokesperson said the four organisations were chosen for their efforts in providing legal assistance and support services for immigrants, as well as for their efforts on resettlement and general assistance for refugees globally. Last week, US President Donald Trump signed a sweeping executive order to suspend the arrival of refugees and impose tough new controls on travellers from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen, as part of new measures to "keep radical Islamic terrorists" out of America. Googles India-born CEO Sundar Pichai had criticised Trumps controversial order saying it will create "barriers" to bringing great talent to the US. The Internet search giant also ordered its travelling staff to return to America. Pichai, in an email to staff, said the US ban on foreign nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries will hit nearly 200 Google employees. "It is painful to see the personal cost of this executive order on our colleagues. Were upset about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US," Pichai had said. PTI SR BAL --- ENDS --- Saeed has reportedly been held at Jamia Masjid at Chowburji, the headquarters of the outfit, in Lahore. A heavy contingent of police has surrounded the place. By Santosh Chaubey: Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed, the mastermind of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack, was on Monday night placed under house arrest in Lahore, his outfit said. Earlier, Punjab government's Home Department had issued detention order of Saeed and Lahore Police have reached the JuD headquarters in Chauburji to implement the order, it said. He "is at Masjid-e-Qadsia Chauburji and a heavy contingent of police has surrounded the JuD markaz (headquarters)," JuD official Ahmed Nadeem, who is present at the premises of the outfit, told PTI by phone. advertisement Saeed has reportedly been held at Jamia Masjid in Chauburji in Lahore. PUNJAB HOME DEPARTMENT ISSUED HOUSE ARREST ORDER "The commanding police officer told us that he has with him the house arrest order of the JuD chief issued by the Punjab Home Department," Nadeem said. Punjab government's action comes amid pressure from the Donald Trump administration to act against terror. The Trump administration has put a ban on immigrants from seven Muslim majority nations that are 'most identifiable with dangerous terrorism taking place in their country' - Syria, Somalia, Yemen, Iran, Iraq, Libya and Sudan. Reince Priebus, the White House Chief of Staff, has said that countries like Pakistan that are 'having problems similar to those seven nations', can be added to the list in future. According to sources, government officials say that Pakistan government has been under pressure from the Trump administration to ban the militant outfit or face visa ban. This has prompted the Pakistan government to put him under house arrest. The United States has clearly told Islamabad that in case of not taking action against JuD and Saeed, it may face sanctions. Pakistan's Federal Minister for Interior Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said that the JuD was declared a terrorist outfit by the US last year and was under observation in Pakistan since 2010. Also read | After Hafiz Saeed's comments, US warns Pakistan: Go after Mumbai attackers, shut terror shops JuD is the front for the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror outfit, which is responsible for numerous terror attacks in India, including the Mumbai terror strike of November 26, 2008, which was masterminded by Saeed. He has been detained six times since the Mumbai carnage. In December 2008, UN Security Council, under its Resolution 1267, imposed sanctions on JuD and Hafiz Saeed for supporting the Al Qaeda and the Taliban. India had named Hafiz Saeed, LeT and JuD as the perpetrators of the Mumbai attack. advertisement JuD has already been declared a foreign terrorist organisation by the United States in June 2014. Earlier, reports of the ban on JuD were wrong, the group continues to be only on Pakistan interior ministry's "watch list". Order issued by Pakistani authorities is for "preventive detention" of Hafiz Saeed and 4 others, JuD still not banned. Also read | Pakistan daily asks how action against Hafiz Saeed, Masood Azhar is danger to national security As Twitter doesn't allow designated terrorists like Hafiz Saeed on its platform and blocks their Twitter accounts, they keep on changing their Twitter handles. @HMSaeedOfficial is one of the Twitter handles being used by Hafiz Saeed. Saeed tweeted on Monday from this account, "We knew this would happen when we declared 2017 the year of #Kashmir. If I am arrested, millions will continue to raise voice for #Kashmir." This might well be a strategy to garner support and pressurise the Pakistan government from taking any strong measure against the terror mastermind or could be, again, an elaborate sham in collusion with the Pakistan's ruling establishment and the ISI to show to the world that Pakistan, at last, was going to crackdown on terror. advertisement (WITH INPUTS FROM PTI) WATCH VIDEO --- ENDS --- Members of the transition team and leaders in the tech industry held a meeting last month at the Trump Tower. The discussion centered on revamping the procedure in awarding H-1B visa. H-1B visa grants permission to an immigrant to work in the United States. One requirement is that he should possess specialized skills and knowledge. Every year, 65,000 immigrants are granted the H-1B visa. The number of applicants is so high that selection was done by lottery. However, this defeats the purpose of the H-1B visa. Some applicants might not belong to the group of highly educated and highly skilled professionals. This means that some people who are qualified may not be able to get the H-1B visa simply because their name was not drawn. This will be disadvantageous to engineers, physicians, and other specialists, according to Reuters. A different way of selecting immigrants to be granted H-1B visa is needed. If skills and knowledge would be the basis, there will be a big chance for immigrant doctors to be kept in the US. Immigrant doctors comprise a big number of health care professionals in the United States. In fact, there is a forecast that by 2044, the population of the US will be of different races and colors. The US population will be composed of old men and women by that time. They would need health care. The number of American doctors may not be enough to provide all these needs, according to STAT. It can be recalled that just recently, international students in the US had been worried about their future. However, those taking STEM courses can apply for optional practical training so their visa will be extended. In the case of immigrant professionals, engineers and physicians may have a better chance of having their H-1B visas extended. In response to Republican President Donald Trump's decision on immigration, universities and colleges everywhere are opening sanctuary campuses as well as issuing guidance on travel for students who are affected. Protection from the immigration ban starts internally. Princeton University,Tulane and Stanford have voiced out their concerns about their students' welfare. Princeton and Stanford stresses to their students not to travel outside the country. Tulane insists that their students carry their identification cards and ACLU civil rights brochures, as reported by Buzz Feed. Princeton,Tulane and Stanford are not the only ones caring for their students' welfare. Many colleges and universities have sworn to support their undocumented students and has even instructed their university police to not ask questions regarding immigration statuses. Some have pledged to provide sanctuary against federal immigration authorities. While there are still no official reports detailing immigrant or undocumented international students being affected, some universities are ready to provide legal counsel as well. According to the New York Times, lawyers have already started to proceed to the country's international airports after hundreds if not thousands of immigrants have been detained because of President Donald Trump's executive order. These lawyers have volunteered to go to these immigrants' aid. According to lawyers from the International Refugee Assistance Project, some people who are traveling would land and would have their status affected while in midair. A petition has already been reportedly filed on Saturday in some federal courts to block a part of Trump's order. Andre Segura, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, says that attorneys from various law firms and non profits are working together to protect the people. There are reportedly university and college students who have been detained after arriving in the United States from their travels or studies abroad. There is no reported number yet as to how many and which schools were affected. Watch the Fox News Clip below when an undocumented Yale student speaks out because of the issue: Cornell University has received a $150 million from SC Johnson. The gift will be used for the school's College of Business. In its official website, H. Fisk Johnson, chairman and CEO of SC Johnson, and his company have committed to giving Cornell University $150 million for its College of Business. This is the largest single gift to the university's Ithaca campus and the second largest gift to a U.S. business school. Cornell University's College of Business is comprised of the Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management, the School of Hotel Administration as well as the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management. The school's Board of Trustees has decided to rename the college to the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business. Mr. Johnson said that Cornell University has been a part of his family for over 120 years. He hopes that the gift will help with the growth of the college's reach and impact by strengthening it through enhancing its three individual schools. Interim President Hunter R. Rawlings III believes that the gift will transform business education at Cornell University. It will be used to provide ongoing support for faculty, students and programs of the college. According to The Journal Times, Mr. Johnson said that it is an honor that the college is renamed as a tribute to the Johnson family. However, he clarified that the gift is not about himself or his family but it's about the school's future as one of the top business schools in the country. Cornell Sun noted that $100 million will be used to create a permanent endowment to support the school's future endeavors. It will include faculty recruitment, research opportunities as well as the SC Johnson Scholars program, which will provide programs, internships and opportunities to undergraduates in Dyson and the School of Hotel Administration. $50 million will be set aside to increase philanthropic support for a challenge grant on a 1:3 matching ratio. The grant will be focused on faculty and student support. By Press Trust of India: Los Angeles, Jan 30 (PTI) Stars turned the 2017 Screen Actors Guild Awards into political stage with winners Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Bryan Cranston and Sarah Paulson speaking up against President Donald Trumps controversial immigration ban in their acceptance speeches. Louis-Dreyfus said when accepting the prize for "Veep", "I want you all to know that I am the daughter of an immigrant. My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France and Im an American patriot and I love this country. advertisement "Because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes. This immigrant ban is a blemish and it is un-American, so I say to you this: Our sister guild, the WGA Writers Guild of America made a statement today that I would like to read because I am in complete agreeance with it, Our guilds are unions of storytellers, who have always welcomed those from nations and from various beliefs who wish to share their creativity with America. "We are grateful for them. We stand with them. And we will fight for them. Thank you very much." Cranston, who won outstanding performance by a male actor in a television movie or limited series for his role as President Lyndon B Johnson in HBOs "All the Way", imagined what LBJ would react to Trump, "I honestly feel that 36 would put his arm around 45 and earnestly wish him success. "And he also would whisper in his ear something he said often as a form of encouragement and a cautionary tale: Just dont ... in the soup that all of us gotta eat." Paulson, meanwhile, encouraged people to donate to the American Civil Liberties Union, which challenges the immigration ban in court. "Any money you have to spare, please donate to the ACLU. "Its a vital organization that relies entirely on our support." Taylor Schilling also brought up the topic when she and her "Orange Is the New Black" co-stars took the stage to accept the award for ensemble in a comedy series. "And we know its going to be up to us and all of you probably too to keep telling stories that show what unites us is stronger than the forces that seek to divide us," she said. "Moonlight" star Mahershala Ali, who accepted best supporting role male prize, indirectly addressed the immigration ban. "And what I was so grateful about in having the opportunity to play Juan was playing a gentlemen who saw a young man folding into himself as a result of the persecution of his community, and taking the opportunity to uplift him and tell him that he mattered, that he was okay, and accept him. advertisement "I hope that we do a better job of that," he said. He went on sharing his story about embracing diversities saying his mother is an ordained minister, he is a Muslim and she didnt "do backflips when I called her to tell her I converted 17 years ago." "And Im able to see her, and shes able to see me. We love each other and the love has grown. And that stuff is minutiae. Its not that important." Actor Ashton Kutcher also addressed the controversial ban when opening the show. "Good evening, fellow SAG-AFTRA members, and everyone at home, and everyone in airports that belong in my America," he said. "You are a part of the fabric of who we are, and we love you, and we welcome you." PTI JCH JCH --- ENDS --- Marshall University has released a statement on Saturday addressing President Trump's executive order. On Friday, President Trump signed a ban on travel to and from seven Muslim-majority countries. According to the New York Times, Trump's executive order was part of an extreme vetting plan to keep "radical Islamic terrorists" outside the nation. He has also ordered that Christians and others from minority religions be prioritized over Muslims. Trump's executive order suspends the entry of refugees into the U.S. for 120 days. It also directs officials to conduct additional screening to make sure that refugees approved for admission do not threaten the security and welfare of the country. The order also bars admission of refugees from Syria for an indefinite amount of time. It also stops entry into the United States for 90 days from countries such as Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. WSAZ reported that Marshall University President Jerome A. Gilbert confirmed that they are reviewing how the executive order of President Donald Trump will affect its student community. They are also checking how many students they have from the banned countries. Gilbert also noted that they will do everything possible to assist and retain all of their international students. Marshall University has over 550 international students from 56 countries. Metro News added that West Virginia University and Marshall University are advising all international students to carry documentation verifying their legal status in the U.S. at all times. They are also advised to follow the rules and regulations with regard to their immigration status. WVU has more than 65 students from Iran, 27 students from Libya, 13 from Syria, 13 from Iraq, four from Yemen and one from Sudan. A federal court in Brooklyn granted an emergency stay on Saturday. In a report by Reuters, it was revealed that U.S. judges in at least five states have blocked federal authorities from implementing President Trump's executive order. However, some authorities were not willing to follow the judges' rulings. Universities in the United States have announced advisories to their students after President Trump's immigration order. Some institutions have advised its students against travelling internationally until the order's effects and consequences are more clearly understood. NBC News reported that President Trump's executive order suspends entry for 90 days from certain Muslim-majority nations based on statute related to the Visa Waiver Program. Individuals from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen will not be allowed entry from the nation. Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger released key provisions for the executive order named "Protecting the Nation from Terrorist Attacks by Foreign Individuals." Bollinger also urged community members and visiting scholars from the banned countries to suspend their plans for international travel. Stanford University's Bechtel International Center took to Facebook to urge nationals of the banned countries to refrain from travelling. A PhD student, who is from Sudan but is a longtime legal U.S. resident, from the school got detained for about five hours after the executive order was signed. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology admitted that its first concern is for the international students and scholars who are directly affected. The school is working closely with the affected individuals to offer their support. According to The Washington Post, about 21 Nobel laureates and several academics signed a petition against President Trump's immigration order. The Association of American Universities President, Mary Sue Coleman, urged the administration to clarify to the world that the U.S. continues to welcome the most talented people from all countries to study, teach as well as conduct research at local universities. The organization explained that the U.S. needs to continue attracting the best students, scientists, engineers and scholars. Other countries may surpass the nation as the global leader in higher education, research and innovation if it is replaced as the prime destination for the most talented students and researchers, causing irreparable damage to the economy. The University of Michigan has publicly announced that it will not be revealing the immigration status of its students. This comes after President Donald Trump issued an executive order banning travel from seven countries for 90 days. Michigan Daily reported that UM President Mark Schlissel confirmed on Saturday that the school is committed to helping its international students and faculty. On Friday, President Trump signed an executive order banning the immigration and travel of people from seven Muslim-majority countries. In an announcement on the University of Michigan's official website, Schlissel affirmed that the school is committed to protecting the rights and opportunities of its academic community. He also admitted that they will continue to identify, recruit, support and retain academic talent from all around the world. The University of Michigan is one of the hundreds of colleges and universities that signed a letter in support of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) Executive Order. The institution is also working with the Association of American Universities (AAU) and Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU). Another legislation that the school has expressed support for is the Bar Removal of Individuals who Dream and Grow our Economy (BRIDGE) Act. It would allow people who arrived in the U.S. as children to stay for another three years without fear of deportation as Congress addresses the changes in the immigration system. The University of Michigan has vowed to continue welcoming and supporting students without regard to their immigration status. It will continue to comply with federal requirements in connection to the management of its international programs. However, it will not share sensitive information such as immigration status. According to Michigan Live, the institution will be focusing on potential changes to immigration laws, policies and practices. These are especially important since it may include programs and policies that can affect international students, particularly those who are undocumented. Cyber security degrees might not be as common as engineering or computer science degrees but there are already a number of colleges and universities that offer cyber security programs. Those who are interested in pursuing a career in cyber security will find themselves as among the first line of defense against cyber attacks and cyber crimes in the future. Here are 5 colleges that has been recognized by the National Security Agency (NSA) for offering such programs. Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon has cyber security programs from their undergraduate to Ph.D programs. For the undergraduate course, they are offering the Computer Information Systems Undergraduate Program: Information Assurance Track. One of their master's program is the Masters of Science in Information Security where the main focus is handling and managing the emerging complexities of information technology including data and network security. They also offer a Ph.D in ECE: Mobility Research Center where the focus is on mobile devices and the improvement of mobile network and security. California State University - San Bernardino The California State University - San Bernardino offers certifications in different cyber security areas. Their Business Administration, Concentraion: Cyber Security is one of the first cyber security programs in California. The university has received various grants from different state and federal agencies, such as the Department of Defense, allowing them to offer various cyber security programs in both undergraduate and graduate levels. George Washington University George Washington University in Washington, D.C. has a lot of NSA-recognized cyber security programs in both the graduate and undergraduate levels. Moreover, they also offer online degree programs although it is only for those who are pursuing a master's degree in cyber security. One of these programs is the Online Master of Engineering in Cyber Security Policy & Compliance which incorporates engineering and computer science courses. Missouri University of Science and Technology Located in Rolla, Missouri, the institution offers two NSA-recognized cyber security programs: Big Data Management and Security Graduate Certificate and Information Assurance & Security Officer Essentials Graduate Certificate. Admission to the program requires a B.S. degree in any engineering field with an average GPA score of 3.0. Purdue University Purdue University offers a number of graduate and undergraduate cyber security programs recognized by the NSA. The highest one can get is a Ph.D in Computer Science with an Info-Security Focus. According to the university's website, the average time to complete the Ph.D degree is 5 years provided the student has a good undergraduate background in computer science. By Press Trust of India: Jaipur, Jan 29 (PTI) Karni Sena patron Lokendra Singh Kalvi has said he is hopeful about resolving issues with Sanjay Leela Bhansali after members of the Rajput group assaulted the filmmaker for allegedly presenting "distorted facts" in his upcoming movie "Padmavati". Bhansali was roughed up by members of Karni Sena who also stopped the shooting of Ranveer Singh-Deepika Padukone starrer at the Jaigarh fort here on Friday. advertisement "The matter is being unnecessarily raked up despite the fact that both the sides have decided to let go of the incident, Kalvi told PTI. "Our protest is against filming inappropriate scenes between Rani Padmavati and Allaudin Khilji." Kalvi said his organisation has been in touch with the filmmaker over email and both are trying to reach a common ground. "We are corresponding with the representatives of Bhansali over e-mail. We have to meet consensus on few words on the written agreement. We hope that the issues will be settled soon," he said. Kalvi said he along with other Sena members even met Bhansali in Mumbai six months ago regarding the script of "Padmavati". "We met Bhansali in Mumbai six months back and told them that he will not present the history in distorted manner. But, still he came to shoot the movie. The incident on last Friday occurred because of his denial." Defending Karni Sena activists action of vandalising the films set, Kalvi said it was he and Sena members, who were first fired at by the directors bodyguard. "We have evidence that security guards of Sanjay Leela Bhansali had fired on us but we did not lodge police complaint in the matter. "The incident which happened with Bhansali resulted from that. Why should I apologize to Bhansali. Suspecting that history related to Padmavati will be presented in a distorted form, we had moved a petition in Rajasthan High Court two months back," said Kalvi. "We would not let history of Rajput community to be presented in a distorted form," he said. Kalvi clarified he had no objections to Bhansali shooting "Padmavati" here but he wants the director to remove the "wrong facts" from the movie. "We hope that the issues will be resolved through dialogue. We are waiting for Bhansalis response. We will welcome him to shoot his movie in Rajasthan, if objectionable words are omitted," he said. PTI AG SSN SK SSN --- ENDS --- Oct. 26, 2022 U.S. AIR FORCE ACADEMY, Colo. Cadets got the unique experience of interacting with and learning from the 12 Outstanding Airmen of the Year for 2022 at the U.S. Air Force Academy Sept. 27-29. The National Character and Leadership Symposium sponsored the visit and three days of activities.The 12 During the War of 1812, the Treasury Department required revenue cutters, such as the Connecticut-based Eagle, to enforce tariffs and trade laws, and protect American maritime commerce. Connecticut native Frederick Lee (left), one of the most noted revenue cutter captains at the time, commanded Eagle out of her homeport of New Haven. Born in 1766, Lee was too young to see action in the Revolution. Instead, he became a shipmaster and received a cutter master's commission in 1809, at the ripe age of 43. Built in New Haven in 1809, the topsail schooner-rigged Eagle was the third revenue cutter to bear that name. She had dimensions of 60 feet in length on deck and 18 feet wide, with small arms of muskets, pistols and cutlasses, and ordnance of four 4-pound and two 2-pound cannon. During the War of 1812, her primary mission was to apprehend British merchant ships as well as American merchantmen carrying illegal British cargoes. In August 1812, Lee's Eagle seized the brig Harriot of Bristol, England, and a brig from Liverpool, both bound for New York, and sent them into New London for adjudication. In October 1813, Eagle also apprehended American brigs Patriot, Harriet and Ann McLane and sent them into New Haven for carrying illegal British cargoes. A profile view of the War of 1812 Revenue Cutter Eagle, showing hull lines and sail rig. Coast Guard Collection. (U.S. Coast Guard courtesy photo) With U.S. Navy warships cruising far off shore and Navy gunboats often moored in port cities, the speedy revenue cutters became effective maritime intelligence gathering tools. They monitored enemy naval movements, identified British privateers, and provided the latest news regarding Navy vessel movements. Master Lee's cutter gathered and shared this information with customs collectors, local officials, and military leaders. For example, on Tuesday, July 14, 1812, Eagle sighted a British squadron of four large warships patrolling off Montauk Point, Long Island, and transmitted their location by letter to the Navy agent at New York City. On July 24, Lee also notified the New York Navy agent that famed frigate USS Constitution had narrowly escaped a British squadron of nine warships after a four-day chase. During the war, cutters also enforced over half-a-dozen trade restrictions passed by Congress. Revenue cutter officers and crew were well versed in these numerous laws, for American merchants and ship captains would often challenge in court any seizures, forfeitures or detentions of U.S. ships they believed to be illegal or wrongful. These restrictions included the Non-Intercourse Act, which was in force throughout the war. In October 1813, Eagle apprehended the fast-sailing Boston to New York packet for Breach of the Sabbath. Federal authorities indicted, incarcerated, and fined the crew and passengers according to the law. Eagle also escorted convoys of American merchantmen, a revenue cutter tradition established during the Quasi War with France in the late 1790s. Between 1813 and 1814, Eagle regularly served as escort for convoys of merchantmen between Connecticut and New York that ranged in size from three vessels to as many as 20. On June 17, 1814, a New York newspaper noted, Yesterday at 4 P.M. Passed the New-Haven Revenue Cutter Eagle, Lee, from New York, with 20 sail of coasters under convoy, standing into New-Haven. Eagle's ability to protect American commerce was put to the test in October 1814. On Monday, October 10, news arrived from Long Island Sound that a privateer had captured an American merchantman. Despite the threat of Royal Navy vessels patrolling the Sound, Lee showed no hesitation in pursuing the enemy. He assembled local militia to join his cutter and sailed into the night to re-capture the American vessel and take the British privateer. At daybreak, Lee found his cutter dangerously close to the 18-gun brig HMS Dispatch and an armed tender; and he narrowly escaped capture from deployed armed barges by running Eagle onto the northern shore of Long Island. The cutter's crew stripped the cutter of her sails and dragged her cannon up the bluffs to duel with the British warships and armed barges. Painting of Cutter Eagle on patrol in Long Island Sound during War of 1812 by marine artist Patrick O'Brien. (U.S. Coast Guard courtesy photo) With only six cannon, and 50 men armed with muskets, Lee managed to fend off the two ships and their barges for another day. Of the battle, a contemporary newspaper account stated that: Having expended all the wadding of the four pounders on the hill, during the warmest of the firing, several of the crew volunteered and went on board the cutter to obtain more. At this moment the masts were shot away, when the brave volunteers erected a flag upon her stern; this was soon shot away, but was immediately replaced by a heroic tar, amidst the cheers of his undaunted comrades, which was returned by a whole broadside from the enemy. In all, the British shot away Eagle's flag three times, but volunteers from Lee's crew replaced it each time. After they had exhausted their cannon shot, Eagle's gun crews tore up the cutter's logbook to use as wadding and fired back enemy small shot that lodged in the hill. By Wednesday, October 12, the Royal Navy warships departed to locate reinforcements while Lee patched up and refloated the damaged Eagle. Early the next day, at low tide, the British gun brig and her tender returned bringing with them the 32-gun frigate HMS Narcissus. Lee's men ran the damaged cutter into shallow water again. Later that morning, the Royal Navy ships launched a boarding force of seven armed barges with covering fire from the three warships. Lee's men kept up a brisk musket fire against the barges and, according to Lee, Our guns were loaded nearly to the muzzle with grape and canister, and the fire reserved until they were within a handsome distance, and then discharged. Painted by Aldis Browne, this mural image in the Henriques Room of the Coast Guard Academy's Chase Hall depicts the heroic battle for Cutter Eagle by Capt. Frederick Lee, his crew and militia forces during The War of 1812. (U.S. Coast Guard courtesy photo) The Americans fended off the British with withering cannon and musketry fire for nearly an hour. After that, the incoming tide re-floated Eagle and an enemy barge secured a line to the cutter. At around noon October 13, the British finally towed Eagle away from shore and the range of Lee's cannon and riflemen. Lee's men survived to fight another day prompting him to write, The officers and crew, together with the volunteers, on board the cutter, have done their duty as became American sailors. During the War of 1812, five cutters were lost, including one whose magazine exploded, another lost in a hurricane, and three captured by the enemy. Eagle was the last cutter lost in the war. In November 1814, a month after the Royal Navy flotilla captured her, a Boston newspaper reported, American revenue cutter, the Eagle, prize to H.M.B. Dispatch, sailed under convoy of the Narcissus. Two more revenue cutters named Eagle later served out of New Haven, one built in 1816 and another constructed in 1824. Frederick Lee would remain a cutter master until 1829. He was a member of the long blue line and served honorably for 20 years before retiring from the Service at the age of 63. By William H. Thiesen, Atlantic Area Historian, USCG Provided through Coast Guard Copyright 2017 Comment on this article By Press Trust of India: From Shirish B Pradhan Kathmandu, Jan 30 (PTI) India has provided USD 2.49 million to Nepal for the construction of postal highway which runs across the Terai region close to the Indo-Nepal border. "Ambassador of India Ranjit Rae handed over a cheque amounting to Nepalese rupees 249,710,698 equivalent to USD 2.49 million to Minister for Physical Infrastructure and Transport Ramesh Lekhak at the ministrys office at Singha Durbar in Kathmandu," according to a statement issued by the Indian Embassy here. advertisement A postal road is designated for the transportation of postal mail. It is also known as Hulaki Rajmarg which runs across the Terai region of Nepal, from Bhadrapur in the east to Dudhaura in the west, cutting across the entire width of the country. It is the oldest highway in the country constructed by Ranas to aid transportation and facilitate postal services. Ambassador Rae had inaugurated a campus building for Chautara Multiple Campus, Chautara in Sindhupalchok district situated in the east of Kathmandu last week. The building has been constructed with financial assistance of Nepalese Rupees 27 million provided by India under its Small Development Projects Scheme as part of India?Nepal Economic Cooperation Programme, the statement said. The three-storied building consists of 12 classrooms and separate rooms for campus office, accounts, store, meeting hall, computer room and science laboratories. PTI SBP AJR AKJ AJR --- ENDS --- Media Can Call on UW Faculty for Commentary, Expertise Whether you need an economist to speak about energy trends occurring in Wyoming or a zoologist to discuss some of the states critters, the University of Wyoming has faculty experts in these and many other fields available. State, regional and national media can reach out to UW faculty members to obtain information and comment on particular topics or current events for their stories. For a list of current UW experts, go to www.uwyo.edu/uw/news/experts-list/. Former Finance Minister P Chidambaram, who addressed the media with Manmohan Singh, said that the BJP-led government was "presenting a rosy picture" of country's economy. By India Today Web Desk: Accusing the Narendra Modi government of "presenting a rosy picture of the Indian economy", former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Finance Minister P Chidambaram today claimed the BJP is hiding behind a GDP number which can be easily challenged. "The Indian economy is not in a good shape," Manmohan Singh said in a press conference he addressed with Chidambaram in New Delhi. advertisement ALSO READ: Ex-PM Manmohan Singh helped Vijay Mallya's sinking Kingfisher Airlines get bank loans, alleges BJP Chidambaram said the state of the Indian economy is not something we could be happy about. "The BJP is hiding behind a GDP number which is being challenged. People are not dazzled by it, but are asking where the jobs are," he said. "Where are the jobs? Where is new capital investment? Where is credit growth? There are no jobs, capital formation is declining, credit growth is the lowest in several decades," he said. "Yet if the government presents tomorrow a rosy picture of the economy, people of India are entitled to question that," Chidambaram said. The senior Congress leader said while every government has a right to be optimistic, "the optimism must stem from a realistic assessment of the situation". "The NDA government tends to believe in an exaggerated version of the economy. This research document is closer to truth than what government will say tomorrow," he said. ALSO READ: RBI removes ATM cash withdrawal limit from Feb 1, weekly limit of Rs 24,000 to continue for now Manmohan Singh tears into Modi's demonetisation, calls it monumental mismanagement --- ENDS --- The 5 soldiers, who were rescued after a snow track caved in in Macchil sector, have also been brought to Srinagar for specialised treatment. By Shuja-ul-Haq : Five soldiers, who were rescued in Machhil sector, and the mortal remains of those killed in the Gurez avalanche have been brought to Srinagar. The Indian Army had earlier said that bad weather was preventing pilots from bringing back remains of the soldiers killed in the Gurez avalanche. The five soldiers were rescued after an avalanche in Macchil sector and have also been brought to Srinagar for specialised treatment. advertisement "Army aviation pilots are attempting to evacuate the five soldiers who were rescued in Machhil Sector to Srinagar for specialised treatment," said a Srinagar-based spokesman. The army said that it was impossible for the helicopter to fly in such weather. Foggy conditions are preventing the pilots to make the sorties. Also read | Avalanche tragedy: 4 more bodies recovered from J-K's Gurez, death toll touches 14 Carrying out Flying operations on the higher reaches of Gurez valley to transport mortal remains of 14 soldiers killed in Gurez avalanche to Srinagar has been impossible. The valley has been witnessing bad weather over past one week due to western disturbances. Due to heavy snowfall there is a severe risk of avalanches and that is why a warning has been issued. Also read | Avalanches hit Kashmir's Gurez, 10 jawans killed, 4 missing, rescue efforts on --- ENDS --- The NHRC observed that victim girl's right to life, dignity and medical care have been violated due to the negligent and irrational act of the school authorities. By Shivendra Srivastava: The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has issued a notice to Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidayalaya in Garhwa district of Jharkhand where a class VI pregnant student was forced to consume abortion pills, to prevent the institution from falling into disrepute. The Vidayalaya is a state-run residential school for girls. Details of the incident: 1. As the medicine was given without consulting a doctor, the girl's condition worsened to an extent that she had to be rushed to the Garhwa Sadar Hospital where she was found two months pregnant. Doctors immediately carried out a proper abortion to save her life. advertisement 2. The Commission has observed that the contents of the news report are not only shocking but painful. The victim girl's right to life, dignity and medical care have been violated due to the negligent and irrational act of the school authorities. 3. Accordingly, it has issued a notice to the Chief Secretary, Government of Jharkhand calling for a detailed report in the matter within four weeks. He has also been asked to inform the Commission about the steps taken for relief, medical care and proper counseling of the victim girl. 4. According to reports, the incident happened on the January 24, 2017 and her family was informed two days later. The school authorities remained tightlipped about the incident to save the name. 5. Reportedly, the police authorities have said that punitive action will be taken if the victim's family lodges a complaint. However, the district education superintendent has said that a probe is on and truth will come out to the fore. Also read: Delhi: College students protest Dalit minor's rape, murder in Bihar --- ENDS --- All foreign enterprises seeking to staff operations in Vietnam will find the process regulated by the Vietnamese Labor Code of 2012 (Law No. 10/2012/QH13) and guided by several circulars which have clarified aspects of this legislation. Covering hiring, probationary periods, termination of contracts, and post-employment benefits, the nature of contracts should be studied closely to ascertain the most effective means of onboarding workers as well as ensuring the compliance requirements associated with these contracts. As per Chapter 3, Article 15 of the Vietnamese Labor Code, the following contract structures are permitted and thus should form the basis for cost and compliance comparisons: Seasonal or work-specific contracts; Indefinite-term contracts; Definite-term contracts; and, Probationary contracts. Requisite documentation Labor contracts are required to outline the following information concerning various aspects of the planned employment. While indefinite, definite, and seasonal labor contracts are required to include all the information outlined above, probationary employment contracts are subject to a reduced list of requirements. Selecting optimal contract terms Ranging from under a year to indefinite in length, labor contracts in Vietnam can give employers significant room to maneuver in terms of reduced demand, sudden receipt of large orders, or, as will be discussed further, instances where severance becomes an issue. Under one year (seasonal contracting) Contracts under a year in length are reserved for seasonal or task specific employment. While the relatively short periods of time under these contracts can afford a significant degree of maneuverability, there are several limitations that should be noted. First, and foremost, probationary periods outlined in greater detail below are currently not permitted for contracts falling under the year mark. In addition, seasonal contracting is currently restricted for any work that is normally completed under definite or indefinite employment contracts. Exceptions to this include workers filling in for employees contracted under longer labor contracts are indisposed due to pregnancy, military service, sickness, or other temporary leaves of absence. In the event that the end of a seasonal contract is reached and the employee continues to work for more than 30 days without the introduction of a new labor contract, the worker will be automatically transitioned to a 12 month definite contract. 12 to 36 months (definite term contracting) Any employer in need of workers for more than a year but on temporary basis, or unsure of their long term needs, will likely find definite term contracts to be an attractive option. Ranging from one to three years, these contracts permit the use of probationary periods but come at the cost of increased contract specificity. For most employers, particularly those hiring skilled workers, definite term contracts are the most effective contract structure that is available in Vietnam. Similar to seasonal contracts, and in the event that a new contract is not signed within 30 days of the expiry of a definite term contract, the contract of an employee will be automatically upgraded to a definite term employment contract. It should also be noted that employers may only renew a definite term contract for a particular employee once. Following this renewal, the employee must be hired via an indefinite labor contract as outlined below. The maximum length of time that employers are currently allowed to retain employees on definite term contract is six years. Indefinite contract terms As the name suggests, indefinite term employment contracts are effective until the employee or employer decides to terminate the contract. As it becomes more difficult to terminate an underperforming employee on an indefinite term contract, it is generally advisable that employers engage employees on a definite term contract for the first six years and then transition their employees to an indefinite structure following the expiry of the second, and final, definite term contract. Utilizing probationary periods Prior to the formal onboarding process, probationary periods provide both employers and potential employees the opportunity to assess their relationship. With reduced contract compliance and compensation requirements on the part of employers, and fewer restrictions surrounding termination of these contracts, the use of probationary periods can be an effective tool to safeguard operations and reduce costs in an environment characterized by an increasingly mobile skilled workforce. Companies that will primarily benefit from probationary periods are those seeking to employ workers in high-skilled positions. Not only are the skills required for these jobs more subjective and difficult to assess within an interview, the nature of probationary periods permitted for skilled positions have been expanded relative to unskilled positions under current laws. All employers should note probationary periods and compensation stipulations before utilizing these contracts, as detailed below. Drafting probation contracts Under the prevailing labor code of 2012 and subsequent circulars, probationary contracts are subject to a reduced list of information and documentation requirements. The specifics of these requirements can be found above in the chart outlining contract requirements. Structuring of probation contracts Probationary periods for a given position are proportional to the education required for the position and range from six to 60 days. These contracts are limited to a one time usage and must be converted to a standard contract of one year or more if both parties wish to continue the relationship beyond the period specified in the probation contract. Existing probationary contract lengths specified under Vietnamese employment law include: 60 days: probationary periods of up to 60 sixty days are reserved for positions that require professional or technical skills that demand a collegiate education or higher. 30 days: probationary periods of up to 30 days may be applied for jobs that require a professional skillset and/or technical qualifications, some of which may require some degree of education to obtain. Six days: for all other types of employment in Vietnam, including most manual labor and manufacturing, probation is limited to six days. The distinction between the 30 and 60 day probationary periods is subject to clarification at the circular level and should be monitored closely when drafting contracts. As a matter of compliance, pursuant to Circular No. 05/2015/N-CP, companies will be required to notify those undergoing 30 and 60 day probationary periods of their results three days prior to the conclusion of the probation contract. Compensation Compensation for probationary employment is subject to the agreement set out by the parties involved and must be stipulated in the agreement negotiated by the employer and employee. While there is considerable latitude with regard to the amount of compensation that is to be provided for probationary employment, employers are obligated to provide compensation no lower than 85 percent of the going wage applied to the position for which the probation is in preparation. Hiring through recruiting services Foreign employers can also use recruiting services to hire Vietnamese workers through reputable sources, but this is pursuant to several qualifications. First of all, only the following foreign offices may be eligible: Foreign diplomatic missions, consular offices, representative offices of international organizations of the United National system, intergovernmental organizations of regions and sub-regions; Representative offices of foreign news agencies and foreign broadcasting and television organizations; International, intergovernmental, and foreign governmental organizations; Permitted foreign non-governmental organizations; and, Foreign non-profit representative offices of organizations. These foreign offices are then only allowed to use recruitment agencies approved by the following government bodies: Identically to Ha Long Bay, Bai Tu Long Bay owns the same legend. Once upon a time, in order to protect the ancient Vietnams border from invaders, God sent mother dragon and child dragons down to help Vietnamese people fight the enemy. When the enemys boats approached the shore, the dragons sprayed countless pearls which then turned into thousands of limestone islands and became a solid wall that blocked invaders way. After the victory, since having fallen in love with spectacular landscapes and hospitable Vietnamese people, the dragons decided to stay here. The location where mother dragon landed is Ha Long Bay and where child dragons launched is Bai Tu Long Bay. The dragons tails hitting the water to create white foam layers become white sand beaches around Bai Tu Long Bay. The original and charming Bai Tu Long Bay comprises many islands, either earth or limestone, scattered across three communes, Ha Long, Van Yen and Minh Chau of Van Don district. The bay covers a total area of 15,783 hectares, including 6,125 hectares of high islands, which is home to 1,909 species of fauna and flora, forming a priceless treasure of the nation. According to Associate Professor Dr. Bui Tat Thang from the Strategic Development Institute of the Ministry of Planning and Investment, Bai Tu Long includes all three fundamental ecosystems: forest, wetlands and sea a diverse area for different species to live and develop. In the Bai Tu Long National Park, there are 102 rare and precious species, including 72 species of fauna and 30 varieties of flora listed in Vietnams red book of endangered species. Typical flora species include Chittagong wood, Aglaia, Tembusu and Ardisia sylvestris Pitard. Typical fauna species include Pale-capped Pigeon, Rhesus monkey, Asiatic golden cat, Sambar deer, Otter, Three-striped Box Turtle, Gecko, Water monitor, Burmese python, Cobra and King Cobra. Oceanic species include Chinese white dolphin, False killer whale, Otter shell, Pearl Oyster, Abalone, Olive ridley sea turtle and hawksbill sea turtle. Bai Tu Long National Park has been officially operating since April 2002. Besides the extremely diverse biological environment, the park also has archeological values found in Soi Nhu cave, where there was evidence of ancient Viet people residing here 14,000 years ago. The park has 1,000 hectares of wetlands, including mangrove forest, sandy and rocky tidal banks and sea-grass that provide food, a breeding ground and habitat for animals, including migrating birds and insect varieties. The wetlands ecosystem, with its impressive scenery and biodiversity, has attracted many eco-tourism, environmental education and research activities. Some notable pool areas include Cai Quyt, Lo Ho, Soi Nhu, O Lon, Cai De and Cai Lim. The sea-grass covers 10 hectares of mud and sand floor areas such as Chuong Di, Mang River, Lo Ho pool, Cai De pool and Tra Than pool. Sandy and rocky tidal banks are home to sea creatures like mollusc, making Van Don an attractive destination to taste local specialties. The areas of coral account for only a minor section of the park, mostly found around the fringes of islands, but play an important role to aquatic resources. The areas provide a place for many kinds of sea creatures to lay eggs, shelter and hunt. It has high biological productivity, generating organic substance and an important food source, but is also a gene bank for many types of sea species. Bai Tu Long National Park needs to have sustainable protection, conservation and development. Under pressure from customer demand, banks look to anticipate the future Photo: Le Toan The cutting edge of trends Transferring money or checking your outstanding balance has never ever been easier. Ho Chi Minh City-based resident Nguyen Tan Nhat Quang, a Citi account holder, can now access his bank account through a smartphone. No passwords are required; his fingerprint is the only key required to open the door to his financial world. In 2016, Citi introduced Touch ID, a technology that uses customers fingerprints for verification when conducting business on their smartphones. According to Citi, its customers no longer need to memorise username and password information they simply use their fingerprint to reduce fraud and enhance usability. A year ago, I was absolutely fine typing my password, now the app doesnt have Touch ID, Id get very impatient with questions: Why do I have to type my password? Why does this app not have a Touch ID? Natasha Ansell, managing director and Citi country officer for Vietnam, spoke very keenly of the cutting-edge transformation in the banking sector. She cited statistics showing that 1.8 billion people out of over seven billion people around the world today are millennial. They will make up 75 per cent of the global workforce by 2025, and as the majority of the population, they will be earning money, spending money, and driving the global economy. 73 per cent of them are found to be more excited about financial offerings from digital, rather than physical branches, and 38 per cent of them do not visit physical branches for any banking activity, she noted. Citi is one of the first banks, globally and regionally, driving the technological transformation in the banking industry. For Ansell of Citi, it is always exciting to be part of such a transformation, to not only respond to change, but to drive it. Like Touch ID, Voice Biometrics was also rolled out by Citi to its Vietnamese market last year, providing its customers with ease and peace of mind. Where Touch ID uses fingerprints, Voice Biometrics uses unique, pre-recorded, voiceprints. on the scale of security, voice is the hardest thing to replicate, virtually impossible, said Ansell. Twins or even triplets will not be able to impersonate each other, as the system will automatically detect the difference, she said. Changing gears in the fast lane For Nirukt Sapru, CEO of Standard Chartered Bank Vietnam, it is evident that not only the global banking landscape, but also the landscape in Vietnam, is changing rapidly, with technology coming to the forefront of attention. On one hand, as a service that is fundamentally digitisable, banks can reduce costs, improve speed and service quality, and put power into the hands of their customers through the innovative deployment of technology, Sapru told VIR. On the other hand, customers want safe and convenient banking services anytime, anywhere. These forces are causing a technological banking race, and according to Sapru, it is equally good for banks, customers, and the continuing development of the entire banking sector. A key element that technology brings to the forefront is the ability to integrate seamlessly across products and services, which give customers a more feature rich and frictionless banking experience, he added. Citis Ansell meanwhile agreed that this transformation of the banking sector comes as part of the technological revolution, as banks search to increase efficiency and respond to the existing demands of banking customers. Regulators have facilitated these changes as well, acting as the third force in addition to the banks and customers that influences contemporary banking. According to Ansell, the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) has set up its strategic objectives to 2020, attempting to boost e-commerce, diversify payment channels and methods, and reach an annual POS (point of sale) volume of $200 million. In addition, the monetary authority also aims to increase e-payments and reduce total cash transactions to less than 10 per cent. Those objectives include increasing access to the banking system for 70 per cent of individuals above the age of 15. Its an ambitious target. We cant achieve those targets through bank branches alone, she stressed. Money in the air According to Ansell, there was a period roughly five ago when the banking sector got very excited about virtual branches built around state-of-the-art technology. These branches would basically have no service staff or tellers. Rather, they would use flat-screen displays where bank customers could access their account information, make financial projections, and, if needed, connect by video call to a bank representative. Back then, we thought it was going to be the future, and the demand of the consumers. Today, the concept of virtual branches is moving on to ecosystems. It is moving so really prominently to where the branch is actually the smart phone in your hand, Ansell said in an interview with VIR. The question now is whether virtual banking branches can fulfil the SBVs targets and how they will fit into Vietnams present banking scene? Techcombank head of Transaction Banking Phan Thanh Son said that some countries can go very fast with branchless banking. But for others, the adoption of virtual branches is slower, as consumers prefer to go to physical branches even though the frequency and nature of the transactions could change. With the help of technology, customers can interact with banks without actually going to the banks, but the need for physical branches still persists, Son noted. For Vietnam, I think it would be a gradual process, as the banking penetration in Vietnam is still relatively lower than other countries in the region, he said. The need for physical branches will be there. However, more and more transactions will be done virtually by the customers, so the role and function of the branch might change. The concept of a virtual branch is moving on to be present in the ecosystems of the clientele, said Ansell of Citi. They use smart phones so thats where we need to be. This convenience is expected from us. And frankly, the same is happening with card technology, where clients can pay using an app on their phone instead of a piece of plastic [bank card]. For a bank customer like Quang, certain banking services that can be done remotely via a smartphone are much appreciated, saving him time and hassle. However, a trip to a physical branch may still be compulsory for more complicated banking services like applying for a home loan. Nirukt Sapru CEO of Standard Chartered Bank Vietnam Digital is the emerging frontier in the industry, with traditional concepts like brick and mortar branches quickly fading away. Customers want instant and ubiquitous access to their banking account. Local banks have become aware of this and are making appropriate investments in the digital banking space. We expect that to continue in the future. Vietnam offers great opportunities for the development of digital banking given its young and tech-savvy population. The internet and mobile phone penetration is very high, averaging 50 per cent, and keeps growing every year. Additionally, the SBV is supporting innovation and has defined a clear development agenda to move from a cash-based to a digital economy. Each bank needs to have their own strategy to make the best use of these advantages with regards to their competitive strengths, the target markets and segments they cater to, and the technologies theyve adopted to cover those segments. NATASHA Ansell Managing director and Citi country officer for Vietnam Ive been in the industry and with Citi for 24 years. Back in early 90s, when we were setting up offices in Vietnam and in other parts of the world, the regulators were keen for Citi to bring its state-of-the-art ATMs to their markets. Obviously, a lot has changed since then in terms of where the technology has moved. With regards to the SBVs ambitious target, Im a big believer in setting ambitious targets. If you dont set yourself an ambitious goal, you will never find out what youre capable of. Who knows how the next four or five years will continue to evolve. The pace of change is becoming much faster. What used to take five to 10 years now takes a year. So I would call the SBVs objectives ambitious, but I wouldnt call them unachievable. I believe the vision is absolutely right, and I think its absolutely worth going after it. You shoot for the moon, even if you miss, youll land among the stars: so lets shoot for the moon, and well land somewhere in a very good place. Even if cash transactions are not reduced to 10 per cent of the total, itll be somewhere meaningful from that perspective. Phan Thanh Son Head of Transaction Banking at Techcombank We have seen the rising importance of innovation and technology in the development of the global banking sector, which has changed the face of the industry with its business model, customer experience, and customer interaction with financial institutions. The trend has been similar in Vietnam over the last 10 years. Local banks have invested in core, fundamental technologies and systems to help improve risk management, the automation of processes, and bookkeeping. Additionally, they have expanded alternative channels like ATMs, internet banking, and mobile banking. From the banking infrastructure standpoint, Vietnam is also bolstering its centralised clearing system and national switching and payment companies to help improve non-cash payments and settlements. Furthermore, innovation should not be limited to information technology, but should also be applied to improve business processes and business models. This is evident in the rapid growth of consumer financing and mortgage loan products over the last couple of years. With the adoption of the internet and social media, consumers can be constantly updated on the latest financial products and can access information about banking products and services at any time. Therefore, banks need to stay ahead to meet these demands by focusing on innovation and better technology. Cybercrimes Conventional banking has changed dramatically and at a rapid pace. Bank clients now expect more from their banks and have welcomed digitalised banking for the sake of convenience. They will, however, pay particular attention to security risks, such as cybercrime, when transactions are carried out online. We cannot say whether or not this is safer than a traditional bank, but this is the new reality that the financial industry has to deal with, noted Son. Banks, according to Standard Chartereds Sapru, are fully aware of the need to upgrade their technology and security measures to protect clients from fraud, data theft, and other financial crimes. I believe each bank has made certain investments to enhance the security level of their services, he said. The local authorities, particularly the SBV, have also been active in raising awareness of security threats, urging banks to enhance their security measures. I believe that this will continue to be the area of focus for banks to address security concerns. The development of threats and counter threats is constantly evolving, and is not limited to banking or technology. As in any other field, banks will need to keep abreast of emerging trends to overcome them, Sapru added. Going against the current The domestic and international investors in attendance could not stop applauding after VietJet CEO Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao and her associates concluded the question-and-answer session at a recent ceremony in Ho Chi Minh City about the companys proposed initial public offering this year. Though they were responding to Thaos news, in the background was a shared admiration for the results that Vietnams premier budget airline has posted since its debut several years ago. As part of its promotional campaign, VietJet also held a string of successful roadshows in London, Hong Kong, Singapore, France, and Thailand, with support from global financial institutions including BNP Paribas, Deutsche Bank, and JP Morgan. The numbers VietJet exhibited were built on the 44 per cent of the domestic passenger market they occupied through June 2016. After two years in operation they started to turn a profit; from 2013-2016 seat occupancy stood at 88-89 per cent, surprising even international aviation experts. Behind the success was a new approach. VietJet did not focus on pricing as the top factor in realising its market share ambitions; instead it concentrated on tapping new markets and attracting fresh customers. The airlines upbeat business figures have driven away long-standing prejudices in the domestic aviation industry that aviation is not a field to turn a quick profit in profits usually come after five or 10 years of operation. There was also a hard-to-kill belief that aviation needed to target affluent markets, and could hardly be accessible to the masses. Part of the entrepreneurial generation that came of age in the 1970s, Thao has built a reputation by leveraging her strong ambition, confidence, and strategic thinking and management expertise. In this way, she has far surpassed many of her contemporaries. But her ambitions do not end with the Vietnamese field. VietJet is oriented to become a global international airline, Thao said. Our business indexes on the airlines performance, safety, and services counting technical safety levels, flying hours, and passenger seat factors VietJet is among the worlds top performers. Based upon these metrics, Im highly confident that VietJet is well-positioned to conquer the global sky. But not to be overlooked is Thaos influence on the Vietnamese horizon, and the inspiration her story has provided for young local entrepreneurs. The eight advantages of VietJet 1-Being the fastest growing airline based in the Asia-Pacific region 2-The government provides active support for the aviation sector 3-Being the leading budget carrier in Vietnam 4-Possessing a competitive cost structure, which allows the firm to compete with other players in the international market 5-Having healthy finances and high operational efficiency 6-Generating added income from sources such as freight transport, added luggage service, and other value-added services like seat selection, ticket upgrades, and tourism insurance 7-Having earned strong brand recognition 8-Its experienced management team contains high-profile aviation experts and successful entrepreneurs Promoting a new model It was not a straight route to success. To compete in todays challenging business environment, VietJet had to carefully consider its business plan and find a more suitable growth path, Thao said. The new path began with a shift from a five-star business model to a new-generation airline model, allowing passengers to self-select the services they want to use, instead of including everything in the base ticket cost. Sorting out the right growth model is crucial to the success of an airline. Indochina Airlines and Air Mekong, two other domestic airline ventures that launched alongside of VietJet, are now defunct. VietJet, on the other hand, was shortlisted in its first year for the Top 5 Best New Route Launch at Londons Budgies and Travel Awards ceremony. The airline posted profits in its second year of operation, and in its third year, VietJet became the first private Vietnamese airline to fly to international destinations and form foreign joint ventures. Its revenue in its fifth year tripled that of its third year. This success had precedent, although not one in the aviation industry. Before venturing into this highly challenging and risky field, Thao was already a highly successful entrepreneur. After more than two decades of activity, Thao had become well known in investors circles through a string of major merger and acquisition deals in banking and real estate. She was the founder of Vietnams first commercial joint stock bank and is the owner of Danangs Furama Resort, one of the premier resort properties in Vietnam. Many people had advised us not to venture into such a challenging field as aviation, but this could not affect our firm commitment, Thao said. I have trust in the government and the Ministry of Transports policy supporting private sector development, and on the other hand I want to prove this truth: Vietnam can compete head-on with other global players. The aviation model Thao and her associates now pursue is a mixed low-cost and traditional service-style combination, a new-generation model. Accordingly, VietJet is being governed in such a way that ensures cost optimisation, in concert with the use of high-tech applications which help save in manpower costs. I think aviation is an eye-catching field, Thao said. We have earned a good deal of attention from the general public, as well as from business observers who say that VietJet has grown too fast. But in fact, we had five years for planning before receiving our business licence, and another five years for preparations before taking wing. That 15-year path is not too short, and our growth is all pre-planned. Think globally, act locally Thaos talents do not lie only in her vision. VietJets CEO has her finger on VietJets development every day, and every hour. People at VietJet have become accustomed to the fact that the office of their CEO is often lit until 2-3am, including on weekends and holidays. The CEO also remains accessible to her flight corps. Thao has never refused to take photos with an employee, though she might not know what position these people hold in VietJets several-thousand-strong workforce. This business culture is visible everywhere at VietJets workplace, where the concept of friendliness translates into sincerity and a willingness to listen to and support customers and colleagues as they are their family members. Aircraft maintenance workers tell a moving story of a field visit made by Thao and some other executives, at an airport in peak season on a year-end night. During that trip, Thao did the cleaning work on her own with a vacuum cleaner, even picking up debris from the aircraft floor. And, after learning of the diligence of one veteran staff member, she immediately called human resources and asked them to increase the employees salary. She inspires her corps through more than just a peerless work ethic. VietJet employees have learned active thinking from their CEO which has been useful in the difficulties VietJet has faced, and in determining the companys future development. Our target is low operating costs but high-class quality, Thao said. Competition will serve as a motivating force for VietJet to perfect itself and better serve the community. The National Assembly Building used large aluminium glass facades of Eurowindow Using green materials for this sustainable brand of architecture has proven vital. These products emerged as a significant target of the global building material production industry. Green materials have less impact on the environment and on people throughout their life cycles. Green building materials must satisfy the following criteria: non-toxic, recyclable, with a longer life cycle, resources-saving, and harmless to the environment. This growth trend has come to Vietnam in force. As the premier company in the provision of overall solutions related to doors, windows, and finished products in Vietnam, in the past almost 15 years the Eurowindow Joint Stock Company (Eurowindow) has made consistent efforts in the research and application of the latest technologies, to bring environmentally friendly and energy-saving products into users lives. Among the companys most prominent products are uPVC doors and windows, made from profile uPVC bars by Koemmerling a leading German brand in manufacturing profile bars pursuant to Greenline standards. These are non-lead-based, friendly to the environment, and non-toxic. In addition, Eurowindows uPVC doors and windows are impervious to oxidisation and discolouration when facing solar radiation. The products are also heat-insulated and soundproofed, helping to save in energy, repair, and maintenance costs, bringing long-term economic benefits to users. Koemmerling is one of the largest profile uPVC manufacturers in Europe, with a more than century-long track record. Eurowindow is Koemmerlings exclusive profile bar distributor in the Vietnamese market. The aluminium products the company supplies are not only made with green materials, but also feature high durability, anti-scratch properties and a resistance to corrosion by common chemicals or climate conditions. They can be recycled as well. The companys doors and aluminium-glass facades are made from thermally-insulated aluminium profiles combined with an integrated glass box, EPDM gasket, and auxiliary metal kits. They bring modern style, but are also soundproofed, weatherproofed, and energy-saving. Eurowindow has invested in an automatic paint spraying system to give its aluminium products a refined look as well. This system employs an electrostatic painting technique integrated with powder coating, which is the latest in painting technology. And with an automated wastewater treatment system imported from Singapore, discharged water from the Eurowindow factory has reached A grade, the highest standard in Vietnam in environmental protection. Eurowindows wooden doors are made from natural wood materials and come in many varieties and designs, ranging from classic to semi-classic, modernist to high-tech. The material sources are meticulously selected, and then undergo denaturalisation treatment before going into production. This ensures stability and durability and minimises wood deformation in Vietnams tropical climate. Eurowindows wood materials are all certified by the Forest Stewardship Council, which runs a global wood certification system. Nguyen Tan Van, chairman of the Vietnam Association of Architects, said, In the context of green architecture trends, Eurowindows products appear to be the best choice for users, as they fulfil many of the goals that green architecture has set out to accomplish. Eurowindow was awarded an ISO 9001:2000 certificate for quality management by Norways Det Norske Veritas, a global verification services organisation. It was also awarded an ISO 14001:2004 certificate for environmental management by the British Standards Institution. Liberalisations in the financial system such as raised foreign ownership limits will attract capital and promote growth-Photo: Le Toan Innovations allow businesses to be more effective and efficient, operate with improved productivity, and make further economic developments more robust and certain. Businesses, for example, have gained tremendous productivity from implementing innovations related to the development of the internet. Innovations, therefore, are a cornerstone of any economy. And for a developing economy, a vastly more important cornerstone. Fundamentally, innovations often lead to other related innovations which can profoundly alter policy, laws, and regulation. From this perspective, the implementation of innovations must be considered carefully. Innovations related to foreign investment and regulations concerning the stock markets are vital to the development of the Vietnamese economy. As the stock markets in Vietnam provide a quarter of the capital supply in the country, according to Minister of Finance Dinh Tien Dung, the future of these markets will play an essential role in the future of the economy. It is imperative that these stock market developments remain dynamic and fluid all implementations of innovations require flexibility. In the past, Vietnam has been progressive in its implementation of policies aimed at attracting both direct and indirect foreign investment. Considerable effort has been made to pattern the laws and regulations with the developing economy and thereby provide a framework for the implementation of future innovations. Vietnam is in an enviable position from a foreign investment standpoint. If Vietnam continues to implement innovations relative to foreign investment, it can and will continue to attract foreign investment. Central to this consideration of innovation for foreign investment in the stock market in Vietnam in 2017 is the further implementation of the lifting of the foreign ownership limits. Raising the foreign ownership limits on listed firms is an innovation which promotes the goal of the government to transition from a frontier market to an emerging market. Access, liquidity, and foreign ownership play critical roles in determining the status of a country. As Vietnam continues to work toward this goal, adjustments to regulations and laws promoting more transparency, ease of investment, and capital flow requirements will move Vietnam in the right direction. Sometimes the expectancy of innovation gets ahead of the actual innovation. As interest in an innovation develops, anticipation increases and speculators begin to formulate the effects of the innovation. Often, the expectations do not directly or accurately meet the effect of the innovation. Certainly this has happened with the increase in foreign ownership limits of listed securities in Vietnam. Much anticipation has formed over the raising of the foreign ownership limits for listed securities over the last few years. In fact, the anticipation has been so considerable that it has increased certain stock prices beyond reasonable levels. Domestic and foreign investors speculated on firms expected to raise the foreign ownership limits first. The government telegraphed its intentions to the market concerning the innovation. Consequently, many listed firms experienced higher interest based on the pretence of a higher foreign ownership limit. Subsequently, as these firms have implemented the raising of the foreign ownership limit, many of the prices of these firms have moderated. Investors bought on the rumour, sold on the news and interest in the foreign ownership limit change has become of little investor interest. It is not uncommon that anticipation of a major change or alteration in policy related to investment in the stock market would bid prices of securities higher. Over time, the anticipation can significantly outpace the effect of the change. As a result, when the change is implemented, a realisation of the effect of the change normalises the prices of the securities. An example of this can be seen with the stock market rally that occurred after the last presidential election in the US. After the election, the markets rallied strongly through the end of the year on the promise of a Trump presidency. Thoughts of tax cuts and infrastructure spending propelled the market rally. But it remains to be seen if either policy change will actually take place, or how the markets will react to their actual implementations. Most experts expect a moderated effect on the stock market in that event. Investors are making a mistake by not considering the importance of the implementation of this innovation. The raising of the foreign ownership limit for listed securities might be considered one of the most important innovations implemented since the creation of the stock market system in Vietnam. It is so important simply because it propels Vietnam to a country status that will attract more substantial capital from foreign sources. The future development of emerging market status will essentially open the markets in Vietnam to a whole new group of international investors which are substantial in size, whereas Vietnam is now limited to foreign ownership by those international investors willing to invest in frontier markets. This increased interest would mean that the stock markets and economy would continue to increase in valuation. Investors should never underestimate dramatic innovations such as the increase in the foreign investment limits. Such innovations may take time to develop, to be implemented in scale, but such innovations can meaningfully affect the markets and the future of the country. As foreign capital into Vietnam continues to stream in, foreign investment will provide needed sources of capital for corporate expansion and economic growth. This economic growth will be considerable and stock prices will reflect the greater economic growth. Innovation brings prosperity at all levels, for all participants. The synergy between economic growth, foreign investment, and stock price valuations is well documented and proves the need for innovations to encourage foreign investment for greater economic growth. And development of an economy depends not only on flexibility in laws and regulations, but also on innovation. Without innovation, productivity suffers and the economy will suffer. First and foremost, commitment to foreign investment requires the implementation of innovations such as the increased foreign investment limit. It alerts foreign investors to the seriousness of the Vietnamese government to continue to alter policies to attract and protect foreign investment. Such innovations as lifting the foreign ownership limit provide a clearer, more certain path for foreign investors and therefore heighten foreign investment interest. Whether the innovations are legal or regulatory or simply technologically-driven, all innovations promoting greater transparency, ease of investment, and a more solid and sound foundation will benefit all investors and the market as a whole. And as Vietnam continues to develop as a formidable foreign investment destination, innovations will provide added incentives for foreign investors. Innovations will continue to set Vietnam apart from other countries attracting foreign investment. The future of the financial markets in Vietnam will be defined by the innovations which are implemented to attract foreign investment. As Vietnam continues to develop innovations catering to the need for transparency and ease of investment, more substantial foreign investment will be assured. The lifting of the foreign investment limit is one major innovation leading to this future. By Dr. Christian Kamm - President of Kamm Investment Inc, a US-backed investment firm in Ho Chi Minh City A view of Marina Bay in Singapore. Tet (Lunar New Year) tours have seen demand surge this year, according to HCM City-based travel agents. Fiditour Travel Company has sold 95 per cent of its tours, most of which depart in the first four days of the new year. Outbound tours to South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and Singapore are almost sold out while tours to the US, Australia and Europe are fully booked. Only tours by road to Thailand and Cambodia are still available. This year bookings have soared by 25 per cent, Tran Thi Bao Thu, the companys marketing and communications manager, said. People have opted for Asian destinations like Thailand, Singapore, Taiwan and China due to reasonable prices and plenty of options in terms of attractions, she said. Vietravel offers more than 800 different tour options and expects to serve 30,000 customers. By mid-January it had sold around 85 per cent of the tours. Tran Thi Viet Huong, marketing director of Vietravel, said the tours cost only VN3.9-10.9 million (US$170-480) as the company wants to keep prices down to attract customers. The tours include by charter flights to Thailand and China, Huong said. According to travel agents, people prefer outbound tours for five or six days during Tet, with Thailand, Cambodia, Singapore, South Korea and Malaysia being the most popular destinations. The number of outbound tourists is up 9 per cent from last year, she said. New, longer trips to countries such as Sri Lanka-Maldives, Mexico-Cuba-Panama, Bhutan, Jordan-Israel are also popular. Ben Thanh Tourist said the number of people travelling to Japan and South Korea is up three- or four-fold and tours are fully booked. Nguyen Thi Tuyet Mai, marketing and communications manager at Ben Thanh Tourist, said more and more people prefer tours to faraway destinations like the US, Bhutan, Japan and South Korea. Last year tours to Southeast Asian countries like Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore were popular during Tet, she said. Saigontourist launched a promotion programme, with awards for lucky tourists including VN100 million (US$4,420) in cash and five-star cruise tours. More than 50,200 people have bought its inbound and outbound tours during a week before and after the New Year, 20 per cent more than last year. Travel agents said overseas tours are popular because of reasonable prices and schedules but also crowds and high prices at domestic tourist destinations. German Chancellor Angela Merkel delivers a speech at a local meeting of her Christian Democrats, CDU, in Grimmen, northern Germany. (Source: Stefan Sauer/dpa via AP) Her spokesman said Merkel had raised the issue in a telephone call with Trump on Saturday, reminding him of obligations under international human rights law. "The chancellor regrets the entry ban imposed by the US government against refugees and nationals from certain countries," spokesman Steffen Seibert said in a statement. "She is convinced that even in the necessarily resolute battle against terrorism it is not justified to place people from a certain origin or belief under general suspicion." The German government "will now examine the consequences" of the ban for German citizens with dual nationality, he added. Trump has caused consternation at home and abroad after signing a sweeping executive order on Friday suspending refugee arrivals and barring visas for travellers from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for the next three months. A federal US judge on Saturday blocked part of the ban, ordering authorities to stop deporting refugees and other travellers stuck at US airports. Merkel's condemnation comes a day after she spoke by phone with the new US president, when they discussed a range of issues from relations with Russia to the situation in the Middle East and NATO. Statements released by both sides after the call made no mention of the immigration ban, but Seibert on Sunday said Merkel had reminded the US billionaire of his human rights responsibilities. "The Geneva Refugee Convention calls on the international community to take in war refugees on humanitarian grounds," he said. "The chancellor stressed this policy in yesterday's phone call with the US president." 'UNACCEPTABLE' In an interview with European media earlier this month, Trump said Merkel had made a "catastrophic mistake" in allowing a record number of migrants into Germany. More than a million people, including hundreds of thousands from war-torn Syria, have arrived in Germany since the chancellor opened the country's doors to those fleeing conflict and persecution in 2015. Although the number of arrivals has slowed significantly in recent months, concern over the influx has fuelled support for the rightwing, anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party. Trump also came under fire on Sunday from former European Parliament president Martin Schulz, who is running against Merkel for Germany's Social Democrats in a September general election. Trump's "outrageous and dangerous" comments about women, religious communities and minority groups were "unacceptable", he said. But not all German politicians condemned the US leader. Bavarian state premier Horst Seehofer, a Merkel ally but also one of her strongest critics on immigration, praised Trump for sticking to his campaign pledges. "He is implementing his campaign promises one by one with consistency and speed," Seehofer told Germany's bestselling Bild am Sonntag newspaper. Seehofer added however that he did not agree with all of Trump's decisions. The court also opined that the order passed by the Supreme Court on jallikattu would have a bearing on the future course of action on Kambala as well. By Nolan Pinto: Notwithstanding repeated pleas made by counsels for various Kambala organisations, the Chief Justice of the Karnataka High Court on Monday refused to lift the ban on the buffalo-racing sport. He told them that it would be better to wait for the Supreme Court's decision on Jallikattu that is expected on Tuesday before he takes a call on Kambala. advertisement "The court said since the ordinance passed by the Tamil Nadu government has been challenged by filing an application in the Supreme Court and the matter is coming up for hearing on Tuesday, let us wait. We also filed a request in the court that in case the Jallikattu order was pronounced on Tuesday or Wednesday, we be allowed to move the matter before the division bench itself and the Court has agreed to that", said S Rajashekar, counsel for the Kambala Committee. The court also opined that the order passed by the Supreme Court would have a bearing on this case as well. FATE OF KAMBALA DEPENDS ON JALLIKATTU VERDICT BV Acharya, a senior advocate representing the Kambala Samiti, said that if the Supreme Court upheld the Jallikattu ordinance in spite of the risks involved and the pain caused to animals, the chances of ban on Kambala being lifted would go up. But just in case the apex court said that jallikattu would not be allowed, it could not immediately be said following that ruling that Kambala also would not be allowed. "Whatever happens to the apex court judgment and whatever law the state government passes, we are confident that in the next hearing, we will be able to convince the high court that it is not proper to ban Kambala and that it must be held, he told India Today. Also read | Kambala supporters take out procession in Karnataka, demand ordinance to lift ban Acharya is confident that even without the legal backing of the state government, they may be able to win. "In the meantime, if the state passes a regular legislation, it will further strengthen our hands to fight the case before the high court", he continued. ANIMAL RIGHTS ACTIVISTS FILED PLEA AGAINST KAMBALA IN 2016 The Karnataka High Court had stayed the conduct of Kambala in November 2016 on a petition filed by animal rights activists. However, the government of Karnataka not wanting a Marina beach-like situation in the state, immediately resolved to move an amendment in the forthcoming assembly session that begins on February 6. "The cabinet has decided to get this done and either on February 7 or 8, we will discuss this in the assembly", said Moodbidri MLA and former Minister Abhaychandra Jain. There are 14 MLAs from South Canara in the legislative assembly and all support Kambala since it is close to the hearts of the people in those districts and none of these 14 would want to face their wrath. "When Jallikattu is allowed, Kambala should also be allowed. We MLAs are the voice of the people and hence we will fight for this in the assembly, Jain added. advertisement Also read | Kambala agitation: 10 things you should know about the buffalo race WATCH VIDEO --- ENDS --- The year of the rooster 2017 is believed to be promising and favorable. Archeological studies show that the rooster was a vestige of Vietnams agricultural civilization, which can be seen on Dong Son bronze drums. There are images of roosters in temples and pagodas devoted Mother Goddess worship. The rooster appears in Dong Ho folk paintings and in folk toys like the rooster-shaped clay whistle of the Nung ethnic group in northern Vietnam. Long ago, the Vietnamese offered roosters to their ancestors to call for the sun to return on New Years Eve, believed to be the darkest night of the year. The rooster is chosen as a sacred sacrifice because the Vietnamese think it connects the world of the living and the world of genies. Thats why the biggest and strongest cocks, like the Dong Tao big-foot species, are chosen for worship rituals. Nguyen Xuan Vet, a resident of Dong Tao hamlet, Hung Yen province, said Dong Tao chickens are spiritually meaningful. They crow loudly to ask for sunlight on the earth. This species was considered so precious that it was offered to Kings to eat. In the myth Son Tinh-Thuy Tinh about the God of the Mountain and the God of the Water, 9-spur roosters are mentioned as one of the three wedding presents demanded by the Hung King of the would-be groom of Princess My Nuong. Surprisingly, the mythical 9-spur roosters have been found recently and many people use them as sacrifices on New Years Eve. A poultry farm in Phu Tho province, home of myth Son Tinh-Thuy Tinh, has been successful in breeding this rare rooster species, which cost VND3 million (US$133) each. Nguyen Nhu So, the owner of the farm, said "These special chickens are reserved for special days: death anniversaries, Lunar New Year, and weddings. It would be great if a future groom offered his fiancees family a 9-spur rooster. The rooster image is popular among Vietnams ethnic groups. The Tay and the Nung believe that if a familys cocks crow first in the New Year, that family will be blessed with good luck and happiness. The most important thing a man should bring to his fiancees house for the wedding proposal is a pair of castrated cocks. Castrated cocks should be part of big events like a village founding, a house warming, or a harvest. For many Vietnamese families, the rooster is a sacred animal believed to bring wealth, health, and success to the owners. Small-sized banks are making great efforts to grow to avoid being merged or acquired. VietA Bank, for example, plans to promote retail sales and focus on individual customers and small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Although VietA Banks non-performing loan ratio in late September 2016 reduced to 1.17 per cent from 2.25 per cent in early 2016, its provisions for risky loans rose by 82 per cent to VND71 billion (US$3.12 million), strongly affecting the profit result. Following the first three quarters of 2016, VietA Bank posted pre-tax profit of only VND101 billion. Another case is Kienlongbank, which was transformed from a rural bank to an urban bank. The bank aims to become a retail bank targeting SMEs operating in agriculture and rural areas. However, Kienlongbank is also facing difficulties like other small banks in the banking system. The bank failed to complete its 2016 profit plan, with pre-tax profit of only VND19.8 billion recorded in the first nine months of 2016, a decline of 90 per cent compared with the same period of 2015. Kienlongbanks bad debts increased from 1.12 per cent in the beginning of 2016 to 1.46 per cent by late September 2016. Financial expert Tran Du Lich said the more important task for small banks, at present, is to find solutions to successfully carry out restructuring and improve financial capacity, thereby avoiding being merged or acquired. In an attempt to avoid M&As, small banks also plan to raise capital and have conducted self-restructuring in recent years through internal resources, however, many have repeatedly been unsuccessful. Saigonbank, for example, has not fulfilled its plan to increase charter capital to VND4 trillion following its refusal to merge with Vietcombank. VietA Bank also managed to raise its capital to just VND3.5 trillion in early 2016 and no further progress has been recorded since then. Following the failure of the merger deal (according to rumours) with Export Import Commercial Joint Stock Bank (Eximbank), NamA Bank has also been unable to increase capital as expected. The current charter capital of the bank is just more than VND3 trillion. The central bank recently also allowed VietBank to increase charter capital from VND3 trillion to VND3.249 trillion. With this level of charter capital, VietBank remains at the top of banks with the lowest charter capital in the market, along with other banks whose legal capital has reached only VND3 trillion, such as Kienlongbank, VietCapital Bank, NCB and Saigonbank. However, according to experts, if small banks want to survive without conducting M&As, they must raise their financial capacity. Meanwhile, foreign investors are not interested in weak domestic banks if the controlling regulations are not relaxed. As long as the ownership limit of foreign investors is still less than 51 per cent, foreign shareholders cannot take control of the bank. According to economist Le Xuan Nghia, since weak and small banks are finding it difficult to increase financial capacity to accelerate the settlement of bad debts and restructuring, it is in their interests to find potential partners to conduct M&As. As Trump pushes for US manufacturing, Made in America is losing its luster in the fashion world The Omnipotent Owl Why Are We Drawn to This Ancient Symbol of Wisdom? Like a great sage, an owl sits stock-still, seeing everything, but saying nothing. When she takes action, it is swift and precise. These bold characteristics have earned the owl both respect and fear among humans; yet any great big eyes set into a fluffy body is sure to have broad By India Today Web Desk: January was considered as the coldest month in Kashmir but the snowfall this year in the Valley has been witnessed after almost a decade. A heavy snowfall like this was last recorded back in 2006 in the hilly areas of Kashmir. The most affected areas by the snowfall this year are the hilly areas of North Kashmir, where 8 to 12 feet of snow got accumulated on the surface. advertisement Locals in Gurez Valley say that they have seen such snowfall after 20 years ,"more than 25 houses got collapsed by the snow in Gurez area of Bandipora district in North Kashmir. 18 people including 14 soldiers died in Gurez Valley due to snow avalanches. While 25 people including 10 soldiers were rescued under snow" police officials from Bandipora said. Authorities issued fresh snow avalanche warnings in Bandipora, Kupwara, Baramulla and Kargil districts of J&K after the fresh snowfall on sunday evening. About 250 vehicles stuck on Jammu-Srinagar highway were cleared on sunday and were allowed to move towards Srinagar, but after the fresh snowfall, the Qazigund and Jawahir tunnel highway were closed and while the snow is being cleared. Many far flung areas in Kashmir Valley still remain cut off from nearby towns and cities including Thangdhar, Gurez ,Drass and Kargil. Aru valley continues to remain cut-off from Pahalgam, however, snow clearance operation continues. Three departments' R&B, MED and PDA are jointly clearing the snow and debris of snow avalanches accumulated on the 12 km long road. All the three departments have pressed men and machinery to clear the road. PDA AEE Sajad Malik said that the 9 km stretch out of the 12 km strectch has been made trafficable and the work on the rest of the three kilometres is on. Meanwhile, Aru residents expressed deep anguish against BSNL authorities for not restoring power supply and telecommunication services in the area. People living in other far flung areas of Valley are also facing the similar kind of problems. Also Watch: Jammu Kashmir: 10 soldiers killed in Gurez avalanche, rescue operations still on --- ENDS --- Would love your thoughts, please comment. Democracy has taken root in some areas at a local level since Cambodia held its first commune council elections 15 years ago, but the capacity of local officials to deliver services is still limited, analysts say. Governance specialist Ok Serei Sopheak told a Hello VOA last week that the local politics was more transparent than before; people receive better services, and they are more able to speak out if they receive poor services from local governments. However, with low funding for local development crucial needs such as schooling and healthcare still falls short of demand, he said. The development is still ill-funded with most of the budget allocated being used for paying officials, Serei Sopheak said. Therefore, from one year to another this low budget can only be used for fixing roads after destruction from rains. There are still demands in schools, health centers, agriculture, and finding markets. Sopheak said there is a lack of cooperation between police and elected officials at the commune level. The police do not seem to pay attention to commune chiefs on processing paperwork, he said. They do things independently, which has led to inactivity. But people are braver and dare to express their dissatisfaction. Cambodia held its first commune council elections on February 3, 2002, beginning a process of decentralization. Serei Sopheak said the legal and administrative capacity of commune councilors was still limited, prompting the central government to appoint clerks, who are trained by the Ministry of Interior. This is also another source of conflict because some clerks do not cooperate well with their councilors. As a matter of fact, if the opposition holds the post of commune chief, but the clerk favors the ruling party, there is certainly difficulty, he said. There should be reform. Currently, political parties are still in charge of nominating their candidates to run for the commune positions. This makes the parties influence on the elected officials even stronger. This is in contrast to what voters want. They want their commune chiefs to be accountable directly with them, Serei Sopheak said. He added that the best solution would be to amend the election law to allow individuals to run for office without being a member of a political party. If we can do that, I think the commune chiefs or the city mayor are accountable to their people rather than the party. This is a big political reform and I dare not believe that it will happen any time soon. But if the reform is through this path, I believe that there will be a big and positive change. The next commune council election is schedule for June 4. A member of Prime Minister Hun Sens Bodyguard Unit, who allegedly beat opposition party lawmakers in 2015, has been promoted to the rank of general. The other two bodyguards were promoted to colonel, according to a royal degree dated November 18, which was recently shared with journalists. Cambodian National Rescue Party lawmakers Nhay Chamroeun and Kong Saphea were savagely beaten near the National Assembly in October 2015 by a group of protesters known to be CPPs supporters. After Hun Sen called on the attackers to come forward, in November of the same year, three of his bodyguards, Chhay Sarith, Mao Hoeun, and Soth Vanny, claimed responsibility. They were sentenced to serve 12 months of a 4-year sentence. After being imprisoned for one year, the three bodyguards were released on November 4. In the royal degree, Sarith was promoted from a colonel to a one-star general. Hoeun and Vanny were also promoted from lieutenant colonels to colonels. Chhum Socheat, a Defense Ministry spokesman, could not be reached for comment. Socheat, however, told the Phnom Penh Post on Wednesday that the promotion of Sarith was legitimate. Their punishment has already been served through the court, they can go back to work and, for promotions, and its implemented according to individual [circumstances], Socheat was quoted as saying. Saphea, one of the victims of the attack, said attacking a lawmaker is a serious crime and the perpetrators should be fired. The perpetrators who committed a serious crime [by] beating lawmakers who represent millions of people won promotion while they are serving a suspended sentence, which is not even over yet, he said. That encourages other perpetrators and promotes violence, he added. Sok Sam Oeun, a leading human rights lawyer, said there is no law banning the promotion of an official who had served time in prison. However, he added that the promotion of the three bodyguards was too quick. We cannot promote only when there is a law. If we quickly look at [the promotion], talking about morality, it can lead the public to suspect that [the attack] was following an order. In short, it [the promotion] was too quick, he said. Thousands of demonstrators gathered in front of the White House and at airports around the country to protest President Donald Trumps executive order temporarily barring entry to people from seven Muslim majority nations. VOAs Katherine Gypson looks at how the second day of protests unfolded in Los Angeles, New York City and Washington, DC. A temporary U.S. immigration ban against three African nations is a concern for the entire continent, the outgoing head of the African Union commission said Monday as dozens of African leaders met for an annual summit. In Africa the ban targets Libya, Somalia, Sudan, predominantly Muslim nations with already complicated, sometimes strained, relations with the United States. The U.S. government does not maintain an embassy in either Libya or Somalia, largely because of safety concerns. But in a speech before dozens of African leaders at the opening of the African Union summit on Monday, commission chairwoman Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma said this ban affects all African nations. Excellencies, it is clear that globally, we are entering very turbulent times, she said ... the very country to whom many of our people were taken as slaves during the transatlantic slave trade has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries. What do we do about this? Indeed, this is one of the greatest challenges to our unity and solidarity. The 90-day ban also includes Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen. The seven countries represent about 12 percent of the world's Muslims, and the White House says they are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. The Trump administration says the ban, and a 120 ban on accepting refugees, is in place while U.S. immigration laws and security can be reviewed in order to enhance public safety. Somalias foreign minister Abdisalam Omer told VOA his country is still optimistic about its relations with the United States, it is too soon to be concerned about that, he said. But the ban, he said, is worrying. We are always sorry to see that people from particularly places where war is being waged now, who are running for their safety, to be told they could not come to the most powerful country in the world, to a country thats built on refugees and asylum seekers and people who are running from droughts and prosecution and wars and all that, he said. Equally important," he added, "is that one needs to think about international terrorism and how to defeat it, and we need all to come together, not to discriminate against each other. Separately, Sudan's Information Minister Ahmed Bilal told VOA's English to Africa service that he sees no reason for Sudan to be among those listed as a state sponsor of terror. That label was affixed in 1993 amid concerns about Sudans links to Hamas, Hezbollah and al-Qaida, but Sudans government says it has recently ramped up its counterterrorism efforts. Bilal says his country hopes the United States will lift the ban after 90 days. He said he thinks the order will damage the United States "because it will make America almost isolated from the world." At AU headquarters in Addis Ababa, even nations that dont have formal relations with the United States, like the disputed Western Sahara territory that claims independence from Morocco, says this affects them. That territorys ambassador-at-large, Sidi Omar, told VOA the ban is alarming. As a matter of principle, restrictions should not be made on the basis of religion, or any kind of distinction, as to gender, religion, race or ethnicity, Omar said. So thats really a matter of great concern to us and to, I understand, the larger Muslim community." Omar said he understands the ban was presented as a measure to "counter terrorism and violent extremism," but he said "extremist elements may actually benefit out of this. And presenting it as something that is anti-Islamic, anti-Muslim ... will feed into the rhetoric that the West is against Islam and so on and so forth. And that concern was echoed, indirectly, by new U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres, who praised African leaders for accepting refugees, and urged African nations to remain open to those seeking shelter and safety. When asked by VOA how many refugees might be affected by the U.S. ban, he did not answer, but said that in the future, I strongly hope that refugee protection will become again high on the agenda of the United States. Malaysian authorities expanded the search for five Chinese tourists and a boat crew member still missing at sea Monday two days after their boat sank off Borneo island. Police also detained two crew members to assist the investigation. Three Chinese died but 22 people from the boat were rescued, most of them after huddling together in the rough waters, wearing life vests and forming human chains, finally being saved by fishermen after more than 10 hours adrift. Malaysia's Maritime Enforcement Agency said in a statement that the search area has been expanded by about four times to 1,500 square nautical miles of the South China Sea off Sabah state. It said Brunei has also deployed a plane to search in its waters. Government minister Shahidan Kassim was reported by the national Bernama news agency as saying that the 20 Chinese tourists rescued were weak, shivering and sunburnt but had sustained no serious injuries. The survivors were brought ashore late Sunday and hospitalized. Shahidan said rescuers were running out of time as one of the survivors had told authorities that one of the missing six had died. Their catamaran left Sabah's capital, Kota Kinabalu, Saturday morning to Pulau Mengalum, an island 60 kilometers (38 miles) west, and was reported missing about 12 hours later. The 28 passengers were Chinese and the boat had three crew members. The captain and one crew member were rescued by another tourist boat Sunday afternoon, and fishermen found the 20 other survivors along with the three dead, two men and a woman, a few hours later. The Bernama news agency said they had been adrift for 10 hours but didn't say when the boat sank or give other details. Sabah police chief Ramli Din tweeted that the boat captain and crew member have been held to facilitate investigations. He didn't elaborate. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang in a statement Sunday expressed profound condolences to the affected families. Geng called on Malaysia to continue to make all-out efforts in its search and rescue work, as well as to carry out an impartial and objective investigation into the accident. Malaysia's Sabah and Sarawak states share Borneo island with Brunei and Indonesia's Kalimantan province. Many Chinese travel abroad during the Lunar New Year holiday, which began Saturday. Using a combination of diplomacy and muscle, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) forced longtime Gambian President Yahya Jammeh to cede power this month to challenger Adama Barrow, who won the nations general election. Neighboring Senegal amassed troops and threatened to remove Jammeh by force. Regional powerhouse Nigeria threatened to help. The presidents of Mauritania and Guinea conducted shuttle diplomacy between Gambias capital of Banjul and Senegal, where Barrow had fled. Jammeh finally agreed to go into exile on January 20. Despite the successful outcome, some question the wisdom of ECOWAS intervening on behalf of the people of the Gambia. Ezekiel Gebissa, a professor of history and African studies at Kettering University in Michigan, said that the military intervention is not something that should be replicated elsewhere. If the reason for the intervention by ECOWAS in the Gambia is to save democracy and restore constitutional rule, then I think [it] would be counterproductive because a democracy that is imposed from outside by using military force cannot be an enduring democracy, he said. Sadiq Ibrahim, a member of the ECOWAS parliament and a lawmaker in Nigerias National Assembly, said that although the regional body must respect the sovereignty of each member nation, there are exceptions that demand direct action. If we have a situation that can threaten the security of a member nation and the entire region, the ECOWAS can collectively intervene to ensure peace in that country, he said. Gambia was 'peculiar situation' This was not the first time ECOWAS has intervened in the affairs of one of its member states. In 1990, the military intervention known as ECOMOG led largely by Nigeria helped end the Liberian civil war. Another ECOWAS intervention took place in Mali in 2013 where soldiers from ECOWAS countries worked in collaboration with French and other African forces. ECOWAS used Article 58 of its revised treaty relating to regional security to justify the intervention, according to Nigerian legal expert Barrister Hassan Liman. Liman said the law stipulates that member states must work to safeguard and consolidate relations to maintain peace, stability and security within the region. He added that the article does not give ECOWAS the right to use force to oust a leader. The peculiar situation we have in Gambia is that there was a peaceful election and the president lost but refused to concede defeat. Obviously in this case the regional force can act to ensure regional peace, he said. Liman said that Africas continental body, the African Union, could look to follow the example of ECOWAS as it tries to resolve crises in Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo and in South Sudan. Political analyst Abdurrahman Abu Hamisu said ECOWAS also has an economic incentive to prevent instability in one of its member nations. The expenses ECOWAS would have incurred if the crisis had erupted in Gambia could have outweighed what has been spent in this intervention effort, he said. J. Peter Pham, director of the Atlantic Councils Africa Center, said ECOWAS has signaled for years that it would intervene in a case such as this, so its actions should come as no surprise. There is an agreement within ECOWAS, the acknowledgment that elections stand and if you lose elections you leave, Pham said on VOAs Press Conference USA. Pham added that there is another lesson to be learned from the Barrow side's tactics. Aides to the newly elected president began talking about prosecuting Jammehs inner circle right after the election, when it was clear Barrow had won and Jammeh had lost. But such talk may have unintentionally derailed a peaceful transition of power, Pham suggested. That scared Mr. Jammeh and his people and they rethought the wisdom of giving up power because they thought that meant consequences [for them], he said. Im not arguing for impunity, but perhaps that conversation should have been saved for a later moment. Nasiru Adamu El Hikaya contributed to this story from Abuja. Saturday's phone conversation between presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin has raised the hopes of many Russian politicians for a U.S.-Russian rapprochement. But other observers in Moscow remain more cautious about the prospects for bilateral relations in the Trump era. According to the White House, the two leaders discussed topics ranging from "cooperation in defeating ISIS [Islamic State]to efforts in working together to achieve more peace throughout the world including Syria," in a phone call that was "a significant start to improving the relationship between the United States and Russia that is in need of repair." The Kremlin said the two presidents "expressed their readiness to make active joint efforts to stabilize and develop Russia-U.S. cooperation on a constructive, equitable and mutually beneficial basis." It also said they discussed the fight against terrorism, the Middle East, the Arab-Israeli conflict, strategic stability and non-proliferation, Iran's nuclear program, the situation on the Korean Peninsula, and "the main aspects of the Ukrainian crisis." Trump and Putin called for "real coordination of actions" aimed at "defeating ISIS and other terrorist groups in Syria," and "stressed the importance of rebuilding mutually beneficial trade and economic ties between the two counties' business communities," the Kremlin reported. Anti-IS coalition Following the call, Leonid Slutsky, head of the international affairs committee of the State Duma, the lower house of Russia's parliament, said he expects Washington and Moscow to forge a joint fight against Islamic State. "The next step, I am sure, will be negotiations to create a broad anti-terrorist coalition in Syria, the formation of which the Russian president called for in 2015 from the rostrum of the U.N. General Assembly," Slutsky said. Slutsky also said he believes that references to economic issues in the conversation between Trump and Putin were a "positive signal for investors and, in general, for the prospects of mending relations between our countries." No word on sanctions Some Russian parliamentarians suggested the two presidents intentionally and rightly avoided discussing sanctions that the United States imposed on Russia for annexing Crimea and backing separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine. "For tactical reasons, it was premature to raise the issue of lifting the sanctions in the first conversation," Mikhail Emelyanov, deputy head of the Just Russia party's faction in the Duma, told the Interfax news agency. "I think that in the process of improving Russian-American relations, in the process solving international problems of mutual interest, the issue of sanctions will be resolved of its own accord." While it is no surprise that leading Russian politicians spoke approvingly of the Trump-Putin phone conversation, some Russian foreign policy experts say it is premature to make favorable forecasts about the future of U.S.-Russian relations. "It seems to me that neither Putin nor Trump knows what constitutes the crux of the matter in our relations with America," Viktor Kremeniuk, deputy director of the Institute for U.S. and Canadian Studies, told VOA's Russian service. "The fact that we will necessarily cooperate in the fight against ISIS helps us find some common ground. But, in my opinion, it doesn't go beyond that, neither with the Americans, nor with us. "Trump probably wants expand cooperation with Russia," Kremeniuk added. "But I'm not sure that he has a program for such an expansion, and I'm not sure that what he can offer will appeal to Putin." Thorny issues remain Thorny issues like the annexation of Crimea and war in eastern Ukraine are unlikely to continue to "color" the U.S.-Russian relationship, he said, adding that he believes the Trump administration is willing to soften the U.S. position on Crimea. Andrei Kolesnikov of the Carnegie Moscow Center told VOA's Russian service it is no accident the issue of lifting sanctions was not discussed in the two leaders' phone call. "The conversation took place amid rumors that Trump had already prepared a draft document on lifting the sanctions, and everyone understandably got worked up, because he was showing that he is strictly carrying out his agenda, from a wall with Mexico to anti-immigrant legislation," he said. "But, apparently, it is precisely with this issue the issue of lifting sanctions against Russia that something needs to be coordinated with partners from the EU and the U.K. in general, with partners in the Western world." He added, "Apparently, [British Prime Minister] Theresa May is not thrilled with this idea, and the EU is clearly strongly against it. Perhaps Trump decided to back off a little bit in this matter, although in the Kremlin's press release there is a phrase, very vague, about the importance of establishing mutually beneficial trade and economic ties." According to the Kremlin, the two presidents agreed to issue instructions to work out the possible date and venue for a face-to-face meeting. "There was apparently nothing extraordinary in this conversation," Kolesnikov said. "This is called putting a toe in the water. If the water is warm, you can move farther in." She Decides is a global fundraising initiative launched by the Dutch Minister of Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation last Saturday. The campaign is trying to raise money to offer family planning services to women in developing countries. The crowdfunding effort was established in response to a decree signed last week by U.S. President Donald Trump. His order, also known as the Mexico City policy, prohibits federal funding to groups and organizations that support abortions. Dutch Minister Lilianne Ploumen said in a video message she received an overwhelming amount of supporting messages from around the world after she voiced her plan to set up an international safe abortion fund. We want to raise funds to make sure women and girls all over the world have access to family planning services, " she said, "Please join us, spread the word. It is time that she decides. The first $10 million donation came from the Dutch government. Multinational effort Ploumen is now actively lobbying other governments and organizations to close the $600 million funding gap. Canada is said to be enthusiastic about the Dutch initiative and so is Belgium. Belgian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Development Cooperation Alexander de Croo announced he will host an international conference this spring in Brussels. The aim is to bring together like-minded countries and organizations when it comes to the topic of womens rights and family planning. De Croo said in a statement that this is an issue of human rights. This White House decision has a direct impact on the lives of millions of girls and women in developing countries," he said. "Information on family planning and the possibility of abortion are of great importance for the development of girls and women. The Belgian ministry did not want to say yet which countries, institutions and companies are attending, but said the responses have been positive. One of the affected organizations will be Marie Stopes International, which provides contraception and abortion services to women in 37 countries. Last year it received about $30 million from the U.S. Agency for International Development, for expanding access to contraception in developing countries. Will Harris of Marie Stopes International said the decree leaves the organization with a 17 percent budget cut for 2017. In 2001, the last time the Mexico City Policy was re-enacted, we saw a number of European governments step up their funding commitments," said Harris. "However, with aid budgets today under unprecedented pressure from the challenges of the 21st century, we can take nothing for granted. The group believes without alternative funding, the impact of the decree between 2017 and 2020 will be 6.5 million unintended pregnancies, 2.1 million unsafe abortions and 21,700 maternal deaths. Many American Republican politicians oppose abortions, while this is not as much of a public debate in most European countries. The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation says the initiative is not against President Trump or the United States, but is focusing on the millions of women they believe will not have access to information, contraceptives and abortions. Former President Ronald Reagan imposed the Mexico City policy in 1984. It was repealed by President Bill Clinton, re-imposed by President George W. Bush and repealed again by President Barack Obama. Kenya is fighting female genital mutilation by sheltering at-risk girls at a boarding school in the Maasai region. Deputy head teacher Lucy Itore has rescued more than 100 girls and sheltered them at the Ilbisil Boarding Primary School in Kajiado, where the Maasai live and practice FGM. FGM is a cultural practice that practitioners say ensures a girls purity and eligibility for marriage. A family member or practitioner often performs the cutting and mutilation of a girls genitals. Sometimes the cut removes the clitoris. Sometimes the vulva is sliced and sewn up, leaving a small channel. Sometimes all a girls external genitalia are removed. The painful procedure is debilitating physically and psychologically, survivors say. Some girls have bled to death or died from infection when dirty razors or knives were used. According to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) the practice is found in communities around the world. While FGM is a crime under federal law, it is legal in 26 U.S. states. Sweden prosecutes parents who take a girl out of the country to be mutilated. Peninah Tombo, a Maasai retired nurse and human rights activist, said girls experience intense pain during the ritual cut, still a common practice among the Maasai community. But activists, educators and officials are fighting back. This December holiday weve rescued over 30 girls, Itore said. Some of them have gone through the cut. Through the help of [local officials], we have been able to rescue many girls in this area. One of the girls living at the school is Mary, 13. She said her parents performed FGM on her four years ago. My dad came to school and requested for permission from my teachers to allow me go home, she explained. I went home and at around 9 p.m. that night, my parents forced me to undergo the ritual cut. Most cases are carried out in secret. Kenya outlawed FGM in 2011. If caught, perpetrators face a minimum three-year jail term or fine, and life imprisonment if a girl dies from the ritual practice. Because of the arrest threat, families are carrying out the practice earlier and earlier to ensure a girls eligibility for marriage. Critics argue that when a girls parents are arrested and jailed, that leaves the girl and her siblings alone and imperiled. Whats happening now is that they are doing it silently. Girls are taken through the FGM at night, Itore said. The parents of a girl she rescued pretended that they reconciled with the girl, she said. They took her home and mutilated her. Its painful, having kept her at the center for four years, and within a twinkle of an eye she has gone through FGM. Family's wrath Rescuers sometimes face the wrath of families of rescued girls. When we started I was about to be killed, because the stepfather was wondering why I should rescue the girls instead of them being married off, Tombo said. He thought of killing me It is not an easy job. You have to sacrifice your life. Its a matter of life and death. Itores program is unique because when she enters villages, she is accompanied by police. So far, she has saved more than 140 girls who are under her care on the school compound. The deputy head teacher said, unlike many girls from her community, she was lucky to escape FGM and attend school. But it was not with her parents total approval. I was lucky that my parents took me to school. They educated me up to high school, she explained. But immediately after high school I disagreed with my father because he wanted to marry me off. I ran away and went to stay with my uncle. I was lucky that I had an educated uncle in Nairobi. I ran to his place and rescued me. Itore studied at college and became a teacher. Her boarding school houses about 50 girls. Its a bit hard because we have to look for school fees, and money for personal use, Itore said. More than 125 million women have been mutilated in 29 countries in Africa and the Middle East, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), which condemns the practice as a "violation of the human rights" of women. Tombo underwent genital cutting at the age of 11. The retired nurse said she was devastated. Now, she spends most of her time helping Maasai girls escape FGM and forced early marriage. The five soldiers, who were rescued after a grueling day-long mission and brought to Srinagar for specialised treatment, have succumbed to their injuries. By Praveen Shekhar, Shuja-ul-Haq : The five soldiers, who had been trapped under snow after the caving in of a track in Macchil sector on Saturday, died today. They were rescued after a grueling day-long mission and brought to Srinagar for specialised treatment despite persistent poor weather conditions. The mortal remains of 14 soldiers in Gurez, which could not be evacuated earlier because of inclement weather, were also brought to Srinagar today in Air Force helicopters. They will be taken to their native places tomorrow for the last rites. advertisement The Valley has been witnessing bad weather over the past one week due to western disturbances. ALSO READ | J-K: Bodies of Gurez avalanche martyrs brought to Srinagar The incident comes days after two avalanches hit a military post and a patrol along the LoC, killing 15. Kashmir saw heavy snow this week and the authorities had warned of "high danger" of avalanches. Power and communication lines are also down in some areas. Officials evacuated dozens of residents from high-risk areas after authorities issued an avalanche warning in many parts of the region. ALSO READ | Avalanches hit Kashmir's Gurez, 10 jawans killed, 4 missing, rescue efforts on WATCH | Mortal remains of 15 jawans killed in avalanches to be brought to Srinagar --- ENDS --- Federal counterterrorism authorities in Pakistan have banned a local charity that is suspected of luring recruits to battle alongside Iranian-backed fighters supporting government forces in Syrias civil war. The ban on Ansar ul-Hussain, reported by Pakistani media last week, took effect on Dec. 30, according to the website of the National Counter Terrorism Authority (NACTA), which monitors terrorist organizations in the country. The ban makes it illegal for the group to operate in Pakistan. Abdul Qayyum, chairperson of the Senate Defense Committee and leading member of the ruling Muslim League party, told VOA that following the ban, Pakistan is further pursuing if any other network is involved in recruiting people for Syria within Pakistan. Little publicized in Pakistan, Ansar ul-Hussain, which bills itself as a Shi'ite humanitarian organization, has quietly been luring and sending Shiite youths from several northwestern areas in Pakistan to Iran, where they are trained to fight and then sent to Syria, according to media reports and local intelligence officials. Ansar ul-Hussain has been skilled at avoiding surveillance, but Pakistani authorities say they were able to detect its recruiting activities. We have a very effective system of tracing and eliminating terrorism within the country, said Qayyum, a retired lieutenant general. Thats the reason we were able to catch and ban Ansar-ul-Hussain. Islamabad's counterterrorism measures have been widely criticized by many Pakistani politicians and U.S. lawmakers for being largely ineffective. As militant groups continue to flourish in Pakistan, the government is facing threats of increasing diplomatic isolation from some U.S. lawmakers over its inability to curb homegrown militancy and the threat it poses to its neighbors. Pakistani media reported last year that more than 1,000 Pakistanis are fighting in Syria alongside Irans elite Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The recruited Pakistanis are reported deployed in the Zaynabiyoun Brigade in Syria, which is comprised of Pakistani fighters recruited from inside and outside Pakistan, including Pakistani students in Iran, analysts told VOA. There are a number of Pakistani Shia who are in Iran, said Phillip Smyth, a researcher at the University of Maryland who focuses on Irans role in the Syrian war. At times, they are there for religious learning, and these types are more easily recruited due to the Islamic Republic's mixing of ideology and religion. Tehran says its forces are in Syria to protect the Zeinab Shrine in Damascus, a Shi'ite holy site. But since 2011, Iran has been a major backer of the Syrian regime in its war with rebel groups across the country, at first sending advisers, then forces from the IRGC expanding far beyond the shrine area. The Pakistani fighters presence is known inside Syria, according to watchdog groups monitoring the fighting. Pakistani fighters have been spotted with pro-Iranian militias, including Irans proxy, the Lebanese Hezbollah. The primary role of Pakistani militia is to fight in areas around Damascus, Ahmed Khaddour, a media activist from eastern Damascus, told VOA, talking of where pro-Iranian forces are prevalent. Pakistani recruits for the Syria fight are often lured to Iran by social media, Smyth said. This has been done on Twitter and on Facebook, he said. It often involves posted phone numbers where potential recruits could call in and state their abilities and see if they were applicable to be recruited. Pakistani recruits are promised financial incentives and Iranian citizenship, analysts say. The IRGC organized a rally in Tehran last summer to honor fallen Pakistani fighters in Syria. We have thousands of fighters in the brigadefighting in front lines, Abu Talib Musawi, a Pakistani fighter in Syria, told the Tehran-based conservative Panjera magazine. VOA could not independently verify his account. A Facebook page, which bears Ansar ul-Hussain name, lambasted the Pakistani governments decision to ban the organization. The page pledges allegiance to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. We are proud that you are our leader, the Facebook post reads. In struggling Wapello County, a swath of southeast Iowa Donald Trump was the first Republican to carry in 44 years, his earliest and most devout supporters cheer the new president's quick action on health care, trade, energy and immigration, including accelerated construction of the long-promised Mexican border wall. And yet, even these voters, to whom Trump disproportionately owes his presidency, roll their eyes at his ongoing fixation with his popularity. "He's said what needs to be done, and he's doing it," said Viki Wilson, a retired trucking company operator from Ottumwa, Wapello County's seat. "He's just got to sort the small stuff from the big stuff." Far from the cacophony enveloping Washington in Trump's first week in office, the Iowa voters who helped him capture the state and the presidency last November give the president high marks for reversing eight years of Democrat Barack Obama's policies. But they shake their heads at his widely debunked claims about the crowd size for his inauguration and voter fraud costing him the popular vote. Wilson is like hundreds of Trump supporters in this county of about 35,000 people, a former Democrat in a once union-heavy city who embraced Trump's candidacy out of frustration with the region's high unemployment. Like Wapello, working-class counties that were once home to thriving union Democratic precincts, such as Racine County, Wisconsin, and Macomb County, Michigan, voted decidedly for Trump in November, and helped him carry the entire northern arc of states from Iowa to Pennsylvania. Cherie Westrich of Ottumwa had never been politically active. But the 51-year-old antique car rebuilder had researched the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade agreement between the United States and Asian nations, and concluded the treaty would benefit U.S. corporations, not its workers. By signing an order withdrawing from the 12-nation treaty brokered by Obama, Trump made good on what he argued was a pledge to protect U.S. workers from competition in low-wage Asian countries. "No matter if you agree or disagree on this campaign promise, there's no question he's jumping right on it," said Westrich, who became an active volunteer for Trump in Ottumwa last fall. It's the kind of promise that drew hundreds of newcomers to Wapello County's Republican presidential caucuses almost exactly a year ago when Trump finished a surprising second to Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. Wilson and Westrich, like thousands of other voters in this onetime coalmining and manufacturing hub, had drifted away from their Democratic roots, emblematic of the region's shift from labor unions. For decades, the voters backed Democratic presidential candidates after supporting Richard Nixon in 1972. Vestiges of Ottumwa's better days - rows of once-majestic Victorian homes - loom on bluffs overlooking the Des Moines River where barges used to haul coal to the Mississippi. Gone are the mines and dozens of manufacturing plants, replaced by a JBS - formerly Swift - non-union meatpacking plant, the county's top employer with about 2,400 workers. John Deere's Ottumwa plant is the city's lone heavy manufacturer and, while still a union shop, employs about a third as many as the Swift plant. Making good on his trade promise and immediately giving federal agencies leeway to ignore Obama's health care law have Wapello County Republicans feeling vindicated. It has eased concerns that Trump is too easily distracted by his image and refighting his 18-month campaign. Westrich was among the 1,200 Wapello voters who attended the county's Republican presidential caucuses, twice as many as party officials had planned. She supported Trump on the hope that the brash billionaire could help revive what was once a thriving manufacturing base. Trump won her county in the caucuses nearly a year ago. And in November, he won Iowa, which was carried by Obama in 2008 and 2012. But the election is over, Westrich said. "He borders on being embarrassing. And I wish he'd stop," she said. "But when it comes to doing things that mean something, he's coming through." Trump complained last week that news organizations had underreported the size of the crowd assembled on the National Mall for his inauguration. He has repeated the false claim that he lost the popular vote - despite his Electoral College win - because millions of immigrants ineligible to vote cast ballots. Trump wants an investigation. "I don't like that he wanted to choose crowd-size at his inauguration as a fight to wage on his first day. That's piddly," said Mark Feller, an early Trump devotee from Dennison, in conservative western Iowa. "And you can't tell me he didn't win. C'mon." Instead, Feller is happy Trump revived plans to construct the Keystone XL petroleum pipeline, which was halted under Obama. Even Trump's equivocation and uncertainty about deporting children of immigrants in the country illegally is forgivable, in light of the list of other action he's tackling, said Sandy Brus of rural Crawford County near Denison. On Wednesday, Trump signed executive actions to speed construction of his promised U.S.-Mexico border wall and cut federal grants for immigrant-protecting "sanctuary cities." Brus, a retired teacher, is concerned the influx of immigrant children into Dennison, with a roughly 70 percent immigrant enrollment, is overburdening the district and underserving the students, including immigrants. "He's got people around him that are encouraging him to think things through," Brus said. "Now, they just need to take away his Twitter." When President Donald Trump abandoned the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) Deal, there was a sense of relief in India, where sectors such as apparel and pharmaceuticals were bracing for a hit. The ambitious pact between 12 countries bordering the Asia Pacific to boost trade had been a serious worry for Sudhir Dhingra, Managing Director of New Delhi-based Orient Craft, one of Indias biggest apparel exporters. India is happy to see TPP go away The reason: it would have made Indias exports less competitive as it slashed tariffs and gave countries like Vietnam and Malaysia preferential access to markets in the United States and Japan. Dhingra calls its scrapping very good news. I personally was very concerned for the trade, he explains. As it is, parts of those region are more productive, more efficient. And on top of that if you get duty free advantages, so obviously the entire business runs to these markets. Huge apparels industry in India Indias garment and textiles sector employs millions of people and about 20 percent of apparel exports are headed to the United States. The apparel industry was not the only one threatened by TPP. Indias Commerce Minister, Nirmala Sitharaman had said that the pact would impact a range of sectors like leather goods, plastics, chemicals and textiles. Effectively, the TPP meant that India would have been sidelined from a mega trade agreement which covered about 40 percent of global trade. Estimates for export losses that India would have eventually suffered have varied widely. The Peterson Institute for International Economics said Indias losses would approach $50 billion per annum if China and other countries joined the pact at a later stage. Others said it would be far less. But with losses being a near certainty, the scrapping of the TPP gives India respite, said Biswajit Dhar, trade expert and professor at New Delhis Jawaharlal Nehru University. There might be a sense of relief because TPP was threatening to introduce standards for trade liberalization and introduction of new rules which were far more stringent than those that India is comfortable with, he said. The TPP involved setting strict labor and environment regulations and higher intellectual property rights protection. Regional deals The end of TPP is now likely to turn the focus to regional agreements one of them could be the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) a bloc which includes India and China and accounts for nearly half the worlds population. Many expect that China will step in to fill the gap left by the United States as new trade deals are hammered out. Some say that will be a relief for India as China is unlikely to set the same kind of standards as the one that were envisaged for the TPP. However, many others feel that may not be any more comforting for India because it would also mean that India would have to open its markets to China. China's influence Even without preferential access, China has managed to put its footprint in the Indian economy quite substantially, pointed out trade expert Dhar. So the worry among Indian business people is that if China is given preferential market access, then there would be a real problem that they will have on their hands. India, long known for its tough business climate, complicated rules that deter investment, high taxes and stringent labor laws, has not benefited from the manufacturing boom that transformed many Asian economies in recent decades. Efforts to give a lift to manufacturing under a flagship program of Prime Minister Narendra Modi called Make in India has yet to have a significant impact. Uncertain economic future Trade experts warn with the scrapping of the TPP and more talk of protectionism by the United States, the future of global trade has become uncertain. I dont think we should cheer, said Arpita Mukherjee, a Professor at the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations. He (Trump) is also saying Make in America. It is an unknown scenario, so you should be worried. Experts are calling on India to implement reforms to make its industries globally competitive. You have to offer ease of doing business, and once you do that, you will benefit by any trade agreement, she said. Still with the looming threat of TPP off his mind, apparel exporter Dhingra remains optimistic. He and others feel it will give India breathing room as the government presses ahead with promised reforms which Modi has promised. Dhingra said different states in the country have been wooing businesses like his in the past year offering subsidies and other incentives that could help him become more competitive. There is not a week that I dont get a call from some state government or the other where they want Orient Craft to set up factories there. They are willing to give support, they are willing to give subsidies. This is something I have not seen in the past 40 years, he said. Despite losing ground elsewhere in Syria and Iraq, the so-called Islamic State (IS) group seems to be gaining momentum against forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in the eastern city of Deir Ezzor. After days of fierce clashes across the city in which dozens Syrian soldiers and IS fighters were killed, IS was able to impose a siege on a strategic military airfield Saturday, local news reports said. The Deir Ezzor military airbase is the last government-held position in the city where several residential areas are still under government control. Deir Ezzor is the capital of a province that bears the same name. IS has controlled much of the oil-rich province since 2014 and a complete control over the city is a strategic objective for the terror group, analysts said. Deir Ezzor is ISs next capital when Mosul and Raqqa are taken from it, said Nicholas A. Heras, a Middle East researcher at the Center for a New American Security, a Washington-based think tank. The Assad government's stronghold in Deir Ezzor threatens ISs ability to operate with complete freedom in eastern Syria, he told VOA. Although Russian airstrikes on IS positions in Deir Ezzor have intensified in the past few days, government forces havent been able to make any advances in the city. The fact that these (Russian) airstrikes are not supplemented with effective ground operations makes it easier for (IS) to continue fighting in Deir Ezzor, said Sadradeen Kinno, a Syrian reporter who closely follows IS military activities. He said that in other parts of Syria, government troops have relied on pro-Assad militias to battle rebel forces. But that has not been the case in Deir Ezzor, he told VOA. Most of the government soldiers in Deir Ezzor are members of local tribes, Kinno said. They only fight IS because they are forced to. Recent military successes by IS in Deir Ezzor have largely been achieved thanks to its special forces, known as Inghemasyoun or those who submerge themselves. Since its inception in 2014, IS has only used these elite fighters in major battles against opponents in Syria and Iraq. They were of particular benefit to IS in an offensive last December when they recaptured the ancient city of Palmyra from Syrian troops. These forces have proven their effectiveness in carrying out precise suicide attacks and surprise raids, reporter Kinno said. They have also broken frontlines of anti-IS forces. The role of these forces has particularly been evident in the battle for Deir Ezzor, especially with Assad military forces being entrenched in defensible positions, observers said. And such an important battle is the job for battle-hardened and well-trained foreign fighters who have been repurposed from the Mosul battle for the task, analyst Heras said. The battle for Deir Ezzor is an existential necessity for (IS) to retain a Caliphate in the Levant, he added. Im like your uncle, the old man reassured brothers Ali, 17, and Ahmad, 16, before pressing a 20 euro note into Ahmads palm. The boys had only just arrived in the Greek capital of Athens, having fled Afghanistan and their fathers murderers, the Taliban, but they had not fully escaped danger. The second time they met the man, a week later, he had company - and the brothers narrowly escaped abduction. In Greece, reports of young, unaccompanied refugees and migrants being lured into prostitution are on the rise. These reports are symptomatic of a broader failing as unaccompanied minors continue to fall through gaps in the Greek asylum process. No family, no money Ali and Ahmad arrived in a central part of Athens called Victoria Square, a well-known meeting point for refugees. Like thousands of others who had undertaken grueling journeys without adult accompaniment to reach Europe, they found themselves in a strange city with no help and little idea of what to do next. We went to Victoria because we didnt know where else to go and we thought someone could help us, said Ali. At first we thought this man was very kind. He wasnt. The second encounter - a demand for the money to be repaid, followed by a failed attempt to snatch the youngsters - is typical of the tactics used to induce vulnerable young refugees into the sex trade, said social worker Tassos Smetopoulos. Since around 60,000 refugees and migrants became trapped in Greece by the closure of borders last spring, Victoria Square and nearby Pedion tou Areos park have become known as places where young men and teenage boys sell themselves for sex to make money. There was prostitution among migrant men [in the area] before the refugee crisis, explained Smetopoulos, but with the refugee crisis they have got younger and increased in numbers. Clients - often elderly Greek men - will offer a small payment and sometimes a place to stay and shower to boys as young as 15. Increasingly desperate for money and keen to escape Greece, some are venturing into this world alone. Others, said Smetopoulos, are being entrapped. I see them, men and boys explained 18-year-old Muhammed Ansari, an Afghan who was waiting for friends at Victoria Square. They have come to me and Ive said no. But the boys have no family, and no money. Going 'off radar' Despite an identification process that is supposed to occur upon arrival in Greece, some unaccompanied minors are failing to be identified and protected. Others have chosen to remain "off-radar" in the hope it will help their efforts to move on elsewhere in Europe - a journey made illegal by border closures, save for a formal process of relocation that has sped up in recent months but remains painfully slow. The broader problem was highlighted last year when Europol - the EUs criminal intelligence agency - estimated that 10,000 unaccompanied child refugees had disappeared since arriving in Europe. Some, especially young boys, are fragile and open to suggestion, said the Salvation Armys Maria Konti-Galinou, who works extensively with refugees vulnerable to sexual exploitation around central Athens. They want to raise some money to reach the countries where their families are, added Galinou, who explained that a small number of refugee women were also becoming entrapped in the nearby red light district. Its like someone is dying and youll get the vultures coming out. According to figures from the U.N. agency assisting refugees, of 2,300 unaccompanied minors in Greece only 1,300 are being provided with shelter or adequate accommodation. Unlike others, brothers Ali and Ahmad now have a safe place to stay. They fled from the gang to the offices of Praksis, an NGO that provides accommodation tailored towards unaccompanied minors. Praksis did not comment specifically on Ali and Ahmads incident, but in an email to VOA it stated that for some men and unaccompanied minors living outside shelters due to a lack of beds things have already escalated to a level that sex working or survival sex has become their everyday life. Estimates unavailable Despite its severity, the scale of the problem remains ill-defined. While acknowledging the issue, Praksis stated that even estimates regarding this vulnerable population are not available. A spokesman for the Greek government stated that the police were collaborating with NGOs and partner organizations and receiving specialist training to help address the trafficking and sexual exploitation of vulnerable minors. The spokesman added that, as of the end of December, police had received no reports of such cases of recruitment aiming at sexual exploitation of minors. Yet having seen the trade himself from his cafe overlooking Victoria Square, Vasilis Kakomanolis questioned efforts to address the problem. If everyone here knows about this, then surely the police do? he asked, rhetorically. Following their ordeal, Ali and Ahmad now try to avoid Victoria Square for fear of bumping into the men who tried to abduct them. One day, Ali hopes, he will emulate his father and become a dentist. But as Afghan boys in Europe, a place ever less welcoming to even the most vulnerable refugees, their future remains opaque. For Smetopoulos, it is not just the authorities and NGOs in Greece that are falling short, it is the international community as a whole. These vulnerable boys need to be given a chance, he said. You need to treat children as children. Belgium has sent "man in the hat" airport bombing suspect Mohamed Abrini to France to face charges in connection with the deadly 2015 Paris terror attacks . Abrini was turned over to the French for a day to be indicted in the coordinated gun and bomb attacks that killed 130 people and injured hundreds of others on November 13, 2015. Two days before the assault on the French capital, surveillance cameras showed Abrini at a gas station on a highway to Paris, alongside Salah Abdeslam, who is believed to be the only direct participant to have survived the Paris attacks. Abdeslam fled and was arrested in Belgium on March 18, 2016, four days before suicide bombers struck the Brussels airport and Maelbrook metro station, killing 32 people and wounding scores of others. On the day of the Brussels attacks, Abrini was seen on security cameras walking through the airport, wearing a hat. Authorities say he fled the scene without detonating a bomb in his suitcase. He was arrested in April. Belgian prosecutors have said evidence suggests the Brussels assailants wanted to strike France again, but later switched their target to the Belgian capital as the Paris investigation gained momentum. Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attacks in Paris and Brussels. "Islamic State militants would bring busloads of prisoners here at night," says Bassam, a worker at a hilltop cemetery overlooking eastern Mosul. "People who had been smoking, wearing the wrong clothes or doing other things IS said were forbidden were ordered to destroy the headstones." Militants told locals that gravestones bearing their loved ones names were un-Islamic. Muslims in eastern Mosul, now entirely Iraqi-controlled for almost a week, disagreed with the IS interpretation of their religion. Bassam, living adjacent to the graveyard, saw some residents sneak into the graveyard to repair broken headstones, despite of the danger of defying IS. "They cut off my friend's head because he cursed during an argument on the street," says Omar, a baker, after burying an elderly female relative Sunday. "Any little thing could get you killed." Other residents say they intend to repair broken headstones now that IS is gone, but so many people have died during the past two-and-a-half years, it is hard to locate the burial sites. "This was a tiny local graveyard before IS," says Bassam. "But now it's huge." The graveyard, like many others in Mosul, is now so packed that bodies are buried on top of each other, or two or three to a grave, says Taha Ghanim, a Mosul resident and social studies teacher. "We were trapped," he explains, while outside a small market that sells eggs, sodas and cigarettes. "We couldn't go to Iraqi-controlled areas, so we were forced to bury all of our dead here." WATCH: Residents Tend to Loved Ones Graves Missing bodies The bodies of the people murdered by IS for being former police officers or soldiers, having extramarital affairs, using mobile phones or committing one of the many other actions IS calls "crimes" are almost all still missing. "When they killed someone," says Bassam, "they would never let you bury them." Often bodies were publicly displayed with notes describing their crimes as a warning to the public. The remains of these victims are believed to have been tossed in the trash, now lying in a large dumpsite deep inside IS-controlled western Mosul. "They murdered people and hung their bodies on traffic lights," explains Omar, the baker, and father of a one-year-old son. "We wouldn't let the children out of the house sometimes, because we didn't want them to see." Scattered throughout the city and the surrounding countryside in Iraqi-controlled territories are also the bodies of IS militants, often laying for weeks where they died. Unbearable damage At the graveyard, one mourner blames Bassam, the gravedigger, for the desecration of his family's graves. "You have taken my family gravesites and ruined them," argues Hassam Ali, who lost two sisters and a niece to Islamist extremists. "You buried other people in their plots with them." The murders took place before IS, but Ali says that, for many residents, IS, al-Qaida and other militant groups are not all that different. Bassam is defiant, saying he had no choice but to bury all the dead, and the constant destruction of headstones left him little information about where he should dig. Like so much of the carnage left over in eastern Mosul, Bassam says he was powerless to stop it while it was happening. "IS forced me to bury the people," he protests. "There was no other place." Thousands of mourners gathered at Yayway Cemetery on Yangon's outskirts late Monday to pay tribute to Ko Ni, a prominent Myanmar lawyer and advisor to Aung San Suu Kyi's ruling party, who was assassinated Sunday at Yangon Airport. Moments of public grief and anguish marked the funeral. Hundreds of Muslim men shouted expressions of faith as they carried his coffin from a mosque to a nearby grave while a huge crowd looked on. Many later lined up to pour a handful of sand on Ko Ni's last resting place. Nyan Win and several other senior members of the National League for Democracy (NLD) came to pay their respects. A party statement said Ko Ni's death was an irreplaceable loss for the NLD, while the president's office said his killing was intended to destabilize the nation. State Councillor Aung San Suu Kyi has not yet reacted to the killing. Soe Lwin, a NLD member and Muslim resident from Yangon's Hlaing Township who attended the funeral, said, Everybody was saddened and shocked. We are worried whether there will ever be anyone as competent in law as him. Gunned Down at Airport Ko Ni was shot in the back of the head at point-blank range by a gunman as he held his grandson at the airport. The assassin also killed a taxi driver who tried to prevent his escape, but the gunman was later caught by police and other drivers, two of whom were injured. Ko Ni was a pro-democracy advocate and worked as a constitutional lawyer who advised the NLD on charter reform. The party formed Myanmar's first elected government in decades last April, but its powers remain severely curbed by the military-drafted 2008 constitution. He was a member of the Muslim minority and spoke out not only on charter reform, but also against communal tensions with the Buddhist majority and the rise of a nationalist Buddhist movement in recent years. On Sunday, he was returning from Indonesia with a Myanmar delegation, including Cabinet members, and Rakhine Buddhist and Rohingya Muslims leaders. They were invited to study Indonesia's resolution of communal conflict in order to help resolve Myanmar's Rakhine crisis, which has newly displaced tens of thousands of Rohingya in recent months. Police have given no motive for the killing, but reportedly said the gunman served 11 years in Mandalay Prison before his release in a 2014 amnesty. Most Muslim mourners interviewed on Monday believed that Ko Ni had been killed for his constitutional reform work and not because of inter-communal tensions. U Ko Ni used to talk about the constitution very openly and very detailed, so the public got to learn about what's wrong with the constitution, said Soe Lwin. It has nothing to do with religion, or Buddhist-Muslim conflict, it is only because they wanted to stop him. Mr. Ko Ni knows very well about the law and how to prepare the constitution. In our country some people don't want to change the constitution, that is why [he was killed], said Tun Kyi, a Muslim activist at the Former Political Prisoners Society, which helped organize the funeral. He said the NLD government's response to the incident had been good so far, though he stressed that a thorough investigation into the killing should be conducted. Bo Bo Oo, a NLD lawmaker and secretary of the Lower House Foreign Relations Committee, told VOA it was yet unclear if the parliament would call for an independent investigation, adding that police were handling the case. Demands for Investigation International rights groups, United Nations and foreign embassy representatives in Yangon, many of which had consulted Ko Ni over legal and political matters in the past, strongly called for a transparent, independent investigation into the murder. The International Crisis Group said the killing has all the appearances of a hate crime and underlines the urgency of the Myanmar government and society coming together to condemn all forms of hate speech. The NLD government has been relatively quiet about increased discrimination against Muslims and refrained from fielding any Muslim candidates in the 2015 elections, apparently out of fear for nationalist fervor among Buddhists at the time. Soe Tint, a Supreme Court advocate and a close friend of Ko Ni was quietly witnessing the funeral from a distance on Monday. He declined to be drawn out on religious issues and said, U Ko Ni did his best for the NLD and the democratization of the country without caring for his personal interests. It is very difficult to have an opinion [about the killing], but there might be a mastermind behind it. I think there is some malicious attitude towards his contributions to the NLD and the political progress so far. As the White House continues to defend President Donald Trumps executive order banning entry to refugees and people from seven Muslim majority countries, former President Barack Obama has opposed it in his first statement since leaving the White House. Obamas spokesperson, Kevin Lewis, issued a statement rejecting any comparison of his foreign policy to Trumps ban. "The president fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion." The Trump administration says the travel ban is not directed against any religion, adding that the seven countries selected are on State Department lists compiled during the Obama administration, either as state sponsors of terror, or as countries that harbor terrorists. In Obamas statement, Lewis said the former president is heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities across the country, saying protests are exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake. This is the first time the former president has criticized the new president, who has been in office for 10 days. In his last news conference before leaving office, Obama said he would only weigh in on his successor if he felt core values were at stake, such as freedom of the press and voting rights. White House Defends Ban At Mondays White House briefing, Press Secretary Sean Spicer strongly defended the travel ban, saying the attack on a mosque in Quebec, Canada that killed six people shows why the president wants to be pro-active instead of reactive on threats to national security. Spicer said that only 109 people were detained on Saturday and Sunday for additional screening, calling it an inconvenience, and adding: Look, coming into this country is still a privilege; were the greatest country on earth and being able to come to America is a privilege and not a right and it is our duty and it is the presidents goal to make sure that everybody that comes into this country, to the best of our ability, is here because they want to enjoy this country and come in peacefully. Spicer said the executive order issued Friday was not in response to any specific threat, but that the president wants to get out ahead of any potential threats. The order includes a 120-day suspension of refugee admissions and a 90-day entry ban for people from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya and Yemen. The implementation led to confusion, particularly at the nation's airports, where in some cases people holding green cards as permanent legal residents were detained for extra questioning before being allowed entry. Attempts to Clarify Policy Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday seeking to clarify the policy, saying he deems "the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest." In a separate statement, the Department of Homeland Security said the government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if necessary for national security. That followed an emergency order by federal court in New York temporarily barring the deportation of people who arrive at U.S. airports with a valid visa or an approved refugee application. Judge Ann Donnelly wrote, "There is imminent danger that, absent the stay of removal, there will be substantial and irreparable injury to refugees, visa-holders, and other individuals from nations" who are subject to the president's order. Refugee screening Trump has repeatedly called for stricter screening of refugees, and the senior administration official who briefed reporters Sunday described the previous system as "woefully inadequate." Under President Barack Obama's administration, refugees were required to undergo security checks, including strict vetting by law enforcement and intelligence agencies, and extensive interviews before they were allowed into the country. For many refugees, the process took up to two years to complete. The ban has sparked outrage and protests both at home and abroad. In the United States, human rights organizations and some churches have issued strong condemnations, calling the ban un-American and cruel. A number of universities and corporations also have expressed concern about the ban, saying America needs students, scholars and highly valued employees from the countries that are targeted. The Philippine police have ended a controversial anti-drug operation in response to the kidnapping and brutal murder of a South Korean businessman by anti-narcotics officers. National Police Chief Roland Dela Rosa says local anti-narcotics units will go through a period of "internal cleansing" to get rid of rogue officers, whom he described as "scalawags." Dela Rosa's announcement came just hours after President Rodrigo Duterte openly accused as many as 40 percent of policemen of corruption, as he deals with the fallout over the death of Jee Ick-joo in Manila last October. The suspected officers are accused of kidnapping Jee for ransom. More than 7,000 people have died since Duterte launched a brutal and deadly crackdown of illicit drugs shortly after taking office last June. Human rights groups say the victims were denied due process of law, but police have claimed self-defense in the killings. Despite the cloud caused by Jee's death, Duterte is vowing to continue with his anti-drug crackdown across the archipelago until he leaves office in 2022, discarding a promise to end the operations in March of this year. U.S.-based Human Rights Watch has issued a statement saying unless Duterte "seeks meaningful accountability" for the bloody crackdown, his order to suspend the operations amounts to nothing more than a public relations stunt. The state mining department on Sunday night seized six dumpers carrying sand beyond the permissible limit near Salganpur in district Sehore. By Hemender Sharma: Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan these days is busy these days travelling alongside the Narmada River, trying to make the 'Save Narmada' campaign a people's movement through his 'Namami Narmada Yatra' while his family members are busy mining sand from the state's lifeline. The state mining department on Sunday night seized six dumpers carrying sand beyond the permissible limit near Salganpur in district Sehore. Four of the six dumpers belonged to Pradhyumn Singh Chouhan, son of Narendra Singh Chouhan who happens to be the first cousin of the chief minister. advertisement Case so far: 1. Mining Inspector, Rashmi Pandey stopped the six dumpers near Salganpur claiming it was a routine exercise. The dumpers were carrying sand mined at Rehti in Budhni on the Narmada River bank. Interestingly, CM Chouhan represents Budhni constituency in the state Vidhan Sabha. 2. The four dumpers seized by the mining department belonging to Pradhyumn Singh are numbered MP04HE 3400, MP04HE2005, MP04 HE3718 and MP04HE3720. The permanent address on the RTO registration is that of A91 Alkapuri Bhopal. 3. The mining department was initially reluctant to register a case but was forced to act once the media got a whiff of it. 4. District mining officer, MA Khan later spoke to India Today and accepted that six dumpers carrying access sand had been seized. 5. "We don't know which dumper belongs to whom but we have seized six dumpers. The drivers were carrying royalty receipts but the sand they were carrying was much more than the royalty they had paid for," said the officer. 6. Mining Minister Rajendra Shukla too has accepted that the dumpers were seized and claimed no one would be spared. "We will fine the owners of the dumpers for the royalty evasion and dumpers would be released only after the penalty is paid," he said. 7. The chief minister, while participating in a programme in Morena, claimed his government was serious about saving and conserving Narmada River. "We are serious. We have chalked several short term and long term programmes to save the river. As far as mining is concerned, no one, whosoever it may be, would be spared," he said. 8. The opposition has sharpened its attack on the chief minister alleging that Save Narmada Yatra was a farce while a peak in to the actual story has been provided by the seizure of dumpers. 9. "We have been saying this for the past so many years. The chief minister is into illegal sand mining for the past 11 years and we have videos of 200 dumpers that they use. We will give this video to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and expose the chief minister. He should come clean and tell the state about who Pradhyumn Singh Chouhan and Narendra Singh Chouhan are and what is their relationship with him," Chief Congress spokesman KK Mishra while talking to India Today said. advertisement Also read: Bhopal: Retired DSP's son shoots neighbour's pet dog; father, son assault owners for objecting --- ENDS --- Public fury over the Trump administrations ban on travel from several Muslim majority countries may not be abating, but many Muslims in the Middle East and beyond are taking the measure in stride. The ban on travel from seven predominantly Muslim nations - Iraq, Iran, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya and Yemen has triggered vocal condemnations from Baghdad and Tehran, but elsewhere in the Islamic world, the criticism has remained subdued. It took the worlds largest body of Islamic countries more than two days to react, and only with a carefully worded statement that fell short of the denunciation heard in the United States and Europe. The Saudi-based, 57-nation Organization of Islamic Conference expressed grave concern about the measure, saying it would only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism. In addition to barring citizens of the seven Muslim countries from traveling to the United States for 90 days, the executive order includes a 120-day suspension of refugee admissions. The most forceful reaction came from Iran, which threatened retaliatory measures to bar Americans. Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said the move will be recorded in history as a great gift to extremists and their supporters. The Iraqi response was just as sharp, with parliament calling for a reciprocal travel ban on Americans if Washington does not withdraw its decision. But reaction from other Muslim countries, including those affected by the ban, was more measured. Sudans foreign minister told Bloomberg the government would wait until the period mentioned, until the executive decision passes and see what is next after that and then well act accordingly. Pakistan's Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar said Monday it would not affect terrorism but it will increase the problems for those who are victims of terrorism. And in the Middle East, while the ban sparked criticism of the Trump administration on social media and television, the governments have opted to remain silent. The government of Turkey has yet to comment, although a member of parliament from the ruling party called the ban "inhumane and insensitive." Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, two key U.S. allies in the region, have remained silent. The government of Egypt, another U.S. ally, has similarly kept mum, as has the al-Azhar, the government controlled center of religious scholarship that often takes public positions on issues of concern to Muslims around the world. One reason Middle Eastern governments have kept quiet is that most do not want to antagonize the Trump administration and have a vested interest in boosting ties with the U.S. While Egypt wants the Trump administration to designate the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries are welcoming the administration's pledge to take a tougher line against Iran. "So it serves them well to stay silent," said Hilal Khashan, a professor of political science at the American University of Beirut. On the campaign trail, Trump vowed to rebuild alliances with "moderate" Middle Eastern countries such as Egypt and Jordan to fight Islamic State. Trump has vigorously defended his executive order, saying it is about terror and keeping our country safe and not a Muslim ban. In a statement issued Sunday, he said the seven countries included in the travel ban had been identified as countries of concern under the Obama administration. But experts have questioned the choice, noting that no one with family backgrounds in the seven countries has been implicated in a deadly terrorist attack in the United States since the attacks of September 11, 2001. Of the 414 Muslim Americans associated with violent extremism since the attacks, only 23 percent had family backgrounds in the seven countries, according to Charles Kurzman, a professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. However, there have been no fatalities in the United States caused by extremists with family backgrounds in these countries, Kurzman wrote in a report on Muslim involvement in terrorism. John Esposito, a prominent scholar of Islamic studies at Georgetown University, said that while he vigorously opposed the ban he equally questioned the choice of the seven countries. The question becomes, why identify these countries and not identify countries where in fact citizens have been involved in acts of terrorism within the United States, Esposito said, noting that most of the hijackers that carried out the 9/11 attacks hailed from Saudi Arabia and UAE. In leaving out Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries from the list, the Trump administration is largely following a precedent set by past American administrations that put a premium on working with allies at the expense of human rights. Khashan of AUB voiced concern that the void left by the Arab governments' lack of reaction to the ban may be filled by the very radicals the Trump administration says it wants to quash. Somalia's foreign minister says he is "saddened" by the order barring Somalis from entering the United States and hopes officials will reconsider the policy. In an interview Monday with VOAs Somali service, Abdusalam Hadliye Omer expressed disappointment in the ban, saying that Somalia is just starting to recover from years of violence and instability. [T]hey work, they are entrepreneurs and they are also fighting terrorism, he said. We are saddened that they are being finger-pointed by this immigration ban. The foreign minister said he hopes the United States will carry out an immediate review of Trump's executive order, which temporarily bars entry to people from seven Muslim-majority countries in the Middle East and Africa. Everyone in America came from somewhere," Omer said. "We are saddened by this [order] but every country has to make its own immigration decisions. Asked if the Somali government will take any action to respond to Trumps order, the minister, who is in Addis Ababa attending African Union meetings, said the Somali Cabinet will discuss the issue and make a decision. The U.S. government is active in the Somali government's war against Islamist militant group al-Shabab. U.S. instructors have trained Somali special forces, and U.S. drones have killed many top leaders of the al-Qaida-linked group, including its emir, Ahmed Godane, in September 2014. A number of Somalis who hold visas and green cards were affected by the new immigration ban. Some were detained at airports. One of them, Farhan Sulub Anshur, was delighted to see his wife and two children after a brief detention at Washington Dulles International Airport on Saturday. Anshur told VOA that he was contacted by airport authorities who told him that his family will be deported. He said he felt joy when the deportation was averted after a judge issued an injunction. President Trumps executive orders, however, are creating anxiety and concern in the Somali community, according to Amiin Harun, an immigration attorney in Minneapolis. First, many Somali families are still apart and they are trying to join their family members and loved ones in the U.S. and they are going through visa processing, he said. Many of them have been in refugee camps for a long time waiting to be resettled in the U.S. Others are going through the visa processing overseas and are trying to come and join their families in the U.S. He said other Somalis already living in the U.S. are worried this measure will affect their process for citizenship. Harun said Somali lawyers received a lot of support from the legal community and the immigration lawyers association around the country. We are mobilizing our resources, we are going around the community to give talks at different locations to give people information about what is going on exactly, he said. He added that lawyers will stake out airports to make themselves available to families affected by the order.. We have lawyers who are on hand to assist them and to tell them about their rights, to provide comfort and to push back against border protection agencies," he said. Heavy clashes have erupted in southern Afghanistan, after Taliban rebels staged a coordinated assault on a district center. Afghan officials and insurgents have made conflicting claims about Mondays fighting in the Sangin district of Helmand, the largest of the 34 Afghan provinces. Provincial government spokesman Omar Zwak told VOA insurgents assaulted multiple security outposts, but Afghan forces repulsed the Taliban. He claimed many assailants were killed and wounded, but would not say whether government forces also suffered casualties. A Taliban spokesman claimed insurgents overran more than 25 outposts and bases around Sangin, saying intense fighting continued in the area. He said a Taliban suicide bomber struck a military compound before insurgents stormed the area and killed or wounded more than 100 Afghan forces. The insurgent group often issues inflated casualty tolls for government forces. The Taliban dug a tunnel near a military compound taking advantage of surrounding civilian houses and packed it with explosives before detonating it to begin the assault, Afghan regional corps commander, General Wali Mohammad Ahmadzai told VOA. Most of Helmand is under the control of the Taliban. The government fully controls only the provincial capital, Lashkar Gah, and a few surrounding district centers. The United States has announced it would deploy a new group of around 300 troops to Helmand later this year to help Afghan forces defend the city and beat back the Taliban during the spring fighting season. Thai media organizations, battling to halt a media reform bill they see imposing restrictions on press freedoms, including licensing, are pressing the military government to review the legislation. Some 30 Thai media groups, amid fears of increased government control, met Sunday and called on the National Reform Steering Assembly (NSRA) to amend the bill, saying the law marks a major setback to media freedoms in Thailand. Fear of government control Thepchai Yong, president of the Confederation of Thai Journalists said the meeting aimed to galvanize the industrys concerns over the media outlook since the military came to power in 2014. The objective is to voice our concern, our opposition to this new media bill that is pending on the committee for media reform which we think is quite, quite dangerous in the sense that it would give the power to censor the media to the state, Thepchai told VOA. Fears are focused on a proposed law The draft bill, widely criticized by Thai and English language mainstream media, covers rights protection, ethical promotion and standards of media professionals. A new national media council will include both top bureaucrats of four ministries to order and guide media reform, The Bangkok Post said in an editorial. Government presence on a press panel and licensing of journalists are never part of a free press. The media and the public it serves are capable of continuing to reform the press, which has never stopped, the paper added. Current system is not perfect The bill would replace a system of self-regulation that media organizations say ensures both media responsibility and meeting the publics changing demands. Some media analysts say the system of self-regulation has on occasion fallen short. Thepchai acknowledges public faith in the mainstream media has also been affected by Thailands polarized political climate and often partisan reporting. New bill would register journalists and force them to carry an identity card A controversial aspect of the bill requires media personnel and reporters to be registered, carry a media identity card with the threat of losing their registration and heavy fines for ethical breaches. If they are successful with this legislation it would be the first time that the system of media licensing will be introduced in Thailand and this is something we believe is quite scary because it would subject the media to the control of the authorities, Thepchai told VOA. He said if the new bill succeeded a Big Brother would watch over journalists and their organizations. The tighter media controls are similar to laws in Singapore and Malaysia, says Edgardo Legaspi, director of the South East Asian Press Alliance (SEAPA), and marks a major step back for Thai media. Analysts say the proposed law threatens press freedom The media reform bill might actually result in the ability to control who gets to publish newspapers or who gets to report news or not. Actually its like a 40 year plus leap backward since 1973, when the 1973 democratic movement removed the authority of the military to shut down the papers, Legaspi said. He said the legislation represented the shutting down of one of the freest media in Asia, calling for solidarity among Thai journalists to fight against this proposed bill. Government says protests will have little effect But Kanit Suwannate, chairman of the National Reform Steering Assembly (NRSA) who holds the rank of Air Chief Marshal, said the protests were unlikely to impact the panels deliberations. Kanit told local media it was controversial to say the law will allow state interference in the work of the media. But we have to understand that the country has a government and the government has to take charge, together with the private sector to ensure social order, he said. He added major changes to the draft bill were unlikely, but proposals from the panel members and comments from media organizations would be carefully reviewed. International standards threatened Piyanuch Kosot, Thai representative for Amnesty International, said Thailand as a signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), has to uphold international standards. We try to understand the purpose of these reforms and basically the reform is just to control the media which I understand is at the final stage. Our concern is that the bill they are going to pass has to be under the standard pf the ICCPR or the international human rights law, Piyanuch said. Thailands once vibrant and active media has been curbed due to the changing media landscape and a weak economy. Strict laws on covering the royal family Since the military came to power in 2014 there has also been a tightening of laws governing computer crimes and a crackdown on online media, backed by Thailands tough lese majeste laws protecting the Royal Family from criticism and defamation. The New York based Human Rights Watch says since May 2014, authorities have charged at least 68 persons with lese majeste, largely for posting or sharing comments online, and leading to many lengthy prison sentences. While the latest legislation largely focuses on mainstream media, Arthit Suriyawongkul, from the Thai Netizen Network, said the laws may have wider implications for bloggers and citizen reporters. Theres the possibility it could be extended to netizens and citizen reporters or bloggers or users in general as well. And I think that will be very worrying because yes we agree that there are blogs probably no longer considered citizen reporters, Arthit said. But Thai Broadcast Journalists Association president Thepchai said he is not optimistic a civilian government will overturn the tighter media controls once elected into power. This is exactly what politicians would love to have and the junta is putting this on a silver platter for the politicians waiting in the wings to return to power, he said. Angela Merkels aides jokingly explain the German chancellors improving poll ratings as due to "the Trump factor." With a federal election barely eight months away, the German leader is bouncing back from the low approval ratings she was getting during the height of the refugee crisis in the winter of 2015-16. And her advisers think they have the new U.S. president in part to thank for the bounce. Pollster Forschungsgruppe Wahlen has Merkels approval rating now at 74 percent, which is much higher than any of her peers in Europe. U.S. President Donald Trumps approval rating in the United States stands at 42 percent in the latest Gallup poll. Trump and his aides have not held back in criticizing the chancellor. During his election campaign, Trump repeatedly criticized Merkel for admitting into Germany war refugees from Middle Eastern nations, blaming her for what he said would be the wrecking of her country, although on occasion he pulled back and described her as his favorite world leader. A year ago, Trump predicted, "The German people are going to end up overthrowing this woman. I don't know what the hell she's thinking." In a March 2016 interview with The New York Times, he said, Germany's being destroyed. I have friends, I just left people from Germany and they don't even want to go back. Germany's being destroyed by Merkel's naivete or worse. And days before his inauguration earlier this month, Trump told The Times of London and Germanys Bild newspaper that Merkel's decision to allow more than a million migrants into Germany had been a catastrophic mistake. His views mirror the attack lines of the "America First" website Breitbart News, which until recently was run by key Trump aide, Steve Bannon. High approval rating Forecasts of her imminent downfall, however, appear to be having the opposite effect in Germany. Nearly 60 percent of Germans, according to recent polls, now feel their country can cope with the refugees. That may be in part because refugee numbers have fallen from 890,000 in 2015 to 280,000 last year. The initial shock of the refugee impact is starting to wear off, a Merkel aide told VOA. As she starts her election campaign hoping to secure a fourth term as chancellor, Merkel and her aides are already using Trump as a foil, although the chancellor herself has avoided too much overt criticism of Trump, leaving the sharper attacks to others in the German government. Merkels aides note she has enjoyed rising approval ratings since last Junes vote by Britons to leave the European Union. Within days of the British vote, known as Brexit, Merkels popularity rose by 9 percent, according to a poll conducted for Germanys ARD television, to record her best showing since September the previous year, when her numbers were dipping fast and the talk in Berlin was of the chancellors fast approaching political demise. Analysts say probably the best explanation for her growing popular support are signs, across many western European countries, of increased backing for the European Union amid fears of instability. Europeans see leaving the regional grouping as a big gamble, she said last year. Nobody wants to put themselves in the kind of mess the British have created for themselves, she added. Far from riding Brexit and Trump waves, Germanys populist nationalist party AfD, backed loudly by Breitbart News, has been stuck in the polls at about 12 percent. The terror attack in Berlin in December, when a Tunisian refugee rammed a truck through a Christmas market killing a dozen, didnt improve AfDs political fortunes. Opposition Faced by a strengthened chancellor, Germanys Social Democrats, reluctant members of Merkels grand governing coalition, have turned to Martin Schulz, the former president of the European Parliament, to run against Merkel and her center-right bloc in the September 24 federal election. The Social Democrats hope Schulzs tenure in Brussels means he will be in a better position to criticize the chancellor than others in the party who have had to work with her. Few, however, believe Schulz will be able to topple Germanys so-called Iron Lady. Analyst Josef Janning, in a commentary for the European Council on Foreign Relations, describes Merkel as seemingly unassailable and says Schulzs chances of landing a knockout blow in this duel are slim. U.S. President Donald Trump has continued to defend his executive order banning entry to refugees and people from seven Muslim-majority countries, while rights groups vowed to keep pressing legal action, thousands of people protested in cities across the country and Democrats prepared to issue legislation to block the ban. In a series of tweets Monday morning, Trump said Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly told him that "all is going well with very few problems." He added that "big problems at airports" were caused by a computer outage that hit Delta airlines, protesters and "the tears of" Senate Minority leader Chuck Schumer. WATCH: Trump accuses Schumer of faking his tears Schumer appeared to be holding back tears as he called Sunday for Trump to overturn the executive order. The order, signed Friday, includes a 120-day suspension of refugee admissions and a 90-day entry ban for people from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya and Yemen. The implementation led to confusion, particularly at the nation's airports, where in some cases people holding green cards as permanent legal residents were detained for extra questioning before being allowed entry. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday seeking to clarify the policy, saying he deems "the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest." In a separate statement, the Department of Homeland Security said the government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if necessary for national security. That followed an emergency order by federal court in New York temporarily barring the deportation of people who arrive at U.S. airports with a valid visa or an approved refugee application. Judge Ann Donnelly wrote, "There is imminent danger that, absent the stay of removal, there will be substantial and irreparable injury to refugees, visa-holders, and other individuals from nations" who are subject to the president's order. Trump has repeatedly called for stricter screening of refugees, and the senior administration official who briefed reporters Sunday described the previous system as "woefully inadequate." Under President Barack Obama's administration, refugees were required to undergo security checks, including strict vetting by law enforcement and intelligence agencies, and extensive interviews before they were allowed into the country. For many refugees, the process took up to two years to complete. Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, told VOA's Urdu service Trump's order goes against the values of Americans who have historically welcomed those fleeing persecution and war. "Donald Trump did not convince any of us that he has sound legal or national security concerns. For example, the Syrian refugees are subjected to at least two years of scrutiny and extreme vetting already, and once they come here they are safe, they are vetted. There is no terrorist attack that happened at the hands of a Syrian refugee, or any refugee, that we know," Awad said. "So for him to base all his executive order on [that] false notion is un-American, unethical." The 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation said Monday that Trump's action will further complicate the challenges refugees face. "Such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism at a critical time when the OIC has been engaged with all partners, including the U.S., to combat extremism and terrorism in all their forms and manifestations," said an OIC statement. All seven countries featured in the executive order are OIC members. The text of the order cites the September 11, 2001 terror attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people in the U.S., but does not apply to Saudi Arabia, where most of the hijackers involved were from. Iran, Syria and Sudan are on the State Department's list of state sponsors of terrorism, while Iraq, Libya, Yemen and Somalia are listed as terrorist safe havens. Sudan's Information Minister Ahmed Bilal told VOA's English to African service that his country hopes Trump will lift the ban after the 90-day period is up. He said he thinks the order will damage the U.S. "because it will make America almost isolated from the world." He also said Sudan had been looking forward to improving relations with the United States, and that there is "no reason" for Sudan to be among those listed as a sponsor of terrorism. The designation has been in place since 1993 over concerns about Sudan supporting terror groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah, and its role in the mid-1990s as a "safe haven and training hub" for groups like al-Qaida. Senior Republican U.S. Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, who are members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, criticized Trump's order Sunday, saying the confusion at airports showed the measure was "not properly vetted." "We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defense, Justice and Homeland Security," they said in a joint statement. "Such a hasty process risks harmful results." Trump responded on Twitter, calling McCain and Graham "weak on immigration" and saying they should be focused on Islamic State, illegal immigration and border security. Other congressional reaction Senator Chris Murphy, a Democrat, called the words from McCain and Graham a "strong statement" and said they should work together. "I will introduce a bill this week to immediately overturn this dangerous, hateful order," he posted on Twitter. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell expressed support Sunday for more strict screening, but said he is against religious tests. "I think it's a good idea to tighten the vetting process," he told ABC News. "But I also think it's important to remember that some of our best sources in the war against radical Islamic terrorism are Muslims, both in this country and overseas." Republican Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona said Trump is right to be concerned about national security, "but it's unacceptable when even legal permanent residents are being detained or turned away." People affected by order Twenty-eight-year-old Iranian national Neda Daemi, a 16-year legal U.S. resident, was released after being detained for 10 hours Saturday. Daemi spoke with two lawyers and added she was not asked to sign any papers. She said she had flown to Los Angeles from Tehran where she was visiting family members. Somali refugee Binto Siyad Aden and her children were released late Saturday after they were detained in Virginia. They had arrived on a family reunion visa from Kenya. Adens husband, Farhan Sulub Anshur - a U.S. citizen from Minnesota - said he believes his wife and two children were released after a court intervened. "You cant image our joy and feelings now. They have been released and we are here together at a hotel near the airport," Anshur said. He told reporters his wife was subjected to harsh treatment from law enforcement while in detention at the airport. "They harassed her and threatened her with handcuffs and arrest; they forced her to sign a form stating that her and her children will be deported, but she refused to sign for the kids and told them their father is an American citizen," he said. U.S. President Donald Trump has signed an executive order cutting regulations on businesses. Trump held a closed door meeting at the White House with small business owners before the signing. The president repeated his desire to cut business regulations by as much as 75 percent. He said it is his desire to make it as easy as possible to open businesses in the United States. Surrounded by the small business owners for the signing, Trump said for every new federal regulation proposed, two must be revoked. "If you have a regulation you want, number one, we are not going to approve it, because it has already been approved probably in 17 different forms, but if we do, the only way you have a chance is we have to knock out two regulations for every new regulation, so if there is a new regulation, they have to knock out two, but it goes far beyond that, Trump said. We are cutting regulations massively for small business, and for large business, but they are different, but for small business. And that is what this is about today, and this will be the biggest such act that our country has ever seen," he added. President Donald Trump will announce his pick for the U.S. Supreme Court during a nationally televised address Tuesday, as he seeks to fill the vacant seat on a high court that is essentially evenly split along ideological lines. WATCH: Trump on his Supreme Court pick Trump said Monday his choice is unbelievably highly respected and predicted Americans will be very impressed with this person, but offered no further details. He is 100 percent sure he is the pick, said White House Spokesman Sean Spicer during a briefing Monday. He added the presidents nominee was selected from a list of 21 contenders drawn up by conservative groups. The selection will likely trigger an intense battle over who will fill the position and serve as a lifetime jurist with the potential to tilt the high courts rulings for many years to come. Trump appears to be ready to return the nine-member high court to a conservative majority.All three top contenders were appointed to the bench by Republican former President George W. Bush. They include: former Alabama Attorney General William Bill Pryor, who sits on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals; Neil Gorsuch, who serves on the federal appeals courts 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver; and Thomas Hardiman of the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals in western Pennsylvania. If confirmed, the jurist will fill the seat left vacant after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia in February of 2016. During a campaign debate, Trump said he wanted to appoint a judge much in the mold of Judge Scalia, later adding, People that will respect the constitution of the United States. The lifetime appointment as a Supreme Court justice requires Senate confirmation. President Barack Obama nominated Judge Merrick Garland to fill the seat last March. But Republican lawmakers in the Senate refused to hold confirmation hearings on Obamas choice, saying the seat should be filled by the next president. Now, Senate Democrats are vowing to block Trumps pick, accusing Republicans of stealing the Supreme Court seat. Senate Democrats have signaled they plan to filibuster and force a 60-vote majority to confirm the nominee. Currently, Republicans hold a slim 52-48 majority in the Senate. Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer has said his party planned to fight tooth and nail against any Trump nominee who is not mainstream. White House press secretary Sean Spicer fired back Monday, saying, For a party preaching tolerance, its interesting to see some Democrats have already come out against this unnamed individual." WATCH: What you need to know about Supreme Court Justices U.S. President Donald Trump wasted no time Monday night in firing an acting attorney general who earlier in the day ordered the Justice Department not to defend his executive order temporarily banning travelers from seven mostly Muslim countries. A White House statement said Acting Attorney General Sally Yates, a holdover from the Obama administration, "betrayed the Department of Justice by refusing to enforce a legal order designed to protect the citizens of the United States." The statement also called Yates "weak on borders and very weak on illegal immigration." It said Trump relieved her of her duties and named Dana Boente, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, to serve as acting attorney general. The president's nominee for attorney general, Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions, is likely to be confirmed soon by his Senate colleagues. Earlier Monday, Yates wrote a letter to Justice Department lawyers saying, "I am responsible for ensuring that the positions we take in court remain consistent with this institution's solemn obligation to always seek justice and stand for what is right." Then-President Barack Obama appointed Yates to be deputy attorney general in 2015, and she was asked to stay on by the Trump administration until a new attorney general is confirmed by the Senate. After Trump relieved Yates of her duties, the White House said, "Calling for tougher vetting for individuals traveling from seven dangerous places is not extreme. It is reasonable and necessary." At the White House briefing Monday, spokesman Sean Spicer launched a fresh defense of Trump's sweeping travel ban, saying only a tiny fraction of those entering U.S. territory since Friday have been affected. Spicer told reporters that 109 people have so far been stopped from entering the United States, out of 325,000 foreign nationals who have entered the country in a single 24-hour period since the ban was imposed. He said those 109 individuals had been "temporarily inconvenienced," and characterized those detentions as a small price to pay to ensure the safety of all Americans. Trump took to Twitter earlier Monday to defend his executive order, which suspends U.S. entry to all refugees for 120 days, and bans Syrian refugees indefinitely. The decree further blocks citizens of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Syria, Sudan, Yemen and Somalia from entering U.S. territory for a period of three months. WATCH: Trump Defends Executive Order, Criticizes Schumer Trump has insisted the ban is not a religious measure targeting Muslims, instead calling it a series of precautionary steps needed to keep America safe. However, the national litigation director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Lena Masri, on Monday called the ban a "Muslim exclusion order" and said her organization was filing two lawsuits challenging the executive orders. The ban was initially described as blocking green card holders from Iran and the six other Muslim majority nations from reentering U.S. territory, but the Trump administration has since sought to clarify the directive, saying green card holders and non-citizen visa holders will no longer be automatically blocked. Top lawmakers bristle, call for reversal Senate Democratic Minority Leader Chuck Schumer continued to attack the travel restrictions Monday, saying the ban should be reversed immediately "because it is un-American." On the floor of the Senate, he warned colleagues that Islamic State extremists stand to gain the most from the travel ban, saying they "want nothing more than to paint the United States as a country at war with Islam." He also reminded his audience that America was founded "by the descendants of asylum seekers, and that the country has been "constantly invigorated by immigrants." Senior Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, both members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, criticized Trump's order Sunday, saying the confusion at airports showed the measure was "not properly vetted." Trump responded to McCain and Graham on Twitter, calling them "weak on immigration" and saying they should be focused on Islamic State, illegal immigration and border security. Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, also blasted the travel ban. In comments to VOA's Urdu service, he said Trump "did not convince any of us that he has sound legal or national security concerns. For example, the Syrian refugees are subjected to at least two years of scrutiny and extreme vetting already, and once they come here they are safe, they are vetted. There is no terrorist attack that happened at the hands of a Syrian refugee, or any refugee, that we know," Awad said. "So for him to base all his executive order on [that] false notion is un-American, unethical." Confusion reigns at airports The ban's implementation led to a weekend of confusion, particularly at the nation's airports, where in some cases people holding green cards as permanent legal residents were detained for extra questioning before being allowed entry. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday seeking to clarify the policy, saying he deems "the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest." Separately Monday, State Department employees and U.S. diplomats opposed to Trump's order circulated a "dissent channel memo" that said the administration's move "will not achieve its aims and will likely be counterproductive." The State Department says it is aware of the memo. The Dissent Channel is a longstanding official vehicle for State Department employees to convey alternative views and perspectives on policy issues. Right to revoke visas In a separate statement Sunday, the Department of Homeland Security said the government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if necessary for national security. That followed an emergency order by a federal court in New York temporarily barring the deportation of people who arrive at U.S. airports with a valid visa or an approved refugee application. Judge Ann Donnelly wrote, "There is imminent danger that, absent the stay of removal, there will be substantial and irreparable injury to refugees, visa-holders, and other individuals from nations" who are subject to the president's order. Trump has repeatedly called for stricter screening of refugees, and the senior administration official who briefed reporters Sunday described the previous system as "woefully inadequate." U.N. officials have condemned the killing of a legal advisor to Myanmar's ruling party and called for a "proper, effective impartial" probe into murder. Ko Ni, a prominent member of Myanmar's Muslim minority, was gunned down Sunday as he was waiting for a taxi outside Yangon's international airport. He had just returned to Myanmar after an overseas trip. A taxi driver was wounded in the attack. Officials say the gunman has been arrested. I am shocked to the core by the senseless killing of a highly respected and knowledgeable individual, whom I have met during all of my visits to the country, including most recently just over a week ago, said Yanghee Lee, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Myanmar. She said his death is a tremendous loss to human rights defenders and for Myanmar. A Myanmar presidential spokesman said the suspected attacker is being questioned. No motive for the attack is known. Gandhiji's words and bhajans have been given the shape of a video by musical duo Soumyojit and Sourendro. By Manogya Loiwal : While the whole country paid tributes to Mahatma Gandhi on Martyrs Day, West Bengal had an an artistic tribute for the father of the nation. Gandhiji's words and bhajans have been given the shape of a video by musical duo Soumyojit and Sourendro. Endowed with remarkable talent, the melodious duo Soumyojit and Sourendro paid their homage by singing Bapu's most loved bhajan 'Vaishnava Jana To' advertisement 'Vaishnava Jana To' is one of the most popular Hindu bhajans, written in Gujarati. The bhajan was included in Mahatma Gandhi's daily prayer. An artistic tribute in the honour of the 69th death anniversary to father of the nation was released by former FICCI Chief and Industrialist Harshavardhan Neotia along with musical duo, Soumyojit and Sourendro on Monday. Neotia commentig on the video said, "This heartfelt homage to revered Gandhi ji is perhaps a unique soulful remembrance of him and his wisdom. Gandhiji's exemplary teachings of peace and brotherhood are inspiring ideas to live up to even in today's world." Also read: Trinamool MP Idris Ali embarrasses party by comparing Mamata Banerjee with Gandhiji "It speaks about the life, ideals and mentality of a Vaishnava Jana (a follower of Vishnu). This video has been interspersed with the all-time famous words of Gurudev Tagore from Gitanjali: "Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high...," he added. The video shot in Apeejay School in Kolkata premises where the students join them in the chorus makes the tribute even more special. The musical homage to Bapu also reiterates his quintessential teachings of peace and brotherhood. 'Vaishnava Jana To' - one of Bapu's most favourite bhajans, which speaks of respect, equality, renunciation and faith - the immortal virtues he drew inspiration from in this new version truly keeps the essence intact with a new fragrance. Watch the video here: Also read: Mahatma Gandhi's samadhi gets a new look, to be unveiled by Venkaiah Naidu --- ENDS --- U.S. President Donald Trumps Executive order temporarily halting the resettlement of all Syrian refugees and banning entry of individuals from seven predominantly Muslim nations has left the United Nations scrambling to limit the fall-out to some of the worlds most vulnerable people. This week alone, over 800 refugees were set to make America their new home, but instead find themselves barred from traveling to the U.S., said a statement issued Monday from the U.N. Refugee agency, UNHCR. According to the statement, UNCHR estimates that 20,000 refugees in precarious circumstances might have been resettled to the United States during the 120 days covered by the suspension announced Friday, based on average monthly figures for the last 15 years. The agency, which works around the world assisting and screening refugees for resettlement said refugees are anxious, confused and heartbroken at this suspension in what is already a lengthy process. On Friday, Trump signed the executive order, which includes a 120-day suspension of refugee admissions and a 90-day entry ban for people from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya and Yemen. The president has dismissed critics who accuse him of targeting Muslims, saying in a statement that it is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. He noted that there are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. And he said the U.S. would resume issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid al Hussein criticized the ban on Twitter and Facebook, writing that discrimination based on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law. He also called the order mean-spirited and said it wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism. The human rights chief has been a vocal critic of Trump for his views on torture and immigrants, and referred to him in a September speech denouncing populists and demagogues in Europe and the U.S. UN Concerns and Confusion Meanwhile, concerns and confusion at the United Nations around the immigration ban extend beyond the people the organization serves to those who serve them. U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres sent an email to thousands of staff on Monday morning saying he had been following closely the developments regarding the recent Executive Order on immigration issued Friday. He said his office had been in close contact with the U.S. Mission to the United Nations throughout the weekend, and had received reassurances that the order should not impact U.N. staff and their families who are entering the United States using their G4 visas. G4 visas are issued to officers and employees of international organizations and members of their immediate families. At the daily briefing for journalists, Guterres chief spokesperson said there may have been a handful of cases of staff being told by airlines that they could not board since the order was signed Friday. The spokespersons office quickly sent out a clarification saying there were no confirmed cases of staff being affected by the ban. The U.N. secretary-general has not issued a direct condemnation of the ban or called for it to be revoked. We very much hope that the measures put in place regarding refugees are temporary, U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in response to questions about the U.N. position. The U.S. has been a critical partner of the United Nations organization, especially UNHCR and IOM in resettling refugees. On Saturday, the International Organization for Migration and UNCHR put out a joint statement on the importance of ensuring safe and secure resettlement and immigration programs. We strongly believe that refugees should receive equal treatment for protection and assistance, and opportunities for resettlement, regardless of their religion, nationality or race, the statement said. We will continue to engage actively and constructively with the U.S. government, as we have done for decades, to protect those who need it most, and to offer our support on asylum and migration matters. In a speech Friday just hours before Trump signed the order, Guterres told a U.N. gathering commemorating the victims of the Holocaust that Today, we see anti-Semitism, along with racism, xenophobia, anti-Muslim hatred and other forms of intolerance, triggered by populism. Guterres, a former U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees continued, I am extremely concerned at the discrimination faced by minorities, refugees and migrants across the world. I find the stereotyping of Muslims deeply troubling. He said there is a new normal in public discourse in which prejudice is given a free pass and the door is opened to even more extreme hatred. The United Nations has removed two Lunar New Year posts on refugees and poverty from its social media site on China's popular Weibo microblogging platform after the messages sparked strong backlash online. Although the microblog messages were aimed at boosting awareness, many took the posts as a slight to China, arguing that the world's second largest economy has already done enough to contribute to the U.N. and was not a source of the problems - be it refugees or poverty. Another world In the first message that went up on the eve of the Lunar New Year, the U.N. post asked: Dear, have you had your Lunar New Years dinner yet? It must have been some feast! The post went on to talk about how some 800 million people in the world struggle with starvation every day and that the same number live in extreme poverty. The post also noted that $250 billion in funds is needed from around the world to achieve the U.N.s sustainable development goal of eradicating poverty by 2030. The second post, which came early on Lunar New Year Day, included a video that highlighted the sharp contrast between those living in conflict zones such as Syria and in refugee camps and those living elsewhere. The introduction read: As the flowers of the Spring Festival blossom, let me take you to see another world Before it was taken down, the video was viewed more than 10 million times and received more than 54,000 comments. Most were negative and many urged the United Nations to not send such messages to China, especially during the holiday season. A post by MarcelZ that was liked by 21,000 argued that China was already doing plenty to help this other world that the United Nations was sharing with the Chinese public. We know more about that other world than you and our contributions are even greater, the post said, noting Chinas participation in U.N. peacekeeping, medical and construction work. At this time, we are already working for that world, so dont come to us at this time and ask us to look at another world. Another post, which had 11,000 likes, accused the U.N. of trying to brainwash the Chinese public with western culture. You (expletive) UN go and talk about war, while we enjoy our Spring Festival," the post said. Does the U.N. harbor some ill will toward China? Unfairly targeted Although neither of the posts suggested China was to blame, many Chinese saw them that way and argued that the United States and the west were the ones who should be receiving such messages on Facebook during their holidays. This is like sending pictures of a funeral during a wedding, one noted. The same post was not found on Christmas or New Years Day on the U.N.s social media or Facebook sites. But on Twitter on Christmas Day, the United Nations did have two similar posts, one about Syria and another on poverty. Social media sites such as Facebook, Youtube and Twitter are blocked in China. Of the two posts that went up in China on the U.N.s Weibo account, one was a statement from a recent International Fund for Agricultural Development conference in Rome. The video was from the UNHCR, the U.N.s refugee agency. Unintended offense In an emailed response about the online backlash, Peter Dawkins, the head of the United Nations web services, told VOA that while the messages reflected established U.N. positions, they were taken down after it quickly became clear that the timing of the release of the posts and associated choice of imagery may have caused unintentional offense to some Chinese readers. We have always appreciated our Chinese audiences support for the work of the United Nations and will continue to try our best to live up to that trust, Dawkins said. In addition to the postings about refugees and poverty, the U.N. also posted several messages to mark the Lunar New Year, including a video from Secretary General Antonio Guterres in which he highlighted what he said was the vital role that China plays. Ive called for 2017 to be a year for peace. We must work together to overcome conflict, human rights abuses, poverty and other crises, Guterres said. And above all we must work together to prevent these problems in the first place. Most of the comments in response to the video, however, continued to vent anger and frustration with the posts that had been removed. Just take care of America, that would be your greatest achievement, one post read. Another said, Thank you Secretary General, but we do not take refugees. Anything else though, can be discussed. One post did seem to respond to Gutteres challenge, urging the Secretary General to investigate what it called the Communist Partys bad behavior, including its encroachment on the human rights of its own citizens, and the Han peoples (Chinas main ethnic group) racial prejudice. Bigger role The online commotion comes at a time when U.S. President Donald Trump is facing mounting criticism at home over recently enacted immigration policies, and as China looks to play a bigger role on the global stage. Reports have suggested that the Trump administration could make major cutbacks at the United Nations and Chinese officials are already beginning to hint Beijing is ready to fill the power vacuum that would leave in its place. But so far, when it comes to money and playing a bigger role, the Chinese public seems hesitant and divided. When Chinese President Xi Jinping delivered his first address to the United Nations in 2015 and pledged $2 billion for debt relief and assistance to poor countries, critics at home argued he had gone too far, noting that China still has millions of its own at home who live below the poverty line. Over the past six decades, China has said it has contributed nearly $60 billion in aid to 166 countries and organizations around the world. But thats less than what the European Union and its members give each year. And when it comes to refugees, China has largely viewed the crisis as a problem created by Western nations. In 1982, China ratified the United Nations Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees. However, it was not until 2013 that a law went into practice that allowed public security officials to issue identification cards to refugees and asylum seekers. The U.S. Senate is pressing ahead on President Donald Trump's nominee for secretary of state, with a procedural vote that puts the confirmation on track for later this week. In a vote of 56-43, Rex Tillerson received the backing of a majority of the Republican-led chamber Monday evening, in a vote that sets in motion a confirmation hearing in the coming days. Many Democrats oppose Tillerson, Exxon Mobil's former CEO, but are unable to derail the nomination unless several Republicans join them, a feat that appears unlikely. Democratic Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has called for a delay in the confirmation vote until Tillerson answers questions about Trump's executive order temporarily banning entry to refugees and people from seven Muslim-majority countries. Two leading Republican senators, John McCain and Lindsey Graham, have criticized Trump for failing to consult with key federal agencies before issuing the travel bans. They have also voiced concern over Trump's desire to have better relations with Russia; however, the two senators have not indicated they will hold up Tillerson's nomination. Tillerson, 64, recently resigned from Exxon Mobil. Tillerson's massive oil deals with Russia have raised questions about his close ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who in 2013 gave Tillerson Russia's Order of Friendship, an honor reserved for foreigners. Tillerson told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee earlier this month that Russia poses a danger to the United States, and "its recent activities have disregarded American interests." He told the lawmakers,Our NATO allies are right to be alarmed by a resurgent Russia, and said Trump has urged closer relations with Russia to address a resurgence that occurred in the "absence of American leadership." Tillerson said the United States is "not likely to ever be friends" with Russia, noting that values between the two countries are "starkly different." He maintained that "dialogue is critical" so that matters of mutual interest to the U.S. and Russia do not "spin out of control." Tillerson, trained as a civil engineer, joined ExxonMobil right after he graduated from the University of Texas and moved up the corporate ranks over the next four decades. He is known for his international deal-making skills, and is said to have good relations with a number of heads of state around the globe, which would be an important asset for the top U.S. diplomat. Top officials at U.S. universities are pushing back against President Donald Trumps executive order that temporarily limits the entry into the country of travelers from seven Muslim-majority nations. Since Friday's order, the presidents of several universities have criticized the decision to halt immigration from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Saudi Arabia, which is not on the ban list, ranks No. 4 among countries that send students to the United States, with 61,000 students here. Many said the order is disrupting research and academics. Some suggested they would defy the ban if legally possible, the Associated Press reported. The Association of American Universities (AAU), which represents 62 schools, urged Trump to reverse the order. It said the order will send top scholars to countries that compete with the United States academically, like Canada, Australia and Germany. Critics of those who are protesting the travel ban point to Muslim-majority countries like Indonesia, Pakistan and Nigeria, which are not on the list. President Trumps order refers to the prevention of terrorism by implementing extreme vetting of immigrants from the seven countries banned. Other critics say the ban will negatively impact the U.S. economy. International students bring $32.8 billion to the U.S. economy, according to economic data compiled by NAFSA: Association of International Educators. It is vital to our economy and the national interest that we continue to attract the best students, scientists, engineers and scholars, the AAU said in a statement. That is why we have worked closely with previous administrations, especially in the wake of 9/11, to ensure our visa system prevents entry by those who wish to harm us, while maintaining the inflow of talent that has contributed so much to our nation. More than 1 million international students are in the U.S. More than 17,000 of them are from the seven affected countries, according to data from the State Department and the nonprofit Institute of International Education (IIE). More than 12,000 of those were from Iran. In Boston and the vicinity, home to numerous universities that include Harvard, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Northeastern University, academics are vocal about foreign educators and students being blocked from entry. Two professors of Iranian nationality fom the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth (UMass) were detained at Bostons Logan International Airport as they tried to re-enter Jan. 27 under the ban. Federal judges in New York, Massachusetts, Virginia and Washington state have issued a temporary stay to the travel ban at the request of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Some students and scholars from the countries in question, however, remain in legal limbo, stranded while traveling abroad or visiting home during the recent holiday break. "This is not the country we promised to them when we invited them to study, teach and conduct research here," wrote UMass President Marty Meehan. In Oregon, Portland State Universitys President Wim Wiewel said the ban has a chilling effect on Muslim and other international students. We are dismayed, Wiewel wrote, saying Portland State educates more than 1,900 international students, including 76 from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Yemen and Syria who are part of the ban. Young people from across the world have come to universities in the United States for decades because our higher education system is a global leader in providing educational opportunities, he wrote. At PSU, our international students provide cultural and academic contributions that are integral to our mission and enrich the campus life of Oregon and domestic students. As I said in declaring PSU a sanctuary campus, we have a responsibility to do all we can to make all of our students feel safe and supported regardless of their religion, national origin or immigration status. Indiana University has advised its international students from the banned countries not to leave the United States. It has designated a special page to update them. The U.S. president signed an executive order on January 27 that will impact visa processing abroad for international students and scholars, the web page says. We'll keep this page updated with the most recent information and our guidance. In another section, the school states, Indiana University has long recognized the absolute necessity of a diverse and inclusive community to an excellent education. All IU students, regardless of their background or country of origin, are welcome in our community. The University of Michigan published similar statements. The university complies with federal requirements associated with managing its international programs. Otherwise, the university does not share sensitive information like immigration status, it said. Campus police will not partner with federal, state or other local law enforcement agencies to enforce federal immigration law except when required to do so by law. Other dissenting schools include Princeton, Stanford and Columbia Universities, along with New York University. It is clearly up to the federal government to decide how to safeguard our nation, but at the same time, it is in Americas interest to remain the destination of choice for the worlds students and scholars, Terry W. Hartle, senior vice president of the American Council on Education, told The New York Times. Engineering, business and management, and unspecified are the preferred study fields of choice by international students, NAFSA says. The Johns Hopkins University announced recently that it will offer Syrian refugees two full scholarships to its Master of Public Health program, according to MedPage Today. The application deadline for the 12-month program, however, is January 31. Brown University is the only other school offering a scholarship program to Syrian refugees, MedPage Today reported. In December 2016, a report lamented the lack of critical-language speakers among students in U.S. universities. Those foreign languages are defined as critical to U.S. diplomacy and national security. More employers seek workers with varied language skills in markets of trading partners and in geopolitical regions in which diplomacy is critical, the report said. The study of languages considered of significant strategic interest to the United States, include Hindi, Indonesian and Swahili, and reflect a desire for stronger ties with important emerging regions around the world, the reports states. MIT professor Hazhir Rahmandad set up a public document on Google for international travelers to indicate whether they entered the U.S. or were detained. Rahmandad, who was born in Iran, is an assistant professor of system dynamics at the MIT Sloan School of Management. The injunctions issued in Massachusetts, New York and Virginia last seven days, The Boston Globe reported. Rahmandad said on his Facebook page that the temporary stay is a narrow window for immigrants to return to the U.S. African Union leaders chose Chad's candidate to chair the 54-nation body on Monday at a summit where the divisive issues of Africa's relationship to the International Criminal Court and Morocco's readmission to the AU were on the agenda. In the last round of voting, Chadian Foreign Minister Moussa Faki Mahamat beat Kenya's top diplomat Amina Mohamed to secure the post as head of the commission of the AU, which is headquartered in the Ethiopian capital. A Chadian official told a group of reporters that his nation's candidate had secured 39 votes in the final round. Faki, born in 1960, has served as foreign minister since 2008. His previous posts also included a stint as prime minister. In a race usually resolved in behind-the-scenes talks before a summit vote, three of the AU's four major regions vied for the post the south, the east and the largely Francophone west with some regions pushing more than one candidate. Outgoing commissioner, South Africa's Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, stayed in post an extra six months after leaders failed to agree a candidate in July. She is now tipped as a contender to succeed her ex-husband, Jacob Zuma, as South Africa's president. (REUTERS - Additional reporting by Aaron Maasho; Editing by Edmund Blair and Toby Chopra) U.S. Homeland Security chief John Kelly says he believes admitting lawful permanent residents into the United States is in the country's national interest, and does not go against the provisions of President Donald Trump's executive order on refugees and immigration. Kelly's statement late Sunday clarifies some of the confusion surrounding Trump's executive order limiting immigration. It basically halts immigration for 90 days from seven Muslim majority countries he says have spawned terrorists. Trump defended his order against the global outcry, saying it is not about religion but about "terror and keeping our country safe." "America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border," he said in a statement from the White House on Sunday. The president noted that former President Barack Obama had identified the seven countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen - as sources of terror. He pointed out that more than 40 Muslim majority countries are not affected by his order, and he took a characteristic swipe at the media for calling his order a ban on Muslims. Trump's executive order issued Friday will be in effect for 90 days, but has led to widespread confusion. Refugees, green card holders, students and workers have been detained at American airports or barred from boarding international flights to the United States. A senior administration official told reporters late Sunday that the president's executive order was written by the top Republican immigration experts on Capitol Hill, and that the legal significance of how it will be carried out was carefully considered. But U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly in New York issued an emergency order Saturday temporarily barring the deportation of people with valid visas being detained at U.S. airports. The order also bars the detention of anyone with an approved refugee application. The judge wrote "there is imminent danger that, absent the stay of removal, there will be substantial and irreparable injury to refugees, visa-holders, and other individuals from nations" who are subject to the president's order. The Homeland Security Department says it will comply with judicial orders, but stressed it will continue to enforce all of the president's executive orders. But reports from federal authorities indicated at least 170 people had been detained at U.S. airports since Trump signed his order Friday. Two senior Republican senators criticized Trump's order Sunday. "It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trumps executive order was not properly vetted. We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defense, Justice and Homeland Security, Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham said. Such a hasty process risks harmful results. People affected by order Twenty-eight-year-old Iranian national Neda Daemi, a 16-year legal U.S. resident, was released after being detained for 10 hours Saturday. Daemi spoke with two lawyers and added she was not asked to sign any papers. She explained she had flown to Los Angeles from Tehran, Iran, where she was visiting family members. WATCH: Protests at Los Angeles Airport Somali refugee Binto Siyad Aden and her children were released late Saturday after they were detained in Virginia. They had arrived on a family reunion visa from Kenya. Adens husband, Farhan Sulub Anshur, a U.S. citizen from Minnesota, said he believes his wife and two children were released after a court intervened. You cant image our joy and feelings now. They have been released and we are here together at a hotel near the airport, Anshur said. He told reporters his wife was subjected to harsh treatment from law enforcement while in detention at the airport. They harassed her and threatened her with handcuffs and arrest; they forced her to sign a form stating that her and her children will be deported, but she refused to sign for the kids and told them their father is an American citizen, he said. A Seattle judge issued an emergency stay of removal from the U.S. for two people, and another judge in Virginia banned the deportation of green card holders for seven days and ordered immigration officials to allow detainees access to lawyers. Other congressional reaction Trumps allies on Capitol Hill are treading carefully amid the controversy following his order. Republican Senator Mitch McConnell said the president has a lot of latitude to try to secure the country. We need to be careful as we do this. I think we need to be careful we do not have religious tests in this country, McConnell said. Republican Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona said Trump is right to be concerned about national security, "but it's unacceptable when even legal permanent residents are being detained or turned away ..." Democrats, however, believe Trump is doing more harm and playing into the hands of the enemy. What Trump is doing is harming our national security. It will incite attacks against us. ISIS (Islamic State) is already using this ban as propaganda, U.S. Representative Seth Moulton said. 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. Gibraltar's New Official Representative in the U.S. Government has recently appointed David Liston as its official representative in the United States. He replaces Joe Carseni who retired from the post with effect from the end of last year. Mr Liston is currently the leader of the Gibraltar-America Council, an organisation which, in his words, fosters positive relations between Gibraltar and the United States, celebrates the unique heritage and character of Gibraltar and her people and supports Gibraltars inalienable right to selfdetermination. Members of the Council include prominent current and former diplomats, military, academic, government and business leaders. It also includes members of well-known American families including the Roosevelts and Eisenhowers. Mr Liston, whose grandparents, Edward and Mary Guerrero emigrated from Gibraltar to the USA in the 1920s said, "I am honoured to serve as Gibraltars Man in the States. My grandparents travelled over the ocean many days from Gibraltar to start a new life in America but their hearts were always home in Gibraltar, where my heart is as well. I thank HMGOG and the people for this great honor. David Liston is a partner with a New York law firm and has previously served as an Assistant District Attorney in the Manhattan District Attorneys office. The Chief Minister Fabian Picardo said: "I would first of all like to thank Joe Carseni for the work that he has done in New York and in Washington over the years in furtherance of the objectives of Gibraltar and its people. At the same time, I am delighted to welcome David Liston to the post. David is already well versed on the positive issues that Gibraltar needs to project in the United States and I am certain that he will serve as a bridge to further cement cultural, heritage, commercial and political ties between our two countries." The makeover of this historic place was pending since last 15 years and and Union minister M Venkaiah Naidu will inaugurate it on the 69th death anniversary. A memorial committee stressed the need for more readable material on the life of the freedom struggle leader. By Ajay Kumar: The samadhi of Mahatma Gandhi at Raj Ghat is set to unveil a new look on Monday. Ministry of urban development has completed its face-lifting exercise on Sunday and Union minister M Venkaiah Naidu will inaugurate it on the 69th death anniversary of the Father of the Nation on Monday. The makeover of this historic place was pending since last 15 years. With increasing number of visitors, the Samadhi Samiti observed an urgent need to offer more readable materials that pertains to the life of the freedom struggle leader. advertisement "For more than 10,000 domestic and foreign visitors, who visit Mahatma Gandhiji's samadhi at Raj Ghat in the national Capital, there was nothing more than the black stone platform that marks the spot where Gandhiji was cremated. Also Read: PM calls for complete elimination of leprosy "To address this deficiency and to enhance the engaging experience of the visitors, the ministry has decided on its facelift, on the recommendation of the samiti," said a senior official of MUD. This revamp exercise has been going on since last September. Gandhi's profile has been briefed in 157 words and 131 words, describing his Samadhi have been put on display, both in Hindi and English, at all the three gates of Rajghat. The profile says Mahatma espoused "Truth, Non-violence, Sarvadharma Samabhava, Gram Swaraj, Trusteeship and Swadeshi which are the building blocks of a new social order free from all kinds of exploitation, discrimination and domination". The profile also says, "The Samadhi reflects the simplicity of Father of Nation, Mahatma Gandhi's life". Also Read: Assam's eri silk may be linked with peace and Gandhi: Irani Besides, 30 Amrit Vachans (eternally relevant thoughts of Gandhiji) have been engraved on marble and displayed on granite stone pedestals. These include - "Innumerable are the names of God; but if a choice were to be made of one, it would be Sat or Satya, that is Truth." The pedestals are illuminated by LED light atop aesthetically designed light post. "We have replaced all the existing conventional lights at Raj Ghat Complex with energyefficient and environment friendly LED lights that will be placed atop 104 aesthetically designed poles replacing the old ones. These LED lights result in energy saving of 60,000 KWH annually. "Solar panels are installed on roof tops. Cycle sheds are made at the parking area. These will generate 52 KW of energy. 27 CCTV cameras are also installed followed by high-tech control room" said an official. --- ENDS --- Govt to Raise CEPSA Refinery Flaring Incident with EU Commission The Government of Gibraltar is looking into the events surrounding the unprecedented level of flaring witnessed at the CEPSA refinery this weekend, following what appears to have been an electrical fault. Scientists from the Department of the Environment, Heritage & Climate Change along with its expert air quality consultants are currently investigating the impacts of said flaring on Gibraltar. HMGOG is also in contact with its representatives in Brussels in order to raise the incident with the EU Commission as a matter of urgency. Govt is aware of the concerns in the community with regards to the potential health impacts of such practices and reassures the public that it is taking decisive action to follow this up at the highest levels. The Environmental Agency has checked Gibraltars monitoring station data and no abnormal peaks have been recorded. Luckily, the wind direction E/SE was in Gibraltars favour on this occasion. The public will be provided with further updates as and when these are available. Learn how to winterize different parts of your home such as the chimney, furnace, windows, doors, gutters and smoke detectors Emily Browning in Golden Exits, Zoe Lister-Jones in Band Aid, and Jessica Williams in The Incredible Jessica James. Sundance is as much a showcase for people as it is movies. The list of actors and filmmakers who got their first major exposure in Park City is long, and each years festival promises a new crop of breakouts who will, soon enough, be showing up not only in their Sundance entries but also big Hollywood blockbusters. This year was no different. Weve highlighted the ten breakout performers at the festival; some of them are up-and-comers, and some are household names, but all of them are actors we left Park City seeing in a new light. Timothee Chalamet, Call Me by Your Name The 21-year-old Chalamet will be every indie directors new muse after his revelatory turn in Luca Guadagninos Sundance hit Call Me by Your Name. As an intellectually precocious teenager who has mastered everything but matters of the heart, Chalamet holds his own opposite onscreen lover Armie Hammer with a performance that feels real and unpredictable. It all culminates in a remarkable whopper of a final shot that rests on Chalamets face for minutes as he goes through the emotional gamut. That sort of scrutiny would defeat most young actors, and yet Chalamet soars. Zoe Lister-Jones, Band Aid Zoe Lister-Jones happens to have a major role on the CBS sitcom, Life in Pieces, but Band Aid, the movie she wrote, produced, directed, and starred in, showcases an actress with far greater range and power than she gets to show off in prime time. In the film, Lister-Jones plays the whole emotional scale, going from goofy and buoyant read: stoned to emotionally ravaged, and she does her most poignant scene naked, over the course of one seriously long take. Her director didnt let her off the hook, but fortunately, shes up for it. Anya Taylor-Joy and Olivia Cooke, Thoroughbred Pretending to not feel emotions is a tough task for an actor; thats Olivia Cookes challenge in Cory Finleys Thoroughbred, and she still manages to create a fully fleshed-out character without the benefit of emoting. Meanwhile, Anya Taylor-Joy, who shined just as bright at the festival two years ago with The Witch, gives a similarly virtuoso performance as a young woman bound, and eventually unwound, by the demands of her upper-class upbringing. Both actresses are rapidly rising through Hollywood, and Thoroughbred is a showcase for why. OShea Jackson Jr., Ingrid Goes West The Straight Outta Compton crew had a mighty good Sundance: Jason Mitchell scored in Mudbound, and Jackson had audiences howling with a comedic turn as Aubrey Plazas would-be boyfriend in the social-media satire Ingrid Goes West. A wannabe screenwriter who references Batman Forever a bit too much, Jackson is still the most appealing character by far in a sea of charlatans, and you could power a whole neighborhood with the wattage of his smile. Get this man in more rom-coms. Emily Browning, Golden Exits In Golden Exits, Alex Ross Perrys sharp and wounded investigation of temptation in Brooklyn, Emily Brownings Naomi is as much an agent of the ennui-fueled deceit that drives the film as any of the men, who include former Beastie Boy Adam Horovitz and ARP repertory player Jason Schwartzman. But its a testament to Brownings deft touch that Naomi still possesses a certain clear-eyed decisiveness that makes her seem less nefarious, or at least less obviously lost, than her male counterparts. If the musical God Help the Girl put Browning on the map as a dynamic, engaging performer, Golden Exits reveals her serrated edge. Mary J. Blige, Mudbound The Queen of Hip-Hop Soul takes on her most significant acting role yet as a sharecroppers wife in Mudbound, the Dee Rees drama that was one of the most acclaimed films of the festival. Its as muted and human as weve ever seen Blige, with her superstar confidence brought to bear on a woman who just hopes to make it through every day with her family intact, a tougher task than it may seem given the level of racism they encounter in the postWorld War II South. Lily Collins, To the Bone Collins has been forever on the verge of a breakout, but vehicles like Mirror Mirror and Rules Dont Apply were too muddled to do her any favors. Handed Marti Noxons razor-sharp screenplay for To the Bone, though, and Collins finally comes into relief. As a young woman battling anorexia, Collins swathes herself in blankets and sarcasm, and shes got spiky, wounded chemistry with everyone in the excellent cast, most notably scene-stealer Alex Sharp as a love interest who pokes, prods, and ultimately protects her. Harris Dickinson, Beach Rats Dickinson is the next young Brit ready to snatch great roles away from our Americans. In Eliza Hittmans Beach Rats, he disappears into character as a conflicted Brooklyn bro who prowls the boardwalk with his buddies by day and seeks clandestine hookups with older men by night. Its a film debut that requires Dickinson to bare both body and soul, and hes already in hot demand, tapped to star opposite Amandla Stenberg in the coming YA adaptation The Darkest Minds. Kumail Nanjiani, The Big Sick You know Nanjiani as unlucky-in-love Dinesh from Silicon Valley, which is why its so refreshing to see him as a heartbreaker of a leading man in this sharp, semi-autobiographical rom-com he wrote with his wife, Emily Gordon. Its rare enough to see a brown guy as a Hollywood-matinee idol, but what makes Nanjiani stand out is his willingness to be a complete ass who cries while doing stand-up comedy, throws fits in line at a drive-through, and takes his awesome girlfriend for granted, yet still has you rooting for him all the way. Chante Adams, Roxanne Roxanne This unknown actress had only eight days to prepare to play the inimitable Roxanne Shante, a rare female MC who rose to popularity in the early 1980s when she was just 14 years old. Not only does Adams go toe-to-toe with Mahershala Ali and Nia Long in the film, she spits with such fierce conviction that she manages to keep the entire movie afloat even when it descends into melodrama. Shes so mesmerizing that the Sundance jury gave her a special award for Breakthrough Performance. Danielle Macdonald, Patti Cake$ Youd think there wouldnt be room at this festival for two female rappers, but this charming Australian newcomer, playing a plus-sized cater waiter with dreams of rhyming her way out of New Jersey, had whole theaters at Sundance cheering her on. Macdonald spent two years learning to rap, and it shows, but her biggest achievement is in being so relentlessly sure of herself that her physicality becomes way less interesting than her fantasy life or her relationships with her ragtag band, PBNJ, her Nana (Cathy Moriarty), and her alcoholic, karaoke-master mom (comedian Bridget Everett, in her biggest film role). Daniel Kaluuya, Get Out As the lead of Jordan Peeles genius new horror-comedy about the terror of being a black man in a white world, the young British actor has to morph from a naive romantic visiting his white girlfriends parents, to an amateur detective trying to figure out why all the black people in their neighborhood are acting so strange, to a person running for his life once he finds out whats really going on. In other hands, a premise this outrageous might turn campy, but Kaluuya keeps things subtle; hes just an ordinary guy caught in an impossible situation. And hes so good, you may find yourself weeping in empathy. Margaret Qualley, Novitiate Best known for playing Justin Therouxs disillusioned daughter on The Leftovers (and for being Andie MacDowells daughter), Qualley radiates with devotion as a young woman whos fallen in love with God and has decided to undergo the rigorous process of becoming a nun. Qualley throws herself into the role, which involves sadistic acts of self-torture, and almost relentless scrutiny from Melissa Leos unhinged, tradition-bound Reverend Mother, while rhapsodizing about God as if hes a hunk she met at summer camp. Youll never think of nuns as staid and sexless again. Jessica Williams, The Incredible Jessica James Writer-director Jim Strouse wrote the lead role of his new film The Incredible Jessica James for the former Daily Show correspondent, and Williams takes full advantage, delivering one of the festivals most talked-about, and most enthusiastic, lead performances. As the titular aspiring playwright, Williams dances, boasts, jokes, and jabs her way across her star vehicle, essentially giving a 90-minute advertisement for her powers. If Strouses films title sounds like it could just as easily refer to its lead actress as her character, then rest assured that that was the intention. This finale reveals that The Affairs entire third season has been about rehabilitating Noahs character. By focusing so intensely on Noahs mental instability and grief, the show has created excuses for the terrible, selfish behavior hes demonstrated since season one. If his mothers death is the bedrock of his character, why wasnt it important until now? Thats just one of the finales many issues, all of which are impossible to ignore. By the way, Alison and Cole arent in the finale at all. Helen only appears at the very end and has zero dialogue. The episode is split between the perspectives of Noah and Juliette, as they spend Christmastime in Paris. Yes, you read that correctly. The first half of the finale is from the perspective of a walking French stereotype. Maybe if Juliette were interesting or more developed, her outsized role in the finale would feel justified. The episode opens with Juliette in bed with Noah at his place in Paris. His neck wound has fully healed, so some time has passed since the events of the previous episode, in which he realized the terrorization from Gunther was his imagination. Noah mentions to Whitney hes been seeing Juliette for about three months, but Im not sure if hes including the time they spent together while in New Jersey. He is seemingly stable and downright joyful about his life, which brings up a lot of questions. Whats the status of his parole? What did he tell the investigators who pretty much disappeared? How is he suddenly so sane? Did he go to therapy? All of these lingering questions are ignored in favor of fleshing out Juliettes relationship with her Alzheimers-afflicted husband, Etienne (Patrick Bauchau), and her 22-year-old daughter Sabine (Nadja Settel). Juliettes rendezvous with Noah hits a snag when she comes home to find Etienne lucid. But it isnt the miracle Sabine and Juliette want to believe. He soon becomes confused, thinking Juliette is his first wife and proclaiming, I cant live without you. For a show in which memory is identity and destiny, heres a woman whose husband has lost his. Despite its heavy subject, however, Juliettes storyline has no emotional resonance. Its also not the only other major issue she has to contend with: She has been lying to the university, posing as Etienne in emails to further his sabbatical and buy him time before revealing his condition. This proves to be a terrible mistake when she meets with a university official, Celia (Frederique Tirmont). Celia is casually cruel about Juliettes situation, going so far as to suggest that if Etienne was no longer able to work at the university, her position would need to be reconsidered. She subtly argues that perhaps Juliette wasnt doing her own work at all and it was Etienne who deserves the credit. You have no idea who you are without him, Celia says. In the world of The Affair, French people are cruel, emotionally distant, and use libertine attitudes to justify ugly behavior. They also wear berets and casually insult Americans. Everyone is pretty much a caricature a few stops short of Pepe Le Pew. But honestly, who cares about any of these characters? At this point, why do we need two perspectives especially when one belongs to a character with so little development? Memory, the show argues, is notoriously unreliable. Its shaped more by emotion and self-image than the absolute truth. But theres something about the scene in which Noah and Juliette meet at a cafe that bothers me. From her perspective, hes already downed half a bottle of wine by the time she sits downs. Shes a bit too concerned to fully engage with him and gets a call from Sabine that sends her racing home to find Etienne dead. From his perspective, hes the one who goes to meet her at the cafe, and she seems a bit harsh about her marriage. Do you think youre some expert on affairs? Why? Because you wrote a book? she tells him. Let me tell you something about my marriage you dont know: Etienne made you look like an amateur. A handful of differences are interesting, like the lack of subtitles in Noahs point of view when they bump into Juliettes friends. He doesnt know French, so that is a nice touch. Others, like Juliettes quote above, feel overly written. But more than anything, these dueling perspectives put the shows failure to establish context and time under a harsh light. When exactly are these characters having these recollections? A day after these events? A week? A year? Without context or a proper frame, the structure of the show simply falls apart. In season one, the characters scenes with the detective acted as the only objective part of the series. They provided a neat framing device that helped separate the present day from past memories. In season two, Noahs trial acted as a similar device. In season three, no scenes are completely divorced from characters perspectives, which means no part of the narrative acts as the absolute truth or marks a present point in time. Without these elements, the stark differences in peoples memories lack relevance and logic. While Juliette struggles with Etiennes place in her life, Noah is forced to confront his role as a father. As he strolls through Paris, he comes upon an ad for Furkats new exhibition only to pass by the gallery moments later. He thinks he sees Whitney inside, but its just a lookalike who is acting as Furkats latest paramour. Instead, Whitney is spending time as Furkats sex toy and errand girl, with neither the respect nor care she deserves. Furkat invites Noah to the exhibition opening, laying on thick every disgusting aspect of his character. When Noah goes to the opening, he opts not to go inside and instead watches Whitney serve wine and be ignored by Furkat. Fed up, Whitney decides to leave and their argument spills onto the street. I dont want to be your assistant. I love you, she says. Furkat, proving himself to be more than just a terrible partner, gets downright abusive. Learn your place, he shouts after backhanding her. Noah rushes to the rescue, but Whitney holds him back from going inside and causing any havoc. Think about this: In order to make Noah the good guy, The Affair had to invent a man so selfish and disgusting that anyone would look good in comparison. Furkat isnt a character. Hes a caricature solely constructed to facilitate Noahs redemption. The same can be said about Gunther. Whitney tries to defend Furkat, claiming his passion as an artist cant just be turned on and off. But being an artist doesnt justify abuse. Love isnt supposed to bring you pain, Noah says. Thats hard to believe, coming from him of all people. When Whitney undercuts his argument by mentioning his relationship with Helen, he counters by saying, I never hit your mother. Congrats, Noah. Thats the bare minimum. Also, what about the sexual assault we saw earlier this season? Are we really supposed to write off Noahs disgusting behavior because he decided to be a good parent for once? I see I failed in the most important job I had, which was to protect you from men like me, he tells Whitney. Well, that level of self-awareness is great, but Im not buying this redemption at all. Noah lets Whitney crash at his place and buys them tickets to return to New York City just in time for Christmas. He doesnt stay with Whitney, though. Instead, he spends the night with Juliette and plays hero by comforting her in the aftermath of Etiennes death. She apologizes for her harsh words earlier. He speaks of the narratives people build in the wake of a loved ones death, obviously alluding to his mother. Back in New York, Noah decides not to go inside the brownstone with Whitney. (You can see Vic at the window briefly, so I guess thats why he decides against spending Christmas with his family.) Helen waves at him from the window and Trevor comes outside, inviting him to spend time together in Central Park. Does it feel there is something missing here? When did this episode explain why theyre suddenly okay with Noah, not to mention the host of other unsolved matters? When Noah gets back in the cab, hes asked where hes going. He has no answer. His face is marked by the realization he has nowhere to go. Im guessing this Graduate-inspired ending is supposed to be poignant, considering its set during the holidays. It simply isnt. The more poignant ending came earlier this season between Cole and Alison, the shows most interesting and underutilized characters. Instead, were presented with a scene empty of emotion or depth. Ill end with this: For The Affair to be watchable again in its fourth season, it needs to move away from its obsession with Noah; it needs to lend reason to its memory structure; and it needs to create emotional resonance, rather than aiming for the profound. After all, there is nothing profound about a terrible, selfish white man being redeemed on television in ways he doesnt deserve. Bruce isnt having it. Photo: Ilya S. Savenok/Getty Images Though Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band may be on the other side of the world theyre currently performing in Australia they havent distanced themselves from the chaos thats unfolded back home during Donald Trumps first week in office. Springsteen recently used these concerts as a platform to publicly support the Womens March and back the new American resistance to Trumps presidency. Tonight in Adelaide, he joined the throngs of celebrities and protesters across the country in denouncing Trumps Muslim and refugee ban, calling the executive order anti-democratic and fundamentally un-American. America is a nation of immigrants, Bruce added. In 2010, Springsteen accepted his Ellis Island Family Heritage Award on behalf of his family of immigrants, which included his grandparents, and offered Gods grace, safe passage, and good fortune to those who are crossing our borders today. Springsteen closed his remarks in Adelaide by dedicating a performance of American Land to all immigrants. Photo: Theo Wargo/Getty Images for Tony Awards Productions If you thought your chances of getting one of the 23 coveted $10 lottery tickets to Hamilton were less likely than the chance of a poor immigrant becoming General Washingtons secretary followed by a career as the first secretary of Treasury for the United States well, your shot just got a little bit more likely. Deadline reports that the blockbuster Broadway musical will be doubling the number of $10 same-day tickets available through its digital lottery. The show, which sells premium tickets at a record high $849 a piece, will, starting Tuesday, expand the available seats from 23 to 46 per performance at the Richard Rodgers Theatre. So let that Founding Father fever rage on. Photo: ROBYN BECK/AFP/Getty Images Though the Screen Actors Guild Awards havent always drummed up excitement in the past, this years show seemed to be energized by the hectic week in political headlines. From Julia Louis-Dreyfus delivering a top-notch President Trump impersonation to Mahershala Alis plea to end persecution, the actors were quick to rally against bullying and the immigration ban. Among the winners for the acting honor were 2017 award-show favorites La La Land, Moonlight, Fences, and Hidden Figures. The television winners included performances from The Crown, The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story, and Stranger Things. See the full list of winners below. Television Outstanding performance by a female actor in a comedy series Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Veep Outstanding performance by a male actor in a comedy series William H. Macy, Shameless Outstanding performance by an ensemble in a comedy series Orange Is the New Black Outstanding performance by a female actor in a television movie or limited series Sarah Paulson, The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story Outstanding performance by a male actor in a television movie or limited series Bryan Cranston, All the Way Outstanding performance by a male actor in a drama series John Lithgow, The Crown Outstanding performance by a female actor in a drama series Claire Foy, The Crown Outstanding performance by an ensemble in a drama series Stranger Things Stunt ensemble Game of Thrones Motion Pictures Outstanding performance by a female actor in a supporting role Viola Davis, Fences Outstanding performance by a male actor in a supporting role Mahershala Ali, Moonlight Outstanding performance by a female actor in a leading role Emma Stone, La La Land Outstanding performance by a male actor in a leading role Denzel Washington, Fences Outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture Hidden Figures Each season, Homeland has a habit of spinning its wheels around episode three or four, after the narrative has been established and before the action really gets going. Despite a few nice moments, mostly due to the gravity that Mandy Patinkin brings to everything he does, The Covenant is a remarkably thin episode for this often-thick series. Its almost startling how little distance the plot is pushed. Yes, Quinns paranoia now appears to have some validity, Dars distrust of Carrie and PEOTUS Keane is growing, and Saul is finally overseas, but thats about it. Quinn (Rupert Friend) wakes up and goes to take a shower. Although it seems like this might be the moment at which Quinn finally comes back to us, returning from the brink of sanity on which hes teetered the last couple episodes, its a bit of a fake-out. The opening scene turns out to be a horrifying nightmare: Its not water that comes out of the showerhead, but gas, sending Quinn to the floor in convulsions. He wakes up screaming and is quickly comforted by Carrie (Claire Danes), but he takes her kindness the wrong way, sliding his hand under her shirt onto her bare back. She jumps up. Carrie has plenty to worry about beyond Quinns affection. Conlin (Dominic Fumusa) has learned that she defied a judges orders and tracked down the confidential informant who turned in her client, Sekou Bah (J. Mallory McCree). Its bad. The plea deal has been withdrawn and Sekou could now get 15 years instead of the 7 offered. Reda is furious, but somehow still lets Carrie go talk to their client alone, which I dont buy for a second. Homeland has a bad habit of falling into suspension-of-disbelief traps with these small scenes. Almost everything about the Carrie/Sekou arc fell into that trap this week, especially the overwritten scene in which she confesses and apologizes to the young man. Lets hope the writers will be able to move on soon. Meanwhile, Saul (Mandy Patinkin) is in Abu Dhabi, trying to get to the bottom of the rumors about a parallel nuclear program being operated by the Iranians. To do so, he interrogates Farhad Nafisi (Bernard White), who claims to be in Abu Dhabi for a conference. Saul suspects hes really there to negotiate an illegal arms deal on behalf of the Iranians. Saul talks tough, telling Farhad that he knows he recently accessed a massive line of credit at First Emirates, likely to buy illegal weapons, and tries to pressure him with photos of Farhad sleeping with a prostitute. Farhad insists it was a deal with the Russians, and that he did not go to North Korea as Saul insists he did. He even drops that Iran never wanted a nuclear weapon; they only fired up the program as a way to get sanctions lifted. They wanted to negotiate away a program we never wanted in the first place. Something doesnt make sense. If they were negotiating with the Russians for a defensive weapon, why were they hiding it? That wouldnt be against the agreement. Saul suspects something is up. Quinn is pretty suspicious too, staring at the cracked ceiling like Martin Sheen at the beginning of Apocalypse Now, when he hears a sound upstairs. He grabs a knife and locks the door, just before someone tries to open it. He goes to the window and sees someone cross back across the street, to an apartment overlooking Carries house. Whos watching the house? And are they watching Carrie or Quinn? After telling Dar Adal (F. Murray Abraham) that he had to let Farhad go, Saul finds a pack of cigarettes in the trash that makes him even more suspicious. He knows that Farhad put the pack in his pocket when he left. How did it get back in the trash? Saul heads off to the West Bank to visit family, but a late-night excursion to a car, in which he slumps in the back seat, proves that hes still investigating something. Dar tells Keane that the evidence is conclusive that the Iranians are doing something illegal, but it sure doesnt seem that way yet. Carrie is later surprised that Saul/Dar used that word, noting how the CIA likes to use vague terms especially since they got into so much trouble with the WMD drama. Is Dar planting a trap? Meanwhile, Carrie makes a play to save Sekou. She goes to a man named Roger for a favor: a transcript of the call between Conlin and his CI, which she later plays for the furious attorney. She wants all charges dropped and Sekou released tomorrow, or shell take the audio to the attorney general. Im increasingly convinced that this will be a classic Homeland double switch another bad judgment of character on Carries part. Shell get Sekou out and then hell commit a terrorist act, sending her down another spiral of self-loathing and insecurity. I actually hope Im wrong, because that arc would be too familiar. Finally, Quinn finds the girl who set him up for a beating and gets her to take him to the dude who robbed him. The guy seems somewhat apologetic, but Quinn beats him and takes his gun. Quinn does not seem stable enough to have a weapon, and Carrie would lose her mind if she knew that there was a loaded gun in the basement of the home she shares with her daughter. As Carrie comes home, Quinn picks up his weapon, looking out across the street. The guy is still there in the window of the apartment. And hes watching them. Other Notes: Photo: Maya Robinson and Photo by Getty Images A common refrain when discussing HBOs new series The Young Pope is that its a showcase for Jude Law, who, as Pope Pius XIII, has finally shed his ingenue beginnings. It alludes to the idea that, at the start of his career, Law was lovely to look at, but offered little beyond leading-man good looks. This isnt to say Law has never been praised or awarded, especially in his early career, when his beauty was at its peak. But the 44-year-old English actor has never been revered and studied in the ways his peers, like Daniel Day-Lewis or Philip Seymour Hoffman, have been, which is a shame. Because to categorize Law as an ingenue misunderstands a truth that has been evident since the very beginning: His presence and striking good looks dont enchant so much as they ensnare. As the titular figure in The Young Pope, Laws American-born Pope (real name: Lenny Belardo) is vaulted to the position thanks to much-mentioned but never fully explained manipulation. He isnt just unorthodox, complicated, and dangerous in the way that has come to be expected of so-called antiheroes in lush TV productions. Hes a cigarette-smoking, Cherry Cokeguzzling maelstrom. The series created, written, and directed by Paolo Sorrentino is weird, ostentatious, and deliriously hilarious. Early in the second episode while tending to his new duties with some archbishops and Sister Mary (Diane Keaton), the nun who raised him and now acts as his personal secretary, a strange rumbling is heard. Lenny leads them to the noise: Its from a cage holding a wild animal donated by the Australian foreign minister. Instead of playing it safe, he swings open the cage door and lures a grown kangaroo out as if it were a kitten. His expression here lands somewhere between resolve and deep interest. The Young Pope is full of moments like this, where it spins off into odd tangents, none of which would work without Law, who makes a meal out of every scene. Sometimes hell toss off clever one-liners like bombs, other times discarding them like day-old trash. In the blink of an eye, his gaze will move from compassionate to cruel scrutiny. At one point in The Young Pope, Lenny says, I know Im incredibly handsome. Please, lets try to forget about that. But Sorrentino never does (neither does Law, for that matter). The director frames Law with a sort of movie-star grandness that only the right presence can adequately fill. Hes more than game, lending Lenny a cocky aggression, arms splayed wide as hes addressing a hungry crowd or handling a cigarette as if to punctuate his sentences. The Young Pope is compulsively watchable because of Law, where another actor might have tilted too far into the characters wackiness or darkness. His performance crystallizes his greatest strengths as an actor his leonine physicality, his ability to deliver lines with equal parts charm and venom, and the ways hes weaponized his good looks. Director Anthony Minghella, with whom Law worked on The Talented Mr. Ripley and Cold Mountain, once said about the actor, Jude is a beautiful boy with the mind of a man. A true character actor struggling to get out of a beautiful body. A-list actresses of this kind of great, overpowering beauty have learned to use their looks to inform their performance. This tactic is clear particularly in the tradition of femme fatales of the 1940s, or even today: Rosamund Pikes patrician blonde visage is useful in how it contrasts with the pure psychopathy of Amy Dunne in David Finchers Gone Girl. An intelligent actress can use her looks in a way that enriches her work, rather than depending on or trying to downplay them. Its actors, though, who are often more vocal about the struggles of being an object of sexual desire while trying to carve out a fulfilling career. For actresses, beauty and a degree of sex appeal are arguably non-negotiable if they want to achieve major fame. Their careers are often curtailed in their 30s, even as their skills grow. In contrast, actors historically are given better parts and awarded as they age out of their ingenue phases. The Washington Post did a study on the age dynamics at play for men and women at the Academy Awards, writing, The average age of best actor winners was 44, compared to the best actress average of 36. The average best supporting actor is 50, while the average best supporting actress is 40. This only reinforces the idea that being a young, beautiful object of desire as an actor is antithetical to more acclaimed roles. At 44, Law is still attractive, but not in the near-perfect way he was in his youth. It isnt a coincidence his career would gain esteem as his looks have changed in middle age. Laws line about his handsomeness in The Young Pope could easily have been said by any number of actors who felt ill at ease with their own beauty, like Errol Flynn, whom Law played in Martin Scorseses The Aviator. (Its a brief cameo, but Law is light on his feet, altering his voice enough to sound akin to Flynn without falling into caricature as Cate Blanchett did with Katharine Hepburn.) Flynn was one of many to believe his good looks ruined his chances of being a serious actor. Tyrone Power, Paul Newman, and others have expressed the idea that being genetically blessed made it harder to get meatier roles. Actors in classic Hollywood didnt have the opportunity to put on weight or drop it to perilous lows, since the studio system prized their sex appeal. But for leading men today who want to be taken more seriously, transformation is key taking on tricky accents, losing and gaining weight to a dangerous degree, uglifying themselves. In many ways, modern actors obscuring their beauty is an attack on what classic Hollywood valued strong star persona, gorgeousness, and a sense of play. Law embraces this aesthetic, while adding enough darkness and unpredictability to deepen his work beyond mere classic-Hollywood, leading-man pastiche. This is what makes him one of the most entrancing modern actors: Hes at his best when he doesnt obscure his good looks, but leans into them. This doesnt mean he hasnt also leaned away just look at his lead performance in the 2013 film Dom Hemingway. As the titular character in the uneven crime drama/black comedy, its Laws voice that is heard before hes ever seen. Over a red screen, he asks, Is my cock exquisite? In his introduction, he looks directly at the camera while obviously getting a blowjob. He goes on for nearly three whole minutes talking about the virtues of his treasured appendage. Even before Law is seen with grimy teeth, a paunch, and a dramatically receding hairline, his disembodied voice alerts us to how different he will be. Gone is his usual posh, eloquent purr. Instead, his voice is rough, clipped, and aggressive. The film begins as a fun, slapdash, nasty piece of work before turning into a Guy Ritchie knockoff. But throughout, Law is utterly mesmerizing. Hes bursting with quicksilver moods, cocky brio, and joyful violence. What separates Laws transformative turn in Dom Hemingway from the countless other examples of pretty-boy actors who obscure the good looks that got them noticed in the first place is a single factor: the sheer exuberance of his performance. This isnt a typical Oscar-bait role full of carefully curated suffering and an arc predicated on overcoming great struggle. Its a rip-roaring, slovenly, gleefully deranged work that is as transformative within as it is without. Even if Law didnt gain the weight, his performance as Hemingway would still sing. And long before Dom Hemingway, Law had been doing great, even subversive work. In his early ingenue roles that clearly capitalize on his beauty, Law found ways to add texture and gravitas to what could have been mere Adonis figures. For many, The Talented Mr. Ripley was their first introduction to Law. The 1999 adaptation of Patricia Highsmiths unnerving mystery sees Law playing Dickie Greenleaf, a spoiled trust-fund kid who Matt Damons Tom Ripley is tasked with bringing back to the United States. Director Anthony Minghella wrings as much sumptuous beauty from the Italian landscape as possible, but from the moment hes introduced, Laws face is what remains his most enchanting subject. Lounging on a crowded beach, his body, tanned and taut, stretches under the bright sun. Its the sort of achingly beautiful, aspirational movie-star entrance thats rare to see these days. When Law is called an ingenue, its because of roles like this. But in Laws hands, Dickie isnt just an impetuous, simplistic pretty boy delaying adulthood. There is a darkness on the margins of his identity far more compelling than that of Damons Ripley. At times, his compliments and kind gestures dont fully feel sincere because theyre tinged with bitterness. His eyes will unexpectedly grow dark and shark-like, as if hes figuring out ways to use you. The warmth of his smile never quite reaches his eyes. Here, his beauty isnt an inward quality, but a mask hiding his more damning inhibitions. In the hands of a great actor, physical beauty can bring unexpected complexity to a role. One such figure is French actor Alain Delon, who also starred in an adaptation of Highsmiths novel decades earlier, in the 1960 Rene Clement film Purple Noon. Hes an actor of such stunning beauty and grace, he feels like a genetic fluke. Delon is a clear antecedent to Law, even though in Purple Noon he isnt playing Dickie, but Ripley himself. His performance couldnt be more different from Damons approach to the character. He lends a perverse delight to Ripley as he tries on various identities. Hes cunning, elegant, playful, all wrapped up in a devastating package. Damons Ripley, meanwhile, is a clumsy mess, devoid of any of the deviant lust that makes Highsmiths creation so magnetic. While Delon and Law both use their beauty to deepen their performances, there are fundamental differences in their techniques. Delon typically carried an iciness and unreadability that belied his boyish good looks, while Law has a warmth to him that at times feels genuine (like in Nancy Meyerss The Holiday), and other times is just a front to disguise his self-absorption (Closer). But Delon is just as clever in how he wields his beauty in films like Purple Noon: as a source of power that, to the audience, is like a mesmerizing spell. His movements have an ease that feels natural, yet at the same time too smooth to be exactly human. In 2001s A.I., Law demonstrates a more heightened version of this balletic physicality, as the male-prostitute robot aptly named Gigolo Joe. (Casting Law as this character almost feels like a way of poking fun at his own image as desirable leading man.) His more robotic movements are a bit too sharp or too quick to feel natural. Even the most blessed among us have some imperfection that underscores our inherent humanity. There are none of those touching imperfections in Gigolo Joe, which isnt a matter of special-effects trickery, but of an actor with a supreme understanding of his own physicality. As stated in one of the DVD extras of the film, Law studied the work of Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly in preparation for the role. At first this seems a bit odd, given how different Astaire and Kelly are. As Kelly himself once said, Fred Astaire represents the aristocracy when he dances, and I represent the proletariat. Kelly is grounded to the Earth with raw energy and sexuality brimming in his every move. Astaire is the picture of grace: He doesnt so much walk and dance as he does float. But Law actually does meld these wildly different aesthetics. Law moves nearly imperceptibly between the earthy lustfulness of Kelly and the supreme grace of Astaire. He glides, jumps from objects to the ground, and moves differently from anyone else in the film, using his movements to communicate the technological nature of his character. This understanding of his own body can be traced throughout Laws career. Even in The Young Pope, when he smokes with such flourish or saunters through the opening credits, his keen understanding of physicality as emotion is evident. It can sometimes seem modern directors rely a bit too heavily on close-ups in order to telegraph the grandest emotions. But Law is an actor begging to be seen wide. (For the record, he works great in close-ups, too, as the beginning of The Young Popes third episode illustrates when he lasciviously and passionately conducts a monologue. I love myself more than my neighbor, he extols with only the upper half of his face filling the screen. I love myself more than God.) As Laws career has progressed, hes played a variety of roles, including cheating obituary writer (Closer), a rougher, dashing version of John Watson (Guy Ritchies Sherlock Holmes films), a humorous spin on the James Bondbrand of super spy (Spy), cunning mob enforcer (Road to Perdition), and Hamlet on Broadway, to name a few. In each, he mines the contradictions between his spellbinding good looks, dangerous cunning, and natural warmth. Even in uneven films like Joe Wrights Anna Karenina he brings enough heartbreaking interiority to his work to make at least his own performance magnificent; or in the unmemorable 2004 remake of Alfie, where theres a smarminess to his performance that prevents it from being trite. In recent years, its that smarminess in particular that hes used to great effect. Take Steven Soderberghs 2013 film Side Effects. Law plays a psychiatrist whose patient (Rooney Mara) kills her husband in a sleepwalking stupor, which she blames on her medication as part of an elaborate plot. Hes being manipulated, of course, and what follows is a series of double crosses and hidden agendas. But for the film to work, Laws innocence must always be in question. The assumptions and suspicions you may have about men that good-looking complicates the experience of watching the film. Laws signature dark charm and confidence, bordering on narcissism, is necessary for the film to maintain its urgency. Of course, he makes it look easy: Law is the ne plus ultra of actors who innately understand how beauty can add complexity to a role. As a viewer, to watch him is to be seduced and frightened in equal measure. Hes the ultimate cinematic fantasy and nightmare youre not sure you ever want to wake from. Whenever Chef Manisha Bhasin wants to relax she cooks. And not just anywhere, in her specially designed, fully customised kitchen. Though a stone's throw away from the airport, it lies well hidden from traffic and the city rush. Walk into the house in Palam Vihar, Gurgaon, and you see carefully curated furniture pieces, but it is the heavenly mix of aromas of the foccacia, winter vegetable lasagna, roasted chicken and salad tossed with home grown greens coming from the kitchen that really leaves an impact. "My husband Ajay and I built this house in 2013. We planned every last detail, however, there was one room, where we had a tussle on the size-the kitchen. Infact, our architect was surprised and so are the guests when they see it. I knew I was going to spend most of my time here and so it had to fit all my needs with everything at hand. Today Ajay is happy with our decision," says the 50-year-old Bhasin. Needs dictate layout advertisement "I have a peninsula kitchen or a G-shaped kitchen for maximum storage, separate meal prep, cooking and clean up areas. It's important to group all tall appliances together and short appliances separately, keep refrigerator and sink together, and stove on the opposite side," says Bhasin. The 25ft x 12ft long kitchen, even has a dining table. "My dream in future is to cook for my grand children and involve them in handling of food from young age so that they grow up appreciating good food and respect for ingredients in these modern times. As of now we use the table for family brunches, lunches and dinners," she says. While the formal entertaining happens in the dining room just outside the kitchen. As for the facility planning, all the equipment has been placed in one line so that it is easily accessible. "I had an option of getting into an island kitchen but an island kitchen does not augur very well in an Indian cooking scenario. Our vessels are very different, we use degchi, lagan, patilas, they don't go well with an island kitchen," she says. Also read: 10 kitchen hacks that you need in your life right now! Further, she purposely did not opt for a show kitchen, though everyone was recommending it. "When you are cooking Indian food, masala flavours will waft into your dining room, so I insisted on a family table in the kitchen itself. This way I can cook and chat with friends and family at the same time," she adds. Bhasin believes is arranging spices, oils, herbs according to the cuisine. "I have a Asian pantry, Western and my good old Indian spices cabinet, this segregation as per the cuisine not only keeps the flavours intact but also allows ease in cooking," she says. Bhasin also believes in storing pots and pans in the cabinets nearest to the cooking area so that you do not struggle last minute. One should keep fancy dishes and serving bowls on the top shelves and everyday plates on the bottom shelves. "Store daily use serving dishes in cabinets near the washing area for ease of stacking once washed; keep the reusable ready to go food containers, cling wraps, silver foils, paper napkins separately at one spot; and use the door interiors for pinning up of recipes, which you like or baking conversion cheat sheet." says Bhasin. advertisement Storage drawers around the fridge. Photo courtesy: Rajwant Rawat Pot and plan This is a planned kitchen where all the equipments are easily accessible and it meets all your needs. "The gadgets are not very fancy they are basic hardcore conventional ovens that work well in a home scenario. Of course, I had an option of going for combi-ovens and induction hobs, but I stayed away from it because I know these things may not survive long," adds Bhasin, who does Indian and western cooking at home. The next phase of her plan involves creating a small extension of the kitchen with all artisan Indian kitchen equipment. She has already started collecting. A cook's tools Bhasin is most proud of her knives, which she collected over the years on her travels. "From equipment point of view, I wanted a practical kitchen that is gadget friendly," she says. Topping her list is the food processor and the conventional oven followed by the Weber grill and ice cream machine. Besides this she has invested in good quality gas range with efficient brass burners that have 5,000 plus BTU (British Thermal Unit) and a stainless steel effective chimney equipped with baffle filters with a capacity of 800m/hour. advertisement Clever design "The entire kitchen is modular," says Bhasin, adding, "The space is divided into two, one side is only for my husband's glassware and bar accessories and one side are my utensils and pull outs for knives, forks, spoons, crockery and linen." In fact, to pick out the right colour for the cabinets, flooring and walls, Bhasin waited for three months . "Grey is a practical colour, which I used for the lower cabinets and the cleverly hidden pantry, white has been used for the cabinets above," she says. To add a spark of brightness, burgundy has been used for the backsplash on the walls. The large opaque glass window which overlooks the rows of trees has been designed by her son with print of cooking terminology, thus adding fun element to the kitchen table section. Informal dining table next to the opaque glass with cooking terminology. Photo courtesy: Rajwant Rawat Her last piece of advice is to avoid non-stick or aluminium pans, use traditional heavy bottom pans instead, grow your greens, think practically and stay away from the microwave. "Your kitchen, must reflect what you believe in." Rest, let loose your creative juices. advertisement Manisha's quick tips 1.Arrange spices, oils, herbs according to the cuisine. Segregation as per cuisine not only keeps the flavours intact but also allows ease in cooking. 2. Store pots and pans in the cabinets nearest to the cooking area so that you do not struggle last minute. 3. Keep fancy dishes and serving bowls on the top shelves and everyday plates on the bottom shelves. 4. Store daily use serving dishes in cabinets near the washing area for ease of stacking once washed. 5. Keep reusable ready to go food containers, cling wraps, silver foils, paper napkins separately at one spot. 6. Use the door interiors for pinning up of recipes, which you like or baking conversion cheat sheet. Text by Ridhi Kale, Styling by Srishti Jha --- ENDS --- The cast of Stranger Things at the SAG Awards. Photo: Kevin Winter/Getty Images After a weekend dominated by news about the presidents refugee ban and the ensuing protests in various American cities and airports, sitting down to watch a Hollywood awards show felt like an even more frivolous act than usual. But Sunday nights Screen Actors Guild Awards, as a piece of television, turned out to be a surprisingly cathartic experience that delivered a bit of escapism, some unexpected wins, and personal reflections relevant to whats happening in the country. Most of us have learned not to expect much from awards shows. Even the junkies who still get some weird contact high from awkward teleprompter banter often find that these affairs last too long and become bloated with insidery thank-yous. The SAG Awards ceremony, which concentrates solely on film and television acting, has always been more focused in this regard. Only 13 awards are presented during the program, which airs on TBS and TNT the honors for stunt ensemble are announced off camera and there is neither a host nor an attempt to inject comedy bits and musical numbers into the proceedings. The SAG approach has always been: hand out the awards, let the winners make their speeches, then get out. That format always makes the SAGs happily succinct, but under ordinary circumstances, it also can make them a little dull and overly rote. As we all know by now, these are not ordinary times, and the SAGs reflected that. From the traditional Im an actor opening in which Kerry Washington insisted right off the bat that actors are, by nature, activists to the first acceptance speech of the evening from lead actress in a TV comedy winner Julia Louis-Dreyfus of Veep, it was obvious that everyone inside the Shrine Auditorium had politics and social justice on the front burners of their minds. Im an American patriot, Louis-Dreyfus said after explaining that she is the daughter of an immigrant, her late father, who fled Nazi-occupied France. I love this country, and because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes. This immigrant ban is a blemish, and it is un-American. The best speeches of the evening similarly evoked the personal to make their point. Mahershala Ali, honored as best supporting actor on the film side for Moonlight, spoke articulately about the connection between lifting up those who feel marginalized, something his character in Moonlight does, and the current cultural climate. He did that without ever mentioning the guy who occupies the Oval Office. When we get caught up in the minutiae, the details that make us all different, I think theres two ways of seeing that, he said. Theres an opportunity to see the texture of that person, the characteristics that make them unique. Then theres an opportunity to go to war about it, and to say that persons different than me. I dont like you. Lets battle. My mother is an ordained minister. Im a Muslim. She didnt do backflips when I called to tell her I converted 17 years ago. But I tell you now, we put things to the side. Im able to see her, shes able to see me. We love each other, that love has grown, and that stuff is minutiae. Where Ali spoke with soft dignity, David Harbour, designated spokesperson for the cast of Stranger Things, which won for best TV drama ensemble, barbarically yawped his way through a speech that used the language of the series as a way to convey solidarity. In the continuing narrative of Stranger Things, we 1983 Midwesterners will repel bullies, Chief Hopper said to great applause while Courtney B. Vance looked on incredulously from the audience. We will shelter freaks and outcasts, those who have no home. We will get past the lies. We will hunt monsters. And when were at a loss amidst the hypocrisy and the casual violence of certain individuals and institutions, we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the meek and disenfranchised! The only thing more emotionally charged than Harbours words was the full musical scale of emotions that played across Winona Ryders face while he was talking. Was Ryder a little drunk, or just overly expressive because she was caught up in the shock of having won an award that, honestly, most people thought would go to The Crown? It didnt matter. In roughly a minute and a half, Ryder summarized the vast array of conflicting feelings many Americans have experienced since the inauguration. Actually, in that minute and a half, she might have captured every feeling every human being has ever had in his or her life. Witnessing it was a gift that also, inevitably, produced several GIFs. Other visuals during the SAGs were pretty striking, too, including the kaleidoscope of races and ethnicities that crowded the stage when all 875 (number approximate) members of the Orange Is the New Black cast accepted best comedy ensemble for the third year in a row, and the image of the three African-American stars of Hidden Figures, which won for best film ensemble, standing in the center of the frame as representatives of three black women whose achievements were long obscured by history. This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race, Taraji P. Henson said while accepting the award. She didnt make a much more pointed statement about racism or politics than that, but she didnt have to. Just seeing her alongside her co-stars Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monae, both of whom were visibly crying Cindi Mayweather was weeping on TV, and it nearly broke me, guys was statement enough. There was plenty on the SAGs that still qualified as standard awards fare. Denzel Washington thanked a bunch of people that most people watching had never heard of; Paulson, who won yet another award for The People v. O.J., thanked Marcia Clark for what felt like the 15th time in the past year; Dolly Parton presented the lifetime achievement award to Lily Tomlin and made 18 jokes about her boobs while doing so. But there was also real, unfiltered joy that burst through the TV, most notably when Ali, Viola Davis, Washington, Orange Is the New Black, Claire Foy of The Crown, and Stranger Things won, and again at the end of the night when Hidden Figures did. Everybody seemed more grateful than usual, as if they were mindful of their blessings as well as those who arent as blessed. Awards shows are silly and self-congratulatory, and when actors speak of current events or causes, they skate a very fine line between projecting humble social awareness and grandstanding for personal glory. (For more on this, see Tom Hiddlestons speech at the Golden Globes.) Everybody stayed on the right side of the line last night, expressing themselves at a fraught national moment in a way that seemed to emanate more from a sense of duty than partisanship. (Again, I dont think a single person said the name Trump. The words Republican and Democrat were not spoken either.) Hollywood is full of bullshit, even on its best days. But even if the winners didnt always jibe with ones expectations, for the most part, the SAGs this year was refreshingly free of bullshit. Come the end of February, well see if the Oscars are able to say the same. Photo: John Sciulli/Getty Images for Turner Given President Donald Trumps recent clashes with the media, which he called the opposition party, its hard to imagine the press and the Trump administration having a chummy or even cordial iteration of the star-studded White House Correspondents dinner this year. And given the presidents unwillingness to withstand any roasting, its also hard to imagine that any comedian chosen to perform will feel free to make the traditional jokes at the commander-in-chiefs expense. On April 29 the same time as the Correspondents Dinner Samantha Bee will host an alternative gala called Not the White House Correspondents Dinner at Washingtons Willard Hotel, and celebrities and journalists will be invited to attend, the New York Times reports. TBS and Bees Full Frontal staff are still working out the details of how the night will be broadcast, but its sure to be a riot. I honestly cant imagine what theyre thinking, but I really wish them well, Bee told the Times, adding that the Trump administration will likely have a tough time finding a suitably famous comedian willing to host the dinner and take on the tricky task of roasting the president. Does [inauguration performer] 3 Doors Down do comedy? I dont know, maybe they do, Bee said. Mark your calendars for Bees special on April 29 and the presidents inevitable tweets to follow in the early hours of April 30. Disney/Pixars Finding Dory. Photo: Disney/Pixar/IMDB After a night of protests against Trumps immigration ban which is barring refugees and people from several Muslim countries from entering the U.S. this weekend, preventing many families from reuniting Trump chose to screen Finding Dory at the White House this afternoon. The Pixar and Disney animated blockbuster is a little on the nose, considering its about a family that gets separated, and searches the ocean to reunite. Coincidental? The internet didnt miss a beat. Trump is screening "Finding Dory" today: the story of a foreigner entering the U.S. without authorization to reunite with her parents #Irony pic.twitter.com/FKU7ItiPod Chris Lu (@ChrisLu44) January 29, 2017 He relates to Ellen's character who has no attention span. https://t.co/Zpn9PDYJr4 Judd Apatow (@JuddApatow) January 29, 2017 At 3pm, Trump is hosting a screening of Finding Dory, a movie about what happens when you're separated from your family. Let that sink in. Alex Zalben (@azalben) January 29, 2017 The 3:00 p.m. screening took place as protests continued outside the White House. A source tells The Hollywood Reporter that the Trump White House has also asked to see the year-end comedy Why Him? starring James Franco and Bryan Cranston. Fill in your own joke here. By Press Trust of India: Hyderabad, Jan 30 (PTI) Fuelled by growing demand, the countrys largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki India (MSI) plans to double the number of Nexa outlets to 400 by 2020. "Maruti Suzuki plans to expand the number of Nexa outlets to 250 by end of FY 2016-17. With regard to long term plan, by 2020 we are planning around 400 Nexa outlets," (MSI Executive Director (Marketing & Sales) R S Kalsi told reporters here. advertisement Maruti Suzuki India today inaugurated its 200th Nexa showroom here. Nexa, the premium retail chain of MSI, is now present in 121 cities and has already sold over 1,85,000 vehicles since its inception in July 2015. "Nexa has been fastest rising retail network anywhere in the world. We will continue this momentum... We are focused on network and product expansion," Kalsi said. At present, the cars sold through Nexa are: premium cross-over S-Cross; premium hatchback Baleno and premium urban compact IGNIS. "The new Baleno RS model would be introduced through the Nexa channel within this fiscal year," Kalsi said. By March 2017, when Nexa completes 20 months of its launch, it expects to sell 2,00,000 units. To a query on note-ban, he said, "Demonetisation phase is over for us. That is behind us." PTI VVK RSY --- ENDS --- The toll of elephants in Midnapore and Rupnarayanpur divisions this year has risen to 10, while a total of 4 elephants have died in Lalgarh. By Manogya Loiwal : Despite alertness of forest authorities, another elephant has died in West Bengal's Midnapore. Only recently, an adult male elephant was found dead in the woods. According to villagers and forest department officers (FDO), two elephants in Goaltore village got into a fight over intrusion into their territory. While one elephant was shot dead, the other which was injured died after a few days in Lalgarh village. advertisement Also read | West Bengal: How new toilets are going to help reduce human-elephant conflict The elephant's body was sent for post-mortem. The autopsy report revealed that the causes of death were the fight between the two animals and the eating of pesticide crops. The toll of elephants in Midnapore and Rupnarayanpur divisions this year has risen to 10, while a total of 4 elephants have died in Lalgarh. CONSUMING OF PESTICIDE REMAINS MAKES ELEPHANTS ILL The consuming of pesticide remains in crops makes elephants ill, causing their death. In earlier years, elephants coming from Jharkhand's Dalma area in search of food used to return to their home territory. Later, they started dwelling near the villages which began posing a security hazard for villagers. The quantity of crops destroyed in a year because of the straying of elephants is immeasureable. This has not only hurt the farmers economically, but also terrified families staying in villages, as several people have been trampled by the animal. Also read | West Bengal: Elephant dies after accidently falling into irrigation well Indrajit Das, a villager, described the incident and the fear it has triggered among the people. "The elephant died two days ago, perhaps due to ill health. As it fell down on the ground, it suffered major injuries. This year four elephants and around 100 people have died. There are 100 elephants going amok all over the forest. This is what we are scared of." WHAT DOES THE DFO HAVE TO SAY Despite the villagers blaming forest departments for not taking the responsibility to rein in the pachyderm menace in villages in East Midnapore district, Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) Rabindranath Saha explained the cause of deaths of elephants. "Around 10 elephants have died in one year. The problem that occurs when all elephants gather in one place is that they start fighting among themselves. The male elephants, especially, fight among themselves over food and capturing of their land. Earlier, when elephants used to come to the village, they used to go back but now they don't move out of the territory. Elephants coming from the Bankura side are staying in our Midnapore area for the rest of the years. The cause of the death is supposed to be the fight among elephants. It is a case of survival of the fittest", said the DFO. advertisement If the forest department does not control the situation at the earliest, the toll of both elephants as well as villagers will increase. (WITH INPUTS FROM DEBEN TIWARI IN WEST MIDNAPORE) --- ENDS --- By Press Trust of India: Islamabad, Jan 30 (PTI) At least one Pakistani soldier was killed when militants operating from Afghanistan targeted a border post in Khyber tribal district, the army said today. Terrorist fired at the border post in Khyber district, critically injuring soldier Waqas. Army said the injured soldier was shifted to the Combined Military Hospital in Peshawar where he succumbed to injuries. advertisement "Terrorists are resorting to fire from across the border taking advantage of weak border control on Afghanistan side. There is a requirement to check terrorists freedom of movement on Afghan side of the border," it said. PTI SH ZH --- ENDS --- Figuring out how to incorporate Girl Scout cookies into a formal four-course meal came by instinct for one local chef. Until the Peanut Butter Patties. Its got such a strong profile, Barnetts Public House chef Elizabeth Pannabecker said. To compliment the already popular taste of the cookie, Pannabecker mixed the treat with mole Colorado sauce, a Mexican-style sauce with about 27 ingredients. Pouring it over a seared pork loin, green rice and black beans, Pannabecker created the main dish for the upcoming Girl Scouts of Central Texas specialty dinner at the pub. Girl Scouts are celebrating 100 years of cookie sales, and the Waco area is stepping up with a four-course meal that incorporates the cookies, a special coffee inspired by the cookies, a beer-and-cookie pairing and a sprint to burn off all the calories. History Girls baked cookies out of their homes the first 10 or so years of Girl Scouts, said Melissa Green, Girl Scouts of Central Texas program and teen mentor specialist. You got what you got. It wasnt like everybody make chocolate chip or whatever, Green said. Theres two bakeries in the country now that make their whole living off Girl Scout cookies, which is insane when you think about it. There are Girl Scout cookies that the tried-and-true flavors that everyone knows and looks forward too, Green said. But theres also always the appeal of the new. This cookie season the organization announced the Girl Scout Smores, a crispy graham cookie double-dipped in cream icing and finished with chocolatey coating. The new Smores cookie is included in the four Waco-area cookie events. Green said Scouts are trying to market the cookies to adults. Food Starting with an adult market in mind, Barnetts agreed to dedicate one of its specialty Friday night dinners to cookies. Limited space is available, and reservations are required to get the $25 four-course meal featuring dishes made using Girl Scout cookies. The meal is at 7 p.m. Friday at 420 Franklin Ave. Were always looking for something different, unique and creative for our Friday night dinners, Barnetts owner Andrew Steakley said. Its the fun part of my job. Pushing the envelope is always fun, Pannabecker said. Steakley came up with the idea to incorporate the cookies in a meal, she said. The meal then naturally progressed. The Chicken Satay, Pannabeckers favorite part of the meal, includes the Peanut Butter Sandwich cookie, which is a crisp oatmeal cookie with creamy peanut butter filling. She said she crumbled the cookie and mixed it with green chili peanuts. Youd be surprised how easy it was to make some of the cookies way on the savory size, she said. The four-course meal also includes a spring berry salad. Pannabecker said she took the Girl Scout Lemonades cookie and crushed it with herbs and wrapped it around goat cheese. Thats kind of something very similar to what I would do with bread crumbs and lemon zest and honey, so to me, one would trade off with the other perfectly, she said. Customers partaking in the four-course meal will end the night with the Girls Scouts newest cookie, Smores, paired with brimstone marshmallow. Coffee Community members can also support the local Girl Scouts organization by ordering coffee at Dichotomy Coffee & Spirits. A portion of sales from any Centennial deLite until Feb. 26 will go back to the Girl Scouts of Central Texas, which consists of 17,000 girls and almost 13,000 volunteers. Area girls in the Coffee and Cookies program created the latte and earned a patch in the process, Green said. They learned about the coffee business and got a chance to roast coffee beans at Apex Coffee Roasters, she said. Anybody can make a latte with caramel and chocolate all in it, but they wanted it to taste like the cookie, Green said. Beer For the second year in a row Barnetts will also host Cookies on Tap. The come-and-go event from 2 to 8 p.m. Saturday pairs Girl Scout cookies with Texas craft beers. Last year, the event lasted only two hours. Green said it wasnt well attended so they made some changes, including extending the hours. VIP packages are available for $35. Customers can also pay $10 for a flight of four craft beers paired with four cookies or $20 for two flights with all eight pairings. Run Those ready to burn off the calories from a week of cookies, coffee and beer can sign up to participate in the Thin Mint Sprint. The event starts at 8 a.m. Feb. 11 at Woodway Park, 924 Estates Drive. Proceeds from the 5K will help Girl Scouts in the Waco area expand their travel horizons, Green said. Life lessons Troop Leader Fallon Beaudin said she loves teaching and working with the Girl Scouts. The messages are so encouraging and inspiring for the girls: to be a sister to each other, strive for community and togetherness, Beaudin said. My Girl Scouts literally scream and squeal and hug and kiss every time they meet, which is every other Monday night. Selling cookies is a great way to learn money management and build necessary social skills such as approaching adults and being a polite businesswoman. Seven-year-old Ares Morales said the best way to sell cookies is just to ask. I say Do you want to buy some Girl Scout cookies? Ares said. Ares and her sister, Ladyn Owens, 6, are members of the Girl Scouts of Central Texas Troop 9145. Morales said she has already made new friends and earned a few patches. Ladyn, a Daisy-level Scout, said she enjoys the craft portion of Girl Scouts. I only need one more petal to become a Brownie, she said. Amber Fazzino, the girls mother, said putting her daughters in Girl Scouts has changed their lives for the better. But she wasnt always a believer. Fazzino said initially she didnt want her daughters to have anything to do with Girl Scouts and thought the cookie selling was a scam. She said she has several cousins who are a part of the program and kept encouraging her to give it a try. Hesitant, she said, she entreated Ladyn into the program first. I dove into it and started reading and found out they teach so much more, Fazzino said. I can tell you that Ladyn came home every time just full of joy. Shed done a new thing or a new experience or learned a new song. A year later, she put Ares in the program as well. Fazzino said shes blown away at the different skills, characteristics and topics the girls are taught by troop leaders. She said her daughters are getting to experience things that otherwise they might never get to do. Waco Independent School District officials say they are seeing signs of success in their work to tackle high teacher turnover rates. Waco ISDs teacher turnover rate is the best it has been in four years, according to recently released Texas Academic Performance Report data from the Texas Education Agency. The district still has room for improvement, and it remains to be seen whether the most recent improvement will hold. The districts turnover rate of 23.6 percent for the 2015-16 school year is three points better than any of the previous three years. Waco ISD remains seven points behind the state average of 16.5 percent and about two points behind similar school districts with student populations that are more than 70 percent economically disadvantaged. More than 80 percent of Waco ISD students are economically disadvantaged. Everyone knows teachers work way more than 40 hours a week and its a hard job. Theres planning thats involved. Theres constant professional development, and then theres challenges in the classroom, especially because we are the demographics that we are, Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources Elaine Botello said. Theres going to be behavioral problems. You can go to a different school district and not have the same type of discipline issues you would here in Waco ISD. About half a million teachers leave the profession each year in the U.S., costing up to $2.2 billion annually, according to a 2014 study by the Alliance for Excellent Education, which also reported more than 40 percent of new teachers leave the field in their first five years. The organization is dedicated to ensuring all students graduate high school ready for success, the groups website states. The study also states high-poverty schools experience a turnover rate of 20 percent per calendar year, 50 percent higher than affluent schools. Wacos poverty rate is about 30 percent. At 942 teachers in 2015-16, 222 teachers either left the district or transferred to another position within the district, which is how teacher turnover is defined. In 2014-15, the district had 909 teachers and a turnover rate of 27.5 percent. In 2013-14, the district had 895 teachers and a turnover rate of 27.3 percent. In 2012-13, the turnover rate was 25.7 with 906 teachers, according to the performance reports. Before the 2012-13 school year, the reports were known by a different name and recorded differently, according to the TEA website. The 2012-13 school year was the districts first after closing nine campuses, which likely contributed to the high rate, Botello said. The district also started hiring aides and behavior intervention specialists with money voters approved through a tax rate bump in the fall of 2015, which may have contributed to the improved turnover rate in 2015-16, she said. Everything from campus culture to student success and feedback from school officials plays into the turnover rate, Botello said. I think employee morale is improving as well in Waco ISD, she said. Little things and some things we just implemented this year like jeans every Friday little things like that, employees appreciate and they embrace. The district also started an incentive pay program for strong performance on State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness tests. But the majority of turnover last school year was among first-year teachers, so the district has started a professional development push specifically geared toward keeping teachers who are either new to the field or new to the district, Botello said. Professional development director Patrick Uptmore said his department started three years ago providing direct support for first- and second-year teachers. Even with the best training and support, teaching isnt easy, Uptmore said. Its a difficult profession. . . . You dont envision everything else that goes along with the profession, Uptmore said. The one thing I think were really good about is we offer a ton of resources and were very honest from the very beginning that this is going to hard. Its difficult and its not a profession that youre perfect in year one. There are some teachers that have it, something, that they look like theyve done it their whole life, but for everybody else it takes three, four, five years. What were seeing is were losing them before that fifth year and they get to that level of confidence. When Waco High School Principal Ed Love took the position three years ago, teacher retention on the campus was extremely low at 56 percent. The school had seen five principals in four years, which contributed to the turnover among teachers, Love said. The retention rate has climbed to 82 percent since, and one of Loves main goals is to keep good teachers, he said. Waco High has 120 teachers. What you want to do is put in a support system for them. One of the things we started was restorative justice, Love said. We have a restorative center here and we have two coordinators, a behavior specialist and six behavior aides. . . . A teacher can pick up the phone and call for assistance if they need assistance, or a lot of times we have them in the hallways, so they can pop their head out of the door and see someone 99 percent of the time and get assistance quickly if needed. That feeling of support and an effort to celebrate the little things are helping drive the campus improved retention rate. The campus has also had a cookout every six weeks and a monthly huddle that allows teachers to vent and express concerns informally, he said. Its just building that sense of familiness, Love said. Reasons teachers give for leaving Waco ISD Reason: Personal reasons unknown 2010-11: 20 percent 2011-12: 19.31 percent 2012-13: 15.79 percent 2013-14: 19.44 percent 2014-15: 26.43 percent 2015-16: 30.40 percent Reason: Resigned in lieu of termination or nonrenewal - board terminated 2010-11: 15.61 percent 2011-12: 09.87 percent 2012-13: 17.81 percent 2013-14: 23.02 percent 2014-15: 23.35 percent 2015-16: 12.33 percent Reason: Accepted another position 2010-11: 18.54 percent 2011-12: 24.46 percent 2012-13: 25.1 percent 2013-14: 16.67 percent 2014-15: 13.66 percent 2015-16: 12.33 percent Reason: Moving 2010-11: 14.63 percent 2011-12: 17.17 percent 2012-13: 13.36 percent 2013-14: 12.7 percent 2014-15: 8.81 percent 2015-16: 14.98 percent Reason: Transferred to non-teaching position 2010-11: N/A 2011-12: N/A 2012-13: N/A 2013-14: 10.32 percent 2014-15: 5.29 percent 2015-16: 10.57 percent Reason: Retirement 2010-11: 14.15 percent 2011-12: 12.02 percent 2012-13: 9.72 percent 2013-14: 6.35 percent 2014-15: 8.81 percent 2015-16: 7.49 percent Reason: Personal health or hardship 2010-11: 2.93 percent 2011-12: 3.43 percent 2012-13: 8.91 percent 2013-14: 4.76 percent 2014-15: 3.96 percent 2015-16: 3.52 percent Reason: Position eliminated 2010-11: 5.85 percent 2011-12: 1.72 percent 2012-13: 0.40 percent 2013-14: 0.79 percent 2014-15: 0 percent 2015-16: 0.44 percent Reason: Continue education 2010-11: 3.41 percent 2011-12: 2.15 percent 2012-13: 2.43 percent 2013-14: 0.4 percent 2014-15: 1.76 percent 2015-16: 2.20 percent Reason: Left teaching profession 2010-11: 0.49 percent 2011-12: 3.86 percent 2012-13: 0.81 percent 2013-14: 1.98 percent 2014-15: 2.64 percent 2015-16: 1.32 percent Reason: Abandoned job or unsigned contract 2010-11: 0.49 percent 2011-12: 3.86 percent 2012-13: 0.81 percent 2013-14: 1.98 percent 2014-15: 2.64 percent 2015-16: 1.32 percent Reason: Raise family 2010-11: 1.46 percent 2011-12: 3 percent 2012-13: 1.21 percent 2013-14: 0.79 percent 2014-15: 2.2 percent 2015-16: 0.44 percent Reason: Unhappy with job 2010-11: 2.44 percent 2011-12: 2.15 percent 2012-13: 2.02 percent 2013-14: 1.59 percent 2014-15: 1.32 percent 2015-16: 0 percent Reason: Deceased 2010-11: 0 percent 2011-12: 0.43 percent 2012-13 : 0.81 percent 2013-14: 0.4 percent 2014-15: 0 percent 2015-16: 0 percent Reason: Certification reasons 2010-11: 0 percent 2011-12: 0 percent 2012-13: 0 percent 2013-14: 0 percent 2014-15: 0.88 percent 2015-16: 0.44 percent Source: Waco ISD A 17-year-old Lorena High School student was arrested Monday after she and at least one other student planned to kill a school administrator by poisoning him, an arrest affidavit states. Kelly Lynn Praytor was arrested at school after she and another student were overheard talking about killing an assistant principal late last week. A teacher reportedly overheard the students conversation, became concerned and notified the administration, the arrest affidavit states. The teacher stated that the two were going into specific details on how to murder (the intended victim) and get away with it, such as poisoning him with an undetectable substance, the arrest affidavit states. The comments also were overheard by several students in a classroom. Administrators investigated the comments on behalf of the school and interviewed Praytor and the second student, and neither student denied making statements about planning the slaying. It was also found that comments were made about knowing where (the intended victim) lives as well as comments about his wife and kids, the arrest affidavit states. Both the administrator and teacher were alarmed by the students statements, and the administrator was fearful about the level of planning that the students had discussed, the affidavit states. The teacher told police that they were fearful of telling the administrator because of the tone of such aggressiveness about hurting someone that they (would) possibly hurt the teacher, according to the affidavit. Lorena Independent School District Superintendent Joe Kucera said the school became aware of the reported threats last Friday and conducted an investigation. On Friday, we were made aware of an alleged threat toward an employee. We conducted a thorough investigation, and appropriate action was taken promptly, Kucera said. Our students and staff were not in any immediate danger and, as always, the safety of our students and staff are always our first priority. Lorena Police Chief Tom Dickson said there was no immediate threat to students or staff at the school. He said the investigation remains ongoing and an additional arrest may be made, pending further investigation. Praytor was arrested and taken to McLennan County Jail on a Class B misdemeanor charge of terroristic threat. She posted a $1,000 surety bond and was released Monday. By Press Trust of India: Bhopal, Jan 30 (PTI) Madhya Pradesh government would seek a loan from New Development Bank (NDB) for renewal and repair of 1,500-km long district roads of the state. "The state Cabinet chaired by the Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan decided to seek a loan equal to 70 per cent of Rs 3,400 crore required for repair and renewal of major district roads," MPs Finance Minister Jayant Malaiya informed after the Cabinet meeting here this afternoon. advertisement "Seventy per cent of the total Rs 3,400 crore would be sought as loan from NDB while the state government would contribute the remaining 30 per cent," Malaiya said. Replying to a question, the minister said the loan was not for construction of new roads, but would be used for the repair and renewal of the existing roads. Informing about other decisions, Malaiya said, "The state Cabinet also approved the proposals to increase the MBBS seats in medical colleges at Rewa, Jabalpur and Indore." The Cabinet gave nod to proposals for increasing MBBS seats from 100 to 150 in Rewa Medical College, from 150 to 250 in Jabalpurs Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose Medical College and from 150 to 250 seats in Indores MGM Medical College. Funds for expansion of these colleges along with construction of new medical colleges at Chhindwara and Shivpuri were also approved in the Cabinet, he added. PTI ADU MAS GK GK BAS --- ENDS --- Angry with her two children - Tanuja, 15 and Anuj, 9 - Sushma poisoned them both and after that consumed poison herself. By Saurabh Vaktania: It is said that there is no comparison to a mother's love and care. However, in Mumbai, a 38-year-old woman, identified as Sushma Chile, broke that myth and murdered her own children. The shocking incident was reported from Kalachowkie police station in South Mumbai. Angry with her two children - Tanuja, 15 and Anuj, 9 - Sushma poisoned them both and after that consumed poison herself. While the two children succumbed to the poison four days later, Sushma is recovering at a hospital and is reported to be out of danger. advertisement The police has registered a case of murder against her and she will be arrested as soon as she is discharged from the hospital. MOTHER REPRIMANDED KIDS FOR EXAMS The incident took place on November 29 when the two children were fighting with each other. Irritated with their constant bickering, Sushma, who herself had not been keeping well, told the two to sit down and study since their exams were approaching. However, the two children did not listen to her and went out to play. Furious with the children, Sushma poisoned the children when they returned and consumed poison herself. When their condition started worsening, the trio was rushed to the KEM hospital by neighbours. Four days later, both the kids died in the hospital, while Sushma survived. On the basis of their investigation and several medical and chemical reports as well as the autopsy of the children, the police have registered a case against Sushma. Also read: Mumbai: Three arrested for murder of 72-year-old man Business man murdered over love affair in Mumbai's Santacruz --- ENDS --- Protesters rally against President Trump's refugee ban at Miami International Airport on Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017.President Donald Trumpas immigration order sowed more confusion and outrage across the country Sunday, with travelers detained at airports, pa By AP: The White House on Sunday vigorously defended President Donald Trump's immigration restrictions, as protests against the order spread throughout the country. Some Republicans in Congress publicly opposed the changes amid legal challenges to the order banning travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries, though top congressional Republicans remain largely behind the new president. In a background call with reporters, a senior administration official declared the order's implementation "a massive success story," claiming it had been done "seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism." advertisement But there was confusion at airports around the world, and late Sunday the administration appeared to walk-back how the order would apply to certain groups, like legal permanent U.S. residents. Also read: Trump's ban on immigration: See how the world is reacting to it Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday saying that, absent information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a "dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination." That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent U.S. "green cards" will be allowed to re-enter the U.S. Officials had previously said they would be barred from returning. It remains unclear what kind of additional screening they will now face. Trump's order, which also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria, sparked widespread protests and denunciations from Democrats and a handful of Republicans. Many have accused the administration of rushing to implement the changes, resulting in panic and confusion at the nation's airports. Izzy Berdan, of Boston, center, wears an American flags as he chants slogans with other demonstrators during a rally against President Donald Trump's order that restricts travel to the U.S., Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, in Boston. Trump signed an executive order Friday, Jan. 27, 2017 that bans legal U.S. residents and visa-holders from seven Muslim-majority nations from entering the U.S. for 90 days and puts an indefinite hold on a program resettling Syrian refugees. (AP Photo - Steven Senne) "You have an extreme vetting proposal that didn't get the vetting it should have had," said Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, who urged the new president to "slow down" and work with lawmakers on how best to tighten screening for foreigners who enter the United States. "In my view, we ought to all take a deep breath and come up with something that makes sense for our national security" and reflects the fact that "America's always been a welcoming home for refugees and immigrants," he said. Several Democrats in Congress said they would introduce legislation to stop the ban. During a round of Sunday show interviews, Trump's aides stressed that just a small portion of travelers had been affected by the order and emphasized its temporary nature. "I can't imagine too many people out there watching this right now think it's unreasonable to ask a few more questions from someone traveling in and out of Libya and Yemen before being let loose in the United States," Trump's chief of staff, Reince Priebus, said. "And that's all this is." LEGAL PERMANENT RESIDENT DENIED ENTRY As of Sunday afternoon, one legal permanent resident had been denied entry to the country as a result of the order, according to a federal law enforcement official. The official was not permitted to discuss the order's impact publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity. advertisement White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said the changes were "a small price to pay" to keep the nation safe. But it's unclear whether the order will accomplish that. It does not address homegrown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. And the list of countries in Trump's order doesn't include Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. Also read: Pakistan could be included in immigration ban list in future, says White House Priebus said that other countries could be added to the list. Trump spoke by phone Sunday with leaders from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Neither country is among the seven specified in Trump's order. The president, meanwhile, defended his actions, insisting it was "not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe," he said. Trump also said he has "tremendous feeling" for the people fleeing the bloody civil war in Syria and vowed to "find ways to help all those who are suffering." advertisement The White House said later that King Salman of Saudi Arabia and Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates, had both agreed to support safe zones for refugees, but offered no further details. Also read: Immigration order: Twitter CEO slams Donald Trump, US tech industry worried The developments came a day after a federal judge in New York issued an emergency order temporarily barring the U.S. from deporting people from the seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trump's 90-day travel ban. The court barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. A demonstrator wears a Statue of Liberty hat and applauds during a rally against President Trump's order that restricts travel to the U.S., Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, in Boston. Trump signed an executive order Friday that bans legal U.S. residents and visa-holders from seven Muslim-majority nations from entering the U.S. for 90 days and puts an indefinite hold on a program resettling Syrian refugees. (AP Photo - Steven Senne) advertisement The Department of Homeland Security on Sunday said the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order."President Trump's executive orders remain in place - prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety," the department said in a statement. Top congressional Republicans, meanwhile, were backing Trump despite concerns raised Sunday from a handful of GOP lawmakers and condemnation from the Koch political network, which is among the most influential players in the conservative movement. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said he supports more stringent screening, though he cautioned that Muslims are some of the country's "best sources in the war against terror." FEAR OF SELF-INFLICTED WOUND Republican Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham, meanwhile, expressed fear that the order could "become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism." "This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security," they wrote.Trump fired back on Twitter, calling the pair "sadly weak on immigration." Priebus was on NBC's "Meet the Press" and "Face the Nation," Portman was on CNN's "State of the Union," while McConnell appeared on ABC's "This Week." Also read: After Mark Zuckerberg, Google's Sundar Pichai slams Trump's immigration order --- ENDS --- Lakhan Singh from Samajwadi Party (SP) and Daljit Singh of Congress have been issued notices by NGT vide an order dated 24 January, 2017, for allegedly lifting sand from Ken river in Banda District of UP. By Baishali Adak: The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has summoned two political leaders of Uttar Pradesh in an illegal sand mining case. Lakhan Singh from Samajwadi Party (SP) and Daljit Singh of Congress have been issued notices by NGT vide an order dated 24 January, 2017, for allegedly lifting sand from Ken river in Banda District of UP. This came after the district superintendent of police, RP Pandey, himself named the two, expressing helplessness in a letter to the Banda district magistrate. This was submitted as proof before the NGT. advertisement Also Read: NGT norms on appointing chiefs of pollution boards face opposition Pandey said, "It has come to our knowledge through a secret investigation that certain influential politicians are mining sand in our jurisdiction and also exerting pressure on senior officers not to interfere. Mainly, Lakhan Singh of SP and Daljit Singh of Congress (MLA from Tindwari) have been working in a syndicate to this effect." "They don't just illegally mine sand, but extract money from trucks coming in from Madhya Pradesh. Their trucks are also dangerously overloaded with sand risking accidents. A special team must be constituted of revenue and police department officers to curb this menace," he advised. The NGT took cognisance of the letter and asked the two politicians to be present in court on March 7. Also Read: NGT's new year gift to Delhi: Disposable plastic banned, Rs 10K fine for throwing garbage in public places A bench headed by chairperson Justice Swatanter Kumar said, "We directed them to be present before the tribunal and respond as to why proper action should not be taken against them in accordance with law, including paying up environmental compensation. Notice will be served through the state government." When contacted, an aide of Daljit Singh said, "We have not received any NGT notice yet. Also, the leader is busy with the approaching elections right now." Lakhan Singh could not be reached. Ken is a major river of the Bundelkhand region of central India. Originating in Jabalpur (MP), it travels a distance of over 400 km before merging with the Yamuna near Fatehpur in Uttar Pradesh. It has become infamous for rampant mining in the past two decades. The NGT order came on a petition filed by one Brij Mohan Yadav, a resident of Banda, who claims to be a victim of sand mining. He told Mail Today, "Not just did the mafia usurp my agricultural fields, but when I protested, they thrashed me and my family. Later, they kidnapped me and released me at Satna near Jabalpur in Madhya Pradesh after three days. advertisement Environmental lawyer Rahul Choudhary, through whom the petition was filed, said, "Such orders are indeed difficult to come by because officers never name any politicians. They just catch subordinates of the henchmen and labourers saying they were running the racket." Banda DM Saroj Kumar said, "We will definitely comply with the NGT orders if they issue us any directions." --- ENDS --- Demonstrators at Los Angeles International Airport in January protest President Trump's travel ban. Credit:AP "In his final official speech as President, he spoke about the important role of citizen and how all Americans have a responsibility to be the guardians of our democracy not just during an election but every day," Mr Lewis said. "Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organise and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake." Trump, meanwhile, deflected blame for the confusion at airports over the weekend on protesters and on a computer outage at Delta Air Lines Inc. that caused flight cancellations, even though that occurred more than 48 hours after the President's order and lasted only three hours. Even with the protests at airports around the country and some confusion over who was affected by the restrictions, Trump tweeted that Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly "said that all is going well with very few problems." A spokesman for the airline didn't immediately comment. The Pentagon has also begun assembling a list of Iraqis who had worked as translators for US troops or otherwise supported American forces as partners to protect them from being caught in the immigration crackdown, Captain Jeff Davis, a Defence Department spokesman, told reporters at the Pentagon. The executive order Trump issued Friday sets new barriers to entry for people from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Libya. Refugees, visa holders and permanent US residents were all among those affected, at least initially. Three US court orders were issued blocking parts of the plan as after allies from the UK to Germany criticized Trump's action the move and major international companies said it threatened to strangle the free flow of workers and commerce. After an early outburst of anger by some American technology leaders - Apple's Tim Cook, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, Tesla's Elon Musk - chief executive officers of other industries from finance to autos started to grapple with the order's reach as the implications began to set in for multinational companies. Elon Musk, left, has asked the public for help in rewriting Trump's immigration bill. Credit:AP. Jeff Immelt, General Electric Co.'s chairman and CEO, wrote in an internal email that GE has "many employees from the named countries" who are "critical to our success and they are our friends and partners." GE, he said, would "continue to make our voice heard with the new administration." Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein said in a voicemail Sunday to employees, that Trump's move threatens "disruption to the firm" and is "not a policy we support." Mastercard Inc. Chief Executive Officer Ajay Banga, citing his own status as immigrant, said the order caused "fracture in our society." Ford Motor Executive Chairman Bill Ford and CEO Mark Fields issued a joint statement Monday saying they didn't support the directive. Legal challenges to the executive order have been mounted across the country already, with civil liberties groups saying they will work to have the entire action overturned by the courts. Lawsuits filed in Brooklyn, Boston, Seattle, and Virginia over the weekend sought immediate relief for those arriving in the U.S. from banned countries with valid visas. And a US District judge in Los Angeles directed the return to the United States of Ali Khoshbakhti Vayeghan, who was sent back to native Iran following the implementation of the order. But with all the individuals who had been detained at the airport now cleared for entry, attention is now turning to overturning the ban going forward. The American Civil Liberties Union has said they will be among the groups undertaking a wider challenge, fuelled in part by millions of dollars in donations over the weekend. And attorneys general from 15 states and Washington DC have issued a statement condemning the move and pledging to combat it. The fallout from the order was compounded by the fact that few - including some of Trump's own aides - seemed clear about what was in it. Two of his top aides, strategist Steve Bannon and son-in-law Jared Kushner, had to get on the phone with British officials to walk them through it. Another Trump aide said the order added a new step to re-entry for some green-card holders. Yet another aide said the status of such permanent legal residents would be clarified later. From left, White House Senior Advisers Jared Kushner, Steve Bannon and National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. Credit:AP Late in the day Sunday, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement declaring that the entry of green-card holders is in the national interest. He said such individuals would be allowed into the country barring any significant evidence that they pose "a serious threat to public safety and welfare." One Trump friend and adviser, Tom Barrack, said the president has indicated that the immigration order serves two purposes: one, to keep a potential terrorist out, but two to send a signal to the larger Middle East that the countries there need to take control of the situation at home and stop using a flood of refugees as a bargaining chip to pressure the West. Given that Trump's foreign policy team is only now taking shape, "it is just a way to push back with the only tool that he has, so he is giving a time-out while his team gets in place and then they will have a run at it," Barrack said in an interview. Byron Bay murder suspect Sara Connor has admitted she and her boyfriend burned their clothes after learning her identity cards had been found near a dead police officer because they "panicked". Ms Connor told the Denpasar District Court of how she had learned from a friend of the death of Bali police officer Wayan Sudarsa. "When I got to know a person had died we were in tears, we were crying both of us, it was panic." She said she didn't know how the burning of the clothes they were wearing the night of Mr Sudarsa's death came about, but the decision was made it was better to burn them. Asked by a prosecutor why Ms Connor had panicked and destroyed evidence before going to the Australian Consulate-General in Bali, Ms Connor said: "Look what happened. I am still not guilty and look where I am. It was the panic of being in a distant country, not understanding the language." By Press Trust of India: chief New Delhi, Jan 30 (PTI) Sri Lanka today assured India that neither will its land nor water around it be used for any activity against Indian interests, amid increased Chinese naval forays into the Indian Ocean. "We assure the Indian government that nothing against India will happen in Sri Lankan land and waters around it," Sri Lankan Navy chief Vice Admiral R C Wijegunaratne said when asked about the docking of Chinese submarines there. advertisement The Sri Lankan Navy chief is on an official visit to India from January 29 to February 2. The visit is aimed at consolidating bilateral naval relations between India and Sri Lanka as well as explore new avenues for naval cooperation. Speaking to the media here, he asserted that Chinese presence in Sri Lanka was purely for economic reasons. "We have also invited Indian firms," he said. Wijegunaratne said security at the Colombo Port City (renamed Financial City) would be entrusted to the Sri Lankan Navy and not the Chinese as is being speculated. He also hoped that training of Lankan defence personnel at the Defence Service Staff College at Wellington in Tamil Nadu will restart. The Sri Lankan Navy chief held bilateral discussions with Navy chief Admiral Sunil Lanba and other senior officials. He is also scheduled to meet the Chief of the Air Staff, Chief of the Army Staff as well as the Director General, Indian Coast Guard. An interaction with the Minister of State for Defence and Defence Secretary has also been scheduled as part of the Sri Lankan Navy chiefs official meetings in New Delhi. The Admiral is also scheduled to proceed to Goa where he will be visiting Naval War College and Goa Shipyard Limited besides interacting with Flag Officer Commanding Goa Area. He will further visit the Training Command of the Indian Navy based at Kochi, where he would be briefed on training aspects and visit various training facilities/professional schools. During his visit to Kochi, Wijegunaratne would interact with Sri Lankan Naval personnel undergoing training in India. PTI SAP SRY --- ENDS --- An American brewery has come up with an Oreo-flavoured beer that will appeal to adults around the world. By India Today Web Desk: Ever since Oreo cookies hit the Indian market, we have taken to the traditional American practice of pairing the cookie with milk. This little tradition has been the bedrock of childhood in America. And why not? It brings out the child in you. But what about adults? Don't they deserve a combination of a cookie and a little more boozy-something, to suit their taste? Of course they do! And an American brewing company has come out with the perfect combo that will appeal to adults around the world. advertisement Yes, we're talking about Oreo and beer. Also read: Tea was meant to be a replacement for beer; a short history of tea as a beverage The Veil Brewing Company in Virginia has come up with a beer that's fermented with hundreds of kilos of Oreo cookies. Their brewery already produces a 7% robust chocolate milk stout--Hornswoggler-and they built on the flavour profile, added a considerable amount of Oreos, and created the Oreo-flavoured Hornswoggler! Who can say no to a sweet can of Oreo-flavoured beer? Picture courtesy: Instagram/republic_ales Even if you don't love the usual flavour of beer, you might like this one, because it's quite sweet. One can get a taste of this novelty beer at 17 dollars for a pack of four (Rs.1155). And people who have been lining up to grab a can of Oreo beer have already started commenting on social media that it's quite worth the price and hype. So while we in India are still stuck with the traditional, if somewhat boring Oreo-and-milk combination (we have our own Parle G-and-chai combo to rely on), we hope to get a taste of the Oreo-flavoured, Hornswoggler beer soon. --- ENDS --- advertisement At the invitation of Mr. Aydin Aliyev, Director General of Azerbaijan Customs, WCO Secretary General Kunio Mikuriya visited Baku, Azerbaijan, on 27 January 2017 to speak at the opening ceremony of the conference on Economic Security - Aspect of Trade Facilitation and Security, held at the Azerbaijan Economic University on the occasion of International Customs Day and the 25th Anniversary of the State Customs Committee of the Republic of Azerbaijan. In his speech, Dr. Mikuriya traced the history of Azerbaijan Customs and expressed appreciation for its support for the WCO, including its capacity building activities, particulary by hosting the Regional Office for Capacity Building, Regional Training Centre and Regional Dog Training Centre which contributed greatly to the enhancement of international cooperation with a focus on human resource development, and he also expressed gratitude to the Administration for expertly hosting the WCO PICARD Conference in 2015, thus further enhancing the partnership between Customs and academia. Dr. Mikuriya applauded Azerbaijan's focus on the importance of knowledge and technology, and said that such a strategy provided the perfect policy platform for the WCO theme for 2017, "Data Analysis for Effective Border Management". During an audience with His Excellency Ilham Aliyev, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan, Dr. Mikuriya expressed his gratitude for the strong political support provided by the office of the President for the progress made in Customs modernization. The President reiterated his continued support for further cooperation with the WCO. In the course of his mission, Dr. Mikuriya joined the opening of the exhibition entitled "Azerbaijan Customs on Guard for Cultural Heritage" at the Museum Center of Baku in the presence of the Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Culture of Azerbaijan. He commended the contribution made by Customs to protect society from organized criminal and terrorist organizations, including the fight against trafficking of cultural goods. By India Today Web Desk: According to latest developments, a middle ground has been reached between members of the Karni Sena and Padmavati director Sanjay Leela Bhansali. Sanjay Leela Bhansali told India Today that all issues between him and Karni Sena have been resolved. Meanwhile, Karni Sena has demanded that the film's title should be changed. However, certain sections of Karni Sena want Padmavati to be entirely banned. Karni Sena also demanded that there shouldn't be any intimate scene in the film or for that matter, any distortion of history. advertisement Demands by the Karni Sena: 1. No intimate scenes in Padmavati 2. No distortion of history 3. Padmavati name be changed ALSO READ: BJP leader announces Rs 10,000 reward for anyone who slaps Sanjay Leela Bhansali with a shoe Sanjay Leela Bhansali was manhandled and had his clothes torn apart by Karni Sena members on January 27 in Jaipur. A gang of men entered the sets of Padmavati in Jaipur's Jaigarh fort and ransacked the place in addition to destroying expensive film equipment. WATCH: Sanjay Leela Bhansali gets thrashed by Karni Sena members on the sets of Padmavati The reason for the attack was that Bhansali was allegedly showing a romantic sequence between 14th century emperor Alauddin Khilji (Ranveer Singh) and Rani Padmini (Deepika Padukone), an incident which Karni Sena claims had never happened in history and thus, filming the same would be an insult to Rajputana's pride. Interestingly, the filmmakers had never planned to insert such a scene in the first place. Moreover, Rani Padmini is a character that was first written of in an epic poem named Padmavat by 16th century Sufi poet Malik Muhammad Jayasi. Padmini's existence is a matter of debate among historians. ALSO READ: Padmavati is not real. Why are you angry? After the attack on Sanjay Leela Bhansali and his team, the makers of the film issued a statement saying that they are pulling out of Jaipur and are not shooting in Rajasthan. Here is the full statement by Sanjay Leela Bhansali Productions: Sanjay Leela Bhansali has shot two films in Jaipur and despite his love for Rajasthan, for the safety of his crew, we have decided to stop the shoot and leave the city post the shocking incident where miscreants damaged property and misbehaved with the crew on the shoot of Padmavati. Sanjay Leela Bhansali had directed the opera 'Padmavati' to packed houses in Paris and earned worldwide praise for it. He was inspired by the beautiful and courageous queen and is making a feature film on the story. We clarify that there is no dream sequence or any objectionable scene between Rani Padmavati and Allauddin Khilji. We have been carefully researching and making the film. In spite of this, the attack on the shoot and crew was uncalled for and was extremely damaging to the image of the beautiful city of Jaipur. We are grateful to the authorities at Jaipur who responded promptly and limited the damage on shoot. We are confident that Mewar will be proud of the film made on their revered queen. We do not want to hurt any sentiments and would appreciate if the local people support us in making this film and making their queen revered by the world. advertisement The film fraternity has also stood by Sanjay Leela Bhansali in this time of distress. The Film and Television Producers Guild of India issued a statement in support of Bhansali and Padmavati, asking the authorities to catch the culprits. ALSO READ: Ranveer, Deepika, Shahid break their silence about attack on Sanjay Leela Bhansali Here is the full statement by The Film and Television Producers Guild of India: The dastardly act of vandalism and assault which happened yesterday on the sets of filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali's film 'Padmavati' at Jaipur is extremely unfortunate, deplorable and totally unacceptable to the Indian film industry. The Film & Television Producers Guild of India Ltd. ("Guild") in unison with the entire film fraternity strongly condemns this despicable episode and expresses its absolute and unflinching support to Sanjay Leela Bhansali. advertisement Guild President Siddharth Roy Kapur in no uncertain terms said, "As President of The Film & Television Producers Guild of India and speaking on behalf of the entire film industry, I strongly condemn the acts of vandalism on the sets of Padmavati as a direct attack on freedom of expression in our democracy. The film industry has become the softest target for any fringe group looking for media attention, and we need the strongest possible intervention from the concerned authorities to end this and to end it now. We stand united and unflinching in our support of Sanjay Leela Bhansali, and urge the Government of India and the State Government of Rajasthan to take immediate steps to ensure the strongest possible punitive action is taken against these miscreants, so it serves as a deterrent in preventing the recurrence of such unacceptable events in the future. The distressing part is that this is not the first time that fringe elements have unilaterally taken the law into their own hands to disrupt shoots/film releases and cause tremendous financial losses to film producers. The film Jodhaa Akbar was also not permitted to release in Rajasthan by the same group despite censor certification. advertisement It is a glaring paradox that on the one hand the Central Government, various State Governments along with the film fraternity has been leaving no stone unturned to universally project India as an attractive shooting locale and on the other such hands miscreants are resorting to hooliganism of the worst order to defeat the 'Shoot in India' endeavor. Such disparaging incidents not only discourage our film makers to shoot in India with them preferring to travel abroad for shoots, but also puts foreign producers on the alarm against prospective plans to shoot in Indian locales. The sordid story of these debilitating turn of events is that such misinformed individuals/organizations are not even realizing the structured and methodical manner in which the process of film making evolves at the shooting/release stage and further at the time of certification clearance from the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC). The Guild makes a strong plea to the concerned ministries and authorities to promptly initiate stringent measures against these elements to send out a strong message to other misinformed individuals/bodies that such acts will not be tolerated in the future and thereby provide a timely deterrent against the repetition of these unacceptable incidents. --- ENDS --- By Press Trust of India: There is a possibility in the future of including Pakistan in the list of countries from where immigration has been banned, a top White House official indicated today, acknowledging for the first time that Pakistan was under consideration to be put in that category. "The reason we chose those seven countries was, those were the seven countries that both the Congress and the Obama administration identified as being the seven countries that were most identifiable with dangerous terrorism taking place in their country," White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, told CBS News. advertisement Trump has issued a controversial executive order banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia. "Now, you can point to other countries that have similar problems, like Pakistan and others. Perhaps we need to take it further. But for now, immediate steps, pulling the Band-Aid off, is to do further vetting for people traveling in and out of those countries," Priebus said. Also Read: US cities gather to protest against Trump's immigration order ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This is for the first time that the Trump Administration has publicly acknowledged about considering putting Pakistan into that list. Currently as per the executive order, visitors from countries like Pakistan and Afghanistan are subject to extreme vetting. Priebus said the executive orders were signed after a lot of planning. "We're not going to advertise to the world that we're going to put a stop or at least a further vetting on travel in and out of our country from these seven places," he said. Also Read: US states discussing lawsuit over Donald Trump's immigration order AMERICANS HAVE TO BE PROTECTED "Some people have suggested, that, well, maybe we should have given everyone a three-day warning. But that would just mean that a terrorist would just move up their travel plans by three days. Identifying too many people in these countries and giving them a heads-up in these countries would only potentially flag the executive order for bad order," Priebus said. "The President has a call with leadership in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and other countries around world. And I'm sure this topic may come up," he said. Priebus asserted that Americans have to be protected first. "These are countries that harbour and train terrorists. These are countries that we want to know who is coming and going in and out of to prevent calamities from happening in this country," he said. "We're not willing to be wrong on this subject. President Trump is not willing to take chances on this subject. He was elected president in many respects because people knew that he was going to be tough on immigration from countries that harbour terrorists," Priebus said. advertisement "I can't imagine too many people out there watching this right now think it's unreasonable to ask a few more questions from someone traveling in and out of Libya and Yemen before being let loose in the United States. And that's all this is," he said. --- ENDS --- Your Ultimate Investing Toolkit Sign up for MarketBeat All Access to gain access to MarketBeat's full suite of research tools: Portfolio Monitoring Top Stock Lists Premium Reports Stock Screeners Live News Feed Premium Support Free for your first month. By Press Trust of India: From Sajjad Hussain Islamabad, Jan 29 (PTI) Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will start his three-day visit to Pakistan tomorrow to discuss bilateral ties, the Foreign Office here said today. Abbas will stay in Pakistan from January 30 to February 1 and is scheduled to meet President Mamnoon Hussain and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. advertisement "He will be accompanied by a 17-member delegation, including five ministers," the Foreign Office said in a statement. Abbas will have a one-on-one meeting with Sharif followed by delegation-level talks, it said. Abbas and his delegation will meet President Mamnoon Hussain, followed by a state banquet in his honour. Bilateral political matters as well as other issues of common interest will be discussed between them. The relations between Pakistan and Palestine have traditionally been strong. Pakistan has consistently supported the creation of an independent, viable and contiguous Palestinian State, with pre-1967 borders, with Al-Quds Al-Sharif as its capital. Pakistan has also extended support to the Palestinian struggle for their independent homeland, in all international forums. This would be his third visit to Pakistan. He has previously been to Pakistan in 2005 and 2013. PTI SH AJR --- ENDS --- ITT Inc. manufactures and sells engineered critical components and customized technology solutions for the transportation, industrial, and energy markets worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Motion Technologies, Industrial Process, and Connect & Control Technologies. The Motion Technologies segment manufactures brake pads, shims, shock absorbers, and energy absorption components; and sealing technologies primarily for the transportation industry, including passenger cars, trucks, light- and heavy-duty commercial and military vehicles, buses, and trains. The Industrial Process segment designs and manufactures industrial pumps, valves, and plant optimization and remote monitoring systems and services; and centrifugal and twin screw positive displacement pumps, as well as aftermarket solutions, such as replacement parts and services. It serves various customers in industries, such as chemical, energy, mining, and other industrial process markets. The Connect & Control Technologies segment designs and manufactures a range of engineered connectors and specialized control components for critical applications supporting various markets, including aerospace and defense, industrial, transportation, medical, and energy. This segment's connector product portfolio includes electrical connectors, such as circular, rectangular, radio frequency, fiber optic, D-sub miniature, micro-miniature, and cable assemblies, as well as control products consist of actuators, valves, and pumps and switches for flow control applications; rate controls, seat recline locks, and elastomer isolators for aircraft interiors; elastomeric bearings for rotorcraft vibration isolation; heaters, hoses, and composite ducting for environmental control systems; and advanced composites for engine applications. ITT Inc. was incorporated in 1920 and is headquartered in White Plains, New York. While I vote, even though this has had no control over the direction of The Bahamas, Ive come to dislike the admonition that if you dont vote you cant complain. My father used to say he had never voted FOR anything. In other words, he always voted against something. Lets face it Governments are repressive, and politicians generally make us hate each other. By voting we encourage the winning political party to assume a right to implement any policy they like, particularly those broadly outlined in their platforms. This is obviously not the intention of voters. In addition, the actual results of public policy, that is supposed to achieve some good, more often than not turn out to be harmful. Also, it is obvious that Bahamians did not vote for the outcomes weve been handed. A Bahamians right to civic engagement - complaining about public policy - is based on ones citizenship, not whether I vote or not. You might enjoy the video of the debate, Should Libertarians Vote? below: The following is a Jan. 27 news release from the Gulf Coast Strategic Highway Coalition: AUSTIN, TEXAS -- The Texas Transportation Commission voted Thursday to give final approval to designation of 25 miles of US 190 freeway in Bell County as Interstate 14. The freeway segment is now part of the Interstate Highway System and Interstate 14 signs will go up in the coming months on the section stretching west from Interstate 35 in Belton to the eastern edge of Copperas Cove. The Texas Department of Transportations Waco District spent the past year working with the Federal Highway Administration to review elements of the existing highway to confirm they meet required interstate highway design standards. Highway upgrades of this segment have been underway for the past few years and more expansion projects are planned. Leading up to Thursdays final decision, the I-14 designation was previously approved by the Killeen-Temple Metropolitan Planning Organization, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, and the Federal Highway Administration. John Thompson, former county judge of Polk County and board chairman of the Gulf Coast Strategic Highway Coalition, had high praise for the Transportation Commissions swift action in making the first section of Interstate 14 a reality. He noted it took only a year to reach that milestone following the congressional designation of the Central Texas Corridor as future I-14 as part of the FAST Act in December 2015. I-14/US 190 serves as the primary access to Fort Hood at Killeen, home of 36,000 military personnel and 50,000 family members. Fort Hood is the largest single site employer in Texas. John Crutchfield, president of the Killeen Chamber of Commerce, said I-14 is more than a highway project, it is a way for the state to support one of the most important military facilities in the nation. Major General Ken Cox USA (ret), president of the Heart of Texas Defense Alliance, noted that the 25-mile highway segment was recently used by the Army to deploy Army units to Europe. The Central Texas Corridor begins in West Texas and runs through Killeen, Bryan/College Station, Huntsville, Livingston, Woodville and Jasper before crossing into Louisiana at the Sabine River near Fort Polk. Thompson said upgrading this corridor to interstate standard will mean improved safety and traffic mobility while creating new economic development opportunities for the communities in the regions served by the interstate highway. About the Coalition The Gulf Coast Strategic Highway Coalition is made up of cities, counties, local authorities and economic development organizations in Texas and Louisiana. The organization has been working for more than a decade in support of highway upgrades that will improve access between major U.S. Army installations at Fort Bliss, Fort Hood and Fort Polk and the Texas strategic deployment seaports that support them the Port of Corpus Christi and the Port of Beaumont. If you have an event you'd like to list on the site, submit it now! Submit Fort Polk, LA (71446) Today Mostly cloudy skies early, then partly cloudy this afternoon. Slight chance of a rain shower. High 72F. Winds light and variable.. Tonight Generally clear. Low 53F. Winds light and variable. By Press Trust of India: New Delhi, Jan 30 (PTI) Amulya Kumar Patnaik, who has been appointed as Commissioner of Delhi Police, will have one of the longest tenures as the head of the force. Patnaik, who is 57-year-old, will retire in January 2020, thereby allowing him to serve at the top position of Delhi Police for almost three years. advertisement A 1985-batch officer of AGMUT cadre, Patnaik, who is currently the Special CP (Administration), will take over from Alok Kumar Verma, who has been appointed as the CBI Director. Patnaik has handled several critical assignments in Delhi Police and as the joint commissioner he had the rare distinction of heading both the Crime Branch and the Southern Range. He is known for his adept investigation skills and has been involved in detection of sensitive cases like kidnapping of a school boy by armed gangsters in Sarita Vihar which was solved in a record 12 hours. Some of the cases that he has handled include the parcel bomb case, the dreaded Asghar gang of dacoits and the Bombay blast accused. He was at the forefront of the police action to quell riots in two mammoth public rallies -- anti-Dunkel rally and Uttarakhand in 1994. In 1995, Patnaik took the initiative to launch Pratidhi, a Delhi Police programme to extend counselling and other assistance to victims of traumatic crimes, an initiative that is working successfully till date. During his stint as the IG of SPG, he is credited with the planning and managing the security of the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2003, who had undertaken the lone train journey ever undertaken by a Prime Minister. Patnaik handled the Central, East and South Districts of Delhi Police wherein his focus on preventive planning and police-community partnership led to a drastic fall in heinous crimes. He has taken steps like launching the Anti-Obscene Call Cell and Anti-Stalking Cell. As Special CP (Administration), he was part of the team which brought about the recently given large-scale promotions in Delhi Police. He has also served as SSP, Law & Order, Puducherry, and DGP in the sensitive north-eastern state of Mizoram. Patnaik is also a recipient of the Presidents Police Medal for distinguished service and the Police Medal for Meritorious Service. He also got the prestigious G-Files Excellent Contribution Award in the year 2015 for his outstanding track record of honesty, integrity and dedication to work. PTI SLB NSD --- ENDS --- advertisement By West Kentucky Star Staff Jan. 30, 2017 | 05:50 AM | MCCRACKEN COUNTY, KY A traffic stop late Sunday night led to a drug arrest. According to the McCracken County Sheriff's Office, deputies stopped a car on Lone Oak Road, driven by 20-year-old Jessica McManus of Paducah. Police said McManus was in possession of methamphetamine and drug paraphernalia. McManus was arrested on charges of possession of methamphetamine, possession of drug paraphernalia and rear license plate not illuminated. Her passenger, 36-year-old Bryan Wilkey of Paducah, had an active warrant from McCracken County. He was placed under arrest for the warrant. Both were booked into the McCracken County Regional Jail. Advertisement By Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce Jan. 30, 2017 | PADUCAH, KY By Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce Jan. 30, 2017 | 09:35 AM | PADUCAH, KY The Paducah Area Chamber of Commerces Annual Meeting and Business Celebration sponsored by Lourdes and CSI was held at the Julian Carroll Convention Center on January 27 with a record crowd of more than 800 attendees. Outgoing board chair Bruce Wilcox, President of Henry A. Petter Supply, officially passed the gavel to Tammy Zimmerman, President/CEO of Payment Plus, as the board chair for 2017. The Chamber also honored several area businesses and individuals with their annual awards: Young Leaders of Western Kentucky Ed and Meagan Musselman. This award is selected by the Four Rivers Business Journal. Leadership Paducah Alumnus of the Year John A. Williams, Jr. This award is selected and presented by the Leadership Paducah Foundation. Chamber Volunteer of the Year Tonya Goodale with Midas Hospitality Non-Profit Organization of the Year Merryman House Entrepreneur of the Year VUE with owners Carolyn Raney and Maggie Armon Small Business of the Year Stone Lang Co. and owner Mike Stone Business of the Year HealthWorks with owner/founder Dr. Kyle Turnbo The theme for the evening was Making a Difference with guest speaker Steve Gilliland. Recognized as a master storyteller and comedian, Gilliland focused on how to positively influence people in every imaginable way. His message focused on three empowering dynamics: Purpose - It drives you!; Passion - It fuels you!; and Pride It defines you! As a member of the Speaker Hall of Fame, an honor bestowed on only 227 men and women worldwide, he can be heard daily on SiriusXM Radios Laugh USA. He is a prolific, accomplished author, evidenced by four of his books, including Making a Difference, perennially making the publishers bestseller list and his being named Author of the Year. He was named one of the Top 10 Motivational Speakers in 2015 by espeakers. He built a multimillion-dollar company from the ground up, which the Pittsburgh Business-Times named one of the fastest growing privately held companies in the region. Suzanne Farmer (Lourdes) and Mike Mallory (WPSD Local 6) served as the emcees for evening. The Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce is the regions largest business advocacy organization with more than 1,000 member firms and is the fifth largest Chamber in the state. The Chamber was named 2011 Chamber of the Year by the American Association of Chamber Executives, is 4-star accredited by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and is a Kentucky Certified Chamber. Additional information about award winners: 2017 Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce Award Recipients Information Note: All recipients must be a member of the Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce Business of the Year Two Categories Attributes for this award included: possesses staying power, has seen company growth, and involvement in the community. Business of the Year (more than 15 employees) HealthWorks Medical LLC and founder/owner Dr. Kyle Turnbo As one of the nomination letters stated, the winner of this award is often several generations old, but this company has reached an equitable level of meaningful impact in less than a decade. This clearly validates the impact of leadership, the degree by which the measured needs of care are being met across the region, and the heart-felt desire to serve upon which the company was founded. Beginning with only four employees and a goal of simply taking care of people, this company today employs 52 professionals and has grown from one location to six locations. In 2000 Dr. Kyle Turnbo opened a private family practice in Paducah. As a result of the rapidly growing complexity and dramatic cost increases in healthcare forcing employers to either drop or reduce coverage, Dr. Turnbo envisioned a company that would partner directly with employers to provide comprehensive healthcare. In 2008 HealthWorks was founded with a local company who had asked him to take over the occupational and primary care needs of its employees and their dependents. HealthWorks has continued to see growth each year and additional services and locations have been added throughout the region in West Kentucky and Southern Illinois. To quote one of the nominees about the CEO of HealthWorks: I have had the privilege of knowing the CEO for over six years, seeing a highly motivated physician, effective leader, mentor in our community and how he has been able to grow this companys outstanding reputation throughout the community. Small Business of the Year (15 or less employees) Stone Lang Co. and Mike Stone, owner Stone Lang Medical recently celebrated their 140th anniversary. The history of this business dates back to the late 1800s when the company was founded by two brothers. The brothers were very active in the community with one of them serving as Mayor of Paducah and also as the McCracken County Judge. The business was originally located in downtown Paducah at 207 Broadway, moved to 213 Broadway and now is in the 26th block of Broadway. With only three location changes and two corporate name changes, this company has a very long history in Paducah. Todays owner represents the fourth generation to help citizens of our region with improving their daily lives. Stone-Lang not only specializes in hearing aids but also in many other medical products and equipment. Non-Profit Organization Merryman House They received a $1,000 award from sponsor AECOM. In the words of their founder Merryman Kemp, knowing the kindness, compassion and generosity of the people of western Kentucky, failure never entered my mind back in the late 70s. The need was here and it wasnt being met. We had a big vision, but we were realistic. We would have to start small. The Merryman House, originally known as Women Aware, began as a shelter, even using local homes, and has grown through the years into a comprehensive advocacy and support program. All services are confidential and free of charge with almost 800 clients per year. This organization with its sister non-profit, Cornerstone of Hope, Inc., employs 25 and will increase that number this year due to their expansion and new partner, Mountain Comprehensive Care., Inc. In 2015 the group started its first ever capital campaign to build a new facility. In 2016, they acquired 13 acres of land and their partner (Mountain Comprehensive Care) purchased 13 additional acres to complete a 26 acre campus. Together the two agencies are planning to bring 30 jobs to the area with a residential substance abuse treatment for women and specialized care for victims of domestic violence. Entrepreneur of the Year VUE and owners Carolyn Raney and Maggie Armon This award is open to Chamber members who established a business within the past five years, recognized for innovative products or services, demonstrates community involvement and exceptional performance and growth. Since starting in 2014, the VUE Magazine has almost doubled their number of full time employees and added 15 contract employees and sales have grown by 200%. They have also been innovative in their technology usage with the VUE Magazines digital publication the only one in the region that is interactive. They focus on covering events of non-profit organizations and have gone from 25 events per month to as many as 65. They also expanded from printing 5,000 magazines to 9,000 in less than 3 years. Chamber Volunteer of the Year Tonya Goodale with Midas Hospitality This award is presented to someone who has made significant contributions to the goals and mission of the Chamber, donated time and/or resources and embodies the ideals of volunteerism and provided leadership in a key area. According to a statement in one of the multiple nominations for this award nominating her, Tonya Goodale exemplifies the Chamber volunteer of the year. Tonya arrives at 6:30 a.m. for every Chamber monthly breakfast to serve as a greeter at the door and in 2016 attended every (or almost every) ribbon cutting throughout the year. She is active with the Membership and Marketing Committee and has been active with the Total Resource Campaign. Additionally she is involved throughout the community and the surrounding area. She has never let any challenges slow her down or impact her positive attitude. Leadership Paducah Alumnus of the Year John A. Williams, Jr. with Wells Fargo and Leadership Paducah Class #6 This award is selected and presented by the Leadership Paducah Foundation. Criteria includes: sought out opportunities to improve the Paducah community; innovative; inspired others to assist in the process of accomplishing the vision; leads by example; provided encouragement and recognition to those who worked together to accomplish the goal. John A. Williams Jr. was nominated and selected for this award for his leadership role in developing and building the Rotary Playground at the new Paducah Health Park. He was a member of Leadership Paducah Class #6. While serving as the President of the Rotary Club, he had an idea to have the Rotary Club take on some type of service project that would make a long lasting impact for our community. After gathering information and conducting research, the idea of a project to enhance the citys new Health Park came alive. Not only did he serve as the visionary for the project, he was willing to take the risk and say yes to the challenge that our community could raise the money and then literally build the new playground from the ground up! He was on site every day from sun up to sun down and worked tirelessly to make sure it all came together. Young Leaders of Western Kentucky Ed and Meagan Musselman Note: The Selection Committee decided to award the Musselmans as the Young Leaders jointly for this award. Ed Musselman and Meagan Musselman were both nominated and individually selected as finalists for the award. They received a $1,000 continuing education award from the Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce. Because of the contributions of the two of them, it was hard to separate for the award. They are entrepreneurs and owners of Musselman Properties, Coke Plant, Dry Ground Brewery and Mellow Mushroom. Meagan Musselman is also an associate professor at Murray State University. It was believed that they represented a perfect pairing of passion and commitment; made an impact on Paducahs expanding business landscape that is nothing short of historic; couples community service with a well-crafted entrepreneurial spirit; partners with many community organizations and Young Professionals to move Paducah forward; and has seamlessly blended civic pride with personal accomplishments. Other finalists included: Lakilia Bedeau, Director of Youth Services, Paducah Public Schools Landee Bryant-Green, Executive Director, Paducah Art House Alliance Katie Englert, Owner, Compass Counseling and licensed professional clinical counselor Eri Gjergii, Product Manager, CSI Jonas Neihoff, President/Owner of Socially Present Matt Snow, Executive Director of Facilities with Baptist Health Chuck Tate, Director of Operations, Paducah-McCracken County Convention Center Monique Zuber, Administrator, United Way of Paducah-McCracken Co. Advertisement By West Kentucky Star Staff Jan. 26, 2017 | PADUCAH, KY By West Kentucky Star Staff Jan. 26, 2017 | 03:48 PM | PADUCAH, KY A unique and romantic fundraiser is once again set for next month at the River Discovery Center. On Valentines Day, former Circuit Judge Jeff Hines will perform wedding ceremonies in the Founders Room of the River Discovery Center from 1:00 - 3:00 pm, with ceremonies approximately every 10 minutes. Judge Hines is donating his time and services to the River Discovery Center in a unique way. For a donation of $100 to the museum, couples can enjoy a quick, easy service in a beautiful setting with a wonderful view. We are pleased to once again offer our Founders Room to couples who do not want an elaborate ceremony, but would like their memorable moment to be on Valentines Day, said Julie Harris, executive director of the center. The second floor has a beautiful view of the river and is a wonderful setting for a wedding. In addition, the donation gives each couple an unexpected tax deduction for their wedding ceremony. All proceeds help the centers educational programs. For those who are already married, renewal of vows is also popular for couples on Valentines Day. For more information and to reserve a time for a Feb. 14 ceremony, call Dana Marvin at 270-575-9958. By West Kentucky Star Staff Jan. 30, 2017 | 10:35 AM | CALVERT CITY, KY An investigation is underway in Marshall County after a man was assaulted over the weekend and his home set on fire. According to the Marshall County Sheriff's Office, Saturday night around 8:45, deputies were dispatched to Walker Harris Lane near Calvert City in reference to a house fire with a possible victim. Deputies said someone entered the home, assaulted the homeowner, and started a fire. The homeowner, 63-year-old Edward Harris, was treated by Marshall County EMS before being flown by Air Evac to a hospital for further treatment. The case remains under investigation. By Press Trust of India: London, Jan 30 (PTI) Parents, take note! Your kids may get along with their pets better than their siblings, according to a new study which shows that children get more satisfaction from the relationships with animals. The new study by researchers at the University of Cambridge in the UK adds to the increasing evidence that household pets may have a major influence on child development and could have a positive impact on childrens social skills and emotional well-being. advertisement Pets are almost as common as siblings in western households, although there are relatively few studies on the importance of child-pet relationships. "Anyone who has loved a childhood pet knows that we turn to them for companionship and disclosure, just like relationships between people," said Matt Cassells from University of Cambridge, who led the study. "We wanted to know how strong these relationships are with pets relative to other close family ties. Ultimately this may enable us to understand how animals contribute to healthy child development," said Cassells. Researchers surveyed 12 year old children from 77 families with one or more pets of any type and more than one child at home. Children reported strong relationships with their pets relative to their siblings, with lower levels of conflict and greater satisfaction in owners of dogs than other kinds of pets. "Even though pets may not fully understand or respond verbally, the level of disclosure to pets was no less than to siblings," said Cassels. "The fact that pets cannot understand or talk back may even be a benefit as it means they are completely non-judgmental," Cassels added. "While previous research has often found that boys report stronger relationships with their pets than girls do, we actually found the opposite," he said. "While boys and girls were equally satisfied with their pets, girls reported more disclosure, companionship, and conflict with their pet than did boys, perhaps indicating that girls may interact with their pets in more nuanced ways," he added. The study was published in the Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology. PTI NKS MHN SAR MHN --- ENDS --- By West Kentucky Star Staff Jan. 30, 2017 | 09:53 AM | DRAFFENVILLE, KY A Marshall County man was arrested Sunday on drug and gun charges. The Marshall County Sheriff's Office said deputies were dispatched Sunday night to a disturbance at a Draffenville restaurant. Deputies said one of the men involved was found in possession of several knives, a 45-caliber handgun, a marijuana pipe and a bag of marijuana. Deputies arrested 21-year-old Steven R. Klepfer of Benton on charges of carrying a concealed weapon, possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia. The investigation revealed that Klepfer did not have a concealed carry permit. Klepfer was lodged in the Marshall County Detention Center. A member of legislative leadership, in response to the Dakota Access Pipeline protests, is aiming to ban protectors from wearing masks.House Bill 1304 prime sponsor Rep. Al Carlson, R-Fargo, said the purpose of bills such as his are to give law enforcement clear direction on handling of protests.Thats not a peaceful protest, Carlson said of protesters wearing masks during demonstrations. It might be legal in Baghdad but not in Bismarck.HB1304 would bar people from wearing a mask or hood that covers part or all of the face when in a public area, such as a road or highway. It would also ban use of coverings for a persons face while at a demonstration or rally on private property without written permission.Throughout the months of protests, some of the opponents of the four-state, $3.8 billion pipeline have worn masks to shield their identities whether at construction sites or around the Bismarck-Mandan area.A number of exemptions are included in HB1304 for masks and coverings. These include for religious purposes, for theatrical productions, sporting events, parades, civil defense drills and protection from severe weather.A violation under HB1304 would result in a Class A misdemeanor, which carries a maximum penalty of one years imprisonment, a $3,000 fine or both.Carlson said he believes there would be strong support among fellow lawmakers for the anti-mask law.Jennifer Cook, policy director for ACLU of North Dakota, said the organization opposes HB1304 on First Amendment grounds.The fact that they have exemptions shows a speech restriction based on content, Cook said. Its also concerning that this bill is directed to the Dakota Access Pipeline protests. Wearing a mask during a protest, thats not a criminal activity. WHAT CITY COUNCIL DOES---OR DOESN'T DO---ON FEBRUARY 9 COULD SEND THE HHS ISSUE TO THE NC GENERAL ASSEMBLY FOR RESOLUTION UPDATE LOCAL ISSUES LIKE CLOSING NINTH AVENUE AND ZONING CHANGES FOR THE NEW HHS CAMPUS COULD END UP IN THE HANDS OF THE NC GENERAL ASSEMBLY As WHKP News predicted it would several months ago, the battle over a new Hendersonville High School campus has now shifted from the county courthouse to Hendersonville city hall. Commissioners are sticking to their Clark Nexsen-proposed $53 million dollar new high school at Five Points on the former Boyd propertyand commissioners have issued an ultimatum to city council---either close Ninth Avenue between Oakland and Church Streets to make room for the new campus and approve the necessary zoning changes OR the whole HHS project will be shelved indefinitely. The next step in the process would normally be for the county to formally request that the street be closed and the county or its architect and contractors would apply to the city planning board and then to city council for the necessary zoning changes. But because three members of city council, Mayor Volk and council members Stevens and Smith, have already let their opposition to the Clark Nexsen proposal be known and are likely no votes, they could defeat the proposed closing of Ninth Avenue for the new campus and/or their participation in the quasi judicial hearing that would be required on the zoning changes could become an issue. This leaves whats appearing to be growing gridlock between the city and county on the new HHS issue. And this also opens the door for the North Carolina General Assembly to possibly step in and force a solution. State Representative Chuck McGrady, a former county commissioner who served with some of the current "sitting" commissioners, has reportedly indicated to county commissioners that hes willing to do so...and there is historical precedent for that. The legislature settled a downtown building heights issue a decade ago by authorizing a vote of the people on the issue. More to the point, a quarter of a century ago, State Senator Bo Thomas wrote legislation forcing reluctant county commissioners to deal with the issue of a crumbling jail and old courthouse which led to the construction of the newer 1995 courthouse and detention facility. McGrady tells WHKP he has not been asked yet for legislation on the issue---so a lot is obviously riding on what city council does in that February 9th meeting. The need for a new Edneyville Elementary School was recently resolved when commissioners voted unanimously to build a new facility for about $25 million, and as Commission Chairman Michael Edney correctly pointed out the Edneyville school is a separate issue.. And County Commissioner Grady Hawkins re-affirmed the obviousthat the county CAN afford to build both the new Edneyville school and the new HHS campus. That SHOULD resolve both issues, but the city-county gridlock, at least for now. appears to be firmly in place. The bottom line iseither a compromise is worked out between city and county to move the new campus and preservation of the historic Stillwell building forwardor the whole issue may be moved out of the hands of local elected city and county officials and placed squarely in the lap of a few hundred legislators in Raleigh who know diddly-squat about our situation and needs here in Henderson County---and thats "Raleigh decision-making" and "legislative mandates" that are consistently decried by local elected officials. This is not an editorial opinion...,what were offering is just an objective over-view from an historical perspective of where this contentious situation stands today and may be going in the very near future. So, like with other similar situations in our recent history, such as building heights and new courthouses, as we say in the radio business, please stand by and stay tuneddepending on what city council does on February 9th, it is looking more and more likely that this issue is about 210 miles down I-40 (the distance from here to Raleigh) from being resolved. By WHKP News Director Larry Freeman Updated 01/30/17 "Tributes to beloved Bapu on his 'Punya Tithi' (death anniversary)," Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted. By Indo-Asian News Service: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday paid tribute to Mahatma Gandhi, the Father of the Nation, on his 69th death anniversary. "Tributes to beloved Bapu on his 'Punya Tithi' (death anniversary)," Modi tweeted. On this day in 1948, Mohan Das Karamchand Gandhi was assassinated by Nathuram Godse, a Hindu nationalist, who fired three bullets into his chest during a prayer meeting at the Birla House here. advertisement Also read: Mahatma Gandhi's samadhi gets a new look, to be unveiled by Venkaiah Naidu Gandhi is admired across the world for his nonviolent philosophy of passive resistance. He was known to his many followers as the Mahatma. --- ENDS --- K Rasila Raju was allegedly strangled with a computer wire. The incident took place on the ninth floor of the Infosys building. By India Today Web Desk: A 25-year-old woman from Kerala who was working with Infosys was found murdered at her office in in Pune on Sunday. K Rasila Raju was allegedly strangled with a computer wire. The incident took place on the ninth floor of the Infosys building. A security guard has been arrested in connection with the murder. "We are saddened and shocked at this unfortunate incident and the loss of our colleague. Our prayers and sympathies are with our employee's family and friends. We are focused on assisting the police with their investigation and providing all possible support to her family," a statement issued by Infosys said. WHAT WE KNOW SO FAR: According to police, the woman was strangulated to death with a computer cable. The deceased has been identified as K Rasila Raju. Police say, she had come to the office on Sunday to work on a project and was coordinating with the team from Bangalore. A security guard found her body lying on the floor in the conference room. Police suspect, she had been killed between 5pm and 6.30 pm. Police have zeroed down on the prime suspect Bhaben Sailcia, a 26-year-old from Assam who worked as a watchman in the office. advertisement CAPEGEMINI EMPLOYEE CHASED, STABBED IN DECEMBER In December 2016, a 23-year-old Capegemini employee was chased and stabbed multiple times in the city. The victim Antara Das, had come to Pune from Kolkata. The incident took place only 500 metres from her office as a young assailant chased her brandishing knife along the footpath while the deceased screamed for help. After a chase for some distance, she was caught by the assailant, with whom Antara supposedly had a heated argument.The killer hit her on her head and stabbed her in neck. Antara was taken to a hospital, where she was announced brought dead. ALSO READ: Pune techie chased and stabbed multiple times to death while she screamed for help Bangalore: Woman kills techie husband to elope with her cousin IBM techie found dead in her Bengaluru flat --- ENDS --- Gurwinder is the former chief of KLF. He is accused of inciting Sikh-Hindu riots during the years when terrorism was at its peak in Punjab. He was even jailed in cases relating to murder and other heinous crimes. AAP has sought to defend Arvind Kejriwal's choice of spending the night in Gurwinder's house. By Satender Chauhan: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is embroiled in a fresh controversy over staying in the house of Khalistan Liberation Front (KLF) activist Gurwinder Singh during his Punjab visit on Saturday. Gurwinder is the former chief of KLF. He is accused of inciting Sikh-Hindu riots during the years when terrorism was at its peak in Punjab. He was even jailed in cases relating to murder and other heinous crimes. advertisement However, he was later acquitted and went to England. He is allegedly working for KLF from England. With Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) convener Arvind Kejriwal staying in Gurwinder's house in Moga ahead of the February 4 Punjab Assembly elections, the politics in the state is on the boil. AAP's rivals - Congress and Akali Dal - have once again repeated their charge against AAP of hobnobbing with anti-Punjab and pro-Khalistan radical forces. They have alleged that AAP is seeking their support and getting funds from them for the Punjab elections. Besides, Hindu organisations have also come out in the open against Arvind Kejriwal and AAP. Panchanand Giri Maharaj, who is associated with Hindu Takht and Juna Akhada, has accused Arvind Kejriwal of being hand in glove with pro-Khalistan radical groups. He said as per protocol, Kejriwal, being a chief minister, could have stayed in any state guest house. Giri Maharaj said Kejriwal could even have stayed in the house of any local AAP leader. However, the Delhi Chief Minister chose the house of "terrorist" Gurwinder Singh who is working for KLF, he said. Giri Maharaj declared that Hindu Takht will openly work against AAP and tell the people how Kejriwal and his party are associated with anti-Punjab and pro-Khalistan forces. On the other hand, AAP has sought to defend Arvind Kejriwal's choice of spending the night in Gurwinder's house. Senior AAP leader Sanjay Singh said AAP had provided prior information to the Punjab police regarding Kejriwal's stay in Gurwinder's house. He said the Punjab police should have stopped Kejriwal from staying in the KLF activist's house but it did not do so. Sanjay Singh further said Kejriwal does not know Gurwinder Singh. He went to stay in his house on the suggestion of an AAP member Satnam Singh. He also said Gurwinder Singh has been acquitted of all charges and he cannot be labeled a terrorist. Sanjay Singh released a photograph and said both Akali Dal and BJP had earlier accused Kejriwal of meeting an alleged terrorist RP Singh. However, the same PK Singh was seen sitting with Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal. advertisement "If the person sitting with Arvind Kejriwal is a terrorist, then Parkash Singh Badal has also held a meeting with him. In such a scenario, Punjab's Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal should order an FIR to be lodged against his father," he said. ALSO READ: Election Commission orders FIR against Arvind Kejriwal for poll code violation, AAP says not aware --- ENDS --- Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. The original whistleblower who ignited a meltdown in the fortunes of Winnipeg-based packaged-ice company Arctic Glacier Income Fund has settled a long and contentious civil suit for $400,000. Martin McNulty, a former Arctic executive based in Michigan, settled with the receivers who are responsible for managing the assets of the fund under the Companies Creditors Arrangement Act. He had been seeking $14 million in damages. The firm Alvarez & Marsal was appointed monitor of the fund including its Canadian and U.S. subsidiaries in February 2012 when the company was forced into creditor protection after it was in violation of debt covenants. Phil Hossack / Winnipeg Free Press files Arctic Glacier. The business and assets of the company were acquired by HIG Capital in July 2012 for $434 million. HIG continues to operate the company as Arctic Glacier Inc. Officials from Arctic Glacier Inc. were unavailable for comment. Alvarez & Marsal continue to manage the assets of the fund that remained as a result of the sale transaction through a court-monitored claims process. The McNulty claim was the largest outstanding matter and with its resolution, a cash distribution to the fund unitholders might be in the offing. Two years ago, the monitor released $54.5 million to unitholders. An official from Alvarez & Marsal said it was holding back $27.4 million to cover off the remaining potential liabilities. Alvarez & Marsal officials were unavailable to comment last week, but when the distribution took place in January 2015, an official said he expected there would be another. McNulty has alleged Arctic and others engaged in a conspiracy to prevent him from working in the industry and that he was offered bribes to prevent him from assisting the Department of Justice officials in their investigation, which began in 2007. It has been reported McNulty was fired allegedly because he refused to participate in the antitrust conspiracy and he wore a wire on behalf of the FBI and taped a meeting with industry officials in Michigan. That, ostensibly, was the basis of the wrongful-dismissal and civil suit. Before the collusion allegations and investigation surfaced, Arctic had been on an impressive run of success, buying up small ice companies and distributing generous dividends to unitholders. After that, the companys fortunes started to decline. In 2009, Arctic Glacier International Inc., the former companys St. Paul, Minn.-based subsidiary, agreed to a US$9-million fine for conspiracy to suppress and eliminate competition in the U.S. Specifically, it agreed to plead guilty to one charge of engaging in a conspiracy to suppress and eliminate competition by allocating packaged-ice customers in the Detroit and southeastern Michigan region from the beginning of 2001 to at least July 17, 2007. Under the terms of the settlement agreement announced last week, McNulty releases and forever discharges and covenants not to sue Arctic and will dismiss all proceedings against Arctic and its associated companies. martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca Police said two suspects had been arrested, but gave no more details into what prompted the "terrorist attack", saying the investigation had just begun. Police officers patrol the perimeter near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City on January 29, 2017. Reuters Photo By Reuters: Six people were killed and eight wounded when gunmen opened fire at a Quebec mosque during Sunday night prayers, in what Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a "terrorist attack on Muslims". Police said two suspects had been arrested, but gave no more details into what prompted the "terrorist attack", saying the investigation had just begun. Also read: Canada's Trudeau welcomes all immigrants day after Trump signs anti-refugee order advertisement Initially, the mosque president said five people were killed in the shooting, and a witness said up to three gunmen had fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre. Police said only two people were involved in the attack. WATCH THE VIDEO --- ENDS --- Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Kevin Chief, former NDP MLA and former Jobs and Economy Minister, has been named vice-president of the Business Council of Manitoba. Chief, who served the Point Douglas riding and was seen by many as a potential leadership candidate for the provincial NDP, announced his resignation from the Manitoba Legislature in December. He is to start with the Business Council immediately. Don Leitch, president and CEO of the Business Council of Manitoba, said Chief will undertake a variety of assignments. PHIL HOSSACK / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES Former NDP MLA Kevin Chief will work with new Canadians and indigenous communities in his role as vice-president of the Business Council of Manitoba. With his recent experience in government and his extensive background working in the community, Kevin will strengthen our team as we advance the goals of the council working to make Manitoba a stronger community for all our citizens, said Leitch. The BCM has long been engaged in various efforts to allow Manitobas indigenous community to become more involved in the mainstream economy, including the funding of hundreds of scholarships for indigenous youth. Steve Kroft, chair of the board of the BCM, said Chief will work on a broad range of objectives. One of those objectives is to provide new Canadians and members of our indigenous communities with opportunities to play a greater role within our economy, said Kroft. The Business Council has for many years been committed to providing individuals with opportunities to further their education through our Aboriginal Awards Program. Kevins record in helping our fastest growing group of young people realize their potential combined with his unique understanding of the challenges they face make him ideally suited to help the council advance these and many other objectives. Before he became an elected official, Chief worked as co-ordinator of the Innovative Learning Centre at the University of Winnipeg, director of the Winnipeg Aboriginal Sport Achievement Centre and community networker with the River East Transcona School Division. The Business Council of Manitoba was formed in 1998, representing more than 80 of the largest private sector employers in the province. It offers a non-partisan voice on challenges and opportunities for Manitoba and Canada. martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Popular fashion retailer H&M is opening a new store in Kildonan Place Shopping Centre. The Swedish company announced on Monday the new outlet will open late this spring in the Regent Avenue mall. The announcement confirms a long-standing rumour that H&M would be one of three high-profile retailers who would be setting up shop in a portion of the former Target department store space in the mall. The other two Marshalls and HomeSense announced on Jan. 19 they will be opening a new 45,000-square-foot superstore in the centre April 18. Mark Lennihan / The Associated Press Files After almost a year of rumours, Swedish fashion retailer H&M finally confirmed it is opening a new Winnipeg store at Kildonan Place. Kildonan Place general manager Sandra Hagenaars said at that time that HomeSense and Marshalls would be among 11 new tenants moving into the redeveloped Target space, which has been vacant since 2015 when the U.S.-based retail giant announced it was withdrawing from the Canadian market. However, she said she couldnt comment on who the others are, or if H&M would be one of them. Coun. Jeff Browaty (North Kildonan) revealed last March that site drawings Kildonan Place submitted to the East Kildonan-Transcona community committee showed Marshalls, HomeSense and H&M would be moving into the Target space. Kildonan Place officials said at the time they were just conceptional drawings and that no leases had been signed with any prospective tenants. The H&M release did not say how big the new store would be, but said it will employ 35 people. The company has one other store in the city in the Polo Park shopping centre. That outlet opened in September 2014, and is one of 83 the company has opened in Canada since entering the market in 2004. murray.mcneill@freepress.mb.ca Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Winnipegs Class A office-vacancy rate has fallen to its lowest level in nearly 20 years, thanks in part to a downtown highrise office tower landing a new 10-year government contract. The tower at 360 Main St. beat out 11 other contenders late last fall for a federal contract to supply 68,000 square feet of office space for the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA). The deal helped to drive down the citys Class A office vacancy rate to 2.9 per cent at the start of this year from 5.7 per cent in January 2016, according to the latest vacancy-rate report (the Johnson Report) from Wayne Johnson, a commercial agent with Royal LePage Dynamic Real Estate. PHIL HOSSACK / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Class A office vacancy rate has fallen to its lowest level in nearly 20 years, thanks in part to 360 Main landing a new long-term federal government lease for 68,000 square feet in the building. Johnson said thats the lowest the rate has been since 1999 when it was 2.8 per cent. He noted in 1998 it was 1.1 per cent. But while the rate is at its lowest level in nearly two decades, Johnson said theres a twist. Although the 360 Main St. space is considered leased, the CRA wont be moving in and wont begin paying rent until January 2021. So for the next four years, the 68,000 square feet at 360 Main St. will be classified as leased, and the 87,000 square feet the CRA now occupies in a Class B building at 325 Broadway will also be classified as leased. So that will keep the Class A and B vacancy rates lower than they otherwise would be. He said the Class B vacancy rate is 7.1 per cent. So its one of those unusual circumstances where youre double-counting the same tenant (for the next four years), he added. One downtown office leasing specialist Wayne Sato, vice-president of office for Cushman & Wakefield, Winnipeg said a long lead time is not unusual for federal government tenants, which have strict leasing requirements. And given that its for 68,000 square feet we havent got very many (existing) buildings that would be ready to do that space, Sato added. So they would have to anticipate that it may require a brand-new build-to-suit (building). Thats why the long lead time. It turned out there was an existing building that was able to meet the agencys requirements. Sato said one of the things that likely worked in 360 Mains favour is the federal government already leases space there. A spokesman for Artis Real Estate Investment Trust, which owns 360 Main and has its head office there, could not be reached for comment. A federal government spokesman also confirmed long lead times are typically necessary for larger spaces so new developments also have a chance to bid on the contract. He said the government chose the 360 Main proposal because it met all of the agencys requirements and was the lowest bid. Sato said it was encouraging to see the federal government make another long-term commitment to leasing space downtown. Especially when the Liquor and Gaming Authority of Manitoba recently issued a tender seeking to lease 22,000 sq. ft. of office space for 15 years but specified it couldnt be downtown. A spokesperson for the gaming authority said two reasons it prefers suburban space is rents are cheaper and on-site parking spaces are more plentiful. Sato said many downtown landlords are disappointed by the authoritys decision to look outside the downtown. We look to the public sector to play a role in the revitalization of the downtown, and the feds signing (a long-term lease) and the gaming commission leaving is one step forward and one step back, he said. The public sector really has to play a role (in downtown revitalization) or it wont happen. Sato said hes not surprised to see the Class A vacancy rate declining because there is a strong interest in downtown office space. The enthusiasm really has been sparked by all of the downtown development thats been going on, he said. All eyes are on the downtown. Johnson said the CRAs decision to lease space at 360 Main will have a ripple effect on the downtown market. Marwest Management Canada Ltd., which manages 360 Main on behalf of Artis, currently occupies a big chunk of the space the CRA has leased, he said. So this September, it will be relocating its operations to a 42,000-sq.-ft. space in the neighbouring building at 220 Portage, which is also owned by Artis. The CRAs departure at the end of 2020 also means the landlord at 325 Broadway will have to backfill that space, and Johnson said that may not be easy. Theyre going to go looking for tenants, but where are the tenants coming from if our market isnt growing in need? He said some of the existing Class A buildings could face the same challenge if they lose tenants to the new Class A buildings that will be coming onto the market in a few years. He noted there are several hundred thousand square feet of Class A office space in the True North Square development and two floors of Class A office space in the proposed SkyCity Centre Winnipeg residential/office/retail tower. Were not having head-office space move here from Toronto. Not even from Saskatchewan, he said, so the new buildings will likely end up poaching tenants from existing Class A and B buildings. In fact, two of the office tenants that have leased space in the True North Square tower will be relocating from existing buildings at Portage and Main. So I would call this the calm before the storm, Johnson added. murray.mcneill@freepress.mb.ca Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Child porn, a loaded handgun and 108 drug seizures are among the top stories from Canadas border patrol in Winnipeg and southern Manitoba for 2016. A press release from the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) chronicled five unique tales about the various ways that officers protect Manitobans by stopping crime at Canadas border. Our officers continued to protect the province on the frontline at our land border, airport and inland operations. Their efforts are ongoing and diligent in keeping Manitobans safe and contribute to our countrys protection as a whole, said Yvonne Bremault, the director of the Southern Manitoba District Canada Border Services Agency. Canada Border Services Agency Officers played key roles in catching a man smuggling child pornography and last spring, helped securing Canadas longest jail sentence resulting from a child pornography cross-border smuggling case investigated by the CBSA. Robert William Roske of Minnesota was sentenced to 2.5 years in jail on March 1, 2016. Officers at the Sprague border crossing discovered illegal images on his electronic devices when he tried to cross in July 2015. A loaded handgun seized on Dec. 10, 2016 at the Emerson crossing was one of 16 firearms including 12 handguns and 11 prohibited weapons seized by southern Manitoba officers in 2016. The Illinois man who was in possession of the loaded handgun spent 11 days in jail in Winnipeg before he was was sentenced on Dec. 22, 2016 to time served and had to pay a $9,000 fine. He pleaded guilty to smuggling under the Customs Act. Two Winnipeg men who were acting as unauthorized consultants last September and December were charged in separate immigration fraud cases which are still before the courts. The men were deported after serving sentences for robbery at gunpoint and manslaughter. They were among 41 people removed from Canada due to criminal inadmissibility by the CBSAs Inland Enforcement unit in Winnipeg. In addition to the 108 drug-related seizures by CBSA officers in Manitoba, officers intercepted more than 15 litres of gamma-butyrolactone (GBL) being illegally imported into Winnipeg. GBL is a controlled substance used in the manufacturing of gamma-hydroxybutyric acid which is used in the date rape drug. A joint RCMP-CBSA investigation last August resulted in a man charged with allegedly importing fentanyl into Canada. The fentanyl was in a parcel originating from China and destined to a Winnipeg address. The joint investigation followed a CBSA seizure of 39 grams of fentanyl at the Vancouver International Mail Centre. Last summer, CBSA officers from Winnipeg boarded the Crystal Serenity cruise ship in Ulukhaktok, Northwest Territories reaching the ship by zodiac to identify travellers and determine their admissibility to Canada. The Winnipeg officers processed 1,000 passengers and 600 crew members of the ship. The large vessel was making an historic voyage through the Northwest Passage from Alaska. It was the first time CBSA officers had processed travellers on board a large cruise ship in Northern Canada. Officers in Winnipeg, home to one of two CBSA call centres in Canada, handled 149,834 enquiries by telephone and over 21,829 by email. Some of the questions included traveller tips, documents required to enter Canada, duty rates, and import/export requirements. At the border crossings, CBSA officers in Manitoba saw 1,831,390 travellers in 615,390 cars, 264,165 commercial trucks, 965 buses, 5,450 aircraft, and 4,665 trains. They processed over 2,370,575 commercial shipments. Officers welcomed 2,340 new permanent residents, issued 2,650 work permits, issued 475 study permits and executed 301 seizure actions. Over 990 foreign nationals were refused entry into Canada for various reasons including criminal activity. The CBSA also announced a Manitoba pilot partnership with the Canadian Centre for Child Protection to help intercept missing and abducted children. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 29/01/2017 (2106 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Manitoba resident Abdikheir Ahmed, who came to Canada from Somalia as a refugee more than a decade ago, is critical about the U.S. travel ban issued against people from seven predominantly-Muslim countries. Mr. Trump and his administration do not know how to run a government, Ahmed said on Sunday. They toss things out without knowing the consequences. These guys seem to not understand how to run a government. They seem to think it is like running Trumps business. Phil Hossack / Winnipeg Free Press Files Abdikheir Ahmed, co-director of Immigration Partnership Winnipeg, believes refugees in the U.S. won't receive a fair process because of Donald Trump's policies. U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Saturday, imposing a three-month travel ban to the United States involving people from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya. That kicked off attempts by the Canadian government, which hadnt been given advance notice about the American move, to spend much of the weekend trying to find out if that also affected citizens of those seven countries who also hold a valid Canadian permanent resident card. While U.S. officials havent commented publicly since, they have talked to their Canadian counterparts, and on Sunday afternoon Canadian immigration minister Ahmed Hussen said people with a valid Canadian permanent resident card and a passport from one of the seven countries can travel to the United States. As well, dual citizens with a Canadian passport can also cross the border. But Ahmed, the co-director of the federally-funded Immigration Partnership Winnipeg, said he not only is critical about what Trump has done so far, he also fears what might come next from the White House. Im sure they have more that are coming and they would have gone farther if it did not affect the economy of the United States, he said. These seven countries are the poorest. Ahmed said that beyond Prime Minister Justin Trudeaus tweet on the weekend saying Canada continues to welcome refugees, he would like to see the country accept all the refugees that have already been vetted by American officials for acceptance, but who are now subject to the travel ban. We need to follow our words with action, he said. Everyone turned back should be allowed to come to Canada. And Ahmed believes Canada should pull out of the Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement, which requires refugees to apply for refugee protection in the first country they arrive in. The United States is not a safe country anymore. No refugee in the United States will receive a fair process, he said. Meanwhile, the local Mennonite Central Committee will be meeting on Monday about the executive orders issued by Trump against refugees, but for now they pointed to a statement made by J. Ron Byler, MCC U.S.s executive director, last Thursday following the immigration enforcement taken on Wednesday and what had been expected in the days ahead. These actions portray immigrants and refugees as criminals and threats rather than seeing them as Gods beloved children, Bylers statement said. By building walls and turning away refugees we ignore Christs call to care for those in need and to love the stranger among us as we love ourselves as Anabaptist Christians, we have long held that governments must protect the religious freedom of all people, not just Christians. We strongly oppose any discrimination against refugees, including discrimination based on religion or nationality. Our nation must keep its doors open to all people who are in need and face persecution. kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca Opinion Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 29/01/2017 (2106 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Although he may have been guilty of using some unfortunate words, Premier Brian Pallister said in an exclusive interview he is not racist and supports the right of indigenous hunters to engage in night hunting in areas where they have a legal right to harvest wildlife. In his first extensive interview about the night-hunting controversy, Pallister said he used imprecise and possibly inflammatory language when he discussed the issue with a group of rural municipal politicians at a meeting in Virden on Jan. 16. Those comments were recorded by a radio reporter and widely broadcast and discussed in media reports on Jan. 19. In those comments, Pallister talked of his concern about young indigenous guys going out and shooting a bunch of moose. He said that conflict between indigenous and non-indigenous people in many rural areas was threatening to become a race war. FACEBOOK / Pallister says a Maclean's reporter who stopped by his Costa Rica home didn't appear to be taking notes. In a telephone interview Sunday night from Costa Rica, Pallister said he now wishes he had used different language to broach the subject. Quite frankly, it was an unfortunate choice (of words). Pallister said he has no quarrel with indigenous people who choose to night hunt on lands where they have a legal right to hunt. There are court-established, well-established indigenous hunting rights, Pallister said. Jurisprudence is very clear on this: indigenous people have the right to hunt on their land, they have the right to hunt on crown land, they have the right to night hunt on private land with the permission of landowners. However, Pallister said his real concern is what he called night shooting a term he uses to describe hunters who fire their weapons from the back of trucks using high-powered lights in areas where hunting is not permitted, including on or near highways and farm properties. I think its important to get people talking about this issue, Pallister said. People are getting fearful and concerned. Im hearing this from indigenous hunters and elders, too. This is across the board. Out in the country where the night-shooting activity is happening, its scaring people. Its a growing problem. Pallister said his original comments on Jan. 16 were missing some context. During his recent tour of western Manitoba, he heard many people raise the issue of night hunting, and related to him anecdotes about bullets striking farm buildings and inadvertently killing farm animals. Pallister noted that at least one man died in the past year in connection with night hunting. Pallister said he also heard some non-indigenous people talk about a possible vigilante response, which only re-enforced the importance of bringing the issue up for discussion when he met with municipal councillors in Virden. In that speech, Pallister said he intended to encourage those in attendance to work together with indigenous people to end illegal night hunting to avoid turning the issue into a race war. His comments denouncing night hunting were supposed to be limited to the illegal practice, not hunting involving indigenous hunters on legally appropriate land. However, the issue remains a difficult one for the premier to discuss and one that will likely continue to dog him. When asked directly if he believes indigenous hunters are responsible for the majority of incidents of illegal night hunting, Pallister said yes, based on provincial government statistics that show a high number of hunters with treaty status involved in illegal night hunting. Pallister acknowledged that non-indigenous hunters are also involved in this reckless practice, and that in the final analysis, race need not be part of the debate over how to curtail night hunting. BORIS MINKEVICH / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES Premier Brian Pallister is concerned about "night shooting." The night hunting story exploded later last week when a comment attributed to Pallister appeared in an article in Macleans magazine. A reporter from that magazine made an unannounced visit to Pallisters Costa Rica vacation home. During her visit, the reporter quoted Pallister as saying that young indigenous men a preponderance of them are offenders, with criminal records are going off shooting guns in the middle of the night. It doesnt make sense. Pallister flatly denied making that statement, and said he was shocked to see any direct quote in the article given that, during the reporters brief visit to his vacation home, she did not appear to have a notepad or tape recorder. Pallister said his office has contacted Macleans to ask for notes or a recording to back up the quote. Pallister said he has a long history of advocating for indigenous rights, particularly as it relates to indigenous women, and would never utter such a comment. Im obviously disappointed about the comments attributed to me because thats not me. The night hunting story did expose just how weak the Pallister government can be when the premier is out of the country in Costa Rica. Shortly after the comments on night hunting went public on Jan. 19, Pallister left for an 11-day visit to his tropical vacation property. As a result he was unable to respond directly to concerns about his comments, and efforts by his office to defuse the story seemed only to fan the flames of controversy even more. The vacuum that was created in his absence certainly allowed the story to grow in intensity and reach. Pallister conceded that its possible the story could have been defused earlier had he been in Winnipeg, but said he is still committed to taking family time in Costa Rica, and that he can still perform all of the important duties of a provincial first minister while on vacation. Ive been accessible every day Ive been here, he said. Ive got my family 10 per cent of the time and Ive got the job the other 90 per cent of the time. Im happy with that ratio, but I wont go lower than 10 per cent family time. dan.lett@freepress.mb.ca Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. wfpvideo:f0iKNZLk:wfpvideo Police presence around Winnipegs mosques and Islamic schools will be beefed up following Sundays deadly shooting at a Quebec City mosque. Winnipeg Police Chief Danny Smyth said while additional security measures are not being put into place, police will be more visible around mosques and Islamic schools in an attempt to reassure the Muslim community. We remain steadfast in our support with the Muslim community here in Winnipeg, Smyth told reporters Monday afternoon following a meeting between several leaders of the local Muslim community and senior civic leaders, including himself, Mayor Brian Bowman and CAO Doug McNeil. WAYNE GLOWACKI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS At right, Shahina Siddiqui, founder and executive director of the Islamic Social Services Association, in a show of unity with Mayor Brian Bowman, Police Chief Danny Smyth and other community members Monday. Those in the community can expect to see an increase in our presence in and around mosques and schools, Smyth said. I really want to reassure the Muslim community that we support them. Bowman and Smyth were joined by Shahina Siddiqui, founder and executive director of the Islamic Social Services Association; Dr. Idris Elbakri, president of the Manitoba Islamic Association; Rita Chahal, executive director of the Manitoba Interfaith Immigration Council; local businessman Albert El Tassi; former CFLer Ibrahim (Obby) Khan; Idris Knapp, Executive Director Winnipeg Central Mosque; and Barry Tuckett, vice-chair of the Winnipeg Police Board. Elbakri, who is a radiological physicist at CancerCare Manitoba and assistant professor of radiology at the University of Manitoba, said the the Quebec City mosque shooting, in which six were killed and 19 wounded, has left the local Muslim community on edge, adding he wanted to thank Bowman and Smyth, other civic leaders and the public at large who have reached out to the Muslim community to express sympathy and support. Islamaphobes and terrorists believe that being Muslim and being Canadian are incompatible, Elbakri said. To me, my family, my friends, my community, we make a choice to be both every single day. Siddiqui said Sundays fatal shooting was traumatic for local Muslims, adding its important all members of the community support each other in such situations. Innocent people were killed and they were killed in a mosque, a place of worship and sanctuary and the message was you are not safe anywhere, Siddiqui said. We all have to stand together so that this does not happen against any other community, she said, adding that while Muslims were targeted Sunday, other racial and religious groups could be next. Bowman said he invited the leaders from the local Muslim community to city hall to discuss how the community can offer support and security to them. Bowman said Winnipeggers must be united in their opposition to hatred and discrimination that targets people based on religion or race. This attack is testing us as Canadian. Its testing our willingness to continue to stand up for the values we hold dear, he said. aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca By Press Trust of India: Kannur (Ker), Jan 30 (PTI) An RSS leader was today attacked and injured allegedly by CPI-M activists at Kankol in Payanoor in Kannur district, police said. He has been admitted to a hospital here and his condition is stated to be serious, they said. RSS alleged that a group of CPI-M workers attacked Ajit with iron rods when a meeting of the saffron organisation was in progress late in the evening. advertisement The district has been witnessing a series of clashes between CPI-M and RSS-BJP workers after the May 16 Assembly polls which saw the CPI-M-led LDF government coming to power in the state. In another incident, a 64-year-old Congress worker was attacked and injured allegedly by RSS-BJP workers at Panoor in the district. The injured, M Sukumaran, a former school teacher, has been admitted to Thalassery Indira Gandhi Cooperative hospital, police said. He was attacked while he was opening his shop in the morning. Meanwhile, in the southern part of the state, a flag and flagpost of CPI-M was damaged allegedly by RSS-BJP workers at Paravoor in Kollam district. On January 18, a 53-year-old BJP worker was stabbed to death at Andaloor in Dharmadam, the constituency of Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan. Six CPI(M)workers have been arrested in this connection. On Friday last, 10 people, belonging to BJP-RSS, were taken into custody here in connection with the hurling of a bomb near the venue of a public meeting of CPI(M) state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan, police said. PTI COR KV JRK BN GVS --- ENDS --- Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Several Manitoba rivers including the Red and the lower Assiniboine are at risk of major flooding if unfavourable weather conditions persist. High soil moisture levels before freeze-up and above-normal snowfall so far this winter have created the potential for modest to major overland flooding in most areas of the province, the Manitoba government said Monday. We have experienced some unusual winter weather to this point that has contributed to an expanded risk of overland flooding in Manitoba, said Infrastructure Minister Blaine Pedersen. RUTH BONNEVILLE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES Heavy rains in western Manitoba and Saskatchewan recently have raised the level of the Assiniboine River causing it to overflow its banks flooding roads and farmers fields in 2014. Winter precipitation is normal to well-above-normal throughout southern Manitoba, according to the provinces January Conditions Report. Snowfall amounts in the Red River basin in the United States and the Winnipeg River basin in Ontario have also been above normal. The government said there is also a risk of major flooding along the Souris, Pembina and Roseau rivers and throughout the southwest corner of the province. The magnitude of spring flooding potential is still very dependent on weather until the spring melt, Pedersen told a media briefing at the provinces flood forecast centre in Winnipeg. Flood potential is significantly affected by the amount of additional snow and spring rain, the frost depth at the time of runoff, the timing and rate of the spring thaw, and the timing of peak flows in Manitoba the U.S. and other provinces. Long-term weather forecasts are not promising, though. Both Environment Canada and the U.S. National Weather Service forecast above-normal precipitation in the Souris River, Pembina River and Red River basins in the coming months. According to the latest provincial report, it is likely that both the Red River Floodway and the Portage Diversion, which channels surplus Assiniboine River water into Lake Manitoba, will be operated this year. Lake Manitoba is 0.7 feet higher than normal for this time of year, Lake Winnipeg is 2.3 feet above normal and Lake St. Martin is nearly four feet above normal. Given average weather going forward, the flood risk along the Red River from Emerson to Ste. Agathe is similar to 2010, when Highway 75 was not flooded. With unfavourable weather, flooding along the Red would be similar to the major flood of 2009. With normal weather, there would be a moderate risk of flooding along the Assiniboine River. But with unfavourable weather, there is a major risk of flooding. Between Brandon and Portage, levels would only be slightly lower than that observed in the spring of 2011 or the summer of 2014, officials said. In southern Manitoba, the risk of flooding is greatest along the Souris River in the southwest corner of the province. There, even with normal weather from here on out, there is a major risk of flooding. With adverse weather, the risk is listed as major to severe. However, officials say that even with a major flood similar to 1976 or 2011 along the Souris River, existing dikes around the towns of Melita, Souris and Wawanesa would be up to the task. The report released Monday by Manitoba Infrastructures hydrologic forecasting and co-ordination branch takes into account soil moisture conditions and river and lake levels at freeze-up plus precipitation amounts since then. The province will release its first comprehensive flood outlook for 2017 at the end of February. larry.kusch@freepress.mb.ca Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Beer aficionados who would rather quaff a cold one later at night rather than first thing in the morning will soon get their chance. The Liquor and Gaming Authority of Manitoba is shifting the time period tasting rooms or taprooms at breweries can be open from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. to 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Liz Stephenson, a spokeswoman for the authority, said the change is being made after the fledgling industry reported few people were coming in during the early hours. TREVOR HAGAN / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS A flight of beer inside the new tap room at Half Pints Brewery. When the licence first came in there was a push for it from a tourism point of view, Stephenson said on Monday. People would go on tour and then have a taste of a brewed product. The hours seemed reasonable. But, since July 2016, they showed us they were turning customers away in the evening. Tasting rooms are different than regular bars and lounges because the beer has to be brewed onsite and the venue can only serve a maximum of 50 people at any time. Currently, there are four licenced taprooms in Winnipeg Torque Brewing, Barn Hammer, Half Pints and Little Brown Jug. Farmery in Neepawa is in the process of applying for a licence while a company which wants to distill liquor in Winnipeg, called K, has also applied for a licence. Stephenson said none of the four taprooms are in residential areas so nobody will be affected by revellers leaving the establishments two hours later. John Heim, Torque Brewery president and a spokesman for the Manitoba Brewing Association, said since his company opened its taproom doors last month they hardly saw anybody coming in the morning. Youd get the odd person coming in right after their night shift, but for the most part from 9 a.m. to noon there was nobody, Heim said. But then a lot of people would come to the taproom at 8 or 8:30 (p.m.) and then youd have to get them out at 9. Heim said the Brewing Association met with the authority last November and he is pleased the change appears to be going through so fast. The licence, which came in along with other liquor act changes in 2014, also sets minimum pricing at $2.25 per 341 ml serving of beer, but the brewery may also offer free samples up to 120 ml. kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. The first clear multi-billion-dollar signal of Premier Brian Pallisters austerity plan will come by Tuesday the day Education Minister Ian Wishart is expected to unveil the public school systems operating grants for 2017-2018. Its a $2.33-billion system, for which the province this year is covering 61.5 per cent of the costs. What Wishart does with funding, or with shifts of provincial spending onto local property taxes, will be the first significant look at where Manitoba is going in Finance Minister Cameron Friesens March budget. BORIS MINKEVICH / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Manitoba Education Minister Ian Wishart scummed by the media Monday afternoon. June 20, 2016. Wishart has given no hint hes identified any potential savings or efficiencies through reducing waste or duplication in the public school system. But neither has he identified any front-line workers the province has vowed to protect, other than classroom teachers. The public school system paid $194 million this past school year to certified teachers who are not at the head of a classroom 8.8 per cent of the entire budget. That information is in the FRAME report (Financial Reporting and Accounting in Manitoba Education). Those teachers work primarily in student support services (guidance counsellors, reading and math clinicians), adult learning centres and community education. The civil service told Wishart at his initial briefing that he should dump the zero guarantee. Thats the $26.1 million the former NDP government spent to ensure school divisions would receive at least the same operating grant as the year before, regardless what happened to their enrolment and assessment base. The Pallister Tories have also been floating trial balloons about income-testing the education property tax credit it costs the province $201.2 million each year to put up to $700 back in the pockets of homeowners paying school property taxes. In a recent interview, Wishart said he wont order school property taxes capped, but, in divisions doing well with property assessment, Wishart said, I would hope theyll be able to hold the line near zero increase in school property taxes. Our message to school boards across the province will be: focus on your mandate and your results, said Wishart. I think their taxpayers and ratepayers will quickly inform them what their mandate is. Wishart has recognized hes hamstrung in holding down spending by a full nine per cent of education funding going to teachers pensions, increasing by $7 million a year. The Tories have not said they will open up existing public sector collective agreements, and have not said they will impose wage freezes on the next round of deals but they have also said everything is on the table in their quest to control public spending. Every teachers bargaining unit in Manitoba has settled contracts through June 30, 2018 teachers got a two per cent raise when school started this year, theyre due two 1.5 per cent raises in the next school year. By the time those deals expire in 18 months, a typical teacher with 10 years experience will receive a salary ranging from a low of $90,874 in Swan Valley to a high in Thompson of $99,435. The total paid to teachers this year over last went up $41 million, when they received a two per cent increase, money which also included increments and new salaries for a larger workforce. That suggests the two 1.5 per cent raises with further increments teachers are due in the 2017-18 school year could exceed $60 million in new spending. While non-teaching employees are paid much less than teachers, some have higher wage increases, and some deals run into 2019 and even 2020. They get two to three per cent a year, some get additional adjustments, one bargaining unit gets 75 cents an hour each year, a few bargaining units get 95 per cent of the outside rate in their trades. During the NDPs time in power, class sizes shrunk 12.1 per cent more teachers got jobs, even as enrolment declined or stagnated in most years. Only a portion of additional hires, in recent years, can be attributed to the NDPs capping kindergarten to Grade 3 class sizes at 20 kids. But even more dramatically, the educator-pupil ratio shrank by 14.9 per cent. There is now one certified teacher in a school for every 13.1 children. Wishart said hes been wading into the complex public schools funding formula and has found it difficult to understand the rationale behind parts of the formula. Some of it goes back a long way, he said. Weve asked for analysis of numbers that our staff tell us the previous government never even asked for. What hes looking to determine, said Wishart, is, Whats fair? Barely $1 in every $7 spent on public schools goes to anything beyond salaries and benefits. There is only so much a school can do to hold down heating and lighting bills, to make school bus routes more efficient, or even to limit how much chalk gets used. Reducing spending on public education inevitably means having fewer people on the payroll. nick.martin@freepress.mb.ca Opinion Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Union Bank Tower has quietly watched over Winnipeg from the bend in Main Street for 113 years. Symbolic of a more optimistic time, its full significance has been lost in our civic memory. If this elegant building stood in one of Canadas more confident cities, it might adorn postcards and tourist brochures. In Winnipeg, a small bronze plaque on its facade timidly boasts, The citys first skyscraper. A deeper investigation, however, reveals it likely deserves to be celebrated with the much loftier title of Canadas first skyscraper. The term skyscraper was coined in the late 1800s as buildings in Chicago and New York used new technologies to race toward the sky. The first innovation that facilitated the highrise era was the invention of the electric elevator by the Otis Company in 1857. This made the idea of taller buildings more practical, but it was the steel-frame structural system that made them possible. Thin exterior walls could be hung from the frame, known as a curtain-wall system, replacing heavy, load-bearing walls supported from the ground. This allowed buildings to be lighter and more flexible, unlocking the barriers to height. The worlds first skyscraper is generally recognized as Chicagos Home Insurance Building, built in 1885. It was the first structure to have all four ingredients of a modern skyscraper: a high-speed elevator, steel skeleton frame, curtain-wall exterior and a height that was well above typical (then considered to be 10 storeys or taller). BRENT BELLAMY / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Winnipegs Union Bank Tower can rightfully claim to be Canadas first skyscraper. It would be reasonable to assume the same four conditions must be present to define what was Canadas first skyscraper. As expected, Montreal and Toronto most commonly claim to have buildings that own this title. Montreals contender is the New York Life Insurance Building, constructed in 1889, still standing today beside Notre-Dame Basilica in Place dArmes. The handsome red sandstone building is eight storeys and 46 metres tall to the top of a clock tower rising above its roof. Even with a low floor count, this height might qualify it as an early skyscraper. Its floors and roof, however, were supported by a cast-iron frame, a precursor to steel used in building construction since the 1700s. Its exterior walls were not hung from this frame, but supported from the ground, requiring a thickness of one metre to hold its own weight. This lack of modern construction technology makes New York Life the last of a previous generation not the first of a new. Toronto, being Toronto, claims two buildings as Canadas first skyscraper. The earliest was the Temple Building, erected in 1896, at 36 metres tall. Demolished in 1970, Temple was the tallest building in Canada and first to reach 10 storeys, but it also used a cast-iron frame, one of the last highrise buildings in Canada to do so. Its hybrid structural system partially supported the exterior walls, but not as curtain wall. At its ground floor, the stone walls were 1.2 metres thick, narrowing to half a metre at its top. The building was an evolution, but it did not possess all four characteristics required to be considered the very first of a new building type. Torontos second challenger is the Traders Bank, a 15-storey, 55-metre, steel-framed, curtain-wall tower with modern elevators. The dominant building in Torontos skyline for a decade, it was undoubtedly a skyscraper. It was, however, built two years after Union Bank Tower in Winnipeg. Designed by prestigious Toronto architects Darling and Pearson, the Union Bank Tower meets every criterion required to take its place at the beginning of the modern skyscraper lineage. At 47.6 metres, it was the tallest building in Canada for two years and the first to go above 10 storeys (it has 11). Its top floor was the second-highest in the British Empire, only one metre below Londons tallest building. It has a steel structural skeleton that fully supports its thin, Lac du Bonnet brick curtain walls. Old construction photos show the exterior brick first being installed at the fifth floor, something that must have been disconcerting for sidewalk pedestrians in 1904. Union Bank was important enough to make the Otis Elevator Company set up shop in Canada, boasting they would use the largest and fastest elevator in the West and one of the finest in all of Canada. It was also the reason the Fuller Construction Company first came to this country. Having built most of the landmark buildings of Chicago and New York, including the just-completed Flatiron Building, they were regarded as the worlds foremost skyscraper builders, known familiarly as Skyscraper Trust. Fuller would bring one more innovation that further solidifies Union Banks place as the first of a new generation. Its construction introduced to Canada the modern concept of a general contractor to hire and supervise trades and oversee construction, quickly spelling the end of architect-led projects, revolutionizing Canadas building industry to this day. There are no set rules to define the title of Canadas first skyscraper. Whoever decides to defend it, owns it. The case for Winnipegs Union Bank Tower is more defensible than any other building in Canada, yet it is often conditionally described as Western Canadas oldest existing skyscraper, or meekly celebrated for once having had the highest flagpole in the British Empire, despite the flag on British Parliament being 40 years older and twice as high. It is time we shed these half-hearted proclamations and elevate Winnipegs Union Bank Tower to its rightful place in our countrys history, with the unconditional title of Canadas first skyscraper. Brent Bellamy is chairman of CentreVentures board and the creative director at Number Ten Architectural Group. Opinion Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Lawyers are paid to put the best possible spin on their clients situation, but sometimes its tough. The optics are terrible, said Robert Tapper, the lawyer representing former mayor Sam Katz and former city chief administrative officer Phil Sheegl, when asked about the $200,000 paid to Sheegl by a construction company that got the bid to build the city police headquarters. Its important to note nothing has been proven in court and those under investigation are entitled to the presumption of innocence. Tapper insists that, despite terrible optics, his clients are not guilty. He portrays investigators as incompetent and inexplicably wonders whether the Mounties see communists in every closet? It remains to be seen whether those arguments will be convincing. In the meantime, here are some key points. City council approved a price tag of $135 million for the new police headquarters. Caspian Construction got the contract. Massive overruns drove the price up to $214 million. Now, theres a new twist. The RCMP allege Caspian paid Sheegl $200,000. Then Sheegl gave Katz $100,000. The RCMP say the payments are linked to the police-headquarters contract. Tapper says Caspian gave Sheegl $200,000 for an unrelated real estate deal. He also says Sheegl cant remember why he gave Katz $100,000. The legal system will work out the details, but on one point, there is consensus: The optics are terrible. Mayor Brian Bowman is now asking for the obvious: a public inquiry. The brightest possible light is needed to illuminate the darkest corners of this scandal. And all of those responsible, criminal or otherwise, must be exposed and held accountable. But even a full public inquiry is not enough. City hall must take action to prevent future scandals. Thus far, it has done virtually nothing. Despite RCMP investigations leading to damning allegations, and despite numerous scathing audits with even more numerous recommendations for concrete change, city hall remains almost completely stalled in a wait-and-see approach to strengthen tattered ethical safeguards. In fact, one of the only recent ethical improvements is the new requirement for the mayor to disclose expenses. Its a practice thats been routine for city councillors for some time. Its standard procedure for many governments. Nevertheless, its a step in the right direction, and the mayor deserves credit for moving on it. But there are other stunningly obvious changes that remain unmade. At the very beginning of the police-headquarters scandal, two whistleblowers came to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation with serious concerns. Both were put in contact with city police. City police interviewed only one of them. Yet, when the RCMP took over the investigation, both were interviewed, and their revelations provided part of the justification for key search warrants. The next time an issue arises with any connection to the Winnipeg police, city hall will be taking a significant risk if it has the city force investigate. This is not necessarily a criticism of the citys women and men in uniform these are no-win situations for them. It should be standard policy to bring in an outside force when questions are connected to the city police. Then theres the question of city decision-makers doing business with companies that are doing business with the city. That kind of thing, at the very least, looks terrible. Yet, the mayor and council have made no significant efforts to prevent such dealings. If anyone at city hall is involved in a future business deal that raises even the slightest odour, they can now expect no forgiveness from taxpayers. The optics are terrible for the current scandal, and the optics of inaction are terrible for the current mayor and council. Todd MacKay is prairie director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. Opinion Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Police officers have a tough job, or so goes the mantra. But ask any former internal affairs officer, and theyll tell you theres an even more challenging job policing the police. Since June 2015, the most serious part of that work in Manitoba investigating alleged criminal misconduct by cops has been the broader responsibility of the Independent Investigations Unit of Manitoba. In some respects that role hasnt been made any easier by staffing decisions made by the former NDP government that created the unit, or by the hiring practices of its founding director, former Crown attorney Zane Tessler. After he was appointed, to his credit, Mr. Tessler reportedly asked the government for more investigators because he was concerned there wouldnt be enough to do the work in such a large geographic area. The NDP took a wait-and-see attitude. PHIL HOSSACK / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS IIU director Zane Tessler But its the composition of the investigative team, rather than the roster count that has since ticked up to 10 , that has turned out to be the more substantive systemic issue. Thats because, arguably, Mr. Tesslers recruiting practices have served to undermine what should be and is one of the agencys pillars: the units credibility. At inception, Mr. Tesslers search for investigators went well beyond Manitobas borders. But, relying on what he believed were the best candidates, he selected only investigators with police backgrounds. In the process, he essentially created another version of what could be perceived as police investigating police. Ontario created Canadas first independent police oversight body in 1990. Over time, its special investigations unit was forced to listen to concerns about the perception of bias that taints an independent policing agency when it chooses to hire only ex-cops. Today, Ontarios Special Investigations Unit reports 75 per cent its 15 lead investigators have never worn a police uniform. Instead, they have been recruited from civilian agencies, such as the Ontario College of Physicians and Surgeons, the Toronto Transit Commission and insurance companies. Meanwhile, Mr. Tessler who had a chance to learn from Ontario not only chose to go with cops only, but one of his initial hires was a former Winnipeg detective. And when the volume of work eventually required another body, he compounded the perception problem by seconding a serving city cop and bringing him aboard. Recently, Mr. Tessler inadvertently said something that serves to further highlight the ill-advised nature of stacking the units investigative pool with all cops particularly police officers who come from local agencies. The remark concerned the units rules that apply to the appearance of independence and, in this instance, being at arms length from police agencies when his investigators travel to northern Manitoba to do their work. We cant use their cars or offices, Mr. Tessler said in reference to the RCMP. No, the provinces unit wouldnt dare be seen working out of a Mountie office in Thompson. But it seems to have no problem using a serving member of the Winnipeg Police Service to work in the units own office. Perhaps its time Mr. Tessler considered his own hiring bias and acknowledge the unit needs a staffing makeover. Two Winona-area people, as well as a man accused of armed robbery in Winona, have been indicted on federal firearms charges related to a September 2016 burglary of a southeast Minnesota gun shop. Trinity James Wicka, 19, of Winona and Sasha Marie Erdner, 29, of Peterson have been charged in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis with conspiracy to possess and distribute stolen firearms, and aiding and abetting possession of stolen firearms. Meanwhile, Alex Boyd, 37, of Chicago has been charged with conspiracy to possess and distribute stolen firearms, aiding and abetting possession of stolen firearms, and aiding and abetting a felon in possession of a firearm. According to court documents, Wicka and two juvenile accomplices forced the front door of the Millville Rod and Gun Shop in the early-morning hours of Sept. 2, 2016. Once inside, surveillance cameras captured the images of three masked individuals, one standing watch while the other two filled bags with guns and ammunition, at one point smashing a glass display case, leaving glass shards and blood behind. Later that day, Winona police responded to a report of an armed robbery and shortly after 10 p.m. stopped a silver SUV and arrested four suspects, including Boyd. Police recovered five handguns, four of which bore serial numbers associated with the Millville burglary, along with a backpack containing shards of glass similar to the shattered glass case. Seventy-six firearms, mostly handguns, were taken from the shop. The night of Sept. 7, Wicka came to a party in Erdners RV. While there, he told Erdner he had 20 to 25 guns in two bags in his vehicle. Later, Wicka left the RV, but soon returned with two bags of guns after getting his vehicle stuck in a ditch. He said he brought the guns to the RV because he was afraid the car in the ditch would draw attention from police. Erdner told investigators she knew the guns were stolen and that she offered to help Wicka sell the guns. Wicka, Erdner and several others face state charges related to the theft and sale of the guns. Boyd and Xzaviar Dominique Rian Aune, 18, of Winona have been charged in Winona County District Court with first degree robbery. By Press Trust of India: From Shirish B Pradhan Kathmandu, Jan 30 (PTI) Senior officials of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) are scheduled to meet in Kathmandu this week for the first time since the summit was postponed last year to discuss various issues. The meet on February 1-2 to attend the Programming Committee will be the first meeting of theSAARCmember states since the postponement of the 19thSAARC that was supposed to take place in Islamabad November last year, a Foreign Ministry official said. advertisement During the meeting,SAARCmember states will discuss a number of issues, including the budget of the SAARC Secretariat and five regional centers of SAARC, according to Foreign Ministry sources. The matter relating to rescheduling the next SAARC summit will also come up during the meeting, to be attended by joint secretaries of the SAARC countries. Nepal, current chair of the SAARC, had decided to postpone theSAARCSummit until further notice after four nations Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh and India requested to postpone the summit in Islamabad scheduled for November 9 and 10 last year, following escalation of tension between India and Pakistan. India and three other countries had blamed Pakistan for not creating a conducive environment and not cooperating on combating cross-border terrorism in South Asia for holding theSAARCSummit, while Pakistan has rejected the charges. The decisions made by the programming committee will be forwarded to the Standing Committee for endorsement. SAARC is a regional body founded in 1985 in South Asia, comprising Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. PTI SBP AMS --- ENDS --- There are no words that can calm the fear and anger that have resulted from the recent executive orders from the new president. These orders are based on fear fear that has been sadly exploited by both corporate political parties and the corporate media. By giving into these fears, we become less human, and miss the chance to learn and evolve. We are so much better than that as a society. Immigrants and refugees have been your friends and neighbors for years and have contributed greatly to our communities. They deserve and need our support. As co-chair of the Green Party of Winona County, I have seen what can happen when even a few concerned citizens raise their voices. Please, contact your U.S. senators Al Franken and Amy Klobuchar in Minnesota, and Tammy Baldwin and Ron Johnson in Wisconsin, and make them listen. Make them resist this dehumanizing slap in the face of our wonderful country. Reach out to those in our community who are living in fear and frustration and embrace them as your neighbors. You are the positive change we need. MILWAUKEE (AP) New data show that the Wisconsin solar industry saw its most active year of development as it was boosted by a major investment in solar by Dairyland Power Cooperative, other utilities and Target Stores Inc., as well as projects around the state. Construction started last year on projects across Wisconsin exceeding 30 megawatts. The new projects will be able to power about 5,000 homes once theyre fully running, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. Thats nearly five times as much development as what occurred in 2015 as businesses, homeowners and utilities responded to decreasing solar prices. Wisconsin solar energy saw its best year ever in 2016, with the projects installed and under construction more than doubling the states total production, said Tyler Huebner, executive director of Renew Wisconsin, a clean energy advocacy group based in Madison. But we cant stop here, because our neighboring states are growing even faster than us. Research group Solar Power Rocks gave Wisconsin a C grade and ranked Wisconsin 20th in the country in an evaluation released this month of how solar-friendly the states are, based on their policies. Dairyland Power Cooperatives multi-site project thats a series of solar fields across western Wisconsin was among the biggest solar projects highlighted at a renewable energy policy summit in Madison on Thursday. Chief executive Barbara Nick, a keynote speaker at the policy summit, said that when Dairyland put out a request for proposals last year for up to 25 megawatts of solar, the response was strong and competitive. Its a real story of Dairyland doing what the communities want, she said. ITProPortal is supported by its audience. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Heres why you can trust us. OAK GROVE The names of the men involved a semi tractor versus car accident on Highway A at Highway W Saturday have been released. According to the Dodge County Sheriffs Office the crash occurred Jan. 28 at 3:24 a.m. in the town of Oak Grove. Preliminary investigation shows that a 24-year-old Horicon man, identified as John W. Petri, was driving a 1996 Toyota sedan east on Highway W and failed to stop at a stop sign at the intersection with Highway A. Daniel Bouchette, 57, Watertown, was driving a 2009 Kenworth semi tractor and pulling an empty fuel tank trailer north on Highway A. Petris vehicle struck the rear wheels of the semi. Petri and his 24-year-old male passenger Jacob J. Steiner both suffered serious but non-life threatening injuries in the crash. Petri was transported to Beaver Dam Community Hospital and Steiner was transported to Oconomowoc Memorial Hospital. Bouchette was uninjured. Dodge County Sheriff Dale Schmidt wrote in a press release that alcohol is believed to be a factor. Highway A was closed for almost four hours while the crash was investigated and the roadway was cleared. Juneau Fire Department and Juneau EMS, Beaver Dam EMS, Wisconsin State Patrol, and the Dodge County Highway Department assisted. The crash remains under investigation by the Dodge County Crash Investigation Team. By Press Trust of India: From Shirish B Pradhan Kathmandu, Jan 30 (PTI) Senior SAARC officials will meet here this week for the first time to discuss a new date for the 19th SAARC summit which was postponed by Pakistan last year after India and four others pulled out of it accusing Islamabad of not cooperating on combating terrorism. advertisement The meet on February 1-2 to attend the Programming Committee will be the first meeting of theSouth Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC)members since the postponement of the 19th summit that was supposed to take place in Islamabad November, a Nepalese Foreign Ministry official said. During the meeting, the member states will discuss a number of issues, including the budget of the SAARC Secretariat and five regional centers of SAARC, according to Foreign Ministry sources. The matter relating to rescheduling the next SAARC summit will also come up during the meeting, to be attended by joint secretaries of the SAARC countries. Nepal, current chair of the SAARC, had postponed the SAARCSummit until further notice after Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India requested to postpone the summit in Islamabad scheduled for November 9 and 10 last year, following escalation of tension between India and Pakistan. India and others had blamed Pakistan for not creating a conducive environment and not cooperating on combating cross-border terrorism in South Asia for holding the SAARC Summit, charges rejected by Pakistan. The decisions made by the programming committee will be forwarded to the Standing Committee for endorsement. SAARC, a regional body founded in 1985 in South Asia, member states include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, the Maldives, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Last week, Pakistan Prime Ministers advisor on foreign policy Sartaj Aziz said his country remains committed to hosting the 19th SAARC Summit at Islamabad at the earliest so that the objectives of regional cooperation under the SAARC umbrella can be pursued more vigorously. PTI SBP AMS ZH AKJ ZH --- ENDS --- Madison lent its voice to those speaking out across the country and around the globe to condemn President Donald Trumps position on immigration. We are not going to give Donald Trump a night or a day of peace until he understands what this nation is about that we are the ones who stand with the Constitution and the American flag, said Madison Mayor Paul Soglin in his opening remarks before a standing-room-only crowd at Know Your Rights: United We Stand, a public forum Sunday at Monona Terrace. The event was planned long before Trumps executive order, issued Friday, banning citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States for 90 days while also suspending all refugee admissions for at least 120 days. National and global reaction was immediate and intense over the weekend and Madisons response was particularly well focused because so much of it came during the forum, which was billed by organizers as a community gathering in support of our neighbors subject to deportation or discrimination. The three-hour event, sponsored by six groups including the city of Madison and the Madison Muslim community, drew 2,500 people throughout the afternoon for its speakers and panels. Organizers planned for 500, but set up more than 900 chairs just in case. They ended up opening a partition to accommodate everyone, said Masood Akhtar, a prominent member of the areas Muslim community who helped put on the forum. It exceeded our expectations, he said. Art Shegonee, a member of the Menominee and Potowatomi Indian tribes, and founder of the Call for Peace Drum and Dance Co., started things off by addressing the crowd. Welcome to my country, he said to huge applause. The American people have never shut out anybody from coming to our lands, Shegonee said. It is said, When the water turns to poison, and you can no longer eat the fish, a new people will emerge. The Rev. Everett Mitchell, a Dane County circuit judge and pastor of Christ the Solid Rock Church in Madison, who moderated the event, delighted in the size of the crowd by having everyone look to their left and then right. This is what makes Dane County and Madison, Wisconsin, a special place, he said. Mitchell congratulated the crowd for coming together to take a stand against xenophobia and hate, and to say, In this community, Madison, Wisconsin, in Dane County, Wisconsin, that we choose to stand to be something different. Soglin, like he did during a press conference Thursday, stressed that the city is not going to be an agent of Immigration and Customs Enforcement when, for instance, police make traffic stops or intervene in disorderly conduct situations. He said thats basically the standard of about 200 cities and counties, including Madison, that now identify as sanctuary communities. Soglin called this one of the most troublesome periods in U.S. history. It will be recognized with slavery and the Civil War. It will be recognized with World War I and the Great Depression. It will be recognized with World War II. It will be recognized with the 1950s, and the red baiting and the witch hunting. It will be recognized with the tragedy of Vietnam, as a period of confusion and disaster. And a time when people of good conscience came together and said, We will not accept this anymore. Fatou Ceesay, 42, who came to Madison from Gambia 16 years ago and runs her own home care agency, attended Sundays event and said she lives in fear of the Trump administration. Our rights as humans, as immigrants and Muslims are being stripped away from us overnight, she said. We feel like this is an attack on us and our families and we feel like we are as productive as any other members of society. Samba Baldeh, a member of the Madison City Council who helped organize the forum, called America a country of immigrants. America cant function in a silo, in isolation from other nations, said Baldeh, who also emigrated from Gambia, two years before Ceesay. America needs to work with other nations to be effective in fighting terrorism, and for its security in general, its economy, and for its standing in the world, he said. What Donald Trump is doing is not the character of this country, he said. This country was not founded on bigotry. Even the founders of this country, despite slavery and all the other evils that happened, they continued to work to make this country better for everybody. Starting Saturday, members of Congress reported hearing from constituents who had friends or relatives detained at airports. Akhtar, another of the forums organizers, said that Sunday morning he began getting emails from people who are U.S. citizens but have children born overseas, and were on their way into OHare airport in Chicago and didnt know what to do. He said he passed on contact information for immigration attorneys and is making himself available to help around the clock. This is a very unfortunate situation we are going through, Akhtar said, particularly the people who have green cards and are permanent residents of this country. A number of people he heard from went to visit family, or were on business trips, not knowing the executive order was going to be issued, said Akhtar, who emigrated to the U.S. from India 32 years ago. Some of these people might be subject to deportation and thats a very sad day for us in the United States, he said. This is not the America that we know. Items are listed under the day of the event only, running as space permits prior to the event. To submit items, call 745-3511, email jcutsforth@capitalnewspapers.com or visit www.portagedailyregister.com. Include name and phone number. TODAY Clinic: 8 a.m. to noon, Columbia County Public Health Walk-In Clinic, Columbia County Division of Health, 2652 Murphy Road, Portage. Use door No. 4. Bring childs immunization record. Visit www.co.columbia.wi.us for more information. Euchre card party: 6:30 p.m. Bethlehem Lutheran Church, W8267 Highway 33 East, Portage. Public welcome. Contact: Cloe, 429-2363. Fundraiser: Portage Family Skatepark Project fundraiser at Papa Murphys Pizza, 2936 New Pinery Road, Portage. Mention the PFSP and 10 percent of your purchase will benefit the PFSP. Portage Sharing Supper: 5 to 6:30 p.m. Bartels Middle School, Portage. Food and conversation. Kids Corner for young people to do a craft and hear a story, as well as informational tables for adults. This months sponsor is Pizza Ranch of Portage. All welcome. Zumba/Zumba Toning: 6 p.m. Harrisville. $5 drop in fee. Contact Tami at 608-346-3971 or 4dreamers@frontier.com. TUESDAY, JAN. 31 Library event: 10 a.m. Preschool Story Time for children ages 3 to 5 (younger siblings welcome), Portage Public Library, 253 W. Edgewater St., Portage. Preschool Story Time is 30 to 40 minutes and focuses on books, songs, movement and other learning opportunities. This week the theme is Mixed-Up Story Time where stories, songs, finger plays and crafts that werent used last fall will be incorporated into this weeks story experience. Registration is recommended to ensure enough supplies and can be done by calling the Childrens Department at 742-4959, ext. 211 or online at www.portagelibrary.us. Zumba Toning: 4:30 p.m. Woodridge Primary School, Portage. $5 drop in fee. Contact Tami at 608-346-3971 or 4dreamers@frontier.com. WEDNESDAY, FEB. 1 Free arthritis seminar: 6 to 7 p.m. Divine Savior Healthcare Wellness Center, 2815 New Pinery Road, Portage. Are you suffering from arthritis joint pain? Our experts will share options for relief. Call 608-745-6289 to register. G.G.s: 1:30 p.m. Civic League Clubhouse, Edgewater St., Portage. Hostess is Joyce Gloeckler and the program is by Virginia Laing. Library event: 10 a.m. Preschool Story Time for children ages 3 to 5 (younger siblings welcome), Portage Public Library, 253 W. Edgewater St., Portage. Preschool Story Time is 30 to 40 minutes and focuses on books, songs, movement and other learning opportunities. This week the theme is Mixed-Up Story Time where stories, songs, finger plays and crafts that werent used last fall will be incorporated into this weeks story experience. Registration is recommended to ensure enough supplies and can be done by calling the Childrens Department at 742-4959, ext. 211 or online at www.portagelibrary.us. Senior meal: 11:30 a.m. Portage Area Senior Citizens Group, Municipal Building, 115 W. Pleasant St., Portage. The meal will be provided by the Columbia County Nutrition Center. If you wish to have a meal, call Lois Williams at 608-697-5800 by noon Tuesday to register. The cost is a cash donation which will be directly put back into the nutrition program. The meeting will start at noon with cards to follow. St. Vincent de Paul free medical clinic: 9 a.m. to noon. Wilz Drugs lower level, 140 E. Cook St., Portage. No appointments needed. Information needed is name, date of birth and a contact number. A chiropractor is available from 10 a.m. to noon Wednesdays. A foot clinic is available every week. The clinic can do exams and prescribe medications. Physical therapist available. Discounted medications are available at Wilz and Walmart. Call Bonny Oestreich, RN, at 608-234-0159 for information. Zumba/Zumba Toning: 5 p.m. Montello. $5 drop in fee. Contact Tami at 608-346-3971 or 4dreamers@frontier.com. Zumba: 5:30 p.m. 1208 Northport Road (the former Freedom Carpeting building). This is a $5 drop-in class. For more information, contact Deb at DJMACK00001@yahoo.com or Rena at 697-6713. THURSDAY, FEB. 2 Library event: Toddler Thursday story time for children ages 18 to 36 months, 9:30 and 10:30 a.m. Portage Public Library, This week toddlers will have fun with Socks in a story, song and counting, and craft. Registration is recommended to ensure enough supplies. For more information, call 742-4959, ext 211. Museum: 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Portage World War II Museum, 119 E. Cook St., Portage. Free tours for veterans every Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The tours take 2 1/2 hours. For information, call 608-697-3690. Ouisconsing School of Collaboration Culture Project Night: 6 to 8 p.m. Lodi Charter School, 103 Pleasant St., Lodi. Students in grades three through five present projects on cultures from around the world. This event is free and open to the public. Portage Family Skate Park public meeting: 5 to 6:30 p.m. Portage Public Library, 253 W. Edgewater St., Portage. All interested people are welcome to attend. Meetings will be held on the first and third Thursdays of each month. Cancellations will be announced on our Facebook page. Call 608-742-4959 for more information. Salvation Army Volunteer Appreciation Dinner: 5:30 p.m. Municipal Building, 115 W. Pleasant St., Portage. All are welcome. Please make a reservation by calling 920-980-7938. FRIDAY, FEB. 3 Art exhibit: Portage Center for the Arts Drury Gallery presents the exhibit The Flowers are Burning by Helen Klebesadel and Mary Kay Neumann, Portage Center for the Arts, 301 E. Cook St., Portage. Opening reception from 4 to 6 p.m. The gallery is open from 1 to 6 p.m. Wednesday through Friday and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday. Call 742-5655 for more information. Blood drive: Lodi Red Cross blood drive, 11:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Faith Lutheran Church, 120 Faith Drive, Lodi. Download the American Red Cross Blood Donor app, visit www.redcrossblood.org or call 800-733-2767 to make an appointment or for more information. All blood types are needed. A blood donor card or drivers license or two other forms of identification are required. Fish fry: 5 to 7:30 p.m. Knights of Columbus fish fry, Knights of Columbus Hall, 918 Silver Lake Drive, Portage. Cocktails at 4 p.m. Public invited. Cost is $10.75. Hope House support group: 1 to 2 p.m. Portage Public Library, 253 W. Edgewater St., Portage. Has domestic violence touched your life in some way? Find connections with supportive individuals who have similar life experiences as you at Hope Houses newest support group. All are welcome. Held on the first and third Friday of the month. For more information, contact Katie Fluger, outreach advocate, at 608-356-9123. Seniors Bowling Social: 1 p.m. Fireball Lanes, 817 E. Wisconsin St., Portage. Cost is $6 and includes three games of bowling and shoe rental. Unique Singles: 5 p.m. Knight of Columbus Hall, Silver Lake Drive, Portage. All single men and women older than age 50 welcome. The group is strictly social with no dues or officers. SATURDAY, FEB. 4 Annual Oyster Stew and Chili Supper: 4 to 8 p.m. Rosedale Presbyterian Church, Highway 33 between Cambria and Pardeeville. Menu includes oyster stew, chili, cheese, crackers, gelatin, cake, rolls and beverage. Cost for adults is $8, children ages 6 to 12 are $4 and children younger than age 6 are free. Library event: 10 to 11 a.m. FamilyFunEvent, Portage Public Library, 253 W. Edgewater St., Portage. This months family event is a Valentine Party for children of all ages and will include some traditional story time elements such as a story and song. Families will then work on projects that include a fabric heart-shaped wreath, heart-shaped bird feeders, pop-up cards, and more. Activities include a giant tic-tac-toe game and word search. To top off the morning participants will make a love potion to enjoy with other refreshments provided by the Friends of the Library. Registration is not required. For more information, call 742-4959, ext. 211. University of Wisconsin Varsity Band Concert: 2 p.m. Portage High School, 301 E. Collins St., Portage. Michael Leckrone will be conducting the band in the high school gymnasium. Portage High School Alumni, Hyden Breene, trumpet, and Jaden Briggs, trombone, will perform with the band. They are both in their second year performing with the Varsity Band. Tickets can be purchased in advance at the Portage High School Office or Bartels Middle School Office. Tickets for students and seniors are $5, adult bleacher seats are $10 and floor seating is $15. SUNDAY, FEB. 5 Bingo: 3 to 5 p.m. VFW Hall, 215 W. Collins St., Portage. Doors open at 2:30 p.m. Hard cards are $1 and chips are available. All are welcome. Runs the first and third Sunday of each month. Zumba: 5:30 p.m. Rusch Elementary School, Portage. $5 drop in fee. Contact Tami at 608-346-3971 or 4dreamers@frontier.com. Two days after President Donald Trump signed executive orders promoting the development of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access oil pipelines and shredding environmental protections in a dirty-energy embrace of climate change denial, Irish parliamentarians overwhelmingly endorsed groundbreaking fossil fuel divestment legislation in their country. By a 90 to 53 vote, the Irish Dail backed a move to drop coal, oil and gas investments from the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund. The decision gives Ireland what the climate change group 350.org refers to as the historic opportunity to become the first country in the world to fully divest its sovereign wealth fund, worth over 8 billion, from coal, oil and gas. It also sends a signal to the world that, no matter what Trump and his Republican allies at the national and state levels do, the future will not wait for retrograde Republican politicians to accept science. With a climate skeptic recently inaugurated into the White House, this move by elected representatives in Ireland will send out a powerful message, said Eamonn Meehan of the Irish social justice group Trocaire. The Irish political system is now finally acknowledging what the overwhelming majority of people already know: that to have a fighting chance to combat catastrophic climate change we must phase out fossil fuels and stop the growth of the industry that is driving this crisis. Trump and Republican governors like Wisconsins Scott Walker are shaming themselves and their offices by rejecting not just sound policies but sound thinking about climate change. This alternative facts assault on the discourse moves the United States backward at precisely the moment other countries are moving forward. As evidence of the myopic irrationality of the Trump team, the Irish Times newspaper noted the new administrations replacement of serious proposals for addressing climate change with a White House webpage announcement that President Trump is committed to eliminating harmful and unnecessary policies such as (President Obamas) Climate Action Plan. This is Trumpism. But it does not stop in Trumps White House. In Republican-run states across the country, climate change denial is becoming the official order of the day. In Walkers Wisconsin, notes Democratic state Sen. Mark Miller, the Department of Natural Resources recently removed the truth about the human impacts on global warming from their website and replaced it with the language used by climate change deniers. The truth, observes Miller, has become inconvenient for Republican politicians. Their response? Erase reality, inserting instead language that fits their distorted view, a view not supported by science. Alternative facts, if you will. Alternative facts are more commonly known as lies. These politicians are perpetrating fraud on the people of Wisconsin and the entire country, says Miller. By continuing to degrade and deny science, they are subjecting Wisconsins air, water and land to long-term damage while hiding behind the cover of being open for business. Denying reality does not change reality, however. It simply removes our nation and our states from the forward march of progress. I'm curious if the Daily Register is considering a non-renewal of the contract to Tim McCumber since Barack Obama's presidency is over? What will he write about? We won't need him to rattle up the reactionaries with comments like "Obama always sided with the thugs," or "odds are very high that you can't keep your doctor." Truthful on either count? The fact is, Obama had a far higher level of prosecution and deportation of illegals than the previous three presidents. Citizens only lost their doctor from the Affordable Care Act if an employer switched carriers requiring them to do so, and it was a low percentage. Not to mention at least 12 million newly insured cost not withstanding. How, McCumber, will you display your stellar citizenship now with no "over the top arrogant" president as quoted, to obstruct, dishonor, or spread half-truths about? In your cost-saving doctrine, it makes sense to save the Register and subscribers your fee for writing what is no longer needed. Finally, wouldn't you expect a president or anyone for that matter to sometimes vacation where they were born? Say Hawaii for Obama? Whoops, you thought Kenya? Sorry about that, maybe you're still fact checking. Norm Hurd, Portage WITF Music: Vulcans Joe Ulrich Bio Recent Stories Joe has been interested in audio and music since he was a kid. What started as a fascination with his parents vinyl records and cassette tapes turned into a love of both performing and recording. He grew up in Elizabethtown, Pa. and moved to Pittsburgh in 1999 where he majored in Photography at the University of Pittsburgh. In 2004, he attended the Conservatory of Recording Arts & Sciences in Tempe, AZ. He returned to Pittsburgh to work at a recording studio. In 2008, Joe arrived at WITF, where his skills have found a good home as an on-air host, audio engineer and producer of WITF Music. In 2016, Joe earned a National Edward R. Murrow award for Best Use of Sound. Joe Ulrich / WITF Vulcans performing in the WITF studio. From L-R: John Thomas, Aaron Spangler, Nick Lindsay None of the guys that greeted me in the lobby had exceptionally pointy ears or flashed any weird hand signs. So Vulcans band member John Thomas explains the name. I remember before our first big coffeehouse gig that we booked we needed a name. They all laugh at their beginnings and the idea of a coffeehouse gig being big. More importantly we needed a facebook event, says bandmate Aaron Spangler. And in order to make a Facebook event we needed to have something other than Nick, John and Aaron Play Music for Two Hours. John continues, So we were sitting on Aarons roof and Aaron threw out, How about The Vulcans? because Aarons a big Star Trek fan and we were like, Sure. Sounds good.' John and Aaron along with Nick Lindsay all sing and play multiple instruments including guitar, banjo, fiddle and harmonica. Vulcans formed in 2011 after the guys returned from college. And since then theyve made two recordings, played a number of festivals including winning the 2013 Philadelphia Songwriters Project contest. And that was kind of a crucial time for the band, because it presented them with some choices. We were playing every week and sometimes more than once a week, Aaron explains. And there was always that cliff that we could jump off of where if we wanted to go on tour, if we wanted to do all these things, and I think in that process we discovered the kind of musicians we wanted to be. We wanted to have the freedom to be able to choose and grow and not be chained to the road. Also we had families starting and serious relationships and things that we didnt necessarily want to sacrifice to be successful musicians. Nick adds, We only had a certain amount of time to dedicate to music. We had to allocate it differently. And this has had the interesting effect of giving the guys in Vulcans more room to breath and be more creative. This next recording project that we have coming up is really kind of liberating in a lot of ways, Aaron says. We stopped thinking about writing music for other people, writing music that will be on the radio. Theres no timeline, theres no deadline, theres no obligation, theres no pressure. This is all about creating music that we want to create. Thats really liberating. Its a refreshing way to approach it after all these years. Vulcans will be applying that new approach to a recording they expect to have ready by spring. Sponsored by By India Today Web Desk: Saif Ali Khan and Amrita Singh's daughter Sara Ali Khan has been in news for quite some time now. The 21-year-old, who has been making news with her style statement these days, is set to make her Bollywood debut soon. And the reports of her big debut has been doing the rounds for a while now. advertisement ALSO READ: Kareena prepping Sara Ali Khan for her Bollywood debut? ALSO READ: Is Amrita Singh unhappy with daughter Sara Ali Khan's debut for THIS reason? Karan Johar's Dharma Productions will launch this star kid in Bollywood. Buzz has it that Sara will share screen space with Hrithik Roshan in a Karan Malhotra film. However, rumour has it that the project has been shelved. Earlier, Sara was to begin shooting for the film in March this year. But if a report in Mumbai Mirror is to be believed, it is not happening any time soon as Hrithik and Karan didn't get the time to sit and discuss the details. A source close to the development was quoted as telling the daily, "The last meeting between Hrithik and Karan happened last November. Talks are still on and the duo plan to meet in a few days. They are hoping to begin work by March." The source added, "However, Sara who was being considered as the lead may not be part of the project." Sara's Bollywood debut has been in news for a while now. From rumours of being cast opposite Ranveer Singh to doing a film with Shahid Kapoor's brother Ishaan Khattar, a lot has been said about her big screen debut. However, with this new twist in the story, we will have to wait a little more to see with which film Sara makes her Bollywood debut. --- ENDS --- Wits pair in US Boeing internship Two Witsies have joined an elite group of international interns at the worlds largest aerospace company. Witsies Mbalenhle Sekautu and Keegan Moore are serving their internship at Boeing, the worlds largest aerospace company and leading manufacturer of commercial jetliners and defence, space and security systems. Sekautu, holds a Masters in strategic marketing while Moore recently completed his Honours degree in industrial engineering. The pair began their six month internship in January and joined an elite group of international students getting comprehensive experience at the companys facilities in the US. The International Business Internship Program (IBIP) provides students with valuable exposure to the latest technological and business advances and thinking in a variety of disciplines relating to business operations, finance, marketing, strategy and the aviation industry. Sekautu says she learnt of the IBIP through her Programme Manager at the Wits Business School and seized the opportunity. With a keen interest to understand consumer behavior, she is excited to be learning from product marketers, analysts and strategists who will give her invaluable experience for her chosen careen path. I am confident that this experience will add to my continued personal growth through acquainting myself with a diverse group of potential lifelong friends and mentors, people I can continue to draw advice and inspiration from as I navigate my way through life beyond this internship. For Moore working at Boeing was his childhood dream. I have wanted to work for Boeing since I was about 11 years old, when I was utterly inspired by the Boeing 777-300 ER. An aspiring entrepreneur, Moore also wants to use the internship as an opportunity to learn about other cultures and business styles around the globe. One of my goals is to start my own company someday, I cannot think of a better place to gain experience about the vast complexities and challenges I may someday face, he says. Boeing Managing Director for Sub-Sahara Africa and Director of Commercial Airplane Sales for Africa, Joao Miguel Santos, wished them well on their internship. The students will be provided with US-based work experience that will prove extremely valuable when they return and invest their new skills to the benefit of South Africa. By Press Trust of India: New Delhi, Jan (PTI) The Supreme Court today asserted that it cannot "run away from its own cause" and refused to budge on the Centres plea that the petitions on judicial reforms, including appointments of judges in the high courts and the apex court, should not be heard on the "judicial side" and be rejected. advertisement A bench headed by Chief Justice J S Khehar said that once a petition has been admitted for hearing by issuing notice, it cannot be wished away without a "formal order" of finality. "It is our cause. How can we run away from our own cause," the bench, also comprising Justice N V Ramana, said when Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi, representing the Centre and a lawyer, who has sought to intervene in the proceedings, submitted that this court should not hear the pleas. The bench also prima facie did not agree with the contention of lawyer Ashwini Kumar Upadhaya, one of the PIL petitioners, that there should be all India judicial services to select judges. "In a federal structure, the high court is the highest court of the state and it is not under the control either of the central government or the Supreme Court," it said. At the outset, Rohatgi said that there should not be parallel proceedings as the executive and the judiciary are dealing with the issue of appointment of judges on the administrative side and the pleas be dismissed. The court rejected the submission. Referring to earlier proceedings, the top law officer said that the Centre has been filing reports as and when it has been asked by the court to inform about the latest status on the appointment and transfer of judges in higher judiciary. "I have been instructed to say that the government will render all assistance," he said while repeatedly submitting that the pleas should not be heard on the judicial side. Rohatgi referred to the NJAC judgement and said that for almost last six months, the Memorandum of Procedure (MoP), which would deal with the appointment procedures of judges, is lying in limbo. The bench got irked when lawyer Mathews J Nedumpara, who has sought to intervene in the hearing of PILs on the issue, sought recusal of the CJI from hearing the case. (More) PTI SJK ABA MNL RKS SC --- ENDS --- Black Diamond Group Limited rents and sells modular space and workforce accommodation solutions. It operates through two segments, Modular Space Solutions and Workforce Solutions. The Modular Space Solutions segment provides modular space rentals to customers in the construction, real estate development, education, manufacturing, health care, financial, government, and defense industries in North America. Its products include office units, lavatories, storage units, large multi-unit office complexes, classroom facilities, banking and health care facilities, custom manufactured modular facilities, and blast resistant structures. This segment also sells new and used space rentals units; and provides delivery, installation, project management, and ancillary products and services. The Workforce Solutions segment provides workforce housing solutions, including rental of accommodations and surface equipment, and provision of turnkey lodging and travel management logistics services in Canada, the United States, and Australia. This segment also provides associated services, such as installation, transportation, dismantlement, and sale of used fleet assets. This segment primarily serves the resource, infrastructure, construction, disaster recovery, and education sectors. company also provides specialized field rentals to oil and gas industries. Black Diamond Group Limited markets its rental assets, custom sales, and ancillary products and services through in-house sales personnel, its website, social media, web campaigns, and its digital marketplace. The company was founded in 2003 and is headquartered in Calgary, Canada. Provident Financial Services, Inc. operates as the bank holding company for Provident Bank that provides various banking products and services to individuals, families, and businesses in the United States. The company's deposit products include savings, checking, interest-bearing checking, money market deposit, and certificate of deposit accounts, as well as IRA products. Its loan portfolio comprises commercial real estate loans that are secured by properties, such as multi-family apartment buildings, office buildings, and retail and industrial properties; commercial business loans; fixed-rate and adjustable-rate mortgage loans collateralized by one- to four-family residential real estate properties; commercial construction loans; and consumer loans consisting of home equity loans, home equity lines of credit, marine loans, personal loans and unsecured lines of credit, and auto and recreational vehicle loans. The company also offers cash management, remote deposit capture, payroll origination, escrow account management, and online and mobile banking services; and business credit cards. In addition, it provides wealth management services comprising investment management, trust and estate administration, financial planning, tax compliance and planning, and private banking. Further, the company sells insurance and investment products, including annuities; operates as a real estate investment trust for acquiring mortgage loans and other real estate related assets; and manages and sells real estate properties acquired through foreclosure. As of December 31, 2021, it operated 96 full-service branch offices in northern and central New Jersey, as well as in Pennsylvania and New York counties. The company was founded in 1839 and is headquartered in Jersey City, New Jersey. Synthetic Biologics, Inc., a clinical-stage company, develops therapeutics to treat diseases in areas of high unmet need. The company's lead product candidates include SYN-004 designed to degrade various commonly used intravenous beta-lactam antibiotics in gastrointestinal (GI) tract for the prevention of microbiome damage, clostridium difficile infection (CDI), overgrowth of pathogenic organisms, the emergence of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), and acute graft-versus-host-disease (aGVHD) in allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplant recipients; and SYN-020, a recombinant oral formulation for the enzyme intestinal alkaline phosphatase to treat both local GI and systemic diseases. It also develops VCN-01 for the treatment of patients with pancreatic cancer, head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, colorectal cancer, and retinoblastoma. In addition, the company develops clinical stage products, such as SYN-006 to prevent aGVHD and infection by carbapenem resistant enterococci; SYN-007 for preventing antibiotic associated diarrhea with oral -lactam antibiotics; SYN-005 for the prevention and treatment of pertussis; and VCN-11 to treat cancer. It has collaborations with Intrexon Corporation, The University of Texas at Austin, and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center; and a clinical trial agreement with Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis to conduct a Phase 1b/2a clinical trial of SYN-004. Synthetic Biologics, Inc. is headquartered in Rockville, Maryland. The actress' new Instagram picture is super-hot. By India Today Web Desk: Shakti actress Rubina Dilaik is as talented as she is stunning. And that she has proved time and again. But in case you have forgotten how hot the actress really is, Rubina recently posted a super-sizzling picture of herself on her personal Instagram account. She captioned the picture as "You are the wind beneath my wings ! Thank you @ashukla09." You are the wind beneath my wings ! Thank you @ashukla09 A photo posted by Rubina Dilaik (@rubinadilaik) on Jan 27, 2017 at 11:44pm PST advertisement The picture was taken by Rubina's actor-boyfriend Abhinav Shukla. Donning a cute pair of chequered bikini, the actress looked hot as hell as she posed for the camera. Also read: TV actress Nia Sharma's new beach avatar will make your jaw drop; see pics However, this is not the first time the actress has posted photographs of her sexy self. Have a look: #highlights 2016 A photo posted by Rubina Dilaik (@rubinadilaik) on Dec 31, 2016 at 1:56am PST Thanks for setting unattainable fitness goals, Rubina. Life changes when we change the "context" of life not the "content " Pic courtesy @ashukla09 ??? Loc courtesy @photuwalas A photo posted by Rubina Dilaik (@rubinadilaik) on Nov 27, 2016 at 9:20pm PST --- ENDS --- Bank of Montreal provides diversified financial services primarily in North America. The company's personal banking products and services include checking and savings accounts, credit cards, mortgages, and financial and investment advice services; and commercial banking products and services comprise business deposit accounts, commercial credit cards, business loans and commercial mortgages, cash management solutions, foreign exchange, specialized banking programs, treasury and payment solutions, and risk management products for small business and commercial banking customers. It also offers investment and wealth advisory services; digital investing services; financial services and solutions; and investment management, and trust and custody services. In addition, the company provides life insurance, accident and sickness insurance, and annuity products; creditor and travel insurance to bank customers; and reinsurance solutions. Further, it offers client's debt and equity capital-raising services, as well as loan origination and syndication, and treasury management; strategic advice on mergers and acquisitions, restructurings, and recapitalizations, as well as valuation and fairness opinions; and trade finance, risk mitigation, and other operating services. Additionally, the company provides research and access to markets for institutional, corporate, and retail clients; trading solutions that include debt, foreign exchange, interest rate, credit, equity, securitization and commodities; new product development and origination services, as well as risk management advice and services to hedge against fluctuations; and funding and liquidity management services to its clients. It operates through approximately 900 bank branches and 3,300 automated banking machines in Canada and the United States. Bank of Montreal was founded in 1817 and is headquartered in Montreal, Canada. Royal Bank of Canada operates as a diversified financial service company worldwide. The company's Personal & Commercial Banking segment offers checking and savings accounts, home equity financing, personal lending, private banking, indirect lending, including auto financing, mutual funds and self-directed brokerage accounts, guaranteed investment certificates, credit cards, and payment products and solutions; and lending, leasing, deposit, investment, foreign exchange, cash management, auto dealer financing, trade products, and services to small and medium-sized commercial businesses. This segment offers financial products and services through branches, automated teller machines, and mobile sales network. Its Wealth Management segment provides a suite of advice-based solutions and strategies to high net worth and ultra-high net worth individuals, and institutional clients. The company's Insurance segment offers life, health, home, auto, travel, wealth, annuities, and reinsurance advice and solutions; and business insurance services to individual, business, and group clients through its advice centers, RBC insurance stores, and mobile advisors; digital, mobile, and social platforms; independent brokers; and travel partners. Its Investor & Treasury Services segment provides asset servicing, custody, payments, and treasury services to financial and other investors; and fund and investment administration, shareholder, private capital, performance measurement and compliance monitoring, distribution, transaction banking, cash and liquidity management, foreign exchange, and global securities finance services. The company's Capital Markets segment offers corporate and investment banking, as well as equity and debt origination, distribution, advisory services, sale, and trading services for corporations, institutional investors, asset managers, private equity firms, and governments. The company was founded in 1864 and is headquartered in Toronto, Canada. The Hanover Insurance Group, Inc., through its subsidiaries, provides various property and casualty insurance products and services in the United States. The company operates through three segments: Commercial Lines, Personal Lines, and Other. The Commercial Lines segment offers commercial multiple peril, commercial automobile, and workers' compensation insurance products, as well as management and professional liability, marine, specialty industrial and commercial property, monoline general liability, surety, umbrella, fidelity, crime, and other commercial coverages. The Personal Lines segment provides personal automobile and homeowner's coverages, as well as other personal coverages, such as personal umbrella, inland marine, fire, personal watercraft, personal cyber, and other miscellaneous coverages. The Other segment markets investment management services to institutions, pension funds, and other organizations. The Hanover Insurance Group, Inc. markets its products and services through independent agents and brokers. The company was formerly known as Allmerica Financial Corp. and changed its name to The Hanover Insurance Group, Inc. in December 2005. The Hanover Insurance Group, Inc. was founded in 1852 and is headquartered in Worcester, Massachusetts. Sushmita Sen returned to the Miss Universe pageant this year, only, as a beautiful judge. Sushmita Sen was her graceful self at the Miss Universe 2016 red carpet. Picture courtesy: Instagram/elmundodelabelleza_oficial By India Today Web Desk: It's not difficult to fall in love with Sushmita Sen. Just one look at her, and you're helplessly hooked. The Bong beauty did India proud at the world stage of Miss Universe in 1994. Yes, it's been almost 23 years; we can't believe it either. And it was right there, in the Philippines, where she first wore the Miss Universe crown, so this was a homecoming of sorts for her. Sushmita Sen's homecoming was a beautiful affair. Photos: Reuters advertisement This year, for Miss World 2016, the actress, model and doting mother of two beautiful daughters joined the judges panel, and needless to say, floored everyone present! Picture courtesy: Instagram/movifiedbollywood For her red-carpet appearance before the main event, Sush chose this black floor-length gown with a mid-thigh slit, and paired it with a sheer black shrug. Though Miss Sen can pull off just about anything, this black number made our hearts flutter a tiny bit more than the contestants' gowns. Picture courtesy: Instagram/sushmitasenweb Before the D-Day (January 30), Sushmita walked the Miss World stage one last time, and evidently got a little nostalgic (for good reason). She took to social media to share the special moment with her fans: For the main event, Sushmita wore a dazzling gold-on-white outfit, making it genuinely difficult for us to take our eyes off of her. @sushmitasen #sushmitasen, the first #missuniverse I ever worked with doing hair at #MissUSA in #southpadreisland, texas! Amazing opportunity! A photo posted by @lalbertluiz on Jan 29, 2017 at 8:03pm PST --- ENDS --- Avik Saha, National Convener of Jai Kisan Andolan, said that they will hold a historic Farmers' Parliament (Kisan Sansad) on February 1 at Jantar Mantar. By Indo-Asian News Service: The Jai Kisan Andolan of the Swaraj Abhiyan and a few other farmers' organisations on Sunday decided to hold a 'Kisan Sansad' (Farmers' Parliament) here on February 1, parallel to the presentation of the Union Budget. "We are going to hold a historic Farmers' Parliament (Kisan Sansad) on February 1 at Jantar Mantar, parallel to the presentation of the Union Budget, where a budget for farming and farmers will be presented, debated and put to vote," said Avik Saha, National Convener of Jai Kisan Andolan. advertisement Also read: Budget 2017: Tax rates may be slashed, says top Modi minister The delegates will also offer initial comments on the agriculture and farmer related provisions of the Union Budget at this unique event, Saha said. Andolan member and founder member of Swaraj Abhiyan, Yogendra Yadav said: "Deliberations to put an end to the apartheid of the voice of farmers and all other rural primary producers of the country in the debate on the state of our economy and its future will be put in Farmers' Parliament." Also read: What India expects from Arun Jaitley on February 1 in first budget after demonetisation --- ENDS --- The tiger mauled the man to death inside a zoo at the Youngor Wildlife Park in the Ningbo city, 200 kilometers away from China's Shanghai. By India Today Web Desk: A man was mauled to death by a tiger in front of his wife in a horrifying incident in a wildlife park in China. The incident took place at Youngor Wildlife park in the Ningbo city. The a man was dragged into a zoo enclosure by a tiger as his wife, child and onlookers helplessly witnessed the deadly scenario. advertisement The graphic video shows the tiger dragging him, digging his teeth inside the man's neck, killing him. The authorities tried to distract the tiger using water canon and firecrackers but to no avail. After an hour of trial and error, the man was freed from the claws of the deadly tiger. The victim was taken to the hospital but was declared dead. Take a look at the horrifying video: DISCLAIMER: DISTURBING CONTENT. VIEWER'S DISCRETION ADVISED --- ENDS --- China News on Women Sorry, the page you requested was not found. If you're having trouble locating a destination on Womenofchina.cn, try visiting the Womenofchina Home page Spherical tokamak 'to put fusion power in grid' by 2030 30 January 2017 Share Experimental and theoretical research has shown 'spherical' tokamaks to be a "fast route to fusion" compared with more "conventional" tokamak devices such as Joint European Torus (JET), according to David Kingham, chief executive of Tokamak Energy. "By pursuing this route, fusion researchers around the world, including at Tokamak Energy, are developing new materials and technologies to help us get fusion power into the grid by 2030," Kingham told a meeting held last week by the International Energy Agency (IEA) on developing fusion power. Tokamak Energy was invited as "one of the three most promising fusion concepts", along with General Fusion and Tri-Alpha Energy. The UK's Tokamak Energy grew out of Culham Laboratory, home to JET - the world's most powerful tokamak - and the world's leading centre for magnetic fusion energy research. Tokamak Energy's technology revolves around high temperature superconducting (HTS) magnets, which allow for relatively low-power and small-size devices, but high performance and potentially widespread commercial deployment. The world's first tokamak with exclusively HTS magnets - the ST25 HTS, Tokamak Energy's second reactor - demonstrated 29 hours continuous plasma during the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition in London in 2015 - a world record. "The plasma is where the fusion reaction takes place, and its stability is crucial," Kingham said. The next reactor in construction - the ST40 - would produce plasma temperatures of 15 million degrees Celsius - hotter than the centre of the Sun - this year. The ST40 is currently being built at Tokamak Energy's facility at Milton Park in Oxfordshire. "The ST40 is designed to achieve 100 million degrees C and get within a factor of ten of energy break-even conditions. To get even closer to break-even point, the plasma density, temperature and confinement time then need to be fine-tuned," Kingham said. "The next step is to build a reactor that takes this knowledge and uses it to demonstrate first electricity from fusion by 2025. This will then form the basis of a power plant module that will deliver electricity into the grid by 2030," he added. This huge challenge requires, he said, "massive investment, many important collaborations, an excellent supply chain, many dedicated and creative engineers and scientists - and, no doubt, some good luck and good management" in order to succeed. Tokamak Energy has raised private investment of 20 million ($25 million) from Oxford Instruments, L&G Capital, the Institution of Mechanical Engineers and others. It has a "valuable dialogue", Kingham said, with Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory on spherical tokamaks, and with the Plasma Science and Fusion Centre at MIT on HTS magnets. Both institutions are "leading laboratories that share our vision", he said. Elsewhere private ventures can be seen "tackling challenges previously assumed to be the realm of governments" - Virgin Galactic and Space X being two examples, he said. "Even Lord Rees of Ludlow, ex-president of the Royal Society, said in 2015 that the private sector now has greater appetite for risk in scientific projects than Western governments. This is good news for fusion, which over previous decades has become large, political and cumbersome. "Private investment is allowing smaller, agile companies to try different approaches and make new inroads into an old problem. We are treating the pursuit of fusion energy as an engineering challenge and a business, rather than a 'big science' project," he said. Commissioning this Spring In an interview with World Nuclear News (WNN) on 26 January, a day after his meeting with the Paris-based IEA, Kingham said the ST40 is due to be completed and start commissioning this Spring. "This signals a defining moment for Tokamak Energy, as the ST40 will be the most powerful compact spherical tokamak in the world that will aim to produce plasma temperatures hotter than the centre of the sun well before the end of the year," he said. The IEA has a Fusion Power Coordinating Committee (FPCC), which provides a forum to co-ordinate international science and research with regard to fusion - device-specific research (tokamaks and alternate concepts) and cross-cutting research (materials, safety and technologies). The FPCC also oversees eight IEA Technology Collaboration Programs in fusion. "The IEA fosters international collaboration and coordination to help close the existing gaps in physics, technology and regulation and move forward in developing the peaceful use of fusion energy," Kingham said. Its activities in this field cover, among others, plasma physics and fusion power, technologies and material, both for magnetic and inertial fusion. Tokamak Energy is "unique among nimble, privately funded fusion energy ventures", he said, in the way that the majority of them are looking for alternative and quicker routes to fusion energy, in comparison to large publicly funded companies, which often make slow progress but do sometimes produce new scientific breakthroughs. Tokamak Energy is unique amongst privately funded fusion energy ventures, he added, as it is aiming to accelerate the development of fusion energy based on the tokamak. Other "routes to fusion" are being taken by, for example, General Fusion and Tri-Alpha Energy, he noted. General Fusion is taking the approach of Magnetised Target Fusion, with the aid of modern electronics, materials, and advances in plasma physics. Tri-Alpha Energy is utilising proprietary advanced beam-driven field reversed configuration technology to create a superheated plasma environment. Tri Alpha Energy has operated a national lab-scale machine, which in many aspects resembles a future power plant, in which hydrogen and boron would fuse generating helium and energy. The tokamak as a class of device has had "unprecedented global support backed up by scientific consensus", Kingham said. More than 200 tokamaks have been built in laboratories worldwide, he noted, and there has been a 20 billion ($21 billion) international agreement to build Iter, a huge tokamak, in France. The Iter fusion reactor is widely seen as being JET's successor on the route to developing commercial fusion power. Iter is currently scheduled to produce its first plasma in 2025 and start deuterium-tritium operations in 2035. Like JET, Iter will not demonstrate the use of nuclear fusion to produce electricity. That will be the objective of Iter's successor, the Demonstration Fusion Power Reactor, or DEMO, which will aim to demonstrate the continuous output of energy, supplying electricity to the grid. According to EUROfusion, DEMO is expected to follow Iter by 2050. The most recent and largest investment Tokamak Energy has received in a single round to date was announced at the end of last year, when Legal & General Capital, British billionaire David Harding and other private individuals invested over 10 million. This was "a signal of our ambitions within the fusion energy industry and a vindication of our approach", Kingham told WNN. This investment boost brought the total investment Tokamak Energy has received to almost 20 million. Previous rounds of investment came from investors in the engineering and corporate sectors, including Oxford Instruments, the Institution of Mechanical Engineers and Rainbow Seed Fund. Other developers, like General Fusion, Tri-Alpha Energy, Helion Energy and First Light Fusion have had recent investment rounds, he added. Tokamak Energy was originally established in 2009, with the objective of designing and developing compact fusion reactors and small spherical tokamaks for a variety of applications. Its strategy has evolved significantly since 2012, Kingham said, and moved towards prioritising the development of a pilot plant to exceed fusion energy breakeven. The company is primarily focused on compact spherical tokamaks due to their efficiency; these devices can achieve a much higher plasma pressure for a given magnetic field than conventional tokamaks, he added. "Today, we hold the world record for running our tokamak with magnets of high temperature superconductors for 29 hours. The previous record was five hours, indicating the progress being made at Tokamak Energy towards achieving the goal of fusion energy, he told WNN. "We've made progress backed by scientific evidence and acknowledged by globally recognised bodies. For example, we were announced as a Technology Pioneer of the World Economic Forum in August 2015. Papers by Tokamak Energy scientists including Dr Alan Costley, occupy the top three places in the 'most read' charts of the Nuclear Fusion Journal," he added. The "economical size" of a tokamak device is crucial, he said. "Historically, the school of thought has been that as far as the tokamak based approach goes, the bigger the better. However, Tokamak Energy's scientifically backed approach (the use of high temperature superconducting magnets) shrinks the reactor down into a much more compact and therefore economical size, more easily rolled out on a larger scale. "The ST40 will be the most powerful compact spherical tokamak in the world as it will aim to produce the highest temperature and pressure ever reached by a spherical tokamak. The device aims to reach plasma temperatures hotter than the centre of the sun before the end of this year. The ultimate milestone we'd like to achieve is to demonstrate that fusion temperatures of 100 million degrees can be achieved in a dense plasma in a small tokamak," he said. The ST40 has not yet produced a plasma, but forerunner device, the ST25, achieved a maximum plasma temperature of 1 million degrees. The timeline for the ST40 is to achieve "first plasma" in March this year, to be fully commissioned over the next six months, culminating in demonstration of a 15 million degree plasma in September, he said. JET, Iter and DEMO are all conventional, high aspect ratio, tokamaks, Kingham noted. "JET at Culham in the UK is the basis of a centre of fusion expertise in the UK. Locating Tokamak Energy near to Culham is no mistake," he said. "The expertise fostered by JET (and other devices like START and MAST - spherical tokamaks - at Culham) has helped us to get to where we are today. Large government projects like JET and Iter further the understanding of the fusion process so that businesses such as ours can prosper and get closer to the fusion goal." According to the World Nuclear Association, fusion power presents scientific and engineering challenges, one of which is a concern of the possible release of tritium into the environment. Asked about this, Kingham said fusion will initially use tritium and deuterium as fuel, and the tritium will be bred from lithium within the tokamak device. "Great care will be taken to avoid any risk of leakage of tritium," he said. "In the long term we may work out how to use a deuterium-deuterium fusion process that would not require tritium." Asked how things have changed from seeing fusion as science fiction rather than science - in the absence of definite details, such as budgets or working prototypes - Kingham said the answer lies with private ventures. "Fusion projects in government laboratories have become increasingly expensive and slow. For example, Iter is now planning to start full power operations in 2035. However, now there is a new way forward with fusion, based on rapid development of new technologies by private ventures. Being a privately funded commercial entity with the necessary expertise and team, we feel that we can make fusion a reality and have stated a clear timeline to do so, i.e. putting fusion electricity into the grid by 2030," he said. "What is different is our approach - we are aiming to accelerate the development of fusion energy taking the tokamak route. More specifically, we aim to do this through combining two emerging technologies: spherical tokamaks and high-temperature superconductors; and by aiming to keep our devices as small as possible." On the relationship between the fusion and fission industries, Kingham said nuclear fission innovators have also realised the benefits of compact reactors and the benefits of faster technological development and rapid deployment they bring. "Therefore, we do not consider the fission industry as competitors, but instead consider our relationship with them as one that is mutually beneficial, involving the exchange of ideas. There is an interesting overlap of technologies between small modular fission reactors and the equivalent small modular fusion reactors of the type we are developing. "We are creating a way for small, modular fusion energy to become a reliable source of clean energy for the world. Our business model is based on agility and 'open innovation'," he said. "We believe that machines that are able to generate net energy gain for a sustained period need to be built; these machines must be economical to build, run and decommission." Tokamak Energy's schedule is, he said: build a small prototype tokamak to demonstrate the concept; build a tokamak with all magnetics of high temperature superconductor (achieved in 2015); reach fusion temperatures in a compact tokamak (aiming for 100 million degrees in 2018); achieve close to energy breakeven conditions by 2019; produce electricity for the first time by 2025; put fusion electricity into the grid by 2030. Researched and written by World Nuclear News Related topics Viewpoint: What's really killing America's nuclear plants 30 January 2017 Share The premature shutdown of America's nuclear power plants is nothing short of a national catastrophe, writes Jarret Adams. The agreement to close prematurely the Indian Point Energy Center north of New York City felt like a gut punch. The latest in a string of closure announcements, Indian Point hurts so deeply because of its high-profile and proximity to the world's leading financial centre. As many as two-thirds of America's 99 reactors could shut down by 2030. Today we are building four. The only way to change this trajectory in the near term is to convince more Americans that nuclear energy makes sense. But we are not doing enough to earn more supporters and remain too focused on finding technical solutions. Nuclear energy produces - by a wide margin - the largest portion of America's carbon-free power. It is the nation's safest and most reliable source of electricity. The reality is that every time a nuclear plant shuts down the power that replaces it is less reliable, produces more emissions, and costs more. But too few people know this or care. That is what is really driving nuclear energy out of business. The nuclear energy industry has not invested enough in telling people why they should value this important technology. The same thing is happening in other countries with established nuclear fleets. If the US nuclear sector falls apart, others will follow. Led by brilliant, hard-working engineers, the industry would rather find an engineering solution to a challenge than one involving squishy stuff like marketing and public relations. When opponents claim nuclear plants are not safe enough, the industry develops a doohickey to make them even safer, even though nuclear energy is already America's safest source. This, of course, increases their costs. When critics say that nuclear power is too expensive (and most vocal critics belong to organisations pursuing legal and regulatory actions to make it more so), the industry has pursued ambitious initiatives to cut costs. Cutting costs and developing safer new technologies are important, but they are not enough to save the plants at risk. If people care about the climate effects of closing plants, they should consider this: the five nuclear reactors that closed since 2013 annually produced about the same amount of carbon-free power as all US solar power in 2015 combined. Six years after the incident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear facility in Japan and faced with declining public support, the US nuclear sector is cutting spending on public outreach. People inherently prefer subsidized wind and solar because they understand the simple technology and think they somehow seem safer. Without a carbon tax, highly unlikely at least at the federal level, nuclear energy is generally more expensive than fossil fuels. As business guru Michael Porter noted, businesses must either be the cost leader or differentiate. With natural gas prices at historic lows, nuclear energy must differentiate itself. How do other industries convince customers to pay more for a product that is more reliable, safer and environmentally friendly? They invest in more marketing, advertising, and public relations. As we are witnessing in real time, treating nuclear-generated electricity as a commodity is a recipe for failure. Nuclear energy is a premium product and must be sold as such. The professionals tasked with marketing and communication have performed heroically. But they need more resources if we are going to turn the tide. Each nuclear plant that closes prematurely results in the loss of hundreds of high-paying jobs and hurts the local tax base. Each nuclear plant that shuts down early makes our electricity less clean, less reliable and more expensive. Each nuclear plant whose light goes out before its time should be a rallying cry for the diligent and dedicated people who build, operate and supply them. Jarret Adams Comments: Send them to editor@world-nuclear.org Jarret Adams is founder and CEO of Full On Communications, a public affairs and strategic communications consultancy focused on the nuclear energy sector. Related topics It was this question that all three of them had to answer one by one, which won the top three constants their titles. By India Today Web Desk: So, Miss Colombia, Miss France and Miss Haiti were the top 3 contestants of Miss Universe 2016, and all three of them were made to answer the same question, posed by the host of the night, Steve Harvey. While one constant was asked the question, the other two stood on the side with noise-cancellation headphones on. advertisement Here's the question that changed their life, and their subsequent answers: Name something from the course of your life that you failed at, and tell us what you learned from that experience... Picture courtesy: Instagram/bossladydl Miss Colombia, Andrea Tovar--Second Runner-Up "I think many times, one makes mistakes for many things; during moments when you may not accept someone due to their differences, to not accept them due to their sexual preferences, and to not be capable of accepting their error--I think any of those experiences gives you the opportunity to have strength and value and principles." Picture courtesy: Instagram/tramoyauniversal Miss France, Iris Mittenaere--Miss Universe 2016 "I've failed several times in my life. I thought I failed the first time I went out on a casting because my name wasn't on the list, and the very next day I found that I was in a new book. So, I think that when you fail, you have to be elevated, and you have to try again and keep going. If tonight, I'm not one of the winners, I would still have had the great honour of being one of the three finalists. So, I think that I have failed before, but for me this is a great first opportunity." Picture courtesy: Instagram/grandslamrd Miss Haiti, Raquel Pelissier--First Runner-Up "About seven years ago, I survived the earthquake. I felt I was filing myself because I wasn't living my dreams; I was living day by day, and that earthquake, it was a bad event, but I chose to be a very positive person and learn a great lesson from it because if I am here today, it's because I am living my dreams." --- ENDS --- Four school children were rushed to a hospital after getting into contact with cocaine while believing the drug was candy, according to police in the United Kingdom. Dorset police said that on Tuesday, they have received a call from the school, saying that a child was in possession of a suspicious white powder that looked like cocaine. Police officer who arrived at the Broadstone Middle School, learned that 4 children, who are about 9 years old, touched the cocaine after mistaking it for sherbert. The children took the cocaine from the classmate. The children were taken to the Poole General Hospital, where they were examined and released. The 32-year-old father of the child who brought the cocaine to school, was arrested on a charge of drug possession. Principal Dawn Wilks said that no action was taken against the students. A monk desecrated his own temple by holding drug parties for teens, according to police in Thailand. Si Saket police said that they have arrested 37-year-old Phra Prakong Punyavaro, after being accused of plying teens with meth. Punyavaro has been charged with one count of possession of category one narcotics. He has also been removed from the temple and is no longer a monk. According to the criminal complaint, police launched an investigation after neighbors of the temple complained to officials about teens holding wild parties. Neighbors also reported that Punyavaro was plying the teens with meth during the wild parties. Police raided Punyavaroas home, where they found meth and drug paraphernalia. During questioning, Punyavaro admitted to police that he provided pills containing meth and caffeine to teens at his temple. The 154 pounds of drugs By: Mason White WorldWideWeirdNews.com Police in Georgia, said that a criminal walked straight into their trap when he asked for directions to a drug house. The Chattahoochee Hills Police Department said that on Monday around 8:00 p.m., officers executed a search warrant at 6915 Campbellton Redwine Road. During their search, they found 17 bags, which contained about 50 pounds of marijuana. Three suspects were arrested and taken into custody for questioning. Three days later, on Thursday, a driver of a flatbed utility trailer flagged down a Chattahoochee Hills city public safety vehicle operated by Fire Chief Greg Brett. He asked Brett for directions to the same house that was raided earlier in the week. Chief Brett, who knew about the drug bust, immediately notified Police Chief Stoney Mathis. Chief Mathis and other officers quickly responded to the scene and initiated a traffic stop. The driver consented to a search of the vehicle. Chief Mathis requested assistance from the Fulton County Sheriffas Office K-9 unit. The K-9 led police to the axle of the utility trailer. Police found 154 pounds of cocaine and it was confiscated. The driver of the vehicle was questioned and released while police conduct their investigation. The pointer to a stormy Budget Session lies in the stand taken by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress that it will boycott the first two days of the session to protest against the way demonetisation was implemented. By Kumar Shakti Shekhar: The Winter session of Parliament was washed out in the din of the Opposition's protest against the Narendra Modi government's demonetisation initiative. The Budget Session is commencing from Tuesday. For the first time, the Budget would be presented on February 1, as against February 28 in the previous years. ANTI-DEMONETISATION PROTESTS RETURN The Winter Session is unlikely to be a smooth one. In fact, it may go the Winter session way. advertisement The pointer to a stormy Budget Session lies in the stand taken by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress (TMC). The regional party on Monday declared that it will boycott the first two days of Parliament's Budget Session. The reason offered by TMC for skipping the first two days of Parliament's Budget Session is to protest the manner in which demonetisation was implemented by the Narendra Modi government. Also read | Mamata vs Modi: Prez Pranab reminds of federalism as Arun Jaitley skips Bengal business meet TMC also decided to boycott the two all party meetings on the Budget Session in the national capital. While one was convened by Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar, the other has been called by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan. A statement issued by Trinamool Congress Parliamentary Party on Monday said its MPs will not be present in Parliament on the first two days of the Budget Session in protest against demonetisation. It grudges that demonetisation was implemented without taking Parliament into confidence and restrictions on withdrawal limits from bank accounts are still in force. TMC'S PROTEST AGAINST ARREST OF ITS LEADERS In an indication of the stormy Budget Session, TMC said besides demonetisation and other matters, it will also raise the arrest of its Lok Sabha leader Sudip Bandyopadhyay and another MP Kunal Ghosh. The party called the arrests "a clear case of political vendetta by the ruling party at the Centre by misusing CBI and abusing its power". OBJECTIONS TO BUDGET PRESENTATION DATE Besides demonetisation and other issues, the opposition parties have objected to the date of budget presentation itself. They had preferred the Budget Session to be deferred and convened after the February-March assembly elections in five states. They argued that the budget would influence the voters in these five states. The matter even reached the Supreme Court which gave a nod to the Narendra Modi government to go ahead with the Budget presentation on February 1. The Centre has made two crucial departures from the colonial era. Budget would not be presented on February 28 and a separate full-fledged Railway Budget, which used to be presented on February 26 earlier, would now be a part of the main Budget. However, like before, the Budget Session has been split in two parts. The first part would be held from January 31 to February 9. It will again meet on March 9, just a day after voting for the Assembly elections would get completed, to end on April 12. Senior Congress leader and Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad said on Monday that this session is of just nine days. "The (Narendra Modi) government should have called the all-party meet before the next full session", he said. CPM leader and Rajya Sabha MP Sitaram Yechury too objected to the Budget presentation date. He said, "The Centre is dislocating the manner in which Budget Session is being called. Also it is not scientific to present the Budget on February 1? We told the government that it would have been better to have the Budget postponed like it was done in 2012. But it is their prerogative." The ruling BJP-led NDA government is apprehending disruption of Parliament in the ensuing session. In the all-party meeting held on Monday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi told the leaders of the political parties that Parliament must function. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar quoted the Opposition as saying that they too want Parliament to function. But the question is: Will the Opposition walk the talk? advertisement Also read | Modi must go, let Advani, Jaitley or Rajnath head government, says Mamata advertisement WATCH VIDEO --- ENDS --- Car Fire at Island Green Roundabout This article is old - Published: Monday, Jan 30th, 2017 Fire crews have this afternoon tackled a car fire near Island Green. North Wales Fire and Rescue Service were called to the fire at the Island Green roundabout at 2:40pm. A spokesperson for North Wales Fire and Rescue Service said an elderly occupant in the car was assisted away from the vehicle by a passer by. The fire has since been extinguished. There are delays around the Island Green area at present with several motorists getting in touch to say the entrance to the car park is blocked. There is no indication just yet on what caused the fire. A spokesman for Welsh Ambulance Service said: We were called at about 2.45pm by our fire service colleagues to reports of a car on fire at Island Green Shopping Centre in Wrexham. A paramedic in a rapid response vehicle is currently at the scene. *Picture sent to Wrexham.com by Sian Criticism Over Welsh Government Communications Amidst Calls To Halt Bypass Roadworks This article is old - Published: Monday, Jan 30th, 2017 A leading councillor has warned of the significant impact proposed works on the A483 could have on traffic across Wrexham if they take place. As motorists and readers of Wrexham.com will already know, roadworks between Junctions 4 and 5 (Ruthin Road and Mold Road interchange) on the A483 started last week, resulting in long delays at both rush hour and throughout the day. Further resurfacing works are to be undertaken between junctions 5 and 6 (Mold Road and Gresford Roundabout), scheduled to commence from Monday 6 February which will take approximately eight weeks. The works, which are being undertaken by North and Mid Wales Trunk Road Agency, will require 24 hour lane restrictions. But Cllr David A Bithell, Lead Member for Environment and Transport for Wrexham Council, has called on Ken Skates AM, Welsh Government Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Infrastructure, to call a halt for the works to allow more time for planning and the impact of the works to be communicated to members of the public and to businesses. Speaking last Friday, Cllr Bithell said: Earlier this week, we were contacted by officers from the Trunk Road Agency regarding proposals for major resurfacing works on the A483, which are due to start on February 6 and expected to last for at least eight weeks. It was only on January 25 that we were given proposals for the scheme, and how the works were to be delivered but have received no plans detailing traffic management arrangements, which could include a contraflow system and slip-road closures. I have significant concerns about the level of impact these works will have on Wrexham and the surrounding area there is a great risk that they could effectively bring Wrexham to a standstill, with a major detrimental impact on business and service providers. I really cant stress how concerned I am with the potential impact of these works, and the manner in which NWMTRA has gone about planning and communication in advance. There is a real lack of consideration and appreciation of the impact this will have on Wrexham, its residents and businesses. I have written to Mr Skates as a matter of urgency, asking him to reconsider the works and prevent the likely chaos which would be caused by their taking place. For the record communication from Welsh Government / North and Mid Wales Trunk Road Agency to Wrexham.com has been zero on the recent works, however the usual small print notices to communicate buried in less and less read local papers is the legal requirement for telling people what is going on have been complied with. Back in 2014 we did an FOI that showed nearly half a million pounds was spent with NWN (Leader) by Wrexham Council on such statutory notices, but have not yet got the full details on the overall spend by other entities such as Welsh Government. On this set of roadworks we asked Wrexham Council if they knew after a notice was placed as their release said they had the plans on the 25th, and the notice was placed a few days before on the 18th. Cllr Bithell responded: We were aware of the notice, but there was certainly not enough detail for us to be able to mitigate and adequately plan for the measures, as the Highway Authority. The box tick nature of statutory notices rather than their genuine informative value is well documented around the UK, with our favourite being a licensing change being advertised one day, we then ran a story a few days later on the of-interest change, then the very paper that was paid for the statutory notice then viewed our take and did their own version. We will add this one to the collection! By Press Trust of India: From Lalit K Jha Washington, Jan 30 (PTI) Facing flak over his immigration and refugee policy, US President Donald Trump today defended his decision and questioned the integrity of the opposition Democratic party and the media for creating "all the outrage". "Where was all the outrage from Democrats and the opposition party (the media) when our jobs were fleeing our country?" Trump said in a tweet as he lashed out at both the media, whom he has now started describing as an opposition party and the Democratic party. advertisement Trump said only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. "Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of (Democratic) Senator (Charles) Schumer," he said. The Homeland Security Secretary Gen (rtd) John Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. "MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!" Trump tweeted. "There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world!? Trump said in another tweet to his 22.9 million followers. "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the bad would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad dudes out there!" said the US President. PTI LKJ NSA --- ENDS --- The release early last week of thousands of files related to New Zealand by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) further demolishes the myth of the now-deceased Labour Party Prime Minister David Lange (in office from 1984 to 1989) as a crusader against nuclear weapons. The database was put online after legal action by the US-based MuckRock group, set up to help people file Freedom of Information Act requests. Among 13 million pages of records are almost 4,000 CIA documents referencing New Zealand, dating from 1948. Outgoing US Ambassador to New Zealand Mark Gilbert told the New Zealand Herald the documents came from note-taking in diplomatic meetings and that the US does not spy on New Zealand. Such claims are manifestly false. There is material in the CIA documents, which are heavily redacted, that could only have been collected by clandestine means. This includes a 12-page report from 1949 on the Stalinist Communist Party of NZ, discussing the extent of its influence within the Labour Party and trade unions. The Herald noted that coding on some of the sensitive documents indicates that their circulation was limited to high levels of the US government. Many documents deal with the Lange government, which barred US warships from entering New Zealand. Washington was concerned about widespread opposition to nuclear weapons testing and the potential for Moscow to take advantage to increase its influence in the Pacific, which the US has always regarded as its back yard. Under the Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament and Arms Control Act, passed by the Labour government in 1987, the countrys territorial sea, land and airspace became nuclear-free zones. After the law was passed, Washington suspended the tripartite ANZUS defence treaty, which included Australia. While NZ-US defence ties have been fully restored and strengthened, particularly since 2001, the anti-nuclear policy has remained in place and is frequently trumpeted as the basis of the countrys independent foreign policy. In a July 2016 speech, Labour leader Andrew Little praised it as a core part of New Zealands international identity, now supported by all sides of the political divide. The CIA documents show that Labours pacifist posturing was always a cynical charade. The party represents the interests of the New Zealand ruling class that, since World War II, has maintained a close alliance with the US in order to advance its own neo-colonial interests in the South Pacific. According to the Herald, Langes newly-elected government in 1984 immediately tried to find a loophole in the policy to allow continued visits by US warships and save the NZ and US relationship. Lange told US officials he believed nuclear propulsion was safe, leading the CIA to conclude that Lange had backed himself into a corner by campaigning on the anti-nuclear issue. The proposed visit by the USS Buchanan in 1985 was eventually denied on the basis that Washington refused to confirm or deny if it was nuclear armed. A CIA report from 1985 stated that Labour MP Mike Moore, briefly prime minister in 1990 and later New Zealand ambassador to Washington (201015), told US embassy officials in 1984 the United States should finesse the nuclear power issue by asking to send a conventionally powered ship. Moore said it should tell David [Lange] privately that no nuclear weapons would be on board the ship requesting access. Gerald Hensley, then head of the prime ministers department, told the Herald Lange had secretly worked on a similar plan with the US Embassy. Chief of Defence Ewan Jamieson was to be sent to Hawaii to choose a ship obviously unable to carry nuclear weapons or sail under nuclear propulsion. The USS Buchanan was the vessel NZ selected to break the deadlock. News of the proposal leaked while Lange was overseas. Acting Prime Minister Geoffrey Palmer refused the USS Buchanan entry after Labour MP Jim Anderton said he would publicly protest the visit. A CIA report suggested Anderton would have had majority support in Labours parliamentary caucus. Another former cabinet minister, Richard Prebble, said shortly after this came the invitation to debate the issue at the Oxford Union and Langes evolution into a nuclear-free warrior. Lange went to Oxford and argued before an international television audience that nuclear weapons are morally indefensible. According to Prebble, the public reaction to little New Zealand standing up to America was euphoric. Behind the scenes, however, Labour worked assiduously to maintain ties with Washington. This included granting certain exemptions to the anti-nuclear legislation for visiting US military aircraft. More significantly, Labour vastly expanded the spy agencies, and in 1987 sought to appease the US by constructing the Waihopai spy base and boosting New Zealands contribution to the US-led Five Eyes spy alliance. The Labour governments of the 1970s and 1980s were not concerned about peacemaking. Their opposition to nuclear weapons tests in the Pacific was bound up with the determination of both Australia and New Zealand to continue to hold sway over the region, particularly in opposition to France, which was conducting nuclear tests in the South Pacific. The anti-nuclear posturing served a fundamental purpose for the New Zealand ruling class. It provided a left wing veneer for Labour as it launched far-reaching pro-market reforms, imposing the same policies as Thatcher in Britain and Reagan in the US on behalf of big business and the financial elite, with devastating consequences for the working class. Hensley told the Herald there was a rumoured trade-off between the different factions of the Labour caucus: there would be no opposition to the right-wing economic agenda so long as Lange made New Zealand nuclear-free. Regardless of whether there was such a deal, as the anti-nuclear policy gained wider support, especially among the middle class, Labour proceeded to deregulate the financial sector, privatise government-owned corporations, slash taxes for the rich and introduce the regressive Goods and Services Tax. The result was soaring social inequality. Tens of thousands of workers abandoned the Labour Party in disgust. In 1989 Anderton quit the Labour Party to set up NewLabour as a vehicle to contain the deepening hostility. NewLabour subsequently joined with three other capitalist parties to form the Alliance. In 2001 the Alliance, with Anderton as deputy prime minister in the Helen Clark-led Labour government, voted to send SAS troops to join the US invasion of Afghanistan. After its participation in this brutal and criminal war, the Alliances support collapsed and the party disintegrated. Today, the anti-nuclear policy has effectively been brushed aside. Last November, for the first time in three decades, the National Party government, supported by the Labour and Green parties, welcomed the visit by a US naval destroyer to New Zealand. The protest group Greenpeace also cheered the visit, despite the continued refusal of the US to say whether its vessels are nuclear-armed. The entire political establishment wants a closer alliance with US militarism, precisely at the point where Washingtons encirclement and threats against China have raised the risk of war between nuclear-armed countries. A profit-making beauty college in Sydney went into administration late last year, jeopardising the studies of up to 800 students and leaving 80 teachers and administrative staff out of work. The sudden closure drew further attention to the dubious practices of a host of operators in the private education sector, who have enjoyed a bonanza as a result of the gutting of public education by successive Labor and Liberal-National governments at the state and federal level. The Australasian College Broadway (ACB) was owned and run since 1994 by Maureen Hussein-Mustafa, a self-made millionaire who was listed 29th on Australias BRW Rich List in 2014. In 2011, she received the Medal of the Order of Australia for education and training. She is a financial backer of the Liberal-National Coalition. ACB collapsed just days before new vocational reforms were to come into effect, subjecting private colleges to more stringent funding laws. The college is still embroiled in a fraud investigation from 2014, facing allegations that it placed phantom students on its books in order to receive higher government funding. According to media reports, the college may have been paid tens of thousands of dollars per phantom student. ACB received over $10.4 million in government funding in 2015. Between the beginning of 2009 and early 2015, the college took in more than $50 million in federal funds. Under the VET [Vocational Education and Training] FEE-HELP scheme, introduced by the former federal Labor government of Julia Gillard, students undertaking tertiary studies at private institutions are eligible for loans from the federal government to pay their course fees. Many students accrue tens of thousands of dollars of debt. Private providers receive the fees up front from the government, creating opportunities for easy profits. ACB, which offers courses in hairdressing, make-up and beauty therapy, strongly denied allegations that phantom students were enrolled in uncompleted courses. However, according to Federal Department of Education data cited by the Sydney Morning Herald, only 73 students graduated from the college last year, out of the reported student body of 800. Speaking to the media anonymously, some staff members claimed they were coerced into registering questionable student applications, and that up to 60 percent of those processed in recent years may have been fake. One former tutor told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) she assisted an illiterate student in writing a letter to withdraw from the college, only to see it later torn up and thrown in a bin. Other media reports indicated that college management stonewalled attempts by students to unenroll from courses by refusing to answer phone calls or waiting six months before taking any action. Other students and industrial professionals spoke out about the low quality of the training provided by ACB. A young single mother told the ABC that her $33,000 Diploma of Salon Management and Certificate III in hairdressing left her without the skills required for the industry. When she went for a job, she was told to return to a publicly-funded Technical and Further Education (TAFE) college and start over again. Gloria Lee-Cooke, a hairdresser who received students from ACB over the years, told the ABC in 2015 that she had regularly complained about the training being provided by ACB. Its frightening to think that these students have been misled, I believe, into thinking they can get years of experienceand its just not the case, Lee-Cooke said. Government authorities repeatedly ignored questions over the colleges practices. In 2012, the Australian Skills Quality Authority (ASQA) rejected an application from ACB to renew its registration as a VET provider. This was overturned by the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. ACBs collapse is one of a series, mostly stemming from moves by federal and state governments to belatedly tighten funding regulations because of a growing public outcry, including by students. Last February, at least 5,200 students and 500 employees were left stranded due to the collapse of several colleges owned by Global Intellectual Holdings. The colleges closed after a supposed crackdown by the Victorian Labor government on study now, pay later loans that increasingly targeted the most vulnerable potential students. Before those closures, millions of dollars in government-sponsored loans were reportedly siphoned away into shelf companies owned by two prominent shareholders, who tried unsuccessfully to sell the company. Agents for colleges have reportedly been issued fines by police for their aggressive sales tactics. These include targeting people around federal government Centrelink offices, where the unemployed, indigenous and intellectually disabled, and other disadvantaged people, must go to apply for, or try to retain, welfare payments. Jacob De Battista, a recruiter for Keystone College, which was owned by Global Intellectual Holdings, told the ABC last year: I used to manipulate people from all walks of life a lot of the time I knew they werent capable of completing a diploma. De Battista said he had been desperate to keep his job. A host of smaller colleges have been embroiled in similar scandals and a number have collapsed. The rise and rise of profiteering colleges was facilitated by the Labor governments of Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard as part of the decades-long offensive against public education. The Gillard government introduced a host of pro-business reforms aimed at subordinating universities ever-more directly to the demands of the corporate elite, while forcing them and the public TAFE colleges to compete with private firms that cherry-picked profitable courses. Labor and Liberal-National governments alike, at the state and federal levels, intensified the assault on TAFE and technical colleges. In New South Wales alone, more than 2,000 TAFE teachers have been sacked since 2011, while the number of enrolled students declined by over 80,000 from 2012 to 2016. At the same time, the federal government removed limited regulations on funding for private colleges. As a result, funding under the VET FEE-HELP Scheme soared from $325 million in 2012 to more than $3 billion in 2016, with much of the increase going to private operators. The current federal Liberal-National government has seized upon the resulting crisis to justify introducing a replacement VET Student Loans program that slashes financial support for students. The new program imposes a three-tiered cap on government student loans, with the maximum grant consisting of $15,000. Many courses cost considerably more than the caps. The result is students having to pay, up front, out of their own pockets, amid mounting financial insecurity and joblessness among young people. In a joint operation carried out by federal and state authorities, 26 Afghan refugees were deported on 23 January with officials putting them on a plane in Rhein-Main airport in Frankfurt, Germany and flying them to Kabul. This was the second mass deportation of this kind, following the deportation of 34 Afghan refugees on 14 December. The young men came from Bavaria, Baden-Wurttemberg, Hamburg and Rheinland-Palatinate, where they sought to find refuge from the war in their country. Eighteen of the 26 deported came from Bavaria. Many of those affected were seized from their homes in the dead of night, detained like hardened criminals and flown against their will to Kabul, one of the most dangerous cities in the world. Many of them had been in Germany for several years, had friends and family, and a professional qualification or a job. The daily TAZ reported on 24 January that several of the young men came from Kabul or the western Afghan city of Herat, while others came from the unsafe provinces of Logar, Kunar, Kapisa or Wardak. Among them were many who spoke German and in some cases had worked for years. It further stated, Badam Haidari (31) explained in easy-to-understand German that he had lived for seven years in Wurzburg. For five years and eight months he worked at Burger King, always full-time. He never caused any trouble. No stealing, no war with anyone, no fights Arash Alokosai (21) from Kabul said he lived in Nuremberg for six years. He had an apprenticeship contract to manufacture vehicle bodies, but then the rejection (of his asylum application) occurred. His girlfriend was three months pregnant. Ramin Afshar (19), also from Kabul, said he had attended vocational college in Germany. They got him out of bed on Monday morning and deported him in handcuffs. To avoid protest and resistance, the interior ministries provided no details about the planned deportation and only announced the timetable at the last minute. Nonetheless, 200 people still gathered at the airport to protest the deportations. A group of Afghan refugees from the Frankfurt area organized by the Afghan Refugees Movement and ProAsyl, a refugee support organisation, called the demonstration on short notice. Their banners read, Right to remain for all, Stop deportationsnow! and No deportations to Afghanistan. Roughly a quarter of a million Afghans currently reside in Germany. Of these, around 1,600 are facing potential deportation. More than 10,000 have obtained the status of tolerated. Although their asylum application was rejected, authorities have suspended the deportation for the meantime. They now live in constant fear that they will be thrown out of the country. The mass deportations are based on the repatriation agreement reached by the German government with the regime in Kabul on 2 October, 2016. The dirty deal provides a payment to the Afghan government from Germany, plus additional EU funding for every refugee they take back. Conditions in Afghanistan today are more insecure than ever. In the first half of 2016, there were more than 1,600 recorded deaths and 3,565 injuries to civilians, the worst figures since 2009. At the end of 2016, more than 1.7 million people were internally displaced. Half a million people were forced from their homes last year alone. During the first two weeks of January there have been attacks and kidnappings in Kabul, Kandahar, Helmand and Pamir leading to more than 100 deaths. The latest report by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on Afghanistan makes it clear those being deported will face countless perils and possible death. All of Afghanistan was in the grip of a domestic armed conflict, the report stated, adding that it was impossible to distinguish between safe and unsafe regions due to the constantly shifting security situation. In newspaper interviews, former Afghan minister Amin Farhang, as well as former Afghan Foreign Minister Rangin Dadfar Spantawho both lived in Germany for decadesverified the findings of the refugee agencys report. Even Hans-Peter Bartels (SPD), the parliamentary ombudsman for the armed forces, told Tagespiegel on 27 December, Afghanistan is not a safe country. That is why the international community has decided to make further efforts at stabilisation, both civilian and military, above all by training and advising the Afghan security forces. In fact, the disastrous situation in Afghanistan is due to the nearly 16-year US occupation of the country, which has been backed by Germany. After ruining the country, Germany and the USnow under Donald Trumpare scapegoating immigrants who escaped the war-torn region and suggesting they are somehow associated with terrorism. To whip up public opinion in opposition to the refugees, the government is claiming that only dangerous criminals and threats are being deported. Federal Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere, in a letter to the state interior ministers, wrote that since the attack on a Berlin Christmas market on 19 December, the entire practice of deportation in our country [has been] under review, and repatriation measures had to be enforced more decisively in the future. This is contradicted by information gathered by ProAsyl, which provides an entirely different picture. Among those deported, there were people who had committed crimes, the report acknowledged. But as a whole it remains unclear how large the number is and how serious the offences they are being accused of actually were. ProAsyl obtained information on 23 immigrants, some of whom were deported in December while others had their deportation temporarily stopped. The people are between 21 and 57 years old, had mostly been in Germany between two and five years, sometimes even longer. Some of them were on the way to completing training or already had a job. Many were receiving medical carefor example with psychiatric problems. For most of these 23 people, nothing is known about criminal acts. Although deportations fall under the responsibility of the states, decisions are being taken in the offices of the federal agency for migration and refugees, and implemented by the federal police. The federal government is collaborating closely with the states. State governments currently have no uniform policy. Refugees have been deported from Bavaria, Baden-Wurttemberg, North Rhein-Westphalia, Hesse, Hamburg and Saarland, while other states have yet to deport anyone to Afghanistan. A proposal was made by Schleswig-Holstein for a nationwide stop to deportations. The mass deportations have been facilitated by this months decision by the Green Party in 10 states to support deportations to war zones like Afghanistan. This decision obliges state governments to complete forced repatriations, which are decided solely by the federal governments own assessment of the local security situation. Significantly, the Greens urge the government to better conceal deportations from the public. The federal interior ministry ought to avoid the undignified public presentation of mass deportations, their statement declares. The Greens are thus jointly responsible for the shameful deportations. In Hesse, this includes Green Transport Minister Tarek al Wazir who, together with Volker Bouffier (Christian Democratic Union), leads the CDU-Green state government. The state government could choose to reject the federal governments deportation ordersbut it has not. The state government also has partial ownership of the Rhein-Main airport and oversees everything, including deportations, which go on there. In Thuringia, Brandenburg and Berlin, where it is in government, the Left Party also supports the deportations. In these state, the Left Party claims it is only carrying out case voluntary repatriations. This is a cynical sham. The voluntary nature of the repatriation consists in the fact that refugees voluntarily agree to leave so they will not be forcibly deported at their own expense. The Left Party does not oppose the federal governments deportation laws. In Thuringia, where Bodo Ramelows Left Party leads the state government, they are carrying out a refugee policy just as brutal as other parties. Last year, with 1,762 voluntary repatriations from January to November, Thuringia was second among all German states for deportations. In contrast to this, solidarity in the population is growing. Demonstrations against deportations are increasing and becoming larger. Many workers and young people have displayed a great willingness to help the refugees, many of whom fled imperialist war in 2015 and fled by foot to Germany through a perilous path of persecution and state repression. In a landslide victory, Benoit Hamon won yesterdays second round of the ruling Socialist Partys (PS) primary contest and became the partys presidential candidate. According to initial figures yesterday evening, Hamon, the former education minister under President Francois Hollande, received 59 percent of the vote, eliminating former Prime Minister Manuel Valls, who won only 41 percent. Two million voters cast their ballots, as opposed to the 4 million voters who participated in the primary contest for the right-wing Republicans (LR) in November, in a campaign marked primarily by vast popular disaffection with the PS government. Hamon hailed his victory as the day the left lifted its head once again, declaring the vote to be a sign of a living and vibrant left. He pledged to start, tomorrow, by uniting the left, and stated his intention to propose to [the Green Party presidential candidate] Yannick Jadot and to [former Left Party leader] Jean-Luc Melenchon, in particular, that we create a social, economic and democratic governmental majority. The vote represents nothing of the sort. The result of the primary is a rejection by the electorate of the hated policies of the Hollande administration, represented most clearly in Valls candidacy. His defeat is a further humiliation for the government, and the PS is widely anticipated to face a debacle in the presidential contest in April-May of this year. The party is profoundly discredited after years of austerity and war; President Hollande has approval ratings of around 4 percent. Although posing as a critic of Hollande, Hamon does not in any way represent a shift in the PS right-wing programme, or a reorientation to the left, let alone the working class. Hamon is a resolute advocate of war and a law-and-order policy oriented to the security forces, and has stated his approval for Hollandes programme of extra-judicial killings. In response to the growing danger of a large-scale war between the major powers in the wake of Donald Trumps inauguration in the USA, Hamon has called for an offensive of French imperialism and indicated his sharp hostility towards Russia. Calling for the creation of a universal basic income, Hamon has made certain gestures towards the pseudo-left parties linked to the PS, including his calls for discussions with Melenchon. His proposal for a universal basic income of 600-800 a month is reactionary, however. It would not lift the unemployed out of poverty, and is intended as a substitute for a secure and well-paying job under conditions of mass unemployment and deindustrialisation, which Hamon treats as inevitable. His programme would, however, cost hundreds of billions of euros, an expenditure that Hamons backers inside the bourgeoisie would not tolerate. The reactionary character of his proposal is not lost on the French population, two-thirds of whom are hostile to his universal income scheme. Recent polls show that with Hamon as candidate, the PS will still come in fifth place in the first round of the presidential elections, with 8 percent. This puts him behind the National Fronts (FN) Marine Le Pen, LRs Francois Fillon, PS-linked banker Emmanuel Macron and the former leader of the Left Party, Jean-Luc Melenchon. He would be eliminated after the first round, in a humiliating defeat for the PS. Hamons victory will only exacerbate the crisis of the PS, which has been the major pillar of bourgeois rule in France for half a century. The PS is deeply divided, and large sections of the party have already expressed their opposition to aligning with Hamons positions. Many PS officials have pledged their support for Emmanuel Macron, rather than backing the PS candidate. Speaking to BFMTV two days before the second round, Valls also made clear that he would not back Hamon. While stating that he would remain loyal to the PS if Hamon won, he also declared that he would not defend [Hamons] programme but would move aside during Hamons campaign. Other PS officials have also already stated that they would oppose Hamons campaign. Pro-Valls MPs, including Christophe Caresche, Gilles Savary and Francois Loncle, circulated a letter last week stating that if Hamon won, they would assert their right to withdraw from Hamons campaign, and call for a Macron vote. The calls to oppose Hamon demonstrate the depth of crisis within the PS. With support for the party haemorrhaging towards Macron, its very survival is at stake; it is deeply divided and threatened with a split after the April-May elections, if not before. The turn of large sections of the PS to Macron, whose programme is even more explicitly right-wing than Hamon, underscores the reactionary and pro-capitalist character of European social democracy. Such parties across Europe, including Pasok in Greece and the Socialist Party in Spain, have also seen their vote collapse after decades of supporting the European Unions (EU) austerity diktat. Francois Fillon, the right-wing The Republicans (LR) candidate, also appears increasingly fragile. Although initially expected to win in a second round of the presidential election against neo-fascist FN candidate Marine Le Pen, Fillon was seriously damaged last week by corruption allegations. Last Wednesday, the satirical weekly Le Canard Enchaine published claims that Fillon paid his wife Penelope hundreds of thousands of euros in tax-payers money over eight years for a job as his parliamentary assistant in which she did no identifiable work. Fillon is now in serious legal jeopardy, with French financial authorities announcing an investigation into the issue. Between November, when he became LRs presidential candidate, and last week, his approval ratings have dropped by 16 points, from 54 to 38 percent. The French bourgeoisie now faces a severe crisis, with both its traditional parties of government, LR and the PS, threatened with electoral collapse. The FN is attempting to emerge as the main beneficiary of this collapse. Le Pen is expected to easily make it through to the second round of the presidential contest, according to the polls. The prospect of the collapse of the two major parties of bourgeois rule in France is causing increasing unease within the European ruling class. Already reeling from the Brexit vote and from Trumps denunciations of the EU as a tool of Germany, the crises in the PS and LR are further undermining Europes political order. In a statement to the German parliament last week, recently appointed German Deputy Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel expressed Berlins concern over the consequences of the FNs rise for the EUs future. After Brexit, if enemies of Europe manage again in the Netherlands or in France to get results, he warned, then we face the threat that the largest civilisation project of the 20th century, namely the European Union, could fall apart. The Trump administration has made it clear that it intends to exploit Brexit to use Britain as a political weapon against the EU, and particularly Germany, which it regards as a major economic competitor. France is also emerging as a battleground as Berlin and the Trump administration vie for influence, with the Trump administration rapidly building ties with the FN and Berlin seeking to keep pro-EU forces such as the PS and LR in power. The breakdown of PS is thus a symptom of the deep factional conflicts within the European ruling elite and the growing international tensions and threat of war. Last Thursday, Illinois Attorney General, Democrat Lisa Madigan, filed a request in a southern Illinois court to stop payment to over 110,000 state workers. Madigan is seeking to force the Illinois legislature and Republican Governor Bruce Rauner to adopt a new austerity budget by threatening a de facto government shutdown. Since July 2015, Illinois has operated without a complete budget, relying on a patchwork of court orders and stop-gap budgets instead. This has led to the gutting of higher education and social services in the state. Madigan is attempting to nullify a July 2015 ruling from St. Clair County Circuit Court Judge, Robert LeChien, that declared state workers must be paid their full salaries despite a budget impasse. Arguing against the ruling, Madigan stated it has allowed the legislative and executive branches to fail to fulfill their constitutional duties without facing the real threat of a government shutdownWith no possibility of a government shutdown to force action by the legislative and executive branches, the state has continued to operate without a budget to fund many services provided by vendors and grantees. Madigan requested that the court enforce a deadline for Rauner and the state legislature to reach an agreement by February 28. If an agreement is not reached, Illinois state workers will stop receiving payments, forcing a statewide government shutdown. The request by Madigan came the same day the Illinois senate postponed a vote on a new 13-bill budget proposal, SB 11. Had the Senate voted in its favor, it would have required approval by the state House of Representatives and the governor. Rauner favors the new budget proposal, backed by both Republicans and Democrats, declaring during his state of the state address, Its heartening to see the Senate coming together on a bipartisan basis to acknowledge these changes are needed. The proposed budget deal reopens the attack on state worker pensions following the 2015 Illinois Supreme Court ruling that struck down legislation that reduced so-called cost-of-living adjustments and raised the retirement age for workers with Tier 1 pensions. Because the court found that the Illinois constitutions pension protection clause, that pensions shall not be diminished or impaired was violated, Democratic lawmakers have been casting about for a legal theory that would allow them to make a run around the constitution and the courts ruling. Senate President John Cullerton has favored a theory known as consideration, under which workers would be given the supposed option to trade the way they want their pension benefits. Under the current proposal these workers would be given the following options: 1) Future pay raises will not count in calculating the initial pension amount upon retirement. Instead, they will receive a current 3 percent yearly annuity adjustment, compounded or 2) Future pay raises will count in calculating the workers initial allocated pension amount upon retirement. In exchange, the worker would receive a yearly annuity adjustment that is less than the current compounded adjustment. In both cases, workers are being forced to accept sharp reductions in their pension payouts. Rather than having their pensions calculated based on future pay rates and earning 3 percent cost of living increases, they must accept one or the other, a clear violation of the intent of the pension protection clause. Madigans request is a direct affront to state workers. Workers are at risk of going days without paysending thousands into extreme debt or worseif a budget is not agreed upon before the deadline. Over her career, the daughter of the long-time leader of the state Democratic Party machine has led the assault on Illinois pensions, seeking to attack the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of workers who, having spent their entire lives working, wish to retire with comfort. If a budget is reached before the deadline, it will contain a multitude of attacks on workers salaries, pensions and a dismantling of public and social programs and public education. Since the budget impasse began, higher education across the state has been slashed by budget cuts, with Chicago State University for a time teetering on closing. Social service spending, which includes mental health agencies, received only 65 percent of 2015s social services budget, intended to last 18 months, shuttering mental health agencies across the state and leaving thousands in desperation. There is also no guarantee that a shutdown would force Rauner to negotiate. During his campaign for governor, Rauner told a meeting of the Tazewell County Republican Party, I apologize but we may have to go through a little rough times and we have to do what Ronald Reagan did with the air traffic controllers in a reference to Reagans 1981 firing of the striking PATCO workers. The budget standoff represents a deep rift in the ruling class on how best to impose its attacks on the working class. Sections of the Democrats, masquerading as opponents to Rauner, worry a budget that includes massive cuts to social services and public employees might provoke opposition that the unions could not control. Rauner, Madigan, & Co. have taken the measure of their so-called oppositionthe unions, which have never called a strike and have collaborated in decades of concessionsand are pressing ahead with the dictates of the wealthy bondholders and financial institutions that hold the states debts. AFSCME Council 31, which covers 38,000 state workers, claimed to be caught unawares by Madigans request. Roberta Lynch, the executive director for AFSCME 31, wrote, Governor Rauner created this hostage situation by refusing to enact a fully funded budget unless his unrelated personal demands were enacted first. He should put aside those demands and do his job to work toward a budget without preconditions. Even so, we are shocked and extremely disappointed that the Attorney General would take this action. It is fundamental that everyone who works must be paid on time and in full, but this filing throws that basic commitment into question for state employees. The union worries if a budget is not reached in time and payment to state workers is stopped, it could provoke a social upheaval, leading to a confrontation like Wisconsin in 2011, when hundreds of thousands descended on the state capital of Madison to protest Governor Scott Walkers attack on state employees. That struggle was betrayed by the unions in alliance with the Democrats. A strike authorization vote will begin today and end in mid-February. AFSCME has repeatedly made clear it is willing to make whatever necessary cuts Rauner wants, including wage freezes and increased health insurance costs, but the governor has repeatedly ignored AFSCMEs request to negotiate a new contract. State employees have found themselves in a struggle against all the forces arrayed against them, from Rauner and the Democrats and Republicans to their servants in the union apparatus. The author also recommends: Illinois AFSCME sets strike authorization vote [21 January 2017] Illinois enters 2017 in the midst of an ongoing budget crisis [6 January 2017] Vivek Dahiya recently posted a super-cute selfie of himself with wife Divyanka Tripathi Dahiya. By India Today Web Desk: Indian television's beloved couple Vivek Dahiya and Divyanka Tripathi Dahiya are as happy as can be. After all, they are blessed with everything a person could ask for. Also read: IN PICTURE: Vivek Dahiya sweeps wife Divyanka Tripathi off her feet The lovebirds have taken time off from their hectic schedules to visit Divyanka's home in Bhopal. Vivek shared a rather sweet and cheesy post about the fact. advertisement Have a look: Sajan chale sasural ?????#MummysAndPapas #HereWeCome #BhopalKeDamaadJi A photo posted by Vivek Dahiya (@officialvivekdahiya) on Jan 28, 2017 at 4:35pm PST The talented actor took to social media site Instagram and posted a super-cute selfie of himself with wife Divyanka, and captioned the picture as, "Sajan chale sasural #MummysAndPapas #HereWeCome #BhopalKeDamaadJi." Vivek even called himself Bhopal Ke Damadji (Bhopal's son-in-law). Wow, someone thinks highly of himself. Anyway, have fun, you two! --- ENDS --- Protests against the Trump administrations executive order banning travelers from seven majority-Muslim countries and all refugees spread across the country on Sunday, as the Homeland Security Department and immigration authorities continued to detain men, women and children denied entry to the US on the basis of the illegal executive order issued Friday by the new president. Tens of thousands gathered at airports and city centers following initial demonstrations on Saturday after Trump and his top aides insisted the ban would be enforced despite court orders delaying the deportation of foreign citizens caught up in the anti-immigrant dragnet. Many thousands demonstrated in New York; Los Angeles; Boston; Washington, DC and Houston. Demonstrations also took place in many Midwestern and rustbelt cities such as Cleveland, Wichita, Rochester, Minneapolis, Bloomington, Pittsburgh and Detroit. Immigrants and legal permanent residents (green card holders) from the countries named in Fridays order remain in detention, though the exact number is not known. Immigration officials have continued to block migrants from speaking to their attorneys. They have confiscated their personal belongings and searched their phones and computers. Officials reportedly seized the medication of two 80-year-old migrants and refused to return it to them while they were in captivity, placing their lives in danger. Three federal courts issued stays or restraining orders on the executive order banning immigration from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Sudan. A federal court in Massachusetts ordered the administration to stop deporting and detaining migrants for seven days, while courts in Washington State and New York blocked immediate deportations but not the ongoing detainment of those entering the country. None of the orders permanently halt the deportation program. Trump senior advisor Stephen Miller told the Associated Press that there was nothing in the court orders to in any way impede or prevent the implementation of the presidents executive order, which remains in full, complete, and total effect. Immigration officials at Washington, DCs Dulles Airport reportedly ignored the federal court order and carried through the deportation of migrants. Samer Khalef, president of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), told the World Socialist Web Site: We are receiving phone calls from people whose family members are either stuck in another country or are stuck detained. They are breaking down and crying. It gets very emotional. People are fearful more than anything. Things that were previously not said in polite company are now being said by the government, normalizing the racism of the white supremacy movements. One Iranian student living in the US told the World Socialist Web Site: I feel disoriented and I dont know what the future entails. My 75-year-old grandfather who lives in Tehran has two sons living in the US now, and he has never met his granddaughter. Though he had gotten approved to come visit in March, he has now been declined and I worry we will not be able to ever see him again because if we leave we wont be let back in. In response to the court orders and mass demonstrations, the Trump administration pledged to fully enforce its unconstitutional program. Trump tweeted Sunday: Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the worlda horrible mess! The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued a statement Sunday morning saying, President Trumps Executive Orders remain in placeprohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the US government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety. The DHS director, retired Marine Gen. John Kelly, issued a statement last night saying legal permanent residents could still be barred on a case-by-case basis, but that absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, they would generally be admitted. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus appeared to hedge when he told NBCs Chuck Todd: If youre traveling back and forth [even with a green card], youre going to be subjected to further screening. Priebus also said border agents would have the discretionary authority to question and perhaps detain US citizens. He further declared that the executive order could be expanded to include more than those countries currently impacted. Apologies for nothing here, he said. NBC News reported Sunday that the White House did not confer with the Justice Department, State Department or the Department of Defense, and that administration officials prevented National Security Council attorneys from reviewing the orders before their publication. The New York Times reported that Customs and Border Protection and the United States Citizen and Immigration Services were notified of the order only at the time Trump signed it. Unnamed government officials told CNN that the Department of Homeland Security was briefed on the orders only on Friday night, and that the fascist White House chief strategist, Stephen Bannon, overruled a DHS request that the orders not apply to lawful permanent residents. Bannon insisted that immigration officials could use their discretion to bar green card holders on a case-by-case basis. The Trump administration is also considering issuing a new order that would require all foreign visitors to disclose all websites and social media sites they visit, and to share the contacts in their cell phone, CNN reported. If the foreign visitor declines to share such information, he or she could be denied entry. Immigration attorneys have established volunteer networks to provide legal advice to migrants at many airports across the country. Shani Smith Fisher, an attorney in Los Angeles, spent several hours at the airport yesterday providing support for incoming migrants and told the World Socialist Web Site: There is a strong and enthusiastic presence from attorneys of all backgrounds. There are so many people joining the protest itself, its energized and there is a lot happening. The full extent of these orders has not yet been felt. Under the language of the orders, it is possible that immigrants from the seven named countries may be prevented not only from entering the United States, but from acquiring other immigration benefits under the Immigration and Nationality Act, meaning they may be barred from applying for legal permanent residency or citizenship, even if they have fulfilled all legal requirements. The exact meaning of extreme vetting also remains unclear, but the order notes that migrants will be evaluated based on their ability to make contributions to the national interest, an anti-democratic provision that will be used to bar migrants on the basis of their political views. Though immigrants can already be barred for having left-wing political views under current law, the Trump administration is poised to enforce these reactionary provisos in a manner not seen since the anti-socialist Palmer Raids of the early 1920s. This national interest vetting provision will serve as a further barrier to immigrants from Muslim countries. The racial animus driving Trumps executive orders is exposed by his decision to prioritize immigrant petitions only from Christians. The enactment of Trumps measures lays the basis for police state conditions of rule in the United States. The prospect of mass internment centers for processing hundreds of thousands or millions of immigrants is not a distant possibility, but an imminent threat. The administrations efforts to whip up a climate of anti-immigrant hysteria are a sign that the government is preparing to attack the living standards and democratic rights of the entire working class. The defense of immigrants must be carried out as part of a broader defense of democratic rights. This requires a political perspective for the unification and mobilization of the working class, regardless of nationality, religion or immigrant status, on the basis of a socialist program. Such a fight must begin with a break with the Democratic Party, which established the legal framework Trump is using for his executive orders. The Democrats provided the necessary votes for the passage of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, which was signed by President Bill Clinton, and for the Secure Fence Act of 2006, which was supported by then-senators Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Joseph Biden and Charles Schumer. As president, Obama deported 2.5 million immigrants and placed travel restrictions on immigrants from the seven countries listed in Trumps executive order. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer cited Obamas action as legal authority for the Trump Muslim ban. The Obama administration either bombed, invaded or imposed brutal sanctions against all seven countries listed. At about 5 a.m. on Wednesday morning, January 25, a Magellan Midstream Partners petroleum pipeline ruptured in northern Iowa, about 124 miles north of Des Moines, spewing an estimated 3,300 barrels (about 138,600 gallons) of diesel fuel onto farmland in Worth County, just over the Minnesota state line. Monitoring technicians at Magellan headquarters in Tulsa, Oklahoma noted a fall in pipeline pressure early that morning and shut down the 127-mile-long segment from Mason City to Rosemount, Minnesota. The spill follows by one day the signing of an executive order by President Donald Trump to revive the Dakota Access Pipeline and the Keystone XL Pipeline projects. By Thursday morning, journalists from Des Moines and Mason City observed some 70 persons on the spill site north and northeast of Harlontown, including Magellan representatives, officials from the EPA and the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, and cleanup crews. High winds and about a foot of fresh blowing snow hampered cleanup efforts, while truck crews with their hoses sucked the diesel fuel and snow into tanks for transport to a terminal in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The company also announced plans for excavating the contaminated soil from the 1 1/2 acres of grass and cultivated land to a landfill near Clear Lake, Iowa. No injuries have been reported. News reporters from KTTC Television in Rochester, Minnesota and Mason City reported seeing officials testing water from nearby Willow Creek, a tributary to the Little Sioux River. Magellan had already declared that there was no environmental damage. The Iowa DNRs Jeff Vansteenberg told Wisconsins National Public Radio, Its a big one. Its significant. The product is under pressure, so as soon as a leak develops, it starts coming out pretty fast. According to Wisconsins NPR, Magellan filed a safety plan with the US Department of Transportation in 2014, which reported that the companys pipelines traversed areas in Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota. Magellan moves multiple refined products in its systems, including diesel, gasoline, jet fuel, natural gas, naphtha, propane and butane. The Omaha World-Herald reported that a Magellan pipeline carrying anhydrous ammonia ruptured near Decatur, Nebraska last October, killing one person and causing the evacuation of 23 homes. Last November, Magellan temporarily shut down its pipelines after an earthquake in Cushing, Oklahoma damaged several buildings. The company was also fined $418,000 for a 45,000-gallon gasoline spill in Oklahoma in 2010. The US DOT Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, prior to Trumps inauguration, employed 533 inspectors, or about one inspector for each 5,000 miles of pipeline. Magellan Midstream Partners is a public corporation whose stock is traded on the NYSE. According to Wikipedia, the US State Department reports that the company owns 83 petroleum products terminals, more than 9,000 miles of refined products pipeline, 800 miles of crude oil pipeline and a 1,100-mile ammonia pipeline system. The current spill occurred days after a January 19 US Environmental Protection Agency announcement that Magellan had agreed to spend $16 million on injunction relief, meaning cleanup, and pay a $2 million fine for 3 spills in Texas, Nebraska, and Kansas for violating the Clean Water Act. The EPA declined to talk to The Guardian about the spill, and the Associated Press reported Wednesday that the EPA staff were barred by the Trump administration from talking with journalists. According to multiple sources, Wednesdays northern Iowa diesel pipeline spill is the largest diesel spill in the United States since January 2010. The Magellan line was built in the early 1950s, according to company spokesman Bruce Heine, who claimed that, given good inspections and maintenance, age should not be an issue for ruptures. The cause of the incident is still under company investigation. Heine also announced that the pipeline rupture would not disrupt company petroleum flows in the region. On-site observers also reported that Magellan repair crews were cutting out the ruptured 15-inch-long segment on Thursday and welding in a replacement for the 12-inch diameter pipe. The incident is also said to represent the 6th largest refined petroleum spill reported to the US Department of Transportations Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration in a decade. According to the Austin Daily Herald in Austin, Minnesota, since 2010 there have been 807 petroleum spills in the US, causing $342 million in estimated property damage while releasing about 3 million gallons of gasoline, diesel and other petroleum products into the environment. Magellan has a recorded 218 pipeline spill accidents causing some $48 million in damages since 2006, spilling an estimated 832,000 gallons of petroleum products. In the last 10 years, Magellan has had 40 enforcement cases lodged against it for pipeline violations, and $1.4 million in penalties. According to the federal government, Iowa has had a total of 13 serious pipeline accidents, with one fatality and 16 injuries, between 1996 and 2015. The Des Moines Register noted that Magellan paid a $46,200 fine to the US government for a violation of the Clean Water Act in March, 2010 for a spill at its Milford, Iowa terminal, when the company spilled 5,000 gallons of oil into a nearby creek. In 2001, a Koch Pipeline Company leak of 312,000 pounds of fertilizer near Algona, Iowa killed an estimated 1.3 million fish, turtles, frogs and other aquatic life, according to Des Moines Register archives. On January 26, Eco Watch reported that a pipeline belonging to Tundra Energy Marketing LTD ruptured and spilled some 52,830 gallons of crude oil on the Ocean Man First Nation reserve in Saskatchewan, Canada. Ocean Mans Chief Connie Big Eagle told Global News of Canada and Reuters that a resident had smelled oil for a week, and found the spill January 20, when they informed the Saskatchewan government. According to ProPublica, the 2.5 million miles of US pipelines sustain hundreds of leaks and ruptures a year, costing lives and money, as the system ages. Since 1986, pipeline accidents have killed over 500 people, injured over 24,000 and cost almost $7 billion in property damage. NBC reported January 13 that a proposed North Dakota slate of state legislative bills would, if passed, criminalize pipeline protest movements, including prohibiting the wearing of masks, and exemptions of driver liability for injuring or even killing pedestrians obstructing traffic and roadways. The bills were drafted without a whisper to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, whose reservation sits a half mile from the site of the proposed Dakota Access Pipeline. Dave Archambault II told NBC News, The state claims they want to work closely with the tribe on repairing our relationship with them. Clearly that is not happening when legislation that impacts us is being drafted without consultation, consent or even basic communication. The Dallas, Texas-based company, Energy Transfer Partners, in which President Trump holds tens of thousands of dollars of stock, is the Dakota Access Pipeline builder. North Dakota Republican Sen. John Hoeven, an avid lobbyist for the 1,172-mile pipeline, was named Chairman of the US Senate Committee on Indian Affairs last week. Allison Renville, a pipeline protester and water protector activist, told NBC, This is a scary time for Indian Country. To have such an avid supporter of the oil industry who has consistently stated his support for extractive industry projects on Native lands named to the position as chairman is akin to stepping on our sovereignty. Protests swept across the US this weekend after President Donald Trump issued an executive order targeting immigrants and refugees. Thousands gathered outside of airport terminals in New York City, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C. and other major cities to oppose the measures after reports of individuals, families and even small children being detained en route from the seven majority-Muslim countries named in the executive order. The protests express the growing hostility to the increasingly dictatorial measures of the new administration. Many attending the protests carried handmade signs, indicating the spontaneous character of the demonstrations. On Sunday, several thousand gathered outside of the White House to denounce the Trump administration, calling for the recently inaugurated president to leave office immediately. Hundreds gathered outside of both Dulles and Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airports, both in the Washington DC area, on Saturday and Sunday. Nearly 4,000 marched at Atlanta International Airport on Sunday. At Los Angeles International Airport, protesters on Sunday numbered in the thousands. In Chicago, nearly 1,000 protesters gathered at OHare International Airport. The WSWS spoke to those attending several of the demonstrations. San Diego, California Over one thousand people attended a protest at the San Diego airport on Sunday, many carrying handmade signs. Jackie, a San Diego resident, said, The entire thing [Trump administration] is symptomatic of authoritarianism. In a globalized world, no country can stand to isolate itself in anyway. We have global problems so we need to be working across borders to solve them. WSWS reporters asked what Jackie thought was the root cause of the refugee crisis. She answered that people are often fleeing war-torn countries, adding, Which are a product of our wars and our guns. We need to remember that if any layer of society is not safe than no one is safe On the Democratic Party, Jackie said, It pains me that the criticism of the Obama administration is so true, but it is. He disappointed us on so many issues, militarism, expanding drone operations, immigration. And the other thing is the precedent set by Obama, like the executive orders he issued, really paved the way for Trump to be able to do what he did. Hannah, a University of California, San Diego graduate student, said she considers herself a socialist. What is going on is not only fundamentally unconstitutional, it defies our humanity. I am a socialist, and I also think we need to get rid of national boundaries. The growing nationalism not just here but everywhere I think is deplorable and not good for anybody. I personally am not a fan of the Democratic Party. They have a tendency to try and compromise, which is a fine thing to do if both sides have something good to say, but of course neither does. Cher, who has Iranian family and whose husband works in Mexico, said that her 79-year-old aunt was detained in an airport for over six hours when arriving back from Iran. She has been coming back and forth for 20 to 30 years. We were outraged, but mostly worried about her health. Honestly, I think the US has gotten involved in wars over there [the Middle East] which it shouldnt be in, and that it is those actions which are really the cause of terrorism. I dont hate Obama, but I do think that he really opened the door many times for what is now happening. Nazarian said she came to the protest because I am realizing that the acts of Trump are completely outrageous. When it comes to the wall, I mean it just isnt going to solve anything. We have our military all over the world, we dont need to build it up on the border. Ally added, The problem is that we already have a wall, and one that is heavily guarded, what we need is not to build up but to tear down. Jessica, a middle school history teacher, said she was at the protest to support my refugee neighbors and refugee students and my students parents who are refugees. Jessica described Trump as incompetent, and a puppet for what used to be a fringe element of society in the United States. Jahleh, a graduate student at San Diego State University, attended the protest in part because of the effect of Trumps executive orders on her father, a legal resident from Iran. Jahleh said that the American government bears a great political responsibility for the current crisis affecting refugees worldwide. She said that animosity toward Muslims that has long been promoted in ruling circles has now come to a boiling point, expressed hostility toward the political establishment as a whole and said that now people have to take action, pointing to the crowd. Jahleh added that the wars waged by American imperialism around the globe only benefit the ruling class. Workers are victims of the wars and are sent to die fighting. She added, Growing up, in high school, socialism was always presented as something to fear, but things are changing now. Young people are realizing that capitalism isnt working. Following a discussion about the nature of the Sanders campaign, which she supported, Jahleh conceded that he is still part of the system and is working within it. New York City Hundreds gathered at Cadman Plaza in Brooklyn in front of the Brooklyn Federal courthouse where a federal judge was deciding the fate of the refugees. They chanted, No ban, no wall/Liberty for one and all, and Put a fence around Mike Pence. Scores of officers of the New York Police Department were mobilized, many of them in riot gear. Cynthia from Brooklyn explained, When I heard what was happening to the refugees I had to come down to protest. Im against Trumps promotion of hate and fear, everything he stands for. He appeals to peoples fears, particularly related to terrorism. He takes a very small number of people and uses them to stereotype the entire group. If we allow this to happen hell single out other groups like African Americans, she continued. There are people in every group that do bad things. We cant allow him to incite hate. I dont know how we got here. Im still trying to wake up from this nightmare. But we have to unite. Matthew told the WSWS that prior to Trumps victory he had never protested in his life. He attempted to join the protests at JFK airport, but after officials restricted access to ticketed passengers only, he made his way to the downtown Brooklyn courthouse. This is now my fourth protest since the election. People have to fight. Youre all in or youre all out at this point, he said. Trump has been in office 7 days. This is only the beginning. After the election people tried to normalize it. But Trump made it clear what his position was during the campaign. We have to do everything we can to stop him. We have to stay active. Asked about the prospects for the Democratic Party to resist Trump, Matthew responded, Its the people who are going to stop it, not the Democrats. Its beyond political parties at this point. Valerrie explained her fears of the new Trump administration. People have called Trump a lot of things: a narcissist, a buffoon Im calling him Hitlers reincarnation. I think were talking civil war, global war. Thats where were headed. My mother grew up in the Jim Crow south, she added. There is no way were going back to those days. I wont have it. Asked about the role of the Democrats, Jen said, Look at the confirmation hearings. [Senate Minority Leader] Chuck Schumer is letting Trumps nominees sail through. The same with Cory Booker. We have to get the corporate Democrats out. The days are over where you can just say that the Democrats are better than the Republicans. They need to go. Hamtramck, Michigan About 800 workers and young people rallied in front of city Hall in the Detroit enclave of Hamtramck on Sunday. The city is home to a large immigrant population, including large numbers of workers from Eastern Europe as well as the Middle East. Supporters of immigrant rights attended from throughout the Metro Detroit area. Jessica, a high school teacher in the Hamtramck public schools, said, I am here to support my neighbors and students. I have students who are from 15 different countries. I have students whose parents are overseas; a lot of split families. Hamtramck is an immigrant community. Our superintendent of public schools said we are going to be a sanctuary school. Speaking of Trumps announcement banning immigration from predominantly Muslim countries she said, It is unbelievable. I thought before the election, there is no way. It is hard to believe any of these policies have a large following. In the past, I have not considered myself a political person. But now I cant not follow it. This is only the first week. Any attempt to address the war on terror is out the window. Trump is adding fuel to the fire. He reinforces the belief that Muslims are not welcome, even if they are American citizens. Matthew, a retired Hamtramck teacher, said, I want people to know that this is not how our country is supposed to be. The Constitution is a document; it is not a poem to be interpreted. It is the law of the land. Asked what he thought had led to the installation of Trump he said, The two-party system is controlled by big money. In the last election, they put up the two worst possible choices we ever had. A series of tragic events has now led to this. Bryan, a heavy equipment operator from suburban Detroit, said that he was a libertarian, but opposed Trumps policies. I want to stand and let immigrants know that they are welcome. We bomb their countries for 10 years and then say they are not welcome. Thats BS. I believe in liberty for everyone. It is as much Obamas fault as it is Bushs. British aircraft engineering and FTSE 100 company Rolls-Royce received a 50 percent reduction in the size of the fine they received for protracted and endemic corrupt corporate practices. Rolls-Royce was fined just 671 million (US$787 million) for what Sir Brian Leveson in his judgement described as truly vast corrupt payments. The fine was levied after the largest-ever investigation by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) found Rolls-Royce guilty of conspiracy to corrupt, or failure to prevent bribery by the company in Brazil, United States, China, India, Indonesia, Thailand, India, Russia, Nigeria, China and Malaysia. The SFO, with the assistance of a joint Guardian and BBC Panorama investigation, uncovered the scale of mass corruption by Rolls-Royce spanning continents and several decades. However because the company, once exposed, cooperated with the investigation and admitted guilt, they were let off with what in financial terms can only be described as a slap on the wrist. The corruption directly involved Rolls-Royce agents or intermediaries who on behalf of the company handled the sales, maintenance and distribution of Rolls-Royces products in emerging capitalist markets. The catalogued cases of bribery and corruption involved, amongst other crimes, gifts of Rolls-Royce cars and large bribes to government officials in Indonesiawho facilitated Rolls-Royce winning a lucrative contract with a national airline. In China, bribes worth $5 million were paid to a state-owned airline, whilst negotiations were being conducted into a contract to purchase Rolls-Royce engines. In Thailand, Rolls-Royce paid almost $19 million to secure state contracts and, in India, bribes of undisclosed sums were paid in order to secure state contracts. The investigation revealed how substantial sums of money were made available by the company to fund extensive bribes approved by senior Rolls-Royce board members. It is estimated that contracts won because of corrupt activities garnered 250 million (US$292 million) in gross profits for the company. Rolls-Royce also falsified documents between the years 2005 and 2009 to conceal commissions paid to intermediaries in India in relation to a defence contract, where such activities were banned by the government. False accounting and conspiracy to bribe foreign officials in India were part of a series of admissions made by Rolls Royce. According to the SFO, senior figures within Rolls-Royce were aware as far back as 2010 about allegations regarding corruption within the company but decided not to notify the authorities. Such is the scale of the criminal activity involved that it took from 2012 for the SFO inquiry to arrive at an indictment of Rolls Royce. No explanation, however, has been offered by the SFO or the British government as to why leading Rolls-Royce board members do not face any criminal investigation and prosecution. This despite the fact that Judge Leveson believed the corruption involved, on the face of it, very senior Rolls-Royce employees. The kid gloves treatment of Roll-Royce is bound up with the fact that company is crucial to the global armaments industry and Britains leading role within it. Regardless of the findings, Judge Leveson described Rolls-Royce as a jewel in the UKs industrial crown. The engineering corporation manufactures engines for both military and civil aeroplanes and for locomotives, ships, nuclear submarines and power stations. Rolls-Royce ultimately got the exceptionally lenient treatment from the British state that they themselves had lobbied long and hard to gain. In 2004, the company lobbied then-Labour government ministers to weaken curbs on corporate bribery. Protracted efforts to diminish and dilute anti-bribery regulations were conducted, while former chief executive Sir John Rose was the leader of the company. Documents from a 2004 court case reveal how Rolls- Royce, in conjunction with other transnational corporations, influenced Labour government ministers to shred policy proposals ostensibly aimed at reducing corporate crime. Utilising arguments extolling commercial secrecy, the corporations argued against revealing the identities of their agents and intermediaries operating within foreign countries. The big business-supporting Labour government fell into line, granting them their every wish. The 497 million fine imposed upon Rolls-Royce involves a very convenient interest-free five-year payment schedule, agreed between the SFO and the company. Rolls-Royce will pay back the fine in instalments to settle the corruption cases brought by both British and American authorities. This sum is comparable to the companys expected profits for 2016. The agreement between the parties, approved by the British courts, is known as a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA). The DPA allows organisations to pay huge penalties back over a protracted period, and also crucially escape prosecution, if they confess to corporate crimes like fraud or bribery. There is no onus upon corporations to report criminal behaviour to the SFO. The Rolls-Royce DPA is the third such agreement struck by the SFO since they were introduced into UK law in 2014. Speaking about the case, Sir Edward Garnier, lawyer for the SFO, was concerned mainly that the investigation had uncovered criminal offences discrediting the operation of the capitalist marketrather than planned and systematic unlawful acts conducted by the people who ran Rolls-Royce. That corporations like Rolls-Royce do not face serious punishment regardless of the extent or nature of the crimes committed, or prosecution at a later date, was reflected in the price of Rolls-Royce shares. On news of the settlement, they rose by 4.5 percent. The company trumpeted that free from further investigation and prosecution, its 2016 profits would beat previous market expectations. This will come at the expense of the workforce. Even before the ruling, Rolls-Royce was continuing with its ongoing restructuring, announcing the loss of 800 more jobs from its marine division, after shedding 1,000 last year. Its marine sector business employs 4,800 workers in 34 countries, including about 400 in the UK. Since privatisation in 1987, the companys sales have risen from 2.8 billion to 76 billion last year, making it the worlds leading supplier of engines for wide-body passenger jets, and second overall to its much bigger rival General Electric of the US. It now appears that its stellar performance is not so much the result of its engineering excellence as its corrupt payments to local officials and airline executives around the world. Robert Barrington, executive director at Transparency International UKwhich describes itself as a global civil society organization leading the fight against corruption, said, Individuals havent been held to account and the marketswhen the share price has gone up todayare perhaps suggesting this isnt really a punishment or deterrent. Rolls-Royce executive Warren East stated after the judgement, The behaviour uncovered in the course of the investigations by the Serious Fraud Office and other authorities is completely unacceptable and we apologise unreservedly for it. The crimes of Rolls-Royce are similar to those of the Siemens corporation, who were found guilty of conducting business in a criminal manner, and come on top of more recent revelations concerning criminal behaviour by car manufacturers Volkswagen and Renault, who have admitted to falsifying vehicle emission figures. These scandals, together with the revelations concerning the manipulation of the Libor inter-bank lending rates, confirm that the big banks and corporations are engaged in systematic criminal activity in order to steal a march on their competitors. The so-called capitalist free market is nothing of the sort. Summing up the case, Judge Leveson sought to smooth things over by stating that he had since been informed that no current member of the board was involved in any of the conduct described in the statement of facts and that there had since been a cultural change at Rolls-Royce. Yet again big business has committed completely unacceptable criminal behaviour and evaded justice. The crisis engulfing Theresa Mays UK government has worsened, following her meeting with US President Donald Trump. Shortly after May departed from the US Friday, Trump enacted an executive order banning immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries for an initial 90 days. The order applies both to new immigrants and current permanent residents (green card holders) from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. May flew straight to Turkey for talks with President Recep Erdogan, the leader of the ruling Islamic Justice and Development Party. Erdogan made over 40,000 arrests following last Julys failed coup attempt and is preparing for a broader military offensive against the Kurds in Syria and Iraq. He has also forged an alliance with Russia and is seeking to grant himself dictatorial powers in order to suppress domestic dissent. Following the pattern set by her ingratiating performance with Trump in Washington, May raised none of these issues with Erdogan and Prime Minister Binali Yildirim as she signed a 100 million agreement for BAE Systems to collaborate with Turkish companies to build a fighter jet. May was still left reeling as the bombshell from Trump exploded under her feet. In a press conference with Yildirim, May initially tried to avoid answering questions as to her position on Trumps anti-Muslim edict. When asked, for the third time, she would only comment, The United States is responsible for United States policy on refugees. The UK is responsible for UK policy on refugees. Mays attempt to bury her head in the sand came unstuck within hours. In the UK, Trumps orderunder which those with dual nationality but were born in one of the named countries are also bannedwill affect many British citizens. Olympic gold medallist Sir Mo Farah, a British citizen, was born in Somalia but lives in the US city of Portland, Oregon. The athlete issued a statement: Its deeply troubling that I will have to tell my children that daddy might not be able to come hometo explain why the President has introduced a policy that comes from a place of ignorance and prejudice. An MP from Mays ruling Conservative party, Nadhim Zahawi, said since he was born in Iraq and was now de-facto banned from the US, he would not be able to visit his sons who are studying at Princeton University. There are 256,000 British citizens who hold dual nationality with just three of the countries on the Trump ban listIran, Iraq and Somalia who are all affected. With protests taking place in the US and throughout the world, May was forced into an abrupt U-turn. A statement from her Downing Street Office read, Immigration policy in the United States is a matter for the government of the United States. But we do not agree with this kind of approach and it is not one we will be taking." During a conference call Sunday, May was said to have ordered Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson and Home Secretary Amber Rudd to phone their American counterparts to discuss the US travel ban. Public revulsion continued to grow, with an online petition calling for Mays government to cancel a planned state visit by Trump to the UK to meet the queen. During her press conference with Trump she made the visit central to the re-forging of the special relationship between the two countries. The petition, however, has gained over 1.2 million signatures, far above the 100,000 required to be considered for a debate in Britains parliament. Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, who had earlier let it be known he was planning to meet with Trump in the summer, was obliged to register a belated protest. He told the Guardian May would be failing the British people if she did not call off the visit by Trump. The call was also backed by Ruth Davidson, the leader of the Scottish Conservatives. The existential crisis enveloping the British ruling elite is encapsulated in the weekends political turmoil. Since the referendum vote last year for the UK to leave the European Union, May has made closer political and economic ties to the US the centrepiece of her programme of a global Britain supposedly turning out to the world. Preparing free trade agreements, she has made trips in just a few months to India, Bahrain and New Zealand as well as the US and Turkey. May stated last week that she planned to visit China relatively soon to deepen Britains trading arrangements with the worlds second-largest economy. She told the Fina ncial Times, Were obviously looking at our trading relationship with China ... I think one of the things that was interesting to people in Davos was the speech that President Xi gave and the comments he made about the importance of free trade around the world. In response, a Chinese official said, China can potentially help the UK at a difficult time and the UK can also help China. ...We are just waiting to see what Mr. Trumps real policies will be. The more Trump makes clear the ramifications of his America First agenda, based on a ferocious assertion of economic nationalism and protectionism, the more surely Mays own strategy is going up in smoke. As well as threatening Mexico with tariffs, Trump and his team have threatened to impose 45 percent penalties on Chinese imports at the risk of sparking a global trade war with devastating results for workers in America and internationally. Just days after taking office, referring to Chinese-controlled islands in disputed waters in the South China Sea, Trumps press secretary, Sean Spicer, threatened, [W]e are going to make sure we defend international territories from being taken over by one country. Now Trump has pitted the US not just against the seven named Muslim countries, but the 1.5 billion adherents of Islam and 50 majority-Muslim nations. Germany, France and other European powers have already been alienated by Trumps open support for the breakup of the EU. Mays grovelling before Trump places the UK on a collision course with the rest of the world. In the UK, her government is now at odds with powerful sections of Britains ruling elite who never wanted Brexit and will now view the promise of a renewed special relationship with the US as cold comfort. Like Trump, May is provoking widespread political revulsion that can galvanise broad popular opposition to her. Having finished her trip to Turkey, she returns to the UK as the political firestorm over Brexit escalates. Tomorrow, two days of debate will begin over Mays Brexit bill on the triggering of the Article 50 legislation that begins the formal process of the UKs exit from the EU. To underscore the fraught character of what lies ahead, one of the major concerns of the majority pro-Remain wing of the British ruling elite is the economically disastrous implications of leaving the European Union Single Market and Customs Union implied by Mays support for an end to the EUs insistence on the free movement of labour. In order to appeal to the most right-wing Euro-sceptic wing of her party and to win back support the Tories have haemorrhaged to the UK Independence Party, May has made anti-immigrant rhetoric a bedrock policy. This could see her government rolling out bans on immigrants not dissimilar to those being imposed by Trump. The right of up to 1 million EU nationals to remain in the UK is under threat in a way that will split up families and foster outrage just as surely as Trumps targeting of Muslims. 25 Years Ago | 50 Years Ago | 75 Years Ago | 100 Years Ago 25 years ago: Venezuelan constitution suspended following coup attempt The government of President Carlos Andres Perez announced its suspension of the Venezuelan constitution February 4, 1992, as it continued operations aimed at suppressing an abortive military coup that began the night before. Officers loyal to the government claimed that military forces backing the coup had surrendered in the capital of Caracas as well as in the cities of Maracay, Maracaibo, and Valencia. It was reported that up to 60 people were killed in the fighting and more than 200 others wounded. The coup attempt began when paratroopers from Maracay, 60 miles west of the capital, surrounded the presidential palace and presidential offices in Caracas. Maracay was the site of Venezuelas main air base where US military advisers were stationed. Government spokesmen said that the middle-ranking officers who led the revolt intended to kill Perez and install another regime. Some observers noted that these officers, as well as lower-ranking army personnel, had seen their living standards dramatically decline in previous years, along with those of the vast majority of Venezuelans. The coup attempt came in the midst of continuing strikes, riots and demonstrations which were sparked by the attempts of the Perez government to meet payments on the countrys $32 billion foreign debt by imposing brutal austerity measures. [top] 50 years ago: Reuther resigns from AFL-CIO council On February 3, 1967, labelling the AFL-CIO as complacent and a custodian of the status quo, UAW President Walter Reuther resigned from the executive council and other important posts in the federation. Top UAW officials, including Emil Mazey and Leonard Woodcock, also resigned their positions in the AFL-CIO leadership, effecting a virtual split with the 13.5 million-member labor body. In a letter sent to 1,500 local unions, the UAW executive board claimed that its disagreements with the AFL-CIO were of a fundamental character, calling for the trade union bureaucracy to act as advocates of creative social change. Reuther declared the UAW would push for reformist legislation in the areas of civil rights, housing and medical care and for a reduction in military tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union. In the months leading up to the split, Reuther had publicly criticized AFL-CIO President George Meanys position on Vietnam. While supporting the imperialist war, Reuther opposed the official AFL-CIO position as intemperate and hysterical. In November the UAW president boycotted an executive council meeting in which Meanys resolution on Vietnam passed unanimously. Reuthers break with Meany was in no way a rejection of the AFL-CIO bureaucracy's ferocious anticommunism and subordination of the interests of the working class to US imperialism. It rather reflected the divisions which were mounting within the US ruling class itself over what policy to pursue in Vietnam, under conditions of deepening economic and social crisis at home. Reuther was lined up with those sections of the Democratic Party, represented by figures such as William Fulbright, Eugene McCarthy, and later Robert Kennedy, who were opposed to the Johnson administrations handling of the war. Significantly, Reuther maintained his adamant opposition to a political break by the labor movement from the Democratic Party and the formation of a Labor Party [top] 75 years ago: German Afrika Korps retakes Benghazi At noon on January 30, 1942, General Erwin Rommels German Afrika Korps recaptured control of the eastern Libyan coastal city of Benghazi. Only weeks earlier Rommels forces had been pressed all the way back to El Aghelia at the bottom of the Gulf of Sidra by the British army, with Allied forces taking control of almost all of the eastern Cyrenaica region. Rommel had little choice but to retreat back to the starting position the German Army held the previous May. Rommels forced retreat, however, drastically shortened his previously vulnerable supply lines. Consequently in early January the German North African army situated in Tripoli was able to receive a convoy of 55 new tanks, armored cars, and anti-tank guns that had previously been denied to the Mediterranean theater because of the demands placed upon the German war effort by Operation Barbarossa inside the Soviet Union. By the beginning of 1942 the British Eighth Army was in disarray. The 7th Armoured Division had been replaced by the inexperienced 1st Armoured Division, while other veteran military formations, including an Australian contingent, had been shipped to the Asian theater. The Germans were thoroughly aware of British battle plans due to their ability to intercept reports from the American military attache in Cairo, Bonner Fellers, whose code was easily broken. On January 21 Rommel had been able to take the British by surprise by striking back into Cyrenaica. Rommel told neither the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) nor the Italian Comando Supremo of his plans and ignored repeated attempts by the OKW to halt his advances. One German column under Rommels command advanced up the coastal road towards Benghazi while another two panzer divisions turned inland. In five days of fighting they destroyed almost 250 British armored vehicles. The British 1st Armoured Division was at risk of an encirclement by German forces, but the slower than expected advance of the panzer divisions allowed the Allied forces to escape Cyrenaica into western Egypt. Hitler was overjoyed at the news of Rommels successesin sharp contrast to news emerging from the Eastern Front, where the Red Army had inflicted a series of defeats on the Wehrmachtand promoted him to General der Panzertruppe. [top] 100 years ago: Germany declares unrestricted submarine warfare On January 31, 1917, the German government announced that it was resuming unlimited submarine warfare, using so-called U-boats, and targeting all shipping in the war zone of the eastern Atlantic. The announcement markedly escalated tensions with the United States and provided the American government of Woodrow Wilson with a pretext to directly intervene in the First World War. The move was a reversal of the policy adopted by Berlin, after the sinking of the passenger ship Lusitania in May 1916, which resulted in the death of 128 US citizens. In September 1916, in response to notes from the Wilson administration, the German government had stated, Liners will not be sunk by our submarines without warning and without safety of the lives of noncombatants, provided the liners do not try to escape or offer resistance. German strategists viewed submarine warfare as the only means of countering the effective blockade of the ports of the Central Powers, imposed by the British navy. The decision to resume submarine warfare followed the failure of half-hearted attempts by the Wilson administration and the German government of Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg to establish a peace process. The German declaration was used to escalate longstanding plans of the Wilson administration to dispense with formal US neutrality and enter the global conflict. American banking firms had already loaned billions of dollars to the Anglo-French allies, profiting handsomely from the bloodshed in Europe. Thomas W. Lamont, a partner in the House of Morgan, for instance, stated, Our firm had never for one moment been neutral. We didnt know how. Massive quantities of copper, cotton and wheat had poured across the Atlantic. US banks registered the greatest growth by any financial institutions to that point in history, with an increase in deposits of over 33 percent in 1916 alone. Germanys submarine warfare threatened this lucrative trade. The US ambassador to Britain sent a cable back to Washington in early 1917, noting the perilous state of the war-ravaged economies of Britain and France. He commented, Perhaps our going to war is the only way in which our present prominent trade position can be maintained and a panic averted. [top] US Special Forces carried out a raid on a number of homes in Yemens central Al Baydah Province on Sunday, killing as many as 57 people, including 16 civilians. One American soldier was reported killed. The raid marks President Donald Trumps first authorized military operation and first military fatality. The last US Special Forces raid in Yemen was in 2014, when a botched hostage rescue attempt resulted in the deaths of American journalist Luke Somers and South African teacher Pierre Korkie. A US Central Command spokesman claimed on Sunday that 14 militants were killed in the raid but did not report any civilian casualties. According to the Pentagon, one US soldier was killed and at least three others injured in combat. Two additional US soldiers were injured when the helicopter they were riding in was forced to make a hard landing as they sought to evacuate the American casualties. The helicopter was so damaged in the course of the raid that it had to be abandoned and was intentionally destroyed in place. The attack targeted the home of tribal leader and reputed member of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) Abdulrauf al Dhahab. In addition to the destruction of a number of homes, a school, a mosque and a medical facility were all damaged in the assault. The operation began at dawn when a drone bombed the home of Abdulrauf al-Dhahab and then helicopters flew up and unloaded paratroopers at his house and killed everyone inside, a resident told Reuters and the Associated Press. Next, the gunmen opened fire at the US soldiers who left the area, and the helicopters bombed the gunmen and a number of homes and led to a large number of casualties. Among those killed in Sundays attack was the eight-year-old daughter of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American citizen and Muslim cleric who was assassinated by Obama with a drone missile strike in Yemen in 2011. Awlaki was related to Dhahab by marriage. Nasser al-Awlaki, the childs grandfather, told Reuters that the young girl was hit with a bullet in her neck and suffered for two hours. Why kill children? This is the new administrationits very sad, a big crime." This is the second of Anwar al-Awlakis children to be killed by the US government. His 16-year-old son, Abdulrahman, was killed in a drone strike in Yemen in 2011, a few weeks after his father. Two other local tribal leaders, Abdulraufs brother Sultan and Saif Alawai al-Jawfi, were also killed in the attack. The Dhahab brothers were allegedly motivated to join AQAP in early 2012 after a third brother, Sheikh Tariq al Dhahab, was killed by the Yemeni intelligence service. Abdulrauf had previously been targeted for death by the Obama administration in September 2012 when a drone missile was fired at his car. He survived that attack when the missile, instead of hitting his vehicle, hit a minibus, killing 12 civilians, including a 10-year-old girl and her mother. The US has waged a covert war in Yemen since 2002 when President George W. Bush ordered the first drone missile strike on suspected Al Qaeda members. The use of drone assassinations was dramatically expanded by Obama, who also claimed the right to use drone strikes to kill American citizens without due process anywhere in the world. According to a tally by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, US drone strikes and other covert military operations over the last 15 years in Yemen have killed as many as 1,461 people. The Pentagon carried out the first drone strikes under the Trump administration in Yemen on January 20, 21 and 22, killing five alleged AQAP members in Baydah province. In addition to the ongoing drone war, the US has been facilitating a devastating aerial onslaught in Yemen by Saudi Arabia and its allies against Houthi militants since March 2015. At least 7,469 Yemenis have been killed in the Saudi-led war and some 40,438 have been injured. The Saudi coalition has deliberately bombed food markets, schools, hospitals, factories and residential neighborhoods in its efforts to break the Houthi insurgency and reinstate the government of President Adbrabbuh Mansur Hadi. Supported by US intelligence, bombs, fighter jets and refueling flights, the Saudi-led coalition has pushed the poorest country in the Middle East to the brink of famine. A no-fly zone and naval blockade imposed by the Saudi coalition with the support of the US have blocked the delivery of desperately needed food and medicine. Prior to the war the country relied on imports for 90 percent of its food supply. According to the latest figures published by the UN, some 14 million Yemenis, more than half of the countrys population, are suffering from food insecurity, including 2.2 million acutely malnourished children and 500,000 children who are suffering from severe acute malnourishment. Approximately 19.4 million Yemenis currently lack access to clean drinking water or proper sanitation. The UN estimates that a child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen from preventable causes. Everywhere you go, you see people begging in the streets in bigger numbers, you see people rummaging through rubbish to survive, the UN humanitarian coordinator in Yemen, Jamie McGoldrick, told the BBC. You hear catastrophic stories of children dying because they cant get to health centers. People dying of malnutrition, people dying of preventable diseases. It will get worse because the problem is that the economy is in really bad shape and banking sector doesnt function. Indicating the ferocity of the conflict, more than 100 fighters were killed over the weekend in clashes between troops loyal to Hadi and Houthi rebel fighters in the western city of Mokha, a major port which overlooks the Bab al Mandeb Strait, a strategic oil shipping lane. Approximately 370 fighters have been killed on both sides in the offensive which was launched by the Saudi-backed forces on January 7 with the aim of retaking the Houthi-controlled port. By Press Trust of India: London, Jan 30 (PTI) A primary school in the UK has introduced a policy of allowing students to wear slippers in class as part of a move it claims improves learning. Findern Primary School in Derby adopted the approach based on global research indicating the positive impact of relaxed footwear in classrooms and say they have already noticed improvements. advertisement "One of the teachers suggested the idea after seeing some research, and when we pitched the idea to the children they were very excited. It has been a success so far, most of the children and even some members of staff are wearing slippers now," deputy headteacher Michelle Halltold ?Derby Telegraph?. "Our pupils are already very well behaved but there have been some changes. There is less stomping around and the pupils are a lot calmer and seem very relaxed. The children love it and thats why we do our jobs, with them at the heart of everything," she added. A Bournemouth University study completed over 10 years in 25 countries had found that when students removed their shoes at school, it created a calmer and quieter environment. They also found that children were more likely to get to school earlier, leave later and read more, the newspaper reports. As well as visiting schools in New Zealand and Australia for the project, researchers had studied childrens attainment at a school in west London after the habit was introduced, analysing the pupils academic results all the way up through to university. The system is already in use in Scandinavian countries, where cold weather conditions mean that children take their snow boots off before entering the classroom. PTI AK NSA --- ENDS --- VALDOSTA, Ga. (WTXL) - A health advisory that was issued on January 26th in Valdosta due to sewage spill has officially been lifted. According to the Florida Department of Health, the Georgia city originally reported a large spill of untreated sewage that overflowed into the Withlacoochee River. Health officials originally urged individuals not to come into contact with the possibly contaminated water. Officials now deem the river to be safe due to water samples taken by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. Reports indicate that the river water meets surface water quality standards. The Florida Department of Health ensures that individuals may resume water-related activities. VERO BEACH, Fla. (AP) - Authorities say a pilot safely made an emergency landing on Interstate 95 in Florida and no one on the ground was hurt. The Federal Aviation Administration said the pilot reported that the plane was out of fuel on approach to Vero Beach Regional Airport. The pilot landed in the median of the interstate about 1:30 a.m. Monday. Sgt. Mark Wysocky of the Florida Highway Patrol says traffic was light on the interstate at the time. He told The Associated Press the pilot is Firas Awad H. Alghamdi, of Saudi Arabia. He took off from Fort Pierce in a plane owned by Ari Ben Aviator Inc. (Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.) By Press Trust of India: Pak declines India invite to attend Speakers Summit New Delhi/Islamabad, Jan 30 (PTI) Amidst chill in Indo-Pak ties, Pakistan has declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend South Asian Speakers Summit to be held next month. "Pakistan and Myanmar which were among the countries in the South Asian nations invited to the Speakers meet in Indore on February 18-19 have declined the invitation," official sources in New Delhi said. advertisement India had invited the Speaker of the National Assembly of Pakistan, Sardar Auaz Sadiq, for the regional summit. In Islamabad, a senior official said Sadiq would not be able to participate in the summit due to crucial national engagements. The official told PTI that the schedule of the summit clashes with an important session of the National Assembly, the lower house of parliament. "The Speaker would be needed to chair the crucial session and we have already conveyed this to India," the official said. The Summit, which is primarily an IPU initiative and not a SAARC activity, will be attended by Speakers of Parliament from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka among other countries, the sources said. Significantly, in 2015, India had boycotted a Commonwealth Parliamentary Union (CPU) meeting in Islamabad to protest against Pakistans decision to not invite the Speaker of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. The discussions during the Speakers Summit on achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will update the participants on implementation of the SDGs in their region and globally. Special emphasis will be laid on sharing experiences and increasing understanding about how parliaments in the region institutionalise the global goals, capture the synergies and build coherence at the policy level, IPU said on its website. PTI PYK/SH TIR NSA --- ENDS --- A protester holds a sign while sitting in baggage claim saying, Immigrants make America great, at Seattle Tacoma International Airport on Saturday. (Lindsey Wasson/The Seattle Times) YAKIMA, Wash. Police said a girl who fell out of a window at the Cascade Apartments earlier this year is in state custody while state casewo An early mornining fire Jan. 30 caused $200,000 damage to this home at 3605 Tieton Drive, and displaced seven people in three families. (YAKIMA COUNTY ASSESSOR'S OFFICE/Courtesy Photo) You are the owner of this article. On Saturday during an election campaign, Rana had said that curfew will be imposed in Kairana, Deoband and Moradabad if he is elected again. By India Today Web Desk: Controversial BJP MLA Suresh Rana has been booked by the Uttar Pradesh police for saying that his victory in the forthcoming Assembly election will result in a curfew in communally-sensitive Kairana, Deoband and Moradabad areas of the state. On Saturday during an election campaign, Rana had said that curfew will be imposed in Kairana, Deoband and Moradabad if he is elected again. advertisement Rana is an accused in the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots in which nearly 65 people, mostly Muslims, were killed. He is the BJP's candidate from Thana Bhawan constituency in Shamli district. Also read | UP election: 2 booked for using Sangeet Som's Dadri, Muzaffarnagar speech videos for campaign "If I emerge as the winner (in UP polls), curfew will be imposed in Kairana, Deoband and Moradabad," he said. As the remarks kicked a row, Rana later claimed the comments were meant for the goons who have spread terror in the state. RANA CLARIFIES REMARK "What I meant was many people have planned to leave Western UP fearing the terror spread by goons and robbers. There is no city in that region where people have not planned to move out due to the fear of these goons," he said. Kairana made headlines last year after BJP MP Hukum Singh alleged the exodus of Hindus by releasing a list of more than 300 families who had reportedly fled the town following alleged extortion threats and attacks. WATCH VIDEO --- ENDS --- Sometimes Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is right and the state comptroller is wrong. The reader can rest assured: These words are not the product of a secret plot devised between Yedioth Ahronoths publisher and the prime minister. They offer a different view from that of the state comptroller in his report on Operation Protective Edge . The report has yet to be released, but the snipperts being published daily from it create a misleading and confusing atmosphere. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter The reports first draft included harsh criticism against the Military Intelligence Directorate and the Shin Bet. The tunnel affair was described first and foremost as an intelligence failure. In the second draft, following explanations provided by the two bodies, the tide was turned: The comptroller has a lot compliments for the intelligence community's information gathering efforts, starting from 2008 and mainly since the end of 2013. He describes the information provided to the fighting forces as an important intelligence achievement, which allowed the troops to reach the entries to most offensive tunnels. The Military Intelligence Directorate and the Shin Bet understood the seriousness of the tunnel threat and gave the defense minister and prime minister detailed reports. They defined the threat as significant and strategic. In other words, the fail grade in the draft turned into a citation in the report. Prime Minister Netanyahu with then-Defense Minister Yaalon, who failed to instruct, and then-IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz, who failed to act (Photo: Kobi Gideon) Operation Protective Edge was not free of mistakes. Of all the mistakes made before, during and after the operation, the comptroller is occupied primarily with one issue: The Security Cabinets performance. He is harshly reprimanding Prime Minister Netanyahu, then-defense minister Moshe Yaalon and then National Security Council head Yossi Cohen for their conduct. In this context, he is also scolding the IDFs top command, as well as the members of cabinet. According to the report, the cabinet should have set strategic targets for Gaza. It did not do so because Netanyahu and Yaalon did not bother to bring the issue up for discussion. Instead, they presented the cabinet with operative plans. The result was that the military command was forced to form the targets itself and plan the military operations accordingly. The comptroller states that most cabinet ministers did not show an interest in the tunnel threat even when it was presented to them. He mentions four cabinet meetings, two in March 2014 and two at the end of June and July. Netanyahu and Yaalon did not demand that the IDF present the tunnel threat to the cabinet, and the IDF did not volunteer to do so. The comptroller holds Netanyahu and Yaalon accountable, but does not deny the responsibility of the IDF commanders as well. Although the IDF is not in direct contact with the cabinet, although the law does not require reporting, the comptroller believes that the IDF chief of staff and the head of the Military Intelligence Directorate have a responsibility towards the government too. The comptroller understands that there is a lot of information. He also understands that the ministers do not read much. He recommends, therefore, that the IDF suggest to the defense minister to recommend to the prime minister to allow officers to verbally complete what the ministers fail to read in writing. Complicated? If the recommendation sounds like the way to handle students suffering from learning difficulties, thats exactly what it is. The comptrollers most convincing argument against the IDF is that it failed to prepare operational plans that included a reference to the tunnel threat. It is directed at Netanyahu and Yaalon, who failed to instruct, and at IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz and Major-General Yoav Har-Even, head of the Military Intelligence Directorate, who failed to act. Gantz surely has answers. He showed indifference when the report moved from one draft to another. Now, ahead of its release, he is preparing for the public battle. What Netanyahu would like to say to the comptroller, but cant, is that the comptroller is barking up the wrong tree. The cabinet is not a solutionits a problem. Its a baseless, futile body which is incapable of completing the missions it has been tasked with by the law. During Operation Protective Edge, there were at least three ministers in the cabinet who wanted to succeed Netanyahu and saw the operation as an opportunity to build themselves up at his expense. The leaks were only part of the problem. The more serious problem was that everyone spoke in headlines, and are still doing so to this very day. Running a military operation that way is impossible. Decisions during military operations should be made in a much smaller forumusually a forum that includes the prime minister, the defense and foreign ministers and the chief of staff. As we learned from Operation Cast Lead and the arguments between prime minister Ehud Olmert, foreign minister Tzipi Livni and IDF chief Gabi Ashkenazi, such a forum is not free of personal and political considerations either. In the current government, the composition is even more problematic. Netanyahu doesnt have a cabinet, and he doesnt have a narrow forum. The comptroller criticizes Netanyahu for failing to come up with a strategy for Gaza. The truth is that he has a strategy, but he cannot expose it. He does not want to occupy Gaza because he is afraid to get stuck there; he does not want to impose the Palestinian Authority on Gaza because he finds the split convenient. A weakened Hamas and a major military conflict every few yearsthat was the strategy, and it is firm and valid to this very day. The comptroller says no diplomatic alternatives were examined, including improving the infrastructure and quality of life in Gaza. He would be glad to hear that such alternatives are being examined today and rejected for fear that Netanyahu would be seen as giving in to Hamas. Soon Gaza will blow up, and what happened in the past will happen again. The Jerusalem City Council decided on Sunday to increase the intensity of their strike after a transfer of 800 million shekels in funds for the city's budget was delayed. Starting Monday, schools will be delayed and preschools will be closed all across the city. That is in addition to strikes in most city departments, such as sanitation and water, which are already in progress. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter The city council stated that the lack of funding might lead to employment terminations and severely damaging the services granted by the city to the public. Sanitation Department's strike taking its toll on the streets (Photo: Gil Yohanan) City Mayor Nir Barkat (L) & Minister of Finance Moshe Kahlon (Photo: Orel Cohen, Gil Yohanan) Starting Monday there will be widespread strikes across the city, in particular in front of the city's treasury department. Jerusalem City Mayor Nir Barkat called for the Minister of Finance Moshe Kahlon to immediately step in and fix the issue "to prevent civilian suffering." The treasury department has responded to Jerusalem city council's decision to broaden the strike: "The Jerusalem city's systematic exploitation of its citizens as hostages is cynical and inappropriate. The treasury department has already transferred 525 million shekels to the city, and even though this is a budgetary addition from last year, the mayor of Jerusalem chooses to act in budgetary and civil irresponsibility towards the children of the city who deserve proper education and are negatively affected by this for the second time in the last two months." "The mayor will have to bear responsibility for the parents who will be forced to leave their children at home as a result of this unnecessary strike that reflects inadequate budgetary behavior and capricious and impractical courses of action by the city." The prime minister's bureau published on Sunday night a response to what the police have termed Case 3000the Submarine Affairin which the timetable for the purchase of the seacraft is detailed. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter A statement released along with the timeline read, "Contrary to claims that have been made, the purchase of four surface ships was carried out in accordance with the recommendations of the Navy and the Ministry of Defense itself. The Prime Minster and the Security Cabinet acted in accordance with the recommendations of the professional ranks." Netanyahu climbs out of the INS Rahav submarine in January 2016. (Photo: Reuters) According to Netanyahu, "This is the political-security timetable of the purchase of the surface ships, as documented in the National Security Council, which proves that. The timetable is backed up with the documents." The timetable follows: 4/24/2013: The commander of the Navy recommends moving forward with purchasing the ships from Germany. 9/11/2013: The Ministry of Defense's director general instructs his ministry that if an agreement can be reached with Germany, there will be no need to open a request for tenders. 11/11/2013: The Ministry of Defense's director general emphasizes the benefits of purchasing from Germany for reasons of cash flow, cost and schedule. November 2013: The Security Cabinet decides to purchase the ships and to prefer an agreement with Germany. 5/6/2014: The Germans withdraw from the discount proposal. 7/21/2014: The Ministry of Defense publishes an international request for tenders for the purchase of the ships. In the background, talks are held with Germany. 8/17/2014: In light of progress in the talks, the director general of the Ministry of Defense asks to freeze the tenders. 8/21/2014: Germany approves a discount at a rate of 27.5% with Minister of Finance Yair Lapid. 8/23/2014: German Chancellor Angela Merkel approves the summary to the prime minister. 9/20/2014: The Israeli Navy asks to stop the bidding and slow down the signing of the memorandum of understanding (MOU). 9/21/2014: The director general of the Ministry of Defense asks to stop the bidding in light of the developments. 10/27/2014: The minister of defense decides to stop the bidding. December 2014: Israel and Germany sign an MOU for the purchase of the ships. A new study into smoking patterns in the IDF shows that the prevalence of smoking increases by 40% during compulsory military service. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter The IDF has been trying for years to kick its reputation as a "school for smokers". Whereas in the past soldiers were encouraged to smoke, today things are very different. Dining areas, lecture halls, offices, canteens and other enclosed public areas are all designated as mandatory smoke-free areas, and soldiers caught smoking in them face disciplinary action. In addition, the army regularly disseminates anti-smoking information. Despite these efforts, a large number of recruits who did not previously smoke acquire the habit while in the IDF. IDF soldiers smoking (Photo: Shutterstock) Combat units and former smokers have been identified by the study as high-risk factors in the reintroduction to smoking. Part of the reason may be that smoking makes it easier to stay alert when on reduced sleep schedule, as is often the case in combat units. Prevalence of smoking was greater among men at discharge (40.3%) than among women (32.4%), but the increase itself during service was similar. The study, carried out at Tel Aviv University, systematically sampled around 30,000 soldiers from 1987 to 2011. It concluded that the prevalence of smoking changed from 26.2% at recruitment to 36.5% at discharge, constituting a 39.4% increase. On the other hand, 12% of smokers at recruitment notably quit smoking during service. Dr. Laura Rosen, Chair of the Department of Health Promotion in the School of Public Health at Tel Aviv University's Sackler Faculty of Medicine, one of the researchers told Tazpit Press Service (TPS) that tobacco is extremely addictive, "even more so than heroin." "Once the habit is acquired, quitting is not easy, and as a result, starting to smoke while in the army can easily become a lifelong habit with potentially severe consequences, given the proven links between smoking and life-threatening diseases." said Rosen. Between 50% to 65% of smokers die prematurely from smoking-related causes, and Dr. Rosen hinted that the number might actually be closer to 67%. "The IDF is a much more controlled environment than civilian life", told Rosen. "This means that the army has a lot of tools at their disposal to discourage and reduce smoking if it wants to." The study proposes the creation of a central tobacco control monitoring body with comprehensive tobacco control policy, like in the US, to both protect the soldiers and to improve performance in combat units. Approximatley two weeks ago, an IDF force arrested four residents of Jalazone refugee camp in the area of Ramallah, who threw Molotov cocktails toward Beit El on a number of occasions. The cell members were arrested three days after being identified and handed over to the Samaria & Judea (SJ) District Police for interrogation. Six people were killed and eight wounded when gunmen opened fire at a Quebec mosque during Sunday night prayers, in what Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a "terrorist attack on Muslims". Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter Police said two suspects had been arrested, but didn't give details about them or what prompted the attack. Scene of attack in Canada (: ) X Initially, the mosque president said five people were killed and a witness said up to three gunmen had fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre. Police said only two people were involved in the attack. Police forces at the scene of attack in Quebec (Photo: AP) "Six people are confirmed deadthey range in age from 35 to about 70," Quebec provincial police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told reporters, adding eight people were wounded and 39 were unharmed. The mosque's president, Mohamed Yangui, who was not inside when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. "Why is this happening here? This is barbaric," he said. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement: "We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge". "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country." The shooting came on the weekend that Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, after US President Donald Trump suspended the US refugee program and temporarily barred citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States on national security grounds. Photo: Reuters A Canadian federal Liberal legislator, Greg Fergus, tweeted: "This is an act of terrorismthe result of years of sermonizing Muslims. Words matter and hateful speeches have consequences!" New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said police were providing additional protection for mosques in that city following the Quebec shooting. "All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something," he tweeted. 'NOT SAFE HERE' Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them from North Africa. In June last year, a pig's head was left on the doorstep of the cultural centre. Photo: Reuters "We are not safe here," said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque in the middle-class, residential area, but did not on Sunday. Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now "very worried" and thinking of moving back to Morocco. Mass shootings are rare in Canada, which has stricter gun laws than the United States, and news of the shooting sent a shockwave through mosques and community centres throughout the mostly French-language province. "It's a sad day for all Quebecers and Canadians to see a terrorist attack happen in peaceful Quebec City," said Mohamed Yacoub, co-chairman of an Islamic community centre in a Montreal suburb. "I hope it's an isolated incident." Photo: Reuters Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of the province was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighbouring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Zebida Bendjeddou, who left the Quebec City mosque earlier on Sunday evening, said the centre had received threats. "In June, they'd put a pig's head in front of the mosque. But we thought: 'Oh, they're isolated events.' We didn't take it seriously. But tonight, those isolated events, they take on a different scope," she said. Bendjeddou said she had not confirmed the names of those killed, but added: "They're people we know, for sure. People we knew since they were little kids." Swaraj on Monday replied to Radhakishan's family's tweets saying that she has asked for a report from Indian Ambassador to the United States, Navtej Sarna. By Smita Sharma: External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj has sought a report from the Indian Embassy in Washington DC. This in connection with a 53-year-old Indian paraman Radhakishan, taken into custody by Grand Forks police on Saturday. Swaraj on Monday replied to Radhakishan's family's tweets saying that she has asked for a report from Indian Ambassador to the United States, Navtej Sarna. advertisement WHAT HAPPENED As per police Radhakishan was to board a flight from Grand Forks to Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, when a bomb threat was reported at 5.14 am local time. The airport was immediately evacuated. According to local media reports, a traveler had informed a ticket agent of a bomb in Radhakishan's bag, and subsequently the Indian man from Vadodara was arrested. No bombs or threatening device were however recovered, and normal operations resumed at the airport. Police have not provided details as to what might have been the motive behind the bomb scare. FAMILY RESORTS TO SOCIAL MEDIA Radhakishan' wife in a series of tweets to Swaraj and Prime Minister Narendra Modi has defended her husband saying he deals with energy conservation and is being falsely implicated. @SushmaSwaraj Sushmaji, my husband Paraman Radhakrishnan is an honest man with a passion for energy conservation. renu (@Nair1209Renu) January 28, 2017 @SushmaSwaraj Sushmaji, my husband Paraman Radhakrishnan is an honest man with a passion for energy conservation. renu (@Nair1209Renu) January 28, 2017 --- ENDS --- Following President Trumps imposition of a temporary immigration ban on citizens from 7 Muslim countries last week, concerns have arisen in Israel over whether the measure could adversely affect some of its dual-nationality citizens abilities to enter the US. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter American diplomats and lawyers specializing in immigration to the US warn that Israelis born in one of the 7 Muslim countries on Trump's list may be included in the ban. The list includes Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya, Iraq, Iran and Yemen. American embassy in Tel Aviv (Photo: AFP) An American consul, who previously served in the American embassy in Tel Aviv and defines herself as a friend of Israel, believes that "if you are a citizen of one of those countries and not an American citizen, you will be banned entry into the US for 90 days. This will apply to you even if you have an additional citizenship such as an Israeli one, and even if you have a valid immigration visa, tourist's visa, refugee visa, or a work visa. Even if you have a green card, you may be included in the temporary ban." Washington protest (Photo: AP) Later on, the White House clarified that green card holders will be able to enter the US. Liam Schwartz, a lawyer specializing in immigration laws to the US, warned Israelis holding citizenship of these other countries to avoid travel to the US. "I recommend that Israelis born in these countries avoid travelling to the US in the near future until we clear things up. I don't think I'm exaggerating by saying this. The ban is unequivocal," Schwartz said. Photo: AP Trump's executive order is already directly affecting thousands of Israelis by cancelling the existing decree to exempt individuals between the ages of 14-80 requesting a visa, or people asking to renew their visa, from a personal interview. Following Trump's order, every visa candidate must undergo an interview at the consulate. This will weigh heavily on the American consulates in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, which may lengthen the waiting period for an interview date. Boston protest (Photo: Reuters) The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs decided to address the American consul in Tel Aviv in order to clarify whether the ban will include Israelis born in the Muslim countries. The American consul responded that the subject still remains unclear and that the embassy is awaiting clarification from the Washington State Department. Around the US, large protests continued late into the night on Sunday against Trump's decision as tens of thousands protested in several major cities. Miami protest (Photo: Orit Ben-Azar) Trump stated that his decision to ban entrance of citizens from Muslim countries is not a ban on Muslims, but rather a step to safeguard national security. He added that he would review the visas for all countries in the upcoming 90 days. Ever since the ban, hundreds of individuals have been arrested or deported from American airports. Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer said that "what we are talking about here is a matter of life and death for many people. I will not rest until these horrible orders are annulled." Sundays protest at Battery Park, Manhattan, began with an impressive Jewish presence, with signs such as Were all Jews, were all Muslims, were all refugees. But as time went by, it turned into a demonstration of veteran members of Occupy Wall Street, with many signs showing US President Donald Trump with a Hitler mustache. More than sympathy towards refugees, it was an act of disdain towards Trump. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter If we thought the polarization of the election campaign would start fading away, the opposite appears to be happening: The crisis is only getting worse, splitting the entire United States. The Obama administrations US did not take in masses of refugees eitherthe million people who received an immigration visa last year included only 85,000 refugees. A total of 12,587 refugees arrived from Syria, and less than 40,000 arrived from Muslim countries altogether. The US was blocked to refugees in general, and to Muslims in particular, during Obamas days too, and Trump simply blocked it a bit more, for three months, in order to improve the examination and screening processes. The average refugee quota during the days of the Obama administration was 70,000, and Trump has announced a quota of 50,000 for 2017. Thats not a dramatic change. Manhattan protest. Included quite a few religious Jews (Photo: AFP) For the absolute majority of asylum seekers, the new executive order creates no change. In addition, one of the arguments made by Trumps opponents is that the order was imposed on countries that have not produced terrorists. Thats inaccurate. The stabbing attack in Minnesota, last November, was carried out by a young man from Somalia. Two Iraqis who arrived in Kentucky as refugees planned a terror attack and were arrested. As a result, Obamahe and no othersigned an executive order banning the entry of asylum seekers from Iraq for six months. The difference between the two presidents is in the rhetoric: Obama spoke pompously, made the right statements to the liberals, but didnt do much. In fact, the collapse of the Arab world, which is producing millions of refugees, is on him as well. He created a problem, and then failed to deal with it. The same applies to the leaders of European countries, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who voiced profound criticism. Europe opened its gates in 2015 and took in more than a million refugees from Muslim countries, but that ended. In 2016, Europe began building separation walls and imposing restrictions. The problem is not in a change of policy from one end to another, but in the way the executive order was issued. It looks like an instinctive reaction. The immigration workers are a bit helpless, because the order is unclear. Does it apply to people who already have visas? After all, one picture or one story of a young Yazidi woman taken off a flight is worth more than a thousand explanations. And in general, its slightly difficult to understand Trumps logic: the countries that produce radicalization, Islamization and support for terror are mainly Saudi Arabia and Qatar, yet he didnt utter a word against them. That is not the way to fights Islamists; it is the way to increase the rift with the Muslims, most of whom are the victims of jihad rather than its supporters. Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun, at the Reform Jews biggest synagogue in Manhattan, prepared activities against Trump after the Shabbat morning prayer. And its not just Reform Jews. Orthodox rabbis are also feeling uncomfortable with the order that is portrayed as an anti-Muslim move. After all, the Jews are a nation of immigrants. Jews suffered from closed gates. So no, its not the same thing, but even symbolic moves are significant. The immigration policy can be changed. The demand for security checks is justified, but Trumps order fails to take care of the problem, and there is a problem, includes unnecessary humiliation and is rightly interpreted as a racist move against Muslims. Israeli politicians should not rejoice. Sundays protest at Battery Park included quite a few religious Jews. They represent the majority of Jews. Most Americans likely feel uncomfortable too. So there is no reason to jump on the bandwagon. The Americans are deliberating, they are angry and they are protesting. They can do it on their own. There is no need to poke the Israeli nose in. Jerusalems residents awoke to a partially crippled light rail system caused by trash littered all over its tracks on Monday morning, as the municipality continues to battle with the Finance Ministry over a budget dispute. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter The garbage sprawled throughout downtown Jerusalem comes in the wake of a decision by the Jerusalem Magistrates Court Sunday night to issue a decree against a strike of childrens educational institutions and preschools planned by the city Mayor Nir Barkat which was set to take place Monday morning. Large quantities of garbage bring light rail to a halt. The Jerusalem City Council decided on Sunday to increase the intensity of their strike after a transfer of 800 million shekels in funds for the city's budget was delayed. The strike on the educational institutions was planned to begin in addition to strikes in most city departments, such as sanitation and water, which are already in progress. As a result of the obstacles composed of food, cardboard boxes and various other forms of waste, the light rail service has been compelled to limit its operations between Pisgat Zeev to Damascus Gate and from Mount Herzl and the Central Bus Station. Nir Barkat (Phot: Amit Shabi) Officials at the Ministry of Finance, whose office appealed to the court to thwart the strike, told Ynet that Nir Barkat is a failed mayor. He tries to pass his managerial failings onto the State. An accountant for the municipality needs to be appointed because of Barkats failings, the official said. He further accused Barkat of having a lack of interest in Jerusalem, claiming instead that he has his sights firmly set on the primaries for the Likud party. In order to stand a realistic chance of making the Likud list for the next Knesset, Barkat is putting Jerusalem on strike, the official asserted. This strike is part of his cynical political campaign and the residents of Jerusalem are being used as the set. Photo: Gil Yohanan The court announced that it was issuing a temporary ban on the strike of elementary educational institutions after studying reasons posited justifying its implementation, saying that it required time to make a decision. Residents of the capital vented over having to endure, not for the first time, the filth and waste which has spilled over onto their streets as disputes have simmered in the political establishment. Resident forced to endure the brunt of political dispute (Photo: Gil Yohanan) It is absurd that the municipality is fighting for a budget and the ones who are hit in the end are the residents, the weak public of Jerusalem, one resident fumed. Neither the Finance Ministry or the municipality cares that this feud is harming us. We need to take the piles of garbage and put them at the entrance of the ministry and perhaps then the budget issue will be solved. Former Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel Yona Metzger was convicted on Monday morning of bribery and fraud and sentenced to 3.5 years' imprisonment in accordance with a plea deal he signed last week. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter Metzger was also fined NIS 5 million by the court. He was convicted of three counts of taking bribes, one count of fraudulently obtaining benefits, one count of fraud and obstruction of justice. Rabbi Yona Metzger (Photo: Liran Levy) The amended indictment filed by the prosecution to the Jerusalem District Court charged Metzger with receiving NIS 5 million in bribescompared to NIS 10 million in the original indictmentas well as tax transgressions he committed while serving as the chief rabbi from 2003 to 2013. The original indictment detailed Metzger's method of taking cuts from donation money. Along with his driver, he worked to raise money for different organizations. Officials within these organizations then transferred various sums to Metzger, which typically amounted to anywhere between 10% and above. In one case, the two raised funds for a yeshiva operating in Metzger's synagogue. According to suspicions, the driver received a $28,000 donation, handed it over to Metzger, and it was divided between the two of them without being transferred to the yeshiva. Another donation of NIS 72,000 was given by an Israeli businessman to an organization providing food to the needy. After receiving the funds, the organization's director allegedly gave Metzger 30 percent of the donation, about NIS 22,500, without informing the donor. According to the indictment, this was repeated many times. If you thought of sending US President Donald Trump a gift, Harry Trumans biography would be an excellent choice. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter Had Truman sat in his office at the White House, hastily signing executive orders like Trump and not allowing Jewish refugees from death camps and concentration camps into his country, there would be no US Jewry today. The survivors arrived at the continents shores with nothing, frightened, hungry, hopelessand America opened its gates to them, wide open. Several decades later, Trumans seat is occupied by a president who has decided to label the Muslims: He has banned the entry of refugees to the United States. Christians yes, Muslims no. Trumans seat is occupied by a president who has decided to 'label' the Muslims (Photo: Reuters) The world is anxiouslyalthough also indifferentlyfollowing the massacre committed by Syrian President Bashar Assad against his people. In a supremely humane gesture, former US President Barack Obama decided to take in refugees from Syria just like European countries did, mainly Germany. With the wave of a pen, Trump shut the door in their face. And not just in the face of Syrian refugeesthose who have fled the horrors of the regime in Yemen and in Iraq, in Iran and in Somalia, have been banned entry too. Muslims, go home. What Trump is do ing right now is waging a religious war. There is apparently no one around him who understands the consequences, but the US Jews should understand. Just like they rushed to help the black people in their struggle for rights during the days of Martin Luther King Jr., they should stand up and use their money, power and influence to break through the door that has been arrogantly and insensitively shut by Trump. Not to mention the fact that a war on Islam, like the one being waged by Trump, will only intensify terrorism. All studies have shown that the failure to close the notorious Guantanamo Bay detention camp served the terror organizations propaganda system very well, as did the torture methods that Trump has now reinstated. Trump may succeed in building a wall, but the enlightened world should come together to stop him from placing the steel lock on the door. A shooting attack that took place in Haifa at the beginning of the month in which 48-year-old Guy Kafri was murdered was nationalistically motivated, authorities have determined, and is now treated as a terror attack. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter According to the indictment submitted against Mohammad Yusef Shinawi, 21, by the Prosecutors Office in Haifa to the citys Magistates Court, who turned himself into police custody in Acre shortly after committing the attack, his murderous actions were motivated by anti-Semitism The indictment concludes that the seeds of Shinawis hatred toward Jews were sown approximately 10 years ago, during the second Lebanon war. "Over the years, the defendant's hatred toward Jews intensified due to intermittent incidents involving Jews experienced by himself and members of his family, the indictment states. His belief that Jews are infidels also increased, and were thus valid targets for physical harm," it continued. "In the last few months prior to the events described below, his hatred intensified even further in light of additional events he experienced, and the desire for revenge became stronger." Shinawi and his girlfriend, who mocked him as a 'Jew lover.' During the interrogation, it was revealed that the impetus for carrying out the attack came when his girlfriend accused him of being a "Zionist Jew" and "Jew lover." The indictment also describes how at the end of 2015, Shinawi purchased an improvised machine gun which he painted black and managed to conceal as he practiced shooting it in the area's woods. On the night between January 2nd and 3rd, "he made up his mind, and the decision to kill Jews with his weapon had crystallized," the indictment deduced. He asked his younger brother, who is a minor, to bring him the weapon after which he loaded it and concealed it in his brother's presence. Later, Shinawi told his brother that if anything were to happen, he should say that Shinawi had sent him for the weapon; according to the Prosecutor's office the brother was not aware of Shinawi's intention to execute a terror attack. Scene of Haifa terror attack (Photo: Gil Nechushtan) Shinawi concealed the weapon in a backpack and close to 9:30am, he arrived at Ha'atzmaut Street in Haifa in order to carry out the attack. Shinawi fired several times at his first victim, Yehiel Iluza visibly religious Jewish manfrom a short distance while the weapon was still concealed in his bag, causing Iluz to collapse on the ground before his attempted murderer fled the scene. The indictment describes how the defendant then hailed a taxi and was dropped off in Chalisa neighborhood. During the interrogation, it was revealed that as he was fleeing the scene, Shinawi fired again in the direction of a Jewish woman in the area, but she was not harmed. As it neared 10:00am, in Hagiborim Street, the shooter noticed Kafri walking by himself. "When he realized that the victim was Jewish, and in accordance with his initial decision to kill Jews, the defendant made up his mind to murder his victim. From a short distance, the defendant fired the weapon, with the intention of killing him. Three bullets hit the deceased in the left side of the chest and neck, causing his death." Kafri, a 48-year-old from Nesher, worked as a schoolbus driver for disabled children, who he was driving to school on the morning of the murder. "Guy was one of the loveliest, kindest people I know, who always liked to help others. No one had a bad word to say about him. He drove kids with disabilities and did it out of a sense of calling. He loved the kidsand they loved him," said his brother-in-law, Shachar Dror. The deceased, Guy Kafri The escape route: reached Jerusalem and Tel Aviv The indictment, signed by Advs. Shonit Kedem-Nimtzn and Shelley Zeevi-Barzilai, details Shinawi's escape route that lasted for two and half days. The first thing he did was discard the bag with the weapon in a mountainous area near his family's home in Chalisa neighborhood. He was assisted by his friends, Ihab Ayoob Yusef, 20, and Khaled Atef abu Klieb, 21who were also charged in the indictment. From right to left: Shinawi, Klieb and Yusef (Photo: Zohar Shahar) The two friends drove Shinawi to various hideouts, and Yusef even provided him with a knife to protect himself, after the former revealed his intentions to steal a motorcycle from a restaurant delivery boy. The encounter between the defendant and the delivery boy is then described, where the former noticed the defendant's suspicious behavior and left the area. Shinawi spent the night following the murder in a Chalisa neighborhood mosque. On the following morning, he drove to Jerusalem and prayed at a mosque near Damascus gate, then drove to Tel Aviv, finally to return to Haifa, where he wondered around Neve Sha'anan neighborhood. On the following day, he continued to wonder around the city, then ended up driving to his uncle's house in Makr-Jadeidi, near Acre. Accompanied by his uncle, he then turned himself into the Acre police. The charges in the indictment include premeditated murder as per the Terrorism Law, attempted murder, armed activity with terrorist purposes, as well as possession of a knife, grand theft auto, and attempted robbery. His two friends are charged with providing the means to commit a terrorist act, providing the means to commit a crime, and, among other things, obstruction of justice. Two Palestinians were sentenced to time in prison on Monday after being found guilty of planning a terror attack inspired by the Islamic State organization (ISIS). Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter Musab Aliyan and Samir Abed Rabbo, both residents of east Jerusalem, built an explosive device and planned to use it against an Israeli security forces vehicle in the capital. Aliyan was sentenced to 10 years in prison, while Abed Rabbo was sentenced to nine years. Samir Abed Rabbo and Musab Aliyan (Photo: Daniel Elior) According to the indictment, the two conspired to carry out the attack in the name of ISIS. Aliyan, 24, began supporting the organization in 2014. He attended a religion study group, where he was introduced to the ISIS ideology. He saw himself as part of the extremist organization, identified with it, and supports it, the indictment notes. In October 2015, Aliyan tried to join the ISIS ranks in Syria. He left for Jordan to issue a Jordanian passport with which he could travel to Turkey and thence to Syria, but he was arrested by authorities in Jordan and deported back to Israel several days later. After returning to Israel, Aliyan began gathering funds so he could ask the Turkish consulate for a visa to the country. He also looked into the possibility of getting to ISIS in Syria through the Sinai Peninsula. During that time, the second defendant, Abed Rabbo, followed ISIS's activities via the web and learned more about the group. In late 2015, Aliyan decided to carry out an attack and sought Abed Rabbo's help, as he knew the other man had experience in building bombs. According to the indictment, the two purchased a cell phone to be used as a remote control to detonate the explosive as well as a coffee grinder to grind the materials needed to create the explosive. They also bought an ammeter and iron oxide powder, also for the bomb. Later, they also met to discuss the additional materials they needed to complete the bomb as well as how to carry out the attack. The Saudi government condemned Israel's decision to build hundreds of new housing units in the "settlements of east Jerusalem." In an announcement issued on Monday, the Saudi government noted that these steps conflict with the international community's intentions, counteracting the Human Rights Act and the UN treaties, and sabotage any chances for peace and stability in the region. Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman addressed the harsh Cabinet deliberations during Protective Edge Operation, which were first exposed by Yedioth Ahronoth, in an Yisrael Beytenu faction meeting, and said that leaking them constitutes a "criminal offense." Lieberman added that "this is a direct affront to our national security." Regarding the Regulation Bill, Lieberman said: "We will support the Bill, but it doesn't take a geniuswhen you read that the attorney general said it's an unconstitutional law, its chances of being disqualified by the Supreme Court is 100 percent." Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman declared his partys support Monday afternoon for the Regulation Billwhich seeks to legalize certain outposts in the West Bankwhile cautiously adding that the chances of it actually being ratified by the High Court of Justice (HCJ) were scant. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter You dont need to be a genius. When you read that the Attorney General says that the law is unconstitutional, the chances that it will be thrown out in the HCJ are 100 percent, he cautioned during the Yisrael Beytenu faction meeting. Avigdor Lieberman (Photo: Eli Mendelbaum) A Knesset Special Committee met to discuss the Regulation Bill on Monday afternoon in order to discuss the law as it approaches its second and third Knesset reading. It was announced earlier on Monday that the discussion would be delayed until the following day when the opposition managed to delay the vote after submitting 500 objections to the proposed bill. Despite the best efforts of the opposition to force delay however, eventually the Knesset Chairman Yuli Edelstein and Coalition Chairman MK David Bitan, decided to schedule the vote regardless. While the bills chief proponents insist that it be brought to the vote, Lieberman's warnings came on the heels of an announcement by Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit stating his intention not to defend the bill if it is approved given that, according to him, it is unconstitutional and could precipitate numerous lawsuits being brought against Israel in the Hague. By contrast, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted during his Likud party meeting that This week we will advance the Regulation Bill, with the aim of preventing repeated attempts to harass the communities in Judea and Samaria. PM Netanyahu (Photo: Reuters) Heads of the Yesha Council convened Monday morning to stage a protest opposite the Knesset in support of the bill and voiced their anger against the planned evacuation of Amonaone of the key outposts which propelled the proposed bill to prominence. Demonstrations in support of Regulation Bill (Photo: David Michael Cohen/TPS) Opposition Leader Isaac Herzog came out swinging full force against the bill during his Zionist Union meeting, describing it as one of the most dangerous bills in the State of Israel. The reason is that this bill is unconstitutional. All legal advisors aggressively oppose it, he asserted. This law is one which annexes and complicates (matters). It will complicate and endanger the countrys and IDFs leaders in the international courts. It contravenes both domestic and international law. It is dangerous on an unprecedented scale and what is more, it is annexation by theft. Last year, the UK government had rejected the request made by the Indian government citing its legal complications. By Virendrasingh Ghunawat: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) is planning its second attempt to extradite liquor baron Vijay Mallya in the Rs 900 crore Kingfisher IDBI loan case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). But this time, the agency would have 2000 pages chargesheet in hand to support its request to the United Kingdom (UK). Last year, the UK government had rejected the request made by the Indian government citing its legal complications. Thus, the ED had no other option but to make a fresh request under the India-UK Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT), in connection with its money laundering probe against Mallya. advertisement In extradition, an agency has to file a chargesheet first and then notify the counterpart country to send back the fugitive, which is a time taking affair. Developments so far: 1. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has filed a 2000 page chargesheet against the 11 accused, including Vijay Mallya, making it a more stronger case against him. 2. Officials said the agency is expected to place the extradition request before the special PMLA court in Mumbai on the basis of chargesheet in hand. 3. Once the special PMLA court issues an order, it would be placed before the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) for completing further bilateral procedures. 4. "We are awaiting the copy of chargesheet in hand. Once we examine the chargesheet, the legal process of extradition will begin against Mallya. The entire process would take a month or two," said the source. 5. The agency, which wants Mallya to join the probe in the loan fraud probe case "in person", has virtually exhausted all legal options to bring him back to India, including issuance of the NBW warrant against him. 6. Based on this NBW, the requests for revocation of his passport and subsequent deportation bid were made, last year. However, the UK had cleared that the liquor baron cannot be deported and had suggested India to seek his extradition instead. 7. Earlier, the ED had asked the Interpol to issue a Red Corner Notice (RCN) against him under the criminal sections of the PMLA. Off late, the agency had also issued Letters Rogatory (judicial requests) to at least seven countries seeking details of Mallya's finances, bank accounts and properties/assets. 8. The ED is investigating financial structure of Kingfisher Airlines and looking into any payment of kickbacks to secure the loans. Also read: Ex-PM Manmohan Singh helped Vijay Mallya's sinking Kingfisher Airlines get bank loans, alleges NO CLEAN CHIT TO MALLYA'S KEY ADVISOR Ravi Nedungadi, the former president and chief financial officer (CFO) of United Breweries (UB) group, and the key advisor to liquor baron Vijay Mallya remains untounched by investigative agencies. In May 2016, to know the working patterns of finance, accounts and legal affairs department of UB group and more importantly, on issues concerning inter-corporate loans to KFA, the CBI and the ED had questioned Ravi Nedungadi and KFA's CFO A Raghunathan, together. Both were repeatedly summoned to the Mumbai offices of the investigating agencies. Source within the ED said, "We believe Nedungadi has played crucial role in getting banking loans for Kingfisher Airlines and UB group. During our investigation, we have found that Mallya had least knowledge on the technical aspects of banking. Nedungadi, being a key advisor to Mallya and the brain behind all financial deals within the group has not been given any clean chit from our end". Similar views are coming from the CBI. Senior official of CBI told Indiatoday.in, "At this stage, we are not giving any clean chit to anyone. The investigation in this case is still on. In fact, the arrest of nine officials (IDBI Bank and KFA) till now, was first step of our action plan. There is lot to come in the coming days." Nedungadi had stepped down from the UB group after two-and-a-half decades. A chartered accountant by profession and hailing from Kerala, Nedungadi joined UB in 1990 in the corporate treasury department. But within a short span he was elevated to the position of group finance director of its international business. Since his appointment as President and CFO in 1998, Nedungadi was instrumental in UB's expansion both overseas as well as in India through acquisitions. advertisement advertisement --- ENDS --- Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyhau responded on Monday to the current strain on Israel-Mexico relations, following a tweet he pose that hailed US President Donald Trump's promise to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. His tweet had already garnered the condemnation of the Mexican Foreign Ministry and criticism from Israeli Interior Minister Aryeh Deri (Shas). Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter Netanyahu referred to the diplomatic crisis during a Likud faction meeting. "President Trump praised the fence built according to my guidance along the border with Egypt. He said it almost completely halted illegal infiltration to Israel, and I said he was right. As a result, he retweeted what I wrote. And from this molehill the commentators have made a mountain in the press. Netanyahu (Photo: Reuters) "These are the same commentators who said that I should have given up on Israeli security assets to maintain good relationships with the previous president. And now they're saying 'You hurt Mexico, you've ruined our relationship with them'. Who even mentioned Mexico? We had a good relationship with them, and we will continue (to have one). Even when there are real disagreements, such as their vote in UNESCO. Trump's and Netanyahu's respectives tweets "But to distract from the fence's fantastic success in the South when it comes to blocking infiltration, a success that has been recognized the world over and first and foremost by the president of the United States? This doesn't surprise me. The left-wing media has been on a Bolshevik hunting spree, a brainwashing campaign and has been carrying out a character assassination against me and my family. They create a barrage of false reporting on us, what's been referred to as 'fake news'. They put endless pressure on the attorney general and law enforcement officials to issue an indictment against me by any means necessary. "And why do they do it? Because ever since the founding of the State of Israel, the left has controlled the media and other sources of power in an undemocratic way, and I'm the first right-wing prime minister who has tried to change it, who has dared to try and change it. So they're doing everything they can to get rid of me, to allow the left to continue to hold control of the sources of power, in contrary to the will of the majority of the people, who are right-wing. We won't let them do this, they won't succeed." Mexico Foreign Affairs Minister Luis Videgaray responded to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's tweet from Sunday, in which he hailed US President Donald Trump's plan to build a wall along the US-Mexico border . "Mexico is a friend of Israel, and it must be treated as such by its prime minister," wrote Videgaray on his Twitter account, in a retweet from the account of Mexico's Foreign Ministry. He added that Netanyahu's tweet is irrational and that it felt aggressive, stating that Israel should clarify its position on the matter, in addition to having Netanyahu apologize. Videgaray brushed off Netanyahu's statement that he was not referencing the United Mexican States. "In Mexico we all know that when Trump's wall is mentioned, it is a reference to a wall with Mexico," he said. Jews in Mexico have responded with heightened concern and condemnation of Netanyahu's tweet. "We think Netanyahu has opened his mouth without reason, he shouldn't have been for or against (the issueed), it's useless," said Mexican Daniel Dorenbaum to Ynet. "As a very Zionist community, we are very supportive of the State Israel, but things are sensitive over when it comes to the wall. People think that all Jews believe the same thing Netanyahu does, and that's not the case." Dorenbaum continued to say that the Mexican Jewish community has received "anti-Semitic comments, some of them anonymous, on Facebook and Twitter. It happens every time the Middle East heats up, but this time we think it was pointless." Life imprisonment plus 20 years is the sentence imposed Monday afternoon on the terrorist Khaled Kutina, who was indicted for the murder of Shalom Sharki, and the attempted murder of Shira Klein in the April 2015 car-ramming attack in Jerusalem's French Hill. The Jerusalem District Court also imposed a payment of 258,000 shekels as restitution for Sharki's parents. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter Judges Yoram Noam, Rivka Friedman-Feldman and Moshe Bar'am stated in the verdict that "the murderous terror attack executed by the defendant, which was meant to sow death and destruction in the lives of innocent people simply for the fact of being Jewish, is a diabolical act that dehumanizes its committer. "The murderous, vicious and heinous act committed by the defendant necessitates the imposition of accumulating sentences. The consecutive sentences are doubly required when the case is of such a heinous terror attack whose sole purpose is to cause the death of innocent civilians. In terror attacks in particular, which ruthlessly and indiscriminately seek to harm innocents, it is incumbent on the court to repay the assassins This approach is necessary in order to provide proper expression to the sanctity of life." Convicted terrorist Khaled Kutina, Monday in court (Photo: Alex Kolomoisky) Kutina, a 39-year-old resident of Anata, changed his story versions throughout the procedure. During his initial interrogations, he claimed he had been taking medications and wanted to die; afterwards, he said he executed the attack as revenge against the Jews responsible for the blockades, and finally, he claimed that he cannot be indicted for murder since the prosecution failed to prove his intention to kill the two. The district psychiatrist determined that Kutina was mentally competent to stand trial. Jenny Avni from the Jerusalem District Prosecutor's Office said after the verdict: "We thought that the gravity of the murderous terror attack lies not only in the tragic outcomes of the event, but also in those few minutes during which the defendant drove down the highway looking for potential victims. The verdict expresses the incessant struggle of law enforcement authorities with terror attacks." Sharki, who was 25 when he died, studied in at the Hesder Yerucham Yeshiva and worked as a tour guide in Bnei Zvi pre-yeshiva high school. He served as a combatant in the Navy, and in his last years was studying in Herzog College and worked as a tour guide for The Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel. After the verdict Shrki's father, Rabbi Uri Sherki, said that "we will do as much as we can for justice. From then on, it's up to heaven's judgment. I hope they won't shorten his sentence and release him in the future. This is not out of vengeance; he will commit another terrorism act if he is gets out." The late Shalom Sharki Before the verdict, Shrki's father said, "We hope justice will be made, if only for the wave of terror attacks that started following this murder. There is a sense that the sanctity of Jewish lives has lessened. The assault on my son and Shira happened solely because they were Jews, in the name of an Islamic agenda, and it is the duty of a proper civil society to protect itself. "My son Shalom was an antithesis of the terrorist. He was a good, kind person...We found, among his belongings, a page on which he had written, 'I choose to live out of happiness', and we hung it up on the living room wall, replacing his picture, as his will. "We request that the terrorist's punishment will be as severe as the law permits, that his sentence will not be shortened, and that he will not be pardoned. Lately the biblical verse has been forgotten and maybe it should be remembered: 'Whoever sheds man's blood, by man his blood shall be shed, for in the image of God He made man.' We should not let this man endanger another." Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit announced on Sunday that he was considering reopening the investigation against the former police officer who was recorded beating a uniformed IDF soldier of Ethiopian descent in April 2015 to the joy of the beaten man's family. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter The footage showed the soldier, Damas Pakada, approached by two policemen who speak with him for a few moments before violently assaulting him. The police officer who led the assault was not criminally charged at the time, and the case against him was closed. Pakada, now an officer in the army , has been attempting to have the case reopened and criminal charges brought against his assailant. Mandelblit explained that he was waiting to hear from the former police officer before making his final decision in the matter. Pakada being beaten X Mandelblit's announcement comes following a petition that was filed again his predecessor, Yehuda Weinstein, for having closed the file. In his decision from June 2015, Weinstein wrote that the police officer had asked Pakada to leave the area due to a suspicious package that was nearby. The policeman then claimed that Pakada refused and pushed the police officer. Mandelblit wrote that "a reevaluation of the facts revealed certain inaccuracies" in Weinstein's decision. He added that "the use of force in the incident did not begin with Pakada's pushing the policeman, but with the policeman pushing Pakada and his bicycle." Pakada becoming an IDF officer last year Mandelblit said that an additional reason to reexamine the case was that "while the police officer allegedly used unnecessary force, no measures were taken against him in that respect, not even on the police disciplinary level." Mandelblit added that his predecessor took into account the fact that the police officer was no longer in his position. However, the current attorney general's reevaluation found that he was removed due to other reasons and not for his assault on Pakada. Pakada's brother, Darbe, spoke with Ynet regarding the attorney general's announcement. "I'm so glad to hear that happy news; this is a welcome decision that justice will come out." Darbe Pakada He criticized Weinstein's earlier decision, deeming it contrary to the facts of the case. He added, "Today's message gladdens not just the family, but the entire (Ethiopian) community." The officer's brother explained, "What happened to us was really frustrating. We were very angry at the time. What else do you need to see outside of what you see in the video? Everything is recorded 'play by play.' I dont' know if the video was edited, but you can see everything, and they decided despite that on a decision other than what you see." The former police officer's lawyer, Efrat Nachami Bar, said that her client has been summoned to the attorney general's office to present his version of the events. She stated that she was certain that after Mandelblit converses with her client, the case will remain closed. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tweeted on Monday that "Over the weekend, Iran launched another ballistic missile. This is a blatant violation of the Security Council's decision. I will be meeting with President Trump in Washington soon. I will bring up the need for renewing the sanction against Iran, sanctions agaisnt ballistic missiles and sanctions against terrorism, in addition to handling this whole failed agreement." He added that "Iranian aggression cannot be left without a response." A film about Arab-Israeli women who left their villages to live in Tel Aviv has angered some traditionalists in Israel's Arab community, who say its depiction of homosexuality and independent single women is insulting. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter "In Between", which has an Arab director and a Jewish producer, won best film at the Haifa International Film Festival in October and accolades in Toronto and San Sebastian with its portrayal of three very different women who share an apartment in Israel's most liberal city. From the film 'In Between' (Photo: Yaniv Berman) Layla is a lawyer and liberal Muslim who parties every night; Salma, from a traditional Christian family, is gay and works as a DJ and bartender; and Nour is a devout Muslim computer student whose Muslim fiance rapes her. Photo: Itay Gross Photo: Itay Gross The film addresses issues that some of Israel's Arabswho make up about 20 percent of the country's 8.5 million peopleprefer not to see on screen. Photo: Yaniv Berman The conservative leadership of Umm al-Fahm, a large Arab Israeli town that is featured in the film, has called for the movie to be boycotted. "We support art that has a purpose and art that criticises the negative aspects of our society, but we oppose a movie that distorts the image of Umm al-Fahm," Abed Al-Monem Fuad, a spokesman for the municipality, said. Sana Jammelieh, who plays Salma, said it was time for Israel's Arab community to address the movie's subject matter. "No one wants to talk about homosexuality, or a woman who feels free enough to party all night and drink alcohol, but they should be discussed so that (Arab society) can catch up with the modern world," she said. Mouna Hawa, who plays Layla, expected the criticism but said it did not worry her: "It took courage to make this film, but I feel convinced that it reflects many real lives in our society." Foreign Affairs Dir. Gen. Yuval Rotem is due to fly to Turkey and work toward mending fences. His trip will be the first in six years, and is a follow-up to the reconciliation agreement between Israel and Turkey after years of diplomatic disconnect. In 2016, Israel transferred $20 million as part of the reconciliation deal involving the Marmara flotilla incident, where nine Turkish citizens were killed after those on board the Marmara attacked IDF soldiers who commandeered the vessel as it attempted to break Israels maritime blockade on Gaza. Rotem's trip is to focus on diplomatic, financial, cultural and other issues, as well as conveying Israel's sympathis in light of the the deadly terroist attack in Istanbul on New Year's Eve, in which 18-year-old Israeli Layan Nasser was killed. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will meet with US President Donald Trump on February 15 in DC for talks covering a range of security issues, the White House said on Monday. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter "Our relationship with the only democracy in the Middle East is crucial to the security of both our nations, and the president looks forward to discussing continued strategic, technological, military and intelligence cooperation with the prime minister," White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told reporters as he announced the visit. Trump (L) and Netanyahu (Photos: Reuters) Spicer, "I think that with respect to Israel and the Jewish people specifically, there's been no better friend than Donald Trump when it comes to protecting Israel, building a better friendship with Israel. You look at what Prime Minister Netanyahu's talked about: He welcomes this administration. He appreciates the friendship and respect that he has shown to Israel and the Jewish people." Iran launches a ballistic missile (Archive photo) The White House was criticized after releasing a statement last Friday to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day that failed to mention Jews. Spicer addressed the inclusivity of the American president. He continued, "But to suggest otherwiseI got to be honest: The president went out of his way to recognize the Holocaust and the suffering that went through it, the people that were affected by it and the loss of life. And to make sure that America never forgets what so many people went through, whether they were Jews, Gypsies, gays, disability, priests "At the end of the day, I don't think that when you look at the State of Israel or the Jewish people themselvesI think there's been no better friend to (sic) Donald Trump, especially after the past eight years. The tremendous respect that he's shown Israel, the Jewish people. And to suggest anything otherwise is frankly a little disappointing." Iranian missile Also on Sunday a US official said, Iran carried out a test launch of a medium-range ballistic missile that exploded after 630 miles. The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the test launch was carried out from a site near Semnan. The official added that the last time this type of missile was test launched was in July 2016. Spicer said that the White House was aware of the incident when questioned: "We're looking into that. We're aware that Iran fired that missile. We're looking into the exact nature of it, and I'll try to have more for you later." Netanyahu mentioned the incident himself earlier that day on his Facebook page. He wrote in Hebrew, "Over the weekend, Iran launched another ballistic missile. This is a blatant violation of the Security Council's decision. I will be meeting with President Trump in Washington soon. I will bring up the need for renewing the sanction against Iran, sanctions against ballistic missiles and sanctions against terrorism, in addition to handling this whole failed agreement." He added, "Iranian aggression cannot be left without a response." Israel's Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Amb. Danny Danon, issued on the launch. He stressed that Iran once again contravened the UN Security Council's resolution and exposed its true intentions. He added that the international committee can no longer bury its head in the sand and ignore Iranian aggressions. He urged the UN to act immediately against Iranian actions that put both Israel and entire Middle East at risk. According to UN Security Council Resolution 1929: "Iran is prohibited from undertaking any activity related to ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear weapons and States are required to take all necessary measure to prevent the transfer of related technology or technical assistance." The commander of the Air Reserve Personnel Center, Col. Ellen Moore, received her first star today in a promotion ceremony at Buckley Air Force Base, Colo. Lt. Gen. Maryanne Miller, Chief of Air Force Reserve and Commander, Air Force Reserve Command, officiated the ceremony.Moore is the first female brigadier general to command ARPC. She is responsible for personnel support to nearly 1.3 million Air National Guard, Air Force Reserve, Regular Air Force and retired members, ensuring they are ready to deliver strategic Total Force war fighting capability for the Air Force. The center is a major command direct reporting unit of Air Force Reserve Command. From initial entry to retirement, the center provides world-class support for "Generations of Airmen" throughout their military careers. In addition, Headquarters Individual Reservist Readiness and Integration Organization reports directly to her. Headquarters RIO is responsible for the readiness, accountability, personnel and administrative servicing of more than 8,500 Individual Reservists worldwide. The center is a major command direct reporting unit of Air Force Reserve Command.Life is truly about relationships and it is all of you and my new ARPC family who are here today that makes this day special. I will always do my best to represent the Air Force and the Air Force Reserve in the best manner, Moore said. Vishal Dadlani and wife Priyali Kapur have filed for a divorce after staying apart for several years. By India Today Web Desk: Musician Vishal Dadlani has filed for divorce from his wife of many years, Priyali Kapur. Vishal and Priyali have been living separately for quite some time. Speaking to MissMalini.com, Vishal said, "After several years of living separately, Priyali and I are officially filing for divorce. This is the only statement either of us wishes to make, as this is a private and personal matter, and we hope it will be respected as such." advertisement Dadlani's statement further read, "Over our time apart, we have become perhaps greater friends than we have ever been before. Both our families are extremely close, to us and to each other, and of course, this will remain so. Our private lives have always been extremely personal to us, so we humbly ask for dignity and privacy in this regard. Thank you." The news of the Dadlanis parting ways adds to the long list of divorces in B-Town. ALSO READ: Vishal Dadlani's public apology to Sri Tarun Sagar - an act of humility or a mark of a true politician? ALSO WATCH: Brangelina to Ranbir-Katrina, 2016 was the year of celebrity splits --- ENDS --- As a homeowner, you probably already know that you should be working to maintain your home. But, chances are, you Read More Dobra, k. Szczecina 900 m2 40 miejsc parkingowych Atut: Dodatkowe dochody z paczkomatow InPostu, a juz niedugo i z myjni samoobsugowej. Tradycyjny zakup nieruchomosci, mozliwosc wykupienia uzytkowania wieczystego. Undeniably, Shahrukh and Aamir are the hottest ingredients for my Spiczee chicken delight. It all began with Aamir Khans recent blog, in which he stated that he has a dog called Shahrukh. The remark paved way for a great controversy in B-town and had the entire nation talking. What is on with Aamir? Till recently was he not the Mr Perfectionist? Aamir, please dont be so ridiculously involved in such down-market antics of insulting a fellow actor and especially not King Khan.

Well, Shahrukh didnt really appear to be affected with Aamirs comments; He chose to keep his calm and acted in a much-dignified manner. So far Shahrukh has been replying to Aamir in a diplomatic fashion, but I would like to warn Aamir that if his childish acts happen to continue, things can get real dirty.

It seems SRK is just not hitting the right notes these days; troubles are mounting on him one after the other. Shahrukh has been in for an onslaught ever since the launch of his TV show `Paanchvi Paas` well which is not doing well either. And talking about his IPL team, it has been the nucleus of complexities for him- the dressing room conflict, then the defeat of his team has crushed his dream of winning the `KARAMYUDH`.

Oh! Shahrukh I feel so sad for you!

Mmm with all that spicy gossip Im certain on winning the Yummy blog award.
Now lets add some juicy flavour to the feast.

Lets move on to the new starlet Deepika Padukone (Dips), who is all set to reign as the Princess of Tinsel Town, and has been in the glare of publicity for her ever changing relationships.

One really wonders who Dips is finally dating. Is it our cricket hero Yuvi, the T20 charmer Dhoni, or the mummys scrumptious boy Ranbir Kapoor?

This cute looking hunk definitely has chics drooling over him. He is as alluring as of course, my recipes. And with all that fan following, I really dont think Dips can have him for too long. But, I am sure she would cope up with it much sooner than expected because she seems to have a fling thing with almost everyone she meets.

Ask her about her status quo with each of these men and she finds refuge in diplomatic cliche. Dips, you are yet another, saucy ingredient for my Spicezee delight.

Hey! I did hear something on Dips teaming up with the King Khan to donate a few bucks for the release of an India Prisoner Of War in Pak. Wonder what happened to that. Thought she was finally making it into my good books.

Even Kareena Kapoor (Bebo) is riding the high waves of Bollywood. The searing hot sexy siren of Bollywood, who set the screen on fire with her sexy size zero look in `Tashan` is aspiring to be the No. 1.

This is besides being known as the 'Endorsement Queen of Bollywood' like brand SRK and brand Big B. Bebos beau Saif seems to be endorsing the Queen herself. With that tattoo in his arm what else do you expect?

I really hope this time Bebo is really considering marriage. I dont want to see our Chote Nawab ending up like poor dear Shahid.

I know I know you are all ears to more tittle-tattle. But, youd just have to wait until I dish up more gossips from B-town. See you soon!
Hi there, reader! Yes you, my dear, ogling at this bright page spilling into red. Its because of you that we at Zee News are all worked up! From the bossy types (hey boss its just a blog!) to the chai chors (the peon who is too busy looking at Mallika Sherawat on site)! All excited and taking a deep breath before plunging into the spicy world that the new India- Your India, my India- has come to live in.

Welcome to the heady times of a youngistan India. Where the gentlemens game has turned into a sporting orgy incomplete without a bevy firang beauties jiggling what they got, where your fav stars are willing to shake what they got with YOU on a reality show, where blogs have replaced eyes as the window to ones soul, and where the letter S truly represents everything we love- silver spoons, saucy curves, sushi, sex, street food, style, smooth skin, saree, spotlight, speaking (arguing, if a certain Sen is to be believed), soul-searching, sparkling drinks and spice.

Lots of the last S.

Its not for nothing that our land is often called the spice bowl. Since the time our ancients found spices to churn the curry culture, our mirch-masala has tickled many a-nose and made them stream with tears of gluttonous gratitude.

You see, we are like that only.

Celebrating birth and death, kindling a thousand lights on a moonless night, squeezing lemon into our soft-drinks, making our sati-savitris drench on screen with proper jhtakas in my-white-is whiter-than-your-white sarees, throwing colours at none other than Godthe spice train just goes on.

Spice is truly the way of life in India. And in such a charged atmosphere, how could we ignore the amount of fun you are having and, indeed, want to have?

After all underneath us all Indians is a chaat loving foodie who just cant do without his daily mouthful of golgappa. No, not even the hard news nosed nosey types (us) who like to drown themselves under the Sethusamudram or periodically choke themselves with nuclear deal dramas.

So it was that we decided to add some tadka in your- and our- life. Smelling it already? Well thats Spicezee.com brewing!

Its your adda, dhaba, lounge, pub, disc, mehfil- call it what you will- of glamour, glitz and girls. From Rakhi Sawants latest nakhra to Britneys newest revelation (not just the sans underwear type), from movies and music ratings to whats happening at a theatre near you, from the latest offering from Salman Rushdie to Sri Sri Ravishankars enlightening musings- Spicezee is your first and last stop on the entertainment trail.

Basically spicezee.com puts anything and everything about the well heeled and sought after trendsetters from India and across the world just a click away.

Television, Fashion, fads, funny & weird stories from around the world, Bollywood/Hollywood gossip, hotties on the dating circuit, latest pictures & videos, blogs, interviews, reviews & previews, fitness & yoga- you ask it, Spicezees got it.

And oh I hope you didnt miss the main ingredient of this mouth watering salami of a site, its main masala- You. This offering is made entirely with you in mind. You can have your say on every story posted, every picture shown, every video played- you type it, we make it live instantly.

Believe me you, feedback is something taken very seriously here. So bring on the compliments/Wah Wahs, the brickbats/Chi Chis- we are all ears dear reader.

And in the end, well a statutory warning:

Logging on to Spicezee.com can be intoxicating. You may feel like abandoning the eggs simmering on your pan or the sandwich grilling in the oven and find your eyes & ears glued to the computer screen. We take no responsibility for sudden wardrobe changes due to the fashion tips offered on site nor would the company be liable in case of your sudden urge to karaoke your neighbours deaf just to be published on the website. We will entertain no complaints about any rise in the number of gossip aunts who know why Katrina has become such a cat or why Amy Winehouse craves for pills. In short, click at your own risk.

Happy snee..ee.e.aAAAcChHOOOO..zing!




YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. The ministry of emergency situations says as of 09:00 come highways are closed or difficult to pass throughout the country. The Vardenyats Pass has been shut down, along with inter-community highways of Aragatsotn province and Ararat region. The Sotk-Karvajar section of the M11 highway, all highways of Lori province, the inter-community highways of Syunik and the 120-250kms of the M2 highway are difficult to pass. The ministry told ARMENPRESS a snowstorm is currently observed in the Stepanavan-Katnaghbyur highway. Georgian authorities reported the Stepantsminda-Lars highway is open for all types of vehicles with the use of snow chains, except trailers. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. The Turkish Armed Forces issued a statement on eliminating two dozen Islamic State militants in northern Syria, Anadolu reported. According to the Turkish Armed Forces, 23 targets have been hit, which killed 20 militants. The Turkish military intervention in Syria, code-named by Turkey as Operation Euphrates Shield began on August 24, 2016. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Mass protests are being held in a number of cities of the United States against President Donald Trumps toughening of the migration policy, reports TASS. The protests were organized in California, New York, Texas, Massachusetts, Georgia, as well as the capital district of Columbia. Over 12.000 people are taking part in the protest in New York. More than 1000 people gathered at one of the central squares of Boston. Several hundreds of people are taking part in the protest near the international airport of the city of Dallas, Texas. They are demanding to release 9 people who arrived from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Syria and were arrested based on Trumps order. Photo by AP YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. The overnight situation in the Nagorno Karabakh-Azerbaijan line of contact has been relatively calm, the defense ministry of Nagorno Karabakh (NKR) told ARMENPRESS. The ministry released a statement, saying: On January 29 and overnight January 30 the situation in the line of contact has been relatively calm. Azerbaijani forces made over 15 ceasefire violations in the abovementioned period, firing more than 90 shots at NKR posts. The Armed Forces of NKR refrained from taking countermeasures and confidently carried on with their service. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. The new measures on toughening the immigration control in the US, is not a ban on arrival of Muslims to country, as the US media falsely report, President Donald Trump said on January 29, TASS reported. Trump said America will continue supporting those who escape from pressures. But we will do this by defending our own citizens and borders, he said in a statement released by the White House. Trump said the new ban on entry of citizens of Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Libya, Syria, Somalia and Sudan to the United States relates to those 7 countries who were considered as sources of terrorism by the former US administration. This not a Muslim ban. This is not about religion, this is about terror and keeping our country secure, Trump said. Photo by EPA YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. In several provinces of Armenia, namely in Tavush and Lori, light snowfalls will begin on January 30. No significant precipitations are expected in other provinces. Gagik Surenyan, head of the meteorological center of Hydromet service, says the next cyclone is approaching Armenia after midday January 31. After midday January 31, snowfalls will start in all provinces of Armenia and will continue until the evening of February 1. Wind speed is expected to reach 15-20 m/s in separate areas, snowstorms in separate mountains terrains with low visibility. Snowfalls will stop overnight February 2 and the weather will be clear throughout the entire territory of Armenia February 3-4, Surenyan said. Overnight February 2-3 temperature will fall drastically due to arctic air currents and clear weather. Temperature at night will reach -30, in Shirak, Kotayk, Gegharkunik and mountainous areas of Aragatsotn and Vayots Dzor, -22.-27 in Lori, -15.-20 in Tavush. In Yerevan the temperature will reach 15..- 25 at night. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Armenias Prime Minister Karen Karapetyan held a consultation on January 28 over the process of implementation of the Governments program, press service of the Government told Armenpress. Arman Sahakyan - Head of the State Property Management Department under the Government, reported over the state property management and alienation process, stating that a new privatization program has been developed jointly with all agencies under the PMs instruction. It is already submitted to the Government and will be presented to the Parliament after the final discussion. The PM instructed Arman Sahakyan to quickly complete the works and prepare the entire package, saying: We must clearly formulate what is going to be private. We have a lot of property where the director year by year brings negative numbers, as a result we neither dismiss the director nor take certain steps. The PM stated that the activity of state governors, who are not working effectively, must be suspended. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Sajjad Karim British political figure, Co-Chair of EU-Armenia Parliamentary Cooperation Committee, gave an interview to Armenpress over the existing issues, solution prospects in the Nagorno Karabakh conflict settlement process, as well as spoke about the April four-day war. -Mr. Karim, first I would like you to comment a bit on the most painful event of the recent months, the April war. What do you think why now after so many years Azerbaijan restarted military operations? Was it expected? -The European Parliaments principled position on the matter, which we have been repeating many times over the years, is that the status quo in this conflict is unacceptable and unsustainable, precisely because it bears the constant risk of an escalation and of a resumption of armed hostilities. This is precisely why we have always spoken of a protracted conflict and not of a frozen one, and I think the April events just proved such fears were actually justified. -The international community, including also You, made so many calls on this case, but there wasn't any official statement about who has started the actions. Don't you think it's important? I want to know your personal opinion. -Look - especially in the fog of war it is extremely difficult to forge ones personal opinion in an impartial manner. Even more so when we - as the EU - do not have direct access to the region, something we - as the European Parliament - have requested many times. This is why we certainly back the creation of an OSCE investigative mechanism, as we have called for and are continuing to call for. -The Minsk Group Co-Chairs stated many times that the solution of this issue is political, it should be solved in a peaceful way. But during these years we see that the developments prove the contrary, the position of Azerbaijan during these years hasn't changed. What's your opinion about this? -Our principled stance is that there can be no alternative to the peaceful resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Currently we have a situation which is a protracted conflict, with a no war / no peace ratio of variable intensity. Such a status quo is no permanent solution. -Do you think the involvement of Nagorno Karabakh in the negotiation process could have some impact on the process? -There is an ongoing negotiation process, which is currently underway, led by the OSCE Minsk Co-Chairs. It may not be perfect, but it is the only one we have and the only one to which both Azerbaijan and Armenia agree. At this stage, I doubt the wisdom of introducing such new elements in the equation. -Mr. Karim, what will you say about the atrocities from Azerbaijani side toward Armenian soldiers and elderly people. They mutilated the bodies of our soldiers, beheaded them, cut the ears of elderly people and then gave the bodies to Armenian side. It's against all the norms and rules of war. Facts were collected on this and were sent it to the international institutions. What do you think about this and what should be done to bring the guilty side to responsibility? -War crimes are an extremely serious issue to which we should all give political priority. This is precisely the reason the international community has created the International Criminal Court, to deal with crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. All of our EU Member States have ratified the Rome Statute, which creates this Court. As the European Parliament, we have constantly encouraged all countries to join us -and that includes both Azerbaijan and Armenia, which signed, but still has not ratified [Azerbaijan even didnt sign the Rome Statuteed.]. I can only repeat this call and hope Armenia will thus be able to lead by example. -How would you comment on the recent Azerbaijani sabotage infiltration attempt on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border on December 29? The OSCE Minsk Group only 12 days later issued a statement by urging the sides to refrain from aggression and accusations. It seemed an attempt was made to put an equal sign between the sides, again refraining from addressed calls in case when Azerbaijan continues violating the ceasefire regime and also, according to the Minsk Group, refuses to implement the agreements reached in Vienna and St. Petersburg. -The text of the Minsk Group states that Baku and Yerevan continue to accuse each other of a December 29, 2016 attempted incursion on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border resulting in casualties. I think this is factually correct, even though it is true it refrains from apportioning blame. The same declaration also calls the leaders of both countries to assist in the setting up of an OSCE investigative mechanism - which we fully support and is indeed long overdue. -Mr. Karim, eventually how do you see the solution of the Karabakh conflict? -My personal opinion is that, frankly, the keys to this conflict lie in Baku and Yerevan much more than elsewhere and that the EU, and the international community can only assist and mediate, but not solve the conflict on its own. The ceasefire violations -not to speak of last April- are ample demonstration that the status quo is not sustainable. A negotiated solution will necessarily involve a give and take from all sides. Interview by Syuzi Muradyan YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Turkeys President Recep Tayyip Erdogan plans to hold campaign in over 40 provinces ahead of the upcoming constitutional changes referendum in the country, Hurriyet reported. During the campaign Erdogan will visit Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir, Bursa, Antalya, Adana, Erzurum, Diyarbakir, Van and etc. He will also take part in TV programs to present the essence of the expected changes. Turkeys Parliament approved the Constitutional changes, proposed by the ruling Justice and Development Party (JDP) that are comprised of 18 points. Under the constitutional changes the country is making a transition to the presidential system. After the Parliaments approval, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will sign the document which will be followed by a referendum. The referendum is expected to be held in the first half of April. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Turkeys pro-Kurdish Peoples Democratic Party lawmaker Nadir Yildirim has been arrested, Milliyet reports. The arrest took place while he was taking part in the court proceedings of another arrested MP of the party Idris Baluken. The Turkish media do not specify over which case the arrest happened. 11 out of 59 MPs of the Peoples Democratic Party are arrested. They are accused of being a member of the armed terrorist group, provoking to commit a crime and carrying out propaganda of terrorist group. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Aghvan Hovsepyan, Chairman of the Investigative Committee of Armenia appointed on January 30 Tigran Tamamyan to the post of Head of the Investigative department of Arabkir administrative district, the Investigative Committee told ARMENPRESS. Hovsepyan convened a working consultation and introduced Tamamyan to the department. The IC Chairman highlighted the working discipline and gave assignments aimed at raising the effectiveness and quality of investigations. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Georgia has achieved impressive progress in recent years, Secretary General of the Council of Europe Thorbjrn Jagland said in a joint press conference with Georgias Foreign Minister Mikheil Janelidze in Tbilisi, Sputnik News reported. Jagland arrived in Georgia on January 30 on a two-day official visit during which he will hold meetings with the countrys leadership, including President Giorgi Margvelashvili and Prime Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili. First of all I want to congratulate Georgia on this progress achieved during the recent years. The European institutions support the reforms carried out by Georgia. We are happy that the Georgian Government takes into account our instructions, Jagland said. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Armenian Ambassador to US Grigor Hovhannisyan visited the Armenian Genocide Monument at the California State University campus, Fresno, Armenpress reports citing The Collegian. The Ambassador was accompanied by California State University President Joseph Castro and honorary consul for the Republic of Armenia Barj Apkaryan. The visit was held on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the establishment of the Armenian Army. This monument is a powerful pride point for us because its the only one of its kind on a university campus in the United States. I think it says to our Armenian community and to all communities that we stand with them, that we support them, Castro said. In his turn Ambassador Hovhannisyan attached importance to erecting this monument in the campus territory. To have one of the finest universities in the state of California dedicate a place to erect this amazing monument, this [is a] powerful symbol that contains symbolism that we feel radiates solidarity, Hovhannisyan said. Castro gave the Ambassador an official Fresno State souvenir. He said the Ambassadors visit is an important proof of expanding the relationships between the California State University and universities in Armenia. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. 27% of students, participated in the survey by the National Institute of Labor and Social Studies, plan to leave Armenia if they will not find jobs with appropriate salaries or in their specialty, Arman Sargsyan, director of the National Institute of Labor and Social Studies told a press conference in Armenpress. In a 10-point scale the students assessed the chance on finding a job in Armenia with their desired salary, and it comprised 5.2 point which is quite a low point. This shows that the students having a desire to receive higher salaries, believe that it is not easy to find jobs with a salary acceptable for them in Armenia, Arman Sargsyan said. The students mentioned the amount of salary for their desired jobs. Majority of them, 55.1%, want to receive from 50.000 to 250.000 AMD, 35.7% from 250.000 to 500.000 AMD, and 7.8% wants to receive more than 500.000 AMD salary. The analysis shows that 29% of students are also working. 39.3% of the employed students said their work is of a temporary nature, 25.5% said they are working permanently, but without employment contract, 26.9% stated that their work is permanent with employment contract and 8.3% said they are doing volunteer work. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. The State Property Management Department adjunct to the Government of Armenia suggests that 47 public organizations mainly operating in the social sphere should be privatized. The Department has already submitted to the Cabinet the new draft program on Privatization of public property 2017-2020 plan. The Deputy Chairman of the State Property Management Department Ashot Markosyan told Armenpress that other organizations are also encompassed in the program, which had been put up for privatization earlier but have not been privatized so far. Upon the Premiers instruction we held productive discussions based on which we singled out the public organizations that should be privatized. At the moment the draft program is ready and is in the process of some minor amendments, Markosyan said. He clarified that the main goal of privatizing those organizations is to cut public expenditures. Those are budget-funded organizations and we aim to raise their efficiency. We have to admit that those organizations currently operate inefficiently. For 70 years we lived in a country where everything was publicly owned. The public ownership is deep-rooted in our consciousness and we abandon this with great difficulties. Those organizations need investments. One of the goals of the privatization is to attract investments. Its not a secret that we are in a risky zone with little investments. If you examine Armenias investment market you will find out that there was a great amount of investments when we privatized many companies, Markosyan explained without naming the companies. He only noted that there are many healthcare institutions among them. The Deputy Chairman of the State Property Management Department informed that after the Cabinet upholds the program, it will be submitted to the National Assembly. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. At the invitation of Minister of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics of the Islamic Republic of Iran Hossein Dehghan the delegation led by Defense Minister of Armenia Vigen Sargsyan left for Iran on January 30 on an official visit. As Armenpress was informed from the pres service of MoD Armenia, talks between Vigen Sargsyan and Hossein Dehghan are scheduled in the sideline of the visit. The talks will address the current level of bilateral defense cooperation and development prospects, as well as other issues of regional and international security and other issues of bilateral interest. In the sidelines of the visit the Armenian Defense Minister will hold meetings with the top legislative and executive officials and will visit various research and industrial enterprises. During his stay in Tehran Vigen Sargsyan will also meet with the representatives of the Armenian community. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Prominent Italian Corriere della Sera newspaper has again referred to the corruption scandal at the Council of Europe with the participation of Italian and Azerbaijani parliamentarians. Armenpress reports the newspaper mentions that any country member to that European institution are obliged to respect human rights, freedom of speech and principles of democracy, while in case of infringing the member states should be condemned, punished and in case of extreme cases their membership should be discontinued. The 10 years of Azerbaijans membership engendered the concept of caviar diplomacy. Almost none of the parliamentarians denies receiving at least some small amount of Caspian caviar from their Azerbaijani colleges during those years, the newspaper writes. The newspaper than refers to one of the cases that has caused most stir, the case of Italian parliamentarian Luca Volante, who being the leader of the political group of the largest party in the PACE, the European Peoples Party, has received a donation amounting 10 million Euro from Azerbaijani lobbyist Suleymanov with 10 thousand Euro for each month. The payments started in 2013 and were implemented through 4 different offshore organizations registered in Belize, Seychelles and the British Virgin Islands. Volante describes those sums as donations. Based on the suspicions over this case Milans Prosecutors Office launched an investigation in 2014 when the transactions had already amounted to nearly 2 million Euros. After two years of investigation the Court of Milan froze the money, expressing suspicions that these sums might be paid by the Azerbaijani government as a bribe to get political support at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. As evidence, the Italian newspaper states that Volante guided the political group led by him to vote against the report by German parliamentarian Strasser on political prisoners in Azerbaijan, as well as presents the conversation of Volante and Azerbaijani parliamentarian Muslim Mammadov, where Volante says that what Mammadov wants is a law for him. Last Friday the Court of Milan launched a proceeding over this case under money laundering, but not corruption, since the parliamentarian has immunity. But the Prosecutor will apply to the Supreme Court for that. The exposure of this issue is of more importance for the Council of Europe, since this organization represents the values for which we have shed blood and tears. But, at the same time, political persecutions against opposition representatives go on in Azerbaijan, with over 100 in prisons. The European Parliament did not even deploy election observers in Azerbaijan in 2015 since Azerbaijan did not meet the necessary conditions, while the leadership of that country has even closed the OSCE Office in Baku, the newspaper writes. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. The institutions of the Armenian community in Argentina issued a joint statement in which they "rejected" the visit of the Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mevlut Cavusoglu, to Argentina and South America, Armenpress reports, citing Prensa Armenia. "Not only is Cavusoglu the representative of the State that committed the crime against humanity, but his figure constitutes the executing arm of the negationist policy historically adopted by Turkey," denounces the text, noting that as Minister of Foreign Affairs "Cavusoglu devoted his work to intimidate anyone who recognizes or even names the Armenian Genocide, as were the cases of Russia, the European Parliament and the Vatican in 2015 and Germany and the United States in 2016." "On several occasions, Cavusoglu repeated that any pronouncement on the matter not coming from the parties (Armenia-Turkey) prejudices the reconciliation between the two peoples. However, they only criticize the statements that are not 'favorable' to Turkey, as they do not issue statements when the Azerbaijani denialist president, Ilham Aliyev, speaks of the 'Armenian lies', for example. Another pattern of double standard and lies of Cavusoglu are seen in what they call 'just memory,' a concept very similar to the infamous 'theory of the two demons' in Argentina, when they appeal to 'the sufferings of all parties' as a new stage of negationism. This implies that Armenians and Turks were two different parties to a conflict, and did not constitute a State-citizen relationship. Cavusoglu went on to say that Pope Francis 'discriminated between the sufferings' when he spoke of the Armenian Genocide." "We consider that his work as Minister of Foreign Affairs consists solely in exporting the model of censorship to freedom of expression maintained by the regime of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan against his own people," said the statement. "This is evidenced in the many occasions when Turkish diplomacy lobbied to block resolutions of solidarity with the Armenian people throughout the region of South America." "Law 13.326 of Uruguay and Law 26.199 of Argentina, as well as resolution 550/2015 of the Federal Senate of Brazil are pillars of the Human Rights policy in our region, and they form an indispensable standard. In this context, we urge the authorities responsible for the foreign policy of our countries to avoid joining any of the manifold manifestations of the negationism and totalitarianism of the Turkish State," finished the statement. Guy Verhofstadt said he "deplored" the Brexit decision but that he was looking "for fair negotiations, not punishment or revenge" The European Parliament's chief Brexit negotiator said Monday that simultaneous talks on the divorce terms and a potential trade deal for Britain after it leaves the EU were possible. "In the treaty,Article 50, we are saying a withdrawal can be agreed taking into consideration the future relationship," Guy Verhofstadt said during an event at London's Chatham House think tank. Britain has promised to trigger Article 50 of the EU's Lisbon Treaty by the end of March, after which negotiators will have two years to thrash out a deal. "It is a fantastic political text and it says it all -- a withdrawal agreement in the light of the future relationship," added Verhofstadt. "That is literally in the treaty and that is what we need to apply." Verhofstadt said he "deplored" the Brexit decision but that he was looking "for fair negotiations, not punishment or revenge". He set a 14- to 15-month timetable in which to conclude negotiations. British Prime Minister Theresa May is keen to conduct talks over the terms of the break-up and Britain's future relationship with the European Union at the same time. However, EU Commission chief negotiator Michel Barnier has warned he will "take everything step by step, in the right order," suggesting he favoured striking the divorce deal before discussing a potential future trade deal. Former Belgian PM Verhofstadt warned that the EU was under "serious threat" from three sides; radical political Islam, Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump, who recently suggested that more countries could leave the bloc. The parliament chief negotiator said it would be "completely ridiculous to ignore" that the EU faces a "polycrisis". He called for deeper federalisation of the remaining EU members, arguing that the European Union "doesn't exist" at the moment, and was really just a "loose confederation of 28 member states". Verhofstadt compared the swift and sweeping response of the United States to the 2008 financial crisis with the EU's reaction. Story continues "We had a discussion, when you have two opinions in EU nothing is happening at all," he said. "We have not adequate political institutions in the EU to react." Brexit is a "golden opportunity" to bring about deep reform, he added, drawing the countries into tighter unions on the economy and security. He urged voters to reject the nationalist politics currently sweeping western democracies, adding that polls showed most Europeans believe the EU should take more action on key issues such as external border controls, terrorism and the economy. "I am astounded to see a lot of people supporting nationalism as a solution to the common problems," he said, adding it was the "most stupid thing you can do, it is playing with fire". Uber found itself at the center of a storm created by the travel ban imposed by President Donald Trump's executive order, as angry customers accused the company of attempting to profit from a taxi driver work stoppage. In response to a growing controversy, Uber announced it would create a $3 million defense fund to help cover the legal expenses associated with the executive order. It was unclear, however, if the move would be sufficient to quell the firestorm surrounding one of Silicon Valley's darlings and a fixture in countless mobile devices. On Saturday, The New York City Taxi Workers Alliance called for a temporary halt to rides heading to John F. Kennedy airport. Several immigrant detainees were being held at a terminal there before being released when a judge intervened to block parts of Trump's executive order. The alliance, which is not a union but a cab driver advocacy group, sought to rally drivers in support. Uber continued to carry passengersmany of them protesters rallying in support of detaineesto the airport. However, the company announced shortly after 730pm Eastern that it would temporarily suspend surge pricing, in recognition that demand would be unusually high. Still, usersangered by the fact that the company didn't completely halt service in solidaritylashed out by vowing to delete their Uber applications. Some pledged to switch to competitor Lyft, even though Uber CEO Travis Kalanick was one of the first Silicon Valley chiefs to come out against the Trump travel ban. Uber pledged its support to drivers affected by what it called Trump's "unjust" ban, even promising to compensate them for lost wages. That, however, failed to placate a client base riled up by the travel ban. Some pointed out that Kalanick was a member of the president's advisory council on business. In a statement, Kalanick said he would use his leverage with Trump to address the travel ban. Yet on Sunday afternoon, the backlash appeared to widen. Twitter lit up with celebrities expressing their outrage and planning to delete the app. Story continues Boldface names such as Lena Dunham, George Takei, Taraji P. Henson and Janelle Monae all suggested they would join the Uber boycott. A spokesperson contacted by CNBC said Uber was "sorry for any confusion about our earlier tweetit was not meant to break up any strike. We wanted people to know they could use Uber to get to and from JFK at normal prices, especially last night." Separately, Lyft said it would donate $1 million to the ACLU, which spearheaded the legal action that resulted in the freeing of detainees. More From CNBC TORONTOGrand Slam Media has revealed the newest addition to the Adnium team: Stephanie Hall. She will lead as the director of advertising and will be responsible for advertiser acquisition and retention. Hall also will focus her efforts on a number of key initiatives, such as expanding Adnium's growth into emerging markets. With years of experience in performance marketing, Hall is prepared to forge more strategic partnerships to the already successful Adnium brand. Stephanie has years of experience in very technologically driven ad environments, so this is a huge benefit to RTB advertisers who take a more automated approach to marketing, said CEO Luke Hazlewood. We're thrilled to see where Stephanie will take the advertising team. Watch out for Adnium to reach an even wider demographic as we continue to build on our brand awareness this year. A company release notes that Adnium has "grown into one of the most progressive and innovative RTB ad networks in the industry, winning over the trust and confidence of all its publishers and advertisers. The network boasts a wealth of members area sites featuring the very best display and pop traffic from major adult dating platforms." Said Hall, Ive gained a lot of experience developing partnerships and key business relationships so joining the Adnium team to develop their advertising department was a no-brainer. As a company, Grand Slam Media has over ten years of delivering quality traffic so I know they already have a glowing reputation. Hall will work out of Grand Slam Medias Toronto office. For business inquiries and networking opportunities, contact her through e-mail: [email protected] An American pensioner suffering from dementia who was found wandering a remote English village was flown to Britain and left in a car park by his wife and son, according to US court documents. Roger Curry was allegedly abandoned in the car park of Hereford bus station on 7 November 2015 after being taken from his home in Los Angeles and flown to Britain by his wife and son. The 76-year-old, who did not know his name or where he was, was found in the company of two men who flagged down a passing ambulance. They had reportedly found him looking lost in the village of Credenhill, Hereford. Abandoned: Mr Curry was discovered in the village of Credenhill, more than 5,000 miles away from his Los Angeles home. (Google Maps) Mystery had surrounded how he came to be in the UK but legal documents uncovered by Panorama and filed in Los Angeles state: In late 2015 Mr Curry was taken surreptitiously to England by his wife Mary Curry and his son Kevin Curry and abandoned there. MORE: Uniformed civilian Traffic Wombles may soon be given the same powers as traffic police MORE: Conman jailed after racking up 124,000 at luxury hotels using a cancelled credit card One of the men with Mr Curry when he was found was described as having an American accent, but younger than Mr Curry and he allegedly vanished from the scene. Mr Curry was taken into the care of a nursing home while police and social services spent months trying to find out who he was. Mystery: Roger Curry was allegedly dumped in the UK by his wife and son (SWNS) He was finally flown back to America eight months later and is now under the care of authorities in Los Angeles. At the time of his discovery, police appealed for help to identify the vulnerable man and contacted the American and Canadian embassies after hearing his accent. West Mercia Police said they also wanted to trace a man, described as being in his forties, who was seen to be walking with Mr Curry towards Hereford County Hospital on the day he was discovered. As part of the investigation, a 50-year-old man from Taunton, Somerset, was arrested on suspicion of kidnap and was bailed. He has not been charged. Mr Currys son Kevin, who was interviewed by Panorama, said he had had nothing to do with the abandonment of his father. Top pic: SWNS Canadian citizens can travel freely to the United States despite U.S. President Donald Trump's sweeping immigration order that bans visitors from seven Muslim-majority countries, the Prime Minister's Office says. Saturday's news came hours after the U.S. State Department told CBC News the 90-day travel ban covers all people who have a nationality or dual nationality with Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Iran, Somalia, Libya, and Yemen which would include tens of thousands of Canadians. "We have been assured that Canadian citizens travelling on Canadian passport will be dealt with in the usual process," Kate Purchase, spokeswoman for the Prime Minister's Office, said in a statement. The NDP has written to the Speaker of the House of Commons requesting an emergency debate on the immigration ban, a day before Parliament is set to re-open after a six-week break. NDP Immigration critic Jenny Kwan said the ban will have "disastrous implications" for thousands of travellers, family members, students, business people and asylum-seekers. "A ban against individuals based upon race, religion, or country of birth, implemented by our closest neighbour, cannot be tolerated," Kwan said in the letter. "Canadians cherish their role as global citizens and defenders of human rights and as their elected representatives it is our duty to respond to these extraordinary events." Trump's executive order on Friday curbs travel to the U.S. for people coming from the seven Muslim-majority countries. In an email to CBC News earlier on Saturday, a spokesperson for the U.S. State Department said: "Beginning January 27, 2017, travellers who have nationality or dual nationality of one of these countries will not be permitted for 90 days to enter the United States or be issued an immigrant or nonimmigrant visa." "Those nationals or dual nationals holding valid immigrant or nonimmigrant visas will not be permitted to enter the United States during this period." Story continues It's not clear at this point whether the ban affects dual nationals who have citizenship with one of the banned countries and another country outside of Canada. 'We're not terrorists' Before the PMO issued the statement of assurance to Canadian dual citizens, Leena Yousefi, a family and immigration lawyer in Vancouver, told CBC News she is "deeply saddened and offended" by Trump's order. Yousefi, 34, said her family immigrated to Canada in 1996 and she's only returned to Iran once to visit family and hasn't bothered to update her Iranian passport. She said she often travels to the U.S. and was hoping to start a new law firm there because she often works with Americans looking to immigrate to Canada. "We're just completely shocked," she said. "We have family in the United States. We've never had a problem with American people." "I think all the Iranian-Canadian professionals ... need to speak up," she said. "We're not terrorists, at all." Families separated Plenty of people in Canada are still affected by the executive order. Mehran Shirazi, a PhD engineering student at Simon Fraser University and a permanent resident in Canada, said he doesn't know when he will be able to see his brother in New York City, who is awaiting a green card for the U.S. Both were born in Iran. "We'd hoped to see each other but it's not going to work because he cannot come here because then he cannot come back to the U.S. and I cannot visit him," Shirazi said. Shirazi's parents haven't seen his brother in six years and had planned to visit to New York this spring. "Now they cannot do that. They don't know when, if at all, they can see him again," he said. 'I can't believe this is happening' A Canadian-Iranian woman living in the U.S. who asked not to be named told CBC Toronto on Saturday that she's afraid to come back to Canada, for fear she won't be able to return again to her family. "I can't believe this is happening," she said. She said she and her husband were planning a trip to Toronto along with their children during their February school break. Despite the fact that she holds a green card and her children are born in the U.S., the woman says, she fears she would be barred from re-entering the country after their visit to Canada. "If we leave the country they'll all be able to come back, including my husband, but I would be denied entry," she said by phone. "If I didn't have kids I would just leave and not want to come back. But I have kids and they go to school here. And I can't just say, 'OK, we'll go' and risk it." Canada's immigration minister born in Somalia Canada's Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen was born in Somalia, one of the countries on Trump's ban list. Camielle Edwards, senior special assistant for Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, told CBC News, "We have no concerns about Minister Hussen's ability to travel to the United States." Trump's order makes some exemptions for diplomats. It also suspends entry for Syrian refugees until Trump determines that doing so is "consistent with the national interest," and freezes the country's refugee program for 120 days though the U.S. may admit refugees on a case-by-case. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Twitter "Canadians will welcome" those escaping persecution, regardless of their faith, and that, "Diversity is our strength." 2011 National Household Survey According to the 2011 National Household Survey from Statistics Canada, the latest survey available, there were over 35,000 Canadians in 2011 who shared citizenship with the countries banned. - 1,655 with Somalia. - 5,590 with Iraq. - 21,610 with Iran. - 1,505 with Sudan. - 210 with Yemen. - 4,080 with Syria. - 535 with Libya. The survey also showed there were 74,550 people in Canada from those countries who do not have citizenship in Canada: - 5,115 from Somalia. - 19,030 from Iraq. - 36,950 from Iran. - 4,005 from Sudan. - 830 from Yemen. - 5,375 from Syria. - 3,245 from Libya. The survey was compiled before Canada's commitment to resettle tens of thousands of Syrian refugees in 2015. A federal judge in New York on Saturday night barred U.S. from deporting travellers with valid visas covered by Trump order, which the American Civil Liberties Union says will affect 100 to 200 people detained at airports. It's unclear how many are Canadian. (In this Jan. 29 story, corrects quote of tweet by Canadian legislator Greg Fergus to 'demonizing' instead of 'sermonizing') By Kevin Dougherty QUEBEC CITY (Reuters) - Six people were killed and eight wounded when gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque during Sunday night prayers, in what Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a "terrorist attack on Muslims". Police said two suspects had been arrested, but gave no details about them or what prompted the attack. Initially, the mosque president said five people were killed and a witness said up to three gunmen had fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre. Police said only two people were involved in the attack. "Six people are confirmed dead - they range in age from 35 to about 70," Quebec provincial police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told reporters, adding eight people were wounded and 39 were unharmed. The mosque's president, Mohamed Yangui, who was not inside when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. "Why is this happening here? This is barbaric, he said. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement: "We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge". Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country." The shooting came on the weekend that Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, after U.S. President Donald Trump suspended the U.S. refugee program and temporarily barred citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States on national security grounds. A Canadian federal Liberal legislator, Greg Fergus, tweeted: "This is an act of terrorism -- the result of years of demonizing Muslims. Words matter and hateful speeches have consequences!" The premier of Quebec province, Philippe Couillard, said security would be increased at mosques in Quebec City and Montreal. "We are with you. You are home," Couillard said, directing his comments at the province's Muslim community. "You are welcome in your home. We are all Quebecers. We must continue together to build an open welcoming and peaceful society". New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said police were providing additional protection for mosques in that city following the Quebec shooting. "All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something," he tweeted. 'NOT SAFE HERE' French President Francois Hollande condemned the attack. "The terrorists wanted to attack the spirit of peace and tolerance of the citizens of Quebec," Hollande said in a statement on Monday. "France stands shoulder to shoulder with the victims and their families". Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them from North Africa. In June last year, a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the cultural center. "We are not safe here," said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque in the middle-class, residential area, but did not on Sunday. Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now "very worried" and thinking of moving back to Morocco. Mass shootings are rare in Canada, which has stricter gun laws than the United States, and news of the shooting sent a shockwave through mosques and community centers throughout the mostly French-language province. "Its a sad day for all Quebecers and Canadians to see a terrorist attack happen in peaceful Quebec City," said Mohamed Yacoub, co-chairman of an Islamic community center in a Montreal suburb. "I hope its an isolated incident." Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of the province was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighboring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Zebida Bendjeddou, who left the Quebec City mosque earlier on Sunday evening, said the center had received threats. "In June, they'd put a pig's head in front of the mosque. But we thought: 'Oh, they're isolated events.' We didn't take it seriously. But tonight, those isolated events, they take on a different scope," she said. Bendjeddou said she had not confirmed the names of those killed, but added: "They're people we know, for sure. People we knew since they were little kids." (Reporting by Kevin Dougherty in Quebec City; Additional reporting by Mark Hosenball in Washington, Allison Lampert in Montreal, Andrea Hopkins and David Ljunggren in Ottawa, Anna Mehler Paperny in Toronto and Chris Michaud in New York; Writing by Michael Perry; Editing by Peter Cooney, Robert Birsel) During Sundays Miss Universe pageant, host Steve Harvey announced the correct winner for the 2017 pageant, and it was Miss France, Iris Mittenaere. The contestant seemed to impress the judges with her well-rounded life and authentic responses to questions. Mittenaere had a funny moment with Harvey as she explained that she was quite the cook and that her specialty was beef bourguignon. When she invited him over to try it, Harvey responded, No, I have a wife. I cant come. Mittenaere is studying to become a dentist in Paris. She explained that dentists did a lot of work for her as a child, so she wanted to give back. She also showed how caring she can be when she was asked a question about the global refugee crisis. She said, In France, we want to have the most globalization that we can. We want to have the biggest exchange of people that we can. Maybe someday that will change, but now we have open borders. With her study of dentistry and her care for refugees, Iris Mittenaere will be sure to bring smiles to many faces in her reign as Miss Universe. Watch: Steve Harvey avoids another Miss Universe fail: Tell us what you think! Hit us up on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram, or leave your comments below. And check out our host, Cynthia LuCiette, on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram. BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq has asked the United States to reconsider the travel ban on its citizens, the foreign ministry said on Monday, taking a more diplomatic line than the Iraqi parliament which had demanded the government "retaliate". "It is necessary that the new American administration reconsider this wrong decision," the foreign ministry said in a statement. Noting their cooperation in fighting the Islamic State group, the statement added: "We affirm Iraq's desire to strengthen the strategic partnership between the two countries." By executive order on Friday, President Donald Trump banned U.S. entry for people from seven Muslim-majority countries Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen and temporarily halted the admission of refugees. (Reporting by Ahmed Rasheed and Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Robin Pomeroy) He writes, Despite the boasted rhetoric about the agreement reached in the Astana talks over the Syria ceasefire, this latest stage unveiled the limits involved parties face in bringing an end to the six-year war. Even Russias chief negotiator at the discussion reached the point of complaining, more than once, about diverse complications. And the main obstacle remains Iran, due to the fact that a true ceasefire in Syria should spell the end of its foothold. He adds, The talks have even been dubbed a diplomatic coup, with all three sponsors, Moscow, Ankara, and Tehran accused of seeking separate objectives. The truth is there is no ceasefire thanks to Irans support for Syrian dictator Bashar Assad. Despite the so-called ceasefire pact sealed on December 30th, pro-Assad forces backed by Iran including the Lebanese Hizballah have continued attacks on the besieged rebel-held area of Wadi Barada near Damascus. The Syrian regime makes the excuse that al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorist groups are in control of Ain al-Fijeh, a small town in Wadi Barada. This, despite locals reporting only a tiny minority of terrorist being present. It would seem that neither Assad, nor Iran have are seeking a meaningful ceasefire in Syria. Alavi says that according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, regime warplanes launched further airstrikes targeting rebel-controlled areas in west Syria, leaving 12 dead in one area alone. The Astana talks have left many loopholes may be exploited: No details are available about a mechanism to monitor a supposed ceasefire. Political issues failed to achieve progress and the talks are as narrowly focused. One senior Western diplomat criticized the entire initiative as not very serious,adding, You dont seal a ceasefire in two days. There are no indications of any work on modalities, observers, mechanisms, maps, and so forth. No document has been signed by Syrian opposition or regime representatives, the two parties who actually have to reach an arrangement. While the agreement promises a separation of rebel forces into legitimate opposition and terrorists, no specific method is laid out over how, and according to what merits. The main benefactor of the talks might be considered Russia, especially since the U.S. has participated only as an observer. Iran is among those tasked to monitor the ceasefire, but it is obvious Iran-backed Shiite militias, who have already been accused of violating this ceasefire, will seek to exploit the numerous Astana agreement loopholes. Even the next date set for future talks between Syrian opposition and regime delegations, lacks firm confirmation. The Astana negotiations did not go as planned due to the different interests of all three sponsors, proving that Washington and the Gulf States should take part in any future effort. However there is difficulty, due to differences between Russia and Iran over the United States possibly taking part. Moscow is in favor of Washington, under the Trump administration, taking part, while Iran flatly rejects the proposal. They (the Russians) can now see how difficult their partners are, one Western diplomat described, according to Reuters. They are finding a lot of obstacles from Hezbollah forces, Iran and the regime, explained Mohammed Alloush, head of the Syrian opposition delegation. Western diplomats have also voiced concerns, viewing Iran as a main obstacle to progress for a ceasefire. Concerns regarding Irans involvement in Syria, including a conglomerate of militias and Assad forces continuing to launch attacks on civilians in rebel-held areas, there are serious doubts about Tehrans role in this entire ordeal. This leaves the international community lacking an obvious solution. The regime in Tehran is the source of crisis in the region and killings in Syria; it has played the greatest role in the expansion and continuation of ISIS. Peace and tranquility in the region can only be achieved by evicting this regime from the region, said Iranian opposition leader Maryam Rajavi, President of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, an umbrella group of dissidents including the Peoples Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). Alavi points to Irans meddling report card in Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen, saying, this proves this is the sole solution that can render a lasting ceasefire and pave the path to genuine peace. On Friday evening, President Trump signed an executive order to temporarily bar the citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States and immediately halt to the U.S. refugee program for four months with Syrian refugees barred indefinitely. By Saturday, protests had erupted at international airports across the nation, calling for the release of people being detained because of the executive order. Amid the chaos and unrest, Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, a senior White House adviser, were getting ready for a night out on the town in black tie apparel. Late Saturday night, a judge blocked the deportations. And late Saturday night, the Trump-Kushner couple tweeted a photo of themselves, pictured above, all dolled up and ready for a night out. It was the tweet seemingly heard around the world, as people immediately took to social media to decry the fact that Trump and her husband showed off fancy attire while the lives and security of refugees were in question, with a mounting number of Americans filling every nook and cranny at airports to protest the detention and deportation of refugees. It also didnt help that Ivankas dress, reportedly $5000, was metallic silver jacquard. @amjoyshow @IvankaTrump It reminds me of when Germans danced to Richard Wagner and went to concerts as Jews were led into gas chambers. Katie (@wrennywrenn) January 29, 2017 @IvankaTrump Refugees who sold their belongings and were told they'd be welcome are turned around at U.S. border: https://t.co/EP42ZgtlRW John Green (@johngreen) January 29, 2017 @IvankaTrump Your father is responsible for two senior citizens with green cards being illegally detained at O'Hare for 10 hours.Have fun! Cher (@thecherness) January 29, 2017 .@IvankaTrump But, you know. Enjoy your party or whatever. Looks fancy. Mike Satcher (@satchmoagain) January 29, 2017 @IvankaTrump Oh, good, the world is burning and families are being torn apart, but you're decked out in tin foil. Cool. #MuslimBan Christopher Ehlers (@_ChrisEhlers) January 29, 2017 Quickly, the hashtag #lethemeatcake popped up on social media, as people compared Ivanka Trump and by association, the entire Trump family to Marie Antoinette. Story continues Antoinette, while married to French King Louis XVI, is associated with the phrase Let them eat cake! in relation to her supposed reaction upon hearing about the struggles of the people of France, including a food shortage that left many families without staples like bread. The open question on social media was the following: Could Trump be so deep in a rarefied bubble that tweeting a photo of herself and her husband before a black tie event wearing a $5,000 evening gown seemed like an appropriate message while the country was embroiled in protests over the rights of immigrants and the safety and well-being of refugees? What do you think? Tell us in the comments, below. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest for nonstop inspiration delivered fresh to your feed, every day. A Nova Scotia judge has quashed the decision by the province's environment minister to dismiss the appeal of a First Nation opposed to the Alton natural gas project. The Sipekne'katik First Nation had argued the plan to flush out salt beds to create natural gas storage caverns near Stewiacke, and then pipe the diluted brine into the Shubenacadie River, posed a danger to the tidal waterway and its fish species. It said it had not been adequately consulted and appealed the January 2016 decision by Environment Minister Margaret Miller to approve the project, which is managed by Alton Natural Gas Storage LP. Miller ultimately rejected that appeal. In a decision released Monday, Nova Scotia Supreme Court Justice Suzanne Hood found the band was not supplied with reports and documents it needed to mount a proper appeal of the minister's decision. "As a result, I conclude the decision of the minister should be quashed. It was not procedurally fair in the circumstances of this case," she wrote. In particular, she said, the band was denied a copy of a report by provincial environment project leader Glen Warner that was submitted to Miller. The Warner report, based on information from the Office of Aboriginal Affairs, criticized the band's position on lack of consultation as well as its conduct. That report was part of the minister's decision. "The matter is therefore remitted back to the minister to allow Sipekne'katik an opportunity to respond to the Warner report and the material from the Office of Aboriginal Affairs on which Warner relied," Hood said. Judge does not order stay But the judge stopped short of ordering a stay of the minister's approval, which the band had also requested. "I conclude I do not have the authority to deal with the stay while the matter is subject to appeal to the minister." On Monday, a spokeswoman for the Department of Environment said it would need time to review the decision, but that the company can continue operations at this point. Story continues The government has said it believes the project is safe and does not threaten the environment. When it granted the approval last year, the Environment Department said the salinity of the Shubenacadie River had to meet "normal background levels." Protesters have demonstrated at the Alton site. In September, some blocked the road near Stewiacke, calling for better science and consultation. Alton Natural Gas Storage is a subsidiary of Calgary-based AltaGas Ltd. Last year it said the storage project would save consumers $17 million annually by maintaining a natural gas supply during winter months when prices typically spike. Expected in-service date is 2019 In October, the company said it was holding off on creating its underground natural gas storage caverns until some time in 2017. It had planned to start the process, called salt brining, in late 2016. In a statement Monday, the company noted the judge did not stay the approval. AltaGas did not offer an updated timeline on immediate work, but said the expected in-service date is 2019. "Alton respects the decision of the court and will work constructively with the government of Nova Scotia and Sipekne'katik First Nation to understand next steps," the company said. "We remain committed to the project and to working closely with members of the Mi'kmaq community regarding environmental protection and community benefits." By Karen Lema MANILA (Reuters) - Philippine police have suspended controversial anti-narcotics operations until they can rid their ranks of "scalawags", their chief said on Monday, following President Rodrigo Duterte's admission the force was "corrupt to the core". Duterte, in a break from his steadfast support for the police, estimated 40 percent of the force were corrupt and as "lousy as drug lords", responding angrily late on Sunday to the kidnap and killing of a South Korean businessman by drug squad officers. Duterte has been unwavering in his defense of police involved in the campaign against drugs in the face of international outrage over the death toll, and repeatedly said he would protect those accused of wrongdoing. He has, however, frequently voiced frustration at police corruption. Duterte made it clear the drugs war would continue until his presidency ends in 2022 and his police chief, Ronald dela Rosa, said he hoped operations could resume within a month. "To all the rogue cops, beware! We no longer have a war on drugs. We now have a war on scalawags," Dela Rosa told reporters after a flag-raising ceremony at the police headquarters where South Korean Jee Ick-joo, 53, was strangled in October. "We will cleanse our ranks." New York-based Human Rights Watch dismissed the suspension of the anti-drug campaign as a public relations stunt, unless Duterte "seeks meaningful accountability" for the wave of drug-related killings unleashed after he took office seven months ago. More than 7,000 people have since been killed, about 2,250 during police operations. The remainder are being investigated. The drugs war has alarmed the West and rights groups accuse Duterte of tolerating a wave of extrajudicial killings by police. Police deny this, saying they have acted in self-defense. 'DIRE CONSEQUENCES' While rights groups suspect many of killings being investigated have been police "hits", police have attributed the deaths to vigilantism, narcotics turf wars and other violence not related to drugs. "His wilful blind-eye to those deaths constitutes a disgraceful betrayal of the public trust," Phelim Kline, the group's deputy Asia director, said in a statement, referring to Duterte. Kline said it was "a telling indicator of his personal contempt for rule of law and the right to life of his fellow citizens". Dela Rosa's decision to suspend the drug crackdown came a day after he announced the dismantling of all anti-drugs units due to police abuses, including the planting of evidence. The death of Jee was a disaster for the image of the police. Jee was arrested for drug offences that his wife and lawyers said was an official cover for kidnap for ransom. Senator Leila De Lime, Duterte's most outspoken critic, said the president had a problem with "cognitive dissonance" and it was baffling that he could so strongly denounce police yet vow no let-up in the campaign. "I continue to worry about the state of the president's mental health," she said in a statement. "This latest incongruence between his factual assertion of a rotten police force on the one hand and his reliance on them to continue prosecuting his drug war as official government policy, has dire consequences." (Additional reporting by Neil Jerome Morales; Editing by Martin Petty, Robert Birsel) By Andrew Osborn MURMANSK, Russia (Reuters) - The nuclear icebreaker Lenin, the pride and joy of the Soviet Union's Arctic great game, lies at perpetual anchor in the frigid water here. A relic of the Cold War, it is now a museum. But nearly three decades after the Lenin was taken out of service to be turned into a visitor attraction, Russia is again on the march in the Arctic and building new nuclear icebreakers. It is part of a push to firm Moscow's hand in the High North as it vies for dominance with traditional rivals Canada, the United States, and Norway as well as newcomer China. Interviews with officials and military analysts and reviews of government documents show Russia's build-up is the biggest since the 1991 Soviet fall and will, in some areas, give Moscow more military capabilities than the Soviet Union once had. The expansion has far-reaching financial and geopolitical ramifications. The Arctic is estimated to hold more hydrocarbon reserves than Saudi Arabia and Moscow is putting down a serious military marker. "History is repeating itself," Vladimir Blinov, a guide on board the icebreaker Lenin, which is named after communist revolutionary Vladimir Lenin, told a recent tour group. "Back then (in the 1950s) it was the height of the Cold War and the United States was leading in some areas. But we beat the Americans and built the world's first nuclear ship (the Lenin). The situation today is similar." Under President Vladimir Putin, Moscow is rushing to re-open abandoned Soviet military, air and radar bases on remote Arctic islands and to build new ones, as it pushes ahead with a claim to almost half a million square miles of the Arctic. It regularly releases pictures of its troops training in white fatigues, wielding assault rifles as they zip along on sleighs pulled by reindeer. The Arctic, the U.S. Geological Survey estimates, holds oil and gas reserves equivalent to 412 billion barrels of oil, about 22 percent of the worlds undiscovered oil and gas. Low oil prices and Western sanctions imposed over Moscow's actions in Ukraine mean new offshore Arctic projects have for now been mothballed, but the Kremlin is playing a longer game. It is building three nuclear icebreakers, including the world's largest, to bolster its fleet of around 40 breakers, six of which are nuclear. No other country has a nuclear breaker fleet, used to clear channels for military and civilian ships. Russia's Northern Fleet, based near Murmansk in the Kola Bay's icy waters, is also due to get its own icebreaker, its first, and two ice-capable corvettes armed with cruise missiles. "Under (Soviet leader Mikhail) Gorbachev and (Russian President Boris) Yeltsin, our Arctic border areas were stripped bare," said Professor Pavel Makarevich, a member of the Russian Geographical Society. "Now they are being restored." 'AGGRESSIVE STEPS' The build-up, which echoes moves in Crimea and Kaliningrad, has been noticed in Washington. U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis told his confirmation hearing this month it was "not to our advantage to leave any part of the world" to others. Mattis, in a separate written submission, described Moscow's Arctic moves as "aggressive steps" and pledged to prioritize developing a U.S. strategy, according to Senator Dan Sullivan. That poses a potential dilemma for President Donald Trump, who wants to repair U.S.-Russia ties and team up with Moscow in Syria rather than get sucked into an Arctic arms race. The build-up is causing jitters elsewhere. Some 300 U.S. Marines landed in Norway this month for a six-month deployment, the first time since World War Two that foreign troops have been allowed to be stationed there. And with memories of Russia's 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimea still fresh, NATO is watching closely. Six of its members held an exercise in the region in 2015. The Soviet military packed more firepower in the Arctic, but it was set up to wage nuclear war with the United States not conventional warfare. Arctic islands were staging posts for long-range bombers to fly to America. But in an era when a slow-motion battle for the Arctic's energy reserves is unfolding, Russia is creating a permanent and nimble conventional military presence with different and sometimes superior capabilities. Sergei Shoigu, the defense minister, is presiding over the re-opening or creation of six military facilities, some of which will be ready by the year's end. They include an island base on Alexandra Land to house 150 troops able to survive autonomously for 18 months. Called the Arctic Trefoil, officials have said they may deploy military jets there. MiG-31 fighters, designed to shoot down long-range bombers, or the SU-34, a frontline bomber, are seen as suitable. Moscow's biggest Arctic base, dubbed "Northern Shamrock", is meanwhile taking shape on the remote Kotelny Island, some 2,700 miles east of Moscow. It will be manned by 250 personnel and equipped with air defense missiles. Soviet-era radar stations and airstrips on four other Arctic islands are being overhauled and new ground-to-air missile and anti-ship missile systems have been moved into the region. Russia is also spending big to winterize military hardware. "The modernization of Arctic forces and of Arctic military infrastructure is taking place at an unprecedented pace not seen even in Soviet times," Mikhail Barabanov, editor-in-chief of Moscow Defense Brief, told Reuters. He said two special Arctic brigades had been set up, something the USSR never had, and that there were plans to form a third as well as special Arctic coastal defense divisions. "Russia's military activity in the Arctic is a bit provocative," said Barabanov. "It could trigger an arms race." (For a graphic on Russia's Arctic Expansion, click: http://tmsnrt.rs/2k9Vhxh) 'FRIENDLY PEOPLE' In Murmansk, home to Russia's icebreakers and just an hour from the Northern Fleet's headquarters, the prospect of an Arctic renaissance is a source of pride. The city is steeped in Arctic and military history. The conning tower of the Kursk submarine, which sunk in 2000 after an explosion, looks down from a hill above the port. And in central Murmansk, scale models of dozens of icebreakers crowd the halls of the Murmansk Shipping Company, while sailors, wrapped in great coats, barrel along its streets. "These Arctic bases are on our territory. Unlike some other countries we are not building them overseas," said Denis Moiseev, a member of the Russian Geographical Society. "Other countries are also very active in trying to push their borders towards the North Pole. Our army must be able to operate on all our territory in extreme conditions." One country regularly mentioned as an unlikely Arctic rival is China, a close Moscow ally, which has observer status on the Arctic Council, the main forum for coordinating cooperation in the region, and is starting to build its own icebreakers. Politicians are keener to discuss a commercial Arctic push. New roads and a railway are being built and ports overhauled as Moscow expands its freight capacity and, amid warmer climate cycles, readies for more traffic along its Arctic coast. It hopes the Northern Sea Route, which runs from Murmansk to the Bering Strait near Alaska, could become a mini Suez Canal, cutting sea transport times from Asia to Europe. But while the route's popularity inside Russia is growing, relatively high transit costs and unpredictable ice coverage means it has lost some of its luster for foreign firms. Grigory Stratiy, deputy governor of the Murmansk Region, told Reuters there was strong interest in sea route from Asian nations however and that new icebreakers would allow for year-round navigation in the 2020s. "Whatever the weather, the Northern Sea Route will be needed. Its use will definitely grow," said Stratiy, who said Russia was keen to attract foreign investment to the Arctic. When asked about his country's military build-up, he smiled. "There's no reason to be afraid I can reassure you," he said, saying it was driven only by a need to modernize. "Russia has never had any aggressive aims and won't have them. We are very friendly people." (Editing by Janet McBride) Shopping south of the border could get easier as North Dakota mulls increasing Sunday hours Manitoba shoppers who head down to Grand Forks, N.D. for a bargain know that they have to sleep in on Sundays the state's "blue law" keeps Sunday shopping hours limited to 126 p.m. Those are the same hours Manitoba kept for decades, until 2012. Since then, businesses have been allowed to open at 9 a.m. on Sundays. Now, North Dakota is looking to learn from Manitoba's example. A state committee began looking at opening up shopping hours last week. If that happens, though, Manitoba might have to extend its Sunday hours further to stay competitive, according to Manitoba Chambers of Commerce president Chuck Davidson. "They are one of the few jurisdictions that's behind where Manitoba is. What we are concerned about is that if they open up these hours ... what that would do for cross-border [shopping]," Davidson said. "A lot of the stores that people may have shopped in the past, they now have it in Manitoba, so there's less and less reason for consumers in Manitoba to go south of the border to do their shopping. If they open up those hours, that again puts them at a bit of a competitive advantage." Province should extend hours more, MCC president says Davidson says the three extra hours on Sundays had a big impact on Manitoba's retail sales, and he'd like to see the province go further. "Open it wide open," he said. "Let consumers decide. They'll tell retailers when their hours of operations need to be and it'll allows that greater flexibility to be more competitive and to meet what consumers are looking for." As in Manitoba, some North Dakotans are resistant to the idea, including Christopher Dodson, the director of the North Dakota Catholic Conference. "There are more important things than taxes and commerce," Dodson said. "It's built in our human nature to need some time of rest so we can rejuvenate and spend time with each other." Story continues 'We need some time off,' opponent says Dodson says Sunday-shopping advocates put up a straw-man argument that his only interest is to get more people into church. "We don't presume that we are going to make people go to church just because stores are closed. We know better than that," Dodson said. "We should not be slave to working and buying and selling. We need some time off for our families, for our communities, for our kids, to rejuvenate so that we could be good workers later." As for whether Manitoba might further extend its Sunday shopping hours to compete, Minister of Growth, Enterprise and Trade Cliff Cullen said the government will always consider ways to support entrepreneurs and reduce red tape. "We are open to hearing what Manitobans have to say and look forward to meaningful dialogue on the subject," Cullen said in a statement. Manitoba Tammy Andruchuk was in Grand Forks Sunday for a "girls' weekend," which included some shopping. "I'm not tempted to get up to go shopping," she said of Manitoba's extended hours. "Sunday's kind of a relaxing day to get stuff done around the house and visit with family." Badges ACE and Credly Launching Digital Credentials for Workforce Training A collaboration between the American Council on Education (ACE) and digital credential service provider Credly will allow working professionals to earn digital badges for workplace training. The two organizations are launching a digital credential program for ACE's College Credit Recommendation Service (CREDIT), which helps students get academic credit for formal training taken outside traditional degree programs. ACE CREDIT participants (major corporations, associations, labor unions and government agencies offering courses in various fields) will now be able to issue secure, portable and data-rich digital badges through Credly, according to a press release. Individuals can use the badges to document professional and academic achievements; the credentials can be showcased through online professional networks as well as in job applications and e-portfolios. An ACE official transcript will remain the primary means of communicating ACE credit recommendations to colleges and universities. "Our work is rooted in the belief that experience in the workplace can lead to a more flexible pathway to earn college degrees and credentials and fuel career growth," said ACE President Molly Corbett Broad, in a statement. "Credly is helping us transform a powerful concept for the digital era through empowering professionals with portable credentials. We are pleased to enable our CREDIT organizations to tap into the promise of digital credentialing." The first organizations to offer CREDIT digital credentialing this spring will include Walt Disney, KFC, AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps and Jiffy Lube. For more information, visit the ACE CREDIT site. President Trumps flurry of executive orders on sanctuary cities and immigration late last week flummoxed his opponents, who responded by making good on their promise to stage constant protests as part of the #Resistance. In New York, progressive politicians have characterized Trumps relatively modest efforts to impose order on what they have always characterized as a broken system as outright Nazism, and have taken their rhetorical cues from hard-Left radicals who seek the dissolution of national borders. For instance, President Trump announced last Wednesday his intentions to work within the existing system and framework in order to enforce current immigration law and pressure so-called sanctuary cities to end their policies of noncompliance with federal authority regarding immigration. A few hours later, Bill de Blasio, mayor of the nations largest sanctuary city, called a spontaneous press conference to proclaim his administrations continued dedication to sanctuary policy. This executive order does not change who we are . . . the stroke of a pen in Washington does not change the people of New York City or our values. Mayor de Blasio, echoed by City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito and Congressman Joseph Crowley, insisted that Trumps crackdown on sanctuary cities is a war on difference. Mark-Viverito proclaimed, Lets be clear: these proposals are driven by the false narrative that immigrantsall immigrantsare criminals. When asked by this reporter if he sees any difference between illegal aliens, legal immigrants, and citizens of America generally, Mayor de Blasio was blunt in his response: I appreciate the ideological bent of your question, but I will answer it very clearly. . . . there has been an attempt to demonize immigrants across the board, thats whats happening here. The vast majority of even the undocumented are law-abiding people . . . this has been a systematicand Steve Bannon is behind this 100 percenta systematic effort to demonize people of color and immigrants, and its playing out today. From illegal aliens who have committed crimes, to all immigrants, to people of color generally: the circle of Trumps victims widens by orders of magnitude in de Blasios fantasy of total persecution. Even to ask a question about whether illegal aliens should be regarded in the same way as legal immigrants betrays an ideological bent; on the other hand, it is perfectly straightforward to read a legal challenge to sanctuary cities as all-out race war. The mayors expansive definition of victimhood was echoed this weekend by Governor Cuomo, who repeated the Lefts favorite cliche: I am a Muslim. I am a Jew. I am Black. I am gay. I am a woman seeking to control her body. This quasi-heroic affirmation of identity with the oppressed fringes of society, powered by anaphora, collapses into intersectional absurdity, and ultimately becomes the lowest form of political pandering, underscored by the repetition of the word I. Last Friday, Trump announced that he would extend and expand the visa restrictions that Obama established in the 2015 Terrorist Travel Prevention Act, impose a 90-day moratorium on travel from seven countries with links to organized terror, and put a halt to the Syrian-refugee resettlement program. These policies fulfill campaign promises and have been clearly stated as temporary measures in order to make sure that migrants are being accurately screened. Despite applying to a small fraction of the worlds billion-plus Muslims, the policy was quickly labeled a Muslim ban. Mayor de Blasio went on television and repeated the canard that the executive order specifically excludes Muslims from entry to the country; when called on this falsehood by Jake Tapper, the mayor responded with clause-heavy babble: I would be careful on that. The notion that theres not a pattern of exception for individuals, that the only indication suggests bluntly non-Muslims, should be very, very worrisome here. The mayor went on to say that, in his view, illegal aliens who are convicted of drunk driving should be protected by New York City, providing that they didnt run anyone over. Hundreds of protesters, organized in New York by the immigrant-rights organization Make the Road, flocked to JFK airportwhere several dozen foreign nationals in transit were detainedand demanded their immediate release. Thousands more protesters assembled Sunday at Battery Park in lower Manhattan, where they chanted No Ban, No Wall, a pithy expression of disdain for the principle of border controls, or borders generally. Senator Charles Schumer, standing in front of a handmade sign reading Fascism is for Fascists, announced that 42 people in transit stuck at JFK would be released. Then, falling into the rhetorical tic of infinite liberation, the senator declaimed, So weve made progress for forty-two. Weve got to make progress for thousands, and tens of thousands, and hundreds of thousands more. Yet only a hundred or so people are being detained as a result of the presidents recent order. Leftist grandiosity regarding revolution and human potential is limitless, bounded only by the skills of the man with the megaphone. But the Lefts readiness to heighten contradictions, or, in the words of President Obama, to bring a gun to a knife fight, indicates the seriousness of its purpose in impeding every part of President Trumps agenda. Scott Olson/Getty Images Americas blue-collar unions just had their best week in years. On his first Monday as president, Donald Trump formally withdrew the United States from what union leaders considered a jobs-killing trade deal, the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP). Later in the week, labor honchos met in the White House with Trump to discuss his plans for a massive infrastructure-building program that will likely employ tens of thousands of workers. Trump also signed orders that potentially revived the Keystone XL and Dakota pipelinestwo projects that trade unions have heavily backed but that the Obama administration had refused to approve. The union leaders, whose membership once constituted the core of the Democratic Party, were effusive in their praise of a president who knows their business perhaps better than anyone whos ever held the office. We believe that President Trump really is going to put America first, said Sean McGarvey, president of North Americas Building Trades Unions, after the White House meeting. Trump, a Republican, continues to scramble assumptions about American political allegiances. Right-to-work legislation that would enable employees to opt out of joining unions is advancing in two states where control recently shifted to the GOPNew Hampshire and Missouri. Trump has said that hes sympathetic with such laws. Republican governors and legislatures have also been at the forefront of opposing union-backed efforts to raise the minimum wage, and Trump agreed with that strategy during the campaign. But if the presidents party affiliation presented a dilemma for the union leaders who visited the Oval Office, they hardly showed it. Trump has consistently pushed an optimistic, pro-growth message to blue-collar union workers and their leaders, who have always benefitted the most when the American economy is humming. Thats in stark contrast to the Democratic administration of the last eight years, which championed redistributionist policies at the cost of economic growth, passed health-care legislation that still threatens union insurance plans, and whose alignment with environmentalists clouded the outlook for the opportunity-rich oil, gas, and transportation industries. Not surprisingly, blue-collar unions continued losing members for three years after the 2008 recession ended, and today they remain nearly 1 million members below their pre-recession peak. In recent years, trade unions have grown increasingly dissatisfied with the Democratic Party. Democrats urged them to support passage of the Affordable Care Act in 2010, which they did. Three years later, though, the presidents of the Teamsters and two other blue-collar unions fired off a letter to Democratic congressional leaders arguing for Obamacares repeal. We can no longer stand silent in the face of elements of the Affordable Care Act that will destroy the very health and well-being of our members, they wrote. Similarly, Democrats promised the trade unions a bounty of green jobs helping to build clean infrastructure as America went about transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy. Instead, the so-called BlueGreen Alliance led the opposition to Keystone, prompting the head of the Laborers International Union to accuse the group of having kicked our members in the teeth. Behind the trade unions dissatisfaction is a simple fact: the modern Democratic Party no longer resembles the one that nurtured the union movement when it was largely composed of blue-collar, private-sector workers. In 1955, George Meany, who was in the process of completing the merger that created the AFL-CIO, wrote in the New York Times that business leaders fears that the labor movement was driving the country toward collectivism were overblown. In response to claims that he and his fellow labor leaders were in favor of big government or nationalization, he answered, Nothing could be further from the truth. Years later, Meany led a contingent of pro-growth labor leaders to the Kennedy White House to urge the president to stimulate the economy and create jobs by cutting taxes. Today, however, the union movement pushes a different agenda. Nearly half of all members are government workers, unsympathetic to the concerns of trade unions and favoring bigger government and more regulation. Many other union members are nominally private-sector workers employed in industries, such as health care, that government heavily subsidizes. Of the 14.7 million union members in America, only 4.1 million, or about 28 percent, work in blue-collar industries: construction, manufacturing, transportation, and repair and maintenance. Some of these unions have gradually decided to go their own way. After the disastrous experience with Obamacare, trade unions representing carpenters and operating engineers backed dozens of Republican candidates in the 2014 midterm elections. Republican governors like John Kasich and Chris Christie also won support in their reelection bids from blue-collar unions, even as their public-sector counterparts worked furiously to defeat them. But none of these departures was as striking as the lavish praise heaped on Trump last week. The details we just heard from the president, were very excited about, McGarvey said. That Trump managed to elicit such enthusiasm by formally killing TPP, and without repudiating his own partys domestic economic policies, illustrates how little the new Democratic Party has to offer members of blue-collar trade unions. Photo by White House Pool/Getty Images Howard Schultz Some Starbucks customers are threatening to boycott the coffee giant after its CEO took a stand against President Donald Trump's executive order barring immigrants from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the US. On Sunday, Starbucks announced it planned to hire 10,000 refugees worldwide in the next five years. "We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question," CEO Howard Schultz wrote in a letter to Starbucks employees about the plan. While many customers were immediately supportive of Starbucks' actions on social media, others threatened to boycott after the letter's release. "Upon hearing about your decision to hire 10000 refugees instead of Americans I will no longer spend any money at Starbucks," one such Facebook user wrote on Starbucks' page. When .@Starbucks puts refugees before Americans safety Time for me to #BoycottStarbucks Sales will drop from me alone! Stick 2coffee please! pic.twitter.com/kwKX49tCOB MAGAMama (@tteegar) January 30, 2017 #BoycottStarbucks We put Trump in the White House We can Put Starbucks out of business They want to hire refugees over Americans go 4 it! Sandy (@sandra8301) January 30, 2017 Many said they were angry that Starbucks was hiring refugees instead of veterans. Starbucks, however, does have a program in place to support veterans and their families, hiring 8,000 veterans and military spouses since 2014. Weiterlesen #starbucks Why don't you hire the vets instead of refugees who might really ruin your business? #BoycottStarbucks Marilynn Randall (@emjayr1942) January 30, 2017 Starbucks has no plans to end its program to hire veterans. So instead of hiring 10,000 unemployed Americans or out of work vets @Starbucks will hire 10,000 refugees to spite @POTUS #BoycottStarbucks pic.twitter.com/cPbM1FvCwu iaExtremeVetting (@nia4_trump) January 30, 2017 Other users said the plan to give jobs to refugees would make it harder for Americans to get jobs. The 10,000 hires will be spread out over the 75 countries where the company does business. Now they will hire people who don't belong here when AMERICAN high school/college students need a part time job. #BoycottStarbucks pic.twitter.com/17nip7wKmx Hutch (@LawlessPirate) January 30, 2017 .@Starbucks will hire refugees over Americans. CEO Schultz proudly implements his #AmericaLast hiring priorities at Starbucks. #BuyDunkin Small Biz for Trump (@SmallBiz4Trump) January 30, 2017 Some felt that Schultz was needlessly political in his plan to hire refugees. Anyone else sick of @Starbucks CEO's pushing HIS political agenda through our coffee and down our throats?#BoycottStarbucks pic.twitter.com/nKZCzbZknA McQ (@cultcommoncore) January 30, 2017 Schultz has long been vocal regarding his progressive beliefs as CEO of Starbucks. He endorsed Democrat Hillary Clinton for president in September, and he would have reportedly been Clinton's pick for secretary of labor had she won the election. The movement to boycott Starbucks has already inspired a counter-protest #BuyStarbucks, with supporters including actress Jessica Chastain. Hi yes can I get a salted caramel mocha with an extra shot of conservative tears? #buystarbucks #boycottstarbucks Graceful (@grace_sergott) January 30, 2017 The #BoycottStarbucks movement makes me want to #BuyStarbucks. Venti latte please. Real Americans believe in liberty and democracy. idea woman (@idea_woman) January 30, 2017 This is not the first time there has been an online movement to boycott Starbucks. In November, Twitter user Baked Alaska encouraged followers to visit a Starbucks location and tell the employees that their names are Trump in an effort to "normalize Trump" and the white-supremacist alt-right movement. When Starbucks introduced a green cup intended to promote unity in the week leading up to the election, social-media users accused the coffee chain of ""political brainwashing." Despite the protests, Schultz seems unlikely to back down from his political stances. For more news videos visit Yahoo View, available now on iOS and Android. In Sunday's letter, the CEO also expressed his support for immigrants who are part of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, as well as Mexican employees and customers. The letter restated Starbucks' policy that workers who are eligible for benefits would have the option to access health insurance through the company, whether or not the Affordable Care Act is repealed. "I also want to take this opportunity to announce specific actions we are taking to reinforce our belief in our partners around the world and to ensure you are clear that we will neither stand by, nor stand silent, as the uncertainty around the new Administration's actions grows with each passing day," Schultz wrote. NOW WATCH: 'This is not about religion': Trump defends his immigration ban as thousands protest around the US More From Business Insider Justin Trudeau tears President Donald Trump called Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau on Monday to offer condolences over a shooting at a Quebec City mosque on Sunday night that left six dead. "President Trump expressed his condolences to the Prime Minister and people of Canada following the tragic shooting at the Centre culturel islamique de Quebec, located in Quebec City, and offered to provide any assistance as needed," Trudeau's office said in a statement, according to The Toronto Star. White House press secretary Sean Spicer confirmed the call between the two leaders Monday. Trudeau further said that Muslim-Canadians are an "important part" of Canada's "national fabric," according to a statement. "These senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country," Trudeau said. The sole suspect, a French-Canadian university student named Alexandre Bissonnette, was in police custody as of Monday morning. Two suspects were initially apprehended following the shooting. However, police now believe that the second person, Mohamed Belkhadir, was a witness who called 911. "They consider this a lone wolf situation," a source familiar with the matter told Reuters. More From Business Insider saudi ship houthi yemen Saudi Arabia confirmed a Houthi militant attack that killed two Saudi sailors on Monday. "A Saudi frigate on patrol west of the port city of Hodeida was hit by a terrorist attack from three suicide boats belonging to the Houthi militias," Saudi state media said, according to Reuters. However, the Saudis and Iranian media disagree on whether a missile or bomb-laden boat carried out the attack. Footage claiming to show the attack surfaced on Monday. Iranian state media claimed the attack was carried out by Houthi militants in Yemen with a guided missile against a Saudi navy vessel. The media cites a source as saying the vessel had 176 sailors and officers, as well as a combat helicopter, on board at the time of the attack. The US Navy told Business Insider that it was aware of reports of the Saudi ship being hit but could not yet confirm or deny the event. Yemen's Houthi militants have received support from Iran. In October, the same Houthi militants successfully struck a United Arab Emirates vessel with an anti-ship cruise missile in the waters off Yemen's western coast, where Iranian media claims this strike took place. Later in October, when US ships entered the waters off Yemen's coast, Houthi militants shot missiles at US ships, which the US intercepted before firing a salvo that destroyed the radar sites that had been used to launch the attacks. Without such radar sites, the Houthis couldn't properly fire a guided anti-ship missile. uss mason It doesnt require a stretch of the imagination to presume that it was an anti-ship missile since the sites the US hit back in 2016 werent the only ones that the Houthis had access to, courtesy of defected forces from Saleh, said Behnam Ben Taleblu, a senior Iran analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, referring to Ali Abdullah Saleh, the former president of Yemen and a prominent Houthi figure. Story continues However, this assessment is complicated by the recent Saudi report claiming that damage was done by suicide boats as well as the shoddy footage. Indeed many who viewed the footage have pointed to what they say could be editing. Stills from before & after 'explosion' seem to show the frigate flip direction, could be a result of images used to edit video pic.twitter.com/YzAblFQ0QF Ian Keddie (@IanJKeddie) January 30, 2017 Saudi Arabia leads a coalition of Arab Gulf states that currently back the internationally recognized government of Yemeni President Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi against the Houthi uprising. The US carried out a raid on Al Qaeda operatives on Sunday that left at least 14 Al Qaeda militants dead, as well as one US service member. Additionally, three US service members were wounded, and a helicopter was damaged and intentionally destroyed by US forces. Watch the full footage: NOW WATCH: Why the US military's M1 Abrams tank is still the king of the battlefield More From Business Insider Polarcus Limited ("Polarcus" or the "Company") (OSE: PLCS) announces that Mr. Chris Kelsall has resigned from the board of directors of the Company with effect from 29 January 2017. Chairman, Mr. Peter Rigg said: "I would like to thank Chris for his diligence and hard work. Polarcus wishes Chris every success in his future endeavours." Mr. Arnstein Wigestrand has decided not to stand for re-election at the Company's Annual General Meeting in May, 2017. The Company's Nomination Committee has been informed and will make recommendations to shareholders prior to the AGM concerning the size and composition of the Board for the future. Contacts Rod Starr, CEO +971 4 436 0800 rod.starr@polarcus.com Hans-Peter Burlid, CFO +971 50 559 8175 hp.burlid@polarcus.com About Polarcus Polarcus (OSE: PLCS) is an innovative marine geophysical company with a pioneering environmental agenda, delivering high-end towed streamer data acquisition and imaging services from Pole to Pole. Polarcus operates a fleet of high performance 3D seismic vessels incorporating leading-edge maritime technologies for improved safety and efficiency. Polarcus offers contract seismic surveys and multi-client projects with advanced onboard processing solutions and employs nearly 500 professionals worldwide. The Company's principal office is in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. For more information, visit www.polarcus.com English Dutch 's-Hertogenbosch, the Netherlands, 30 January 2017 The Extraordinary General Meeting of Shareholders held today appointed Lex van Overmeire as a member of the Supervisory Board. The agenda of the Extraordinary General Meeting and further details, including a biography, are available on our website at https:// corporate.vanlanschot.nl/egm. Media Relations: +31 20 354 45 85; mediarelations@vanlanschot.com Investor Relations: +31 20 354 45 90; investorrelations@vanlanschot.com Van Lanschot is the oldest independent bank in the Netherlands with a history dating back to 1737. Van Lanschot, a wealth manager operating under the Van Lanschot, Evi and Kempen & Co brand names, is active in Private Banking, Asset Management and Merchant Banking, with the aim of preserving and creating wealth for its clients. Van Lanschot NV is listed on Euronext Amsterdam. English French JCDecaux and Vodacom rebrand the Soweto Towers, South Africa's iconic and famous landmark Paris, 30 January 2017 - JCDecaux SA (Euronext Paris: DEC), the number one outdoor advertising company worldwide, and Vodacom, part of Vodafone Group and a leading African mobile communication company providing a wide range of communication services, announced today that they have joined forces in rebranding the iconic Soweto Towers, in South Africa, following the Vodacom Soweto Towers Competition launched in March 2016 to give a new look to the towers. Built in 1951 to supplement the power plant's cooling system, the 100-metre tall two cooling towers have become a prominent landmark for Soweto and are inextricably linked to the industrialisation and expansion of Johannesburg. At its time it was a state of the art facility and the largest of its kind in Southern Africa. The towers are now a colourful landmark depicting a taste of the vibrant Soweto life and attracting visitors from all around the world. JCDecaux won the advertising rights for the towers in April 2015 and, together with Vodacom, they began the transformation of the Western Tower in February 2016. The current artwork is a result of an extensive public participation process in the form of a competition that saw winners from Soweto, Eldorado Park and Pretoria collaborate with world-renowned artists such as Helen Sibidi, the illustrator Karabo Poppy Moletsane and the fine artist Bambo Sibiya. With a crew of 13, mostly composed of previously disadvantaged artists with specialised training at height skills, the project covers a surface area of 11,841m2, towering 100m above the Soweto skyline. Over the years, the towers, which carry the heritage of South Africa's biggest and most famous township, have also played a remarkable role in underlining the uniqueness of the township. From local films, dramas and television adverts, the towers have served as a symbol that represents the vibrancy and cacophony of sound and colour that are Soweto and its 900 000 inhabitants. Nyimpini Mabunda, Chief Officer Consumer Business Unit of Vodacom, said: "Over the past two decades we have made a significant economic impact in and around Soweto through various commercial initiatives, community projects and a sustained investment in the network. The Soweto Towers competition is an innovative and creative avenue to connect art, the iconic towers and our leading brand in a way that reinforces our long-standing partnership with the community." Jean-Sebastien Decaux, CEO Southern Europe, Belgium and Luxembourg, Africa and Israel of JCDecaux, said: "We are proud to be part of such an emblematic project. JCDecaux is committed to working closely with the communities of Orlando Ekhaya precinct and Soweto at large to have a positive impact beyond the branding of the Towers. The tangible and sustainable empowerment and transformation of communities is a far more meaningful relationship agenda that we espouse, working with the local Councillors in various projects such as Nelson Mandela Day, Annual School Visits programme and Fun Runs for the aged. As the number one outdoor advertising company in Africa, we'll use our expertise to ensure the success of this partnership with Vodacom, benefiting citizens and extending our business opportunities in South Africa." About Vodacom Vodacom is a leading African mobile communication company providing a wide range of communication services including mobile voice, messaging, data and converged services to over 63 million customers. From our roots in South Africa, we have grown our mobile network business to include operations in Tanzania, DRC, Mozambique and Lesotho. The mobile networks cover a total population of approximately 200 million people. Through Vodacom Business Africa (VBA), we also offer business managed services to enterprises in over 30 countries across the continent. Vodacom is majority owned by Vodafone (65% holding) one of the world's largest mobile communications companies by revenue. About JCDecaux in sub-Saharan Africa JCDecaux in sub-Saharan Africa, formerly Continental Outdoor Media until the acquisition by JCDecaux SA (Euronext Paris: DEC) in partnership with Royal Bafokeng Holdings in June 2015, is Africa's leading traditional and digital outdoor advertising company and operates in 16 countries in Africa. The company offers 32,000 advertising opportunities within the African continent and employs more than 400 people. Key Figures for JCDecaux 2016 revenue: 3,392.8m JCDecaux is listed on the Eurolist of Euronext Paris and is part of the Euronext 100 index JCDecaux is part of the FTSE4Good and Dow Jones Sustainability Europe indexes N1 worldwide in street furniture (524,580 advertising panels) N1 worldwide in transport advertising with more than 230 airports and 280 contracts in metros, buses, trains and tramways (395,770 advertising panels) N1 in Europe for billboards (177,760 advertising panels) N1 in outdoor advertising in Europe (731,390 advertising panels) N1 in outdoor advertising in Asia-Pacific (236,760 advertising panels) N1 in outdoor advertising in Latin America (62,860 advertising panels) N1 in outdoor advertising in Africa (32,840 advertising panels) N1 in outdoor advertising in the Middle-East (16,280 advertising panels) N1 worldwide for self-service bicycle hire: pioneer in eco-friendly mobility 1,129,410 advertising panels in more than 75 countries Present in 4,435 cities with more than 10,000 inhabitants Daily audience: more than 390 million people 12,850 employees HAUPPAUGE, N.Y., Jan. 30, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Air Industries Group (NYSE MKT:AIRI) (Air Industries or the Company), announces on January 27, 2017 that we sold our subsidiary AMK Technical Services to Meyer Tool of Cincinnati Ohio for a purchase price of $ 4,500,000, subject to a customary working capital adjustment, plus additional quarterly payments, not to exceed $ 1,500,000, equal to five percent (5%) of Net Revenues of AMK commencing April 1, 2017. The purchase price is approximately equal to the purchase price of AMK when acquired in October 2014. Proceeds of the sale will be used to reduce debt and enhance liquidity. Separately Air Industries announced that revenue for the year ended December 31, 2016 will be approximately $ 66.8 million dollars, a decline of about $ 14 million dollars from the prior year. Air Industries Groups President and CEO, Dan Godin commented, Earlier this year we announced that we were collaborating with Meyer Tool, co-locating AMK at their site in Poland and eventually in Greenville, South Carolina. As that collaboration developed Meyer Tool expressed an interest in acquiring AMK. While the operations and capabilities of AMK are complementary they are not identical to our core business of producing complex machined aerospace hardware. The divestment of AMK allows Air Industries to focus management and other resources on its core business. Meyer Tool will remain a customer of Air Industries and we hope and expect that our relationship with them will continue to grow in the future. As we have previously announced, sales results for 2016 were disappointing and a significant decline from the prior year. This decline resulted largely from delays in developing new programs and products, plus a few operational execution issues in our largest sector. During the last half of 2016 we have made significant changes in management at several of our subsidiaries to address this and strengthen our New Product Introduction (NPI) process and Operational Excellence. Against this disappointment I am pleased to announce that our new business development activities for 2016 were very encouraging with bookings of new business increasing by $ 9 million or 13% to approximately $ 80 million dollars. Our firm 18-month backlog also increased by more than $ 12 million or 16% and is now more than $ 90 million. ABOUT AIR INDUSTRIES GROUP Air Industries Group (NYSE MKT:AIRI) is an integrated manufacturer of precision components and provider of supply chain services for the aerospace and defense industry. The Company has over 50 years of experience in the industry and has developed leading positions in several important markets that have significant barriers to entry. With embedded relationships with many leading aerospace and defense prime contractors, the Company designs and manufactures structural parts and assemblies that focus on flight safety, including landing gear, arresting gear, engine mounts and flight controls. Air Industries Group also provides sheet metal fabrication, tube bending, and welding services. Certain matters discussed in this press release are 'forward-looking statements' intended to qualify for the safe harbor from liability established by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. In particular, the Company's statements regarding trends in the marketplace, the ability to realize projected EBITDA, firm backlog and projected backlog, potential future results and acquisitions, are examples of such forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties, including, but not limited to, the ability to consummate contemplated acquisitions, the timing of projects due to variability in size, scope and duration, the inherent discrepancy in actual results from estimates, projections and forecasts made by management regulatory delays, changes in government funding and budgets, and other factors, including general economic conditions, not within the Company's control. The factors discussed herein and expressed from time to time in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission could cause actual results and developments to be materially different from those expressed in or implied by such statements. The forward-looking statements are made only as of the date of this press release and the Company undertakes no obligation to publicly update such forward-looking statements to reflect subsequent events or circumstances. Essay Questions, Analysis, and Tips from Essay 1: This question encourages you to present your goals in the context of your experience and to integrate your MBA plans with both. With only 500 words, be selective and thoughtful about what points from your career to use to contextualize your goals. Also, the question specifies short-term goals. While it would be fine to add a sentence or a phrase about longer- term goals or overall career vision, keep your goals discussion focused on the same time frame the question focuses on: immediately post-MBA. This question is asking for linkages among your experience, your short-term goals, and your anticipated MBA experience, so think about how you will form an integrated message out of these elements. In answering the last point, continue the linkage approach: the alternatives you identify should build on your experience in some way and be consistent with your expressed career interests. Show that you are adaptable and strategic, informed about the options, and resourceful in your thinking. Essay 2: Once you decide on a topic and question, write this Consider which question will give you the best avenue to both (a) round out your profile and (b) showcase an interesting and relevant aspect of your life and/or experience.Once you decide on a topic and question, write this short essay in mini-story format. Sometimes the story itself will convey the message and/or insight, sometimes you may want to add a concluding sentence with this information. And be sensitive to the tone and presentation of the question it really is asking for something engaging, meaningful, and lively. Essay 3: Your topic selection here should balance the topic in essay 2 and reflect another aspect of you. Also, if you choose an older story above, make this one more recent. (Its fine to have them both be recent, but not so great to have them both be far in the past.) Optional Essay: This question first and foremost invites you to explain anything that needs explaining (e.g., gap in employment, choice of recommender if not using a direct supervisor, etc.). As far as unnecessary points, that last phrase is a polite warning that anything extra must be pretty darn important. Please discuss your immediate post-MBA professional goals. How will your professional experience, when combined with a Kelley MBA degree, allow you to achieve these goals? Should the short-term goals you have identified not materialize, what alternate career paths might you consider? (500 words max)Please respond to one of the following short essay prompts. (300 words max)a. My greatest memory is...b. I'm most afraid of...c. My greatest challenge has been...d. I'm most proud of...Please share with the admissions committee an interesting or surprising fact about you. (25 words max)Is there anything else that you think we should know as we evaluate your application? If you believe your credentials and essays represent you fairly, you shouldn't feel obligated to answer this question. (300 words max)- See more at: http://gmatclub.com/blog/2016/06/indian ... 19lBk.dpuf - 42-year-old Xiong Simei was locked in a cage outdoors by her family for 10 years - The woman enclosure is open and snake can enter to it - According to her brother, they had to lock her because she developed emotional issues following a breakup - Simeis brother said that she became aggressive and the family didnt have other option than putting her in the cage 42-year-old Xiong Simei was found by reporters locked in a cage that was open to the elements and animals such as snakes in China. Horrifying: A woman in China was found locked in a cage by a young hiker READ ALSO: Meet men who catch, dance and have lived with venomous snakes for 7 generations (photos) In the cage were the mentally ill woman has spent the last decade, animals like snakes could enter without problem because her enclosure is open to nature and it is surrounded by firewood. According to Simeis brother, Xiong, she had been with her live-in partner but after they broke up she had to move with her mother. The woman was locked in a cage by her family members following a relationship breakdown PAY ATTENTION: Get all the latest gossips on NAIJ Gossip App Our mother is a mute and our father died a few years ago. Our sister has problems and often hits people, destroying things but we have to go to work so out of desperation we put her in a cage, said Mr. Xiong. He told reporters that the family is very poor and do not have money to pay for his sister's treatment so the government gives them a subsidy of 200 yuan (23) a month. Mr. Xiong also said that sometimes he manages to buy sedative drugs to calm her and her sister didnt have special care because they dont know people who could help them. According to her brother, the family are too poor to afford treatment for her An 18-year-old student surnamed Wu who came across the woman in the cage while he was hiking said that when he found her it was cold, only one or two degrees Celsius. READ ALSO: Giant python killed in Caleb University Wu said that she told him that the winter is cold but the most difficult is the summer heat because of mosquitoes and also there are often snakes. The cage was surrounded by bits of wood for an extra layer of protection from the elements Upon seeing the woman, Wu along with some friends, bought her some clothes, shoes and food. READ ALSO: Man hangs himself after a fight with his wife The Civil Affairs Bureau of Zhenyuan County, said that staff will be sent to the scene to investigate the case further. Source: Legit.ng The weather and climate on other planets has unusual features but planetary astronomers think JWST could potentially discover clues to help answer the fundamental question of Where do we come from? As of August 26th, 2021 Yahoo India will no longer be publishing content. Your Yahoo Account Mail and Search experiences will not be affected in any way and will operate as usual. We thank you for your support and readership. For more information on Yahoo India, please visit the FAQ [January 29, 2017] IAB Announces 2017 Sales & Service Excellence Awards Winners IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) announced the winners of the 2017 IAB Sales & Service Excellence Awards during an opening night ceremony at the IAB Annual Leadership Meeting, taking place at the Diplomat Beach Resort in Hollywood, Florida. The IAB Sales Excellence Awards recognize the individuals and member companies that have demonstrated the highest levels of customer service, knowledge, and innovation in digital advertising sales. The IAB Service Awards honor those individuals at IAB member companies who have made exceptional contributions to IAB initiatives over the past year. 2017 IAB Sales Excellence Awards Working hand-in-hand with IAB, Advertiser Perceptions identified which particular skills and achievements should be measured and honored for the awards. Advertiser Perceptions then developed and sent out a two-part customer feedback survey, which served to pinpoint the sales organizations and individuals that the ad buying community believes excel. Over 575 agency and marketing executives answered the questionnaire, nominating and then voting on the best sales teams and individuals across four main categories-large organization, small-to-medium sales organization, leadership through mentoring, and sales person of the year in four key U.S. regions. Respondents represented companies that spent at least $1 million on interactive advertising during the last year. 2017 IAB Sales Excellence Awards Winners are: Overall Sales Excellence for a Large Sales Organization: Hulu (News - Alert) Hulu (News - Alert) Overall Sales Excellence for a Small-to-Medium Sales Organization: MaxPoint MaxPoint Leadership through Mentoring: Jim Lecinski, Google (News - Alert) Jim Lecinski, Google (News - Alert) Sales Person of the Year: East Coast: Sarah Potts, AOL West Coast: Chris Robertiello, Google Central: Shannen Gillespie, ESPN (News - Alert) South: Anna Baldwin, Pandora "We salute this year's recipients of the IAB Sales Excellence Awards, who have earned the respect of the digital media industry through their great success in digital advertising sales," said David Doty, Executive Vice President and CMO, IAB. "These companies and individuals provided brand marketers with valuable solutions for connecting with their customers as they move across digital screens." 2017 IAB Service Excellence Awards The IAB Service Excellence Awards honor individuals from IAB member companies for their noteworthy contributions and thought leadership on IAB and IAB Tech Lab initiatives over the past year. Members of the 20 IAB committees, councils, and working groups choose the winners based on nominations made by IAB staff. "We are proud to applaud these leaders-each providing significant guidace and individual resources to initiatives that have fostered the growth of the interactive advertising industry," said Anna Bager, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Mobile and Video, IAB. "Their outstanding service will shape the future of the digital media and marketing in mobile, virtual reality, gaming, messaging, and more." 2017 IAB Service Excellence Awards Winners are: Kevin Ching, Vice President, Product Management, NinthDecimal , for his significant input toward the publication of the "Mobile Location Data Guide for Publishers," which provides comprehensive information for publishers looking to tap into the power of geo-marketing. , for his significant input toward the publication of the "Mobile Location Data Guide for Publishers," which provides comprehensive information for publishers looking to tap into the power of geo-marketing. Adam Cohen-Aslatei, Senior Director of Marketing, Jun Group , for his contributions in defining the terminologies and providing meaningful feedback in the final draft of the "IAB Mobile App Marketing Glossary." , for his contributions in defining the terminologies and providing meaningful feedback in the final draft of the "IAB Mobile App Marketing Glossary." Rick Erwin, President, Audience (News - Alert) Solutions, Acxiom , for his direction and instrumental involvement leading to the formation of the IAB Data Center of Excellence. , for his direction and instrumental involvement leading to the formation of the IAB Data Center of Excellence. Dan Feldstein, Head of Marketing, Medialets , for his leadership of the IAB Mobile Identity Working Group, as well as his contributions in defining the scope of "Mobile Identity for Marketers: A Best Practices Primer for Mobile & Cross-Device Marketing." , for his leadership of the IAB Mobile Identity Working Group, as well as his contributions in defining the scope of "Mobile Identity for Marketers: A Best Practices Primer for Mobile & Cross-Device Marketing." Rhett Frandsen, Senior Director, R&D Business Strategy, Rubicon Project , for his outstanding contributions on "Marketing in the Messaging Space," encapsulating the expanding messaging landscape and its opportunities for advertisers. , for his outstanding contributions on "Marketing in the Messaging Space," encapsulating the expanding messaging landscape and its opportunities for advertisers. Vikas Gupta, Vice President of Strategy and Interim Head of Marketing, Factual , for his leadership in producing the publication of the "Mobile Location Data Guide for Publishers," which provides comprehensive information for publishers looking to tap into the power of geo-marketing. , for his leadership in producing the publication of the "Mobile Location Data Guide for Publishers," which provides comprehensive information for publishers looking to tap into the power of geo-marketing. Ariane Gut, Head of Insights and Analytics, Tremor Video , for her insightful research on mobile video advertising, contributing to the study "Multiscreen Video Best Practices: Understanding the Next Wave of Video Ad Receptivity." , for her insightful research on mobile video advertising, contributing to the study "Multiscreen Video Best Practices: Understanding the Next Wave of Video Ad Receptivity." Ryan McConville, President and Chief Operating Officer, Kargo , for his thought leadership and creative perspective on ways to improve the user experience and serve today's liquid consumer as captured in the whitepaper "Improving Digital Advertising Experiences with Liquid Creativity." , for his thought leadership and creative perspective on ways to improve the user experience and serve today's liquid consumer as captured in the whitepaper "Improving Digital Advertising Experiences with Liquid Creativity." Ariel Shimoni, Director of Virtual Reality, StartApp , for his insights into VR and 360-degree video analytics that were instrumental in the development of the IAB VR market snapshot report, "Is Virtual the New Reality." , for his insights into VR and 360-degree video analytics that were instrumental in the development of the IAB VR market snapshot report, "Is Virtual the New Reality." Joe Zawadzki, CEO, MediaMath, for his vital leadership in the formation of the IAB Data Center of Excellence. "The IAB Tech Lab Service Excellence Award winners responded to the industry's call for intelligent, innovative leadership to help guide the next wave of digital advertising technology," said Alanna Gombert, Senior Vice President, Technology and Ad Operations, IAB, and General Manager, IAB Tech Lab. 2017 IAB Tech Lab Service Excellence Awards Winners are: Amy Cerrito, Senior Manager, Ad Technology , CBS Interactive, for her consistent and meaningful contributions in creating the "Publisher Ad Blocking Primer," from initial ideation through refinement and final editing. , for her consistent and meaningful contributions in creating the "Publisher Ad Blocking Primer," from initial ideation through refinement and final editing. Sarah Kirtcheff, Director, Technology Services - Midwest, Flashtalking, for her outstanding leadership in drafting the Flash to HTML5/JavaScript migration paper and checklists, which are key to helping the industry adopt HTML5. for her outstanding leadership in drafting the Flash to HTML5/JavaScript migration paper and checklists, which are key to helping the industry adopt HTML5. Gasper Kozak, Director Engineering, Ad Delivery, Celtra, for his leadership on MRAID 3.0, in particular his work in developing the viewability solution and defining key features for user experience, pre-loading, and ad readiness. for his leadership on MRAID 3.0, in particular his work in developing the viewability solution and defining key features for user experience, pre-loading, and ad readiness. Jay Lieske, Mobile Software Architect and Manager, Google, for his outstanding contributions on the development of MRAID 3.0, specifically for providing data, technical details, and other features to improve user experience. for his outstanding contributions on the development of MRAID 3.0, specifically for providing data, technical details, and other features to improve user experience. Sam Lo, Director of Mobile Creative Technology (News - Alert), Flashtalking, for his important contributions to the IAB Flex Ads Working Group, including efforts in developing the flex ad sizing grid, as well as his guidance on determining asset weights and sample ads for testing. for his important contributions to the IAB Flex Ads Working Group, including efforts in developing the flex ad sizing grid, as well as his guidance on determining asset weights and sample ads for testing. James Reetzke, Senior Software Engineer, Visible Measures, for his contributions in developing testing for the Open VV code base, and his leadership on developing the intersection observer-based technology release to support HTML5. for his contributions in developing testing for the Open VV code base, and his leadership on developing the intersection observer-based technology release to support HTML5. Paul Vincent, CEO, Flexitive, for his leadership of the IAB Flex Ads Working Group and efforts in defining flex ad sizing and LEAN guidance for the IAB New Ad Portfolio. for his leadership of the IAB Flex Ads Working Group and efforts in defining flex ad sizing and LEAN guidance for the IAB New Ad Portfolio. Jarred Wilichinsky, Vice President, Video Monetization and Operations, CBS Interactive, for his outstanding leadership in drafting the VAST 4.0 specification to improve the support for server-side ad insertion in video advertising. About IAB The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) empowers the media and marketing industries to thrive in the digital economy. It is comprised of more than 650 leading media and technology companies that are responsible for selling, delivering, and optimizing digital advertising or marketing campaigns. Together, they account for 86 percent of online advertising in the United States. Working with its member companies, the IAB develops technical standards and best practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising, while also educating brands, agencies, and the wider business community on the importance of digital marketing. The organization is committed to professional development and elevating the knowledge, skills, expertise, and diversity of the workforce across the industry. Through the work of its public policy office in Washington, D.C., the IAB advocates for its members and promotes the value of the interactive advertising industry to legislators and policymakers. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City and has a West Coast office in San Francisco. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170129005017/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] This Account has been suspended. The test uses a liquid-based technique known as capillary electrophoresis to separate a mixture of organic molecules into its components. It was designed specifically to analyze for amino acids, the structural building blocks of all life on Earth, Joinfo.com reports with reference to NASA. The method is 10,000 times more sensitive than current methods employed by spacecraft like NASAs Mars Curiosity rover, according to a new study published in Analytical Chemistry. The study was carried out by researchers from NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California. One of the key advantages of the new method to look for an extraterrestrial life is that the process is relatively simple and easy to automate for liquid samples expected on ocean world missions: it involves combining a liquid sample with a liquid reagent, followed by chemical analysis. By shining a laser across the mixture a process known as laser-induced fluorescence detection specific molecules can be observed moving at different speeds. They get separated based on how quickly they respond to electric fields. While capillary electrophoresis has been around since the early 1980s, this is the first time it has been tailored specifically to detect extraterrestrial life on an ocean world, said lead author Jessica Creamer, a postdoctoral scholar at JPL. Our method improves on previous attempts by increasing the number of amino acids that can be detected in a single run, Creamer said. Additionally, it allows us to detect these amino acids at very low concentrations, even in highly salty samples, with a very simple mix and analyze process. The researchers were able to simultaneously analyze 17 different amino acids, which they are calling the Signature 17 standard. These amino acids were chosen for study because they are the most commonly found on Earth or elsewhere. Using our method, we are able to tell the difference between amino acids that come from non-living sources like meteorites versus amino acids that come from living organisms, said the projects principal investigator, Peter Willis of JPL. Key to detecting amino acids related to life is an aspect known as chirality. Chiral molecules such as amino acids come in two forms that are mirror images of one another. Although amino acids from non-living sources contain approximately equal amounts of the left and right-handed forms, amino acids from living organisms on Earth are almost exclusively the left-handed form. It is expected that amino acid life elsewhere would also need to choose one of the two forms in order to create the structures of life. For this reason, chirality of amino acids is considered one of the most powerful signatures of life. One of NASAs highest-level objectives is the search for life in the universe, Willis said. Our best chance of finding life is by using powerful liquid-based analyses like this one on ocean worlds. It should be recalled that US researchers created metallic hydrogen in superconductor that can take man to Mars. On 3-5 October 2017 Kyiv is going to host the Space and Future Forum to network international experts and youth, many of whom will also participate at the first CosmoHack in the world. Joinfo provides media coverage of the Forum, and some of its topics were already discussed ... People who speak two or more languages appear to weather the ravages of Alzheimer's disease better than people who have only mastered one language, a new Italian study suggests. Bilingual people with Alzheimer's outperformed single-language speakers in short- and long-term memory tasks, even though scans showed more severe deterioration in brain metabolism among the bilingual participants, the scientists said. The ability to speak two languages appears to provide the brain with more resilience to withstand damage from Alzheimer's, said lead researcher Dr. Daniela Perani, a professor of psychology at Vita-Salute San Raffaele University in Milan. The more often a person swapped between two languages during their lifetime, the more capable their brains became of switching to alternate pathways that maintained thinking skills even as Alzheimer's damage accumulated, the researchers found. Previous studies have shown that lifelong bilingualism can delay the onset of dementia by as much as five years, Perani said. However, no one has yet examined what causes that effect in the brain. To examine this more closely, Perani and her colleagues performed brain scans and memory tests on 85 seniors with Alzheimer's. Among the participants, 45 spoke both German and Italian, while 40 only spoke one language. The bilingual people dramatically outscored monolingual speakers on memory tests, scoring three to eight times higher, on average. Bilingual people achieved these scores even though scans of their brains revealed more signs of cerebral hypometabolisma characteristic of Alzheimer's in which the brain becomes less efficient at converting glucose into energy. The brain scans also provided a clue why this might be. People who were bilingual appeared to have better functional connectivity in frontal brain regions, which allowed them to maintain better thinking despite their Alzheimer's, Perani said. Constantly using two languages appears to make the brain work harder. During a lifetime this causes structural changes to the brain, creating a "neural reserve" that renders the bilingual brain more resistant against aging, Perani said. Bilingualism also sets up a person for better "neural compensation," in which the brain copes with its own degeneration and loss of neurons by finding alternative pathways through which to function, she said. "Our finding suggests that in bilingual patients with Alzheimer's dementia both mechanisms are at play, since neuronal loss is accompanied by compensatory increase of connectivity, allowing bilingual patients to maintain high neuropsychological performance and cognitive functioning longer than monolingual [patients]," Perani said. Heather Snyder, senior director of medical and scientific operations for the Alzheimer's Association, said these results make sense given what is known about the aging brain. "It's that idea of cognitive engagementcontinuing to use it or you lose it," Snyder said. "People who are bilingual and are going back and forth with two different languages throughout their day are activating a specific way of thinking that's making those brain connections." "It's a small study, so you can't draw too many conclusions from it, but it is the kind of research we do want to see more of," Snyder added. The study also suggests that kids who learn a second language and use it often will benefit in their old age, Perani said. "Considering that delaying the onset of dementia is a top priority of modern societies, governments and health systems should be stimulated to activate social programs and interventions to support bilingual or multilingual education, and to maintain the use of more languages in aging," she said. Understanding these Alzheimer's-resistant brain mechanisms could also lead to future therapies where medications and lifestyle changes are combined to protect seniors' minds, Snyder said. The new study was published Jan. 30 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. More information: The impact of bilingualism on brain reserve and metabolic connectivity in Alzheimer's dementia, Daniela Perani, M.D., professor, psychology, Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, Milan, Italy; Heather Snyder, Ph.D., senior director, medical and scientific operations, Alzheimer's Association; Jan. 30, 2017, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1610909114 Journal information: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences The impact of bilingualism on brain reserve and metabolic connectivity in Alzheimer's dementia, Daniela Perani, M.D., professor, psychology, Vita-Salute San Raffaele University, Milan, Italy; Heather Snyder, Ph.D., senior director, medical and scientific operations, Alzheimer's Association; Jan. 30, 2017, Copyright 2017 HealthDay. All rights reserved. Opioid use and abuse is a significant social, health and economic issue in Canada. Researchers at the University of Calgary's Faculty of Veterinary Medicine (UCVM) and Hotchkiss Brain Institute (HBI) have discovered that an existing anti-gout medication is effective in reducing the severity of withdrawal symptoms in opioid-dependent rodents. Their work is leading to the development of a clinical trial at the Calgary Pain Clinic. Neuroscientist Tuan Trang, PhD and his team, including PhD student Nicole Burma, explored the underlying causes of opioid withdrawal and identified an important target in the spinal cord that is responsible for producing withdrawal symptoms in rats and mice. The target, called pannexin-1, is located throughout the body and importantly, in the brain and spinal cord. The study was published January 30 in the prestigious journal Nature Medicine. Opioids are a potent class of drugs that are used to treat pain. Stopping opioid use can result in severe withdrawal symptoms - a key contributor to continued opioid use. Currently, there are few medications that ameliorate these symptoms. For their study, Trang and Burma looked specifically at two common opioid drugs: morphine and fentanyl. "Opioid withdrawal is aversive, debilitating and can compel individuals to continue using the drug in order to prevent these symptoms," explains Trang, an assistant professor in the UCVM and the Cumming School of Medicine. "In our study, we effectively alleviated withdrawal symptoms in rodents, which could have important implications for patients that may wish to decrease or stop their use of these medications." Prior to this study, the cellular mechanism of opioid withdrawal was not well understood, hampering the search for therapeutic avenues. Trang explains, "the focus of much of the research so far has been on neurons themselves. Our study looked at key immune cells in the nervous system - and specifically at the pannexin-1 channel on these immune cells, which is something that hasn't been explored before." The discovery represents a key shift in understanding how withdrawal occurs and it opens the door to treatments that could have tremendous therapeutic potential. Once they identified the mechanism, the researchers were able to test an existing drug - in this case an anti-gout medication called probenecid that is known to have non-selective pannexin-1 blocking effects. The drug is Health Canada approved, is relatively inexpensive, and has few side effects. Importantly, the researchers were also able to demonstrate that the drug did not affect the ability of the opioid to relieve pain. "This is an exciting study which reveals a new mechanism and a potential therapeutic target for managing opioid withdrawal, says renowned Canadian pain researcher Dr. Michael Salter, Chief of Research at SickKids Hospital in Toronto. "The findings of Dr. Trang and his team could have important implications for people on opioid therapy and those attempting to stop opioid use." With such encouraging preclinical results, the researchers quickly started looking at how to translate this discovery to humans. They are already moving forward with Dr. Lori Montgomery and Dr. Chris Spanswick at the Calgary Pain Clinic to design a clinical trial. "We now need to look to see if this works with patients as well as ensure safety," says Spanswick, Medical Leader of the Calgary Pain Program. "We are at the very early stages of organizing clinical research. It will be some time before this research gets off the ground and we look forward to continuing collaboration with the HBI on this and other areas of research." "Opioids are the pharmacological cornerstone for treating chronic pain in a large variety of diseases," says Trang. "Understanding why opioid withdrawal occurs and how to alleviate it, is of critical importance in improving pain therapy and may have implications for substance abuse in opioid addicts. The potential impact is immense." More information: Blocking microglial pannexin-1 channels alleviates morphine withdrawal in rodents, Nature Medicine nature.com/articles/doi:10.1038/nm.4281 Journal information: Nature Medicine Blocking microglial pannexin-1 channels alleviates morphine withdrawal in rodents, Breast conserving therapy (BCT, breast conserving surgery combined with radiation therapy) is superior to mastectomy in certain types of breast cancer patients, according to results from the largest study to date, to be presented to the European Cancer Congress 2017 today (Monday). Professor Sabine Siesling, from the Netherlands Comprehensive Cancer Organisation (IKNL) and University of Twente and Mirelle Lagendijk, MD, from the Department of Surgical Oncology, Erasmus MC Cancer Institute, Rotterdam, The Netherlands, and colleagues from other hospitals, studied survival nationwide in nearly 130,000 breast cancer patients, divided into two groups: those diagnosed between 1999-2005 and those diagnosed between 2006-2012. The patients selected from the Netherlands Cancer Registry had no metastases (spread of the cancer to organs other than the lymph nodes close to the tumour). To obtain information on cause of death, data were linked to the cause of death register. Although randomised trials initiated in the 1980s have shown equal survival outcomes for BCT and mastectomy, trials often exclude elderly patients or patients with existing disease other than breast cancer (comorbidity). Studies with large, population-based groups, including comorbidity and those who are elderly, can add to the knowledge based on these trials and provide outcome that is more widely applicable and reflect daily practice. Several recent population-based studies showed a survival advantage for BCT. However, these studies tended to lack long-term follow-up, evaluated limited patient numbers, had differences in medication after surgery between both groups and lacked the data on cause of death that are needed to evaluate breast cancer-specific survival. All this could have led to the introduction of confounding factors such as severity of disease or death due to other causes, the researchers say. In the current study, a number of prognostic factors such as age, stage, comorbidity, hormonal receptor and HER2 status, and differences in systemic treatments (medication after surgery) were included and considered as possible explanations for the previously reported survival differences between BCT and mastectomy. This enabled the identification of possible prognostic factors that might, in future, predict which patients could benefit most from BCT. "We looked at two different groups in order to allow us to compare long-term outcomes in a more historical versus a more recent cohort, evaluating patients that had been able to benefit from more sophisticated diagnostics and therapies. A considerably superior survival, both specific to breast cancer and from any cause of death, was found for BCT in the early stage T1-2N0-1M0 cancers in both time cohorts," says Prof Siesling. To identify patients who could possibly benefit most from BCT, both time cohorts were divided into subgroups. Evaluation of T1-2N0-1M0 cancers, which are at a stage when metastasis to distant organs has not yet occurred, in both groups showed a considerable advantage for BCT in patients with increasing age, those with comorbidity, and those who did not receive chemotherapy. "Although this study is based on retrospective data with much detailed data, and residual confounding factors cannot be ruled out completely, we believe that this information will have potential to greatly improve shared treatment decision-making for future breast cancer patients in those aged over 50 years and those with comorbidity," says Prof Siesling. "However, we would like to emphasise that these results do not mean that mastectomy is a bad choice. For patients for whom radiotherapy is not suitable or feasible due to social circumstances, for whom the risk of late side effects of radiotherapy is high, or who have the prospect of a poor aesthetic outcome following BCT, a mastectomy may still be the preferable treatment option. Our study showed that BCT is at least as good as mastectomy and that some patients might benefit more than others from BCT in the future," Prof Siesling will conclude. More information: Abstract no: 4LBA, Practice Changing Trials III session, 12.00 hrs (CET) Monday 30 January, Room Veronesi. Provided by ECCO-the European CanCer Organisation Credit: Northeastern University National healthcare spending increased 5.8 percent in 2015, reaching a total of 3.2 trillion, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. If you're doing the math, that's an average of $9,990 per person. And while the exact numbers haven't been released yet, the nation's 2016 healthcare tab is expected to hit $3.35 trillion, surpassing $10,000 for every man, woman, and child for the first time in history. "Healthcare costs are too high," says Timothy Hoff, professor of management, healthcare systems, and health policy at Northeastern University. "Employers want to pay less and individuals want to pay less, but the only way that will ever happen is if we can figure out a way to deliver healthcare to patients at a lower cost." Some cost-reduction strategies are focused squarely on the evolution of the healthcare workforce. Hoffwho recently co-edited The Healthcare Professional Workforce: Understanding Human Capital in a Changing Industrysays that doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other healthcare workers have begun collaborating to provide better, more affordable care to patients nationwide. For example, a primary care physician might work with the same group of nurses and medical assistants on a day-to-day basis, communicating regularly and sharing the same caseload. "This team-based approach is still a work in progress," says Hoff, "but the goal is to increase efficiency and deliver higher quality care within a compressed time frame." In this new system of care, physician assistants, nurse practitioners, and other healthcare professionals have been asked to take on more responsibility than ever before. Medical assistants, for example, now perform some of the duties of nurses, while nurses, in turn, now perform some of the duties of doctors. "There simply aren't enough physicians to provide all the care," Hoff explains. "To make up for that, other healthcare professionals are being exposed to better training in school and then being given a chance to do more complex work." This healthcare trend has direct implications for Northeastern students who are looking to break into the industry, especially those in the university's nursing, pharmacy, physician assistant, and physical therapy programs. According to Hoff, these healthcare-professionals-in-training will soon have more complex jobs, more career options, and more opportunities to make an impact on the nation's overall health and wellness. "Healthcare costs are too high. Employers want to pay less and individuals want to pay less, but the only way that will ever happen is if we can figure out a way to deliver healthcare to patients at a lower cost. Timothy Hoff, health policy expert "If you want to get into healthcare as a care provider," he advises, "then you need to talk to people in your field and use your co-ops to get insight into how changes in the industry will impact your particular profession." A snapshot of the healthcare industry looks like this: The nation's population is getting older and living longer than ever before, due in part to improvements in medicine, vaccines, and antibiotics. According to a report published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2016, the numbers of Americans aged 100 and over increased by more than 43 percent from 2000 to 2014, rising from 50,281 to 72,197. Despite the deep uncertainty surrounding the future of healthcare reform, cutting costs will continue to be a top priority, particularly as it relates to an aging and increasingly sicker patient population. "For the moment, we've bought into a market-driven model of healthcare delivery," says Hoff, "but there's plenty of evidence to show that it can't on its own solve the system's cost and access issues." And that, he adds, is "where turning out big numbers of competent healthcare professionals who can work together will play an important role." Credit: Drexel University Philadelphia's public housing residents are breathing in less secondhand smoke since a 2015 comprehensive smoke-free policy went into place, a new study indicates. Ann Klassen, PhD, a professor in Drexel University's Dornsife School of Public Health, led the study that monitored nicotine levels in Philadelphia Housing Authority properties both before and after the smoke-free policy was implemented. Klassen and her team found that although the number of places where nicotine was detected remained unchanged, the levels of detected nicotine were reduced by almost half after the policy was enacted. "This is encouraging," Klassen said. "These data show a reduction in exposure to airborne nicotine, which is an indicator of reduced exposure to secondhand smoke, and, therefore, healthier air in multi-unit housing." With the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) now requiring all public housing authorities across the U.S. to implement smoke-free policies by 2018, these findings from Philadelphia are a timely look at what could be accomplished. For their study, set to be published in Tobacco Regulatory Science, Klassen, Drexel epidemiologist Nora Lee, PhD, and colleagues partnered with the Philadelphia Housing Authority and Philadelphia Department of Health, as well as the Second Hand Smoke Exposure Assessment Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University. The Philadelphia Housing Authority is the largest in the country to implement a fully smoke-free policy in their properties. The policy, approved in July, 2015, was developed by Philadelphia Housing Authority leadership in partnership with PHA residents, with technical support from the Philadelphia Department of Public Health, including on-site cessation services provided through the Health Federation of Philadelphia and National Nurse-Led Care Consortium. Prior to the new policy, smoking was not permitted in public areas, but was allowed inside individual homes. However, there was concern about how secondhand smoke drifted in these properties and how much they affected common areas, like hallways, laundry room and elevators, and non-smoking households. In multi-unit housing, as much as 60% of air is transferred between units To measure potential secondhand smoke exposure, the team placed monitors throughout four different communities, ranging from high-rise apartment complexes to rowhomes, to capture nicotine in the air. Airborne nicotine was measured in common areas, where the average nicotine level was found to be significantly reduced (from 0.44 micrograms per cubic meter in 2013 to 0.23 in 2016). Inside non-smoking residents' homes, trends toward reduced nicotine exposures were also seen. These findings confirm that community-wide smoke-free policies are more effective in reducing secondhand smoke exposures for all residents than policies that permit smoking inside individual residences. This is very important in public housing communities, which include a variety of residents, including children, elderly, and chronically ill residents, who are especially vulnerable to respiratory diseases, like asthma. Klassen's study took readings from monitors in 2013, 2014 and 2016, but she supports continuing assessment. "For all new policies, it is very important to continue to monitor implementation over time and support consistent improvements," Klassen said. "Sustainable change takes long-term commitment, but this is a strong start." Programming could strengthen that start and continue progress. "Cessation and education services are an ongoing need all communities, as successful cessation takes time and support," Klassen explained. "In addition, environmental educationhow secondhand smoke travels and how it remains over timeis a great interest for residents. We found that both smokers and non-smokers are truly interested in learning about how to protect the health of their families and communities." More information: Tobacco Regulatory Science, DOI: 10.18001/TRS.3.2.7 A new drug extends the effectiveness of multiple HIV therapies by unleashing a cell's own protective machinery on the virus. The finding is an important step towards the creation of long-acting HIV drugs that could be administered once or twice per year, in contrast to current HIV treatments that must be taken daily. Credit: University of Rochester Medical Center A drug developed at the University of Rochester Medical Center extends the effectiveness of multiple HIV therapies by unleashing a cell's own protective machinery on the virus. The finding, published today in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, is an important step towards the creation of long-acting HIV drugs that could be administered once or twice per year, in contrast to current HIV treatments that must be taken daily. The drug, called URMC-099, was developed in the laboratory of UR scientist Harris A. ("Handy") Gelbard, M.D., Ph.D. When combined with "nanoformulated" versions of two commonly used anti-HIV drugs (also called antiretroviral drugs), URMC-099 lifts the brakes on a process called autophagy. Normally, autophagy allows cells to get rid of intracellular "trash," including invading viruses. In HIV infection, the virus prevents cells from turning on autophagy; one of the many tricks it uses to survive. When the brake on autophagy is lifted, cells are able to digest any virus that remains after treatment with antiretroviral therapy, leaving cells free of virus for extended periods of time. "This study shows that URMC-099 has the potential to reduce the frequency of HIV therapy, which would eliminate the burden of daily treatment, greatly increase compliance and help people better manage the disease," said Gelbard, professor and director of UR's Center for Neural Development and Disease, who has studied HIV/AIDS for the past 25 years. The finding builds on previous research that Gelbard conducted with Howard E. Gendelman, M.D., professor and chair of the Department of Pharmacology/Experimental Neuroscience at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. The ultimate goal in the HIV field is to develop a vaccine - a single shot that provides lifetime protection from the virus. Scientists from around the world are studying various strategies, including the use of broadly neutralizing antibodies that have the ability to neutralize a wide variety of strains of HIV, but these techniques are years away from being used in people. Gelbard believes the combination of URMC-099 and a nanoformulated antiretroviral into a long-acting HIV therapy can be mobilized for human use in the next 5 years. URMC-099 was tested in combination with nanoformulations of two FDA-approved HIV medications - a protease inhibitor called atazanavir and an integrase inhibitor called dolutegravir - in laboratory experiments using human immune cells and in mice that were engineered to have a human immune system to sustain HIV infection. URMC-099 reversed the block on autophagy and restricted viral growth only in the presence of the nanoformulated drugs. URMC-099 alone had no antiviral effect. The team also found that URMC-099 initiation of autophagy kept the nanoformulated HIV drugs in cells for extended periods of time, leading to a 50-fold increase in the half-life (the period of time required for the amount of drug in the body to be reduced by half) of nanoformulated dolutegravir. Scientists don't know why or how this happens, but are conducting additional research to understand more. The nanoformulated drugs were created in Gendelman's laboratory using a highly novel process called LASER ART (long-acting slow effective release antiretroviral therapy). The drugs are made into crystals and LASER ART enables them to be taken up in immune system cells called macrophages that reach certain destinations in tissues and stay there for prolonged periods of time. The crystals are protected against destruction (metabolism) in the liver and excretion in the kidney and urine. In addition to Gelbard and Gendelman, the research team included Divya Prakash Gnanadhas, Ph.D., post-doctoral research associate and Santhi Gorantla, Ph.D., associate professor, both in the Department of Pharmacology/Experimental Neuroscience at Nebraska. The work was supported by the University of Nebraska and several grants to Gelbard and Gendelman from the National Institutes of Health. URMC-099 is owned by URMC and has three international patents for its design and use in disease states. Transmission electron microscope image of negative-stained, Fortaleza-strain Zika virus (red), isolated from a microcephaly case in Brazil. The virus is associated with cellular membranes in the center. Credit: NIAID Why is there a delay between when a pregnant woman is infected with Zika virus and when her fetus shows signs of brain malformations or microcephaly? Why do only a small minority of infants born to infected women appear to be affected by Zika virus infection? Researchers at Baylor College of Medicine may have found answers to these important questions through their discovery that the trophoblast cells of the placenta may serve as a potential reservoir, or portal, of fetal transmission of the virus. The trophoblasts are a self-renewing population of cells that support the developing fetus. The findings, appearing today in the journal Scientific Reports, lend hope to the possibility that in the future care providers could use existing prenatal diagnostic techniques to detect the virus in the placental cells and someday find a way to stop its spread to the fetus. "These studies were important in not only establishing a potential portal for Zika virus transmission from mother to fetus, but in helping us understand why some pregnant women continue to have detectable virus in their blood or urine for many, many months after initial infection," said Dr. Kjersti Aagaard, professor and vice chair of obstetrics and gynecology at Baylor College of Medicine and maternal-fetal specialist at Texas Children's Pavilion for Women. The findings The research team isolated the virus from a patient who had been infected during the current epidemic in Colombia and propagated (or passaged) the Zika virus once. Next, they collected placental samples from 20 uninfected donors in Houston who had delivered uninfected and non-exposed infants at or near term. They isolated the trophoblasts from the placental samples to create a pure population of trophoblasts that they incubated for just one hour with the Zika virus. They then looked up to eight days later for ongoing replication of the virus, as well as changes in the placental trophoblast cells themselves. "We found that the virus can replicate in trophoblasts from every donor tested, and it does not kill the trophoblasts but instead allows them to continue doing their day to day function, including production of the pregnancy hormone bhCG," said Dr. Melissa Suter, assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Baylor and a co-author on the study. Aagaard echoed, "We have shown that you can take from uninfected donors from a non-endemic region, isolate their placental trophoblast cells, infect with a current Zika virus strain, and get replication," she said. "Since the placental trophoblasts are permissive to replication, our findings suggests that the placental trophoblasts may serve as a reservoir and potential portal for fetal transmission." Research techniques Researchers used three techniques to show that Zika virus, but not its related cousin dengue virus, was capable of propagating in placental trophoblast cells. First, they used a double stranded antibody that is not specific to Zika virus but is common to several related viruses and showed that the replicating virus was present in the pure population of trophoblasts. Next, they specifically measured Zika virus nucleic acid using the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test, which is equivalent to the clinical test used for Zika virus. They observed an increase in message level by PCR. Finally, they generated a series of fluorescent probes against single molecules of RNA and hybridized both RNA strands to visualize the replication of the virus at a single molecule level in these pure trophoblast population from uninfected donors. Why the trophoblasts? Why would Zika but not dengue virus replicate in the cells? Researchers also wanted to determine how the Zika virus might enter the trophoblast cells and why the virus replicates in the placental trophoblasts when other viruses do not. To answer this, they first looked at transcribed message of several putative cell entry receptors for Zika virus, and found that these important receptors are made in uninfected placental trophoblast cells. They also looked at the localization of expression of one such entry receptor, AXL, and found it on the cell surface of the trophoblast. The researchers then looked in both infected and uninfected trophoblast primary cultures for the expression of microRNA's and found that some were changed in their expression unique to Zika. Specifically, they looked at miR21, a ligand-binding microRNA receptor that binds to Toll-like receptors 7 and 8 and found that the presence of Zika virus infection caused a decrease in the amount of miR21. "It's interesting because it's a Toll-like receptor binding ligand, and that may be one of the ways that Zika virus can dampen an otherwise active immune response that would be functioning to keep the virus at bay," said Dr. Max Seferovic, a postdoctoral associate in obstetrics and gynecology at Baylor and co-author on the study. Finally, the researchers sequenced the Zika strain generated when they first isolated the virus and compared it to all 77 other genomic sequences of the Zika virus dating back to the original strains from the 1940s. They found a very different cluster between the current American and Asian strains of the virus compared to the historical African strains. "In the older African strain, we have not seen an association with fetal brain malformations or microcephaly," Aagaard said. "However, we do not yet know if the cluster separations between the different strains of the viruses has anything to do with either its capacity to cause congenital brain malformations or its ability to infect trophoblasts. This deserves much more attention in future studies." More information: Kjersti M. Aagaard et al. Primary Human Placental Trophoblasts are Permissive for Zika Virus (ZIKV) Replication, Scientific Reports (2017). Journal information: Scientific Reports Kjersti M. Aagaard et al. Primary Human Placental Trophoblasts are Permissive for Zika Virus (ZIKV) Replication,(2017). DOI: 10.1038/srep41389 KUNDUZ, Afghanistan The Taliban controlled the nearby streets and bullets were popping in the dark when Dr. Marzia Salam Yaftalis neighbors in Kunduz City turned to her for help. Their relative had gone into labor with twins and was having trouble, the streets to the hospital were blocked, and Dr. Yaftali was their best hope. With urban battle all around, she took the risk of leaving her two young children at home to try to save three lives. But on that evening last fall, the doctor did not feel like a hero she felt guilty. Her place was at Kunduz Regional Hospital, where she was the chief doctor, directing her staff members as they handled a wave of casualties. But they had begged her to stay home, feeling she would be at risk if the Taliban or even the militiamen fighting them found a woman in charge. I still struggle with that feeling why I was not able to come to the hospital that day, Dr. Yaftali said in an interview at the hospital months later. I am still uncomfortable. When Barack Obama was in office remember the good old days, just over a week ago, when we didnt wake up every morning and wonder what new atrocity was emanating from the White House Republicans were apoplectic about his use of executive orders. They called them unilateral edicts and power grabs. As Iowa Senator Charles Grassley once said in a floor speech: The president looks more and more like a king that the Constitution was designed to replace. What a difference a week makes. Now many of those Republicans are as quiet as church mice as Donald Trump pumps out executive orders at a fevered pitch, doing exactly what he said hed do during the campaign, for all of those who were paying attention: advancing a white nationalist agenda and vision of America, whether that be by demonizing blacks in the inner city, Mexicans at the border or Muslims from the Middle East. Trumps America is not America: not todays or tomorrows, but yesterdays. Trumps America is brutal, perverse, regressive, insular and afraid. There is no hope in it; there is no light in it. It is a vast expanse of darkness and desolation. And that is a vision of America that most of the people in this country cannot and will not abide. That is a vision of America that has galvanized ordinary American citizens in opposition in a way that is almost without precedent. We are inching toward anarchy as both the people and the president refuse to back down. DANAKIL DEPRESSION, Ethiopia In oppressively dry heat and a miasma of sulfur and chlorine, the rocky landscape sprouts patches of neon green and yellow that resemble oozing scrambled eggs. Near-boiling pools of acidic water bubble between odd formations of rocks and minerals: white beehive-shaped mounds of salt, yolk-colored lattices of sulfuric crust, purplish-red crumbles. Nearby, iron-rich rock fans out into flat mushroom shapes. The ground crackles hollowly underfoot and emits the hiss of bubbling liquid. Cones and small mineral chimneys babble from one-holed spouts in alien whispers. Though it looks like an extraterrestrial scene, this landscape belongs to the Danakil Depression, in a remote northeast region of Ethiopia aptly named Afar, near Eritrea. About 100 meters below sea level, the Danakil Depression is one of the worlds lowest places. It is also one of the hottest places on Earth, with average daily temperatures of 34.4 degrees Celsius (93.9 degrees Fahrenheit) and only about 100 millimeters of rain each year. Advertise Here Be seen advertise here. Contact us. Council of Border Guard Troops commanders discusses situation at CIS external borders Russia oil, natural gas companies plan to collaborate with Iraq Armenia army intelligence troops 30th anniversary is solemnly celebrated (PHOTOS) Rally of unity in support of Karabakh kicks off in downtown Yerevan Pentagon announces sending 8 NASAMS air defense systems to Ukraine Armenian Apostolic Church Supreme Spiritual Council meeting ends, Armenia and Artsakh security discussed Tropical Storm Nalgae death toll climbs to 155 in Philippines Artak Beglaryan is appointed advisor to Artsakh Minister of State (PHOTOS) US House committee extends deadline for Trump to produce documents on Capitol attack Over 200 elephants die in Kenya amid drought 13 dead in cafe fire in Russia Armenia Security Council chief to head for Poland, Netherlands, Lithuania Rishi Sunak: State cannot fix all problems Newspaper: To what extent Armenia adheres to sanctions on Russia? Biden accuses Twitter of spewing lies Newspaper: There are active political processes in Karabakh Qatar FM slams hypocrisy of calls to boycott World Cup France, Singapore and Switzerland begin joint testing of experimental digital currencies Oil war is Biden's biggest mistake Japan considers possible deployment of hypersonic missiles by 2030 Germany to install better air defense system over Defense Ministry buildings Erdogan and Stoltenberg discuss war in Ukraine Armenian MOD: Azerbaijani Armed Forces open fire in direction of Armenian positions True cost of Europe's rejection of Russian gas White House tries to explain Biden's statement about freeing Iran Former Pakistani Prime Minister: Either we will have a peaceful revolution or a bloody one Aramyan: Why are police officers' salaries increasing, while defense officers' are not? Pentagon and U.S. weapons manufacturers to discuss Russia, human resources and supply chain Ankara says U.S. may approve sale of F-16s to Turkey within few months IMF: Turkey should tighten monetary policy and give the Central Bank more independence Pope urges religious leaders to keep the world from brink of abyss Putin awards Catholicos of All Armenians Karekin II with Order of Honor U.S. says G7 countries realize need for coordinated response to China Round-the-clock curfew is introduced in Kherson Borrell says they can't put China and Russia on same level Olaf Scholz calls on China to influence Russia G7 foreign ministers express 'unwavering commitment' to protecting Ukraine, criticized PRC and IRI Political technologist explains why Pashinyan was elected chairman of board of ruling party in Armenia Erdogan signs up for TikTok China's army is constantly preparing for war amid provocative U.S. actions Kalin: Armenia is constructive about normalization of relations Poland asks EU to suspend fines Putin: Situation in Ukraine was deadly for Russia Portugal to test a four-day workweek US embassy in Armenia issues statement ahead of November 5 protests in Yerevan Dollar, euro go up in Armenia Baku authorities once again refuse to allow PFPA to hold protest rally Iranians commemorate anniversary of US embassy seizure Richard Kauzlarich: Azerbaijan, Armenia FMs meeting in Washington 'will send message to Putin' Russia ratifies protocol on requirements for length of service of EEU bodies' employees for pensions Armenia deputy defense minister in Russia, discusses military cooperation Yerevan receives proposal to hold Russia-Armenia-Azerbaijan interparliamentary talks Health minister: We will work with fallen Armenia detainees relatives one more time after which bodies will be buried Putin allows mobilization of citizens with unexpunged criminal record for serious crimes Arnika, NESEHNUTI NGOs of Czech Rep. issue joint statement on plan to expand gold mine in Armenias Karaberd Putin urges to evacuate civilians living in Kherson from the war zone Iran parliament speaker to visit Armenia Ruling force MP: Canada is opening embassy in Armenia because we are one of worlds most democratic countries Girl with Armenian roots ends up in Vladimir orphanage Erdogan says he has agreed with Putin to supply grain to needy countries for free Armenia President, UK envoy agree to continue cooperation, close contacts Armenia FM receives EU Monitoring Capacity Spanish MPs don't approve agreement with Baku as a sign of solidarity with Armenia Japan says North Korea may go ahead with nuclear test Armenia government to allocate about $5M to Karabakh refugees support program Belarusian border service: Border guards intercepts Ukrainian training drone President appoints Ruben Vardanyan as Karabakh Minister of State US embassy expresses concern about human rights violation in Azerbaijan Azerbaijan continues muscle play on Iran border Ibrahim Kalin says Turkey will become an important gas center one way or another Biden: We're gonna free Iran Reuters: G7 countries and Australia agrees on fixed price for Russian oil World oil prices dropping Wizz Air to launch new flights between Venice, Yerevan EU assesses Armenia, Azerbaijan border commissions meeting in Brussels as constructive Artsakh President convenes enlarged working consultation Envoy: China supports Armenians Azerbaijan MOD disseminates disinformation, Armenia army did not fire Armenia ruling party recounts congress voting results Quake jolts Turkey Newspaper: Armenia PM once again manipulates topic of negotiations, Karabakh conflict Newspaper: Studies underway on Armenia MPs business involvement US wants to prevent Germany, other allies from working together with China Protests turn violent in Iran's Alborz Province Portugal is considering abandoning golden visa scheme Biden and Erdogan to meet at G-20 summit NATO supports normalization of relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan and welcomes EU efforts Bank of England raises interest rates by largest amount since 1989 Scholz says Berlin must change its attitude toward China Cavusoglu and Stoltenberg disagree over Sweden's and Finland's fulfillment of commitments Turkish Vice President to visit Azerbaijan and occupied Shushi Britain buys 250 million pounds worth of oil from Azerbaijan from July 2021 to June 2022 Yair Lapid congratulates Benjamin Netanyahu on winning election Armenian MOD: Azerbaijani Ministry of Defense spreads another disinformation ENISA: War in Ukraine, geopolitics fuel cyberattacks Armenian MFA: Yerevan and Baku agree to speed up work on agreeing procedure of Commissions' activities Zelenskyy will not participate in G20 summit if Putin participates in it WP: Man who attacked Pelosi's husband was in the U.S. illegally At Upper Lars, 30 cars are allowed through per day instead of previous 300: What are authorities doing? Bloomberg: Turkey unlikely to sign Sweden's bid for NATO membership before the end of the year The Armenians of Washington and New York held protests in front of Belarus diplomatic missions in Washington, DC and New York City demanding the immediate and unconditional release of the Russian-Israeli blogger Alexandr Lapshin. The protests staged on Sunday were organized by the Armenian National Committees of Greater Washington (ANC of GW) and New York (ANC of New York). Mr. Lapshin currently faces extradition from Belarus to Azerbaijan for traveling and reporting from Republic of Artsakh (Nagorno Karabakh) and speaking critically of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyevs dictatorial regime. The gathered voiced their discontent and outrage over Azerbaijans continuous assault against free media and journalists over the past several years, with Mr. Lapshin being the latest victim. We condemn in the strongest terms any attempt to silence or intimidate journalists and individuals who travel to the free and independent Republic of Artsakh, said ANCA Eastern Region Chairman Steve Mesrobian. Azerbaijan and Belarus are two of Europes last remaining dictatorships and for us it is absolutely unacceptable to silence journalists for speaking up about human rights offences or for expressing their support for the free and democratic Republic of Artsakh. We also call upon the United States government to take a strong stance on this issue in solidarity with the people of Nagorno Karabakh Republic, our democratic and reliable ally in the region. The Washington DC protest was organized in coordination with the ARF Sebouh Committee and the AYF Ani Chapter. Similar protests have taken place at Belarus Embassies around the world. We have gathered here today in solidarity with Mr. Lapshin and with hundreds of other journalists who have been silenced by President Aliyevs dictatorial regime, said AYF Ani Chapter Chairman Aram Tramblian. Media freedom is one of the cornerstones of any democracy. With Mr. Lapshins extradition, the Azerbaijani government hopes to quash future free and unfettered reporting about Artsakh a dangerous precedent which we simply cannot allow. The lack of clergymen in the Armenian Patriarchate of Constantinople has become a problem for the Armenian community of Istanbul. Istanbul-based Armenian newspaper Agos has touched on the statement of the General Vicar of Patriarch Aram Atesyan, according to whom three more clergymen have terminated their spiritual service for different reasons. This fact made Agos study the process of raising religious officials. The newspaper journalists talked on this topic to one of the clergymen of the Constantinople Patriarchate, High Priest Zakeos Ohanyan. The latter noted that a church without a seminary school is like a bird missing a wing. He also stressed that when someone wants to be a cleric, he should go to Etchmiadzin, Jerusalem or Beirut to receive education. Oregon's 2017 Safety Break Set for May 10 Safety Break invites employers to bolster workplace safety and health with training, award recognition gatherings, or other creative activities. Coordinated by Oregon OSHA, it's a voluntary initiative. With the 14th annual Safety Break for Oregon now scheduled for May 10, 2017, Oregon OSHA is encouraging employers in the state to take part and to promote safety and worker health at their workplaces. It is a day to "talk about why workplace safety and health matter in our lives [and] to put safety into action and to renew our commitment to preventing on-the-job injury, illness, and death," according to the agency. Safety Break invites employers to bolster workplace safety and health with training, award recognition gatherings, or other creative activities. Coordinated by Oregon OSHA, it's a voluntary initiative. "This stand-down provides an opportunity for employers and their workers to pause and remember the high value they should place on safety and health while on the job," said Michael Wood, Oregon OSHA's administrator. "It's an opportunity to celebrate past successes and to review the reasons behind those successes. It's also a time to reflect on current challenges and to look to the future with a renewed commitment to identifying and eliminating hazards." Companies that participate will be entered to win one of three $100 checks to be used for a luncheon of their choice, if they sign up online by Friday, May 5. The prizes will be given to participating companies as part of a random drawing. The Oregon SHARP Alliance is sponsoring the contest. For more information, visit the Safety Break for Oregon website. What's the best way to combat frosty late Wisconsin winter temperatures? With frosty, delicious Wisconsin brews, of course. At least that's the thinking behind the first annual Keg Killer Winter Beer Festival, an outdoor tribute to tasty craft beers as well as the city's first outdoor winter beer sampling event of its kind headed to The Micro at Wisconsin State Fair Park on Saturday, Feb. 11. From 1:30 to 5 p.m., more than 30 Wisconsin craft breweries will serve up unlimited three-ounce samples of their frosty finest, while live music provided by J-Dubz raffles and prizes, food from the Leinie Lodge and other fun activities will help keep attendees heated and happy. "It's partially just that we wanted to create a cool event and, more important to us than anything else, something fun," said Ken Michel, director of operations at The Micro. The craft brewery lineup for the Keg Killer Winter Beer Festival, just finalized today with 31 total breweries 12 of which from the Milwaukee area includes: Aly Asylum Brenner Brewing Capital Brewing Central Waters Brewing Co. Door County Brewing Co. Eagle Park Brewing Company Enlightened Brewing Company The Fermentorium Good City Brewing Grumpy Troll Brew Pub Hinterland Karben4 Lakefront Brewery Leinenkugel's Miller Valley Brewery Milwaukee Brewing Co. Mobcraft Beer New Glarus Brewing Co. Pearl Street Brewery Point Potosi Brewing Company Raised Grain Brewing Company Saint Francis Brewing Co. Sand Creek Brewing Company Sprecher Brewery Third Space Brewing Titletown Brewing Tyranena Wisconsin Brewing Co. 3 Sheeps 3rd Sign The newly created beer festival ties into The Micro's overall "Micro All Year" campaign, which includes Wisconsin State Fair, Harvest Fair and Summer Untapped, hosted on Memorial Day weekend. "We just want to have some big events that help promote Wisconsin craft beer," Michel said. "As things have grown in the Milwaukee area even in the last year we want to help promote that as much as possible. That's one of our primary goals with any event that we do." Of course, staying warm in the midst of predictably chilly February conditions the current forecast as of writing expects a high of 32 degrees for that Saturday will also be a goal. So the Keg Killer Winter Beer Festival will have a heated warm-up tent for those beer lovers needing a quick break from the brisk weather. "Minnesota and Michigan both have rather large beer festivals that are completely outdoors, and in talking with them a little bit, they said they both have a heated area where they don't necessarily serve beer, but people can warm up for five or ten minutes or stay in there all day if they want but the actual sampling and festival itself is outside," Michel noted. General admission tickets cost $45 in advance, while VIP tickets complete with a free Pub Pass and early admission beginning at 1 p.m. cost $65. For more information, visit the Keg Killer Winter Beer Festival's website. Its been almost exactly a year since news emerged that Gino Fazzari would open a new pizzeria right next door to his Calderone Club, 842 N. Old World 3rd St. Pizzeria San Giorgio located in the former Thai Palace, 838 N. Old World 3rd St. will host a ribbon cutting ceremony Tuesday at 4:30 p.m. with Mayor Tom Barrett and Bucks President Peter Feigin. Fazzari expects to open to the public next week, after his staff is thoroughly trained. The restaurant is named in honor of Fazzari's cousin, George who passed away last year and was Gino's cooking mentor (and namesake; George was called Gino, too) as well as in honor of Saint George, who Fazzari says is his patron saint. "He's been in control of this whole thing," Fazzari told me this morning. Unlike Calderone, which serves thin crust Italian-American style pizza (among my Milwaukee favorites!), San Giorgio will focus on classic Neapolitan pizza and is currently undertaking the certification to be classified as a Vera Pizza Napoletana, which means it adheres to the "strict requirements that respect the tradition of the art of Neapolitan pizza making." According to Fazzari, the pizzeria will serve a "unique array of Italian dishes." Just what that means, well find out as our own Lori Fredrich will attend a preview dinner this week and will report back afterward. Fazzari also noted in a statement this morning that Pizzeria San Giorgio will create 50 new jobs in Downtown Milwaukee. Every day, Kavon Cortez Jones discovers a new word via Dictionary.com. On the morning of our interview, he had just learned the meaning of "emolument," which, for the record, means "profit, salary, or fees from office or employment." "This made perfect sense to me because I got paid today from Beans & Barley," says Jones, who works at the East Side institution as a dishwasher. However, most of the money he made in 2016 which was enough to move out of his moms house in Harambee and buy himself a pair of glasses he actually liked and a non-government phone came from sales from his poetry book, called "Club Noir." The 52-page, self-published collection features poems from 2012 to 2016 about Milwaukee, Paris, New Orleans, Chicago and more. Since September, he has sold about 250 books at $50 each. "I don't know if people buy my books because I'm poor and young and black or because I'm really good at what I do," Jones says. "But at the same time theyre buying it because they know me and they want to support me. But Im paranoid sometimes." High points of the book include his ability to artistically share his life growing up on Milwaukees North Side with poems like "Friiied Chickennnn," but he also writes in the first person as Vincent Van Gogh in "Starry Night" and tributes Jimi Hendrix in "Pink Elephant Night" and Prince in "Club Noir." "Club Noir" is not available online or in bookstores, but Jones always has a bunch of copies in his backpack. Visit his Facebook page to find out how to get one. Putting out a book of poetry was a new experience for Jones, who is best known for his live spoken word performances. Since graduating from Riverside High School four years ago, he has performed between 250 and 300 times at venues all over Milwaukee and beyond. "I mostly perform for free I love doing stuff for free, especially for kids, but Im also trying to make money so I can feel more like an adult," Jones says. Experiencing Jones perform live is an invigorating experience. His words, rhythm, voice and stage presence combine into a performance thats professional and skilled and with every show he gets even better. One of the amazing aspects of his performances is Jones ability to memorize so many words and to offer them flawlessly, without a stumble or glitch. "I can memorize an 8-minute monologue in a couple of hours," says Jones. "I recommend you read a poem 10 times before you go to sleep. Five times in your head and five times out loud and when you wake up, you're gonna know that poem." During his live performances, Jones likes to challenge the audience about many issues, including race. "I address a lot of white audiences," he says. Even though he was warned by teachers and mentors not to read "old or dead white poets" he finds himself reading a lot of old or dead white poets and enjoying them. "Ive read a lot of Billy Collins and Walt Whitman and Charles Bukowski," Jones says. "I just spent the last couple of days sitting in the East Side Library and reading Bukowski. I wrote down a lot of his quotes. He is really funny." Originally, Jones performed under the name "KJ Progidy" but recently started to bill himself by his legal name, Kavon Cortez Jones. "I wanted people to see me more as a real person, not as this poet named KJ Progidy," says Jones. Jones, who is a student in the Milwaukee Area Technical Colleges Promise Program, started writing when he was 13 years old and attending Dr. Martin Luther King Elementary School. Poets and activists Muhibb Dyer and Kwabena Nixon provided a poetry workshop for Jones class and he was immediately inspired. He went on to join The Poetry Club at Riverside High School and compete locally and nationally. "It was very good for me," he says. "When I started I was 15 and introverted." This summer, Jones planes to release a second short book called "Nostalgia" and eventually, another full-length book. For now, hes adjusting to being on his own, going to college, holding down a job, being a spoken word performer and creating new and powerful relationships. "Ive built up a family of people outside my family my friends who really see me as a person," says Jones. "Thats why I went back to my real name. It connects deeper to my heart." Satellite image of the Gibraltar Arc (NASA). Credit: NASA A team of Andalusian scientists led by the University of Granada (UGR) has been able to reconstruct for the first time what the Gibraltar Arc was like 9 million years ago. It's one of the narrowest landforms on Earth. The researchers have been able to prove that, since then, large blocks of land with sizes of about 300 kilometers long and 150 kilometers wide have rotated clockwise (in the case of the Baetic System mountain range) and counterclockwise (in the case of the Rif mountain range, in the north of Morocco). These movements have completely reshaped the Gibraltar Arc, since they occurred at a very high speed: Six degrees per 1 million years (in total, 53 degrees for the block of the Western Baetic System). This is compatible with both the opening of the Strait of Gibraltar about 5 million years ago. As Ana Crespo-Blanc, professor from the Department of Geodynamics at the UGR and lead researcher of the project, explains, the Gibraltar Arc is a geological region corresponding to the arched mountain range that surrounds the sea of Alboran (located between the Iberian peninsula and Africa), and it is formed by the Baetic System (south of Spain), the Strait of Gibraltar and the Rif (north of Morocco). The team of geologists from the universities of Granada, Pablo de Olavide (Seville) and the Andalusian Earth Sciences Institute (IACT from its abbreviation in Spanish), has analyzed the existing connection between the different episodes of deformation that the Baetic and Rif mountain ranges have suffered (which include folds and ridges), as well as the paleomagnetism data of previous publications. UGR researcher Ana Crespo-Blanc on board the Japanese ship Chykyu during an expedition. Credit: UGRdivulga "This work, published in the journal Tectonophysics, is the first in the world that shows both the homogeneity of block rotations and the speed of rotations for the Gibraltar Arc. It reconciles much apparently contradictory data, particularly in relation to the kinematic markers of the movements associated with large geological structures such as faults systems 9 million years ago," professor Crespo-Blanc explains. Their research culminates with a reconstruction of the Gibraltar Arc 9 million years ago, at a key moment in the tectonic history of the collision between Africa and Iberia, shortly before the closure of the connection between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean and when the Gibraltar Arc was situated more to the East than at present. More information: Ana Crespo-Blanc et al, Clues for a Tortonian reconstruction of the Gibraltar Arc: Structural pattern, deformation diachronism and block rotations, Tectonophysics (2016). DOI: 10.1016/j.tecto.2016.05.045 Artist's reconstruction of Saccorhytus coronarius, based on the original fossil finds. The actual creature was probably no more than a millimeter in size. Credit: S Conway Morris / Jian Han Researchers have identified traces of what they believe is the earliest known prehistoric ancestor of humansa microscopic, bag-like sea creature, which lived about 540 million years ago. Named Saccorhytus, after the sack-like features created by its elliptical body and large mouth, the species is new to science and was identified from microfossils found in China. It is thought to be the most primitive example of a so-called "deuterostome"a broad biological category that encompasses a number of sub-groups, including the vertebrates. If the conclusions of the study, published in the journal Nature, are correct, then Saccorhytus was the common ancestor of a huge range of species, and the earliest step yet discovered on the evolutionary path that eventually led to humans, hundreds of millions of years later. Modern humans are, however, unlikely to perceive much by way of a family resemblance. Saccorhytus was about a millimetre in size, and probably lived between grains of sand on the seabed. Its features were spectacularly preserved in the fossil recordand intriguingly, the researchers were unable to find any evidence that the animal had an anus. The study was carried out by an international team of academics, including researchers from the University of Cambridge in the UK and Northwest University in Xi'an China, with support from other colleagues at institutions in China and Germany. Simon Conway Morris, Professor of Evolutionary Palaeobiology and a Fellow of St John's College, University of Cambridge, said: "We think that as an early deuterostome this may represent the primitive beginnings of a very diverse range of species, including ourselves. To the naked eye, the fossils we studied look like tiny black grains, but under the microscope the level of detail is jaw-dropping. All deuterostomes had a common ancestor, and we think that is what we are looking at here." Degan Shu, from Northwest University, added: "Our team has notched up some important discoveries in the past, including the earliest fish and a remarkable variety of other early deuterostomes. Saccorhytus now gives us remarkable insights into the very first stages of the evolution of a group that led to the fish, and ultimately, to us." Most other early deuterostome groups are from about 510 to 520 million years ago, when they had already begun to diversify into not just the vertebrates, but the sea squirts, echinoderms (animals such as starfish and sea urchins) and hemichordates (a group including things like acorn worms). This level of diversity has made it extremely difficult to work out what an earlier, common ancestor might have looked like. The Saccorhytus microfossils were found in Shaanxi Province, in central China, and pre-date all other known deuterostomes. By isolating the fossils from the surrounding rock, and then studying them both under an electron microscope and using a CT scan, the team were able to build up a picture of how Saccorhytus might have looked and lived. This revealed features and characteristics consistent with current assumptions about primitive deuterostomes. Dr Jian Han, of Northwest University, said: "We had to process enormous volumes of limestone - about three tonnes - to get to the fossils, but a steady stream of new finds allowed us to tackle some key questions: was this a very early echinoderm, or something even more primitive? The latter now seems to be the correct answer." In the early Cambrian period, the region would have been a shallow sea. Saccorhytus was so small that it probably lived in between individual grains of sediment on the sea bed. The study suggests that its body was bilaterally symmetricala characteristic inherited by many of its descendants, including humansand was covered with a thin, relatively flexible skin. This in turn suggests that it had some sort of musculature, leading the researchers to conclude that it could have made contractile movements, and got around by wriggling. Perhaps its most striking feature, however, was its rather primitive means of eating food and then dispensing with the resulting waste. Saccorhytus had a large mouth, relative to the rest of its body, and probably ate by engulfing food particles, or even other creatures. A very distant relative A crucial observation are small conical structures on its body. These may have allowed the water that it swallowed to escape and so were perhaps the evolutionary precursor of the gills we now see in fish. But the researchers were unable to find any evidence that the creature had an anus. "If that was the case, then any waste material would simply have been taken out back through the mouth, which from our perspective sounds rather unappealing," Conway Morris said. The findings also provide evidence in support of a theory explaining the long-standing mismatch between fossil evidence of prehistoric life, and the record provided by biomolecular data, known as the "molecular clock". Technically, it is possible to estimate roughly when species diverged by looking at differences in their genetic information. In principle, the longer two groups have evolved separately, the greater the biomolecular difference between them should be, and there are reasons to think this process is more or less clock-like. Unfortunately, before a point corresponding roughly to the time at which Saccorhytus was wriggling in the mud, there are scarcely any fossils available to match the molecular clock's predictions. Some researchers have theorised that this is because before a certain point, many of the creatures they are searching for were simply too small to leave much of a fossil record. The microscopic scale of Saccorhytus, combined with the fact that it is probably the most primitive deuterostome yet discovered, appears to back this up. More information: Jian Han et al, Meiofaunal deuterostomes from the basal Cambrian of Shaanxi (China), Nature (2017). DOI: 10.1038/nature21072 Journal information: Nature Chris Ferguson, Boeing director of Starliner Crew and Mission Systems and a former NASA astronaut and Space Shuttle commander wears the brand new spacesuit from Boeing and David Clark that crews will wear on Starliner missions to the ISS. Credit: Boeing Boeing has unveiled the advanced new lightweight spacesuits that astronauts will sport as passengers aboard the company's CST-100 Starliner space taxi during commercial taxi journey's to and from and the International Space Station (ISS) and other low Earth orbit destinations. The signature 'Boeing Blue' spacesuits will be much lighter, as well as more flexible and comfortable compared to earlier generations of spacesuits wore by America's astronauts over more than five decades of human spaceflight, starting with the Mercury capsule to the latest gear worn by Space Shuttle astronauts. "The suit capitalizes on historical designs, meets NASA requirements for safety and functionality, and introduces cutting-edge innovations," say NASA officials. The suits protect the astronauts during both launch and reentry into the Earth's atmosphere during the return home. Indeed Chris Ferguson, a former NASA Space Shuttle Commander who now works for Boeing as a Starliner program director, helped reveal the 'Boeing Blue' spacesuits during a Facebook live event, where he modeled the new suit. "We slogged through some of the real engineering challenges and now we are getting to the point where those challenges are largely behind us and it's time to get on to the rubber meeting the road," Ferguson said. The suits offer superior functionality, comfort and protection for astronauts who will don them when crewed Starliner flights to the space station begin as soon as next year. Astronaut Eric Boe evaluates Boeing Starliner spacesuit in mockup of spacecraft cockpit. Credit: Boeing At roughly half the weight (about 10 pounds vs. 20 pounds) compared to the launch-and-entry suits worn by space shuttle astronauts, crews look forward to wearing the 'Boeing Blue' suits. "Spacesuits have come in different sizes and shapes and designs, and I think this fits the Boeing model, fits the Boeing vehicle," said Chris Ferguson, Boeing director of Starliner Crew and Mission Systems and a former NASA astronaut. Among the advances cited are: Lighter and more flexible through use of advanced materials and new joint patterns Helmet and visor incorporated into the suit instead of detachable. The suit's hood-like soft helmet sports a wide polycarbonate visor to give Starliner passengers better peripheral vision throughout their ride to and from space. A communications headset within the helmet also helps connect astronauts to ground and space crews Touchscreen-sensitive gloves that allow astronauts to interact with the capsule's tablets screens overhead Vents that allow astronauts to be cooler, but can still pressurize the suit immediately Breathable, slip resistant boots Zippers in the torso area will make it easier for astronauts to comfortably transition from sitting to standing Innovative layers will keep astronauts cooler "The most important part is that the suit will keep you alive," astronaut Eric Boe said, in a statement. "It is a lot lighter, more form-fitting and it's simpler, which is always a good thing. Complicated systems have more ways they can break, so simple is better on something like this." The astronauts help the designers to perfect the suits very practically by wearing them inside Starliner mock-ups, moving around to accomplish tasks, reaching for the tablets screens, and climbing in and out of the capsule repeatedly, says Boe "so they can establish the best ways for astronauts to work inside the spacecraft's confines." "The spacesuit acts as the emergency backup to the spacecraft's redundant life support systems," said Richard Watson, subsystem manager for spacesuits for NASA's Commercial Crew Program. Hull of the Boeing CST-100 Starliner Structural Test Article (STA)- the first Starliner to be built in the companys modernized Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility high bay at NASAs Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Credit: Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com "If everything goes perfectly on a mission, then you don't need a spacesuit. It's like having a fire extinguisher close by in the cockpit. You need it to be effective if it is needed." Boe is one of four NASA astronauts that form the core cadre of astronauts training for the initial flight tests aboard either the Boeing Starliner or SpaceX Crew Dragon now under development as part of NASA's Commercial Crew program. The inaugural flight tests are slated to begin in 2018 under contract to NASA. The procedure on launch day will be similar to earlier manned launches. But for Starliner, the capsule will launch atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket currently being man-rated. Astronauts will don the new 'Boeing Blue' suit in the historic Crew Quarters. The will ride out to the rocket inside an astrovan. After reaching Space Launch Complex 41, they will take the elevator up, stride across the recently installed Crew Access Arm and board Starliner as it stands atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket. The first test flight will carry a crew of two. Soon thereafter the crew size will grow to four when regular crew rotation flights to the ISS start as soon as 2019. "To me, it's a very tangible sign that we are really moving forward and we are a lot closer than we've been," Ferguson said. "The next time we pull all this together, it might be when astronauts are climbing into the actual spacecraft." Boeing is currently manufacturing the Starliner spacecraft at the company's Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. USC researchers will try to predict the location of oil and gas reservoirs using 3D-imaging techniques and a knowledge of physics. Credit: Photo/iStock A golden age of easy-to-extract oil and natural gas appears to be coming to an end. As a result, major oil companies are developing new technology to help detect underground oil and gas reservoirs, some of which lie more than 3,000 meters below the earth's surface. The complex process of detecting, drilling and extracting from these reservoirs can be fraught with challengesthe field of subsurface science aims to learn more about the dynamics of underground rock formations during man-made disturbances such as oil extraction, groundwater pumping, geothermal energy recovery and carbon dioxide storage. A new unit at the USC Viterbi School of Engineeringthe Foundation CMG Industrial Research Center for Advanced Reservoir Characterization and Forecastingis poised to aid in this effort. Resource recovery The center will help develop state-of-the-art imaging technology and efficient, environmentally responsible best practices for subsurface resource recovery. Foundation CMG, which has a mandate to investigate research and innovation in oil and gas reservoir modeling, has provided $1.35 million in seed funding for the center at USC Viterbi, one of only 15 worldwide. Behnam Jafarpour and Kristian Jessen, associate professors in the Mork Family Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science at USC Viterbi, will co-direct the center, focusing on the development of novel imaging and forecasting technologies. "Subsurface characterization is very much like solving a giant jigsaw puzzle," Jafarpour said. "You may have very few pieces of the puzzle here and there, but they reveal little information about what fills the gap between them." Three-dimensional tools Jafarpour, who has a background in electrical engineering, will develop advanced 3-D imaging tools that can help create a more complete picture of material properties in underground rocks and their variability in space. This area, called dynamic reservoir characterization, is critical for predicting the behavior of subsurface energy and water resources, as well as waste disposal systems, he noted. "There is a lot of potential to combine imaging tools and techniques with reservoir monitoring and response data and geological insight to fill in the missing pieces of the puzzle," Jafarpour said. "If done successfully, the result can significantly improve our understanding of the behavior of these systems and prediction of the resource recovery process." Jessen's area of expertise is in the physics of fluid flow, specifically fluid flow in rocks. Despite appearances, rocks actually have porous surfaces that make it possible for liquids and gases to pass through them. He intends to develop predictive models for the physics at play during fluid movement in the reservoirs themselves. "[Jafarpour] tries to figure out what [the subsurface] looks like, while I predict how fluids will move in the subsurface," Jessen explained. "So, basically what he's doing provides input to me in terms of the variability of the properties within the subsurface materials, and I try to look at how that would affect movement of fluids in a larger volume. That then feeds back into his work." A five-year plan Jessen's and Jafarpour's focus over the next five years, the duration of the grant, will be to develop relationships with industry and determine research topics and activities that address key challenges in subsurface modeling. Ultimately, the center will comprise a 20-member research team that includes both graduate students and postdoctoral faculty, and it will be supported by a consortium of industry representatives. "We want to take the technology that is used to make decisions about how we recover and utilize the subsurface resources on the planet to the next level so that we can make even better decisions," Jessen said. "We need to do a better job there to ensure that we develop and extract the resources in the most efficient ways possible." Jafarpour and Jessen are thrilled at USC Viterbi's selection and the opportunities ahead. "I'm really excited about the contribution that multidisciplinary scientific approaches can bring to the technology and computational models that we use in optimizing and predicting these [subsurface] systems, leading to improved energy recovery with minimal environmental impact and associated risks," Jafarpour said. Black-hole-powered galaxies called blazars are the most common sources detected by NASA's Fermi. As matter falls toward the supermassive black hole at the galaxy's center, some of it is accelerated outward at nearly the speed of light along jets pointed in opposite directions. When one of the jets happens to be aimed in the direction of Earth, as illustrated here, the galaxy appears especially bright and is classified as a blazar. Credit: M. Weiss/CfA NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has identified the farthest gamma-ray blazars, a type of galaxy whose intense emissions are powered by supersized black holes. Light from the most distant object began its journey to us when the universe was 1.4 billion years old, or nearly 10 percent of its present age. "Despite their youth, these far-flung blazars host some of the most massive black holes known," said Roopesh Ojha, an astronomer at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. "That they developed so early in cosmic history challenges current ideas of how supermassive black holes form and grow, and we want to find more of these objects to help us better understand the process." Ojha presented the findings Monday, Jan. 30, at the American Physical Society meeting in Washington, and a paper describing the results has been submitted to The Astrophysical Journal Letters. Blazars constitute roughly half of the gamma-ray sources detected by Fermi's Large Area Telescope (LAT). Astronomers think their high-energy emissions are powered by matter heated and torn apart as it falls from a storage, or accretion, disk toward a supermassive black hole with a million or more times the sun's mass. A small part of this infalling material becomes redirected into a pair of particle jets, which blast outward in opposite directions at nearly the speed of light. Blazars appear bright in all forms of light, including gamma rays, the highest-energy light, when one of the jets happens to point almost directly toward us. Previously, the most distant blazars detected by Fermi emitted their light when the universe was about 2.1 billion years old. Earlier observations showed that the most distant blazars produce most of their light at energies right in between the range detected by the LAT and current X-ray satellites, which made finding them extremely difficult. Then, in 2015, the Fermi team released a full reprocessing of all LAT data, called Pass 8, that ushered in so many improvements astronomers said it was like having a brand new instrument. The LAT's boosted sensitivity at lower energies increased the chances of discovering more far-off blazars. NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has discovered the five most distant gamma-ray blazars yet known. The light detected by Fermi left these galaxies by the time the universe was two billion years old. Two of these galaxies harbor billion-solar-mass black holes that challenge current ideas about how quickly such monsters could grow. Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger, producer The research team was led by Vaidehi Paliya and Marco Ajello at Clemson University in South Carolina and included Dario Gasparrini at the Italian Space Agency's Science Data Center in Rome as well as Ojha. They began by searching for the most distant sources in a catalog of 1.4 million quasars, a galaxy class closely related to blazars. Because only the brightest sources can be detected at great cosmic distances, they then eliminated all but the brightest objects at radio wavelengths from the list. With a final sample of about 1,100 objects, the scientists then examined LAT data for all of them, resulting in the detection of five new gamma-ray blazars. Expressed in terms of redshift, astronomers' preferred measure of the deep cosmos, the new blazars range from redshift 3.3 to 4.31, which means the light we now detect from them started on its way when the universe was between 1.9 and 1.4 billion years old, respectively. "Once we found these sources, we collected all the available multiwavelength data on them and derived properties like the black hole mass, the accretion disk luminosity, and the jet power," said Paliya. Two of the blazars boast black holes of a billion solar masses or more. All of the objects possess extremely luminous accretion disks that emit more than two trillion times the energy output of our sun. This means matter is continuously falling inward, corralled into a disk and heated before making the final plunge to the black hole. "The main question now is how these huge black holes could have formed in such a young universe," said Gasparrini. "We don't know what mechanisms triggered their rapid development." In the meantime, the team plans to continue a deep search for additional examples. "We think Fermi has detected just the tip of the iceberg, the first examples of a galaxy population that previously has not been detected in gamma rays," said Ajello. Credit: Welthungerhilfe Researchers from Universidad Politecnica de Madrid (UPM) are involved in the first large collection and analysis of data on greenhouse gases emissions in African crop systems. A researcher from the School of Agricultural, Food and Biosystems Engineering (ETSIAAB) at UPM was involved in an international scientific team that collected the existing data on greenhouse gases emissions (GHG) released in natural ecosystems and agricultural lands in Sub-Saharan Africa. Researchers also collected data of the factors causing these emissions and the management strategies, as well as possible solutions for their reduction. All collected data is available in an open access database hosted on a blog developed by the researchers in order to share the knowledge on GHG in the African continent. In spite of the great relevance of Africa as an agricultural country and the vulnerability of its agro-ecosystem due to the climate change, very little is known about greenhouse gases emissions in Sub-Saharan Africafor instance, the natural and anthropic factors responsible for these emissions and their contribution and mitigation potential to global emissions. This work project carried out by an international group of researchers, including Professor Alberto Sanz Cobena from ETSIAAB, has collected the existing information so far on greenhouse gases emissions released in natural ecosystems and agricultural lands in Sub-Saharan Africa. After reviewing all available scientific literature on the subject, 75 research projects carried out in 22 African countries were studied in detail in order to determine the factors that cause these emissions, the management strategies as well as their possible reduction. After analyzing the study results, researchers observed that the main contributor to the total emissions in Africa is carbon dioxide, followed by methane and nitrous oxide. In the first case, the major emissions rates are released when land usage changes, this is very common in slash-and-burn agriculture. Methane emissions usually occur in crops of deepwater rice and in African landscape elements such as termite mounds. Nitrous oxide, as it usually occurs in crop systems, is defined by management practices linked to the nitrogen fertilization, mainly the use of manure. In short, the type of vegetation, management of forest areas and changes in land use are the main factors that cause GHG in natural ecosystems in Sub-Saharan Africa. In agricultural systems, the adding of crop residues and the use of manures and synthetic fertilizers cause significant emission flows. However, there are great changes on these systems in the magnitude of the emission depending on the gas in question and the management practices. In this way, improving the fallow in the presence of legumes can lead to an increase in carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide emissions compared to the traditional crops. The type and quality of crop residues are key factors to control the emissions of these gases. Likewise, the intensity of the carbon dioxide emissions (emissions per kilogram of crop) was minimal with doses of fertilizer between 100 and 150 kilograms per hectare. The study results suggest that natural ecosystems and agricultural lands in sub-Saharan Africa can be a significant source of emissions worldwide. Additional measures of GHG emissions are required in order to reduce the existing uncertainty about estimated annual emissions associated with different uses of land as well as the potential effectiveness of potential mitigation strategies. Alberto Sanz Cobena, the UPM researcher involved in this project says, "Africa is a vast continent with many different types and uses of land, agricultural practices, etc. In order to achieve robust conclusions about the role of Africa as a contributor of global GHG, it is necessary a greater international collaboration at scientific, academic and socioeconomic levels." More information: Dong-Gill Kim et al. Greenhouse gas emissions from natural ecosystems and agricultural lands in sub-Saharan Africa: synthesis of available data and suggestions for further research, Biogeosciences (2016). DOI: 10.5194/bg-13-4789-2016 Journal information: Biogeosciences Credit: University of Plymouth Accidental introductions of non-native species has been of increasing concern since the 1980s when human-mediated transportation, mainly related to ships' ballast water, was recognised as a major route by which species are transported and spread. A review just published by PML Applications Ltd (the wholly-owned subsidiary of Plymouth Marine Laboratory, PML) and the University of Plymouth, brings together and updates evidence on invasive species for the NE and SW Atlantic Ocean, in order to assess the risk represented by the shipping trade between these two regions. The study found that the pathways most frequently recorded as transporting invasive species are ballast water and biofouling for both regions, while aquaculture has also been a very significant route of introduction and spread of invasive species in the NE Atlantic. It also established that the number of non-native species that have become invasive with high ecological impacts are 44 in the NE Atlantic and 15 in the less well studied south-western Atlantic. Cecilia de Castro, lead author of the review, commented: "This study comes at a pertinent time, providing further evidence to highlight the importance of the IMO Ballast Water Convention, which has recently reached 35 per cent of world merchant shipping tonnage and will enter into force on 8/09/2017. Though countries such as the UK have yet to sign up, the convention remains a landmark step towards halting the spread of invasive aquatic species, which can damage biodiversity and local ecosystems, as well as potential economic problems." Non-native species are a crucial issue that needs to be addressed to raise general awareness and publicity, alongside scientific surveys and monitoring, improved data availability, regulations, management tools, risk assessment, stakeholders' commitment, enforcement, best practices and constant surveillance. For example, Chinese mitten crabs are officially listed as one of the World's 100 worst invasive species. They can cause damage to fishing gear and river banks, block intake screens, modify natural habitats and compete with native species, and it is this economic and ecological damage that makes this crab such an unwelcome arrival. The full extent of these exotic pests in English and Welsh waters is currently unclear and a consortium of research institutes is requesting mitten crab sightings from members of the public, anglers and waterway workers, to clarify the distribution of this species. Professor Jason Hall-Spencer is coordinating the UK-Brazil collaboration. He says: "An estimated 10,000 marine species are transported around the world in ballast water every day. This sometimes causes outbreaks of diseases such as Cholera in which 1000s of people die, and commonly introduces toxic algae which can cause massive kills of aquatic life. I would hope the UK signs up to the United Nations ballast water regulations to help secure healthy productive seas." Geberlein Man. Credit: Linkoping Universitet Using visualisation technology developed at Linkoping University under the auspices of Visualization Center C, visitors to the British Museum can reveal the murder of the mummified Geberlein Man, 5,500 years ago. This world-leading technology has been described in a prestigious journal of computer science, Communications of the ACM. Anders Ynnerman, professor of scientific visualisation at Linkoping University and director of Visualization Center C, together with colleagues from Linkoping University, Interspectral AB, the Interactive Institute Swedish ICT, and the British Museum, describes in the article the technology behind the visualisation. The Geberlein Man, who was mummified by natural processes, and the collaboration with the British Museum constitute the framework for the article, which focusses on the development of the technology used in the visualisation table, which has received a great deal of attention. "It was challenging to obtain sufficiently high performance of the visualisation such that visitors can interact with the table in real-time, without experiencing delays. Further, the interaction must be both intuitive and informative," says Anders Ynnerman. Several thousand images of the mummy taken by computer tomography (CT) are stored in the table. In this case, 10,000 virtual slices through the complete mummy have been imaged, each one as thin as 0.3 mm. Rapid graphics processors can then create volumetric images, 3D images, in real-time to display what the visitors want to look at. The degree of reflection and absorption of the X-rays by the mummy is recorded by the CT scanner and converted with the aid of a specially developed transfer function to different colours and degrees of transparency. Bone, for example, gives a signal that is converted to a light grey colour while soft tissue and metal objects give completely different signals that are represented by other colours or structures "The table displays 60 images per second, which our brain interprets as continuous motion. Sixty times each second, virtual beams, one for each pixel on the screen, are projected through the dataset and a colour contribution for each is determined. We use the latest type of graphics processor, the type that is used in gaming computers," says Patric Ljung, senior lecturer in immersive visualisation at Linkoping University. This makes it possible for visitors to interact with the table. The desiccated skin of the mummy can be peeled away in the image and only the parts that consist of bone displayed. When this is done, it becomes clear that the Gebelein Man was killed by a stab through the shoulder. The principles that have determined the design of the table are also described in the article. The design arose in close collaboration between the personnel at the museum and Interactive Institute Swedish ICT, working within the framework of Visualization Center C in Norrkoping. The design is minimalist and intuitive. The display table must be rapid, and no delay in the image can be tolerated. It must be able to withstand use by the six million visitors to the museum each year, and much emphasis has been placed on creating brief narrative texts with the aid of information points. Simple and self-explanatory icons have been used, and several favourable viewpoints and parameters have been preprogrammed in order to increase the table's robustness. "Allowing a broader public to visualise scientific phenomena and results makes it possible for them to act as researchers themselves. We allow visitors to investigate the same data that the researchers have used. This creates incredible possibilities for new ways to communicate knowledge, to stimulate interest, and to engage others. It's an awesome experience watching the next generation of young researchers be inspired by our technology," says Anders Ynnerman. More information: Anders Ynnerman et al. Interactive visualization of 3d scanned mummies at public venues, Communications of the ACM (2016). DOI: 10.1145/2950040 Journal information: Communications of the ACM Space exploration and exploitation has changed a lot in 50 years. Credit: Shutterstock Space exploration is governed by a complex series of international treaties and agreements which have been in place for years. The first and probably most important of them celebrates its 50th anniversary on January 27 The Outer Space Treaty. This treaty, which was signed in 1967, was agreed through the United Nations, and today it remain as the "constitution" of outer space. It has been signed and made official, or ratified, by 105 countries across the world. The treaty has worked well so far but challenges have increasingly started to crop up. So will it survive another 50 years? The Outer Space Treaty, like all international law, is technically binding to those countries who sign up to it. But the obvious lack of "space police" means that it cannot be practically enforced. So a country, individual or company could simply ignore it if they so wished. Implications for not complying could include sanctions, but mainly a lack of legitimacy and respect which is of importance in the international arena. However it is interesting that, over the 50 years of it's existence, the treaty has never actually been violated. Although many practical challenges have been made these have always been made with pars of the treaty in mind, rather than seeking to undermine it entirely. Challenges so far Although there are many points to consider in the treaty, one of the most important is that outer space is to be used for "peaceful purposes" weapons of mass destruction cannot be used in space. Another is that celestial territory (such as the moon or Mars), is not subject to "national appropriation" in other words, no country can lay claim to them. These points have been subject to challenges since the treaty came into play the first example of such a challenge was the Bogota Declaration in 1976. A group of eight countries tried to claim ownership of a segment of an orbit that was in the space situated above their land - since if their borders projected into the heavens, any "stationary" satellite there would always be within their borders. They claimed that this space did not fall under the definition of "outer space" by the Outer Space Treaty and was therefore a "natural resource". This declaration was not seen as an attempt to undermine the treaty, but rather to say that orbits that go around the Earth's equator, or in the direction of the Earth's rotation, must be owned by the countries beneath. However this was was eventually dismissed by the international community. In 2007 China was thought to have violated the treaty when it shot down one of it's own weather satellites with a "ground-based medium-range ballistic missile". This was seen as "aggressive" by Japan, but since the missiles did not come under the definition of "weapons of mass destruction", it was found that it did not violate the treaty. There was, however, international outcry because of the debris cloud it caused within the orbit. We could do with some updates Despite its importance, we must recognise that the Outer Space Treaty does have some specific failings in the modern era mainly since it is focused on countries only. Many private companies, such as lunarland, have exploited this and have offered to sell plots of land on celestial bodies such as the moon. Agents doing this justify their activity because the treaty says that territory is not subject to national appropriation and therefore, this technically means that private companies or individuals could however make claims to celestial territory, since they are not countries. In an attempt to tackle some of the modern-day shortfalls of the treaty, the US government passed the Space Act of 2015, which says that US citizens may engage in the commercial exploration and exploitation of space resources. Although this seems to undermine the space treaty's ban on anyone owning celestial territory, the Space Act has a clause stating, in simple terms, that the US does not lay claim to, or own, any such thing. This conflict, that indicated that the US "may" be able to claim celestial territory, while not violating the treaty, remains an issue of key debate. Despite these obvious legal loopholes and challenges, the treaty has long formed the basis for an international law with regards to outer space and it remains as the important backbone of outer-space governance. The intention that it embodied when it was first written, to create law in space, remains important and whether any changes will be made in the futuree to reflect changing political and commercial circumstances is yet to be seen. This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article. Cycad by Glen Fleishman. Credit: Glen Fleishman (Creative Commons licence) A joint project between conservationists and electronics experts at the University of Kent has developed miniature radio devices in tamper-proof casings to protect rare species from poachers. The University of Kent is now working in association with the South African National Biodiversity Institute, where this technology has now been proposed as part of conservation planning. The illegal wildlife trade is fourth only to narcotics, human trafficking and counterfeiting, with an estimated value around $20 billion per year and the United Nations recognising environmental crime as requiring greater response by governments. The project team have developed and tested Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags on endangered cycads, a group of plants that predate the Jurassic era. Nearly 40% are threatened with extinction and are vulnerable to theft due to their rarity, durability and looks. Some have been so heavily poached that populations have crashed from 10,000 to less than 400 individuals. The tag is placed within a tamper-proof case that can't be moved without destroying the transponder chip within the tag. The team proposed that the tags could be used along with satellite or cellular networks to relay immediate alerts to ranger stations as soon as a plant goes missing, with drones deployed for observation. Secondary RFID tags could also be embedded into plants to help identify any that are stolen and later recovered. The project was led by Professor John Batchelor, Professor of Antenna Technology in the School of Electronics and Digital Arts, and Dr David Roberts, Reader in Biodiversity Conservation in the Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology in the School of Anthropology and Conservation. Larkmead School. Credit: CC-BY-SA-2.5,2.0,1.0 A rigorous Northwestern University study of a quarter-century of data has found that economic insecurity is related to the rate of gun violence at K-12 and postsecondary schools in the United States. When it becomes more difficult for people coming out of school to find jobs, the rate of gun violence at schools increases. The interdisciplinary study by data scientists Adam R. Pah and Luis Amaral and sociologist John L. Hagan reveals a persistent connection over time between unemployment and the occurrence of school shootings in the country as a whole, across various regions of the country and within affected cities, including Chicago and New York City. "The link between education and work is central to our expectations about economic opportunity and upward mobility in America," said Hagan, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Professor of Sociology in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences. "Our study indicates that increases in gun violence in our schools can result from disappointment and despair during periods of increased unemployment, when getting an education does not necessarily lead to finding work." Frequent school shootings have been a major concern in American society for decades, but the causes have defied understanding. The Northwestern researchers used data from 1990 to 2013 on both gun violence in U.S. schools and economic metrics, including unemployment, to get some answers. "Our findings highlight the importance of economic opportunity for the next generation and suggest there are proactive actions we could take as a society to help decrease the frequency of gun violence," said Pah, clinical assistant professor of management and organizations at the Kellogg School of Management. Other key findings include: While Chicago is singled out in the study as one of the six cities with the most incidents from 1990 to 2013, Chicago schools are not any more dangerous than schools in other large cities. Gun violence at schools has not become more deadly over time. Most shootings are targeted, with the shooter intending to harm a specific person. Gang-related violence and lone mass shooters comprise only small fractions of the gun violence that occurs at U.S. schools. Gang-related violence constitutes 6.6% of all incidents. The results suggest that during periods of heightened unemployment, increased gun violence may be a growing risk in American college and university settings. The study, "Economic Insecurity and the Rise in Gun Violence at US Schools," will be published Jan. 30 by the journal Nature Human Behaviour. The research team also found the rate of gun violence at schools has changed over time. The most recent period studied (2007-2013) has a higher frequency of incidents than the preceding one (1994-2007), contradicting previous work in this area. This is a unique contribution made possible because of the researchers' backgrounds in data science and modeling. "Our work helps us understand why the frequency of gun violence at schools changes, not necessarily why gun violence at schools in the United States exists at all," said Amaral, professor of chemical and biological engineering in the McCormick School of Engineering. In the last 25 years, there have been two elevated periods of gun violence at U.S. schools, the researchers found; 2007-2013 was largely due to events at postsecondary schools while 1992-1994 more often involved events at K-12 schools. The Northwestern study stands apart from earlier studies on gun violence in U.S. schools by bringing into play knowledge about the school-to-work transition in American society. "Once we consider how important schools are to American ideas about economic opportunity and upward mobility, we can better understand why school settings are revealed in our research as focal points of violent responses to increased unemployment," said Hagan, who also is a research professor at the American Bar Foundation. "Prior research about gun violence in schools has not adequately analyzed these connections." How the study was conducted There have been a number of other studies on this topic, but the previous data sources used were incomplete and biased in their coverage of the school shooting events, Pah said. Also, the definition of gun violence at school varied among creators of these datasets. Pah collected these previously used data sets and collated them into a single data set. He and undergraduate and graduate student co-authors then individually sourced and read reports for each event to make sure it was actually an incident of gun violence at a school. The process yielded 379 events meeting the researchers' strict criteria, and two additional events were found, for a total of 381 events for the final data set. "We spent days doing nothing but reading about violence at schools, which is quite possibly the saddest thing I've had to do for research," Pah said. The researchers focused on all gun violence at schools, not only mass shootings. They used the following criteria for an event to be included in the study: (1) the shooting must involve a firearm being discharged, even if by accident; (2) it must occur on a school campus; and (3) it must involve students or school employees, either as perpetrators, bystanders or victims. Next, the researchers evaluated the timing of these events against multiple indicators of economic distress, including unemployment, the foreclosure rate and consumer confidence. They then hypothesized that increased school shootings are a response to increasing unemployment and tested that hypothesis in two additional ways. The results strongly support the hypothesis that a breakdown in the school-to-work transition contributes to an increase in gun violence in U.S. schools, the authors write. More information: Economic insecurity and the rise in gun violence at US schools, Nature Human Behaviour, nature.com/articles/doi:10.1038/s41562-016-0040 Journal information: Nature Human Behaviour Lowering of sensing equipment from the RRS James Clark Ross. Credit: University of Southampton An international team of researchers has discovered why fresh water, melted from Antarctic ice sheets, is often detected below the surface of the ocean, rather than rising to the top above denser seawater. The research, led by the University of Southampton, is published this week in the journal Nature in association with colleagues at the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton, University of East Anglia (UEA), British Antarctic Survey and Stockholm University. The team found that the Earth's rotation influences the way meltwater behaves - keeping it at depths of several hundred metres. Professor Alberto Naveira Garabato, of Ocean and Earth Science at the University of Southampton and lead author of the study, says: "We believe our study is an important step in understanding how the meltwater mixes in the ocean and will help with the design of climate models, which largely assume meltwater is only present on the surface of oceans. Our research emphasises its detection at greater depths and explains why it is found there." The researchers made their discovery during an expedition in the Southern Ocean, led by Professor Karen Heywood of UEA, on British Antarctic Survey's Royal Research Ship James Clark Ross. The trip was undertaken in 2014 as part of the NERC-funded iSTAR programme4. The team measured turbulence experienced by meltwater as it flowed out of a cave beneath the Pine Island Glacier - one of the fastest melting glaciers in Antarctica. They used a VMP23 (Vertical Microstructure Profiler) to detect subtle fluctuations in the water. The scientists discovered the meltwater ends up settling hundreds of metres down, because as it tries to rise above the surrounding denser seawater, it is affected by the Earth's rotation. This makes it spin very quickly around its vertical axis, resulting in the ejection of meltwater filaments in a sideways motion into the surrounding sea - preventing the water from rising to the surface. Scientists are interested in the depth at which water from Antarctic ice sheets enters the ocean because it has differing effects on global ocean circulation and climate. Surface meltwater makes the upper layers of the Southern Ocean lighter. This is thought to slow down the sinking of those waters in the region, and to favour the expansion of Antarctic sea ice. Injecting the same meltwater at depth is believed to have the opposite effect, favouring sinking of surface waters and the retreat of Antarctic sea ice. Vertical Microstructure Profiler lowered from RRS James Clark Ross. Credit: Povl Abrahamsen at British Antarctic Survey Dr Alexander Forryan, also of the University of Southampton, comments: "The effect of meltwater on climate was taken to the extreme and popularised in the Hollywood blockbuster 'The Day After Tomorrow'. While no one expects our climate to change in the space of a few days, like the movie - we do know that fresh water flowing into our seas could dramatically affect sea levels and ocean circulation. As such, it is vital our models take into account the presence of both surface and deep meltwater to maximise their accuracy." The team now hope to develop a way to represent the process in climate models, so that climate modellers can reliably investigate the impact of the melting of Antarctica on our changing climate. More information: Alberto C. Naveira Garabato et al, Vigorous lateral export of the meltwater outflow from beneath an Antarctic ice shelf, Nature (2017). DOI: 10.1038/nature20825 Journal information: Nature Hispasat 36W-1 with SmallGEO platform. Credit: ESA ESA's new small telecom platform was launched on its first mission in the early hours of this morning. The Hispasat 36W-1 satellite, based on the SmallGEO platform, lifted off on a Soyuz rocket at 01:03 GMT this morning from Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. SmallGEO is Europe's response to the market demand for more flexible, modular telecommunications platforms. It marks the first time the German satellite manufacturing company OHB System AG have been the prime contractor for a telecommunications satellite mission. Its Hispasat payload marks the first ESA partnership with a Spanish operator. The three-tonne satellite was released by Soyuz into its transfer orbit 29 minutes after liftoff this morning. It will now use its own thrusters to make its way to its final destination over the course of the next few weeks. It is heading towards 'geostationary' orbit at an altitude of 36 000 km over the equator, where it will take a day to circle Earth and therefore appear to hang over the same point, in this case at 36W over the Atlantic Ocean. OHB will test the satellite's health and performance, making sure the sensitive technology made it unscathed through the violence of the launch. After all is deemed well, they will hand the control over to Hispasat and the satellite will begin providing broadband services to Europe, South America and the Canary Islands. "The launch of this first SmallGEO platform marks another major success for ESA's programme of Advanced Research in Telecommunications Systems, known as ARTES, which aims to boost the competitiveness of its Member State industry through innovation," noted Magali Vaissiere, ESA's Director of Telecommunications and Integrated Applications. "SmallGEO is part of our continuous efforts to strengthen the position of European and Canadian industry in the commercial telecommunications market, expanding the current range of available products. "The next satellite based on SmallGEO will be EDRS-C, as the second node to the European Data Relay System." Carlos Espinos Gomez, CEO of Hispasat, said: "For Hispasat, this new satellite represents an important step forward in its innovation strategy. "Hispasat 36W-1 is not only the first mission of the new SmallGEO platform, but also incorporates an advanced regenerative payload that will provide the satellite with greater flexibility and signal quality thanks to its reconfigurable antenna and onboard processor, thus improving the telecommunications services it will provide to our clients. "We are very satisfied with our collaboration with ESA, which has allowed us to participate in a leading technological project to which they have added significant value with their knowledge and experience in the space sector." Marco Fuchs, CEO of OHB System AG, commented: "The launch is a major milestone in the history of OHB. Hispasat 36W-1 proves that OHB's concept of a modular and flexible SmallGEO platform fits into the market. "SmallGEO is destined to build a cornerstone for Europe's future activities in the segment of geostationary satellites in the three-tonne class. "For OHB, Hispasat 36W-1 is the first project of a wide scope of future missions based on the SmallGEO platform, including a revolution in satellite technology: the full electric propulsion mission Electra." The big storm that crossed North America on Jan. 15, photographed by NOAAs new geostationary weather satellite. By now it should have been possible to get away from our new presidency here at On Science Blogs. January 2017 is ending and the Year of the Rooster, bringer of light, is upon us. But stuffbad stuff, often worse stuffkeeps happening to science and medicine. the gag reflex Bad Astronomer Phil Plait is gagging at the gag orders suddenly clamped on government science, and he is far from alone. He is talking particularly about Environmental Protection Agency staff and scientists at the Agricultural Research Service. But Official Silence has been imposed at other government agencies too. No press releases. No blog posts. No tweets. Speculation that researchers will not even be permitted to publish their findings in journals in the usual way. Writing about the gag orders and also Trump's executive order to freeze all EPA grants and projects at Nothing in Biology Makes Sense, grad student Christina Jenkins said, "Before now we were talking in hypotheticals, about what might happen if Trump was the president, what that might mean for science or for the environment. The reality is scarier than I imagined." Is this really the new government lowering the boom on taxpayer-funded science? Or is it scaremongering overreactions? Plait himself notes that, at data-minded FiveThirtyEight, Maggie Koerth-Baker is cautioning against immediate full-panic mode. It's possible the restrictions are temporary, intended only to give the new administration a chance to settle in. There's also evidence of confusion and crossed wires and, possibly, speedy reactions to public protests. On Tuesday, media reported that references to climate change had been ordered removed from the EPA's web site. Outrage surfaced immediately. On Wednesday, Science reprinted a post from Robin Bravender and Hannah Hess of E&E News. They reported that the order to scrub all mention of climate change, said to have come directly from the White House, had been put on hold. Temporary hold? Nobody knows for sure. But we may find out soon. At Vox, Brian Resnick points out that it's not unusual for work at government agencies to be halted briefly while new administration appointees get their acts together. A TrumPet told him that the EPA restrictions will be lifted today (Friday, Jan 27.) We'll see. OTOH, Resnick notes, even if the early outrage was overheated, there are plenty of reasons for concern. There's the Bush administration history of muzzling the EPA. There are anti-science declarations from the TrumPets. Trump transition team members have recommended that EPA stop funding science altogether. The pushback from science has begun Predictably, counter-tweets claiming to come from rebellious employees at the EPA, the Forest Service, the USDA, and NASA sprang up immediately. At The Verge, Rich McCormick says there's reason to believe these claims may be genuine, although none has yet been verified. A lovely hed on this post: "On the internet, nobody knows if you're a National Park." At Hit&Run, Ronald Bailey provides handles for several of these alt tweet streams, which he calls "the revolt of the permanent government." (That's a compliment.) Bailey argues, "with exception perhaps of some minor amount of national security intelligence, there is no good reason that any information, data, studies, and reports that federal agencies produce should be kept from the public and press. In any case, I will be following the Alt_Bureaucracy feeds for a while." NeuroDojo Zen Faulkes posted on how to demand that scientific societies show some backbone. "Ask yourself: "Have my professional societies done anything more political than say, 'Please don't cut funding?'" Will they fight?," he asked. Scientists associated with the group 500 Women Scientists donned lab coats and marched in DC as part of the Women's March on Washington the day after Trump's Inauguration, Robinson Meyer reported at the Atlantic. A wildlife ecologist from North Carolina told Meyer, "I just can't believe we're having to yell, 'Science is real.'" North and South America and surrounding oceans, photographed by GOES-16, NOAA s new geostationary weather satellite on Jan. 15. Taking a cue from how the Women's March did its social media organizing, other scientists who want to set up a Washington march of their own have put together a closed Facebook group that claims more than 600,000 members, Kate Sheridan writes at STAT. The #ScienceMarch Twitter feed says a date for the march will be posted in a few days. The group also plans to release tools to help people interested in local marches coordinate their efforts and avoid duplication. At The Atlantic, Ed Yong describes the political action committee 314Action. (314=the first three digits of pi.) Among other political activities, it is holding a webinar on Pi DayMarch 14to explain to scientists how to run for office. Yong calls 314Action the science version of Emily's List, which helps pro-choice candidates run for office. 314Action says it is ready to connect potential candidate scientists with mentorsand donors. Other groups may be willing to step in when government agencies wimp out. A few days before the Inauguration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention abruptly and with no explanation cancelled a 3-day meeting on the health effects of climate change scheduled for February. Scientists told Ars Technica's Beth Mole that CDC has a history of running away from politicized issues. One of the conference organizers from the American Public Health Association was quoted as saying nobody told the organizers to cancel. I believe it. Just one more example of the chilling effect on global warming. In politics, once the Dear Leader's wishes are known, some hirelings will rush to gratify them without being asked. The APHA guy said they simply wanted to head off a potential last-minute cancellation. Yeah, I guess an anticipatory pre-cancellation would do that. But thenAl Gore to the rescue! He is joining with a number of health groupsincluding the American Public Health Associationto hold a one-day meeting on the topic Feb 16 at the Carter Center in Atlanta, CDC's home base. Vox's Julia Belluz reports that it is not clear whether CDC officials will be part of the Gore rescue event. Overseas, gags are not funny either Meanwhile, a gag order familiar from previous Republican administrations, this one sometimes known as the Mexico City Rule, was resuscitated in a more comprehensively cruel form. The original version prevents American aid from going to foreign family planning organizations that perform or even discuss abortion, even when the funding for them comes from other sources. The Trump-Pence version expands the rule to cover all global health organizations that get US funding. "This means organizations that address everything from malaria, tuberculosis, and HIV/AIDS to tropical diseases and vaccinationsthe list goes onwill now risk losing funding if they even mention abortion," says Sarah Wildman at Vox. In her post on the resuscitated climate change meeting, Belluz says, "The canceled event was one in a series of disruptions at science-related agencies following Trump's inauguration. Taken together, they suggest science in the age of Trump is on track for massive upheaval." And that was Week One of the Trump-Pence administration. Only 207 weeks to go. Good grief. This story is republished courtesy of PLOS Blogs: blogs.plos.org. A close-up of one end of the fake wrist. Credit: National Institute of Standards and Technology What if there were a wearable fitness device that could monitor your blood pressure continuously, 24 hours a day? Unfortunately, blood pressure (BP) measurements currently require the use of a cuff that temporarily stops blood flow. So a wearable BP "watch" using today's technology would squeeze your wrist every few minutes, making it impracticable to use not to mention annoying. A better method might gauge subtle pressure changes at the surface of your skin above one of the main wrist arteries the radial artery without regularly cutting off your circulation. But before scientists can create this new technology, they need to understand what the pressure inside a blood vessel "looks" like on the surface of the skin. And to do that, they must make a physical model that can be used to test wearable devices in a laboratory. NIST's Physical Measurement Laboratory (PML) is currently collaborating with Tufts University's School of Medicine to develop just such a model, a blood pressure wrist "phantom" essentially a fake arm that mimics the mechanical properties of blood pulsing through an artery surrounded by human tissue. "The phantom will give us very precise measurements say, for example, what is actually the force on the blood vessel wall? And what is the force on the soft tissue and the skin?" says Tufts University School of Medicine assistant professor Mohan Thanikachalam, who is collaborating with NIST on this work. "I think it will help us tremendously in terms of optimizing our technology" for wearable BP devices. The NIST-Tufts blood pressure phantom consists of a slab of squishy silicone, which stands in for human tissue, sitting on top of a metal plate, the stand-in for bone. A pliable tube runs through the silicone to mimic an artery, through which fluid flows via a mechanical heart pump. The materials were carefully selected to match the properties of skin, soft tissues, bone, and artery walls, the researchers say. But unlike actual live human tissue, the phantom can easily have sensors running through it, measuring the pressure changes that occur each time water is pumped through the tube. "One of the things we want to understand is, if a sensor is sitting up here on top of the silicone, what is it really seeing?" says Zeeshan Ahmed, lead researcher for the NIST PML team. "Is it just seeing the primary wave from a pulse of fluid going through? Is it seeing a lot of reflection waves, when the primary wave bounces off the metal plate? How does the pressure change over the time it takes for each pulse of water to pass through the artificial artery?" The sensors they are currently testing are thin optical fibers called Bragg gratings, designed to block a specific frequency, or color, of light from passing through them. When the pressure changes inside the Bragg grating, so does the color of light that is blocked. Researchers can use this change in color to identify the pressure that was applied to the fiber. The final phantom will likely incorporate about a half dozen of these Bragg sensors, running through the silicone and over its top as well as inside and outside the artificial artery. This version of the fake wrist includes the artery, sitting in the center of the squishy silicone pad that acts like human skin and soft tissue. Thin fiber optic sensors are embedded in the silicone pad; you can see their extensions coiling around the table at the top of the image. Note: To make it visible in this photograph, the artery is illuminated by a red fiber optic cable that is not part of the actual experiment. Credit: National Institute of Standards and Technology Presently, the NIST team is conducting preliminary tests to gauge the performance of their sensors using a prototype without the mock artery. Instead of pumping water through a tube, they apply pressure to the silicone by crushing it with weights. For example, to mimic a BP of 140/60, they use masses of about 1 to 1.8 kilograms (kg, thousand grams, equivalent to approximately 2 to 4 pounds). So far, they have found that their sensors are able to detect pressures from 170 millimeters of mercury (mmHg, equivalent to about 22.5 kilopascals, kPa, or about 3 pounds per square inch, psi) down to 60 mmHg (about 8 kPa, or a little more than 1 psi) with a resolution of 2 mmHg (about 250 Pa, or less than 0.04 psi). In terms of weight, this means that they are measuring masses of about 1 kg with a resolution of just 20 grams. Also promising, Ahmed says, is that the results are reproducible: Each time the silicone is crushed, it springs back to its original form, so that the results are the same no matter how many times the experiment is run. The NIST team, which includes Kevin Douglass, is currently preparing to test the sensors' ability to measure pressures that change over time, using a universal testing machine that they call "the crushinator." If all goes well, the collaboration could potentially have a working prototype sometime this year. Stained head double hook ring tapeworm. Credit: Forschungsverbund Berlin e.V. (FVB) Since the year 2000, the Eurasian grey wolf, Canis lupus lupus, has spread across Germany. Ines Lesniak, doctoral student at the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (Leibniz-IZW), and her colleagues, have taken a closer look at the parasites of this returnee to determine whether the number and species of parasites change with an increasing wolf population. This was the case, because the number of parasite species per individual wolf increased as the wolf population expanded. Furthermore, cubs had a higher diversity of parasite species than older animals. The good news: wolf parasites do not pose a threat to human health. The results of this study were published in the scientific online journal Scientific Reports. In the course of a long-term study of wolf health in Germany, the internal organs of 53 wolf carcasses were studied in detail. They came from wolves that had died in traffic accidents or were illegally killed between 2007 and 2014. "Whereas tapeworms are recognisable with the naked eye, the identification of single-celled Sarcocystis parasites was a real challenge, since the species of this genus do not differ morphologically," explains Lesniak. According to their developmental cycle, endoparasites can be grouped into two types: Some, such as many tapeworms, infect their hosts directly. Others, such as Sarcocystis parasites, first live in an intermediate host, specifically the prey animal of the wolf. These parasites are released back into the environment in the wolf faeces. Potential prey animals of the wolf feed on vegetation contaminated with the parasites. The parasites thereby invade the intermediate host and settle in the muscle flesh. Roe deer, red deer and wild boar are such intermediate hosts in central Europe. When these are eaten by a wolf, the parasites infect the wolf and reproduce in its intestines. By applying sophisticated molecular genetic analyses, the scientists identified 12 Sarcocystis species in the wolf carcasses. They also found four tapeworm species (cestodes), eight roundworm species (nematodes) as well as one fluke species (trematode). In order to examine parasite infections also in the wolf's large prey species, the team collected internal organs of shot prey animals from hunting parties. In Germany, wolves mainly feed on roe deer, but also red deer and wild boars. Small mammals, such as hares, voles or mice, are very seldom on the menu. The identified parasites provide indirect evidence for this insight, since fox tapeworms were found in only one of the 53 wolves. Fox tapeworms are transmitted by mice and can occur in all canids, but particularly frequently in foxes. This is good news, Lesniak says, because the larvae of fox tapeworms can cause severe diseases in humans. The scientists found that the infestation of wolves with parasites varied over their lifetime. "Cubs carry many more parasite species than yearlings or adults." According to Ines Lesniak, such variation in parasite species prevalence can be explained by the more robust immune system of older wolves. Wolves, just like any other wild canid other than domestic dogs are never dewormed, after all. Wolves that died at the beginning of the study period had a lower parasite diversity than those who died later. "The bigger the population, the more often wolves are in contact with each other and their prey, and the more often they became infected with different parasites," Lesniak says. Currently, there are 46 wolf packs settled within Germany. A pack consists of the parents as well as the cubs of the current and the previous year and can comprise up to ten individuals. "Genetic analyses conducted by our cooperation partners for this study show that the ancestors of the Central European lowland population, which nowadays ranges from Germany to Poland, originated from Lusatia in eastern Germany," Lesniak says. This population was probably initiated by individuals who migrated from the Baltic region at the beginning of the millennium and settled between southern Brandenburg and northern Saxony. From there, they began to spread across northeastern Germany and southwestern Poland, a process which continues to this day. "Wolves are shy, wild animals. Thus, contact between people and wolves is rare," Lesniak emphasises. "Nevertheless, hunters should boil the leftovers of shot game thoroughly before feeding this to their hunting dogs, in order to avoid possible parasite infections," warns Lesniak. It is also essential to regularly deworm hunting dogs in regions occupied by wolves. Occasionally, it has been reported that wolves come closer to residential areas; sheep farmers are complaining about losses. "It may well be that today's wolves have learnt that it is easier to find food closer to humans those, who once eradicated their wolf forefathers," says Lesniak. Of course, it is more convenient for a wolf to break into a sheep enclosure than to chase roe deer in the forest. Therefore, the implementation of appropriate protective measures of domestic animals is very important and now also financially supported by the government in Germany. More information: Ines Lesniak et al. Population expansion and individual age affect endoparasite richness and diversity in a recolonising large carnivore population, Scientific Reports (2017). DOI: 10.1038/srep41730 Journal information: Scientific Reports The latest spawning reefs in the Detroit River, near Belle Isle, were built from blocks of broken limestone 4 to 8 inches in diameter. Loads of rock were placed directly on the river bottom using a crane with a clamshell bucket mounted on a barge in the river. Credit: Austin Thomason, Michigan Photography Construction crews recently deposited 25,000 tons of limestone blocks on the bottom of the Detroit River in the latest phase of a decade-plus effort to lure lake sturgeon to rock spawning reefs and help restore severely depleted populations of the once-common Great Lakes giants. The latest reef project, completed last month, added 4 acres of high-quality spawning habitat just upstream of Belle Isle, bringing the total to 16.6 acres at six locations in the Detroit and St. Clair rivers. Researchers know the reefs work because they've collected sturgeon eggs there and have underwater video showing the huge fish spawning. But where do the baby fish go after they hatch and leave the shelter of the rock reefs? Researchers have spent years searching for those youngsters, without much to show for their efforts. Now a study of the St. Clair River by two University of Michigan scientists suggests the experts may have been looking in the wrong place all along. The U-M researchers show that despite river-current speeds of more than 3 feet per second, some recently hatched lake sturgeon manage to remain in the St. Clair's North Channel, a surprising finding with implications for the siting of future spawning reefs. "Our work showed that these very young sturgeon stay in the channel instead of going downstream into the river delta or to Lake St. Clair, as people had assumed," said U-M doctoral candidate Joseph Krieger, first author of a paper published online Dec. 1 in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences. The St. Clair River is about 40 miles long and drains waters from Lake Huron into Lake St. Clair. The Detroit River drains Lake St. Clair into Lake Erie. Beginning in the early 1900s, both rivers were straightened, widened and deepened to create shipping canals for large freighters. The construction stripped away much of the rocky habitat that sturgeon and other native fish used for spawning. Credit: University of Michigan Today, the St. Clair River averages 43 to 49 feet in depth and moves more than 175,000 cubic feet of water per secondmore than the Missouri, Arkansas and Illinois rivers combined. "There's no way these tiny sturgeon larvae have the strength to swim against that current," Krieger said. "The only way for them to stay in the river channel is to burrow into the sediment on the bottom or to hide behind small rocks. And that's exactly what we think they are doing." Krieger spent three summers doing fieldwork on the St. Clair and Detroit rivers to collect data for his doctoral dissertation at the U-M School of Natural Resources and Environment. He is expected to graduate in April. The Canadian Journal article is based on his dissertation work on the St. Clair River and is co-authored by his doctoral adviser, U-M fishery biologist Jim Diana. A paper summarizing his findings from the Detroit River will be submitted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal later this year. The fieldwork involved placing drift nets on the bottom of the river channels, at various distances downstream from artificial spawning reefs, and looking for sturgeon larvae. That work was done with researchers from the U.S. Geological Survey. Additional fieldwork was done in collaboration with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. A big part of the project by Krieger and Diana involved creating computer models to evaluate the amount, quality and spatial distribution of different habitat types used by young lake sturgeon in the St. Clair and Detroit rivers. The researchers then tested their habitat suitability model by comparing its predictions to field observations. Loaded buckets were lowered to the river bottom before the rock was released. The latest Belle Isle reefs are located in water that is 18 to 22 feet deep, and they rise about 2 feet above the river bottom. About 4 acres of new rock reefs were created and are located outside commercial shipping channels. Credit: Austin Thomason, Michigan Photography In the St. Clair River, 91 percent of the 283 larval sturgeon netted by Krieger were clustered at three North Channel locations no more than 1.2 miles downstream from Maslinka Reef, a known sturgeon-spawning site formed in the early 1900s when steamships dumped coal cinders into the river. Most of the larvae were taken in areas designated as high-quality habitat by the computer model. No larvae were found exiting the North Channel into Lake St. Clair. The three North Channel clusters were at river bends where the bottom is a mix of sand and silt and contains moderate densities of the larval insects that baby sturgeon eat. The current speeds in these sections of the river are highly variable, and water depths typically exceed 30 feet. Larval sturgeon were collected at these locations up to four weeks after the eggs hatched on Maslinka Reef, meaning the baby fish were not swept downstream into Lake St. Clair as soon as they hatchedas the experts had long believed. Instead, they remained in the swiftly moving channel. "We had thought that these little fish couldn't fight the current and within a day they'd be out in Lake St. Clair," said Diana, who is a professor at U-M's School of Natural Resources and Environment and director of Michigan Sea Grant, a federally funded collaboration between U-M and Michigan State University. "But it looks like they can manage to stay in place against the current by burrowing into the bottom, and that was a surprise. For a little fish that's an inch long at most, in a current that's a meter per second, that was unexpected." A museum specimen of a baby lake sturgeon. This individual would have been several months old. Lake sturgeon this size are rarely found in the Detroit and St. Clair rivers. Credit: Austin Thomason, Michigan Photography Diana has been involved in sturgeon research on the St. Clair River system since the early 1990s and has had five other U-M graduate students who worked on some aspect of the spawning reefs and sturgeon populations. The population of adult lake sturgeon in Lake St. Clair and the St. Clair River is estimated at around 10,000, according to Diana. The estimates are based on sturgeon tagged by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. Roughly 90 percent of those adult sturgeon are believed to be in Lake St. Clair, rather than the river, Diana said. They move into the lake when they are 5 to 10 years old after spending their first years in "nursery habitat." Researchers had assumed the nursery for St. Clair sturgeon was the shallow delta wetlands, filled with cattails and phragmites reeds, where the river empties into the lake. But the new study shows that there is "an abundance of suitable nursery habitat" further upstream, within the North Channel. When considering possible spawning reef sites in the future, the habitat suitability model could help identify high-quality nursing habitat, then reef sites could be selected a short distance upstream from those locations, Krieger and Diana wrote. "Linking future reef placement in proximity to high-quality habitat for young fish should improve success and aid in future habitat restoration efforts," they wrote. A view of the reef-building barge and crane during construction on the Detroit River, just upstream of Belle Isle, in early December. Credit: Austin Thomason, Michigan Photography Jennifer Read, director of the U-M Water Center and lead investigator for the reef project, said the new research helps address "a big gap in our knowledge." "Once the larvae leave the reef, where do they go?" Read said. "This study's results will help inform our siting decisions so that we spend management dollars in the most effective way possible." The U.S. government has provided about $10 million for a series of reef projects in the St. Clair and Detroit rivers, much of it through the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, with additional support from cooperating agencies and private sector partners. The Detroit-area restoration effort began in 2004 with completion of 0.28 acres of reefs in the Detroit River near Belle Isle. The approaches and techniques for siting and reef construction are updated as new information comes in, Read said. For example, a recent U-M hydrodynamics study helped the restoration team identify locations and reef shapes that would minimize silting on the new Belle Isle rock structures. "We learn as we go, and we make changes," Read said. Credit: Michigan Sea Grant Lake sturgeon are considered threatened or endangered in seven of the eight Great Lakes states. Their current population is estimated to be about 1 percent of what it once was. They are the largest fish in the Great Lakes can grow to 7 feet in length, weighing up to 300 pounds. Female sturgeon live 80 to 150 years, while males live an average of 55 years, according to Michigan Sea Grant. Females take 20 to 25 years to reach reproductive age, while males take 15 years. Because it takes so long for lake sturgeon to reach sexual maturity, it will also take years to know whether the reef-building project is significantly boosting the sturgeon population, said Gregory Kennedy, a fishery biologist with the U.S. Geological Survey. "If success means bringing egg deposition to the reefs, then most of these reefs are pretty successful," Kennedy said last month during a tour of the Belle Isle reef-construction site. He began studying Detroit-area sturgeon in the late 1990s. "But are we improving recruitment? Are we adding new young to the population?" he said. "It could be 20 or 30 years before we get any real feel for that." The restoration team includes scientists from the U-M Water Center, Michigan Sea Grant, U-M School of Natural Resources and Environment, U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Michigan Department of Natural Resources, SmithGroup JJR, and DTE Energy. The contractor for the latest Belle Isle reef project was Durocher Marine. "We're restoring a wild fish population inside the city of Detroit, and it's going to take some time," U-M's Read said during the Detroit River tour. "The destruction of this habitat took several decades, and so will the restoration." More information: Joseph Richard Krieger et al. Development and evaluation of a habitat suitability model for young lake sturgeon (Acipenser fulvescens) in the North Channel of the St. Clair River, MI., Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences (2016). DOI: 10.1139/cjfas-2016-0357 Journal information: Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences Newest North American Version of Epicor BisTrack Released AUSTIN, Texas, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ Epicor Software Corporation, a global provider of industry-specific enterprise software to promote business growth, today announced a significant upgrade to its North American version of Epicor BisTrack business management software for lumber and building materials (LBM) dealers and distributors. Epicor BisTrack version 5.5 delivers advanced pricing tools, cloud, and mobile functionality, interface improvements, and third-party integrations to the Epicor flagship solution for the LBM market. The new version of Epicor BisTrack combines our companys deep lumber industry expertise with our rich retail knowledge and commitment to cloud and mobile technologies, said Jason Parchomchuk, manager, BisTrack product management, Epicor Software. Weve endeavored to build an LBM business management tool that is simultaneously feature rich and easy-to-use. Knowledgeable Decisions with Impactful Pricing Analytics Todays building materials customer has access to a wide array of pricing information and dealers need to be equally informed. The innovative BisTrack Pricing Planner tool is an integrated application that helps LBM dealers and distributors make knowledgeable pricing decisions and apply rules-based price adjustments. The software streamlines the capturing of competitor and catalog prices, helps users analyze the impact of pricing on sales, and tracks pricing performance across multiple locations. The software can also perform what if analysis to predict the potential results of price changes prior to their implementation. These pricing strategies are passed directly into existing price-change workflows within BisTrack software. Establishing an effective pricing strategy in todays competitive building materials market requires a balanced approach. Dealers obviously want to maximize the profits from each item sold, but, if they get too aggressive, they can price themselves out of business, added Parchomchuk. With our new Pricing Planner tool for BisTrack software, LBM dealers can easily identify the products that are most price sensitive and should be priced competitively, as well as the blind and non-comparable products that can be priced higher. The BisTrack Pricing Planner application gives LBM dealers the information they need to increase gross profit without lowering sales. Cloud and Mobility Improvements Epicor has made great strides in the development of its BisTrack Cloud mobile platform. BisTrack Cloud software is a touch-optimized web application for mobile LBM employeessuch as outside sales representatives. Read full release here: http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/newest-north-american-version-of-epicor-bistrack-released-300398408.html Other point of sale articles of interest: - There has been a lingering controversy over the ownership of two seized amoured helicopters currently grounded at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport - Governor Nyesom Wike had said his government wrote the Buhari administration to take possession of the helicopters, but Amaechi has revealed more about the issue The controversies surrounding the two armoured helicopters belonging to the Rivers state government and seized by security agencies may not end soon as a former governor of the state, Rotimi Amaechi, has presented his own side of the story. Amaechi said he was frustrated by Jonathan and Wike According to Amaechi, now the minister of Transport under President Muhammadu Buhari, his administration as governor of the state was prevented by Nyesom Wike and former President Goodluck Jonathan from taking possession of the helicopters. The helicopters have since been abandoned at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos. Wike, now the governor of Rivers state, was the minister of Education under Jonathan and the administration had a tough political battle with Amaechi. Wike had recently told some editors that he actually asked the Buhari-led administration to take possession of the helicopters since the latter prevented the state from owning them probably for political reasons. READ ALSO: Gunmen murder APC chieftain in Rivers In a response from Amaechis media office made available to Legit.ng, the minister accused Wike of misrepresenting the facts on the issue. Recall that when Rt Hon Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi took over as governor of Rivers state, criminals masquerading as militants, kidnappers and all other criminal elements were on the prowl in the state. With a strong political will to tackle these menaces and make the state a safe place, Amaechi initiated a lot of measures to deal with the menace. And the decision to go for these helicopters was based on the advice and recommendation of security experts and specialists that were working closely with our Nigerian security agents to rid the state of these criminals- kidnappers, pipeline vandals, vicious political cultists etc, the statement said. The statement said the two Bell 412 security surveillance helicopters were bought by the administration of Amaechi in collaboration with the federal government through the office of the National Security Adviser (NSA). The federal government then was very impressed with the Amaechi administrations security plan to curb criminality in the state and supported the plan all the way. To show their support, the Federal government through the office of the NSA contributed $15 million, about half of the total sum, towards the purchase of the helicopters. Also, the then former President Goodluck Jonathans administration granted waivers to the Rivers state government to purchase and import the helicopters. However, trouble started many months later when the helicopters became ready for the Rivers state government to take possession of them and use them to fight crime and the criminals in the land and creeks of the state, Amaechi said adding that the Jonathan administration frustrated and rebuffed all attempts by the then governor to take possession of the helicopters. READ ALSO: DSS fingers South-south governor plotting against federal government The minister recalled how he spoke loudly about the refusal of the President Jonathan to allow the state government to take possession of the security surveillance helicopters. It was about security; the safety of lives and property, but the Jonathan administration refused and bluntly blocked the Rivers state government from taking possession of the helicopters, the same helicopters the federal government had months back partly funded and had granted approvals and waivers for the purchase and importation into the country. It was obvious why the President Goodluck Jonathan administration acted the way it did and Nyesom Wike, the present governor of Rivers state was an integral part, a major player in the whole conspiracy to block and prevent the state government from taking possession of the helicopters. Then, as a minister in President Jonathans cabinet, Wike inundated President Jonathan with lies and fake stories of how then Governor Amaechi wanted to use the helicopters for presidential campaigns against Jonathan, how Amaechi will use the helicopters to support President Jonathans opponents before and during the presidential elections and all sorts of concocted tales that created a false impression that the Amaechi government in Rivers state would use the helicopters against and to fight President Jonathan, and not to secure lives and property. READ ALSO: See the ex-ministers that have pledged their support to Wike (list) Wike then, was already nursing the ambition to run for the office of governor of Rivers State, he didnt care about the security of lives and property; his grand plot was to use the criminals, political cultists and criminal militants to harass, intimidate, terrorize, maim and even kill his political opponents and those that refused to support or vote for him before, during and after the elections, the statement added saying Wike knew early that he needed these criminal elements to rig his way into the government House, so he did everything to ensure that these criminals will be always available for him to use. Source: Legit.ng Rescuers Monday expanded their search for four Chinese tourists and a crewman whose boat sank in rough seas off Malaysia, as police detained the skipper, another crewman and the boat owner for suspected negligence. The owner had breached procedures, including overloading the boat, Sabah state Police Commissioner Ramli Din was quoted as saying by national news agency Bernama. "Police will also investigate whether negligence led to the deaths of the tourists," Ramli said. The sinking of the catamaran off Sabah on Borneo island on Saturday, the first day of the Lunar New Year holiday, sparked a major air and sea search. Twenty exhausted Chinese tourists survived hours in the water thanks to their life jackets and by clinging desperately to objects from the boat, but three other tourists died. The skipper and another crew member were earlier rescued off a nearby island. Initially, authorities said 28 Chinese tourists were on board the ill-fated vessel. But late Monday Malaysian officials said one Chinese had failed to show up for the trip. The search area has been further expanded from 1,500 to 2,400 nautical square miles, Awil Kamsari, a spokesman for the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, told AFP. Awil said the search was expected to continue through the night despite adverse weather. Malaysian navy chief Ahmad Kamarulzaman Ahmad Badaruddin told AFP that more assets have been deployed. Part of the search area falls in Brunei's waters and the sultanate's navy is assisting, he said. "It's not going to be easy as time is critical. The longer it takes, the lower the probability of finding them," Ahmad said, adding the sea was still very rough. "But we cannot lose hope and must continue." The search was postponed due to rough seas on Sunday night but resumed Monday morning. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said on his Facebook page he wanted a "thorough investigation" into the incident. China's foreign ministry also urged "a fair and objective investigation to find out the truth in the accident as soon as possible". The boat with 27 tourists and three crew aboard had left the Sabah state capital Kota Kinabalu for Pulau Mengalum, an island known for its pristine beaches and dive sites. The boat owner reported it missing on Saturday evening. The skipper said the boat had "broken" and sank after being hit by big waves. The traumatised and exhausted survivors were taken to Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Kota Kinabalu. A Malaysian official there told AFP they "looked shocked" and some "could not walk and looked very tired" as they were taken to hospital. He said they survived because of their life jackets and by clinging on to objects from the boat. State Tourism, Culture and Environment Assistant Minister Pang Yuk Ming said authorities were checking whether the catamaran had sailed from a jetty in Kota Kinabalu that was not intended for tourist trips to nearby islands. By Philip Pullella VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - On the afternoon of Jan. 24, a black BMW pulled out of a 16th century palace in Rome, crossed the Tiber River and headed for the Vatican, a short trip to end a brazen challenge to the authority of Pope Francis. Inside the car was 67-year-old Englishman Matthew Festing, the head of an ancient Catholic order of knights which is now a worldwide charity with a unique diplomatic status. Festing was about to resign, the first leader in several centuries of the Order of Malta, which was founded in 1048 to provide medical aid for pilgrims in the Holy Land, to step down instead of ruling for life. The move was aimed at ending a highly-public spat between Festing and the reformist pope over the running of the chivalric institution. The weeks-long conflict had become one of the biggest internal challenges yet to Francis' efforts to modernize the 1.2 billion member Roman Catholic Church. At issue was the Order's reaction to the discovery that condoms had been distributed by one of its aid projects in Myanmar. The Order had fired its Grand Chancellor, Albrecht Freiherr von Boeselager, whom it held responsible for the condom distribution. Von Boeselager declined to comment for this article. Though condom use goes against Catholic teaching, the Vatican had ordered an investigation into the firing of von Boeselager. It subsequently publicly castigated Festing, who had refused to cooperate with the investigation. Backing down, Festing -- a former Sotheby's art auctioneer -- gave a hand-written resignation letter to Francis in the pope's private residence, according to a senior Vatican source. Festing, who has the title of prince, declined an interview request. Instead of quelling the conflict, however, Festing's resignation was followed by yet another challenge to Francis' authority -- led by vocal pope critic American Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, according to Vatican and Knights sources. In particular: Burke tried to convince Festing to withdraw his resignation and keep fighting the pope, these sources say. On Saturday, the Knight's Sovereign Council accepted Festing's resignation and re-instated von Boselager, a clear defeat for Burke. Burke declined to comment for this article. The tussle suggested Francis is still battling to consolidate his power over the Church almost four years into his tenure, Vatican insiders say. Beyond a fight over condoms, the clash pointed to lingering divisions between the Church's conservatives and more progressive factions who support the pope's reformist agenda, they add. Francis is trying to make the Church less dogmatic and more welcoming to whose who have felt excluded, such as homosexuals and the divorced. "While this whole saga was an internal matter that probably should have stayed that way, it metamorphosed into a clash that showed the divide between conservatives and progressives," said Andrea Tornielli, author of several books on Pope Francis. The Vatican declined to comment on the clash and on Pope Francis' efforts to consolidate his power. It directed Reuters to two public statements. One, on Dec. 22, relates to the Vatican order to investigate the firing of von Boeselager. The second, on Jan. 17, followed a pledge by Festing on the Knights' web page not to cooperate with the Vatican. It decried his resistance and ordered members of the order to cooperate. GERMAN ARISTOCRAT The all-male top leaders of the Knights of Malta are not clerics, but they take vows of poverty, chastity and obedience to the pope. [L5N1FH58O] A German aristocrat whose father participated in a failed plot to kill Hitler in World War Two, von Boeselager was fired by Festing in December, and accused of having allowed the use of condoms while he was head of the Knights' global humanitarian projects. Festing fired him in Burke's presence, arguing that the German had hidden the condom use from the order's leaders when he was named Grand Chancellor, according to Knights and Vatican sources. Immediately, the firing set off the conflict between the Knights' hierarchy and the Vatican. Von Boeselager , a devout Catholic, said in a statement on Dec. 23 that he was fully behind Church teachings. He closed two projects in the developing world when he discovered condoms were being distributed but kept a third running in Myanmar for a while because closing it would have abruptly ended all basic medical services to poor people. The Church does not allow condoms as a means of birth control and says abstinence and monogamy in heterosexual marriage is the best way to stop the spread of AIDS. In the same statement, von Boeselager said Festing and Burke told him the Vatican wanted him to resign and that there would be "severe consequences" for the Order if he did not. The Vatican denied, in a letter from its secretary of state to the Order and seen by Reuters, that it had mandated the resignation, saying it had told the Knights the pope wanted a solution through dialogue. The German said his sacking was against the Knights' constitution and appealed to the pope, who ordered the investigation. Festing refused to cooperate, issuing a series of increasingly strident public statements. In one, he called the papal commission that was investigating the firing "legally irrelevant". In a Jan. 14 confidential letter to the top echelons of the order and seen by Reuters, Festing wrote: "In refusing to acknowledge this group of people's jurisdiction, I am trying to protect the order's sovereignty". The institution has the status of a sovereign entity, maintaining diplomatic relations with over 100 states and the European Union and permanent observer status at the United Nations. The pope was irritated by Festing's defiant stand, a senior Vatican source said, and the Vatican shot back with a public statement ordering the Knights to obey. After that public order, Festing changed his tune and resigned in the pope's residence a week later. Festing's resignation came as a shock for many inside the Knights: some of them told Reuters it was akin to the resignation of Pope Benedict in 2013. Four sources said that for many others in the order, it came as a relief. They feared the clash was damaging the image of the institution whose 13,000 members, 80,000 volunteers and 20,000 paid medical staff help the neediest around the world. The day after Festing handed his resignation to the pope, Cardinal Burke drove to the order's headquarters from his apartment near the Vatican and sought to persuade Festing to withdraw his resignation, a source from the Vatican and one from the Knights said. Burke declined to comment on his meeting with Festing. Burke has long been leading challenges against the pope. Pope Francis demoted him from a top Vatican job in 2014 with no official explanation and assigned him to be the "patron" of the Order of Malta. Such "patron" positions are usually given to older cardinals after they retire at 75. Burke was only 66 then and the demotion was widely seen as a sign of the pope's irritation with the cardinal's constant sniping over Francis reforms. In particular, Burke has contested moves by the pope that would allow Catholics who have divorced and re-married outside the Church without an annulment to return to the sacrament of communion. Burke declined to comment on his demotion. Since the demotion, Burke has become even more of a rallying point for conservatives, flying around the world to give lectures to conservative groups and often giving interviews criticising the pope's decisions. In November, he led a rare public challenge to the pope with three other cardinals who accused the pontiff of sowing confusion on important moral issues such as that of communion for the divorced. Burke later said in an interview that if the pope did not respond to their letter, the cardinals might need to "correct" the pope themselves for the good of the Church. The Vatican did not comment on the uprising at the time but many of the pope's supporters publicly criticised the four cardinals. The pope will now appoint a "pontifical delegate" to help run the order, at least until elections can be held for a new Grand Master. In a personal letter to the Sovereign Council on Jan. 27 and seen by Reuters, Francis made clear that the Vatican did not want to interfere with the Order's sovereignty but said his delegate would seek to "renew the spirituality of the Order, specifically of those members who take vows." (Editing by Mark Bendeich, Philippa Fletcher and Alessandra Galloni) AFP News Former Pakistan prime minister Imran Khan was recovering in hospital Friday after a gunman shot him in the leg, with his supporters vowing the assassination attempt will not derail his "long march" bid to return to power. The attack on his convoy, apparently by a lone gunman, killed one man and wounded at least 10, significantly raising the stakes in a political crisis that has gripped the South Asian nation since Khan's ousting in April. Khan "was stable and he was doing fine" at Shaukat Khanum hospital in the eastern city of Lahore, his doctor Faisal Sultan told AFP Friday. Seemi Bokhari, a lawmaker with Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, said after visiting Khan the former premier was in high spirits. "The doctors are allowing him to move ... He is feeling perfectly well and he will soon be discharged," she told AFP. The 70-year-old former international cricket star had been leading a campaign convoy of thousands since last week from Lahore to the capital Islamabad when he was attacked. Khan suffered at least one bullet wound to his right leg when a gunmen sprayed pistol fire at his modified container truck as it drove slowly through a thick crowd in Wazirabad, around 170 kilometres (105 miles) east of Islamabad. "Everyone who was standing in the very front row got hit," former information minister Fawad Chaudhry, who was standing behind Khan, told AFP. Senior aide Raoof Hasan said it was "an attempt to kill him, to assassinate him". Chaudhry said party officials would meet later Friday to discuss the immediate fate of Khan's campaign march. "The real freedom long march will continue and the movement for people's rights will remain until an announcement on the general elections," he tweeted. - Threats - Party officials also called for supporters to stage rallies and marches across the country after Friday afternoon prayers, the most important of the week. Protesters lit fires and blocked roads in several cities late Thursday as news of Khan's shooting spread. His campaign truck has become a crime scene for now, cordoned off and guarded by commandos as forensic experts comb the area. Information Minister Marriyum Aurangzeb said Thursday the attacker had been taken into custody. Officials shared an apparent confession video that was circulating online. "I did it because (Khan) was misleading the public," says a dishevelled man in the leaked video, shown with his hands tied behind his back in what appears to be a police station. He says he was angry with the procession for making a racket during the call to prayer that summons Muslims to the mosque five times a day. Pervaiz Elahi, the chief minister of Punjab, said officers who leaked the video would be disciplined. Pakistan has been grappling with Islamist militancy for decades, with right-wing religious groups having huge sway over the population. It has been no stranger to assassination attempts during decades of political instability, and the powerful military has led the country several times. Pakistan's first prime minister, Liaquat Ali Khan, was shot dead at a rally in Rawalpindi in 1951. Another former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, was killed in 2007 when a huge bomb detonated near her vehicle as she greeted supporters in the city of Rawalpindi. - Kicked from power - Khan was booted from office in April by a no-confidence vote after defections by some of his coalition partners, but he retains huge support. He was voted into power in 2018 on an anti-corruption platform by an electorate tired of dynastic politics, but his mishandling of the economy -- and falling out with a military accused of helping his rise -- sealed his fate. Since then, he has railed against the establishment and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif's government, which he says was imposed on Pakistan by a "conspiracy" involving the United States. Khan and Shehbaz have for months traded bitter accusations of corruption and incompetence, raising the political temperature in a nation that is frequently at boiling point. Khan has repeatedly told supporters he was prepared to die for the country, and aides have long warned of unspecified threats made on his life. The attack drew international condemnation including from the United States, which had uneasy relations with Khan when he was in power. "Violence has no place in politics, and we call on all parties to refrain from violence, harassment and intimidation," US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement. sjd/fox/ecl/pbt/dhc Poles on Sunday got their first -- and possibly last -- glimpse of a new Museum of the Second World War, a project slammed by Poland's right-wing government as underplaying the country's harrowing wartime fate. Conceived by EU President Donald Tusk during his time as Poland's premier, the museum offers a sweeping panorama of the war focused primarily on civilians who made up the majority of its victims. But led by Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the governing Law and Justice (PiS) party, has shown a penchant for a more inward-looking nationalist and "patriotic" approach to everything from the economy to history. Its vision for the new venue is no different. The museum's angular brick-red and glass facade juts sharply into the air in a part of Gdansk's medieval old town the Nazis razed to the ground. It lies near the city's Westerplatte peninsula where the German navy fired the first shots of World War II by attacking Poland on September 1, 1939. The main exhibitions located three floors underground offer visitors a stark look at the human toll of the war and the rise of the fascist and totalitarian politics that led to it. A soaring wall of suitcases symbolises the mass deportation of European Jews to death camps. The tattered shoe of a Polish child killed during the 1944 Warsaw Uprising focuses on the carnage against children. Porcelain melted by the atomic bomb the US dropped on Hiroshima bears witness to the advent of nuclear war. World War II claimed upwards of 55 million lives, the majority of whom were civilian, according to the museum. Some ten million were children. - 'Good Change'? - A court ruling this month gave the PiS government the go-ahead to merge the new museum with another planned one -- which critics say exists purely on paper and may never be built -- on February 1, a move widely seen as paving the way for a change of director. Historian Pawel Machcewicz, who spent the last eight years bringing the venue to life, is a former advisor to the liberal Tusk, whom Kaczynski views as his political arch-rival. Respected Polish historian Andrzej Paczkowski says the machinations surrounding the museum have more to do with "pure politics" than differing visions of history. "This is part of the PiS's 'Dobra Zmiana' (Good Change) policy that has seen it systematically take over all the important public posts in Poland since its election" in late 2015, Paczkowski told AFP. Critics accuse the PiS of installing loyalists as directors in a slew of key state-controlled enterprises and public institutions like television and radio as well as pushing through personnel changes that undermine the independence of the Constitutional Court. The moves triggered a series of mass protests and an unprecedented threat of EU sanctions over Warsaw's rule of law violations. "The criticism that the museum neglects the Polish perspective is being used as a justification to remove Machcewicz, because of course, no one is going to admit that it's because he was chosen by a rival political party," Paczkowski told AFP. Gdansk teacher Krystyna Matejczuk was among the museum's first 4,000 visitors as it opened its doors for a brief stint this weekend amid uncertainty over its fate after February 1. "The exhibition is absolutely neutral, but it's here in Gdansk, in Poland, and so its greatest focus is on the fate of Poles," she told AFP, adding "there's nothing wrong with showing that other people also suffered during the war". Poland lost around 17 percent of its population during World War II, giving it the highest national death toll from the conflict. Some six million Polish citizens, roughly half of Jewish ancestry, died under Nazi Germany's occupation. The vast majority were civilian. - 'Urgent warning' - Costing 104 million euros ($111 million) the museum is Poland's most expensive yet, according to Jaroslaw Sellin, a senior culture ministry official. Machcewicz told AFP on Sunday that "the culture ministry hasn't been in touch for months and (Culture) Minister Glinski has never visited the museum. "I don't know what will happen on February 1. I don't know how the museum will be liquidated. It's unprecedented." Poland's Culture Minister Glinski offered no clues about the fate of the museum after last week's court ruling. But last November he vowed that "no one is going to destroy the Museum of the Second World War created by our predecessors". The PiS simply wants to "complete its message", he said. According to Paczkowski, its message about the unspeakable human toll of a global war could not be more timely. "We are now in a period of history when the need for a warning about the consequences of war is especially urgent," he told AFP. AFP News Pope Francis warned the world is on the edge of a "delicate precipice" and buffeted by "winds of war" as he held inter-faith talks with one of Sunni Islam's top leaders in Bahrain on Friday. The 85-year-old Argentine decried the "opposing blocs" of East and West, a veiled reference to the standoff over Russia's invasion of Ukraine, in a speech to religious leaders in the tiny Gulf state. "We continue to find ourselves on the brink of a delicate precipice and we do not want to fall," he told an audience including Bahrain's king and Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, the grand imam of Cairo's prestigious Al-Azhar mosque. "A few potentates are caught up in a resolute struggle for partisan interests, reviving obsolete rhetoric, redesigning spheres of influence and opposing blocs," he added. "We appear to be witnessing a dramatic and childlike scenario: in the garden of humanity, instead of cultivating our surroundings, we are playing instead with fire, missiles and bombs." The pope's visit, aimed at strengthening relations with Islam, comes with the Ukraine war in its ninth month, and as tensions grow on the Korean peninsula and in the Taiwan Strait. Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin, who met Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in September, told journalists that there had been "a few small signs" of progress in negotiations with Moscow, warning that peace initiatives should not be "exploited for other goals". Francis, who is on his second visit to the wealthy Gulf, later met privately with al-Tayeb, with whom he signed a Muslim-Christian manifesto for peace in the United Arab Emirates in 2019. "This meeting has great symbolic importance, both locally and internationally, for promoting peace and peaceful co-existence between different religions and civilisations," said Hala Ramzi Fayez, a Christian and member of Bahrain's parliament. - Sunni, Shiite talks? - Leader of the world's 1.3 billion Catholics, Francis has placed inter-faith dialogue at the heart of his papacy, visiting other Muslim-majority countries including Egypt, Turkey and Iraq. Al-Tayeb, who met with the pope on previous Middle East visits, also called on Friday for talks between Islam's two main branches, Sunni and Shiite, to settle sectarian differences. Later, the pope addressed 17 members of the Muslim Council of Elders, an international group of Islamic scholars and dignitaries, at the mosque of the Sakhir Royal Palace. He told them dialogue was "the oxygen of peaceful coexistence". "In a world that is increasingly wounded and divided, that beneath the surface of globalisation senses anxiety and fear, the great religious traditions must be the heart that unites the members of the body," he said. He also struck out at the arms trade, a "commerce of death" that he said was "turning our common home into one great arsenal". The pope, who is using a wheelchair and a walking stick due to long-standing knee problems, began the first papal visit to Bahrain on Thursday by hitting out at the death penalty and urging respect for human rights and better conditions for workers. Sheikh Salman bin Khalifa Al-Khalifa, Bahrain's minister of finance and national economy, insisted the country has "led the region" with its criminal justice reforms. "We have some of the most robust and wide-ranging human rights and criminal justice protections in the region," the minister told AFP on Friday. "There are very well-established channels through which any of these critics can go, well established institutions of accountability," he said, adding that the pope's comments on the death penalty did not single out Bahrain. "It is important to note that that reference... was a general reference to countries around the world," the minister said. Bahrain has executed six people since 2017, when it carried out its first execution in seven years. Some of the condemned were convicted following a 2011 uprising put down with military support from neighbouring Saudi Arabia. cmk-lar/par/ho/th/dwo ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AP) The U.N. Secretary General has commended African countries for opening their borders to refugees and people fleeing violence while other parts of the world, including the developed West, close boundaries and build walls. Antonio Guterres made the remarks Monday in Addis Ababa where several dozen African leaders are attending the summit of the African Union. "African nations are among the world's largest and most generous hosts of refugees," said Guterres, attending the summit for the first time as head of the U.N. "African borders remain open for those in need of protection when so many borders are being closed, even in the most developed countries in the world." Guterres didn't make a direct reference to the recent executive orders signed by U.S President Donald Trump to build a wall along the Mexican border and also ban the entry of people from seven Muslim nations, including three in Africa, but his comment drew enthusiastic applause from 2,500 attending the opening, including African leaders, officials, diplomat and dignitaries. Speaking later at a press conference, Guterres said he hopes the U.S ban will only be temporary. "It is clear for me that refugee protection is something that is absolutely essential ... The U.S. has a large tradition of refugee protection." Sub-Saharan Africa hosts more than 18 million refugees, about 26 percent of the world's refugees, according to the U.N. refugee agency. The refugees have fled conflicts in Somalia, Central African Republic, Nigeria, South Sudan and Burundi. The world's largest refugee camp is Dadaab in Kenya which houses more than 300,000 refugees, mostly from neighboring Somalia. However, the Kenyan government last year announced that it intends to close Dadaab, which has been open for more than 20 years, saying that the camp is a security threat because it harbors Islamic extremists. The African Union Commission selected Moussa Faki Mahamat, Chad's foreign minister, as its new chairman to succeed outgoing chairwoman, South African Nkosazana Dlami- Zuma. Guinea's President Alpha Conde has succeeded Chad's President Idris Deby as chairman of the African Union. The African leaders approved Morocco's request to rejoin the body. Morocco left the pan-African bloc 32 years ago after a majority of the member states recognized the disputed territory of Western Sahara as a member. Morocco claims the territory in defiance of U.N. resolutions for a referendum on the independence. Gambia's new leader, Adama Barrow, did not attend the summit but send his deputy. AFP News Zhang Yao recalls the moment he realised something had gone deeply wrong at the Chinese mega-factory where he and hundreds of thousands of other workers assembled iPhones and other high-end electronics. In early October, supervisors suddenly warned him that 3,000 colleagues had been taken into quarantine after someone tested positive for Covid-19 at the factory. "They told us not to take our masks off," Zhang, speaking under a pseudonym for fear of retaliation, told AFP by telephone. What followed was a weeks-long ordeal including food shortages and the ever-present fear of infection, before he finally escaped on Tuesday. Zhang's employer, Taiwanese tech giant Foxconn, has said it faces a "protracted battle" against infections and imposed a "closed loop" bubble around its sprawling campus in central China's Zhengzhou city. Local authorities locked down the area surrounding the major Apple supplier's factory on Wednesday, but not before reports emerged of employees fleeing on foot and a lack of adequate medical care at the plant. China is the last major economy committed to a zero-Covid strategy, persisting with snap lockdowns, mass testing and lengthy quarantines in a bid to stamp out emerging outbreaks. But new variants have tested officials' ability to snuff out flare-ups and dragged down economic activity with the threat of sudden disruptions. - Desperation - Multiple workers have recounted scenes of chaos and increasing disorganisation at Foxconn's complex of workshops and dormitories, which form a city-within-a-city near Zhengzhou's airport. Zhang told AFP that "positive tests and double lines (on antigen tests) had become a common sight" in his workshop before he left. "Of course we were scared, it was so close to us." "People with fevers are not guaranteed to receive medicine," another Foxconn worker, a 30-year-old man who also asked to remain anonymous, told AFP. "We are drowning," he said. Those who decided to stop working were not offered meals at their dormitories, Zhang said, adding that some were able to survive on personal stockpiles of instant noodles. Kai, a worker at in the complex who gave an interview to state-owned Sanlian Lifeweek, told the magazine Foxconn's "closed loop" involved cordoning off paths between dormitory compounds and the factory, and complained he was left to his own devices after being thrown in quarantine. TikTok videos geolocated by AFP showed mounds of uncollected rubbish outside buildings in late October, while employees in N95 masks squeezed onto packed shuttle buses taking them from dormitories to their work stations. A 27-year-old woman working at Foxconn, who asked not to be named, told AFP a roommate who tested positive for Covid was sent back to her dormitory on Thursday morning, crying, after she decided to hand in her notice while in quarantine. "Now the three of us are living in the same room: one a confirmed case and two of us testing positive on the rapid test, still waiting for our nucleic acid test results," the worker told AFP. Many became so desperate by the end of last month that they attempted to walk back to their hometowns to get around Covid transport curbs. As videos of people dragging their suitcases down motorways and struggling up hills spread on Chinese social media, the authorities rushed in to do damage control. The Zhengzhou city government on Sunday said it had arranged for special buses to take employees back to their hometowns. Surrounding Henan province has officially reported a spike of more than 600 Covid cases since the start of this week. - Distrust - When Zhang finally attempted to leave the Foxconn campus on Tuesday, he found the company had set up obstacle after obstacle. "There were people with loudspeakers advertising the latest Foxconn policy, saying that each day there would be a 400 yuan ($55) bonus," Zhang told AFP. A crowd of employees gathered at a pick-up point in front of empty buses but were not let on. People in hazmat suits, known colloquially as "big whites" in China, claimed they had been sent by the city government. "They tried to persuade people to stay in Zhengzhou... and avoid going home," Zhang said. "But when we asked to see their work ID, they had nothing to show us, so we suspected they were actually from Foxconn." Foxconn pointed to the local government's lockdown orders from Wednesday when asked by AFP if it attempted to stop employees from leaving, without giving any further response. The company had on Sunday said it was "providing employees with complimentary three meals a day" and cooperating with the government to provide transport home. Eventually, the crowd of unhappy workers who had gathered decided to take matters into their own hands and walked over seven kilometres on foot to the nearest highway entry ramp. There, more people claiming to be government officials pleaded with the employees to wait for the bus. The crowd had no choice as the road was blocked. Buses eventually arrived at five in the afternoon -- nearly nine hours after Zhang had begun his attempt to secure transport. "They were trying to grind us down," he said. Back in his hometown, Zhang is now waiting out the home quarantine period required by the local government. "All I feel is, I've finally left Zhengzhou," he told AFP. bur-tjx/oho/je/mca/cwl ABOARD THE VIKING STAR (AP) Looking out over the sea, you can almost see the Viking longboat at sail, far off in the distance. Or that may just be your imagination, teased by the whitecaps and swells, as you trace the route taken a millennium ago by so many intrepid seafarers. The image played out as we made our way across the North Atlantic on the Viking Star. Launched in 2015, the 930-passenger ship was the first ocean-going vessel to set sail for Viking Cruises, known for its fleet of longships plying rivers of Europe, Russia, China, Southeast Asia and Egypt. Responding to a demand for more destination-oriented trips, Viking looked to the sea, offering itineraries to the Baltic, Mediterranean, Caribbean and North America. Just as the Norsemen ventured off into the unknown, Viking Cruises was sailing into somewhat uncharted territory with its "In the Wake of the Vikings" voyage, a 15-day trip first offered in the fall of 2016. The sailing will be repeated in September 2017. Last fall's itinerary began in Bergen, Norway (flights from the U.S. were booked through the cruise line) and continued on to Lerwick, Scotland; Torshavn, Faroe Islands; Reykjavik, Iceland; Nanortalik and Qaqortoq, Greenland; L'Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland; Saguenay, Quebec City, and Montreal, Quebec. The stops appealed to me and my wife as out-of-the-ordinary ports. No palm trees and sandy beaches here. This was something new and intriguing, taking us to places not inundated by tourists - at least not yet. In Scotland's remote Shetland Islands, hearty cheers of men clad in Viking outfits greeted passengers walking off the gangway in Lerwick. Those outfits are also worn when they torch a replica Viking galley as the highlight of the Up Helly A' winter festival, a local tradition. In Nanortalik ("Place of the Polar Bears"), a town of roughly 1,300 at the mouth of a fjord in southwestern Greenland, villagers delighted visitors with a church concert where they sang in Inuit. The cruise to the village featured breathtaking scene after scene of towering mountains and glaciers edging toward the fjord. The sun-splashed view was so awe-inspiring that the captain at one point stopped the ship and spun it 360 degrees so nothing was missed. Story continues Some passengers were invited into homes of locals who wanted to display their crafts and culture. In Qaqortoq, a young woman eager to practice English joined us as we walked in town and spoke of her dream to travel beyond her island home. At L'Anse aux Meadows, the northern tip of Newfoundland where Leif Erikson arrived in the late 900s, we marveled at the remains of the Norse village unearthed in the 1960s, revising longstanding notions of who "discovered" Vinland. Just as the Vikings faced the Atlantic's mercurial moods, the Viking Star got a taste of what the ocean can dish out. After warm and sunny late-September weather in Bergen and Lerwick, rough seas prevented us from stopping at the Faroe Islands. It got even rougher en route to Iceland, with 80-90 mph gusts and 45-foot waves. The motion took a toll on glasses, dishes, liquor bottles and some passengers' stomachs, but the nimble-footed servers (representing a diverse array of nationalities) performed admirably as they balanced loaded trays. The storm gave way to sunny weather in Reykjavik, where we luxuriated in the Blue Lagoon, a geothermal pool of 102-degree mineral-rich, milky-blue water surrounded by walls of black lava. Then it was on to Greenland and our Canadian ports. In Newfoundland, persistent ocean swells delayed trips on smaller boats from the Star to shore. Trips to L'Anse aux Meadows ran so late that some passengers could not even board a launch. Disappointment, yes, but no mutiny. Viking acknowledged the weather-related curtailments and offered $250-per-person credits for a future cruise. Although the northern route may elicit shivers from some, the weather for most of the voyage was pleasant and warm enough to sit on the open deck for meals or drinks. Even in less-balmy weather, some passengers took to whirlpools on deck (although we opted for opulent indoor spa, which also featured saunas and a snow grotto, where snowflakes descend through the chilled air). The ship's two swimming pools include one protected from the weather by a retractable glass roof. Dining options range from a cafeteria-style cafe to a full-service restaurant, plus specialty settings where reservations are requested. Entrees included European, Russian and Asian dishes. Reindeer consomme and poached Norwegian salmon were part of our five-course meal, each course served with a different wine, in The Chef's Table. In addition to the shops, salon, theatre, bars, library, laundry and other amenities including verandas off all staterooms, the Viking Star offers space - enough room in public areas so that you don't constantly feel wedged in a crowd. There's no casino on board (for us, a plus). The Wake of the Vikings cruise featured excellent speakers on voyage-related topics. Among them: What causes the northern lights we saw last night? Why the geothermal springs in Iceland? What about Norse women? And the ultimate myth-buster: Did you know that Vikings didn't have horns on their helmets? ___ If You Go... VIKING CRUISES: "In the Wake of the Vikings" 15-day itineraries depart Sept. 9 and Sept. 23 from Bergen, Norway. Prices listed in January began at $5,749 with airfare $1,095; http://www.vikingcruises.com. India has increasingly turned to the United States and France, rather than traditional ally Russia, for its military hardware in recent years (AFP Photo/NICOLAS ASFOURI) WASHINGTON (AP) It's been described as the greatest burden any commander in chief must bear. Just days into his young presidency, a U.S. service member has died in military action authorized by Donald Trump. It's the first known combat death of a member of the U.S. military since Trump took the oath of office on Jan. 20 and underscores the gravity of the decisions he now makes. Three service members were also wounded Sunday during the firefight with militants from al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula's branch in Yemen. The raid left nearly 30 others dead, including an estimated 14 militants. A fourth U.S. service member was injured when a military aircraft assisting in the mission had a "hard landing" nearby, according to U.S. Central Command. "Americans are saddened this morning with news that a life of a heroic service member has been taken in our fight against the evil of radical Islamic terrorism," Trump said in a statement. "My deepest thoughts and humblest prayers are with the family of this fallen service member," he said. The names of the casualties were not released. Planning for the clandestine counterterrorism raid begun before President Barack Obama left office on Jan. 20, but Trump authorized the raid, according to a U.S. defense official, who was not authorized to discuss details beyond those announced by the Pentagon and so spoke on condition of anonymity. The U.S. has been striking al-Qaida in Yemen from the air for more than 15 years, mostly using drones. Sunday's surprise pre-dawn raid could signal a new escalation against extremist groups in the Arab world's poorest but strategically located country. The action provides an early window into how the new president will put his campaign rhetoric into action when it comes to foreign intervention. Trump had promised an "America first" approach and an end to the "era of nation building" if he won the White House. Many interpreted his language as isolationist and expected Trump to be more cautious about where the U.S. intervened. Story continues At the same time, Trump had broadcast a stronger posture on the world stage. He pledged to beef up the military and said he aimed to achieve "peace through strength." Sunday's raid was not the first time that the United States had conducted a counterterrorism raid on the ground in Yemen, but it was not the usual approach of striking from the air, the defense official said. The raid was planned as a clandestine operation and not intended to be made public, but the loss of a service member changed that, the official said, adding that no detainees were taken in the operation. An al-Qaida official and an online news service linked to the terror group said the raid left about 30 people dead, including women and children. Among the children killed was Anwaar, the 8-year-old daughter of Anwar al-Awlaki, a radical Yemeni-American cleric killed in a U.S. airstrike in Yemen in 2011, according to the girl's grandfather. Nasser al-Awlaki told The Associated Press that Anwaar was visiting her mother when the raid took place. She was shot in the neck and bled for two hours before she died, he said. In addition to killing the militants, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said U.S. forces "captured a whole host of information about future plots that's going to benefit this country and keep us safe." The president "extends his condolences," he said on ABC's "'This Week." ''But more importantly, he understands the fight that our servicemen and women conduct on a daily basis to keep this country safe." Just over a week ago, suspected U.S. drone strikes killed three other alleged al-Qaida operatives in Bayda in what was the first-such killings reported in the country since Trump assumed the U.S. presidency. Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, long seen by Washington as among the most dangerous branches of the global terror network, has exploited the chaos of Yemen's civil war, seizing territory in the south and east. The war began in 2014, when Shiite Houthi rebels and their allies swept down from the north and captured the capital, Sanaa. A Saudi-led military coalition has been helping government forces battle the rebels for nearly two years. ___ Ahmed al-Haj reported from Sanaa, Yemen. Associated press writers Maggie Michael in Cairo and AP National Security Writer Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report. ___ This story has been corrected to reflect that Anwar al-Awlaki's daughter's name is Anwaar. In his first hours as president, Donald Trump took aim at the Affordable Care Act, issuing an executive order minimizing the economic burden of the law and re-stating a campaign promise to have Obamacare repealed. Impact of the Executive Order on Obamacare But according to health insurance expert Arthur Tacchino, the executive order has little, if any, practical impact on your small business in the short-term. In the immediate future, it really doesnt do anything, said Tacchino, the principal and chief innovation officer for SyncStream Solutions, a healthcare insurance consulting firm. I think the key part of it from a legal perspective is that it does not create a regulation or a law, said Tacchino, who is also a lawyer and an assistant professor of health insurance at The American College of Financial Services in Bryn Mawr, Pa. Businesses really need to continue what theyre doing in terms of compliance with the Affordable Care Act. The executive order does call on the new Secretary of Health and Human Services and other federal agency heads to implement new policies with regard to Obamacares implementation and enforcement, for example stating: To the maximum extent permitted by law, the Secretary of Health and Human Services (Secretary) and the heads of all other executive departments and agencies (agencies) with authorities and responsibilities under the Act shall exercise all authority and discretion available to them to waive, defer, grant exemptions from, or delay the implementation of any provision or requirement of the Act that would impose a fiscal burden on any State or a cost, fee, tax, penalty or regulatory burden on individuals, families, healthcare providers, health insurers, patients, recipients of healthcare services, purchasers of health insurance, or makers of medical devices, products, or medications. But even new administrative orders issued by those agency heads presumably U.S. Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., and fast food restaurant CEO Andrew Puzder, Trumps unconfirmed selections for HHS and Labor secretaries cannot be implemented immediately, Tacchino said. The agencies must follow the Administrative Procedures Act, which requires agencies to submit new policies for public review and comment before final implementation. The individual mandate policy portion of Obamacare took more than a year to go through this review and undoing that may take just as long, Tacchino said. In many ways, I really think (Trumps executive order) is more of a ceremonial thing, he said. This was a major campaign promise throughout the nomination process. Obviously, he wants to carry it forward and say, I did what I said I was going to do on day one. From his perspective, he thinks he has done that, but from a practical perspective it doesnt really do much. That said, small business owners must be aware that change is ultimately coming. Right now were still in a period of uncertainty about what that change is going to be, Tacchino said. If you have an adviser related to this an agent, a broker or a CPA make sure they are staying current with whats going on so that you can continue to be in compliance with whatever new regulation ultimately comes from this change. At the moment, individuals and business owners need to be aware that ACA remains the law. Freelancers, for example, remain under the individual mandate. At the same time, they also remain eligible for federal subsidies to buy health insurance and those subsidies may remain in place for another year or more, Tacchino said. If I was a freelance reporter or worker, I would want to get enrolled, while there are subsidies, as soon as possible, he said. Not that the executive order is taking it away, but for all intents and purposes, all of the actions that are being taken, whether its through executive order or through Congress, are leading toward getting rid of the subsidies or at least getting rid of the individual mandate and therefore getting rid of the subsidies. Small business owners who opted out of providing healthcare coverage to allow individual employees to get federal subsidies might want to reconsider their approach if the law is changed. They really need to pay attention to what happens next if they believe its important for their employees to get benefits, Tacchino said. Once a new plan gets put in place, theyll have to weigh their options and see if its achievable for them to purchase healthcare coverage. On the other hand, if a change to the law provides an opportunity for individuals to get tax credits to buy their own health insurance, it might make sense for the employer to steer clear of buying a company policy. If you do have a company policy, Tacchino said, it is important to note that benefits purchased in an annual contract cannot be changed this year even if Obamacare is repealed and replaced immediately. If youve just renewed an insurance contract, theyre not going to change that until it expires. Lets say that whatever replaces the plan may take away things like the prohibition on (not covering) pre-existing conditions. That will remain in effect. See Also: Small Business Optimism Skyrockets As Trump Prepares to Take Office It might be different next year when its time to renew your insurance policy, but even if a replacement bill takes effect today, those insurance contracts are locked in for the year. Whatever happens to federal health insurance regulations, Tacchino said he does not see premiums dropping in price any time soon. A misconception is that, for some reason, people think the Affordable Care Act is what was creating high premiums. The reality is there is lots of studies you can find these on Kaiser Family Foundation that healthcare premiums have been on the rise for multiple years prior to the Affordable Care Act. In fact, he said, Obamacare slowed the rate at which premiums were increasing. I think premiums will continue to rise for people, Tacchino said. Regardless of what the replacement is, it will be very difficult to make a promise that premiums wont rise or will go down. If anything, they will stay the same or increase. It will be distributed to the cities of Norcia and Foligno. Font size: A - | A + A contingent of four trucks carrying Slovak humanitarian aid in form of 16 containers arrived in Italy in mid-January. The aid will be sent to the locations stricken by earthquakes. The aid was unloaded and assembled without problems, despite the snow calamity and repeated shakes. It will be distributed to the cities of Foligno and Norcia, the latter of which is inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List, the SITA newswire reported. Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Of the 16 containers, 13 will be sent to Norcia and three to Foligno, the Slovak Foreign Affairs Ministry reported on its website. Slovak Ambassador to Italy, Jan Soth, will symbolically give the aid to the representatives of the two cities and the civil protection organisation in the region of Umbria on January 25, SITA wrote. The humanitarian aid is an initiative of the Slovak Foreign Affairs Minister Miroslav Lajcak, who decided to provide the aid to Italy via the Slovak Aid programme. Following the first earthquake which struck the country on August 24, 2016, Slovakia which at the time presided over the EU Council, said it is ready to help the inhabitants of the affected localities. In cooperation with the Italian government they proposed several scenarios, of which the one to provide the aid to the civil protection organisation and the two cities was selected, SITA wrote. The August earthquake in Italy claimed 297 victims and many others were injured. The 6.2-magnitude earthquake struck the territories from the Lazio region through Umbria and Marche to the coast of the Adriatic Sea. With approximately 75,000 Slovaks living and working in the UK the question arises: will the "hard Brexit" send some of them home? Font size: A - | A + "Brexit must mean control over the number of people who come to Britain from Europe," British PM Theresa May announced in her speech as she outlined the way Great Britain will look and function after its exit from the European Union. Where does that leave Slovaks living in the UK? Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement There are currently an estimated 75,000 Slovaks living and working in the UK. While the rules for entry to the British labour market for Slovaks are expected to be stricter following Brexit, people who have legally lived and worked in the UK should not find it hard to remain in Britain. At the same time, Slovakia should surely get ready for those who decide to return home, first of all by removing bureaucratic barriers for them, in order to put their potential to use, labour market experts say. If Great Britain talks about its citizens and its country, we will talk about our citizens and our country and the project we care so much about the project of the EU, Prime Minister Robert Fico reacted to Mays Brexit speech, as quoted by TASR newswire. Meanwhile in the UK, the Supreme Court ruled that the UK cannot leave the EU without getting a green light from the parliament. Still, experts dont believe that this situation could reverse the decision of Brits from the June 23, 2016 referendum. Our citizens going home? Theresa May is expected to deliver some more concrete plans on how her government wants to go about the Brexit. But even before she presents her white paper, observers see it as almost clear that the UK will regulate labour migration. After Brexit, it will be harder for all EU citizens to enter the UK labour market, Zuzana Gabrizova from the Euractiv portal stated for The Slovak Spectator, explaining that getting a job in the UK will not be impossible, mainly for qualified workers and seasonal jobs, but it will definitely be harder. The tendency is to guarantee rights to those foreigners who have been living and working in the UK until now, she said. The question is, where will the line be drawn, Gabrizova said. Its possible that those who move to the UK now, will have to leave. Slovaks in the UK But the Slovaks living in the UK that The Slovak Spectator spoke to do not see Brexit as a completely terrifying prospect. No one is sending us home, Viktor Mydlo, who moved to the UK with his girlfriend to find a better-paid job, said. They live in Northampton and like many Slovaks, they left their native country to find better-paid work. I was tired. I work as a nurse and my aim was to finally find a job position where I would gain enough respect and money, Mydlo explained why he moved to the UK seven months ago, at the time when the Brexit referendum was happening. In response to the question whether he would go home or move to another country if he was forced to leave the UK, he has a clear opinion: I didnt move to stay here forever, he says. I wanted to see another part of the world and gain experience. I believe that one day I will return to Slovakia and use all the skills and knowledge which will come my way. Going home would also be the preferred choice for Marianna Buzmova, who has lived in the UK since 2012. She works in the hospitality industry as a front office manager. Buzmova has a long-standing relationship with a Brit. The question if she would marry him because of a visa amused her. We are going to marry in August, she told The Slovak Spectator. But definitely not for a visa, thats not a reason for wedding. We are joking that he is going to marry me because of easier travelling in Europe. Official residence helps Slovaks dont have to be afraid about their legal position during the transition period before Brexit, the Slovak embassy in the UK wrote on their Facebook page reacting to the announced hard Brexit. The embassy, however, admits that immigration rules could strengthen and entry to the labour market could be more complicated. The advantage will be to prove present and past legal residence in the country, the embassy wrote, and recommended Slovaks living in the UK to register their residence if they are planning to stay after Brexit. Less bureaucracy around the return Labour market experts at the moment admit it is not clear what those Slovaks living in the UK who will not be allowed to stay on the British labour market after Brexit will do come back home or move to another country within or even outside of the EU. Even if part of the people living in the UK come back to Slovakia, given the current economic situation and according to the number of job positions, they will find work for themselves, opines Ivana Molnarova, CEO of Profesia.sk. The situation is similar in the Czech Republic, so jobseekers could also look for work there if they do not want to stay in Slovakia. The question is how Brexit will influence the UK's economy, Molnarova noted. Several banks have already announced they are moving to other European countries and there are concerns that this could bring about another economic crisis. Martin Kahanec, scientific director of the non-governmental Central European Labour Studies Institute (CELSI) and research assistant professor at the University of Economics in Bratislava, stresses that Slovakia needs to prepare for the return of people after Brexit, to ease the bureaucratic burden for them. Slovakia needs to have a very clear and predictable policy regarding how to facilitate the return of its migrants. We should give them a clear signal: if you like, we are happy to welcome you back, this is the office where you should go, here is the website you should look at to get all the information you need, he told The Slovak Spectator, adding that there should be qualified people to advise people about their return, how to register with social security, and what are the specific things they need to take care of. Otherwise, they might not come back and that would be lost potential, Kahanec said. Mikulas Polony faced charges for alleged murder in Bratislavas Irish Pub. Font size: A - | A + Mikulas Polony died at Bratislava University Hospital on January 24 due to a serious head injury caused by a gunshot. He was close to the Bratislava Pitovci mob. Some of the media reported earlier that Polony was found with a gunshot wound to his head on January 10 in an apartment block in the Bratislava borough of Lamac, known as the Pitovcis base. Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement The wound, which was caused by an illegally possessed gun, was probably self-inflicted, according to the preliminary police information. A 7.65-calibre projectile allegedly ran through Polonys frontal sinus, entering on the left-hand side and leaving on the right-hand side. In the 90's, Polony faced charges for an alleged murder at Bratislavas Irish Pub where gunshots killed two people on July 9, 1999. Nonetheless, he was eventually exonerated from the charges by the Bratislava Regional Court. Police conducted a huge operation against the Pitovci in June 2016. During this action, entitled Gondola, they carried out 20 house searches and 17 searches of non-residential premises. They detained 23 people, of whom 22 were identified as members of an organised crime group. One member of the group was at large, while four were in prison. Coalition supported by Kotlebas MP. Font size: A - | A + The public may never get the answer to the question of how the allegedly overpriced event, where the logo of the Slovak presidency of the EU Council was presented, was allowed to take place, the Sme daily wrote. Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement The parliamentary committee will not discuss the suspicion of non-transparent use of money which former employee of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Zuzana Hlavkova, pointed to. Coalition MPs voted for enclosing the case. However, opposition MPs left the room to prevent the committee from dicussing the issue and to force it to hold talks again, the exception being Jan Kesckes, MP of Kotlebas LSNS, who did not leave even though he claimed that he has no doubts about why Evka was used. Read also: Read also: Ex-employee points to overpriced presidency-related orders Read more Miroslav Beblavy, independent opposition MP, asked Foreign Affairs Minister Miroslav Lajcak (Smer) to present all the documents within 15 days but Lajcak did not fully cooperate and the names and offers from the other companies were missing. Beblavy has previously said that after reading the documents he does not believe Lajcak anymore. The ministry provided about 200 documents in total. Ninety percent of them were talking about nothing, we got no information from them, stated Beblavy as quoted by SME. The law requires that the documents detailing the tenders, the approval process and the reason why the Evka agency was chosen out of the three candidates, are available as public information according to Beblavy. Read also: Read also: Lajcak still failing to provide answers to key questions about Evka Read more Another document in which Ministry compares the offers and makes the decision to choose Evka is also missing. MPs requested it but Minister Lajcak failed to produce it, according to Beblavys words, even though Lajcak promised it would be made available. Only the police or the Supreme Audit Office (NKU) can move Causa Evka further. The recipe for defeating the emotionally driven, but empty, populism now trending in Europe is the same as it has always been: Offer a better idea, actually believe it is better, and then take the time to explain to people why it is. Font size: A - | A + A strange thing is happening to Europes political mainstream. As politicians worry about nationalist and populist opponents, they are beginning to talk like them a tactic that will almost certainly backfire. Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement This week, Mark Rutte, the Dutch prime minister, published an open letter in Dutch newspapers that targeted, anti-social people Who dump rubbish on the streets, and who spit on the conductors on the trains and trams. Those who refuse to adapt, and criticize our values should behave normally, or go away, he added. Meanwhile, taking a page from Donald Trumps America first playbook, Czech Interior Minister Milan Chovanec said his country should conduct its own Brexit negotiations rather than wait for the EU process to unfold. We should undertake an independent initiative with Great Britain and not wait for what Europe does, he told Czech Television. (I am not sure how good a deal Mr. Chovanec is capable of getting, as he does not speak English, nor any foreign language) Both Mr. Rutte and Mr. Chovanec are appealing to populist sentiment ahead of elections. In the Netherlands, its about pulling voters from the bleach blond racist Geert Wilders. In the Czech Republic, its an attempt to attract supporters of President Milos Zeman who might otherwise support Andrej Babiss rival ANO party in the fall. In both cases, its about being as populist as the populists. You might recall, Prime Minister Robert Fico tried a similar tactic just last year. Worried about losing nationalist voters he spent six months scaring the public about the threat posed by refugees. It didnt work. The result was to push voters right, and the Smer party lost 41 percent of their parliamentary seats. Mr. Fico was trying to appeal to voters who were considering a vote for more extreme candidates primarily the SNS but also Marian Kotlebas thugs. But as was the case in Slovakia, this plan does not usually work out. Instead, people like Mr. Rutte come off as an inauthentic, the worst thing you can be in todays political climate. People see the rhetoric for exactly what it is, a calculated tactic designed to get votes, not something the politician actually believes in. Voters hate this, and worse yet, by using language similar to what Wilders and others use, Mr. Rutte makes that language mainstream. This makes Wilders seem a more reasonable choice. In short, Mr. Rutte exposes himself as a fraud in a suit while helping his opponent look more sensible. In the end, engaging with populists on their own terms is a lot like surrendering. The recipe for defeating the emotionally driven, but empty, populism now trending in Europe is the same as it has always been: Offer a better idea, actually believe it is better, and then take the time to explain to people why it is. In other words, actual politics not just campaigning. Publishing reviews takes time, but it also shows the quality of the product or service and help other customers make the right choice. It is not the only factor in the decision to buy, however. Font size: A - | A + A glossary of words as well as exercise related to this article are also published online. Trust and reliability is what customers need when shopping online, unlike in traditional brick-and-mortar stores. When direct contact with the product or service is not available, customer reviews can be a substitute for quality assurance. Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Reviews by other customers tend to be very important, the more expensive the item, the more I rely on reviews, Diego Loyola, an expat from Ecuador living in Slovakia, told The Slovak Spectator. Many foreigners living in Slovakia that The Slovak Spectator spokewith share this opinion and confirm that they use online shopping services considerably. Online sellers of products and services do realise that reviews from satisfied or dissatisfied customers play a key role in their business. Customer reviews belong to the most important factors in purchase decisions, especially when buying experiences and accommodation, Stefan Miho, marketing manager of Zlavomat discount shopping portal, told The Slovak Spectator. Offers of services in a discount portal such as Zlavomat and ZlavaDna are evaluated by hundreds of people every day. They claim to publish all the reviews transparently, with the exception of those that violate a moral or ethical code. Safety and reviews Customer reviews are, however, only one of many factors that motivate people to shop in an online store. The website needs to look nice and be easy to navigate. The price obviously plays a role too, say foreigners who regularly buy from online shops in Slovakia, such as Mert Durral from Turkey. Finding the cheapest price is most important thing when buying online, he said and added that he also looks at reviews. Pierre Nrmand from France says he shops online once every two or three months, mainly for clothes, transportation tickets or reservations for accommodation. Apart from low price, he also mentions the security of the website as a factor in deciding whetherto buy. Its quite important, especially when I make a reservation for a flight or accommodation, in order to avoid negative surprises, he told The Slovak Spectator. The safety of online purchases also matters to Loyola, who prefers to pay when picking up a product rather than paying through third party portals. Theresa Piil Laursen from Denmark admits to having had a bad experience with a website selling ink for printers, but generally she is positive about shopping through Slovak websites. She buys cat and dog food, perfumes and other products and services online. I do not look at reviews, she told The Slovak Spectator, I look to see if the web pages look easy to buy from, where are they located, if I can wait to pay until I get my order delivered orI can pick it up. Negative feedback can help Good and bad evaluations matter, but they are not the only important factor, according to Anna Porubcova from the marketing department of the Martinus bookstore. Reviews are important for other customers, because it helps them in buying decisions. If the reader has a negative experience with the book, it is his opinion and he can, of course, express it, she stated. Peter Blazecka, PR & marketing manager of ZlavaDna, explains that negative reviews can help the portal improve their services. If the evaluation is really negative, we contact the provider and try to solve the matter, he explained, adding that in most cases things get explained and the problem is solved or they compensate dissatisfied customers. On the other hand, positive reviews help sell, giving them a competitive advantage. We see that especially with our long-term certified partners that have good reviews, said Miho. If we launch an offer with a new partner with similar products, even cheaper, the customers will have a small preference for the partner with a high ranking. How to get reviews While customer reviews are an important decisionmaking factor, people from online stores admit only a few customers actually go back to review the product. Some time after their purchase we usually ask customers for their feedback, Porubcova said. The online bookstore runs a survey among customers once a year where their feedback can bring them benefits, but there is no other year-round system of motivating people to review the books they bought. Discount online portals, on the other hand, do have a system of motivating people to provide feedback. On ZlavaDna, people can post a verbal rating and their photographs, which then earn them credits for their next purchase, Blazecka explained. This too makes it clear that it is not so easy to get feedback, he said. Miho, however, says that as social networks are gaining popularity, Slovaks have also learned to express their opinion. We do not need to motivate them to give feedback that much anymore, he said. Still, they have a system of credits as a reward for customer reviews with photos. That way we are trying to get as much added value as possible from the reviews for the customers. The Spectator College is a programme designed to support the study and teaching of English in Slovakia, as well as to inspire interest in important public issues among young people. The project was created by The Slovak Spectator in cooperation with their exclusive partner the Leaf Academy. Reubin Askew Reubin Askew (Sept. 11, 1928 -- March 13, 2014) is now regarded as one of the greatest governors of Florida. Askew made a lasting impression as the Democratic governor between the years 1971 and 1979 by improving civil rights, tax reform and financial transparency for public officials. Among Askews many accomplishments was initiating the rule that each year public officials in Florida must disclose their income and financial interests. The Sunshine Amendment requiring financial disclosure was just one of a host of reforms he put in place for the state of Florida. In addition, he convinced the Florida legislature to pass a corporate tax that is now netting over two billion dollars a year to help support schools, health care and other state programs. Florida, being a southern state, has had a relatively harmonious racial history in part because of Askews willingness to embrace issues such as busing to end school segregation. He was appointed the states first Black Supreme Court justice. Askews reforms on ending school segregation was carried out during the same period in our history when Alabama Governor George Wallace was building his legacy on a strident segregation campaign. Talbot Sandy DAlemberte, a former American Bar Association president, Florida State University president and a member of the state House from 1966 to 1972 stated, When Reubin became governor, Florida was widely regarded as an ethical mess. He further stated, Reubin came in and straightened it out. He was a model for everyone. After leaving office in January 1979, Askew didnt find any more political success. His presidential bid in 1984 faltered in New Hampshire. He entered the 1988 U.S. Senate race in Florida, only to withdraw, complaining about the demands of constant fundraising. Askew did find success at Florida State University as a distinguished professor of public administration and policy in 1995. He later was awarded an eminent scholar chair named after him. Although many of Floridas current members of the legislature had not been elected to office during Askews term, they did encounter Askew while being a student at FSU. It was present Senate President Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, Florida, who said, One of the most memorable evenings of my life was the opportunity to co-teach his graduate class at Florida State. Unlike incumbent public officials, the former prime minister returned an award she received from an NGO that made a provoking declaration on migration and migrants. Font size: A - | A + Former prime minister Iveta Radicova (2010-12) has officially renounced the 2012 Golden Biatec award she received from the Informal Economic Forum (NEF)-Economic Club, a non-governmental organisation called Centre for Open Politics informed the TASR newswire on January 27. Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement I read the Declaration issued by the NEF-Economic Club on migration, including the list of its signatories, featuring also the Police Corps president [Tibor Gaspar], Radicova said. Its unacceptable to see anyone signed under such a mixture of absurdities, confused facts and illogical pseudo-connections. Therefore, Im officially renouncing and returning the 2012 Golden Biatec award I received from this club. Earlier this week, Gaspar was invited by President Andrej Kiska to the Presidential Palace to explain why he had signed the declaration. The police president did not want to comment on the content of the meeting after it took place. I dont know, we didnt agree that I would comment, Gaspar told TASR on January 23. I was at the meeting, thats all. In the declaration, NEF presented a Basic Set of Measures against Economic Migrants, recommending the government to gather statistics of their number and structure, introduce a range of rules related to the issuing of work permits for migrants and the acquisition of citizenship in individual European Union member countries, keep track of money flow abroad for migrants families, and seek financial compensation from economic migrants for the cost of language education and other necessary training provided in the host country. The Golden Biatec award has been bestowed since 1992, in an originally prestigious poll highly publicized in the media. Interest has been declining for the last few years, the Sme daily wrote on January 27. Other personalities from among the more than 250 people who received it so far include, for example, archbishop Robert Bezak, former presidential candidate and chairman of the Siet party, Radoslav Prochazka, and Milan Sikula, head of the Economic Institute of the Slovak Academy of Sciences. Some of the laureates thanked and took the prize in person, while others quietly ignored it. Former foreign minister and Slovak diplomat Eduard Kukan who got the award in 2001 says he saw no problem in it then. Then, I did not have the feeling that the activities of this club would develop in any suspicious way, he noted, as quoted by Sme. He added that he has been following the recent scandal around Gaspar and conspiracy theories but he has not read the document yet, as he was in Brussels he will read it soon and then decide what to do with his Golden Biatec. Fashion designer Lydia Eckhardt received the prize in 1996; but she has not paid attention to the case and is not going to return the award. Apart from Gaspar, the chairman of the SNS coalition party Andrej Danko also got the award, but the latter distanced himself form the club. The Economic Club bestows the award also on foreign personalities, e.g. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russian President Vladimir Putin who has recently been dominating the new category, Global Peace and Security Personality together with Chinese President Xi Jinping, both of whom occupy territories of neighbouring countries, according to Sme. Ironically Merkel, who got the award in 2012, is now heavily criticized by the club for her decision concerning migration to the EU. The rating agency expects economic growth for Slovakia in the next three years at the level of about three percent annually. Font size: A - | A + Standard and Poors rating agency confirmed a rating of A+ for Slovakia on January 27, with a stable outlook. It forecasts fast economic growth for the country, reducing the debt and continuing to attract the interest of investors, the Finance Ministry informed the TASR newswire. Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement S&P in its evaluation expects the economic growth in Slovakia between 2017 and 2020 to be at about three percent a year. It also positively appraises the relatively low external debt of the country and expects a gradual decrease of the public debt. Apart from stable economic growth, the cabinet measures to improve tax collection have contributed to this development, the ministry added. Slovakia remains an attractive country for foreign investments, the ministry stated, as quoted by the Sme daily, while the continuing construction of the Jaguar Land Rover plant near Nitra should bring along, as expected, more foreign investments of suppliers, amounting to about 100 million, the ministry informed, adding that these investments will result in more new jobs. The Slovak banking sector also remains stable and well-capitalised, and the share of unpaid loans is at an acceptable level. However, the structural problems especially regional disparities, an aging population and continued long-term unemployment are currently limiting the potential increase in Slovakias rating according to S&P, the Finance Ministry wrote. Former Constitutional Court judges, constitutional lawyers and academics say parliament should pass a constitutional law to abolish Meciars amnesties. Font size: A - | A + Former Slovak prime minister, who also served as a provisional president before the election selected a successor, in this brief function pronounced amnesties to each and every crime connected with the abduction of the son of then-president Michal Kovac. Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Recently, constitutional lawyers and academics issues a statement which was first published by the Dennik N daily. In it, they opined that with his decisions on amnesties, Meciar considerably intervened, in a negative way, in the natural course of justice and decency in the law, and thus abused the law. This abuse of law has no par in the modern history of Slovakia, and is a blemish of every country which is democratic and has rules of law. A bit of history These amnesties were abolished already in 1998 by then-PM Mikulas Dzurinda who also briefly was an acting president and it resulted in the decisions of the first panel of the Constitutional Court led by judge Tibor Safarik that culminated in a ruling from December 20, 1999 which abolished the charges against former deputy head of the Slovak Intelligence Service (SIS), Jaroslav Svechota. Read also: Read also: Controversial amnesties to face another challenge Read more In these decision, the fist panel of the CC disrespected the whole previous judicature of the CC, as well as the wording of Slovak Constitution and several key principles of a rule of law, the lawyers opine in their statements, adding that these decisions enabled the top state officials suspected of having committed the crimes of state terrorism to escape justice. Such a state of matters is inadmissible in a legally consistent state. The possibility to study the constitutional compliance of these decisions on amnesties by the Constitutional Court is ruled out due to the unambiguous wording of the Article 125 of the Slovak Constitution. The CC has no authority to study the constitutionality of wider scale of legal norms except for a narrow, specifically defined types like laws, government decrees and general regulations of central state and local administration bodies. Where there is will, there is a way Presidential decisions on amnesties are not included in this list. In a rule of law, it is possible and admissible to revoke a decision of the Constitutional Court only by amending the Constitution, or by passing a constitutional law. In the case of crimes which were amnestied by Meciar, there is serious suspicion that state bodies were involved in the criminal activities. By using the presidential authority to grant amnesty, the investigation of this serious suspicion was prevented, and principles of material lawful state were suppressed, and the law abused. The lawyers and academics conclude that the scrapping of amnesties issued by former prime minister Vladimir Meciar through a constitutional law is a legal and legitimate means in a rule of law whose aim is first to fulfil international obligations of Slovakia, but also to offer effective protection to fundamental rights of victims of amnestied crimes, as well as to increase the authority and trustworthiness of applying law and justice in Slovakia. Read also: Read also: Meciar amnesties condemned, but still effective Read more The signatories of the statement include former judges of the CC Juraj Babjak, Jan Luby and Viera Mrazova, Jan Klucka who is also a former justice of the Court of Justice of the EU; the current justice of the Court of Justice of the EU; Daniel Svaby. It has been supported also by former chair of the CC and former general attorney of the of the Court of Justice of the EU Jan Mazak, as well as former judge of the Constitutional Court of the Czechoslovak Federative Republic (which later split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia) Peter Kresak. Several current judges of the Supreme Court (Elena Berthotyova, Dusan Cimo, Rudolf Circ, Zuzana Durisova, Miroslav Gavalec, Juraj Kliment, Peter Paluda and Peter Szabo) also signed it, as did lawyers and academia experts on law. The statement was issued shortly before the next parliamentary session, which should decide on the scrapping of amnesties, starts of January 31, the SITA newswire wrote. Read also: Lucnica is a successful Slovak folklore ensemble that performs both at home and abroad, cooperating with various artists and performers and has been evolving through the decades into its current modern form. Font size: A - | A + Professor Stefan Nosal who has devoted his whole professional life to the Lucnica, celebrated his 90th birthday on January 20. Since as early as 1951, Nosal has created over 100 dance compositions and a number of feature, thematic compositions during a prolific career. The ensembles members were among the first to wish Nosal a happy birthday at noon on the day. In homage to its doyen, the troupe is now working on a special programme called Stefan Nosal 90, which will be shown at the Slovak National Theatre in Bratislava on March 6 and 7. Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement It was hard work, but I hung in there, and theyre happy about it, Nosal told the TASR newswire. Everybody perks up at our performances, they rejoice and this is fine because theres not that much to be cheerful about in Slovakia. Stefan Nosal and his 90-th birthday cake. (Source: TASR) Also Lucnicas general director Marian Turner recognised Nosals lasting legacy. To me, he is the person who created Slovak national culture, Turner opined for TASR. Hes a man who elevated the national arts on stage to such a form that it gained acceptance not only in Slovakia, but also worldwide. Nosals students include some outstanding showbiz personalities and artists, e.g. theatre director and choreographer Jan Durovcik, who came to congratulate and praise the birthday kid. Born in Hrinova on January 20, 1927, Nosal received a degree in civil engineering from Bratislava in 1953 before going on to study dance choreography. A Lucnica dancer since 1949, he was appointed as the ensembles artistic director and choreographer a mere two years later. That he led the troupe artistically for nearly seventy years is viewed as a unique feat worldwide. Lucnica started off as a troupe of young enthusiasts from the Zivena association in 1948. The soldiers received Poland's Afghanistan Star medal for excellent performance in carrying out their duties with the Polish contingent in Afghanistan. Font size: A - | A + Polish Ambassador to Slovakia, Leszek Soczewica, decorated two Slovak soldiers in Bratislava on January 30. Colonel Rudolf Pastor and Major Igor Cerven, each received Poland's Afghanistan Star medal. They were awarded for "excellent performance" in carrying out their duties with the Polish contingent as part of the Resolute Support operation in Afghanistan. The medal was awarded to them by Polish President Andrzej Duda. Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement Skryt Remove ad Article continues after video advertisement "The bestowal of this extraordinary award speaks highly about the work of all Slovak servicemen in Afghanistan," said Chief of General Staff of the Slovak Armed Forces, Milan Maxim, during the ceremony at the Polish Embassy in Bratislava as cited by the TASR newswire. Read also: Read also: Slovakia will host more than 40 international trainings Read more The medal has been awarded to military and civilian participants in operations in Afghanistan since 2002 and to foreigners cooperating with Polish forces during the mission. "It was an honour for me to be on duty with the Polish soldiers in this dangerous area," said Pastor, speaking also on behalf of his comrade. Slovak troops in Afghanistan deal mainly with training, consultancy and assisting the Afghan security forces. Report Hawaii and Kentucky are Among States That Lead the Way in Connectivity The second annual State of the States report on the state of broadband connectivity in United States schools finds a number of states are leading the way in ensuring that their students have access to equal educational opportunities provided by technology. The report was issued Monday by EducationSuperHighway, a national nonprofit focused on upgrading the internet access in every public school classroom in America. Among the highlights of the report, every student in Hawaii, Kentucky, North Dakota, South Carolina and Wyoming meets the minimum connectivity goal of 100 kilobits per second (kbps) per student meaning that every child in these states can take advantage of digital learning. Meanwhile, Kentucky and Hawaii also join Delaware, Tennessee and West Virginia in having every school connected to high-speed fiber the infrastructure that will allow their school districts to increase bandwidth over time to keep up with demand, according to a news release. Here are some of the top performing states in 2016: States with all school districts meeting the minimum school connectivity goal: Hawaii Kentucky North Dakota South Carolina Wyoming States with all schools connected to high-speed fiber: Hawaii Delaware Kentucky Tennessee West Virginia States with highest percentage of school districts that have affordable broadband: Hawaii Connecticut Delaware Maine South Dakota States that are most improved in percent of school districts now meeting the minimum connectivity goal (from 2015 to 2016): North Carolina Delaware Tennessee Nevada Virginia States that upgraded the most students in 2016: North Carolina Tennessee Virginia New Mexico Arkansas States that are most improved in school broadband affordability (from 2015 to 2016): South Dakota Nevada Rhode Island Nebraska Delaware In a statement, Evan Marwell, founder and CEO of EducationSuperHighway said, It is clear: States are making tremendous progress in getting more and more students online at the speeds necessary to take advantage of digital learning. During the past year, an additional 10.4 million students gained the minimum connectivity they need, and 88 percent of school districts nationally are now meeting minimum connectivity goals. The full 2016 State of the States report can be found on EducationSuperHighways website. The Prime Ministers meeting with Mr Blankfein and other senior bank bosses came just two days after her landmark speech confirming that the UK would leave the EU single market: Getty Images The boss of Goldman Sachs told Prime Minister Theresa May that a hard Brexit would help European cities such as Frankfurt and Paris compete for Londons position as the continents dominant financial centre. Lloyd Blankfein talked tough and said there was no reason why European financial centres cant set up as effective rivals, the Financial Times reported, citing sources briefed on a private meeting at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January. Mr Blankfein reportedly expressed bemusement over how Ms May treats finance like any other industry, despite its outsized contribution to the UK economy and to tax revenues. Goldman was one of the biggest donors to the Remain campaign in the run-up to the June 2016 referendum. It employs about 6,000 staff in the UK, its main European operation. Speaking separately during the WEF, Mr Blankfein told Bloomberg Television that New York is already a bit of a gainer from Brexit, and that his firm has slowed down its planned policy of moving operations to London because of the vote. Operating our business to maximise our global potential -- we were trying to get as much into the UK as we could, Mr Blankfein said. Its too early to say what businesses might move, he said. I dont think we will need two years to make whatever adjustments we make, so were watching. The Prime Ministers meeting with Mr Blankfein and other senior bank bosses came just two days after her landmark speech confirming that the UK would leave the EU single market and suggesting that it would also leave the customs union. Several senior banking executives spoke openly in Davos about their plans to move thousands of jobs out of the UK to other European cities. HSBC chief executive Stuart Gulliver said trading operations that generate about 20 per cent of revenue for its investment bank in London may move to Paris. JP Morgan boss Jamie Dimon told Bloomberg it looked like more jobs than hed hoped for would be affected, while the president of UBS investment bank, Andrea Orcel, said he would definitely have to move jobs from London. LONDON, Jan 30 (IFR) - Standard Chartered (BSE: 580001.BO - news) has hired former UK financial regulation chief Tracey McDermott as its head of corporate, public and regulatory affairs. Standard Chartered said the appointment will take effect on March 20 and McDermott will report to CEO Bill Winters and join the bank's global management team. McDermott was formerly the acting chief executive of Britain's Financial Conduct Authority from September 2015 until June 2016. Before that she held a number of senior roles at the FCA with responsibility for overseeing the conduct of financial firms in Britain, including head of enforcement and financial crime. Standard Chartered said McDermott will work closely with Winters and new chairman Jose Vinals to strengthen the bank's main regulatory relationships. She (Munich: SOQ.MU - news) will also work with chief risk officer Mark Smith on managing reputational risk. The bank said Steve Atkinson, currently head of corporate affairs, will take up a new role as Winters' chief of staff, also effective on March 20. (Reporting by Steve Slater; Editing by Ian Edmondson) SPRINGFIELD -- Usually, the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library & Museum welcomes authors after theyve written a book. But on Thursday, this site will present historian Michael Burlingame and photographer Robert Shaw for a look at the process of producing a new book on Lincolns early years in Illinois. The library and museum reported in a press release that Burlingame and Shaw have teamed up twice before on A Day Long to Be Remembered: Lincoln in Gettysburg and Abraham Lincoln Traveled This Way: The America Lincoln Knew. Now theyre at work on Determined to Rise The Frontier Years that Transformed Abraham Lincoln, 1830-1837, a look at the period from Lincolns arrival in Illinois to his move from New Salem to the growing city of Springfield. The free event begins at 6 p.m. Thursday with Burlingame and Shaw signing their previous books in the museums main plaza. Then, at 6:30 p.m. in the museums Union Theater, they will discuss the research, writing and photography for their upcoming book, which has been underway for three years. To reserve a seat, visit www.PresidentLincoln.Illinois.gov and click on special event reservations. Burlingame is a historian and Lincoln scholar. He is the author of Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Lincoln and the Civil War, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln and many other books. He holds the Chancellor Naomi B. Lynn Distinguished Chair in Lincoln Studies at the University of Illinois at Springfield. Shaw has been a professional photographer for 30 years, specializing in books and calendars. In addition to his books with Burlingame, he has published Illinois Seasons of Light and Windy City Wild Chicagos Natural Wonders. His photos have also been used in many other books and publications. The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, a division of the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, is dedicated to telling the story of Americas 16th president through old-fashioned scholarship and modern technology. The library holds a large collection of Lincoln books, documents, photographs, artifacts and art, as well as some 12 million items pertaining to all aspects of Illinois history. The museum uses traditional exhibits, special effects and innovative story-telling techniques to educate visitors. LONDON, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Britain's financial watchdog has received assurances its former head will not share confidential information gleaned from her time at the regulator when she joins banking group Standard Chartered (BSE: 580001.BO - news) , the watchdog said on Monday. StanChart (HKSE: 2888-OL.HK - news) on Sunday named Tracey McDermott as its group head of corporate, public and regulatory affairs. She (Munich: SOQ.MU - news) was previously acting chief executive of Britain's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) before departing in June last year. Britain's lawmakers have called for greater scrutiny of moves between watchdogs and the firms they oversee amid concerns they can erode the independence of regulators. The government's ethics watchdog on Sept. 15 said "regulatory bodies can do more to maintain integrity through processes to mitigate the risks arising from the 'revolving door'" between regulators and financial firms. In a letter to StanChart published on the FCA's website, the FCA's current head Andrew Bailey said he had discussed with the bank's CEO Bill Winters the potential that McDermott's work at the regulator might give StanChart an advantage over rivals. The letter said Bailey and Winters had agreed McDermott would not share with the bank confidential information gleaned during her time at the FCA. "There are no surprises with this letter, it's part of the process and entirely right and proper," a spokesman for StanChart said. Banks in recent years have hired a number of former senior regulators and politicians in a bid to improve oversight. Barclays (LSE: BARC.L - news) in 2012 hired Hector Sants, the former head of the FCA's previous incarnation the Financial Services Authority (FSA). Jon Pain, a former top director at the FSA, joined Royal Bank of Scotland in May 2013. (Reporting by Lawrence White; Editing by Mark Potter) By Karolina Tagaris ATHENS (Reuters) - The third migrant to perish in a week was found dead in his tent on Monday on Greece's Lesbos island, raising alarm about the grim winter conditions in overcrowded camps that critics have denounced as deplorable. The dead man is believed to be about 20 and from Pakistan, a police official on the island said. Another migrant who shared his tent was critically ill and taken to hospital. The death at the island's Moria camp follows those of a 22-year-old Egyptian and a 46-year-old Syrian who shared a tent and died days apart. Greek media reported they had inhaled fumes from a heater, but authorities would not confirm or deny that. Greece's migration minister Yannis Mouzalas ordered an investigation into the deaths, the causes of which remain unclear. Steps would be taken "to make the situation more manageable," he was quoted by the Athens News Agency as saying. "We wonder how many deaths it will take for the government to wake up," said Stavros Theodorakis, leader of the small centrist party To Potami. At least 3,000 refugees and migrants are living in Moria, a hilltop former military base where conditions have deteriorated as they await for months for word on their future. The United Nations refugee agency and other international organisations have urged Greece to improve conditions at its overcrowded facilities. "Something has got to give. We cannot tolerate this wanton loss of life," said International Rescue Committee Greece director Panos Navrozidis, acknowledging that conditions in Moria did not meet humanitarian standards. As a mid-winter freeze gripped parts of the country earlier this month, thousands of asylum-seekers endured sub-zero temperatures. Summer tents on Lesbos were weighed down by snow. Across Greece, more than 60,000 refugees and migrants, most from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, have been stranded since last March in formal or makeshift camps which U.S.-based group Human Rights Watch has described as "deplorable and volatile." "We don't know yet how they died but we do know the thousands stuck on the Greek islands have been suffering horrendous conditions in the cold, trapped by the failure of the EU to offer protection and dignity," said Gauri van Gulik, Amnesty International's Europe director. (Editing by Tom Heneghan) By Francesco Guarascio and Huw Jones LUXEMBOURG/LONDON (Reuters) - The European Union should create a publicly-funded asset management company to scoop up some of a trillion euro mountain of bad loans that has become a brake on economic growth, the bloc's banking watchdog said on Monday. A decade since the start of a financial crisis that forced taxpayers to bail out lenders, the European Banking Authority (EBA) said dealing with so-called non-performing loans or NPLs was "urgent and actionable". Italian banks account for 276 billion euros ($295 billion) of the bloc's bad loans, by far the largest of any EU banking sector, but 10 EU states have an average bad loan ratio of 10 percent, well above the low single-digit figures seen in the United States and elsewhere. In a speech in Luxembourg on Monday, EBA Chairman Andrea Enria sketched out how banks could sell some of their bad loans to a new, pan-EU "asset management company" or AMC. So far, the sale of NPLs has been hampered by the lack of a proper market for bad loans, which has resulted in too low prices for NPLs, discouraging banks from offloading them. Under the plan, loans would be priced at "real economic value" - an assessed rather than a market price - and the AMC, a concept similar to a "bad bank", would have about three years to sell on the loans at that real economic value. "If that value is not achieved, the bank must take the full market price hit," Enria said, adding EU rules on bank resolutions, known as bail-in rules, would apply if state aid was required to recapitalise ailing banks, hitting their creditors. PUBLIC SUPPORT Support from the public sector would, however, be needed to launch the bad bank and who would pay is not clear yet. "Some sort of state intervention to help start this process is useful," Enria said, urging the deployment of public resources to create an efficient secondary market for NPLs that could attract private capital. Klaus Regling, who heads the European Stability Mechanism, the euro zone's bailout fund, welcomed Enria's proposal and confirmed state support would be required. Story continues Regling said the new entity should have a target of acquiring up to 250 billion euros of NPLs from EU banks. The EBA's plan does not envisage the sharing of bank risks among EU states, Enria and Regling said, because if bad loans were not sold and recapitalisation were needed, the bill would be footed only by the bank's creditors and the home state of the lender. Germany, the EU's largest economy, has long opposed plans to share bank risks, fearing its taxpayers would end up paying for bank rescues in other countries. The EBA's plan would complement European Central Bank pressure on euro zone banks to sell their NPLs and a European Commission proposal to amend national insolvency regimes. While the ratio of bad loans to total loans fell slightly in the third quarter of last year to 5.4 percent, EU banks were still slower than their U.S. rivals in tackling soured loans. There is some good news for the bloc's banks, Enria said. Average core equity capital buffers at banks across the 28-country bloc continue to rise, and reached 13.6 percent of risk-weighted assets by the third quarter of last year when all requirements are also factored in, well above regulatory minimums. (Editing by Mark Potter) By Joseph Guyler Delva PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) - Haiti's incoming president said on Sunday he believed U.S. President Donald Trump's business background would give him a better grasp of bilateral relations, as the impoverished Caribbean nation recovers from a devastating hurricane. President-elect Jovenel Moise, a successful banana exporter, was declared winner this month of a vote initially held in 2015 that had to be rerun more than a year later, due to allegations of voter fraud. He is scheduled to be sworn in on Feb. 7. "I believe today that President Trump will have a better understanding of the relations between the two countries, which will be based on a results-oriented cooperation in the interest of both countries," Moise told Reuters in an interview. "President Trump and I are entrepreneurs, and all an entrepreneur wants is results, and therefore I hope we'll put everything in place to make sure we deliver for our peoples," he added, noting that he hoped he would get along well with Trump. Haiti, the poorest country in the western hemisphere, is continuing to pick up the pieces from the devastation left by Hurricane Matthew in October, which killed up to 1,000 people and left 1.4 million in need of humanitarian assistance. There has been a sharp increase in the number of Haitian migrants trying to enter the United States through Mexico over the past year, and the country on the island of Hispaniola still bears the scars of a devastating earthquake that hit in 2010. Haiti's opposition has accused Moise of money laundering, allegations he dismisses as baseless and politically motivated. However, the case is still under investigation. Moise hopes two measures, known by their acronyms HOPE and HELP, which provide duty-free preferences for certain light manufactured goods, will help power the economy. Haiti's apparel industry accounts for most of its national export earnings and provides tens of thousands of jobs. "I've already engaged in talks with the textile sector, where we hope to create tens of thousands more jobs," Moise said. (Editing by Clarence Fernandez) FILE PHOTO - Akio Toyoda, president of Toyota Motor Corporation, speaks during the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, Michigan, U.S., January 9, 2017. REUTERS/Mark Blinch/File Photo By Yoshifumi Takemoto TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan is scrambling to respond to intensifying trade pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump, with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe planning to meet the head of Toyota Motor Corp this week and business lobby Keidanren planning a Trump task force. Abe will visit Washington on Feb. 10 for talks with Trump at which the U.S. leader is expected to seek quick progress toward a two-way trade deal with Japan and discuss the automotive sector. Ahead of those talks, Abe will meet with Toyota Chief Executive Akio Toyoda, two sources told Reuters. One of them said the meeting would take place on Friday. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga denied a meeting had been set for Friday, while Toyota Motor Corp declined to comment. In a phone call with Abe on Saturday, Trump reiterated his pledge to create jobs in the United States and asked that the Japanese auto industry contribute, the Nikkei business daily reported, quoting unidentified Japanese government officials. The two leaders discussed the automotive industry, senior government spokesman Koichi Hagiuda told reporters after the phone call, without giving details. A White House statement said the two "committed to deepen the bilateral trade and investment relationship". Japan needs to craft a plan to show that its firms, car makers especially, will contribute to creating U.S. jobs, a former Japanese diplomat said. "I think that is the only way forward to make the bilateral summit a success," the diplomat said. "Trump only cares about numbers. Everything has to be linked to jobs creation," he added. "Symbolically, autos is a very big player." Abe has left the door open to discussing a free trade agreement (FTA) with the United States, but some officials worry Japan would have little to gain while coming under intense pressure from Washington. Bilateral talks on specific sectors such as autos, however, are an option, officials have said. Trump, who last week dropped out of the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership pushed by his predecessor Barack Obama and favoured by Abe, has repeatedly attacked Japan's auto market as closed, in an echo of criticisms heard two decades ago. Story continues Japan has rejected that accusation, saying it does not impose tariffs on U.S. auto imports nor put up discriminatory non-tariff barriers. Over the decades, Japanese automakers have developed SUVs, mini-vans and pick-up trucks specifically targeting American consumers' taste for bigger cars, while U.S. brands have struggled to make inroads in Japan, where drivers overwhelmingly prefer domestic brands. Foreign-branded cars accounted for only 7 percent of the Japanese passenger car market, led by Germany. American brands collectively made up less than a third of 1 percent of passenger cars sold in Japan last year. TRUMP TASK FORCE Toyota has come under fire from Trump for plans, announced in 2015, to shift production of its Corolla sedan to Mexico from Canada. Earlier this month, Japan's top automaker said it would invest $10 billion in the United States over the next five years, the same as the previous five years. Toyota says it directly employed about 40,000 American workers as of December 2015, and indirectly more than 200,000 if dealers and suppliers are included. Japan's biggest business lobby Keidanren wants to beef up its information gathering and analysis of the Trump administration's policies, while also conveying data on Japan Inc's importance to the U.S. economy, a Keidanren official said. "We will create a task force, the main purpose of which is to convey correct information about the contribution of Japanese firms in the United States," said another Keidanren official, who declined to be identified because he was not authorised to speak to media. Japan's government is already trying to give Trump's administration a crash course on its companies' contribution to U.S. jobs and growth, with fact sheets showing, among other things, that Japanese companies created 839,000 jobs in America, second only to Britain. Tokyo came under harsh U.S. criticism in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when Japan accounted for up to 60 percent of the U.S. trade deficit. But now its share has shrunk to less than 10 percent, while China's has ballooned to nearly 50 percent - something Japanese officials are trying to stress to American counterparts. Automobiles and car parts account for about three-quarters of the overall Japan-U.S. trade gap, making it an easy target. Japanese media have begun reminiscing about the heated U.S.-Japan auto talks 20 years ago. A last-minute deal in June 1995 averted U.S. tariffs on Japanese luxury cars when Japan's automakers crafted "voluntary plans" to boost purchases of American auto parts and expand production in the United States. (Additional reporting by Chris Gallagher, Maki Shiraki, Kiyoshi Takenaka, Ami Miyazaki, Stanley White, Chang-Ran Kim and Tetsushi Kajimoto; Writing by Linda Sieg and Malcolm Foster; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Alex Richardson) By Suleiman Al-Khalidi AMMAN (Reuters) - Jordan's King Abdullah will hold talks with U.S. President Donald Trump's administration in Washington on Monday on how to bolster the kingdom's domestic security amid the growing risk of Islamic State militant attacks, officials and diplomats said. They said the monarch, who will be the first Arab leader to hold talks with the new administration, is scheduled to meet congressional leaders, senators and senior officials including Defense Secretary James Mattis in coming days. A meeting was expected to be arranged with Trump, one official said, but there was no official confirmation. The king will address top administration officials about his country's fears of Islamic State fighters descending southward to its borders at the end of a U.S.-led campaign whose goal is to drive them out of their de facto capital of Raqqa in northern Syria. "The king will seek a stepped-up campaign against the extremists and secure extra resources to help ensure the militants would not be allowed to move towards our borders," one official told Reuters on condition of anonymity. Abdullah, a former special operations commander, shares Trump's views about the priority of fighting the hardline group, warning repeatedly of its threat to a kingdom that borders Israel to the west, Syria to the north and Iraq to its east. The kingdom is among the few Arab states that have taken part in a U.S-led air campaign against Islamic State militants holding territory in Iraq and Syria. The country has pockets of support for the militants and has been eager not to trumpet its military role in a neighboring Arab country. Jordanian militants embracing Islamic State ideology killed at least 10 people in an attack in the southern city of Karak last December. A Jordanian guard killed three U.S. servicemen last November in an attack that Washington did not rule out was politically motivated and signaled risks of radicalization from within the U.S.-equipped Jordanian armed forces. Two officials said Abdullah was heartened by a new Republican administration whose emphasis on traditional security would be a refreshing change from the former Obama administration's concern over the pace of political reforms, which was seen in Jordan as interference. The monarch hopes Mattis will be more responsive to the extra military funding and equipment the Obama administration had turned down for one of its key regional allies. U.S. officials say the kingdom is one of the largest recipients of its foreign military financing. U.S. Patriot missiles are stationed in Jordan and the U.S. Army has hundreds of trainers. Since the start of the Syrian conflict in 2011, Washington has spent millions of dollars to set up an elaborate border defense system. But Washington has been dismayed by the mishandling of a series of security lapses in the past year, including an attack by an Islamic State suicide bomber on a U.S.-funded military outpost on the Syrian border. 'WHAT ARE OUR OPTIONS?' The king will also seek to ease U.S. concerns over his strong support of the Russian military campaign in Syria, where the shift towards Moscow has been interpreted as coming at the expense of Washington, Jordan's main donor. Abdullah, who has warm personal ties with Russian President Vladimir Putin, went to Moscow last week ahead of Washington in a sign of Russia's rising role in the Middle East Officials defend Jordan's strong embrace of Moscow's diplomatic and military drive to reach a political settlement in Syria that could keep President Bashar al-Assad in power for years in the absence of a strong counterbalancing U.S role. "Without Russia, we will not be able to find solutions to not only the Syrian problem but other regional problems in the Middle East," Abdullah told reporters in Moscow, adding he shared with Putin "the same vision of bringing stability to our region." Abdullah had accused the Obama administration of failing to act decisively and leaving Moscow to fill the vacuum. "What are our options? You have no choice in the absence of someone else to rely on," said one official in reference to the Jordanian shift towards Moscow. In a kingdom whose destiny has been shaped by successive Arab-Israeli wars, Abdullah will also raise concerns about Trump's pledge to move Washington's embassy to Jerusalem. Jordan fears that could bury hopes of a two-state solution and jeopardize a peace settlement. Officials say it could unleash a new bout of violence in Palestinian territories with a spillover into the kingdom where a majority of the population is of Palestinian origin. (Reporting by Suleiman Al-Khalidi; Editing by Peter Cooney) By Mehreen Zahra-Malik and Mubashar Bukhari ISLAMABAD/LAHORE (Reuters) - Pakistan on Monday ordered Hafiz Saeed, accused by the United States and India of masterminding the 2008 attacks on the Indian financial capital Mumbai that killed 166 people, to be placed under house arrest. The move came after years of pressure and could ease recently escalating tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours. Saeed's continued freedom has long infuriated Islamabad's arch-foe India. The United States has offered $10 million for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Saeed, who heads the Muslim charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD). Washington says JuD is a front for the Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT). "A large police team arrived (at JuD headquarters) and told us that Hafiz Saeed would be placed under house arrest," Nadeem Awan, a spokesman for the group based in the eastern city of Lahore, told Reuters. An Interior Ministry source confirmed Saeed and the other men "are under house arrest" and on the exit control list, meaning they could not leave the country. India's foreign ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment. It was unclear why Pakistan decided to act now. A senior Pakistani defence ministry official said Islamabad had not heard anything from the new administration of U.S. President Donald Trump but had been feeling U.S. pressure on the issue. "Trump is taking hard decisions against Muslim countries, there is open talk of actions against Pakistan also. So yes, this was a consideration," said the official. Other government officials have said recently that a broader diplomatic campaign - pushed by India - to isolate Pakistan over its failure to go after some Islamist groups has taken a toll, even involving pressure from longtime ally China. RAMPAGE IN MUMBAI The Mumbai attacks in 2008 brought Pakistan and India to the brink of war after 10 gunmen killed commuters, foreigners and some of India's wealthy elite in a rampage that included attacks on two luxury hotels, a Jewish centre and a train station. India accused Pakistan of sponsoring the attack through LeT, which Saeed founded in the 1990s. Pakistan has denied any state involvement and Saeed - who has distanced himself from LeT - has said repeatedly he was not responsible. Saeed was put under house arrest after the Mumbai attack but was released about six month later in June 2009. Awan said Islamabad had been under pressure from the United States to take action against Saeed or face sanctions. "This government has buckled under the pressure," he said. The Punjab provincial government said Saeed and four other men were in "protective custody" because they violated a U.N. Security Council resolution passed after the Mumbai attacks. Interior Ministry documents seen by Reuters named Saeed and four other men as members of JuD and Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FiF), a charity wing of JuD headed by Saeed. One document said the government believed FiF was "acting in a manner that may be concerned in terrorism". PROSECUTIONS RARE Previous Pakistani announcements of action against anti-India militant groups have rarely led to serious punishments for them. Western countries have for decades accused Pakistan of harbouring Islamist militant groups and using them as proxies against bigger neighbour India, with whom it has fought three wars since independence. Islamabad denies having such a policy. In recent months, Saeed has been holding regular press conferences about the security crackdown in Indian-controlled Kashmir, trying to highlight alleged civil rights violations against the mainly Muslim population there. He told Reuters last month that he had no fear of arrest despite the appointment of a new army chief and a new head of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) spy agency. Successive Pakistani governments have vowed to crack down against militant groups but lack of action against Saeed has often been seized on by India as proof that Islamabad was dragging its feet on tackling banned outfits. (Writing by Drazen Jorgic; Editing by Tom Heneghan) FILE - In this May, 12, 2015, file photo, Singapore teen blogger Amos Yee speaks to reporters while leaving the Subordinate Courts after being released on bail in Singapore. Yee, who is seeking seeking asylum after online posts mocking his government landed him jail, appeared in a Chicago immigration court Monday, Jan. 30, 2017, via video from an Illinois jail where he's been held since immigration authorities took him into custody at O'Hare International Airport in December 2016. Yee's attorneys submitted his asylum application Monday. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E, File) CHICAGO (AP) A Singapore teenager seeking to stay in the U.S. after his blog posts mocking his government twice landed him in jail made his first appearance Monday in a Chicago immigration court, where an attorney officially submitted his application for asylum. Amos Yee appeared via video and spoke little during the hearing. He's been detained at a northern Illinois jail since December, when immigration authorities took him into custody at O'Hare International Airport. His 246-page application includes statements of support from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, who urged U.S. officials to let him stay. They allege Yee has been harassed by the Singapore government for publicly expressing his views on religion and politics, and for criticizing the city-state's leaders, including late Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew. Yee, 18, was imprisoned in Singapore for six weeks in September on charges of hurting the religious feelings of Christians and Muslims, after breaching bail conditions following a monthlong sentence he served on the same charges. "Our theory is that he was persecuted in Singapore and that the prosecution against him was illegitimate because it was based on laws that were meant to restrict his freedom of expression," Yee's attorney Sandra Grossman said outside court. "If he returns to Singapore, he's likely to be convicted again for similar acts." Wearing an orange jumpsuit, Yee sat with hands folded in his lap, his once shoulder-length hair closely cropped. He briefly greeted and thanked the judge and said he didn't have anything to add to his attorney's comments. A federal government attorney said in court that Yee's criminal record in Singapore would be reviewed. Grossman said she intended to call witnesses at the next hearing. Judge Samuel Cole set a March 7 hearing, though he indicated he'd seek an earlier date. It was unclear if Yee will remain in custody as his case proceeds. Story continues Grossman said his release was at the discretion of the Department of Homeland Security, but President Donald Trump's recent immigration orders had fueled an air of uncertainty. Trump's executive order stopping immigration for citizens of seven predominantly-Muslim countries for 90 days created chaos over the weekend. Those with legal permission to live in the U.S., including refugees and green-card holders, were detained at airports. Some were sent back before a federal judge issued an emergency order temporarily barring deportations. Thousands protested from Seattle to New York. Grossman said those in the U.S. have legal protections. "He's lucky that he's already here," she said of Yee. "But he is affected by the general atmosphere that the administration is creating." Kathryn Mattingly, a spokeswoman for the Executive Office for Immigration Review, which oversees U.S. immigration courts, declined to comment. ___ Follow Sophia Tareen on Twitter at https://twitter.com/sophiatareen LONDON (Reuters) - The Syrian government has denied rumors that President Bashar al-Assad is suffering from ill health, saying he was "carrying out his duties quite normally". Speculation swirled in recent days on social media and some Arab news websites saying Assad, 51, was in critical condition, citing rumors of stroke, or even that he had been shot. "The presidency denies all these reports. President Assad is in excellent health," his office said in a statement on Friday. "They (the reports) coincide with the changing circumstances in the field and politically," it said, without elaborating. The Ikhbariya news channel said on Monday that Assad had spoken by phone to Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, the first report from state media to detail Assad's activities since the health rumors emerged. Assad ally Russia and rebels backer Turkey hosted talks between the government and opposition in Kazakhstan last week, where they reaffirmed a shaky month-old ceasefire between the two sides ahead of a new round of planned peace negotiations in Geneva. Assad had said before the Astana talks he was ready to discuss "everything", including his own position within the framework of the Syrian constitution. His opponents have insisted throughout nearly six years of conflict that he must leave power under any peace deal. But in the 17th year of his presidency Assad holds the upper hand in the Syrian war, bolstered by allies Russia and Iran whose military involvement has turned the conflict to his advantage. The Syrian army and allied forces recaptured the Wadi Barada area near Damascus on Sunday, in another blow to rebels who have fought for years to unseat Assad. Wadi Barada's recapture came weeks after rebel groups were driven from areas they held for years in east Aleppo, their last major urban stronghold. Taking full control of Aleppo represented Assad's most important gain yet in a conflict that grew out of protests against his rule in 2011. Swathes of Syria remain outside his control, including the Islamic State-held eastern province of Deir al-Zor, large areas of the north held by Kurdish groups, and pockets of rebel-held territory in the west. The Moscow-led effort to revive diplomacy has emerged as ties between Russia and Turkey have improved. (Reporting by Ellen Francis; Editing by Toby Chopra) LONDON (Reuters) - The Syrian government has denied rumours that President Bashar al-Assad is suffering from ill health, saying he was "carrying out his duties quite normally". Speculation swirled in recent days on social media and some Arab news websites saying Assad, 51, was in critical condition, citing rumours of stroke, or even that he had been shot. "The presidency denies all these reports. President Assad is in excellent health," his office said in a statement on Friday. "They (the reports) coincide with the changing circumstances in the field and politically," it said, without elaborating. The Ikhbariya news channel said on Monday that Assad had spoken by phone to Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, the first report from state media to detail Assad's activities since the health rumors emerged. Assad ally Russia and rebels backer Turkey hosted talks between the government and opposition in Kazakhstan last week, where they reaffirmed a shaky month-old ceasefire between the two sides ahead of a new round of planned peace negotiations in Geneva. Assad had said before the Astana talks he was ready to discuss "everything", including his own position within the framework of the Syrian constitution. His opponents have insisted throughout nearly six years of conflict that he must leave power under any peace deal. But in the 17th year of his presidency Assad holds the upper hand in the Syrian war, bolstered by allies Russia and Iran whose military involvement has turned the conflict to his advantage. The Syrian army and allied forces recaptured the Wadi Barada area near Damascus on Sunday, in another blow to rebels who have fought for years to unseat Assad. Wadi Barada's recapture came weeks after rebel groups were driven from areas they held for years in east Aleppo, their last major urban stronghold. Taking full control of Aleppo represented Assad's most important gain yet in a conflict that grew out of protests against his rule in 2011. Swathes of Syria remain outside his control, including the Islamic State-held eastern province of Deir al-Zor, large areas of the north held by Kurdish groups, and pockets of rebel-held territory in the west. The Moscow-led effort to revive diplomacy has emerged as ties between Russia and Turkey have improved. (Reporting by Ellen Francis; Editing by Toby Chopra) Horrified visitors at a zoo in China watched in shock when a group of tigers kill a man who climbed into their enclosure. WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT The victim, identified only by his surname of Zhang, was filmed being mauled to death by the animals at Ningbo Younger Zoo in eastern Chinas Zhejiang province. He is said to have climbed a fence to avoid paying the zoos admission fee before finding himself in the enclosure while his wife and children paid. Horrific: Zhang was mauled by the tigers after he entered their enclosure (YouTube) MORE: Trump ban: What are the UKs biggest ever petitions and were any successful? MORE: Uniformed civilian Traffic Wombles may soon be given the same powers as police One of the tigers attacked Zhang before gripping him by his neck as he desperately kicks out when the others approach him. According to eyewitnesses, Zhangs clothes were ripped from his body before he was dragged into the forest by a tiger as officials tried to scare the others away using firecrackers and water cannons. One witness told the South China Morning Post : I saw the tiger mauling the person, whose face was covered with blood. Every time he sat up, the tiger pushed him down again. Recovery: One of the tigers was shot dead so Zhang could be pulled out (YouTube) One of the tigers was eventually shot dead and officials managed to disperse the rest before recovering Zhang from the enclosure. He was rushed to hospital but is reported to have died from his injuries. The incident has sparked fresh controversy about keeping large animals in zoos. PETAs vice president of international campaigns, Jason Baker, said in a statement: Attacks by captive big cats on people which occur with staggering regularity illustrate the profound level of stress, anxiety and agitation these animals experience every day of their lives. Top pic: YouTube ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey reopened its embassy in Libya on Monday, 2-1/2 years after closing it due to the security situation, the Turkish foreign ministry said, as diplomatic missions begin to reopen in the divided country. Turkey closed the embassy in Tripoli in 2014 as rival factions battled three years after rebels toppled long-time leader Muammar Gaddafi. Italy reopened its embassy earlier this month. "The reopening of the embassy will allow Turkey to make stronger contributions to efforts to build peace and stability, as well as reconstruction in Libya," the Turkish foreign ministry said in a statement. Both Libya and Tripoli itself are home to myriad armed groups with shifting and conflicting loyalties that have sought to fill the power vacuum created when Gaddafi was killed. In 2014, fighting between armed alliances backing opposing political factions resulted in rival governments being set up in the capital and the east. Since March last year a third, U.N.-backed government has been trying to establish itself in Tripoli, but it has been unable to win support from all groups. "Turkey will continue to support the territorial integrity and national unity of brotherly Libya," the statement said. Turkey's ambassador had been based in Tunisia during the embassy's closure, while the Turkish consulate general in the western city of Misrata had remained open without interruption. (Reporting by Tulay Karadeniz; Writing by Nick Tattersall) MATTOON -- The local plant of LSC Communications, formerly known as R.R. Donnelley, is planning to expand its manufacturing operations and workforce in the new year. LSC Communications, which has its corporate office in Chicago, reported in a press release that the name of this plant along north U.S. Route 45 in Mattoon changed after LSC launched as an independent company on Oct. 1 resulting from the spin-off from R.R. Donnelley & Sons Co. The Mattoon plant was built by R.R. Donnelley, with construction starting in 1967. This facility's manufacturing process consists of printing, binding and wrapping books, magazines and catalogs. Paul Smith, vice president of operations at the Mattoon plant, said in the press release that "2017 is going to be an exciting year for us." "We are installing a couple more pieces of manufacturing equipment as well as upgrading and expanding several manufacturing assets so that we can better serve our customer base," Smith said. "Additionally, several of our existing customers are moving additional titles to Mattoon and we are on-boarding a few new customers, as well." Smith said the new equipment will create about 50 new positions across multiple pay grades at the Mattoon plant. "Additionally, one of our goals for 2017 is to grow our part-time and full-time headcount to reduce overtime hours for our workforce," Smith said. "With both of these projects, there will be significant advancement and career opportunities." LSC Communications is scheduled to host a career fair from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Feb 7 at the Burgess-Osborne Auditorium, 1701 Wabash Ave., Mattoon. "We are looking to fill many skilled and professional openings, so please stop by and see if you want to grow with us," Smith said. LSC reported that the Mattoon plant's target staffing level for 2017 is to be at approximately 800 full-time employees. LSC reported that the Mattoon plant originally had three presses and three binding lines and was built to print and bind a single magazine with nation-wide distribution. Over the years, the plant has expanded and added equipment and customers. The plant now has more than 35 manufacturing assets with Rotogravure and Offset presses, Saddlewire and Patent/Perfect binding lines, and several poly wrap lines. "We produce over 500 million bound products annually; serve the magazine, catalog, retail, financial and government print sectors; and have multi-year contracts with our largest customers," Smith said. The Mattoon plant's manufacturing process involves large rolls of paper entering one side of the facility. From there, the rolls of paper are loaded into printing presses where customer content is printed onto the paper and then the paper is cut and folded to size. These printed pages are assembled into books, magazines, catalogs, and flyers within the bindery and then shipped out the other side of the plant. "We are a high-volume commercial printer and specialize in production counts from 100,000 to multi-million," Smith said. If you have opinions about the subject matter of posts on this blog please share them. Do you have a story about how the system affects you at work school or home, or just in general? This is a place to share it. Not so long ago, my half-brother, who lives in Toronto, suffered a twisted bowel. He was found collapsed in his basement apartment. The emergency responders arrived, stabilized him but needed additional help so they called the fire department to lift him up an outdoor flight of stairs. His case was quickly diagnosed and what followed was a several-hours-long operation followed by ICU care, a hospital stay of two weeks and finally, nursing home care. Daily, specialists visited. After the ordeal, all the family was required to pay was a TV rental fee. There was never a question about money; his recovery was the sole concern. Pre-existing condition or not, did not matter. Canadian health care is a single-payer system, which means that while the insurance is publicly financed and costs are controlled, both hospitals and doctors function privately. Canadian national health insurance ensures that all residents of Canada have access to medically necessary care on a pre-paid basis. (Those seeking tattoo removal or cosmetic surgery have to pay on their own.) Each province or territory determines its share of the cost; some provinces, like Alberta and British Columbia, finance premiums through sales and payroll tax, but no resident is denied coverage because of inability to pay insurance premiums. And the Canadian government regulates drug prices to ensure that its residents are not gouged when purchasing prescriptions. Another advantage to this single payer system is that Canadians dont require attorneys to deny health coverage, nor do they have to pay actuaries to set premiums. The result? According to the Canadian Institute of Health Information site, Canada spends around 11 percent of its Gross Domestic Product on health care, much lower than many countries. With a single payer system, suppliers arent able to charge as much, and the difference goes to services for patients, not administrative costs. Canadians enjoy free choice of physicians; they are not restricted by specific health care plans. And all Canadians enjoy health care; no one goes without, no one is bankrupted by health-care bills. No Canadian resident clings to a soul-denying job to ensure his or her family is insured. No Canadian resident frets that if she loses employment that shell be denied coverage because of a pre-existing condition. In Canada, a patients access to health care is based upon need, not upon ones ability to pay, thus avoiding psychological trauma and worry. Dr. Pat likes to work as a collaborative physician. Her patients, she believes, will be her best partners in providing diagnostic informationas long as they are asked the right questions. She also believes in consulting with the best medical minds on issues that require specialization or unique clinical experience. This week, during Glaucoma Awareness Month, she calls upon the expertise of ophthalmologist Leila Rafla-Demetrious, M.D., who specializes in glaucoma, to interpret the current recommendations on screening for this vision-stealing condition. Dear Dr. Pat: I am a 50-year-old African-American woman with hypertension that is well controlled, plus some slight enlargement of the heart that causes no symptoms. I am a master teacher in a highly regarded magnet school in New York. I asked my primary care doctor for a referral for an eye exam, since my sister recently developed older-age glaucoma (she is 70) and may become blind from a late diagnosis. The primary care doctor did a basic exam (finger wiggling to check if I could see from the sides of my vision and looking into my eyes with a simple hand held instrument). She told me that since I had no symptoms and had no change in my vision (I wear drugstore readers in restaurants with dim light), I did not need a referral for a visit to an ophthalmologist. She told me that the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force had found no reason to support screening for glaucoma in adults who had no symptoms. She said that the screening tests were inconclusive and that I would be given eye drops that might cause cataracts. I had read about glaucoma and found that it is increased in African-Americans and that I was at greater risk because I had a sister with glaucoma. She still refused to give me a referral. So I went to a major teaching hospital here in New York City, where I was examined by a resident, then by the senior doctor in charge of the clinic. I still had to pay for my visit, but certainly less than I would have paid to see a private ophthalmologist. The resident doctor dilated the pupils of my eyes and examined them thoroughly. He measured the pressure inside my eye and looked at my eye nerve disc with a more sophisticated instrument than the hand-held device used by the primary care doctor. He then asked the senior doctor in the clinic to evaluate his findings. I do have glaucoma after all, even though my vision has not changed. I have wide-angle glaucoma, and the pressure inside the eye is still normal. The doctors told me to use two eye drops daily in each eye and to come back to the clinic in three months. There has been change already in the nerve disc, but they are hopeful that they can arrest the progression of damage. I always thought that glaucoma was caused by high pressure in the eye, but apparently not. I am relieved that I have this diagnosis before I have lots of damage, and that I have a place to go where I can get good care. But how many other primary care doctors are there who do simple visual field testing by wiggling their fingers and looking into the eyes of patients that have not been dilated, and then refuse to allow patients access for screening? My sister may become blind because her glaucoma was found very late. Who makes these recommendations? Should my brothers and sisters be screened? What causes this kind of glaucoma, anyway? Can these drops keep me from losing my sight? Shirley Dear Shirley, I have asked our WVFC Medical Advisory Board member Leila Rafla Demetrious, M.D., a board-certified ophthalmologist, to answer this question. She is fellowship-trained in the medical and surgical treatment of glaucoma. Glaucoma is the No. 1 cause of blindness in African-Americans, and the risk of developing this kind of glaucoma is increased when a brother or sister develops it. You should tell your family members about this. Primary care doctors are all aware of the recommendations from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) these days. Insurance companies plan to hold down costs by refusing to pay for a great many previously available preventive care evaluationssuch as a visit to an ophthalmologist for glaucoma testingto improve their bottom line, while pointing to the increasing health care costs as the reason. Most patients do not have your determination to do the research that you did, then choose to pay for your evaluation because you made a decision that the recommendations did not make sense. Do share this information and the medical evaluations from the ophthalmology clinic with your current primary care doctor. All health care providers need to know their diagnostic limitations, and doctors need to really listen to the patient. You were at greater risk for glaucoma, and you did need an evaluation. Thank you for sharing your experience and sending in your questions. Dr. Pat Jambo Cafe is bringing its African-Caribbean food to the Duke City. The Santa Fe restaurant has signed a lease for the former Wecks at 1105 Juan Tabo, according to owner and chef Ahmed Obo. The new location is expected to open by early spring. Jambo started in Santa Fe in 2009, and Obo estimates that roughly half his clientele comes from Albuquerque. They all tell me Why dont you open in Albuquerque? (But) as you know restaurants are not an easy job. I said Not yet, not yet,' Obo told the Journal this week. Finally this opportunity came, and it seems like the time is now. Wecks recently moved its Juan Tabo restaurant to a newly constructed building southward at Juan Tabo and Interstate 40, creating the opening. Obo hails from Lamu Island off the coast of Kenya. He moved to Santa Fe in 1999 and worked in other restaurants before launching Jambo in 2009. He said the Albuquerque restaurant will serve the same menu with perhaps a few twists. Dishes on Jambos Santa Fe menu include East African coconut lentil stew, fried cornmeal plantain crab cakes, Kenyan style beef kabobs and a Jerk-seasoned tofu sandwich. Obos various creations have won multiple titles in the annual Souper Bowl competition in Santa Fe. WASHINGTON Starbucks says it will hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years, a response to President Donald Trumps indefinite suspension of Syrian refugees and temporary travel bans that apply to six other Muslim-majority nations. Howard Schultz, the coffee retailers chairman and CEO, said in a letter to employees Sunday that the hiring would apply to stores worldwide and the effort would start in the United States where the focus would be on hiring immigrants who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel. Schultz, a supporter of Hillary Clinton during the presidential run, took aim at other parts of a Trump agenda focused on immigration, repealing former President Barack Obamas health care law and restructuring trade with Mexico. The letter said that Starbucks would help support coffee growers in Mexico, provide health insurance to eligible workers if the health care law is repealed and back an Obama-era immigration program that allows young immigrants who were brought to the country as children to apply for a two-year reprieve from deportation and a work permit. The move reflects the increasing complexity that businesses face when dealing with the Trump administration. Trump has met with CEOs at Ford, General Motors and Boeing and asked them to create jobs in the United States, while touting each announcement about new factory jobs as a success even if those additions had been planned before his presidential victory. But not all corporate leaders have embraced Trump. Schultz added that Starbucks would aim to communicate with workers more frequently, saying Sunday, I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack. Every day Rudy Beserra walks into his office at Coca-Colas Atlanta headquarters and remembers how far he has come. The reminder is right there on his wall a black-and-white photo showing his father, then just a boy, and his grandfather. The duo stand together inside of the familys corner grocery store at Bridge and 2nd Street in southwest Albuquerque, a bartering-friendly enterprise the elder man ran during the Great Depression and World War II. A familiar feeling sometimes strikes Beserra anew: How did a guy from South Barelas, someone who never rode in an airplane until his mid-20s, become senior vice president at a Fortune 500 company? It has been a colorful journey for the 64-year-old, one that included a stint working in Ronald Reagans White House. And now it is bringing him back. Beserra left New Mexico more than 30 years ago, and he still lives and works in Atlanta. But he plans to return to his hometown at least monthly now that he assumed the role of board chairman for the Albuquerque Hispano Chamber of Commerce. I was brought up to be humble, appreciate where you come from, always give back, he said during a recent interview. Beserra brings valuable perspective and prestige to the position, according to one of his predecessors, Anthony Trujillo. Hes one of few successful Hispanics who has made it in corporate America; we should praise that and support that 110 percent, said Trujillo, a past chamber chairman and the president and CEO of Albuquerque-based Holmans USA. Its a hell of an achievement. Such a career might have seemed improbable to a younger Beserra. New Mexico can sometimes feel shut off from the rest of the world. A lot of natives just dont venture outside of it, he said. And yet he also credits New Mexico for emboldening him as a minority. Latinos were my principals. Latinos were my teachers. There was a Latino senator. Theres Latino governors. Latinos have prominent roles in this state, he said. Leaving New Mexico (means) seeing its not like that in other states Latinos dont really have that kind of access. (New Mexico) prepared me, because I never felt I was second class to anything. I could compete just like anybody else, and I think thats what has always stayed with me. Beserras roots in New Mexico go back several generations. He said his shopkeeper grandfather was an influential community presence, the kind of man people said could have been mayor if hed spoken English. Beserras father worked on revitalization projects in Barelas as a local president for the federally backed Model Cities program. Beserra spent much of his childhood surrounded by extended family in a neighborhood hollering distance away from the chambers 4th Street headquarters. He attended Sacred Heart, Washington Middle School, Albuquerque High and University of New Mexico and then followed his older brother into the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), taking a job as an educational center counselor. His brother later moved to Washington, and Beserra ultimately followed him there, too encouraged in large part by Sen. Pete Domenici. Beserra had been visiting his brother in D.C. and found himself seated next to Domenici at an event. Domenici basically told me Rudy, you need to come to Washington.' Beserra said he expressed interest, and had a job with the Republican National Committee two months later. Its all about mentorship and people who have helped along the way, he said. The RNC job led him to the White House in 1985. What was supposed to be a temporary public liaison gig lasted the rest of Reagans second term, with Beserras communications efforts focused on the Latino, small business and disability communities. When Reagan left office, Beserra had a few choices stay in Washington and work for New Mexicos Congressman-turned-U.S. Secretary of the Interior, Manuel Lujan, or join Coca-Cola. Beserra said Lujan, whom he considered an important mentor, actually encouraged him to seize the corporate opportunity. He went to the soda giant in 1989. He established the companys Office of Latin Affairs, which he still runs. Even to this day, Beserra sounds awestruck when detailing his professional trajectory. Every day when I walk in and I see that photo (of his father and grandfather), he said, I pinch myself. Beserra is no stranger to the chamber, having been lifelong friends with its current president and CEO, Alex Romero, and among the donors who helped build the chambers campus. He has also crossed paths with the organization at major Latino conferences and events around the country. He takes the chamber chairmanship at a time of organizational transition. The board must find a new president and CEO for the organization that boasts about 1,500 members and a budget of around $3 million since Romero plans to leave this spring after 12 years. Beserra said it might mean a national search. One of his chief objectives is identifying a candidate who can relate to both the existing members and the next generation of professionals. Trujillo said he has confidence in Beserras leadership. I think thats going to give the chamber kind of a new edge and new experience not only for the staff but for the board of directors that we havent had in several years, Trujillo said. Beserra said he wants to help the chamber forge new connections and relationships with national, and perhaps even international, business and civic leaders. He knows people and some of those people might be able to help the chamber. Not only does he work for Coca-Cola, a company with about $44 billion in annual revenue, a global workforce 123,000-strong and 500-plus brands ranging from soda to bottled water and orange juice. He also remains involved with LULAC, the Congressional Hispanic Leadership Institute, and he was a former chairman of the Hispanic Scholarship Fund. Beserra said he will try to recruit more high-profile conferences to Albuquerque. (The chamber receives some city of Albuquerque lodgers tax revenue to help boost tourism.) Beserra said his contacts may also yield new financial contributions to the chamber, and the funds could go toward expanding its entrepreneurship training programs to other parts of the state. Youd be surprised at the amount of Latino wealth in this country. I think what the situation is with our community is its not that we dont want to give; sometimes we dont know how to give. As a community we tend to wait until were asked to participate, he said. Well, I want to be that conduit to ask individuals with the financial wherewithal to contribute and invest in our community and I know a lot of those people and where theyre at. Were almost through the first month of the New Year. It started with news of several major businesses shutting their doors in Albuquerque. Then more news about the ongoing struggles of our education system: Low student test scores, low performance ratings for Albuquerque Public Schools, thousands of third graders who cant read well and debates on how to fix it all. Are we on track for another year of the same old, same old? Or will 2017 be the year that we start making significant positive change as a city? I believe that we can do the latter make positive change to help our children and our economy. Both are tightly intertwined. When the economy struggles, our families struggle and our kids suffer. They suffer from not having enough food and not receiving quality education. And rates of abuse increase. When were on an economic upswing, rates of child hunger, low education performance and child abuse tend to be better. So what can we, as members of the business and professional communities, do differently this year to start a tide of positive change to help our kids and our economy? It may sound simple, but I have a suggestion that will put us on the path to a brighter future. Its mentoring. If it takes a village to raise a child, I believe that it takes the business leaders of that village to help a disadvantaged child see the way out of poverty. I know, because Ive been there. Growing up, my family was so poor that we received block cheese and powdered milk from the commodities assistance program. Fortunately, I had loving parents who set a good example about working hard and never giving up. I carry that with me, and it motivated me to earn my degree and become an attorney. Not all New Mexico children are as fortunate. Thousands live in abject poverty, and many dont have the benefit of supportive parents. Some are from single-parent homes where that sole guardian is working three jobs. Or no jobs. The mere idea of finishing high school is a stretch. The thought of college is downright absurd. Thats why they need a mentor: Just one trusted adult who takes time to encourage them, help them set goals and access the resources available to achieve those goals. They need us professionals who recognize that helping a child on the path to success is a reward for that child, and for our citys future. We wont be around forever. Younger generations of business leaders will take our place. They need the tools, guidance and confidence to take what we have built and help it grow even stronger. Ive mentored young people and adults in Albuquerque for many years, through the New Mexico Hispanic Bar Association, the State Bar Bridge the Gap program and on my own. Im also an official mentor in the Mentor 2.0 program for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central New Mexico. Ive always supported that organizations work to help disadvantaged children succeed, but my schedule didnt allow me to be a mentor in their traditional program. When Mentor 2.0 started, it was the perfect fit. Mentor 2.0 matches busy professionals like me (and you) with a high school freshman. It is academic-focused, and BBBS-CNM provides a structured online program to help you guide your student through high school and prepare them for college or the workforce. You email your mentee once a week and meet with them in person every month at an official BBBS-CNM event. Those few hours per month are life-changing for the student, and for the mentor. It is such an easy way to make a huge difference to a child, and to our citys future. I encourage all professionals in Albuquerque to become a mentor, and spend a few hours each month changing the course of a childs life. We will all be better for it. Economic development is among the most pressing issues facing New Mexico. How we achieve the growth required to raise our economic performance is central to the current public policy debate. The focus is on tax incentives, economic-development funds, funding of education and training, as well as infrastructure investment and other tools. Both public and private investments facilitate growth. The question then is how government approaches these opportunities. At one extreme, government can simply ignore private-sector development and passively accept its role in managing economic growth by providing adequate education, public safety/health and infrastructure funded by taxes and fees. This passive economic development posture for government has been broadly rejected in our current economic circumstance. Discussion thus centers on the role of government in facilitating and supporting private investment and development decisions. Questions with respect as to how we measure public costs associated with development initiatives are raised. Concerns for transparency in the confusing world of government finance and accountability in large-scale economic development projects are common. In other words, how should government determine priorities in its use of the limited resources available for economic development? Government incentives for economic development have real public costs. Government revenues may be expended on infrastructure, training, education, public safety, public health and on tax incentives. In other words, government expenditures and tax incentive programs for economic development directly reduce revenues available for all other government programs. These are the public costs of economic development. The logic is that taxpayer cost burdens are offset by the benefits of expanded economic activities. The difficulty lies in that fact that, while expanded job opportunities and tax revenues are important benefits, they are uncertain and not immediately realized at the time the commitments to the economic development incentives are offered. Crucial to government management is a balanced budget. State and local governments must match revenues and expenses each fiscal year. Government can only facilitate. Real economic development is provided by private businesses with concerns about cash flow, income statements, balance sheets and owner interests Opportunities are analyzed based on actual costs and revenues realized. Property-tax abatements are monetized by the developer in the form of reduced actual costs. A private developer is certain to put pencil to paper in analyzing an investment decision. Shouldnt government do the same? Government incurs public costs when it supports economic development projects costs which can last decades. These public costs are borne by the other citizens and taxpayers who provide annual government revenue. A package of economic development incentives decreases government revenue each year a developer pays less than their otherwise applicable share in tax obligations. A business offered economic development incentives may require many years to produce a net economic return to the public investment. In other words, it may be decades before citizens and taxpayers are compensated (in the form of a sufficient expansion of economic activities) for the costs they incurred in support of the project. In the meantime, government revenues are reduced by tax or fee abatements and infrastructure costs. Through time, the cumulative incentives granted impact annual revenues available to meet growing government obligations. Economic growth also requires expansion of governments obligations to its growing base of citizens and taxpayers. Government accounting standards require annual financial statements. A recently adopted standard (GASB 77) requires that governments report tax abatements. A key consideration in evaluating the financial health of a government unit is its ability to meet its expenditures with the revenues it receives. This transparency characteristic is evaluated by the financial analysts and impacts bond ratings and financing costs. Importantly, it is measured relative to other government units. At one extreme, the governments decision calculus is simple. For example, the subject property has fiscal value only as raw land, and the economic development is all new money in the economy. However, a 30-year abatement of taxes (for example) has clear implications in each and every year. Government must look at its annual financial obligations and consider how revenues are impacted by the aggregation of abated tax revenues. Too much abatement of tax revenues places excessive public cost burdens on the remaining citizens (and taxpayers). If these cost burdens are disproportional to the expanded economic base obtained by economic development initiatives, it weakens governments ability to fulfill its obligations. Discussions of economic development incentives must focus on the cumulative public costs borne each year and measured against the government units specific annual obligations to its citizens. Next week: Measuring the public costs of economic development against the public benefits Moss Adams LLP considers itself a leader in assurance, tax, consulting, risk management, transaction and private client services, focusing on serving public, private, and not-for-profit enterprises across the nation. NAME: John Tysseling TITLE: Consulting Director NAME: Steve Keene TITLE: Managing Partner ORGANIZATION: Moss Adams LLP WASHINGTON The flurry of bold executive orders and of highly provocative Cabinet nominations (such as a secretary of education who actually believes in school choice) has been encouraging to conservative skeptics of Donald Trump. But it shouldnt erase the troubling memory of one major element of Trumps inaugural address. The foreign policy section has received far less attention than so revolutionary a declaration deserved. It radically redefined the American national interest as understood since World War II. Trump outlined a world in which foreign relations are collapsed into a zero-sum game. They gain, we lose. As in: For many decades, weve enriched foreign industry at the expense of American industry; subsidized the armies of other countries while depleting our own. And, most provocatively, this: The wealth of our middle class has been ripped from their homes and then redistributed all across the world. JFKs inaugural pledged to support any friend and oppose any foe to assure the success of liberty. Note that Trump makes no distinction between friend and foe (and no reference to liberty). Theyre all out to use, exploit and surpass us. No more, declared Trump: From this day forward, its going to be only America First. Imagine how this resonates abroad. America First was the name of the organization led by Charles Lindbergh that bitterly fought FDR before U.S. entry into World War II right through the Battle of Britain to keep America neutral between Churchills Britain and Hitlers Reich. Not that Trump was consciously imitating Lindbergh. I doubt he was even aware of the reference. He just liked the phrase. But I can assure you that, in London and in every world capital, they are aware of the antecedent and the intimations of a new American isolationism. Trump gave them good reason to think so, going on to note the right of all nations to put their own interests first. America included. Some claim that putting America first is a reassertion of American exceptionalism. On the contrary, it is the antithesis. It makes America no different from all the other countries that define themselves by a particularist blood-and-soil nationalism. What made America exceptional, unique in the world, was defining its own national interest beyond its narrow economic and security needs to encompass the safety and prosperity of a vast array of allies. A free world marked by open trade and mutual defense was President Trumans vision, shared by every president since. Until now. Some have argued that Trump is just dangling a bargaining chip to negotiate better terms of trade or alliance. Or that Trumps views are so changeable and unstable telling European newspapers two weeks ago that NATO is obsolete and then saying NATO is very important to me that this is just another unmoored entry on a ledger of confusion. But both claims are demonstrably wrong. An inaugural address is no off-the-cuff riff. These words are the product of at least three weeks of deliberate crafting for an address that Trump said would express his philosophy. Moreover, to remove any ambiguity, Trump prefaced his America first proclamation with: From this day forward, a new vision will govern our land. Trumps vision misunderstands the logic underlying the far larger, far-reaching view of Truman. The Marshall Plan sure took wealth away from the American middle class and distributed it abroad. But for a reason. Altruism, in part. But mostly to stabilize Western Europe as a bulwark against an existential global enemy. We carried many free riders throughout the Cold War. The burden was heavy. But this was not a mindless act of charity; it was an exercise in enlightened self-interest. After all, it was indeed better to subsidize foreign armies German, South Korean, Turkish and dozens of others and have them stand with us, rather than stationing even more American troops everywhere around the world at greater risk of both blood and treasure. We are embarking upon insularity and smallness. Nor is this just theory. Trumps long-promised, but nonetheless abrupt, withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership is the momentous first fruit of his foreign policy doctrine. Last year, the prime minister of Singapore told John McCain that, if we pulled out of TPP, youll be finished in Asia. He knows the region. For 70 years, we sustained an international system of open commerce and democratic alliances that has enabled America and the West to grow and thrive. Global leadership is what made America great. We abandon it at our peril. CHICAGO Disaggregation is not a word that rolls off the tongue easily. But the concept of separating a whole into its distinct parts is one that we should embrace when it comes to statistics about minorities. The time when it was sufficient to break out data by simple race or ethnicity segments has passed. Demographics and new sociological and scientific understanding about the people who make up the broad categories of black, Asian and Hispanic tell us that these labels are becoming increasingly blunt instruments when we look at public health and education policy. For instance, what do we miss when we talk about health in the black community if we neglect to understand that the share of foreign-born black people, largely from Africa and the Caribbean, has grown from 3.1 percent of the black population in 1980 to 8.7 percent in 2013? According to the Pew Research Center, by 2060, 16.5 percent of the U.S. black population will be foreign-born. A 2011 study from the University of Michigan found that, in order to track racial disparities in health, more attention needs to go to understanding the different groups. Researchers found that African-Americans, U.S.-born Caribbean blacks and Caribbean-born blacks had significantly different self-ratings of their health and self-reports of being diagnosed with a chronic physical health condition. And its only logical that there might also be differences for migrants to the U.S. from Africa. Last summer, Asian-American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander civil rights organizations in California helped pass legislation requiring the states institutions of higher education and public health to collect, analyze and report data for up to 42 subgroups of those three broad categories since the disparities among national-origin groups are so dramatic. Without more nuanced collection and reporting of subgroup data, for example, differences such as those between older adult Chinese and Vietnamese elders (who have the most chronic health conditions) and Japanese elders (who have the least) may potentially mask the reality that Japanese women are nearly twice as likely to die of cancer as Asian Indian women. These distinctions are as important in Hispanic populations, which can be separated into foreign- vs. native-born, country of origin and language preference. A recent study by minority health researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine found that cardiovascular disease presents itself differently in Latinos from the three largest Hispanic subgroups, Mexicans, Puerto Ricans and Cubans. More Mexicans (19.5 percent) and Puerto Ricans (16.4 percent) died at a young age (25-49 years) vs. Cubans (5.3 percent) and non-Hispanic white people (6.6 percent), according to mortality data. But while cardiovascular disease was the leading cause of death in all subgroups, a higher portion of deaths in the Cuban subgroup (37.6 percent) were a result of heart disease. Differences in [cardiovascular disease] mortality across the three largest Hispanic subgroups in the United States (Mexicans, Puerto Ricans and Cubans) are particularly intriguing because these distinct groups vary widely in immigration histories, socioeconomic status, culture, lifestyles and risk factors, Dr. Fatima Rodriguez of the division of cardiovascular medicine at Stanford and colleagues wrote. They concluded that aggregation of Hispanics as a single group fails to capture important differences in [cardiovascular disease] outcomes for this increasingly important and growing segment of the population. This plays itself out in education, as well. For years now, Asian advocacy groups have been trying to break the stereotype of the model minority student because it fails to take into account lower-income segments of the population, such as the Vietnamese and Cambodians. When lumped in with traditional high achievers like the Chinese and Japanese, students with fewer resources can miss out on the educational support necessary to succeed. A recent Stanford University and Economic Policy Institute study found that, while Asian students generally attend schools that have lower levels of poverty even than those attended by white students, poor Asian students are much more likely to attend high-poverty schools than poor white students. The same study found that non-English-language-learner Hispanic students perform nearly as well as their white counterparts of similar socioeconomic background. On a 100-point test, these Hispanics were only the equivalent of 5 points behind in eighth-grade math tests in 2013. Comparing gaps in quality-of-life factors between minorities and whites will always be an effective gauge of disparity or progress. But neglecting wide-ranging differences within the individual groups will only worsen inequality in America. Copyright, Washington Post Writers Group. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto has a new diplomatic invitation to visit the United States after canceling a trip to Washington in response to President Donald Trumps plans to build a border wall this time from a trio of Democratic lawmakers in the heavily Hispanic state of New Mexico. Democratic state Rep. Javier Martinez of Albuquerque said Sunday that Trumps insistence on making Mexico pay for a border wall extension is a threat to centuries-old economic and cultural ties between Mexico and the state of New Mexico, including recent investments by taxpayers in the Santa Teresa-San Jeronimo border crossing that have spurred trade. Martinez, with state Reps. Bill McCamley of Mesilla Park and Angelica Rubio of Las Cruces, sent a letter Friday inviting Pena Nieto to address the New Mexico House Chamber during the current legislative session. If you look at the way Trump has spoken out against the Mexican president, the country of Mexico, his position to build this very expensive wall across the border and then his suggestions that it be paid for with a 20 percent tariff on imports those are all statements and actions that can only be detrimental to the state of New Mexico, said Martinez, an attorney and El Paso native who spent part of his childhood in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. Theres no word yet if Pena Nieto will accept the invitation. Republican New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez has avoided criticizing Trump on his executive action pushing a border wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. A spokesman for Gov. Martinez said Friday that she supports strengthening our border and giving the federal government a variety of tools to protect residents, while declining to comment specifically on the border wall. The second-term governor of no relation to Javier Martinez said last year that building fences could impact the U.S. economy and relationship with trading partners in Mexico and farther south. Martinez was a vocal critic of Trump during the presidential campaign for his derogatory comments about Mexican immigrants and women. Trump lost the popular vote in New Mexico to Democrat Hillary Clinton by about 8 percentage points. SANTA FE A state lawmaker once took her own camera to a committee hearing frustrated by her colleagues refusal to broadcast their work on the web. But after a decadelong struggle, the culture is changing at the Roundhouse. Starting this session, the state House and Senate are not only providing an online video stream of their work, but theyre archiving it, too, so the public can catch up on committee hearings and floor action anytime. It was a long journey, former state Rep. Janice Arnold-Jones, R-Albuquerque, said in a recent interview. Shes the lawmaker who irritated her colleagues eight years ago by setting up her own webcam in a committee room at the Capitol, streaming video of the proceedings online. Arnold-Jones colleagues werent happy with the move. She was blasted by then-House Speaker Ben Lujan, D-Santa Fe, who said Arnold-Jones should have warned her fellow representatives ahead of time. Arnold-Jones, in turn, said legislators had already refused repeatedly to make their work available online, and they would have tried to stop her if shed notified them beforehand. Change takes time The Roundhouse is a different place now. At least two lawmakers Sen. Jacob Candelaria and G. Andres Romero, both Albuquerque Democrats just turned 30, young enough to have been in college when Arnold-Jones was battling her colleagues on transparency. Without opposition last year, the House passed a rule change that went into effect for this session: All floor and committee webcasts will be archived for five years. That was after two earlier tries by then-Rep. Jeff Steinborn a Las Cruces Democrat who joined the Senate this year to win House approval for archiving. The dam kind of broke at the at the end of the last session, Steinborn said Friday in an interview. The Senate last week embraced a similar archiving rule on its first day, without controversy. Senate Majority Leader Peter Wirth, D-Santa Fe, said its been a step-by-step progression as lawmakers have grown more comfortable with the concept of online video. He was one of only three senators in 2009 who supported turning on the floor cameras, he said, but leaders on both sides of the aisle were ready for full archiving by this session. The state pays about $35,000 a year for video archiving and about $48,000 a year for live streaming. Change takes time, Wirth said. Steinborn credits newcomers to the Legislature with helping make the Roundhouse a friendlier place for webcasting. Some veterans were always comfortable with video, he said, but others feared the footage would be used against them politically. In 2009, one member then-Rep. Ray Begaye, D-Shiprock had this objection: If Im sleeping and its recorded, that could be used for gain by my opponent. The move to archiving, in any case, is already changing the Capitol, Steinborn said. Lawmakers know theres a video record of their work, even in committee, so theyre taking more care to explain their policy positions, he said. And being watched is always good for accountability, Steinborn added. Better access There are, of course, more transparency battles to come, particularly over competing proposals aimed at investigations of ethical misconduct. Besides archiving, some action has already taken place. House Minority Leader Nate Gentry, R-Albuquerque, won approval on the sessions first day for a House rule requiring that amendments and bill substitutions made on the House floor be posted online when theyre introduced. Peter St. Cyr, executive director of the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government, commends the transparency and said he hopes the move to archiving is a sign of whats ahead. Not all taxpayers can take the day off work to drive to Santa Fe and wait for a committee meeting, he said, so on-demand video gives everyone better access to state government and policy discussions that impact our lives. We hope this signals lawmakers commitment to protecting and strengthening all of New Mexicos sunshine laws. Leaders from six states traveled to Albuquerque last week to learn about Bernalillo Countys criminal justice initiatives, including those focused on reducing the countys jail population. Elected officials and administrative staff traveled from North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Louisiana, and other counties in New Mexico for a two-day event hosted in conjunction with the National Association of Counties. On the itinerary was a tour of the county jail, an observation of a county meeting, and presentations from Bernalillo County officials and nonprofit organizations. Counties across the country are looking for criminal justice strategies that make systems more efficient and reduce inappropriate incarceration, particularly the number of people with mental health disorders who end up in jail, said County Commissioner Maggie Hart Stebbins in a statement. Here in Bernalillo County, we have been cooperating with our partners and stakeholders across multiple systems, using data-driven strategies, to achieve concrete results. A report provided by the county to the Journal shows the total jail population as of Dec. 31 was 1,224 inmates, including those individuals awaiting trial at home through the countys Community Custody Program. Thats a 23.2 percent drop from the year prior, and a 41.8 percent decline from Dec. 31, 2014. The county attributes that decrease to criminal justice reform measures such as reducing the amount of time parole violators spend in jail before receiving a hearing and expanding the early plea program. The reform measures are part of an effort to comply with a 20-year-old federal class action lawsuit that claimed conditions at the jail violated inmates constitutional rights. The decline received significant public attention in recent months when Albuquerque Mayor Richard Berry presented a study indicating the lower jail population was correlated with an increase in the citys crime rate. An analysis from the University of New Mexico disagreed, saying the correlation was weak and had been used incorrectly. Nancy Fishman, a project director at the nonprofit Vera Institute, led a presentation at the countys event called Reducing Your Local Jail Population: Getting Started. In it, she emphasized that its essential for counties to seek collaboration and, as often as possible, consensus, throughout the process of instituting criminal justice reforms. What is a jail? Who should be in there and who should not? said Fishman. If you have a lot of different answers to those questions, its hard to measure how youre making progress toward your goals. Correction: An earlier version of this story contained an incorrect first name for protest speaker and mayoral candidate Stella Padilla. Armed with chants and handmade signs, about 1,000 people Sunday evening marched on city streets and into the Albuquerque International Sunport in protest of President Donald Trumps executive order banning refugees and immigrants from several majority Muslim nations. No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here, the group shouted. The protest started in a parking lot on Yale SE on Sunday afternoon and gathered into a mass as speakers shared messages of encouragement, tolerance and resistance through a megaphone. Signs stood above the crowd. One with cut out green and red chiles read We love red, we love green and all the colors in between. Images of the Statue of Liberty decorated several signs, and many more quoted a portion of the poem engraved on her pedestal: Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. After hearing multiple speakers, protesters took over two of Yale Boulevards northbound lanes as they headed for the airport. Many passing motorists honked or offered a thumbs-up in support. Police briefly stopped traffic into and out of the Sunport as the dense but sprawling protest crossed roadways outside. Soon the group flooded inside, still chanting. No ban, no wall, Albuquerque is for all, they said, also a reference to Trumps determination to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexican border. Several signs alluded to that: Families dont have borders, one read. Once inside, many in the crowd sat on the brick floors at the base of several escalators beside the baggage claim. Police helped carve a path for travelers ascending the escalator and headed to the exit. Some travelers raised a fist in solidarity; others looked annoyed by the inconvenience. Nasra Ali stood toward the back of the crowd with friends. She had emigrated in 2001 from Somalia, and as a Muslim, she said she felt comforted by the protest turnout. As a naturalized citizen, shes not worried for herself, she said, but fears for friends and family members who might travel home and find themselves unable to return. Somalia is one of the seven countries named in the travel ban. Youre not alone, she said of the support shown by the march. Everybody is with you. One floor up, another large contingent of protesters gathered as more speakers took to the megaphone. Human lives matter, one shouted. A woman stood on an airport chair waving an American flag. As they slowly filtered out of the airport, people chanted This is what democracy looks like. And as they marched out of the airport, a rendition of This land is your land echoed through the covered pick-up lanes. The march was one of many across the United States to take place outside of airports, in parks and beside government buildings in dozens of cities. A spokesman for the Sunport confirmed that the presidents order hadnt impacted travel in Albuquerque, which doesnt offer international service. Daniel Jiron said Sunday nights are a quiet time as far as travel goes, so any disruption caused by the protest was minimal. Were very pleased with how the protesters acted, Jiron said, describing the group as well organized and respectful. From our perspective, it went as well as it could have. NM officials react Meanwhile on Sunday, New Mexicos Hector Balderas was among 15 attorneys general to issue a joint statement condemning the un-American federal executive order. Religious liberty has been, and always will be, a bedrock principle of our country and no president can change that truth, the statement said. Yesterday, multiple federal courts ordered a stay of the administrations dangerous Executive Order. We applaud those decisions and will use all of the tools of our offices to fight this unconstitutional order and preserve our nations national security and core values. Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., issued a similar condemnation of the order, calling it shameful, and it is an affront to our history and our values. Beyond its moral repugnance, I believe there are serious constitutional problems with this new Trump policy. Udall urged his Senate colleagues of both parties to refuse to confirm Rex Tillerson, Trumps nominee for secretary of State, until he states his position on the policy. Mayoral candidates Stella Padilla and Tim Keller both spoke briefly at Sundays protest. Democrats in New Mexicos congressional delegation this weekend harshly denounced a White House immigration order that temporarily bans refugees and immigrants from entering the U.S. Even as President Donald Trumps White House backpedaled from a section of the order that prevented legal green card holders from entering the country, New Mexicos delegation used words such as shameful and dangerous to describe the overall decree. Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., said he was sickened by the action, which Trump insisted is not a Muslim ban. On Friday, Trump signed an executive order suspending all immigration from countries with terrorism concerns for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, which are all Muslim-majority nations. The move sparked protests across the nation, with hundreds gathering at the Albuquerque Sunport on Sunday. Rep. Steve Pearce, a Republican, was the only member of the delegation who hadnt issued a statement as of Monday morning. Ive asked his office for reaction and will keep you updated here when I receive it. Meanwhile, delegation Democrats didnt hold back. President Trumps anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant executive order is shameful, and it is an affront to our history and our values, said Sen. Tom Udall, the dean of the delegation and a former New Mexico attorney general. Beyond its moral repugnance, I believe there are serious constitutional problems with this new Trump policy. The United States has always led by example on the world stage, unapologetically standing for freedom and human rights. Turning our backs on desperate refugees and essentially imposing a ban on Muslim immigration projects weakness, not strength. This order not only betrays who we are as nation, but it will make us less safe fueling anti-American sentiment and potentially inspiring violence. During a round of Sunday show interviews, Trumps aides stressed that just a small portion of travelers had been affected by the order. The aides also reversed course and said that citizens of those countries who hold permanent U.S. residency green cards will not be barred from re-entering the U.S., as officials had previously said. I cant imagine too many people out there watching this right now think its unreasonable to ask a few more questions from someone traveling in and out of Libya and Yemen before being let loose in the United States, said Trumps chief of staff Reince Priebus. And thats all this is. As of Sunday afternoon, one legal permanent resident had been denied entry to the country as a result of the order, according to a federal law enforcement official. The official was not permitted to discuss the orders impact publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday, saying he deemed the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest, and absent information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination. Like many New Mexicans, I am sickened by an administration that now poses dangerous threats to the values and freedoms we all cherish, Heinrich said in a statement. We are not a nation that turns our back on the innocent victims of terrorism or the allies who risked their own lives so that American soldiers may live. We are not a country that discriminates based on how you pray. President Trumps reckless actions seek to turn us into the kind of authoritarian nation that we have always stood against, Heinrich added. This is not greatness, in fact, this is un-American. Rep. Ben Ray Lujan said the immigration order was a worrisome, ill-considered and a dangerous move by the president. Our government must rely on accurate, unbiased intelligence, not political gamesmanship or alternative facts when making critical security decisions, Lujan said. The safety and security of our nation is too important for the President to play political games with the national security mechanisms of the country. Rep. Michelle Lujan Grisham, a candidate for New Mexico governor in 2018, also condemned the order. President Trumps executive order on refugees and immigration jeopardizes our national security and provides ISIS and other terrorists the propaganda they desire to fuel future attacks against the U.S. and our allies, she said. The most effective weapon we have against extremists is our American principles of protecting human rights and civil liberties. If the president believes we need to strengthen an already rigorous vetting process for refugees fleeing violence and persecution, I am interested in seeing what he has in mind. But that doesnt mean we should toss out the entire population of asylum-seekers who do not pose risks to our national security. The Associated Press contributed to this report. LEA COUNTY, N.M. The Lea County Sheriffs Office is meeting with New Mexico State Police Chief Pete Kassetas and District Attorney Dianna Luce to swear in members of the sheriffs office as New Mexico Mounted Patrol Officers. The move comes after the death of Lea County Sheriff Steve Ackerman in a rollover crash Tuesday night. As sworn commissioned personnel under Ackerman, the Lea County deputies could enforce the laws and civil service under his authority. But now, there is concern whether they still have that authority until a new sheriff is sworn into office and can swear in the commissioned deputies under their command. As Mounted Patrol Officers, the sheriffs commissioned deputies will have full police powers and the county sheriffs office will be able to resume functioning as a law enforcement entity. PHOENIX Democratic Arizona lawmakers who want to amend the states civil rights laws to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity and veteran status appealed Monday to Republicans pro-business core to support the effort. Democratic leaders said at a Capitol news conference that the states lack of protection is hurting its national reputation among businesses. We have a governor and a Republican-controlled Legislature that define themselves as being pro-business, so I challenge them to walk the talk, said Rep. Rebecca Rios, the House minority leader. Supporting LGBTQ workplace equality is good for business and Arizona workers should be judged by one thing their ability to get the job done. Rios and state Sen. Katie Hobbs have support from religious leaders and gay-rights groups. Another prominent backer is Arizona-based tech firm GoDaddy, one of the states largest employers. Kate VanHorn, the companys vice president of diversity and inclusion, said GoDaddy has a strong non-discrimination policy but is at a competitive disadvantage with other firms across the nation because Arizona lacks protections for all workers. Employees want to know they are protected both within and without the workplace, VanHorn said. Current Arizona law prohibits discrimination in employment, housing or public accommodations because of race, religion, sex or national origin. The law does not cover sexual orientation, gender identify or veteran status. Democrats have introduced Senate Bill 1320 and House Bill 2364 to add those categories to state civil rights laws. Efforts to push similar legislation since 2008 have gone nowhere in the Republican-controlled Legislature. Hobbs, minority leader in the Senate, said Democrats efforts to garner Republican support has run up against the Center for Arizona Policy, a social conservative group led by Cathi Herrod that is a powerful force at the Legislature. I think that most people are cowering to Cathi Herrod and not willing to do anything to upset her on this bill, Hobbs said. Herrod said its easy to blame her for everything that happens at the Capitol, but the facts are that Republican lawmakers dont support the proposals. She said the proposals limit the rights of individuals and private business owners. The First Amendment guarantees all individuals the right to live and work according to their beliefs, Herrod said. These proposals do not protect that guarantee. Republican Gov. Doug Ducey has said hes against discrimination in all its forms but does not plan to push the Legislature to adopt stronger anti-discrimination laws. Im not in the habit of telling the Legislature and other elected officials what they should be doing, Ducey said. ALBUQUERQUE The Jewish Federation of New Mexico is assisting Sephardic Jews and their non-Jewish descendants around the world in their acquisition of Spanish citizenship. Sephardic Jews are descendants of the Jewish community who lived in Spain and were persecuted before and during the Spanish Inquisition, which lasted between 1478 and 1834. This certification program is a part of a new Spanish law promulgated on Oct. 1, 2015 to confer Spanish nationality to descendants of the estimated 300,000 Jews who were expelled from Spain in 1492. The Jewish Federation of New Mexico provides certification of Spanish Jewish origin as one of the steps necessary to acquire citizenship in Spain. To receive a certificate, individuals must provide a letter of justification that outlines proof of Sephardic decent. Non-Jewish individuals need to provide a genealogical connection to a Spanish Jewish ancestor, while Jewish individuals only need to prove Sephardic heritage. The Spanish law is only valid for three years, between Oct. 1, 2015 and Oct. 1, 2018. It allows descendants of the Sephardic community to be granted European Union passports which provide the opportunity to live, work, and travel throughout the European Union as Spanish citizens. Once the certification of Sephardic heritage is obtained from the Jewish Federation of New Mexico, applicants must pass an intermediate Spanish language exam (DELE A-2) and a Spanish civics and culture exam (CCSE) at an Instituto Cervantes, located in Albuquerque and major cities throughout the world. They will also need to pass an FBI and state-level criminal background check; show two special links to Spain which can include a degree in Spanish culture, donations to a Sephardic synagogue, or business with Spain; and travel to Spain to obtain a Spanish nationality identity card. Applicants are not required to renounce other nationalities. The Jewish Federation of New Mexico will be accepting applications until the Spanish law expires on Oct. 1, 2018. Those who wish to apply for a Sephardic heritage certificate can apply online at www.sephardiccertificate.org. Information: www.jewishnewmexico.org, or 505-821-3214. 2017 the Las Cruces Sun-News (Las Cruces, N.M.) Visit the Las Cruces Sun-News (Las Cruces, N.M.) at www.lcsun-news.com Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC. _____ PHOENIX Authorities say a 29-year man has been arrested in an arson fire that charred the foyer of an historic black church in downtown Phoenix. Fire Capt. Reda Bigler says the motive for the fire Friday night at Tanner Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church didnt appear to be related to bias. She said 29-year-old Marcellus Mais approached police at the scene and claimed responsibility. A Police Department spokesman said he could not provide additional information. Jail records indicate Mais was arrested on suspicion of arson of an occupied structure. Online court records dont indicate whether he has an attorney who could comment on the allegation. The churchs website says it is the oldest African American church in Arizona, founded in the late 1880s with the existing facility completed in 1929. DENVER Colorado is seeing an increase in cases of the mumps. The state health department said Friday that 14 cases have been reported so far this year, compared with 17 in all of last year. Over the last five years, the state has averaged about 6 cases a year. The director the departments disease control division, Rachel Herlihy, says this years cases include an outbreak among 11 people in the Denver area. Its still being investigated and she says the number of people found to be infected in that cluster will likely grow. Mumps is a viral infection that causes swelling in the salivary glands and cheeks. The state health department is urging people to make sure their mumps vaccinations are up to date. People born before 1957 are generally considered to be immune. ZAGAN, Poland On a snowy field in southwest Poland, U.S. tanks and troops gathered on Monday to defend against a resurgent Russia that President Donald Trump wants to befriend. The troops part of the largest U.S. deployment to Europe since the Cold War plan to spread across Eastern Europe, fanning into the Baltic nations, digging in to Poland and also deploying to Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary. Major new commitments were made in July at a NATO summit in Warsaw by then-President Barack Obama, and at the time they seemed like a bipartisan expression of support for U.S. allies at a moment of heightened fear about Russia. Now, however, they are coming despite the White House, not because of it. Eastern European nations say they fully trust Washingtons commitments but the jubilation of the summer has been replaced by concern over Trumps overtures to Russian President Vladimir Putin. NATO leaders acknowledge that the alliance would be rocked if Trump abandons the troop deployments. The uncertainty has led to an unusual gap between Trumps rhetoric and that of nearly the entire military establishment underneath him. It was the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the unlawful annexation of Crimea that forced the deployments, said Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, the commander of U.S. Army ground forces in Europe, ahead of a frigid Monday ceremony on a military exercise range outside the Polish town of Zagan, where a Polish military band played The Star-Spangled Banner to welcome their American counterparts. The last American tank left Europe three years ago because we all hoped Russia was going to be our partner. And so we had to bring all this back, Hodges said. Just over a week into the Trump presidency, the new U.S. leader has shown mixed messages on NATO. He called the alliance obsolete in an interview days before the inauguration. But Defense Secretary James Mattis called NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on his first full day on the job last week, praising the fundamental and enduring value of NATO for the security of both Europe and North America, according to NATO. Later in the week, British Prime Minister Theresa May stood by Trumps side and said he had confirmed that youre 100 percent behind NATO. The uncertainty has weighed on Eastern European leaders, who have welcomed the international deployment of several thousand troops to their nations. Any reversal of deployments would be an issue of concern to us, said Ojars Kalnins, the head of the foreign affairs committee of Latvias parliament. In Zagan, the site of a vast Communist-era artillery training field, there was little explicit acknowledgment of the new questions over NATOs future. But phrases that would have been unexceptional before Trumps November election victory took on new meaning after his inauguration. An attack on any of us is an attack on all of us, said U.S. Ambassador to Poland Paul Jones, the senior representative of the Trump administration at the event. Polish leaders said they were delighted to be able to choose their friends, something they said was not possible during more than four decades of communist rule. Thirty years ago, which is not that long in history, we had units here in Zagan which we were forced to treat as allies, said Polish President Andrzej Duda, referring to Soviet Army troops. And today we have in Zagan allies who symbolize freedom. After the celebratory speeches, Polish and U.S. tanks and heavy artillery conducted live-fire exercises intended to show that they could work together to fend off a common enemy. Explosions and gunfire rang out across a vast, deforested plain, which was covered in the snow and mud of a Polish winter. AMMAN, Jordan Syrian refugee Ammar Sawan took a first hopeful step toward moving to the United States last fall, submitting to an initial security screening. His dream of a better life was abruptly crushed when President Donald Trump banned Syrian refugees from the U.S. until further notice. Sawan learned of the entry ban while watching late night TV news with his wife in their small apartment in the Jordanian capital of Amman. When we heard of the order, it was like a bolt of lightning, and all our hopes and dreams vanished, the 40-year-old said Saturday, a day after Trumps executive order. He and other Syrian refugees bristled at the idea that they pose a potential security threat, saying they are peaceful people fleeing persecution. Some warned that the new U.S. policy will be seen as targeting Muslims and further inflame anti-American sentiment in the region. This decision made the U.S. loose its reputation in the world as the biggest economy, the biggest democracy, said refugee Nasser Sheik, 44, who was paralyzed by a stroke two years ago and lives with his family in Amman. We are not going out to harm people of other countries, added his wife Madaya, 37. Trump on Friday suspended all refugee admissions to the U.S. for four months and banned the entry of Syrian refugees indefinitely pending a security review meant to ensure terrorists cannot slip through vetting. Trump also issued a 90-day ban on all entry to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries with terrorism concerns, including Syria. At the time of Trumps decision, more than 27,000 Syrian refugees from 11 Middle Eastern host countries were being considered for resettlement to the U.S. and were in various stages of the approval process, according to the International Organization for Migration. During the last budget year, the U.S. accepted 84,995 refugees, including 12,587 from Syria. Close to 5 million Syrians have fled their country since an uprising against President Bashar Assad erupted in 2011 and escalated into civil war. Most refugees have settled in neighboring countries, including Jordan and Lebanon where their struggle for survival gets tougher every day. Savings have run out, jobs are poorly paid and refugee children learn in crowded classrooms. Many refugees prefer to return home, but thats not an option as long as the war continues. Eager to escape tough conditions in the host countries, resettlement to the West now seems the best alternative. Ammar Sawan fled the Damascus suburb of Moadamiyeh in 2012, after he was roughed up by pro-Assad militiamen and feared eventual arrest. His wife Sanaa, 35, and three sons followed him a year later, fleeing government shelling. The couple had a fourth child, a girl, in Jordan, last year. The family struggles to cover rent, utilities and school transportation for the three oldest, especially during the winter when Sawans income from his part-time work as an upholsterer drops. Sawan worries about his children, including bullying in school. His oldest, 15-year-old Khaled, said Jordanian students sometimes pick fights with Syrians school mates. Sawan said he underwent the first round of security vetting for possible resettlement to the U.S. in October. With a new life in America suddenly in reach, he began to dream of a decent education for his children and a stable income for the family. My dream, even before the war in Syria, was to live in America, he said, as the family huddled around a gas heater in the living room. Now he is disappointed in America. We are not terrorists and we dont support terrorism, he said. Refugee aid groups said Trumps ban is hurting innocent people. It will not make America safer, Jan Egeland, head of the Norwegian Refugee Council, said by phone from Oslo. It will make America smaller and meaner. He said the new U.S. policy deals a blow to international responsibility for those fleeing persecution, an idea forged in the aftermath of the Holocaust when Jews and others seeking safe haven were often let down. Others said U.S. security checks of refugees are already robust, involving biometric screening and up to three years of vetting. The suspension of the refugee admissions allows for exceptions, including for members of minority faiths claiming persecution, such as Christians in Muslim-majority countries. Feras Zahka, 35, a Syrian Christian who fled to Turkey, is in the final stages of vetting to immigrate to the U.S., but now fears he wont be able to go. I was going through security screenings before the (US) elections took place, he said by phone from Istanbul, where he works as a hotel receptionist. I am scared my file will be scrapped. Bashir al-Saadi, 67, a Christian in the town of Qamishli in northern Syria, said giving preferential treatment to Christians could raise tensions with their Muslim neighbors. Giving visas to Christians (only) will give the impression that the U.S. is a Christian state and is standing against Islam, said al-Saadi who has family in the U.S. This will trigger resentment, might foment religious conflict and reflect badly on us. Mohammed Hassan al-Homsi, who fled his hometown of Palmyra in Syria, said Trumps decision will serve as propaganda fodder for Islamic State, the extremist group that controls parts of Syria and Iraq. The entry ban will encourage Islamic State supporters, al-Homsi wrote in text messages from Syrias rebel-held province of Idlib where he found refuge. This decision proves the militant groups theory that the West, led by the United States, is an enemy of Muslims, he wrote. Its an unfortunate decision. ___ Associated Press writers Sarah El Deeb in Beirut, Dominique Soguel in Basel, Switzerland, and Mohammed Daraghmeh in Ramallah, West Bank, contributed to this report. BERLIN Thousands of citizens of U.S.-allied nations in Europe and beyond may be barred from entering the United States under President Trumps travel ban, sparking a wave of outrage and fresh confusion that threatened to open an early rift across the Atlantic. Yet the administration also appeared to be doling out exceptions to nations such as Britain playing a game of favorites among traditional allies that could risk long-standing relationships. Following instructions from the Department of Homeland Security, the U.S. embassies in Germany and France warned Monday that citizens of those countries who are also dual nationals of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen the seven mostly Muslim nations targeted by the ban would fall under the travel ban, joining people who hold passports only from those countries. The measures full effect appeared unclear even to the U.S. embassies in Europe, where conflicting information circulated. The U.S. Embassy in Paris, for instance, warned that even existing U.S. visas granted to dual citizens would be revoked, while the U.S. embassy in Berlin suggested only that new visas would not be granted. The Trump administration, however, may be favoring the dual nationals of some Western nations a turn of events that could further complicate the White Houses already foundering relations with Europe. After talks with the White House, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, for instance, reassured his nation Monday that dual British nationals of the flagged Muslim nations have received an exemption from the travel ban. A statement posted early Monday by the U.S. Embassy in London initially contradicted that saying visa issuance to dual nationals has been suspended effective immediately until further notification. But later in the evening, the embassy took down its warning and reposted another confirming that British dual nationals were indeed exempt. We have received assurances from the U.S. Embassy that this executive order will make no difference to any British passport holder, irrespective of their country of birth or whether they hold another passport, Johnson told parliament. The advisories sowed more confusion over a travel ban denounced by critics as a haphazard religious test targeting Muslims criticism rejected by the Trump administration. Yet the indication that dual nationals could also be included raised the surprise prospect that even full citizens of friendly nations with deep ties to Washington may find themselves at least temporarily prohibited from entering the United States. The Trump administration has sought to portray the order which blocks entry to citizens of the seven Muslim-majority countries and to refugees from around the world for at least 90 days to allow for extreme vetting as an attempt to weed out prospective terrorists. But German Chancellor Angela Merkel led the European protest Sunday, suggesting it targets Muslims and saying she would seek to defend the travel rights of all German citizens. The necessary and also resolute fight against terror does not justify in any way a general suspicion against people of a certain faith, in this case against people of Muslim faith, or people of a certain origin, Merkel said Monday. Alluding to the uncertainty surrounding the ban, she added, The chancellery in cooperation with the Foreign Ministry is making all efforts to clarify the legal situation for the dual citizens affected and to strongly assert their interests. The U.S. guidance appeared to catch the Europeans off guard. German Foreign Ministry spokesman Martin Schafer, for instance, began a news conference Monday by saying he did not know whether dual German citizens of the seven countries targeted by Trump would be affected. Several minutes later, he told reporters than he had just received information that the U.S. Embassy in Berlin had said those citizens would indeed be impacted. The German Foreign Ministry said tens of thousands of German citizens are potentially affected. The number of other people impacted could surge far higher across Western Europe. In addition, Schafer said the order has raised further complications. If a citizen of one of the seven targeted nations has a U.S. green card and wants to visit Germany, can we give him a visa? he asked. The condition for this would be that he can return. The French Foreign Ministry issued a warning about travel to the United States, mentioning the uncertainty of the regulations for dual nationals. To date, not all the practical consequences of this text have been clearly identified, the ministry said in a statement. The situation remains highly evolving. It left some dual citizens shocked, and others fearful over whether and how they could visit family in the United States. Its completely unbelievable that members of parliament and millions of other people are treated like terrorists, said Niema Movassat, a lawmaker from Germanys Left Party who holds dual German and Iranian citizenship. He penned a sharp letter to the U.S. Congress denouncing the move. This is not about combating terrorism, but about right-wing populism and fascistic action, he said. Other European citizens with dual nationality fretted they would be unable to see family. Luckily I was there in 2015 to see my 97-year-old uncle, who died shortly after, the German actress Jasmin Tabatabai, a dual German-Iranian national, told the Frankfurter Allgemeine newspaper. Half of my family lives in the U.S., and because I have an Iranian passport, Im not allowed to enter anymore. . . . I dont know when Im going to be able to visit my family in the U.S. again. . . . Many families are torn apart; parents cant see their children anymore. Trumps decree is inhumane and unfair. Others, however, had been preparing for the other shoe to drop nearly certain the Trump rule would also apply to them. However, it did not blunt their rage. Omid Nouripour, vice president of Germanys German-American parliamentary committee, said Saturday that he feared he would not be allowed to visit the United States as long as the executive order remains in place. Nouripour was born in Iran and holds dual Iranian and German citizenship. Long a strong advocate of closer German-American relations, he blasted the new order. Its dirty symbolism, Nouripour said of Trumps executive order on Sunday. Its the best boost jihadis could hope for. They can now pretend the West really is at war with Islam. It remained unclear whether officials like Nouripour could yet find an out, since many lawmakers hold special diplomatic passports. The U.S. Embassy in Berlin could not immediately provide additional comment, though its advisory noted certain exceptions, including travel related to official government or North Atlantic Treaty Organization business. Other nations around the globe also scrambled to assess the impact of the ban on their dual nationals, and it remained unclear whether the administration was granting exemptions to some nations and not to others. Late Sunday, authorities announced that Canadian citizens and permanent residents would continue to have access to the United States as usual. David MacNaughton, the Canadian ambassador to Washington, tweeted that dual citizens in particular would not be affected by the ban and that those traveling with a Canadian passport would go through a normal entry [and] transit process. MacNaughton suggested that national security adviser Michael T. Flynn had confirmed this information to the Canadian Embassy in Washington. According to reports in the local press, Australian officials were seeking to clarify the situation for dual nationals traveling to the United States. Public broadcaster SBS reported Monday that an Australian-Iranian schoolboy appeared to have been the first dual national in the country affected by the ban. Pouya Ghadirian, 15, had been attending a visa interview at the U.S. Consulate when he was advised that the new executive order would affect his travel. They were a bit shocked, and they didnt know how to handle it, Ghadirian told SBS. There were also widespread concerns about the ban in Israel. Israelis born in the countries listed by the executive order were warned by experts to avoid travel to the United States. I recommend that Israelis born in these countries avoid traveling to the U.S. in the near future until we clear things up, Liam Schwartz, a lawyer who specializes in American and Israeli immigration, told Ynetnews. I dont think Im exaggerating by saying this. The ban is unequivocal. Rick Noack in London, James McAuley in Paris, Stephanie Kirchner in Berlin and Adam Taylor in Washington contributed to this report. Copyright 2017 Albuquerque Journal To certain foreign students and faculty, a caveat: Dont leave the country if you want to come back. That was the advisory issued by New Mexicos largest universities to those from the seven Muslim-majority nations affected by President Donald Trumps travel ban, as uncertainty around the orders implementation hung over campuses nationwide. The executive order issued Friday bars citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen from entering the U.S. for 90 days; prohibits all refugees from entering the country for 120 days; and indefinitely bans Syrian refugees. Defiant in the face of an international backlash, Trump pressed into his second week in office defending the ban, saying it targeted nations tied to terrorism and was not against Muslims. Protests persisted at major airports, and concern mounted from U.S. diplomats and members of his own party. And there was still confusion regarding the impact. In a statement, the University of New Mexico Global Education Office said, We appreciate how stressful and unnerving this situation is for everyone. More than 110 current and incoming students and professors at University of New Mexico are citizens of the seven countries; at New Mexico State University, the number is 65. About a dozen students and three faculty and staff members are from the affected countries at New Mexico Tech. The largest contingent at all three is from Iran. Citizens of the seven countries are not required to leave the U.S.; the risk is that if they do leave, it is unclear whether or not they will be allowed to re-enter, UNMs Global Education Office said in a statement. Similarly, visits from family and friends from their home countries is currently not an option, UNM said. Three students and three scholars scheduled to arrive on the UNM campus may not be able to travel now, a spokeswoman said. At least two foreign scholars scheduled to teach at Tech likely wont be able to come, according to a spokesman. Given uncertainty regarding how the order may be enforced, New Mexico Tech also advised its students to take care traveling near the Mexican border, where Border Patrol stops travelers at checkpoints on U.S. highways. In a campuswide email on Sunday, NMSU Chancellor Garrey Carruthers said, At this time, we advise any NMSU student, faculty or staff member who are citizens of these countries not to leave the United States, even if you are a permanent resident of the United States, because it is unclear when you might be able to return. Trumps executive order spawned confusion and chaos at airports globally over the weekend, as authorities initially interpreted it to include even legal permanent residents of the United States. Protests sprung up at Albuquerque International and airports from Los Angeles to New York. A federal judges order staying implementation of part of the decree, and a statement by Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly permitting entry of legal permanent residents from the countries shifted the orders reach even as Trump defended the order in a series of tweets on social media. Trump denied that his order was to blame for weekend chaos at the nations airports, instead pointing in social media messages to computer glitches, demonstrations and even the fake tears of Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y. U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce, the only Republican in New Mexicos congressional delegation, said the order was poorly executed. The recent executive order on refugees rolled out by President Trump was poorly executed, and struck confusion throughout the Department of Homeland Security and citizens at home and abroad, Pearce said in a statement. I applaud DHS Secretary Kelly for acting through the provisions laid out in President Trumps order to permit lawful permanent residents and green card holders admission into the United States. Of course, our refugee policy needs a comprehensive assessment after years of the Obama administration failing to follow our immigration laws that were put in place. I hope the Trump administration takes immediate action to follow through on its plan to revise our security procedures so we can return to a safer America. The ban prompted predecessor Barack Obama to wade into politics for the first time since leaving office. A spokesman for the former president said Monday that Obama fundamentally disagrees with discrimination that targets people based on their religion. Obama spokesman Kevin Lewis alluded to but did not specifically mention Trumps order but added that Obama was heartened by the civil engagement being seen across the country. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Sunday that the seven countries selected for the ban were based on actions by the Obama administration. In 2015 and early 2016, Obama placed limited restrictions on the visa waiver program for certain travelers who had visited Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Syria, Libya, Somalia and Yemen on or after March 1, 2011. The executive order also affects foreigners from any nation requiring a visa to travel to the U.S. through a provision that reinstates mandatory in-person interviews for all visa applicants. Those interviews are generally conducted at embassies and consulates, complicating travel; how long a visa lasts depends on U.S. policy toward a given nation. The Trump administration has defended the executive order as necessary to give it time to review vetting procedures. Carruthers, who has previously declined to name NMSU a sanctuary campus, as some immigrant advocates called for in a recent petition, said in the campus email, Among our most important responsibilities at NMSU is to provide a safe and caring community where all students can focus on learning without fear of persecution and where all faculty and staff know that they are valued and supported. The Associated Press contributed to this report. DUBROVSKOYE, Russia Russian businessman Oleg Sirota is such a big fan of Donald Trump that hes built a snowman of the new U.S. president outside his factory. Its an irony then that he fears Trump could spell his business ruin. Sirota is one of Russias winners from international sanctions. A ban on Western food imports has made it possible for the former programmer to fulfil his dream of becoming a cheesemaker. Sirota has become something of a darling in Russian media with his patriotic gestures, notably his wheel of cheese that is inscribed with Russian President Vladimir Putins name. Sirota insists it must be collected in person. Demand is so high that Sirota has a three-month waiting list for new customers and he plans to increase production 10 times over this year with new facilities and a hiring push provided the warm words between his two political heroes, Trump and Putin, dont bring about an end to sanctions. I was backing Trump in my heart, but Hillary in my head, Sirota said. If sanctions are canceled, this will all collapse. Sanctions have reduced foreign competition in some sectors of the Russian economy, helping entrepreneurs like Sirota to expand rapidly to plug the gap. Often heavily in debt, many will struggle without sanctions, and some are considering whether to go public with their protests. Sanctions were not mentioned directly during Trumps first phone call with Putin last Friday, though the Russian government said the two leaders discussed restoring mutually beneficial trade and economic ties. The U.S. and the European Union slapped Russia with sanctions in 2014 when it annexed the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine and backed separatists in eastern Ukraine. The sanctions have focused on individuals close to Putin, as well as major companies in the energy, defense and banking sectors. Russia responded with bans on fresh food imports from the U.S., EU and other Western countries. Since then, food prices in Russia have risen sharply, but the agriculture and fisheries sectors have performed strongly against the backdrop of much-reduced competition. Sirota, who has borrowed large sums from banks and relatives, and taken government grants, predicts that the removal of a Russian ban on food imports would flood Russia with cheap milk imports, sweeping away fledgling businesses like his. Its like sending a small boy out to box a world champion, he said. We need five or six years of sanctions, minimum, to break through. This shield has been protecting us and we need it to keep doing so. Sirota sees himself as the proud heir to a Russian agricultural tradition devastated by war and revolution in the 20th century. Hes strongly anti-globalization and backs Putins signature foreign policy moves in Ukraine. Now he and other farmers are considering taking to the streets. If theres serious talk of canceling the sanctions, well definitely appeal to Vladimir Putin for support. Maybe well even have protests in favor of keeping them because its hugely detrimental for us, he said. If sanctions go, Sirota wants higher tariffs on imported products, asking why can the Americans do it and we cant? In recent weeks, Russian officials have made conflicting statements on whether their counter-sanctions will stay. Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev called on Russians to shed the illusions that sanctions against Russia would soon be lifted while Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov has said key government ministries should operate on the assumption that they will be. Without providing details, Putin has said Russia would support farmers while admitting Russias membership of the World Trade Organization, which sets the rules for global trade in a way that no one country is discriminated against, could leave the domestic agriculture sector vulnerable. For Putin, removing the sanctions, the Russian sanctions, would actually hurt several important constituencies within Russia, said analyst Dmitry Trenin, director of the Moscow Carnegie Center. Maybe removing them too fast, too soon, is not what Putin would want. The Russian food ban mostly affects European countries and is unlikely to be scrapped before the removal of EU sanctions, which were last extended in December for a six-month period. There is a very big chance that this was the last extension of the sanctions, said Hendrik Vos, a professor in international relations at Belgiums Ghent University, pointing to countries like Italy, Greece and Hungary which favor closer ties with Russia. There are simply too many member states that also dont have an interest in extending sanctions. Potential winners of any dropping of sanctions would likely include Russias oil and gas industry, which would find it easier to access foreign financing and expertise. Retailers could also benefit from extra competition among suppliers, while consumers would welcome lower food prices. Lorenzo Getti, an Italian who runs cafes and a restaurant consultancy in Moscow, has swapped Italian produce for products from Mexico or the unsanctioned mini-state of San Marino, as well as buying salami from Russian suppliers. Unfortunately it is not the same level as the Italian ones and it will not be for some years, he said of Russian-sourced salami. In his cheese storeroom outside Moscow, Sirota muses on how the annexation of Crimea made his dreams come true, but reconciliation could kill them. Crimea is in the heart of every Russian, he said, pointing to a cheese colored dark red with Crimean wine, and without Crimea none of this would have happened. ___ Raf Casert in Brussels, Belgium, and Ekaterina Chernyaeva in Moscow contributed to this report. TULSA, Okla. Authorities say 31 pounds of cocaine that was accidentally discovered stashed in the nose of an American Airlines aircraft in Tulsa is worth around $434,000. Tulsa County Sheriffs Office spokesman Justin Green says the plane arrived in Miami from Bogota, Colombia, on Sunday. It was flagged for maintenance and sent later that day to Tulsa International Airport, where American Airlines has a maintenance base. While working on the nose gear, an airline employee noticed what looked like a clump of insulation or a brick-like object and called the sheriffs office to inspect the suspicious find. Authorities discovered seven bricks of cocaine, worth at least $14,000 a pound. Green says the case has been turned over to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration in Miami. Right now, too many families dont feel secure, just look at the 30 largest cities. In the last year alone, the murder rate has increased by an estimated 14 percent. Here in Philadelphia, the murder rate has been steady I mean just terribly increasing. And then you look at Chicago, whats going on in Chicago? I said the other day, What the hell is going on? President Donald Trump, remarks at Republican retreat, Jan. 26 When President Obama was there [Chicago] two weeks ago making a speech, very nice speech. Two people were shot and killed during his speech. -Trump, interview with ABC News, Jan. 25 If Chicago doesnt fix the horrible carnage going on, 228 shootings in 2017 with 42 killings (up 24% from 2016), I will send in the Feds! -Trump, in a tweet, Jan. 24 Mothers and children trapped in poverty in our inner cities and the crime and the gangs and the drugs that have stolen too many lives and robbed our country of so much unrealized potential. This American carnage stops right here and stops right now. -Trump, inauguration speech, Jan. 20 President Trump made it clear in his first week in office that he plans to crack down on crime and the American carnage plaguing inner cities. In fact, this was a recurring topic throughout his campaign, and a major theme of his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention. Trump often takes crime statistics out of context or gets them flat-out wrong. He did both in the above statements. Lets take a look at the facts underlying his rhetoric on crime. (The White House did not respond to our inquiry.) The Facts Inner cities is not a category by which crime is measured. Trump seems to mean the largest and urban cities, based on his previous references to Democrat-led inner cities and the 30 largest cities. Trump accurately cites a statistic from a report by the Brennan Center for Justice: that in the largest 30 cities, homicides increased by 14 percent from 2015 to 2016. But one outlier city Chicago was responsible for 43.7 percent of the total increase in homicide rates in 2016. Law enforcement officials and researchers think that the shrinking detective force, gang violence and socioeconomic factors are contributing to this increase in killing. There was a similar trend in 2015: Chicago, Washington, D.C., and Baltimore were three outlier cities that accounted for more than half of the increase in homicide rates in the 30 largest cities. Yet in 2016, homicide rates declined in Washington and Baltimore by 18.6 percent and 6 percent, respectively. A warning about percent changes in crime: They can exaggerate the magnitude of crimes in a city. For example, the homicide rate in Austin increased by 68 percent in 2016, even though the actual number of homicides increased to 40 from 23. Thats a small fraction of the number of homicides in Chicago (from 478 in 2015 to 732 in 2016), yet Austin saw a bigger percentage increase than Chicago. Overall, violent crime is on a decades-long decline, since the height of the crack cocaine epidemic in the early 1990s. Crime trends can randomly fluctuate year to year. Many factors affect such rates, including the weather. This is why criminologists do not make generalizations about crime trends based on short-term comparisons of rates, such as annual or monthly changes. They consider the data over much longer periods of time at least 10 to 15 years to make conclusions about trends. For example, in 2006 and 2007, the national violent crime trend increased for the first time in nine years. Democrats bemoaned the return of the crime wave, creating a political headache for the George W. Bush administration. After years of driving crime rates down, were now in reverse gear, said then-Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr., D-Del. Its time to get back to crime-fighting basics that means more cops on the streets, equipped with the tools and resources they need to keep our neighborhoods safe. Then-Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales denied that the crime trend was reversing: In general, it doesnt appear that the current data reveal nationwide trends. Rather, they show local increases in certain communities. Each community is facing different circumstances, and in many places violent crime continues to decrease. Turns out Gonzales was right. The increase in 2006 and 2007 was a temporary blip not a return of a national crime wave. In his Jan. 24 tweet, Trump says killings are up 24 percent from 2016. The percentage is accurate, per Chicago police. But with only one month of data in 2017, its too early to use that statistic to call it a carnage. Trump also said that he would send the feds, although federal agencies already work with Chicago police. Are crimes worse in inner cities led by Democrats? Crime, in general, tends to be higher in larger, urban cities with concentrated populations and greater socioeconomic divide. The cities with the greatest income inequality also are urban cities contained within a small geographic boundary, with bigger, yet more concentrated populations. And urban cities tend to be more Democratic; 25 of the 30 largest cities have Democratic mayors. But thats a causation, not a correlation. Brennan Center researchers say the only connection they have found between city-level policies and crime statistics is the adoption of better crime-data tracking systems, which all the major 30 cities have. Some of Trumps recent references to crime statistics were off the mark. In Philadelphia, he claimed the citys homicide rate is terribly increasing. Thats incorrect. Homicides have declined significantly in Philadelphia over the past decade, from 397 in 2007 to 277 in 2016. According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, in 2016, there were fewer violent crimes than in any other year since 1979, the fewest number of property crimes since 1971, and the fewest number of robberies since 1969. Trump also claimed that two people were fatally shot during President Barack Obamas farewell speech on Jan. 10. No one was shot and killed in Chicago that day, according to the Chicago Police Department. Four shootings occurred that day, with a total of six people shot, but no one died. Crime trends are susceptible to cherry-picking, because they fluctuate so much for many reasons. The general consensus among criminologists is that two years worth of data (i.e., upticks in crime in 2015 and 2016) are not enough evidence to prove a crime wave. So Trumps claims using data from inner cities, or the 30 largest U.S. cities, to make sweeping statements about American carnage is misleading. Some cities have experienced spikes in violent crime in the past two years. Outlier cities drove up the overall violent crime rate in the 30 largest cities, for reasons that arent clear. A previous two-year increase in the rates, in 2006 and 2007, showed it was a temporary blip in the overall decades-long downward trend in violent crime. That is important context that is not represented in Trumps rhetoric on crime. Trumps references to crime terribly increasing in Philadelphia and the shootings during Obamas speech in Chicago are factually inaccurate. His use of crime rates in the 30 largest cities (or inner cities) to describe an American carnage are also inaccurate. SPRINGFIELD -- Gov. Bruce Rauners effort to shake up Springfield has sent shock waves from the Capitol to every corner of the state as the first-term Republican governor and the Democratic-controlled General Assembly have failed to reach a comprehensive budget agreement during his first two years in office. While Illinois financial problems predate Rauner's foray into public office, his clash with Democratic legislative leaders -- most notably long-serving Democratic House Speaker Michael Madigan -- has led to unprecedented uncertainty. The state went the entire last fiscal year without a complete budget, leaving the vast majority of spending completed by court orders and laws that require funding for certain expenses, such as pension and debt payments. But for other areas, including higher education, social services and state agency operations, the flow of revenue was cut off for most or all of the year. That resulted in the layoffs of hundreds of employees at public universities, community colleges and agencies that provide mental health treatment, care for the elderly and other social services. By one estimate, roughly 1 million people statewide have lost services as a result of the ongoing impasse. A six-month stopgap spending plan that was approved in late June provided a cash infusion, but it expired Dec. 31, resurrecting the uncertainty of the previous year. Since taking office, Rauner has insisted that items on his pro-business, union-weakening policy agenda be incorporated into any comprehensive budget deal if its also going to include the tax increases nearly everyone now acknowledges are needed to begin addressing the states long-term deficits. Many Democrats, meanwhile, argue that some of the governors policy priorities, such as stricter workers compensation laws and changes to collective bargaining rights for public employees, are a vigorous denunciation of the partys core values. Were going through a process which is completely abnormal, said Kent Redfield, an emeritus political science professor at the University of Illinois Springfield and a longtime observer of state government and politics. And, ultimately, its not sustainable. Recently, momentum has been building in the Senate for a bipartisan grand bargain, but whether the proposed deal, which includes tax increases, new casinos, pension reforms and a host of other changes, can pass through both legislative chambers and earn Rauners signature remains to be seen. Even if it does, experts say, it would only be a small step toward firmer fiscal footing. Deep roots Rauner frequently notes that Illinois financial problems stretch back decades. A 2012 report from the State Budget Crisis Task Force that examined the financial problems of several struggling states noted that Illinois has long used budgetary gimmicks, such as delaying payments to vendors and borrowing to cover pension payments, to make unbalanced budgets appear balanced on paper. Illinois did all this without any sort of long-term financial plan to restore balance, and without reserves, the report notes. Illinois has been doing backflips on a high wire, without a net. The result has been a backlog of unpaid bills that totals nearly $11 billion and unfunded pension liabilities nearing $130 billion. In a recent report for the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, economist Thomas Walstrum notes that state and local governments in Illinois collectively have been spending more money than they bring in for nearly three decades. From the late 1980s on, Illinois has spent more than it has collected in revenues, Walstrum writes. And while the typical U.S. state has also generally spent more than it has collected, Illinoiss overspending has outpaced the national average since the mid-1990s, primarily through pension spending. Prior to Rauners tenure, the Democratic-controlled General Assembly and then-Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn took steps to address some of the problems. During the lame-duck session in January 2011, lawmakers pushed through temporary increases in the states personal and corporate income tax rates, raising the former to 5 percent from 3 percent and the latter to 7 percent from 4.8 percent. Nearly three years later, in December 2013, the legislature approved and Quinn signed a pension reform law that reduced retirement benefits to save the state money. Those savings never materialized, however, because the state Supreme Court in May 2015 unanimously tossed out the law. The seven justices ruled it violated a clause of the Illinois Constitution that says pension benefits for current and retired workers shall not be diminished or impaired. By the previous fall, a debate was raging in the Quinn-Rauner gubernatorial race about whether the temporary tax increase, which was set to begin rolling back Jan. 1, 2015, should be made permanent or allowed to expire. While the increase was in place, the states backlog of unpaid bills dropped from $8.5 billion in January 2011 to slightly less than $6 billion in January 2015, the month Rauner took office. It continued dropping to a low of just under $3.5 billion in July 2015 before beginning to climb again. But the new governor campaigned against extending the tax increase without also enacting other reforms he said would jump start Illinois economy. Democrats said they didnt have the votes to do it alone, so tax rates were allowed to roll back to 3.75 percent for individuals and 5.25 percent for corporations. Rauner and Democrats were able to come together on a plan to plug holes in that years budget, but theyve been unable to reach a comprehensive budget agreement since then. When it comes to budget inaction, Illinois has no peer. Pennsylvanias Democratic governor and Republican-controlled legislature had their own standoff in July 2015. But unlike Illinois, the two sides there came together in March to end the impasse. When it comes to Illinois budget standoff, theres no comparison that we can point to, said Arturo Perez, a fiscal analyst for the National Conference of State Legislatures. Proposed solutions The most recent round of talks among Illinois top leaders broke down in December, with Rauner and Madigan pointing fingers at each other. Afterward, Senate President John Cullerton and Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno got together and hashed out a massive package of legislation aimed at bring the impasse to an end. The two leaders stood together earlier this month and vowed that senators from both sides of the aisle would support the entire package. Among the various proposals as they stand now are permanent increases in the personal income tax rate from 3.75 percent to 4.99 percent and the corporate rate from 5.25 percent to 7 percent. Meanwhile, a proposed penny-per-ounce tax on sugar-sweetened beverages has been discarded, and a new business opportunity tax and taxes on some services, including dry cleaning and storage unit rentals, have been added. The business tax would be charged based on a companys Illinois payroll and would range from $225 annually for businesses with payrolls of less than $100,000 to $15,000 for businesses with payrolls of $1.5 million or more. The proposal also would make permanent a tax credit for research and development and close what some describe as tax loopholes for corporations. The package also includes several provisions that should make Republicans happy, including a two-year freeze on local property taxes, workers compensation reforms, and greater flexibility for school districts to use third-party contractors for food, janitorial and transportation services. Passing the deal through both chambers of the General Assembly wont be an easy task, but its introduction has been greeted with a sense of optimism thats been rare in Springfield of late. Dan Lesser, director of economic justice for the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law and a coordinator of the Responsible Budget Coalition, is pleased that its message that more revenue is needed to address the states budget problems seems to have gotten through to lawmakers. We are a coalition because we have a shared interest in the state having sufficient revenue to make smart investments and to stop making cuts and to repair some of the damage thats been done, Lesser said. Were pleased that theres substantial revenue in the Senate package. Even Fitch Ratings, which downgraded the states credit rating in October 2015 as a result of the impasse, sounded a positive, albeit cautious, tone. These proposals, if they proceed through the full legislature and are signed by the governor, have the potential to stabilize the states credit rating, the ratings agency said in a Jan. 11 statement. However, Fitch notes that previous signs of progress have not always come to fruition, the agency added, warning it might downgrade Illinois debt again if a deal isnt reached this month. With some lawmakers, particularly Republicans, wanting to take more time, Senate leaders decided to hold off on voting last week. But they told senators to be prepared to vote Feb. 7 when they return to Springfield. Rauner has said he finds recent developments in the Senate encouraging, though hes withholding judgement on the specifics of the package. I applaud them, Rauner said in an interview. Theyre dealing with issues. Theyre talking about term limits. Theyre talking about property tax relief. Theyre talking about regulatory reform. This is great. This is a step in the right direction. Rauner also applauds House Democratic leaders for proposing economic reforms. Madigan is taking a wait-and-see approach to whats being proposed in the Senate, noting that many of the items in its proposal have been discussed and debated previously. Theyre going to get due consideration in the House, he told the JG-TC Springfield Bureau. Meanwhile, hes proposed his own policy agenda that includes a 50 percent reduction in the corporate income tax and a tax surcharge on personal income of more than $1 million to fund education. No quick fix Even if the Senate package or something similar is approved, it will only be a small step toward improving the states long-term financial outlook, experts say. Redfield said whats being proposed is good start. It would allow us to kind of stabilize the situation, but that set of bills in no way is a fix, he said. In the long run, the state will need a revenue structure that better aligns with the modern economy, such as a sales tax thats broadened to include more services, and a stronger business climate, he said. A recent study from the Fiscal Futures Project at the University of Illinois Institute of Government and Public Affairs helps put the task in perspective. With a combination of higher income tax rates, a broader income and sales tax base, increased economic growth, and 2 percent annual reductions in discretionary state spending, it would take a decade to bring Illinois budget into line, according to the analysis. We should think about this as a multiyear process, said David Merriman, one of the reports authors. Its going to require significant revenue increases and restraint on spending over a long period of time. If we show the political backbone to do that and show a realistic long-term plan that will strengthen the economy immensely. President Donald Trump said Monday that Lockheed Martin has cut $600 million from its next lot of 90 F-35 Joint Strike Fighter planes, capping weeks of private meetings with Lockheed Martin chief executive Marillyn Hewson, and public criticisms of the programs cost. He specified that the cost-savings would apply to the companys next lot of 90 planes, but offered few details on how the program or contract would change as a result. Lockheed Martin did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Whats happening with Lockheed, number one were cutting the price of their planes by a lot but theyre also expanding and thats going to be a good thing. Ultimately theyre going to be better off, Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. The presidents public back-and-forth with Lockheed began in late December when he took to Twitter to criticize the program for cost overruns. At the time he asked aerospace company Boeing to price out a comparable F-18 Super Hornet, suggesting he would substitute Boeings cheaper plane for Lockheeds. The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter currently costs about $100 million per plane, though the company says it already expects the cost of the plane to drop to $85 million as the company ramps up its volume of production. Lockheed Martin chief executive Marillyn Hewson said earlier this month that the company was close to a deal that would lower the cost of the program, departing a private meeting with the president at Trump Tower. She said the cost of the program would be significantly lower, and also pledged to create 1,800 new jobs at a production center in Fort Worth, Texas. The F-35 program, a $400 billion project to supply advanced jets for the U.S. government and allied countries, has been criticized by politicians on both sides of the aisle over cost overruns and delays. It is the single largest military program. There were great delays, about seven years of delays, tremendous cost overruns, Trump told reporters. Weve ended all that, and weve got that program really really now in good shape. The most recent delay to the program came earlier this month when the Defense Department acknowledged a schedule delay that could increase the cost of the program by another $500 million. The delay drew a rebuke from Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., chairman of the Senate Committee on Armed Services. In one of his first actions in office, Defense Secretary James Mattis on Friday ordered a review of the program. A familiar talking point has permeated the many Republican defenses of Donald Trumps controversial travel entry ban: Its not a Muslim ban. This is not a ban on Muslim refugees, Rep. Todd Rokita, R-Ind., assured. Everybody needs to take a deep breath; there is no litmus test based on religion, Rep. Tom Emmer, R-Minn., said. Its simply wrong to call the presidents executive order concerning immigration and refugees a religious test of any kind, Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., argued. Trump himself issued a statement Sunday saying the same: To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. For the record, non-ideological media outlets arent flat-out calling it a Muslim ban just noting that the opposition is making that argument. The executive order makes no explicit mention of religion, after all. But its unavoidable to note that the ban covers citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries the only seven countries it targets. And even some Republicans are suggesting that it amounts to a religious test, or at least worrying it has the appearance of one. For that perception and storyline, Trump has himself to thank. It was Trump, after all, who once actually did propose a Muslim ban. Its still on his campaign website, more than a year later DONALD J. TRUMP STATEMENT ON PREVENTING MUSLIM IMMIGRATION. Then-Trump confidant Rudy Giuliani took to Fox News on Saturday night and said Trump basically was shooting for a Muslim ban with his executive order but recognized it needed to be altered to pass muster. Fox News host Jeannine Pirro asked Giuliani, How did the president decide the seven countries? Ill tell you the whole history of it, Giuliani said. So when [Trump] first announced it, he said, Muslim ban. He called me up. He said, Put a commission together. Show me the right way to do it legally. Giuliani continued: And what we did was, we focused on, instead of religion, danger the areas of the world that create danger for us. Which is a factual basis, not a religious basis. Perfectly legal, perfectly sensible. And thats what the ban is based on. Its not based on religion. Its based on places where there are substantial evidence that people are sending terrorists into our country. Its hard not to read Giulianis comments as confirmation that a Muslim ban was the original intent, if not the final result. Hes basically arguing its not a Muslim ban because that wasnt practical. And given the particulars of the final result even if not explicitly a religious test its not hard to draw a line between A and B. Trumps long-running commentary has also made clear that he believes Muslims should perhaps be treated differently in some way (though the actual proposals have shifted). A few examples: Asked about increasing surveillance of Muslims, Trump said: Were going to have to look at a lot of things very closely. Were going to have to look at the mosques. Were going to have to look very, very carefully. Asked whether he would support a full Muslim database, he said: Basically the suggestion was made and [is] certainly something we should start thinking about. Asked if he would rule out a database on all Muslims, he said no, but then shifted to talking about a database just of refugees. No, not at all, he said. I want a database for the refugees that if they come into the country. We have no idea who these people are. And even as recently as this weekend, Trump again suggested a preference for Christian refugees over Muslim ones. Heres an exchange between him and the Christian Broadcasting Networks David Brody, which aired Saturday night: BRODY: Persecuted Christians, weve talked about this, the refugees overseas. The refugee program, or the refugee changes youre looking to make. As it relates to persecuted Christians, do you see them as kind of a priority here? TRUMP: Yes. BRODY: You do? TRUMP: Theyve been horribly treated. Do you know if you were a Christian in Syria it was impossible, at least very tough, to get into the United States? If you were a Muslim, you could come in, but if you were a Christian, it was almost impossible, and the reason that was so unfair, everybody was persecuted in all fairness, but they were chopping off the heads of everybody but more so the Christians. And I thought it was very, very unfair. So we are going to help them. The common thread running through these and many of Trumps comments about applying extra scrutiny to Muslims is that hes often asked about something specific, and tends to offer a generally positive response. The most charitable interpretation is that hes just trying to be agreeable. But the totality of Trumps comments on this make it impossible to divorce this issue from religion. Hes gone to that well too many times, suggesting that it might be okay to single Muslims out either for immigration, surveillance or a registry of same kind. Which is why you now see even some Republicans saying this looks way too much like a religious test. I am deeply troubled by the appearance of a religious ban, Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., said Sunday night. Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., added that the terrorist recruiters win by telling kids that America is banning Muslims and that this is America versus one religion. Trump and his team will chalk that sort of criticism up to Republicans who dont much like him spouting off. The White House would probably be better served by looking over rhetoric from the president and some of his top surrogates, up to and including this past weekend. Giuliani on Fox INDIAN WELLS, Calif. Charles Murray, the political scientist best known for his book The Bell Curve, spoke Sunday afternoon to 550 donors who have each agreed to give at least $100,000 a year to finance the conservative Koch network. He painted a pessimistic picture of decaying institutions, growing dependency on government assistance and the increasing isolation of the rich from the rest of society. Completely apart from the individual person of the president, I think we see an environment that is fertile for authoritarianism in the United States now, he told some of the countrys most affluent business leaders, as they sipped lemonade and ate salad at a desert resort outside Palm Springs. As recently as 1960, both the left and the right were united in general support for what was called the American creed. The American creed was the basics of individualism and freedom and opportunity, Murray explained. And what we discovered last year was that the proportion of the American electorate on the right that is still devoted to those American creedal principles is way smaller than I thought it was. Im not talking about how many doctrinaire libertarians there are. Im talking about the degree to which people buy into what weve always considered, This is what America is all about.' During a panel discussion later in the afternoon, billionaire industrialist Charles Koch who has been convening these twice-annual seminars since 2003 reiterated Murrays point. We have a tremendous danger because we can go the authoritarian route, he said, or we can move toward a free and open society. Koch, who has become a household name over the past few years, was not referring specifically to Trump. But he and others at the three-day conference, which continues until tonight, have warned in stark terms that the disenchantment which allowed Trump to become president shows how fragile freedom is in this country. Theres some that like Trump. Theres some that like Bernie Sanders. But they didnt like the status quo, Koch said. The struggle between opportunity and humanity and control and stagnation is eternal. We can never rest. The comments come at a surreal moment for the Koch network. On the one hand, it has never been more powerful. Republicans have unified control of government, and no one else has invested more money since the start of this decade to make that happen. Some of their biggest dreams could soon become reality: repealing the Affordable Care Act, rolling back environmental regulations, overhauling the tax code, moving the Supreme Court to the right. But the network, and the Koch brothers, didnt support Trump. Several of Trumps priorities are anathema to them. Yesterday the network, in its first formal break with Trump since the election, criticized his travel ban on some refugees and immigrants, calling it the wrong approach. Many here are alarmed that Trump is targeting individual companies, theyre nervous about new tariffs and they dont like the idea of a big infrastructure package. The Kochs are recalibrating for the new era. The mixed emotions foreshadow a provocative role for the network in the age of Trump as a potent resistance movement within the GOP, well-positioned to fight the president and his allies on Capitol Hill when they push policies that run counter to the groups libertarian credo. But theyre also happy to back him up when hes on the same page. In the next two years, the network aims to spend $300 million to $400 million on policy and political campaigns up from $250 million during the 2016 elections. The plan is to continue building an operation that has 1,600 staffers and thousands of activists spread across 36 states. (Read my story with Matea here.) The network is accustomed to taking on a Republican president. Koch convened his first seminar in 2003, partly driven by frustration with George W. Bush. Brian Hooks, the president of the Charles Koch Foundation, argued Sunday night that Barack Obamas presidency was only possible because Bush failed to govern effectively. Mike Pence, as a congressman, made a video with us. In it, he warns: Beware unified government under either party,' Hooks told the assembled donors. When Pence was making that video with us, he was talking about the squandered opportunity of the 2000s. Frankly the promises of limited government and good reforms like tax cuts were overshadowed by the spending and regulatory policies that grew the size and scope of government by 60 percent. .. Im not here to pick on the Bush people. I just want to tell you the truth. Policies like Medicare Part D, the steel tariffs and No Child Left Behind didnt help people to improve their lives. . . Barack Obama was an extreme reaction away from the status quo of 2008, Hooks continued. Still frustrated, the American people have voted for change again. Donald Trump has made it very clear thats what hes offering. Many of the people who voted for President Trump also voted for Obama. Hooks, who is co-chairing the seminar, cautioned donors that Trump, too, could lead to a massive backlash. If things dont get better, then we should expect history to repeat itself, he said. We should expect that the political pendulum will swing with even more force to the other direction the next time. With people even further to the left than Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren! There are people right now who are prepared for the next four years to be a failure, people who cannot wait to be there to address the frustrated American people and introduce them to their own vision of radical hope and change. So the stakes are extremely high. The Washington Posts Breanne Deppisch contributed to this report. Make me an offer, says Jeff Yeager with a sweep of his arm, taking in the sylvan Accokeek, Maryland, spread hes putting on the market and is eager to unload. Because this man is getting out of Dodge. Leaving the United States. Escaping Donald J. Trump. Yeager, a self-employed writer, and his wife plan to spend the coming year roaming the globe in search of a new home where they will live for four years. Or possibly eight. Trumping out, Yeager calls it. Sort of like extended political camping. When the devastation of the election hit, he says, we thought, Lets just leave and travel, travel, travel and see where it takes us. Remember all those celebrities who were going to quit the country if Trump was elected president? Samuel L. Jackson (bound for South Africa), Amy Schumer (Spain or somewhere) Lena Dunham (Vancouver) and Cher (Jupiter). Perhaps you had a cousin who threatened to leave. A neighbor, too. And all those Facebook friends who offered posts of parting, invariably mentioning Canada, O, Canada, I could drink a case of you, so nice, so close. Talk, talk, talk. They all appear to be here still in our notably less United States. Not a one has followed the example of Lyndon Johnson press secretary Pierre Salinger, who famously said in 2000, If George Bush is elected president, I will leave the country and then did, for France. In fact, finding people who are actually leaving is a challenge. Many toying with the idea who, mind you, have yet to make a decision declined to speak on the record for fear, they said, of potentially enraging Trump supporters. One man wouldnt give his name, instead choosing to be called Martin and communicating through a temporary and untraceable email account and cell number. He did, however, send a multi-page manifesto of 30 indicators that could prompt him and his wife to change their country of residence. (He said he has hundreds of friends considering a similar move.) Warning Indicators of When Its Time to Flee aka Dont wait until Kristallnacht include the creation of a national registry for Muslims or other vulnerable groups and Washington unilaterally withdrawing from free-trade agreements (as opposed to following amendment procedures within those agreements). The truth is, leaving the country for extended periods of time isnt easy, especially if you have school-age children. Or aging parents. Or need to earn a living. Those sorts of things. Many countries warmly welcome American visitors and their money. Theyre somewhat less enchanted with Americans taking their citizens jobs. (Where have we heard this before?) It seems very sexy to move to Canada these days, says immigration lawyer Elizabeth Wozniak of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Whats not sexy is the amount of paper involved. We have a ridiculous amount of bureaucracy. Such obstacles are not stopping Yeager. The 58-year-old is a man of his Salingeresque word. Even as others face challenges entering the country after the presidents new travel ban, he is determined to depart. He and his wife, Denise, met with a real estate agent the Monday after the inauguration. Or, more important to the Yeagers, after the Womens March on Washington, for which they hosted nine fellow demonstrators. Make me an offer, pleads Yeager again, showing a visitor around the airy compound a two-bedroom house with a separate office and a guest cottage overlooking a creek and a mile and a half from the Potomac. Actually, he says it four times. The Yeagers dwell in that special demographic of people who are able to leave. They have no children. Theyve paid off the mortgage. Denise, 65, retired as a health and physical education teacher at Prince Georges Community College and collects Social Security and a small pension. Jeff, who was a fundraiser and administrator of nonprofit groups until he quit to write in 2005, can work anywhere. Also, he is famously, prodigiously and professionally thrifty, the self-proclaimed Ultimate Cheapskate. Yeager has written four humorous books on the joys of thrift. He has appeared on The Today Show more than 20 times and travels the country lecturing, a couple of times by bike. In a subversive twist, he makes money by preaching about not spending it. Tall, earnest, with a Twainian mustache, he believes that happiness has very little do with money. Also, that you can reuse anything. (He has a dozen uses for eggshells.) He amasses junk, uses five dusty computers because they all do a little something, its just that not one of them does everything. He and Denise plan to store, sell or trash most of their belongings. The Yeagers live on less than $40,000 a year. When they travel, they spend $100 a day. Or less less being a mantra. I am violently opposed to debt, Yeager says. A die-hard liberal, he was long apolitical in his writing, but Trumps election left him despondent and vocal. He received a sewer of virtual vitriol from his 3,500 Facebook followers. Youre just whining. You need to suck it up, they told him. And more. Genial in manner and prose, Yeager wasnt used to such venom and removed himself from the social media platform in November. Listen, Im a fourth-generation American. I come from the heartland, northwestern Ohio. I am a deeply disheartened, concerned individual, he says, chatting in the sitting room that he remodeled. I consider Trump a dangerous, unstable person. After the election, the Yeagers spent a month in Ireland, their first visit. They liked it very much. So, Ireland is on the list of places to land. Im committed to being out of the country forjust as long as we can,says Yeager. I dont see us coming back on a permanent basis. That is, until Trump is out of the White House. What were trying to escape is the disappointment of my homeland, he adds. When theyre abroad, the Yeagers use public transit, bike, crash in hostels, inexpensive hotels or with locals whom they find through couchsurfing.com. They dont frequent restaurants much, preferring to cook wherever they happen to land. The Ultimate Cheapskate knows how to travel cheaply. And hes been smart about saving. Their next country-hunting adventure will be to Panama and Costa Rica. Spain and Portugal are on the list, also New Zealand and Malaysia, Vietnam and Thailand. They love Eastern Europe, particularly Croatia and Poland, countries where Americans can live relatively inexpensively. I love the raw, real feel of a place that you cant find with a lot of tourists there, says Yeager. Would he consider Russia? Jeff would like to ride the length of the Trans-Siberian Railroad, not in luxury, but like ordinary Russians with chickens. Denise is having no part of that. Otherwise, shes game. Many people tell us they wish they could do the same thing and leave, she says. Theyre looking for countries that offer good health care, affordable housing, friendly people, limited paperwork. (So no Canada for them.) Ive never felt this strongly, not even with Nixon, Yeager says. Rather than seeing themselves as prodigal Americans, we see ourselves as citizen ambassadors. The goal is to represent a different, non-Trumpian America, their America, to the world. Yeager finds that hes happiest when I cant speak the language of the country where I am. I cant possibly speak politics. But, he adds emphatically, We have no intention of giving up our U.S. citizenship. Theyre just giving up, for a while, on their residency. So its urgent to find someone to rent or buy their home. Make me an offer, he says again. If you have the feeling that something is wrong, dont be afraid to speak up. Fred Korematsu Monday, as Google honors civil rights leader Fred Korematsu through its home-page Doodle, some of the most memorable words about the man and his actions he once defied a presidents executive order that was rooted in ethnic prejudice can be found on the White Houses own website: Today, we remember the dangers of casting stereotypes on entire communities, and we recommit to our countrys ideals of protecting civil rights and promoting an environment where people can strive to achieve the American dream based on the content of ones character, not the color of ones skin. So wrote Akil Vohra in 2011, as senior adviser at the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, about the man famous for the 1944 Supreme Court case Korematsu v. United States, in which he fought against Japanese internment during World War II. Those words (now in the archives of the WhiteHouse.gov pages from then-President Barack Obamas tenure) were published in 2011 just after Jan. 30, which was proclaimed Fred T. Korematsu Day of Civil Liberties and the Constitution to celebrate the legacy of a courageous man who has left a message not just for one community, but for the entire country. He was, in other words, a human rights champion who fought against demeaning and demonizing people by race and nationality. Korematsu, who died in 2005 in Marin County, California, would have turned 98 Monday. And seven years before his passing, when he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, President Bill Clinton said that Korematsus name stood along those of such brave and justice-seeking ordinary citizens as Homer Plessy, Oliver Brown and Rosa Parks. Korematsus courage during World War II centered on taking a stand against the governments internment of many of its own citizens in the wake of the Pearl Harbor attack. Executive Order 9066, signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, approved the incarceration of about 120,000 people most of Japanese descent, and two-thirds of them U.S. citizens who were taken from their homes. Korematsu a 23-year-old foreman in his native Oakland who was denied Coast Guard enlistment because of his ethnicity refused to go, went into hiding and was eventually arrested. He lost his landmark case before the Supreme Court and was sent to a Utah relocation center. Four decades later, his conviction was finally overturned. In 2010, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger long before replacing President Donald Trump as Celebrity Apprentice host signed the Fred Korematsu Day bill, creating the first day in American history to be named for an Asian-American. Several months later, WhiteHouse.gov said: In June 1983, the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians concluded that the decision to remove those people of Japanese ancestry to U.S. prison camps occurred because of race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership. At every level of American life, we forever relearn these hard lessons. Mondays Google Doodle of Korematsu wearing his Medal of Freedom and surrounded by symbolic cherry blossoms is by Sophie Diao, the daughter of Asian immigrants. QUEBEC CITY Canadian authorities on Monday charged a 27-year-old university student known for his far-right sympathies with six counts of first-degree murder in a mass shooting the day before at a local mosque. Alexandre Bissonnette, described by neighbors and acquaintances as a socially awkward introvert who had recently adopted virulent political views, was also charged late Monday afternoon with five counts of attempted murder with a restricted firearm. The five surviving victims were still in the hospital, with two of them in critical condition, although hospital officials said their injuries were not life-threatening. Handcuffed, his feet manacled and wearing a white prison jumpsuit, Bissonnette reportedly looked at the floor throughout the court hearing, aside from casting a brief glance at his lawyer. The prosecutor, Thomas Jacques, indicated that terrorist charges could be added later to the murder and attempted murder charges. The attack, which took place just as about 50 worshipers at the small mosque in the suburb of Sainte-Foy near Laval University had completed evening prayer, sent shock waves through Canada. Accustomed to seeing violence as a phenomenon taking place in the United States, Europe and the Middle East, Canadians found themselves in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was clear that his government considered the shooting a terrorist act. This was a group of innocents targeted for practicing their faith, Trudeau told the House of Commons. Make no mistake. This was a terrorist attack. These were people of faith and of community, he said. And in the blink of an eye, they were robbed of their lives in an act of brutal violence. Bissonnette was described in media reports as an ardent nationalist and a strong supporter of the French far-right politician Marine Le Pen. He was known to activists in Quebec for taking positions against feminism and refugees, Francois Deschamps of the pro-refugee group Bienvenue aux Refugies said on his Facebook page. The suspect was captured by police about 15 miles from the scene of the attack after he called 911 and offered to surrender. The police initially said they had also arrested a 29-year-old engineering student at the mosque. By Monday afternoon, they had released him and called him a witness to the event. It turned out the witness, Mohamed Belkhadir, had left the mosque at the end of prayers and was near the building when he heard shots. Returning inside, he called 911 and began helping a friend who had been shot. When he saw armed police arrive, he panicked and ran off and was quickly stopped. He said the police had treated him well. On Rue du Tracel, a quiet crescent of modest houses in suburban Cap-Rouge about a 15-minute drive from the mosque, Rejean Bussieres knew something was up when several police cars descended on his street Monday morning. Having heard of the shooting, he said, he immediately thought it could be Bissonnette. He used to like to break things as a kid, said Bussieres, who has been a neighbor of the family for 30 years. He was turbulent. Bussieres, a retired municipal blue-collar worker, said that Bissonnette and his twin brother, Mathieu, were always introverted. Bussieress 23-year-old daughter, Rosalie, said the twins had reputations as nerds who were obsessed with violent computer games and were bullied at school. They were always just with each other. Its sad. They were always home alone, she said. According to Torontos Globe and Mail website, Vincent Boissoneault, a friend of the suspects who also studied at Laval University, said that Bissonnette had been uninterested in politics until Le Pen visited Quebec City last year. Soon Boissoneault was clashing with his friend over his support for Le Pen and Trump. I wrote him off as a xenophobe, Boissoneault told the newspaper. I didnt even think of him as totally racist, but he was enthralled by a borderline racist nationalist movement. But the Globe and Mail also quoted friends from Bissonnettes days in junior college as saying he was apolitical and more interested in chess than right-wing politics. While mosques in Canada and the United States have been the targets of vandalism and other hate crimes in recent years, the Quebec City attack appears to be one of the first mass shootings at an Islamic house of worship in North America. Jack Jedwab, president of the Association for Canadian Studies, whose research is focused on Canadian attitudes toward immigrants and religious minorities, said that the far right is a marginal movement in Quebec but that it does not stop unstable people from being attracted to its propaganda. He told The Washington Post that Bissonnette was clearly a person with problems who was drawn to far-right ideology. But Jedwab noted that there were no prominent elected politicians in Quebec who backed far-right positions, and he praised Trudeau and other leading Canadian politicians for reaffirming the governments position of openness and support for the acceptance of Syrian refugees. Jedwab said he did not link the attack to Trumps election win or his ban on refugees and visitors from several Muslim-majority countries last week. I dont think this was planned in 24 hours. This was planned over a period of time, he said, noting that Canadian firearm laws make it difficult to procure weapons in short order. The attack is a particular shock for Quebec City, a prosperous city of 800,000 that prefers to be known for its winter carnival and charming Latin Quarter. Unlike the multicultural centers of Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal, Quebec City remains overwhelmingly white, Catholic and French Canadian. Nevertheless, the city has seen recent growth in its Muslim population, particularly immigrants from French-speaking North and sub-Saharan Africa. The mosque located a short distance from the university was a microcosm of that growing community. Among the victims identified by the Quebec coroner late Monday was Azzediene Soufiane, a 57-year butcher, whose halal meat market and grocery story was shut on Monday afternoon, a few forlorn bouquets left at the front door. He was nice, social and well-liked by his customers, Amine Noui, a longtime friend of Soufiane, told Radio-Canada, the French service of the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. Noui said it was Moroccan-born Soufiane who was one of the first people to lend him a helping hand when he moved to the community a decade ago. Khaled Belkacemi, another victim, was an Algerian-born professor at Laval whose work focused on green chemistry and functional foods. Calling it horrible news, university rector Denis Briere said Belkacemi was a colleague who would be greatly missed. Two of the remaining victims were from Guinea. Both were married and leave a total of six children. The other victims were born in Tunisia and also had young families. Bever and Hawkins reported from Washington. Marissa Miller in Quebec City contributed to this report. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly said green-card holders from the predominantly Muslim Middle East countries covered by an executive order on travel wont be stopped from returning to the U.S., as criticism mounted over President Donald Trumps action. Trump defended Fridays order, which halted entry to the U.S. from seven countries for 90 days, after judges blocked parts of the plan and companies, lawmakers and foreign leaders weighed in. Senators from Trumps own party, notably John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, in a sharply worded joint statement, suggested the action had been too broad and potentially damaging to the U.S. In applying the provisions of the presidents executive order, I hereby deem the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest, Kelly said in a statement. Absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, lawful permanent resident status will be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determinations. The administration also moved to assure nervous counterparts in the U.K. and elsewhere about how their citizens would be affected. Trump, who spent part of the afternoon at a staff screening of the animated movie Finding Dory at the White House, emerged to say on Twitter that McCain and Grahams statement was wrong they are sadly weak on immigration. Senators should focus their energies on Islamic State, illegal immigration and border security, he said, instead of always looking to start World War III. In a statement from the White House and on Facebook, Trump repeated that the move was not a Muslim ban, and said his policy was similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria, Trump said in the statement. World leaders including Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have denounced the move. Merkel expressed her concerns about the temporary ban during a call with Trump on Saturday. Australia on Monday said its asking the Trump administration to ensure its citizens are exempt from the ban, after U.S. officials moved to reassure Canada and the U.K. A federal judge in Boston on Sunday became the latest to curb Trumps immigration order, directing customs officials at the citys Logan International Airport to let passengers from the seven countries with valid visas go on their way. Protests were held at numerous airports and cities around the country, including one outside the Trump International Hotel in Washington. Signs at the Washington demonstration included No Muslim Ban and The Pilgrims were undocumented. Protesters led chants that included No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here. Im here because Im very frightened about Trumps actions against immigration, said Lisa Richard, 59, who lives in Virginia. Richard also protested at Dulles International Airport on Saturday night. This is as anti-American as it could be, she said. Trump told his almost 23 million Twitter followers on Sunday morning: Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world a horrible mess! Judges temporarily blocked the administration from enforcing portions of his order to halt immigration and entry of citizens of Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Libya. Under the order, the admission of refugees would also be suspended for 120 days. Sudans foreign minister, Ibrahim Ghandour, said came the ban comes as the two countries started to work more closely to combat terror and only two weeks after Obama lifted decades-old sanctions on the North African country. We feel sorry that the decision was taken at a time we started cooperating and the sanctions were lifted, Ghandour said in an interview in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, where hes attending an African Union summit. Well wait until the executive decision passes and see what is next after that and then well act accordingly. White House spokesman Sean Spicer said on ABCs This Week program that 109 people held by immigration authorities on Saturday were simply slowed down in entering the U.S., he said, because the safety of the American citizens, the safety of our country has got to be paramount. The judges moves on Saturday followed a day when a number of students, refugees and dual citizens were stuck overseas or detained, and some businesses, including Google, warned employees from those countries not to risk leaving the U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell expressed opposition to religious tests for immigration restrictions. Its hopefully going to be decided in the courts as to whether or not this has gone too far, McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, said on ABC. I dont want to criticize them for improving vetting. I think we need to be careful. We dont have religious tests in this country. In their joint statement, McCain and Graham said they were concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defense, Justice, and Homeland Security. Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism, the senators said. Fridays executive order was reviewed by the Department of Justices Office of Legal Counsel before being made final, according to a White House aide. DHS said in a statement late Sunday that it was, and will remain, in compliance with judicial orders and was working with the departments of Justice and State to implement Trumps executive order. We are committed to ensuring that all individuals affected by the executive orders, including those affected by the court orders, are being provided all rights afforded under the law, the agency said. It also issued a two-page fact sheet on the order. Trump returned to Twitter to say that Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue! In an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network, Trump said Christians should be a priority in a revamped refugee program. It was almost impossible for Syrian Christians to enter the U.S., Trump said. With assistance from Elizabeth Dexheimer NEW YORK I am an Iranian, a journalist, a campaigner against Islamic extremism and a 40-year-old mother. I was forced to flee Irans media crackdown with my teenage son, Pouyan, in 2009. I came to the United States as a green-card holder in in 2014 after being a political refugee in the United Kingdom for five years. Due to my work, I cannot go back to Iran. After seven years of being in exile due to Irans repression, I feel as if I am facing another crackdown, thanks to President Trump. His executive order to suspend the flow of refugees into the United States for 120 days, and to halt immigration for citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for at least 90 days, could prevent me from seeing Pouyan, my only child, who is a now a student in the U.K. We feel as if we are both in limbo. I am unsure if he can come see me, or if can I go visit him, without being deprived of the right to come back to the United States. If were unable to return, it would be the end of my life here as I know it. When I think about not being able to see him, I feel sick. Trump has resorted to this policy of barring Iranian nationals allegedly because of the fight against terrorism. I am not a terrorist. I am not a murderer. I am merely the victim of Irans repressive government. The authorities in Tehran put dissidents in jail, and force girls from the age of 7, including Christians, Jews and other religious minorities, to wear veils. I am coming from a country where there the government has erected institutional walls between the Bahai minority and the Muslim majority, treating Bahais as second-class citizens. Ive been fighting against Islamic extremism and Irans repression for all of my adult life. When I was 19 years old, and pregnant with my son, I was briefly imprisoned in Iran for my political activities. During the height of the election fraud of 2009 in Iran, I was one of the few journalists to highlight human right abuses in the aftermath of the elections. Millions of people marched in the streets for a better and more open country. In response, the Iranian government cracked down on them and mercilessly killed many protesters. I tracked down the families of hundreds of Irans victims and publicized their stories through my articles, television program and documentaries which were shown around the world. Because of my work I became a target for the Iranian government. I would face jail or worse if I were to return to Iran. Even as I live in exile, the Iranian authorities have launched smear campaigns against me. Other exiled journalists have been victims of similar measures. Iran has built a wall around my family and me. My family has been taken hostage by Irans judiciary, barred from leaving the country. I have not been able to see them for seven years. The pressures and isolation of living in exile has even made me contemplate suicide. But having my son with me kept me connected to life. He gave me a reason to go on. Even though Pouyan and I do not know when we will be able to see each other again, his mind is on those who are even less fortunate than us. When I complained to him about Trumps order, he said, Mom! Compared to what Syrian refuges have to endure, I feel guilty talking about our own problems. The Syrians have suffered much worse. All of this is why the idea of a wall in the United States to keep out refugees fleeing repression and war makes me shudder. I think of the millions of those in the Middle East who not only have had to flee homelands, but now face discrimination here in the United States, their adopted land. I know very well that ordinary people will be suffering immensely. I know because I already am. On Sunday afternoon, I walked outside my house in Brooklyn, in a daze of emotions and thoughts after the events of this week. I bumped into my 64-year-old neighbor as she was walking her dog. She quietly asked me, How are you coping these days? I have been thinking about you and your son. I am so sorry for you, and all of this that is happening. I dont know my country anymore. Her kind and humane gesture both comforted and stunned me at the same time; I realized that in the past seven years, no one has ever offered apologies for what I have endured. No one has said sorry for me being separated from my family in Iran. But my neighbors words have given me some hope in the goodness of the American people, hope that there are other Americans that will speak out on behalf of refugees and people in exile like me. Right now, that hope is what I will hold onto. Masih Alinejad is a journalist and the founder of My Stealthy Freedom, a campaign to oppose compulsory head scarves in Iran. She can be found on Twitter: @MasihPooyan. On New Years Day, a kerfuffle on an international flight led a San Francisco-bound United Airlines plane departing from Sydney to divert to Auckland, New Zealand. On what would have been a 13-hour flight, an agitated middle-seat passenger who was recorded on video exchanged terse words with a flight attendant and was subsequently arrested when the plane made an early landing. The encounter was the latest incident of air rage something that flight attendants say is on the rise. The conditions on board just lead to more potential for air rage, says Sara Nelson, international president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA. Nelson ticks off the reasons: tight seating, fuller flights, alcohol consumption, fewer flight attendants, human nature. Any time you get a whole bunch of humanity packed in together theres opportunity for a conflict, Nelson says. According to data from the International Air Transport Association, a trade association that represents 265 airlines and 83 percent of global air traffic, unruly passengers on planes worldwide increased 14 percent in 2015 over the previous year. In 2015, there were 10,854 reported cases of such incidents, or one in every 1,205 flights. In 2014, there were 9,316 incidents, or one per 1,282 flights. Alcohol or drug intoxication was reported in 23 percent of the cases; physical aggression was reported 11 percent of the time. Verbal abuse and failure to follow the instructions of the flight crew were cited in a majority of the incidents. A recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States found that airplane design may play a role in air rage. The study, authored by Katherine DeCelles, who is the James M. Collins senior lecturer and a visiting associate professor of business administration at Harvard Business School and Michael Norton, the Harold M. Brierley professor of business administration at the same institution, found the mere presence of a first-class section in a plane mattered: The chance of an air rage incident happening in economy is 3.84 times greater when there is a first-class section. Making class difference more salient can be bad for everyone, DeCelles says. For the study, the researchers had access to a database containing about five years of air-rage incidents from a major airline. (DeCelles declined to say which airline, citing a nondisclosure agreement.) For every 1,000 flights, there were 1.58 incidences of air rage in economy and .31 in first class. The researchers found that when passengers enter the plane through the front and pass through a first-class section, rather entering in the middle of the plane and into their own designated section, the odds of air rage increase, both in economy and in first-class: Economy passengers are 2.18 times more likely to become unruly and first-class passengers are 11.86 times more likely to act out than when they board from the middle. DeCelles points out that these results statistically account for a number of other factors that might relate to first class and boarding patterns, such as leg room, flight size and flight length. In describing the emotions of the passengers in the reports, flight crews classified disruptive first-class passengers more frequently as belligerent, and described economy upsets as emotional outbursts. (Beyond the report, the researchers didnt have any additional information on the passengers actual emotions or other factors, such as alcohol intake, says DeCelles.) Based on the correlational results, DeCelles theorizes that first-class passengers may have felt a sense of entitlement, which led to their reactions, while those in economy may have felt a sense of deprivation and frustration. We all know we live in a class-based society, but its never quite so in your face as when you board an airplane, says DeCelles. Whatever the cause, Nelson, who is also a flight attendant with United Airlines, says that employees are trained to handle passenger interruptions of all types, and they are also presented with the option of taking a self-defense class offered by the Transportation Security Administration. She adds that the Federal Aviation Administration takes poor passenger behavior seriously: Passengers who interfere with the duties of the flight crew could face criminal charges or be fined up to $25,000 by the FAA. Any type of unexpected behavior in-flight could be cause for concern, says Nelson. Flight attendants are taught that if someone is acting out, it may be a distraction for a larger threat. We are in a metal tube hurtling through this space, an object that has been used as a weapon of mass destruction, says Nelson. That is the new world. Silver is a freelance writer and author of Frommers EasyGuide to Chicago. LONDON The Latest on President Donald Trump, his travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries and other immigration actions (all times local): 6:50 p.m. The head of the U.N. refugee agency estimates that some 20,000 people could have been resettled in the United States during President Donald Trumps 120-day suspension on admitting refugees. The office of U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi says he is deeply worried by the uncertainty faced by thousands of refugees in the process of being resettled in the U.S. UNHCR said in a statement Monday that it estimates that 800 refugees were set to travel this week alone, but have been barred from entry following Trumps executive order signed Friday. The Geneva-based agency says it came up with the estimate for a total of 20,000 people who might have been resettled during the 120-day suspension based on average monthly figures from the past 15 years. ___ 6:35 p.m. Hundreds of people are protesting in the British university town of Oxford against U.S. President Donald Trumps immigration ban. The protest on Monday night also targeted Conservative U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May, who many in the crowd felt did not react strongly or quickly This is what democracy looks like! The crowd chanted. They carried signs reading No to racism, no to Trump! As speakers vowed to press to get the government to revoke the state visit invitation to the American president, the crowd chanted: Theresa May, hear us shout: Muslims in, sexists out! ___ 6:10 p.m. The United Nations says it has received assurances that the Trump administrations ban on travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries will not affect U.N. staff members from those countries. U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said a handful of U.N. staff members traveling on G-4 visas which allow non-diplomats to work at U.N. headquarters in New York were kept from boarding planes over the weekend. But Dujarric said he was informed Monday that all issues had been ironed out and we got the needed assurances from the U.S. Mission that staff from the seven countries with valid G-4 visas can return to work at the United Nations. Dujarric reiterated that the U.N. very much hopes that the measures put in place regarding refugees are temporary, saying the U.S. has been a critical partner of the United Nations organization in resettling refugees. ___ 6 p.m. Entrepreneur Richard Branson has registered his opposition to President Donald Trumps travel ban in a blog post, promising to donate to the American Civil Liberties Union and the International Rescue Committee and urging the public to donate to worthy causes. The founder of the Virgin empire said in his post Monday there were many reasons to be worried about the order, which bars people from seven countries in the Middle East and Africa from entering the United States and suspends refugee immigration for 120 days. Branson says he applauds the thousands who have taken to the streets and the airwaves in solidarity across the U.S. and others donating their time on behalf of those caught up in this mess. The company did not immediately disclose the size of the donations. ___ 5:40 p.m. A Somali refugee says more than 200 refugees with flights to the U.S. have been told they cannot travel because of President Donald Trumps orders temporarily suspending entry by citizens from seven majority-Muslim countries. Suleiman Yusuf, a teacher, said Monday that the 200 left a refugee camp in eastern Kenya last week, but were told by the International Organization for Migration that their Monday flights were canceled because of Trumps orders. Yvonne Ndege, a spokeswoman for the United Nations refugee agency, says about 13,000 Somali refugees who had been interviewed and approved for resettlement by the United States Citizen and Immigration Services have been affected by the order. ___ 4:45 p.m. British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson says he has been assured by American officials that all British passport holders remain welcome in the United States, even if they are also nationals of seven countries temporarily barred by President Donald Trump. Johnson has told lawmakers in the House of Commons that Trumps executive order will make no difference to any British passport holder, irrespective of their country of birth or whether they hold another passport. Confusion has reigned about whether dual nationals are affected by the 90-day ban on citizens of Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya . Johnson said the U.K. had told the Americans of our anxiety about measures that discriminate on grounds of nationality. He said this is something that we do not support. Opposition lawmakers are demanding the government condemn the ban even more strongly and cancel a state visit to Britain by Trump planned for later this year. ___ 4:40 p.m. French and U.S. travelers at Paris largest airport Charles de Gaulle reacted with shock to President Donald Trumps decision to ban citizens from a number of largely Muslim countries. National carrier Air France announced 15 people from the countries listed in the executive order had been blocked before boarding their flight to the U.S. Ross Anderson, a U.S. tourist heading back home to the Washington area, said that he was afraid he might probably witness firsthand the effects of Trumps decision with protests and maybe people being detained or blocked. Travelers at Charles-de-Gaulles 2E Terminal were mainly critical of the measure. French U.S.-bound tourist Bernadette Taglia-Zackarin called the decision with respect to members of targeted countries Iran and Iraq extremely dangerous. ___ 3:15 p.m. The foreign minister of Qatar says his country is against President Donald Trumps blanket banning of refugees and travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries. Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani said in Serbia on Monday he hopes U.S. authorities will further assess the move and we hope that they are going to do the right thing about it. Several of those stopped at U.S. airports since Friday are believed to have traveled on flights from Qatar. The foreign minister says: When it comes to be addressed in a Muslim framework, I think this is something we will stand against. The 90-day ban, imposed on Friday, affects travel to the United States by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. ___ 2:45 p.m. The president of the American University of Beirut has criticized President Donald Trumps executive order to indefinitely bar refugees from Syria and keep individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. for 90 days. Fadlo Khuri, a dual Lebanese-American citizen, said in a statement released Monday that the AUB community has watched the fallout at Americas airports with growing concern in the last 72 hours. The university is one of the oldest and most prestigious educational institutions in the Middle East. Khuri says: We find this action and its implications to be in conflict with the enduring values of liberty and justice for all, which the original framers of the US constitution fought to protect. Founded in 1866, AUB enrolls around 8,500 students from all over the world. ___ 2:20 p.m. Turkeys national airline says it will reimburse passengers who were unable to fly to the United States due to the U.S. ban on travelers from seven Muslim-majority nations. Turkish Airlines said Monday that customers who could not board their flights would be fully reimbursed and not charged any fines. The carrier did not say how many Turkish Airlines passengers were affected by the ban. A company official did not immediately respond to questions from the Associated Press. The 90-day ban, issued by President Donald Trump on Friday, halts travel to the United States by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. ___ 2:15 p.m. German Chancellor Angela Merkel is renewing her criticism of President Donald Trumps order suspending entry to the U.S. for people from seven Muslim-majority countries and halting refugee admissions. Merkel said Monday that the necessary and determined fight against terrorism in no way justifies a general suspicion against people of a certain faith in this case against people of Muslim faith or people with a certain origin. She added that she believes the U.S. action also contradicts the basic concept of international help for refugees and international cooperation. Merkels words echoed similar comments by her spokesman Sunday, the day after the German leader voiced her regret at the decision during a telephone with Trump. ___ 1:55 p.m. Pakistans interior minister says President Donald Trumps action banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States will hurt global unity against terrorism and could backfire and help terrorists achieve their goals. The minister, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, also said on Monday that the U.S. administrations measure will add to the miseries for the victims of terrorism world over as Muslim countries were the ones most hit by terrorism. Khan says linking terrorism with Islam is not justifiable since only a few hundred misguided people turn to militancy and defy the message of Islam out of the worlds 1.5 billion Muslims. ___ 2:05 p.m. An Iraqi lawmaker says the parliaments decision calling for a reciprocity measure in response to U.S. President Donald Trumps executive order is non-binding for the Iraqi government. The deputy parliament speaker, Sheik Humam Hamoudi, says the vote approved in the Iraqi parliament on Monday was a recommendation and did not move as a law. Hamoudis statement is echoed by Kirk Sowell, a political and legal analyst focused on Iraq and publisher of the newsletter Inside Iraqi Politics. Sowell says that the Iraqi parliament absolutely lacks the authority to originate legislation of any kind regulating anything the executive branch does. ___ 12:40 p.m. The European Union has vowed it will not discriminate against refugees based on nationality, race or religion and will never choose for isolation and inequality. EU Commission spokesman Margaritis Schinas said that the 28-nation bloc is carefully studying the decision of U.S. President Donald Trump to impose a travel ban on refugees to see how much it will impact EU citizens. Schinas also quoted from a Sunday interview of Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker in which he said: We have to make choices about the world we want to live in. We must choose between isolationism, inequality and national egotism on the one hand. And openness, social equality and strength through solidarity on the other. In an interview with the German Die Welt, Juncker said that it is by standing for opening, social equality and solidarity that Europe can credibly act on the world stage to find common forward looking solutions. ___ 12:15 p.m. Doctors Without Borders says U.S. President Donald Trumps executive order suspending entry for refugees from Syria into the United States is putting lives in danger. The Paris-based advocacy group says Trumps order will effectively keep people trapped in war zones, directly endangering their lives. Doctors Without Borders, also known by its French-language acronym MSF, called Trumps order an inhumane act against people fleeing war zones. It called on the U.S. government to lift the ban, end the exclusion from specific countries, and to restart the resettlement of refugees. ___ 12:10 p.m. The U.S. Embassies in London and Berlin have advised people from the seven countries affected by President Donald Trumps travel ban not to seek a visa, or schedule an appointment even if they are a dual nationals. The statement posted on the London embassys website on Monday issued the guidance to aliens from the countries of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. It says, if you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time. There has been widespread confusion about whether the ban applied to dual nationals. The embassy did not immediately respond to requests for comment. ___ 11:55 a.m. Two lawmakers say that the Iraqi parliament has approved a reciprocity measure after U.S. President Donald Trumps executive order temporarily banning citizens from Iraq and six other Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. The measure, adopted by lawmakers at a Monday session of parliament, is to apply to Americans entering Iraq. Lawmakers Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun told The Associated Press that decision is binding for the government. Both say the decision was passed by a majority votes in favor but couldnt offer specific numbers. No further details were available on the wording of the parliament decision. It was also not immediately clear who the ban will apply to American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and other Americans doing business in Iraq. It was also not known if and how the Iraqi measure would affect cooperation in the fight against the Islamic State group in Mosul. Trumps order includes a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program. ___ 11:20 a.m. A spokesman for the German foreign ministry says tens of thousands of people are likely to be affected by the recent U.S. travel ban. An executive order issued Friday by U.S. President Donald Trump temporarily restricts entry to America of people from seven majority-Muslim countries. Foreign ministry spokesman Martin Schaefer says Germany is trying to understand the practical implications for its citizens who also hold a passport from one of the affected countries. He told reporters in Berlin on Monday that Germany hoped to receive further clarity from Washington in the coming hours. Chancellor Angela Merkel had expressed regret Sunday about Trumps decision, but refrained from condemning it. Her spokesman, Steffen Seibert, said Monday that Merkel intended to work for a good German-American relationship. ___ 11:00 a.m. British Prime Minister Theresa Mays office says that a state visit to Britain by U.S. President Donald Trump later this year will go ahead, despite increasing calls for it to be canceled over his temporary ban on residents of seven majority-Muslim countries entering the U.S. Her office says an invitation has been extended and accepted. No date has been announced for the state visit, which involves lavish pomp and ceremony, often with a stay at Buckingham Palace hosted by Queen Elizabeth II. An online petition on a government website has attracted more than 1 million signatures opposing the trip. Protests against the travel ban are planned Monday in London and other British cities. ___ 10:50 a.m. Irans senior vice president is calling President Trumps executive order on travel and visa process ban illegal, inhumane and against human rights. The official IRNA news agency Monday quotes Ishaq Jahangiri as saying the order should be reviewed at the international level. Jahangiri says: We will definitely take stance against this illegal, inhumane and anti-human-rights activity in international bodies. And once again (we) will review and explore American human rights in international bodies in order to let the world to know what a system they are facing. He did not elaborate. The executive order suspended issuing visas for people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria or Yemen for at least 90 days. ___ 10:40 a.m. The worlds largest body of Islamic nations has told The Associated Press that it has grave concern over U.S. President Donald Trumps order banning travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries. The 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation issued a statement Monday to the AP warning that such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism. It called upon the U.S. to reconsider this blanket statement and maintain its moral obligation to provide leadership and hope at a time of great uncertainty and unrest in the world. The 90-day ban, imposed Friday, affects travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. All are OIC members. ___ 10:30 a.m. Air France has blocked 15 passengers from Muslim countries from traveling to the U.S. because they would have been refused entry under President Donald Trumps new immigration ban. Air France said in a statement it was informed Saturday by the U.S. government of the new restrictions, and had no choice but to stop the passengers from boarding U.S.-bound flights. An airline spokeswoman said Monday that the passengers were taken back to their point of departure or otherwise taken care of. She would not provide the passengers names, nationalities or other details. The passengers were from seven Muslim-majority countries affected by the three-month immigration ban: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. SPRINGFIELD -- The budget impasse that has plagued Illinois for nearly two years has disrupted the flow of funds to public universities and community colleges, social service providers, and even state agencies, but money has kept flowing to the states underfunded pension systems. State law requires payments into the pension funds for teachers, university employees, state workers, lawmakers and judges regardless of whether theres a budget. The state paid $7.6 billion into the five systems last fiscal year and is expected to pay $7.9 billion for the current fiscal year, which ends June 30. Despite these continued and increasing payments, the unfunded liabilities in the systems also continue to rise, growing from $111 billion in fiscal year 2015 to nearly $130 billion last year, according to the General Assemblys Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability. Taken together, the systems are now less than 38 percent funded. JP Aubry, associate director of state and local research at Boston Colleges Center for Retirement Research, said Illinois pension woes are the result of a long history of shorting payments to the systems. Its not to say that the costs today arent extremely burdensome, Aubry said. They just didnt need to be. While some blame benefit increases -- such as a 1990 law that created compounding cost-of-living raises for retirees -- for the states pension problems, Aubry said his centers research suggests Illinois benefits are on par with other states. The Illinois comptrollers office reached the same conclusion in a 2011 report. Illinois passed a law in 1994 that requires annual payments toward a target of 90 percent funding for all five systems by 2045. But the law kept payments low for the first 15 years before ramping them up, essentially leaving it to future leaders to figure out how to pay the bill. During the tenure of disgraced former Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich, the state borrowed money to pay down unfunded liabilities and subsequently shorted later payments. The economic downturn that followed the 2008 financial crisis wreaked havoc on the funds investments and subsequently led the systems to lower their assumed rates of return, both of which have contributed to the growth in unfunded liabilities. In recent years, the state has contributed the amount required by law, but that amount is lower than what actuaries say the state should be paying. The state approved two major changes early this decade aimed at reining in pension costs. The first enacted less generous retirement benefits for new workers after Jan. 1, 2011. The change is expected to help bring down costs in later decades as so-called Tier II workers replace older Tier I workers. But critics have already begun raising questions about whether newer employees, who pay the same share of their paychecks into the pension plans but will receive significantly lower benefits in retirement, are being unfairly forced to subsidize more generous benefits for older workers. The next attempt at pension reform, approved in the General Assembly and signed by then-Gov. Pat Quinn in December 2013, went even further, raising the retirement age and ending compounding 3 percent cost-of-living raises for retirees. But the state Supreme Court tossed out the law in May 2015, with the courts seven justices unanimously ruling that it violated the Illinois Constitution, which says that pension benefits for existing workers shall not be diminished or impaired. Since then, pension reform has taken a backseat to the larger budget standoff. But the state Senates wide-ranging proposal to end the impasse includes a pension reform plan long backed by Senate President John Cullerton, D-Chicago. The proposal, which would apply to public school teachers, state university employees and members of the General Assembly, would give Tier I employees a choice between counting future raises toward their pensions or receiving compounding cost-of-living raises in retirement. The pension plan for employees at state agencies wasnt included because of an ongoing contract feud between Gov. Bruce Rauners administration and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31. Supporters argue the Senate plan, which they say could save up to $1 billion annually, would pass constitutional muster because workers would be given a choice. Those who choose to count raises toward their pensions and forgo the compounding raises in retirement would also receive lump-sum refunds worth 10 percent of their previous pension contributions and a 10 percent reduction in future payments. Opponents of the previous pension reform law disagree. Chicago attorney John Fitzgerald, who represented retired teachers who sued to overturn the 2013 law, said the Senate plan would force workers to make a choice that would cut their benefits. Keeping what they currently have is not on the menu, and the only two items on the menu reduce peoples pension benefits, Fitzgerald said. And that, in my view, is unconstitutional for the same reasons why (the previous law) was unconstitutional. Donald Trump should push the nuclear button. No, not the one that launches actual nuclear weapons. I mean the one that blows up Democratic obstruction to his Supreme Court nominee and puts a reliable conservative on the court to replace justice Antonin Scalia. There is no reason for Trump and Senate Republicans not to go nuclear. Senate Democrats have already made clear their intention to stonewall his nominee, before even knowing whom he plans to nominate on Tuesday night. If the nominee is not bipartisan and mainstream, we absolutely will keep the seat open, Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., recently declared. No, you wont. Senate Democrats dont have the power to keep the seat open. Thats because, in 2013, Democrats broke a nearly four-decade-long precedent and changed Senate rules to eliminate the filibuster for executive branch nominations and appointments to the federal circuit or district courts allowing them to be confirmed by simple majority. Eliminating the filibuster for political appointments that die with a presidents term was one thing. But Democrats eliminated the filibuster for lifetime appointments to the federal bench as well. Once that line was crossed, Republicans can now rightly ask: Why stop at the district and circuit courts of appeal? If Democrats openly say they will obstruct anyone Trump chooses, why not follow the precedent they set and apply their rules to Supreme Court nominees? The reason Democrats eliminated the filibuster for judicial appointments was to let Barack Obama stack the federal courts with liberal judges particularly the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, the nations second-highest court, which reviews many critical cases related to federal laws and regulations. And stack the courts Obama did. He appointed more than one-third of the federal judiciary and reversed the ideological balance of the 13 U.S. circuit courts of appeals. When he took office, 10 circuit courts had conservative majorities. Today, nine have liberal majorities, including the D.C. Circuit. Going nuclear paid huge dividends for the left. One of the liberal judges Obama put on the D.C. Circuit on a party-line vote was Nina Pillard. She later authored the decision that upheld the Obamacare contraception mandate. When Obama first nominated her Democrats never expected her to be confirmed. She was, White House sources toldPolitico, a sacrificial lamb, a scalp Republicans could claim while confirming Obamas other picks. She went on to write the decision that forced the Little Sisters of the Poor to violate their religious conscience. Obama and Senate Democrats used the nuclear option to shift the ideological tilt of the nations second-highest court. And if Democrats had controlled the Senate last year, does anyone doubt they would have hesitated to use it to put Merrick Garland on the Supreme Court over Republican objections? Of course they would have. And the next time they are back in the majority, they will not hesitate to use the nuclear option to overcome Republican opposition to a liberal nominee. It is only a matter of time before the nuclear option is invoked. The only question is whether it will be invoked by Republicans now, or by Democrats later. So why wait? Trump should forget about the Democrats and pick the most conservative nominee possible. He does not even need every Republican to vote with him. He needs just 50 of the 52 Senate Republicans to vote in favor, and Vice President Mike Pence can cast the tie-breaking vote. By going nuclear, Trump has a chance to do something no modern Republican president has ever done have a perfect record on Supreme Court nominations. As I have pointed out, over the past three decades, Democratic presidents have appointed four justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor and every single one has been a consistent liberal on the bench. Republicans, by contrast, have picked seven justices Sandra Day OConnor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas, David Souter, Samuel Alito and John Roberts and more than half have defected to vote with the courts liberal bloc on critical issues. Democrats have a perfect record, while Republicans are not even batting .500. One reason is that, while Republicans have consistently allowed qualified liberal justices with whom they disagreed philosophically to move forward (Sotomayor was confirmed 68-31, and Kagan was confirmed by a vote of 63-37) Democrats do not. This meant that Democrats could appoint justices who openly affirmed liberal positions (declaring, as Ginsburg did in her confirmation hearing, that the right to abortion was central to a womans life, to her dignity) while conservative nominees had to speak cryptically in terms of judicial philosophy to avoid a Democratic filibuster. Well, that is no longer necessary. Trump can, if he so chooses, put a nominee on the Supreme Court who has openly and correctly declared that Roe v. Wade is the worst abomination in the history of constitutional law and Democrats are powerless to stop him. If and when that happens, Democrats will have no one to blame but themselves because they set the precedent that Republicans will follow. Back in 2013, when then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., invoked the nuclear option for lifetime judicial appointments, The Post reported that after the vote Reid and his leadership team held a victory party with liberal activists afterward in a room just off the Senate floor. Lets hope they enjoyed it. Because the partys over. Thiessen, a fellow with the American Enterprise Institute and former chief speechwriter to President George W. Bush, writes a weekly online column for The Post. HOUSTON Former President George H.W. Bush was released Monday from Houston Methodist Hospital where he received treatment for pneumonia for more than two weeks. Bush, 92, was experiencing breathing difficulties when he was admitted Jan. 14. During his treatment, which included a stay in intensive care, doctors inserted a breathing tube and connected him to a ventilator. He is thankful for the many prayers and kind messages he received during his stay, as well as the world-class care that both his doctors and nurses provided, Bush spokesman Jim McGrath said Monday. Bush has been allowed to return to his Houston home, McGrath said. The nations 41st president was joined at the hospital by his 91-year-old wife, Barbara, who spent five days there for treatment of bronchitis until her release a week ago. The couples 72-year marriage is the longest of any presidential couple in U.S. history and the former first lady was with her husband during much of his stay, including when she was hospitalized for her own treatment. They were essentially therapy for each other, Dr. Clint Doerr, one of the physicians treating Bush, said last week. Bush, who served as president from 1989 to 1993, has a form of Parkinsons disease and uses a motorized scooter or a wheelchair for mobility. He was hospitalized in 2015 in Maine after falling at his summer home and breaking a bone in his neck. He was also hospitalized in Houston the previous December for about a week for shortness of breath. He spent Christmas 2012 in intensive care for a bronchitis-related cough and other issues. Despite his loss of mobility, Bush celebrated his 90th birthday by making a tandem parachute jump in Kennebunkport, Maine. Last summer, Bush led a group of 40 wounded warriors on a fishing trip at the helm of his speedboat, three days after his 92nd birthday celebration. George Herbert Walker Bush, born June 12, 1924, in Milton, Massachusetts, also served as a congressman, CIA director and Ronald Reagans vice president. SANTA FE A House committee on Monday endorsed a proposal to boost funding for education especially early childhood education by diverting more money from New Mexicos land grant permanent fund. But the proposed constitutional amendment still has a long way to go. It must clear two more House committees before reaching the House floor, and then it would go to the Senate, where similar efforts have died in recent years. If approved by the Legislature, the measure would go on the 2018 general-election ballot, bypassing Gov. Susana Martinez, a Republican. Mondays debate fell along party lines Democrats in favor and the House Education Committee supported the proposal on a 7-6 vote. Its the best investment New Mexico can make, said Rep. Antonio Moe Maestas, D-Albuquerque. He and the other co-sponsor, Rep. Javier Martinez, D-Albuquerque, said early childhood education is one of the most effective ways to help children in poverty. Its cheaper to make sure they enter school ready to learn rather than catch up later, they said. But much of Mondays debate focused on whether the proposal would eat into the principal of the $15 billion land grant permanent fund. Opponents said economic conditions volatile oil and gas prices, which contribute to the fund mean it may not be sustainable to increase distributions, no matter how worthy the new services would be. Rep. Dennis Roch, R-Logan, suggested renaming it the land grant temporary fund if the proposal moves forward. Rep. Jimmie Hall, R-Albuquerque, questioned whether the money would be put to good use. Theres no accountability, to speak of, in this, he said. Maestas said he doesnt believe the increased distribution would harm the principal of the fund. The state now uses about 5 percent of the fund for public schools, hospitals and other beneficiaries, and his proposal would boost it to 6 percent an extra 1 percentage point. At the current rate of 5 percent, the state expects to get an annual distribution from the fund of about $689 million in the coming fiscal year. Maestas said the fund is generating double-digit gains, well above the 6 percent he proposed. And the distributions would be suspended if the land grant fund fell below $12 billion, based on a five-year average. The extra 1 percent would generate $130 million to $150 million a year. Early on, some of the money would be used to help school districts fund general education programs, supporters said. After a phase-in period, all of the money would go toward early childhood programs. The proposal now heads to two other House committees: the Local Government, Elections, Land Grants and Cultural Affairs Committee and the Judiciary Committee. SEOUL, South Korea Plans to deploy an American anti-missile battery to South Korea and the growing North Korean threat will be at the top of James Mattiss agenda this week when the new defense secretary visits South Korea and Japan on his first foreign trip. Mattis, a retired Marine Corps general nicknamed Mad Dog, will meet with Han Min-koo, the South Korean defense minister, in Seoul Thursday before heading to Tokyo. Han is expected to reiterate South Koreas commitment to hosting the Terminal High Altitude Aerial Defense system, or THAAD. But with China exacting economic revenge on South Korea over its decision to host the missile battery and the South Korean government in crisis, some in Seoul now have jitters about the plan. Moon Jae-in, the progressive candidate currently running at the top of the presidential polls, has said decisions on the THAAD deployment should wait until the next South Korean administration is in place. That could take months, with the constitutional court now deciding whether to uphold the national assemblys motion to impeach President Park Geun-hye, who made the decision to host THAAD, for her role in a sensational political scandal. If the court forces her from office, elections must be held within 60 days. Otherwise, they will take place in December as scheduled. In the meantime, the Chinese government which has made no secret of its opposition to the THAAD plan is trying to convince South Korean political leaders to change their minds. Although both Washington and Seoul insist it is to guard against the threat of North Korean missiles, Beijing views the system as another attempt to curtail its military expansion. In recent weeks, China has slapped a number of trade sanctions on South Korea in an apparent effort to dissuade Seoul from going ahead with the deployment. China is one of the biggest reasons why people are opposing THAAD, and I would say that its based on reasonable concerns, said Kim Dong-yub of the Institute for Far Eastern Studies in Seoul. Just go into a department store and you can feel the change, he said, referring to the sudden drop in Chinese tourists coming to South Korea. In the last month alone, China has banned imports of South Korean bidet toilet seats and South Korean cosmetics, which are hugely popular among young women who love Korean dramas. Classical musicians have joined K-pop stars in having visas denied and concerts canceled. Meanwhile, department stores in China run by Lotte, the South Korean retail group, have been subject to a sudden flurry of safety and hygiene inspections and tax audits, although Beijing rejects any suggestion this is related to THAAD. Lotte owns the country club 200 miles from Seoul earmarked for the THAAD battery, which it will swap with the government for another parcel of land. Lotte appeared to be going slow on the internal procedures needed to be completed before the swap can take place, a possible sign it was worried about the impact on its business in China. It has more than 150 stores in China and is currently building a huge retail and amusement park complex in the southwestern city of Chengdu . Chinese tourists accounted for more than 70 percent of Lotte Duty Frees sales in the first quarter of last year. It is true that we are sandwiched between our role as a South Korean enterprise, South Koreas relations with China and possible economic loss, the Yonhap News Agency quoted a senior Lotte official as saying. Small South Korean companies are suffering, too. There has been a sharp decrease in Chinese tourists, said Kim Seo-kyung, who owns a clothing store in Myeongdong, a fashion district usually teeming with Chinese shoppers. Maybe its because of THAAD and because the relationship between South Korea and China has soured, Kim said. She estimated that her revenues had fallen about 40 percent since last year. Businesses around South Korea reported a sharp drop in tourist numbers over the Lunar New Year holiday this past weekend. American proponents of THAAD say they hope South Korean authorities will not waver. The THAAD is a far more effective ballistic missile defense system than anything South Korea has or will have for decades, said Bruce Klingner, a northeast Asia specialist at the Heritage Foundation. To not deploy THAAD is to choose to put South Korea and U.S. forces stationed there at grave risk to North Korean nuclear, chemical, and biological attack. Former president Barack Obama rejected the idea Monday that President Donald Trump had based his immigration executive order on a policy adopted by his own administration, and endorsed the protests that have been taking place across the country in response to the new restrictions. Trump has said that his move to ban the entry of migrants from seven Muslim-majority countries into the U.S., and to suspend temporarily the admission of refugees, was based in part by a decision in 2011 by then-President Obama to ban the admission of Iraqis to the U.S. after evidence surfaced that two Iraqis seeking resettlement had been linked to terrorist activity in their home country. Former Obama administration officials have denied that there was ever a halt to the awarding of visas to Iraqis, though the processing of these applications slowed after they were subject to more intense scrutiny. Obama, who has remained publicly silent about his successor since leaving office a week-and-a-half ago, pledged before leaving office to only speak about Trumps policy moves where I think our core values may be at stake. On Monday his spokesman Kevin Lewis said in a statement, With regard to comparisons to President Obamas foreign policy decisions, as weve heard before, the President fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion. Alluding to the widespread protests taking place in major airports and cities in response to the new immigration policy, Lewis said that Obama is heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country. In his final official speech as president, he spoke about the important role of citizen and how all Americans have a responsibility to be the guardians of our democracy not just during an election but every day, Lewis said. Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake. FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. One by one, a judge detailed the 22 charges against an Alaskan man accused of killing five people and wounding six others in the Florida airport shooting spree. Then, Esteban Santiago pleaded not guilty. Santiago, 26, stood in chains Monday in a red max custody inmate jumpsuit as U.S. Magistrate Judge Barry Seltzer took the unusual step of reading the entire 17-page indictment aloud in court with repeated emphasis on the victims names. After each count, Santiago said he understood and was asked if he realized he could get the death penalty if convicted. Yes, I do, he replied. Santiago, an Iraq war veteran who lived in Anchorage, Alaska, was taken into custody shortly after investigators say he opened fire in a baggage claim area Jan. 6 at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. He is being held without bail on charges of causing death or bodily harm at an international airport, causing death during a crime of violence and using a firearm during a crime of violence. His court-appointed attorneys declined comment after Mondays hearing. According to the FBI, Santiago flew on a one-way ticket from Alaska to Fort Lauderdale with a 9mm Walther handgun and two ammunition clips in a case in checked luggage. Authorities say he picked up the case, loaded the gun in a bathroom and came out firing randomly at other travelers. Santiago was arrested after firing 15 shots. The FBI says he told agents he did the shooting because of some form of government mind control, later saying he was inspired by videos and chatrooms linked to the Islamic State. The indictment contains no terrorism-related charges despite those claims. Its also not clear why Santiago came to Fort Lauderdale. The FBI previously said Santiago visited its office in Anchorage last year complaining about hearing voices and supposed CIA mind control, which led to Anchorage police temporarily seizing his gun and Santiagos brief stay in a mental hospital. Records at the Alaska Psychiatric Institute show Santiago was given anti-anxiety medications but no prescriptions for drugs that would treat serious mental conditions such as schizophrenia. He was released after a five-day stay with no restrictions that might prevent him from possessing a gun, and his weapon was returned by police. That same gun was used in the airport shooting. A trial date has not yet been set. ___ Follow Curt Anderson on Twitter: http://twitter.com/miamicurt BIRMINGHAM, Ala. In a story Jan. 30 about the reaction of Trump supporters to his travel order, The Associated Press misspelled the name of a Maryland woman. The womans name is Judith Wilkenloh, not Wilkenroh. A corrected version of the story is below: Trump supporters say they are happy with immigration order Supporters of President Donald Trump say they are happy with his executive order temporarily banning refugees and immigrants from some Muslim countries By JAY REEVES Associated Press BIRMINGHAM, Ala. Dont talk about airport protests in Trump Country. In the places that propelled Donald Trump to the White House, the presidents fans couldnt be much happier with his executive order temporarily banning refugees and immigrants from seven mostly Muslim countries. Trump promised to put America first during the campaign, his supporters say, and hes doing it. That includes securing the nations borders and doing everything possible to prevent terrorists from entering the U.S. In their view, Democrats and liberal snowflakes and soft-hearted do-gooders just need to calm down. Trump is being Trump. Hes going to do what he says and says what he does, said Barbara Van Syckel, 66, of Sterling Heights, Michigan. Thats a little frightening for some people. Two of Barbara Woods three sons served in the military after Sept. 11, and shes all for Trump and his immigration order. The president is fulfilling his campaign promises to the best of his ability. I applaud him for that, said Wood, who lives in suburban Birmingham. Thousands of people have demonstrated at U.S. airports since Trump issued an order Friday blocking people from seven countries in the Middle East and Africa from entering the United States and suspending refugee immigration for four months. The protests included a gathering of several hundred people in Birmingham, the largest airport in a Southern state that Trump carried with ease. Washingtons state attorney general filed a lawsuit over the order, and a federal judge in New York issued an emergency order temporarily banning deportations of people from the seven nations. Some Republican lawmakers have questioned the order, with Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina saying they fear it will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. Yet none of that criticism matters much in Trump Country, those states and counties where Trump claimed the votes to win the Electoral College despite losing the popular vote to Democrat Hillary Clinton. Retired social-service worker Judith Wilkenloh says the order shows Trump means what he says. Hes just unafraid. Hes just going ahead like a locomotive, and I like him more and more every time he does something, said Wilkenloh, 72, of Fredrick, Maryland. Trump supporters said they are happy with the immigration order and the ideas behind it. Some Trump backers said they might do things a little differently than the president, but their overall reaction is positive. Were not the worlds Social Security office. Were not here to take care of people, said Jim Buterbaugh, the head of custodial work and maintenance at a public school in the western Montana town of White Hall. I understand that people need help, but there are other ways besides bringing them here. Buterbaugh, who has actively fought the re-settlement of Syrians in Montana, was frustrated that Trumps moratorium did not include countries such as Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. The executive order also did not include the creation of safe zones for refugees, which he favors. Mike Honaker has some misgivings, too. A Trump supporter in a struggling West Virginia coal town, he didnt think blitzing everybody with an order that spread chaos around the world was the right way to go. But Honaker worries about terrorism and does not have a problem with Trumps plan to screen refugees more thoroughly. Overall, Honaker likes 85 percent of what the president has done so far. I think hes shaking it up, the whole of Washington, D.C., and half the country, like he said he would, he said. Attorney Terri King, 56, said Trumps order has widespread support in her Rust Belt city of Middletown, Ohio. The only people who dont support it are those who are paid to protest on the left and some Democrats, said King, an also-ran in a GOP congressional race last year. Republican Scott Presler of Virginia Beach, Virginia, likes Trumps order so much he thought about staging an airport protest of his own in support of the president. Presler, who is gay, said he wanted to go to Virginias Dulles International Airport to support the presidents immigration ban while carrying a sign that said Radical Islam Murders Gays. But he said he stopped short of making the trip out of fear for his safety. Im a compassionate human being, said Presler, 28. Im a humanitarian. But Im also compassionate toward the health and well-being of the American people. We have 50,000 homeless veterans in this country. We have our own poor and suffering. ___ Associated Press writers Dave Dishneau in Hagerstown, Maryland; Claire Galofaro in Louisville, Kentucky; Ben Finley in Norfolk, Virginia; Dan Sewell in Cincinnati; Mike Householder in Sterling Heights, Michigan; Jacob Jordan in Atlanta; and Alanna Durkin Richer in Richmond, Virginia, contributed to this report. PHOENIX Authorities say a 16-year-old boy has been booked in a shooting at a west Phoenix apartment that left one man dead and three others injured. Police say the shooting occurred Sunday morning when as many as four suspects went to the apartment for a home invasion. Gunfire was exchanged between the suspects and people who were in the apartment. One of the suspects was fatally shot. Two women and a 17-year-old girl also suffered injuries that werent life-threatening. Police say the identity of the 16-year-old boy who was arrested in the shooting wont be publicly released because he is a juvenile. AIR FORCE ACADEMY, Colo. The Air Force Academy has agreed to pay $25,000 in legal expenses to a religious freedom advocacy group to settle a lawsuit over the groups request for records. The academy and the Military Religious Freedom Foundation announced the settlement Monday. The foundation says the academy also agreed to broaden its search for records the foundation requested. Foundation president and founder Mikey Weinstein (WYN-steen) says the documents concern the academys internal responses to him, his family and the organization. Weinstein is a persistent critic of the school, accusing it of favoring evangelical Christianity. His lawsuit accused the academy of delaying some documents and withholding others. The academy says it didnt admit any wrongdoing in the settlement. It says it had a backlog of records requests when Weinstein filed his in 2011. DENVER Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper is urging President Donald Trump to rescind his executive order temporarily banning refugees. Hickenlooper said Monday the order serves as a powerful recruiting tool for the U.S. enemies because it bans nearly all citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations. He also says it needlessly antagonizes U.S. allies. Trump says the U.S. must protect itself against extremists looking to attack Americans and U.S. interests. Hickenlooper said that the U.S. must work to screen refugees as thoroughly as possible. But in a statement, he said that refugees coming here already undergo the worlds toughest vetting program. The Democratic governor also said a vast majority of refugees admitted to the U.S. are families, especially women and children. SPRINGFIELD -- First-term Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner and long-serving Democratic House Speaker Michael Madigan agree that Illinois long-term budget deficits are a major threat to the vitality of the state. Where they diverge is how to address those deficits, and that fundamental disagreement has been at the root of an impasse that has plagued the state for the past two years. Rauner came into office vowing to shake up Springfield, which he argued was controlled by special interests and entrenched politicians, namely Madigan, whos been speaker for all but two of the past 34 years and also leads the state Democratic Party. The new governors prescription was the turnaround agenda, a set of policies, such as changes to workers compensation laws and collective bargaining rights, that he said would jump-start Illinois economy and bring more money into the states coffers. While he acknowledged that tax increases of some kind would be needed to balance the budget, he said hed only sign on if the Democratic-controlled legislature agreed to some of his proposals. Madigan, meanwhile, argued that much of what the governor wanted ran afoul of the Democratic Partys core values. He accused Rauner of holding the budget-making process hostage to advance his personal agenda. The speakers prescription has been a combination of spending cuts and tax increases to bring the budget into line. Madigan has said Democrats dont have the votes to pass a tax increase on their own. More recently, hes proposed a 50 percent reduction in corporate income taxes, coupled with provisions to make sure every company pays something, and increased investments in higher education and infrastructure to spur economic growth. But Madigan isnt tying that to budget negotiations. In separate interviews with the JG-TC Springfield Bureau, Rauner and Madigan showed that their positions havent significantly changed since the last comprehensive state budget expired after June 30, 2015. The reality is our system in Illinois has been broken for a long time and has needed significant changes, Rauner said. The reason I ran for governor was to change it. We need more jobs. We need better funding for schools. We need to have balanced budgets. Among the changes Rauner has pushed are term limits for elected officials and an independent commission to redraw legislative districts once a decade. He said those actions would send a message to businesses and taxpayers that Illinois is changing. Madigan and many Democrats counter that those ideas have nothing to do with the budget and should be addressed separately. The speaker notes that, despite their political differences, he was able to reach compromises with Govs. Jim Thompson, Jim Edgar and George Ryan, the previous card-carrying Republicans who held the office during his tenure. All three of them were very successful in working with a Democratic legislature, identifying governmental problems, acknowledging political differences, and then working through all of that and coming to agreements that would be in the best interest of the people of the state of Illinois, Madigan said, adding that Rauner could learn from his GOP predecessors. Both leaders said theyve attempted to compromise, often to no avail. One situation that typifies these attempts was a proposal early in Rauners tenure to privatize some operations of the state Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity. Madigan said House Democrats supported the effort but wanted to put in a three-year sunset provision to re-examine the setup because similar arrangements in other states, including Wisconsin, have run into problems and scandals. Rauner said the Democrats proposal might have made for a good headline but wouldnt have been effective because the new organization wouldnt be able to attract talented people if they thought it might go away in a few years. Instead, Rauner helped launched an independent, not-for-profit corporation last year to work with the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity to attract businesses to the state. Looking back at the past two years, neither Rauner nor Madigan could offer an example of something he could have done differently that might have brought the standoff to a swifter end. But looking forward, they both said they have some degree of optimism that a resolution may be in sight. Rauner said hes heartened by the Senates discussion of a grand bargain on the budget and other issues, including some changes to workers compensation laws and term limits for legislative leaders. Hes also encouraged that House Democratic leaders are talking about the need for economic growth and that the House passed a bill at the end of the previous legislative session that wouldve required voter approval for future property tax increases. While hes made specific items on his agenda prerequisites to a budget deal in the past, Rauner said hes not insisting now that any specific item be included. The critical thing is that whatever compromise we work out, it needs to be real and needs to really make a difference, Rauner said. Madigan, meanwhile, said his optimism is a little tempered with reality and hope based on his four decades in Springfield. When people want to be reasonable, you can come to an agreement, he said. Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz added a coffee magnates voice to the chorus of tech industry executives who spoke out over the weekend against President Donald Trumps travel ban order, announcing plans for the coffee behemoth to hire 10,000 refugees over five years in 75 countries, initially focusing on those who served as interpreters or as support personnel for U.S. military. In an impassioned letter Sunday to Starbucks employees, Schultz reiterated the companys backing of Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Sen. Dick Durbins, D-Ill., support of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. He also described the companys work of building bridges, not walls, with Mexico following Trumps border wall directive Wednesday, and shared his worries about Trumps order temporarily prohibiting U.S. entry for migrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries. I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise, Schultz opened his letter. We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question. Schultzs memo to employees spoke out against Trumps policies at a time when many CEOs have touted the jobs they will create or stayed largely quiet as Trump known for using Twitter to lash out at his critics began his presidency. It was also notable for the extent to which he openly acknowledged the anxieties and concerns his employees have been expressing. Schultz said that he and Kevin Johnson, who will replace Schultz as CEO in April, are hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack, and want to use a faster, more immediate form of communication to engage with you on matters that concern us all. Schultz went on to address actions he said would ensure you are clear that we will neither stand by, nor stand silent, as the uncertainty around the new administrations actions grows with each passing day. One of these, he said, would be to hire more refugees. We are doubling down on this commitment by working with our equity market employees as well as joint venture and licensed market partners in a concerted effort to welcome and seek opportunities for those fleeing war, violence, persecution and discrimination, he said. Schultz said Starbucks would begin by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel. (In sharing the letter, a company spokesman said Starbucks would not comment further on it.) Schultz also reiterated the support the company expressed in a letter last week for dreamers, or undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children. He tried to reassure employees they would be able to return to the companys health benefits without waiting for open enrollment if the Affordable Care Act ends up being repealed. And he detailed the companys relationship with Mexico, where it has 600 stores and sources coffee: We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. For many CEOs, a letter with such lofty rhetoric addressing political hot-button matters would be unusual, but not for Schultz. He has long been more willing than most CEOs of companies Starbucks size to speak out on societal issues, fueling a brand identity carefully constructed around corporate responsibility and community mindedness. In 2013, Schultz told an investor he could sell his shares if he didnt like the companys stance on same-sex marriage, and he has been credited for company programs that have offered college education benefits and hired young, minority workers and veterans. Other efforts have been panned, such as his Race Together campaign to get baristas and customers talking about race. Many saw it as tone deaf, an overreach in bringing political topics into a business transaction. In March, Starbucks put together a series of online videos designed to teach lessons on civic engagement; he also spoke openly at Starbucks annual meeting for investors about the lack of civility and leadership in the country. There are moments when Ive had a hard time recognizing who we are and who we are becoming, Schultz told shareholders. We are facing a test not only of our character but of our morality as a people. As a result, he has repeatedly faced questions about whether hes interested in higher office. In an op-ed in the New York Times last August, Schultz said he has no intention of entering the presidential fray, though in a September interview on CNN, he didnt entirely rule out a run. Im still a young man. Lets see what the future holds. Later, Schultz added, I determined for myself that at this time, I can do more as a private citizen and as the CEO of a public company to advance the causes that I think are important for the country and for our company. In his letter Sunday, Schultz did not just express his own concerns; he also made a direct appeal to employees to get involved in the political process. If there is any lesson to be learned over the last year, its that your voice and your vote matter more than ever. We are all obligated to ensure our elected officials hear from us individually and collectively, Schultz wrote. Starbucks is doing its part; we need you to use the collective power of your voices to do the same while respecting the diverse viewpoints of the 90 million customers who visit our stores in more than 25,000 locations around the world. He closed by trying to reassure employees. We are in business to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time whether that neighborhood is in a Red State or a Blue State; a Christian country or a Muslim country; a divided nation or a united nation, Schultz wrote. That will not change. You have my word on that. MEC India has recently been awarded with the media duties for The Hindu Group, after robust rounds of scouting. The account will be handled by MECs Chennai branch. Speaking on appointing MEC as a media partner, Sathya Sriram, AVP, Marketing & Strategy, The Hindu Group, said, MECs integrated approach combined with their understanding of consumers and how they engage with our brands make them the perfect partner to handle our mandate. These are important and exciting times for The Hindu Group. We are happy to on-board MEC in this journey. Commenting on the win, Rajendra J Prasad, General Manager, MEC, said, The Hindu is a prestigious brand with an inspiring legacy. We are eager to combine our talent and range of services to deliver standout brand work and outstanding business results. Kasturi & Sons is a 138-year old institution and Indias leading media house, best known for its flagship English-language newspaper, The Hindu, since 1878. It was the first media house in India to start online news operations and has multiple daily newspapers, magazines and online portals, including The Hindu Business Line, Sportstar, and Young World. Roca, the leader in bathroom space has appointed K.E. Ranganathan as Managing Director (MD) for its India Business. Ranganathan joined the company in September 2016 as President Sales & Marketing. Prior to joining Roca Bathroom Products Pvt. Ltd, Ranganathan served as the Managing Director of TVS Electronics Ltd and as Operating Partner of TVS Capital, a private equity player during the years 2012 to 2016. During his earlier stint in Parryware business in Murugappa Group, from 1994 till 2008, he served as the CEO of Parryware business and later was instrumental in forging the JV with Roca during the year 2005. Ranga served as the Managing Director of the JV till 2008. He is credited with result orientated approach that reflected in sales growth at a CAGR of 25% during his earlier stint with Parryware. Ranganathan comes with more than 33 years of experience in finance, accounting, business planning, strategy, Marketing & Sales. He had held senior positions in various companies in Murugappa & TVS Group. Ranganathan in his earlier role with Roca was responsible for creating new strategies and opportunities to drive growth and further consolidate the companys leadership position. He is replacing Indias MD- Pau Abello who is moving to another senior position within Roca group and will be leading Rocas business in Latin America as Senior Managing Director. Commenting on his role, K.E. Ranganathan, Managing Director, Roca Bathroom Products Pvt Ltd, said, We have a very exciting business opportunity ahead of us. The Indian market is expected to grow at 15 per cent and further, we have an additional opportunity from exporting our products to global markets. We are well poised to ride the growth curve and propel the brand to the next level. Starcom India, part of Publicis Media India, has won the digital duties of Mahindra Holidays & Resorts India. The business will be powered by Performics.Convonix, the digital marketing company integrated under the Starcom brand in India, which will handle all performance media duties on digital, inclusive of paid media, SEO, analytics for Mahindra Holidays & Resorts India. Mahindra Holidays & Resorts India is part of the $17.8 billion multinational Mahindra Group. Mahindra Holidays, together with Holiday Club Resorts Oy, Finland, is the largest vacation ownership company in the world, outside of the US. The company provides unique and memorable leisure holiday experiences to its over 207,000 member families when they holiday at its 46 resorts in India and abroad. Giridhar Seetharam, Chief Marketing Officer, Mahindra Holidays, commented, We are very happy to have Performics.Convonix on board for our digital marketing mandate and hope to maximise returns on our digital spends through this partnership. Their experience and expertise across all digital fronts will further enable us to provide better customer experience using digital technologies. On winning the account, Pallav Jain, Co-Chief Executive Officer of Performics.Convonix, said, We are pleased to be the strategic partner on digital for Mahindra Holidays. A holiday is about beautiful, memorable experiences. The digitally astute traveller goes online to judge for himself. With the rapid growth of the internet, customers face an influx of excessive information.The brand Mahindra Holidays is about unparalleled family vacation experiences and we will help themenhance their digital engagement with their prospects and customers. What we bring is strategic direction and flawless execution to their digital plans. Worlds No.1 motoring brand, TopGear, hosted the 9th edition of its highly coveted TopGear Awards at Sofitel Hotel, Mumbai. This prestigious and one of a kind auto-lifestyle award celebrates innovation in the automobile industry and was a power-packed event for the speed aficionados as they saw the best of automobiles from 2016 being honored at the ceremony. The night witnessed the deserving metals being felicitated with the most recognized symbol of excellence in the automotive world, The Stig. The awards were attended by the creme de la creme from the automobile industry. Speaking about TopGear Magazine awards, Mr. Deepak Lamba, CEO, Worldwide Media said, TopGear Magazine awards receive tremendous appreciation and love from our patrons every year. This year, we host the 9th edition of the same and continue its legacy of being the most coveted awards in the auto space. The nominations were chosen based on two crucial parameters, i.e. the automobile has to be launched in India within a year of its first international launch and it has to be an all-new model, or an update of an existing one which makes it shift categories. Additionally, this year TopGear introduced 3 new categories, namely the All-rounder of the year, Lifestyle vehicle of the year and Off-Roader of the year. Last year the Car of the Year was bagged by Audi RS6, while the Bike of the Year was the Ducati Scrambler. The winners are selected by the magazines writers and road-testers who live with the cars through the year and subject them to a variety of situations and environments. This rigorous and disciplined process to choosing the deserving winners has made TopGear the most credible automotive title. Commenting on the 9th edition of TopGear magazine awards, Girish Karkera, Editor, BBC TopGear Magazine said, It's been a rather interesting mix of cars and bikes that we ended up short listing for the 9th edition of BBC TopGear Magazine India Awards. It was a tough task zeroing in on some of the categories like SUV, urban car and limo of the year. But I strongly feel we have managed to select the more deserving machine. At TopGear we celebrate the joy and fun of driving. All our winners, irrespective of price and engine capacity, have that core value. They truly deserve the Stig. The red carpet was graced by popular celebrities and renowned personalities who dazzled the night with their presence. The award ceremony was a visual fiesta with colorful performances and the winning new metals of 2016 on display. The event was felicitated by The Park by Lodha, Hindustan University, Victorinox , Big Boy Toys, SBI Bank, Sofitel BKC and Pause Wines. Winners of 9th TopGear Magazine Awards 2017 l All-rounder of the year Maruti-Suzuki Vitara Brezza l Lifestyle vehicle of the year Isuzu D-Max V-Cross l Off-roader of the year Jeep Wrangler l Engine of the year Porsche Macan (2-litre petrol) l Luxury SUV of the year Mercedes-Benz GLC l Entertainer of the year Ford Mustang l Hot Hatch of the year Volkswagen Polo GTI l Value car of the year Volvo S90 l Man of the year CV Raman, Executive Director (Engg), Maruti Suzuki l Quickest car of the year Nissan GT-R l Limousine of the year Skoda Superb l Scooter of the year Aprilia SR 150 l Supersport bike of the year MV Agusta F3 l Touring bike of the year Kawasaki Versys 650 l Super-car of the year Audi R8 V10 Plus l Green car of the year Honda Accord Hybrid l Design of the year Triumph Thruxton R l Family car of the year Toyota Innova Crysta l Urban SUV of the year Hyundai Tucson l Compact car of the year Tata Tiago l Roadster bike of the year Ducati XDiavel S l Bike of the year MV Agusta F3 l Car of the year Skoda Superb l Readers choice bike of the year Royal Enfield Himalayan Readers choice car of the year Maruti Vitara Brezza We can help you make sense of the agribusiness industry, extending from chemicals and fertilizers used as inputs into agriculture, to the commodities, food and by-products that are an output to farming, with policy and regulation applied at every step of the value chain. Opening Introduction When you think of great driving destinations, Uttar Pradesh is probably the last place to cross the mind. Anyone who has been to this quintessentially Indian state would probably know that even in a taxi it can be a frustrating experience; the traffic is deadly, the pot-holed roads are deadlier, all the honking is like a symphony that reaches a rhythmic climax as you approach busy junctions and worst of all, the traffic cops, more often than not, are royally ignored. So what better car to drive from Varanasi to the capital city Lucknow than the truly iconic Ford Mustang . Yes, the traffic was bad at times and yes, the roads were too broken for any sensible human to want to drive this long-nose, low-slung muscle car (we did, anyway). All said and done, it was a lot of fun and who said we were sensible? The Car One look at the Mustang is all it takes to comprehend why its such a celebrated piece of motoring the world over. Even though it borrows from its classic look of the 1960s, the Mustang totally nails it when it comes to preserving that classic coupe stance and merging it with modern-day design cues. The proportions are spot on and so it the homage to the original Pony car, with signature Mustang elements like the long bonnet, the unmistakable shark-bite grille and those triple-strip taillights. Inside, Ford has gone ahead with a look that clearly nods to the past, marrying an old-school dash design with plenty of modern materials and metallic accents. The air vents and the dials, for instance, look pretty much the same as ones in the earlier Mustangs. Sadly, there are some hard surfaces and plasticky bits that take gloss off the overall appeal details such as the steering wheel buttons and plastic toggles on the center console cannot disguise the Mustangs blue-collar roots. Whats made the Mustang so appealing isnt its tire-shredding performance, but its broad range of capabilities. Having driven it on the BIC last year, we have established that its great on a race track (you can read about it here). Now to see if its as good a road car on our 300-odd km drive from Varanasi to Lucknow. The Drive Its five in the morning and I have beaten the alarm. However, its well after 7pm that we get to grips with the Mustang and leave for Lucknow. Heading out of Varanasi, driving through the outskirts is pretty uneventful as the elevation is flat and the roads are properly dusty. There are plenty of diversions and roads under constant construction. About an hour into the drive, things start to get prettier. Dusty roads make way for some typical countryside vistas flanked by decades-old farm houses and fields of yellow. The road to National Highway 19 which felt narrow before, tightens even further. I was initially skeptical about the Mustangs mettle for the task before it: too wide, too low with simply too much power for these single lane roads. To my surprise, the Mustang felt at home within minutes after getting behind the wheel. First off, the driving position is simply great and there is vastly better visibility than what I was foreseeing. The V8 motor, of course, is the definitive charm of the Mustang GT and it certainly doesnt disappoint. The 5-litre Coyote V8, in fact, fires up with purpose before burbling away on light to medium throttle. It picks up revs relatively cleanly, building speed gradually as you head towards its 6,500rpm peak power. What becomes exceedingly apparent is that the Mustang is one machine that can get you into trouble easily. Despite the strong top-end grunt, it picks up speed in a surprisingly linear manner. You dont realize how fast you are going until you glance at the speedo or notice the vehicles shrinking rather quickly in the rearview mirror. We never felt the need for more straight-line grunt for sure. That said, we would certainly like more volume out of those exhaust tips on light to medium throttle, the Mustang is surprisingly quiet though it is at its songful best when properly floored. Perhaps the biggest surprise of the day was the compliance with which the Mustang muscled through the shockingly bad roads we encountered throughout the drive. The ride quality in fact was eminently comfortable despite the low profile tyres and the stiff suspension. The Mustang rides on non-adjustable dampers, so even though we switched between various drive modes (Normal, Sport+ and Track) to alter engine and gearbox response, we couldnt firm up or soften the suspension. Complaints? Hardly. It may not be as sharp to drive or as well put together as its European rivals but the fact remains that the Mustang offers cracking value. And as we eventually figured after driving it over broken roads all day without fatigue, the Mustang impresses as a bona fide grand tourer as well. Pictures by: Ameya Dandekar Ford Mustang N/A Onwards Ford | Ford Mustang | Mustang There is a guaranteed applause line in Lin-Manuel Mirandas hit musical about the life of Alexander Hamilton. The Caribbean-born title character, still just a lieutenant colonel in the Continental Army, and the Marquis de Lafayette, a Frenchman fighting for American independence, rhapsodize about their influence and effectiveness at the Battle of Yorktown: Immigrants, we get the job done! The crowd at Broadways Richard Rodgers Theater typically goes wild. Most nights since Novembers election, the applause takes the form of a standing ovation. However, Miranda and his audience may not have as firm a grasp as they think on Hamiltons views of judicial power, especially as it applies to immigration law. Whatever your opinion of President Trumps recent executive order banning refugees from seven countries, the subsequent protests and judicial response raise important questions about how the law in general is designed to work and the role of the courts in ensuring that it does. Hamilton believed that crowdsthose who cheer at Broadway musicals, demonstrate at airports, or salute poorly attended inaugural addressesthreatened the stability of the law. Judges were granted life tenure specifically so that they could resist the political pressure of the mob. In Federalist 78, Hamilton wrote that lifetime appointments would provide members of the judiciary with an excellent barrier to the encroachments and oppressions of the representative body . . . . And it is the best expedient which can be devised in any government, to secure a steady, upright, and impartial administration of the laws. It must be painful for Democrats and immigration advocates to have the full power of executive authority suddenly turned against them and their interests. The National Immigration Law Centerone of many advocacy groups protesting Trumps executive orderstill has posted on its website an information fact sheet explaining that the president has broad authority when it comes to immigration law. Posted in 2014 to support President Obamas use of unilateral action, the fact sheet reads like a permission slip for Trumps order from this past week. We have become a nation obsessed with outcomes. When it comes to the law and how it functions, however, the national discourse could do with more focus on process. The courts should be evaluating whether the presidentany presidenthas the power to regulate immigration through executive order. Too often, court decisions hinge upon whether a particular judge likes a particular exercise of that power. Liberals and immigration advocates are applauding U.S. District Court judge Ann M. Donnellys Saturday night decision, staying President Trumps executive order. Few, if any, seemed bothered by President Obamas 2014 executive order halting deportations and legalizing the status of many undocumented immigrants. There is no liberty, Baron de Montesquieu wrote in The Spirit of Laws in 1748, if the power of judging be not separated from the legislative and executive powers. The French political philosopher, influential to the revolutionary generation of 1776 and the framers of the U.S. Constitution that eventually followed in 1787, might be surprised by the situation in American jurisprudence today. In far too many cases, the judiciary has essentially become both legislature and executive. Its no knock on immigrants to say that a nation should have an immigration policy, and that the policy should not be the sole province of one elected official, acting alone. It would be grand if Congress could reestablish its legislative function in this area. But if the judiciary could reestablish its immunity to the pressures of popular political opinion, a playwright might one day say, Judges, they get the job done! Thats a line that would be worthy of applause. Photo by Chis Ryan/iStock GARRETT CHEEN/THE LIVINGSTON ENTERPRISE/AP PHOTO In February 2013, Utah governor Gary Herbert canceled plans to establish a state-run exchange for individual health insurance, bringing to 34 the number of states opting out of that essential piece of the Affordable Care Act. Meanwhile, another part of the law, an expansion of Medicaid rolls, is being defied by more than 20 states. Having survived congressional logrolling, Tea Party rallies, a presidential election, and a Supreme Court case, Obamacare may yet be sunk by a resurgent force that many had thought dead: federalism. The new federalist fervor is coming from both sides of the aisle. Among the governors refusing to create state health-insurance exchanges are two Democrats (in Missouri and Montana), while the Democratic governor of President Obamas home state, Illinois, is willing only to partner with the federal government in setting up an exchange. Nor is the resistance limited to Obamacare. Last November, Californias Democratic governor, Jerry Brown, warned federal gendarmes to stop interfering with his states medical-marijuana lawechoing former Massachusetts representative Barney Frank, who had championed medical marijuana as a states rights issue for years. Such deep-blue states as New York and Massachusetts have tried (unsuccessfully) to block the Secure Communities Act, which requires every arrested persons fingerprints to be run through federal immigration databases. The Democratic governor of locavore Vermont is locked in a battle with the feds over who gets to determine the future of the Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant: the state legislature or the presidential appointees on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. In March 2012, Yale law professor Heather Gerken took to the pages of Democracy to urge her fellow progressives to embrace federalism because state and local governments were more effective sites of empowerment for racial minorities and dissenters than the federal government. JIM WILSON/THE NEW YORK TIMES/REDUX Conservatives may still be the most vocal advocates of greater state autonomy, but federalism is far from a uniquely conservative phenomenon. Indeed, the revival of states rights is a movement that has the potential to unite Left and Right while fundamentally changing the balance of power in America. Political scientists divide American federalismbroadly speaking, the system that divides sovereignty between the federal government and the statesinto three eras: dual, cooperative, and coercive. Dual federalism, which lasted from 1789 until the New Deal, reflected the Founders original understanding of the state and federal governments as joint sovereigns, each supreme within its own sphere. Article I of the Constitution grants Congress relatively few powers, relating to defense, tariffs, and the like. The Tenth Amendment, added in 1791, clarifies that the states and the people retain all powers not delegated to the central government. Even before the Tenth Amendment, however, James Madison observed in Federalist 45 that the Constitution gave states nearly complete power to pass and enforce laws touching on the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State. Realizing that individual liberty is at risk whenever political power becomes concentrated in one level or one branch of government, the Constitutions framers considered federalism, together with the separation of powers, a far more important safeguard of freedom than the Bill of Rights. During the era of dual federalism, the national government focused on its constitutional duties while the state and local governments tended to the safety and welfare of their residents. The debates of the time would seem quaint today, such as the controversy that raged over Congresss authority to subsidize infrastructure projects; as president, Madison vetoed a bill providing for roads, canals, and other internal improvements as beyond the powers of the federal government. At the end of the nineteenth century, the British historian Lord Acton credited Americas division of power with producing a community more powerful, more prosperous, more intelligent, and more free than any other the world has seen. Franklin Roosevelts New Deal put an end to dual federalism. At first, the Supreme Court killed off a number of the presidents new programs, but after FDR threatened to install six additional pro-administration justices, it began to change course. In the 1941 case United States v. Darby, which upheld the federal takeover of wage and hour laws, the Court brushed aside the Tenth Amendment as a mere truism that didnt limit the scope of Congresss powers. Thus was born the era of cooperative federalism, characterized by a constantly increasing concentration of power at Washington in the stimulation and supervision of local policies, as FDR advisor Edward Corwin put it. Notwithstanding the federal encroachment on their turf, states often welcomed the new federal programs because they were accompanied by unprecedented grants. Those grants were subject to relatively few conditions; instead, the federal government treated the states as partners in implementing national policy and gave state officials considerable flexibility in carrying out their roles. The cooperative model began to break down in the 1960s, as Congress attached ever more specific and intrusive conditions to federal aid. The Highway Beautification Act of 1965, for example, told states to follow federal rules for regulating billboards or lose 10 percent of their highway funding. By the 1970s, such conditional grants, combined with unfunded mandatesmarching orders that the federal government issues but doesnt pay forcreated the model that persists to this day: coercive federalism. In this context, coercive is a descriptive, not a normative, term, explains John Kincaid, who directs the Meyner Center for the Study of State and Local Government at Lafayette College. Its troubling enough that in the academy, coercion has become a neutral label for what the federal government does every day. Far more troubling, however, is that the constitutionality of coercive federalism rests upon a legal fiction: that federal programs dont infringe on state sovereignty because they are voluntary. States are always free to liberate themselves from federal mandates, the theory goes, simply by rejecting the grants to which the mandates are attached. That argument is unpersuasive. States and cities dont embrace federal programs out of enthusiasm; they do so out of fiscal necessity, trying to regain some fraction of the tax revenue that their citizens send to Washington every April. The most dependent state is Mississippi, where federal aid constitutes 49 percent of all state revenues; even in the least dependent, Alaska, its nearly a quarter of all revenues. In the aggregate, states depend on federal funding for 35.5 percent of their income. Any governor who turns down a federal grant is effectively asking his states taxpayers to subsidize the other statesnot a formula for political success. Federal aid, Cato Institute scholar Neal McCluskey writes, is the mighty tool that Washington uses to make states do its unconstitutional biddingtaking tax dollars from state citizens whether they like it or not, and forcing states to follow federal rules to voluntarily get some of the money back. Further, federal aid crowds out other spending at the state and local levels, be it for education or pothole repair, says Kincaid. Maintenance of effort rules require that federal grants cant be used to free up state and local dollars for other purposes. If a state accepts a federal education grant, for example, it cant use the funds to reduce its own education spending. The result is that state spending effectively tracks federal priorities, which, increasingly, means health and welfare entitlements. Already, state spending on Medicaid has surpassed education spendinga trend that will continue, as entitlement programs are projected to eat up 75 percent of all federal grant funds by 2020. Cities, which need to spend money on prosaic things like schools, roads, and cops, are hit hard by the pressure to allocate resources according to Washingtons priorities. As long ago as 1980, New York mayor Ed Koch criticized the maze of complex statutory and administrative directives coming from Washington, saying that they threatened both the initiative and the financial health of local governments across the country. Koch conceded that he had supported such mandates as a congressman. But as mayor, he had come to realize the folly of Washington bureaucrats micromanaging local affairs. Breaking Washingtons coercive hold on states is the holy grail of federalism. The most straightforward approach would be shrinking the federal budget, cutting federal taxes proportionately, and letting state and local governments decide what to do and how to pay for it. Today, such a proposal would be regarded as a Tea Party fantasy, but not long ago, it was championed by liberal icon Daniel Patrick Moynihan. Toward the end of his career, the late New York senator, having seen New York consistently run a negative balance of payments with the federal government, suggested letting states keep more of their own money. Less activism in Washington in return for more revenue at home, for whatever active measures recommend themselves to the state or municipality in question, Moynihan proposed in a 1999 report for the Kennedy School of Government. Unfortunately, federal programs have strongly entrenched constituencies that would object loudly to having their federal funding yanked, even if it was replaced by state dollars. The federal government need not balance its budget and can, in any event, print money. Why take a chance on being funded by your home state, which has far less fiscal flexibility? Besides, proposals to abolish federal programs are vulnerable to cheap but effective demagoguery: if you dont like the federal Department of Education, youre anti-education. The next best alternative, from a federalists perspective, is to give states a way to opt out of federal programs, or at least to opt out of federal micromanagement. For instance, New Jersey congressman Scott Garrett, a Republican, introduced legislation this past March that would allow states to decline federal transportation funding without being penalized. Under the current system, a federal fuel tax is collected at the gas pump and then sent to Washington, where Congress and the Department of Transportation decide how much each state gets back in transportation grants and under what conditions. Nowadays, the conditions include such absurdities as the Department of Transportations Livability program, which tells towns where to build bike paths and recreational trails. Garretts bill would let a state keep the roughly 18 cents per dollar collected in federal fuel taxes and use that money according to the wishes of the states voters. Education is another area targeted by the new federalists. Utah congressman Rob Bishopa Republican, a former high school teacher, and the founder of the Tenth Amendment Task Forceargues that weve tried everything except giving schools the freedom to be different. In the last Congress, Bishop introduced the A-PLUS Act, which would let states receive federal education grants without having to submit to federal micromanagement; the states would merely enter into broad performance agreements with the Department of Education. An alternative measure introduced by Garrett would give each state the power to opt out of federal education programs entirely and receive a tax credit equivalent to its share of federal education funding. The credit would flow through to the states taxpayers, leaving states and school districts free to impose additional taxes to fund their own education priorities. Other creative solutions are percolating up from the House backbenches. Under legislation sponsored by Texas Republican John Culbertson, when a state rejects a federal grant, the unused money would have to be used to reduce the federal deficit, rather than to subsidize other states. And some House Republicans have called for eliminating Medicaids current funding systemin which the feds match whatever each state spends, so long as the state adheres to federal requirementsand replacing it with block grants with few strings attached. Block grants dont have to be partisan poison; in fact, Democrats pioneered them in the 1960s for health and crime-prevention programs. The states themselves retain considerable power to resist Washingtonabove all, by challenging federal laws that exceed Congresss enumerated powers. For 60 years after the New Deal, Congress justified legislation with no clear basis in the Constitution by citing its constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce, and the Supreme Court agreed. But that changed under the Rehnquist and Roberts Courts. Today, federal legislation under the Commerce Clause must actually target economic activity with a plausible relationship to interstate commerce. And it doesnt count if the legislation simply forces citizens to engage in commerce, as the Court held in its 2012 Obamacare decision. (Alas, Congresss taxing power was invoked to save the individual mandate.) With increasing vigor, states are testing the boundaries of Congresss jurisdiction under the Commerce Clause. Take the Montana Firearms Freedom Act, the brainchild of activist Gary Marbut. The law declares that guns that are manufactured in Montana and remain within the state arent subject to federal regulations, including registration requirements. The act, which is being tested in a pending federal lawsuit, has inspired copycat laws in seven other states and pending bills in 24 others. Legislators have applied the firearms strategy to other productsfor example, lightbulb freedom statutes that would allow the intrastate manufacture and sale of incandescent bulbs, despite federal mandates to switch to compact fluorescents. States are also exercising their right to withhold their assistance in implementing federal policies. For example, 13 have adopted laws prohibiting state and local officials from carrying out the Affordable Care Act. These laws rely on a 1997 Supreme Court decision, Printz v. United States, that established that Congress cannot commandeer a states administrative machinery in the service of federal law (in that case, the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act). But the tradition of state resistance goes back much furtherall the way to the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions of 1798, which proclaimed the right of states to interpose their authority to block the hated Alien and Sedition Acts. Those resolutions were invoked in the nineteenth century when some northern states refused to enforce the federal Fugitive Slave Act. Finally, states are beginning to explore interstate compacts as a way of casting off unwanted federal mandates. The Constitution envisions interstate compactsregulatory agreements among statesand there are more than 200 currently in force, including the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. In 2010, future senator Ted Cruz, writing for the Texas Public Policy Foundation, encouraged states to enter into a compact exempting themselves from Obamacare. In 2011 and 2012, seven states approved a draft compact in which the member states would assume responsibility for regulating health care. In order to trump federal law, an interstate compact must be approved by Congress, seemingly a tall order in the era of divided government. But at some point, even congressional Democrats may recognize that their constituents are calling for more local control over their lives and pocketbooks. A reinvigorated federalism would transfer todays most polarizing issues to the state capitols, where a more pragmatic brand of governing still obtains. Not only is that what the Constitution provides for; it might just be good for the Republic. A trial of contactless donations has led to an "overwhelmingly positive" response from the public and some charities have continued to use the boxes. More than 20,000 was raised through contactless donations during a four-month trial in partnership with 11 national charities last year. Barclaycard issued 100 lightweight donation boxes to charities including NSPCC, Oxfam and the Royal British Legion to use between September and December. Some charities have continued to use the boxes. The boxes also accepted chip and pin donations so that charities could accept donations above the 30 contactless limit. According to a survey of 2,000 carried out by YouGov 15 per cent of people have walked past a donation box because they are unable to give by card. Barclaycard says this means that charities are missing out on more than 80m. Barclaycard provided the technology that allows charities to accept payments through the donation boxes. Paulette Rowe, managing director of Barclaycard Payment Solutions, said: We are proud to use our payments expertise once again to open up more opportunities for fundraising, and are excited to work with the charities to help them adapt the technology to best suit their needs. Payworks developed the contactless donation box app, and integrated payment functionality into the card reader. The card reader was provided by Miura and the box design was created by Sprout. The Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) consulted on the trial. Chris Allwood, head of product development at CAF, said: People in the UK donate around 10 billion to charity every year. However, a rapidly growing number of them can no longer make donations on the street when they feel inspired to do so because they have stopped carrying cash. This makes it vital that charities are able to accept payment by debit and credit card. Success for NSPCC NSPCC used 10 boxes 40 times at events and for volunteer fundraisers collectors raising money in public spaces. At an event at the Houses of Parliament the charity took a 1,000 donation using the device. The charity preset the donations at 2, but donors were able to change it and the average donation was 3.07, not including the 1,000 donation, which the charity said is higher than the amount it gets from spare change. Megan Johnston, senior fundraiser at NSPCC, said: The feedback we received from the public was overwhelmingly positive. Previously, many people have said they would like to donate even though they no longer carry cash, so it was great to offer a cashless giving alternative through our hard working volunteers who are committed to our fight for every childhood. NSPCC has continued to use the boxes. Concerns over DfIDs use of a service delivery model when it comes to international aid were raised in a debate yesterday on the civil society space. The Westminster Hall debate was raised by Jim Shannon from the Democratic Union Party, and looked at civil society around the world, and the increasing restrictions felt by civil society organisations. He said: DfIDs current civil society partnership review, which was announced by the Secretary of State for International Development, sets out a simplified new central funding system for civil society organisations that supposedly incentivises good performance and pushes for more efficiency, transparency and accountability. He said that while value for money and stemming profiteering is welcome, he must ask the Secretary of State what she is doing to ensure that the current stringent reassessment of DFIDs partnership with grassroots organisations will not, in practice, endanger UK support of vital civil society action. Patrick Grady, SNP MP for Glasgow North, also questioned DfIDs approach, and the Civil Society Partnership Review, which DfID published in November 2016. He said: My concern about it was that the concept of partnership was being changed significantly. Adding: Partnership was not about working together to achieve shared goals but about a service delivery model through which DfID was almost to commission its desired results from civil society stakeholders, rather than take the collaborative approach that may have been seen in the past. Khalid Mahmood, Labour MP for Birmingham, Perry Barr, added that DfID needs to keep the use of external contractors to a minimum. He said: We all cherish the fact that we have protected our fantastic aid budget in difficult circumstances here at home. We want to keep protecting that budget, but if we are to do that, it must be implemented properly in countries of operation, and DFID must understand that when it allocates money in those countries, it should keep the use of external contractors to a minimum. This is not the first time DfID has received criticism over these policies, ActionAids director of programmes last year described them as a scary visions of aid, and of aid which is a self-interested agenda, rather than genuinely looking to address poverty and injustice around the world. Speaking of the concerns around civil society throughout the world more generally, Susan Elan Jones said that the tradition of civil society and openness goes hand in hand with the development of charity in our country. Grady said he wanted to thank the large number of non-governmental, civil society organisations that provided briefings for todays debate, including Bond, CAFOD, Amnesty International, the Charities Aid Foundation, and ABColombia. He said that the fact that so many briefings were submitted is a cause for both celebration and perhaps a little concern: celebration because this country has a vibrant NGO sector that feels empowered to speak out; but concern at the content of the briefings and the many instances of the closing of civil society space around the world. He added that a report from Amnesty said that the situation is unprecedented. Our weekly round-up of all the latest movers in the charity sector. Chief Executive Adeela Warley has been appointed as the new chief executive of CharityComms, the membership body for charity communications professionals. Warley replaces Vicky Browning, who left the organisation to become the chief executive of Acevo. Warley joins CharityComms from Friends of the Earth, where she is currently head of communications and supporter experience. She will take up her new role on 20 February. Browning replaces interim chief executive Asheem Singh at Acevo, and starts in her new role today. International animal charity Society for the Protection of Animals Abroad (SPANA) has appointed Geoffrey Dennis as its new chief executive. Dennis joins SPANA from the Royal National Childrens Foundation, where he was the chief executive. Prior to working for the Foundation, he spent ten years as chief executive of Care International UK. Dennis takes over from Jeremy Hulme who retired from the charity at the end of 2016, having led the charity for 28 years. International development charity Send a Cow has announced the appointment of Paul Stuart as its new chief executive. Stuart has been in the interim chief executive role since March 2016 and, prior to this, spent four years as the organisations chief operating officer. Prior to joining the charity, Stuart spent 12 years as the head of an international publishing house and spent a year as a country manager in Mozambique with Oasis International. Mike Dixon has been appointed as chief executive of drug and alcohol treatment charity Addaction. He will take up his new role on 1 May. Dixon joins the organisation from Citizens Advice, where he is currently assistance chief executive, a position he has held for the last six years. Prior to joining Citizens Advice, Dixon was director at Victim Support, and also worked as an adviser in the Cabinet Office, the Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs and the Department for International Development. Non executive Former Prime Minister David Cameron has been appointed as the new president of Alzheimers Research UK. In his time in office, Cameron launched the Prime Ministers Dementia Challenge in 2012, and launched Alzheimers Research UKs 100m Defeat Dementia campaign during a G7 event in 2014. Cameron made the announcement on both his personal Facebook and Twitter feeds last week. Independent life science research charity MRC Technology has appointed Steve Visscher as a trustee. MRC Technology progresses medical research in areas where there is unmet patient need. Visscher is currently deputy chief executive of the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC). United Parcel Service, Inc. provides letter and package delivery, transportation, logistics, and related services. It operates through two segments, U.S. Domestic Package and International Package. The U.S. Domestic Package segment offers time-definite delivery of letters, documents, small packages, and palletized freight through air and ground services in the United States. The International Package segment provides guaranteed day and time-definite international shipping services in Europe, the Asia Pacific, Canada and Latin America, the Indian sub-continent, the Middle East, and Africa. This segment offers guaranteed time-definite express options. The company also provides international air and ocean freight forwarding, customs brokerage, distribution and post-sales, and mail and consulting services in approximately 200 countries and territories. In addition, it offers truckload brokerage services; supply chain solutions to the healthcare and life sciences industry; shipping, visibility, and billing technologies; and financial and insurance services. The company operates a fleet of approximately 121,000 package cars, vans, tractors, and motorcycles; and owns 59,000 containers that are used to transport cargo in its aircraft. United Parcel Service, Inc. was founded in 1907 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. After three days of discussions and presentations to the cruise industry in South Florida, Antigua & Barbudas Minister of Tourism, Honorable Asot A. Michael, is very encouraged about the future of his countrys cruise sector, according to a statement. The Minister and his group met with Carnival, Royal Caribbean, Norwegian, MSC, Holland America, Seabourn and Princess over the course of three days. The cruise executives and itinerary planners were impressed with our vision for improving how Antigua will be welcoming their ships and passengers, and their feedback has helped us to better understand their specific needs for achieving sustainable growth, said Minister Asot Michael. I am confident that we have developed the right master plan, and it is now up to our Government to identify additional financing to complete what we started last year when we successfully implemented critically needed marine improvements at St. Johns Harbour and the Heritage Pier. According to a statement, there is also the idea of creating a beach-focused island style destination in Barbuda for cruise ships, which garnered interest from the cruise lines. Minister Michael was accompanied at his cruise industry meetings by his cruise-sector advisor, Ricky Skerritt, Tourism Authority Board member Nathan Dundas, Antigua & Barbuda Port Authority CEO Darwin Telemaque, and representatives of the BEA-Meridian design and construction team who are responsible for designing and constructing the master plan. In 2016, under the leadership of Minister Michael, the Antigua & Barbuda Government started a cruise facilities and downtown development program. To date, some $50 million has already been spent on the harbor and lengthening and strengthening the Heritage Pier to allow for the berthing of larger ships up. It all came together for the Anthem of the Seas, which became the largest ship ever to dock in Antigua when it arrived on Dec. 2. The master plan calls for further dredging of the approach channel and turning area, the creation of a fifth berth, and land reclamation to help with major improvements to pedestrian and vehicle flows, town aesthetics, tour operations, and shopping. Richard Leon Wilbern pleaded not guilty to a fatal credit union robbery in 2003 in U.S. District Court in Rochester, N.Y., Friday. Last September, the FBI and federal prosecutors announced they solved the cold case with DNA evidence taken from the robbery scene on Aug. 12, 2003 at the former Xerox Federal Credit Union branch in Webster, N.Y., which is now the $969 million Xceed Financial Credit Union based in El Segundo, Calif. Wilbern was arrested and charged with credit union robbery that resulted in the death of Raymond Batzel, who was a member of Xerox FCU. Another member, Joseph Doud, was also shot and injured but survived. If convicted, Wilbern will face a life in prison sentence. Last month, the U.S. Attorneys Office decided not to seek the death penalty. Andrew Strotman, a former judge advocate of the Marine Corps, has joined the Berry Law Firm, adding his years of white-collar advocacy to the firm's repertoire. Berry Law Firm of Nebraska welcomes its latest addition, Andrew Strotman, to the firm, a lawyer with a military background and a strong reputation for handling white-collar criminal cases and civil litigation involving the government. Strotman served ten years in the Marine Corps, first as an infantry officer and later as a judge advocate. He graduated summa cum laude from the Creighton University School of Law. As a trial defense counsel at Marine Corps base Quantico, Strotman participated in the defense of several high-profile cases involving charges ranging from homicide to capital espionage. Following his Marine Corps service, he practiced 26 years at a large Nebraska firm as a criminal and civil litigator, as well as the firm's general counsel. Today, Strotman focuses heavily on white-collar criminal cases and parallel civil or administrative proceedings. His clients are typically businesses, their owners or officers, government officials or medical or legal professionals. He also continues to represent service members and veterans in a variety of encounters with the government. "For more than 25 years, I handled cases alongside and, occasionally against, John Stevens Berry Sr. and the Berry Law Firm," Strotman says. "I always admired their skill, tenacity, integrity and, above all, their devotion to our service members and veterans. I am excited to be a part of the Berry Law Firm tradition and to continue to serve those who serve." The addition of Andrew Strotman is a testament to the Berry Law Firm's rapid growth in recent years and its commitment to serving veterans. A steady history of successful cases throughout Nebraska has expanded the firm's criminal practice, and their nationwide reputation for handling veterans' disability claims has led the firm to open another office in Kansas City, as well as placing veterans' lawyers in Phoenix, Ariz. and Sydney, Australia. Altogether, the firm has thousands of clients both nationally and internationally. Berry Law Firm's commitment to serving military veterans is further reflected in the fact that it has also opened an office in Seward, where the firm strongly supports the National Guard Museum. A quarterly newsletter, "The Service Connection," is published and distributed to its veteran client base, keeping veterans around the world up-to-date on important legal changes and cases. Founding attorney John Stevens Berry Sr.: "I remember when we used our criminal and civil trial practice to allow us to represent veterans pro bono before the law changed and we could charge for our services on behalf of veterans. Our firm has veterans from the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines, as does the Berry family." To learn more about Andrew Strotman and Berry Law Firm, inquiring parties are encouraged to visit the firm's website (http://www.jsberrylaw.com/). The regulatory freeze memo issued by the Trump administration and recent news from the NCUA are detailed today by NAFCU Regulatory Affairs Counsel Ann Kossochev in a Compliance Blog post. Kossachev noted potential regulatory changes may be on the horizon given the memo from the Trump administration to heads of executive departments and agencies about a regulatory freeze pending review. She explained that the past three presidents have issued similar freeze memos. NCUA, an independent agency, is not addressed in that memo. However, Kossachev said whether the freeze applies to the CFPB hinges on whether the Trump administration still considers the CFPB an independent agency in light of the D.C. Circuits recent decision in PHH Corp. v. CFPB. She was referring to the ruling in October by a three-judge panel that the bureaus single-director structure is unconstitutional. The CFPB has not commented on the regulatory freeze, and it is not clear how the administration will react to any further CFPB rulemaking. NAFCU will be monitoring the situation closely. Cyberwar: How Prepared Is Nepal? The main reason Nepal became a target of cyber attackers was because of the chaos and dilemma caused by the earthquake. The proliferation of Internet usage in the recent years has changed the way we interact daily. Right from the usage of e-Commerce, online banking, social networking sites up to connecting every single device like the Internet of things, IOT i.e. toasters, refrigerators, televisions, temperature controls, home automation systems, nuclear power station to the Internet and controlling them from any end point of the globe have been developed. After land, sea, air and space, warfare has entered the fifth domain: cyberspace. Back in the old days, war was fought either from land, sea, air, and space with guns, ammunition, fighter jets, missiles, but now an individual or even a group of individuals can wage a war with just a use of computers and working Internet connection, right from their bed while taking a sip of tea and in pajamas. So, cyber warfare is the art and science of fighting without fighting; defeating an opponent without spilling their blood. In other words, cyber war refers to the action by a nation-state, to penetrate other nations computers and networks for the purpose of causing damage or disruption. These days almost all the nations are fully dependent on the Internet for storage and transference of information and information in this era has become a critical part of daily operations. What we say, what we do, what we share, what we plan are very critical information we hold as an individual or as a nation overall, and this information could be used against us. The Internet was not originally designed with security in mind, but as an open system to allow scientists and researchers to send data to one another quickly. Without strong investments in cyber security and cyber defenses, data systems remain open and susceptible to rudimentary and dangerous forms of exploitation and attack. Back in the old days (the late 80s and early 90s), hackers used to break into systems for fun and with motive of learning new things. Robert Tappan Morris, a Cornell University graduate student who released the most notable internet worm also known as Morris worm on November of 1988, was where the people started noticing the ability and potential of the Internet. Vulnerability of Nepal Nepal is also extremely vulnerable to cyber-attacks and is encountering a high number of malware attacks on a daily basis. The Asia Pacific region is especially vulnerable with emerging markets most at risk of malware threats. Nepal has also become a target and being exploited by cyber-criminals and state sponsored hackers. Previously, Naikon also known as APT-30 (Advanced Persistent Threat) group, has targeted military, government and civil organizations and exploited them. Carbanak, an APT style attack, also resulted in financial loss for Nepal and almost thirty other countries. These types of attacks are growing rapidly although Nepal has not developed much in terms of technology. Although Nepal has Information Technology Security Emergency Response Team (ITSERT-NP) it does not actively participate in research and development nor do they participate in active intelligence gathering and learning about new threats and spreading awareness. Technical personnel capable of defending the national level infrastructure are extremely limited and are always outnumbered by start-up hackers. Lack of training, resource, materials and especially security awareness seem to be the problem in Nepal. The first phase should be divided into learning defensive tactics and then gradually developing offensive techniques and eventually building up an elite cyber task force for national defense of information and security of Nepal. During 2014-2015 Nepal was highly vulnerable to cyber-attacks since the national infrastructure almost collapsed because of the massive earthquake, and as a result, thousands of websites and servers, including servers from government, military and private servers, were victims of huge cyber-attacks and cyber vandalism. Most of the websites are built by people who have little or no knowledge about security and on top of that the websites are built for small amounts ranging from a minimum of five thousand to fifty thousand rupees. Until and unless the gap between developers and security people are bridged, cyber-attacks will continue and will be a big curse for Nepalese economy and national infrastructure. There is no such thing as hack-proof security but still adding an extra layer of security and using the concept of defense in depth will make attackers put in more effort, time and resource. No matter how deep the defense is or how hard you are trained to defend, an attacker will always find a way inside and eventually break into the systems, but that does not mean to do nothing. We can never predict a cyber-war until we start one. Previous attacks could be of great help to predict future attacks and patterns of attacks. We can expect satellites, naval forces, aircraft, missiles and rockets being hacked and exploited to cause severe damage to the global economy and infrastructure. If we do not prepare now for cyber warfare, develop threat intelligence and prepare defensively then it could raise massive threats. Ein News: Cyber Warfare: Regional Is Becoming Global: Iranian Malware Delivered Via Fake Oxford University Sites An Iran-linked advanced persistent threat (APT) group dubbed OilRig has used a fake Juniper Networks VPN portal and fake University of Oxford websites to deliver malware to victims. OilRig has been around since at least 2015 and its campaigns have been analyzed by several researchers, including from FireEye and Palo Alto Networks. The attackers have targeted organisations in Saudi Arabia, Israel, the United States, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon, Kuwait and Qatar, including government agencies, financial institutions and tech companies. Recent attacks observed by researchers at ClearSky have been aimed at several Israeli organisations, including IT vendors, financial institutions and the countrys national postal service. In some of the attacks seen by ClearSky, the threat actor set up a fake Juniper Networks VPN portal and used compromised email accounts from IT vendors to lure victims to it. Its unclear if the malicious actor compromised the affected vendors entire networks or just the email accounts they used to send out messages containing links to the fake VPN portal. Once taken to the fake Juniper website, victims were instructed to install a VPN client, a legitimate piece of software from Juniper Networks bundled with Helminth, a piece of malware known to be used by OilRig. According to researchers, these files had been signed with a valid code-signing certificate issued by Symantec to a US-based software company called AI Squared. A different Helminth sample found by ClearSky was signed with a different certificate issued to the same company. This suggest that the attackers had got a hold of an AI Squared signing key, potentially after compromising their network, researchers said. Alternatively, the attackers might have got Symantec to issue them a certificate under AI Squareds name. In other OilRig attacks, the threat group registered four domain names apparently belonging to Oxford University, including oxford-symposia.com, oxford-careers.com, oxford.in and oxford-employee.com. The first domain mimicked an Oxford conference registration website and instructed visitors to install a tool allegedly needed for pre-registration. The tool, also signed with an AI Squared certificate, prompts users to provide various types of personal information and generates what it claims to be a pre-registration form. Users are then instructed to send the form to an email address hosted on the attackers second domain, oxford-careers[.]com. At one point, this domain was linked to oxford[.]in, which had stored some documents, but researchers could not determine what these files contained as they were unavailable during their analysis. The last fake Oxford domain, oxford-employee.com, hosted a job application website and provided users an official Oxford CV creator. The fake CV creator is also a tool created by the attackers. In a blog post published in October, Palo Alto Networks revealed that OilRig had used an IP address mentioned in 2015 by Symantec in a report describing the activities of two Iran-based threat groups, named Cadelle and Chafer, that appeared to be linked. ClearSky has confirmed that the same IP address has been linked to both OilRig and a piece of malware used by Chafer. While attribution is often difficult, evidence found by researchers suggests that OilRig is based in Iran, including the use of the Persian language in the malware samples, and information associated with the command and control domains used by the group. Security Week: Destructive Cyber Attack On Saudi Kingdom: The Growing Cyber Threat From Iran: Celebrating Dalhousie's first great benefactor Every year on the first Friday in February, Dalhousie celebrates Munro Day. Though Dalhousie students, faculty and staff are keen to celebrate this special Dalhousie holiday, not all are aware of its namesake's contributions to the university. George Munros generous gifts, worth about $8 million in todays money, helped Dalhousie through some rough times. Lydia Cushman Schurman wrote "Three Canadian-Born Publishers of Popular Literature and Their Effect on Nineteenth-Century Publishing in the United States." The article contains the story of Munro, her great-grandfather. The following is an excerpt: The man behind Munro Day George Munro, "undoubtedly the best known producer of cheap books in the late 1870s and during the 1880s"... was born in West River, Pictou County, Nova Scotia, on the 12th of November 1825, the fourth of twelve children... Little is known about George Munro's early years except that he initially had very basic schooling. At 12, he became apprenticed to The Observer, a Pictou newspaper, but two years later he resumed his education and, from 1839 to 1842, attended the New Glasgow School, where he studied Greek, Latin, and mathematics in preparation for more rigorous academic training at Pictou Academy. At 17, he left the New Glasgow School and taught school for a year in order to earn money to attend the academy. Around 1850, he went to teach natural philosophy and mathematics at the Free Church Academy in Halifax, where he did sufficiently well in the six years that he stayed there to become its principal ... In October [1856], he left Nova Scotia permanently for New York City with a few hundred dollars. Little is known about Munro's five earliest years in New York, where he arrived as a well-educated, 31-year-old married man ... In 1861, Munro went to work for Irwin P. Beadle and Company, a firm that published popular songbooks, handbooks, and the first dime novels.... In 1863, the original Beadle firm broke up, Munro entered into a brief partnership with Irwin Beadle and, a year later, the company became George Munro's. Munro's publications ... made him rich. In 1879, under the influence of his brother-in-law, John Forrest, then minister of St. John's Church, Halifax, and a member of the Board of Governors of Dalhousie University, Munro began to give money to the struggling institution. In 1879, its income from invested sources yielded only $3,000 a year, and income from its rented property brought in only $600 annually; its $3,000 grant from the government was soon due to expire. The total combined income of $6,600 was insufficient to run the university. According to Dalhousie University historian, P.B. Waite, "Desperate is not too strong a word for Dalhousie's financial condition. Talk of closing Dalhousie down was heard on every side." In 1879, however, Munro began to turn the tide. He told Forrest, "If you will find the man for the chair of Physics, I will find the money." The largeness of Munro's gift $2,000 a year astonished the university's Board of Governors because even the premier of Nova Scotia earned only $2,400 a year. To fund such a gift, with interest at 5 per cent, necessitated capital amounting to $40,000. In expressing its appreciation, the Board of Governors exclaimed: "Mr. Munro's liberality is on a scale that is without parallel in the educational history not of Nova Scotia alone but of the Dominion of Canada and his action in giving the patronage of the Chair to the Governors instead of availing himself of the privilege secured to him by Statute by nominating a Professor, enhances their sense of indebtedness." The chair in Physics, awarded to J.G. MacGregor, was Munro's first endowed chair. His gifts over the years amounted to a total of five endowed professorships, an expenditure of $250,000, as well as about $83,000 in bursaries and exhibitions (approximately $333,000). In 1999 terms, this sum amounts to a total of approximately $8 million dollars. Munro's largesse, "gifts without parallel in British North America," rescued the university from extinction. It is little wonder that by 1885, a special holiday had been set aside to commemorate George Munro, and he is still honored on "George Munro Day" each year at the university on the first Friday in February. This excerpt is reproduced with permission. Update: February 14, 2017: The US travel ban barring citizens from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the United States continues to be suspended. On Thursday, February 9, 2017, judges from the San Francisco-based 9th Circuit Court of Appeals declined to block the lower-court ruling that suspended the US travel ban. This decision means that Dalhousie students, faculty, visitors, and staff who are permanent residents, temporary residents, dual citizens from the affected seven countries can continue to be eligible to enter the US. Travellers will be subject to the standard processing and immigration requirements that existed prior to the ban. Despite the suspension, Dalhousie remains dedicated to providing you with ongoing support. If you have any questions or concerns, you can contact the help line (902-494-1566) or email (UStravelbanhelp@dal.ca). Original story below --- Dalhousie University has joined other universities across North America in expressing concerns about a new executive order in the United States preventing individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the country for 90 days. The executive order was signed into action by U.S. President Donald Trump Friday evening. Universities Canada, an advocacy organization run by Canadian university presidents, released a statement Sunday night supporting the American Association of Universities call for a quick end to the ban. The new order is having an impact on Canadian campuses and communities that is real, immediate and profound, the group said in the statement. Contacts for support In a memo to the Dalhousie community Monday afternoon, Dal President Richard Florizone and Provost Carolyn Watters echoed the call to end the travel ban. Dalhousie has also set up a help line (902-494-1566) and email (UStravelbanhelp@dal.ca) to offer support and information for those at Dal affected by the executive order. Dals leadership is also working with Universities Canada and colleagues at other institutions on ways to support students, faculty, staff and researchers from those countries caught in the executive orders sudden implementation. Dalhousie welcomes students, faculty and staff from around the world, including those seeking refuge from violence and hardship, said President Florizone and Provost Watters in the memo. They strengthen all of our universities and our country by bringing new knowledge, talent and skills. We stand for diversity and inclusion. President Florizone also shared and expressed his support for the Universities Canada statement on Twitter Sunday evening. This executive order poses a direct challenge to the free flow of ideas and to the values of diversity, inclusion and openness that are central to democracy, said Dr. Florizone. Full text of the memo: Dayton Local is your guide to visitor attractions, activities, places to go and things to do in Dayton and around the Miami Valley. Thousands of people find places to go and things to do around Dayton every day on DaytonLocal.com! Visit our easy-to-use community events calendar where you'll find more than 15K events posted annually. Browse our dining guide where you'll find hundreds of local restaurants listed. Dayton Local is an independent, locally-owned, small family business. We're proud to support other small businesses through our Business Directory, which features everything from Attorneys to Wedding Vendors. We hope you find Dayton Local useful, and we invite you to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. If you're looking for new ways to promote your business in Dayton, please consider advertising with us. Visit Dayton Local Advertising for more information. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us. Find the very best apartment complexes in the Greater Dayton area. If you would like to add your business or organization to this page, please create an account Angela Artisan Germantown, OH Interior Styling/Artisan Perspective. Furniture Refinishing. Custom Artwork Creations. Interior Styling Consultations. Painting Technique Workshops. AR Workshop Centerville, OH AR Workshop-your DIY studio to create custom decor & gifts including; signs, pillows, lazy susans, chunky knit blankets & more. Birthday, corporate, and private parties plus kid camps too! Art Academy Of Dayton Dayton, OH Full world class art program. No portfolio needed. We teach you how to go from beginner to professional. We have youth (7-12), and teen/ adult classes. Artsy Mind - Fine Arts School Centerville , OH GROUP and INDIVIDUAL Fine Arts Classes for ADULTS and KIDS from 8 years old. Students of all skill levels are welcome. Classes: Drawing, Colored Pencil, Watercolor, Acrylic, Oil Painting and Pastel. Barstools and Brushstrokes Dayton, OH Barstools and Brushstrokes is the newest twist for your happy hour! Explore your creative side while recreating the featured nights painting with step-by-step guidance from the instructor. BeauVerre Riordan Studios Middletown, OH We offer repair or restoration of stained, etched, custom beveled, and art glass. 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It's FUN art, not fine art! Painting with Jacki J New Carlisle, OH Hi there! My name is Jacki J, I am the owner of Painting with Jacki J. I create fine art, functional art and I teach step by step paint classes. Picture Perfect Paint Parties Dayton, OH Picture Perfect Paint Parties a Social & Corporate Paint Party Event Co. No Experience Required! We will guide you through a fun painting/activity, that you will LOVE! COME & PAINT THE TOWN WITH US!! Raise Your Brush Centerville, OH Have a fun, social, & creative experience at Raise Your Brush! As Daytons premier paint and sip studio, stop in to paint, drink, and enjoy a fun night out! We also have a studio in the heart of Troy. Rosewood Arts Centre Dayton, OH Rosewood Arts Centre offers hands-on experiences in the visual and performing arts. Over 100,000 visitors participate annually in Rosewood classes, gallery exhibitions, theatre performances, studios, special events and festivals. SPARK Art Studio Kettering, OH Art enrichment classes for kids of all ages, art birthday parties, workshops, and more! Studio 14 Gallery and Tippsy Art Parties Tipp City, OH Tippsy Art Parties is your custom Paint and Sip Venue! From canvas and glass, to wood, jewelry and more, were an extraordinary art experience. Choose your project, reserve a date and create fun! That Music Place Miamisburg, OH That Music Place is dedicated to providing all ages with the opportunity to enjoy music. The Little City Cooking School Oakwood, OH The Little City Cooking School hosts intimate 6-8 student cooking classes in Oakwood. Enter from the back porch and step into an evening of learning and fun. The Nova Studio Beavercreek, OH Teaching creative people how to make natural bath & body products since 2003. Soapmaking, natural perfumes, mineral makeup, bath products, & more. 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Boston Stoker Dayton, OH Dayton's Gourmet Coffee Roaster - these coffees represent the best we have to offer from over 30 years experience in searching for the worlds finest beans. We use only the top 2% of the coffees produced in the world. Boston Stoker Clayton, OH Dayton's Gourmet Coffee Roaster - these coffees represent the best we have to offer from over 30 years experience in searching for the worlds finest beans. We use only the top 2% of the coffees produced in the world. Boston Stoker Troy, OH Dayton's Gourmet Coffee Roaster - these coffees represent the best we have to offer from over 30 years experience in searching for the worlds finest beans. We use only the top 2% of the coffees produced in the world. Boston Stoker Vandalia, OH Dayton's Gourmet Coffee Roaster - these coffees represent the best we have to offer from over 30 years experience in searching for the worlds finest beans. We use only the top 2% of the coffees produced in the world. 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Wanderlust Coffee Bar Beavercreek, OH Wanderlust Coffee Bar is a full service craft coffee, tea & espresso bar focused on serving high quality products, precisely prepared by our baristas. Winans Chocolate and Coffee Dayton, OH Premium handmade chocolates and freshly roasted coffees. Wine available at Beavercreek, Dayton Mall, Far Hills, and The Greene. Dayton Local Visitor Terms and Conditions By using this website, you agree that the information provided by Dayton Local is available without warranty, express or implied, and that you use this site at your own risk. Dayton Local takes reasonable measures to ensure, but cannot guarantee the accuracy of the information on our website since we rely heavily on user submitted content and on information relating to businesses and events that may change without notice. If inaccurate, misleading or inappropriate information is brought to our attention, Dayton Local will make a reasonable effort to fix or remove it. 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HOME Real Estate would like to welcome the following realtors to the company: J ohn Kalogeras , Amy Kriz , and Nicole Philippi . The company also welcomes back Julie Tallichet . These agents can now offer their clients the service, strength and stability that HOME Real Estate is known for. All HOME agents have undergone licensing through the Nebraska Real Estate Commission, as well as completing an additional training program offered by HOME Real Estate. HOME Real Estate, an affiliate of HomeServices of America, is the area's leading real estate company serving the Lincoln, Seward, and surrounding areas. The company's agents are committed to providing clients with exceptional service in all stages of the building, buying and selling process, including real estate, mortgage, title, and insurance. For more information about HOME Real Estate, visit www.HomeRealEstate.com. The handwritten signature is still the most widely accepted biometric used to verify a person's identity. Banks, corporations, and government bodies rely on the human eye and digital devices such as tablets or smart pens to capture, analyse, and verify people's autographs. New software developed by researchers at Tel Aviv University and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev now enables smartwatches, currently worn by one in six people around the world, to verify handwritten signatures. The accompanying study was recently published on arXiv. It is available at https://arxiv.org/abs/1612.06305. "A popular device worn by so many people should feature additional, critically useful functions," said study co-author Dr. Erez Shmueli of TAU's Department of Industrial Engineering, who added that 373 million of these devices will be in use by 2020. "Considering how dependent we are on signatures, we decided to develop software that would verify the smartwatch device wearer's handwritten signature." The next step in signature verification Signing on a digital pad or using a special electronic pen has replaced pen and paper in many instances, but these alternatives often require cumbersome dedicated devices. The new software developed by Dr. Shmueli and his student Alona Levy, in collaboration with Prof. Yuval Elovici of BGU's Department of Software and Information Systems Engineering and his student Ben Nassi, would turn any generic smartwatch into an expert signature verifier. The novel technology utilizes motion data -- a person's wrist movements measured by an accelerometer or a gyroscope -- to uniquely identify them during the signing process and subsequently classify the signature as either genuine or forged. "Using a wrist-worn device such as a smartwatch or a fitness tracker bears obvious advantages over other wearable devices, since it measures the gestures of the entire wrist rather than a single finger or an arm," said Dr. Shmueli. "While several other recent studies have examined the option of using motion data to identify users, this is its first application to verify handwritten signatures -- still a requirement at the bank, the post office, your human resources department, etc." Fighting forgery The team tested its system on 66 TAU undergraduates. The students, all wearing smartwatches, were asked to provide 15 signature samples on a tablet, using the tablet's digital pen. The students were then shown video recordings of people signing during the first phase, and were asked to forge five of those signatures. The students were given ample time to practice and were compensated for "exceptional forgeries." The smartwatch, equipped with the new verification software, was able to detect forgery with an extremely high level of accuracy. "Next we plan to compare our approach with existing state-of-the-art methods for offline and online signature verification," said Dr. Shmueli. "We would also like to investigate the option of combining data extracted from the wearable device with data collected from a tablet device to achieve even higher verification accuracy." The researchers have applied for a patent in an initial step toward commercializing their system. ### Tel Aviv University (TAU) is inherently linked to the cultural, scientific and entrepreneurial mecca it represents. It is one of the world's most dynamic research centers and Israel's most distinguished learning environment. Its unique-in-Israel multidisciplinary environment is highly coveted by young researchers and scholars returning to Israel from post-docs and junior faculty positions in the US. American Friends of Tel Aviv University (AFTAU) enthusiastically and industriously pursues the advancement of TAU in the US, raising money, awareness and influence through international alliances that are vital to the future of this already impressive institution. PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] --Want to learn something and then quickly make that mastery stick? A new Brown University study in which people learned visual perception tasks suggests that you should keep practicing for a little while even after you think you can't get any better. Such "overlearning" locked in performance gains, according to the Nature Neuroscience paper that describes the effect and its underlying neurophysiology. Everybody from actors learning lines, to musicians learning new songs, to teachers trying to impart key facts to students has observed that learning has to "sink in" in the brain. Prior studies and also the new one, for example, show that when people learn a new task and then learn a similar one soon afterward, the second instance of learning often interferes with and undermines the mastery achieved on the first one. The new study shows that overlearning prevents against such interference, cementing learning so well and quickly, in fact, that the opposite kind of interference happens instead. For a time, overlearning the first task prevents effective learning of the second task -- as if learning becomes locked down for the sake of preserving master of the first task. The underlying mechanism, the researchers discovered, appears to be a temporary shift in the balance of two neurotransmitters that control neural flexibility, or "plasticity," in the part of the brain where the learning occurred. "These results suggest that just a short period of overlearning drastically changes a post-training plastic and unstable [learning state] to a hyperstabilized state that is resilient against, and even disrupts, new learning," wrote the team led by corresponding author Takeo Watanabe, the Fred M. Seed Professor of Cognitive Linguistic and Psychological Sciences at Brown. Different ways to learn The findings arose from several experiments in which Watanabe, lead author Kazuhisa Shibata and their co-authors asked a total of 183 volunteers to engage in the task of learning to detect which one of the two successively presented images had a patterned orientation and which depicted just unstructured noise. After eight rounds, or "blocks," of training, which lasted about 20 minutes total, the initial 60 volunteers seemed to master the task. With that established, the researchers then formed two new groups of volunteers. After a pre-test before any training, a first group practiced the task for eight blocks, waited 30 minutes, and then trained for eight blocks on a new similar task. The next day they were tested on both tasks to assess what they learned. The other group did the same thing, except that they overlearned the first task for 16 blocks of training. On the next day's tests, the first group performed quite poorly on the first task compared to the pre-test but showed substantial progress on the second task. Meanwhile the overlearning group showed strong performance on the first task, but no significant improvement on the second. Regular learning subjects were vulnerable to interference by the second task (as expected) but overlearners were not. In the second experiment, again with new volunteers, the researchers lengthened the break between task training from 30 minutes to 3.5 hours. This time on the next day's tests, each group -- those who overlearned and those who didn't -- showed similar performance patterns in that they both demonstrated significant improvement on both tasks. Given enough time between learning tasks, people successfully learned both and neither kind of interference was evident. What was going on? The researchers sought answers in a third experiment by using the technology of magnetic resonance spectroscopy to track the balance of two neurotransmitters in volunteers as they learned. Focusing on the "early visual" region in each subject's brain, the researchers tracked the ratio of glutamate, which promotes plasticity, and GABA, which inhibits it. One group of volunteers trained on a task for eight blocks while the other group trained on it for 16. Meanwhile they all underwent MRS scans before training, 30 minutes after, and 3.5 hours after, and took the usual pre-training and post-training performance tests. The overlearners and the regular learners revealed a perfectly opposite pattern in how the ratio of their neurotransmitter levels changed. They all started from the same baseline, but for regular learners, the ratio of glutamate to GABA increased markedly 30 minutes after training, before declining almost back to the baseline by 3.5 hours. Meanwhile, the overlearners showed sharp decline in the ratio of glutamate to GABA 30 minutes after training before it rose nearly back to baseline by 3.5 hours. In other words, at the stage when regular learners were at the peak of plasticity (leaving their first training vulnerable to interference from a second training), overlearners were hunkered down with inhibition (protecting the first training, but closing the door on the second). After 3.5 hours everyone was pretty much back to normal. In a final experiment, the researchers showed that the amount of decline in the glutamate to GABA ratio in each volunteer was proportional to the degree to which their first training interfered with their second training, suggesting that the link between the neurotransmitter ratio and the effects of overlearning were no coincidence. Timing is everything Though the study focused on a visual learning task, Watanabe said he is confident the effect will likely translate to other kinds of learning, such as motor tasks, where phenomena such as interference work similarly. If further studies confirm that overlearning's effects indeed carry over to learning in general, then such findings would suggest some advice optimizing the timing of training: To cement training quickly, overlearning should help, but beware it might interfere with similar learning it that follow immediately. Without overlearning, don't try to learn something similar in rapid succession because there is a risk that the second bout of learning will undermine the first. If you have enough time, you can learn two tasks without interference by leaving a few hours between the two trainings. "If you want to learn something very important, maybe overlearning is a good way," Watanabe said. "If you do overlearning, you may be able to increase the chance that what you learn will not be gone." ### In addition to Watanabe and Shibata, who is now an associate professor at Nagoya University in Japan, the paper's other authors are Yuka Sasaki, Ji Won Bang, Edward Walsh, Maro Machizawa, Masako Tamaki and Li-Hung Chang. All the authors have been members of Watanabe's lab at Brown, though Bang, Macizawa and Chang are now at Georgia Tech. The National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science funded the study. Los Alamos, N.M., January 30, 2017 - Today, more than 16 years of space-weather data is publicly available for the first time in history. The data comes from space-weather sensors developed by Los Alamos National Laboratory on board the nation's Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites. The newly available data gives researchers a treasure trove of measurements they can use to better understand how space weather works and how best to protect critical infrastructure, such as the nation's satellites, aircraft, communications networks, navigation systems, and electric power grid. "Space-weather monitoring instruments developed at Los Alamos have been fielded on GPS satellites for decades," said Marc Kippen, the Los Alamos program manager. "Today, 23 of the nation's more than 30 on-orbit GPS satellites carry these instruments. When you multiply the number of satellites collecting data with the number of years they've been doing it, it totals more than 167 satellite years. It's really an unprecedented amount of information." Extreme space-weather events have the potential to significantly threaten safety and property on Earth, in the air, and in space. For example, the hazard of increased radiation exposure from charged particles released during a large solar flare could require that flights be diverted away from a polar route. Similarly, sudden bursts of plasma and magnetic field structures (coronal mass ejections, or CMEs) from the sun's atmosphere and high-speed solar wind could significantly disable large portions of the electric power grid. The resulting cascading failures could disturb air traffic control, disrupt the water supply, and interfere with life-saving medical devices. In space, the charged particles measured by the Los Alamos-GPS sensors are the primary limit on how long a satellite can operate in space before succumbing to the damaging effects of radiation. In extreme events those particles can cause malfunction of satellites or even catastrophic failure of entire satellite systems. For example, in April 2010, a large magnetic disturbance resulted in a communications failure, causing a satellite to uncontrollably drift in space and presenting a hazard to nearby satellites. Currently, scientists are unable to predict when these extreme events will occur, how strong they will be, or how severe the effects will be. The release of Los Alamos-GPS data enables new studies that will help answer these questions. The Los Alamos-GPS sensors continuously measure the energy and intensity of charged particles, mainly electrons and protons, energized and trapped in Earth's magnetic field. These trapped particles form the Van Allen radiation belts, which are highly dynamic--varying on time scales from minutes to decades. From GPS orbit (roughly 12,600 miles above Earth), satellite-borne sensors probe the largest radiation belt--consisting mainly of energetic electrons. Each of the 23 sensors in the current GPS constellation makes detailed measurements of the belts every six hours. Together the sensors provide 92 complete measurements of the belts every day. The newly released measurements constitute a nearly continuous global record of the variability in this radiation belt for the past 16 years, including how it responds to solar storms. The data provides an invaluable record for understanding radiation-belt variability that is key to developing effective space-weather forecasting models. Los Alamos has been anticipating greater awareness of the nation's vulnerability to space weather since the 1990s, when it began aligning its space-weather research activities with its critical-infrastructure program. "This led to an awareness that we could expand the utility of our space-weather data to programs beyond the specific requirements they were designed for," said Kippen. The public release of GPS energetic-particle data was conducted under the terms of an October 2016 White House Executive Order. It culminates years of work between the Office of Science and Technology Policy and the National Security Council to coordinate interagency efforts aimed at improved understanding, prediction and preparedness for potentially devastating space-weather events. The specific goal of releasing space-weather data from national-security assets such as GPS satellites is to enable broad scientific community engagement in enhancing space-weather model validation and improvements in space-weather forecasting and situational awareness. ### The Los Alamos-GPS sensor data is hosted by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) at: https://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/stp/space-weather/satellite-data/satellite-systems/, or by searching for "GPS Energetic Particles" at https://data.gov. The sensors are supported by the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration. A feature article providing an overview of the data was published today in Space Weather, a journal of the American Geophysical Union, as well as commentary by the Editor-in-Chief of the Space Weather journal. About Los Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos National Laboratory, a multidisciplinary research institution engaged in strategic science on behalf of national security, is operated by Los Alamos National Security, LLC, a team composed of Bechtel National, the University of California, BWXT Government Group and URS, an AECOM company, for the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration. Los Alamos enhances national security by ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile, developing technologies to reduce threats from weapons of mass destruction and solving problems related to energy, environment, infrastructure, health and global security concerns. OAK RIDGE, Tenn., Jan. 27, 2017 -- Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam visited the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory today to congratulate the ORNL team involved in the discovery of the element tennessine, named in recognition of the vital contributions of the state of Tennessee to the international search for new superheavy elements. UT-Battelle, the managing contractor of ORNL, is marking the discovery by providing more than 1,000 public middle schools and high schools in Tennessee with new charts of the periodic table. Tennessine--the official name for element 117--completes the seventh row of the table and the column of elements classified as halogens. The charts will include the signatures of Haslam and ORNL Director Thom Mason. "We had two very significant announcements in Tennessee this fall as it relates to science. In October, the Nation's Report Card announced that Tennessee students are the fastest improving in the nation in science, and in November, Tennessee became only the second state to be recognized in the periodic table of elements," Haslam said. "Having an element named in our honor is further evidence of the scientific excellence that exists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the University of Tennessee, Vanderbilt University and other institutions throughout our state, and by UT-Battelle donating new periodic tables to every middle and high school in Tennessee, students can feel proud of our state's important role in the scientific community and inspired to play a role in its future." Haslam spoke after Yuri Oganessian, the Russian scientist who developed the "hot fusion" method of creating superheavy elements, delivered a Eugene P. Wigner Distinguished Lecture to ORNL staff. Oganessian was joined by Victor Matveev, director of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia, where the experiment was performed. "We appreciate Gov. Haslam's recognition of the laboratory's research and support staff who helped add this historic experiment to the long list of Tennessee's scientific achievements," said ORNL Director Thom Mason. "We also welcome Dr. Oganessian and Dr. Matveev to ORNL to mark the culmination of our long partnership to expand the horizons of physics and chemistry." The state of Tennessee made several contributions to tennessine's discovery. Vanderbilt University professor Joe Hamilton, a longtime collaborator with ORNL in physics research, advocated for the experiment to discover element 117, which required the radioisotope berkelium-249. The only source of berkelium-249 is ORNL's High Flux Isotope Reactor and adjoining Radiochemical Engineering Development Center. When a campaign to make the industrially important radioisotope californium-252 began in 2008 under the auspices of the DOE Isotope Program, Hamilton put Oganessian in touch with ORNL Director of Science and Technology Partnerships Jim Roberto. Roberto pulled together a team of scientists and engineers to produce berkelium-249, as a byproduct of the californium production, for the experiment and to collaborate in the international research effort. After a year-long process, the discovery team had detected six atoms of element 117 at JINR's atom smasher, which the team that included JINR, ORNL, Vanderbilt and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory reported in early April 2010. Follow-up experiments to confirm the discovery, which included nuclear physicists from the University of Tennessee, have identified 16 more of the "superheavy" atoms. The DOE Isotope Program produced and contributed the additional amounts of Bk-249 to the nuclear physics research community for these follow-on experiments. The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry announced its final approval of tennessine as the name for element 117 last November. IUPAC also announced the naming of element 115, which is a decay product of element 117, as moscovium after the Moscow region where JINR is located, and element 118 as oganesson, honoring Oganessian. Although the superheavy elements at the bottom of the periodic table are extremely short lived, scientist believe an "island of stability" may exist as the atomic numbers of newly discovered elements increase, which could revolutionize physics and chemistry. The discovery of tennessine represents strong evidence of the existence of the island of stability. "The discovery of tennessine is an example of the potential realized when nations combine their resources and work together in the pursuit of knowledge that could be of tremendous benefit to society," Roberto said. The periodic tables to be issued by UT-Battelle to the schools represent an approximately $25,000 corporate gift to public education in Tennessee. ### ORNL's research was supported by DOE's Office of Science via the DOE Isotope Program. The High Flux Isotope Reactor is a DOE Office of Science User Facility. ORNL is managed by UT-Battelle for the Department of Energy's Office of Science, the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States. DOE's Office of Science is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit science.energy.gov. At present, the most immediate threat to EU citizens is to those living or visiting influenza A(H7N9)-affected areas in China A steep increase of human cases of avian influenza A(H7N9) has been reported since the beginning of December 2016 from China. During this wave, the number of human cases is already higher than during the last two waves in 2014-15 and 2015-16. The majority of recently reported human cases are associated with exposure to infected live poultry or contaminated environments, including markets where live poultry are sold. Influenza A(H7N9) viruses continue to be detected in poultry and their environments in the areas where human cases are occurring. In addition, the human cases are more geographically widespread and cases are also reported from rural areas, unlike in previous epidemics. At present, the most immediate threat to EU citizens is to those living or visiting influenza A(H7N9)-affected areas in China concludes the updated rapid risk assessment by the European Centre for Disease Control (ECDC). Caution should be taken by people travelling to China to avoid direct exposure to poultry, live poultry markets or backyard farms. The recent upsurge of human cases indicates the possibility of imported cases to Europe. However, the risk of the disease spreading within Europe between humans remains low as the virus does not appear to transmit easily from human to human: investigations do not support sustained human-to-human transmission. Travellers that visited affected areas and develop respiratory symptoms and fever within up to 10 days after their return should consult a physician and inform him/her about their recent travel history to facilitate early diagnosis and treatment. People in the EU presenting with severe respiratory or influenza-like infection and a history of travel to the affected areas in China- with potential exposure to poultry or live bird markets - will require careful investigation, management and infection control. Adequate samples for influenza tests should be rapidly taken and processed from patients with relevant exposure history within 10 days preceding symptom onset. Early or presumptive treatment with neuraminidase inhibitors should be considered for suspect or confirmed cases, in line with relevant national and international recommendations. Contacts of confirmed cases should be followed-up and tested. Offering post-exposure prophylaxis should be considered. ### TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- A team of Florida State University researchers has discovered that a common household pest can tell us a lot about an aggressive tumor that attacks young children. Professor of Biological Science Wu-Min Deng and postdoctoral researcher Gengqiang Xie published a new paper in the journal Cancer Research that describes how a complex protein called Snr1, the homologue of human SMARCB1/hSNF5/INI1, acts as a tumor suppressor in an unconventional manner in fruit flies. Fruit flies are often used as a model to determine the basic fundamentals of several diseases in humans, including cancer, because about 75 percent of human disease-causing genes have a counterpart in the fly. "Basically, we used a fly's imaginal tissue, composed of cells similar to human epithelia, to understand this cancer gene," Xie said. "There's no treatment for this cancer, so we need to understand how it works first." Xie and Deng are specifically looking at malignant rhabdoid tumors, highly aggressive tumors that attack the brain or the kidneys and occur primarily in children under 2 years old. There are about 20 to 25 new cases diagnosed each year, according to the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Little is known about these tumors, so finding a cure is incredibly difficult. Researchers investigating the disease are focused on learning how the body functions and why these tumors occur at all. In studying the fruit flies, Xie and Deng homed in on a specific protein that was generally known as part of a larger protein complex crucial to normal growth and development. They found this protein, which is analogous to one in humans, was molecularly and functionally different than other components of the protein complex. In carefully orchestrated experiments, researchers removed that protein from several fruit flies. When they did this, the fruit flies immediately experienced tumor growth in the tissues that line the organs. "It really has a lot of potential because if you want to find treatments, you need to understand how it works," Deng said. "We knew this information would be very useful in understanding human tumor growth." Deng and Xie hope to further investigate this protein to find out what causes it to occasionally misfire and stop suppressing the tumor growth. Their long-term goal is to find drug molecules to test on these proteins to see if they can develop a treatment. ### Other institutions contributing to the research are the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the National Cancer Institute and the Sino-French Hoffmann Institute at the Guangzhou Medical University in China. The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation. Boston, MA - Hospital admissions for cardiovascular diseases decline on days with major snowfalls compared to days with no snowfall, but they jump by 23% two days later, according to a new study led by researchers from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. "With global climate change, major snowstorms may become more frequent and severe," said lead author Jennifer Bobb of the Group Health Research Institute in Seattle, who worked on the study as a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Biostatistics at Harvard Chan School. "Understanding trends in hospitalizations related to snowfall will help us develop ways to protect public health during harsh winter conditions." The study will be published online January 30, 2017 in the American Journal of Epidemiology. The researchers analyzed data for 433,037 adults hospitalized at the four largest hospitals in Boston (Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston Medical Center, and Massachusetts General Hospital) during the months of November through April, for the years 2010-2015. They focused on admissions for cardiovascular diseases; cold-weather related conditions such as frostbite; and falls and injuries. "This was a complex data science endeavor that required coordination and linkage of electronic medical records across hospitals," said senior author Francesca Dominici, professor of biostatistics and senior associate dean for research at Harvard Chan School. Other findings included: Cold-weather-related disease admissions increased by 3.7% on high snowfall days (greater than 10 inches of snow), compared to days with no snowfall. Cardiovascular disease admissions were higher on days of moderate (5 to 10 inches), rather than high, snowfall. Admissions for falls increased 18% on average during the six days following a moderate snowfall, compared to days with no snowfall. Health hazards posed by snowfalls may have previously been unrecognized, according to the researchers. A possible explanation could be that people who are most susceptible to cardiovascular events and falls stay indoors during heavy snowfalls and avoid potential hazards, say the researchers. They write that the two-day delayed jump in admissions for cardiovascular events after heavy snowfalls could reflect delays getting to the hospital during snow emergencies. The mechanisms by which snowstorms lead to adverse cardiovascular events that are not fully understood, noted the authors. Snow shoveling may be one such factor. This possibility derives from prior studies of "snow-shoveler's infarction," which found that heavy snow shoveling resulted in cardiorespiratory demands that were comparable to or higher than the demands of maximal treadmill testing. ### This study was supported by the National Institutes of Health (Grants R21 ES022585-01, R21 ES024012, R01 ES024332, R01 ES026217, P30 ES000002, P50 MD010428, K08 AR060257); the Environmental Protection Agency (Grant 83587201-0); the Health Effects Institute (Gran 4953-RFA14-3/16-4); and the Harold and Duval Bowen Fund. "Time-Course of Cause-Specific Hospital Admissions During Snowstorms: An Analysis of Electronic Medical Records from Major Hospitals in Boston," Jennifer F. Bobb, Kalon K. L Ho, Robert W. Yeh, Lori Harrington, Adrian Zai, Katherine P. Liao, Francesca Dominici, American Journal of Epidemiology, online January 30, 2017, doi: 10.1093/aje/kww219 Visit the Harvard Chan School website for the latest news, press releases, and multimedia offerings. Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health brings together dedicated experts from many disciplines to educate new generations of global health leaders and produce powerful ideas that improve the lives and health of people everywhere. As a community of leading scientists, educators, and students, we work together to take innovative ideas from the laboratory to people's lives--not only making scientific breakthroughs, but also working to change individual behaviors, public policies, and health care practices. Each year, more than 400 faculty members at Harvard Chan School teach 1,000-plus full-time students from around the world and train thousands more through online and executive education courses. Founded in 1913 as the Harvard-MIT School of Health Officers, the School is recognized as America's oldest professional training program in public health. Writing a scientific research paper is tough at the best of times regardless of funding conditions and political intervention. As such, a scientist will turn to any tool they might find to help with this generally arduous task. Writing in the International Journal of Business Innovation and Research, a Brazilian team has surveyed common tools and determined which tools have what useful features. Their summary points to the possibility of designing a new system for helping in the writing of scientific papers that has the pros of the best tools and none of the cons of the worst. For Ralf Landim Reith, Jose Dutra de Oliveira Neto and Anderson de Andrade Santos of the University of Sao Paulo, as with most academic researchers, the scientific Endeavour is a "publish or perish" environment. Researchers must maintain records of their hypotheses, experiments, results and their theories and interpretations. And periodically, they must pull this information together into a cogent, coherent and cohesive form that can be disseminated via conference poster, lecture and ultimately published paper. The ultimate aim to record the progress of their research endeavors so that they might be peer-reviewed and otherwise validated against other findings in their field. There is also, of course, the business side of science. "The importance of scientific articles in the dissemination of research findings and results is unquestionable," the team says. "Besides disseminating the findings, scientific papers play a key role in the distribution of funding and scholarships for research projects, where the number of publications is used as a quality index by various funding agencies." The team has investigated the benefits and limitations of software in terms of brainstorming, organization of ideas, database of examples, schematic structure models, automatic identification of structure, automatic review of structure, indication of rhetorical strategies and the basis of writing standards. The tools include the likes of "Abstract Helper", "AntMover", "AMADEUS", and "SciPo-Pharmacy", indeed, most available tools are for abstracting rather than paper structure. Those that were useful for organizing and brainstorming date back to the 1990s and are sometimes incompatible with modern personal computers and not necessarily widely used. Nevertheless, all the types of software assessed has had a place in the scientific writing process and features of even the most archaic and mundane might be useful in the modern context of the web, social media, digital journals and such. The team points out that there is currently an almost complete lack of support for scientific writing, particularly in highly specialized areas such as production engineering. The study points to a significant gap in the "market" representing a need that might be fulfilled by a software company or the community itself with the requisite skills to create open source tools. ### Reith, R.L., de Oliveira Neto, J.D. and de Andrade Santos, A. (2017) 'Support tools to assist scientific writing: assessment of key features to construct a system for production engineering', Int. J. Business Innovation and Research, Vol. 12, No. 3, pp.353-362. AMES, Iowa - Iowa State University's Neal Iverson and an international team of researchers are working to help quantify the single biggest uncertainty in predicting how much glaciers will contribute to the rise of sea levels. That uncertainty: how much will glaciers that flow to oceans speed up over the next century as the climate warms? Iverson, an Iowa State University professor of geological and atmospheric sciences who has studied glaciers in Iceland and Norway, and the rest of the research team will look to lab experiments and field work to build more realistic computer models of glacier flow. It's all about getting a better, more accurate understanding of the physics involved in glacial ice moving to the seas in places such as Greenland and Antarctica. "Glaciologists are trying to predict how fast glaciers will flow to the oceans," Iverson said. "To do that, we need new lab and field data to include complexity in models that is usually neglected. "These are complicated systems," he said. "Modelling them is hard. But we need to include how water in ice affects its flow resistance, and we need sliding laws that are based on the real topography of glacier beds and that include rock friction. Adding these things really matters." Two new grants will help Iverson and his collaborators add that complexity. An international team Both grants are from the National Science Foundation, with funding from the United Kingdom's Natural Environment Research Council to support the work of applied mathematicians at the University of Oxford in England. Iverson is the lead investigator on both grant proposals. The other researchers are Lucas Zoet, an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a former postdoctoral research associate at Iowa State; Ian Hewitt, an associate professor and university lecturer at Oxford's Mathematical Institute; and Richard Katz, a professor of geodynamics at Oxford. The projects will also support several positions at Iowa State: two postdoctoral research associates, a graduate student research assistant and two undergraduate summer field assistants. Iverson credits time spent at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in 2015 as a Fulbright scholar with making it possible to coordinate the research team and lead the writing of the first of the two proposals. Two icy projects The first project (a total of $926,178 over three years with $441,751 to Iowa State) will support studies of temperate ice, or ice at its melting point, and how this soft, watery ice resists deformation. That's important because the resistance to deformation of temperate ice at the edges of ice streams - areas of rapid ice flow within the Antarctic ice sheet that can be hundreds of miles long and tens of miles wide - holds back the flowing ice. "Results will improve estimates of the evolution of ice stream speed and geometry in a warming climate, and so improve the accuracy of assessments of the contribution of the Antarctic ice sheet to sea level rise over the next century," the researchers wrote in a project summary. The second project (a total of $551,084 over three years with $352,025 to Iowa State) will support development of better "sliding laws" to help predict the sliding speeds of glaciers and ice sheets. Sliding laws are the mathematical relationships between the glacier sliding speed and the factors that control it, such as the stresses below the glacier, the water pressure there, the topography of the glacier bed and the concentration of debris in glacier ice. This project will include field studies of exposed glacier beds at receding glaciers in Canada and Switzerland. "We need better data on the topography of real glacier beds and its variability from glacier to glacier," Iverson said. "We'll take those data, and with the help of a numerical model of slip at glacier beds, develop relationships that reflect the real range of sliding behavior expected beneath glaciers." Glacier in a freezer Both projects will use the one-of-a-kind glacier sliding simulator Iverson has been using since 2009 to study glacier movement. The machine is big - it's more than 9 feet high. It's also powerful - it can put as much as 170 tons of force on an ice ring eight inches thick and three in diameter. And it's precise - motors can rotate the ice at speeds of 100 to 7,000 feet per year and circulating fluid can control ice temperature to 1/100th of a degree Celsius. The new projects will add complexity to Iverson's lab experiments. Debris, for example, will be added to the ice ring to study friction between it and the rock bed during sliding. In other experiments, temperate ice will be sheared between rotating plates to study how its resistance to flow depends on its water content. "There is lots of water both at the beds of ice sheets and within them and that's why parts of ice sheets can move unusually fast and dump lots of ice into the ocean," Iverson said. "We hope these new projects will boost efforts to predict the fast flow of glaciers and its major effect on sea-level rise." ### Though placid enough to be managed by humans, yaks are robust enough to survive at 4000 meters altitude. Genomic analyses by researchers of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich show that yak domestication began several millennia ago and was promoted by repeated crosses with cattle. The first systematic genome-wide comparison of the genetic heritage of yaks and cattle shows that about 1.5% of the genome of Mongolian yaks is derived from domesticated cattle. While male hybrids are sterile, hybrid females can be backcrossed to male yaks for several generations, which allows for the stable introgression of short regions of bovine chromosomes into the yak genome. The results of the new study suggest that yak hybridization began thousands of years ago. Dr. Ivica Medugorac, who heads a research group in population genomics at the Chair of Animal Genetics and Husbandry at LMU, is the first and corresponding author on the new paper, which appears in the journal Nature Genetics. "Our results indicate that hybridization between yaks and cattle began more than 1500 years ago, and has continued with varying intensity ever since," Medugorac says, and points out that written records also testify to early hybridization of yaks by Mongolian breeders. In collaboration with Dr. Aurelien Capitan of the Universite Paris-Saclay, Dr. Stefan Krebs of the Laboratory for Functional Genome Analysis at LMU's Gene Center and colleagues from other European, American and Mongolian institutions, Medugorac has mapped the distribution of cattle genes in the yak genome. "Many of the genetic variants in the yak that can be traced back to cattle are found at gene loci that are known to play roles in the development and function of the nervous system. They have an impact on sensory perception, cognition and social behavior. Evidently, over a period of several thousands of years, Mongolian breeders succeeded in speeding up the domestication of the yak by crossing them with cattle, which had been domesticated thousands of years before," he explains. Furthermore, the traits that enable yaks to survive at high altitudes, in mountain ranges such as the Altai, the Pamirs and the Himalayas have obviously been retained during this process. In the course of the study, the researchers identified a gene variant in Mongolian cattle and yaks that is responsible for the loss of horns. "We were able to show that this variant had been introduced into yaks from the domesticated Mongolian Turano cattle long ago," Medugorac says. Lack of horns (known as 'polledness') is, however, only one of the traits with which yak breeders attempted to tame the ferocious temper of the yaks. Interestingly, the polled variant in the Mongolian Turano cattle differs from the mutations known to be responsible for polledness in European cattle, which had previously been molecularly characterized by Medugorac's group in 2012 and 2014. These findings are already being exploited by breeders worldwide to select for polled cattle in order to avoid the painful procedure of dehorning. ### Nebraska Home Sales is pleased to welcome Brynna Luke to their Lincoln office. She was born and raised in Monterey Bay, Calif., and has lived in Lincoln since 1999. Luke loves imagining and discovering the potential in homes old and new and teaching others how to create their dream home with good design and a bit of ingenuity. She is excited to help others discover the special places they'll call home. Brynna Luke invites anyone seeking professional real estate services to contact her at 402-853-4172. A group of scientists are recommending giving the world's nature reserves a makeover to defend not only flora and fauna, but people, too. Scientists in this week's Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences argue that the world's protected areas such as nature reserves, traditionally havens for endangered animals and plants, can be made better if they ratchet up benefits that directly benefit people. The world's nature reserves not only defend nature for nature's sake, but also can curb erosion, prevent sandstorms, retain water and prevent flooding and sequester carbon. The authors include more of a place for people - judiciously. "Decades of interdisciplinary research teaches us that the best, most durable protections we can give nature are ones that also directly benefit people," said Michigan State University's Jianguo "Jack" Liu, a sustainability scholar long known for science of coupled human and natural systems. "This new look at China's expansive nature reserves is an exciting way to understand how protected areas all over the world can be improved for both people and nature." Liu joins Weihua Xu of the State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology in the Chinese Academy of Sciences, as well as scientists from several other institutions in China as well as Stanford University and University of Minnesota, to evaluate what and how China's expansive protected areas are protecting, and envision a kind of new national park system that nurtures both man and beast. Globally some 209,000 protected areas cover approximately 12 million square miles - more than 15 percent of the world's land surface and 3.4 percent of the ocean area. Those areas can be a hot bed of human benefit - they are places that also are treasured for hunting, fishing, recreation and to marvel at natural beauty. The group evaluates how good a job China's protected areas are doing at protecting biodiversity. Overall, the reserve networks, which focus mainly on protecting valued mammals, do "reasonably well" for mammals and birds - mostly because they're designed with them in mind. Plants, amphibians and reptiles aren't the target group for most reserves, and thus aren't as well protected. Likewise, China's nature reserve network wasn't designed with the four key ecosystem services on which the study focuses in mind. Water retention, soil retention, sandstorm prevention and carbon sequestration aren't on the map - literally. The scientists see an opportunity to change borders and create new national parks to balance protection with sustainable use of natural resources. The group envisions clusters of nature reserves, which would foster connectivity. These new parks could permit human activity that wasn't disruptive to conservation efforts. The win-win approach could garner more local and national support for protected areas, as well as make the super-sized parks more effective and durable. "Many benefits generated in China's nature reserves, such as carbon sequestration, are telecoupled with the rest of the world. The research approach developed in this study can also be useful for evaluating biodiversity and ecosystem services of protected areas in other countries, including the United States," said Liu, Rachel Carson Chair in Sustainability and director of MSU's Center for Systems Integration and Sustainability (CSIS). ### Besides Liu and Xu, other authors of "Strengthening protected areas for biodiversity and ecosystem services in China" are Yi Xiao, Jingjing Zhang, Wu Yang, Lu Zhang, Vanessa Hull, Zhi Wang, Hua Zheng, Stephen Polasky, Ling Jiang, Yang Xiao, Xuewei Shi, Enming Rao, Fei Lu, Xiaoke Wang, Gretchen Daily and Zhiyun Ouyang. Xu, Yi Xiao, and Ouyang were visiting scholars at CSIS. Hull and Yang earned PhDs at CSIS. NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has identified the farthest gamma-ray blazars, a type of galaxy whose intense emissions are powered by supersized black holes. Light from the most distant object began its journey to us when the universe was 1.4 billion years old, or nearly 10 percent of its present age. "Despite their youth, these far-flung blazars host some of the most massive black holes known," said Roopesh Ojha, an astronomer at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. "That they developed so early in cosmic history challenges current ideas of how supermassive black holes form and grow, and we want to find more of these objects to help us better understand the process." Ojha presented the findings Monday, Jan. 30, at the American Physical Society meeting in Washington, and a paper describing the results has been submitted to The Astrophysical Journal Letters. Blazars constitute roughly half of the gamma-ray sources detected by Fermi's Large Area Telescope (LAT). Astronomers think their high-energy emissions are powered by matter heated and torn apart as it falls from a storage, or accretion, disk toward a supermassive black hole with a million or more times the sun's mass. A small part of this infalling material becomes redirected into a pair of particle jets, which blast outward in opposite directions at nearly the speed of light. Blazars appear bright in all forms of light, including gamma rays, the highest-energy light, when one of the jets happens to point almost directly toward us. Previously, the most distant blazars detected by Fermi emitted their light when the universe was about 2.1 billion years old. Earlier observations showed that the most distant blazars produce most of their light at energies right in between the range detected by the LAT and current X-ray satellites, which made finding them extremely difficult. Then, in 2015, the Fermi team released a full reprocessing of all LAT data, called Pass 8, that ushered in so many improvements astronomers said it was like having a brand new instrument. The LAT's boosted sensitivity at lower energies increased the chances of discovering more far-off blazars. The research team was led by Vaidehi Paliya and Marco Ajello at Clemson University in South Carolina and included Dario Gasparrini at the Italian Space Agency's Science Data Center in Rome as well as Ojha. They began by searching for the most distant sources in a catalog of 1.4 million quasars, a galaxy class closely related to blazars. Because only the brightest sources can be detected at great cosmic distances, they then eliminated all but the brightest objects at radio wavelengths from the list. With a final sample of about 1,100 objects, the scientists then examined LAT data for all of them, resulting in the detection of five new gamma-ray blazars. Expressed in terms of redshift, astronomers' preferred measure of the deep cosmos, the new blazars range from redshift 3.3 to 4.31, which means the light we now detect from them started on its way when the universe was between 1.9 and 1.4 billion years old, respectively. "Once we found these sources, we collected all the available multiwavelength data on them and derived properties like the black hole mass, the accretion disk luminosity, and the jet power," said Paliya. Two of the blazars boast black holes of a billion solar masses or more. All of the objects possess extremely luminous accretion disks that emit more than two trillion times the energy output of our sun. This means matter is continuously falling inward, corralled into a disk and heated before making the final plunge to the black hole. "The main question now is how these huge black holes could have formed in such a young universe," said Gasparrini. "We don't know what mechanisms triggered their rapid development." In the meantime, the team plans to continue a deep search for additional examples. "We think Fermi has detected just the tip of the iceberg, the first examples of a galaxy population that previously has not been detected in gamma rays," said Ajello. ### NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope is an astrophysics and particle physics partnership, developed in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Energy and with important contributions from academic institutions and partners in France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Sweden and the United States. For more information on Fermi, visit: https://www.nasa.gov/fermi Satellite data from NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite showed that former Tropical Cyclone 03S resembled a frontal system in the Southern Indian Ocean as it continued moving in a northwesterly direction over cooler sea surface temperatures. The Joint Typhoon Warning Center or JTWC issued their final warning on the system at 4 a.m. EST (0900 UTC) on January 29, when 03S' maximum sustained winds dropped to 30 knots. At that time, it was about 310 nautical miles northwest of Learmonth, Western Australia. Infrared imagery from the MODIS instrument aboard NASA's Aqua satellite on Jan 29 at 0720 UTC (2:20 a.m. EST) showed that the system appeared elongated. On Jan. 30, the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument aboard NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite provided a visible-light image of Ex-Tropical Cyclone 03S that showed its circulation center was being battered by vertical wind shear. That wind shear pushed most of the clouds and thunderstorms west and southwest of the center. The image showed that those clouds were streaming to the southeast, being drawn between a low pressure center over the western part of Western Australia and a high pressure system located to the south-southwest of 03S's remnant center. As a result, the clouds resemble a frontal system over the southern section of Western Australia. Some of the storms associated with that system have triggered warnings on January 30. The Australian Bureau of Meteorology issued a warning to "Sheep Graziers for the Lower West (where the city of Perth is located) and Great Southern forecast districts" on 5:03 p.m. WST local time on Monday 30 January 2017. The warning stated "Sheep graziers are warned that cold temperatures for this time of year, heavy rain at times and easterly winds are expected during the remainder of Monday and Tuesday. Areas likely to be affected include parts of the Lower West and northern parts of the Great Southern forecast districts. There is a risk of losses of lambs and sheep exposed to these conditions." JTWC said that the remnant low pressure area will continue to weaken due to unfavorable environmental conditions. ### Fort Lauderdale/Davie, FL & Ithaca, NY - A new genomics study of shark DNA, including from great white and great hammerhead sharks, reveals unique modifications in their immunity genes that may underlie the rapid wound healing and possibly higher resistance to cancers in these ocean predators. This research brings us a few steps closer to understanding, from a genetic sense, why sharks exhibit some characteristics that are highly desirable by humans. Sharks and rays are well known to be highly efficient wound healers, and suspected to show a greater resistance to cancers, though this needs further study. These properties are likely tied to their immune systems, which have been fine-tuned over 400 million years of evolution. A study by the Nova Southeastern University (NSU) Save Our Seas Shark Research Center and Guy Harvey Research Institute (GHRI) and the Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine just published in the journal BMC Genomics (lead author, postdoctoral associate Nicholas Marra,) now provides the first evidence that some shark and ray immunity genes have undergone evolutionary changes that may be tied to these novel immune system abilities. "The immune system of sharks and rays has been battle-tested and evolved over hundreds of millions of years," said Mahmood Shivji. Ph.D., director of NSU's Save Our Seas Shark Research Center and Guy Harvey Research Institute. "Using genomics approaches to understanding their immunity genesis is likely to produce many more exciting discoveries, some of which could potentially translate into human medical benefit. Now we have another important reason to make sure we don't lose these marvelous and ecologically critical animals to overfishing, as is currently occurring in many parts of the world. We've just scratched the surface in terms of learning what these ancient animals can teach us, as well as possibly provide us in terms of direct biomedical benefits." Cancer-related Immunity Genes The researchers found that two shark immune genes, legumain and Bag1, stood out in particular. Both these genes have counterparts in humans, where their overexpression is well known to be associated with a whole range of cancers. Quite notably, the new research shows that these genes in sharks, however, have become modified and have undergone evolutionary natural selection. "Several studies have demonstrated anti-tumor properties of shark-derived compounds in lab studies, said Shivji, who co-led this research with Michael Stanhope, Ph.D., of Cornell University. "It's intriguing that we are now seeing evidence of evolutionary adaptation in these specific shark immunity genes, which just happen also to be involved in promoting cancer in humans." Shivji stresses, however, that's it's important to understand that ingesting parts of sharks will not cure or prevent cancer, and in fact it is likely to be damaging to one's health because of the high mercury content in sharks. Although the notion that sharks and rays are more resistant to cancers needs rigorous scientific confirmation, the results of this new study raise the enticing prospect that the proteins produced by these cancer-related legumain and Bag1 genes have modified functions in sharks, including the possibility of actually protecting the animals from acquiring cancer. The Bag1 gene, for example, codes for a protein that in humans is involved in inhibiting an essential natural process called "programmed cell death." This is important because the programmed cell death process works to eliminate dysfunctional cells, and one of the hallmarks of cancer is the ability of malignant cells to evade this key natural process. So the shark-specific signature of adaptation found in the Bag1 gene may indicate an alternative, or modified role for this important gene - one that could alter its tendency to inhibit programmed cell death in sharks. Wound-healing Related Genes And the novelty of the shark immune system does not end there. What might explain their rapid wound healing abilities while immersed in seawater with its myriads of bacteria which would be expected to quickly cause infections in open wounds? The shark DNA sequences provide further clues. The research team found that compared to bony fishes, the four species of sharks and ray examined not only had a much higher proportion of genes involved in antibody-mediated immunity, but also that several of the infection immunity-related genes were expressed only in the sharks and rays. "This higher proportion of genes involved in adaptive (antibody) immunity function could be a key reason behind the infection fighting and fast wound-healing abilities of sharks and rays," said Professor Stanhope. "Previous studies of the shark immune system have already yielded some surprises in terms of antibody structure, and these new genetic findings further add to the box of biological novelties in this highly successful vertebrate lineage." ### You can find the study published in the journal BMC Genomics. The Save Our Seas Foundation was the primary funding organization for this study. Be sure to sign up for NSU's RSS feed so you don't miss any of our news releases, guest editorials and other announcements. Please sign up HERE. About Nova Southeastern University (NSU): Located in beautiful Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Nova Southeastern University (NSU) is a dynamic research institution dedicated to providing high-quality educational programs at the undergraduate, graduate, and first-professional degree levels. A private, not-for-profit institution, NSU has campuses in Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Jacksonville, Miami, Miramar, Orlando, Palm Beach, and Tampa, Florida, as well as San Juan, Puerto Rico, while maintaining a presence online globally. For more than 50 years, NSU has been awarding degrees in a wide range of fields, while fostering groundbreaking research and an impactful commitment to community. Classified as a research university with "high research activity" by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, NSU is 1 of only 50 universities nationwide to also be awarded Carnegie's Community Engagement Classification, and is also the largest private, not-for-profit institution in the United States that meets the U.S. Department of Education's criteria as a Hispanic-serving Institution. Please visit http://www.nova.edu for more information about NSU and realizingpotential.nova.edu for more information on the largest fundraising campaign in NSU history. About NSU's Halmos College of Natural Sciences and Oceanography: The college provides high-quality undergraduate (bachelor's degree) and graduate (master's and doctoral degrees and certificates) education programs in a broad range of disciplines, including marine sciences, mathematics, biophysics, and chemistry. Researchers carry out innovative basic and applied research programs in coral reef biology, ecology, and geology; fish biology, ecology, and conservation; shark and billfish ecology; fisheries science; deep-sea organismal biology and ecology; invertebrate and vertebrate genomics, genetics, molecular ecology, and evolution; microbiology; biodiversity; observation and modeling of large-scale ocean circulation, coastal dynamics, and ocean atmosphere coupling; benthic habitat mapping; biodiversity; histology; and calcification. The college's newest building is the state-of-the-art Guy Harvey Oceanographic Center, an 86,000-square-foot structure filled with laboratories; offices; seminar rooms; an auditorium; and indoor and outdoor running sea water facilities. Please visit cnso.nova.edu for more information. About Cornell University (Cornell): Cornell University is unique in the Ivy League for having private and public schools and colleges. Cornell's mission is to discover, preserve, and disseminate knowledge; produce creative work; and promote a culture of broad inquiry throughout and beyond the Cornell community. Cornell also aims, through public service, to enhance the lives and livelihoods of our students, the people of New York, and others around the world. About The College of Veterinary Medicine at Cornell University (The College): The College is consistently ranked among the top veterinary schools in the world, a tribute to its strengths in training students, the breadth and quality of its research, its cutting-edge clinical and diagnostic services, and its extension and outreach programs. The DVM program combines innovative, small-group learning strategies and intensive early clinical experience. The College's teaching hospitals and diagnostic laboratory impact the health of over 150,000 animals annually. Ottawa researchers have validated a rule that could safely take a third of chest pain patients in the emergency department off of heart monitors, according to a study published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal. Implementing this made-in-Ottawa rule could free up these monitored beds for sicker patients and reduce wait times. "Chest pain is one of the most common reasons people visit Canadian emergency departments, with around 800,000 visits a year," said Dr. Venkatesh Thiruganasambandamoorthy, lead author of the study and a scientist and emergency physician at The Ottawa Hospital and an assistant professor at the University of Ottawa. "Between the two emergency departments at The Ottawa Hospital we see around 35 chest pain patients every day, and usually 25 are assigned to monitored beds. This rule would let us safely remove eight patients from these beds, freeing up the monitors for other patients." About 70 percent of chest pain patients who come to the emergency department are put in beds with heart monitors in order to detect a potentially dangerous condition called arrhythmia, or irregular heartbeat. However, previous studies have shown that this condition is rare, with less than two percent of chest pain patients experiencing it during stay. This is why Ottawa researchers had previously developed a simple, highly sensitive tool to identify those patients who can be safely removed from heart monitors. According to the Ottawa Chest Pain Cardiac Monitoring Rule, patients can be removed if they have no current chest pain and there are no significant abnormalities in the electrocardiogram reading. Patients are normally taken off the monitor after about eight hours, when they are discharged home. Applying this rule will allow patients to be taken off monitors much sooner. If implemented when they first arrive, the rule will allow them to be redirected to a non-monitored area of the emergency department. To verify the rule, researchers observed chest pain patients in the emergency department. Then they tested whether the tool could accurately predict which patients had needed to stay on heart monitors because of irregular heartbeat. They found that 15 of the 1,125 patients admitted to The Ottawa Hospital emergency departments for chest pain between November 2013 and April 2015 experienced irregular heartbeat during their eight-hour stay. The rule was able to predict with 100 percent accuracy the 15 patients who needed to stay on heart monitors. It also indicated that 36 percent of the 796 patients who were monitored during the study could have been safely removed from the monitors. "This rule now has the potential to take a large number of low risk chest pain patients off of heart monitors," said Dr, Thiruganasambandamoorthy. "We started using this rule in The Ottawa Hospital emergency departments a few months ago, and we're watching the outcomes very closely. We have also spoken to several emergency departments across the country who are excited about bringing this rule into their hospitals." ### Full reference: Prospective Validation of a Clinical Decision Rule to Identify Emergency Department Chest Pain Patients Who Can Safely be Removed from Cardiac Monitoring: The Ottawa Chest Pain Cardiac Monitoring Rule. Shahbaz Syed, Mathieu Gatien, Jeffrey J. Perry MD, Hina Chaudry, Soo-Min Kim, Kenneth Kwong, Muhammad Mukarram, Venkatesh Thiruganasambandamoorthy. Canadian Medical Association Journal. January 30, 2016 Funders: Ontario Innovation Fund, The Ottawa Hospital Foundation. Dr. Thiruganasambandamoorthy was previously supported through the Jump Start Resuscitation Scholarship and currently holds the National New Investigator salary award (both through the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada). This paper is an example of how The Ottawa Hospital is contributing to making Ontario Healthier, Wealthier and Smarter. http://www.healthierwealthiersmarter.ca. About The Ottawa Hospital: Inspired by research. Driven by compassion: The Ottawa Hospital is one of Canada's largest learning and research hospitals with over 1,100 beds, approximately 12,000 staff and an annual budget of over $1.2 billion. Our focus on research and learning helps us develop new and innovative ways to treat patients and improve care. As a multi-campus hospital, affiliated with the University of Ottawa, we deliver specialized care to the Eastern Ontario region, but our techniques and research discoveries are adopted around the world. We engage the community at all levels to support our vision for better patient care. See http://www.ohri.ca for more information about research at The Ottawa Hospital. About the University of Ottawa --A crossroads of cultures and ideas: The University of Ottawa is home to over 50,000 students, faculty and staff, who live, work and study in both French and English. Our campus is a crossroads of cultures and ideas, where bold minds come together to inspire game-changing ideas. We are one of Canada's top 10 research universities--our professors and researchers explore new approaches to today's challenges. One of a handful of Canadian universities ranked among the top 200 in the world, we attract exceptional thinkers and welcome diverse perspectives from across the globe. http://www.uottawa.ca Media Contact: Amelia Buchanan, Senior Communication Specialist, Ottawa Hospital Research Institute; ambuchanan@ohri.ca; Office: 613-798-5555 x 73687; Cell: 613-297-8315 New insight into two states of a viral protein reveal its function as a DNA-sensor and gives a roadmap for developing anti-viral therapy for pathogenic DNA viruses PHILADELPHIA -- To generate swarms of new viral particles, a virus hijacks a cell into producing masses of self-assembling cages that are then loaded with the genetic blueprint for the next infection. But the picture of how that DNA is loaded into those viral cages, or capsids, was blurry, especially for two of the most common types of DNA virus on earth, bacterial viruses and human herpesvirus. Jefferson researchers pieced together the three-dimensional atomic structure of a doughnut-shaped protein that acts like a door or 'portal' for the DNA to get in and out of the capsid, and have now discovered that this protein begins to transform its structure when it comes into contact with DNA. Their work published today in Nature Communications. "Researchers thought that the portal protein acts as an inert passageway for DNA," says senior author Gino Cingolani, Ph.D., a Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Thomas Jefferson University and researcher at the Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center. "We have shown that the portal is much more like a sensor that essentially helps measure out an appropriate length of DNA for each capsid particle, ensuring faithful production of new viral particles." The finding solves a longstanding puzzle in the field, and reveals a potential drug target for one of the most common human viral pathogens, herpesviruses, which is responsible for diseases such as chicken pox, mononucleosis, lymphomas and Kaposi sarcoma. Dr. Cingolani and colleagues started their work 18 years ago by characterizing the structure of the portal protein using X-ray crystallography from P22, a bacteria-infecting virus that has a nearly identical portal protein as the human-infecting herpesviruses. In a paper published in 2011, the group showed that the portal protein looked like a perfect doughnut on a pedestal, with 12-fold rotational symmetry. Paradoxically, though, the protein wasn't very good at binding to DNA, which should have been an essential ability, the researchers thought. "We figured the portal protein we had studied for over a decade must be an end-stage, or mature version, of a more plastic and dynamic molecular machine," says Dr. Cingolani. "And that it must also adopt other conformations earlier in viral assembly that have the capacity to bind both DNA and other motor proteins, or terminases." Proteins can change structure and hence their function and biochemical activity many times before reaching their final mature state. While these intermediate states are unstable and sometimes exist for tiny fractions of a second, they can also have important functions. In the current paper, Dr. Cingolani and colleagues describe their success in identifying and characterizing an immature state of the portal protein, of which they determined the three-dimensional structure down to the atomic level. Unlike the mature final-stage protein that was profoundly symmetric, this immature conformation of portal protein is surprisingly asymmetric and has the ability to bind strongly to both the motor and the DNA itself. "We think that DNA binds to the immature portal protein and wraps around it like a python, as it enters the viral capsid with the help of the motor protein. This DNA stranglehold causes the portal protein to begin to transform into its final symmetric state that because of its weak binding will ultimately release both the DNA and the motor, cutting off the DNA-loading at an appropriate length," says Dr. Cingolani. "It's a completely novel mechanism for sensing DNA. It's a conformational change from asymmetric to symmetric that's completely unexpected, yet makes perfect sense." In addition, the portal protein is unique to viruses, which makes it -- in all of its various forms -- a potentially good drug target. Because some herpesviruses infect and lay dormant in human cells until they reawaken by stress, developing a therapy that could interfere with viral production at different levels could prove a useful therapeutic strategy. "It took us 18 years to understand that the portal protein functions by existing in two states that turn the viral DNA packaging on and off by changing its structure. At 18, it feels like this story has come of age along with the research," says Dr. Cingolani. ### This work was supported by NIH grant R01 GM100888 and GM076661, by the AAAS Marion Milligan Mason Award for Women in the Chemical Sciences. The Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center X-ray Crystallography and Molecular Interaction Facility is supported in part by NCI grants P30 CA56036 and S10OD017987. About Jefferson Jefferson, through its academic and clinical entities of Thomas Jefferson University and Jefferson Health, including Abington Health and Aria Health, is reimagining health care for the greater Philadelphia region and southern New Jersey. Jefferson has 23,000 people dedicated to providing the highest-quality, compassionate clinical care for patients, educating the health professionals of tomorrow, and discovering new treatments and therapies to define the future of care. With a university and hospital that date back to 1824, today Jefferson is comprised of six colleges, nine hospitals, 34 outpatient and urgent care locations, and a multitude of physician practices throughout the region, serving more than 100,000 inpatients, 373,000 emergency patients and 2.2 million outpatients annually. A complete clinical and genetic profile of a rare inherited disorder, steroid 11-hydroxylase deficiency, which can cause genital masculinization in females, is being reported by an international group of researchers led by investigators at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. This is the first time that the complete genetic profile has been identified. The findings, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, on January 30th, may eventually lead to newborn screening, diagnosis, and treatment. Prenatal diagnosis and treatment may be developed to prevent genital ambiguity. The disorder is a rare form of congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) resulting in excessive adrenal male hormone secretion caused by deficient secretion of cortisol, a vital steroid hormone. This begins to affect sexual development at approximately 9 weeks of pregnancy and leads to masculization of the genitalia in the female fetus, resulting in genital ambiguity. "Female infants born with this disorder may be misidentified as males and raised that way. Now that we understand much more about this disorder, we believe it will be possible to prevent an incorrect sex assignment in a fetus and avoid all of the social, cultural, and sexual issues that can come from such an error," says the study's senior investigator, Maria I. New, MD, Professor of Pediatrics, Genetics and Genomic Sciences, and Director of the Adrenal Steroid Disorders Program at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. The study's lead author is Ahmed Khattab, MD, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. This current study is focused on a rare form of the disorder, 11-hydroxylase deficiency. Steroid 11-hydroxylase deficiency affects only 5-8 percent of CAH patients, or 1 in 100,000 live births in the United States. The team collected data on 108 patients diagnosed with the 11-hydroxylase deficiency. They found that the form occurs most often in countries of the Middle East, Turkey and North Africa and that most of the patients in the study were from Tunisia. "We propose that consanguineous marriages, such as between first cousins, common in these countries, suggests an explanation for the prevalence of 11-hydroxylase deficiency in that part of the world," says Dr. New. The disorder is caused by a recessive gene defect, which means that both parents may each carry a normal gene and a mutated gene, but can each pass one copy of the defective gene to the fetus, which is then affected. Dr. New and her colleagues have fully described the most common form of CAH: steroid 21-hydroxylase enzyme deficiency, responsible for 90-95 percent of all cases. Their previous work has led to newborn screening in the U.S. and in many other countries for the most severe form of 21-hydroxylase deficiency, which involves gene mutations on chromosome 6. Most people affected are from Europe, South America, and Asia. Dr. New and her team were the first to develop a method that can noninvasively test for genetic mutations starting at 6 weeks of pregnancy by identifying steroid 21-hydroxylase deficiencies circulating in the pregnant mother's blood. Once the diagnosis is made, proper treatment can prevent masculinization of the female fetus in the womb by suppressing adrenal androgen secretion during genital development. Studying the genotype and clinical profiles of 68 of the patients, the researchers identified the chromosome 8 mutations responsible for the structure of the 11-hydroxylase enzyme, and examined how each mutation affected the severity of sexual ambiguity in females and other effects of the disorder in both sexes, including hypertension, and advanced skeletal maturation. "Additionally, males with severe forms of CAH, especially those born in countries that do not have a newborn screening program, may never be recognized as their male genitalia are normal. This study is a significant contribution that gives the endocrine world a detailed description of the genetics and of the clinical spectrum of 11-hydroxylase deficiency, which is treatable." ### The study was supported by the Maria I. New Children Hormone Foundation; and NIH Grants DK80459 (to M.Z. and S.L.), AG40132 (to M.Z.), AR06592 (to M.Z.), and AR06066 (to M.Z.). S.H. received funding from a University College London Excellence fellowship. About the Mount Sinai Health System The Mount Sinai Health System is an integrated health system committed to providing distinguished care, conducting transformative research, and advancing biomedical education. Structured around seven hospital campuses and a single medical school, the Health System has an extensive ambulatory network and a range of inpatient and outpatient services--from community-based facilities to tertiary and quaternary care. The System includes approximately 7,100 primary and specialty care physicians; 12 joint-venture ambulatory surgery centers; more than 140 ambulatory practices throughout the five boroughs of New York City, Westchester, Long Island, and Florida; and 31 affiliated community health centers. Physicians are affiliated with the renowned Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, which is ranked among the highest in the nation in National Institutes of Health funding per investigator. The Mount Sinai Hospital is in the "Honor Roll" of best hospitals in America, ranked No. 15 nationally in the 2016-2017 "Best Hospitals" issue of U.S. News & World Report. The Mount Sinai Hospital is also ranked as one of the nation's top 20 hospitals in Geriatrics, Gastroenterology/GI Surgery, Cardiology/Heart Surgery, Diabetes/Endocrinology, Nephrology, Neurology/Neurosurgery, and Ear, Nose & Throat, and is in the top 50 in four other specialties. New York Eye and Ear Infirmary of Mount Sinai is ranked No. 10 nationally for Ophthalmology, while Mount Sinai Beth Israel, Mount Sinai St. Luke's, and Mount Sinai West are ranked regionally. Mount Sinai's Kravis Children's Hospital is ranked in seven out of ten pediatric specialties by U.S. News & World Report in "Best Children's Hospitals." For more information, visit http://www.mountsinai.org/, or find Mount Sinai on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. In the ancient Japanese art of origami, paper must be folded precisely and following a specific order to create the desired result -- say, a crane or lotus flower. It's a complex pursuit that requires keen attention to detail and utmost accuracy. An equally precise biological process in living cells gives rise to proteins, the large biomolecules essential for life. Proteins begin life as long strings of amino acids that must fold into the three-dimensional shape prescribed for their particular biological function. When proteins don't fold as expected -- think badly misshapen crane -- the cells activate stress responses meant to mitigate the problem. But severe or prolonged stress produces an acute response: Cell death is triggered to protect the organism. Sustained activation of one such reaction -- the unfolded protein response, or UPR -- has been implicated in a number of diseases. Seeking to illuminate a piece of this biological puzzle, an international team of scientists, including UC Santa Barbara cell biologist Diego Acosta-Alvear, examined the role of a central UPR component, a stress sensor protein called IRE1 (inositol-requiring enzyme 1), in atherosclerosis. The researchers found that blocking IRE1 with a small molecule prevented the progression of atherosclerosis in mice. The findings appear in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "A healthy cell has one type of stress response network wiring and it's likely that a diseased cell accommodates that wiring to survive," said Acosta-Alvear, an assistant professor in UCSB's Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology. "Stress response networks control the life vs. death decision in cells, and since a diseased cell is nowhere near its comfort zone, rewiring its stress responses allows it to avoid or delay cell death even when conditions are adverse. That's what we wanted to understand: how a diseased cell does that and why it happens." The UPR is triggered when the normal functions of the endoplasmic reticulum -- the cell's largest organelle in charge of making and folding proteins -- are compromised. Though the UPR usually promotes healthy endoplasmic reticulum function, sustained UPR activation sometimes results in diseases such as atherosclerosis, the deposition of fatty plaques on artery walls, among other conditions. Understanding what happens with the UPR in disease is key to illuminating the normal operation of this essential pathway -- and to providing insights into the development of targeted therapies. Endoplasmic reticulum stress is triggered not only by protein-folding problems, but also by fatty acids, explained Acosta-Alvear. Fat-induced stress and metabolic overload of the endoplasmic reticulum can alter its function, triggering chronic inflammation, which plays an important role in the development of atherosclerosis. In this research, the scientists disturbed endoplasmic reticulum function by introducing saturated fatty acids into cells to induce lipotoxic stress. This in turn activated the UPR and IRE1. Active IRE1 relays the protein-folding stress information to the cell nucleus by controlling the production of a very potent transcription activator, XBP1 (X-box binding protein-1). Transcription activators are proteins involved in the process of converting, or transcribing, DNA into RNA. The investigators' analyses demonstrated that XBP1 was responsible for turning on pro-atherogenic genes. They then treated mice with a compound that blocked IRE1. "The end result was that if the transcription factor was not produced, the pro-atherogenic genes were not turned on, which mitigated the progression of the disease," Acosta-Alvear said. "This research is a proof-of-concept study showing that blocking this single critical enzyme delivers a desirable therapeutic benefit. It's a first step in mechanistically understanding how cellular stress responses are wired in specific contexts." ### A joint project between conservationists and electronics experts at the University of Kent has developed miniature radio devices in tamper-proof casings to protect rare species from poachers A joint project between conservationists and electronics experts at the University of Kent has developed miniature radio devices in tamper-proof casings to protect rare species from poachers. The University of Kent is now working in association with the South African National Biodiversity Institute, where this technology has now been proposed as part of conservation planning. The illegal wildlife trade is fourth only to narcotics, human trafficking and counterfeiting, with an estimated value around $20 billion per year and the United Nations recognising environmental crime as requiring greater response by governments. The project team have developed and tested Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags on endangered cycads, a group of plants that predate the Jurassic era. Nearly 40% are threatened with extinction and are vulnerable to theft due to their rarity, durability and looks. Some have been so heavily poached that populations have crashed from 10,000 to less than 400 individuals. The tag is placed within a tamper-proof case that can't be moved without destroying the transponder chip within the tag. The team proposed that the tags could be used along with satellite or cellular networks to relay immediate alerts to ranger stations as soon as a plant goes missing, with drones deployed for observation. Secondary RFID tags could also be embedded into plants to help identify any that are stolen and later recovered. The project was led by Professor John Batchelor, Professor of Antenna Technology in the School of Electronics and Digital Arts, and Dr David Roberts, Reader in Biodiversity Conservation in the Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology in the School of Anthropology and Conservation. ### https://kar.kent.ac.uk/58968/1/RFID%20Cycad%20Conservation.pdf For further information or interview requests contact Sandy Fleming at the University of Kent Press Office. Tel: 01227 823581/01634 888879 Email: S.Fleming@kent.ac.uk News releases can also be found at http://www.kent.ac.uk/news University of Kent on Twitter: http://twitter.com/UniKent Note to editors RFIDs were developed to track assets either by scanning barcode labels or using tags but have been applied in other areas, one of which is security. In tests, the RFID tag on the plant could be detected up to 10 metres away, and stopped working when it was moved. Established in 1965, the University of Kent - the UK's European university - now has almost 20,000 students across campuses or study centres at Canterbury, Medway, Tonbridge, Brussels, Paris, Athens and Rome. It has been ranked: 23rd in the Guardian University Guide 2017; 23rd in the Times and Sunday Times University Guide 2017; and 23rd in the Complete University Guide 2017. In the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings 2015-16, Kent is in the top 10% of the world's leading universities for international outlook and 66th in its table of the most international universities in the world. The THE also ranked the University as 20th in its 'Table of Tables' 2016. Kent is ranked 17th in the UK for research intensity (REF 2014). It has world-leading research in all subjects and 97% of its research is deemed by the REF to be of international quality. In the National Student Survey 2016, Kent achieved the fourth highest score for overall student satisfaction, out of all publicly funded, multi-faculty universities. Along with the universities of East Anglia and Essex, Kent is a member of the Eastern Arc Research Consortium. The University is worth 0.7 billion to the economy of the south east and supports more than 7,800 jobs in the region. Student off-campus spend contributes 293.3m and 2,532 full-time-equivalent jobs to those totals. In 2014, Kent received its second Queen's Anniversary Prize for Higher and Further Education. Osteogenesis imperfecta, also known as brittle bone disease, is a genetic disorder that causes bones to break easily. Severe cases of the disease can result in hundreds of fractures during a person's lifetime or even death. Researchers at the University of Missouri School of Medicine have shown that limiting a specific maternal protein in pregnant mice with osteogenesis imperfecta resulted in offspring with stronger, denser bones. The finding might one day provide a new therapeutic approach to treating brittle bone disease. "Osteogenesis imperfecta is caused by the body's inability to make strong bones because of mutations affecting the production of the protein known as collagen," said Charlotte Phillips, Ph.D., associate professor of biochemistry and child health at the MU School of Medicine and a senior author of the study. "No cure exists; however, we know from previous research that the prenatal environment can have a lasting effect on cardiovascular and metabolic health into adulthood. We studied whether bone health of mice could be improved by optimizing the environment within the womb." Myostatin is a protein that limits muscle growth. However, exercise causes myostatin levels to decrease - which is good because it allows muscle tissue to develop, Phillips said. Increased muscle tissue results in stronger bones. In the study, Phillips and her team decreased maternal myostatin levels to see if this would increase bone strength in offspring with osteogenesis imperfecta. Using mice with brittle bone disease, the MU researchers were able to identify the female as responsible for offspring bone health. The team also confirmed that female mice deficient in myostatin had offspring with stronger bones. "The third part of our study really confirmed our initial hypothesis," said Laura Schulz, Ph.D., associate professor of obstetrics, gynecology and women's health at the MU School of Medicine and a senior author of the study. "Fifty to 80 percent of bone density is predicted by genetics. To see if we could reverse this trend, we transplanted embryos from female mice with osteogenesis imperfecta into the wombs of female mice deficient in myostatin. The offspring from myostatin-deficient mothers with transplanted embryos had stronger, denser bones when they grew up than mice with the same genetic makeup from osteogenesis imperfecta females." "Humans achieve 90 percent of their peak bone mass by age 19," Phillips said. "To approximate this timeframe with mice, we re-evaluated their bone strength and density four months after birth. In each case, the mice with stronger, denser adult bones were those whose fetal development involved females deficient in the protein myostatin. This finding shows that the environment within the womb affects bone development not only at birth, but into adulthood." Both researchers believe that their work represents a paradigm shift in understanding and possibly treating osteogenesis imperfecta. The researchers also feel that their findings may prove beneficial to reducing the risk of other bone diseases such as osteoporosis later in life for many others. However, more research is needed. "The intrauterine environment is important to bone health," Schulz said. "For parents with osteogenesis imperfecta, we may be able to reduce the severity of their unborn child's disease through prenatal treatment. This also may be true for reducing the instances and severity of other bone diseases." ### The study, "Decreasing Maternal Myostatin Programs Adult Offspring Bone Strength in a Mouse Model of Osteogenesis Imperfecta," recently was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institutes of Health (AR055907), a National Space and Biomedical Research Institute Postdoctoral Fellowship (NCC 9-58), a Leda J. Sears Trust Foundation Grant, a University of Missouri Life Sciences Fellowship and the University of Missouri Interdisciplinary Intercampus Research Program. The researchers have no conflicts of interest to declare related to this study. PITTSBURGH, Jan. 30, 2017 - Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and Washington University in St. Louis have provided the first details of how enteroviruses, which cause millions of infections worldwide annually, may enter the body through the intestine. The results of the study are published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Enteroviruses are a class of viruses that are the second most common human infectious agents and are primarily transmitted through close person-to-person contact, touching infected surfaces, or ingesting food or water containing the virus. Enterovirus infections are associated with diseases that can range from mild flu-like symptoms to much more severe outcomes such as inflammation in the brain or heart, acute paralysis, and even death. Enterovirus infections acquired within neonatal intensive care units (NICU) can be devastating as newborns are particularly susceptible to infection by these viruses. "Despite their major global impact, especially on the health of children, little is known about the route that these viruses take to cross the intestine, their primary point of entry. Our approach has for the first time shed some light on this process," said senior author Carolyn Coyne, Ph.D., associate professor of microbiology and molecular genetics at the Pitt School of Medicine. In the study, researchers isolated stem cells from premature human small intestines and grew them in the laboratory into enteroids, or so-called "mini-guts," which contained the different cell types and tissue structures that are normally found in the human intestine. Using the mini-gut model, they demonstrated that echovirus 11 (E11), the enterovirus most commonly associated with NICU infections, induced significant damage to the enteroids, which could facilitate passage of the virus into the bloodstream from the infected intestine. The results also provided the first evidence that different types of enteroviruses could target distinct cells within the gastrointestinal tract and might vary in their effectiveness at infecting intestinal cells. "This study not only provides important insights into enterovirus infections, but also provides an important model that could be used to test the efficacy of anti-enterovirus therapeutics in the premature intestine," said Misty Good, M.D., assistant professor of pediatrics at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and co-senior author of the study. ### Other authors of the study included Coyne G. Drummond, B.S., and Congrong Ma, M.Sc., of the University of Pittsburgh; and Alexa M. Bolock, B.S., and Cliff J. Luke, Ph.D., of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The study was funded by National Institutes of Health grants R01AI081759 and K08DK101608, the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, and Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC. About the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine As one of the nation's leading academic centers for biomedical research, the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine integrates advanced technology with basic science across a broad range of disciplines in a continuous quest to harness the power of new knowledge and improve the human condition. Driven mainly by the School of Medicine and its affiliates, Pitt has ranked among the top 10 recipients of funding from the National Institutes of Health since 1998. In rankings recently released by the National Science Foundation, Pitt ranked fifth among all American universities in total federal science and engineering research and development support. Likewise, the School of Medicine is equally committed to advancing the quality and strength of its medical and graduate education programs, for which it is recognized as an innovative leader, and to training highly skilled, compassionate clinicians and creative scientists well-equipped to engage in world-class research. The School of Medicine is the academic partner of UPMC, which has collaborated with the University to raise the standard of medical excellence in Pittsburgh and to position health care as a driving force behind the region's economy. For more information about the School of Medicine, see http://www.medschool.pitt.edu. http://www.upmc.com/media An international team of researchers has discovered why fresh water, melted from Antarctic ice sheets, is often detected below the surface of the ocean, rather than rising to the top above denser seawater. The research, led by the University of Southampton, is published this week in the journal Nature in association with colleagues at the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton, University of East Anglia (UEA), British Antarctic Survey and Stockholm University. The team found that the Earth's rotation influences the way meltwater behaves - keeping it at depths of several hundred metres. Professor Alberto Naveira Garabato, of Ocean and Earth Science at the University of Southampton and lead author of the study, says: "We believe our study is an important step in understanding how the meltwater mixes in the ocean and will help with the design of climate models, which largely assume meltwater is only present on the surface of oceans. Our research emphasises its detection at greater depths and explains why it is found there." The researchers made their discovery during an expedition in the Southern Ocean, led by Professor Karen Heywood of UEA, on British Antarctic Survey's Royal Research Ship James Clark Ross. The trip was undertaken in 2014 as part of the NERC-funded iSTAR programme4. The team measured turbulence experienced by meltwater as it flowed out of a cave beneath the Pine Island Glacier - one of the fastest melting glaciers in Antarctica. They used a VMP23 (Vertical Microstructure Profiler) to detect subtle fluctuations in the water. The scientists discovered the meltwater ends up settling hundreds of metres down, because as it tries to rise above the surrounding denser seawater, it is affected by the Earth's rotation. This makes it spin very quickly around its vertical axis, resulting in the ejection of meltwater filaments in a sideways motion into the surrounding sea - preventing the water from rising to the surface. Scientists are interested in the depth at which water from Antarctic ice sheets enters the ocean because it has differing effects on global ocean circulation and climate. Surface meltwater makes the upper layers of the Southern Ocean lighter. This is thought to slow down the sinking of those waters in the region, and to favour the expansion of Antarctic sea ice. Injecting the same meltwater at depth is believed to have the opposite effect, favouring sinking of surface waters and the retreat of Antarctic sea ice. Dr Alexander Forryan, also of the University of Southampton, comments: "The effect of meltwater on climate was taken to the extreme and popularised in the Hollywood blockbuster 'The Day After Tomorrow'. While no one expects our climate to change in the space of a few days, like the movie - we do know that fresh water flowing into our seas could dramatically affect sea levels and ocean circulation. As such, it is vital our models take into account the presence of both surface and deep meltwater to maximise their accuracy." The team now hope to develop a way to represent the process in climate models, so that climate modellers can reliably investigate the impact of the melting of Antarctica on our changing climate. ### Notes to editors 1) The research Vigorous lateral export of the meltwater outflow from beneath an Antarctic ice shelf (DOI: 10.1038/nature20825) is published as a Letter in the journal Nature. A copy can be obtained from Media Relations on request. 2) For images of the Vertical Microstructure Profiler (VMP) and a Conductivity Temperature Depth (CTD - used to measure the vertical profile of temperature and salinity throughout the full depth of the ocean) being lowered from the expedition ship, please contact Media Relations. 3) A brief description of how the data are collected using the vertical microstructure profiler: The VMP is attached to the ship by a very thin, but strong cable. After the ship has come to a stop, it is carefully craned over the side of the ship to protect the delicate sensors on its tip, and the cable is then fed out from the ship fast enough that the probe can fall freely through the water. As it falls, the sensors at the tip of the probe measure minute fluctuations in the flow of the water, as well as in its temperature, allowing scientists to determine the amount of turbulence in the water. The brush at the back of the probe is to stabilize the probe as it sinks, and to slow it down slightly. Before the probe hits the seabed, the cable is wound back in, and the probe is pulled back on board. 4) This research was funded by the NERC iSTAR Programme, which aims to improve understanding of what's happening to the area of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet where the greatest rates of ice loss over the last decades have been observed. New knowledge about the stability of this ice sheet is critical for making better predictions about how the ocean and ice will respond to environmental change, and what impact this may have on future sea level. iSTAR is an ambitious scientific programme funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). It brings together leading scientists from 11 UK universities and from British Antarctic Survey (BAS). http://www.istar.ac.uk/ 5) This latest paper forms part of an iStar project called Ocean2ice, led by Professor Karen Heywood of the University of East Anglia. More about Ocean2ice can be found here: http://www.istar.ac.uk/projects/ocean2ice-istar-a/ 6) The University of Southampton is a leading UK teaching and research institution with a global reputation for leading-edge research and scholarship across a wide range of subjects in engineering, science, social sciences, health and humanities. With over 24,000 students, 6500 staff, and an annual turnover in excess of 550m, the University of Southampton is acknowledged as one of the country's top institutions for engineering, computer science and medicine. We combine academic excellence with an innovative and entrepreneurial approach to research, supporting a culture that engages and challenges students and staff in their pursuit of learning. The University is also home to a number of world-leading research centres including the Institute of Sound and Vibration Research, the Optoelectronics Research Centre, the Institute for Life Sciences, the Web Science Trust and Doctoral training Centre, the Centre for the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease, the Southampton Statistical Sciences Research Institute and is a partner of the National Oceanography Centre at the Southampton waterfront campus. http://www.southampton.ac.uk 7) Ocean and Earth Science at the University of Southampton has a well-established reputation for outstanding research and teaching. Our unique waterfront campus at the National Oceanography Centre Southampton (NOCS) attracts prominent researchers and educators from around the world, who join us to work within the areas of geochemistry, geology and geophysics, marine biogeochemistry, marine biology and ecology, palaeoceanography and palaeoclimate and physical oceanography. Following publication of the national Research Excellence Framework 2014 (REF2014), OES was ranked second in the UK, for proportion of research recognised as world-leading (4*) in the Earth Systems and Environmental Sciences Unit of Assessment. http://www.southampton.ac.uk/oes/index.page 8) More information on partner institutions and organisations can be found at: National Oceanography Centre, Southampton British Antarctic Survey University of East Anglia Stockholm University For further information contact: Peter Franklin, Media Relations, University of Southampton, Tel: 023 8059 5457, email: p.franklin@southampton.ac.uk http://www.soton.ac.uk/mediacentre/ Follow us on twitter: http://twitter.com/unisouthampton Like us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/unisouthampton Breakdown of unique cells that wrap around blood vessels in the brain leads to neuron deterioration, possibly influencing the development of Alzheimer's Abnormality with special cells that wrap around blood vessels in the brain leads to neuron deterioration, possibly affecting the development of Alzheimer's disease, a USC-led study reveals. "Gatekeeper cells" called pericytes surround blood vessels. They contract and dilate to control blood flow to active parts of the brain. "Pericyte degeneration may be ground zero for neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer's disease, ALS and possibly others," said Berislav Zlokovic, senior author of the study and director of the Zilkha Neurogenetic Institute at the Keck School of Medicine of USC. "A glitch with gatekeeper cells that surround capillaries may restrict blood and oxygen supply to active areas of the brain, gradually causing neuron loss that might have important implications for Alzheimer's disease." Published on Jan. 30 in Nature Neuroscience, this was the first study to use a pericyte-deficient mouse model to test how blood flow is regulated in the brain. The goal was to identify whether pericytes could be an important new therapeutic target for treating neuron deterioration. "Vascular problems increase the risk of cognitive impairment in many types of dementia, including Alzheimer's disease," said Kassandra Kisler, co-first author and a research associate at the Zilkha Neurogenetic Institute at the Keck School of Medicine of USC. "Pericytes play an important part in keeping your brain healthy." A closer look at the mouse models Pericyte dysfunction suffocates the brain, leading to metabolic stress, accelerated neuronal damage and neuron loss, said Zlokovic, holder of the Mary Hayley and Selim Zilkha Chair in Alzheimer's Disease Research. To test the theory, researchers stimulated the hind limb of young mice deficient in gatekeeper cells and monitored the global and individual responses of brain capillaries, the smallest blood vessels in the brain. The global cerebral blood flow response to an electric stimulus was reduced by about 30 percent compared to normal mice, denoting a weakened system. Relative to the control group, the capillaries of pericyte-deficient mice took 6.5 seconds longer to dilate. Slower capillary widening and a slower flow of red blood cells carrying oxygen through capillaries means it takes longer for the brain to get its fuel. As the mice turned 6 to 8 months old, global cerebral blood flow responses to stimuli progressively worsened. Blood flow responses for the experimental group were 58 percent lower than that of their age-matched peers. In short, with age, the brain's malfunctioning vascular system exponentially worsens. "We now understand the function of blood vessel gatekeeper cells is to ensure adequate oxygen and energy supply to brain cells," said Amy Nelson, co-first author and a postdoctoral scholar at the Zilkha Neurogenetic Institute at the Keck School of Medicine of USC. "Prior to our study, scientists knew patients with Alzheimer's disease, ALS and other neurodegenerative disorders experience changes to the blood flow and oxygen being supplied to the brain and that pericytes die. Our study adds a new piece of information: Loss of these gatekeeper cells leads to impaired blood flow and insufficient oxygen delivery to the brain. The big mystery now is: What kills pericytes in Alzheimer's disease?" ### The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health, the National Natural Science Foundation of China and the American Heart Association. Scientists at the Zilkha Neurogenetic Institute, the USC Mark and Mary Stevens Neuroimaging and Informatics Institute and other collaborators are already working to further this line of research, scanning the brains of people who are genetically at risk for Alzheimer's. They are also collecting cerebral spinal fluid and blood for analysis of vascular damage, including injury to pericytes. Alzheimer's and aging research at USC USC has more than 70 researchers dedicated to the prevention, treatment and potential cure of Alzheimer's. The memory-erasing illness is one of the greatest health challenges of the century, affecting 1 in 3 seniors and costing $236 billion a year in health care services. USC researchers across a range of disciplines are examining the health, societal and political effects and implications of the disease to improve health across the life span. Home to an Alzheimer Disease Research Center funded by the National Institute on Aging, USC is one of the top recipients of NIA research grants. The NIA leads funding of research activities on Alzheimer's, dementia and other age-related diseases and has nearly doubled its investment in USC research in the past decade. JACKSON, Tenn. - Shawn Butler, a doctoral candidate in the University of Tennessee's College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, won first place in a student oral paper competition at the 2017 Beltwide Cotton Conference in Dallas. Butler's presentation was titled, "Influence of Droplet Size and Number of Orifices on Fungicide Efficacy in Corynespora cassiicola Infected Cotton." Corynespora cassiicola is a fungal pathogen that causes target spot in cotton and soybeans. Target spot is a relatively new disease in the Southeast but has already caused significant yield losses in cotton fields near the Gulf coast. While target spot is not currently considered a major threat in Mid-South crop production, researchers with the University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture are evaluating measures to reduce its impact. Butler's study concluded that neither droplet size nor number of exit orifices had an effect on disease control or yield in cotton infected with target spot. Butler also noted that within the study there was no significant difference in disease control or yield between cotton treated with a fungicide application and untreated cotton. "This is a common occurrence in Tennessee in that, although symptoms may become severe, the timing in which infection occurs is not currently affecting yield in the northern portion of the cotton belt," says Butler. "In more southern areas, such as Alabama and Mississippi, yield loss is often noticed, requiring a fungicide application to protect the crop." Butler's presentation involved research conducted while he was completing his masters degree with UT's Department of Entomology and Plant Pathology. Dr. Heather Kelly served as his major professor. The two-year study took place at the West Tennessee AgResearch and Education Center in Jackson, Tennessee. Butler evaluated the efficacy of broadcast applications of a locally systemic fungicide when using two droplet size ranges (fine-medium and coarse). Within each droplet size range, two nozzles were utilized possessing either a single or dual exit orifice. He presented his research during the Beltwide's Cotton Disease Council Student Oral Paper Competition on January 5, 2017. Other notable achievements by UT CASNR students at the Beltwide Cotton Conference include Scott Graham, Department of Entomology and Plant Pathology, who received second place in the Cotton Insect Research and Control - PhD Student Competition and Cole Condra, Department of Biosystems Engineering and Soil Science, who received second place in the Cotton Engineering and Ginning Systems Conference. Freeman Brown, a UT Martin student and student assistant at the West Tennessee AgResearch Center, received first place for his poster entry in the Cotton Agronomy, Physiology, and Soil Conference. ### Through its mission of research, teaching and extension, the University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture touches lives and provides Real. Life. Solutions. ag.tennessee.edu In two studies published today (30 January) in Nature Genetics, researchers from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and their collaborators have identified a genetic variant that doubles an individual's risk of developing ulcerative colitis, one of the subtypes of a chronic disorder known as Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD). They also uncover a further 25 novel genetic associations to IBD risk, including several that implicate genes related to a class of therapeutics that has shown promise in the treatment of this disease. More than 300,000 people suffer from IBD in the UK. The disorder primarily consists of two subtypes: ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease, neither of which currently have a cure. IBD is a debilitating disease in which the body's own immune system attacks parts of the digestive tract. The exact causes of this disease are unclear. To understand more about the genetics underlying IBD, researchers studied the genomes of 16,000 UK IBD patients, as well as 10,000 more from a previously published international study, in the largest whole-genome IBD genetic study to date. From the research, which included 5 per cent of IBD sufferers nationwide, scientists identified a rare genetic variant that doubles the risk of ulcerative colitis. The variant affects a gene known as ADCY7, and is carried by 1 in 200 people in the UK. It is one of the strongest genetic risk factors associated with ulcerative colitis to date and presents a novel drug target for IBD. In the second study, researchers identified that a family of proteins called integrins play a key role in increasing the risk of IBD. Integrins are transmembrane proteins that act as bridges for interactions between cells from the immune system and the rest of the body. For the inflammation associated with IBD symptoms, drugs targeting some of these interactions have been shown to be effective. This study demonstrated that genetic variants that increase the risk of developing IBD also increase the expression of certain integrins in response to stimulation of the immune system. Katrina de Lange, first author from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, said: "We study genetics because we ultimately want to understand the biology of the disease. From the genetic information we can extract a compelling story about why a particular anti-integrin drug is effective against Inflammatory Bowel Disease, or why others have serious side effects." These examples of genome wide association studies give scientists a clearer view of IBD biology than they had previously and are helping to reveal the underpinning biology of human inflammatory diseases overall. Looking to the future, Sanger Institute scientists, with help from the UK IBD BioResource, are aiming to sequence 25,000 genomes of IBD patients in the next five years. The unprecedented scale of this study will hopefully reveal even more details of the biology of this condition. Dr Miles Parkes, co-author of the studies and consultant gastroenterologist at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge, said: "Whilst there are challenges in recruiting large numbers of patients to IBD studies and interpreting the resulting volume of data, there are also great opportunities to better understand the role of genetic variation in not only risk of disease but also in treatment and prognosis. The IBD Bioresource will drive recruitment of IBD patients across the UK and allow recall of patients for repeat tests so the function of specific genes behind IBD can be explored." The results from these studies will be translated into potential treatments by Open Targets, an initiative that takes the outputs of the genetic studies and works with pharmaceutical companies to aid the development of new treatments for diseases including IBD. Dr Carl Anderson, a lead author from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute said: "The scale of these collaborations means we are able to spot genetic associations to IBD that we hadn't seen previously. We hope that by continuing to work together we will be able to translate these findings into better treatments for IBD patients." ### Notes to Editors: Publication(s): Katrina M. de Lange et al. (2017) Genome-wide association study implicates immune activation of multiple integrin genes in inflammatory bowel disease. Nature Genetics. DOI 10.1038/ng.3760 Yang Luo et al. (2017) Exploring the genetic architecture of inflammatory bowel disease by whole genome sequencing identifies association at ADCY7. Nature Genetics. DOI 10.1038/ng.3761 Selected websites: UK IBD BioResource The UK IBD Genetics Consortium has established the IBD BioResource, a resource that enables scientists and researchers to access groups of patients with IBD based on their known genetic make-up, so that they can ask focused questions relating to disease mechanisms and potential new treatments. http://www.ibdbioresource.nihr.ac.uk/ Open Targets Open Targets is a public-private initiative to generate evidence on the validity of therapeutic targets based on genome-scale experiments and analysis. Open Targets is working to create an R&D framework that applies to a wide range of human diseases, and is committed to sharing its data openly with the scientific community. https://www.opentargets.org/ The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute is one of the world's leading genome centres. Through its ability to conduct research at scale, it is able to engage in bold and long-term exploratory projects that are designed to influence and empower medical science globally. Institute research findings, generated through its own research programmes and through its leading role in international consortia, are being used to develop new diagnostics and treatments for human disease. http://www.sanger.ac.uk Wellcome Wellcome exists to improve health for everyone by helping great ideas to thrive. We're a global charitable foundation, both politically and financially independent. We support scientists and researchers, take on big problems, fuel imaginations and spark debate. http://www.wellcome.ac.uk Log House Holidays Escape to a log cabin holiday with us and look forward to a few special days staying in our secluded Cotswold nature reserve. Each of our luxury log c... Gloucestershire Gloucestershire Farmers have expressed concern about the announcement that Tesco is to buy Booker, the UKs largest food wholesaler and the company behind Londis and Budgens, in a 3.7bn deal. The firms said the deal would create the 'UK's leading food business'. But Farmers Union of Wales (FUW) Policy Officer Charlotte Priddy said there are already 'well recognised' concerns regarding the balance of power along the supply chain being loaded in favour of major retailers. She said: Any moves which increase such imbalances are a great worry. Mrs Priddy said there were also concerns the merger could have a particularly acute effect over some local supply chains where those companies were the main retailers. The Union previously welcomed the establishment of the Groceries Code Adjudicator, which was formally established in 2013 to ensure supermarkets treat their suppliers lawfully and fairly. The FUW will be monitoring the situation to see what impact it could have on farmers, and we would want to see the Competition and Markets Authority consider the merger carefully. National Pig Association chief executive Zoe Davies questioned whether the link between Tesco, one of the toughest players in the retail market, and a major wholesaler could put further pressure on pig producers. "We will seek assurance this does not create greater imbalance in the supply chain," she said. In a joint statement, the two companies said that the combined group would bring benefits for consumers, independent retailers, caterers, small businesses, suppliers, and colleagues, and deliver 'significant value to shareholders'. The British Veterinary Association (BVA) has voiced support for vets across the globe regardless of where they come from, in response to President Trump's migrant ban from numerous countries. This news follows reports that Dr Hamaseh Tayari, who holds an Iranian passport, was prevented from flying to the US under President Donald Trump's executive order barring citizens from several countries. Dr Tayari had been due to fly home from a holiday in Costa Rica via New York. But she was told she could not fly to the USA because of the order. Gudrun Ravetz, BVA President, said: BVA shares the concerns of many of our colleagues and members about the situation Dr Tayari found herself in. My theme for my year as BVA President is the veterinary family and it has never been more important to pull together as one profession. "The veterinary profession in the UK depends on colleagues from outside of the UK, with over half of the vets registering to practise in 2014/15 being non-UK graduates. "The scientific community is international and it is common for scientists to work with colleagues from across the world. "Vets work alongside colleagues from around the globe, shoulder-to-shoulder, day-in and day-out. We stand with all our colleagues, wherever they are from in the world or wherever they are. The public support for Dr Tayari, including crowdfunding her travel home, shows that the public is with us in this." The Trump administration is standing firm over its ban on immigration from seven countries despite court rulings and mass protests against it. European Union Ministers have supported the idea to extend the EU milk package beyond 2020, stressing that the package helps to improve farmers weak positioning in the food chain. The milk package focuses on strengthening contractual relations between farmers and processors in order to improve producers weak position in the food chain and to enable them to get a better return from the market. The EU milk market has meanwhile improved since the worst of the crisis last year. EU milk prices have been rising since August 2016, mainly as a result of increased demand from China and the USA as well as actions taken by the European Commission since June 2016. The increased prices on now to starting to feed through to producers. But EU agri-cooperative Copa and Cogeca has called on the EU Commission and Minsters to remain vigilant as the markets are still fragile, with it taking time for producers to recover their cash flow. Copa Vice-President Henri Brichart said: "Dairy farmers have suffered a lot recently and contracts under the package help to reduce the impact of market volatility and give producers some predictability." The National Farmers Union has also said the EU milk package must continue post 2020. What is the Milk Package? Adopted under co-decision in 2012, the Milk Package was aimed at strengthening the position of dairy producers in the dairy supply chain and preparing the sector for a more market-oriented and sustainable future, seeking in particular to learn lessons from the 2009 dairy market crisis. EU Member States have the option to make written contracts between farmers and processors compulsory in the milk sector, and it allows farmers to negotiate contract terms collectively within certain limits. The package also sets out specific EU rules for inter-branch organizations, allowing actors in the milk supply chain to dialogue and carry out certain activities and Member States are allowed, under certain conditions, to apply rules to regulate the supply of PDO/PGI cheeses. The package also entails a series of measures enhancing transparency in the market. Farmers who are not treating sheep to avoid infection are being 'unfairly blamed' for increases in disease, according to a new study. Prior to 1992, farmers throughout the UK were required by law to treat all their sheep to prevent scab, an infectious condition caused by the presence of a tiny parasitic mite. At that time there were only around 40 outbreaks per year. After compulsory treatment was removed, the number of scab outbreaks rose dramatically and there are now around 5,000 - 10,000 outbreaks each year. This costs the UK sheep industry at least 10 million every year. The failure to reduce scab incidence, despite many industry initiatives, is often blamed on those farmers who are unwilling to use routine preventative treatments. Economic incentives New research, published in the journal Preventative Veterinary Medicine by Emily Nixon and colleagues from the School of Biological Sciences, shows that many of these farmers are being blamed unfairly. Information on the losses and treatment costs were analysed along with the risks of scab, to show whether it is financially better for a farmer to treat to prevent scab before any sheep are infected or whether it is worth running a risk, and only treating if the flock contracts scab. The analysis suggests that under current conditions, it is actually only cost-effective for farmers to use preventative treatments in areas where the scab risk is highest - Scotland, Northern England and Wales and where high risk grazing strategies (particularly common grazing) are used. For farmers in other areas, it is more cost-effective in the long run for them to only pay to treat if and when their flock gets scab. Mrs Nixon said: "Farmers will not treat preventatively when it is not in their economic interest to do so. "To achieve national reductions in scab incidence, approaches that give farmers an economic incentive to use preventative treatment will need to be adopted." These findings show that when it comes to disease control, there is not always one blanket strategy that works for all farmers; tailoring strategies to specific regions or farms can help to ensure that farmers do not lose out. Sen. Burke Harr of Omaha said Monday he has addressed Gov. Pete Ricketts' stated objections to an earlier redistricting proposal in drafting a new bill to help distance the Legislature from the politically-charged task of shaping redistricting decisions. Ricketts vetoed a redistricting reform bill that was passed by the Legislature last year, citing concerns with the constitutionality of some of its provisions. "We've taken into account the governor's concerns," Harr said in presenting his bill to the Legislative Council's executive board. Harr's bill (LB216) is one of two redistricting proposals introduced this year and the Omaha senator said he is willing to work on a compromise agreement with Sen. John Murante of Gretna, chief sponsor of LB653. Murante partnered with former Sen. Heath Mello of Omaha in offering the bipartisan bill that was vetoed last year. Although the Legislature is nonpartisan, Murante is a Republican and both Mello and Harr are Democrats. Under Harr's plan, redistricting proposals would be authored by an independent citizens commission and presented to the Legislature for approval or rejection. Equal population among districts would be the primary consideration in realigning districts following each federal census. Even though it is nonpartisan, the Legislature typically has responded to partisan considerations in reapportioning Nebraska's congressional districts, most recently splitting Sarpy County in a manner designed to increase Republican voting strength in metropolitan Omaha's competitive 2nd Congressional District. Reapportionment of legislative districts also has tended to drift into partisan territory at times. Representatives of Common Cause Nebraska, Nebraskans for Civic Reform and the League of Women Voters of Nebraska testified in support of Harr's bill. Resolution seeks new state flag In other action, Harr told the committee that his resolution (LR3) proposing a study to determine whether Nebraska should adopt a new state flag probably dates back to when he was in Mrs. Patterson's fourth-grade class at Catlin Elementary School in Omaha. "Mrs. Patterson did not like our flag," he said. Nebraska's cluttered state flag is unattractive and unidentifiable, he said. Ten days after he introduced the resolution, the flag mistakenly flew upside down at the State Capitol and no one noticed, he said. Nebraska's sesquicentennial year is an ideal time to consider adopting a well-designed, iconic state flag, Suzanne Wise, executive director of the Nebraska Arts Council, told the committee. It ideally should be "a visual symbol to rally behind," she said. Harr said he recognizes that in a year when Nebraska faces difficult challenges like a sharp decline in anticipated revenue, state budget cuts and ongoing prison reform, the Legislature has "more important things to do" than begin the process of adopting a new state flag. "But," he suggested, "we can walk and chew gum at the same time." The House of Lords EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee will continue its inquiry into the implications of Brexit on UK agriculture on Wednesday 1 February. The Committee will hear from the Tenant Farmers Association (TFA), the Country, Land and Business Association (CLA) and the Soil Association. The Committee will explore with the witnesses what critical policy decisions the Government must consider before the UK leaves the EU; how important trade with the EU is; and whether the UK should align itself with EU standards for agricultural goods, food safety, animal welfare, pesticides and plant protections after Brexit. Membership of the EU has allowed the UK to trade freely in agricultural goods and foods with Member States and has determined the UKs external trading relations with the rest of the world. European Union legislation has also governed UK policy on agricultural production, animal welfare, food safety, product standards, environmental protection, funding and rural development. This inquiry seeks to highlight the challenges the Government will face when disentangling UK farming from the EU and the opportunities that arise for agriculture and food after withdrawal. Questions likely to be asked What are the implications of leaving the Common Agricultural Policy for tenant farmers, organic farming and land owners? What are the critical policy decisions the Government must consider and/or implement before the UK leaves the EU? In repatriating agricultural policy, should the Government review, diminish or strengthen regulations that affect the agricultural sector? What examples are there of legislative areas/legislation that merit de-regulation? How important is trade with the EU to tenant farmers, organic farming and land owners? How will the future trading relationship with the EU and external influences such as WTO rules affect tenant farmers, organic farming and land owners? The first evidence session took place on Wednesday 25 January, the Committee took evidence from leading academics. Five dogs that attacked and killed sheep and unborn lambs have been shot dead by farmers over two days. The two separate incidents, which took place last Thursday and Friday (19 and 20 January), has prompted the police to issue a plea warning dog owners to keep their pets under control during lambing season. PC Mike Barnett, dog legislation officer for Warwickshire Police and West Mercia Police, said: We are at the very beginning of lambing season and we are already starting to have problems with dogs. Farmers are within their rights to shoot dogs worrying sheep on their land. To lose sheep and unborn lambs has a big effect on farmers livelihoods. To lose a loved pet causes huge upset for dog owners too. All is takes to avoid this distress is to keep dogs on leads and make sure they cannot get out and run loose. Farmers are within their rights to shoot dogs worrying sheep on their land, Warwickshire Police said. Government officials and senior police officers have been presented findings indicating that around 15,000 sheep were killed by loose dogs in 2016, more than ten times higher than the number previously thought. Marts to donate Scotch Lamb for St Andrew's Day campaign Haiti - Elections : Message to all, by Sandra Honore Sandra Honore, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General of the United Nations and Civilian Chief of the Minustah, on the occasion of the elections this Sunday, January 29, 2017, delivered a message to all Haitians. Message from Sandra Honore : "Haitians and Haitians this 29 January you are called to vote in order to elect your representatives to the CASEC and ASEC as well as city delegates, it will also be for you to elect 8 senators in the second round of the partial senatorial elections, the senators of the department of the North East and South East having already been elected in the first round https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-19936-haiti-flash-2nd-round-senators-voting-intentions-brides-poll.html The elections on 29 January will finally give the populations concerned the chance to elect the deputy of Roseaux in Grande Anse, whose election was not able to take place last November because of the damage caused by the passage of Hurricane Matthew . The local elections and legislative elections this Sunday will mark the culmination of this electoral cycle and the full re-establishment of democratic institutions, thus facilitating the opening of a new stage in the process of democratization, stabilization and development of Haiti. It is important to remember that local elections have not been organized since 2006, that of January 29 will allow you to choose your representatives in charge of ensuring the proximity management of your territorial spaces, thus guaranteeing the country a participatory democracy, which will influence the future direction Haiti will take. I once again welcome the Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) for the good preparation of these elections and the efforts to continue to improve the electoral process. I would also like to congratulate the Haitian National Police (PNH) for its professionalism in protecting citizens, voters and CEP facilities during this final stage of the electoral process. The United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) will provide the PNH with its police and military staff for the implementation of the joint integrated electoral security plan. I call upon all men and women candidates, representatives and supporters of political parties, representatives, all women and men of voting age to do their utmost to allow the elections to take place in the Peace. I encourage political actors to wait calmly for election results and to take the path of justice to solve the problems they may encounter in the process, based on democratic values and principles, Not to do violence, in order to build a stable country, a country that will change its image. I encourage all Haitian citizens of voting age to vote in crowds in their polling stations this Sunday. In particular, I am talking to women and young people, whom I strongly encourage to exercise their right to vote in these elections, which will allow them to participate in the decisions that will be taken by their local elected representatives, who will be responsible to defend the interest of their community in their area. I notice that there are almost 40% women on just over 31,000 candidates https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-19785-haiti-news-zapping-politics.html https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-19927-haiti-news-zapping-politics.html , I hope this figure will encourage women to vote. Your vote is your right, that's your advantage. The future of your communities and your children depends on your votes. Every voice counts, make your voice heard, go vote." HL/ HaitiLibre Haiti - Elections : Second tear gas bomb and sporadic shooting Second tear bomb and sporadic shootings This morning after an individual threw a tear gas canister at the voting center at Mirebalais High School, causing a panic https://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-19945-haiti-elections-tear-gas-on-a-voting-center.html the police intervened and regained control of the voting center, electoral operations continue. We have been informed that a second tear gas canister was thrown at the voting center of Mirebalais High School, and that sporadic gunfire, of unidentified origin were heard in the area. Privert wishes peace and serenity The de facto President Jocelrme Privert the State reminds all actors of the need to maintain a climate of peace and serenity in order to facilitate the smooth running of the electoral process throughout the country. Jovenel Moise calls to vote Jovenel Moise, the elected President of Haiti, shortly before noon said "I am on the plane in the direction of Pilet, Trou du Nord, with my wife to fulfill my civic duty. You also, fulfill your civic duty !" CASEC/ASEC ballots, CEP specifies The Executive Director of the Provisional Electoral Council informs the general public and voters in particular that the presence of ballots for candidates for the positions of CASEC, ASEC in urban voting centers is not an anomaly. This is due to the fact that some portions of the cities have expanded in the Communal Sections. In these cases, the voters concerned may exercise their right to vote. Consequently, all the voting centers concerned are provided with bulletins of local and regional authorities, at the behest of the Departmental, (BED) and communal electoral offices, (BEC). Formal instructions were given to all temporary staff in order to anticipate any confusion. France alongside the OAS Providing support to the electoral observation mission of the Organization of American States (OAS), France had placed an observer team at its disposal in the election of 20 November. These observers are again deployed alongside their OAS colleagues to observe the partial and local elections that are taking place today. How to find your Centre and polling station https://www.haitilibre.com/article-19886-haiti-flash-j-7-comment-trouver-votre-centre-et-bureau-de-vote.html HL/ HaitiLibre Haiti - Elections : 10 arrests, 3 weapons seized (Provisional) Leopold Berlanger satisfied... Leopold Berlanger, President of the Provisional Electoral Council (CEP), who at approximately 1 p.m. exercised his civic duty by going to the polls, said in a press conference this afternoon to be "generally satisfied with the conduct of the election day" which we recall it ends at 4:00 p.m. 10 arrests, 3 weapons seized In a press conference this afternoon, in a provisional report the PNH reported 10 people arrested and 3 weapons seized. Destruction of ballots Electoral Adviser Jean Simon Saint-Hubert, Representative of the Human Rights Sector, announced the arrest of an individual suspected of tearing up ballots. Electoral vagueness According to candidates, of ballots would have been sent in the wrong voting centers, this would have been the case at the voting center of the National school of Petion-ville. In the municipality of Hinche ballots, which should be used in the 3rd constituency (Aguahedionde, rive gauche), were sent to the 4th constituency (Aguahedionde, rive droite, including the neighborhood Los Palis). Always at Hinche of voters are unable to vote, having not found their names posted on some voters lists. Lack of electoral fever Pierre Esperance, the Executive Director of the National Network for the Defense of Human Rights (RNDDH), noted a lack of electoral fever, of awareness campaigns and education campaigns at the level of the government, of CEP and the political parties. They voted The de facto President Jocelerme Privert, accompanied by his wife Ginette, fulfilled their civic duty at the voting center of the Petit-Trou High School in Nippes, his hometown. Prime Minister Enex Jean-Charles went to Chansolme, his native commune, to fulfill his duty as a citizen. The Head of Government took advantage of this civic act to invite all his compatriots to do the same. HL/ HaitiLibre Ask Matt ... where the sidewalk (clearing) ends City clears sidewalks downtown and in the Historic Seventh Avenue District. Related Stories Q. What is the Citys policy on snow removal for downtown sidewalks? After a snowstorm, the city crews scrape the sidewalks in the downtown business district and also in the Historic Seventh Avenue District. Thats as far as they go. No other sidewalks in the City get this attention nor is sand or ice melt applied on other sidewalks. The downtown and 7th Avenue areas are singled out because district property owners pay additional taxes that are used to provide the extra service. Hendersonville has an ordinance that requires businesses and homeowners to clean the sidewalks in front of their property but according to City officials, that policy is not presently enforced. OK, if you dont hang around downtown Hendersonville after a major snow event, heres what typically happens. City public works crews, using both a John Deere tractor with a front-mounted blade and a Kubota tractor with a front bucket, start moving snow. The Kubota is small enough to maneuver around the benches, trees, planters and, yes, the mountain fountain too. The larger John Deere clears the parking lots and side streets. For a major snow event, the City brings in even larger equipment to remove the snow that was pushed up in the parking spaces and haul it off to a vacant lot. After that, it just melts, but you knew that. Q. I read where some abandoned North Carolina landfills are being used as solar farms. Has our County looked into putting solar panels on the Stoney Mountain landfill? Yes, the County has considered it but has not pursued it. Heres why. North Carolina law requires that after a solid waste landfill is closed, it must be capped with a protective layer of soil and grass. This cap actually requires a good deal of maintenance, particularly for our Stoney Mountain site which is about 20 years old relatively young for a closed landfill. Henderson County Engineer Marcus Jones explained that there is still seepage from decomposing trash in the ground. This liquid, also known as leachate, must be drained and the way to do that is to bore holes down into the decomposing trash itself. So mounting solar panels in close proximity to one another on the side of the landfill could hinder draining the leachate and complicate landfill maintenance. For the record, North Carolina has 675 closed landfills and the one that Charlotte is leasing to a solar farm company is 30 years older than ours. So perhaps one day when there is no risk of seepage we may have solar panels on the mountain side but for now its wait and see. * * * * * Send questions to Askmattm@gmail.com. A dozen business people from across Nebraska joined Gov. Pete Ricketts and a coalition of area business leaders to tout his proposed income tax cuts Monday. "I like this plan a lot, and I like where this governor's trying to take us," said Jack Schreiner, owner of Bruckman Rubber in Hastings, during a news conference in Ricketts' state Capitol office. The proposal, which is before the state Legislature, would gradually reduce the state's top individual income tax rate from 6.84 percent to 5.99 percent over the next 10 years, or longer depending on state revenue growth. Schriner said he isn't a "rubber-stamp Republican" but believes the tax plan was thoughtfully done. "It's not a huge decrease," he said. "I would have liked to have seen much bigger, but it wasn't going to happen this year. This is practical." Ricketts said the plan will boost small businesses and make Nebraska more competitive with surrounding states. He described small businesses as employing anywhere from a couple to 250 or 500 people. "If we want families to move here, if we want companies to expand here, if we want small businesses to grow, we have to be more competitive when it comes to taxes," he said. Ricketts said his plan is supported by the Nebraska, Omaha and Lincoln chambers of commerce, as well as the Nebraska Federation of Independent Business, the Lincoln Independent Business Association and the Platte Institute think tank. OpenSky Policy Institute, a Lincoln-based think tank that has opposed income tax cuts, argued many small businesses are unlikely to be affected by the governor's proposed cuts because they don't make enough income to qualify. The group also questioned whether the cuts would have any positive economic impact. "Income tax cuts have not grown Kansas' economy and there's no reason to believe that would be any different here in Nebraska," said Renee Fry, OpenSky's executive director, in a news release. The governor's bill (LB337) is sponsored in the Legislature by Sen. Jim Smith of Papillion, chairman of the Revenue Committee. Half of the committee's members Sens. Curt Friesen of Henderson, Lydia Brasch of Bancroft and Brett Lindstrom of Omaha stood behind Ricketts during the news conference. "We need overall tax relief in this state," Smith said. Brasch is sponsoring another measure (LB338) on the governor's behalf to change the method of valuing agricultural land for tax purposes from the market value to an "income potential" model. Both bills are scheduled for a public hearing Feb. 8 at 1:30 p.m. in the state Capitol. On Friday, January 27, attorneys representing the first ten water protectors arrested in actions against the Dakota Access Pipeline in early August 2016 renewed their motion for a change of venue, on grounds that the state did not adequately respond to the motion and is not taking basic steps to assess bias among jurors. The requested change of venue would move the trials to a different county, outside the reach of negative media coverage and hostile community perception. The motion was filed on January 19th and denied by North Dakota District Judge Cynthia Feland on January 24th, who claimed that a fair and impartial jury has already been impaneled and seated and that it would be nonsensical for the Court to say it cannot be done.The motion renewal filed Friday by North Dakota attorney Chad Nodland states: it appears that the State's strategy is to simply delay discovery, charge people based on collective action and not individual acts which can be established by admissible evidence, and then hope for a conviction from a jury overwhelmingly biased towards law enforcement and the State.A randomized survey conducted by the National Jury Project (NJP) concluded it is highly likely that the over six hundred water protectors facing criminal charges in the coming months will not receive fair trials from petit jurors impaneled in Morton and Burleigh Counties. The survey found that 77% of the juror-eligible population in Morton County and 85% of the juror-eligible population in Burleigh County had already decided the defendants were guilty.A substantial number of of the surveyed population have connections to law enforcement, the oil industry, landowners and others who have been affected by the protests.Many respondents made statements indicating that they perceive protesters as a threat to community safety and described the water protectors as eco terrorists, criminals, and idiots who hopefully all freeze to death.North Dakota States Attorney Ladd Erickson has made incendiary verbal and written comments about DAPL defendants that have been aired in local media markets, characterizing water protectors as people from around the world [who have] come to intentionally commit crimes for political purposes and have North Dakota taxpayers pick up the tab.The actions of county and city authorities have also contributed to an atmosphere of prejudice and fear in the general public. There have been reverse 911 calls to warn residents to avoid certain areas Morton County deemed unsafe due to prayer circles and demonstrations. Elected officials called for economic boycotts and advised local businesses to deny service to those they suspect connected with the Standing Rock encampments. North Dakota GOP lawmakers also introduced bills to crack down on demonstrators by restricting the use of face masks and protecting drivers from liability if they injure or kill a pedestrian obstructing traffic on a public road or highway.Ms. Wiley, President of the National Jury Project Midwest, said that most juror-eligible residentshave prejudged or at a minimum are negatively predisposed against the protestor defendants and that it is next to impossible to expect that jurors holding these attitudes and predispositions, and living in such an atmosphere, can impartially weigh the evidence in the cases. In Ms. Wileys 43 years of jury pool research, this is the only time she has found 100% recognition of the issues involved in a court case.The Freshet Collective is a non-profit organization supporting the legal defense of water protectors arrested during actions against the Dakota Access pipeline near Standing Rock: https://freshetcollective.org/ Sacred Stone Camp STANDING ROCK INDIAN RESERVATION, N.D., January 26, 2017 On his fourth day in office, President Trump took executive action that signaled his desire to complete the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline. He signed a memorandum ordering the Army secretary and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to review and approve in an expedited mannerrequests for approval to construct and operate the DAPL as well as an executive order to streamline and expedite the environmental review and approval process for so-called high priority infrastructure projects. Trumps outrageous and provocative executive actions took many people by surprise even the new Republican governor of North Dakota was not consulted before it was signed. People and water protectors we met with this week in Standing Rock were furious and fearful. Despite this, water protectors say they are very resilient and ready to continue their opposition to the pipeline that many call the black snake.Since August when the protests against the construction of the oil pipeline reached historic proportions and made major headlines, some Native-American water protectors and allies have been seriously injured by the indiscriminate use of life-threatening crowd-control weapons by law enforcement. Over 300 protestors have been hit with water cannons, tear gas, rubber bullets, concussion grenades, and mace weapons that Physicians for Human Rights have reported can cause emotional, psychological, and physical harm to victims. People across the globe witnessed much of this abuse through live video feeds shared through social media and footage taken by independent indigenous drone journalists.Sadly, these reports were confirmed and further substantiated during a U.N. hearing earlier this week co-facilitated by the International Indian Treaty Council and the ACLU. Several water protectors gave testimonials about being shot with rubber bullets at point blank range, hosed with water cannons in freezing temperatures, beaten by officers, and incapacitated by concussion grenades. Witnesses described the war-like weapons being deployed indiscriminately, against medics, reporters, elders, pregnant woman, and legal observers. Protesters who were arrested testified about abuse and ill-treatment in detention, including being held in dog kennels. The testimonies were heartbreaking and disturbing.There has been little, if any, leadership from local authorities to curtail the well-documented abuses. The Morton Country Sheriffs Department has not released any protocol or procedures for the use of potentially deadly crowd-control weapons. There has been a resounding lack of accountability for law enforcement agents and commanders. Thus far, no officer has been charged with excessive use of force, but over 600 protestors, and even journalists like Democracy Nows Amy Goodman, have been arrested for excessive and outrageous charges like criminal trespassing. Some were hit with outlandish felony charges and high bail bonds. More than likely, if state leaders do not require a significant change in policing tactics, law enforcement will only continue its violent and unconstitutional responses to largely peaceful protesters.Weve also seen law enforcement outsource their human rights abuses to private security contractors. This must be investigated, and the people responsible for releasing dogs on protestors should be held accountable. After all, even the Department of Justice has condemned the use of canines on unarmed individuals as unreasonable. While the Morton County Sheriffs Department claimed last September that it created a multi-agency task force to investigate the use of force by DAPL security, we still do not know if anyone has been held accountable.Recently, the Standing Rock Tribal Council called for the evacuation of the camps behind the Dakota Access Pipeline protests within 30 days, which means by February 19. However, the question remains whether law enforcement will use force to clear the camps and, whether on accident or with intent, injure or kill someone who refuses to leave in an act of civil disobedience.The Morton County Police Department should adopt policies and practices for the deployment of crowd-control weapons that align with civil and human rights principles:* The use of crowd-control weapon should be an absolute last resort when dealing with genuine and imminent threats to the safety of those present, and only after all other means have been exhausted* The most effective method to prevent violence is to engage in negotiations and open a dialogue with protesters* Even if some protesters engage in or incite others to engage in acts of violence which require police intervention, the explicit goal of intervention should be to deescalate the situation and promote and protect the safety and the rights of those present protestors, journalists, medical personnel, monitors, and bystanders* All deployment of crowd control weapons must be documented, and the reports retained for public record* Adequate training must be provided on the use of crowd-control weapons for out-of-state police to ensure a proportionate level of force is applied to the threatAdherence to these principles will help increase accountability, transparency, and the safety of everyone.But where local law enforcement quickly resorts to the massive use of less-lethal weapons, it is the responsibility of the state and federal governments to step in. The state and federal governments must rein in the county sheriff and private security contractors, and they must immediately end any unlawful surveillance practices against individuals and groups expressing their right to free speech and peaceful assembly.Until then, the ACLU will continue to monitor the situation through legal observers and will consider taking legal action including supporting the Water Protectors Legal Collaborative. We have also released an action requesting the public to call North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and urge him to do everything in his power to prevent police violence against Standing Rock water protectors. Using crowd control weapons will only exacerbate the injuries and trauma that has plagued Native American communities and water protectors since the pipeline protest intensified this past August.In his inauguration speech, Donald Trump advocated for the immediate end of American carnage ravaging this country. That carnage is occurring right now at the hands of law enforcement in Standing Rock. If Trump truly intends to end unnecessary violence, he must listen to the voices of Native American water protectors and those who are supporting them at Standing Rock, and he must vow to protect their right to water, sacred sites, and their future development as sovereign nations.Human decency requires it.By Jamil Dakwar, Director, ACLU Human Rights ProgramACLU of North Dakota Ukraine welcomes Donald Trump with high ranking staff revolution by Manuel Reinhart Mon, Jan 30, 2017 1:22AM Minister for Public Expenditure Paschal Donohoe has said that an assessment of how Donald Trump's travel ban will be implemented at Irish airports, should be carried out. Dublin and Shannon airports offer preclearance to passengers travelling to the US. A number of Human Rights Organisations say it could violate a person's rights under the Constitution, EU law or the European Convention on Human Rights. Embassy Statement on POTUS Executive Order Enhancing Public Safety in the Interior of the U.S. Read https://t.co/XTnDRX4jRU pic.twitter.com/Dk02fuznJA U.S. Embassy Dublin (@USEmbassyDublin) January 28, 2017 Minister Paschal Donohoe says the way the system operates here should be looked at in light of the new rules: "We should do so in the context that pre-clearance offers great opportunity and benefits to people who are looking to travel to Ireland and to America, and that is an essential part of how we engage in the outside world," he said. "And we should be careful that responding back to changes that are happening elsewhere that might make other countries more closed than we would hope that we don't make changes here in Ireland, that we don't make changes here in Ireland that reduce our openness." Airport authorities have confirmed the US president's travel ban on citizens from seven mainly Muslim countries - Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen - is being implemented by US officials in Ireland. Children's Minister Katherine Zappone has written to Taoiseach Enda Kenny seeking an investigation into its operation at Dublin and Shannon. She suggested it "may be unlawful" because the US-Ireland pre-clearance agreement upholds the rights of people under Irish law. It is understood Ms Zappone is concerned that the implementation of the ban on Irish soil could amount to nationality and religion-based discrimination. She also said Ireland has a moral obligation to "stand with our fellow human beings against discrimination of this kind". Speculation is mounting that more Independent government ministers will back Ms Zappone's stance at a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday. Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams has also written to the Taoiseach urging him not to "allow Irish airports to enforce this fundamentally unjust order". A joint statement from five human rights organisations - including Amnesty, the Irish Council of Civil Liberties and the Irish Refugee Council - said the pre-clearance agreement means Irish police (gardai) and immigration officials may be helping implement Mr Trump's travel ban. They have demanded an urgent review of the system including its suspension if a person's rights under Irish and EU law are under threat. "This executive order is a barely concealed attempt to discriminate on nationality and religious grounds, itself a gross violation of freely accepted international human rights obligations," the statement said. Junior Minister John Halligan said Mr Trump is "close to being a fascist'' and has backed calls for Mr Kenny to snub the annual invite to the White House for the traditional gifting of a bowl of shamrock to the US president on St Patrick's Day. Labour leader Brendan Howlin and Green Party chief Eamon Ryan have also urged a boycott of the March 17 event. But the Government has signalled Mr Kenny will travel for the face-to-face meeting "to maintain the historically strong links between the Irish and American peoples" and to outline Ireland's viewpoint on several issues. Update 2pm: The Iraqi parliament's decision calling for a "reciprocity measure" in response to Donald Trump's order temporarily banning citizens from Iraq and six other Muslim-majority countries from entering the US is non-binding for the government, according to a lawmaker. Deputy parliament speaker Sheik Humam Hamourid says the vote approved in the Iraqi parliament on Monday was "a recommendation" and did not move as a "law". Mr Hamourid's statement is echoed by Kirk Sowell, a political and legal analyst focused on Iraq and publisher of the newsletter Inside Iraqi Politics. Mr Sowell says the Iraqi parliament "absolutely lacks the authority to originate legislation of any kind regulating anything the executive branch does". Earlier: The Iraqi parliament has approved a "reciprocity measure" in response to Donald Trump's executive order temporarily banning citizens from Iraq and six other Muslim-majority countries from entering the US, according to legislators. The measure, adopted by lawmakers at a Monday session of parliament, is to apply to Americans entering Iraq. Lawmakers Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun told the Associated Press the decision is binding for the government. Both say the decision was passed by a majority votes in favour but could not offer specific numbers. No further details were available on the wording of the parliament decision. It was also not immediately clear who the ban will apply to - American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and other Americans doing business in Iraq. It was also not known if and how the Iraqi measure would affect co-operation in the fight against the Islamic State group in Mosul. US President Mr Trump's order includes a 90-day ban on travel to the US by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, and a 120-day suspension of the US refugee programme. AP. Burmese politicians and activists shocked by the assassination of an adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered on Monday at a cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony. Ko Ni, a prominent lawyer and member of Burma's Muslim minority, was shot in the head at close range as he walked out of Rangoon airport on Sunday. "This is a great loss not only for our community but also for the country," Win Myint, a Muslim religious leader, said at the funeral. "He was necessary to our country's democratic system." The killing shocked many in Rangoon because attacks on prominent people are rare, although security forces are notorious for brutal behaviour in remote rural areas, especially when dealing with ethnic minorities. Ko Ni "is irreplaceable for both Aung San Suu Kyi and the party", Ms Suu Kyi's ruling National League for Democracy party said in a statement. Members of Parliament, political activists and NLD party members gathered for the funeral at a Muslim cemetery, said Tun Kyi, a prominent Muslim activist and a friend of Ko Ni. Many of the thousands of people who streamed to the cemetery wept openly. Security was tight, with police even using bomb detectors on the baskets of flowers sent by mourners. Those attending included US ambassador Scot Marciel, who called Ko Ni's death "a terrible loss". "All I want to say is, of course, we are all shocked and really sad," he said. "I knew Ko Ni and his commitment to his country and democracy." Ko Ni was especially valued as an expert in constitutional law, looking for ways to sidestep provisions placed in the charter by an earlier military junta to retain power at the expense of elected governments. He was seen as a familiar and helpful figure by journalists and human rights workers who have found Ms Suu Kyi's government almost as difficult to deal with as the military-backed regime it replaced. At the same time, Ko Ni was active in defending the rights of Muslims, who often face discrimination in Buddhist-majority Burma. Anti-Muslim sentiments have increased in the country in recent years following deadly intercommunal violence in the western state of Rakhine, home to many Muslims belonging to the Rohingya minority. The suspect was arrested after he also shot a taxi driver who tried to stop him from fleeing the airport, the Information Ministry said in a video posted on state-run MRTV. The driver died on the way to hospital. Police seized two guns from the man, whom they identified as Kyi Linn of Mandalay. Authorities were searching for any possible accomplices. Speculation about the motive included political intimidation, anti-Muslim prejudice and a possible business dispute involving the victim's private law practice. AP Cork Opera House still loved 161 years on It has overcome challenge after challenge in its 161 years Corks famed Opera House is now as well-known for its tenacity and resilience as it is for its commitment to the arts. Last year was the fourth in-a-row that Cork Opera House posted profits, a testament to the dedication and passion of its stakeholders to grow the beloved venues commercial capacity, as well as enhancing its artistic standing, year on year. Cork Opera House has been celebrating and promoting creativity in the Cork and wider Munster region for 161 years, holding a special place in the hearts of the people of Cork. Having been confronted by many challenges throughout its history, each time it has faced them head on and emerged each time with new vigour, determined to fulfil its mandate as arts provider for the people of Munster. It has survived bankruptcy and even being burned down, yet in 2017 it is a shining light of what Cork has to offer as a city. Even the recent recession couldnt keep the great institution down, with Cork Opera House battling back from the brink of financial disaster to once again shine into a beacon of prudent management. With over 200,000 people passing through its doors annually, Cork Opera House sees itself not only as the cultural heart of Cork City but also a significant contributor to its social and economic well-being. There were 267 performances for punters to savour in 2016. Employing 28 full-time and 72 seasonal part-time staff, Cork Opera House also takes its role in developing young Cork talent as seriously as it does in putting on memorable shows. In 2015 and 2016, 12 stage schools, with more than 2,760 local children, were introduced to the magic of showbusiness. The 22 cafes and restaurants within a five-minute walk of Cork Opera House have also benefited from its triumphant four years, with estimates that it adds 13m to the local economy annually. To be recognised by Cork Chamber in its non-profit category is testament to the renaissance in the past four years, it says. Chairman Damian Wallace said: We are delighted to be included as one of the finalists, as it is a very significant recognition of the important role that Cork Opera House plays in the commercial and artistic life of the City. Over the last few years we have consistently exceeded our targets and achieved our goals and this has impacted positively on our business, resulting in better shows, bigger audiences and a consequent positive spin off for the business community in Cork. Enable Ireland a genuine Cork gem It is an organisation that a whole city should be grateful to have - Enable Ireland has done its community proud in assisting thousands of families in 63 outstanding years in Cork. Enable Ireland Cork provides vital therapy and support services to more than 640 children and 60 adults with disabilities and their families. Founded in 1954 by volunteers, Enable Ireland Cork has supported thousands of children and adults to reach their full potential. In an indication of how goodwill and generosity of spirit can lift an entire city, the 47 employees are joined by hundreds of volunteers to work with children, adults and their grateful families. Those employees and volunteers work tirelessly to make sure the children and adults of Cork get the very best care and support possible. Children attending the service receive vital therapies including occupational, speech and language, physical therapy and hydrotherapy at an individual and group level. Enable Ireland Cork has four locations a childrens service at the Lavanagh Centre, an adult service centre in Little Island, a respite house in Ladysbridge and a residential house in Blackrock to support independent living for adults with disability. This gem of an organisation has reached a milestone this year with the decision that the Lavanagh Centre in Ballintemple is no longer fit to accommodate the needs of the children and families using services there. It means a state-of-the-art new childrens service centre in Curraheen. Running Enable Ireland Cork is not an easy thing to do but year after year the organisation rises to the occasion, bringing the best out of Cork people who respond to the fundraising cause. Every year Enable Ireland Cork needs more than 2m in funding in addition to State funding to meet the costs of delivering services - 90% of all money received is spent on disability services. Funds raised in Cork stay in Cork. To be recognised by Cork Chamber is a source of great pride for Enable Ireland Cork, it says. CEO of Enable Ireland, Fionnuala ODonovan, said: "We are delighted to be shortlisted for the Cork Company of the Year Awards 2017. Our planned new Childrens Service Centre in Curraheen is a very important development for the children in Cork City and County. "Once open, it will allow us to provide vital therapy and supports to over 640 children with disabilities every year. "The parents and children who use our services in Cork city and county deserve to have a world-class, modern centre that is custom built to support their needs. We look forward to working with the business community in Cork to make this a reality." Shine Ireland striving to change lives For 16 years, Shine Ireland has been a champion of children and families affected by autism in Cork - its impact on the city and county has been such it is hard to imagine what we would do without it. Established in 2001 by the parents of children with autism, Shine has always been a child-centred and client-focused organisation. Its mission is a simple one - to brighten the future for children and families affected by autism. Let there be no doubt, however, that simple mission has brought profound and moving change for families all over Cork. Shine Irelands goal is reflected in its commitment to always put the child and family at the centre of every decision made. Through innovative and effective services, Shine Ireland continues to positively impact the lives of thousands of families affected by autism in Cork and worldwide through its award-winning app series. And what an impact its app series has made, not just in Cork, not just in Ireland, but the entire world. Shine Ireland is committed to reaching as many children as possible with innovative programmes like its Social Skills app which has positively impacted over 40,000 families across the world. Imagine that, children in Cork are getting such world-class support it is coveted around the globe. As Shine Ireland says, it continues to stretch out beyond its geographical reach to change lives. Based at the Shine Centre on Ballinrea Road, Carrigaline, there are 16 staff working tirelessly for families. Shine Ireland provides services such as an early intervention unit, life skills programmes, social skills programmes, educational support service, family support, advocacy services and a parent helpline. To be recognised by Cork Chamber is a source of great satisfaction that Shine Ireland continues to make massive strides in its field. Director of Shine Ireland, Eoin Motherway, said: To be chosen as a finalist is a great endorsement that our organisation is achieving momentum yet adhering to ethical standards and the expectation of probity. We fight every day to put a dent in the challenge of autism, locally through our centre in Cork and virtually through our technology apps. Public support and sentiment for Not-For-Profits is in the cold shadow of recent scandals and the vision of Cork Chamber to showcase the positive societal impact of the Not for Profit sector must be applauded. The Everymans beating heart will never be still It has been described as the beating heart of theatre in Cork - a look at the history, vibrance and excellence of The Everyman in Cork tells you why this passionate heart will never be still. There is no magic formula for why it has worked so beautifully for so long - it is actually the other way around. There are no gimmicks or fancy tricks - The Everyman has and always will work on the premise that the audience is central to everything it does. As the theatre staff and performers will always say, you are nothing without that wonderful audience. In its own words, The Everyman offers tremendous support to local artists through regular partnership, professional development, and employment. It is a not-for-profit organisation that maintains a powerful connection with Cork and Irish audiences, preserving its listed building on MacCurtain Street for generations to come. It is committed to programming which enables the whole family to enjoy theatre, programming which entertains, highlights and engages with societal issues. With a core staff of 27, throughout the year The Everyman provides employment for up to 5,000 artists, technicians and everyone involved in the process of making the theatre a memorable experience. The Victorian auditorium is a nationally important structure of rare historical and cultural value and The Everyman has been an iconic symbol of theatrical excellence for 120 years. Not only content with enriching the fabric of Cork, Munster and Ireland through delivering a diverse programme in a stunning heritage venue, it has also been a boon to the thriving restaurant, gastro and bustling bar scene on the famous old street, ensuring millions go to the immediate local economy annually. There is scarcely a night those in attendance at a wonderful performance dont make a great Cork night of it and have a meal or a few drinks on MacCurtain Street. To be recognised by Cork Chamber brings great satisfaction for all involved in making The Everyman that beating heart. Executive director and CEO, Sean Kelly, said: We are, of course, delighted the Chamber have honoured the Everyman by selecting us as finalist of the Cork Company of the Year awards. The Everyman has made tremendous strides in recent years and there are even more exciting times ahead. This nomination is a recognition of vital role that the Everyman plays in Corks cultural life and of the hard work and dedication of all of our team. Give us a little insight into what Impossible Foods does. We started out about five and a half years ago looking at the question of how we feed the world today, the scaling population and the growth in food consumption. We really have to change the way we produce food. The way we produce food for consumption is highly inefficient and leaves a huge environmental footprint. So we asked if there was a way we can look at the plant-based world and pick out the pieces we need to recreate some of the most environmentally impactful meats and dairy products, things of that nature. Then, find their equivalent in plant-based inputs. Weve built a company that now has nearly 130 employees, mostly scientists and engineers. Their job is to find out what makes up meat and dairy and then convert that into the experiences that people love. So what makes up the Impossible Burger, which seems to bleed like a meat burger? Everything in our product is natural plant-based proteins and nutrients. The beauty of it is that we have an amazing team of talented scientists which allows the making of very simple natural solutions for how to make products like the Impossible Burger, which is our first product out on the market. The burger itself has mainly five components. Water, just like meat would have, is the biggest component. Coconut oil is the fat source. Then there is wheat protein and potato protein. Then we have the hemeprotein which you mentioned in your question. We learned early in the studies that hemeprotein, which is very prevalent in beef, was the key part that drove all the flavour chemistry and all the aromas that make up what meat is. We use a protein called leghemoglobin, which comes from legumes. This protein allows for the exact same chemical reaction to take place in the cooking process of the burger, matching that of a meat burger. What was the journey from concept to an actual business? Well, it starts with the basic premise. Dr Pat Brown was a medical researcher at Stanford University. He took a sabbatical, looking at how he could have the best impact on the world for the remainder of his career. If anybody was going to solve this problem it was going to be Pat Brown, who is just a brilliant scientist and a visionary. I joined him from the start to say how we actually build a business to do this. The first couple of years we had to find investors who were in it for the long term. For the first two years we didnt even work on product development, it was about building those tools to allow us to actually begin to create the product. It took us five years to develop the product, but we did it very methodically. First we needed the tools, then we needed to start building the product, then you make it scalable and sustainable. Then you build a marketing plan to make it deliverable. So, from an investment point of view, weve been able to pull in great investors who understand what were trying to do. Was it hard to find long-term investors? Pulling investment is never easy anyway. When we really knew who we were and what we were targeting, articulating that to investors really helped in bringing them on the journey with us. We were able to get the top investors to come on board with us. So Khosla Ventures, a firm which specialises in science-based start-ups, came on board. When they did, we hadnt built the technology yet that was going to allow us to begin to even test product, let alone make it. Bill Gates is a visionary, looking at how he can use his influence to try to make the world a better place. Google Ventures is looking for ways to build new big businesses, but is willing to take that longer-term viewpoint. Horizon Ventures, out of Hong Kong, is a fit because we do have an international focus as well. It is a very mission-orientated, philanthropic organisation. UBS and Viking Global are bigger financial institutions. The animal products industry around the world is worth $1 trillion. So to change that size of a system means selling that long-term vision. Was it a gamble to mess with a food that many people hold dear? It was a very concerted choice, we knew what we were doing. Internally, we set the bar very high. The only way were going to change the way we make food and the way people experience the food today is to set the bar extremely high. So, the burger is on this pedestal and the meat is very much front and centre. So if we can do that, which now we have and were in the market, then we can do a lot more things. Its great for building a consumer brand and really showing the impact that we can have. How do you now decide on what products you bring out in the future? Well, I guess thats the beauty and the difficulty with starting to build a platform. The first couple of years of building the company was about creating dairy-based products. We chose ground beef as a strategic product, its iconic in the American market. Weve made prototypes of steak, chicken, fish and cheese. Then it comes to the selection standpoint of what do we commercialise? Were going through that process every day as we work with the science team and the business team. Right now were working on scaling our Impossible Burger as quickly as possible because its had such a big impact, but we will have other products coming in the pipeline. THIS saga began in late 2006. On the outskirts of Galway city at a time when the entire country had gone mad for building houses and apartments, a local developer agrees to buy a 7.6 acres plot of land, in two lots, from a local farmer. They agree a price of 6.5m for the land known as Keeraun on the Ballymoneen Road and the deal is done. The developer, Sawgrass Properties Ltd, in little over a year, will sell the land on to Galway City Council at a premium of more than 4m. The council, having spent well over the odds for the land, which was bought for the purpose of developing social and affordable housing, bought the land for 10.5m in early 2008, a full year and a half after the property market had gone into freefall. The council had been willing to pay almost 1m more than that for the land. Now, nine years on, the land has never been developed and is now in line to become a halting site, the most expensive halting site in the country. Worse still, the council has been nursing hefty interest payments on the loan it took out to buy the land. The saga is laid out in an extensive dossier of Freedom of Information documents which have in recent days been handed to the Public Accounts Committee, the Dails spending watchdog, which is now to investigate just how the taxpayer came to be burnt so badly. According to documents, obtained by the Irish Examiner, the land was sold to Galway City Council for almost 10.5m in early 2008 for the purpose of building social and affordable housing. The 7.6 acres of land at Keeraun, on the outskirts of Galway city, had been sold to developer, Sawgrass Property Ltd, in November 2006 for 6.4m, who then sold it on to the council for 10.5m a few months later. The Irish Examiner has learned that this is despite the council knowing what Sawgrass paid to the local farmer who sold the land a few months before, as shown by the documents. It is revealed that, five months after the sale of the land to Sawgrass, the city council got a valuation from auctioneers who gave three different values based on how many homes could be built. The first valuation was for 7.5m, based on 10 homes per acre, or 76 homes in total, being built on the land. The second was for 9m, based on 12 homes per acre or 91 units and the third valuation was for 11.3m, based on 15 units per acre or 114 units in total. The mid-range valuation was the most relevant one, as it was the one closest to the actual number of units that were planned to be built on the land. The documents suggest that the council proceeded to draw contracts and the necessary financial documents based on a price of 11.14m. At this stage, Sawgrass Properties pulled the plug on the deal, only to be talked back to the table by officials after some haggling over a number of special conditions which were attached to the sale. But, ultimately, the final agreed sale price was reduced down to 10.5m in light of the stalling of the property market weakening. So, the council paid Sawgrass their money and they walked away with a very tidy profit from the land which they had bought themselves only months before. But for the council, the nightmare was only beginning. Just as soon as the contracts were signed and the money was paid, Irelands crash took hold with a vengeance. As budgets were being slashed all over the country, all house building by local authorities stopped. As a result, the very expensive 7.6 acre plot of land was never developed and has remained idle ever since. But it gets worse from the taxpayers perspective. The site, along with others across the city, was not accepted into Nama for local authorities, the Land Aggregation Scheme. As a result, the council was obliged to continue to pay the loan it used to acquire the site. The interest-only loan payment on this and other sites will cost the council around 600,000 in 2017, according to the council budget meeting; or 4.8m if spread out over eight years. It has emerged that other than paying interest, the local authority has done nothing with the site for over eight years. Not one cent has been paid off the capital loan of 10.5m. The local authority appears to have now abandoned its commitment for social housing for this site, and instead wants to use it for Traveller-specific accommodation, and possibly a halting site. Repeated requests to Galway City Council for a response went answered. All queries to contact not only the people who were in the positions of authority at the time, but also the current occupants of those roles have so far brought no response. We also made contact with Sawgrass Properties Ltd, but again no response has been forthcoming. But the move to make the land available for traveller accommodation was announced to councillors before Christmas. The councils director for housing, Tom Connell, told councillors that emergency accommodation issues require the landbank at Keeraun to be considered to relieve the Traveller housing crisis. We now have to go back and look at our landbanks on the Ballymoneen Road and assess the most appropriate and bring forward proposals, he said. City manager Brendan McGrath said the need to address the traveller accommodation crisis will require difficult and braver decisions and he ultimately has the power to approve the plans, without the consent of the elected councillors. This, predictably enough was met with a furious response from councillors who complained about a lack of consultation. Whatever about the future use of the site, there is considerable national political interest in what happened here, and just who is to blame. Speaking to the Irish Examiner, Public Accounts Committee member Marc MacSharry said the details of the dossier received by the committee are simply extraordinary when you consider the double hit to the taxpayer. On the surface it would appear that because a lack of process there is a major loss, he said. It would appear the executive entered into the deal without seeking or receiving the approval of the elected members of the council. It would seem to be an extraordinary premium to be paid for the land by the council and it is clear that someone was caught napping. Under the various acts the Department of the Environment have to sanction all borrowing so we need to know on what basis was this allowed happen. This saga will be discussed this Thursday when the PAC gather and open this dossier in public session. One of the last hurdles in Nebraska's Prescription Drug Monitoring Program is helping veterinarians find a way to participate to help prevent people from abusing narcotics prescribed for animals. The program was set up to prevent abuse of prescription painkillers and sedatives that can cause addiction, misuse and death from overdose. Nebraska was one of the last states to implement a functional prescription drug monitoring program, with the Legislature getting it done last year. On Jan. 1, dentists, pharmacists, some doctors and anyone else who dispenses prescription drugs began reporting each day all narcotic drug prescriptions dispensed within the state or to Nebraska addresses. The monitoring program stores the information in a secure database and makes it available to health care professionals. Veterinarians, who can be authorized by the federal Drug Enforcement Administration to dispense certain narcotic painkillers, were exempted from that requirement until Jan. 1, 2018. But the Nebraska Veterinary Medicine Association sought to have participation delayed to 2019, and Omaha Sen. Bob Krist introduced a bill to do that earlier this month. This week, he withdrew the bill (LB642), and Sen. John Kuehn of Heartwell introduced, then withdrew, a bill (LB583) that would have taken away veterinarians' ability to dispense narcotic drugs. The bills were withdrawn, the senators said, to give veterinarians a chance to work out a way to get all professionals who dispense narcotics to participate in the program. A task force created to deal with the issue seemingly had reached an impasse. Dr. Bruce Brodersen, co-chair of the veterinary medicine association's legislative committee, said veterinarians do realize that prescription drug abuse is real, even though only about 1 percent of abuse cases involve people seeking veterinary drugs. The issues involving participation by vets have to do with the mechanisms for reporting what drugs are dispensed; data collected for the monitoring program isn't compatible with data collected by veterinarians, he said. A veterinarian's patient is an animal, and the animal's owner is a client. That distinction isn't made in the system, he said. There's also concern about access to confidential information on people who aren't the patients of the veterinarians, which could be a violation of federal privacy laws. Also, not all veterinary clinics are computerized, and the software doesn't exist yet to make the reporting easier for them, Brodersen said. "We're just asking for a delay to get the bugs worked out of the system," he said. They'd like to have some clinics use the system on a trial basis to identify problems so they can be addressed, he said. In other states, veterinarians have sought full exemption from reporting to avoid having to check the prescription history of both the animal and its owner, which would mean looking at a person's medical history and assessing his or her medical conditions. Veterinarians say they aren't comfortable with that. But others fear if veterinarians are exempt, they could become a target for people who "doctor shop" for opioids. In addition, some people have been known to intentionally injure an animal in order to get a pain medication prescription. A letter from a Massachusetts district attorney illustrated the potential for abuse, according to a story in the Boston Globe. The attorney said a woman she met told her she couldnt understand why her pet was in pain despite having been prescribed medication. Then, the woman realized a family member had been taking the animals pills. If veterinarians don't participate in the Nebraska monitoring program, it will be much harder to account for all opioids going into communities, Kuehn said. But for it to work as intended, the program must work for all health care providers, Krist said. If the drugs are not handled, warehoused and secured properly, they could end up in the hands of children, or people with addictions. Omaha Sen. Sara Howard, who was instrumental in getting the working prescription drug monitoring program going, said although the vets have presented the biggest challenges to the program, they should be able to figure out a way to report before 2018. The goals, Kuehn said, are to address the opioid crisis effectively and have all health professionals treated equally. Feminist Economist, World Bank Consultant to Deliver Eckley Lecture Yana van der Meulen Rodgers Jan. 20, 2017 BLOOMINGTON, Ill. A feminist economist who regularly consults for the World Bank and the United Nations will present the Eckley Lecture in Economics Feb. 8 at Illinois Wesleyan University. Yana van der Meulen Rodgers, professor of womens and gender studies at Rutgers University, will use a global perspective to discuss womens empowerment in the labor market at 7 p.m. Feb. 8 in the Hansen Student Center (300 Beecher St., Bloomington). Her presentation will focus on successful strategies for empowering women in the labor market and the benefits not just to women, but also to their families and to economies as a whole. In the era of smart phones and smart cars, empowering women can be a gender-smart way to achieve economy-wide gains, Rodgers said. An expert on East and South Asian economies, Rodgers has traveled to and lived in Asia to conduct her research, which focuses on feminist economics, labor studies, economics of the family, development economics, and nutrition and food policy. She is the author of Maternal Employment and Child Health: Global Issues and Policy Solutions (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011), an empirical study of the relationship between the employment of mothers and three aspects of malnutrition among children under five in several Asian countries including India, Pakistan and the Philippines. She has also published numerous articles in refereed economics journals. In addition to working regularly as a consultant for the World Bank, the United Nations and the Asian Development Bank, Rodgers has served as an associate editor for the journal Feminist Economics for more than a decade. She was president of the International Association for Feminist Economics in 2013-2014. Rodgers earned a bachelors degree in economics from Cornell University and holds a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University. Ilaria Ossella-Durbal, chair and associate professor of economics, said Rodgers is a prolific researcher whose interests include the impact of public policy and labor laws on womens employment and wages, how ownership rights and access to resources for women can not only improve their childrens welfare but also reduce their household poverty level, and how gender disparity, growth and development are all interconnected. Economics of gender is an area of economics that our students are generally not exposed to, so it is our honor to have such a distinguished scholar in this field provide us with her insights, said Ossella-Durbal. The Eckley Lecture in Economics was made possible by a gift to Illinois Wesleyan from President Emeritus Robert S. Eckley, his wife Nell, and the Eckley Family Foundation shortly before President Eckley passed away in 2012. Prior to his 18-year tenure as Illinois Wesleyans president, Eckley was considered one of the nations top business economists and was Caterpillar Inc.s first professional economist. Eckley earned a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University. Rodgers visit to Illinois Wesleyan is also a part of the co-curricular programming surrounding the Universitys annual theme Womens Power, Womens Justice. Her lecture is free and open to the public. VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA--(Marketwired - Jan. 30, 2017) - Alianza Minerals Ltd. (TSX VENTURE:ANZ) ("Alianza" or the "Company") reports results of fieldwork at the Horsethief sediment-hosted gold project, one of three properties in eastern Nevada where Alianza is actively exploring. Mapping, prospecting and sampling at Horsethief identified multiple areas of favourable alteration, structure and stratigraphy. This program also confirmed the presence of anomalous gold and pathfinder element geochemistry in both jasperoid and carbonate rocks with 10 of 68 samples returning more than 0.10 gram/tonne ("g/t") gold with a high of 1.22 g/t gold. These results, in combination with historic structural and stratigraphic data, will be used in prioritizing drill targets for the next phase of exploration. "The Horsethief area isn't typically considered prospective for sediment-hosted gold ("SHG") deposits, however, a considerable amount of exploration has recently recognized potential SHG prospects outside of the Carlin and Cortez trends," noted Jason Weber, P.Geo., President and CEO of Alianza, "Horsethief clearly shows potential for SHG mineralization. Modelling of previous drill and geophysical data with our recent field observations, we will be able to select high priority targets for drill testing." Horsethief Exploration Results The 2016 program focussed on gaining an understanding of the property stratigraphy and potential structural controls for mineralization. It was successful in identifying multiple new occurrences of jasperoid alteration in limestone and dolostone rocks considered to be Upper Cambrian age Dunderburg Formation. Sampling of both the jasperoids and carbonate rocks returned gold values ranging from below detection to 1.22 g/t gold and 11 of 68 rock samples collected returned gold values more than 0.10 g/t gold. A further 10 samples were considered anomalous in gold. Two primary target areas have emerged, both characterized by jasperoid alteration, anomalous gold and pathfinder element (silver ("Ag"), arsenic ("As"), mercury ("Hg"), molybdenum ("Mo"), antimony ("Sb")) geochemistry and complex structural setting. The North Horsethief target is dominated by a 900 by 150 metre jasperoid breccia occurrence at the contact of the Cambrian carbonate stratigraphy with Tertiary age volcanic tuffs that surround the property. Strongly anomalous gold geochemistry and coincident pathfinder element geochemistry in rocks and soils are associated with north-south, northeast and east-west oriented faulting. The highest rock sample reported from the property (sampled by a previous operator - 21.94 g/t gold) is located in this area. Immediately east of the main jasperoid body, vuggy fluorite and barite were noted in a smaller outcrop of jasperoid located on an east-west fault. The second area, Horsethief South, lies approximately one kilometre southeast of Horsethief North. This area hosts jasperoid alteration coincident with east-west and lesser north-south and northeast oriented structures. Gold values are subdued as compared to the northern target, but pathfinder geochemical anomalies are strong for As, Hg, Sb and Mo in soils. A strong Induced Polarization ("IP") geophysical anomaly exists at this target, persisting to depth to the limits of the survey (approximately 250 metres). The Horsethief property is located in Lincoln County, Nevada, approximately 20 km northeast of Pioche. Work by prior operators included mapping and sampling hematite-rich jasperoid breccia outcrops followed by shallow drilling. Historic drilling, generally 100 metres or less in depth, returned multiple intervals of gold mineralization including 13.7 metres averaging 1.2 g/t gold and 39.6 metres averaging 0.79 g/t gold with four holes terminating in mineralization. Gold mineralization was hosted in both silty limestone and jasperoid. Maps and photos from the Horsethief property can be found on the Company's website at http://alianzaminerals.com/project/horsethief/. Alianza contracted Big Rock Exploration LLC of Minneapolis, Minnesota to complete the 2016 field program. Bureau Veritas Minerals of Sparks, Nevada performed the analytical work using Ultra Trace (ICP-AES/MS) 53 element analysis (AQ252-EXT) using a 30-gram sample. Anomalous gold samples were then selected for Fire Assay - AAS analysis (FA430) to check and refine gold values further. Additionally, 10% of all samples will be sent to ALS for QA/QC check analysis. About Alianza Minerals Ltd. Alianza increases the chances of success in mineral exploration by using the "Prospect Generator" business model, focussing on gold and copper exploration in Latin America, Nevada and Yukon Territory. The Company has 28.3 million shares issued and outstanding, and is listed on the TSX Venture Exchange (TSX VENTURE:ANZ). Mr. Jason Weber, BSc, P.Geo., Alianza's President and CEO is a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101. Mr. Weber supervised the preparation of the technical information contained in this release. To learn more visit: www.alianzaminerals.com WINNEMUCCA, NEVADA--(Marketwired - Jan. 30, 2017) - Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. (NYSE MKT:PZG) ("Paramount") today announced that the first results from its current drill program at its Grassy Mountain Project are exceeding expectations in terms of grade and rock quality for mining purposes. The results to date are confirming the high-grade core of the deposit which is surrounded by a larger envelope of lower grade gold mineralization. Paramount's plan is to construct an underground mine to exploit the high-grade core. The current 29-hole drill program is part of an ongoing Pre-Feasibility Study ("PFS") required to raise resources to proven and probable reserves and complete the mine permitting process. As reported in November 2016, Paramount began a drill program using one reverse circulation rig and two core rigs. The program was designed in conjunction with PFS consultants Mine Development Associates ("MDA"), Golder Associates ("Golder") and AUSENCO to: Better define the high-grade core for underground mining and potentially expand its size and grade; Acquire material for PFS-level metallurgical testing to design the recovery process including studies to better define the crushing equipment and milling circuits necessary to optimize gold recoveries; Obtain geotechnical data on rock quality for underground mine design and mining methodology. For resource confirmation and metallurgical drilling, the reverse circulation rig is being used to drill the upper portion of the holes while the two core rigs are being used to complete the lower portions of the holes in the targeted high-grade core. For geotechnical data, core rigs are being used for the entire hole employing a triple tube technique to preserve the in situ characteristics of the rock. Paramount believes that triple tube drilling and logging at the drill site provide a more accurate assessment of rock competence encountered in actual underground mining compared to the previous methodology of manipulating and transporting drill core prior to logging, which can generate additional fracturing. Results for the first four holes completed to their targeted depths are as follows (see the map below for drill hole locations): Hole-ID Type From (ft.) To (ft.) Width (ft.) Width(1) (m) Au (g/T) Ag (g/T) GM16-02 RC 130 400 270 82.4 0.60 3.2 Core 450 525 75 23.0 1.69 9.85 Core 545 685 140 43.0 47.51(2) 12.68 GM16-03 Core 85 415 330 100.7 0.53 2.0 Core 455 785 330 100.7 2.17 5.0 Including 500 672 172 52.5 3.35 7.5 Including 500 545 45 13.7 3.41 7.1 Including 605 633 28 8.5 5.96 8.7 GM16-04 Core 130 681 551 167.9 1.12 5.1 Including 520 601 81 24.7 2.48 7.3 GM16-14 Core 367 750 383 116.8 2.20 9.1 Including 546 579 33 10.1 7.51 18.0 Including 613 679 66 20.1 3.56 9.2 (1) These holes were oriented to intersect the target at true thickness. (2) Intercept includes 5 ft. (1.5m) @ 1090 Au g/T RC= Reverse Circulation sample; core= core samples Average grades are calculated using uncapped lab assays The following table provides the objective and observations for each of the reported holes: ID Purpose Total depth (ft.) Total depth (m) Specific objective Observations GM16-02 Resource 742 226 Test continuity and true width of high grade zone interpreted in the resource model to be 90 ft. (28 m.) thick, in a zone with limited previous drilling Intercept of 140 ft. (43 m.) grading 47.5 g Au/T (uncapped) confirms high grade core with grade and thickness substantially exceeding resource model. Several samples with over 100 g Au/T (see fig 2) GM16-03 Metallurgic & Resource 785 239 Metallurgical drill hole to acquire several rock types and grade distribution for recovery optimization Intersected zones and grades as predicted by resource model. GM16-04 Geotech & Resource 745 227 Geotechnical hole to evaluate rock quality & infill drilling Demonstrates rock quality is better than anticipated in PEA which has favorable implications for mining costs. Grades and thicknesses as predicted in resource model. GM16-14 Geotech & Resource 750 229 Geotechnical hole to evaluate rock quality & infill drilling to limit high grade zone between two previous drill holes. Confirmed limit of high grade towards a less mineralized area. A 10 m thick zone of 7.5 g Au/T and a 20 m zone of 3.5 g Au/T were as predicted by resource model. Paramount CEO Glen van Treek commented: "The results from the first four holes confirm our expectation of a possible improvement in the resource. We expect that the infill drilling will continue to find smaller but very high grade zones that can add meaningful ounces to the overall resource. Previous resource estimates may not have captured the impact of these very high grade occurrences. Further drill results are needed to come to a firm conclusion but we are excited by the assays we have received to date which lead us to believe that incremental improvements in quantity and overall grade may be achievable." Paramount has paused the drilling due to current weather conditions at the site and expects to resume its drill program in February. Figure 1 - Drill hole Location Map Figure 2 - Section containing GM16-02 NI 43-101 Disclosure Exploration activities at Grassy Mountain are being conducted by Calico Resources USA Corp. personnel under the supervision of Michael McGinnis (CPG 10914), Project Manager and a Qualified Person under National Instrument 43-101, who has reviewed and approved this release. An ongoing quality control/quality assurance protocol is being employed for the program including blank, duplicate and reference standards in every batch of assays. About Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. Paramount Gold Nevada is a U.S. based precious metals exploration company. Paramount has a high ratio of ounces of gold in mineral inventory to shares outstanding, providing its shareholders with exceptional leverage to the gold price. For our mineral inventory, click here. Paramount holds a 100% working interest in the Grassy Mountain Gold Project which consists of approximately 9,300 acres located on private and BLM land in Malheur County, Oregon. The Grassy Mountain project contains a gold-silver deposit (100% located on private land) for which a Preliminary Economic Assessment ("PEA") has been prepared and key permitting milestones accomplished. For the PEA, click here. Additionally, Paramount owns a 100% interest in the Sleeper Gold Project located in Northern Nevada. The Sleeper Gold Project, which includes the former producing Sleeper mine, totals 2,322 unpatented mining claims (approximately 60 square miles or 15,500 hectares). Paramount's strategy is to create shareholder value through exploring and developing its mineral properties and to realize this value for its shareholders in three ways: by selling its assets to established producers; entering into joint ventures with producers for construction and operation; or constructing and operating mines for its own account. VANCOUVER, Jan. 30, 2017 /CNW/ - Lithium X Energy ("Lithium X", or the "Company")(TSX-V: LIX)(OTCQX: LIXXF) is pleased to announce that the Company has entered into a binding purchase and sale agreement (the "Agreement") to acquire 100% of the Arizaro lithium brine project (the "Project") in Argentina's Salta Province. The Project consists of 33,846 hectares in 11 mining claims covering parts of the western and eastern portions of the Salar de Arizaro, one of the district's largest known salt lakes. (Refer to Figure 1: The Arizaro Project, which can also be found on the Company's website at www.lithium-x.com.) "Arizaro is an accretive acquisition for Lithium X, well priced under current market conditions, with considerable exploration potential," commented Executive Chairman, Paul Matysek. He continued, "It is one of the largest salars in the world thought to contain elevated lithium brine values and has gone largely unexplored. Preliminary indications of brine geochemistry suggest the possibility of employing Arizaro Project brine products to increase and enhance processing of Sal de los Angeles brine, the Company's flagship asset, also located in Salta, Argentina." The Arizaro Project benefits from good infrastructure in the Puna region, and is set to benefit from further development of adjacent large-scale mining projects, including First Quantum's Taca-Taca copper project and Fortuna Silver's Lindero gold project. Salar de Arizaro is traversed by a highway and railroad that connect the Project to Chile and Pocitos, where natural gas and an Industrial Park are found. Other property owners in Arizaro include Eramet, Sentient and REMSA (Salta Government). Historical sampling on the western margins of the Salar de Arizaro show elevated lithium values near surface contained within a classic halite dominant salar, much like nearby Rincon, Salar del Hombre Muerto and Atacama projects, all of which host advanced or producing lithium brine operations. In consideration for the Project, Lithium X will pay USD $250,000 and issue 3,500,000 common shares to the Vendor for a 100% interest in the Project on closing, which is subject to receiving valid title certificates. In connection with the purchase a finder's fee of 5% of the total acquisition price (USD $12,500 and 175,000 shares) shall be payable. The acquisition of the Project is subject to certain conditions including, but not limited to, receipt of all necessary approvals, including the approval of the TSX Venture Exchange. The Company is currently planning an exploration program to assess the quantity and quality of the contained brine at Arizaro, as well as beginning to assess the brine for use in mixing with Sal de los Angeles brine. Sal de los Angeles Project Update Since Eduardo Morales, Chief Operating Officer and Andres Barrientos, General Manager, joined the Company the Company has been pilot processing Sal de los Angeles brine, testing two flow sheet designs both aimed at producing a 5% lithium brine concentrate. The evaporation and crystallization path of this brine has been within expectations, following a similar crystallization path to the Salar de Atacama brine employed in the current producing facilities at that location. The concentrated brine is currently at 4% lithium by weight and the first batches of product at 5% lithium concentration are expected by March 2017, which will then be shipped to potential end users and for testing of battery grade lithium carbonate at laboratory scale by the Company. "Half way through our first summer season, we are extremely pleased with the evaporation rates and crystallization path of our brine," commented Chief Operating Officer, Eduardo Morales. He continued "upon Andres Barrientos and my incorporation into the Lithium X team, we designed a ponding flow sheet that would enable the production of a 5% lithium brine that is both potentially a commercial product and feed for a battery grade lithium carbonate plant. The Sal de los Angeles brine is now at 4% lithium concentration, having followed the crystallization path at our on-site pilot pools within expectations, reaffirming my conviction as to the high processing quality of this brine. With current evaporation rates we expect to reach our target concentration before the end of March, 2017 demonstrating in this way a full cycle is achievable within a single summer season." Following the completion of the upgraded brine resource at SDLA in August 2016, follow-up exploration and resource definition was planned and is set to commence in February 2017. Work will focus on expanding the resource and upgrading the existing resource further. Resource expansion will consist of additional seismic surveys and drilling to basement depths to the north of the existing resource boundary. The northern portion of the basin contains the higher grade brines hosted in predominantly sand and gravel layers, with approximately 9 square kilometres of this area yet untested by drilling. Resource upgrading will consist of additional long and short term pump tests as well as collection of additional samples for relative brine release capacity testing. The Salta Exploraciones S.A. ("SESA") and Potasio y Litio de Argentina S.A. ("PLASA") Joint Venture "SESA JV") has initiated construction of the camp expansion required to commence construction of the pumping, piping and ponding facilities. The camp shall be increased from 17 people to 40 people, accommodating the additional work force to be employed during the upcoming construction. Equipment and supplies for construction of the brine collection, pumping and piping facilities are to be dispatched shortly followed by construction of these facilities once all necessary permits have been received. A detailed construction schedule will be released when such permits have been received. The scientific and technical content and interpretations contained in this news release have been reviewed and approved by VP of Project Development William Randall, a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101, Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects. About Lithium X Energy Corp Lithium X Energy Corp. is a lithium exploration and development company with a goal of becoming a low-cost supplier for the burgeoning lithium battery industry. Lithium X owns 50%, and has the option to acquire up to 80%, of the Sal de los Angeles lithium brine project in the prolific "Lithium Triangle" in mining friendly Salta province, Argentina, a well-known salar with a large resource and high concentrations of lithium. Lithium X's Arizaro project consists of 33,846 hectares located in one of the world's largest salars thought to contain elevated lithium brine values. Lithium X is also exploring a large land package in Nevada's Clayton Valley, contiguous to the only producing lithium operation in North America Silver Peak, owned and operated by Albemarle, the world's largest lithium producer. Lithium X is listed on the TSXV under the trading symbol LIX. For additional information about Lithium X Energy Corp., please visit the Company's website at www.lithium-x.com or review the Company's documents filed on www.sedar.com. Join the Company's email list at http://lithium-x.com/subscribe. Burnaby, British Columbia--(Newsfile Corp. - January 30, 2017) - Bayhorse Silver Inc. (TSXV: BHS) (the "Company" or "Bayhorse") has received favorable initial test results from testing run-of-mine silver mineralization from the Bayhorse Mine, Oregon, USA., submitted to Steinert US, manufacturer of state-ofthe-art Ore-Sorting equipment. The Steinert X-Ray Transmission Ore-Sorter (XSS) effectively identified and discriminated between mineralized and non-mineralized silver bearing material, as well as differentiating higher (above 93 g/t or 3oz/t Ag) from lower (below 93 g/t or 3oz/t Ag) grade mineralization. The XSS rejected 37% from the stream as non mineralized and retained 63% of the run-of-mine stream. The material was sized between 1 inch (25mm) and 4 inches (100mm), and was comprised of high grade, low grade, and non-mineralized material. Steinert X-Ray Transmission Ore-Sorter The Company will be shipping a larger, approximately 2 ton, sample of the Bayhorse mineralized material to Steinert US, to establish the crush size for the most effective sorting, and rejection of unmineralized and lower grade (under 93 g/t or 3 oz/t Ag) material. The XSS is designed to sort material at up to 60 tons per hour from material sized at 10 mm (0.35 inch) to 200 mm (8 inches). By narrowing the size range for Ore-Sorting to between 12.5 mm (0.5 inch) to 32.5 mm (1.25 inch) and lowering the hourly throughput, the XSS can achieve better discrimination between low grade and the higher grades, and more effectively upgrade the mineralization. Bayhorse CEO, Graeme O'Neill comments, "By using the XSS we could increase the proposed daily tonnage throughput from 100 tons/day to 150 tons/day with no other changes to the current in-place crushing-upgrading circuit. As the XSS uses no water and has a low power consumption requirement, we believe its use could have a substantial effect in reducing processing costs and increasing recoverable mineralization." He also notes that Adam Hamilton, of Zeal Research, has an article posted on 321Gold.com discussing silver's potential upside in 2017. http://www.321gold.com/editorials/hamilton/hamilton012717.html This News Release has been prepared on behalf of the Bayhorse Silver Inc. Board of Directors, which accepts full responsibility for its contents On Behalf of the Board. Dr. Clay Conway, P.Geol., a Qualified Person and Director of the Company has prepared, supervised the preparation of, or approved the technical content of this press release. Bayhorse Silver Inc., a junior exploration company, is earning an 80% interest in the historic Bayhorse Silver Mine, Oregon, USA. Bayhorse is also earning a 75% interest in the past producing Bridging the Gap Project, consisting of ASARCO's historic Crown Point, Silver King, Ranger, Wyoming, Curlew, and Blackhawk silver/lead/zinc mines in Idaho's Silver Valley. The Company has an experienced management and technical team with extensive exploration and mining expertise. VANCOUVER, BC--(Marketwired - January 30, 2017) - (TSX VENTURE: NRG) (FRANKFURT: X6C) - Newrange Gold Corp. ("Newrange" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that further to the Company's news release dated January 23, 2017 it is increasing the financing by $73,650 due to high demand. The Company is currently seeking TSX Venture Exchange approval to issue 9,411,765 units at $0.085 per unit for gross proceeds of $800,000. Subject to regulatory approval, the Company announces an additional non-brokered private placement for up to $73,650 comprised of 566,538 units at a price of $0.13 per unit. The units consist of one common share and one share purchase warrant entitling the holder to purchase one additional common share for a two (2) year period at a price of $0.17 per share. The warrants may be accelerated under certain terms if the 20 day volume weighted average is equal to or higher than $0.20. Proceeds raised from the private placements will be used to advance the Company's high grade Pamlico project and for general working capital. There are no finder's fees or commissions payable in respect to the financing and all securities issued will be subject to a four month hold period. About Newrange Gold Corp.: Newrange is an aggressive exploration and development company focused on advanced stage projects with near to intermediate term production opportunities in favorable jurisdictions including Nevada, Colorado and Colombia. Focused on developing shareholder value through exploration and development of key projects, the Company is also one of Colombia's leading "prospect generators". Further information can be found on our website at www.newrangegold.com. TORONTO, ONTARIO--(Marketwired - Jan. 30, 2017) - Kirkland Lake Gold Ltd. ("KL Gold" or the "Company") (TSX:KL)(OTCQX:KLGDF) is pleased to report new exploration drill results from surface and underground drilling at its Taylor Gold Mine Complex ("Taylor") located in Northeastern Ontario; situated along the prolific Porcupine Destor Fault (the "PDF") which is host to numerous gold deposits. The Company controls an extensive land package extending approximately 120 km along the PDF, a portion of which hosts Taylor. At Taylor, the Company has currently identified three major mineralized deposits along the PDF which include: (i) the West Porphyry Deposit (the "WPZ"') which contains the majority of the Mineral Resource and Mineral Reserve estimates in the middle of the property and where active mining currently takes place; (ii) the Shoot Deposit located to the west of the property; and (iii) the Shaft Deposit located on the eastern side. (see Figure 1 and 2 below). All drilling targeted new mineralized extensions situated both at depth and along strike to the east of the Shaft Deposit and west of the WPZ, which includes the 1003, 1004, and 1008 Zones. (See Tables 1 and 2 below.) Highlights from the surface and underground drill program include: Surface Drilling West of WPZ (See Figure 3) Drilling from surface approximately 300 m from the edge of known mineralization at the WPZ Deposit intersected 10.31 g/t Au over 3.2 m in hole TA16-001 and 13.91 g/t Au over 1.5 m (12.74 g/t Au cut) in hole TA16-005. Follow up drilling is underway with two surface diamond drill rigs. Underground Exploration Drilling Outside of WPZ Near 1004 and 1003 Zones (See Figure 3) 9.50 g/t Au over 4.5 m in hole T160-017 up-dip of the 1004 Zone. 7.78 g/t Au over 3.4 m in hole T450-008 and 15.03 g/t Au over 1.3 m in hole T450-019, demonstrating good potential to expand Mineral Resources and remains open in all directions. 39.62 g/t Au over 1.1 m including 85.0 g/t Au(1) over 0.5 m in hole T450-012, located 330 m down-dip of existing development, providing a suitable target for 2017 drill follow up. Surface Drilling East of Shaft Deposit Reporting Newly Discovered Area of Mineralization (See Figure 4) 3.29 g/t Au over 9.6 m and 4.59 g/t Au over 5.8 m in hole TA16-008, mineralization remains open at depth. 2.35 g/t Au over 11.0 m including 3.96 g/t Au over 3.0 m in hole TA16-019, open along strike to the east and at depth. Reported intercepts are core lengths, with higher grade assays cut to 30 g/t Au. True widths have not been determined at this time. See Tables 1 and 2 below for detailed information regarding both the surface and underground assay results. (1) Visible gold present in drill intercept. Figure 1: Plan View - Recent Surface Drillhole Locations Figure 2: Longitudinal View - Location of Deposits Figure 3: Longitudinal View - West of Shaft Deposit: Mineralized Drillhole Intercepts Figure 4 : Longitudinal View - East of Shaft Deposit: Mineralized Drillhole Intercepts Mr. Tony Makuch, President and Chief Executive Officer of Kirkland Lake Gold, commented, "The Taylor Mine is the Company's newest gold mine with 2016 gold production totaling 42,639 ounces. Since the mine commenced operation in Q4 2015, the focus has been on better understanding the deposit with resource definition drilling and underground development to support stoping. Looking forward to 2017, Taylor is scheduled to produce 55,000 - 60,000 ounces of gold. The Company believes the higher production target will be achieved through the ramp up of operations combined with productivity and efficiency improvements. A steady increase of daily mine throughput is expected to occur by incorporating additional mining faces in the second half of the year. Mining is currently taking place in the WPZ Deposit 1004 Zone. "In planning our 2017 exploration program, the goal is to significantly add to the resource to allow increasing production and mine life beyond 10 years. We recognize that the ore at Taylor occurs within a series of shear hosted en echelon high grade quartz veins stepping off the PDF. This is our first opportunity to capitalize on the underground drill platforms and we are pleased with the exploration success to date. We believe that it speaks to a large mineralizing system and supports our view that it is a highly prospective location to explore for gold." Taylor Gold Mine Complex Exploration - Surface Drilling Surface drilling at Taylor is focused on two target areas; namely west of the WPZ and east of the Shaft Deposit. The area west of the WPZ targeted potential mineralization between the 1004 Zone and the Shoot Deposit. Drilling along strike to the east targeted shallow dipping mineralized quartz veins situated in the hanging wall of the PDF. A total of 25 holes or 13,400 metres of surface exploration drilling have been completed on Taylor since January 2016. To the west, exploration diamond drilling has targeted mineralization on the Bourgeois claim. Being the most recent claim to be incorporated into Taylor, little diamond drill exploration has been performed up to this point. Drilling was conducted to identify lithologies and stratigraphy and to explore for potential mineralized extensions between the Shoot Deposit and 1004 Zone. Drill hole TA16-001 (dipping at -56) intersected 10.31 g/t Au over 3.2 metres. Strong quartz veining, and disseminated sulphides are noted within the altered mafic volcanic. Drilling is currently underway to follow-up on this intercept from surface. Approximately 800 metres east of the Shaft Deposit, historical drilling from TA84-005 which contained strong quartz veining and brecciation, returned anomalous gold values. The 2016 surface exploration drill program focused on targeting the mineralized quartz veins and to follow-up on historical assays. TA16-008 returned two mineralized intercepts which assayed 3.29 g/t over 9.6 metres and 4.59 g/t Au over 5.8 metres (approximately 400 metres below surface and 800m to the east of the Shaft Deposit). Drilling intersected highly deformed and altered ultramafic volcanics (green carbonate), including an altered albite-rich unit. Mineralization remains open to the east and at depth. Taylor Gold Mine Complex Exploration - Underground Drilling Underground exploration during 2016 focused on the delineation and extension of mineralization associated with both the 1004 Zone and also targeted mineralization north of the PDF in an area termed the 1003 Zone. Historic drilling had identified narrow intervals of variably mineralized, shallow dipping (35) quartz carbonate +/- pyrite veins hosted within strongly sheared carbonate-altered ultramafic rocks. Preliminary drilling has confirmed the presence of mineralization in the eastern half of the 1003 Zone situated approximately 125 vertical metres below and to the north of the planned development on the 450 Level (refer to Table 2). An additional drill hole T450-012 intersected quartz carbonate veining containing visible gold which assayed 39.62 g/t Au (14.63 g/t Au cut) over 1.1 metres. This intercept is situated approximately 330 metres down dip of existing development, providing a suitable target for drill follow-up planned in 2017. A total of 8,600 metres of underground exploration drilling have been completed on the Taylor property since January 2016. Qualified Persons Doug Cater P. Geo Vice President Exploration Canada, is a "qualified person" as such term is defined in National Instrument 43-101 and has reviewed and approved the technical information and data included in this News Release. QA/QC information is provided at the bottom of Table 2. About Kirkland Lake Gold Ltd. Kirkland Lake Gold Ltd. is a mid-tier gold producer targeting +500,000 ounces in tier 1 mining jurisdictions of Canada and Australia. The production profile of the Company is anchored from two high-grade, low-cost operations including the Macassa Mine Complex located in northeastern Ontario and the Fosterville Gold Mine located in the state of Victoria, Australia. KL Gold's solid base of quality assets is complemented by development and district scale exploration projects, supported by a strong financial position with extensive management and operational expertise. For further information on KL Gold and to receive news releases by email, visit the website www.klgold.com. Table 1: TAYLOR GOLD MINE COMPLEX EXPLORATION - SURFACE ASSAY RESULTS Note: Taylor high grade assays are capped at 30 g/t Au. True widths have not been determined at this time. DRILL HOLE ZONE Easting (UTM NAD 83) Northing (UTM NAD 83) DIP (degrees) AZIMUTH (degrees) FROM (m) TO (m) CORE LENGTH (m) ASSAY Au (g/t) CUT Au (g/t) TA16-001 527228 5379006 -56 355 244.3 245.3 1.0 2.68 - And 254.4 257.6 3.2 10.31 And 385.0 388.0 3.0 2.99 - And 1004 454.4 457.55 3.15 4.20 And 507.75 509.0 1.25 2.32 And 531.0 532.0 1.0 1.80 TA16-002 1004 527591 5378920 -66 355 383.75 387.0 3.25 3.60 - TA16-003A 527482 5378945 -70 315 NSV TA16-004 1004 527257 5378871 -70 315 280.3 281.4 1.1 1.81 TA16-005 1004 527133 5378978 -78 360 397.15 399.0 1.85 2.81 And 423.3 424.8 1.5 13.91 12.74 Includes 423.3 423.8 0.5 33.51 30.00 TA16-006 529353 5379153 -62 355 265.0 267.0 2.0 3.30 And 318.4 332.5 14.1 0.74 TA16-007 527035 5378723 -70 315 409.0 410.0 1.0 2.95 And 435.8 436.4 0.6 21.76 TA16-008 529353 5379153 -75 355 247.0 249.0 2.0 4.41 And 278.9 288.5 9.6 3.29 Includes 278.9 284.5 5.6 4.87 And 411.95 417.7 5.75 4.59 Includes 416.9 417.7 0.8 11.68 TA16-009 526908 5378728 -70 315 NSV TA16-010 529268 5379200 -55 350 141.5 143.4 1.9 2.08 TA16-011 529333 5379194 -55 330 82.2 86.4 4.2 1.30 And 243.75 244.75 1.0 5.46 And 292.5 293.4 0.9 16.33 TA16-012 527208 5379054 119.9 122.8 2.9 1.15 TA16-013 528361 5378916 -63 337 Pending TA16-014 529333 5379194 -67 330 94.0 95.0 1.0 2.44 TA16-014A 529333 5379194 -67 330 94.0 98.0 4.0 1.63 And 257.5 260.4 2.9 3.50 And 358.0 362.0 4.0 1.79 TA16-015 528361 5378916 -70 350 Pending TA16-016 529358 5379156 -67 20 Pending TA16-017 528361 5378916 -64 350 Pending TA16-018 529358 5379156 -60 20 254.0 254.8 0.8 3.75 And 325.5 329.6 4.1 2.12 TA16-019 5379226 10270 -60 355 215.0 226.0 11.0 2.35 Including 218.0 221.0 3.0 3.96 Table 2: TAYLOR GOLD MINE COMPLEX UNDERGROUND EXPLORATION ASSAY RESULTS DRILL HOLE ZONE DIP (degrees) AZIMUTH (degrees) FROM (m) TO (m) CORE LENGTH (m) ASSAY (g/t) CUT (g/t) T160-017 1004 -24 352 147.0 151.5 4.5 9.50 T160-039 1008 -9 339 200.1 201.4 1.3 7.09 And 1008 220.9 221.6 0.7 16.11 T160-042 1008 -46 334 135.4 136.4 1.0 22.25 T390-011 1003 -42 317 141.0 144.0 3.0 4.98 And 1003 177.0 178.5 1.5 7.72 T450-008 1003 -42 353 128.1 128.9 0.8 16.00 And 1003 143.0 146.4 3.4 7.78 T450-009 1003 -65 353 129.0 130.8 1.8 5.42 T450-010 1004 -22 77.8 318.15 319.0 0.85 3.59 And 1004 343.2 345.2 2.0 2.18 And 1004 348.0 351.0 3.0 2.46 T450-011 1004 -34 77.8 192.0 193.5 1.5 1.44 T450-012 1003 -64 160.43 316.6 320.6 4.0 1.63 And 1003 332.4 333.5 1.1 39.62 14.63 Including 1003 332.4 332.9 0.5 84.98 30.00 T450-019 1003 -75 327 157.7 159.0 1.3 15.03 T450-025 1003 -40 18 149.3 151.1 1.8 8.50 And 1003 158.9 159.7 0.8 24.66 T450-027 1003 -47 36 192.5 194.8 2.3 5.92 Note: Taylor high grade assays are capped at 30 g/t Au. True widths have not been determined at this time. QA / QC Controls The Company has implemented a quality assurance and control (QA/QC) program to ensure sampling and analysis of all exploration work is conducted in accordance with the best possible practices. The drill core is sawn in half with one half of the core sample shipped to SGS Laboratories located in Cochrane, ON or Swastika Laboratories situated in Swastika, ON. The other half of the core is retained for future assay verification. Other QA/QC measures includes the insertion of certified reference standards and blanks into the sample stream, and the regular re-assaying of pulps and rejects at alternate certified labs. Gold analysis is conducted by fire assay using atomic absorption or gravimetric finish. The laboratory re-assays at least 10% of all samples and additional checks may be run on anomalous values. When Becky Haines, of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and her two sisters attended the Women's March on Washington last weekend, they, along with millions of other women, wanted to make a difference. They never imagined that their march photo would go viral and eventually lead to state Sen. Bill Kintner's resignation over 1,100 miles away from their home. "That the people of Nebraska stood up against him gave me hope that with our new president people will stand up for what's right," she said. The photo, which showed Haines and her sisters holding signs referencing an audio clip of President Trump saying that he grabbed women by their genitals, was first tweeted by conservative talk show host Larry Elder in California with the caption "Ladies, I think you're safe." Haines found out about it after a conservative DJ in Harrisburg had shared it. The tweet, which made light of sexual assault and mocked Women's March participants, was retweeted by Kintner on Jan. 22. Haines' niece called her after reading about Kintner's retweet on a blog. "The comments were hurtful," she said. "As a middle-aged woman, you don't always feel beautiful to begin with, so it was really hard to hear all of those mean comments." Although she was hurt at first, Haines said she and her sisters have not been discouraged. "We're not going to let that define us," she said. "It's the beauty on the inside that matters most." Haines, a survivor of domestic abuse, wanted to stand up for women who had been abused, or suffer from pre-existing mental health issues, which she has also struggled with. She felt it was important to support LGBT rights, too. Haines and her sisters had been planning to attend the march since finding out about it in November. "We grew up in a staunch Republican household,"Haines said. "My niece and nephew are of Mexican descent and my son is gay; the march for us is for our family as well as our country." Haines said her son shared a link on Facebook Tuesday with information about contacting Nebraska legislators to call for Kintner's removal from office. Haines and her son both left voice messages for Kintner Tuesday night and she said many people from Harrisburg also called Nebraska legislators. Kintner faced criticism on Twitter after retweeting the photo, then deleting his Twitter account on Monday. Several legislators called for his resignation and threatened to impeach him during legislative debate. Haines, an insurance adjuster, hoped to watch live feed of Kintner's Wednesday morning press conference, but was busy at work. She found out later that he resigned. "All these hateful comments were worth it," she said. "We got someone out of office who didn't belong there." The campaign against Education Secretarydesignate Betsy DeVos has been both predictable and extraordinary. Its no surprise that the education establishment was perturbed by the selection of a school choice advocate, and opposition from interest groups is to be expected. But in an era when the president of the United States has declared a running war on the media, accusing reporters of distorting facts to attack him, the work of one education journalist unfortunately lends some credence to that argument. Whatever your take on DeVos or the media, everyone loses when the line between fact and falsehood is blurred beyond distinction. Some critical coverage has been responsible and fair, but DeVos was sadly not spinning when she told the Senate that theres been a lot of false news about her record. The New York Times has been most conspicuous in this regard. The editorial angle of its national education correspondent Kate Zernike was clear from her first piece on the nominee, Betsy DeVos, Trumps Education Pick, Has Steered Money From Public Schools. Liberal bias at the Times is less than a non-story; if anything, Id argue a partisan press is healthy in a pluralistic democracy. But when Americas paper of record makes verifiably false claims, they must be checked and corrected. Here are two significant ones. In a front-page June article titled A Sea of Charter Schools in Detroit Leaves Students Adrift, the Times education correspondent asserts that half the charters perform only as well, or worse than, Detroits traditional public schools. That claim was echoed by a Times editorial and would be big, if true. DeVos was nominated based on her school choice advocacy. If that work helped foster charter schools that are worse than the worst-in-the-nation Detroit Public Schools, that would be profoundly troubling. But if Detroits charters are better (even if not as much better as wed desire), then its a different story entirely. Fortunately, they are better. There are three key studies that compare Detroits charter and district schools: one from Stanford University, one from the center-right Mackinac Center and one from Excellent Schools Detroit (ESD), a local education nonprofit. As Jason Bedrick, a policy analyst at the Cato Institutes Center for Educational Freedom, and I demonstrated in Education Next, all three show that charters significantly outperform district schools. Perplexed at how the Times reached the opposite conclusion, I reached out to Zernike. Some critics assumed that Zernike was twisting data from the Stanford study, the presumptive source of district-to-charter comparisons. But Zernike informed me that she chose to use the ESD study after contacting the Stanford studys author and determining that the data was too outdated for her purposes. I asked why she chose the ESD data over the Mackinac Centers. Mackinac grades schools using a complex regression taking into account students socioeconomic background. ESD grades on a combination of raw test scores, test-score growth and a school climate survey, but it doesnt consider socioeconomic status. She explained that Mackinac is a partisan group that is proschool choice and anti-DPS. ESD, despite how GLEP [the DeVos-backed Great Lakes Education Project] will characterize it, supported charters and traditional public schools, and the measures seemed broader. When I told her that sounded more like political than methodological reasoning, she countered, Its not politics, its methodology. I think graduation rate was the only thing Mackinac used to compare, and added that she thinks the ESD data do break down for demographics. Wrong and wrong. Now, its possible that she didnt simply default to the politically congenial option without further scrutiny. Perhaps she just failed to properly recall the details several months later. Whatever the case, the ESD data also show charters outperforming district schools. So, how did the Times national education correspondent reach the opposite conclusion? Tier 1 and 2=excellent to good; Tier 3=average to weak; Tier 4=weak to failing. (Source: Excellent Schools Detroit) Now, bear with me, here because its complicated and it makes no sense. First she separated out K-8 district schools and high schools, calculating their respective average scores, weighted by student enrollment. She included high-performing selective-admissions district schools and excluded low-performing Detroit public schools that have been taken over by the state. (Neither decision is justifiable in a traditional-to-charter comparison.) Then she saw that for both K-8 district schools and high schools, the (inflated) weighted average score was higher than the median charter school score, and concluded that half the charters perform only as well, or worse than, Detroits traditional public schools. On the high school side, the unweighted average score of .33 is significantly lower than the weighted average of .41. Its worth noting that the .41 is above the charter median score and the .33 is below it. So going by the weighted average was the only way to arrive at that result for high schools. On the K-8 side, the weighted and unweighted averages are essentially equal. That average is indeed slightly higher than the median charter score, but its much higher than the districts median score. So on K-8 schools, by her same faulty logic, it would also be accurate to say that two thirds of the public schools perform only as well, or worse than, Detroits traditional public schools. If that sounds silly, its because comparing an average to a median is statistical nonsense. The apples to oranges metaphor is apt but insufficient here. Essentially, Zernike took a basket of apples, pulled out the rotten ones, kept the genetically modified ones, made statistically weighted applesauce, and plopped that applesauce in the middle of a row of organic oranges. Then she drew a false conclusion thats become central to the case against Betsy DeVoss nomination for secretary of education. Personally, I doubt the mathematical mistakes were conscious or intentional. But what really matters is that the ESD, Mackinac and Stanford studies all show Detroit charters significantly outperforming traditional public schools. The second claim also involves the Timess editorial against DeVos, in this case lamenting that she funded charter advocacy efforts, winning legislative changes that have reduced oversight and accountability. The editorial linked to a December article by Zernike covering a legislative debate on Detroit charter regulation wherein Ms. DeVos pushed back on any regulation as too much regulation. Whatever the rhetorical merit of that editorial claim, it is flat false. In a Detroit News op-ed, to which the article later links, DeVos called for two additional regulations: AF school accountability grades and default closure for failing schools, both charter and district. She certainly pushed back on some regulations as too much. But the bill that passed included the additional accountability regulations for which she advocated. In fact, the final legislation boosted Michigans accountability score on the National Alliance of Charter School Authorizers index. Given the fact that the main subject of her article was a net increase in charter accountability, Zernike admits on Twitter that shes not sure what the ed board meant by that, but notes that MI legislation in 2011 (not June bill) did weaken oversight. Zernikes December article refers to the 2011 legislation in one passing sentence. Her June article noted that the law repealed a longstanding requirement that the State Department of Education issue yearly reports monitoring charter school performance. While true, that provision didnt merit mention among the 12 key changes in the official legislative summary (five of which increased charter regulation). Its possible that the Timess editorial was referring to that repealed reporting requirement from 2011 when it claimed that DeVos backed legislative changes that have reduced oversight and accountability. But that seems unlikely, given that the editorial linked to Zernikes December article on the 2016 legislative debate and that piece doesnt even mention the 2011 provision. It seems more likely that the editors honestly confused an increase in accountability that was smaller than some stakeholders wanted with an actual, absolute reduction. And given the reporting they relied on, it would be hard to blame them. Education blogger Alexander Russo has skillfully outlined the problematic media coverage of Betsy DeVos, in which journalists have latched onto hyper-simplified story lines while ignoring complexities and eschewing nuanced criticism. Whatever your take on DeVos or the media, everyone loses when the line between fact and falsehood is blurred beyond distinction. At a time when the presidents advisers proudly tout alternative facts, critical, fact-based reporting is more necessary than ever, especially from outlets with the weight and influence of The New York Times. Their readers, and Americas schoolchildren, deserve better. Correcting the record would be a good start. This piece originally appeared at The 74 Million _____________________ Max Eden is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Were excited to announce that metalbulletin.com is now part of fastmarkets.com. A new look and an improved experience means you can still stay ahead of this fast-moving metals market with price data, news and market intelligence right here on Fastmarkets. Discover more than 2000 prices, news and analysis in primary and secondary metals markets. We cover base metals, industrial minerals, ores and alloys, steel, scrap and steel raw materials. If you already have a Fastmarkets account, youll still have uninterrupted access to your markets by logging in with your current details. Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc. (NYSE:ARE), an S&P 500 urban office real estate investment trust ("REIT"), is the first, longest-tenured, and pioneering owner, operator, and developer uniquely focused on collaborative life science, technology, and agtech campuses in AAA innovation cluster locations, with a total market capitalization of $31.9 billion as of December 31, 2020, and an asset base in North America of 49.7 million square feet ("SF"). The asset base in North America includes 31.9 million RSF of operating properties and 3.3 million RSF of Class A properties undergoing construction, 7.1 million RSF of near-term and intermediate-term development and redevelopment projects, and 7.4 million SF of future development projects. Founded in 1994, Alexandria pioneered this niche and has since established a significant market presence in key locations, including Greater Boston, San Francisco, New York City, San Diego, Seattle, Maryland, and Research Triangle. Alexandria has a longstanding and proven track record of developing Class A properties clustered in urban life science, technology, and agtech campuses that provide our innovative tenants with highly dynamic and collaborative environments that enhance their ability to successfully recruit and retain world-class talent and inspire productivity, efficiency, creativity, and success. Alexandria also provides strategic capital to transformative life science, technology, and agtech companies through our venture capital platform. We believe our unique business model and diligent underwriting ensure a high-quality and diverse tenant base that results in higher occupancy levels, longer lease terms, higher rental income, higher returns, and greater long-term asset value. Register for more free articles. Sign up for our newsletter to keep reading. Obituaries Newsletter Sign up to get the most recent local obituaries delivered to your inbox. Sign up! Already a Subscriber? Already a Subscriber? Sign in Terms of Service Privacy Policy AutoZone, Inc. retails and distributes automotive replacement parts and accessories. The company offers various products for cars, sport utility vehicles, vans, and light trucks, including new and remanufactured automotive hard parts, maintenance items, accessories, and non-automotive products. Its products include A/C compressors, batteries and accessories, bearings, belts and hoses, calipers, chassis, clutches, CV axles, engines, fuel pumps, fuses, ignition and lighting products, mufflers, radiators, starters and alternators, thermostats, and water pumps, as well as tire repairs. In addition, the company offers maintenance products, such as antifreeze and windshield washer fluids; brake drums, rotors, shoes, and pads; brake and power steering fluids, and oil and fuel additives; oil and transmission fluids; oil, cabin, air, fuel, and transmission filters; oxygen sensors; paints and accessories; refrigerants and accessories; shock absorbers and struts; spark plugs and wires; and windshield wipers. Further, it provides air fresheners, cell phone accessories, drinks and snacks, floor mats and seat covers, interior and exterior accessories, mirrors, performance products, protectants and cleaners, sealants and adhesives, steering wheel covers, stereos and radios, tools, and wash and wax products, as well as towing services. Additionally, the company provides a sales program that offers commercial credit and delivery of parts and other products; sells automotive diagnostic and repair software under the ALLDATA brand through alldata.com; and automotive hard parts, maintenance items, accessories, and non-automotive products through autozone.com. As of August 27, 2022, it operated 6,168 stores in the United States; 703 stores in Mexico; and 72 stores in Brazil. The company was founded in 1979 and is based in Memphis, Tennessee. ESCO Technologies Inc. produces and supplies engineered products and systems for industrial and commercial markets worldwide. It operates through Aerospace & Defense, Utility Solutions Group, and RF Shielding and Test segments. The Aerospace & Defense segment designs and manufactures filtration products, including hydraulic filter elements and fluid control devices used in commercial aerospace applications; filter mechanisms used in micro-propulsion devices for satellites; and custom designed filters for manned aircraft and submarines. It also designs, develops, and manufactures elastomeric-based signature reduction solutions for U.S. naval vessels; and mission-critical bushings, pins, sleeves, and precision-tolerance machined components for landing gear, rotor heads, engine mounts, flight controls, and actuation systems for the aerospace and defense industries. The Utility Solutions Group segment provides diagnostic testing solutions that enable electric power grid operators to assess the integrity of high-voltage power delivery equipment; and decision support tools for the renewable energy industry, primarily wind and solar. The RF Shielding and Test segment designs and manufactures RF test and secure communication facilities, acoustic test enclosures, RF and magnetically shielded rooms, RF measurement systems, and broadcast and recording studios; and RF absorptive materials and filters, active compensation systems, antennas, antenna masts, turntables, electric and magnetic probes, RF test cells, proprietary measurement software, and other test accessories to perform various tests. It also provides services, such as calibration for antennas and field probes, chamber certification, field surveys, customer training, and various product tests. The company distributes its products through a network of distributors, sales representatives, direct sales teams, and in-house sales personnel. The company was incorporated in 1990 and is based in St. Louis, Missouri. Abdul Bari, the Afghan man whose family was stranded in Kabul following President Donald Trump's executive order on immigration Friday, says his wife and two children plan to depart for Lincoln Wednesday. He said via text message Sunday he is not certain they will be allowed into the U.S. but he was told refugees with their type of visa are cleared for entry. Bari helped the U.S. government as an interpreter and quality control expert and was granted a special immigrant visa as a result, as was his family. "I am still worried and reluctant," he said Sunday. After serving as interim director, Harris Smith has been named director of the Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film at the University of NebraskaLincoln. Smith, who holds degrees from the University of Washington and Montana State University, was interim director since Paul Steger stepped down as director to return to the faculty on June 30. In January, Andrew Park began as the artistic director for the Nebraska Repertory Theatre and research assistant professor in the Johnny Carson School of Theatre and Film. Park was the artistic director of the John G. Shedd Aquarium in Chicago prior to coming to UNL. Megan Elliott began in January as the founding director of the Johnny Carson Center for Emerging Media Arts. She was previously manager of leadership and community connections at the University of Technology Sydney in Australia. The Carson Center was made possible by a $20 million gift to the University of Nebraska Foundation from the Johnny Carson Foundation in 2015. Courses and curriculum are being developed, and students are expected to begin enrolling in fall 2018. Fortune Brands Home & Security, Inc. provides home and security products for residential home repair, remodeling, new construction, and security applications. It operates in three segments: Plumbing, Outdoors & Security, and Cabinets. The Plumbing segment manufactures, assembles, and sells faucets, accessories, kitchen sinks, and waste disposals under the Moen, ROHL, Riobel, Victoria+Albert, Perrin & Rowe, and Shaws brands in the United States, China, Canada, Mexico, Southeast Asia, Europe, and South America directly through its own sales force, as well as through independent manufacturers' representatives to wholesalers, home centers, mass merchandisers, and industrial distributors. The Outdoors & Security segment offers fiberglass and steel entry door systems under the Therma-Tru brand; storm, screen, and security doors under the Larson brand; composite decking and railing under the Fiberon brand; and urethane millwork under the Fypon brand. This segment also manufactures, sources, and distributes locks, safety and security devices, and electronic security products under the Master Lock and American Lock brands; and fire resistant safes, security containers, and commercial cabinets under the SentrySafe brand. It serves home centers, hardware and other retailers, millwork building products and wholesale distributors, specialty dealers, and remodeling and renovation markets, as well as locksmiths, industrial and institutional users, and original equipment manufacturers in the United States, Canada, Europe, Central America, Japan, and Australia. The Cabinets segment manufactures custom, semi-custom, and custom cabinetry, as well as vanities for the kitchen, bath, and other parts of the home directly to kitchen and bath dealers, home centers, wholesalers, and builders in North America under the AOK, Diamond Brands, Homecrest, Kitchen Craft, Omega, and EVE brands. The company was incorporated in 1988 and is headquartered in Deerfield, Illinois. The following companies are subsidiares of Tyson Foods: APF Legacy Subs LLC, Advance Food Company LLC, AdvancePierre Foods, AdvancePierre Foods Holdings Inc., AdvancePierre Foods Inc., Aidells Sausage Company Inc., Allied Specialty Foods Inc., American Proteins Inc, Artisan Bread Co. LLC, Australian Food Corporation Pty Limited, Australian Food Corporation Trust, BRF, Barber Foods LLC, Bosco's Pizza Co., Bryan Foods Inc., C.S. Grain LLC, C.V. Holdings Inc., CBFA Management Corp., Central Industries Inc., Chefs Pantry LLC, Clovervale Farms LLC, Cobb (Hubei) Breeding Co. Ltd., Cobb (Shanghai) Enterprise Management Consulting Co. Ltd., Cobb Ana Damizlik Tavukculuk Sanayi Ve Ticaret Limited Sirketi, Cobb Columbia S.A.S., Cobb Europe B.V., Cobb Europe Limited, Cobb Peru (Andina) S.A.C., Cobb-Heritage LLC, Cobb-Vantress Brasil Ltda, Cobb-Vantress Inc., Cobb-Vantress New Zealand Limited, Cobb-Vantress Philippines Inc., Coominya AFC Pty Limited, Coominya AFC Trust, DFG Foods Inc., DFG Foods L.L.C., Don Julio, Egbert LLC, Equity Group - Georgia Division LLC, Equity Group - Kentucky Division LLC, Equity Group Eufaula Division LLC, Equity Meat Corp., Flavor Corp., Flavor Holdings Inc., Foodbrands America Inc., Foodbrands Supply Chain Services Inc., Gallo Salame Inc., Global Employment Services Inc., Grow-Out Credit LLC, Grow-Out Holdings LLC, Haimen Tyson Poultry Development Co. Ltd, Hudson Foods Company, Hudson Midwest Foods Inc., Hybro Genetics Brasil Ltda, IBP Caribbean Inc., IBP Foodservice L.L.C., IBP Inc., International Affiliates & Investment LLC, Jiangsu Tyson Foods Co. Ltd, Keydutch Finance B.V., Keydutch Holdings I LLC, Keydutch Holdings II LLC, Keydutch Investments B.V., Keystone CLJV Holdings Limited, Keystone County House Road LLC, Keystone Foods, Keystone Foods (AP) Limited, Keystone Foods Holdco LLC, Keystone Foods Intermediate LLC, Keystone Foods LLC, Keystone Foods Pty Limited, Keystone Management Inc., Keystone Trading (Shanghai) Company Limited, LD Foods LLC, M & M Express LLC, M&M Restaurant Supply (MI/OH) LLC, MFG (USA) Holdings Inc., Mac Food Services (Malaysia) SDN. BHD., Madison Foods Inc., McKey Food Services (Hong Kong) Limited, McKey Food Services (Shandong) Limited, McKey Food Services (Thailand) Limited, McKey Food Services Limited, McKey Luxembourg Holdings APMEA S.a.r.l., McKey Luxembourg Holdings S.a.r.l., McKey Luxembourg S.a.r.l., McKey VI Holdings Limited, Myung Seung Food Company Ltd., National Comp Care Inc., New Canada Holdings Inc., Oaklawn Capital Corporation, Oaklawn IT Solution Private Limited, Original Philly Holdings Inc., PBX inc., Pierre Holdco Inc., River Valley Ingredients LLC, Rizhao Tyson Foods Co. Ltd, Rizhao Tyson Poultry Co. Ltd, Rural Energy Systems Inc., Sara Lee - Kiwi Holdings LLC, Sara Lee Diversified LLC, Sara Lee Foods LLC, Sara Lee Household & Body Care Malawi Ltd., Sara Lee International LLC, Sara Lee International TM Holdings LLC, Sara Lee Mexicana Holdings Investment L.L.C., Sara Lee TM Holdings LLC, Sara Lee Trademark Holdings Australasia LLC, Saramar L.L.C., Shandong Tyson-Da Long Food Company Limited, Smart Chicken, Southern Family Foods L.L.C., Southwest Products LLC, TF 20 B.V., TF 5201 B.V., TFA Leasing LLC, TFA Opportunity Zone Fund LLC, TFI of California Inc., Tecumseh Poultry LLC, Texas Transfer Inc., The Bruss Company, The Hillshire Brands Company, The IBP Foods Co., The Pork Group Inc., TyNet Corporation, Tyson (Shanghai) Enterprise Management Consulting Co. Ltd., Tyson Americas Holding Sarl, Tyson Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd., Tyson Breeders Inc., Tyson Chicken Inc., Tyson China Holding 2 Limited, Tyson China Holding 3 Limited, Tyson China Holding Limited, Tyson Deli Inc., Tyson Europe Holding Company, Tyson Farms Inc., Tyson Farms QOZB LLC, Tyson Foods Brasil Investimentos Ltda., Tyson Foods Canada Inc., Tyson Foods Europe (Netherlands) B.V., Tyson Foods Europe GmbH, Tyson Foods France S.A.R.L., Tyson Foods Germany GmbH, Tyson Foods Group Limited, Tyson Foods Holland B.V., Tyson Foods Huadong Development Co. Ltd, Tyson Foods Iberia Alimentos S.L.U., Tyson Foods Italia S.p.A., Tyson Foods Korea, Tyson Foods Netherlands B.V., Tyson Foods Products Limited, Tyson Foods Scotland Europe Limited, Tyson Foods Scotland Sales (Europe) Limited, Tyson Foods UK Limited, Tyson Foods Wrexham Limited, Tyson Foods oosterwolde B.V., Tyson Fresh Meats Inc., Tyson Fresh Meats Sales and Distribution LLC, Tyson Global Holding Sarl, Tyson Hog Markets Inc., Tyson India Holdings Ltd., Tyson International APAC Ltd., Tyson International Company Ltd., Tyson International Holding Company, Tyson International Holding Sarl, Tyson International Service Center Inc., Tyson International Service Center Inc. Asia, Tyson International Service Center Inc. Europe, Tyson Mexican Original Inc., Tyson Mexico Trading Company S. de R.L. de CV., Tyson New Ventures LLC, Tyson Opportunity Zone Fund LLC, Tyson Pet Products Inc., Tyson Poultry Inc., Tyson Prepared Foods Inc., Tyson Processing Services Inc., Tyson Refrigerated Processed Meats Inc., Tyson Sales and Distribution Inc., Tyson Service Center Corp., Tyson Shared Services Inc., Tyson Storm Lake Holdings LLC, Tyson Warehousing Services LLC, Tyson of Wisconsin LLC, Uninex SA, Universal Meats (UK) Limited, WBA Analytical Laboratories Inc., Wilton Foods Inc., Xamol Consultores e Servicos, and Zemco Industries Inc.. Read More The following companies are subsidiares of Pfizer: AH Robins LLC, AHP Holdings B.V., AHP Manufacturing B.V., Agouron Pharmaceuticals LLC, Alacer, Alpharma Holdings LLC, Alpharma Pharmaceuticals LLC, Alpharma Specialty Pharma LLC, Alpharma USHP LLC, American Food Industries LLC, Anacor Pharmaceuticals, Anacor Pharmaceuticals Inc., Angiosyn, Array BioPharma, Ayerst-Wyeth Pharmaceuticals LLC, BIND Therapeutics Inc., BINESA 2002 S.L., Bamboo Therapeutics, Bamboo Therapeutics Inc., Baxter International - Marketed Vaccines, BioRexis, Bioren, Bioren LLC, Blue Whale Re Ltd., C.E. Commercial Holdings C.V., C.E. Commercial Investments C.V., C.P. Pharmaceuticals International C.V., CICL Corporation, COC I Corporation, Catapult Genetics, Coley Pharmaceutical GmbH, Coley Pharmaceutical Group, Coley Pharmaceutical Group Inc., Continental Pharma Inc., Covx, Covx Technologies Ireland Limited, Cyanamid Inter-American Corporation, Cyanamid de Argentina S.A., Cyanamid de Colombia S.A., Distribuidora Mercantil Centro Americana S.A., Encysive Pharmaceuticals, Encysive Pharmaceuticals Inc., Esperion LUV Development Inc., Esperion Therapeutics, Excaliard Pharmaceuticals, Excaliard Pharmaceuticals Inc., Farminova Produtos Farmaceuticos de Inovacao Lda., Farmogene Productos Farmaceuticos Lda, Ferrosan A/S, Ferrosan International A/S, Ferrosan S.R.L., FoldRx Pharmaceuticals Inc., Foldrx Pharmaceuticals, Fort Dodge Manufatura Ltda., G. D. Searle & Co. Limited, G. D. Searle International Capital LLC, G. D. Searle LLC, GI Europe Inc., GI Japan Inc., GenTrac Inc., Genetics Institute LLC, Greenstone LLC, Haptogen Limited, Hospira, Hospira (China) Enterprise Management Co. Ltd., Hospira Adelaide Pty Ltd, Hospira Aseptic Services Limited, Hospira Australia Pty Ltd, Hospira Benelux BVBA, Hospira Chile Limitada, Hospira Deutschland GmbH, Hospira Enterprises B.V., Hospira France SAS, Hospira Healthcare B.V., Hospira Healthcare Corporation, Hospira Healthcare India Private Limited, Hospira Holdings (S.A.) Pty Ltd, Hospira Inc., Hospira Invicta S.A., Hospira Ireland Holdings Unlimited Company, Hospira Ireland Sales Limited, Hospira Japan G.K., Hospira Limited, Hospira Malaysia Sdn Bhd, Hospira NZ Limited, Hospira Nordic AB, Hospira Philippines Inc., Hospira Portugal LDA, Hospira Produtos Hospitalares Ltda., Hospira Pte. Ltd., Hospira Pty Limited, Hospira Puerto Rico LLC, Hospira Singapore Pte Ltd, Hospira UK Limited, Hospira Worldwide LLC, Hospira Zagreb d.o.o., ICAgen, Idun Pharmaceuticals, Industrial Santa Agape S.A., InnoPharma, InnoPharma Inc., International Affiliated Corporation LLC, JMI-Daniels Pharmaceuticals Inc., John Wyeth & Brother Limited, Kiinteisto oy Espoon Pellavaniementie 14, King Pharmaceuticals Holdings LLC, King Pharmaceuticals LLC, King Pharmaceuticals Research and Development LLC, Korea Pharma Holding Company Limited, Laboratoires Pfizer S.A., Laboratorios Parke Davis S.L., Laboratorios Pfizer Ltda., Laboratorios Wyeth LLC, Laboratorios Wyeth S.A., Laboratorios Pfizer Lda., MTG Divestitures LLC, Mayne Pharma IP Holdings (Euro) Pty Ltd, Medivation, Medivation Field Solutions LLC, Medivation LLC, Medivation Neurology LLC, Medivation Prostate Therapeutics LLC, Medivation Services LLC, Medivation Technologies LLC, Meridian Medical Technologies Inc., Meridian Medical Technologies Limited, Monarch Pharmaceuticals LLC, Neusentis Limited, NextWave Pharmaceuticals, NextWave Pharmaceuticals Incorporated, P-D Co. LLC, PAH USA IN8 LLC, PF Americas Holding C.V., PF Asia Manufacturing B.V., PF PR Holdings C.V., PF PRISM C.V., PF PRISM Holdings S.a.r.l., PF Prism S.a.r.l., PFE Holdings G.K., PFE PHAC Holdings 1 LLC, PFE Pfizer Holdings 1 LLC, PFE Wyeth Holdings LLC, PFE Wyeth-Ayerst (Asia) LLC, PHILCO Holdings S.a r.l., PHIVCO Corp., PHIVCO Holdco S.a r.l., PHIVCO Luxembourg S.a r.l., PN Mexico LLC, PT. Pfizer Parke Davis, Parke Davis & Company LLC, Parke Davis Limited, Parke Davis Productos Farmaceuticos Lda, Parke-Davis Manufacturing Corp., Parkedale Pharmaceuticals Inc., Peak Enterprises LLC, Pfizer, Pfizer (China) Research and Development Co. Ltd., Pfizer (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, Pfizer (Perth) Pty Limited, Pfizer (Thailand) Limited, Pfizer (Wuhan) Research and Development Co. Ltd., Pfizer AB, Pfizer AG, Pfizer AS, Pfizer Africa & Middle East for Pharmaceuticals Veterinarian Products & Chemicals S.A.E., Pfizer Anti-Infectives AB, Pfizer ApS, Pfizer Asia Manufacturing Pte. Ltd., Pfizer Asia Pacific Pte Ltd., Pfizer Atlantic Holdings S.a.r.l., Pfizer Australia Holdings B.V., Pfizer Australia Holdings Pty Limited, Pfizer Australia Investments Pty. Ltd., Pfizer Australia Pty Limited, Pfizer B.V., Pfizer BH D.o.o., Pfizer Baltic Holdings B.V., Pfizer Biofarmaceutica Sociedade Unipessoal Lda, Pfizer Biologics (Hangzhou) Co. Ltd, Pfizer Biologics Ireland Holdings Limited, Pfizer Biotech Corporation, Pfizer Bolivia S.A., Pfizer Canada Inc., Pfizer CentreSource Asia Pacific Pte. Ltd., Pfizer Chile S.A., Pfizer Cia. Ltda., Pfizer Colombia Spinco I LLC, Pfizer Commercial Holdings Cooperatief U.A., Pfizer Commercial Holdings TRAE Kft., Pfizer Commercial TRAE Trading Kft., Pfizer Consumer Healthcare AB, Pfizer Consumer Healthcare GmbH, Pfizer Consumer Healthcare Ltd., Pfizer Consumer Manufacturing Italy S.r.l., Pfizer Corporation, Pfizer Corporation Austria Gesellschaft m.b.H., Pfizer Corporation Hong Kong Limited, Pfizer Croatia d.o.o., Pfizer Deutschland GmbH, Pfizer Development LP, Pfizer Development Services (UK) Limited, Pfizer Domestic Ventures Limited, Pfizer Dominicana S.R.L, Pfizer ESP Pty Ltd, Pfizer East India B.V., Pfizer Eastern Investments B.V., Pfizer Egypt S.A.E., Pfizer Enterprise Holdings B.V., Pfizer Enterprises LLC, Pfizer Enterprises SARL, Pfizer Europe Finance B.V., Pfizer Export B.V., Pfizer Export Company, Pfizer Export Holding Company B.V, Pfizer Finance Share Service (Dalian) Co. Ltd., Pfizer Financial Services N.V./S.A., Pfizer France International Investments, Pfizer Free Zone Panama S. de R.L., Pfizer GEP S.L., Pfizer Global Holdings B.V., Pfizer Global Supply Japan Inc., Pfizer Global Trading, Pfizer Group Luxembourg Sarl, Pfizer Gulf FZ-LLC, Pfizer H.C.P. Corporation, Pfizer HK Service Company Limited, Pfizer Health AB, Pfizer Health Solutions Inc., Pfizer Healthcare Ireland, Pfizer Hellas A.E., Pfizer Himalaya Holdings Cooperatief U.A., Pfizer Holding France, Pfizer Holding Ventures, Pfizer Holdings Corporation, Pfizer Holdings Europe Unlimited Company, Pfizer Holdings G.K., Pfizer Holdings International Corporation, Pfizer Holdings International Luxembourg (PHIL) Sarl, Pfizer Holdings North America SARL, Pfizer Hungary Holdings TRAE Kft., Pfizer Inc., Pfizer Innovations AB, Pfizer Innovations LLC, Pfizer Innovative Supply Point International BVBA, Pfizer International LLC, Pfizer International Markets Cooperatief U.A., Pfizer International Operations, Pfizer International S. de R.L., Pfizer International Trading (Shanghai) Limited, Pfizer Investment Capital Unlimited Company, Pfizer Investment Co. Ltd., Pfizer Investment Holdings S.a.r.l., Pfizer Ireland Investments Limited, Pfizer Ireland PFE Holding 1 LLC, Pfizer Ireland PFE Holding 2 LLC, Pfizer Ireland Pharmaceuticals, Pfizer Ireland Ventures Unlimited Company, Pfizer Italia S.r.l., Pfizer Italy Group Holding S.r.l., Pfizer Japan Inc., Pfizer LLC, Pfizer Laboratories (Pty) Limited, Pfizer Laboratories Limited, Pfizer Laboratories PFE (Pty) Ltd, Pfizer Leasing Ireland Limited, Pfizer Leasing UK Limited, Pfizer Limitada, Pfizer Limited, Pfizer Luxco Holdings SARL, Pfizer Luxembourg Global Holdings S.a r.l., Pfizer Luxembourg SARL, Pfizer MAP Holding Inc., Pfizer Manufacturing Austria G.m.b.H., Pfizer Manufacturing Belgium N.V., Pfizer Manufacturing Deutschland GmbH, Pfizer Manufacturing Deutschland Grundbesitz GmbH & Co. KG, Pfizer Manufacturing Holdings LLC, Pfizer Manufacturing Ireland Unlimited Company, Pfizer Manufacturing LLC, Pfizer Manufacturing Services, Pfizer Medical Technology Group (Belgium) N.V., Pfizer Medicamentos Genericos e Participacoes Ltda., Pfizer Mexico Luxco SARL, Pfizer Mexico S.A. de C.V., Pfizer Middle East for Pharmaceuticals Animal Health and Chemicals S.A.E., Pfizer New Zealand Limited, Pfizer Norge AS, Pfizer North American Holdings Inc., Pfizer OTC B.V., Pfizer Overseas LLC, Pfizer Oy, Pfizer PFE ApS, Pfizer PFE AsiaPac Holding B.V., Pfizer PFE Australia Holding B.V., Pfizer PFE Australia Pty Ltd, Pfizer PFE B.V., Pfizer PFE Baltic Holdings B.V., Pfizer PFE Belgium SPRL, Pfizer PFE Brazil Holding S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE CIA. Ltda., Pfizer PFE Chile Holding LLC, Pfizer PFE Colombia Holding Corp., Pfizer PFE Colombia S.A.S, Pfizer PFE Commercial Holdings LLC, Pfizer PFE Croatia Holding B.V., Pfizer PFE Eastern Investments B.V., Pfizer PFE Finland Oy, Pfizer PFE France, Pfizer PFE Global Holdings B.V., Pfizer PFE Ireland Pharmaceuticals Holding 1 B.V., Pfizer PFE Italy Holdco 2 S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE Italy Holdco S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE Korlatolt Felelossegu Tarsasag, Pfizer PFE Limited, Pfizer PFE Luxembourg S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE Mexico Holding 3 LLC, Pfizer PFE Netherlands Holding 1 C.V., Pfizer PFE New Zealand, Pfizer PFE New Zealand Holding B.V., Pfizer PFE Norway Holding S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE PILSA Holdco S.a r.l., Pfizer PFE Peru Holding LLC, Pfizer PFE Peru S.R.L., Pfizer PFE Pharmaceuticals Israel Holding LLC, Pfizer PFE Pharmaceuticals Israel Ltd., Pfizer PFE Private Limited, Pfizer PFE S.R.L, Pfizer PFE Service Company Holding Cooperatief U.A., Pfizer PFE Singapore Holding B.V., Pfizer PFE Singapore Pte. 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Ltd., Wyeth Pharmaceuticals Company, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals FZ-LLC, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals LLC, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals Limited, Wyeth Puerto Rico Inc., Wyeth S.A.S, Wyeth Subsidiary Illinois Corporation, Wyeth Whitehall Export GmbH, Wyeth Whitehall SARL, Wyeth-Ayerst (Asia) Limited, Wyeth-Ayerst International LLC, and Wyeth-Ayerst Promotions Limited. Read More Shams Al-Badry admitted she would never have had the opportunity to stand among hundreds on the north steps of the State Capitol if she had been turned away as a refugee. Speaking in front of demonstrators protesting President Donald Trumps executive action to halt entry of refugees for 120 days, Al-Badry, who escaped worn-torn Iraq in 1993, said she hopes her dream will extend to the refugees of today -- and for years to come. Holding signs and waving foreign flags -- including those of Iraq and Syria -- local protesters gathered on Sunday evening to stand in solidarity with refugees and immigrants, including undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. who face deportation. The crowd, which spilled across the street and onto Centennial Mall, swelled to over 300 people, according to Nebraska State Patrol Lt. Todd Kinghorn. Rev. Karla Cooper said work to organize the event began after she and co-organizer Jeannette Eileen Jones heard stories about refugees being denied entrance into the U.S. on Saturday. Although the focus was on the plight of refugees, Cooper said Sunday's protest was also a statement against Trumps other executive actions, including orders to renew the process for completing the Dakota Access Pipeline and to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. Anything that is marginalizing and hurting people, we need to stand together because were better than that, Cooper said. Were better than hate, were better than ignorance. Joyce Hahn, who works at Lincoln Literacy, a center that teaches English to refugees and immigrants, came to protest all of Trump's policies. But the immigration ban was the one that hit the hardest for her. Immigrants and refugees are like my family, Hahn said. But for the first time theyre saying they dont feel safe here. Several speakers rallied the crowd, including Lincoln state Sen. Patty Pansing Brooks, who quoted Emma Lazarus, the poet of "The New Colossus," whose words are etched on the Statue of Liberty. We need to widen our circle of compassion, Pansing Brooks said. Our beacon of humanity is vital to our very essence, to our moral fiber, to our economic prosperity, to our national security. Trumps executive order, signed Friday, blocks any visitors from Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen, Syria, Iran and Iraq for 90 days. Immigrants detained in U.S. airports in the hours following the order were allowed to leave after the American Civil Liberties Union secured an injunction from a federal judge late Saturday. The Trump administration walked back some of the policy Sunday, allowing green card holders from the sanctioned countries to return to the U.S. Danielle Conrad, executive director of ACLU of Nebraska, spoke at the rally and praised her organizations role in helping lessen the burden of Trumps executive action. The ACLU has always held accountable those who hold the reins of power, she said. We will continue to do so no matter who sits in the Oval Office. Conrad also praised U.S. Sen. Ben Sasse, who was quick to condemn Trumps ban. Other speakers included UNL professor Hope Wabuke and Rev. Stephen Griffith of the Faith Coalition of Lancaster County. Griffith said Trumps ban violates all of my religious beliefs and betrays our American principles." Speaker Shirl Mora James of the Nebraska Dream Alliance and a member of the Nebraska Hispanic Bar Association labeled Trumps actions cold-blooded bigotry at its finest." Trumps executive order is a thinly-veiled effort to ban and scapegoat Muslims, and it does not make America safer, Mora James said. Banning people based solely on the country that they come from is ineffective and overreaching. As the afternoon sun turned to twilight, protesters held up candles, lighters, and phones and sang This Little Light of Mine." Joseph Denicola, 23, was surprised by the turnout. I hope this will bring attention to the fact that we as a country, we as a people, do care about immigrants, especially those refugees who cant come into our country, Denicola said. For Al-Badry, the protest showed that people are ready to fight. If President Trump keeps doing this, there are going to be more and more protests, Al-Badry said. "And its not just one nationality that are here, or one race. Its a diverse array of individuals who are standing against hate. Barnes & Noble Education, Inc. operates bookstores for college and university campuses, and K-12 institutions in the United States. It operates through three segments: Retail, Wholesale, and Digital Student Solutions. The company sells and rents new and used print textbooks, digital textbooks, and publisher hosted digital courseware through physical and virtual bookstores, as well as directly to students through Textbooks.com. It also offers First Day and First Day Complete access programs; BNC OER+, a turnkey solution for colleges and universities, that offers digital content, such as videos, activities, and auto-graded practice assessments; and general merchandise, including collegiate and athletic apparel, school spirit products, lifestyle products, technology products, supplies, graduation products, and convenience items. In addition, the company sources, sells, and distributes new and used textbooks; and sells hardware and a software suite of applications that provides inventory management and point-of-sale solutions to approximately 350 college bookstores. Further, it offers direct-to-student subscription-based writing services; and bartleby, a direct-to-student subscription-based offering that includes textbook solutions, expert questions and answers, and writing and tutoring services. The company operates 805 physical college and university bookstores; 622 virtual bookstores; 8 True Spirit e-commerce websites; pop-up retail locations; 73 customized cafes and 11 stand-alone convenience stores; and a media channel for brands targeting the college demographic. Barnes & Noble Education, Inc. was founded in 1965 and is headquartered in Basking Ridge, New Jersey. Yesterday, Donald Trump dominated New Yorks Republican primary, securing over 60% of the popular vote and 89 of the states 95 delegates. This victory makes it all the more likely hell secure the Republican Presidential nomination over climate change denier Ted Cruz and women-in-the-kitchen candidate John Kasich. Naturally, many New Yorkers are upset that our state played any part in the advancement of such a violent, bigoted oligarch. One of these people, incidentally, would have been Harlem-born rapper Tupac Shakur, whose views on Trump have now become public in a 1992 video recently unearthed by MTV. The MTV video is dated August 8, 1992 a short few months after race riots erupted in Los Angeles following the announcement that the four officers responsible for brutally beating Rodney King had been acquitted of using excessive force. In it, Pac discusses the systemic nature of wealth inequality in America: Everybody is taught at school if you want to be successful, you want to be like Trump, its all gimme gimme gimme, crush crush crush, he explains. Nearly 25 years later, this video is all the more relevant. Tupac unknowingly explains why Trumps greed-fuelled rhetoric cripplingly impedes a truly democratic, equal, and just society. Now America is dressed up in jewels, they paid and they lending money to everybody except for us. Everybody need a little help on they way to being self reliant, he explains. No independent person was born and just grew up independent. You worked and you learned teamwork and cooperation and unity and struggle and then you became independent. We have to teach that and instill that. He continues to make an impassioned case about the redistribution of wealth the fundamental tenant of Sanders Presidential platform: Theres no way that these people should own planes when people dont have houses, apartments, shacks, drawers, pants. What about, as the MTV interviewer suggests, people who earned all that? Even if you earned it, Pac responds, you still owe. Perhaps most importantly, the rapper also speaks about the connection between economic inequality and social prosperity, acutely demonstrating why Trumps campaign is so incredibly harmful. Just because [a person] dont got [money or resources] doesnt mean hes bad, mean hes a criminal, mean hes crazy, a drug addict, or none of that. It just mean he dont got. There is a 16 to 1 wealth accumulation gap between black and white Americans right now. Economic disadvantage isnt, as Trump is attempting to convince us, a signifier of individual or communal degeneracy, its been institutionally sustained for hundreds of years from slavery to the G.I. Bill . In spite of all the justified anger Pac expresses in the video, he like Sanders sees potential for change: but it takes something revolutionary, something out of the ordinary. Watch the interview below Ghana Music Week Festival 2017 was successfully launched at the Alliance Francais in Accra, During The weekend, January 27, 2017. 2017 GMW would be held from March 5 to 12. However, the key attraction for this years festival is a 3-day Celebration of Ghanaian music and dance plus comedy, fashion, merchandising vending, products sales and exhibitions at the Independence Square from March 10-12, 2017, dubbed The Festival. Entry is free to the general public for all three days as the organisers expect good attendance, in order to patronize the concerts and exhibitions. Aside The Festival, there would be a cross communication of cultures through music at the International Expo & Honours on March 5, 2017 and a major seminar at the British Council on March 5, 2017. MUSIGA President, Bice Osei Kuffour, in his keynote message, used the platform to reassure musicians that one of his key agendas of 2017 would be to put pressure on collecting society, GHAMRO to be more proactive in ensuring that the logging system is implemented and royalties paid appropriately to right owners. On behalf of Tourism Minister-designate Hon. Catherine Abelema Afeku; a Director at the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts Mr. Edwin Owusu-Mensah pledged the Ministrys full participation and support for GMW 2017. I am aware of some of the major concerns that have engaged the attention of practitioners and stakeholders in this sector; including the need for the immediate passage of the Creative Industries Bill which will give the appropriate legislative framework for the operations of the sector. As you may be aware, the manifesto of the National Patriotic Party under the leadership of President Akufo-Addo has captured the aspirations of the creative arts and we intend to address those issues comprehensively, said the Minister-designate. Josephine Thompson, Head of Cultural Affairs and Events at Alliance Francias, reiterated her outfits commitment to ensuring participation of some musicians from Francophone Africa at this years GMW. There were performances by Ben Brako, Jupitar, Koo Ntakara, Knii Lante, Fatau Keita, Nenebi, the Tesaa and Aayalolo Cultural Troupes. As part of activities of the night, www.ghanamusicweek.com, the Festivals official website was launched and tour given by GMW IT Head and webmaster/creator, George Fitzgerald Adjebeng. For more info on GMW, please hit www.ghanamusicweek.com or https://twitter.com/ghanamusicWk, https://www.facebook.com/ghanamusicweek, or https://www.instagram.com/ghanamusicweek Ghana Music Week Festival is organized by the Musicians Union of Ghana, Showbiz Africa and other partners, in collaboration with the Ministry of Tourism, Culture & Creative Arts UK based Ghanaian Gospel musician Sonnie Badu has confirmed claims by Reverend Lawrence Tetteh, founder and President of the Worldwide Miracle Outreach (WMO) that he gave him his first international exposure. Days ago, reports surfaced online that the man of God had bragged about giving Sonnie Badu his first international exposure and that obviously means no harm to Sonnie Badu since it is true. Sonnie Badu who has been busy touring the world with his ministry affirmed the comments by Lawrence Tetteh, who he refers to as papa. According to him, the comments are very very very true and that he continues to polish his shoes and irons his shirts when ever he is with him. This was to put to rest calls and questions put to him by a number of media houses. In a post, Sonnie Badu said, "I still polish his shoes and iron his shirts when I am with him. So to the press ,bloggers and media calling the office to confirm , it is very very very true .. I am his son and I will forever be his son .. love you papa.. #LawrenceTetteh . I cant forget where I started from. Sir please Brag some more, for when I was rejected and looked down upon , homeless you saw the gold in me , I beg brag more ooooooo, I am actually like their last born in the family , Doctors mum is my mum too .. I love you paps..". Hidden Figures was the surprise winner of the top prize at this years Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards, which was dominated by anger over Donald Trumps policies on immigration. The film, which tells the true story of black female mathematicians during the 1960s space race, won the best ensemble prize at the Los Angeles ceremony. Denzel Washington was named best actor for Fences. Several winners attacked Mr Trumps ban on immigration from seven countries. The tone was set by host Ashton Kutcher, who began the evening by greeting everyone at home and everyone in airports that belong in my America. Were in a really tricky time in our country and things are very inexcusable and scary, said Emma Stone as she won the best actress prize for La La Land. Mahershala Ali, meanwhile, spoke about his Muslim faith as he accepted the best supporting actor prize for Moonlight. Mr Trumps executive order, signed on Friday, halted the entire US refugee programme for 120 days, indefinitely banned Syrian refugees, and suspended all nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries. Lithgow and Foy were recognised for playing Winston Churchill and the Queen in The Crown Julia Louis-Dreyfus called the immigration ban a blemish and un-American as she won best comedy TV actress for Veep. And there were cheers for actress Taylor Schilling when she described the award-winning cast of Orange is the New Black as a diverse group of people, representing generations of families who have sought a better life here. Denzel Washingtons Fences co-star Viola Davis was named best supporting actress at an event where several actors of colour were honoured. Yet the actress told reporters that every black nominee had been shortlisted because they deserve to be and not because of the colour of their skin. Meanwhile, Lily Tomlin was presented with a lifetime achievement award by her 9 to 5 co-star Dolly Parton at Sundays ceremony. There were also awards for John Lithgow and Britains Claire Foy for their work in The Crown, Netflixs drama about the British royal family. Hidden Figures success came at the expense of such Oscar-tipped titles as Manchester by the Sea, which left empty-handed despite being up for four prizes. Oscar favourite La La Land was not up for the outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture award the SAG equivalent of the best picture prize. A supposed petition raised against the nomination of Catherine Afeku as Minister for Tourism, Creative Arts and Culture is unmeritorious and lacks any significant substance that can be used to revoke her nomination, Lawyer Godfred Dame, counsel for the nominee, has said. Truth and Accountable Governance (TAG), an anti-corruption group, has petitioned President Akufo-Addo over Catherine Afeku's nomination and raised allegations of fraud against her. The petitioners alleged that Catherine and her husband were found guilty of fraud in a court case filed against her by an American couple. Godfred Dame explained, however, that the fact that the case in reference is a civil case and not a criminal one is enough to let any objective mind know it was not a case of fraud because fraud cases are of a criminal nature and prosecuted by the Attorney General. He was categorical that no court or judge in Ghana or anywhere in the world has found Catherine Afeku and her husband of fraud. There has not been any judgment whatsoever by any court of competent jurisdiction in Ghana, or anywhere in the world convicting Catherine Afeku of fraud or any other criminal offenceThe case between the Americans was a civil one; a civil one instituted by them in 2005 and judgment was given by the Commercial Division of the High Court in 2007. The judgments were for the specific reliefs of the recovery of the sum of $217,000. That is not a criminal offence; is it? Catherine Afeku and the Americans entered into some business transactions, the object of which was to incorporate a company in Ghana. The Americans who claimed to have an interest in the company were not satisfied with certain payments that were made, and it was specifically in relation to that the action was filed, Godfred Dame told Citi FM's Eye Witness News. He said even the judgment that Catherine and her husband should pay some money to the American couple has been challenged and there is a pending appeal to that effect. The case took another turn in 2013 when Mrs Afeku appealed the 2007 judgment alleging fraud on the part of the Americans who filed the initial lawsuit. She had come by evidence suggesting that the judgement itself was procured by fraud. So Catherine Afeku filed another action and I executed it on her behalf in 2013, seeking to set aside the earlier judgement on the basis of fraud, Godfred Dame added. Catherine Afeku first entered parliament in January 2009, but she lost the December 2012 elections and has fought hard to return to parliament in January 2017. In her first encounter with parliament, Catherine Afeku served on three Committees; the Road and Transport Committee, the Communications Committee as the Deputy Ranking Member and the Business Committee. She also became the government spokesperson for infrastructure during the regime of President John Agyekum Kufuor. Catherine Afeku is reputed as a strong lobbyist and an affable person who has a listening ear for all manner of persons and ideas. By Halifax Ansah-Addo The saddest thing about betrayal is that it never comes from your enemies.Its extremely funny how most times the people youd take a bullet for,are the ones behind the trigger. Coincidentally,legendary highlife musician,Nana Quame has revealed that he now knows God exists after being betrayed by his manager Prince Dadzie and some artistes he helped in the past . Nana Quame who was speaking in an intriguing interview with Dr.Who on Accra based Hot 93.9fm, affirmed that his dream was to come back to Ghana from London and continue doing the wonderful music he did a decade ago but that did not come to fruition because he has been shabbly treated by people he entrusted: I spent all my money I brought from UK and I felt there was no place for me in Ghana since almost everyone was turning against me and no help was coming from anywhere-My own manager whom i housed and fed together with a company duped me to the tune of GHC200.000.00 meant for my Nana Quame and friendsshow in Cape Coast- Some artistes i helped during my hey days doesnt want to even collaborate with me.but God has a way of blessing everyone and I think my trying moments has drawn me closer to God. I now know God is the only one I can trust,He told Dr Who with much passion. Known for songs like Odo Shock, As?w Konofo?, Julie, As?m S?b?, Eno Abena, K?y? Meho Adi?, Awodeme and many others, Nana Quame who has also won numerous awards accentuated further that,his new single,Guy Guy is enjoying massive airplay hence he is hoping to break through again in order to shame his enemies. The despondent part of the interview was when the Atia Donko hitmaker surprisingly shed uncontrollable tears after a caller called on the show to give his account of Nana Quames ordeal. The legendary Nana Quame was then consoled by the host of the show Dr.Who. Razzonline.com brings you excepts of what transpired in the Studio Popular Ghanaian comedian, Funny Face also known as Opetey in the Televison series Cow and Chicken has congratulated Ex- Black Star Player Abedi Pele for his two son Andre and Jordan Ayews goals. Yesterday, 29th January, 2017, Andre Ayew and Jordan Ayew have given given the opportunity to go into the semi-finals at the ongoing AFCON 2017. Had it not been for these boys, Ghana should be eliminated from the tournament. Ghana triumphed over DR Congo in a 2-1 scoreline. Funny Face who could not hide his joy quickly took to snap chat to congratulate the father of Andre and Jordan. He said in the video, We are so proud of you, Abedi Pele. Your sons have made us proud again and we are most grateful to you and your family Watch video below A Kenyan couple unable to afford the expense of a wedding have earned plaudits on social media for pursuing a budget option $1 ceremony which they attended wearing casual clothes. Wilson and Ann Mutura postponed their wedding twice in 2016 because they were unable to raise the $300 (240) fee. They decided to get married this year with the minimum of expense. The groom only spent $1 on two budget wedding rings, which he produced amid cheering during the exchange of vows. Other expenses surrounding the pairs nuptials including the licence fee were instead borne by their church. Online commentators have praised their move, pointing out that weddings are becoming increasingly expensive. The romantic story of Wilson, 27, and his bride Ann, 24, seems to have captured the attention of many Kenyans. Somali town bans lavish wedding spending After dating for more than three years, the couple overcame the biggest hurdle in their relationship money. Last year their appeals to friends and family failed to raise enough cash. Blessed union Wilson told the BBC that his older brother even advised him to forego the wedding and live with Ann without getting married. But that was not an option for the self-employed fruit seller and his fiancee who wanted a permanent and blessed union. I love it so much! Online reaction Who said we have to complicate marriage ceremonies with huge budgets? Jay Can-did (Nairobi News comment page) This is impressive. The most important thing is the marriage, not the wedding. Daniel Wafula (Twitter) Their wedding had nothing, but their marriage will be beautiful, Beatrice Oloo (Facebook) God has done for them, five star hotel! Esther Renson (Facebook) This is wonderful and I love it so much using what you have is the best principle of satisfaction. Moses Matikho (Facebook) If both families agree, let it be made simple. This will reduce the backsliding rate of the youth, Martin Mwangi Njoroge (Nairobi News comment page) As a [Christian] couple, we wanted to marry and live with dignity in order to avoid other temptations, said Ann. So the pair opted to have a low-key wedding ceremony in Nairobi without cakes, flowers or decorations. The couple were simply dressed, wearing jeans, T-shirts and training shoes. Their only assets were two shiny steel circles that served as wedding rings. During the wedding service, Wilson surprised the congregation by running out of the church to buy the two rings, Pastor Jasper Ojwach from the Community Christian worship centre in Nairobi told the BBC. The groom was cheered when he produced them from his pocket just before the exchange of vows. The couple say they are surprised by the positive reaction on social media to their frugal wedding and have urged other young Kenyans to follow their example. I believe money should not stop young people like us from getting married. If people love each other and want to marry they should, Ann said. So warm has been the reaction that the couple have received gifts from companies and individuals who were touched by their courage. They are expected to go on their honeymoon soon, after a travel agency gave them a five-day break. By: BBC Khartoum (AFP) - Sudan on Sunday summoned US charge d'affaires Steven Koutsis to protest President Donald Trump's visa ban which has already prevented some of its citizens from flying to the United States. The foreign ministry "expressed its displeasure" with Trump's order to bar Sudanese and citizens from six other Muslim-majority countries from entering the US for three months. Koutsis is the most senior diplomat at the American embassy in Khartoum. Trump signed an executive order on Friday temporarily prohibiting entry to the US to citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen and suspending the arrival of refugees. Fatimah Abu Al-Qassem Al-Qash and businessman Amer Hamed al-Manufi were among the first Sudanese to be hit by the ban. "We went through passport control at Khartoum airport and flew to Doha. But when we arrived there (on Saturday) we were detained with some Iranians and Iraqis," Fatimah told AFP after her return home. "A man who identified himself as an American employee told us that we cannot travel further," she said, adding that she had a valid visa and had been planning to visit her brother in the state of Arizona. Manufi, a dairy farmer, was on his way to Atlanta to attend a fair and sign business deals, when he was told he was not welcome in the United States. "I run a group of companies... and we are also agents for international firms, including two American companies with which we have been working since 2009," he said. The US embassy in Khartoum posted on its website an announcement reiterating Trump's executive order and stressing that visas would no longer be issued to citizens of the seven countries. "If you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time. "If you already have an appointment scheduled, please do not attend your appointment as we will not be able to proceed with your visa interview." The words "do not attend" were in bold print. The country Director,Mr Girmay Hailey in an orientation organised for the selected delegates of Young diplomats of Ghana charged young people to work hard and make a change in Africa. Mr. Girmay urged African leaders to stand up and fight against the challenges we facing in Africa. He encouraged leaders to formulate good policies that could help develop Africa and provide enough resources that will help the growth and success of the African 2063 plan. Mr. Girmay also revealed that HIV has been controlled over the few years and charged the young delegates to take up the issue and advocate to help fight against the epidemic issue that has crippled the world with lots of innocent lives lost as a result of the virus canker. He also advised that people should try as much as possible to get tested in other to know their HIV status and then be given the necessary help if tested positive to the virus. Other speakers were the Deputy German Ambassador who shared his opinion on youth diplomacy and educated the delegates on the bilateral relations between Ghana and Germany. Mr.kordzo Sedegah who is also an economic specialist at UNDP office in Ghana also educated the delegates on the importance of the sustainable development goals and the projected vision by 2030 in Ghana and the world. Ms. Hannah Ashoikai Akrong, the Human Resource Director for Vodafone urged participants to find that value on themselves and build on it. She asked participants to be cautious of the things they do and they should be critical about how they brand themselves as Young emerging leaders in Ghana and Africa. The Resident Ambassador for Legon Center for international Affairs and Diplomacy ,Ambassador Kwabena Baah Duodu took participants through Diplomacy and its practitioners. Ambassador Kwabena Baah Duodu educated delegates on the qualities of a diplomat and the importance of Diplomacy in a countrys foreign policy and peaceful international relations. Young Diplomat of Ghana seeks to advance the development of a new generation of aspiring leaders and diplomats. YDG provides a platform for young professionals and students to engage with senior diplomats and key stakeholders in Ghanas international Affairs to exchange ideas and knowledge through training, policy campaigns and research. The YDG is to enrich delegates understanding in international issues and broaden their horizon on the impression and essence of Diplomacy in Ghana and the world. Sorry, we can't find the content you're looking for at this URL. 29.01.2017 LISTEN Gee! Yes, you heard me ! I am in pain, as a result of an orgy of self pinching I subjected parts of my body to this morning. The melodramatic events that unfolded from the Appointment Committee within the last 24 hours made me wonder momentarily whether I was alive on earth or languishing in space. To assure my self of my existence, I kept pinching myself to ascertain the functionality of my senses, and opened my eyes widely to make sure what I was reading was what had actually been written. When I heard the news yesterday, I dismissed it as utter rubbish not worthy of a nanosecond of anyone 's time. It just didn't make sense." Why would someone who performed superbly and would sail through without any impedance bribe the panel." I murmured to myself.However, when I read this morning it was a cock and bull story, I was at a loss. "How could such a scandalous behavior be tolerated by our legislature?" I asked myself. Ayariga's misconduct seems to be a collective scheme by the minority, calculated to injure public interest, and must be condemned in no uncertain terms. He could have spared us his vulgar politics of propagating such blatant lies. He has insulted the Ghanaian public, and must apologize to the entire nation. It is very troubling, that instead of engaging in policy and substance, some of the minority MPs on the committee, may be for lack of any clue as regards the vetting process, wallow in political mire of personal attack, expression of hate and exposure of their inadequacies in public governance, rule of law and principles of natural justice. I was of the view that the committee is made up of persons of enviable substance who will definitely rise above sophomoric partisan politics. Members of the committee, regardless of their political coloration must be strongly committed to the principle of natural justice and the protection of the rights of people who appear before them, instead of engaging in deliberate lies, witch hunting, personal attacks, and mudslinging. Ayariga's pedestrian behavior has rendered him unworthy to be a member of the committee. The good image of parliament, without an iota of doubt, has been brought into disrepute. Therefore, it is incumbent upon the leadership of the house to take the necessary steps, including, but not limited to, asking Ayariga to recluse himself from the committee to assure the nation that parliament is not replete with jokers who don't understand their role as an essential arm of government. It's politically tragic that Mr Ayariga will come across as a joke who lacks the cognitive faculties that will enable him execute his responsibilities on the committee judiciously. He seems to thrive on infantile innuendos which he propagates with unqualified sadistic fervor and amoral smugness. It is grievously saddening to see people we are compelled to call honorables, behave so dishonorably! THE LIES MUST STOP! VOTE ON SUBSTANCE!! VOTE ON COMPETENCE!!! THE CAUSE ENDURES!!! Charles Biney Dallas, Texas, USA Sent from my iPhone I shall plead with our traditional leaders to cease dictating to, or bringing pressure to bear on, His Excellency President Nana Addo Dankwah Akufo Addo. I had it in mind to write about the role of our traditional chiefs in our modern times economic and infrastructural development of Ghana. However, the recent developments where some paramount chiefs in Sunyani in the Brong-Ahafo region are bearing unnecessary pressure on the President to do their wish has compelled me to rush out this publication before my envisaged write-up about the role and relevance of our traditional chiefs in the socio-economic development of Ghana. Let us all take note that Gold Coast, now Ghana, and especially the then powerful Ashanti Kingdom, was a total monarchy. The chiefs then had absolute powers to practise their culture and traditions without restraints. They were the overlords of their tribes, lands and subjects. They could banish offending subjects from the lands which were their jurisdiction. They could behead some of their subjects in fulfilment of their traditions during the burial of deceased paramount chiefs and, or queens. All these absolute powers of our traditional chiefs ceased, or were abrogated, during the colonial rule to never be reinstated even after the departure of the British Colonialists when Gold Coast gained her political independence and was renamed Ghana. The chiefs were granted limited and regulated powers to aid the Whites in their indirect rule of the Ashanti Kingdom. Since the political independence of Ghana, with the introduction of democracy in the country, the powers of our traditional chiefs have waned. They have been reduced, in essence, to ceremonial heads. Under Dr Kwame Nkrumahs civilian but dictatorial Conventional Peoples Party (CPP) regime, he had less respect for our chiefs and threatened to let them run away leaving their sandals behind. Under the military dictatorship of former President Rawlings, he treated most of our traditional chiefs with disdain yet, they kept mute. All these go to conclude that in dictatorships or democracies, the chiefs have no longer the powers they wielded when the nation or part of it was an ABSOLUTE MONARCHY (a monarchy that is not limited or restrained by laws or a constitution). Under former President John Mahama, our chiefs became so corrupt and partisan. Because the President himself and his government were so corrupt to the core, they could easily be swayed by the chiefs who were seen or were perceived to affiliate to the NDC party. Having overtly or covertly become members of the NDC party, dining from the same bowl and drinking from the same cup of corruption with the President and the members of his government and party, some chiefs thought they had found or regained their long lost powers once more. The modern day chiefs most of whom have acquired formal education, and riches oftentimes obtained illegally through the rampant and uncontrolled sale of stool lands; do not actually pursue the interests of their subjects but themselves. Therefore, they are no longer the embodiment of unity and do not represent their subjects as the olden days chiefs, although autocratic as they were, did represent their people and commanded their total respect. Subsequently, the three paramount chiefs (Amanhene) in Sunyani, like their other compatriot traditional chiefs elsewhere in Ghana, should please know where their powers end in a country where democracy is practised. They are mere ceremonial heads without any authority to dictate to the President of the Republic as to who he should appoint as a member of his government or not. They can only offer advice on such issues but not to dictate. Additionally, a Minister for Brong Ahafo is there as the representative of the President and his government for the entire region but not only for the Sunyani Metropolis hence the three Sunyani paramount chiefs cannot object to the choice of person made by the President when the other chiefs may prefer him to another. Even in the event of other chiefs unanimously objecting to his appointment, the government has the prerogative to choose who he wants provided that person can help him realise his positive dreams for the region and the nation as a whole. It is only a respect for the chiefs, a privilege but not a right, if a President consults them before appointing a Regional Minister for them, or removes the person he has designated if they object to that choice. Where did Lawyer Kwaku Asomah-Cheremeh, the Regional Minister-designate for Brong Ahafo region go wrong, showing utter disrespect for the chiefs as they allege? He was right to point out the mistake of the chiefs to them when they publicly declared support for, and assured then, President Mahama who doubled as the NDC Presidential-candidate, of garnering 80% of the electoral votes from Brong Ahafo region. Did the farsighted Mr Asomah-Cheremeh not warn them against their decision? Has their public statement issued in bad faith probably not come back to bite them hard in the arse? The majority of the people of Brong Ahafo region including the other Amanhene in the region want the choice of person designated for the Regional Ministry by the President so Mr Asomah-Cheremeh has come to stay regardless of your objections. We are in democracy where the government is of the people, by the people, and for the people. Therefore, the choice of Lawyer Asomah-Cheremeh as the Regional Minister for Brong Ahafo region as made by President Nana Addo Dankwah Akufo-Addo is the choice of the Ghanaian people. Period! I hope no chief, irrespective of their status among their tribe, shall seek to bully His Excellency President Nana Addo Dankwah Akuo-Addo in the discharge of his duties to be of selfless service to his people and nation. We are under Constitution but not any Absolute Monarchy where whatever the chief says goes. In England, the Queen does not interfere in the running of the government by the Prime Minister. The Queen knows her role as purely being ceremonial. She commands the respect of the British people because she has earned it by comporting herself but not through any act of command. I pray our chiefs will learn from her to comport themselves accordingly! Rockson Adofo Akoasi (E/R), Jan 29, GNA - The Chinese Ambassador to Ghana, Madam Sun Baohong has inaugurated an Information Communication Technology (ICT) centre at Akoasi Methodist Basic School in the Birim North District of the Eastern Region. It was the second ICT centre established by the Ghana-China Friendship Association (GhaChiFA) in the Eastern Region as part of their social responsibility to the people. The association presented 30 desktop computers and their accessories, and 135 mono desks, exercise books and mathematical sets to the school in addition to footing electricity bills and the cost of the items. Madam Sun Baohong in a brief history of the association said Ghana was the second Sub-Saharan African country to establish diplomatic ties with China. She said during the former President John Agyekum Kufuor's regime, they discussed the construction of Bui Hydropower project which was completed and put into operation and that led to the strong mutual support between China and Ghana. The Chinese Ambassador together with the Member of Parliament for Abirem, Mr John Osei Frimpong inaugurated the centre. Mr Danny Easmon Mawuenyega, the General Secretary of GhaChiFA said the association was putting plans in place to undertake more projects in the country to improve the living standards of the people. Mr Oduro Gyan of the Birim North Education Directorate urged teachers to equip the students with the necessary ICT skills with the computers and monitor their monitor their usage. Nana Afia Serwaa I, the Queen mother of Akoasi expressed gratitude to the Chinese Ambassador for the support. The 'Youth in GhaChiFA' at Akoasi was also inaugurated by the Chinese Ambassador. GNA New Abirem(E/R), Jan 29, GNA - Mr John Osei Frimpong, the Member of Parliament (MP) for Abirem has donated assorted drugs valued at $300,000 dollars to the New Abirem Government hospital in the Eastern Region. The drugs, which would be distributed to nine health centres in the Abirem constituency, include carvedidol, simvastatin, antibiotics among others. Presenting the drugs, Mr Frimpong said he sought assistance from the Breast Care International, a Kumasi-based non-governmental organisation (NGO) for the drugs who also solicited support from the Direct Relief, an American-based NGO to provide them with the drugs. He said some of the community health centres that were to benefit from the gesture were located at Ntronang, Akoase, Nkwarteng, Tweapease and Atibie Government Hospital. Mr Frimpong pledged his support to help improve the conditions at health centres in the area just as the motto of the Ghana Health Service says "Your Health Our Concern". Dr Priscilla Addae Konadu the Medical Officer at New Abirem Government Hospital who received the items expressed gratitude to the MP for the support and appealed to all and sundry to come to their aid with a chemical analyser, children's ward and a mortuary. GNA The Center for Progressive Governance (CenProG) has noted with grave concern the happpenings on the Appointment Committee of Parliament since they begun vetting the first batch of ministerial nominees of President Akuffo Addo for various portfolios. CenProG will like to put on record that, like many Ghanaians, we have not been very pleased with the conduct of the Chairman of the Committee who doubles as the 1st Deputy Speaker of the August house. There have been times where he has been unfair to colleague MPs on the committee even to the dissatisfaction of the Majority Leader who has had cause to sometimes intervene. This intervention has mostly been treated with contempt by the Chairman who has assumed an autocratic posture alien to all Appointment Committees formed under the 4th Republic. The crust of this call for his recusal is however the fact that Hon. Osei Owusu is on record as having made false claims to the effect that MP for Bawku Central, Hon Mahama Ayariga has apologized for an allegation of bribery against Hon. Boakye Agyarko, Energy Minister. CenProG is hugely dissapointed in the posturing of the Chairman and believe that he should recuse himself to purge the committee of this bribery scandal. We believe it is not only in the interest of the Chairman but Ghanaians as a whole for steps to be taken to keep the integrity of the Appointments Committee intact. Until Hon. Boakye Agyarko appeared before the Appointments Committee of Parliament, there was no news of any such donations to Parliament by him and so if indeed, he did make such a donation to Parliament with specific reference to the committee then you do not need an MSc in Law to know that it constitutes a *BRIBE*. If he did not make such a donation then the onus lies on Hon. Mahama Ayariga apologize but not the Chairman of the Appointments Committee. Hon. Ayariga is on record to have said that he had not withdrawn and apologized and so what could have prompted the Chairman to have made such a claim? We are also baffled that Hon. Osei Owusu would allow himself to be used as a conduit for bribery since the minority MPs claim that Hon. Boakye Agyarko handed the money to the chairman who subsequently handed it over to the minority chief whip to be disbursed to the MPs. His role as the facilitator in this allegation of bribery cannot be overlooked. CenProG believes that the Chairman of the committee's integrity is tainted and therefore lacks the moral authority to continue to sit and chair the vetting process. We therefore call on him to as a matter of urgency recuse himself from the Committee to restore the confidence of Ghanaians in the committee. CenProG shall subsequently petition Leadership of Parliament and the Presidency to call for investigations into this bribery allegation since the Energy Ministry is one of the few ministries with corruption Potentials and it is too early for the new government to be embroiled in a bribery scandal. Leadership of Parliament must also impress on the 1st Deputy speaker to render an apology to the minority MP and the entire nation for the false claims which has the potential of bringing Parliament into disrepute. God Bless our homeland Ghana and make it GREAT and STRONG. Signed Sawadogo Mahmoud Executive Secretary, CenProG 0504607005 Mallam Yahya Stone Executive Director, CenProG 0243728659 The Concern Youth of Bekwai has noted with great displeasure the defamatory bribery allegation by Mahama Ayarigah the MP for Bawku central on our M.P, Rt Hon Joseph Osei-Owusu 1st deputy speaker of the 7th Parliament of the 4th Republic and the chairman of the Appointment Committee of parliament. We have been communicating with Rt. Hon Joe wise privately since this allegation and trust this is false as declared by Hon Muntaka a member of the appointment committee and an MP for Asewase constituency on Joy News file last Saturday. As concern youth of bekwai we wish to add our voice publicly to this False allegations by Mahama Ayarigah. Well the kind of street politics which the NDC is embroiled in recent times is not only dangerous to sustain the credibility of politicians in this country but also a way of trying to draw us back to the dark days. This man Mahama Ayariga has not only put his credibility in question, but has exhibited gross disrespect to the parliament of Ghana and shown the whole world that, he has to be subject to serious scrutiny if such a person was trusted with the public purse. What saddens us the most is that, many Young people will want to become MPs to serve their country in the near future because of the sanctity associated with this position. Many Youth alike will also want to be legal practitioners because of the decent image associated with the profession. It is however fallacious for a man who falls within this category and who has shamefully been a minister of state in the previous administration go "NAKED IN FRONT OF HIS IN-LAWS " in broad daylight. In fact, this Ayarigah man has brought the name of Parliament and the Ghana Bar Association into disrepute and must face the consequences squarely. We would have only requested for pardon for him if he was a drunkard and might have done this under the influence of "OH" It is thus imperative that,this man which l find it difficult to referring to as Hon. should be subjected to the following after getting to the bottom of this matter. 1. Be made to retract his allegations on all media houses especially Radio Gold where this allegations were made public. 2. Be made to face the law for defamation and necessary sanctions given him. 3. Be made to appear before the Privileges Committee of Parliament and investigations made public to that effect. On the other hand we wish to put it on record that our MP Hon Joe wise has never been corrupt and will never be. The records are there to show how honestly he worked when trusted with the public purse as the C.E.O of the DVLA in the Ex- President Kufours' regime which subsequently led to his election as a member of parliament for three consecutive terms. Rt. Hon Joe wise who grew from the palace of "Twafohene" bekwai had a good moral standards right from childhood and as concern youth we believe Him to be honest and God Fearing and will not stay low to be bribed or bribe somebody. At this moment, we ADVISE that Rt Hon Joe wise must go to court to sue Mahama Ayarigah for defamation after making a statement on the floor of parliament. It is extremely despicable that people can concoct lies to try and destroy the hard earned integrity of others this way. We will push our MP Rt. Hon Joe wise to court to help sanitise the political space for such nonsense not to resurface and to be reoccurring. He will not only be restoring his hard earned reputation but strengthening our democracy to enhance responsible conduct of our elected public servants. This allegation is FALSE and we believe in our incorruptible MP Rt. Hon Joseph Osei-Owusu. We hope to see Rt Hon Joe wise sue for Defamation. LONG LIVE GHANA LONG LIVE AMANSIE LONG LIVE JOE WISE ----------Signed------------ Eugene Osei Poku 0243684100 Convener Ibrahim Boateng 0240432357 Youth Organiser As a nation, we need to honour our National Heroes whiles they are alive. The usual ritual of heaping lots of praises and long tributes to our heroes only at their funerals shouldnt be countenance any longer. Wade Davis couldnt have said it better when he opined that Heroes are never perfect, but they're brave, they're authentic, they're courageous, determined, discreet, and they've got grit. Hon. Martin Alamisi B. K. Amidu is a Ghanaian politician and an anti-corruption campaigner. He was the Attorney-General and Minister for Justice from January 2011 till January 2012. He is the man, who introduced the word gargantuan, into the lexicon of Ghanaian politics, when he opened the can of worms about the Woyome scandal which is set to be the worst financial scandal in Ghanas fiscal history. Mr. Alfred Woyome was paid 51.2 million after he claimed to have helped Ghana to raise funds to construct stadia for purposes of hosting the CAN 2008 Nations Cup. He was also a Deputy Attorney-General for about the last four years of the Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC) military government. And he continued to serve in the government of H. E. Jerry John Rawlings as Deputy Attorney-General for both terms lasting eight years until January 2001. In the December 2000 presidential elections , he stood as the running mate for the late Prof. John Evans Atta Mills . In January 2010, he was appointed as the Minister for Interior. As Mr. Amidu is a Builsa, some people raised questions as to his neutrality in dealing with the Bawku conflict. He however went through vetting successfully and performed creditably at that ministry. Following a second major cabinet reshuffle by President Mills, Hon. Martin Amidu became the Attorney general and Minister for Justice. He was relieved of his post on Thursday January 19, 2012 by President John Evans Atta Mills under circumstances described by presidential spokespersons as 'his misconduct' at a meeting chaired by the president at the Osu Castle on January 18, 2012. That he made allegations related to alleged financial impropriety on the part of another cabinet minister which he failed to substantiate. But after months of silence, Hon. Martin has in two short sentences revealed the reason for his abrupt exit from office. He indicated that "I had suggested that Mrs. Betty Mould-Iddrisu should be persuaded to be a prosecution witness in lieu of prosecution. The Government disagreed, so I was removed from office", he said. Most commentators on the matter have wondered why Mrs. Mould-Iddrisu especially and other state officials were never invited to testify on behalf of the state. Even Justice Ajet-Nassam, the High Court judge who acquitted Mr Woyome, said in his ruling that state prosecutors hurt their case by not inviting Mrs. Mould-Iddrisu and other key officials as witnesses against the NDC financier. Even after leaving office, the Citizen Vigilante as he is affectionately called has not relented on his fight for mother Ghana. In a writ to invoke the original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, as enshrined in the Constitution, Mr. Amidu explained that his action was purely based on public interest -pursuant to Articles 2 and 130 (1) and 181 of the 1992 Constitution and not a personal action for which the requirement of a controversy or dispute or personal interest is required to ground a cause of action. He contended that in spite of the fact that Mr Woyome and Austro-Invest did not have any locus standi or cause of action to have commenced an action in the High court against the State, the then AG (Madam Betty Mould Iddrisu), stood by and also the court upon glaring facts entered a default judgement against the Republic of Ghana of the two (Mr Woyome and Austro-Invest) without any jurisdiction whatsoever. The eleven-member panel presided over by Chief Justice Georgina Theodora Wood, said the alleged contract was null and void because it didnt have parliamentary endorsement per the laws of Ghana, regarding contracts of such international nature. The highest court therefore ruled that a judgment debt could not have been said to have been properly merited for the cancellation of a contract, which fell short of constitutional and legal requirements, ab initio. It ordered Woyome to refund the whole sum to the coffers of the State. Amidu also secured similar rulings against two international firmsIsofoton and Watervillewhich were ordered by the same Court to pay back to Ghanas coffers $325,472 and 25 million, respectively, as monies wrongfully and illegally paid them as judgment debt by the government of Ghana. After securing these favourable judgement for the state, till date Mr. Amidu is still fighting through all legal means to ensure the judgement is enforced to the latter. It is based on the foregoing reasons that I believe the Hon. Martin Alamisi Amidu is a hero of our time and worth celebrating. Let us all in one accord honour him in his life time. We have vested the power of the state in H. E. Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo; and I expect him to lead this CRUSADE. What else can we do for a man who has dedicated his life, time and resources to the service of his nation? A man who had indicated that ..My integrity and professionalism as a lawyer was a threat to the concealment of gargantuan crimes against the people of Ghana in which they might be implicated. Hon. Martin A. B. K. Amidu we all salute and adore you as we wait for the powers that be to confer a National Honour on you. You have won the hearts of many; and your name, bravery and works will forever linger around for decades. We say Ayekoo!!! Naagode!!! Barika!!! Akpe!!! Mii da bo shi!!! Npouhiya!!! Thank you!!! Signed Anuwar-Sadat Amadu Nubanie Email: [email protected] NB: The writer is holds a Bachelor of Commerce, Accounting (B.Com (Hons)), is a practicing Customer Service (Experience) Specialist, a writer and a Youth activist. The Speaker of the 7th Parliament of the Republic of Ghana, Rt. Hon. Prof. Aaron Mike Ocquaye has stated that the commitment at ensuring transparent and accountable governance starts from within parliament. According to speaker, the capacity of parliament to adequately scrutinize the budget as well as government policies and programs has become an issue of concern to the citizenry and parliaments visibility at exposing corruption and the conduct of members regarding their commitment to work have also attracted public attention. He has therefore urged members of parliament to conduct themselves appropriately. Rt. Hon. Prof Ocquaye was speaking at an orientation and induction seminar organized for Members of the 7th Parliament at Koforidua; the Eastern Regional capital. The seminar which is under the theme: Deepening Transparent and Accountable Governance: Strengthening Parliament for National Development is meant to take the Members of Parliament through presentations on the role and functions of Parliament, parliamentary practice and procedures, Legislative processes, Services and resources that contribute to parliaments effective discharge of its constitutional mandate amongst many other useful topics that relate to governance. For the first time in many years, the orientation and induction seminar which is expected to last for three days has a special session for new members of parliament, the purpose of which is to devote time to properly orient and usher these new members into parliament so that they will be able to find their bearings within the precinct of parliament. The speaker used the opportunity to admonish members who most often absent themselves from parliament without any proper excuse to desist from that. The majority leader and the minority leader both spoke about the relevance of the seminar and urged the members to give the needed attention to the exercise. Some new members of parliament who spoke to the media expressed their satisfaction with the exercise and hoped that by the end of the 3 days exercise, they would have been groomed enough and fully prepared for their parliamentary duties. This, indeed, is a grave matter that should never be swept under the carpet with the kind of trite response from Kate Addo, Acting Director of Public Affairs of Parliament, nor the barrage of insults and denials I have been reading online and hearing on TV. The outright insults demonstrate the mental depravity and moral turpitude of Ghanaians themselves, which have made them accomplices and accessories to the pervasive corruption in Ghana. Spend two weeks in Ghana and one is speechless, with tongue hanging out, at the stories of calumny and graft one hears about. I must say I was impressed at the clean up at the Airport though, on a recent snap visit to Ghana after a long absence. NONETHELESS, THIS ALLEGATION MUST BE INVESTIGATED!!! That someone can think that Ayariga can just make up this story and involve many others as accomplices and get away with it is madness itself, unless one knows Ayariga as a crazy and unstable liar. If that were the case, we can brand his allegation as just another effusion from his fevered brain. But I don't know him to be either a mad man or a habitual liar beyond being a greedy bastard who took 5 tractors for himself whereas Agyei Marfo got the sack in the 80s for using his discretion to allocate a tractor to a more deserving investor than those already in the queue. Accordingly, I am willing to credit him with some plausibility that he is telling the truth until proven a liar. In fact, as one of the kingpins of the NDC party, whatever he says or does reflects on that party that has just been shoved unceremoniously into the opposition by the NPP on main grounds of being corrupt and all the dishonesty associated with it. It therefore behoves on Ayariga and his fellow NDC members privy to this matter to pursue the issue to its full logical end: a proper parliamentary investigation. We the public cannot accept any further dishonesty being dished to us. This is a story involving several others who can corroborate what Ayariga said or deny it. It can be true but in order to preserve the facade that covers the rot that Parliament has been said openly to be, they can deny that it is not true, and that is exactly this statement is doing in support of the NPP Chairman of the Appointment Committee who reportedly doled out the money as well as other key persons involved. Alhaji Muntaka, whose name was mentioned as the source of the information that the money came from the Energy Minister, has come out to strenuously deny the story but in a skewed manner. Reading through Mr Ayarigas initial statement, there was nowhere I can deduce that it was Mr Muntaka who shared the money to the minority MPs but it was said that the monies were given back to him to return to the Chairman. So denying that he shared the monies is redundant and to no effect. But did he collect some monies back? It was even clear that he Mr Muntaka was not sure of the source of the money at first and had to investigate and return with that story. Did he get the story right about the source? There are just too many questions to ask I can think of over a score in this sordid case and it is clear some people are telling bloody lies and no sane person must believe anyone until this case is investigated to unravel the truth. Some involved can also choose to be silent, as many, including the remaining 7 NDC members who reportedly received the money and returned it, obviously are doing right now. They are doing Ghanaians a great disservice and must be condemned as accomplices to the venal criminality and corruption in Ghana. So, for these NDC members remaining silent simply cements the perception created around them that they are corrupt and dishonest, at a time when they should be re-building their collective image. For the NPP members, the reasons to deny or remain silent are obvious and we need not belabour the point but it is worth mentioning how P. C. Ofori was ostracised for publicly spilling too much of the dirty laundary in public; for instance, how Vodafone shelled out through President Kufuor a lousy $5000 to NPP MPs in order to get their support for the Ghana Telecom fire sale. Now, Vodafone, reportedly, is remitting out of Ghana each year more than the price they paid for GT and the VRA fibre optic system. We the angry observers will like to know if they are just mere scoundrels in Parliament? It is a pity that Anas has been prevailed upon to shelf his undercover investigation of Parliamentarians, which promised to be even more explosive than that of the judges. The public must clamour for the rot in Parliament to be exposed and eradicated but is the public up to the task? Already, most have taken partisan lines, with the NPP supporters rallying behind the Chairman of the Appointments Committee and the new Enerygy Minister, with insults being rained on Ayariga. I treat them with utter contempt! Ghana does not belong to them alone. It belongs to all of us. For some of us, our forebears sat at the high table throughout its formative years until independence and made enumerable sacrifices to turn it into the rich, model colony that Ghana became. We have been outraged since our childhood at the plunder the new urchins on the block have unleashed on us since the attainment of independence. Enough is enough! Time to organise a Million Men and Women March on Parliament and force them to investigate this case and make a lot of drastic changes as to how they operate, conduct themselves and are enumerated. No one forces anyone to become an MP and it is supposed to be a voluntary job. It is sickening to learn that the MPs even think they are entitled to overtime sitting allowance in this case amounting to a whopping GHS3000 in an envelope (a brown one?) - for doing their job, a job which we all know they are being paid extravagantly for. Of course, we have all repeatedly read that this is normal practice, with even Ministries and government departments having to pay the MPs for the approval of budgetary allocations! Anyone who does not know this or haven't heard about it is simply ignorant, an illiterate or not a Ghanaian scene observer and so can be excused for his/her ignorance. Now is the time to clamour for a halt to the ongoing gross graft and plunder of our scarce resources by our MPs, as such actions are only worthy of scoundrels in any democracy following the rule of law. The time has come to deal with these unwholesome and unethical actions in Parliament. I thought they MPs were capable of hauling members of the public before them for contempt and threatening them with sanctions. Let them haul Ayariga before their disciplinary committee and not tell him or anyone else to go to court. INVESTIGATE THE ALLEGATION NOW!!! Andy C. Y. Kwawukume [email protected] Addis Ababa (AFP) - African Union leaders meet in Ethiopia on Monday for a difficult summit likely to expose regional divisions as they debate whether to allow Morocco to rejoin the bloc, and vote for a new chairperson. The two-day summit comes after several shake-ups on the international stage: the election of US President Donald Trump and a new head of the UN, Antonio Guterres, who will address the opening of the assembly. On Sunday in Addis Ababa, Guterres praised Ethiopia's generosity in welcoming refugees from the region while battling its worst drought in 50 years. It is "an example that I would say needs to be thought about in a world where unfortunately so many borders are being closed," he said in a veiled dig at the US ban on travellers from seven Muslim countries, including Libya, Somalia and Sudan in Africa. Uncertainty over Africa's relationship with Trump's America is one of several issues demanding the attention of AU leaders -- from turmoil in Libya, radical Islamism in Mali, Somalia and Nigeria, to stagnating peace efforts in South Sudan. However Monday's talks will be dominated by Morocco's bid to return to the fold 33 years after it quit in protest against the AU's decision to accept Western Sahara as a member. New UN Secretary general Antonio Guterres will address the opening of the African Union assembly The membership of affluent Morocco could be a boon for the AU, which lost a key financier in late Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi and is working hard to become financially independent. Currently foreign donors account for some 70 percent of its budget, according to the Institute for Security Studies (ISS). However Addis-based ISS analyst Liesl Louw-Vaudran highlights that Morocco's return "is still not a done deal", with heavyweights such as Algeria and South Africa lobbying hard against the move. Both have long supported the fight for self-determination by Western Sahara's Polisario independence movement. Morocco maintains that the former Spanish colony which it annexed in 1975, is an integral part of the kingdom. Regional interests Also on Monday, leaders will vote for a new chairperson six months after failing to decide on a replacement for South Africa's Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma. This time, fragmented regional interests are likely to make it harder for one of five candidates from Kenya, Senegal, Chad, Botswana and Equatorial Guinea to win a two-thirds majority and be elected chairperson of the AU Commission. Kenya's foreign minister Amina Mohamed, Chad's former prime minister Moussa Faki Mahamat and Senegal's veteran diplomat Abdoulaye Bathily are the newcomers and frontrunners in the race. Aside from Morocco, regions are also divided by growing anger with the International Criminal Court (ICC). Burundi, South Africa and The Gambia decided late last year to pull out of the court, claiming it unfairly targets African nations. Others such as Kenya have threatened to follow suit while Botswana and Senegal have argued in favour of the court. AU reform The choice of a new leader is crucial for the future of a bloc still seen as largely irrelevant in the daily lives of most Africans, and which is undergoing deep introspection on how to reform. Rwanda's President Paul Kagame was tasked with drawing up a report recommending an overhaul of the bloc, which he presented to heads of state on Sunday. According to the Kenyan government, the "biting" report criticised "chronic failure to see through African Union decisions (which) had resulted in a crisis of implementation and a perception that the AU was not relevant to Africans". Kagame also slammed "over-dependence on (donor) funding." Efforts to obtain more financial independence are likely to gain even more significance as Africa faces uncertainty over its partnership with the United States after Trump's vow to put "America first". The US is one of the main contributors to the fight against the Shabaab in Somalia, and the AU Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) has already been hit by funding cuts from the EU. The Chairman of the Appointments Committee of Parliament, Joseph Osei-Owusu will call for a review of the committee following a bribery allegation levelled against the committee by one of its members, Mahama Ayariga. According to the chairman, this will ensure help conclude investigations of the scandal to enable the committee carry out its duty smoothly. The Bawku Central Member of Parliament, Mahama Ayariga accused the Energy Minister, Boakye Agyarko of bribing the ten minority members of the committee with GHc3,000 each when he realized that the minority had refused to pass him for the position following some comments he made about former president John Mahama during his vetting. Mr. Ayariga alleged that the money was given to the Minority Chief Whip, Mubarak Mohammed Muntaka by the Chairman of the Appointments Committee, Osei-Owusu for onward disbursement; a claim, both the Chairman and Muntaka subsequently rubbished. Speaking on The Big Issue on Saturday, Joseph Osei Owusu said, the option of impressing on Ayariga to answer questions on his allegations at the committee sitting will be impossible since he [Osei-Owusu] who was implicated by Ayariga in the bribery allegations has to chair that sitting. The Bekwai legislator said By our standing orders, I am the Chairman of that committee and by our standing orders, I don't think that Ayariga will get justice if my committee is to try him. That is why I am doing away with that suggestion and looking at going to court. When asking by host, Umaru Sanda Amadu whether he will continue to chair the committee after the allegations, Osei-Owusu said I am supposed to be there by law. I will make a statement and invite the leadership and the speaker to review that committee. He added that, My only challenge now is that we have postponed consideration of some members for appointment for so long and I'm not sure it is fair to them to postpone sitting again. Otherwise I would have refused to sit until those matters are resolved and who ever took money in whose name is brought out. He further disclosed that he was engaging his lawyers to possibly seek redress in the court of law to clear his name. I swear I didn't give Ayariga bribe money Muntaka The Minority Chief Whip, Muntaka Mubarak had rejected claims that he gave Mahama Ayariga any money he received from Energy Minister, Boakye Agyarko. I'm a Muslim and Ayariga is a Muslim. I'm swearing by the Allah that created him that I never gave Ayariga anything and I said it was from Osei-Owusu. Osei Owusu has never discussed any money issue with me. He has never given me any money to be given to Ayariga and I've never given Ayariga or anybody any money saying that it was coming from the Chairman, he said. By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana Follow @jnyabor The Speaker of Parliament, Prof. Aaron Mike Oquaye has urged new members of 7th parliament to work diligently to protect the public purse. He made the appeal at a 3-day orientation program for the new legislators of the 7th parliament in Koforidua in the Eastern Region on Sunday. He advised the new MPs to demonstrate a strong sense of patriotism and be of good behavior while representing their constituents. The Speaker: You have a lot of privileges, but to whom much is given, much is expected. Our roles are expressly articulated in Article 103 of the constitution. We need to examine ourselves and sharpen our tools so that we can deliver our mandates effectively. Among other reasons, the people who elected us, are watching. Prof. Oquaye also pledged to be firm and balanced in the discharge of his duty to promote the integrity of the house. By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana Three of the Minority members of the vetting committee Mahama Ayariga, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa and Alhassan Sayibu Suhuyini, MPs for Bawku Central, North Tongu and Tamale north constituencies respectively have written to the Speaker of Parliament calling for a thorough investigation of the bribery claims against the Minister of Energy, Boakye Agyarko. The three, in a joint letter addressed to the Speaker of Parliament, want the House to initiate an internal investigation to ascertain the veracity of their claims against the minister. The letter said, we request you to carry out an internal enquiry into the veracity of the claims made by us in the allegation of attempted bribery of the Minority members of the Appointments Committee of Parliament by the ministerial nominee. Mahama Ayariga on Friday [January 27, 2017] accused the Energy Minister, Boakye Agyarko of bribing the ten Minority members of the committee with GHc3,000 each when he realized that the Minority had refused to pass him for the position following some comments he made about former president John Mahama during his vetting. Mr. Ayariga alleged that the money was given to the Minority Chief Whip, Mubarak Mohammed Muntaka by the Chairman of the Appointments Committee, Joseph Osei-Owusu for onward disbursement; a claim Mr Suhuyini and Mr Ablakwa both confirmed. Although the Chief Whip and the Chairman have denied the claims, the trio have insisted they were certain about the allegations. They noted in the letter that We, the three (3) Members of Parliament will subject ourselves fully to the processes of enquiry. I swear I didn't give Ayariga bribe money Muntaka The Minority Chief Whip, Muntaka Mubarak had rejected claims that he gave Mahama Ayariga any money he received from Energy Minister, Boakye Agyarko. I'm a Muslim and Ayariga is a Muslim. I'm swearing by the Allah that created him that I never gave Ayariga anything and I said it was from Osei-Owusu. Osei Owusu has never discussed any money issue with me. He has never given me any money to be given to Ayariga and I've never given Ayariga or anybody any money saying that it was coming from the Chairman, he said. Osei-Owusu threatens court action Meanwhile, the Chairman of the Appointments Committee and MP for Bekwai, Joseph Osei-Owusu has threatened he will seek redress in court to clear his name from the scandal. According to him, he has no idea why Ayariga mentioned him as being at the forefront to receive the bribe money since he does not recollect ever doing so. He has also given indications he may call for a review of the Committee to allow it run effectively as it ves other ministerial nominees named by President Akufo-Addo. By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana An attempted coup in Turkey on July 15, 2016, is believed by NATO sources to have been staged by the president of Turkey himself, according to a Wednesday report on the aldrimer.no website. Although sources admit that there is no written NATO documentation to support the claim due to its sensitivity, the website said that the dominant NATO assessment is quite clear. The senior officers, three- and four-star generals, and those who worked with Turkey for 30-40 years and who mentored Turkish officers for four or five years, say they do not believe that there was a coup. If the Turkish Armed Forces wanted to carry out a coup, they would have succeeded. Thats a tradition in Turkey, a NATO source told aldrimer.no. They had a list of 1,600 names the very next day of people they wanted gone, he added. Turkey survived a military coup attempt on July 15 that killed over 240 people and wounded more than a thousand others. Immediately after the putsch, the government along with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan pinned the blame on the Gulen movement, which strongly denies the allegation. The next morning, after announcing that the coup had been foiled, the Turkish government immediately launched a purge of military officers, judges and others in state institutions under which at least 135,000 civil servants to date have been dismissed from their jobs. According to the aldrimer.no report, some 80 to 90 percent of Turkish officers serving at NATO headquarters were relieved of their duties and recalled to Turkey. Those who dared to return home have been jailed, said sources, one of whom added: Turkish officers who still have contact with NATO said that Erdogan had been planning the so-called coup for a year and had a list of people he wanted out. I have so far not met anyone who believes there was a real coup attempt. The report also points to one of Erdogans acts following the alleged coup splitting up the Turkish military and the gendarmerie, separate organizations that had previously served under the same jurisdiction but with different objectives. The paramilitary gendarmerie, however, was particularly loyal to Erdogan and had actively participated in the purges that followed the alleged coup. The Norwegian website had contacted NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg for remarks on its report, but the NATO head declined to comment. His press office responded with a statement saying that the secretary-general had already commented on the failed coup and had discussed the issue with the Turkish leadership, adding: He has made clear that those responsible for the failed coup must be brought to justice, and it is important that this be done with full respect for the rule of law. The press office, however, did not respond to questions about NATO assessments of who was really behind the coup attempt, nor has the president of Turkey answered questions submitted to him, either. 30.01.2017 LISTEN Xexe, just last week, outspoken Presiding Bishop of mega church, Lighthouse Chapel International, Bishop Dag Heward-Mills briefly touched on the subject of homosexuality during a sermon at Grace Bible Church in Soweto, South Africa. It caused a global furore because a certain South African media celebrity who is gay, and a member of that church, stormed out of the church because he felt the message violated his constitutional rights but the congregation cheered the Bishop on. Maybe he expected the congregation to boo the Bishop or at least give him a cold shoulder even though he was preaching the bible and not South African constitution and laws. Later on the pastor of that church chose to distance himself and his church from the Bishop's message. That was unfortunate, but the story is no secret so I will leave it here. I have heard whole sermons on fornication, adultery, stealing, lying, and other ungodly acts, but hardly do you go to church and hear a pastor preach a whole sermon on homosexuality or lesbianism. And that is not for want of enough biblical verses on the subject. I think pastors try to be sensitive because they acknowledge that ungodliness is a bondage that people need to be helped out of, and not be condemned to. You would therefore notice that the Bishop only touched on the matter briefly, but strongly enough to bring the message home. Maybe he should have read some of the many biblical verses directly and left it at that, so that he would not be accused of preaching an anti-gay or homophobic message. The Bishop did not author the Bible. Xexe, what does the bible say about homosexuality? 1. Leviticus 18: 22 - IT IS AN ABOMINATION "Do not have sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman; that is detestable. 2. Leviticus 20:13 - IT IS PUNISHABLE BY DEATH If a man has sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads. 3. 1Corinthians 6:9 - HELL BOUND Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor MEN WHO HAVE SEX WITH MEN. 4. 1Timothy 1:9-11 - THE LAW FOR THEM We also know that the law is made not for the righteous but for lawbreakers and rebels, the ungodly and sinful, the unholy and irreligious, for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers, for the sexually immoral, FOR THOSE PRACTICING HOMOSEXUALITY, for slave traders and liars and perjurersand for whatever else is contrary to the sound doctrine, that conforms to the gospel concerning the glory of the blessed God, which he entrusted to me. 5. Romans 1: 26-28 - IT IS VILE AND UNSEEMLY For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; MEN WITH MEN WORKING THAT WHICH IS UNSEEMLY and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet. 6. Mark 10:6-9 - ADAM AND EVE (NOT STEVE) But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. As you can see, there are at least (at least) six biblical verses that speak directly about homosexuality and its place in the sight of God. Six verse is more than enough for a whole sermon on the subject. There are many more verses that imply it, and none of them was written by a Bishop Dag Heward-Mills. Obviously, gay rights may be civil rights, but not Christian rights. I doubt if gay rights are even Islamic rights. Please understand that Christians/pastors never condemn people who practice homosexuality. It is the act that is condemned, and there is, obviously, enough biblical basis for that condemnation. The people who profess Christianity and pretend those scriptures do not exist, their own conscience is their witnesses. It is strange how such people want the church to compromise the written word just because scientists of today say some men were born with a natural orientation to desire men for sex and some women were also born same. That kind of reasoning only make show how true the word of God is, that "all things shall pass away but the WORD OF GOD will still remain same." In time past, no scientist had this so-called proof that some people are born gay. Today, they claim to have made that discovery, and on the basis of that so-called proof, some countries have granted gay rights. We all know how scientific discoveries are disproved over time. There is no telling what contrary discoveries would be made when this generation is dead and gone. So if tomorrow they came with another discovery that the so-called proof of people being born gay is actually fake, what happens, the laws will change, I guess? The other question is, why should the word of God be ignored or be amended just because scientists, with their limited knowledge about creation, claim some people are born gay, so they can't help being gay? God's word is forever. It does not change to suit people's myopic scientific discovery. The word of God makes no compromises for anyone. It tells it as it is, sharp and straight to the point. But it also instructs believers not to shun and condemn those involved in stuff that the word of God has already declared judgment on. Our duty as believers is to continue to persuade and warn such people in love and also about the coming danger for people engaged in such acts. We therefore separate the persons from the act and we continue to use the scriptures to let people see there is enough grace and strength in Christ to overcome the act. In the same way people who cannot help drinking, smoking, stealing, being paedophiles deserve consideration and help, we strive to help such. It is the duty of Christians to do that. The problem starts when, in the name of "the church must be considerate of people's frailties", some suggest that the church should not even preach written scriptures. They forget that one of the key roles of the church is to WARN people about the coming judgment. So what if another group of people engaged in another form of ungodly practice also say we need to be considerate of them, so we do not have to preach about their frailties? Is that what the church is becoming now - preaching only stuff that are convenient and sweet in the ears of people living in ungodliness? The church is full of people who have one moral issue or the other, but their attitude is to seek grace, strength and guidance (counsel) from God's word to overcome their frailties. Part of that assistance comes as pastors are led by God to speak about the immoral acts as stated in the bible, and this include homosexuality as the six biblical verses above clearly indicate. Please, let's not suggest for once, that the laws men write for themselves, based on their limited understanding of life, should now dictate moral standards in the church. Should we now seek amendments in the biblical verses just to suit the rights of homosexuals as provided by the Constitution of a country? God forbid. That is an abomination. Let the laws of countries say what they want, but don't tell the church to change or close our eyes to scriptures just because a certain country's laws say people must be allowed to be gay openly. The church is not a social club where people come and do what they want and leave. It is a place people come to seek divine counsel and strength for a better life. And the rules for the church are in a book called THE HOLY BIBLE. So if you are given hard bible-based counsel and you feel that should be second to your rights under your country's constitution, then you need to decide if you want to be a Christian or you don't. So if tomorrow another country's laws says another thing that is not biblical, do we tear pages from the bible, or delete them or amend them to suit the rights of people as provided by their country's constitution? Where does it end? Can you see how dangerous that proposal is? The church does well to separate the act from the persons. But when the persons decide to take the liberties in Christ for granted and now take offense because a pastor spoke about the act, as stated in the bible, then obviously those persons are equating themselves to the act and are unwilling to know what the bible says, because they think the laws of their country should be more important than the bible, even in the church. You can't claim to be a Christian and yet insist that part of the scriptures should not apply to you because they infringe on your rights under your country's constitution. You either want to be a Christian and accept the diagnoses and prognosis of the bible to moral issues or you can just attend church but you are not a Christian. Christians are not perfect, but they at least open up to the prescriptions of the bible rather than resist it and storm out of church. That is totally unChristian and a clear lack of understanding of what Christianity is. When a pastor preaches what the bible says about homosexuality, he does not say people engaged in it should be shunned. He preaches consideration and mercy for them because the judgment prescribed for them in the bible is dangerous. It is arrogance that make people think what they think about life, based on secular ideas, should take preeminence over what the bible they claim to believe in says. Those of you who profess Christianity and also think gay rights should be upheld, what is your position on the six biblical verses quoted above? Let me stop here Xexe. 30.01.2017 LISTEN Nigerians should not comment on what they do not really have detail reports of, as this is largely responsible for the escalation of the situation. My findings so far show that everyone is talking from the position of strength. People are not talking from knowledge of what they know and this is not helping. We must be able to dump all our sentiments to overcome the challenges. Just like other cases of injustice around us, we need peace; it is only peace with justice that can solve all these crises. Genuine peace is what everyone is craving for and this can only come when there is justice,former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, speaking on Southern Kaduna crisis. The crises that have engulfed the southern part of Kaduna state are worrisome and must be stopped to forestall the spread of ethno-religious upheaval across the country. Troubled by this ugly development and to confirm the reality on ground, I had called at least two of my friends who are from the area. Both of them gave impressive reports. Summarily, the media is blowing the happenings out of proportion. In addition, the press has not been fair to the efforts by the state and federal government to resolve the crises. Just like Boko Haram was faceless for a long time in the northeast, herdsmen alleged to be from outside Nigeria are now used to terrorize the northwest. Historically, herdsmen are believed to have entered Nigeria since the 11th century from Futa Toro in Senegal. These herdsmen, as Prof. Ishaq Akintola puts it, have been killing Nigerians across the country including Bauchi, Niger, Kano, Zamfara and states of the southern Nigeria. The Prof. seeks a candid answer on why Kadunas case is so special. The government must step up measures to guard the north-central against any attempt of terrorism. There have been claims and counter claims over the causes of the crises. The postulations made by the Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) are very intriguing. According to NSCIAs Director of Administration, Ustaz Christian Isa Okonkwo, historical record has it that in 1810, Mallam Usman Yabo, the son of Sarkin Kabin Yabo, Muhammadu Mayijo lorded over the area, thereby establishing since then a contact between Islam and that part of Nigeria. This approach to Kaduna history has led to violent struggle in identity politics and the assumption among the people of the state that Southern Kaduna belongs to some people. In other words, the conflict is nothing but a virulent contest for space and place or more appropriately contestations over history and geography. Some citizens say the area belongs to Nigeria and by extension to all Nigerians irrespective of ethnic and religious differences; others see it as belonging to a particular ethnic and religious group. It is all interwoven in settler-indigene dichotomy. He recalled the aftermath of the onslaught in 1987 in Kafanchan when a commission of inquiry led by Rivers-born Justice Karibi Whyte sentenced the troublemakers in Southern Kaduna to death resulting from misquotations of the Quran by one Rev. Bako. But that was never executed. The same thing happened in 1990 at Zango Kataf leading to the destruction of at least 50 Fulani settlements. The Christians, on the other hand, have claimed heavy losses of lives and property, thus every religious group claiming oppression by the other. The most recent crisis has consumed lives. The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) announced that 204 people were killed while the Catholic Church claimed 808 deaths. Ethno-religious crises in the area can be traced as far back as 1981. That has continued from time to time especially after general elections. In Southern Kaduna, Muslims are said to be in the minority. That is one of the strongholds of Christians in the core northern states. In other areas where Christians and Muslims are equal in number or the Muslims predominate, relative peace prevails. The question now is why are these conflicts reoccurring in the Christian majority area of the north? Christians of the area feel marginalized. The political class has used the area to promote personal interests and cause violence when aspirations are not actualized. Simply, they feel denied in the political opportunities in the state. Efforts put up to restore lasting peace and order are growing and commendable. President Buhari has ordered the introduction of a drilling exercise codenamed Operation Kunama 11 in the place. After a meeting with all the service chiefs as well as the Inspector-General of Police and the Director-General of the Department of State Security at the Presidential Villa in Abuja, the Chief of Army Staff, General Tukur Yusuf Buratai, told the press that the operation would be extended to parts of Plateau and Kano States. So, it is part of our strategy for this year to continue all the exercises we have had before. We will be having exercise Kunama 11 which will come into Southern Kaduna State and parts of Plateau and Kano States; (Operation) Crocodile Smile in the Niger Delta and indeed the Python Dance. But we are going to rename the Python Dance for the Southeast this year also. Operation Lafiya Dole is continuing operations in the northeast as they are still moving all over the Sambisa forest. About 100 soldiers of Operation Safe Haven (OPSH) presently in Plateau State are part of security men for the operation. OPSH Commander, Major General Roger Nicholas said long-range patrols have begun in the villages of Southern Kaduna and that 60 men have been stationed around the Saminaka axis bordering Kaduna and Plateau. The federal government has also announced plans to establish military and police formations in the area. Notable Nigerians led by former Head of State, General Abdulsalami Abubakar, have been gathered to end the communal misunderstandings and clashes. The group made up of the Archbishop of Abuja John Cardinal Onaiyekan, Commodore Ebitu Ukiwe (rtd) and Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah of Sokoto has met in Kafanchan Unity Choice Hotel and Kagoro Town hall with religious clerics, traditional rulers and community groups. The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), the Jamaatu NasriI Islam (JNI), Southern Kaduna Peoples Union (SOKAPU), Muslim Youth Foundation of Southern Kaduna (MYOFOSKA), Jamaa Foundation, Catholic Diocese and Anglican Communion of Kafanchan made very useful presentations. The committee had held similar meeting with Governor Nasir el-Rufai. Abubakar said: Nobody from outside can teach you how to live in peace. You are the people living together and you know yourselves more than anybody, we have nothing to do more than what you can do yourselves to maintain peace. We are just doing initiatives that will help restore peace. The Sultan of Sokoto and Chairmen of councils of traditional rulers across the 19 States of northern Nigeria, Alhaji Saad Abubakar, recently met with governors in the region over the violence and accused the federal and the Kaduna governments of not doing enough to end the killings. Disturbed by the use of religious places of worship to preach hatred and violence, the sultan identified impunity as one of the numerous reasons why violence has continued to thrive in the region as culprits go without punishment. The Prelate of Methodist Church Nigeria, Dr. Samuel Chukwuemeka Uche has urged the media to accurately report the crisis without exaggerating it because the peace of Kaduna State was paramount and must be pursued with dialogue and peace-building. While giving a sermon at the inauguration of an ultra-modern Mosque at the Federal University of Technology, Minna, (FUTMINNA),the emir of Kano, Alhaji Muhammadu Sanusi, warned Islamic clerics in Nigeria to stop hate messages when preaching to Muslim faithful. Hate preaching is against the tenets of Islam The emir asked the Islamic clerics to work towards having harmonious co-existence with people of other religions. Chairman of the Northern State Governors Forum (NSGF) and Governor of Borno State Kashim Shettima said managing multiculturalism is a major challenge and indeed a litmus test for leadership, good governance and progress not just in Northern Nigeria but in the entire global society. He identified poverty as the number one monster dragging Northern Nigeria backward. In June, 2013, a good number of poor persons were recruited for as little as N5,000 to spy on soldiers, report their vulnerability to insurgents, attack and set schools ablaze. Poor old women were paid similar amounts by insurgents, to either keep arms in their huts or smuggle arms from one point to another. One Musa Grema, a 13 year old boy revealed that he accepted N5,000 to set three primary schools ablaze and also spy on soldiers, because his parents relied on him for their feeding. Governor Nasiru El-Rufai of Kaduna state urged traditional rulers to guide their subjects in ensuring security in their domains. NSCIA recommended holistic approach to determine the causes, scope and victims of the conflict with punishment on deserving perpetrators as well as mandating National Orientation Agency (NOA) to embark on national campaign that would promote national integration, peace-building and give full effect to constitutional provisions that guarantee the survival of all citizens of Nigeria anywhere in the country no matter their ethnic or religious affiliations. The Kaduna state government should uphold equity and justice in political and social representation. In other words, the state government should put into full effect the plurality of the state in all matters such as appointments into public offices, recruitment into civil service and location of development projects. And for the Jama'atu Nasril Islam (JNI), the sectarian violence has revealed the ineptitude and pettiness from some religious leaders and individuals who have sinister motives and political undertones alongside intent to foment trouble and imbalance reportage. The body warned against unguarded and exaggerated utterances, planting the seed of discord, acrimony and hate. It commended the security agencies, recalling the 2011 post election violence which recorded gruesome murder of Muslims by the Southern Kaduna Christians. JNI called for calm and restraint by citizens. A former governor of the state, Senator Ahmad Makarfi enlisted the people of Southern Kaduna against politicizing the crisis. He believes that the matter was a serious criminal issue that may have to do with other things that may not be seen as criminality. We must not politicize the matter. Even those outside the state must never politicize this crisis because, if we attempt to politicize it, then the crisis will spread beyond Kaduna and that would be a disaster, he said. I welcome the Abdulsalami committee. We need a body of arbitrators composed of both sides of the divide that the people can have confidence in to try to stem the tide, broker some peace and listen to all sides and come up with ways and manners that we can re-establish stability and lasting peace in that area, he added. All that is required is justice for every citizen in Southern Kaduna and all Nigerians living in any part of the country. Southern Kaduna has unfortunately become a bad reference point. Every minority group in Nigeria groans over socio-political exclusion, even as the majorities seem snug in perpetrating injustice. Muhammad Ajah is an advocate of humanity, peace and good governance in Abuja. E-mail [email protected] The Greater Accra Regional Campaign Coordinator of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) for the 2016 election, Sylvester Mensah, has distanced himself from circulating posters indicating his interest in contesting the next Presidential Primaries of the party. In a statement copied to citifmonline.com, Mr. Mensah said he was not behind the circulation of such posters and urged the media and the public to ignore them. My attention has been drawn to a poster in circulation announcing my interest in contesting the next Presidential Primaries of the National Democratic Congress (NDC). I wish to place on record that I have neither circulated nor caused to be circulated any such poster announcing my intentions. The posters, which bear Mr. Mensahs photo has the inscription, Sylvester Mensah, our hope for years to come and Our Choice for President, 2020. The posters also indicate that they were sponsored by a group calling itself; Believers in Sly. Find below Mr. Mensah's full statement My attention has been drawn to a poster in circulation announcing my interest in contesting the next Presidential Primaries of the National Democrat Congress (NDC). I wish to place on record that I have neither circulated nor caused to be circulated any such poster announcing my intentions. I am persuaded that our attention as NDC for the moment should be focused on understanding why we lost the 2016 general elections, rebuilding our party, strengthening the grassroots and restoring hope and confidence in our membership. I advise party members, the media, and the general public to ignore the poster/resume and remain steadfast and united for the task ahead in the coming years. Signed: Sylvester Mensah By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana The 60th Independence Anniversary Planning committee will be forfeiting any allowances due them. This was decided after the committee's maiden meeting on Saturday, January 28 according to a statement signed by its Chairperson, Ken Amankwa. The statement indicated that at the said meeting, members resolved to forfeit any and all allowance(s) and/or remuneration which may be due them. The service to be rendered by the committee members will be strictly on a pro bono basis. The statement explained that the committee's decision is motivated by President Nana Akufo-Addo's attitude towards public service. Further, we are determined to religiously be guided by H.E. the Presidents directive for members to be mindful of the difficult financial and economic circumstances of our country, regarding our 60th-anniversary commemoration, the statement added. President Akufo-Addo has already indicated that Ghana's 60th Independence Day celebration will be modest owing to the country's economic situation. The President gave the assurance when he inaugurated a 30-member committee on Thursday, to oversee the celebration. Ghana will on 6th March 2017, celebrate its Diamond Jubilee after gaining independence from Britain in 1957. The Independence Anniversary Planning will supervise all events and planning processes leading to the celebration. Other members of the committee include Historians, Professor Irene Odotei and Professor JH Nketiah, Senior Lecturer at the School of Communication Studies, University of Ghana, Professor Audrey Gadzekpo and a lawyer, Kweku Asirifi. Find below the full statement FORFEITURE OF ALLOWANCE(S) BY MEMBERS OF THE 60TH INDEPENDENCE ANNIVERSARY PLANNING COMMITTEE The 60th Independence Anniversary Planning committee held its maiden meeting on Saturday, the 28th of January, 2017 At the said meeting, members resolved to forfeit any and all allowance(s) and/or remuneration which may be due them. The service to be rendered by the committee members will be strictly on a pro bono basis. This decision was largely motivated by H.E the Presidents attitude towards public service, that is to say, selfless service to ones homeland. Further, we are determined to religiously be guided by H.E. the Presidents directive for members to be mindful of the difficult financial and economic circumstances of our country, regarding our 60th anniversary commemoration. We continue to count on the support and prayers of all Ghanaians in this endeavour. Thank you and may God continue to bless our homeland. SGD KEN AMANKWA (CHAIRMAN, 60TH INDEPENDENCE ANNIVERSARY PLANNING COMMITTEE) By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana Tamale Central Member of Parliament is accusing Minority Chief Whip Muntaka Mubarak of not being candid in the recent bribery scandal that has left the Minority side of Parliament even more divided. Inusah Fuseini told Super morning show host Kojo Yankson Monday, he suspects the Minority Chief Whip is rather covering up the rot in the house to protect what is left of Parliament's integrity. His comments on Monday is the new twist to a fluid bribery scandal that has hit the second arm of government just days after its personnel were sworn into office. The scandal broke out last Friday and was triggered by Bawku Central Member of Parliament, Mahama Ayariga who claimed the Minority MPs on the Appointment Committee of Parliament had been bribed with an amount of GHE3,000.00. According to him, they received the money from Muntaka Mubarak thinking it was their sitting allowance only for them to be told that the money came from the chairman of the Appointments Committee Joe Osei Owusu on behalf of the then Energy Minister Designate Boakye Agyarko who had been struggling to be approved unanimously without rancour. The money was supposed to bribe them into approving the nominee, he hinted stating they had to return the money. Ayariga was however unequivocal that at no point did he directly receive money from the Chairman, or from the nominee. His only key witness, Muntaka Mubarak, in an interview on Saturday, categorically denied giving him any money, swearing on his integrity, his belief in Allah and challenging Ayariga to prove his claim. The nominee, Boakye Agyarko who was alleged to have paid the bribe also swore on his life that he never gave out any money to bribe anybody to approve him and suggested that his lawyers have taken up the matter and will most probably take legal action. The Chairman of the Committee accused Ayariga as a liar and also hinted he will take the matter up in Court or at the Privileges Committee of Parliament. The House has issued a statement signed by the Director of Public Affairs Kate Addo denying the claim and describing it as "vexatious." But Mahama Ayariga remains resolute even in the face of the denials by the key witnesses in the scandal. Together with two other MPs, Alhassan Suhuyini, MP for Tamale North, and Okudzeto Ablakwa MP for North Tongu have all petitioned the Speaker to investigate the matter. The Majority side are also considering to haul Ayariga before the Privileges Committee of Parliament for disciplinary action to be taken against him. On Monday came new revelations. Tamale Central MP Inusah Fuseini who is not on the Appointments Committee but on the side of the Minority said he has spoken to the key actors in the scandal and can say on authority that the Minority Chief Whip is "not being candid" to the matter. "When I spoke to him, I realized he is worried. He feels that the integrity of Parliament is more important than uncovering the rot." "He places the integrity of Parliament higher and would rather cover up," Fuseini stated. He wondered why Muntaka Mubarak would swear by Allah on the matter and suggested it was not necessary. Was it sitting allowance? According to Inusah Fuseini all the Minority members on the Appointment Committee were each called and paid the amount. He added that at the point of receipt they all knew it was not the sitting allowance because allowances are only paid quarterly, contrary to the claim by Ayariga that they received the money initially believing it was their sitting allowance. He also revealed that it was Samson Ahi who later told the Minority MPs that the money came from the Energy Minister nominee, something that may have forced them to return the money. He confirmed that all the MPs on the Minority side of the Committee including Nii Lante Vanderpuye returned the money but suggested Nii Lante can only speak to the return of the money and not about the motive to bribe or where the money came from. Inusah Fuseini has called for an ad-hoc committee to investigate the matter. Story by Ghana|Myjoyonline.com|Nathan Gadugah Mahama Ayariga, Boakye Agyarko, Muntaka Mubarak, Joseph Osei Owusu 30.01.2017 LISTEN Member of Parliament (MP) for Bawku Central, Mahama Ayariga, has landed himself in hot waters following a claim he made that MPs were given bribes to approve the nomination of then Minister-designate of Energy and Petroleum Resources, Boakye Agyarko. Ayariga, who is the immediate-past Minister of Environment, Science and Technology, caused public uproar last weekend when he claimed on pro-National Democratic Congress (NDC) Radio Gold that his Minority Chief Whip, Muntaka Mohammed Mubarak, gave them (MPs) GH3,000 each to approve the nomination of Boakye Agyarko to become Minister of Energy. In the wake of the bribery allegation by Mahama Ayariga, the Majority Leader, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, has called for a thorough investigation into the matter to establish the truth or otherwise in order to preserve the image of the House. He said leadership must treat this as an urgent matter since the allegation was put up by somebody who is a member of the Appointments Committee and comes from 'within' in order to purge the institution of any wrongdoing. According to the majority leader who is also the Minister-designate for Parliamentary Affairs, the veracity of the allegation has to be properly established since it has the potency to inflict 'mortal wound' on the reputation of the legislature, adding that it (allegation) must not be wished away because it could seriously dent the image of the Seventh Parliament if the truth is not established. It is not a child's play for somebody to go about labeling people without any shred of evidence, he charged. Wild Allegation According to Ayariga, the Minority Chief Whip had said that the money was given to him by Chairman of the Appointments Committee, Joe Osei Owusu, who is also the First Deputy Speaker, and insisted later that Mr. Osei-Owusu had confirmed to him (Ayariga) that the money came from Mr. Agyarko. Mahama Ayariga then went on Radio Gold on Friday and said that the minority MPs outrightly rejected envelopes containing GH3,000 each when they found out from Mr. Osei-Owusu that the money was coming from Mr. Agyarko. According to Mahama Ayariga, the minority MPs first accepted the money because they thought that it was their sitting allowance; but he claimed he became alarmed and decided to return the money after they heard that it was coming from Mr. Agyarko to bribe them to approve his nomination. Radio Interview We were expecting our committee allowances from the chairman so when we were called by our leader to come and take our money we took it, knowing that that is our allowance, he claimed on Radio Gold in an interview. So, as for the quantum, we cannot tell how much money he (Agyarko) might have given to the chairman (Joseph Osei Owusu) , so there are all sorts of speculations about what sort of quantum he is alleged to have given but what we know is what came to us as individuals, that is what we can bear testimony to: whether it's GH1 or GH2, no matter how small it is, what we know is what was given to us and we found out later that it was coming from him (Agyarko) so as for the quantum, it's not important. He continued, For me, the most important thing is that we were expecting to be given our committee sitting allowances, and we were promised by our chairman that it would come very soon, and we were called to pick up money from our Whip (Muntaka). We picked it up and assumed that it was our allowances and then later we heard rumours in the house and we called our leader and asked him 'where is the money coming from?' He said it came from the chairman but the chairman said it was coming from Boakye Agyarko so that is where we realised that we (couldn't) take money from Boakye Agyarko, adding, So we asked him to take his money back; we are not interested. The quantum is insignificant, even if he had brought GH1 million, we would still return it to him. Under Pressure Mahama Ayariga is currently under pressure to substantiate the wild allegation following outright denials by Mr. Osei-Owusu, Alhaji Muntaka and Boakye Agyarko. On Saturday, Muntaka was on Joy FM swearing by 'Allah' that he never gave any money to Mahama Ayariga who is his best friend. Im a Muslim and Ayariga is also a Muslim. I want to swear by Allah that, Ive never given any money to Ayariga claiming that its from Hon. Joe Osei-Wusu, the Minority Chief Whip fumed. Muntaka said that from day one, the MPs had resolved that they were not going to take money from any nominee who appeared before the Vetting Committee and when the host of the programme, Samson Anyenini, asked what made it necessary to hold a meeting to say that they would not take money from a nominee, the line went dead. Chairman's Denial Mr. Osei-Owusu also denied ever giving money to Muntaka on the instructions of Mr. Agyarko saying, Hon Ayariga knows that I have never spoken to him or Muntaka or any member about money. I have never received any monies from Agyarko or anybody for that matter I will take steps that will protect my integrity, he said. There are not many people from the other side that I like anyway, for me to go to that level I cannot get into friendship with people I seem to be uncomfortable with to even go and give them bribes. I have been a lawyer for 27 years; can I just get up and go to anyone to offer them bribe? You can only do that with somebody you are friends with, he fumed. He said he was surprised because Ayariga had said it was a prank to pin down Boakye Agyarko since he had called Ex-President Mahama a corrupt person. Frivolous Claim In the ensuing debate, the Leadership of parliament issued a statement urging the public to disregard Mahama Ayariga's bribe claim. A statement issued in Accra and signed by acting Public Affairs Director, Kate Addo, described Mahama Ayariga's claim as 'frivolous' and 'vexatious.' We have noted with concern allegations that the leadership and members of the Appointments Committee have been bribed by some of the president's nominees to facilitate the recommendation of approval of their nomination as ministers to the House. Parliament would like to state categorically and without any equivocation that these allegations are frivolous and vexatious and should be disregarded. The statement further said, Parliament attaches a lot of importance to its constitutional duties and abhors practices that will not only affect its work but also bring the institution into disrepute. Therefore extreme care is taken and thorough background checks are made before chairpersons to the various committees are appointed. This is to ensure that the works they oversee are meticulously carried. The House concluded that, Parliament will therefore like to state that no such event has taken place and anybody having any information to the contrary, must resort to the laws of the land and take the appropriate action for redress. Agyarko's Reaction Meanwhile, Mr. Agyarko who has since been passed to become Minister of Energy and was subsequently sworn into office by President Akufo-Addo, has reacted to Mahama Ayariga's claim saying that his lawyers were studying the tapes to advise him on the line of action to take. He also said he was expecting Mahama Ayariga to substantiate the claim or face him in court. By William Yaw Owusu &Thomas Fosu Jnr 30.01.2017 LISTEN My attention has been drawn to various publications on some media outlets and social media suggesting that I intend to contest for President in 2020. For the avoidance of any doubt, I wish to put on record that I have no intention, whatsoever, to contest for any elective public office. I have served my country in various capacities and consider myself a statesman who is retired from active politics. God bless Ghana. SGD Dr. Kwabena Duffuor 30.01.2017 LISTEN Nobody can climb a baobab tree with shoes on his feet. Truth and falsehood do not go together. The lies will fall down Swahili Proverb. The sweet political rhythm blaring from the radio continues unabated. It has become so intense that those apathetic to political happenings in the country could not help but join in the political dance. What a beautiful dance it is! The vetting of ministerial nominees by the Appointments Committee continues in earnest. The vetting itself has generally been very smooth. I've seen only one glitch so far; and that glitch almost marred the beauty of the process. The unwarranted outburst by Alhassan Suhuyini is what I refer to. He asked an unfair question and the Chairman of the committee disallowed it. Suhuyini wanted Boakye Agyarko, Energy Minister-Designate, to confirm he wasn't part of the group that was engaged in fraud in the nominee's previous place of employment. What made the question unfair and unnecessary was the fact that Suhuyini already knew ten named officers had been responsible. The Chairman, therefore, decided to disallow the question. Suhuyini, however, did not take the Chairman's action lightly. He spat fire and brimstone as he accused the Chairman of bias. He later apologized for the dishonourable conduct. It is more than obvious that Suhuyini's question was more for mischief purposes than any other thing. Perhaps, he had forgotten that he was no longer in the studios of Ghana's version of Radio Rwanda, where he used to churn out all manner of propaganda without any inhibition. He has, however, partially achieved his aim. Aside intending to lampoon the nominee, he also sought to become relevant in media discussions on the vetting saga. And that has been achieved, hasn't it? Without a doubt, Yaw Osafo Marfo and Boakye Agyarko are so far the two most impressive among the nominees. Isn't it very ironic that the two most impressive nominees were the ones whose approval met the greatest opposition? They were eventually cleared, but not without a controversy. Few minutes before all the thirteen nominees were approved by the House of Honourables, we all heard Mahama Ayariga screaming, bribe oo, bribe. He subsequently alleged that Boaakye Agyarko had offered bribe to the Appointments Committee in order to be approved. Taking a cue from Nicodemus in the Bible, many of my compatriots asked how that could be. Yes, the minority members were flexing their small muscles; but everyone knows they lack the capacity to annul his nominations. So why should he pay bribe to be approved? Having mentioned Mohammed Muntaka, the Minority Chief-Whip, as the one who gave him the said money, which he subsequently returned, we all waited with bated breath for Muntaka to speak. He did finally speak on Joy FM's Newsfile, and it was a thunderbolt. Muntaka swore by the Bearded Old Man above that he never gave Ayariga any such money, and dared him to produce proof to support his claim. It said that he who alleges must prove. If the saying is anything to go by, then it means the burden of proof is now on Mahama Ayariga. Walahi, I just can't help but wonder how he could prove such a wild allegation! Do you remember the Bugri Naabu bribery allegation against President Ogwanfunu? Even after producing a car and its documentation, which could be traced to a company belonging to the President's Aide, many people still doubted his claim. How then does Ayariga expect us to believe his story without any evidence? I swear by Kwame Sefa-Kayi's baldhead that many would doubt the claim even if it came from Yesu Kristo himself! Following the bribery accusation and the denial, many have propounded all manner of theories about the political future of the main opposition party. I leave that discussion for another day. But one thing I can say is that there is going to be a lot of mistrust among the leadership of Zu-za in Parliament. You see, both Ayariga and Muntaka cannot be right. One of them is definitely lying through his teeth. The liar has sown a very poisonous seed, and one can only imagine the disastrous consequences in future. By the way, in a country where the likes of clueless Oti Bless, inexperienced Okudjeto Ablakwa and loud-mouthed Fiifi Kwetey could become ministers, how could there be questions on the suitability of experienced folks like Osafo Marfo and Boakye Agyarko as ministers? Ours is indeed a very warped system! It is said that, The mouth of the elder may have an offensive smell, but has no lie. That may be true for many elders, but not the ones playing chaskele with the truth in this country. See you next week for another interesting konkonsa, Deo volente! Professor Kenneth Agyemang Attafuah, a popular criminologist and human rights lawyer, has been appointed acting Executive Secretary of the National Identification Authority (NIA). A statement signed by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo before emplaning for the Africa Union (AU) Summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, last Friday, tasked the learned man to take charge until an exhaustive consultation had been done with the appropriate bodies. I hereby appoint you to act as Executive Secretary of the National Identification Authority, pending receipt of the constitutionality required advice of the governing council of the authority in consultation with the Public Services Commission, the president stated, adding, May I take this opportunity to congratulate you formally on your appointment. The statement, which was copied to Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, the Chief of Staff, the Secretary to the President and Chief Director of the Office of the President, underscored, Kindly indicate your acceptance or otherwise of this appointment. Prof Attafuah appears to be excited with the position as he was part of the stakeholders who attended the recent meeting chaired by Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia over the national identification project. Until recently, Prof. Attafuah was the Dean of Faculty of Law at the Central University. He was formerly the Executive Secretary of the NIA under the erstwhile Kufuor's New Patriotic Party (NPP) administration. He was subsequently sacked by then President John Evans Atta Mills, who said openly that Prof Attafuah did not share the ideals of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) government. He was the Executive Secretary of the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) set up by the Kufuor government to 'heal' wounds caused by previous governments, particularly Jerry John Rawlings' military junta the Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC). He was also Head of the Investigation Department at the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ). Prof Attafuah, a mediator, management consultant with an impeccable human rights advocacy record, is the Managing Solicitor of Ken Attafuah Law Place based in Accra. In March 2014, he broke his silence when he said the excuse used by the NDC government to relieve him of his duties as the Executive Secretary of the National Identification Authority was unjustifiable. Answering questions at the 5th Re Akoto Memorial lectures organized by the students of Ghana School of Law to mark its 51st Law Week celebrations under the theme Upholding fundamental human rights: Role of the law student, Prof Attafuah said, The cycle of reprisal and political vendetta must not be allowed to continue. It has stalled the development of this country and we do not seem to end the stalemate. Asked to react to the tag of incompetence used by the late President Mills against him, the eloquent legal gem posited, I cannot be described as somebody who is incompetent. I remember Valery Sawyer calling to express her gratitude to me for the good work I did at the NIA and that I was one of the hardworking individuals she had ever seen. This clearly cannot be said to be incompetence. By William Yaw Owusu The Member of Parliament for Tamale North, Alhassan Suhuyini is asking President Nana Akufo-Add0 suspend the nomination of Mr. Boakye Agyarko as the Energy Minister until investigations into the bribery accusations against him are concluded. Mr. Suhuyini, along with two other Minority members of the Appointments Committee; Mahama Ayariga and Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, MPs for Bawku Central and North Tongu, have written to the Speaker of Parliament calling for a thorough investigation of the bribery claims against the Mr. Agyarko. Speaking on the Citi Breakfasts Show, Mr. Suhuyini said the requested enquiry into the allegations would bring finality to the corruption allegations, but in the meantime, he insisted Mr. Agyarko's nomination should be stayed. Boakye Agyarko Mr. Boakye Agyarko, if you ask me; I think the President should stay his nomination and then after the enquiry let's all request the Speaker to do the needful by setting up whatever enquiry process and address the issues speedily and then take a decision. Instead of us focusing on who is lying and who is telling the truth, let us push for the process to work. Let us understand the various angles and let us look at how finality can be brought to this matter. Finality to me can be brought to this matter through an enquiry that will establish the way forward, the MP said. The claims surfaced last Thursday with Mr. Ayariga accusing Mr. Agyarko of bribing the 10 Minority members of the Appointments Committee with GHc3,000 to pass him. Mr. Ayariga alleged that the money was given to the Minority Chief Whip, Mubarak Mohammed Muntaka by the Chairman of the Appointments Committee, Joseph Osei-Owusu for onward disbursement; a claim Mr Suhuyini and Mr Ablakwa both confirmed. Although the Chief Whip and the Chairman have denied the claims, the three have insisted they were certain about the allegations. By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana The attention of Nzema Youth Association (NYA) has been drawn to an intense lobbying by Dr. Ben Asante and his surrogates to enable him occupy the enviable position of the Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Gas Company. This antics and machinations by Ben Asante, is what the NYA has vowed to resist and implore His Excellency Nana Akuffo Addo, President of the Republic not to cave in to those lobbyist, as Dr. Ben Asante; a Petro-chemical Engineer with specialty in natural gas is an NDC mole and technically bankrupt. A conclusion we have drawn from his dealings with Ghana Gas as a consultant brought in from Texas in 2010 by the NDC government to help kick start the Early Phase Gas Infrastructure Project. In fact, he was the Chief technical advisor to the Former CEO - Dr. Sipa Yankey. Today, five years down the line, the realities from the advices and decisions carried through by Ghana Gas makes Dr. Ben Asante a Misfit to the CEO position. Here are the facts; Foremost, the decision to relocate the Early Phase Gas Infrastructure Project from the Domunli enclave (site that had been concluded with all the geophysical test done) in the Jomoro District to Atuabo in the Ellemble District was masterminded by him to promote a parochial political agenda of his pay masters, most especially Hon. Armah Kofi Buah - then Minister of Energy and his surrogate, Dr. Sipa Yankey. Subsequent to the above, we would proceed by interrogating Dr. Ben Asante's advice on the following landmark decision carried through by GNGC. They are as below; What was Ben Asante's input in the controversial relocation of the Gas Processing Plant from the Domunli enclave to Atuabo, knowing very well that Atuabo does not have the geophysical advantages for the construction of a Calm Buoy to facilitate the transport of NLNG from the suppose NLNG plant which was an integral part of the Gas Master Plan? Where was Dr. Ben Asante when the decision was taken to extend a lean gas pipeline to a " No Man's Land" in the Prestea area knowing very well that an extension of the pipeline to the Tema Power Enclave where Gas is most needed could have averted this country the power crises which crippled this country's economy? What was Dr. Ben Asante's input when Ghana Gas was recording all those huge cost over-runs due to poor technical decisions that shot up the entire project cost beyond its $750,000,000 threshold? What was Dr. Ben Asante's technical input when GNGC delayed to tie- in the Atuabo Gas pipeline to the West Africa Gas Pipeline at Aboadze in order to make Gas readily available to the Tema Power Enclave? What was his input when GNGC decided to delay the construction of the LPG loading gantry project to pave way for a privately owned LPG Bay called Amorkyi Quantum Terminal to set up and enjoy monopoly for the usage of their terminal? Perhaps, to allow his pay masters to have a monopoly. Isn't it Dr Asante's vouch attempt to the position of Director of Projects at GNGC and his subsequent posting to Petroleum Commission; a position that he did not seem to like that is prompting his over-arching quest to the position of CEO of GNGC? In fact, this and many more technical ineptitude demonstrated by the Former CEO with the tacit support of Dr Asante that made this country incurred avoidable cost over- runs. Notwithstanding the above, we are of the firm belief that Dr Ben Asante was in bed with the NDC Government to push a parochial agenda. We also have it on record that when his name popped up as the CEO to be, there was jubilation amongst some prominent Senior Management staffs at GNGC perhaps to celebrate one of their own who is likely to cover- up for them. Whiles we have nothing against Dr Ben Asante's person, we strongly believe that his imminent appointment to the CEO position of GNGC will not bring radical positive changes to the company which has been a "sleeping giant'. What GNGC needs now is a radical shift from the past in order to make Ghana great. Thank you. Mark Asma President - NYA Who paid who, and who are the recipients of the alleged bribe money from President Nana Addos nominee for Energy? The brouhaha about the bribery scandal has been in the news over the week and some minority members are at each others neck with claims which are yet to be justified. Former Deputy Education Minister, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has said that minority chief whip, Muhammad Muntaka lied over his claims that the minority members of the house were not paid any amount of money for them to approve the Presidents nominee for Energy. Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa maintained on NEAT FMs morning show Ghana Montie that, he indeed was paid a sum of GHC3,000 by the Asawase MP and hence was shocked when Muntaka said on Saturday that money did not exchange hands before Boakye Agyarko was approved by the house. Truly, we were given moneyI was shocked when Muntaka denied the bribery allegation, someone called to inform me; but I was shocked until later in the day when I heard the tapeI must say I wasnt surprised, I was shocked, he said. Genesis of Boakye Agyarko bribery scandal Bawku Central MP, Mahama Ayariga alleged on Accra-based Radio Gold on Friday that the Energy Minister designate, Boakye Agyarkko who was hailed by Ghanaians for outstanding performance before Parliaments Appointment Committee sneaked an amount of GHC100, 000 to the house to be distributed to members on both sides of the committee. According to him, each of the members from the minority side of Parliaments appointment committee was given an amount of GH3,000. He said he took the money because they had discussed issues about their sitting allowances with the minority chief whip, Muntaka Mubarak and he promised to find out from the Chairman of the Committee, Joe Osei-Owusu as to when the allowances will be paid. Muntaka Mubarak, he said, later gave the amount to them saying the money was coming from the Chairman of the committee only for them to hear it was coming from Boakye Agyarko. This allegation has been denied by the Chairman of the Appointments Committee, Joe Osei-Owusu and Muhammad Muntaka with the former swearing by the Quoran that he never paid any money to Mahama Ayariga and the Minority members of the committee. But Okudzeto said, he was surprised especially when Muntaka who gave the money to him and also chaired a meeting of the minority caucus, denied the claims. I find it a bit disingenuous of Jim Vokal, in his Local View column, to point out that OpenSky Policy Institute is funded by the billionaire Buffett family without also pointing out the Platte Institute of which he is CEO was founded in 2007 by a billionaire, Pete Ricketts, who then became the governor of Nebraska ("Dont believe the spin against income tax reform," Jan. 22). Ghana's health authorities have been urged to view community partnership in the implementation of primary healthcare (PHC) services as central to the success of the health concept. According to health specialists at a day's workshop for journalists on PHC, government-community partnership was important in developing effective, sustainable models of primary healthcare in low-income countries. PHC which is an essential healthcare made universally accessible to individuals and acceptable to them through full participation and at a cost the community and country can afford is the surest way to attain universal health coverage (UHC) in Ghana, they said. The workshop was attended by over 30 health journalists and civil society representatives working to promote health. Participants were schooled on the history behind the PHC concept and the elements that characterise the practice. The media's role and contribution to attaining and improving PHC in Ghana was also highlighted. Dr George Amofa, former Director General of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), presenting the history of PHC stated that there has been a shift in the original concept of the PHC as a result of government's over-reliance on donor partners to fund PHC. According to him, the over-reliance on donor partners for primary health interventions, especially at the community level, obstructs the underlining purpose of primary healthcare (PHC). Explaning further, Dr Amofa said the type of health interventions implemented at the PHC level is selected based on donor funding, which most of the time does not often involve the people or reflect their health condition. Citing an example of the CHPS compound initiative that has greatly helped in PHC delivery in hard-to-reach areas in the country, Dr Amofa said the building of a CHPS compound defies the original concept of CHPS, in that the original concept was for the health officer to live among the community members and her place of abode is what is referred to as the 'CHPS compound', however, the construction of the CHPS compound ('mini clinics') has a high tendency to making the health officers stationary. He said it behoves government and ministries of health, especially in developing countries, not to forget the principles and philosophies underlying the original PGC concept. Dr Amofa, therefore, called for the implementation of policies which would ensure equal distribution and access to health interventions to revert the inverted pyramid dilemma in healthcare delivery where the few rich have large access to the limited health resources. Community Involvement Dr Robert Mensah, a Reproductive Health Specialist at the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), called on health institutions to involve community members in health promotion programmes, saying, When people are informed of what they have to do, they can help themselves and be champions of their own health care. He said community involvement is a shift in emphasis from external agencies supplying health services to the people of a community becoming active participants in their own healthcare. In order words, they become partners in healthcare, assessing their needs, involving themselves in decision-making, planning and evaluating the care received, he said. Dr Mensah also stated that locally endemic disease prevention and control, expanded programmes of immunisation against major infectious diseases, maternal and child healthcare, including family planning nutritional food supplement, and adequate supply of safe and basic nutrition, treatment of communicable and non-communicable disease and promotion of mental health and safe water and sanitation are key elements that should characterise PC services. Media The availability of health information through accurate journalistic reportage steadily increasing every year and has led to a variety of effective in the behaviour of recipients but lacks the discussion of important issues such as evidence quality, cost and risk versus benefits, journalists should ensure evidence-based reporting, he said. He, thus, advised participants to exhibit a high sense of professionalism by being precise and getting the medical and scientific terminologies right. By Jamila Akweley Okertchiri The Ghanaian delegation attending the 28th Africa Union Summit in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa is hoping to grab one of the vacant top positions in the Africa Union (AU) Commission. On the list of persons vying for the Deputy Chairperson position of the AU Commission position is Ambassador Thomas Kwesi Quartey, former Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, who was one-time Executive Secretary to former President John Dramani Mahama. President Akufu-Addo has submitted his name for consideration for the top job, and government is hopeful he would become the next Deputy Chairperson after the elections today. The government is counting on his strong credentials in the contest. The continental body, made up of 54 member countries, is also expected to elect a new AU Commission chairperson to replace outgoing leader, Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who is not seeking a second term after finishing her four-year tenure. Heads of states and dignitaries have been arriving in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, where the AU is based, to attend the continental summit and to lobby for their preferred candidates for Africas top jobs. Five candidates intend to replace Dlamini-Zuma, a former South African Minister and first female AU leader, who is planning to take over from her former husband, President Jacob Zuma, as South Africas fourth democratically elected president since the end of apartheid in 1994. Contestants Al Jazeera reports that Amina Mohamed, Kenyas Foreign Minister, is widely seen as a front-runner for the job. Amina has the backing of almost all Anglophone countries. Amina, who served as UNEPs Deputy Executive Director, is renowned for her critique of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Since her appointment as Kenyas top diplomat in 2013, Amina has continually criticised the Hague-based court over its handling of African cases, especially those involving sitting heads of state. Her anti-ICC stance has won her many admirers. She successfully campaigned to get the ICC to drop its cases against Kenyas President Uhuru Kenyatta, and his deputy, William Ruto. Amina, 55, also served in the World Trade Organization. Many people have argued that she would obtain for better trade agreements with the rest of the world for Africa. Abdoulaye Bathily, Senegalese diplomat and academic Bathily is seen by many analysts as a strong candidate for the AU chair seat. He served as a UN mediator in the Central African Republic and Burundi. Bathily has strong support from Morocco which could complicate his bid. Morocco, the only country on the continent that is not part of the AU, withdrew from the union in 1984 to protest against the admission of disputed Western Sahara territories. Ghana would also prefer to see someone else other than Bathily as AU Chair. Accra is campaigning for its former Deputy Foreign Minister Thomas Kwesi Quartey to get the deputy chair position. Quartey cannot obtain the position if Bathily becomes the chair because AU protocol forbids two candidates from the same region from holding the two most senior posts of the organisation at the same time. Another headache for Bathilys bid is that Nigeria the continents biggest economy and most populous country, is seeking the position of Peace and Security Commissioner, which Abuja will not get due to protocol if Bathily gets the AU Chair post. Algeria, Moroccos rival, would rather have anyone at the AUs top position except Rabats man. But Senegal can still count on the support of many fellow Francophone countries. Moussa Faki Mahamat, Chadian Foreign Minister Mahamat is another candidate who could snatched the seat from the favourites, Amina and Bathily. The 56-year-old and father of five is not new to the workings of the AU, having served as the chair of the AUs Economic, Social and Cultural Council previously. Before taking up his current post, Mahamat was his countrys prime minister. His boss, Chadian President Idriss Deby, who has ruled the country since 1990, is the current chairperson of the AU. As the AU chair, Deby, who is not in the good books of rights groups for alleged repression of critics, wields enormous power within the organisation. The candidacy of two Francophones Chadian and Senegalese for the top seats will also not help Faki or Bathily, as it could potentially lead to a split in Francophone countries votes. Pelonomi Venson-Moitoi, Veteran politician from Botswana A veteran politician from Botswana and a close ally of President Seretse Khama, Venson-Moitoi, is also vying for the post, although reports say she has a slim chance of winning. Venson-Moitoi, 65, is the current foreign minister of the diamond-producing southern African country. The former journalist-turned-politician has served in her countrys cabinet since 2001. Mba Mokuy Mokuy served as a senior adviser to Equatorial Guineas President. Mokuy has a slim chance of becoming the chairperson of AU, according to reports. Before landing his current post, Mokuy, 51, served as a senior adviser to President Teodoro Obiang. Mokuys boss, President Obiang, has ruled the former Spanish colony for the past 37 years and is the continents longest serving president. By Charles Takyi-Boadu, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Juliette Samuel 30.01.2017 LISTEN A Mississippi woman looking for a late night burger may have unwittingly gotten something extra with her order, after a drive-through worker was accused of smearing menstrual blood and saliva on a fast food order. Sky Juliette Samuel, 18, was working the late shift at Jacks Family Restaurant in Columbus, Mississippi, earlier this month when police suspect she committed the unsanitary act. Juliette Samuel, a mother of a young daughter, had also worked at a Krispy Kreme location just down the road from the Jacks in Columbus, but no longer works there, an employee there told DailyMail.com, referring other questions to a general manager who was not immediately available. The incident at the Jacks Family Restaurant occurred on January 7 around 10:20pm. A woman from nearby Tupelo, Mississippi, pulled up to the drive-through of the restaurant, located on a state route that runs toward her hometown, witnesses say. Sources say the woman ordered a Sprite and a Big Jack, the southern fast food chains $3.69 signature burger, which it describes as a big, juicy beef patty stacked up with pickles, onions, lettuce and tomato. But Juliette Samuel, working the drive-through, got in some kind of dispute with the customer, a female co-worker said. This woman got an attitude with Sky, the witness said in a text message later made public on Facebook. Juliette Samuel responded to the perceived slight by smearing her own menstrual blood on the bread of the burger with a finger, and licking the cheese, the witness said. The co-worker alerted her mother, Tabatha Hollins, who went public with the accusations after she says Jacks Family Restaurant dismissed her private complaint to the company. We called the store to try and talk to the general manager and they wouldnt give her the numbers to get a hold of a manager. We then called corporate who again did nothing!! Hollins wrote on a January 10 Facebook post that has since been shared over 4,000 times. The public post drew thousands of horrified reactions in the comments. Samuel reacted to the mounting controversy later on January 10 in a public Facebook comment that has since been deleted. Lol S**t Kms! the teen mother wrote in response to a friend who asked her to explain herself. The b***h shouldnt have gotten smart n said all s**t she said over intercom mfs act like they aint never did no stupid s**t idgaf about this s**t tbf. The comment was followed by emojis sticking their tongue out, grinning, and crying with laughter. The woman believed to have ordered the tainted burger heard about the accusations and came forward on January 13 to file a criminal complaint, sparking a police investigation. On January 21, police in Columbus announced an arrest warrant for Samuel on charges of 'knowingly selling unwholesome bread or drink', a felony with a potential five-year jail sentence. Shortly after the announcement, Jacks Family Restaurants corporate office in Birmingham, Alabama, released a statement saying it fully supported the police investigation and had hired its own third-party investigator, according to The Dispatch of Columbus. -Daily Mail Napo, exchanging pleasantries with some of the Muslim leaders in Kumasi during the function The Minister of Education, Dr. Mathew Opoku Prempeh, says he will work tirelessly to promote education in deprived Zongo communities to make the youth in those area productive in future. He bemoaned situations whereby school-going children in the Zongo areas drop out of school, stressing that he will do everything possible to reverse the trend. The minister, popularly known as 'Napo,' disclosed this while addressing Muslim leaders and chiefs during the 21st Anniversary of Maulidin Nabiyyi (Prophet Muhammed birthday in Kumasi on Sunday. He also promised to work to promote education across the country, indicating that his primary objective is to ensure that education becomes accessible to every school-going Ghanaian child without discrimination. Arabic Teachers Allowance Napo, who is also the Member of Parliament (MP) for Manhyia South, stated that the Akufo-Addo-led government would reintroduce allowances for Arabic teachers in the country, saying This will come very quickly. He said the Arabic teachers would be well motivated, especially through the payment of allowances and other incentives so that they would impart their knowledge to the students to help them to become influential in future. The Education Minister also announced that Arabic would soon be made an examinable subject as captured in the New Patriotic Party (NPP) manifesto, noting that education of all forms ought to be given maximum attention and support. Fight Poverty Napo was of the view that poverty in society could be alleviated if many people are educated. He called on all and sundry to play various roles to help improve education in the country. Ghana's Peace He stressed the need for Ghanaians from different tribal, ethnic and religious backgrounds to continue to live in peace without any prejudice to help accelerate Ghana's growth. Zongo Dev't Fund The Education Minister gave assurance that the Zongo Development Fund would be captured in the next budget of the NPP government. He added that the growth of the Zongo areas is central to the NPP government. Prayers Meanwhile, the Muslim leaders, chiefs and Imams, who were at the religious programme, prayed fervently for Napo, who was attending his maiden public event as Minister of Education to make his tenure successful. The Islamic clerics and Imams also prayed for Allah's continual protection and blessings for President Akufo-Addo to enable him to fulfill his promises to lead the country onto the path of prosperity. From I.F. Joe Awuah Jnr., Kumasi An opinion leader in the East Axim Traditional Area, Obaahemaa Eza Nkrumah, has stated that the fraud allegations levelled against Catherine Afeku, Minister-designate for Tourism, Arts and Culture, are unfounded. According to her, the allegations do not only tarnish the image of the minister-designate but also brings the East Axim Traditional Area into disrepute. My town has not gained much from national development activities and when President Akufo-Addo campaigned in my area, I placed my request before him and he said he could not promise anything, but if God willing he becomes the next president he will address the issue. So I was very elated when I heard that he had chosen from my traditional area, his minister designate for tourism, culture and creative arts. Then while preparing to come and congratulate him for his victory and thank him for keeping his word, I heard this sad fraud story, she said. Obaahemaa Esa Nkrumah mentioned that this is the second time the same issue of fraud allegation has been levelled against Catherine although she was exonerated the first time the allegation was investigated. Obaahemaa said the allegation first popped up in 2007 when Catherine Afeku was elected as a Member of Parliament (MP). I call on all Ghanaians, especially the media, to disregard the fraud story as it is the agenda of some people to destroy the reputation of Catherine Afeku and deny the people of Axim their share of the national cake, she added. By Jamila Akweley Okertchiri The management of Ghana Post has interdicted the company's Head of ICT, Godfred Aboagye, for embezzling funds of the company. This follows protests by some workers of Ghana Post against Mr. Aboagye and demands for the removal of the companys Managing Director and Human Resources for allegedly shielding Mr. Aboagyes dubious deals. The workers contend that these deals have caused financial loss to the company and the State. Speaking to Citi News, the Divisional Chairman of Ghana Post, Phoyon Isaac Bruce Mensah, confirmed that Mr. Aboagye had been interdicted, explaining that this meant, he is on indefinite leave without pay and will hand over all properties of Ghana Post in his care to the management. Mr. Mensah, however, indicated that the workers were expecting an arrest to follow the interdiction. The first thing we were thinking they could do is that they would interdict him and get him arrested but he has been asked to report to the head of investigations twice a week and he can escape. We will need a forensic audit to be done so that if he is exonerated, fine. But if he is culpable of the offences that we have raised against him then the law must take its course. He should be arrested and then investigations done by an independent body. EOCO [Economic and Organised Crime Office] is there and they can do that. The BNI is there and they can also do that, he stated. By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta says he is committed to creating wealth and improving peoples lives by ensuring economic freedom as the mainstay of the economy. He also promised in response to his vision for his tenure the commitment to cleaning up our public finances, managing the enormous debt that "we have inherited in order to create the needed fiscal space, invest in critical infrastructure, and empower the private sector to create jobs. Mr Ofori-Atta who assumed office as Finance Minister brings to the Ministry over 30 years experience in the Ghanaian and international financial sector. Together with 12 other Ministers-designate, they were approved by Parliament on Friday, January 27, after going through a successful vetting process by the Appointments Committee of Parliament and later sworn-in by the President. Ministers immediate priority is to protect the public purse, stabilize Ghanas macro economy, spearhead anti-corruption, increase revenue and introduce policy initiatives to grow the economy for the private sector to thrive and create jobs. The legacy of the Ministry will be a professional institution with global standards in treasury and risk management to give effect to enforcing the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA), he added. He intends to work hard to get the economy growing eventually at double digits through policies and strategies that will increase revenue, reduce waste, control spending, grow the economy to create jobs. The Minister noted that the three-year International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme was needed to achieve fiscal consolidation, though it is presently in a delicate state. I am committed to an IMF programme which addresses our current predicaments and will ensure that we also meet all the necessary structural benchmarks that may be suggested. As our president has stated, we now need to 'get Ghana working again in order to create jobs,' he said. He further assured that he will deliver with Gods guidance on the New Patriotic Party's 2016 manifesto pledges in spite of the daunting economic challenges. He is optimistic that in the Presidents first budget, there will be a clear path towards fulfilling the manifesto pledges and opening economic space for the private sector to thrive. Story by Ghana | Myjoyonline.com | Abubakar Ibrahim | Joy Business The Appointments Committee of Parliament has resumed vetting of ministerial nominees amidst raging controversy that MPs were given monies to approve a nominee. Three ministers-designates are set to appear before the committee. Monitoring and Evaluation Minister-designate Anthony Akoto Osei Works and Housing Minister-designate Samuel Atta Akyea and Environment, Science and Technology Minister-designate Prof. Kwabena Frimpong Boateng are expected to appear. But there is huge public interest in the MPs themselves to get to the bottom of the bribery saga. Cracks are appearing in the Minority as some of its leadership have been fingered in the saga. Bawku Central MP Mahama Ayariga has pointed to Minority Chief Whip as the one who was given the money to be shared to the MPs. He has denied this, putting his caucus member in an uncomfortable position of seeking fresh witnesses to the money-sharing claim. Joe Osei Owusu comments on the bribery saga. He says he is presiding over todays session with a lot of pain. He says he proposed to the Majority leader to have the committee re-constitued in order to keep public confidence in the committee. But after a careful review of the Standing Orders they concluded this is not practicable. He says Ghanaians have become a very cynical people and he can understand why the public may not trust us again. He hopes investigations into the saga will start and end soon enough so that our integrity will be restored. He stresses that Appointment Committee members meet and decide on a nominee immediately after sitting is over. If anybody wants to bribe us, I suggest he pays the bribe before we start. there is no room to bribe us, he says. Minority leader Haruna Iddrisu also breaks his silence on the matter says I will support full scale investigation into the matter to establish the truth of the matter. Meanwhile the nominee for Monitoring and Evaluation Minister-designate Dr. Anthony Akoto Osei is answering questions on his CV. He is asked to explain a position on his CV a dorm director in a university in the US. He says it was called the Third World Dorm because it was full of students from Asia and Africa. He was matured enough to be in charge for two years and got free accommodation as a result. His work is to work with ministers to achieve results in the promises detailed in the partys manifesto. For example, the government wants to restore teachers and nursing trainee allowances and so he will work with the Education ministry to implement this according to agreed timelines. He gives another example with the Minister for Re-organisation who is charged to create some new regions by August 2018. This minister will need support from him to meet his target. Once Cabinet approves the performance targets, his work kickstarts. OB Amoah: I suspect the nominees work will dovetail into the work of the Chief of Staff. He wants a response from the nominee. AO: Chief of Staff handles the presidency but he is going to handle the results-churning machinery of government. He is to ensure that government machinery works. MP says he finds it difficult to understand nominees role. We have a whole senior-minister cordinating some ministeries and in each Ministry there are M & E directors to track results. AO: I am looking from information from political heads to satisfy the president. The ministers may use their M&E departments to generate information he needs. My job is to police my colleagues, he simplifies his assignment. He says he suspects that there could be a retreat for all ministers and the Vice-President Dr. Bawumia to determine targets and plans to implement governments agenda with clear timelines. -Myjoyonline The Minority leader, Haruna Iddrisu has declared his support for a full scale investigation into a bribery scandal that has hit the Appointments Committee. According to him, the speaker of Parliament and the leadership of the house must take up the matter to ascertain its veracity or otherwise. He made the comments at the sitting of the committee on Monday. The Member of Parliament for Bawku Central, Mahama Ayariga on Friday [January 27, 2017] accused the Energy Minister, Boakye Agyarko of bribing the ten Minority members of the Appointments Committee with GHc3,000 each when he realized that the Minority had refused to pass him for the position following some comments he made about former president John Mahama during his vetting. Mr. Ayariga alleged that the money was given to the Minority Chief Whip, Mubarak Mohammed Muntaka by the Chairman of the Appointments Committee, Joseph Osei-Owusu for onward disbursement; a claim other minority members including Alhassan Suhuyini and Okudzeto Ablakwa confirmed. Although the Chief Whip and the Chairman have denied the claims, the trio have insisted they were certain about the allegation and have called on the speaker of parliament to initiate an internal investigation into their claim. Their leader, Haruna Iddrisu who have remained silent over the issue since it broke last Friday said he supported the call for an investigation to help unravel the truth and save Parliament from public ridicule. I will and we will support full scale investigations to ascertain the veracity of otherwise of any matter that bothers on the reputations of persons and parliament; including a full scale a parliamentary enquiries which may be at parliament's privileges committee, he said. He added that, I expect that the speaker of parliament and leadership will take up the matter and establish the truth or otherwise of what is being speculated around which is undermining the integrity and the work of this committee. The Appointments Committee of Parliament resumed sitting today [January 30, 2017] having suspended its vetting of ministerial nominees last Wednesday [January 25, 2017]. MPs writes to speaker over allegations Three of the Minority members of the vetting committee Mahama Ayariga, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa and Alhassan Sayibu Suhuyini; MPs for Bawku Central, North Tongu and Tamale north constituencies respectively have written to the Speaker of Parliament calling for a thorough investigation of the bribery claims against the Minister of Energy, Boakye Agyarko. The three, in a joint letter addressed to the Speaker of Parliament, want the House to initiate an internal investigation to ascertain the veracity of their claims against the minister. 'Osei-Owusu threatens court action Meanwhile, the Chairman of the Appointments Committee and MP for Bekwai, Joseph Osei-Owusu has threatened he will seek redress in court to clear his name from the scandal. According to him, he has no idea why Ayariga mentioned him as being at the forefront to receive the bribe money since he does not recollect ever doing so. He has also given indications he may call for a review of the Committee to allow it run effectively as it ves other ministerial nominees named by President Akufo-Addo. By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana Follow @jnyabor Accra, 30th January, 2017 - A study supported by the United Nations University Institute for Natural Resources in Africa (UNU-INRA) confirmed that access to credit and technology can increase crop yield among smallholder farmers in Africa. The research findings, reported in the Institutes working paper entitled Crop Yield Volatility among Smallholder Farmers revealed that smallholder farmers who had access to credit obtained an increased yield of 35.5 percent per acre compared to their counterparts who did not have access to credit. Similarly, the results showed that smallholder farmers who adopted farming technologies such as improved seeds and fertility-restoring technologies like organic manure, had about 65.7 percent increase in yields per acre than farmers who did not adopt any farming technology. The research, led by Dr. James Atta Peprah, explored factors that influence crop yield volatility among rural and urban smallholder farmers in Ghana. According to Dr. Peprah and the research team, the findings confirm the significant roles that credit and yield-raising technologies such as improved seed varieties, fertility-restoring and conservation technologies can play in improving the yield of rural smallholder farmers. He noted that the results back calls to make credit available to rural farmers to purchase farming inputs so as to increase their productivity. The study therefore calls on policy makers to strengthen existing agricultural policies to target reduction of the cost of credit for smallholder farmers so as to enhance their access to credit. It also admonishes financial institutions to put in place special packages for farmers as well as measures to ensure that funds given out to farmers for agricultural activities are not diverted for other purposes. In addition to access to credit, the paper calls for education and training of smallholder farmers, especially by Agriculture Extension Officers, on the use of technology. More specifically, the study is advocating for farmers to be trained and advised to adopt yield-raising technologies such as organic manure, improved seeds suitable for local conditions, and modern agricultural machinery to facilitate their farming activities for poverty reduction. In the view of Dr. Elias T. Ayuk, Director of UNU-INRA, this research empirically endorses calls for policies to encourage smallholder farmers access to credit and modernization of agriculture to ensure food security in Africa. The study, he indicated, is in line with UNU-INRAs mandate to investigate, amongst others, the efficient management of natural resources to inform policies in Africa. An Omaha police officer and a suspect were injured in a shootout near a Midtown park Monday afternoon, an Omaha police official said. Officer Jill Schillerberg was hit in the ankle. Suspect Monroe Evans III sustained multiple gunshot wounds and was in critical condition late Monday after surgery, police said. Deputy Police Chief Dave Baker said police went to 33rd and Turner on a report of someone looking in windows just before 1 p.m. Schillerberg spotted someone matching the description of the suspicious person near Dewey Park, Baker said. A witness, Greg Powell, said the man sat down but didn't put his hands behind his back, as instructed. Then he pulled something out of his jacket or backpack. Schillerberg, 39, and 36-year-old Officer Matthew Skradski exchanged gunfire with Evans, who is 20. Evans was taken to the hospital in critical condition Monday afternoon. Schillerberg was released after treatment. Skradski wasn't injured. 30.01.2017 LISTEN Casanova. That word certainly evokes a meaning associated with sexual promiscuity. Many people may not know Casanova was a real person. The Venetian lived his life in the 18th century Europe. Giacoma Girolamo Casanova, at age 17, had a Law degree. He is also known to have studied chemistry, maths, medicine and moral philosophy. Aside his promiscuous and hazy lifestyle, Casanovas scholarly works exist, and his political life is there to be learnt. However, today, the legacy, the impression that is passed on to generations about him is that sexual tag. Blame generations? May be, may be not. Marketers believe perception is a powerful variable of the marketing mix that need not be treated lightly. Some even say perception is everything. Granted. Granted that the deeds and misdeeds of people help fuel perceptions, it does hold that, one which I believe, these perceptions are born out of peoples beliefs, observations, cause or even motive. The United States of America, today, has one of the most vilified, ridiculed and stereotyped personalities as President. Donald J. Trump is perceived as a character, regardless of his wealth and fame, who isnt a presidential material. People still are in dreamland, in self-denial, they just cant believe Trump is manning the White House. Some say Trump was fit for the screens; that he chalked his popularity on television, having been on screens for over three decades. Trump has played cameos in The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Home Alone 2, WWE Raw, and the ever popular reality show The Apprentice. President Trumps screen-life had been used against him. They made it personify him, turning it into reality. The media, of course, will be that channel, but today, America has a TV star as President. If it were in Ghana, I doubt it would have been any different, a country where anybody associated with the arts, one way or the other is touted a concert person a narrowed meaning that basically translates as joker. In our part of the world, entertainers are perceived as non serious people, people who have no life to live regardless of their level of education. In recent times, when rapper Pope Skinny made his infamous I am in love with Samira declaration, the popular alibi was that, he was an entertainer, hence hes free to say what he liked; that he was just being himself. This mentality is what makes those in the arts to be considered subservient to others. The Socrate Debate Ever since filmmaker Socrate Safo confirmed his interest in becoming a deputy minister for the Tourism, Arts and Culture Ministry in President Akufo-Addos administration, I questioned his resolve to settle for the deputy, and not the substantive minister. It is public record that I thought he need not be a minister or deputy for him to help his party achieve their goals for the industry, considering what he had said in the past, and his values that I have observed from afar. That Socrate was very close to the Creative Arts Ministry in the past administration is a fact. He was instrumental in the drafting of the policies for the industry under that administration, so may be, having been that close, and considering his wealth of experience, he probably believes it takes nothing special to man that ministry. And I believe that special thing required to man a ministry is the competence and diplomacy to make things happen. But there are a lot who have literally rubbished Socrates ambition purely on the class debate. Some have likened him to a mechanic who by his wealth of experience thinks he is qualified to become transport Minister. Some have questioned his stance on overly placing emphasis on theoretical knowledge over practical knowledge; something he believes has been our bane as a country. In Socrate, all they see is his engagements on radio and the titles of his movies. The movie maker has been lampooned by people who claim to be his friends, hiding behind smoke screens churning out missives of destruction, all in the name of power! For me, I see competence beyond qualification and class: having degrees, working in the formal sector, and associating with the rich and famous. These, do not necessarily make one competent, and the lack of these do not make one less qualified. If Socrate had been a true and true politician, those we call career politicians, I doubt he would be vilified this much; he would adorn the tag honourable and all he would have done were honourable deeds. Isnt it public record that some of these honourables who have become Ministers of State and parliamentarians, and still are, are Form 4 leavers? Some did not even have elite certificates, but their influence, worth and competences were evident. Lessons to be Learnt The goings-on tell me one thing: that until you seek public office, you may think your friends support all you do. It also tells me another thing: that when one seeks power, the perceptions and stereotypes that people have about you, whether true, fabricated or make-belief, become the reality that is fed people. The onus is on us to play our political cards very well, if we desire for political office. Politics isnt a dirty game. Dirty people make it dirty, and thats what I see going on in the industry. Whoever gets the nod as deputy minister has a vetting committee to meet. In there lies the opportunity to quell, deny, explain and straighten these perceptions or realities. Addis Ababa (AFP) - African Union leaders grappled with Morocco's divisive bid to rejoin the bloc at a summit Monday and sounded alarm for the continent over US President Donald Trump's immigration ban. "The very country (where) our people were taken as slaves... has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries," outgoing AU Commission chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told some 37 heads of state and leaders from across the continent. "It is clear that globally we are entering very turbulent times," she added. The leaders have a packed agenda for the two-day meeting in the Ethiopian capital where they will also have to bridge divisions to elect a new chairperson. The 54-nation bloc often struggles with competing regional interests, and issues such as Morocco's bid to rejoin the bloc and differing views on membership of the International Criminal Court (ICC) are expected to shape the election of the AU's top executive. But the meeting is the first since Trump's election and anger over a ban on citizens from three African nations marked the summit opening. "What do we do about this? Indeed this is one of the greatest challenges and tests to our unity and solidarity," Dlamini-Zuma said. Trump's administration has faced outrage and widespread protests over the move to ban citizens from seven countries including Libya, Somalia and Sudan in Africa. New UN Secretary general Antonio Guterres will address the opening of the African Union assembly In his opening address at the summit, new UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres didn't mention Trump's refugee and travel ban specifically, but criticised the closure of borders "even in the most developed countries in the world." At the start of the summit leaders heaped praise on west African grouping ECOWAS for its decisive role in dealing with the Gambian crisis, and welcomed new President Adama Barrow -- who could not attend the meeting. They then retreated behind closed doors to weigh Morocco's bid to return to the fold 33 years after it quit in protest against the AU's decision to accept Western Sahara as a member. Facing resistance The membership of affluent Morocco could be a boon for the AU, which lost a key financier in late Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi and is working on ways to become financially independent. Currently foreign donors account for some 70 percent of its budget, according to the Institute for Security Studies. A Moroccan diplomat said Sunday the country had the "unconditional support" of 42 members of the bloc. However in a sign of the resistance Morocco is facing, 12 countries including heavyweights Nigeria, South Africa, Algeria, Kenya and Angola, requested a legal opinion from the AU on whether the bloc could accept a member that is "occupying parts of the territory" of another member. These nations have long supported the campaign for self-determination by Western Sahara's Polisario movement. Morocco maintains that the former Spanish colony under its control is an integral part of the kingdom, while the Polisario Front, which campaigns for the territory's independence, demands a referendum on self-determination. The AU's legal counsel, in a document seen by AFP, said the nations raised "fundamental concerns that have to be taken into account". However the decison to weigh Morocco's request ultimately rests with heads of state. Regional interests Also on Monday, leaders will vote for a new chairperson six months after failing to decide on a replacement for South Africa's Dlamini-Zuma. One of five candidates from Kenya, Senegal, Chad, Botswana and Equatorial Guinea will have to unite different regions to win a two-thirds majority. Kenya's foreign minister Amina Mohamed, Chad's former prime minister Moussa Faki Mahamat and Senegal's veteran diplomat Abdoulaye Bathily are frontrunners in the race. The choice of a new leader is crucial for the future of a bloc which is undergoing deep introspection on how to reform to become more relevant and better respond to crises on the continent. Tasked with leading the reforms, Rwanda's President Paul Kagame delivered a "biting" report to heads of state on Sunday, according to a statement from the Kenyan government. He criticised "chronic failure to see through African Union decisions (which) had resulted in a crisis of implementation and a perception that the AU was not relevant to Africans". 30.01.2017 LISTEN Nairobi 30th January, 2017: Airtel Africa, a leading telecommunications company with operations in 15 countries across Africa, has refuted speculative media reports erroneously stating its possible exit from Africa. The organization has reaffirmed that it remains committed to Africa and will continue to invest in its operations to grow sustainably in Africa. Airtel Africas recent 3rd quarter results were strong. The underlying Africa revenues for the quarter accelerated by 6.0 per cent Y-o-Y, the highest over the last 9 quarters. The organizations efforts to improve the quality of customer acquisitions have resulted in a reduction in customer churn to 4.9 per cent from 6.0 per cent. Data consumption and revenues have grown by 91.0 per cent & 24.0 per cent Y-o-Y respectively, led by stronger data networks. The strong focus on cost management has led to a significant underlying EBITDA margin expansion of 4.5 per cent Y-o-Y, which now stands at 24.5 per cent. Africa is now generating positive free cash and is PBT positive in constant currency. Raghunath Mandava, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Airtel Africa, said All the steps taken recently with regard to human resources and infrastructure have been geared towards readying the organization to grow efficiently and sustainably in the medium to long term. The company remains committed to competing in various markets and providing more choice to customers through further investments to ensure consistent delivery of quality and value for money services to our customers. We are also accelerating our investments in new data networks and to modernize our existing networks. We are committed to launch 4 G in multiple countries. He added Mergers and acquisitions continue to be the norm for any multinational organization and they affect all global organizations in equal measures as and when they happen. As a strategy, we look for opportunities to acquire or merge in opcos that are operating in a fragmented market structure with too many players in a small market. Last year, Airtel and Orange reached a mutually beneficial agreement on the assets in Sierra Leone and Burkina Faso. Similarly, Airtel also acquired assets in Uganda, CongoB and Kenya in recent times. The agreements brought together the strengths of Airtel, Warid and Essar. This has offered benefits to customers in the form of a superior and wider network, affordable voice / data services and better customer care. Away from Africa, recently, we merged with Robi in Bangladesh to create a solid and profitable No.2 player in the market. The recent results demonstrate the effectiveness of Airtels business strategy in Africa. The organization sees an opportunity ahead to emerge with a broader reach and sharper execution. About Bharti Airtel Bharti Airtel Limited is a leading global telecommunications company with operations in 17 countries across Asia and Africa. Headquartered in New Delhi, India, the company ranks amongst the top 3 mobile service providers globally in terms of subscribers. In India, the company's product offerings include 2G, 3G and 4G wireless services, mobile commerce, fixed line services, high speed DSL broadband, DTH, enterprise services including national & international long distance services to carriers. In the rest of the geographies, it offers 2G, 3G and 4G wireless services and mobile commerce. Bharti Airtel had over 364 million customers across its operations at the end of December 2016. To know more please visit, www.airtel.com. President John Mahama is, indeed, wicked and an embarrassment to people of the Northern Region, Gender, Children and Social Protection Minister-designate Otiko Afisa Djaba has insisted. I dont owe him [Mr Mahama] or you [Alhassan Suhuyini] any apology she said in response to the Tamale North MPs question about whether she would apologise to the ex-president on whom she used those words during the electioneering period ahead of the 7 December 2016 elections. My comment about he being an embarrassment was in relation to SADA, It was in relation to SADA that I said he had embarrassed northerners and the northern chiefs themselves had come to say same, Ms Djaba said justified on Monday, 30 January 2017, explaining that: When I talked about his wickedness, the people of Ghana were asking for reductions, they were asking for dumsor to be solved, people were losing jobs and so forth what I said was within the context of that period. When asked by Tamale South MP Haruna Iddrisu if she would withdraw those words owing to their harshness, which the minority too strong exception to, Ms Djaba retorted: Are you saying that we cannot criticise in this country? Are you saying that my right to speak [is curtailed?] It was not an insult, it was a criticism and Im allowed as a citizen of Ghana to criticise the president and these are descriptive words, it is not an insult. Asked by Mr Iddrisu is she stood by her words, Ms Djaba said: Yes Mr Chairman. I did not insult the president, I criticised him. In 2014, Ms Djaba told Moro Awudu on Radio XYZs breakfast show that: This President [Mr Mahama] is not serious. He has embarrassed a lot of Northerners. Reacting to Mr Mahamas promise, at the time, to progressively make Senior High School Education free as announced in the state of the nation address presented to Parliament in that year, Ms Djaba said: Hes embarrassing mother Ghana and the IMF is telling him that: E no dey go well, so he should stop the edey be k3k3; put down his Dubai things and get down to the ground and give us the bread and butter things that we need for the development of this country. Also, in the heat of the 2016 campaigns, Ms Djaba said:President Mahamas time is up. President Mahama is extremely wicked, and, so, he must step down. We need change, we need someone who is passionate about this country. You have to vote massively for Nana Akufo Addo. We need change this year. Your time is up President Mahama. The Writer 30.01.2017 LISTEN As defining terrorism in any particular case implies a political component, this very category becomes quite extensive - a subject to different readings and understandings. Having permanent primarily political disputes over the category and scale of conflict, contemporary international community repeatedly failed over decades to agree upon a single and comprehensive but universal instrument determining, prescribing and combating terrorism. As a consequence of these - mostly political and less legal implications, today we are confronted with some two dozen international (universal and regional) instruments. These instruments are good, but far from being a norm-setting standardized and harmonized. Thus, the tentative political definition of (international) terrorism could be as follows: Terrorism is the use of violence as political means of pressuring the government and/or society into accepting a radical socio-political or/and socio-economic change (ideological or/and territorial). The word terrorist is obviously self-incriminating (demonizing and alienating), and consequently most terrorists would not apply the label to themselves. Experts estimate that for every apprehended/detained terrorist another 9 remain at large (rating it to 10%). Therefore, many describe terrorism like a balloon: squeeze one end and it expands at the other. - professor Anis H. Bajrektarevic analyzed in his seminal work JHA Diplomacy The Palermo Treaty System 10 years After Hereby is the take on the national legislation with the huge regional impacts that comes from the heart of gold, biggest and most relevant Central Asian republic one of the key pivots to continental Asia. In President Nursultan Nazarbayevs first speech to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), Kazakh Head of State set forth what is considered a landmark initiative called the Astana Code of Conduct focused on preventing and tackling terrorism and extremism while maintaining human rights standards. The Astana Code of Conduct reflects Kazakhstans four main UNSC priorities and trends in international security: energy security, food security, counter-terrorism measures, and nuclear safety. These four priorities reflect greater Central Asia interests to ensure its stability and security, to effectively respond to regional challenges and threats, to strengthen cooperation and promote its growth and development. President Nazarbayevs political address at the UNSC addresses seven key priorities, the fourth priority emphasizing the acute problem of international terrorism. The fourth priority introduced the Astana Code of Conduct was hailed by members of Kazakhstans Government as a landmark initiative, hoping that nations would refrain from the actions which may lead to destruction of statehood emphasizing Kazakhstans desire push to end or mitigate global conflict. It also reflects the ubiquitous diplomatic trends of engagement, cooperation, and partnerships, in Kazakhstans multi-lateral and regional policies and arrangements. The Astana Code of Conduct is nascent. The Code of Conduct will probably be based on Kazakhstans prior national-level programs and priorities, cooperative efforts, and current counter-terrorism efforts. The central tenet of the Astana Code of Conduct, ending extremism and terrorism, is already visible in Kazakhstans attempts to be the mediator in high-profile negotiations and talks aimed at sustaining peace such as Syria and Iran. Kazakhstan hopes that the Astana Code of Conduct will lead to the formation of the Global Anti-Terrorist Coalition (Network) to defeat terrorism and reduce the global terror threat. Kazakhstan will chair the Security Council 1267 Committee on ISIL and Al-Qaida. The Astana Code of Conduct will be a multi-lateral effort focusing on challenging the root causes of terrorism, confronting transnational groups, preventing power vacuums, and destabilization. In March 2016, Kazakhstan called for a new program, Manifesto: The World. The 21st Century, focusing on non-proliferation, global cooperation, and ending war. Kazakh officials met with the OSCE Astana Program Office to discuss anti-counter terrorism efforts in mid-October 2016. Kazakhstan would also benefit from European assistance and cooperation combating terrorism online. After 2011, Kazakhstan reformed its counter-terrorism strategy through community participation by creating web-based instruments to prevent terrorism: www.counter-terror.kz , and a mechanism created recently for citizens to report terrorist or extremist activity via the Prosecutor Generals Office website. Changes to the Counter-Terrorism Law improving counter-terrorism methods, increased regional security and cooperation through the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and the Collection Security Treaty Organization aid Kazakhstans fight against domestic terrorism. Kazakhstan also shut down 950 websites (with court approval) and increased the use of information technology against terrorism, and in January 2013, the Kazakhstan National Security Committee announced the launch of a Security Academy to train specialists. Kazakhstan has long been the recipient of criticism about its human rights records, the misapplication of anti-terrorism measures to silence the opposition, and the absence of basic civil liberties including freedom of press, assembly, religion, and association. Changes to the Counter-Terrorism Law resulted in violations of religious freedoms among Muslims, arbitrary detention, and increased powers among the security services. Like its chairmanship of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the Kazakhstans position on the UNSC provides the country with access to materials, resources, and the opportunity to implement policies and improve its human rights record. This Central Asian colossus did not live up to its commitments as OSCE chair. Kazakhstan recently announced future basic constitutional reforms to redistribute power among the executive, legislative, and judicial branches. Kazakhstan must be willing to implement resolutions and programs developed during its UNSC chairmanship and not use the UNSC as a way to push an international agenda without a domestic commitment. About author: Samantha Brletich is a researcher on the region of Central Asia and Russia. She focuses on extremism and terrorism, governance, culture, mining, and foreign policy. She holds a Masters in Peace Operations Policy from George Mason University. She is an employee of the U.S. Government (opinions and ideas are her own). 30.01.2017 LISTEN Authorities of the Konadu Yiadom Senoir High School at Akrofonso Asamang in the Sekyere East District in the Ashanti Region have expressed concern over the schools huge infrastructural deficit, describing it as a disincentive to effective and quality teaching and learning. Management regrets that even though the school has been in existence since 1975, its infrastructure base is nothing to talk about. The Headmaster, Mr. Baba Idrisu Seidu, bemoaned that the institution, to date, has no befitting administration block, as he and his core administrative staff operate from a shared temporary dormitory structure. He pointed out that the school has just 23 classrooms accommodating a student population of a little over 1,000, which is below standard. He indicated that teachers are sometimes compelled to split and conduct classes in open spaces, as a means of decongesting classrooms. The Headmaster disclosed that the only befitting structure on campus, a two storey 21-unit classroom block, was undertaken by schools Parent Teacher Association (PTA). Mr. Seidu sadly mentioned that a dining hall project, which is also an initiative of the PTA, has stalled due to financial constraints. He said despite the tremendous improvement in student discipline and schools academic performance, enrollment is not encouraging at all, and attributed it to the poor infrastructural base of the school. He revealed that less than one third of students who were posted to the school through the Computerized School Selection Placement System (CSSPS) this academic year did not report, as they preferred sister schools with quite decent infrastructure. Mr. Baba Seidu has, therefore, appealed to the government, the Ministry of Education, and other relevant educational bodies to come to aid of the school. He also appealed to the District Education Directorate to deploy two mathematics and one physics teacher to fill these positions which have been left vacant for some time now. From Ernest Best Anane 30.01.2017 LISTEN I Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey do solemnly swear that the evidence I shall give before this committee touching the matter in issue shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God. Chairman of Committee, Hon Joe Osei Owusu Hon. Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey, congratulations on your nomination to the ministerial position of Minister for Foreign Affairs. Kindly tell us a little about yourself as briefly as possible. Hon. Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey Thank you very much Hon. Chairman. Hon Chairman my name is Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey. I am 53 years old, next month I will be 54. I've 2 children, married. I've been in Parliament; this is my thirteenth year, fourth term as a parliamentarian. My hobbies, I like to cook, I like to read, I like to travel, that's about it Hon Chairman. Chairman That cannot be about it. Tell us where you went to school, what you have done before coming to Parliament. Ayorkor answers Okay thank you. I went to primary school at New Hope Preparatory School, secondary education at Akosombo International School for my 'O' Level and then proceeded to Saint Marys Secondary School for my Advanced Level. From there I did a course in Secretarial and Management studies at Pitman Central College. Also then I did, few years down the line I came to Ghana Institute of journalism to do Public Relations and Advertising. Few years after that I went to the University of Westminster to do a Masters in Communications and I went to the University of Ghana Business School as well to do MBA in project management option. In between I have worked in various organizations in admin; I've owned my own company Dynacom for about four, five years. Whiles at Dynacom I did some consultancy for the Ministry of Tourism on the modernization of the capital city and then I came to Parliament. I've worked at Worldspace Ghana, first in admin and then marketing manager. I've also worked at the Divestiture Implementation committee as PA to the Executive Secretary. In short this is what I've done. I've also done a number of short courses including ADR (Alternative Dispute Resolution). Also short courses at Harvard, I have short courses in marketing management at GIMPA. I don't know whether I've left anything else out Hon Chairman Chairman Were you ever a Minister of State or Deputy Minister of State? Ayorkor answers I've left that out. Yes in 2005, I was appointed into the President Kufour's administration as the Deputy Minister, first at the Ministry of Information for about a year. Then I was transferred or appointed to the Ministry of Trade. No, Ministry of Foreign Affairs for over a year. Then from Foreign Affairs I went to Ministry of Trade and then from Ministry of Trade I was brought back to Ministry of Foreign Affairs before we left power on the 7th, on the midnight of the 6th of January 2009 thank you. Chairman Have you also served on any Parliament outside Ghana? Have you been a Member of any Parliament outside Ghana Parliament? Ayorkor answers Yes, Hon Chairman, thank you for prompting me. Yes I've been since April 2013 I've been a Member of the ECOWAS Parliament and at the ECOWAS Parliament I was the Vice Chair for NEPAD [New Partnership for Africa's Development] and APRM [African Peer Review Mechanism]. I've also been on committees. During my 12 years in Parliament, I've been on the Defense and Interior Committee as a member, I've also been on the Gender committee, I've also been on the Communications committee and I've been Ranking Member for 4 years on the Foreign Affairs committee thank you. After some clarification on the nominee's Curriculum Vitae (CV), the Chairman directed for the substantive matter to proceed, while calling on the Member of Parliament for Cape Coast North, Barbara Ayisi Asher to begin. Barbara Ayisi Asher Thank you very much Mr. Chair, congratulations Hon. Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey. I have three questions. Looking at your CV you have a lot of very rich experience to come to bear in this new ministry. How would you use your office to help in securing and encouraging Foreign Investors into this country? Ayorkor answers Thank you very much Hon. Chairman, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs like most ministries of Foreign Affairs in the world have shifted focus to what is called Economic Diplomacy and Economic Diplomacy apart from the normal diplomacy that we all know about has to do with training foreign service officers to ensure that our foreign policy has a direct linkage to the country's economic development and in doing so focus is on trade, on attracting foreign direct investment, and also attracting and boosting tourism. So I would ensure that most or all Foreign Service officers who are posted outside this country are well trained to be able to carry out this important policy initiative of ours. Our focus has changed; economic diplomacy is a major plank of our Foreign Policy. And therefore training and ensuring that that becomes the focus of each mission outside the country would help in ensuring that we attract foreign direct investment and also help in marketing our non-traditional exports or commodities outside the country so training, training, training is important. We are fortunate to have a sub vented agency under the Foreign Ministry which is the Legon Center for International Affairs and Diplomacy (LECIAD) and it run courses so we will need to sit down with them and find out how they can help in terms of running short courses for Foreign Service officers. I believe that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has an important role to play in that it will surfing the ground, make the initial moves for other ministries to benefit from it. Ministries such us the Ministry Of Trade and other ministries that have something to do with investment and of cause the GIPC thank you. Barbara Ayisi Asher Thank you very much. There has been an increasing incidence of abuse in all forms against some Ghanaians living outside, what practical steps will your ministry take to ensure the safety of Ghanaians living outside? Ayorkor answers Thank you Hon. Chairman, this is very unfortunate and very disturbing phenomenon. You would find that our compatriots live the shores of this country to go outside in search of greener pastures. They are lured by all kinds of agencies and then they take them to countries where they are maltreated, where whatever agreements that they may have signed with the so-called agents are not adhered to and as a result they are abused. And in most cases these are women. It is worrying but I believe that we should be careful we should sensitize people that they should be careful not to fall into the trap of these unscrupulous agents. Secondly, I believe that our Ministry would work with the Ministry of Interior, especially because Ghana Immigration is under the Ministry of Interior so we need to work together. When you find a group of people living, you should be able to, as an immigration officer to question them, interrogate them as to where they are going and all of that. And also, we need to work together with the Ministry of Employment, some of these agencies are licensed some are not and we need to crack down to ensure that these agencies, these so-called employment agencies, we look into their background before we allow them to do anything. But I think that more importantly we should sensitize Ghanaians that there is nothing like greener pastures outside, thank you. Barbara Ayisi Asher Reading the NPP manifesto page 45, it says that the NPP will task our Diplomatic Missions to link up businessmen with foreign counterparts; I just want to end here. How would you include businessmen and women outside the capital, because it looks like the focus is on businessmen in the capital, how do you extend it to the other regions especially to the rural areas? Thank you. Ayorkor answers Thank you very much Hon. Chairman, this is a difficult question for me because it is not within the remit of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs but I must say that, in linking local businessmen with local businessmen outside, I think it's important that we don't just look within the capitals but look outside the capitals into the rural areas. Because when you take agriculture for instance and you are linking a local businessmen (farmer) to somebody outside in terms of export of his/her farm produce, you should be looking outside the capital because the real work or the real businesses are in the rural areas and therefore we shouldn't look at what is happening in Accra only. Of course when it comes to other businesses you find them in Accra but you find them throughout so we must have some policy or programme that will target probably a quota for each region and for each district, so that would be my answer to that. Alhassan Sayibu Suhuyini, MP for Tamale North takes turn to quiz the nominee Hon. Nominee congratulations Do we have a Foreign Policy and what is it? Ayorkor answers Yes, Hon. Chairman we do have a Foreign Policy. Our Foreign Policy has changed over the period from when we gained independence to now. Our Foreign Policy started with Pan Africanism as a focus during the times of Dr Kwame Nkrumah. But what hasn't changed is the fact that, as part of our Foreign Policy we intend to be a good neighbor to the countries that surround us and any other country that so desire to have relations with us. We also are part of ECOWAS. We are part of the African Union. We are part of the United Nations and its agencies so this how it started. Along the line, Foreign policy of this country has shifted focus from what we call normal diplomacy, good neighborliness, good relations, making sure that everything the people, the countries around you, you are very charming with them and all of that. What we moved to is Economic Diplomacy which I talked about a little earlier and that is to ensure that in every relationship that Ghana engages in, that relationship should end in promoting and protecting the interest of Ghana and also to ensure that it ends up in giving us positive dividends towards our developments economically. So that is the trust of our Foreign Policy right now. But in the NPP manifesto we have decided that one area that we need to focus on is the area of our engagement with our multilateral agencies such as ECOWAS and also the African Union. ECOWAS because we believe that with the industrialization that we intend to embark on we should be able to trade within the region, that is West African region and also within the continent. And therefore our Foreign policy is to make ECOWAS strong, is to make the African Union strong and we should make our membership felt within these agencies. We should be able as a country, as we have done in the past to shape consensus within the ECOWAS region because if we are able to get things right and get ECOWAS to work very well, we have a ready market of 350 million. Right now Ghana or West Africa and by extension Africa we do not trade amongst ourselves. We always look outside the continent to trade with Europe or with the Asian countries. I think it's about time that we start looking within because there's so much potential but we need to get things right. Haruna ask a follow up Are there aspect of the Foreign Policy that you may want to seek a revision to and why? Ayorkor answers Hon Chair I don't quite get the question that what aspect of the Foreign Policy would we seek a revision. Haruna My understanding is that his first question was whether Ghana had a Foreign policy, haven listened to you I heard you want to trade, a trade promotion related Foreign policy which focuses on it. So share with us which aspects of the Foreign Policy would you seek to improve by way of revision? Ayorkor answers Thank you Hon Chairman, yes in the area of trade, in the area of Foreign Direct Investment, in the area of ensuring that our country and our region is secure, in the area of making sure that as countries within our sub region and the continent peace and security issues are not out there where we have countries that are in crisis because if the countries are in crisis than it will be very difficult for us as a nation to achieve the aims. Haruna Would you want to include terrorism on your list for revision? Ayorkor answers Yes Hon Chairman, terrorism, maritime security, we need to improve maritime security; we need to improve cyber security and areas such as that. We need to work and to ensure that all these areas are improved so that we are able to achieve our vision. Thank you Suhuyini Thank you very much Mr Chairman. From the answer I see more Foreign relation instead of a Foreign Policy at best what I see is a regime policy over the years from the 60s maybe that is something you may want to look at as Foreign Minister see whether we can have a national policy that we can call a Ghana Foreign Policy. But moving on if you will indulge me Mr Chairman I would like to go back to the nominee's CV just for some clarification. I see that you write on page two that June 2008 you were a student at Harvard Kennedy School, Boston USA doing a course that's June 2008 and I also see on page 4 that at the same time or so it seems, you were Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs and Deputy Minister for Trade and Industry. Now when you were student, a foreign student for that matter at the same time you were the Deputy Minister for Trade and later Foreign Affairs, how did you attend lectures and all? Ayorkor answers Thank you very much Hon Chairman, Hon Chairman this is a course that many Members of Parliament have attended. It is a 10 day course. I was then at the Ministry of Trade and I took my leave to attend that particular, to do the course. Yes, an executive program, thank you. Suhuyini asks final question Now the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a new building that you would be occupying is of interest to me. And it's of interest because of two government decisions. There was a government decision called the in-filling scheme, now this in-filling scheme led to abuse where allocations of state lands in Ridge, Cantonment and Airport Residential Area were made through either protocol or bidding. Now that piece of land was subject for, in fact it was allocated to people by one government, another government came into power and confiscated the lands and thanks to that confiscation and a Chinese grant we have that magnificent building that houses our Foreign Affairs workers which you would be occupying. Now with the in-filling scheme I hate to say but you are listed as one of the beneficiaries of that in-filling scheme not at that particular place. Chairman interjects Hon. Member if you may avert your mind to Order 67 of our rules. This question is not admissible. Suhuyini I haven't asked the question yet Mr Chairman. Chairman But your premise is mentioning and then making personal characterizations. So if you going to ask a question and you go straight to that, this characterization; and please I will advise that you apply yourself with that provision so we don't keep coming back with interventions. Suhuyini So the question is as somebody who can be said to have been a beneficiary of the first decision of government and a beneficiary today if you are passed by the House to be our Foreign Minister where you will be working in that Foreign Ministry, how would this two decisions of different governments guide the discharge of your duties in the best interest of the state? Ayorkor answers Thank you Mr Chairman, I don't see any linkage between my benefitting from an in-filling scheme and if this committee approves my nomination and also the House approves me how it would affect my work in the Foreign Ministry. I don't see any linkage. The Hon Member may want to draw the linkage for me thank you. Dominic Nitiwul, MP for Bimbilla Let me congratulate the nominee. She has done herself a lot of good. When I look at her academic achievements and her political achievements, congratulations madam nominee. The manifesto of the NPP emphasizes economic diplomacy and I heard her say that under the foreign policy guide that she will be pursuing and it is also clear that they will prioritize that particular section of the policy. What I want to find out from her is how she would be able to tap into the rich business culture of Ghanaians staying outside the country, how she would be able to link that with our people back home to enable us take advantage of Ghanaians who are staying there and help this country achieve, after all many countries including Israel were built by people who stayed in other countries. Not just the idea of foreign direct investment that she had already pre-mentioned but am talking of how she would galvanize them, how she would organize them, who she would link them to enable us take advantage of them than we are currently doing? Ayorkor answers Thank you very much Mr Chairman, Hon Chairman I think, I must say that the Diaspora, Ghanaians who are living in the Diaspora, whether they have just moved outside Ghana or they are second or third generation citizens of Ghana who live outside or the youth, they are doing very well. Some of them are doing extremely well wherever they live. I'm told that you can find Ghanaians in 33 countries in the world and some of them are captains of industry. I think it is important that we bring the expertise and the experience, and the skills that they have acquired outside Ghana to help us in our development. There is always the need to link are youth especially those who are engaged in start up businesses to people who are already in the field and are doing it. It's important also to say that, even if as we look at the wider policy of engaging people who are prepared to come and help us as a country, we should specifically target our own people who are outside the country they are doing well and therefore they should come and also help us develop our country. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs started a unit called the Diaspora Unit where they were collecting data on people of Ghanaian origin who live outside in these countries then at some point they realized that this unit needed to be upgraded so that they would be able to do a comprehensive job of engaging people in the Diaspora so it was expanded into a full bureau which is a department at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The center for migration studies at the University of Ghana has done a lot of work on what they call the Diaspora engagement policy, how to engage the people in the Diaspora for them to bring their experience to bear on what we do here. They are in the process of collecting data of who and who in each country and all of that and also in their engagement with some of our compatriots what do they get in return and this is where in some of the meetings they mentioned that they would like to be part of the whole democratic process which is for them also to vote during election. So this brings into play the issue of ROPAL which we passed many years ago but it's into force. So we are looking at ways in which, it's at a very basic level right now. We are now going to build on that policy, the policy will go before Cabinet and if God willing Cabinet approves it then we will start some engagement with the people in the Diaspora who can build this country for us. You have situations where doctors take some time off their annual leave and come into this country and render health services, operations and surgeries for Ghanaians. Okudzeto Ablakwa, MP for North Tongu Thank you very much Mr Chairman. My first question will flow from where you just took off, our engagement with Ghanaians abroad and this time I want us to narrow down on undocumented Ghanaians living abroad. We have seen that with the rise of Nationalist Party in Europe in the election of President Donald Trump, he has talked about an America's first policy, he's been greeted with protests all over within the United State of America and outside people are concerned with his immigration policies. Already I do know that in October last year one hundred undocumented Ghanaians were deported back to Ghana. The German ambassador has also served notice that she would want to hold discussions with the Ghanaian government on this particular matter. Knowing that immigration has become the biggest issue in Germany ahead of Germany September 24 elections. I want to find out from you what would be your strategy in the face of all this rise of right wing Nationalist Party and the anti-immigration sentiments. How do we protect undocumented Ghanaians living in Europe and America? What will be your strategy for engaging them, regularizing them and ensuring that their rights are protected and that they are not deported in some of the circumstances that we are seeing like it happened in October last year? Ayorkor answers Thank you very much Hon Chairman. Hon Member you asked about my strategy and if we could regularize them. I think that will be difficult because the country has its laws and citizens of Ghana who have moved to other countries and have been able to acquire either citizenship or resident there become illegal and it will be very difficult for any mission outside the country to interfere in the affairs of that country to regularize them. But we also need to engage countries that we know or we have evidence of them treating such persons in an inhumane manner. We need to engage them and ensure that these people when they are arrested are treated well according to human right of any person so that they brought back. I think what happens in some cases is that when they are arrested, some in their efforts not to be brought down will even say that, if he/she is a Ghanaian will say that I'm not a Ghanaian, I am stateless so you don't know where to take them, the immigration officer don't know where to take them. So they stay in detention for a very long time and when that happens it is difficult for the Ghana mission there to intervene because the person says he/she is not a Ghanaian so we need to look at these things and also to sensitize Ghanaians that it is not bad, things are not bad here. We are all here. You will find something to do and, therefore, come back home. I think that's something that our missions can do, meet with Ghanaians and appeal to them to come back home and when a Ghanaian decides to come we will facilitate by ensuring that if they don't have a traveling document we prepare a traveling document for such a person. But I think it will be difficult to intervene in the affairs of a nation. Okudzeto Ablakwa My concern was with the Ghanaians, how we engage with them and how we support them, we extend support services to them and guide them and the latter part of your answer speaks to that so I am okay with your response. My second question has to do with economic diplomacy and you have been quiet heavy on that this morning. What would be your advice? Couple of weeks ago we listened to Theresa May, a Prime Minister of the United Kingdom drawing the roadmap, putting out the roadmap for Brexit, the final exist of the United Kingdom out of the European Union. That has implications for trade with Ghana. We had an IEPA and we still have an IEPA, the interim EPA which this House has the initial, the European Union has rectify but with article 50 about to happen as Theresa May indicated, it will mean that you need to renegotiate with Britain alone out of EU. What advice will you be offering President Nana Akufo-Addo, and how do you intend to work with the Trade Ministry to ensure that at the end of the day Ghanaian businesses are protected especially when it comes to duty free, when it comes to quota free access to the British economy and vice versa since trade agreements are reciprocal, what will be your strategy in this regard? Ayorkor answers Thank you very much Hon Chairman. Hon Chairman indeed Brexit is on us and whether we like it or not it will have some effect on the relationship that we have with the UK. Like Hon member you said, we would have to renegotiate our trade agreements outside of the negotiations that we did where because the UK was part of the European Union it covered. We would have to renegotiate but whatever we renegotiate I don't believe will put us in a worse situation. We've been a trading partner with the UK for a very long time, we go back a long way and therefore whatever we do I believe that it would not put us in a worse situation, neither will it be against the WTO and therefore yes it will happen. My worry, Hon Chairman is to do with, the UK would have to renegotiate trade agreements with bigger countries such as China, India and the rest and I hope that it will not adversely affect the agreement because when you are negotiating with big countries small countries such as ours. But we have tides of history and therefore I don't believe it will put us in a worst situation. My advice to the Trade Ministry will be that we should start engaging very quickly. I'm told that it will take about two years for them to exit after they've trigged the article 50. And so we should start early so that we know the position, we know what exactly is the situation and we start putting our stuffs together early enough. That will be my advice. OkudzetoAblakwa Mr Chairman my final question. The biggest issue currently perhaps within the corridors of the African Union has to do with Morocco's application to rejoin the African Union. We do know that last week an official visit had been scheduled with the President Nana Akufo-Addo with the Moroccan King. A statement was issued a few days ago that the visit has been postponed. It's clear to those of us who are watching the international relation space that Morocco continues to lobby. I want know what will be your advice to the Ghanaian President on this bid by Morocco to rejoin the African Union? But remember that that bid is linked to the right of the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic to have their right to self determination and to remain a member of the AU. Morocco would want to join the AU with the Saharawi Republic been removed or losing its membership of the AU. I want to know, to what extent are you conversant with this matter which is currently the most thorny issues within the AU corridors and what will be your advice to president Nana Akufo-Addo? Whose side are you on Morocco or the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic? Chairman Hon Member please don't answer the question relating to sides. Just offer your advice. Ayorkor answers Thank you very much Hon Chairman. Hon Chairman let me say that we in Ghana believe in the right of a people to self determine where they want to be. It's been our policy for a very long time. Indeed it is true that Morocco has applied to rejoin the African Union. Western Sahara is a member of the African Union. We do have relations with all countries, so we do have relations with Morocco, we do have relations with Western Sahara. Up till now I haven't seen any document that is saying Morocco wants Western Sahara taken out of the AU and therefore I really can't speak much to that. But they are coming. Their application has not yet been looked at by the African Union, I'm not even sure that the Summit coming up it will one of the issues to be discussed. But let me say that Morocco is a friend so is Western Sahara. It will be difficult at this point to take a stand as I sit here because the issues of expelling Western Sahara from the African Union I don't believe have come up officially Hon. Patricia, MP for Asokwa Thank you Hon Chair. Congratulations Hon Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey. Hon as a Foreign Minister designate, I would like to ask you, what is your view and position in GITMO 2? Chairman Hello, one moment please. Is it on GITMO 2? Sorry the matter is [in court] so I advise that you ask another question please. Hon. Patricia Thank you Hon Chair. I will go on to my second question. You will agree with me that with reference to our economic diplomacy our missions will be the selling point and therefore should have a certain image. What is the current state of our missions after Parliamentary approval of a $50 million? I don't know whether you have any idea. Parliament approved $50 million to ensure we enhance our missions. Do you have any idea of our missions, the state of our missions? Thank you. Ayorkor answers Thank you Hon Chairman. Hon Chairman in the last 8 years I have traveled and I have had occasions to some of our missions. I must say that most of our buildings are in very bad state. And so the $50million Societe General facility is very welcome. In some missions we need to do rehabilitations. In other missions we need to purchase a building because some of our buildings are rented and as a result we pay a very high rent and it would make business sense for us to purchase some of whether is the chancery or the residence, we need to do something immediately about it. Hon Chairman, in some of the missions, or with regards to some of them I think we would have to relook at what we intended to do with that money. If you take the, in my opinion if you take the New York building, it's in a very, very prime area but it's in a very bad state. We have asbestos which would make any public environmental body close down a building that has asbestos but they've discovered asbestos there which causes cancer. And then you take the heating system is almost gone. If we are to apply a paltry amount which I have seen, we would be able to create what we would like to see. So I believe that in some cases we have to be radical and look at other options whether it's a build operate and transfer option. You have a building in a prime area, you build it all the way to maybe twenty, thirty floors, whoever you go into partnership with will rent the rest you use whatever you need to use after a while it is transferred to you. So we have the money but I think we should reexamine the options available to us. Thank you. Hon. Patricia Thank you. Hon nominee, I know that our foreign missions, or let me state it this way, you are a member of the Transitional Team, the question I want to ask is, do you have a fair view of the conditions of service of our foreign officers and if it need some kind of enhancement? Thank you Ayorkor answers Hon Chairman until I become Minister by the grace of God and through your approval and recommendation, I wouldn't know what the condition of service is for Foreign Service officers. But I know that they always complain so I will look at it Hon. Bernice Adiku Heloo, MP for Hohoe Thank you very much Mr Chair, I would also like to congratulate the minister designate for your nomination to this high office. I'm very, very happy about it and we women are really in supportive of women been nominated. My first question really is about the acquisition of passports by our brothers and sisters living abroad. Recently I had to come in to support students studying in Cuba who had difficulty in acquiring passports when the ones they took had expired. Can you give us what you think can be done so that they do not go through such hardship when they have to renew or even acquire a new passport. Thank you Ayorkor answers Thank you Hon Chairman. Hon Chairman the issue of passport I knew would come up. It's an issue that has become controversial for several reasons. But let me say that we now, as a ministry not we, as a ministry there are about six missions outside that issue passport. The example you gave which is Cuba, they do not issue passport so what will happen is the people will go and fill the forms and then it will be sent back here for the passport to be issued and sent back. What happens which is why delays are caused is that in some cases there are mistakes on the form and or some documents can't be authenticated and as a result delays happen because then they have to find ways of contacting the applicant, correcting the mistakes, that takes time and that is one of the reasons why you would find such delays in the issuance of passport. Chairman Hon., before you go on, if you did an online application that same problem persist? Ayorkor answers Hon Chairman that is why the online application has been introduced. It cuts out a lot of the mistakes that you find in passports. Unfortunately, if, I think I've got it right, some of the missions such as Cuba they will still have to do the manual completion and send it to Ghana but I stand for correction if that is not the case. But I think that that is the case. We have about 6 missions where passports are issued such as Abuja, UK. I believe New York and Washington, Berlin and South Africa. But apart from those missions any other mission would have to send and sometimes the diplomatic bags through which these things are sent it takes time there's a delay with that as well. Hon. Heloo Thank you my second question really is about the appointments that we make when it comes to ambassadorial positions. It is our history that we sometimes put political figures, we appoint political figures. Whereas the career diplomats also are qualified to serve as ambassadors, would you suggest a quota so that we have a win, win situation? I stand to get your view on this. Ayorkor answers Thank you very much Hon Chairman. Hon Chairman the appointment of political ambassadors lies in the bosom of the President. I have some strong views on it but I don't think that I am qualified to give those views. But yes I think that (Haruna interjects) Haruna Mr Chairman sorry to interject. You will be the President's principal legal advisor on foreign policy. You are not saying you should share. Foreign Policy, as Foreign Minister the President will rely very heavily on the advice that you would give so do we expect advice sharing your heavy position on this matter? Ayorkor answers Hon Chairman in answering her question I think that there must be a quota. Presidents all over the world including those who have been President in this country and our President will have and will always appoint political persons to the post of ambassador. What happens is you might want a certain emphasis to be laid in a certain area which is very important to you and therefore you send somebody who is not a career person to go. This is not to say that the career people are not capable. Haruna Mr Chairman sorry I'm back again. Hon Minister nominee, there is a career division of the foreign service of men and women who have dedicated themselves to the pursuit of Ghana's foreign policy, on a 60 40 basis, 60 career, 40 political or 80 career, 20 political, what will be your policy options? Ayorkor answers Thank you Hon Chairman. I'm trying to be diplomatic that's why. But Hon Chairman in my opinion it should be about 60 40 and also that in favor of the career diplomats and also that we do not appoint political deputy ambassadors. Thank you that's my opinion. Haruna You are against Deputy Ambassadors at the missions? Ayorkor answers No, political Deputy Ambassadors Haruna Political Deputy Ambassadors, but the office of the Deputy Ambassador, what will you do with head of chancery? Ayorkor answers We have the Charge d'Affaires in every mission so they will act in the absence of the Ambassador Hon. Heloo Last question, not too important but I need to know. Do you think that in the area of economic diplomacy that you yourself have talked about a lot, do you think that Ghana should continue to be a member of the non-aligned missions? Ayorkor answers Hon Chairman I'm not even sure that it still exist, hahaha, I'm sorry but if it does, we've always been non-aligned. I mean we don't take sides so that's what I will say. If it exist we should be part of it thank you. Hon Sarah Adwoa Safo, MP for Dome-Kwabenya, Vice Chairman Thank you Mr Chairman. Congratulations minister designate on Foreign Affairs and also to place on record that she is one of my mothers in politics and a mentor as well. I want to start by asking, public procurement is an area where finances of the state could be saved or wasted. If you come to the European Union, they do have a directive on public procurement. As the minister designate for Foreign Affairs Would you advice that Ghana makes a strong case for the African Union or the ECOWAS to have a framework for all member states to draw their national procurement practices from as the lessons are in the European Union? Ayorkor answers This is a legal question, I am not a lawyer but I will attempt to answer this. I believe the ECOWAS (Adwoa Sarfo interjects) Adwoa Safo, Vice Chair Hon. Nominee, I withdraw. I would want to divert your mind to Article 40 of the constitution, which talks about international relations and it reads; in its dealings with other nations the government shall promote and protect the interest of Ghana, seek the establishment of just and equitable international economic and social order, promote respect for international law, treaty obligations and settlements of international disputes by peaceful means and it reads on and on and on. In your view would you say that is the Foreign Policy of Ghana, and would you add on, given current international developments all over? Ayorkor answers Thank you Hon Chairman I believe article 40 encapsulates the foreign policy of Ghana. Promoting and protecting the interest of Ghana whiles you deal with countries and institutions of the world. Also ensuring that we promote and respect treaties, other obligations and international laws. I think by and large we haven't done badly as a country. Also that as I said earlier we are strong, as a country we have played very leading roles in ECOWAS in the AU. We've had our voices heard in the corridors of the UN. We have taken the Chair of the UN Security Council again and it goes on and on and on. I think we haven't done badly and by and large that is our foreign policy. Haruna Iddrisu, Tamale South, Ranking Member Mr Chairman let me thank you for this opportunity and to congratulate the Hon Colleague, Hon Ayorkor Botchwey. I worked with her representing President Mahama and she then President elect Nana Addo Dankwa on the inauguration committee and by all standard I believe that this was one of our best inaugural ceremonies, but taking it from Hon Adwoa Sarfo, will you be guided by article 40 in the pursuit of your Foreign Policy? Ayorkor answers Yes, Hon Chairman I believe that our foreign policy, the base document for our foreign policy or any policy is the supreme law of the land which is the constitution so yes. I can see (Haruna comes in) Haruna So when the Hon Adwoa Sarfo was suggesting to you to add to it remind her that you don't have the power to add to it. Chairman it leads me to my first and major question. Securing passport in Ghana is the headache of many Ghanaian citizens across the country from Hamle in the Upper West region, Kukobla in the Northern Region to Zoalungu in the Upper East region and Boadi in the Western Region. Can you assure this House and give specific time limit. Your predecessor ministers had initiated decentralization of passport offices; I should think that we have 3 as at now, 6. When will we have ten across the regions? Ayorkor answers Thank you very much Hon Chairman. Hon Chairman this is so. We have major issues when it comes to securing passports for our citizens. Fortunately the passport office has chalked a lot of successes in terms of decentralizing passport acquisition. As we speak, we have what we call the passport application centers in 6 regions of the country. I will assure the House that just as my predecessor has increased it from what it was, I would also, if I'm given the nod, I will also work towards having passport application centers in the rest of the 4. Which is in Koforidua representing the Eastern region, in the Upper East, Upper West, Wa and Bolga and then the last one would be in Cape Coast , the Central region. So yes I, and then let may say that plans are far advanced as we say in Ghana. We have identified, when I say we the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has identified properties in all four. In some cases they've been offered the properties by the regional administrations of those regions and therefore what is left is for some money to be made available for renovation and then they can set up in the four areas left. So it shouldn't take us too long, I can't put a time frame to it but I can see it happening within, if I'm being very generous with time within two years thank you. Haruna Thank you. Related to that is Muslim Pilgrims who have to travel to Mecca for an important religious and spiritual exercise of Hajji, can we have some assurances from you? What you would do to allow their speedy and ready access to passport to enable them make the trip? Ayorkor answers Thank you Hon Chairman. I think first hand I have experienced the problem that Muslims pilgrims go through. My constituency has a lot of Muslims there and I know when it comes to going on the Hajji it create a lot problems in even acquisition of passports. I think the system has improved in that the passport office has during this period has allocated some days where they deal with Hajji applications and I think that has sort of (interjected by Haruna) Haruna Can I just have the assurance? Ayorkor answers Yes, you have my assurance. We will look at and even improve upon it Haruna Special attention, special working relations. Whatever committee has to work to ensure that pilgrims are guaranteed early access to the passport to enable them make this important journey? Ayorkor answers Yes, Hon Chairman Haruna Related to that, your predecessor minister was very passionate and I recall I had a privilege to work with her in Cabinet that the 50 million that the Hon Appiahaegyei referred to, the Hon Hannah Serwaa Tetteh's position was to argue for retention of the ministry's IGF as security to guarantee this US$50million. Would that be your position? Ayorkor answers Hon Chairman that is exactly my position. 25% retention is not enough and even then we do not always, the ministry of foreign affairs does not always get that money. I would even go further to advocate for an increase in the retention so that the ministry is not always cash trapped which is the case. This is the ministry that is always, always cash trapped thank you. Haruna Chairman thank you ones again, the matter that the Hon Okudzeto raised vis-a-vis Morocco versus the Saharawi Arab Republic, are you aware that at the last TICAD [Tokyo International Conference of Africa's Development] meeting in Nairobi Morocco declined taking their seat if Saharawi Arab was not withdrawn from the meeting? Ayorkor answers Hon Chairman I am not aware. I haven't come across any such [information] Haruna What would be your advice as we seek in handling this delicate diplomatic matter? Ayorkor answers Hon Chairman this is a difficult one. This will be handled I believe at the levels of Head of States and this matters of course it will come to the Executive Council which is made up of foreign ministers. Chairman Okay thank you Hon member. Thank you for attending upon the committee you are discharged By Maxwell Ofori, Parliament House 30.01.2017 LISTEN We write as Barristers and Solicitors for and on behalf of NYONKOPA COCOA BUYING LIMITED, a subsidiary Company of Barry-Callebaut Ltd, the world's largest chocolate manufacturing. We respectfully refer to your publication of 5th day of January, 2017 wherein you published a story about a theft incident of some quantities of bags of cocoa beans concerning our client and some of its staff and the impounding of the vehicle by the Ashanti Regional Police Command. We have our client's instructions and we hereby execute to humbly request you to, as a matter of urgency and professional ethics, to retract the said publication as same being completely fabricated false and further publish a rejoinder giving it the same prominence as the original publication of the said date. We kindly invite you to be guided in the publication of the said rejoinder with the following as the true facts and the indefeasible state of affairs which your paper failed and/or refused to advert its mind by way of consultation of our client before putting up the said fabricated false story. One Rahman who worked for a rival company Unicom Commodities but ceased to work for it in September, 2016 and commenced to work for our client, Nyokonpa Cocoa Buying as FH. At the time of severance ties, he owed Unicom Commodities, 165 bags out of which 140 has been lying in his depot at a village called Nfante close to Asumura township, he indicated that the 25 bags he didn't pay as Unicom owed him on account of PC and Franchisee commissions. He even indicated that he had even offered to give Unicom Commodities cash as a refund at some point when he realized that Unicom were not coming for the stocks but the new Area manager told him that, they have already reported the stocks so they prefer the stocks. He also indicated that, one Richard (the head of Business for Unicom) thought he could convince him to rescind his decision of working for us through his frequent visits and numerous plea hence the delay in picking the stocks. The said Rahman made it clear that, he had never dealt with Unicom nor any of their agents at the commencement of the 2016/17 Main Crop season, so it was strange that anybody in Unicom could make a case as if he has some balances to be cleared. The said Rahman who since has been working for our client, loaded a truck with about 600 graded bags of cocoa beans from a depot belonging to our client at Asumura to the port but the said truck was impounded by the Ashanti Regional Police Command. Apparently when our client inquired on the 3rd day of January, 2017, at the said Regional Command, it was informed that Unicom alleged that their graded stocks have been diverted for Nyonkopa a call came through their Regional Commander COP KOFI BOAKYE to detain the driver for further investigations. However, The vehicle documents related to the cocoa( way bill, QCC certificate ) in the name of Nyonkopa were handed over to the police by the driver, Kwasi Agyemang for verification. Our client claimed the ownership of the bags of cocoa as there was no legal basis for Unicom to cause the arrest of our truck which was legally loaded from our client's warehouse at Asumura. The Unicom team comprising of Muzammil Mohammed, Head of Business, Richard Suwli (Acting LBC Head and the Area manager) was at the station. They claimed that thesaid Rahman was owing them 405 bags and hence caused the arrest of the truck. Both the teams assembled at the office of the said Regional crime officer and after going through the two written statements and some verbal narrations and the cocoa documents the Crime officer established the following; That the Ashanti Regional Police command even lacks jurisdiction to handle this case in that the case happened at Asumura and for the matter the case should have been handled at Brong Ahafo. That the 405 bags being claimed by Unicom is not correct and accurate in that, the remaining balance of 240 bags is with One Stanley Kwadwo Yeboah who is currently working for Unicom as a FH at Kasapin. That, police cannot impound the truck because the stocks are in Nyonkopa's name and were legally graded and sealed in Nyonkopas name. Our team further asked Richard to confirm whether he was not aware that the said Rahman has stopped working with them since September 2016, his answer clearly confirmed that their action lacked merit and it was borne out of malice. The following consensus was reached at the said Regional CID's office after the discussions:. That the truck be unconditionally be released to continue to its destination. That Unicom should go for their 140 bags. That all payables due the said Rahman with Unicom should be calculated by Thursday so that it can be used to offset the remaining 25 bags. That the remaining bags of 240 bags should be sorted out with Stanley at the presence of William Larbi( Nyonkopa SM ), the AM of Unicom and Rahman so that nobody will come back and lay any fresh claims. We respectfully entreat you to take this letter as amicable means of arriving at a fait-accompli since your publication has had an adverse effect on our client and its said holding Company, Barry-Callibaut Plc. You are therefore expected to place the rejoinder with the same prominence within one week from the receipt of this letter in default our client shall take legal action to assert its right and consequential effects. You can call lawyer Frank Kwadwo Otoo on 0244724684/0266615265 for clarification if any. Please, be advised accordingly. Yours faithfully, FRANK KWADWO OTOO ESQ., O & ALEGAL CONSULT KUMASI THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF CHRONICLE NEWSPAPER 37 BOBO STREET TESANO-ACCRA COPIES TO THE HEREIN: THE MANAGING DIRECTOR NYONKOPA COCOA BUYING LIMITED KUMASI THE EDITOR CHRONICLE NEWSPAPER KUMASI-OFFICE President Nana Akufo-Addo 30.01.2017 LISTEN The dust has hardly settled on the 7 December election and already a much hackneyed phrase used whenever there has been a shift of political power has started to appear in our political discourse empty coffers. Governments taking over from another either through a coup detat or peaceful transition will always claim they met empty coffers. But really for the sake of the records, the only Government that met money in the coffers was the Nkrumah administration when it took over from the British. Since then Ghana has been running an economy based on deficit financing. What this really means is that no Government since Nkrumah has come to meet money in the coffers. The coffers at any moment has money trickling in from taxes, duties, levies etc. The truth is that by years end, all the revenues collected do not meet our expenditure. We therefore have to borrow to finance the shortfall also referred to as the deficit. When the NPP handed over to the Atta Mills administration, the budget deficit as a percentage of GDP stood at about 14%. This simply means that our expenditure exceeded all revenues collected in the national kitty during the year by 14% of our GDP. All Governments have to raise revenue to finance their budgeted expenditure using various taxes, export revenues etc. Any shortfall which is described as the deficit is financed through borrowing either on the domestic market or international credit market, euro bond etc. The Mahama administration is likely to leave office with a deficit of 7% of GDP. Much better than the 12% inherited from the Atta Mills administration and definitely much better than the 14% inherited from the Kufuor administration. Politicians have made us promises that they are unable or unwilling to keep. The theory of empty coffers and debt is therefore going to be very topical in the next few months. Our answer the coffers have never been full. You knew full well you were not going to meet any money sitting in the kitty when you made us all those promises. No excuses please. Give us our factories, our dams, and all the fantastic promises that attracted our votes. Just get to work ASAP. Nana Ohemaaba 0209325624 Some 30 teens and young adults in communities across the Brong -Ahafo Region have benefitted from a five-day adolescent reproductive health/capacity building seminar, under the auspices of UK-aid. Dubbed Girls Leading Our World/ Boys Respecting Others Camp, and running under the theme: Building the Future through Positive Adolescent Reproductive Health and Agriculture, the event (which came off from January 16th to January 22nd) sought to empower these young beneficiaries in subjects relating to responsible sexual behavior, personal hygiene, leadership, and a variety of income generating skills. A glamorous opening ceremony, held at the Ghana Permaculture Institute (GPI) in Techiman on January 25th, was graced by key stakeholders and partners including those from the Permaculture Institute (which also served as venue for the camp), the District Coordinating Director, Palladium International, Peace Corps Ghana, as well as the National Youth Authority (NYA). Representatives of the District Coordinating Director, Palladium International, Peace Corps Ghana, as well as the National Youth Authority (NYA), all commended the timeliness and importance of the programme and the positive effects it is expected to generate in the coming months.. Speaking on behalf of the Peace Corps, Amanda (also a teacher in the area) espoused the overall motive of the organization: to live and work in communities, to help connect them to resources, and empower the future leaders of Ghana through education, health, and agricultural projects. During this camp, we have been connecting the youth to resources in this region, and how to use their surroundings to create an income, be independent, take care of their families, and be contributing citizens to Ghana. It has been rewarding for Peace Corps to be able to work hand in hand with Palladium to teach creative activities and agricultural projects; as an education volunteer, I personally enjoyed seeing the youth participating in hands-on activities and growing into leadership positions. The selected teenagers and young adults, according to Peace Corps volunteers who were involved in the recruitment process, must exhibit traits of self-motivation and must have natural flair for leadership, as well as academic potential. The beneficiaries were taken through practical sessions in bead-making, beekeeping, mushroom farming and cashew grafting, as well as batik-making, were full of praise for the opportunity to be part of the seminar. Alex Mensah (from Duadaso), Abdulai Dallah ( from Techiman Fianso), Ernest Kelvin Oppong (from Nkoranza), Edna Arigbe (from Techiman), Belinda (from Techiman) were some of the participants. I look forward to applying the skills I have acquired here when I leave, as it affords me multiple avenues to make money, an enthusiastic Alex revealed to DAILY GUIDE. It has taken a lot to reclaim the land, and theres no use of chemicals here.. We have been taken through several permacultural practices. I am grateful to all who have made this possible. The skills in batik, I have learned, I hope to share with my colleagues when I return home, Edna added. The situation today Statistics relating to Ghanas adolescent reproductive health situation are staggering: about 31% of Ghanas current population are young people (ages 10-24). A 2014 report placed the contribution of adolescents to fertility at 9.1 %, and 3 of every 10 births are between the ages of 15 and 24. Again, a 2016 30-year projection by the National Population Council of Ghana states that Ghanas New Generation (between ages 15-24) will soar from 1.3 million to 3 million, and lack of preparation spells doom, especially regarding Ghanas poverty situation. But the situation has largely been ignored, Alaya Adogboba (Programme Officer for Palladium on the Ghana Adolescent Reproductive Health Project) opined. The Brong- Ahafo Region specifically, lags behind as compared to other parts of the country in this respect, hence, being the focal point of the Ghana Adolescent Reproductive Health Project (GHARH). Many of the adolescents in the area (especially young women), because of extreme poverty and lack of economic opportunities after school, resort to sexual relationship with men expecting financial assistance, no matter how paltry, though they are not fully prepared for the repercussions (STIs, unwanted pregnancies among others). Its time to break that cycle, Alaya cried, adding that programmes thus are effective tools.. She also calls for an end to the depressing Ghanaian culture of hypocrisy especially with matters relating to adolescent reproductive health, asking that parents should eschew shyness and eliminate the perception of sexual education as a taboo. The Ghanaian child is getting pregnant at 15, Amanda (Peace Corp volunteer at the camp) stresses about the situation, advising that the matter of adolescent reproductive health be tackled head-on, and not massaged in any way, or be limited by cultural considerations. But theres hope While theres still much to be done to improve the adolescent reproductive health situation, and possibly eradicate the menace from the region (and by extension, the country), key steps have been put in place by several partners including the Ghana Health Service, the National Population Council among others, to tackle the problem. In the Brong-Ahafo Region, 64 adolescent health corners have been set up in the past three years, over 1000 Ghana Health Service Personnel, some 1,681 teachers, as well as over 3000 peer educators have been trained in adolescent reproductive health issues. 75 M & E officers who went on the field to monitor the progress of the initiative, have supported in the review of the Reproductive Health Policy for adolescents. Expected outcomes from this camp, according to an official programme document, include inculcating leadership habits into participants, guiding them to make better sex and life choices, as well as building their capacities in the area of agricultural skills and other income generating activities in their home communities. Hannah Kyremeh a Physician Assistant based in Techiman, who was also bead-making instructor at the camp, as well as Donkor Yaw Barnabas, a local teacher, translator at the event, were both optimistic that GLOW/BRO 2017 would go a long way to improve situations. Theres nothing better than having your own job. These skills will make them [young girls especially] less dependent, Hannah was convinced. The progress of beneficiaries (who are also recipients of funding to go into various startups based on the knowledge they have acquired at the camp), will be monitored over time, according to Alaya. They will be assigned mentors to guide them toward their goals, and she was optimistic that ripple effects from GLOW/BRO 2017 would be felt all across the country. The GLOW/BRO Camp 2017 is based on former U.S First Lady Michelle Obamas initiative to improve education among boys and girls in the sub-region. Funded by UK-aid, it is also supported by Palladium International, Unilever Ghana, the Ghana Health Service, Ghana Education Service, and the National Population Council. Palladium Day4 (56 Of 82) (1) Palladium Day3 (13 Of 82) Participants Also Learned To Make A Variety Of Items Using Beads Participants Being Taken Through Tie And Dye Training Participants Being Taking Through The Rudiments Of Preparing A Budget Participants Pose With Facilitators And Partners (1) Participants Pose With Facilitators And Partners The high-profile mayoral contest between Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert and challenger Heath Mello is smashing campaign finance records. Stothert, who is seeking re-election, filed a campaign finance report that shows she has raised $1.5 million, far more than the previous high mark of $1.1 million raised by Mike Fahey for the mayor's race in 2001. Mello, who served eight years in the Legislature and was term-limited out of office in January, has raised $531,000 during a far briefer time as a candidate. Stothert has been raising money for a possible re-election bid since 2013. A comparison of the money raised in 2016: Stothert, $542,669; Mello, $531,000. This year's contest featuring the mayor, a Republican, and Mello, a Democrat who headed the Legislature's Appropriations Committee, is the top election race in Nebraska this year. The office of mayor is nonpartisan. The Omaha mayoral primary election is April 4; the general election will be May 9. Addis Ababa (AFP) - Chad's foreign minister Moussa Faki Mahamat was named Monday as the new AU Commission chairperson, beating four others to succeed South Africa's Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, diplomats told AFP. Several delegates leaving the election hall confirmed the win, while grinning Chadian delegates hugged each other in celebration. Former Burundian president Pierre Buyoya confirmed Faki's victory, telling AFP it came after a final round battle with Kenyan foreign minister Amina Mohamed. The 56-year-old former prime minister has been at the forefront of the fight against Islamists in Nigeria, Mali and the Sahel and has promised "development and security" will be top of his agenda as chief of the continental bloc. He said he dreams of an Africa where the "sound of guns will be drowned out by cultural songs and rumbling factories" and pledged to streamline the bureaucratic AU during his four-year term in office. Member states elected him after seven rounds of voting, according to a statement from Kenya congratulating him on his victory. Other losing candidates were from Botswana, Equatorial Guinea and Senegal. Accra, Jan. 30, GNA - Mr Frank Blaskovich, the Vice President of Blaskovich Services in Northern California, US, has noted that energy policy has a serious impact on everyone in the society. He therefore called on stakeholders whoever cared about the society, the energy business, energy jobs or his or own job to be focused on the policy. Mr Blaskovich made the observation when he spoke on: 'Energy Policy- Is it Effective? Is it Fair in Accra, as a SPE 'Distinguished Lecturer' in Accra. Mr Blaskovich focused on energy policy and its importance to stakeholders including energy producers, governments and societies as a system problem. His primary spotlight was on measuring policy effectiveness and fairness. The Lecturer said a policy model had number of drivers that could affect system behaviour. 'Even though policy models and physical models are different in many ways, analysis techniques are similar. 'However, because of deep uncertainties about the future, we use regret analysis to develop policies that minimise losses when bad behaviour occurs. 'We test our policies by re-running the model with resulting policies to see how well they perform. Modifications can be made until policies work better than previous policies. This is a never ending process, because uncertainty about the future will always be with us,' he said. Mr Blaskovich said: 'Our goal is to find policy choices that tend to minimise regret over a wide range of possible, but unknowable futures. This shows typical results from a Regret Analysis and the boundaries of the Policy Envelope created from model runs. 'Every combination of policy drivers and objectives represents a possible future. For each future, a specific policy generates the best objective result - Minimum State Regret for the State and Minimum Producer Regret for the Producer. He said there was much more variability in the Fair case production taxes than in the other policies. 'A logical question is whether or not the Fair policy is correct? This is a non-intuitive result that often can occur in complex systems. No one, other than a system 'savant', could guess the Fair policy without running the model. Complex model results always need constant scrutiny.' He said it was impossible for one to choose a best policy in a complex system problem the only alternative was to try the best ones. Mr Blaskovich said policy making was a never-ending process of development, testing and refinement to meet the needs of all of the actors, who were ultimately all members of the society. He described the energy policy problem as a wicked, complex system problem that affected all every day and could only be managed using a system model approach. 'We can only hope for the best, but always plan for the worst,' he said. Mr Blaskovich asked stakeholders to think more carefully about how energy policy was determined while it was very important and difficult to develop effective and fair policies. 'The more people understand this, the better our chances of getting policies that will benefit all of us. 'I have always thought that the best way to understand a problem is to look at it from another person's perspective. 'What policy would you recommend if you are an Energy Producer? If you are a Society member? If you were a State Policy Maker? I suspect that the choice is not the same depending on your perspective. This reinforces the idea that policy making is difficult,' he said. The programme was organised by the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE), Ghana Section, and funded by the SPE Foundation through member donations and a contribution from Offshore Europe. The SPE is the largest individual member organisation serving managers, engineers, scientists and other professionals worldwide in the upstream segment of the oil and gas industry. There are two types of membership: Professional and Student. Membership is not restricted to Petroleum Engineers. Other professionals, regardless of experience or course of study, including other engineering professions, lawyers, journalists and accountants. Student membership has its own benefits and include: Opportunity to apply for SPE scholarships; Discounts on textbooks and reference books; Compete in paper contests; Receive career advice from a mentor; Participate in SPE programmes like eMentor and Petrobowl; access to technical papers on onepetro etc. Each year, SPE selects a group of professionals, nominated by their peers, to share their knowledge and expertise with SPE members through visits to local sections. Distinguished Lecturers are nominated by their peers, and selected by the SPE's Distinguished Lecturer Committee for quality, timeliness and relevance of presentations. The committee solicits nominations from each region of the world to cover all disciplines. The SPE Ghana Section was established on 19, September 19, 2010 and given approval by the SPE International Board during the Annual Technical Conference held in Florence on September 20 - September 22, 2010. GNA By Mispah Tumtuo, GNA Kumasi, Jan 30, GNA - Master Paul Mensah, a science student of Kumasi High Senior School (SHS), has emerged winner of the national essay competition, organized by the Bible Society of Ghana. He scored 88 per cent to beat his over 400 other competitors from across the nation. For his prize, he was presented with an HP laptop computer. Ms. Ayishetu Fuseini of the Saint Jerome SHS and Master Elvis Marcus Baah also of Kumasi High placed second and third, respectively, and each took home 'TICHIPS iPad'. The students wrote on the topic 'I stand for integrity'. Mr. Ebenezer Ofosu Yeboah, the Ashanti Regional Coordinator of the Competition, said at the presentation ceremony held in Kumasi that the goal was to help sharpen their writing and critical thinking skills. He said he was impressed with the overall performance of the students - it was a keen contest. He added that, he had been left in no doubt that 'Ghana indeed has a bright future'. Mr. George Amponsah-Duodu, the Assistant Headmaster of Kumasi High, said he was thrilled by the strong performance of his students and applauded them for bringing honour to the school. GNA By Alex Ofori Agyekum, GNA Korleman (G/A), Jan 30, GNA - The chief Korleman near Amasaman in the Ga West Municipality has released a five-acre stretch of land for the construction of a school. Nii Korle, the chief, announced the decision at a community durbar held to discuss education development in the area. The land, he said could be used by the government to build a senior high school (SHS) in the community. He appealed to President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to do everything to ensure the fulfilment of the free SHS election campaign promise. Nii Korle indicated that there were in excess of 500 young people in the area, who were out of school because of the economic situation of their parents - the grinding poverty. He called for the municipal assembly to construct a clinic in the community to assure the people of access to quality healthcare. The eight kilometer road linking the area with Pokuase should also be improved to allow for smooth evacuation of farm produce to the marketing centres, he added. GNA Accra, Jan. 30, GNA - Archbishop Charles Palmer Buckle, the Metropolitan Archbishop of Accra, has urged the management and staff of the National Investment Bank (NIB) to put behind their past and focus on the present and the future. This, he said, must be done with honesty, hard work and humility to improve on the bank's past activities and performance with commitment and dedication. Archbishop Palmer Buckle was speaking at the 2016 Thanksgiving Service of the NIB in Accra on Sunday on the theme: 'The Mercies of God'. The service was climaxed with praises and dancing to the glory of God. He called on the management and staff of the NIB to count their blessings as a corporate institution and as individuals, name them one by one and balance them with their challenges which would surprise them of what God has done for them. Archbishop Palmer Buckle said though there were some experiences of 'ups and downs God must always be appreciated in every situation'. Ghana is the toast of Africa and everything about Ghana is a blessing, he said, adding that being a Ghanaian put some responsibility on each citizen. The Metropolitan Archbishop said the biggest fallacy in life was that some people believed they had been given less or no talent and hence did not give off their best. 'God requires us to bring out our best with whatever talent is given to us and this is seen and done through honesty, hard work and humility,' he said. Archbishop Palmer Buckle noted that the steadfast love of God never ceases and His blessings never ends and that the talent God has blessed each and every individual with should be invested to the maximum. He said Ghanaians could only fulfill what God expected of them when they were honest, hardworking and humble. GNA The good works of the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTC) continues to manifest as an award was bestowed on the Centre for its exceptional accomplishments in Burkina Faso. The Burkinabe Police Service presented a medal of honour to the KAIPTC for achieving outstanding work in the delivery of Police Pre-Deployment Training (PPDT) and the Police Middle Management Courses (PMMC) to a total of 738 Police officers, both in Accra and Ouagadougou. The award was in recognition of excellent work delivered by the KAIPTC Mobile Training Team (MTT), led by Dr Amadou Fofana, to the Burkina Faso Police Service from 2011 till date. Prior to the KAIPTCs training of the Burkinabe Police Service, the nation was ranked 75th with respect to the deployment of Police Troops to the United Nations Peacekeeping Missions. Currently, it can boast of an enviable 8th position on the ranking of Military and Police Contributions to United Nations operations. The Commandant of the KAIPTC, AVM Evans expressed his delight at this significant achievement noting that this is a double honour for the Mobile Training Team individually and the KAIPTC as an institution. By excellently delivering on our mission to provide internationally-recognized capacity on African peace and security through training, our team is indeed worthy ambassadors of the quality that the Centre represents. Dr Amadou Fofana, who received the award added that this is a personal honour for me; I am most grateful that the hard work of my colleagues and I have been recognized. This is a huge inspiration to us and an encouragement to us to continue with our good work. The medal of honour is proposed by the Burkina Faso Inspector General of Police (IGP), and granted by the Minister of Security and signed by the President of Burkina Faso. In Burkina Faso, the medal of honour gives financial promotion to citizen beneficiaries, and for recipients abroad, it is for honour, for supporting the activities of the Police Service towards global peace in the sub-region. The Norwegian and German governments have over the years financed the training of the Burkina Faso Police Service and supported them in varied aspects of the programme. Since 2011, the KAIPTC Mobile Training Team has been providing Police Pre-deployment Trainings for Peace Support Operations in Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Mali, Benin, and Malawi and to missions such as United Nations-African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID), African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the DR Congo, (MONUSCO), ECOWAS Missions, etc. Story by Ghana | Myjoyonline.com The President of the Republic, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, has called on the new Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, to take the lead in effecting reforms at the UN, so as to promote and deepen international co-operation. According to President Akufo-Addo, with the reform of the Security Council being the most debated topic at the UN since 1993, it is important that Antonio Guterres, during his tenure of office, ensures the implementation of reforms of this important organ and, indeed, all other organs of the UN. To this end, the President urged the new UN Secretary-General to ensure the realization of the Ezulwuni Consensus, a position on international relations and reform of the United Nations agreed by the African Union in 2005. President Akufo-Addo was speaking at a breakfast meeting between African Heads of State and the new Secretary General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, on Sunday, January 29, 2017, in Addis Ababa, ahead of the commencement of the Ordinary Session of the 28th Assembly of the African Union. The President recounted how he, as Ghana's Foreign Minister and Chairman of the AU Ministerial conclave in Swaziland, in 2005, together with his colleague AU Foreign Ministers drafted the Ezulwuni consensus, which called for a more representative and democratic Security Council. The goal of the AU, as contained in the Ezulwuni Consensus, was to be fully represented in all the decision-making organs of the UN, particularly in the Security Council, which is the principal decision-making organ of the UN in matters relating to international peace and security. Full representation of Africa on the Security Council would mean having not less than two permanent seats with all the prerogatives and privileges of permanent membership including the right of veto; five non-permanent seats; and that the AU should be responsible for the selection of Africa's representatives on the Security Council. Nearly 12 years down the line, President Akufo-Addo lamented the fact that little progress had been made since the drawing up of the Consensus in Swaziland. He, thus, urged Antonio Guterres to hasten efforts towards the full realization of this consensus. With the new UN Secretary General advocating conflict management and prevention as one of his topmost priorities in office, President Akufo-Addo expressed concern about the growing rift between some AU Member States and the International Criminal Court (ICC). His concern was hinged on the fact that as many as 6 African countries in 2016, namely Gambia, Burundi, Uganda, Namibia, Kenya and South Africa, announced their intentions to pull out, and in the case of South Africa completely withdrew, from the tribunal, after claims of inappropriate targeting of Africa by the ICC. To this end, President Akufo-Addo called for a closer engagement between the AU and the UN in the spirit of mutual respect and trust, and reiterated Ghana's continued support and confidence in the ICC. -Peacfmonline The Writer 30.01.2017 LISTEN The pomp and pageantry that greeted the newly elected president of the Gambia Mr Adama Barrow on Thursday 26th January, 2017 was undoubtedly a warm one. Warmth which symbolised unity, oneness and the preparedness for a paradigm shift from the erstwhile perceived autocratic regime of Jammeh. But the sustenance of this national unity is not absolute yet; given the hurdles to cross and the myriad of work to be done. The Gambia must expeditiously cross the rubicon to lay a solid foundation for the speedily growth of the country. For the trained eye, the country isn't out of the woods yet and may want to consider the perspective below to accelerate development, consolidate national unity and deepen the much needed peace and security. Jammeh's 22yr rule under a litmus test will fail in many areas with respect to good governance. But what kept him sailing was a security base that was as loyal to him as a person. Depoliticizing and over hauling the army / security sector cannot be a matter for tomorrow especially considering a whopping 70% of the service men are loyalist of the Jammeh administration. It is even disturbing to know that majority have the same ethnic background as Jammeh. How professional can a national army be, when it's interest is in one man and not the entire nation? This path of providing security for a nation only breeds a hypocritical army and a divided nation. The new President faces the greatest challenge of overhauling the security sector whiles holding the virtues of nationalism. It will be a great mistake to assume that for the purposes of national unity he should keep them all. Any move to keep them all could serve as an excellent reprisal base for Jammeh to use anyday. And this in itself would be a national insecurity. It is also important that the process of overhauling doesn't take the shape of tribalism ethnicity or cronyism. This will only amount to what I call the ' jammerism' ie reintroducing the Jammeh style. The element of time is crucially necessary in all these. The understanding here is that if it will take 6months to complete the overhaul, it means that the potency of the army will be decreased or weakened for 6 months which invariably will be gap for any adversary. In the broader scheme of things and for security reasons , Gambia could revive the *Senegambia confederation* which broke down in 1989, for Senegal to provide a limited security exercise as the country tries to find it's feet. The over 36% of citizens who voted for Jammeh cannot be forgotten. Years of bonding have made them hardliners of Jammeh. They are lurking around and waiting to test the paws of the new administration. A conscious effort must be made to bring them under the umbrella of unity to dispell any feeling of exclusion. When exclusion reaches its all time high, it will create a fertile ground for reprisal/insecurity. This security dilemma as established above only challenges the Gambian government to speed up in building a strong security institution/measure to prevent the country from backsliding. Article by: Nana Owusu Sekyere Security Analyst. Twellium Industrial Company Ghana Limited, producers of Rush Energy Drink and Verna distilled water, has launched a foundation to light up the faces of poor people in the country by giving them a life changing experience. The project is aimed at lifting the downtrodden from a deprived stage to a glorious height that will make life worth living for them. Disadvantaged individuals are requested to write to the Foundation, spelling out clearly their specific needs and how to address them accordingly. Head of Research at Twellium Industrial Company Limited, Selorm Kofi Dake, urged businesses to take their corporate social responsibility seriously. He urged the corporate world to see it as a duty to impact lives positively especially the disadvantaged in our society. According to him, the Twellium Foundation has come to stay and to invest in people in order to empower them to contribute to the development of their communities. Latif Abubakar, Head of Projects and Programmes at Twellium Industrial Company Ghana Limited said the Foundation seeks to impact the lives of disadvantaged groups in the society. Our doors will be open to everybody. Individuals in need of educational and other assistance in society are encouraged to write to the Foundation to appeal for support, he said. Mr. Ebenezer Adjaye, Administrative and Finance Officer indicated that the Foundation will focus on projects such as health, business development for rural women and scholarships for brilliant but needed students and pupils across the 10 regions of Ghana. With a tagline Impacting Lives he urged the disadvantaged individuals to write to the Foundation spelling out their specific needs. Twellium Industrial Company which started operations in Ghana on February 28, 2014 brings to the Ghanaian market beverages that have been on the US and European markets for over 30 years as a franchise from the Monarch Beverage Company of Atlanta, USA. Mr. Ken Ofori-Atta, assumed office as Ghanas Finance Minister after having been sworn-in on January 27, 2017, by his Excellency the President. He brings to the Ministry over 30years experience in Ghanaian and international financial sector. A Statement issued by the Public Relations Unit of the Ministry of Finance indicated that Hon. Ofori-Atta and twelve other Minister designates were approved by Parliament on Friday, January 27, after going through a successful vetting process by the Appointments Committee of Parliament. The Statement noted that the Hon Ministers immediate priority is to protect the public purse, stabilize Ghanas macro economy, spearhead anti-corruption, increase revenue and introduce policy initiatives to grow the economy for the private sector to thrive and create jobs. We will create wealth and improve peoples lives by ensuring economic freedom as the mainstay of the economy. I am committed to cleaning up our public finances, managing the enormous debt that we have inherited in order to create the needed fiscal space, invest in critical infrastructure, and empower the private sector to create jobs, he said in response to his vision for his tenure. Mr. Ofori-Atta added that the legacy of the Ministry will be a professional institution with global standards in treasury and risk management to give effect to enforcing the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA). The Sector Minister intends to work hard to get the economy growing eventually at double digits through policies and strategies that will increase revenue, reduce waste, control spending, grow the economy to create jobs. The Hon Minister noted that the 3-year IMF programme was needed to achieve fiscal consolidation, though it is presently in a delicate state, I am committed to an IMF programme which addresses our current predicaments and will ensure that we also meet all the necessary structural benchmarks that may be suggested. As our president has stated, we now need to get Ghana working again in order to create jobs. He further assured that he will deliver with Gods guidance on the NPPs Manifesto pledges in spite of the daunting economic challenges. Mr. Ofori-Atta explained that he is optimistic that in the Presidents first budget, there will be clear path towards fulfilling the manifesto pledges and opening economic space for the private sector to thrive. Short Profile of the Hon. Ken Ofori-Atta The new Minister was a Co-Founder and former Executive Chairman of the Databank Group, (a premier investment banking firm) in Ghana. Prior to co-founding Databank in 1990, the Hon Minister was an investment banker at Morgan Stanley and Salomon Brothers on Wall Street in New York. He has over the past 25-years since he returned from New York, had business interests in Insurance, Retail Banking, Private Equity, Pharmaceuticals and Real Estate. He went to Achimota School; received a BA in Economics from Columbia University in New York and an MBA from the Yale School of Management. The Upper East Regional Health Directorate and Management of the Bolgatanga Regional Hospital will from Tuesday, 31st January 2017, paste names of health personnel and their contacts at the Out-Patients Department of the hospital to improve quality service delivery. According to Upper East Regional Health Director of Health Services, Dr. Kofi Issah, the decision was borne out of public outcry of poor health care delivery by health personnel on nights and weekends duties. Residents within the Bolgatanga Municipality, lashed out at the management of the Upper East Regional Hospital over delays in the provision of health care at the facility. They claimed staff on the night and weekend shift were the worst culprits. Dr. Kofi Issah According to the residents, health personnel at the Out-Patients Department (OPD), Laboratory, Pharmacy and the consulting rooms, also exhibited similar conduct like their colleagues who worked during the night and weekend shifts. I got to the hospital in the night and I was told that, the Doctor on duty had gone home because there was no work. We had to wait till the next day and even the doctor for the morning also came late One resident lamented. Another resident said I spent 3 hours at the pharmacy for drugs for a patient that I brought to the hospital, and just at the time I was served, the nurses came to tell me my patient was dead. But Speaking to Citi News, Upper East Regional Director of Health Services, Dr. Issah, said the situation has compelled the management of the hospital to make public, the names of health personnel and their contacts including their respective shifts effective Tuesday 31st January in a bid to curb the issue. The most common are when people get to the hospital in the evenings where they have to wait for long periods to be able to be seen by health personnel and the frustrations of the patients. What I have ordered the hospital to do is to get the names of all those who are on duty, and their contacts pasted at the OPD, so that when patients get into the hospital and the fellow is not around, then the public can identify the health worker who delayed health care in order that the appropriate sanctions can be taken against the person. Because if the public complain and we dont have specifically who was expected to be on duty, at what time and what service the person was to deliver, we will find it difficult to normally answer to some of the public demands to be able to improve care. He urged patients not to quarrel and fight health staff, but report any concern to the In-charge of the various units, and when they are unable to resolve it, it will then be forwarded to the health directorate for resolution. Dr. Issah admonished health personnel to work at reducing the time periods it takes patients to receive care especially at the Records, OPD, Laboratory, Pharmacy and in the Consulting rooms, admitting that the current situation is not the best. He added that, due to inadequate doctors at the hospital, the hospital can only assign one doctor for night duty. Dr. Issah advised management and staff of the hospital to have regular radio discussions to educate the public and address any emerging concerns. By: Frederick Awuni/Citifmonline.com/Ghana Once again Ghana's Parliament is in the news and this time not too palatable. A heartbreaking corruption allegation leveled against some Honorable members of the noble house. In contention, Hon. Mahama Ayariga alleging that, Hon. Boakye Agyarko, the current minister for Energy and Petroleum, paid bribe (GHS 3,000 for each minority vetting committee member) to facilitate his confirmation as the minister since there were a little hitches surrounding His confirmation. This wild allegation calls for raising of eye brows at the heard of it. It had been one and many parliament as an institution in one way or the other being entangled in corruption accusation. As Ghanaians we can all admit to the fact that, corruption is one of the agents that retrogress the development of Ghana as a nation. So it become so dangerous if such an allegation is leveled against a minister who is assigned to one of the strategic ministries which is seen as the growth engines in Ghana. Notwithstanding this, following this issue kingly, as to the various intertwined revelation coming up, a lot of questions also keep popping up ; 1. Was any payment made at all? 2. What prevented Hon. Mahama Ayariga from raising this serious issue on the floor of Parliament since the report that contained the fate of this ministerial nominee was under discussion on the floor of Parliament. 3. Why is Hon. Mahama Ayariga still standing by His allegation even as Hon. Muntaka Mumbarak who by Hon. Ayariga distributed the said money to the minority members has come out to debunk this allegation even with His faith (ALAH) ? 4. Why did Hon. Mahama Ayariga only felt comfortable to broke the news on no other radio but Radio Gold whose political alliance is a known secret? 5. Or is this one of the political gymnastics, as they say, In Ghana politics is a dirty game In fact this a test case for all parties involved to prove a point even at the time the ruling government had promised to frown on corruption. We demand Parliament as an institution to lunch a thorough investigation into the matter to bring every bit to bear to protect the dignity and sanctity of this noble house. Also we demand that, Hon. Boakye Agyarko to take the matter up (court) as a private entity to enable him exonerate Himself and prove His Perspective He want as to understand from. Notwithstanding all this, as it is said, He who alleges must prove, we demand that Hon. Mahama Ayariga should bring up all His evidence which substantiate His allegation else we call on the leadership of parliament should not spare the rod to serve as a deterrent to others. All eyes are watching how this matter will be handled. THANK YOU LONG LIVE STAND FOR GHANA MOVEMENT LONG LIVE GHANA ...........signed............. CONVENER FRIMPONG FOSTER 0546075778 OPERATIONS AFFAIRS SIMON OKYERE 0542458842 COORDINATOR ACHEAMPONG BOADI JEPHLIN 0244676908 PRESS SECRETARY YAW BOAMAH 0279846965 RESEARCH OFFICER ISAAC APPIANIN 0277907465 STAND FOR GHANA MOVEMENT !!! CITIZENS NOT SPECTATORS!! Gender Minister-designate Otiko Afisa Djaba says all Ghanaians has urged Ghanaians to set an example in speech as a way of sanitising the airwaves. She made the comment in response to a question posed by former Deputy Education minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, one of the young appointees under the former National Democratic Congress (NDC) government. He wanted to know how Otiko Djaba would serve as a role model to children in using temperate language. In a statement filled with innuendos, the NPP National Women's Organiser said "babies with sharp teeth should be a thing of the past. The description will trigger memories of former President Rawlings who first used it to describe some young politicians in the NDC skilled in denigrating and insulting their elders. Although President Rawlings did not mention names of persons who fit this category, many have linked the young ministers under the Mills government to this description. When her attention was drawn by the Tamale South Member of Parliament (MP) Haruna Iddrisu to withdraw the use of the phrase babies with sharp teeth which he deemed offensive, Madam Djaba only wanted to know who have I offended? When the Chairman of the Committee, Joseph Osei-Owusu, pressed her, whom she is referring to with the description, she retorted I didnt describe anyone but we should expunge that from our body politic The Chairman further appealed that since someone is known to have used that description to refer to some people in the past, which has stuck with, people, if you wont mind you can choose another expression so that you would reach the same target. To this, she replied, it is important that as we build the nation it is important that we use language that is not insulting, but use temperate language that would help us unite and build the country. She called on all politicians to be mindful of how they communication as it would impact on children growing up. The nominees own choice of words came under scrutiny during her vetting at the Appointments Committee. She has once described President John Mahama as a "wicked" man and the "devil". But Otiko Djaba insisted these words are descriptions of the President's governance style and do not amount to an insult. She said she described the now former President as wicked because he dissipated an opportunity to improve the lives of the people in the regions of the north. His flagship agency for development of these regions, Savannah Accelerated Development Authority ( SADA ), was gutted in a scandal in which a reported 200 million was embezzled. Otiko Djaba said her strong criticisms of the president was rooted in her convictions that the President who hails from the Northern region was a big disappointment. She refused to apologise. Story by Ghana | Myjoyonline.com | Abubakar Ibrahim Vice President Alhaji Dr Mahamudu Bawumia has paid a surprise visit to the Tema Port to familiarise himself with the operations of the port and hear at first hand the challenges facing the players in the sector. The Tema Port is a major backbone of the country's revenue collection efforts, generating a significant percentage of annual domestic revenue. The Tema Collection Point of the Customs Division of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) however missed its 2016 target, mobilizing GH7,334,174,613.10 against a target of GH7,690.380.000.00. The shortfall was 4.63 percent. Jacob Kwabla Adorkor, Director of Ports, and officials of the Customs Division including sector commander, Confidence Nyadzi conducted Dr Bawumia round to observe the operations of the Nick TC Scan, Meridian Port Services (MPS), Golden Jubilee Car park, State Warehouse, and Atlas Copco, among others. The Vice President also interacted with Clearing Agents, workers at the Port, security and other officers, and ordinary Ghanaians anxious to clear their goods on time. He inspected seized goods stored in the State warehouse, including mattresses, fridges and other materials barred from importation. In brief comments after the tour, Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia, indicated that the Akufo-Addo government would take steps to consolidate some of the functions at the port that interface with the public in order to reduce the frustrations of Agents and port users, while plugging any revenue leakages. This is the second time Vice President Alhaji Dr Mahamudu Bawumia has paid an unannounced visit to a key government facility in as many weeks. On January 18, 2017, Dr Bawumia visited the Registrar Generals Department to identify the bottlenecks bedeviling the State outfit and also interacted with owners of businesses and ordinary Ghanaians who had gone to the Department to register their businesses. 1003-40 1003-63 1003-79 1003-84 Airtel Africa, the continental group of Bharti Airtel, has refuted claims in sections of the media that it is exiting the market. According to the company, it will continue to invest in its operations to grow effectively on the continent. A statement issued by the group headquarterered in Kenya and copied to citifmonline.com on Monday [January 30], said the reports were erroneous. Reports in a section of the Ghanaian media suggested the company was exiting 15 countries in Africa including Ghana, Uganda, Nigeria, Kenya and Congo, selling them to a rival telco company, Orange. But according to the company, its third quarter results were strong, and it sees an opportunity within the continent to emerge with a broader reach and sharper execution. The underlying Africa revenues for the quarter accelerated by 6.0 per cent Y-o-Y, the highest over the last 9 quarters. The organizations efforts to improve the quality of customer acquisitions have resulted in a reduction in customer churn to 4.9 per cent from 6.0 per cent. Data consumption and revenues have grown by 91.0 per cent & 24.0 per cent Y-o-Y respectively, led by stronger data networks. The strong focus on cost management has led to a significant underlying EBITDA margin expansion of 4.5 per cent Y-o-Y, which now stands at 24.5 per cent. Africa is now generating positive free cash and is PBT positive in constant currency. Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Airtel Africa, Raghunath Mandava, said' All the steps taken recently with regard to human resources and infrastructure have been geared towards readying the organization to grow efficiently and sustainably in the medium to long term. The company remains committed to competing in various markets and providing more choice to customers through further investments to ensure consistent delivery of quality and value for money services to our customers. We are also accelerating our investments in new data networks and to modernize our existing networks. We are committed to launch 4 G in multiple countries, he said. He said mergers and acquisitions are normal for multinational organizations and Airtel looks forward to the opportunity to acquire or merge with in operating companies that are operating in a fragmented market structure with too many players in a small market. Last year, Airtel and Orange reached a mutually beneficial agreement on the assets in Sierra Leone and Burkina Faso. Similarly, Airtel also acquired assets in Uganda, CongoB and Kenya in recent times. The agreements brought together the strengths of Airtel, Warid and Essar. This has offered benefits to customers in the form of a superior and wider network, affordable voice / data services and better customer care. Away from Africa, recently, we merged with Robi in Bangladesh to create a solid and profitable No.2 player in the market, he added. By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana Follow @jnyabor By Morkporkpor Anku, GNA Accra, Jan. 30, GNA - The Ghana Investment Promotion Centre (GIPC) has presented a Nissan Hard body pickup to AgroAfrica Company Limited, leading supplier of Agro Solutions and Equipment, winner of the 15th Edition on the Ghana Club 100 Company of the Future Awards. The awards, which is jointly sponsored by Japan Motors is intended to motivate Small and Medium Scale Enterprises, (SMEs), who have enough promise to succeed in the next five to 10 years. Mrs Mawuena Trebarh, the CEO of GIPC, presenting the Vehicle to the winner in Accra said the Awards forms part of the Centre's strategic effort to encourage and promote the development, efficiency and excellence of SMEs in the country. She said the Ghana Club 100 Company of the Future Awards was introduced as part of the discretionary awards category of the Ghana Club 100 Awards. She said in giving the Awards, the Center collaborated with Imagine8, organisers of the SME Ghana Awards to provide the Centre with the top three companies of the Awards event. The CEO said the three top companies then go through a ten-day SMS public voting system to arrive at the winner with the company with the highest number of votes selected as the Ghana Club 100 Company of the Future. Mrs Trebarh commended the effort of stakeholders and partners for their enormous contribution to the Centre during the recently held Ghana Club 100 Awards. She encouraged corporate Ghana to continue to participate in the Awards as it was a platform to advocate and to promote the needs of the private sector, while showcasing the excellence Ghana has to offer in business. 'Companies participating are able to promote their brands, find suitable business partners and grow their businesses,' she added. She pledged the Centre's commitment to continue to introduce such initiatives that facilitate and create the needed environment for prosperous enterprise building. She said the Centre in future would ensure that Ghanaian Companies working in Agriculture were acknowledged and recognized for their effort to promote the sector's contribution to the economy. Mr Amine Kabbara, the General Manager, Japan Motors expressed the hope that AgroAfrica would continue to improve on their business operation to develop the economy. He also expressed the desire for more collaboration with stakeholders and partners to promote business growth in the country, especially SMEs. Mr Kwabena Opagya Amoateng, the CEO, AgroAfrica Limited told the Ghana News Agency that the news of the Awards came to them as a surprise and management and staff were overwhelmed with the recognition. He said per their operations, it is the company's desire to be the best input supplier in the whole of Africa by 2025. He called on government to continue to empower the private sector, especially the SMEs to lead the growth of the economy. 'It has really not been easy from the initial stages of the business development but with the determination and zeal, we have reached where we are now,' he added. The maiden Awards was presented to Samba Foods Limited, a wholly owned Ghanaian Food processing company that specializes in condiments and food seasoning. GNA 30.01.2017 LISTEN By Morkporkpor Anku, GNA Accra, Jan. 30, GNA - The Entrepreneurs for Progress (EFP), an association of dedicated entrepreneurs, has launched its maiden edition of the 'Entrepreneurs Fair 2017' slated for March 25 and 26 at the Technology University in Accra. The Association is determined to succeed and ensure that the success reflects not just within the group but also the society at large. The EFP consists of both startups and existing businesses that provide support to each other in diverse ways to ensure the growth and success of each member's business. Ms Sandra Ohui Opata, the Chairperson of the Association, in an interview with the Ghana News Agency, expressed delight at the effort of the Association and the opportunity for entrepreneurs to showcase their products and services during the fair. She said that EFP represented the next generation of entrepreneurs in Ghana with so much talent, innovation, style and determination and urged all to patronise the fair to experience what it would bring. Mr Emmanuel Tetteh Mensah, an Executive Member of the Association, said the EFP was looking forward to evolving into a strong association that would gradually spearhead the transformation of the impact of entrepreneurs and businesses in the economy. He expressed the association's plans to have an entrepreneurs training institute to achieve the goals and objectives of the group in transforming their sphere. He said the Association undertook different activities including philanthropic gestures to help support the disadvantaged in the society. GNA By Afedzi Abdullah, GNA Cape Coast, Jan. 30, GNA - Six persons have picked nomination forms to contest the Council of State representative position in the Central Region at the close of filing at the Electoral Commission's office. They are Nana Appiah Nuamah II, Omanhene of Twifo Mampong and Vice President of the Regional House of Chiefs who is also an Educationist, Okatakyi Dr Amanfi Vll, Lecturer and Omanhen of Asebu Traditional area and Neenyi Ghartey VIl, Omanhen of the Effutu-Traditional area. The rest are Samuel Nana Brew-Butler, Board Member of the University of Cape Coast and a management scientist, Mr George Frempong, Regional Co-ordinator for Inclusive Education at the Ghana Education Service and Professor Ato Essuman, an Associate Professor of Education and Development. Mrs Philomena Adusei, Regional Director of the Electoral Commission (EC), told the Ghana News Agency that 10 people picked nomination forms but only six filed as of the close of nominations. She said 40 people; two from the 20 districts of the Region were expected to form an electoral college to decide through voting, who would represent the Region on the Council. The election would be held on Thursday February 9. The Council of State serves as the advisory body to the President. GNA Were not even a full month into 2017. Just 30 days in, and 2017 is already one heck of a year. However, only in the last 10 days have things really gone up a gear. The Trump factor is nothing short of extraordinary. His actions are extreme. But he is at least following through on everything he said hed do. It shouldnt come as a surprise really. Trump said hed build a wall. And the US is starting to build a wall. He said hed ban Muslims. And you guessed it hes banning Muslims from entering the US. If youre going to ban Muslims, then why not Indonesia? I was thinking how Trumps immigration ban has any benefit to the US. The extreme policy in supposed to protect the US. If anything, it makes the country a bigger target. Theres no way this helps the US. And it is cherry-picking targets, too. Like the ban on just seven major Muslim countries. For a start, if Trump was worried about Muslims, then why didnt he ban Indonesia? There are more Muslims in Indonesia than anywhere else in the world. Indonesia has around 205 million Muslims. And the seven countries banned from entering the US? Iran has 74.8 million Muslims. Iraq has 31.1 million. Sudan has 39 million and Yemen 24 million. Syria has 20.8 million. And then theres Libya with 6.3 million and Somalia with 9.2 million. The grand total205.2 million. Unbelievably, Indonesia has as many Muslims as the others combined. Yet for some reason, if youre from Indonesia, the US is happy to have you. Trump has no business interests in Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria or Yemen. However, his company, Trump Hotels, is opening two six-star hotels in Indonesia. According to The New York Times, One resort, planned as the largest in Bali, will overlook a spectacular Hindu temple. The other, in the verdant hills of West Java, will adjoin a theme park. The properties will be so luxurious, the Trump Organization says, that even an impressive five-star rating will not do them justice. So it will give them six stars instead. The NYT also highlights Trumps relationships with high-ranking Indonesian officials. These include a former politician who had to step down because of corruption allegations. These allegations had to do with alleged extortion of mining company Freeport-McMoRan [NYSE:FCX]. Freeport has major mining operations in Indonesia. In particular, its exploration and development of the Grasberg minerals district. According to the company, The Grasberg minerals district contains one of the worlds largest copper and gold deposits The NYT also says Freeport is looking to extend its mining licence in Indonesia. With Trump in office and his pals in the Indonesian government, that might just happen. The Icahn investment You see, one of Freeports major shareholders is Carl Icahn. Icahn is also Trumps special adviser. As at 30 September, 2016, Carl Icahn held 104 million Freeport shares. Thats 7.64% of the company. Icahn began to buy it up in July 2015. By the end of 2015, he had a huge stake in the company. But why? In December 2010, it was trading around US$60. And by January 2016, it was US$3.94. Most people would walk away from a company like that. However, Icahn must have seen or known something the rest didnt. Since January last year, the stock has taken off like a rocket. This US$23.04 billion miner is up 315% in the last year. At the close last Friday, it was US$16.37. Today, Icahns holding is worth US$1.76 billion. One year ago, that holding was worth US$424 million. Some might suggest Icahn is just a shrewd investor. Or is it that he just knows the right people or person? Also according to Fortune, U.S. President Donald Trump helped send shares of Freeport McMoRan soaring Tuesday after he signed an executive order putting his infrastructure spending plan into action. Shares of the metals and mining company jumped 8.27% Tuesday as investors anticipated higher sales for Freeport under the infrastructure-focused and energy-friendly Trump administration. Upon naming Icahn as his special adviser, Trump said, Carl was with me from the beginning and, with his being one of the worlds great businessmen, that was something I truly appreciated. This got me thinking How have some of Icahns holdings performed year-to-date? With the year of Trump, how much richer (or poorer) is Icahn? Well, lets take a look at some of his investments. Herbalife [NYSE:HLF] , up 16.93% , up 16.93% Freeport-McMoRan [NYSE:FCX] , up 24.11% , up 24.11% PayPal Holdings [NASDAQ:PYPL] , up 2.03% , up 2.03% American International Group [NYSE:AIG] , down 0.15% , down 0.15% Cheniere Energy [NYSEMKT:LNG] , up 18.44% , up 18.44% CVR Energy [NYSE:CVI] , down 8.78% , down 8.78% American Railcar Industries [NASDAQ:ARII] , up 4.17% , up 4.17% Hertz Global Holdings [NYSE:HRI], up 22.93% I think you get the drift here. Year-to-date, Icahn has done well with his investments. I guess it pays to have friends in high places. Im not suggesting theres anything illegal going on. Conflicts of interest? Well, quite possibly. But its clear that a Trump presidency has been good to Icahn. And it could be good to you. What it shows is that the best Trump trade might not even be a Trump trade. You could just follow his mate, Carl Icahn. If you did, your portfolio would have seen a cracking start to the year. Thats the kind of start you want to 2017. Not turmoil and trouble thanks to the president himself. Thats why the best Trump trade for 2017 might be to follow Icahn. Get on the Icahn investment. Regards, Sam Volkering - Governor Ifeanyi Okowa has come out to deny the allegation that he was the governor involved in the $10 million bailout fund scandal. - There was an earlier report that a governor from an oil rich state was defrauded of $10 million by his mistress whom he initially connived with to divert the state fund - Governor Okowa has now denied having an extra marital affair and insisted that he has appropriate documentation of how he disburses state money Delta state governor, Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa has come out to deny the allegation that he was the governor involved in the $10 million bailout fund scandal. Governor Ifeanyi Okowa has come out to deny the allegation that he was the governor involved in the $10 million bailout fund scandal. Delta state governor denies being involved in $10 million bailout scandal On Saturday, January 28, news broke that a South-South governor hid $10 million bailout fund with a mistress who in return absconded with the money. READ ALSO: NDLEA promises to support US court's ruling to extradite Senator Kashamu to the USA In a statement released by the state Commissioner for Information, Mr. Patrick Ukah on behalf of the government, the state government stressed that the public should disregard the report, Nigeria Bulletin reports. The statement said: We are appalled by the attempt to link Governor Okowa with the story by online media. We find it ridiculously tasteless and mischievous. This can only be part of the unrelenting campaign of calumny and the ceaseless peddling of pernicious propaganda against the person and the office of the Delta State Governor. For the record, the state government has several times in the past given account of how the bailout the state got from the Federal Government was used. We will not repeat ourselves here. Governor Okowa is a responsible family man and a well respected public figure. READ ALSO: Nigeria takes over Gambia's military Meanwhile, governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria Godwin Emefiele and the accountant-general of the federation Ahmed Idris face being arrested by security agencies over oil licenses. The House of Representatives has threatened to issue a warrant of arrest for the two government officials over the sale of Oil Prospecting Licenses (OPLs) and Oil Mining Leases OMLs to some international oil companies. The threat was issued by chairman of the House Ad-hoc committee on OPLs/OMLs Honourable Gideon Gwani (PDP-Kaduna) while briefing newsmen on Friday, January 27 in Abuja. Source: Legit.ng - The Department of State Security (DSS) are set to receive Apostle Johnson Suleman - The general overseer of Omega Fire Ministries is expected at the DSS headquarters today, January 30 - The DSS has tightened security around its premises ahead of the visit A report by The Authority indicates that the Department of State Security (DSS) has tightened the security around its premises as Apostle Johnson Suleman is expected to visit the facility. Apostle Johnson Suleman According to the report, over 50 policemen where sighted at the premises of the DSS this morning waiting for the arrival of Apostle Suleiman. The DSS action might have been prompted by calls from various quarters urging the cleric to honour the invitation without thousands of his church members. READ ALSO: Don't plunge Nigeria into religious crisis, Fayose cautions DSS over planned detention of Apostle Suleiman, Bishop Oyedepo There were also concerns that that if Apostle Suleman is detained, it might turn rowdy or violent at the DSS premises. Over the weekend, Apostle Suleman had cancelled an event he is billed for at the University of Abuja due to his present travails. READ ALSO: Apostle Suleman yet to honour DSS 10am invitation He made his decision known via his Twitter page. Meanwhile, the Christians Association of Nigeria (CAN) has said it wont be sending a representative to accompany Apostle Suleman to the DSS office. The association said it is solidly behind Apostle Suleman but would prefer if he will honour the DSS invite alone. READ ALSO: Presidency attacks Christian body over Apostle Suleman There was an initial attempt to arrest Apostle Suleman on Wednesday, January 25, but Ekiti state governor, Ayodele Fayose thwarted the effort of the DSS officials who accosted the cleric after a crusade in Ekiti state. Source: Legit.ng The founder of Omega Fire ministry Apostle Johnson Suleman is yet to honour a 10 am invitation by the State Security Service. Suleman had left his church at Jahi district of Abuja at about 11 am, sources told Legit.ng. "He had just finished a meeting inside his church before he came outside to address journalists," a source said. READ ALSO: Breaking: Apostle Suleman allegedly on his way to DSS Hdqrs (PHOTOS) "He later drove off and they told us he was going to the SSS headquarters at Aso Drive to honuor the invitation. While a drive from Jahi to Aso drive is about 20 to 25 minutes, the sources who went ahead of him said he is yet to arrive there as 2.30 pm. READ ALSO: BREAKING: Over 50 mopols lay siege at DSS headquarters for Apostle Suleman Legit.ng also gathered that there is a probability that Suleman went to the office of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) and then the chambers of a senior advocate of Nigeria Femi Falana before heading he would head to the SSS office. "I was told he went to CAN and from there he will go to Falanas office before going to DSS. Maybe to finalize things before any interrogation with the DSS, the source said. READ ALSO: DSS should leave Apostle Suleman and invite Sultan, Zahra Buhari, others IPOB He said: "A few minutes after 2 pm, the regional pastor for north, Kingsley Aihgbe acme in a black tinted jeep. He told all the church members at the SSS headquarters to leave." The source said they were all asked to return to the Omega Fire Ministries in Jahi. "All his church members have left here now, they all went back to their church, the one in Jahi," he said. See photos of Apostle Suleman leaving his church in Jahi district below: Apostle Suleman leaving his church premises in Abuja Source: Legit.ng STURTEVANT Traditionally, wedding planning has been mostly a job for the bride-to-be. But these days an increasing number of grooms are getting involved in preparations for their big day. At the fourth annual Southeast Bridal Showcase, which took place Sunday at Fountain Banquet Hall, 8505 Durand Ave., more than 140 registered brides-to-be checked out area vendors and companies with friends, family members and their fiances. The event was sponsored by The Journal Times and Rasmussen Diamonds, 6220 Washington Ave., Mount Pleasant. Weve had a lot of grooms come through, which seems up this year than from a lot of years, said Donna Mueller, event coordinator and advertising director for The Journal Times. Its not just for the women anymore. Alejandro Davalos and Laura Hernandez of Racine came to the event to find some ideas for their upcoming wedding. She dragged me here, Davalos said jokingly. Hernandez snapped back No I didnt! The couple hasnt done a lot of planning and they were looking to see if anything caught their eye, particularly reception venues. We both have big families, Davalos said. Makeup, finger foods and cake Some expo vendors gave those interested a sampling of what they have to offer. Cassandra Kurt, owner of All Cut Up Salon in Union Grove, offered free mimosas and allowed women the opportunity to get their hair and makeup done to get a sense of the services the salon provides. As far as hairstylists, (brides are) looking for people to come onsite for them to do their hair and makeup and air brush makeup, Kurt said. Gabby Kroening, one of the stylists for All Cut Up, is planning a wedding of her own and practiced doing some hair on her fiances cousin to show people walking by. A lot of people are interested in seeing the different styles, Kroening said. (Were) just giving them an idea of what we do in the salon and what we can do for the bride and the bridal party. One of the most popular booths was Larsen Bakery, 3311 Washington Ave., West Racine, which was giving away free pieces of wedding cake. Owner Donald Hutchison said one of the wedding trends hes noticing is the traditional wedding cake getting less and less popular. Theyre heading more toward the cupcake wedding cakes; that seems to be what people are looking for, Hutchison said. Or individual cakes on the tables. Angela Espinoza, general manager at Los Mariachis, 5821 Washington Ave., Mount Pleasant, was giving away quesadillas. She said the trend is toward finger foods. I think people are more into grabbing and going instead of the formal sit- down, Espinoza said, adding she believes it makes people more social. I think people are into it. For Bryce McCall of Racine, the expo was her second in preparation for her wedding. This time she brought her fiance. I went to one last week by myself and I was telling him about it so I think he got a little excited, McCall said. Were just getting a feel for whats in the area. McCall also brought her mom, Tammy Meyers, and they were surprised by what is available in the area. There seems to be a lot of quality businesses, Meyers said. Im really impressed Im happy they have this opportunity in southeastern Wisconsin and we dont have to go to Milwaukee or Chicago to get the quality of providers that are here. - The court has issued a warning to the inspector general of police and two others to release the leader of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria - The court said the IGP, the attorney general and the director of the Security Service (SSS) has committed court contempt by disobeying its December 2, order - The court also said the trio are liable to be committed to prison if they do not obey the orders of the court The Federal High Court in Abuja has issued a warning to the inspector general of police, Ibrahim Idris; the attorney general of the federation, Abubakar Malami and others to release the leader of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria Ibrahim El-Zakzaky and his wife. The court in its fresh order said the IGP, the AGF and others detaining El-zakzaky must release or face arrest. Also joined in the matter include is the director of State Security Service, Lawal Duara. READ ALSO: BREAKING: Many feared injured as Shiites, Police clash (Photos) The court said unless the December 2, 2016, order made by the court is obeyed, the trio will be guilty of court contempt and as such liable to be committed to prison. This court has been informed that even as of today, Friday, January 20, 2017; you are yet to comply with the lawful order of this honourable court by refusing to release the following persons namely: Sheik El-Zakzaky and Malama Zennah Ibrahim in your custody. You are hereby directed to comply with the court order forthwith or you will be guilty of contempt of court, the order said. READ ALSO: Release El-Zakzaky or charge him to court NOW, EU tells FG El-Zakzaky and his wife were arrested one year ago (December 5, 2015) after a clash between members of the IMN and troops of the chief of army staff Tukur Buratai in Zaria, Kaduna state. See the new order made by the court below: He has since been detained by the SSS and the Nigerian police. However, on December 2, Justice Gabriel Kolawole of the Federal High Court issued an order for the release of El-Zakzaky and his wife. But in defiance to the court order the SSS and the police have continued to detain the duo. An act which the international groups like Amnesty International has condemned. Source: Legit.ng In a move that is considered a reciprocal one, Iraq has placed a ban on US citizens entering the country. This follows an initial executive order signed by President Donald Trump placing a temporary ban on seven Muslim-dominant countries with Iraq being one of them. According to Daily Mail, Iraqi politicians on Monday, January 30 banned US citizens from entering their country. READ ALSO: Migrants ban: 6 other times US has banned migrants Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun who are Iraqi politicians said the decision which was made at the parliament was binding. Although no specific numbers were given, they said this decision was made by majority of the politicians. How the ban will be affected is not known yet as American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and American business people are in Iraq. Ishaq Jahangiri who is the senior vice president in Iraq described the ban illegal and against human right. READ ALSO: Canada ready to help people affected by Trump's ban 'We will definitely take stance against this illegal, inhumane and anti-human-rights activity in international bodies. 'And once again (we) will review and explore American human rights in international bodies in order to let the world to know what a system they are facing.' Source: Legit.ng BURLINGTON In the past four years at Cooper Elementary School in Burlington, no student is alone during recess thanks to paws on the playground. This school year more than 100 students, roughly a quarter of the student body at the school 249 Conkey St., volunteered to be on the lookout for any classmates without a friend to play with. Jenny Holle, Cooper Elementary counselor, helped start the program at the school and it is one of the reasons why she was one of four school counselors in Wisconsin to be honored as Counselor of the Year by the Wisconsin School Counselors Association. I was very surprised, Holle said, adding that she became a little emotional about the recognition. School Principal Christine Anderson, who nominated Holle, told her about the honor in front of the school staff. Jenny provides unique opportunities for our students through creative event planning and by creating an environment that is enjoyable to come to each and every day, Anderson said. I believe that we are fortunate to have Jenny working in our building. I am always amazed at her tireless energy and have a profound respect for her role as a school counselor. Holle has been with the Burlington Area School District since 2000 after spending a few years as a middle school special education teacher in Cudahy and Muskego. I really enjoyed working with my students and helping them learn, Holle said. The relationships I had with my students was the best part of teaching those relationships were the biggest part and thats why I went into school counseling. Transition to counselor Holle said becoming a counselor was a change in what she was doing, but a positive change. It was challenging and a great experience, Holle said. My roles have definitely evolved since being here in the Burlington Area School District. Every morning Holle said she greets the students as they walk in, she checks on them during the day and if she sees a student in the hallway she always asks: How are you doing? I want every single student to feel welcome every day, Holle said. I try to be that extra person, that caring person that they can come to if they have a problem that they need help solving. Although shes being recognized, Holle doesnt view herself as someone who stands out in particular. Everyone I know who works in education goes above and beyond whats asked, Holle said. As an advocate for adding more school counselors, Holle said they are important in the learning process. We play such a crucial role and classroom teachers cant do it all, Holle said. School counselors are a huge part of helping our students succeed. Its about learning, but its about so much more. District Superintendent Peter Smet said the work that Holle and the other school counselors are doing is important to the district. (Holle) is really very conscientious, caring professional, Smet said. The counselors are a key component to the students and staff at our schools. They do a lot of things with the mental and social health of our students. Sorry! This content is not available in your region SPIELFELD, Austria The small, alpine state of Slovenia became the latest focus of Europes continuing migration crisis, when hundreds of migrants were diverted there on Saturday, after Hungary blocked a main transit route by closing its frontier with Croatia. The Slovenian prime minister, Miro Cerar, said that the army would be used to help deal with the flow of refugees from Croatia, who began arriving at the Slovenian border town of Petisovci and were being transferred to, and then across, the Austrian border. I want to emphasize that Slovenia is not in a state of emergency, Mr. Cerar told reporters in Ljubljana, the capital. There is a process in place and it is working well, but its important that police get the logistical and technical support they need. Hungarys unilateral decision to close its border with Croatia underlines Europes collective failure to draw up a coherent strategy to deal with the huge movement of humanity. Am I the only one to have found the pace of tonights episode to be a bit off? A bit too slow, a bit tiresome kind of like, I imagine, how it may feel for Carrie to be on her meds. Mood-related or not, there is an increasingly uncomfortable difference between the pitch and tenor of Carries civilian life, with its rule-bound power plays, compromises and lies, and the raw, desperate thrill of her old existence in the C.I.A. Its the normal-people issue we encountered in her half-life with Jonas in Berlin all over again. Normal people dont defy court orders. Normal people dont stage spy-meets-spy rendezvous in the shadow of porch lights out in the suburbs. Normal people dont conclude their announcement that theyve blown a persons chance of avoiding a 15-year maximum-security prison term with the words, I am so, so sorry. Neither do they then promise, with confidence, to fix this. (What are you talking about? a normal person, like Sekou Bah, would indeed shout. How could you do this to me?) We wanted to offer 21st-century living in a very historic context by making an architecture that was inspired by the city in its scale, texture and natural elements, Gisue Hariri said. The buildings were conceived as six large rocks, as if they were taken from the Rainberg rock face and just simply put on the landscape. The Rainberg was the generator of the project. The Conrads, longtime attendees of Salzburgs music festival, were inclined to look in the area when on the hunt for a home in Mrs. Conrads country of birth (Mr. Conrad is from Germany). The couple had lived around the world in connection with Mr. Conrads work, and their main home was in Switzerland, with another home in Tenerife. After our odyssey living in various places in Germany, the United States and now Switzerland, Mr. Conrad said, Helga was looking for something at home. With the help of an architect friend, the couple made significant changes to the apartment, including knocking down some walls. From the entrance via an elevator that opens directly into the home, Mr. Conrads open office (he keeps busy as president of the Berlin School of Creative Leadership) is to the left and includes a teal Eames chair. A staircase to the lower level, where there is a guest suite including a kitchen, is at the right. Topped by a lamp by Adolf Loos on the high ceiling, the timber staircase is bordered by a half wall that separates the area from the narrow galley kitchen At our age we are not big cooks anymore, Mr. Conrad said and the long dining and living area that is the heart of the home. After the initial shock of President Trumps order on Friday restricting entry to the United States by citizens of seven predominantly Muslim nations and all refugees, businesses and trade organizations began to respond over the weekend, some with outrage, some with caution. The ride-hailing service Lyft promised to donate $1 million over the next four years to the American Civil Liberties Union to defend our Constitution. Brian Chesky, a founder of Airbnb, wrote on Twitter that his company, a short-term home rental service, would provide free housing to refugees and anyone not allowed in the U.S. In a message to his employees on Sunday, Howard Schultz, the chief executive of Starbucks, said the company planned to hire 10,000 refugees in the 75 countries where it operates. Jeff Immelt, the chief executive of General Electric, told his staff in an internal blog post that I share your concern, adding, There would be no G.E. without people of all religions, nationalities, gender, sexual orientation and race. Many airlines, caught off-guard by the sudden policy change, scrambled to follow the new directive while attending to their rattled and distressed customers. United Airlines, for instance, posted a statement on its website saying that travelers affected by the order will not be able to board flights to the United States. Other domestic and foreign airlines issued statements that they were trying to identify affected passengers and help them with rebooking or obtaining refunds. RACINE Several ice sculptures made during Saturdays Break the Ice scupture event in Downtown Racine were vandalized over Saturday night and/or early Sunday morning. Divino Gelato Cafe, 245 Main St., sponsored an ice sculpture that appeared to be tipped over. When I left here last night it was fine ... I dont think the wind couldve pushed it over, said Luke Jackson, manager at Divino Gelato Cafe. Its a shame. One of the acts of vandalism was caught on surveillance video. The ice sculpture sponsored by Innovative Dynamic Networks, 610 Sixth St., was kicked over at about 8:30 p.m. Saturday night. The video shows two individuals walk past the ice sculpture, then return a moment later to take a selfie with the sculpture. After the selfie was taken, one individual gets into a white car parked right in front of the sculpture and the other kicks it over, then quickly gets in the car, which drives off. Racine Police Department said Sunday they had not received any calls about any of the ice sculptures being vandalized. It was something Mr. Cuomo came to accept and even admire despite his own run-ins with Mr. Barrett, who wasnt deterred by the fact that his wife, Fran McGettigan Barrett, works for the Cuomo administration. There was his Village Voice cover story pinning some of the blame for the 2008 housing crisis on Mr. Cuomo; a more recent Daily News piece knocked the governors approach to campaign finance. And, Mr. Cuomo said, there was the haranguing phone call this month in which Mr. Barrett, speaking from his hospital bed, lit into him for his latest State of the State speech. At the end of the day, he did make me better at what I do, Mr. Cuomo said. Because it highlighted the questions that you have to be aware of, your motivation when youre in power are you using the office to its fullest? Are you being the best leader you can be? Has there been any venality in your decision? What Mr. Cuomo and Mr. Schumer were saying in so many words was that Mr. Barretts tougher stories werent acts of war, and didnt make him a member of some opposition party. They understood his work as the proper approach to public servants whose power and paychecks are derived from the people. Then again, any truly principled lover of the Constitution would appreciate the views of founders like Thomas Jefferson, who wrote to George Washington in 1792, No government ought to be without censors: And where the press is free, no one ever will. A mouthy, adversarial and never sycophantic press has been baked into the great American cake since the earliest days of the republic. Not all of Mr. Barretts journalistic marks were so generous about his passing. One of them, Roger Stone, a friend and adviser to Mr. Trump, offered a particularly acrid farewell: Rot in hell, he wrote on Twitter. Mr. Trump didnt comment on Mr. Barretts death, but its not too hard to imagine what he would have said if he had. Mr. Barretts reporting on Mr. Trump led to a night in an Atlantic City jail in 1990, for trespassing at his otherwise press-friendly birthday party. But it also led to the first major investigative book on the mogul Trump: The Deals and the Downfall chronicling the tangled connections of money, politics and power in our times, as the author Nicholas Pileggi described it then. Update | March 7, 2017 President Trump signed an executive order on March 6, revising his previous immigration order. The new order blocks citizens of six predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States, the most significant hardening of immigration policy in generations, even with changes intended to blunt legal and political opposition. _________ On Jan. 27, President Trump signed an executive order that temporarily closed the nations borders to refugees from around the world and to people from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Part of the presidents order gives preferential treatment to Christian refugees from majority-Muslim countries who try to enter the United States. By Jan. 28, a federal judge in Brooklyn had already blocked part of the presidents actions, preventing the government from deporting some arrivals who found themselves ensnared by the presidential order. But the judge stopped short of letting those new arrivals into the country or issuing a broader ruling on the constitutionality of Mr. Trumps actions. On Jan. 29, Reince Priebus, the White House chief of staff, appeared to reverse a key part of Mr. Trumps immigration order, saying that people from the affected countries who hold green cards would not be prevented from returning to the United States. But Mr. Priebus also said that border agents had discretionary authority to detain and question suspect travelers from certain countries. That statement seemed to add to the uncertainty over how the executive order would be interpreted and enforced in the days ahead. What Ive learned from working on Moonlight is, we see what happens when you persecute people, Mr. Ali said, referring to the story of a gay black boy growing up in poverty in Miami. They fold into themselves. And what I was so grateful about in having the opportunity to play Juan was, playing a gentleman who saw a young man folding into himself as a result of the persecution of his community, and taking that opportunity to uplift him and tell him that he mattered and that he was O.K. and accept him and, uh I hope that we do a better job of that, he said, to applause. You know, when we kind of get caught up in the minutiae, the details that make us all different, I think theres two ways of seeing that, he said. Theres an opportunity to see the texture of that person, the characteristics that make them unique. And then theres an opportunity to go to war about it, and to say that that person is different than me, and I dont like you, so lets battle, he continued. My mother is an ordained minister. Im a Muslim. She didnt do back flips when I called her to tell her I converted 17 years ago. But I tell you now, we put things to the side, and Im able to see her, shes able to see me we love each other, the love has grown, and that stuff is minutiae. Its not that important. Viola Davis, who won best supporting actress for her performance in Fences, stood out for not taking a jab at the ban because virtually every other winner did. Mr. Washington, accepting his award, called for a more empathetic society. Emma Stone, who won best actress in a feature for her performance in La La Land, ended her speech with: Things are very inexcusable and scary and need action. Im so grateful to be part of a group of people that cares. Sarah Paulson, who won for best actress in a television mini-series, for The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story, urged people to donate to the American Civil Liberties Union. Among those with ailments were an Iranian couple who had arrived in Los Angeles on visitors visas. The man, in his late 60s, had been through two open-heart operations, and he and his wife, in her late 50s, were both diabetic. After arriving at the airport on Saturday afternoon, they were allowed to call their daughter in the United States only once, around 1 a.m. on Sunday, said Patricia Corrales, a private lawyer working on detainees cases there. Relatives and lawyers repeatedly asked whether the couple were receiving proper medical care but learned nothing further from border agents. Ms. Corrales, who was an Immigration and Customs Enforcement lawyer for 17 years, said, I think they dont necessarily have the resources, the staff and experience to deal with these large numbers. In a statement, the Department of Homeland Security said, We are committed to ensuring that all individuals affected by the executive orders, including those affected by the court orders, are being provided all rights afforded under the law. Some detainees were reportedly pressured to sign documents they hardly understood and then put on flights out of the country. When two brothers from Yemen, Tareq Aqel Mohammed Aziz, 21, and Ammar, 19, landed on Saturday morning at Dulles International Airport near Washington with immigrant visas, they planned to board a connecting flight to Flint, Mich., to join their father. Instead, they were taken off the plane, put into handcuffs and told they needed to sign a form or face being barred from the country for five years, said their lawyer, Simon Y. Sandoval-Moshenberg, of the Legal Aid Justice Center in Virginia. They signed the form and were quickly put on a plane to Ethiopia. A 24-year-old Iranian woman who is a graduate student in the United States told relatives of a similar problem at Los Angeles International Airport, where she arrived on Saturday after a trip visiting family members in Europe. Border agents told the woman that her student visa was no longer valid, which lawyers said was not true, and that if she did not sign a document saying she was leaving voluntarily, she would be forcibly deported and barred from entry for five years. In issuing the executive orders, Mr. Trump said they were needed to protect the United States, and invoked the killings of Sept. 11, which were carried out by fundamentalist terrorists. Among those who died that morning was Mohammad Salman Hamdani, 23, born in Pakistan and raised in the United States. He was working in Midtown Manhattan. Having served on ambulance corps and as a police cadet, Mr. Hamdani, a Muslim, rushed to the trade center and became part of the human bridge that led survivors to refuge. Trump is doing this in my sons name, said Talat Hamdani, the mother of Mr. Hamdani. That he signed this executive order on the day of Holocaust Remembrance is very poignant. It is a Muslim ban. It is a faith-based ban. Under screening procedures put in place during the administration of President Barack Obama, Syrian refugees went through two years or more of vetting before being permitted into the United States. Mr. Trump had denounced the process as inadequate during the presidential campaign, and said persecuted Christians had no chance of coming to the United States. That is untrue. Last year, 37,521 Christian refugees came to the United States, as well as 38,901 Muslim refugees, according to the Pew Research Center. Many Christian and Catholic leaders have strongly criticized the executive orders. In New York City, Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan, who read from Scripture at Mr. Trumps inauguration, did not mention them during Sunday Mass. Later, speaking with reporters, he said he had not had time to consult with experts on the implications. At first blush it causes us some apprehensions, Cardinal Dolan said. But in the case of Mr. Trump, there is a sense that the rush for change has superseded a study of unintended consequences. The ban on immigration and visitors from seven nations came with minimal, if any, input from the State Department about the regional fallout as did Mr. Trumps declaration that he intends to move the American Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. The absence of advance thinking about how to deal with green card holders and Iraqi interpreters who were promised entry to the United States in return for their service to American troops forced the White House to amend its interpretations of the order less than 48 hours after Mr. Trump signed it. It was all symptomatic of a new president eager to tweet first and work out details later. This is policy by thunderbolt, said Joseph Nye, a Harvard professor who served as the head of the National Intelligence Council and has written extensively on how the United States can gain leverage from its soft power the attractiveness of its culture and democracy. You dont want to tear up 70 years of foreign policy until you think hard about what replaces it. But inside the halls of the State Department, where Rex W. Tillerson, the pick for secretary of state, has just begun to find his way around, there is definitely the sense among career diplomats that this is Year Zero. Last week, the landing team of Trump designees told several of the departments most senior diplomats career officials, some with decades of service to clear out of their offices. Almost all had submitted their resignations, the protocol when administrations changed, but had volunteered to stay on for a month or two until successors were appointed, to ensure that State Department facilities were safe, American citizens were evacuated from perilous places and passports were issued. The Trump team made it clear it had no interest in transitions. (Mr. Tillerson also never met one-on-one with his predecessor, John Kerry, before the inauguration.) It was not exactly a purge, but the fact remains that some of the governments most experienced diplomats have moved on including some of the highest-ranking women in the department. Among them is Anne Patterson, 67, the assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs and a former ambassador to Pakistan and Egypt, two of the biggest tinderboxes Mr. Trump will face. Victoria J. Nuland, 55, one of the departments top Russia experts and former ambassador to NATO, who dealt with the Ukraine crisis, decided to retire after concluding there was probably no place for her in Mr. Trumps administration. The rush of Democratic governors and senators, both moderates and progressives, to airports this weekend also showed that they recognized that the outpouring of protesters for the womens marches on inauguration weekend was only the start of a new movement. I think the key for the Democratic Party is to show to a very powerful and dynamic coalition that we are hearing them and connecting to their issues, said former Representative Tom Perriello, who made a surprise entry into the Virginia governors race after Mr. Trumps election and drove to Dulles International Airport from Richmond, Va., on Saturday to join the protests. The demands for purity from Democratic leaders are likely to grow only more unequivocal, and standing in solidarity with sign-waving protesters may prove insufficient. A rising chorus of liberals is pressuring senators to filibuster Mr. Trumps selection for the Supreme Court, which he has said he will announce this week. When it comes to the Supreme Court, eight is enough, said Representative Keith Ellison, a Minnesota Democrat who is one of the top contenders to be the chairman of the Democratic National Committee. They literally stole a Supreme Court justice from President Obama, so I see no reason why we should facilitate them putting in some right-wing extremist. But some Democratic senators, including those facing re-election next year, are uneasy about forming a blockade against Mr. Trumps pick, as Senate Republicans did last year against Mr. Obamas nominee, Judge Merrick B. Garland. Doing so could be fruitless, anyway. Mr. Trump has already encouraged Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, to ram through new Senate rules that would allow a Supreme Court pick to be seated with a simple majority of 51 votes the same rules change Democrats engineered in 2013 to end filibusters of virtually every presidential appointment besides a Supreme Court justice. I believe we must fulfill our constitutional responsibility to have a hearing and a vote, said Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, a member of the Judiciary Committee, while urging Mr. Trump to choose a nominee in the mainstream. The order, which administration officials said was drafted without the input of Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Middle East experts at the State Department, has offended the Iraqis in several respects. During the Bush administration, the United States and Iraq signed a Strategic Framework Agreement, which calls for close diplomatic, economic and security ties and is still in effect. If I were an Iraqi, I would be waving this signed agreement in the face of the current administration, said Ryan C. Crocker, who negotiated the accord and served as the United States ambassador to Iraq under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. It is totally inconsistent. Iraqis who are already skeptical about Washington have also seized on the order to stir up opposition against the United States. Moktada al-Sadr, the fiery cleric whom many Iraqi Shiites support, accused the United States of arrogance. So get out U.S. citizens from Iraq before you expel communities from U.S., he said on Twitter. To contain the political damage, officials said a long-planned call between Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi of Iraq and Mr. Trump might be arranged for this week. Mr. Trump spoke on Sunday with King Salman of Saudi Arabia and with the crown prince of the United Arab Emirates, but neither Saudi Arabia nor the Emirates are covered by the new order. Iraqi officials who are close to the Americans worry that the Islamic State will exploit the policy in its propaganda to recruit new volunteers. As of early Sunday, the terrorist group had made no official pronouncement. However, individual members and supporters have been sharing the order and news articles about it. Yet another worry has been expressed by veterans, and even members of Mr. Trumps own party: that the order will interrupt the flow of former Iraqi interpreters and cultural advisers who have worked closely with the Americans and have sought special visas to move to the United States for their own protection. Demonstrators turned out in force and on short notice at rallies across the country on Sunday to condemn President Trumps executive order restricting immigration. Protesters amassed in public spaces and at airports to oppose the order, which they assailed as un-American, even as the administration defended it as crucial to improving national security. The executive order, signed on Friday, stranded travelers around the world over the weekend and caused widespread confusion. In Washington, protesters gathered by the thousands outside the front lawn of the White House to show their disgust with Mr. Trumps decision and their solidarity with Muslims. Shame, they chanted, hoisting homemade signs toward the Executive Mansion, where Mr. Trump was scheduled to spend part of the day making telephone calls to foreign leaders and later hosting a private screening of Finding Dory, an animated film about a fish who travels the ocean in hopes of reuniting with its family. Susan E. Rice, President Barack Obamas last national security adviser, called the arrangement stone cold crazy in a tweet posted Sunday. Mr. Spicer said the language the Trump White House used in its N.S.C. executive order is, with the exception of Mr. Bannons position which was created during the transition almost identical in content to one the Bush administration drafted in 2001. And Mr. Obamas top political operative, David Axelrod, sat in on some N.S.C. meetings, he added. There were key differences. Mr. Axelrod never served as a permanent member as Mr. Bannon will now, though he sat in on some critical meetings, especially as Mr. Obama debated strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Its a profound shift, Mr. Axelrod said. I dont know what his bona fides are to be the principal foreign policy adviser to the president. But Mr. Bannons elevation does not merely reflect his growing influence on national security. It is emblematic of Mr. Trumps trust on a range of political and ideological issues. During the campaign, the sly and provocative Mr. Bannon played a paradoxical role calming the easily agitated candidate during his frequent rough patches and egging him on when he felt Mr. Trump needed to fire up the white working-class base. The president respects Mr. Bannon because he is independently wealthy and therefore does not need the job, and both men ascribe to a shoot-the-prisoners credo when put on the defensive, according to the former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski. Mr. Bannon is a deft operator within the White House, and he has been praised by Republicans who view him skeptically as the most knowledgeable on policy around the president. But his stated preference for blowing things up as opposed to putting them back together may not translate to his new role. The hasty drafting of the immigration order, and its scattershot execution, brought a measure of Mr. Bannons chaotic and hyperaggressive political style to the more predictable administration of the federal government. Within hours of the edict, airport customs and border agents were detaining or blocking dozens of migrant families, some of whom had permanent resident status, until John F. Kelly, the new homeland security secretary, intervened. RACINE Mayor John Dickert showed support for undocumented immigrants in Racine on Monday. The diversity of Racines population is one of its greatest strengths, Dickert said in a release. The job of mayors is to protect their residents. Mine is no different. I will continue to protect our diversity by protecting our residents all our residents. Dickert said that Racine "will not actively pursue undocumented immigrants," a view he has expressed publicly in the past. Last week, President Donald Trump signed an executive order promising to withhold federal funding from "sanctuary cities" that protect undocumented immigrants from prosecution. While it's unclear whether Racine is a sanctuary city, partly because it's not an official, legal designation, Dickert said that it will not be the job of the Racine Police Department to pursue undocumented immigrants. "The focus of the Racine Police Department will be to find and arrest those who break the law," he said. "It is not against state or city law to be undocumented." Dickert added that a legal review called for by the United States Conference of Mayors found that there is no legal authority for Trump's actions. The review concluded that Trump's directives would face "significant challenges" under the Tenth Amendment and Spending Clause of the U.S. Constitution, according to the release. Additionally, Dickert emphasized the importance of Racine's citizens trusting its Police Department. "Our Police Department works hard to build and preserve trust with all of the communities they serve, including immigrant communities," Dickert said. "Immigrants residing in Racine must be able to trust both the PD and city government." According to Dickert, the USCM plans to bring together mayors, police chiefs and high ranking government officials to develop an approach to immigration enforcement that "does not interfere with strong police-community relations or place inappropriate burdens on local police officers and upholds our nation's immigration laws." Dickert concluded his statement by "taking the long view" on Racinians' immigration status. "If you engage in illegal or criminal activity, the police will find and arrest you," he said. "If you are like 99 percent of our residents, no matter who you are or where you were born, in the City of Racine, the police will not stop you solely on suspicion of immigration status. Taking the long view, with the exception of Native Americans, we are all immigrants." Law enforcement leaders weigh in Racine Police Chief Art Howell said that his officers enforce the law without bias toward immigration status. "On those occasions when members of the Racine Police Department encounter individuals engaged in criminal activity, consistent enforcement action is taken regardless of immigration status," Howell said. "The suspicion of being undocumented, however, does not meet the legal threshold upon which probable cause may be established to initiate a criminal or status investigation." Howell added that undocumented citizens can receive the federal "U non-immigrant status" for cooperating with law enforcement. The distinction, also called the U visa, is set aside for victims of certain crimes who help law enforcement in the investigation process. Racine County Sheriff Christopher Schmaling stressed that his office would prioritize protecting Racine County residents. "Regardless of our different views, we must not forget that the fundamental role of government is, in fact, the protection of its people," he said. "The primary role of law enforcement has always been to enforce laws equally to all people. To pick and choose which law to enforce on certain individuals or groups would clearly be discrimination." Schmaling said that he will also continue to comply with state and federal laws regarding immigration, emphasizing that sheriffs enforce laws and do not make them. "I will continue to fully comply with and enforce all state statutes and federally imposed mandates, including cooperating and assisting the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency, ICE, should they have a detainer on an arrestee." Added Schmaling: "As your sheriff and chief law enforcement officer, I took an oath to protect all of the nearly 200,000 residents of Racine County by enforcing the laws impartially and fairly. I am committed to stay the course by enforcing the laws." The Mount Pleasant and Caledonia police departments did not respond to requests for comment. It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence, he said in a statement early Monday. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. Christine Colombe, a spokeswoman for the Quebec Provincial Police, said the victims ranged in age from 35 to 70 and said that 39 people who were in the mosque were not hurt. The police had not yet identified a motive in the shootings, saying the investigation was just beginning. Ms. Colombe said that one of the two suspects was arrested at the scene of the shooting, while another was apprehended nearby on Ile dOrleans. The police said that some of those wounded in the shooting were seriously hurt. On Twitter, Martin Coiteux, the provincial minister of public safety, said that the police systems for dealing with terrorist acts have been activated in the wake of the shooting. Ensuring the safety of the population is our priority, he wrote. Radio-Canada, the French-language service of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, said the area surrounding the mosque had been sealed off by the police after the attack. Our country needs the left, but a modern, innovative left, he said. Mr. Hamons victory was the clearest sign yet that voters on the left want a break with the policies of President Francois Hollande, who in December announced that he would not seek re-election. However, Mr. Hamons strong showing is unlikely to change widespread assessments that left-leaning candidates have little chance of making it into the second round of voting in the general election. The first round of the general election is set for April 23 and the runoff for May 7. The Socialist Party is deeply divided, and one measure of its lack of popular enthusiasm was the relatively low number of people voting. About two million people voted in the second round of the primary on Sunday, in contrast with about 2.9 million in the second round of the last presidential primary on the left, in 2011. However, much of the conventional wisdom over how the elections will go has been thrown into question over the past week, because the leading candidate, Francois Fillon, who represents the main right-wing party, the Republicans, was accused of paying his wife large sums of money to work as his parliamentary aide. While nepotism is legal in the French political system, it is not clear that she actually did any work. Prosecutors who specialize in financial malfeasance are reviewing the case. Frances electoral system allows multiple candidates to run for president in the first round of voting, but only the top two vote-getters go on to a second round. Still, Mr. Trumps executive order which froze all refugee arrivals in the United States and barred the entry of citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days has sent a whirlwind of confusion, anxiety and fury across the Middle East and Africa. Refugees have been turned back at airports, families separated indefinitely and long-planned trips upended. I thought in America, there were institutions and democracy, said Fuad Sharef, 51, an Iraqi Kurd bound for New York who was turned away from the Cairo airport with his wife and three children on Saturday morning. This looks like a decision from a dictator. Its like Saddam Hussein. On Sunday, Trump administration officials backtracked on one aspect of the order, saying green-card holders would be allowed to return to the United States. In a Facebook post on Sunday evening, Mr. Trump insisted that his policy was not a Muslim ban and accused the news media of inaccurate reporting. Hours earlier, he had characterized the conflict with the Islamic State in starkly sectarian terms, asserting on Twitter: Christians in the Middle East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue! In fact, a majority of the Islamic States victims have been Muslims, many of them shot, burned or beheaded. Among the Muslims who managed to escape Islamic State territory are the refugees Mr. Trump has now excluded. In a phone conversation with Mr. Trump on Saturday, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany cited the 1951 Refugee Convention, which calls on signatories to take in people fleeing war, according to Steffen Seibert, Ms. Merkels spokesman. Yet in much of the Middle East, Mr. Trump is less likely to get such a scolding. He has drawn close to Mr. Sisi of Egypt, whom he called a fantastic guy, and is considering designating the Muslim Brotherhood, Mr. Sisis sworn enemy, a terrorist organization. In a call last week, the two leaders discussed a possible visit to the White House by Mr. Sisi, whose administration faces accusations of human rights abuses an unthinkable prospect during the Obama administration. In his order on Friday, whose stated aim is to keep extremists out of the United States, Mr. Trump invoked the Sept. 11 attacks three times. Yet Saudi Arabia, which was home to 15 of the 19 attackers, was not included on the list of countries whose citizens would be shut out. That reflects the deep economic and security ties between the United States and Saudi Arabia. Mr. Trump also has a personal financial link: In August 2015, just as his campaign was gathering steam, the Trump Organization registered eight companies in Saudi Arabia that were linked to a hotel development in the city of Jidda. The annual dinner hosted by the White House Correspondents Association is often referred to as a nerd prom, but its really a way for the Washington complex of journalists and power brokers to coat themselves with gaudiness and glamour by mingling for a night with Hollywood celebrities. That coziness has sometimes been criticized, but this years dinner, scheduled for April 29, may be even more controversial, if the Trump administration continues to throw grenades false facts, threats, insults in the news medias direction. Samantha Bees decision to counterprogram on that night wont make it any easier. (The New York Times does not attend the event.) How did this bizarre event mixing the likes last year of Joseph R. Biden Jr., Aretha Franklin and Damian Lewis ever come to be? The answer is that it seems, like the universe, to be ever expanding. Here, a history. No Presidents Here On May 7, 1921, 50 men congregated at the Arlington Hotel in Washington for the first White House Correspondents Dinner. Not in attendance: the new president, Warren G. Harding, a former newspaper publisher. But some of his top aides were, including the guest of honor that night, George B. Christian, Mr. Hardings secretary and close friend. Its lucky this one did. Washington ordered it when his first field tent began rotting during the brutal winter of 1777 at Valley Forge. Designed just like the first with a scalloped valance, trimmed in scarlet, dropping from two peaks over the outer walls this one passed by inheritance from Custis to his daughter, Mary Anna, who married Lee long before he became commander of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia. It was seized by federal troops in 1862 and eventually sent into storage at the Smithsonian Institution. There it resided until 1901, when, after petitions by the Lee family, President McKinley returned it. In 1909, to raise money for Confederate widows, Mary Custis Lee sold it for $5,000 to the Rev. W. Herbert Burk, founder of the Valley Forge Historical Society, whose collection was given to the new museum in 2003. Readying it for display was complex, even for Virginia Whelan, a textile specialist who has conserved a cotton shawl worn by Gandhi and the coat Franklin D. Roosevelt wore at Yalta, among other artifacts. A one-square-yard piece was missing entirely, probably cut up at some point for souvenirs. The linen bore about 550 jagged holes, ranging in size from a thumbnail to a couple of playing cards. And it had stains. I wondered if someone spilled their grog, or is it sweat? Ms. Whelan said. Or did it come from candlelight? Wearing a thimble but no gloves, Ms. Whelan layered fine, nearly invisible netting over and under each hole, then used polyester thread finer than human hair to stitch around the damage to prevent further fraying. For large tears and the missing piece, she worked with the faculty of Philadelphia Universitys textile design department to make high-resolution images of the fabric, which were printed on polyester with a digital inkjet printer. The immersive aspect of this cycle did make an impact on me particularly with a composer like Bruckner, whose symphonies all feel, in a way, so alike, digging deeper rather than spreading over more territory. And yet the later symphonies integrate moods and material more powerfully: Theres something so awkward about the Fifth the meandering buildup of the final movement! compared with the inexorable focus of the Eighth. (Though even in that later work, we are trudged through transformation after transformation of the burly Game of Thrones-like theme in the Scherzo.) DA FONSECA-WOLLHEIM I tried my best to listen to the Second with an open mind. But the lack of flow, which some of Bruckners contemporaries skewered, really stood out. Bruckner said that the pauses he used to separate blocks of thematic material were like an orator drawing breath, but what came across was a nervous and inexperienced public speaker. That said, I heard six symphonies over 10 days, and the level of playing was uniformly impressive. Hearing this music live is also a whole different experience from recordings: Nothing beats the thrill of feeling the ground vibrate under your feet during a timpani roll, or absorbing the shock wave of a brass section at full tilt. WOOLFE This orchestra made as good a case for the music as Ive ever heard live. Mr. Barenboim kept it vital, flowing: He didnt linger either on the bombast or the Adagio exhalations. The playing had power and transparency, a real sense of layers. I was so struck in the first movement of the Ninth by the coexistence of milky winds, spiraling strings, roaring brasses and the slightest shudder of timpani; so many colors and textures, in perfect balance. Not all breakthrough television is on a high-profile channel like HBO, and not all of it makes a ratings splash. A case in point: Switched at Birth, which begins its fifth and final season on Tuesday on Freeform. It is a series that has shown, consistently and without much fanfare, how to illuminate deaf culture and, by extension, any other that faces impairments without being condescending, sensationalizing or preachy. The series is about two families whose daughters, Daphne (Katie Leclerc) and Bay (Vanessa Marano), were, well, switched at birth: Bay ended up being raised by Daphnes affluent parents, John and Kathryn Kennish (D. W. Moffett and Lea Thompson), and Daphne was raised by Regina Vasquez (Constance Marie), a single mother. The catch: Daphne lost most of her hearing as a young child. When, in the premiere, 15-year-old Bay discovers the mistake while doing a school blood-typing project, the Kennishes meet a biological daughter who communicates largely in sign language. That may sound like the recipe for a lighthearted swapped-identity film along the lines of The Parent Trap, and that may have been what some viewers expected when the show had its premiere in June 2011 on a tweener-and-teen-centered channel that was then known as ABC Family. But the shows creator, Lizzy Weiss, was going for something more substantive. The high aspirations were evident in the tendency to refer to noteworthy paintings for episode titles the premiere was called This Is Not a Pipe, a name drawn from a Magritte work. As for subject matter, the series wasnt interested in merely providing a surface look at the deaf and hearing-impaired world. Before 20 minutes had passed in the first episode, it had broached the subject of the cochlear implant and why many hearing-impaired people object to it and to the whole notion that deafness is something to be cured. A show that might have used its deaf characters for feel-good moments, the way Glee sometimes used Artie and his wheelchair, instead signaled that it intended to be more challenging and thought-provoking. Warren Buffett opens the door on his Nebraska life, but not necessarily his investment strategy. Things become positively vicious on The Bachelor. And Kim Cattrall stars in a sizzling BBC update of Agatha Christie's The Witness for the Prosecution. Whats on TV BECOMING WARREN BUFFETT (2017) 10 p.m. on HBO and HBO streaming platforms. Despite an estimated net worth of $74 billion, Mr. Buffett still lives modestly in his hometown, Omaha. From there he manages Berkshire Hathaway, the fourth-largest company in the world, and plans how to give away the majority of his fortune to philanthropic causes, mostly the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. If youre in the luckiest 1 percent of humanity, you owe it to the rest of humanity to think about the other 99 percent, he has said. Here, Mr. Buffett allows the filmmaker Peter Kunhardt into his life including his frequent chats with students, his daily reading sessions and his routine visits to McDonalds to chronicle how he became one of the richest men in the world, and how he changed the way Americans consider capitalism and charity. At 86, actuarially, I know whats in the books, but literally I get to do what I love, and its easy for me, Mr. Buffett said in an interview with The New York Times. I do not feel that my life is past its most interesting points. THE BACHELOR 8 p.m. on ABC. Corinne and Taylor have a catfight. Then the 13 bachelorettes head to New Orleans for the dreaded two-on-one date with Nick. Pilcher ends nearly every chapter by admitting the impossibility or near impossibility of cloning the animals under review. Dinosaurs are out, for instance, because DNA has been found to have a half-life of 521 years, meaning that no trace of it could survive longer than 6.8 million years, about a tenth of the time since dinosaurs last roamed. Image Helen Pilcher Credit... RLP Photography Yet Pilcher sympathizes with a stubbornly optimistic scientist named Mary Schweitzer, who says: If you can get DNA from a 700,000-year-old fossil, why not a million-year-old one? And if you can get DNA from a million-year-old fossil why not one that is seven or even 70 million years old? Its useful that Pilcher is upfront about her advocacy for her subject, though it does give one pause when she writes about especially controversial figures, like Hwang Woo-suk, convicted in 2009 of publishing fraudulent stem-cell research. Pilcher quickly acknowledges Hwangs spectacular, humiliating and public fall from grace, but in the same sentence writes, Yet through gritted teeth, dogged determination, and the emotional and financial support of many loyal fans, Hwang has quietly rebuilt his career. He now clones dogs in South Korea. In a 2015 interview with NPR, Insoo Hyun, a bioethicist, said of Hwang, I just dont think someone like him can be trusted to follow the rules appropriately. Pilcher does offer many of popular sciences deep and trivial brainy pleasures along the way. Just learning the name of the Cape Verde giant skink (a lizard) seems worth the price of admission. There are also informative condensed histories of extinct species like the passenger pigeon, which flew with a lot of company. (If you took all the pigeons in the U.K., multiplied them 400 times, then launched them into the air, that would be the size of a single passenger pigeon flock.) Were told that we could probably bring back a Neanderthal today, and that at least one expert believes it might be best if he or she was home-schooled. (Neanderthals didnt do well around strangers.) One of the last great auks, flightless birds, was inexplicably branded a witch and beaten to death. And maybe this doesnt fall under pleasure, exactly, but youll learn far more than you want to know about an elephants sexual anatomy. Merkins parents were prosperous Orthodox Jews who, in her telling at least, were cold and unloving, but who seem nonetheless to have provoked in her a passionate and consuming attachment. Her mother fulfills all the cliches about Jewish mothers except the one about unbridled self-sacrifice. She is domineering, intellectually inclined, critical, with a viselike grip, and so woven into the fabric of her childrens lives that they cannot have any experience that is not somehow of her. She appears empathetic enough to grasp what her children are feeling, but not very kind in the application of that knowledge. As a child, Merkin could achieve her mothers full attention only when she was sick, and she ponders whether her yearning for maternal affection might have been an engine of her later breakdowns. When Merkin gets married, she feels she has betrayed the sacred monster she so loves to hate. We were tangled up like bedclothes, she complains, and yet she also writes, Without my mother, who will cut up the world into bite-size pieces for me? Image Daphne Merkin Credit... Tina Turnbow You feel Merkin struggling to see her mother even as she professes to escape from her. The fact is that she is not as unaware of my turmoil as she acts or as I choose to believe, she acknowledges. There is nothing she doesnt know, nothing that will undo her. Perhaps this resilience is what she offers instead of a more recognizable form of love. This ruthless intimacy, no matter how poisoned, was inescapable; and when it faded, the shock was palpable. Of her mothers final illness, Merkin observes, She was alert enough but seemed far away, as though she had sailed out to sea while the rest of us stayed on dry land. Those psychoanalytic narratives in which barely suppressed family drama and cruelty are intermingled with attachment and thus produce neurosis are often questioned in our post-Freudian epoch, but they hold true for Daphne Merkin, who has been much analyzed by psychiatrists and friends and family and self to emerge as an epitome of what analysis seeks to locate: a person in whom every emotion is also its opposite. Her concern that her own depression is a pathetic failure, and perhaps even an imagined hysteria, salts a memoir full of actual hospitalizations and suicidal longings. She describes sitting at a dinner where she feels depression is a fraudulent bundle of symptoms, an inflated case of malingering that everyone suffers from but that only a select, self-indulgent few choose to make a big deal about. She is one of those who make a big deal about it, but she can hardly say how or why. In one telling passage, she writes: Yesterday in therapy I described my life as horrific, which I realize is subjective and self-dramatizing. . . . I know there are people hanging on by a thread in Haiti and the Congo and elsewhere across the globe, I know, I know, I know. . . . But I still cant get out of being me, a desperado from way back. Elsewhere, she confesses, First there was the confinement of my childhood, like an incessantly replayed loop of film, and now there is my adulthood, which seems like a prison of a different kind. Yet she knows how unattractive her condition is; she writes about sweating a lot, and about being boring, even to herself. The truth is that no one is interested in why you want to kill yourself, no one really believes that you will, until youve already done it, and then it becomes morbidly intriguing to try and map it backward. Merkin is accustomed to the disengagement that her emotional state provokes; she dares us to disengage like so many others. Of her most recent hospitalization she says, In my intake interview . . . I alternated between breaking down in tears and repeating that I wanted to go home, like a woeful child left behind at sleep-away camp. The admitting nurse was pleasant enough in a down-to-earth way but was hardly swept away by gusts of empathy for my bereft state. She describes her envy of the anorexics on the unit, who were clearly and poignantly victims of a culture that said you were too fat unless you were too thin. . . . No one could blame them for their condition or view it as a moral failure, which was what I suspected even the nurses of doing about us depressed patients. In the eyes of the world, they were suffering from a disease, and we were suffering from being intractably and disconsolately and some might say self-indulgently ourselves. While Merkin nearly boasts of her nose-dives into hell, she also relates how hard she has worked to mask her depression, an enterprise that has made her feel only more alone. I have hurled all the charm and wits I have at my disposal against my proclivity to depression, such that it would be difficult for even close friends of mine to detect how low I am at any given time. YORKVILLE Yorkville Elementary School District officials are kicking off a public education campaign regarding a spring referendum that's aimed at shoring up an operational budget deficit. The district has put updated information on its website about the referendum, is planning information sessions with residents and will direct a mailer to residents with the finalized language for the April 4 ballot initiative. This year the district is $170,000 in the red, but the district is expected to be insolvent in five years if nothing changes, according to Superintendent Dave Alexander. Revenue issues Alexander has repeatedly called the recurring budget deficits a revenue problem. "We're assuming that we're not going to get revenue cap relief from the state policies," Alexander said. Earlier this week, Gov. Scott Walker's administration signaled an increase in the state-imposed revenue limits to more than $200 per pupil and increase funding for rural school districts in the proposed 2017-2019 state budget. But that may not be enough to help the Yorkville district. Data provided by the district shows it spends more than $1,000 less per student than some neighboring districts. While residential grow could impact district revenues in a positive way, Alexander doesn't see that as something to bet on. "We've been hoping for residential growth for the past seven years and it hasn't happened. Hoping is not a strategy," Alexander said. Referendum info The $490,000 recurring operational referendum, if approved, would amount to a tax rate increase of $1.05 per every $1,000 of property value. Before the April 4 election, officials plan two informational sessions: one on Feb. 15 and the other on March 23 at the Yorkville Elementary school cafeteria, 18621 Washington Ave. School Board President Jeff Gruhn believes the referendum has a headwind for passage, based on the feedback he received at information sessions last year and the results of a recent online survey that shows two-thirds of 182 people surveyed are in support of a tax increase for the school. Gruhn is confident voters will approve the referendum, even if it is a recurring amount. "There are benefits to a recurring. It allows you to implement things without the fear of a funding cliff," Gruhn said. For the near future, the increased revenue would be used for bathroom renovations, a new roof for an older section of the school, annual funding of curriculum programs as well as technology needs for students, among items. Salary talk Right now, 80 percent of the district budget goes toward salary and benefits for teachers and staff and that's not something district officials want to cut any further. "Something that differentiates us from the bigger districts is we run our classes with 18 to 22 students per class. We could adjust our staffing to 30 to 35 students per teacher but that would have a significant impact on how things work here," Alexander said. Not tied to the referendum is a proposal of a one-time 4 percent increase in teacher salaries, to be discussed this budget cycle by the School Board, and a recurring 2 percent increase annually. Alexander says it's up to the board to decide what they want to do, but he believes the current salaries are not competitive enough. "We're already behind in our region," Alexander said. "We don't want to be in the top 10 percent of teacher salaries, we just want to be in the top half." Gruhn said teacher salary increases are something the board needs to address. "We'll see what we can build into our budget," Gruhn said. "We'll make our decision for a multiple of reasons in August." This story has been corrected since publication to reflect the correct estimated tax rate impact. Which genres do you especially enjoy reading? And which do you avoid? The genres I most enjoy reading are the ones I try and avoid, because I love them too much. As a child and teenager, those beloved genres were comic books, science fiction, fantasy and war stories, both fiction and nonfiction. As an adult, I added crime stories. The problem is that if I pick up a crime thriller by Jo Nesbo, Walter Mosley or Don Winslow, or a science fiction novel by Octavia Butler, Ill be up until the early hours of the morning to finish it, and I dont have the time. Thats likewise the case with comic books when I give in to them, whether they are by the Hernandez brothers, Alan Moore, Rumiko Takahashi, Osamu Tezuka, Adrian Tomine, Gene Luen Yang, or many others. Besides the fact that these genres provide gripping storytelling, I also love them because they oftentimes have more to tell us about our larger contemporary world than so-called literary fiction (which doesnt acknowledge that its a genre as well). Comic books long ago predicted presidents like Donald Trump, in series like Frank Miller and Dave Gibbonss Give Me Liberty. Crime fiction, which often connects low-level crime to high-level corruption, can help us understand the operations and effects of a Trump presidency that unabashedly favors strongmen of all kinds. Science fiction likewise often speculates on grand political questions. Kim Stanley Robinsons Red Mars, for example, is about the colonization of that planet and the ensuing tragedy wrought by human politics, greed and ambition. It takes place in the future but is really about our eternal human strengths and weaknesses. I like it when literature gets political, and contemporary literary fiction is more often apolitical than not. How do you like to read? Paper or electronic? One book at a time or several simultaneously? I love paper books, but traveling with them was a pain, because my luggage could only accommodate so many books. When the Kindle came along it solved that problem of portability and was my favored reading mode for several years. Then I published my novel and rediscovered the fetish of the physical object. I wanted to hold my book and enjoyed seeing it on bookstore shelves, and have returned to the thrill of buying and reading paper books. I still read on the Kindle, however, and also listen to books on audio. It doesnt matter how Im reading as long as Im reading. I read several books at a time, which mirrors to some extent how I always have more than one writing project that I work on simultaneously. How do you organize your books? Organize? Whats your favorite book to assign to and discuss with your students? Maxine Hong Kingstons The Woman Warrior. I find the book endlessly rewarding to teach, because its so rich and layered and still relevant to the lives of students. In addition, its a powerful book about the necessity and dangers of storytelling. The first line is You must not tell anyone, my mother said, what I am about to tell you, and the rest of the book is about the author telling everyone what her mother said. Telling what must not be told is one of the writers primary tasks. It is also a difficult and dangerous one. What kind of reader were you as a child? Which childhood books and authors stick with you most? I was a lonely boy and a voracious reader who treated the library as my second home. I loved Curious George and Tintin, although I see their problems now as an adult whos more sensitive to racial and colonial connotations. I wouldnt want to reread the Hardy Boys, Tom Swift or Tom Browns School Days, but I liked them as a child. Other favorites that I have not revisited for fear of spoiling their memory are Robert Louis Stevensons Treasure Island; DAulaires Book of Greek Myths; Tolkiens The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings; Isaac Asimovs Foundation and Robot books; Frank Herberts Dune; early Robert Heinlein novels; Harper Lees To Kill a Mockingbird; Erich Maria Remarques All Quiet on the Western Front; Audie Murphys To Hell and Back; Benets Readers Encyclopedia; and many, many superhero and war comic books. A curious child can read whatever he or she wants in a good library, which has no borders and stands up for the First Amendment. That meant that by the time I was 13 or 14, I had access to lots of war books filled with sex and violence, as well as trashy, soft-core porn paperbacks featuring detectives, medieval knights and hit men. This probably goes a long way toward explaining how I became the writer that I am. If you could require the president to read one book, what would it be? For President Obama, the Bible (the Old Testament, not the New). For President Trump, the Bible (the New Testament, not the Old). Shortly before his death, Gustave Eiffel famously predicted that his Eiffel Tower in Paris would stand for a thousand years. Nearly a century later, the city has now said it wants to almost double what it spends on maintaining the tower for a face-lift. The French capital is eager to host the Olympic Games in 2024 and the World Expo in 2025. If it wins either bid, Paris will need to accommodate more than the normal roughly six million tourists visiting the landmark each year. But this concern would not exist nor would the tower itself had Eiffels many early opponents prevailed. Some appeared to have worked at The Times. In 1887, when construction started, critics called the monument the grotesque and mercantile imagination of a machine maker, according to a Times report. When the tower was inaugurated at a world exhibition in 1889, The Times wrote: Oh! who will deliver us from the Eiffel Tower! President Trumps executive order to temporarily block all refugees and deny entry to citizens of certain predominantly Muslim countries has sowed chaos and confusion. The White House has already had to pull back on part of it, saying the temporary ban did not apply to those with green cards. The Department of Homeland Security then issued an order declaring legal residents exempt from the order. These steps back did nothing to reassure critics fearful of a retreat from traditional American values. Any hope that Silicon Valley may have had of finding common ground with the administration dissipated quickly over the weekend. The administrations nationalist agenda struck at the heart of the tech industrys mantra of globalization. Vodafone has dialed for backup in its India fight. The Britain-based telco is talking with Aditya Birla Group about an all-share merger of its Indian business with Idea Cellular, which is part-owned by Aditya, a cement-to-retail conglomerate. It could feel the benefits beyond the subcontinent. The two firms confirmed the talks in separate statements on Monday, but financial details were limited. Vodafone said that any merger would take effect through the issuing of new Idea shares to Vodafone, and that it would deconsolidate its Indian subsidiary. Ideas statement said that equal rights between Aditya Birla Group and Vodafone in the combined entity were a fundamental premise of discussions. The strictest interpretation of this is that Aditya Birla Groups equity stake in the new company would equal the equity value of Vodafone India. That seems unlikely. Berenbergs estimates from early January put the equity value of Vodafone India at 9.2 billion euros, or about $9.8 billion, while Ideas market capitalization is about 4.8 billion, or about $5.1 billion. Alternatively, Aditya Birla Group might have equal control just in terms of voting rights in the new company. Another workaround could be that Vodafone India sells some of its equity to Aditya Birla Group in order to equalize their stakes, or that it receives an equalizing cash payment. Concerns about regulatory approval have weighed on Walgreens Boots Alliances bid to buy a top drugstore rival, Rite Aid, as the two cut the price of the deal while pushing back the expected closing date by six months. Shares of Rite Aid tumbled nearly 15 percent in morning trading on Monday, to $5.91. In a joint statement on Monday, the retailers said that they would cut the price of the takeover to between $6.50 a share and $7 a share, potentially revaluing the transaction to as little as $6.8 billion. When the transaction was announced in 2015, Walgreens had agreed to pay $9 a share, or $9.4 billion. The ultimate purchase price will be determined by how many more Rite Aid stores the combined company will sell to win antitrust approval above the 1,000 that Walgreens had previously agreed to. Under the new agreement, Walgreens said that it was willing to sell up to 1,200 stores. Last month, Walgreens said that it planned to sell 865 stores to another drugstore operator, Freds. Casting a ray of sunlight on a case that has been shrouded in secrecy, a federal appeals court ruled on Monday that the government must produce a raft of documents to plaintiffs suing over its decision to seize all the profits of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the mortgage finance giants that were put into conservatorship in September 2008, at the depths of the financial crisis. The case against the government was brought in 2013 by Fairholme Funds, a mutual fund that owns shares of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Its lawyers contend that the governments surprise decision to divert the companies profits to the United States Treasury in August 2012, just as the companies were turning around, was an illegal seizure of private property. The government has argued that the profit sweep was necessary to protect taxpayers against further losses; taxpayers advanced $187 billion to the companies after they were put into conservatorship. But documents unsealed last year in the case cast doubt on this argument, showing that the timing of the profit sweep coincided with a rebound in the companies operations and occurred just before they began generating profits again. As it has defended itself against Fairholme, the government has withheld more than 11,000 documents relating to the profit sweep decision, arguing that they should not be disclosed because they are subject to various claims of privilege, including the privilege covering presidential communications. Contending that those claims were an overreach, lawyers for Fairholme asked Margaret M. Sweeney, the judge hearing the case in the Court of Federal Claims in Washington, to review a representative sample of 56 documents. Andy Hicks, owner of HIX Inc., a small health care technology consulting business in Denver, travels frequently. And as a gay man, he said, hes enjoyed acceptance in many destinations even in Cuba, where he traveled this year with his partner. We didnt know what to expect, Mr. Hicks said. We had zero problems. The travel industry offers gay travelers everything from special cruises and tours to gay-friendly hotels. But there are still many places in the world, including many countries in the Middle East, Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and the Pacific, as well as Russia, where laws or social customs create an unwelcoming and unsafe environment for travelers who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. More than 75 countries consider consensual same-sex sexual relations a crime, and in about 10 countries a person could be put to death for being gay, according to the United States State Department. Today, it is important for a L.G.B.T. person to understand the laws and how they are enforced and the culture of the countries and even cities where they visit, said Bruce McIndoe, chief executive of iJet International, a travel risk management company. In an environment of religious extremism, he said, individuals are more likely to lash out or take unilateral action against assumed members of the L.G.B.T. community. IJet, he said, has seen increased requests from clients to help prepare and protect their gay and transgender travelers after the mass shooting at an Orlando, Fla., nightclub last June and other episodes. Mr. Hicks, who has been to many high-risk countries, recently returned from North Korea. It was absolutely a nonissue, he said. You have to adapt, go with the flow and fit in as best you can. Next stop, Provence. No, not the sunny, pastel Provence with lavender in the air, anchovies on the plate and rose in the glass. This is the Provence of Bandol, a structured, sometimes ferocious, age-worthy red wine that is the antithesis of ephemeral rose. Bandol is grown in small quantities in the limestone hills near the village of Bandol, east of Marseille and west of Toulon in France. The red wines must be at least 50 percent mourvedre, with the remainder generally blended with grenache and cinsault, and occasionally syrah and carignan. The best producers will use considerably more mourvedre than the minimum, and it is mourvedre that can sometimes make the wine fiercely tannic when young, before it evolves into a thing of complex beauty. Mourvedre originated in Spain, where it is known as monastrell. When grown there in sunny Mediterranean appellations like Jumilla and Alicante, it rarely has the brooding character found in Bandol. Recent years have not been kind to the historic pantheon of fortified wines. Port, sherry and Madeira once played fundamental roles in the drinking regimen of wine lovers. Now? They have had to reinvent themselves for a world that offers far more choices in wine and no longer seems to value the high alcohol or sweetness in fortified wines or the occasion of the after-dinner drink. Partly, this means promoting fortified wines as cocktail ingredients, which keeps the flow of wine going but seems a little sad, as it fails to recognize the intrinsic grandeur of these wines. Port may have the biggest challenge in winning a new audience, as it is intensely sweet, high in alcohol and perhaps best suited for the postprandial smoke fests of a departed era. Sherry, because it is primarily dry and wonderfully flexible with savory food, has a path forward, particularly because the sherry business has begun to shift from mass production of mediocre wines to the smaller production of exceptional wines. Dr. Ogbu, who died a few months after his book was published, classified immigrants like my family those who chose to migrate to settler societies like Canada and the United States as voluntary minorities who accepted many aspects of the culture they had chosen. In contrast, he described involuntary minorities indigenous people and those who came here as part of the slave trade as suffering from marginalization and discrimination for multiple generations. Some of these individuals, he found, were less trusting of educational institutions, which they saw as part of the system that contributed to their historical disenfranchisement. They clung to manners of speech and dress that were distinct from the (predominantly white) mainstream and that fostered a disregard, even a disdain, for assimilation. Dr. Ogbus theories rang true at times in my own life as I continued to struggle with the balancing act: Would I slack off or go to the library in the evenings to pre-read for the next physiology lecture and risk being caught acting white? (It was Dr. Ogbu who popularized the phrase in the mid-1980s, to explain why black students might spurn behaviors associated with achievement.) How much would I have to lower the grades I reported to my friends when they would pry, to fit their preconceptions? Both my grades and my identity were slipping. But toward the end of my undergraduate years, I found myself spending time with other first-generation Canadians from Africa. Like me, many of them understood that agency and dedication would propel them farther than foreign names and pigmentation would pull them back. The doors that advanced education promised to open were a primary reason our parents emigrated to North America. My new friends and I were not trying to conform to what peers, strangers or society believed a black male should be. I attended medical school in St. Johns, Newfoundland and Labrador. Commonly, minority physicians-in-training report tremendous support from their communities. In his memoir, Black Man in a White Coat, the African-American psychiatrist Dr. Damon Tweedy describes receiving positive and encouraging reactions when medical staff members saw the young brother sporting a white coat during his medical training at Duke in the late 1990s. This would be the case for me as well. Unfortunately, it is not always the case for others, who have the ability to succeed but succumb to social pressure. Minorities with aspirations of upward mobility have considerable barriers holding them back. Systemic factors like differential access to high-quality child care, lower socio-economic status overall and poorly funded schools account for much of the educational achievement gap between black students and the general population. Peer pressure should not be one of them. Every step I took, from undergraduate training to medical school to competitive postgraduate training programs, yielded fewer and fewer colleagues of my complexion a pattern documented in a recent article by Dr. Amit G. Pandya and other members of the American Academy of Dermatology diversity task force. It is for this reason that the academy runs a mentorship program that engages medical students of color in the hope of creating an ethnically diverse cohort of dermatologists. The Dane County 911 Center and Madison police confirmed officers were investigating multiple reported shootings Sunday night, with at least two people injured. The first call came in at 7:57 p.m. for a reported shooting at the 7-Eleven at 2201 S. Park St., on the citys South Side. Madison police Lt. Tim Radke confirmed Madison police were investigating that incident, along with another reported shooting on Sunday night on Schroeder Road; further details were unavailable on that incident. Chad Robinson was one of those students. Ranked in the top 10 of his high schools senior class, with a 3.75 grade-point average, he had already been accepted to the engineering school at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte when he told his parents he wanted to shift course and apply for the Siemens apprenticeship. They were very against it, he said, until they went to the open house. A lot of my friends who majored in engineering in college told me they wish they had done the apprenticeship because my work experience will put me ahead of everyone else. IT is not uncommon to find executives in Europe who got their start in apprenticeships, which are seen as a respected path to a profession in a variety of fields, from hospitality to health care, retail to banking. In the United States, on the other hand, apprenticeships have long been associated with the construction trades and labor unions. That can be traced to a Depression-era labor shortage that led Congress to pass the National Apprenticeship Act. The act formalized standards and empowered the Labor Department to certify training, which was mostly in manual labor occupations. Unions took on the task, tightly controlling apprenticeship opportunities and passing them down through the generations. In the decades after World War II, registered programs expanded in number and type, with the addition of fields like firefighting and medical technician. But apprenticeships never caught on, relegated to a second-class career track as college enrollment ballooned in the 1960s and 70s, and more recently mirroring the falloff in the influence and membership of labor unions. The Department of Labors registry now lists 21,000 programs with about 500,000 apprentices, which sounds impressive but represents only 1.5 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds in this country and is far short of demand. Still, participation is up 35 percent and the number of programs by 11 percent since 2013. Apprenticeships are making a comeback thanks in part to bipartisan support among lawmakers. In the last two years, Washington has allocated $265 million to spur programs. President Obamas secretary of labor, Thomas E. Perez, a strong proponent, attempted to rebrand apprenticeships to appeal to educators and parents. During his tenure, the department established a partnership between registered community colleges and sponsors that allowed on-the-job-training to count as academic credit toward a degree. New year, new designer turnover. After weeks of speculation that the creative director of Chloe, Clare Waight Keller, was leaving after six years, and no comment responses from executives, the French fashion house finally confirmed her departure on Monday. Her last collection for the house will be shown at Paris Fashion Week on March 2, and a successor has not yet been announced. Clare has been a remarkable partner at Chloe over the past six years, Geoffroy de la Bourdonnaye, chief executive of the company, said in a statement. She helped rejuvenate the legacy of Gaby Aghion, the first ever Chloe girl, by infusing a cool and easy breeze into the Chloe wardrobe, effortlessly mixing graceful and feminine flou with a freewheeling and boyish take on tailoring. Ms. Waight Keller, a Briton, joined Chloe from Pringle of Scotland in 2011, after designers including Paulo Melim Andersson and Hannah MacGibbon tried, unsuccessfully, to recapture the retail magic the brand enjoyed under the designer Phoebe Philo, who left in 2006. Ms. Waight Keller, whose soft-spoken mien belies a tough core, rejuvenated the house with a highly wearable and bohemian flair as well as a successful high profit margin accessories business. In an interim report for the six months ended Sept. 30, Chloes parent company, Compagnie Financiere Richemont, reported good sales growth, but it did not provide financial numbers for its individual luxury brands, which also include Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels. Often a night at the ballet can serve as an escape from reality, a respite from politics, with its gridlock and its brinkmanship. But on Saturday evening, as crowds gathered at Kennedy International Airport to demonstrate in response to President Trumps executive order on refugees and immigration, a protest-themed performance at the New York City Ballet underscored the tensions of the world outside Lincoln Centers halls. The performance was both a dance piece The Times Are Racing, choreographed by Justin Peck and a fashion show for Opening Ceremony, which usually presents its collections during New York Fashion Week. Humberto Leon, who runs the company with Carol Lim, designed the costumes, which in turn inspired Opening Ceremonys spring 2017 collection. The audience included Derek Blasberg, Claire Danes, Maggie Gyllenhaal and Solange Knowles. Mr. Leon said he had met with Mr. Peck hundreds of times to understand how his costumes could best serve the mood and themes of the ballet. He said he wanted a unique look for nearly every dancer in order for each to appear as authentic as possible, like people meeting on the street. Since taking office on Jan. 20, Donald J. Trump has announced executive orders calling for an indefinite ban on Syrian refugees entering the country, along with the temporary suspension of immigration from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen for those who do not hold green cards; the construction of a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico; a scaling back of the Affordable Care Act; a reviving of the Keystone Pipeline; and a lifting of the ban on overseas black site prisons among other actions. How do you feel about these executive orders? What are your thoughts on the new presidents first days in office? In the op-ed column The Fog of Trump, Ross Douthat writes: Normally at the end of a new administrations tumultuous first week, its the pundits job to sit back and chin-stroke and explain everything that the president and his aides are doing right or wrong. In the Donald Trump era, though, theres a distinctive problem: Before he can be defended or criticized, we have to figure out whats actually happening. And for several reasons, thats going to be harder in this presidency than ever before. Trump himself is a loose cannon whose public interventions tend to make his own policies harder to interpret. Is his administration planning a trade war with Mexico, as his tweets suggest, or just pushing a wonky border-adjustment tax thats been part of G.O.P. proposals for a while? Are we actually considering reviving waterboarding, or is that just an empty executive order left over from the Romney transition that James Mattis and Mike Pompeo have no intention of operationalizing? Is the administration about to embark on a racially-coded war against phantom voter fraud based on random anecdotes and conspiracy theories or is this just a Twitter promise, not a real one? Of course time will bring a certain clarity. Well find out whether Trumps refugee and visa freezes from Muslim countries are actually temporary, a means to stricter screening, or whether they become permanent. Well move from speculation to reality on Russia policy. Well find out how far the president intends to run with the voter-fraud nonsense. Well see how often his angry tweets and behind-the-scenes obsessions cash out, and how often theyre just a way of venting. But if the fog lifts in some cases, its likely to chronically shroud the policy-making process on issues (health care, taxes, infrastructure, more) where Trump needs his congressional allies to have certainty about their shared objectives. And it threatens to descend more dramatically with Stephen King-style monsters screaming in the mist with every unexpected event, every unlooked-for crisis, in which what the White House says in real time will matter much more than it does right now. Students: Read the entire column, then tell us: Have you felt, like this writer, that is has been difficult to figure out whats actually happening in this administration so far? Do you find Mr. Trump himself a loose cannon? Why or why not? Are there any actions that this administration has taken so far that especially interest, alarm or please you? Which? Why? How closely are you watching this new president and administration in general? What are your feelings about the Trump presidency so far? Why? Mr. Douthat ends this piece by writing, Trump is not a popular president, he has not actually built an electoral majority, his team is not particularly experienced. If he cant provide clarity and reassurance and a little light around his agenda, it will be very easy for a fog-bound presidency to simply run aground. Do you agree? Why or why not? What predictions can you make about the Trump administration based on this first week? Teachers: We have three related lesson plans you might find helpful: The Inauguration of a New President: A Lesson Plan on Predicting and Evaluating the First 100 Days of a Trump White House The consequence of this, at Kennedy and other international airports, was a sort of pop-up miniature security state: in the face of confusion, the momentary retreat of law in favor of order. The corridors of Kennedy were full of state and Port Authority police and the occasional National Guardsman. The ones I met or saw were cordial and coolheaded, doing nothing to dissuade the immigration lawyers from their work. But behind the security perimeter, the C.B.P. officers charged with making sense of the legal contradictions created by the executive order appeared to have, in their uncertainty, more or less gone dark. The normal channels of communication available to us have gone silent, Camille Mackler, the director of legal initiatives at the New York Immigration Coalition, told me. (The C.B.P.s New York press office did not respond to requests for comment Monday.) After two Iraqi immigrants one of them Hameed Khalid Darweesh, a translator who had worked with the United States government in Iraq for a decade were detained at Kennedy early in the day, Mark Doss, an International Refugee Assistance Project lawyer who came to their aid, asked an official whom to talk to. The reply, Doss told reporters, was Call Mr. Trump. This was the kind of atmosphere that might prevail after a national-security emergency, but with no actual emergency in sight, save for the crisis the White House had created for itself. Airports, with the chilly futurism of their architecture, lend themselves well to dystopia, and at Kennedy over the weekend it was impossible to shake the feeling that, in more ways than one, America had finally caught up, at least momentarily, with its own dark cinematic imagination. Through the windows of Terminal 4, on Saturday evening, you could see a thousand-some protesters chanting from every level of the main parking garage and the lot below it, held at bay by barricades and phalanxes of riot police. Inside, things seemed effortfully normal. The arrivals board showed flights from Havana, Montego Bay, Kuwait, Taipei, Dubai, Port of Spain. Along the railing were family members holding balloons and bouquets of roses, limo drivers holding up placards with Sharpied names, all of them waiting for people who, having been in the air for hours, were often visibly surprised when they emerged from customs into a national news event. In the arrivals hall, the seating area of an ersatz 1950s diner had been commandeered and turned into a sort of guerrilla legal-aid clinic. After the International Refugee Assistance Project put out a call for volunteers earlier in the day, dozens of lawyers with immigration backgrounds, and many without them, had come to Kennedy. The diner tables were littered with pyramids of to-go boxes and picked-at slabs of red velvet cake. Everyone was pecking at a laptop. An email thread was bouncing between lawyers and law clerks camped out in several terminals, representing, based on the price tags usually attached to the firms in the signature lines, many thousands of dollars in pro bono write-offs. Who knew Arabic? Farsi? How to file a habeas corpus petition? There were 10 arrivals from Iraq and Yemen detained at Terminal 7, who had been there since 7:30 that morning. There seemed to be Iranian graduate students detained everywhere. Whats our most effective strategic move here? one lawyer wrote. Do we try to get press over here? Try to start a Twitterstorm at Donald Trump regarding these cases? At Terminal 1, a dozen young lawyers and a handful of law students were splayed around the floor of the arrivals hall, amid empty Dunkin Donuts boxes, coffee-soaked napkins and tangles of phone chargers. They were looking for families of passengers who had been detained by C.B.P. or, as one of them put it to me, Were looking for sad-looking people with no luggage. Members of a large Yemeni family were slumped in one bank of chairs waiting for relatives. A 78-year-old Iranian man, Ali Jalayer, a green-card holder who has lived in Connecticut since 2001, had just been released after several hours detainment; his daughter, Atousa, was trying to find out what was happening with her brother, who was still being held somewhere in customs. Mohamad Zandian, a 26-year-old Iranian biochemistry graduate student at Ohio State, was sitting on the floor against the wall, talking on his cellphone. Zandian had driven from Columbus the previous night to meet his wife at the airport. Her flight landed late Saturday morning. I was waiting for her, but I didnt see her, Zandian told me. So I talked to a couple of people in the welcome center, they told me it would be fine; she would come sooner or later. Two hours later, she called him from an airport phone to tell him she was going to be detained until Monday, then deported. So I bought a new ticket, to make sure she would not be in a bad situation. It cost him $800 for a Turkish Airlines flight to Tehran through Istanbul, but it was better than the unknown. It was taking off shortly before midnight. (The following day, his wife was finally released.) If there is one thing Elaine Fludgate wants to emphasize, it is that she is not the neediest. Nope, not her. What she is, she said, is the luckiest, the most grateful: She was caught before she actually fell through the cracks. For 40 years, Ms. Fludgate, 62, has lived on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Her most recent job was as an administrator for the Kimmel Center for University Life at New York University, where in 2013 she was a recipient of the colleges Give-a-Violet Award for outstanding work. She had a loving partner, Michael, by her side. Ms. Fludgate had a good life. But everything changed in late 2013, after Ms. Fludgate learned that her partner had liver cancer. She left her job to care for him, helping him until he died in March 2015. The depth of my grief was really unbearable, Ms. Fludgate said. He was my life for 32 years. That was just us. So hes gone, and Im nothing. Paul J. Massey Jr., a wealthy real estate sales executive and a Republican who wants to unseat Mayor Bill de Blasio in November, is still an unknown quantity to voters. He has yet to mount a significant ad campaign, and he has said little about his platform. He has, however, revealed an ability to raise money and spend it even faster. His campaign took in $1.6 million, slightly more than half from donors outside the city, and about $600,000 more than the mayor, according to a report filed this month with the citys Campaign Finance Board. The report covers the last six months of 2016 and the start of January. But he spent all of that and more, racking up bills of more than $1.9 million, much of it going to pollsters, political consultants and his top campaign employees. In part to cover the gap, Mr. Massey lent his campaign $1.2 million, and he says he is willing to put up millions more of his own money. (Mr. de Blasio, in part because of earlier fund-raising and Mr. Masseys spending spree, has more than twice as much money in the bank as Mr. Massey. The mayor is also participating in the citys generous matching funds program and already has contributions that will qualify him for more than $2 million in public financing. Mr. Massey has opted out of that program.) When she realized that Etan was missing, Ms. Patz said, she fell into shock. My legs started giving out, she said in court last year. Before long, the familys apartment had been converted into a command center, where police investigators, volunteers and journalists had assembled. Etans image spread widely, splashed across the front pages of the citys newspapers and shown on television newscasts. A missing poster, with an illustration of his hair peeking out from under the cap, was plastered around the city. He was said to be the first missing child to be featured on a milk carton. His disappearance with the search and the concern it generated overtook Lower Manhattan. Neighbors remembered the police going to door to door, with officers showing his picture, asking questions and going through apartments room by room, as the author Amanda Stern wrote in a retrospective of the case, published by The New York Times Magazine in 2001, after Etan was declared legally dead: We lacquered ourselves to the evening news, pried open windows, called across to neighbors. Stories bounced around like kids in a moonwalk. Someone saw Etan in a lumber store, on the subway. Seemed that people saw him like light trails every time they turned. We slept to bloodhounds and loudspeakers: Has anyone seen this little boy? He is 3 feet 4 inches tall, was carrying a cloth bag with imprints of elephants. Our shiny gold name decals were torn off shirts. I feared slowly passing cars and the solitude of my bedroom. At school, we learned about stranger danger. His disappearance reverberated far beyond his neighborhood. The date of his disappearance, May 25, was designated by President Ronald Reagan as National Missing Childrens Day, and his case helped prompt the creation, in 1984, of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Paula S. Fass, a historian and the author of the book Kidnapped: Child Abduction in America, told The Times in 2015: This case served as a wellspring of the idea that when little boys and little girls but especially boys were taken, that it was almost certainly by a pedophile. As years went by, what happened? Thessaloniki, Greece The refugee camp where I work as a doctor, in northern Greece, is seven hours ahead of Washington, so news of President Trumps executive order barring refugees for 120 days and Syrian refugees indefinitely came in the middle of the night. The next morning, it was the topic of conversation among the translators I work with. Given the enormity of our day-to-day tasks, theyre impressively well versed in the news: I first learned about the draft order early last week from one of the Syrian translators in our group. He made a point of mentioning Mr. Trumps promise to create vaguely defined safe spaces in Syria; I suspect this promise rings hollow, given that the Syrian government and Russia have shown no scruples about directly targeting hospitals and civilians, and the Islamic State acts without any regard for war conventions. Would Mr. Trump stand up to Vladimir V. Putin if the Russian president bombed a safe space? Another translator seemed equally unfazed by news of the ban, reminding me, Hes already been saying he was going to do this. His brother was recently resettled in the United States, and he will now likely be unable to visit his family if they are ever relocated in Europe. For most people here, though, the news is not really news, just another rejection by the West and they have enough to deal with already. Having fled the horrors of an endless civil war, many Syrians languish in purgatorial refugee camps. To the Editor: By purging nearly all references to climate change from the White House website (news article, Jan. 21), the Trump administration has ceded yet another American leadership role to other countries, in this case, probably China. President Xi Jinping of China stated clearly in Davos the importance of supporting the Paris climate agreement (DealBook, Jan. 22). Our new governments Luddite disregard for scientific data threatens the lives and economic well-being of all our citizens. Donald Trump may be our president, but because of backward-leaning policies, it is more and more apparent that the president of the United States is no longer leader of the free world. America is diminished. JANE P. CAREY Paso Robles, Calif. Our objective in making this film was something of a psychology experiment: We sought to capture people facing a difficult situation, to make a portrait of humans in doubt. Weve all seen actors playing doubt in fiction films, but we have few true images of the feeling in documentaries. To make them, we decided to put people in a situation powerful enough not to need any classic narrative framework. A high dive seemed like the perfect scenario. Through an online advertisement, we found 67 people who had never been on a 10-meter (about 33 feet) diving tower before, and had never jumped from that high. We paid each of them the equivalent of about $30 to participate which meant climbing up to the diving board and walking to its edge. We were as interested in the people who decided to climb back down as the ones jumping. We filmed it all with six cameras and several microphones. It was important for us not to conceal the fact that this was an arranged situation, and thus we chose to show the microphones within the frame. Ultimately, about 70 percent of those who climbed did jump. We noticed that the presence of the camera as well as the social pressure (from those awaiting their turn beside the pool) pushed some of the participants to jump, which made their behavior even more interesting. In our films, which we often call studies, we want to portray human behavior, rather than tell our own stories about it. We hope the result is a series of meaningful references, in the form of moving images. Ten Meter Tower may take place in Sweden, but we think it elucidates something essentially human, that transcends culture and origins. Overcoming our most cautious impulses with bravery unites all humankind. Its something that has shaped us through the ages. MIAMI President Trump is expected on Tuesday to announce his nominee for the Supreme Court seat vacated by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia. Many conservatives argue that a jurist who replicates Justice Scalias approach to law should fill the vacancy. Mr. Trump appears to agree, having vowed to nominate federal judges in the mold of Justice Scalia. While Justice Scalia was a brilliant and ardent defender of conservatism, achieving a restoration of the original meaning of the Constitution particularly its separation of powers could be more quickly and effectively achieved by a nominee whose approach is more aligned with that of Justice Clarence Thomas. The demeanors of the two justices could not have been more divergent. Justice Scalia was a firebrand known for opinions that were eloquent but often acerbic. Justice Thomass quieter disposition he rarely asks questions at oral arguments camouflages an equally deep and tenacious intellect. What matters most, however, is not a justices demeanor but his judicial philosophy. On this score, Justice Thomass originalism is unflinching. In Gonzales v. Raich (2005), for example, a majority of the court held that state medical marijuana laws are pre-empted because the federal Controlled Substances Act is a valid exercise of Congresss power to regulate interstate commerce. Justice Thomas dissented, asserting that if Congress can regulate individuals ability to grow, possess or use marijuana for personal medicinal use, it can regulate virtually anything, and states will be left with little power. The Holocaust was about the Jews, former Reagan speechwriter John Podhoretz wrote in Commentary this weekend, There is no proud way to offer a remembrance of the Holocaust that does not reflect that simple, awful, world-historical fact. On Friday afternoon, of course, Trump signed an executive order barring refugees and citizens of seven majority Muslim countries from entering the United States. It was his way of making good on a campaign promise to ban Muslims from the country. The order also said it would eventually give priority to religious minorities from these countries. And if anyone doubted who that meant, Trump gave an interview Friday to the Christian Broadcasting Network, explaining that its goal was indeed to help Christians. Fortunately, many Christian leaders are opposing the policy. I expect that Trumps attempts to undermine the First Amendment will ultimately fail. But theyre not guaranteed to fail. He is the president, and he has tremendous power. The attempts will fail only if Americans work to defeat the White Houses flirtations with theocracy as so many people began to do this weekend. This passionate, creative opposition may help explain Trumps weakening of the ban on Sunday. Yet the struggle to defend American values is clearly going to be a long and difficult one. Amherst, Mass. In an emblematic essay called The Wall and the Books, the Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges wrote about Shih Huang Ti (also known as Qin Shi Huang), the Chinese emperor who in 220-206 B.C. built the original Great Wall of China. In his essay Borges points out that the same emperor who implemented the project also banned all books from the kingdom. His intention was clear: The wall was meant to defend his people against enemy incursions; and the burning of all literature announced that all memory of the past needed to be erased. History for Shih Huang Ti started with him. President Trump is looking more and more like an emperor these days. The decision by his administration to bring down the Spanish-language side of the White House website is an egregious attack against an essential aspect of todays America. And next comes the wall he has ordered along the United States-Mexican border. Ours, after all, is a multilingual culture. And in the last few decades, the Spanish language has become unquestionably one of the most significant in that plurality. It is the second most used tongue in the land, with about 38 million speakers. In the context of the Hispanic world, Spanish speakers in the United States are the fifth largest community after Mexico, Colombia, Spain and Argentina. Such is its ubiquity that calling it foreign no longer seems logical. The president is nefariously monolingual. At the beginning of the Republican primary, Mr. Trump admonished Jeb Bush for speaking in the native tongue of his wife, Columba, a Mexican-American. This is a country where we speak English, not Spanish, he said. Humans are sometimes said to occupy a pecking order, but of course the term actually refers to chickens and other poultry. Mild pecking is normal behavior in the flock, employed by dominant birds (or despots) as a way to remind subordinates of their lower social position. But the practice can turn gruesome when thousands of birds are packed wing to wing. Then, some bottom-of-the-order birds are pecked to death and eaten. As poultry and egg farms increased in size in the 1920s and 1930s, feather-pecking and cannibalism, known in the trade as pick out, became serious threats. In 1939, Joseph Haas, founder of the National Band and Tag Company, devised a fashionable method to deal with cooped-up cannibals: mini sunglasses equipped with red celluloid lenses on a hinged aluminum frame. Poultry farmers were informed that having their chickens see the world through rose-tinted cheaters would make a sissy of your toughest birds. Until relatively recently, the party line among scientists was that cannibalism occurred in only a few species in the wild, like black widow spiders and praying mantises. Cannibalism, researchers felt, was an aberrant behavior resulting from a lack of alternative forms of nutrition or the stresses associated with captive conditions. Jennifer Golbeck, a professor of computer science at the University of Maryland, said her department had a number of Iranian students and researchers. Using social media, Dr. Golbeck in recent days has organized a database of people willing to shelter scientists and others who were in transit to the United States and were halted by the order. Theres a lot of people from these seven countries, Dr. Golbeck said. And suddenly theres this possibility that faculty members, students, postdocs and others who are outside the country for one reason or another suddenly cant come back. Solmaz Shariat Torbaghan, an Iranian neuroscience researcher at New York University who was awaiting a green card, said the order would force her to soon make a decision: stay and take her chances, or move to Canada. My partner and I just moved into a new place here, we are waiting for our furniture, and were hoping to have our parents visit us in a couple of months, which is not a possibility anymore, she said. Now, I dont know whats coming next. The uncertainty, she added, is not good for her research colleagues, either. People in my lab are very supportive, she said, but in an experimental lab, people need to know they can count on you, that youre not going to be suddenly gone and leave the project. The order may also affect work at some of the countrys most prestigious medical institutions. Eleven patients from the seven affected countries, which also include Syria, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, were planning to travel to Johns Hopkins University for medical treatment within the next 90 days, said Pamela Paulk, the president of Johns Hopkins Medicine International. All have visas, she said, but now it is not clear whether or when they may come. It turns out that finding common ground with Donald J. Trump isnt going to be that easy for Silicon Valley after all. Last month, a group of tech executives marched to the Trump Tower in Manhattan to meet with the president-elect, his advisers and his children. The message Mr. Trump delivered to the tech bosses was friendly: Im here to help. This weekend, a string of tech executives prodded by their employees criticized Mr. Trumps executive order temporarily blocking all refugees while also denying entry to citizens of Iran, Iraq and five other predominantly Muslim countries. Image In short, Mr. Trump had an answer to his offer, and it sounded like no thanks. While at least some of those executives spoke out because their employees demanded it, the standoff was inevitable. Aside from the venture capitalist and noted contrarian Peter Thiel, few in tech openly supported Mr. Trump. The presidency of Donald J. Trump has been noteworthy for its speed. In his first week in office, as the presidents aides wont tire of reminding us, Mr. Trump has already put in motion plans to do much of what he promised to do while campaigning. But its not just the politician who is moving fast. Its the population, too. In a matter of hours on Saturday, thousands rushed to the nations airports, beckoned by tweets. The flash protests in response to Mr. Trumps immigration ban, which continued to grow in many cities on Sunday, were as organized as they were instantaneous. Dispatched online, the protesters knew where to go, and they knew what to do once they arrived: to command the story by making a scene. Mr. Trump feeds off media attention. Throughout the campaign, the bigger a spectacle he created, the larger he loomed in the public consciousness. What has been remarkable during the last two weekends is how thoroughly Mr. Trumps own media personage was blotted out by scenes of protesters. In a brief appearance on Saturday, the president assured the nation that his immigrant ban was working out very nicely you see it in the airports. But the pictures and videos flooding across our social streams put the lie to Mr. Trumps breezy pronouncements. Things at the airports werent working out very nicely; you could see it right there on Instagram. Other memories appeared in vivid bursts. A rug merchants store, tucked into one of the Aleppo souks narrow passageways. Rugs in piles tens of feet high, covering every available space. They even covered his desk. In his sales pitch, the merchant said that the rug I had chosen could function as a passe-partout, framing any room to enhance its appeal. It sounded convincing, though I still do not really understand what it means. Then I remembered the oud. Walking into my wifes office, I found the curved instrument that looks like a pear cut in half. As I held it in my arms I suddenly could picture the store in Aleppo where I bought it. The merchant was an older man, instantly wary when he saw me push open the door. We spoke in halting French. I pointed to an oud that I liked and asked him about it. He described it in basic, nonflowery terms. The gist was it is an oud; it was made in Aleppo. I bargained to get the price down. He looked crestfallen, so I quickly agreed to the original price. Then I left. The encounter took maybe five minutes. Afterward, I walked along Aleppos boulevards and admired the tall apartment buildings that seemed like the very heart of the city. Like the door knocker and the postcard showing the Syrian dictators, this oud had traveled with us to every diplomatic assignment to Haiti, to Paris, to New York, to Canada. Now it sits in our apartment in Chicago. It has left its case several times, and has never been played properly. I thought of the old man who sold it to me, and wondered whether he might have made it. It was like the completion of a thought that began 17 years ago. Again and again, I see him standing up in the dust-filled store as the bell chimes, ready to meet whoever walks through the door. The memory is so vivid that it could have happened hours ago. Something like this happened once to my father. One evening we were watching the rain pour down thick and straight. He leaned back in his chair and sank into himself for a minute. Then he looked at me and said, The smell reminds me of Africa. He was talking about the rain splattering into the soil, humus lifting up in waves from the ground. I could tell from his expression that he was swimming in memories. Thirty-five years had melted away and he was back in Ivory Coast as a young Peace Corps volunteer, if only for an instant. Both of us had experienced the lifelong impact of travel, the way that it can echo for decades. My trip to Syria lasted only a few days, and yet it has apparently attached to my life like a barnacle. It clings to me, mostly forgotten, but once in a while it asserts its presence. The result is an upswelling of memory so strong that it feels like time travel. It is the umami of life, infusing ordinary days with unexpected flavor. Memories of travel can linger for a lifetime. But it gets even better. Memories bestow the same benefits as the original trip: They build empathy, broaden perspectives, and remind us, again and again, of our common humanity. They help rattle the cage of assumptions we build through the years. Most of all, they are a gift we give to ourselves a transfer of spirit from our younger, fresh-eyed versions to the people we are right now. Despite the growing protests against President Trumps executive action on refugees and other people from seven predominantly Muslim countries, relatively few members of his party have spoken out against the policy a familiar pattern since the election. To date, no congressional Republicans have consistently resisted Mr. Trump or his agenda even though his approval ratings are already historically low for a new president. Although some Republicans may fear a voter backlash in the midterm election, the greatest threat to re-election for most G.O.P. members of Congress is still a primary challenge. Thats what many legislators probably fear they will get if they oppose Mr. Trump, who is viewed overwhelmingly favorably among their partisan base, according to polling data. There have been several Trump policies once opposed by top Republicans that many now support or at least will not actively resist. House Speaker Paul Ryan said in 2015 that a proposed Muslim ban is not what this party stands for, and more importantly, this is not what this country stands for. He now backs the current executive order; all seven affected countries have Muslim majorities. President Trumps executive order barring millions of refugees and citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from the United States has spurred a surge in donations to humanitarian and rights groups like the American Civil Liberties Union. The A.C.L.U. has raised more than $24 million in online donations since Saturday, the first full day of the immigration ban, said Stephen Smith, a spokesman for the group. That is nearly seven times as much raised online in 2015, roughly $3.5 million, he added. Those donations came from at least 356,306 individual donors, and about two-thirds of those who gave money were believed to be first-time donors, said its executive director, Anthony D. Romero. The response from the public has been remarkable, Mr. Romero said. It clearly shows that people are exercised over the proposed policies of Donald Trump. Prosecutors in Washington have dropped felony rioting charges against four of the six journalists arrested while covering Inauguration Day protests, but charges remain in place against two others. The six were among 230 people arrested during violent demonstrations that took place just blocks from the inauguration of Donald J. Trump, who was sworn in as the 45th president on Jan. 20. Some protesters smashed shop windows in downtown Washington and set a limousine on fire. Charges against three of the journalists Matthew Hopard, John Keller and Alexander Rubinstein were dropped on Monday, according to Bill Miller, a spokesman for the United States attorneys office for the District of Columbia. WASHINGTON After years of railing against the reams of regulations enacted during the Obama years, Republicans this week will zealously embark on an effort to roll back some of those rules using an obscure law known as the Congressional Review Act. Republican leaders have dusted off this rarely used legislation, added to their tool kit in 1996, to quickly reject recently finalized Obama-era regulations, many of which they say impose an excessive burden on American businesses. This week, the House is expected to use the Congressional Review Act to start the process of tossing out five rules, including one that limits the venting of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, from oil- and gas-drilling facilities and another that requires federal contractors to report previous labor law violations. What is this law, and how will it be used? Let us fill you in. What Is the Congressional Review Act? This law is intended to be an oversight tool for members of Congress, offering a check on federal agencies. Mr. Mattis was not consulted by the White House during the preparation of the executive order on immigration, which temporarily blocks Iraqi citizens from entering the United States for 90 days. Six other predominantly Muslim countries are covered by the edict: Syria, Yemen, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Iran. The White House has argued that the temporary ban is needed so that the United States can develop procedures for the extreme vetting of travelers from nations that have been stricken by terrorism. Officials said that the Iraqis who will be put on the Pentagon list have already undergone a stringent form of vetting: serving with the United States military in combat. Schumers a no on nominations, across the board Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, approached his new job as the anti-Harry Reid: Yes, he would fight President Trump where he needed to, but he made it clear he really wanted to find areas of cooperation. That may not be happening. Driven by the executive order on immigration and by the vociferous demands of the increasingly activist Democratic base, Mr. Schumer announced on Monday that he would oppose President Trumps nominees pretty much across the board: No on Betsy DeVos for education secretary, Rex Tillerson for secretary of state, Senator Jeff Sessions for attorney general, Representative Mick Mulvaney for budget director, Representative Tom Price for secretary of health and human services, Steven Mnuchin for treasury secretary, Scott Pruitt for E.P.A. chief and Andy Puzder for labor secretary. Cooperation, it seems, is over. After the first week of the Trump presidency its clear our country is at a cross roads. In his first week in office the president has stomped over our proud American tradition of welcoming immigrants and refugees, trafficked in alternative facts, and is attempting to fill his cabinet with billionaires and bankers. What kind of country do we want to be: one that helps the middle class and those struggling to get there or one that further rigs the system in favor of the special interests? It might not have helped that Mr. Trump mocked Mr. Schumer for his tearful denunciation of his immigration order. I noticed Chuck Schumer yesterday with the fake tears, Mr. Trump told reporters on Monday during a meeting with small-business leaders. Im going to ask him who was his acting coach, because I know him very well. I dont see him as a crier. Calm down, Trump says, few were detained Besieged by criticism, with chaos at international airports mounting and protests proliferating, Mr. Trump defended the aftermath of his executive order halting immigration from the seven countries, saying that problems at airports were the fault of a Delta Airline computer error. WASHINGTON Since the death of Justice Antonin Scalia last February, the Supreme Court has been evenly divided between Democratic appointees and Republican ones. This has resulted in occasional deadlocks and many narrow decisions. A new justice appointed by President Trump would revitalize the courts conservative bloc. The balance of power would then return to the one in place since 2006: leaning right, but tempered by the occasional liberal votes of Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. Mr. Trump said in a Twitter post on Monday that he would announce his pick on Tuesday at 8 p.m. Here is a look at how a court with a reinvigorated conservative wing might act. Abortion Rights Appear Secure, for Now So long as Justice Kennedy continues to support the broad outlines of the constitutional right to abortion established in 1973 in Roe v. Wade, the addition of a new justice is not likely to make a difference. Heres a look at what is already in place. Preclearance The preclearance program is run by the Customs and Border Protection agency. Customs officers are stationed at 16 airports around the world and screen passengers before they board planes to the United States. Customs officers based at foreign airports collect fingerprints and photos and check travel documents before allowing passengers to travel to the United States. The officers also conduct inspection interviews with passengers and monitor their behavior before they are allowed to fly. According to the Government Accountability Office, data from the agency show that it identified and stopped over 22,000 high-risk air travelers in the fiscal year 2015 through these predeparture programs. The customs officers at these locations determined that 10,648 of the approximately 16 million air travelers seeking admission to the United States through such locations were inadmissible. Many of those who were denied entry onto flights bound for the United States were stopped for national security reasons. The Immigration Advisory Program Created in 2004, the Immigration Advisory Program is intended to prevent terrorists and high-risk passengers from boarding commercial aircraft to the United States. Unlike in the preclearance programs, customs officers in this program are unarmed, plainclothes officers who discreetly help airline and security employees with a review of passenger reservation and ticketing data on flights bound for the United States. These officers also assist foreign countries with document examination to check for fraud and provide training for airlines and foreign security personnel. The officers make nonbinding no board recommendations to air carriers and the host governments to prevent these passengers from boarding flights to the United States. Airlines typically adhere to the recommendations, even though they are not required to. These customs officers serve strictly as advisers in the foreign countries. They hold no law enforcement authority. WASHINGTON President Trump fired his acting attorney general on Monday night, removing her as the nations top law enforcement officer after she defiantly refused to defend his executive order closing the nations borders to refugees and people from predominantly Muslim countries. In an escalating crisis for his 10-day-old administration, the president declared in a statement that Sally Q. Yates, who had served as deputy attorney general under President Barack Obama, had betrayed the administration by announcing that Justice Department lawyers would not defend Mr. Trumps order against legal challenges. The president replaced Ms. Yates with Dana J. Boente, the United States attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, saying that he would serve as attorney general until Congress acts to confirm Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama. In his first act in his new role, Mr. Boente announced that he was rescinding Ms. Yatess order. Mondays events have transformed the confirmation of Mr. Sessions into a referendum on Mr. Trumps immigration order. Action in the Senate could come as early as Tuesday. Three days after President Trump signed an executive order sharply curtailing immigration and the rights of refugees, questions about its reach and legality are increasingly focusing on the orders uncertainty. By circumventing normal practices for formulating policies and their execution, the White House has created still-swirling confusion about whom the order targets and how it will be enforced. There is also ambiguity about the legality of the order, which the White House calls extreme vetting but which critics call a Muslim ban, and about how court challenges, already underway, will proceed. For many abroad, the ban raised questions about how an American president could undertake such an action suddenly and unilaterally, seemingly unfettered by checks and balances. The orders apparent breaches with usual protocol over how policy is made, and potentially with the law, are already creating major problems in its enforcement. Why has the order created such disarray? The order targets three groups: refugees from any country, who are blocked from entering the United States for the next 120 days; refugees from Syria, who are barred indefinitely; and citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries, who are barred from entering the United States for at least 90 days. Those countries are Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. CHICAGO This weary city ended last year with 762 murders, more than anyplace else in America, a grim statistic that alarmed Chicagos leaders, haunted grieving families and drew the presidents attention. And though the calendar has now turned, the violence of 2016 is claiming still more lives. Thirteen days into the new year, a young mother named Precious Land became Chicagos 766th murder victim of 2016. Ms. Land was the fourth person in 2017 to die of injuries from violence that happened last year, according to the Chicago police, who have made no arrests in her case. A mother of four with a steady job and no criminal record, Ms. Land was shot in the neck over the Memorial Day weekend while driving on the citys West Side. When she was injured, Ms. Land was just a block from home, and only a few miles from where her brother was shot to death in 2014. A Texas mosque that was gutted by fire over the weekend has raised about $900,000 in donations since Saturday to go toward rebuilding, a mosque official said on Monday. Dr. Shahid Hashmi, a surgeon who in 2000 helped found the mosque, the Victoria Islamic Center, said that both an online fund-raising campaign and separate offerings of cash and checks from the local community had pushed total donations over $900,000. By the afternoon the online portion alone had reached over $910,000. The money will go toward rebuilding the 4,000-square-foot prayer and community center in Victoria, home to about 66,000 people, about 100 miles southwest of Houston. It was the only Muslim community center and place of worship for the approximately 40 Muslim families in the city, Dr. Hashmi said. While President Trumps order banning immigration from several Muslim countries led to protests at several American airports, the news was often met with satisfaction and approval in those precincts that Mr. Trump carried in the November election. And the protests themselves were viewed with irritation by some, including conservatives who were otherwise critical of Mr. Trumps order. People at airports are on tight schedules and are henpecked enough as it is, Jay Cost, a senior writer for the Weekly Standard, said on Twitter. It is uncivil and rude. Dan McLaughlin, a securities lawyer in New York, in an article for National Review, wrote that the anger over the new policy was seriously misplaced, and he argued that the policy was far less radical than critics had made it seem. His policy may be terrible public relations for the United States, Mr. McLaughlin wrote. But it is fairly narrow and well within the recent tradition of immigration actions taken by the Obama administration. African leaders took such a strong line in Gambias case for one chief reason: Mr. Jammeh was an easy target to align against. With a long record of human rights abuses and bizarre, repressive behavior, he had increasingly distanced himself from regional and Western governments. He had jailed journalists and opponents, some of whom were tortured or died in prison, and had been widely disliked for years. Numerous governments had denounced Mr. Jammehs administration long before he declared that he would defend his presidency with his security forces. He rubbed too many people the wrong way, said Mohammed Ibn Chambas, the top representative to West Africa from the United Nations. He didnt have too many friends. It didnt take long for regional organizations to side with the winner of the election, Adama Barrow. The United Nations, the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States denounced Mr. Jammehs actions and called on the government of Gambia to abide by its constitutional responsibilities and international obligations, according to a joint statement from the groups. It is fundamental that the verdict of the ballots should be respected. The African Union announced that it would no longer recognize Mr. Jammeh as president as of Inauguration Day. And most important, the Economic Community of West African States a group that despite its name has been increasingly active in peace and security matters kept open a channel for a diplomatic solution, but simultaneously announced that it was preparing a regional military force to intervene if Mr. Jammeh did not step down. No one came to the defense of Gambia, a country with a shaky economy so small it barely registers on the global economic stage. Gambia wasnt strategic or interesting to anyone, said Alex Vines, head of the Africa program for Chatham House, a research group. So they were all united. The authorities said it was the first time that the police in the city had dealt with an attack of such magnitude. They repeated their characterization of the attack as an act of terrorism because of its size and style. Antiterrorism forces activated in response. One spokesman said that it might have been something else. The police said all of the victims were men, although they revised their age range to 39 to 60. One of the suspects fled by vehicle and called 911 at 8:10 p.m. Sunday, describing his actions and saying he wanted to cooperate. He gave his location and was quickly apprehended. Canadian television showed an abandoned gray Mitsubishi S.U.V. with the driver door open and emergency lights flashing. The police said neither of the suspects was known to the police. Kellie Leitch, a conservative member of Parliament who has proposed screening immigrants for Canadian values, released a statement saying that this outrageous act of violence is an attack not just on those gathered in a house of worship, but on the very fabric of Canadian society. Trudeau condemns attacks Prime Minister Justin Trudeau issued a statement on behalf of himself and his wife after the shooting: It was with tremendous shock, sadness and anger that I heard of this evenings tragic and fatal shooting at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec, located in the Ste.-Foy neighborhood of the city of Quebec. We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge. On behalf of all Canadians, Sophie and I offer our deepest condolences to the family and friends of all those who have died, and we wish a speedy recovery to those who have been injured. While authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, it is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country. Canadian law enforcement agencies will protect the rights of all Canadians, and will make every effort to apprehend the perpetrators of this act and all acts of intolerance. Tonight, we grieve with the people of Ste.-Foy and all Canadians. Quebec leaders call for solidarity The leaders of the province and city of Quebec held a news conference Monday morning to express their solidarity with Muslims. YANGON, Myanmar A day after a prominent human rights lawyer was fatally shot in Yangon, Myanmars government said on Monday that the gunman had been trying to undermine stability in the country. The lawyer, U Ko Ni, 65, an adviser to Myanmars leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, was shot in the head at close range as he was leaving Yangon International Airport on Sunday. The police arrested a suspect, identified as U Kyi Lin, and seized two handguns. According to an earlier interrogation, the motivation of the incident is to undermine the countrys stability, the presidents office said in a statement. Mr. Ko Ni, a Muslim and a member of the governing National League for Democracy, was returning from Indonesia with other government officials and civic leaders who had traveled there to discuss democracy and conflict resolution. He wrote six books on human rights issues and democratic elections, and he was actively involved in the interfaith peace movement. ISLAMABAD, Pakistan After years of living in the open in Pakistan despite a $10 million American bounty, the militant leader accused of orchestrating the 2008 Mumbai attacks, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, was placed under house arrest in Lahore on Monday, Pakistani officials said. The move against Mr. Saeed, the founder of the banned militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba, came amid a reported new round of pressure by the United States to arrest Mr. Saeed and to ban Jamaat-ud-Dawa, the charity he leads, which has been accused by American officials of being a front for militants. The News, a Pakistani English-language newspaper, reported on Monday that American officials in the waning days of the Obama administration had threatened sanctions or other penalties if action was not taken. On Monday, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, the Pakistani interior minister, announced that action against Jamaat-ud-Dawa was being discussed and that a decision would be announced on Tuesday. Hours later, police officers arrived at the groups headquarters in Lahore and placed Mr. Saeed under house arrest. Party banners and flags were removed from the offices. This is not the first time, however, that Mr. Saeed has been put under house arrest, and he has repeatedly avoided long-term detention or serious legal charges. He was placed under detention at least twice after the 2008 attacks in Mumbai, which killed at least 166 people. India claimed almost immediately then that Mr. Saeed was the mastermind of the terrorist attacks. MANILA The top police official in the Philippines said Monday that he would suspend police participation in the nations bloody drug war while he conducted a purge of rogue officers. But President Rodrigo Duterte said earlier on Monday that the crackdown would continue until the last day of my term, raising questions about whether a suspension would do anything to halt the violence. At least 3,600 people, and possibly thousands more, have been killed by the police or by vigilantes since Mr. Duterte came to power. Human rights groups have said the extrajudicial killings of drug dealers and users may have been ordered by the police, a charge officials have denied. SEOUL, South Korea President Trump assured South Koreas acting president on Monday of the United States ironclad commitment to defend the country, agreeing with Seoul to strengthen joint defense capabilities against North Korea. Mr. Trumps assurances came amid anxiety in South Korea over the future of the alliance with the United States. During his campaign, Mr. Trump cast some doubt on the United States defense and trade commitments, saying that South Korea was not paying enough to help keep 28,500 American troops in the country. But speaking by phone to Hwang Kyo-ahn, the acting president of South Korea, Mr. Trump said that the coming visit to South Korea by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis reflected the close friendship of the two countries and the importance of their alliance. Mr. Mattis is scheduled to visit South Korea on Thursday on his first official trip abroad, which also includes a stop in Japan. President Trump reiterated our ironclad commitment to defend the R.O.K., including through the provision of extended deterrence, using the full range of military capabilities, the White House said in a statement after Mr. Trumps phone conversation with Mr. Hwang, using the initials for South Koreas official name, the Republic of Korea. The police found no signs of a struggle at the cliff top, but there had been a storm that could have washed such evidence away. The site was never secured as a crime scene. In the years after Mr. Johnsons death, his brother became wealthy in the 1990s tech boom, selling a company that developed compression technology for delivering sound and video over the internet to America Online. After reading about the 2005 inquest on the Sydney cliff deaths, Steve Johnson began devoting some of his resources to finding out what had happened to his brother. He hired an investigative journalist, Daniel Glick, to go to Australia to dig up court records and other documents. And he assembled an array of high-powered lawyers his legal team includes a former Massachusetts attorney general, Martha Coakley, who said her firm took the case pro bono to argue for reopening the case. In 2012, a new inquest overturned the original finding of suicide. But the coroner reached no conclusion about how Mr. Johnson had died, saying that while anti-gay violence was a possibility, so was an accidental fall. When the current inquest resumes in June, it will hear new evidence, the coroners office has said. Whatever the result, Steve Johnson and others hope it will spur further investigations of these cases. There was clearly a pattern to these deaths, said Margaret Sheil, whose brother Peter was found dead at the base of a cliff in 1983. Today, it is extraordinary to think that we would not have had an open discussion about what happened. And if we had, it might have prevented it happening to someone else. SYDNEY, Australia President Trump confirmed that his administration would honor a refugee resettlement deal for the United States to accept migrants Australia has detained on the Pacific islands of Nauru and Manus, the Australian prime minister said on Monday. Mr. Trump agreed to maintain the agreement, reached under the Obama administration, during a 25-minute telephone call on Sunday, said the prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull. The election of Mr. Trump, whose harsh talk about immigration was central to his campaign, left the deal in doubt, and its future was considered an early test for relations between the United States and Australia. I thank President Trump for his commitment to honor that existing agreement, Mr. Turnbull said during a news conference on Monday in Canberra, the Australian capital. Mr. Turnbull did not provide details on how many refugees, who have been banished to Nauru and Manus by Australia after being intercepted at sea trying to reach its shores, would be going to the United States under the one-time agreement or when they were likely to be resettled. Hundreds of people are housed in offshore detention facilities on the islands in what rights groups describe as inhumane conditions. The deal had been under negotiation for months before being announced in mid-November, shortly after Mr. Trump was elected. As a presidential candidate, he pressed for a temporary ban on all Muslim immigration, though his campaign later said that the ban would apply only to migrants from terror-prone regions. His executive order on immigration, enacted on Friday, banned immediate entry into the United States by people from several predominantly Muslim countries, and it further fueled speculation that the deal with Australia might be derailed. The shooting was the first time anyone had been killed in a mosque in Canada in such circumstances and was, at least in recent times, a rare event outside the Muslim world. The attack was particularly shocking for Quebec City, where the bulk of the population of 750,000 works for the provincial government, universities or in tourism. Until Sunday there had not been any murders in the city for 21 months. Mr. Bissonnette was well known to people who monitor far-right groups in Quebec, where he frequently commented on sites speaking about immigration and Islam. He was a particularly vocal supporter of Marine Le Pen, leader of Frances far right, when she visited the city last year. He was a student of anthropology and political science at Laval University, just minutes from where the shooting took place, according to people who monitored his online activities. He was not a leader and was not affiliated with the groups we know, said Francois Deschamps, a job counselor at Carrefour Jeunesse, a community organization that helps young people find jobs. Mr. Deschamps, who also runs an online group to help refugees called Bienvenue aux Refugies, said he had watched Mr. Bissonnettes anti-Muslim postings for about a year. The minute I saw his picture this morning, I recognized him, Mr. Deschamps said by telephone, adding that Mr. Bissonnette used his real name online. Mr. Bissonnette and his family live in Cap-Rouge, a western suburb of Quebec City that lies in the shadow of a towering railroad trestle. Neighbors said there was nothing remarkable about the quiet young man. Brunhilde Pomsel, the personal stenographer of the Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels during the last three years of World War II and one of the last surviving members of Hitlers retinue in his final days in a Berlin bunker, died on Friday at her home in Munich. She was 106. Her death was confirmed by Christian Krones, a director of A German Life, a documentary film about Ms. Pomsel. Mr. Krones said family members told him of the death. A trusted Nazi Party loyalist, Ms. Pomsel was the private secretary of Goebbels from 1942 until the wars end in 1945, taking his dictation and transcribing documents, letters, diary entries and other business of that virulently anti-Semitic propaganda chief, who rigidly controlled the news media, the arts, radio broadcasting and films in Nazi Germany. In Berlins swastika-draped Sportpalast in 1943, when Goebbels gave his most famous speech, acknowledging publicly for the first time after the Nazi defeat at Stalingrad that the nation faced serious dangers, calling for total war and hinting at a vast extermination of Jews that was already underway, Ms. Pomsel sat near the front, just behind her bosss wife, Magda Goebbels. The weapon? A type of software known as ransomware. The crime is as simple as it is mendacious. Victims typically receive an email with a link or attachment that contains software that encrypts files on their computer and holds them hostage until they pay a ransom. Many of the hackers who carry out such attacks operate in Russia and Eastern Europe, according to the police, and often demand a ransom in Bitcoin, a digital currency that is hard to trace. Ransomware is becoming a pandemic, said Tony Neate, a former British police officer who investigated cybercrime for 15 years. With the internet, anything can be switched on and off, from computers to cameras to baby monitors. Still, he added, hacking a hotel and locking people out of their rooms is a new line of attack. Mr. Neate, now chief executive of Get Safe Online, a government-backed security charity in Britain, said that demands in ransomware schemes were usually low enough that victims would acquiesce. As a result, however, hackers waged dozens of attacks a day to make them financially viable. He nevertheless counseled victims not to pay, arguing that that would only further encourage more attacks and that the funds used to pay the ransom would bankroll nefarious activity, including possibly terrorism. Hotels, he warned, should also guard against copycat crimes by reinforcing their digital security. According to the United States Justice Department, ransomware attacks quadrupled in 2016 to an average of 4,000 a day. The F.B.I. said the costs to victims of such attacks rose to $209 million in the first three months of 2016, compared with $24 million throughout 2015. It is a sign of the crimes sinister proliferation that it has also entered popular culture. In an episode of the legal drama The Good Wife, a Russian hacker attacked a law firm in the middle of a prominent case, encrypting its files and demanding a $50,000 ransom. The hacker eventually relented after the firm turned the tables by infecting the extortionists computer with propaganda criticizing Russias president, Vladimir V. Putin. In the real world, however, many have been forced to pay up. Last year, hospitals in California and Kentucky were targeted in ransomware attacks. In one case, a Los Angeles hospital paid more than $17,000 to hackers to restore its computer network, and all of its digital medical files. Other victims in Europe and the United States have included a municipal utility, companies, schools, law firms and police departments. At bottom, it sends the message that America sees Iraqis as untrustworthy, Kenneth M. Pollack, a longtime Iraq analyst at the Brookings Institution, wrote in an email. That they are not our partners. It reinforces Trumps idea of taking their oil; that we dont view them as allies but something much less than that. Mr. Trump has explained his executive order as a way to keep America safe from terrorism, but officials and analysts say that it is likely to hinder his efforts to wipe out the Islamic State, also called ISIS or ISIL, given that the United States is leaning on the Iraqis to do most of the fighting. It is going to alienate the whole of Iraq against the man, to say to all Iraqis, You are not welcome in our country, said Mouwafak al-Rubaie, a member of Parliament and a former national security adviser in Iraq. The issue could also become a political liability for Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, who has spoken optimistically about expanding cooperation between Iraq and the United States under Mr. Trump in the fight against ISIS. It will be difficult, Mr. Rubaie said, for Mr. Abadi to justify to the Iraqi public a close relationship with the United States when the country is closing the door on Iraqis. This is going to be a huge embarrassment for the prime minister, Mr. Rubaie said. On Monday, Iraqs Parliament voted to ask the government to respond by barring Americans from the country. It was unclear whether the government would do so, and in a statement issued on Monday the Foreign Ministry was more cautious, asking that the United States reconsider the policy. Other leaders, including the Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr, and the spokesman for Iraqs paramilitary units that have been fighting the Islamic State, said that Americans should be barred from Iraq. Clearly its time for a quantum change, Naftali Bennett, the education minister, who plans to introduce the annexation bill, said in an interview. The incremental approach has not worked. We have to understand its a new reality. We have to go big, bold and fast. The Parliament seems poised to approve a law that few thought had any chance of passage just a few months ago: It would ultimately legalize settlement homes built illegally on private Palestinian land. Critics call this yet another form of creeping annexation. Many Palestinians agree this is a critical moment. They fear Maale Adumim will be just the beginning of the annexation of settlements in the West Bank, now home to roughly 400,000 Jews, and the end of the two-state dream. We believe in two states for two nations, but if they took that Maale Adumim there will be no longer two states, said Yousef Mostafa Mkhemer, chairman of the Organization of Jerusalem Steadfastness, which focuses on issues like Muslim holy sites, refugee camps and Israeli settlements. There will be one state called Israel. Many Palestinians and peace activists argue that the line has already been crossed that any annexation of Maale Adumim, after so many years, would be a technicality. WASHINGTON Female fighters were among the roughly 14 Qaeda militants killed in an American commando raid in central Yemen over the weekend, the Pentagon said on Monday, seeking to explain a number of reports that civilians died in the nearly hourlong firefight. A member of the Navys SEAL Team 6 was killed and three other commandos were wounded in the operation early Sunday, the first authorized by President Trump since he took office on Jan. 20. The Pentagon identified the commando who died as Chief Petty Officer William (Ryan) Owens, 36, of Peoria, Ill. After initially denying there were any civilian casualties, Pentagon officials backtracked somewhat on Sunday after reports from the Yemeni authorities begin trickling in and grisly photographs of bloody children purportedly killed in the attack appeared on social media sites affiliated with Al Qaedas branch in Yemen. Capt. Jeff Davis, a Defense Department spokesman, told reporters at the Pentagon on Monday that the military was assessing the claims that civilians were killed in the surprise dawn raid that targeted the compound of a suspected Qaeda leader in Yemen, Abdulrauf al Dhahab. Hamdiyah Al Saeedi Detained en route to meeting her son, stationed at Fort Bragg Had all gone according to plan, after an overnight flight from Doha, Qatar, Hamdiyah Al Saeedi, 65, would have landed at Kennedy Airport in New York on Saturday and then boarded a connecting flight to Raleigh, N.C., to meet her son Ali Alsaeedy, whom she had not seen in five years. It was not by chance that her new life as an American immigrant would begin in North Carolina. Her son is a sergeant in the 82nd Airborne Division, which is based at Fort Bragg. When she did not show up at the airport, Sgt. Alsaeedys immediate fear was that his mother, who does not speak English, had somehow gotten lost. He flew to New York, where another reality awaited him. His mother was not lost: She was being held somewhere in Terminal 4 by authorities who were threatening to deport her. They wouldnt even let me see her, Sgt. Alsaeedy, a newly minted American citizen, said by phone on Sunday morning from the airport, where he was still waiting for his mother. A native of Baghdad, Sgt. Alsaeedy has been working for the American government for much of his life. After the 2003 invasion, he was an interpreter for seven years, working for the American military and the United States Agency for International Development. For his service, he eventually received a special immigrant visa and emigrated to the United States. He joined the Army and returned to Iraq in 2015, this time as a United States soldier with the 82nd Airborne Division. I cannot tell you what I was doing, he said when asked about his role. All he would say was this: The mission we were doing there, I was a part of it. For years, he had been filling out endless forms so that his mother and his father could join him in America. I started the process five years ago to bring both parents to this country, Sgt. Alsaeedy said. In December, his father died. A few weeks later, his mothers visa was approved. He immediately booked a flight for her. At the moment that the president signed the immigration order, at 4:42 p.m. in Washington on Friday, she was probably waiting to board her flight in Doha. When Sgt. Alsaeedy arrived at J.F.K. searching for his mother on Saturday, other families were waiting at the airport with similar stories. With the help of lawyers, he filed a habeas petition for her release. And his morale was buoyed by the swelling protests outside. This country is great because of those people, the thousands outside who were protesting and helping people with whom they have no relation, Sgt. Alsaeedy said. Even in my worst situation, I felt hope and freedom and that there are great people. But even as the protests were occurring, Sgt. Alsaeedy received a phone call with crushing news. A federal agent told him that his mother would be deported on a flight bound for Germany around 9 p.m. The agent offered to put Sgt. Alsaeedys mother on the phone to say goodbye. She was crying. I was hoping to see you and hug your child, she said, according to Sgt. Alsaeedy, who said he was stunned, unsure what to say. Its not over, he said, hoping to calm her down. In the end, his mother was not deported. She was held for more than 33 hours, handcuffed for some of the time, and was denied a wheelchair, according to a lawyer for Sgt. Alsaeedy, Molly Lauterback of Brooklyn Defender Services. They were reunited at J.F.K. after 4 p.m. on Sunday. Joseph Goldstein 1. Registration with the United Nations. 2. Interview with the United Nations. 3. Refugee status granted by the United Nations. 4. Referral for resettlement in the United States. The United Nations decides if the person fits the definition of a refugee and whether to refer the person to the United States or to another country for resettlement. Only the most vulnerable are referred, accounting for less than than 1 percent of refugees worldwide. Some people spend years waiting in refugee camps. 5. Interview with State Department contractors. 6. First background check. 7. Higher-level background check for some. 8. Another background check. The refugees name is run through law enforcement and intelligence databases for terrorist or criminal history. Some go through a higher-level clearance before they can continue. A third background check was introduced in 2008 for Iraqis but has since been expanded to all refugees ages 14 to 65. 9. First fingerprint screening; photo taken. 10. Second fingerprint screening. 11. Third fingerprint screening. The refugees fingerprints are screened against F.B.I. and Homeland Security databases, which contain watch list information and past immigration encounters, including if the refugee previously applied for a visa at a United States embassy. Fingerprints are also checked against those collected by the Defense Department during operations in Iraq. 12. Case reviewed at United States immigration headquarters. 13. Some cases referred for additional review. Syrian applicants must undergo these two additional steps. Each is reviewed by a United States Citizenship and Immigration Services refugee specialist. Cases with national security indicators are given to the Homeland Security Departments fraud detection unit. 14. Extensive, in-person interview with Homeland Security officer. Most of the interviews with Syrians have been done in Jordan and Turkey. 15. Homeland Security approval is required. 16. Screening for contagious diseases. 17. Cultural orientation class. 18. Matched with an American resettlement agency. 19. Multi-agency security check before leaving for the United States. Because of the long amount of time between the initial screening and departure, officials conduct a final check before the refugee leaves for the United States. February of 1994 wasnt a great month for the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in Manhattan. The institution laid off nearly ten percent of its staff, reduced its hours of operation, temporarily closed its library, and had to cancel a couple of exhibitions. One of them was a retrospective of the Brazilian artist Helio Oiticica (1937-1980), who was still relatively unknown in North America. The exhibition had been traveling throughout Europe since 1992, with stops in Rotterdam, Paris, Lisbon and Barcelona, and had just arrived in the U.S. the year before, when it opened at the Walker Arts Center in Minneapolis in October. The Guggenheim wouldve been its next stop. Kathy Halbreich, then-director of the Walker, couldnt hide her frustration: Heres an artist who is less well-known than he should be, she told the New York Times, adding that the show would no longer be reviewed, since critics were waiting for the exhibition to open at the Guggenheim to review it. Twenty-two years later, they are finally getting their chance. Last October, Helio Oiticica: To Organize Delirium opened at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh to great public and critical acclaim. Art critic Stephen Heyman praised the exhibition writing on Vogue that the Brazilian genius who pioneered installation art is finally getting his due. Art Daily said the visually arresting show was like an experience unlike any other. Hyperallergic picked the show as one of its top exhibitions of 2016. The three-month stint in Pittsburgh was only the first of three legs of the artists first major retrospective in over two decades: it will travel to The Art Institute of Chicago in mid-February and to the Whitney in New York City in July. Oiticica is no stranger to the New York City public. In the summer of 1970, he was part of INFORMATION, a group show at MoMA whose goal was to extend the idea of art beyond traditional categories. Oiticica didnt take that concept lightly: in Barracao Experiment, he built 28 nests where museum-goers were encouraged to go in to rebuild their own nests and relax, all in the name of creativity. On the opening day, former Second Lady Happy Rockefeller opened one of the nests and caught a couple having sex. But with To Organize Delirium, for the first time an exhibition includes Oiticicas New York years in depth, according to the Carnegies director Lynn Zelevansky, also one of the shows curators. There hasnt really been a fully comprehensive exhibition of his work that would tell people what his whole career was like, because when you only see a part of it, or when you only see one, two or three works, you cant fully understand what an artists project was, she says. The exhibition honors Oiticicas evolution, showing three distinct phases of the artist: Rio de Janeiro (1955-68), London and New York (1969-78), and the return to Rio (1978-80). He began as a painter, and his work starts off somewhat in a formal way, as a neo-concrete artist working with rectangles, says art historian Paula Braga, author of three books on Oiticica. Soon, it looks like the rectangles want to get out of the paper, and move into space, she says referring to colorful panels suspended from the ceiling that marked his early work, and that he made for people to walk through them. He leaves the bi-dimensional universe, which is the paper; moves to 3-D, when he starts hanging those shapes from the ceiling; and then moves beyond 3-D, when he puts those colorful structures on the body of a samba dancer, Braga explains, making reference to Parangoles, one of Oiticicas best-known pieces. (Color plays a big part in his early work: The Body of Colour, a 2007 exhibition organized by the Museum of Fine Arts Houston in collaboration with Londons Tate Modern, explored Oiticicas original use of color. His career, Roberta Smith wrote in The New York Times, was fueled by a passion for color as theoretical as it was obsessive.) By 1971, he moved to New York to run away from the Brazilian coup detat of 1964, and became fascinated with the post-Stonewall gay liberation movement, and with lower Manhattans underground gay scene. He was inspired by queer cinema pioneer Jack Smith, worked with gender illusionist Mario Montez Andy Warhols first drag superstar and he denounced the commercialization of the queer art scene in New York. Decades before todays celebrity scandalous tapes, Oiticica filmed himself masturbating, having sex with another man, and having the time of his life with cocaine all of which can be seen in the excellent 2012 documentary Helio Oiticica, directed by his nephew Cesar Oiticica Filho. (Explaining 1973s Cosmococa, Oiticica proclaims Cocaine is the light, snorting happily as he used the drug to make drawings on top of Weasels Ripped My Flesh, an album by the band Mothers of Invention.) As the political situation [in 1964s Brazil] gets worse, and the dictatorship comes in, he gets more socially oriented, explains Zelevansky. This can be seen in one of the highlights of the exhibition: Tropicalia (1966-67). Done in massive scale, Tropicalia consists of two Penetrables (maze-like structures) set in sand, where viewers walk around tropical plants, live parrots, pebbles and a TV set. Its inspired by houses in the favelas, built with wood and decorated with cheap colorful fabric: it critiques the notion of a stereotypical Brazil as a tropical paradise. Brazilian musician Caetano Veloso borrowed the title for a song, which became the theme of resistance against the military coup. The term tropicalism becomes a whole movement in all the arts and signifies the political [anti-establishment] position, says Zelevansky. (Curiously, Oiticica didnt like the term. The burgeois, the sub-intellectuals, idiots of all sorts now preach tropicalism without knowing what it is, he wrote in 1968.) Another highlight is Eden (1969), which he described as a mythical place for feelings, for acting, for making things and constructing ones own interior cosmos. Eden is another massive multi-sensorial installation rarely shown because of it size where people can navigate through Penetrables while walking on sand, leaves, and water. Oiticica wanted to create a new kind of relationship with the viewer, whom he called the participator, and have a kind of social interaction and notion of social life around the art, says Zelevansky though Oiticicas goal was never really art. My aim, he said in 1979, is to trigger states of invention. Muri Assuncao likes to write about arts, culture and all things LGBTQ. He was born and raised in gorgeous Rio de Janeiro, but has lived in Manhattans gayest zip codes since the late 90s. His work has appeared in Towleroad, Mens Journal and others. Follow him @muriassuncao. About the photos: Main + Body Photo 2: Helio Oiticica. PN1 Penetrable (PN1 Penetravel), 1960. Cesar and Claudio Oiticica Collection, Rio de Janeiro. Cesar and Claudio Oiticica, Rio de Janeiro. Body Photo 1: Helio Oiticica. PN27 Penetrable, Rijanviera, 1979. Cesar and Claudio Oiticica Collection, Rio de Janeiro. Body Photo 3: Helio Oiticica. GFR 022 and GRF 028, 1955. Collection of Diane and Bruce Halle; Helio Oiticica. Grupo Frente 24, 1955. Collection of Donna and Howard Stone. Body Photo 4: Luiz Fernando Guimaraes wearing Oiticicas P30 Parangole Cape 23, MWay Ke, at the West Side Piers, New York, 1972. Private Collection. Cesar and Claudio Oiticica, Rio de Janeiro. Body Photo 5: Helio Oiticica. Filter ProjectFor Vergara (Projeto filtroPara Vergara, 1972) (cat. 63) at Galerie Lelong, New York, 2012. Courtesy of Cesar and Claudio Oiticica, Rio de Janeiro, and Galerie Lelong, New York. Body Photo 6: Helio Oiticica. Penetrable, Magic Square 5, De LuxeInvention of Color, 1978. Cesar and Claudio Oiticica Collection, Rio de Janeiro. Cesar and Claudio Oiticica, Rio de Janeiro. Six students stand in a circle laughing. Each sands a gaita, a folkloric Colombian flute. Their backwards caps and general demeanor seem more apt to 2 Chainz than concertos. The students are part of Proyectos De Luteria del Festival, la Fundacion Silva, an ecology-focused program at their school in El Pozon, one of the poorest, roughest slums in Cartagena, and sanding gaitas is their hope for reprieve. Diana Arevalo leads the group of one-hundred poverty-stricken teens, who travel from across Colombia to attend her week-long program during the Cartagena International Music Festival. Its here where the students learn how to construct, fix and play not only gaitas but also other Colombian instruments like the tambora. The program is all free and open for public viewing, and people come each day to attend a workshop or sand a gaita, she says, Its about keeping tradition alive. This idea of tradition inspired Julia Silva, head of the Cartagena International Music Festival, to start the program in the first place. When 90 percent of the population lives in a very low income, has no opportunities of educationfree educationto all of those wonderful things that the world offers, we have to do something about it, Silva said. We created a program to learn how to repair and restore musical instruments and with that teach them how to build instruments. They will know how to clean it, how to change a string, and that the instrument needs service. Silva sees this opportunity not only economicallyas in these kids now have the skills for a jobbut also as a means of sophistication, a level of sophistication she says, is fundamental to human development. Its a sophistication that students like Jadith Valencia, a teen from El Pozon, would likely have never experienced were it not for this program. He, along with the other teens participating, will build between 100 and 1200 flutes, from complete scratch, over the course of the week. Valencia had just begun his first year with the program. I like music and the construction of the gaitas, he said. Ive learned a lot. Ive learned something about my own culture. Of course, for Valencia and many of the other teens here, music is the gateway out of the slums. Much like how many aspiring rappers in the hoods of Detroit or LA see themselves as the next Eminem or Dre, Valencia envisions himself a Champeta star, and, whether its sanding a gaita or learning the violin, this program brings him one step closer to that dream. Tom is a travel writer, part-time hitchhiker, and hes currently trying to imitate Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? but with more sunscreen and jorts. Colombia has a hard time shedding its bad boy image, which is understandable, as it has been in conflict with guerrillas for years. However, with the signing of a deal with FARC (The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) this past September, peace has never been so close. For this achievement, President Juan Manuel Santos was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2016. Meanwhile Colombias tourism has been on the rise for quite some years, making it an attractive country for travelers: there is enough infrastructure and (tourist) information to make it easy to move around while the country is still abound with off-the-beaten path destinations and activities. In Colombia, you will not simply savor a cup of coffee, but see where its made. You can learn to dance salsa in Cali or admire graffiti artists in Bogota. And art buffs, dont forget to check out Boteros sculptures in Medellin. When in need of some quietude, you can linger in one of the many idyllic Andean pueblitos such as Villa de Leyva, Jardin or Jerico. Be open to local people and you will be amazed by the Colombians hospitality. A note of caution: This doesnt mean you should travel just anywhere outside the well-known tourist areas such as Bogota, Cartagena, Medellin and Salento. Check with local authorities whenever you want to travel off-the-beaten path. 1. Graffiti Bogota offers a wide array of restaurants, cafes and museums (dont miss the Gold MuseumEl Museo del Oroon Parque Santander). But the city stands out for one particular sight: its graffiti scene. Contrary to pretty much any other country in the world, here this form of art has been legalized. Instead of creating quick, crude and rushed drawings painted in the darkest hours of the night, in Bogota graffiti artists can leisurely work during the daythe police will come and admire the scene instead of sending them away. Many of the graffiti projects are paid for by the government or are commissioned by the owners of the buildings. A free two-hour tour leads you along dozens of artworks in El Parque de Los Periodistas. The guide gives you insight into this culture, explaining the differences in graffiti styles, the materials artists work with and how to recognize the signatures of renowned graffiti artists. 2. Salt Cathedral of Zipaquira What started in the 1930s as an underground chapel and altar for the salt miners to pray and honor their Virgin has grown into a humungous cathedral situated 656 feet underground. In pre-Colombian days, the indigenous people mined salt in the area, but colonization brought commercialization and in the 1800s the mines were turned into a system of tunnels to optimize the profits. Today you can tour part of the tunnels that are no longer mined, and the cathedral (pictured at top). You dont need a guide, but avoid Sundays, as they are exceptionally busy. If you are interested in the salt-mining process, visit the nearby Nemocon salt mine. Tours are mandatory and provide insight into the salt mining history and process. Both mines can be visited on a day trip from Bogota. 3. Pijao Inspired by the slow food movement, Cittaslow is an Italian organization that aspires to increase the quality of life in towns around the world. The town of Pijao is Latin Americas first Cittaslow, and on arrival it is easy to see why. The colorful, small town centers around a laid-back plaza that is surrounded by coffee bars and traditional houses built with barreque (bamboo cut lengthwise and filled with adobe). Pijao invites you to stay, meander its streets, play chess at its outdoor cafe on the plaza and share a cup of coffee with the locals. One of the key elements to Pijaos Cittaslow status is to encourage sustainable tourism. Check out new local initiatives such as mountain biking and bird watching or plan your visit in September, when Pijao will host Colombias second Festival de Sabores, Sonidos y Saberes (Flavors, Sounds and Knowledge). 4. El Eje Cafetero You are bound to visit at least one coffee plantation in El Efe Cafetero (Colombias coffee region), and Salento is Colombias most famous and touristy coffee town. For those who like some privacy with their coffee, check out the pleasant colonial towns of Jardin and Cuidad de Bolivar. Sign up for a tour of a coffee plantation or sit down in the towns shady plaza and savor a cup of cafe (not to be confused with tinto, which is a weak, cheap coffee generally bought from vendors on the street). Colombias coffee region is on UNESCOs World Heritage List. 5. World Heritage Sites Speaking of World Heritage Sites, Colombia has a number of them. Among them are historic sites such as San Agustin Archaeological Park (pictured above) and Archeological Park of Tierradentro, which both are well visited. On the other hand, the multiple-day hike to the Lost City (Ciudad Perdida) in north Colombia is still an undiscovered option, something thats bound to change as numbers of visitors to Colombia increase. So if you like hiking and visiting historic sites in relative solitude, than this is your trek for 2017. 6. Mocoa Go to the north coast for the beach, visit Tatacoa for a bit of desert, drive through the coffee region to get your share of mountains (and caffeine), and add Mocoa to your list for a pleasant Amazon jungle hike. In the far south of the country and for years off the map due to FARCs presence, the Mocoa area has opened up and is expected to continue to do so, especially now that a deal has been signed with FARC, paving the way toward peace. This is a place for some serious off-the-beaten-track exploration. Expect lush jungle, waterfalls and cute monkeys like the tamarin. Dont venture out on your own as some areas are infested with landmines. The recent opening up of the Putumayo region also means easier, and safer, access to the thus-far little-used, by foreigners, border of San Miguel, which takes you right into Ecuadors Amazon Basin. 7. Cano Cristales Another region thats opening up is Parque Nacional Natural Sierra de La Macarena. Here, between September and November the Cano Cristales river runs in a combination of shades in red, blue, green, yellow and orange. You once had to visit the area with a guide, but you can now travel here independently. Fly in or, for the truly adventurous, overland by motorcycle or car (for the latter: do check with local authorities whether the road via San Vincente del Caguan indeed is safe). Karin-Marijke Vis has been overlanding in Asia and South America since 2003 and is currently in Northeast Asia. Her stories have been published in 4WD and travel magazines. Follow her Notes on Slow Travel. Texas is in a state of crisis. Texas mothers are dying at an alarming ratethe states maternal mortality rate is one of the highest in the developed world. Texas children are faring no better in the states child welfare system, where child abuse related deaths have only become more common. Rising college costs have driven more students into food insecurity, increasing the need and presence of food banks for a population that is not usually considered to need food banks in the first place. Texans find themselves victim to predatory landlords and ecological disaster from fracking. The state ranks dead last in proving health insurance to those below the poverty line. As the working and middle class in the state find their position becoming more perilous, big business is only doing better. Toyotawhich began moving their North American headquarters to the statestands to make 40 million dollars from state funds alone. This is to say nothing of the tax breaks that they will benefit from once the move is complete. Even as an engine of job creation, the move is lacking. In a state with an estimated 4.2 million people living in poverty the creation of 4 thousand largely administrative jobs is not making even 1% of a dent in that number. Or consider Nebraska Furniture Mart, a company owned by one of the richest men in the entire worldWarren Buffett, which made 750 million dollars in sales in 2016 at their brand new Texas location. Nebraska Furniture Mart employs just under 1,800 people in Texas, less than half of what Toyota is bringing to the state. Not only does the company stand to make continued millions in sales, but even larger profits by developing and leasing the 400 acres around the property. The jobs created by this development are largely retail and restaurant service. In a state with lagging union membership and a lack of living wage, this means those benefiting from these economic miracles brought on by multi-billion dollar companies coming to the state are not ordinary Texans. The leadership in Austin has failed the people of Texas. It is unconscionable that a company owned by one of the richest men in the entire world can make nearly one billion dollars in sales while students who require special education in public schools are denied an education so the state government can save some money. Clearly, there is a need for serious change. Unfortunately, creating a state government that is both for the people and by the people is not as easy as just electing Democrats. Although Turn Texas Blue has been a popular slogan among the states dispersed liberals, Democrats and occasional socialists. It is, in present form, not a movement that could bring about the kind of bold change that is needed in Texas. Addressing the problems that face Texas requires more than just rearranging the chairs in Austinit demands a bold and genuinely democratic vision of the future. The question of what the Texas Democratic party stands for is worth asking. At the moment, the party embodies a kind of mild centrism that reflects a fear among Texas progressives of alienating voters. But in the widely publicized 2014 gubernatorial race, only 25% of adults of voting age participated in the race. It is clear that the majority of would-be Texas voters have already been alienated by both parties. By limiting the ideas of their politics to a narrowly defined realm of what could be possible, the Democrats are left fighting over a small slice of all potential voters that they will never win. Not only is it a guarantee of continued political irrelevance, but it means that the millions outside of the small percentage of blue counties are stuck in what is functionally a one-party Republican state. Another justification for the centrism embraced by Texas Democrats is that it best represents the interests of the people. This not always true, though. Returning to the 2014 governors race, Wendy Davis came out for a modified 20 week abortion banostensibly the issue that she gained fame for opposing. While a small portion of all abortions, it is primarily poor and working class women that seek abortions after the 20 week mark. For these women, though one choice was marginally better than the other, neither option promised to represent the full needs or realities of their lives. When Democrats split the difference on even their core issues, its not hard to understand why so many Texans become disengaged from the political process entirely. Further, without a coherent plan to address much of the underlying economic causes of many of Texas woes, the current movement to turn Texas blue will change little. Is the Texas Enterprise Fund (TEF), which has given millions to corporations with no guarantee of creating employment, the best use of Texas money? Especially when the state unemployment rate essentially mirrors the national average? Where are Democrats proposing the legislation of full employment ala the Humphrey-Hawkins Act, using the TEF to help fund it? Or restructuring the program into a basic income program, which would could help everyone in the state from the 3.7 million on SNAP to those barely above the poverty line. The current lack of vision beyond a more humane version of the Republicans capital-friendly policies is not a long-term solution. The last time Texas had a Democratic governor was in 1994the last time Democrats had a majority in the state House was 2002. There is now an entire generation who have known nothing but Republican rule in Texas. The Democratic party is not merely marginal for this generation, it does not exist. If Texas Democrats cannot attempt to build, reaching out to and working with that 75% that didnt vote in the last governors race, a new kind of politics they will cosign themselves to a deserved and permanent irrelevance. 888poker 2017 Super XL Series Day 11: 'fNx_R' Wins Mini Main Event January 30, 2017 Eric Mertens The final day of the 888poker 2017 Super XL Series was one of the busiest days of the year on the second largest online poker room in the world. There were 10 events scheduled with the $1,050 Main Event as the highlight of the day. Who could finish the series in style with a victory and a nice payday? Event #54: $35,000 Super XL - Sunday Breeze Buy-in Date Players Prize Pool $55 Jan. 29 1,375 $68,750 The final day started with Event #54: $35,000 Super XL - Sunday Breeze, where 1,375 players competed for a prize pool of $68,750. In the end, it was "pstratulat" from Romania who was the first winner of the day after defeating "kkvalieri" in the final heads-up. The Romanian got $11,687.50 for first place while the Brazilian had to settle for $8,593.75. Place Player Country Prize 1 pstratulat Romania $11,687.50 2 kkvalieri Brazil $8,593.75 3 scellone94 Malta $6,524.37 4 oneh1twonder Austria $4,675 5 Giefurdollar Germany $3,403.12 6 mukonga Lithuania $2,715.62 7 PulledPorker Canada $2,028.12 8 974kWRT Ukraine $1,340.62 9 kavkazBear Cyprus $742.50 Event #55: $150,000 Super XL - Mega Deep Buy-in Date Players Prize Pool $215 Jan. 29 1,080 $216,000 It was a great day for players who like bigger buy in tournaments. On Sunday, there was also a $215 Mega Deep scheduled and there were 1,080 playing for the first prize of $38,880. After more than 14 hours, United Kingdom's "HappyHour4U" secured the victory. The player received a total first-place prize of $38,880 while Austria's runner-up "88tiger889" couldn't complain, getting second for $27,712.80. Place Player Country Prize 1 HappyHour4U United Kingdom $38,880 2 88tiger889 Austria $27,712.80 3 Fitip4ldi United Kingdom $20,736 4 REFpussy Mexico $15,552 5 curioso24 Peru $10,800 6 pvss10 Brazil $8,640 7 padilha10 Brazil $6,480 8 lanfear9 Netherlands $4,320 9 lrdvoldemort United Kingdom $2,592 Event #56: $35,000 Super XL - Sunday Monsoon Buy-in Date Players Prize Pool $55 Jan. 29 1,295 $64,750 At 19:30 GMT, the series saw 1,295 players register for Event #56: $35,000 Super XL - Sunday Monsoon to almost double the guaranteed prize pool of $35,000. The players played for a total prize pool of $64,750 with the first prize of $11,007.50. This money all went to United Kingdom's "Tuna_lover," who defeated all players after 10 hours and one minute of play. Place Player Country Prize 1 Tuna_lover United Kingdom $11,007.50 2 Brunao333 Brazil $8,093.75 3 Wilmy_x United Kingdom $6,144.77 4 kbelik48o Netherlands $4,403 5 juanaflow Argentina $3,205.12 6 DaPenguin213 Costa Rica $2,557.62 7 lanfear9 Netherlands $1,910.12 8 pokerdave128 United Kingdom $1,262.62 9 gib0derGeh90 Germany $699.30 Event #58: $200,000 Super XL - Mini Main Event Buy-in Date Players Prize Pool $160 Jan. 29 1,512 $328,650 Players who couldn't afford to play the $1,050 Main Event, could register for the Mini Main Event with a buy-in of $160. In total, there were 1,512 players to create a total prize pool of $328,650 with $55,508.98 for the eventual winner of this event! After losing "matehussulz" in 10th place for $2,760.66, the tournament went on with the final table of nine. Each player was guaranteed at least $3,549.42. In quick succession "Trollkonst8," "PairDrawGood" and "InJeBakkes" busted, while the other six players were guaranteed a nice five-figure payday. "F4sKL" busted in sixth place for $12,488.70 and "BMars4Life" finished in fifth place for $15,610.87. Luigi "firgli" Knoppers from Malta got himself to fourth place for $21,362.25, while Brazil's "selouan1991" missed out on the final heads-up after busting in third place for $30,235.80. The heads-up between "dobrydmi" and "fNx_R" was won by the latter and received $55,508.98 for his success! Place Player Country Prize 1 fNx_R Ukraine $55,508.98 2 dobrydmi Czech Republic $39,503.73 3 selouan1991 Brazil $30,235.80 4 Luigi "firgli" Knoppers Malta $21,362.25 5 BMars4Life Finland $15,610.87 6 F4sKL Czech Republic $12,488.70 7 InJeBakkes Netherlands $9,366.52 8 PairDrawGood Germany $6,244.35 9 Trollkonst8 Sweden $3,549.42 Event #59: $15,000 Super XL - Micro Main Event Buy-in Date Players Prize Pool $5 Jan. 29 5,029 $22,881.95 For the players who couldn't afford the $1,050 and $160 Main Event, 888poker scheduled a Micro Main Event with a buy-in of just $5! This buy-in was paid by a massive 5,029 players to create a prize pool of $22,881.95. After nine hours and eleven minutes of play, the lion's share of this money was for runner-up "solnce2303" who got $2,886.21 after a heads-up deal. Winner "waffles10" got $2,742.63 for the victory. Place Player Country Prize 1 waffles10 Brazil $2,742.63 2 solnce2303 Russia $2,866.21 3 alinevod Belarus $1,761.91 4 bekel United Kingdom $1,327.15 5 tutui123 Russia $915.27 6 brewster50 United Kingdom $640.69 7 77Master88 Switzerland $411.87 8 hanses77 Germany $228.81 9 fil_ajwi1 Poland $173.90 Event #60: $100,000 Super XL - Sunday Challenge Buy-in Date Players Prize Pool $90 Jan. 29 1,014 $122,208 Also on the Super XL schedule was the Sunday Challenge with a buy-in of $90. This tournament attracted 1,014 players and it was Czech Republic's "Corlusion" who was the luckiest player. In this event, he or she defeated Japan's "IamKenji1967" in the deciding heads-up to secure a $21,997,44 payday. Place Player Country Prize 1 Corlusion Czech Republic $21,997.44 2 IamKenji1967 Japan $15,679.28 3 7obi490 Germany $11,731.96 4 Kuncito1997 Czech Republic $8,798.97 5 alexdimitrov Czech Republic $6,110.40 6 MAMOHT_T Russia $4,888.32 7 larimetran Brazil $3,666.24 8 LABOMBA1961 Argentina $2,444.16 9 Mowlschbazd Germany $1,466.49 Event #61: $50,000 Super XL - Turbo Mega Deep Buy-in Date Players Prize Pool $215 Jan. 29 349 $69,800 For the fans of Turbo tournament, there was a $215 Turbo Mega Deep on the schedule. This event got 349 players and they played down to a winner within five hours and six minutes. In the end, "GangstaGo" was the biggest winner, winning the heads-up against Swedish player "asanisse4" to win the first prize of $13,506.30. Place Player Country Prize 1 GangstaGo Ukraine $13,506.30 2 asanisse4 Sweden $10,121 3 2skiiied Germany $7,678 4 spektah888 Canada $5,758.50 5 GSTARRAW33 Canada $3,978.60 6 windiswild Denmark $3,071.20 7 Gretigaard Netherlands $2,373.20 8 redsuarez $1,672.50 9 gizz888tti Russia $1,221.50 Event #62: $30,000 Super XL - Turbo Main Event Buy-in Date Players Prize Pool $109 Jan. 29 461 $46,100 After the Main Event, the Micro Main Event and the Mini Main Event, there was also a Turbo edition. This tournament had a buy-in of $109 and 461 players registered to create a prize pool of $46,100. Most of this money was for Switzerland's "skylin007", who won the event after three hours and 53 minutes. He or she defeated "miccoli1904" to secure a $8,759 payday, while the runner-up had to do with $6,454. Place Player Country Prize 1 skylin007 Switzerland $8,759 2 miccoli1904 Czech Republic $6,454 3 marioallin58 Canada $4,725.25 4 midein Germany $3,595.80 5 YSoSerious7 Ukraine $2,535.50 6 t8ofdiamonds Germany $1,959.25 7 ROLDY18 Netherlands $1,498.25 8 pimmelspeck Germany $1,037.25 9 Jiffyjaffy United Kingdom $765.26 Event #63: $15,000 Super XL - Super Turbo Main Event Buy-in Date Players Prize Pool $75 Jan. 29 285 $28,105 To close the 888 Super XL Series, there was the Super Turbo Main Event with a buy-in of $75. In total, there were 285 players who were looking to finish the series with a nice score. The tournament was finished after just one hour and 47 minutes. Brazil's "fjreis" was the lucky one, who got from $75 to the first prize of $5,747.47 within 107 minutes! Place Player Country Prize 1 fjreis Brazil $5,747.47 2 Sekwens. Poland $4,215.75 3 BtM4Ever Argentina $3,175.86 4 crackers333 United Kingdom $2,388.92 5 bommel012 Czech Republic $1,630.09 6 andyhoop14 United Kingdom $1,264.72 7 Hlodge United Kingdom $983.67 8 unGdeMD Uruguay $702.62 9 88tiger889 Austria $533.99 Leaderboard Place Player Points 1 Mindcrushers 435.85 2 GangstaGo 396.45 3 PulledPorker 384.33 4 Tacuara87 382.20 5 DrMiKee 376.48 6 ScratchyR 374.38 7 KellerA 373.69 8 MrBester 371.76 9 b.szaszko 366.85 10 GoFighTer 365.19 Upcoming Tournaments Date Time (GMT) Event Buy-in Jan. 31 18:00 Super XL Champion of Champions Event Rehman Kassam Wins Record-Breaking 2017 PokerStars Festival London January 29, 2017 Christian Zetzsche Contributor The third and final day of the record-breaking PokerStars Festival London 990 Main Event saw 24 survivors out of a 944-entry strong field return to the tables of the Hippodrome Casino. It took until midnight to determine the winner and it was Rehman Kassam who emerged victorious after defeating Daniel Harwood in heads-up. The first series on European soil more than doubled the initial guarantee and created a massive prize pool of 824,112. Kassam, Harwood and Eric Cech struck a deal with three players remaining. Harwood received the biggest portion of the prize pool with 95,000 while Kassam got 89,320 and the coveted golden trophy. Cech received 70,000 while Yuriy Boyko had to settle for fourth place, the exact same position he finished at in the 2,200 High Roller a few days ago. Place Winner Country Prize (GBP) Prize (USD) 1 Rehman Kassam United Kingdom 89,320* 112,543* 2 Daniel Harwood United Kingdom 95,000* 119,700* 3 Eric Cech Australia 70,000* 88,200* 4 Yuriy Boyko Ireland 43,370 54,646 5 Clement Tripodi France 31,510 39,702 6 Ludovic Geilich United Kingdom 22,950 28,917 7 Alexis Fleur France 16,702 21,044 8 Lam Van Trinh United Kingdom 12,150 15,309 *denotes deal of the last three players It wouldn't take long for the first player to bust after the restart. It was Edgar Drozdov, who missed the first few hands and eventually had to settle for 4,250. The last PokerStars qualifier, Kevin Steward, lost a massive pot to the full house of Ludovic Geilich and busted soon after with pocket deuces against the pocket eights of Smit Trivedi. Within quick succession, four players were sent to the rail and the last two tables were set. Paul Skipper was all in and at risk with pocket queens and James Mitchell also showed pocket queens. Four clubs on the board saw Mitchell complete a flush and Skipper was gone in 15th place. David Kahan and Peter Bergman followed before three big clashes reduced the field to the last nine. James Mitchell four-bet shoved with pocket kings and three-bettor Geilich called with ace-king and flopped an ace. Francesco Cortese had slowly but surely made his way to the top of the leaderboard before losing some chips and defended the big blind with pocket fours. The Italian turned bottom set and check-raised before calling the shove of Harwood. His opponent had pushed with eight-five suited for the gutshot and flush draw, which got there on the river. Trivedi, a friend of High Roller champion Joe Johnson, was unfortunate enough to run with pocket queens into the pocket aces of Boyko and the same table provided more fireworks soon after. Day 2 chip leader Mitchell four-bet shoved with pocket kings in the last hand of level 27, three-bettor Geilich called with ace-king and flopped an ace. Guillem Cusco Bach was among the short stacks when the hopefuls had combined to one table and got through with three all-ins without being called. The fourth one was a four-bet shove with pocket jacks and Kassam snap-called with pocket aces. A roller coaster run out saw a jack appear on the flop, only for an ace to follow right away on the turn. Here is how the final eight lined up: Seat Player Country Chip Count Big Blinds 1 Alexis Fleur France 1,750,000 21 2 Clement Tripodi France 2,965,000 37 3 Yuriy Boyko Ireland 4,850,000 60 4 Lam Van Trinh United Kingdom 1,195,000 15 5 Daniel Harwood United Kingdom 6,875,000 86 6 Rehman Kassam United Kingdom 5,400,000 67 7 Eric Cech Australia 1,080,000 13 8 Ludovic Geilich United Kingdom 4,140,000 51 Harwood was still in the lead, but Kassam suddenly jumped into second place with Boyko and Geilich not too far behind. Everyone had 12,150 locked up for the effort and it was short stack Lam Van Trinh who would be the first to fall. He three-bet shoved with pocket eights and Boyko called with ace-queen to spike a queen on the flop. Start-of-the-day chip leader Alexis Fleur never got anything running throughout the day and had to settle for seventh place. Fleur called the shove of Cech with king-jack only to find himself up against pocket aces. The Frenchman was drawing dead on the turn of an eight-high board. Geilich was very active for most of the final day and finished in sixth place. The Scotsman defended his big blind with king-nine and flopped top pair against Harwood. Geilich check-called a continuation bet and reluctantly check-called all in after a blank turn to see Harwood turn over ace-king for the dominating kicker. Down to six tables on Day 2, Cech was down to a mere five big blinds and doubled through Clement Tripodi twice. Both would meet again on the final table and it was Tripodi who three-bet shoved with eight-seven suited. Cech called with ace-four off suit and faded both live cards and a flush draw to eliminate Tripodi in fifth place. They agreed to a deal and left 8,000 and the trophy aside. With four players remaining, deal discussions emerged and came to no avail before Boyko was sent to the rail in fourth place. The Irishman check-raised a ten-high flop with the nut flush draw and Harwood instantly moved all in. Boyko eventually called and was shown pocket kings, both the turn and river were blanks. Harwood had a dominating lead over Kassam and Cech three-handed, but they still agreed to a deal and left 8,000 and the trophy aside. Cech got it in good for his last eight big blinds after calling a shove by Kassam with ace-eight, as his opponent only had jack-six. A six on the flop and four clubs by the river gave Kassam the better hand with a flush and the heads-up duel saw Harwood with a 2-1 chip advantage. Kassam soon found a double and both then got their stacks in again on a ten-high flop; Harwood had ten-seven and Kassam king-ten. The turn and river failed to improve Harwood and the most active player had to settle for second place eventually. This marks the end of the PokerNews live reporting here from the Hippodrome Casino, but make sure to check back in regularly for updates from tournaments all over the world. Sharelines Rehman Kassam lifted the trophy at 2017 PokerStars Festival London. By: www.hotelspro.com Contact Kubra Serter ***@metglobal.com Kubra Serter End -- HotelsPro, a technology and hotel reservation solutions provider for travel industry professionals and a brand of the world's leading travel and accommodation supplier MetGlobal Group of Companies, announced the trends and developments that can affect tourism industry in the world in 2017.Stating that global travel market will grow, the investment to mobile technologies will increase and personalized package tours will come into prominence in 2017, Nevgul Bilsel Safkan, Managing Director of HotelsPro, forecasted the trends and growth that will shape the tourism industry in 2017 and moving forward:Asia Pacific region will maintain its progressBeing the rising destination of the tourism sector in recent years, Asia Pacific region will maintain its progress also in 2017.The travel expenses of Chinese people will continue to increaseAs of 2017, China will be positioned as the biggest travel market with the increasing gross national product, employment and consumption rates. The travel expenses will increase in developing countries such as Russia, Brazil, India and Indonesia.Halal travel demand will scale upHaving a rise in recent years, halal travel will make progress in 2017. Halal travel sector is expected to reach a size of 20 billion dollars in 2020.New technologies will increase the salesTravel product sales will increase in the world with the effect of new technologies and business models. Travel product sales is expected to reach a size of 2.5 trillion dollars in 2020.Mobile technology expenses will increaseLike all the other industries, online and mobile technologies will continue to affect tourism industry in a large scale. The mobile technology oriented expenses of the companies operating in the tourism industry will increase.Business travels to Asia will increaseThe increasing trade connections between East and West will cause an increase in global business travels. The biggest increase will be in Asia region.About HotelsPro:HotelsPro, one of the strong players of tourism industry in global market, offers attractive options for the most exclusive demands of its customers with more than 375.000 hotels in more than 205 countries. Aiming to continue to expand its hotel inventory worldwide, HotelsPro has local offices in more than 40 countries. In two weeks' time, SMi will once again return to Rome to open its doors for the 10th annual Border Security conference. By: SMi Group Border Security 2017 Contact Zoe Gale ***@smi-online.co.uk Zoe Gale End -- Now running for 10 successive years, the best speaker line-up to date will feature senior law enforcement personnel and technological experts from the border security community to discuss the latest technological innovation being used to enhance border security across the globe.The 2017 agenda will hone in on political issues affecting the border security community, such as increasing immigration in the Mediterranean as well as cross-border terrorism, and how these can be combated and managed using innovative technological solutions. Enhancing surveillance and detection strategies, biometric technology and exploring the threats against land, sea and air borders will take centre stage at this global eventRecently added to the programme: Presentations fromandKEY REASONS TO ATTEND: Border Security 2017 will feature 24 handpicked speakers providing 22 thought provoking presentations including exclusive presentations fromand Join 2 interactive panel debates on 'Exploring strategies to effectively manage growing irregular migration and cross-border crime in Europe' and 'Emerging border security and facilitation' 5+ hours of unrivalled networking with leading figures within the border security community A truly global event with attendees from: Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Nigeria, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom and USA Additional workshop focusing 'Biometrics for Border Management and Security', be led by Max Snijder, CEO of theWith just 2 weeks to go until the event takes place, SMI have released a preliminary list of attendees. To access the PDF visit the download centre of the event website www.bordersec.com/prlogFor sponsorship packages contact Sadia Malick on +44 (0) 207 827 6748 or email smalick@smi-online.co.ukFor delegate bookings visit the event website www.bordersec.com/prlogFor group bookings contact James Hitchen on +44 (0) 207 827 6054 or email jhitchen@smi-online.co.ukFor media enquiries, contact Zoe Gale on +44 20 7827 6138 or zgale@smi-online.co.ukBorder Security15-16 February 2017Rome, Italywww.bordersec.com/prlogContact e-mail: zgale@smi-online.co.ukContact tel: +44 (0) 207 827 6054#BorderSec---- END ----About SMi Group: Established since 1993, the SMi Group is a global event-production company that specializes in Business-to-Business Conferences, Workshops, Masterclasses and online Communities. We create and deliver events in the Defence, Security, Energy, Utilities, Finance and Pharmaceutical industries. We pride ourselves on having access to the world's most forward thinking opinion leaders and visionaries, allowing us to bring our communities together to Learn, Engage, Share and Network. More information can be found at http://www.smi- online.co.uk Leading Cape Town-based trade exhibition and conference organiser Spintelligent has won four major awards at the ROAR Organiser and Exhibitor Awards in Johannesburg. By: Spintelligent Getting recognition in this competitive expo industry immensely rewarding Media Contact Spintelligent annemarie.roodbol@ spintelligent.com +27217003500 Spintelligent+27217003500 End -- Leading Cape Town-based trade exhibition and conference organiserhas won four major awards at the *ROAR Organiser and ExhibitorAwards in Johannesburg which honour excellence in the exhibition and events industry on the continent. The awards were organised jointly by the Association of African Exhibition Organisers (AAXO) and the Exhibition & Event Association of Southern Africa (EXSA).*ROAR = Respect, Opportunities, Achievement, Recognition, Spintelligent's flagship energy event for the last 17 years, was the joint winner in the Best Trade Exhibition 6001-12000 sqm category, sharing the honours with the World Travel Market.won two awards: for Best Trade & Consumer Exhibition 12000+ sqm and for Distinction in Social Responsibility Award.which was a launch event for the company in 2016, won the Best Confex category.was also a finalist in the Social Responsibility category."It was a clean sweep for Spintelligent and I could not be prouder of our teams", says an excited Spintelligent MD David Ashdown. "We work incredibly hard to produce successful, relevant and innovative events for our clients in exciting industries such as energy, agriculture and mining. To also get recognition from our peers in this competitive expo industry is immensely rewarding as it inspires us to work even harder and to take things up a notch every year."He adds: "the AAXO ROAR Awards honoured both long-standing events such as African Utility Week, to a more recent project such as Agritech Expo as well as a launch show, African Real Estate & Infrastructure Summit, which is part of our new property portfolio. It shows that we are still on the right track, while also receiving the nod of approval for our newer initiatives."The 17th edition of, the flagship pan-African power and water platform, will take place again in Cape Town in May and gather some 7000 attendees from around 80 countries, including many African nations, as well as 250 exhibitors and 299 high-level conference speakers while more than 80 power and water utilities will be represented.Spintelligent's Group Director for Power, Energy and Real Estate, Le-Ann Hare Keymer says: "we share Africa's goals of economic growth and prosperity for all, especially working in the power, energy and real estate sectors. It is a privilege to be part of the continent's development through our events and particularly to be recognised for excellence and innovation"."Theteam is honoured and thankful for the recognition of what they have achieved over the last three years" says Emmanuelle Nicholls, Natural Resources Group Director, "building the event from scratch in a field in the middle of Zambia." She adds "their commitment, blood, sweat and tears bear testimony to the uniqueness of this event."The fourth edition ofwill also return to Chisamba in April last year the outdoor farming expo attracted a record-breaking attendance of 17 605 visitors. The expo also has an outreach programme at the local Golden Valley Basic School, where, with the assistance of numerous event sponsors, it is assisting the school with much needed infrastructure upgrades, equipment supplies and management of the school's farm."Winning Africa's Best Confex for the inauguralis testament to the creativity, innovation, resourcefulness and hard-work that the entire Spintelligent event team contributed to the project" says event director Richard Stubbs. With the support of Wesgro and the Transport Development Agency, we look forward to realising the vision of a continental meeting place for African Built Environment professionals, and hopefully many more awards along the way."More than 300 sector experts will gather for thein September in Cape Town this year with interactive sessions that focus on key case studies of visionary city planning, investment opportunities in the commercial and residential real estate sectors across the continent.takes place again in June, hosting more than 1500 visitors in the mining hub of Lubumbashi. The event is also an active supporter of the Kinsevere Community School Project in Lubumbashi, which includes the preparation of hot meals for 500 children on Sundays, access to water through a borehole and the school sponsorship of 25 gifted kids in the community."Theteam has been working hard to grow within and outside the company" says event director Elodie Delagneau, "and while our big brother event, Agritech Expo, was a well-deserved winner in this category we are incredibly proud to have been a finalist and this just motivates us to up our game!"is well known for organising exhibitions and conferences across the continent in the infrastructure, real estate, energy, mining, agriculture and education sectors. Other well-known events by Spintelligent include Agritech Expo Tanzania, CBM-TEC, Kenya Mining Forum, Future Energy East Africa (formerly EAPIC), Future Energy Nigeria (formerly WAPIC), Future Energy Central Africa (formerly iPAD Cameroon), iPAD Nigeria Mining Forum, DRC Mining Week and EduWeek. Spintelligent is part of the UK-based Clarion Events Group.Website: http://www.spintelligent.com Twitter: https://twitter.com/ spintelligent Senior communications manager: Annemarie RoodbolTelephone: +27 21 700 3500Mobile: +27 82 562 7844Email: annemarie.roodbol@spintelligent.com End -- For consumers, the purchasing of an air-conditioner tends to be a substantial investment for their household budgets, which is why it is critical that they make sure all the right bases are covered before acquiring such an appliance."There are some in-home factors that need to be taken into account before making a purchase like this. In addition, there are certain questions that the consumer should ask the supplier before committing to the deal," says Michael McKechnie, Director of Digital Appliances at Samsung Electronics South Africa.For starters, it is important to know the size of the room to be cooled in square meters, as buying something that is too big for the area will mean wasted money, while buying one that is too small will mean the room cannot be cooled effectively.It is also necessary to understand whether there are areas in the room that might get excessively hot, such as a large un-tinted glass patio door, for example. As this will allow a great deal of sunshine into the room, it is usually recommended that a larger size product is installed to compensate.Since the majority of domestic air-conditioners are split units with both an indoor and an outdoor component the customer or potential buyer must bear in mind the rules of the body corporate, if they live in a complex, as well as basic aesthetics if they live in a house. Accredited installers can assist with placement, but it is always better if the consumer already has a good idea of where they want it located.They should also ask in-store about the energy ratings of their chosen product. The higher the energy efficiency, rating the more cost effective it will be in the long term. It also goes without saying that consumers must take into consideration the service and maintenance agreements and ensure that an accredited installer is used from the outset, in order to maintain the warranty for its full period."The additional factor to remember if you are unsure about committing to such an investment is that air-conditioners provide both cooling and heating, making them useful throughout the year. In addition, when compared to the cost of using a bar or gas heater, a good unit can save you up to 60% in terms of electricity costs," states McKechnie."In the past, these appliances were viewed as a luxury item, but an increasing number of households today are viewing these as necessities, which means individuals are demanding better, more efficient products. It is for this reason that Samsung has begun placing its 360 Cassette units, which offer omni-directional airflow discharge for a premium cooling experience, at our brand stores. In response to the 360 Cassette's popularity increasing so significantly in the consumer market, a smaller Mini Cassette version will be released in 2017," he concludes.Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. inspires the world and shapes the future with transformative ideas and technologies. The company is redefining the worlds of TVs, smartphones, wearable devices, tablets, cameras, digital appliances, medical equipment, network systems and semiconductor and LED solutions. For the latest news, please visit the Samsung Newsroom at news.samsung.com.Caitlin Robertson Jake GriffioenEpic MSLGROUP Samsung Electronics South Africa011 784 4790 011 549 1646081 304 2697 071 671 2052Caitlin.robertson@epicmslgroup.com Jakes.g@samsung.com A Collection of Crime Stories Edited by Andrew McAleer and Paul D. Marks Coast to Coast 2 edited by Andrew McAleer and Paul D. Marks Contact Lance Wright ***@downandoutbooks.com Lance Wright End -- Down & Out Books is pleased to announce that COAST TO COAST: Private Eyes from Sea to Shining Sea, a collection of crime stories edited by Andrew McAleer and Paul D. Marks, is published this week in trade paperback and ebook formats."The first collection of Coast to Coast stories was very well received and such a treat to publish," said Eric Campbell, Publisher of Down & Out Books. "I was thrilled when Andy and Paul suggested a second collection, the result illustrating the remarkable range of authors across our country."About COAST TO COAST 2 Hardboiled. Softboiled. Noir. East Coast. West Coast. And all points in between.Whatever you call them, gumshoe, shamus, Pinkerton, detective, private eye, P.I., shadow, tail, investigator, and wherever you need them, from East to West, North to South. They're all here.From the hard pavement of Brooklyn, New York, to the mean dusty streets of Carson City. Down to sultry New Orleans and the freak show that's Venice, CA. From the flim-flammers of Waco, Texas to DC, Las Vegas to San Berdoo and LA. And from Iowa City to San Diego and small town North Carolinanot to mention the low-life drug dealers in a little place called King's Quarter, Maine. No one is safe in this impressive collection featuring fifteen original private eye stories. Crime fiction connoisseurs will visit one major crime scene after another with some of today's best-of-the-best crime writers serving as tour guides. Poisoned-pen masters like: J.L. Abramo, Eric Beetner, Michael Bracken, Meredith Cole, Matt Coyle, Thomas Donahue, John Floyd, Gay Toltl Kinman, Terrill Lee Lankford, Janice Law, Paul D. Marks, Andrew McAleer, O'Neil De Noux, Robert J. Randisi, Art Taylor.COAST TO COAST: Private Eyes from Sea to Shining Sea features suspense stories ranging from hardboiled to psychological to thrillers. And while these stories differ in locale, climate, mood and tone, they all resonate with the dark underbelly of crime.Praise for COAST TO COAST 2 "Tough, taut and terrific. This cross-country collection of sleuthing stories from the best writers in the private eye biz is wonderfully written, always surprising, and completely entertaining."Hank Phillippi Ryan, Anthony, Agatha and Mary Higgins Clark award-winning author of"A tantalizing array of stories guaranteed to please fans of PI fiction. High fives all around!" MWA Grand Master Bill Pronzini"A bang-up read of PI fiction from a gallery of impressive authors. Coast to Coast: Private Eyes from Sea to Shining Sea is compelling, fun, and full of surprises. A treat." Shamus Award-winning author John ShepphirdPraise for the COAST TO COAST crime fiction series "Envelope-pushers!A truly WOW collection by the best mystery writers out there full of surprises only they can pull off." Thomas B. Sawyer, bestselling author of, head writer of"A sterling collection of coast-to-coast crime stories dripping with local color all of it blood red." Chuck Hogan, author ofand"An engaging collection from a stellar cast of award-winning mystery authors guaranteed to keep you awake all night." Hannah Dennison, author of the IMBA bestselling Vicky Hill Mysteries"This intriguing collection of stories from these masters of suspense will keep you guessing from cover to cover and coast to coast." Raffi Yessayan, author ofandMeet the Editors Paul D. Marks pulled a gun on the LAPD and lived to tell about it. Which makes him uniquely qualified to write mystery and noir stories. Paul's novelwon the Shamus Award from the Private Eye Writers of America. He also has the distinction, dubious though it might be, of being the last person to have shot a film on the fabled MGM backlot before it bit the dust to make way for condos. According to Steven Bingen, one of the authors of the well-received book MGM: Hollywood's Greatest Backlot: "That forty-page chronological list I mentioned of films shot at the studio ends with his [Paul D. Marks'] name on it."Andrew McAleer is the editor ofand best-selling author of seven books including the, which he co-authored with his father, Edgar winner John McAleer. Past president of the Boston Authors Club, Mr. McAleer teaches at Boston College and works in public service. He is a winner of the Sherlock Holmes Revere Bowl Award. As a sergeant in the U.S. Army, he served in Afghanistan as a Combat Historian. He is also a commissioned Kentucky Colonel.About Down & Out Books Founded in 2011, Down & Out Books (DownAndOutBooks.com ( http://www.downandoutbooks.com/ )) is an independent publisher of literary and crime fiction based in Tampa, Florida. For more information about the book, or to request an interview with the author, contact lance@downandoutbooks.com By: USOH End -- Both Wyoming State Senate and Wyoming House of Representatives in Cheyenne will start their day with ancient Hindu prayers on February third.These invocations will contain verses from; the oldest existing scripture of the mankind still in common use.Hindu statesman Rajan Zed will deliver these prayers from Sanskrit scriptures before the Senate and House. After Sanskrit delivery, he then will read the English translation of the prayers. Sanskrit is considered a sacred language in Hinduism and root language of Indo-European languages.Zed, who is the President of Universal Society of Hinduism, besides, will also recite fromand(Song of the Lord), both ancient Hindu scriptures. He plans to start and end the prayer with "Om", the mystical syllable containing the universe, which in Hinduism is used to introduce and conclude religious work.Reciting from, Rajan Zed plans to say "Asato ma sad gamaya, tamaso ma jyotir gamaya, mrtyor mamrtam gamaya", which he will then interpret as "Lead us from the unreal to the Real, Lead us from darkness to Light, Lead us from death to immortality."Reading from, he proposes to urge the legislators to keep the welfare of others always in mind.Zed is a global Hindu and interfaith leader. Bestowed with World Interfaith Leader Award; Zed is Senior Fellow and Religious Advisor to Foundation for Religious Diplomacy, on the Advisory Board of The Interfaith Peace Project, Spiritual Advisor to National Association of Interchurch & Interfaith Families, etc. He was invited by President of European Parliament in Brussels (Belgium) for a meeting to promote interfaith dialogue. He also leads a weekly interfaith panel "Faith Forum" in a Gannett publication for the last nearly six years.According to "Dress Code in the Chambers During Sessions" (as described in Management Council Policy 12-03), "Business formal (for men is defined as a suit, or dress slacks, jacket, tie, dress shirt and dress shoes or dress boots. Boots must be polished.) dress is expected on the chamber floor during legislative sessions". But Rajan Zed's attire; who wears saffron colored robes, a ruddraksh mala (rosary), and traditional sandalpaste tilak (religious mark) on the forehead; has been reportedly approved by the Wyoming Senate President for February three.Hinduism, oldest and third largest religion of the world, has about one billion adherents and moksh (liberation)is its ultimate goal. There are about three million Hindus in USA.In the 64th Wyoming Legislature, Eli D. Bebout is President of the Senate, which has 30 members; while Steve Harshman is Speaker of the House of Representatives, which has sixty members. Matt Mead is the Governor of Wyoming, whose nickname is "Cowboy State" and tagline is: "Some things can't be explained. Only experienced." Presentation Will Discuss Axalta's AquaEC 6100 NSF-51 Approval By: Axalta Powder Coatings Contact Janine Little ***@axaltacs.com Janine Little End -- Axalta Coating Systems, a leading global supplier of liquid and powder coatings, will co-presentwith Metal Processing International (MPI) at the International Air-Conditioning, Heating, Refrigerating Exposition (AHR Expo) in Las Vegas, Nevada. The presentation will take place in Theatre A of the Las Vegas Convention Center at 1:45 p.m. PST on Wednesday, February 1. Jeff Paxon, Axalta Area Sales Manager, will discuss Axalta's AquaEC 6100, North America's first and only e-coat to achieve NSF 51 Standard compliance.Electrocoat epoxy coatings are widely used for corrosion protection of evaporator and condenser coils, and other heat exchangers. Axalta's new tin-free epoxy coating technology is now certified by National Sanitation Foundation per NSF-51 Standard Food Equipment Materials. This development is meaningful for suppliers of commercial refrigeration, restaurant and hotel HVAC equipment and indoor evaporators who are concerned with indoor air quality in homes."We are excited to discuss the recent NSF-51 certification of Axalta's AquaEC 6100, which complements our existing compliance with NSF-61 for a variety of Axalta e-coat and powder coatings," said Michael Stuhldreher, Axalta Market Development Manager. "Together with our partner, MPI, we'll have the chance to directly engage manufacturers and end-users of food equipment-related HVAC products, for whom this compliance presents immediate opportunities including value-added corrosion protection and other product improvements."In MPI booth #C6300 at the AHR Expo on January 30-February 2 , Axalta will promote its high-performance, corrosion-resistant range of products that are ideal for the HVAC industry, such as AquaEC electrodeposition coatings, Alestapowder coatings and Voltatexelectrical insulation finishes.Axalta is a leading global company focused solely on coatings and providing customers with innovative, colorful, beautiful and sustainable solutions. From light OEM vehicles, commercial vehicles and refinish applications to electric motors, buildings and pipelines, our coatings are designed to prevent corrosion, increase productivity and enable the materials we coat to last longer. With 150 years of experience in the coatings industry, the 12,800 people of Axalta continue to find ways to serve our more than 100,000 customers in 130 countries better every day with the finest coatings, application systems and technology. For more information visit http://www.axaltacs.com/ us/en_US/products- services/powder... Contact Robin Paschall Adventures Within Reach ***@adventureswithinreach.com 303-500-5047 Robin PaschallAdventures Within Reach303-500-5047 End -- Adventures Within Reach (AWR) will pick two winners in our 2017 Trip Giveaway Contest. One person to win a 5-day Inca Trail Trek for 2 people and another to win a 3-day Amazon Rainforest Trip for 2 people. The winner of the Inca Trail Trek will receive a 5-day trip for 2 people in a group departure (valid through December 20, 2018, subject to availability). The Trek includes Inca Trail permit, 1 night at the El Mapi hotel in Aguas Calientes, and Machu Picchu entrance fees. The winner of the Peru Amazon Rainforest Trip will receive a 3-day trip for 2 people with 2 nights accommodations at the Reserva Amazonica in a standard room double-occupancy, tours at the lodge, entrance fees, all meals, and airport transfers (valid through December 20, 2018, subject to availability)People can sign up for the contest on the AWR 2017 Trip Giveaway Contest webpage (http://adventureswithinreach.com/contest/). People can also sign up for the contest by visiting the AWR booth at the 2017 New York Times Travel Show (January 27-29, 2017 at the Jacob K. Javits Center) or the 2017 Denver Adventure & Travel Show (March 18-19, 2017 at the Colorado Convention Center). The contest began on January 1, 2017, and ends on March 31, 2017. Winners will be notified on or about April 5, 2017. "We are delighted to make these exciting trips available for this year's contest. This is the fourth year we have offered a Trip Giveaway Contest. I love being able to highlight a special destination every year. It gets our past travelers excited about a new place they have never been!" says Robin Paschall, President of Adventures Within Reach.Adventures Within Reach offers cultural tours and soft adventure to Africa, South America, Asia, and Antarctica. AWR sends thousands of people each year on their dream adventures around the world. For more information about specific packages and prices, contact Adventures Within Reach at 303-500-5047, or visit http://www.AdventuresWithinReach.com Illinois agency becomes member of St. Louis, Mo.-based alliance By: Valley Insurance Agency Alliance Bailey Family Insurance's Christine and Mark Bailey Contact Elizabeth Powers ***@viaa4u.com Elizabeth Powers End -- Bailey Family Insurance recently joined Valley Insurance Agency Alliance (VIAA), a cohesive family of over 100 independent insurance agencies in Missouri and Illinois.Bailey Family Insurance is a full service insurance agency specializing in home, auto, life and recreational insurance. The company, which is owned by Mark and Christine Bailey, is located at 386 S. Koke Mill in Springfield, Ill."We are excited about the alliance's wide array of products and services that will answer our clients' unique needs," said Bailey Family Insurance CEO Christine Bailey. "We attended a VIAA conference and decided to join based on the alliance's quality team and its members' successful results."Founded in 2006, VIAA generates more than $150 million in written premium and is the regional founding member for the Strategic Insurance Agency Alliance (SIAA), a $6 billion national alliance.For more information about Bailey Family Insurance, call (217) 441-2342 or visit http://www.baileyfamilyinsurance.com David Sanchez-Turner, Wet Wipes Operations Manager Contact Keith Wyatt ***@multipacksolutions.com Photo: https://www.prlog.org/ 12616585/1 Keith Wyatt End -- Multi-Pack Solutions has promoted David Sanchez-Turner to Operations Manager for their Milwaukee, Wisconsin-based wet wipes manufacturing business, where he will lead the company's Production, Procurement, and Logistics teams. David will be responsible for leading lean and quality-based production initiatives in support of the company's core commitments to delivering innovation and speed-to-market, with an initial emphasis on improving key metrics such as on-time delivery and quality.David joins Multi-Pack Solutions' Milwaukee location from their Mt. Prospect, Illinois facility, where for four years he was Operations Manager, responsible for one of the world's leading water-soluble pouches manufacturing sites. David's operations and leadership depth, along with a commitment to continuous quality improvement, make him an asset to the Milwaukee plant."My vision is to follow proven Lean principles to become a world-class wet wipes manufacturing operation, meeting our customers' delivery dates and exceeding their expectations, while delivering the highest levels of quality," said Sanchez-Turner.David will report to Multi-Pack Solutions Milwaukee's Vice President & General Manager, Joe Ervin."David has demonstrated significant operational leadership and has delivered constant improvements in a very demanding environment and market at our Mt. Prospect location. He'll be a tremendous leader and resource for us in Milwaukee," said Ervin.Prior to Operations Manager, David held numerous production supervisory and process engineering roles at Multi-Pack Solutions and elsewhere.David holds a bachelor's of science in Industrial Engineering and a bachelor's of engineering in Engineering/Industrial Management from Missouri University of Science and Technology.Multi-Pack Solutions ( www.multipacksolutions.com ) is a proven, quality-driven contract manufacturing and packaging partner to the most recognizable brands in the world in the consumer, personal care, OTC drug, medical, and industrial markets. With over 500 employees, the company has three manufacturing facilities totaling more than 300,000 square feet in Mt. Prospect, Illinois; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; and Greenville, South Carolina. In December 2016 the PWREF II Fund, with Aermont Capital acting as its investment adviser, received planning permission for the 155-meter-high Marienturm. On what is called Marieninsel at the heart of Frankfurts banking district, the Marienturm and Marienforum will form a new office ensemble with 57,400 square meters of Photos: Pecan Development [] Insects, like mammals including humans, sort chemicals by taste into a few categories and use this information to decide whether to ingest or reject food. University of California, Riverside researchers have identified a receptor playing a key role in insect identification of amino acid, or umami, taste. Amino acid or umami taste is one of the five basic taste categories in humans. There has been some evidence that insects also possess this taste ability, but it was not very well characterized, and the receptor proteins were not known. The research, led by Anindya Ganguly, a graduate student in Anupama Dahanukar's laboratory, describes cellular and behavioral responses to amino acids in fruit flies, a common genetic model insect, and identifies an amino acid co-receptor, Ir76b. Dahanukar is an associate professor of entomology. Ir76b is a highly conserved receptor found in all insects. Its role in amino acid taste is helped by additional Ir receptors, which may offer possible targets for identifying compounds that could be used to modify amino acid-stimulated feeding behaviors as part of efforts to control insect populations. The results were published in a paper, "A molecular and cellular context-dependent role for Ir76b in detection of amino acid taste," that was recently published in the journal Cell Reports. UC Riverside undergraduate students Vi-Khoi Duong, Angelina Lee, Hanni Schoniger and Erika Varady participated in the project and are co-authors on the paper, in addition to Ganguly and Lisa Pang, who was a postdoctoral researcher in Dahanukar's lab. Some diseases are untreatable because we lack a model system to fully understand symptoms or test possible drugs. This is the case of mitochondrial disease, a rare condition caused by defects in the "cellular powerhouse." Scientists from the Max Delbruck Center for Molecular Medicine in the Helmholtz Association (MDC) have now developed a new personalized strategy to address mitochondrial disease by reprogramming the patients' cells and used it to identify a promising potential drug. Mitochondria, compartments in cells that produce most of its energy, are unique in that they carry their own DNA, which is inherited only from a person's mother. Mutations in mitochondrial genes often cause neurological conditions because nerve cells need high levels of energy for their function. Recently it has become possible to solve this problem for mothers bearing a mitochondrial mutation. Scientists can replace the mitochondria of the mother's egg cell with mitochondria from a healthy donor. This gives the baby three genetic parents: DNA in the nucleus from the mother and father, and that of the mitochondria from the donor. This strategy is not an option for every family that carries a mitochondrial mutation. Most countries do not allow scientists to modify human egg cells. And the strategy is purely preventative -- it will not help children who have already inherited mutations. This has motivated groups such as that of Alessandro Prigione at the MDC to continue to search for other solutions. Why research of mitochondrial diseases is hard "A major reason we lack good models to investigate such diseases is that the highly refined techniques we use to modify genes in the nucleus don't work for mitochondrial DNA," Prigione says. "This causes a lack of animal models. Cell culture systems used today also do not faithfully represent the features of human neurons." A major challenge has been to find a way to better understand the way the disease affects human nerve cells. advertisement Another issue is that it would be important to observe the effects of drugs on cells -- specifically the types that are hardest hit by the disease -- before administering them to patients. A skin cell, which is fairly easy to raise in the lab, copes very differently with faulty mitochondria than a nerve cell. A drug might affect them in completely different ways. A new strategy for drug screens Prigione and his team may now have solved these problems in one fell swoop and published their findings in Cell Stem Cell. With PhD student Carmen Lorenz at the MDC and the Berlin Institute of Health (BIH), he teamed up with other MDC researchers and scientists from France to come up with a new cell-based system to carry out drug screens. The strategy involves extracting skin cells from patients with faulty mitochondria and reverting them to a more basic type of cell called an induced pluripotent stem cell (iPS cell). These can now be "reprogrammed" to assume another fate, such as the neurons affected by mitochondrial disease. "It was crucial to establish a cellular system with similar characteristics of the affected nerve cells in the patients," Prigione says. "We discovered that neural progenitor cells show properties that can be associated with the disease and were perfectly suitable for use in large-scale drug screens."A number of tests demonstrated that these artificially created cells had all of the properties of the affected nerves, including the calcium imbalance and reduced energy production observed in patients. Promising first experiments The next step was to expose the neural progenitor cells to 130 substances that had already been approved by the FDA for use in treating other diseases. Functional measurements of the cells showed that a drug called avanafil reversed some of the cellular imbalances caused by the mitochondrial defect. "Avanafil is an approved drug, which is extremely promising," Prigione says. "We can directly move to the next step of trials in human patients. We're preparing for this at the moment. We're also continuing to test a lot more compounds. Once you have a good model system, you can screen the several thousand drugs already approved by the FDA. This creates the potential of developing truly personalized treatments -- even for very rare diseases." Surgeons of University Hospitals Leuven have been the first to operate on a patient with retinal vein occlusion using a surgical robot. Operated by an eye surgeon, the robot uses a needle of barely 0.03 millimetre to inject a thrombolytic drug into the retinal vein of the patient. KU Leuven (University of Leuven, Belgium) developed the robot and needle specifically for this procedure. The operation was successful and is a real world first: the procedure shows that it is technically possible to safely dissolve a blood clot from the retinal vein with robotic support. A phase 2 trial now has to show what the clinical impact is for patients with retinal vein occlusion, a disorder that can lead to blindness. In case of retinal vein occlusion (RVO) there is a blood clot in one of the retinal veins. This leads to reduced eyesight or even blindness in the eye affected. At the moment, treatment consists of monthly injections in the eye that only reduce the side effects of the thrombosis. Until recently, taking away the blood clot itself was not possible. Researchers at University Hospitals Leuven and KU Leuven are studying retinal vein cannulation (RVC), a revolutionary treatment that addresses the cause of retinal vein occlusion by removing the blood clot in the retinal vein. RVC is a promising method requiring the eye surgeon to insert an ultrathin needle into the vein and to inject a medicine that can dissolve the blood clot. A real feat, because a retinal vein only has the width of a tenth of a millimetre, about the same width as a human hair. No surgeon is able to manually inject a drug into such a thin vein while holding the needle perfectly still for 10 minutes. The danger of damaging the vein or the retina would be simply too high. This is why researchers from the department of mechanical engineering of KU Leuven developed a robotic device enabling the surgeon to insert the needle into the veins in a very precise and stable way, after which the robot can hold the needle perfectly immobile. In contrast to most surgical robots, there is no need for a joystick to operate the device. The eye surgeon and the robot co-manipulate the instrument. The surgeon guides the needle into the vein while the robot eliminates any vibration of the needle, hereby increasing the level of precision more than tenfold. After locking the robot, the needle and the eye are automatically stabilised. The surgeon can then inject the product into the vein in a controlled way. The researchers also found a way of producing an ultrathin injection needle: the needle point has a width of barely 0.03 millimetre, three times thinner than a human hair. The robot is the result of seven years of research and a cooperation between KU Leuven engineers and University Hospitals Leuven ophthalmologists. The current phase 1 trial aims to demonstrate that it is technically feasible to use a robotic device to insert a microneedle into the retinal vein and to inject the product Ocriplasmin to dissolve the blood clot. On the 12th of January 2017 the procedure was performed for the first time in a University Hospitals Leuven patient. The patient is doing well and can now start working on the rehabilitation of the eye. In a subsequent phase 2 trial the physicians will study the clinical effects of the procedure. Prof. dr. Peter Stalmans; eye surgeon at University Hospitals Leuven: "Current treatment for retinal vein occlusion is costing society 32 000 per eye, a high price tag, especially if you know that you are only treating the side effects and that there is little more you can do than avoid decreasing eye sight. The robotic device enables us to treat the cause of the thrombosis in the retina for the first time. I am therefore looking forward to what is next: if we succeed, we will literally be able to make blind people see again." Prof. dr. ir. Dominiek Reynaerts, KU Leuven Department of Mechanical Engineering: "We are hugely proud that our robot enables us to perform eye surgery that was previously impossible to perform safely. This brings us one step closer to commercialising this ground-breaking technology. We look forward to making other revolutionary procedures possible with this robotic device and to improving the quality of existing surgical treatments." Worldwide there are 16.4 million people with a blocked retinal vein caused by thrombosis in the blood vessel. In Belgium, there are about 25 000 patients. Studies are often conducted on how media messages impact individuals' opinions, but very few have demonstrated how these messages shift political opinions and political identities of a larger group of people, until now. Hans Hassell worked with two other researchers from the University of California to focus on the issue of immigration. They say the media has largely framed the topic negatively. "The question we looked at is -- as you see more and more news coverage about immigration, specifically Latino immigration, how does that affect people's partisan identification?" Hassell said. "We found that as media coverage of Latino immigration increased, we saw more Caucasians moving away from the Democratic Party and toward the Republican Party." This finding means that under the right circumstances framing can shape the partisan balance of power. The team argues that this happens because of a perceived racial threat. "There's a large amount of literature on how people who don't identify as people of color become more conservative when they perceive a racial threat to their political dominance," Hassell said. "We argue that this is an extension of that. As there becomes more coverage of immigration and as it is perceived to be a bigger issue, Caucasians are less likely to support the Democratic Party which is pro-immigration and are more likely to support the Republican Party and identify with the Republican Party, which is a party that has become largely anti-immigration, as a result." Hassell said the media coverage aspect alone is interesting because fewer illegal immigrants have come from Mexico in the past 10 years, yet the number of news articles is increasing. Hassell digs into this research to find links between changing demographics, partisan identification, and political behaviors. He says race and how people react to race is a significant component in American politics. The research was just published online in the Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics on Jan. 25. In few places are the effects of climate change more pronounced than on tropical peaks like Mount Kilimanjaro and Mount Kenya, where centuries-old glaciers have all but melted completely away. Now, new research suggests that future warming on these peaks could be even greater than climate models currently predict. Researchers led by a Brown University geologist reconstructed temperatures over the past 25,000 years on Mount Kenya, Africa's second-highest peak after Kilimanjaro. The work shows that as the world began rapidly warming from the last ice age around 18,000 years ago, mean annual temperatures high on the mountain increased much more quickly than in surrounding areas closer to sea level. At an elevation of 10,000 feet, mean annual temperature rose 5.5 degrees Celsius from the ice age to the pre-industrial period, the study found, compared to warming of only about 2 degrees at sea level during the same period. "When we run state-of-the-art climate models backward in time to this period, they underestimate the temperature changes at high elevations," said James Russell, an associate professor in the Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences and a fellow at the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society. "That implies that the models may similarly underestimate high-elevation warming in the future." The study, which Russell led with Shannon Loomis, his former graduate student, is published in the journal Science Advances. Temperature differences Questions among scientists about how global warming affects tropical high elevations date back about 30 years. In 1985, influential research by Brown geologist Warren Prell showed that from the last ice age to the pre-industrial period, sea surface temperatures in the tropics rose only a degree or two. Meanwhile, temperature records estimated from high-altitude tropical glaciers suggested much more dramatic warming at high elevation. advertisement "The climate modeling community thought there must be something wrong with one of these temperature records," Russell said, "because the models simply can't reproduce such a big difference in warming between high and low elevations." Subsequent work has largely confirmed the sea surface temperature estimates, but questions about the high-elevation data remained. This new study aimed to generate new, more robust high-elevation records. Over the past decade, Russell's co-author Jaap Damste of the University of Utrecht and colleagues have developed a new method of tracking temperature through time by studying the remains of ancient microbes. Specifically, they look at organic compounds called GDGTs that are produced in microbial cell walls. The chemical makeup of GDGTs is sensitive to temperature. In order to keep GDGTs and cell walls in a stable and permeable state, microbes alter the chemical makeup of GDGTs in response to temperature changes. Russell and his team have been able to precisely calibrate GDGT composition found in lake sediments with air temperatures through time. "We thought we could use this new temperature proxy to create a record of high-elevation temperature since the last ice age that either confirms or refutes the glacier-derived record," Russell said. For the study, Russell and his colleagues looked at sediment cores taken from the bottom of Lake Rutundu, a volcanic lake on Mount Kenya at an elevation of around 10,000 feet. The cores preserve the signature of GDGT chemistry dating back more than 25,000 to the ice age. The data suggested that mean annual temperatures at Lake Rutundu increased about 5.5 degrees Celsius since the last ice age -- a figure consistent with the previous high elevation temperature proxies. Meanwhile, temperature data from two lakes closer to sea level -- Lake Tanganyika and Lake Malawi -- suggest much more modest temperature changes of about 3.3 degrees and 2 degrees respectively. advertisement Climate models are able to reproduce the temperature changes at low elevations, but they underestimate the high-elevation change by 40 percent, Russell says. That suggests there's something amiss in the way the models simulate changes in the atmospheric lapse rate -- the rate at which air temperature varies with altitude. "All climate models calculate a lapse rate -- it's integral to the output of the model," Russell said. "What this work shows is that there's a problem in the way the models make that calculation." Implications for future climate change It's difficult to diagnose exactly what that problem is, Russell says, but it likely has something to do with the way models treat atmospheric water vapor content. Water vapor content is the strongest controlling factor in governing the lapse rate (moist air cools more slowly with altitude). "We would argue that there's probably a problem in the water vapor concentrations and therefore the feedback," Russell said. Whatever the source of the problem, the ramifications for tropical mountains may be significant. The models miss almost half the temperature change at high elevations in the past, and they may be underestimating future change as well. "These are very fragile ecosystems that house extraordinary biodiversity and unique environments such as tropical glaciers," Russell said. "Our results suggest future warming in these environments could be more extreme than we predict." Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can develop after a traumatic event or events. Although it is most often associated with military personnel exposed to the trauma of combat, it can also disproportionately affect vulnerable American Indian and Alaskan-Native (AI/AN) populations. Because alcohol use disorders (AUDs) also have a disproportionate impact on AI/ANs, this study compared both lifetime PTSD and past-year AUD among AI/ANs and non-Hispanic Whites (NHWs). Researchers analyzed data from the 2012-2013 U.S. National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions III, the fourth national survey conducted by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. The researchers estimated the odds of AUD among adults with and without PTSD by race. Of the 19,705 participants, 511 (301 women, 210 men) were AI/AN and 19,194 (10,639 women, 8,555 men) were NHW. The investigators found that both PTSD and AUD were more common among AI/ANs than NHWs. Although PTSD was significantly associated with AUD in both populations, the association was significantly more prevalent among AI/ANs. Thus, among men the rate of both PTSD and AUD in AI/ANs was more than three times that of NHW men (9.5% vs. 3.1%). The authors suggested that screening and interventions for PTSD in tribal-government programs and in AI/AN health services could help to reduce the greater risk for AUD in AI/ANs. They also called for studies that measure trauma resulting from cultural losses and their chronic effects, as well as childhood and adolescent traumas that are specific to AI/ANs. Clinical trials of a new immunotherapy, pembrolizumab, have shown that it prolongs life significantly for patients with bladder cancer and is active against a rare sub-type of melanoma, called mucosal melanoma. The findings were presented in two presentations at the European Cancer Congress 2017. Until now, mucosal melanoma has often been excluded from immunotherapy treatments for the disease. Melanoma usually occurs in the skin and is caused by exposure to ultraviolet radiation (such as sunlight). Mucosal melanoma occurs in the moist surfaces that line the body's cavities, such as the airways, digestive tract and genitourinary tracts, and is not caused by UV radiation; there is no known cause. It makes up about one per cent of all melanomas and has a poor prognosis, usually because of late diagnosis -- the majority of patients with metastatic disease (cancer that has spread to other parts of the body) survive for less than a year if they have received conventional treatments. Reporting the results from three trials of pembrolizumab for patients with advanced melanoma, Dr Marcus Butler, a medical oncologist at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, Toronto, Canada, told ECCO2017 that 84 of the 1567 patients in the KEYNOTE-001, 002 and 006 studies had advanced mucosal melanoma. "Sixteen of these patients (19%) responded to treatment with pembrolizumab, of whom 12 are still alive without their disease progressing and, so far, the longest time some of these patients have continued to be successfully treated is more than 27 months," he said. Of the 1483 patients in these KEYNOTE trials who had other forms of advanced melanoma and who received at least one dose of pembrolizumab, 33% responded to the treatment, 72% were still alive without their disease progressing and the median (average) overall survival time was nearly two years. Median overall survival for patients with mucosal melanoma was 11.3 months. "Immunotherapy for melanoma has revolutionised treatment of the disease. There are some patients with mucosal melanoma who have had complete responses to pembrolizumab and essentially return to a normal life. Some, of course, have less spectacular responses, but they still benefit from therapy. In earlier studies, mucosal melanoma was excluded since it is a rare subtype. These findings suggest that mucosal melanoma patients should be offered immunotherapy as standard of care and not excluded. Response rates may be a bit lower than for other types of melanoma, so further studies to improve benefit need to be conducted." Pembrolizumab works by binding to PD-1 and blocking the interaction between PD-1 and its ligands, PD-L1 and PD-L2, thereby activating T lymphocyte cells which may affect both tumour cells and healthy cells. PD-1 (programmed cell death protein 1) is a receptor on the surface of T cells (the white blood cells that are part of the immune system), while PD-L1 (programmed death-ligand 1) is a molecule that binds to PD-1 and is often over-expressed on the surface of cancer cells, enabling them to evade the immune system and allow cancer to grow and spread. advertisement In the KEYNOTE trials, 70% of the mucosal melanoma patients with known PD-L1 status had PD-L1 positive tumours. "The data presented here are important because they prove that patients with mucosal melanoma can benefit from anti-PD-1 therapy and should not be excluded from this treatment," said Dr Butler. "At this stage we don't know why some mucosal melanoma patients responded to pembrolizumab, while others did not. This is an important question and research is ongoing." Ninety per cent of the mucosal melanoma patients had already received at least one prior treatment and 39% of them had received ipilimumab, a type of monoclonal antibody that is already used in the treatment of melanoma. Dr Butler said: "Our results show that patients benefited from pembrolizumab regardless of whether or not they had been pre-treated with ipilimumab." Patients in the KEYNOTE trials received pembrolizumab intravenously at doses of 2 mg/kg or 10 mg/kg every three weeks, or 10 mg/kg every two weeks. Chair of the Congress and President of ECCO, Professor Peter Naredi, from the Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden, who was not involved with the research, commented: "For rare cancer types it is difficult to evaluate new treatments in normal sized trials. But here Butler and colleagues pull three trials together and show that long-lasting responses also occur with pembrolizumab in patients with mucosal melanoma." In a second, late-breaking presentation, Dr Andrea Necchi, attending physician in the Department of Medical Oncology at the Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori, Milan, Italy, said results from the phase III KEYNOTE-045 trial showed that treatment with pembrolizumab resulted in longer overall survival with fewer side-effects for patients with previously treated advanced bladder (urothelial) cancer compared with patients given chemotherapy. advertisement He said: "KEYNOTE-045 is a landmark study. It represents a real advance in the second-line treatment of advanced bladder cancer because pembrolizumab is the first therapy to show a significant survival advantage over chemotherapy for these patients. "Patients who were treated with pembrolizumab lived significantly longer than patients who were treated with chemotherapy; the median overall survival was 10.3 months with pembrolizumab and 7.4 months with chemotherapy. In addition to helping patients live longer, more patients treated with pembrolizumab responded to treatment and for a longer duration than those treated with chemotherapy; the objective response rate -- the percentage of patients whose tumours shrank or disappeared -- was almost twice as high with pembrolizumab: 21% compared to 11% on chemotherapy. The median duration of response for patients who responded to pembrolizumab has not been reached, while the median duration of response for patients who responded to chemotherapy was only 4.3 months. We estimate that almost twice as many pembrolizumab responders will respond to the therapy for at least one year: 68% versus 35%." He said survival and response benefits for pembrolizumab were seen regardless of the levels of PD-L1 expression. "In addition to the overall survival benefit over chemotherapy, pembrolizumab was also associated with a much lower incidence of treatment-related side effects. This is important because this patient population tends to be mostly elderly patients who have many other illnesses and health conditions as well. These results support the use of pembrolizumab as the new standard of care for advanced bladder cancer," concluded Dr Necchi. Side effects of any grade of severity were reported in 61% of patients treated with pembrolizumab compared with 90% of patients treated with chemotherapy, and more severe side effects that were grade 3, 4, or 5 (the most severe grade) were reported in 15% and 49% of patients, respectively. Bladder (urothelial) cancer is the seventh most common cancer in men and the seventeenth most common in women worldwide. Approximately 430,000 new cases are diagnosed each year worldwide; in the European Union (EU) there are approximately 180,500 new cases each year and 38,200 people die from it. At present there is no standard second-line therapy for advanced bladder cancer. The chemotherapies paclitaxel, docetaxel and vinflunine are commonly used but provide limited benefit. The KEYNOTE-45 study randomised 542 patients from 29 countries between November 2014 and November 2015 to either pembrolizumab (200 mg, given intravenously once every three weeks for up to 24 months) or one of three chemotherapy options chosen by study investigators. The patients all had advanced urothelial cancer that had already been treated with platinum-based chemotherapy. Cancer patients are living longer and in many cases the disease is becoming chronic rather than acute. Access to drugs that help extend life and improve quality of life, and fair prices for those drugs are therefore essential for more and more people. But patients are badly served in this respect, with delays in the availability of new treatments and incomprehensible price rises for well-established therapies, including generics, researchers will tell the European Cancer Congress 2017. There is no value for patients if new cancer drugs are developed and approved but they are unable to benefit from them, says Markus Hartmann PhD, Principal Consultant of European Consulting and Contracting in Oncology, a regulatory affairs consultancy based in Trier, Germany. Approval decisions for cancer drugs are currently granted centrally by the European Commission, in order to ensure that risk/benefit judgments are applied on the same basis across the European Union. But decisions on reimbursement and pricing, and therefore on access to new medicines, are taken at individual EU Member State level, and this results in major differences in the overall availability as well as the time taken before patients are able to obtain new medicines, adds co-author Daniel Droschel, Market Access Consultant at MArS Market Access & Pricing Strategy GmbH, Weil am Rhein (Germany). The researchers studied approval processes for the 48 new cancer drugs that were evaluated between 2011-15 by the European Medicines Agency for use in the European Union. In 17 cases, approvals were based on a principal trial using overall survival as the primary endpoint; in 19 cases on trials using progression-free survival; and in 12 cases on trials -- most often single-arm trials -- using overall response rate as primary endpoints. "These new drugs all show clinical benefit," says Dr Hartmann. "Our data indicate in the overall survival group a median survival gain of 3.0 months, while in the progression-free survival group the median gain was 3.8 months. However, the trial design, trial endpoint and magnitude of effect is evaluated quite differently by the health technology assessment (HTA) authorities in the UK, France and Germany, even though they reviewed the same, or very similar, clinical data." These disparities in national HTA outcomes depend on a number of factors. Additionally, HTAs use different methodologies in their assessments: France, as well as the UK's National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) and the Scottish Medical Council, apply health economics that have an impact on the final reimbursement decision, whereas Germany relies purely on a benefit assessment followed by price negotiations. advertisement "In our study, in France and Germany around 80% of decisions were positive, whereas for UK's NICE, every third assessment ended with a negative outcome," Dr Hartmann will say. Patients' access to new cancer drugs in England and Wales is also hampered by later decision-making compared with Scotland, France and Germany, he adds. In a second presentation, Dr Andrew Hill, Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, University of Liverpool, UK, will tell the congress that UK prices for cancer drugs, including generics, have recently shown a sharp rise. Between 2011 and 2016, prices for some common drugs increased by more than 1000%. At a time when the UK Cancer Drugs Fund is being re-examined because of the pressure caused by high prices, this is particularly worrying, says Dr Hill. "We were surprised to find several companies consistently raising the prices of cancer treatment. Twenty treatments have shown rises of over 100% in the last five years, and in two -- busulfan (used to treat leukemia) and tamoxifen (breast cancer) -- prices have increased by over 1000%. We have found that some companies take over the supply of some generic cancer medicines and then raise the price progressively," Dr Hill will say. In the UK, the Department of Health is aware of this issue and has introduced the Health Services Medical Supplies (Costs) Bill in order to be able to regulate prices in the future, he says. Companies found to be raising prices with no clear justification will be referred to the Competition and Markets Authority, and could face fines. Paying these high prices puts undue strain on health systems, and the long-term result could be negative consequences for disease progression and survival. The researchers say that they are finding similar cases in other European countries. In Spain and Italy, failure to accept the high prices demanded for some generic treatments has led to warnings from companies that they could stop their supply. advertisement "We hope that, by explaining what we have found in the UK, other European countries will take note and protect themselves against these kinds of price rises," says Dr Hill. "At a time when cancer patients are living longer and better lives due to effective treatments, this situation is particularly worrying." Ms Melissa Barber, from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK, will describe to the congress the results of her analysis of the manufacturing costs of all the medicines used to treat cancer included in the World Health Organisation's (WHO's) Essential Medicines List. The results show that several key cancer treatments could be manufactured for less than one per cent of the prices charged in the US and UK. "For example, tamoxifen, used to treat breast cancer, can be manufactured for less than two US dollars per month of treatment, and imatinib, used in the treatment of chronic myeloid leukemia, can be produced for $54 per month," Ms Barber will say. Costs this low could form the initial step in setting up programmes in low and middle income countries for the mass treatment of certain cancers, following the successful precedent of mass treatment for HIV and AIDS. The researchers would like to see the expansion of pilot studies for such treatments; such pilots exist already for cancer treatment in Rwanda and Haiti. "Showing that certain cancers could be treated for very low prices could transform the future of people with these cancers in very low-income countries where there are usually few or no treatment options," Ms Barber will conclude. Professor Ian Banks, ECCO Board Member and chair of the Patient Advisory Committee, who was not involved with the research, commented: "Research presented at the ECCO Congress covers the whole of the cancer field, including important policy issues like those raised in these abstracts. The availability and pricing of treatments are of great interest and concern to cancer patients, and we consider it important to encourage the widest possible debate on them, as well as on other issues that affect patients' quality of life." Optics research into glass micro-bubbles resonators produces interesting non-linear effects in the visible regime. When measuring the duration of high-speed physical phenomena, a good stopwatch can only get you so far, and while oscilloscopes can pick up electrical signals with frequencies of a few GHz, measuring incredibly fast optical phenomena requires something more -- a system called an optical frequency comb. Normal lasers are monochromatic sources only containing a single frequency of light; in contrast, frequency combs contain many frequencies, equally spaced in the frequency domain, which look very much like the teeth of a comb. Frequency combs are used extensively as a type of 'optical ruler' since they can measure rapidly varying signals by interfering the 'teeth' of the frequency combs with the signal they want to measure, which consequently converts those signals into more manageable radio frequency signals. Researchers in the Light-Matter Interactions Unit at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University, along with collaborators in Washington University, published a paper recently in Optics Letters in which they outline how they created a frequency comb in the visible spectrum. They accomplished this by combining a phenomenon known as four-wave mixing with a low-cost, low-power device called a micro-bubble resonator (MBR). MBRs are a type of whispering gallery mode resonator (WGMR), and until now, only infrared frequency combs have been produced directly using four-wave mixing in WGMRs. Moving the operating wavelength of these devices into the visible regime has enormous benefits since an 'optical ruler' is often sought after for light that can be observed by the human eye. The MBR device could be very useful in medical science where high precision frequency measurements are required, such as medical CT scans, where optical frequency combs are an excellent candidate. Presently optical frequency combs are generated using hefty femtosecond laser systems that require a lot of space and consume many watts of power, or using other large mode-locked laser systems. The proposed MBR, in contrast, is microns in size and only requires a low-power laser to pump the device since the tiny volume of the resonator mean that small input powers correspond to extremely high circulating intensities, a requirement for non-linear processes to occur. A classical whispering gallery -- the phenomena which allows this device to operate -- is an acoustic effect. The dome of St. Paul's cathedral in London is a famous example of a whispering gallery. In a circular enclosure, sound waves propagate along the inner walls with little loss, allowing one to hear whispers muttered near the wall a great distance away along the wall. Optically, the researchers replicate this effect by causing light to 'bounce' along the walls of a circular cavity, in this case a micro-bubble resonator. The group managed to fabricate a micro bubble resonator with a wall thickness of 1.4 microns -- about 60 times thinner than a human hair -- and an overall diameter of 120 microns. Using this device, they succeeded in producing an optical frequency comb with a central red wavelength of 765 nanometers, coinciding exactly with the predicted results. The authors of the paper created MBRs by tapering thin glass capillaries down to a few tens of microns in diameter, blocking one of their openings and then pumping gas into the tubes. Heating an area of the glass using a CO 2 laser forms a tiny bubble due to the balance between the gas pressure within the capillary and the surface tension of the molten glass, much like how glass blowers produce beautiful glass vases. Unlike typical solid resonators without thin walls, the researchers can control the wall thickness precisely allowing an extra degree of freedom. This crucial difference allowed the researchers to tune the central frequency of device to the visible regime. Dr. Yong Yang, the primary author of this paper, looks forward to pushing the limits of the device with even thinner wall dimensions and hopes to expand the range of this device to eventually span the gap between the lower wavelength blue light all the way to the near infrared region. "I'm excited about the microbubble resonator since its unique geometry gives us so much more control over the dispersive properties and will ultimately help us to further push the boundaries of this device," says Yang. Ultimately, this work could provide researchers with a tool that is a low-cost, low power and compact alternative to the commercially available frequency combs today. What better way to measure light than to use light? What has fungi got to do with architecture? Or what if we could digitally change the colours or patterns of our clothes, instead of buying new ones? The ArcInTexETN project, funded by the EU, has reached its halfway stage and the PhD students are in the midst of processing their research questions. ArcInTexETN is a project funded by the EU and it aims to strengthen the foundations of design for more sustainable forms of living by connecting architecture, interaction, design and textiles. By the end of 2016 the ArcInTexETN will be midway through the project. Representatives from the European Commission visited Boras in November for a midterm meeting and they are content with the progress. Research results are starting to evolve. "In this project, we can perceive the future," says Mervi Himanen, Expert Evaluator from the EU who has a solid academic background in both textiles and architecture as well as engineering and computer science. 3D printed shoes, fungi design and new methods of changing clothes There are 15 young PhD students from all over the world enrolled in the ArcInTexETN project. Their backgrounds are from the fields of architecture, textiles, fashion or interaction design. Angella Mackey from Canada has her placement at Philips Research Eindhoven in the Netherlands. She has spent the last eight months wearing green clothes. Every day. The reason why, is her research. She is investigating what would happen if we were able to digitally change the colours or patterns of our clothes, instead of buying new ones. "I use my green clothes as a "green screen" and then through a chroma-key smartphone application I alter the colours and the patterns on my clothes," explains Angella Mackey. "Then I post the photos on my Instagram in order to investigate my research." Another PhD student in the project is Bastian Beyer, an architect from Germany. His placement is at the Royal College of Art in London and in his research he is exploring technologies to incorporate living organisms into architectural design processes. He is investigating how synthetic biology, which is located at the cross-section of binary coding (numerical code) and synthetic coding (DNA code), can lead to innovative material developments and design strategies. "I'm studying, for example, the growth and behaviour of active fungi and the mycelium structure this generates, in order to find ways to (co-)design with living organisms," Bastian Beyer explains. American-born ArcInTexETN research fellow Troy Nachtigall comes from Italy and his placement is at Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands. His research involves the ideas of how clothing and accessories do not only fit the body on the physical level, but also with respect to movement and in the society. He has developed a technique to create shoe soles through 3D printing which thus produces ultra-personalised footwear for everyone. "Together with fellow researchers from the Wearable Senses Lab of the Industrial Design Department at Eindhoven University of Technology, I have 3D printed an entire outfit for Jet Bussemaker, who is the Minister of Culture, Education and Science in the Netherlands," says Troy Nachtigall and he continues: "I believe that the future of fashion is dynamic and adaptive, both in the way it is made, as well as in the way clothing acts on the human body." Forming a highly trained avant-garde in artistic research The research is cross disciplinary since the PhD students collaborate in three research groups -- the scale of the building, the scale of the interior and the scale of the body -- and each group consists of persons with different backgrounds. This means that they are working both on their individual theses as well as collaborating within their research groups. The ArcInTexETN is also cross disciplinary in the sense that it is a European Training Network, which means that it is a network with great mobility -- the PhD students travel around the world in order to both educate themselves and to contribute to others with their knowledge. "We are pioneers in our field of research since we are developing a new model of nomadic PhD training," says Lars Hallnas, Project Coordinator and Professor at the Swedish School of Textiles, and he continues: "We form a highly trained avant-garde in artistic research." A rigorous Northwestern University study of a quarter-century of data has found that economic insecurity is related to the rate of gun violence at K-12 and postsecondary schools in the United States. When it becomes more difficult for people coming out of school to find jobs, the rate of gun violence at schools increases. The interdisciplinary study by data scientists Adam R. Pah and Luis Amaral and sociologist John L. Hagan reveals a persistent connection over time between unemployment and the occurrence of school shootings in the country as a whole, across various regions of the country and within affected cities, including Chicago and New York City. "The link between education and work is central to our expectations about economic opportunity and upward mobility in America," said Hagan, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Professor of Sociology in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences. "Our study indicates that increases in gun violence in our schools can result from disappointment and despair during periods of increased unemployment, when getting an education does not necessarily lead to finding work." Frequent school shootings have been a major concern in American society for decades, but the causes have defied understanding. The Northwestern researchers used data from 1990 to 2013 on both gun violence in U.S. schools and economic metrics, including unemployment, to get some answers. "Our findings highlight the importance of economic opportunity for the next generation and suggest there are proactive actions we could take as a society to help decrease the frequency of gun violence," said Pah, clinical assistant professor of management and organizations at the Kellogg School of Management. Other key findings include: While Chicago is singled out in the study as one of the six cities with the most incidents from 1990 to 2013, Chicago schools are not any more dangerous than schools in other large cities. Gun violence at schools has not become more deadly over time. Most shootings are targeted, with the shooter intending to harm a specific person. Gang-related violence and lone mass shooters comprise only small fractions of the gun violence that occurs at U.S. schools. Gang-related violence constitutes 6.6% of all incidents. The results suggest that during periods of heightened unemployment, increased gun violence may be a growing risk in American college and university settings. The study, "Economic Insecurity and the Rise in Gun Violence at US Schools," will be published Jan. 30 by the journal Nature Human Behaviour. advertisement The research team also found the rate of gun violence at schools has changed over time. The most recent period studied (2007-2013) has a higher frequency of incidents than the preceding one (1994-2007), contradicting previous work in this area. This is a unique contribution made possible because of the researchers' backgrounds in data science and modeling. "Our work helps us understand why the frequency of gun violence at schools changes, not necessarily why gun violence at schools in the United States exists at all," said Amaral, professor of chemical and biological engineering in the McCormick School of Engineering. In the last 25 years, there have been two elevated periods of gun violence at U.S. schools, the researchers found; 2007-2013 was largely due to events at postsecondary schools while 1992-1994 more often involved events at K-12 schools. The Northwestern study stands apart from earlier studies on gun violence in U.S. schools by bringing into play knowledge about the school-to-work transition in American society. "Once we consider how important schools are to American ideas about economic opportunity and upward mobility, we can better understand why school settings are revealed in our research as focal points of violent responses to increased unemployment," said Hagan, who also is a research professor at the American Bar Foundation. "Prior research about gun violence in schools has not adequately analyzed these connections." How the study was conducted advertisement There have been a number of other studies on this topic, but the previous data sources used were incomplete and biased in their coverage of the school shooting events, Pah said. Also, the definition of gun violence at school varied among creators of these datasets. Pah collected these previously used data sets and collated them into a single data set. He and undergraduate and graduate student co-authors then individually sourced and read reports for each event to make sure it was actually an incident of gun violence at a school. The process yielded 379 events meeting the researchers' strict criteria, and two additional events were found, for a total of 381 events for the final data set. "We spent days doing nothing but reading about violence at schools, which is quite possibly the saddest thing I've had to do for research," Pah said. The researchers focused on all gun violence at schools, not only mass shootings. They used the following criteria for an event to be included in the study: (1) the shooting must involve a firearm being discharged, even if by accident; (2) it must occur on a school campus; and (3) it must involve students or school employees, either as perpetrators, bystanders or victims. Next, the researchers evaluated the timing of these events against multiple indicators of economic distress, including unemployment, the foreclosure rate and consumer confidence. They then hypothesized that increased school shootings are a response to increasing unemployment and tested that hypothesis in two additional ways. The results strongly support the hypothesis that a breakdown in the school-to-work transition contributes to an increase in gun violence in U.S. schools, the authors write. Researchers have identified traces of what they believe is the earliest known prehistoric ancestor of humans -- a microscopic, bag-like sea creature, which lived about 540 million years ago. Named Saccorhytus, after the sack-like features created by its elliptical body and large mouth, the species is new to science and was identified from microfossils found in China. It is thought to be the most primitive example of a so-called "deuterostome" -- a broad biological category that encompasses a number of sub-groups, including the vertebrates. If the conclusions of the study, published in the journal Nature, are correct, then Saccorhytus was the common ancestor of a huge range of species, and the earliest step yet discovered on the evolutionary path that eventually led to humans, hundreds of millions of years later. Modern humans are, however, unlikely to perceive much by way of a family resemblance. Saccorhytus was about a millimetre in size, and probably lived between grains of sand on the seabed. Its features were spectacularly preserved in the fossil record -- and intriguingly, the researchers were unable to find any evidence that the animal had an anus. The study was carried out by an international team of academics, including researchers from the University of Cambridge in the UK and Northwest University in Xi'an China, with support from other colleagues at institutions in China and Germany. Simon Conway Morris, Professor of Evolutionary Palaeobiology and a Fellow of St John's College, University of Cambridge, said: "We think that as an early deuterostome this may represent the primitive beginnings of a very diverse range of species, including ourselves. To the naked eye, the fossils we studied look like tiny black grains, but under the microscope the level of detail is jaw-dropping. All deuterostomes had a common ancestor, and we think that is what we are looking at here." Degan Shu, from Northwest University, added: "Our team has notched up some important discoveries in the past, including the earliest fish and a remarkable variety of other early deuterostomes. Saccorhytus now gives us remarkable insights into the very first stages of the evolution of a group that led to the fish, and ultimately, to us." advertisement Most other early deuterostome groups are from about 510 to 520 million years ago, when they had already begun to diversify into not just the vertebrates, but the sea squirts, echinoderms (animals such as starfish and sea urchins) and hemichordates (a group including things like acorn worms). This level of diversity has made it extremely difficult to work out what an earlier, common ancestor might have looked like. The Saccorhytus microfossils were found in Shaanxi Province, in central China, and pre-date all other known deuterostomes. By isolating the fossils from the surrounding rock, and then studying them both under an electron microscope and using a CT scan, the team were able to build up a picture of how Saccorhytus might have looked and lived. This revealed features and characteristics consistent with current assumptions about primitive deuterostomes. Dr Jian Han, of Northwest University, said: "We had to process enormous volumes of limestone -- about three tonnes -- to get to the fossils, but a steady stream of new finds allowed us to tackle some key questions: was this a very early echinoderm, or something even more primitive? The latter now seems to be the correct answer." In the early Cambrian period, the region would have been a shallow sea. Saccorhytus was so small that it probably lived in between individual grains of sediment on the sea bed. The study suggests that its body was bilaterally symmetrical -- a characteristic inherited by many of its descendants, including humans -- and was covered with a thin, relatively flexible skin. This in turn suggests that it had some sort of musculature, leading the researchers to conclude that it could have made contractile movements, and got around by wriggling. advertisement Perhaps its most striking feature, however, was its rather primitive means of eating food and then dispensing with the resulting waste. Saccorhytus had a large mouth, relative to the rest of its body, and probably ate by engulfing food particles, or even other creatures. A crucial observation are small conical structures on its body. These may have allowed the water that it swallowed to escape and so were perhaps the evolutionary precursor of the gills we now see in fish. But the researchers were unable to find any evidence that the creature had an anus. "If that was the case, then any waste material would simply have been taken out back through the mouth, which from our perspective sounds rather unappealing," Conway Morris said. The findings also provide evidence in support of a theory explaining the long-standing mismatch between fossil evidence of prehistoric life, and the record provided by biomolecular data, known as the "molecular clock." Technically, it is possible to estimate roughly when species diverged by looking at differences in their genetic information. In principle, the longer two groups have evolved separately, the greater the biomolecular difference between them should be, and there are reasons to think this process is more or less clock-like. Unfortunately, before a point corresponding roughly to the time at which Saccorhytus was wriggling in the mud, there are scarcely any fossils available to match the molecular clock's predictions. Some researchers have theorised that this is because before a certain point, many of the creatures they are searching for were simply too small to leave much of a fossil record. The microscopic scale of Saccorhytus, combined with the fact that it is probably the most primitive deuterostome yet discovered, appears to back this up. This page may have been moved, deleted, or is otherwise unavailable. To help you find what you are looking for: Enter Search Term(s): Still cant find what youre looking for? Send us a message using our contact us form. To report a broken link or other problems with the website, please include the URL. Thank you for visiting state.gov. While global defense spending has been basically static since 2011, stuck between $1.7 trillion and $1.8 trillion a year what has been changing dramatically is what is being spent by nations in some regions. For example there continues to be cuts in the West (especially the Americas and Europe). Actually if you exclude the United States, defense spending went up every year since 2011. Thats because theres an arms race going on in the Persian Gulf and East Asia even as the Americans scale back their spending. One side effect of this is the emergence of Saudi Arabia as the third highest spender (after the U.S. and China) in 2016, displacing Russia. Ironically both Russia and Saudi Arabia depend heavily on oil exports to maintain defense spending. Despite the sharp (more than 50 percent) drop in oil prices since 2013 the Saudis were better able to continue their high spending while Russia was forced to cut back. The Saudis are feeling the fiscal pressure from lower oil prices and will soon have to make cuts. Russia has other problems, like international sanctions because of threats to neighbors. This has crippled the Russian economy, which was already in trouble because of corruption and foreigners reluctant to do business with them. A lot of that spending in the wealthier developing nations like Saudi Arabia is for modern weapons they cannot produce themselves. Since 2008 deliveries of such weapons to these nations have averaged about $48 billion a year and most of this has gone to the oil-rich Arab states buying the latest and most expensive military tech in an effort to deal with increasing aggressiveness by Iran. While the United States and China produce nearly all their own weapons Saudi Arabia imports nearly all of its weapons, mostly from the U.S. and Europe. Thus Saudi Arabia accounts for about two-thirds of the annual foreign weapons imports for developing nations. In the last decade the United States has cut spending about four percent (to the current $595 billion) while Chinas more than doubled (to the current $214 billion). Russian spending nearly doubled (to $66 billion) after dropping sharply in the 1990s and rebounding slowly. In the meantime Saudi Arabia moved past Russia and is now spending $87 billion a year. India is spending more each year and at its current $54 billion has passed France ($51 billion) and is about to surpass Britain ($55 billion.) After more than a decade of cuts European spending went up over one percent in 2015, mainly because East European nations are spending a lot more to deal with a growing threat from Russia. Even Germany is now increasing spending to deal with the Russian threat. A major factor in the static global spending is that by 2010 a decade of heavy defense spending, to replace a lot of the elderly Cold War era equipment was largely completed. Also ending, especially for the United States, were expensive war on terror operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. The U.S. military, especially the army and marines, used the demand for new weapons and equipment in Iraq and Afghanistan as an opportunity to replace a lot of aging Cold War gear. The air force and navy did not do as well and now, with American defense spending shrinking, there will be fewer American warplanes and warships because the money and popular support for replacing a lot of the Cold War era warships and aircraft is not there. That trend may be reversed because of the growing Chinese threat. Most Western nations deliberately shrank their armed forces after the Cold War ended. This included China and Russia, although both of these nations are still buying a lot of modern gear. Russia does it now because it was too broke in the 1990s to buy much and the Chinese because they didnt have a modern force at the end of the Cold War and are determined to take the lead in this area. Since 2014 a growing number of European have started increasing defense spending to deal with the Russian threats. Since September 11, 2001, global defense spending increased nearly 50 percent and is now about 2.5 percent of global GDP. After the Cold War ended in 1991, defense spending declined for a few years to under a trillion dollars a year. But by the end of the 1990s it was on the rise again. The region with the greatest growth has been the Middle East, where spending has increased over 60 percent in the last decade. The region with the lowest growth (six percent) was Western Europe. Five years of world-wide recession and the decline in spending by most Western nations has helped stall global defense spending at $1.7-1.8 trillion a year. Western defense firms are feeling this the most, as their sales have been flat from 2011 to 2014 but are now picking up. In January 2017 a state-owned Turkish factory delivered the first 500 of 20,000 mass produced 7.62mm MPT-76 assault rifles. The state owned factories had long produced the G3, a similar, but much older (1950s) German design under license. The state owned rifle factories have been switching over to production of the MPT-76 and have produced, along with a Turkish firm (KaleKalip, which did much of the design work on MPT-76) several thousand MPT-76s so far for testing and to get ready for mass production. KaleKalip will build 15,000 of the first 35,000 and continue building the MPT-76 for the Turkish military and export customers. Eventually over half a million MPT-76s will be built to replace most of the aging G3s. The MPT-76 has a Picatinny rail on top of receiver with additional on the top and bottom of the forward stock. The Picatinny rail has become the standard way to attach a growing number of accessories like sights, laser designators, flash lights as well as shotguns and grenade launchers under the barrel. The MPT-76 has several other features common in the latest designs like safety/fire selector switch single shots and fully automatic fire that can be easily used by those who are right or left handed. The 4.1kg (9.03 pound) MPT-76 is cheaper to build (at about $1,300 each) but is lighter, easier to handle and generally more capable than the G3 design. The MPT-76 can also be more easily converted to fire 5.56mm rounds or shorter barrel versions. Turkey tried lighter rifles using the 5.56mm round but the troops preferred a NATO standard 7.62mm weapon because they often operate in in desert, mountains and hills where longer range and accuracy are needed that the 7.62mm round can better provide. Most armed forces find that their troops rarely have to sue their rifles at targets more than 200-400 meters which the 5.56mm round can handle. At longer ranges the 7.62mm round is superior as well as being more effective at shooting through doors and walls. The locally developed and produced MPT-76 is part of a self-sufficiency program what has reduced weapons imports to 40 percent of needs from over 80 percent back in 2000. All this is largely the result of a booming post-Cold War economy. This is partly the result of because a new government making good on its pledge to crack down on the corruption that had long crippled the economy. As the economy grew, the government sought to make Turkey more self-sufficient in military equipment. This includes military vehicles and aircraft. Some items were developed locally because they could not be imported from the usual suppliers. For example the United States was reluctant to provide armed UAVs because of the growing influence of Islamic conservatives within the government. So that government asked Turkish firms to develop it. A larger UAV was the easy part but by early 2016 Turkey successfully tested a locally designed and made laser guided missile (MAM-L) for use by its existing UAVs. The laser guided MAM-L is a 22.5 kg (50 pound) weapon with a 10 kg (22 pound) warhead has a range of eight kilometers. A Turkish designed and built UAV (the Bayraktar), carried the MAM-L for the test and was soon using it in combat. Bayraktar is a 650 kg (1,433 pound) aircraft with a 55 kg (121 pound) payload and an endurance of 24 hours. First flight was in 2009 and it entered service in 2016. This is two years later than planned but as every developer of large UAVs knows, there are always unexpected glitches that have to be encountered and fixed along the way. There is also a Bayraktar Mini UAV which is a 4.6 kg (9.9 pound) aircraft that is battery powered and hand launched. Endurance is 60 minutes and the Bayraktar can operate up to 15 kilometers from the operator. The Turkish Army has been using the Bayraktar Mini since 2007. Turkey has long been a reliable source of maintenance and upgrades for commercial and military aircraft and is using those decades of experience to expand into the design and construction of military aircraft and vehicles. His image is peppered with bullet holes. One of the shots passed clean through his left eyebrow. I am trying not to read anything into it, says Paul Curry, who has for 47 years been in a wheelchair. And whose bullet-riddled picture is up there on the experimental mobility parking restriction sign. Hopefully it doesnt tell us anything about peoples attitude to the disabled, says Sean. But it might. Because if Taurangas able-bodied population didnt abuse the citys 133 mobility carparks, if they were more respectful and socially responsible to the citys 400 mobility park permit-holders and hadnt incurred 50 infringement notices worth $150 each in the last six months there might not be a need for the new signs. And there might not be a need for Paul to be a poster boy and champion for social change. But I am big enough and old enough to do it. The number of violations is just representative of the problem because the Tauranga City Council parking wardens cant be everywhere all the time. And they dont have jurisdiction over mobility parks outside supermarkets and malls. Its a pretty selfish, says the citys top traffic cop, Western Bay of Plenty road policing manager Senior Sergeant Ian Campion. And thats why at $150 its an expensive misdemeanor. Its perceived as a particularly inconsiderate act. I get the feeling people want to park directly outside wherever they are going, says Stuart Goodman, who is Tauranga City Councils bylaws and parking man. Its mean-spirited, you are depriving someone of a much-needed facility, someone who really needs it. Someone like Paul, who is paralysed from the chest down after an accident serving his country with the navy. I didnt quite get to Vietnam because a 400 pound anti-submarine marine mortar came loose from a loading rope, landed on top of me breaking my back in six places. Hes never asked for concessions. Never been on the benefit nor ACC, been a chief executive for a couple of government departments; tended to my own needs. But for the people who the permits are designed to assist, like Paul, they are an absolute blessing. They make a helluva difference to our lives and accessing our community. And while some people obviously see us as a lesser species, there are a lot of disabled people contributing tremendously to society and deserve respect. If people understood that simple message, Paul says youd hope there might not be the same level of abuse. And Paul imploring us from the top of a sign post to be fair and keep it clear may help. Theres international research showing the signs might work better than the traditional silhouette or stickman. When signs are personalised they tend to deter would be offenders, says Paul. Thats because it shows real people are affected by bad decisions. But those bad decisions dont stop some motorists with a sense of entitlement getting extremely niggly about mobility carparks. I had a real ding-dong with one woman. When I asked her where her mobility permit was she swore at me, got quite heated. Then several people stood behind me and said: ook lady, you are in the wrong here. Then I realised there were more good people than bad. And there was a what the hell? moment when a motorist towing a boat parked across two mobility parks while he popped into a hardware story for a rubber washer. Amongst the bad are the couriers. Theyre the worst. They always say they are only going to be five minutes. And while you are driving around waiting, their five minutes becomes 10 minutes. There are 360 to 400 legitimate permit-holders in Tauranga. The threshold, determined by doctors, is the persons ability to walk 200m unaided and without difficulty. Then there are the hidden disabilities. People with heart and breathing conditions, says the CCS Disability Action Bay of Plentys BJ Clarke. The public often see these people in mobility parks and think they shouldnt be there. They dont understand. There was another incident at a mall where a woman took issue with an illegally parked motorist. BJ says she was subjected to a tirade of abuse, feared for her safety and had to seek the help of a mall security officer. Stuart says theres a much higher level of abuse at supermarkets and malls because the public understands there wont be any action taken if they get caught. Some malls are good at enforcing mobility parking, some are not so good, says BJ. Some malls dont want to upset people coming to their facilities. But they forget even disabled people have a wallet in their back pocket and want to spend money. The CCS is lobbying there it wants malls to allow council parking wardens to enforce parking restrictions on their properties. So the message from the Police, the Tauranga City Council and CCS is dont. If you cant park right outside where you want to go, park down the street, says Ian. Walking never hurt any able-bodied person. People are still of a mindset they will find a carpark right outside their destination, says Stuart. That doesnt happen anymore in a growing city like Tauranga. So be considerate to others needs. Be respectful. And the TCC will remain strict with mobility parks. They are quite clearly signed and rarely is there a valid reason to park illegally. Either people have a mobility permit or they dont. And if they dont, they will get pinged $150. Pauls hoping personalised signs work better. Photo: Supplied. BAE Systems plc provides defense, aerospace, and security solutions worldwide. The company operates through five segments: Electronic Systems, Cyber & Intelligence, Platforms & Services (US), Air, and Maritime. The Electronic Systems segment offers electronic warfare systems, navigation systems, electro-optical sensors, military and commercial digital engine and flight controls, precision guidance and seeker solutions, military communication systems and data links, persistent surveillance systems, space electronics, and electric drive propulsion systems. The Cyber & Intelligence segment provides solutions to modernize, maintain, and test cyber-harden aircraft, radars, missile systems, and mission applications that detect and deter threats to national security; systems engineering, integration, and sustainment services for critical weapons systems, C5ISR, and cyber security; and solutions and services to intelligence and federal/civilian agencies. It also offers data intelligence solutions to defend against national-scale threats, protect their networks, and data against attacks; security and intelligence solutions to the United Kingdom government and allied international governments; anti-fraud and regulatory compliance solutions; and enterprise-level data and digital services. The Platforms & Services (US) segment manufactures combat vehicles, weapons, and munitions, as well as provides ship repair services and the management of government-owned munitions facilities. The Air segment develops, manufactures, upgrades, and supports combat and jet trainer aircraft. The Maritime segment designs, manufactures, and supports surface ships, submarines, torpedoes, radars, and command and combat systems; and supplies naval gun systems. It also supplies naval weapon systems, missile launchers, and precision munitions. The company was founded in 1970 and is based in Farnborough, the United Kingdom. Cardinal Health, Inc. operates as an integrated healthcare services and products company in the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia, and internationally. It provides customized solutions for hospitals, healthcare systems, pharmacies, ambulatory surgery centers, clinical laboratories, physician offices, and patients in the home. The company operates in two segments, Pharmaceutical and Medical. The Pharmaceutical segment distributes branded and generic pharmaceutical, specialty pharmaceutical, and over-the-counter healthcare and consumer products. The segment also provides services to pharmaceutical manufacturers and healthcare providers for specialty pharmaceutical products; operates nuclear pharmacies and radiopharmaceutical manufacturing facilities; repackages generic pharmaceuticals and over-the-counter healthcare products; and offers medication therapy management and patient outcomes services to hospitals, other healthcare providers, and payers, as well as provides pharmacy management services to hospitals. The Medical segment manufactures, sources, and distributes Cardinal Health branded medical, surgical, and laboratory products and devices that include exam and surgical gloves; needles, syringe, and sharps disposals; compressions; incontinences; nutritional delivery products; wound care products; single-use surgical drapes, gowns, and apparels; fluid suction and collection systems; urology products; operating room supply products; and electrode product lines. The segment also distributes a range of national brand products, including medical, surgical, and laboratory products; provides supply chain services and solutions to hospitals, ambulatory surgery centers, clinical laboratories, and other healthcare providers; and assembles and sells sterile, and non-sterile procedure kits. The company was incorporated in 1979 and is headquartered in Dublin, Ohio. SUPERVALU INC., together with its subsidiaries, operates as a grocery wholesaler and retailer in the United States and internationally. It operates through two segments, Wholesale and Retail. The Wholesale segment engages in the wholesale distribution of various food and non-food products to independent retail customers, such as single and multiple grocery store operators, regional chains, and the military. It also provides professional services, such as pass-through programs; and various services comprising retail store support, advertising, couponing, e-commerce, network and data hosting, training and certifications classes, and administrative back-office solutions. The Retail segment operates retail stores that provide groceries and various additional products that include general merchandise, home, health and beauty care, and pharmacy products. It provides its products under the Cub Foods, Shoppers Food & Pharmacy, and Hornbacher's names, as well as 1 Rainbow stores. The company's stores offer a range of branded and private-label products comprising perishable and nonperishable grocery products. As of February 24, 2018, it operated a network of 3,437 stores, including 3,323 wholesale primary stores; and 114 retail grocery stores. The company was founded in 1871 and is headquartered in Eden Prairie, Minnesota. Weatherford International plc, an oilfield service company, provides equipment and services for the drilling, evaluation, completion, production, and intervention of oil and natural gas wells worldwide. The company operates in two segments, Western Hemisphere and Eastern Hemisphere. It offers artificial lift systems, including reciprocating rod, progressing cavity pumping, gas, hydraulic, plunger, and hybrid lift systems, as well as related automation and control systems; pressure pumping and reservoir stimulation services, such as acidizing, fracturing and fluid systems, cementing, and coiled-tubing intervention; and drill stem test tools, and surface well testing and multiphase flow measurement services. The company also provides safety, downhole reservoir monitoring, flow control, and multistage fracturing systems, as well as sand-control technologies, and production and isolation packers; liner hangers to suspend a casing string in high-temperature and high-pressure wells; cementing products, including plugs, float and stage equipment, and torque-and-drag reduction technology for zonal isolation; and pre-job planning and installation services. In addition, it offers directional drilling services, and logging and measurement services while drilling; services related to rotary-steerable systems, high-temperature and high-pressure sensors, drilling reamers, and circulation subs; managed pressure drilling, conventional mud-logging, drilling instrumentation, gas analysis, wellsite consultancy, and open hole and cased-hole logging services; reservoir solutions and software products; and intervention and remediation services. Further, the company provides equipment and drilling tools; tubular handling, management, and connection services; equipment rental services; and onshore contract drilling and related services through a fleet of land drilling and workover rigs. Weatherford International plc was incorporated in 1972 and is headquartered in Baar, Switzerland. Since Donald Trump was sworn into office, people across the country have taken to the streets to protest his actions. After Trump signed an executive order banning citizens from seven countries from entering the U.S., these protests became more prominent than ever - and many demonstrators brought their dogs along. Dogs love everyone, no matter where they're from, and these politically aware dogs took to the streets with their parents to remind everyone that love will always trump hate. All dogs want to be good dogs, but this guy would give it all up just to help. Majed Moughni has lived the American dream: He climbed the ladder from impoverished refugee, to hotel dishwasher, to parking cars for Ford Motor Co. royalty. Today hes a lawyer, sitting in an office that once belonged to a Ford chief executive officer whose Lincoln Continental he used to park. Moughni sees the business case behind Fords senior executives courting Donald Trump after the president spent months criticizing automakers for making cars in Mexico. Their silence through the weekend on Trumps order halting immigration from seven Middle Eastern countries was another matter, and he couldnt hide his disappointment. Im a product of what Trump is trying to ban, Moughni said. Its careless. This is a country of immigrants. Automakers are walking a tightrope as they court Trump, whose policies on clean-air standards, corporate taxes and trade will affect their fortunes. They have to balance that against other considerations closer to home: The traditional three U.S. automakers are based in Michigan, which backed Trumps surprise victory but also has a substantial Middle Eastern population troubled by his executive order on immigration. Executive chairman Bill Ford and CEO Mark Fields issued a joint statement Monday saying that they dont support Trumps travel ban policy, or any other that goes against our values as a company. General Motors Co. sent a notice to employees Sunday saying it will support any employees travelling back to the U.S. with a visa who encounter difficulties. We are not aware, to date, of any Ford employees directly affected by this policy, Ford and Fields said in an e-mailed statement. We will continue working to ensure the well-being of our employees by promoting the values of respect and inclusion in the workplace. Fords hometown of Dearborn has been referred to as Americas Muslim Capital, with more than 30 per cent of the population of Arab descent. From 2005 to 2015, the state accepted 19,545 refugees from Iraq and Syria two of the seven countries affected by Trumps ban. People would say that if you landed here at 9 p.m., you can have a job at 9 the next morning, Ibrahim Kazerooni, the imam at Dearborns Islamic Center of America, said in an interview. We have many people in our community who work at Ford. Were a part of this community. Plans for 26 refugees to immigrate to the Detroit area from Iraq and Syria in the next week have been cancelled, said Lynne Golodner, spokeswoman for Samaritas, formerly known as Lutheran Social Services of Michigan, which has a contract with the state to help asylum seekers settle and find employment. Trump took special aim at Ford during the campaign and the automaker has worked to get back in his good graces. Bill Ford, a great-grandson of the founder Henry, has said he can always get a hold of Trump, or the president calls him. Fields, the CEO, visited the White House on back-to-back days last week to discuss jobs, fuel-economy standards and even Oval Office decor. Much of the auto industry was silent on the immigration order during the weekend. Mark Reuss, GMs executive vice president for product development, declined to discuss Trumps immigration policy during a fuel cell vehicles press conference Monday. Representatives for Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV, Toyota Motor Corp., Nissan Motor Co., Hyundai Motor Co. and Honda Motor Co. declined to comment. They should be proactive and stand up for the Muslim community, Mohammad All, a 26-year-old Ford engineer, said during a protest Sunday at Detroit Metropolitan Airport, before Ford issued its statement. He entered the U.S. from Iraq in 1997 after years in a Rafha, Saudi Arabia, refugee camp. The United Auto Workers union, which represents GM, Ford and Fiat Chrysler workers, denounces any policy that judges people based on their religion or nation of origin, President Dennis Williams said in a statement Monday. Moughnis is one of countless stories that show the entwined relationship of the auto industry to the regions immigrant population. Protesters also gathered Sunday in Hamtramck, a 5-sq-km city within the borders of Detroit whose longstanding ties to the auto industry include a GM factory that makes sedans and the Volt plug-in hybrid. A Polish enclave for most of the last century, Hamtramck now has a vast Muslim population because of immigration from Bangladesh, Yemen, and to a lesser degree, Bosnia. This is what immigration looks like! was one frequent chant. Hamtramck has the nations first Muslim-majority city council, and the panels top vote-getters in the last two elections descend from Yemen another of the nations affected by the decree. Automakers are afraid of Trump, Councilman Saad Almasmari said in an interview at the Sunday rally: Thats why they keep silent. It was in Hamtramck that Moughnis father newly arrived in America ahead of his family landed a job on the assembly line at a Chrysler plant. The father saved up enough to buy plane tickets for his family, including his eight kids, and eventually managed to afford a Chrysler LeBaron. Moughni was 6 when he and his family moved to America in 1977 to escape civil war in Lebanon. The Chrysler gig lasted only about two years, until Moughnis father joined the thousands of autoworkers swept from the industry after an oil shock. The father worked as a cashier at a convenience store, while Moughni did his part to make ends meet. It wasnt much of a life growing up with your dad not having the financial means to raise eight kids, Moughni says. At 12, he started mowing lawns and picking weeds for neighbours. By 15, he worked at a Dominos Pizza. At 18, he was hired at the newly opened Ritz-Carlton hotel in Dearborn first as a dishwasher, and later as a parking valet. It was the Ritz job that helped Moughni pay his way through undergraduate school at the University of Michigan at Dearborn. It also introduced him to Bill Ford, Edsel Ford II and Harold Red Poling, the CEO who steered Ford through the early-1990s recession. Moughni got to know Poling by name. When Poling died in 2012 and the office Ford rented for the retired CEO right across from the Ritz came up for lease, Moughni seized on the opportunity. That same office has been home to Majed A. Moughni Law Offices for about three years. Moughni sees common ground with Trump, and in fact made an unsuccessful run for Congress about six years ago as a Republican with a motto to keep jobs and production in America. But for companies like Ford, which he notes has many engineers from India, he couldnt understand the delay in speaking out. As far as Ford and Mark Fields and Bill Ford cozying up to Trump, I dont think thats a bad thing for the company, Moughni said. Even so, they should be outraged as well that this policy may trickle over to other parts of the world. Read more about: SHARE: Major airlines including Deutsche Lufthansa AG and Emirates are modifying staff rosters to keep crew members from getting caught up in President Donald Trumps executive order barring people from seven predominantly Muslim states from entering the U.S. Dubai-based Emirates, the worlds largest long-haul carrier, said it has made the necessary adjustments to rotas as it understands that the Trump edict also applies to flight crew from the countries. Lufthansa, Europes third-biggest airline, said its having to adjust since the new U.S. policy also affects those staff who hold two passports. Global airlines such as Emirates and Lufthansa are among those most affected by the Trump ban, since the seven countries targeted Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Libya have few or no direct American flights, compelling their citizens to connect via Western Europe and the Persian Gulf region. At KLMs Amsterdam hub, seven people with valid visas were turned away Saturday. Carriers generally recruit cabin staff with language skills that reflect the nature of their route networks, so services to the Middle East and North Africa are more likely to have Arabic and Persian speakers who could be affected by the U.S. ban. Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways PJSC also said that cabin crew from the seven countries wont be rostered on U.S.-bound flights. Affected carriers say the number of employees affected has been small and nobody has been left stranded. Restoring order Among the nations targeted by Trump, Emirates serves three of them, with onward connections to 11 U.S. cities. It has routes to Iranian capital Tehran and the pilgrimage city Mashhad, Sudanese capital Khartoum and the Iraqi cities of Baghdad, Basra and Erbil. Flights to Syria, Yemen and Libya have been suspended due to the conflicts there. Lufthansa operates to Iran and Iraq and about 20 American cities, including Washington, D.C. The German group serves Tehran from Frankfurt, Vienna and Munich, and also flies to Isfahan from Vienna. In Iraq, it offers flights to Erbil in the Kurdish controlled north from Vienna and Frankfurt. The U.S. government said earlier that its taking steps to restore order to the air-transport industry following a weekend of chaos sparked by the travel ban. Permanent U.S. residents from nations covered by the Trump order should no longer be detained at American airports, and no one covered by the ban should be getting on planes overseas, the Department of Homeland Security said. The agencys statements late Sunday sought to end confusion in which travellers, gate crews and immigration officers were left to contend with conflicting edicts. On one side was the presidential order halting travel; on the other, three U.S. court orders blocking parts of the ban. Airport protests At New Yorks John F. Kennedy Airport, protesters on Saturday chanted Let them in! and No hate! No fear! Immigrants are welcome here! Thousands more gathered from Atlanta to Detroit on Sunday to oppose the restrictions, while at Los Angeles International Airport demonstrators packed into the terminal for foreign flights and snarled traffic outside. In the hours after the Trump order, many foreign airports imposed blanket bans on U.S. travel for citizens from the seven countries. Students, refugees and dual citizens were stuck overseas, and businesses warned affected employees not to risk leaving the U.S. In the Gulf, Qatar Airways, Etihad and Dubai-based Emirates are advising passengers from the seven nations that they can fly to the U.S. if they hold green cards or NATO visas, or are diplomatic officials or UN representatives. Etihad also said people of dual nationality may travel if they hold a passport from a country not affected by the ban and have a visa. Thats a contrast from the weekends turmoil. There are people who boarded flights to the U.S. and were sent back, said a woman who works on the ground staff at Dubai airport. They left before the decision was made. Then they yelled at us after a 16-hour flight each way. Read more about: SHARE: Mahmoud Allouch is not making any plans to travel to the United States and doesnt know when his sister will be able or willing to risk coming to see him. The siblings were born in Syria. They have lived, worked and gone to school in North America for the better part of a decade. Allouch, 26, lives in Toronto and has applied to become a permanent resident of Canada. His sister, 28, made her home in Washington D.C. and has her green card, which makes her a legal permanent resident of the United States. A broad ban stopping citizens of mostly Muslim countries from entering the United States means Allouch wont attempt to enter the U.S. for the foreseeable future. His sister, he said, also had no immediate plans to leave, unsure if her green card would be enough to get her back home once she stepped across the border. Read more: Despite court order, Trump shows no sign of backing down on Muslim ban Canadian permanent residents exempt from Donald Trumps travel ban Protest of Trump Muslim travel ban builds near Statue of Liberty It is really just weird to see it happen in 2017, after the world was moving toward less borders, less walls, or away from the heavy travel restrictions imposed post 9/11, said Allouch, speaking to the Star less than 24 hours after the ban was announced. Allouch asked that his sisters name not be used. He said he was concerned for her safety. Their mother, also Syrian, had moved to Bahrain a few years ago and often travelled to the U.S. over the Christmas holiday and in the summer so the three of them could be together, he said. There is uncertainty, there is apprehension, there is a lot of ambiguity, so we are playing it safe, and holding off on making plans, said Allouch. The executive order was signed by President Donald Trump on Friday afternoon. It means a 90-day ban on entry to the U.S. for citizens of Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen and a 120-day suspension on the entry of refugees. Refugees from Syria are barred indefinitely. It resulted in chaos, confusion, protests and legal challenges across the United States. It also produced a deep sense of unease among Canadians who come from or have family from the countries on Trumps list, but who hadnt received public assurances from their own government on what the ban could mean. Canadian officials were given no warning or opportunity to discuss the ban with U.S. officials and first learned the details contained in Trumps executive order through the news, according to Daniel Jean, national security advisor to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who spoke at a Sunday afternoon press conference. The Canadian government confirmed over the weekend that dual citizens and permanent residents of Canada will not be subject to the ban. In the United States the ban at first seemed to extend to people with valid green cards, resulting in people being detained and prompting massive protests at airports across the country. On Sunday, White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said people with valid green cards could enter the U.S. from that point on, but that border officials had discretionary authority, to detain and question people, the New York Times reported. Allouch and his sister moved from Syria to Boston in 2007 and 2008 to attend Northeastern University. She studied business administration and he got his bachelor of science. His parents travelled from Syria to Boston for their graduations, then stayed. After his father died his mother, now 66, moved to Bahrain. Allouch decided to move to Toronto, and obtained a masters degree in civil engineering from the University of Toronto. He has a work permit and is employed at a non-profit organization helping new Syrians to Canada find employment. His sister chose Washington because she wanted to have a career in foreign policy research. She was in Washington for the inauguration, but didnt leave her house because tensions in the city were so high, said Allouch. When Trump was elected she was worried, because at that point he was making promises about drastic action at the border, but it was unclear if he would keep his word, said Allouch. On our end we were saying that is ridiculous, that is not going to happen, dont worry. But here we are and it is happening now. With files from Alex Boutilier Read more about: SHARE: MONTREALTwo attackers carried out a shooting at a Quebec City mosque Sunday evening that has killed at least five people, according to the president of the Islamic Centre of Quebec. While police did not immediately release a tally of those killed and injured, a spokesperson for the Quebec City force said that there had been many victims in the incident, which occurred shortly before 8 p.m. at the Grand Mosque in the Quebec City suburb of Ste-Foy, while evening prayers were being held. There were dead, said Etienne Doyon, speaking on behalf of the Quebec City police. Montreals La Presse newspaper reported Sunday night that the incident is being treated as a terrorist attack, although Quebec City police would not confirm that. Mohamed Yangui, president of the Islamic Centre of Quebec, said five people were killed in the attack, although he was unable to identify the victims. Yangui said Sunday evening prayers are generally attended by between 60 and 100 people, most of whom are men. The few women in attendance would have been on the second level of the building, above where the shooting occurred, Yangui said. One man who was at the mosque told Radio-Canada that there were two attackers wearing ski masks who burst into the building and opened fire. The man, who didnt want to be identified by name, said they had strong Quebecois accents, but added that he believed he heard them shouting Allahu Akbar. His testimony could not be independently confirmed. The man said he narrowly escaped when a bullet whizzed over his head. He said the gunmen took aim at those who were still praying. One was reportedly arrested at the scene of the attack while another fled. Doyon, the police spokesman, said both men had been arrested and would be facing charges of murder. But police would not provide any information about the individuals who were arrested for strategic and operational reasons, Doyon said. The investigation has not ended, he said. We will be trying to verify if there is a third or fourth or any other person involved. Were not ruling out that there may be other suspects. The mosque was targeted last summer when someone left a severed pigs head at the entrance accompanied by a note that read, Bon appetit. Yangui said the community keeps in contact with the RCMP about threats or concerns, but there have been none recently that stand out. Asked who might commit such an act, or why, he said: I have no idea. Really no idea. There was an immediate outpouring of support and sympathy for the victims and the Muslim community in Quebec City. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau wrote on Twitter: Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families. Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said his government was mobilizing to ensure enhanced security in the city and across the province. He also wrote on social media: Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence. All our solidarity is with the loved ones of the victims, the injured and their families. News of the deadly attack also spread south of the Canada-U.S. Border where, despite this weekends upheaval over the shutting of American borders to people from several predominantly Muslim countries, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, tweeted: Our prayers tonight are with the people of Quebec City as they deal with a terrible attack on a mosque. We must stand together. Read more about: SHARE: You over there, white lady in Wisconsin working as a part-time cashier, is this what youd envisioned when casting your ballot for Donald Trump? And how about you, fifth-generation Irish-American male, jobless in the Rust Belt, are you feeling vindicated now? Or you, a Latino in Florida among the 29 per cent cross-country from that ethnic constituency who shockingly voted for a Republican candidate despite his vow to build a wall along the Mexico border. Are you pleased with the perversities cascading from a slew of executive orders signed by President Trump in his first nine days as occupant of the Oval Office? There has been little polling as yet if, indeed, polls should be trusted following their colossally erroneous electoral predictions of Trumps radical overhaul of U.S. policy straight out of the chute, his disdain for all the principles that have distinguished America across centuries of defining doctrines. Thing is, I fear this is precisely what Trumpists wanted to see unfold in the transitioning of the United States into a mean and intolerant nation, unhinged from its founding tenets. Because, apart from the handful of congressional Republicans, four senators (as of Sunday) and a couple of governors who bravely castigated the presidents banning of nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries, revulsion for the worst of the executive order Fridays toxic edict aimed squarely at Muslims has not triggered a party-base backlash. READ MORE: Canadian permanent residents exempt from travel ban Uncertainty, apprehension means shelving travel plans to the U.S. New York mayor speaks out against Trump ban at Battery Park protest World leaders blast ban, refuse to follow suit Trump shows no sign of backing down on ban Where originally I believed and hoped that Trumps popularity was purely populist in nature, an up-finger gesture to elites whove ignored the escalating anxieties of an underclass and marginalized rump of Americans, its becoming ever clearer that the lowest common denominator is vast, unrelenting and averse to ruefulness. Where in Gods name is the victory of conflating radical Islamists with 1.3 billion Muslims and shuttering Americas portals with no consultation among allies to immigrants, to dual-nationality citizens, to green card holders and to refugees from war-ravaged countries yearning for the freedom that the U.S. has always represented, a refuge embodied in the Statue of Liberty, a country settled by persecuted Pilgrims and enriched over so many years by the hard toil of a grateful diaspora from all over the planet? Who seriously contemplated the appalling scenes witnessed over the weekend at American airports as scores of travellers were prevented from passing through customs, halted in a holding pattern on U.S. soil or outright chased back from whence they came with no chance to consult with lawyers, while authorities conceded they had no idea what they were doing or how to apply Trumps extreme vetting directive. Scenes that brought to mind a disgraceful period in American history when a ship carrying 900 mostly Jews desperately attempting to flee Nazi Germany was, in 1939, prevented from reaching the U.S., sailing in circles around the Atlantic before returning to Europe. Not Jews this time but vilified Muslims, with Trump making it abundantly clear Americas arms would be wide open to persecuted and prioritized Christians from Muslim countries. This, despite the fact that a broad coalition of Christian clergy leaders from evangelicals to the Vatican has strongly condemned the posture as discriminatory, misguided and inhumane. That extreme vetting, it should be noted, hearkens back to the day following the San Bernardino, Calif., terrorist attack, committed by a U.S.-born citizen of Pakistani descent, Pakistan not a country included in the seven-nation embargo when Trump first promised a total and complete ban on Muslims entering the U.S. An emotional Sen. Chuck Schumer, Senate minority leader, could scarcely contain his dismay, his shame, during a Sunday press conference. This executive order was mean-spirited and un-American. It was implemented in a way that created chaos and confusion across the country and it will only serve to embolden and inspire those around the globe who would do us harm. It must be overturned immediately . . . . I will claw, scrap and fight with every fibre of my being until these orders are overturned. Trump is blithely unchastened by the protests that erupted at home or the international condemnation, tweeting to his 22.7 million followers Sunday: Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue! True and valid. But he has yet to explain how this executive order, inflicted on would-be immigrants who have already been vetted by a scrutinizing system over an average application period of two years, will protect his preferred pool of Christians rather than make their lives more miserable and targeted in reactionary Islamic nations overseas. Further from Trump: Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world a horrible mess! At the moment, my view is obstructed by the horrible mess unleashed on America over the past couple of days. Meanwhile, there are reports of preliminary administration discussion that would extend the vetting order ever farther in its hateful parameters asking visitors to the U.S. to provide evidence of social media sites theyve visited, and disclose the contacts on their cellphones. Where Homeland Security would even find the huge staff required for such an intrusive undertaking hasnt been addressed. Two U.S. District Court judges on Saturday slapped a temporary stay on Trumps decree, blocking deportation and detention, but the situation remains confusing in implementation and as an assault against the Constitution by singling out people based on their faith. There are existing laws which forbid barring entry to the U.S. based on country of origin. As a legal matter, this will doubtless be kicked up the judicial ladder and will probably land in the Supreme Court. Trump is expected to this week name his Supreme Court nominee as replacement for the late Antonin Scalia. Amid so much attention correctly focused on the unprecedented travel ban, side-barred was Trumps insertion of his chief strategist odious white supremacist Stephen Bannon as a regular attendee on the National Security Councils Principles Committee, demoting the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and the director of national intelligence to attendance only where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed, another radical departure from normal practice. The flurry of extremist fiats has left a nation and a world reeling. What an ugly distortion of America as a beacon for humanity. Read more about: SHARE: LAMEQUE, N.B. Troops went door-to-door Monday, helping northeastern New Brunswick recover from a devastating ice storm that has been linked to two deaths and almost three dozen hospitalizations from carbon monoxide poisoning. The soldiers cleaned debris from streets, went door-to-door to check on residents, and delivered needed items as the region recovers from a storm that has now prompted a delay in the provincial budget. They are making some significant gains in very difficult conditions . . . But we understand there are people going through a tough time, Premier Brian Gallant told a briefing Monday. The budget scheduled for Tuesday is now delayed until Feb. 7. Early in the day, dark green military vehicles from Canadian Forces Base Gagetown crossed a bridge onto Lameque island, where soldiers set up a base in a school and then fanned out to ice-coated communities where power crews are still attempting to restore electricity lost in Wednesdays storm. Major Turmel Chiasson said the units have trained extensively for disaster scenarios, but for many of the younger soldiers its their first real-life experience responding to an ice storm. (Theyre) very eager . . . they train a lot and they dont do it for real, and this gets them involved in the community, he said. For myself, Im from here, the area, so yes, very excited to be here and helping friends and family. A lot of friends were able to get on social media, and I was able to see the damage from the storms, so I was well in the know. Especially my mother, with no electricity for awhile, living in one of the worst areas. One group of soldiers went to the small village of Sainte-Marie-Saint Raphael, on the eastern coast of Lameque island, and knocked on doors, at one point assisting an elderly woman with limited mobility to clean out her freezer. They ensured no one was using propane burners or open flames indoors, and checked whether any essentials were needed. Most residents had generators, and relatively few asked for additional assistance. So far everyone has been very friendly, very open with their houses, said Bombardier Jurica Mioc of the 4th Artillery Regiment, who was among soldiers knocking on doors in Sainte-Marie-Saint-Raphael. Weve been invited in for food three or four times already. Everyones been amazing so far. Really high spirits for the situation thats going on. Gallant said the number of people without electricity has fallen from 150,000 last Wednesday, to less than 20,000 by noon Monday, and it was expected that with 380 repair crews on the ground that the majority of customers will have power restored by the end of the day. There are some families that will have a few days without power, Gallant said. Meanwhile, hospitals continued to assist people who succumbed to carbon monoxide fumes as some residents resorted to generators or barbecues to supply power and heat. As of Monday afternoon, 33 people had been treated for exposure to the gas. In the small community of St. Leolin on the Acadian Peninsula, Mayor Mathieu Chayer said the community of about 700 people has its power back, but is grieving the loss of an elderly resident. He said many people in the town knew 74-year-old Lorraine Clement, who RCMP said passed away on Thursday as a generator was in her garage. Investigators have said an autopsy has yet to be carried out in her death, or in the death of a 62-year-old man who investigators say died at his home in Petite Riviere de lile on Lameque Island as a generator was running. Chayer said the incidents leave a lasting impact on the small, close-knit Acadian towns, which havent seen an ice storm this severe for decades. Everybodys feeling sorrow about it ... She has family in the town, he said. The mayor said an emergency shelter was open in his town on Wednesday, hours after the storm hit, and that volunteer firefighters went door-to-door in an effort to check on older residents. We cant have 100-per-cent control of the community, he said. Chayer, a paramedic, said the deaths and hospitalizations have alerted residents in the region to the risks of running generators in enclosed spaces. I dont think most of the people before this realized how deadly carbon monoxide is and how quickly it can kill somebody, he said. During his news conference, Gallant said he heard from doctors that many of the poisoning victims were operating generators in garages with the door open, not realizing that doesnt provide sufficient ventilation. People will put things that emit carbon monoxide in garages thinking that if they open the door everything will be OK, but there is still the potential based on air flows of the emissions still going into their homes, said the premier. Read more about: SHARE: QUEBEC CITYThere was a well-known grocer who owned the store where most of the citys Muslims did their shopping. A university professor who taught alongside his wife. And a father of three who worked as a computer scientist for the Quebec government. Among the six killed in a shooting rampage at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec here Sunday night that left 19 others injured including two seriously were men who came from Guinea, from Algeria and from Morocco. They shared their faith; they shared a suburban mosque. Political leaders have deemed it a terrorist attack. Read the latest news on the Quebec mosque shooting Their lives and their families loss were mourned by thousands in the streets of this city, including Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and leaders from all opposition parties Monday evening. Muslim Canadians are an esteemed part of all our communities, said Trudeau at the vigil that was held at the base of the lEglise de Notre-Dame-de-Foy. They are home here. Thirteen-year-old Zineb Soufiane came to the vigil to honour her father, Azzeddine Soufiane, 57, the grocer and father-of-three who was killed. Take care of your parents because you never know what is going to happen, she said. Zineb held a sign that said Je taime, papa and sobbed as vigil organizers read out the names of the six dead. Similar vigils were held across the country. Quebec police have charged one person 27-year-old Alexandre Bissonnette with six counts of murder and an additional five counts of attempted murder with a restricted firearm in connection with the shooting rampage, according to documents filed at the Quebec City courthouse Monday. Prosecutors say the investigation is ongoing and did not rule the possibility of more charges, including terrorism-related offences. Bissonnette, who studied at the Universite Laval, appeared in court late Monday looking dishevelled as he stood beside a guard in a glass prisoners box. He looked down and said nothing. No plea was entered. Crown prosecutors told court the matter needed to return next month, to give Bissonnettes lawyer, Jean Petit, more time receive additional evidence. The number of suspects became a source of much confusion Monday. Early Monday morning, Quebec police told a press conference they had two men in custody they refused to name. In a surprising reversal later in the day, they tweeted out that the second man believed to have carried out the deadly assault was now being considered a witness. The second man initially in police custody, later cleared and released was identified as Mohamed Belkhadir. The 29-year-old, also a Universite Laval student, spent a nerve-wracking night in jail before terrorism investigators realized they had made an error. Belkhadir said Monday he was trying to give first aid to a friend who was on the ground. He saw someone carrying a gun and got scared so he ran. That person turned out to be a police officer. I got scared and I tried to flee, he said. But when I heard that I had to drop to the ground, I understood that it was the police ... When they saw me running they thought I was a suspect. The shots lasted only 15 to 20 seconds, said Belkhadir. Frantic 911 calls reporting shots fired at the mosque started coming in at 7:50 p.m. Sunday, police said. About 20 minutes later the suspect called the emergency services, told them he was near the LIle dOrleans Bridge, was armed and would co-operate. In the suburban neighbourhood of Cap-Rouge about 15 minutes from the mosque neighbours said police arrived at Bissonnettes residence around 9 a.m. Monday. Many said they were shocked to learn of his alleged involvement in the shooting. Rosalie Bussieres, 23, lives across the street. She told the Star her older brother was in school with Bissonnette. He was very solitary and very anti-social, said Bussieres. Bissonnette studied social sciences at the Universite Laval, according to a statement released late Monday. He was in both the Sainte-Foy and Universite Laval chess club with his twin brother, said Universite Laval professor Jean Sevigny, who said he knew Bissonnette and his brother through the club. I can only give you the impression I had and that was that he seemed, he gave the impression of being a very good person, said Sevigny, who last remembered seeing him in the fall of 2015. Bissonnettes Facebook profile was deleted at some point on Monday, but an archived screenshot of his Facebook page showed he liked a wide range of pages, including those of U.S. President Donald Trump, far-right French politician Marine Le Pen, and atheist scientist Richard Dawkins. He also liked several different video games, chess clubs and organizations at Universite Laval, as well as the federal NDP. Police said there were another 39 people inside the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec as Sunday prayers ended. The alleged assailant, said to be wearing a ski mask and carrying a gun, burst into the building and opened fire on the worshippers, according to witness accounts. The victims, all male, ranged in age from 39 to 60. Universite Laval Agriculture and Food Sciences professor Khaled Belkacemi, 60, was married to another professor in the department and had three children. Soufiane, the grocer and father of 13-year old Zineb, had two other children. He was described as an important member of the community who often helped newcomers. Abdelkrim Hassane, 41, was also a father of three. The Algerian native worked as a computer programmer for the Quebec government for the last three years. Before moving to Canada several years ago Aboubaker Thabti, 44, was a pharmacists aid, according to reports from a news outlet in his home country. Mamadou Tanou Barry, 42, and Ibrahima Barry, 39, were both natives of Guinea. Rest in peace my dead Tanu ... you will always be in our hearts, wrote Safie Barry on Facebook. Its a very, very big tragedy for us. We have a sadness we cannot express, said Mohamed Labidi, the vice-president of the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec. The president of the mosque, Mohamed Yangui, said there had been no recent threats or incidents targeting the mosque or members of the community, although there was one high-profile hate incident in which someone left a severed pigs head at the entrance to the community centre last June during Ramadan with a note reading: Bon appetit. Observant Muslims refrain from eating pork. On the floor of the Commons Monday, Trudeau called the shooting an act of terror that struck at the core of Canadas intrinsic values of openness and freedom. This was a group of innocents targeted for practicing their faith. Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack, Trudeau said, adding such senseless violence has no place in Canada. Canada has long been a diverse and accepting nation. We are kind, we are generous and we embrace one another not in spite of our differences but because of them. The prime minister urged people to try to be the best versions of ourselves in these dark hours. To the more than one million Muslims that reside in the country he said: We will grieve with you. We will defend you. We will love you and we will stand with you. The prime ministers speech was followed by several others from opposition party leaders, all of whom urged unity. Today our hearts are broken, but with love and hope we come together with the shared belief that we will overcome, said NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair. Rheal Fortin, leader of the Bloc Quebecois, expressed disbelief in his speech. How can someone do this? It simply does not make any sense, he said, adding. We stand with the families and friends who yesterday lost a loved one for nothing. In Toronto, Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne visited a downtown mosque and greeted noon worshippers as the call to prayers played over a public address system. No one should have to fear worshipping, the premier told reporters earlier in the day before heading to the Masjid Toronto mosque on Dundas St. Quebec City police, the provincial police, the RCMP and a team of national security investigators are now involved in the investigation into the shooting. Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said Monday there would be no change to Canadas national terrorism threat level. It remains at medium, as it has since October 2014, he said. Goodale called on Canadians to be vigilant and contact their local police service if they hear or see anything that makes you uneasy. But, he added, fear should not govern Canadas actions. We are the finest example of pluralism that world has ever known, he said. If terrorist motivations are proven by police, the Quebec City mosque massacre becomes only the second time since the 1985 Air India bombing that a terrorist plot will have been successfully carried out on Canadian soil. Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said there would be increased security at mosques and other places of worship throughout the province in the wake of the killings. The whole world is watching us today, Couillard said at a press conference Monday afternoon. Its our moment, together, to show who we are. The killings have sent shock waves throughout Quebec Citys Muslim community, but also across the province and the country. Flags at schools from the Peel District School board flew at half mast Monday and officials said they were working to get resources to schools to help with conversations with students, according to an email sent to all schools Monday. The Toronto District School Board released a statement reminding staff to promote a positive school climate and nurture seeds of inclusion. Messages of sympathy and condemnation also flooded in from politicians around the world, including from New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, French President Francois Hollande and Russian President Vladimir Putin. This murder of people who had gathered at a mosque to pray is staggering in its cruelty and cynicism, Putin said in a statement released Monday morning. Trudeau spoke with U.S. President Donald Trump, who expressed his condolences to Canadians following the attack. The City of Paris, home to several recent acts of terror, planned to turn off the Eiffel Towers lights starting at midnight to show a fraternal message to everyone in Quebec and in Canada, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said on twitter. At the vigil here Monday, Quebecer Catherine Lemieux, 20, brought a bouquet of flowers for the families of the victims. (Muslims) are like us; even if they wear a veil, even if they pray differently, she said. They have the same values as us. We are all human. News from Quebec City With files from Alicja Siekierska, Megan Dolski, Peter Goffin, Tonda MacCharles, Jacques Gallant, Rob Ferguson and The Canadian Press. Read more about: SHARE: OTTAWACanadian political leaders stood in the House of Commons Monday united first in words then silence to denounce violence and appeal for unity in the wake of Sundays Quebec City mosque massacre. As the Canadian flag on the Peace Tower flew at half mast, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the despicable act of terror last night in Quebec City. Speaking first in French then English, Trudeau said a group of innocents six people dead and many others seriously wounded were targeted for practicing their faith. Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack, said Trudeau. It was an attack on our most intrinsic and cherished values as Canadians values of openness, diversity, and freedom of religion. Terrorism is a loaded and specific criminal allegation that packs a legal, emotional and political wallop. This was an act of extreme violence directed against a particular group with the clear intent to intimidate and harm that group and to strike fear in their hearts, said Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale. In the definition in broad terms of terrorism, they were trying to inflict terror. And that fits the definition. Yet in the face of the American administrations leap to suggest the Canadian attack justified its extraordinary weekend immigration freeze and airport detention orders that affected travellers from seven predominately Muslim countries, Goodale asserted we dont have sufficient hard facts yet to be able to draw conclusions about motivation and the exact nature of this violent act. Trudeaus tough talk and calls for unity were echoed by four other opposition party leaders. They all spoke after Quebec provincial police announced only one of two persons arrested Sunday night was a suspect and the other merely designated a witness. U.S. President Donald Trump called Trudeau mid-morning to express sympathy after the shooting made headline news internationally. Trudeaus office said only that President Trump expressed his condolences to the prime minister and people of Canada following the tragic shooting at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec . . . and offered to provide any assistance as needed, according to a PMO statement. It made no mention of any other subjects the two leaders broached. Trudeaus government faces its most challenging days since the 2015 election in the wake of the stunning attack, sweeping airport detentions south of the border, and loud calls for Canada to step up and denounce Trumps moves on immigration, security and trade. The country that thought it was exempt from a U.S. presidential ban that stranded tens of thousands of Muslim travellers around the world was not exempt from violence that targeted Muslims. On Monday, Trudeau tried to bridge what appeared to be a growing divide. Speaking directly to the more than 1 million Canadians of Muslim faith, Trudeau said, We are with you, 36 million hearts are breaking with yours. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. This is your home. Conservative interim leader Rona Ambrose said the shooting has shocked the Quebec City region one of the safest in Canada and the entire country. This terrorist attack strikes at the very heart of one of the freedoms we cherish as Canadians, the right to practice ones faith, to worship without fear; it is the freedom to worship as you choose with your fellow believers in your community in safety and without fear, she said. The latest from Quebec City NDP Leader Tom Mulcair said the terrorist attack shook our country to its core and vowed to stand united and fight against hate, bigotry and Islamophobia and against those who peddle the politics of fear and division. Bloc Quebecois Leader Rheal Fortin said an unhealthy climate has taken hold in our society and across the western world, calling the Quebec City attack the latest example of a climate of distrust and intolerance. Theres not enough love, he said. Green Party leader Elizabeth May struggled to hold back tears as she echoed Fortins comments. It feels as if it couldnt possibly have happened, and yet it did. Across from Parliament Hill in Gatineau and in the U.S., police tightened security around mosques, and Goodale extended a deadline for religious and community centres to apply for extra federal money to enhance security. Trudeau cancelled participation in a Metis-Crown summit meeting and another planned speech. Instead, he invited opposition party leaders to travel with him to Quebec City in a display of political solidarity, underscoring how his immediate agenda has been overtaken. Read more about: SHARE: MONTREALEven as Canadas leaders were addressing the House of Commons to express their solidarity with the countrys grieving Muslim community on Monday, the White Houses press secretary was arguing that the murderous attack on a Quebec City mosque was a terrible reminder of why the president is taking steps to be proactive, not reactive on national security. Little, of course, could be further from the truth. If one were to connect dots between the shooting that left six dead at the mosque and Donald Trumps entry ban on citizens and refugees from a number of Muslim-majority countries, one would find a community that is having a target painted on its back by the worlds most powerful elected leader. It is a connection whose acknowledgment does not come easily to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau or, for that matter, to much of Canadas political class. Monday was a day for all leaders to vouch for and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the Muslim community. It will take a while to see how far they are willing to walk their talk. But by all indications, whistling past the graveyard will only work for so long. In dealing with the Trump administration, Trudeau has wanted to believe that actions will speak louder than words, that they will, in fact, act as a substitute for speaking out. In the face of questionable moves by the incoming American administration, he and his government would refrain from taking stances in a manner that could be construed as seeking a frontal collision with the White House. But they would stick with charting a distinct and contrary course for Canada. On that basis, Trudeau would tweet to commend the hundreds of Canadians who took part in post-inauguration marches in support of womens rights in the United States but not make a peep about the White Houses moves to make it harder for some of the worlds poorest women to secure safe abortions. The prime minister would use social media to showcase his governments embrace of Syrian refugees but offer no opinion about the abrupt suspension of the American participation in the humanitarian operation and the catastrophic domino effect it could have on international resettlement efforts. Canada would not even beg to differ in public with Trumps outlandish assertion that keeping out refugees, visitors and immigrants including green card holders from some Muslim-majority countries was necessary to keep the U.S. safe from attacks. Given that we share the same continent, it is hard to think of a government leader better placed to offer a rebuttal of that narrative than Canadas. But while Trudeau and many others in his government spent the past weekend reaffirming their attachment to Canadas diversity and their determination to continue to enrich it, they all steered well clear of rebutting the premises of the U.S. ban. That task fell to non-Liberals such as former Conservative immigration minister Jason Kenney. In a series of tweets on Saturday, he described Trumps executive order as a brutal ham-fisted act of demagogic political theatre and called on Republicans in the American congress to challenge it. In a statement issued on behalf of all Canadian universities on Sunday and calling for the ban to be ended immediately, their association pointedly noted that this was an issue that was too important to stay quiet on. Asked point blank to address the ban issue in question period on Monday, the prime minister skirted NDP Leader Thomas Mulcairs question and stuck to touting Canadas diversity. The problem with Canadas tongue-biting approach is that some actions speak louder than others, especially when they are those of a U.S. administration that is using the office of president as a bullhorn to equate Muslims with security threats. The refusal to engage beyond the very narrow scope of securing Canadian exemptions from measures that have negative planet-wide implications leaves the field wide open to those starting with the new administration who are only too eager to distort facts for their own purposes. Surely Trudeau did not see the White Houses appropriation of the Quebec City tragedy as fodder for its controversial entry ban coming. Chances are this will not be the last time he is blindsided by his U.S. vis-a-vis. It was always a given that there would be limits to the lengths the Trudeau government could go to in its quest for a transactional relationship with the Trump administration. But few expected those limits to be reached over a matter of little more than a single week. And yet they have. Chantal Hebert is a national affairs writer. Her column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Read more about: SHARE: Yes, you can transfer your domain to any registrar or hosting company once you have purchased it. Since domain transfers are a manual process, it can take up to 5 days to transfer the domain. Domains purchased with payment plans are not eligible to transfer until all payments have been made. Please remember that our 30-day money back guarantee is void once a domain has been transferred. For transfer instructions to GoDaddy, please click here. City council is being asked to put pressure on the federal government to do more this week with hundreds of Torontonians willing to sponsor Syrian refugees while the United States remains in turmoil over President Donald Trumps temporary ban on immigration to the U.S. from certain predominantly Muslim countries. Councillor Joe Cressy, whose motion on this weeks council agenda calls on the government to do whats necessary to settle Syrian families fleeing continuing violence, says there are two issues: The delay in processing refugees approved for sponsorship, and the new cap imposed by the government on the number of refugees that can be privately sponsored. Weve had Toronto families come forward en masse to support and settle Syrian refugees and its taking an unacceptable amount of time for refugees to be processed and brought to Canada, Cressy said. Although he filed his motion before Donald Trumps executive order for extreme vetting of would-be immigrants from seven countries, including Syria, Cressy said Toronto and Canada must react quickly. I think its incumbent on Toronto to, not only reaffirm its place as a welcoming city, but do more to welcome people who are fleeing persecution and violence, he said. When one country closes its borders, another must open its own wider. Cressy said settlement groups have been told that the federal government lacks resources on the ground to process resettlement applications quickly. Questions to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada went unanswered at deadline. In December, the grassroots group Canada4Refugees said after 13,500 refugees had sponsorship applications submitted on their behalf before the end of March, fewer than a third of those people had arrived in Canada. For others looking to become sponsors, their applications have stalled. According to the federal governments immigration website, nearly 40,000 Syrian refugees had been resettled as of Jan. 2, nearly 14,000 through private sponsorship. Of those, 5,925 refugees arrived in Toronto, 3,234 from private sponsorship. There are currently 17,912 applications that have not yet been processed. In December, former Citizenship and Immigration Minister John McCallum controversially announced the government would place a cap of 1,000 Syrian and Iraqi refugees who could be privately sponsored in 2017, citing the processing backlog. That cap was reached on Jan. 25. Lifeline Syria, a Toronto-based organization helping private sponsors, says they now have 50 sponsor groups whose applications cant be processed because of the government-imposed cap. There is a huge demand, said the Lifeline Syria spokesperson Monday. Another 2,000 people, she said, had applied to be part of a sponsorship group, which must consist of at least five people. Lifeline Syria was anticipating more interest in sponsorship following news over the weekend of the temporary U.S. ban. Following Trumps signing of the ban, Mayor John Tory sent a statement Saturday night saying he was proud of the citys legacy of acceptance and inclusion. We understand that, as Canadians, we are almost all immigrants, and that no one should be excluded on the basis of their ethnicity or nationality, said Tory in the statement, adding that he had reached out to Citizenship and Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen to offer any help and support the city can provide in light of recent events. Tory, who is part of a group sponsoring a refugee family, said Monday that the familys arrival has been delayed. There are a lot of complications involved in having them come, and Im frustrated by that, as somebody who wants to help people who want to come here, he told reporters in his office. Its just one of those things where I think we have to be as patient, on the one hand, but perhaps try to increase our efforts, on the other, to make sure were doing as much as we possibly can. Read more about: SHARE: Employees lose $45 million in potential earnings each week because legal loopholes exclude them from basic workplace rights like overtime pay, holiday pay, vacation pay and even minimum wage, a government-commissioned study shows. Almost two million Ontario employees are not eligible for at least one of these entitlements, the research submitted to the Ministry of Labour found. That is because the provinces employment legislation the main source of protection for the majority of workers contains more than 85 special rules that exclude some jobs from minimum standards. For example, building superintendents are not entitled to minimum wage, rest periods or overtime pay. Neither are farm workers. Construction employees arent entitled to time off between shifts, termination pay or severance pay. Removing the special rules would translate on average to an 8-per-cent pay raise for workers, according to the research. The study, written by York University professors Leah Vosko and Mark Thomas and Ryerson University sociologist Andrea Noack, shows disadvantaged workers are most likely to be exempt from basic rights. These include low-wage and temp workers, women, aboriginals, young people and new Canadians. Its health physical and mental. And also another thing is you feel a constant struggle, said Beixi Liu, 53, who spent years working through temp agencies when he moved to Canada from China in 2000. Really its a financial squeeze, added Liu, who is now an organizer for the Toronto-based Workers Action Centre. You really have to stretch every single dollar, Liu said. Ontarios Employment Standards Act was originally designed to create a basic, universal floor of rights for workers. But existing loopholes mean that less than 40 per cent of Ontario employees are now fully covered by it, according to the latest study, which draws on Statistics Canada data. The loopholes exist largely in response to employer concerns over the effects of (universal minimum standards) on industry, the study says. In a statement to the Star, the Ministry of Labour said its special advisers were thoroughly reviewing all submissions and commissioned research as part of the Changing Workplaces Review. That process, which started in 2015, aims to update legislation to better reflect the rise of insecure work. The ministry is committed to responding to the changing nature of work while continuing to protect workers and support business in todays economy, the statement added. Karl Baldauf, vice president of policy and government relations at the Ontario Chamber of Commerce which has launched a campaign against the proposed updates called Keep Ontario Working said sometimes exemptions were necessary, for example to recognize the distinct demands of entrepreneurial culture in knowledge-based sectors like IT. Keep Ontario Working believes that abolishing sector exemptions would mark a significant and unacceptable change from Ontarios long-standing approach to employment standards legislation, he said. Regulatory reform that raises thresholds only to reduce the ability of business to invest in and grow the labour force is counterproductive, he said. Baldauf added that some exemptions should be evaluated and modified if necessary if the conditions that existed to justify an exemption to the norm no longer exist. But the study says there are considerable consequences to legal loopholes, in the form of both economic and social costs experienced by individual employees, their families and the province as a whole. The social costs of exemptions and special rules include pressures on work-life balance, which may be particularly acute for employees with dependent children and for single parents, it says. The Star has reported extensively on the rise and impact of precarious employment; in the GTA, some 52 per cent of workers now experience some form of insecurity in their jobs, according to research by the United Way and McMaster University. In addition to massive lost wages, exemptions create social costs to workers health and work-life balance, said Mary Gellatly of Parkdale Community Legal Services, which runs a workers rights division. The Employment Standards Act must provide a universal floor that prevents employers from pushing workers below the socially acceptable minimum standards, particularly those in precarious work. The governments special advisers are expected to make their final recommendations on the Changing Workplaces Review in the coming weeks, with legislative reform expected to be formally introduced at Queens Park this fall. For Liu, the reforms are about thriving, living, and prosperity. That (money) translates into purchasing power, he said. Thats really good. Thats good for the economy. Thats good even for business. SHARE: For years, the only skate park Ariel Stagni had was the concrete and metal of the financial district. Its railings and stairwells transformed into the perfect space for kick flips, grinds and ollies until, inevitably, a security guard appeared with the typical scolding. There was a lot of Dont do that here and You cant skateboard here. Me and my buddies were like, Where are we supposed to go? he recalls. They instead turned inward to their garages and converted plywood and junkyard finds into their own makeshift skate parks. That was the experience of a lot of people skateboarding, says Stagni, now 41 and a skateboard consultant. A lot of it was finding a place or making a place. But now, as the public park movement grows to become more inclusive of varying demographics and cultures, Stagni and his community are seeing more spaces for themselves. There are now over a dozen skate parks spanning from Etobicoke to Scarborough. The movement has gathered steam in recent months, with the citys October unveiling of a Skateboard Strategy, which outlines how the city can transform spaces into a skaters paradise. One of the key features is the inclusion and consultation of groups such as the Toronto Skateboarding Committee, of which Stagni is a founding member. For his part, Stagni gave a face to the movement at Saturdays Park Summit, Park Peoples annual community event in its seventh year. Its all part of inclusivity, says Dave Harvey, executive director of Park People. With the skateboard parks weve seen around Toronto theyre packed. Its not just about having them use the parks, but have them design them. While there are more skate parks than ever, Toronto still lags behind other Canadian cities, according to city research, and they arent always built the way the skater community would like. The otherwise much-lauded Underpass Park, an initiative by Waterfront Toronto unveiled in 2012, is one of those spots. Nobody likes it. It is what it is, says Migs Bartula, another member of the Toronto Skateboarding Committee. As far as Bartula and Stagni are aware, no one with skateboarding expertise was consulted for the project, which is maligned among Toronto skateboarders. Many complain that the contraction joints made in the concrete to avoid random cracking are too wide and too many and that the ramps are prefabricated instead of permanent concrete, which many in the skateboarding community prefer. It falls short of what skateboarders are expecting now, Stagni says, which is why inclusivity in all stages is key in park development. As a permanent installation, we dont think it does the skateboarding community justice. Still, the atmosphere at the Park Summit was spirited and optimistic among the hundred attendees, including community members, visitors and city councillors, filling the hall at the Daniels Spectrum building. City councillor Mary-Margaret McMahon called it the most uplifting, euphoric event you could ever go to and similar to a legal high, she joked. Also among presenters were an African sing- and dance-along performance from local performers Lua Shayenne and Walter Maclean, in support of bringing the arts to city parks, and an emotional presentation from members of Vancouvers parks board about indigenous inclusion. At one point during the summit, an old phrase flashed on the screen: When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. For Stagni, thats precisely what his community has been doing for decades, with or without its own parks. Its about seeing spaces differently. There are all these rules, but skateboarders show up and ask, What can I do with that bench? They take a utilitarian approach, he says. Toronto is such a gem there is such a rich of concentration of awesome spaces for skateboarding. SHARE: More than eight years after Israeli tank fire sundered his family forever, a Palestinian medical doctor now living in Toronto will finally have his day in court. Its time for Israel to take responsibility and apologize, Izzeldin Abuelaish told the Star in an interview. A celebrated advocate for peace, Abuelaish, 61, has spent nearly a decade trying to right at least a few of the wrongs committed in a terrible war, the three-week Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip that began on Dec. 27, 2008, and ended on Jan. 18, 2009. Known to Israelis as Operation Cast Lead, the invasion sought to punish Palestinians for almost daily rocket fire from Gaza into southern Israel. The operation claimed more than 1,400 Palestinian lives, many of them civilians, including three of Abuelaishs daughters and a niece. Thirteen Israelis also died. Soon, if all goes according to plan, Abuelaish will finally have a chance to offer his testimony in a courthouse in the Israeli city of Beersheba, where he will back up his claims against the Israeli state. He seeks a formal apology from Israel as well as financial compensation. The doctors testimony is scheduled to be heard on March 15, more than six years after he launched a lawsuit against the Israeli Defense Ministry, an action he was forced to take when Israel refused to apologize or pay damages voluntarily. Despite the severe outcome, from a legal standpoint our stance is that the operation during which Dr. Abuelaishs family members were hurt (sic) was an operation of war, Ahaz Ben-Ari, then legal adviser to the Israeli Defense Ministry, said at the time. Therefore the State of Israel does not carry the responsibility for the damage it caused. Israels position has remained unchanged since then. For the gynecologist and his family, the worst moments of the conflict unreeled during its waning hours, in the late afternoon of Jan. 16, when a pair of shells fired by an Israeli tank blasted through a wall of their residence in northern Gaza, killing three of Abuelaishs daughters Bassan, 20, Mayar, 15, and Aya, 13 as well as his 14-year-old niece, named Nour. Another daughter Shatha, then 16 lost sight in one eye during the attack. Another niece Ghaida, then 14 was permanently disabled. Their deaths attracted international attention at once, partly because of Abuelaishs prominence as a champion of peace in the region and partly because the doctor immediately got on the phone to Israeli TV journalist Shlomi Eldar. Abuelaishs frantic pleas for help were broadcast live on Israeli TV and soon went global via various Internet websites. In a paradox that seems quintessentially Middle Eastern, the doctors wounded daughter and niece, both victims of the Israeli attack, were soon receiving state-of-the-art medical treatment at a hospital near Tel Aviv. His wife, Nadia, was not obliged to endure those terrors. She died of leukemia about four months before the Israeli attack. Soon after the tragedy, Abuelaish and his surviving family, including three daughters and two sons, traded Gaza for Toronto, where the doctor accepted a standing offer to work as a professor of medicine at the University of Toronto, a post he still holds. I have made many mistakes in life, he told the Star, but I am proud of my decision to come to the University of Toronto. His two eldest living daughters, Dalal and Shatha, recently graduated from the U of Ts engineering school a mostly male bastion of learning and now hold down good jobs in their fields. His younger children are also doing well. Following his daughters deaths, Abuelaish wrote a book about his life and his familys losses entitled I Shall Not Hate. He has continued to promote the cause of peace between Israelis and Palestinians. He attributes the slow progress of his lawsuit to bureaucracy, but his lawyer in Israel says other factors may be at work. The Israeli legal system is not efficient when it deals with Palestinians, Hussein Abu Hussein wrote in an email to the Star. There are endless hindrances they put in front of them. In order to launch his lawsuit, Abuelaish was required to post a bond of 20,000 new Israeli shekels for each of his daughters and his niece. That is equivalent to about $28,000 in total. Abu Hussein said a ruling might be issued by the end of this year, but it could be appealed by either side, leading to several more years of litigation. Meanwhile, Abuelaish has set up a foundation in memory of his daughters and niece, called Daughters for Life. He intends to use any financial compensation from Israel to further the foundations goals, which include eventually building schools for young women in the Middle East, as well as a school for First Nations women in Canada. He has not set a fixed amount of compensation he seeks from Israel, content to leave that up to the Israeli courts. Still, he was heartened last year when Israel agreed to pay a reported $20 million (U.S.) in compensation for the 10 lives lost in a 2010 Israeli attack on a Turkish vessel, the Mavi Marmara, that was carrying human-rights activists to Gaza. Israel also formally apologized to Turkey for the incident. Abuelaish sees that development as a possible precedent for his case. I will never give up, he told the Star. I will never forget my daughters. I am living for them. Read more about: SHARE: Premier Kathleen Wynne has recognized the provinces role in fixing crumbling social housing, Mayor John Tory said after their first meeting since her flip-flop on road tolls soured their once-cozy political relationship. The city's housing understanding with the province has fundamentally changed, Tory told reporters at city hall, after he declined to jointly answer questions with Wynne, as has been the custom after their monthly meetings at Queens Park. Her surprise refusal last week to pass a regulation allowing Toronto toll the Don Valley Parkway and Gardiner Expressway tested their trust and would have made such an appearance awkward, Tory said. Without all the cash that road tolls would bring estimated between $160 million and $330 million depending on the toll rate Tory said he made clear the province must contribute to a more-than-$1.6 billion repairs backlog for Toronto Community Housing. I'm encouraged, possibly for the first time since I've been the mayor, that this morning after our meeting the premier acknowledged that the province will have to be a partner going forward with us, the mayor said. The acknowledgment itself is significant after years of provincial downloading of social housing costs onto the city. Wynne, Tory said, was not specific on funding contributions. But the mayor said his expectation is that the province match dollars expected from the federal government when a second phase of infrastructure spending is announced sometime later this year. Both governments were originally asked to contribute some $860 million each to the 10-year, $2.6-billion repairs plan. The city itself will have spent nearly $1 billion on repairs by the end of this year. The Star earlier reported that without more funding, 425 units are slated for closure in 2017 bringing the total number of shuttered homes to nearly 1,000 with more than 177,000 people on the list for subsidized housing. TCH's CEO Greg Spearn said a unit per day will close in 2018 if more funding is not forthcoming. At Queens Park, Wynne stressed that helping the city meet its affordable housing needs is a priority. The mayor and I talked about this in the context of housing dollars and housing is something that we often touch on in our meetings and we agreed that the municipality, the province and the federal government working together as we move into this budget cycle, Wynne said. It is going to be very important for us to make it clear to one another, us to the federal government, municipalities to us, and to the federal government, that we need a three-way partnership on affordable housing, she said, noting since the Liberals were elected in 2003, Queen's Park has spent $1.1 billion on affordable housing. Tory confirmed that, as the Star reported Sunday, Wynnes office has led him to believe Toronto would be getting a boost in gas-tax revenues plus regulations to allow tolling of the Gardiner Expressway and Don Valley Parkway after SmartTrack and Regional Express Rail lines are built. Tory said the understanding, from September when Wynne told him she wouldnt block tolls until she called Jan. 18 to do just that, was: We would have benefited from both gas tax money and from toll money a double jackpot for the city. Asked if Wynne was being honest when she publicly suggested the gas tax had essentially replaced the toll revenue, Tory demurred, saying he wants to fix their relationship. I don't think this is about a broken relationship, I know it's not, Wynne, who had faced a revolt over Torontos toll plans from some 905-belt MPPs, told reporters. This is about a disagreement on a particular issue and I know he's not happy and I understand that. With files from Robert Benzie and David Rider Read more about: SHARE: Hundreds of people shut down University Avenue outside the U.S. Consulate in Toronto Monday for a demonstration in response to the immigration policies of U.S. President Donald Trump. Protesters began lining the sidewalk outside the consulate on around 8 a.m., but quickly spread into the street. They carried signs with slogans that read, Do not scapegoat Muslim people, We will not go quietly, and Help refugees escape war. Nazerah Shaikh, her daughter and her three nieces carried signs reading: The 6ix supports the Seven, and including the flags of the seven predominantly Muslim countries against which Trump has leveled travel bans and restrictions. Were disgusted and sad. Thats why were here, Shaikh said. We do have close friends in Detroit who had to cancel travel plans because of these policies. Their citizenship is pending, and they have family here that they want to come and see, but theyre not sure they can. Torontos protest occurred alongside a similar one in Ottawa where about 2,000 people formed a human chain around the U.S. Embassy, braving freezing temperatures. In Toronto, many of the protesters sat in the southbound lanes of University Avenue, where they chanted, No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here as police officers looked on. Others jumped and stamped their feet to keep warm in the frigid weather. Organizer Dave Meslin said the protest had also become an impromptu vigil for the six victims of the Quebec mosque shooting on Sunday night. Sympathies and condolences with our Muslim brothers and sisters in Quebec. We want to be a sanctuary city, said Ahmad Gaied, an organizer with the Ontario Federation of Labour. Gaied is the son of a first-generation Libyan immigrant family. He said amid the Trump-like rhetoric in Canada from Conservative leadership hopeful Kellie Leitch and others, its important to remember what Canadian values really mean. Leitch has drawn criticism for advocating screening of potential newcomers for so-called Canadian values. My parents love this country, Ahmad said, who was wearing a Libyan flag as a cape, and I love this country just as much. Everyone is welcome here and no one is illegal. The protest remained peaceful all morning, disrupted only once by an irate man shouting that the protesters were hypocrites who couldnt see the danger of what he called extreme Islam countries. The man, who refused to give his name, got into a number of shouting matches with demonstrators before being asked to leave. The crowd moved to Nathan Phillips Square around 9 a.m., where the no hate, no fear chant continued in front of Toronto city hall for about 30 minutes, before the demonstrators made their way back to the consulate. Karl Gardner, an organizer with activist group No One Is Illegal, said Canadians and Torontonians need to be vigilant and not take the citys multiculturalism for granted. Right now we have a sanctuary city policy on the books, but implementation and accountability have not been followed through with, Gardner said. A sanctuary city policy is one where municipalities agree not to report undocumented migrants or ask about a persons immigration status during encounters with city staff. But Gardner said Torontos policy exists in name only, and needs to be backed up with stronger transparency around exactly what measures are being taken to enforce it. We have no idea what training is being provided to (city staff) to not ask about immigration status, and to not tell on people to the Canadian Border Services Agency if their status does become known, Gardner said. We need to turn this from a policy into a practice. A big hole is the Toronto police refusing to come into the sanctuary city mandate, he said. Todays demonstration followed a social media callout over the weekend, which was spurred by Trumps order to ban travel to the U.S. from seven predominately Muslim nations. In response, the consulate said that most consular services were suspended for the day in Toronto, including visa and citizen services. Despite the crowd size in Ottawa, a spokesman for the embassy said that services continued uninterrupted on Monday. Even demonstrations intended to be peaceful can turn confrontational and escalate into violence, the consulates statement said. You should avoid areas of demonstrations, and exercise caution if in the vicinity of any large gatherings, protests, or demonstrations, the statement said. With files from Emily Mathieu SHARE: Every time the issue of police brutality against blacks comes up the question of black-on-black crime looms like a brick wall against which to bang your head. Even when black people harm other blacks, they do so for the same depraved reasons as do criminals of other races, NOT for being black. This fundamental difference between violence inflicted by police and by other blacks is the root of racial discontent and fear. That should be the end of the argument, but the idea of black-on-black crime as a legitimate issue is so insidiously ingrained in peoples psyches that it leaves them with a bad case of chronic supremacy. Unpack the term and it leads to the suggestion and even belief that blacks are more prone to criminality and violence, that if they want change, they must change, and that, really, they have only themselves to blame. This kind of victim-shaming has many shortcomings, but a couple stick out: 1) It has no basis in fact, i.e. it doesnt exist. Are there more black criminals than others, as a percentage of the population? In Canada we dont know. As with any community, the vast majority of people are law-abiding. We also know that most pedophiles are white. Does that mean that every time theres a case of such a crime that all white males deserve to be stereotyped, and stopped and searched? University of Toronto criminologist Scott Wortley had asked the Star, back in 2002. Regrettably, Canada does not record race-based crime statistics, although our southern neighbour does. The FBI crime report (2014) says when it comes to violent arrests, whites accounted for 59.4 per cent of those arrests. FBI studies show crime is racially segregated most people are killed or maimed by someone they know. The percentage of whites murdered by whites mirrors that of blacks by blacks. Supposed black criminality has been used over centuries to justify slavery, resist reconstruction, rationalize segregation and fight against civil rights. By the 80s, the war on drugs and tough on crime mantras were euphemisms for war on blacks. Popular culture did everything in its power to perpetuate the myth. (Think the godawful 1915 D.W. Griffith film Birth of a Nation.) Science, though, found no evidence to back it up. Over the years, researchers found high rates of delinquency among black juveniles, but could not conclude they are higher than for whites, even in poorer areas. This was because it is impossible to replicate the racial barriers to upward mobility, argued Chicago researchers Clifford Shaw and Henry McKay in 1942. Even today, at similarly low-incomes, blacks and whites live in vastly different environments in which to raise their children. 2) It epitomizes fear-based racial typecasting. The concept of blacks as criminals exposes the rejection of blacks as individual humans strong and intelligent as well as weak and flawed and espousal of them as a threatening mass of thugs who need to be kept in check. The double standard becomes obvious with incidents such as the Toronto police clampdown of G20 protests in June 2010. Human rights activists, the public and the media slammed police for using excessive force and criminalizing lawful protesters. Now imagine, if instead of outrage, the reaction was indifference, and that people supported the idea that the predominantly white protesters deserved what they got, given the prevalence of white-on-white crime. Police had recently nabbed Russell Williams, a hotshot military commander, no less, for stalking, raping and murdering, arrested two white men for allegedly stealing from the dying in hospitals, and were part of a cross-border gun raid that led to the arrest of the white kingpin of a massive criminal organization. This and more against the constant background hum of crimes associated with white biker gangs and mobsters. Surely, the protesters had stretched police patience and resources thin. No? Blacks are not any more homogenous than are whites, yet the illogical co-relation between the actions of criminals and police brutality is stridently promoted. Forget criminals, the attitude extends to do-gooders as well. While white rights advocates are encouraged, or tolerated, and in any case, accommodated, for exercising their democratic right to free speech, black activists are labelled murderers and terrorists. On Monday evening, the fiery young activists from Black Lives Matter Toronto held an hour-long Facebook live video chat following news that Pride members had voted to ban police floats from their parade. They spoke of how, even at Pride 2016, where they were the honoured guests, police questioned their presence and asked to see their Pride permits. These university-educated social disruptors who have channeled their rage to fight for equality are maligned because their confidence intimidates people. We represent possibility. Possibility is what is denied to so many of us. Every day. BLM-TO co-founder Janaya Khan said. Such statements threaten to upend the existing hierarchy of power. For those taking refuge in what about black-on-black crime arguments, that is beyond tolerance. Clarification Feb. 3, 2017: In an earlier version of this article, I had stated: Are there more black criminals than others, as a percentage of the population? No, say criminologists. The correct answer in Canada is, we don't know, as we don't collect the data. In answer to the question, Are blacks inherently predisposed to criminality? criminologists have said no. Shree Paradkar tackles issues of race and gender. You can follow her @shreeparadkar SHARE: Refugee advocates are calling on Ottawa to immediately suspend a U.S.-Canada bilateral pact that bans refugees from crossing the border for asylum, arguing the United States is no longer safe for refugees. The Safe Third Country Agreement came into effect in 2004 to prevent refugees from making asylum claims in both countries, clogging up the system. It has significantly slashed the number of claims lodged on both sides of the border. The U.S. was never safe for all refugees and is now even less safe, said Janet Dench of the Canadian Council for Refugees. Withdrawing from the agreement would mean all asylum seekers currently in the U.S. could access Canadas refugee system without having to risk their lives by turning to human smugglers, she added. On Friday, U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order that restricts immigration from seven majority-Muslim countries, halts all refugee admission for 120 days and bans all Syrian refugees indefinitely. The seven countries targeted are Iraq, Iran, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya and Yemen. Not only are the measures affecting travellers to the U.S. but also permanent residents of the U.S., so-called green-card holders. With the 2017 intake of 110,000 refugees slashed by Trump to 50,000, advocates and critics are urging the Trudeau government to step up and fill the void along with other refugee resettlement countries. Clearly Trump is putting his money where his mouth is, most regrettably, said Queens University immigration law professor Sharry Aiken. Given the governments suggestion to revisit the use of torture on U.S. territories and the travel ban, it will be suspect for Canada to have any collaboration with the U.S. administration. The call for the suspension of the agreement is echoed by Amnesty International, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association and the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers. A United Nations Refugee Agency representative in Ottawa said the agency is actively engaging the Trump administration in a constructive dialogue but would not comment on the call to halt the safe country agreement. Some of these measures may impact Canada. We are closely monitoring the situation and are confident that Canada will continue to be responsive to the plight of refugees, and allow those seeking asylum to avail themselves of mechanisms in place to seek protection, said Jean-Nicolas Beuze. Under the pact, either the U.S. or Canada can initiate a three-month suspension, but must give a six-month notice to rescind the deal. American officials in Canada would not comment the prospect of ending the bilateral agreement. Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen did not respond to the Stars requests for comment. Kathleen Newland, co-founder of the Washington-based Migration Policy Institute, said she believed Trumps executive orders would have little immediate impact on Canada as both the travel by Muslim visitors and refugee admissions are temporary measures. What concerns her most is the drastic cut to the U.S. refugee resettlement program. The United States has the biggest resettlement program in the world. Its not easy to replace, she noted. Anna Ireland of the Jericho Road Community Health Centre, which runs the Vive La Casa refugee shelter in Buffalo, N.Y., said any program that will make Canada more open to refugees is welcome. All the changes in our immigration and stuff going on have caused a lot of fear and anxiety not just in the refugee population, but among those with status. Any immigrant, legal or undocumented, has fear, said Ireland, whose shelter provides information to help claimants legally seek protection in Canada. However, Ireland said she would not encourage people to cross the border unless they have a solid case in Canada because of the uncertainty over what might happen if they are turned back to the U.S. amid the chaos. Amnesty International Canada welcomed Prime Minister Justin Trudeaus general commitment to refugee protection over the weekend, but said its time to back that up with concrete measures. The assault on fundamental human rights norms with respect to refugee protection, equality, fairness and religious freedom in the United States this week has been staggering and has rightly attracted condemnation around the world, said Alex Neve, secretary general of the groups English branch. It would be unconscionable, immoral and unlawful for Canada to pretend that the United States remains a safe partner for the purposes of refugee protection. Designation of the United Sates as a safe third country must be rescinded with immediate effect. Read more about: SHARE: Calling the Quebec City attack a cowardly act of terror, Premier Kathleen Wynne visited a downtown Toronto mosque to offer words of comfort to Muslims and send a broader message. There should be no fear, ever, of worshipping your god, our god, here in Ontario or in Canada, a sombre Wynne told dozens of men after noon prayers at the busy Masjid mosque. There is no place for the kind of violence that would make people fear of going to their place of worship, she added. We are all shocked. All of us feel that shock. RELATED: Canadian leaders drop partisanship to denounce Quebec mosque attack Wynne told the crowd she spoke earlier in the day to Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard to express condolences and said the crime hits hard in a multicultural society such as Canada. Were not different. Were the same . . . ; except for indigenous peoples, every single one of us came from somewhere else. We came from another country, another place, to build this open society. The mosques imam, Wael Shehab, said the premiers hour-long visit to greet worshippers on their way in and speak to them afterwards, before a bevy of television cameras and media, was a key symbol on a sad day. Its very important for everyone here to know and to understand that we Canadians, together, are united against hatred, against violence, Shehab told reporters. As Muslims, we know its unfair to blame and unjust to blame communities for the mistakes and the crimes of some individuals . . . . Violence has no religion. Terrorism has no religion. The mosques director said officials will consider asking police for more protection or will hire more security, to add to the closed-circuit cameras already in place, but noted theres only so much that can be done. We are concerned about all mosques and we ask them to be careful and to be vigilant, said Tantawy Attia. It is not the security of the places; it is the people. The more education, the more tolerance, to each other. This will solve the problem, he added. Wynne echoed that sentiment. We have a responsibility to stand together to continue to make it clear what we stand for in this country and in this province, she said to worshippers. That is love and, beyond tolerance, acceptance and understanding of one another. It is because we are different that we are strong. Attia said it is important for all Muslims to stand tall in the wake of the tragedy. They should not be afraid. They should come out even more these days to show that we are not scared and will continue to be good citizens of this country. Read more about: SHARE: They began to torture the men. We could hear their cries. A man entered the church and said if we knew how to pray, we should start to pray. Ramiro Osorio Cristales one of just four survivors Ramiro Osorio Cristales was just 5 years old on the day the Earth stood still. Now, 31 years later, he remembers the events of that day Dec. 7, 1982 with almost preternatural clarity. When he speaks to a reporter on the phone, Osorio has only recently returned to Canada from a late-September journey to Riverside, Calif., where he testified as the final witness for the prosecution at the trial of Jorge Sosa Orantes, a former Guatemalan army officer and alleged war criminal. I dont feel hate, Osorio says. I dont live with hate. He does live with sadness, however sadness and a quantity of fear. Who in his place would not? More than three decades after that grim day, Osorio agrees to tell his story on two conditions: that his Canadian hometown not be revealed, and that his wife and their two youngsters not be identified. I really feel a tremendous sadness. How can someone who is supposed to protect the people of Guatemala do a massacre of this magnitude? What follows is the story of three men one, a survivor of war crimes; the other two, alleged war criminals whose lives have continued to intersect over the years, ever since the Earth stood still one day in an Indian village called Dos Erres, in a remote region of northern Guatemala known as the Peten. This is also a tale about the slow pace of justice, the long reach of memory, and the mysterious ways in which an atrocitys horror can be tempered, at least a little, by time and hope. Two of the men in this story are now Canadian citizens. They werent then. A life changed forever It was at night, says Osorio, as he recalls those terrifying hours when his life changed forever. We had gone to bed. He means his mother and father, himself and his seven siblings. He also means the other residents of Dos Erres, all asleep, none dreaming of what was to come. Not long before sunrise, roughly 20 Guatemalan soldiers advanced into the village on foot, all of them members of an elite combat force known as the kaibiles. More troops, about 40, set up a security perimeter on the outskirts of the hamlet so that no one could enter or escape. By the time the soldiers departed the following afternoon, only four villagers were still breathing Osorio and three others. More than 200 people were murdered, an atrocity that would sear itself into Guatemalas collective memory as possibly the most brutal among hundreds of similar massacres committed by the military during that countrys civil war of the 1980s and 90s. For many years, the massacre at Dos Erres remained a terrible secret, its grisly details buried as deeply as the corpses of those who had been mutilated and murdered. Residents of neighbouring villages suspected the truth but kept silent out of a desperate fear. That dread was the central purpose of the whole murderous enterprise. It was the savage logic of the war, a conflict waged in large part by striking terror into the hearts and minds of the innocent. In all, upwards of 200,000 people are believed to have perished in Guatemalas long civil war, most of them Mayan Indians who dwelled in mud-brick villages scattered across northern Guatemala near the border with Mexico. There, it was easy for leftist rebels to proselytize for support among a population that had long been neglected or oppressed. The armys brutal strategy against Indian targets also reflected a deeply ingrained racism typical of Central Americas civil wars of the 1980s, in which mainly indigenous soldiers were loosed upon mainly indigenous victims. It was Indians who were forced to do most of the killing and most of the dying. The outrages committed on Dec. 7, 1982, would become known as the massacre at Dos Erres. They are, in one sense, an old story, brutal acts that were carried out long ago. In another sense, their terror resonates and will go on reverberating as long as anyone with firsthand memories continues to draw breath. Huddled in a church I heard a knock at the door, says Osorio. With that knock, the horrors commenced. First, the invaders roused all the villagers. The men were hauled to the school; the women and children were taken to the church. In the church, there were many people, says Osorio, who huddled there with his mother and his brothers and sisters, none of them older than 15. Some were crying. We didnt know what was happening. It was not long before they understood. They began to torture the men, he says. We could hear their cries. A man entered the church and said if we knew how to pray, we should start to pray. The indictment handed down against Jorge Sosa by a federal grand jury in Orange County, Calif., in September 2010 captures the barbarity of the ensuing events in just a few gruesome images. During the course of (their) interrogations, the special patrol proceeded to systematically kill the men, women and children at Dos Erres by, among other methods, hitting them in the head with a sledgehammer and throwing them into a well, said the indictment. Members of the special patrol also forcibly raped many of the women and girls at Dos Erres before killing them. The indictment does not mention what was done to the pregnant women, but here is a one-sentence excerpt from an account of the massacre assembled by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in 2009: The cruelty displayed by the soldiers reached the point where they caused abortions to pregnant women by beating them or even jumping on their abdomen until the fetus came out, miscarried. Osorio was too young to understand much of what was happening, except that it was both terrifying and deadly. I remember there were pregnant women, he says. They took them out in the direction of a well that was behind the church. When they came for my mother, we hung on to her. She pleaded, For the pity of God ... They gave no consideration to her words. The soldiers took her away, in the direction of the well, along with all her children, save one. All I heard was my mother crying, Dont kill my children. By some trick of fate, when the screams died down, Osorio found himself in the church, alive and all but alone. Three others would also survive the massacre, including two boys, aged 3 and 12. A fourth villager, an adult, was away from Dos Erres at the time, tending a relatives fields, and so survived as well. Eventually, Osorio fell asleep, curled up on one of the churchs wooden pews. It would turn out that he and the 3-year-old had been selected for adoption. The soldiers took us away that afternoon, Osorio remembers. They took us up into the mountains. We walked for two or three days. They fed us beans and tamales and honey. Eventually, a blue-and-white helicopter landed. It picked up the young survivors and their captors and flew to a military school in the Peten. Eventually, Osorio was taken under the wing of an instructor at the school, a sergeant named Santos Lopez Alonso who had participated in the attack at Dos Erres. He wanted to present the child as a gift to his mother-in-law, Rufina Garcia, who had often said she would like to have a boy. The woman apparently changed her mind, so Osorio was raised instead by Lopez Alonso and his wife, Lidia Garcia Perez, in the town of Retalhuleu in southwestern Guatemala. He was given a new name, Ramiro Fernandez Lopez Garcia, and recalls being treated less as a family member and more as an indentured servant, forced to work long hours in the familys bakery while subject to frequent and severe beatings. In other words, Osorio was raised by, and in many ways owed his life to, an adoptive family whose breadwinner was a man who had played a role in the murder of Osorios mother, father and seven siblings, not to mention their fellow villagers an emotional, legal and psychological echo chamber that makes your head spin. They made me call them Mama and Papa, he says. They were responsible for the death of my family, and they knew it. Questions and answers The Guatemalan civil war ground on until the mid-90s, when a truce was negotiated under international supervision. With peace came questions and, eventually, answers. In July 1994, authorities began exhumations beneath the ground where Dos Erres had once stood. Despite repeated interruptions and bureaucratic disputes, the work proceeded until they had unearthed the skeletal remains of 162 people. Many others may have been missed. According to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, 216 people died in the massacre. Meanwhile, new light was being cast on those dark events from other directions. Using DNA samples, a Guatemalan organization called Famdegua dedicated to recovering the disappeared victims of the war helped members of Osorios extended family find the boy who had magically survived. In 1999, they found my family, says Osorio, who was by then 22. On Feb. 20, 1999, he found himself reunited with a passel of family members, people he barely knew, relatives who had almost but not quite given him up for dead cousins, aunts, uncles, even a grandmother and grandfather. It was really nice, but it was also pretty sad. I knew them and lived with them a very little while. It was happy and sad at the same time. The encounter was sorrowful for many reasons, not least because Osorio was obliged to leave Guatemala City just three days later to begin a journey that would take him far from his native land to a vast northern country called Canada, where he was being admitted into a witness-protection program. In Guatemala, the wheels of justice continued to turn slowly. In April 2000, a Guatemalan court issued warrants for the arrest of 17 individuals deemed responsible for the massacre at Dos Erres. By this time, many of those men had fled Guatemala, including Jorge Sosa, who had absconded in 1985. After failing to gain political asylum in the United States, Sosa travelled to Canada with his family, including his wife and two children. Canadian authorities proved to be more amenable to his claim that he was being hunted by Guatemalan rebels. They granted his application for asylum. The family settled in Lethbridge, Alta., in 1988 and Sosa a karate expert opened a martial-arts school. In 1992, he became a Canadian citizen. Later, Sosa moved back to the United States, where his civil status went through a quick succession of changes a divorce, followed by remarriage to a Guatemala-born American. Thanks to this union, he obtained a green card in 1998. He moved to Riverside, east of Los Angeles, where he again opened a karate school. By this time, he had divorced his second wife. In 2008, Sosa obtained U.S. citizenship. In his application, however, he failed to disclose his military career in Guatemala and made no mention of his role which he continues to deny in the massacre at Dos Erres. These oversights would return to haunt him. Three months later, according to a detailed report published by the investigative website ProPublica, a Homeland Security investigator opened an inquiry into Sosa related to Dos Erres. In September 2010, a California grand jury indicted the karate instructor for citizenship fraud. By then, Sosa was in Alberta, where he had fled to avoid arrest in the United States and where he faced three different legal prospects, none of them favourable. First, Canada could have deported Sosa to Guatemala, which was seeking his extradition on suspicion of war crimes. Second, Canadian authorities could have invoked the legal principle of universal jurisdiction and tried Sosa on Canadian soil for crimes against humanity committed in Guatemala. Or, third, Canada could have acceded to a U.S. request for Sosas extradition, so that he could be tried in California on far less serious charges relating to citizenship fraud. Despite vigorous protests by human rights activists, Canada chose the third option. After being arrested by Lethbridge Regional Police in January 2011, Sosa was deported to the United States last September and is now in a California jail. The former Guatemalan army officer was convicted on two of three counts of citizenship fraud, a comparatively benign outcome considering the charges he faces in his native land. Still, Sosa could spend up to 15 years in a federal U.S. prison, and that is justice of a sort. He is to be sentenced on Dec. 9. Its a good step that hes been found guilty on fraud charges, says Matt Eisenbrandt of the Canadian Centre for International Justice. But we would have liked the Canadian government to prosecute him here for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Now 55, Sosa may well face those charges. Recently stripped of his U.S. citizenship, he will have nowhere to go but Canada or Guatemala, once hes released from jail. If he wants to come here or to Guatemala, he will be tried, says Osorio. In Guatemala, four men have already been convicted for their part in the massacre. On Aug. 3, 2011, they were each sentenced to more than 6,000 years in prison whatever that means, in practice a conviction believed to mark the first time Guatemalan soldiers have been held to account for human-rights offences in nearly four decades. Efrain Rios Montt, Guatemalas dictator in 1982 and 83, now aged 77, faces a raft of charges relating to genocide, including his alleged involvement as mastermind of the Dos Erres killings. I have no rancour As for this Septembers trial in California, Osorio was not the only man to testify against Jorge Sosa. Another witness for the prosecution was Santos Lopez Alonso, the man who adopted Osorio all those years ago in Guatemala. Lopez Alonso was arrested in Texas in 2010 and charged with illegally re-entering the United States after having been deported. He agreed to testify against Sosa and was sentenced to time served before being transferred to California, where he was held as a material witness in Sosas trial. When he thinks of Lopez Alonso now, Osorio says he feels no hostility. I dont feel anything, really, he says. I have no rancour or hate. The same goes for his feelings for the other men who murdered his family and destroyed his village. Osorio would like to see them tried and punished, but the construction worker has a life of his own now. I have been able to make my own family, he says, referring to his Guatemalan-born wife, their two young children, and their home in Canada. I like it here. Its a quiet place to live. One adapts to everything, the climate, the people. There isnt the racism that exists in Guatemala. Osorio changed his legal name back to the one that was given him by his mother and father. To his mind, it represented a kind of rebirth. Here in Canada, I changed my name to Osorio Cristales, he says. This is my true name. Four years ago, Osorio returned to the country of his birth, to visit his new-found relatives and to go back to the village where his family was butchered on that terrible day, Dec. 7, 1982. Guided by people from the nearby town of Las Cruces, Osorio once again set eyes upon Dos Erres or what had once been Dos Erres. The village had vanished without a trace. The only thing we could see was livestock grazing in fields. Everything else has disappeared. The Survivors Ramiro Osorio Cristales Oscar Alfredo Ramirez Castaneda He was the second child survivor of the massacre. He was 3 years old at the time and was abducted/adopted by one of the soldiers involved in the attack. Tranquilino Castaneda Valenzuela Castaneda happened to be away working in a relatives fields at the time of the attack. Thanks to DNA tests, he was reunited with his son Oscar Alfredo Ramirez Castaneda in August 2011. Until that point, he believed his wife and all nine of their children had been killed in the massacre. Salome Armando Gomez Hernandez Salomes aunt lived in Dos Erres and he happened to show up at her place (to provide information about the purchase of two turkeys for Christmas) at the time of the attack. Just 12 years old, he was detained by soldiers but managed to escapeduring a momentary lapse in vigilance. Sources: Washington Office on Latin America, El Periodico newspaper SHARE: Bookworm babble The Sixth Nepal Literature Festival, which is being held in Pokhara, ends today. JERUSALEMIsraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that the American embassy in Israel should be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, injecting himself once again into a charged campaign-trail promise of U.S. President Donald Trump. Netanyahus comments at his weekly cabinet meeting appeared to be aimed at countering reports that Israel was concerned about the fallout of such a move, which is vehemently opposed by Palestinians and has sparked fears of a renewed outbreak of violence. It comes a day after Netanyahu unilaterally endorsed Trumps call to build a wall along the Mexican border, saying the Israeli model along its border with Egypt has proven successful I would like to clarify unequivocally that our view has always been, and continues to be, that the United States embassy should be here in Jerusalem, Netanyahu said. Jerusalem is the capital of Israel and it is appropriate that not only the American embassy will be here, but that all embassies will move here and I believe that in due course, most will come here, to Jerusalem. Nearly all foreign embassies are located in the coastal city of Tel Aviv because their countries have refrained from recognizing Jerusalem as Israels capital until its status is resolved in future peace talks. Israel has long called for the embassies to be relocated, but hasnt pushed hard for it, given the widespread international opposition. But Trumps rise has emboldened Israels nationalists. His campaign platform made no mention of a Palestinian state, a cornerstone of two decades of international diplomacy in the region, and he has signalled that he will be far more tolerant of Israeli settlement construction than his predecessors. Both his designated ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, now a top aide and Mideast envoy, have deep ties to the settler movement. Friedman and Kushners family foundation have both been generous contributors to the Beit El settlement and a delegation of settler representatives was invited to Trumps inauguration. The Palestinians want the West Bank and East Jerusalem areas captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war for their hoped-for state. Former president Barack Obama, like the rest of the international community, considered the building of settlements an obstacle to peace and frequently criticized their construction. But Trump did not comment when Israel announced a major housing drive last week. At the cabinet meeting, Netanyahu also said his government planned to introduce a bill to legalize dozens of West Bank settlement outposts later this week. There are about 100 outposts across the West Bank that Israel considers illegal, but tolerates and often allows to flourish. The bill is being pushed by the pro-settler Jewish Home party, which has threatened to quit Netanyahus coalition if it doesnt go through. The bill was cited as one of the reasons the Obama administration allowed a United Nations Security Council resolution to pass that challenged the legality of the settlements. U.S. officials said that after previously vetoing anti-Israel resolutions, they felt compelled to abstain because of continued Israeli settlement construction and efforts to retroactively legalize dozens of them in exchange for compensation for the original Palestinian landowners. Also Sunday, Israeli troops killed an 18-year-old Palestinian and wounded five others after they came under attack in a refugee camp in the northern West Bank city of Jenin, Israeli and Palestinian officials said. Palestinian police said a group hurled rocks at the Israeli troops, who responded with fire and fatally shot Mohammed Khalefeh. The Israeli military confirmed the account, saying that its forces were attacked with pipe bombs before they responded. Israeli forces routinely carry out arrest raids in the West Bank against wanted Palestinian militants. Since 2015, Palestinian attackers have carried out numerous stabbings, shootings and vehicular assaults that killed 40 Israelis and two visiting Americans. Israeli forces killed 235 Palestinians in the same period, most identified by Israel as attackers. Palestinians and rights groups have accused Israel of using excessive force in some of the confrontations. Israel says the violence is fuelled by a Palestinian campaign of incitement compounded on social media sites that glorify and encourage attacks. Palestinians say it stems from frustration over decades of Israeli rule in territory they claim for a state. Read more about: SHARE: NEW YORKStanding in sight of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, demonstrators on Sunday packed New York Citys Battery Park to demand an end to President Donald Trumps ban on travellers from seven majority Muslim nations. The big crowd gathered Sunday near the ferries that carry visitors to the statue and the island, the place where 12 million people entered the United States in the golden age of immigration. They carried signs saying America was built by refugees, and Muslim ban is un-American. READ MORE: Despite court order, Trump shows no sign of backing down on Muslim ban END Refugees detained, migrants barred from travelling following Trumps ban Canadian dual citizens exempted from Trumps travel ban New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio invoked Americas immigration history in speaking out against Trumps executive order. Forty per cent of all Americans can trace their origins to those who went through Ellis Island, he said. Ill tell you one thing theyd say to us, Were all human beings, we came to this country for freedom, we came to this country because its a beacon. We will not let that beacon be put out by Donald Trump. U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer addressed the crowd, saying, Theyre against everything that is American. Those orders make us less humanitarian, less safe and less American. The rally followed a night of big demonstrations at New Yorks Kennedy Airport, where thousands of people spontaneously gathered to demand the release of detained travellers. At a news conference across town, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo expressed solidarity with the demonstrations. He announced the state is creating a legal help hotline for families with loved-ones who have been blocked from entering the U.S. Scenes from New York protest Freedom is not gained from oppression, and you cannot protect Democracy by violating individual rights, he said. SHARE: MOSCOWAt least seven Ukrainian troops have been killed in an apparent uptick in fighting in eastern Ukraine, government officials said on Monday. An armed conflict between government troops and separatist rebels has killed more than 9,600 since it began in 2014, according to the UN Human Rights Office. A January ceasefire had until recently helped to limit the fighting to sporadic shootouts. The governments press office for the operation in the east said it recorded an increase in fighting on several fronts on Sunday which left at least five killed and nine troops injured. Two more were killed and five injured Monday morning, north of the rebel stronghold of Donetsk, the press office said. Kyiv accused the rebels of using tanks and Grad multiple grenade launchers and said they recorded intensified fighting all along the front line outside the separatist stronghold of Donetsk, in the south of the front-line north of Mariupol and west of Luhansk. The Grad launcher is among heavy-calibre weapons that should have been pulled back from the front line under a 2015 truce between the warring parties. In Donetsk, self-proclaimed separatist authorities reported substantial damage to civilian infrastructure, with several villages and Donetsk neighbourhoods left without electricity and gas supply. The separatist Donetsk News Agency reported one civilian killed and three injured in Makiivka, North-East of Donetsk. The rebels also reported that government forces opened fire on a checkpoint to the north of Donetsk where thousands of civilians pass through every day between rebel-held and government-controlled territories. Both sides reported that fighting continued on Monday morning. In 2014, Russia backed separatists fighting government forces in eastern Ukraine and annexed Ukraines Crimea region, drawing widespread condemnation in Europe and the United States. On Saturday, Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump shared a telephone call and spoke about international issues, including the Ukraine crisis. The Kremlin released a statement hinting that the two men discussed the U.S. sanctions against Russia, implemented by the Obama administration as a consequence of Russian actions in Ukraine. The presidents spoke out in favour of the establishment of real co-ordination of Russian and American actions with the aim of destroying the Islamic State (Daesh), according to the statement. Read more about: SHARE: TEHRAN, IRANOn Thursday night, I looked at the news while visiting my family here and realized I had a problem. U.S. President Donald Trump would be signing executive orders the next day. One of them would ban me from returning to my home in Greenville, S.C., and it did cause federal agents to block me from my flight from Dubai to Washington on Friday night. Ive lived in South Carolina since 2013, when I started my doctoral studies in industrial engineering at Clemson University. I was born in a middle-class family in Tehran, raised by parents who taught me to love and respect people regardless of their race, religion or background. I learned to value education for its contributions to community life, its role in advancing social justice, its capacity to open worlds of cultural and artistic excellencefor the way it helps humanity flourish. My passion for mathematics and problem-solving had started as a young girl. I studied hard for years and did well in Irans mandatory university entrance exam. I won a full scholarship to study engineering at one of the countrys best universities. My dream was to go to the United States for graduate school. Professors and departments at U.S. universities were renowned even in Iran. And Id heard from friends who lived there how nice Americans were, how warmly they welcomed immigrants. I was admitted to several masters programs and decided to attend Northern Illinois University, which offered another full scholarship. Read more:Trump downplays chaos caused by his Muslim ban, blames unrelated airline computer glitch Before I could start, I had to get a student visa. Theres no U.S. diplomatic presence in Iran, so I had to make an expensive trip to Turkey for an interview. My application required additional security checks, but I understood: Thats typical for Iranian citizens, and obviously, any country needs to be sure the people they allow in arent a threat. Finally, on Aug. 13, 2010, I entered the United States for the first time. In May 2013, once I graduated from my masters program, I went to Iran to see my family for the first time in three years. I had to apply for a new visa, but it was worth the hassle; I had dedicated my life in the United States to academics, and knew Id clear the background checks again. I couldnt bear to stay away any longer. All through the summer of 2013, I waited in Tehran for my new visa so I could move to Greenville to start my PhD at Clemson. It came through, and I returned to the United States that August. I promised myself Id return to Iran once a year to see my sister and mother, who had been left without help when my father died. In 2014, I finally got a visa that was good for multiple entries, which meant I could visit home without bureaucracy getting in the way. In August, I graduated and found a job as a data scientist at a technology firm in Greenville, under a provision in the law that allows students to work on their student visas for a time after graduating. I love my job and the team I work with. My firm started the process to sponsor me for a green card, which would give me permanent legal residence and put me on the path to becoming a U.S. citizen. In August, I adopted a rescue puppy whod gone unwanted because of his gastrointestinal issues. I named him Dexter. Hes adorable. I became close friends with three women in my neighbourhood, and we walk our dogs together every morning and evening. I love downtown Greenville, which was especially pretty when it was decorated for Christmas. (Theres even a Persian restaurant for when I want a little taste of Tehran.) My life in upstate South Carolina has been very peaceful. In the winter, I decided to take a three-week trip to visit my mom and sister. My visa was in order, but I hauled along a ton of paperwork to avoid troubleI had my job offer letter, my employment authorization form, multiple pay stubs, even copies of my old student visas, just in case. I got to Tehran on January 22. Within two days, the rumours about Trumps executive orders were flying. It was shocking: How could the United States I know and lovea country based on the rule of law, where supporting human rights is foundationalban people just because they come from Muslim nations? When I saw the news that Trump was really going to go through with the order, I realized I had to leave immediately, three days into my trip. The first available flight back to the United States would take me through Dubai Friday and then to Dulles International Airport. Trump signed the order before I boarded in Tehran. When I got to Dubai, U.S. border agents based there asked me lots of questions, as they usually do. This time, they asked why I was going back on a student visa since I had graduated (even though my visa allows me to work after school). They let me through at first. But later, when passengers started to line up to board, airline employees and the U.S. officials started talking. They looked at me several times. I knew about the order, and I was getting more and more nervous. Finally, it happened: Someone walked over to me and said due to security reasons, I had been denied boarding, and I had to leave the line. I didnt ask anything. I couldnt talk. I was dizzy, and everything got blurry. I just walked away from the gate as early as I could. I didnt see any other Iranians among the passengers. I am guessing no one from the other six banned countries was there, either, or at least no one with a visa. Because I didnt see anyone else getting removed. People were watching. Some passengers were frustrated that the boarding process was getting delayed. It might have been embarrassing, in other circumstances, but I was just numb. A million thoughts rushed through my mind, from the practical to the philosophical: What happens to Dexter now? He is waiting for his mom to come home. Who is going to take him for doctor visits? What happens to my car parked at the long-term lot at the Atlanta airport? What happens to all the stuff I had collected during six and a half years living in the United States? What about my lease? Will my landlord think I just left town? What happens to my job, my life, my American Dream? I flew back to Tehran to stay with my family and figure out what to do next, stung by the realization that as far as the U.S. government is concerned, my life doesnt matter. Nothing I worked for all these years matters. I have applied for a visa three times and have been through extensive clearance and vetting every time. And every time I have been cleared and received my visa. My documents were again evaluated by the Department of Homeland Security when I applied for a work authorization. So I think I have been through vetting enough times. How does it make sense to keep me from going back to where I live because I need extreme vetting? I still consider America to be where my home is. Ive spent my whole adult life there. I have lots of friends; some of them are like family to me. I still love the nice Americans who welcomed me to their country. Of course, I have concerns now about whether the safety and peace I found there will change, but I still love America. I want to go back. Read more about: SHARE: BAGHDADIraqi lawmakers Monday called for banning Americans from entering the country after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order suspending immigration from Iraq and citizens of six other Muslim majority nations. The vote is not binding on the Iraqi government, but it still could strain relations between Baghdad and Washington amid the military operation to retake Mosul from Daesh, also known as ISIS and ISIL. The vote was described as a recommendation, by deputy speaker of parliament, Sheik Humam Hamoudi, and called for the U.S. Congress to pressure the American administration to reconsider that decision regarding Iraq. Read the latest news on U.S. President Donald Trump END The Foreign Ministry also spoke out against Trumps order, saying it regrets such a decision against a country that the U.S. considers an ally and a strategic partner. It is a surprise that Iraq is covered with this order because it is not among the countries that export terrorists or Takfiri ideology, the statement added, using an Arabic term that refers to Sunni extremists. The Iraqi community inside the U.S. enjoys a good reputation and its members have not involved in any terrorist act. The ministry described Trumps decision as wrong and called for him to reconsider it. The 90-day travel ban affects citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The Pentagon is compiling a list of Iraqis who have supported U.S. and coalition personnel to help exempt them from Trumps ban, said Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman. The list will include those who have tangibly demonstrated their commitment to supporting U.S. forces, such as translators, drivers and Iraqi forces who may be training in the U.S., he said. Trumps ban and the Iraqi parliament decision came as Iraqi forces are more than three months into the fight to dislodge Daesh militants from Mosul. Iraqi forces control about half of Iraqs second-largest city. The Mosul operation is the largest in Iraq since 2003 and one in which Iraqis are more dependent than ever on U.S. support. American forces withdrew in 2011. The Pentagon says there are more than 5,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. Small numbers of U.S. forces have operated inside Mosul and from the air. The U.S.-led coalition said it has dropped more than 9,900 munitions in and around the city since the operation began in October. Iraqi forces are largely dependent on coalition air power to retake and hold territory. Iraqi officers leading the Mosul battle say they doubt that politics will hurt the military effort against Daesh. Brig. Gen. Haider Fadhil said he believes U.S. support for Iraq will increase, since Trump has pledged to hasten the pace of the fight against the militants. The measure, a copy of which was obtained by AP, calls for a reciprocal measure in the event the American side will not retreat from that order to maintain the state prestige and the dignity of the Iraqi people. That language suggests it would deny entry to Americans holding valid Iraqi visas. It also called for the U.S. Congress to pressure the Trump administration to reconsider its ban. The decision did not detail when it would be enacted or to whom specifically it would apply: U.S. military personnel, aid workers, oil companies or other Americans in Iraq. Parliament absolutely lacks the authority to originate legislation of any kind regulating anything the executive branch does, said Kirk Sowell, a political and legal analyst focused on Iraq and publisher of the Inside Iraqi Politics newsletter. The prime ministers office said the government is waiting to receive the decision officially and it will take care of it and follow up with the American administration to discuss what is needed to ensure the respect of agreement, according to government spokesman Saad al-Hadithi. Since taking office in 2014, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has struggled to balance his governments dependence on both the U.S. and Iran in the fight against Daesh. Iraq is reliant not only on coalition airstrikes that have helped its forces retake nearly all the territory Daesh once held, but also on U.S. financial aid. Earlier this month, Baghdad signed a $1 billion sovereign loan guarantee with the U.S. aimed at financially supporting Iraq during its economic crisis. Iraq continues to be dominated by powerful political blocs with close ties to Iran, another key ally. Al-Abadis political opponents former prime minister Nouri al-Maliki and influential Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr regularly highlight his close relationship with the U.S. in seeking to portray him as weak. The U.S. Embassy offered only a brief statement, saying we have seen the reports of the parliament vote and are reviewing its details. We refer you to the government of Iraq for further clarification. Even if the government were to take up the parliaments call and implement the ban on Americans entering Iraq, it is not certain that the semi-autonomous northern Iraqi Kurdistan region which has equally strong tie with Washington would abide by it. The Kurdistan region has its own immigration policies and largely controls its own borders. Read more about: SHARE: INDIAN SPRING, CALIF.Conservative patriarch Charles Koch and his vast network is vowing to oppose U.S. President Donald Trump if and when he deviates from their dedication to free and open societies. This weekend alone, Koch raised concerns about whether the Republican president will adopt an authoritarian governing style. Kochs chief lieutenants condemned the nascent administrations plans to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in infrastructure projects. And the Koch networks many donors lashed out at Trumps push to block immigration from several Muslim-majority countries. It doesnt do any good for us to be positioned as hating whole classes of people, said Erick Brimen, who, like the other 550 or so donors who gathered at a luxury California hotel this weekend, will pay at least $100,000 (U.S.) this year to fund Charles and David Kochs nationwide network of policy and political organizations. What has made America great always is that this has been a place that has welcomed the best and the brightest, said Brimen, a Venezuelan native who became a U.S. citizen last year and now manages a private equity firm. The message needs to be very loud and clear that we continue to be such a place no matter where you come from. Read more:Trump defends his immigration restrictions, says its not a Muslim ban The sentiment was in line with a formal statement released Sunday by the Koch network, which said Trumps travel ban is the wrong approach and will likely be counterproductive. The pointed criticism comes as the conservatives who help fund what may be the nations most powerful conservative network grapple with mixed feelings about the new administration. The Kochs refused to support Trumps candidacy last fall, but they now see an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to influence the White House and the Republican-controlled Congress. Many who attended this weekends Koch donor conference reported anxious optimism about the extraordinary opportunity for conservatives. They highlighted strong ties between the Koch network and the Trump administration. And even before it is announced, Kochs team is preparing to devote its tremendous resources to defend Trumps pick for the Supreme Court. Yet there are also deep concerns about a new president with no long-term commitment to conservative priorities like free trade, free markets and small government. Our suspicion is were going to get three parts good and one part bad, said Chris Wright, a Colorado-based energy entrepreneur. Were worried about the one part bad. And over and over again this weekend, Kochs lieutenants insisted they were willing and able to take on the Trump administration and any members of Congress who stand in their way. Without naming Trump, Koch network co-chair Brian Hooks noted that Republicans opposed President Barack Obamas stimulus and would should do the same if the new president follows through on his pledge to support a massive infrastructure package. Others promised to fight what they called crony capitalism in the new administration, reminding conservatives they fought Obamas support for private companies like Solyndra and should do the same when Trump picks winners and losers in private business. Hooks and others also repeatedly raised pointed objections to Republican plans to adopt a border adjustment tax or new tariffs. Were going to have the courage to oppose bad policies ... regardless of who proposes them, Hooks declared. Koch himself raised a broader concern about the new administrations use of executive authority. The billionaire industrialist did not mention Trump by name as he warned that the nation is facing a moment of tremendous danger. He said the nation could go the authoritarian route ... or we can move toward a free and open society. So this is our opportunity. Despite the obvious tension between the Koch network and Trump administration, Koch leaders say theyre confident about their ability to shape the direction of the Trump administrations policies from the inside. There is perhaps no bigger Koch ally than Vice-President Mike Pence, whose staff and ideology has been in close alignment with the Kochs for years. Koch spoke directly with the vice-president on the phone days before his inauguration as Pence considered hiring a Koch communications staffer, Stephen Ford, to serve as his chief speech writer. Ford was soon hired, along with former Koch chief Marc Short, who now serves as the White House legislative director. The reason were optimistic ... is really Mike Pence, said Doug Deason, a prominent Trump supporter and major Koch donor. If you think Cheney had power in Bush White House, just watch and see what happens with Mike Pence. Meanwhile, Koch donor Fred Klipsch, of Indiana, suggested the tension between Trump and Koch is exaggerated. These are two strong-willed individuals and theyve had their disagreements, Klipsch said. On the other hand, when it comes time to get to work, I think theyre all working in the same direction. Read more about: SHARE: HALIFAXNova Scotias highest court has dismissed an appeal by a man convicted of sexually assaulting his common-law wife, in a case that garnered national attention when she asked the court to have a publication ban on her name lifted. The Nova Scotia Court of Appeal, in a decision released today, rejected Jared Peter Beck-Wentzells claim that the original trial judge misunderstood evidence and failed to consider a key defence argument. Read more: Nova Scotia woman says she regrets reporting sex assault despite conviction in case During the trial, Beck-Wentzells lawyer argued his client should be declared not guilty because he had an honest but mistaken belief that his wife had consented to sex. Shannon Graham testified she awoke when Beck-Wentzell entered their bedroom late on July 12, 2014, and she told him she was not interested when he started to remove her pyjamas and indicated that he wanted to have sex. She told the court he continued to sexually assault her while she tried shove him off and repeatedly said no. The appeal court concluded that Beck-Wentzells claim that the trial judge misunderstood evidence was not credible, and it rejected the argument that he had an honest belief that his wife had consented to sex because he never offered evidence to support that assertion. Read more about: SHARE: A million people have signed an online petition calling for Donald Trumps state visit to the U.K. be called off following the U.S. presidents immigration ban targeting Muslim-majority countries. There are 10 times the signatures needed to trigger an almost-automatic debate in Parliament. Graham Guest, a lawyer from Leeds, northern England, started the initiative that went viral and at one point was garnering 1,000 signatures every minute: Donald Trumps well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by her majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales, the petition said. British Prime Minister Theresa May last week became the first foreign leader to meet Trump since he became leader, announcing that he would travel to London later this year on a personal invitation from Queen Elizabeth II. Such visits traditionally include a horse-drawn procession, a state banquet and a stay at either Buckingham Palace or Windsor Castle. Read more:Trump pledges lasting support to relationship with Britain after meeting with Theresa May Its the second time in just over a year that Trump has stirred controversy in Britain. Last January, lawmakers debated whether the Republican candidate should be banned from entering the country for his comments about stopping Muslims from entering the U.S. Since becoming president, Trump has announced a temporary ban on arrivals from seven mostly Muslim countries and dialed back protections against climate change, both policies that run counter to British positions. Any petition exceeding 100,000 signatures is eligible for discussion. Its up to a special Petitions Committee comprised of backbench lawmakers to decide whether to hold a debate in Parliament. While a debate seems almost a certainty, theres no vote at the end of it and Parliament doesnt have the power to force Mays hand. An invitation has been extended and accepted by Donald Trump, Mays office said on Monday in a statement. Read more about: SHARE: FORT LAUDERDALE, FLA.One by one, a judge detailed the 22 charges against an Alaskan man accused of killing five people and wounding six others in the Florida airport shooting spree. Then, Esteban Santiago pleaded not guilty. Santiago, 26, stood in chains Monday in a red max custody inmate jumpsuit as U.S. Magistrate Judge Barry Seltzer took the unusual step of reading the entire 17-page indictment aloud in court with repeated emphasis on the victims names. After each count, Santiago said he understood and was asked if he realized he could get the death penalty if convicted. Yes, I do, he replied. Santiago, an Iraq War veteran who lived in Anchorage, Alaska, was taken into custody shortly after investigators say he opened fire in a baggage claim area Jan. 6 at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. He is being held without bail on charges of causing death or bodily harm at an international airport, causing death during a crime of violence and using a firearm during a crime of violence. His court-appointed attorneys declined to comment after Mondays hearing. According to the FBI, Santiago flew on a one-way ticket from Alaska to Fort Lauderdale with a 9mm Walther handgun and two ammunition clips in a case in checked luggage. Authorities say he picked up the case, loaded the gun in a bathroom and came out firing randomly at other travellers. Santiago was arrested after firing 15 shots. The FBI says he told agents he did the shooting because of some form of government mind control, later saying he was inspired by videos and chat rooms linked to Daesh, also known as ISIS or ISIL. The indictment contains no terrorism-related charges despite those claims. Its also not clear why Santiago came to Fort Lauderdale. The FBI previously said Santiago visited its office in Anchorage last year complaining about hearing voices and supposed CIA mind control, which led to Anchorage police temporarily seizing his gun and Santiagos brief stay in a mental hospital. Records at the Alaska Psychiatric Institute show Santiago was given anti-anxiety medications but no prescriptions for drugs that would treat serious mental conditions such as schizophrenia. He was released after a five-day stay with no restrictions that might prevent him from possessing a gun, and his weapon was returned by police. That same gun was used in the airport shooting. A trial date has not yet been set. Read more about: SHARE: BERLINThousands of citizens of U.S.-allied nations across Europe will be barred from entering the United States under U.S. President Donald Trumps executive order, sparking a wave of outrage that threatened to create an early rift across the Atlantic. Following new instructions from the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. embassies in Berlin, Paris and London warned Monday that European citizens who are dual nationals of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen the seven Muslim-majority countries targeted by Trumps order would fall under the travel ban, joining people who hold passports only from those countries. The measures full effect on dual citizens appeared to be evolving even to the U.S. embassies in Europe, where conflicting information circulated. The U.S. Embassy in Paris, for instance, warned that even existing U.S. visas granted to dual citizens would be revoked, while the U.S. embassies in Berlin and London suggested only that new visas would not be granted. Those instructions appear to contradict assurances the White House have given Canadian officials: Immigration minister Ahmed Hussen told reporters Sunday that Canadian dual citizens are exempt from the ban, and that even permanent residents of Canada can enter the U.S. provided they travel with a valid permanent resident card and a passport from one of the seven affected countries. The advisories sowed more confusion over a travel ban denounced by critics as a haphazardly thought-out measure targeting Muslims criticism rejected by the Trump administration. Yet the indication that dual citizens could be also included in the ban raised the surprise prospect that even full citizens of friendly nations with deep ties to Washington may find themselves at least temporarily prohibited from entering the United States. The Trump administration has sought to portray the order which blocks entry to citizens of the seven Muslim-majority countries and to refugees from around the world for at least 90 days to allow for extreme vetting as an attempt to weed out prospective terrorists. But German Chancellor Angela Merkel led the European protest Sunday, saying she would seek to defend the travel rights of all her citizens. The necessary and also resolute fight against terror does not justify in any way a general suspicion against people of a certain faith, in this case against people of Muslim faith, or people of a certain origin, Merkel said Monday. Suggesting the cloud of uncertainty surrounding the ban, she added, the chancellery in co-operation with the Foreign Ministry is making all efforts to clarify the legal situation for the dual citizens affected and to strongly assert their interests. The U.S. guidance appeared to catch the Europeans off guard. As early as Sunday, British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson comforted his nation by announcing that Trumps order did not affect British dual citizens a statement that was apparently contradicted Monday by the U.S. Embassy in London. Visa issuance to dual nationals has been suspended effective immediately until further notification, the embassy said on its website. Following earlier assertions that dual citizens of western nations may not be impacted, the suggestion that they might be after all created confusion. German Foreign Ministry spokesman Martin Schafer, for instance, began a news conference Monday by saying he did not know whether dual German citizens of the seven countries targeted by Trump would be affected. Several minutes later, he told reporters than he had just received information that the U.S. Embassy in Berlin had said those citizens would indeed be impacted. The German Foreign Ministry said it had tens of thousands of affected citizens a number that could surge far higher across Western Europe. It left some dual citizens shocked, and others fearful over whether and how they could visit family in the United States. Its completely unbelievable that members of parliament and millions of other people are treated like terrorists, said Niema Movassat, a lawmaker from Germanys Left Party who holds dual German and Iranian citizenship. This is not about combating terrorism, but about right-wing populism and fascism. Others, however, had been preparing for the other shoe to drop nearly certain the Trump rule would also apply to them. However, it did not blunt their rage. Omid Nouripour, the vice president of Germanys German-American parliamentary committee said Saturday that he feared he would not be allowed to visit the United States as long as the executive order was in place. Nouripour was born in Iran and holds dual Iranian and German citizenship. Long a strong advocate of closer German-American relations, he blasted the new order. Its dirty symbolism, Nouripour said of Trumps executive order on Sunday. Its the best boost jihadis could hope for. They can now pretend the West really is at war with Islam. It remained unclear whether officials like Nouripour could yet find an out, since many lawmakers hold special diplomatic passports. The U.S. Embassy in Berlin could not immediately provide additional comment, though its advisory noted certain exceptions, including official government or North Atlantic Treaty Organization related travel. With files from Alex Boutilier Read more about: SHARE: Bottlers refuse to import LPG Gas bottlers have been refusing to import liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) even though the government has agreed to their longstanding demand to be allowed to operate their own tankers because now they have another complaint. RANGOON, BURMAThousands of Burmese politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of a longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at a cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. Ko Ni, a prominent lawyer and member of Burmas Muslim minority, was shot in the head at close range as he walked out of the Rangoon airport Sunday. The suspected shooter was apprehended while trying to escape. A statement issued late Monday by the office of President Htin Kyaw said that according to an initial interrogation, the shooting was intended to threaten the countrys stability. It said the authorities would step up security measures, and urged people not to be frightened and refrain from agitation involving race or religion. The killing shocked many in Rangoon because attacks on prominent people are rare, although security forces are notorious for brutal behaviour in remote rural areas, especially when dealing with ethnic minorities. Ko Ni is irreplaceable for both Aung San Suu Kyi and the party, Suu Kyis ruling National League for Democracy party said in a statement. He was especially valued as an expert in constitutional law, looking for ways to sidestep provisions placed in the charter by an earlier military junta to retain power at the expense of elected governments. He was seen as a familiar and helpful figure by journalists and human rights workers who have found Suu Kyis government almost as difficult to deal with as the military-backed regime it replaced. At the same time, Ko Ni was active in defending the rights of Muslims, who often face discrimination in Buddhist-majority Burma. Last year, he helped found the Myanmar Muslim Lawyers Association, which was criticized by ultra-nationalist Buddhists monks as well as by some of his political allies, who feared it encouraged sectarianism. Anti-Muslim sentiments have increased in the country in recent years following deadly intercommunal violence in the western state of Rakhine, home to many Muslims belonging to the Rohingya minority. As a Burmese Muslim, Ko Ni shared their religion but was better integrated into mainstream Burmese society. The suspect was arrested after he also shot a taxi driver who tried to stop him from fleeing the airport, the Information Ministry said in a video posted on state-run MRTV. The driver died on the way to a hospital. Police seized two guns from the man, whom they identified as Kyi Linn of Mandalay. Authorities were searching for any possible accomplices. Speculation about the motive included political intimidation, anti-Muslim prejudice and a possible business dispute involving the victims private law practice. Mandalay regional police chief Han Tun said at a news conference that the suspect is an ex-convict who had received a 27-year-sentence on three counts of stealing statues of Buddha. Reports in the Burmese press said he was released in 2014 under an amnesty after serving 11 years. Members of Parliament, political activists and NLD party members were among those who gathered Monday for the funeral at a Muslim cemetery on Rangoons outskirts, said Tun Kyi, a prominent Muslim activist and a friend of Ko Ni. Many of the thousands of people who streamed to the cemetery wept openly. Security was tight, with police even using bomb detectors on the baskets of flowers sent by mourners. The overflowing crowd turned rowdy at times, jostling for space as the open pavilion, with a capacity for perhaps 500 people, was surrounded by at least 10 times that number of people. Those attending included U.S. Ambassador Scot Marciel, who called Ko Nis death a terrible loss. Of course we are all shocked and really sad, he said. I knew Ko Ni and his commitment to his country and democracy. There are important antecedents in Burma for political violence against influential leaders, including Suu Kyi and her father, Gen. Aung San, who led the country to independence from Britain. Aung San was assassinated in 1947 along with six members of his provisional Cabinet, and some historians consider his lost leadership a reason for the countrys unrest since then, because he could not oversee a power-sharing agreement he had made with ethnic minorities. Suu Kyi was the apparent target of an assassination attempt in 2003, when her motorcade was ambushed by a mob on a remote road in central Burma. Her driver manoeuvred their car to escape, but other people in her entourage four by government accounts, more according to other sources were killed. The attack was generally thought to have been carried out by a faction of the military, although no one faced punishment. Ethnic minority leaders have also been targets, most notably the monarch of the Shan minority, Sao Shwe Thaik, who was also the first president of Burma from 1948-1952. He was arrested by the military when it staged a coup in 1962 and died in unclear circumstances in custody. His son was shot dead on the day of the coup, and another Shan noble disappeared after being arrested. SHARE: WASHINGTONU.S. President Donald Trump on Monday denied his immigration order was to blame for the chaos at the nations airports over the weekend, instead pointing to computer glitches, protesters and even the tears of Senator Schumer. Later he shifted the focus away from the weekends immigration turmoil, signing an executive action aimed at cutting regulations for small businesses. White House officials called the directive a one in, two out plan, requiring government agencies requesting a new regulation to identify two others they will cut. Trump signed the order in the Oval Office surrounded by small business leaders, saying it would massively cut regulations and calling it the biggest such act that our country has ever seen. Trumps business announcement came as protests continued around the country over his immigration order. Early Monday, he took to Twitter to defend the move, saying that only 109 out of 325,000 people were detained and held for questioning. Trump also said swift action was important, noting that there are a lot of bad dudes out there. Trumps order temporarily suspends all immigration for citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries for 90 days. Top Trump aides also defended the order, comparing it to a 2011 policy on Iraqi refugees. In 2011, President Barack Obama imposed additional checks on Iraqi refugees after two Iraqis were charged with terrorism offences in Kentucky. Read more: Refugees detained, migrants barred from travelling following Trumps ban Canadian permanent residents exempt from Donald Trumps travel ban Chief of staff changes Trump teams stance, says green card holders wont be banned In an interview Monday on ABCs Good Morning America, Trump aide Kellyanne Conway wrongly claimed that the 2011 policy was never covered in the press. She also falsely described it as Obamas own ban on refugees. The 2011 policy was reported by several media outlets, including The Associated Press. Unlike Trumps order that imposed a 90-day ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries, the Obama policy applied only to Iraqi refugees and never specifically prohibited entry. Trump also announced he will reveal his pick for the Supreme Court at 8 p.m. Tuesday. The court has had eight justices since the death last year of Justice Antonin Scalia. Obama nominated Merrick Garland for the post, but Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell refused to take up the nomination. Responding to criticism that his sudden immigration action caused unnecessary chaos at airports in the U.S. and abroad, Trump tweeted Monday that If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the bad would rush into our country during that week. Trump enters his second week in office amid a global backlash to his policies. European Union officials denounced his immigration order as a dangerous embrace of isolationism and inequality, while the international aid group Doctors Without Borders accused Trump of keeping people trapped in war zones, directly endangering their lives. In Iraq, two lawmakers said the Iraqi parliament has approved a reciprocity measure restricting the entry of Americans into Iraq. Meanwhile, Trumps order does not address homegrown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. And the list of countries in Trumps order doesnt include Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer, Trump tweeted. He was referring to a Delta systems outage Sunday night that led to departure delays and cancellations of at least 150 flights. However, the chaos started Saturday as protesters packed some of the countrys major airports to demonstrate against the executive order. Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer tweeted Friday that Tears are running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty over the ban. Trump has defended his order by saying its not a Muslim ban. A number of U.S. diplomats prepared a memo criticizing the temporary travel ban. In a dissent cable, being drafted for State Department leadership, the diplomats say the ban will not make the U.S. safe, runs counter to American values and will fuel anti-American sentiment around the world. They say the ban wont produce a drop in terror attacks in the U.S., but instead a drop in international good will toward Americans. U.S. officials say several hundred diplomats have signed on. There appeared to be widespread confusion among authorities tasked with carrying out the order and how it would be applied to certain groups, such as U.S. legal permanent residents. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday saying that, absent information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination. That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent U.S. residency green cards will not be barred from re-entering the U.S., as officials had previously said. It remains unclear what kind of additional screening they will now face. You have an extreme vetting proposal that didnt get the vetting it should have had, said Ohio Sen. Rob Portman, who urged the new president to slow down and work with lawmakers on how best to tighten screening for foreigners who enter the United States. White House press secretary Sean Spicer on Monday morning defended the closed-mouth discussions that preceded Fridays announcement, saying that I think there are some people who might not like the way it was done, but they were all consulted in the process. A federal judge in New York has issued an emergency order temporarily barring the U.S. from deporting people from the seven nations subject to Trumps 90-day travel ban. The order barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. The Department of Homeland Security said Sunday the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. Read more about: SHARE: Canadian governments have long subsidized media. They still do. As the authors of The Shattered Mirror, the latest jeremiad on the state of newspapers in Canada, put it: Those who fear that the state will take up residence in the newsrooms of the nation, should recognize it has been well-ensconced there for a long time. Those subsidies include an income tax provision that favours domestic magazines and newspapers plus a periodicals fund that subsidizes magazines (including big ones). On the electronic front, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission exists not only to regulate broadcasters but to protect them. On the provincial front, some provinces including Ontario give newspaper subscribers a break on the HST. And then theres the CBC. All of which is to say that the studys call for more government action to help media is hardly revolutionary. Indeed, it may not be enough to do the job. The job is daunting. The Shattered Mirror describes a media landscape in which there is little visible hope. Newspapers, the traditional source of news, are in dire financial straits. New online operations have sprung up. But they dont have the staff, resources or in some cases the interest to do the legwork involved in daily journalism. The villains of the piece are internet giants like Google and Facebook. They soak up the online advertising dollars that traditional media need to survive. But they create no journalistic content themselves, relying instead on material cribbed largely from the mainstream media. They are aided and abetted by the mainstream newspapers themselves, which willingly invite the vampire into their homes by voluntarily posting content on social media. Its pretty much a big mess and no one has yet figured out how to solve it. Enter something called the Public Policy Forum, which was asked by the federal government to come up with an analysis and recommendations. Its report, published Thursday, offers no overarching remedy. At best, it outlines a series of holding actions that, if adopted, might give existing media companies more time to re-invent themselves and avoid bankruptcy. The centrepiece involves tweaking the tax laws to knick foreign operations that solicit on-line ads from Canadian firms. The money raised by this move, estimated at $300 to $400 million a year would be put into a fund operated at arms length from the government and used to help publications make the move to digital. The fund would also subsidize a local newsgathering service to be operated by the privately-owned Canadian Press. This service would be expected to provide the coverage of courts, municipal politics and provincial legislatures that many local newspapers no longer offer. The report has much to say about the CBC which, for reasons that are never explained, leads the pack in terms of online presence. The authors recommend that CBC get out of the business of soliciting online ads. But they say that even if this happens, competing newspapers wont gain much, since the amount involved $25 million a year is relatively small. More intriguingly, the report would force CBC to offer its content without charge to competing media beginning with those that are not-for-profit. In effect, this would enlist the employees of the public broadcaster as unpaid news gatherers for private operations. Meanwhile, the CBC itself would be tasked with paying more attention to civic-function (read boring) content and less to that aimed at a broad audience. The report would also change the copyright regime to make it more difficult for online bloggers and news aggregators to reprint newspaper stories without paying for them. Thats a reasonable idea, although I suspect it would be difficult to enforce. Finally, the report would change the tax rules to make it easier for charitable foundations to fund or even own newspapers. Should government put its shoulder to the wheel to rescue endangered media companies? The report wisely says that any government aid should be structured in a way that ensures stockholders and overpaid media executives dont walk off with all the loot. And its own polling suggests that while Canadians mainly trust the mainstream media, most dont think the government should be in the business of bailing them out. In short, if the government does decide to help out media publishers, it would be advised to follow past practice and do so in minimalist ways that create little controversy. That seems to be the message of this quite interesting report. Thomas Walkoms column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday. SHARE: What would help a new Canadian feel at home in this country? I was trying to assemble a small home library for a Syrian migrant family of five being sponsored by my union, Unifor, and supported by a group of co-workers. I mean, anyone can buy towels, right? Three hours later, I was surrounded by wobbly stacks of books and a sense of failure. I dont know what 13-year-old boys like, but it wont be The Stone Angel. The book of the moment, Margaret Atwoods The Handmaids TaleThe Handmaids Tale, will likely horrify them. Will Grammar for Grownups offend? Is poetry helpful for those with little English, or merely obscure? I am confident only of the huge Oxford Illustrated Dictionary. It has photos of moose and diagrams of snowboards, the semaphore alphabet and the human adrenal gland. And I finally know what a capacitor is. Useful. How can I convey the essence of Canada in a handful of books? Heres a handful of advice. 1. Wander around Canadian Tire without help from staff. Thats how the rest of us do it. Compare shovels. Buy a lightweight plastic shovel; never lift metal with your wet snow. 2. Shoppers Drug Mart is your friend. The pharmacists will be thrilled to explain the difference between a dripping cold and a dry cold, what the phrase productive cough means and that a heating pad is your best buy. And youre going to love Loblaws. They sell flannel sheets and parkas. 3. How to start conversations with Canadians. What is a cable company? Hours will pass. Youll hear swears. Youll probably draw a crowd. Follow up with What is Hydro? Is it expensive? and you will be invited to dinner. 4. Keep the TV on in the background. I have a theory, based on nothing, that a new language will sink in at some level and suddenly words you understand will leap out. I do this with TV5 to keep my French up. I dont watch the National. Its hokey and dull and Peter Mansbridge talks ... so ... slowly. Thats why its perfect. 5. Do something with snow, anything. Make snowmen, snowballs. Learn to skate. I never managed it but you might. Ski down small slopes or cross-country ski. I learned it. That means its easy. 6. Get a library card. Try things out. Use the computers there. Decide what screens you like, what information attracts you. Libraries will never let you down. Also there is nothing that melts a Canadians heart faster than a new citizen at the library. They will dance attendance on you. At least I will. 7. Transit is expensive but worth it. Look around you on the subway. Canadians come from everywhere in the world. So many languages are spoken. You are not alone. 8. Read newspapers. (Libraries have them for free.) Learn about levels of government and the quarrelling that takes place at each. All battles are basically about tax money and the stuff people want. Remember that Canadians can have anything they want as long as theyre willing to pay the taxes to fund it. Taxes are the most powerful weapon. We do more together than alone. 9. Its comforting to live in an ethnic enclave, but make sure you leave it occasionally, head downtown, out of town. I insist that you visit Niagara Falls. I dont know why but its splendid. 10. Canada is so big that it is divided into enclaves, just like Toronto. At some point, you should see the West Coast. Camp at Wickaninnish Beach at the edge of the nation. I say camp because you cant afford to buy a house there and neither can I. Heres a tip: Newfoundlanders are the warmest people in Canada. The Rockies are beautiful. I think of turquoise Lake Louise as the most beautiful place in the nation. 11. Canadians are polite, though it may not seem so. Hold doors open for people: theyll love you for it because no one else does it. When there are two doors opening out, one will always be locked. No one knows why. Preface sentences with sorry, e.g., Sorry, is this seat taken? Sorry, popcorn costs $5.75? Not for me, thank you. Sorry sorry sorry sorry. Then, Sorry, how much will this operation cost? Yes, ask that one. You will never be so happy as when you hear the answer. You are Canadian, very happy to be so, and you are not sorry at all. Read more about: SHARE: The profound cruelty of Donald Trumps anti-Muslim travel ban is plain to see. Take, for instance, the case of the interpreter who served the U.S. for 10 years during the Iraq War and who, fearing for his life, applied for a visa so he and his family could go to America. After three years of perilous waiting, he finally arrived in New York on Friday, just hours after Trump had ordered the ban. He did not receive the welcome he had likely dreamed of. Instead, he was detained for 19 hours at JFK airport, treated as a threat to the state he had risked his life to serve. Had a judge not intervened, he would have been sent back to Iraq without regard for the danger. But the policy is not only cruel; it is unsound as well. The executive order, which indefinitely suspends the resettlement of Syrian refugees and bans people from seven predominantly Muslim nations from entering the U.S. for 90 days, purports to protect the nation from foreign terrorist entry. Yet since 2001 not one person has been killed in the U.S. by anyone who emigrated from any of the countries affected by the ban. Far from making America safer, it would seem to do the opposite. Most experts agree that the executive order merely serves to stoke the fear that terrorism itself exists to spread. Groups like Daesh recruit by promoting the message that the U.S. is at war with Islam. Trumps order, which makes an exception for non-Muslims, seems to give credence to that idea. The ban is a black mark on a country that prides itself and is widely seen to be a beacon of openness and democracy. Canada, too, sees itself and is seen this way. The extent to which we now bow to our neighbour or fight against its xenophic turn will put these perceptions to the test. There have already been encouraging signs here that our leaders are willing to stand up and be counted. Canadian politicians of every stripe have signaled their disapproval. Most important, on Saturday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau added his voice. He tweeted, To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength. This is a crucial message: that no matter what happens elsewhere, no matter the pressures, we will not lose sight of who we are, of our commitment to pluralism and democracy. The words are welcome and important, but not enough. There is more we can and must do to protect those values. Among other things, we can adapt our own refugee policies to mitigate the damage done by Trumps executive order. We can, for instance, offer refuge to those stranded by the ban and at the same time reconsider the current cap on private refugee sponsorship. We can also take another look at the Safe Third Country Agreement with the United States. This agreement effectively prevents most refugees arriving from the United States from seeking asylum in Canada. It depends on Americas having a fair refugee system, which at the moment the country does not appear to have. This would undoubtedly be a bold move, but if we are truly committed to the principles threatened by Trumps order we must use every tool at our disposal to reduce the harm done and protect our values. There is no middle way in this pivotal moment. History will judge us not by our words alone, but finally by our actions. Read more about: SHARE: Forty years after a deadly grenade explosion at a camp for military cadets, the Canadian Armed Forces still doesnt give its youth-in-uniform the same health and disability benefits as regular personnel. Talk about sclerotic bureaucracy. Now, as the Stars Allan Woods reports, a new report from Armed Forces ombudsman Gary Walbourne is calling on the government to improve the compensation for cadets who are injured or killed on duty. Canada should take heed however belatedly and provide todays cadets with supports similar to members of the Canadian Armed Forces and Department of National Defence. That much was obvious back in 1974, after the explosion in the Valcartier camp north of Quebec City killed six cadets and left 54 badly injured and maimed. Inequities in government supports quickly became clear. Cadet teachers were automatically compensated with insurance benefits and had access to government support programs while their young charges had a stingy insurance plan, relied on the provincial health care system or paid privately. Only those whose parents took the government to court were compensated. With treatment like that, its a wonder that Canada still has 52,000 cadets. The programs are loaded with adventure: sea cadets focus on sailing or power boat handling, army cadets go on survival camping trips, and air cadets get trained in power flying. These are great opportunities but they are also accompanied by risk. In his report, ombudsman Walbourne noted that today, cadets with minor injuries like a cut or sprain are properly cared for but those who experience a serious injury, such as loss of a limb or paralysis, would not get the same supports as their instructors or military personnel. The current system, notes Walbourne, remains just as it was in 1974. How many more years of prodding does the government need? Just get it done. SHARE: Re: Toronto cop guilty of insubordination for role in drug arrest, Jan. 24 Toronto cop guilty of insubordination for role in drug arrest, Jan. 24 Constable Brian Davy joined the Toronto police force in 2011. In 2016 he was convicted of two counts of deceit for having deliberately falsified official police records. He was sentenced to temporary demotion. In recent days he has been convicted of professional misconduct for failing to report his partners illicit planting of evidence in a suspects car leading to the suspects conviction and 30-month jail term. For this he was penalized 15 days pay. In barely six years with the Toronto police force this officer has been convicted of egregious dishonesty three times. He has been proven to have participated in the falsification of records, and the cover up of misdeeds by other police officers including the creation and planting of false evidence. In appearances before his peers it has been proven that Const. Davy cannot be trusted to faithfully carry out his duties. His punishment can only be dismissal from the force. His peers are protecting him from the consequences of his actions actions which unreasonably threaten the public he is sworn to protect. Robert Kent, Mississauga SHARE: Re: City visible from Buffalo during mirage in 1894, Jan .25 City visible from Buffalo during mirage in 1894, Jan .25 I was relieved to read your story of how the city of Toronto became visible to residents of Buffalo in a sky mirage back in the 1800s. About 20 years ago one August day while canoeing off shore from the waterworks plant in the Beaches area, I looked up in the sky to the south. A wide screen image of blue sky, yellow and green rolling farm hills and trees appeared and sat there for about five minutes. I couldn't explain it to anyone, till now. There is a magic over that lake. Lloyd Walton, Port Carling SHARE: Re: Yes, the truth still matters, Editorial Jan. 24 Re: Mexico stunned after Trump approves wall, Jan. 26 Yes, the truth still matters, Editorial Jan. 24 President Donald Trumps senior advisor Kellyanne Conway coined the term alternative facts to describe the presidents discrepancy in the number of people attending his inauguration. It brings to mind a phrase about statistics popularized by American writer and humourist Mark Twain. To reflect this Trump age, it would be revised as: There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and alternative facts. Alan Pellettier, Scarborough Its not a lie, if you believe it! George Costanza to Jerry Seinfeld. Peter OMeara, Acton Wynne rips O'Leary over auto sector talk, Jan. 23 Those arent falsehoods, theyre |alternative facts. James Knott, Mississauga Mexico stunned after Trump approves wall, Jan. 26 The idea today in a supposedly civilized society of building a wall between two countries is barbaric. I would hope that Canada would defend Mexicos resistance against this proposed wall. Dorothy Low, Richmond Hill Heavy is the head that wears the crown! I am stunned that it has only taken about a week for Donalds hair to turn grey. It usually takes longer. Sharon Kirkham, Toronto If The Donald kicks out the Mexicans, who the hell will build the wall? Gary Roosen, Waubaushene Read more about: SHARE: Short seller Andrew Left, head of Citron Research, sent shares of Express Scripts (ESRX) falling Friday after he called the company the "John Gotti of the pharmaceutical industry." The comparison to the New York mob boss was only the beginning of Left's inflammatory comments about the pharmacy benefit manager, or "PBM." Left also wrote that the company could stand to lose 30% of earnings per share if it lost half of its drug rebates, which could happen if a federal agency idea is implemented. According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, cutting PBM rebates could be a swift way for President Donald Trump to slash drug prices as he has vowed. Express Scripts saw shares fall 2.35% on the report, hitting $67.59 apiece before markets closed Friday. Express Scripts is a pharmacy benefit manager that negotiates drug prices with pharmaceutical companies on behalf of insurers. The company also has its own specialty pharmacy called Accredo that helps patients manager their PCSK9 therapy -- which often includes injection drugs -- for high cholesterol. Left explained the pricing program: insurers pay pharmacy benefit managers a fee to negotiate drug prices. If the PBM does a good job on negotiation, it receives a rebate on top of that fee, he said. "Are [patients] saving money?" Left said when reached by phone Friday. "Yeah, but not as much as they should save. They're shaking down the drug companies." He also took issue with Express Scripts' specialty pharma company. He compared that ownership to owning a home security company that turns around and sells information on homeowners to burglars. So why did Left go after Express Scripts specifically? He noted that the company, as compared to CVS Caremark (CVS) and UnitedHealth Group (UNH) , sees far greater returns from rebates than the others. It's important to note, too, that UnitedHealth and CVS have far more diversified businesses -- with UnitedHealth operating a full-fledged insurer and CVS continuing to own a retail pharmacy. As for Express Scripts? In response to the CMS report and Left's comments, the company posted to its blog on the topic. "A different headline for the same fact sheet could be, 'Part D is Working as Designed,'" company officials wrote. "Plans and PBMs are negotiating discounts from drug makers and pharmacies to get the best deals for the plans they offer. The report finds that as drug prices went up, member premiums went down." Spokesman Brian Henry reiterated that the company works to keep down the cost of prescription drugs. "Rebates do not raise drug prices, drug companies raise drug prices," he said when reached by phone Friday. He also noted that insurers get to determine how much of the rebate they see. As of Friday, Express Scripts had a $41.68 billion market cap. Cases of high-altitude sickness rising among Nepali trekkers Nepal has not only seen a dramatic rise in the number of domestic trekkers, but risks associated with high-altitude sickness among them have grown equally fast. From the fracking fields in North Dakota to the tar sands in Alberta, Canada, there is an abundance of petroleum. But there is a catch. Although the U.S. has a vast network of pipelines at the ready to transport natural gas, oil, refined products and even coal, this network was built out before much of the newer field developments became a major source of fossil fuels. The result has been that much of the petroleum is put on train cars and trucks to be shipped to refineries or transport hubs thousands of miles east and south in the U.S. The cost of shipping is many, many times the cost per barrel of sending the stuff through pipelines. Worse, much of the petroleum from these expanded and newer fields can be more volatile in its composition. This has resulted in a series of horrific train disasters with lives and even whole towns lost. And when it comes to natural-gas fields in the Dakotas with limited or no pipe, the gas is flared-off, meaning that it is just burned to get rid of it as a by-product of crude oil. Pipelines are the solution, and the good news is that there are companies at the ready to build and expand pipelines to more cheaply and safely transport petroleum products. This trends represents a stellar growth opportunity for investors. The catch has been that President Barack Obama held up approvals for pipeline construction, particularly two pipe projects well under way: the Dakota Access Pipeline and the expansion of the Keystone Pipeline known as the XL. That hold-up got kicked to the curb with when President Donald Trump signed the first of what may well be a series of controversial executive orders to move along project approvals. This is great news for producers and refiners and the pipelines companies. The Dakota Access Pipeline owned by Energy Transfer Partners (ETP) will move crude from North Dakota to refinery and storage operations in Illinois. And Keystone XL, which is owned by TransCanada (TRP) ,will bring the heavier tar sand crude to refineries and storage tank farms in Southern Illinois just east of St. Louis. But the play to be made to cash in on new pipes is in the companies supplying the actual pipe for the lines. Trump has said that he wants new pipelines to use U.S.-made pipe. And while that might sound like a tall order, it really isn't. Sure, much of the world's pipe is made in Asian foundries including from Posco in South Korea. But there are U.S. pipe makers, too. One such company that has already supplied much of the pipe for the existing Keystone line is in Little Rock, Ark. Welspun Tubular is held by Welspun of India. This is an impressive company, but its depositary shares aren't accessible to individual investors. But pipe company Tenaris (TS) is a good investing option. The parent is based in Luxembourg for tax treatment but produces pipe and other related products for the production, refining and transport of oil and gas products throughout the southern U.S. as well as in Europe and elsewhere. Tenaris is poised to be a growth stock winner this year. The company has been acquiring smaller U.S. companies and consolidating them into its fold including Maverick Tube of St. Louis in 2006. The pipe is prime to be targeted by pipeline companies seeking to get White House support for approved pipeline construction. Tenaris isn't baggage-free, however. The company sells worldwide, and with the global economy not firing on all cylinders, there has been an overhang on the potential of the US. But with so much pipe needing to be built or replaced around the U.S., including pipe for rebuilding water systems throughout the country, there is a lot of upside in this country alone. The company's shares are a bargain at about $36 apiece. Valued at less than half that of its global peer group based on the price-sales ratio and also at a discount to its peers' price-book ratio, Tenaris can be bought on the cheap now just as U.S. demand picks up. And with a dividend that is at a premium to its industrial peers at 3.21%, perhaps the market is catching on to Tenaris, with shares on an upward ascent. --- As I've just explained, Tenaris is a bargain investment bet now. But, if you're looking for other growth opportunities, we've found a genius trader who turned $50,000 into $5 million by using his proprietary trading method. For a limited time, he's guaranteeing you $67,548 per year in profitable trades if you follow his simple step-by-step process. Click here now for details. This article is commentary by an independent contributor. At the time of publication, the author held no positions in the stocks mentioned. Trump might make pizza night more expensive. Last week President Donald Trump began to move forward on his plan to build a wall across the U.S./Mexico border. This was a major part of his campaign for the presidency despite widespread agreement that a 1,300-mile-long wall will do nothing to secure the border against illegal immigration. The wall will cost anywhere from $10 billion to $25 billion in materials and construction alone, plus the as-yet uncertain costs to buy all of the land necessary for construction. That comes to more than $120 per U.S. household, but the direct costs are just the beginning. To try and recoup this money, Trump has floated the idea of imposing a 20% tariff on Mexican imports. This would be an unambiguously bad deal for American consumers and workers alike. Here are just a few reasons why: Fruits and vegetables will get more expensive. The Mexican government wouldn't pay a penny of any potential tariff. Importers would absorb it as a cost of business and, like any other systemic cost, would pass it along to the customer in the form of higher prices. And a lot of prices would go up in the wake of Trump's tariff. America imports over $316 billion worth of goods and services from Mexico every year, making it our country's third biggest trading partner. Mexico doesn't specialize in any particular export to the United States. Almost every kind of product from beer and wine to medical equipment crosses the border. One category does deserve a particular mention though: fresh fruits and vegetables. America imports a lot of its produce, and Mexico is its top producer of agricultural imports. They would all jump in price. Most notably, America imports nearly 80% of its avocados from Mexican farms. The country also supplies more than half of all U.S. tomatoes and a lot of the onions and peppers at the grocery store too. It's not just salsa that will feel the pinch. Pasta, pizza, hamburger, chili and more will start to get a lot more expensive too. Most products made in America will get a little more expensive. In the wake of NAFTA, Mexico and the United States have shared an unusual global relationship: an expensive, developed nation sharing a major land border with a developing, inexpensive one. The result has been a vast integration of supply chains as U.S. and Mexican companies increasingly specialize in their strengths. On the American side of the border, that generally means the jobs that require skill and capital. On the Mexican side, that generally means labor. Companies today have plants on both sides of the border, with U.S. employees and Mexican employees working together (even if they may not know it). Products are shipped back and forth at various stages of development, even the ones stamped "made in USA." "A 20% tariff would have significant effects on American consumers," said Edward Alden, a senior fellow with the Council on Foreign Relations. "There may be other sources for some of these products, but the cost to Americans would certainly rise." "The bigger point is how closely integrated the supply chains are now in North America," he added. "This is exactly what NAFTA was intended to do. The U.S. sells a lot of components to Mexico which are then assembled in Mexico for final products that are sold in the United States. You start disrupting those supply chains, and it's going to cost companies billions of dollars." Jobs will drop in surprising sectors like trucking, farming and manufacturing. A major tariff from the United States would almost certainly be met in kind by trade restrictions from Mexico, and that would mean job losses across plenty of industries. Notable results would include farmers, truckers and factory workers. "If you've ever gone to the U.S./Mexico border, you'll just see trucks lined up on both sides. There's a whole industry to get products back and forth across the border," said Jason Marczak, director for the Latin America Economic Growth Initiative with The Atlantic Council. "We don't just trade with Mexico like we trade with other countries. We actually work together with Mexico to manufacture products." A trade war between these countries would dry up that trucking industry, maybe to be replaced by shipping sectors from whatever other countries manufacturers relocate to. As for the rest, Mexico is America's second largest customer, buying over $236 billion worth of goods per year. The three leading exports are machinery, electrical machinery and cars. All of those factories across the Midwest? They sell a lot of finished products to Mexico. Meanwhile for the farmers, Mexico is their third largest export market in the world. Chicken and dairy farmers in particular would feel the pinch, since Mexico buys one-quarter of all U.S. poultry exports and is the number one customer for U.S. cheese. About five million will be jobs lost, and inequality will worsen. "U.S./Mexican trade is fundamental to the underpinnings of the U.S. economy," Marczak said. "There are millions of Americans who probably don't even realize that their jobs depend on trade with Mexico." "Five million Americans would be out of work without U.S./Mexican trade," he predicted. Raising a major tariff on Mexican goods would function as a de facto sales tax on countless goods, raising prices just a little bit on a lot of things. This would suck demand out of the economy across the board, leeching dollars out of every consumer product. Any major slowdown in demand generally comes with consequent job loss. It would also make inequality worse, as these price hikes would hurt low income people the worst. The goods most likely affected would sit on the retail shelf. "When basic goods like that become more expensive," Marczak said, "it's somewhat of a regressive tax that affects the lower middle class more so than it does the middle and upper classes. We have been able to thrive as an economy partly because the consumer class in this country has so much more access to goods than they would have otherwise." Vacations will get more expensive. There's not a whole lot to say here. Mexico City is the world's 16th busiest airport and a major hub. A lot of Americans looking to see South America have to stop through there. A trade war between America and Mexico would probably hit that too. There's much to be said about the role of NAFTA and whether it needs changes. (Indeed, most economists agree that after two decades the trade deal at bare minimum needs to be updated.) However a flat tariff introduced by fiat would almost certainly spark a trade war, which would be difficult to quantify since a trade war with Mexico would touch almost every industry. The result is that Trump's tariff would make most goods at least a little bit more expensive. Even the products that don't touch Mexico would likely creep up just a little bit as the entire consumer marketplace adjusts upwards to a new set of price points. And there's no reason to believe that jobs would move back to the United States. Even if companies respond to the tariff by pulling jobs out of Mexico (a big if), most of the rest of the world is cheaper than America. It would take a tariff against the entire planet, and a huge one, to offset the expense that comes with having a wealthy, successful economy. And that's even before we talk about this ugly and cruel attempt to wall people out just for wanting a better life. French downstream oil infrastructure operator Rubis (RBSFY) received a boost Monday after Goldman Sachs said that opportunities to mop up some of the tens of billions of dollars of European oil company assets already on the auction block could boost earnings by about 26% a year over the next three years. "We continue to see a large pool of acquisition opportunities for Rubis," wrote Goldman analysts in a note published Monday. "In 2017, four European oil majors alone intend to dispose of $20 billion in assets, and Rubis is increasingly engaging in talks with second-tier oil companies. We estimate Rubis has financial headroom of 1 billion ($1.06 billion) which, if spent on M&A at historical multiples, could add 22% p.a. to earnings." Shares in Rubis opened more than 3% higher in a falling Paris market and held onto some of those gains late into the morning session to trade at 76.01, up 0.41 or 0.5% on their Friday close. Paris's major index, the CAC 40, traded down by 1% on Monday. Oil companies including Shell (RDS.A) undefined , Total (TOT) , BP (BP) and Statoil (STO) are offloading assets to cut costs and raise cash as they continue to refocus operations on their most profitable upstream projects to deal with oil prices that have tumbled by about 50% since 2013. Rubis principally operates oil and liquified petroleum gas storage facilities, which are rented by oil companies to stock fuel for distribution. The company reported revenue of 741 million in the first three quarters of last year, up 4% on the same period in 2015, as volumes at its terminals increased. "The accretive roll-up strategy of picking up non-core assets from oil companies could lower valuation from 15x 2018E P/E to 10x after M&A," noted Goldman. The potential to boost earnings through acquisitions will be complimented by Rubis' organic growth prospects, particularly through brown field expansion, according to Goldman, offering potential upside of 26% a year between 2018 and 2020. Goldman said it rated Rubis a buy, and added the group to its "conviction list" of stocks. The broker warned that an increase in petroleum prices could have a negative effect on Rubis' margins, but noted that the stock's poor performance since November suggested investors were already "pricing in an (overly) negative view." Keysight Technologies (KEYS) has agreed to purchase network security and software solutions provider Ixia (XXIA) for $1.6 billion, net of cash. In a Monday joint statement, Keysight anticipated the deal would close by October's end and that the transaction would be immediately accretive to earnings. The Santa Rosa, Calif., electronic measurement company added that it already has entered into voting agreements with shareholders that own 23% of Ixia's outstanding stock to support the deal. The transaction values Ixia at $19.65 per share, representing a 45% premium to its Dec. 1 closing price, the day before media reports surfaced that Ixia was considering strategic alternatives. Shares of Ixia were up 6.7% to $19.42 on Monday morning, while Keysight stock was slightly lower, off 26 cents, or 0.7%, to $36.75. Representatives from Keysight declined to comment, while Ixia representatives didn't immediately return requests for comment. Keysight said the acquisition will expand its software-centric business while helping it better meet the demands of changing network environments. Ixia also will provide access to "previously untapped" network equipment manufacturers, particularly those based in Asia, Keysight said during a conference call discussing the transaction. "Together, we will provide leading-edge solutions that address the fastest-growing communications and networking trends, including 5G, internet of things, visibility, security and application performance," Keysight CEO Ron Nersesian said in Monday's statement. The companies did not address any changes to their management and corporate governance following the transaction. Bethany Mayer is Ixia's president and CEO. A Reuters report in December had speculated the companies were exploring a tie-up and that Ixia was fielding takeover offers from several bidders. Founded in 1997, Ixia provides testing, visibility and security solutions for physical and virtual networks for enterprises, service providers and network equipment manufacturers. The Calabasas, Calif., company has been steadily beefing up its network testing technology capabilities through a series of recent deals, notably acquiring network monitoring company Net Optics in 2013 for $190 million. Ixia also completed a pair of deals in 2012, purchasing Anue Systems for $155 million and BreakingPoint Systems for $160 million. Both Anue and BreakingPoint create network security systems. The company counts Cisco Systems (CSCO) , Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) , AT&T (T) , Microsoft (MSFT) and Alphabet's (GOOGL) Google unit as a few of its clients. Ixia posted $3.61 million in net income on $356.7 million in revenue for the nine months ended Sept. 30, up from $200,000 in income on $378.5 million in revenue over the same period in 2015. Keysight was spun off from bioanalytical solutions company Agilent Technologies (A) in 2014. Keysight purchased UK-based Anite, which tests handsets and telecom networks, for $607 million in 2015 as part of its efforts to provide a more comprehensive slate of network testing solutions. Cisco, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Alphabet are holdings in Jim Cramer'sAction Alerts PLUS Charitable Trust Portfolio. Want to be alerted before Cramer buys or sells CSCO, HPE and GOOGL? Learn more now. A growing list of luminaries from Silicon Valley's top technology companies are speaking out against President Donald Trump's executive order, signed on Friday, that restricts immigration from seven Muslim countries. Executives from tech companies including Facebook (FB) , Apple (AAPL) , Netflix (NFLX) and Alphabet (GOOGL) have all issued statements denouncing the travel ban, which prevents the entry of all refugees to the U.S. for 120 days, bars Syrian refugees indefinitely and blocks citizens travelling from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen to the U.S. for 90 days. Twitter (TWTR) , Amazon (AMZN) , Microsoft (MSFT) , Tesla Motors (TSLA) , Uber, Lyft and Airbnb were among other tech giants who railed against the travel ban. Some of the most vocal dissenters were among the leaders invited to Trump's tech roundtable at Trump Tower last month. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, who attended Trump's roundtable, was one of the first high-profile executives to personally condemn the order. "As an immigrant and as a CEO, I've both experienced and seen the positive impact that immigration has on our company, for the country, and for the world," Nadella said in a LinkedIn post on Saturday. "We will continue to advocate on this important topic." Apple, Facebook and Alphabet are holdings in Jim Cramer'sAction Alerts PLUS Charitable Trust Portfolio.Want to be alerted before Cramer buys or sells AAPL, FBor GOOGL? Learn more now. The software company doubled down on the comments by pledging to provide legal assistance to any employees affected by the executive action. Microsoft President Brad Smith went beyond denouncing the travel ban, noting that the company supports "broader immigration opportunities" like the Deferred Access to Childhood Arrivals (DACA) Program, or the "Dreamers" act. On the campaign trail, Trump said he would work to repeal the DACA Program, but the White House has since signaled that there are no plans for immediate changes or a reversal of the program. Additionally, LinkedIn, which Microsoft acquired in June for $26 billion, said on Sunday that it would bring its Welcome Talent program to the U.S. The Welcome Talent Program aims to help connect refugees to internships in the their host countries. Apple CEO Tim Cook, who has communicated extensively with the Trump administration, told staff members that Apple isn't in support of the new policy and that the company "wouldn't exist...let alone thrive and innovate" without immigration. In perhaps one of the most outspoken cases, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said Trump's executive order "hurts" Netflix employees around the world and is "so un-American it pains us all." "A very sad week, and more to come with the lives of over 600,000 Dreamers here in America under imminent threat," Hastings wrote in a Facebook post. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg posted on the social media site that the U.S. is a nation of immigrants that benefits "when the best and brightest around the world can live, work and contribute here." Salesforce (CRM) CEO Marc Benioff also spoke out against the ban on Twitter. Meanwhile, Alphabet's Google unit, Lyft and Uber both took their denouncements a step further. Lyft co-founders John Zimmer and Logan Green said the ride-sharing service will donate $1 million to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) over the next four years. Google has created a $4 million crisis fund to help employees and other people affected by Trump's executive order, noting that the funds will be distributed to the ACLU, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Google CEO Sundar Pichai also told about 100 Google employees travelling overseas to return to the U.S. immediately. "It's painful to see the personal cost of this executive order on our colleagues," Pichai wrote in an internal memo, according to Bloomberg. "We've always made our view on immigration issues known publicly and will continue to do so." Google co-founder Sergey Brin also joined a protest against the order at San Francisco International Airport on Saturday. Uber said it would provide legal support to assist drivers who may be banned from entering the U.S. and is also forming a $3 million legal defense fund. Uber CEO Travis Kalanick denounced the order in a public memo to employees, saying it would "impact many innocent people." Kalanick's tone in the memo was a stark difference from his previous comments regarding Trump, wherein he pledged to work with the new administration and later joined Trump's economic advisory group alongside other tech executives like Tesla CEO Elon Musk and IBM (IBM) CEO Ginni Rometty. Both Kalanick and Musk said they will raise their concerns about the order when they meet with Trump on Friday. Musk asked his Twitter followers to read the order and point out any specific amendments. "Will seek advisory council consensus & present to the President," Musk tweeted. Among other leaders who spoke out were Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield, Box (BOX) CEO Aaron Levie, Etsy (ETSY) CEO Chad Dickerson, eBay (EBAY) founder Pierre Omidyar and Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky, who said the homestay network would provide free housing to refugees and "anyone not allowed in the U.S." A few of Silicon Valley's noteworthy executives were decidedly less vocal, however. Amazon issued a memo to employees in support of cultivating a diverse workforce, but the e-commerce giant's CEO Jeff Bezos hasn't commented so far, despite suggesting during the election that he would send Trump into space. IBM's Rometty, who said she would create 25,000 jobs in the U.S., has also not issued a statement. Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) CEO Meg Whitman has yet to comment on the order, though if her previous statement calling Trump a "dishonest demagogue" is any indication, she likely has some fiery words to spar with. Dropbox CEO Drew Houston appeared on Monday afternoon's "Power Lunch" on CNBC to discuss the company's billion-dollar milestone, where the company is leaning in terms of an IPO and to share his thoughts on Trump's immigration ban. Beginning with the ban, President Trump signed an executive order that keeps people from several Muslim majority countries from entering the U.S. over the next 90 days. The order also keeps all refugees out of the country for the next 120 days. The order sparked protests across the country, with many Americans outraged over the ban. "We don't support it," Houston said of the ban. "As far as directly effecting our employees, we're looking into that. It may be a small number, but we think this is something more fundamental. It's about our values as a country and certainly our values as a company." Earlier today, at an event in San Francisco, Houston announced that the software developer has reached an annual run rate of $1 billion. Annual run rate uses a company's current financial information to predict its future performance. CNBC's Melissa Lee asked Houston to comment on the company's valuation. "Well, it's really the investors who set that," the CEO said. "We just focus on building a great product and growing our business. I think the scale that we just announced is a big indicator of that." As far as an IPO in 2017, Houston explained that one of the best things about having a healthy business is the flexibility to do things on your own timeline. "We'll go when the time is right for us and the time is right for the market," Houston concluded. Tika R Pradhan is a senior political correspondent for the Post, covering politics, parliament, judiciary and social affairs. Pradhan joined the Post in 2016 after working at The Himalayan Times for more than a decade. The following companies are subsidiares of Western Union: Banco Western Union do Brasil S.A., Coins, Custom House, Custom House (Online) Ltd., Custom House Currency Exchange (Australia) Pty. Limited, Custom House Currency Exchange (Singapore) Pte. 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Read More Thomson Reuters Corporation provides business information services in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific. It operates in five segments: Legal Professionals, Corporates, Tax & Accounting Professionals, Reuters News, and Global Print. The Legal Professionals segment offers research and workflow products focusing on legal research and integrated legal workflow solutions that combine content, tools, and analytics to law firms and governments. The Corporates segment provides a suite of content-enabled technology solutions for legal, tax, regulatory, compliance, and IT professionals. The Tax & Accounting Professionals segment offers research and workflow products focusing on tax offerings and automating tax workflows to tax, accounting, and audit professionals in accounting firms. The Reuters News segment provides business, financial, and international news to media organizations, professional, and news consumers through news agency and industry events. The Global Print segment offers legal and tax information primarily in print format to legal and tax professionals, governments, law schools, and corporations. The company was formerly known as The Thomson Corporation and changed its name to Thomson Reuters Corporation in April 2008. The company was founded in 1851 and is headquartered in Toronto, Canada. Thomson Reuters Corporation is a subsidiary of The Woodbridge Company Limited. 3 injured as police, drug peddlers trade fire in Sunsari Three people were injured when police and drug dealers traded fire at Khanar of Sunsari district on Monday. Just hours after the co-founders of Lyft announced a donation of $1 billion to defend the Constitution to the American Civil Liberties Union, CEO Travis Kalanick at Uber opened his wallet as well. The Uber CEO promised via a post on Facebook that the ride-hailing company was going to create a legal defense fund of $3 million to help those drivers that were affected by the White Houses move to restrict refugees and immigrants from seven countries that are majority Muslim. Get Warning: Undefined variable $CompanyName in /home/accttr/public_html/wp-content/themes/responsalambre/single.php on line 65 alerts: The legal fund will be established to help drivers with translation and immigration services. Kalanick said as well that the company, based in San Francisco would provide legal support around the clock to those drivers who are current stuck outside the U.S. The drivers will also be compensated for any lost earnings during their absence. Drivers who are eligible for this assistance were told to contact Uber through a form that has been provided online. While this announcement received some support on both Twitter and Facebook, many saw it as being too little too late. Uber came under fire one day prior to the announcement for an ad on Twitter that it was still operating, during a strike by taxi drivers protesting the presidents executive, at Kennedy International Airport in New York City. One response to Kalanicks post on Facebook said the company was 20 hours late, while another said he had deleted his account. Though a statement was issued on Saturday by Kalanick opposing the executive action by Trump, it did not stop many users on Twitter from adopting a trend of decrying the actions by Uber. They accused Uber of trying to profit from the taxis strike and of prioritizing its business interests before what they described as a moral imperative. Celebrities were also quick to jump on that bandwagon with George Takei an actor as well as activist tweeting on Sunday to his nearly 3 million followers that Lyft donated $1 million to the ACLU and Uber just doubled down on supporting Trump. The action by the White House has prompted some support but by far the reaction has been negative around the globe. Many are upset that a number of people who already held valid visas and green cards, that represent permanent residency in the U.S., were not allowed to enter the country when reaching airports at their destination. - The National Super Alliance (NASA) leader will meet today for a meeting that will chart Kenya's future - The four; Moses Wetangula, Musalia Mudavadi, Kalonzo Musyoka and Raila Odinga will discuss on who among them, should be the flag bearer - All of them have previously asked the others to endorse them for the presidential run in August The four opposition leaders who make the NASA coalition will meet today for a meeting they've said will change Kenya's destiny. The leaders who formed the NASA coalition READ ALSO: After Raila, Ruto attacks Uhuru, Jubilee Moses Wetangula, Musalia Mudavadi, Kalonzo Musyoka and Raila Odinga will discuss on who among them, should be the flag bearer at a meeting whose location has not been disclosed. Install TUKO App To Read News For FREE The meeting comes amid speculations that NASA was falling apart after failing to agree on who among them should battle it out with Uhuru in 2017. READ ALSO: Man takes photos at State House restricted area, why wasn't he arrested? Speaking to his supporters in Kakamega, Wetangula said that the scheduled meeting was so sensitive it would change the destiny of Kenya. "On Monday, January 30, the four of us are going to have an important meeting to ensure that we stand together and continue to look for one person to lead the Opposition," said Wetang'ula. Still on the same topic, Wetangula said that he was ready to sacrifice his presidential dreams for someone else in the opposition. If a leader is not ready to sacrifice, they are not worthy to be a leader. That is why Raila, Kalonzo Musyoka and I are ready to work together to save this country, Wetangula added READ ALSO: ODM 'exposes' how Nkaissery is helping in rigging elections NASA came into being in a bid of bundling out of office, the Jubilee administration which has since been called corrupt and dictatorial. READ ALSO: Railas secrets are about to be exposed, set to cost him the presidential election The four opposition leaders are yet to choose one of them to go to the balllot against Uhuru on Tuesday, August 8. The battle will most likely be between Musalia Mudavadi and Raila Odinga assuming Kalonzo Musyoka and Moses Wetangula shelve their dreams for the common good. Also watch; the formation of NASA: Have anything to add to this story? Let us know on news@tuko.co.ke Source: TUKO.co.ke Duhu welcomes its proud son, Kulman ghising Kulman Ghising, managing director of Nepal Electricity Authority, received a heros welcome when he visited his village in Ramechhap district on Sunday. Britain sends HMS Diamond warship to Ukraine for the first time since the Cold War. This reported by The Daily Mail. HMS Diamond, a Type 45 destroyer equipped with the latest anti-aircraft rockets, will set sail for Ukraine carrying up to 60 Special Boat Service and Royal Marine commandos. As noted, HMS Diamond will lead a NATO task force and help protect 650 British troops who are involved in secret exercises in Ukraine a country invaded by Russian-backed rebels in 2014. Defence Secretary Sir Michael Fallon told The Mail on Sunday last night: The values of freedom and democracy cannot be traded. Britain is stepping up on the global stage and standing firm with our Ukrainian friends. The UK is sending a clear message that we are committed to defending democracy across the world and support Ukraines sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity, he added. ol The rapid development of Ukrainian agricultural sector amid the European integration brings European farmers more chances than risks. Deputy Agrarian Policy and Food Minister of Ukraine Olha Trofimtseva said this at the 10th Europe Ukraine Economic Forum. "The rapid development of Ukrainian agricultural sector brings European farmers more chances than risks as it creates additional opportunities for cooperation and joint investment projects in different sub-sectors," the Deputy Minister said. Trofimtseva noted that discussion with the representatives of Polish agricultural sector had shown that Polish colleagues appreciate the prospects of cooperation within the framework of the EU-Ukraine Free Trade Area agreement since it reduced the level of trade and investment barriers for the two countries' business. In addition, the FTA agreement brings Ukrainian producers closer to the European standards in the production and processing of agricultural products. ol Ukraine and the European Commission have agreed to resume exports of poultry products from Ukraine to the EU countries. As of today, exports of chicken meat to the European market have been already launched, the press service of the Agrarian Policy and Food Ministry reports. According to the report, poultry exports were resumed due to mutual recognition of regionalization principle on the issues of bird flu between Ukraine and the EU. In particular, the agreement was reached thanks to the meeting Agrarian Policy and Food Minister of Ukraine Taras Kutovyi with EU Commissioner Vytenis Andriukaitisduring "Green Week" in Berlin and an active dialog of the State Service of Ukraine on Food Safety and Consumer Protection with DG Sante (the Directorate-General for Health and Food Safety) and veterinary services of the EU member states. iy The development of small and medium-sized businesses would give a serious impetus to the development of the Ukrainian economy. Head of Press of the EU Delegation to Ukraine Jurgis Vilcinskas said this at a workshop on cooperation between Ukroboronprom state concern and small and medium-sized businesses, an Ukrinform correspondent reports. "The small and medium-sized businesses in Ukraine produce three times lower GDP than in the EU. If to unlock its potential fully, it would be a major boost for the economy," Vilcinskas said. According to the EU Delegation to Ukraine representative, Europe proposes three units of assistance to Ukraine, which will make small and medium-sized businesses able to meet competition. "The first unit is the macro level assistance so that businesses could enter the world markets, which have opened after the agreement with the EU was signed. The second unit is consulting and the third one is access to the credit lines," Vilcinskas said. ol Minister of Foreign Affairs of Denmark Anders Samuelsen will be on a working visit to Ukraine on January 30-31, the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs reports. The visit will contribute to deepening a Ukrainian-Danish political dialogue and will outline new areas for further bilateral cooperation, including in the context of attracting assistance of Denmark to implement systemic reforms in our country, reads a statement. According to the Foreign Ministry, the visit will include a joint trip of the Ukrainian and Danish foreign ministers to the cities of Dnipro and Mariupol, in particular so that to obtain current information about the situation in the ATO zone, the state of the Minsk agreements implementation and the scale of ongoing Russias aggression against Ukraine. iy The foreign ministers of the EU Member States will soon discuss the progress of reforms in Ukraine and the ways of strengthening assistance to the country. This issue is on the agenda of the EU Foreign Affairs Council meeting scheduled for February 6, an Ukrinform correspondent reports. "The Council will review the situation in Ukraine. It is expected to assess progress in the implementation of the reform agenda in Ukraine over the past year. Ministers will hold a debate on how to increase the impact of EU support. They will in particular assess EU support to the implementation of the Minsk agreements," the statement reads. ol The "Day of Reforms in Ukraine" will be held in the German Parliament in spring to demonstrate Ukraine's progress in the implementation of reforms. This was discussed by President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko and President of the Bundestag Norbert Lammert during a meeting in Berlin, the press service of the Head of State reports. "Petro Poroshenko and Norbert Lammert noted the importance of holding the Day of Reforms in Ukraine in the Bundestag in spring 2017. It will become a good occasion for Ukraine to demonstrate success in the reforms and its business and investment opportunities," the statement reads. The parties also discussed Ukraine's progress on the path of reforms and appropriate capabilities of the Bundestag to support the efforts of the Ukrainian government in this direction. ol Hi-Aim 2017 meet to be held next month Hi-Aim 2017, a two-day conference and exhibition on the hospitality sector, is slated to be held in Kathmandu next month. Normandy format is the right way to achieve peace and political stability in Ukraine. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said this before the meeting with President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko on Monday in Berlin, an Ukrinform correspondent in Germany reports. "We must make every effort, namely to fulfill the Minsk agreements. We believe that the Normandy format is the right way, which we will continue to adhere to, in order to achieve peace and political stability in Ukraine, to ensure its territorial integrity, despite all the obstacles," Merkel stressed. German Chancellor assured that the friendship between the two countries became even stronger over the past two years and Germany wants to support Ukraine on its way. In addition, Merkel praised the reforms in Ukraine and the economic growth of the country. ol 1 of 15 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad See photos of the harvesting of White Stone oysters View Photos White Stone Oyster has an elite restaurant clientele, including Le Diplomate and Roses Luxury. The company hopes to compete with West Coast firms by offering deep-cup, sweet and meaty oysters grown in a sustainable aquaculture farm in the Chesapeake Bay. Caption White Stone Oyster has an elite restaurant clientele, including Le Diplomate and Roses Luxury. The company hopes to compete with West Coast firms by offering deep-cup, sweet and meaty oysters grown in a sustainable aquaculture farm in the Chesapeake Bay. Jan. 25, 2017 Workers at White Stone Oyster start work well before sunrise. The company grows oysters in cages that float in the Chesapeake Bay near the mouth of the Rappahannock River. Katherine Frey/The Washington Post Wait 1 second to continue. On a chilly night in the fall of 2015, Tom Perry steered his pickup truck into Adams Morgan for a meeting with Phillip Valliant. It was part pleasure the two had met while duck hunting with friends on the Eastern Shore and had hit it off but mostly business. Valliant, who worked at Rappahannock Oyster Bar, was interested in starting an oyster farm. Perry already had one. The two 20-somethings had a few beers, then headed outside to examine and taste a few of the oysters that Perry had brought up from his farm. Holy Jesus, was the first thing Valliant remembers saying. I had never seen oysters like this. They looked like they had been grown in a laboratory. Every one was the same size and shape. [For the Hardys on Prince Edward Island, oyster farming is a family affair] Within a few minutes, a small crowd had gathered around the pair. Within an hour, they had shucked and shared more than 100 oysters with passersby. Something clicked for me that night, said Perry. If I could get all my oysters to D.C., we could turn this into something big. Through White Stone Oyster Co., Phillip Valliant, left, and Tom Perry hope to enhance the national reputation of Chesapeake Bay oysters. (Katherine Frey/The Washington Post) A little over a year later, Perry and Valliant, now a full-time employee, are on their way. White Stone Oyster Co. has an elite restaurant clientele in the District, including Blue Duck Tavern, Le Diplomate, the Dabney and Roses Luxury. And the pair hope to burnish the national reputation of Chesapeake Bay oysters by offering deep-cupped, sweet and meaty oysters that compete with desirable and pricier West Coast varieties such as Kumamoto and Kusshi. [Virginia on the half shell] They are one of the best oysters on the East Coast, easily, said Jeremiah Langhorne, chef-owner of the Dabney, which celebrates the ingredients and cuisine of the Mid-Atlantic. When you start doing the Pepsi Challenge with them putting them next to the other oysters that are around you instantly see how much better they are. The Chesapeake Bay was, once upon a time, what oyster expert Rowan Jacobsen called the Napa of oysters. They grew wild, billions of them, made plump and sweet from the brackish mix of waters where rivers including the Rappahannock, the James and the Potomac meet the Atlantic Ocean. But more than a century of overharvesting, along with rampant water pollution, put an end to the bounty. [Oyster population in protected areas of Chesapeake shows signs of renewal] A boom in aquaculture has returned oysters to the Bay, cheering locavores and environmentalists, who laud the bivalves ability to filter and clean the water. But many Chesapeake oysters, especially in the less-salty northern regions of the bay, lack the distinction of prized varieties such as Olympia from Washington state and Wellfleet from Massachusetts. Workers for White Stone Oyster Co. harvest oysters from floating cages moored at the southern tip of Virginias Northern Neck in the Chesapeake Bay. (Katherine Frey/The Washington Post) Small and plump, White Stones have a delicate salinity. When tasted alongside New Brunswicks Beausoleil oysters and Miradas from Washington state, they split the difference between the briny Canadian oyster and the deeper-cupped West Coast variety. The first taste is a burst of salt that quickly softens into a long, creamy finish. The texture is ideal for oyster skeptics who fear the sometimes-snotty consistency of other East Coast oysters. Theyre Crassostrea Virginica, the same Atlantic oyster species that produces Malpeques, Wellfleets, Rappahannocks and many others on the East Coast. What makes them different? The answer is both the location of the farm and the way Perry raises them. The spot is Windmill Point, Va., just north of the mouth of the Rappahannock, a place where plenty of ocean water floods in to give a salty depth to the oyster meat. (Perry found his location by stalking Google Earth, then kayaking through potential areas using a GPS to pinpoint locations with the ideal depth, bottom and water salinity.) Where to taste White Stone oysters To grow the oysters, Perry uses floating cages, rather than the ones that sit just off the bottom and are more common in the Chesapeake Bay. Heres how it works: Oyster seed, each about the size of a pinkie nail, are bagged, then placed in cages that are anchored into the ground and kept afloat by pontoons. Atop the water, the waves toss and jostle the oysters, polishing their shells and creating the deep cup that leads to a meatier oyster. The constantly moving water also provides a steady stream of oyster food, such as phyto- and zooplankton. The system is not easy for me or for whoever has to go after them especially at this time of year, where you get vicious, cold winds, Perry said. But this is what you have to do to get the end product we want. At White Stone Oyster Co., Max Myers, left, and Adam Hurley sort freshly harvested oysters. (Katherine Frey/The Washington Post) Floating cages are not new; the system is all the rage on the West Coast. But Perry is one of the few using it in the Chesapeake Bay. (Another is the Tangier Island Oyster Co., of which former Virginia attorney general Ken Cuccinelli is a co-founder.) The technique does have its downsides. For example, many people, especially those who own waterfront property, complain that hundreds of cages floating in the waves ruin the view. But, says Julie Qui, who blogs about oysters at In a Half Shell, the method does produce a thicker, smoother shell that makes shucking easier a big plus for anyone who, like this reporter, has tried to open an oyster and turned it into a sloppy tartare. [Ken Cuccinellis post-politics endeavor: Oyster farming] Perry has almost 1,000 cages in the water and is harvesting 30,000 oysters a week. He hopes to triple that over the next three years. In addition to restaurants in the District, he is selling to such respected Charleston, S.C., chefs as Mike Lata and Sean Brock and, through a distributor, to a few places in New York City. We want to grow. But were not trying to be the biggest, says Perry. We are trying to do the best oyster in the world. Ammar Sawan, 40, center, looks at the youngest of his four children, Sham, 1, in Amman, Jordan on Saturday. The family was planning to resettle in the United States, but President Trumps ban on Syrian refugees entering the United States has put their future in doubt. (Sam McNeil/AP) Syrian refugee Ammar Sawan took his first step toward resettlement in the United States three months ago, submitting to an initial round of security screenings. His dreams of a better life were crushed when President Trump stopped Syrians who were forced to leave their homes from entering the United States. Sawan said Saturday that he learned of the decision from TV news the night before. When we heard of the order, it was like a bolt of lightning, and all our hopes and dreams vanished, said Sawan, 40. The upholsterer, who supports his family with odd jobs in the Jordanian capital of Amman, said he was especially disappointed for his four children who he had hoped would get a good education in the United States. The Sawan family had hoped to get a better education for Khaled, 15, and his three siblings in the United States. (Sam McNeil/AP) He and other Syrian refugees in Amman bristled at the idea that they posed a potential security threat, saying they were both shocked and saddened by Trumps ban. We tell the American people that we hope [Trump] retracts this decision, said refugee Mayada Sheik, 37. We are not going out to harm people of other countries. In an executive order Friday, Trump suspended all refugee admissions to the United States for four months and banned the entry of Syrian refugees indefinitely, pending a security review of the admissions program. In a third step, he issued a 90-day ban on all entry to the United States from countries with terrorism concerns, including Syria, Iraq and Libya. Close to 5 million Syrians have fled their homeland since the conflict there erupted in 2011. Millions more are still in Syria but not in their homes. Most refugees have settled in overburdened neighboring countries, including Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey, where the struggle for survival has become increasingly difficult. Savings have run out, jobs are hard to find and poorly paid, while refugee children learn in crowded classrooms and have very limited access to higher education. Many refugees say their first choice is to return home as soon as possible. But with the civil war dragging on, thats not an option and refugees increasingly pursue resettlement to the West because of tough conditions in regional host countries. International aid agencies harshly criticized Trumps restrictions imposed on refugees. The International Rescue Committee said the suspension of the refugee resettlement program was a harmful and hasty decision. America must remain true to its core values. America must remain a beacon of hope, said IRC President David Miliband. The group said the U.S. vetting process for refugees is already robust involving health screening and up to 36 months of questioning by 12 to 15 government agencies. Jan Egeland, the head of the Norwegian Refugee Council, said Trumps decision hurts innocent people fleeing extremist violence in Syria. It will not make America safer, Egeland told the Associated Press in a phone interview from Norway. It will make America smaller and meaner. Its a really sad rupture of a long and proud American bipartisan tradition that America would be there for those fleeing from terror and for the weak and the vulnerable in the world, which are the refugees. Elizabeth Hadfield at her familys holiday party in 2015, left, presenting as male, and as Liz, right, a year later. (Photo courtesy of Elizabeth Hadfield) Id like to introduce you to a friend of mine: Elizabeth Hadfield, a 21-year-old senior at Duke University, my alma mater, in Durham, N.C., who is majoring in cultural anthropology and psychology. She has a 3.7 GPA. Her parents and younger brother live in New Mexico. She is also transgender. On Christmas Day last year, Elizabeth, who goes by Liz, posted two side-by-side photos on Facebook. On the left, shes at the family holiday party in 2015, when she was still presenting as male. On the right, one year later, shes now Liz. I asked if shed speak with me and she agreed, because the best way to help people understand what being trans means is to help those around me understand my experience as a trans person. Lizs public coming-out coincides with Katie Courics compelling new documentary, Gender Revolution, to be broadcast on the Nat Geo Channel on Feb. 6. I asked Couric in an interview why she made the film. More and more, thanks to greater visibility, youre hearing stories about transgender kids, gender confirmation surgery, and being gender-fluid, she said. Maybe we need to take a closer look and connect the dots for people, because it was so hard for me to wrap my head around it. I think that Liz also helps us connect the dots and understand what it means to be transgender today. Our conversation has been edited and condensed: You grew up with a boys name and often dressed like a girl. How different did you feel as a kid? I felt uncomfortable with my gender from a young age. As a preschooler I typically presented as female, with my long hair and the pink cowboy boots I loved to wear. In kindergarten, every Friday I wore a Powerpuff Girls jacket, because that was my absolute favorite show. I was made fun of a lot in elementary school. When I was in third grade, I wanted to dress up as a girl wizard for a Harry Potter book-release party. I had long hair, and most people thought I was a girl anyway, so why would this be a problem? But my parents, who were generally accepting, were displeased with this. I remember my mom telling me, No, youre a boy. From then on, I knew I couldnt dress like that anymore. It finally clicked that it was wrong. Lets jump ahead to college. How did you start to express your changing sense of self and gender identity? I first came to the realization when I was studying abroad in 2015. I was looking at this woman who had her hair done up in a cool way. I thought, Hmm, that would be a cool way to do my hair! In the past, Id say to myself, No, youre not a girl, youre a guy, so you cant do your hair like that. But this time I kept thinking, What if that is the way you want to do your hair? And I let myself think that. And I realized that I would love to do my hair like that. In fact, I would actually like to be like her. It was that moment where I thought, This is what I want to be, what I really am. Im a woman. How and when did you start talking to others about all this? I called my best friend and told her. Soon after that I called my mom and told her, and asked her to tell my dad. In my final week abroad, I texted all my close friends. Finally, in March 2016, I publicly came out via a Facebook profile picture as part of a womens rights campaign. I am extremely lucky my family and friends were all ridiculously supportive. I know it was a little harder for my parents at first mostly because of the lack of information in the mainstream media about what being trans means. You officially started your transition a year ago. Whats that year been like? I have taken four hormone pills every day and one estrogen injection a week for a little more than a year. I feel much more whole with the hormones. Last summer I had a long enough break from school to realize that I was ready to begin presenting as female. I havent looked back since. Still, this past year has been one of the most emotionally trying times of my entire life. There were times that I was so low, I didnt think I would make it out. From your experience, what is the most common misperception about trans people? That we are defined by our genitals. Some women have penises, some men have vaginas. Some men and/or women have both. Some have neither. Some identify as neither a man nor a woman. Some identify as both. Some identify as somewhere in between. Some may identify as genderqueer, gender non-conforming, or non-binary. There is a difference between gender and sex. And the person who knows ones gender the best is oneself not anyone else. What is your advice to others about promoting trans understanding and acceptance? Meet trans people. Talk to trans people. Bear witness to their stories. Empathy is the first step to understanding and acceptance. Learn what you can, and trust that transgender people do not pose a threat to you we are just normal humans here hanging out on Earth like you. Email questions to Civilities at stevenpetrow@gmail.com (unfortunately not all questions can be answered). You can reach him on Facebook at facebook.com/stevenpetrow and on Twitter @stevenpetrow. Join him for a chat online at washingtonpost.com on Feb. 7 at 1 p.m., when Elizabeth Hadfield will be his guest. People protest President Trump and welcome arriving passengers at Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia on Saturday. (Astrid Riecken/For The Washington Post) In Donald Trumps America, there may be no more weekends just an incessant cycle of shocks, of actions and reactions. For the second weekend in a row, Friday to Sunday was wall to wall with resistance and outrage. On Friday, President Trump signed an executive order banning people from seven nations in the Middle East and Africa from entering the United States. On Saturday, protesters began heading to the airports to welcome international travelers, some of whom were detained for hours without access to lawyers. On Sunday, thousands pushed peacefully against the fences around the White House in protest of Trumps order. The signs spelled out embarrassment and resolve and a cheeky self-awareness that only Washington can muster. SHAME ON AMERICA. DEATH TO FASCISM. PROTEST IS THE NEW BRUNCH. Is this what were in for, even on weekends? Will every news alert force us to ask ourselves who we are or send us out into the streets in a spontaneous counterattack? You were out drinking, or at home playing Cards Against Humanity, when suddenly you were wondering how many Syrian refugees you could hide in your basement. Or how many hours you could drive for a protest. Or maybe the Islamic State has made you so panicked that you greeted the weekends news with relief: Finally, you thought, we are safe, and all these new walls will only make us safer. Either way, this weekend didnt feel like a drill. This was no longer, What would you do if? Something profound was happening, under the auspices of extreme vetting. It felt like time to figure out what kind of person you were, or would become. [Acclaimed Iranian director wont attend Oscars due to unjust conditions of Trump] As the president signed the executive order at the Pentagon, it quickly began to resemble, for many, the Muslim ban he once proposed on the campaign trail. Lawyers set up legal triage centers on the floors of airports. More than 356,000 people clicked donate on the website of the American Civil Liberties Union between Saturday and Sunday. Friends sent up flares on Facebook: If I know you and you need a recommendation letter for your citizenship application or green card, message me immediately. Others uncapped Sharpies and took to poster board: IMPEACH PRESIDENT BANNON and FIRST THEY CAME FOR THE MUSLIMS AND WE SAID HELL NO. This weekend was a call to action or, for some, a call to reflection. A call to examine the choices we made to reaffirm them or to question them, quietly and to ourselves. (Dalton Bennett,Erin Patrick O'Connor,Katherine Shaver,Monica Akhtar,McKenna Ewen/The Washington Post) On the Eastern Shore of Maryland, a sales representative named Marcus sat in his bedroom Saturday, by his Donald Trump poster, and watched his Facebook feed fill with photos of protesters at John F. Kennedy International Airport, where even taxi drivers briefly went on strike in solidarity. This is discrimination, thought Marcus, who had voted for Trump because he thought he would make good deals for America. Trump is not seeing Muslim people as equals. In a split-level in Bethesda on Saturday night, Caitlin Moriarty was opening her home to 20 friends and strangers who came to write postcards to senators expressing dismay over the border wall with Mexico and the travel ban. This is the first time Ive been overtly politically active in my life, said Moriarty, 46, a high school teacher. And I think that comes from a sense of not acting doesnt seem like an option. . . . So this is all disturbing, but also exciting. A few time zones west, in Blackfoot, Idaho (population 12,000), a 20-year-old named Chelsey Waddell was feeling heartbroken. Like 65.6 percent of Bingham County, she had voted for Trump, and supported the concept of increased scrutiny at the borders. My friends who supported Hillary kept telling me to turn on the television and see what was going on, see what I started, Waddell said. So I did, and the kids in the ban I just cant. I care about kids a lot. The adults can take of themselves, but the kids . . . In Washington, Trump had wrapped up his first official call with Russian President Vladimir Putin. He skipped that nights black-tie dinner of the Alfalfa Club, the elite gathering of moguls and politicos, but sent Vice President Pence in his place. The president is going to build a big, beautiful, impenetrable wall, Pence said, according to Axios, setting up a joke that riffed on Wednesdays order to build a wall on the Mexican border. The wall is gonna be nine feet tall, and its gonna run right between the West Wing and the press corps. And the New York Times is going to pay for it. [A political truce is called at the 104th annual Alfalfa Club dinner] That night, after a federal judge in New York signed an injunction against the executive order, former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani (R) went on Fox News. This last week, I think, has been a week where [Trump] has done more than Roosevelt did in 100 days, he said triumphantly. (McKenna Ewen/The Washington Post) Over at Dulles, a heartsick Iranian mother was reunited with her 5-year-old son, who was detained for several hours. A few hours later, just after midnight, Ivanka Trump tweeted a photo of herself and husband Jared Kushner in formal attire. The social-media hordes stormed the tweet as if it were the Bastille. Only in America could the Kushners go in just two generations from desperate refugees to shutting out desperate refugees, tweeted journalist Jon Schwarz. On Sunday morning, Rachel Burns came to Washington from Arlington to protest. This wasnt even a protest of the immigration ban, but a previously scheduled one against Trumps nominee for education secretary, Betsy DeVos, in the shadow of the Capitol dome, a dull white against the hazy winter sky. We know the Constitution, said Burns, 38, of her fellow Washingtonians. She was wearing a Wonder Woman costume and was accompanied by her husband and two kids. We can take the Metro to the Archives and see it. So its very dangerous to mess with people in D.C., because were very smart, we know protocol, and we know right from wrong. Meanwhile, a Boeing 777 was preparing for descent. It had left the seaside city of Jiddah at 6:48 a.m. Saudi time Sunday. It had flown over Greece, where refugees from Iraq and Syria have washed ashore, and over Germany, whose chancellor explained the Geneva Conventions to Trump during a phone call a few hours earlier. It had crossed the Atlantic and flew over Ottawa, where Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had that day tweeted a photo of himself welcoming a young refugee to Canada. And after 13 hours in the air and with an unknown number of potential detainees on board, Saudia Airlines Flight 35 landed at 12:07 p.m. Sunday in a country that was beside itself with anxiety. Attorneys were waiting. Are there any detainees that we know of? one asked another, as the arrivals board showed Flight 35 had landed at Washington Dulles International Airport. We dont know, the other replied. Theyll have to go through customs. It will still probably be 30 minutes. The lawyers waited at the ready, with boxes of documents, papers, a portable printer, hand-scrawled name tags, and a sign that said Free Legal Assistance at Baggage Claim 13. Immigration lawyers know: We have been pushing this rock up hill for so long, but this moment feels huge, said Mirriam Seddiq, an Afghan American immigration attorney from Maryland, gesturing to the cheering supporters. Look at all of this. Last night they were chanting, Let them see their lawyers. Nobody ever chants for lawyers. Everyone is realizing this is something. 1 of 40 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad How people reacted to Trumps immigration ban View Photos Thousands protested the presidents executive order outside the White House, at Trump International Hotel and at Dulles International Airport. Caption Thousands protested the presidents executive order outside the White House, at Trump International Hotel and at Dulles International Airport. Feb. 1, 2017 Karen Sultan was among scores who came to the Rally for Immigrants held at Reagan National Airport. She brought flowers to give to anyone who might need them. Shes from Chevy Chase, Md. Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post Wait 1 second to continue. At the White House, a protest that had been organized via Facebook less than two days earlier was getting underway, drawing thousands from the region. Protests also erupted in Boston, Detroit, Louisville, Omaha and Nashville. I did three tours in Afghanistan, said John Lee, a resident of Southwest Washington, who wore a camo vest emblazoned with the words NOT WHAT I FOUGHT FOR. Now, he said, the values I was fighting for over there are being trampled here. Around 1 p.m., the first passenger from Flight 35 emerged from customs at Dulles: a middle-aged woman in a velour track suit and matching blue headscarf, pushing a luggage cart and scanning the crowd. She had not been detained perhaps she was from Saudi Arabia, which was not on Trumps list of banned countries but she got an effusive reception anyway from ralliers. We love you! the first sign-holder called to her, and the woman shook her head in confusion at the unexpectedly warm welcome. The friends who had come to meet her, also in headscarves, ran over, wrapping their arms around the passenger, helping her with the luggage cart. It was okay, she murmured. All okay. Welcome to America, another sign-holder shouted to her. This land is your land. And the woman burst into tears. This story has been updated with the final weekend donation tally for the ACLU. Jeff and Denise Yeager are determined to leave the United States now that Donald Trump is president. (Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post) Make me an offer, says Jeff Yeager with a sweep of his arm, taking in the sylvan Accokeek, Md., spread hes putting on the market and is eager to unload. Because this man is getting out of Dodge. Leaving the United States. Escaping Donald J. Trump. Yeager, a self-employed writer, and his wife plan to spend the coming year roaming the globe in search of a new home where they will live for four years. Or possibly eight. Trumping out, Yeager calls it. Sort of like extended political camping. When the devastation of the election hit, he says, we thought, Lets just leave and travel, travel, travel and see where it takes us. Remember all those celebrities who were going to quit the country if Trump was elected president? Samuel L. Jackson (bound for South Africa), Amy Schumer (Spain or somewhere) Lena Dunham (Vancouver) and Cher (Jupiter). Perhaps you had a cousin who threatened to leave. A neighbor, too. And all those Facebook friends who offered posts of parting, invariably mentioning Canada, O, Canada, I could drink a case of you, so nice, so close. Talk, talk, talk. They all appear to be here still in our notably less United States. Not a one has followed the example of Lyndon Johnson press secretary Pierre Salinger, who famously said in 2000, If George Bush is elected president, I will leave the country and then did, for France. [Heres why you wont really move to Canada if Trump wins in November.] In fact, finding people who are actually leaving is a challenge. Many toying with the idea who, mind you, have yet to make a decision declined to speak on the record for fear, they said, of potentially enraging Trump supporters. One man wouldnt give his name, instead choosing to be called Martin and communicating through a temporary and untraceable email account and cell number. He did, however, send a multi-page manifesto of 30 indicators that could prompt him and his wife to change their country of residence. (He said he has hundreds of friends considering a similar move.) Warning Indicators of When Its Time to Flee a.k.a. Dont wait until Kristallnacht include the creation of a national registry for Muslims or other vulnerable groups and Washington unilaterally withdrawing from free-trade agreements (as opposed to following amendment procedures within those agreements). The truth is, leaving the country for extended periods of time isnt easy, especially if you have school-age children. Or aging parents. Or need to earn a living. Those sorts of things. Many countries warmly welcome American visitors and their money. Theyre somewhat less enchanted with Americans taking their citizens jobs. (Where have we heard this before?) It seems very sexy to move to Canada these days, says immigration lawyer Elizabeth Wozniak of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Whats not sexy is the amount of paper involved. We have a ridiculous amount of bureaucracy. [Americans, its actually quite hard to move to Canada] Such obstacles are not stopping Yeager. The 58-year-old is a man of his Salingeresque word. Even as others face challenges entering the country after the presidents new travel ban, he is determined to depart. He and his wife, Denise, met with a real estate agent the Monday after the inauguration. Or, more important to the Yeagers, after the Womens March on Washington, for which they hosted nine fellow demonstrators. Make me an offer, pleads Yeager again, showing a visitor around the airy compound a two-bedroom house with a separate office and a guest cottage overlooking a creek and a mile and a half from the Potomac. Actually, he says it four times. The Yeagers dwell in that special demographic of people who are able to leave. They have no children. Theyve paid off the mortgage. Denise, 65, retired as a health and physical education teacher at Prince Georges Community College and collects Social Security and a small pension. Jeff, who was a fundraiser and administrator of nonprofit groups until he quit to write in 2005, can work anywhere. Also, he is famously, prodigiously and professionally thrifty, the self-proclaimed Ultimate Cheapskate. Yeager has written four humorous books on the joys of thrift. He has appeared on the Today show more than 20 times and travels the country lecturing, a couple of times by bike. In a subversive twist, he makes money by preaching about not spending it. Tall, earnest, with a Twainian stache, he believes that happiness has very little do with money. Also, that you can reuse anything. (He has a dozen uses for eggshells.) He amasses junk, uses five dusty computers because they all do a little something, its just that not one of them does everything. He and Denise plan to store, sell or trash most of their belongings. The Yeagers live on less than $40,000 a year. When they travel, they spend $100 a day. Or less less being a mantra. I am violently opposed to debt, Yeager says. [Getting a big thrill out of being so cheap] A die-hard liberal, he was long apolitical in his writing, but Trumps election left him despondent and vocal. He received a sewer of virtual vitriol from his 3,500 Facebook followers. Youre just whining. You need to suck it up, they told him. And more. Genial in manner and prose, Yeager wasnt used to such venom and removed himself from the social-media platform in November. Listen, Im a fourth-generation American. I come from the heartland, northwestern Ohio. I am a deeply disheartened, concerned individual, he says, chatting in the sitting room that he remodeled. I consider Trump a dangerous, unstable person. Jeff and Denise Yeager visited Ireland after the election and are also heading to Central America, the Far East and Eastern Europe in search of a new place to live out the Trump administration. (Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post) After the election, the Yeagers spent a month in Ireland, their first visit. They liked it very much. So, Ireland is on the list of places to land. Im committed to being out of the country for just as long as we can, Yeager says. I dont see us coming back on a permanent basis. That is, until Trump is out of the White House. What were trying to escape is the disappointment of my homeland, he adds. When theyre abroad, the Yeagers use public transit, bike, crash in hostels, inexpensive hotels or with locals whom they find through couchsurfing.com. They dont frequent restaurants much, preferring to cook wherever they happen to land. The Ultimate Cheapskate knows how to travel cheaply. And hes been smart about saving. Their next country-hunting adventure will be to Panama and Costa Rica. Spain and Portugal are on the list, also New Zealand and Malaysia, Vietnam and Thailand. They love Eastern Europe, particularly Croatia and Poland, countries where Americans can live relatively inexpensively. I love the raw, real feel of a place that you cant find with a lot of tourists there, Yeager says. Would he consider Russia? He would like to ride the length of the Trans-Siberian Railroad, not in luxury, but like ordinary Russians with chickens. Denise is having no part of that. Otherwise, shes game. Many people tell us they wish they could do the same thing and leave, she says. Theyre looking for countries that offer good health care, affordable housing, friendly people, limited paperwork. (So no Canada for them.) Ive never felt this strongly, not even with Nixon, Yeager says. Rather than seeing themselves as prodigal Americans, we see ourselves as citizen ambassadors. The goal is to represent a different, non-Trumpian America, their America, to the world. Yeager finds that hes happiest when I cant speak the language of the country where I am. I cant possibly speak politics. But, he adds emphatically, We have no intention of giving up our U.S. citizenship. Theyre just giving up, for a while, on their residency. So its urgent to find someone to rent or buy their home. Make me an offer, he says again. Melania Trump with her husband at the Salute to the Our Armed Services Ball on the night of his inauguration. Since becoming first lady, she has kept a low profile. (Toni L. Sandys/The Washington Post) Melania Trump has finished her first week as first lady a title that automatically makes her one of the most prominent women in the country. And yet she was barely visible. She cut an elegant figure at her husbands swearing-in and at the inaugural balls. But two days later, she returned to New York, as she had said she would, to tend to her 10-year-old son, Barron, who remains in school there. Meanwhile, she has given little indication of how much she intends to embrace the life of a public figure. She is said to be building her staff. But she has made no public appearances since a prayer service the morning after the inauguration, given no media interviews as first lady and has not indicated with any specificity what she has planned for her new role. Theres a public expectation for communication, and shes not providing it, said Lauren Wright, a political scientist and author of On Behalf of the President. Its interesting that there doesnt seem to be a willingness to shape her public image, despite the public interest. By any measure, Melania Trumps East Wing has gotten off to an unusually slow start. Last week came word that the first lady had made her first hire: Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, a New York party planner, who will serve as a senior adviser, according to a person with knowledge of the appointment. [Melania Trumps first hire: Event planner Stephanie Winston Wolkoff] Still, several key positions on her staff have not yet been filled, including chief of staff, communications director and press secretary. That last job is so essential that a volunteer has stepped in to field calls. The volunteer, Jessica Boulanger, is a former Capitol Hill staffer who is now the senior vice president for communications at the Business Roundtable. Melania Trump with the president in her most recent public appearance, at a prayer service in Washington on Jan. 21. (Olivier Douliery/Pool photo via European Pressphoto Agency) Most striking, the Trump team has not yet named a social secretary, a position responsible for planning all White House events. Most previous administrations filled the job before Inauguration Day. Amid the silence, some members of the public are rushing to assumptions. Internet wits spent days dissecting the first ladys facial expressions and body language during the inauguration, painting several interactions with her husband as fraught a moment when he left Melania several paces behind him as he met the Obamas on the White House steps, and another when she appeared to frown behind his back. The Twitter hashtag #FreeMelania caught fire. (The Washington Post) But all seemed well on the couples official social-media accounts. Although occasionally reactive to jibes, neither responded to the Twitter conjecture, which came amid a fire hose of larger administration controversies. President Trumps @POTUS account tweeted a thank you to his family, with photo of his wife smiling. Melania, who has not tweeted from her personal account since Election Day, has sent only one message from her new @FLOTUS account, saying that she is deeply honored to serve as first lady. [Maryland judge says Melania Trumps lawsuit against blogger can proceed] She entered the White House with the lowest favorability ratings of any modern first lady. Only 37 percent of the public had a favorable view of her in a Gallup poll released Jan. 16, while the same percentage gave her an unfavorable rating. Michelle Obama, Laura Bush and Hillary Clinton each had a favorability rating above 55 percent when she became first lady. Americans are accustomed to seeing the first family together, said Myra Gutin, a communication professor at Rider University and author of The Presidents Partner. And the Slovenia-born former models decision to live in New York for now may be compounding any negative perceptions of her. (She has said she intends to return to Washington on weekends to see President Trump.) She could be giving the administration a little bit of a softer touch, because we do make certain decisions about a president based on his family, Gutin said. Ivanka and her family are there, but with Mrs. Trump and Mr. Trumps younger son, it would be a different kind of feeling. [Who is minding the White Houses East Wing? So far, nobody knows.] Melania Trumps quiet first week may signal that she is reluctantly grappling with how to embrace the increased scrutiny. Or she could simply be taking her time to determine how she will make an impact. Each first lady takes on the role and makes it their own. That evolves over time, said former White House social secretary Ann Stock. First [priority] for every president and first lady is settling in their family. Michael DAntonio, a Donald Trump biographer, said Melania seemed eager to preserve her privacy when he met her. Her husband playfully begged her to tell me he was a great husband and she complied. However, she fled the room as soon as possible, DAntonio recalled. I expect her to be gracious when acting as first lady, but I would not be surprised if she limits herself to a minimal engagement with the role. Does it matter that shes taking her time with the job? One former White House official noted that staffers who arrive after an administrations early days can have a hard time finding traction within the larger organization assuming, of course, that Melania Trump cares about wielding influence in that space. The job is more than ceremonial: Federal courts have ruled that the first lady is a de facto public official, and Congress has authorized staffing to support her assistance to the president, said MaryAnne Borrelli, a professor of government at Connecticut College and author of The Politics of the Presidents Wife. Melania Trump seemed eager to preserve her privacy, a Donald Trump biographer said. (Evan Vucci/AP) Meanwhile, there are 228 years of tradition surrounding the role, and Melania Trump will be measured against the women who came before her whether or not she chooses to play along. Michelle Obama, whom Melania Trump has said she admires, was also a reluctant first lady. She, too, worried about raising her children in the spotlight. But from the beginning, she positioned herself as a vital part of her husbands administration. While billing herself as mom-in-chief, Michelle Obama nonetheless had a team building her agenda when she entered the White House; in her second week, she began a tour of federal agencies, thanking the employees for their work. [Michelle Obama makes a pitch to keep her advocacy work alive in a Trump White House] Other first ladies, though, have waited months before rolling out their agendas. Melania Trump has so far cited one issue she hopes to champion cyberbullying, which is said to affect about a quarter of adolescents. Experts in the field say they have not yet heard from the first lady but are eager to collaborate. Everyone is kind of looking around, saying, Who is she going to turn to? said Justin W. Patchin, a co-director of the Cyberbullying Research Center. She is a very public figure. At the very least, she can bring this issue to further light. Jane Hampton Cook, a novelist and author of popular histories about the White House, said Melania Trumps reserve could heighten interest in her when she does surface. She recalled a short speech the future first lady gave in Pennsylvania near the end of the campaign, in which she vowed to be an advocate for women and for children. I found myself listening to her more because I hadnt heard from her for a while, Cook said. Sometimes less is more, and she represents that side of the equation. Her husband is more, more, more. The evening before his inauguration, President Trump took time to meet with a 24-year-old FedEx courier from rural Illinois. In a tent behind the Lincoln Memorial in D.C., the soon-to-be president praised Shane Bouvet for his work as a volunteer on his campaign, hugged him and then promised him an extraordinary thank you: a $10,000 check. The unusual meeting was arranged after Trump said he read a profile about Bouvet in The Washington Post. The struggling single father had spent nights working and days volunteering for Trump, who Bouvet hoped could bring renewal to his home town of Stonington, Ill., and other corners hard hit by the decline in U.S. industry. On Monday, the check arrived in the mail. Shane You are a great guy thanks for all of your help, a note from Trump on presidential stationery read. Bouvet was in disbelief at his good fortune. President Trump and Shane Bouvet from Illinois met in Washington on Jan. 19. (Justin Jouvenal/The Washington Post) I'm still just living in a dream, Bouvet said. I never thought in a million years this would happen. Bouvet said he planned to use the money to pay for chemotherapy for his father, who he said is suffering from bladder cancer. So is Trump living up to Bouvet's hopes? So far, yes. Bouvet said he was impressed with Trump's quick moves to implement his agenda in his first week in office. He's getting things done, Bouvet said. He's laying down the law. I'm really blessed with that that's what we need. Most politicians are all talk, no action. Imported DAP fertiliser stuck in Kolkata Nearly 20,000 tonnes of Diammonium phosphate (DAP) imported by Agriculture Inputs Company (AIC) has been stuck in Kolkata, India, for the past two weeks. BLOOD DONATIONS Blood drives Friday, Loudoun County Fire and Rescue, 801 Sycolin Rd., Leesburg, 800-733-2767; Saturday, 10 a.m.-3 p.m., Loudoun County Rescue Company 13, 143 Catoctin Cir. SE, Leesburg, 800-733-2767; Feb. 11, 9 a.m.-2 p.m., Leesburg Public Safety Center, 65 Plaza St., Leesburg, 800-733-2767; Feb. 17, 1:30-6 p.m., St. James Episcopal Church, 14 Cornwall St., Leesburg, 800-733-2767; Feb. 25, 10 a.m.-3 p.m. Ashburn Library, 43316 Hay Rd., Ashburn, 800-733-2767. Inova Blood Donor Center Mondays noon-8 p.m., Tuesdays 10 a.m.-6 p.m., Fridays 6 a.m.-4 p.m. and Sundays noon-4 p.m. Dulles Town Center, 45745 Nokes Blvd., Sterling. 866-256-6372 or inova.org/donateblood. FIRST AID First aid/adult, infant and child CPR/AED (Automated External Defibrillator) Fauquier Hospital Medical Office Building, 500 Hospital Dr., Warrenton. 540-316-3588. Call for schedule. $85. Registration required. HEARING Disability Resource Center Technical assistance through the state Department for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing and presentations to businesses, groups and schools. Third Tuesdays 2-5 p.m., Workplace, 205 Keith St., Warrenton. Call for an appointment, 800-648-6324; TDD, 540-373-5890. Free. Free hearing tests Age 18 and older. Mondays-Thursdays 8:30 a.m.-5 p.m., Blue Ridge Speech and Hearing Center, 19465 Deerfield Ave., Suite 201, Lansdowne. 703-858-7620. Registration required. Hearing loss, tinnitus and Menieres syndrome support For all ages, including parents of children with hearing loss. First Fridays at 2 p.m., Senior Center at Cascades, 21060 Whitfield Pl., Sterling. 703-430-2906. Northern Virginia Resource Center for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Age 18 and older. Second Tuesdays 10 a.m., Carver Center, 200 Willie Palmer Way, Purcellville. 571-258-3400. Hearing loss outreach Free referrals. Fourth Thursdays 10 a.m.-noon, Loudoun County Workforce Center, 102 Heritage Way, Leesburg; third Thursdays 10 a.m.-noon, Senior Center at Cascades, 21060 Whitfield Pl., Sterling. Free appointments: 703-430-2906 or nvrcloudoun@aol.com . MENTAL HEALTH Counseling for sexual violence survivors Provided by Loudoun Citizens for Social Justice. 703-771-9020. Crisis Intervention Treatment and Assessment Center Provides emergency mental-health, substance-use and developmental services to Loudoun residents. Daily from 7 a.m.-11 p.m. 102 Heritage Way NE, Suite 102, Leesburg. Emergency services are available 24 hours a day at 703-777-0320. Crisislink Suicide and crisis intervention. Community education, a volunteer crisis response team and CareRing, a telephone outreach program for the elderly and disabled. 703-527-6016, volunteer@crisislink.org or crisislink.org. Piedmont Chapter, National Alliance on Mental Illness Serves Fauquier, Orange, Madison and Rappahannock counties. Support group, education classes and events for people living with mental illness and their family members. First Wednesdays 7-9 p.m. Fauquier Hospital, 500 Hospital Dr., Sycamore Room A, Warrenton. 571-426-8213. Mental health first-aid A public education program offered by the Loudoun County Department of Mental Health, Substance Abuse and Developmental Services to help residents understand mental illness and seek intervention. Go to loudoun.gov/mhfirstaid. Northern Virginia Chapter, National Alliance on Mental Illness A support group, classes and programs for people living with mental illness and their family members. naminorthernvirginia.org. PREGNANCY, PARENTING Adoptive family preservation Adoptive families discuss common experiences; registration required. Third Tuesdays 12:30-2 p.m., Ashburn Library, 43316 Hay Rd. Call 703-941-9008, Ext. 23, or email jmellario@umfs.org . Birthright of Loudoun County Free pregnancy tests, baby clothing, transportation and support throughout pregnancy, 823 S. King St., Leesburg. 703-777-7272. Bond Between Us A nonprofit organization that offers support to birth parents when children have been placed for adoption. Fourth Tuesdays 7:30 p.m. Call for location. 703-771-7844. Breastfeeding support Mondays 9:30-10:30 a.m., Fauquier Hospital Family Birthing Center, 500 Hospital Dr., Warrenton. 540-316-3588. Dad support New and expectant fathers share ideas. First Tuesdays at 7 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital, 44045 Riverside Pkwy., Leesburg. 703-858-6360. For the Childrens Sake A group for separating or divorcing parents to share advice. Four-hour session weekly. Information: 703-391-8599 or fitsfoundation.org. La Leche League Mother-to-mother support and breastfeeding information. 10 a.m. second Wednesdays in Warrenton, 540-351-6103. Third Fridays 10:15-11:45 a.m., call for location, 703-444-7386. Second Fridays 10:15 a.m., Ashburn Library, 43316 Hay Rd., 703-829-0349; Thursdays 10 a.m.-noon, Panera Bread, 43670 Greenway Corp. Dr., Ashburn, lllashburn@gmail.com. Third Fridays 10:15 a.m., Christ the Redeemer Church, 46833 Harry F. Byrd. Hwy., Sterling, 540-338-4637. Loudoun Fatherhood Program Fathers discuss the joys and challenges of being a parent. Meets every other Saturday for two hours for four months; sponsored by Northern Virginia Family Service. 571-748-2796. Free. Loudoun Nurturing Parenting Program Positive parenting techniques; children attend with parents. Registration required. Call 703-771-3973, Ext. 27, or email nurturingprogram@lcsj.org. Free. Mothernet/Healthy Families Loudoun Program links first-time parents with medical, social and educational resources to give children a socially and physically healthy start in life. Family support workers meet with participants in homes. English-Spanish translation provided. 703-444-4477, Ext. 217 , or inmed.org. New mother support Wednesdays 9:30-11:30 a.m. Inova Loudoun Medical Pavilion, 224 Cornwall St., Leesburg. Babies welcome. 703-858-6360. Young parent services Support for teenage parents. Loudoun County Department of Family Social Services, 52 Sycolin Rd., Leesburg. Call for times. 703-771-5375. Online childbirth education program Inova Loudoun Hospitals Web-based program uses animation, videos and interactive activities to guide users through the basics of childbirth, breastfeeding and caring for newborns. 703-858-6360 or thebirthinginn.org/classes. Parenting Alone group For parents of school-age children who have lost a spouse or partner to cancer. Second Tuesdays 5:30-6:30 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital, Radiation Oncology Center, 44035 Riverside Pkwy., Suite 100, Leesburg. Call 703-698-2536 or email jennifer.eckert@inova.org. Pregnancy and childbirth support Childbirth Solutions Resource Center, 8393 W. Main St., Marshall. 571-344-0438. SENIORS Chair yoga Age 55 and older. Mondays 11 a.m.-noon, Carver Center, 200 Willie Palmer Way, Purcellville. Wear comfortable clothes. Bare feet or socks are encouraged. 571-258-3400. $2 drop-in. Exercise equipment Age 55 and older. Weights, treadmills, bikes and a cardio-glide. Instruction provided. Weekdays 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Leesburg Senior Center, 102 North St. NW. 703-737-8039. Free. Fitness for people 55 and older Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays 1-1:45 p.m. Carver Center, 200 Willie Palmer Way, Purcellville. 571-258-3400. $36, 12-visit card. Eye care LensCrafters staff members clean glasses and make minor repairs. Second Wednesdays 1-2 p.m. Senior Center at Cascades, 21060 Whitfield Pl., Sterling. 703-430-2397. Free. Inova Loudoun mobile van Blood pressure checks. Second and fourth Tuesdays 9:30 a.m.-noon, Senior Center at Cascades, 21060 Whitfield Pl., Sterling, 571-258-3280; first Wednesdays 9:30 a.m.-noon, Leesburg Senior Center, 102 North St. NW. 703-737-8039. Laughing yoga for seniors Improve flexibility and balance. Thursdays 9:30-10 :30 a.m. Leesburg Senior Center, 102 North St. NW. 703-737-8039. Free. Loudoun Adult Day Centers For seniors with physical limitations or memory loss, a safe and social environment, therapeutic activities, individualized care and respite for caregivers. Limited transportation. Sliding-scale fees. Weekdays in Leesburg, 7:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m., 703-771-5334; Purcellville, 571-258-3402; and Ashburn-Sterling, 571-258-3232. Senior Outreach Services Free and confidential assistance from an Area Agency on Aging case manager. Call for an appointment or sign up at the Senior Center at Cascades. First and third Wednesdays 11 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Senior Center at Cascades, 21060 Whitfield Pl., Sterling. 571-258-3280. Senior Outreach Services Free and confidential assistance from an Area Agency on Aging Elder case manager. Sign up in the Leesburg Senior Center lobby. Second and fourth Thursdays 11 a.m.-noon and 12:30-4:30 p.m. Leesburg Senior Center, 102 North St. NW. 703-737-8039. Free. Senior Outreach Services Free and confidential assistance from an Area Agency on Aging Elder case manager. Call for an appointment or sign up at the Carver Center. First and third Mondays, 12:30-5 p.m. Carver Center, 200 Willie Palmer Way, Purcellville. 703-737-8741. Free. Tai chi for seniors Stretching and strengthening movements. Mondays 11 a.m. Leesburg Senior Center, 102 North St. NW. 703-737-8039. Free. Zumba gold class Age 55 and older. Wear rubber-soled shoes and comfortable clothing; bring water and a towel. Tuesdays 11 a.m., Tuesdays and Fridays 1 p.m. Senior Center of Leesburg, 102 North St. NW, Leesburg. 703-737-8039. $24 per month. Zumba For people 55 and older learning Zumba for the first time, or those who prefer a lower-impact version. The fitness program combines Latin and international music with dance.Thursdays 11 a.m. Senior Center at Cascades, 21060 Whitfield Pl., Sterling. 571-258-3280. $12. SUPPORT GROUPS Al-Anon Service Center of Northern Virginia A volunteer is available 24 hours with information for spouses, family members and friends of problem drinkers. 703-534-4357 or 877-339-8350. Mondays 8 p.m. Emmanuel Episcopal Church, 125 W. Washington St., Middleburg, 540-554-2747; Tuesdays 7:30 p.m. St. James Episcopal Church, 14 Cornwall St. NW, Leesburg, 877-339-8350; Fridays 8:30 p.m. Grace Episcopal Church, 6507 Main St., The Plains, 800-344-2666; Tuesdays 12:15 p.m. Warrenton Church of Christ, Route 29 N., 540-347-7448; Tuesdays 7 p.m. and Saturdays 8:30 p.m. Warrenton Presbyterian Church, 91 Main St., 800-344-2666. Alcoholics Anonymous Various meeting times and locations in Loudoun County. 800-208-8649 or 703-876-6166. nvintergroup.org. Alzheimers caregiver support For those who care for people with Alzheimers disease and other forms of dementia. Fourth Wednesdays 4-5:30 p.m. The Villa at Suffield Meadows, 6735 Suffield Lane, Warrenton. 540-316-3800. Alzheimers caregivers support For those caring for people with Alzheimers disease and other forms of dementia. Second Mondays 7-8:30 p.m. Galilee United Methodist Church, 45425 Winding Rd., Sterling. 703-430-9229. galileeumc.org. Alzheimers caregivers support Emotional, educational and social support for family members and friends of people with the disease. Third Saturdays 10 a.m. Loudoun County Area Agency on Aging, 20145 Ashbrook Pl., Ashburn. Call 703-771-5407 or email lesley.katz@loudoun.gov. Alzheimers caregiver support group Fourth Thursdays 3-4 p.m. Carver Center, 200 Willie Palmer Way, Purcellville. 540-903-6831 or alz.org. Alzheimers support First Tuesdays 10-11 a.m. Spring Arbor Assisted Living, 237 Fairview St. NW, Leesburg. 540-338-6520. Alzheimers support First Wednesdays 4 p.m. Leesburg Adult Day Center, 16501 Meadowview Ct., Leesburg. 703-771-5334. Alzheimers support Fourth Thursdays 3-4 p.m. Carver Center, 200 Willie Palmer Way, Purcellville. 571-258-3400. Talk About Curing Autism A nonprofit organization educating and supporting families affected by autism. tacanow.org. Autoimmune support Last Thursdays 6:30-7:30 p.m. Jackson Building, 209 Gibson St., Leesburg. autoimmunesupport@hotmail.com. Bereaved parent support One-on-one counseling is available. Spiritual Care Support Ministry Center, 76 W. Shirley Ave., Warrenton. 540-349-5814 or scsm.tv. Bereavement support Age 18 and older. Third Mondays 1 p.m. Fauquier Hospital Chestnut Room, 500 Hospital Dr., Warrenton. Sponsored by Capital Caring. 703-957-1800. Bereavement support Tuesdays through March 28, 7:30- 9 p.m. Spiritual Care Support Ministry Center, 76 W. Shirley Ave., Warrenton. 540-349-5814. Free. Breast cancer support Fourth Tuesdays 7-8 p.m. Fauquier Hospital Tower, Chestnut Room, 500 Hospital Dr., Warrenton. 540-349-0588. Breast cancer support For those with new diagnoses or starting treatment. Register if attending for the first time. Fourth Mondays 5-6:30 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital Radiation Oncology Center, 44035 Riverside Pkwy., Suite 100, Leesburg. 703-858-8857. Breast cancer support For those who have finished treatment, have had a recurrence or metastatic breast cancer. Register if attending for the first time. Fourth Mondays 6:30-8 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital Radiation Oncology Center, 44035 Riverside Pkwy., Suite 100, Leesburg. 703-858-8857. Free. Breast Cancer Support Assistance Fund Loudoun County residents who have received a diagnosis or have undergone treatment in the past 12 months are eligible to apply for financial assistance. Areas included are wigs, bras, puffs and prostheses, mammograms and medical bills, food and help with utilities, rent or mortgage, and transportation costs. The Pink Assistance Fund has been established by the Loudoun Breast Health Network. lbhn.org. Cancer support Oncology nurses, social workers and spiritual-care providers offer education and support to patients, families and caregivers. Second Mondays 5:30-6:30 p.m. Fauquier Hospital Sycamore Room, 500 Hospital Dr., Warrenton. 540-316-2273. Cancer support Life with Cancer, for patients, family members and friends. Second Thursdays 7 p.m. Ashburn Presbyterian Church, Room 202, 20962 Ashburn Rd. 703-729-2012 or ashburnpresbyterian.org. Caregiver support Emotional, educational and social support. Encourages caregivers to maintain their physical and emotional health while caring for people with dementia or other chronic illness. Fourth Thursdays 3-4 p.m. Carver Center, 200 Willie Palmer Way, Purcellville. 540-903-6831. Caregiver support and resource group Wednesdays 10:30 a.m.-noon (no meeting first Wednesdays), Spiritual Care Support Ministry Center, 76 W. Shirley Ave., Warrenton. 540-349-5814. scsm.tv. Caring for Aging Parents Support group. Confidential. Fourth Wednesdays 7:30 p.m., Family Focus Counseling Service, 20-B John Marshall St., Warrenton. 540-349-4537. Chadd parents support For parents of children with ADD/ADHD. Fourth Sundays 3 p.m. KinderCare, 44051 Ashburn Village Shopping Plaza. chadd.nova loudoun@gmail.com . Chronic illness support Tuesdays 10:30-11:30 a.m. Spiritual Care Support Ministries, 76 W. Shirley Ave., Warrenton. 540-349-5814 or scsm.tv. Coffee and Conversation Support for those discouraged because of illness, bereavement, caregiving or a loved one in the military. Thursdays 10 a.m.-noon. Spiritual Care Support Ministry Center, 76 W. Shirley Ave., Warrenton. 540-349-5814. Compassionate Friends For parents who have experienced the death of a child. First Wednesdays 7:30 p.m. St. James Episcopal Church, 14 Cornwall St. NW, Leesburg. 540-882-9707. Creating and Connecting Two-hour art therapy and relaxation workshop for cancer patients. Every other month, 12:30-2:30 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital Radiation Oncology Center, 44035 Riverside Pkwy., Suite 100, Leesburg. Call for dates. 703-858-8850. Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance of Western Loudoun Saturdays 3 p.m. Purcellville Library, 220 E. Main St., Carruthers Room. Call 703-431-7160 or email kathy@dbsanca.org. Drop-in grief support Second and fourth Wednesdays 1-2 p.m. St. Davids Episcopal Church, 43600 Russell Branch Pkwy., Ashburn. Sponsored by Capital Caring. 703-597-1781. Families Overcoming Drug Addiction Support group. First and third Thursdays at 6:30 p.m. Fauquier Hospital Sycamore Room, 500 Hospital Dr., Warrenton. myfodafamily@gmail.com or 540-316-9221. Gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth and parent support A group in partnership with Metro DC PFLAG. Fourth Sundays 4-6 p.m. Unitarian Universalist Church, 22135 Davis Dr., Sterling. 703-328-6518. Griefshare Nondenominational seminar and support group. Tuesdays 7:30-9 p.m., and Wednesdays, 1-2:30 p.m. Spiritual Care Support Ministry Center, 76 W. Shirley Ave., Warrenton. 540-349-5814. Free. Grief support Sponsored by Hospice Support of Fauquier County. Individual counseling available. First and third Thursdays 3:30-5 p.m. Hospice Support Office, 42 N. Fifth St., Warrenton. Registration required. Email hospicesupport@verizon.net or call 540-347-5922. Grief support Wednesdays, 10:30 a.m.-noon, Spiritual Care Support Ministry Center, 76 W. Shirley Ave., Warrenton. 540-349-5814. Hospice support Free medical-equipment loan facility for Fauquier County residents. Especially needed are donations of wheelchairs, bedside commodes, rolling walkers, electric hospital beds, shower benches and chairs, adult diapers, lift chairs, Ensure and hospital bed mattresses. 540-347-5922. Look Good, Feel Better For women undergoing or emerging from cancer treatment. Every other month, 6:45 to 9 p.m. ,Inova Loudoun Hospital Radiation Oncology Center, 44035 Riverside Pkwy., Suite 100, Leesburg. Call for dates. 703-776-2820. Free. Loudoun CHADD support Led by Children and Adults With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. Third Thursdays 7 p.m. Leesburg Town Hall, lower-level conference room, 25 W. Market St. 703-669-2445. Lyme disease support Fourth Sundays 2-4 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital, 44045 Riverside Pkwy., Conference Room A and B, Leesburg. Go to natcaplyme.org or email loudounlymeadvocates@gmail.com. Lyme disease support Third Thursdays at 7 p.m. Warrenton Church of Christ, 6398 Lee Hwy. Access Road, Warrenton. 540-347-7265 or email lymeinfauquier@gmail.com. Lyme disease support Age 18 and older. First Tuesdays 6:30-8 p.m. Carver Center, 200 Willie Palmer Way, Purcellville. Email charphealy@yahoo.com. MADD Loudoun victim support For those who have been affected by drunken driving. Third Wednesdays 7:30 p.m. 210 Wirt St., Leesburg. 540-338-6491. Man-to-Man Cancer Support Sponsored by Loudoun Cancer Care Center, for prostate cancer patients and their families. Second Tuesdays 6:30-8 p.m. Senior Center at Cascades, 21060 Whitfield Pl., Sterling. Call 703-858-8857 or email karen.archer@inova.org. Menopause support Third Thursdays 6:30-9 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital, 44045 Riverside Pkwy., Leesburg (second floor, Patient Education Room). 703-858-8060. Mens grief support Second Mondays at 7 p.m. Fauquier Hospital Sycamore Room, 500 Hospital Dr., Warrenton. 703-568-3346. Free. Multiple sclerosis support Saturdays 10:30 a.m. Fauquier Hospital Chestnut Room, 500 Hospital Dr., Warrenton. 540-349-2826. Multiple sclerosis support Last Sundays, September-June, 2-4 p.m. Cascades Library, 21030 Whitfield Pl., Potomac Falls. Call ahead to confirm. 703-771-4256. Nar-anon family support For those affected by loved ones with addiction. Meaningful Mondays, 7-8 p.m., Galilee United Methodist Church, 45425 Winding Rd., Sterling. 703-203-9792; Wisdom Wednesdays 7-8 p.m., St. Francis de Sales Catholic Church, 37730 St. Francis Ct., Purcellville, 703-606-7125; Serenity Thursdays, 7-8 p.m. Leesburg Presbyterian Church, 207 W. Market St., Leesburg, 703-606-7125. Overeaters Anonymous For fellowship and support. For locations and times, call oa.org. Parkinsons support Open to those with Parkinsons disease, their family members and caregivers. First Tuesdays 1:30-3 p.m. Call for Ashburn location. 571-442-8851. Post-partum support Second and fourth Wednesdays 1-2:30 p.m. Inova Loudoun Cornwall Campus, 224 Cornwall St., Leesburg. Call 703-909-9877 or email lamckeough@gmail.com. Registration required. Reach to Recovery Home visit program for mastectomy and lumpectomy patients. Temporary prostheses, exercise instruction and encouragement. 703-938-5550. Sexual assault and incest survivors group counseling Services provided by Loudoun Citizens for Social Justice and the Loudoun Abused Womens Shelter are free and confidential. 703-771-9020. Sexual assault survivors empowerment support Sponsored by Sexual Assault Victims Volunteer Initiative. Child care available with 48 hours notice. Mondays; call for times and locations. 540-349-7720. Spiritual support group For cancer patients, family members and friends. Third Tuesdays 6:30-8 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital Radiation Oncology Center, 44035 Riverside Pkwy., Suite 100, Leesburg. 703-858-8850. Spouse loss support Sundays Jan. 29 through April 2, 2:30-4 p.m. Spiritual Care Support Ministry Center, 76 W. Shirley Ave., Warrenton. Facilitated by Liz Shaw. 540-349-5814. Free. Stroke survivors and caregivers support Second Wednesdays 11 a.m.-noon, Inova Loudoun Hospital, 44045 Riverside Pkwy., Leesburg, second floor, Patient Education Room. 703-858-6199 or jill.lieb@inova.org. Suicide counseling Third Wednesdays 7-8:30 p.m. Leesburg Town Office, Conference Room 2, lower level, 25 W. Market St., Leesburg. 703-587-1618 or survivorsofsuicidelossleesburg@gmail.com. Womens support Sponsored by Services to Abused Families. Tuesdays 6:30-8 p.m. Confidential location. 540-825-8876. Widows and widowers support Third Mondays 11 a.m. Leesburg Senior Center, 102 North St. NW. 703-737-8039. Womens cancer support Woman to Woman, first Wednesdays 6:30-8 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital Radiation Oncology Center, 44035 Riverside Pkwy., Suite 100, Leesburg. Registration required. 703-858-8850. MISCELLANEOUS Ask the Expert lecture Pain in the Neck? Evidence-Based Medicine and Spine Surgery Feb. 7 from 6-7:30 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital, 44045 Riverside Pkwy., Leesburg (Conference Rooms A and B). 855-694-6682. Free. Brain trauma survivors brown-bag lunch For survivors and caregivers. First Tuesdays, noon-1:30 p.m., Inova Loudoun Hospital, 44045 Riverside Pkwy., Leesburg, second-floor Patient Education Room. Call 703-737-3150 or email jberg@braininjurysvcs.org. Free. Child developmental screenings For ages 2-5. Children may not be kindergarten-age-eligible. Sponsored by the Loudoun County public schools Child Find Center. 571-252- - 2180. Cholesterol screenings Weekdays from 6 a.m.-8 p.m. Fauquier Health LIFE Center, 500 Hospital Dr., Warrenton. 540-316-2640. Registration required. $35. Emergency food supplies Loudoun County residents in need can receive a free three-day supply of groceries. Supplies are distributed Mondays through Saturdays by Loudoun Hunger Relief. Call 703-777-5911 or go to loudounhunger.org . Fauquier free walk-in medical clinic Call Thursdays from 12:30 to 1 p.m. to register for the clinic, which begins at 5:30 p.m. Patients are seen by appointment Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Fauquier and Rappahannock residents only. Bring proof of address for the first visit. Patients cannot have Medicaid, Medicare or private insurance. Information: 540-347-0394 Tuesdays or Thursdays, 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Fauquier Hospital Bistro Senior Supper Club Nutritious meals and fellowship for people 55 and older. Tuesdays and Thursdays 4:30-6:30 p.m. Fauquier Hospital Bistro on the Hill, 500 Hospital Dr., Warrenton. 540-316-3588. $5.49. HEROES (Hometown Enabling Relationships, Opportunities and Empowerment through Support) is a program for military families. Support to military members and families, from pre-deployment up to two years post-deployment. Assistance includes financial help, job placement, family care and mental-health services. caring@purbap.org or heroescare.org. Inova Loudoun Hospital Mobile Health Services Blood pressure screenings, Tuesday 9 a.m.-noon, Senior Center at Cascades, 21060 Whitfield Pl., Sterling; Wednesday 10 a.m.-noon, Lansdowne Woods, 19400 Leisure World Blvd., Leesburg; Thursday 10 a.m.-noon, Carver Center, 200 Willie Palmer Way, Purcellville. For information, call 703-858-8818 or go to inova.org/mobilehealth. Free. Loudoun Cares information and referral help line Call 703-669-4636 for help in finding resources for county residents dealing with eviction, utility cut-offs, needed health care and employment. Motor skill screenings Birth to 21 months. First Thursdays, Blue Ridge Speech and Hearing Center, 19465 Deerfield Ave., Suite 201, Lansdowne. Call for an appointment. 703-858-7620. Free. Northern Virginia long-term care ombudsman Call 703-324-5861 for help in resolving complaints related to long-term-care facilities. Road to Recovery For cancer patients who need rides to appointments. Call 410-781-6909 or email jen.burdette@cancer.org. Free. Safe sitter classes For girls and boys ages 11-14. First Saturdays except for holiday weekends. 7:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Inova Loudoun Hospital, 44045 Riverside Pkwy., Leesburg. To receive a Safe Sitter Certificate, students must pass practical and written tests on babysitting and handling an emergency. Bring a lunch or buy lunch in the cafeteria. $70, includes handbook and snacks. Registration required. 703-858-8818 or charlene.martin@inova.org. Seven Loaves Food Pantry Individuals and families can receive a three-day supply of food, distributed Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 10 a.m.-noon. Go to sevenloavesmiddleburg.org or call 540-687-3489. Tree of Life Food Pantry Serving western Loudoun County. Food is delivered Wednesdays and Saturdays. 703-554-3595. Compiled by Sandy Mauck TO SUBMIT AN ITEM Email: ldliving@washpost.com Fax: 703-777-8437 Mail: Health Calendar, The Washington Post, 104 Dry Mill Rd. SW, Suite 101, Leesburg, Va. 20175 Artiman Jalali, 5, was detained at Dulles with his cousin Aida Mohammadi, who is behind him. His mothe, r Shohreh Rahnama, left, brought them to a protest at the White House on Sunday. (Michael Chandler/The Washington Post ) When they came through the arrivals gate at John F. Kennedy International Airport in 1968, my parents could have been seen as a threat. It was the middle of the Cold War, and my parents my mom was 21 and my dad was 23 had spent their entire lives behind the Iron Curtain in a communist country. And 1968 was the bloodiest year yet for American troops in a war being fought to contain communism. Nearly 17,000 Americans died that year in Vietnam. And here came Ludmila and Josef Dvorak through the airport gates in the middle of all of that, in the fanciest clothes they owned, two people with paperwork, Czechoslovakian passports, that linked them to communism. They were not detained, they were not questioned. They were allowed into a country symbolized by the Statue of Liberty. That was the America of 1968. It is not the America of today. My parents watched the scenes unfolding across the country this weekend, as people like them refugees with nothing more than suitcases and dreams were treated so differently when they walked through those airport gates. It was the second weekend of Donald Trumps presidency, and, once again, hed generated a wave of protests in Washington and around the country. This time, the outrage was aimed at his decision to sign an executive order temporarily banning immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries and refugees from around the world from entering the United States. [Washingtons new normal: A Trump protest spectacle a day] Trumps Muslim ban, basically. At the White House, up Massachusetts Avenue to the Islamic Center of Washington, outside the Trump International Hotel and at airport arrival gates across the region and the nation, thousands of people gathered to show support for refugees, green-card holders and even U.S. citizens who were suddenly being denied entry to the country. My mom imagined what would have happened if, back then, President Lyndon B. Johnson had signed an executive order banning all citizens of communist countries from the United States. A chunk of America would have bought that, for sure. Fear sells, and the country has a long, ugly history of hostility toward immigrants from many countries and many faiths. Fifty years ago, no one was worried about Islamist militants; the Communists were our enemy. But reason, empathy and humanity won. Because when my parents left everything in Czechoslovakia behind, when they got green cards, and when they raised their hands to pledge allegiance to the United States, the immigrants of my parents era were seen as dissidents heroes, even. Of course, it helped that my mother and father are white and from a Christian country. And it helped that our confrontations with communism didnt take place on American soil. So they were celebrated for rejecting the enemy and embracing the United States. America 2, Communism 0. U.S.A.! [Tell us: What do you think of President Trumps travel ban?] This weekend, we became a country that detained a 5-year-old Bethesda boy at Dulles International Airport and kept him from his mother for hours to make sure he wasnt a terrorist threat. Artiman Jalali was born in the United States and has dual citizenship with Iran. He was traveling back from visiting relatives with his 25-year-old cousin. Both were detained on Saturday. His mother, Shohreh Rahnama, said she waited for him for hours, until he and his cousin were finally released about midnight. He was hungry and he was thirsty, and I could not see him, she said. How can a 5-year-old be banned? Just because his parents are Iranian? We are American, too, the Bethesda resident told my colleague, Michael Alison Chandler, at a protest Sunday outside the White House. I almost died in that airport. I can say it was the worst day of my life. We became the kind of place that treated Hameed Khalid Darweesh, who had a valid U.S. visa and worked as an interpreter for the U.S. Army in Iraq, like a criminal when he flew into JFK airport in New York. He was eventually released. Overnight, America reneged on promises of citizenship and sanctuary to hundreds of people translators, engineers, information-technology specialists, fixers. Some of them risked their lives for our military. [We call it Muslims R Us: In Trumps America, they want to explain who they are] A friend of mine who has worked in Afghanistan and Indonesia was stunned by this development. Over time, he has helped five people come to the United States from Afghanistan all of them had risked their lives helping fight terrorism in their homeland and in return, he helped them find new lives here. He marched Sunday, and as the crowd went past the Islamic Center of Washington, a woman handed out water bottles to the marchers and thanked them for their support. One of the marchers hugged her. And she buried her head in [the marchers] shoulder and began crying about how scared she is, he said. It is tragic to see the human toll on people who are already part of the fabric of America. This executive order is a shameful stain on our country, yanking away the American Dream from families who have been here for decades and from families in dangerous parts of the world who sold everything and endured years of vetting to join us. My parents werent translators or academics or intelligence officers who had already risked their lives for America. My dad was a mason and my mom was a seamstress. They were looking for a better life. And America honored that dream. Now I look at this, what was happening this weekend, and I say to your tatka [father]: What if they did this to us? Detain us like this? my mom said. Thats not America. And critics of the ban from Pope Francis to the business moguls Charles and David Koch also said this isnt America. Why a sudden executive order? To stop terrorism, Trump said. There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign, Trump tweeted Monday morning. It was wrong when it was part of his campaign, and its wrong now. Twitter: @petulad A 10-year-old boy was part of a pack of juvenile suspects arrested last week in a robbery in the heart of downtown Washington, the police said. The robbery occurred about 8:30 p.m. Jan. 24 in the 1400 block of K Street NW, a street of office buildings, restaurants and nightclubs. In the robbery, police said, five people tackled the victim and took her purse. The victims age was not given. Police said the robbery suspects were arrested after running from the scene. There was no description of any injury to the victim. They said two of the suspects were 13-year-old girls, one from Southeast and one from Northwest. Also arrested, police said, were a 14-year-old female suspect from Hyattsville and a 15-year-old male suspect from Hyattsville. The 10-year-old suspect was from Northwest, police said. A report released Sunday did not specify the alleged role of each suspect in the robbery. A former elementary school aide and community choir director instructed children on how to perform sex acts while he videotaped them in a band room at a Prince Georges County school, according to details of his guilty plea Monday. Deonte Carraway, 23, entered the plea in U.S. District Court in Greenbelt almost one year after his Feb. 4 arrest in the wide-reaching sex abuse case that roiled the county and involves at least 23 children as young as 9. Federal prosecutors said Carraway supplied children with cellphones and coerced them into recording sexual activities using the devices. Recordings and alleged sex acts occurred at Judge Sylvania W. Woods Sr. Elementary School in Glenarden, Md., in private homes, a church, a public pool and a Glenarden government building, police and prosecutors said. He faces 60 to 100 years in prison as part of a plea agreement that a judge will consider at his sentencing hearing set for June 5. On Monday, Carraway appeared in an orange prison uniform and only spoke when answering the judge's questions with a Yes, ma'am or No, ma'am. In court, Carraway admitted to 15 incidents that involved 12 children, including an 11-year-old special needs boy. In one incident described by prosecutors, Carraway is heard on video in the band room at the elementary school directing the boy and a girl in explicit sex acts as he films. At one point, when the judge asked Carraway about his condition and whether he was able to understand and answer the judges questions, he responded, I feel good. [Child-porn suspect always had six or seven kids around. Its a little strange.] A federal grand jury last year indicted Carraway on 15 counts of sexual exploitation of a minor to produce child pornography involving the dozen children. Carraway has also been indicted on 270 counts of child pornography and related charges in Prince Georges County. In total, local and federal investigators have said they believe Carraway abused at least 23 children. The investigation into Carraway began after an uncle checking a students cellphone found inappropriate photos and alerted Prince Georges County police. [For years, Pr. Georges didnt strengthen school sex-abuse policies] Carraway admitted to supplying children with phones and telling them to send explicit images of themselves through an anonymous messaging app, according to federal and local charging papers. Carraway also admitted to providing children cellphones to send him explicit videos and told children that if they wanted to join what he called his AKA Club they had to send him images. The case angered Woods Elementary parents, who asked Prince Georges County Public Schools officials why Carraway was allegedly allowed to be alone with students. After Carraways arrest, a task force reviewing how school employees are trained to identify and report suspected child abuse issued a report saying the system should make sweeping improvements to better protect students. Families of the children involved have filed at least nine civil suits against the school system or Glenarden officials, including at least one class-action lawsuit. A grandmother of three children who attend Woods Elementary School arrived at federal court Monday hoping to watch Carraways hearing, but missed the proceedings. The Washington Post does not usually identify individuals in sexual assaults without their agreement. The grandmother said she is still not sure if her grandchildren were victimized in the case, but said they were often around Carraway as part of his choir. I would like to see him get the time he deserves, she said. A 34-year-old man was fatally shot Sunday evening in Northeast Washington. The incident happened around 7:30 p.m. in the 200 block of 51st Street NE. When officers arrived, they found the man suffering from several gunshot wounds. He was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead. The victim was later identified as Wilson Agbebaku of Oxon Hill, Md. A reward of up to $25,000 is being offered for information in the case. Anyone with information should call 202-727-9099. Dozens of supporters await the releases of people who were arrested during Inauguration Day. Prosecutors in the District on Monday dismissed felony rioting charges against three journalists swept up in the arrests by D.C. police of scores of people during violent Inauguration Day protests. Charges were dropped against Alexander Rubinstein, 22, of New York, who worked for the media outlet Russia Today; John Keller, 27, of Fairfax County, who was working on a documentary called Story of America; and Matthew Hopard, 32, of Brooklyn, who is an independent journalist. On Friday, prosecutors dismissed felony rioting charges against another Brooklyn journalist, Evan A. Engel, 30. He was on assignment for Vocativ, a media and technology enterprise. The journalists were among 230 people arrested after a small group of demonstrators rampaged through a four-block area of downtown during President Trumps inauguration on Jan. 20. Protesters broke windows on cars and stores and knocked over mail and newspaper boxes. A stretch limousine was torched, and police were pelted with rocks and bricks. Officers in riot gear responded with pepper spray and crowd-control devices that emitted disorienting bangs, smoke and flashes of light. [Protesters who destroyed property on Inauguration Day were part of organized group] Defense attorneys argued that at the time of the arrests, the scene was chaotic and police were unable to distinguish nonviolent demonstrators from the rioters. The rioting charge carries up to 10 years in prison. Those arrested spent one night in a holding cell until their hearings the following day. Various media outlets have identified several of those arrested as journalists who were covering the riots. Since the arrests, prosecutors have been working to verify whether those people were working journalists. Peter Hermann contributed to this report. Flowers and notes are outside the Blue Sunday Bar and Grill in Bowie. (Dan Morse/The Washington Post) The Blue Sunday Bar and Grill was once just a dream for the people behind its opening. Sherwood Morgan had spent much of his career in the restaurant business, working in the District as a maitre d and host for years, before the opportunity came to start and manage a new venture. Jin Chen, who was part-owner of a buffet in Laurel, was excited to work with Xue Dou to open a business that, he hoped, would eventually help Chen buy a house and bring his family from China to the United States. But the hard work, excitement and aspirations that the three poured into Blue Sunday were quickly shattered this week. Less than a month after the restaurant opened in Bowie, one of its bartenders fatally shot Morgan, Chen and Dou on Sunday over an ongoing workplace dispute, according to Prince Georges County police. Money may have been the cause and investigators are working to determine if the disagreement was related to the distribution of tips or a financial issue at the restaurant, according to two law enforcement officials with knowledge of the case. The Blue Sunday Bar and Grill had been open less than a month when the shooting occurred Sunday. (Dan Morse/The Washington Post) Its all gone, said Mili Chin, a longtime friend of Chen who works at the buffet Chen owned. Its really sad. Police identified Karlief Moye, 40, of Silver Spring, as a bartender and the suspected shooter. Moye ran into woods near his home as police searched for him Sunday and shot himself twice, police said. He remains hospitalized with injuries that appear not to be life-threatening and is expected to be charged in the case, police said. [Three employees fatally shot at Bowie restaurant early Sunday] The violent episode was caught on tape by a high-tech surveillance system in the restaurant, said Prince Georges County Police Chief Hank Stawinski, who called it a tragic example of workplace violence. The triple shooting happened around 2 a.m. Sunday at the restaurant in a shopping center on Race Track Road not far from Route 50. One of the other owners was off-site at the time and awaiting a call about the evenings receipts, police said. When the call didnt come through, he turned to a live surveillance feed from inside the restaurant; he saw people unconscious and called police. Officers arrived and found three people with gunshot wounds: the manager of the restaurant, Morgan, 46, and co-owners Chen, 27, and Dou, 28. Two victims were pronounced dead at the restaurant and the third died at a hospital. Stawinski said at a news conference Monday there were no signs that the ongoing dispute among the men would erupt into such a profoundly sad end. The surveillance system allowed homicide detectives to identify Moye and send police to track and apprehend him within hours of the shooting, Stawinski said. Employees stopped by the restaurant Monday to leave flowers outside and comfort one another. The high-end restaurant, which had its grand opening last week, made a big impression on the area, and the management team was generous and kind, they said. Everybody here is like a big family, said Michaela Sanders, a server. Caroline Mills, a host, said she saw Moye when he arrived at work Saturday afternoon around 3:30. He greeted her with a smile, she said, a day after he had given Sanders a stylish Remy Martin T-shirt, again with a smile. Moye sometimes groused about not getting paid enough, Mills said, but he hardly seemed angry. The only odd thing that surfaced, Mills said, was that some customers believed Moye owned the place. Moyes relatives could not immediately be reached. A man who answered a phone Monday at what appeared to be the home of someone related to Moye said,Were not talking to anyone today. Chin said Chen and the other owners worked hard to open the Bowie venture. He was really excited to open it, Chin said. He was really nice to customers. Chen moved to the United States from China about three or four years ago, looking for a life with better opportunities, Chin said. Chen was generous with his employees, Chin said. He had thrown a Lunar New Year party at the buffet over the weekend and had plans to do the same at his new restaurant on Sunday. Aggie Ballard said she lived next to Dou in Laurel and that he was married and the father of a 5-year-old boy. They were just a lovely young couple, she said. Im just so sad. Dean Patterson, another neighbor reached by phone, said he lived across the street from the Dou family and that Dous wife and child moved from New York to Maryland last summer. Morgan genuinely cared about people, said his uncle, Travis Chisholm, 40. Morgan recently called him on his birthday, Chisholm said. I told him I was proud of him and I wished him luck, said Chisholm of Baton Rouge. We ended every conversation with I love you. Thats the type of person Sherwood was. Employees said Morgan was a devout Christian, a dedicated manager and an encouraging boss. This was his baby, Mills said of Blue Sunday. He was at this place from sun-up to sundown, said Joy Harris, a bartender. On Monday night, after sundown and in the cold, people continued to stop at the door where a cardboard sign read Closed. Its just surreal, Mills said. All of our hearts are broken. Dana Hedgpeth, Jennifer Jenkins and Justin Wm. Moyer contributed to this report. Reverend Roger Gench preaches at New York Avenue Presbyterian Church, about the need for Presbyterians to welcome refugees to the United States on January 29, 2017 in Washington D.C. Many clergy across the theological and political spectrum spoke from the pulpit Sunday against President Trump's executive order. (Photo by Oliver Contreras/For The Washington Post) (Oliver Contreras/For The Washington Post) The liturgy read in churches across America on Sunday said: Blessed are those who are persecuted. What clergy said in many pulpits, reacting to President Trumps most recent executive order: Blessed are the refugees. The words of the Beatitudes the nine blessings recounted in Jesus Sermon on the Mount happened to be prescribed in the liturgical calendar used by Catholics and many Protestants for this weeks readings. After Trump issued an order Friday temporarily barring refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries, clergy across the nation scrapped earlier sermons to build on the lesson and urge parishioners to stand up for what they see as a biblical call to care for the stranger. But at some conservative churches, pastors and parishioners also voiced concerns about how to balance welcoming the stranger with preserving American security. We dont want Christians to be afraid of reaching out to refugees, said Brad Whitt, the pastor at Abilene Baptist Church, a 2,800-member Southern Baptist church in Martinez, Ga. Whitt said that Trumps vow to improve the system for vetting refugees might eventually make churches more comfortable with helping them. He said he supports Trumps order as long as its not a religious test. Meanwhile, the Rev. Roger Gench at the historic New York Avenue Presbyterian in Washington echoed other pastors across the ideological spectrum in treating the order as a Christian call to resist. It seems to me that as followers of Jesus, we can do nothing but to resist the actions that have taken place this week that target Muslims, immigrants and refugees, he told his congregation. When [Jesus] talks about people who are mourning, think about the Syrian refugees whose lives have been devastated. When Jesus talks about those who are striving for justice, think about the mothers and fathers standing over the dead bodies of children, preached Gench at the church that stands just three blocks from the White House. The executive order calls for barring Syrian refugees from the United States indefinitely, and prohibits admitting any refugees from any nation in the world for 120 days. For 90 days, no citizen of seven majority-Muslim countries even those who hold American green cards and have been living in the United States for years will be admitted without a waiver. In Roswell, Ga., the Rev. Eric Lee joined Gench and others, preaching at the United Methodist church Chapel Roswell that followers of Jesus cant just turn away and say I dont care, or its not my problem. Granted, for some people, that whole concept of being hospitable to strangers can be unnerving, scary. . . . Are we willing to take risks on behalf of our faith? he asked. Because practicing intentional, even radical hospitality toward strangers is inherent to the Christian ethic. At Manhattans Riverside Church, one of the most prominent pulpits in the country, the Rev. Amy Butlers sermon on the Christian call to welcome immigrants drew repeated applause and a standing ovation at the end. In the kingdom of God, we open our hearts and our hands; we make extra room at the table; we let the boat dock and the traveler clear customs and the children find safety, she said, urging members to attend an afternoon protest in Manhattan. While some clergy in the evangelical denominations that voted heavily for Trump in November criticized Friday nights order, others remained supportive. The Rev. Franklin Graham, son of evangelist Billy Graham, said in an interview last week that the vetting process for refugees coming into the United States is not strong enough. Its not a biblical command for the country to let everyone in who wants to come. Thats not a Bible issue, he told the Huffington Post. Evangelical leaders including the National Association of Evangelicals World Relief organization and more than 100 prominent evangelicals who gathered at Wheaton College to discuss refugee issues in December have largely denounced Trumps executive order. But many rank-and-file evangelicals probably support Trumps plan even if their pastors do not, said Jerry A. Johnson, president of the National Religious Broadcasters. The minority opposition is being led by the elite political class or professional religious workers, Johnson wrote in an email. Not only are they out of touch with the Common Man, they are out of touch with the people in the pews. Evangelical attitudes are perhaps best reflected by a 2016 Southern Baptist Convention resolution that urged churches and families to welcome refugees while also calling on the government to implement the strictest security measures possible in screening them. Scott Johnson, who teaches a Bible fellowship class at Abilene Baptist and said he voted for Trump because the president opposed abortion, agreed. I dont think theres anything wrong with taking in people who love our country and thats what hes trying to do. If they dont love the country, why should we bring them here? Senior pastor Bill Hulse of Putnam City Baptist Church in Oklahoma City noted that times have changed since the 1970s when the church welcomed Vietnamese, Korean and other refugees with open arms. Those factors that are in the refugee argument then are different from today, he said. Trump said that the new vetting system he plans to put in place during his 120-day stay on refugee admissions would prioritize religious minorities. In an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network, he said he wanted to emphasize admitting more Christians from Syria and other majority-Muslim countries. In a Washington Post/ABC poll in 2015, 78 percent of respondents favored equal consideration for refugees regardless of religious affiliation, while 18 percent backed special consideration for Christians. Many Christian leaders reiterated this week that while they have long been concerned about persecution of Christians in the Middle East, they do not want Christians prioritized over Muslims. Any proposal that preferences Christians over Muslims as refugees makes Catholic leaders nervous because it feeds that narrative that this is a war between the Christian West and the Muslims, said the Rev. Thomas Reese, a member of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. Ace Stafford, a pastor at the nondenominational Church of the Highlands in Harrison, Tenn., said he was bothered by the idea of prioritizing Christians over Muslims. To be discriminatory like that, its definitely treading on thin ice, he said. As a believer, I dont think I should willingly say, My doors are closed to you. But members at his church questioned whether the United States should welcome Muslim refugees. They claim Islam is a religion of peace. But its not, said David Ellis. We are called to love . . . but we are also called to be wise as serpents and gentle as doves. He said he felt the country needs to be smart. A Pew Research Center survey in October found that 54 percent of American voters said the United States does not have a responsibility to accept refugees from Syria, while 41 percent said it does. Of those polled, 87 percent of Trump supporters said Americans dont have to accept Syrians, compared with only 27 percent of Hillary Clinton supporters who said the same. In Birmingham, Ala., Bishop Harry Seawright is in the latter camp. In his sermon, he compared the plight of todays refugees to the Israelites fleeing Egypt in the Bible and of civil rights activists who were demonized in the 1960s. Moses and the children of Israel were oppressed just because they were different. God hears the cries of those suffering, said Seawright, who preached at St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church. We cant forget the church bombing and the deaths of four little girls in this town just because they were different. . . . The only way you can drive out hatred is with love. Gench, at New York Avenue Presbyterian, said Sundays sermon was not the first or the last moment his congregation will focus on openness toward immigrants and refugees. Members signed a letter after the service addressed to officials who identify themselves as Presbyterian that includes Trump plus eight Democrats and 27 Republicans in Congress, according to the Pew Research Centers tally. For Gench, it all comes back to Scripture, which tells the stories of people driven from their homes again and again, from Abraham to Moses to Jesus. Thats why hes not surprised that the message of welcome for all refugees came from pulpits of all political and theological persuasions on Sunday morning. The biblical heritage is really strong on this issue, probably as strong as almost any issue could be, he said. Anybody who reads the Bible knows that this is a huge issue. Hamil Harris, Colby Itkowitz, Michael Schulson, Kate Shellnutt,Scott Clement and Bobby Ross Jr. contributed to this report. Indias Uttar Pradesh fest draws to a close The Uttar Pradesh Festival, which celebrated Indias most populous state and its manifold industrial and cultural offerings, concluded in the Capital on Sunday. Fifth-grader Matthew Benitez, right, pumps his fist after being sorted Tuesday into Lealtad, the Occoquan Elementary tribe that typifies loyalty. Principal Hamish Brewer celebrates with hands raised. (Jonathan Hunley for The Washington Post) The outdated stereotype of the school principal as a foreboding figure ready to punish wayward children is a particularly foreign concept at Occoquan Elementary, where Principal Hamish Brewer was greeted with high-fives from students as he walked through the cafeteria one day last week. Also erased: the idea that new students arent welcomed by their peers. Fifth-grader Matthew Benitezs introduction to Occoquan came with cheers from his fellow pupils Tuesday as he was assigned to one of four tribes at the school. But if the fun atmosphere at the eastern Prince William County school doesnt seem like education business as usual, neither are the results Brewer and his staff have seen in the five years since he took the helm. Despite overcrowding and a student population that includes a high percentage of English language learners and children from low-income homes, the school has seen gains in standardized test scores and now has a national honor to its credit. In November, Occoquan Elementary was named a National Title I Distinguished School by the National Title I Association, an organization of the state directors of the federal Title I program, which provides funding for the education of children from low-income families. Occoquan was chosen for excellence in serving special student populations, such as English language learners and students with disabilities, according to the Virginia Department of Education. It was one of two schools in the state to receive the award last year the other was in Chesterfield County, near Richmond and the first in Prince William to be recognized. It also means the school has overcome challenges that are frequently perceived as barriers to learning. About 67 percent of Occoquans student population is eligible for free or reduced lunch; 53 percent of students are English language learners; and 12 percent require special-education services, according to the Prince William school system. On top of that, the school serves about 620 students in a facility with an official capacity of about 512. But Brewer said he and his staff think all students can succeed, regardless of circumstances. They choose not to worry about what they cant control and concentrate instead on creating a nurturing setting where children want to learn. Were doing all the things a lot of people think cant be done, he said. For instance, passing rates on Virginias Standards of Learning reading tests for economically disadvantaged students at Occoquan increased to 87 percent from 59 percent over four years, according to the county school system. The same groups passing rates for math tests also increased to 94 percent from 68 percent, besting the state average of 69 percent. Pass rates for students with disabilities rose, too, to 72 percent in reading from 40 percent, outshining the state average of 46 percent. And math passing rates for the same students went to 85 percent from 62 percent in two years. Brewer, whos from New Zealand, has achieved this growth while creating an environment in which many teachers and students are so comfortable and engaged that theyre disappointed when school is canceled or when sickness means they cant attend class. Karla Cygan, whose daughters Kayland, 8, and Kylee, 5, are Occoquan students, said children at the school are so eager to learn that they communicate with their teachers even when theyre out sick. And instead of using a minor illness as an excuse to stay home, Cygan said, Kylee once downplayed symptoms Its just a little cough in an effort to go to school. That, to me, speaks so much volume, Cygan said. Kayland is in Heather Ballews third-grade class, and her teacher confirmed the students enthusiasm. Ballew pointed out that when Occoquan started a Saturday program for students who needed extra help, even children who didnt need the added assistance began asking to come to the morning sessions. But while the students and teachers have a good time at Occoquan, Brewer said, education is still the priority. Everyone is expected to be serious about schoolwork and respect one another. Were big on manners around here, Brewer said. Occoquan Elementary also is big on its tribes. Harry Potter readers liken the tribes to the houses that students are sorted into at Hogwarts, the books main wizarding school. But because the mascot of the 90-year-old Occoquan school is a brave, Brewer configured the schools four tribes to reflect four of the 14 leadership traits of the Marine Corps: integrity, unselfishness, initiative and loyalty, each virtue translated into a different world language. The tribes compete in a points race, and everyone at the school, including staff, is a member of one of the tribes. Newcomers learntheir tribal designation by spinning a wheel on the wall in the school office. Demonstrators gather at Dulles International Airport on Jan. 29 to protest President Trumps executive order barring citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. (Thomas Watkins/AFP/Getty Images) Problems entering the United States eased Monday for some international travelers after a weekend of confusion about a travel ban President Trump imposed, but members of Congress said border protection and administration officials still had not answered critical questions. After Rep. Robert C. Bobby Scott (D-Va.) made a late-night visit to Dulles International Airport on Sunday and was denied an audience with Customs and Border Protection officials he received a short written response, his staff said Monday. There are no people in CPB custody at Dulles per the executive order, read an email he received after 11 p.m. Sunday from a congressional affairs official at the agency. The email did not address other specific questions from Scott, including how many people in all have been detained and whether any detainees have been removed from the airport or from the jurisdiction of the federal court in the Eastern District of Virginia, which had ruled Saturday on a case stemming from Trumps order. U.S. District Court Judge Leonie Brinkema issued a temporary restraining order Saturday blocking green-card holders arriving at Dulles from being removed from the country. The order also said they any green card holder detained at Dulles should have access to a lawyer. (Karen Attiah/The Washington Post) Lawyers complained Sunday that they werent being given access to potential detainees. There also were mixed messages and confusion from the Trump administration about whether the order applied to green-card holders. Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) said he confirmed Monday that permanent legal residents green-card holders are subject to the executive order. Kaine said he received the clarification during a phone call Monday with officials from U.S. Customs and Border Protection. He later met with volunteer lawyers at Dulles International Airport. Kaine said he was told that, unlike with others traveling from seven Muslim-majority countries covered under the Trumps travel ban, green-card holders are allowed to board planes to the United States. Once they arrive, they face questioning. But it is expected, at the discretion of border authorities, that they will be granted a waiver that allows them to enter the country, he said. The fact that theyre still saying the order applies to them but then theres a waiver of it, its still a little bit odd, so Im confused about that still, so more work to do, he said during a tour of a library in downtown Roanoke. Kaine said the same procedure applies to people given special immigrant status, such as translators who worked with the U.S. military. [We cant become a dictatorship: Protests erupt across the U.S. against Trump refugee ban] At Dulles on Monday, dozens of demonstrators were back to welcome international visitors, and a contingent of lawyers was on hand to monitor any problems. Hayley Tamburello said an Iranian citizen whose case she was tracking arrived on a flight from Dubai. He is a permanent legal resident and made it through security in a couple of hours. Other than some missing luggage, things went smoothly, Tamburello said. But she said it was difficult to know whether other travelers were being held up by Customs and Border Protection authorities and whether others were being held elsewhere. Its a lot easier for them to say theyre not detaining anyone if theyre not physically here, Tamburello said. Lawyers for two Yemeni brothers who were detained at Dulles on Saturday shortly after Trump issued his order said in a legal filing Monday that their clients had been lied to by U.S. authorities and coerced to sign forms they didnt understand before being put on a return flight to Ethiopia. The brothers, who are 19 and 21 years old, are now in limbo at Addis Ababa Bole International Airport and should be flown back to Dulles, so they can reunite with their father, a U.S. citizen, according to an amended complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. They were handcuffed. . .They were told if they didnt sign a form. . .they would be put into official removal proceedings and barred from the United States for five years, said Paul Hughes, a partner at the firm Mayer Brown who is among those working on the case. The brothers, Tareq Aqel Mohammed Aziz and Ammar Aqel Mohammed Aziz, had been approved for legal permanent residence status in the United States, Hughes said, and do not want to return to Yemen because of the civil war there. A spokesman for Customs and Border Control did not respond to a request for a comment. At Dulles, Kaine greeted a woman holding a Muslims Are Welcome placard, and checked out a variety of other cheering demonstrators with signs, including one that declared Im from Sudan, dont panic. Sudan is one of the countries targeted in Trumps temporary travel ban. I place my hope in these lawyers. I place my hope in Congress, Kaine said. Kaine said smaller communities in Virginia are among those being hit by the travel ban, pointing to scores of people at Virginia Tech who are being affected. Kaine noted the case of a Syrian refugee family that moved to Blacksburg a year ago and has successfully become part of Virginia, a place where Jeffersonian values and freedom of religion are personal. The father got a construction job, and the crew pitched in money for soccer shoes for the familys kids, Kaine said. We are a welcoming state, not a hard-hearted state, Kaine said. The Trump order runs contrary to that spirit, he said. This is a religious test, pure and simple. Also Monday, Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) sent a letter to Elaine Chao, Trumps nominee for transportation secretary, asking several questions about the order. Chao is scheduled for a confirmation vote Tuesday. Nelson asked Chao whether she agrees with the order and whether she was consulted before it was issued, and, if not, whether the Transportation Department should be consulted on any further travel restrictions to minimize passenger and industry disruption. Nelson also asked, given the general confusion caused by the lack of clear communication from the administration in implementing the presidents order, whether airports should be reimbursed by the federal government. [Hundreds of lawyers descend on airports to offer free help after Trumps executive order] Nelson said many passengers caught in the last-minute travel ban suffered substantial losses including ticket cancellation penalties, and he asked Chao if DOT should develop policies on such fees for other last-minute government actions to come. Throughout the day Sunday, lawyers sought information about whether green-card holders or other international travelers were being detained at Dulles, but said they received no official information until getting a late-night comment Sunday similar to the one Scott received. Mirriam Seddiq, who has spent days working with other volunteer lawyers at Dulles, said she spoke directly with a customs official at the airport. I asked him if anyone was being detained. He said, No, my backrooms clear. Our work is done here, she recalled. Seddiq said immigration lawyers and border authorities often have a different understanding of the word detain, making government comments hard to parse. Their idea of detained is somebody put in handcuffs and potentially carted away, she said. Our idea of detained is somebody who is back there who is being interrogated and whos not able to come out in a timely fashion. Seddiq said immigration lawyers are working to figure out whether anyone was transferred from Dulles, and whether travelers faced difficulties Monday. Lawyers also are trying to document the cases of people barred from flying to the United States and are considering further legal action. RICHMOND -- It was probably predictable that the lone Muslim in the Virginia legislature would rise to speak Monday on the events of the weekend, in which President Trump banned people from seven majority-Muslim countries from traveling in the U.S. But Del. Sam Rasoul (D-Roanoke) began his remarks by bringing up a surprising detail of history. In invoking Thomas Jeffersons Statute for Religious Freedom, Rasoul noted that that document was based on an earlier work by James Madison. And the reason Madison wrote his Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments was, in part, because a religious minority was being regarded with suspicion, dislike and mistrust. That religious minority was the Baptists. In the years before and after the Revolution, the Anglican majority regarded Baptists as dangerous. Traveling Baptist preachers incited lower-class workers with religious fervor and even welcomed slaves and free blacks to their gatherings. The Baptists were tormented and even imprisoned, Rasoul reminded the House. A Baptist minister named James Ireland was imprisoned in Culpeper, where the jailer allowed members of the public to urinate on him. Madison agreed with Jefferson that a republic without religious freedom was impossible, Rasoul said. This liberty is a core Virginian value.What good is an American value if were not ready to sacrifice for it? The politics of hysteria and division are a distraction from what we should be focusing on...All sides shouldnt just defend Muslims, women, refugees, Latinos. We must defend our core American values. Del. Mark H. Levine (D-Alexandria) also rose to speak about Trumps actions over the weekend. Citing his own background as a Jew and his ancestors success in seeking freedom in the United States, Levine said he was horrified by the presidents actions, especially the ban of Syrian refugees from entering the country. America has always been a refuge for immigrants, Levine said. My guess is that everyone in this chamber is a descendant of someone who came here from somewhere else. This is fundamentally who we are as a country. This is fundamentally who we are as Virginians. I know most of you oppose this. I ask you to speak out. Both Levine and Rasoul were greeted by applause from all around the chamber. Levines more emotional plea drew a standing ovation on the Democratic side of the House and in the visitors gallery above. While Republicans didnt stand as a group, many could be seen clapping. Dozens demonstrators hold signs at Dulles International Airport to protest President Trump's executive order barring visitors, refugees and immigrants from certain countries to the United States. (Mike Theiler/Reuters) Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) confirmed Monday that permanent legal residents green-card holders are subject to President Trumps executive order temporarily banning refugees from entering the United States. Kaine said he received the clarification during a phone call with officials from U.S. Customs and Border Protection. He plans to go to Dulles International Airport on Monday afternoon. He was also told that, unlike other immigrants, green-card holders are allowed to board planes and fly to the United States. Once they arrive they will be questioned and can obtain a waiver allowing them into the country. Kaine said he doesnt believe the order should apply to these residents at all. The fact that theyre still saying the order applies to them but then theres a waiver of it, its still a little bit odd, so Im confused about that still, so more work to do, he said during a tour of a library in downtown Roanoke. He said the same procedure applies to people given special immigrant status, such as translators who worked with the U.S. military. Kaine said he was told refugee families already approved and working with a resettlement program will be allowed entry at least for the next week or two. At a political event in Blacksburg on Sunday night, Kaine said, he learned about a family who fled Syria and have been living in a United Nations refugee camp for almost four years. Catholic Charities expects them to arrive in Roanoke on Thursday, but they feared the family would be detained or barred from entering the country. Kaine said he supports intense vetting but it should not be based on country of origin, but rather individual circumstances. I dont think you should single out certain countries and especially single out people who have been victimized by war crimes, he said. Imagine senior citizens walking around with stylish ear devices that amplify and clarify sound and connect wirelessly to smartphones, tablets, televisions and digital assistants such as Amazons Alexa or Apples Siri. Technology is already moving in this direction, and companies such as Samsung, Bose and Panasonic are reportedly readying new products of this kind. They would be sold over the counter to customers who could test their own hearing with cellphone apps or online programs and adjust sound parameters themselves. The devices will be widely used by older people, just as ear buds are used by younger people today, predicted Richard Einhorn, a well-known composer who serves on the board of the Hearing Loss Association of America, a consumer group. Helping older people Recognizing market forces, the Food and Drug Administration is mobilizing. In December, the agency said it planned to take steps necessary to propose to modify our regulations to create a category of [over-the-counter] hearing aids. Early in January, the Federal Trade Commission announced plans for a meeting on hearing health care in April. That agency played an important role in ensuring that consumers get copies of eyeglass prescriptions that allow them to shop around for good deals. For the most part, that doesnt happen with hearing aids today. Whether agency priorities will change under the new Trump administration isnt certain. But technology is developing rapidly. Older adults with mild to moderate hearing loss are expected to be a prime market for new products marrying hearing aids with consumer electronics. More than 40 percent of people older than 60 have some hearing loss, mostly mild to moderate; that figure rises to 80 percent of people older than 80. Yet only 20 percent of those with an impairment use hearing aids because of their high cost (an average $4,700 per pair), a lack of insurance coverage (traditional Medicare, for example, doesnt pay for them), stigma, denial and difficulties getting the appropriate care. Hoping to expand access, the Presidents Council of Advisors on Science and Technology came out in favor of low-cost, over-the-counter hearing devices in 2015. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine seconded that recommendation in a major report on hearing health care published in June. Both organizations cite a growing body of research linking hearing loss to cognitive decline, depression, the onset of dementia, falls, poor physical functioning and social isolation. The longer people delay seeking help, research suggests, the more at risk they become. Several recent developments are of note as consumer electronics companies, hearing-aid manufacturers, audiologists, physicians, consumer advocates and regulators prepare for a surge of new devices and changes in the health-care system that deals with hearing: Removing barriers For 40 years, the FDA has required that adults be examined by a doctor before purchasing a hearing aid or sign a waiver noting that they didnt want to take this step. In December, the agency eliminated that requirement. The National Academies of Sciences expert panel on hearing health had noted that the rule provides no clinically meaningful benefit and could discourage people from seeking care. Rather than see a physician, people buying hearing aids signed the waiver 60 to 95 percent of the time. Still, limits on access to hearing aids exist: All states restrict distribution of these devices to certified audiologists, physicians and device specialists. And some states still require medical evaluations. Proposed legislation Sens. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said recently that they would soon introduce legislation endorsing the sale of hearing aids without such restrictions. The goal is to increase competition, lower costs and expand access to devices for people with mild to moderate hearing loss, Grassley said in a statement. Six companies control nearly 98 percent of the hearing aid market in the United States. Nearly two-thirds of people with severe hearing loss report being unable to afford the devices, whose cost is generally bundled with professional fees for evaluation, fitting and follow-up care. Organizations representing hearing professionals are deeply divided. The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, an organization representing audiologists and speech-language pathologists, said it doesnt believe consumers can adequately self-diagnose hearing problems and opposes over-the-counter devices. Ian Windmill, president of the American Academy of Audiology, said his group is taking a wait-and-see stance until the FDA acts. But he added that his group, which represents more than 12,000 audiologists, believes that professionals should evaluate hearing loss. Another group, the Academy of Doctors of Audiology, said it believes the benefits of expanding access to hearing devices outweigh the risks; it supports over-the-counter products. The senators plan to introduce their legislation, which asks the FDA to issue regulations ensuring the safety and effectiveness of these devices, in this new congressional session. Administrations shift and legal challenges occur, Grassley said in a statement, adding that getting the law on the books would ensure needed certainty going forward. Creating standards One area of considerable confusion is the difference between hearing aids and personal sound amplification products, or PSAPs. This is a wide category of products, ranging from cheap items that help amplify sound to sophisticated devices that resemble hearing aids in all but name. In some cases, companies are marketing the same device as a hearing aid and a PSAP, but at different prices. In 2009, the FDA drew a distinction between PSAPs and hearing aids based on what the agency called their intended use. PSAPs were considered unregulated consumer electronics products for people with normal hearing who wanted to hear more sharply for instance, during birdwatching. Hearing aids were regulated and considered medical devices meant for people with hearing impairment. But technological advances have brought the two categories closer. And its well understood that people with hearing loss are using PSAPs as a cheaper alternative to hearing aids. Stephanie Czuhajewski, executive director of the Academy of Doctors of Audiology, said she believes higher-end PSAPs will become over-the-counter hearing aids. In the meantime, the Consumer Technology Association has prepared standards for PSAPs meant to make it easier for people to understand what theyre buying. The standards, which address issues such as maximum output, peak output and sound distortion may be published as early as next month. The intent is to provide a Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval for PSAPs, said Mead Killion, an audiologist who founded Etymotic Research, an Illinois company that manufactures hearing devices. Currently, there is no easy, standardized way to compare these devices. This column is produced by Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent news service and a program of the Kaiser Family Foundation. Read more: Composer helps arrange a concert for people who, like him, use hearing aids Hearing loss can creep up on you stealthily with disturbing repercussions. Judicial Council bids for one-tier Special Court The Judicial Council (JC) has suggested a one-tier Special Court comprising three memberstwo conflict experts and one High Court judgeto deal with conflict-era cases. Let me begin with a word of thanks to Stephen K. Bannon, the chief White House strategist. With a single interview, he dispelled any illusions that normal or productive relations with the media will even be possible under the Trump administration. True, the new presidents modern predecessors in both parties all tangled with the media. And the claim that traditional news outlets are liberal has long been a marker of conservative faith. But where other chief executives saw the Fourth Estate as a legitimate institution to be dealt with (and, where possible, manipulated), Trump sees reporting purely in terms of his own power. I want you to quote this, Bannon told the New York Times. The media here is the opposition party. Bannon went further still. In his ideal world, the media would remain silent, which is pretty much its posture under autocratic regimes. [Its time for journalists to stop pretending objective means mindless] (The Washington Post) The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for a while, Bannon said. We talk, you listen. Not exactly a Jeffersonian attitude toward public conversation in a free republic. And given the administrations de facto Muslim ban, both ill-considered and cruel, silence is not an option for any Americans whether inside or outside the media who want to stand up for our best traditions. Where the press is concerned, a few distinctions are in order. The media is a vague term that can refer to everything from print newspapers to traditional television news to radio, cable, blogs and tweets. Within the old media, there is a world of difference between opinion writers, of whom I am one, and my colleagues on the reporting side who work very hard every day to tell readers what is going on, without fear or favor, to invoke the Times classic slogan. I point this out even though Id insist that opinion writers have as much of an obligation to fact as anyone else, and also that our work is enhanced by good reporting. From the perspective of readers and viewers, the world is messier than it was, say, 40 years ago, because television outlets regularly offer panels of commentators mixing reporters, columnists and political consultants. Citizens can be forgiven for not knowing anymore who is who. My worries are not about the opinion world. It will thrive under Trump, assuming we all maintain our liberties. What concerns me is that Trump, Bannon, press secretary Sean Spicer and senior adviser Kellyanne Conway will have some success in fuzzing up reality in ways that are antithetical to open debate. You can start with Conways memorable coinage, alternative facts. No, facts are facts are facts. Alternative facts are lies, untruths or distortions. Three million to 5 million illegal votes were not cast in 2016, no matter how often Trump says so, and it is a scandal that taxpayer money may be wasted to investigate this phantom charge. The photographs of inauguration crowd sizes cannot be doctored, no matter how often Trump calls over to the National Park Service to ask for new angles. When confronted with untruths, all journalists have one and only one choice: to call them what they are. They cannot, without misleading the public, pretend that there are two sides to a purely factual question. Further, they need to avoid vague language about facts being in dispute when there is absolutely no question about what the facts are. Partisans might well emphasize some facts over others. But facts themselves arent partisan. (The Washington Post) This, in turn, means that reporters may indeed seem oppositional when they confront an administration that, day after day, shows so little regard for fact or truth. But this is not the medias problem. Its Trumps. [Trump considers the media his enemy. We shouldnt treat him as ours.] Even trickier is the bizarre way the administration has been doing business. Because Trump repeated to ABC Newss David Muir on Wednesday his claim that hed find a way for Mexico to pay for his border wall, the administration scrambled to back him up. Spicer told reporters the next day that it would be financed by a 20 percent tax on Mexican imports and then backed away from the idea partly because it was quickly pointed out that the tax would be paid by Americans, not Mexicans. When the policymaking process veers wildly from point to point because it is driven by in-the-moment presidential impulses, not careful analysis, the country is in trouble. This, too, is something down-the-middle journalists will have to describe and analyze dispassionately. Calmly pointing out the obvious may be the most damaging thing my reporting colleagues do to the Trump administration. Doing so wont make them partisans or oppositionists, no matter what Bannon & Co. say. Theyll be patriots, and theyll be doing their jobs. Read more from E.J. Dionnes archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook. Correction: An earlier version of this op-ed misspelled the name of AACCESS Ohio and incorrectly stated that the organization no longer exists. AACCESS Ohio is an independent non-profit organization that is a member of the ACCESS National Network of Arab American Community organizations but is currently on probation due to inactivity. The op-ed also incorrectly stated that Bassam Khawam is Syrian American. He is Lebanese American. This version has been corrected. The Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria has had a quiet but well-funded lobbying effort in Washington since well before he began murdering his own people. But that influence campaigns clearest triumph came only this month, when it succeeded in bringing Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) to Damascus and having her parrot Assads propaganda on her return. Gabbard was not the first U.S. elected official to meet Assad. In the early years of Assads presidency, several senior U.S. lawmakers publicly traveled to see the young English-speaking optometrist-turned-ruler, in the hope that he might be a reformer, break with Iran and even make peace with Israel. Then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) visited Assad in 2007. Then-Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) led a delegation in 2009. After the killing began in 2011, however, Assads friends in Washington largely went underground and a covert influence and intimidation campaign blossomed. The FBI began investigating Syrian ambassador Imad Moustapha, due to evidence he was keeping tabs on Syrian Americans who showed disloyalty so the Syrian government could threaten their families back home. Moustapha departed for Beijing in 2012, but he left in place a network of friends, Syrian Americans and others who nurtured close ties to the regime and worked on Assads behalf. One Lebanese American who was close to Moustapha and would often visit his Washington residence was Cleveland businessman Bassam Khawam, according to three Syrian Americans who saw them together but do not wish to be identified for fear of retribution. Five years later, Moustapha is nowhere to be seen, but Khawam is still active. He organized and joined the trip to Damascus for Gabbard and arranged a meeting with Assad. This guy has been lobbying on behalf of Bashar Assad in the U.S. even before there was a revolution, and we are deeply troubled he would try to help a war criminal build relationships with sitting members of Congress, said Mohammed Alaa Ghanem, director of government relations for the Syrian American Council, a nongovernmental organization that works with the Syrian opposition. Former congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) also joined the trip, which is no mere coincidence. Khawam arranged for Kucinich to meet Assad multiple times, most recently in 2013. Khawam donated to Kucinichs campaigns and in related Federal Election Commission filings listed himself as a self-employed physician. In other FEC filings, Khawam has listed himself as executive director of AACCESS Ohio, an independent non-profit organization that is incorporated in Ohio but has not filed financial disclosure paperwork since 2007. Gabbard says that AACCESS Ohio paid for her trip. Khawam later said he donated the money to AACCESS Ohio for the trip from personal funds. AACCESS Ohio is one of a consortium of completely independent member organizations of our National Network for Arab American Organizations (NNAAC), which has been on probation because of its inactivity, Rana Taylor, director of communications for the entire ACCESS organization, told me. Based on its inactivity with NNAAC, our belief is that it is inactive, but we are not in a position to confirm that. Gabbard, in a press release, called Bassam Khawam and his brother, Elie, who also joined the trip, longtime peace advocates. Her office told me she had no prior knowledge or relationship with the pair and directed all inquiries to the organization or Kucinich. Messages left for Khawam and Kucinich were not retuned. The actual source of the funding for the trip is murky, too. But theres no doubt the Assad regime facilitated it. Not only did the group get an audience with the president, but they also received access to sensitive areas under the protection of government forces. In several arranged meetings, Syrians told Gabbard that Assad is a benevolent ruler fighting terrorists and that the U.S. policy of opposing him is unjust. Upon her return, Gabbard referenced those Syrians in interviews and op-eds to reinforce her long-held opposition to what she calls the U.S. regime change policy in Syria. She also asserted there are no moderate rebels in Syria and that the United States is funding and arming al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. Neither is true, but both match the talking points that the Assad regime has been pushing for the entirety of the war. Principled opposition to U.S. intervention in Syria is one thing. Becoming a tool of a mass murderers propaganda and influence campaign is another. Gabbards cooperation with the Syrian regime damages her effort to promote herself as a legitimate foreign policy voice. If Gabbard really didnt know the men who sponsored her fact-finding mission to Syria, she should have. To many, the entire affair proves that Assads Washington influence campaign is alive and well and now has a sitting congresswoman for a mouthpiece, whether she realizes it or not. Read more from Josh Rogins archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook. Ronald A. Klain was chief counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee during the David Souter and Clarence Thomas nominations, an associate counsel to President Bill Clinton for the Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer nominations, and an assistant to President Barack Obama advising on the Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan nominations. The announcement of President Trumps Supreme Court nominee will unleash a blizzard of commentary, advertising and social media campaigns aimed at influencing senators and the public. But to win the real battle for the future of the high court, the nomination and the messaging around it should be aimed at the one man who truly matters: Anthony Kennedy. For while there will and should be a fierce debate over the nomination, the outcome of the fight to replace Justice Antonin Scalia will probably not change the courts balance of power. What could change the balance dramatically is if Trump gets to pick another justice, particularly if that vacancy is created by the departure of one of the courts three oldest members: Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Kennedy. And since it is very unlikely that Ginsburg or Breyer would voluntarily retire during this presidency, the question of whether a court-shifting pick is willingly handed to Trump rests with Kennedy. The justice I clerked for Byron R. White was inclined to retire as soon as a Democratic president took office. Although White was ideologically distant from the Democratic Party, he felt that because a Democrat (John F. Kennedy) had selected him, a Democrat should name his replacement. When, after 12 years of Republican control of the White House, Bill Clinton became president in 1993, White retired just 60 days after the inauguration. Might Anthony Kennedy appointed by President Ronald Reagan feel the same obligation today to a new Republican president? No one but Kennedy and those closest to him know for sure. But the battle over the current court vacancy could influence Kennedys decision, especially because Kennedy owes his seat on the court to a Supreme Court confirmation battle of a generation ago: the Senates rejection of the nomination of Robert Bork in 1987. Thus, Trump, Senate Republicans and Senate Democrats would be smart to keep Kennedy in mind as they consider the upcoming nomination and how to respond. If Trump picks one of the two most widely speculated choices federal appeals court judges William Pryor or Neil Gorsuch that will likely encourage Kennedy to stay in place. While Kennedy is said to have some personal affinity for Gorsuch (one of his former law clerks), both Pryor and Gorsuch reject Kennedys most important views on constitutional principles particularly his dedication to a core concept of the dignity of free persons. Kennedys dignity principle is an idea he articulated in his Senate confirmation hearing nearly 30 years ago and has been central to many of his opinions in the years since, particularly in cases upholding abortion rights and LGBT rights. Whats more, a highly conservative first pick by Trump would offer an inauspicious signal for what might come next. The last three Republican presidents have all started with more moderate selections (Sandra Day OConnor for Reagan, David Souter for President George H.W. Bush and John G. Roberts Jr. for President George W. Bush) and then moved to the right with their second picks (Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, respectively). If Trump begins with a far-right conservative such as Pryor or Gorsuch, what might his second nominee look like? Definitely not like Kennedy. For Senate Republicans, keeping the prospect of a Kennedy resignation in mind would counsel resisting the temptation to end the right to filibuster Supreme Court nominations. Eliminating any power of the minority to stop the most extreme possible nominee would probably be a red flag to Kennedy an indication that the way was clear for a balance-shifting nominee who rejected Kennedys views and moved the court in a radical new direction. Senate Democrats, too, must be mindful of how their approach to the nomination could affect Kennedys thinking. While it is tempting to begin the confirmation process with an intent to avenge the injustice done to President Barack Obama and his nominee, Judge Merrick Garland and no one could be more tempted than I am this urge must be resisted. An attitude of score-settling and partisan bitterness would likely be off-putting to Kennedy. Rather, even as they resist a nominee as extreme as Pryor or Gorsuch, Democrats should make clear that they would accept a more moderate candidate much as Democrats did a generation ago when Reagan pivoted from Bork to Kennedy. They should make clear not only what they are against in a Supreme Court nominee, but also what they are looking for in a Trump selection. And they should emphasize that they are dedicated to a concept of dignity of free persons, along the lines of Kennedys jurisprudence, and will not accept a nominee who would reverse the progress such a philosophy has achieved. Thus, even as this nomination battle unfolds, all players should keep an eye on the even more significant fight that could lie ahead and the man who will decide whether it comes or not. HAVING ORDERED that unspecified federal funding be halted on the basis of unspecified legal authority to unspecified sanctuary cities and counties, President Trump has triggered a showdown with large swaths of urban America, most of which voted heavily against him. Mayors in Los Angeles, Boston, New York, Chicago, Seattle and San Francisco and leaders of other localities vowed defiance, lending the dispute the air of a standoff between tough guys. His campaign rhetoric notwithstanding, Mr. Trump is unwise to pick a divisive fight impelled by the fiction that the nations 11 million illegal immigrants constitute a community of predatory and violent criminals. His inflated rhetoric on that point served to rile up his campaign events. As a tactic in governance, or to promote public safety, it is likely to be less effective. The president is also on shaky legal ground to demand that local authorities, including police and jail officials, enforce federal immigration law, just as he would by insisting they enforce the federal tax code, federal environmental regulations or federal food and drug rules. In 2014, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in Philadelphia ruled that detention requests made by the federal government to localities specifically, that they hold undocumented immigrants are just that: requests, not commands. It remains unclear which federal funding Mr. Trump would or legally could try to suspend as a means of coercing jurisdictions to cooperate with federal officials, and whether such a threat would amount to much leverage. The Supreme Court has also ruled that there is no legal basis by which the president, or Congress, could withhold federal funding to localities that is unrelated to immigration for instance, for housing or hospitals. Assuming thats the case, then the presidents leverage with most localities would be limited. Nor is it clear which of the more than 300 cities and counties that withhold some form of cooperation from federal immigration officials would fall into Mr. Trumps definition of a sanctuary jurisdiction. Some localities, notably San Francisco, refuse almost all forms of cooperation. Others ignore detention requests from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for undocumented immigrants convicted of minor crimes but not those found guilty of serious or violent crimes. Many others simply instruct their police not to ask detained suspects about their immigration status. No doubt, there are instances of localities having behaved with outrageous irresponsibility by refusing to turn over repeat offenders to ICE. That was the case, in 2015, when San Francisco refused to honor an ICE detainer for an undocumented immigrant with an extensive criminal record, who, shortly after he was released, shot and killed a young woman strolling on the waterfront. Still, Mr. Trump stands to gain very little by declaring what amounts to a culture war on huge swaths of urban America that, with good reason, would defy his attempts to deport millions of productive and largely law-abiding immigrants, many of whom have children and other relatives who are U.S. citizens. President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and their son, Barron, walk to Marine One at the White House en route to Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla. March 17, 2017 President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and their son, Barron, walk to Marine One at the White House en route to Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla. Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post Hey, Republicans: Ready to take him literally yet? Two days after the election, I spoke with Grover Norquist, a conservative tax activist who had made peace with the prospect of a Trump presidency. Expressing confidence that Donald Trump wouldnt attempt the crazier promises made during the campaign, Norquist said Trumps supporters knew to take him seriously, but not literally. Wrong! That hope comforted Republican officeholders and members of the establishment when they reluctantly embraced Trump during the general election. They averted their collective gaze when Trump made scapegoats of minorities, yielded to reckless impulses and exhibited authoritarian tendencies. Now Trump is president and who knew? he is making scapegoats of minorities, giving in to reckless impulses and governing with an authoritarian style. Trump said as a candidate that he would ban Muslims from traveling to the United States. Now he has done it, even if he doesnt use the term. Rudy Giuliani, explaining the new executive order, told Fox News that Trump assigned him the task of finding a legal way to have a Muslim ban. And the son of national security adviser Mike Flynn praised the Muslim ban on Twitter this weekend before deleting his account. [Trump defiantly says all is going well on immigration order] (Dalton Bennett,Erin Patrick O'Connor,Katherine Shaver,Monica Akhtar,McKenna Ewen/The Washington Post) Likewise, Trump displayed a disregard for the courts during the campaign, threatening to take revenge on a judge, to sic the Justice Department on his opponents. Meeting with senators, he didnt know how many articles the Constitution contained. And now? The Trump White House is raising doubts about whether it needs to obey court orders. After parts of the travel-ban order were blocked by federal judges, Trump policy adviser Stephen Miller declared that the order remains in full, complete and total effect. During the campaign, Trump often disparaged intelligence agencies for their bad decisions. He said I know more about ISIS than the generals do and claimed generals had been reduced to rubble. Now he has orchestrated what amounts to a coup at the National Security Council. Out: the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who no longer will attend all meetings of the committee that handles top-level decisions. Instead, political adviser Steve Bannon will serve on the committee. Trump at every opportunity said he would build a border wall and force Mexico to pay for it. He spoke often of tariffs on Mexico and specifically suggested a 35 percent tariff on certain imports. Last week surprise! the White House floated a 20 percent tariff on goods from Mexico to pay for a border wall. The Trump campaign frequently sounded anti-Semitic dog whistles. Now? The Trump White House just issued a Holocaust Remembrance Day statement that made no mention of Jews. A spokeswoman said the omission was deliberate, noting non-Jewish victims. Trump during the election dismissed concerns about Russias meddling in the campaign, even urging Russia to hack Hillary Clintons email. Now we have Sputnik news, controlled by the Russian government, comparing Trump to puppets of the Soviet Union and proposing Moscow help Trump respond to protests by deploying professional Russian journalists as temporary replacement for the Western employees. Trump is also proving himself to be the same temperamentally unsound figure who appeared on the campaign trail. He makes up extravagant falsehoods about voter fraud and crowd size and offers the absurd claim that his travel ban is similar to what President Obama did. He has shown contempt for safeguards in the government, purging the State Department of top nonpartisan leadership. His White House kept Department of Homeland Security lawyers in the dark on the travel ban and then overrode their objections. He has continued to raise suspicion that hes driven by his financial interests, omitting from his travel ban several Muslim-majority countries where he does business. [Sam Waterston: The danger of Trumps constant lying] And he still shows disregard for detail, as seen in the administrations confusion about whether the travel ban covers those with green cards, and in an executive order on Obamacare that even opponents of the law warn could cause health-insurance markets to collapse before a replacement is available. Business leaders, including some previously friendly to Trump, have protested the travel ban, and some Republicans in Congress are opposing Trump on it, at least rhetorically. The Washington Post had counted 24 as of Monday who have opposed the order and 36 more with concerns. But when Senate Democrats attempted Monday to overturn the ban, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), a supporter of it, blocked the effort. Meanwhile, as The Posts Matea Gold and James Hohmann reported, conservative donors at the Koch network gathering over the weekend condemned Trumps travel ban, and Charles Koch, who didnt get involved in the presidential campaign, warned of a tremendous danger of authoritarianism. Oh, so now theyre worried? Many of these donors, like Republicans in Congress, chose not to take Trump literally during the campaign, looking away when presented with repeated warning signs. Now they have a serious problem as do we all. Twitter: @Milbank Read more from Dana Milbanks archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook. Clarification: An earlier version of this op-ed stated that no political advisers to the president had ever served on the National Security Council before the appointment of Stephen K. Bannon, President Trumps chief strategist and senior counselor. Edwin Meese, when he was counselor to the president, served on the NSC during President Ronald Reagans administration. This version has been updated. David J. Rothkopf is chief executive and editor of the FP Group, which publishes Foreign Policy magazine. He has written two histories of the NSC, Running the World and last years National Insecurity. While demonstrators poured into airports to protest the Trump administrations draconian immigration policies, another presidential memorandum signed this weekend may have even more lasting, wide-ranging and dangerous consequences. The document sounds like a simple bureaucratic shuffle, outlining the shape the National Security Council will take under President Trump. Instead, it is deeply worrisome. The idea of the National Security Council (NSC), established in 1947, is to ensure that the president has the best possible advice from his Cabinet, the military and the intelligence community before making consequential decisions, and to ensure that, once those decisions are made, a centralized mechanism exists to guarantee their effective implementation. The NSC is effectively the central nervous system of the U.S. foreign policy and national security apparatus. Trumps memorandum described the structure of his NSC not unusual given that the exact composition shifts in modest ways from administration to administration. The problem lies in the changes that he made. First, he essentially demoted the highest-ranking military officer in the United States, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the highest-ranking intelligence officer in the United States, the director of national intelligence. In previous administrations, those positions or their equivalent (before the creation of the director of national intelligence, the CIA director occupied that role) held permanent positions on the NSC. White House chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon attends the swearing-in of Nikki Haley as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations in Washington on Jan. 25. (Nicholas Kamm/Agence France-Presse via Getty Images) Now, those key officials will be invited only when their specific expertise is seen to be required. Hard as it is to imagine any situation in which their views would not add value, this demotion is even harder to countenance given the threats the United States currently faces and the frayed state of the presidents relations with the intelligence community. A president who has no national security experience and can use all the advice he can get has decided to limit the input he receives from two of the most important advisers any president could have. The president compounded this error of structure with an error of judgment that should send shivers down the spine of every American and our allies worldwide. Even as he pushed away professional security advice, Trump decided to make his top political advisor, Stephen K. Bannon, a permanent member of the NSC. Although the White House chief of staff is typically a participant in NSC deliberations, I know of few other instances in which a political adviser has been a formal permanent member of the council. Further, Bannon is the precisely wrong person for this wrong role. His national security experience consists of a graduate degree and seven years in the Navy. More troubling, Bannons role as chairman of Breitbart.com, with its racist, misogynist and Islamophobic perspectives, and his avowed desire to blow up our system of government, suggests this is someone who not only has no business being a permanent member of the most powerful consultative body in the world he has no business being in a position of responsibility in any government. Worse still, it is an omen of other problems to come. Organizing the NSC this way does not reflect well on national security adviser Michael Flynn whether the bad decision is a result of his lack of understanding of what the NSC should do or because he is giving in to pressure from his boss. Moreover, elevating Bannon is a sign that there will be more than one senior official in Trumps inner circle with top-level national security responsibility, an arrangement nearly certain to create confusion going forward. Indeed, rumors are already circulating that Bannon and senior adviser Jared Kushner are the go-to people on national security issues for the administration, again despite the lack of experience, temperament or institutional support for either. Kushner has been given key roles on Israel, Mexico and China already. History suggests all this will not end well, with rivalries emerging with State, Defense, the Trade Representative and other agencies. Combine all this with the presidents own shoot-from-the-lip impulses, his flair for improvisation and his well-known thin skin. You end up with a bad NSC structure being compromised by a kitchen cabinet-type superstructure and the whole thing likely being made even more dysfunctional by a president who, according to multiple reports, does not welcome advice in the first place especially when it contradicts his own views. (Jenny Starrs/The Washington Post) The executive order on immigration and refugees was un-American, counterproductive and possibly illegal. The restructuring of the NSC, and the way in which this White House is threatening to operate outside the formal NSC structure, all but guarantees that it will not be the last bad decision to emerge from the Trump administration. Michael Morell was deputy director and twice acting director of the CIA. As you walk through the main lobby of the CIA, your gaze is drawn to the right toward the Memorial Wall, with its 117 stars, one for each CIA officer who has died in the line of duty; toward the Book of Honor listing the names of those officers, where cover considerations allow; and toward the fresh flowers that are almost always there, placed by friends and colleagues inspired by their sacrifice. It was this wall that drew so much negative commentary about President Trumps visit to the CIA this month the presidents brief, almost offhand reference to a memorial that is the soul of the agency, and his clear elevation of his ego above the sacrifices of those memorialized on the wall. Such commentaries were on the mark, and they captured my own feelings as well. But there is another wall in the lobby that carries almost as much significance as the Memorial Wall the wall that is to the left as you enter, the wall that your eye often misses. On that wall is a verse from the Gospel of John that reads, And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. The quote was carved into the stone at the insistence of Allen Dulles, the CIAs fifth director. Dulles, the son of a Presbyterian minister, felt strongly that a biblical verse needed to guide the work of his officers. (The Washington Post) The CIA website notes that this verse is the agencys motto, but it is much more. It is the ethos of the agency the strongly held belief that is the job of the CIA, as it relates to national security, to discover the truth and share it with the president, no matter what the implications might be for policy, politics or the president himself. This ethos is discussed on an employees first day on the job, when a young officer raises his or her right hand and takes the oath of office in the very lobby where Trump spoke. The ethos is stressed in training classes, directors reference it in speeches, and it is reinforced in the lore shared when officers gather to have a drink after a long week. The ethos is a key tenet of both the operational and analytic sides of the organization. It is a deeply embedded part of the culture. Any perception of someone trying to alter the truth, as the officers see it, creates immediate antibodies complaints to management, complaints to the agency ombudsman (itself a creation of the ethos), complaints to Congress and, unfortunately, occasional leaks to the media. Sometimes, perhaps most of the time, these perceptions are not accurate, but that is not the point. The point is how strongly the men and women of the CIA feel about the essence of their job, how strongly they feel about that verse on the wall. It was, therefore, a deep irony that Trump chose the CIA lobby, with its quote from Johns Gospel, as the location of his first official act as president. It is an irony because, as has become clear, the president seems to shun the truth and he alters it with alarming frequency. In speaking to the American people, he misrepresents the facts almost daily. Why is it important to point out the irony that played out at the CIA? Because, while this ethos is perhaps strongest there, every executive branch department and agency shares it to some degree. Trumps first frustration with the men and women whom he leads was with his intelligence community and its conclusion that the Russians interfered in the election but it will certainly play out with others in government over the next four years. My hope is that employees at all departments and agencies take inspiration from the CIAs ethos, and that they speak truth to the president, no matter what he wants to hear or what he is tweeting about on any particular day. As he spoke at the CIA, Trump had his back to the Memorial Wall, which means that he was facing the verse from Johns Gospel. He was looking right at it. Near the end of his speech, Trump, taking Time magazine to task for not correcting an error in its reporting (which, of course, it had already done) said, So I only . . . say that because I love honesty. I wish he really did. Lack of Braille textbooks leaves visually impaired students worried Six visually impaired students studying in grade nine in Purbanchal Gyan Chhachhu School in Dharan, Sunsari, are facing a hard time due to lack of Braille textbooks. The image of President Trump, flanked by Vice President Pence and Defense Secretary James Mattis, signing an executive order that (among other things) excludes Syrian refugees from the United States, is indelible. Three powerful American leaders, targeting and dehumanizing some of the most vulnerable people on Earth. A picture of bullying. A picture of cruelty. A picture of national shame. It sits in my head beside images of Syrian refugees in Lebanon and Jordan, bewildered by the loss of their old lives, assets depleted, living (in some cases) eight to a room, exploited by human traffickers. Many families feel compelled to put their boys to work and their girls into early, forced marriages. My home is all broken in Syria, a girl of 6 told me while coloring a picture of helicopters and bombs. Trump is a champion at punching down, but seldom this far. This executive order is a security measure that very few actual security professionals would prioritize, given that refugees are some of the most carefully vetted people who enter the country. Meanwhile, the downside of (in effect) targeting foreigners by their religion is immediate and considerable worrying American Muslims and embarrassing the United States Muslim friends and allies in the world. When some radical cleric in, say, Central Asia, says, The new American president hates Islam, he does not require a conspiracy theory to support his claim. And all of this may have been done with no security upside at all, given the utter incompetence with which the order was drafted and the likelihood that the courts will prevent its implementation. [President Trumps refugee ban is an affront to American values] Trump came to power promising that masterful leadership would replace the stupid kind. This action was malicious, counterproductive and inept the half-baked work of amateurs who know little about security, little about immigration law and nothing about compassion. (Dalton Bennett,Erin Patrick O'Connor,Katherine Shaver,Monica Akhtar,McKenna Ewen/The Washington Post) There is more systematic thought, however, behind Trumps attempt to recast the United States global role presumably the guiding influence of his chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon. In his inaugural address, Trump asserted the right of all nations to put their own interests first and promised that we do not seek to impose our way of life on anyone. Trumps version of the United States is a normal nation, like the Netherlands or Ghana, concerned with its own borders and business, and generally indifferent to the way of life chosen by others. Our national identity as for other nations is ethnic and cultural. Trumps America is vaguely Christian. Vaguely 1950s. Vividly white. A number of policies emerge from these convictions: a walled country, a closed economy and highly restricted immigration. Traditional U.S. commitments to the special relationship with Britain, to a strong and growing NATO and European Union, to the United States Pacific security umbrella seem up for grabs. The trumpet always calls retreat. Every U.S. president since World War II has disagreed with the stunted and self-defeating view of the country now held by Trump. Over the past century in some ways from the beginning the United States has been a cheerfully abnormal nation. American identity (in this view) is not based mainly on blood or soil, but rather on the patriotic acceptance of a unifying creed. American leaders, Democratic and Republican, have believed that a world where the realm of freedom is growing is more prosperous and secure; a world where freedom is retreating is more dangerous. The reason is not mystical. Dictators tend to be belligerent. Governments accountable to their people are generally more peaceful. [Middle Eastern Christians are Trumps pawns] It is the lesson of hard experience. The United States found twice that it could not avoid the bloody disorders of Europe by ignoring them. It found that a Pacific dominated by a single, hostile power is a direct threat to its economy and security. It found that Russian aggression in Europe is like Newtons First Law moving until some force stops it. And the United States has often accepted refugees, reflecting its deepest values and building reserves of trust and respect. The Soviet Union or Cuba under Fidel Castro were not working out unique and special ways of life. They were producing fleeing victims who would be imprisoned or murdered at home. It is in the United States nature to offer at least some of them a home and refuge. The same should be true for Bashar al-Assads victims, including the children of a broken country. This is the difference a creed can make: When Ronald Reagan spoke on foreign policy, tyrants sat uneasy on their thrones and dissidents and refugees took heart. When Donald Trump speaks on foreign policy, tyrants rest easier and dissidents and refugees lose hope. (Adriana Usero/The Washington Post) Read more from Michael Gersons archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook . President Trumps refugee ban and travel restrictions are a disgraceful exercise in cruelty. They do nothing to make us safer and may, in fact, make us less safe but they punish Muslims, and that is his whole point. Fear and loathing of Islam was one of Trumps campaign themes. He appealed to those who wrongly see the fight against terrorism as a clash of civilizations between Christian and Muslim worlds and see Muslim immigrants as a kind of fifth column intent on destroying America from within. During the campaign, Trump called for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our countrys representatives can figure out what is going on. He later modified this position into a call for extreme vetting of Muslim immigrants, including Syrian refugees. But he continued to cite a discredited survey, conducted by a stridently anti-Muslim group, purporting to show that many Muslims in this country support global jihad and the replacement of our legal system with Islamic sharia law. [Did you attend a protest? Tell us what you plan to do next.] Is Trump just playing politics or is he truly an anti-Muslim bigot who believes this rubbish? At this point, it hardly matters. He has fulfilled his campaign promise by striking a gratuitous blow against would-be immigrants and visitors from seven predominantly Muslim countries Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Libya and Yemen. Even more shamefully, Trump has barred entry by refugees from all nations worldwide. Perhaps he will have the Statue of Liberty toppled and sold for scrap. This is not a Muslim ban, the president claimed in a statement. But unquestionably it is. Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, an early Trump supporter, said Saturday on Fox News that when [Trump] first announced it, he said, Muslim ban. He called me up. He said, Put a commission together. Show me the right way to do it legally. Giuliani said the ban is based not on religion, but rather on places where there [is] substantial evidence that people are sending terrorists into our country. The countries covered by Trumps executive order were indeed singled out by the Obama administration for extra scrutiny. But if sending terrorists were the major criterion, surely Trump would have included Saudi Arabia, where 15 of the 19 hijackers in the 9/11 attacks came from. And as for the supposed goal of extreme vetting for refugees, President Barack Obama already put such a system in place. In 2011, Obama paused the refugee flow so that authorities could reinvestigate tens of thousands of refugees who had already come to the United States. Homeland Security officials instituted rigorous vetting procedures for new refugees that require multiple interviews, and many months of waiting, before an applicant is cleared for entry. What, then, is the point of Trumps executive orders? To kick around some Muslims who are too weak to kick back and to further the pernicious narrative of global conflict between Muslim and Christian worlds. Trumps orders carve out an exemption for religious minorities, which in this context clearly means Christians in majority-Muslim countries. By all means, I believe, the United States should be a haven for Christians or any other religious group that is persecuted. But the vast majority of those who have suffered at the hands of the Islamic State, the Syrian regime, al-Shabab and other evil forces in the affected countries are Muslims. If you prick them, do they not bleed? Trumps action was abominable; the reaction, however, has been heartening. Thousands of people spontaneously gathered at airports around the country in protest. Immigration lawyers set up shop in busy terminals and worked to gain entry for passengers who were detained. Federal judges intervened to keep travelers from being sent home. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that his nation would welcome any refugees the United States turned away. Other world leaders criticized the move, as did cautiously a few Republican senators. Iran and Iraq warned they would reciprocate and close their borders to Americans. Trumps orders were not circulated through the normal interagency process before being issued, and it showed; key questions were left open, such as the status of green-card holders from the affected countries. But while the administrations incompetence might have blurred the orders impact, it did not soften their intent. This wasnt about making America safe. It was about nationalism, xenophobia and punishing innocent Muslims for the vile acts committed by terrorists. It was a betrayal of our most fundamental American values. And hes been president for barely a week. Read more from Eugene Robinsons archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook. You can also join him Tuesdays at 1 p.m. for a live Q&A. The Jan. 24 editorial Mr. Trumps heartless fee hike? Not quite. highlighted the inequities of government insurance programs intended to benefit the less-affluent segments of our society when compared to those that protect the wealthy. The editorial supported President Trumps cancellation of then-President Barack Obamas reduction of the Federal Housing Administrations Mortgage Insurance Premium rate to ease home buying for marginally qualified home buyers because it would impose potential risks on all other taxpayers and home buyers. Yes, thats what insurance is all about: allocating risks. In this case, allowing the Private Mortgage Insurance reduction would have benefitted marginally qualified home buyers, perhaps at the expense of the more affluent, to further the social and economic goals of homeownership. Similarly, the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation is forced to cut worker pensions when corporations fail to fund their pension programs. Congress has always refused to intervene in these circumstances to assist workers. On the other hand, Congress bailed out the banking industry, which wasnt charged enough insurance premiums by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to defray the banking industrys risky financial practices. The action of the Trump administration is nothing more than continuing business as usual. The little guy never benefits. Ed Houry, Fairfax The weekend gathering of wealthy donors who help finance the conservative Koch network was supposed to serve as a celebration of the policy victories within reach now that Republicans control Washington: a repeal of the Affordable Care Act, a rollback of environmental regulations, perhaps even a corporate tax overhaul. But with President Trump already embroiled in chaos and controversy, the conservative financiers assembled at a desert resort here were also forced to contend with a new uncertainty: whether the new president will be an ally or an obstacle. In their first formal break with the administration, top network officials Sunday condemned Trumps travel ban on some refugees and immigrants, calling it the wrong approach. Some here expressed alarm that Trump has staked out positions anathema to the networks libertarian principles, targeting individual companies that produce goods abroad and indicating possible support for a border tax on imports. And the networks chief patron, billionaire industrialist Charles Koch, who pointedly declined to back Trump in the presidential campaign, warned in stark terms of the potential perils of the anti-establishment mood that gave rise to Trump. We have a tremendous danger because we can go the authoritarian route . . . or we can move toward a free and open society, he told a packed ballroom Sunday afternoon. The mixed emotions on display here reflect a provocative role for the Koch network in the age of Trump as a potent resistance movement within the GOP, well positioned to fight the president and his allies on Capitol Hill when they push policies that run counter to the groups libertarian credo. (Bastien Inzaurralde/The Washington Post) Network officials were optimistic that they finally have a wide opening to push their policy agenda at a federal level. But they also made it clear throughout the weekend that their allegiance is not to the GOP. They have already criticized House leaders, including House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.), for backing the idea of a border adjustment tax and are contemplating intensifying the pressure through digital ads and grass-roots lobbying. Were not limiting ourselves on our ability to go out and fight on this, said James Davis, a spokesman for the network. The network could present a political dilemma for many GOP lawmakers ahead of the 2018 midterm elections as they choose between two influential forces within the party, a populist wing buoyed by Trumps America First call and the well-organized, well-funded Koch-aligned activists who embrace open trade. In the next two years, the network aims to spend $300 million to $400 million on policy and political campaigns, officials said up from $250 million during the 2016 elections. [Koch network to spend $300 million to $400 million on politics, policy in 2018 cycle] The Koch operation counts several highly placed allies within the Trump administration, including Vice President Pence; Scott Pruitt, the nominee to lead the Environmental Protection Agency; and Marc Short, a former top Koch official who is serving as the White House legislative liaison. Nonetheless, network officials made it clear that they intend to deal with Trump and congressional Republicans as they have every other administration which could mean an impending confrontation with GOP leaders. 1 of 40 Full Screen Autoplay Close Skip Ad How people in the District reacted to Trumps immigration ban View Photos Thousands protest the presidents executive order outside the White House, Trump Hotel and at Dulles International Airport Caption Thousands protested the presidents executive order outside the White House, at Trump International Hotel and at Dulles International Airport. Feb. 1, 2017 Karen Sultan was among scores who came to the Rally for Immigrants held at Reagan National Airport. She brought flowers to give to anyone who might need them. Shes from Chevy Chase, Md. Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post Wait 1 second to continue. Our secret sauce, so to speak, is the accountability play, said Mark Holden, general counsel of Koch Industries and co-chairman of the weekend conference. Were principled, and if we cant get comfortable with the policies that are in place, then were not going to support them. White House officials did not respond to requests for comment. More than 550 donors who give the Koch operation at least $100,000 a year flocked to the Palm Springs, Calif., area for the weekends conclave the largest turnout since Charles Koch began the twice-a-year seminars with like-minded donors in 2003. No one from the Trump administration attended the weekends conclave. However, five Republican senators made appearances: Patrick J. Toomey (Pa.), David Perdue (Ga.), Ben Sasse (Neb.), Mike Lee (Utah) and James Lankford (Okla.), along with two House members, Jason Chaffetz (Utah) and Marsha Blackburn (Tenn.). And three governors flew in: Scott Walker of Wisconsin, Doug Ducey of Arizona and Bruce Rauner of Illinois. Toomey used his time on stage to thank the network for helping him prevail in the most expensive Senate race in U.S. history. It wouldnt have happened without this network and the people in this room, he said during a Saturday dinner. For all the gratitude on display, the Koch network has a history of challenging the GOP that dates backs to its founding during the George W. Bush administration. Charles Koch initially convened a small group of like-minded conservatives and libertarians alarmed about Republican policies such as steel tariffs and No Child Left Behind, which gave the federal government a greater role in education. On Sunday, Brian Hooks, the president of the Charles Koch Foundation, who co-chaired the weekend seminar, reminded the audience how much the federal government grew under Bush. Were going to support this administration and Congress when they support principled public policy, and were going to have the courage to oppose bad policies . . . regardless of who proposes them, he said, drawing muted applause. [Koch network condemns Trump ban on refugees and immigrants] Those on hand offered mixed assessments of the new administration and the posture they think the network should take toward Trump. Indiana donor Fred Klipsch, a longtime Pence ally, said he has been overwhelmingly impressed by the actions of the Trump White House. He said he is confident that when it comes time to get the work done, the network and the administration will be working for the same direction and the same goals. David Kellogg, a defense contractor based in Arlington, said he considers Trump as a hothead, but Im taking a wait-and-see approach. Youve got to at least give the guy a chance, he added. Wariness about the new era of GOP dominance repeatedly surfaced among the networks top officials and invited speakers throughout the weekend. Charles Murray, a political scientist most famous for his 1996 book The Bell Curve, told the group that he was worried that the United States was turning away from the basics of individualism and freedom and opportunity. Completely apart from the individual person of the president, I think we see an environment that is fertile for authoritarianism in the United States now, he warned. Koch later echoed Murrays worry and quoted abolitionist Frederick Douglass, telling donors that they should unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong. And that needs to be our attitude, he said. We cannot be partisan. We cannot say, Okay, this is our party, right or wrong. . . . We support them when we believe theyre doing right, and we try to oppose them and change them when we believe theyre doing wrong. President Trumps elevation of his chief political strategist to a major role in national security policy, and a White House order banning refugees from certain Muslim-majority countries from U.S. entry, appeared to come together as cause and effect over the weekend. Stephen K. Bannon whose nationalist convictions and hard-line oppositional view of globalism have long guided Trump was directly involved in shaping the controversial immigration mandate, according to several people familiar with the drafting who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly. The order, which has ignited sweeping domestic and international backlash, came without the formal input of Trumps National Security Council, the committee of top national security aides designed to ensure the president examines all policy issues from different perspectives. In Trumps case, the NSC has not yet been fully formed. Key department heads, including the secretary of state, have either not been confirmed or had little chance to be briefed by those under them. But even as the mechanism for full consultation with defense, diplomatic, intelligence and other national security chiefs remains incomplete, Bannons policy influence was established late Saturday in a presidential directive that gave him something no previous president has bestowed on a political adviser: a formal seat at the NSC table. The same directive appeared to downgrade the status of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the director of national intelligence the presidents senior intelligence and military advisers under statute by limiting their attendance to some meetings. [Trump orders ISIS plan, talks with Putin and gives Bannon national security role] Former president Barack Obamas national security adviser, Susan E. Rice, called the measure stone cold crazy in a tweet on Sunday. Former Obama defense secretary and CIA director Robert M. Gates, who said he was unconcerned about Bannons role, told ABCs This Week that pushing [the DNI and Joint Chiefs chairman] out of the National Security Council meetings, except when their specific issues are at stake, is a big mistake. Every president finds their judgment useful, whether they like it or not, Gates added. A senior NSC official said Sunday that negative interpretations of both measures misunderstood both the intention and the effect of a directive whose overall aim was to make policy formation more inclusive and more efficient. Bannon is a trusted adviser, said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal organization. Hes got substantial policy responsibilities, and I think its very important that he is there to hear and to provide context to what is going on. I think, candidly, that things in Washington, everything is political, this official said. We wanted to make sure that all viewpoints were considered at critical points. Despite his listing in the NSC organizational chart, Bannon doesnt have to be there all the time, the official said. The intelligence and military chiefs, the official said, are invited as attendees to every single NSC meeting. . . . Theres nowhere in that document that says they are excluded. While they are listed as attendees to meetings of the NSC the highest decision-making body, chaired by the president the directive says they will attend meetings of the national security principals meeting without Trump where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed. In surveying senior officials from previous administrations, those charged with organizing the NSC were frequently told meetings were too frequent, too long and often inconclusive, and that officials were tired of nano-management, the official said of Obama-era complaints that were well-reported at the time. K.T. McFarland, the deputy national security adviser, began her first meeting of NSC deputies Friday by saying that this going to be tight . . . 90 minutes. Youre going to come in, going to have your positions, going to be a decision-making body. The feedback we got was great, the official said. The directive, based on a template that all modern presidents have used in organizing national security decision-making, changed a number of things from the Obama White House. It limits the number of deputy assistants to the president, under Trump national security adviser Michael T. Flynn, in three categories of issues organized by geographical regions, issues such as cyber and counterterrorism, and functions such as legal matters. Some offices such as cyber have been expanded, while others have been collapsed. Obamas separate directorates on Europe and Russia have now been combined, the official said. While Obama was criticized for the size of his NSC staff, and Congress enacted legislation to shrink the number of bodies, Rice cut it by about 17 percent in recent years to fewer than 180 policy positions. Trumps is unlikely to be much smaller, the official said, and numbers were a secondary consideration. All positions on the White House payroll have now been filled, and those detailed from other agencies usually appointed for two-year secondments will eventually rotate out. Outside the White House, reaction to the new NSC organizational directive was less positive, with some saying that the immigration directive suffered from jumping ahead of the normal policy process, allowing it and other orders to be composed by political operatives such as Bannon and Stephen Miller, the White House senior adviser for policy, who is a Bannon ally and a former aide to Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), Trumps populist and conservative nominee for attorney general. Senior Trump officials offered differing public explanations for the Bannon appointment. Asked what the strategist contributed to NSC discussions, White House press secretary Sean Spicer told This Week that Bannon is a former naval officer. Hes got a tremendous understanding of the world and the geopolitical landscape that we have now. Asked if Bannon was giving advice on national security matters, Spicer said he was contributing analysis. Its about the intelligence that comes in and the analysis that comes out of that, he said. Having key decision-makers, and the chief strategist for the United States for the president to come in and talk about what the strategy is going forward is crucial. [How Bannon flattered and coaxed Trump on policies key to the alt-right] Bannon has no job experience in foreign policy. After serving in the Navy for seven years in the late 1970s and early 1980s, his eclectic career took him to Goldman Sachs, to consulting to documentary filmmaking and then to the running of Breitbart News, a far-right website known for peddling conspiracy theories. From his perch as chief of Breitbart News, which produced a satellite radio show, Bannon cemented his role as a champion of the alt-right, an anti-globalism movement that has attracted support from white supremacists and helped power Trumps populist White House victory. Trump sees Bannon as a generational peer who shares his anti-establishment instincts and confrontational style. According to several people familiar with their relationship, Bannon has cultivated a rapport with Trump over security issues in recent months, and impressed Trump with his grasp of policy in talks they have held together with top intelligence and military officials. The new president relies on Bannon to ensure that his campaign promises and nationalist worldview are being followed and are shaping national security strategy.Trumps approval of Bannons new role is seen inside the White House as the formalization of a dynamic that has already been at work for weeks, these people said. For many outside the White House, the optics of Bannons NSC appointment were bad, regardless of the motivation or the substance of his participation. In previous administrations, political advisers have been banned from national security discussions or at least not publicly acknowledged. George W. Bush barred his political strategist, Karl Rove, from NSC meetings, according to Josh Bolten, Bushs chief of staff. The president told Karl Rove, You may never come to a National Security Council meeting, Bolten said at a conference on the NSC and politics last fall. It wasnt because he didnt respect Karls advice or didnt value his input, Bolten said. But the president also knew that the signal he wanted to send to the rest of his administration, the signal he wanted to send to the public, and the signal he especially wanted to send to the military is that the decisions Im making that involve life and death for the people in uniform will not be tainted by any political decisions. While Obama did not include political strategist David Axelrod in his own NSC organizational directive, Axelrod frequently showed up at the meetings particularly those having to do with strategy in Afghanistan and Iraq to the consternation of Gates and others. It is true that the Obama administration did it, said Peter Feaver, a political-science professor at Duke University who served on the Bush NSC staff. Its also true that we Republicans, myself included, sharply criticized them for doing it, precisely on the grounds that you are feeding the image that politics drove the decision. Read more: Heres where Republicans stand on Trumps controversial travel ban Top GOP senators fear Trump order could become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism Koch network could serve as potent resistance in Trump era Robert Costa, Greg Miller and Frances Stead Sellers contributed to this report. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), President Trumps nominee for attorney general, testifies at his confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Jan. 10. (Melina Mara/The Washington Post) In jagged black strokes, President Trumps signature was scribbled onto a catalogue of executive orders over the past 10 days that translated the hard-line promises of his campaign into the policies of his government. The directives bore Trumps name, but another mans fingerprints were also on nearly all of them: Jeff Sessions. The early days of the Trump presidency have rushed a nationalist agenda long on the fringes of American life into action and Sessions, the quiet Alabamian who long cultivated those ideas as a Senate backbencher, has become a singular power in this new Washington. Sessionss ideology is driven by a visceral aversion to what he calls soulless globalism, a term used on the extreme right to convey a perceived threat to the United States from free trade, international alliances and the immigration of nonwhites. And despite many reservations among Republicans about that worldview, Sessions whose 1986 nomination for a federal judgeship was doomed by accusations of racism that he denied is finding little resistance in Congress to his proposed role as Trumps attorney general. (Thomas Johnson/The Washington Post) Sessionss nomination is scheduled to be voted on Tuesday by the Senate Judiciary Committee, but his influence in the administration stretches far beyond the Justice Department. From immigration and health care to national security and trade, Sessions is the intellectual godfather of the presidents policies. His reach extends throughout the White House, with his aides and allies accelerating the presidents most dramatic moves, including the ban on refugees and citizens from seven mostly Muslim nations that has triggered fear around the globe. The author of many of Trumps executive orders is senior policy adviser Stephen Miller, a Sessions confidant who was mentored by him and who spent the weekend overseeing the governments implementation of the refugee ban. The tactician turning Trumps agenda into law is deputy chief of staff Rick Dearborn, Sessionss longtime chief of staff in the Senate. The mastermind behind Trumps incendiary brand of populism is chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon, who, as chairman of the Breitbart website, promoted Sessions for years. Then there is Jared Kushner, the presidents son-in-law and senior adviser, who considers Sessions a savant and forged a bond with the senator while orchestrating Trumps trip last summer to Mexico City and during the darkest days of the campaign. [Trump lays groundwork to change U.S. role in the world] In an email in response to a request from The Washington Post, Bannon described Sessions as the clearinghouse for policy and philosophy in Trumps administration, saying he and the senator are at the center of Trumps pro-America movement and the global nationalist phenomenon. In America and Europe, working people are reasserting their right to control their own destinies, Bannon wrote. Jeff Sessions has been at the forefront of this movement for years, developing populist nation-state policies that are supported by the vast and overwhelming majority of Americans, but are poorly understood by cosmopolitan elites in the media that live in a handful of our larger cities. He continued: Throughout the campaign, Sessions has been the fiercest, most dedicated, and most loyal promoter in Congress of Trumps agenda, and has played a critical role as the clearinghouse for policy and philosophy to undergird the implementation of that agenda. What we are witnessing now is the birth of a new political order, and the more frantic a handful of media elites become, the more powerful that new political order becomes itself. Sessions and Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway speak to members of the media in the lobby of Trump Tower in New York on Nov. 17. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post) Trump, who is never shy about showering praise on his loyalists, speaks of Sessions with reverence. At a luncheon the day before his inauguration, Trump singled out someone in the audience: the legendary Jeff Sessions. Trump said in an email to The Post that Sessions is a truly fine person. Jeff was one of my earliest supporters and the fact that he is so highly respected by everyone in both Washington, D.C., and around the country was a tremendous asset to me throughout the campaign, Trump wrote. Sessions helped devise the presidents first-week strategy, in which Trump signed a blizzard of executive orders that begin to fulfill his signature campaign promises although Sessions had advocated going even faster. The senator lobbied for a shock-and-awe period of executive action that would rattle Congress, impress Trumps base and catch his critics unaware, according to two officials involved in the transition planning. Trump opted for a slightly slower pace, these officials said, because he wanted to maximize news coverage by spreading out his directives over several weeks. Trump makes his own decisions, but Sessions was one of the rare lawmakers who shared his impulses. Sessions brings heft to the presidents gut instincts, said Roger Stone, a longtime Trump adviser. He compared Sessions to John Mitchell, who was attorney general under Richard M. Nixon but served a more intimate role as a counselor to the president on just about everything. Nixon is not a guy given to taking advice, but Mitchell was probably Nixons closest adviser, Stone said. [In Trumps Washington, rival powers and whispers in the presidents ear] There are limits to Sessionss influence, however. He has not persuaded Trump so far, at least to eliminate the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, under which children brought to the United States illegally are allowed to stay in the country. Sessions has also been leading the internal push for Trump to nominate William H. Pryor Jr., his deputy when Sessions was Alabamas attorney general and now a federal appeals court judge, for the Supreme Court. While Pryor is on Trumps list of three finalists, it is unclear whether he will get the nod. In his senior staff meetings, Trump talks about Sessions as someone who gets things done, calmly and without fanfare, said Kellyanne Conway, the White House counselor. He does it in a very courtly, deliberative manner, she said. Theres never a cloud of dust or dramatic flourish. Newt Gingrich, a former speaker of the House and informal Trump adviser, said, Sessions is the person who is comfortable being an outsider to the establishment but able to explain the establishment to Trump. There is this New York-Los Angeles bias that if you sound like Alabama, you cant be all that bright, but thats totally wrong, and Trump recognized how genuinely smart Sessions is. Sessions was especially instrumental in the early days of the transition, which was taken over by Dearborn after a purge of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christies associates. Sessions became a daily presence at Trump Tower in New York, mapping out the policy agenda and making personnel decisions. Once former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani was out of consideration for secretary of state, Trump considered nominating Sessions because he was so trusted by the inner circle, including Kushner, although Sessionss preference was to be attorney general, according to people familiar with the talks. Since his nomination, Sessions has been careful to not be formally involved even as his ideas animate the White House. In a statement Sunday, he denied that he has had communications with his former advisers or reviewed the executive orders. Sessions has installed close allies throughout the administration. He persuaded Cliff Sims, a friend and adviser, to sell his Alabama media outlet and take a job directing message strategy at the White House. Sessions also influenced the selection of Peter Navarro, an economist and friend with whom he co-authored an op-ed last fall warning against the rabbit hole of globalism, as director of the National Trade Council. Sessionss connections extend into the White House media briefing room, where press secretary Sean Spicer took the first question at his Jan. 24 briefing from a journalist at LifeZette, a conservative website run by Laura Ingraham, a Trump supporter and populist in the Sessions mold. The websites senior editor is Garrett Murch, a former communications adviser to Sessions. Another link: Julia Hahn, a Breitbart writer who favorably chronicled Sessionss immigration crusades over the past two years, was hired by Bannon to be one of his White House aides. More mainstream Republicans have been alarmed by Sessionss ascent. John Weaver, a veteran GOP strategist who was a consultant on Sessionss first Senate campaign and is now a Trump critic, said Sessions is at the pinnacle of power because he shares Trumps 1940s view of fortress America. Thats something you would find in an Allen Drury novel, Weaver said. Unfortunately, there are real consequences to this, which are draconian views on immigration and a view of America that is insular and not an active member of the global community. [Trumps pick for attorney general is shadowed by race and history] Inside the White House and within Sessionss alumni network, people have taken to calling the senator Joseph, referring to the Old Testament patriarch who was shunned by his family and sold into slavery as a boy, only to rise through unusual circumstances to become right hand to the pharaoh and oversee the lands of Egypt. In a 20-year Senate career, Sessions has been isolated in his own party, a dynamic crystallized a decade ago when he split with President George W. Bush and the business community over comprehensive immigration changes. In lonely and somewhat conspiratorial speeches on the Senate floor, Sessions would chastise the masters of the universe. He hung on his office wall a picture of He-Man from the popular 1980s comic book series. As he weighed a presidential run, Trump liked what he saw in Sessions, who was tight with the constituencies Trump was eager to rouse on the right. So he cultivated a relationship, giving Sessions $2,000 for his 2014 reelection even though the senator had no Democratic opponent. Sessions was always somebody that we had targeted, said Sam Nunberg, Trumps political adviser at the time. In May 2015, Nunberg said, he reached out to Miller, then an adviser to Sessions, to arrange a phone call between Trump and the senator. The two hit it off, with Trump telling Nunberg, That guy is tough. The next month, Trump declared his candidacy. In August of that year, Sessions joined Trump at a mega-rally in the senators home town of Mobile and donned a Make America Great Again cap. By January 2016, Miller had formally joined the campaign and was traveling daily with the candidate, writing speeches and crafting policies. Senator Sessions laid a bit of groundwork . . . on matters like trade and illegal immigration, Conway said. It was candidate Trump then who was able to elevate those twin pillars in a way that cast it through the lens of whats good for the American worker. As Trump kept rising, so did Sessions. Its like being a guerrilla in the hinterlands preparing for the next hopeless assault on the government, said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, a conservative research institute. Then you get a message that the capital has fallen. Malaysia boat sinks: 23 Chinese tourists and two crew rescued Twenty-three Chinese tourists and two crew members have survived after their boat sank in rough seas off eastern Malaysia, officials said. President Donald Trump applauds with Vice President Mike Pence and House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) at the end of his remarks at a congressional Republican retreat in Philadelphia, U.S. January 26, 2017. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters) President Trumps temporary ban on refugees and other foreigners has significantly deepened fissures in his already fragile relationship with congressional Republicans, as GOP leaders on Capitol Hill complained angrily Monday that they were not consulted before the order was issued. At least a dozen key GOP lawmakers and aides said Trumps order took them by surprise, even as the White House insisted that it collaborated with Congress. House Speaker Paul D. Ryans political team sought to reassure donors and other supporters that the temporary ban on travelers from seven majority-Muslim countries does not amount to a religious test. And a steady stream of Republican lawmakers released carefully tailored written statements expressing concerns about the order. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) said Monday that he was not briefed before the order was signed. I know that they said they talked with some staffers on the Hill not in our office, he said. The disarray over Trumps fulfillment of a core campaign promise underscored the increasingly strained relationship between the new White House and the Republican congressional majority. It comes after a rocky first week-and-a-half punctuated by confusion over health care and tax reform, as well as frustration with the president obsessing over crowd size and his loss of the popular vote in November. Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) speaks to reporters as he arrives for a Senate Foreign Relations Committee business hearing to vote on U.S. Secretary of State nominee Rex Tillerson, on Capitol Hill, January 21, 2017 in Washington, DC. (Drew Angerer) Asked if he was consulted in the drafting of the order, Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Tex.), the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, said simply: I wasnt. Pressed on when he first learned about the order, Corker answered that it was Friday, after it was signed. I guess one of you guys probably told me about it thank you for that, Corker told reporters. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) said he could not confirm whether his staff was consulted but he personally did not weigh in on the executive order as it was being drafted. Grassleys committee is responsible for overseeing the majority of immigration-related legislation in the Senate. Im sure if they said they consulted us, they did, Grassley said. But not me personally. A member of Grassleys committee staff worked alongside other congressional staff to assist the Trump transition team on legislative issues, including early drafting of the executive order, one Senate GOP aide said. However, that staff member did not participate in writing the final order. The White House did not share details of the order with the committee before its release on Friday, the aide said. The statements from top-ranking Republicans in the House and Senate were at odds with comments earlier in the day from White House press secretary Sean Spicer. There were staff from appropriate committees and leadership offices that were involved, Spicer told reporters at a briefing. He refused to specify which committees were involved in the decision-making. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Ky., joined by, from left, Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., and Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn of Texas, speak with reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2017. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP) Politico reported Monday night that senior House Judiciary Committee staffers helped Trumps team draft the executive order without informing party leadership. A committee aide, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said in a statement following the report: Like other congressional committees, some staff of the House Judiciary Committee were permitted to offer their policy expertise to the Trump transition team about immigration law. However, the Trump Administration is responsible for the final policy decisions contained in the executive order and its subsequent roll out and implementation. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) told reporters that his staff was told the State Department, as of today, was ordered not to talk to Congress about the order. Asked about Rubios remark, State Department spokesman Mark Toner said in a statement: The Department remains in contact with Members of Congress who have reached out regarding the Executive Orders, and will continue to provide information and assistance as we are able. Senior House leaders, including Ryan (R-Wis.), did not see the text of the order until after it was signed Friday, according to a GOP aide. Antonia Ferrier, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said it was public that executive orders were coming but declined to offer further clarity on the level of interaction with the White House. Spokespeople for Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah), Rob Portman (R-Ohio), and Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) said the senators were not consulted at all about the order. Several GOP aides who requested anonymity to speak openly about the sensitive discussions said they were frustrated and surprised by the order and were forced to scramble to respond as chaos spread at airports across the country. Many said they felt the administration was moving too swiftly and without respect for critical protocol for vetting executive actions that have been in place for decades. This is emblematic of a new, power-hungry White House staff flexing its muscles without consulting the public servants responsible for implementing their fiats. If this type of behavior continues, then this administration is going to lose all of its friends very quickly, said one Senate GOP aide. As Republicans sparred over the formulation of the ban, they also tried to head off intense criticism that the order unfairly targets Muslims and does little to prevent terrorist attacks in the United States. In a morning email updating backers on various fronts, the head of Ryans political organization said Trumps executive order was undoubtedly the topic leading the weekend. It is important to lay out the facts on this order so we can evaluate it from a place of reason, wrote Kevin Seifert. Two recipients shared the email with The Washington Post on the condition of anonymity. Seifert went on to argue that the order is not a religious testor a ban on people of any religion. He wrote that from the perspective of Congress, this is an extension of the bill the House passed with a bipartisan veto-proof majority following the Paris terrorist attacks. Even as Ryan was defending Trumps move, other Republicans on Capitol Hill were voicing growing anxiety about it. After many GOP elected officials stayed silent in the 24 hours after the order was issued, a flood of written statements started pouring in Sunday as lawmakers returned to Washington from their states and districts, and it continued Monday. Many statements included heavy doses of skepticism. While I support thorough vetting, I do not support restricting the rights of U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents, Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) said in a statement. Furthermore, far-reaching national security policy should always be devised in consultation with Congress and relevant government agencies. At the same time, there was some clear support for the measure in the party ranks, highlighting the how divisive it has been in the GOP. If you didnt see these executive orders coming, you werent looking very closely, said Rep. Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.). I dont know why my colleagues would be so negative toward it. Duncan, a member of the House Committees on Homeland Security and Foreign Affairs, said that everyone wanted to make sure that Americans with legal status would be able to travel freely but that that issue has since been resolved. He also dismissed criticism that the Trump administration did not execute the order smoothly. Not all of the Cabinet-level positions have been filled or confirmed by the Senate, Duncan said in an interview. You have a lot of flux within the agencies that were implementing it. The uproar over Trumps ban comes at a critical moment when congressional Republicans are looking to resolve other matters that many see as much more pressing. Among their most challenging tasks: formulating a consensus plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act and shepherding a Supreme Court nominee to confirmation in the face of expected heavy Democratic resistance. Congressional Democrats on Monday continued fighting the ban, both through proposed legislation that would reverse it and a planned protest in front of the Supreme Court. This executive order was mean-spirited and un-American, it made us less secure, it put our troops in the field at increased risk, and it was implemented in a way that caused chaos and confusion across the country, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on the Senate floor. For many Republicans, this was not an episode they relished. We have a lot of things we need to do, and Im focused on the long term and not these little battles that spring up along the way, so Im going to keep my powder dry so we can accomplish our overall agenda rather than to comment on each and every dust-up like this, Cornyn said. Mike DeBonis and Carol Morello contributed to this report. Read more at PowerPost Jonathan B. Jarvis, shown speaking in Washington in 2015 when he headed the National Park Service, has criticized the communications blackout that the Trump administration ordered at the NPS and other agencies. (Sait Serkan Gurbuz/Associated Press) The just-departed head of the National Park Service has now spoken out against the Trump administrations efforts to suppress the agency, posting a lengthy statement on a Facebook site for park rangers in support of employees. I have been watching the Trump administration trying unsuccessfully to suppress the National Park Service with a mix of pride and amusement, Jonathan B. Jarvis wrote Sunday on the Association of National Park Rangers site. He was referring to the communications blackout the administration ordered last week at the Park Service and other agencies restricting what they should convey to the public about their work. Communications such as news releases, official social media accounts and correspondence with other government officials are restricted in disseminating information for now while the Trump team finds its footing. [Federal agencies ordered to restrict communications] Accordingly, the Park Service cannot share most information with the public about Park Service policies. But Jarvis, who retired earlier this month after a 40-year career with the agency, noted that what may be national policy to Trump officials is simply history to others like him, and should not be muzzled. Edicts from on-high have directed the NPS to not talk about national policy, but permission is granted to use social media for visitor center hours and safety, Jarvis wrote in the post, which was widely shared on multiple social platforms. The ridiculousness of such a directive was immediately resisted and I am not the least bit surprised. For example, he asked, At Stonewall National Monument in New York City, shall we only talk about the hours you can visit the Inn or is it national policy to interpret the events there in 1969 that gave rise to the LGBT movement? So at Martin Luther King Jr. National Historic Site in Atlanta should we not talk about his actions to secure the rights to vote for African Americans in the south, or is that too national policy? he continued. These are not policy issues, they are facts about our nation. The Obama administration made a point of elevating the history of a broad swath of marginalized groups including Native Americans, Latinos, African Americans, Asian Americans and women into the national park system over the past eight years. Jarvis led the Park Service for seven years under former president Barack Obama, overseeing a major centennial celebration this year and revelations of sexual harassment at several major parks. He rose from an entry-level park technician to superintendent. These were his first public statements since the Park Service unexpectedly moved into the new administrations crosshairs on Inauguration Day and became a hero to many of the new presidents opponents. The new limits on public communications appear to be directed at agencies charged with overseeing environmental and scientific policy, particularly those that do research on climate change or, in the case of the Park Service, train employees to understand and share with the public how global warming is affecting the parks. But deeper trouble began during Trumps inauguration, when a former employee who worked with the agencys official Twitter account retweeted two messages that could be perceived as critical of the new administration: One compared the relative crowd size for Trumps inauguration to that of Obamas 2009 swearing-in, and another noted policy pages that had been removed from the White Houses website. [Interior Department reactivates Twitter accounts afrter shutdown following inauguration] The shares caught the new presidents attention and wrath and the next day Trump made a phone call to Jarviss successor, acting Park Service Director Michael Reynolds. Trump personally ordered Reynolds to produce additional photographs of the previous days crowds on the Mall, The Washington Post reported last week. The president hoped the images would show that attendance at his swearing-in was higher than the media reported. Meanwhile, all employees in the Interior Department, the Park Services parent agency, were told to shut down Twitter platforms. The ban was lifted the next day. But then the Badlands National Parks Twitter account posted four tweets in a row about threats posed by climate change. Those tweets were deleted, but a crop of alternative Park Service Twitter accounts hosted by retired and seasonal employees or volunteers have lit up Twitter for days. Jarvis said in an interview that his Facebook statement was designed to speak to employees, to reassure them that they should continue to do what theyve always done and talk about the place you manage. Read more at PowerPost British Prime Minister Theresa May speaks as President Trump listens during a joint news conference Jan. 27 at the White House. (Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg News) A petition calling on Britain to cancel President Trumps state visit surged past 1 million signatures Monday, making the appeal the countrys second-biggest grass-roots effort and pushing it onto the agenda of the British Parliament. Amid the furor, Britains foreign secretary revealed that he secured a deal with the Trump administration to clear travel for any British passport holder even in cases of dual citizenship with one of the seven blacklisted nations. Trump provoked a worldwide backlash after signing an executive order to temporarily prevent people from seven predominantly Muslim countries Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the United States. It also stopped the U.S. refugee program for 120 days. Trump has insisted that the order is not about religion but an interim measure to enhance security vetting. British Prime Minister Theresa May announced during a joint news conference with Trump on Friday before the ban was ordered that Trump had accepted an offer by Queen Elizabeth II for a state visit this year. The petition to rescind the state visit began two months ago, but signatures began to pour in after the travel restrictions were announced. The petition is the second-most-signed initiative on Parliaments website. (The most-signed petition was for a debate to consider a second referendum on E.U. membership after voters in June backed leaving the bloc.) [Iraqi lawmakers call for retaliatory visa block on Americans] Graham Guest, 42, of Leeds, said he launched the petition because he did not want Trump to embarrass the queen. Trump should not be allowed to bask in the queens reflective glory, he told the Independent newspaper. The petition argues that Trump should be allowed into Britain but not receive a full state visit. Donald Trumps well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales, it reads. Lawmakers will decide on Tuesday if they will debate the petition. If a petition receives more than 100,000 signatures, then Parliament automatically considers it for debate. When asked if the petition has any impact on the state visit, a spokesman for Downing Street said of Trump: He has been invited and he has accepted. May has faced criticism from across the political spectrum for plans to roll out the red carpet for Trump. Nobody does pomp and pageantry like the British, and it is on full display during state visits, which usually include a carriage procession and a lavish state banquet at Buckingham Palace. Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson said that the state visit should not proceed while a cruel and divisive policy which discriminates against citizens of the host nation is in place. I hope President Trump immediately reconsiders his Muslim ban, she added. Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the opposition Labour Party, has said that May should cancel the state visit and stand up to Trumps hate. London Mayor Sadiq Khan, the first Muslim to hold the post, said the ban was counterproductive and could do more harm than good. It will play straight into the hands of the terrorists and extremists who seek to divide and harm our great nations, he wrote in the Evening Standard newspaper. I fear it will be used to act as a recruiting sergeant for so-called IS [Islamic State] and other like-minded groups. May has also come under fire for not condemning the ban as quickly or forcefully as other European leaders. After initially refusing to condemn the measure, Mays office released a statement saying that it does not agree with the approach. A spokesman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel, by contrast, said that she is convinced that the necessary, decisive battle against terrorism does not justify a general suspicion against people of a certain origin or a certain religion. Demonstrations were held in cities across the United Kingdom on Monday evening, including in London outside of Mays Downing Street office. In the House of Commons, Boris Johnson, Britains foreign secretary, called Trumps measures divisive and wrong. But he also stressed that the Anglo-American relationship was of vital importance. As evidence, he said Britains standing in Washington allowed a special access deal for any British passport holder regardless of a possible second nationality a move that could anger Britains European Union partners. Nadhim Zahawi, a Conservative member of Parliament who was born in Iraq, told the BBC he thought the ban was demeaning and sad. His twin sons are studying at Princeton University and he initially thought he would be blocked from entering the U.S. because he has dual citizenship in Iraq and Britain. While many on the left have attacked May for appearing to cozy up to Trump epitomized by a photograph showing the two leaders holding hands outside of the White House others have argued that she is only doing her job and it would be foolish not to engage with the elected leader of the United States. Read more: Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news The Philippine police chief stopped the use of the national police force in anti-drug operations Monday and disbanded all police anti-narcotics units after the presidents brutal crackdown was used as a cover by rogue officers to kidnap and kill a South Korean man for money. Police Director-General Ronald Dela Rosa told police officers he would use the indefinite halt of drug operations to launch a massive purge of police involved in crimes. A counterintelligence force would be formed to catch rogue officers and records of those previously implicated in crimes would be reviewed, he said. No more drug operations now, Dela Rosa told police officers at the main police camp, without indicating how long the ban would last. An estimated 7,000 drug-related killings have occurred since President Rodrigo Duterte started his drug crackdown in July, and more than 2,500 of those involved suspects who allegedly fought back and were shot in clashes with police, the national police said. The force said 35 police officers and three soldiers had been killed. The scale of the anti-drug campaign has been unprecedented, with officials reporting that more than 7 million houses of drug suspects have been visited, prompting more than 1.1 million people, mostly drug users, to surrender and agree to undergo rehabilitation programs. Human rights watchdogs have suspected that extrajudicial killings of drug suspects may have been covertly carried out by police or at their behest. Phelim Kine, deputy Asia director at U.S.-based Human Rights Watch, said the temporary stoppage in police drug operations to allow an internal police purge is nothing less than an empty public relations gesture unless he seeks meaningful accountability for the more than 7,000 Filipinos killed in the crackdown. While Dela Rosa has suspended police operations, Duterte has declared that his crackdown will continue up until the last day of his six-year term. We have to focus our effort toward internal cleansing, and by the time we have cleansed the national police, the president will determine that and he will instruct us to go back to our war on drugs, Dela Rosa said, warning wrongdoers they face dire punishments. You policemen involved in syndicates, lets see what happens now, fight back so youll end up dead, he said. You will be killed by this counterintelligence task force. With the police essentially taken out of the crackdown, most of the work would shift to the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, which has a much smaller number of enforcers. As to how the police crisis affects drug lords, this is a momentary victory on your part, the police chief said, expressing fears that use of methamphetamine, locally known as shabu, may rise again. Go ahead and enjoy, but there is always a time for reckoning. The crisis was sparked by the kidnapping and killing of a South Korean businessman who was snatched by police officers for ransom using a fake warrant for his arrest for a purported drug offense. The victim was killed in October at the main police camp in metropolitan Manila, and the officers collected the ransom without telling his wife he was dead, according to police. He was allegedly cremated and his ashes flushed down a toilet, according to an angry Duterte. Two of the officers suspected of carrying out the crime were on a key anti-drug force. Dela Rosa resigned amid the scandal, but Duterte asked him to stay on. NC, Maoists shying away from polls fearing defeat, claim UML leaders CPN-UML leaders have said that the ruling partiesNepali Congress and CPN (Maoist Centre) were reluctant to hold the three-level elections as they feared defeat. Syrian refugees sit during an official welcome ceremony at Rome's Fiumicino international airport on Monday. Italian government and church officials have welcomed 41 Syrian refugees at Rome's airport, saying they wanted to show solidarity at a time when the United States is sending refugees away. (Alessandra Tarantino/AP) Thousands of citizens of U.S.-allied nations in Europe and beyond may be barred from entering the United States under President Trumps travel ban, sparking a wave of outrage and fresh confusion that threatened to open an early rift across the Atlantic. Yet the administration also appeared to be doling out exceptions to nations such as Britain playing favorites among allies at the possible expense of long-standing relationships. Following instructions from the Department of Homeland Security, the U.S. embassies in Berlin and Paris warned Monday that German and French citizens who are also dual nationals of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen the seven mostly Muslim nations targeted by the ban would fall under the travel ban, joining people who hold passports only from those countries. The measures full effect appeared unclear even to the U.S. embassies in Europe, where conflicting information circulated. The U.S. Embassy in Paris, for instance, warned that even existing U.S. visas granted to dual citizens would be revoked, while the U.S. Embassy in Berlin suggested only that new visas would not be granted. The Trump administration, however, may be favoring the dual nationals of some Western nations a turn of events that could further complicate the White Houses already floundering relations with Europe. After talks with the White House, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, for instance, reassured his nation Monday that dual British nationals of the flagged Muslim nations have received an exemption from the travel ban. Haya, a 13-year-old Syrian refugee from Homs, plays with balloons upon her arrival at Rome's Fiumicino international airport on Monday. Italian government and church officials have welcomed 41 Syrian refugees. (Alessandra Tarantino/AP) The U.S. Embassy in London initially contradicted that Monday but later confirmed that British dual nationals were indeed exempt. We have received assurances from the U.S. Embassy that this executive order will make no difference to any British passport-holder, irrespective of their country of birth or whether they hold another passport, Johnson told Parliament. The advisories sowed more confusion over a travel ban denounced by critics as a haphazard religious test targeting Muslims criticism rejected by the Trump administration. [Amid protests and confusion, Trump defends executive order: This is not a Muslim ban] The administration has sought to portray the order which also blocks entry to refugees from around the world for at least 120 days to allow for extreme vetting as an attempt to weed out prospective terrorists. But German Chancellor Angela Merkel suggested that it targets Muslims and said she would seek to defend the travel rights of all German citizens. The necessary and also resolute fight against terror does not justify in any way a general suspicion against people of a certain faith, in this case against people of Muslim faith, or people of a certain origin, Merkel said Monday. Alluding to the uncertainty surrounding the ban, she added that Germany is making all efforts to clarify the legal situation for the dual citizens affected and to strongly assert their interests. [Trumps first official calls to German, French leaders set to be awkward exchanges] The U.S. guidance appeared to catch the Europeans off guard. The French Foreign Ministry issued a warning about travel to the United States, mentioning the uncertainty of the regulations for dual nationals. German Foreign Ministry spokesman Martin Schafer began a news conference Monday by saying he did not know whether dual German citizens of the seven countries targeted by Trump would be affected. Several minutes later, he said that according to new information from the U.S. Embassy in Berlin, those citizens would indeed be affected. The Foreign Ministry said tens of thousands of German citizens are potentially affected. The number of other people impacted could surge far higher across Western Europe. In addition, Schafer said the order has raised further complications. If a citizen of one of the seven targeted nations has a U.S. green card and wants to visit Germany, can we give him a visa? he asked. The condition for this would be that he can return. Niema Movassat, a lawmaker from Germanys Left Party who holds dual German and Iranian citizenship, penned a sharp letter to the U.S. Congress denouncing the move. Its completely unbelievable that members of parliament and millions of other people are treated like terrorists, he wrote. This is not about combating terrorism, but about right-wing populism and fascistic action. Other European citizens with dual nationality fretted that they would be unable to see relatives. Luckily I was there in 2015 to see my 97-year-old uncle, who died shortly after, actress Jasmin Tabatabai, a dual German-Iranian national, told the Frankfurter Allgemeine newspaper. Half of my family lives in the U.S., and because I have an Iranian passport, Im not allowed to enter anymore. . . . Many families are torn apart; parents cant see their children anymore. Trumps decree is inhumane and unfair. Omid Nouripour, vice president of Germanys German-American parliamentary committee, said Saturday that he feared he would not be allowed to visit the United States as long as the executive order remains in place. Nouripour was born in Iran and holds dual Iranian and German citizenship. Long a strong advocate of closer German-American relations, he blasted the new order. Its dirty symbolism, Nouripour said of Trumps executive order. Its the best boost jihadis could hope for. They can now pretend the West really is at war with Islam. It remained unclear whether officials such as Nouripour could yet find an out, since many lawmakers hold special diplomatic passports. The U.S. Embassy in Berlin could not immediately provide additional comment, although its advisory noted certain exceptions, including travel related to official government or North Atlantic Treaty Organization business. Other countries around the globe also scrambled to assess the impact of the ban on their dual nationals, and it remained unclear whether the administration was granting exemptions to some nations and not to others. Late Sunday, authorities announced that Canadian citizens and permanent residents would continue to have access to the United States as usual. David MacNaughton, the Canadian ambassador to Washington, tweeted that dual citizens in particular would not be affected by the ban and that those traveling with a Canadian passport would go through a normal entry [and] transit process. MacNaughton indicated that national security adviser Michael T. Flynn had confirmed this information to the Canadian Embassy in Washington. In Australia, public broadcaster SBS reported Monday that an Australian Iranian teenager appeared to be the first dual national in the country affected by the ban. Pouya Ghadirian, 15, was attending a visa interview at the U.S. Consulate when he was advised that the new executive order would affect his travel. They were a bit shocked, and they didn't know how to handle it, Ghadirian told SBS. There were also widespread concerns about the ban in Israel. Israelis born in the countries listed by the executive order were warned by experts to avoid travel to the United States. I recommend that Israelis born in these countries avoid traveling to the U.S. in the near future until we clear things up, Liam Schwartz, a lawyer who specializes in American and Israeli immigration, told Ynetnews. I don't think I'm exaggerating by saying this. The ban is unequivocal. Rick Noack in London, James McAuley in Paris, Stephanie Kirchner in Berlin and Adam Taylor in Washington contributed to this report. Read more: After Trump pledges America first, the world responds with protests and dismay Analysis: Will Donald Trump abandon Europe? Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news President Trump signs a memorandum in the Oval Officer directing the Pentagon to come up with a plan to defeat the Islamic State. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters) Jihadist groups on Sunday celebrated the Trump administrations ban on travel from seven Muslim-majority countries, saying the new policy validates their claim that the United States is at war with Islam. Comments posted to pro-Islamic State social media accounts predicted that President Trumps executive order would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists. One posting hailed the U.S. president as the best caller to Islam, while others predicted that Trump would soon launch a new war in the Middle East. [Islamic State leader Abu Bakr] al-Baghdadi has the right to come out and inform Trump that banning Muslims from entering America is a blessed ban, said one posting to a pro-Islamic State channel on Telegram, a social-media platform. The writer compared the executive order to the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, which Islamic militant leaders at the time hailed as a blessed invasion that ignited anti-Western fervor across the Islamic world. [Trump promised disruption. Thats what hes delivering] Several postings suggested that Trump was fulfilling the predictions of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American born al-Qaeda leader and preacher who famously said that the West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens. Awlaki was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Yemen in 2011. (Peter Stevenson/The Washington Post) When U.S. President Donald Trump says We dont want them here and bans the Muslim immigrants from Muslim countries, there is one thing that comes to our mind, said another posting, beneath a banner of Awlaki and his quote. Another posting on the Telegram channel Abu Magrebi said Trumps actions clearly revealed the truth and harsh reality behind the American governments hatred toward Muslims. Leaders of the Islamic State speak frequently of their intention to drive a wedge between Western governments and their Muslim populations, and have welcomed outside help intentional or not in fulfilling that goal. In a 2015 essay in the Islamic States English-language magazine Dabiq, the group said that its motivation for launching terrorist attacks in Europe was to provoke an anti-Muslim backlash that would force ambivalent Muslims to enlist with it. Jihadists would have to argue to lengths that Obama, Bush, and others held anti-Islam agendas and hated the religion not just radical terrorists, said Rita Katz, founder of the SITE Intelligence Group, a private organization that monitors jihadist websites. Trump, however, makes that argument a lot easier for them to sell to their followers. [Top Republicans fret about bans execution, possible consequences ] The reaction to the ban from Islamic State sympathizers came as current and former U.S. officials also expressed concern that the temporary ban would undermine the global fight against violent Islamist militants. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he worried about the bans impact on Muslim troops fighting alongside Americans to destroy the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. The effect will probably in some areas give ISIS some more propaganda, McCain told CBSs Face the Nation on Sunday, using an acronym for the Islamic State. Robert Richer, a 35-year CIA veteran and former chief of the agencys Near East division, said the ban was a strategic mistake that could undermine future efforts to recruit spies and collect vital information about terrorists and their plans. How, he asked, can CIA officers persuade Iraqi and Syrian nationals to risk their lives to help the United States? This was a win for jihadists and other anti-U.S. forces, said Richer, the deputy chief of the agencys Operations Directorate during the George W. Bush administration. It fuels the belief out there that Americans are anti-Islam. Otherwise, it accomplishes nothing, because the ones we are most concerned about can still get to the United States. Read more: Officials worry that U.S counterterrorism defenses will be weakened by Trump actions The Islamic State has been oddly quiet about Trump Donald Trump destroyed my life, says barred Iraqi who worked for U.S. President Trump signs an executive order Friday at the Pengagon that temporarily bans people from seven mostly Muslim countries from entering the United States. (Carlos Barria/Reuters) Though cast as measures meant to make the country safe, the Trump administrations moves during its first week in office are more likely to weaken the counterterrorism defenses the United States has erected over the past 16 years, several current and former U.S. officials said. Through inflammatory rhetoric and hastily drawn executive orders, the administration has alienated allies, including Iraq, provided propaganda fodder to terrorist networks that frequently portray U.S. involvement in the Middle East as a religious crusade, and endangered critical cooperation from often-hidden U.S. partners whether the leader of a mosque in an American suburb or the head of a Middle East intelligence service. An executive order issued Friday and titled Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry Into the United States bans entry to people from a list of Muslim-majority nations including Iraq, where U.S. military and intelligence agencies have for years relied on cooperation from Iraqi and Kurdish authorities, not to mention thousands of individual translators and contractors. Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism, Republican Sens. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.) and John McCain (Ariz.) said Sunday in a statement. This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security. [Trump redefines the enemy and 15 years of counterterrorism policy] (Bastien Inzaurralde/The Washington Post) Already, supporters of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, quickly claimed the travel ban as a victory. Postings on social-media sites linked to the terrorist group predicted that President Trumps order would galvanize Muslims and claimed that it showed that the United States is at war with Islam. The White House did not respond to a request for comment. In tweets Sunday, Trump said, The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong they are sadly weak on immigration. The senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III. Separately, in a statement, Trump said the seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror, and he noted that Obama had barred refugees from Iraq for six months in 2011. [Trumps facile claim that his refugee policy is similar to Obamas in 2011] Trumps inauguration vow to put America first and only America rattled allies. A leaked draft of an order on U.S. detention policies compounded those concerns by raising the prospect of rebuilding the CIAs network of notorious black site prisons around the world. The immigration measures imposed late Friday were seen by U.S. counterterrorism officials and analysts as particularly counterproductive and poorly conceived. The whole order is and will be read as another anti-Islam, anti-Muslim action by this president and his administration, said Paul Pillar, a former top official at the CIAs Counterterrorism Center. It is not targeted at where the threat is, and the anti-Islam message that it sends is more likely to make America less safe. Absent from the Trump list: Saudi Arabia or any of the other countries connected to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Nor does the presidents action limit travel from Pakistan, where al-Qaedas leadership still resides. (Whitney Leaming/The Washington Post) [CIA would face hurdles to reopen black site prisons, regardless of presidents orders] Former CIA director Michael V. Hayden said that the order and other possible measures have probably forced U.S. diplomats, military commanders and agency station chiefs abroad into damage-control mode. Weve got good people who will work hard at it, but there is no question that this has already created an irretrievable cost, Hayden said. The refugee order inarguably has made us less safe. It has taken draconian measures against a threat that was hyped. The byproduct is it feeds the Islamic militant narrative and makes it harder for our allies to side with us. Despite acute concerns about the impact overseas, analysts said much of the damage may happen in the United States. Counterterrorism officials have for years cast the successful integration of Muslims in the United States as a major security advantage over countries in Europe, where Muslims are more likely to be isolated and marginalized. Those who study extremism fear that the sense of belonging among U.S. Muslims may begin to fray, increasing the likelihood that a U.S. citizen or resident becomes radicalized, and complicates the already-difficult task for the FBI and local authorities to cultivate relationships with Muslim community leaders. It was already an uphill climb, said Seamus Hughes, a former National Counterterrorism Center official who frequently traveled the country to meet with Muslim community members after terrorist attacks. [A raid in Yemen leads to the first combat death of the Trump era ] Tips to the FBI or local police from concerned parents, religious leaders and concerned Muslim citizens have been the lifeblood of most terrorism investigations in the United States, said Hughes, who is now at George Washington University. I dont see anyone hesitating to report an imminent threat, he said, but adding, I cant see these orders as helping. Marcel Lettre, who oversaw intelligence matters at the Pentagon until earlier this month, said the new measures could affect decisions by allies in Europe or the Middle East, possibly affecting intelligence-sharing and law enforcement cooperation. The political and policy environment might make it such that their publics will insist that they distance themselves from us in terms of tight partnering, Lettre said. But Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said in a statement, In light of attempts by Islamic militant groups to infiltrate fighters into refugee flows to the West, along with Europes tragic experience coping with this problem, the Trump Administrations executive order on refugees is a common-sense security measure to prevent terror attacks on the homeland. In terms of overseas partnerships, no relationship has been placed under more immediate strain than that of the United States and Iraq. Trump used his speech at CIA headquarters on his first day in office to declare that it was a mistake for the United States not to have seized Iraqs oil reserves after the U.S. invasion in 2003, and to hint that there might be another chance to do so. The executive order sparked confusion and condemnation in Baghdad. Iraqis who had worked with the U.S. military for years, often at great risk, were among the first people affected by the regulations. Even before the new measures were issued, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi told reporters that his countrys oil is for Iraqis. The comment also explicitly confirmed widely held suspicions in the Middle East of U.S. geopolitical motivations. Its about oil and its a plot to destroy Islam, said Dan Byman, a terrorism expert at Georgetown University. If you want to combine conspiracy theories, [Trump] is doing a good job. [He risked his life working for the U.S. in Iraq. Now his visas no good.] Iraqi lawmakers over the weekend insisted that Iraq impose similar measures on the United States. Moqtada al-Sadr, an influential Shiite cleric, called the decision to block Iraqi entry while Americans still come and go arrogance, and he demanded that U.S. nationals leave the country. Iraqis also have questioned the omission from the travel ban of certain Gulf and North Africa countries, whose nationals have been involved in high-profile terrorist attacks Saad al-Hadithi, a spokesman for Abadi, said that the U.S. security partnership with Iraq, including American support for operations against the Islamic State and a robust arms sales program, should make the relationship with Iraq different from other countries on the list. The new measures take place as the Pentagon continues to rely closely on Iraq in its campaign to defeat the Islamic State. More than 6,000 U.S. troops are stationed in the country, advising Iraqi forces during a major battle in Mosul, the militant-held northern city. [Inside the battle for Mosul] The decision undermines Abadi, straddled between a Western ally whose support he needs to fight militants and Shiite political peers who view the U.S. presence with hostility. Lukman Faily, who served as the Iraqi ambassador in Washington until last year, said that Abadi would try to draw a distinction between Iraqs security partnership with the United States and the perceived snub contained in Trumps new order It will certainly put the prime minister in the most awkward position, Faily said. It will not help him navigate his politics while hes completing [a major battle] and while he has an oil crisis to deal with. Hadithi sought to stress the temporary nature of the order. We will have a discussion with the American side, Hadithi said. If its only for a short time to reorganize their visa and refugees work, we will understand it and take it positively. Its not yet clear, however, whether the 90-day period stipulated in the executive order will be extended. Joby Warrick, Julie Tate and Mustafa Salim in Baghdad contributed to this report. Read more: The Islamic State has been oddly quiet about Trump Jihadist groups hail Trumps travel ban as a victory Nations condemn Trumps travel ban, as the fallout infects peoples lives NEA to import additional 25MW electricity from Wednesday Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) is importing an additional 25MW electricity from India from Wednesday. A Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) interceptor is launched during an intercept test in this undated photo. (U.S. Defense Department Missile Defense Agency via Reuters) Plans to deploy an American antimissile battery to South Korea and the growing North Korean threat will be at the top of James Mattiss agenda this week when the new defense secretary visits South Korea and Japan on his first foreign trip. Mattis, a retired Marine general nicknamed Mad Dog, will meet with Han Min-koo, the South Korean defense minister, in Seoul on Thursday before heading to Tokyo. Han is expected to reiterate South Koreas commitment to hosting the Terminal High Altitude Aerial Defense system, or THAAD. But with China exacting economic revenge on South Korea over its decision to host the missile battery and the South Korean government in crisis, some in Seoul now have jitters about the plan. Moon Jae-in, an opposition candidate running at the top of the presidential polls, has said decisions on the THAAD deployment should wait until the next South Korean administration is in place. That could take months, with the Constitutional Court now deciding whether to uphold the National Assemblys motion to impeach President Park Geun-hye, who made the decision to host THAAD, for her role in a sensational political scandal. If the court forces her from office, elections must be held within 60 days. Otherwise, they will take place in December as scheduled. Defense Secretary James Mattis, left, stands with Jordan's King Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein during an honor cordon at the Pentagon on Monday. (Andrew Harnik/AP) [U.S. policy on North Korea relies on China and provokes it at the same time] In the meantime, the Chinese government which has made no secret of its opposition to the THAAD plan is trying to persuade South Korean political leaders to change their minds. Although Washington and Seoul insist that its purpose is to guard against the threat of North Korean missiles, Beijing views the system as another attempt to curtail its military expansion. In recent weeks, China has slapped a number of trade sanctions on South Korea in an apparent effort to dissuade Seoul from going ahead with the deployment. China is one of the biggest reasons why people are opposing THAAD, and I would say that its based on reasonable concerns, said Kim Dong-yub of the Institute for Far Eastern Studies in Seoul. Just go into a department store and you can feel the change, he said, referring to the sudden drop in Chinese tourists coming to South Korea. In the past month, China has banned imports of South Korean bidet toilet seats and South Korean cosmetics, which are hugely popular among young women who love Korean dramas. Classical musicians have joined K-pop stars in having visas denied and concerts canceled. [North Korea runs nuclear test, claims it has higher strike power warheads] (Jason Aldag/The Washington Post) Meanwhile, department stores in China run by Lotte, the South Korean retail group, have been subject to a sudden flurry of safety and hygiene inspections and tax audits, although Beijing rejects any suggestion that this is related to THAAD. Lotte owns the country club 200 miles from Seoul earmarked for the THAAD battery. It will swap with the government for another parcel of land. Lotte appeared to be taking it slow with the internal procedures needed to be completed before the swap can take place, a possible sign that it is worried about the impact on its business in China. It has more than 150 stores in China and is building a huge retail and amusement park complex in the southwestern city of Chengdu. Chinese tourists accounted for more than 70 percent of Lotte Duty Frees sales in the first quarter of last year. It is true that we are sandwiched between our role as a South Korean enterprise, South Koreas relations with China and possible economic loss, the Yonhap News Agency quoted a senior Lotte official as saying. [ North Korean missile lands perilously close to Japan ] Small South Korean companies are suffering, too. There has been a sharp decrease in Chinese tourists, said Kim Seo-kyung, who owns a clothing store in Myeongdong, a fashion district in Seoul usually teeming with Chinese shoppers. Maybe its because of THAAD and because the relationship between South Korea and China has soured, Kim said. She estimated that her revenue had fallen about 40 percent since last year. Businesses around South Korea reported a sharp drop in tourist numbers over the Lunar New Year holiday this past weekend. American proponents of THAAD say they hope South Korean authorities will not waver. The THAAD is a far more effective ballistic missile defense system than anything South Korea has or will have for decades, said Bruce Klingner, a Northeast Asia specialist at the Heritage Foundation. To not deploy THAAD is to choose to put South Korea and U.S. forces stationed there at grave risk to North Korean nuclear, chemical and biological attack. Read more Former U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon falters as he prepares to run for president Fierce opponent of U.S. military bases in Okinawa detained for three months South Korean court says no reason to arrest Samsung heir Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news People protest President Trumps travel ban at Schiphol Airport near Amsterdam on Jan. 29. The executive order halts all refugee entry for 120 days and for 90 days bans entry from seven countries. (Alexander Schippers/European Pressphoto Agency) A backlash against President Trumps new immigration rules intensified Monday, threatening Washingtons relationship with its main partner in battling the Islamic State as Iraqs parliament voted for a reciprocal ban on visas for Americans. The Iraqi lawmakers decision is subject to ratification by the government, but it underscores growing resentment over a U.S. executive order that imposed visa restrictions on Iraqis and the citizens of six other Muslim-majority nations. Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari issued a terse statement describing the ban as unreasonable, given that Iraq is sacrificing the blood of its sons in the front-line fight against the militant group. He urged the United States to reconsider. About 5,000 U.S. troops are stationed in Iraq to train and assist Iraqi forces, which are close to pushing Islamic State militants out of Mosul, their last major urban stronghold in Iraq. Given the two countries close military cooperation, Trumps decision to impose visa restrictions has drawn particular ire in Iraq. Exacerbating that anger, many Iraqis hold the United States responsible for their lack of security because of its 2003 invasion. People protest the travel ban at Schiphol Airport near Amsterdam on Jan. 29. (Alexander Schippers/European Pressphoto Agency) [Militants see Trumps order as potent recruiting tool] In the years since then, Iraqis have taken huge personal risks to support the U.S. military and fight alongside it. But many of those who are in the process of being resettled have been caught up in Trumps 90-day ban on visas and 120-day suspension of refugee entries, adding a new layer of uncertainty after years of arduous security vetting, medical checks and onerous paperwork. After all Ive done for the Americans, entering battles side by side with them, now Im a terrorist in their eyes, said Salih al-Issawi, 30, who worked as an interpreter with the U.S. Marines in Fallujah between 2006 and 2011, when he applied for resettlement. They are ungrateful and left me stuck here to die. Six years later, Issawi is still in Fallujah. He fled when the Islamic State took over in 2014, because an association with U.S. forces meant an effective death sentence. But after running out of money to pay rent in northern Iraq, he returned to the city after it was retaken last year. He said he is still at risk from Islamic State sleeper cells and is viewed with suspicion by neighbors. People still look at me as a spy, he said. He was in the final stages of the resettlement process when Trump signed his order. Now, he doubts he will ever be able to leave. I regret that I worked with them in the first place and risked my life and my familys lives, he said. [Denied Entry: Stories of refugees, immigrants and travelers barred from the U.S.] While Trumps executive order is ostensibly meant to protect Americas national security, some say it will have the opposite effect. The 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation whose members include all seven nations hit by the travel ban expressed grave concern Monday. In a statement, the group said that such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to strengthen the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism. It urged the United States to reconsider this blanket statement and maintain its moral obligation to provide leadership and hope at a time of great uncertainty and unrest in the world. In Ethiopia, the head of the 54-nation African Union predicted turbulent times for the continent because of Trumps action. Three African countries Sudan, Libya and Somalia were on the list, which also contains Iraq, Syria, Iran and Yemen. The African Union chief, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, told leaders meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, that the very country to which many of our people were taken as slaves during the transatlantic slave trade has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries. In Tokyo, a group of about 40 Americans protested near the U.S. Embassy against Trumps travel ban and his plan to build a wall on the Mexico border, waving signs declaring I stand with Muslims and Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are all just despondent, said Jesse Glickstein, the American lawyer and grandson of Nazi concentration camp survivors who organized Tuesdays protest. We all felt that we needed to speak up. Rabbi David Kunin, head of the Jewish Community of Japan, held a sign saying No Muslim Ban. This ban is unconstitutional and it goes against all the values that the United States stands for, and people of all faiths need to stand up and say no to the Muslim ban, no to the wall, no to this kind of violence that stems from hate but also stems from fear, he said. Fear wont build a better world, only love and peace will build a better world. If they are implemented, retaliatory visa restrictions against Americans could affect thousands of contractors supporting U.S. troops in Iraq. The U.S. military relies heavily on contractors for logistical support and security for some installations. Nearly 4,000 contractors work for the Defense Department in Iraq. At least 2,035 of them are U.S. citizens. Thousands more support other U.S. government operations. [Trump stands by order: This is not a Muslim ban] Government officials from the semiautonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq have refused to comment on the ban, which also affects Iraqi Kurds. Trump has expressed support for the Kurds; he told the New York Times before Novembers election that he was a big fan of their forces. We, as Kurds, are fighting against terrorism, and the U.S. government is aware of that, said Saadi Ahmed Pira, head of the foreign relations office for the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan political party. He said he did not view the executive order as a decision against Kurds, but he said it was too general. We dont think it will prevent terrorism, he said. We think what prevents terrorism is cooperation after defeating terrorism militarily, by dealing with the sources of terrorism, in terms of ideology and finances. A grievance repeatedly cited by Iraqi officials is that Trump included Iraq in the ban but left out countries such as Saudi Arabia, whose nationals have been responsible for attacks on U.S. soil. Saudis made up the majority of the hijackers in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, which were referenced in Trumps order. Trump has rejected all criticism, insisting the policy is essential to root out terrorists. There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign, Trump tweeted Monday. Study the world! Salim reported from Baghdad. Aaso Ameen Shwan in Irbil, Anna Fifield in Tokyo, Lousia Loveluck in Beirut and Brian Murphy in Washington contributed to this report. Read more: Trumps travel ban is having a spillover effect on European dual nationals Should Britain host Trump for state visit? More than 1 million people say no. Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news Bernard Aronson listens as Secretary of State John F. Kerry speaks at the State Department on Feb. 20, 2015, announcing his appointment as special envoy for the Colombian peace process. Aronson stepped down this month when President Trump was inaugurated, as is routine, and the new administration has not said whether he will be replaced. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images) Like most political appointees, Bernard Aronson, the U.S. special envoy for the Colombian peace process, was out of a job when the new administration took over this month. Few American diplomats have been so central to the resolution of some of Latin Americas most intractable conflicts. Having helped negotiate the end of El Salvadors civil war in 1992, Aronson, 70, was running a private investment firm when he was drafted back into service by the State Department in 2014. The Colombian governments peace talks with FARC rebels were stalling, and President Juan Manuel Santos asked the United States for help. It sent him Bernie. The battle-hardened guerrilla commanders soon warmed to Aronsons quiet pragmatism and disarming willingness to listen. Over two years and many trips to Havana, where the negotiations were held, Aronson helped troubleshoot the controversial accord with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, that is now in the early stages of implementation. He did a brilliant job in helping us get the FARC to understand the constraints of the real world, said Sergio Jaramillo, Colombias peace commissioner, who was one of the governments two principal negotiators, and to agree to things that no guerrilla force has ever agreed to before in a negotiation: to be accountable before a tribunal for their war crimes, to repair their victims and to get out of the drug trade. Aronson leaves at a delicate time in Colombias effort to end its 50-year war, the longest in the Western Hemisphere. The peace-building phase has not gotten off to a great start, and the United States, which has given the country $10 billion in security aid since 2000, has a big stake in making sure the deal sticks. There has been no indication the Trump administration will name a replacement for Aronson. Nor, for that matter, whether it will continue to support Santos, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last year for his effort to extinguish a conflict that has killed more than 220,000. My job was to help them reach a peace agreement, and theyve done that, Aronson said in an interview. I do think there is value in having someone senior in government focused on implementing the peace accord, and theres some loss in not having someone who sees that as their responsibility. Aronson, who served as the top U.S. diplomat for Latin America under presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, said he made clear to the guerrillas from the start that he was not a neutral party in the peace talks. His job was to represent the United States and support its ally, the Colombian government. But over time, he developed a personal rapport with FARC commanders that no other U.S. diplomat has had. Aronson said he was not sure what would happen with his post. Analysts were more blunt. Losing the special envoy will leave a vacuum, said Adam Isacson, a Colombia expert at the Washington Office on Latin America. In written responses he provided to senators, Rex Tillerson, Trumps nominee for secretary of state, said the United States should review Colombias peace accord and decide to what extent it will continue to support it. Many Republicans and Democrats view the agreement as a vindication of Plan Colombia, the counternarcotics and counterinsurgency initiative credited with tipping the conflict in the governments favor. [Plan Colombia: How Washington learned to love Latin American intervention again] After a decade of devastating losses, including the deaths of several key leaders in airstrikes enabled by U.S. military technology and intelligence, the FARC came to the bargaining table in 2012 to negotiate the terms of its disarmament and transformation into a peaceful political party. Enrique Santiago, a Spanish attorney who was one of the FARCs lead negotiators, said Aronson knew how to build a relationship of trust with both sides. He provided sage advice at the most difficult moments of the talks, Santiago said, while always remaining a staunch defender of U.S. interests. But the Obama administrations central role in the peace deal has raised concerns that the new administration could view it the same way it sees the Obama-backed opening to Cuba as a political trophy of the previous regime. Aronson said he hoped that would not happen. If you think about the conventional wisdom on U.S. foreign policy that we cant do anything on a bipartisan basis, that we have a short attention span, and we fail when we try to build democratic institutions Colombia refutes all that, Aronson said. Weve sustained our commitment and our support for Colombia, and weve helped it become the most vibrant democracy in South America, he said. Thats what I hope [the Trump administration] will build on. As president, Barack Obama proposed a 40 percent increase in 2017 U.S. assistance, to $450 million, relaunching Plan Colombia as Peace Colombia, with funds for the removal of land mines, crop substitution in coca-growing zones and economic development in rural areas. But Congress has yet to approve the funds, and some conservative U.S. lawmakers have signaled they want to withhold U.S. aid unless the government and the FARC reopen the peace agreement. In a recent interview with the Washington Times, Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-Fla.) called the accord unacceptable and a potential path to a guerrilla takeover of Colombian electoral politics. We are going to be attaching more and more strings to make sure that the money does not go to handing Colombia over to FARC, Diaz-Balart said. U.S. officials have been frustrated by a rebound in Colombias cocaine output, as the size of the countrys illegal coca crop has doubled in the past two years. As FARC units withdraw from drug-growing areas long under their control, other armed groups have been muscling their way in. Colombias government blames those groups for an increase in lethal attacks on community leaders, leftist activists and others who sympathize with FARC and support the peace accord. The killings are viewed as a major threat to the agreements successful implementation. [The frightening issue that could destroy Colombias peace deal] The peace process is already stumbling. FARCs roughly 6,000 fighters and thousands of irregular militia members are supposed to begin moving into U.N.-monitored camps to disarm. But preparation of the camps has been behind schedule. In the meantime, the government has also launched formal talks with leftist ELN guerrillas, Colombias smaller insurgent group. The United States will not have a special envoy at those talks unless a replacement is named for Aronson, who has returned to running the Washington-based private equity firm he co-founded. I dont think the Trump administration will oppose peace implementation in Colombia, said WOLAs Isacson. Still, its likely that U.S. government support for the peace effort is about to become much less enthusiastic. Read more: Trump administration choosing to replace several senior State Department diplomats Even with a new Colombian peace deal, what happens in the countryside? Today's coverage from Post correspondents around the world Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news U.S. and Polish soldiers gather near their tanks after a live-fire exercise in Zagan, Poland, on Jan. 30. (Kacper Pempel/Reuters) On a snowy field in southwest Poland, U.S. tanks and troops gathered on Monday to defend against a resurgent Russia that President Trump wants to befriend. The major new deployments of tanks and other heavy equipment will fan out to nations on the Russian frontier this week, part of the largest infusion of U.S. troops to Europe since the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union. But the long-planned effort comes at the most unsettled time for U.S.-European relations since World War II, with Trump questioning old alliances and seeking to build bridges to the Kremlin. When President Barack Obama committed the troops, about 3,500 in all, to Europe last February, then followed up with additional commitments to NATO over the summer, they were a bipartisan expression of support for U.S. allies at a moment of heightened fear about Russia. Now, however, they are coming despite the White House, not because of it. Eastern European nations say they fully trust Washingtons commitments but the jubilation of the summer has been replaced by concern over Trumps overtures to Russian President Vladimir Putin. NATO leaders acknowledge that the alliance will be rocked if Trump abandons the troop deployments. The uncertainty has led to an unusual gap between Trumps rhetoric and that of nearly the entire military establishment underneath him. It was the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the unlawful annexation of Crimea that forced the deployments, said Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, the commander of U.S. Army ground forces in Europe, ahead of a frigid Monday ceremony on a military exercise range outside the Polish town of Zagan, where a Polish military band played The Star-Spangled Banner to welcome the American troops. The last American tank left Europe three years ago because we all hoped Russia was going to be our partner. And so we had to bring all this back, Hodges said. Trump has offered mixed messages on NATO. He called the alliance obsolete in an interview days before the inauguration. But Defense Secretary James Mattis called NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on his first full day on the job last week, praising the fundamental and enduring value of NATO for the security of both Europe and North America, according to NATO. [Trump orders Islamic State plan and talks with Putin] Later in the week, British Prime Minister Theresa May stood by Trumps side and attempted to force the issue, saying he had confirmed that youre 100 percent behind NATO. But Trump has been far warmer to Putin since his election than the leaders of bedrock U.S. allies, saying that the Kremlin is a key partner in the battle against the Islamic State and describing the authoritarian Russian as a strong leader. Trump and Putin spoke for an hour Saturday, initiating a new era in U.S.-Russian relations. But the leaders barely mentioned the primary irritant between the West and Russia, its 2014 annexation of Ukraines Crimean Peninsula and subsequent fueling of a separatist war in eastern Ukraine, according to officials briefed on the call. The uncertainty has weighed on Eastern European leaders who have welcomed the international deployment of several thousand troops to their nations. Any reversal of deployments would be an issue of concern to us, said Ojars Kalnins, head of the foreign affairs committee in Latvias Parliament. Privately, European politicians, diplomats and security officials say that a rollback of U.S. troop commitments would be a seismic shift for NATO that could upend the alliance. But most say they do not think Trump will reverse the flow, saying that what truly counts are the boots that are currently touching down on European ground. This is a substantial deployment, with heavy formations for the type of warfare one could expect if there was a crisis in Europe, said Fabrice Pothier, a former senior NATO official who is a senior research fellow at the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based policy center. But if Trump decides to alter the deployments, that would fundamentally change European defense calculations, Pothier said. Everybody is going to run for cover, he said. It would lead to a more fragmented, more unstable Europe. Its a lose-lose both for the U.S. and the Europeans. Mondays exercises involved the U.S. Armys 3rd Armored Combat Brigade Team, 4th Infantry Division, which arrived in Germany this month with 87 Abrams M1A1 tanks, 20 Paladin artillery systems and 136 Bradley Fighting Vehicles. The troops will spread across Eastern Europe, fanning into the Baltic nations, digging into Poland and also deploying to Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary. When the brigade finishes its deployment in nine months, it will be followed by another group of similar size, a rotation that the Pentagon currently expects to maintain on a near-permanent basis. Separately, Britain, Canada and Germany are sending battalions to Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania as part of a commitment made at a NATO summit in Warsaw in July. Those troops, along with a U.S.-led battalion in Poland, will take up their positions this spring. In Zagan, the site of a vast Communist-era artillery training field, there was little explicit acknowledgment of the new questions over NATOs future. But phrases that would have been unexceptional before Trumps November election victory took on new meaning after his inauguration. An attack on any of us is an attack on all of us, said Paul Jones, the U.S. ambassador to Poland and the senior representative of the Trump administration at the event. Polish leaders said they were delighted to be able to choose their friends, something they said was not possible during more than four decades of communist rule. Thirty years ago, which is not that long in history, we had units here in Zagan which we were forced to treat as allies, said Polish President Andrzej Duda, referring to Soviet army troops. And today we have in Zagan allies who symbolize freedom. After the celebratory speeches, Polish and U.S. tanks and heavy artillery were part of live-fire exercises intended to show that they could work together to fend off a common, unnamed enemy. Explosions and gunfire rang out across a deforested training plain, covered in the snow and mud of a Polish winter. [Gorbachev is worried about a world war, hopes Trump and Putin can stop it.] But there was an easy way to distinguish the nations units: Polish tanks and artillery units were painted forest green, while the U.S. tanks were desert sand, a symbol of American military preoccupations over the past 15 years. No matter the winds of change in Washington, the U.S. military appears to be making plans for a long-term shift in focus toward Europe. Ive asked the Army to send over some green paint, Hodges said. Read more: Todays coverage from Post correspondents around the world Like Washington Post World on Facebook and stay updated on foreign news The Trump administrations order to halt the admission of refugees into the United States and bar entry to visitors and returning residents from seven countriesall majority-Muslim, all the targets of US military aggression or economic sanctionsunderscores the unprecedented nature of the new government. This is a government that will not be constrained by laws or the Constitution. Notwithstanding the fact that Trump is a minority president, his administration intends to utilize its control over the state to the maximum, operating on the principle that possession is nine-tenths of the law. It has already established a pattern of rule by decree. Without any congressional vote, without any judicial process or finding of guilt for any crime, more than 100 people have been detained by federal customs and immigration agents and in some cases deported. The victims include the elderly, small children, wives returning to their husbands and people who have lived in the United States legally for many years, even decades. Hundreds more have been barred from boarding flights bound for the United States. And this is the toll just of the first weekend. The potential victims number in the many thousands, even millions. A series of federal judges have issued court orders barring the deportations, ruling that there is a great likelihood that those challenging the Trump-ordered actions will be upheld once their cases are fully adjudicated. While some individuals have been released from detention, federal officials claim that the White House order is still in force and will be carried out. The actions of the government in its first ten days make all the more sinister the central role being played by Trumps chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon. The media has largely downplayed the fact that Trump named Bannon, former boss of Breitbart News, a sounding board for the white supremacists, anti-Semites and neo-Nazis of the alt-right, to a White House position coequal with Chief of Staff Reince Priebus. It was unmistakably Bannons voice sounding in Trumps inaugural address, with its open embrace of the America First slogan first popularized by Nazi sympathizer Charles Lindbergh in the early days of World War II. His speech followed the fascist model in appealing to genuine social grievancesthe devastating decline in jobs and living standards in many industrial areaswhile diverting popular anger away from the American capitalist elite and toward a politically useful scapegoat, in this case China, Mexico and other foreign countries. Bannon, a former Goldman Sachs executive, Hollywood producer and ultra-right media mogul with no national security experience, is a fervent advocate of the racist and anti-immigrant stance expressed by Trump in a series of statements and executive orders last week, from the order to build a wall on the US-Mexico border, to a crackdown on so-called sanctuary cities, to Fridays ban on travelers and refugees. Trump underlined Bannons central position in his White House with an executive order Saturday restructuring the National Security Council (NSC), the principal White House instrument for directing foreign and military policy. The order added the Assistant to the President and Chief Strategist, namely Bannon, to the list of top officials entitled to attend every meeting of the Principals Committee, a subcommittee of the NSC that plays a critical role in preparing decisions for the president, and includes the national security adviser, the secretary of state and the secretary of defense. The same order removed from the Principals Committee the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the director of national intelligence. There is one further action at the weekend that provides the most chilling insight into the mentality of Trumps chief political adviser. The White House issued a statement commemorating International Holocaust Remembrance Day that lamented the innocent people murdered by the Nazis, but made no mention of Jews or anti-Semitism. A White House spokesman confirmed that the omission of Jews from the 117-word statement was deliberate and not a mistake. This is a trope taken straight out of the playbook of the neo-Nazi alt-right: the Holocaust is emptied of its specific content, the attempted extermination of the Jewish population of Europe, and transformed into a generic tragedy in which many people were killed. The Democratic Party will do nothing to oppose the march of the Trump administration towards authoritarian rule. The Democrats have devoted their efforts to playing down the extreme-right character of the new government while centering its criticisms on Trumps conflict with US intelligence agencies. After a transition period in which outgoing President Obama portrayed his successor as respectable and reasonable, and said nothing about his ties to ultra-right and neo-fascist elements, the first ten days of the Trump administration have seen Democrats such as Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer and former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders profess their desire to cooperate with the White House on its nationalistic economic policies. It is significant that when challenged on what legal authority justified the ban on entry, Trumps spokesmen cited the actions of the Obama administration, which designated the same seven countriesIran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemenas those posing the greatest danger of terrorist attacks on the United States. This demonstrates that Trump is basing himself on the antidemocratic foundations laid by Bush and Obama and taking them to a qualitatively new level. Trump also follows Bush and Obama in excluding from sanctions Saudi Arabia, home of nearly all of the 9/11 hijackers, but also a source of vast wealth for American big business from oil and gas as well as arms contracts. This confirms that the executive order has nothing to do with defending the American people from terrorism: its purpose is to intimidate working people, both immigrant and native-born, and pave the way for a frontal assault on the democratic rights of the American people as a whole. The events of this weekend have demonstrated the hollowed-out character of American democracy. In its contempt for democratic and constitutional norms, the Trump administration gives naked expression to the oligarchic character of American society. His method of government is the form of rule appropriate to the social forces that his billionaire cabinet and the entire political establishment represent. The decisive question is the independent intervention of the working class, fighting for its own class interests, including the defense of immigrant workers. Nepali woman, young child found dead in Australia A Nepali woman and a child were found dead at a home in Ashkanasy Avenue, Pascoe Vale, Melbourne. GIF: Bretman Rock Hawaii-based Filipino YouTube sensation Bretman Rock, who returned home to the Philippines on Sunday night to host the Miss Universe red carpet, is a male makeup star in the tradition of James Charles and Manny Mua. Rock has 7 million followers on Instagram compare that to Reese Witherspoons 8 million who all cheered him on during his first hosting stint. And after a dive into his social media presence, its easy to see why. This whole experience has been so surreal and I wanna thank all of you for letting me experience #missuniverse Had a blast hosting the Red Carpet Event???? Special thanks to @francislibiran and @victorharrylive for my custom outfit ???? and @rachelfeliciaa for being my stylist A video posted by Bretman Rock (@bretmanrock) on Jan 29, 2017 at 8:10pm PST Rock, who described working with the pageant as surreal, first went viral on Instagram after he published a How to Contour tutorial. The video is 1. Hilarious. (This is full coverage, you have to cover your age. Im 16, I gotta look 2.) and 2. Actually explains how to contour. In an interview with a local Hawaii news station, Rock broke down how he feels about his Insta-fame. I want to live like a normal life. I dont want to not be normal. I mean, Im a boy that wears makeup, but I want to be as normal as I can, he said. But that doesnt mean hes interested in a normal online persona. To be honest, I dont know something about the camera like turns me into such a diva, he explained. Like when its on and I see my face in the camera, Im just like, oh girl you look so good! Yet, like more than his peers, hes leveraged his vlogger status and made it into a full-fledged and multi-faceted career. For instance, he designed a product with maybe the best name weve ever heard, Hot Tea Eyelashes. The exclusive synthetic silk lashes are part of a collab with Eyeris Beauty. (And yes, false lashes are the most diva beauty product out there.) Story continues Rock also isnt afraid to get deeper than makeup. Hes spoken about being bullied at school and used his platform to raise awareness with anti-bullying campaigns like #KissAndMakeup with Tarte Cosmetics and Bystander Revolution. Hes also a green card holder in the United States and, during his busy weekend prepping for the red carpet, still made time to vocalize his support of the #MuslimBan protests. Being only a green card holder myself, I have to say Im really scared and bothered by everything going on back home, he wrote on Twitter. I wanna thank @piawurtzbach it's truly an honor being your successor ???? and of course I wanna thank the 3 most important people in my life, Me???????? Myself???????? and I ???????? and as my first duty of being @missuniverse I'm giving away Highlighters to those in need ???? A photo posted by Bretman Rock (@bretmanrock) on Jan 29, 2017 at 9:07pm PST As a Miss Universe 2016 host, Rock held his own with Steve Harvey and managed to have his own shining moment when Miss Universe Pia Wurtzbach loaned him the crown. But Rock still has to help out around the house you know, when hes not on TV. I call this look "Chores Glam" . because I ain't even going anywhere, I'm literally staying home ???????? pic.twitter.com/igcuqvIma9 Bretman Rock (@bretmanrock) January 22, 2017 Lets keep in touch! Follow Yahoo Beauty on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, andPinterest. This weekend was marked by plenty of controversy, mostly due to the widespread protests against President Trumps refugee ban. But buried under all that was a relatively unassuming gaffe from Khloe Kardashian. She shared the photo below, along with the caption Island Vibes. Khloe has been vacationing with family in Costa Rica, which, although it is bordered by water, is not surrounded by water, and therefore surprise is not an island. Her followers helpfully gave her a geography lesson. One said, Costa Rica isnt an island, honey. Another pointed it out on a map, writing, gorgeous Khloe! But Costa Rica isnt an Island Khloe decided to take on the growing Island-Gate scandal head on, tweeting: Im fully aware that Costa Rica is not an island. I am feeling island vibes hence my caption. Please stop reading so deep into everything. Im fully aware that Costa Rica is not an island. I am feeling island vibes hence my caption. Please stop reading so deep into everything. Khloe (@khloekardashian) January 29, 2017 Khloe then doubled down on her defense of her post, saying, Vibes are vibes! My vibes! Island vibes! Who even has the time to comment on this negative sh*t! Find out what Khloe said about her past unhealthy eating habits: Tell us what you think! Share your comments with us on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram, or leave your comments below. And check out our host, Julissa Bermudez, on Twitter. Photo credit: McDonald's Japan From Cosmopolitan To the growing list of delicious McDonald's food not available in the United States (dreaming of you, McDonald's Oreo menu), you can now add the curly fries from McDonald's Japan. Yup. Crispy curly fries that have a mild spice. Sounds amazing. This isn't the first time limited-edition curly fries have made an appearance at McDonald's Japan. They've popped up on the menu in the past, but never stay available for long. Maybe in time, these curly fries will make their way to the McDonald's U.S. menu? For now, I'll settle for bottled Big Mac Sauce. For more food news and magical recipes, follow Cosmo Bites on Facebook! Follow Danielle on Instagram and Twitter. You Might Also Like What makes the haunted house genre so scary is that the hapless victims are trapped in a confined space from which it is almost impossible to escape - a house, a spaceship, the woods, the ocean - and they are being stalked by a terrifying entity that is malevolently irrational and supremely powerful. There can be no appealing to the beast logically or emotionally, no defeating it through sheer force. To quote Yeats, it is as "pitiless as the sun." For civilized societies, the absence of reason and compassion is the very definition of pure evil because it is a rejection of our sacred values, distilled from millennia of struggle. The manifestation of this evil can be supernatural (Poltergeist, The Conjuring), natural (Jaws, Alien) or a twisted version of humanity's worst behavior (Friday the 13th, Nightmare on Elm Street). President Trump's recent executive order to bar citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries has resulted in Muslim-Americans feeling as if we're now trapped in a menacing haunted house battling a powerful but irrational specter. There is no escape, nowhere to hide, no one believes us when we tell them about the horrible noises ("Grab them by the pussy"), and no help from the authorities is coming because they're already possessed and mindlessly doing the creature's bidding. The weakness in every horror movie is motivation. Do you really expect us to believe the ghost wants your severed head because someone dropped them down a well? Or that a shark wants to eat you out of revenge? Coming up with a believable motivation for the relentless entity often results in contrived and convoluted reasoning that forces the audience to struggle with our willing suspension of disbelief. President Trump's Muslim ban continues this challenge to our suspension of disbelief because we can find no rational motivation for the scary creature's horrific actions. His ban cites 9/11 as its rationale, yet the ban doesn't include any countries that those hijackers came from (nor any countries that Trump does business with). Refugees who have already been vetted - which can take two to three years of intense scrutiny - were interrogated about their attitudes toward Trump. Some were forced to show officials their social media. Some were handcuffed without provocation. Even the federal government's own lawyers, sent to justify the ban in court in response to an ACLU challenge, were unable to find legal support. When the federal judge questioned Eastern District U.S. Attorney Susan Riley on the government's reasoning, she admitted, "[W]e haven't had an opportunity to address the issues, the important legal issues." When Riley was unable to even estimate the number of people detained, the judge said that was exactly why she would grant the ACLU's request for a stay. Story continues The audience's willing suspension of disbelief is great for poorly written horror films, but when government tries to promote it to the American people, us buying into it would be social suicide. We can't suspend our rational minds while a schlockmeister-in-chief turns our foreign policy into the tacky Plan 9 From Outer Space. The only way Trump can make a ban like this work, since it is so egregiously unconstitutional, is to convince the people that there is no legitimate source of truth except his administration. Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway describes the president's first week of extensive lying as "alternate facts" and, in a Fox interview, even used references that compared Trump to Jesus. Trump strategist Steve Bannon has called the media "the opposition party." They are trying to convince the public that no one has the moral integrity to judge what they say or do. Just like the royalty of old that Americans fought to get away from, they rule through God's grace and so are infallible. Just ask them. A little over a year ago, Vice President Mike Pence tweeted, "Calls to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. are offensive and unconstitutional." Later that same day, he told reporters, "The United States cannot, and should not discriminate on the basis of religion." Now he applauds Trump's unconstitutional religious discrimination. Alternative facts? Or just a terminal case of brown-nosing? It is part of the administration's contempt for the American people that they believe they can continually lie to us and we, including even former Trump supporters, will not fight back. What's even more horrifying than those cinematic stories of blood-curdling terrors are the real terrors and indignities that we are capable of inflicting on other people, with as little rational justification as the vengeful apparition or toothy shark. This country condemned Nazi Germany for its inhumanity while we incarcerated Japanese in our own concentration camps, which President Reagan apologized for when signing the Civil Liberties Act of 1988. When we passed that act, the country was announcing that we had learned from our mistakes and were pledging not to make them again. Not so fast. When the leader of the free world creates a hostile environment for Muslims, as this ban surely does, it can have violent repercussions as other racists and xenophobes are encouraged to act on their hatred. Sunday night's shooting at a Quebec mosque where, during evening prayers, someone fired on about 60-100 worshipers, killing six (one gunman is in custody), is such a repercussion that we all share responsibility for if we sit back and allow such policies as Trump's ban to define who we are as a country. In 1939, a real horror story took place. The MS St. Louis left Hamburg, Germany, carrying 937 Jews bound for Cuba, where they would live free from Nazi persecution. When they arrived in Havana, Cuban authorities refused to let them enter. Turns out that the whole voyage was a ruse, a devious publicity stunt by the Nazis to prove that the rest of the world hated the Jews as much as Germany, thus justifying their maltreatment of Jews. Shockingly, the United States aided the Nazis by also refusing to give the ship's passengers refuge. We were the monster in the horror story. The ship had no choice but to return to Europe. When the ship's captain threatened to run the ship aground in Great Britain, Britain, Belgium, France and the Netherlands offered to take in some passengers. But not all. Of the 937 Jews aboard, 600 died in Nazi concentration camps. So much for "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free." Today, because of Trump's ban, we are trying to return Syrian refugees to a war-ravaged battleground where they could die. Have we not learned from our disgusting and embarrassing past behavior? A movie version of the events aboard the MS St. Louis was released in 1976, called Voyage of the Damned. But in light of current events, we have to ask ourselves who the damned really are: the ones who are abandoned to face their deaths in concentration camps? Or the ones who abandoned them? The sins of the past are never past redeeming if we admit to them. And vow to never make them again. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is the NBA's all-time leading scorer, a New York Times best-selling author and the recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He is a Muslim-American. His Twitter handle is @KAJ33. Theres an old saying, often attributed to Martin Mull, Writing about music is like dancing about architecture. In many ways first-time writer-director Kogonadas Columbus treats architecture like music, as its protagonists write, talk, bicker, and dance about an extraordinary collection of modernist structures in the unassuming Midwest town of Columbus, Indiana. The hypnotically paced drama carried by the serendipitous odd couple pairing of John Cho and Haley Lu Richardson is lovely and tender, marking Kogonada as an auteur to watch. A film critic and video essayist with evident affection for the work of Asian masters ranging from Yasujiro Ozu to Hirokazu Koreeda, Kogonada examines the relationships between his characters and their environment with an architects attention to detail. That he also trains his lens on a place and people rarely explored on film, and provides a quintet of terrific performers with the opportunity to stretch and showcase their skills, only adds to his debuts unique appeal. Casey (Richardson) has lived in Columbus her entire life. Fast approaching her 20s (or possibly just starting them, its not clear), shes beginning to think about next steps. But a deep connection to her hometown and a strong bond with her working class mother (Michelle Forbes, moving and lived-in), a recovering addict now in a stable place, makes her apprehensive about leaving to pursue her interest in architecture. Jin (Cho) left his family behind years ago, but returns to the U.S. from his new life in Korea, where he translates literature, when his architecture professor father collapses on a visit to Columbus and is hospitalized in a coma. Although his passions led elsewhere, Jin retains a lingering guilt, and defensiveness, over his lack of family commitment. Casey and Jin inevitably cross paths and their casual conversations blossom into a genuine friendship, and possible courtship. Nothing is quite so simple in Columbus and Kogonada is more interested in the characters overlapping and divergent worldviews and dreams, based on culture, environment, and upbringing. Story continues They each also have a secondary confidante/love interest. Jin with his fathers colleague (Parker Posey, vibrant), who he nursed a crush on his youth, and Casey with hyperarticulate Doctoral student Gabriel (Rory Culkin, charming). At one point Gabriel delivers a spellbinding dissection of the modern attention span, suggesting Kogonada is aware of the materials ponderous nature and specialized audience appeal. But those who appreciate Columbus will likely take it to heart. The relationships between each of the characters are imbued with warmth and humanity, and the filmmaking like the citys structures designed by the likes of Eero Saarinen and I.M. Pei is simply gorgeous. The modernist landmarks in Columbus (incidentally the hometown of Vice President Mike Pence) are true co-stars here. Caseys appreciation of the healing power of buildings stirs something in Jin that never quite connected when he was with his father (although its surely no coincidence their bond coincides with his fathers coma), and the films gentle explorations of class divides were constantly reminded of the people trying to make a living inside of these works of art qualify as a timely addition to the current national dialog. But Kogonada, who also serves as the editor, has also made a film that feels timeless. From Elisha Christians rigorously composed cinematography to Hammocks sparingly but very effectively used ambient electro score (the film gets just as much emotion out of stretches of silence and layered sound design). At the center of it all, amidst the buildings, are Cho and Richardson. One veteran demonstrating his untapped ability as a captivatingly sincere leading man, and one relative newcomer proving her capability of holding the screen with maximum soulfulness in a minimalist drama. Together they form an unexpected, but perfectly constructed, pair. Related stories Netflix Buys Sundance Drama 'Mudbound' for $12.5 Million Sundance Film Review: 'Winnie' Sundance: Neon Nabs 'Beach Rats,' Drama About Gay Teenager A massive iceberg the size of Delaware is now even closer to breaking free from Antarctica, due to a widening crack in the ice shelf, scientists report. The Larsen C Ice Shelf in Antarctica is cut through by a growing rift, which stretches nearly 109 miles (175 kilometers) long, new satellite data has revealed. Already in 2017, the rift has grown by 6.2 miles (10 km), and now only 12.4 miles (20 km) of ice are anchoring the massive iceberg to the ice shelf, according to Project MIDAS, an Antarctic research project based in the United Kingdom. It's not a matter of if the iceberg will break off (an event known as calving), but when, scientists warn. According to MIDAS researchers, when the iceberg separates, the Larsen C Ice Shelf will lose more than 10 percent of its area about 2,000 square miles (5,000 square km). The resulting iceberg would be one of the largest in recorded history, the scientists said. [Images of Melt: Earth's Vanishing Ice] "This event will fundamentally change the landscape of the Antarctic Peninsula," MIDAS researchers wrote in a blog post. "We have previously shown that the new configuration will be less stable than it was prior to the rift, and that Larsen C may eventually follow the example of its neighbor Larsen B, which disintegrated in 2002 following a similar rift-induced calving event." As the South Pole's fourth-largest ice shelf, the Larsen C Ice Shelf holds back many land-based glaciers just behind it, according to scientists. If the ice shelf deteriorates as the Larsen B Ice Shelf did in 2002, those slow-flowing glaciers will have one less barrier in moving toward the ocean. The Larsen C rift was first noticed by MIDAS researchers in 2014, and has been monitored by satellites and other instruments ever since. In November 2016, NASA's IceBridge mission observed the immense crack, which then measured 70 miles (112 km) long, 300 feet (91 meters) wide and about one-third of a mile (0.5 km) deep. Story continues Given the rate at which the rift is growing, the iceberg could break away early this year, MIDAS researcher Adrian Luckman, a professor of glaciology at Swansea University in the United Kingdom, told BBC News. "Although you might expect any extension to hasten the point of calving, it actually remains impossible to predict when it will break because the fracture process is so complex," Luckman told BBC News. "My feeling is that this new development suggests something will happen within weeks to months, but there is an outside chance that further growth will be slow for longer than that." Original article on Live Science. Editor's Recommendations A hundred drug addicts escaped a compulsory rehab centre in southern Vietnam, officials said Monday, the latest breakout to hit the country's controversial treatment facilities. Many drug addicts in communist Vietnam are forced to undergo up to two years of rehabilitation in treatment centres across the country, but rights groups have complained of poor conditions and overcrowding. Addicts in the southern province of Long An forced their way out of a treatment centre on Sunday afternoon. "Some patients hid in paddy fields or forests, some went onto the roads," Hoa Thanh Nien, deputy director of the provincial labour department, told AFP, saying many were upset they were spending the annual Tet new year holiday away from home. Around 74 patients have since been recaptured or persuaded to return with authorities searching for the rest, he added. Of the 169 patients at the facility, seven were voluntary admissions. Vietnam's compulsory drug treatment centres have seen previous mass breakouts. In November around 100 inmates escaped from a facility in southern Dong Nai during a riot in which police deployed tear gas. Two weeks earlier some 450 addicts broke out of the same centre, flooding onto nearby roads and sparking panic among local residents. There are more than 200,000 addicts in Vietnam, with heroin and methamphetamine being the main drug of choice, and almost 13,000 people are in treatment centres, according to official figures. It was love at first sight for this Mississippi toddler and a newborn calf that lost its mom just days earlier. Read: Cat Comforts Dying Cow During Last Hours of Its Life Little Kinley Gray, 2, of Michigan City, could be seen in photos taken by her mom, Lacey Gray of Delta Rose Photography, curling up next to Molly, the weeks-old calf. "[Molly] doesn't get the same feeling with other kids as she does with Kinley," the girl's mom told InsideEdition.com. "It's a special connection there. I couldn't even stop taking pictures." Gray said it all started 3 weeks ago, when her clients suggested they do a photoshoot involving a calf. Gray then contacted an uncle who owns cows: I was thinking maybe I could go round up one of his cows and bring it over for the day, but he was like, 'Thats not how that works.'" She accepted his answer and continued on with her day, until the following morning, she received a call from the uncle. I could tell in his voice something serious had happened, and he just said, Do you want a baby calf for your own? Gray recalled. Hes like, We had a mama that had a calf. She fell, and will not get back up. She will not recover from it.'" Without hesitation, Gray said she agreed to take on the orphaned newborn and all the work it would entail. I really love animals, she said. It was just super exciting it was almost like having another baby you have to bottle-feed. But, it was her daughter Kinley who immediately struck up a special friendship with Molly. Read: Rescued Calf and Puppy Are Inseparable: 'They Loved Each Other From Day One' The first night, I didnt want her to be scared or alone, so we put her in the laundry room, Gray said. Kinley immediately ran to her room, grabbed a story book, and read to her. Story continues She said their connection only grew from there. Whenever Kinley calls, Molly always comes running. Whenever Kinley lays kisses on the calfs two ears, Molly will reciprocate by licking the tots face up and down. And, when its time to say goodbye, Kinley cries as Molly watches the tot leave from outside their door. And, when they went about creating the photo shoot they originally had in mind, Gray knew Kinley and Mollys connection was unique. When I put Molly with other children, you dont get the same response, Gray explained. [I thought] cows were going to react to everybody the same, but no, I was so wrong. She loves Kinley. She licks Kinley all over. She sucks on her fingers like a pacifier. There are all these little things she doesnt do with other kids. Since Molly officially became a member of their family, she has been living in an empty chicken pen on their property, Gray explained. The family had to teach the cow to drink formula from a bottle, and because she became an orphan at a young age, they will have to teach the cow to feed as she gets older. Read: It Was Love at First Sight for Teen With Special Needs and Elderly Cat She Rescued Gray said while they are enjoying the calfs company for now, they hope to rehome the cow to a nearby pasture in about a year. "She should interact with her own kind. I dont want her to be so different she doesnt know what to do around other cows, Gray said. She doesnt moo a whole lot, and that makes me sad. She should be in her own element and get to do things other cows know how to do." Watch: Meet The Unlikely Animal Friends That Warmed Our Hearts This Year Related Articles: The sun lies low on the desert horizon, the trees and cactuses are throwing long shadows, and the landscape is doused with warm light. In less than 20 seconds, the softtop disappears behind the rear seats, and the enginebarely perceptiblesprings to life. The beginning of a relaxed and indulgent drive into the Sonoran Desert? Hardly. This trip requires the utmost concentration: We are riding along on one of the final engineering drives for the Mercedes-Benz E-class convertible, a model Daimler calls the cabriolet. At the wheel is Christian Fruh, development chief for the coupe and convertible C- and E-class models. In another of several prototypes on this drive, the pilot is Peter Kolb, testing chief for the new models. One car is a Europe-spec E200, with a 181-hp turbocharged inline-four making even less power than the 241-horsepower four found in the base U.S. sedan, the E300. Another car has a four-cylinder turbo-diesel thats so quiet you would be forgiven if you confused it with a six, but dont expect to see that at U.S. dealerships, either. In the U.S., the convertible will be an E400, like the E-class coupe, powered by a twin-turbo V-6 gasoline engine. In the coupe its rated at 329 horsepower and 354 lb-ft of torque, and those figures are likely to be the same in the softtop version. Note that the day of V-8powered E-class convertibles appears to be past, our fond memories of the E550 cabrio notwithstanding. Although the E63 sedan uses AMGs thundering 4.0-liter V-8, the AMG version of this new cabriolet will most likely be an E50 powered by a turbocharged inline-six. Dont look for that one in the first couple of model years, though. Every E-class convertible will come with Daimlers own nine-speed conventional automatic. If Mercedes follows its usual practice of late, it will offer its 4MATIC all-wheel-drive system as an alternative to the standard rear-drive configuration. This test drive is supposed to deliver the finishing touches on these most upscale derivatives of the E-class, the mid-size line that more or less defines Mercedes-Benz to a large portion of the general public. Many thousands of miles of development work preceded our ridealong. Unlike the previous E-class convertible that was actually built on C-class architecture, the new model is E-class from the ground up, with a heavily modified structure adding braces under the engine and below the trunk to make up for the rigidity lost without a steel roof. Using the E-class platform makes it quite a bit larger than the outgoing model, which was the brands only four-seat convertible when introduced. The new one will share showroom space with four-seat ragtop versions of both the smaller C- and larger S-class. Story continues While the open-top C-class looks compact and muscular, the E-class cabriolets straight, unbroken lines give it a more elegant, almost Italianesque aspect. There is quite a bit more rear-seat space than in either the preceding-generation E- or todays C-class cabrio, so even extended journeys should pose no problem for rear-seat occupants. When the multilayer roof is raised, it isolates the interior so well that the difference from the coupe is barely perceptible. The new cars dashboard transfers directly from the sedan with one important change: The cabriolet, like the E coupe, comes with metallic air vents resembling jet turbines, which arent used in the sedan. Further differentiation stems from distinct leather colors and light-colored open-pore wood decor not offered in the sedan. Part of the point of this test drive in Arizona is finding out how well these new materials hold up when subjected to the Southwestern climate. We werent allowed behind the wheel at all, but judging from our passenger-seat vantage, the cabrio chassis seems remarkably stiff and responsive to Fruhs steering inputs. The ride height is lower than the sedans by 0.6 inch. Agility is not a traditional strength of the mid-size Mercedes-Benz, but our impression is that the new cabriolet will be every bit as responsive as the sedan, although its primary mission is to be more comfortable than the softtop C-class. Expect to see the E-class cabriolet revealed at the Geneva auto show in March and in dealerships this summer. The E-class, it seems to us, could be a relaxed and elegant choice among luxury droptops. We look forward to getting behind the wheel in a few months. Are we really stuck with this guy? Its the question being asked around the globe, because Donald Trumps first week as president has made it all too clear: Yes, he is as crazy as everyone feared. Remember those optimistic pre-inauguration fantasies? I cherished them, too. You know: Once hes president, Im sure hell realize it doesnt really make sense to withdraw from all those treaties. Once hes president, surely hell understand that he needs to stop tweeting out those random insults. Once hes president, hell have to put aside that ridiculous campaign braggadocio about building a wall along the Mexican border. And so on. Nope. In his first week in office, Trump has made it eminently clear that he meant every loopy, appalling word and then some. The result so far: The president of China is warning against trade wars and declaring that Beijing will take up the task of defending globalization and free trade against American protectionism. The president of Mexico has canceled a state visit to Washington, and prominent Mexican leaders say that Trumps border wall plans could take us to a war not a trade war. Senior leaders in Trumps own party are denouncing the new presidents claims of widespread voter fraud and his reported plans to reopen CIA black sites. Oh, and the entire senior management team at the U.S. Department of State has resigned. Meanwhile, Trumps approval ratings are lower than those of any new U.S. president in the history of polling: Just 36 percent of Americans are pleased with his performance so far. Some 80 percent of British citizens think Trump will make a bad president, along with 77 percent of those polled in France and 78 percent in Germany. And thats just week one. Thus the question: Are we truly stuck with Donald Trump? Story continues It depends. There are essentially four ways to get rid of a crummy president. First, of course, the world can just wait patiently for November 2020 to roll around, at which point, American voters will presumably have come to their senses and be prepared to throw the bum out. But after such a catastrophic first week, four years seems like a long time to wait. This brings us to option two: impeachment. Under the U.S. Constitution, a simple majority in the House of Representatives could vote to impeach Trump for treason, bribery, or other high crimes or misdemeanors. If convicted by the Senate on a two-thirds vote, Trump could be removed from office and a new poll suggests that after week one, more than a third of Americans are already eager to see Trump impeached. Related: For more news videos visit Yahoo View, available now on iOS and Android. If impeachment seems like a fine solution to you, the good news is that Congress doesnt need evidence of actual treason or murder to move forward with an impeachment: Practically anything can be considered a high crime or misdemeanor. (Remember, former President Bill Clinton was impeached for lying about his affair with Monica Lewinsky). The bad news is that Republicans control both the House and the Senate, making impeachment politically unlikely, unless and until Democrats retake Congress. And that cant happen until the elections of 2018. Anyway, impeachments take time: months, if not longer even with an enthusiastic Congress. And when you have a lunatic controlling the nuclear codes, even a few months seems like a perilously long time to wait. How long will it take before Trump decides that youre fired is a phrase that should also apply to nuclear missiles? (Aimed, perhaps, at Mexico?) In these dark days, some around the globe are finding solace in the 25th Amendment to the Constitution. This previously obscure amendment states that the Vice President and a majority of the principal officers of the executive departments can declare the president unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, in which case the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President. Read more: Sorry, Mr. President: The Obama Administration Did Nothing Similar to Your Immigration Ban And anyone whos saying so, just doesnt have the facts. Its Time for a New Kind of Resistance Nothing in our recent historical experience prepares us for this. Americas New President Is Not a Rational Actor Whether by accident or design, Donald Trump is isolating himself and erratically unraveling the world order. This is option three for getting rid of Trump: an appeal to Vice President Mike Pences ambitions. Surely Pence wants to be president himself one day, right? Pence isnt exactly a political moderate hes been unremittingly hostile to gay rights, hes a climate change skeptic, etc. but, unappealing as his politics may be to many Americans, he does not appear to actually be insane. (This is the new threshold for plausibility in American politics: not actually insane.) Presumably, Pence is sane enough to oppose rash acts involving, say, the evisceration of all U.S. military alliances, or Americas first use of nuclear weapons and presumably, if things got bad enough, other Trump cabinet members might also be inclined to oust their boss and replace him with his vice president. Congress would have to acquiesce in a permanent 25th Amendment removal, but if Pence and half the cabinet declared Trump unfit, even a Republican-controlled Congress would likely fall in line. The fourth possibility is one that until recently I would have said was unthinkable in the United States of America: a military coup, or at least a refusal by military leaders to obey certain orders. The principle of civilian control of the military has been deeply internalized by the U.S. military, which prides itself on its nonpartisan professionalism. Whats more, we know that a high-ranking lawbreaker with even a little subtlety can run rings around the uniformed military. During the first years of the George W. Bush administration, for instance, formal protests from the nations senior-most military lawyers didnt stop the use of torture. When military leaders objected to tactics such as waterboarding, the Bush administration simply bypassed the military, getting the CIA and private contractors to do their dirty work. But Trump isnt subtle or sophisticated: He sets policy through rants and late-night tweets, not through quiet hints to aides and lawyers. Hes thin-skinned, erratic, and unconstrained and his unexpected, self-indulgent pronouncements are reportedly sending shivers through even his closest aides. What would top U.S. military leaders do if given an order that struck them as not merely ill-advised, but dangerously unhinged? An order that wasnt along the lines of Prepare a plan to invade Iraq if Congress authorizes it based on questionable intelligence, but Prepare to invade Mexico tomorrow! or Start rounding up Muslim Americans and sending them to Guantanamo! or Im going to teach China a lesson with nukes! Its impossible to say, of course. The prospect of American military leaders responding to a presidential order with open defiance is frightening but so, too, is the prospect of military obedience to an insane order. After all, military officers swear to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, not the president. For the first time in my life, I can imagine plausible scenarios in which senior military officials might simply tell the president: No, sir. Were not doing that, to thunderous applause from the New York Times editorial board. Brace yourselves. One way or another, its going to be a wild few years. Subscribe to FP Premium for 20% off now! Photo credit: RALPH FRESO/Getty Images Over 50 pc banks fail to assess money laundering risks properly More than half of commercial and development banks operating in the country do not review money laundering risks at every transaction, signalling an indifferent approach to curbing financial crimes that could tarnish the banking sectors image abroad. UPDATE: 4:10 p.m. EST Attorneys general from New York, California, Pennsylvania, Washington, Massachusetts, Hawaii, Virginia, Oregon, the District of Columbia, Connecticut, Vermont, Illinois, New Mexico, Iowa, Maine, Maryland and the District of Columbia issued a statement Sunday condemning the immigration ban as unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful. We are confident that the Executive Order will ultimately be struck down by the courts. In the meantime, we are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created, the statement said. muslim ban Photo: Kate Munsch/Reuters Original story Judges in at least four states moved to block President Donald Trumps executive order on immigration and refugees from Muslim-majority countries. While not striking down the executive order issued Friday, judges in Massachusetts, Virginia, Washington state and New York stayed implementation of the order Saturday night and early Sunday, preventing Customs and Border Patrol agents at U.S. airports from denying admission to people holding valid visas or permanent residency status. The executive order barred immigration indefinitely from Syria and from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen for at least 90 days until extreme vetting procedures can be implemented. It also suspended the U.S. refugee program for at least 120 days. One-hundred-nine people were detained at airports Saturday of the 325,000 foreigners who entered the country while 177 others were barred from even boarding plans headed for the United States. Trump said he issued the order to protect the American people from terrorist attacks by foreign nationals admitted to the United States. White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said on the Sunday talk shows the order could be expanded to include more countries, and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., criticized the administration for issuing the order without developing clear guidelines for border agents. Story continues Meanwhile, more than 100 individuals have filed lawsuits challenging the order, Reuters reported citing estimates by activists and lawyers. U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly in Brooklyn, New York, issued the first of the orders Saturday on behalf of two men held at JFK International Airport. U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema late Saturday ordered Homeland Security not to remove 50 to 60 permanent legal residents who had been detained at Dulles International Airport. Those orders were followed by a decision from U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs in Boston on Sunday on behalf of two University of Massachusetts instructors from Iran who were held at Logan International Airport. And U.S. District Judge Thomas Zilly in Seattle ordered the government not to remove two individuals, who were not identified, pending a Friday hearing. Demonstrations against the immigration order erupted at at least 15 airports Saturday and continued Sunday including airports in San Francisco, Detroit, Louisville and Philadelphia. Protests also were planned for New York, Boston, Miami, Houston, Los Angeles, Dallas and Atlanta either at airports or elsewhere. Nearly three dozen protesters were arrested at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport while a Sunday demonstration was called for 5 p.m. at Westlake Park. More than 1,000 people protested in Pittsburgh. We passed all the background checks, Nadia Elamin, 23, a University of Pittsburgh student, told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Were on the last step and now I dont have a right to have my husband here. I hope this can be undone. About 150 lawyers showed up at OHare International Airport in Chicago Saturday to help more than a dozen travelers affected by the executive order. Related Articles BOONE, N.C. (AP) Police in North Carolina have arrested four women and charged them with painting anti-Trump graffiti. Local media outlets reported a number of businesses and one police car were painted Jan. 21 in the town of Boone. Police said the women were arrested late last week and charged with seven counts of misdemeanor graffiti and one count of damaging personal property. The women are 22-year-old Taryn Bledsoe, 22-year-old Julia Grainger, 22-year-old Elizabeth Prier, and 21-year-old Hannah Seay, all of Boone. Officers had said several people had painted "Black Lives Matter," anti-Trump and anti-police slogans, causing damage of about $10,000. Boone Police chief Dana Crawford said a tip from High Country Crime Stoppers led to the arrests. It was not known if the women have attorneys. QUEBEC CITY (AP) -- A French Canadian known for far-right, nationalist views was charged Monday with six counts of first-degree murder and five counts of attempted murder over the shooting rampage at a Quebec City mosque that Canada's prime minister called an act of terrorism against Muslims. Suspect Alexandre Bissonnette made a brief court appearance and did not enter a plea in the attack that left six people dead during evening prayers Sunday. Wearing a white prisoner jump suit, his hands and feet shackled, he stared down at the floor and fidgeted, but did not speak. The 27-year-old suspect, who has espoused support for the French far-right party of Marine Le Pen and had liked U.S. President Donald Trump on his Facebook page, was known to those who monitor extremist groups in Quebec, said Francois Deschamps, an official with a refugee advocacy group. "It's with pain and anger that we learn the identity of terrorist Alexandre Bissonnette, unfortunately known to many activists in Quebec for taking nationalist, pro-Le Pen and anti-feminist positions at Laval University and on social media," Deschamps wrote on the Facebook page of the group, Bienvenues aux Refugies, or Welcome to Refugees. An anthropology and political science major at Laval University in Quebec City, Bissonnette had also expressed support on his Facebook profile for "Generation Nationale," a group whose manifesto includes the rejection of "multiculturalism." More than 50 people were at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre when the shooting erupted. In addition to the six dead, 19 people were wounded all men. Of the five victims who remained hospitalized, two were in critical condition, authorities said. The dead ranged in age from 39 to 60. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard both characterized the attack as a terrorist act, which came amid heightened tensions worldwide over Trump's travel ban on seven Muslim countries. Le Pen, leader of the National Front in France, is known for her anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant positions and has won the endorsement and admiration of white supremacists. Story continues Canada is generally welcoming toward immigrants and all religions, but the French-speaking province of Quebec has had a long-simmering debate about race and religious accommodation. The previous separatist government of the province called for a ban on ostentatious religious symbols, such as the hijab, in public institutions. Trudeau said in Parliament the victims were targeted simply because of their religion and spoke directly to the more than 1 million Muslims who live in Canada, saying, "We are with you." "Thirty-six million hearts are breaking with yours," Trudeau said. "Know that we value you." The prime minister later attended a vigil outside the mosque. The suspect was arrested in his car on a bridge near d'Orleans, where he called 911 to say he wanted to cooperate with police. Authorities, who initially named two suspects, said the other man taken into custody was a witness to the attack and was released earlier Monday. They said they did not believe there were other suspects but were investigating. Police did not give a motive for the attack. Trump called Trudeau to express condolences to the Canadian people and to offer any assistance that might be needed. The White House pointed to the attack as an example of why Trump's policies were needed. "We condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms. It's a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant and why the president is taking steps to be pro-active, rather than reactive when it comes to our nation's safety and security," White House spokesman Sean Spicer said. The victims were businessmen, a university professor and others who had gathered for evening prayers, said Mohamed Labidi, the vice president of the mosque. "'It's a very, very big tragedy for us," Labidi said tearfully. "We have a sadness we cannot express." He said the victims were shot in the back. "Security at our mosque was our major, major concern," he said. "But we were caught off guard." The shooting took place just before 8 p.m. Sunday. Witnesses described chaos as worshippers scrambled to find friends and loved ones, as police responding to the scene called for backup. Couillard said he would "not go there" when asked if he blamed recent rhetoric in in the U.S. for the attack. "Quebec is a good, generally loving society, but we have these devils as other societies have. We have to recognize that and fight them," Couillard said at a news conference in Quebec City at which he and Muslim leaders held hands in a display of solidarity. "The Muslim community was the target of this murderous attack," Couillard said, adding that solidarity rallies would be held across Quebec later Monday. The mosque has been a target of hate crimes in the past, including last summer when pig's head was left on its doorstep during Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. Practicing Muslims do not eat pork. Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume, appearing shaken, said: "No person should have to pay with their life, for their race, their color, their sexual orientation or their religious beliefs." Worshipper Ali Hamadi said he left the mosque a few minutes before the shooting and a friend, Abdelkrim Hassen, was killed. He said Hassen, who worked in information technology for the government, had three daughters and a wife, whom he had to notify of the death. Majdi Dridi of the Muslim Association of Canada said he knew two of the victims. One was a work colleague who was a father of three little girls, he said. "I don't know what to say, I just hope that his family and his children can have the patience to accept what happened," Dridi said Trudeau had earlier reacted to Trump's visa ban for people from some Muslim-majority countries by tweeting Saturday: "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada." Trudeau also posted a picture of himself greeting a Syrian child at Toronto's airport in late 2015. Trudeau oversaw the arrival of more than 39,000 Syrian refugees soon after he was elected. The mayor of Gatineau, Quebec, near Canada's capital of Ottawa, said there would be an increased police presence at mosques around his city following the attack. The New York Police Department also said it was stepping up patrols at mosques and other houses of worship. ___ Associated Press writer Tracey Lindeman reported this story in Quebec City and AP writer Robert Gillies reported from Toronto. AP writer Sean Farrell in Montreal contributed to this report. TOKYO (Reuters) - Wrapped up from head to toe in a white bag and gently rocking from side to side, five Japanese mothers are hopeful Tokyo's latest health trend can cure their post-pregnancy aches and pains. According to its exponents, Otonamaki, which translates as "adult wrapping", was devised by a Kyoto midwife who thought replicating how children are swaddled at birth could help mothers overcome post labor shoulder and hip pain. The five mothers at a recent session in Tokyo lay on their backs with their knees on their chests bundled up in white cloths. Staff then helped them rock over cushions. "It felt warm and there was this feeling with my body," said one mother who tried the 20 minute session. "I have never experienced this before so its quite hard to describe properly." Not everyone is a fan. Chiropractor Shiro Oba was skeptical about its powers of healing and encouraged mothers with back pain to visit a physician. "There may be cases where people with asthma may find it easier to breath (in that position), but once the cloth is off it's the same thing," said Oba. "But apart from that, I just can't think of how people can benefit from this even as a form of reflexology or exercise." (Writing by Patrick Johnston in London; Editing by Robin Pomeroy) Addis Ababa (AFP) - African Union leaders grappled with Morocco's divisive bid to rejoin the bloc at a summit Monday and sounded alarm for the continent over US President Donald Trump's immigration ban. "The very country (where) our people were taken as slaves... has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries," outgoing AU Commission chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told some 37 heads of state and leaders from across the continent. "It is clear that globally we are entering very turbulent times," she added. Trump's administration has faced outrage and widespread protests over the move to ban citizens from seven countries including Libya, Somalia and Sudan in Africa. In his opening address at the summit, new UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres didn't mention Trump's refugee and travel ban specifically, but criticised the closure of borders "even in the most developed countries in the world." All eyes at the summit are on a bid by Morocco to return to the fold 33 years after it quit in protest against the AU's decision to accept Western Sahara as a member. However proceedings began with the swift election of Chadian Foreign Minister Moussa Faki Mahamat, 56, as the new chairperson of the AU Commission, beating four other candidates. - A less bureaucratic AU - Faki won in a final battle against his Kenyan counterpart Amina Mohamed after seven rounds of voting, the Kenyan government said in a statement, praising a "valiant race" by their candidate. Faki takes on the role as his country's President Idriss Deby Itno hands over the rotating presidency of the AU to Guinea's Alpha Conde. Faki, a 56-year-old former prime minister, has been at the forefront of the fight against Islamists in Nigeria, Mali and the Sahel and has promised "development and security" will be top of his agenda as chief of the 54-member continental bloc. He said he dreams of an Africa where the "sound of guns will be drowned out by cultural songs and rumbling factories" and pledged to streamline the bureaucratic AU during his four-year term in office. Story continues - AU reforms - Faki takes over from South Africa's Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma who is credited with advancing women's issues and moulding the ambitious Agenda 2063, but is seen to have dropped the ball on peace and security while focussing on personal political ambitions back home. The choice of a new leader is crucial for the future of a bloc which is undergoing deep introspection on how to reform to become more relevant and better respond to crises on the continent. Tasked with leading the reforms, Rwanda's President Paul Kagame delivered a "biting" report to heads of state on Sunday, according to a statement from the Kenyan government. He criticised "chronic failure to see through African Union decisions (which) had resulted in a crisis of implementation and a perception that the AU was not relevant to Africans". Kagame also slammed "over-dependence on (donor) funding" which accounts from 70 percent of the AU budget, according to the Institute for Security Studies. - Moroccan money - The membership of affluent Morocco could be a boon for the AU, which lost a key financier in late Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi and is working on ways to become financially independent. A Moroccan diplomat said Sunday the country had the "unconditional support" of 42 members of the bloc. However in a sign of the resistance Morocco is facing, 12 countries including heavyweights Nigeria, South Africa, Algeria, Kenya and Angola, requested a legal opinion from the AU on whether the bloc could accept a member that is "occupying parts of the territory" of another member. These nations have long supported the campaign for self-determination by Western Sahara's Polisario movement. Morocco maintains that the former Spanish colony under its control is an integral part of the kingdom, while the Polisario Front, which campaigns for the territory's independence, demands a referendum on self-determination. The AU's legal counsel, in a document seen by AFP, said the nations raised "fundamental concerns that have to be taken into account". However the decision to weigh Morocco's request ultimately rests with heads of state. Reuters (Reuters) -U.S. Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett on Friday again declined to block President Joe Biden's plan to cancel billions of dollars in student debt, this time in a challenge brought by two Indiana borrowers, even as a lower court considers whether to lift a freeze it imposed on the program in a different case. Barrett denied an emergency request by the Indiana borrowers, represented by a conservative legal group, to bar the U.S. Department of Education from implementing the Democratic president's plan to forgive debt held by qualified people who had taken loans to pay for college. Barrett on Oct. 20 denied a similar request by a Wisconsin taxpayers organization represented by another conservative legal group. Airlines caught in US President Donald Trump's sweeping travel ban on Muslim travelers and refugees have been forced to quickly adopt new security measures and deny boarding to potentially millions of people over the next three months. On Friday, Trump signed an executive order barring travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries and refugees for the following 120 days, creating chaos at airports in the US and around the world. Three days into what's become a confusing and chaotic new reality, here's a look at how some airlines around the world have responded. Delta Air Lines This weekend was not good for the US carrier. In addition to the travel ban, the airline also experienced a major computer outage that exacerbated travel woes. As for the ban, the carrier said: "Delta will make every effort to contact impacted customers with flexible rebooking options, including refunds." Virgin Atlantic Customers directly impacted by the executive order will be able to re-book to travel at a later date, re-route their travel to an alternative destination, or get a refund. British Airways Affected travelers can receive a refund or book to another destination. Emirates Travelers affected by the ban who are booked to fly to and from the US between January 28 and February 28, are being offered rebooking and refund options by the carrier. Etihad and Qatar Customers are advised to call their booking agent to make changes. Air France In a statement to The Local, Air France said it was forced to deny boarding to 15 people for US-bound flights over the weekend. The carrier said they will contact affected passengers by SMS or email if they are subject to the ban. Philippines to suspend drug war to clean up 'corrupt' police Philippine police are suspending their controversial war on drugs after the "corrupt" police force has been "cleansed". Geneva (AFP) - The aviation industry's trade association on Monday criticised US President Donald Trump's travel bans for "causing confusion" and called on Washington to clarify the new rules. "We ask for early clarity from the US administration on the current situation," the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said in a statement. On Friday, Trump signed an executive order barring US entry for travellers from seven mainly Muslim countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen -- for 90 days. It also suspends the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, and Syrian refugees indefinitely. The order led to chaotic scenes at airports around the world, as well as mass protests in major American cities and a diplomatic outcry. Trump's order was "issued without prior coordination or warning, causing confusion among both airlines and travellers," the Geneva-based IATA said. "It also placed additional burdens on airlines to comply with unclear requirements, to bear implementation costs and to face potential penalties for non-compliance." IATA member airlines can be fined if they allow individuals who lack proper permits to board, and can be responsible for returning passengers who are denied entry to their point of departure. Much of the chaos surrounding Trump's policy has been triggered by the fact that it affects dual nationals as well as those with valid US entry permits. Airlines can meet each country's requirements only with "advance coordination as well as with detailed and consistent operational information", the association said. Miami (AFP) - The Iraq war veteran accused of shooting dead five people at a Florida airport pleaded not guilty in court Monday to federal charges that could lead to the death penalty. A lawyer for Esteban Santiago, 26, entered the plea to all 22 counts in the federal indictment in an arraignment at the US court in Fort Lauderdale, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) north of Miami. The January 6 shooting rampage at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport also wounded six people. "Mr Esteban Santiago Ruiz pleads not guilty," his lawyer Eric Cohen told the federal judge, Barry Seltzer. The judge read the 22 charges against him and asked Santiago one by one if he understood them. Santiago, wearing a high-security red jail jumpsuit, his wrists and ankles shackled, responded "yes" each time, calmly and without emotion. Santiago was formally charged last Thursday with 11 counts of performing an act of violence against a person at an international airport, six counts of using a firearm in a crime of violence, and five counts of using a firearm to cause the death of a person. The charges carry a maximum penalty of death or life in prison. On January 6, the suspect arrived around midday at the Fort Lauderdale airport on a one-way ticket from Alaska. Soon after landing, authorities say Santiago retrieved a 9mm handgun and ammunition that he had declared and packed in his checked luggage, then opened fire in Terminal 2 of the busy airport until he ran out of ammunition. Then he dropped to the ground and peacefully surrendered to a sheriff's deputy, authorities said. About a month earlier, Santiago walked into the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Anchorage office complaining that his mind was being controlled by national intelligence agencies that had forced him to watch videos of the jihadist Islamic State group. The FBI said his "erratic behavior" led agents to contact local police, who took him for a mental health evaluation. A former member of the Puerto Rico and Alaska National Guard, Santiago served in the Iraq war from April 2010 to February 2011. He ended his military service in August. Former President Barack Obama broke his postpresidential silence on Monday, issuing a cautious statement about President Trumps travel ban and the protests against it. Before leaving the White House, Obama repeatedly emphasized how important the role of citizen is in American democracy. Now, he says he is inspired that so many citizens have heeded his call by protesting drastic measures that Trump took that many have criticized as antithetical to common American values. Kevin Lewis, a spokesperson for Obama, released a statement on behalf of the former president praising the protesters for exercising their constitutional right of assembly and rejecting the notion that his antiterrorism vetting policies resemble Trumps. It is Obamas first public statement since leaving office Jan. 20: President Obama is heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country. In his final official speech as President, he spoke about the important role of citizen and how all Americans have a responsibility to be the guardians of our democracy not just during an election but every day. Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake. With regard to comparisons to President Obamas foreign policy decisions, as weve heard before, the President fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion. The political and personal differences between Obama and Trump are well known. Obama was highly critical of Trumps policy proposals during the general election but indicated his intention to facilitate a peaceful transfer of power widely considered a hallmark of American democracy and offer his guidance as needed. President Obama holds a press conference addressing email hacking and cybersecurity at the White House in December 2016. (Photo: Leigh Vogel/WireImage) Obama has cited former President George W. Bushs graciousness to his incoming administration despite their political differences as an example he sought to follow. Bush famously avoided criticizing Obama publicly, though his vice president, Dick Cheney, frequently blasted the president during television and print interviews. Story continues During his final press conference, Obama said he would speak out in the Trump era if he felt our core values are at stake. Among the threats to those values, he said, are systematic discrimination, voter suppression, institutional efforts to silence dissent or the press and the deportation of children who immigrated into the country illegally with their parents. Read more from Yahoo News: WASHINGTON (AP) In the face of widespread criticism, President Donald Trump has staunchly defended his order temporarily banning refugees and nearly all citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries. But in a statement Sunday and tweets Monday, Trump misstated the facts multiple times. What Trump said and how it compares with the facts: ___ TRUMP: In a Twitter message Monday, he said "Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage." THE FACTS: According to a federal law enforcement official briefed on the implementation of the order, nearly 400 green-card holders actually were delayed after arriving at U.S. airports after the travel ban was signed. As of Sunday afternoon, one legal permanent resident had been denied entry as a result of the order, according to the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the person wasn't allowed to discuss the matter publicly. Delta Airlines did report a computer problem that forced the cancellation of more than 150 flights on Sunday. The chaos and protests at airports around the country began before that happened and were related to the travel ban, not delayed or cancelled flights. ___ TRUMP: In a White House statement Sunday, he said "My policy is similar to what President (Barack) Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months." THE FACTS: That's not exactly what happened. According to State Department data, 9,388 Iraqi refugees were admitted to the United States during the 2011 budget year. The data also show that Iraqi refugees were admitted every month during the 2011 calendar year. The Obama administration did slow processing for Iraqi nationals seeking refuge in the U.S. under the government's Special Immigrant Visa program for translators and interpreters who worked with American troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. That happened after two Iraqi nationals were arrested on terrorism-related charges. But that year, 618 Iraqis were allowed to enter the U.S. with that special visa. Story continues Government data show that during the 2011 budget year, more than 7,800 Iraqis were allowed into the United States on non-immigrant visas, including tourists. ___ TRUMP: In the same statement, he said "The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror." THE FACTS: That is misleading. The Republican-led Congress in 2015 voted to require visas and additional security checks for foreign citizens who normally wouldn't need visas such as those from Britain if they had visited the seven countries: Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. This was included in a large spending bill passed overwhelmingly by Congress and signed by Obama. As the law was enacted, the Obama administration announced that journalists, aid workers and others who traveled to the listed countries for official work could apply for exemptions. There were no special U.S. travel restrictions on citizens of those seven countries. ___ TRUMP, also in Sunday's statement: "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order." THE FACTS: Trump is right that there are many majority-Muslim countries that have not been included in the travel ban. But he's also being misleading. The executive order signed Friday does not specifically say Muslims can't visit the U.S., but it does create a temporary total travel ban for citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries. It also indefinitely bans Syrians. Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani recently told Fox News that Trump had asked him to create a plan for a Muslim ban that would meet legal tests. Giuliani said he ultimately made recommendations that focused on security and what countries posed security threats. ___ TRUMP: The president also tweeted, "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the 'bad' would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad 'dudes' out there!" THE FACTS: The immigration system doesn't allow the kind of "rush" Trump is describing. There are 38 countries, mostly European, whose citizens can visit the U.S. without a visa. But they must be approved for travel in advance by supplying background information to the U.S. government. Any other foreigner looking to visit or move to America for school or work has to get in line for a visa and be subjected to a variety of background checks, including reviews by federal law enforcement and intelligence. Before Trump's executive order was signed, some people were eligible to skip an in-person interview if they met a variety of requirements. And the U.S. can always stop a foreigner from boarding a U.S.-bound flight or cancel a visa upon someone's arrival. A visa is not a guarantee that a foreigner will be allowed into the U.S. ___ Follow Alicia A. Caldwell on Twitter at www.twitter.com/acaldwellap EDITOR'S NOTE _ A look at the veracity of claims by political figures Many in Myanmar are in mourning this week after the assassination of a prominent Muslim lawyer and peerless symbol of the countrys democracy movement, Ko Ni, who was shot in the head at point-blank range on the pickup curb of Yangon International Airport on Sunday night. Crowds steadily swelled in Yangon throughout the day on Monday, converging at Yayway Cemetery after a funeral procession for the revered pro-democracy advocate, former political prisoner and rare voice of the countrys Muslim community, whose prolific life was cut short at 65 years old. Generations of Burmese scholars, activists, politicians and friends across the globe were shocked by the news; killings of this sort are extremely uncommon in Myanmar, and gun violence almost unheard of in the countrys largest city and commercial capital, Yangon. Ko Ni, a legal adviser to the ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party and an expert in constitutional law, is among the nations most high-profile Muslim figures. He was also a loyal supporter of Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel laureate and the countrys de facto leader since April of last year. The NLD issued a statement condemning his death on Sunday night, lamenting the loss of an irreplaceable member. Photos shared on social media purportedly showed chilling images of the moments just before and after his death; one depicts the suspect, casually approaching in a pink T-shirt and flip-flops, standing behind Ko Ni with a gun to the back of his head as he reportedly holds his young grandson in his arms. After fleeing the scene, the gunman was reportedly chased down by taxi drivers who witnessed the murder. One of the drivers, identified in local news media as 42-year-old Nay Win, was also shot and killed by the suspect in the pursuit; the others reportedly held the suspect captive until police arrived to arrest him. The gunmans motive is still unclear. Ko Ni arrived in Yangon on Sunday evening after joining a delegation to Indonesia, where he and about 20 other prominent figures, including the well-known activist Mya Aye, met with regional counterparts to observe peace-and-reconciliation efforts amid escalating religious tensions in both countries. Ko Ni, a high-profile Muslim in a predominantly Buddhist country, has received multiple threats in the past, his friends say. Story continues Sometimes I was worried for him, because he was always targeted by the extremists for his religion, says Chit Min Lay, a former student under Ko Ni and a member of Myanmars 88 Generation a group that spearheaded the countrys pro-democracy movement in 1988. But we dont know exactly why [he was killed]. Although he was an almost universally admired figure, Ko Ni accrued powerful enemies both for his status as a Muslim public figure among other things he was the patron of a newly formed Myanmar Muslim Lawyers Association and as a vocal opponent of the countrys military-drafted constitution, the armys most crucial tool for maintaining power. While its still unclear exactly why he was targeted, his abrupt death came at a time of heightened religious tensions. Myanmar has grappled for years with an alarming rise in anti-Muslim sentiment and vitriolic hate speech. Several bouts of deadly riots since 2012 have overwhelmingly affected Muslim communities, which have no representation in the newly elected government. Ko Ni, as a senior adviser to the ruling party, was among the most if not the most important voices for Myanmars Muslims. Rights advocates and others have issued a cascade of appeals for a thorough inquiry into his death. Amnesty International called Sunday for a thorough, independent and impartial investigation into the appalling act, while the International Crisis Group warned that this killing has all the appearances of a hate crime and must be promptly and credibly probed. Washington (AFP) - Attorneys general from 16 US states, including California and New York, on Sunday condemned President Donald Trump's executive order on immigration as "unconstitutional" and vowed to fight it. Two days after the new Republican president halted entry to the US by refugees and persons from seven Muslim majority countries, the attorneys general, all Democrats whose states represent nearly a third of the US population, issued a joint statement in opposition. "As the chief legal officers for over 130 million Americans and foreign residents of our states, we condemn President Trump's unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful Executive Order," read the statement. The attorneys general pledged to "work together to ensure the federal government obeys the Constitution, respects our history as a nation of immigrants and does not unlawfully target anyone because of their national origin or faith." Noting that several federal courts had already blocked parts of Trump's order, the attorneys general said they would "use all of the tools of our offices to fight this unconstitutional order and preserve our nation's national security and core values." They also predicted the courts would ultimately strike down the order. "In the meantime, we are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created," the statement said. Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, who initiated the statement, was joined by her counterparts in California, Connecticut, the District of Columbia (home to the US capital Washington), Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia and Washington state. PM urges media to play positive role in constitution execution Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal has appealed to the media to play a supportive and positive role in the local body election together with the constitution implementation. A legal adviser to Myanmars leader Aung San Suu Kyi was assassinated at Yangon International Airport Sunday. U Ko Ni was a prominent human rights lawyer and a well known voice for religious harmony in the country marred by communal violence. Ko Ni, 65, was returning from a state-sponsored trip to Indonesia when he was shot in the head at point-blank range outside the airport. He was reportedly holding his grandchild at the time of the shooting and was rushed to Yangon Hospital. A taxi driver, U Ne Win, who tried to stop the shooter was also fatally shot before others caught the gunman, detaining him till he was arrested by the police. He has been identified as U Kyi Lin from Mandalay, Myanmar and the policy seized two handguns that were in his possession. Ko Ni was a Muslim in the Buddhist-majority Myanmar and a member of the ruling National League for Democracy. He was a prominent activist of the interfaith peace movement and had authored six books on human rights and democracy. U Ko Ni Photo: Phyo Thiha Cho/Myanmar Now via REUTERS His assassination was a big blow to the National League for Democracy, and it would be very difficult for us to replace him, A spokesman for the party, U Win Htein told New York Times. We lost a hero. It is a bad situation here. Myanmars military has forced out almost 65,000 Rohingya Muslims from the country since October last year in clearance operations. The country, which till very recently was led by a military junta, has faced international condemnation over human rights abuses against minorities. While no motive behind Ko Nis shooting has been given, he was a critic of the rising Buddhist nationalism within the country that alienated smaller groups. Not only those responsible for death of U Ko Ni brought to justice but all those killing, torturing, raping innocent people in #Myanmar ! United Nations Special Rapporteur on Myanmar Yanghee Lee said on Twitter. Story continues Related Articles By Colin Packham and Tom Westbrook SYDNEY (Reuters) - Australian dual-nationals will not be affected by U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order blocking visitors from seven Muslim-majority nations, Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said on Tuesday. Trump's executive order placed a 90-day bar on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the United States, igniting chaotic scenes over the weekend as border and customs officials struggled to put the order into practice. "Australian passport holders will be able to travel to the United States in the same way they were able to prior to the executive order," said Turnbull. "Regardless of their place of birth or whether they are dual-nationals or they hold another passport, they will be welcome in the United States." Australia joins Canada and the United Kingdom in winning exemptions for their dual citizens, while New Zealand Prime Minister Bill English said on Tuesday he expected to secure a similar arrangement. Trump's executive order also placed a 120-day hold on allowing refugees into the country and an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria. Despite the restrictions on refugees, Trump on Sunday told Turnbull the U.S. would honor its agreement to resettle an unspecified number of refugees held in Australian processing centers on remote Pacific islands in Papua New Guinea and Nauru. Under Australian rules, anyone intercepted while trying to reach the country by boat is sent for processing to camps in the tiny nation of Nauru and at Manus Island, in PNG. They are never eligible to be resettled in Australia. But questions remain over how many refugees will be resettled in the United States, with humanitarian organizations fearing that many of the 1,100 refugees in offshore detention will not be accepted, leaving them in limbo. "The people on Nauru and Manus Island have suffered enough at the hands of Australia's deliberately cruel policies," Graham Thom, refugee coordinator for Amnesty International Australia, said in a statement. "The vague state of the arrangement and lack of information being provided to them in the current turmoil is deeply distressing." (Reporting by Tom Westbrook and Colin Packham; Editing by Tom Brown and Richard Pullin) Vienna (AFP) - Austria said Monday that Washington has suspended a programme that has allowed thousands of persecuted Iranian Christians and Jews to pass though the European country on their way to setting in the US. Thomas Schnoell, foreign ministry spokesman, told AFP that the Austrian government was informed of the move by President Donald Trump's administration in the middle of last week. It came just ahead of Trump's executive order on Friday temporarily banning travellers from seven predominantly Muslim countries -- including Iran -- and suspending the arrival of all refugees. "We regret this deeply because we think this is a very good programme that always worked without any problems," Schnoell said. Under the scheme, Austria's embassy in Iran would give Christians, Jews and other persecuted minorities temporary visas enabling them to stay in Austria for up to six months. During this time they could apply to settle in the US. Around 1,000 people have made use of the scheme every year since it came into operation more than 30 years ago, Schnoell said. He said that as a result of the suspension, around 300 people in Iran who had been told they would receive Austrian visas have been told that they cannot now travel. An unknown number -- reportedly around 30 -- who were already in Austria under the visa scheme have been stranded. Their fate is now unclear. Trump's order from Friday suspends the arrival of all refugees for a minimum of 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The White House later pulled back on part of the ban, saying it would not apply to those with permanent residence status in the United States. By Francois Murphy and Kirsti Knolle VIENNA (Reuters) - Austria's coalition government promised on Monday to ban Muslim face-covering veils and to restrict eastern European workers' access to the labor market, in a package of policies aimed at countering the rise of the far-right Freedom Party. The anti-Islam Freedom Party (FPO) has topped opinion polls for months, boosted by the influx of more than a million migrants into Europe in the past two years and concerns over their impact on jobs and security. Last month the FPO candidate came close to winning Austria's presidential election. With a parliamentary election due next year, Chancellor Christian Kern of the Social Democratic Party (SPO) hopes the package will provide fresh impetus to an eight-month-old coalition widely seen as ineffective. "We agreed that we must work faster and more clearly," conservative Vice Chancellor Reinhold Mitterlehner told a joint news conference with Kern outlining their 35-page plan. "It is now up to us to do what governing parties do, namely implement the program." The deal included a ban on Muslim veils such as the burka and niqab, which cover all or most of the face, and said a more general ban on civil servants wearing religious symbols was in the works. "We believe in an open society that is also based on open communication. Full-body veils in public spaces stand against that and will therefore be prohibited," the agreement said. Mainly Catholic Austria is home to around 600,000 Muslims in a total population of about 8.7 million. UNEMPLOYMENT The conservative People's Party, the junior coalition member, obtained tougher measures on security, including the electronic tagging of former jihadists. The SPO opposed its call for a lowering of an annual cap on asylum claims, agreeing instead to strengthen existing border controls in general and to support measures such as greater incentives for voluntary deportation. The deal also included a requirement that 30 percent of a company's supervisory board members be female and a plan to make foreign multinationals, particularly online companies, pay the same tax on advertising revenue as newspapers. Unemployment in Austria has been steadily rising but is still relatively low at 5.9 percent, under a harmonized EU measure. Earlier this month Kern proposed returning to a system that gave local workers priority for jobs in sectors that employ a high number of people from poorer eastern European member states. The system was in place provisionally from 2004 to 2011 after many ex-communist countries joined the bloc. The coalition agreement said the government would push for the European Commission to allow a similar system, supporting a "reduction of and limit on labor force migration". Brussels is unlikely to accept such a system, however, as it clashes with the fundamental EU principle of free movement of people. (Reporting by Francois Murphy, Kirsti Knolle and Shadia Nasralla; Editing by Gareth Jones) Vienna (AFP) - Austria's chancellor said Monday he will seek to ban full-face veils in public, as part of a wide-ranging government programme aimed at fending off the challenge of the far-right. "The full-face veil will be banned in public spaces," Christian Kern said after ministers signed off on the new programme of policies set to be implemented over the coming 18 months. There was no mention of a headscarf ban for civil servants but the text said that state representatives must "present themselves as religiously neutral". Kern said he wanted to avoid "giving 600,000 Muslims in Austria the feeling that they are not part of our society." The 35-page programme also includes beefing up surveillance and security measures, obliging migrants granted the right to stay to sign an "integration contract" and a "statement of values". "Those who are not prepared to accept Enlightenment values will have to leave our country and society," according to the text. It also promises the government will lower taxes and non-wage labour costs, restrict access of foreign workers to the Austrian labour market and create 70,000 new jobs. Many of the measures set out in the programme must be hammered out in detail and receive parliamentary approval before they can come into force. The move comes eight months after Kern, 51, replaced Werner Faymann at the head of an unhappy "grand coalition" between his Social Democrats (SPOe) and the centre-right People's Party (OeVP). Both are facing a strong challenge from the Freedom Party (FPOe), which like similar groups across Europe has stoked concerns about immigration, security and the EU to top opinion polls. There has been speculation for months that the Austrian coalition might call early elections. Monday's programme was aimed at showing it aims to govern until its mandate expires in late 2018. By Yasmeen Abutaleb, Kristina Cooke and Mica Rosenberg SAN FRANCISCO/NEW YORK, (Reuters) - Al Ameen, a 33-year-old Iraqi refugee with hemophilia A, a genetic disorder that prevents proper blood clotting, has been living in Jordan awaiting medical care in the United States for two years. His condition is so advanced, his doctors have told him, that only a handful of facilities in the world can treat him. Already worried that his application would not be approved in time to get the treatment he needs, the United States' four-month halt of the resettlement of refugees has convinced him he will never be accepted. "I'm going to die here by myself," Al Ameen said in a phone interview on Sunday. "Where do people expect all the refugees to go? We have nowhere to go." President Donald Trump's executive order last Friday has sowed panic and uncertainty among refugees who need urgent medical care, some of whom had prioritized applications, according to aid workers. Al Ameen, who asked that his last name not be disclosed because he fears attacks on his relatives still in Iraq, said his condition has deteriorated in recent months. He lives in Jordan alone, is barely able to move and is covered by bruises. The four-month U.S. ban on accepting refugees could mean as many as 800 people needing medical treatment will be denied entry, said Karen Monken of HIAS, a Maryland-based refugee assistance organization formerly known as Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society. Before the halt, about 200 refugees with significant medical issues were being resettled in the United States each month on average, she said. Trump administration officials say the 120-day ban is temporary and needed so that a new vetting system can be put in place, which they say will prevent terrorist attacks. The order singles out Syrian refugees and suspends their admission until "sufficient changes have been made" to the refugee program. The executive order allows exemptions on a case-by-case basis. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on refugees in need of urgent medical care. DOCTORS' APPOINTMENTS MADE Under the system in place before the temporary halt, after refugees register with the United Nations and undergo initial assessment and interviews, the strongest candidates are referred for resettlement, aid workers and U.N. officials said. Those referred to the United States tend to be the most vulnerable - including single mothers, children and people with medical conditions that require sophisticated treatment. U.S. State Department guidelines provide that refugees with serious life-threatening medical conditions can move to the front of the line for expedited processing. The fast-track process from referral to arrival in the United States typically takes around eight to ten weeks or several months. The normal processing time for refugees is between 18 to 24 months, according to the State Department. Lawyers say individual refugee cases, though, can often drag on for years longer. HIAS' Monken said her organization had been expecting the arrival of several refugees with medical conditions to the United States in the coming weeks who had already started planning their doctors' appointments and finding apartments. One Syrian woman in her 20s, who is deaf and mute, was supposed to arrive in New York in early February and her case is now on indefinite hold, Monken said. An Iraqi family with a 5-year-old son who has congenital heart disease was also due to arrive in Michigan in coming months. "We see intense medical needs, especially from Syrians, because their trauma is so fresh, including recent shrapnel wounds and lost limbs," said Monken. Officials at the United Nations agency that handles refugees, UNHCR, are still trying to understand the breadth and implications of the executive order. The UNHCR said it could not provide a specific number of how many refugees with medical needs would be affected by the U.S. ban. UNHCR's Larry Yungk, a senior resettlement officer in Washington, said they are speaking with State Department officials and trying to learn which cases might be exempt from the ban. "There are still a lot of unknowns," said Yungk. Since the halt was announced on Friday U.N. officials and attorneys for refugees have also worked to identify emergency cases that could be sent to other countries. But the prospects are not promising. Canada and several European nations where U.N. officials would normally reroute cases, including Sweden, Norway and Germany, have already taken record numbers of refugees in recent years. The Ministers Office for Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship in Canada did not immediately respond to a request for comment. "We've informed (the State Department) that there's limited capacity to resettle these other cases," said Yungk, the UNHCR official. "There's no way to compensate for all the U.S. placements." 'LOST HOPE' FOR DAUGHTER One Syrian mother, who requested anonymity for fear of retribution against her family, said in a telephone interview on Sunday that she had completed interviews with UNHCR and hoped her 15-year-old daughter would be accepted for resettlement and surgery in the United States. She said the girl, who was also born with a birth defect, was imprisoned in Syria by government forces with other children four years ago. The girl was tortured, leaving her with severe injuries to her hands and jaw, according to her mother. She was hospitalized in Jordan and received hand surgery there but the surgery made her condition worse, her mother said. The girl lost much of the movement in her hand and now needs a more complex operation. "I've lost hope that I'll be able to get treatment for my daughter," said her mother. Another refugee needing urgent U.S. medical care is Mohammad Alkhaled, a six-year-old Syrian boy living in Jordan, according to Jayne Fleming, a New York-based lawyer who works with refugees. Fleming said she was working on getting the boy expedited resettlement in the United States before the halt. In October, Alkhaled was diagnosed with Ewing Sarcoma, a type of cancer that forms in bone or soft tissue. Earlier this month, Fleming contacted David Tishler, a pediatric oncologist at Children's Hospital Los Angeles and asked him to review scanned copies of Alkhaled's medical records. "Where he is they have very little experience treating cancer, they don't have the resources," said Tishler. He said that particular strain of cancer requires a year of intensive chemotherapy in addition to surgery and radiation, which is extremely expensive. In cases where the disease is localized, patients with the full course of treatment have a 70 to 75 percent chance of being alive in five years and many survive for much longer, said Tishler. "Without getting additional therapy, he is going to die," Tishler said. (Additional reporting by Bushra Shakhshir in Amman; Editing By David Rohde and Mary Milliken) Bangladesh will push ahead with a controversial plan to relocate tens of thousands of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar to a remote island despite warnings it is uninhabitable and prone to flooding. The government has set up a committee comprising state officials in the coastal districts, ordering authorities to help identify and relocate undocumented Myanmar nationals to Thengar Char in the Bay of Bengal. "The committee will assist transferring both registered and unregistered refugees from Myanmar to Thengar Char near Hatiya island in Noakhali district," according to an order issued by the Cabinet Division last week and posted online. Hatiya is situated on the estuary of the River Meghna and is a nine-hour journey away from the camps where the Rohingya have taken shelter. Some 232,000 Rohingya Muslims -- both registered and unregistered -- were already living in Bangladesh before more than 65,000 stateless Rohingya fleeing violence in Myanmar's western state of Rakhine began entering the country last October. Most of those who fled to Bangladesh live in squalid conditions in refugee camps in Cox's Bazar district, which borders Rakhine state and is home to the country's biggest tourist resort. Bangladesh has also asked its officials in the border districts to identify the Myanmar nationals who "illegally infiltrated" the country. "It has to be assured by taking preventive measures that they (refugees) cannot spread out and mix with the locals," read the order which was dated January 26. "The identified refugees should be arrested or pushed back to the camps if they try to go out beyond the assigned boundary." Bangladesh first mooted the idea of relocating them in 2015 despite allegations that the island was still not ready for human habitation. The idea sparked an outcry from Rohingya community leaders, while a UN agency said a forced relocation would be "very complex and controversial". Story continues - 'Terrible idea' - An official in the region criticised the idea, saying the 6,000-acre (2,430-hectare) island was "only accessible during winter and a haven for pirates". The authorities were planting trees in a bid to shore up land against high tides and flooding, but those efforts were at least a decade away from completion, the official added. "It completely inundates during the monsoon," the official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity. "It's a terrible idea to send someone to live there." There was no immediate comment from the Rohingya community leaders. The island push came as members of Myanmar's state-appointed body headed by Kofi Annan, tasked with finding long-term solutions for Rakhine state, visited refugee camps in Cox's Bazar. Three members of the commission spoke to refugees, who recalled horrific incidents of rape and murder at the hands of Myanmar's security forces. Kamal Hossain, 50, told the observer team his entire village was burned to the ground and his brother killed by the army, forcing him to flee to Bangladesh for safety. "We want to go back home. We don't want to live as refugees here, but we need assurance that we will not be slaughtered like cattle," he told AFP. Dudu Mia, a Rohingya community leader, said he hoped the commissioners would relay to the government in Myanmar about "our people being killed and tortured and women raped by their security forces". The team also met with Bangladeshi officials at Cox's Bazar, and was due to hold talks with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina before their departure on February 1. "The commission came to see for themselves whether these people were forced to come here," Ali Hossain, chief administrator of the district, told AFP. WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A 25-pound (11-kg) female bobcat escaped from Washington's National Zoo on Monday, zoo officials said, while warning area residents not to approach the brownish feline if they see her. The wild-born bobcat, Ollie, was last seen during a routine daily count at 7:30 a.m., the zoo said in a statement. She did not show for the bobcats' daily feeding just over three hours later at the zoo, one of the U.S. capital's major tourist attractions. "Animal Care staff conducted an immediate search and have not located the bobcat," it said. Zoo officials asked anyone spotting the animal to call them. The species is not known to be aggressive to humans. Ollie, who is thought to be almost 7 years old, may return for food and shelter. The area around the bobcat exhibit is closed because she likely will stay hidden from humans, the zoo said. Bobcats, which are similar to lynxes, range from Mexico to southern Canada and can run up to 30 miles per hour (48 km per hour). They are from 1.5 to 2 feet (46 to 64 cm) tall at the shoulder and their fur is buff to brown, sometimes with a reddish tinge, according to the zoo's website. Officials at the Virginia Zoo in Norfolk, almost 200 miles (320 km) to the south, are on the hunt for a female red panda, missing since last Tuesday. (Reporting by Ian Simpson; Editing by Sandra Maler) At least 20,000 people have been killed and more than 2.6 million made homeless in northeast Nigeria since the start of Boko Haram's Islamist insurgency in 2009 (AFP Photo/) Kano (Nigeria) (AFP) - More than 20 people were feared dead after Boko Haram gunmen opened fire on a convoy of motorists travelling under military escort in northeast Nigeria, witnesses told AFP on Monday. The exact toll from the ambush on the main road between Maiduguri to Damboa on Saturday was unclear, with numbers varying from two to as high as 15 and 24. But according to travellers who survived the attack and local rescuers, at least 15 trucks laden with food were seized when the Islamists struck at the Korowaso forest on Saturday. "The attackers appeared from the bushes as the convoy slowed down at a part of the road riddled with potholes and opened fire on the vehicles," said one of the drivers, Idrissa Kyari. "They killed 15 people and injured nine while many passengers fled into the bush after subduing the military escorts. They also took away 15 trucks carrying food into the bush." Two students from of University of Maiduguri were killed in the attack with three others injured, said a teacher at the university on condition of anonymity. Masida Umar, a civilian vigilante assisting the military against Boko Haram, said: "We evacuated 24 dead bodies and several injured to hospital. "Many people fled into the bush and have not been seen despite deployment of a search team." Umar said there were fears Boko Haram may have captured those who fled. The militia member said the rebels were believed to have launched the attack from Sambisa forest, which connects with Korowaso. - Supply lines cut - Last month Nigeria's military claimed to have dislodged Boko Haram from their last stronghold in the former game reserve after a months-long offensive. But residents in the area have said fighters were still hiding in areas on the edge of the forest. Military and police authorities declined to comment on the incident when contacted by AFP. The 90-kilometre (55-mile) Maiduguri-Damboa road was nominally reopened last February, allowing motorists to ply the highway but only under military protection. Story continues It had been closed in 2013 following a spate of deadly attacks on motorists, as Boko Haram seized swathes of territory in Borno and two neighbouring states. In the last two years a coordinated fightback against Boko Haram involving Nigerian troops and soldiers from Cameroon, Chad and Niger has successfully clawed back lost territory. That has put pressure on Boko Haram, substantially cutting its food, fuel and weapons supplies. As a result Boko Haram has carried out raids on farming communities as well as highway ambushes in its search for food and fuel. Last Thursday, at least three Nigerian soldiers were killed when Boko Haram fighters on camels raided a military post near the home of the country's army chief in Borno state. Prez, PM pay their tributes to martyrs Martyrs Day was marked across the country on Sunday by paying tributes to those who sacrificed their lives for the guarantee of peoples rights. Rio de Janeiro (AFP) - Fallen tycoon Eike Batista, who personified Brazil's economic boom and once aimed to be the world's richest man, had his head shaved and was incarcerated Monday after surrendering to face corruption charges. Batista, who rose to become his country's wealthiest person and number seven in the world, with a fortune of $34.5 billion reported by Bloomberg in 2012, flew in from New York and walked immediately to a waiting police SUV. The 60-year-old former oil and mining magnate is alleged to have paid a $16.5 million bribe to ex-Rio de Janeiro state governor Sergio Cabral, already behind bars for allegedly taking bribes over World Cup and Olympics infrastructure projects. As a brash, big-spending entrepreneur with a playboy lifestyle, Batista symbolized Brazil's surge to economic power under then-president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. His downfall represents a new landmark in a series of sprawling but interconnected corruption scandals enveloping much of Brazil's elite, including Lula himself. Globo television broadcast extensive live coverage of Batista's return to the country. He was sent first to the Ary Franco prison in Rio, which like many in Brazil is seriously overcrowded, before transferring to the much bigger Bangu complex. Many corruption suspects in Brazil benefit from a law that puts people with university diplomas in better conditions. However, Batista never graduated, meaning he should experience the gritty -- sometimes dangerous -- reality facing ordinary Brazilian detainees. Television footage showed that he had his head shaved before arriving in Bangu. - Knock at the door - Police first came knocking at Batista's luxury Rio home last week. The cross-border police agency Interpol issued a "red notice" alert when it emerged he was abroad. Late Sunday, he told Globo television from Kennedy International Airport in New York that he had decided to fly back voluntarily. Story continues "I am returning to respond to the judiciary, as is my duty," he said, promising to "clear things up." A former speedboat racer who reached seventh place on Forbes magazine's rich list in 2012 and even vowed to eventually become the world's richest person, Batista indulged heavily in his taste for the high life. He had a palatial Rio residence and loved showing off his $500,000 Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren, planes and a helicopter. But his empire, boosted by billions of dollars in loans from the Brazilian national development bank, was hit by plunging commodity prices and abruptly unravelled with the collapse of his oil company OGX in 2013. - President faces allegations - These are nervous days for Brazil's once untouchable elite. Demonstrating the judiciary's resolve Monday, Supreme Court President Carmen Lucia confirmed she would allow the use of testimony by executives from the Odebrecht construction company in a massive bribery and embezzlement case centered on state oil company Petrobras. The construction executives gave a mountain of what is expected to be politically explosive evidence as part of a plea bargain with prosecutors. The contents of the evidence remain secret, but leaks have pointed to current President Michel Temer being accused of taking millions of dollars in illegal donations. Already the roster of the accused or charged in the Petrobras case reads like a Who's Who of the Brazilian establishment, also including Lula, major senators and the former speaker of the lower house of Congress. The Supreme Court president's decision to accept the testimony was seen as an important reaffirmation of the judiciary's determination to pursue the case after the death in a plane crash this month of Teori Zavascki, the court justice who had been overseeing the matter. By Pedro Fonseca and Rodrigo Viga Gaier RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) - Eike Batista, once the richest and most outspoken cheerleader for Brazil's ill-fated commodities bubble, flew back to Rio de Janeiro Monday and was arrested at the airport by federal police over corruption allegations after four days as a fugitive. Batista, a brash entrepreneur whose meteoric rise and fall made him the poster boy of a decade-long boom in Brazil that turned to bust three years ago, is accused of paying a former Rio state governor millions in bribes. A warrant for his arrest was issued on Thursday. Batista has not been formally charged. Under Brazilian law, only prosecutors can file charges, after police conclude an investigation. The 60-year-old businessman, who has sold or forfeited his stakes in the energy, mining and logistics empire known as EBX Group, was once married to a Carnival queen and is the son of a former chief executive officer of mining company Vale SA. Five years ago, he had a net worth exceeding $30 billion and was considered one of the world's 10 richest people. On Monday, he had his hair implants shaved off before he was locked in a shared cell in Rio's notorious Bangu prison, authorities said. "I am returning to answer to the courts, as is my duty," Batista told the Globo television network at New York's JFK airport. "It's time for me to clear this up." In May, Batista showed up at the southern Brazil offices of federal prosecutors leading a huge probe into political kickbacks made by scores of major companies, in return for lucrative contracts from state-run oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA. Batista told prosecutors at the time that former Finance Minister Guido Mantega had requested, and he had made, a contribution of 5 million reais ($1.60 million) to cover debts from the successful 2010 presidential campaign of former President Dilma Rousseff, who was impeached last year for breaking budget rules. Mantega was charged with corruption in September, due in large part to Batista's testimony, prosecutors said. Both Mantega and Rousseff deny wrongdoing. The sweeping corruption investigation, which now covers several state-run companies, has jailed prestigious CEOs and major political figures, convicted more than 80 people and confirmed some $2 billion in bribes paid over several years. New testimony from plea bargains approved on Monday is expected to implicate more than 100 sitting politicians. "I think federal prosecutors are cleaning up Brazil in a fantastic manner," Batista told Globo TV. "The Brazil that is being born now will be different." He added that he never intended to flee and was in New York on business. Batista declined to answer a reporter's question about whether he considered himself guilty or innocent. Batista's lawyer, Fernando Martins, told reporters outside a prison where the businessman initially was taken that he had not yet spoken with his client but that he was worried about his safety. Inmates with a college degree, which Batista lacks, are usually separated from the rest of the population in Brazil's crowded prison system, where a series of violent riots have erupted this year. A former wildcat gold miner, Batista attracted ravenous demand for shares in his mining and energy ventures, which were forced into bankruptcy court as oil and mineral prices crashed. Police accuse Batista of paying $16 million to former Rio Governor Sergio Cabral in exchange for support of the businessman's many Rio-based endeavors. Cabral, who resigned from office in 2014, has been jailed since last year in connection with other corruption charges. His lawyers have denied he committed any crimes. The oil companies OGX Petroleo e Gas SA and Oleo e Gas Participacoes SA and mining company MMX, which were founded by Batista, said on Monday that he no longer held administrative roles, and his arrest would have no impact on them. (Reporting by Pedro Fonseca and Rodrigo Viga Gaier; Additional reporting by Brad Brooks in Sao Paulo and Paulo Prada in Rio de Janeiro; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Tom Brown) An Ohio man stands accused of breaking into homes, in part so he could prepare himself some home-cooked meals. Police in Youngstown say Jacob Merchant, 33, is homeless and allege that he broke into multiple homes this month and brought along his own food, which he cooked before taking a shower and leaving. Watch: Man Shoots and Kills Wife Who He Reportedly Thought Was a Burglar His alleged streak ended Wednesday, however, when cops say Merchant broke into a third home, allegedly did the cooking and showering routine before the homeowner arrived after midnight to find her kitchen in disarray. According to the police report, the woman heard the shower running. When she followed the sound, the woman told police she was horrified to find Merchant in her bathroom, The Vindicator reported. Cops think Merchant was in the home for about four hours before the woman arrived. Read: Burglar Caught On Surveillance Stealing From Store in a Dance Leotard: Cops Merchant is now charged with felony burglary, according to court records available online. He was due to appear in court via video for an arraignment Monday. Watch: Shocking Video Shows Burglars Creeping Inside Home as Children Sleep Nearby Related Articles: LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump's travel restrictions do not apply to people traveling from the United Kingdom regardless of their nationality or place of birth, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said on Monday. Trump's executive order barring refugees and people from seven mainly Muslim countries has caused a global outcry, and in Britain over 1.3 million people have called for his state visit to the United Kingdom to be canceled. In a statement to parliament, Johnson said London had received assurances from the U.S. administration that people with British citizenship who were also nationals of one of the seven countries would not be affected by the measure. There was confusion earlier when an urgent notice was posted on the website of the U.S. embassy in London advising nationals and dual nationals of the seven countries that visa issuance had been suspended and they should not schedule a visa appointment. That notice later disappeared from the website, and Johnson told parliament that the embassy guidance had been updated. He said Trump's approach to immigration was not one the British government would take, calling it highly controversial, divisive and discriminatory. But he defended the planned state visit as "totally right". On Friday, the new Republican president put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily barred travelers from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Somalia and Sudan. (Reporting by Kylie MacLellan and Estelle Shirbon in London; editing by Stephen Addison) Paris (AFP) - British designer Clare Waight Keller is to quit Chloe after six years, the French fashion house said Monday. The creator, who turned Pringle of Scotland from a rather staid knitwear maker into a fashion brand, has also helped push up sales at Chloe, best known for its floaty, romantic, 1970s-influenced clothes. Chloe said that since Waight Keller's arrival the label has "enjoyed remarkable momentum and global development. "Her lightness of touch as a designer and understanding of the DNA of the maison have given rise to many iconic Chloe collections over the years," it added in a statement. Waight Keller did not say where -- if anywhere -- she would be moving on to, only insisting that working for Chloe had been "one of the most rewarding experiences of my career". She will present her final collection for the brand during the Paris autumn winter shows on March 2. Her departure is the latest in a merry-go-round of changes at the top Paris fashion houses over the last two years. Speculation is already rife that she will be replaced by French designer Natacha Ramsay-Levi, who is now at Louis Vuitton. Former President George W. Bush and President Trump. (Photos: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP, Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) Former President George W. Bush, who spent nearly eight years urging Americans not to view Islam as the enemy of the United States, will not weigh in publicly on President Trumps controversial order temporarily freezing immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, his office said Monday. The same silence that was afforded to President Obama will be extended to President Trump, Bush spokesman Freddy Ford told Yahoo News by email. On Friday, Trump signed an executive order banning immigration to the United States by citizens from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen for 90 days. Admission of all refugees was halted for 120 days. The order sparked protests at major U.S. airports and criticism by some U.S. allies, as well as legal challenges from civil liberties groups. In contrast, former President Barack Obamas spokesman issued a statement Monday saying that Obama was heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country. Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake, the statement said. Bushs decision not to weigh in aligns with his decision to stay out of political fights after leaving office in January 2009, effectively giving the new president a chance to advance his agenda without sniping from the sidelines. But the Republican former president worked enormously hard in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to persuade Americans that the country was at war with extremists, not with the Muslim world. Bush, who declared a war on terrorism not quite 12 hours after the attacks, hurried less than a week later to the Islamic Center of Washington, a mosque and cultural center. There, he quoted the Quran and warned that Americans who were unleashing their anger on fellow American followers of Islam represent the worst of humankind. Story continues The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam. Thats not what Islam is all about. Islam is peace. These terrorists dont represent peace. They represent evil and war, he said. Bushs outreach on this score still draws praise from Democrats. That was one of the real contributions, despite all the other problems, that George W. Bush made after 9/11, when he basically said, after going to a mosque in Washington, We are not at war with Islam or Muslims, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said at a Democratic debate in November 2015. Bush tried to craft his language to avoid offending followers of Islam overseas. He shied from describing the United States enemies as Islamic terrorists, although for a brief time in 2006 he called them Islamic radicals, only to drop the expression after Saudi Arabia objected. Early on, he called the war on terrorism a crusade, a term that has largely lost its religious connotations in the West, but which remains deeply offensive for historical reasons to many Muslims in the Middle East. Angry with himself over the unnecessary provocation, Bush in June 2004 edited Dwight D. Eisenhowers famous D-Day message to leave out a reference to the great crusade of defeating Nazi Germany. On the 2016 campaign trail, Trump condemned the language that Bush and Obama had chosen to use as political correctness run amok, and vowed to be blunter. He delivered on that promise in his inaugural address, declaring: We will reinforce old alliances and form new ones, and unite the civilized world against radical Islamic terrorism, which we will eradicate completely from the face of the Earth. Read more from Yahoo News: _____ Related slideshows: Slideshow: Protests against Trumps travel ban hit the streets of NYC >>> Slideshow: Anti-Trump protesters rally for Muslim and immigrant rights >>> Slideshow: Protests at U.S. airports over travel ban >>> SYDNEY (Reuters) - Canadian diary company Saputo Inc said on Monday it will make an all-cash takeover offer for the 12 percent of Warrnambool Cheese and Butter it does not already own, valuing the company at A$682 million ($515 million). The A$8.85 per-share offer is at a 24.8 percent premium to Warrnambool's Friday closing price of A$7.09. Saputo, which already owns 88.02 percent of Warrnambool shares, will fund the acquisition from cash on hand and existing credit facilities, the company in a statement to the Australian Securities Exchange. "Saputo have been aiming for full ownership, but there has been that block stake there for a while," said Michael Harvey, senior diary analyst at Rabobank. Saputo acquired its majority stake in Warrnambool Cheese and Butter in 2014, beating local rivals Murray Goulburn Ltd and Bega Cheese Ltd in one of the Australia's most hotly contested takeover battles. Saputo's offer is the latest in a series of M&A deals in the Australian dairy industry this year. Bega earlier this month agreed a $460 million deal to acquire Mondelez International's grocery brands in Australia and New Zealand. (Reporting by Tom Westbrook; Editing by Lincoln Feast) Https%3a%2f%2fblueprint-api-production.s3.amazonaws.com%2fuploads%2fstory%2fthumbnail%2f35186%2fe0197b88-783f-4717-8445-4704a5432cb9 Sometimes, a tweet provides just enough room to say what you need to say. People have been pissed following the Trump administration's executive order barring immigrants and refugees from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the United States. Celebrities are not keeping quiet either, and many of them have chosen Trump's favorite platform, Twitter, to get their points across. SEE ALSO: British celebrities take a stand against Trump's 'Muslim ban' Some were outraged and weren't afraid to let the world know Disgusted! The news is devastating! America is being ruined right before our eyes! What an immoral pig you have to be to implement such BS!! Rihanna (@rihanna) January 29, 2017 Donald Trump is an unwell, evil human being. To the core. christine teigen (@chrissyteigen) January 28, 2017 THESE are the HUMAN BEINGS Trump banned today. REFUGEES fleeing ISIS. Children. Their families. Shame on him. May God help us. https://t.co/6fHeqEAaMj Sophia Bush (@SophiaBush) January 28, 2017 I feel sick. So ashamed of our maniac-in-chief. And SO PROUD of our protesters. #RESIST olivia wilde (@oliviawilde) January 29, 2017 Others tweeted on the importance of speaking up as celebrities Your brand is not in jeopardy by public opposition to Trump. Your nation is in jeopardy without it. Cole M. Sprouse (@colesprouse) January 29, 2017 Not saying every celebrity has to be an activist, but am saying accountability culture exists and pretending nothings wrong will only hurt u Rowan Blanchard (@RowanBlanchard) January 29, 2017 John Legend, Kerry Washington, Seth Rogen and more shared personal stories and historical accounts to help navigate the context of the executive order This is a beautiful story. When we reject Iraqi refugees, we reject Brahim. Shame on America. Shame on Donald Trump. https://t.co/1NzFtUPvm8 John Legend (@johnlegend) January 29, 2017 P.S. My grandparents were immigrants. The woman making us pizza right now is Muslim. And I'm grateful for all of them. #NoBan Ellen DeGeneres (@TheEllenShow) January 29, 2017 One of the many reasons I am opposed to the #MuslimBan is because my family immigrated to North America () after fleeing wars in Russia. Seth Rogen (@Sethrogen) January 29, 2017 Sick to my stomach today about the #MuslimBan Don't understand why? Go to @Stl_Manifest & learn the awful history of US rejecting refugees kerry washington (@kerrywashington) January 28, 2017 My best friend, Alaa Mohammad Khaled, is Muslim. His parents were Palestinian refugees. His brother is DJ Khaled. #RefugeesWelcome pic.twitter.com/qXOapgvvF7 Alyssa Milano (@Alyssa_Milano) January 28, 2017 While some, including Zendaya and Miley Cyrus, shared short and powerful messages RESIST Zendaya (@Zendaya) January 29, 2017 Moscow (AFP) - Three Islamic insurgents and two policemen were killed in a shoot-out following an attack on police in Russia's Chechnya region, strongman leader Ramzan Kadyrov said Monday. He said jihadists attacked a police post in Chali, a town about 30 kilometres (20 miles) south of the capital Grozny, during the night. Two policemen and three assailants were killed during the fire-fight, Kadyrov was quoted as saying in a statement from his office. Two civilians were wounded. Russia fought two brutal separatist wars over the past two decades in Chechnya but the region has been largely pacified under Kadyrov's iron-fisted rule. A dwindling group of Islamist insurgents are still fighting the authorities in Chechnya and across the volatile North Caucasus and sporadically launch eye-catching attacks. Fourteen security officers were killed when armed militants stormed several buildings in Grozny on the day of President Vladimir Putin's state of the nation address in December 2014. Rights activists and the opposition accuse Kadyrov of running Chechnya as his personal fiefdom, with kidnapping and torture widespread and little oversight from Moscow. The Russian North Caucasus is one of the major sources of foreign jihadists fighting in Syria and Iraq. The FSB security service last month said it had killed a regional "emir" of the Islamic State group in a raid. Achyut Wagle holds PhD in economics and is currently a professor at the Kathmandu University School of Management. He is an econo-political analyst, writing for The Kathmandu Post for many years. By Jon Herskovitz COLLEGE STATION, Texas (Reuters) - The leaders of the only private university in North Korea asked Texas A&M University, known for its agricultural economics and public health programs, for help on Monday in teaching subjects such as how to grow food in a land of chronic shortages. The Pyongyang University of Science and Technology (PUST) was founded by evangelical Christians and opened in 2010, with students generally the children of the country's elite. The PUST delegation said the requested help is not about politics but about using academics for humanitarian ideals. "It just tugs at the heartstrings when people realize that there are these people who are struggling to get the food that they need. If there is no food, there is no education and life breaks down," Norma Nichols, director of international academic affairs for the university in the North Korean capital. North Korea's centrally planned rationing system never recovered from a famine in the 1990s. From April to June last year the state handed out just 360 grams (12.7 oz) of rations per person per day, the lowest amount for five years, a World Food Program report said. PUST, with a volunteer faculty mostly of evangelical Christians, has a curriculum that includes subjects once considered taboo in North Korea, such as capitalism. The college is an unlikely fit in a country that has been condemned by the U.S. State Department for cracking down on freedom of religion. But at times, the reclusive state allows help, especially when someone else picks up the tab for an expensive project the country's leadership feels is not undermining the state. The staff at PUST, trying to expose the country to foreign academics and research, avoids talking about politics and religion in the classroom, in the restricted campus. The delegation is seeking help from about 10 U.S. universities on topics such as food security and improving nutrition. The United States is a leading proponent of sanctions on North Korea for its military provocations and nuclear arms program. Story continues Nichols said the other U.S. schools that have been approached have asked to keep their names private. Texas A&M has projects in several global hot spots, including Afghanistan and central Africa. "For us, it is as much a scholarly engagement as an altruistic engagement," said Edward Price, director of the school's Center on Conflict and Development in the Department of Agricultural Economics. "We are driven by the notion that food security is fundamental to peace," Price said. (Reporting by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Frances Kerry) The tweet was simple but promised a very complicated future: Any government official who refuses to execute Trumps orders on grounds of illegality will receive free representation from me. & Im good! it read. Good is not an idle boast. The author, Ian Samuel, 33, has clerked for Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, worked for the Obama Department of Justice, and handled cybersecurity cases for a large corporate law firm and currently hosts the FirstMondays podcast about the Supreme Court while also teaching at Harvard Law School. Frustrated by what he saw as a clearly unconstitutional executive order, he typed out his tweet on Friday night, plus a second one asking his 8,000-plus followers to please retweet this. My own audience is rather small but I need lots of people to know this offer exists. (Photo: Twitter) Then he went out to dinner. By the time he checked next, hed been retweeted nearly 7,000 times. By the end of the weekend, hed compiled a list of nearly 100 other lawyers, law students and people with no legal skills who want to help anyway, like one former secretary who offered to do any filing or stapling we needed. He had also heard from some civil servants who might need to take him up on his offer. Perhaps it was his own time spent in government, he said in an interview with Yahoo News, but when he read of the new immigration ban he immediately thought of the workers who would be needed to implement it. No government policy is self-executing, he said in an interview, describing his thinking before posting his tweet. The White House can command whatever they want, but it requires tremendous cooperation from the workers. Ian Samuel, a Harvard Law School lecturer, is offering to defend any government employees who refuse to carry out what he or she considers illegal executive orders. (Photo: Shannon McHugh) And those workers, he says, arent under any obligation to break the law. And, he contends, the policy announced Friday night to bar entry to citizens of seven largely Muslim nations is not only unwise, it also clearly breaks the law. Not all of the response to his tweet was positive. Several people angrily accused him of acting illegally himself. They said next time I am up at Harvard, Im going to have the police arrest you, one said. You are encouraging civil disobedience and anarchy. Story continues Fellow law professors who volunteered to help with the growing project stress that the group is not advocating anarchy or encouraging civil servants not to do their jobs. We are not asking people to do things as much as we are saying, If you do this out of conscience we will defend you, says Dan Epps, an associate professor of law at the Washington University School of Law and a co-host of the FirstMondays podcast, who met Samuel when he too clerked at the Supreme Court (Epps worked for Justice Anthony Kennedy). And there is more to defend them from than just the threat of punishment from above, notes Leah Litman, assistant professor of law at the University of California at Irvine, who also clerked for Kennedy. Simply being asked to carry out an unlawful order puts government employees in jeopardy. If they do so, then they are open to lawsuits down the road by those who their actions have hurt. President Trump signs an executive order in the Oval Office. (Photo: Carlos Barria/Reuters) Their hope, Samuel says, is that few employees will actually have to make the choice to enforce rules they think are illegal. The ideal situation in my view is that no one ever needs the help were offering, because if you have a substantial number of, say, Customs and Border patrol agents who say, Were not going to do this, the government would back off, he says. But they agree it is more likely that instead there will be more orders, affecting more employees, from more parts of government. It wont just be the travel ban, Litman says. There may be other illegal orders related to other things coming out of this administration. They stress that they cannot promise to win the cases they take. While the Merit Systems Protections Board rules specifically protect the jobs of civil servants who refuse to enforce illegal acts, there is not a lot of case law on the details, because it hasnt come up often in recent decades. No one knows what any particular judge will do in a particular case, Litman says. But they do promise to take the case pro bono. We are not saying, Go do this, Epps says. We are saying, If you do this, we will fight for you. Agreed Samuel: What it means is we will put our money where our mouth is. There are so many of us out there ready to do something. A lot of legal energy waiting to be unleashed and unlocked. Read more from Yahoo News: Bogota (AFP) - Colombia said FARC rebels will finish mustering in demobilization zones Tuesday to begin a historic disarmament process ending a half-century conflict. The country's last active rebel group, the ELN, said meanwhile the government had begun releasing certain detainees to clear the way for peace talks with that force, too. The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), the country's biggest rebel group, is set to disarm in coming months under a peace deal with the government. "The last march of the FARC has begun," with some 5,000 troops moving in various groups to gather in UN-monitored zones, a government statement said. Separately, the leftist National Liberation Army (ELN) said the government on Saturday released two of its imprisoned members to serve as peace negotiators -- one of the conditions to start talks. Their release was confirmed on Twitter by ELN negotiators gathered in the Ecuadoran capital Quito, where talks are scheduled to start on February 7. In return, the ELN is to release a former lawmaker it is holding hostage, Odin Sanchez, on Thursday. The government is due simultaneously to release two other imprisoned ELN members and grant them a pardon. After last year's contested peace accord with the Marxist FARC, President Juan Manuel Santos says he wants a deal with the ELN to seal a "complete peace" in Colombia. The Colombian conflict grew out of a crushed uprising over land rights in the 1960s. It has killed more than 260,000 people and left 60,000 missing, according to authorities. The conflict has drawn in not only the Colombian armed forces, the FARC and the ELN, but also drug gangs, right-wing paramilitaries and other leftist rebel groups that have since disbanded. No one knows with any degree of certainty what type of foreign policy approach President Donald Trump and his team might pursue. But important data points from the transition and during his first week do not form a promising picture. A cancelled visit by Mexicos president, chaos at our airports, and a political tirade in front of the CIA Memorial Wall give us plenty to worry about. The most likely scenario is an incoherent and dysfunctional policy process led by an ideological and hardline National Security Council and White House, an independent and reasonable Pentagon, a weak State Department, and an intelligence community leaking like a sieve to counter the White House. Lack of Coherence What is clear from the confirmation hearings for James Mattis, Rex Tillerson, and Mike Pompeo Trumps respective picks for secretary of defense, secretary of state, and CIA director is that the views of Trumps foreign policy team are all over the map and do not align with his own. While Mattis was calling NATO the most successful military alliance, probably in modern world history, maybe ever, Trump was describing it as obsolete. As Tillerson argued for a full review of the Iran nuclear deal, Mattis said that he would not have agreed to it but that the United States must keep its word, and White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus indicated that the agreement was on life support. It is good to have a diversity of views inside the national security team. This leads to robust debate and avoids the danger of groupthink. The problem is that you need a strong and engaged president who can listen to the various positions, make decisions, and set a clear course forward. There are no indications that Trump is going to have the attention span and willingness to do that. And without it, these types of disagreements will lead to dysfunction. The problem is further exacerbated by the fact that the Trump team has yet to nominate a single deputy or undersecretary for any of the key national security agencies. It will take months to fill these positions because they all require Senate confirmation, and these high-level officials are essential for teeing up decisions and setting policy. Under the Barack Obama administration, they spent hours together (some would argue too many hours) in the situation room hammering out positions, setting policy, and preparing decisions for the cabinet and the president. This interagency process is essential for making sure that all agencies are working towards the same objectives. But in the Trump administration it is not clear what the interagency process will look like, given that the two officials responsible for running it National Security Advisor Michael Flynn and his deputy, K.T. McFarland have little experience in managing this critical endeavor. Story continues Trumps immigration executive order is a poster child for how not to conduct interagency coordination. The White House wrote the order with no consultation with the State Department, Department of Homeland Security, or Office Legal Counsel. The end result was confusion from agencies that did not understand how to implement the order (and thus began doing so haphazardly) and legal holes so wide that courts stayed elements of the order within a day. Ideological National Security Council Without a strong interagency process, each agency will operate on its own often at cross-purposes. At the National Security Council, we can expect a right wing, pro-Russia agenda most reflective of the views expressed by the president. None of these officials have to be confirmed by the Senate, which gives Trump leeway to hire people with views similar to his own, even if those perspectives are unpopular with both Democrats and Republicans. The five phone calls between Flynn and Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak on the day Obama announced punitive steps against Russia for interfering in the election are perhaps most telling of what we might see from this National Security Council. While we do not know what those calls involved, it was interesting that Russian President Vladimir Putins response was so restrained and that Trump then came out and praised the Russian leader. It almost felt coordinated. As former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul, who worked on the Obama transition, explained, I dealt with Kislyak all the time when I worked at the White House. Never needed to call him five times in one day to make my point. In an unusual move, Trump has given Stephen Bannon his chief strategist a permanent seat on the Principals Committee an interagency of body of cabinet officials that deliberates on the most pressing national security challenges. Previous presidents have kept political advisors off this body to avoid mixing politics and national security and Bannons inclusion is an indicator of his power. Trump has also stated that Jared Kushner, Trumps son-in-law and senior advisor, who has no real foreign policy experience and a decidedly right-wing perspective on Israel, will be responsible for making peace between Israel and the Palestinians. And the fact that extreme far-right figures like Nigel Farage, the leader of the U.K. Independence Party, and Marie Le Pen, the president of the French National Front, are showing up for meetings at Trump Tower is another indicator of the people with whom Trump is surrounding himself. An Independent Pentagon While the National Security Council may reflect the relatively frightening foreign policy views of the president, you can expect something very different at the Department of Defense. Mattis will be in a politically strong position as an overwhelmingly popular choice on both sides of the aisle who sailed through confirmation with no controversy. He is also the only Trump national security nominee with unassailable credentials and experience for the job he is set to assume, which will give him even more leverage. As the secretary of defense, Mattis will have the authority based on current law to make decisions about significant movements of assets, troops, and money without checking with the White House. Even though the defense secretaries in the Obama administration also had these authorities, they often checked with the president and the national security advisor, because they knew that Obama and his team wanted to get deeply engaged on such detailed questions. And indeed, one critique of the Obama White House was that it was too controlling, often slowing decisions that should have just been made by the military with civilian oversight at the Defense Department. But with a disengaged president and a dysfunctional interagency process, Mattis will not feel those constraints and will likely use his authorities. For example, even as the National Security Council and Trump are moving closer to Russia and dismissing NATO, Mattis may want the United States militarily to deepen it commitment to Europe and deter Russian aggression. This is probably good for those of us who care about maintaining the transatlantic alliance. But it will also be confusing for our friends and adversaries. But Mattis will not be able to block many of the bad ideas coming out of the National Security Council and the White House. This was clear on Friday at the Pentagons Hall of Heros, where Mattis looked on as Trump signed the executive order on immigration, enacting a policy that Mattis has previously opposed. A Feckless State Department The outlook is different at the State Department, which will likely be quite weak. Tillerson will not have a huge budget and military assets to move around the globe. Instead, the secretary of states influence is largely derived from the perception that he speaks for the president and represents the administrations policies abroad. But Tillerson does not seem to have that connection to Trump. When he stated at his confirmation hearing that he had not yet spoken with Trump about the critical issue of Russia, what he was essentially saying was: I have no influence. The tough confirmation process during which a number of Republican senators, including John McCain, Lindsay Graham, and Marco Rubio, as well as many Democrats, aired their concerns may have weakened him further. This will give him less standing in future negotiations with Congress. And early steps by the administration to remove senior career officials at the department with no clear plans yet to replace them means confusion and lack of leadership for months to come. A Leaky CIA Finally, there is the Intelligence Community, in which relations with the president are off to a horrific start. Trump publicly cited Putin a former KGB agent over the assessment of U.S. intelligence agencies, and compared some of the leaks coming out of the Intelligence Community to life in Nazi Germany. This does not sit well with intelligence professionals many of whom risk their lives for the United States. As opposed to the State Department and the Department of Defense, where the Trump administration will have a large number of political appointments that it can use to bend those agencies to its will, there are few such slots in intelligence. Career professionals dominate the intelligence agencies, and Trump has already alienated most of them. The result is likely to be more of what we have already begun to see strategic leaks to undercut Trump and combat what some intelligence officials see as dangerous policies coming out of the White House. It is unlikely that the Intelligence Community leaked the opposition research memo on Trumps alleged ties to Russia many news organizations and political operatives had that information. It is much more likely that someone in the community detected and leaked the existence of the five calls between Flynn and the Russian ambassador to undercut what was viewed as both bad policy and inappropriate meddling with Obamas policies. The stories of intelligence counterparts warning British and Israeli colleagues not to share information with the Trump team for fear it would get to Russia and Iran is another indicator that the Intelligence Community may be at war with Trumps National Security Council and White House for the next four years. Ultimately, it is possible that much of what we have seen thus far is simply the result of a difficult transition process with a team that was not expecting to win the election and did not prepare as much as it should have. It is possible that as it catches up and learn to govern, some of these problems will go away quickly. But the way national security policy is made ultimately derives from the tone set by the president and there is no sign that Trump is changing. It is much more likely that in the months ahead we will see a national security team beset by conflict, with little leadership from the president, resulting in an incoherent foreign policy. The only question is whether this problem lasts six months until Trump decides to clean house and bring in new leadership at the National Security Council to try and fix the problems, or whether it will last four or eight years. Either way, it is bad news for the United States and its allies. Photo credit: MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images JACKSON, Miss. (AP) The Confederate battle emblem still waves on the Mississippi flag and appears in little danger of being erased anytime soon. Legislators have filed bills that propose to either change the flag that has been used since 1894 or punish schools, universities, local governments or state agencies that refuse to fly it. Leaders say there's little chance any bill will survive because there's no consensus on the issue that generates strong emotions. Mississippi is the last state with a flag that still includes the battle emblem a red field topped by a blue tilted cross dotted with 13 white stars. Critics say the flag symbolizes slavery and segregation and tarnishes a state with a 38 percent black population. "It's time for Mississippi to move in a new direction," said Democratic Rep. John Hines of Greenville, a member of the Legislative Black Caucus. "The state that I believe Mississippi can be that flag is not a representative symbol of it." Supporters say the flag represents history and heritage and many say they're tired of attempts to downplay references to the Confederacy. Republican Rep. Dan Eubanks of Walls, who is white, said that when he went door-to-door campaigning in 2015 in northern Mississippi: "People didn't care about anything except, 'Where do you stand on the flag?' Only one person said, 'Change it.'" The day after President Donald Trump was inaugurated, several people stood on an Interstate 55 bridge in Mississippi holding Trump banners, Mississippi flags and American flags, according to photos on the Facebook page of Delta Flaggers, a group that supports the state banner. The public display of Confederate symbols has come under widespread debate since the June 2015 slaying of nine black worshippers in a church in a Charleston, South Carolina, by an avowed white supremacist who had posed for photos with the Confederate battle flag. Soon after the massacre, South Carolina lawmakers removed a Confederate battle flag from the Statehouse grounds. Several Mississippi political leaders said this state needs to change its flag. Story continues All eight of Mississippi's public universities, several schools and city and county governments have stopped flying the banner because of the Confederate emblem, and the Mississippi flag has also been removed from other places, including a display of state flags outside the Oregon Capitol. Mississippi is marking 200 years of statehood, and the state Chamber of Commerce has distributed hundreds of bicentennial banners that some businesses are flying instead of the state flag. The banner has no Confederate images. Tuesday is the deadline for Mississippi legislative committees to pass or kill flag bills. House Rules Chairman Jason White, R-West, said without broad agreement on some sort of flag proposal, "I'm not willing to spend political capital on that." The Mississippi Supreme Court ruled in 2000 that the flag had not been officially recognized by state law since code books were updated in 1906. In the fall of 2000, a flag commission held several contentious hearings. Legislators put the matter to a statewide vote in April 2001. By a nearly 2-to-1 margin, voters chose the old flag over an alternative that would have displayed circles of stars representing Mississippi as the 20th state. Longtime state Sen. Terry Burton, R-Newton, served on the flag commission in 2000. "I got death threats and everything else," Burton said last week. He now chairs the Senate Rules Committee and, like White, said he is not willing to ask lawmakers to vote on any sort of flag bill this year. Republican Gov. Phil Bryant has said that if the flag design is to be reconsidered, it should be done by another statewide referendum. ___ Follow Emily Wagster Pettus on Twitter: http://twitter.com/EWagsterPettus . Kigali (AFP) - Thirty individuals claiming to be members of a Congolese militia group have sought refuge in neighbouring Rwanda, saying they were fleeing a Congo army offensive, the Rwandan government said Monday. The fighters were unarmed when they were apprehended after crossing the border near the Rubavu district on Sunday, Rwanda's defence ministry said. M23 is a mostly ethnic Tutsi rebel group that mutinied against the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2012, saying a peace accord signed in 2009 had not been respected by the government. The militia was defeated the following year, and hundreds of fighters fled the country. The Congolese armed forces (FARDC) refused to comment on any offensive in the country's east, but a military source told AFP that two army helicopters crashed on Friday near Rutshuru, close to the Rwandan border, during an operation against M23 fighters. On Monday morning, a memorial ceremony was held in Goma, a city near the border with Rwanda, for an officer killed in one of the crashes, an AFP correspondent reported. A United Nations source said its MONUSCO peacekeeping mission did not participate in the offensive. Earlier this month, Uganda said that 40 M23 rebels that had been quartered at a military base since 2014 had disappeared, and that about 100 more had been caught trying to cross into DR Congo. The Congolese government, for its part, said this month that some 200 former M23 fighters had occupied a village in North Kivu province, of which Goma is the capital. SKOPJE, Macedonia (AP) Macedonia's conservative leader Nikola Gruevski has failed to reach a deal with his traditional ethnic Albanian coalition partner to form a new cabinet, minutes after the deadline expired at midnight Sunday. Gruevski's party, VMRO-DPMNE, released a statement that calls for new elections and warns against any solution that would not include it. "A coalition agreement with the (ethnic Albanian Democratic Union for Integration) has not been reached ... The VMRO considers that holding new elections is the mature solution to overcome the crisis and set reform priorities. "Any other solution would lead only to new conflicts ... in an already divided society," said the party statement broadcast early Monday. Earlier, the DUI, the largest ethnic Albanian political party, announced it was unable to make a "clear decision" on a coalition with the conservatives. "We need more time and arguments to make a decision that will be useful to Macedonia's people," DUI spokesman Bujar Osmani told reporters in front of the party's headquarters in Tetovo, minutes before the Sunday midnight (2300 GMT) deadline. Gruevski, who had governed continuously since 2006, all but the first two years in coalition with DUI, stepped down in early 2016 amid uproar over a scandal involving widespread wiretapping of political opponents, judges and other officials. An EU-brokered deal led to an early election in December. The conservatives narrowly won, gaining 51 seats in the 120-member Parliament, but still need the DUI's 10 seats to secure a majority. Gruevski was hoping to renew the coalition. But DUI leader Ali Ahmeti set two conditions: one is for Albanian to be made a second official language throughout Macedonia and not only in areas where the Albanian minority, about a quarter of the total population, is concentrated. The other is for Gruevski to allow the investigation into the wiretapping scandal to continue. Story continues Gruevski's VMRO-DPMNE party rejected both conditions on Sunday. Gruevski had three weeks to secure a majority in the parliament. According to Macedonia's constitution, if the party that won the election fails to assemble a majority, the President gives the mandate to the second-largest party, in this case the opposition Social Democrats, who won 49 seats. Late Sunday, National Review published an editorial on Donald Trumps executive order titled Trumps Order on Refugees: Mostly Right on Substance, Wrong on Rollout. Echoing arguments circulating widely on the center right, it notes that capping refugees at 50,000 per year is similar to the policy that prevailed under George W. Bush and for Barack Obamas first term; that the directive to prioritize religious minority refugees in affected countries makes sense, given the existential threat they face from ISIS; and that there is precedent for Trumps order. In 2011, the Obama administration halted refugee-processing from Iraq for six months in order to do exactly what the Trump administration is doing now: ensure that terrorists were not exploiting the program to enter the country, the editorial states, adding dismissively that no one rushed to JFK International to protest. Recommended: How to Build an Autocracy In another slam at Trump critics, the editorial declares that the instant backlash, which has culminated in thousands of protesters creating chaos at the nations airports, is the result more of knee-jerk emotion than a sober assessment of Trumps policy. As the Islamic State continues its reign of terror, it should be a matter of common sense that the U.S. needs to evaluate and strengthen its vetting, the piece argues, focusing its criticism of the Trump administration on its implementation of the directive: Trumps order displays much of the amateurism that dominated his campaign. There seems to have been no guidance provided by the White House and the Department of Homeland Security to the officials nationwide who would be responsible for executing the order; and on Saturday, as refugees were being detained at airports across the country, it was reported that local officials were struggling to contact Customs and DHS higher-ups. The confusion extended to the question of whether the executive order applied to green-card holders. It took DHS secretary John Kelly more than 24 hours to clarify that this is not the case. Similarly, the White House should stipulate that this policy does not apply to the many Iraqi refugees who have acted as aides and translators to Allied forces... The order allows the relevant officials to intervene on a case-by-case basis to issue visas or other immigration benefits to nationals of countries for which visas and benefits are otherwise blocked, but this permission seems to have gone initially unnoticed. Story continues The editorial is correct in parts. Whether right or wrong, capping refugees at 50,000 per year is hardly unprecedented; there is nothing wrong, in principle, with evaluating the vetting process used to guard against terrorists entering the United States; the order does allow relevant officials to intervene on a case-by-case basis; and the Trump administrations implementation is as indefensible as the editors say. Recommended: How to Respond to Donald Trump's Betrayal of American Values Still, I find the editorial as a whole deeply wrongheaded, in large part because it strips away or ignores indispensable context. And I hope its authors will reconsider. * * * The most glaring flaw in the editorial is its characterization of what befell green-card holders, which I wrote about in A Betrayal of Legal Immigrants Who Followed the Rules. To say that confusion surrounded whether these legal, permanent residents would be affected, and that it took 24 hours to clarify that it was not the case, implies that the Trump administration never meant to bar their entry. It would be more accurate to say that the executive order erected a new barrier that kept green-card holders from entering the U.S.; that the Department of Homeland Security and a senior White House official both stated that green-card holders would be barred; that John Kelly, the new head of the Department of Homeland Security, reversed that position on green-card holders in a statement issued on Sunday evening; and that the reversal doesnt clarify that green-card holders were never affected by the executive order, it affirms that the order covers them, but adds that the new waivers they must now request if they travel abroad will be granted. Now a question for the editors of National Review. If not for the public-interest attorneys and journalists rushing to airports to speak with the family members of green-card holders about their unconscionable treatment, the legal challenges filed by non-profit organizations funded by the public, and the masses of outraged Americans who gathered at those same airports to protest, are you sure that the Trump administration wouldve reversed course? Recommended: What Trump's Executive Order on Immigration Doesand Doesn't Do The fact that the reversal on green-card holders occurred suggests at least the possibility that the people who congregated in hopes of that outcome were sober in their assessment of reality, and that the real knee-jerk response here is National Reviews temperamental aversion to anything that smacks of leftist street protests, especially when the protests are informed by a belief that the U.S. government is engaged in bigotry. In various instances I have critiqued charges of bigotry. Here I am baffled by National Reviews confidence in dismissing the possibility that this executive order springs from anti-Muslim bigotry, and is an attempt to ban Muslims to the extent possible in a nation that would resist a naked, total attempt. I agree we cannot call that established fact. And the conservatives declaring that this is not a Muslim ban are correct in noting, as Ive done in my coverage, that the executive order doesnt affect people from many majority Muslim countries, like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, and that even with respect to the affected countries it is billed as a temporary measure to make sure adequate security measures are in place, not a permanent ban on those nationalities. But the Americans who doubt the official explanation, the people protesting Trump who did not protest Obama, are not engaged in knee-jerk emotion or hypocrisy. They are forming reasonable concerns and responding to easily distinguishable facts. Before Obama imposed a 6-month pause in processing refugees from Iraq, an FBI investigation discovered that several dozen suspected terrorists may have been erroneously allowed to move from Iraq to the United States under the Bush administration. Two men living in Kentucky admitted making roadside bombs in Iraq. As a result of the Kentucky case, the State Department stopped processing Iraq refugees for six months in 2011, ABC News reported in 2013, even for many who had heroically helped U.S. forces as interpreters and intelligence assets. One Iraqi who had aided American troops was assassinated before his refugee application could be processed, because of the immigration delays. There was never any reason to suspect Obama had hidden motives for pausing to reevaluate security procedures; he did so in response to specific evidence of serious screening flaws; even then the cost of delay was terrible; but by the time the public even became aware of what had happened, refugee processing was up and running again. That Obamas order generated no mass protests makes total sense. Now consider Trump, whose vastly more expansive and consequential order covers seven majority Muslim countries, responds to no particular threat, post-dates the previous review on Iraq, and flows from the pen of a very different man who has said very different things about the people whose status he just changed. Trump has lied about seeing thousands of Muslims in New Jersey celebrating the collapse of the Twin Towers on September 11, 2001. He has attacked the Gold Star mother of a Muslim American soldier with an anti-Muslim stereotype. He tapped a high-ranking adviser, Mike Flynn, with a long history of making statements that are anti-Islam. Is National Review at all concerned that Trump might hold bigoted views against Muslims? Because more to the point, Trump declared repeatedly during his campaign that he wanted to ban Muslims from the United States. Numerous Republicans criticized him for doing so. That is the biggest reason many fear he is now trying to ban Muslims and using this order as a pretext. His close adviser, Rudy Giuliani, told Fox News in a live interview that the executive order Trump just signed sprang from a committee Giuliani formed for the specific purpose of constructing a Muslim ban in a way that would pass legal muster! Giuliani added that the ban eventually came to focus on countries where there was substantial evidence that people were sending terrorists into our country. Yet the order affects several countries that have yet to send a terrorist to the United States, and does not affect numerous Muslim-majority countries, including Saudi Arabia, home to 15 of the 19 September 11 hijackers; the United Arab Emirates or Egypt, home to other 9/11 hijackers; or Pakistan, where Osama bin Laden was hidden. The totality of these circumstances caused Ben Wittes, who usually avoids knee-jerk responses, to conclude that the executive order was written maliciously. This document is the implementation of a campaign promise to keep out Muslims, he declared, moderated only by the fact that certain allied Muslim countries are left out because the diplomatic repercussions of including them would be too detrimental. Ross Douthat was more cautious, declaring in his New York Times column, time will bring a certain clarity. Well find out whether Trumps refugee and visa freezes from Muslim countries are actually temporary, a means to stricter screening, or whether they become permanent. I understand the wait-and-see approach. But why is National Review taking the word of the Trump administration on these matters, despite knowing that Trump is a serial liar and a man of poor character, and having editorialized that Trump knows approximately as much about national security as he does about the nuclear triad which is to say, almost nothing, and that on immigration, Trump often makes no sense and cant be relied upon? I suspect part of the reason is a knee-jerk aversion to even entertaining the idea that a Republican president of the United States could be maliciously targeting an ethnic minority group. I can respect those who say that we cannot presently make that call definitively. But it is wrong to denounce protesterswho can cite ample circumstantial evidence to justify their concernsfor defending a vulnerable group at the first hint that theyre being targeted by unjust policies, rather than waiting to satisfy those temperamentally prone to missing such injustice until its too late. And it is downright bizarre to criticize protesters who flocked to airports before the reversal of the green-card order, which National Review itself considered wrongheaded. National Review complained about chaos the protesters supposedly caused at airports. If we could rewind history to Friday, would the editors prefer a scenario with zero protesters, confident that green-card holders would be taken care of anyway? I suspect they would be less willing to make that gamble if they had family members affected by the order. The people I spoke to at LAX Saturday, who had a grandmother or uncle or spouse detained, were buoyed in a difficult moment: While fearful about their place in America, they were met by a big crowd of peaceful supporters outside the terminal singing the Star Spangled Banner and Amazing Grace. Cars passing on the departures level were honking in support, too. To side with the president, giving him the benefit of these doubts, even knowing he is an untrustworthy liar, and to make uncharitable assumptions about airport protesters, is beneath a magazine that distinguished itself for seeing Trump clearly. And I suspect that if a president campaigned on promises to ban Christians from immigrating to America, or to target movement conservativesthen appeared to test how far he could go in that direction without pushback from lawmakers, the press, or the peopleeven National Review editors who werent inclined to allude to the Holocaust would take comfort in seeing a sign in support of Christians or conservatives like a sign weve been seeing at these airport protests. The sign says: First they came for the Muslims. And we said, Not this time, Motherfucker! I sincerely hope that message doesnt need to be sent to the Trump administration, and perhaps it misjudges their motives. Nevertheless, I am glad it is being sent, no matter if its hyperbolic or profane, to an untrustworthy White House, to a world uncertain about the U.S. as Trump takes office, and especially to the Muslim Americans understandably afraid of the new administration. Presidents Bush and Obama made it admirably clear that Muslims are welcome here. Trump, Steve Bannon, and associates have not, so that duty falls to the people. For once, the conservative movement should be among the leaders of the effort to protect vulnerable minorities instead of standing athwart or mocking those efforts. Besides, has anyone ever regretted that they trusted Donald Trump too little? Read more from The Atlantic: This article was originally published on The Atlantic. Stigma associated with disease still haunts Nepal Stigma attached to leprosy has been a major hindrance in wiping out the disease as many new cases found recently were completely disabled and deformed, meaning that the patients have been hiding the disease for long. In dozens of cities across the country this weekend, impromptu protests sprung up against the Trump administrations hastily-drafted executive order banning immigration from a handful of Muslim-majority countries. In Washington, protesters many reusing signs and placards from previous marches crowded around the White House, before marching to the Capitol. The protests were loosely organized; turnout seemed to be driven by word of mouth or through calls to action on social media. Jasmine El-Gamal, a former translator for the U.S. military in Iraq who was at the demonstrations outside the White House, said the executive order walks back promises to Iraqis who risked life and limb for U.S. troops. Now, several former translators she knows who put their lives on the line and were promised entry to the United States are in immigration limbo. (One Iraqi translator was temporarily detained in New Yorks John F. Kennedy Airport over the weekend). Our troops can no longer go into the field and promise refuge in America in exchange for cooperation, she told Foreign Policy. Weve alienated an incredibly large swath of Muslims across the Middle East just when we need their help the most, she added. Many protesters were immigrants themselves, or had friends or family who had experience with the U.S. immigration system. Refat Ahsan, a student at Virginia Tech who immigrated to the United States from Bangladesh when he was 3 years old and is now a U.S. citizen, told FP he was marching because he feared the ban could be extended to other Muslim-majority countries. My older relatives dont want to leave the country at the moment because they fear that if they leave, they will be next and not allowed to return, Ahsan said. About 1,000 people rallied at Chicago OHare airport, where a total of 16 people were detained after the immigration ban went into effect. One Chicago demonstrator, Sebastian Gregg, told FP his experience as a U.S. diplomat drove him to protest. Story continues Im not usually a big protester. Yesterday was a completely different story, though, and largely due to my experiences as a diplomat, he said. Gregg, who was a U.S. foreign service officer until 2015, said many current foreign service officers he spoke with were caught flat-footed with the executive order. They were simply not prepared for this seismic shift in visa policy, or more specifically were not even informed of the incoming changes, he said. Many, if not the majority, are abjectly horrified, he added. (Many career diplomats are in open revolt over the executive order, drafting a so-called dissent memo outlining their concerns to leadership in Foggy Bottom. Lawfare blog published a draft of the memo Monday.) Other protestors shared that sentiment. Reza Akbari, who was born in Iran and recently became a U.S. citizen, expressed frustration to see people who had immigrated to the United States legally being barred from entry simply because of their country of origin and religion. I went through the green card process and jumped through all the hoops to become a citizen, Akbari told FP. This is heartbreaking. It couldve have easily been me. Photo credit: JOSHUA LOTT/AFP/Getty Images Photo credit: AP From Popular Mechanics Who are the federal government's rogue tweeters, using official agency social media accounts to poke President Donald Trump? Are these acts of civil disobedience, or federal crimes? The online campaign began with unauthorized tweets - on subjects such as climate change inconsistent with Trump's campaign statements and policies - that have been mostly deleted from official agency accounts. It shifted tactics Thursday as at least 40 new but unofficial "alternative" accounts for federal agencies began spreading across Twitter. It wasn't clear how many unofficial accounts were run by government employees, but there were early indications that at least some were created by federal workers using their work email addresses - and that may have exposed their identities. The administration said the earlier Twitter actions involved tweets by unauthorized users - at least one was a former employee - who still had passwords for the agency accounts, including one case involving the account for the Redwoods National Park in California. Legal experts said the Justice Department could prosecute such tweeters under federal hacking laws, but the FBI so far was not involved. "An unauthorized user had an old password in the San Francisco office, went in and started retweeting inappropriate things that were in violation of their policy," White House spokesman Sean Spicer said. Separately, the National Park Service said tweets published earlier this week on the account of the Badlands National Park in South Dakota were posted by a former employee not authorized to use the account. Employees or former employees publishing unauthorized messages on official accounts could be prosecuted under the U.S. Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which prohibits someone from exceeding authorized access to computers. "The argument would be that the authorization to use the account was only for employees and implicitly that was extinguished when the employee left government employment," said Orin Kerr, a law professor at George Washington University. Story continues You can go right back through .@BadlandsNPS archive and find dozens of #climatechange related comments. What changed in a week? #politics - NOT ALT WORLD (@NotAltWorld) January 26, 2017 Even employees authorized to use official agency Twitter accounts could face legal jeopardy posting messages they weren't supposed to write, said Stewart Baker, a cybersecurity lawyer and former National Security Agency and Department of Homeland Security official. "If someone says you may not tweet except in these circumstances, and you tweet in other circumstances, you're exceeding authority," Baker said. He added that some federal courts would examine the security measures in place and could throw out cases where employees weren't clearly violating them. "It wouldn't surprise me if at this stage a criminal investigation was opened and criminal tools were used to investigate this, even if at the end of the day they decided not to pursue criminal charges," Baker said. A federal law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter by name, said he was unaware of any requests from federal agencies to investigate the rogue tweets. The unauthorized messages posted under official accounts appeared to be dropping off, as the Trump administration regained control over its agency accounts. Over last weekend, immediately after Trump's inauguration, transition staff changed all social media passwords for the Environmental Protection Agency, said Jared Blumenfeld, a former EPA official under the Obama administration who said he was speaking regularly with former colleagues. "It wouldn't surprise me if at this stage a criminal investigation was opened and criminal tools were used to investigate this." Starting Wednesday, scores of unofficial Twitter accounts appeared purporting to represent federal agencies, mocking Trump using the same social media service the president uses daily. At least some were linked to federal employees using work email addresses who inadvertently revealed their involvement. Twitter users can choose to allow others on the service to find them by searching for their email address. In other cases, Twitter notified users who previously shared their online address books using Twitter's "Find Friends" feature that anonymous accounts were created by federal employees whose work email addresses were already in those address books. One side effect to the Twitter dispute? Some U.S. government Twitter accounts saw surges in followers. "We're thrilled you found us," said the official account for Biscayne National Park in Florida, "for whatever reason." You Might Also Like Skopje (AFP) - Macedonia's president on Monday resumed the search for a new prime minister after the former premier failed to form a government, despite his party's narrow election victory. The December vote was held as part of a European Union-brokered deal between Macedonia's four main political parties aimed at ending a long-running political crisis. President Gjorge Ivanov was informed by parliament that the VMRO-DPMNE party led by Nikola Gruevski, the former premier and a veteran conservative leader, had failed to form a government within the 20-day deadline, his office said. A source in the office told AFP that Ivanov would restart consultations. In the vote, VMRO-DPMNE secured 51 seats in the 120-seat parliament, or two more than the Social Democrats (SDSM), the main opposition party. The neck-and-neck results meant that ethnic Albanian parties, with 20 seats between them, emerged as kingmakers, but Gruevski was unable to negotiate a deal. The three main ethnic parties are demanding that Albanian be made an official language. Ivanov may now ask the Social Democrats to try to form a government, or he could seek to form a broader coalition, according to analysts. SDSM leader Zoran Zaev said he was expecting Ivanov to give him the mandate, saying the president would be "breaking the constitution" if he did not, while VMRO-DPMNE said new elections were the "only mature solution". European Commission spokeswoman Maja Kocijancic urged the president to swiftly give the task to a leader capable of forming "a stable, solid and accountable coalition". Speaking in Brussels, she told reporters the coalition should be "as broad as possible" with a strong reformist consensus and inter-ethnic cooperation. Macedonia's political crisis emerged after a mass wiretapping scandal erupted in February 2015, inciting huge street protests both for and against the government. The scandal led Gruevski to step down in January 2016 after nearly 10 years in power, clearing the way for new elections. Macedonia wants to join both NATO and the EU, but its membership has been blocked by Athens over a dispute about the country's name -- a northern region of Greece is also called Macedonia. Ethnic Albanians make up about a quarter of Macedonia's two million people. Quebec City (AFP) - Gunmen killed at least six people and injured eight more when they opened fire in a mosque in Quebec City, Canada on Sunday night. Here are some of the major attacks perpetrated by gunmen against civilians around the world over the last two years. - Pakistan school raid - December 16, 2014: Taliban insurgents storm an army-run school in Peshawar, killing 154 people, most of them children. - Double Paris shootings - January 7-8, 2015: Gunman Amedy Coulibaly, claiming allegiance to the Islamic State group, kills a policewoman in a Paris suburb before attacking a Jewish supermarket the next day, where he kills four more people. He is killed in a police assault. On January 7, the Al-Qaeda-linked Kouachi brothers kill 12 people at the headquarters of the Charlie Hebdo satirical weekly in Paris. - Karachi bus slaughter - May 13, 2015: Gunmen storm a bus in Karachi and kill 45 people who belong to the Shiite Ismaili minority. IS claims the attack, its first in majority Sunni Pakistan. - Charleston church tragedy - June 17, 2015: A white gunman kills nine people at an historic black church in Charleston, South Carolina. - Tunisia beach attack - June 26, 2015: Gunmen kill 38 people, including 30 British tourists, at a beach hotel in Sousse, a little more than three months after a similar attack at the Bardo museum in Tunis kills 22 people, including 21 foreign tourists. IS claims both attacks. - Mali hotel siege - November 20, 2015: Gunmen take guests and staff hostage at a luxury hotel in Mali's capital Bamako, in a siege that leaves at least 20 dead, including 14 foreigners. The attack is later claimed by AQIM, which says it was a joint operation with the Al-Murabitoun group. - San Bernardino bloodbath - December 2, 2015: Syed Farook and his Pakistani wife Tashfeen Malik open fire at a Christmas party in San Bernardino, California, killing 14 people. IS hails the attack, but does not claim direct responsibility. - Ivory Coast assault - Story continues March 13, 2016: At least 14 civilians and two special forces troops are killed when gunmen storm the Ivorian beach resort of Grand-Bassam. Al-Qaeda's North African affiliate, Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), claims responsibility. - Orlando gay bar massacre - June 12, 2016: A gunman claiming allegiance to the Islamic State group opens fire inside a gay bar in Orlando, Florida, killing 49 people in the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history. - Munich mall rampage - July 22, 2016: David Ali Sonboly -- who police say was obsessed with mass murderers including Norwegian right-wing fanatic Anders Behring Breivik -- shoots dead nine people at a Munich shopping mall before turning the gun on himself, having spent a year planning the attack. - Istanbul nightclub terror - January 1, 2017: Seventy-five minutes after party-goers ring in the New Year, a gunman opens fire in the Reina nightclub on the banks of the Bosphorus, killing 39 people and injuring at least 65. - Quebec mosque terror - January 29, 2017: Six people died and eight were injured after masked gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque, a shooting Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned as a "terrorist attack." The death toll from a series of avalanches in Kashmir has climbed to 25 after five Indian soldiers pulled alive from beneath heavy snow died of their injuries, the military said Monday. The seriously injured troops were rescued Saturday after a day-long mission along the de facto border that divides the disputed territory with Pakistan. They had been approaching a border post along the Line of Control (LoC) when their track caved in. Hostile weather prevented the soldiers from being flown to a base hospital in the main city of Srinagar 140 kilometres (87 miles) away until Monday, but they succumbed to their injuries, the military said in a statement. They were the latest casualties from a series of avalanches in Indian-administered Kashmir, which is suffering one of its severest winters for decades. Last Wednesday 15 Indian soldiers died when a patrol and two camps were hit by separate avalanches in the north of the territory that is also claimed by Pakistan. It took rescuers two days to retrieve their bodies from under tons of snow. Five civilians -- four from a single family -- also died in separate avalanches. Heavy snowfall was recorded across the region and temperatures dropped to minus seven degrees Celsius (19 degrees Fahrenheit). Dozens of Indian and Pakistani soldiers are killed by avalanches every winter along the heavily militarised dividing line. Authorities have warned of the possibility of more avalanches in the Himalayan region and urged residents in the mountainous areas not to venture out. WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic U.S. senators tried to force a vote on a bill to rescind President Donald Trump's order banning travel from seven Muslim-majority nations on Monday, but were blocked by a Republican lawmaker. Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein said she had 27 co-sponsors of a bill to rescind the order Trump signed on Friday, but under Senate rules it takes only one member to prevent a vote. Republican Senator Tom Cotton blocked consideration of the measure. It would have faced a difficult fight for passage in the Senate, where Trump's fellow Republicans hold a 52-48 seat majority. Trump's directive on Friday put a 120-day hold on allowing refugees into the country, an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria and a 90-day bar on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The president argues that his action will protect Americans, but critics say it illegally singles out Muslims, violating U.S. law, and defiles America's historic reputation as a welcoming place for immigrants. More than 160 Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives introduced legislation in that chamber to defund and rescind Trump's order. But that measure is unlikely to advance in the House, where Republicans hold a 240-193 seat advantage, larger than their advantage in the Senate. (Reporting by Patricia Zengerle; Editing by James Dalgleish and Jonathan Oatis) Congressional Democrats on Sunday called for a demonstration on the steps of the Supreme Court to protest President Donald Trumps immigration order, calling for nationwide enforcement of judicial orders barring its immediate implementation. Trump issued an executive order Friday barring indefinitely immigration from Syria and for at least 90 days from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. It also suspended the U.S. refugee program for at least 120 days. I support the efforts of the ACLU [American Civil Liberties Union] and others to challenge this order on Constitutional grounds, and call on the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Customs and Border Protection to respect the district courts nationwide injunction prohibiting the U.S. government from removing lawful permanent residents and nonimmigrants who are returning home to the United States, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in a statement. Thousands protested Sunday at the White House and Capitol in Washington as well as in Bostons Copley Square ad Battery Park in Manhattan in addition to airports in Atlanta, Dallas, Los Angeles and Washington. Pelosi sent a Dear Colleague letter, inviting them to a press event on the steps of the Supreme Court at 6 p.m. Monday to demand the order be withdrawn and hold a candlelight vigil, flanked by refugees. We are witnessing an historic injustice unfold, and we must keep the pressure on, Pelosi wrote. She added: As Members of Congress, we take a solemn oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. Democrats intend to honor that oath by fighting the unconstitutional injustice of the Presidents Muslim ban. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., promised to introduce legislation to overturn the executive order, calling it mean-spirited and un-American. House Democrats are expected to take similar legislative action. Story continues Schumer choked up during a Sunday press conference announcing the legislation. Schumer also said Secretary of State-designate Rex Tillerson would be asked where he stands on the issue before his nomination can be approved. Whether such legislation goes anywhere is an open question. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Sunday he thinks the courts should handle the issue in an appearance on ABCs This Week although he did caution the administration against imposing any kind of religious test. House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., endorsed the executive order Friday. However, Schumer noted several Republican lawmakers have broken ranks and denounced Trumps order. Though the administration has denied the order is anti-Muslim, former New York Mayor Rudi Giuliani told Fox New Sunday the president had asked him how to construct the a Muslim ban so that it would pass constitutional muster. And what we did was, we focused on instead of religion, danger, Giuliani said. The areas of the world that create danger for us. Which is a factual basis, not a religious basis. Perfectly legal, perfectly sensible. And thats what the ban is based on. Related Articles As the shock of Novembers defeat and the reality of being in opposition finally sink in, Democrats are moving beyond denial and starting to think about how to win in 2018 and 2020. This months DNC Chair election is providing an opportunity to discuss what went wrong and how to do better. Although I am not a Democrat, I thought my friends on the left could benefit from an outsiders viewpoint. And, please dont worry, I wont tell you to start acting like Republicans. Clinton received 2.9 million more popular votes than Trump but lost the electoral college because her voters were concentrated in a few coastal states. Further, she would have won an electoral college majority had she been able to overcome an aggregate Trump margin of just 78,000 popular votes in three states. Trumps razor thin victories in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania could have been reversed if more Democratic-leaning voters had turned out, if fewer voters had selected a third party candidate or if fewer voters chose no Presidential candidate, voting only in down ballot races. Related: Will Democrats Stand Up to Trump? Heres Their First Test This last phenomenon large number of voters declining to choose a Presidential candidate - was so unusual that it triggered demands for a recount. In Michigan, for example, 75,000 ballots did not include a Presidential preference, compared to a margin of just 11,000 votes separating the two major candidates. As far as we can tell, these blank votes werent caused by errors or fraud: they were the result of voters who disliked both candidates so much that they couldnt bring themselves to vote for the lesser of two evils. This is testimony to Clintons unattractiveness as a candidate. Hundreds of thousands of voters across the country repelled by Trump and unwilling to vote third party still could not convince themselves to vote for Clinton, despite her depth of experience and centrist platform. These voters, along with others who didnt show up or voted for Jill Stein, could not accept Clintons cozy relationship with corporate interests, the whiff of corruption surrounding her familys Foundation and her email controversies. Story continues Post-election, Democratic insiders have blamed the Russians and FBI Director James Comey for Clintons defeat. And I find that hard to argue: news arising from leaked DNC email messages could have easily cost Clinton 78,000 votes in three states, as could the last-minute reopening (and reclosing) of the FBI investigation. But blaming external forces is not a solution for winning: all candidates risk running up against such headwinds, including Trump who managed to overcome a hot mic off-air recording that NBC should not have leaked. Between the 1930s and the 1980s, the Soviets intervened in US politics by supporting the Communist Party USA and beaming propaganda to us over short wave radio, so Putins actions in 2016 are nothing new rather just a higher tech version of the same old thing. Comey had been painted into a corner: he had sworn during Congressional testimony to promptly notify Committee members if new evidence turned up, and the cache of Clinton emails found on Anthony Weiners computer counted as such evidence. Related: The Power of the Pink Hat: Heres How Democrats Can Win America Back Rather than blaming these circumstances, Democrats should have chosen a candidate not vulnerable to the contents of a disgraced former Congressmans hard drive. And the DNC and Clinton Campaign should not have written email messages that could later be used against them. Remember that the Democratic National Convention last August was initially rocked by revelations that DNC staff were trying to figure out how to stop Bernie Sanders. The DNC and Democratic leadership seemed bent on protecting Clinton from serious primary opposition. This turned out to be a gross misjudgment. While the Republican process consisting of 17 candidates hurling mud at one another seemed ugly, it ultimately served a purpose. Jeb Bush, a weak candidate with strong establishment support, was winnowed out as were others that seemed to check all the boxes but werent ready for prime time. Trump emerged from this messy process by demonstrating that he had the will to win and the ability to motivate a large base of support. By contrast, Hillarys support was a mile wide and an inch deep. And the warning signs of her potential downfall were with us from the beginning of her primary campaign. News of her email server and her clumsy, shifting explanations for it date back to mid-2015. The $225,000 Goldman Sachs speeches were also in the news long before the Iowa Caucus. But instead of providing an opening for a stronger candidate to replace Clinton, Democratic Party leadership closed the doors to effective opposition. Compared to the Republicans, Democrats held fewer Presidential debates, sometimes scheduling them at low-viewership times. Donna Brazille even abused her post at CNN by feeding town hall questions to the Clinton campaign. Related: Trump Might Adopt a Democratic Plan to Crack Down on Drug Prices The fact that Bernie Sanders, who came from outside the party with a far left agenda was able to mount a major challenge to Clinton was another sign of her weakness as a candidate. But now that we have entered the post mortem period, Democrats are in danger of learning the wrong lessons from Sanders success. On the unproven assumption that Sanders would have defeated Trump last November, they conclude that Democrats need more progressive candidates going forward to excite the base. But for every base voter they motivate, hard left candidates may turn off more than one middle of the road voter. The Democrats last experience with a far left candidate George McGovern in 1972 did not end well: he lost 49 states. The British Labour Party offers its own cautionary tales. The Tories remained in power from 1979 to 1997 largely because Labour did not move toward the middle. Only when Tony Blair proclaimed New Labour and ended the partys support for nationalizing the means of production, was the party able to defeat the Conservatives, Labour is now repeating this mistake under its far left leader Jeremy Corbyn, failing to capitalize on Tory disorder in the wake of the Brexit vote and David Camerons resignation. I do not believe Sanders would have defeated Trump, but I am pretty sure that Obama or Biden could have. Indeed, Martin OMalley may have beaten Trump as well. The takeaway is that a center left candidate, advocating an approach similar to Clintons, but with a cleaner record and better able to connect with voters would have won in 2016 and will be best positioned to defeat Trump in 2020. This column was mistakenly posted under Mark Thoma's byline originally. The Fiscal Times regrets the error. Top Reads from The Fiscal Times: The Volkswagen Group has overtaken Toyota to become the world's biggest automaker by volume, with its sales for 2016 coming at 10.31 million vehicles. That compares to Toyotas tally of 10.175 million over the same period. Its the first time VW has been at the top of the sales ranks, while for Toyota its the first time in four years that it has missed out on the top spot. General Motors Company [NYSE:GM], which has been the worlds biggest automaker in more years than any other, is yet to announce sales for figures for 2016 but is expected to rank third overall. ALSO SEE: Mercedes overtakes BMW in sales race in US and abroad It was in 2009 that VW, under the guidance of former CEO Martin Winterkorn, first outlined plans to become the worlds biggest automaker by 2018. The plan, called Strategy 2018, was to see VW rely on innovative technologies as well as improved quality and customer satisfaction to boost sales. Martin Winterkorn Ironically, just as Winterkorns long-term goal was reached, the embattled executive is now being investigated by prosecutors in Germany over his knowledge of the defeat device software at the heart of VWs emissions cheating scandal. He was previously tied to a separate probe of market manipulation related to the scandal, along with other VW executives. Despite the scandal, VW experienced sales growth of 3.8 percent over the past year. The growth was mostly from China where diesel sales are much lower than in more established markets. Toyota's sales grew just 0.2 percent. The automaker was set back by production halts at some plants in Japan early in 2016 due to an earthquake and an explosion. A slowdown in the United States and less demand for hybrids like the Prius due to low fuel prices also had an impact on Toyotas sales. Supreme Court settles admission dispute between TU and AFU The Supreme Court has settled the dispute between the Tribhuvan University (TU) and the Agriculture and Forestry University (AFU) regarding student admissions in Hetauda. By Karen Freifeld and Arno Schuetze NEW YORK/FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Deutsche Bank AG has agreed to pay $425 million to New York's banking regulator over a "mirror trading" scheme that moved $10 billion out of Russia between 2011 and 2015, the regulator said on Monday. In addition, Britain's Financial Conduct Authority is about to penalize the bank roughly $200 million for the suspicious trades, a person familiar with the matter said. The scheme involved clients buying stocks in Moscow in rubles and related parties selling the same stocks shortly thereafter through the bank's London branch, the New York Department of Financial Services (DFS) said in a statement. The trade of a Russian blue chip stock, typically valued at between $2 million to $3 million an order, was cleared through the bank's New York operations, with the sellers typically paid in U.S. dollars, the regulator found. The regulator, which licenses and supervises the New York branch, found the bank conducted its business in an unsafe and unsound manner in violation of state banking law. Though the trades appeared to have no legitimate economic purpose, Deutsche's deficient anti-money laundering controls and know-your-customer policies did not detect and stop the scheme for years, DFS superintendent Maria Vullo said. Deutsche Bank said "it has been unable to identify the actual purpose behind this scheme," according to a consent order between the New York regulator and the bank. "It is obvious, though, that the scheme could have facilitated capital flight, tax evasion or other potentially illegal objectives." In addition to the penalty, Deutsche is required to retain an independent monitor to review the bank's compliance programs. A spokesperson for the Financial Conduct Authority declined to comment. The source on the FCA's expected penalty did not want to be identified because the terms were not public. The New York regulator said it worked closely on the investigation with the FCA. Reuters reported on Monday that Deutsche Bank was poised to settle with British and U.S. authorities over the trades. The U.S. Department of Justice, which also has been investigating the suspicious trades, is not party to the deal. A spokesman for the Justice Department declined to comment on the status of its probe. Deutsche Bank disclosed last September that it had taken disciplinary measures against certain employees as part of an investigation of the trades and would continue to do so. The bank also cut back on its investment banking activities in Russia last year. Monday's consent order found Deutsche Bank's Moscow traders facilitated the scheme. Deutsche Bank had set aside 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion) in provisions for the Russian case, people close to the matter have told Reuters. A resolution on the mirror trades comes on the heels of a $7.2 billion agreement with the Justice Department for misleading investors in selling mortgage-backed securities in the run-up to the financial crisis. The two probes lift much of the uncertainty swirling around the bank over its exposure to fines and enforcement. The bank is due to report fourth-quarter financial results on Thursday. (Reporting By Karen Freifeld; additional reporting by Kirstin Ridley in London and Kathrin Jones in Frankfurt; Editing by Bernard Orr) President Donald Trump boasted on Monday that he was instrumental in knocking roughly $600 million off the cost of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program as part of his effort to bring down defense costs. During a White House conference on small businesses Monday morning, Trump highlighted the savings he said he squeezed out of defense giant Lockheed Martin. Related: The 10 Most Expensive Weapons in the Pentagons Arsenal We cut approximately $600 million off the F-35 fighter, Trump said during the meeting in the Oval Office. I appreciate Lockheed Martin for being so responsive, and that will be appreciated very much. Trump also claimed to have fixed the F-35 program more generally: There were great delays, about seven years of delays, tremendous cost overruns. Weve ended all that, and weve got that program really, really now in good shape. The president acknowledged that the savings applies only to the latest batch of 90 of the stealth jet fighters, out of close to 3,000 planes called for in the overall program. He said that the savings stemmed from high-level talks that Trump instigated with Lockheed Martin beginning in early January, after he complained that spending for the aircraft was out of control. Trump summoned Marillyn Hewson, Lockheeds CEO, to his Florida estate on Dec. 21 for a meeting that included the military head of the F-35 program. Trump and Hewson met again in January, this time at Trump Tower in New York. Related: The Pentagon Is Planning a New Super Rival to the Troubled F-35 At that second session, Hewson signaled to the president-elect that Lockheed intended to trim the price of the next batch of 90 F-35 jets. Lockheed expected the cost of the latest batch of planes to fall by 6 percent to 7 percent, compared to the previous batch. Valerie Insinna, the air warfare reporter at Defense News, calculated that the $600 million reduction in costs claimed by Trump for the next batch of F-35s is roughly in line with expected drop in price. Story continues Last week, Hewson said that the cost reductions she negotiated with Trump were not tantamount to slashing our profit or hurting the companys profit margins. Instead, she said, the cuts were part of the companys long-term effort to bring down the cost of the F-35 by lowering costs in the supply chain and manufacturing. Trump targeted Lockheed Martin as part of a broader attack on costly defense contracts, including Boeings proposed next-generation Air Force One. Even before he was sworn in as president Jan. 20, Trump sought to burnish his reputation as negotiator-in-chief by attacking government waste and browbeating the auto industry and other manufacturers to abandon plans for moving jobs overseas. Related: Trump Says Costs Be Damned as He Moves on Major Defense Buildup In the case of the F-35, which is worth upwards of $450 billion to Lockheed Martin, Trump threatened to end the contract and replace the fifth-generation fighter plane with an enhanced version of the F/A-18 Super Hornet. He also rattled Air Force brass who felt compelled to challenge the president-elects dismissive characterization of the program as a financial disaster. However, as the military subsequently explained to Trump and his aides, the F/A-18 Super Hornet has a much different design and purpose and lacks the stealthy, radar-evading features of the F-35. Top Reads from The Fiscal Times: Amid nationwide protests, lawsuits and court stays in response to his Executive Order halting entry to America for citizens of seven Muslim majority nations, President Donald Trump today addressed the matter directly kind of. After an afternoon spent watching Finding Dory with his family and friends at the Executive Mansion, the ex-Celebrity Apprentice host responded in a way that is becoming increasingly familiar in the early days of his administration: Stand steadfast but tone the language down and alway blame the media. America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave, a statement from the President said Sunday. We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say, the statement added. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting, Trump goes on to say of the Executive Order he signed on January 27. With detentions, ACLU lawyers and chaos at airports including LAX, Dulles in DC, DFW in Texas, NYC and more, the order puts a 90-day freeze on travel by citizens of Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Syria, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen. The wide-ranging order also halts Syrian refugees from resettling in America for the next 120 days with an aim to eventually cut those admitted by 50% to 50,000. RelatedWriters Guild Calls Travel Ban Unconstitutional & Deeply Wrong As has also become the norm after eliciting a backlash for its actions, the subsequent more measured approach from the Trump administration this afternoon seems to contradict POTUS own words on social media of earlier today: Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world a horrible mess! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 Heres the full statement the White House released from the President on Sunday afternoon: Story continues America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave. We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say. My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering. At the same time as the official word from the White House is more contrite, tweets from Trump lashed out at the 2008 GOP Presidential candidate and an another Republican Senator who disagree with his actions. Earlier in the day, Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham issued a statement that said, in part, that ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. POTUS hit back hard: The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong they are sadly weak on immigration. The two Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 Senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 It should be noted another Republican, Senator Bob Corker has now come out against the way the travel ban order was implemented. Corker is chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee and was considered a pick for Trumps Secretary of State at one point. With the SAG Awards tonight, expect a lot more reactions and expressions from Hollywood later today. RelatedKal Penn Turns Trolls Tweet Into $250,000 Refugee Fundraiser; Im Speechless, Actor Says Related stories Donald Trump Moves Supreme Court Choice Reveal To Tuesday Primetime, Sending Networks Scrambling Barack Obama Dings President Trump's Travel Ban In First Statement Since Leaving Office Samantha Bee Announces Safe Haven For Hollywood Celebrities At Alt-White House Correspondents' Dinner By Ben Hirschler LONDON (Reuters) - Novo Nordisk, the world's top maker of diabetes drugs, is investing 115 million pounds ($145 million) in a new research centre in Britain, undeterred by Brexit. The Danish company said on Monday it would invest the money over 10 years in the centre based at the University of Oxford, which will employ 100 scientists hunting for new ways to treat type 2 diabetes. Britain's vote last year to leave the European Union was disappointing but did not undermine the case for working with a renowned centre of science, said Mads Krogsgaard Thomsen, Novo's chief scientist. "There's no doubt that Brexit created uncertainty for a period in our deliberations," he told Reuters. "It is unfortunate, but we've passed that challenge and I'm convinced we've no need to worry...Oxford is a worldwide powerhouse in medicine." The decision was welcomed by the government of Prime Minister Theresa May, who last week highlighted life sciences when she laid out a new industrial strategy designed to rebalance Britain's heavily services-based economy after it leaves the EU. Treasury minister David Gauke said Novo's move was "a vote of confidence in the UK's position as a world-leader in science and research". Brexit has raised concerns in the life sciences sector, with academics fretting over a potential gap in funding currently provided by the EU and drugmakers concerned over future medicine regulation. The European Medicines Agency - based in London for now, but likely to move after Brexit - currently offers a one-stop-shop for drug approvals, smoothing the sale of pharmaceuticals across borders. Given these challenges, some drug company executives have warned that Britain could lose its appeal as a centre for research and manufacturing. Novo's move is therefore reassuring, although the bulk of the company's work in producing new diabetes treatments, including large-scale drug development and manufacturing, will still be done in Denmark. Significantly, Britain's two big domestic drugmakers have both committed to new investments in the country recently. AstraZeneca is finishing a $500 million headquarters and research centre in Cambridge, while GlaxoSmithKline pledged $360 million to expand manufacturing in Britain in July, just five weeks after the Brexit vote. Novo Nordisk has built a booming business over the last two decades by focusing on diabetes, which is a growing problem worldwide, driven by obesity and sedentary lifestyles. More recently, however, it has struggled with squeezed prices in the key U.S. market. It said James Johnson, currently a professor at the University of British Columbia, had been appointed head of the Novo Nordisk Research Centre Oxford. Johnson is an expert on pancreas biology, insulin action and diabetes. The new set-up will allow for daily interactions between academics at Oxford and Novo's industrial scientists. (Editing by Ruth Pitchford/Keith Weir) The Hague (AFP) - Four of the largest mosques in The Netherlands said Monday they will shut their doors during major prayer meetings after six people were killed in attack on a Canadian mosque. The Blue Mosque in Amsterdam, The Hague's as-Sunnah Mosque, Rotterdam's Essalam Mosque and the Omar Al Farouq Mosque in Utrecht said in a statement "we feel compelled to close mosque doors during prayers." Additional safety cameras have also been set up at the Blue Mosque, situated in the southwestern suburbs of the Dutch capital. Several thousand people attend prayers at the four mosques daily. "Merciless acts such as in Quebec contribute to the growing global hatred of Muslims," Said Bouharrou of the Dutch Moroccan Council of Mosques (RMMN) told AFP. "A mosque is an open building that should be accessible at any time of day to all people looking for peace and calm." "But we have to be alert against these terror attacks. It's disappointing that these stringent safety measures should be put in place," Bouharrou said, adding mosque leaders were in close contact with the Dutch National Coordinator for Security and Counterterrorism (NCTV). Six people died and eight others were injured late Sunday when gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque in a shooting Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a "terrorist attack." The Netherlands is facing parliamentary elections in March with anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders leading in opinion polls. Wilders said he would close all mosques and Islamic schools and ban the Koran if he becomes the country's next prime minister. Although no specific threats have been made against mosques in The Netherlands, Bouharrou said the RMMN was keeping a close eye on political developments, ahead of next month's vote. "There is considerable anxiety ahead of these elections. A politician like Mr Wilders has had clear viewpoints (about Islam) over the last few years," he said. By Asma Alsharif CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt may issue bonds in other international currencies after successfully selling $4 billion of Eurobonds last week, Finance Minister Amr El Garhy said on Sunday. He told a news conference that potential issuing currencies included the Japanese yen and China's yuan but that it was too early to say when or how much Egypt might seek to borrow. Egypt sold $4 billion of Eurobonds in three tranches on Tuesday, raising twice as much as targeted and at lower yields than initially expected. The combined order books for the five-, 10- and 30-year bonds exceeded $13.5 billion, which bankers said should mean demand is there for further bond sales. "If (Egypt) decides in 2017 to issue more external debt it will be able to do so because (Tuesday's) issuance was covered 3.5 times," said one banker, who declined to be named because he is not authorised to speak to media. "That on its own shows there is a lot of appetite. "The appetite is mainly driven by the economic reforms happening in Egypt combined with the lack of investment opportunities abroad that have similarly high yields," he added. Another banker said bigger-than-expected demand for the 30-year bonds had been a surprise and showed confidence is growing in Egypt's long term stability. Six years after a popular uprising drove away tourists and investors, both major sources of foreign currency, the country of over 90 million people is struggling with an acute shortage of dollars. To meet its financing needs, it has sought funding from a variety of sources, from development loans to foreign grants and aid. Tough economic reforms, including floating its currency, which roughly halved the value of the Egyptian pound overnight, and a three-year, $12 billion International Monetary Fund programme have helped reassure foreign investors. Economists say Egypt faces debt repayments of about $11 billion next year. Allen Sandeep, head of research at Naeem Brokerage, said Egypt's external debt to GDP ratio of 18 percent - much lower than major emerging market countries like India or Russia - meant it had scope to raise more funding internationally. "If we look at a comfortable level of 25 percent of GDP, that would give Egypt room to borrow at least $20-25 billion more through international bonds," although it was likely to have to pay more to borrow than at last week's sale, he said. (Editing by Catherine Evans) Chicago (AFP) - Former US president George H.W. Bush was released from the hospital on Monday after spending approximately two weeks recovering from pneumonia, including a stint in intensive care, his spokesman said. The 41st president, age 92, was taken to Houston Methodist Hospital on January 14 suffering from bacterial pneumonia. His 91-year-old wife Barbara, who had viral bronchitis, was also admitted to the same health facility but released just several days later. "President George H.W. Bush was discharged today from Houston Methodist Hospital after being treated for pneumonia," Bush spokesman Jim McGrath said in a statement. During his stay the former president was intubated for 48 hours to aid with his breathing. Bush has Parkinson's disease, which has left him in a wheelchair, but doctors said it was not a major factor in this latest illness. His is a less-common version of Parkinson's that only affects the lower body. Advanced age was of greater concern. The former president and first lady received many messages of support, doctors said, including from a family that hand-delivered a get-well card which hung in the former president's hospital room. "He is thankful for the many prayers and kind messages he received during his stay, as well as the world-class care that both his doctors and nurses provided," McGrath said. Bush, who served as commander-in-chief from 1989 to 1993, is the oldest of the five living former US presidents. He is father to former president George W. Bush (2001-2009) and former Florida governor Jeb Bush, who was a contender in the 2016 Republican presidential primaries. Top Myanmar lawyer, adviser to Aung San Suu Kyi's party, assassinated A leading lawyer and adviser to Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) party has been shot dead at Yangon airport in Myanmar. By Julia Harte and Timothy Mclaughlin WASHINGTON/CHICAGO (Reuters) - Steve Loomis, president of the Cleveland Police Patrolmens Association, had a blunt message for Donald Trump during a meeting in September: court-ordered reforms aimed at curbing police abuses in the midwestern city are not working. Loomis and two other attendees said Trump seemed receptive to Loomis's concerns that federally monitored police reforms introduced during the Obama administration in some cities in response to complaints of police bias and abuse are ineffective and impose an onerous burden on police forces. Trump, Loomis said, was taken aback by the waste of money when the union chief told him that federal monitors overseeing his citys police department earned $250 an hour - a standard salary for the position. "I think hes going to have a more sensible approach to rising crime rates," Loomis said of now President Trump. "What I got from the meeting was that Donald Trump is going be a very strong supporter of law and order." Emboldened by Trump's election, some of the countrys biggest police groups want to renegotiate "consent decrees" agreed to under President Barack Obama, the police labor groups said in interviews. Consent decrees are agreements between a police force and the Justice Department that can prescribe changes to use of force, recruiting, training and discipline. They are enforced by a federal court with the oversight of court-appointed monitors. Currently 14 police departments, including Seattle and Miami, are operating under the decrees. The police groups want to discuss the decrees with Jeff Sessions, Trump's designee for attorney general who has voiced criticism of them, although any renegotiation would be legally complicated because all parties as well as a federal judge must approve any changes. There are certainly decrees that are inartfully applied that wed like to see revisited, said Jim Pasco, the head of the Fraternal Order of Police, the nations largest police union with 330,000 members. It endorsed Trump in September and has worked with Sessions, a Republican senator from Alabama, for years while lobbying Congress for pro-police policies. Weve always found him a man whos willing to listen to alternatives to a previously charted course, Pasco said of Sessions. Civil rights groups are alarmed at the possibility that the decrees could be unraveled, saying they have been an important tool for the government to try to address issues like excessive use of force by police in Baltimore and an officer shooting in Ferguson, Missouri that led to nationwide protests. Trump officials did not respond to multiple requests for comment on the meeting with Loomis. While Trump has not publicly commented on consent decrees, he has expressed strong support for police departments and unions, and on Jan. 20 the White House said he wants to end the "dangerous anti-police atmosphere in America." CURBING ABUSE There have been questions by police and conservative politicians over the effectiveness of the consent decrees, which give the Justice Department power to obtain court orders imposing reforms on police forces that routinely violate civil rights through practices such as unlawful stops and seizures, racial discrimination, and illegal uses of force. The federal program was authorized by Congress in 1994 in the aftermath of riots in Los Angeles sparked by the police beating of Rodney King. Some police unions complain the decrees stigmatize police and impose overly restrictive limits on use of force. They also chafe at what they see as misguided federal prescriptions to local problems and have fought the reforms in court. A reform agreement that the Justice Department negotiated with the New Orleans police department in 2013, for instance, has been extraordinarily expensive to implement, said Donovan Livaccari, the lawyer for the Louisiana Fraternal Order of Police. The city of New Orleans is footing the bill. The Obama administration negotiated 24 reform agreements with law enforcement agencies during Obama's eight years in office after finding patterns of excessive force, racial bias, poor supervision and other issues, more than double the 11 agreements reached under the previous Bush administration. Vanita Gupta, the last Obama-appointed head of the Justice Department's civil rights division, which investigates and recommends reforms for police departments, defended the use of consent decrees in an interview, saying they are apolitical ways of improving public safety and making policing more effective. Bill Johnson, head of the National Association of Police Organizations, which represents about 241,000 officers, said he expects local police associations to examine existing consent decrees to see whether the Justice Department under Obama overstepped in imposing any measures. Some police union officials say they have been encouraged by comments by Sessions, who has said that federal inquiries smear police departments and undermine respect for officers. Under Attorney General Sessions, itll be more, Okay, theres a problem, lets craft an agreement as best we can and cure it, and then move onto the next thing, Johnson said. Union officials said they expect the Trump administration to initiate and reach fewer binding reform agreements with police departments, and they hope Sessions will work with them to try to re-negotiate some of those existing agreements. Sessions said in his confirmation hearing on Jan. 10 that he wouldnt commit that there wouldnt be any changes to existing consent decrees when he becomes attorney general if police departments show improvement before they have fully complied with the terms of the decree. A Trump transition official said Sessions would not comment on his testimony until after the Senate votes on his appointment. That vote is not expected until February. DECREES HAVE MIXED RESULTS Not all union leaders agree that the decrees costs outweigh the benefits. Sean Smoot, who directs the Police Benevolent & Protective Association of Illinois and serves as a monitor for the Cleveland police reform agreement, said the federal inquiries prompt cities to hire more cops and invest in better equipment. The decrees have had mixed results. Reforms in some cities, such as Los Angeles, have resulted in higher public satisfaction with police and declines in reports of police use of force. In other places, such as Ferguson, the city has missed multiple deadlines for implementing reforms required by its decree. Civil rights advocates in Chicago say that given Trump's law and order platform they fear his administration will neglect the Justice Departments findings from a 13-month-long investigation into the police force. Issued in the last days of the Obama administration, the Justice Departments Jan. 13 report found that Chicago police routinely used excessive force and violated the constitutional rights of residents, particularly minorities. City officials signed an agreement to negotiate a consent decree. But with Trump in the White House, its not clear where the leverage is going to come from for the reforms, said Jamie Kalven, founder of the Invisible Institute, a nonprofit group which advocates for police transparency. The White House did not respond to a request for comment about Kalven's concerns. Jonathan Smith, the Obama-appointed former chief of special litigation in the Justice Departments Civil Rights Division, said he is confident that most agreements reached during the Obama era will remain intact because they are overseen by judges who are committed to their implementation. In Cleveland, for instance, the judge who oversees the reform agreement that Loomiss union is objecting to recently rejected any efforts to renegotiate it. (Editing by Jason Szep and Ross Colvin) By Alexander Cornwell DUBAI (Reuters) - Emirates airline has changed pilot and flight attendant rosters on flights to the United States following the sudden U.S. travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries, highlighting the challenges facing airlines trying to deal with the new rules. The world's largest long-haul carrier, which flies daily to 11 U.S. cities, has made "the necessary adjustments to our crewing, to comply with the latest requirements," an Emirates spokeswoman told Reuters by email on Sunday. She added U.S. flights continue to operate to schedule. President Donald Trump on Friday suspended the entry of people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The decision caught airlines off guard, according to the International Air Transport Association. "I cannot think of anything comparable. This brings a mix of administrative confusion, impact and uncertainty for many travelers as well as practical operational headaches and complexities for airlines in planning their flight programs," independent aviation consultant John Strickland told Reuters. The ban applies to pilots and flight attendants from the seven countries, even though all flight crew who are not U.S. citizens already need a special visa to enter the country. Nicoley Baublies, from the German cabin crew union UFO, said the move was very unusual and meant uncertainty for airlines in terms of planning. "Lufthansa has always ensured it has very diverse crews, with staff of different nationalities and that means that we are for the first time in decades having to look at where people come from," he told Reuters at Frankfurt airport. A spokesman for Lufthansa said on Sunday it was too early to comment on the effects of the order but that airlines and passengers were required to follow the new rules. Another Emirates spokeswoman said the impact of the ban on operations would be minimal. The airline employs over 23,000 flight attendants and about 4,000 pilots from around the world, including the United States, Europe and the Middle East. Meanwhile, a spokesman for Etihad Airways of Abu Dhabi said the airline had "taken steps to ensure there will be no issues for flights departing over the coming weeks." Japan Airlines <9201.T> (JAL) on Monday said it had begun screening passengers from the countries affected Trump's travel ban before their departure for the United States. JAL officials would contact the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency to confirm whether passengers would be allowed entry, a spokesman for Japan's second-biggest carrier said. It is unclear if the ban applies to dual nationals - those who hold one passport from a country on the list and another from a non-U.S. country that is not. Etihad said on its website that dual citizens could travel to the U.S. using their non-banned passport. IATA have told its members that the ban does not apply to dual nationals if they have a passport not on the list, according to an email seen by Reuters. However, the Guardian reported on Saturday, quoting State Department officials, that dual nationals were banned. US officials said on Sunday holders of green cards need to check with a U.S. consulate and will be cleared on a case by case basis. EFFECT ON TRAVEL DEMAND? On Sunday, IATA sent another email to member airlines, seen by Reuters, asking for examples of Green Card holders being denied boarding. It also said it was seeking more information from authorities in Washington. Baublies said the uncertainty over the rules was not helping. "Trump reacts in 140 characters, we don't know what it means - for people with the wrong entries in their passports or with dual nationality or married to someone from one of the countries affected, are they allowed to travel?" There are also concerns the restrictions could dampen travel demand. "Ultimately this could feed through to the role airlines play in the global economy in supporting business and tourism due to as yet unquantifiable impacts on demand & cost," Strickland said. Baublies said airlines were usually among the first affected by global crises. "We hope it doesn't mean that seats are left empty because people don't know where they can travel with which passport." Dubai-based Emirates and Etihad Airways are both owned by the governments of the United Arab Emirates, a U.S. ally and Muslim-majority country. Both carriers said they would continue to comply with the new rules on U.S. immigration but where possible would offer to refund or re-book affected passengers. Emirates and Etihad have also said that passengers were affected by the ban over the weekend but their flight crews had not been impacted. Qatar Airways declined to comment on the impact of the ban on flight operations, although on Saturday it issued a statement on its website that passengers would need a green card or diplomatic visa to enter the U.S. Emirates and Etihad issued similar statements. (Reporting by Alexander Cornwell in Dubai, Reuters TV in Frankfurt and Victoria Bryan in Berlin, editing by Ralph Boulton and Stephen Coates) Brussels (AFP) - The European Union on Monday kicked off the second stage of a training scheme for Libya's coastguard to stem the trafficking of migrants. The programme was launched last October to help train and equip Libya's coastguard to intercept unseaworthy migrant boats on the Mediterranean. From Monday a new contingent of 20 coastguards will be trained on the Greek island of Crete, the EU's foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said in a statement. The training will cover "maritime legal aspects, human rights and raising gender awareness, as well as search and rescue operations," the statement said. The first tranche of 78 coastguard staff are due to complete their training in February. More than 181,000 people made the perilous Mediterranean crossing to Italy last year, and close to 177,000 to Greece. A record 5,000 died trying to make the trip. Of those headed to Italy, the vast majority crossed from Libya -- but the EU's "Sophia" naval mission, launched in 2015 to crack down on smugglers, can only operate in international waters, limiting its effectiveness. Germany on Monday criticised the "catastrophic" human rights situation for migrants held captive by traffickers in Libya, ahead of an EU summit set to discuss migrant flows through North Africa. Last week the European Commission said the fragile UN-backed government in Tripoli should receive 3.2 million euros ($3.4 million) for the coastguard training programme, as the EU debates how to get Libya to do more to curb migrant departures. By Gabriela Baczynska BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union delivered a tacit rebuke on Monday to U.S. President Donald Trump over his new travel bans, but diplomats said harsher criticism was unlikely due to internal divisions among EU member states. In his most far-reaching action since taking office on Jan. 20, Trump last Friday put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily banned travellers from seven Muslim-majority nations. The action, which resulted in legal U.S. residents also being turned away at airports, drew strong criticism from rights groups, foreign leaders and others. The EU's foreign policy chief, Italy's Federica Mogherini, said Europe would continue to work closely with countries across the Muslim world and to help refugees from the region. "In Europe, we have a history that has taught us that ... you might end up being in a prison if you build all the walls around you," said Mogherini when asked about Trump's action. "The EU will continue to work... with all the countries of the region regardless of their religion." Trump's ban covers citizens of Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. He says the ban will help keep Americans safe and he has cited recent attacks by Islamist militants in several European countries. "WE DO NOT DISCRIMINATE" A spokesman for the European Commission said lawyers were analysing Trump's executive order on immigration to see whether it would affect Europeans, adding that this was not yet clear. "This is the European Union and in the European Union we do not discriminate on the basis of nationality, race or religion," said the spokesman, Margaritis Schinas. But achieving unity among the EU's 28 member states on Trump's travel ban is likely to prove difficult, especially given the rise of anti-Muslim, far-right parties in France, the Netherlands and elsewhere. The speed of Trump's announcements since taking office and his use of Twitter to communicate directly with supporters have also wrongfooted the EU, with its cumbersome decision-making machinery. "Even if we arrive at a common stance, there is a group of EU states that would not sign anything too critical of the United States," said one diplomat in Brussels. A second diplomat also said the trans-Atlantic relationship required delicate handling. "There is the problem of the speed at which he Tweets and how the EU works, how quickly we can react. And the general mood is of great caution. It's a new situation in which we could end up preaching to the United States as we would normally do to a third-world country," the diplomat added. While some EU officials and citizens see Trump's ban as discriminatory and xenophobic, the EU is currently also working to curb the flow of migrants and refugees to its soil after the uncontrolled arrival of some 1.5 million people in 2015-2016. Though the EU measures on curbing immigration fall well short of Trump's travel bans, member states such as Hungary and Bulgaria have built new border fences to try to keep out migrants and refugees. (Additional reporting by Alastair Macdonald and Philip Blenkinsop, Writing by Gabriela Baczynska; Editing by Gareth Jones) Brussels (AFP) - The EU will ensure its citizens are not affected by any "discrimination" caused by US President Donald Trump's ban on travellers from seven Muslim countries, a European Commission spokesman said Monday. "Our lawyers are in contact with our EU partners and others, and of course we will make sure that no discrimination is inflicted on our nationals," Margaritis Schinas, the spokesman for Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker, told reporters. "This is the European Union, and in the European Union we do not discriminate on the basis of nationality, race or religion, not only when it comes to asylum but in any of our policies." Trump's measures, introduced by executive order just one week after he took office, have been criticised by allies. Barring Syrian refugees indefinitely and citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days, the measures also affect those with dual nationality. Schinas said that the Commission, the executive arm of the 28-nation EU, was taking "measured time" to find out what the effect on European citizens would be. "At this stage the situation is not clear, and we are in the process of establishing if the executive order has consequences for EU citizens having dual nationality with one of the seven countries which this travel ban is now targeting," he said. By Eric Auchard FRANKFURT (Reuters) - German software maker SAP SE, Europe's largest technology company, criticised Donald Trump's immigration curbs, saying the United States, its biggest market, has drifted away from the nation's principles of opportunity and equality. In a letter addressed to "all our nervous families wondering about your place in the world" Chief Executive Bill McDermott told SAP's 84,000 global employees that "we are always in your corner", while emphasising its own non-discrimination policies. SAP joined U.S. technology leaders from Apple, Facebook and Google in emailing their employees to denounce the suspension of the U.S. refugee program and the halting of arrivals from seven Muslim-majority countries. McDermott, a New York native and U.S. citizen, described a nation "stitched together by immigrants" and expressed confidence that "America will find its way back to its original identity," which he asserted was based on opportunity and equality for all. SAP is moving gingerly to reassure its employees while also seeking to avoid tussling publicly with the new U.S. administration. The firm, which supplies software planning tools that help multinational companies manage far-flung operations, generates nearly one-third of its revenue in the United States. Twenty-one percent of SAP's employees were based in the United States, according to its 2015 annual report. Last week, SAP said trade uncertainties presented by the Trump policies could drive sales of its business planning software as it raised its business outlook for the next four years (http://reut.rs/2kEKuJD). McDermott said it was premature to say what impact U.S. policy changes may have on business. While technology firms denounced the travel restrictions, many counterparts in other industries either declined to comment or responded with statements reiterating their company's commitment to diversity. (http://reut.rs/2jME4Ht) (Reporting by Eric Auchard, editing by Louise Heavens) BEIRUT (AP) Syria warned Monday of safe zones for civilians that U.S. President Donald Trump has expressed interest in creating, saying it would have to come in coordination with the Syrian government, otherwise it would be unsafe and violate the Arab nation's sovereignty. The announcement was made in Damascus by Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem during a meeting with the head of the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR, Filippo Grandi, who began an official visit to Syria on Monday. The announcement came about a week after the Trump administration's expressed interest in setting up safe zones for civilians in war-torn Syria, an idea that was greeted with caution by Russia and Turkey, who have taken the lead in the latest peace efforts to end the Mideast country's devastating six-year war. The idea of safe zones, proposed by both Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Hillary Clinton during the U.S. presidential election campaign, was ruled out by the Obama administration for fear it would put U.S. aircraft in harm's way with Russia waging an air campaign to aid Syrian President Bashar Assad's forces since September 2015. The recent rapprochement between Russia and Turkey, a key backer of Syrian rebels which now has thousands of troops in northern Syria, in theory makes the creation of safe zones more achievable. So does Trump's pledge to mend ties with Moscow. However, Syrian state news agency, SANA, said the foreign ministry and UNHCR officials agreed that any attempt to impose safe zones without coordination with the Syrian government will be an "unsafe act and will pose a violation of the Syrian sovereignty." Meanwhile, Al-Moallem called on all Syrians refugees who fled the war in their homeland to return home, pledging that the government will meet all their needs. It was not clear if the call was related to Trump's signing of executive orders placing a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen, and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program. Syrians are indefinitely blocked from entry. Story continues Syria's conflict, which began in March 2011, has displaced half the country's population and sent more than four million Syrians as refugees, mostly to neighboring countries. SANA said al-Moallem briefed Grandi on the "huge efforts" the Syrian government is exerting to improve the living conditions of its people and the displaced as well. For his part, Grandi stressed that the offering of humanitarian aid will continue. Earlier on Monday, the Syrian military said the evacuation of rebels and their families from the Barada Valley as part of an agreement to surrender the capital region's primary water source has been completed. The military said via the Telegram messaging system that 1,142 fighters and 760 members of their families have been evacuated from the region northwest of the capital Damascus. They were taken in buses to the rebel-held northwestern province of Idlib. The evacuation marks the end of a nearly six-week-long standoff between rebels and pro-government forces that led to severe water cuts to some 5 million people around Damascus. Syrian state TV reported later Monday that pumping water to some neighborhoods of the capital resumed after technical teams fixed some of the pumps at the Ein al-Fijeh spring. It said work is ongoing to fix all pumping stations in the area in what would mark an end to the weeks-long water crisis. The military said more people are to be evacuated from the nearby village of Harira but it has been delayed because the roads are closed with snow. Meanwhile, the Russian military said its heavy bombers struck the Islamic State group in eastern Syria on Monday, the latest in a series of such raids in recent days. The Russian Defense Ministry said six Tu-22M3 bombers flew from their base in Russia to strike IS targets in the province of Deir el-Zour. It followed four previous such raids Jan. 21-25. Monday's raid targeted two militant command facilities along with weapons and ammunition depots and militants. Syrian troops have been struggling to repel an IS offensive in Deir el-Zour since earlier this month. The extremists control the entire province except for a small pocket of the provincial capital and a nearby air base. _____ Associated Press writers Albert Aji in Damascus, Syria, and Vladimir Isachenkov in Moscow contributed to this report. When an interviewer asks you for a list of references, are you confident about the names you hand over? Do you wonder what kind of questions they might be asked, or whether you've picked the right people? Are you supposed to list your current manager, or is it OK not to? Here's a quick rundown of the basics that you should know about job references. [See: Famous CEOs and Executives Share Their Best Career Advice.] What kind of questions will your references be asked? This varies from employer to employer, but it's pretty typical for a reference checker to ask about the quality of your work, your strengths and weaknesses, the reason you left the job and whether the employer would hire you back if they could. They may also ask more detailed questions, such as how well you took feedback, how you got along with co-workers and how reliable you were, and they might even ask for specific examples of times that you showed particular initiative or solved a tricky problem or resolved a customer complaint. Some reference checkers will stick to just verifying your title, dates of employment and job duties -- but that's more typical of a background check than a reference check. Who should you pick for references? The best references are people who managed your work and will speak positively of you. You want to offer up people familiar enough with you and your work that they can speak with some nuance to your skills and accomplishments -- and you definitely want people who will speak of you with enthusiasm. A lukewarm reference who sounds ambivalent can raise concerns for the employer who's considering hiring you. How many references do you need? Typically you should have at least three references who you're comfortable offering up. If you're early in your career and have only had one or two jobs, employers will generally understand if you only have one or two references from managers. [See: 15 Awesome Jobs That Pay More Than $90K.] Is it OK to use peers instead of managers? Past managers will make the strongest references, because they're the people who were charged with evaluating your work. Peers can talk about you as a co-worker, but most reference checkers will want to hear the assessment of the person responsible for evaluating you. But it's OK to include one peer on a reference list as long as you also include several managers. (And if you don't include any managers, reference checkers are likely to wonder if you're hiding something.) Story continues Do you have to list your current manager? No! It's very normal to ask a reference checker not to contact your current boss because most people don't let their employer know they're job searching. If an employer is insisting on a reference from your current manager, it's reasonable to push back. You can point out that you can't jeopardize your job by letting your manager know that you're looking to leave. But if the employer keeps insisting, one option is to allow it only once you have an offer (which can be contingent on a good reference from your current job). What if you're not in touch with previous managers anymore and don't know how to find them? Try hard to find them. Check LinkedIn, check with other former co-workers to see if they know where to find the person, and otherwise do your best to locate them. Many employers will be wary of hiring you if they can't speak to anyone who has managed you in the past. (And this is why it's important to stay in touch, so that you don't find yourself in this position!) Does an employer need your permission to contact a reference? No. Employers don't need your permission to contact your references, and they also aren't limited to just the names you provide. They can call anyone they'd like, including jobs that you didn't put on your reference list. (This is more likely to happen if the hiring manager knows someone at one of your previous employers and contacts the person to ask about you.) That said, it's considered bad form to contact your current employer without your explicit permission. [See: 8 Ways Millennials Can Build Leadership Skills.] What if your old employer doesn't give references? Some companies have policies that they'll only confirm dates of employment and won't provide more detailed references. In most cases, though, it's usually human resources who sticks to that policy, while individual managers are often willing to give more candid references, no matter what the policy says. That's especially true for strong employees, since most managers want to help former good employees find their next jobs. What if you're worried about a former boss giving you a bad reference? If you're worried about getting a bad reference, trying calling your old boss to see if she's willing to reach an agreement with you about what she'll say to reference checkers. Many managers will be willing to work something out with you if you explain that you're worried that their reference is making it impossible for you to find work -- even if it's only to agree to limit the reference to confirming your work there. But if your old boss is outright lying about you, go straight to your former company's HR department and explain what's happening. HR should recognize the potential for legal problems if a company rep is lying about you and they are likely to intervene with your old boss. Last, if none of that works, you might need to warn future reference checkers that the reference from that manager might not be a positive one. That will allow you to provide some context about why -- such as that your work there suffered while you were having health problems that have since been resolved, or that you were in a job that was a bad fit for your skills. Moving day has finally arrived for an alleged squatter accused of taking over an elderly womans home for a year and filling it with trash. Read: Woman's Heartbreak After Notorious Hoarder Takes Over Her Mother's Home: 'Incredibly Traumatic' Cheryl Sherrell, 71, moved into the San Diego, California, house a year ago to take care of the elderly homeowners, Alan and Fran Breslauer. When Alan died at age 92 last January, she was reportedly asked to leave but allegedly refused to go and the 90-year-old widow moved out, leaving Sherrell in the home. The once immaculate home was filled with trashed, according to the elderly couple's daughter, Jan. It's like having the city dump dumped in your mothers home, she told Inside Edition. It is mind-blowing. Sherrell is a notorious hoarder. In 2010, she was featured on the TLC show Hoarders: Buried Alive. It took an entire year of legal wrangling for the Breslauer family to win back their home of six decades. Inside Edition was there as the accused hoarder finally moved out all her stuff Friday. Today is the day we are finally getting the property back although as you can see, its a total disaster. It's a disaster and fairly disgusting," Jan said. "I see old lamps, paperback books; I see TV sets, vacuums, ski poles, liquor bottles. I can't even begin to catalogue the amount of trash that has been brought into this house." Sherrell rented a big truck and recruited a bunch of friends to get her stuff out as two police officers arrived to keep the peace. Read: Shelter Bombarded With Requests to Adopt Two Dozen Puppies Saved From Animal Hoarder All day long, they carried out furniture and boxes but even she didn't want some of the stuff. As most of the things were cleaned out, some of the junk is still in the home. Its a cautionary tale," Jan said. "You have to be extremely careful who you let into your home." Story continues Earlier this month, Sherrell agreed to move out of the home as part of a settlement in a civil lawsuit. As part of the settlement, Sherrell did not admit to any wrongdoing. Her lawyer says Sherrell was a legal tenant, not a squatter. In October, Sherrell was arrested and charged with theft, theft against an elder, elder abuse and criminal trespass. She pleaded not guilty to all the charges and her trial is scheduled for on February 21. Watch: Pregnant Chihuahua Poses for Maternity Photo Shoot After Rescue From Hoarder Home Related Articles: Are you Russian? Tired of the cold winters? Authoritarian antics of President Vladimir Putin got you down? Well Anton Bakov, a Russian businessman and ex-member of parliament, has your back. Because Bakov has plans to restore the Russian monarchyon some desert islandsin the South Pacific. Bakov wants to buy three uninhabited islands from the small Pacific nation of Kiribati to establish what he calls an alternative Russia. The details on how he plans to do that are sketchy. But during a visit to Kiribati on Jan. 27, he said he planned to invest $350 million into the islands to create a resort, support the local economy and, of course, to restore the Romanov Empire to its former glory days. This is the desire ofa great number of Russian patriots who are not happy with Putins regime, Bakovs wife told Radio New Zealand. (Though its unclear how many Russians who dont like Putin also want to reinstall a tsar). Its not the most traditional form of foreign investment, but Kiribati may not quibble over such details. (After all, $350 million is a large chunk of cash for a country whose 2016 GDP was just $211 million.) Former Kiribati president Teburoro Tito told Radio New Zealand on Jan. 27 that he favored the deal. If they can do it, without any cost on us, except from the land which we can host them, then I dont see any fuss at this stage, he added. The Kiribati government declined to comment to Foreign Policy, though its foreign investments commission is reportedly still mulling Bakovs proposal. Some say the deal may be too good (and too weird) to be true. Sitiveni Halapua, a former politician from the nearby island nation of Tonga, said he understands how Kiribati would be tempted by the cash. But one has to remember that sometimes you think, This is the solution to your problems, and it turns out to make the problems worse, he said. Russia already has a history with some of Kiribatis neighboring island nations. After the 2008 Russia-Georgia war, three of them Vanuatu, Tuvalu, and Nauru recognized Georgias breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia in exchange for lucrative economic deals from Russia. (Russia reportedly paid Nauru $50 million for recognizing Abkhazia). Story continues The last Romanov Tsar, Nicolas II, died in the Bolshevik revolution 1917. But Prince Karl Emich of Leiningen, a distant relative to the family line, is the living would-be heir to the now-defunct throne. Bakov established the Monarchist Party in Russia in 2012 to re-establish the throne, but his enthusiasm to go back to the days of the tsars hasnt caught fire in Russia. Maybe thats just because he didnt have an island resort to go along with it. Photo credit: De Jongh Freres Neully Paris/Bonhams/Wikimedia Commons Trump denies immigration restriction caused airport chaos President Donald Trump on Monday denied his immigration order was to blame for the chaos at nation airports over the weekend, instead pointing to computer glitches, protesters and even the "tears of Senator Schumer." The two biggest stories of the past few days, President Trumps immigration ban and his restructuring of the National Security Council to elevate his chief political strategist above top military and intelligence leaders are largely being treated as separate events. But there is a case to be made that they should, even that they must be viewed as two sides of the same coin. The ban, announced Friday night, bars all refugees from entering the country for 120 days, and singles out refugees from Syria, the victims of a horrific humanitarian disaster, for an indefinite ban. It also bars people from seven majority Muslim countries, including Syria, and those holding valid visas, from coming to the United States for at least 90 days. The ban was initially applied to legal permanent residents, but after multiple federal judges issued stays against enforcement, the Trump administration seems to be backtracking slightly. Related: Trump Says Costs Be Damned as He Moves on Major Defense Buildup As many warned, the decision to implement what amounts to a ban on millions of Muslims coming to the United States, combined with Trumps spoken assurance that he will give preferential treatment to Christians, was greeted with glee by supporters of terrorist organizations. They predicted that it would reinforce the idea that the United States is at war not with terrorism but with Islam as a whole. And thats where Steve Bannon comes in. Trumps senior counselor and chief strategist does not want to prevent a war between the US-led West and Islam. He believes an apocalyptic war of immense proportions has already started and that the real problem is that the West isnt taking it seriously enough. That view is largely shared by Michael Flynn, the retired Army General who serves as Trumps National Security Advisor and chairs meetings of the NSC. Thats why Fridays other executive order needs to be seen as a companion piece to the travel ban. The second EO demoted the Director of National Intelligence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff -- key leaders of the Intelligence and Defense communities, respectively -- from the Principals Committee of the National Security Council. Both will be limited to attending meetings that address issues specifically in their areas of expertise, though many struggled, particularly with regard to the DNI, to think of a national security related subject that would not be in their portfolios. Story continues Related: Team Trump on Immigration Disruption: Its a Small Price to Pay In their places, it put Bannon, the former publisher of the alt-right Breitbart News, an individual with no relevant national security experience. The reason the refugee ban and Bannons elevation to the NSC need to be viewed as connected is that it is Bannons worldview that plainly informs Trumps decision-making on issues like terrorism and relations with the Muslim world. In 2014, in a lengthy video-conference presentation to the Human Dignity Institute at the Vatican, Bannon laid out his vision on the need for a Church Militant to fight an ongoing war between the Judeo-Christian west and Islam. It is not a struggle for land or influence, in Bannons view, but a truly existential fight between Islam and the West. Were at the very beginning stages of a very brutal and bloody conflict, he said. If the people in this room, the people in the church, do not bind together and really form what I feel is an aspect of the Church Militant, to really be able to not just stand with our beliefs, but to fight for our beliefs against this new barbarity thats starting, that will completely eradicate everything that weve been bequeathed over the last 2,000, 2,500 years. Related: Trump Pratfalls Onto the World Stage Targeting Muslims, Mexico, and Iraqs Oil Bannon continued, in increasingly apocalyptic terms, to describe a major war brewing, a war thats already global. Its going global in scale, and todays technology, todays media, todays access to weapons of mass destruction, its going to lead to a global conflict that I believe has to be confronted today. Every day that we refuse to look at this as what it is, and the scale of it, and really the viciousness of it, will be a day where you will rue that we didnt act. Given Bannons perspective, the travel ban is not a massive and counterproductive overreaction to a real but limited threat. Its an early step in the belated prosecution of a war that -- it cant be stated clearly enough -- he believes has already begun. Ask yourself, 500 years from today, what are they going to say about me? he urged the Vatican audience. What are they going to say about what I did at the beginning stages of this crisis? He closed with this: See whats happening, and you will see were in a war of immense proportions. Its very easy to play to our baser instincts, and we cant do that. But our forefathers didnt do it either. And they were able to stave this off, and they were able to defeat it, and they were able to bequeath to us a church and a civilization that really is the flower of mankind, so I think its incumbent on all of us to do what I call a gut check, to really think about what our role is in this battle thats before us. With that view in mind, it feels safe to say that if Trumps immigration ban exacerbates existing divisions between Islam and the West, Bannon will view that as a feature of the new program, not a bug. Top Reads from The Fiscal Times: Masaya Nakamura, the Japanese video game pioneer known as the "father of Pac-Man", has died aged 91, his company said Monday. Nakamura, who passed away on January 22, founded a company in 1955 that would later become Namco. The company started out by installing two wooden, mechanical horses on a department store rooftop and went on to develop household and arcade games, theme parks and other amusement facilities. It merged with Japanese toy giant Bandai in 2005. Namco game designer Toru Iwatani created the yellow Pac-Man, which hit the market in 1980. The gobbling character became hugely popular among gamers, with the Guinness World Records ranking it "the most successful coin-operated arcade machine". The company did not release details about Nakamura's death, citing the wishes of his family. Photo credit: NASA From Popular Mechanics Project Apollo was first proposed by the Eisenhower administration in early 1960, even before Alan Shepherd became the first American to fly in space in May 1961. It was conceived to develop more advanced spaceflight technologies, including a spacecraft that could hold three people instead of one, and it had an obvious end-game target: the moon. "Apollo riding his chariot across the sun was appropriate to the grand scale of the proposed program," NASA manager Abe Silverstein, who named the program, explained in 1960. The plan required so many technological advances-building new rockets, building new spacecraft (including control modules and landing modules), designing new spacesuits, developing new control systems and writing new code-that it was easy to consider the whole program outrageously overambitious. Then in May 1961, just 20 days after Shepherd's first flight, President Kennedy called on NASA to put a person on the moon before the decade was out. I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish. - Special Message to the Congress on Urgent National Needs, May 25, 1961 NASA quickly realized that it needed an interim project to develop new spaceflight technologies and strategies before work on Apollo could begin in earnest, and Project Gemini was born. That program, which ran from 1961 to 1966, launched ten crews of two into low Earth orbit. Many of the core spaceflight operations for Apollo were developed in Project Gemini, including sending astronauts on extra-vehicular activity (EVA), or spacewalks, and docking two spacecraft together. The Gemini capsule, which Apollo 1 astronaut Virgil I. "Gus" Grissom helped design, was known as the "pilot's spacecraft" for the enhanced control of the craft given to the astronauts. Story continues Photo credit: NASA Finally it was time for Apollo. The first mission would include two veterans of Project Gemini, Gus Grissom (who also flew in Project Mercury) and Edward H. White II, as well as Roger Chaffee of Astronaut Group 3. The spacecraft they would be flying in, the first version of the Command/Service Module Block I, had been launched in test flights on Saturn 1B rockets, the same launch vehicle that the crew would ride into low Earth orbit for up to 14 days. Apollo 1 was to perform a verification test on the more complicated spacecraft for three-the first test in the mission to the moon. The launch date was set for February 21, 1967. Photo credit: NASA A week before delivery of the Command/Service Module, the crew expressed their concerns about the amount of flammable material in the spacecraft to Apollo Spacecraft Program Office (ASPO) manager Joseph F. Shea. They even presented a parody photo of their crew portrait to Shea that was inscribed: "It isn't that we don't trust you, Joe, but this time we've decided to go over your head." Shea instructed his team to remove some of the flammable material, including nylon and Velcro straps, but did not oversee the process. Photo credit: NASA On January 27, 1967, during a launch rehearsal test, an electric source-determined to be "vulnerable wiring carrying spacecraft power" and "vulnerable plumbing carrying a combustible and corrosive coolant"-lit the nylon in the spacecraft, as well as the astronauts' nylon suits. The fire spread rapidly due to the high-pressure, pure oxygen atmosphere inside the capsule. The astronauts could not open the hatch door because of the inflated pressure in the spacecraft, and there were few emergency procedures prepared because the test was considered low-risk due to the fact that the rocket was not fueled. When all three Apollo 1 astronauts died in the fire, their last panicked words recorded, many at NASA surely wondered if they could in fact rise to the challenge set by President Kennedy, who had been assassinated over three years earlier. The mission name Apollo 1 was officially retired by NASA in remembrance of the crew, who had chosen the name, on April 24, 1967. Yet support from President Johnson allowed the Apollo program to continue. In October 1968, the first manned Apollo flight, Apollo 7, launched to low Earth orbit. Apollo 8 flew around the far side of the moon just two months later, and of course Apollo 11 landed on the moon on July 20, 1969, fulfilling Kennedy's call. We returned five times after that, and haven't been back since the last Apollo flight in 1973. Photo credit: NASA As we climb back to the moon, beyond to Mars, and maybe one day all the way to the stars, it's important to remember the men who gave their lives to exploration-who fearlessly forged ahead to bring humanity to worlds beyond our skies. Command Pilot Gus Grissom, Senior Pilot Edward H. White II, and Pilot Roger Chaffee are enshrined in the same hallowed tomb as the test pilots who were lost before them, and the crews of the Space Shuttles Challenger and Columbia. But fifty years later, the sting of Apollo 1 is still particularly severe. The astronauts selected to lead us on a journey to the moon were also the first U.S. astronauts to die in a spacecraft. But their legacy lives on, their courage lives on, and their willingness to press into the unknown lives on in people across the world. There's always a possibility that you can have a catastrophic failure, of course; this can happen on any flight; it can happen on the last one as well as the first one. So, you just plan as best you can to take care of all these eventualities, and you get a well-trained crew and you go fly. - Gus Grissom, December 1966 You Might Also Like Thousands of New Yorkers gathered in lower Manhattans Battery Park on Sunday to protest the executive order signed by President Trump on Friday that halted immigration from seven Muslim countries and barred entry for all refugees for at least the next 90 days. Bookended by One World Trade Center to the north and the Statue of Liberty to the east, the diverse crowd of demonstrators alternated between chants of Let them in and No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here, as several local officials, including New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, took the stage to condemn Trumps action. A protest in New Yorks Battery Park on Sunday against President Trumps immigration order. (Photo: Caitlin Dickson/Yahoo News) The presidents executive order is un-American, de Blasio declared to cheers from the crowd. We see clearly where this road leads and how dangerous it is. There were many children present, including a young boy who stood with his family behind a large Yemeni flag and led a group of demonstrators in a call-and-response chant of Show me what democracy looks like, this is what democracy looks like. Yemen, one of seven, said the boys father, referring to seven countries affected by Trumps travel ban. In addition to Yemen, they are Syria, Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Sudan and Libya. Abu Ali, who immigrated to the U.S. from Libya 42 years ago, said he and his family had come from their home in Connecticut to Sundays protest to try to educate people about Muslims, because President Trump, hes really discriminating against the Muslims. There is extremist, there are people who are not extremist, you cant put everybody in the same basket, he said, urging that everybody has to be treated in a dignified way. Slideshow: Protests against Trumps travel ban hit the streets of NYC >>> If a hurricane comes here, it wouldnt distinguish between Muslim and Irish, he added. Were all in the same boat. Ali said he is an electrical engineer, his wife is a teacher and his son works at Yale hospital. Like them, he said, many people seeking refuge in the U.S. want to contribute to American society. Story continues Theyre coming from decent families, he said. Theyre coming to make it. Sunday marked the second day of massive protests in New York and around the country in response to Trumps controversial order. On Saturday night, thousands rallied at the international terminals of major airports in New York City, Chicago, Dallas and several other cities, where citizens of affected countries were already being detained. On Saturday night, a federal judge in New York granted an emergency stay for citizens of those countries who are already in the U.S. or traveling here with valid visas. Read more from Yahoo News: _____ Related slideshows: Slideshow: Anti-Trump protesters rally for Muslim and immigrant rights >>> Slideshow: Protests at U.S. airports over travel ban >>> Ford Motor Co on Monday criticized President Donald Trumps controversial immigration order, becoming one of the highest profile U.S. manufacturers to question the decision to temporary ban travelers coming from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Ford Executive Chairman Bill Ford Jr. and Chief Executive Officer Mark Fields said in a statement to employees that the company does not support what it called a new U.S. travel ban. We do not support this policy or any other that goes against our values as a company, they said, adding that Ford is not aware of any employees directly affected by the policy. Fields met twice with Trump last week to talk about economic issues. Ford was harshly criticized by Trump during the campaign for moving some production to Mexico, but he has praised the automaker in recent weeks for announcing new U.S. investments. Ford is based in Dearborn, Michigan, home to one of the largest Arab-American populations in the United States. General Motors Co, Fiat Chrysler Group NV, Toyota Motor Corp and Honda Motor Co are among automakers that have declined to comment when asked by Reuters about the immigration order. Tesla Motors Inc CEO Elon Musk has also criticized the order. Voter list update: 14 districts get extra time The Election Commission has extended the deadline for updating the voter list in 14 districts until February 11 after it failed to complete the works by January 28. Quebec City (AFP) - Gunmen stormed into a Quebec mosque during evening prayers and opened fire on dozens of worshippers, killing six and wounding eight in what Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned as a "terrorist attack." Police arrested the two assailants following the shooting Sunday inside the Islamic Cultural Center in a busy district of Quebec City, police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe said. She gave no indication of the identities or nationalities of the two suspects. One witness told Radio Canada that "the two men were wearing black cagoules," and one of them "had a "strong Quebecois accent." Some 50 people were in the mosque when the shooting began at around 7:30 pm on Sunday (0030 GMT Monday) toward the end of evening prayers, Coulombe said. Several minutes later, police descended on the Saint-Foy district -- an area packed with offices and shops some 10 kilometers (six miles) west of the city's historic center. The mosque has already been the target of hate: a pig's head was left on the doorstep last June during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Other mosques in Canada have been targeted with racist graffiti in recent months. The shooting comes as Canada has vowed to open its arms to Muslims and refugees after US President Donald Trump's controversial immigration ban Friday prompted travel chaos and outrage around the world. - 'Senseless violence' - People fleeing the mosque -- where custom requires worshippers to remove their shoes during prayer -- ran barefoot through the snow. "They arrived in a panic," said Louis-Gabriel Cloutier, the manager of a cafe across the street who watched worshippers fleeing the rampage. Some took refuge at the cafe. "I never thought that such a thing could happen," said a man who frequents another of the city's 10 mosques. He had ventured to the scene because "I know people who were inside." Story continues Ambulances treated the wounded at the scene. Police reconstructing the events later questioned witnesses in a sports center near the mosque. Trudeau issued a statement saying "we condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge." "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, city and country," he said. "It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence," he added. "Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear." Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said in a series of Twitter posts that the government was "mobilized to ensure the security of the people of Quebec." "Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence," he wrote. "Solidarity with Quebec people of Muslim faith." Condemning what he called an "odious attack," French President Francois Hollande said "it's the spirit of peace and openness of the people of Quebec that the terrorists wanted to hit." - Policy of compassion - Police stationed near the mosque told AFP that they had feared this type of attack "because it's happening all over the world." "For us Muslims, Quebec and Canada had been a safe zone," said Hamid Nadji, who learned of the shooting from a friend and rushed to the mosque area. Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of Trump's order, the immigration ministry said Sunday. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen told a news conference. Trump has suspended the arrival of all refugees to the United States for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Although Hussen, who is of Somali origin, did not condemn the US measure, he stressed that Canada would continue to pursue an immigration policy based on "compassion" while also protecting the security of its citizens. "We welcome those fleeing persecution, terror and war," he said, echoing a welcoming Twitter post by Trudeau on Saturday. According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one of five people in the country are foreign-born. Canada has welcomed more than 39,670 Syrian refugees between November 2015 and early January 2017, according to government figures. Less than 130 light-years from Earth a mere stones throw away as things are measured in the cosmic scale lies a young star named HR 8799. Although perhaps unremarkable in an objective sense, for us humans, this is a special celestial object. It, and its system of planets, is one of the first to be directly imaged by astronomers. Usually, the presence of exoplanets planets that orbit a star other than our sun is confirmed through indirect means, such as by studying the dimming of the parent stars light when an object passes in front of it. In 2008, however, scientists were able to, for the first time, observe three of HR 8799s four planets directly using the Keck and Gemini telescopes in Hawaii. Now, eight years hence, Jason Wang an astronomy student at the University of California, Berkeley has used images taken by the Keck observatory to create a short but stunning video showing the four exoplanets in motion. The creation of the video, which is just three-seconds long, required images gathered over a period of seven years. Even then, it shows only a tiny portion of the planets full orbits which range in duration from 40 Earth years for the nearest one to over 400 years for the farthest one. via GIPHY The data was obtained over 7 years from one of the 10 meter Keck telescopes by a team of astronomers (Christian Marois, Quinn Konopacky, Bruce Macintosh, Travis Barman, and Ben Zuckerman), Wang told Universe Today in an email. Christian reduced each of the 7 epochs of data, to make 7 frames of data. I then made a movie by using a motion interpolation to interpolate those 7 frames into 100 frames to get a smooth video so that it's not choppy (as if we could observe them every month from Earth). All the planets in the 40-million-year-old system are heavier than Jupiter, and can be seen as bright floating orbs in the video. The black circle in the centre is the result of an effort to block out the stars light thereby making the planets visible. Story continues Directly imaging exoplanets is extremely hard, especially because of the technical difficulties involved in blocking out the light from the parent stars. Of the over 3,400 confirmed exoplanets, only a handful has ever been directly observed. Despite this, however, astronomers continue to strive to image exoplanets, as they believe doing so could provide vital clues to the formation and evolution of planets something that is still scarcely understood. It's just hard to go back billions and billions of years and rewind time in our own solar system, Wang told National Geographic. We rather find it easier to study young star systems like this to understand planet formation. Related Articles Paris (AFP) - Mohamed Abrini, the "man in the hat" bombing suspect caught on security cameras during the Brussels airport attack, has been charged in France over the November 2015 jihadist massacres in Paris, his lawyers said Monday. Belgium handed Abrini over to the French authorities for a day so that he could face charges related to the deaths of 130 people in the French capital. The 32-year-old was taken under armed guard to the Palais de Justice in Paris where he was charged by an investigating magistrate. A Belgian national of Moroccan origin, he was arrested in Brussels in April over his suspected involvement in the March 22 Brussels attacks and the Paris killings, both of which were claimed by the Islamic State group. Belgian investigators have said the Brussels airport and metro bombers who killed a total of 32 people were part of the same Brussels-based cell that orchestrated the Paris attacks. Dubbed the "man in the hat" from images caught on security cameras, Abrini fled Brussels airport without detonating his suitcase bomb, prosecutors say. His accomplices Najim Laachraoui and Ibrahim El Bakraoui set off their explosives, killing 16 people and themselves. Belgian authorities have already charged Abrini over the massacres in the French capital, leading his lawyers to complain that he risks being tried twice for the same acts. Two days before the Paris attacks, he was seen at a petrol station north of Paris with prime suspect Salah Abdeslam. Abdeslam is believed to be the only survivor of the jihadist team behind the carnage at the French capital's Bataclan concert hall, the national stadium and a handful of bars and cafes. A Belgian-born French national Abdeslam is suspected of driving one of the vehicles used in the attacks. He is in custody in France, where he is refusing to answer questions from investigators. - 'Brioche' - The federal prosecutor's office in Belgium confirmed that Abrini had been "surrendered" to French authorities for a day "in the framework of the investigation related to the attacks in Paris on 13 November 2015." Story continues Eric Van Der Sypt, a spokesman, told AFP that the decision is based on "mutual agreements" between the two countries. "It's not uncommon that suspects in different cases are surrendered for one day or a few days," Van Der Sypt said. Abrini had a long record as a petty criminal growing up in the troubled Molenbeek area of Brussels with Abdeslam. Nicknamed "Brioche" after his days working in a bakery, he is thought to have given up training as a welder at the age of 18 before eventually gravitating towards extremism. Identified as a radical Islamist by Belgian investigators, Abrini is believed to have briefly visited Syria in 2015 and his younger brother Suleiman, 20, died there. On an airbase in Jordan (Jordan) (AFP) - French warplanes have used twice as much firepower against the Islamic State (IS) in Syria and Iraq as in the campaign to oust Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi in 2011, according to Air Force Chief of Staff Andre Lanata. In an interview with AFP, Lanata said Mirage jets taking off from bases in Jordan and United Arab Emirates had dropped 1,800 bombs since France joined the US-led anti-IS coalition in 2014. The total figure, including strikes carried out by planes taking off from the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier, stood at 2,300, he said. "That's twice as many as in Libya in 2011 and four times more than in the Serval and Barkhane operations (against jihadist groups in the Sahel)", Lanata said during a weekend visit to a base used by French forces in Jordan. France, which has been targeted by a wave of jihadist attacks, ratcheted up its strikes against IS after the Paris massacre of November 2015 which was claimed by the group. The coalition is currently focusing its strikes on the Iraqi city of Mosul -- which is being fought over by Iraqi forces and IS -- as well as the jihadists' Syrian stronghold of Raqa. Lanata said the air campaign -- the bulk of which is being shouldered by the US, with France and Britain playing the main support roles -- was straining resources. "I'm having a hard time (recruiting and retaining personnel) in a number of positions, from plane mechanics to intelligence officers, image analysts and base defenders." "We also have historical capacity shortcomings," he said, pointing to aerial refuelling tankers "that are on average 55 years old" as well as a shortage of drones and other surveillance devices. Besancon (France) (AFP) - France has asked Chile to extradite the man suspected of killing a Japanese student in the eastern French city of Besancon last month, officials said Monday. An official request for the arrest and extradition of the man, identified in the media as Nicolas Zepeda Contreras, was filed on Wednesday, prosecutor Edwige Roux-Morizot told AFP. French authorities believe 21-year-old Narumi Kurosaki was murdered by Contreras, 26, her former boyfriend. Contreras is then thought to have fled to his home country. "All the necessary documents will be transmitted to Chile, who can now detain the suspect," Roux-Morizot said, adding that Chile would have 50 days to respond. Police believe Kurosaki is dead, but have been unable to find her body despite extensive searches. "The search is continuing," the prosecutor said. In a video that dates from September and has since been published by French and Japanese media, Contreras threatened Kurosaki with unnamed consequences if she did not fulfil unspecified conditions. Speaking in English in the video, Contreras said he loved Kurosaki but accused her of doing "bad things". Kurosaki, who had been studying in Besancon since September, met the Chilean teaching assistant in Japan but the pair later split. Two Pakistani bloggers freed after vanishing earlier this month have now left the country because of safety fears following a virulent media campaign painting them as blasphemers, relatives said Monday. They were among five men who went missing from various cities in Pakistan. Four of the five -- who had taken a stance against religious intolerance and criticised the military -- have been freed, their families said. They would not comment on where the men had been held. Their disappearance triggered nationwide protests and raised concerns of government involvement, claims denied by officials. Allegations on social media networks Facebook and Twitter and by right-wing TV hosts that the missing men were blasphemers have triggered a flood of threats despite denials from their worried families. Such allegations can be fatal in deeply conservative Muslim Pakistan, where 17 people remain on death row for blasphemy. Liaqat Ali Goraya, the father of blogger Waqas Goraya, confirmed to AFP that his son had left the country. "Waqas has gone, we've sent him abroad," said his father, declining to comment on who had held him. Before he went missing, Goraya was based in the Netherlands but had returned to Pakistan for a family wedding. A source close to the family of blogger Asim Saeed confirmed he too had left the country. His father Ghulam Haider Akbar declined to specify his son's whereabouts but said the family had received death threats purporting to come from the anti-Shiite Laskhar-e-Jhangvi group. "You who have blasphemed deserve death. You are out of Islam and should be ready for a painful punishment, which will be remembered by your generations to come," a text message said, according to Akbar. A relative of a third blogger, who asked to remain anonymous, said both he and his family had left their home town and were in hiding. "We are going to think about it for a few days and assess the situation. If it seems OK, we'll return, else we'll try to go abroad," the relative said. Story continues Zeeshan Haider said his brother, poet and activist Salman Haider, was "fine and safe". The whereabouts of the fifth man remains unknown. - Coordinated campaign - Rights groups have long criticised the colonial-era blasphemy legislation as a vehicle for personal vendettas as even unproven allegations can result in mob lynchings. Several NGOs and observers say the online campaigns are intended to silence progressive voices and are carefully coordinated. Pakistan has had a history of enforced disappearances over the past decade, but this has mainly been confined to conflict zones near the Afghanistan border or Balochistan province, where separatists are battling for independence. The country is among the world's most dangerous countries for journalists. Reporting which is critical of security policies controlled by the powerful military is considered a major red flag, with reporters at times detained, beaten and even killed. On Monday satirical news site Khabaristan Times announced it had been blocked by Pakistan's Internet regulatory authority. The site "has been blocked on complaints of objectionable content", a government source confirmed to AFP, requesting anonymity. The site often poked fun at the military and politicians. We should aim to consume power domestically rather than export it Energy Minister Janardan Sharma has been the talk of town lately because of his initiation to reform the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) and free the Capital from load shedding, while minimising power outages throughout the country. Civil rights activist Fred Korematsu, an Oakland native who fought the governments internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, was honored by Google Doodle on Monday on what would have been his 98th birthday. Following the bombing of Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Roosevelt signed the infamous Executive Order 9066, which forced about 115,000 American citizens of Japanese descent to live in designated military zones. The internment is now seen as an ugly moment in American history, in which fear outweighed tolerance. Korematsu, the son of Japanese immigrants, refused to go into the governments internment camps and was arrested and convicted of breaking military law. With the help of the ACLU, Korematsu appealed in the landmark Supreme Court case of Korematsu v. United States, but in 1944 the court ruled against him. He and his family were then sent to the Central Utah War Relocation Center until the end of the war in 1945. Korematsus conviction was overturned in 1983 when evidence came to light that showed the FBI knew there was no serious evidence that Americas Japanese population was helping the enemy. TIME wrote: The Supreme Court precedent would still stand, but the judge who cleared Korematsus conviction declared in her ruling that, in the words of the report of the Commission on Wartime Relocation, Korematsu lies overruled in the court of history. Korematsu remained an activist throughout his life, becoming a member of the National Coalition for Redress and Reparations, where he lobbied for a bill that would grant an official apology from the government and compensation of $20,000 for the Japanese Americans who were held in internment camps. In 1988, President Ronald Reagan signed the reparations legislation and redress into law. President Bill Clinton awarded Korematsu the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1998. The medal is seen in the Google Doodle drawn by Sophie Diao, who is also a child of Asian immigrants. Korematsus birthday, Jan. 30, is now officially recognized as Fred Korematsu Day in Hawaii, Virginia, California and Florida. BEIRUT (Reuters) - A rebel group fighting under the Free Syrian Army banner in northwest Syria has withdrawn from a shaky nationwide ceasefire, blaming the government and its allies for violations. "Due to Russia's lack of commitment as a guarantor...we announce that, as of today, we are not bound by this agreement," Jaish al-Ezza, a signatory to the deal brokered by Russia and Turkey, said in a statement on Sunday. The group said its decision was in response to what it described as heavy Russian bombardment of its positions and surrounding areas in Hama province. Fighting and air strikes have plagued the ceasefire between the government and rebel groups since it took effect in late December, with the combatants accusing each other of violations. After two days of negotiations in Kazakhstan last week, Russia, Turkey, and Iran agreed to ensure full compliance with the fragile truce. Jaish al Ezza, which has received foreign aid from states opposed to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, also blamed government forces and allied militia for breaching the ceasefire in Wadi Barada near Damascus. A month-long offensive against rebels in Wadi Barada ended on Sunday when the government captured the valley, where a major spring supplies most of the capital's water. The Hama-based rebel group's withdrawal from the truce could further complicate the battlefield in the insurgent-held northwestern corner of Syria, where jihadists and more moderate Islamist factions are at war with each other. The Syrian conflict pits Assad's government, backed by Russia and Iran, against an array of mostly Sunni rebel groups, including some supported by Turkey, Gulf monarchies, and the United States. Despite an overall reduction in violence, more than 400 civilians have died in clashes and bombardment since the truce began, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said. (Reporting by Ellen Francis) By Lisa Rapaport (Reuters Health) - Hospitalizations for heart problems may drop the day of a major snowstorm then climb above average in the aftermath, a U.S. study suggests. Over five winters in Boston, Massachusetts, researchers found that admissions for health issues like abnormal heart rhythm and heart attacks were 32 percent lower on the day of a major storm than on days without snow. But two days after a major snowfall, patients were 22 percent more likely to be admitted to the hospital for cardiovascular disease than on days without snow. During major storms in the study, at least 10 inches of snow accumulated. One explanation for the dip in cardiovascular disease admissions on the day of the storm could be that the individuals most susceptible to cardiovascular events or falls tend to stay inside during the most severe weather conditions, and therefore would not be exposed to the health hazards posed by these conditions on the day of the storm, said lead study author Dr. Jennifer Bobb, of the Group Health Research Institute in Seattle. Its also possible that individuals may delay going to the hospital during high snowfall days, especially when there is a declared snow emergency or travel ban, leading them to come to the hospital in the next few days instead, Bobb, who worked on the study as a researcher at Harvard University in Boston, said by email. Previous research has documented the potential for people to face an increased risk of heart attacks and other cardiac problems after storms, often due to overexertion while shoveling show, researchers note in the American Journal of Epidemiology. For the current study, Bobb and colleagues wanted to see how the odds of hospital admissions for heart problems, weather-related issues like frostbite and injuries like falls fluctuated before, during and after storms. Besides looking at the timing of hospital admissions relative to when the storms hit, researchers also looked at how heavy snowfall versus moderate snow accumulation of just 5 to 10 inches influenced the number of people who arrived and what ailments brought them in. They examined data on about 433,000 adults hospitalized at the four largest hospitals in Boston over five winter seasons from November 2010 to April 2015. Out of 906 days studied, 110 had low snowfall of less than 5 inches, 11 had moderate snowfall and 10 had heavy snowfall. On heavy snowfall days, cold weather related admissions for things like frostbite increased by more than four-fold compared with days it didnt snow. Admissions related to cold exposure remained higher than average for five days after storms. Admissions for falls were 18 percent higher about six days following a moderate snowfall than when it didnt snow, the study also found. Increased exposure to cold, which could be due to spending time outside shoveling snow or other activities, as well as icy and uncleared sidewalks and roadways, seem to be likely suspects for explaining the increase in cold-related admissions and falls requiring admission, Bobb said. Limitations of the study include the reliance on data from a single location in Boston to assess the amount of snowfall, which can vary across the city, the authors note. The study also didnt examine other outcomes that might be influenced by winter weather, such as emergency department admissions or clinic visits. Still, the spike in cardiac admissions two days after major storms makes sense because it can take the body a couple of days to react to the cold, said Dr. Yihai Cao, a researcher at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, who wasnt involved in the study. Metabolic changes can start happening when the body is exposed to cold that can exacerbate cardiovascular disease, Cao said. As for a dip of cardiovascular disease on snowstorm days, I think that this is due to inconvenience of traffic situation, Cao added by email. Patients would bear their symptoms at home on those days and there is no clear scientific rationale. SOURCE: http://bit.ly/2ka16Ja American Journal of Epidemiology, online January 30, 2017. By Lisa Lambert WASHINGTON (Reuters) - House Republicans on Monday began the process of killing five Obama-era rules on corruption, the environment, labor and guns under the first real test of the Congressional Review Act, a law intended to keep regulation in check. Republicans put as much urgency on limiting what they consider over-regulation that stifles economic growth as they do on overhauling the tax code and dismantling the Affordable Care Act, according to House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy. This is the first time the Republican-led House of Representatives has targeted specific rules since convening on Jan. 3. Earlier this month it passed bills to limit regulatory agencies and Republican President Donald Trump is cutting regulation through executive orders. Under the law, Congress can use simple majority votes to stop recent regulations in their tracks. Timing in the law means any rules enacted after May 31 are eligible for axing. The law has been used effectively only once, ending a rule on ergonomics in 2001. Both sides consider this week a test of its powers. The House Rules Committee was expected on Monday evening to send to the full chamber a measure axing three regulations enacted under former President Barack Obama, a Democrat. They were the Stream Protection Rule, the Securities and Exchange Commission's "resource extraction rule," and the Social Security Administration's expanded background checks on disabled gun buyers. On Tuesday it will send another measure overturning rules on methane and federal contractors. The full body is expected to pass both measures on Wednesday and then hand them off to the Senate. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Monday introduced a companion measure on the stream rule so the Senate can act quickly once the House votes. Senator James Inhofe, chair of the Environment committee, meanwhile, said he was introducing one on the extraction resources and warned that there were other resolutions to come. The Interior Department took years to craft the stream rule, hoping to prevent coal-mining waste from contaminating water sources in areas near mountain-top removal mining sites. Critics say it is unnecessary and goes too far, wiping out jobs and usurping state rights. The extraction rule took years to complete. It was required in the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law, but only approved this summer. It requires companies such as Exxon Mobil Corp to state publicly how much they pay governments in taxes and other fees. Opponents say it hurts U.S. energy companies, while human rights groups argue it reduces corruption. Liberal groups are outraged by the rollbacks, but their traditional allies, Democratic lawmakers, have limited means to stop them in the Republican-dominated Congress. House Democrats will host events with experts, and activists will try to rally the public, hoping to persuade Republicans to vote no. Senate Democrats cannot filibuster the measures but congressional aides expect them to slow the process by taking the full five hours they are allowed to speak against each measure on the chamber's floor. (Reporting by Lisa Lambert; additional reporting by Sarah N. Lynch; Editing by Cynthia Osterman and Grant McCool) The number of State Department officials signing memos protesting President Donald Trumps immigration and refugee ban quickly surpassed 200, department officials told Foreign Policy on Monday. The exact number of signatures is unknown as several different draft versions are in circulation, but the number far outstrips the 51 signatories who spoke out against former President Barack Obamas Syria policy last summer, a number viewed at the time as extremely large, if not unprecedented. The surge in opposition to Trumps executive order sows immediate tension between Foggy Bottom and the White House, and creates a headache for Rex Tillerson, the presidents nominee for secretary of state whos expected to receive Senate approval on Wednesday. This ban will not achieve its stated aim to protect the American people from terrorist attacks by foreign nationals admitted to the United States, warned one version of the memo. Rather, it will inflame anti-American sentiment and immediately sour relations with counterterrorism partners in the Muslim world, the memo stated. The presidents order indefinitely bars Syrian refugees from coming to the United States and temporarily bans refugees and immigrants from seven Muslim-majority nations: Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Iran, Libya, and Sudan. Various versions of the memo are expected to be consolidated and sent to the director of policy planning at the State Department through the dissent channel, a means for diplomats to air their grievances without fear of retaliation. The channel was setup in 1971 during the Vietnam War to give rank-and-file diplomats a pipeline to senior leadership. On Monday, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer pushed back against the dissenting State Department officials, saying they should either get with the program or they can go. The president has a very clear vision. Hes going to put the safety of this country first, he said. If somebody has a problem with that agenda, that does call into question whether they should continue in that post or not, Spicer said. Story continues The diplomats argued that given the near absence of terror attacks committed in recent years by visa holders from the seven countries, this ban will have little practical effect in improving public safety. The new administration appears to be at pains to scrub information at odds with its policies from public websites. An April 2016 State Department fact sheet on myths and realities of U.S refugee programs was taken off the departments website the day Trump signed the executive order. Democrats on the House Foreign Affairs committee now house it (as do some overseas embassy pages). The signatories include a mix of younger and older officials, and many are career foreign service officers. A State Department official told FP on Monday that the letter would soon be closed because organizers were satisfied that a comprehensive subsection of the State Department was represented. In a statement, acting spokesman Mark Toner said: We are aware of a dissent channel message regarding the executive order. The Dissent Channel is a long-standing official vehicle for State Department employees to convey alternative views and perspectives on policy issues, he added. This is an important process that the acting secretary, and the department as a whole, value, and respect. It allows State employees to express divergent policy views candidly and privately to senior leadership. After the memo is submitted, it is distributed to the senior leadership of the State Department and prompts a response from the secretary of state. At times, that can put the nations top diplomat in an exceedingly awkward position. Last summer, diplomats wrote a dissent memo imploring the Obama administration to launch missile strikes against the Syrian government, a policy Secretary of State John Kerry reportedly supported in private. However, choosing not to break with the president publicly, Kerry said through his spokesman that he was very committed to the administrations policy. Its unclear how Tillerson will respond to widespread dissent among his new subordinates even before he takes office. But a State Department official on Monday expressed doubts that the memo would ultimately succeed in changing White House policy. I doubt youre going to get Trump to change his mind because of this cable, said the official. You guys will make a big deal of it, he said, referring to the press, and leadership here will have to respond. But like the Syrian dissent memo, nothing usually comes out of it. Regardless of what comes of the backlash, Tillerson is likely to have a lot of frustrated and dispirited employees on his hands. Sebastian Gregg, a former foreign service officer, said his erstwhile colleagues in consular services are particularly concerned because they will be the ones rejecting or approving applications. Theyre making life-altering decisions on a daily basis, he said, and some are abjectly horrified. Another State Department official said the White House executive order is creating an enormous amount of confusion and disarray because it didnt go through the normal process for clearing. Spicer said Monday that criticisms of the rollout of the policy are overblown. Remember, there are 329,000 people who came into this country in a 24-hour period. There were 109 stopped over a 24-hour period, Spicer said, referring to all international arrivals, rather than those from the seven countries targeted in the order. Spontaneous demonstrations broke out in dozens of cities and airports across the country, including in Washington, over the weekend, while several courts put a stay on the order. When you actually look at the perspective of whats going on, a majority of Americans agree with the president, he asserted. Robbie Gramer and Jessica Holzer contributed to this report. Photo credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images Https%3a%2f%2fblueprint-api-production.s3.amazonaws.com%2fuploads%2fcard%2fimage%2f365893%2ff279eb9f-6560-4783-8654-059d532b00d7 LONDON A British illustrator has penned a powerful drawing following Prime Minister Theresa May's visit to the United States on Friday. During the visit, May was pictured holding hands with Donald Trump; a gesture that was met with contempt and derision on social media. SEE ALSO: The British media just roasted Donald Trump, and he hated it Veronica Dearly decided to create an illustration to convey her thoughts about May and Trump's handholding. "First they came for women's rights, and we were like NOPE. Then Theresa May held his fucking hand and we were like WTF THERESA NO. And then they came for the Muslims and we were like EVEN MORE NO. Let's just assume it's always fucking no," reads the illustration. This isn't the first time Dearly's illustrations have touched on politics. She recently created a series of illustrations about the Women's March. "In the current climate I'm keen to create work that strikes a chord with people and articulates how a lot of people are feeling, but at the same time cut through the misery a little bit with some topical humour where possible," explains Dearly. She created a particularly apt illustration following Piers Morgan's attempts to organise a "Men's March" and his comments that those attending the Women's March "rabid feminists." Story continues "I have always included political themes such as feminism in my illustrations, but when the EU referendum came around I decided to really go big or go home on it and see what the response was," says Dearly. The response to her illustrations has been largely positive, despite some negativity. "I often take a little bit of stick on Twitter but I'm always happy to be challenged and it's interesting to hear alternative points of view," says Dearly. "Sometimes I feel quite exposed but on the whole it's really, *really* helped me connect with my audience who are on the whole like-minded," she continued. The fate of the tired, huddled masses, and of the country famed for welcoming them, could come down to the courts. U.S. President Donald Trumps ban on immigrants from seven countries Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen, and Somalia was partially blocked by a federal judge in Brooklyn, New York on Saturday. Specifically, the judge ruled that U.S. officials could not deport those detained at the airport. But on Sunday, the Department of Homeland Security issued a statement saying, President Trumps Executive Orders remain in place prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety. It later clarified that the entry of lawful permanent residents was in the national interest, and that it would comply with judicial orders and carry out the executive order, which the White House is reportedly expected to rewrite. While thousands around the country protested the ban outside of airports, Team Trump made the Sunday morning show circuit, defending the executive order and saying that the 109 detained including an Iranian scientist on a fellowship, Syrian refugees, and an Iraqi citizen who had worked for the U.S. government for 10 years made up but a small portion of the immigrant population. And just hours after Americas northern neighbor rejected the ban, gunmen opened fire on a mosque in Quebec City, killing six and wounding eight. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the attack as a terrorist attack on Muslims. The debate over the U.S. immigration ban cast a shadow over the tragedy, as Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard alluded to in a statement Sunday evening. We should not withdraw and become a closed society because of such a terrible event, Couillard said. On the contrary, as I indicated, we have to keep working together, striving towards an open, inclusive, peaceful society. Thats the right response to this terrible event. Story continues Back in Washington, the battle between the executive branch and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which brought the case against the immigration ban, is likely to be settled in court. Some senators such as the dynamic duo of John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) issued statements condemning the executive order and Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on Monday he would ask for a vote to overturn the executive order. But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said on Sunday that the courts will decide whether the executive order is too broad. And so, while German Chancellor Angela Merkel wonders whether Trump understood her explanation of the significance of Americas signatory status on the Geneva Refugee Convention, and while Iraq and Iran issue retaliatory bans, and while public and politicians alike in the United Kingdom pressure their government to withdraw Trumps invitation to a state dinners, the world will watch the courts and the White Houses response. Incidentally, Trumps pick to replace the late Antonin Scalia on the U.S. Supreme Court could be announced this week. Meanwhile, in the race for Frances next president: National Front candidate Marine Le Pens Socialist Party challenger will be Benoit Hamon, and not, as some had suspected, former French Prime Minister Manuel Valls. Hamon is further to the left than Valls, who conceded after losing a run-off vote on Sunday. Hamons is candidacy will likely secure the immediate irrelevance of Frances Socialist Party, said Sheri Berman, a European politics expert at Barnard College. But, Berman added, this may very well rattle the final Presidential outcome, giving [center-left candidate Emmanuel] Macron a much better chance since he and Valls would have been competing for center-left and even center voters. With center-right candidate Francois Fillons embroiled in scandal, Macron may be the French establishments best chance to stop Marine Le Pens far-right candidacy. Kavitha Surana contributed to this post. Photo credit: Aydin Palabiyikoglu/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images A Nepali who will become the first transgender model to walk the runway at an Indian fashion show hopes to inspire other victims of gender identity discrimination across conservative South Asia. Anjali Lama, who was born a man in rural Nepal, was ostracised by members of her own family after telling them twelve years ago that she wanted to live as a woman. She overcame abuse and prejudice to become the Himalayan country's first transgender model and is now preparing to strut the catwalk at Lakme Fashion Week in Mumbai, India's premier fashion show, next month. "Growing up in Nepal as a transgender was extremely difficult," Lama, 32, told AFP in an email interview ahead of the fashion extravaganza, which runs from February 1 to February 5. "In South Asian countries people still aren't that accepting, they treat it like an illness. The public looks at you differently and treats you in a different manner." "One has to stay strong and reach out for their dreams," she added. Lama was born Nabin Waiba to a family of poor farmers in remote Nuwakot in mountainous Nepal. But she always knew that she had been born in the wrong body and in 2005 took the decision to dress as a woman for the first time. "I knew I couldn't feel like another person living in someone else's body. Hence, I was ready to face the cruel words that people threw at me," said the model. "Most of the people, including my own brothers, weren't ready to accept me for who I was. I had to stay strong and believe in myself. My mother and sisters were the only ones who supported me throughout." Lama found some acceptance in Kathmandu, where she moved to study, and later became an activist for an LGBT rights group called Blue Diamond Society. She underwent partial sex reassignment surgery in 2009 and her interest in modelling was piqued the following year when she was pictured on the front cover of a magazine featuring an article about transgender people. Story continues - New York, Milan, Paris? - It spurred her to pursue a career in modelling full-time. She enrolled in classes but initially found work hard to come by. "I was getting rejected because of my identity and that was extremely disheartening," said Lama, who has established herself as a successful model in her native Nepal over the past couple of years. In 2014 she featured in a documentary titled "Anjali: Living Inside Someone Else's Skin" in which she said she hoped to become completely female one day -- an operation that is financially out of reach for most Nepalis. Her recent success has come as Nepal has increased its recognition of transgender people. In 2015 the country, which allows citizens to choose their sex, started issuing third gender category passports for those who identify themselves as transgender. "With the changing times people have become more accepting," explained Lama. Manisha Dhakal, one of the founders of the Blue Diamond Society, said Nepal's government needed to do more to provide equal opportunities in education and employment for transgender people. "To get the acceptance in society we need to be economically empowered," she told AFP. In neighbouring India, "Hijras" have also long complained of discrimination and marginalisation. They are recognised as a third gender but are often shunned from society with some forced into begging or prostitution. Lama -- who said it would be a "dream come true" to follow other transgender models onto major catwalks such as New York, Milan and Paris -- hopes her turn at Lakme Fashion Week will make a difference in the battle for acceptance. She added: "I do hope to be an inspiration for other transgender people. I'd like to tell them to always believe in themselves and to work towards their goals." By Agustinus Beo Da Costa JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesian police on Monday named the leader of an Islamist group, the hardline Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), as a suspect over allegations that he insulted the secular state ideology in the world's biggest Muslim-majority country. Police in the province of West Java had been investigating Habib Rizieq over allegations that he made defamatory comments in 2014 about one of Indonesia's founding fathers, Sukarno, and questioned the legitimacy of the state ideology Pancasila. The complaint was brought against Rizieq in October last year by Sukarno's daughter, Sukmawati Sukarnoputri. Based on video evidence, documents and 18 witnesses the police investigation found the case "met elements needed to name him as a suspect", said West Java Police Spokesman Yusri Yunus. A person can be named a suspect in Indonesia once sufficient evidence has been gathered for the case to be presented to judges in a court. Rizieq has not been detained, but if found guilty he could face up to four years in prison. The FPI leader has denied wrongdoing and a spokesman for the group pledged to fight the case "until the last drop of our blood". FPI spokesman Slamet Maarif said the allegations were being engineered by authorities to "silence Muslims demanding justice". The FPI leader was a key organizer of rallies late last year by hundreds of thousands of Muslims against Jakarta's governor, an ethnic Chinese Christian, who is on trial over accusations that he insulted the Muslim holy book, the Koran. National police chief Tito Karnavian has warned against creeping Islamist extremism in the country of 250 million, home to dozens of religious and ethnic groups, and where the vast majority of citizens practice a moderate form of Islam. Rizieq and his followers have vowed to press their demand for Jakarta governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama to be jailed, with another rally set for Feb. 11, just days before the Jakarta governor elections. Late last year the FPI led some of Indonesia's biggest rallies in nearly 20 years targeting the Jakarta governor. There are concerns among rights groups that Purnama has been unfairly targeted as he runs for reelection next month and that the government has not done enough to protect the rights of religious and ethnic minorities. (Reporting by Agustinus Beo Da Costa; Writing by Ed Davies; Editing by Alison Williams) Baghdad (AFP) - President Donald Trump's order to ban US entry to nationals of seven Muslim-majority countries has sparked growing international criticism. Here is a roundup of reactions on Monday: - Iraq - Parliament voted to call on the Baghdad government to enact a reciprocal travel ban on Americans if Washington does not withdraw its decision to bar Iraqis. "We reject... the decision to prevent the reception of Iraqis in the United States of America, and call for its review," Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari told the US ambassador to Baghdad. - France - French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said it would be "common sense" for Trump to scrap the travel ban. The measure was "unacceptable and very punishing for those concerned", he said at the start of a visit to Tehran, while also announcing his country plans to double the number of visas it issues to Iranians. - US diplomats - A number of US diplomats have protested against the order, officials in Washington said, prompting the White House to tell the dissidents to "get with the programme or go". - Germany - German Chancellor Angela Merkel accused the United States of unfairly targeting Muslims. "The essential and also resolute fight against terrorism in no way justifies general suspicion against people of a specific faith, in this case people of the Muslim faith, or people of a certain background," she said. - Yemen - Yemen warned Trump's order would encourage global "extremism". "Yemen expresses its dissatisfaction after the order prohibiting, even for a limited time, the entry to the United States of people holding a Yemeni passport," a government spokesman said. - UN rights chief - The travel ban is illegal and "mean-spirited", said UN human rights chief Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein. Zeid tweeted that "discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law", adding that "the US ban is also mean-spirited and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism." Story continues - OIC - The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation said the travel ban would strengthen the position of extremists worldwide. "Such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism," it said. - Israel - Israel said it was seeking clarification of whether the ban applies to tens of thousands of elderly Israeli Jews born in Middle Eastern countries, many of whom are over the age of 65 and fled persecution. - IATA - The aviation industry's trade association criticised the bans for "causing confusion". "We ask for early clarity from the US administration on the current situation," said the International Air Transport Association. - Starbucks, Airbnb - Starbucks and Airbnb, to help those affected by the temporary immigration ban, pledged to hire more refugees and provide accommodation. "We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question," Starbucks chairman and chief executive Howard Schultz wrote in a letter to employees. - Goldman Sachs - The chief executive of American finance firm Goldman Sachs sent a voice mail to employees outlining his concerns. "This is not a policy we support, and I would note that it has already been challenged in federal court, and some of the order has been enjoined at least temporarily," said Lloyd Blankfein. - Italian FM - Italian Foreign Minister Angelino Alfano said the European Union, having put up its own barriers, was in no position to judge Trump's immigration decrees. Europe "is not in a good position to give opinions about the choices of others. Or is it that we want to forget that we too erect walls in Europe," said Alfano. - Support of Czech Republic, France National Front - "When you live in a house you have the right to decide who to accept, who to host, and if you arrive at the conclusion that someone poses a security risk this decision is up to you," said Czech Foreign Minister Lubomir Zaoralek. "This is something that only the Americans can decide and we can hardly advise them on this." The number two of France's far-right National Front, Steeve Briois, said its presidential candidate, Marine Le Pen could emulate Trump's example to limit entry to France if she is elected in May. "We live in a horrible world, and so from time to time we have to take measures which are authoritative, even shocking," he told AFP. - World leaders - On Sunday several other world leaders and governments had already criticised the US restrictions, including Britain, European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, Sudan, Indonesia, France, Sweden, the Netherlands, Czech Republic and Poland. Iran said it would reciprocate. By Bozorgmehr Sharafedin DUBAI (Reuters) - Oscar-winning filmmaker Asghar Farhadi will boycott this year's ceremony in protest at U.S. President Donald Trump's "unjust" ban on people from his country - Iran - and six others. Announcing his decision, the director, who won the 2012 best foreign language film award for "A Separation" and is nominated again this year, compared the Trump administration to Iranian hardliners as both use the fear of outsiders "to justify extremist and fanatic behaviour by narrow-minded individuals". "Hardliners, despite their nationalities, political arguments and wars, regard and understand the world in very much the same way," Farhadi said in a statement, published by the New York Times and some Iranian media. "In order to understand the world, they have no choice but to regard it via an 'us and them' ... This is not just limited to the United States; in my country hardliners are the same," he said, announcing he would not attend the Oscars even if he were given special permission to travel. Trump imposed a temporary travel ban on citizens of Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen as a first step in a policy he says will keep terrorists from entering the United States. Taraneh Alidoosti, the female lead of Farhadi's "The Salesman", which is nominated for this year's foreign language Oscar, has already announced she would boycott the ceremony in protest at Trump's "racist" travel ban. Some of Britains leading actors, directors and producers, including Julie Christie, Kevin Macdonald, Keira Knightley and Terry Gilliam, have asked for permission to hold a screening of "The Salesman" outside the U.S. embassy in London on Academy Awards night. "We wish to hold an event in solidarity with Mr Farhadi himself, but crucially, with the many thousands of innocent people who will now be negatively impacted and harmed by a policy of outright discrimination such as this," the filmmakers said in a letter published by the Guardian newspaper on Monday. Farhadi is unpopular with Iranian hardliners who criticised "A Separation" as it illustrated gender inequality in Iran and the desire by many Iranians to leave the country. Sociologist Ebrahim Fayyaz was quoted in Iranian media calling it "the worst Iranian film ever" as it was incompatible with Islamic morality and the ideal of defying the West. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences called Trump's travel ban "extremely troubling" after noticing that Farhadi and his cast and crew could be barred. "The Academy celebrates achievement in the art of filmmaking, which seeks to transcend borders and speak to audiences around the world, regardless of national, ethnic or religious differences," it said on Saturday. (Editing by Robin Pomeroy) Baghdad (AFP) - Baghdad called Monday for the United States to review its "wrong decision" to prevent Iraqis from entering the country as parliament backed reciprocal restrictions if Washington does not change course. The responses from Baghdad are part of a growing backlash against President Donald Trump's executive order barring citizens of Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen from entering the US for at least 90 days, a decision he billed as an effort to make America safe from "radical Islamic terrorists". The travel restrictions, which come on the heels of repeated assertions by Trump that the US should have stolen Iraq's oil before leaving in 2011, risk alienating the citizens and government of a country fighting against militants the president has cast as a major threat to America. "We reject... the decision to prevent the reception of Iraqis in the United States of America, and call for its review," Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari told US ambassador Douglas Silliman, according to a statement on his website. But "we (also) confirm our commitment to establishing better relations between Baghdad and Washington," Jaafari said. The foreign ministry also issued a statement calling on the US to "review this wrong decision". "It is very unfortunate that this decision was issued towards an allied state linked by strategic partnership with the United States," it said. The ministry noted the US move "coincides with victories achieved by (Iraq's) brave fighters and with the support of the international coalition against the Daesh terrorist gangs in Mosul," referring to the battle to retake the city from the Islamic State jihadist group. Parliament, meanwhile, urged the government to take similar measures against Americans if Washington does not reconsider its position. Lawmakers voted for "a policy of reciprocity with the American decision in the event that the American side does not withdraw its decision," according to text read out before the vote. Story continues It also called for the US Congress to pressure the Trump administration to reconsider its decision, and for the UN, Arab League and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation to oppose the measure. - Security ramifications - And it said that if the US does not roll back the move, this "will push Iraq to take policies and decisions commensurate with the preservation of its interests." "We are against this stance from the new administration," lawmaker Sadiq al-Laban told AFP. "We hope that the American administration will rethink... this decision," he added. Trump's decision led to the detention of incoming refugees at US airports, sparking protests, legal challenges and widespread condemnation from rights groups. The parliamentary vote came a day after its foreign affairs committee made a similar call for Iraq to respond in kind to the US measure. Hassan Shwairid, the deputy head of the committee, said the committee's call did not apply to the thousands of American military personnel in the country as part of the US-led coalition against IS. The Pentagon on Thursday pledged to lobby for US entry of Iraqis who have worked for the US military, including fighters and translators. And US senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham said Trump's ban could impact military cooperation and security in other ways. "This executive order bans Iraqi pilots from coming to military bases in Arizona," where they have received training, they said in a joint statement. "Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism." Iraq's former ambassador to Washington Lukman Faily told AFP the ban was a "betrayal" as Iraq is a partner with the United States, fighting against militants. The Hashed al-Shaabi, a powerful paramilitary umbrella organisation that includes Iran-backed Shiite militias that fought against American forces in past years, appealed Sunday for US citizens to be banned from the country. Units from the Hashed and American troops are both deployed in the Mosul area as part of the operation to retake the city from IS, and heightened anti-US sentiment among militiamen could increase the danger to Washington's forces. Trump's travel restrictions also drew condemnation from populist Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, America's bete noir for much of its 2003-2011 war in Iraq. "Get your nationals out before removing expatriates," said Sadr, scion of a powerful clerical family who rose to widespread fame due to his condemnation of and violent resistance to the US invasion and occupation of Iraq. BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's parliament approved the appointment on Monday of a new defense minister, Erfan al-Hiyali, and a new interior minister, Qasim al-Araji, state television said, but rejected nominees for new ministers of trade and industry. Hiyali, a Sunni, and Araji, a Shi'ite, are filling positions left vacant last year. Hiyali replaces Khaled al-Obeidi, who was sacked by parliament last year, while Araji replaces Mohammed al-Ghabban, who resigned after a massive truck bomb in central Baghdad in July. However Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi's nominees for the trade and industry ministries failed to win the necessary votes for approval. Those two positions, alongside the finance ministry, have been vacant since last year. Hoshiyar Zebari was sacked as finance minister in September following accusations of corruption, which he denied. Critics have slammed the dismissals of Obeidi and Zebari as politically motivated and warned they risked further undermining security in the country. Iraqi forces are battling Islamic State fighters in the northern city of Mosul. Industry Minister Mohammed al-Daraji resigned following orders from the powerful Shi'ite Muslim cleric Moqtada al-Sadr who called for protests last year demanding Abadi replace his cabinet with technocrats. Daraji is from Sadr's political camp. (Reporting by Saif Hameed; Editing by Dominic Evans) Baghdad (AFP) - Iraqi lawmakers voted Monday to call on the government to enact a reciprocal travel ban on Americans if Washington does not withdraw its decision to bar the entry of Iraqis. The call is a response to President Donald Trump's executive order barring citizens of Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen from entering the US for at least 90 days, a move he billed as an effort to make America safe from "radical Islamic terrorists". The travel restrictions, which come on the heels of repeated assertions by Trump that the US should have stolen Iraq's oil before leaving in 2011, risk alienating the citizens and government of a country fighting against militants the president has cast as a major threat to America. Parliament called on the Iraqi government to "respond in kind to the American decision in the event that the American side does not withdraw its decision", a parliamentary official who was present for the vote told AFP, quoting text of the decision that was read at the session. "Parliament voted by majority on calling on the Iraqi government and the foreign ministry to respond in kind," MP Hakim al-Zamili said. Sadiq al-Laban, another lawmaker, confirmed that "the vote was for a call on the government" to enact reciprocal measures. "We are against this stance from the new administration," Laban said, adding: "We hope that the American administration will rethink... this decision." Trump's decision led to the detention of incoming refugees at US airports, sparking protests, legal challenges and widespread condemnation from rights groups. And it has led to a growing backlash inside Iraq that could undermine relations between Baghdad and the US amid the battle for Mosul, the largest military operation yet in the war against the Islamic State group. - Security ramifications - The parliamentary vote came a day after its foreign affairs committee made a similar call for Iraq to respond in kind to the US measure. Story continues Hassan Shwairid, the deputy head of the committee, said that the call did not apply to the thousands of American military personnel in the country as part of the US-led coalition against IS. But US Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham said Trump's ban would impact military cooperation and security in other ways. "This executive order bans Iraqi pilots from coming to military bases in Arizona to fight our common enemies," the two lawmakers said in a joint statement. "Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism," they said. The Hashed al-Shaabi, a powerful paramilitary umbrella organisation that includes Iran-backed Shiite militias that fought against American forces in past years, called Sunday for US citizens to be banned from the country. Both units from the Hashed and American troops are deployed in the Mosul area as part of the operation to retake the city from IS, and heightened anti-US sentiment among militiamen could increase the danger to Washington's forces. Trump's travel restrictions also drew condemnation from populist Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, America's bete noir for much of its 2003-2011 war in Iraq. "Get your nationals out before removing expatriates," said Sadr, scion of a powerful clerical family who rose to widespread fame due to his condemnation of and violent resistance to the US invasion and occupation of Iraq. BAGHDAD (AP) Iraq's lawmakers on Monday backed a "reciprocity measure" that would bar Americans from entering Iraq in retaliation for President Donald Trump's banning of Iraqis and citizens of six other majority-Muslim countries from traveling to the United States. But though the deputy parliament speaker said the Iraqi vote is non-binding for the government, it will likely strain Baghdad's relations with Washington amid joint efforts to quash the Islamic State group and retake Mosul, Iraq's second-largest city, from the extremists. Iraq has been a long-time U.S. ally and Iraqi forces, aided by a U.S.-led coalition, are just over three months into the fight against IS in Mosul, the largest military operation in Iraqi history since 2003. Lawmakers Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun told The Associated Press that the decision was passed by a majority vote in favor but could not offer specific numbers. No further details were available on the wording of the parliament decision. Deputy Parliament Speaker Sheik Humam Hamoudi described the lawmakers' decision as a "recommendation" and called on the U.S. Congress to "pressure the American administration to reconsider" Trump's order at least when it comes to Iraqis. Iraq's Foreign Ministry also denounced Trump's order, releasing a statement on Monday saying it "regrets such a decision against ... an ally and a strategic partner of the United States." "It is a surprise that Iraq is covered under this order because it is not among the countries that export terrorists," the statement added. "The Iraqi community inside the U.S. enjoys a good reputation and its members have not been involved in any terrorist acts." The ministry also described Trump's decision as "wrong" and called for the new U.S. president to reconsider it. A copy of the Iraqi parliament's decision obtained by the AP did not say when the reciprocity ban would be enacted or who it would affect American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and or all other Americans doing business in Iraq. Story continues Even if the government in Baghdad were to take up the parliament's call and implement the ban on Americans entering Iraq, it is not certain that the semi-autonomous northern Iraqi Kurdish region which has equally strong tie with Washington would abide by it. "We have seen the reports of the Parliament vote and are reviewing its details," the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad told the AP in a written statement. "We refer you to the Government of Iraq for further clarification." Related: For more news videos visit Yahoo View, available now on iOS and Android. Baghdad (AFP) - The ban on Iraqis entering the United States is a "betrayal" and sign of mistrust, said Lukman Faily, Baghdad's former ambassador to Washington who is himself affected by the restrictions. Iraq is a partner with the United States, is fighting against militants, and is not one of the countries in the region that "exports terrorists" elsewhere, Faily told AFP. So for it "to be treated like this... to say it's a betrayal (is) an understatement," he said. The travel restrictions are due to President Donald Trump's executive order barring citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US for at least 90 days, a decision he has billed as an effort to make America safe from "radical Islamic terrorists". "I confirmed with the US embassy here in Baghdad that I am banned as well," Faily said, adding that visas were not being issued to Iraqis who are not government officials. So while Faily was Iraq's envoy to Washington from 2013 to 2016, he now could not even make it through US passport control. And he is not alone: Iraqis with valid visas -- including some who worked with the United States here -- have been barred from flying to America or detained at airports upon arrival until lawyers mounted legal challenges to free them. Iraqis "from all sort of walks of life have been banned -- it isn't effective," Faily said. - Raises questions on reliability - The policy "does not reflect reliability to me. It makes me very worried that... we cannot rely on the United States," he said, also describing it as an indication that Iraqis are not viewed as being trustworthy enough to come to the US. Faily also said he thinks that it "will reflect to the Iraqi people that the US is unjustly treating them." But while the restrictions do not bode well for relations in general, he believes the issue will remain separate from the fight against the Islamic State jihadist group, for which a US-led international coalition is providing support. Story continues Trump's travel restrictions -- which also apply to Iran, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen -- have sparked a growing backlash in Iraq. The foreign ministry has called it a "wrong decision" and said that Washington should review it, while parliament voted to back reciprocal restrictions on Americans if Washington does not change course. The row ultimately benefits neither side, and harms the interests of both. Baghdad needs US support against IS and international investment to build its economy, while Washington also wants the jihadists defeated, and has repeatedly stated its desire to have a stable Iraq as a partner in the region. The travel ban and Trump's repeated assertions that the US should have taken Iraqi oil are indicators that "there's some level of chaos in Washington," Faily said. "At this moment I cannot say that I have confidence in the US decision-making process in relation to what... they want Iraq to be." Jerusalem (AFP) - Israel's parliament on Monday discussed the final adoption of a bill that would allow it to appropriate hundreds of hectares of Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank. A committee backed the bill but around 500 revisions will be voted on separately in a process starting Tuesday. Lawmakers will then vote on the bill in two further readings, with parliament expected to approve it. The bill is backed by Israel's rightwing government but has alarmed the international community and supporters of an independent Palestinian state. The Palestine Liberation Organisation labelled the bill a "declaration of war", and called on the international community to intervene. The law would legalise at least 3,921 Jewish homes on the occupied West Bank built in contravention of Israeli law, according to the anti-settlement organisation Peace Now. It would be the first time Israel has applied its own civil law to land it recognises as Palestinian-owned in the West Bank, law professor Amichai Cohen told AFP. Around 2,000 Israelis, including many settlers, protested outside parliament Monday in support of the law, an AFP correspondent said. Israeli law distinguishes between settlements it considers legal and so-called "outposts", but the bill would legalise 54 of the latter, Peace Now said. The owners of the land would be compensated financially or with land elsewhere. The attorney general has told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the bill would be unconstitutional and could open up Israel to international criminal prosecutions. Addressing his Likud faction on Monday, Netanyahu insisted his coalition would advance the bill "this week." "This bill's purpose is to prevent recurring attempts to harass the Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria," he said, using the biblical term for the West Bank. Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman said his Yisrael Beitenu faction would support the bill, despite reports that the attorney general has said he would refuse to defend the law if it were challenged in court. Story continues "The chance that it will be struck down by the supreme court is 100 percent," Lieberman said. Opposition leader Isaac Herzog said that "all the legal advisors are opposed" to the bill which posed a "danger to Israel," both internally and internationally. International law considers all settlements in the West Bank, which Israel seized in the 1967 Middle East war, to be illegal, and they are seen as a major obstacle to peace between Israelis and Palestinians. - 'Significant success' - At Monday morning's protest, around 2,000 people marched to parliament, with teenagers holding signs condemning the demolition of any Jewish homes in the West Bank. "Israel the only country that destroys Jewish homes," one sign read. "If the regularisation bill passes that would be a very significant success for the Jewish people," David Goldenberg, a 29-year-old protester from Jerusalem, told AFP. "This is our land. We came here because of our history, because this is the land of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob." Many Israeli rightwingers see all of the West Bank as part of Israel and have called for it to be annexed. Following Donald Trump's inauguration as US president last week, Netanyahu has greenlighted thousands of new settlement homes in the West Bank and annexed East Jerusalem. Trump has indicated he will be far more supportive of Israeli settlement building than his predecessor Barack Obama, who criticised them throughout his time in office. At the protest, Yehudit Tayar, a spokeswoman for the Yesha council which represents settlers, denied the bill's passing was the result of Trump's election, although she admitted it may have sped up the process. "It doesn't start with Trump. It starts here in our nation -- the responsibility to protect our land and our people." The Trump administration declined to comment on Israel's announcement of 2,500 new settlement homes on January 20, breaking with Obama's policy of condemning such plans. The proposal being debated Monday was approved by parliament for the first time in early December. Netanyahu suggested at the time that the proposal be shelved until Trump took over, according to media reports. By Jeffrey Heller JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel's government postponed a vote in parliament on Monday on a bill retroactively legalizing about 4,000 settler homes built on privately owned Palestinian land, a measure the attorney-general has said is unconstitutional. The legislation, which is backed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's right-wing coalition, had been expected to pass in an evening session, but a filibuster threat from the opposition and discussions over its final wording slowed its progress. Bezalel Smotrich, a far-right lawmaker who helped draft the bill, said the vote had been postponed and would probably be held on Tuesday. He told Reuters that a committee putting the final touches to the bill still had work to do. The bill has been condemned by Palestinians as a blow to their hopes of statehood but its passage may only be largely symbolic as it contravenes Israeli Supreme Court rulings on property rights. Critics and some legal experts say it will not survive judicial challenges. Political sources say Netanyahu had privately opposed the bill, which won preliminary parliamentary approval in November amid international denunciations and speculation in Israel that it would subsequently die a quiet death in committee hearings. But the far-right Jewish Home party, a member of the coalition looking to draw voters from the traditional base of Netanyahu's Likud, pressed to revive the legislation. With Likud slipping in opinion polls, and himself under criminal investigation over allegations of abuse of office, Netanyahu would have risked alienating supporters and ceding ground to Jewish Home if he had opposed the move. Netanyahu has denied any wrongdoing. While the measure seems certain to stoke more international condemnation of Israeli settlements - the Obama White House termed the first vote two months ago "troubling" - Netanyahu cis unlikely to face criticism from the administration of the new U.S. president, Donald Trump. An Israeli announcement last week of plans for 2,500 more settlement homes failed to ruffle Washington, whose spokesman responded by describing Israel as a "huge ally". Israeli Attorney-General Avichai Mandelblit has described the new bill as unconstitutional and a breach of international law since it allows expropriation of private land in areas Israel seized in the 1967 Middle East war. The homes covered by the bill are in West Bank outposts built without Israeli government approval. Under the new law, settlers could remain on the land if they built there without prior knowledge of Palestinian ownership or if homes were constructed at the state's instruction. Palestinian owners would receive financial compensation. Most countries view all Israeli settlement in occupied territory as illegal. Israel disputes this. (Additional reporting by Maayan Lubell; Editing by Kevin Liffey) JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday he planned to push U.S. President Donald Trump to renew sanctions against Iran during a visit to Washington next month, complaining that Iran had once more tested a ballistic missile. Netanyahu has been harshly critical of the deal that six world powers including the United States under president Barack Obama struck with Iran to curb its nuclear program in return for an end to multilateral sanctions. Iran is Israel's avowed enemy and Israel argues that the agreement fails to prevent Iranian weapons posing a threat to its very existence. During the U.S. election campaign, Trump called the pact a "disaster" and "the worst deal ever negotiated", though he has also said it would be hard to overturn an agreement enshrined in a U.N. resolution. In a statement on his personal Twitter account, around the same time the White House announced his Feb. 15 visit, Netanyahu said: "Iran again launched a ballistic missile. This is a flagrant violation of a Security Council Resolution." A U.S. official said on Monday that Iran had test-fired a medium-range ballistic missile on Sunday, which exploded after 630 miles. "In my upcoming meeting with President Trump I intend to bring up the renewal of sanctions against Iran," Netanyahu said. "Iran's aggression cannot be left without a response." The Obama administration said Iran's ballistic missile tests had not violated the nuclear agreement, but Trump has said he will stop Tehran's missile program. Under the U.N. resolution approving the nuclear deal, Iran is "called upon" to refrain from work on ballistic missiles designed to deliver nuclear weapons for up to eight years. Critics of the deal have said the language is ambiguous and does not make compliance obligatory, while Tehran says the missiles it has tested are not specifically designed to carry nuclear warheads. This month, Iranian lawmakers approved plans to increase military spending, including expanding the long-range missile program. (Reporting by Ari Rabinovitch; Editing by Kevin Liffey) Rome (AFP) - Italian police said Monday they had dismantled a major people smuggling network responsible for trafficking hundreds of people across Europe. "The criminal organisation comprised Egyptians, North Africans, Sudanese, Albanians, many of them with their papers in order, while a few were Romanian and Italian citizens," a police statement said. The migrants hailed from Syria, Egypt, Eritrea and Sudan. On making it to Italy they headed for Italy's northern business hub of Milan where the network had its main base. After reaching Milan, the migrants were transferred to Ventimiglia, near the French border. There, "they were regrouped and hidden pending transport" into France or Austria, police said. Up to 40 migrants who had paid 500 to 1,000 euros ($530 to $1,065) each were often packed "like meat" into trucks, Ilda Boccassini, a state prosecutor, told a press conference. Describing the network as a "globalisation of evil", Boccassini said it was just "a drop in the ocean" of human trafficking. Police broke up the group after a two-year investigation which pieced together 62 clandestine voyages that allowed "hundreds of people" to enter various European countries. The Italian authorities have issued 34 arrest warrants following their investigation -- 18 concerning people based in Italy. Italian Interior Minister Marco Minniti lauded an operation against traffickers whom he dubbed "unscrupulous criminals who abuse people in great difficulty." Police added they had arrested two Italians in another anti-trafficking operation. They said the pair had been working at a clandestine unit churning out false EU identity documents, including driving licences. Italy, along with neighbouring Greece, has been at the forefront of attempts to stem the flow of migrants fleeing war and poverty in recent years. More than 180,000 migrants land in Italy last year, compared with a previous annual record of 170,100 in 2014, on a par with Greece. More than a million people arrived in Europe via Mediterranean routes in 2015, prompting much political soul-searching across the European union amid strong opposition from some member states to a scheme to relocate them. Ivanka Trump has upset the internet by parading her wealth amid the immigration ban [Photo: Twitter/Ivanka Trump] On Friday evening, President Trump signed an executive order to temporarily bar the citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States and immediately halt to the U.S. refugee program for four months with Syrian refugees barred indefinitely. By Saturday, protests had erupted at international airports across the nation, calling for the release of people being detained because of the executive order. Amid the chaos and unrest, Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, a senior White House adviser, were getting ready for a night out on the town in black tie apparel. Late Saturday night, a judge blocked the deportations. And late Saturday night, the Trump-Kushner couple tweeted a photo of themselves, pictured above, all dolled up and ready for a night out. It was the tweet seemingly heard around the world, as people immediately took to social media to decry the fact that Trump and her husband showed off fancy attire while the lives and security of refugees were in question, with a mounting number of Americans filling every nook and cranny at airports to protest the detention and deportation of refugees. It also didnt help that Ivankas dress, reportedly around 4,000, was metallic silver jacquard. Quickly, the hashtag #lethemeatcake popped up on social media, as people compared Ivanka Trump and by association, the entire Trump family to Marie Antoinette. Antoinette, while married to French King Louis XVI, is associated with the phrase Let them eat cake! in relation to her supposed reaction upon hearing about the struggles of the people of France, including a food shortage that left many families without staples like bread. Story continues The open question on social media was the following: Could Trump be so deep in a rarefied bubble that tweeting a photo of herself and her husband before a black tie event wearing a $5,000 evening gown seemed like an appropriate message while the country was embroiled in protests over the rights of immigrants and the safety and well-being of refugees? What do you think? Tweet us at @YahooStyleUK. Melania Trump stars on the cover of Vanity Fair Mexico. Yes, Mexico First Family style: Every look from the Trump women Mosul (Iraq) (AFP) - In recaptured areas of Mosul, the extreme interpretation of Islam that jihadists forced on the local population for more than two years has sparked a backlash against religious observance. After the Islamic State group seized the city in June 2014, it made prayers compulsory for people who were outside their homes, banned smoking, mandated beards for men and veils for women, smashed artefacts it said were idolatrous, publicly executed homosexuals and cut off the hands of thieves. The jihadists cast their efforts as enacting the true interpretation of Islam -- an assertion that most Muslims reject -- but for some people, rather than making them more religious as intended, IS extremism had the opposite effect. The call to prayer sounds over a mosque's loudspeakers in a recaptured area of Mosul, but a butcher named Omar continues working -- something that would have been impossible under IS rule. "Mosul is an Islamic city and most young people used to pray," but IS was "forcing us... we had to go to the mosque against our will", he said. Before eastern Mosul was retaken from IS during the massive operation to recapture the northern city that was launched on October 17, shops had to close five times a day for prayers. "One day, the boy who works with me received 35 lashes because he hadn't been praying," Omar said. "Now, we are no longer obliged to close our stores... Whether we pray or not, the decision is ours." Imam Mohammed Ghanem, who was forbidden to conduct Friday prayers under IS rule because he refused to pledge allegiance to the group, said the jihadists sparked a backlash against religion. "Now some people hate the time of prayer because IS forced them" to pray, Ghanem said. - 'Too much pressure' - "They reject these rules because they associate them with IS, even if they are in fact true Islamic precepts," he said. "Put too much pressure on something and it will explode. This is what's happening now with the people: they want to live the way they want," he said. Story continues According to Ghanem, part of his work before IS seized Mosul was educating people about Islamic practices and correcting them if necessary. "Now, we say nothing because they reject religious authority. If we tell them they are doing something wrong, they tell us that we are from IS," he said. In another area of eastern Mosul, where rain is accumulating in craters left by the fighting, Imam Fares Adel said he too has changed the way he interacts with the faithful. "Now we are afraid to give advice to people because they feel uncomfortable with the religious clothing" worn by imams, said Adel. The imam said he understands those residents who "reject Islam", but thinks the situation will "gradually" return to normal. "The number of people is gradually increasing and they will all come back once of the footprint of IS has disappeared," said Adel. In Ghanem's mosque, latecomers have to pray outside. Around 40 worshippers kneel near fruit and vegetable stands to pray, while hundreds are squeezed inside the mosque. "The imam has a good mentality and he speaks well to us. More and more people are coming back" to the mosque, said 25-year-old resident Mohammed Ali. Now, without the threat of IS reprisals, "they come because they choose to". Photo credit: Mono County Tourism From Popular Mechanics Researchers at JPL have crafted a simple chemistry-based way to test for signs of life on another world, be it Mars or the watery moons Europa and Enceladus. The new test is 10,000 times more sensitive than current methods used on NASA's Curiosity rover, according to a study published recently in Analytical Chemistry. The test uses a process called capillary electrophoresis to separate a liquid into its independent components. First the liquid sample is mixed with a liquid reagent. Then by shining a laser across the mixture, different molecules can be observed moving at different speeds thanks to a process called laser-induced fluorescence detection. By applying a charge to the mixture, scientists can see the molecules separate based on how fast they respond to the electric field. The test is specifically designed to look for the building blocks of all life on Earth: amino acids. Proteins are constructed form long chains of amino acids, but there is a wide variety of amino acids and not all of them are created due to the processes of life. In fact, some of them don't even come from this planet. "Using our method, we are able to tell the difference between amino acids that come from non-living sources like meteorites versus amino acids that come from living organisms," said the project's principal investigator, Peter Willis of JPL, in a press release. Capillary electrophoresis has been used since the 1980s, but the new test made some important changes that optimize the process to search for alien life. Seventeen of the most commonly found amino acids were chosen, what the research team is calling "the Signature 17 standard," and the test will be able to detect these molecules even at low concentrations. The new test also allows these amino acids to be detected in extremely briny water, the type of stuff we expect to find on Mars or the watery moons. To try out their new method, the researchers analyzed amino acids in the waters of Mono Lake in California (pictured above). The high alkaline content in the lake makes it a difficult environment for life, and a good stand-in for the alien oceans we hope to explore in the coming years. Story continues To distinguish between amino acids created by life and ones that were created through natural processes, the researchers analyze the "chirality" of the molecules. Amino acids are chiral molecules, meaning they exist in two forms that are mirror images of each other, called right-handed and left-handed. The distribution of right- and left-handed amino acids from non-living sources is essentially even, but life on Earth produces almost exclusively the left-handed form of amino acids. Scientists believe that alien life probably also will show a preference for either right- or left-handed molecules. Now the question is, when will we get to deploy this new life-searching tool to another world? JPL mentions that the process is "relatively simple and easy to automate," so hopefully it can be added to a spacecraft soon, though it is not going to be included on the Mars 2020 rover. Europa and Enceladus offer the most enticing opportunities to use the new test, as they have a practically endless supply of water available if it can be accessed, and the test was designed primarily with larger bodies of water in mind. "One of NASA's highest-level objectives is the search for life in the universe," Willis said. "Our best chance of finding life is by using powerful liquid-based analyses like this one on ocean worlds." Let's hope NASA's mission to put a lander on Europa, currently on the drawing board, picks up some steam. Source: JPL You Might Also Like A judge granted the ACLU a stay on the immigration ban, and heres what that means exactly On Friday, Donald Trump signed an immigration ban as an executive order. The order bans entry from seven major Muslim countries (Iraq, Iran, Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen) for 90 days. It also suspends the entire US refugee system for 120 days. And, it suspends the Syrian refugee program indefinitely. Trump also stated that he would prioritize Christian refugees over non-Christian refugees specifically Muslim refugees. Yes, we are as horrified and as heartbroken as you are. Boston friends: see you at Copley Square at 1pm. #BeTheResistance #NoBanNoWall A photo posted by (@sallyebartlett) on Jan 29, 2017 at 9:32am PST One of the immediate consequences of this ban was chaos at American airports. Immigrants and refugees with valid visas being denied entry into the United States. But protesters flooding major airports protesting the ban. And, lawyers and interpreters are also racing to the airport to make their services available to those being denied entry under this shocking ban. Its a dark situation. Though the immigration ban remains in effect, we did get a piece of good news this weekend. On Saturday, U.S. District Court Judge Ann Donnelly issued an emergency stay temporarily stopping the removal of those detained as a result of Trumps immigration ban. @femalecollective This is what what America looks like #strongertogether #nobannowall #resist A photo posted by AnnaSophia Robb (@annasophiarobb) on Jan 28, 2017 at 9:52pm PST Donnelly ruled in favor of a habeas corpus petition (a law that ensures a person can report an unlawful detention or imprisonment before a court) for two Iraqi men detained at JFK airport on Friday. Virginia, Massachusetts, and Washington state issued similar rulings. So no one affected by the ban who was in a U.S. airport when the executive order was signed can be removed. The ACLU considers this their first major victory against the Trump administration. As the civil liberties organization wrote in a post about the stay: Story continues The United States is a nation governed by the rule of law and not the iron will of one man. President Trump now has learned that we are democratic republic where the powers of government are not dictatorial. They are limited. The courts are the bulwark of our democracy that protects individual rights and guards against the overreaching of an administration that confuses its will for the American publics. "Messed with the wrong city!" Repost @cjfrombk - #NYTillIDie #NoBanNoWall #NoMuslimRegistry #ImmigrantsMakeAmericaGreat A photo posted by UndocuMedia #HereToStay (@undocumedia) on Jan 28, 2017 at 11:02pm PST As The Guardian reports, German chancellor Angela Merkel called Donald Trump on Saturday. In the call, she explained that Trumps decision to ban refugees from certain countries violated the Geneva refugee convention. We hope that the call reminds the president of Americas obligations to refugees and immigrants. And we hope the immigration ban will be quickly rescinded. Https%3a%2f%2fblueprint-api-production.s3.amazonaws.com%2fuploads%2fcard%2fimage%2f365337%2f00c4a6eb-29f2-44e7-960b-a2b637e9346c President Donald Trump and his week of executive orders did not go unnoticed at the 2017 Screen Actors Guild awards this Sunday. Julia Louis-Dreyfus won the first award of the night for Outstanding Performance by Female Actor in a Comedy Series for her show Veep and immediately celebrated the win with an impassioned message of acceptance for refugees around the world trying to flee from desperate situations. SEE ALSO: Barb from 'Stranger Things' is back and killing it on the SAGs red carpet "Whether the Russians did or did not hack the voting of tonight's SAG awards, I look out on the million or million and a half people in this room and I say, this award is legitimate and I won," she jokingly began, mimicking the president's speech. "I am the winner. The winner is me. Landslide." But her joke only set the stage for her to get personal about the executive order President Trump signed on Friday, which drastically cuts the number of refugees the U.S. will accept and bars citizens of seven Islamic-majority countries from entering America. "I want you all to know that I'm the daughter of an immigrant," Dreyfus said. "My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France. I'm an American patriot [and I] love this country. Because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes and this immigrant ban is a blemish and it's un-American." The gathered actors applauded her strong take against Trump's measures. She then read a statement from the Writer's Guild of America, noting she agreed with it. "Our guilds are unions of storytellers who have always welcomed those from the nations of varying beliefs with just you share their creativity with America," she read. "We are grateful for them. We stand with them and we will fight for them. Thank you very much. Thank you." Story continues Louis-Dreyfus' statement came only hours after she shared similar objections to what many consider to be a ban on Muslims on her Twitter account. Kal Penn is clapping back at his haters with a fundraiser for Syrian refugees. The 39-year-old American actor has started a CrowdRise fundraiser in the name of a commenter who told him he doesnt belong in America. The message appeared to be written in an Instagram post of Penns, in which he spoke out about the personal effect President Donald Trumps Muslim Ban is having on him and his friends. Families are being torn apart, Penn wrote. Shame on us. This is un-American. What Donald Trump and the Republican Party are doing is wholly unAmerican. His online critic responded, you dont belong in this country you f joke. RELATED VIDEO: Watch: Natasha Stoynoff Breaks Silence, Accuses Donald Trump of Sexual Attack Penn, who worked in President Obamas administration as an associate director in the White House Office of Public Engagement and plays fictional White House Press Secretary Seth Wright on the hit ABC show Designated Survivor, was born in Montclair, New Jersey, to Gujarati immigrant parents. Responding to the racist claims with a charity effort is an example of the love Penn sees in the United States, he said. We are better than the hateful people who tell us we dont belong in our own country, that America cant be a beacon of freedom and hope for refugees from around the world, Penn wrote in the fundraisers description. We will turn their bigotry, along with the Presidents, into love. Within 30 minutes of the fundraisers posting, it had already received over $5,000 in donations. By Sunday afternoon, he had raised over $300,000. On Monday morning, he crossed $500,000. Penns response is just one of the many ways in which Americans are responding in opposition to President Trumps executive order, which he signed Friday. Story continues The order temporarily bans any refugees from entering the U.S., indefinitely bans refugees who hail from Syria and temporarily bans citizens from several Muslim countries from entering the U.S. The president also said in the order that Christians and other minority religions from Muslim countries should be given preferential treatment when entering the U.S. over Muslims. Titled Protection Of The Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into The United States, the order closes the nations borders for four-months. For 90 days, visas will also not be issued to nationals from several Muslim countries Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Iran. This ban would apply to anyone from those countries visiting the U.S., not just people seeking asylum or looking to immigrate. Our numbers are growing at JFK. Come out! I hear there's a shake shack in this terminal now. #MuslimBan #nobannowall pic.twitter.com/j0asQVmRoK Melinda Taub (@MelindaTaub) January 28, 2017 At New York Citys John F. Kennedy airport on Saturday, protests broke out featuring hundreds of people standing in solidarity with the detained refugees. Many documented the gathering on social media, including Melinda Taub, a writer for Full Frontal With Samantha Bee. No hate, no fear refugees are welcome here, people chanted. One person even held a sign quoting the testament of Jesus: For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me. City council member Carlos Menchaca, chair of the immigration committee, gave a rousing speech where he told the crowd, We will fight. We will stay until everybody is released. These are our families. A formal vigil is being held outside the terminal beginning at 6 p.m. Kaley Cuoco recently posted an adorable photo with her miniature dog, Ruby, before she left for the 2017 SAG Awards. In a photo posted on her Instagram account, the Big Bang Theory star is already dressed and completely made up when she decided to pose with Ruby for a photo. The dog looks fierce in the snap just like the actress. Cuoco also posted a series of photos from the red carpet. In one picture, she posed with her sister, Briana, who went with her as her date at the event on Sunday night. Cuocos boyfriend, Karl Cook, did not accompany her to the awards show. But immediately after it concluded, the actress went home and spent time with Cook. Meanwhile, the Big Bang Theory did not win outstanding performance by an ensemble in a comedy series. They were nominated alongside Black-ish, Modern Family, Veep and Orange is the New Black. The latter brought home the award. Even though the hit CBS sitcom did not win, it seems that things are still looking good for Cuoco and her co-stars. According to TV Line, even though Season 11 hasnt been confirmed yet, it is highly likely that Big Bang Theory will be renewed for another season. While speaking with Variety, CBS president Glenn Geller confirmed earlier this month that they are still in negotiations with the creators and stars of the sitcom. We are in negotiations, but it is definitely business as usual. We are guardedly optimistic that we will make a deal, he said. At the time, the contracts of Cuoco, Jim Parsons and Johnny Galecki were still being finalized. We want to get them all back. Thats the goal, he added. Big Bang Theory Season 10 airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. EST on CBS. Kaley Cuoco Photo: Reuters/Phil McCarten Related Articles CADIZ, Ky. (AP) A Kentucky man will spend life behind bars for orchestrating the killings of his parents, sister and an acquaintance. News outlets report Ryan Champion was sentenced Friday. Champion avoided the death penalty after pleading guilty in December to four counts of murder. He also pleaded guilty to a kidnapping charge. After the October 2014 slayings, Champion portrayed himself as the lone survivor of an attack on his family in western Kentucky. Champion said 22-year-old Vito Riservato had killed the family and he survived by killing Riservato. But prosecutors have said it was a murder-for-hire scheme with a twist that ended with Riservato's slaying. Remaining family members addressed Champion in court Friday. His attorney Joanne Lynch wished the family well as they continue to heal. North Korea's Kim Jong Un will most likely order the launch of a Musudan intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) instead of a long-range one, South Korean military officials said Monday. The news comes hours after U.S. President Donald Trump and South Korean Acting President Hwang Kyo-ahn vowed to strengthen their defenses to combat North Korea's nuclear threat. "There are no signs of an imminent test firing of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) by North Korea. But we are closely monitoring any new military activities in the country as it could launch an IRBM at any time if leader Kim Jong Un gives the order," an official at the South Korean defense ministry said, according to Yonhap News Agency. During the New Year's Day address, Kim announced that the country has entered the final stage of preparations to test-fire an ICBM, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. On Sunday, the White House released a statement saying that Trump and Hwang spoke over the phone, where they discussed North Korea's continuous threats, and also the upcoming visit by the new U.S. defense secretary to Japan and South Korea. "President Trump reiterated our ironclad commitment to defend (South Korea), including through the provision of extended deterrence, using the full range of military capabilities," the White House said in the statement. The U.S. and South Korea have agreed to deploy a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in order to protect against North Korea's growing nuclear and ballistic capabilities. Last week, South Korean and U.S. sources claimed that North Korea has placed two ICBMs on mobile launchers, giving rise to speculation that the test could come earlier than expected. In recent months, North Korea has carried out several ballistic missile tests and ramped up its nuclear program, increasing tensions with the West and its southern neighbor. Related Articles INDIAN WELLS, Calif. (AP) Charles Koch first likened candidate Donald Trump's plan to ban Muslim immigrants to something Adolf Hitler would have done in Nazi Germany. The billionaire industrialist and his chief lieutenants offered a more delicate response this weekend when asked about President Trump's plan to block immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. They described Trump's plan as "the wrong approach" that violated its dedication to "free and open societies." The criticism comes as the Koch network, among the most powerful conservative groups in the nation, works to strike a delicate balance in the early days of the new administration. The Kochs refused to support Trump's candidacy last fall, but they now see a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to influence the White House and the Republican-controlled Congress. Their optimism is fueled by strong relationships inside the administration, despite their vow to oppose Trump's policies if they deviate from the Koch brothers' conservative priorities. Trump critics were easy to find at the California desert resort this weekend, where attendance at a semi-annual conference was limited to the 550 people who donate at least $100,000 each year to the various conservative political and policy groups backed by Charles and David Koch. The critics included Charles Koch himself, although the conservative patriarch did not mention Trump by name Sunday as he warned that the nation is facing a moment of "tremendous danger." He said the nation could "go the authoritarian route ... or we can move toward a free and open society. So this is our opportunity." Still, the Koch network says it's confident about its ability to shape the direction of the Trump administration's policies from the inside. "Many former network staffers that are in the White House now remain good friends of ours. So we're in constant contact with them," said Koch spokesman James Davis. "Conversations have been open and continue to be." Story continues There is perhaps no bigger Koch ally than Vice President Mike Pence, whose staff and ideology has been in close alignment with the Kochs for years. Charles Koch spoke directly with the vice president on the phone days before his inauguration as Pence considered hiring a Koch communications staffer, Stephen Ford, to serve as his chief speechwriter. Ford was soon hired, along with former Koch chief Marc Short, who now serves as the White House legislative director. "The reason we're optimistic ... is really Mike Pence," said Doug Deason, a prominent Trump supporter and major Koch donor. "If you think Cheney had power in Bush White House, just watch and see what happens with Mike Pence." Several reporters, including one from The Associated Press, were invited to attend the weekend conference. As a condition of attending, photographers were not allowed and reporters were not permitted to identify any donors without their permission. Koch and his powerful allies insist they will challenge Trump when his policies don't align with their conservative vision. The network plans to spend between $300 million and $400 million over the next two years to shape policy and politics, much of it devoted to its nationwide grassroots network. While there has been much talk of Trump allies creating an outside group to help promote his agenda, the Koch network's capacity to communicate directly with voters on the ground in key states has no political rival. The Koch's "secret sauce," Holden says, is "the accountability play." "We're principled. And if we can't get comfortable with the policies that are in place, then we're not going to support them. But if we can we will support them, regardless of who's in office," he said. Like Trump, the Kochs favor efforts to cut government regulation and replace the federal health-care system. They do not share the president's plans for a massive infrastructure spending or his crackdown on immigrants from Muslim-majority countries. "The travel ban is the wrong approach and will likely be counterproductive," network co-chair Brian Hooks said Sunday. "Our country has benefited tremendously from a history of welcoming people from all cultures and backgrounds," he said. "This is a hallmark of free and open societies." You know, in previous years a deficit of mutual respect was a main reason for the regression and degradation of our relations, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov told reporters on Monday, doing his best to channel Aretha Franklin. Per Peskov, the one-hour phone conversation Saturday between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin was good and constructive. It apparently focused on both regional and international threats, as well as the war against terrorism and, critically, the centrality of mutual respect between heads of state. What it did not cover, according to the Kremlin, were U.S. economic sanctions slapped on Russia in 2014. The Kremlin said that, for now, there are no deals on the table with the United States in return for an end to economic sanctions on Russia. White House officials have insisted sanctions werent discussed at all. Trump has previously floated the idea of lifting sanctions, as has his Secretary of State-designate, Rex Tillerson. The first round of sanctions were put in place by the United States in 2014 after Russia illegally annexed Crimea. Late in December, just weeks before leaving office, Obama added additional sanctions after intelligence officials concluded that Russia was indeed responsible for hacking into and leaking Democratic emails over the course of the U.S. presidential election. Remarkably, there is no indication from the White House that the Trump-Putin call even touched on Russias meddling in the election. While the two may have danced around the sanctions issue for now, they did apparently discuss the improvement of economic and trade relations, which some members of the Duma consider to be a direct reference to a post-sanctions world. In order to fully develop economic relations, it is necessary to create an appropriate climate and legal conditions, and this calls for lifting sanctions, said Dmitri Novikov, first deputy chairman of the Dumas committee on international affairs. Story continues Some Republican leaders have preemptively warned Trump that they will oppose efforts by his administration to lift sanctions. It certainly sounds like the call did not end in the immediate disillusionment of either Trump with Putin or Putin with Trump. In fact, Trumps a lot more popular in the Russian media and gets more respect than he does at home. Trump is certainly getting respect from the Russian media, which is running televised segments defending the president from the immoral American press; op-eds (since removed) argued that only Russians should be allowed to report on American politics, a stance surely in tune with White House chief strategist and former Breitbart head Stephen Bannon, who has said the media should keep its mouth shut. Peskov said that the two presidents are likely to meet at some point before the G20 summit in July in Hamburg. Photo credit: SERGEI ILNITSKY/AFP/Getty Images Kuwait City (AFP) - The Kuwaiti government on Monday approved the 2017/2018 budget with a projected huge deficit for the third year running due to the sharp fall in oil prices. Finance Minister Anas Al-Saleh said the fiscal year's budget which begins on April 1 is projecting a shortfall of 6.6 billion dinars ($21.6 billion). The deficit is 25 percent less than the projected shortfall in the current 2016/2017 fiscal year estimated at $29 billion, due to an improvement in oil prices. Revenues are projected at 13.3 billion dinars and spending is estimated at 19.9 billion dinars, the minister told reporters. The budget becomes official only after the Gulf state's elected parliament approves it. Oil revenues are projected at $38.4 billion, up 36 percent on the estimated oil income in this year's budget, the minister said. Despite the sharp slide in oil prices in the past three years, income from oil is still projected to make up 88 percent of Kuwait's total revenues, Saleh said. After posting healthy surpluses for 16 years in a row, Kuwait posted a budget deficit in 2015/2016 which ended March 31 last year. In previous years Kuwait built up a sovereign wealth fund worth around $600 billion that is invested mostly in the United States, Europe and Asia. As part of efforts to reduce the shortfall, the emirate hiked the price of petrol in September and plans to raise electricity and water charges. From Road & Track Recently, turbocharging has become the go-to choice for automakers looking to make a lot of power from smaller, more efficient engines. Even exotic car brands like Ferrari and Aston Martin have turned to forced induction. But according to Lamborghini boss Stefano Domenicali, his brand won't be doing that anytime soon. Australian site CarAdvice talked to Domenicali regarding the future of Lamborghini's flagship, the Aventador supercar. When asked whether its replacement would be turbocharged, he replied, "our position in the [Volkswagen] group must be different, and a naturally aspirated V12 engine is part of that difference." And don't expect that position to change any time soon. According to Domenicali, "the Aventador has more than five or six more years to run and the next platform also has a V12 at the center of the project." Unsurprisingly, Domenicali gave emotional reasons for why the next V12 Lamborghini won't have any forced induction. "We want to be different, we don't want to follow the route of the others," he said. "We are purists in that respect. The top priority for us is to retain the feel from a naturally aspirated engine." via Carscoops You Might Also Like RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) The Latest on a South Carolina resident trying to return from Iran (all times local): 1:20 p.m. U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham says President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily banning travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries should be modified, and he's working to get Nazanin Zinouri back to South Carolina "as soon as possible." Graham told people at Zinouri's workplace in Clemson on Monday that the 29-year-old Clemson University graduate "is exactly the type of person we want to be part of America." Zinouri left on Jan. 20 for what was supposed to be a vacation to see family in Iran. After Trump signed the order temporarily banning entry from citizens of Iran and six other nations, she says she tried to get back but was taken off a plane in Dubai. Graham says that's a mistake. He says Trump can limit some people coming into the country, but an executive order can't "arbitrarily yank" someone's existing legal status. __ This item has been corrected to reflect that Zinouri left the U.S. on Jan. 20, not last Friday. ___ 3:30 a.m. A South Carolina woman who went to visit her family in Iran now worries if she'll ever be allowed back. Nazanin Zinouri said in a phone interview Sunday with The Associated Press that she left Jan. 20 for Tehran. The 29-year-old Zinouri, who has a doctorate from Clemson University, is among those caught up in the chaos surrounding an executive order issued by President Donald Trump that temporarily bans the entry of citizens from seven countries, including Iran. She has a visa and works for a technology company in Clemson. Zinouri got as far as Dubai but was denied boarding on a flight to Washington, D.C. Her employer hopes to hire an attorney to help her. WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Latest on President Donald Trump (all times local): 6:30 a.m. President Donald Trump is jawboning Democrats to move faster on approving his Cabinet nominations. In an early morning post on his verified Twitter account, the president said, "When will the Democrats give us our Attorney General and rest of Cabinet." He said, "They should be ashamed of themselves! No wonder D.C. doesn't work." His choice to succeed Loretta Lynch as attorney general, Alabama's Sen. Jeff Sessions, was due for a vote by the Senate Judiciary Committee later Tuesday morning. Several other Cabinet picks are due for votes by the respective committees in the next few days. 6(05 a.m. A shakeup at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency has resulted in the departure of acting director Daniel Ragsdale. The administration didn't offer any explanation for the move announced late Monday. The move came on the same day that President Donald Trump fired acting Attorney General Sally Yates for publicly declining to defend Trump's executive order on immigration and refugees. ICE executive associate director Thomas Homan has been elevated to the role of acting chief. The agency's Twitter account says Ragsdale is returning to his previous position as deputy director of ICE. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly said in announcing the change that Homan had led efforts "to identify, arrest, detain, and remove illegal aliens." The statement didn't make any mention of Ragsdale. An ICE spokeswoman didn't offer any further explanation for the move when reached early Tuesday. 3:50 a.m. In an extraordinary public showdown, President Donald Trump fired the acting attorney general of the United States after she publicly questioned the constitutionality of his refugee and immigration ban and refused to defend it in court. The clash Monday night between Trump and Sally Yates, a career prosecutor and Democratic appointee, laid bare the growing discord and dissent surrounding an executive order that halted the entire U.S. refugee program and banned all entries from seven Muslim-majority nations for 90 days. The firing also served as a warning to other administration officials that Trump is prepared to terminate those who refuse to carry out his orders. Yates' refusal to defend the executive order was largely symbolic given that Sen. Jeff Sessions, Trump's pick for attorney general, will almost certainly defend the policy once he's sworn in. He's expected to be confirmed Tuesday by the Senate Judiciary Committee and could be approved within days by the full Senate. Federal judges in four states issued orders over the weekend temporarily forbidding the removal of some individuals who had been targeted by President Trumps executive order on refugees and immigrants, capping 36 hours of protests and chaos at major U.S. airports. The confusion began shortly after Trump issued his sweeping executive order on Friday night. Under its provisions, Trump suspended the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program for 120 days, barred the citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. on all but certain diplomatic visas for 90 days, and permanently blocked the admission of Syrian refugees into the United States. The order does not affect travel by U.S. citizens, whether they were born in the country or later became naturalized. The orders sudden release and sweeping effect led to confusion and chaos at major U.S. airports as hundreds of travelers, including some lawful permanent U.S. residents with green cards, found themselves unable to enter the country. In New York, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and other major cities, demonstrators gathered outside international terminals to protest the executive order. Democratic members of Congress and volunteer lawyers also arrived to free people detained by U.S. customs officials. The ACLU and other legal organizations also filed lawsuits seeking temporary stays of removal in federal courts in at least four cities. Recommended: How to Respond to Donald Trump's Betrayal of American Values Those efforts first bore fruit in the form of a late-night order in New York City, where federal judge Ann Donnelly granted an emergency stay of removal. In the broad order, Donnelly enjoined the federal government from, in any manner or by any means, removing individuals with refugee applications approved by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services as part of the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, holders of valid immigrant and non-immigrant visas, and other individuals from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen legally authorized to enter the United States. Donnelly did not limit the orders scope to her jurisdiction, effectively making it a nationwide injunction. Story continues Shortly after Donnellys order was issued, federal judge Leonie Brinkema in Virginia issued a temporary restraining order requiring the federal government to permit lawyers access to all legal permanent residents being detained at Dulles International Airport and forbade U.S. officials from removing the lawsuits plaintiffs for a period of 7 days from the issuance of this order. Unlike Donnellys broad injunction, Brinkema limited her orders scope to Dulles International Airport, a major international airport in Virginia located about 30 miles outside Washington, D.C. Early Sunday morning in Boston, federal judge Allison Burroughs and federal magistrate judge Judith Dein then issued an order barring the detention as well as the removal of the same groups covered by Donnellys injunction. Both of their injunctions apply nationwide. Federal judge Thomas Zilly issued the fourth order on Sunday morning, granting temporary stay of removal to two John Doe plaintiffs in Washington state. Recommended: What Trump's Executive Order on Immigration Doesand Doesn't Do In practical terms, both the Donnelly order and the Burroughs-Dein order temporarily block the federal government from removing or detaining anyone with valid immigrant or non-immigrant visas, approved refugee applications, or lawful permanent residents under the executive orders authority. The orders also do not re-open the suspended U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, nor do they prohibit other changes to U.S. immigration policy by either Congress or the president. The temporary rulings also mark the beginning of the legal battle over President Trumps executive order instead of its conclusion. None of the judges addressed the broader legality or constitutionality of the order itself, instead leaving that to future court hearings where both sides can present more complete arguments to the court. In an unusual statement, the Department of Homeland Security said it would both comply with judicial orders and implement President Trumps executive orders at the same time, noting that less than 1 percent of U.S.-bound travelers were inconvenienced while enhanced security measures were implemented. The department also defended the executive order on its merits. No foreign national in a foreign land, without ties to the United States, has any unfettered right to demand entry into the United States or to demand immigration benefits in the United States, it concluded. Read more from The Atlantic: This article was originally published on The Atlantic. By Noah Browning DUBAI (Reuters) - Years after he fled political persecution in his native Yemen, a new life in the United States was finally taking shape for democracy activist Abdulraqeb al-Duais. But U.S. President Donald Trump's temporary travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries has upset his plans to bring his family over to the United States - where he has political asylum - and has left him in limbo in Malaysia. "It's like it's not real - like I'm living a nightmare now," he said. "I believed my color, my religion was not an issue in (the United States) and that it represented progress and freedom. Now I don't know what to believe." A U.S. green card holder, Duais flew to Malaysia from New York on Friday to be with his family when they appeared for an immigration interview at the U.S. embassy in Kuala Lumpur, to which they fled their war-damaged home country. The 41-year-old father expected prompt approval for his wife and three young children to acquire green cards and join him. But now his appointment is likely canceled as some U.S. missions abroad advised residents from the seven countries - Yemen, Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Libya and Syria - not to attend interviews or pay visa fees because they can no longer be processed. The U.S. embassy in Kuala Lumpur could not immediately be reached for comment on any changes to its activities following the new visa measures. Trump's administration says the ban is in place pending study of how to keep militants out, and denies accusations by rights groups that the move singles out Muslims. The ban brings uncertainty not just for his family, but to Duais himself. Government officials have provided various accounts on treatment for green card holders abroad - that entry would be reviewed on a "case-by-case" basis, that they should report to a U.S. mission abroad before returning or that they may merely face more questioning upon arrival on U.S. soil. "I can't return to Yemen. I worked against the regime there as a political activist and was among those in the independent youth movement which started a revolution in 2011," said Duais, who headed a civil society group before he moved to the U.S. in 2011. Mass protests as part of the "Arab Spring" forced Yemen's veteran autocrat President Ali Abdullah Saleh to step down in 2012. Three years later, the country descended into civil war. Saleh's General People's Congress party controls Sanaa together with the Iran-allied Houthi movement. They are engaged in a war against Yemen's internationally recognized government. Duais said he faced death threats and Yemeni authorities issued a warrant for his arrest in 2011 while he was in United States as a delegate to a leadership program, prompting him to seek asylum. "I'm not a rich man, I'm making this visit to keep myself and my family safe. I've got a new business in America and I've just registered with the tax authorities," he added. "I want to pay my way and be an American. This may not be possible anymore. I did everything right and according to the rules, but now nothing is clear for me." (Reporting By Noah Browning; editing by Sami Aboudi and Dominic Evans) Worldwide, rising populism and identity politics are leading to increased demands from families seeking out specific types of schools that mirror their ideologies. In some countries, this has extended to replacing the public system of schools with government vouchers that can be used to pay for private schools -- a priority of Betsy DeVos, the nominee for U.S. education secretary. Advocates argue that school choice promotes competition that will improve performance and allow the freedom of choice that will best serve student educational needs and family preferences. These are not new ideas. Nobel prize-winning economist Milton Friedman designed an educational voucher plan some 60 years ago that was adopted by Sweden and Chile. Under his plan, families can use vouchers at any approved private school. Several states and cities in the U.S. sponsor voucher approaches for students from low-income families that are used mainly at religiously affiliated schools. Education in most democratic countries was established primarily to prepare students for roles in the emerging industrial democracies of the 19th century. Democratic political participation requires access to information, engagement in discourse and electoral activity to be effective. Economic participation requires understanding of markets, prices, money, government intervention, employment relationships and economic responsibilities and opportunities. "A stable and democratic society is impossible without a minimum degree of literacy and knowledge on the part of most citizens and without widespread acceptance of some common set of values," Friedman wrote in a 1955 essay on educational vouchers. This required universal schooling at government expense. Clearly there is a tension between unfettered school choice as a goal and a common educational experience that will ensure students are prepared for the demands of a democratic society. Families have their own private goals and their own reasons for preferring particular types of schooling experience. Story continues Eighty percent of private school students in the U.S. are in religiously affiliated institutions that reflect their family beliefs, but not necessarily the values of a democracy. It is natural that families would like their schools to reinforce their religious, philosophical and political beliefs, but these must be weighed against a common experience that justifies government funding. Some have argued that competitive incentives induced by school choice will lead to better educational outcomes. However, there is little evidence to support this claim. Sweden has had an educational voucher system since 1992, but its achievement levels on international tests have been falling for two decades. Chile has had such a system since 1980, and there is little evidence of improvement in achievement relative to countries at similar levels of income. Cleveland, Milwaukee, and the District of Columbia have issued vouchers to low-income families, but sophisticated evaluations find no difference between achievement in private voucher schools and public schools with similar student populations. Students from low-income families in Louisiana who have used vouchers to shift from public to private schools have experienced striking reductions in achievement gains relative to similar students in public schools. In England there has been a dramatic shift from schools governed by public councils to academies run by private groups with great autonomy and the ability to select their own students. The results on student achievement show no distinct advantage, and there are similar results for U.S. charter schools based upon careful statistical comparisons. Where school choice has shown powerful effects around the world is the systematic separation of students by ethnicity, social class and religion. Sweden's vouchers have increased segregation by social class and immigrant status. Chile's voucher system has produced one of the most segregated system of schools in the world by family income. In the Netherlands, studies of the school choice system have pointed to school separation of students by ethnicity, immigrant status and family income. A Brookings Institution study found that U.S. charter schools are more segregated racially and socio-economically than public schools in surrounding areas. The Program for International Student Assessment, an important triennial study of international student performance, finds school segregation by social class is associated with school choice. [READ: Is PISA a misleading test?] Although even public schools have segregation challenges typically caused by residential location, school choice tends to streamline the racial, social class and ethnic isolation of students, as well as separate them by political ideology and religion. Parents have their own private goals for their children and ample opportunities to pursue them. Schools account for only about 10 percent of the waking hours of the young between birth and age 18, freeing most of the time for family experience. They also have a constitutional right to send their children to religious schools. The question is how to balance the quest for school choice with preparation of the young for the shared values and knowledge necessary for an effective democracy. Universal school choice will undermine a shared experience and further exacerbate conflict and social division. The challenge for education is to find forms of choice that insure exposure of all students to the experiences they need for democratic participation. Henry M. Levin is the William Heard Kilpatrick Professor of Economics and Education at Columbia University's Teachers College. Our financial decision-making abilities peak in our 50s and can decline pretty rapidly after age 70, researchers tell us. That's how otherwise smart older people fall for sweepstakes frauds, Nigerian investment schemes and the grandparent scam, where con artists pretend to be grandchildren in a financial jam. But few people want to hear that they're not as sharp as they used to be. Many won't recognize the rising risk of losing hard-earned life savings as they age, says financial literacy expert Lewis Mandell, author of "What to Do When I Get Stupid: A Radically Safe Approach to a Difficult Financial Era." "As our ability to make sound financial decisions decreases with age, our self-confidence in this area actually increases," Mandell says. Adult children who want to protect their parents from fraud and bad financial decisions have to tread carefully, says Jessie Doll, wealth management adviser with TIAA in Fairfax, Virginia. Money may be a difficult subject, and parents may resent the interference or fear losing their independence. It may help to frame the issue as one all of us will face if we live long enough. Talking about your own efforts to "future-proof" your finances can start the discussion of how they can defend their money against bad decisions and bad guys. Together, parents and children can: Draft powers of attorney. Two documents everyone needs, regardless of age: a power of attorney for health care decisions and a power of attorney for financial decisions. This paperwork names the people we want to speak for us in case we become incapacitated. We should be having discussions with whoever we name about our wishes and our financial situation, Doll says. "Talking about it is opening the door to making this less of a taboo discussion," Doll says. Consolidate and simplify. One bank. One brokerage firm. Two credit cards, one for daily purchases and one for automatic bill payment. That's the prescription for simplified, consolidated finances that will be easier to track as we age, says financial planner Carolyn McClanahan, a physician and director of financial planning at Life Planning Partners in Jacksonville, Florida. McClanahan also recommends replacing individual stocks and bonds, which require constant monitoring, with a small number of mutual funds or exchange-traded funds. Story continues Having fewer accounts helps the fraud-sniffing software that banks and brokerages use to detect suspicious transactions, Doll says. "If the assets are all over the place, it's hard to establish a baseline so they can notice if something's amiss," she says. Adult children can: Stay in touch. Isolation is the fraudster's best friend. Scam artists don't want their victims to have a close circle of family and friends looking for signs of exploitation, says Sally Hurme, an elder-law attorney with AARP in Washington, D.C. Weekly calls to catch up and regular visits can help loved ones spot red flags, like a pile of sweepstakes offers or the investment salesman who's getting too friendly. Keep up to date on the latest scams. Criminals are endlessly creative. Some places to learn about their ever-evolving schemes include StopFraud.gov , AARP's Fraud Watch Network and the IRS, which offers consumers alerts and an annual list of the "Dirty Dozen" top tax-related scams. Discussing news reports about frauds, such as telephone imposters pretending to be IRS agents or Microsoft tech support, can help you keep relatives informed. Lastly, parents can: Get more eyes on your money. Financial institutions likely offer text or email alerts to notify you of unusual activity, and so do sites that provide regular looks at free credit reports. Once you're over 65, consider setting these up so that your "wingman" the person you want to make financial decisions for you gets them as well. It may also be smart to run any investment you're considering past your appointed person, says elder-law attorney Carolyn Rosenblatt, author of "The Family Guide to Aging Parents: Answers to Your Legal, Financial, and Healthcare Questions." Give your doctors and any financial professionals, such as your adviser or accountant, permission to contact your wingman if they suspect you're suffering serious cognitive decline. Finally, plan with your family about what to do if you show signs of diminished capacity but you don't know you are impaired, Rosenblatt says. "Set the 'trigger points' for having your successor take over your finances and what they can do if you resist because you think you're fine, but no one else does," Rosenblatt says. "People who don't know they are impaired resist giving up financial control, and this is very dangerous." _______ This column was provided to The Associated Press by the personal finance website NerdWallet. Liz Weston is a certified financial planner and columnist at NerdWallet. Email: lweston@nerdwallet.com. Twitter: @lizweston. RELATED LINKS: IRS: Tax scams and consumer alerts: https://www.irs.gov/uac/tax-scams-consumer-alerts NerdWallet: How to get your free credit reports: https://nerd.me/2iosb8V HAMBURG (Reuters) - Low water levels after dry weather over the past month is again preventing cargo vessels from sailing fully loaded on the Rhine and Danube rivers in Germany, traders said on Monday. All of the Rhine and Danube in Germany are too shallow for normal sailings, with some barges only able to sail 20 to 30 percent full, the traders said. Loads are being divided among several vessels instead of being carried by a single craft, increasing transport costs for cargo owners. Freight is also being transferred to road transport. Rain and snow in river catchment areas in southern Germany and Switzerland this week could provide some relief, traders added. The Rhine is an important shipping route for commodities including grains, minerals, coal and oil products including heating oil. The Danube is a major route for east European grain exports, especially maize, to west Europe. (Reporting by Michael Hogan; Editing by David Goodman) Making a Murderers second season will premiere sometime this year. Thats as specific as Netflixs VP of original content, Cindy Holland, could get about the follow-up to the hit docuseries as the story is still ongoing, so you will see new episodes coming sometime this year as this story continues to unfold. We dont know when for sure new episodes will be coming. The first season, shot over the course of 10 years, followed Steven Averys wrongful conviction of sexual assault and attempted murder in a 1985 case, as well as his 2007 trial and conviction for the murder of Teresa Halbach. Averys nephew, Brendan Dassey, was also convicted as an accessory to the crime. Related: Making a Murderer: Casting 15 Key Roles Since the show became a huge hit for Netflix, a We the People petition was signed by more than 100,000 people to pardon Avery and Dassey. Unfortunately, the crime was tried in a state court and former President Obama did not have the authority to pardon a state criminal offense. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker did not act on the petition, or virtually any petition, because, as he told the Associated Press in 2013, [Granting pardons is] not really why I ran for office. Its not what I campaigned on. Its not what I talked about. Dasseys case was overturned in a federal court this past August, because his confession was unconstitutionally coerced. Porn website xHamster jumped into action to help fund a trip to WrestleMania for the die-hard WWE fan, but state attorneys filed an appeal to block his release. As of January 2017, Brendan Dassey remains in Columbia Correctional Institution in Wisconsin. Netflix hasnt stated if any of this will be covered in Season 2, as its leaving the program in the hands of documentarians Moira Demos and Laura Ricciardi. As Holland of Netflixput it, Very few people inside of Netflix actually know the details of what were getting because were wanting to keep it really under wraps, and it is an ongoing case so were trying to be sensitive to that. Story continues Monica Lewinsky Scandal Will Be Focus of Fourth Season of American Crime Story Tell us what you think! Do you believe that Avery and Dassey are innocent? Or do you think that the Wisconsin courts got it right the first time? Hit us up on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram, or leave your comments below. And check out our host, Khail Anonymous, on Twitter. By A. Ananthalakshmi KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Malaysia searched on Monday for four Chinese tourists and a Malaysian missing after a boat on a Lunar New Year holiday cruise capsized off the coast of Borneo, tossing 30 people into stormy seas and killing three Chinese passengers. The catamaran carrying 27 Chinese tourists and three crew members sank late on Saturday as it sailed from Kota Kinabalu, the capital of the eastern Malaysian state of Sabah, to the tourist spot of Mengalum, Malaysian maritime officials said. The boat went down after being battered by heavy waves. The tourists were tied together in life jackets and swept away by the current, the head of the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) said. Adrift for several hours before help arrived, the tourists were picked up by fishermen, Malaysian maritime officials said. Three of the tourists were found dead on Sunday, while 22 people, including the boat's captain, were rescued. Military ships and aircraft were scouring an area of 2,400 square nautical miles of sea, the agency said. The search had been hampered by strong wind and choppy waters, officials added. Provincial police chief Ramli Din said three people had been arrested for questioning, including the boat owner and captain. Maritime officials said late on Monday 27 Chinese tourists were on the boat and not 28, as they had previously said. Chinese President Xi Jinping had offered assistance and neighboring Brunei deployed a helicopter and naval assets to help. The rescued passengers and crew arrived in Kota Kinabalu early on Monday and were taken to hospital, the maritime agency said. Anxious relatives arrived and were escorted to the hospital by Chinese embassy officials. Authorities were investigating whether the boat should have been used as a tourist vessel, the MMEA's director-general, Ahmad Puzi Ab Kahar, told reporters. "According to the skipper, the boat was 'broken' after being hit by strong waves, and sank. All the tourists were tied together and were carried away by the currents," he said late on Sunday. Thousands of Chinese visitors flock to Mengalum island during the long Lunar New Year holidays. China is one of Malaysia's main sources of tourists. Ties between the two countries were strained in 2014 when Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 went missing on its way from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Most of its passengers were from China. The search for the airliner ended this month with no clue of its whereabouts. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak called for a full investigation to determine why the boat sank. "However, at the moment we must concentrate fully on the search and rescue efforts," he said in a statement. China said it hoped Malaysia would conduct a fair and objective investigation and "ascertain the facts about the incident as quickly as possible," foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said in a statement. (Additional reporting by Alexandra Harney in Beijing; Writing by Praveen Menon; Editing by Clarence Fernandez) Rescuers Monday expanded their search for four Chinese tourists and a crewman whose boat sank in rough seas off Malaysia, as police detained the skipper, another crewman and the boat owner for suspected negligence. The owner had breached procedures, including overloading the boat, Sabah state Police Commissioner Ramli Din was quoted as saying by national news agency Bernama. "Police will also investigate whether negligence led to the deaths of the tourists," Ramli said. The sinking of the catamaran off Sabah on Borneo island on Saturday, the first day of the Lunar New Year holiday, sparked a major air and sea search. Twenty exhausted Chinese tourists survived hours in the water thanks to their life jackets and by clinging desperately to objects from the boat, but three other tourists died. The skipper and another crew member were earlier rescued off a nearby island. Initially, authorities said 28 Chinese tourists were on board the ill-fated vessel. But late Monday Malaysian officials said one Chinese had failed to show up for the trip. The search area has been further expanded from 1,500 to 2,400 nautical square miles, Awil Kamsari, a spokesman for the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, told AFP. Awil said the search was expected to continue through the night despite adverse weather. Malaysian navy chief Ahmad Kamarulzaman Ahmad Badaruddin told AFP that more assets have been deployed. Part of the search area falls in Brunei's waters and the sultanate's navy is assisting, he said. "It's not going to be easy as time is critical. The longer it takes, the lower the probability of finding them," Ahmad said, adding the sea was still very rough. "But we cannot lose hope and must continue." The search was postponed due to rough seas on Sunday night but resumed Monday morning. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said on his Facebook page he wanted a "thorough investigation" into the incident. Story continues China's foreign ministry also urged "a fair and objective investigation to find out the truth in the accident as soon as possible". The boat with 27 tourists and three crew aboard had left the Sabah state capital Kota Kinabalu for Pulau Mengalum, an island known for its pristine beaches and dive sites. The boat owner reported it missing on Saturday evening. The skipper said the boat had "broken" and sank after being hit by big waves. The traumatised and exhausted survivors were taken to Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Kota Kinabalu. A Malaysian official there told AFP they "looked shocked" and some "could not walk and looked very tired" as they were taken to hospital. He said they survived because of their life jackets and by clinging on to objects from the boat. State Tourism, Culture and Environment Assistant Minister Pang Yuk Ming said authorities were checking whether the catamaran had sailed from a jetty in Kota Kinabalu that was not intended for tourist trips to nearby islands. London (AFP) - Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp admitted on Monday that Sadio Mane might miss their crunch clash with Premier League leaders Chelsea at Anfield on Tuesday, despite their best efforts to rush the Senegal star back from the Africa Cup of Nations. The Merseysiders sent a private jet to Gabon on Sunday following Senegal's exit from the competition, with Mane heartbroken after missing the decisive penalty in a 5-4 shoot-out quarter-final loss to Cameroon. But problems with the flight delayed his arrival back in Britain and now Klopp will have to decide whether Mane can be on the bench against Chelsea in a match where a faltering Liverpool will kick-off 10 points behind the league leaders. "I don't know exactly (when he will be available)," said Klopp of Mane. "The club did an outstanding job to bring him back as soon as possible and he is now on his way. "We thought it would be possible yesterday: we had a plane there but he was not allowed to go in the plane so we had to wait. "He will be here tonight but I spoke to him and it is all good so far. "He will be in tomorrow morning and we have to make a decision. We have to look in his eyes and see whatever is possible." Mane's absence on international duty has coincided with a dramatic slump in Liverpool's form that has produced just one win in seven matches (against fourth-tier Plymouth in the FA Cup) and a mere seven goals since he last appeared for the Reds in a 2-2 draw against Sunderland on January 2. For many at Anfield, the sooner Mane -- Liverpool's joint top-scorer so far this season, is back in a red shirt the better. But Klopp cautioned against billing the 24-year-old Mane as the saviour of a season that saw Liverpool knocked out of both the League Cup and FA Cup last week. "It was a strange situation in the Senegal game against Cameroon and I wish not for one second he missed the penalty at the end but it happened so he is coming back," said Klopp. Story continues "He is a quality player. It is easier if you have him in the team or around the team than when you don't have him. That's fair," the German boss added. "But it is not that he can decide games by himself or we should expect this. "We came through December and most of January without Phil Coutinho (sidelined for nearly seven weeks with ankle ligament damage). "I spoke about a few reasons about why it was not good in January but I don't want to think about the last few games any more. "He is kind of an option for the Chelsea game. He is back at least for the Hull game and that is good for us. "We have to decide whether we can involve him for tomorrow somehow or not. "Everything is like it was before he left. It is a very good player back for selection, that can only be good news." By Scott Malone (Reuters) - Maine on Monday became the eighth U.S. state to legalize recreational marijuana use and the state's Republican governor called on lawmakers to approve funds to develop rules to oversee retail sales of the drug. The measure was narrowly approved by voters on Nov. 8 to make it legal for adults 21 and over to possess and use marijuana, but did not take effect until Monday. Governor Paul LePage, who opposed legalization, said he would order the state's Bureau of Alcoholic Beverages and Lottery Operations to hold off on formulating rules to govern the sale of the drug until the state's legislature approved new funding. A measure approved by state lawmakers last week delayed the retail sales of the drug until February 2018. "The executive branch must be provided with the resources necessary to implement this new law," LePage said in a statement. Massachusetts on Dec. 15 became the first state in the densely populated U.S. Northeast to legalize recreational marijuana use, also the result of a Nov. 8 ballot initiative. Lawmakers there delayed until July 1, 2018 the legal sale the drug, leaving state residents in a gray area where they can use but not legally buy marijuana. Marijuana remains illegal under federal law but is now legal in Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Nevada, California and Alaska, as well as Maine, Massachusetts and the District of Columbia. The Maine state senate on Monday named five members, three Republicans and two Democrats, to a committee charged with developing laws related to marijuana. Legalization advocates called on the governor and legislature to act quickly to clear the way for legal sales. "Now that the law has taken effect, our efforts must turn to the timely and effective implementation of the remaining parts of the law, to ensure that all Maine taxpayers benefit," said Alysia Melnick, a lawyer with Maine's Yes on 1 campaign. An October poll by Gallup showed that 60 percent of Americans now support the legalization of recreational use of marijuana. Even more approve of the idea of legalizing marijuana for medical use, a step that 28 states have taken. (Reporting by Scott Malone in Boston; Editing by Lisa Shumaker) PRINCETON, W.Va. (AP) Authorities have cleared of wrongdoing a West Virginia deputy who fatally shot a man wielding a toy pistol. The man who was killed, 69-year-old Dennis Stanley, was drunk and using other substances at the time of the September shooting, Mercer County prosecutor George Sitler told the Charleston Gazette-Mail (http://bit.ly/2kM6d1q). Deputy Adam Ballard shot and killed Stanley on Sept. 10 in the middle of West Virginia Route 71 in Montcalm. A resident had called 911 and reported Stanley was waving the pistol around and acting erratically. Officers didn't see Stanley waving the pistol, Sitler said, but knew he had a pistol in his pocket. "From a short distance away, it looked like a real gun in his pocket," he said. Ballard was wearing a body camera at the time of the shooting. The recording captured Ballard telling Stanley to put his hands in the air "more than a dozen times" before the fatal shot was fired, Sitler said. Ballard is still employed by the sheriff's department. He will not face criminal charges and police found he violated no internal policies. The investigation is complete, and Sitler said he has no plans to present the case to the grand jury. "Deputy Adam Ballard's actions were restrained, careful and professional," Sitler said. "I have personally commended him for his conduct, although the outcome was regrettable." An autopsy found that Stanley's blood alcohol content was .14. He also tested positive for cocaine and oxycodone and had what police believed was marijuana in his pocket. ___ Information from: The Charleston Gazette-Mail, http://wvgazettemail.com. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus tweet in support of U.S. President Donald Trumps plan to build a wall along the border with neighboring country Mexico has not gone down well with the Mexican government. Israeli ambassador to the country, Jonathan Peled, was summoned by Mexico after Netanyahus post on Twitter lauded Trumps border wall plans, noting the success of a similar wall along the southern border of his country that he said curbed illegal immigration. The Mexican government and leaders of the Jewish community in Mexico were quick to call out the Israeli prime minister on his comments. The Foreign Ministry expressed to the government of Israel, via its ambassador in Mexico, its profound astonishment, rejection and disappointment over Prime Minister Netanyahu's message on Twitter about the construction of a border wall, Mexicos foreign ministry said in a statement. The statement also noted that Mexicos Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray had expressed his deep affection for Israel at an event commemorating the Holocaust on Friday, adding: Mexico is a friend of Israel and should be treated as such by its Prime Minister. The Central Committee of the Jewish Community in Mexico also issued a statement condemning Netanyahus comment. Mony de Swaan, a former head of the Mexican telecommunications regulator, took to Twitter to post pictures of walls related to the Nazi concentration camp Bergen-Belsen with the caption: So you like walls @netanyahu? Here you have a couple of nice designs. Peled reportedly said that Netanyahus tweet did not necessarily refer to Trumps wall but instead talked about the fence on Israels border with Sinai. Israeli Foreign Ministry Spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon said on Twitter: @IsraeliPM referred to our specific security experience which we are willing to share. We do not express a position on US- Mexico relations. Story continues U.S.-Mexico relations took a turn for the worse on Thursday after Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto canceled his plan to meet Trump after the latter said again that Mexico should pay for the wall Trump wants to build. However, in a call Friday, the leaders have reportedly decided to work out their differences. trump wall Photo: REUTERS/Jorge Duenes Related Articles MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Israel should apologise for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's praise for U.S. President Donald Trump's plans to build a wall on the Mexican border, Mexico's foreign minister said on Monday, calling it an "aggression" against the country. The Israeli government had sought to nuance Netanyahu's tweet after a rebuke from Mexico on Saturday, saying the prime minister was referring to Israel's specific security experience and not taking a position on U.S.-Mexico relations. However, Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray said that explanation was not good enough, and that the Israeli government needed to clarify and "correct" its position. "I would ask prime minister Netanyahu how many walls has President Trump said he wants to build? It's obvious he was referring to the relationship with Mexico, and we should be serious and assume responsibility for what we say," he said. "I think an apology ... would be appropriate in this case," he said, noting that Israel was a "close friend" of Mexico. "It's absolutely incomprehensible that its prime minister should express himself in this way, which frankly we consider an aggression," Videgaray added. Trump's planned border wall, which he wants to keep out illegal immigrants, has caused serious strain to Mexican-U.S. relations at a time when the American president is threatening to impose punitive taxes against Mexico to rebalance trade. Netanyahu, who is under pressure at home with police questioning him in two criminal probes into abuse of office, came under fire both domestically and abroad for the tweet. "President Trump is right. I built a wall along Israel's southern border. It stopped all illegal immigration. Great Success. Great idea," Netanyahu wrote on Twitter. (Reporting by Dave Graham; Editing by Meredith Mazzilli) Mexico City (AFP) - Mexico urged Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday to apologize for praising US President Donald Trump's border wall plan, but the Israeli prime minister denied he was targeting the Latin American country. Netanyahu has shocked Mexico and the country's small Jewish community in praising Trump's wall plan on Twitter over the weekend. "We are expecting a clarification, a rectification. I think that an apology would be something appropriate in this case," Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray told the Televisa network. Videgaray said Mexico rejects Netanyahu's statement "and we hope that the government of Israel has sensitivity to correct this position." He said the Israeli government's explanation so far was not acceptable. US-Mexican relations plunged into the worst crisis in decades last week after Trump ordered the construction of the wall to stop illegal immigration and insisted that Mexico will pay for it. - Netanyahu blames 'Bolshevik' media - Israel built a more than 150-mile (240-kilometer) barrier along its border with Egypt, a route previously taken by many African illegal migrants and traffickers. Trump hailed the Israeli wall as an example last week, prompting Netanyahu to express his support for the new US president's plans to build a wall. "President Trump is right. I built a wall along Israel's southern border. It stopped all illegal immigration. Great success. Great idea," Netanyahu tweeted in English, adding the Israeli and American flags. On Monday, the Israeli prime minister blamed the media for the controversy. "They say 'you've hurt Mexico, you've ruined the relationship with them.' Who even referred to Mexico? We've had a good relationship with them and we will keep on having one," he said. The Israeli leader, speaking at a meeting of his right-wing Likud party, accused the media of overplaying the dispute, failing to focus on the "fantastic success" of the fence built in southern Israel to prevent migrant traffic and spreading "fake news." Story continues "I am not surprised. The left-wing media is on a Bolshevik hunting trip, brainwashing and character assassination against me and my family," he said. Since the end of 2016, Netanyahu has been the subject of two police investigations -- one regarding luxury gifts he and his family allegedly received and the other concerning a meeting with the head of a prominent newspaper to try to negotiate better coverage. He denies any wrongdoing. Israel's ambassador to Mexico, Jonathan Peled, met with deputy foreign minister Carlos de Icaza on Monday. "In the conversation, it was agreed to continue being in contact in order to settle the disputes and continue the good relations between the states," the Israeli foreign ministry said in a statement. Peled told Radio Formula earlier that "a tweet should not affect this very good relationship." - Mexican Jews reject tweet - Mexico's foreign ministry had already expressed its "deep surprise, disapproval and disappointment" on Saturday. The Central Committee of the Jewish Community of Mexico said in a weekend statement: "We strongly reject (Netanyahu's) position." The tensions with the United States over the proposed border wall had prompted Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto to cancel a meeting with Trump scheduled for Tuesday in Washington. The Jewish community voiced support for Pena Nieto and his decision to scrap the meeting with Trump. Mexicans "live and work in and contribute to the neighboring country. Their human rights must be respected at all moments," the statement said. Mexico City (AFP) - Mexico welcomed on Monday a senior US official's suggestion that drug cartels could pay for a controversial border wall, but the idea raised eyebrows in local media. US President Donald Trump has angered Mexico by insisting that he will make the country pay for a massive barrier along the border, though he has yet to specify exactly how. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said Sunday there was a "buffet of options" to fund the wall along the 2,000-mile (3,200-kilometer) border. "There is no final conclusion on exactly how this wall is going to be paid for by the Mexican government," he told CBS's "Face the Nation." "It can either be through a tax on goods coming across the border. It be through tax reform and a formula on import and export taxes and credits. It could be on drug cartels. And it could be on people that are coming here illegally and paying fines. Or it could be all of the above." Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan has estimated the wall's cost at between $12 and $15 billion. Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray, who was in Washington last week for talks with US officials, welcomed the suggestion that cartels pay for the wall. "It's undoubtedly positive progress that they are talking about someone that is not Mexico. Narcos are not Mexico," Videgaray told the Televisa network. "It's a signal that -- at least that's how I interpret it -- must be welcomed because we are already seeing how the discussion is changing." Videgaray said Mexican and US officials could meet in the next few days. For more news videos visit Yahoo View. President Enrique Pena Nieto canceled a meeting with Trump scheduled for Tuesday in Washington in protest over his wall plan, but the two leaders later instructed their teams to continue the dialogue. Priebus did not explain how the authorities would get money from the cartels. The US Treasury Department has imposed sanctions that block Mexican drug lords' US assets. Courts can also seize the funds of convicted kingpins. Story continues US federal prosecutors, for example, are seeking a $14 billion forfeiture from Sinaloa drug cartel baron Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, who was extradited to New York on January 19, on the eve of Trump's inauguration. Priebus's suggestion surprised Mexican media. The national daily Reforma exclaimed on its front page: "They are analyzing making cartels pay!" and the story described the option as "not very conventional." The headline in another newspaper, Excelsior, said: "Now they want narcos to pay for the wall." A cartoon in Excelsior featured a drug lord sitting on a bag of money, holding an assault rifle and asking: "What is Trump smoking?" Manila (AFP) - France won its first Miss Universe crown in 64 years on Monday in a made-for-television spectacle where finalists spoke out on the refugee crisis and other hot-button global issues. Iris Mittenaere, a dental surgery student from Lille in the north of France, beat 85 of the world's most beautiful women at the event in the Philippines scheduled for primetime viewing in the United States. Mittenaere, 24, edged out Miss Haiti, the first runner-up, and Miss Colombia, the second runner-up, to win France's first Miss Universe title since 1953. "I was very surprised. I am always touching the crown and saying 'Oh my God. I have the crown on my head. I don't believe it,'" Mittenaere said in a post-pageant news conference. "French people love beauty pageants but they don't really know Miss Universe because never (did) our country win," she said, adding she would advocate for good hygiene and educating children. In the final question round, the six remaining contestants were each asked questions relating to various political issues in their own countries or abroad. When asked about the global refugee crisis, Mittenaere said France had the right to close its borders to refugees if it wanted but she also spoke about the benefits of migration. "In France we want to have the most globalisation that we can. We want to have the biggest exchange of people that we can. Maybe someday that will change but now we have open borders," Mittenaere said, with her comments translated into English for the audience. "Having open borders allows us to travel more through the world and to find out more about what's out there in the world." Miss Kenya, another finalist, said Donald Trump's presidency "may not have been the choice of many people" in the United States. "So many people oppose his position. But I feel that once (Trump) took up his position, he was able to unify the entire nation," said Mary Esther Were, 27. Story continues Miss Colombia appeared to allude to Trump when asked why violence was prevalent in the world. "Although there are presidents who don't get along with others, we work together to unite. Campaigns, respect and inclusivity to be able to have a social transformation that would educate our children," said Andrea Tovar, 23. Monday's show was headlined by US performers including Grammy award-winning rhythm and blues group Boyz II Men and rapper and Grammy award nominee Flo Rida. - Smooth ceremony - Pia Wurtzbach of the Philippines won last year following a major blunder in which the host -- Emmy Award winner Steve Harvey -- mistakenly awarded the title to Miss Colombia. Harvey corrected the error minutes later, apologising on air to Wurtzbach and Miss Colombia, Ariadna Gutierrez. The mistake featured prominently on Monday's show, with candidates and the home audience often ribbing Harvey about it. "Steve, I never got to thank you but thank you for making me the most popular Miss Universe," Wurtzbach told Harvey at the opening of show. Harvey this year got through the closing moments of the ceremony smoothly. The Philippines agreed to host the pageant as part of efforts to draw tourists and investors. Beauty pageants are also hugely popular in the Philippines, particularly among the tens of millions of poor who see the contests as a chance for their beautiful compatriots to live a life of fame and luxury. But allowing the Philippines to host has proved controversial, with critics claiming the pageant would whitewash Duterte's brutal drug war, which has left more than 6,000 people dead. Environmentalists also hit out at pageant organisers for letting the bikini-clad contestants swim last month with endangered whale sharks. Dresses, sashes, pearly smiles and a crown mixed together create the Miss Universe Competition, where one contestant among 12 will win and receive a platform from the organization for a year to achieve her national and global goals. This years competition will take place in the capital of the Philippines Manila and will be presented by last year's host, Steve Harvey. Watch here for the Miss Universe 2017 live stream slated for broadcast Sunday night 7 p.m. EST/6 p.m. CST. Harvey had his fair share of slipups during the competition in 2015 when he incorrectly announced Miss Colombias Ariadna Gutierrez as the winner of Miss Universe. Quickly after, Harvey came back on stage to correct himself, instead giving the title to the actual winner, Miss Philippines Pia Wurtzbach. It wasnt that quick. It was four minutes of pure hell, Harvey said to Jimmy Fallon in December 2016 on the "Tonight Show." The pageant was founded in 1952 by Catalina Swimsuits and has continuously been organized by the Miss Universe Organization. The swimsuit company founded Miss USA, too, although the competitions are separate entities and the Miss Universe system does not host a talent competition. Around 80 to 100 countries usually compete and after preliminary interviews and swimsuit/evening gown presentations, the contestants are narrowed down to the Top 12 who appear in the televised event. RTSXJXM Photo: (REUTERS/Erik De Castro) A contestant must be confident. She must be able to demonstrate authenticity and articulate her ambitions as a titleholder. The competitions showcase and evaluate the contestants aspirations and are judged by accomplished business leaders, philanthropists, and public figures, the Miss Universe website states about what they look for in a contestant. Another public figure previously involved with the pageant was President Donald Trump. The businessman-and-TV-personality-turned-president owned the Miss Universe Organization from 1996 to 2015 before selling it. Earlier that year, Trump found himself in hot water when Univision networks and NBCUniversals NBC declined to air the Miss USA pageant following Trumps comments about Mexican immigrants during his campaign. Related Articles By Curtis Skinner (Reuters) - More than $900,000 has been raised in an online fundraiser for a south Texas mosque destroyed by fire over the weekend, exceeding the amount needed to rebuild the place of worship, according to the fundraising page on Monday. The GoFundMe page for the Victoria Islamic Center received donations from more than 19,000 people in the two days after the mosque, about 125 miles (200 km) southwest of Houston, was gutted by flames early on Saturday. The blaze has been classified as "suspicious," said Victoria city spokesman O.C. Garza. "Our hearts are filled with gratitude for the tremendous support we've received," mosque leaders said in a statement on the online fundraising page. "The outpouring of love, kind words, hugs, helping hands and the financial contributions are examples of the true American Spirit." The fire broke out just hours after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order last Friday that banned travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the country for several months on national security grounds. Authorities have found no evidence linking the fire with the order. The fire was reported around 2 a.m. on Saturday, according to Garza. By the time firefighters reached the scene, "flames were already coming through the roof, so we went into containment mode to stop it from spreading," he said. The building was so badly burned that only the exterior walls of the mosque withstood the blaze, Garza said. State fire officials, as well as agents with the FBI and the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, are investigating. Garza said it would likely take weeks before a cause could be determined. Muslims in the United States have expressed fears of growing Islamaphobia in the country amid concerns about white nationalist rhetoric against the religion. In Canada, a French-Canadian man is suspected of entering a Sunday prayer service at a Quebec City mosque and opening fire on congregants, killing six people and injuring 17. Garza said city building officials had met with mosque leaders, who are planning to demolish the ruins and rebuild at the same site. He said there had been an outpouring of support for the mosque, adding about 500 people showed up for a prayer service there on Sunday. "They've been an outstanding member of our community," Garza said. (Reporting by Curtis Skinner in San Francisco; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Peter Cooney) Good morning. These are todays top stories: President Trump faces outrage over travel ban President Donald Trump defended his executive order that suspended the U.S. refugee program and banned travel for people from seven Muslim-majority countries. In a series of Monday morning tweets, he said all is going well with very few problems and reminded Americans that the order was a major focus of his campaign. The measure was met with fierce opposition over the weekend, including from some Republicans. Thousands of people protested at several major U.S. airports, including JFK Airport. Democrats hope to change Trumps mind A group of Democratic lawmakers will call for Trump to reverse his executive order during a rally outside the U.S. Supreme Court today. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi will lead the 6 p.m. demonstration in Washington, D.C. Senators to decide on Secretary of State The U.S. Senate is set to vote on whether it will approve Rex Tillerson as the next Secretary of State. The legislative body will convene about 5 p.m. for an executive session. Canadian mosque shooting leaves 6 dead At least two gunmen opened fire inside an Islamic center in Quebec City, Canada, killing six people and wounding eight others during a Sunday evening prayer session. Police said two suspects have been arrested. Florida airport shooting suspect heads to court Esteban Santiago is set to be arraigned in federal court in Florida. The Iraq war veteran is accused of fatally shooting five people inside a baggage claim area at Floridas Fort LauderdaleHollywood International Airport earlier this month. Actors are activists. SAG Awards turn political Some Hollywood stars got political during speeches they gave at last nights Screen Actors Guild Awards. Among those who slammed President Trumps immigration order was Scandal star Kerry Washington, who urged other A-listers to speak up. The truth is, actors are activists no matter what, because we embody the worth and humanity of all people, she said. Story continues Also: Miss France was crowned the new Miss Universe in the Philippines. Serena Williams triumphed over her older sister, Venus, to win her record 23rd Grand Slam singles title. On the mens side of the Australian Open, Roger Federer took home his 18th grand slam title. Tomorrow is the last day anyone can enroll in a health plan through the Affordable Care Act. The Morning Brief is published Mondays through Fridays. Email Morning Brief writer Melissa Chan at melissa.chan@time.com. By Wa Lone and Shwe Yee Saw Myint YANGON (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of people gathered in the Myanmar city of Yangon on Monday for the funeral of Ko Ni, a Muslim lawyer shot dead the previous day who was involved in efforts to amend a military drafted constitution. The 63-year-old was an expert in constitutional law and adviser to Aung San Suu Kyi's ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party, that came to power in April. He was also a prominent member of Myanmar's Muslim minority. His killing, amid heightened communal and religious tension in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, appears to be a rare act of political violence in the former capital that coincided with a tough security operation in a northwestern region populated mostly by Muslims. Police have arrested a 53-year-old man, suspected to be the lone gunman who shot Ko Ni in the head while the lawyer held his grandson outside Yangon's international airport on Sunday evening. He had just returned from a trip to Indonesia, where Myanmar government officials and Muslim community leaders discussed with Indonesian counterparts issues of reconciliation. Taxi driver Nay Win, 42, was also killed when he attempted to apprehend the gunman, state media reported. Police Colonel Myo Thu Soe told Reuters the suspect, Kyi Linn, was from central Myanmar's Yinmabin township who has served two stints in jail for trafficking religious antiques. Kyi Linn was last released in a 2014 amnesty by then-President Thein Sein, he said, adding that the suspect had not given clear answers during interrogation. "We cannot say exactly why he killed or who was behind him," Myo Thu Soe said. Reuters was unable to contact Kyi Linn's family for comment and it was not clear if he had legal representation. An estimated 100,000 mourners, including family members, lawyers, NLD activists and members of Yangon's diplomatic corps, attended Ko Ni's funeral beginning at a Muslim cemetery in northern Yangon. Suu Kyi was not in attendance and has yet to comment on the killing. Her party said on Sunday Ko Ni's death was "a great loss for which there is no substitute". LEGAL MASTERMIND Khin Maung Htay, a colleague of Ko Ni's at the Yangon-based Laurel Law Firm, said Ko Ni was instrumental in devising the role of "state counsellor" for Suu Kyi, enabling her to lead the government. The 2008 constitution, drawn up by the then ruling military, bars Nobel laureate Suu Kyi from the presidency because she has family members who are foreign citizens. Ko Ni was working on amendments that would further challenge the role of the military, which retains a quarter of parliamentary seats and controls security ministries under the charter. Aung Shin, a member of the NLD's central committee, said the murder was a "well-planned, fearless conspiracy" to kill a man who had extensive legal expertise and an ability to communicate the flaws of the 2008 constitution to the public. Ko Ni was also spearheading a new Interfaith Harmony Bill that would include provisions on hate speech, hate crimes and discrimination, according to two experts working with him on the draft legislation. Family members and friends told Reuters that Ko Ni had received death threats connected to his political work, but the motive for the killing was not known. The timing of the killing was a matter of particular concern, said the International Crisis Group (ICG) think-tank, since it comes just months after deadly attacks on police near the border with Bangladesh blamed on insurgents from the Rohingya Muslim minority. It was essential "that no stone is left unturned in finding the truth about this incident and who may have been behind it", the Brussels-based group said in a statement. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said on Monday 69,000 people were now estimated to have fled to Bangladesh since the launch of a sweep by the security forces in response to the attacks on Oct. 9 in which nine policemen were killed. More than 23,000 people have been internally displaced, the office said. "In a context of strong anti-Muslim sentiment, rampant hate speech on social media, and virulent Buddhist nationalism propounded by some senior monks, this crime could embolden others and unleash further violence," the ICG said. (Additional reporting and writing by Simon Lewis; Editing by Clarence Fernandez, Robert Birsel) GENEVA (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump's decision to stop resettlement of Syrian refugees will cost lives, medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said on Monday. "The presidents executive order will effectively keep people trapped in war zones, directly endangering their lives," MSF, also known as Doctors Without Borders, said in a statement. Slamming shut the doors to the United States of America, which has rigorously vetted refugees for years, is an attack on the basic accepted notion that people should be able to flee for their lives, Jason Cone, executive director of MSF-USA, was quoted as saying in the statement. Every day our teams on the ground see people desperately seeking safety at closed borders and in war zones from which they cannot flee, he said. The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR says 4.9 million Syrians are refugees in neighboring countries, while almost a million have fled to Europe, and more than 6 million are displaced within their own country. During the election campaign, Trump decried former President Barack Obama's decision to increase the number of Syrian refugees admitted to the United States over fears that some fleeing the country's civil war might carry out attacks. Some 25,000 refugees were resettled in the United States between October and year-end under UNHCR's program for the most vulnerable, UNHCR said on Friday. Trump's administration has banned entry of refugees and people from seven Muslim-majority countries, drawing criticism even from some prominent Republicans and protests that drew tens of thousands in major American cities. On Sunday his administration tempered the ban by saying people who hold so-called green cards as lawful permanent U.S. residents would not be blocked. Apart from Syria, the affected countries are Somalia, Sudan, Iran, Iraq, Yemen and Libya. UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said in a joint statement on Saturday that the U.S. resettlement program was vital, and but they stopped short of criticizing the new administration's policy. Nobody at UNHCR or IOM was immediately available to comment on Monday. (Reporting by Tom Miles; Editing by Toby Chopra) Thousands of mourners gathered on Monday to bury a top Muslim lawyer and adviser to Aung San Suu Kyi who was gunned down outside Yangon airport in what the ruling party said was a political assassination. Ko Ni, a legal adviser to the National League for Democracy, was shot in the head on Sunday afternoon as he waited outside the airport while holding his grandson. His killing sent shockwaves through both Myanmar's already hard-pressed Muslim community and the ruling party in a country where political killings are rare. Police have not said what prompted the murder, but Ko Ni, 63, was a prominent Muslim figure who spoke out against the increasingly vocal anti-Islamic sentiments of Buddhist hardliners and criticised the powerful military's grip on power. Distraught relatives were joined by senior NLD figures, imams, Buddhist monks and members of the public who crammed into a Muslim cemetery on the outskirts of Yangon on Monday afternoon. "This is a very cruel and ugly tragedy," Moe Zaw, a 37-year-old Muslim mourner told AFP. Both the NLD and Ko Ni's family suspect he was targeted because of his politics. "We strongly denounce the assassination of Ko Ni like this as it is a terrorist act against the NLD's policies," the NLD said in a statement, describing him as an "irreplacable" aide to Suu Kyi. She has yet to make a statement on the killing. A taxi driver who tried to stop the gunman was also killed. The attacker, named by police as 53-year-old Kyi Lin, was arrested at the scene. A harrowing photo circulating on social media showed what appeared to be the moment the gunman, standing behind Ko Ni as he held his grandson, took aim. His daughter Yin Nwe Khaing said she brought her young son to greet his grandfather at the airport, adding her father had made enemies because he had been a prominent Muslim voice. "As we are from a different religion there were many people who didn't like and hated it. I think that also could be a reason (for his murder)," she told DVB TV. Story continues - Anti-Muslim sentiment - Ko Ni had just returned from a government delegation visit to Indonesia where regional leaders were discussing sectarian tensions in Rakhine state. Myanmar's army has waged a crackdown on the mainly Muslim Rohingya community which has prompted tens of thousands of them to flee the area. Ko Ni had previously criticised religious laws pushed by Buddhist nationalists. Myanmar's border regions have simmered for decades with ethnic minority insurgencies but it is rare for prominent political figures to be murdered in Yangon -- the country's booming and largely safe commercial hub. However in recent years Myanmar has witnessed a surge of anti-Muslim sentiment, fanned by hardline Buddhist nationalists. Around five percent of Myanmar's population is Muslim. Suu Kyi has herself faced criticism for not fielding a single Muslim candidate during the 2015 elections, a move which analysts said was a sop to Buddhist hardliners. She has also faced international censure for her failure to criticise the crackdown on the Rohingya in Rakhine state. Since the launch of the crackdown in October at least 66,000 Rohingya have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh, alleging security forces are carrying out a campaign of rape, torture and mass killings. Suu Kyi and the military have denied allegations of abuse. Senior NLD leaders, including party patron Tin Oo, visited Ko Ni's family before the funeral. "Losing that kind of person is great loss for the country, for democratic forces and for us (the party)," Tin Oo told reporters, describing the killing as an "assassination". The International Crisis Group, a think-tank that has previously sounded the alarm over rising religious intolerance in Myanmar, said the killing "underlines the urgency of the Myanmar government and society coming together to condemn all forms of hate speech". BATH, Maine (AP) The daughters of the late President Lyndon B. Johnson traveled to Maine on Monday to celebrate a milestone in construction of a Navy destroyer bearing his name. Wearing welder helmets, Lynda Bird Johnson Robb and Luci Baines Johnson were assisted by shipbuilder Timothy Trask in welding signatures on a steel plate during a keel-laying at the ceremony at Bath Iron Works. "Work hard on that ship because I'm an old lady, and I want to make sure I see it in the water. So work, work, work!" Robb, 72, joked. As the ship's sponsors, the sisters will be responsible for christening the warship when it goes into the water late next year. It'll be commissioned later. The keel-laying ceremony harkens to the days of sailing vessels when construction began with a keel upon which the ship is built. In this case, it marked the joining of two massive hull units, the first of several that will comprise the 610-foot-long destroyer. During the ceremony, the ship's no-nonsense namesake was praised for his service to country, including his efforts to help the poor and to fight for equality in the civil rights era. Brent West, program manager at Bath Iron Works, said the ship that's being built will "reflect the spirt of her namesake and a commitment to the defense of the ideals he cherished: equality, security and freedom." During the ceremony, Luci Baines Johnson singled out an electrician, Larry Stegna, who held an old poster that commemorated LBJ's campaign in which the Democrat trounced Republican Barry Goldwater. "It was a trip down memory lane for me," she said. The future USS Lyndon B. Johnson is the last of three stealthy destroyers in the Zumwalt class. They have wave-piercing hulls, a stealthy shape and electric propulsion. Automation has halved the crew size compared with other destroyers. While it's the final ship in the class, the warship could boast an armament that the other ships won't have. Story continues The Navy's director of surface warfare floated the idea of putting an electromagnetic railgun aboard the ship. The weapon, which is in development, can fire projectiles at seven times faster than the speed of sound, with deadly results. If the railgun does happen, it would be installed after the ship leaves Bath. Unlike its sister ships, the ship will have a deckhouse that's made of steel, not composite materials, to save money. The first ship in the class, the USS Zumwalt, carried a price tag of more than $4.4 billion. Munich (Germany) (AFP) - The former secretary of Nazi Germany's propaganda boss Joseph Goebbels died aged 106 last week, on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the maker of a documentary about her said Monday. Brunhilde Pomsel died on January 27 in a care home in the southern city of Munich, said Christian Kroenes, who conducted extensive interviews with her for his 2016 film "A German Life". Pomsel, who worked for Goebbels as a secretary, typist and stenographer from 1942-45, had insisted she had no idea of the Holocaust that claimed the lives of six million Jews while it was happening. "We knew nothing," she said in the film. "We ourselves were all trapped in a vast concentration camp," she said about the totalitarian state of Adolf Hitler. As one of half a dozen secretaries in Goebbels' office, Pomsel was among the last eyewitnesses to the inner circle of top Nazis. In "A German Life", she insisted she felt no guilt and also said: "I could not put up resistance -- I was too much of a coward." She told AFP in an interview last year that she had once cheered on Hitler, in 1933, adding that "we didn't know then what lay ahead". She spoke of the final days in Hitler's bunker, saying a lot of alcohol was drunk because the Nazi chiefs had to "numb themselves". When Soviet troops marched into Berlin at the end of World War II, Pomsel was captured and would spend five years in Russian detention camps. From 1950 she worked for a German public broadcaster, for 20 years, but kept silent about her war-time job until she gave a newspaper interview in 2011. - 'Warning future generations' - She opened up at great length in the 2016 film, which its makers said aimed to force viewers to ask themselves what they would have done, and whether they would have had the courage to resist the Nazi machine. In the black-and-white film, extreme close-up shots of Pomsel recalling her time with Goebbels are interspersed with archival footage of Nazi horror, including of naked Jewish corpses and mass graves. Story continues Pomsel herself said: "Nothing's black and white. There's always a bit of grey in everything." "I wouldn't see myself as guilty," she said, "unless you end up blaming the entire German population". She told AFP in an interview that "since I have a clear conscience for myself, I do not see why I should not talk about it". She said the point of the film was "for future generations to be informed about all these things. There are ever fewer eyewitnesses left. So I agreed." She described Goebbels as well groomed and polite, and "an excellent actor," who during public speeches turned into a "raging dwarf ... unrecognisable" But she also labelled him "a very cold person" who showed no interest in the lives of those who worked for him. Asked about rising right-wing populism in Europe now, she said she found it "horrific, just horrific". Filmmaker Kroenes confirmed to AFP that she died on January 27 in the old people's home but had remained mentally alert until her death. "We were in contact, I last spoke to her on the occasion of her birthday on January 11," he said. "She was still full of energy, full of hope for the future. There were some ups and downs owing to her advanced age. Mentally there was no change, she was still alert." He said a book on Pomsel's reminiscences, based on the interviews, is set to be published this year. Kroenes said that, in view of the rise of right-wing populism in the Western world, it was intended "as a warning to current and future generations." Security has been stepped up at mosques in New York City and elsewhere after a deadly assault on an Islamic center in Canada over the weekend. Six worshipers were killed Sunday when two gunmen opened fire in the Islamic Cultural Center of Quebec, authorities said. Read: Donald Trump Tells Democrats Boycotting His Inauguration: Give Me Your Tickets As Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called the assault a "terrorist attack on Muslims," New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said police there were providing additional protection for mosques in the city, which upwards of one million Muslims call home. "All New Yorkers should be vigilant," the mayor tweeted. "If you see something, say something." In the Canada attack, Quebec provincial police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told reporters that eight additional people were wounded, some gravely. "Six people are confirmed dead they range in age from 35 to about 70," Coulombe said. In a statement released Monday, Trudeau doubled down on earlier support he gave his country's Muslims, as well as those affected by Donald Trump's travel ban, over the weekend. "It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence," he said in a statement early Monday. "Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear." Police said two suspects were arrested, but gave no details about them or what prompted the attack. Read: South Carolina Ph.D. Graduate Banned From Returning Home After Visiting Family in Iran Officials said about 50 people were in the mosque when the gunmen opened fire on the men's side of the center. Last June, a pigs head was left at the door of the same mosque in the middle of Ramadan. Watch: Man Threatened to Kill Donald Trump in Twitter Video: Cops Related Articles: COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) Police say an Ohio woman who said her 4-year-old daughter was sleeping in her car when it was stolen made up the story so officers would quickly find the vehicle. Columbus police say the car was located Monday morning and the child was found unharmed. But police had indicated she wasn't found with the vehicle. Police said later Monday that the car was stolen, but the child was never in it. The mother's call reporting her daughter was in the stolen car had resulted in an Amber Alert. Police said that after the alert was issued, a 911 caller reported the girl was safe at a Columbus home with her aunt, who was babysitting. Authorities say the mother has been charged with making a false statement. London (AFP) - A petition demanding Britain cancel a planned state visit by US President Donald Trump passed one million signatures on Monday, following outrage over his travel ban on mainly Muslim countries. "Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US government, but he should not be invited to make an official state visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen," the petition on parliament's website says. "Donald Trump's well-documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales." Parliamentary petitions can be signed by anyone with a British postcode and those doing so are asked if they are a UK resident or citizen. Such petitions must be considered by lawmakers if they attract more than 100,000 signatures. Last January parliament debated banning Trump from Britain following a petition signed by nearly 600,000 people, after the then White House candidate promised to drastically restrict US entry to people from Muslim countries if he became president. Trump on Friday signed an executive order suspending the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely -- and barring citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. Related: For more news videos visit Yahoo View. By Mehreen Zahra-Malik and Mubashar Bukhari ISLAMABAD/LAHORE (Reuters) - Pakistan on Monday ordered Hafiz Saeed, accused by the United States and India of masterminding the 2008 attacks on the Indian financial capital Mumbai that killed 166 people, to be placed under house arrest. The move came after years of pressure and could ease recently escalating tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbors. Saeed's continued freedom has long infuriated Islamabad's arch-foe India. The United States has offered $10 million for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Saeed, who heads the Muslim charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD). Washington says JuD is a front for the Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT). "A large police team arrived (at JuD headquarters) and told us that Hafiz Saeed would be placed under house arrest," Nadeem Awan, a spokesman for the group based in the eastern city of Lahore, told Reuters. An Interior Ministry source confirmed Saeed and the other men "are under house arrest" and on the exit control list, meaning they could not leave the country. India's foreign ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment. It was unclear why Pakistan decided to act now. A senior Pakistani defense ministry official said Islamabad had not heard anything from the new administration of U.S. President Donald Trump but had been feeling U.S. pressure on the issue. "Trump is taking hard decisions against Muslim countries, there is open talk of actions against Pakistan also. So yes, this was a consideration," said the official. Other government officials have said recently that a broader diplomatic campaign - pushed by India - to isolate Pakistan over its failure to go after some Islamist groups has taken a toll, even involving pressure from longtime ally China. RAMPAGE IN MUMBAI The Mumbai attacks in 2008 brought Pakistan and India to the brink of war after 10 gunmen killed commuters, foreigners and some of India's wealthy elite in a rampage that included attacks on two luxury hotels, a Jewish center and a train station. India accused Pakistan of sponsoring the attack through LeT, which Saeed founded in the 1990s. Pakistan has denied any state involvement and Saeed - who has distanced himself from LeT - has said repeatedly he was not responsible. Saeed was put under house arrest after the Mumbai attack but was released about six month later in June 2009. Awan said Islamabad had been under pressure from the United States to take action against Saeed or face sanctions. "This government has buckled under the pressure," he said. The Punjab provincial government said Saeed and four other men were in "protective custody" because they violated a U.N. Security Council resolution passed after the Mumbai attacks. Interior Ministry documents seen by Reuters named Saeed and four other men as members of JuD and Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FiF), a charity wing of JuD headed by Saeed. One document said the government believed FiF was "acting in a manner that may be concerned in terrorism". PROSECUTIONS RARE Previous Pakistani announcements of action against anti-India militant groups have rarely led to serious punishments for them. Western countries have for decades accused Pakistan of harboring Islamist militant groups and using them as proxies against bigger neighbor India, with whom it has fought three wars since independence. Islamabad denies having such a policy. In recent months, Saeed has been holding regular press conferences about the security crackdown in Indian-controlled Kashmir, trying to highlight alleged civil rights violations against the mainly Muslim population there. He told Reuters last month that he had no fear of arrest despite the appointment of a new army chief and a new head of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) spy agency. Successive Pakistani governments have vowed to crack down against militant groups but lack of action against Saeed has often been seized on by India as proof that Islamabad was dragging its feet on tackling banned outfits. (Writing by Drazen Jorgic; Editing by Tom Heneghan) LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) Pakistan has placed the leader of a charity linked to a militant group under house arrest. Hafiz Saeed, whose Jamaat-ud-Dawa is a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba, the group behind the 2008 Mumbai attacks, was placed under house arrest along with four aides. Azam Suleman, the top security official in the eastern Punjab province, ordered them detained for 90 days after the government vowed to act against the charity and an affiliate known as the Falah Insaniat Foundation. Saeed is wanted by the U.S. government, which has offered a $10 million reward. Pakistan has long tolerated Lashkar-e-Taiba and other Islamic militant groups, viewing them as allies against its archrival India. The U.N. Security Council labeled the charity a terrorist front group in 2008. Terrified that her heroin addict son's escalating drug use would soon kill him, one Maryland mother took a painful and drastic step to get him off the street: She set him up with the police. The woman tipped authorities that she was about to go for a drive with her young adult son, who'd be in the passenger seat with drugs, says Michael Beach, the chief public defender in Charles County, Maryland. Acting on the tip, a law enforcement officer stopped the vehicle and arrested the young man for allegedly carrying drug paraphernalia with trace amounts of an illegal controlled substance. As the opioid epidemic rages across the country, some desperate parents of addicts are taking the extreme step of turning their own adult or teenage child in to the police to prevent him or her from overdosing, perhaps fatally. For a parent, having an addict child jailed "gives you a chance to take a breath," says Romas Buivydas, vice president of clinical services for Spectrum Health Systems Inc., a private nonprofit that provides drug treatment services to people who are incarcerated or on parole or probation in five states. "In jail, they'll be safer than they would be on the streets." And some addicts who have spurned treatment will change their mind after spending time locked up, Buivydas says. [See: 10 Concerns Parents Have About Their Kids' Health.] A Viable Option Delivering your son or daughter into police custody is a severe but rational measure for distraught parents who've exhausted other options, addiction clinicians say. "I know parents [of people who went into treatment] who say if they hadn't turned their kids in to the police, their kids would be dead now," says Deni Carise, chief clinical officer at Recovery Centers of America, which has addiction treatment centers in four northeast states. "For a lot of parents, going to the police is a matter of getting their child off the street so he doesn't die." For some parents of addicts, turning their child in to authorities is a matter of protecting themselves or others, says Tina Muller, program manager for the family wellness department at Mountainside Treatment Center in Canaan, Connecticut. "If an opiate addict is being abusive and creating safety issues, threatening or engaging in violence and bringing drugs into a home where younger siblings may find them, you need to call the police," Muller says. While opioid addiction gets the most attention because it's currently claiming the most lives, some parents of people addicted to cocaine and other drugs also turn their sons or daughters in to police. A Deadly Scourge Though it's an agonizing step for parents, turning one's own child in to law enforcement to save his or her life makes sense in the context of the deadly opioid epidemic, clinicians say. In 2015, drug overdoses driven by the opioid scourge -- including heroin, which is illegal, as well as prescription pain relievers such as oxycodone, hydrocodone, codeine, morphine and fentanyl -- were the leading cause of accidental death in the U.S., according to the American Society of Addiction Medicine. There were 20,101 fatal overdoses related to prescription painkillers and 12,990 stemming from heroin, according to ASAM. Putting an addict in jail may temporarily prevent him or her from becoming a grim statistic, but it won't guarantee immediate treatment. Throughout the U.S., there are more than 3,000 drug courts, which refer people to treatment instead of jail, according to the National Association of Drug Court Professionals. Drug courts put about 150,000 people annually into treatment. Meanwhile, there are about 650,000 people incarcerated in local jails at any given time, according to the Prison Policy Initiative, a nonprofit that produces research on the criminal justice system and advocates against mass incarceration. "We realize we're just scratching the surface of meeting the need," says Chris Deutsch, a spokesman for the NADCP. [See: 7 Health Risks of Binge Drinking You Can't Ignore.] The need for drug treatment also outpaces resources in juvenile detention facilities. There are 409 drug courts nationwide in juvenile courts, and there were 50,821 people in juvenile detention in October 2014, according to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. Some local jails have treatment programs apart from drug court, but there are usually waiting lists. This dearth of resources shouldn't stop parents from turning to law enforcement if they believe their child or others are in imminent danger, clinicians say. "If your child's life is at risk or your safety and that of your family's [is] at risk, it might be the only option," Muller says. Experts say parents considering taking this step should keep these things in mind: Be sure you've exhausted every option. You may think you've tried everything, but before you call the police, make certain you've explored every potential resource to try to get your son or daughter help, Muller says. "I would definitely recommend that parents and families seek advice from local treatment centers," she says, as treatment clinicians may be aware of resources parents don't know about. If your child is a juvenile, check with local and state social services officials and authorities at the school your child attends, and ask if there are resources such as counseling or therapy for addicts, she says. Some school districts have alternative schools that can help students with addiction issues, Muller says. If they haven't already tried one, parents can try to stage an intervention, in which relatives and friends confront a person to describe how his or her drug use is affecting them and urge them to seek help. Explain to law enforcement officers why you are turning in your child. Once you've decided you have no other recourse, call the police to explain why you're about to turn your child in, says Howard Samuels, owner and chief executive officer of The Hills Treatment Center, an alcohol and drug rehabilitation facility in Los Angeles. "You want the police to know that you want the person arrested because he or she is out of control because of drugs," Samuels says. "That's the way to handle it. You don't want to call 911 and have the cops come in with guns drawn." Don't assume your son or daughter will be in jail for long. The amount of time someone spends in jail varies depending on the charge, the person's prior criminal record, if any, and local statutes. Someone who's arrested for a first offense on a charge that doesn't involve violence or a weapon may be incarcerated for a brief time, overnight or maybe even a matter of hours, Samuels says. Let your child's lawyer know what's going on and ask him or her what treatment resources the local criminal justice system provides, he says. Even a short stay in jail could convince some addicts to seek treatment. [See: How to Find the Best Mental Health Professional for You.] Seek support for yourself and other family members. Just as addicts in recovery need a support system, so do their loved ones, Buivydas says. "This is an epidemic" that affects not only addicts, but those close to them, he says. Parents and other relatives need to know they are not alone, and they need to learn strategies for supporting the addict without enabling him or her, he says. Resources include clinical licensed therapists and support groups, such as Nar-Anon Family Groups, which is similar to the Alcoholics Anonymous model in that it uses 12 steps to help people deal with their feelings about their loved one's addiction. "Counselors can help, and being part of a group in which you hear from other people who are going through similar experiences is invaluable," Buivydas explains. "There's a feeling of fellowship." Ruben Castaneda is a Health & Wellness reporter at U.S. News. He previously covered the crime beat in Washington, D.C. and state and federal courts in suburban Maryland, and he's the author of the book "S Street Rising: Crack, Murder and Redemption in D.C." You can follow him on Twitter, connect with him at LinkedIn or email him at rcastaneda@usnews.com. Sofia (AFP) - Two stray Bulgarian cats who lost their hind legs in accidents have been given bionic paws, in what vets say is the first such operation in Europe outside groundbreaking Britain. One-year-old Pooh, whose name means "fluff" in Bulgarian, scurries around Sofia's Central Vet Clinic, chasing a toy mouse and curiously sniffing at medicine bottles inside an open cupboard -- just like any other cat would. The only difference is a gentle tapping sound as his two tiny polymer-and-rubber paws mounted on titanium stems touch the floor. Pooh, who is thought to have lost his legs in a car or train accident last April, is back on the prowl thanks to Bulgarian veterinary surgeon Vladislav Zlatinov. He is the first vet in Europe to successfully apply the pioneering method of Irish neuro-orthopaedic surgeon Noel Fitzpatrick, who shot to fame in 2009 when making Oscar the first bionic cat by fitting him with new hind legs in Britain. A month after the black-and-white feline took his first steps after a final graft in December, Zlatinov said this week the procedure could now be considered a success. "Pooh's condition is more than satisfactory. There might be some clumsiness but he can walk, jump and run," the 35-year-old told AFP. If all goes well, Pooh's skin will eventually grow over the bone and stem tightly enough to prevent infections, Zlatinov said. "Cats who lost one leg do pretty well. But what happens if they lose both their hind legs? Yes, they move somehow, but what quality of life are we talking about?" he said. Zlatinov recently performed a graft on another cat, eight-month-old Steven who also lost both hind legs last year. "(The operations) give hope that even in a country like Bulgaria innovative things can be done," Zlatinov said. Pooh and Steven were brought to the clinic by animal charity Let's Adopt Bulgaria, which paid for the operations. "We went to Zlatinov looking for a solution because he had solved other hopeless cases of injured animals before," Vyara Mladenova of Let's Adopt said Friday. "But we didn't expect him to offer this solution and for it to be successful." WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Vice President Mike Pence and Jordan's King Abdullah on Monday discussed a range of issues from speeding up the fight against Islamic State, the crisis in Syria, and efforts to reach an agreement between Israelis and Palestinians, the White House said. Abdullah, the first Arab leader to hold talks with the new administration, also raised the issue of potential changes to the U.S. embassy in Israel, the White House said in a statement. President Donald Trump is expected to greet Abdullah at a prayer event in Washington on Thursday, White House spokesman Sean Spicer separately told reporters in a daily briefing. (Reporting by Ayesha Rascoe; Writing by Susan Heavey; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama) HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) A 20-year-old Pennsylvania man pleaded guilty Monday to trying to help the Islamic State group and to tweeting out a list that identified and targeted people serving in the U.S. military. Jalil Ibn Ameer Aziz faces the potential of up to 25 years and a $500,000 fine after admitting to a charge of conspiring to provide material support to the Islamic State group and to transmitting a communication containing a threat, both felonies. Aziz, a natural born American arrested in Harrisburg in December 2015, used about 70 different Twitter accounts and an encrypted mobile messaging application to spread messages from the Islamic State group and to help people trying to travel to territory it controls, said federal counterterrorism prosecutor Robert Sander. In March 2015, Aziz published on Twitter a list of more than 100 American military personnel that included photos, rank and addresses, along with instructions to kill them, Sander told the judge. Aziz referred to it as an assassination list, Sander said. The message exhorted people to "kill them in their own lands, behead them in their own homes, stab them to death as they walk their street." Federal officials say the service members on the list were notified and appropriate security measures were taken. During a search in November 2015, authorities found five high-capacity magazines, a knife, a balaclava and other equipment in the home he shared in Harrisburg with his parents. Federal public defender Thomas Thornton said Aziz does not remember all of the messages he was accused of sending or retweeting. After the hearing, Thornton described his client as "a young kid who was tweeting from his bedroom." "He's very sorry that he ever got himself involved in something like this," Thornton said. Authorities have said Aziz also expressed on Twitter his interest in "buying" a Yazidi woman upon his arrival in Islamic State group territory. Story continues "I just want one girl 17 years old," he tweeted, according to federal prosecutors. In a filing last week that argued the Yazidi posts were irrelevant and should not be evidence at trial, Thornton called the communications "no more than the fantastical musings of an isolated and suppressed teenage boy." Yazidis, whose heartland is in Iraq's remote Sijar region, have been targeted by Islamic State group militants for conversion and elimination, and Yazidi women have described being forced into sexual slavery. Aziz's sentencing was scheduled for May. Lima (AFP) - Peru's jailed ex-president Alberto Fujimori has been hospitalized again, this time for a spinal problem, his doctor said Monday. It is the latest in a string of health scares for the 78-year-old, who was jailed in 2007 for human rights atrocities. Fujimori was taken from prison on Sunday and admitted to hospital "for more in-depth tests on his spine" after being unable to walk, his doctor Alejandro Aguinaga said on RPP radio. Fujimori was convicted for his role in killings by a death squad targeting supposed guerrillas in the 1990s, and for embezzlement and bribery. He has been in and out of hospital in recent months. He was admitted in December with a cyst on his pancreas and in September due to gastric problems and high blood pressure. "He is suffering more and more illnesses," the doctor said. "He has been operated on several times for cancer of the tongue and now he has problems with his lower back." In a message posted by his aides on Twitter after his last hospital stay, Fujimori said prison conditions were "slowly killing" him. It's shortly before midnight, at around 10,000 feet on Mount Rainier, when a shooting star rips across the sky so close you can almost hear it sizzle. Groggy climbers are fidgeting with headlamps and harnesses on the edge of Cowlitz Glacier. Above us, 4,000 vertical feet of steep, icy terrain separates the huts at this way station, Camp Muir, from the 14,411-foot summit of Washington's highest peak and Peter Whittaker, co-owner of the guiding service Rainier Mountaineering Inc. (RMI), knows every inch of them. The son of mountaineer Lou Whittaker, who formed RMI in 1969 (and nephew of Jim Whittaker, the first American to summit Mount Everest, in 1963), Peter Whittaker has been climbing this peak since his father dragged him up it in a frigid whiteout when he was 12. He's been guiding it since he was 16. Tonight will mark his 249th ascent. "Are you stoked?" Whittaker booms. "I'm stoked! Let's finish this thing off in style!" The 58-year-old has every reason to be amped. This is the first time he's had both of his children clipped into the same rope with him. Kristian, 19, is a freshman at the University of Colorado Boulder and has never climbed Rainier. Whittaker's 18-year-old daughter, Gabriella, has been up the mountain twice, as well as up Kilimanjaro once. "Hope you're OK with being on the Whittaker rope," Whittaker says to me. I am, of course, and I clip in, falling in line behind America's first family of mountaineering as we spool off into the night. Whittaker's stoke also hinges on the fact that this climb puts him one step closer to the launch of his outdoor-apparel company, MtnLogic Global, which he believes will produce a level of designed-in-the-field expertise not seen in years. Tonight's climb is one of the last of hundreds of ascents that Whittaker and his 60-odd guides have made to test and tweak the prototypes for the line of climbing jackets, pants, and shirts a staggering 1.2 million vertical feet of evaluating. They filled out hundreds of surveys and created massive spreadsheets to track data. No decision, from a simple seam placement to a cuff length, was even considered before the garment had gone through at least 100,000 vertical feet of testing. "We are doing 10 times the testing that any other company is doing," says Whittaker. "Our decisions, the process, have to come 100 percent from being in the mountains." For Whittaker, MtnLogic whose products are made almost entirely from Polartec fabrics is a way to finally resolve all the niggling apparel problems he's encountered over a lifetime of mountaineering. Whittaker can cite countless examples of clients shivering at 13,000 feet because the zippers on their puffy jackets snagged on bulky materials. He's tired of poorly placed seams. Sleeves that are too tight to pull over his altimeter watch make him seethe. "Why have we been putting up with this shit?" he says. "We're like pilots, constantly monitoring our elevation and time, and you can't even get to your watch? How is this happening?" Whittaker is an ox on the mountain, but he keeps the pace mellow as we push our way up Disappointment Cleaver, a fin of rock not far from where he watched an ice wall collapse and crush 10 of his clients (plus one guide) to death in 1981. He and two other guides had unclipped from the rope to assess avalanche conditions above. As they scouted, the glacier fractured, releasing thousands of pounds of ice and entombing their crew. It remains the worst mountaineering accident in American history. Courtesy MTNLOGIC "The bodies are still there, but they'll all melt out in my lifetime," Whittaker says. "When they do, they'll find a rope with a knot in it that was meant for me." In 1984, at 25, he had a shot at becoming the youngest American to climb Everest, but his father, now 88, took him off the summit team: Two years earlier, a friend and mentor of Peter's, Marty Hoey, had fallen 6,000 feet to her death on the same peak, and it spooked Lou. "I was pissed he took me off the team at the time," Whittaker says. "Today I understand. I'm a father now, too." Despite never having been to college, Whittaker has a keen business sense. When Eddie Bauer wanted to return to more-hardcore apparel in 2008, the company partnered with Whittaker to help launch its mountaineering line, First Ascent. He assembled a team of some of the best climbers on the planet, including Everest legends Dave Hahn and Melissa Arnot, to design and test the gear. The cuts were clean and lean with arms and waists tailored to a reaching body. Hoods fit hats and helmets equally well. The line they created won 14 industry awards, and in four years it was raking in $45 million in annual sales. While nothing went to market without his approval, Whittaker says the process left him wanting to make something free from cost concerns a guide's dream getup. "It's really easy to make a $3,000 jacket," says Scott Trepanier, director of public relations at Columbia Sportswear, "but what's really hard is making a $500 jacket that competes with that $3,000 jacket." MtnLogic is essentially Whittaker's First Ascent 2.0, but this time he can do whatever he pleases, prices be damned. Polartec is footing the bill for a year's worth of design help, but Whittaker is using his own money to make the products, so the company's success (or failure) rides entirely on his shoulders. Courtesy MTNLOGIC For the past few months, Whittaker and his guides have sometimes actually lived in their prototypes while working. One guide, Jess Matthews, spent 250 hours straight on Denali, wearing a sun hoodie made of Power Dry, a synthetic weave. "I didn't stink! Or, rather, the shirt didn't stink," she says. Other guides overwhelmingly preferred Power Wool, a blend of merino and synthetic fibers, for its ability to keep them cool, so that's what Whittaker will use, even though it's 40 to 60 times more expensive. What guides liked and didn't like was rarely unanimous, but they did "align," as Whittaker says. As a result, jackets will have none of those wind flaps. To reduce bulk, pockets and seams on outer layers won't stack atop pockets and seams on inner layers. If a zipper couldn't be zipped in three seconds or less, Whittaker redesigned it. And snaps: "They have no business being on anything you plan to take above tree line, because they're impossible to use with gloves," he says. What is less certain than the quality is whether consumers will be willing to shell out a premium for the clothing. Nothing in the 19-item line is cheap. T-shirts with Power Wool start at $80. Jackets with NeoShell, a breathable windproof fabric, will go for $500. For now at least, Whittaker's plan is to keep things small and rely on his inhouse distribution channel: More than 3,000 people climb with RMI every year, and 70 percent of them have never been in crampons. Whittaker intends to stock his clothing-rental program with MtnLogic, and his clients will see his guides wearing the same stuff. Courtesy MTNLOGIC "If you're going to trust us with your lives, you're probably going to trust us when it comes to gear," he says. "We can't take away the suffering, but we can reduce it." As for the Whittaker clan and I, we make the summit after five hours of what proves to be the least amount of suffering I've ever had on this mountain. We take pictures. We hug. Kristian does just fine. In a few months, Gabriella will request to climb it all over again. But we can't linger, not with 9,000 feet back to the car, so we rope up and head down. The sun is out, and the views of the toothy valleys and plains below are even more spectacular in the searing light, but it's the joy of exertion in an extremely beautiful place that makes us glow. And that feeling, of course, is what the best gear is for. A young man who made a religious pilgrimage in England sometime during the late 11th or early 12th century ultimately died of leprosy and was buried in a hospital cemetery. Now, scientists studying his remains have found, at least in his death, he was not treated as an outcast but was given a traditional pilgrim burial. "The wider implication of our research, ultimately, is that it can help challenge long-held and false notions of leprosy sufferers being traditionally outcast," lead researcher Simon Roffey, a lecturer in archaeology the University of Winchester in the United Kingdom, told Live Science. The excavated man received a pilgrim's burial meaning he was interred with a scallop shell, a symbol of a pilgrim who has made the journey to the shrine of St. James in Spain. The burial challenges modern misconceptions that leprosy sufferers were outcast and the disease was linked to sinfulness, Roffey said. [6 Strange Facts About Leprosy] Leprosy genetics Leprosy is a bacterial disease that causes severe, disfiguring skin lesions and nerve damage, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The disease is not all that contagious; a person needs repeated contact with nose or mouth fluids from an infected person to contract leprosy, the CDC said. However, many people feared the condition in the past, seeing it as an incurable, contagious threat, the CDC said. Leprosy dates back almost 4,000 years, and other studies suggest that the genome of the bacteria that cause it, Mycobacterium leprae, has not changed significantly in that time, the researchers said in the new study. This might explain the decline in the incidence of leprosy since its peak in the medieval period, as people gradually adapted to the disease, the researchers added. To learn more about leprosy's genetic history, Roffey and his colleagues examined the pilgrim's skeleton. The man had been buried in the cemetery of the leprosy hospital St. Mary Magdalen, Winchester. Story continues The scientists said they found that the man, who was between 18 and 25 years old when he died, lived during a time when religious pilgrimages were at their height in Europe. He likely didn't live in Winchester, and may have traveled because he wanted to die there, they said. The pilgrim's skeleton showed minimal signs of leprosy, with the lesions mostly confined to the bones of his legs. However, he likely suffered from multiple tumors in his tissues caused by inflammation and infection, the study researchers said. The man might have also suffered from facial paralysis as a result of nerve damage associated with the disease, they said. Leprosy strains The majority of strains of leprosy found in remains in the cemetery at St. Mary Magdalen were from a genetic strain called 31. However, the particular strain found in the pilgrim's remains belonged to what's called the 2F lineage, a type of leprosy associated today with cases from south-central and western Asia. Though other excavated remains at the site also contained 2F M. leprae strains, the strain from this pilgrim was genetically distinct from others at this site, the scientists said. [27 Devastating Infectious Diseases] "This would suggest that the individual was quite widely traveled and came into contact with a diverse range of ethnic groups," Roffey said. The man's travels may have included trips to Spain, the scallop shell that he was buried with suggests. The presence of two different leprosy strain types, 31 and 2F, in the cemetery may indicate that the disease was introduced at multiple times into southern Britain by the movement of pilgrims and settlers, the researchers wrote in their study. The site is also one of earliest excavated examples of leprosy from Western Europe, with about 86 percent of the burials there showing skeletal signs of leprosy. Researchers noted, however, that they are still not sure of the man's origins, or whether he contracted the disease abroad or in Winchester. They also aren't sure when he contracted the disease, before or during his pilgrimage, they said. The study was published today (Jan. 26) in the journal PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases. Originally published on Live Science. Editor's Recommendations Krakow (Poland) (AFP) - Poland on Monday published the first online database with the names and other personal details of nearly 10,000 staff who ran the Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi German death camp. The database, which the IPN says contains 9,686 names "is just the beginning of a wide-ranging project" that will cover the staff of other death and concentration camps that Nazi Germany set up in occupied Poland, IPN chairman Jaroslaw Szarek told reporters in Krakow. Around 25,000 names have already been gathered so far. Szarek said the project is in part intended to curb the use by foreign media of the erroneous phrase "Polish death camps" to refer to sites built and run by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland. Warsaw has long called out media for identifying the camps as "Polish" due to confusion caused by their geographical location. But according to Szarek, "it is sometimes the case that this is done in bad faith due to anti-Polish policy." The new database, available in five languages "is a tool to fight lies", Szarek said. "We're not expressing an opinion, we're presenting the cold, hard facts." The ruins of gas chambers, crematoria and barracks at the site bear witness to the killing of around 1.1 million people, mostly Jews, at the camp built in 1940 in the southern city of Oswiecim in occupied Poland. An estimated 232,000 of Auschwitz's victims were children. The new database comes days after the museum at the former Auschwitz-Birkenau camp urged Germans and Austrians to hand over any material that could shed light on the "motivations and mentality" of its wartime staff. Museum director Piotr Cywinski said that the institution was seeking more information about the death camp's staff as part of efforts to "better understand the influence of populist mechanisms of hatred for human beings". The new database also presents 350 verdicts against camp staff in war crimes trials after the war, but the documents still need to be translated. Story continues The list of names was compiled in large part by Professor Aleksander Lasik, who began his work in 1982 by identifying the Nazi SS staff that ran Auschwitz. Cywinski said the Nazis destroyed many files as they fled the camp toward the end of the war. "We have more documents about the camp's prisoners than about its staff," Cywinski added. WARSAW, Poland (AP) Historians in Poland have put online what they say is the most complete list of Nazi SS commanders and guards at the Auschwitz concentration camp in hopes some of them can still be brought to justice. The state-run Institute of National Remembrance said Monday that the SS KL Auschwitz Garrison list is based on data from archives in Poland, Germany, Austria, the United States and, to a limited extent, Russia, where archives remain mostly inaccessible. The work of historian Aleksander Lasik, the institute and the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial, it has more than 8,500 entries. It is based on a list that Lasik built during more than 30 years of archival research. "The world justice system has failed and I'm doing what a historian should do: expose the responsible individuals as war criminals," Lasik said. Up to 200 former guards at the German death camp could still be living, he said. Historians estimate that some 12 percent of Auschwitz guards were tried by courts in Poland and elsewhere. Lasik's full database includes more than 25,000 names of guards from various German-run camps. The list is not complete and his search continues, Lasik told The Associated Press. The online list of Auschwitz guards and commanders is written in Polish, English and German. Most entries include the date and place of birth, nationality, education, military service and party affiliation. Some have a photo attached. Judicial documents are included when the person stood trial in Poland. For example, the entry for Rudolf Hoess, the camp's commander from 1940-43, has a photocopy of the death sentence he was handed by a court in Krakow, Poland, in 1947. The dates of service at Auschwitz are being verified pending publication. Nazi hunter Efraim Zuroff said the publication of the names is "very important and the right thing to do" and can have "practical implications" if Nazi crime investigators in Germany were unaware of some of the names. It is estimated that from 1940-45, Nazi Germans killed some 1.1 million people in the death camp that they operated in occupied Poland. Some 1 million of the victims were European Jews, up to 75,000 were Poles, some 21,000 were Roma and approximately 15,000 were Soviet prisoners of war. Warsaw (AFP) - Polish President Andrzej Duda on Monday hailed the "historic" presence of US soldiers on his country's soil, saying it would reinforce Poland's security within NATO. The US armoured brigade of some 3,500 troops as well as tanks and heavy equipment arrived in Poland this month, one of the largest deployments of US forces in Europe since the Cold War. "This moment is historic, because it changes the model in our part of Europe," Duda said at the launch of a joint exercise of Polish and American troops in Zagan, a town near the German border. He was joined by Lieutenant General Ben Hodges, the US Army commander in Europe. The previous US administration of president Barack Obama ordered the deployment to reassure NATO allies in eastern Europe after Russia's annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in 2014. The Kremlin has denounced the operation as a "threat" to its security. Although President Donald Trump has said he wants to ease tensions with Moscow, the deployments remain in place for now. Three decades ago, the Zagan garrison which is hosting the US troops housed "another army which we had not invited and which we had to treat as allies," Duda said, referring to former Soviet troops in then-communist Poland. The so-called "Iron Brigade", from Fort Carson in Colorado, will also be deployed in rotation in six other NATO members -- the three Baltic states as well as Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania. Gdansk (Poland) (AFP) - Poles on Sunday got their first -- and possibly last -- glimpse of a new Museum of the Second World War, a project slammed by Poland's right-wing government as underplaying the country's harrowing wartime fate. Conceived by EU President Donald Tusk during his time as Poland's premier, the museum offers a sweeping panorama of the war focused primarily on civilians who made up the majority of its victims. But led by Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the governing Law and Justice (PiS) party, has shown a penchant for a more inward-looking nationalist and "patriotic" approach to everything from the economy to history. Its vision for the new venue is no different. The museum's angular brick-red and glass facade juts sharply into the air in a part of Gdansk's medieval old town the Nazis razed to the ground. It lies near the city's Westerplatte peninsula where the German navy fired the first shots of World War II by attacking Poland on September 1, 1939. The main exhibitions located three floors underground offer visitors a stark look at the human toll of the war and the rise of the fascist and totalitarian politics that led to it. A soaring wall of suitcases symbolises the mass deportation of European Jews to death camps. The tattered shoe of a Polish child killed during the 1944 Warsaw Uprising focuses on the carnage against children. Porcelain melted by the atomic bomb the US dropped on Hiroshima bears witness to the advent of nuclear war. World War II claimed upwards of 55 million lives, the majority of whom were civilian, according to the museum. Some ten million were children. - 'Good Change'? - A court ruling this month gave the PiS government the go-ahead to merge the new museum with another planned one -- which critics say exists purely on paper and may never be built -- on February 1, a move widely seen as paving the way for a change of director. Historian Pawel Machcewicz, who spent the last eight years bringing the venue to life, is a former advisor to the liberal Tusk, whom Kaczynski views as his political arch-rival. Story continues Respected Polish historian Andrzej Paczkowski says the machinations surrounding the museum have more to do with "pure politics" than differing visions of history. "This is part of the PiS's 'Dobra Zmiana' (Good Change) policy that has seen it systematically take over all the important public posts in Poland since its election" in late 2015, Paczkowski told AFP. Critics accuse the PiS of installing loyalists as directors in a slew of key state-controlled enterprises and public institutions like television and radio as well as pushing through personnel changes that undermine the independence of the Constitutional Court. The moves triggered a series of mass protests and an unprecedented threat of EU sanctions over Warsaw's rule of law violations. "The criticism that the museum neglects the Polish perspective is being used as a justification to remove Machcewicz, because of course, no one is going to admit that it's because he was chosen by a rival political party," Paczkowski told AFP. Gdansk teacher Krystyna Matejczuk was among the museum's first 4,000 visitors as it opened its doors for a brief stint this weekend amid uncertainty over its fate after February 1. "The exhibition is absolutely neutral, but it's here in Gdansk, in Poland, and so its greatest focus is on the fate of Poles," she told AFP, adding "there's nothing wrong with showing that other people also suffered during the war". Poland lost around 17 percent of its population during World War II, giving it the highest national death toll from the conflict. Some six million Polish citizens, roughly half of Jewish ancestry, died under Nazi Germany's occupation. The vast majority were civilian. - 'Urgent warning' - Costing 104 million euros ($111 million) the museum is Poland's most expensive yet, according to Jaroslaw Sellin, a senior culture ministry official. Machcewicz told AFP on Sunday that "the culture ministry hasn't been in touch for months and (Culture) Minister Glinski has never visited the museum. "I don't know what will happen on February 1. I don't know how the museum will be liquidated. It's unprecedented." Poland's Culture Minister Glinski offered no clues about the fate of the museum after last week's court ruling. But last November he vowed that "no one is going to destroy the Museum of the Second World War created by our predecessors". The PiS simply wants to "complete its message", he said. According to Paczkowski, its message about the unspeakable human toll of a global war could not be more timely. "We are now in a period of history when the need for a warning about the consequences of war is especially urgent," he told AFP. By Allison Lampert and Anna Mehler Paperny QUEBEC CITY/TORONTO (Reuters) - A French-Canadian university student was the sole suspect in a shooting at a Quebec City mosque and was charged with the premeditated murder of six people, Canadian authorities said on Monday, in what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called "a terrorist attack." Court documents identified the gunman in the attack on Sunday evening prayers as Alexandre Bissonnette, 27, and charged him with six murder counts and five counts of attempted murder with a restricted weapon. The slightly-built Bissonnette made a brief appearance in court under tight security wearing a white prison garment and looking downcast. Prosecutors said all of the evidence was not yet ready and Bissonnette was set to appear again on Feb. 21. No charge was read in court and Bissonnette did not enter a plea. "The charges laid correspond to the evidence available," said Thomas Jacques, a representative of the prosecutor's office, when asked why Bissonnette was not charged with terrorism-related offences. Among the six men killed were a butcher, a university professor, a pharmacist and an accountant, according to police and Canadian media. The government of Guinea said in a statement that two of its citizens were among those killed in the mosque attack. Police declined to discuss possible motives for the shooting at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec. "They consider this a lone wolf situation," a Canadian source familiar with the situation said. In Washington, U.S. government security experts were leaning to the view that the gunman most likely was motivated by hatred for Muslims, a U.S. government source familiar with official reporting said. Trudeau, who has made a point of welcoming refugees and immigrants from Muslim-majority countries, told parliament in Ottawa: "Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack." He added a personal message to Canada's 1 million Muslims: "Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. Last night's horrible crime against the Muslim community was an act of terror committed against Canada and against all Canadians. We will grieve with you. We will defend you. We will love you. And we will stand with you." Somber parliamentarians observed a moment of silence. The attack was out of character for Quebec City, a city of just over 500,000 which reported just two murders in all of 2015. Mass shootings are rare in Canada, where gun control laws are stricter than in the United States. Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became an issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. In addition to the six killed, five people were critically injured and 12 were treated for minor injuries, a spokeswoman for the Quebec City University Hospital said. Federal Safety Minister Ralph Goodale told reporters in Ottawa there was no change to "the national terrorism threat level" from medium because "there is no information known to the government of Canada that would lead to a change at this time." U.S. President Donald Trump called Trudeau to express his condolences "and offered to provide any assistance as needed," said Trudeau spokesman Cameron Ahmad. Over the weekend, Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, his response to an executive order by Trump on Friday to halt the U.S. refugee program and to temporarily bar citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. Trump's action, which the president said was "not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe," was widely condemned in the United States and abroad as targeting Muslims. On Monday, White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters that the Quebec shooting was "a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant, and why the president is taking steps to be proactive, rather than reactive, when it comes to our nation's safety and security." FATHER OF FOUR KILLED A father of four, the owner of a halal butcher near the mosque, was among those killed, said Pamela Sakinah El-hayet, a friend of one of the people at the mosque. The mosque concierge was killed, as was Ahmed Youness, a 21-year-old student, El-hayet told Reuters. One of El-hayets friends, Youness roommate, was in the mosque at the time of the shooting. He was unharmed, she said, but in total shock. A man of Moroccan descent who had also been arrested was now considered a witness, although his nationality was not immediately known, a Canadian source familiar with the situation said. Ali Assafiri, a student at Universite Laval, said he had been running late for the evening prayers at the mosque, near the university in the Quebec City area. When he arrived, the mosque had been transformed by police into a crime scene. "Everyone was in shock," Assafiri said by phone. "It was chaos." Vigils were planned for Montreal and Quebec City, the provincial capital, as well as in Edmonton. There was an outpouring of support for the mosque on social media. (Additional reporting by Kevin Dougherty in Quebec City,; Alastair Sharp and Anna Mehler Paperny in Toronto; David Ljunggren in Ottawa; Mark Hosenball in Washington; Saliou Samb in Conakry; Writing by Andrea Hopkins, Frances Kerry, Grant McCool; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and Alan Crosby) By Hamid Shalizi and James Mackenzie KABUL (Reuters) - Atta Mohammad Noor, one of Afghanistan's most powerful regional leaders, is in talks with President Ashraf Ghani to join the central government, a move that could shake up the country's politics ahead of elections scheduled for 2019. Negotiations have been going on for weeks, and while the outcome is uncertain and it is unclear what role Noor would take if any, his ambitions have implications for the balance of power between Ghani and government co-leader, Abdullah Abdullah. "I am here in Kabul to continue my negotiations with the president," Noor told Reuters in an interview at his house in the capital, where hundreds of visitors and petitioners crowd in daily to seek his help. "If our negotiations succeed, we will leave Balkh to new and young faces," he said, referring to the northern province where he has built a far-reaching regional power base. "We are ready to support the government and work together." Abdullah is CEO in a U.S.-brokered power-sharing government, but he is under growing pressure to deliver more for his followers, many of whom consider he has failed to protect their interests. Some political commentators see Noor's initiative as a challenge for the leadership of Afghanistan's powerful ethnic Tajik group, currently led by Abdullah, a former ally whom he backed in the 2014 election. Ghani is a Pashtun, traditionally the strongest ethnic Afghan group that is often viewed with suspicion by Tajiks and other minority communities. Noor's relations with Ghani have been strained in the past, and the president tried to dismiss him as Balkh governor. But recent talks point to a thaw and have sparked keen interest in the mainstream and social media. There has also been a steady stream of politicians and foreign diplomats to Noor's residences in Kabul and Mazar-i-Sharif in the north. "The big question people are asking is, 'is this the start of the 2019 presidential campaign for Afghanistan?'," said Scott Worden, director of Afghanistan and Central Asia Programs at the United States Institute of Peace in Washington. POLITICAL RIVALRY Heightened political rivalry would add to the challenges the new U.S. administration faces in Afghanistan, where Taliban militants have increased their hold and the lack of jobs and security has pushed tens of thousands of people to leave. Nationally, support for the government has weakened. The Asia Foundation's 2016 survey of Afghanistan, the biggest such survey, found overall satisfaction at a record low. About 49 percent of people thought the national unity government was doing a good job, down from over 70 percent in 2014. More specifically, many Tajiks feel the government, formed in 2014 after allegations of massive vote-rigging on both sides, has not produced a genuine power-sharing agreement, sidelining Abdullah and leaving Ghani in sole charge. Whether Noor exchanges his regional power base for the unpredictable politics of Kabul is unknown, as is his ability to be any more successful than Abdullah in soothing discontent among supporters. For his part, Abdullah, whose position as chief executive is protected by the power-sharing agreement until the next election, has not reacted publicly. His office declined to comment on Noor's talks with Ghani and the president's palace also declined to comment. Last year's deal with the Hizb-i-Islami faction led by former Islamist warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar has brought a potentially significant new Pashtun group into the government fold, leaving some Tajiks feeling further isolated. And Noor's longstanding rivalry with First Vice President Rashid Dostum, an ethnic Uzbek who also wields significant power in the north, is another potential source of tension should they both be in government together. Dostum's political future has been uncertain following allegations that one of his rivals was tortured and threatened with sexual abuse by some of Dostum's bodyguards, accusations he has denied and said were spread by enemies trying to damage him. (Reporting by James Mackenzie; Editing by Mike Collett-White) President Trumps White House is on the defensive over a controversial executive order that suspended the U.S. refugee program and banned travel for people from seven countries Sunday. Speaking to reporters 48 hours after issuance of the order, which sparked protests across the U.S., protestations from overseas and criticism on Capitol Hill, senior Administration officials maintained that the implementation of the order was a massive success story. But the reality Sunday appeared to be anything but, as a growing list of Republicans joined Democrats in calling for immediate changes to the order, which bans visas for nations from Muslim-majority countries Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia. Airlines and ports of entry complained of contradictory or unclear guidance from federal officials, which were left scrambling over the weekend to determine how to implement Trumps order. Less than 24 hours after the Administration maintained that legal permanent residents were covered by the executive order, the White House worked to walk that back Sunday. As far as green-card holders moving forward, it doesnt affect them, White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said Sunday morning in an appearance on NBCs Meet the Press. But a senior Administration official confirmed Sunday that the reality was more complicated, and that green-card holders are covered, but that absent any derogatory information, they would be granted a national interest exemption. The actual operation of the waiver is such that in the absence of derogatory information, the waiver is approved, ergo they are exempt from the executive order, the official maintained. The official declared that the proof is in the numbers, for green-card holders, saying that as of earlier Sunday 170 people had applied and 170 people had received a waiver. But the Administration did not define what would be considered derogatory, nor specify the waiver process, which was proceeding on an ad hoc basis over the weekend and had yet to be formalized by the departments of Homeland Security and State. Story continues In a statement Sunday afternoon, Trump, who had called for a ban on Muslim immigration to the U.S. during the presidential campaign, criticized the media for its reporting on his executive order. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting, Trump said. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. By Sunday afternoon more than a dozen Republicans on Capitol Hill were critical of Trumps plan. This vetting proposal itself needed more vetting, Senator Lamar Alexander said Sunday in a statement. While not explicitly a religious test, it comes close to one, which is inconsistent with our American character. The officials defended the hours-long delays faced by travelers to the U.S. from those countries, which included detentions in handcuffs in at least one occurrence, as worthwhile given the reduced threat from those countries. The countries were selected because they have been identified by Congress and the Obama Administration as countries of concern for travel. The official said that in the first 24 hours under the order, 109 of approximately 325,000 travelers from overseas were subjected to enhanced screening and interviews under the order. While Republican and Democratic lawmakers expressed frustration over the weekend that they were not briefed on the substance of the order in advance, the official maintained that GOP congressional staffers involved in the presidential transition assisted in drafting the order. The officials also cast the protests at airports and cities nationwide, including a several-thousand-strong gathering outside the White House on Sunday, as immensely disproportionate with the disruption caused by the order. Under the order, travel for citizens of the seven high-risk countries is banned without a waiver for 90 days and the U.S. refugee program is to be halted for 120 days, until Trumps Administration can institute what the President has called extreme vetting. Priebus suggested Sunday morning that more countries could be added to the visa-ban list. Perhaps other countries needed to be added to an executive order going forward, he said. President Trump has issued a series of executive actions linked to a range of scientific issues since taking office earlier this month, but he has yet to name a science advisor. Formally known as the Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the science advisor is responsible for consulting with scientists inside and outside of government to ensure the President has the best available information on any policy issue related to science. OSTP and the science advisor role have not been a priority for the Trump White House with the position still open and no indications that a nomination is coming soon. The transition team only held one meeting with the office before Trump became president, according to John Holdren, Obamas OSTP director. That meetingattended by a single transition stafferlasted one hour and took place a week prior to inauguration, Holdren said. Read More: Why Trump Will Lose His War on Science He seemed positive and enthusiastic about the mission of OSTP as we explained it, Holdren said of the meeting with the transition team. But I have not had any further contact. The White House did not reply to a request for comment Monday, and the presidential transition team did not reply to a request on the same topic in December. Several controversial names have appeared as potential science advisors including Yale University computer scientist David Gelernter and Princeton University physicist William Happer. Both are respected in their fields, but deny the science of climate change. Trumps approach to OSTPor lack thereofis a dramatic departure from that of President Obama, who selected Holdren more than a month before taking office and immediately tasked the office with several initiatives. Holdren, an accomplished physicist known for his work on environmental issues, was widely viewed as an influential voice in the Obama administration who consulted on a wide variety of issues. Story continues The absence of an OSTP director comes as the scientific community has expressed concern that Trumps policies represent a challenge to the fundamentals of science. A number of executive actions and other measures enacted in the first week of the Trump presidency relate to science and could have benefited from input from the scientific community, scientists say. Trump signed measures to expedite construction of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access Pipelines, which have drawn concern over the contribution of oil extraction to man-made climate change. The White House temporarily blocked the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from issuing grants. Trumps executive order Monday calling for rapid deregulation does not mention science explicitly but will inevitably affect a slew of measures rooted in science. Read More: Climate Scientists Fear Trump May Fatally Undermine Their Work What binds together a lot of things we saw last week is a president basing statements and policies on beliefs rather than on evidence and expert assistance, says Kenneth Kimmell, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists, a scientific advocacy group. We have strongly recommended that the President get a science advisor in there as soon as possible. Trump would not be the first president to go without a science advisor for an extended duration. President George W. Bush waited until June of his first year in office to select his science advisorphysicist John H. Marburgerdespite taking positions on some key science issues prior to that nomination. Scientists at the time sharply criticized that delay as well as a downgrade in the attention given to the office during the Bush presidency. Until Trump selects an advisor, he still has the research and data housed in a vast array of federal agencies at his disposal. But getting the relevant information in front of him may still prove difficult. Theres a lot of great scientists across the federal government, says Kimmell. But to make the sure that work gets the attention of the ultimate decision makerthats the role of the science advisor. WASHINGTON, D.C. Thousands of people converged on the White House Sunday to protest President Trumps executive order banning the entry into the United States of people from seven majority-Muslim nations, along with refugees of all religions from around the world. Shame! Shame! the protesters chanted in the direction of the president, who was that afternoon at the White House holding phone calls with the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed, and then screening the animated film Finding Dory. It was at least the fourth significant protest to address the new president at his new home since he took office on Jan. 20, during which time his disapproval rating has risen to 51 percent, according to the Gallup daily tracking poll, while his approval has sunk to 42 percent. Protesters came because friends told them about the gathering. They came because they saw something on Facebook. Because they were on a list-serv. Because they were part of one of the new anti-Trump groups that have sprung up since the election, like Indivisible. They came to show solidarity, and outrage, and love. To tell the president, This is not who we are, and demand he undo what he had done. The protest was called for 1 p.m. in a Facebook posting, and word of it was tweeted and shared overnight in documents listing protests around the nation against Trumps abrupt Friday move. By 1:30 p.m., Lafayette Park across from the White House was nearly full, and so were those parts of the pedestrian plaza in front of the White House gates not still cordoned off and full of inauguration structures. Somewhere in the crush of people there were official rally speakers. Newly elected Democratic U.S. Sens. Kamala Harris of California and Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada were there, according to reports on social media. Occasionally a cheer would go up that indicated the direction they were in. Without a sound system that could cover the entire park and grounds, few could hear anything other than the chants and the conversations of those in their immediate vicinity. But with the tumult of signs and sounds and people threading their way through the mass, it became an active sort of standing around. People pointed fingers at the White House, and live-streamed themselves and the rally on Facebook and Facetime, and took pictures of the crowd, and the signs, and each other. Protesters scrambled up into trees, and onto a wall surrounding the Bank of America building across from the U.S. Treasury building to get a better look. A woman with a microphone there ignored the distant official speakers and led the section of the crowd I could see in chants. Story continues Some of the chants were old standbys, often heard in Washington: Whose House? Our House! Stand up! Fight back! This is what democracy looks like! There were new ones for the new occasion, and the new president, too: No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here! Hands too small, cant build a wall! Evil plans, tiny hands! No ban, no wall! Not everyone was in sync as they chanted, which had the odd effect of making that last one at times sound like No Bannon, no wall! Chief White House strategist Stephen Bannon, the former Breitbart chairman, was a particular focus of ire at the protest, with some accusing him of being a Nazi or fascist in signs and comments. Around 2:15 p.m., the crowd got antsy and a cry went up: March! March! March! The woman with the sound system announced that the group would be marching down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Trump International Hotel, which is located just blocks from the White House, and to the U.S. Capitol. If this had been part of the plan, it was not previously advertised on Facebook. The protesters turned around and started to walk out of the White House plaza, heedless of whether they had a permit to march or whether the streets were clear of cars. They were followed by the crush of people who had been in the park. The size of the gathering began to become apparent. It was more than 500 people. More than 1,000. They marched past me, a thickly packed crowd pouring out of the park and turning right, heading down 15th Street toward Pennsylvania Avenue. There were more than 5,000 people, certainly. The crowd kept going and going, increasing in size as word of the protest spread across social media, and as passersby joined from the street. Many marchers had brought their children. There were pregnant women, and toddlers, and strollers galore. A few well-tended dogs. Groups of college students. Government workers. Non-government workers. People from Maryland, and Virginia, and D.C. Musical instruments, mainly drums, and at least one puppet. The D.C. Police Department, skilled in the ways of de-escalation and crowd control in a city that is used to marches and also one that voted more than 90 percent against Trump blocked intersections with their cars to protect the marchers from errant traffic. Signs ranged from the polite I love my Muslim sisters & brothers to the pointed Impeach Twitler to the crude First they came for the Muslims and we said NOT TODAY motherf***er. Some were educational 97% of ISIS victims are Muslim. Many were scrawled on cardboard boxes by people who grabbed the first available poster-making material at hand on short notice. One individual sported a sign made out of a pizza box. At the Trump International Hotel, one declared, Protest is the new brunch. The scene outside the Trump Hotel after security ceded the steps. Sign: "Protest is the new brunch." pic.twitter.com/FKaJDxxOLd Garance Franke-Ruta (@thegarance) January 29, 2017 Another sign said simply, Decency. Security personnel standing guard outside the hotel eventually thought better of trying to keep the activists off the hotel steps. A triumphant cry went up as they receded. The protesters surged up the steps and stood on the landing outside the hotel, which kept its enormous black doors shut. Shame! Shame! Shame! they chanted. Guests exited through a side door. Behind the throng, marchers continued on toward the Capitol, its white dome appearing polished to a shine in the flinty winter sunlight. View from the Newseum this afternoon #MuslimBan pic.twitter.com/0JScYG705a Brittany Harris (@brittharr) January 29, 2017 Outside Trump Hotel, heading toward the Capitol. Never seen this kind of thing in DC. Crowd keeps coming & coming, growing bigger & bigger. pic.twitter.com/ia72umkHoT Garance Franke-Ruta (@thegarance) January 29, 2017 At Dulles Airport an hour away, lawyers still worked frantically to sort out the consequences of the executive order as conflicting reports about its implementation continued to pour in and travelers remained detained. Another protest against the executive order was called for the following week. This time, people would have more time to plan. _____ Related slideshows: Slideshow: Protests against Trumps travel ban hit the streets of NYC >>> Slideshow: Anti-Trump protesters rally for Muslim and immigrant rights >>> Slideshow: Protests at U.S. airports over travel ban >>> Quebec City (AFP) - A Canadian political science student known to have nationalist sympathies was charged Monday with six counts of murder over a shooting spree at a Quebec mosque -- one of the worst attacks ever to target Muslims in a western country. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned as a "terrorist attack" Sunday night's assault on the Islamic Cultural Center in a busy district of Quebec City, which sent terrified worshippers fleeing barefoot in the snow. Eight people were also wounded in the crossfire, and five of them remained in critical condition in hospital Monday. Alexandre Bissonnette, who made a brief court appearance after surrendering to authorities, was charged with six counts of premeditated murder and five of attempted murder, police said. More indictments are expected later, police added. "There are search warrants underway," a spokeswoman for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police told a press conference. "We hope to obtain the evidence to reach the point where we will be able to lay terrorism and national security charges," she said. So far, authorities have shed no light on what may have prompted the attack. Local media said Bissonnette is a Quebec nationalist and anti-feminist who recently "liked" US President Donald Trump's page on Facebook. He also has reportedly expressed support for French far-right politician Marine Le Pen. Both police and witnesses had initially described two masked men opening fire inside the mosque, where worshippers were gathered for evening prayer. But authorities said Monday that a second person detained had only been questioned as a witness. Explaining how one suspect was eventually let go, the RCMP said: "This morning and last evening we had reason to believe that two individuals should be arrested, that two people had participated." After investigating, they said: "we reached the conclusion that we should focus on one single suspect. And there was no reason to believe that the other individual had participated." Story continues - Victims are dual nationals - Some 50 people were in the mosque at the time of the attack. The dead are all dual Canadian nationals: one Moroccan, two Algerians, one Tunisian and two Guineans. Quebec has traditionally attracted Muslim immigrants from North Africa. Bissonnette, who is a student at Laval University, surrendered 20 kilometers (12 miles) outside the city after calling an emergency services hotline an hour after the attack to reveal his location. "It is a domestic investigation at this time," Royal Canadian Mounted Police Inspector Martin Plante said. Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said the nation's security threat level remained at medium -- requiring security forces to be on guard but having no specific information about an imminent threat. It was raised to this level in October 2014 after a lone gunman attacked parliament. - Open door to Muslims - Police are continuing to collect evidence in a bid to "identify exactly who is involved and what was their motivation," Goodale said. Authorities, he added, don't have "sufficient, hard facts yet to be able to draw conclusions." The Quebec mosque had already been the target of hate: a pig's head was left on the doorstep last June during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Other mosques in Canada have been targeted with anti-Muslim graffiti in recent months. Police stationed near the mosque told AFP that they had feared this type of attack "because it's happening all over the world." The shooting came as Canada vowed to open its arms to Muslim refugees after Trump's controversial immigration ban prompted travel chaos and outrage around the world. "Last night's horrible crime against the Muslim community was an act of terror committed against Canada and against all Canadians," Trudeau said. To the one million Canadians who profess the Muslim faith, he said "36 million hearts are breaking with yours," alluding to the country's total population. "Canadians will not be intimidated," Trudeau added. "We will not meet violence with more violence. We will meet fear and hatred with love and compassion." Trump telephoned Trudeau to offer his condolences following the attack, which was condemned around the world including by leading Sunni Muslim body Al-Azhar, as well as Egypt and Jordan. - 'Senseless violence' - Mohamed Ali Saidane, who lost a relative in the shooting, joined elected officials at city hall Monday to denounce escalating hate. "The Arab-Muslim community has become the victim of populist politics," he told AFP. People fleeing the mosque -- where custom requires worshippers to remove their shoes during prayer -- did not have time to collect their winter boots. "They arrived in a panic," said Louis-Gabriel Cloutier, the manager of a cafe across the street who saw them fleeing the rampage. Some took refuge at the cafe. "I never thought that such a thing could happen," said a man who frequents another of the city's 10 mosques. He had ventured to the scene because "I know people who were inside." Hamid Nadji learned of the shooting from a friend and rushed to the mosque area. "For us Muslims, Quebec and Canada had been a safe zone," he said. For the first time in his presidency, Donald Trump is facing significant criticism from Republican officials and conservative groups who are rattled by his ban on immigrants and refugees from Muslim-majority nations, questioning his domestic policy agenda and worrying about what steps the New York billionaire might take next in the name of nationalism. By Sunday evening, more than a dozen GOP members of Congress had spoken out against Trumps executive order on immigration. Among them were an array of the partys most influential figures. The top Republican in the Senate, Mitch McConnell, said the United States should not implement a religious test. Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio said the plan to strengthen vetting of refugees was itself not vetted. And the political and policy groups led by Charles and David Koch offered their first public criticism of Trump, whose candidacy the billionaire brothers found so unpalatable they sat out the 2016 election. The wave of criticism marks the end of a startlingly brief honeymoon period for a new President who has been in office for scarcely a week, and even set the White House on defense as it backtracked on the ban applying to green-card holders. And while much of the blowback was driven by Trumps immigration orders, the controversial plans he has on the horizon suggest the rest of his term could be just as rocky. The emerging rifts come amid mass protests in cities around the U.S. against an executive order that would block millions of people from entering the United States. Legal permanent U.S. residents were detained at airports, refugees were trapped en route to the United States and judges from coast to coast stepped in to stop the unprecedented White House action. The chaos knocked the White House back on its heels and prompted Trump on Sunday night to release a defense of the policy. This is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting, Trump said in a statement released by the White House. This is not about religionthis is about terror and keeping our country safe. Story continues The sentiment did little to calm skittish conservatives, who have already grown tired of the theatrics and hysterics. From removing the Director of National Intelligence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Force from the National Security Council, to trolling news organizations on Twitter, the precedent-breaking new President was testing the patience of Republicans who had hoped he might change tactics and tone once he was in the Oval Office. But there is no changing a 70-year-old billionaire. And by Sunday some of the partys most influential figures had begun to break publicly with the Republican President. We cannot be partisan. We cant say, OK, this is our party, right or wrong, Charles Koch said Sunday as he gave a pep talk to his deep-pocketed pals who plan to spend as much as $400 million heading toward the 2018 midterm elections. The networks official position, taken Sunday with no caveats, was that Trumps immigration ban was anathema. During a later session at the Koch retreat near Palm Springs, Calif., the co-chairman of the policy and politics network told donors not to expect Trump to get a pass, especially if he goes after specific groups of people or adds red ink to government budgets. We have the courage to oppose bad policies that will only harm peoples lives, regardless of who proposes it, Brian Hooks said. Remember: A trillion-dollar government stimulus was a bad idea under Democrats. Its a bad idea when a Republican proposes it. Hooks, one of Charles Kochs top aides, vowed that the Koch network would hold all politicians accountable, regardless of political party. Put another way: Stand with Trump at your own risk, lawmakers. To be sure, the number of Republicans to publicly excoriate the new President is still relatively low. Silence reigned for most of the weekend as protests raged. And there were few signs that Trump was ready to bend in any meaningful way in the face of criticism. If anything, the criticism may only convince Trump to step up attacks on his opponents and the media. His first public comment on Sunday morning, after a day of striking protests, was a broadside at The New York Times. Yet it is clear Trump will not have an unconditional coalition behind him. Rep. Charlie Dent of Pennsylvania called the move ridiculous. Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska said the order gives terrorists a win because they can claim the United States just equated all Muslims with jihadists. Rep. Dan Newhouse of Washington said many immigrants are having their lives needlessly disrupted. Sen. Bob Corker, a finalist to be Trumps Secretary of State, joined fellow Tennessean Sen. Lamar Alexander in calling for changes to this policy. All are Republicans and come from across the ideological spectrum. At the same time, conservatives are building blockades on Trump-style fiscal policy. I really dont like it, Sen. Mike Lee of Utah said of Trumps border tax plan, which could add a 20% tax on good and materials imported from Mexico. (Companies are most likely to pass the cost along to American consumers.) Asked later about Trumps moves to shut out immigrants from seven countries with Muslim majorities, Lee tried his best to dodge. I wasnt aware that Id lose my First Amendment rights after walking out this door, he said gamely as as he left reporters behind. Until now, the prospect of sweeping policy changes under unified Republican government had largely swept aside the tensions between Trump and members of his party. Trump rode a populist wave to victory, and many lawmakers are skittish about being the next target of a tweeted tirade. Some lawmakers are hoping Trump proves pliable on policy, or that he defers to Vice President Mike Pence or White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus. Still, theres an unknowable risk of sitting on the sidelines and hoping things turn out just fine. Its simply not whats in the DNA of the outside groups who pushed the party to the right during the Obama administration. Jason Pye, a spokesman for the conservative advocacy group FreedomWorks, said that there is plenty to like about Trumps policy agenda, from his early push to gut Obamacare to his pledge to usher in sweeping regulatory reforms. But Pye said he was troubled by plans to shell out billions to build a border wall without corresponding spending cuts, invest up to $1 trillion in infrastructure and impose tariffs while doing little to tackle entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare. Its a far cry from the conservative mantra during the Obama years, when the GOP insisted on offsetting all new discretionary spendingincluding for emergency disaster relief and unemployment insurance for the needywith reductions elsewhere. There was no mention of doing the same for Trumps proposed border wall. Republicans spent the last eight years complaining about budget deficits, Pye says. It makes us look like hypocrites. During the Bush administration, he added, Congressional Republicans abandoned any sort of fiscal restraint they claimed to have. Im worried that just because the man in the White House has an R next to his name that were going to do it all over again. Other conservative groups echoed the sentiment. The Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity wrote a letter to House Ways and Means chair Kevin Brady complaining that the GOPs border-adjustment plan amounted to a whopping tax hike. Club for Growth spokesman Doug Sachtleben says the proposal is really a bad idea. The free-market group opposes some of Trumps other trade ideas as well. We dont think getting the country involved in the trade war is a good idea, Sachtleben says. The notion that you punch first with a tariff threat is just not good for the economy. But for now, disagreements on fiscal policy have taken a backseat to the backlash over the immigration ban. Even Trumps allies struggled to excuse the hastily composed order. Rep. Jason Chaffetz, a Utah Republican, told reporters at the Koch summit that he appreciated Trumps intentions to secure borders. But, he added, he had no idea what Trump was thinking when it came to residents who have green cards. I dont understand what theyre trying to do, Chaffetz said. The rupture in GOP unity, coming so soon after Trump took office on Jan. 20, portends bigger fights to come. Many of the big-ticket items on Trumps domestic agenda are sure to ruffle feathers among budget hawks. Airports arent cheap to rebuild, and bridges, roads and tunnels arent free, either. The widespread protests against the immigration moves suggest Trumps critics are energized, if not organizedand that not all Republicans will blindly have Trumps back. This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country, Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham said in a joint statement. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security. In typical fashion, Trump brushed them off as weak on immigration and always looking to start World War III in a tweet. He ordered the White House, too, to release a statement defending the Presidents moves. Two of his top advisers convened a conference call late Sunday to further brief reporters and dispute coverage of the order as a ban on Muslims. Yet there are signs that patience with the President is wearing thin. Breaking with Trump carries political risks. But some Republicans are beginning to believe that not doing so would be even riskier. This story originally appeared on Time.com. For the first time in his presidency, Donald Trump is facing significant criticism from Republican officials and conservative groups who are rattled by his ban on immigrants and refugees from Muslim-majority nations, questioning his domestic policy agenda and worrying about what steps the New York billionaire might take next in the name of nationalism. By Sunday evening, more than a dozen GOP members of Congress had spoken out against Trumps executive order on immigration. Among them were an array of the partys most influential figures. The top Republican in the Senate, Mitch McConnell, said the United States should not implement a religious test. Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio said the plan to strengthen vetting of refugees was itself not vetted. And the political and policy groups led by Charles and David Koch offered their first public criticism of Trump, whose candidacy the billionaire brothers found so unpalatable they sat out the 2016 election. The wave of criticism marks the end of a startlingly brief honeymoon period for a new President who has been in office for scarcely a week, and even set the White House on defense as it backtracked on the ban applying to green-card holders. And while much of the blowback was driven by Trumps immigration orders, the controversial plans he has on the horizon suggest the rest of his term could be just as rocky. The emerging rifts come amid mass protests in cities around the U.S. against an executive order that would block millions of people from entering the United States. Legal permanent U.S. residents were detained at airports, refugees were trapped en route to the United States and judges from coast to coast stepped in to stop the unprecedented White House action. The chaos knocked the White House back on its heels and prompted Trump on Sunday night to release a defense of the policy. This is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting, Trump said in a statement released by the White House. This is not about religionthis is about terror and keeping our country safe. Story continues The sentiment did little to calm skittish conservatives, who have already grown tired of the theatrics and hysterics. From removing the Director of National Intelligence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Force from the National Security Council, to trolling news organizations on Twitter, the precedent-breaking new President was testing the patience of Republicans who had hoped he might change tactics and tone once he was in the Oval Office. But there is no changing a 70-year-old billionaire. And by Sunday some of the partys most influential figures had begun to break publicly with the Republican President. We cannot be partisan. We cant say, OK, this is our party, right or wrong, Charles Koch said Sunday as he gave a pep talk to his deep-pocketed pals who plan to spend as much as $400 million heading toward the 2018 midterm elections. The networks official position, taken Sunday with no caveats, was that Trumps immigration ban was anathema. During a later session at the Koch retreat near Palm Springs, Calif., the co-chairman of the policy and politics network told donors not to expect Trump to get a pass, especially if he goes after specific groups of people or adds red ink to government budgets. We have the courage to oppose bad policies that will only harm peoples lives, regardless of who proposes it, Brian Hooks said. Remember: A trillion-dollar government stimulus was a bad a idea under Democrats. Its a bad idea when a Republican proposes it. Hooks, one of Charles Kochs top aides, vowed that the Koch network would hold all politicians accountable, regardless of political party. Put another way: Stand with Trump at your own risk, lawmakers. To be sure, the number of Republicans to publicly excoriate the new President is still relatively low. Silence reigned for most of the weekend as protests raged. And there were few signs that Trump was ready to bend in any meaningful way in the face of criticism. If anything, the criticism may only convince Trump to step up attacks on his opponents and the media. His first public comment on Sunday morning, after a day of striking protests, was a broadside at The New York Times. Yet it is clear Trump will not have an unconditional coalition behind him. Rep. Charlie Dent of Pennsylvania called the move ridiculous. Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska said the order gives terrorists a win because they can claim the United States just equated all Muslims with jihadists. Rep. Dan Newhouse of Washington said many immigrants are having their lives needlessly disrupted. Sen. Bob Corker, a finalist to be Trumps Secretary of State, joined fellow Tennessean Sen. Lamar Alexander in calling for changes to this policy. All are Republicans and come from across the ideological spectrum. At the same time, conservatives are building blockades on Trump-style fiscal policy. I really dont like it, Sen. Mike Lee of Utah said of Trumps border tax plan, which could add a 20% tax on good and materials imported from Mexico. (Companies are most likely to pass the cost along to American consumers.) Asked later about Trumps moves to shut out immigrants from seven countries with Muslim majorities, Lee tried his best to dodge. I wasnt aware that Id lose my First Amendment rights after walking out this door, he said gamely as as he left reporters behind. Until now, the prospect of sweeping policy changes under unified Republican government had largely swept aside the tensions between Trump and members of his party. Trump rode a populist wave to victory, and many lawmakers are skittish about being the next target of a tweeted tirade. Some lawmakers are hoping Trump proves pliable on policy, or that he defers to Vice President Mike Pence or White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus. Still, theres an unknowable risk of sitting on the sidelines and hoping things turn out just fine. Its simply not whats in the DNA of the outside groups who pushed the party to the right during the Obama administration. Jason Pye, a spokesman for the conservative advocacy group FreedomWorks, said that there is plenty to like about Trumps policy agenda, from his early push to gut Obamacare to his pledge to usher in sweeping regulatory reforms. But Pye said he was troubled by plans to shell out billions to build a border wall without corresponding spending cuts, invest up to $1 trillion in infrastructure and impose tariffs while doing little to tackle entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare. Its a far cry from the conservative mantra during the Obama years, when the GOP insisted on offsetting all new discretionary spendingincluding for emergency disaster relief and unemployment insurance for the needywith reductions elsewhere. There was no mention of doing the same for Trumps proposed border wall. Republicans spent the last eight years complaining about budget deficits, Pye says. It makes us look like hypocrites. During the Bush administration, he added, Congressional Republicans abandoned any sort of fiscal restraint they claimed to have. Im worried that just because the man in the White House has an R next to his name that were going to do it all over again. Other conservative groups echoed the sentiment. The Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity wrote a letter to House Ways and Means chair Kevin Brady complaining that the GOPs border-adjustment plan amounted to a whopping tax hike. Club for Growth spokesman Doug Sachtleben says the proposal is really a bad idea. The free-market group opposes some of Trumps other trade ideas as well. We dont think getting the country involved in the trade war is a good idea, Sachtleben says. The notion that you punch first with a tariff threat is just not good for the economy. But for now, disagreements on fiscal policy have taken a backseat to the backlash over the immigration ban. Even Trumps allies struggled to excuse the hastily composed order. Rep. Jason Chaffetz, a Utah Republican, told reporters at the Koch summit that he appreciated Trumps intentions to secure borders. But, he added, he had no idea what Trump was thinking when it came to residents who have green cards. I dont understand what theyre trying to do, Chaffetz said. The rupture in GOP unity, coming so soon after Trump took office on Jan. 20, portends bigger fights to come. Many of the big-ticket items on Trumps domestic agenda are sure to ruffle feathers among budget hawks. Airports arent cheap to rebuild, and bridges, roads and tunnels arent free, either. The widespread protests against the immigration moves suggest Trumps critics are energized, if not organizedand that not all Republicans will blindly have Trumps back. This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country, Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham said in a joint statement. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security. In typical fashion, Trump brushed them off as weak on immigration and always looking to start World War III in a tweet. He ordered the White House, too, to release a statement defending the Presidents moves. Two of his top advisers convened a conference call late Sunday to further brief reporters and dispute coverage of the order as a ban on Muslims. Yet there are signs that patience with the President is wearing thin. Breaking with Trump carries political risks. But some Republicans are beginning to believe that not doing so would be even riskier. Former national security adviser Susan Rice called President Donald Trumps reorganization of the National Security Council stone cold crazy. In a tweet Sunday the former U.N. ambassador criticized the presidents executive order, which puts White House political strategist on the Principals Committee but indicates the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff would attend by invitation in contrast to previous administrations where the two (or in earlier years the director of the CIA) would attend. White House spokesman Sean Spicer told ABCs This Week Rices comment was inappropriate. Rice also noted U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley has been sidelined to sub-Cabinet meetings. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., told CBS Face the Nation Trumps national security team is impressive and he should use it. "I am worried about the National Security Council who are the members of it and who are the permanent members of it. The appointment of [White House strategist Steve] Bannon is something which is a radical departure from any National Security Council in history," he said. "It's of concern this quote reorganization." The NSC is headed by national security adviser Michael Flynn, who headed the Defense Intelligence Agency before he was directed to step down by superiors. What they have done is modernize the National Security Council so that it is less bureaucratic and more focused on providing the president with the intelligence he needs, Spicer said, adding its about how intelligence comes in and how we synthesize that data to make the best decision for our country. Former Defense Secretary and CIA director Robert Gates told This Week pushing the director of the CIA or the director of national intelligence and the head of the Joint Chiefs out of NSC meetings is a big mistake. Story continues I think that they both bring a perspective and judgment and experience to bear that every president, whether they like it or not, finds useful, he said. Trump has had a running battle with the intelligence community, questioning its conclusions about Russian efforts to influence the election and expressing anger about the leak of a 35-page dossier of unconfirmed allegations about Trumps sexual encounters and business dealings. He also has accused the intelligence services of partisan leanings. The executive order issued Friday says the reorganization is designed to address 21st century threats that cross international borders. In addition to Bannon, the Principals Committee will include the secretary of state, treasury secretary, the attorney general, the secretary of Homeland Security, the White House chief of staff and the Homeland Security adviser. Related Articles Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte has ordered the countrys police to dissolve its anti-drug units following the killing of a South Korean businessman by rogue officers. Duterte said Sunday that he was embarrassed that anti-drug officers abused their powers, and will change the way the police operates. Cleanse your ranks. Review their cases. Give me a list of who the scalawags are he said, in remarks reported by CNN. Duterte has, however, vowed to go ahead with his anti-drug campaign until the last day of six-year term. Government prosecutors say officers abducted Jee Ick-joo on Oct. 18, strangled him to death at Manilas Philippine National Police headquarters, and asked for a ransom from the slain businessmans wife, Choi Kyung-jin. Duterte has since apologized to South Korea and promised swift retribution. The killing has added to criticism of Dutertes anti-drug campaign, which unleashed a bloody crackdown that saw about 2,000 killed by the police and another 5,000 killed by suspected vigilantes. Fury Stranger Things star David Harbour delivers the speech of the night Credit: Getty There are always actors who use their moment in front of the world at the Oscars to broach politics, but judging by last nights SAG Awards, this years event promises to be like no other. Many of those receiving their goings from the Screen Actors Guild took the opportunity to slam Donald Trumps extraordinary decision to suspend immigration from a host of predominantly Muslim countries. Ashton Kutcher, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, and the cast of Netflix hit Stranger Things were among those calling for tolerance and resistance during their time on stage. But the level of vitriol reserved for the presidency points towards what is most certainly going to be the most angry and political Oscars ever. Veep star Dreyfus, in accepting the award for best actress in a comedy, said: I want you all to know that I am the daughter of an immigrant. My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France, and Im an American patriot and I love this country. And because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes. And this immigrant ban is a blemish, and it is un-American. Julia Louis-Dreyfus jokes by echoing Trump: This award is legitimate and I won. #SAGawards pic.twitter.com/mQB9nhPDuJ Hollywood Reporter (@THR) January 30, 2017 Scooping best actor in a comedy series for the US remake of Shameless, William H. Macy joked: I would like to go against the stream this evening and thank President Trump for making Frank Gallagher seem so normal. John Lithgow, scoring best actor in a drama series for The Crown, added to his list of tributes a great and underrated actress who somehow managed to speak my exact thoughts three weeks ago at another awards ceremony and thats Meryl Streep, referring to her barn-storming address at the Golden Globes earlier this month. Story continues It seemed like almost every speech railed against the president, but it was David Harbour, who played policeman Jim Hopper in Stranger Things, who delivered the most simultaneously damning and rousing speech of all, which had the crowd on its feet. Accepting the award for TV drama ensemble, he roared into the microphone: When people feel broken, afraid and tired, they are not alone. We are united in that we are all human beings and we are all together on this horrible, painful, joyous, exciting and mysterious ride that is being alive. As we act, in the continuing narrative of Stranger Things, we 1983 mid-Westerners will repel bullies, we will shelter freaks and outcasts, those who have no homes, we will get past the lies, we will hunt monsters. And when we are at a loss amidst the hypocrisy, and the casual violence of certain individuals and institutions we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the weak and disenfranchised and the marginalised, and we will do it all with soul, with heart, and with joy. The Oscars takes place on February 26, but its confirmed that it will already be missing the potential winners of the best foreign movie, the Iranian-French production The Salesman, the director and the stars of which will not be attending the ceremony. (Credit: AP) Director Asghar Farhadi confirmed that he was joining lead actress Taraneh Alidoosti in boycotting the awards in protest. To humiliate one nation with the pretext of guarding the security of another is not a new phenomenon in history and has always laid the groundwork for the creation of future divide and enmity, he said. I hereby express my condemnation of the unjust conditions forced upon some of my compatriots and the citizens of the other six countries trying to legally enter the United States of America and hope that the current situation will not give rise to further divide between nations. Alidoosti tweeted last week that she would not be attending. Trump signed an executive order on Friday passing a 90-day ban on citizens from the predominantly Muslim countries of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the US. It left many with valid green cards stranded abroad. It doesnt usually take much to persuade movie stars to speak out about injustice so well be in for a bumpy ride this year. Read more: John Hurt has died, aged 77 Iconic French actress Emmanuelle Riva has died Stranger Things actress Millie Bobby Brown joins new Godzilla movie A new report is claiming that Samsung could be launching a Gear Fit 2 successor soon. This assumption is based on the South Korea tech giants recent trademark application with the European Agency for Intellectual Property. According to SamMobile, Samsung could be expanding its fitness tracker line by introducing a new wearable on the market. While the device could be the next-generation Gear Fit 2 because of its fitness tracking feature, it could also be designed to have other features present in the Gear S2 and Gear S3 smartwatches. This is due to the fact that Samsung filed a trademark application for the words Gear Fit Pro. Samsung filed the trademark application last Thursday, and it did not provide more details about the wearable just yet. Hence, it isnt really clear how this fitness tracker would be different from the Gear Fit 2 in terms of appearance and features. SamMobile believes Samsung is developing the Gear Fit Pro wearable with its Simband health platform in mind. The company reportedly announced the platform for cloud-sourced health tracking in 2014. The reference wearable sported a number of sensors that worked by measuring data points like heart rate, oxygen level, body temperature and many more. However, just because Samsung is attempting to trademark the Gear Fit Pro doesnt mean the company is really certain about launching the new wearable. PhoneArena pointed out that Samsung is no stranger to trademarking various products. In fact, the tech giant likes to trademark stuff every so often. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee that every trademark reaches fruition. Thus, only time will tell if this Gear Fit Pro will see the light of the day. Should the Gear Fit Pro become official, it will be joining Samsungs slew of wearables that includes staples such as the Gear Fit 1 and Gear Fit 2 fitness trackers and the aforementioned Gear S2 and Gear S3 smartwatches. Hopefully, well get more details about Samsungs plan for the Gear Fit Pro in the coming weeks. Related Articles WASHINGTON/RIYADH (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia's King Salman, in a telephone call on Sunday with U.S. President Donald Trump, agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, a White House statement said. Trump, during his presidential campaign last year, had called for Gulf states to pay for establishing safe zones to protect Syrian refugees. A statement after the phone call said the two leaders agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of Islamic State militants. "The president requested, and the King agreed, to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the statement said. The Saudi Press Agency, in an initial readout of the call, made no specific mention of safe zones, but said the two leaders had affirmed the "depth and durability of the strategic relationship" between the two countries. The agency later said "the custodian of the Two Holy Mosques had confirmed his support and backing for setting up safe zones in Syria", but did not mention Yemen, where a Saudi alliance is fighting against the Iran-aligned Houthi group. A senior Saudi source told Reuters the two leaders spoke for more than an hour by telephone and agreed to step up counter-terrorism and military cooperation and enhance economic cooperation. But the source had no word on whether the two leaders discussed Trump's order to put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily ban travelers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries. The source said Saudi Arabia would enhance its participation in the U.S.-led coalition fighting to oust Islamic State from its strongholds in Iraq and Syria. The White House statement said the two leaders also agreed on the need to address "Iran's destabilizing regional activities." SPA confirmed the report but made no specific mention of Iran. Both countries share views about Iranian policies in the region, the Saudi source said, suggesting Trump agreed with Riyadh's suspicion of what it sees as Tehran's growing influence in the Arab world. Iran denies it meddles in Arab countries. The White House statement said the two also discussed what it called an invitation from the king for Trump "to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future, economically and socially," for Saudi Arabia and the region. The two also discussed the Muslim Brotherhood, the senior Saudi source said, adding in a reference to the late al Qaeda leader, "it was mentioned that Osama bin Laden was recruited at an early stage" by the organization. Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates designated the Brotherhood a terrorist organization. Riyadh fears the Brotherhood, whose Sunni Islamist doctrines challenge the Saudi principle of dynastic rule, has tried to build support inside the kingdom since the Arab Spring revolutions. U.S. officials and people close to Trump's transition team have said a debate is under way in the Trump administration whether the United States should also declare the Brotherhood a terrorist organization and subject it to U.S. sanctions. Trump also spoke with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. In what appears to have been a reference to the Muslim Brotherhood, the Crown Prince was cited by UAE state news agency WAM as saying "groups that raise fake slogans and ideologies aim to hide their criminal truth by spreading chaos and destruction." The White House said Trump had also "raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative." (Reporting By Steve Holland in Washington, Samia Nakhoul in Beirut and William Maclean and Reem Shamseddine in Dubai; Writing by Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Meredith Mazzilli) WASHINGTON/RIYADH (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia's King Salman, in a phone call on Sunday with U.S. President Donald Trump, agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, a White House statement said. Trump, during his presidential campaign last year, had called for Gulf states to pay for establishing safe zones to protect Syrian refugees. A statement after the phone call said the two leaders agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of Islamic State militants. "The president requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the statement said. The Saudi Press Agency, in its readout of the call, made no specific mention of safe zones. It said the two leaders had affirmed the "depth and durability of the strategic relationship" between the two countries. A senior Saudi source told Reuters the two leaders spoke for over an hour by telephone and agreed to step up counter-terrorism and military cooperation and enhance economic cooperation. But the source had no word on whether the two leaders discussed Trump's order to put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily ban travelers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries. The source said Saudi Arabia would enhance its participation in the U.S.-led coalition fighting to oust Islamic State from its strongholds in Iraq and Syria. The White House statement said the two leaders also agreed on the need to address "Iran's destabilizing regional activities." SPA also mentioned Trump and the King had similar visions on "confronting whomever seeks to destabilise security and stability in the region and interfere in the affairs of other countries," an apparent reference to Riyadh's arch-foe Iran. Both countries share views about Iranian policies in the region, the Saudi source said, suggesting Trump agreed with Riyadh's suspicion of what it sees as Tehran's growing influence in the Arab world. Iran denies it meddles in Arab countries. The White House statement said the two also discussed what it called an invitation from the king for Trump "to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future, economically and socially," for Saudi Arabia and the region. The two also discussed the Muslim Brotherhood, the senior Saudi source said, adding in a reference to the late al Qaeda leader, it was mentioned that Osama bin Laden was recruited at an early stage by the organization. Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates designated the Brotherhood as a terrorist organization. Riyadh fears the Brotherhood, whose Sunni Islamist doctrines challenge the Saudi principle of dynastic rule, has tried to build support inside the kingdom since the Arab Spring revolutions. U.S. officials and people close to Trump's transition team have said a debate is under way in the Trump administration about whether the United States should also declare the Brotherhood a terrorist organization and subject it to U.S. sanctions. Trump also spoke with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. In what may appear to have been a reference to the Muslim Brotherhood, the Crown Prince was cited by UAE state news agency WAM as saying "groups that raise fake slogans and ideologies aim to hide their criminal truth by spreading chaos and destruction." The White House said Trump had also "raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative." (Reporting By Steve Holland in Washington, Samia Nakhoul in Beirut and William Maclean and Reem Shamseddine in Dubai; Writing by Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Meredith Mazzilli) Https%3a%2f%2fblueprint-api-production.s3.amazonaws.com%2fuploads%2fcard%2fimage%2f366408%2f669e6e91-3e55-40a2-94da-25d1ee6990e3 High atop the Greenland ice sheet lies thousands of dollars of sophisticated scientific monitoring equipment key to projecting future sea level rise. Their batteries are drained and in need of repair, but a scientist charged with their care fears she can't reach the equipment because of Trump's de-facto Muslim ban. University of Calgary doctoral student Samira Samimi, who was born in Iran but is a permanent resident of Canada, was supposed to hitch a ride to Greenland in April with other researchers on a specially equipped U.S. Air Force C-130 Hercules aircraft out of upstate New York. But Trump's executive order on immigration, known as the Muslim ban, is a severe blow to her research and America's reputation in the science community. SEE ALSO: How 21 kids could keep climate websites from going completely dark She is one of thousands of science researchers ensnared in the sudden travel ban, which led to confusion at airports around the world and public demonstrations across the U.S. this weekend. I came so far, from the other side of the planet, to be free, to not fight for my rights anymore," Samimi said in an interview. "And this is like a nightmare." Beyond Samimi's case, researchers have said Trump's order is already undermining American leadership in science and technology. The order bans immigration for 90 days from seven predominantly Muslim countries, including Iran, suspends the U.S. refugee resettlement program and indefinitely bans immigration from war-torn Syria. That means Samimi can't enter the United States to catch her flight, and alternative options to carry herself and her cargo would require as much as $100,000 in new funding. Samimi is having trouble digesting the news first delivered to her by the leader of her research team that she may not be able to conduct her work because of the nationality on her passport. Im just sick in my stomach. I dont want to accept that Im not going. I cant do that. I just cant, she said. Story continues This is so stupid, this so doesnt make sense. Researchers walking on sea ice outside the village of Qaanaaq, northwestern Greenland, on July 3, 2015. Image: Yomiuri Shimbun via AP Images Samimi said she's been hearing of many researchers in her field and other scientific disciplines that are affected by this executive order. I dont understand how in the 21st century one man can stop this science, stop it, just like that, so easily without even thinking." Self-inflicted wound Samimi and others are worried about the longer-term damage that the executive order may have on American scientific research and technology leadership, with some calling to boycott scientific conferences in the U.S. Social media is now full of people saying we should not schedule conferences in, or I am not sure I want to attend a conference in such a country," Rush Holt, the CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world's largest general science organization, said in an interview. I think it does raise serious science issues. Freedom to collaborate in person, to attend conferences in person, to communicate is a fundamental ingredient of good science. And particularly in this age of wide-ranging collaboration, geographically-speaking. Demonstrators brought an illuminated banner to Lindbergh field to protest Donald Trump's travel ban and the wall, this month. Image: Frank Duenzl/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images Immigrants have long played a major role in American scientific research. According to a 2013 report from the National Science Foundation, immigrants comprised 16 percent, or 3.4 million, of all U.S. scientists and engineers. The majority of these immigrants were naturalized U.S. citizens, whereas 22 percent were permanent residents and 15 percent were temporary visa holders. In 2016, all six of the U.S. Nobel Prize winners were immigrants who went on to do much of their work in the U.S. In addition to potentially discouraging talented foreign born scientists from coming to the U.S. to do their research, there may be short-term fallout in the form of scientific meetings in the U.S. and abroad that are canceled or boycotted. The International Council for Science advocates that, when planning and conducting scientific meetings, its members "ensure that participation of scientists is free from discrimination of any kind," according to its website. The group published a statement denouncing the immigration order and calling for it to be rescinded, saying: "The Council believes that the complex problems of our world can only be solved through international dialogue, collaboration and the sharing and exchange of ideas and research findings." Scientific brain drain Saeed Mehraban, an Iranian born quantum computing researcher at MIT who came here on a student visa in 2013, said Trump has damaged his vision of America as an inviting, welcoming land where one could freely pursue their scientific studies. His adviser at MIT, Scott Aaronson, wrote an emotional blog post on Jan. 25, expressing anger over the policy that hurts students like Saeed. "Were talking about people who happen to have been born in Iran, who came to the US to do math and science," Aaronson wrote. "Would we rather have these young scientists here, filled with gratitude for the opportunities weve given them, or back in Iran filled with justified anger over our having expelled them?" Mehraban said the executive order, and the sense among many of his fellow international students that they are no longer welcome in the U.S., could prompt a significant brain drain to other, more open countries. Speaking of the international students who come to the U.S. for graduate training, Mehraban said, imagine if they decided not to work in America. It will be drastic. Farhad Ghorbani, who is studying for his Phd in chemistry at the University of Florida but is now stuck in Istanbul due to the travel ban, said he is now searching a different graduate program outside the U.S. Right now we can see there are organizations who are supporting Phd students like me, and they are trying to find a Phd position for me somewhere else in Europe or Canada, he said in an interview. Everyone is now thinking about an alternative like Europe or Canada, he said, referring to researchers affected by Trump's executive order. Samimi, too, raised the risk of a brain drain. "Of course theyre all going to move," she said of international scientists in the U.S. "You dont live in a country where youre not supported and you dont have any value as a scientist, she said. Samimi has some credibility when it comes to what prompts a brain drain, considering she left a repressive regime in Iran to earn graduate degrees in Canada instead. If theyre gonna treat the science like this, theyre gonna wind up like lots of other countries, she said. The brains are running away from those countries. The Screen Actors Guild Awards are given by actors to their peers, so depending on how you look at them, they are either a glitzy self-congratulatory pat on the back, or the most honest award around as artists recognize the best in their field. This year, though, the show blended Hollywood glamour with political outrage. The show started with Scandal star Kerry Washington preemptively defending the right of Hollywood stars to speak up. A lot of people are saying right now that actors shouldnt express their opinions when it comes to politics, she said. But the truth is, actors are activists no matter what, because we embody the worth and humanity of all people. Her words were seconded by Ashton Kutcher, who opened the show. Good evening, fellow SAG-AFTRA members and everyone at home and everyone in airports that belong in my America, Kutcher said to resounding applause. You are a part of the fabric of who we are, and we love you and we welcome you. The issue is particularly personal for Kutcher, whose wife, the actress Mila Kunis came to the U.S. from Ukraine on a refugee visa when she was seven. Here are the best, worst and wildest moments of the 2017 SAG Awards. Most Should-Have-Known-Better Moment: Kutcher has sat through enough awards show by now that he should know that its not Julia Louise-Dreyfus, but Lou-ee-Dreyfus. Yet he miffed it when he announced her as the winner for her work in Veep. Best Impersonation: Louis-Dreyfus proved her acting chops by using her acceptance speech to deliver a spot-on impersonation of President Trump. Whether the Russians did or did not hack the voting of tonights SAG Awards, I look out on the million or probably even a million and a half people in this room and I say this award is legitimate and I won, Louis-Dreyfus said. Im the winner. The winner is me. Landslide! Louis-Dreyfus, who is the daughter of an immigrant who fled Nazi-occupied France, took the time to read the WGA statement issued earlier on Sunday and condemning the immigrant ban. Story continues Best Slow Burn: William H. Macy had some stiff competition in the category of Outstanding Male Performance in a Comedy, as his work in Shameless was going up against Transparents Jeffrey Tambor, Black-ishs Anthony Anderson, and more, so it was a bit of surprise when he took the prize. Im shocked, he said. Probably not as shocked as Jeffrey, but still shocked. To his credit, Tambor laughed harder than anyone else. Best Back-Handed Compliment: In his acceptance speech, Macy went against the grain and thanked President Trump for making Frank Gallagher seem so normal. Best Self-Inflicted Burn: The kids from Stranger Things introduced the nominees for Best Ensemble in a Comedy Series. Bunch of nerds in retro t-shirts, said Gaten Matarazzo, waiting a beat before adding, Thats the Big Bang Theory not us. Best Taylor Swift Surprise Faces: Orange is the New Black took the Ensemble prize for the third year in a row, but when the award was announced the entire cast looked genuinely shocked. Good acting, people! Most Tear-Jerking Speech: In collecting her prize for her stunning performance in Fences, Viola Davis thanked writer August Wilson for his play. What August did so beautifully is he honored the average man, who happened to be a man of color, she said. And sometimes we dont have to shake the world and move the world and create anything that is going to be in the history book. The fact that we breathed and lived a life and was a god to our children, just that, means that we have a story and it deserves to be told. Best Stick-It-To-The-Man Moment: When encouraged by Viggo Mortenson and Kathryn Hah, the cast of Captain Fantastic stood up and shouted, Stick it to the, man! The SAG Awards: Actors standing up for other actors. #sagawards pic.twitter.com/gdVdqySW3I SAG Awards (@SAGawards) January 30, 2017 Most Personal Speech: When Mahershala Ali took the Supporting Actor prize for Moonlight he drew a line between the film, where he played a drug dealer that helps a kid who is bullied for his sexuality, explaining that persecuted people fall into themselves and we must tell them that they matter. He then noted that his mother is an ordained minister, while he converted to Islam. We love each other, the love is grown, the other stuff is minutia, he said. Best SAG Date: Sarah Paulson brought the real life Marcia Clark with her to the awards show, so the lawyer was there to watch Paulson win the award for her performance as Clark in The People vs O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story. Best Historical Perspective: Bryan Cranston took home the SAG award for his performance as Lyndon B. Johnson in All the Way and because he had inhabited the world of LBJ for so long, Cranston had some insight into what Johnson would say to Donald Trump. 36 would put his arm around 45 and whisper in his ear, said Cranston. Just dont piss in the soup that all of us got to eat. Most Heartbreaking Reunion: Dolly Parton burst onto the stage with an exuberant, Greetings from Dollywood! and a joke about her double Ds. She was there to celebrate her 9 to 5 co-star Lily Tomlin who was receiving the Lifetime Achievement Award. Parton was supposed to be joined by Jane Fonda for a 9 to 5 reunion, but Fonda got sick and was unable to attend, so there was no reunion. We should do a follow up sequel to 9 to 5, said Parton. We better get after it or well have to call it 95. Parton hinted that the thwarted reunion might happen later when she stopped by Fondas and Tomlins show Grace and Frankie. Best Timing: The Doomsday Clock was moved up to two minutes to midnight, so this award came just in the nick of time, said Tomlin, upon accepting her Lifetime Achievement Award. Best Advice: Tomlin claims that she reached the age where people ask her advice. Dont leave the house when youre drunk, she said, later adding to the list, Dont worry about missing opportunities, because behind every failure is an opportunity someone wishes they had missed. Best Call-Back: As John Lithgow accepted his award for The Crown his final bit of gratitude was slyly political: To an underrated actress who somehow managed to speak my exact thoughts in another awards show three weeks ago and thats Meryl Streep. Streep gave a heartfelt speech at the Golden Globes, calling out Trump. Best Subtle Act of Resistance: Iranian-American actress Alia Shawkat took the stage with Steven Yeun and said two little words that said a lot more: Salaam Alaikum, or peace be with you. Best Shipper Speech: For anyone who ships The Crowns Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip, in her acceptance speech Claire Foy gave a special shout-out to Matt Smith, saying he was not only really spontaneous, exciting and incredibly talented actor, but also her friend. And then, as Queen Elizabeth, she told Prince Philip, Thank you for making this job a joy and for making me laugh. I love you. Foys married in real life, but dont let that stop you from dreaming. Most Impassioned Speech: It was a surprise when Stranger Things won for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble (besting Game of Thrones and Downton Abbey), but David K. Harbour came prepared with a serious speech delivered passionately: As we act in the continuing narrative of Stranger Things, we 1983 Midwesterners will repel bullies. We will shelter freaks and outcasts, those who have no home. We will get past the lies. We will hunt monsters. And when we are at a loss amidst the hypocrisy and casual violence of certain individuals and institutions, we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy what we have envisioned for ourselves and the marginalized. And we will do it all with soul, with heart, and with joy. We thank you for this responsibility! Best Reaction: Winona Ryder had no idea what to make of Harbors speech and let it all play out on her face. Her face will be nominated for outstanding performance next year. That speech + Winona's face = what I needed tonight #sagawards pic.twitter.com/op4KbA1DIT Michelle Collins (@michcoll) January 30, 2017 Best Reunion: When Jonah Hill announced that Emma Stone had won for her performance in La La Land, it meant that the SAG Award stage briefly turned into a Superbad reunion, as the two friends gave each other some McLovin. Then Stone got in a fight with the teleprompter when it told her to please wrap up and added to the fact that she is a mere mortal who feels insecure sometimes. Way to bum out Emma Stone, teleprompter. Most Humble Speech: Like Emma Stone, Denzel Washington is just a human, and sometimes he feels insecure, so he seemed genuinely surprised to have won Best Actor for his performance in Fences. Im a God-fearing man, Im supposed to have faith, but I didnt have faith, he said of not preparing a speech. Im getting choked up! Most Uniting Speech: Hidden Figures may have won the SAG Award for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture, but star Taraji P. Henson took the prize with her speech. This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside, and we come together as a human race, we win, Henson said. Love wins every time. Friends and family of a missing Missouri woman who are still actively searching for her have found human remains from an unrelated case for the second time in two weeks, authorities said. Relatives of Jessica Runions uncovered the body of an unidentified man in a small embankment while searching fields and brush near South Brighton Avenue at about 11:15 a.m. Saturday, The Kansas City Star reported. Two bodies two weeks in a row? John Runions, Jessicas father, told The Star, which was covering the search when the discovery was made. "Its unbelievable." Relatives and volunteers were searching a Kansas City creek bed last Saturday for any sign of 21-year-old Jessica when they found the decomposing remains of Brandon Herring, officials said. The death of the 21-year-old man, who was last alive on November 22, is now being investigated as a homicide. Herring's family had reported him missing when he failed to come home for Thanksgiving. The young man, known affectionately as Mac Bear, leaves behind an infant son, King, who turns two months old on February 7, and a close family for which the discovery of his body was bittersweet. Read: Man Accused of Holding Woman in Storage Container Confesses to Murders from 2003 I already knew my son had already gone home to God... but the selfish part of me just wanted confirmation and closure, Herrings mother, Rhonda Herring, told InsideEdition.com after his body had been found. The body discovered this Saturday has not yet been identified. Kansas Police told The Star they are investigating it as a suspicious death. It is awful a family searching for their loved one finds two victims during their search, in one weeks time, said Kansas City Police Capt. Stacey Graves. Although this is a strange turn of events for those searching, I am very thankful the victims have been found for their families sake." Story continues Jessica Runions was last seen September 8 leaving a gathering of friends in south Kansas City, officials said. Her burned vehicle was found two days later in a nearby wooded area. Kylr Yust, 27, who had been questioned in the 2007 disappearance of his ex-girlfriend, Kara Kopetsky, was charged with burning the vehicle. A judge entered a not guilty plea on his behalf. Read: Family Searching for Missing Woman Finds Body of Man Who Disappeared Months Ago Kopetsky was 17 when she went missing. She had filed for an order of protection against Yust days before she disappeared on May 4, 2007. Yust hasnt been charged in either disappearance. Runions family has spent nearly every week since her disappearance combing through secluded areas for any sign of the young woman. The discoveries of the past two weekends serve as proof that their work is important, the Runions family told The Star. "Were not going to stop looking until we find her," John Runions said. "And if we find other people along the way, thats good. Families deserve closure." Janice Runions, Jessicas great aunt, echoed his sentiments, saying: "Someones loved one was found. I just wish someone or we would find ours." Watch: See The Moment This Man Learns His Missing Wife with Alzheimer's Was Found Related Articles: Agile scientists equipped with 3D laser scanners have revealed the secrets of a hidden room, known as a "priest hole," in the tower of an English Tudor mansion linked to the failed "Gunpowder Plot" to assassinate King James I in 1605. A new study reveals how the secret double room was constructed in the tower of a gatehouse at Coughton Court in Warwickshire, as a hiding place for priests during the anti-Catholic persecutions of the 16th and 17th centuries. Catholic priests faced execution as traitors under the English laws of the time, and they were often tortured to reveal their accomplices, according to Christopher King, an assistant professor in the Department of Archaeology at the University of Nottingham in the United Kingdom, and one of the lead researchers of the study. [See More Photos of the Secret "Priest Hole" at Coughton Court] Despite being outlawed, many priests chose to travel around England in disguise and perform the banned Catholic ceremonies in secret, often at the country homes of wealthy Catholic families such as Coughton Court, he said. The secret priest holes were ingeniously constructed inside walls and between floors, as places where a priest could hide from search parties while the family of the house pretended to go about their normal lives, King told Live Science. The priest hole at Coughton Court was rediscovered by later owners in the 1850s. "We know that priests were hiding in these spaces for up to three days while people were searching the properties," he said, "and some of them are really very small, where the priest would be in quite an enclosed box-like space." Double-blind Archaeologist Chris King (left) and mapping specialist Lucasz Bonenberg prepare an exterior laser scan at Coughton Court. University of Nottingham To learn more about how the priest hole was constructed and hidden from searchers, King and his colleagues used 3D laser scanning equipment to precisely map the secret chambers and determine their location in relation to the rest of the building and its grounds. The composite images and 3D computer models generated from the laser scans show the chamber's "double-blind" construction, which was designed to fool searchers into thinking they had found an empty priest hole, King said. Story continues "When they're searching, they think they've found the priest hole but it's empty, but actually the priest is hidden in the more concealed space beyond," he said. "And that's what happens at Coughton: there's one chamber under the floor in the turret of the tower, and then there is another trap door that goes through into a second space, which we assume is where the priest was actually hiding." [10 Biggest Historical Mysteries That Will Probably Never Be Solved] The restricted size of the priest hole presented a challenge for King and his colleague Lukasz Bonenberg, a geodesy and mapping specialist at the University of Nottingham's Geospatial Institute. "They are quite narrow, probably about a meter [3.3 feet] across, and quite tall and thin. It was difficult to get the scanner in there, and Lukasz ended up spending a couple of hours down there with the equipment, basically because he's the skinniest," King said. Gunpowder Plot In 1605, Catholic resentment over England's anti-Catholic laws inspired the Gunpowder Plot, a conspiracy to assassinate King James I by blowing up the House of Lords at Westminster while the king and his government ministers were inside. King explained that Coughton Court played a role in the plot when it was rented as a family home by Sir Everard Digby, who was one of the Catholic conspirators along with Robert Catesby, their leader, and Guy Fawkes, who became the most famous of the plotters. On the date agreed by the plotters for the assassination, Nov. 5, 1605 now commemorated as "Guy Fawkes Night" in the U.K., complete with bonfires and fireworks a group of leading Catholic conspirators met at Coughton Court to wait for news of the attempt to kill the king. [ But when the messenger reported that the plot had been discovered and many of the plotters had been captured, the conspirators who had gathered at Coughton Court fled into the night. Most were captured and executed in the years that followed, King said. Coughton Court is now owned by the heritage charity National Trust, which keeps most of the historic property open to the public, including the tower that contains the priest hole. But the tower itself is inaccessible to many people, King said. "The scans and the fly-throughs that we've created will be really good for people who can't get up the stairs to the priest hole you can stand in the courtyard with these images and it really helps you visualize where the space is," he said. The initial study at Coughton Court was funded by Britain's National Lottery, and King now hopes to expand the research project by investigating other priest holes in historic houses in England. Around 30 are known to exist, but many are not open to the public and most are deliberately difficult to access, he said. "That's really important from a public outreach point of view: making sure that visitors are aware of these spaces and their very interesting histories, and, hopefully, getting people interested in the stories associated with the buildings," King said. Original article on Live Science. Editor's Recommendations Https%3a%2f%2fblueprint-api-production.s3.amazonaws.com%2fuploads%2fcard%2fimage%2f365300%2f05a97453-61c2-4354-a903-c01759a5338c This is what it's like when British people tell you, politely but firmly, to bugger off. A petition demanding the UK government prevent U.S. President Donald Trump from making a state visit because it would be an "embarrassment" for him to meet Queen Elizabeth II has been signed 861,658 times. "Donald Trump's well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales," the petition reads. SEE ALSO: Airbnb offers free housing to those affected by Muslim travel ban Trump was invited to come for a state visit after he met with Prime Minister Theresa May in Washington D.C. on Friday, but his far-reaching Muslim travel ban has caused outrage on the other side of the Atlantic. Sadiq Khan, London's first Muslim mayor, spoke out against Trump's visit. "We should not be rolling out the red carpet for President Trump," he said, according to Sky News not while the "cruel and shameful" ban was in place. Graham Guest of Leeds, who started the petition, told the Independent it wasn't initially intended as a counter to Trump's actions against refugees and Muslim immigrants, but now he thinks the president shouldn't come at all. "It's added a new dimension to things and until that ban is lifted I don't think he should come to the country at all in any capacity," he said. "I mean, if he's photographed stood next to the Queen it makes him look like a statesman, which of course he's not." Needless to say, the petition's skyrocketing popularity is causing Twitter paroxysms of joy. The popular Twitter account @AltNatParkSer tweeted Sunday at Trump that "more people voted to ban you from the UK in the last 12 hours, than turned up to your #Inauguration." Although the National Park Service no longer provides official crowd estimates, it seems certain that Trump's inauguration nowhere near matched President Barack Obama's record crowds of 1.8 million in 2009. Story continues .@POTUS more people voted to ban you from the UK in the last 12 hours, than turned up to your #Inauguration. Let that sink in. #TrumpBan. pic.twitter.com/9sZhhfqSc9 AltUSNatParkService (@AltNatParkSer) January 29, 2017 Made on the UK's official petitions website, the government is obliged to respond to petitions with more than 10,000 signatures, while parliament also considers such petitions for debate. If parliament does take up the issue, it will not be the first time UK politicians have debated banning Trump from the country. In Jan. 2016, Members of Parliament scrapped over whether he should be barred or his unfortunate views confronted in person. Some MPs called him a "wazzock" and a "ridiculous individual." In that case, the official government response clarified that it is up to the Home Secretary to bar an individual if she "considers their presence in the UK to be non-conducive to the public good." The current Home Secretary is the MP Amber Rudd. The embarrassment may in fact be Trump's if he does meet the Queen, especially given his previous comments regarding her daughter-in-law Kate Middleton after paparazzi captured images of her topless on vacation in 2012. The Queen never forgets. Who wouldn't take Kate's picture and make lots of money if she does the nude sunbathing thing. Come on Kate! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 17, 2012 BONUS: Here's a clip of Kellyanne Conway's previous (and mercifully brief) career in stand-up comedy By Zachary Fagenson FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (Reuters) - A 26-year-old Iraq war veteran pleaded not guilty on Monday to federal charges accusing him of opening fire in the baggage claim area of a Florida airport this month in an attack that killed five people. Esteban Santiago, 26, wore shackles and a red jail jumpsuit at his arraignment hearing in federal court in Fort Lauderdale, near the airport where the Jan. 6 shooting occurred. U.S. Magistrate Judge Barry Seltzer read aloud the 22 criminal counts Santiago faces, emphasizing the names of those killed. Santiago is charged with violence at an airport causing death and injury, as well as firearms crimes. "Yes," said Santiago, acknowledging the charges, some of which are punishable by life imprisonment or death if he is convicted. The U.S. Attorney General will decide whether to seek a death sentence. Prosecutors say Santiago planned the shooting, which also left six people wounded. They accuse him of aiming at victims' heads and bodies at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport until he ran out of ammunition. He was immediately taken into custody. Santiago, who served in Iraq from 2010 to 2011, had a history of erratic behavior. Authorities have said they were investigating whether mental illness played a role in the attack. Santiago traveled from Alaska to Florida on a one-way airline ticket with a handgun and ammunition in his checked luggage, a criminal complaint said. Upon arrival, he claimed his gun case and loaded the weapon in a men's bathroom, then opened fire on the first people he encountered after exiting, it noted. Santiago told investigators he was inspired by Islamic State and had previously chatted online with Islamist extremists, according to FBI testimony presented in court. (Reporting by Zachary Fagenson; Writing by Letitia Stein; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and James Dalgleish) President Donald Trumps sweeping immigration order signed late Friday caused an uproar among the tech elite over the weekend. The executive order bars people from seven primarily Muslim countries including Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen from entering the US for at least 90 days. (On Sunday, though, the Trump administration said green card holders from those countries wouldnt be barred from entry.) The chief executives, investors and entrepreneurs Yahoo Finance spoke to over the weekend expressed either surprise or disgust at President Trumps most recent executive order, which spurred protests across the country over the weekend. Source: AP Photo/Elaine Thompson The chief executives, investors and entrepreneurs Yahoo Finance spoke to over the weekend expressed either surprise or disgust at Trumps latest moves. I fundamentally think its a disastrous idea and policy, between the moral ramifications and the moral issues around it, which is blocking refugees of countries that, in some cases, are dealing with some pretty significant atrocities, is a huge moral failing of the country, Aaron Levie, chief executive of Box (BOX) told Yahoo Finance, cautioning there would be major consequences to blocking off the country from large populations of people. Brit + Co CEO and founder Brit Morin. Source: Fortune Live Media Brit Morin, CEO of the Do-It-Yourself-oriented lifestyle startup Brit + Co in San Francisco, contended her business and Silicon Valley overall will be significantly influenced in the months and years to come as Trump pursues a protectionist philosophy that favors America First and ignores the important contributions immigrants can make to the US economy, particularly to tech. The effect this will have on innovation and our competitive advantage aside, the pain that others in our community and their families are facing is heartbreaking, Morin told Yahoo Finance. So many of the greatest companies in the US were built by descendants of immigrants Apple, Facebook, Google, etc. If we start restricting the influx of different cultures and new ideas on any level, it will have a negative impact on our growth as a society. Diversity makes us stronger. For other tech entrepreneurs, the immigration ban struck on a more personal level. Thats not exactly a surprise, given roughly 50% of the countrys unicorns private companies with $1 billion-plus valuations have at least one immigrant founder at the helm, according to a report last March from the National Foundation For American Policy. Story continues My family and I, and thousands of Soviet Jews like us, came here as refugees in 1991, running from an unjust regime that persecuted us simply for who we were, recalled Max Levchin, PayPal (PYPL) co-founder and CEO of the credit startup Affirm. As a nation of immigrants, we must not close our doors to refugees, and those willing to contribute to Americas success. PayPal co-founder and Affirm CEO Max Levchin. Source: Getty Images Adrian Aoun, chief executive of the healthcare startup Forward, echoed Levchin. As a French-Lebanese immigrant, I wouldnt be here without the open-arms of fellow Americans, Aoun said. My work at Wavii, Google and now Forward has been done hand in hand with Muslims and immigrants from across the world. People are not their religions or their countries, theyre our brothers and sisters. Together we are stronger. The big question is: now what? Members of the community such as Hunter Walk, a partner at the San Francisco-based venture capital firm Homebrew, are taking action. During the final months of the 2016 presidential election, Walk led an effort in which over 320 companies, including Square (SQ), Twilio (TWLO) and Spotify, gave their employees time off on Nov. 8 to their cast their votes in the presidential election. Homebrew partner and founder Hunter Walk. Source: Noam Galai/Getty Images for TechCrunch Now, Walk is helping lead the charge with Project ELLIS (Entrepreneurs Liberty Link in Silicon Valley ). Started by venture capitalist Michael Dearing, Project ELLIS is focused on helping employees at smaller companies, particularly those affected by Trumps executive order, with immigration issues. Many of us in the tech community are enraged by the events of the past week, Walk told Yahoo Finance. Not surprised, because weve taken Trump both literally and seriously since he began running a scorched earth campaign for the presidency, but angry that our other elected officials have failed to put country ahead of party. We see which politicians in both parties are standing up and fighting and will put our dollars, voices and talent behind them now, in 2018 and beyond. Others such as Levie made donations to the American Civil Liberties Union, which raised $19 million between Saturday morning and Sunday evening and received 150,000 new member sign-ups. Eventbrite CEO and co-founder Julia Hartz. Source: JD Lasica/Flickr Meanwhile, Eventbrite CEO Julia Hartz spent the weekend scrambling to assess whether any Eventbrite employees 10% of whom work in the US on some type of visa were impacted. (None were.) Now, she and her husband Kevin also plan on finding ways they can lend the ACLU further support. As an events platform and as a ticketing platform, were able to provide more support to organizations that want to bring people together for information or for support, Hartz explained. Im working with a team on how we can support the ACLU on the platform. Then Im giving a call for open ideas because I think more and more things are coming together like Project Ellis. These tech entrepreneurs are raising their voices along with heavyweights in the tech world who have already spoken out, including Tim Cook and Mark Zuckerberg, and in the case of Google (GOOG, GOOGL) co-founder Sergey Brin, joined the protests. Their actions over the last 18 months herald a new chapter for a much more politicized Silicon Valley, an industry where quiet donations once sufficed as political activism. But Trumps anti-trade, anti-immigration rhetoric during the presidential campaign spurred many members in tech to also weigh in heavily on social media, host fundraisers for candidates, and encourage involvement in their community. The presidents executive order is the latest in a series of decisions to catalyze the technoratis political participation. Samasource and LXMI CEO and founder Leila Janah. Source: Fortune Live Media The executive order does not directly affect me my family are all US citizens but it does make me wonder who is next on the list, explained Leila Janah, CEO and founder of Samasource and LXMI. If Trump can ban visa holders and dual citizens from entering the country, what else will his administration dare to do? It appears that women, religious and ethnic minorities, the LGBTQ community, and low-income people are all at risk of having basic rights curtailed under Trump. JP Mangalindan is a senior correspondent for Yahoo Finance covering the intersection of tech and business. Follow him on Twitter or Facebook. More from JP: Qualcomm president: Apple is behind regulatory attacks Amazon is now worth more than the 8 largest retailers combined How Silicon Valley reacted to Trumps inauguration AMD CEO: Why its good to be the smaller guy Nick Jonas explains why you should buy his new headphones Inside San Franciscos last affordable neighborhood By Julia Love and Stephen Nellis SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Silicon Valley took the lead over the weekend in corporate resistance to President Donald Trump's clampdown on immigration, financing legal opposition, criticizing the plan, as well as helping employees ensnared by his executive order. In an industry that has long depended on immigrants and celebrated their contributions - as well as championing liberal causes such as gay rights - there was little initial consensus on exactly how to respond to Trump's move on Friday. But, while most in the tech industry stopped short of directly criticizing the new Republican president, they went much further than their counterparts in other sectors, who were mostly silent over the weekend. Most of the major U.S. banks and auto companies, for example, declined to comment in response to Reuters inquiries. Trump ordered a temporary ban on travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries and a 120-day halt to refugee resettlement. The action triggered a global backlash, and sowed confusion and anger after immigrants, refugees and visitors were kept off flights and left stranded in airports. Bigger companies such as Apple Inc , Google and Microsoft Corp offered legal aid to employees affected by the order, according to letters sent to staff. Several Silicon Valley executives donated to legal efforts to support immigrants facing the ban. And Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk and Uber head Travis Kalanick both said on Twitter that they would take industry concerns about immigration to Trumps business advisory council, where they serve. Kalanick has faced opposition on social media for agreeing to be part of the advisory group. Kalanick in a Facebook post on Sunday called the immigration ban "wrong and unjust" and said that Uber would create a $3 million fund to help drivers with immigration issues. Among those affected by the ban was Khash Sajadi, the British-Iranian chief executive of San Francisco-based tech company Cloud 66, who was stuck in London. Like many tech workers, he holds an H1B visa, which enables foreigners with special expertise to work for U.S. companies. Story continues Sajadi said he hoped big tech companies such as Google and Facebook would take legal action to protect affected employees. That could help set a precedent for people in similar situations - but at smaller companies. "Ultimately, I think them simply speaking up is not going to move the needle with people" who are not wealthy and do not live on the East or West Coasts, he said. 'TECH AGAINST TRUMP' PROTEST The response from tech companies has been as forceful as it possibly can be, said Eric Talley, a corporate law professor at Columbia Law School. One of the difficult aspects of reaction to the Trump administration in its first couple of weeks is trying to balance the interest of expressing legitimate concern ... against the potential cost of being out too far ahead of everyone else, he said. The tech industry also has other issues where it may find itself opposed to Trump, including trade policy and cyber security. The president of Mountain View, California-based startup incubator Y Combinator, Sam Altman, wrote a widely read blog post urging tech leaders to band together against the immigration order. He said he has spoken with a variety of people about organizing but remains unsure about the best course of action. The honest answer is we dont know yet, he said. We are talking with legal groups and tech groups, but this is so unprecedented that I dont think anyone has a manual. At Lyft, co-founders John Zimmer and Logan Green pledged on the companys blog to donate a million dollars over the next four years to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which won a temporary stay of part of Trump's executive order on Saturday night. Slack collaboration service co-founder Stewart Butterfield and Union Square Ventures partners Albert Wenger and Fred Wilson promised to match contributions to the ACLU. Michael Dearing, founder of venture capital firm Harrison Metal, started an effort called Project ELLIS, short for Entrepreneurs' Liberty Link in Silicon Valley, to help startups and smaller tech companies with immigration issues. "ELLIS" is a also a reference to New York Harbor's Ellis Island, where millions of immigrants arrived. In less than a day, the group has handled two cases, he said. Dearing said the idea was to "get people in touch quickly with the ... resources they would have access to if they were in a Google or an Apple or a Microsoft. Dave McClure, the founding partner of 500 Startups and an outspoken critic of Trump, said his venture capital firm will soon open its first fund in the Middle East and will shift its attention to supporting entrepreneurs in their native countries, if bringing them to the United States proves impossible. Investing in entrepreneurs in other countries is probably one of the best things we can do to promote international awareness and understanding, he said. Rank-and-file employees were already prodding executives to go further over the weekend. Shortly after learning of Trumps order, Brad Taylor, a 37-year-old engineer for web analytics firm Optimizely, began organizing Tech Against Trump, a protest scheduled to take place on March 14. In addition to holding a rally in Palo Alto, California, organizers of the event were urging tech workers at companies that have remained silent on Trump to walk out of their offices. Taylor said he was heartened by tech leaders statements over the weekend but wants to see the industry go further. The purpose of this is not to be against tech, but to urge them to be on the right side of history, he said. (Writing by Jonathan Weber and Peter Henderson; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Mary Milliken) London (AFP) - The European Parliament's chief Brexit negotiator said Monday that simultaneous talks on the divorce terms and a potential trade deal for Britain after it leaves the EU were possible. "In the treaty,Article 50, we are saying a withdrawal can be agreed taking into consideration the future relationship," Guy Verhofstadt said during an event at London's Chatham House think tank. Britain has promised to trigger Article 50 of the EU's Lisbon Treaty by the end of March, after which negotiators will have two years to thrash out a deal. "It is a fantastic political text and it says it all -- a withdrawal agreement in the light of the future relationship," added Verhofstadt. "That is literally in the treaty and that is what we need to apply." Verhofstadt said he "deplored" the Brexit decision but that he was looking "for fair negotiations, not punishment or revenge". He set a 14- to 15-month timetable in which to conclude negotiations. British Prime Minister Theresa May is keen to conduct talks over the terms of the break-up and Britain's future relationship with the European Union at the same time. However, EU Commission chief negotiator Michel Barnier has warned he will "take everything step by step, in the right order," suggesting he favoured striking the divorce deal before discussing a potential future trade deal. Former Belgian PM Verhofstadt warned that the EU was under "serious threat" from three sides; radical political Islam, Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump, who recently suggested that more countries could leave the bloc. The parliament chief negotiator said it would be "completely ridiculous to ignore" that the EU faces a "polycrisis". He called for deeper federalisation of the remaining EU members, arguing that the European Union "doesn't exist" at the moment, and was really just a "loose confederation of 28 member states". Story continues Verhofstadt compared the swift and sweeping response of the United States to the 2008 financial crisis with the EU's reaction. "We had a discussion, when you have two opinions in EU nothing is happening at all," he said. "We have not adequate political institutions in the EU to react." Brexit is a "golden opportunity" to bring about deep reform, he added, drawing the countries into tighter unions on the economy and security. He urged voters to reject the nationalist politics currently sweeping western democracies, adding that polls showed most Europeans believe the EU should take more action on key issues such as external border controls, terrorism and the economy. "I am astounded to see a lot of people supporting nationalism as a solution to the common problems," he said, adding it was the "most stupid thing you can do, it is playing with fire". A Syrian boy and his mother wait in line with hundreds of other Syrian families to register at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees headquarters in Beirut on Monday. (Photo: Hassan Ammar/AP) This was the weekend Americans met the enemy. Turns out it was not who many had expected. As the new ban on people entering from certain Muslim countries took effect at airports across the country, details replaced generalized accusations. Now refugees, guest workers and green card holders acquired faces and names. Now they were doctors, industrial engineers, young adults orphaned by Taliban bombs, elderly parents of American citizens, widowed mothers of American soldiers, interpreters who had risked their lives for American troops. Americans are very good at worrying about the wrong things. We fear the slim chance our children will be abducted should they play on the front lawn, but we dont weigh it against the health risks of staying indoors watching TV instead. The risk of being killed by a foreign terrorist within the United States is one in 3.6 million, while the risk of dying because of a car accident is about one in 6,700, yet it is the terrorist that keeps more people up at night. At the same time, Americans are fiercely moved by a face and a name. It was Joseph Stalin who reportedly said, The death of one person is a tragedy; the death of one million is a statistic, an observation codified by psychologist Paul Slovic of the University of Oregon. If we read about millions being displaced in Syria, we tend to turn the page. But, if we see a photo of one little boys body on a beach or bloodied face staring back from an ambulance, we are moved. This weekend, statistics and stories flowed through social media. The large number of potential immigrants in the pipeline tens of thousands collided with the very singular tales of those whose dreams were caught up in politics. The perceived risks (Some people have come in with evil intentions, President Trump said on Thursday in an interview with Fox News Sean Hannity. Most havent, I guess, but we cant take chances.) were presented against hard data (Not a single terrorist death has been caused by a refugee from any of the seven countries on the new no-immigration list.). Story continues The question is which human instinct would prevail? Would stories or statistics, fears or data, matter most in the end? Below are the tales of some of the would-be immigrants and visitors waiting to learn the answer: Protesters assemble at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York on Saturday after two Iraqi refugees were detained while trying to enter the country. (Photo: Craig Ruttle/AP) Samantha Lloyd is an immigration lawyer in Chicago. She said that after the draft of Trumps executive order on immigration was first leaked to the press last week, the American Immigration Lawyers Association began circulating an email call for lawyers to volunteer to show up at their nearest airport within an hour after Trump signed the order. Lloyd signed up and was one of the first attorneys to arrive at OHare International Airport on Saturday afternoon, offering to help people waiting for relatives who had been detained. Lloyd told Yahoo News about two cases she handled on Saturday for people who, because of fear and confusion about the executive order, asked that their names not be published. One man was a U.S. green card holder who was actually born in the U.K. and has dual citizenship with Iran. Lloyd learned from his brother-in-law, who was awaiting his arrival in the terminal, that the man was being detained with his wife, a U.S. citizen, and their child. Lloyd said she worked with the mans brother-in-law to figure out that he lives in Democratic Rep. Jan Schakowskys district, in the northern suburbs. Unable to extract any information from U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents, Lloyd said that she and her colleagues began tweeting Schakowsky, and within a couple of hours, the detained family was released. The other man who approached Lloyd at OHare was also an Iranian immigrant with an employment-based visa petition known as a National Interest Waiver, or NIW. Lloyd said only that the man was working on a PhD in the United States. But, she noted that an NIW is a very, very difficult immigration petition to get approved, so the fact that he was able to get a green card with that is really, truly extraordinary. You have to be of such great value to the United States that the U.S. considers it a national interest for you to be here, she explained. The man was at the airport waiting for his wife, also from Iran, and their 18-month-old daughter, who is a U.S. citizen. The two had gone, with approved travel authorization, to visit his wifes parents in Iran and had been detained upon their return to Chicago. Throughout the day, Lloyd said, she received mixed messages from clearly confused Customs and Border Patrol officers who initially told her that the mans wife and daughter would be released but later said theyd received orders to the contrary. The two were eventually released at around 10 p.m. on Saturday. Suha Abushamma Suha Abushamma was an H-1B visa holder in her first year of an internal medicine residency at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. The 26-year-old Sudanese citizen was visiting family in Saudi Arabia when she heard about Trumps proposal for an executive order that would include a 90-day travel ban for citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries, including Sudan. Concerned that she might not be able to get back into the country, Abushamma decided to cut her vacation short and quickly renewed her work visa at the U.S. Embassy before getting on a flight back to New York on Saturday one day after Trump signed the executive order. Because of her Sudanese passport, Abushamma was detained at John F. Kennedy International Airport and eventually given the option to withdraw her visa and leave the country willingly, or refuse to withdraw and be deported, which would result in being banned from the U.S. for at least five years. Though shed managed to make contact with lawyers who were trying to work quickly on her case, officers refused Abushammas request to delay making any decisions for a few more hours and by 8:30 Saturday evening, shed been put on a plane back to Saudi Arabia. Minutes after her flight took off, a federal judge in New York ordered a stay on deporting people whod been detained in airports under the executive order. Im only in this country to be a doctor, to work and to help people thats it, Abushamma told ProPublica via FaceTime while in flight back to Saudi Arabia. Theres no other reason. Refugee Moustafa Abdulrahman, 2, from Kobani, Syria, peeks out while standing outside his familys shelter at the refugee camp of Ritsona, about 53 miles north of Athens, Greece, on Jan. 5. (Photo: Muhammed Muheisen/AP) Hameed Khalid Darweesh Hameed Khalid Darweesh was one of two Iraqi men detained at Kennedy Airport who became the subjects of a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) seeking to stay Trumps order. A husband and father of three, Darweesh had been granted a Special Immigrant Visa because he faced threats to his life over his work with the U.S. military in Iraq from 2003 to 2010. Brandon Friedman, a U.S. veteran and former Obama administration official who worked with Darweesh in Iraq, tweeted about his former interpreters travel plans. One of my Iraqi interpreters is immigrating *tomorrow* on an SQ1 Special Immigrant Visa. He's arriving in NYC. Not sure they'll let him in. Brandon Friedman (@BFriedmanDC) January 26, 2017 Guy literally spent years keeping U.S. soldiers alive in combat in Iraq. He was one of the first to sign up in 2003. He is fearless. Brandon Friedman (@BFriedmanDC) January 26, 2017 In an interview with NPR, Friedman said Darweesh was committed to the mission. Hes committed to protecting the U.S. troops who are over there, and hes absolutely fearless. We would go out and all the American soldiers would be wearing body armor. He would go out with when we first started, he would go out wearing absolutely nothing but his clothes, and he would do the same missions, he continued. He didnt have an ounce of fear in him, and it was really unfortunate that they decided to detain him. This executive order is quite un-American because hes exactly the type of exactly the type of person we need to be letting in. We really owe it to him. Haider Sameer Abdulkhaleq Alshawi The second Iraqi man named in the ACLU lawsuit was Alshawi, a 33-year-old accountant who was on his way to join his wife and 7-year-old son, both lawful permanent residents, at their home in Houston when he was detained at Kennedy Airport. According to the New York Times, Alshawis wife was also an accountant who had worked for a security contractor with the U.S. military in Iraq and, as a result, was subjected to threats to her family including a car bombing that killed her sisters husband in Baghdad in 2010. Alshawis wife and son came to the U.S. as refugees in 2014 and, three years later, hed finally been granted a visa to join them. After almost an entire day in detention, Alshawi was released Saturday night following the judicial stay, and by Sunday morning had resumed his journey to Houston. Protesters rally on Saturday against the new immigration ban issued by President Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City. (Photo: Stephanie Keith/Getty Images) Nazanin Zinouri Nazanin Zinouri is an Iranian-born data scientist and South Carolina resident who was blocked from boarding her flight from Dubai to Washington, D.C., after Trump signed the executive order Friday night. Zinouri first arrived in the United States in 2010, to began a masters program in engineering at Northern Illinois University, where she received a full scholarship. Since 2013, she has lived in South Carolina, where after earning her doctorate in industrial engineering at Clemson University, she was hired at a technology firm that soon began the process of sponsoring her for a green card. In the winter, I decided to take a three-week trip to visit my mom and sister, Zinouri wrote in the Washington Post on Monday. My visa was in order, but I hauled along a ton of paperwork to avoid trouble I had my job offer letter, my employment authorization form, multiple pay stubs, even copies of my old student visas, just in case. Shortly after arriving in Tehran last weekend, however, she was starting to hear rumors about Trumps executive orders. Three days into what was supposed to be a three-week trip, it became clear to Zinouri that she had to get back to the U.S. But by the time she boarded the earliest flight she could get out of Tehran, the order had been signed. And before she reached the second leg of her trip, from Dubai to Dulles, U.S. officials stopped her from boarding for security reasons. Zinouri describes feeling numb, as a million thoughts rushed through my mind, from the practical to the philosophical, like what would happen to the puppy shed recently adopted, or her car shed left parked at the Atlanta airport? What happens to all the stuff I had collected during 6 years living in the United States? What about my lease? Will my landlord think I just left town? What happens to my job, my life, my American Dream? she wrote. I flew back to Tehran to stay with my family and figure out what to do next, stung by the realization that as far as the U.S. government is concerned, my life doesnt matter. Nothing I worked for all these years matters. Read more from Yahoo News: _____ Related slideshows: Slideshow: Protests against Trumps travel ban hit the streets of NYC >>> Slideshow: Anti-Trump protesters rally for Muslim and immigrant rights >>> Slideshow: Protests at U.S. airports over travel ban >>> There are so many reasons to detest the Donald Trump administrations executive order on Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States, that its hard to know where to start. Others have already argued eloquently about its cruelty in singling out the most vulnerable in society; its strategic folly in insulting countries and individuals the United States needs to help it fight terrorism (the ostensible purpose of the order in the first place); its cynical incoherence in using the September 11 attacks as a rationale and then exempting the attackers countries of origin; its ham-handed implementation and ever-shifting explanations for how, and to whom, it applies; and, thankfully, its legal vulnerability on a slew of soon-to-be-litigated grounds, including that it may violate the Establishment and Equal Protection clauses of the U.S. Constitution. In light of all that, and particular in light of the new White Houses acknowledged aversion to facts, it may seem like a minor point that President Donald Trump and his advisors, in seeking to justify and normalize the executive order, have made a series of false or misleading claims about steps taken five years earlier by the Barack Obama administration. In case you missed it, a statement from the president published Sunday afternoon read: My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. Leaving aside the unusual nature of team Trump looking to his predecessors policies for cover, it seems worth pointing out this statement obscures at least five enormous differences between the executive order the White House issued on Friday and what the Obama administration did. 1. Much narrower focus: The Obama administration conducted a review in 2011 of the vetting procedures applied to citizens of a single country (Iraq) and then only to refugees and applicants for Special Immigrant Visas (SIVs), created by Congress to help Iraqis (and later Afghans) who supported the United States in those conflicts. The Trump executive order, on the other hand, applies to seven countries with total population more than 130 million, and to virtually every category of immigrant other than diplomats, including tourists and business travelers. Story continues 2. Not a ban: Contrary to Trumps Sunday statement and the repeated claims of his defenders, the Obama administration did not ban visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. For one thing, refugees dont travel on visas. More importantly, while the flow of Iraqi refugees slowed significantly during the Obama administrations review, refugees continued to be admitted to the United States during that time, and there was not a single month in which no Iraqis arrived here. In other words, while there were delays in processing, there was no outright ban. 3. Grounded in specific threat: The Obama administrations 2011 review came in response to specific threat information, including the arrest in Kentucky of two Iraqi refugees, still the only terrorism-related arrests out of about 130,000 Iraqi refugees and SIV holders admitted to the United States. Thus far, the Trump administration has provided no evidence, nor even asserted, that any specific information or intelligence has led to its draconian order. Read more: 3 Ways to Get Rid of President Trump Before 2020 Why you need to read the 25th Amendment now Its Time for a New Kind of Resistance Nothing in our recent historical experience prepares us for this. Americas New President Is Not a Rational Actor Whether by accident or design, Donald Trump is isolating himself and erratically unraveling the world order. 4. Orderly, organized process: The Obama administrations review was conducted over roughly a dozen deputies and principals committee meetings, involving Cabinet and deputy Cabinet-level officials from all of the relevant departments and agencies including the State, Homeland Security and Justice Departments and the intelligence community. The Trump executive order was reportedly drafted by White House political officials and then presented to the implementing agencies a fait accompli. This is not just bad policymaking practice, it led directly to the confusion, bordering on chaos, that has attended implementation of the order by agencies that could only start asking questions (such as: does this apply to green card holders?) once the train had left the station. 5. Far stronger vetting today: Much has been made of Trumps call for extreme vetting for citizens of certain countries. The entire purpose of the Obama administrations 2011 review was to enhance the already stringent vetting to which refugees and SIV applicants were subjected. While many of the details are classified, those rigorous procedures, which lead to waiting times of 18-24 months for many Iraqi and Syrian refugees, remain in place today and are continually reviewed by interagency officials. The Trump administration is, therefore, taking on a problem that has already been (and is continually being) addressed. *Bonus: Obamas seven countries taken out of context: Trumps claim that the seven countries listed in the executive order came from the Obama administration is conveniently left unexplained. A bit of background: soon after the December 2015 terror attack in San Bernadino, President Obama signed an amendment to the Visa Waiver Program, a law that allows citizens of 38 countries to travel to the United States without obtaining visas (and gives Americans reciprocal privileges in those countries). The amendment removed from the Visa Waiver Program dual nationals who were citizens of four countries (Iraq, Iran, Sudan, and Syria), or anyone who had recently traveled to those countries. The Obama administration added three more to the list (Libya, Somalia, and Yemen), bringing the total to seven. But this law did not bar anyone from coming to the United States. It only required a relatively small percentage of people to obtain a visa first. And to avoid punishing people who clearly had good reasons to travel to the relevant countries, the Obama administration used a waiver provided by Congress for certain travelers, including journalists, aid workers, and officials from international organizations like the United Nations. Bottom line: No immigration vetting system is perfect, no matter how extreme. President Obama often said that his highest priority was keeping Americans safe. In keeping with Americas tradition and ideals, he also worked to establish a vetting system that worked more fairly and efficiently, particularly for refugees who are, by definition, in harms way. President Trump should defend his approach on the merits, if he can. He should not compare it to his predecessors. This post has been updated. Subscribe to FP Premium for 20% off now! Photo credit: SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images By Anthony Esposito SANTIAGO (Reuters) - As Chilean authorities battle the historic blazes that have taken 11 lives, burned over 1,000 homes and wiped an entire town off the map, the theories about who may be to blame have spread as quickly as the wildfires themselves. The fires have consumed over 379,000 hectares (937,000 acres) in recent days, and cost Chile's forestry industry $350 million in losses. Forest fires are a regular feature of Chile's hot, arid summers, but a nearly decade-long drought combined with historically high temperatures have created tinder-dry conditions. Authorities said the worst was over, but firefighters, aided by helicopters and airplanes, were still battling 61 fires as of Monday. Amid signs not all the fires were accidental, conspiracy theories have abounded as to their origin, amplified by social media. Nearly nine out of 10 people surveyed by pollster Cadem said they believed most of the fires were intentional and 75 percent disapproved of how the government had handled the disaster. Ten people were in jail awaiting trial on suspicion they lit some of the fires, although the possible motives were unclear. President Michelle Bachelet said the Justice Department was investigating to determine "who has been causing the fires in our nation, in those cases where there is malice and those case where there is negligence." Bachelet said she had authorized the military to patrol rural areas in an effort to prevent any further arson. Opposition lawmakers said the government had done too little, too late. "They try to look for those responsible before putting out the forest fires to hide their own incompetence," tweeted independent opposition lawmaker Jose Manuel Edwards. A video showing a man on horseback setting fields ablaze was widely distributed on social media as purported evidence of arson. The video's time stamp indicated it was recorded a year ago. Chile's national prosecutor, Jorge Abbott, said his office would open an investigation into the false information on social media. "Information about Colombian citizens and Mapuche indigenous people detained (for arson) is completely false," he said. Chile's forestry industry asked for calmer heads to prevail as it also found itself on the defensive. "We have seen many videos and photos on Twitter of things that are two to three years old and are shown as if they were happening now ... you also hear things like (forestry) companies are causing the fires themselves to collect insurance. That is absurd," industry group CORMA said. (Reporting by Anthony Esposito; Editing by Peter Cooney) NEW YORK (Reuters) - Starbucks Corp Chief Executive Officer Howard Schultz said on Sunday that the company planned to hire 10,000 refugees over five years in 75 countries, two days after U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order banning refugees from certain countries. Trump on Friday put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily barred travelers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries, saying the moves would help protect Americans from terrorist attacks. The order sparked widespread international criticism, outrage from civil rights activists and legal challenges. Starbucks in a letter from Schultz told employees it would do everything possible to support affected workers. (http://bit.ly/2kIFjLE) The hiring efforts announced on Sunday would start in the United States by initially focusing on individuals who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where the military has asked for such support, Schultz said. Schultz has been outspoken on various issues and has put Starbucks in the national spotlight, asking customers not to bring guns into stores and urging conversations on race relations. Schultz said on Sunday that if the Affordable Care Act is repealed and employees lose healthcare coverage, they would be able to return to health insurance through Starbucks. Trump and a Republican-controlled legislature are seeking to undo much of the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare. Schultz will step down as CEO in a few months to focus on new high-end coffee shops, handing the top job to Chief Operating Officer Kevin Johnson, a long-time technology executive. He will become executive chairman in April. Schultz also affirmed the company's commitment to trade with Mexico, another subject that has been front and center of Trump's campaign. (Reporting by Devika Krishna Kumar in New York; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn) Starbucks (SBUX) CEO Howard Schultz sent out a company-wide letter following President Donald Trumps decision to sign an executive order that bans citizens of seven majority Muslim countries from entering the United States. Schultzs letter detailed plans to hire 10,000 refugees in the countries where the coffee chain operates. This was met with some backlash on social media, with some users calling for a boycott of Starbucks. The executive order, signed on Friday, temporarily halts citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen from entering the US. We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question, Schultz wrote. Reuters/ David Ryder He continued: These uncertain times call for different measures and communication tools than we have used in the past. Kevin and I are going to accelerate our commitment to communicating with you more frequently, including leveraging new technology platforms moving forward. I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack, and want to use a faster, more immediate form of communication to engage with you on matters that concern us all as partners. A number of CEOs, including Facebooks Mark Zuckerberg, have knocked Trumps decision to sign the orders. Schultzs letter went on to detail some of the actions the company is taking, including plans to hire 10,000 refugees. We have a long history of hiring young people looking for opportunities and a pathway to a new life around the world. This is why we are doubling down on this commitment by working with our equity market employees as well as joint venture and licensed market partners in a concerted effort to welcome and seek opportunities for those fleeing war, violence, persecution and discrimination, Schultz wrote. He continued: There are more than 65 million citizens of the world recognized as refugees by the United Nations, and we are developing plans to hire 10,000 of them over five years in the 75 countries around the world where Starbucks does business. And we will start this effort here in the U.S. by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support. Story continues Afterward, the hashtag #BoycottStarbucks started trending on Twitter. Instead of hiring 10,000 AMERICAN VETERANS, #Starbucks has decided to hire 10,000 refugees. Calling on all Americans to #BoycottStarbucks! The Trump Train (@The_Trump_Train) January 30, 2017 1000s of homeless veterans are starving right now on the streets yet @Starbucks wants to hire refugees to troll @POTUS?#BoycottStarbucks pic.twitter.com/XnVPXrxWWQ Raven (@KazeSkyz) January 30, 2017 Starbucks already has a program in place dedicated to hiring military veterans. Anyone who loves freedom & buys #BoycottStarbucks is not patriot Theyre radical liberal corporation trying to shove their opinions throat pic.twitter.com/Qpsd3JtOFf #ThankYouTrump (@MAGAUSA1) January 30, 2017 Others on social media used the hashtag to show their support for the company. Thank you, @Starbucks CEO for committing to hire 10,000 refugees. To all those tweeting #boycottstarbucks, thanks for the shorter line. nikita (@nikitakhara) January 30, 2017 Thanks, @Starbucks, for supporting refugees-& humoring me when I said my name was The Resistance #BoycottStarbucks pic.twitter.com/2S0w1DaXtD Candy Kirby (@candykirby) January 30, 2017 In addition, Schultz also wrote about Starbucks operations in Mexico. Social media users in Mexico had called for boycotts of US companies, including Starbucks. We have been open for business in Mexico since 2002, and have since opened 600 stores in 60 cities across the country, which together employ over 7,000 Mexican partners who proudly wear the green apron. We have sourced coffee from Mexicos producers and their families for three decades and last fall, we also announced the creation of a farmer support center in Chiapas to help accelerate our collective ability to grow and export some of the worlds finest coffees from this important growing region, while donating more than $2 million to support the livelihood, food security and water quality of coffee producing communities in Oaxaca, Schultz wrote. He added: With the support of thousands of Starbucks partners and millions of customers, we have also donated half a million coffee trees to support 70,000 families, and we will be expanding the initiative this year to generate another 4 million tree donations. Coffee is what unites our common heritage, and as I told Alberto Torrado, the leader of our partnership with Alsea in Mexico, we stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same. Last week, Trump put out additional orders aimed to crack down on illegal immigration, including a measure expanding the authority of local law enforcement officers to enforce immigration laws, among other policies. Trump also announced that it was his administrations policy to immediately begin construction of a wall along the US-Mexican border. Julia La Roche is a finance reporter at Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter. Read more: Howard Schultz: We need servant leadership and humility from our elected officials Buffett: What I tell people who are anti-immigration Mark Zuckerberg knocks President Trumps executive orders on immigration Starbucks plans to hire 10,000 refugees worldwide over the next five years in response to President Donald Trump's travel ban, the head of the US coffee-chain company said Sunday. "I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise," Starbucks chairman and chief executive Howard Schultz said in a letter to employees posted on the company's website. "We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question." Schultz, a Democratic Party supporter, said that Starbucks had been in contact with employees affected by the new Republican president's executive order signed Friday. The decree suspends the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The CEO said the refugee hires would be fleeing war, persecution and discrimination in the 75 countries where the company operates. "And we will start this effort here in the US by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support," he said. Schultz also defended Mexico, which Trump has said will have to pay for a wall along its long and porous border with the United States to deter immigrants, perhaps by the US imposing a 20 percent tariff on Mexican imports. "Building bridges, not walls, with Mexico," he wrote, voicing support for the country that has provided Starbucks with coffee for three decades and where nearly 600 Starbucks coffee shops employ 7,000 people. "We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. Story continues "But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same." Schultz is close to Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential candidate who lost to Trump in the November election, and supported her during her White House campaign. But he has dismissed persistent rumors that he would seek the highest office in the land. From Esquire UK As soon as he was elected, Donald Trump promoted one of his key campaign managers, Stephen K. Bannon, to chief strategist and senior adviser. Like Trump, Bannon is an outspoken Washington outsider who has never been elected to office. He is also now one of the most powerful men in Western politics, and has already claimed he is at war with the media. Here's some thing you should know about the man with the president's ear. 1. Bannon is the executive chairman of Breitbart News, an "alt-right" website. Breitbart News is a divisive right-wing opinion and news outlet, known for offensive headlines like "Bill Kristol: Republican Spoiler, Renegade Jew," "Trannies 49 Xs Higher HIV Rate," and "Birth Control Makes Women Unattractive and Crazy." According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, the site promotes racist, anti-Muslim, and anti-immigrant ideas, and it has been accused of white nationalism, a movement that opposes multiculturalism and believes in the supremacy of the white race. Bannon, who is on leave from Breitbart, described his ideology to Mother Jones as "nationalist," but not necessarily white nationalist. Former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke called Bannon's selection "excellent," and Peter Brimelow, who runs the white nationalist site VDARE, called it "amazing." Bannon, who has been with the site for about a decade and ran the business out of the basement of his D.C. townhouse, according to a Bloomberg profile, told Mother Jones about the site, however, "We're the platform for the alt-right." According to NPR, "The views of the alt-right are widely seen as anti-Semitic and white supremacist." The site was hugely successful during the 2016 presidential campaign, thanks to social media. On election night, Breitbart's Facebook page had the fourth-highest number of user interactions on the whole platform, beating CNN, Fox News and the New York Times, according to the New York Times. Story continues 2. He started a nonprofit to investigate politicians. Bannon is the founding chairman of Government Accountability Institute, or GAI, a nonprofit that investigates politicians and delivers findings to mainstream media outlets, like Newsweek and ABC News, according to Bloomberg. GAI's president, Peter Schweizer, wrote Clinton Cash as well as thee-book, Bush Bucks. Clinton Cash - which looked at donations made to the Clinton Foundation, a topic of constant attention during Trump's campaign -was later made into a documentary. 3. He served in the U.S. Navy. Bannon signed up to serve right after college, spending four years at sea, according to Bloomberg. His daughter Maureen followed in his footsteps, attending West Point and then serving as a lieutenant in the 101st Airborne Division. 4. He grew up in a family of Democrats in Norfolk, Virginia. And he goes after Republicans, like Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, as well as attacking Democrats, like the Clintons. "I come from a blue-collar, Irish Catholic, pro-Kennedy, pro-union family of Democrats," Bannon told Bloomberg. "I wasn't political until I got into the service and saw how badly Jimmy Carter f---ed things up. I became a huge Reagan admirer. Still am. But what turned me against the whole establishment was coming back from running companies in Asia in 2008 and seeing that Bush had f---ed up as badly as Carter. The whole country was a disaster." 5. Bannon worked at the investment bank Goldman Sachs. Though Trump's campaign promised to go after big banks, Bannon worked for one of the biggest. After leaving the Navy, Bannon earned a master's degree in national security studies at Georgetown University and then went on to Harvard Business School before landing an investment banking job at Goldman Sachs' New York offices. "The camaraderie was amazing. It was like being in the Navy, in the wardroom of a ship," he told Bloomberg. After leaving that bank in 1990, he started Bannon & Co., a boutique investment bank specializing in media. The bank was eventually bought and Bannon is no longer affiliated. 6. He has Hollywood ties. When he ran his own investment bank, Bannon invested in films, and he eventually made the leap to directing movies, like In the Face of Evil, a celebration of the Ronald Reagan administration, and The Undefeated, a 2011 documentary about failed vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin. 7. He said progressives vilify conservative women because they're not "a bunch of dykes." During a 2011 radio interview, Bannon said women like Ann Coulter, Michele Bachmann, and Palin threaten the progressive narrative. "That's why there are some unintended consequences of the women's liberation movement. That, in fact, the women that would lead this country would be pro-family, they would have husbands, they would love their children. They wouldn't be a bunch of dykes that came from the Seven Sisters schools up in New England," he said, referring to historic women's colleges. "That drives the left insane and that's why they hate these women." 8. He's been wanting to shake up the Republican Party for years. Breitbart News cheered on the Tea Party, a wing of the Republican Party, in its early years and supported the 2013 government shutdown, according to Bloomberg. In fact, in 2010, Bannon said in an interview, "What we need to do is bitch slap the Republican party." 9. He was charged with domestic abuse. In 1996, Bannon was charged with misdemeanor domestic violence, battery, and dissuading a witness, though the case was ultimately dismissed, according to a police report and court documents obtained by Politico. The case was brought by his then-wife, who claimed Bannon pulled at her neck and wrist, then smashed her phone when she tried to call the police. His ex-wife did not appear in court and Bannon pleaded "not guilty," so the case was dismissed. 10. His ex-wife has accused him of being anti-Semitic. The same wife who accused Bannon of abuse said in 2007 court documents that he didn't want their daughters to go to a particular school because of the number of Jewish students enrolled. "The biggest problem he had with Archer is the number of Jews that attend," she said in her 2007 statement, according to the New York Daily News. "He said that he doesn't like the way they raise their kids to be 'whiny brats' and that he didn't want the girls going to school with Jews." A spokesperson for Bannon told the Daily News: "At the time, Mr. Bannon never said anything like that." 11. Bannon's site Breitbart News has regularly attacked Planned Parenthood, going so far as to compare their work to the Holocaust. In an August 2015 article headlined "Planned Parenthood's Body Count Under Cecile Richards is Up to Half a Holocaust," the author writes that the women's health organization, which provides a range of health services including abortions and which Trump has threatened to defund, has "comfortably surpassing Hitler according to its own annual reports. You have to admire the chutzpah, if you'll forgive my terminology: Planned Parenthood has amassed a Third Reich-style death count completely legally." 12. The Anti-Defamation League opposes Bannon's appointment. The ADL released a statement over the weekend explaining why the group "strongly opposes" Bannon's appointment. We at @ADL_National oppose the appt of Steve Bannon to sr role at @WhiteHouse bc he & his alt-right are so hostile to core American values pic.twitter.com/qCVEPKoa7q - Jonathan Greenblatt (@JGreenblattADL) November 14, 2016 13. Those from the left and the right have come out against Bannon holding the new role. A spokesperson for Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said in a statement: President-elect Trump's choice of Steve Bannon as his top aide signals that white supremacists will be represented at the highest levels in Trump's White House.It is easy to see why the KKK views Trump as their champion when Trump appoints one of the foremost peddlers of White Supremacist themes and rhetoric as his top aide. Bannon was 'the main driver behind Breitbart becoming a white ethno-nationalist propaganda mill,' according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. Others spoke out on Twitter: Just to be clear news media, the next president named a racist, anti-semite as the co-equal of the chief of staff. #NotNormal - John Weaver (@JWGOP) November 13, 2016 Selection of Steve Bannon for senior WH role unsurprising but alarming. His alt-right, anti-Semitic & misogynistic views don't belong in WH - Adam Schiff (@RepAdamSchiff) November 13, 2016 Saying "stop it" to racist attacks means little when you name white supremacist darling Steve Bannon chief strategist in the very same day. https://t.co/BKuyA09VRA - Evan McMullin (@Evan_McMullin) November 14, 2016 The media organizations that refuse to report on Steve Bannon's white nationalist ties shouldn't be read, viewed, or trusted anymore. - Jon Favreau (@jonfavs) November 14, 2016 Let us be clear. The hiring of Steve Bannon as a WH policy adviser is exactly the same as hiring David Duke. Please don't normalize this. - Charles P. Pierce (@CharlesPPierce) November 13, 2016 Meanwhile, Trump supporters have continued to defend Bannon. Critics of Steve Bannon know he's smarter and tougher than they are. When CAIR doesn't like you that is a good thing. Bannon a good guy - Gov. Mike Huckabee (@GovMikeHuckabee) November 14, 2016 WATCH: The guy I know is a guy that isnt any of those things...He is very, very smart. @reince on #SteveBannon pic.twitter.com/FwzY4Dbfia - TODAY (@TODAYshow) November 14, 2016 14. He has lashed out at the media. On 26 January, Bannon said the media, not the Democratic party, is the "opposition party." "The media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for awhile," he told the New York Times, adding, "The media here is the opposition party. They don't understand this country. They still do not understand why Donald Trump is the president of the United States." He also said, "The media has zero integrity, zero intelligence, and no hard work." You Might Also Like If there was any question about who is largely in charge of national security behind the scenes at the White House, the answer is becoming increasingly clear: Steve Bannon, the former head of Breitbart News, a far-right media outlet, and now White House advisor. Even before he was given a formal seat on the National Security Councils principals committee this weekend by President Donald Trump, Bannon was calling the shots and doing so with little to no input from the National Security Council staff, according to an intelligence official who asked not to be named out of fear of retribution. He is running a cabal, almost like a shadow NSC, the official said. He described a work environment where there is little appetite for dissenting opinions, shockingly no paper trail of whats being discussed and agreed upon at meetings, and no guidance or encouragement so far from above about how the National Security Council staff should be organized. The intelligence official, who said he was willing to give the Trump administration the benefit of the doubt when it took office, is now deeply troubled by how things are being run. They ran all of these executive orders outside of the normal construct, he said, referring to last weeks flurry of draft executive orders on everything from immigration to the return of CIA black sites. After the controversial draft orders were written, the Trump team was very selective in how they routed them through the internal White House review process, the official said. Under previous administrations, if someone thought another person or directorate had a stake in the issue at hand or expertise in a subject area, he or she was free to share the papers as long as the recipient had proper clearance. With that standard in mind, when some officials saw Trumps draft executive orders, they felt they had broad impact and shared them more widely for staffing and comments. Story continues For more news videos visit Yahoo View. That did not sit well with Bannon or his staff, according to the official. More stringent guidelines for handling and routing were then instituted, and the National Security Council staff was largely cut out of the process. By the end of the week, they werent the only ones left in the dark. Retired Marine Gen. John Kelly, the secretary of homeland security, was being briefed on the executive order, which called for immediately shutting the borders to nationals from seven largely Muslim countries and all refugees, while Trump was in the midst of signing the measure, the New York Times reported. The White House did not respond in time to a request for comment. Read more: President Bannons Hugely Destructive First Week in Office The puppet master is leading the Trump administration down a road of carnage. Donald Trumps Big League Balkans Problem The first victim of Trump-induced instability might not be Ukraine, or the Baltics but tiny Kosovo. LISTEN: A Tale of a Very Messy Trump Transition On this weeks episode of The E.R. podcast: With just a week gone by, how much damage can the new Trump administration do? The lack of a paper trail documenting the decision-making process is also troubling, the intelligence official said. For example, under previous administrations, after a principals or deputies meeting of the National Security Council, the discussion, the final agreement, and the recommendations would be written up in whats called a summary of conclusions or SOC in government-speak. Under [President George W. Bush], the National Security Council was quite strict about recording SOCs, said Matthew Waxman, a law professor at Columbia University who served on Bushs National Security Council. There was often a high level of generality, and there may have been some exceptions, but they were carefully crafted. These summaries also provided a record to refer back to, especially important if a debate over an issue came up again, including among agencies that needed to implement the conclusions reached. If someone thought the discussion was mischaracterized, he or she would call for a correction to be issued to set the record straight, said Loren DeJonge Schulman, who previously served in former President Barack Obamas administration as a senior advisor to National Security Advisor Susan Rice. Schulman is now a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security. People took the document seriously, she said. During the first week of the Trump administration, there were no SOCs, the intelligence official said. In fact, according to him, there is surprisingly very little paper being generated, and whatever paper there is, the NSC staff is not privy to it. He sees this as a deterioration of transparency and accountability. It would worry me if written records of these meeting were eliminated, because they contribute to good governance, Waxman said. It is equally important that NSC staff be the ones drafting the issue papers going into meetings, too, said Schulman. The idea is to share with everyone a fair and balanced take on the issue, with the range of viewpoints captured in that document, she said. If those papers are now being generated by political staff, she added, it corrupts the whole process. It could also contribute to Bannons centralization of power. He who has the pen has the authority to shape outcomes, the intelligence official said. Now Bannons role in the shadows is being formalized thanks to an executive order signed Saturday by Trump that formally gives Bannon a seat on the National Security Councils principals committee. The same executive order removed from that group the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the director of national intelligence, and the secretary of energy. Their new diminished role is not unprecedented, but some still find it a troubling piece of this larger picture. For example, former Defense Secretary Robert Gates who served under both Bush and Obama told ABC News this weekend that sidelining the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the director of national intelligence was a big mistake. Every president can benefit from their perspective, judgment, and experience, Gates said. Meanwhile, Bannons new role is unprecedented. Under Obama, it wasnt unheard of for his chief political advisors, John Podesta and David Axelrod, to attend NSC meetings, but they were never guaranteed a seat at the table. Under Bush, the line between national security and domestic political considerations was even clearer. Top aides have said they never saw Karl Rove or anyone from his shop in NSC meetings, and thats because Bush told him explicitly not to attend. The signal Bush especially wanted to send to the military is that, The decisions Im making that involve life and death for the people in uniform will not be tainted by any political decisions, former White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten said last September. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) called Bannons appointment to the council as a permanent member a radical departure from how the decision-making body was organized in the past, adding that he found the change concerning. Inside and outside of government, there are also deep reservations about Bannons alignment with the far right and white nationalism, thanks to his previous leadership of Breitbart. One Bannon quote making the rounds this weekend: Lenin wanted to destroy the state, and thats my goal, too. I want to bring everything crashing down and destroy all of todays establishment. There are new questions about where retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, Trumps national security advisor, fits into all of this. Internally, it remains unclear what his role is, the intelligence official said. He has a voice at the table, but hes overshadowed by Bannon. Meanwhile, Tom Bossert, a former Bush national security aide whom Trump picked to serve as the White Houses homeland security advisor, is not one of Bannons, so he is also on the outside looking in, according to the official. However, in Saturdays executive order, Bossert was also given a permanent seat on the NSC principals committee. But there is not a lot of infighting right now, because to have infighting, there needs to be a power struggle, and there is no struggle, the intelligence official said. However, there is an effort to crack down on leaking. Last week, a draft executive order, which raised the prospect of bringing back CIA black sites and reopening the debate on torture, leaked to the press. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said it was not a White House document and that he had no idea where it came from. But according to the New York Times, the White House had circulated it among National Security Council staff members for review on Tuesday morning. The Times was even provided with the details of the email chain that showed the draft orders movements through the White House bureaucracy. Theyre doing a witch hunt now to find out how that got out, the intelligence official said. There is zero room for dissenting opinion. Trump did say publicly that he would defer to Defense Secretary James Mattis for now on the question of torture, which would suggest that disagreement is OK. But while publicly the president is allowing for different opinions, there is unhappiness about what is permitted behind the scenes, according to the official. If you take a stand against the White House, you might find yourself frozen out of future meetings, he said. The NSC staff is mostly in shock after last week, the intelligence official said. For now, no one knows what each day will bring. There is no organizational chart yet for the NSC, meaning there has been no internal guidance yet about which portfolios still exist and to whom they report, the official said. The Washington Post reported Sunday on some of the changes being made, including that some offices such as cyber have been expanded, while others have been collapsed. The directorates on Europe and Russia, which were separate under Obama, have now been combined. Its possible that the current chaos and lack of bureaucratic process is a result of the Trump administration still going through growing pains and figuring out how best to run things. But former NSC officials said an organizational chart for the NSC is the kind of thing you have in place weeks before taking office. Only time will tell if the way things are currently being done is deliberate or part of a new administration learning on the job how best to provide advice to the president and communicate with the relevant agencies. Trumps management style is known to be highly unstructured, if not chaotic. The Post reported in May that he was running his presidential campaign like he ran his business fond of promoting rivalries among subordinates, wary of delegating major decisions, scornful of convention and fiercely insistent on a culture of loyalty around him. While this may have worked for his company, it is certainly not a way to run a country, the official said. This article is cross-posted with Just Security. Photo credit: SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images A Chinese honor guard prepares to welcome Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte in Beijing, Oct. 20, 2016. (Photo: Ng Han Guan/AP) Donald Trump is in the White House, and Yahoo News is taking a look at the top stories to watch in his first 100 days. From the unusual role family members will play as White House advisers to his promises to aggressively transform U.S. trade policy, and from investigations into Russian interference in the election to his relationship with Paul Ryan, well be rolling out 15 stories over five days signposts for the road ahead. _____ THE STAKES President Donald Trump has escalated his campaign-trail attacks on China since the election. But he needs Beijings help as North Korea draws ever nearer to the day when it can hit the U.S. mainland with a nuclear-tipped missile. How Trump navigates the sensitive relationship with China will determine whether and how he defuses the coming crisis. ____ THE STORY President Donald Trump has escalated his war of words with China since Election Day, raising questions about how he will enlist Beijings help with a frightening national security problem: North Koreas nuclear and ballistic missile programs. On Barack Obamas watch, the secretive Stalinist regime in Pyongyang made enough progress on both fronts that, experts predict, it may be able to strike the U.S. mainland, possibly even the East Coast, in two to three years. The Obama administration enlisted China and other world powers in two rounds of international sanctions, and left Trump options for further tightening the economic vise, according to administration and congressional sources. Those punitive measures havent deterred North Korea, which announced in January that it could launch an intercontinental ballistic missile at any time. The United States responded that it would shoot down any missile, but the back-and-forth highlighted how international diplomacy and economic sanctions have not worked to date, leaving Trump very few options for facing down an escalating threat. North Koreas growing capability is one of the most significant challenges the next administration will face. There are no simple solutions, Vice President Joe Biden said in a January speech about nuclear policy. We must continue working closely with the international community including China to convince North Korea to reverse course, Biden added. Story continues After Pyongyangs January missile threat, Trump tweeted: North Korea just stated that it is in the final stages of developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching parts of the U.S. It wont happen! And China has been taking out massive amounts of money & wealth from the U.S. in totally one-sided trade, but wont help with North Korea. Nice! the president-elect added. China is the key to North Korea policy because its the smaller countrys patron, its source of food and fuel. Yet China has been in Trumps sights: He and top aides have threatened a trade war and taken steps towards closer relations with Taiwan, which Beijing considers a breakaway province. Trump will also likely confront China over its territorial ambitions, like the construction of artificial islands to further its claims in international waters. Experts are watching to see whether tensions on other issues hurt Sino-U.S. cooperation on North Korea. Beijing doesnt want North Korea to collapse, which would potentially send refugees streaming into China, to say nothing of raising doubts about the security of the countrys nuclear weapons. It also doesnt want North and South Korea to reunite, fearing that the result would be a U.S.-aligned country on its borders. I think we have to be clear-eyed as to how far China will go and not get overly optimistic as to how far theyll go, Rex Tillerson told a January 11 hearing on his confirmation as Trumps secretary of state. If China is not going to comply with U.N. sanctions, then its appropriate for us for the United States to consider actions to compel them to comply, he added. That statement raised eyebrows even among some Republican members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who wondered privately how the Trump administration would compel China to do something it considers profoundly risky choking off trade and therefore risking North Koreas collapse. Theres probably no bilateral relationship that carries more significance and where theres also the potential if that relationship breaks down or goes into full conflict mode that everybody is worse off, Obama told reporters in a December press conference. ____ Read more from Yahoo News: SAN FRANCISCO (AP) Ocean rise already is worsening the floods and high tides sweeping California this stormy winter, climate experts say, and this month's damage and deaths highlight that even a state known as a global leader in fighting climate change has yet to tackle some of the hardest work of dealing with it. The critical steps yet to come include starting to decide which low-lying cities, airports and highways, along with threatened landmarks like San Francisco's Embarcadero, to hoist above the rising water and which to abandon and where to start getting the many billions of dollars for those climate rescues. "People always tell us we're ahead of the curve" on climate change, said Larry Goldzband, head of a regional San Francisco Bay commission that late last year stepped up regional efforts to identify and prioritize communities and infrastructure at risk from rising sea level. As proud as Californians are of their climate-change efforts, "I always think, 'Man, if we are ahead of the curve, I feel sorry for the rest of the country,'" Goldzband said. A 2009 study by the Pacific Institute, a California-based environment think-tank, estimated $100 billion in property was at risk from ocean rise in California, two-thirds of it in the low-lying San Francisco Bay region. That's far more than the state takes in from income taxes each year. Experts say the real cost of raising, shielding or evacuating vulnerable spots, which include mass-transit systems, power plants and sewage plants, could be far higher. "Astronomical. The San Francisco airport? What would it cost to replace that?" asked Gary Griggs, director of the Institute of Marine Sciences at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Griggs is part of a scientific working group requested by Gov. Jerry Brown to examine whether new evidence on melting and potential ice-sheet collapse in the Antarctic, whose ice holds almost 90 percent of the Earth's fresh water, means sea-level rise may be even higher than the 3 feet projected for California by the end of the century. Story continues The Pacific off California has risen just about 8 inches overall in the past century. For the next three decades or so, the accelerating pace of sea rise primarily will make worse the flooding and erosion from big storms like this month's in California. "Probably until mid-century, short-term events ... are going to be more damaging than sea-level rise itself," Griggs said. In January, a series of powerful storms brought more than a foot of rain to parts of the San Francisco Bay, triggered record 34-foot waves off the state's central coast, killed at least five people and prompted the evacuations of thousands around the state. The dead included a cab driver who slid off a wet road and into a swollen estuary off Oakland's airport, which along with San Francisco's bayside airport is one of the big sites expected to be hit more and more often by flooding as the Pacific Ocean rises a foot over the next 30 years. Brown, who declared an emergency in much of the state this month because of flooded towns and highways, crumbled roads and rockslides, has vowed to fight if the fossil-fuel friendly Trump administration goes after California's landmark programs to reduce climate-changing carbon emissions. Brown's administration in 2015 also sought to speed up planning for dealing with sea rise and other climate change. On a sparkling afternoon after three storms brought some of the heaviest rain and surf to California in decades, ecologist Fraser Shilling stood on a highway bridge north of San Francisco, looking over sprawling miles of floodwater and salty bay water swallowing the highway's exit ramp, and drowning salt marshes and fence posts as far as the eye could see. State Route 37 is a busy highway for tens of thousands of commuters and truckers in and out of California's wine country. Shilling, a co-director of the Road Ecology Center at the University of California, Davis, had forecast it wouldn't be seeing this kind of regular high water for at least another 20 years. "This is the new normal," says Shilling, who believes sea rise already is changing conditions on the ground more than some state agencies realize. "And all of our infrastructure is not accommodating the new normal." Pumps and bulldozers labored to clear water from another stretch of the state highway, two weeks after the storms. State and local governments acknowledge that low-lying sites like State Route 37 will be hit by sea-rise worsened floods and tides more and more, before the bay claims them completely. But authorities are stymied by the financial and political difficulties of raising billions to elevate or protect the highway, or reroute it through pricey vineyards inland. As it is now, substantial state funding isn't expected for this particular highway until 2088, long after parts of it are expected to be regularly submerged. "Our biggest challenge is how to fund and build it before it goes underwater," said Kate Miller, executive director of the transportation authority for Napa County. California might not really start funding its rescues from sea rise until a major part of the public is inconvenienced, said state Sen. Jerry Hill, a Democrat from San Mateo County. Hill's prediction of what would free the funds: If a low-lying stretch of U.S. Highway 101 near San Francisco's old Candlestick Park floods, and much of the Bay Area suddenly could not get to work. "That will be the wake-up call, when the rubber hits the road," he said. "When the water hits the tailpipe." BOSTON (AP) Dozens of U.S. colleges are opposing President Donald Trump's sweeping travel ban that has left some students and professors stranded abroad. The presidents of several universities on Sunday issued scathing attacks of Trump's executive order halting immigration from seven Muslim-majority nations. Many said it's already disrupting research and academics for their scholars, while some suggested they would defy the ban as far as legally possible. The Association of American Universities, which represents 62 schools, urged Trump to reverse the order and said it will only steer top scholars to countries that compete with the United States. Mitch Daniels, the president of Purdue University and a former Republican governor of Indiana, called the order "a bad idea, poorly implemented," and called on Trump to revoke it. The ban, which blocks immigrants from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, has been put on hold after federal judges in New York, Massachusetts, Virginia and Washington state stepped in. But some students and scholars from those countries remain caught in legal limbo, stranded while traveling abroad or visiting home during the recent holiday break. Ata Anzali, an assistant professor of religion at Vermont's Middlebury College, has been living in his home country of Iran since last summer to conduct research. His family booked flights that would have brought them back to the U.S. just before noon Sunday, but Anzali changed his mind at the last minute. He said he canceled two flights because he feared his children might get snarled by the travel ban. "I don't want my kids to go through this traumatic experience of being detained or deported," Anzali told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from Iran. "This is causing so much confusion, what are we supposed to do?" Yale University doctoral student Ali Abdi, who is from Iran, left the U.S. days before the order was signed to conduct research in Afghanistan. Now he doesn't know if he can return. Story continues "I cannot go to Iran, my home country, because I've been a human rights activist over the past 10 years and I might face some sort of persecution," he said. "I'm in a situation where it seems I am neither welcome by the Iranian government or the American government." A Stanford University student from Sudan who is a legal resident in the U.S. was detained for hours after arriving in New York on Friday but later allowed in. "An unfortunate consequence of the new policy appears to be that students and scholars from designated countries are, for the moment, effectively detainees in this country," Stanford President Marc Tessier-Lavigne and other leaders from the school wrote in a letter. University of Massachusetts President Marty Meehan said several students and faculty members were traveling abroad when the order was signed, including two professors from Iran who were temporarily detained at Logan Airport in Boston even though they're permanent U.S. residents. "This is not the country we promised to them when we invited them to study, teach and conduct research here," Meehan wrote. Students and scholars from several other colleges also have been stuck, including from Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Clark Atlanta University. More than 17,000 students from the seven counties affected by the ban studied at American colleges last year, according to data from the State Department and the nonprofit Institute of International Education. More than 12,000 of those were from Iran. As spring break approaches, some international students were planning to visit home or take academic trips abroad. But now, many colleges are urging them to reconsider. Schools including Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and Tufts University in Boston guided students from nations under the ban to avoid all travel outside the U.S. Many are advising to students to determine whether it's safe to travel. On social media, some schools received praise Sunday for saying they would do everything in their power to protect immigrants on campus. The University of Michigan said its campus police don't ask about immigration status and don't partner with federal officials to enforce immigration laws. Duke University said it "cannot and will not share confidential student records with law enforcement agencies local, state, or federal without a subpoena." ___ Associated Press writer Wilson Ring in Montpelier, Vermont, contributed to this report. (Adds details) BEIRUT, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Syria said on Monday that any attempt to create so-called safe zones for refugees without coordinating with Damascus would be "unsafe" and violate Syria's sovereignty, the state news agency SANA reported. SANA said Syria's Foreign Ministry and the United Nations refugee agency had agreed on the issue during a meeting in Damascus. It did not elaborate. The White House said U.S. President Donald Trump and Saudi Arabia's King Salman agreed in a telephone call on Sunday to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen. It was Damascus's first comment on the issue since Trump said on Wednesday he would "absolutely do safe zones in Syria" for refugees fleeing violence in the war-torn country. According to a document seen by Reuters, Trump is expected to order the Pentagon and State Department to craft a plan for setting up the safe zones, a move that could risk escalation of U.S. military involvement in Syria's conflict. Rebel backers including Qatar have welcomed Trump's support for safe zones, and Turkey says it is waiting to see the outcome of the U.S. president's pledge. Creation of safe zones could ratchet up U.S. military involvement in Syria, including increased U.S. air power to enforce "no fly" restrictions and ground forces to protect civilians in those areas. The document gave no details on what would constitute a safe zone, where they might be set up and who would defend them. Policing them could prove difficult in a war zone dotted with armed groups. Trump has also not provided details about the proposed safe zones, except to say he would have the Gulf states pay for them. (Reporting by John Davison and Ellen Francis; Editing by Tom Heneghan) Damascus (Syria) (AFP) - Syria's foreign minister on Monday called on the country's refugees to return home, official media reported, without directly commenting on a US ban targeting them. Walid Muallem "renewed the invitation of the government to Syrian refugees living in neighbouring countries to return to their country", the SANA news agency said. The minister "stressed the country was ready to receive them and grant them a dignified life", the agency reported, as Muallem met UN refugee agency chief Filippo Grandi. On Friday, US President Donald Trump issued an executive order to suspend Syrian refugee arrivals indefinitely and impose tough controls on travellers from seven countries, including Syria, for 90 days. The minister spoke after President Bashar al-Assad's forces on Sunday retook control of a key region that supplies water to the capital. The army's recapture of Wadi Barada from rebels comes a month after Assad's forces pushed the armed opposition out of east Aleppo, taking back control of the whole of the northern city. Syria's rebels still hold to the northwestern province of Idlib, the Western Ghouta area outside the capital and areas in the south of the country. Syria's conflict has killed more than 310,000 people since it erupted in 2011 with the brutal repression of anti-government protests. The war has forced 4.8 million people to flee Syria, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Turkey has taken in more than 2.7 million Syrians, the UNHCR says, and is now the main host country. It is followed by Lebanon with more than one million Syrian refugees, according to the UN. The UNHCR says Jordan has taken in 655,000 Syrians, but Amman says the number is much higher at 1.4 million. At least another 228,000 Syrians have taken refuge in Iraq and 115,000 in Egypt, the refugee agency says. Syrian refugees have in increasing numbers travelled to, or tried to reach, Europe, making the perilous journey overground or by sea. A South Carolina elementary school teacher has been arrested after cops say she bit a little boy over the weekend. Melanie Johnson was allegedly at the Sky Zone Trampoline Park in Greenville Saturday when police say an 11-year-old boy was playing "keep away" with another boy's hat. Read: Man Brutally Beats His Mom, Scrawls Name of Spit-Firing Demon on Her Chest: Police According to a police report, the 35-year-old fourth grade teacher grabbed the boy and bit him while she yelled, "Let go of his hat!" The alleged assault was reported to Greenville County Law Enforcement Center on Sunday by the boy and his mother. The Greenville Police Department said they viewed surveillance video from Sky Zone that showed Johnson biting the child on the arm, WYFF reports. Read: Mom Allegedly Beats 4-Year-Old Son to Death After He Drops Egg Johnson is a teacher at Forest Acres Elementary School, where Pickens County Schools spokesman John Eby said she is on administrative leave. Johnson reportedly turned herself in on Sunday and is charged with assault and battery, police said. Watch: Strangers Donate More Than $140,000 for Chicago Beating Victim Related Articles: Fans of the 2000 film "Snow Day" may remember that anything can happen on a snow day -- and for some high schoolers, that includes learning. Those might soon include students at a school district in Georgia, which recently proposed teaching students at home when schools close for inclement weather, a local news report stated. Last year, Barren County High School in Glasgow, Kentucky, also implemented at-home learning days instead of snow days, says Brad Johnson, the school's principal. "We've had a lot of success with it," says English teacher Keri Mosier. [Find out how teachers make up for lost time after snow days.] Students at Barren County High may get a reading passage or an ACT review packet to complete at home, for example, says Johnson. Teachers try to stay away from rolling out new material on these days and teens can communicate with instructors by phone or online, he says. Once school is back in session, students have a few extra days to turn in assignments, which count for grades. They don't have to make up these days at the end of the school year, Johnson says. Kentucky has approved dozens of districts to provide non-traditional instruction in lieu of snow days, while in Ohio some students may complete assignments -- known as "blizzard bags" -- when winter weather closes schools. Most students at Barren County High have internet access at home, Johnson says, but teachers aim to inform students about plans before school closes and provide needed hard copies of assignments. These days are a great opportunity to use technology and meet teens -- who have their phone or tablet with them all the time -- in their world and accomplish what is needed academically, says Mosier. [Get three ways to teach cell phone etiquette to high schoolers.] One recent assignment asked students reading "Great Expectations" by Charles Dickens to analyze vocabulary in the book, she says. Students made a Google Slides presentation on words they were studying. They had to define the words, provide antonyms and synonyms, and insert an image. Story continues Material at the high school level can be challenging as teachers try to get students college- and career-ready, Mosier says. "Staying focused on that material is always a plus," she says. Even without at-home learning days, Mosier thinks high school teachers elsewhere could send home assignments to keep teens on track -- similar to what many teachers do in the summer. Johnson says many Advanced Placement teachers at the school already communicated virtually with students on snow days before the new policy. Students are still getting used to the new concept, he says. Some students failed to turn in at-home assignments in the past and their grades suffered as a result, but many like finishing school on time in May. Mosier says high school teachers can motivate teens to learn outside of school by using technology. She encourages teachers to give assignments students can complete on their phone or computer. It's important for teachers to be on their computer and ready to answer any questions students may have, she says. Then, teachers can help students work through those challenges. Another way to motivate teens is to assign work that allows students to interact with their peers or teachers -- like virtual discussions, she says. Johnson says communication is the key to keeping teens on track on snow days -- for example, make sure teacher websites are up to date and encourage students to use technology. Have something of interest to share? Send your news to us at highschoolnotes@usnews.com. Alexandra Pannoni is an education digital producer at U.S. News. You can follow her on Twitter or email her at apannoni@usnews.com. As federal officials across the nation and in foreign airports dealt with the impact of President Trumps order banning refugees and nationals of seven foreign nations from entering the United States, the message his communications team brought to the public on Sunday was a simple question: Whats the big deal? Despite the large protests taking place at international airports across the country, where demonstrators demanded that officials allow legal permanent residents and refugees holding valid visas, Trumps closest advisers portrayed the detentions as minor inconveniences that were well worth the price of protecting Americans from terrorism. Related: Trump Pratfalls Onto the World Stage Targeting Muslims, Mexico, and Iraqs Oil Appearing on Fox News Sunday, Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway insisted that the number of people affected by the ban was trivial in relation to the number who actually entered the country from foreign nations on Saturday. With the upside being greater protection of our borders and our people, its a small price to pay, she said. Television screens across the country have been full of images of children and elderly people detained at airports, and distraught men and women who learned that members of their families some abroad visiting relatives, and others in possession of valid travel visas wouldnt be allowed back into the United States. Conway ridiculed the idea that there was any serious disruption taking place. This whole idea that theyre being separated, and ripped from their families? Its temporary, she said. And its just circumstantial in terms of whether you were one of those three hundred and some that was already on an aircraft or trying to get on an aircraft as opposed to the more than 3,000 children who will be forevermore separated from their parents who perished on 9/11. Related: Is This How Trump Plans to Take On China in Asia? Other administration spokespersons toed a similar line. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer insisted that the detentions of travelers amounted to a minor inconvenience, and besides, he said, nobody should be surprised because President Trump is doing exactly what he told the American people he would do. Story continues Trump did spend his presidential campaign promising to impose extreme vetting on people entering the U.S. from foreign countries. However, Spicer and other Trump spokespeople are consistently insisting that there was virtually no system in place to clear refugees coming from war-torn places like Syrian. Spicer likened the current system to an open door to let people march right into our country. This is utterly false, as multiple experts have testified. The United States refugee resettlement program involves intensive scrutiny of applicants that can take several years to complete. Yet its a line the administration is apparently sticking with, even as the plan comes under continued legal and public assault. Federal judges on Saturday issued stay orders preventing the deportation of people in the U.S. with valid visas and legal permanent residence status. Related: Heres What the US Imports From Mexico and Who Would Pay Trumps 20% Tax Conway, in her appearance on Fox, suggested the ruling was politicized, and suggested that it somehow doesnt apply to the administrations action. [The] Obama appointee judge in Brooklyns stay order really doesnt affect the executive order at all, she insisted. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus further muddied the water regarding treatment of green card holders, saying at different points that the executive order both would and would not apply to them going forward. While Republican lawmakers have been generally supportive of Trumps actions so far, some cracks were starting to appear Sunday. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said that he was against both a religious test for entry to the United States and against preventing people like Iraqi interpreters who had helped U.S. soldiers from entering the country. Some of our best sources against radical Islamic terror are Muslims, he said in an interview on Fox. He added, It will be up to the courts to decide if this went too far. Top Reads from The Fiscal Times: It was a match made in heaven for this California teen and her Chihuahua companion, with which she shares a traumatic past. Read: Chow Chow and Terrier Brothers Adopted Together After Starving Themselves While Living Apart 14-year-old Chloe Levenson-Cupp of the San Francisco Bay area suffered burn injuries after hot tea was spilled on her when she was just 1. "My burn is not very visible," she explained in an interview with HooplaHa-Only Good News. "They gave me medication so I wouldnt remember." Thats when fate brought Chloe to Fireman, the Chihuahua. Fireman was reportedly discovered abandoned with burns on his ears and stomach nearly two years ago. Authorities believed he was burned with chemicals, and may have had his ears set on fire intentionally. We knew Fireman needed somebody who would understand his situation, said Kristy Keusch, who fostered the pup. Chloe was a burn victim and Fireman was a burn victim. They connected on that level and she wouldnt have gotten that with another animal and he wouldnt have gotten that with another person. The Umbrella of Hope rescue organization arranged the medical care, fostering, adoption, and follow-up care for Fireman. Read: Cop Adopts 3-Legged Puppy After It Was Thrown From Moving Car: 'I Was the Right Officer at That Moment' Chloe said she had been begging her mom to adopt another dog for months when they met Fireman, and knew he would become the perfect companion. I am a burn survivor and I understand all the pain and how much it itches and everything, she said. Watch: Lost Dalmatian Wanders Into Fire Station, Makes Himself at Home Among Firefighters Related Articles: By Alistair Smout LONDON (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of people protested in London and other British cities against President Donald Trump's ban on entry to the United States by refugees and people from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Thousands of people, some holding placards reading "No to Racism, No to Trump", "Dump Trump" and "I stand with Muslims", joined a protest on Monday outside the Downing Street residence of Prime Minister Theresa May, the first leader to visit President Trump. Some chanted "Shame on May" for her offer to Trump of a visit to Britain while 1.5 million people signed a petition calling for Trump's planned trip - which will involve lavish displays of royal pageantry and a banquet hosted by Queen Elizabeth - to be cancelled. "It's a lot worse under Trump than I was expecting, because it's only been 10 days but he's changed so much already," Rawnak Jassm, a 23-year-old British-Iraqi, who joined the protest, told Reuters. "It's pretty scary." Trump's immigration order, which was signed just hours after his meeting with the British prime minister in Washington, has soured May's attempt to show that post-Brexit vote Britain can have a "special relationship" with the world's superpower. Some British voters, including thousands on protests across Britain, have expressed concern that May has failed to criticise Trump sufficiently for his temporary ban on travel to the United States by people from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. While the protests in Britain were smaller than those in the United States, they illustrate how Trump's first days in office have had a sometimes unexpected impact on politics across the world, even in some close allies such as Britain. Trump said the new controls were aimed at securing the United States by keeping out radical Islamic terrorists, but protesters in Britain said the measures were racist and anti-Muslim. Trump has denied the measures are anti-Muslim. "THERESA THE APPEASER"? Jassm, on the protest outside Downing Street, expressed anger at May's lack of criticism of Trump and urged the prime minister to stand up for the rights of all people. "We have to campaign and make sure May stands up for the rights of everyone everywhere," said Jassm, who is a project manager in local government. May's attempt to court Trump, who hailed Britain's June 23 vote to leave the European Union as a "wonderful thing", came in for particular criticism with some saying Britain was now in a weaker position after the Brexit vote. "With Brexit, they have to go around the world, cap in hand," said Rhys Edwards, a 29-year-old art consultant who attended the London protest. One picture of May at the protest was adorned with the words: "The lady don't protest enough". Another read: "Theresa the Appeaser". May, who wants to control immigration from the EU after Brexit, said on Monday that Britain has a different approach to immigration but that the United States was a close ally and that the invitation to Trump stood. "The United States is a close ally of the United Kingdom, we work together across many areas of mutual interest and we have that special relationship between us," May said. "I have formally issued that invitation to President Trump and that invitation stands." (Reporting by Alistair Smout; Editing by Guy L Faulconbridge) By Frank McGurty and Nathan Frandino NEW YORK/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of people rallied in U.S. cities and at airports on Sunday to voice outrage over President Donald Trump's executive order restricting entry into the country for travelers from seven Muslim-majority nations. In New York, Washington and Boston, a second wave of demonstrations followed spontaneous rallies that broke out at U.S. airports on Saturday as U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents began enforcing Trump's directive. The protests spread westward as the day progressed. The order, which bars admission of Syrian refugees and suspends travel to the United States from Syria, Iraq, Iran and four other countries on national security grounds, has led to the detention or deportation of hundreds of people arriving at U.S. airports. One of the largest of Sunday's protests took place at Battery Park in lower Manhattan, within sight of the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor, long a symbol of welcome to U.S. shores. Democratic Senator Charles Schumer of New York told the crowd that Trump's order was un-American and ran counter to the country's core values. "What we are talking about here is life and death for so many people," the Senate Democratic leader said. "I will not rest until these horrible orders are repealed." The march, estimated to have grown to about 10,000 people, later began heading to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection office in lower Manhattan. In Washington, thousands rallied at Lafayette Square across from the White House, chanting: "No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here." It was the second straight weekend that Washington was the scene of protests. Last Saturday, hundreds of thousands of women participated in an anti-Trump rally and march, one of dozens staged across the country. On Sunday, many of the protesters left the White House area and marched along Pennsylvania Avenue, stopping at the Trump International Hotel where they shouted: "Shame, shame, shame." A crowd that police estimated at 8,000 people eventually arrived at the steps of the U.S. Capitol, where a line of uniformed officers stood guard. As the crowd passed the Canadian Embassy en route to the Capitol, protesters chanted: "Hey hey, ho ho, I wish our leader was Trudeau." It was a reference to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's Saturday Twitter message affirming his country's welcoming policy toward refugees. Trump defended the executive order in a statement on Sunday, saying the United States would resume issuing visas to all countries once secure policies were put in place over the next 90 days. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," Trump said. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe." 'NEVER AGAIN MEANS NEVER' Aria Grabowski, 30, of Washington, was carrying a sign that read: Never again means never again for everyone. Above the slogan was a photograph of Jewish refugees who fled Germany in 1939 on a ship that was turned away from Havana, Cuba, and forced to return to Europe. More than 250 people aboard the ship were eventually killed by the Nazis. About 200 protesters chanted on Sunday afternoon at Washington Dulles International Airport in northern Virginia near the U.S. capital. About the same number gathered at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, where anxious families awaited relatives detained for hours after flights from countries affected by the presidential order. At Los Angeles International Airport, police estimated 4,000 demonstrators crowded into and around terminals to protest Trump's order, as chants of "refugees are welcome here" echoed through the arrivals hall. Organizers estimated that more than 10,000 people packed Boston's Copley Square to hear Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, a vocal critic of Trump and a leader of the Democratic Party's liberal wing, and other speakers. During the protests, dozens of Muslims, some of them kneeling on protest signs, bowed in prayer on rugs laid out on a grassy patch of ground in the square. In Houston, which was already filling up with visitors for next Sunday's Super Bowl, about 500 people marched through the downtown. Jennifer Fagen, 47, a sociology professor at Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas, said she hoped she did not lose her job for protesting. "I'm Jewish, and it's supposed to be 'never again,'" Fagen said, referring to the Holocaust. "Jews should be the first ones to defend Muslims, considering what has happened to us, and it seems it's being repeated under Trump." At Detroit Metropolitan Airport, police cordoned off sections of terminal as up to 3,000 demonstrators chanted, "No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here." Among the demonstrators were Wail Aljirafi and his wife, Samyeh Zindani of Ann Arbor, Michigan, and their three children. "We want them to feel that they're always included," Zindani, a Yemeni-American, told Reuters. In the Detroit suburb of Hamtramck, Michigan, home to a large number of Yemeni immigrant families and the nation's first Muslim-majority city council, at least 600 people rallied outside City Hall. Rama Alhoussaini, 23, a Syrian immigrant who lives in nearby Dearborn, said she and her family emigrated to Michigan in 1999 when she was 6 years old. "Now for us to see this kind of hatred and bigotry, it breaks my heart," she said. "It makes me feel like I am not wanted here." (Additional reporting by Susan Corwall, Ian Simpson and Lesley Wroughton in Washington, Brian Snyder in Boston, Ruthy Munoz in Houston, Chris Francescani in New York, Daina Beth Solomon in Los Angeles and Serena Maria Daniels in Detroit; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Jonathan Oatis) By Frank McGurty and Nathan Frandino NEW YORK/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of people rallied in U.S. cities and at airports on Sunday to voice outrage over President Donald Trump's executive order restricting entry into the country for travellers from seven Muslim-majority nations. In New York, Washington and Boston, a second wave of demonstrations followed spontaneous rallies that broke out at U.S. airports on Saturday as U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents began enforcing Trump's directive. The protests spread westward as the day progressed. The order, which bars admission of Syrian refugees and suspends travel to the United States from Syria, Iraq, Iran and four other countries on national security grounds, has led to the detention or deportation of hundreds of people arriving at U.S. airports. One of the largest of Sunday's protests took place at Battery Park in lower Manhattan, within sight of the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor, long a symbol of welcome to U.S. shores. Democratic Senator Charles Schumer of New York told the crowd that Trump's order was un-American and ran counter to the country's core values. "What we are talking about here is life and death for so many people," the Senate Democratic leader said. "I will not rest until these horrible orders are repealed." The march, estimated to have grown to about 10,000 people, later began heading to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection office in lower Manhattan. In Washington, thousands rallied at Lafayette Square across from the White House, chanting: "No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here." It was the second straight weekend that Washington was the scene of protests. Last Saturday, hundreds of thousands of women participated in an anti-Trump rally and march, one of dozens staged across the country. On Sunday, many of the protesters left the White House area and marched along Pennsylvania Avenue, stopping at the Trump International Hotel where they shouted: "Shame, shame, shame." A crowd that police estimated at 8,000 people eventually arrived at the steps of the U.S. Capitol, where a line of uniformed officers stood guard. As the crowd passed the Canadian Embassy en route to the Capitol, protesters chanted: "Hey hey, ho ho, I wish our leader was Trudeau." It was a reference to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's Saturday Twitter message affirming his country's welcoming policy toward refugees. Trump defended the executive order in a statement on Sunday, saying the United States would resume issuing visas to all countries once secure policies were put in place over the next 90 days. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," Trump said. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe." 'NEVER AGAIN MEANS NEVER' Aria Grabowski, 30, of Washington, was carrying a sign that read: Never again means never again for everyone. Above the slogan was a photograph of Jewish refugees who fled Germany in 1939 on a ship that was turned away from Havana, Cuba, and forced to return to Europe. More than 250 people aboard the ship were eventually killed by the Nazis. About 200 protesters chanted on Sunday afternoon at Washington Dulles International Airport in northern Virginia near the U.S. capital. About the same number gathered at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, where anxious families awaited relatives detained for hours after flights from countries affected by the presidential order. At Los Angeles International Airport, police estimated 4,000 demonstrators crowded into and around terminals to protest Trump's order, as chants of "refugees are welcome here" echoed through the arrivals hall. Organizers estimated that more than 10,000 people packed Boston's Copley Square to hear Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, a vocal critic of Trump and a leader of the Democratic Party's liberal wing, and other speakers. During the protests, dozens of Muslims, some of them kneeling on protest signs, bowed in prayer on rugs laid out on a grassy patch of ground in the square. In Houston, which was already filling up with visitors for next Sunday's Super Bowl, about 500 people marched through the downtown. Jennifer Fagen, 47, a sociology professor at Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas, said she hoped she did not lose her job for protesting. "I'm Jewish, and it's supposed to be 'never again,'" Fagen said, referring to the Holocaust. "Jews should be the first ones to defend Muslims, considering what has happened to us, and it seems it's being repeated under Trump." At Detroit Metropolitan Airport, police cordoned off sections of terminal as up to 3,000 demonstrators chanted, "No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here." Among the demonstrators were Wail Aljirafi and his wife, Samyeh Zindani of Ann Arbor, Michigan, and their three children. "We want them to feel that they're always included," Zindani, a Yemeni-American, told Reuters. In the Detroit suburb of Hamtramck, Michigan, home to a large number of Yemeni immigrant families and the nation's first Muslim-majority city council, at least 600 people rallied outside City Hall. Rama Alhoussaini, 23, a Syrian immigrant who lives in nearby Dearborn, said she and her family emigrated to Michigan in 1999 when she was 6 years old. "Now for us to see this kind of hatred and bigotry, it breaks my heart," she said. "It makes me feel like I am not wanted here." (Additional reporting by Susan Corwall, Ian Simpson and Lesley Wroughton in Washington, Brian Snyder in Boston, Ruthy Munoz in Houston, Chris Francescani in New York, Daina Beth Solomon in Los Angeles and Serena Maria Daniels in Detroit; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Jonathan Oatis) By Ben Hirschler LONDON (Reuters) - Israel's Teva Pharmaceutical Industries has won U.S. approval to market a copy of GlaxoSmithKline's best-selling Advair inhaler, although the real battle is still to come. Teva's version of GSK's blockbuster medicine, called AirDuo RespiClick, is not directly substitutable for Advair and is only approved for asthma, while Advair is also widely used for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Teva said on Monday it would launch AirDuo later this year. It has not said how much its product will cost. AirDuo provides patients with the same two drugs as Advair, fluticasone propionate and salmeterol, but it delivers a lower dose of salmeterol. It also uses Teva's Respiclick inhaler rather than a copy of GSK's device. Producing cut-price copies of Advair is a major opportunity for generics companies at a time when fewer blockbuster medicines are losing patent protection. For GSK, it is a challenge since Advair has sold more than $1 billion annually since 2001. Global Advair sales were $5.6 billion in 2015, with half that generated in the United States, although sales are now shrinking. Teva's product promises to grab some of this business in asthma but the bigger threat will come from fully substitutable generic copies of Advair, which are still pending approval. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is due to decide whether to approve the first of these, from Mylan, by March 28. A rival version from Hikma and Vectura is close behind, with an approval date of May 10. GSK said that as Teva's product was not substitutable for or equivalent to Advair it did not "pose the same competitive dynamics as market entry of generic products in the U.S. would." Advair is already available generically in Europe, but demand for copies is expected to take off more swiftly in the United States, where managers of prescription plans can quickly drive conversion to such cheaper products. Investors are watching closely to see how GSK's Advair sales will fare in the face of new competitors. One big unknown is the scale of discounts that will be offered by generic companies. (Reporting by Ben Hirschler; Editing by Susan Fenton) Hours after meeting British Prime Minister Theresa May, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order which banned the entry of all Syrian refugees into the country. He halted the entire US refugee programme for 120 days and suspended entry for all nationals from seven predominantly Muslim countries for 90 days. The next day, May was pressed to criticise the order three times during a press conference in Istanbul. Each time she dodged the question, falling back on the line that the United States is responsible for the United States policy on refugees, the United Kingdom is responsible for the United Kingdoms policy on refugees. After much criticism of this tepid response Downing Streets position gradually became more forceful. First came a late night statement that the PM did not agree with the policy and then, eventually, news that the PM had instructed both the home and foreign secretary to contact their US counterparts about how the ban may affect British citizens. The problem for May is that, on this subject in particular, responses actually do matter. A delicate balance The entire system of international human rights protection depends on states being vocal when their peers fail to live up to agreed standards and Trumps executive order is arguably in breach of a number of international human rights treaties. The mechanisms at the UN which enforce human rights treaties such as these are largely non-coercive, and instead rely on open dialogue with the state in question in order to explore how it can best fulfil its commitments. This relatively benign enforcement mechanism puts the onus on other world figures. Some clearly understand the importance of this role, among them Germanys Angela Merkel, Pope Francis and the UNs Zeid Ra'ad al Hussein. Mays hedged response, on the other hand, is both a moral failure on her part and a threat to the effectiveness of the international human rights system more generally. Story continues UN human rights bodies have been accused of double standards and politicisation for decades. When one of the founding members of the organisation refuses to criticise a close ally for its own failings, that omission is not lost on other states. May has commented that the very strength of the special relationship is that when she has concerns, she can speak frankly with Trump. Apparently the threshold for when she will do so is incredibly high. A dubious record Public responses also give some indication of how committed a state is to protecting the most vulnerable. The problem with Mays response, which only speaks to the interests of UK citizens, is that this demonstrates an inherent disinterest in the rights of others. While British dual-nationals, including Olympic Runners and MPs, may be among those discriminated against by the ban, there are thousands of nationals of other states, many of whom are refugees and asylum seekers whose government does not protect their rights, requiring equally as strong a voice. Appealing only for the protection of the interests of ones own nationals is not enough. Its even reminiscent of a pre-World War II age when states would only intervene on issues affecting their own nationals a system which worked wonders for fascist regimes. There is an argument that May is biting her tongue on Trumps actions out of concern for the UKs national interest. After all, a post-Brexit Britain, cut adrift from the EUs single market, will badly need close relationships with other states. This approach was exemplified by Downing Streets statement that it will not consider revoking Trumps invitation to a state visit, as that would undo everything achieved during Mays talks with him. However, a glance at Mays track record demonstrates that her indifferent response may not be purely pragmatic. Her record on human rights and refugee protection is questionable, to say the least. As home secretary, she ran a long battle to, in her own words, create a hostile environment for illegal immigrants. She did that by, among other things, compelling private landlords to check the immigration status of their tenants. She also backed the UKs withdrawal from maritime rescue operations in the Mediterranean, which she argued were acting as a pull factor. Within days of becoming prime minister, she scrapped a ministerial post for Syrian refugees. Her human rights record is no less hawkish. She has openly disdained left-wing human rights lawyers, proposed to exempt the UK from some human rights obligations overseas, and mounted a crusade to repeal the Human Rights Act and take Britain out of the European Convention on Human Rights. This is the context in which her response to Trumps ban should be seen. In this episode we therefore not only witness Theresa May as a pragmatic politician, but we are also reminded of Theresa May the human rights sceptic. Leaders can to some extent be measured by their responses to each other and less than a fortnight into Trumps presidency, May has been found wanting. But she wont have to wait long for another chance. Trump promises to usher in considerable changes to both internal and external US policies of all kinds. We can only hope that next time, the prime minister finds her voice and remembers whats really important. This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article. The Conversation Conall Mallory does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above. Dulles (United States) (AFP) - Throngs of noisy demonstrators -- and scores of lawyers -- poured into Dulles International Airport outside Washington to show support for immigrants impacted by President Donald Trump's contentious travel restrictions. Similar protests were taking place outside the White House and across the United States as outrage grew over Trump's executive order, signed on Friday, that imposed sweeping restrictions on some travelers to the country. Saif Rahman, a 38-year-old Iraqi-born US citizen who lives in Virginia, had just flown into Dulles from Istanbul, via Frankfurt. He said two border agents were waiting as people got off the plane. About 16 people, including him, were called in for additional screening but he was let through fairly quickly. "I just hope that we can pass this difficult period while maintaining our values as a country," Rahman said. Trump's executive order suspended the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely -- and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. With each new international arrival at Dulles, whoops of support erupted from a crowd of up to some 400 people gathered at the exit point from US customs. People handed out flowers and food, waved greeting signs and chanted slogans, including: "No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here," and "Let them in! Let them in!" It was unclear if, or how many, travelers had been detained at Dulles. Four congressmen said they had been refused access to the area where the travelers would be held, a move lawyers said was in contempt of a court order issued late Saturday. "The executive order is terrible, it's bad and we are going to fight it," Democratic Representative John Delaney told AFP. Trump should "realize the error in his ways, which is something I believe he is incapable of doing, and reverse this thing," Delaney added. Story continues Julia Mendelson, 31, came to protest with her mother. "I had family killed in the Holocaust, and I think it's shameful to have any ban on immigration," she said. "When you see injustice, it's important to stand up and do whatever possible." - 'Bigotry' - Outside the White House, thousands gathered to express their anger at Trump's move. Khadija Shakour, an American Muslim, said the order was unconstitutional. "It's wrong, it's hateful, it's bigotry," she said. "He says it's not a Muslim ban. It is a Muslim ban, especially when you say, 'I'm gonna look after the Christians,'" Shakour added, referring to Trump saying his plan favored Christian refugees. Trump's executive order has already faced legal setbacks and lawyers around the country are massing in person and online to lend pro-bono support to those whose lives have been upended by the travel ban. Kate Belinski, a Washington attorney who specializes in political law, was one of about 100 lawyers who showed up at Dulles to offer support. Several volunteer interpreters were also present to lend their help. Many attorneys held bright signs offering legal advice to anyone who had been detained or for their relatives. Belinski called it "unconscionable" to turn back travelers who have already undergone the laborious, and often yearslong process of getting visas. "It is completely beyond the pale, I never would fathom that this could be happening," Belinski said. "I am concerned this could be an incremental step. It's got to be stopped so it doesn't go further." A tiger was shot dead at a Chinese zoo after it fatally mauled a man who scaled a wall to avoid buying a zoo ticket, only to land in the animals den, officials said. Local tourism officials said the man, whose full name has not yet been released, was visiting the Youngor Zoo in Ningbo with his wife, two children and another couple Sunday when he decided to climb two walls to enter the zoo instead of paying an entrance fee, the BBC reports. The man ascended two 10-foot walls, including one that bordered the zoos tiger exhibit. He was attacked when he dropped into the den and later died at a hospital. Read More: Tiger Attacks Women in Beijing Animal Park, Killing One The tiger was killed by local police, the BBC reports. Its death was met with anger on social media from people who condemned the man for entering its enclosure. [BBC] TOKYO (AP) North Korea will be casting a dark and nuclear shadow over U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis' first foray abroad. When Mattis calls on South Korea and Japan from Wednesday he will be visiting Washington's two staunchest allies in Asia. Both host tens of thousands of American troops and both will be looking for reassurances the new administration in the U.S. is not going to drop the ball on North Korea. North Korea, racing ever closer to having a nuclear-tipped missile that could strike the U.S. mainland, is without doubt already one of the biggest security challenges on new President Donald Trump's plate. MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) A sixth person died in hospital 10 days after a man with a history of mental health and drug issues drove a car through a lunch-time crowd in a pedestrian-only street in Australia's second largest city, police said on Monday. A 33-year-old woman died on Monday night and nine victims remained in hospital after a stolen sedan caused havoc in downtown Melbourne on Jan. 20, a police statement said. One of the patients was in a critical condition. The driver, Dimitrious Gargasoulas, 26, has been charged with five counts of murder and faces a life prison sentence if convicted. YANGON, Myanmar (AP) Thousands of Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of a longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at a cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. Ko Ni, a prominent lawyer and member of Myanmar's Muslim minority, was shot in the head at close range as he walked out of the Yangon airport Sunday. The suspected shooter was apprehended while trying to escape. A statement issued late Monday by the office of President Htin Kyaw said that according to an initial interrogation, the shooting was intended "to threaten the country's stability." It said the authorities would step up security measures, and urged people not to be frightened and refrain from agitation involving race or religion. Story continues An Iraqi man is bracing for a long absence from family in the United States after President Donald Trump suspended refugee arrivals and ordered that visas no longer be issued to Iraqis. Luey Rabban said Monday from Baghdad that he was granted refugee status about eight months ago and was just waiting for a slot to join a brother and mother in the San Diego area and a sister in Michigan. The 47-year-old chef says he prepared meals for the U.S. military from 2003 to 2007 at the Baghdad airport and that a U.S. Army official got him started on his refugee application. JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, says President Donald Trump's ban on citizens of seven Muslim countries from entering the U.S. could hurt the global fight against terrorism. Foreign Ministry spokesman Armanatha Nasir said Monday that the policy is the sovereign right of the U.S. but Indonesia, which is not one of the directly affected countries, "deeply regrets" it and believes it will have a "negative impact on global efforts to fight terrorism" and the handling of refugees. "It is wrong to associate radicalism and terrorism with a particular religion," Nasir said in a statement. "Efforts to combat terrorism must be carried out by promoting international cooperation, including in addressing the root causes of terrorism." Trump on Friday signed an executive order placing a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) A Dutch tourist aboard a cruise ship near Antarctica who suffered a suspected stroke was successfully evacuated Tuesday to a U.S. base on the frozen continent. New Zealand's Rescue Coordination Centre said the 66-year-old woman was flown by the ship's helicopter to McMurdo Station and is due fly to New Zealand on Wednesday where she will receive further medical treatment. Chris Henshaw, a senior search and rescue officer, said the inhospitable conditions make medical rescues in Antarctica complex and challenging. "It's a long way from anywhere," he said. "There's not a lot of support out there." He said the woman was cared for by a doctor aboard the cruise ship Ortelius, which sailed 670 kilometers (416 miles) off its normal route to get close to the base. CANBERRA, Australia (AP) President Donald Trump had agreed to keep an Obama administration promise to resettle refugees languishing in Pacific island camps despite the U.S. toughening its stance on Muslim immigration, the Australian prime minister said Monday. Trump had agreed that during a 25-minute telephone conversation on Sunday to accept an unspecified number of refugees as promised in the final months of the previous administration, ending weeks of uncertainty, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said. "I thank President Trump for his commitment to honor that existing agreement," Turnbull told reporters. He declined to say how many refugees might be resettled in the United States. CANBERRA, Australia (AP) The White House had assured Australia that its passport holders won't be affected by President Donald Trump's executive order suspending immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, the Australian prime minister said Tuesday as he resisted pressure to join other Western leaders in publicly denouncing the travel ban. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull made the announcement after 15-year-old Pouya Ghadirian said the U.S. Consulate in Melbourne refused him a visa Monday to go on a school trip to the United States because he had an Iranian passport as well as an Australian passport. "Our ambassador has just called me to say that he's had assurances, confirmation from the White House, that Australian passport-holders regardless of their place of birth or whether they are dual nationals or whether they hold another passport will remain welcome to come and go to the United States in the usual way," Turnbull told Sky News television. KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) Malaysian authorities expanded the search for four Chinese tourists and a crew member still missing at sea Monday two days after their boat sank off Borneo island. Police detained the boat's owner and the surviving captain and crew member to assist the investigation. Three Chinese died but 22 people were rescued, most of them after huddling together in the rough waters, wearing life vests and forming human chains, finally being saved by fishermen after more than 10 hours adrift. Malaysia's Maritime Enforcement Agency said in a statement that the search area has been expanded by about four times to 1,500 square nautical miles of the South China Sea off Sabah state. MANILA, Philippines (AP) The Philippine police chief stopped the use of the national police force in anti-drug operations Monday and disbanded all police anti-narcotics units after the president's brutal crackdown was used as a cover by rogue officers to kidnap and kill a South Korean man for money. Police Director-General Ronald Dela Rosa told police officers he would use the indefinite halt of anti-drug operations to launch a massive purge of police involved in crimes. A counter-intelligence force would be formed to catch rogue officers and records of those previously implicated in crimes would be reviewed. "No more drug operations now," Dela Rosa told police officers at the main police camp, without indicating how long the ban would last. TORONTO (Reuters) - George Brown College in Toronto issued a "hold and secure" alert on Monday after shots were fired nearby and police in Canada's largest city said a man was found unconscious. The call came in at 2:47 p.m. ET, a police spokeswoman said. The college said campus buildings were locked and asked people to remain indoors, but said it was not on "lockdown". The suspect was seen fleeing the area, but police could not confirm further details. Local media reported the victim was pronounced dead. (This story corrects to say campus is under a "hold and secure" order, not on lockdown) (Reporting by Solarina Ho; editing by Diane Craft) Toyota lost its crown as the world's top-selling automaker in 2016, company figures showed Monday, with the Japanese giant overtaken by Volkswagen as the industry prepares for an uncertain trade environment under Donald Trump. The German automaker moved back into the top spot despite being hit by a massive emissions cheating scandal that rocked its reputation. The carmaker, once a paragon of German industry, was plunged into its deepest-ever crisis after it emerged in September 2015 that it installed emissions-cheating software in millions of diesel engines worldwide. However, the crisis seemed to have little effect on the firm's standing with drivers as it announced this month that annual sales rose 3.8 percent in 2016. The results were boosted by strong performance in China which helped push total sales to 10.3 million, after slipping to 9.93 in 2015. VW group also includes the brands Audi, Porsche and Skoda. On Monday Toyota said it sold 10.175 million vehicles worldwide last year, a 0.2 percent increase. The annual figures come as the industry faces an uncertain outlook year with President Trump threatening punitive tariffs on imports into the United States in a bid to force them to manufacture and hire there. Trump targeted Toyota in one his fiery tweets, criticising its ongoing project to build a new factory in Mexico and threatening it with painful tariffs. He has also pledged to review several trade deals that he says are detrimental to American workers. Japan's Kyodo News agency reported Monday that Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda will meet Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday, ahead of the latter's scheduled summit next week with Trump. Toyota said it could not comment on the report, while Japan's chief government spokesman Yoshihide Suga would not confirm it. Toyota shares ended flat Monday. "Toyota has problems in China, whereas VW is very strong in China and is using it as en engine of growth," said Hans Greimel, Asia editor for Automotive News. Story continues "That's the difference that matters," he told AFP. "They might be neck-and-neck right now but maybe long term you have to be a big player in China, and Toyota is still playing some catch-up there." "In the US, another key market, Toyota has a big advantage over VW but it is running out of steam because it is not able to tap the boom there for SUVs as much as its rivals." Volkswagen admitted in September 2015 to installing so-called "defeat devices" in 11 million vehicles worldwide, after their existence was revealed by the US Environmental Protection Agency. The software caused engines to reduce emissions of harmful nitrogen oxide when they were undergoing regulators' tests VW agreed this month to plead guilty to fraud and pay fines amounting to $4.3 billion in the United States to close its emissions cases with the Department of Justice. By Omar Fahmy and Ali Abdelaty CAIRO (Reuters) - Supporters of Islamic State mocked U.S. President Donald Trump's decision to deny entry to citizens of seven Muslim- majority countries, saying it would fail to stop attacks in the United States and help win new militant recruits instead. "Your decision will do nothing. Attacks will come at you from inside America, from Americans born in America with American parents and grandparents," one Islamic State supporter posted on Telegram, an encrypted messaging app. In a move he said would help protect the United States from terrorists, Trump signed an order on Friday suspending the entry of people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for at least 90 days. Admission of all refugees was halted for four months, and for Syrians indefinitely. The sweeping travel curbs took effect immediately, wreaking havoc for would-be travellers with passports from the seven countries and prompting an international outcry. Islamic State, which has been fighting military assaults on several fronts in its heartlands of northern Syria and Iraq, has made no formal comment on Trump's ban. But some sympathisers took to social media to pour scorn on immigration restrictions they said would serve Islamic State's cause. "Trump bans Muslims from entering America and kills them in Yemen, Iraq and Syria, then threatens them ... the wretch does not know he presents an invaluable service to Islamic State," a supporter calling himself Salem al-Mosuly wrote on Twitter. An Islamist channel on the messaging app Telegram called "Scholars of Haq", monitored by U.S. monitoring service SITE, asked whether Trump's policies meant he was currently the best "caller to Islam" - someone who attracts new believers. Of the first 48 users to respond, 34 answered that he was, according to SITE. SITE quoted one respondent, Abu Magrebi, as saying: "What Trump has done has clearly revealed the truth, and harsh reality behind the American government's hatred towards Muslims." Story continues "What is Trump doing to his country? He just become president and already people (are) protesting against his policy, and worldwide countries criticising him. Trump will bring American down God willing," Abu Magrebi wrote in another post monitored by SITE. By Monday morning, the Scholars of Haq channel had been taken down, along with several other channels on which Islamist militants had posted responses on Sunday. Other Islamic State supporters mocked an order issued by Trump on Sunday requiring his joint chiefs of staff give him a plan, in the next 30 days, to defeat the militant group. "The Crusader Trump has made himself an unthinking Pharaoh. The despicable Crusader forgets the reckless utterances of Bush Junior and the mule Obama before him. They did not succeed and by the grace of God we will rub his nose in the mud as we did his predecessors," wrote user Turjman Al Asawirti on Telegram. (Additional reporting by Sami Aboudi in Dubai and Eric Knecht in Cairo; Writing by Lin Noueihed; Editing by Peter Graff) WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Aides to U.S. President Donald Trump on Sunday called the implementation of a temporary travel ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries a "massive success story" despite criticism from some top Republicans, protests and disarray at airports. A senior administration official said the executive orders signed by Trump on Friday, which bars the admission of Syrian refugees and suspends travel to the United States from Syria, Iraq, Iran and four other countries on national security grounds, was being fully enforced by relevant agencies. "Nothing has changed," said the official, briefing reporters on condition of anonymity as rallies against the move erupted across the United States. U.S. judges in at least five states blocked federal authorities from enforcing the order. Lawyers representing people covered by the order said, however, that some authorities were unwilling to follow the court rulings. The administration official rejected criticism of the way Trump's plan had been implemented, saying: "So it really is a massive success story in terms of implementation on every single level." Senator Bob Corker, the Republican chairman of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said, however, that the application of the order was poorly implemented, particularly for green card holders, who have lawful permanent residence status. (Reporting by Lesley Wroughton and Will Dunham; Editing by Peter Cooney) Protests and Court Orders ruled the weekend after President Trump signed an executive order limiting immigration from certain muslim countries, considered to be terrorism threats. Corporate America is reacting as well. Starbucks says it will hire 10,000 refugees as a response to President Trump's order. USA Today reports that Google created a $4 million crisis fund for causes related to immigration. 6 people were killed and 9 people injured in a shooting at a mosque in Quebec. Government officials call it an act of terrorism. The Chicago Tribune quotes officials who say two suspects had been arrested. Delta Airlines has resumed limited operations after a systems outage grounded its domestic U.S. flights Sunday evening. Delta said it had canceled about 150 flights scheduled for departure, with more expected today. Trump Roe V Wade_4x3 With control of the presidency, the House of Representatives, the Senate, and at least one Supreme Court seat to fill, the GOP has the opportunity to make sweeping changes in the next four years. Since opposing abortion is part of the Republican Party's platform, Americans can expect a reproductive-rights fight will be part of the agenda. On his fourth day in office, President Donald Trump signed an executive order reinstating a gag order keeping nongovernmental organizations that receive federal funding from discussing abortion abroad. While Trump once supported abortion, he has since reversed his position, saying in his first interview after winning the election that he wants to appoint "pro-life" judges with the goal of overturning Roe v. Wade. His highly conservative nominee to fill the vacant Supreme Court seat, Neil Gorsuch, is expected to try to carry out this mission. The landmark Supreme Court case, decided in 1973, gave women a constitutional right to safe, legal abortions and the justices have upheld that precedent for over four decades. 'Death by 1,000 cuts' Roe would likely fall in one of two ways, according to Dawn Johnsen, a constitutional scholar from Indiana University and the legal director of NARAL Pro-Choice America from 1988 to 1993. The most drastic way the court could get rid of Roe would be to overturn the case. The more likely scenario, however, would see the court letting Roe stand but incrementally upholding laws that restrict access, making abortions impossible to get rendering the procedure virtually illegal over time. States have been trying to pass outright bans for years. They've been most successful at enacting laws that make it more difficult or upsetting for women to get abortions. Some laws require women to have funerals for aborted fetuses, or require waiting periods between appointments. supreme court abortion decision celebrating Story continues Glenn Cohen, a health-law expert and professor at Harvard Law School, said two kinds of laws provide the most likely paths for SCOTUS to overturn or undermine Roe. The first are known as fetal-pain laws. They aim to ban abortions when a fetus can feel pain, which legislators typically claim is after 20 weeks, though scientists disagree. The Supreme Court has ruled that abortions are legal up to viability when a fetus can survive on its own outside the womb but has neglected to define exactly when that is, and hasn't taken on a fetal-pain statute, Cohen said. The second kind of law is what reproductive rights activists call Targeted Restrictions on Abortion Providers, or TRAP laws, that impose strict requirements on abortion clinics and providers. A TRAP law was at the heart of a major case taken up by the court this past year, Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt. The law in question required abortion clinics in Texas to meet strict standards, from the exact size of the examination rooms to admission privileges doctors had to secure for admitting patients to local hospitals. In June, the Supreme Court ruled in a 5-3 decision that the law "provides few, if any, health benefits for women, poses a substantial obstacle to women seeking abortions, and constitutes an 'undue burden' on their constitutional right to do so." Presumably, that means the high court has a 5-3 majority at the moment that supports abortion, Cohen said. If it were to switch course and uphold similar laws over time, the court could chip away at abortion access in the US. The gradual erosion of Roe v. Wade is a much more likely scenario for diminishing abortion access, according to Cohen, because Chief Justice John Roberts often plays the "long game." Roberts hasn't explicitly come out against Roe or abortion (as is tradition with justices), but he has said he respects the precedence of Roe yet supported abortion restrictions in Supreme Court cases while on the bench. "Roberts, in particular, has often preferred the method of 'death by 1,000 cuts' to get rid of decisions he does not like narrow it, make small changes, et cetera., in a series of cases," Cohen told Business Insider. "He is very honorably committed to the idea of the integrity of the court, and my own sense is he would not favor a dramatic action that would cause half the country to lose faith in the court." What would happen if Roe were overturned? The short answer: Abortion rights would be up to the states. If Roe fell, 13 states have laws on the books banning abortion, so the practice would be illegal there immediately. Other states would likely act quickly to pass similar "trigger" laws. As Trump said in his first interview as president, that would mean women in those states would "have to go to another state" to get an abortion. Restrictive abortion policies at the state-level tend to have a "hugely disproportionate impact on poor women, immigrant women, women of color, and women in rural areas," said Stephanie Toti, the lead attorney on the Whole Woman's Health case and a senior counsel at the Center for Reproductive Rights. Your ZIP code will start to determine whether you have access to safe abortion. That would likely become even more apparent if Roe fell. "What we would end up with is a country where there is a patchwork of rights depending on where you live," Toti told Business Insider. "Your ZIP code will start to determine whether you have access to safe abortion, and other reproductive health services, or not. "As we learned from our recent experience in Texas, while the very restrictive clinic shut down law was in effect in that state, not every woman can afford to travel out of state to access abortion care," she added. BI Graphics_Abortion Clinics Per State (2) final Research coordinated by the University of Texas supports Toti's assertion. After Texas' law went into effect in 2013, the number of clinics providing abortions in the state dropped in half, from 41 to 18, as of November 2015 increasing the number of women who lived over 50 miles from a clinic in Texas from 1.2 million to 4.2 million. How likely is it that Roe will be overturned? Toti said she doesn't think Roe is in "any immediate jeopardy," largely because both the Supreme Court and a majority of Americans support abortion. Pew Research Center polls have found that 59% of US adults today support the legality of abortion in general and 69% want the Supreme Court to uphold Roe both numbers that have risen over time. Roe v Wade Views poll BI Graphics On January 31, Trump announced his Supreme Court justice nomination, Neil Gorsuch, to fill the late Justice Antonin Scalia's seat. The 49-year-old judge was appointed to the 10th Circuit US Court of Appeals by President George W. Bush in 2006. While he's never ruled directly on abortion, he did vote against the so-called contraception mandate in the Affordable Care Act in the Hobby Lobby decision before it went up to the Supreme Court and a majority of justices agreed with Gorsuch's opinion. Even if the Senate approves Gorsuch's nomination, Toti said, the court will likely still have a 5-4 majority that would uphold Roe. "Less than four months ago, a majority of Supreme Court justices reaffirmed more than four decades of precedent holding that every woman has a fundamental, constitutional right to access abortion. We are confident that the court will not back away from that," Toti said. "Regardless of how the current vacancy is filled, that majority decision stands as controlling precedent." It will likely be some time before Gorsuch can actively participate in cases, as well. Toti estimated that the lengthy Senate approval process will sideline the new justice from deciding on cases until at least October 2017. And even if Gorsuch is aggressively anti-Roe, Trump would still need another justice to retire or die to shift the balance, an unlikely scenario in the next four years. Not everyone is as optimistic as Toti. If Trump is elected for a second term, the chances of him choosing another justice go up as do the chances of Roe falling. Johnsen, the constitutional law expert, pointed to Vice President Mike Pence, who has enacted some of the strictest antiabortion laws in the country as governor of Indiana, as evidence of which way the political winds are blowing. "I am very pessimistic about it, and that's because I'm thinking about the range of ways Roe can fall that would not require the Supreme Court to actually say, 'We are overruling Roe v. Wade,'" Johnsen said. "We've seen the kinds of laws that would shut clinics, and ban abortions for reasons, and force women to be interrogated by their doctors and that all could be upheld without the Supreme Court actually saying, 'We're overruling Roe v. Wade.'" Abortion rights advocates prepare for a fight abortion supreme court Advocacy groups are gearing up for a fight, and they received an outpouring of donations after the election to help them wage costly court battles across the country. "We will continue to fight for a country in which all women have access to safe abortion, contraception, and safe pregnancy care," Toti said. "We haven't met that ideal yet. We don't have that situation now. There are women in many parts of the country who face lots of challenges, but we are going to keep pushing to move forward and to make things better, and we won't allow backsliding." Erica Sackin, director of political communications for Planned Parenthood, told Business Insider that the healthcare provider is "absolutely gearing up for a huge fight," and that the wave of donations they received underline how many people support upholding Roe including those who voted for Trump. "We've seen a number of laws across the country that try to take away women's access to safe, legal abortions. At the heart of it, these laws are unpopular, and they are dangerous," Sackin said. "For the people who come to Planned Parenthood, for the people who need to access abortion, this isn't about politics. It's about basic healthcare." NOW WATCH: 'Is abortion murder?' Watch Trump's latest garbled response More From Business Insider Jerusalem (AFP) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Iran on Monday of launching a ballistic missile in what he said constitutes a "flagrant violation" of a UN Security Council resolution. In a statement on his Facebook page, Netanyahu said he intended to "raise the renewal of sanctions against Iran in this context and in other contexts" in his upcoming meeting with US President Donald Trump. The White House said on Monday that Trump will host Netanyahu on February 15. Israel's archfoe Iran has carried out a number of missile tests in recent months, which the United States and European governments have said are a breach of its commitments under the 2015 nuclear deal. Western powers say the missiles are capable of carrying nuclear warheads and therefore go against the deal, while Iran says its missile programme is "non-negotiable". Israel had opposed the deal between Iran and major powers, which lifted a wide range of international sanctions in exchange for limits on Iran's nuclear programme. "Iranian aggression must not go unanswered," Netanyahu wrote on Monday. Https%3a%2f%2fblueprint-api-production.s3.amazonaws.com%2fuploads%2fcard%2fimage%2f366165%2f73f0372f-e095-4833-8d67-eda253bdd678 After an emotional, chaos-filled weekend stemming from Donald Trump's ordered immigration ban, people are taking every Trump-related tweet into serious consideration... even ones from 2011. Following the order which resulted in protests at airports across the United States after legal U.S. residents and immigrants were detained Twitter users happened upon a nearly six-year-old tweet from the official Trump Hotels account, representing the president's former business franchise. Then came the trolling. SEE ALSO: Celebrities shared their outrage following Trump's immigration ban On Oct. 11, 2011, Trump Hotels simply asked followers to recall and share their favorite travel memories whether that be a photograph, a souvenir or a sunset. Tell us your favorite travel memory - was it a picture, a souvenir, a sunset? We'd love to hear it! Trump Hotels (@TrumpHotels) October 11, 2011 The tweet wasn't very popular back in the day, but following Trump's controversial immigration ban on Friday things started to get heated. Twitter users began replying to the 2011 tweet, sharing powerful travel-related memories about loved ones and personal experiences to inform President Trump what life is really like for immigrants. @TrumpHotels Visiting San Francisco the American city my grandparents settled in after leaving the Philippines after WWII. Cate Sevilla (@CateSevilla) January 29, 2017 @TrumpHotels They escaped concentration camps and a country devastated by war. They weren't turned away and I'm here today because of it. Cate Sevilla (@CateSevilla) January 29, 2017 @TrumpHotels @nybooks It was to Syria. In 2010. A beautiful place. A country full of warm, welcoming people who greeted us everywhere like friends. Sarah Ra (@hundredgrapes) January 28, 2017 That time I fled Communist Romania to a refugee camp in Austria, came to America, & years later became an exec @Google creating 10ks of jobs https://t.co/iaerM5gLHc Laszlo Bock (@LaszloBock2718) January 29, 2017 @TrumpHotels 1922 when my grandma sailed the Haverford to flee violence - was welcomed in America openly by Republican president. pic.twitter.com/IRUFFpDtPj Matt Grocoff (@mattgrocoff) January 30, 2017 .@TrumpHotels hearing about my grandfather's perilous trip to America by boat as a child alone. I wonder if he would be let in today? Noah Scalin (@NoahScalin) January 29, 2017 If you knew the humiliation one has to go through to become a refugee or asylee in this country you wouldn't be able to contain your anger Aminatou Sow (@aminatou) January 28, 2017 @TrumpHotels Been to UAE. Great time. Not on your stupid Muslim ban even tho' they've got Muslims. Oh but you have a hotel there. Got it. Ato Essandoh (@AtoEssandoh) January 29, 2017 @TrumpHotels A photo of my father on the boat that brought him from the Philippines to his new home in California. #immigration #resist Veronica Montes (@vmontes) January 28, 2017 @vmontes @TrumpHotels my Lolo & his family coming to Daly City, where they would make a home in a welcoming country pic.twitter.com/o8wS6DG5Jw Vida Wadhams (@VidaWadhams) January 29, 2017 @TrumpHotels I enjoyed the hospitality of @Airbnb; an experience made even more memorable in comparison with Trump's hideous #MuslimBan. pic.twitter.com/webVkEpbJp kim (@kim) January 29, 2017 @TrumpHotels I remember the old days, when you could travel abroad without feeling ashamed of being an American in the Trump era. David Walker (@DavidWalk3) January 28, 2017 Over the weekend, a tweet from Trump's daughter Ivanka, showing her and her husband Jared Kushner ready for a night out, also came under fire, and a handful of celebrities used Twitter to share their thoughts on the president's immigration ban. New York (AFP) - Many American businesses are publicly breaking with President Donald Trump over his anti-immigration policies, saying they could damage competitiveness by limiting access to the best and brightest employees. Criticism of Trump's order has been most virulent in Silicon Valley, where chiefs of tech firms Apple, Microsoft, Airbnb and Google were among those to blast the policy, unveiled late Friday, which prohibits people from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States, and includes a temporary ban on refugees. Protests erupted at airports nationwide over the weekend, while lawsuits led to judges blocking parts of the order, which initially prevented some legal US residents from returning home. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings called the policies "un-American." Executives outside of the technology industry have joined in pointing out the perils of the immigration policies as well, although they are more cautious about provoking the administration, which is expected to pursue favored policies such as tax cuts and regulatory relief. Any criticism could trigger blowback from Trump, who has frequently lambasted individual companies, including Ford, General Motors, Toyota, Boeing and Lockheed. - Looking out for employees - Company chiefs, in messages to employees, have emphasized the importance of a diverse workforce and promised to support employees. "This is not a policy we support," Goldman Sachs chief executive Lloyd Blankfein told employees in a recorded voice mail. "I want to assure all of you that we will work to minimize such disruption to the extent we can within the law and are focused on supporting our colleagues and their families who may be affected." JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, who is on a council of corporate chief executives tasked with advising Trump on job growth, promised "unwavering commitment" to staff in a statement. Goldman and JPMorgan have vast international businesses that advise and provide financing to foreign governments, multinationals and private individuals. Story continues Boston-based General Electric, whose chief executive Jeff Immelt, also sits on a Trump business advisory board, came out against the policy. "We have many employees from the named countries and we do business all over the region," Immelt said. "We stand with them and will work with the US Administration to strive to find the balance between the need for security and the movement of law abiding people." Last week, Iraq signed a billion-dollar deal with GE for the construction of two power plants. But the Iraqi government has criticized Trump for targeting the country in the ban, and parliament urged the government to retaliate against Americans entering the country if Washington refuses reconsider. GM, which Trump has criticized for building cars in Mexico, sent a statement to all employees on Sunday saying a few are from countries affected by the order, and pledging to provide support to any worker who encounters difficulty while traveling. Stressing that it welcomes individuals of all races, nationality, gender, culture or sexual orientation, GM said, "Empowering these unique perspectives keeps GM on the cutting edge of technological innovation in the fast-paced automotive industry." And Ford, which also has sparred with Trump over its Mexican operations, criticized the immigration policy, saying the company is "proud of the rich diversity" of workers. "That is why we do not support this policy or any other that goes against our values as a company." Boeing, which has been a Trump target for high costs of the Air Force One presidential airplane, did not respond to AFP requests for comment. ExxonMobil, whose former chief executive is in line to be Trump's secretary of state, also did not respond to requests for comment. ExxonMobil has projects in Yemen, one of the seven countries affected by the ban. The US Chamber of Commerce said the policy is creating confusion for companies with employees who are legal residents or dual nationals. A Chamber spokesperson told AFP "we hope the administration can quickly clarify how these will be handled." President Donald Trumps executive order barring citizens of seven Muslim countries from entering the country threatens to increase the risk of terror attacks and endanger U.S. troops abroad by alienating allies, angering Muslim populations, and handing a propaganda coup to Islamist extremists. The executive order signed Friday is ostensibly meant to protect the United States from terrorism, but will almost certainly have the opposite effect, said experts, former senior officials, and lawmakers from both parties. The order quickly sparked chaos and confusion at airports across America, and prompted immediate reprisals from some countries. Members of Iraqs parliament called for retaliating by blocking all visas for Americans, including contractors and journalists trying to enter the country. U.S. diplomats in Baghdad warned Washington in a memo Saturday that the order could inflict lasting damage to bilateral relations with a U.S. ally fighting Islamic State militants, and could jeopardize the safety of American diplomats and contractors on the ground, The Wall Street Journal reported. Top Republican lawmakers also underscored how counterproductive the order is likely to prove. Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism, said Sen. John McCain (R- Ariz) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said in a joint statement on Sunday. They said that the executive order will alienate key Muslim allies, and we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security. The move was not something counter-terrorism officials had lobbied for or championed. Their focus has been on finding better ways to counter Islamic States online propaganda and forging closer cooperation with other governments including in the Middle East to uncover terrorist plots and networks. Instead, experts and lawmakers said, the order provides a propaganda jackpot that Islamic State could never have managed on its own. Story continues Within 24 hours of Trump signing the order, Islamic State propagandists began exploiting the travel ban on social media. In one message an Islamic State propagandist seized on the order to harangue Muslims who cooperate with the United States to combat Islamist terror groups. The dogs of the cross should know their true value now, he wrote, referring to collaborators. Worthless! The executive order suspended entry of all refugees to the United States for 120 days, banned Syrian refugees indefinitely, and blocked entry into the United States for 90 days for citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The ban included interpreters who assisted U.S. troops in Iraq. The action blindsided career civil servants in the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security, who were not consulted in advance and who struggled to carry it out over the weekend, prompting chaos and confusion across the nation. The order also triggered a flurry of legal challenges that have already turned into a court battle for the new administration. Federal judges in at least four states issued ordered deportations to be halted temporarily, but the White House reportedly ordered Customs and Border Patrol agents to defy the court rulings. Dozens of protests erupted Sunday in cities across the country, including in Washington. Thousands of demonstrators gathered outside the White House before marching to the Capitol building. Sen. Diane Feinstein (D.-Calif.) said she will introduce legislation to rescind the executive order and to curtail the presidents ability to change immigration policies with the stroke of a pen. The sweeping action against people from Muslim-majority countries, including permanent legal U.S. residents, reflected the growing influence of Trumps senior advisor and strategist, Stephen Bannon, the architect of the presidents populist campaign rhetoric demonizing immigrants and Muslim refugees in particular. As a candidate, Trump promised a ban on all Muslims entering the country, before later revising it to apply to people from terror prone countries. Bannons growing power in the White House was underscored Saturday by an extraordinary presidential memo giving him a bigger role in national security decisions, while marginalizing the countrys top military officer and top intelligence official. The reorganization of the National Security Council gives Bannon a white nationalist fond of conspiracy theories, who previously ran the right-wing media outlet Breitbart a regular seat on the principals committee, a meeting of senior security officials such as the secretaries of state and defense. Meanwhile, the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff will not have a permanent place on the committee, a break with the past two administrations. Trump signed the executive order in a ceremony at the Pentagon as Defense Secretary James Mattis applauded. The retired four-star general, revered for his combat experience in the Middle East, had spoken out against any ban on Muslims entering the country last year. Mattis supporters in Congress had hoped he could play a moderating role in the Trump White House, but the executive order called into question whether the new defense secretary will be able to steer the administration on a more restrained course. The White House dismissed criticism from lawmakers, rights groups and foreign governments, saying Trump was merely carrying out the promises he made in the presidential campaign. The safety of the American citizens, the safety of our country has got to be paramount. And thats what the president did yesterday, is to ensure that the people that were letting into our country are coming here with peaceful purposes and not to do us harm, spokesman Sean Spicer told ABCs This Week. The rationale for Trumps executive order banning entry to millions of foreigners appeared to be based on an ill-informed view of the nature of the terrorist threat facing the United States, experts and former officials said. No terrorist attack over the past 16 years has been traced to the seven countries listed in the executive order. Saudi Arabia and Egypt, which were home to the founders of al Qaeda and other extremist groups, were excluded from the list, as was Pakistan long considered a hotbed for Qaeda and other jihadists. The travel restrictions also did not affect countries where Trumps family has business investments, including Turkey. The most recent attacks on U.S. soil were carried out by American-born U.S. citizens, such as the attacks on a nightclub in Orlando, Fl. and a shooting rampage in San Bernadino, Calif. Both the Obama and Bush administrations had taken pains to distinguish between Islam and extremists in the Islamic State or other groups promoting a macabre ideology of violence and sectarian bloodshed. But Trumps executive order and his public statements seemed to conflate the two. The executive order said that to protect Americans, the United States must ensure that those admitted to this country do not bear hostile attitudes toward it and its founding principles. But experts and former officials said the order could not be justified on security grounds. This policy is about religious and racial exclusion, not security, said author and researcher J.M. Berger, who has spent years studying extremism and its propaganda. Even if you push through the moral repugnance of the ban, it fails on practicality grounds and costs us far more than any theoretical security gain and that gain is at best highly theoretical. Since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, the U.S. military has learned first hand about the dangers of perceived insults to Islam, and has had to change tactics or apologize when troops have overstepped cultural boundaries. When U.S. soldiers inadvertently burned Korans in Afghanistan in 2012, the country erupted in a wave of outrage and protests. Two U.S. soldiers were killed in the riots and the White House issued an apology. While Iraq, a U.S. ally, has borne the brunt of the fighting against Islamic State with the help of U.S. airpower, the drastic and chaotic nature of the executive order promises to give ISIS and other Islamist groups a much-needed lifeline, said Luay al-Khateeb, an energy adviser to the Iraqi government. To tell the truth, ISIS is no longer Iraqs major threat, but rather its the unpredictability and ill-advised moves and thoughts of the new U.S. administration that keeps our nascent democracy endangered, he said. Sen. Ben Cardin, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called the order a betrayal of our friends and those who stood with us and that it promises to make the U.S. less safe and places our courageous servicemen and women in even greater danger as they fight against terrorism. A former senior official counter-terrorism official said the Trump administration was seemingly ignorant of current vetting procedures. To say that the same systems that kept terrorists out of the country for 15 years is not high enough scrutiny for a mother and her six year old child? That to me is insane, thats a bit more than insane, thats a little unhinged, the official told FP. Jon Finer, former chief of staff and director of policy planning at the State Department, said that the consequences for counter-terrorism cooperation could extend far beyond Iraq, with other countries not covered in the order retaliating against U.S. travelers, because hundreds of thousands of dual nationals are now blocked. He added that Americas willingness to take in refugees from Syria has been crucial for countries such as Jordan and Turkey as they try to justify counter-terrorism cooperation with the United States to domestic political audiences, he said. Now those governments will come under renewed pressure to rebuff Washingtons requests. European allies, already alarmed at Trumps protectionist program and skepticism toward NATO, expressed dismay and criticized the move in conversations with the new president. In a telephone conversation on Saturday with Trump, German Chancellor Angela Merkel reminded the U.S. president that the Geneva Convention on refugees requires all members states to take in those fleeing war. The chancellor is convinced that the resolute fight against terrorism does not justify blanket suspicion on grounds of origin or belief, Steffen Seibert, a spokesman for Ms. Merkel, said in a statement. French President Francois Hollande told Trump in a phone conversation that defending democratic principles required abiding by the principles on which it is founded, in particular the acceptance of refugees, the Elysee Palace said in a statement. Indonesian Foreign Minister Rento Marsudi, who said his country, which has the worlds largest Muslim population, has deep regrets about the policy. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif tweeted on Sunday that the country will take reciprocal measures against Americans, and noted that the move will be recorded in history as a great gift to extremists and their supporters. FP reporters Elias Groll, John Hudson, Molly OToole, Reid Standish, Ruby Mellen, and Colum Lynch contributed to this report. Photo Credit: OLIVIER DOULIERY-POOL/Getty Images President Donald Trump lashed out at Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham Sunday, accusing the two of looking to start World War III. McCain, R-Ariz., and Graham, R-S.C., warned Trump suspending arrivals of refugees and others from seven Muslim-majority countries would do more to help terrorist recruiting efforts than enhance U.S. security. "Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism," they said in a statement. "This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security." Trump issued an executive order Friday that would suspend immigration from Syria indefinitely and for at least 90 days from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen, as well as halt the U.S. refugee program for at least 120 days so that extreme vetting procedures can be put into place. The order already has been blocked by four federal judges. Trump called the senators statement wrong and described the pair as sadly weak on immigration. He called on them to focus their energies on the Islamic State group, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III. Trump issued a statement Sunday saying his actions are similar to that taken by former President Barack Obama in 2011 "when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. "The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe," the White House statement said. Story continues Before issuing the statement, McCain said on CBS Face the Nation Trumps executive order had not been properly vetted. There are so many questions: For example, it didn't filter down to our customs people who can come in, who can't. Is a green-card holder, as was originally interpreted, who's legally in this country, can that person be barred from coming into the country?" McCain asked. McCain said he talked with former CIA director David Petraeus, who expressed concern about interpreters who have helped the U.S. military and are literally in danger as we speak. Trump spent part of the day Sunday talking with Middle East leaders, including Saudi King Salman and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad of the United Arab Emirates, pledging to step up the fight against terrorism. They all agreed safe zones should be set up for refugees, the White House said. Related Articles President Trump is blaming the airport chaos that followed his controversial executive order temporarily banning immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries on protesters, a computer outage at Delta Air Lines and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumers teary-eyed response to the ban. Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning, Trump tweeted early Monday. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,.. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 I noticed Chuck Schumer yesterday with fake tears, Trump said before a meeting with small-business leaders at the White House on Monday morning. Im going to ask him who was his acting coach. Because I know him very well and I dont see him as a crier. If he is, hes a different man. Schumer broke down in tears on Sunday as he announced that Democrats are considering legislation to overturn Trumps order, which bars people from seven countries Syria, Sudan, Yemen, Iran, Iraq, Libya and Somalia from entering the United States for 90 days. Story continues This executive order was mean-spirited and un-American, Schumer said at a press conference in New York City, where he was surrounded by families affected by the ban. It was implemented in a way that created chaos and confusion across the country, and it will only serve to embolden and inspire those around the globe who will do us harm. The move sparked a wave of protests at airports around the country on Saturday after more than 100 people, including some with current visas, were detained or turned around. On Saturday night, a federal judge in Brooklyn issued an emergency stay temporarily blocking part of Trumps order. The decision, which will affect people who have been detained in airports, came after the American Civil Liberties Union and other activist groups filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of two Iraqis who were held at New York Citys John F. Kennedy International Airport. People participate in a protest against Trumps travel ban outside Terminal 4 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City on Saturday night. (Andrew Kelly/Reuters) It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trumps executive order was not properly vetted, Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said in a joint statement issued Sunday afternoon. We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defense, Justice and Homeland Security. Trump disputed the characterization that the order caused chaos, and dismissed criticism that it was issued with little or no warning. If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the bad would rush into our country during that week, Trump tweeted Monday. A lot of bad dudes out there! If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 He also took a swipe at McCain and Graham, accusing the pair of national security hawks of constantly pushing for World War III. In an interview with NBCs Meet the Press Sunday, White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said the administrations lack of advance notice was by design. I dont think you want a grace period, Priebus said. Because then people who want to do bad things to Americans would just move up their travel date two days in order to get into the country before the grace period is over. And if you ask, a lot of the people at the customs and border patrol would just tell you youve got to just rip off the Band-Aid and you have to move forward. On Sunday, tens of thousands of people gathered at airports and in cities around the world to demonstrate against the ban, including more than 20,000 in Boston alone. Protesters hold signs as they block a road during a demonstration against the immigration ban imposed by Trump at Los Angeles International Airport on Sunday. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images) America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border, Trump said in a statement issued late Sunday afternoon. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave. We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say. The seven countries named in the executive order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror, Trump continued. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. Late Sunday night, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly said it would remain in compliance with judicial orders while continued to enforce President Trumps executive order humanely and with professionalism. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems, Trump tweeted Monday. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN! Where was all the outrage from Democrats and the opposition party (the media) when our jobs were fleeing our country? Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 Trump added: Where was all the outrage from Democrats and the opposition party (the media) when our jobs were fleeing our country? More from Yahoo News: _____ Related slideshows: Slideshow: Protests against Trumps travel ban hit the streets of NYC >>> Slideshow: Anti-Trump protesters rally for Muslim and immigrant rights >>> Slideshow: Protests at U.S. airports over travel ban >>> The Trump administration is poised to pay back many of its general election supporters with a Supreme Court pick in the mold of, as the new vice president recently described him, the late, great Antonin Scalia. President Trump on Monday morning announced via Twitter that he has made his choice of a nominee for the empty seat on the Supreme Court and that he will announce his decision Tuesday evening at 8 p.m. The move represents an acceleration of the original timetable, presumably in part to deflect attention from the growing controversy that has swirled around Trumps executive order banning refugees and residents of several Muslim-majority countries from entering the US. The addition of a Republican appointee to the court will roughly restore the balance of conservative and liberal justices that had prevailed prior to the death of Justice Antonin Scalia last year. But the selection is heavily freighted with significance for both Trumps supporters and his political opponents for at least two more reasons. Related: Extreme Muslim Immigration Ban Suggests Bannon Is Running the White House Many conservatives had reservations about supporting Trump during the election because of concerns about his character, conflicts of interest, and policies. But they came around when he promised to select a justice from a list of candidates assembled by the Heritage Foundation and the Federalist Society, reasoning that their highest duty was to prevent Hillary Clinton from creating a liberal majority on the court. After a chaotic first week of his presidency, they will be looking to Trumps pick as justification of their support for a candidate whose actions in office have so far confirmed many of those initial fears. Liberals will likely greet this appointee with unconcealed anger. Scalias vacant seat was held open by the Republican-controlled Senate that, in defiance of all precedent, refused to allow a vote on President Obamas nominee last year. There have been suggestions of an almost unprecedented filibuster of the nominee unless Trump surprises with a moderate selection. Story continues So far, that looks very unlikely. The smart money has the short list down to three: Related: Team Trump on Immigration Disruption: Its a Small Price to Pay Many believe the frontrunner to be Judge Neil Gorsuch who sits on the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Denver. A 49-year-old Harvard-trained lawyer, Gorsuch clerked for sitting Justice Anthony Kennedy before spending time in private practice and serving in the George W. Bush Justice Department. Another is Judge Thomas Hardiman, of the 3rd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Pittsburgh. Hardiman is considered a tough law-and-order judge; he wrote an opinion (later affirmed by the Supreme Court) that held mandatory strip searches of all arrestees is not a violation of the unreasonable search clause in the Fourth Amendment. A Georgetown University Law School graduate, he is 51 years old. A third is Judge William Pryor, of the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Birmingham. The oldest of the candidates at 54, Pryor was a popular Alabama attorney general before becoming a judge. In one of the notable episodes of his prosecutorial career, in 2003 he called for the removal of Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore over his refusal to obey a federal court order to remove a sculpture featuring the 10 Commandments from his courthouse. At the time, Pryor said that while he disagreed with the ruling, it was not acceptable for Moore to violate it. All three of the nominees appear to be strong opponents of abortion rights, something that many of Trumps supporters view as a litmus test for the nomination, even though the administration itself insists that there is no such test. Top Reads from The Fiscal Times: WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump and South Korean Acting President Hwang Kyo-ahn agreed to take steps to strengthen joint defense capabilities to defend against North Korea's nuclear threat, the White House said on Sunday after a telephone call between the two leaders. "President Trump reiterated our ironclad commitment to defend (South Korea), including through the provision of extended deterrence, using the full range of military capabilities," the White House said in a statement. It also said Trump and Hwang discussed the upcoming visit by the new U.S. defense secretary to Japan and South Korea, where shared concerns about North Korea will top the agenda. The United States and South Korea have agreed to deploy a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system designed to protect against North Korea's growing nuclear and ballistic capabilities despite objections from China, which says the radar could penetrate Chinese territory. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said on Jan. 1 his country was close to test-launching an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), and state media has said a launch could come at any time. North Korea has maintained its nuclear and missile programs in violation of repeated rounds of international sanctions. (Reporting by Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Will Dunham) By Isabel Coles ERBIL, Iraq (Reuters) - Khudeeda Naif won refuge in the United States as a member of Iraq's Yazidi minority, but what he fears more than religious persecution is retribution for his brother's work as an interpreter for the U.S. army in Iraq. Naif is one of the many affected by the U.S. President Donald Trump's decision on Friday to temporarily ban the entry of refugees and others from seven Muslim-majority countries. Naif was scheduled to leave Iraq this week with his wife and two children when the International Organization for Migration (IOM) told him the trip was off until further notice. The 35-year-old electrical technician will remain instead at a refugee camp in Dohuk, northern Iraq, where he has lived since Islamic State militants overran the Sinjar area in the summer of 2014, purging its Yazidi inhabitants. The insurgents systematically killed, captured and enslaved thousands of Yazidis, whose beliefs combine elements of several ancient Middle Eastern religions and are regarded by Islamic State as devil-worshippers. A U.N.-appointed commission of independent war crimes investigators said last year the crimes against the Yazidis amounted to a genocide. Naif fled across the border to Syria on foot with his immediate family and thousands of other Yazidis before returning to Dohuk. But the family was afraid for their lives even before the Islamic State started its attacks. "People came here (to the camp) because there was a threat to the Yazidis in general, but for the people who worked for the Americans we had to be cautious even when we were home," he said, contacted on the phone from the Kurdish capital Erbil. Trump's executive order bars the admission of people from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. The order said "religious minorities facing persecution in their countries" would be given priority when refugee admissions resume. More than one hundred Yazidis are waiting for their IOM asylum applications to be processed, Saib Khidr, a prominent Yazidi lawyer and human rights activist close to the Baba Sheikh, the top religious leader of the community. A Yazidi woman was denied boarding a flight to the United States on Sunday, he said. Khidr said he had hoped Yazidis would be among those given priority but was concerned that Trump only mentioned the persecution of Syrian Christians when asked about the issue in an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network. "We're disappointed," he told Reuters in Baghdad. "We're waiting for the American side to clarify its position." Germany, Canada and the United States are usually the top desired destinations for Iraq's Yazidis, Khidr said. Naif said his brother was killed in a suicide bombing along with two Americans in 2008 when U.S. forces occupied the country from 2003 to 2011. Although Iraqis working for the Americans use a pseudonym, his brother's identity -- and by extension that of his family -- was revealed when he was killed. "Eventually, we are going to get killed," Naif said. Naif's family obtained a refugee visa to join his four sisters, brother and mother in the United States after six months of interviews and medical tests. Interpreters and translators who worked for the U.S. military and American state agencies in Iraq are eligible to apply to a Special Immigration Visa (SIV). U.S. consular services are currently processing "fewer than 500" application under the SIV program, said a State Department official. Overall, "more than 20,000 Iraqis have received immigrations benefits" from this program, the official said. "We hope that he (Trump) changes his mind and at least takes the people who worked with them (the Americans)," Naif said. "We protected them," he said. "We never expected this." (Additional reporting by Maher Chmaytelli in Baghdad; Editing by Sonya Hepinstall) Geneva (AFP) - The UN refugee agency said Monday it was "alarmed" by the consequences of US President Donald Trump's order barring refugee arrivals, describing those targeted as "anxious, confused and heartbroken." "This week alone, over 800 refugees were set to make America their new home," the Geneva-based UNHCR said in a statement. The order signed by Trump on Friday suspends arrivals by refugees in general for 120 days and Syrian refugees indefinitely. "UNHCR estimates that 20,000 refugees in precarious circumstances might have been resettled to the United States during the 120 days covered by the suspension," the statement added, basing that figure on averages over the last 15 years. "Refugees are anxious, confused and heartbroken at this suspension," it further said, describing UNHCR chief Filippo Grandi as "deeply worried" by the impact of Trump's move. Refugees who qualify for resettlement to the US or other developed countries have typically endured extreme hardships and have no prospect of safely returning to their home countries. The US president's widely-condemned executive order also bars entry for travellers from seven mainly Muslim countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen -- for 90 days. By Devika Krishna Kumar and Ross Kerber NEW YORK/BOSTON (Reuters) - Most U.S. corporate bosses have stayed silent on President Donald Trump's immigration curbs, underscoring the sensitivities around opposing policies that could provoke a backlash from the White House. While the leaders of Apple Inc , Google and Facebook Inc emailed their staff to denounce the suspension of the U.S. refugee program and the halting of arrivals from seven Muslim-majority countries, many of their counterparts in other industries either declined comment or responded with company statements reiterating their commitment to diversity. The difference in response shows the pressure large swathes of corporate America faces to avoid tussling publicly with the new administration. Companies such as aircraft maker Boeing Co and automakers Ford Motor Co and General Motors Co have already had run-ins with Trump over other issues, and they have much at stake in policy decisions that the administration will make on tax, trade and regulatory matters. Before office, Trump attacked Boeing over the cost of the future Air Force One program. Boeing Chief Executive Officer Dennis Muilenburg met with him earlier this month and said he and Trump had made progress on the Air Force One issue and the potential sale of fighter aircraft. Representatives from Boeing, General Motors and Ford declined to comment on Trump's immigration curbs. Wall Street, meanwhile, is hoping the new administration will ease some of the regulations introduced in the wake of the 2007-08 financial crisis and adopt a lighter touch in their enforcement. Industries including banking, healthcare and auto manufacturing see themselves on the cusp of a new era of deregulation, and they do not want to do anything that would offend the new emperor, said Cornelius Hurley, director of Boston Universitys Center for Finance, Law & Policy. Story continues So far, Lloyd Blankfein, the chief executive of Goldman Sachs , is the only major U.S. bank boss to speak out directly against the executive order. "This is not a policy we support," Blankfein said in a message sent to staff on Sunday evening. "Being diverse is not optional; it is what we must be." Representatives of Citigroup Inc , Bank of America Corp and Morgan Stanley declined to comment on Trump's immigration order. Wells Fargo & Co said in a statement that it was reviewing the executive order and its implications for staff and its business. JPMorgan Chase & Co's Operating Committee, which includes CEO Jamie Dimon, sent a note to staff saying it was reaching out to all employees affected and noted that the country was, strengthened by the rich diversity of the world around us. To be sure, some CEOs were more outspoken. Nike Inc CEO Mark Parker said the company did not support the executive order. "Nike believes in a world where everyone celebrates the power of diversity," he said in a statement. "Those values are being threatened by the recent executive order in the U.S. banning refugees, as well as visitors, from seven Muslim-majority countries." Brent Saunders, CEO of U.S. drugmaker Allergan Plc , tweeted: "Oppose any policy that puts limitations on our ability to attract the best & diverse talent." But many boardrooms kept quiet. Representatives for some energy companies, including Exxon Mobil Corp , for example, declined to comment. GOOD CORPORATE CITIZENS As the idea of corporate social responsibility has taken root, so companies have increasingly championed a range of causes, including gay rights, diverse workplaces and a global view. Many in corporate America are still trying to work out how to deal with a new government that takes a more conservative stance on some social issues and has an anti-globalization platform. Those non-tech companies that did issue statements over the weekend tended to emphasize their role as good corporate citizens rather than openly criticize Trump's policies. Starbucks Corp CEO Howard Schultz has put the coffee chain in the national spotlight before, asking customers not to bring guns into stores and urging conversations on race relations. In a letter to employees, he said Starbucks was developing plans to hire 10,000 refugees over five years across dozens of countries, but he did not directly criticize Trump's order. I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack, he wrote. In his statement, General Electric Co CEO Jeff Immelt told staff that the company would engage with the U.S. government. "We will continue to make our voice heard with the new administration and Congress, and reiterate the importance of this issue to GE and to the business community overall," he wrote. One of the most immediate ways for corporate bosses to communicate with Trump about the immigration order will be the first meeting of his advisory panel of business leaders next week. Of the 19 leaders on that panel, only two, Elon Musk, who founded Tesla Motors Inc and SpaceX, and Travis Kalanick, CEO of Uber Technologies Inc [UBER.UL], have spoken out against Trump's immigration curbs. A spokeswoman for Stephen Schwarzman, the billionaire chief executive of Blackstone Group LP whom Trump tasked to set up and chair the panel, declined to comment. (Additional reporting by Olivia Oran, Dan Freed, Lauren Hirsch, Lawrence Delevingne and Gui Qing Koh in New York, Joe White in Detroit and David Shepardson in Washington; Writing by Carmel Crimmins; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Nick Zieminski) President Donald Trump believes that he can transfer his main professed skill in the private sector deal-making to the world of foreign policy. But foreign policy, and the diplomacy that supports it, cannot be reduced to cutting businesslike deals alone. When making short-term deals trumps long-term strategy, America loses. And this will create problems for the new president and his administration as they seek to implement their America First agenda. Perhaps nowhere is Trumps dangerous approach to foreign policy more concerning than in his apparent desire to accommodate Vladimir Putins Russia. Its unclear whether Trumps views are the product of foolishness or of Russian coercive leverage over him. But its not only his views on Putin and the Kremlins motives that should disturb all Americans. Its that he has repeatedly talked about making deals as the way to improve the relationship. What kind of deals would these be? We should all be concerned by what the president would be ready to give up to his Russian counterpart in order to reach an easy agreement. So far, Trumps comments suggest that hed be willing to trade away the two intertwined aspects of U.S. foreign policy since the end of World War II: strategic investment in a rules-based system of international politics and moral leadership grounded in a commitment to human dignity and freedom. Never short on self-confidence, Trump may think hes ready to sit down with Putin, put everything on the table, and come out a winner. Sadly, Trump appears to be moving forward with this flawed idea. At his Jan. 27 news conference with British Prime Minister Theresa May, Trump after awkwardly reading his scripted remarks about the importance of the special relationship with the United Kingdom based on universal values reaffirmed his desire to make nice with Putin, suggesting that the United States, on his watch, might have relationships with Russia and China that were just as strong as that with Britain. How quickly he forgot that our relationship with London is based on shared values and investment in the post-World War II system. On Jan. 28, Trump pressed on during a phone call with Putin, just a day after Trumps senior advisor told a morning show that removing sanctions on Russia was under consideration. According to readouts of the call, Trump and Putin had a pleasant back-and-forth and agreed to further talks on counterterrorism cooperation. And the two presidents agreed to discuss restoring business ties code for, among other things, removing sanctions Dmitri Novikov, a leading member of Russias Parliament, told Interfax. Dont be fooled. This isnt statesmanship its selling Americas hard-won leadership in the world, and selling it cheap. And to do that for a handshake with an autocrat like Putin isnt just a shameful deal, its a bad deal. Trump may think hes being clever by baiting Putin with the notion of the United States accepting the illegal invasion and attempted annexation of Crimea, or with ending the sanctions for Russias actions on the peninsula and its manufactured conflict in eastern Ukraine. But what Trump and his team seem to have missed is that the moment they sit down to do deals the sort of deals that Putin wants (like throwing out the principle that states should be free to choose their own security arrangements or accepting Russian limitations on NATOs defensive posture) America will already have lost. This is because it doesnt matter what price Trump and his team extract from the Kremlin. By doing deals with Putin that undermine the principles of international law, such as lifting sanctions prematurely or changing U.S. policy on Crimea, the White House will have bought into a system based on deals rather than on rules. And its exactly this kind of deal-making devoid of principles that Putin and other authoritarian leaders want, and that those working on behalf of world peace, global prosperity, and human freedom have toiled so hard to leave behind. This isnt to say that the Trump administration should not engage in dialogue and negotiations with Moscow. The United States should be ready to negotiate on concrete initiatives that can advance international peace and security as my team at the U.S. Mission to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe did to achieve the mandate and budget for the organizations Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine and agreements to counter foreign terrorist fighters, make progress on good governance, and fight anti-Semitism, among other things. These initiatives set a common agenda, with benchmarks and action items for which we can hold other countries and they can hold us accountable. But to negotiate with the Kremlin over the fundamental principles of the international system in which generations of U.S. political leaders and diplomats have invested so much is to lose before talks even begin. Read more: President Bannons Hugely Destructive First Week in Office The puppet master is leading the Trump administration down a road of carnage. Steve Bannon Is Making Sure Theres No White House Paper Trail, Says Intel Source The Trump administrations chief strategist has already taken control of both policy and process on national security. LISTEN: A Tale of a Very Messy Trump Transition On this weeks episode of The E.R. podcast: With just a week gone by, how much damage can the new Trump administration do? American leadership, in concert with close partners and allies, and backed by American hard power and the NATO alliance, helped to build a system where the kind of deal-making (and inevitable deal-breaking) that had bloodied Europe for centuries would be left behind. Although Putin would like a Yalta 2 a 21st-century grand bargain dividing Europe into spheres of influence to engage in such deal-making would be an unconscionable abandonment of American moral leadership, and one that leaves the world more dangerous. The consequences of abandoning these principles wouldnt be limited to Europe. The Chinese are certainly watching the U.S. commitment to defend the principle of sovereignty and territorial integrity in Ukraine as Beijing plots its next moves in the South China Sea. In effect, this would create a new age of uncertainty and usher in a world where anything goes. Its a world where countries must jockey for the upper hand, including by deploying military capabilities, so that they can be the ones cutting deals rather than be the subject of deals. This is one of the many things that Trumps call for an America First, isolationist foreign policy gets wrong. One of the great strategic cornerstones of U.S. foreign policy has been the recognition that even in a world where the United States is by far the most powerful country, the interests of the American people are best served by a system that doesnt depend on transactional encounters and instead creates long-term expectations of state behavior that allows for win-win arrangements. The peace and prosperity that have flowed from such a system has benefited Americans and U.S. allies around the world. After Trumps election in November, the diplomats I interacted with on a daily basis had two reactions: The Russian diplomats were gleeful and gloating not only because the U.S. elections constituted perhaps the most successful Kremlin intel operation since the end of the Cold War, but also because they saw Trumps desire to appease Putin as a harbinger for the end of American-led solidarity in holding the Kremlin accountable for its violations of international law. They saw a future where Moscows willingness to exercise destructive power would facilitate deal-making with the United States at the expense of Europe and its citizens. The other diplomats from all across Europe were shaken and alarmed. First, they worried that the United States, which has been the guarantor of the European security system since World War II, was abandoning them and the rules intended to protect them from external aggression. In Helsinki in 1975, at the height of the Cold War, U.S. President Gerald Ford and Soviet General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev, along with 33 other heads of state and government, signed the Helsinki Final Act which included commitments to open societies and markets, as well as to peacefully resolve disputes and respect sovereignty and territorial integrity. Ford wisely observed then that the leaders would be measured not by the promises we make, but by the promises we keep. For more than four decades, the United States has been Europes chief partner in upholding the promises made in Helsinki, thereby helping to preserve European security. But in addition to their very real security concerns, my European counterparts despaired at the loss of an America they respected an America, imperfect though it was, that could inspire people around the world. Even those diplomats who represented countries where the elites have loved to hate the United States admitted unabashedly that they loved America in the days after Nov. 8. These were diplomats from across Europe and Eurasia: Some represented NATO allies, some represented former Soviet states, some represented neutral or non-aligned countries, some represented our closest friends, and others represented more difficult partners. Within 48 hours, I got text messages and emails from more than a dozen ambassadors. We all mourn with you and We need you, and American values, more than ever, they wrote. It is not only the economic and military might, but also values and the degree that our country consistently upholds them that makes the United States a superpower. Of course, the new administration must find effective channels of communication with Moscow, and the United States should be prepared to engage with Putin, especially to welcome and encourage actions that show he is ready to remedy some of the damage done by Russias attacks on the international order. But Americas objective should always be to reinforce the rules, not rewrite them. Speaking at his inauguration 36 years ago, former U.S. President Ronald Reagan reminded the American people, No arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women. The generations-long quest to build a system of international politics that is anchored in this truth has been the moral and strategic bedrock of American foreign policy since World War II, throughout the Cold War and after the collapse of the Soviet Union. America has led the world by standing up for the moral courage of free men and women. We should not stop now. Photo Credit: MIKHAIL KLIMENTYEV/AFP/Getty Images WASHINGTON (AP) The legal fight over President Donald Trump's ban on refugees is likely to turn on questions of a president's authority to control America's borders and on whether the new immigration policy unconstitutionally discriminates against Muslims. Civil liberties advocates have challenged the order, which temporarily suspends immigration from seven countries and the United States' broader refugee program. It has drawn nationwide protests since the order was issued on Friday. Federal judges in New York and several other states issued orders that temporarily block the government from deporting people with valid visas who arrived after Trump's travel ban took effect. Acting Attorney General Sally Yates, a Democratic appointee, said Monday she has directed Justice Department attorneys to not defend Trump's order, as she is not convinced it is lawful. Trump responded by swiftly firing her and replacing her with Dana Boente, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. Washington state's attorney general announced he's suing Trump over the order. And the Council on American-Islamic Relations also filed a lawsuit arguing the ban violates the First Amendment's bar of preferential treatment for a religion by appearing to favor Christian over Muslim refugees. "While this ban does not apply to all Muslims, it only applies to Muslims," said Gadir Abbas, one of the council's lawyers. "That type of religious gerrymandering is illegal." The court cases are only beginning, and legal experts are divided as to whether courts will find Trump's action constitutional. Federal law gives the president unconstrained power to suspend the entry of "any class of aliens" if he determines their entry "would be detrimental to the interests of the United States." But a different law prevents discrimination against the issuance of an immigrant visa based on a person's nationality or place of birth. Story continues "Historically, the courts have not tried to regulate the executive branch's determination as to who's allowed to enter the country," said Eric Posner, a University of Chicago law professor. "The immigration statute gives the president very broad discretion to block people from entering the country," including for national security reasons. Posner said he expected judges to give the policy more deference if the administration can show that it was done to protect national security, rather than for political reasons. He also said courts could find it compelling that the executive order is temporary rather than permanent, and that it does not cover all Muslims from all countries, notably omitting Saudi Arabia the home nation for the majority of Sept. 11 hijackers. "The fact that he lets in Muslims from Saudi Arabia tends to undermine the theory that he's acting out of animus," Posner said. Trump isn't the first American leader to apply a different standard to Saudi Arabia. Its status as the world's leading oil producer and close U.S. ally has led Republicans and Democrats to often overlook its woeful human rights record and spotty history in fighting terrorism. The travel ban applies to Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Sudan. Courts have a long history of upholding portions of immigration law that discriminate on the basis of race and nationality, said Peter J. Spiro, a law professor at Temple University. As far back as 1889 the Supreme Court upheld the exclusion of Chinese laborers, and more recent rulings have also upheld similar discrimination. The court, for example, ruled in 1953 that a noncitizen trying to enter the U.S. has no right under the Constitution to challenge the government's decision to deny entry. That case involved a legal permanent resident of the United States who traveled abroad to Hungary for 19 months. He was denied re-entry because the government said he posed a threat to national security. But that case and others were decided at a time when the public was more accepting of discriminatory policies. Adam Cox, a law professor at New York University, said it's historically been challenging to prove that a policy was enacted with the purpose of disadvantaging a particular religion or race, often requiring "smoking gun evidence of the state of mind of the people" behind it. He said that though courts in the past have sustained discriminatory policies, it could be possible for a judge in this instance to "pierce the veil" and decide that the executive order was motivated by animus. "If a court gets to the point where it sees this as open discrimination on the basis of religion or race, at that point I would part company with people who argue that simply by virtue of this being an immigration policy, it is insulated from constitutional attack," Cox said. It's also possible that federal judges could be more likely to push back in light of the massive public backlash over Trump's ban, Spiro said. "If there's going to be a case in which a constitutional challenge has some chance of succeeding, this is it," he said. ___ Associated Press writer Sam Hananel contributed to this report. After future doctors finish medical school, they go on to residency programs to wrap up their training in hospitals. Both American and foreign medical-school graduates can apply to American residency slots, and among this years foreign applicants, there are currently 260 people from the seven nationsIraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemenbanned from coming to the U.S. for 90 days under President Trumps executive order, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges. Because the total number of residency slots are limited, many of these individuals might not become American doctors. The typical primary-care doctor sees 3,000 patients, so the AAMC is estimating those 260 future doctors would have been able to take care of more than three-quarters of a million American patients. Foreign medical students typically come to the U.S. under J1 or H1 visitors visas, which are subject to Trumps 90-day ban. Residency matching typically happens in March, and residents start in June. Thats more than 90 days away, but the uncertainty is throwing people off, said Atul Grover, the director of the AAMC, which oversees the residency matching program. Recommended: How to Build an Autocracy The program directors are like, what do I do? Grover told me. If theres someone who I think is going to make a fantastic doctor from Sudan, are we going to be able to take them? Only foreign medical graduates whose colleges are recognized by the U.S. and who pass U.S. qualifying exams are eligible to apply for American residencies. Typically, only half of all foreign medical students secure an American residency spot, so the true number of potential future doctors who would be excluded from the program is around 130. Still, those people would have been able to take care of nearly 400,000 Americans upon graduation. As a twist, its the most needy Americans who will lose out if the doctors are barred from entry. Theres a major shortage of doctors, even though nearly a quarter of all practicing American physicians are foreign-educated, Grover said. One way foreign medical graduates can negotiate to stay in the U.S. after their residency is through a visa waiver under which they agree to practice in underserved areas for several years. Thats why some studies estimate that foreign medical graduates are more likely than Americans to work in these doctor deserts. Story continues Grover said residency program directors are still frantically trying to sort out the rules, but in some ways, the chilling effect has already begun. As ProPublica reported over the weekend, one Cleveland-Clinic medical resident who had a Sudanese passport was forced to return to Saudi Arabia hours after her plane landed in New York. Im only in this country to be a doctor, to work and to help people thats it, the woman, Suha Abushamma, told ProPublica. Theres no other reason. Read more from The Atlantic: This article was originally published on The Atlantic. On Friday, U.S. President Donald Trump handed the Islamic State and its likeminded rivals a symbolic victory when he announced he would immediately suspend immigration from seven Muslim-majority nations. By stopping the citizens of Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen, Iraq, and Iran from entering the United States for 90 days, and from Syria indefinitely, the new American president worked wonders for salafi-jihadist ideologues the world over. Citing, on Sunday, the horrible mess of Europe as his justification for the policywhich has already brought thousands out in protest at airports and street corners around the worldTrumps position can be summarized as follows: By stopping citizens of countries that are sources of terror from entering into the United States of America, he will reduce the threat presented by infiltration by foreign terrorists. (Its worth noting, as the New America Foundation has, that every jihadist who conducted a lethal attack inside the United States since 9/11 was a citizen or legal resident.) In any case, reaffirming his position in a statement posted to Facebook on Sunday, Trump contended that this is about terror and keeping our country safe. If only this were the case. Not only does the policy miss the point, it betrays a worryingly superficial understanding of the threat from Islamist terrorism. The ban also has the power to make things much worseit will go far to symbolically aid and abet the very terrorists that the president says he wants to keep out, popularizing and reinforcing their binary worldview. Unwittingly, the new administration is building the world that salafi-jihadists so dearly want to inhabit, one where crusader governments and citizens are seen to be persecuting Sunni Muslims en masse and in which the conspiracy about there being a U.S.-orchestrated war on Islam actually rings true. Story continues As one of the Islamic States fans recently wrote on Telegram, when it comes to cleaving the world in two and undermining the prospects of peaceful coexistence between Muslims and non-Muslims, the self-proclaimed caliphate has a friend in Trump, a man that is just stupid enough to do it for us. Recommended: Where America's Terrorists Actually Come From Theres no question that Trumps latest policy blunder will be spun as hard evidence for the Islamist extremist reading of global politics, impacting the ability of groups like the Islamic State and al-Qaeda to influence and recruit. After all, a sense of grievance, when agitated correctly, can be a powerful thing. It can even serve as a way to galvanize support and justify the most extreme violence. Of course, its not just salafi-jihadists that instrumentally value victimhood. Indeed, behind almost all extremist outrages lurks an artificially augmented conception of victimhood. It was, as the academic Nicholas OShaughnessy points out, a carefully cultivated narrative of victimhood that provided Adolf Hitler with the justification he wanted to attack the rest of Europe in 1939. It was a not dissimilar sense of victimhood that Timothy McVeigh cited as his reason for carrying out a retaliatory strike against the federal government in Oklahoma in 1996. Likewise, it was the victimhood narrative that al-Qaeda took to in order to justify its killing of thousands of civilians in the United States on September 11, 2001. Salafi-jihadists have in fact been parroting the victimhood line for decades nowand thats not going to changebut what makes Trumps latest actions so problematic is how they will be interpreted by those who would otherwise be Americas allies. What many thought would only ever be crude and bombastic campaign rhetoric is fast becoming reality. And, monitoring this more closely than anyone else, probably rubbing their hands with glee, are extremists like those in ISIS, who have explicitly stated a goal of polarizing society and fomenting anti-Muslim hatred. While it may seem counterintuitive, when conditions are bad for Muslims in the West, salafi-jihadists are closer to achieving this goal. They want to foster communal vulnerability and generalized disillusionmentin so doing, they create their own recruitment opportunities and are able to frame themselves as a panacea, an immediate alternative to the status quo. ISIS can now declare with more gusto than ever that the White House is indeed at war with Islam. They can now declare with more gusto than ever that the White House is indeed at war with Islam, that all it wants from the Middle East is oil, and that it incorporates neither ethics nor morals into its myopic pursuit of global hegemony. In this sense, the new president is doing the Islamic States propaganda for it, buoying the caliphate in its time of need, and helping make up for its territorial losses in Iraq and Syria. If Trump continues on this trajectory, it will help the Islamic State idea to live on, even if Mosul falls tomorrow and Raqqa the day after. In any case, the reverberations from his first 10 days in office will be sure to far outlive his time as president. Read more from The Atlantic: This article was originally published on The Atlantic. ISTANBUL (AP) Turkey's foreign ministry says it is re-opening its embassy in the Libyan capital which had closed over security concerns in 2014. The foreign ministry said in a statement Monday the embassy in Tripoli was starting out with a "core staff" working under Ambassador Ahmet Aydin Dogan. The ambassador had been working out of Tunisia after the embassy closed. Turkey's consulate in Misrata never closed. Turkey has close ties with the North African country and provided vital support to the rebels who overthrew and killed Moammar Gadhafi in 2011. Libya has been wracked by fighting and other violence involving rival militias since the demise of its longtime leader. The foreign ministry said in its statement that re-opening the embassy would allow Turkey to support reconciliation and reconstruction efforts in Libya. Ankara (AFP) - Turkey on Monday opened the biggest trial yet over the failed July coup aimed at ousting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, trying 270 suspects including, in absentia, the alleged mastermind Fethullah Gulen. The suspects, 152 of whom are in pre-trial detention, include ex high-ranking military officials like former Aegean Army Command Chief of Staff Major General Memduh Hakbilen, the state news agency Anadolu reported. Also going on trial was ex-NATO Land Commander Chief of Staff Major General Salih Sevil. The "number one" suspect is US-based Islamic preacher Gulen who is charged with ordering the failed July 15 coup, an accusation he strongly denies. Ankara also accuses the movement Gulen leads of being a "terror organisation" although the group insists it is a peaceful organisation promoting moderate Islam. Those on trial in the western city of Izmir face multiple charges including being a member of the "armed terror group". Turkey has repeatedly asked the United States to extradite Gulen, who has been living in self-imposed exile there since 1999. The previous administration of Barack Obama had insisted that a possibly slow legal process should take its course but Ankara is hoping for a more eager response to its extradition request from new President Donald Trump. Gulen previously went on trial in absentia in January last year over corruption allegations that hit Erdogan in 2013. The Turkish justice ministry also sent new evidence to Washington for Gulen's return including the indictment for the Izmir case, Anadolu reported on Monday. The indictment includes witness statements alleging that Gulen was to be presented with the plans for the coup by Adil Oksuz for his approval, the agency added. Turkish officials have said that theology lecturer Oksuz was the so-called "imam" of the plot and in charge of coordinating between Gulen and the army. Oksuz was detained in the aftermath of the coup but then released and is now on the run. Story continues - 'Izmir: main plotting hub' - Other charges against the suspects include seeking to prevent parliament performing its duty as well as attempting to remove the constitutional order, the agency said. The suspects face life imprisonment if convicted in a trial expected to take two months, the Hurriyet newspaper reported. It said Izmir was believed to be one of the main plotting hubs of the coup with the Aegean city used as a "logistical base". Memduh was apparently to be declared Izmir's "martial law commander" by the putschists, Anadolu reported at the time. A special courtroom was built to accommodate the size of the trial and security was tight. Intensive security measures included a drone above the courthouse, bomb-sniffing dogs and commando units. Previous trials have opened in Istanbul and smaller cases in other provinces in what is expected to be the largest legal process in the country's history. Some 43,000 people are under arrest ahead of trial in a large-scale crackdown within a state of emergency declared after the coup which remains in place. On Monday, 10 more soldiers were arrested in connection with the Gulen movement, Anadolu reported. In December, 29 police officers went on trial in Istanbul accused of failing to defend Erdogan while 62 rebel soldiers are being tried over claims they attempted to take over Istanbul's Sabiha Gokcen Airport on the night of July 15. ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey reopened its embassy in Libya on Monday, 2-1/2 years after closing it due to lack of security, becoming the second country to reopen its diplomatic mission in the divided country. Turkey shut the embassy in Tripoli in 2014 as rival factions fought for control after the overthrow of long-time leader Muammar Gaddafi. Italy became the first country to reopen its embassy in Tripoli earlier this month. "The reopening of the embassy will allow Turkey to make stronger contributions to efforts to build peace and stability, as well as reconstruction in Libya," the Turkish foreign ministry said in a statement. The road where the embassy is located close to Tripoli's seafront was closed on Monday, and there was a heavy security presence. The Turkish embassy is about 600 meters from the Italian embassy. On Jan. 21, less than two weeks after the Italian embassy reopened, a car bomb exploded in a street between the two embassies. A local anti-terrorism unit blamed rival political factions in eastern Libya for the blast, which left two suspected bombers dead. Both Libya and Tripoli itself are home to myriad armed groups with shifting and conflicting loyalties that have sought to fill the power vacuum created when Gaddafi was killed in 2011. In 2014, fighting between armed alliances backing opposing political factions resulted in rival governments being set up in the capital and the east. Since March last year a third, U.N.-backed government has been trying to establish itself in Tripoli, but it has been unable to win support from all groups. "Turkey will continue to support the territorial integrity and national unity of brotherly Libya," the statement said. Turkey's ambassador had been based in Tunisia during the embassy's closure, while the Turkish consulate general in the western city of Misrata had remained open without interruption. (Reporting by Tulay Karadeniz and Aidan Lewis; Writing by Nick Tattersall and Dominic Evans) ATHENS, Greece (AP) A group of Turkish servicemen seeking asylum in Greece have appeared before an Athens court to contest their continued detention despite the rejection of Turkey's request for their extradition. The pilots and flight engineers fled to Greece in a military helicopter a day after the failed July 15 military coup in Turkey. Greece's Supreme Court ruled last week that the eight men wouldn't get a fair trial in Turkey, and that their lives might be in danger there. The decision prompted anger from Turkey. The Supreme Court ordered their release from police custody, but police later extended their detention order on national security grounds for three months, pending examination of their asylum bids. The men appealed that decision in an administrative court Monday. A ruling is expected within days. ATHENS (Reuters) - Turkish soldiers caught in an extradition row between Athens and Ankara appeared before a Greek court on Monday to challenge an order extending their custody by three months, court officials said. The eight men landed a helicopter in northern Greece in July after the failure of a coup against President Tayyip Erdogan and requested asylum, saying their lives were in danger at home. Greece's top court blocked their extradition last week, angering Turkey, a NATO ally which alleges the men were involved in efforts to overthrow Erdogan and has demanded they be sent home. The men - three majors, three captains and two sergeant-majors - have been kept in custody pending final decisions on their asylum applications in Greece. They are challenging a decision by immigration authorities to extend that custody by three months on public order and national security grounds. During Monday's closed-door hearing, the soldiers argued that innocent people should not be held in custody, a court official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. A decision was expected in the coming days. The months' long case has strained relations between the two neighbors who remain at odd overs issues raging from territorial disputes to ethnically-split Cyprus. Turkey wants Greece to reconsider what it said was a politically-motivated decision not to extradite them, and threatened measures including scrapping a bilateral migration deal with Athens. (Reporting by Constantinos Georgizas; Writing by Karolina Tagaris; editing by Ralph Boulton) Warsaw (AFP) - Two Belgians risk up to a decade behind bars in Poland if found guilty of stealing parts of an electric fence from the former Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi death camp, Polish prosecutors said Monday. The trial of the two men is set to open in the southern Polish city of Krakow on February 28. The two fifty-year-olds, identified only as Yann P.-B. and William H., were detained last July as they tried to remove three porcelain electrical isolators. Although charged, they were not arrested, prosecutors in Oswiecim, where the camp is located, told AFP on Monday. All objects at the former Nazi death camp, including its electric fence, are the property of the state museum on a site that is on UNESCO's World Heritage list. Several people have tried to make off with barbed wire while one particularly brazen gang walked out with the camp's infamous "Arbeit macht frei" ("Work makes you free") sign in 2009, sparking a global outcry. The mastermind of that theft, a Swedish neo-Nazi, was jailed for two-and-a-half years. Auschwitz-Birkenau has become a symbol of Nazi Germany's genocide of European Jews, one million of whom were killed at the camp from 1940 to 1945. More than 100,000 others including non-Jewish Poles, Roma, Soviet prisoners of war and anti-Nazi resistance fighters also died there, according to the museum. An estimated 232,000 of Auschwitz's victims were children. By Jonathan Stempel (Reuters) - A federal appeals court on Monday struck down part of a 2015 Indiana law governing the manufacture and sale of vapor pens and other liquids used in e-cigarettes. The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Indiana went too far by subjecting out-of-state manufacturers to detailed rules for such things as sinks, cleaning equipment and even contracts with outside security firms, and could not enforce those rules against them. Writing for a three-judge panel, Circuit Judge David Hamilton said the state's Vapor Pens and E-Liquid Act has an "extraterritorial reach that is unprecedented," violating the "dormant" Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution. Hamilton said Indiana could impose reasonable and "even-handed" rules to ensure the safety of vaping products. But he said some of its rules were "remarkably specific," and that "only one company in the entire United States, located not so coincidentally in Indiana," met them. "These circumstances raise obvious concerns about protectionist purposes and what looks very much like a legislative grant of monopoly," he wrote. The decision by the Chicago-based appeals court overturned a June 30 ruling by U.S. District Judge Sarah Evans Barker in Indianapolis. That ruling had been appealed by out-of-state e-cigarette makers Legato Vapors, Rocky Mountain E Cigs and Derb E Cigs, supported by the Right to be Smoke-Free Coalition trade group. "We're very happy," Robert Epstein, a lawyer for the out-of-state companies, said in an interview. He said the law "essentially foreclosed" them from delivering e-cigarettes to Indiana retailers and consumers. The office of former Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller had defended the law in court. A spokesman for Zoeller's successor, Curtis Hill, did not immediately respond to requests for comment. In court papers, the out-of-state manufacturers said the Indiana law drove costs higher and subjected them to potentially inconsistent regulations, "as other states decide how best to regulate e-vapor products and enact their own e-vapor laws." The case is Legato Vapors LLC et al v Cook et al, 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 15-00761. (Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Cynthia Osterman) BANGKOK (Reuters) - Thailand might get more tourists from the Middle East as a result of U.S. President Donald Trump's entry ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries, the head of the tourism authority said on Monday. "The Middle East is a big market for us, especially in the medical tourism sector. They may choose to visit Thailand more and this may also boost our sector," Tourism Authority of Thailand Governor Yuthasak Supasorn told Reuters. He said Thailand would need to assess the situation further. Thailand's military government did not respond to a request for official comment on the ban. Trump has presented his ban as a way to protect the United States from Islamist militants, but it has been condemned by a growing list of foreign leaders and drawn protests by tens of thousands in American cities. The Tourism Authority of Thailand is the government agency responsible for promoting tourism to Thailand. Only just over 2 percent of Thailand's tourists came from the Middle East in 2016, but it expects an 8 percent rise in the first quarter of 2017 compared with the year before. Medical tourism is a growing market for Thailand. The largest operator is Bangkok Dusit Medical Services Pcl. Another is Bumrungrad Pcl.. Muslims represent the second biggest religious group in Thailand behind Buddhists, but make up only about 5 percent of the population. (Reporting By Pairat Temphairojana; Editing by Matthew Tostevin, Robert Birsel) BERLIN (Reuters) - The U.S. embassy in Berlin said on its Facebook page on Monday that visa issuance had been suspended to nationals, or dual nationals, of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. "Per U.S. Presidential Executive Order signed on January 27, 2017, visa issuance to aliens from the countries of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen has been suspended effective immediately until further notification," it said. "If you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time," the embassy added. (Writing by Paul Carrel; Editing by Joseph Nasr) Photo credit: Getty From ELLE A federal judge's emergency order has temporarily barred the U.S. from deporting people from nations subject to President Donald Trump's travel ban. The judge said travelers who had been detained had a strong argument that their legal rights had been violated. The Department of Homeland Security issued a statement early Sunday that said the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order and it affected a relatively small number of travelers who were inconvenienced by security procedures upon their return. The emergency order was issued by U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly in New York Saturday night after lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union filed a court petition on behalf of people from seven predominantly Muslim nations who were detained at airports across the country as the ban took effect. The judge's order addressed only a portion of Trump's executive action. As the decision was announced, cheers broke out in crowds of demonstrators who had gathered at American airports and outside the Brooklyn courthouse where the ruling was issued. The order barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. It was unclear how quickly the judge's order might affect people in detention, or whether it would allow others to resume flying. "Realistically, we don't even know if people are going to be allowed onto the planes," ACLU lawyer Lee Gelernt said. "This order would protect people who they allow to come here and reach U.S. soil." DHS said the court ruling would have no effect on the overall executive action. "President Trump's Executive Orders remain in place - prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety," according to the DHS statement. Story continues Stephen Miller, a senior adviser to the White House, said: "Nothing in the Brooklyn judge's order in anyway impedes or prevents the implementation of the president's executive order which remains in full, complete and total effect." Under Trump's order, it had appeared that an untold number of foreign-born U.S. residents now traveling outside the U.S. could be stuck overseas for at least 90 days even though they held permanent residency green cards or other visas. However, an official with the Department of Homeland Security said Saturday night that no green-card holders from the seven countries cited in Trump's order had been prevented from entering the U.S. Some foreign nationals who were allowed to board flights before the order was signed Friday had been detained at U.S. airports, told they were no longer welcome. The DHS official who briefed reporters by phone said 109 people who were in transit on airplanes had been denied entry and 173 had not been allowed to get on their planes overseas. In her three-page order, Donnelly wrote that without the stay "there will be substantial and irreparable injury to refugees, visa-holders and other individuals from nations subject to the Jan. 27, 2017, executive order." Trump billed his sweeping executive order as a necessary step to stop "radical Islamic terrorists" from coming to the U.S. It included a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program. Trump's order singled out Syrians for the most aggressive ban, indefinitely blocking entry for anyone from that country, including those fleeing civil war. The directive did not do anything to prevent attacks from homegrown extremists who were already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. It also omitted Saudi Arabia, home to most of the Sept. 11 hijackers. As a candidate Trump pledged to temporarily ban Muslims from coming to the U.S., then said he would implement "extreme vetting" for people from countries with significant terror concerns. He told reporters Saturday the order is "not a Muslim ban." "It's working out very nicely," Trump said of the implementation of his order. "We're going to have a very, very strict ban and we're going to have extreme vetting, which we should have had in this country for many years." The order sparked protests at several of the nation's international airports, including New York's Kennedy and Chicago's O'Hare and facilities in Minneapolis and Dallas-Fort Worth. In San Francisco, hundreds blocked the street outside the arrival area of the international terminal. Several dozen demonstrated at the airport in Portland, Oregon, briefly disrupting light rail service while hoisting signs that read "Portland Coffee Is From Yemen" and chanting anti-Trump slogans. U.S. lawmakers and officials around the globe also criticized the move. Two of the first people blocked from entering the United States were Iraqis with links to the U.S. military. Hameed Khalid Darweesh and Haider Sameer Abdulkhaleq Alshawi were detained by immigration officials after landing at New York's Kennedy airport Friday night. Both had been released by Saturday night after their lawyers intervened. The government can exempt foreign nationals from the ban if their entry is deemed in the national interest. But it was not immediately clear how that exemption might be applied. Diplomats from the seven countries singled out by Trump's order would still be allowed into the U.S. Those already in the U.S. with a visa or green card would be allowed to stay, according to the official, who wasn't authorized to publicly discuss the details of how Trump's order was being put in place and spoke only on condition of anonymity. Trump's order also directed U.S. officials to review information as needed to fully vet foreigners asking to come to the U.S. and draft a list of countries that don't provide that information. That left open the possibility that citizens of other countries could also face a travel ban. The U.S. may still admit refugees on a case-by-case basis during the freeze, and the government would continue to process requests from people claiming religious persecution, "provided that the religion of the individual is a minority religion in the individual's country." You Might Also Like By Mica Rosenberg and Jonathan Stempel REUTERS - U.S. judges in at least five states blocked federal authorities from enforcing President Donald Trump's executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. However, lawyers representing people covered by the order said some authorities were unwilling on Sunday to follow the judges' rulings. Judges in California, Massachusetts, Virginia and Washington state, each home to international airports, issued their rulings after a similar order was issued on Saturday night by U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly in New York's Brooklyn borough. Donnelly had ruled in a lawsuit by two men from Iraq being held at John F. Kennedy International Airport. While none of the rulings struck down Friday's executive order by the new Republican president, the growing number of them could complicate the administration's effort to enforce it. The rulings add to questions about the constitutionality of the order, said Andrew Pincus, a Mayer Brown partner representing two Yemeni men who were denied U.S. entry from an overseas flight despite being legal permanent residents. "People have gone through processes to obtain legal permanent resident status, or visas," Pincus said. "There are serious questions about whether those rights, which were created by statute, can be unilaterally taken away without process." Trump's order halted travel by people with passports from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days, and stopped the resettlement of refugees for 120 days. He said these actions were needed "to protect the American people from terrorist attacks by foreign nationals admitted to the United States." The order sparked a global backlash, including from U.S. allies that view the actions as discriminatory and divisive. Attorneys general from California, New York, 13 other states and Washington, D.C., meanwhile, in a statement condemned and pledged to fight what they called Trump's "dangerous" and "unconstitutional" order. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security on Sunday said it "will comply with judicial orders," while enforcing Trump's order in a manner that ensures those entering the United States "do not pose a threat to our country or the American people." SAFE, NOT SORRY Striking that balance has caused confusion, according to lawyers who worked overnight and on Sunday to help travelers at JFK Airport, Washington Dulles International Airport in northern Virginia, and elsewhere. Immigration lawyer Sharifa Abbasi said some Border Patrol agents at Dulles refused to let lawyers talk with detainees, even after being shown an order from U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema requiring such access. Abbasi said the agents instead told the lawyers to call their agency's office, where no one was answering. "There is really no method to this madness," Becca Heller, director of the New York-based International Refugee Assistance Project organization, told reporters on a conference call. Supporters of Trump's order said authorities acted properly in swiftly taking steps to enforce it. "It is better (to) be safe than sorry," said Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies at the conservative Center for Immigration Studies in Washington. Lawsuits on behalf of more than 100 individual travelers have been filed nationwide, activists and lawyers estimated. Some have come from large corporate firms including Mayer Brown, Kirkland & Ellis, and Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton. CURBS ON TRUMP'S ORDER In Boston, U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs on Sunday temporarily blocked the removal of two Iranians who have taught at the University of Massachusetts, and had been detained at the city's Logan International Airport. Burroughs' ruling appeared to go further than Donnelly's by barring the detention, as well as the removal, of approved refugees, visa holders and permanent U.S. residents entering from the seven countries. Donnelly's order forbade only removal. Matthew Segal, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, in a statement called Burroughs' ruling "a huge victory for justice" in the face of what he called Trump's "unconstitutional ban on Muslims." The U.S. Constitution's First Amendment guarantees the free exercise of religion. Trump's order sought to prioritize refugees fleeing religious persecution, which the president said was aimed at helping Christians in Syria. Burroughs' ruling also prompted some Trump critics to urge holders of green cards, which allow foreign nationals to live and work permanently in the United States, to fly into Boston, to lessen the risk of detainment. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said several times on NBC's "Meet the Press" that Trump's order does not affect green card holders "moving forward" or "going forward." In a ruling on Sunday, U.S. District Judge Dolly Gee in Los Angeles directed the return to the United States of Ali Khoshbakhti Vayeghan, who authorities had sent back to his native Iran following Trump's order. The ruling from Brinkema, in Alexandria, Virginia, barred the Homeland Security agency from removing an estimated 50 to 60 legal permanent residents who had been detained at Dulles. In Seattle, U.S. District Judge Thomas Zilly barred the government from removing two people, who were not named in court papers. He scheduled a Feb. 3 hearing on whether to lift that stay. (Reporting by Nate Raymond and Mica Rosenberg and Jonathan Stempel in New York; Additional reporting by Andrew Chung, Dan Levine and Yeganeh Torbati; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Mary Milliken) By Sarah N. Lynch and Lisa Lambert WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two senior U.S. lawmakers unveiled legislative plans on Monday to scrap a rule devised under the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law requiring publicly-traded mining, oil and gas companies to disclose payments they make to foreign governments. Michigan Republican Bill Huizenga, who chairs the House of Representatives Financial Services subcommittee on capital markets, and Oklahoma Republican James Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Environment Committee, took aim at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's so-called "resource extraction" rule, saying it makes it harder for U.S. energy companies to compete. They introduced measures to ax the rule using the Congressional Review Act, which allows Congress to stop recently adopted regulations through a simple majority vote. Republicans this week are expected to undo five Obama-era regulations. The full Republican-led House on Wednesday will vote to kill all the regulations and then send them to the Senate, also controlled by Republicans. The SEC rule is championed by human rights organizations who say disclosure of payments to foreign governments by companies like Exxon Mobil Corp and Chevron helps fight corruption. "There is absolutely no benefit to nullifying this common sense law unless your objective is to make it easier for corrupt elites to steal money," said Isabel Munilla who studies extraction policies for anti-poverty group Oxfam. But the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other industry groups have long opposed it, saying it hurts U.S. companies without providing investors with meaningful, material information. Industry groups successfully beat back the rule a few years ago and the SEC was forced to go back to the drawing board. Then, Oxfam accused the regulator of dragging its feet on a new draft. A federal judge ordered the SEC to fast-track the rule in 2015, and the agency issued a final version last summer set to take effect in 2018. Story continues "The SEC continues to propose a resource extraction rule that is overly burdensome, puts U.S. companies at a competitive disadvantage, and fails to provide investors with useful information," Huizenga said. The House Financial Services Committee's senior Democrat, Maxine Waters, said killing the rule "is undoubtedly another conflict of interest on account of Trump and his cronies." President Donald Trump's Secretary of State nominee Rex Tillerson headed Exxon when it fought the drafting of the rule, Waters said. She added the regulation would identify oil companies with financial ties to countries that have been hostile to the United States, such as Russia. (Reporting by Sarah N. Lynch; Editing by Tom Brown and Diane Craft) By Michelle Nichols UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - A Saudi Arabia-led military coalition has carried out attacks in Yemen that "may amount to war crimes," U.N. sanctions monitors reported to the world body's Security Council, warning coalition allies including the United States, Britain and France that they are obligated to respect international humanitarian law. The annual report by the experts who monitor sanctions and the conflict in Yemen, seen by Reuters on Saturday, investigated 10 coalition air strikes between March and October that killed at least 292 civilians, including some 100 women and children. "In eight of the 10 investigations, the panel found no evidence that the air strikes had targeted legitimate military objectives," the experts wrote in a 63-page report presented to the Security Council on Friday. "For all 10 investigations, the panel considers it almost certain that the coalition did not meet international humanitarian law requirements of proportionality and precautions in attack," the report said. "The panel considers that some of the attacks may amount to war crimes." The experts said Saudi Arabia is leading a military coalition made up of Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco and Sudan. Saudi U.N. Ambassador Abdallah Al-Mouallimi said the accusations in the report were unfounded, that the coalition has been "exercising maximum restraint and rigorous rules of engagement," and that there had been transparent investigations into any incidents. "In some cases errors were acknowledged and responsibility accepted. Corrective measures including compensation to victims were taken," he told Reuters. The U.N. experts said U.S. officers were supporting coalition logistical and intelligence activities, while the coalition's chief of joint operations told the experts that officers from France, Malaysia and Britain were also present at the Riyadh headquarters. "All coalition member states and their allies also have an obligation to take appropriate measures to ensure respect for international humanitarian law by the coalition," the U.N. experts wrote. "The panel finds that violations associated with the conduct of the air campaign are sufficiently widespread to reflect either an ineffective targeting process or a broader policy of attrition against civilian infrastructure," the report said. 'WIDESPREAD, SYSTEMATIC VIOLATIONS' The U.N. experts said that although they were unable to travel to Yemen, they have "maintained the highest achievable standard of proof." A spokesman for the British U.N. mission declined to comment on a leaked document, but added: "We take reports of alleged violations of international humanitarian law by actors in the conflict very seriously." A senior U.S. State Department official said: "We urge all sides to take steps to prevent harm to civilians. Ending the conflict in Yemen requires a durable cessation of hostilities and a comprehensive political solution." The French Foreign Ministry and the Malaysian U.N. mission did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Malaysia has said that its armed forces are not involved in the Saudi-led campaign in Yemen. It said Malaysian troops in Saudi Arabia were only part of training exercise. The outcry over civilian casualties has led some lawmakers and rights activists in the United States and Britain to push for curbs on arms sales to Riyadh. The Saudi-led coalition began a military campaign in support of Yemeni government forces nearly two years ago to prevent Houthi rebels, whom it sees as a proxy for Iran, from taking complete control of Yemen after seizing much of the north. The Houthis, who are allied with forces loyal to former Yemen president Ali Abdullah Saleh, deny carrying out any crimes in their war effort and say they are defending the country and its civilians from Saudi-led foreign "aggression.""There have also been widespread and systematic violations of international humanitarian law, international human rights law and human rights norms by officials and security forces affiliated (with) the (Yemen) government and (with) the Houthis," the U.N. report said. The U.N. experts said it was "highly likely that the Houthi and Saleh forces did not comply with international humanitarian law in at least three incidents when they fired explosive ordnance at a market, a house and a hospital." Yemen and Saudi Arabia blame Iran for supplying weapons to the Houthis, but Tehran denies that. The U.N. experts said they had identified 2,064 weapons seized from boats off Yemen that "could be directly linked to Iranian manufacture of origin." "The panel has not seen sufficient evidence to confirm any direct large-scale supply of arms from the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran, although there are indicators that anti-tank guided weapons being supplied to the Houthi or Saleh forces are of Iranian manufacture," the experts said. Iran's mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment. (Additional reporting by Lesley Wroughton, Praveen Menon, Noah Browning; Editing by Bill Rigby and Jeffrey Benkoe) By Curtis Skinner SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - U.S. universities in both Democratic and Republican-voting states said they were unnerved by President Donald Trump's executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority nations, many warning students and staff to avoid travel abroad. The president's order, which bars admission of Syrian refugees and suspends travel to the United States from Iraq, Iran, Sudan and four other countries, led to the detention of more than a hundred travelers arriving at U.S. airports over the weekend and sparked protests in major cities. Leaders of the prestigious University of California system, which is partly funded by the liberal state, called the order "contrary the values we hold dear", while Penn State President Eric Barron, whose state backed Trump, asked for the order be ended as soon as possible. "The problems that are surfacing with the order are clear," Barron said in a statement. U.S. universities are seen as bastions of free speech and protest, although the institutions themselves are typically not seen as inherently political. Association of American Universities President Mary Sue Coleman said in a statement on Saturday that the order "is already causing damage and should end as quickly as possible." University of Missouri Interim Chancellor Hank Foley said on Sunday that Coleman had expressed the concerns of universities to government officials, adding "I can assure you that our voices are being heard loudly and clearly in Washington." Missouri voters supported Trump. The University of Texas and the University of Michigan also issued statements in support of their international students, without explicitly condemning government policy. They said they were working to try to help get their students affected by the ban back into the United States. University of Texas at Austin (UT) President Gregory Fenves on Sunday said he was "proud to say we have 110 students, faculty members and scholars who are citizens of the seven affected countries". Those abroad should "know that we are doing everything we can regarding your return to UT," he added. Trump defended his order in a statement on Sunday, saying the United States would resume issuing visas to all countries once "the most secure policies" were put in place over the next 90 days. "This is not a Muslim ban," he added. (Reporting and writing by Curtis Skinner in San Francisco; Additional reporting by Yasmeen Abutaleb, editing by Peter Henderson and Richard Pullin) By Ed Cropley and Aaron Maasho ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - The head of the African Union said on Monday that a U.S. travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries including three in Africa heralded "turbulent times" for the continent. Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma spoke after U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order halted travel by people with passports from Libya, Somalia, Sudan and four other Middle East nations for 90 days, and stopped refugee resettlement for 120 days. "We are entering very turbulent times," Dlamini-Zuma told African leaders at the start of a summit in the 54-nation bloc's headquarters in the Ethiopian capital. "The very country to which many of our people were taken as slaves during the transatlantic slave trade has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries. What do we do about this? Indeed, this is one of the greatest challenges to our unity and solidarity," the AU Commission chief added. Even before the travel ban was announced last week, African capitals had watched the transition from Barack Obama's administration to Trump with some concern, fearing his focus on "America first" could push trade and other ties with the continent down the U.S. list of priorities. The new U.N. secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, also hinted at unease about the U.S. administration's actions in his address at the summit, without mentioning Trump or the United States. "African nations are among the world's largest and most generous hosts of refugees. African borders remain open for those who need protection, when so many borders are being closed even in some of the most developed countries in the world," said Guterres, who took over at the U.N. helm this month. (Reporting by Ed Cropley; Writing by Edmund Blair; Editing by Andrew Heavens) This article originally appeared on Fortune. On Saturday night, Ubers New York City Twitter account notified riders that the company was turning off surge pricing for trips at JFK Airport, the site of protests against President Donald Trumps executive order blocking some Middle Eastern travelers and refugees. Critics swiftly accused the ridesharing company of attempting to undermine or profit from a work stoppage by taxi drivers that had been called by the New York Taxi Workers Alliance, an AFL-CIO affiliate that represents many immigrants, and whose work has been largely focused on stopping the encroachment of ride-hailing companies like Uber. What followed was a firestorm of online anger and calls for a boycott of Uber. Well into Sunday morning, #deleteuber was a top trending topic on Twitter, with many commenters sharing screenshots of their deletions or account cancellations. Surge pricing has been turned off at #JFK Airport. This may result in longer wait times. Please be patient. Uber NYC (@Uber_NYC) January 29, 2017 BREAKING: NYTWA drivers call for one hour work stoppage @ JFK airport today 6 PM to 7 PM to protest #muslimban! #nobannowall NY Taxi Workers (@NYTWA) January 28, 2017 A spokesman for Uber, however, has told Fortune that the decision to turn off surge pricing was made specifically to avoid profiting from increased demand during the protest. The company has previously made a similar commitment to limiting surge pricing during disasters, after being accused of taking advantage of riders in times of need. Ubers notification regarding surge pricing went out at 7:36 Eastern Time, after the end of the taxi drivers announced work stoppage. Story continues In addition to the taxi stoppage, transit to JFK was roiled on Saturday by temporary restrictions on the AirTrain system that connects the airport to the citys subway. At least some protesters reported using Uber to get to the protests while train access was restricted. If those riders had experienced unusually high fares, Uber could have risked accusations of attempting to either suppress or profit from the protest. Last tweet not meant to break strike. Our CEOs statement opposing travel ban and compensating those impacted: https://t.co/joWvPvux9J Uber NYC (@Uber_NYC) January 29, 2017 Some promoting the Uber boycott also criticized Uber CEO Travis Kalanicks decision to serve on an economic advisory panel to President Donald Trump. However, Kalanick swiftly issued a strong response to the Trump administration order, saying that dozens of Uber employees and thousands of drivers who use the platform could be affected. He said Uber will offer direct financial support for drivers impacted by the travel restrictions. RELATED VIDEO: Watch: Natasha Stoynoff Breaks Silence, Accuses Donald Trump of Sexual Attack Some promoting the Uber boycott said they would give their business to either traditional taxis or to Uber competitor Lyft. Lyft co-founder and CEO Logan Green voiced his companys opposition to the immigration ban on Saturday, and the company announced a $1 million donation to the ACLU, which has successfully obtained a court injunction against the travel restrictions. 1/ Lyft has worked hard to create an inclusive, diverse and conscientious community where all our drivers and passengers feel welcome. logangreen (@logangreen) January 29, 2017 2/ Trumps immigration ban is antithetical to both Lyft's and our nation's core values. logangreen (@logangreen) January 29, 2017 While the current anger at Uber may have been triggered by a misunderstanding of the companys motivations, it was also fueled by a succession of disputes the company has had with city governments, taxi drivers, and its own workers. That includes accusations that its business model drives down wages and erodes worker protections, claims for which the evidence is mixed. LONDON (Reuters) - Nearly 1 million people have signed a petition urging Britain to withdraw an invitation for U.S President Donald Trump to visit London and dine with Queen Elizabeth. The petition was started before British Prime Minister Theresa May extended the invitation for a "State" visit to Trump last Friday, which means he would come by invitation of Queen Elizabeth II. Trump is set to visit to Britain later in the year. But the campaign to prevent the visit to Britain gathered momentum after Trump put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily barred travelers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries. So far, the petition has garnered 930,000 names. "Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen," the petition said. Once a petition passes 100,000 signatures, lawmakers must consider the petition for debate. Lawmakers from the governing Conservative party and opposition Labour party have criticized Trump's move, with Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn saying the state visit should be put on hold. (Reporting by Alistair Smout; editing by Guy Faulconbridge) London (AFP) - British Prime Minister Theresa May on Monday refused to back down on inviting US President Donald Trump for a glitzy state visit, despite a petition gaining more than 1.5 million signatures and protesters rallying across the country. May is standing firm on the invitation, which would see Trump honoured by parliament and Queen Elizabeth II, despite the premier's office saying she does not agree with his controversial ban on refugees and citizens of seven mainly Muslim countries. "The United States is a close ally of the UK, we work together across many areas of mutual interest and we have that special relationship between us," May told a press conference in Dublin alongside her Irish counterpart Enda Kenny. "I have issued that invitation for a state visit to President Trump to the UK and that invitation stands." The British premier added: "In relation to the policies that have been announced by the US, the UK takes a different approach." May announced the state visit during a meeting with Trump at the White House on Friday, which was intended to boost trade ties after Britain leaves the European Union. But her closeness to the erratic billionaire drew fire at home, particularly when she initially failed to condemn the travel ban, saying it was a US affair. - Tens of thousands protest - Protesters rallied in cities across the UK on Monday, with a police source telling AFP the crowd in London stood at tens of thousands. "Don't hold hands with Nazis" and "No to racism, no to Trump" read placards in London, while the crowd chanted: "Shame on you Theresa May." Protester Annette Connors, 41, said the government's position on Trump suggested Britain was more concerned with scoring a trade deal than principles. "I'm very much against Trump being invited for a state visit, I'm also very disappointed at the government response to what he does compared to European leaders' responses," she told AFP. Story continues In Manchester, northwest England, crowds chanted "no state visit" and "refugees are welcome here". Janet Harbour, 54, said she was protesting for the very first time. "He is a disgrace to America," she told AFP. "America can do better and needs to do better." The national mood was captured on several of Britain's newspaper front pages for Tuesday, many of which carried protest photos contrasting with May's position. By Monday evening, more than 1.5 million people had signed an online petition calling for the state visit to be cancelled because Trump's "well-documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him" from meeting the queen. Set up several months ago, the number of signatures has surged since Trump signed his contentious executive order on Friday. - 'Divisive and wrong' - Opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, the smaller Liberal Democrats and the Scottish National Party have all called for the state visit to be cancelled, as have some from May's own party. Conservative Muslim lawmaker Sayeeda Warsi told BBC radio that Britain should question whether it should roll out the red carpet for "a man who has no respect for women, disdain for minorities... and whose policies are rooted in divisive rhetoric." Trump's order suspended the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely, and barred citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. British foreign minister Boris Johnson told parliament it was "divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality", confirming that, after talks with the US administration, most Britons would be exempt. However, Johnson said there was "no reason" why Trump shouldn't receive a state visit, calling the US-UK relationship the "single most important geopolitical fact of the last 100 years". CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (AP) Most postcards carry a simple sentiment: Wish you were here. But the cards Anastasia Taylor-Lind and Alisa Sopova are mailing randomly to people around the globe convey a haunting message: Wish this stranger was still alive. The pair hopes their postcards each scribbled with the name of a victim of armed conflict in Ukraine will put a human face on war. "I wanted people to have a more personal experience with conflict," said Taylor-Lind, a photojournalist who was on assignment for National Geographic when inspiration struck in a post office in the middle of the war zone. Fighting between Ukrainian government troops and Russia-backed separatists has killed more than 9,600 people in eastern Ukraine since it began in 2014. Ukraine filed a case against Russia this month at the United Nations' highest court, accusing Moscow of illegally annexing Crimea and illicitly bankrolling rebel groups. Although the shelling has diminished, Taylor-Lind feels compelled to keep alive the memories of those on all sides who have perished. At a post office in the embattled city of Slavyansk, she came across postcards with idyllic scenes: a cityscape framed by a river and blossoming trees; lovers embracing at twilight along a moonlit promenade. Printed on them was a cheerful greeting in English: "Welcome to Donetsk," the capital of the Donbass region and ground zero for the conflict. In the summer of 2015, Taylor-Lind ordered 1,000 cards and began addressing them to people around the world she'd never met. Some were chosen at random; others had responded to her vague offer via social media of a postcard not knowing what they'd get. That launched a continuing project that gained momentum last year while she was at Harvard University on a fellowship. Each carried a cryptic message with the name of a casualty of war and the date that he or she died. "The war in Ukraine isn't something that happened and then just went away. The lives and livelihoods of millions were affected," she said. "This was very much an experiment. I didn't know how people would react." Story continues React they have, with anger, shock, confusion and sadness. A few recipients initially puzzled over the cards, which are postmarked in Ukraine, worrying whether someone in their household had lost a friend. Eventually, and by the hundreds, they've shared their thoughts using the hashtags #WelcomeToDonetsk and #WarIsPersonal. Some have carried their cards to a leafy park, a remote beach or a tranquil mountainside and held a moment of solitary remembrance for a fellow human they never met. Others have posed their cards next to lighted candles and posted photos and videos in somber tribute . Jochem Lindelauf, of Groningen, Netherlands, was left reeling when he got a card that read, "Artem Gorlenko was killed in Spartak on Tuesday the 13th of October 2015." Oct. 13 is Lindelauf's birthday. "The crazy coincidence of my birthday brought it even more home for me," he said in an Instagram post. Taylor-Lind, an English-Swedish national now at the Carey Institute for Global Good in Rensselaerville, New York, and Sopova, a journalist from Donetsk doing her own Nieman Fellowship at Harvard this year, so far have mailed more than 2,000 postcards to people in 60-plus countries. Trying to identify those killed has been a challenge. Neither the Ukrainian government nor the U.N. maintains a comprehensive list, forcing Sopova to spend many hours scouring news reports and gruesome photographs posted online, as well as corresponding with officials and others back in Ukraine. "It means nobody cares," Sopova said. "And that makes this project even more important." ___ Follow Bill Kole on Twitter at https://twitter.com/billkole. His work can be found at http://bigstory.ap.org/journalist/william-j-kole. Addis Ababa (AFP) - UN chief Antonio Guterres criticised Monday the closure of borders "even in the most developed countries in the world", after US President Donald Trump slapped a ban on travellers from seven Muslim countries. The new UN secretary general was speaking at the opening of an African Union summit in Addis Ababa, where he praised African nations for being "among the world's largest and most generous hosts of refugees". "African borders remain open for those in need of protection when so many borders are being closed, even in the most developed countries in the world," Guterres said to loud applause. The 28th African Union summit is the first since Trump's election, and the consequences of his presidency for the African continent are already being felt. Trump's administration has faced outrage and widespread protests over the move to ban citizens from seven countries including Libya, Somalia and Sudan in Africa. "It is clear that globally we are entering very turbulent times. For example the very country (where) our people were taken as slaves... has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries," said outgoing AU Commission chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma. "What do we do about this? Indeed this is one of the greatest challenges and tests to our unity and solidarity," she said. The summit has a heavy agenda as leaders will decide whether to allow Morocco to rejoin the bloc 33 years after it quit. They will also vote for a new AU Commission head in an election that will be shaped by regional alliances and interests. United Nations (United States) (AFP) - The United Nations has received assurances from Washington that its employees from Muslim countries hit by the US visa ban will be able to travel to New York to work at UN headquarters. UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric initially told a briefing Monday that a handful of staff was unable to board US-bound flights over the weekend. He later clarified that there were no confirmed cases of UN staff members being affected by the new policies. On Friday, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order suspending the arrival of all refugees for a minimum of 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and barring citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. Some UN employees from the blacklisted countries have G4 visas, which are issued to staff of international organizations -- a class of visas that was deemed exempt in the order. "We have gotten assurances from the US mission that UN staff members from those seven countries listed, who have valid G4 visas, will be allowed to come in the United States for their work," Dujarric said. The United Nations has said it hopes the visa ban will be temporary, but has not urged Trump to reverse course. "Obviously, we have seen the confusion that has taken place over the last few days, and it's clear that it's of concern to us," said Dujarric. UN rights chief Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein called the ban illegal and mean-spirited, issuing the toughest response from the United Nations. Human Rights Watch called on UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to take a clear stand and condemn the US ban. "At a time when governments, civil society and business leaders are increasingly speaking out, it's important that the UN's message not come solely from the UN human rights chief," said HRW deputy director for global advocacy Philippe Bolopion. "Secretary-General Guterres should take a clear stand that Trump's executive order is a blow to refugees, reflects bigotry and will do little to address terrorism." Many governments had a quick, decisive response to President Donald Trumps executive order banning citizens from seven countries from coming to the United States. Some of the impacted countries like Iran and Iraq threatened reciprocal bans; Iraqs parliament has already taken the first step. Some Western countries, like France and Germany, spoke out against the ban, citing things like international obligations and pledging to contact Rex Tillerson, Trumps pick to lead the State Department, once his nomination is confirmed. Canada, for its part, said it would take refugees banned by the United States, a stronger statement than perhaps any press release. And then there was the United Kingdom. British Prime Minister Theresa May, who appeared with Trump at the White House for a press conference to affirm the strength of the special relationship just hours before the executive order was signed, has not condemned the ban. Some of her fellow Tories have been quick to censure her silence (or pseudo-silence: she did say in a statement that she does not agree with Trumps approach). Meanwhile, a petition demanding the cancellation of Trumps state visit to Buckingham Palace garnered more than a million signatures, but so far no cancellation. Foreign Minister Boris Johnson, for his part, was made to defend the government over both Trumps ban and his impending state visit before Parliament. It went better than some other interviews in which Johnson has participated in his time, but was still, shall we say, fraught. Johnson said that the U.S. government had clarified for him that the ban did not apply to U.K. dual nationals (originally, the U.S. embassy in London issued a statement reiterating that it did, but Johnson has apparently received assurances to the contrary), which is to say that, according to Johnson, a U.K. citizen who also has citizenship with, for example, Libya would be able to come to the United States. Story continues He also noted that the Queens reception of such statesmen as Nicolae Ceausescu or Romania and Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe went unhindered, which perhaps says more about the Queens next guest than what Johnson intended. Labours shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry said that the United Kingdom needs a prime minister who is prepared to tell him to stop, not one who simply proffers her hand and silently helps him along, which was probably a reference to this: Also, Labour MP Dennis Skinner, who lived through World War II, recalled hiding under the stairs from Adolf Hitlers bombs, and then called Trump a fascist. Johnson had previously tweeted, We will protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals home and abroad. Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality, and, while taking questions from members of Parliament, reiterated, this is not the policy of Her Majestys government. But that, of course, is not the point. Johnson also reminded Parliament of the vital importance of maintaining good working relations with the United States, and that that is more important to Mays government than, say, condemning a nationality-based ban. And why is the special relationship so very special right now? The United Kingdom needs to maintain good relations in part because it is now uniquely dependent on the United States because of Brexit, for which Boris Johnson himself campaigned. Photo credit: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images Top officials at many prominent U.S. universities are doubling down on their commitment to the traditionally American values of multiculturalism, religious pluralism and tolerance as President Trumps recent executive order on immigration stirs anxiety and disorientation among international students. The White House announced Friday that for at least 90 days, citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries in the Middle East and Africa Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen will not be issued visas or granted entry into the U.S. Admission of all refugees was halted for 120 days. In response, college presidents, teachers and students have taken a variety of actions to stress the importance of international scholars and students in the quality and character of their institutions. Many are condemning Trumps orders as deeply unsettling and contrary to the core principles of their universities and the United States. Todd Fernandez, a graduate student in engineering at Purdue University, has been active in protests efforts against the Trump administration. He said that his friends from countries affected by the travel ban are frankly terrified. They do not know what is going to happen to them and people they love. Others are trying to be supportive, but that only goes so far, Fernandez told Yahoo News. Slideshow: Protests against Trumps travel ban hit the streets of NYC >>> The common sight of protests on college campuses over the weekend was merely one facet of the seemingly ubiquitous demonstrations across the country and beyond. What is less common however and arguably more telling of the troubled state of the nation is the bold and defiant statements from presidents of top U.S. universities. The Rev. John I. Jenkins, the University of Notre Dame president, released a statement Sunday denouncing the sweeping, indiscriminate and abrupt character of the executive orders that will halt the work of some students and faculty members. He said these academics have already undergone thorough review processes in the post-9/11 era and contributed immensely to their campuses. Story continues If it stands, it will over time diminish the scope and strength of the educational and research efforts of American universities, which have been the source not only of intellectual discovery but of economic innovation for the United States and international understanding for our world, he said. Slideshow: Protests at U.S. airports over travel ban >>> According to Jenkins, the executive order demeans the true greatness of the United States guiding ideals: welcoming immigrants, offering compassion for refugees, respecting religious faith, refusing to compromise principles in the face of threats and valuing fairness in general. We respectfully urge the president to rescind this order, Jenkins said. Purdue University president Mitch Daniels said in a statement Sunday that there are many better ways to protect Americans from terrorism than this executive order. The Presidents order related to immigration is a bad idea, poorly implemented, and I hope that he will promptly revoke and rethink it, Daniels said. Drew Faust, the president of Harvard University, penned an open letter titled We Are All Harvard to members of the schools community on Sunday. She said the university has already taken steps to better inform and help international students as everyone grapples with the full, concrete consequences of Trumps executive orders. She said a paramount source of Harvards strength is that it attracts students and scholars from around the world. Similarly, she said, thousands of students travel abroad each year to gain experiences that they would not be able to replicate on campus that elevates the school and helps sustain human bonds essential to mutual understanding. Slideshow: Anti-Trump protesters rally for Muslim and immigrant rights >>> Our robust commitment to internationalism is not an incidental or dispensable accessory. It is integral to all we do, in the laboratory, in the classroom, in the conference hall, in the world, she said. Mark Schlissel, the University of Michigan president, released a similar statement Saturday affirming the schools commitment to its international student body and faculty. He said the universitys actions regarding immigration status are consistent with its long-standing positions on non-discrimination, privacy and public safety. The University of Michigan welcomes and supports students without regard to their immigration status, he said. We will continue to admit students in a manner consistent with our non-discrimination policy. Once students are admitted, the university is committed to fostering an environment in which each student can flourish. Schlissel said the University of Michigan will refuse to divulge the immigration statuses of its international students. The universitys international center released an open letter to international students. It outlines how Trumps controversial orders might affect the students and affirms the staffs continued commitment to their well-being, safety and success. During this challenging and uncertain time, please take care of yourself and continue to focus on the positive reasons you came to U-M, the letter reads. We are glad that you are here. Read more from Yahoo News: Washington (AFP) - US President Donald Trump and South Korea's Acting President Hwang Kyo-Ahn vowed to "strengthen" their joint defense capabilities against the belligerent North, the White House said. "President Trump reiterated our ironclad commitment to defend the ROK, including through the provision of extended deterrence, using the full range of military capabilities," the White House said in a statement, using an acronym for the South's formal name. "The two leaders agreed to take steps to strengthen joint defense capabilities to defend against the North Korean threat." Pentagon chief James Mattis is due to travel to South Korea on Wednesday and Japan on Friday on his first trip as defense secretary. The trip comes amid worries in the two long-standing American allies about the direction of US policy in their region under President Donald Trump. During his campaign, Trump threatened to withdraw US forces from the two countries if they did not step up their financial support for their defense. But the White House insisted that the trip "reflects the close friendship between our two countries and demonstrates the importance of the US-ROK alliance." Seoul and Washington agreed last year to install the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in the South after a string of North Korean nuclear and missile tests -- prompting strong objections from China, which fears it will undermine its own ballistic capabilities. Earlier this month, Hwang warned that North Korea's nuclear and missile capabilities are accelerating at an "unprecedented" pace, as he called for the "swift" deployment of the anti-missile system. Within South Korea, voices opposing the THAAD installation have grown louder, with some opposition candidates pledging to scrap the agreement if they win a presidential election due this year. The plan has also angered Beijing, which has imposed a string of measures seen in the South as economic retaliation, including effectively barring K-pop stars from performing on the mainland and not authorizing South Korean airlines to operate charter flights between the countries. Geneva (AFP) - The United Nations' top torture expert warned US President Donald Trump on Monday that endorsing waterboarding and other abuse as an interrogation technique would be illegal and have disastrous global consequences. Trump has repeatedly said he supports the use of torture in interrogations, although he has said he would defer to his Pentagon chief James Mattis, a torture opponent, for guidance on any new waterboarding push. His comments have nonetheless sparked alarm that he will try to reverse laws put in place by his predecessor Barack Obama outlawing the brutal interrogation techniques like waterboarding used by the CIA on suspects following the September 11, 2001 attacks. "If the new administration were to revive the use of torture, ... the consequences around the world would be catastrophic," Nils Melzer, the UN special rapporteur on torture, said in a statement. "Should Mr. Trump follow through on all of his pledges, more countries are likely to follow his lead and get back into the torture business," he warned, adding that this would be "an ultimate disgrace for all of humanity." Melzer said he was open to engage in "constructive dialogue" with Trump, but urged him not to reintroduce interrogation methods "that are more closely associated with barbarism than with civilisation." He pointed out that torture as an interrogation technique had repeatedly been shown to "produce false confessions and unreliable or misleading information." "Faced with the imminent threat of excruciating pain or anguish, victims simply will say anything - regardless of whether it is true - to make the pain stop and try to stay alive," he explained. Moreover, torture is neither legally nor morally acceptable, Melzer said. "If you are looking for military advantages in war, you can argue that chemical weapons 'work', or terrorism 'works' as well," he warned. And under international law, the prohibition against torture is "absolute", he said, stressing that when used in the context of armed conflict such techniques could amount to war crimes. Washington (AFP) - US special forces who led a rare ground assault against Al-Qaeda in Yemen over the weekend killed women fighting alongside male troops, the Defense Department said Monday. "There were a lot of female combatants" in Sunday's battle, said Pentagon spokesman Jeff Davis. "Female fighters ran to pre-established positions as though they had trained to be ready" to fight the US forces, he said. The US special forces mounted the raid in the Yakla region of Baida province against Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), which Washington views as the global terror network's most dangerous branch. A US service member was killed during a firefight and three others were injured in a hard landing of a V-22 Osprey military aircraft nearby, Davis said. On the AQAP side, 14 fighters, including women, were killed, according to the Pentagon. The jihadist militant group said nearly 30 people were killed, including women and children. The Pentagon declined to say whether children were among the fatalities and stated that the death toll was still being evaluated. The operation, which President Donald Trump said "will assist the US in preventing terrorism against its citizens and people around the world," was the first major US military action in Yemen since he took office on January 20. According to the Pentagon, it was aimed at gathering information, using a lightning raid by special forces to seize the maximum amount of documents, computers or other electronic devices before pulling back. The US military notably wants to be able to improve intelligence on AQAP operations after the militants redeployed to the interior of the country after being chased from the coastal areas between Mukalla in the southeast and Aden. "Since they were ejected out of Mukalla and have moved to the countryside, into the desert, they have been in many ways in a much more friendly environment," Davis said. Story continues The raid, he said, "was specifically to enable us to gather the information we needed to be able to map out this group better and to prevent future foreign terrorist attacks." The raid authorized by Trump was in preparation for some time and former president Barack Obama was aware of it, the spokesman said. "There were operational reasons to why it did not happen, say, two weeks ago," when Obama was still the commander-in-chief, he said. Violent crime increased in many of the nations largest cities in 2016, the second year in a row that metro areas saw jumps in homicide, robbery and aggravated assault. According to the Major Cities Chiefs Association, which collected data from 61 metropolitan police agencies, U.S. cities saw 6,407 homicides in 2016, an 11% increase from the year before. Dallas, Las Vegas, Louisville, Memphis, Phoenix and San Jose all saw rises in killings last year, as did some smaller cities that typically have very low murder rates. Arlington, Texas, for example, had 4 homicides in 2015 but 18 in 2016; Salt Lake City saw 6 in 2015 compared with 14 last year. Darrel Stephens, the MCCAs executive director, cautions that its too early to know whether increases seen over the last two years are mere blips or the beginning of a sustained increase in overall crime rates around the country. Criminologists often say it takes at least three to five years of data to show true trend lines. President Donald Trump routinely portrays crime in the countrys inner cities as out of control. Last week, he tweeted a vague threat to send in the feds in Chicago if the city didnt lower its crime rates. But even with the recent increases, crime remains near all-time lows. Weve had at least two years running now where theres been an increase in 35 to 45 major cities, Stephens says. Its a major issue and should be in the cities where its taking place. But its not anywhere near the kind of violence that we had in the 1990s. Stephens says many departments cite similar problems: gang violence and retaliation, violence associated with drugs, the overwhelming number of guns in many U.S. cities, and even problems related to conflicts originating on social media. Another consistent factor is that violent crime is often concentrated in just a handful of neighborhoods. In Chicago, for instance, most of the homicides occur in a few areas on the South and West sides. Story continues In Dallas, officials often cite domestic assaults and drug-related offenses as factors in the increasing crime rates, leading the department to create a 170-member violent crime task force made up of K-9, narcotics, and gang units. Memphis, meanwhile, is struggling with domestic violence and gang-related violence. We are going to put more focus in the police department on the gangs and the gang units, because they are really driving a lot of the homicides, Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland told local NBC affiliate WMC earlier this month. The raw numbers, however, often dont fully reflect the circumstances behind the increases. The city with one of the biggest spikes last year was Orlando, where 85 people were killed compared with 32 in 2015; 49 of those, though, were from the Orlando nightclub shooting in June. Read more: See Chicagos Deadly Year in 3 Charts About a third of the cities noted in the report either remained steady or saw declines in the number of homicides, including Baltimore, which had a record number of murders in 2015 but reported a decrease last year. As for this year, Stephens says he believes the crime rates will largely be similar to 2016. I dont think thats going to substantially change this year, he says. British mobile phone giant Vodafone said Monday that it was in talks to merge its Indian unit with Idea Cellular in a move that would create India's largest telecoms company. The confirmation ended months of speculation that the two operators were exploring a deal to help fend off Reliance Jio whose recent arrival shook up India's ultra-competitive mobile network market. It also sent Idea shares soaring by a whopping 26 percent on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE). "Vodafone confirms that it is in discussions with the Aditya Birla Group about an all share merger of Vodafone India (excluding Vodafone's 42% stake in Indus Towers) and Idea," Vodafone said in a statement. "Any merger would be effected through the issue of new shares in Idea to Vodafone and would result in Vodafone de-consolidating Vodafone India. "There is no certainty that any transaction will be agreed, nor as to the terms or timing of any transaction," the statement added. A merger between Vodafone India and the Mumbai-based Idea Cellular would turn India's multi-billion dollar telecommunications market on its head, according to global brokerage firm CLSA. The group of analysts has estimated that the pair would command a combined revenue market share of 43 percent, ahead of rival Bharti Airtel, which would hold 33 percent. Reliance Jio, which began operations with great fanfare last year and is owned by India's richest man Mukesh Ambani would have 13 percent, according to CLSA's research. The 4G Jio network launched in September with an audacious free service for the rest of 2016, followed by vastly cheaper data plans and free voice calls for life. It forced rivals to dramatically slash their tariffs and left them scrambling to match the deep pockets of Jio, which is backed by India's hugely wealthy energy-to-chemicals conglomerate Reliance Industries. In afternoon trade Idea stocks were up 26.86 percent, or 20.90 points at 98.70 rupees on the BSE's Sensex index following the announcement. Vodafone was trading up three percent at 199.15 pence on the London Stock Exchange in early morning trade. It wasn't about the politics that divided them, but the kindness that brought the country together for this west Texas man, who left a $450 tip for his waitress despite their political differences. Read: Waitress Shocked to Get Note on Receipt Instead of Gratuity: 'We Only Tip Citizens' Jason White, a dentist, said he traveled to Washington, D.C., last Friday for Donald Trump's inauguration, Fox 5 reported. "For someone like myself that lives out here in west Texas [...] we don't really see the extreme disagreements as much," White said. But that's exactly what he found when Monday morning, he stumbled into a Northwest D.C. coffee shop Busboys and Poets, known for their liberal, eclectic atmosphere. Waitress Rosalynd Harris, 25, who is black, was working at the restaurant that day. She said she was still feeling energized after having participated in the Women's March on Washington the day before. Despite their contrary backgrounds, Harris said she enjoyed chatting with White about his beliefs and politics as she served him. "He said, 'I'm from west Texas, we don't have this. We don't have places where we can get this kind of food, this kind of atmosphere," Harris explained. "It made me happy that he could express himself in that way and be honest, like, 'I'm not from here, and I know you know I'm not from here.'" When White left the restaurant for the airport, Harris was surprised with a $450 tip, on top of a $72.60 lunch bill. Next to the tip was a note: "We may come from different cultures and may disagree on certain issues, but if everyone would share their smile and kindness like your beautiful smile, our country will come together as one people. Not race. Not gender. Just American. God Bless!" "The simple fact that he didn't want to create a scene, but just wanted to let me know that this was a great experience and this is what he hopes for people in general, it was very touching, Harris said, touched by the interaction. Story continues Read: Trump Change: President Donates $10,000 to Campaign Volunteer Whose Father Has Cancer The two were later reconnected via Facetime, where White explained his eyes were opened by his experience in Washington. "I saw a lot of respect from everybody," he said. "The American spirit was real and it was real with everybody, whether you were you a Trump supporter or were there to be a part of the Women's rally." Watch: Drunk Customer Leaves $1000 Tip at Restaurant - Then Returns the Next Day to Get It Back Related Articles: By day, Quinn Woodard Jr. is an electrical engineer at Chevron Corp. By night, he's an online student pursuing his MBA at the Indiana University--Bloomington Kelley School of Business, hoping to accelerate his career and develop new skills. The Bakersfield, California, resident usually wakes around 5 or 5:30 a.m. and prepares to head to the office or drive to the site he's assigned that day. Woodard doesn't have much time to study during the morning or afternoon -- that's typically reserved for after work a few evenings each week. When he returns home, Woodard might attend a live class session through videoconferencing, work on group projects virtually with classmates or complete other assignments. "I go pretty late sometimes, just depending on when things are due," says the 28-year-old, who also plans to earn a master's in entrepreneurship and innovation through a dual degree program at Kelley. "And then I kind of recycle for the rest of the week and plan out what I have to do." Currently juggling two classes, Woodard devotes several hours on weekends to catching up on reading. [Discover four time management tips for online students.] For online MBA students, juggling a full-time job and an education is typical given the flexibility of online education, experts say. Many select this route to either move up in their field or change careers. William Christiansen, MBA program director and finance chair at Florida State University, which offers an online program, says because online MBA students come from various backgrounds, including business, their familiarity with different course subjects varies. That influences how much time they devote each week to classes. "Time management is the key to success with this," says Tara Lall, an online MBA student at the University of Southern California Marshall School of Business. "And I think that looks very different for everybody." Story continues Regardless, prospective online students shouldn't expect a light course load. Sherry Dunbar, an online MBA student at the University of Maryland Smith School of Business and a senior director of global scientific affairs at the biotechnology engineering company Luminex Corp, spends at least 20 hours a week on her program, she says. [Learn why to develop self-motivation skills before starting online courses.] Many online MBA students say they adhere to strict weekly calendars -- especially if they travel for work, as many do. Take 35-year-old Diana Sharpe, an online MBA student at FSU. As a business development manager for L'Oreal, Sharpe often meets customers over a 180-mile span from morning through dinnertime. Enrolled in one course this semester, Sharpe typically blocks off a night or two each week to study at the local library or in her hotel, she says -- plus at least half a day most weekends, depending on her workload. She also sections off time to spend with her three-year-old daughter. "I could easily be dropping the ball on any one -- either family, or coursework, or work," she says. "But when I dedicate specific hours to each, I find it just much more manageable and easier to be 100 percent dedicated to what I'm doing at the time." That's simpler to do in certain situations than others, online students say. Lall, the USC student, says that by juggling her education with a full-time job in applications marketing, she didn't have much time to exercise -- so she purchased a stationary bike desk to use while watching recorded lectures. Whether an online MBA program requires students to virtually attend classes at predesignated times varies with the program, experts say -- something to consider when looking into an option's flexibility. Sharpe, for instance, transferred from an online program that had such requirements, to FSU, which was more self-paced and worked better for her schedule, she says. Despite their busy lives, many online MBA students still find time to network with classmates -- a crucial step to build a business career. Lauren Crawley, an online student pursuing an MBA and a master's in business analytics in a dual degree program at Kelley, says some online student groups hold regular networking events; one geared toward women in business, for example, is hosting a virtual happy hour. [Explore networking tips for online MBA students.] "It's just an integrated, regular part of daily life," the 30-year-old says of networking. Many programs also have in-person requirements or opportunities to travel -- another factor a prospective student should consider, experts say. Woodard, the Kelley student, studied business in Cuba. Dunbar, the Maryland student, says she used vacation time at work to attend a three-day residency on campus. Students participate in community-building activities and complete an introductory course. She also says what she learns each week in class is almost instantly applicable to her job, and vice versa. "It's kind of uncanny that something will come up in a meeting at work, and then we end up discussing that in class the next night," she says. Trying to fund your online education? Get tips and more in the U.S. News Paying for Online Education center. Jordan Friedman is an online education editor at U.S. News. You can follow him on Twitter or email him at jfriedman@usnews.com. The White House says President Trump is aware of some of the criticism from the American Jewish community over the omission of Jews in his statement on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, but White House press secretary Sean Spicer called the controversy ridiculous and pathetic. Hes aware of what people have been saying, but I think by and large hes been praised for it, Spicer told reporters at his daily briefing on Monday. The president recognized the tremendous loss of life that came from the Holocaust, Spicer said. To suggest otherwise, I mean, Ive got to be honest: The president went out of his way to acknowledge the Holocaust. Spicer became defensive during the briefing when he was again asked about the backlash. To suggest that remembering the Holocaust and acknowledging all of the people Jewish, Gypsies, priests, disabled, gays and lesbians frankly, its pathetic, Spicer said. The idea that youre nitpicking a statement that sought to remember this tragic event that occurred and the people who died in it is just ridiculous. Trumps six-sentence statement, issued by the White House on Friday, honored victims, survivors [and] heroes of the Holocaust, but made no specific mention of Jews: It is with a heavy heart and somber mind that we remember and honor the victims, survivors, heroes of the Holocaust. It is impossible to fully fathom the depravity and horror inflicted on innocent people by Nazi terror. Yet, we know that in the darkest hours of humanity, light shines the brightest. As we remember those who died, we are deeply grateful to those who risked their lives to save the innocent. In the name of the perished, I pledge to do everything in my power throughout my Presidency, and my life, to ensure that the forces of evil never again defeat the powers of good. Together, we will make love and tolerance prevalent throughout the world. Spicer said the statement was written by an individual who is both Jewish and a descendant of Holocaust survivors. Story continues But its omission of Jews did not go unnoticed. The Final Solution was aimed solely at the Jews, John Podhoretz, a conservative columnist, wrote in Commentary magazine. The Holocaust was about the Jews. There is no proud way to offer a remembrance of the Holocaust that does not reflect that simple, awful, world-historical fact. To universalize it to all those who suffered is to scrub the Holocaust of its meaning. On NBCs Meet the Press Sunday, White House chief of staff Reince Priebus was asked by host Chuck Todd if the administration was effectively whitewashing anti-Semitism. Im not whitewashing anything, Chuck, Priebus said. Its a terrible time in history. And obviously I think you know that President Trump has dear family members that are Jewish. And there was no harm or ill-will or offense intended by any of that. Trumps daughter, Ivanka, and her husband, Trump senior adviser Jared Kushner, are Jewish. Kushners paternal grandparents were Holocaust survivors who came to the U.S. as refugees. The Haaretz newspaper ran an op-ed criticizing Kushner for staying silent on both the Holocaust statement and Trumps executive order, issued the same day, temporarily banning immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries. After the Holocaust Day refugee bombshell announcement, any solace that could be found in Kushners Jewishness is gone, Allison Kaplan wrote in a column titled Shame on You, Jared Kushner. Priebus was asked if the administration regretted not including Jews in the presidents statement. I dont regret the words, Priebus said. I mean, everyones suffering in the Holocaust including obviously all of the Jewish people affected and the miserable genocide that occurred is something that we consider to be extraordinarily sad and something that can never be forgotten and something that if we could wipe it off of the history books we [would]. But we cant. The Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect, a U.S. civil and human rights group, condemned Priebus explanation. Wake up and smell the Antisemitism in the White House, Steven Goldstein, the organizations executive director, said in a statement. President Trump and his administration are engaging in the kind of Holocaust denial we have seen elsewhere from the most offensive scoundrels of history. Is that what we have come to deal with here? Jonathan Greenblatt, chief executive and national director of the Anti-Defamation League, blasted Trump for overlooking the defining aspect of Holocaust Remembrance Day the horror that befell the Jewish people. As if this were not a sufficient error, repeated statements by White House surrogates in the days that followed only compounded the sin, Greenblatt wrote. Rather than acknowledge the oversight, Administration officials suggested that there was nothing amiss. As one official put it, Everyone suffered in the Holocaust, including the Jewish people. Wrong, Greenblatt continued. The suffering of the Jewish people is not an afterthought, a prepositional phrase to be bolted onto the end of a sentence. The suffering of the Jewish people is the whole reason that the concept of the Holocaust was defined. Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine was equally critical. This is what Holocaust denial is, Kaine said on Meet the Press. Its either to deny that it happened or many Holocaust deniers acknowledge, Oh, yeah, people were killed. But it was a lot of innocent people. Jews werent targeted. The fact that they did that and imposed this religious test against Muslims in the executive orders on the same day, this is not a coincidence. Following Spicers press conference, the Washington, D.C.-based U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum issued its own statement on International Holocaust Remembrance Day: The Holocaust was the systematic, state-sponsored murder of six million Jews by Nazi Germany and its collaborators. Nazi ideology cast the world as a racial struggle, and the singular focus on the total destruction of every Jewish person was at its racist core. Millions of other innocent civilians were persecuted and murdered by the Nazis, but the elimination of Jews was central to Nazi policy. As Elie Wiesel said, Not all victims were Jews, but all Jews were victims. The Holocaust teaches us profound truths about human societies and our capacity for evil. An accurate understanding of this history is critical if we are to learn its lessons and honor its victims. More from Yahoo News: _____ Related slideshows: Slideshow: Protests against Trumps travel ban hit the streets of NYC >>> Slideshow: Anti-Trump protesters rally for Muslim and immigrant rights >>> Slideshow: Protests at U.S. airports over travel ban >>> Hours after Donald Trump signed an executive order immediately barring refugees and immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries on Friday, Sami, an Iraqi who had worked with the U.S. government, boarded a plane in Istanbul. He, his wife and their two children watched Tom and Jerry cartoons as they waited to finally take off for America. It had taken seven years and an extensive vetting process to get special immigration visas, (SIV), a restricted program for Iraqi and Afghan translators endangered by having worked for the U.S. military. Sami, whose name has been changed for safety concerns, had worked for the U.S. Army and USAID. Officials scheduled the familys trip for Jan. 31, but Sami grew worried and bought tickets for Saturday, out of his own pocket. He woke up to see Trump had signed the order, but decided to head to the airport. The family passed through security, flew to Istanbul, and boarded their connecting flight. Minutes later, security officers boarded. At that time both of us recognized that our dream has ended, Sami told Foreign Policy Sunday. As they gathered their belongings and left the plane, his 7-year-old daughter asked through tears, Why they dont want us in America? Trumps executive order on Friday immediately suspended the entire U.S. refugee admissions program for 120 days; indefinitely froze the entry of refugees from Syria; and barred for 90 days travelers from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen. In the United States and overseas, refugees approved for resettlement in the United States, permanent residents holding green cards, and others were turned away from flights, detained, and in some cases deported. Federal judges in New York, Virginia, and Massachusetts, among others, issued emergency stays blocking officials from removing people with valid visas and asylum claims. But the Trump administration seemed determined to press ahead despite the court ruling. President Trumps Executive Orders remain in place prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time, DHS said in a statement Sunday morning. Later in the afternoon, Trump released his own statement. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting, he said. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. Story continues And Customs and Border Patrol agents at U.S. airports continued to enforce the order, in some cases denying lawyers access to detained individuals. Some lawyers have said they are pursuing contempt charges and have called for federal marshals to be sent in, as one judge outlined, if necessary to force compliance. Over the weekend, as lawyers, protesters, and families flocked to airports, immigration officials with no real guidance on how to enforce the order told them: Call Mr. Trump. White House Chief of staff Reince Priebus appeared to walk back parts of the hastily-prepared order, and said people with green cards from the seven countries will not be prohibited from returning to the United States. But he also further muddied the waters, noting that border agents still have discretionary authority to detain and question travelers. The administration will apologize for nothing here, Priebus said Sunday on NBCs Meet the Press. Late Sunday, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker, (R-Tenn.), said the Trump administration should immediately revise the executive order. Later Sunday evening, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, in his first public comment since Trump signed the order, said in a brief statement: I hereby deem the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest. Barring significant derogatory information, permanent legal status will now factor positively into case-by-case determinations, he said. Still, current and former senior officials in the State Department and Department of Homeland Security told Foreign Policy that U.S. immigration and national security policy has been reduced to utter chaos. DHS officials are struggling to keep up with civil rights complaints pouring in, and guidance on implementation remains hazy, haphazard and even contradictory. Veteran officials who normally would have reviewed the orders language to ensure smooth implementation and avoid potential litigation have been cut out of the typical process by the Trump administration or simply overruled, current and former officials told FP. According to one person at DHS, the staff didnt receive any official heads up before Fridays executive order was published, beyond general meetings about what extreme vetting might mean. We had no idea, another immigration official at DHS told FP. It is complete confusion. Caught in the chaos was Said, a 29-year-old physician from Syria who works in a D.C.-area hospital. Late Sunday, he was still waiting at Dulles International Airport to learn what the U.S. government will do with his wife, who arrived Saturday night from Turkey and has been in U.S. custody since. Said received a non-immigrant visa to live and work in the U.S. His wife escaped Aleppo in 2014, and they were married in 2015. In the past two years they have seen each other once, for a week. With no other option, Saids wife has applied for asylum, and as of Sunday afternoon remains in Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention, according to their lawyer. They arent sure where. The executive order destroyed a lot of things,Said said. Im sure a few days after this executive order, Americans who believe that this was the right policy, will know they are wrong. A senior Trump administration official on Saturday insisted Trump advisers had been in contact for many weeks with key State Department and DHS officials about the directive. Everyone who needed to know was informed, the official said. But former senior DHS and State Department officials told Foreign Policy the chaotic implementation of the executive order makes it clear that veterans were railroaded by Trump advisors. There are no career officials at [Citizenship and Immigration Services] or DHS who would have done this when their previous counsel was that it was categorically wrong and potentially both unlawful and unconstitutional on either a national origin or religious test basis, one senior official who just left DHS told FP. That break from typical government procedure riddled the executive order with holes, according to experts and former officials, which could expose it to legal challenge. The initial court rulings blocked most immediate deportations, but have stopped short of making a larger determination on the orders constitutionality. Dan Kesselbrenner, executive director for National Immigration Project, said he expected initial legal challenges will center around permanent residents from the banned countries, and due-process guarantees for immigration hearings. Even though foreigners dont have the right to enter the United States, legal permanent residents and other visa holders have the right to a fair process to decide whether you should come in, he told FP. Sami and his family made it back home just north of Baghdad early Sunday, after more than 15 hours of travel. Their house is nearly empty: Sami had sold most of the furniture to buy our tickets to freedom. Had they made it to the United States, their special immigrant visas would have granted them permanent legal status. Now they could be revoked. Im still in shock, he said, looking to my wife and my kids and wondering what the future is holding for us. Paul McCleary contributed to this article. This story was updated at 6:30 p.m. Photo credit: Stephanie Keith/Getty Images WASHINGTON (AP) -- Since taking office 10 days ago, President Donald Trump has moved to consolidate power within a small cadre of close aides at the White House. He's added a senior political adviser to the National Security Council and appears to have cut out Cabinet secretaries from decision making on some of his top policies, including the immigration and refugee order that led to protests, legal challenges and temporary detention of some legal U.S. residents this weekend. Trump has empowered a small group of advisers, some of whom have no experience in government, to tackle a broad range of issues including national security, the immigration policy, U.S. relations with Mexico and plans to repeal President Barack Obama's health care law. The inner circle includes loyal campaign aides, his son-in-law (Jared Kushner) and the advisers who ran Trump's populist, outsider bid for office. Here's a look at the Trump's inner circle and how they're shaping the policies that are shaking up Washington: __ STEVE BANNON: Every major decision at the new White House has involved Bannon, a media executive who became Trump's top political adviser in a shakeup in August and quickly infused Trump's campaign with an anti-establishment fervor. Bannon's power has only grown at the start of the administration. He is typically at Trump's side in the Oval Office. He helped write the new president's inaugural address marked by the reference to "American carnage." He shaped executive actions pulling the U.S. out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal and freezing the U.S. refugees program. Saturday's memorandum reorganizing the National Security Council extends Bannon's reach further. He will now have a seat at regular meetings on national security, while the incoming director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff will attend only as required by the subject matter. Bannon is a former naval officer and Goldman Sachs executive who led Breitbart News before joining Trump's campaign. Under his tenure, Breitbart became the voice of the alt-right movement and critics pointed to coverage they said espoused racist and sexist vews. Story continues His rhetorical influence on the president was particularly clear last week. In signature style, Bannon referred to the media as the "opposition party" in an interview. Trump repeated the phrase a couple of days later. __ STEPHEN MILLER: Trump's policy rollouts and speeches also bear the fingerprints of Miller, a 31-year-old senior policy adviser who joined his campaign after working as a top aide to Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, Trump's pick for attorney general. Miller played an influential, behind-the-scenes role in derailing efforts in the Senate to pursue an immigration overhaul after the 2012 elections. After joining Trump's team, Miller played multiple roles on the campaign, writing Trump's speeches, developing his policies and frequently serving as a warm-up act at rallies. At the White House, Miller has been the new administration's policy guru with a heavy focus on immigration. He and Bannon were instrumental in the drafting of the executive order that established a temporary travel ban on citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations. Amid chaos at airports and confusion over the ban's impact on legal U.S. residents, Miller was running Saturday night meetings on the order. But that has also made him the subject of criticism. MSNBC's Joe Scarborough accused Miller on Monday of not doing enough to loop in agency heads about the executive order and said the White House adviser had gone on a "power trip." __ JARED KUSHNER: Considered a "first among equals" in the competing power circles in Trump's West Wing, Kushner often has the last word as his father-in-law makes decision and, as family, has unprecedented access to the president in the White House residence. Kushner emerged as one of Trump's most powerful campaign advisers during his father-in-law's often unorthodox presidential bid a calming presence in an otherwise chaotic campaign. He was usually at Trump's side and on his plane during the campaign's final weeks. At the White House, Kushner has played a key role dealing with foreign government officials and Trump has entrusted him to resolve the dispute with Mexico over the border wall and has indicated that he will take the lead in negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. Asked about Kushner's involvement on foreign policy, a White House official said he was "particularly well-suited for sensitive negotiations and relationship building." Kushner also championed the pick of his friend Gary Cohn, the president of Goldman Sachs, for a top White House economic post. ___ REINCE PRIEBUS: Trump's chief of staff is a former chairman of the Republican National Committee and Republican operative from Wisconsin with close ties to House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis. If Bannon has become Trump's policy soul-mate, Priebus appears more focused on organization and implementation. When Trump signs executive orders in the Oval Office, it is often Priebus who hands the president the paperwork. The longest-serving chairman in Republican Party history, Priebus remains popular among RNC members and will help Trump stay connected with members of Congress, the party's establishment, fundraisers and activists across the nation. He is in frequently in touch with Ryan, one of his oldest political allies, and will serve as a key emissary to House and Senate Republicans. __ KELLYANNE CONWAY: The veteran Republican pollster served as Trump's final campaign manager, joining the team with Bannon last summer at a crucial time for the insurgent campaign. Conway's title is counselor to the president and she has frequently been the face of the new administration, appearing frequently on Sunday shows and cable television to promote Trump's message. After White House press secretary Sean Spicer claimed that Trump had the "largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period," Conway defended him on NBC's "Meet the Press," arguing that he was giving "alternative facts." Conway, who also advised Vice President Mike Pence when he was Indiana governor, is using the West Wing office used by former Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett, who led the former president's outreach to the U.S. business and political community. She is expected to help shape the administration's policies on women and veterans. __ Associated Press writers Jonathan Lemire, Jill Colvin and Vivian Salama contributed to this report. __ Follow Ken Thomas on Twitter: https://twitter.com/KThomasDC The White House responded Monday to a State Department dissent channel cable critical of Presidents Trumps new immigration and refugee executive order by encouraging the officials to get with the program or find the exit. A policy which closes our doors to over 200 million legitimate travelers in the hopes of preventing a small number of travelers who intend to harm Americans from using the visa system to enter the United States will not achieve its aim of making our country safer, the memo, first obtained by the Lawfare blog, states. Moreover, such a policy runs counter to core American values of nondiscrimination, fair play, and extending a warm welcome to foreign visitors and immigrants. White House spokesman Sean Spicer rejected the criticism Monday, telling reporters during the daily briefing that the foreign-service officers can get with the program or they can go. The dissent channel, created within the department during the Vietnam era, allows foreign-service officers an outlet to share their concerns about Administration policies without fear of retribution. The memos are generally distributed widely within the State Department to senior leadership and overseas posts and must receive substantive response. Spicer continued to defend the Administrations implementation of the Friday order, which suspended the U.S. refugee program for 120 days and banned travel to the U.S. without a case-by-case waiver for people from seven Muslim-majority countries. Addressing reports of a 5-year-old child detained because he was from one of the affected countries, Spicer maintained, To assume someone because of their age or gender, that they dont pose a threat, would be wrong. Facing mounting criticism from even Republicans on Capitol Hill over the orders drafting and implementation, Spicer reiterated that congressional aides were involved in drafting the order. And facing reports that even Cabinet-level officials were learning of the orders details only after it was released publicly, the press secretary argued that, The people that needed to be kept in the loop were kept in the loop; the people that needed to be briefed were. President Trump on Monday morning signed an executive order, Reducing Regulation and Controlling Regulatory Costs. The order appears to be a gift to the business community, which constantly complains of the burden of compliance with federal requirements. It also appears to vest considerable power in the director of the Office of Management and Budget to throttle federal rulemaking if thats what the administration wants to do. But it promises no immediate disruption. Related: Trump Says Costs Be Damned as He Moves on Major Defense Buildup The headline elements of the new order are that federal agencies need to target two rules for elimination for every new rule they issue, and that the executive branch will move toward establishing a regulatory budget for federal agencies. While both of those steps might feel foreign to Washington, theyd be pretty familiar in a number of other advanced Western democracies. The executive order stipulates that, Unless prohibited by law, whenever an executive department or agency publicly proposes for notice and comment or otherwise promulgates a new regulation, it shall identify at least two existing regulations to be repealed. The idea of a one-in, two-out rule for regulations is not a creation of the Trump administration, but is borrowed from other countries that use a similar method to assure that outdated or redundant requirements that impose a burden on people or businesses are actively sought out and eliminated. The United Kingdom, for example, instituted a similar requirement in 2013. Related: Team Trump on Immigration Disruption: Its a Small Price to Pay The executive order also contains the building blocks of a regulatory budget. It requires that for the remainder of 2017, the net incremental cost of the regulations federal agencies issue shall be no greater than zero, unless otherwise required by law or consistent with advice provided in writing by the Director of the Office of Management and Budget. In other words, the cost of the new regulations must be less than the costs of those being eliminated. Story continues In the following years, the OMB director will, on an annual basis identify to agencies a total amount of incremental costs that will be allowed for each agency in issuing new regulations and repealing regulations for the next fiscal year. No regulations exceeding the agency's total incremental cost allowance will be permitted in that fiscal year, unless required by law or approved in writing by the Director. The order adds the warning that the annual budget could effectively be negative, requiring a net reduction in regulatory costs. Again, this is not uncommon elsewhere. Canada, for example, has had regulatory budgeting in some provincial governments since 2001, and began moving toward it on the federal level with the election of Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper in 2006. The big question now is how the executive order will be implemented, say experts. Related: Trump Targets Muslims, Mexico and Iraqs Oil I really think that the devil is in the details on this kind of scheme, said Philip Wallach, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution. The bigger challenge of the two main elements of the order will be the regulatory budget, he said. And that will be up to Trumps OMB director, who is expected to be Rep. Mick Mulvaney. How is cost assessed? What, exactly, counts as a regulation for these purposes? This order doesnt define any of that stuff. It leaves it all for the director of the Office of Management and Budget to figure out. To know what the real effect of the order will be, Wallach said, it will be necessary to see how OMB defines many of the key terms in it and how the White House decides to handle exceptions. Related: Why Repeal and Delay of Obamacare Could Send Premiums Soaring Next Year There could be a whole lot of gaping exceptions that make it so this really doesnt do a whole lot but thats just one possibility, he said. What the order does do, though, is at least open the door to greater White House control of the regulatory process. I think its possible that the OMB could use it as a way of trying to exert a lot of control over the various regulatory agencies. Well just have to wait and see. Top Reads from The Fiscal Times: donald trump executive order extreme vetting In Donald Trump's first televised interview since becoming president, he explained why he doesn't fear they type of anger or backlash that has resulted from his executive order to restrict immigration from seven Muslim-majority nations. ABC's David Muir asked Trump in the interview if he was "all concerned" that his executive action, which he went on to issue two days later, would "cause more anger among Muslims around the world?" "Anger? There's plenty of right now. How can you have more?" Trump said. Muir asked whether Trump thought it could "exacerbate the problem." "David, David I mean, I know you're a sophisticated guy," Trump said. "The world is a mess. The world is as angry as it gets. What, you think this is going to cause a little more anger? The world is an angry place." But as the order was put into practice, the detention of two Iraqi refugees who had been granted asylum in the US on Saturday sparked a wave of protests around the country and world. Lawyers representing the two Iraqi refugees swiftly filed legal challenges to Trump's executive order, and a federal judge in Brooklyn issued an emergency ruling Saturday evening to prevent the continued deportation of travelers. The ruling, a temporary emergency stay, now allows those who landed in the US and hold a valid visa to remain. Federal judges in Virginia, Massachusetts, and Washington also made emergency rulings on various aspects of the executive order. Trump's order bars people from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen for entering the US for 90 days. It has already strained relations between the US and Iraq, which are currently in a joint operation to fight ISIS. NOW WATCH: Here's how President Obama starts every morning More From Business Insider WWE Network When WWE rolled into San Antonio for the Royal Rumble, we knew they selected the Alamodome as the venue because it was a Big Damn Stadium and was going to make the Rumble feel like a Big Damn Deal. And it did! It was a truly, truly enormous stadium, with an entrance ramp of WrestleMania 24-ian proportions. All night long, people on Twitter were noting the length of the entrance aisle and joking about how long it would take Undertaker to get to the ring when his number came up. Wisely, WWE saw fit to just stash Taker under the ring and have him pop up under cover of darkness. To give you an idea of how long the aisle was and how long it took the speedier participants in the Royal Rumble match to make it to the ring, heres a clip of the internets sweet boy, Jack Gallagher, making his entrance into the Rumble. WWE Network But for those in the arena on Sunday night, they were treated to one of the most amazing sights that no one watching on TV got to see: WWE circumvented the long ramp issue for its beefiest and heaviest Rumble participants by having them come out onto the stage, then the camera would cut away and they would climb aboard an ATV outfitted with a handle, and be speedily driven to the ring. We were first tipped off to this by our own Brandon Stroud. not to tweet during my blackout but are y'all seeing the little hustle cart carrying big guys to the ring Brandon Stroud (@MrBrandonStroud) January 30, 2017 I've never laughed so hard in my life. Brandon Stroud (@MrBrandonStroud) January 30, 2017 But it wasnt until Monday that photos actually showed us what the cart looked like in action. And brothers and sisters, let me tell you that it was absolutely worth the wait. (Via Wrestling Inc.) Story continues Here it is in action, and IT. IS. INCREDIBLE. Me omw to steal ur girl: braun-strowman-cart Yes. YES. MORE BEEFCARTS IN PRO WRESTLING NOW. Hell, bring back Steve Austin and let him drive them to the ring on his tricked-out general manager redneckmobile, or whatever it was called. Im so, so sad that WWE didnt show this adorable cart on the Network, but Im forever thankful that these images exist. Aden (AFP) - Yemen's government warned Monday that US President Donald Trump's order banning travellers from mainly Muslim countries would encourage global "extremism". "Yemen expresses its dissatisfaction after the order prohibiting, even for a limited time, the entry to the United States of people holding a Yemeni passport," a foreign ministry spokesman said. The Arabian peninsula country was one of seven named by Trump in Friday's order whose nationals will be temporarily barred from travelling to the US. "Such a decision is likely to strengthen the position of extremists," the spokesman said, adding that "the only way to achieve victory in the fight against terrorism... is dialogue and not creating barriers." Yemen is gripped by a conflict that has killed more than 7,400 people since March 2015, when a Saudi-backed coalition began bombing raids on rebel forces who had seized control of capital Sanaa and northern and central parts of the impoverished nation. By Hilary Russ NEW YORK (Reuters) - New York City wasted as much as $2.8 billion over an 11-year period on condominium apartments included in a massive affordable housing tax break program, according to a new study to be released on Monday. Instead of fulfilling its mandate to stimulate additional housing development, the benefits are going to condo owners in the form of tax relief through the program known as 421-a, according to the study by the New York City Independent Budget Office (IBO), a non-partisan fiscal watchdog. Critics, including the anti-poverty group Community Service Society, have said 421-a subsidizes mainly market-rate apartments at a huge annual cost to the city. The program, which stopped accepting new applications a year ago, faces an uncertain future as Governor Andrew Cuomo wrestles with lawmakers and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio about how to revive it, including whether to keep condos in the program at all. The program is the city's largest tax abatement, totaling $1.2 billion this fiscal year. That figure includes breaks not only for condo units, which make up a third of the program, but also rental units at 50 percent, according to city tax data. The remainder of the program includes cooperative apartments, family and mixed use units. Earlier this month, Cuomo introduced his Affordable New York legislation, calling for qualifying new residential developments to get full property tax abatements for 35 years. Though it targets development in the city, the program must be authorized by the state. The 421-a program is supposed to promote affordable housing by providing a tax break for up to 25 years if developers set aside apartments for low-income New Yorkers in their residential construction projects. It was enacted in 1971, when private development had stalled in a city that would face the possibility of bankruptcy just a few years later. Once developers sell units or buildings to new owners, the 421-a benefit moves to the new owners, usually at a premium because the tax incentive is attached. Story continues In its study, seen by Reuters, the IBO only examined condos, comparing more than 17,000 repeat condo sales from 2005 through 2015. Manhattan condo owners paid only 53 to 61 cents on average for every dollar received in tax savings, the study found. "Condo owners receive tax relief through a program intended to incentivize development," the IBO's Geoffrey Propheter wrote in his report. "It represents wasted dollars because buyers are receiving more in benefits than they pay for." (Reporting by Hilary Russ; Editing by Daniel Bases and Tom Brown) By David Ingram NEW YORK (Reuters) - New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said on Monday he would seek to ensure that women have access to late-term abortions in the state even if conservatives on the U.S. Supreme Court remove federal legal guarantees in place since the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling. Cuomo, a Democrat who is considered a potential candidate for his party's 2020 presidential nomination, proposed an amendment to the New York Constitution that he said would preserve the status quo regardless of future Supreme Court rulings. President Donald Trump, the Republican who took office on Jan. 20, plans to announce a nominee to the Supreme Court on Tuesday. That person, if confirmed, is expected to restore the court's conservative majority after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia in 2016. The high court ruled four decades ago that the U.S. Constitution protects the right of a woman to have an abortion until the point of viability. The court defined that as when the fetus "has the capability of meaningful life outside the mother's womb," generally at about 24 weeks into pregnancy. The court also recognized a right to abortion after viability if necessary to protect the woman's life or health. If the Supreme Court were to overrule Roe v. Wade, as abortion opponents have long hoped, the procedure would remain legal only where state laws allow it. In New York, a state law that dates to 1970 legalized abortion up to 24 weeks of pregnancy, and afterward only if the woman's life is at stake, with no exception for health. The law is not enforced but could be if Roe v. Wade were overruled, abortion advocates say. The state's law was "revolutionary back in the day because it legalized abortion before Roe v. Wade, but is now unchanged," Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said in an interview this month. "The state law is not as protective as Roe," she said. Dennis Poust, a spokesman for the New York State Catholic Conference, which opposes abortion, predicted that Cuomo's proposal would fail. Story continues "How many abortions are enough?" he said in a statement, noting New York's high rate of abortions. "No one can credibly claim that access to abortion is under any threat in New York." There were 29.6 abortions per 1,000 women in New York in 2014, compared to 14.6 abortions per 1,000 women nationally, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit group that supports abortion rights. Cuomo told a Planned Parenthood rally in Albany, New York, on Monday that women's rights were under attack in Washington. "As they threaten this nation with a possible Supreme Court nominee who will reverse Roe v. Wade," Cuomo said, according to a transcript provided by his office. "We're going to protect Roe v. Wade in the State of New York." New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman issued a legal opinion in September making clear that federal court rulings supersede the state's 1970 law. For a constitutional amendment to succeed in New York, majorities in the legislature must approve it twice, in successive terms, and voters must approve it. Republicans control the New York Senate, although it is possible some Republicans might support such an amendment if pressured by constituents who favor abortion rights, said Costas Panagopoulos, a political scientist at New York's Fordham University. Opposition to Trump may galvanize liberals into being aggressive, Panagopoulos said. "People are scared, and that might compel them to action in a way that different circumstances might have them sitting on the sidelines," he said. For years, states have planned for a day when the Supreme Court might overrule Roe v. Wade. Some 19 states have laws that could restrict abortion in that event, while seven have laws that would still guarantee the right to an abortion, according to the Guttmacher Institute. (Reporting by David Ingram; Additional reporting by Jonathan Allen; Editing by Frank McGurty and David Gregorio) After thousands of people showed up at JFK Airport and in Lower Manhattan over the weekend to protest President Trumps ban on immigration from certain Muslim-majority countries, some New York Muslims say that they feel comforted by the widespread support. Since Trumps election. Yasmeen and Sara Hassan have been cautious about how fellow New Yorkers will interpret the hijab they both wear. The Brooklyn natives say theyve worn hoods on the subway to avoid stares, and their mother fears for their safety on the way to and from school. When Trump was elected, their worst fears about Islamophobia were realized. The most terrifying thing is how many people stood by, that they thought this was acceptable, says Yasmeen Hassan, 22. But on Sunday afternoon in Lower Manhattan, the Hassan sisters felt buoyed by the thousands of people, most of them non-Muslims, who flooded the streets to protests Trumps ban on travel from Muslim-majority nations. I had lost hope in humanity until yesterday, says Sara Hassan, 15, referring to the mass protests at JFK Airport. I thought everyone was like that. Until yesterday. For 25-year old Siham Graine, who emigrated from Algeria in 1998, the anti-Muslim sentiment is as high as shes seen it since just after the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. She says the ban on travel from Muslim countries amounts to an assault on basic American values. Its supposed to be a place for freedom, and he just broke the word freedom, she says. It feels like U.S. passport doesnt mean anything anymore. Read More: President Trump Is on the Defensive After a Chaotic Weekend But looking around the crowd gathered in downtown Manhattan on Sunday, Graine felt encouraged. It makes me feel like we have people to back us up, she says, adding that she plans to show up to every single anti-Trump protest she possibly can, whether its about Muslim immigration or not. He can ban whoever he wants, well be standing here. Story continues Linda Sarsour, a co-chair of the Womens March and executive director of the Arab American Association of New York, addressed the crowd in Battery Park on Sunday, urging the progressive coalition that had formed around the Womens March to continue opposing Trump. Sisters and brothers, you are what democracy looks like. You are what the resistance looks like, she said. What were talking about is not in the abstract, these are human beings that are being impacted by this racist, white supremacist, white nationalism Administration. Read More: President Trumps Immigration Ban Upends Families: They Cant Treat Us Like This Tasnim Islam, a 27-year-old U.S. citizen of Bangladeshi descent who studies at Columbia, said Trumps election made her feel betrayed, but that the outpouring of protest and support for Muslim immigration rejuvenated my faith in my country. To see so many people of so many ethnicities coming out and showing support, she says, makes me so proud. Other Muslims at the protest on Sunday also vowed that they would continue to oppose Trump, no matter what. Even if its not my turn personally, its going to be my turn later on, says Marwah Garib, a 24-year-old Columbia student and U.S. citizen from Egypt. Garib said she was pleasantly surprised to see so many non-Muslim New Yorkers take to the streets to defend her religion. I dont feel so alone, she said. Thank you, New York. Https%3a%2f%2fblueprint-api-production.s3.amazonaws.com%2fuploads%2fcard%2fimage%2f363067%2f3d76533e-e7a0-4d3a-a310-9e17f05326fd It's been a little over a week since President Trump's inauguration, and already, millions of Americans are sitting in front of their phones, hysterically retweeting Vox articles, often immobilized with fear. The bad news comes in so fast you can hardly keep up with it: senior State Department officials asked to resign, a defacto Muslim ban and a white supremacist given a role typically held for generals. As important as it is to remain informed, however, it's equally necessary for people to stay calm and not lapse into full on Facebook post hysteria. It's far easier to organize when you're motivated by the hope in your heart rather than the panic our president inspires. SEE ALSO: 4 new sites to help you take action after the Women's March on Washington You can't and shouldn't dissociate from what's happening in Washington. You have a moral responsibility to act. But there are more effective ways you can manage your media consumption and activism, making you a stronger organizer (and way more likable human). Here's a look at just a few. 1. You only need one breaking news notification, not twelve. Do you really need to read "we're on the verge of nuclear holocaust" story from The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, Vox, The Guardian and The Wall Street Journal? Read the news and often, but only when you can. Don't let 900 repetitive interruptions interfere while you're peacefully napping on the toilet at work. 2. Follow more activists on Twitter and Facebook. Journalists have one job: to inform the public, regardless of the emotional toll it costs. Activists have a slightly different responsibility. They need to execute a careful balancing act: giving their followers enough information so that they stay awake, and the right amount of hope and resources so that people want to wake up in the first place. Alicia Garza and Rebecca Solnit are both brilliant activists to follow on Facebook, as are Linda Sarsour, Deray McKesson and the Women's March on Twitter. Story continues 3. Set a realistic, measurable goal for the number of phone calls you can make to your representatives per week. There is only so many times per week you can call your Senator from your office bathroom to block the appointment of Betsy Devos. Stop aggressively copy pasting your email address into 100 different wtf.org petitions and use a service that guides you, like "Five Calls," which tells you exactly who to call each day and precisely what to say to them. 4. If you're new to politics, don't create a new organizing group. Join one that already exists and make it stronger. Post-election, many of us have been invited to so many secret organizing groups and Facebook chats we have literally lost the ability to click. If you haven't been active before, admit it you have no idea what you're doing. Try to find a group in your area already led by experienced organizers and contribute whatever skills you have, even if it's licking 19th century envelopes or fixing the group's horrifying Geocities homepage. The best and easiest way to find a group in your area is to head to Indivisible, which has a full list of anti-Trump resistance groups here. 5. Celebrate every goddamn victory "the resistance" achieves. It may be hard to believe, but the past few months haven't been a total loss for Western civilization. "The resistance" has already achieved remarkable results in a shockingly short period, including: the largest protest in United States history, skyrocketing donations to groups like the ACLU, calls to legislators that actually resulted in real action and the greatest spike in vagina hats this world has ever seen. Instead of just counting up your losses, hold onto your victories. That makes them easier to build. 6. Read news sources that aren't designed to give you a heart attack There are plenty of slower-moving, highly reputable news sources out there that aren't just out to get your heart racing and your fingers clicking. Watch PBS News Hour instead of CNN, listen to NPR instead of Sirius radio and read The New York Times. They'll give you the news and perspective you need without striking you dead from panic at your desk. 7. Turn off Facebook, Twitter and close any Wiki pages you have open about nuclear war for at least one hour before bed. You should be doing this anyway, but especially now. You need to sleep. Nazis will be there tomorrow! 8. Eat whatever the hell you want because f*ck it Listen, the doomsday clock is literally inching towards midnight now is not the time to go Paleo, folks. Sure, it's technically "good" to eat healthy, but who cares. If eating fettuccine alfredo for breakfast keeps you from bawling in front of your boss, then do it. Don't let Trump take away your constitutional right to cream sauce. 9. Set up monthly automatic donations from your bank account so you don't go bankrupt If you donate to everything people ask you to donate to on Facebook, you will lose your entire life savings to some random state senator's South Dakota slush fund. Many reputable nonprofits can make automatic deductions from your bank account, so let them provide that service. Of course, you can and should (if possible) donate to other causes as situations arise, but for now, let the bots do the work for you. 10. Go to a march and scream your heart out with a bunch of people who care just like you Listen: none of us like to stand. But if standing involves yelling obscenities at full volume with women twice your age in vagina hats, and twerking in booty shorts outside of Mike Pence's gingerbread house, then yes, you should go for it, not just because it feels good, but because it's effective, and it makes Trump really, really mad. 11. Try to separate fear from reality. Trump has signed a frightening number of executive orders in the past few days. Whether he'll actually be able to some execute any of those orders is up for debate most executive orders are symbolic, and even his own Department of Homeland Security is preaching a different message than the White House. 12. Remember: you do have leaders in government who are standing up for you. Watch everything Maxine Waters does. Not all of the Democratic leadership is dead at the wheel. Representative Maxine Waters (D-CA) feels your pain. It didn't even cross her mind to attend Trump's inauguration. She once lovingly called certain Republicans "demons." If that's not a leader, I don't know what is. 13. Never forget: you're not alone. The vast majority of this country doesn't want this either. Nearly 3 million more people voted for Clinton than Trump. These people agree with you: Oh and these people: Aaaaand these: Even, technically, this guy: Image: martha tesema/mashable We're all here, right by your side, even when you don't see us. Photo credit: Getty From Town & Country The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) raised $24.1 over the weekend, reports CNN. To put things in perspective, the organization, which works to preserves the rights and liberties guaranteed by U.S. law and the constitution, typically receives $4 million in online donations per year. Anthony Romero, executive director of the organization, called the influx in support an "unprecedented" response to President Trump's executive order on immigration, which suspends all refugee admissions for 120 days and blocks citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen from entering the United States for 90 days. As it stands, the executive order applies to citizens of those countries with valid visas and green cards as well as those with dual citizenship-for example, someone who is a citizen of both Iran and Canada, according to The Atlantic. It does not apply to naturalized U.S. citizens. The order went into effect immediately, causing immigrants with valid visas or green cards and refugees to be detained in international airports across the country. They had been mid-flight when it was signed. The ACLU requested a temporary injunction to "block the deportation of all people stranded in U.S. airports under President Trump's new Muslim ban." The stay was granted by a federal judge in New York's Eastern District Saturday night. WATCH: ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero coming out of the court where the ACLU just argued and won block of Trump's Muslim ban. pic.twitter.com/kvWDgWiUIn - ACLU National (@ACLU) January 29, 2017 "Clearly the judge understood the possibility for irreparable harm to hundreds of immigrants and lawful visitors to this country," said Romero of the ruling in a statement by the ACLU. "Our courts today worked as they should as bulwarks against government abuse or unconstitutional policies and orders. On week one, Donald Trump suffered his first loss in court." Story continues Deputy director of the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project Lee Gelernt, who argued the case, said, "This ruling preserves the status quo and ensures that people who have been granted permission to be in this country are not illegally removed off U.S. soil." The ACLU sees the stay as a victory, but plans to continue fighting. Rallies across the country this weekend have protested the executive order, and many celebrities and tech moguls are matching donations to the ACLU so they can continue their work. I'm inspired by all who are barely scraping by yet still giving monthly to the @ACLU. Show me your receipts and I'll match 'em to $75k. https://t.co/dej1dXag3a - Chris Sacca (@sacca) January 28, 2017 help our queer & immigrant friends. send me your donation receipts for the @aclu & I will match up to $100K https://t.co/P9zVRH0WH0 #RESIST - sia (@Sia) January 28, 2017 stand with me for immigrants and the LGBTQ community. i will be matching donations to the @ACLU up to 20k. tweet me your donation receipts - jackantonoff (@jackantonoff) January 29, 2017 For the full text of the executive order, click here, and for the full legal document regarding the stay, head over to the ACLU's website. [contentlinks align="center" textonly="false" numbered="false" headline="Related%20Story" customtitles="The%20Role%20of%20Philanthropy%20in%20Political%20Opposition" customimages="" content="article.8793"] You Might Also Like Miss Universe contestant Iris Mittenaere, right, of France is crowned the 2017 winner by former Miss Universe Pia Wurtzbach of the Philippines during the Miss Universe pageant at the Mall of Asia Arena in Manila on Jan. 30, 2017. (Photo: AFP) Steve Harveys Miss Universe gaffe stole the show during the 2016 Miss Universe competition. Yet for this years scandal-free event, the gowns (and, of course, the women wearing them) were a focal point of the night which was good news for Marquis Bias, the stylist for the Miss Universe Organization. So what made this years pageant fashion, which is typically overlooked, different than in the past? Contestants shifting away from wearing typical pageant looks (think voluminous tulle skirts with jewel-encrusted bodices in bright colors) and opting for more typical red carpet ready stunners. Bias, who is a fan of the trend, says that the change is being brought on by the participants themselves and that IMG, which bought the organization in late 2015, has also been a proponent of the shift. Of course theres still girls that are tried and true pageant girls, and their gowns are very of that inspiration, but I feel that a lot of the girls that are more successful in the evening gown competition are girls that choose gowns that could easily be seen on any red carpet, Bias tells Yahoo Style. Case in point: the dresses worn by the competitions top nine finalists, especially those of Miss Kenya, Miss Thailand, and Miss Haiti. Of course, no ones fashion was more emblematic of this trend than that of the crowned winner herself, Miss France, Iris Mittenaere. The dental surgery student, whose honesty during the Q&A section made her a shoo-in for the crown, dressed in a gold couture gown that reportedly took five months to make for the evening gown portion of the night. Yet, Bias admits that he was just very excited to have a Miss France because its been 64 years, if Im not mistaken, since Europe has had a winner. As a function of his role, Bias works with the crowned Miss Teen USA, Miss USA, and Miss Universe throughout their respective reigns. We often have Latin winners, which is wonderful; weve had several winners from Asia; weve had quite a few American winners; weve had some African winners as well; but we havent had a European winner in quite some time. Story continues Miss Universe 2016, Pia Wurtzbach, whos from the Philippines where the competition took place and also collaborated with Bias, crowned her successor in a blue custom-designed Michael Cinco couture gown. She really just honestly left it up to him, Bias said of the full-skirted design. She has admired him for years and she was very adamant about having him create her final walk gown. She really just said that she wanted a strapless ball gown and left the rest up to him. The royal blue piece, which was one of three Cinco designs Wurtzbach wore for the weekend-long competition, was a stunner. Not only was it important in that Cinco is also Filipino, but the color was actually significant to Wurtzbachs tenure too. She was crowned in a blue gown as well, and since then the color has been coined as Pia Blue, Bias explains. Throughout her reign shes worn this same color blue a lot at pivotal moments in her career. She wore Pia blue when she was interviewed by Steve Harvey; she wore blue when she did her homecoming in the Philippines, and she really wanted that full circle moment in her reign of having the same Pia blue for her final walk gown. However, Cinco wasnt the only designer who dressed the pageant queen for the weekend; there was also industry mainstay Sherri Hill. Ever since I was a kid growing up and watching pageants, you really werent anything if you werent wearing Sherri Hill, Bias explains. Shes of course been a sponsor at Miss Universe for many, many years and were so blessed to have her. Wurtzbach wore multiple designs from the company while the Texas based-brand also created Miss USAs preliminary and evening wear gowns. And as for what the stylist is looking forward to throughout Miittenaeres tenure? Im excited for those French designers, he confessed. Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest for nonstop inspiration delivered fresh to your feed, every day. A Bella Hadid cookie from Cupcake Market in New York City was part of a DKNY contest with the model. (Photo: Courtesy of DKNY) Budding young model Bella Hadid has started 2017 with a handful of lucrative contracts, elevating her star status to the level of her sister, Gigi. On Jan. 27, the fashion brand DKNY announced a new spring campaign featuring Bella, to praise from media and fans alike. The campaign was also part contest, where fans could embark on their own Bella-themed scavenger hunt around New York City. DKNY released addresses of six destinations on Instagram early Sunday. If contestants visited each one and posted pictures with the corresponding hashtag, they would qualify for a chance to win $4,500 DKNY gift card and meet Bella (!!!!!) at a store event on Feb. 1 (not during the contest itself.) The contest description for model Bella Hadids promotional campaign with DKNY. (Photo: Courtesy of DKNY) I was skeptical about just how many fans would spend their precious weekend navigating downtown Manhattans spotty subway system on the Hadid hunt. Was the faint promise of meeting a famous 20-year-old motivation enough? And could it possibly even eclipse the chance of winning all that merch? Like any self-respecting journalist, I decided to investigate (since, as a member of the press, I couldnt technically win). And so, a bit past noon on that brisk, sunny Sunday, I left my Brooklyn apartment to #FindBellaDKNY. My first stop was the Chelsea High Line Hotel, where an Intelligentsia Coffee truck was parked not on the street, but within the hotels gated courtyard. On the truck itself was one of the campaigns posters, and on the counter, coffee sleeves printed with Bellas face. This first location was calmer than Id expected, the only other people there being the woman working the coffee truck and a man working on a laptop who was clearly not interested in the Bella hunt. I was disappointed. Is this what I gave up brunch for? I decided Id wait for the inevitable swarm of Bella fans to mob the truck. After all, this was international supermodel Bella Hadid we were talking about. Besides, the contest had officially started only an hour before. Story continues A few minutes later, finished with the scone Id scarfed down and seeing no other reason to stand in the cold, I began to walk toward 10th Avenue. Suddenly, whoosh! a fiercely determined young girl nearly sideswiped me, iPhone in hand, to snap a picture of the truck. Are you here for the Bella search? I asked, as if it werent obvious: The girl was in a rush to capture the campaign poster, while her cab, door ajar with the meter left running, was waiting for her at the curb. Yes! the girl said. I love Bella! It was only 2 p.m., just two hours into the all-day contest, but the 18-year-old, who told me her name was Olivia, had just captured her final image, now qualifying her to win the grand prize. Clearly, Id underestimated fans dedication to meeting Hadid. Before I could ask Olivia anything more, she had sprinted back to her yellow cab and jumped in, and I watched as the driver sped off until it hit a red light 50 feet away. Finally! My sleepy morning was injected with some real action, as if Id suddenly become an extra on a low-budget heist movie that would probably go direct to video. Reenergized by this youthful exuberance, I set out to hit the next location: the Cupcake Market in the East Village. I arrived at the quaint bakery 15 minutes later, although there seemed to be no apparent Bella hysteria. I walked in and immediately noticed the giant Bella cookies on a table near the doorway. Resisting the sugary temptation, I approached a bakery employee named Mackenzie to ask her about the contest. I found a cookie form of Bella #FindBellaDKNY @dkny A photo posted by aundera schroder (@aundera) on Jan 29, 2017 at 1:29pm PST Weve had more foot traffic early on a Sunday morning than we would normally, Mackenzie told me. When asked whether contestants were buying Bella cookies or simply checking items off their list, she said that some had bought cupcakes, some nothing, and only two had bought a $15 Bella cookie. The bakery was charming, and I almost didnt leave, until I glanced up and caught a Joe Biden cookie hanging on the wall (the bakery is known for creating huge cookies with celebrities faces iced on them). Inanimate Cookie Joe seemed to give me a reassuring nod-and-wink, as if to say Go get em, Tiger. Not wanting to disappoint our former VP and forever Internet hero, I grabbed my backpack and sought out Destination No. 3, waving Mackenzie good-bye, and knowing that I might never see her or the magical bakery again. (Goodbye, Cookie Joe) This time, I embarked on foot through the citys not-so-mean streets to the Lower East Side, the formerly gritty downtown neighborhood thats now reserved after dark for belligerent trust-fund kids. I might have missed my third destination, AKIKO Nails, if not for an inconspicuous overhead sign and a set of stairs leading to the tiny salon. A Venezuelan hand model named Ines wearing stick-on Bella nails sat perched in a bright alcove, looking down on Rivington Street and waiting for contestants to come in to take pictures of her manicure. #dkny #findbelladkny @bellahadid @dkny A photo posted by #findbelladkny (@cher.rios2) on Jan 29, 2017 at 2:59pm PST AKIKOs receptionist told me that no one, aside from Ines, had got a Bella manicure. The salons nail technicians were busy working on regular clients and were booked solid through that evening. I examined my own hands and, feeling inadequate (ugh, my nail beds suck), turned to walk out, when I noticed a woman named Monique waiting patiently behind me to take a picture of Iness nails. Monique (who asked to be identified using an alias), seemed, well, too old to be a hardcore Bella fan. I soon learned that she is a 38-year-old health care professional who had met Bella and Gigi Hadid once before in Los Angeles. It was just at a meet-and-greet, quickly. Id like to meet her again. Ashamed of my ageism, I wished Monique good luck and left the salon. I was close to another destination, a graffitied wall only a 10-minute walk away. But I was tired, dedication dwindling. Maybe a Bella cookie could have given me more stamina, I thought. Then I remembered Cookie Joe and, inspired again, resumed my mission. I walked down Eldridge Street and saw a graffiti Bella, face slightly misshapen thanks to the grooves in the tagged garage door. The models perfectly sculpted, ahem, features looked as if they were reflected through a funhouse mirror. @dkny #FindBellaDKNY A photo posted by (@jkk624) on Jan 29, 2017 at 1:16pm PST Eldridge Street was quieter than the hotels courtyard had been, and I decided after a painstaking 45-second wait that the chance of running into another Bella fan here was unlikely. By now, I was three hours into the Bella hunt, hungry, with waning morale. I rewarded myself with lunch at nearby Cherche Midi and scrolled through Instagram posts using the contest hashtag. Much to my surprise, people were visiting each destination. There were hundreds of posts at the checkpoints across town, and I quickly saw photos posted by Olivia, the teenager I ran into at the High Line Hotel. She had completed the contest in an astonishing two hours. thank you @dkny for the fun day of scavenger hunting around NYC ???? make my dream come true ???????? #FindBellaDKNY #DKNYSS17 @dkny A photo posted by olivia (@olivia_nixon) on Jan 29, 2017 at 3:14pm PST I decided that Id embark on a search for one last locale the DKNY flagship store in New Yorks SoHo neighborhood, which seemed like an appropriate way to end the Bella hunt. There was a Bella newsstand displayed in the window, rendering it unnecessary for contestants to actually go into the DKNY store to participate. At the DKNY Flagship store in SoHo, a newsstand is set up for the Bella Hadid Instagram contest. (Photo: Courtesy of DKNY) I walked in anyway, and the saleswoman I approached looked deflated. She explained to me that most of the people who came into the store that day were young girls asking whether they could meet Bella there. They keep asking, Is she here? and I try to tell them, No. Theyre not really buying anything. It didnt seem to bother any of the fans I encountered that theyd have to wait a few days for the chance to meet Bella. They might have endured, but I had not, and I decided to call it a day. I had only hit five stops, just shy of the six for completing the contest. I went back to Brooklyn empty-handed, wishing Id gotten myself a Bella cookie or at least a coffee with her face around the cup to sustain me. Alexandra Mondalek is a writer for Yahoo Style and Beauty. Follow her on Twitter @amondalek. Lets keep in touch! Follow Yahoo Beauty on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. Related: Welcome to the Spotlight, Anwar Hadid By Rishika Sadam and Aishwarya Venugopal (Reuters) - Fitness-band maker Fitbit Inc said it would cut about 6 percent of its workforce and estimated fourth-quarter revenue well below its own forecast, hurt by weaker-than-expected demand during the holiday shopping season, especially Black Friday. Fitbit's shares fell 14.42 percent to a record low of $6.17 in morning trading on Monday. The company's colorful wristbands and clippable widgets, which track heart rate, calories, sleeping patterns and step counts, have come under pressure in a peaking market for wearables and as new rivals step in. "I'm not sure how many people out there, who don't have a fitness tracker yet, will all of a sudden will feel the need to go out and get one," Wedbush analyst Nick McKay told Reuters. The company is also facing intense competition from rivals such as Apple Inc, Samsung Electronics, Xiaomi Inc [XTC.UL] and Garmin Ltd. Fitbit said it now expects fourth-quarter revenue between $572 million and $580 million, much lower than its previous forecast of $725 million-$750 million. Analysts on average were expecting revenue of $736.36 million, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. The company, in November, forecast revenue for the key quarter below Wall Street estimates, partly due to production issues related to its new Flex 2 wristband. Fitbit's weak results highlight the risks of relying on a hit-driven device business, where consumer tastes are fickle, competition intense and differentiation limited, SunTrust Robinson Humphrey analysts wrote in a note. Fitbit said it estimates sales of 6.5 million devices in the quarter compared with 8.2 million devices a year earlier. "To address this reduction in growth and what we believe is a temporary slowdown and transition period, we are taking clear steps to reduce operating costs," Fitbit Chief Executive James Park said. Fitbit, which had about 1,627 employees as of Oct. 1, said the reorganization will impact around 110 employees, and it expects to record about $4 million in charges in the first quarter of 2017. Fitbit also said it expects an adjusted net loss of 51-56 cents per share in the fourth quarter, compared with a previously announced profit of 14-18 cents. Analysts on average were expecting a profit of 17 cents. The company also forecast 2017 revenue of $1.5 billion-$1.7 billion, widely missing analysts' average estimate of $2.38 billion. Up to Friday's close, stock had more than halved in the past 12 months. (Reporting by Rishika Sadam and Aishwarya Venugopal in Bengaluru; Editing by Martina D'Couto) The Galaxy S8 may not be the only piece of hardware arriving from Samsung later this spring. A set of wireless, noise-canceling headphones may be coming with the new phone. Samsung's GearX headphones came out in 2016. (Jeremy Lips/Tom's Guide) Samsung's GearX headphones came out in 2016. (Jeremy Lips/Tom's Guide) Samsung will reportedly offer the headphones alongside its Galaxy S8 this year, according to a tweet by Roland Quandt, who leaks mobile news. Quandt says the headphones will be announced at the same event where Samsung unveils its new Galaxy S8. Earlier leaks suggest that will happen March 29. Samsung has big plans for the Galaxy S8. Rumored features for the new phone include a dual curved display that could top out at 6.2 inches, a built-in personal assistant called Bixby and possibly even the ability to plug into a dock and transform into a mobile desktop PC. Samsung has in the past unveiled accessories alongside flagship handsets, so the idea that it might be doing it again with the Galaxy S8 is no surprise. And an early rumor making the rounds in December also suggested that wireless headphones would be part of the Galaxy S8 launch. Of course, when that rumor first emerged, it appeared that the Galaxy S8 might ship without a dedicated headphone jack subsequent leaked images suggest that there will be a 3.5mm audio jack on the S8, though. MORE: Best Headphones - Top Rated Headphones and Earbuds Quandt fills in a few more details about the rumored headphones, which will feature active noise canceling like the kind available in Samsung's wired headphones. Samsung has said that its active noise canceling can reduce ambient noise by up to 20db. The wireless versions will reportedly come with a microphone to allow you to make phone calls while you're wearing them. The wireless Samsung headphones, which will undoubtedly invited comparisons to Apple's AirPods, which were also announced alongside its iPhone 8 last year, will come in several colors, Quandt says, including black, silver, red, and green. He puts the price of the headphones at 130, which would be $139 for U.S. consumers. Story continues Samsung hasn't said what its plans might be for future headphone releases, and likely won't comment on those plans until it's ready to unveil something later this year. See also : Most Anticipated Phones of 2017 By Naomi Tajitsu and Paul Lienert TOKYO/DETROIT (Reuters) - Honda Motor Co Ltd and General Motors Co (GM) will jointly produce pollution-free hydrogen fuel cell power systems in the United States from around 2020, the companies said Monday, despite President Donald Trump's promises to dismantle U.S. environmental regulations intended to spur green car demand. At a briefing in Detroit, GM executive Mark Reuss said the fuel cells could be used in autonomous vehicles, as well by ride-sharing companies, such as GM affiliate Lyft. He also said fuel cells could have aerospace and military applications. The companies on Monday said they will invest $85 million to add a production line at a GM battery plant in Brownstown, Michigan, and create 100 jobs. The fuel cell production line will be partly automated and is designed to be quickly scaled up if demand warrants. The companies' U.S. investment plan is the latest this month from the auto industry after Trump urged car makers to raise production in the United States and vowed to cut regulations, including environmental ones, and taxes to make the U.S. more business friendly. Honda on Monday said fuel cell vehicles (FCVs) remained central to new-energy cars making up two-thirds of its line-up by 2030 from around 5 percent now. "The United States is where demand for fuel cell vehicles is going to be among the highest so we've decided to consolidate our manufacturing operations into one location there," Honda spokesman Teruhiko Tatebe said at a joint news briefing in Tokyo. Honda is among a handful of automakers to develop FCVs, which combine hydrogen and oxygen to produce electricity and emit only water. But limited fuelling infrastructure has limited demand while in the United States while low petrol prices have pushed consumer preference toward sport utility vehicles and pick-up trucks. Honda has produced just 118 of its Clarity Fuel Cell cars since its U.S. and Japan launch last year at a relatively high price of 7.66 million yen ($66,795). Honda makes that vehicle's components in Japan but on Monday said it would eventually shift production of fuel cell power systems to the U.S. to cut costs. It said it had not decided whether to continue assembling FCVs at home in the longer term. At GM, research into hydrogen as a fuel stretches as far back as the mid-1960s with a modified Chevrolet Corvair minivan. As part of a development partnership forged in 2013, the latest agreement will see GM and Honda each hold 50 percent of newly formed Fuel Cell System Manufacturing LLC. Their future FCVs will share the same power system from around 2020. (Reporting by Naomi Tajitsu in Tokyo and Paul Lienert in Detroit; Editing by Christopher Cushing and Cynthia Osterman) Apple will soon announce its numbers for the December quarter, and all eyes will be on its new flagship, the iPhone 7. Analysts expect Apple to announce 78 million iPhone sales for the first quarter of the fiscal year 2017, a 4% increase from last year. A new report also indicates that Apples iPhone 7 Plus has been the absolute star of last quarter, which seems to suggest the incoming iPhone 8 will not be as cheap as you may hope. Don't Miss: From Apple to Tesla, Silicon Valleys biggest tech companies thrash Trumps new immigration policy After talking to analysts, The Wall Street Journal concluded that Apples strategy to differentiate the iPhone 7 Plus from the iPhone 7 more than it did with their predecessors works for the company. Not including screen and battery size differences, the iPhone 7 Plus is superior to the iPhone 7 in two key aspects: camera and RAM. These features are enough of a differentiator for Apple to slightly bump the iPhone 7 Plus price compared to the iPhone 6s Plus. The base iPhone 7 Plus sells for $769, a $20 premium compared to the 2015 phablet. The specs differences are also seen as the main reason why more people who bought a new iPhone last quarter chose the Plus version. According to Cowen & Co, the iPhone 7 Plus accounted for 40% of the 58.5 million iPhone 7 units sold in the December quarter. Thats 17% more than iPhone 6s Plus sales last year. UBS estimates its also enough to help increase the average selling price (ASP) of iPhones to $693 for the December quarter, up $2 from a year ago. Thats even though Apple had to face with a lowered iPhone 7 demand compared to its predecessors. The iPhone 7 Plus was a hit in China, though iPhone sales dropped 10% in the December quarter. It was also more popular than the iPhone 7 in the US 47% of sales went to the phablet compared to 35% last year The market is saying, We still value what Apple is doing and value it enough to even spend more on it, Creative Strategies analyst Ben Bajarin told The Journal, addressing the fact that many $300 phones offer similar features as iPhone 7 models. Story continues Apple on Tuesday will announce its actual results for the period. All eyes will be on Apples rumored iPhone 8 this year, expected to feature a complete makeover. The iPhone base wants a new, cooler iPhone, Cowens Tim Arcuri said. Theres a lot of pent-up demand for a product with newer, cooler features. Arcuri said that Apple pulled that [pricing] lever like never before with the iPhone 7 Plus. He also estimates theres even more room for Apple to increase prices on future devices. Apple has kept iPhone pricing virtually unchanged, at least for the entry-level models. The iPhone 7 costs as much as the iPhone 6s or iPhone 6 did last year. The iPhone 7 Plus was the only one to get a price bump. Considering Apple is rumored to launch two iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus successors alongside the radically redesigned iPhone 8, it wouldnt be surprising to see the iPhone 8 priced a little higher than the iPhone 7s Plus. Reports indicate that the Galaxy S8 will also be more expensive than its predecessor. It remains to be seen whether the iPhone 8 will be more affordable than Samsungs upcoming handset, or whether Apple will indeed go for a price hike to drive up the iPhones ASP. Trending right now: See the original version of this article on BGR.com Amid Nokias planned comeback in the smartphone scene, there were reports that the Finnish company was also interested in joining the digital assistant trend. However, it seems Nokia does not have any intention of joining the major players in the growing market. In fact, the formerly top cellphone maker is not planning to position its voice-activated assistant as a direct rival to Amazons Alexa, Apples Siri, Microsofts Cortana and Googles Google Assistant. Nokias smart assistants name, MIKA, has a nice ring to it mainly because it is an acronym that stands for what it is and what it does. Short for Multi-purpose Intuitive Knowledge Assistant, MIKA is not like any of the digital assistants that are being marketed as commercial services at present. This is because instead of being a voice-activated AI assistant for general consumers, MIKA was made with a specific market and purpose in mind. According to NeoWin, Nokias MIKA assistant is built solely for engineers and telecommunications operators. Thus, it is capable of answering very technical questions. It is therefore a perfect companion for engineers who want a quick help in figuring out engineering questions something that Siri, Alexa and the rest are not capable of doing. MIKA has numerous tools, documents and data sources to obtain its answers from. A huge chunk of its intelligence is from the Nokia AVA knowledge library, which is basically a repository of the best practice collected from all of the companys projects all over the world. Not only that, it can draw answers to questions from other networks as well. TechCrunch reports that Nokias cognitive services platform utilizes augmented intelligence as well as automated learning to provide solutions to engineers and telecom operators. Thus, it can help the latter in more ways than just answering simple questions or responding to simple commands. Finding the right information is a daily challenge for telco engineers tasked with boosting network quality, Global Services at Nokia head Igor Leprince said. MIKA taps into the power of the Nokia AVA platform to provide quick and accurate answers, avoiding time wasted on fruitless searches. MIKA is customized to support the specific needs of telecoms, and can deliver recommendations based on experience from networks around the world. Story continues The news about Nokias digital assistant comes amid the companys preparation for its appearance at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this February. The company already launched the mid-range Nokia 6 to the Chinese market this month, so now it is expected to officially introduce its flagship smartphone at the biggest tech exhibition this year. Related Articles Following Donald Trumps executive order banning certain immigrants and refugees from entering the United States, the people of the UK have tried to reply in kind. A petition that seeks to prevent Trump from making an official state visit to the United Kingdom has gathered well over a million signatures in just 24 hours, and at the time of writing is about to break 1,400,000 signatures. An e-petition with that many signatures will be considered for debate in the House of Commons, although it seems unlikely to force any decision in this instance. Prime Minister Theresa May was the one who extended the official invite to Donald Trump last week, and an about-face seems unlikely. Don't Miss: A rogue group of staffers is tweeting secrets from the White House Notably, the petition doesnt call for Trump to be banned entirely from the country; rather, it says that he should be allowed to enter as the head of the US Government, but not as head of state. That would mean no meeting the Queen, no formal state dinner, and a much more low-key affair than Trump would presumably be expecting. For a leader who puts so much value on status, recognition and public turnout, that would be a major blow. The full text of the petition reads: Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen. Donald Trumps well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore during the term of his presidency Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official State Visit. British citizens living both in and outside of the country are eligible to sign the petition, although there is no real enforcement of that rule which is why the petition does not even oblige the government to debate the issue, but rather consider it for debate. Story continues The Prime Ministers office has already told UK news outlets that the invitation will not be rescinded, as a state visit remains substantially in the national interest. That said, the opposition party and individual Members of Parliament have stated that the visit should be delayed and reconsidered. This isnt the first time that Donald Trumps visitation rights have been debated in Parliament. A petition floated during Trumps campaign, which gathered over half a million signatures, called for Trump to be banned from the country completely. That petition was actually debated in Parliament, and although it didnt pass a vote, MPs did describe Trump as a racist demagogue, a buffoon and a wazzock. Trending right now: See the original version of this article on BGR.com The Google Pixel range, which was released in the US in 2016, was built by HTC. Google's next-generation Pixel smartphones are expected to get a tougher build and an upgraded camera, according to the 9to5Google website. However, successors to the Pixel and Pixel XL aren't expected before the end of 2017. The first leaks on the subject suggest that the search giant's next-gen Pixel smartphones could get fully dust- and water-resistant builds. Google also apparently plans to improve the onboard camera, particularly low-light performances. However, it's as yet unclear whether the upgrades will come from new hardware elements via the sensor or from software upgrades via the camera app. The camera is already a major selling point for Google's current Pixel handsets, billed as the "highest-rated smartphone camera ever." The price could once again be set to rise, with reports of an increase of around $50. Note that the current 5-inch Pixel sells for $649 in the USA. The new high-end smartphones could also be joined by more affordable models with pared-down specs, dubbed "Pixel 2B," aimed at emerging markets. Google presented and launched its first range of Pixel smartphones in fall 2016, with two high-end handsets (5-inch and 5.5-inch models) boasting a stylish design, a super-fast latest-gen processor and a top-end camera, designed to get the best out of Android Nougat. At launch, Pixel smartphones were positioned as direct rivals for the Samsung Galaxy S7 or Apple's iPhone 7 and 7 Plus, although they only went on sale in selected countries. Google's Pixel and Pixel XL smartphones are currently available in the USA, Germany, Australia, Canada and the UK, and are coming to India soon. The "Trump & Dump" artificial intelligence program identifies Trump's market-moving tweets, assesses instantaneously whether the sentiment is positive or negative and then executes a speedy trade (AFP Photo/SPENCER PLATT) (GETTY/AFP/File) New York (AFP) - Techies have devised a program to execute quickfire stock trades to take advantage of President Donald Trump's Twitter habit of blackballing individual companies. And the president's tweets are saving puppies, since when the program earns money, the funds are donated to an animal welfare group. The "Trump & Dump" artificial intelligence program identifies Trump's market-moving tweets, assesses instantaneously whether the sentiment is positive or negative and then executes a speedy trade. Ben Gaddis, president of Austin, Texas marketing and technology company T3, said the idea was sparked by watching Trump's actions during his transition, when twitter attacks of companies such as Boeing and Lockheed Martin sent the share prices tumbling. "Everyone is asking themselves how to deal with the unpredictability of Trump's tweets," Gaddis told AFP. T3's response was to develop a "bot," a piece of software that does automated tasks, to trade on the information. The company has so far been pleased with the results, which yielded "significant winnings" on two occasions and a "slight" loss on a third trade, Gaddis said. In early January, T3 scored a "huge" profit by betting Toyota's share price would fall after Trump lambasted the automaker for building cars in Mexico, it said in a short video on the T3 website. The time lag between the Trump tweet and T3 trade was only a second, according to a short video on the T3 website. T3, which has pictures of numerous dogs on its website and describes itself as having "dog friendly offices" is donating the earnings from the bot-directed trades to American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). "So now, when President Trump tweets, we save a puppy," the video. It didn't take long for the SAG Awards to get political Sunday night. When Ashton Kutcher took the stage to introduce the show, he welcomed the crowd "and everyone in airports that belong in my America!" he said to applause from the audience. "You are part of the fabric of who we are, and we welcome you and we love you." "We also welcome you to the 23rd annual Screen Actors Guild Awards...." he joked. Several award winners also addressed Trump's controversial executive order and immigration ban in their acceptance speeches. Read more: SAG Awards: Ashton Kutcher Makes Pro-Immigration Statement in Opening Upon winning best actress in a comedy series for Veep, Julia Louis-Dreyfus joked that the Russians "didn't hack" the awards show. "I'm the winner, the winner is me. Landslide!" Julia Louis-Dreyfus jokes by echoing Trump: This award is legitimate and I won. #SAGawards pic.twitter.com/mQB9nhPDuJ Hollywood Reporter (@THR) January 30, 2017 She added that she is "horrified" by the immigrant ban, being the child of immigrants. "My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France," she said. "I love this country and because I love this country I am horrified. This immigrant ban is un-American." Accepting his award for best actor in a comedy series, Shameless' William H. Macy said he'd actually like to "thank President Trump for making Frank Gallagher seem so normal." Sunday, protests continued across the country against Trump's immigration and travel ban, with demonstrations at LAX in Los Angeles, JFK in New York, Dulles in Washington, D.C. and Logan Airport in Boston, gaining support. L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti was reportedly part of the group at LAX to demonstrate in support of travelers being detained from countries on the banned list, which includes Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lybia, Sudan, Somalia and Yemen. Story continues Read more: Trump's Immigration Ban Sparks Second Day of Protests at LAX Airport The White House on Sunday released a statement defending the immigration order, specifically taking aim at the media's coverage of the ban thus far. "America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border," read the statement. "America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave. We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say." The awards are being handed out Sunday night at the Shrine Exposition Center in Los Angeles. Read more: SAG Awards: The Winners List (Updating Live) What good is a vacation if you don't use it for a sexy photo shoot? Kourtney Kardashian took full advantage of her tropical backdrop on Sunday to strip down for a steamy late-night photo session. WATCH: Kim and Kourtney Kardashian Show Off Abs at Family Dinner in Costa Rica "Jen [Atkin] and Mike, when Mr. Mike Rosenthal is in Costa Rica, that means we need a late night photo shoot," the mother of three said in one Snapchat. GODDESS #kourtneykardashian A photo posted by Kourtney's Snapchat (@kourtneysnapchat) on Jan 29, 2017 at 8:02pm PST She then shared a photo of her naked backside standing in a pool of water with her long, dark locks cascading down her back. Rosenthal has regularly photographed the Kardashian family, recently shooting Khloe Kardashian's GQ Germany cover. #kourtneykardashian A photo posted by Kourtney's Snapchat (@kourtneysnapchat) on Jan 29, 2017 at 7:51am PST Earlier in the day, Kourt lounged in a hammock wearing a striped crop top and wide-brimmed hat, captioning the shot, "Sundaze." And for a night of family fun, the reality star rocked a pink bra top and trench coat with her daughter, Penelope, in a matching pink ruffled dress. Family time A video posted by Kourtney's Snapchat (@kourtneysnapchat) on Jan 29, 2017 at 6:38pm PST WATCH: Scott Disick Joins Ex Kourtney Kardashian on Family Vacay to Costa Rica The Kardashian family is currently vacationing together in Costa Rica along with Kourtney's ex, Scott Disick. For more from the proud mom's sexy vacation attire, watch the clip below! Related Articles At Sundays Miss Universe pageant, Steve Harvey returned to the scene of his embarrassing 2016 announcement fail. Last year Harvey accidentally announced the first runner-up, Miss Colombia, as the winner. Harvey then had to backtrack on his pronouncement and explain that he read the card wrong and that Miss Philippines had won. Harvey opened the show with a quick sketch showing an Oceans Eleven-style escape plan if he had another flub. He then took to the stage and joked, I know what youre thinking. Is that the guy from last year? Did they bring back that guy from last year? Well, they did. When he saw the reigning Miss Universe, Pia Wurtzbach, he said, This is a great moment. Its great to see you again. The last time we were on this stage together, you were first runner-up for about 28 seconds. Wurtzbach got her own dig in, handing Harvey a pair of glasses as he prepared to read the winners name. He remarked, Thank you so much, Pia. A year late. But thank you. Thankfully, Harvey correctly announced Miss France, Iris Mittenaere, as the 2017 Miss Universe. Watch: On his birthday, Steve Harvey looks back over 60 Years of American history: Tell us what you think! Hit us up on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram, or leave your comments below. And check out our host, Cynthia LuCiette, on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram. On Sunday's Miss Universe pageant, Steve Harvey returned to the scene of his embarrassing 2016 announcement fail. Last year Harvey accidentally announced the first runner-up, Miss Colombia, as the winner. Harvey then had to backtrack on his pronouncement and explain that he read the card wrong and that Miss Philippines had won. Harvey opened the show with a quick sketch about an Ocean's Eleven style escape plan if he had another flub. He then took to the stage and joked, "I know what you're thinking. Is that the guy from last year? Did they bring back that guy from last year? Well, they did." When he saw the reigning Miss Universe, Pia Wurtzbach, he said, "This is a great moment. It's great to see you again. The last time we were on this stage together you were first runner-up for about 28 seconds." Wurtzbach got her own dig in, handing Harvey a pair of glasses as he prepared to read the winner's name. He remarked, "Thank you so much, pia. A year late. But thank you." Thankfully, Harvey correctly announced Miss France, Iris Mittenaere, as the 2017 Miss Universe. Tucker Carlson (Photo: Fox News) On a recent edition of Fox Newss Tucker Carlson Tonight, the host spent some time debating with a guest who felt President Trumps immigration ban was a bad idea. When it comes to allowing Syrians into the country, Carlson had a bottom-line litmus test: Whats in it for America? he asked. The guest was taken aback, and rightly so: Since when do people lawfully entering America have to prove what dollar amount theyre going to contribute to the economy? But thats the way it goes on Tucker Carlson Tonight, which has replaced The Kelly File and which, along with its lead-in, The OReilly Factor, gives Fox News a nightly one-two punch of pro-Trump rhetoric. (Foxs third prime-time hour, Hannity, packs no punch: its a nightly, gummy smooch a prissy peck on President Trumps cheek.) Theres a bold, fresh trend on The Factor these days: OReillys slavish devotion to supporting everything Trump utters is something new for the self-styled, two-fisted Sgt. Fury of Fox News. He had long fancied himself an independent voice dont call him a conservative! but it seems clear hes read the same reports we all have that Trump watches Fox and is taking his talking points from the network. As a result, OReillys signature Talking Points Memo has become a rough draft of opinions hed like Trump to echo later that evening in a presidential tweet, or cut and pasted into Sean Spicers White House press briefing the next day. OReilly has become remarkably gullible; Ill give you two examples. One, he persists in peddling the idea that theres a Hollywood-liberal vengeance squad discriminating against celebrities who are pro-Trump. To prove it, he brought on two men who very nearly fail to even qualify as celebrities these days: Scott Baio and Joe Piscopo. The most evidence Baio could muster was when he said, a woman accosted me at a school event for my daughter and evidently made some hostile remarks to him. Baio said he hasnt lost a job due to his politics, but Im sure it happens. As for Piscopo, his response was, Wow: Not happened to me at all. Way to assemble proof for your argument, Bill! Story continues A second example: OReilly has bought into such right-wing fantasies as the idea that the recent womens march was completely bankrolled by millionaire liberal George Soros. On the Jan. 23 Factor, OReilly thundered, That wasnt a spontaneous event. It was organized! By far-left groups which received millions of dollars from the liberal activist George Soros. Soros is manipulating protests behind the scenes! Some of the top march organizers were Democratic operatives! Operatives is one of those weasel words that can mean anything from appointed official to any citizen who once voted for Jimmy Carter; its meaningless in this context. Over on Tucker Carlson Tonight, the producers love to make their pudgy pugilist into a brawler: The most-frequently used chyron running beneath Tuckers opening segment uses the tough-guy phrase takes on (emphasis mine): Tucker Takes On Democratic Congressman! Tucker Takes On Buzzfeed Editor-in-Chief! Tucker Takes On University of Connecticut Professor! Whats next? Tucker Takes On Elementary-School Lunch Lady? Carlsons method is to invite a guest on with whom he disagrees, then paraphrase the guests position into an absurd exaggeration, and then ask the guest to justify Carlsons misleading misinterpretation of the guests own words. Combine this with Carlsons habit of hooting over the guests response (Thats absurd! Youre making no sense!) and it leaves the impressionable viewer with the idea that Carlson has steamrolled over his opponent. Or as the Internet regularly phrases it, Tucker Carlson DESTROYS this-or-that on-camera foe. Carlson positions himself as a younger, feisty new contrast to OReilly, but hes in lockstep with The Factor. On Jan. 25, he did a segment about Sally Boynton-Brown, an Idaho Democrat who has been widely ridiculed as a white person seen in a film clip saying my job is to shut other white people down whenever they show evidence of white privilege. Now, you never see Fox News jump on a story about discrimination faster than when the perceived victim is white. Happens all the time on the channel. In fact, it happened just the night before, when OReilly ran the exact same story on his show. I guess it was OReilly and Carlsons way of making sure that their No. 1 fan the new leader of the now-sorta-Free World didnt miss this point, in case it merited a presidential tweet. The OReilly Factor and Tucker Carlson Tonight air weeknights at 8 and 9 p.m. on Fox News. The late Ghanaian Actress Gifty Temeng was be laid to rest on 28th January, 2016. Get the latest celebrities news in Ghana here Sad photos from burial of late Ghanaian actress, Gifty Temeng Her final funeral rites took place the Methodist Park in Tema Community 8. READ MORE: "Miser" Sarkodie gets wickedly insulted by fans after begging for money for sick girl Madam Temeng's burial was well attended by Ghanaian celebrities who mourned with the family and offered their condolences. Sad photos from burial of late Ghanaian actress, Gifty Temeng PAY ATTENTION: Get all the news on the free Yen.com.gh app The likes of Kofi Adjorlolo and Kalsum Sinare were among the many celebrities who joined family members to bid a final farewell to their fallen colleague. Sad photos from burial of late Ghanaian actress, Gifty Temeng Sarkodie was also present to spice the event for a befitting burial and paying their last respect to the late actress. Sad photos from burial of late Ghanaian actress, Gifty Temeng The Kumawood actress was reported dead on December 21, last year at the 37 Military Hospital. Sad photos from burial of late Ghanaian actress, Gifty Temeng The cause of death remains unclear but a close source from the family has confirmed to that she has been sick for well over 2 months before her untimely passing. Sad photos from burial of late Ghanaian actress, Gifty Temeng READ MORE: Late actress, Gifty Temeng's final funeral rites take place on Saturday Source: YEN.com.gh Internationally acclaimed Ghanaian Gospel musician Sonnie Badu has urged by Reverend Lawrence Tetteh, founder and President of the Worldwide Miracle Outreach (WMO) to keep bragging. Get more on celebrities in Ghana here Keep bragging, Sonnie Badu tells Reverend Lawrence Tetteh According to the ace gospel musician, the renowned pastor can continue bragging about him since it was him [Rev. Lawrence] who brought him into the limelight. READ ALSO: Sad scenes from burial of late Ghanaian actress, Gifty Temeng Days ago, reports surfaced online that the man of God had stating categorically that he gave Sonnie Badu his first international exposure. And though some sect of Ghanaians launched a backlash against the pastor, his words seem to be ok with Sonnie Badu since he has come out to say that it was true. PAY ATTENTION: Get all the news on the free Yen.com.gh app Sonnie Badu, who has been busy touring the world with his ministry, affirmed the comments by Lawrence Tetteh, who he refers to as Papa. In a post on his Instagram, the artiste wrote, "I still polish his shoes and iron his shirts when I am with him. So to the press ,bloggers and media calling the office to confirm , it is very very very true .. I am his son and I will forever be his son .. love you papa.. #LawrenceTetteh . I cant forget where I started from.Sir please Brag some more, for when I was rejected and looked down upon , homeless you saw the gold in me , I beg brag more ooooooo, I am actually like their last born in the family , Doctors mum is my mum too .. I love you paps..". READ MORE: "Miser" Sarkodie gets wickedly insulted by fans after begging for money for sick girl Source: YEN.com.gh The King of Busoga has been tasked to reject his appointment as the ambassador in charge of General Duties in the office of the President. The Kyabazinga William Gabula was among the 37 ambassadors named by president Museveni during a reshuffle last week. However, his appointment has seen resounding calls for him to decline the responsibility which is seen to be in conflict with the constitution. Speaking to KFM, the coordinator Citizen Coalition for Electoral Democracy in Uganda Crispy Kaheru says the Kyabazinga should reject this appointment for the good of the country. Ugandas Constitution bars traditional and cultural leaders from participating in partisan politics. The Parliamentary Committee on Commissions, Statutory Authorities and State Enterprises which is probing the Shs. 6 billion oil cash bonanza has faulted officials of the Uganda Revenue Authority for not consulting the board before paying out the money to 42 government officials. The money which has been commonly referred to as a presidential handshake was a reward for those that took part in the oil arbitration case that saw Uganda awarded 345 million dollars in capital gains tax from two oil companies. Committee member Francis Mwijukye asked the board if it thought it was irregular for such a huge sum of money to be taken from the URA account. We captured that moment as the board Chair Simon Kagugube gaves a response Similarly Committee member Medard Lubega Segoona has tasked the URA Commissioner General Doris Akol to explain how the money was picked from the URA fund and paid out without the boards approval. Jailed Rwenzururu cultural leader Charles Wesley Mumbere is today expected to re-appear before Jinja Magistrates court for mention of the treason case against him. Mumbere is expected to appear before Jinja Court Chief Magistrate John Francis Kaggwa to know the stage of investigations. He is accused of involvement in a range of offences-all capital in nature including treason, terrorism, and murder, malicious damage to property, attempted murder and aggravated robbery. The offences attract a maximum sentence of death. The Omusinga is jointly charged with 160 Royal guards and his Prime Minister who were remanded to Kirinya and Bugunga government prisons while the Juveniles are being held at Naguru Remand Home in Kampala. Prosecution states that between March and November 2016, Mumbere and his co-accused persons plotted to overthrow the government of Uganda by use of firearms. The accused are said to have expressed such a plot by utterances and attacks on various police installations, killing police personnel, robbing firearms and ammunitions, recruiting and training individuals to join an armed rebel outfit as well as attending meetings abroad and attempting to acquire firearms illegally. President Yoweri Museveni and the United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres have had several discussions including The security situation in Somalia, South Sudan, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo pledging to strengthen efforts to develop sustainable peace and development in the region. The two leaders have met at the sidelines of the 28th Ordinary Summit of the AU in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and agreed on the need for the building of a national political ideology and national army in Somalia. They have also agreed on the need for the leaders in South Sudan to embrace democracy and fight sectarianism for the sake of peace in the newest nation and the importance of dialogue for all stakeholders in Burundi. The UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has pledged to push for reforms at the United Nations as more countries rally to see a more reformed world body. The two leaders agreed to host a solidarity conference on refugees in March this year with both Uganda and the United Nations as conveners. Kendallville, IN (46755) Today Cloudy and windy with periods of rain. High near 65F. Winds S at 25 to 35 mph. Chance of rain 80%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch. Winds could occasionally gust over 40 mph.. Tonight Partly cloudy skies. Low 41F. Winds SW at 15 to 25 mph. Higher wind gusts possible. America is battling an opioid epidemic and Indiana is no exception. Our state is facing a crisis that is destroying lives and damaging entire communities. Heroin overdose deaths have quadrupled since 2010. In 2015, there were 239 heroin-related overdose deaths, and drug overdoses are now the number one cause of accident-related deaths in Indiana and the United States. As a result of this disaster, every 25 minutes a baby is born with opioid withdrawal, and drug-related crime has increased. Indiana is the nations leader in pharmacy robberies, most of which involve opioid theft. Needle sharing among heroin and other opioid users has led to an HIV outbreak in Scott County with 212 confirmed cases connected to it. The General Assembly is considering a package of legislation that attacks this epidemic in a comprehensive way, including prevention, law enforcement and treatment. Senate Bill 226 would limit doctors to prescribing no more than a 7-day supply of opioids to patients who have not previously been prescribed opioids. This bill would also prevent unused opioid prescriptions from winding up in the wrong hands and will help prevent legitimate patients from becoming addicted in the first place. Senate Bill 151 would require the INSPECT prescription-tracking program to indicate whether a patient has a pain medication contract with a physician. This would also prevent opioid abusers from going to multiple doctors and pharmacies seeking out multiple opioid prescriptions. Senate Bill 446 would create a pilot program to fund residential addiction treatment for pregnant women addicted to opioids. This pilot would be modeled after the successful Fresh Start Recovery Center in Indianapolis. In 2015, Indiana dedicated $30 million for addiction and mental-health treatment of low-level, non-violent criminal offenders in addition to making Narcan more accessible. In 2016, legislation was passed to require mandatory minimum sentences for the highest level of heroin and meth dealers if they have a prior dealing conviction. In response to the HIV outbreak, we passed legislation to authorize counties to establish needle-exchange programs with oversight from the Indiana Department of Health. Although we have passed legislation that addresses the opioid crisis, it is only the beginning. We will continue to push back against this problem and work to make Indiana a safer and healthier state. What do you think? ANGOLA A man accused of shooting his father last March admitted to murder Monday morning in Steuben Superior Court. Cody Scott Smith, 26, appeared composed and lucid in court with short, soft-spoken answers to the questions posed by his public defender Anthony Kraus and Judge William Fee. After hearing the short plea dialog and a proposed deal that calls for a cap of time served of 55 years, Fee took the guilty plea under advisement. A presentence investigation was ordered and a sentencing hearing was set for Feb. 27 at 1:30 p.m. in Superior Court. Smiths personality in Mondays proceedings was a departure from his initial hearing March 10, 2016, following the March 9, 2016, gunshot killing of Rusty Smith, 51, of the rural Lake Gage area. When he was arraigned by videoconferencing equipment a year ago by Judge Randy Coffey, Cody Smiths words were garbled and he was difficult to understand. In an interview with Steuben County Sheriffs Detective Mike Meeks after his arrest, Meeks reported that Codys pupils were fully dilated and he appeared to be agitated one second and then crying the next. From his experience, Meeks said Cody appeared to be on a stimulant. Smith, represented by public defender Anthony Kraus, asked for competency evaluations last fall, indicating that he may have been mentally unable to comprehend criminal proceedings. That issue is conceded, said Kraus Monday. The contents of mental health evaluations by area professionals were not disclosed. A murder conviction carries a maximum sentence of 65 years and a minimum of 45 years. The plea agreement proffered by Smith and Steuben County Prosecutor Jeremy Musser calls for a sentence of 45-65 years with a maximum served term of 55 years. Fee would make that determination at sentencing, if he chooses to accept the guilty plea as presented. If not, Smith could be tried by a Steuben County jury. At least two people may have witnessed the shooting, including Cody Smiths girlfriend, who had their infant daughter with her the morning of March 9, 2016. The crime was reported to 911 by a mail carrier, who Cody allegedly approached and showed a shell casing, telling her his prints would be on the gun. He also allegedly admitted the murder to a rural Steuben County homeowner before his whereabouts were reported and he was taken into police custody. Entries will be accepted online through 5 p.m. Tuesday in the 14th annual Wisconsin Governors Business Plan Contest, which is produced by the Wisconsin Technology Council. First-round entries are limited to 250 words in one of four contest categories: advanced manufacturing, business services, information technology and life sciences. There is no cost to enter. Over time, about 3,350 entries have been received in the contest and finalists have raised more than $220 million in angel and venture capital while launching their businesses. Enter at www.govsbizplancontest.com. WINONA, Minn. Two Winona-area people, as well as a man accused of armed robbery in Winona, have been indicted on federal firearms charges related to a September 2016 burglary of a southeast Minnesota gun shop. Trinity James Wicka, 19, of Winona, and Sasha Marie Erdner, 29, of Peterson have been charged in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis with conspiracy to possess and distribute stolen firearms, and aiding and abetting possession of stolen firearms. Alex Boyd, 37, of Chicago, meanwhile, has been charged with conspiracy to possess and distribute stolen firearms, aiding and abetting possession of stolen firearms, and aiding and abetting felon in possession of a firearm. According to court documents, Wicka and two juvenile accomplices forced the front door of the Millville Rod and Gun Shop in the early-morning hours of Sept. 2, 2016. Once inside, surveillance cameras captured the images of three masked individuals, one standing watch while the other two filled bags with guns and ammunition, at one point smashing a glass display case, leaving glass shards and blood behind. Later that day, Winona police responded to a report of an armed robbery and shortly after 10 p.m. stopped a silver SUV and arrested four suspects, including Boyd. Police recovered five handguns, four of which bore serial numbers associated with the Millville burglary, along with a backpack containing shards of glass similar to the shattered glass case. Seventy-six firearms, mostly handguns, were taken from the shop. The night of Sept. 7, Wicka came to a party in Erdners RV. While there, he told Erdner he had 20 to 25 guns in two bags in his vehicle. Later, Wicka left the RV, but soon returned with two bags of guns after getting his vehicle stuck in a ditch. He said he brought the guns to the RV because he was afraid the car in the ditch would draw attention from police. Erdner told investigators she knew the guns were stolen and that she offered to help Wicka sell the guns. Wicka, Erdner, and several others face state charges related to the theft and sale of the guns. Boyd, along with Xzaviar Dominique Rian Aune, 18, of Winona have been charged in Winona County District Court with first-degree robbery. When Greg Remen saw his apartment in the 2219 Lofts, his eyes were drawn to the high ceilings. My first thought when I moved in here is that I can actually have a Christmas tree, like a 10-footer, said Remen, 62, who moved in to the newly renovated apartment building Jan. 23 after eight years of homelessness. His next-door neighbor, Kevin Gray, 55, was most impressed by the in-unit washer and dryer. As long as I can do laundry, Im great, Gray said. Gray was homeless for nearly 41 months to the day, or about 3 years, before Couleecap found him transitional housing. On Jan. 20, he moved from there into the new apartments at 2219 South Ave. The men are two of the first formerly homeless able to take advantage of the affordable housing offered through a partnership between MetroPlains LLC of Minneapolis and Couleecap of La Crosse. The mixed-income building, which held a grand opening Jan. 18, is an unusual project in that it combined public and private funds to provide six units of transitional housing for the homeless, two market rate apartments and 18 units of affordable housing all in the same building. The project is funded in part by $500,000 from the city of La Crosses Community Development Block Grant and HOME Investment Partnership, and is eligible for low-income housing tax credits and historic tax credits from the Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority, as well as federal and state tax credits. Im really proud of what weve been able to do here, said Caroline Gregerson, community development administrator with the city of La Crosse planning department. The city had long focused on increasing home ownership, and while it still hopes to do so, it expanded its interests into denser housing options in the past few years. When we looked at just homelessness and the problems of unaffordable rent in the city, we realized we really needed to start doing something about this issue, Gregerson said. The increased focus on homelessness and the partnership between the private nonprofit Couleecap with public entities such as the city and the federal Housing and Urban Development program have gone a long way to combat poverty in the area, according to Couleecap community services director Kim Cable. Housing goes a long way on the journey to self-sufficiency, Cable said. Were so thrilled to see people getting into really great apartments, ones they are actually able to afford. The apartments and the building as a whole are great, say Gray and Remen. I really appreciate the history, Gray said. I think thats the best. Grays eyes lit up as he considered decorating his new place, carrying through MetroPlains nod to the buildings 100-year history as a stable, armory and the Bakalars sausage factory. Im going to follow through and keep the antiques and try to find some pictures of La Crosse, Gray said. Remen was excited to set aside the bedroom as a guest room for his granddaughters, who are 2 and 4, setting up his own bed in the living room. This is all the space I need. Im used to living in a tent, Remen said, gesturing to the main room. Both men are able to pay their own rent and utilities, although the rent is at a reduced rate. They were both grateful for the Catholic Charities Warming Center and Couleecap case manager Chandra Cox for helping them with the application. They were both really great members of society before things kind of fell apart for them, Cox said. They have fought their way back and theyre really doing a great job. It didnt take much on my end. Cox is happy and excited to see them succeed, while being slightly sad she wont see them as often. Its a good feeling, she said. Gray and Remen are both pleased to see the increase in services in the area. La Crosse has come a long way, Gray said, adding that it was nice the way the city safeguards its homeless. Im glad. Man, I thank Couleecap for investing in things like this, Remen said. Best of all, their move into stable housing creates space in Couleecaps other programs to get two more of La Crosses homeless off the street. The city is also working with Impact Seven and Couleecap to develop a similar mixed-income project on La Crosses North Side. The Kane Street development is scheduled to move forward later this year. Ken Poole is looking forward to getting to know the 7 Rivers Region better. The CEO of the Center for Regional Economic Competitiveness of Arlington, Va., will work with local businesses and public officials as part of a $110,000 contract his organization has signed with the 7 Rivers Alliance. The three-state, 14-county business development organization headquartered in La Crosse has embarked on a process to develop a 10-year workforce development plan for the region and will use the expertise at CREC in that work. I think we picked a leader in the field, 7 Rivers Alliance Strategic Initiatives Manager Chin-Chin Minniear said. They have a lot of expertise to offer. Minniear started on Jan. 2, and her role with the business alliance will be to help lead and supervise the WISE plan work. She will help coordinate site visits between CREC staff and area businesses, help collect the data used to develop the plan and disseminate the final results. It is a lot of coordinating with Chambers of Commerce and employers around the region, she said. Day to day, it is a lot of project management. The $200,000 project, which has received funding from the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. as well as the U.S. Economic Development Administration, will identify workforce development needs over the next 10 years and formulate goals and proposals to address them. The plan will focus on the availability affordable housing, affordable childcare and transportation, along with other areas identified during site visits and listening sessions. Poole said his organization will work with business leaders to identify clear priorities for the plan as well as strategies to generate the resources needed to address those issues. His firm also will provide its own analysis of where the region is going and where the needs are. Poole founded CREC in 2000 as a nonprofit research and consulting organization. Today, his 20 employees work across the country to help regions compete better economically. We want to ensure that regions can provide the talent their industries need, he said. He said the 7 Rivers Region has some unique challenges, including the fact it includes counties from three different states, all with their own laws, regulations and economic climates. La Crosse also has several other urban centers such as Eau Claire, Rochester and Madison to compete with for talent. How do you keep the best and brightest in the community? he said. And how do you bring them back if they have already left? Poole said he hoped to craft a plan with three to five priority areas that could be presented to the 7 Rivers Alliance Steering Committee sometime in November. The first 14 site visits CREC will conduct are set to begin in February. The potential trade war that could follow President Donald Trump's proposed 20 percent tax on Mexican imports bodes poorly for Minnesota businesses especially farmers. Trump has floated the tax as a possible funding mechanism for his massive wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, which some experts say could trigger a backlash from Mexico. "By imposing a tariff on imports, you could trigger a retaliation against U.S. exports, particularly Minnesota exports to Mexico," said Doug Loon, the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce president. There's a lot at stake: Minnesota exports to Mexico totaled $2.4 billion in 2015. Mexico was the state's second-biggest export market, behind Canada. Minnesota's top exports to Mexico include machinery, food, vehicles, plastics, and iron and steel products. The state's farmers also sold about $800 million in agricultural commodities like corn and soybeans to Mexico. One of the impacts of retaliation by Mexico could be lower prices for farmers. "If we get in a trade war with Mexico, farmers are going to learn that they're on the front line of that war," University of Minnesota grain marketing economist Ed Usset said. "They'll feel it first." New Vision Coop in southwest Minnesota sold about $30 million in corn and soybeans to Mexico last year, said Keith Newman, the coop's grain department manager. Newman agrees with some of Trump's goals including that there may be a need for a border wall but he wants the president to consider all the impacts his policy could have. "I think he just needs to step back, slow down and take into consideration how some of these policies that he's talking about is going to affect U.S. agriculture and the overall U.S. economy," Newman said. Farmers have little capacity to absorb further price drops. Grains and other commodities already fetch less than it costs to produce them for many farmers. And there could be long term damage to the agriculture sector. If Mexico finds new suppliers, it may be hard for the U.S. to win back that nation's business in the future. Plus, any unsold products that had been destined for Mexico would boost stockpiles in the U.S. That additional supply would put downward pressure on prices unless it can be sold elsewhere. "It's just that much more grain in the U.S. that has to find another destination or another home," Newman said. Farmer's aren't the only ones with business to lose: Talk of a tariff also has the attention of Minnesota's medical device industry. Many of those companies have facilities in Mexico, and they may move products back and forth across the border during the manufacturing process. They sell products in Mexico, too. "Mexico is certainly a country with significant presence of medical device companies, and so anything related to trade with the U.S. or tariffs on imports or exports is something that we're going to be concerned about and want to be looking closely at," said Shaye Mandle, CEO of Medical Alley, a trade groups whose members include big medical device makers in the state. A 20 percent tariff on products coming from Mexico would hurt consumers, too, Loon said. They'd get hit by higher prices for everything from avocados to automobiles. "A tax basically on imports to raise money for whatever purpose, that many times will turn into a tax on U.S. consumers," Loon said. "And that probably will not be well received." The hefty tax on Mexican imports could be part of a comprehensive tax reform package that Trump and Congress will work out, the White House said. But there was great ambiguity about the proposal. White House officials say the tax is just one possible way Trump could finance the wall. ZUMBROTA, Minn. (AP) Opponents of a proposed 4,700-hog farm in southeastern Minnesota arent giving up, even though the state Pollution Control Agency has approved the environmental review for the project. The proposed Circle K Family Farm would feature a pit for storing up to 1.54 million gallons of liquid manure annually. Kristi Rosenquist, who lives near the proposed facility about five miles outside Zumbrota, said she still plans to attend a Monday meeting with John Linc Stine, the agencys commissioner. The (environmental assessment worksheet) has flaws, Rosenquist said. Well be talking to Commissioner Stine about that. Kim Grosenheider, a project manager for environmental review with the agency, said its common to have an environmental assessment worksheet with missing data, but that its important to make sure there is enough data to make an informed decision about the impact a project will have on the environment. She said the commissioners decision to sign off on the environmental review of the project was based on the original environmental assessment worksheet and all public feedback. This is how its designed to work, Grosenheider said. I would prefer to have a document that doesnt have any problems. We take in whatever concerns they have, and we evaluate it. Rosenquist said the next step to fight against the farm comes at the county level. I might be less concerned if there wasnt just error after error after error in the EAW, Rosenquist said. They didnt talk to the neighbors. They didnt make any effort. Dear reader, we're asking for your help to keep local reporting available for all today during our fall fundraiser. Your financial support keeps stories like this one free to read, instead of hidden behind paywalls. We believe when reliable local reporting is widely available, the entire community benefits. Thank you for investing in your neighborhood. Start your day with LAist Sign up for How To LA, delivered weekday mornings. Subscribe Ali Vayeghan was set to arrive at LAX at 7:15 p.m. on Friday, make his way through customs with a visa in hand, and emerge into the terminal to meet his niece, Marjan Vayeghan. But by 3:00 a.m Saturday morning, Ali had yet to appear. According to the Los Angeles Times, Ali Vayeghan, an Iranian national, was traveling through LAX on his way to see his wife, who arrived in the States four months ago, and his son, a U.S. citizen, in Indiana. Instead, Vayeghan was detained for hours by CBP as result of the Trump administration's then-hours-old executive order prohibiting entrance to immigrants from seven Muslim-majority nations - Iran being one of them. Vayeghan, despite his valid entry visa, was then put on a plane to Dubai. Once there, "Vayeghan was held in custody by local authorities working with U.S. border officials,"KPCC reports, adding that he was threatened to be sent back to Iran. Its a story about a son who wants to see his dad after 12 years, and just be with our family, Marjan Vayeghan told the Los Angeles Times. We did not think this would be a big deal wed pick my uncle at LAX, eat, hang out, travel. We didnt know our entire world would turn upside down. Then, on Sunday afternoon, the story took another turn. Federal Judge Dolly Gee, of California's Central District, sided with a petition filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and ordered Ali be returned to America. "Petitioner has demonstrated a strong likelihood of success in establishing that removal violates the Establishment Clause, the Immigration and Nationality Act, and [Vayeghans] rights to Equal Protection guaranteed by the United States Constitution," Gee wrote in her ruling. She added, "There is a strong likelihood that Petitioner is likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of interim injunctive relief." "In light of the foregoing, it is hereby ordered that: ...Respondents shall transport Petitioner back to the United States and admit him under the terms of his previously approved visa." According to the Times, the order of events ran on close timing. Vayeghan was placed on a plane to Dubai at 3:15 p.m. on Saturday. The ACLU's attorneys received paperwork for Vayeghan's release some 45 minutes later - already too late. If he had left for Los Angeles one or two days earlier, hed be fine, Marjan Vayeghan said. If he hadnt been deported a half hour earlier, hed be fine. ...Hes literally crying in the airport in Dubai." It is believed at least 17 more people are currently detained at LAX, despite an emergency stay ruling issued by a separate federal judge on Saturday. Dear reader, we're asking for your help to keep local reporting available for all today during our fall fundraiser. Your financial support keeps stories like this one free to read, instead of hidden behind paywalls. We believe when reliable local reporting is widely available, the entire community benefits. Thank you for investing in your neighborhood. Start your day with LAist Sign up for How To LA, delivered weekday mornings. Subscribe Thousands protested at Los Angeles International Airport on Sunday following President Trump's executive orders on immigration. Although numerous detainees have been released, at least 17 individuals remain detained at LAX, despite the emergency stay issued on Saturday night by a federal judge in New York. A Mexican restaurant adjacent to baggage claim at the Tom Bradley International Terminal has been transformed into an impromptu legal command center, with a small army of volunteer lawyers doing what they can to assist families of the detained. Working without any official information, the dozens of volunteers have spent the past two days stationed on the arrivals level of the international terminal holding signs in English, Farsi and Arabic. "The only way we've figured out who's being detained is if we're walking around with our name tags that say 'lawyer' and people come up to us to ask for help," one lawyer who was volunteering told LAist on Saturday night. "Based on interviews with family and friends of the detained, we know of at least 17 people [who are currently being detained]," Michael Hagerty, an immigration lawyer acting as a volunteer media liaison, told LAist just after 7 p.m. on Sunday night. Hagerty said that Customs and Border Protection (CBP) was still not providing the lawyers with any official information. "Presumably, new flights are coming in as regularly scheduled and there could be new people on any of these flights [who are being detained]," Hagerty said. Hagerty said that at least ten detainees have been released at Tom Bradley, and there may have been more released who didn't check in with the lawyers. According to Hagerty, at least 12 people in Terminal 2 have also been released. The majority of the people being held at Terminal 2 were reportedly legal permanent residents, and released detainees told lawyers that they were only interviewed for about ten minutes each before being held for several more hours. Linda Lopez, chief of Los Angeles' Office of Immigrant Affairs, told LAist that the mayor's office was continuing to monitor the situation and that Mayor Eric Garcetti had spoken further with customs since his press conference this morning where he said that CBP was complying with the emergency stay. Others familiar with the detainee situation have told LAist that CBP is only in "partial compliance" with the stay; although customs is releasing some people, they are still submitting new arrivals to so-called "extreme vetting." Los Angeles Airport Police Chief Patrick Gannon told LAist on Sunday evening that customs still hadn't provided his department with any information. "All of the information is being disseminated through Washington D.C.," Gannon said. As of 7 p.m. Sunday, the crowd of protesters was substantially smaller than it had been earlier in the day, but protesters continued to block the road outside of Tom Bradley. The protesters, who are currently facing off with a line of police in riot gear, have pledged not to leave until all of the detainees have been released. Dear reader, we're asking for your help to keep local reporting available for all today during our fall fundraiser. Your financial support keeps stories like this one free to read, instead of hidden behind paywalls. We believe when reliable local reporting is widely available, the entire community benefits. Thank you for investing in your neighborhood. Start your day with LAist Sign up for How To LA, delivered weekday mornings. Subscribe With the November 2016 passage of Proposition 64, the marijuana industry found validation from the largest state in the nation. Now, the state is scrambling to create regulations for the $7 billion industry as the January 1, 2018, deadline approaches. Were building the airplane while its being flown, state Sen. Mike McGuire, a Democrat representing Healdsburg, said, notes the San Francisco Chronicle. I believe some departments will be fully operational by January 2018 but, if were being honest, its going to be difficult to get everything done by then. "It's taking so long to get the draft regulations out there," Dale Gieringer, director of California NORML, told LA Weekly. "It wouldn't surprise me if they're late. Furthermore, there's every indication the legislature will pass some more bills altering the regulatory system this year, which could require a mid-stream adjustment that would further push legal sales down the line." According to the Associated Press, the state's lead pot regulator, Lori Ajax, said that she and her 11-person team are indeed facing challenges, but can and will (and must) be ready for the January 1 deadline. She added, "We're small but mighty." Under law established by Prop. 64, some 20 new types of licenses will need to be created, regulating everything from marijuana farmers to home-delivery services and pot retail dispensaries. However, current estimates see a potential $1 billion in tax revenue for the state from the newly-legalized industry. But one question still looms in the minds of state regulators and marijuana advocates alike: federal drug policy. "If Trump sends in the feds to shut down dispensaries, it might not make sense to issue licenses," Lynne Lyman, state director of the Drug Policy Alliance, which helped draft Prop.64, told LA Weekly. "To me that's a much bigger question mark." Good people don't smoke marijuana, President Donald Trump's nominee for U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in April 2016, reports Politico. He added that pot poses a "very real danger" and it is not the kind of thing that ought to be legalized. Part of the challenge here is that the wild card is the president, Rep. Earl Blumenauer, a Democrat from Oregon, a state that has legalized recreational marijuana, added in December. I think its unlikely that a President Trump takes a stand and reverses this trend that would put him out of step with his constituents. Hes not likely to do anything to alienate himself with millions of his supporters. In the meantime, Ajax and her team is hard at work completing California's regulation standards in the months remaining, notes the Associated Press. Ajax concluded, "We're confident that we can get this accomplished." 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(4) Feb 06 (7) Feb 05 (7) Feb 04 (7) Feb 03 (9) Feb 02 (7) Feb 01 (9) Jan 31 (5) Jan 30 (6) Jan 29 (5) Jan 28 (6) Jan 27 (6) Jan 26 (5) Jan 25 (6) Jan 24 (5) Jan 23 (4) Jan 22 (6) Jan 21 (6) Jan 20 (8) Jan 19 (4) Jan 18 (9) Jan 17 (5) Jan 16 (5) Jan 15 (6) Jan 14 (7) Jan 13 (7) Jan 12 (5) Jan 11 (7) Jan 10 (8) Jan 09 (7) Jan 08 (8) Jan 07 (11) Jan 06 (9) Jan 05 (5) Jan 04 (7) Jan 03 (6) Jan 02 (8) Jan 01 (8) Dec 31 (6) Dec 30 (6) Dec 29 (4) Dec 28 (7) Dec 27 (4) Dec 26 (5) Dec 25 (5) Dec 24 (5) Dec 23 (7) Dec 22 (5) Dec 21 (5) Dec 20 (5) Dec 19 (4) Dec 18 (6) Dec 17 (6) Dec 16 (4) Dec 15 (3) Dec 14 (5) Dec 13 (4) Dec 12 (5) Dec 11 (4) Dec 10 (4) Dec 09 (5) Dec 08 (6) Dec 07 (5) Dec 06 (6) Dec 05 (5) Dec 04 (5) Dec 03 (6) Dec 02 (4) Dec 01 (5) Nov 30 (4) Nov 29 (6) Nov 28 (3) Nov 27 (4) Nov 26 (4) Nov 25 (4) Nov 24 (4) Nov 23 (5) Nov 22 (7) Nov 21 (5) Nov 20 (6) Nov 19 (4) Nov 18 (3) Nov 17 (5) Nov 16 (5) Nov 15 (4) Nov 14 (5) Nov 13 (6) Nov 12 (6) Nov 11 (6) Nov 10 (8) Nov 09 (8) Nov 08 (7) Nov 07 (5) Nov 06 (5) Nov 05 (4) Nov 04 (6) Nov 03 (5) Nov 02 (3) Nov 01 (5) Oct 31 (4) Oct 30 (3) Oct 29 (5) Oct 28 (5) Oct 27 (3) Oct 26 (6) Oct 25 (6) Oct 24 (2) Oct 23 (3) Oct 22 (5) Oct 21 (4) Oct 20 (6) Oct 19 (3) Oct 18 (4) Oct 17 (3) Oct 16 (5) Oct 15 (2) Oct 14 (5) Oct 13 (2) Oct 12 (3) Oct 11 (7) Oct 10 (3) Oct 09 (3) Oct 08 (2) Oct 07 (7) Oct 06 (2) Oct 05 (6) Oct 04 (5) Oct 03 (3) Oct 02 (8) Oct 01 (3) Sep 30 (6) Sep 29 (3) Sep 28 (6) Sep 27 (4) Sep 26 (4) Sep 25 (4) Sep 24 (1) Sep 23 (5) Sep 22 (3) Sep 21 (2) Sep 20 (5) Sep 19 (3) Sep 18 (3) Sep 17 (5) Sep 16 (3) Sep 15 (4) Sep 14 (4) Sep 13 (4) Sep 12 (3) Sep 11 (3) Sep 10 (4) Sep 09 (5) Sep 08 (4) Sep 07 (4) Sep 06 (4) Sep 05 (5) Sep 04 (2) Sep 03 (4) Sep 02 (4) Sep 01 (3) Aug 31 (3) Aug 30 (3) Aug 29 (2) Aug 28 (4) Aug 27 (4) Aug 26 (4) Aug 25 (3) Aug 24 (3) Aug 23 (2) Aug 22 (3) Aug 21 (4) Aug 20 (4) Aug 19 (4) Aug 18 (4) Aug 17 (3) Aug 16 (4) Aug 15 (4) Aug 14 (3) Aug 13 (5) Aug 12 (5) Aug 11 (3) Aug 10 (4) Aug 09 (3) Aug 08 (4) Aug 07 (3) Aug 06 (3) Aug 05 (3) Aug 04 (4) Aug 03 (4) Aug 02 (4) Aug 01 (3) Jul 31 (4) Jul 30 (5) Jul 29 (3) Jul 28 (3) Jul 27 (3) Jul 26 (4) Jul 25 (4) Jul 24 (3) Jul 23 (3) Jul 22 (3) Jul 21 (4) Jul 20 (5) Jul 19 (4) Jul 18 (4) Jul 17 (3) Jul 16 (4) Jul 15 (3) Jul 14 (3) Jul 13 (4) Jul 12 (3) Jul 11 (3) Jul 10 (3) Jul 09 (4) Jul 08 (4) Jul 07 (4) Jul 06 (3) Jul 05 (5) Jul 04 (4) Jul 03 (4) Jul 02 (4) Jul 01 (4) Jun 30 (3) Jun 29 (4) Jun 28 (4) Jun 27 (3) Jun 26 (3) Jun 25 (4) Jun 24 (5) Jun 23 (5) Jun 22 (5) Jun 21 (3) Jun 20 (4) Jun 19 (3) Jun 18 (3) Jun 17 (4) Jun 16 (4) Jun 15 (4) Jun 14 (4) Jun 13 (4) Jun 12 (6) Jun 11 (3) Jun 10 (4) Jun 09 (3) Jun 08 (5) Jun 07 (3) Jun 06 (3) Jun 05 (5) Jun 04 (5) Jun 03 (3) Jun 02 (5) Jun 01 (6) May 31 (3) May 30 (5) May 29 (3) May 28 (4) May 27 (5) May 26 (7) May 25 (4) May 24 (4) May 23 (4) May 22 (6) May 21 (4) May 20 (3) May 19 (5) May 18 (4) May 17 (4) May 16 (5) May 15 (4) May 14 (4) May 13 (5) May 12 (4) May 11 (5) May 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Mar 15 (2) Mar 13 (1) Mar 12 (1) Mar 11 (1) Mar 10 (1) For VOA Learning English, this is the Health & Lifestyle report. Peanuts are among the most popular snack foods in the United States. Millions of American children are raised on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. PB&Js, as we like to call them, are found in childrens lunchboxes around the country. Or at least they used to be. Now, many school officials ban peanuts or any products containing peanuts from school property. About 2 percent of U.S. schoolchildren will have an allergic reaction to peanuts. And that number is growing. People allergic to peanuts can develop skin conditions or watery eyes. Children with a peanut allergy can develop a skin condition called eczema. Some reactions are so severe they can result in death. So far, doctors have advised parents against serving peanut-containing foods to children under the age of 3. But a 2015 British study found that waiting too long most likely is partly to blame for the peanut allergy problem. Anthony Fauci is head of Americas National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Dr. Fauci spoke to VOA on Skype. He notes that in Israel, people have a tradition of feeding peanuts to babies. He says the percentage of Israeli children with a peanut allergy is much lower than the rate among Jewish children living in England. "It was observed that in Israel -- where they have a custom of feeding peanut-based foods to babies, infants, within the first few months of life -- that when you, in fact, compare the incidence of peanut allergy among the Israeli children compared to comparable Jewish children living in England, the incidence of peanut allergy was more than 80 percent decreased among the Israeli kids as opposed to the kids who are living in England." Dr. Fauci says this finding is very important. It means that babies have a natural mechanism that can be trained not to react negatively to peanuts. That mechanism may turn off as the baby reaches the age of 1. He says a team of experts have agreed on new guidance for U.S. pediatricians who specialize in children's allergies. Fauci calls giving children peanuts a way of challenging their bodies. He thinks it could be done safely with some boys and girls, but not with others. "If the child has a history of severe eczema or egg allergy, that in the first 4 to 6 months of life, that you should bring the child to an allergy specialist who can do a skin test or a blood test to determine if the child does have an underlying allergy to peanuts. Because if they do, you are going to want to refrain from challenging that child. Whereas if they don't, then it would be safe to challenge the child and feed them peanuts at 4 to 6 months." If the child has moderate eczema and has a mild reaction to eggs, the doctor is likely to suggest that that child be fed peanut-containing foods at the age of 6 months. That child may need no allergy tests either. Children who have no allergies or family history of allergies can be given peanuts at any age. And thats the Health & Lifestyle report. Im Anna Matteo. Zlatica Hoke reported this story for VOANews.com. Anna Matteo adapted her report for Learning English. Dr. Fauci spoke to VOA on Skype. George Grow was the editor. Check your understanding by taking this quiz: Quiz - New Measure to Prevent Peanut Allergies Start the Quiz to find out Start Quiz ________________________________________________________________ Words in This Story allergy n. a medical condition that causes someone to become sick after eating, touching, or breathing something that is harmless to most people : allergic adj. mechanism n. a process or system that is used to produce a particular result < Scientists are studying the body's mechanisms for controlling weight. > pediatrician n. a doctor who treats babies and children refrain v. to keep from giving in to a desire or impulse challenge v. to administer a physiological and especially an immunologic challenge to (an organism or cell) eczema n. an inflammatory condition of the skin characterized by redness, itching, and oozing vesicular lesions which become scaly, crusted, or hardened Crowds gathered in Ybor City near downtown Tampa Sunday to protest President Donald Trump's immigration restrictions. Protests during the weekend over President Donald Trump's immigration restrictions Protesters showed support for refugees, immigrants Protest set for Monday on USF campus President Trump issues statement on "extreme vetting" Some Republicans in Congress urged caution amid legal challenges to the order banning travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries, though top congressional Republicans remain largely behind the new president. In a background call with reporters Sunday, a senior administration official declared the order's implementation "a massive success story," claiming it had been done "seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism." The order barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. Meanwhile, demonstrations took place during the weekend all across the country, including in the Bay area. A small gathering of protesters gathered in downtown Tampa and near Westshore Mall Saturday night. Today, more protests are expected, including at gathering set to take place at noon at the MLK Plaza on the University of South Florida campus. Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world - a horrible mess! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 The Department of Homeland Security said Sunday the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. Trump's order, which also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria, has sparked widespread protests and denunciations from Democrats and a handful of Republicans. Many have accused the administration of rushing to implement the changes, resulting in panic and confusion at the nation's airports. President Trump released a lengthy statement Sunday on Facebook, saying in part: "My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months," Trump wrote. "The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." Today's protest in Tampa will be happening at the same time Senate Democrats may be moving on legislation that could block the President's executive orders. Democrats agree, however, that anything short of court action may not be enough to block the temporary ban. State lawmakers Sen. Bill Nelson and Rep. Kathy Castor both issued statements on Sunday. "We have to do everything we can to protect ourselves from those who want to do us harm," Nelson said. "But a hastily-issued policy that bans everyone from one of these seven countries from entering the U.S. including the Iraqi interpreters who served alongside our troops in Iraq is not the answer." Said Castor: "President Trumps executive order targeting and banning legal permanent residents and refugees from war-torn areas is illegal, immoral and un-American. It has made us less safe. If the President wants to empower jihadists, this is the way to do it." Information from the Associated Press was used in this report. GET OUR APP Our Spectrum News app is the most convenient way to get the stories that matter to you. Download it here. Russia's parliament has voted 380-3 to decriminalise domestic violence in cases where it does not cause "substantial bodily harm" and does not occur more than once a year. The move on Friday, which eliminates criminal liability in such cases, makes a violation punishable by a fine of roughly $500, or a 15-day arrest, provided there is no repeat within 12 months. Yelena Mizulina (L), is the ultra-conservative Russian MP behind the bill. Credit:ITAR-TASS via Alamy The bill now goes to the rubber-stamp upper chamber, where no opposition is expected. It then must be signed by President Vladimir Putin, who has signalled his support. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told journalists that family conflicts do "not necessarily constitute domestic violence." BURLEY Mike Beus has spent most of the last 30 winters analyzing the snowpack in the Upper Snake Basin and then telling water managers and users what to expect in the coming irrigation season. As difficult as forecasting a drought year can be, explaining flood releases in a big water year can be even more contentious. Even when the models predict that snowmelt will refill reservoirs in time for the irrigation season, seeing water flowing down the river in early spring to provide flood control space can be controversial. Especially, if the models dont get the the spring runoff timing or amount correct. Beus is looking forward to spending more time enjoying the snowpack on the ski slopes starting in early February, when he will officially step down as water operations manager for the Bureau of Reclamation in Burley. The Twin Falls Canal Co. annual stockholder meeting in early January was often the first water forecast meeting of the year and so Beus was able to test theories for the coming water season and use the stockholders reactions to fine-tune his slides or thoughts for later meetings. The meeting was also a homecoming of sorts, as Beus began his water career developing the canal companys water measuring network during the early 1980s. Working with you has been good, he told shareholders. Based on his high school aptitude tests, Beus began studying mechanical engineering at the University of Idaho following graduation from Twin Falls High School. He spent a summer working for the University of Idaho at the Kimberly Research and Extension Center and that experience helped change his major to agricultural engineering. He jokes that he graduated both first in his class and last in his class from UI. And yes, he was the only agricultural engineer to graduate that year. Even though his classes had left him prepared to design tractors, water had always fascinated Beus so he took three semesters of graduate studies focused on hydraulics and hydrology. Attending his last TFCC annual meeting this January, Beus recalled that the canal company sold its last team of horses used on the project about the same time he began in February 1981. Thats symbolic of the technological changes Beus has seen over his career. When he went to work for Bureau of Reclamation in 1986, he brought slide projectors to meetings. Then color overheads, and now PowerPoint. One thing that has not changed over the years is the need to accurately measure water deliveries to resolve conflicts between water users. Beus was hired to re-establish the TFCC water measurement network largely in response to the Canyon View lawsuit which claimed the canal system had excess capacity that could be used to deliver water to the other side of Salmon Falls Creek. In addition to measuring snowpack, the Bureau of Reclamation has become more active in helping water users manage water through development of the AgriMet system that helps track evapotranspiration rates and crop water use. Beus has also worked closely with the Natural Resources Conservation Service, U.S. Geological Survey, Committee of Nine and Water District No. 1 to improve the data used by the southern Idaho water community to make decisions. Educating the greater community to look upstream for their water supply has been one of his greatest challenges over the years. He wishes the public had a better understanding of basic hydrology and how the hydraulic cycle works. Of all the water years he has tracked, 1997 stands out as the most memorable. You only have a few big floods, he said. Droughts occur much more frequently. Managing all of the reactions to the unprecedented flooding along the Snake River, and maintaining communications between entities so one location wasnt flooded to save another were among the greatest challenges during that spring. I learned to be ornery and to challenge authority when you have the data and experience to back up the challenge, he said. Beus has been working this winter with his replacement, Corey Loveland, and helped him prepare for several key water forecast meetings. Loveland worked as a hydrologist for the National Weather Service in Pocatello before joining the Bureau of Reclamation. While at the NWS he managed the water resources program in southern Idaho and also worked with county emergency managers to set flood level criteria on rivers and develop community flood preparedness. He began his career as a project manager with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers managing aquatic restoration projects. Loveland received his bachelors degree in environmental science-hydrology from the University of Idaho. You only have a few big floods. Droughts occur much more frequently. Mike Beus, water operations manager for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation in Burley BOISE Our record-setting winter is taking an expensive toll on Idaho agriculture. Heavy snows collapsed greenhouses and onion-packing and storage buildings across southwest Idaho. Cold temperatures threaten to slash grape yields at Canyon County vineyards. Livestock operations are paying for extra feed at a time when the cold and snow stresses animals and kills newborn calves. This winter, the Boise Airport received 35.5 inches of snow from Nov. 1 through Jan.23, the most ever for that date range dating to 1892, according to the National Weather Service. The previous record for that time period was 1985. Treasure Valley farmers cannot remember a more severe winter, said Tucker Shaw, co-owner of Shaw Cattle Co. near Caldwell and president-elect of the Idaho Cattle Association. Shaw has been dealing with stressed and sick animals and a collapsed auction barn. This is definitely one for the ages, Shaw said. Heres a closer look at some of the impacts: Greenhouse destruction On the afternoon of Jan. 8, about a foot of snow had accumulated on the greenhouses of Purple Sage Farms, which grows organic produce and herbs 4 miles north of Middleton. Owner Tim Sommer had taken the usual precautions, knocking snow from inside the top of the plastic cover of the quonset-hut-shaped greenhouses and heating the interior to encourage the snow to slough off the sides. But the combination of the snow and freezing temperatures caused the snow to cling to the greenhouses, eventually bending the steel frames and collapsing five structures. Sommer slashed the plastic of three other greenhouses to save the frames, which are reinforced with wood walls on each end. In 28 years, weve never seen anything like this, he said. Purple Sage grows 60 percent of its crop in the greenhouses, including the plants that generate sales during winter, Sommer said. He is looking at $30,000 to $50,000 in damages, mostly to replace the greenhouses. The timing couldnt be worse. You dont want to start the spring with big bills because theres no cash flow, he said. A GoFundMe account for the business raised more than $25,000 by Friday. Vineyards threatened The fruit-producing buds on grapevines in the Sunnyslope area of western Canyon County were fine until the temperature reaches 10 below zero. The thermometer reached minus 13 on Jan. 6 and minus 21 on Jan. 7. Krista Shellie, viticulture research horticulturist at the University of Idaho Extension in Parma, said grape growers wont know until April how severe the damage is. An industry model that factors in extreme temperatures and the stages of the growing cycle suggests that as many as half of the buds may have died. That would leave Idaho output far short of the 3,000 tons of grapes the Idaho Wine Commission estimates were harvested in 2016. Theres a chance some vine trunks were damaged, too, which would require cutting the damaged areas, retraining vines and waiting until 2018 for some fruit to return. Shellie said she has taken far more calls from growers than normal. I think most of them are panicked, she said. Dale Jeffers manages Skyline Vineyards, which grows 22 grape varieties on 500 acres 11 miles southwest of Nampa. The vineyard sells to about a dozen Idaho wineries. Jeffers said he and other growers are bracing for a poor 2017. The growers are going to pay a price for it, and the wine makers, too, Jeffers said. Hopefully, they can source grapes from Washington or Oregon. There always seem to be ways around problems. But its going to be rough. A reduced supply of grapes could raise prices, helping certain growers offset weather damage. Our grapes are contracted at an agreed-upon price, he said. Others who dont have contracts may sell on the spot market, and (the low yield) could be beneficial for them. Damaged vines could limit the states wine production for several years, said Moya Shatz Dolsby, executive director of the Idaho Wine Commission. However, Shatz Dolsby said wineries have plenty of wine already aging, thanks to last years bumper crop. Wineries could hold back some wines if they see this as a problem, she said. Its not going to be the end of the world. Onion sheds collapse Some of the worst damage has struck onion growers. Snows collapsed 16 onion-storage sheds and two packing plants around Canyon County and eastern Oregon 25 percent of the regions onion-processing capacity, according to the Capital Press, an agricultural newspaper. Dallas Jensen, grower and industry relations manager at Champion Foods in Parma, said his company was lucky to lose just one of 20 storage sheds. Jensen expects the damage to buildings and in lost business in the region will total in the millions of dollars. This is unprecedented, Jensen said. I dont think you could understate the kind of damage thats happened. Were just glad the damage has been structural, with no loss of life. Insurance will likely cover most of the structural damage, he said. But the lost business and upfront rebuilding costs are added hardships for an onion industry already struggling from back-to-back poor years, said Garth Taylor, an agricultural economist at the University of Idaho. Some of them are in desperate straits about their onion prices, Taylor said. This is adding a financial burden. Onion growers and packers who suffered no losses could benefit. The Capital Press reported that a 50-pound bag of yellow jumbo onions cost $3.50 before the collapses and $6.50 one week afterward. Stress on livestock Shaw Cattle Co. is in the thick of calving season. The temperature reached minus 20 on the night of Jan. 7, when 31 calves were born. The company, which raises breeding stock, is feeding its 1,500 cows an extra 20 to 25 tons of hay per day to keep up their strength, said Greg Shaw, Tuckers father and co-owner of the business. That is boosting feed and labor costs. Normally, the cows stay out and graze, Greg Shaw said. We had to start feeding every cow before Christmas, which we havent had to do for 25 years. Temperatures below 20 degrees stress the cattle, especially newborns. The 2-week-old calves are showing signs of weak immune systems, Tucker Shaw said. The newborn mortality rate has been up to 5 percent, nearly twice that of most winters, and it could rise, he said. We expect when it starts warming up and getting real wet and muddy, well potentially have a lot of sick calves, Tucker Shaw said. Then, we can really have losses. Greg Shaw said two buildings on the farm collapsed under the snow, including a large barn where he planned to auction animals Feb. 15. He is scrambling to find a crew to either replace the roof or rebuild the entire structure in time for the auction. At least one dairy in the valley lost cows when a building collapsed. The dairy was forced to euthanize the critically injured animals, Tucker Shaw said. Greg Shaw, 66, said he has spent 58 years in Canyon County. This is the hardest winter I have ever seen here, and the most snow. JEROME A developed downtown corridor with new retail in Jerome is just some of what Jerome 20/20 hopes to see in 2017. Executive Director Larry Hall said the economic development organization is actively working on these and other projects in Jerome County that will bring more private investment. And the city is ready for growth as long as it doesnt require large public investments in infrastructure, Hall said. The vision is that we would bring in new business, but business that fits with the city, he said. One key focus of Jerome 20/20 has been to develop the downtown corridor on West Main Street from Lincoln Avenue to Interstate 84. If you look at any city with good economic growth, a vibrant downtown is part of that, Hall said. Additionally, the confidentially named Project Centerpiece would bring 50,000 square feet of new retail construction to that corridor, Hall said. Work is also underway to bring a truck stop to Exit 165 and reopen the Jerome Cinema. Jerome 20/20 is also anticipating three dairy-related expansion projects that could bring more than $40 million in capital expenditures. We are hoping that in the second quarter of this year that well have activity on those and perhaps other projects, Hall said. Dairy prices are becoming more stable, and there has been dairy growth in the Magic Valley as a whole, said Bob Naerebout, executive director of the Idaho Dairymens Association. Were at the point where we could always use additional capacity in processing, he said. Another longer-term project of Jerome 20/20 has been the University of Idaho Center for Agriculture, Food and the Environment. The proposed 2,000-cow dairy research center is probably a three-year project, Hall said. Gov. C.L. Butch Otter has mentioned funding the project in this years legislative session. The farm will have to be located within a 25-mile radius of Twin Falls, Naerebout said, and Jerome 20/20 has high hopes for Jerome County being picked. The research center would help Idaho dairies better understand and address issues of water quality and wager usage, Naerebout said. Jeromes been really slow for quite a while, said Brad Wills, interim director for the Southern Idaho Economic Development Organization. Right now, Jerome has quite a few irons in the fire, so to speak. Some recent successes such as more development at the Crossroads Point Business Center have not been a result of Jerome 20/20s efforts, but came of their own accord. Most recent growth in the downtown has come from investment by the Latino community, Hall said. Theres been some great investment by those individuals to build our businesses downtown, he said. Jerome now has the land, buildings and the momentum to make more happen, Wills said. Its a good place to be and a good place to grow, Hall said. HAILEY Yes, its tempting to get a closer photo of all those deer and elk. But disturbing the herds that this winters deep snow pushed into popular Wood River Valley recreation areas puts stress on animals already struggling for survival. Forcing animals to move during a winter like this one is the last thing they need, said John Kurtz, a Shoshone-based outdoor recreation planner for the Bureau of Land Management. So keep your dogs on leashes, and dont ski or ride a snowmobile on any hillside with animal tracks or visible wildlife, the BLM pleaded Monday in a joint statement with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game, Blaine County and the cities of Bellevue and Hailey. If you see deer or elk, they asked, just go away. This winter has been harsh for herds east of Idaho 75 from Carey to Ketchum, and elk and deer there are particularly vulnerable. In particular, Kurtz encouraged people to avoid trails and south-facing slopes in the Quigley Canyon drainage east of Hailey. Instead, he suggested, use trails west of Hailey, such as the Croy Creek trail system. Fish and Game and the BLM said theyll post signs at several informal trailheads east of Idaho 75 from Ohio Gulch to Bellevue explaining that its critical wildlife not be disturbed as they struggle to survive winter and early spring. With elk and deer congregating in Wood River Valley lowlands often along roadways Fish and Game also urged drivers to take it slow, especially at night. Fish and Game in mid-January started emergency feeding at several sites in the Bellevue Triangle to alleviate damage to stored crops, keep deer and elk out of livestock feed lines and corrals and move wildlife away from major roads. Still, Regional Manager Toby Boudreau said, herds are clearly stressed and still face a long winter. By Monday, the agency was operating 17 emergency feed sites in Blaine County, feeding about 650 deer at eight sites and more than 1,300 elk at nine sites around Hailey, Bellevue, Picabo, and Carey. On Saturday, while Blaine County deputies closed Idaho 75, Fish and Game employees on snowmobiles, on snowshoes and in trucks moved a group of elk across Buttercup Road north of Hailey. The elk were too close to Idaho 75 and were causing problems for landowners; the team pushed them toward a feeding site away from the highway. Herding elk is no easy task, but this went very well, and the elk are where they need to be, the agencys regional office posted that evening on social media. IDFG strongly encourages people to stay away from any wintering wildlife, but especially so with this popular herd. We want them to stay where they are, and those looking for photo opportunities can easily push them back towards the highway. A video followed a few minutes later, showing elk streaming across snow-filled Buttercup Road. Its caption: Herding elk isnt quite as bad as herding cats. For updates on Fish and Games winter feeding efforts throughout the state, go to idfg.idaho.gov. For advice on alternative recreation areas, call BLMs Shoshone Field Office at 208-732-7200 or Fish and Games Jerome regional office at 208-324-4359. HAILEY Hemingway Elementary School principal Don Haisley will retire after this school year, the Blaine County School District announced. Haisleys career as an educator spans 37 years. He has spent 24 of those years at Hemingway Elementary 16 as principal and eight as a teacher. Blaine County School District superintendent GwenCarol Holmes and assistant superintendent John Blackman will meet with employees and parents to get feedback on what theyre looking for in the next principal. A nationwide search will be conducted, led by a committee including employees and parents from Hemingway Elementary. The school district expects to hire a new principal by the end of the school year. BOISE Idahos all-Republican congressional delegation have released statements generally supportive of President Donald Trumps executive order putting a temporary halt on the refugee program and travel from seven Muslim-majority countries, although some criticized its implementation. The president is fulfilling his duty and promise to evaluate the screening process for those attempting to enter our country to ensure that these individuals are indeed safe and pose no threat to us, said U.S. Rep. Mike Simpson, whose district includes the Magic Valley. However, the administration could have and should have disseminated the details and enforcement guidelines of the executive order in a more effective manner to minimize the unintended consequences of this change in policy. I am glad to see that the administration has already taken steps to clarify these guidelines, and I hope all other errors in implementation of this order will be immediately addressed. During town meetings I held across my state, Idahoans affirmed that we must take steps to secure our borders and I agree, said U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo. We will need to constantly refine and improve our vetting process. Trump spoke frequently of the dangers posed by Muslim refugees during the campaign at one point he called for a ban on Muslims entering the country but has since walked that back. He also ran on a promise to tighten immigration laws and their enforcement. On Friday, the president signed an executive order that suspends refugee resettlement for four months while changes are made to the vetting process, bans travel for three month by citizens of seven Middle Eastern and African countries and ends resettlement of Syrian refugees indefinitely. Opponents of Trumps actions held protests at airports across the country over the weekend, including one at the Boise Airport that drew hundreds of people. Some congressional Republicans have also come out against the order, including widely known Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham. U.S Rep. Raul Labrador, whose district covers the western part of the state, said Trump has finally taken necessary national security and public safety measures regarding refugees and non-immigrants seeking entry, and criticized the media for characterizing Trumps actions as a Muslim ban, accusing them of trying to mislead the public and undermine Trump. The ban is temporary and does not exclude any particular group based on religion, Labrador said. However, Labrador criticized the administration for failing to provide guidance on how to enforce the order and urged the president to exempt lawful permanent residents, which Trump has done subsequently after the initial confusion. Inadequate review and poor implementation of this executive action threatens to undermine otherwise sound policy, Labrador said. I remain a strong supporter of President Trumps bold efforts to keep America safe, but they must be legally sound and uniformly enforced. I look forward to working with the president on these issues. Labrador sponsored a bill in the last Congress that would have altered the refugee program, and some of the ideas in Trumps executive order reducing the number of refugees to be allowed in, giving states and communities more of a say in the program, tightening the vetting process and prioritizing some claims of religious persecution are similar to what was in Labradors bill. U.S. Sen. Jim Risch told the Idaho Statesman on Sunday, through his spokeswoman Kaylin Minton, that he believes the existing vetting process has been inadequate in many cases but that a comment at this time would be premature. Sen. Risch believes the security of America and Americans is of the utmost importance, she said. Since the order was issued just this past Friday, and there is much speculation about specifics of the presidents action, and many moving parts, Sen. Risch is gathering and reviewing information from a number of sources and will learn more when he returns to Washington, D.C. for briefings this week. BOISE, Idaho (AP) Idaho cities and counties would lose taxpayer money if they curtailed enforcing federal immigration laws and instead adopted so-called "sanctuary city" policies under new legislation introduced in the Statehouse. The proposal comes just days after President Donald Trump signed an executive action to crackdown on immigrant-protecting sanctuary policies by cutting federal dollars. While several big cities, such as New York and Chicago, have formal sanctuary policies in place, Idaho has none. Republican Rep. Greg Chaney of Caldwell says that his bill does not allow law enforcement officers to arrest or round up suspects solely for immigration violations. The House State Affairs Committee introduced the bill Monday with just one Democratic lawmaker casting a nay vote. The proposal must now clear a full legislative hearing. Register for more free articles. Sign up for our newsletter to keep reading. Get local news delivered to your inbox! Subscribe to our Daily Headlines newsletter. Sign up! Already a Subscriber? Already a Subscriber? Sign in Terms of Service Privacy Policy Pilate saith unto (Jesus), What is truth? (John 18:38) Let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one anothers speech. (Genesis 11:7) Recently presidential adviser Kellyanne Conway turned unexpectedly philosophical during a live argument with NBCs Chuck Todd on Meet the Press by saying the White House press secretary had used alternative facts while ripping media reports that crowds at Trumps inauguration were somewhat smaller than was being claimed by the newly sworn-in president. Within minutes her apparently ad-libbed phrase produced mocking memes and hashtags, and instantly set the agenda for the next days late-night monologues. But while millions laughed, the controversy is not altogether funny. Daniel Moynihan, a four term Democratic U.S. senator from New York who also served as President Gerald Fords ambassador to the United Nations, once famously said You are entitled to your own opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts. Moynihan died in 2003, and these days his political approach feels both quaint and irrelevant. Because as every partisan believer knows, the facts of any issue proclaimed by those you support are invariably true, while your opponent shamelessly promotes as facts only lies and distortions. Consider global warming. Barack Obamas birthplace. Refugees seeking help in America. The national impact of illegal aliens. The social impact of gay marriage. Hillary Clintons email account. I could go on. All of these issues are divisive, and are framed by the partisans on each side with facts accepted by supporters, but which are viewed as lies (or, at best, uninformed stupidity) by the opposition. Global warming is hard science or a hoax. Refugees are the tired, poor, and huddled masses, or undercover terrorists. Hillary is in need of rudimentary computer training, or a criminal. You get the idea. These days facts, such as they are, tend to exist only to support partisan issues. In our rush to isolate ourselves from those with whom we disagree, our very language is becoming proudly incomprehensible to each other. Has modern America truly lost its greatness? Is marriage equality as much an American right as voting? It depends on how you define greatness and right, and these days each side shouts the same words but invests them with definitions that others reject a modern Babel. As a young attorney, Founding Father John Adams once said in a colonial court that facts are stubborn things, but its also true that facts can be slippery. The world was once flat. Smoking was once good for asthmatics. Ingesting tapeworms was once a safe way to lose weight. And in modern times, those who are religious tend to accept the origins and tenets of their faith as absolute fact, while many of those who are not religious view such faith-as-fact statements as not only misguided but potentially harmful to society. Its a debate thats raged for 3,000 years. Philosophers from Plato to Sartre have debated the question of what, exactly, is truth? It was certainly an issue in the time of Jesus, as Pilate declined to accept as truth the testimony of the convicted man who stood before him, and in the process reminded us all that, like it or not, one mans fact is often another mans fable. So even though the side-by-side pictures of the national mall were pretty compelling, the larger arguments over alternative facts and fake news are not new. Nor is the extreme polarization of our competing national cultures. (Anyone remember the 60s?) What is new is the overwhelming power of the modern media echo chamber, which allows anyone to reduce to near zero the chance of exposure to the thoughtful expression of a point of view with which the listener is predisposed to disagree. The future? As a society, we may at some point rediscover our common language, and start listening to each other again as we seek common solutions to the serious challenges we face. If not, we may, like the people of Babel, just continue shouting at each other in languages we no longer share, or, like Pilate, spend our time debating the meaning and substance of truth while our best hopes slowly wither in front of us. News Story not available This story has been published on: 2022-11-05. To contact the author, please use the contact details within the article. This story is no longer available on our site. Right now, before the Idaho Legislature gets too deep into working through what will be considered, passed or rejected this session, time seems right for a review of the policy preferences of the people of Idaho. When we do, well have a benchmark for the end of the session: How closely did the Legislatures decisions, and the subjects it addressed, match the views of Idahoans? Strictly, of course, the people of Idaho collectively dont get to deliver a State of the State address, or something similar. But you can derive a rough equivalent, in priorities and preferences, from the Idaho Public Policy Survey. This is the annual poll of 1,000 Idaho adults conducted toward the end of each year. (The whole thing can be found at sps.boisestate.edu/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Official-2017-State-Survey-Report.pdf.) Polls arent perfect, of course, but Boise State University has deep experience in running these, and the results tend to match from year to year. It seems at least roughly realistic. The top agenda item for Idahoans, according to the poll, was the same as in Gov. C.L. Butch Otters State of the State: public schools. For the second consecutive year, Idahoans identify education as the most important issue facing the state, with 26.5 percent saying that it is the most pressing issue (compared to 28.2 percent in 2016), the report said. No great surprise there, though there was also this about a related area often ignored by the Legislature: Another source of educational opportunities the states public libraries received high marks, however. 82.8 percent agree that the libraries in their communities create educational opportunities for people of all ages, while 81.7 percent consider the library in their community a good resource for access to information and other technological resources. These figures are consistent across all groups, with respondents in northern Idaho the most favorably disposed toward public libraries. The second biggest concern, well ahead of anything else: The results ... indicate that the issue area with greatest increase in public concern is health care policy. 70.5 percent of Idahoans scored health care at least an 8 when asked how important it was, on a scale of 1-10, for the state legislature to address, an 11.2 percent increase from last year. The number of respondents giving health care a 10 (i,e., the highest level of importance possible) increased by 12.7 percent from 2016, further underscoring the fact that the public views health care as an area deserving of the state legislatures attention. In recent years, the Legislatures biggest health concern seems to have been an obsession with not doing anything proposed by the federal government. Well see if its interest expands at all this session. Transportation has been a topic of contention in several recent sessions. The publics take? Transportation also saw some change as there was a slight increase (+3.7 percent) in those who felt addressing transportation issues was moderately important (i.e., 4-7) and a significant decrease (-7.9 percent) in those stating addressing transportation was not very important. On another subject of much discussion, the poll asked Idahoans what they thought of resettling refugees in Idaho. The result: Idahoans are divided in their support of resettling refugees in Idaho; a slim majority (51.1 percent) favor this program, while a sizeable minority (43.8 percent) of citizens oppose it. However, although more citizens of Idaho favor this program, those who oppose refugee resettlement appear to feel very strongly about the matter. The Legislature wont necessarily take much action on refugees, but if it does, who will it listen to? And beyond that, how closely will the Legislature match the views of Idahoans? Watch and see. Troubled over Trumps refugee ban Since Jan. 20, I have read the news with anxiety. The presidents ban on refugees makes me worried about how quickly our country is dismantling its place as a country that welcomes those in need. Ive been thinking of those aboard the St. Louis, who were turned away and sent back to Europe in 1939, who had a chance to live and build new lives but were turned away and sent to their deaths. We live in a time when America has the opportunity to be a leader in the worlds refugee crisis. But once again we are falling short. There should be truth in Emma Lazaruss lines: Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, / I lift my lamp beside the golden door! The presidents ban on Muslim refugees from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen extinguishes this flame. As a teacher in Twin Falls, I taught refugees from Bosnia and various countries in the Middle East. Their stories were heartbreaking, but their families were eager to find stability in Idaho. I encourage our leaders to remember the many ways refugees contribute to our state and America. This is our opportunity to uphold Americas principles and to stand up for what is right. Brandon Bolyard Caldwell The names of the Final 13 contestants in the 65th Miss Universe pageant ongoing at the MOA (Mall of Asia) Arena on Monday morning have been announced. They are candidates from Kenya, Indonesia, USA, Mexico, Peru, Panama, Colombia, Philippines, Canada, Brazil, France, Haiti and Thailand. Host Steve Harvey began the show saying, Hello, Manila! I know what youre thinking A short video of the moment when he mistakenly announced Miss Colombia as winner in last years pageant was shown. He then brought Miss Universe 2015 Pia Wurtzbach on stage. ADVERTISEMENT Pia embodies everything that the crown stands for, he said. Pia shared that she already signed a contract with IMG, a major talent management agency based in New York. She told Harvey, thank you for making me the most popular Miss Universe. The swimsuit competition is next. Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus. President Donald Trump of the USA and King Salman of Saudi Arabia had a phone discussion on Sunday with a Saudi source claiming that it lasted for more than an hour. In their discussions, King Salman agreed to Trumps request to support the establishment of safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts according to a statement from the White House. Riyadh confirmed that the telephone discussion took place but state controlled Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported that King Salman confirmed his support and backing for setting up the safe zone in Syria without mentioning Yemen. President Trump, during his presidential campaign last year, had called Gulf States to pay for establishing safe zones to protect Syrian refugees. Discussion between the two leaders also focused on strengthening their bilateral ties and the depth and durability of the strategic relationship between the two countries according to SPA. They renewed their plans to fight extremist groups with emphasis on the self-declared Islamic State and its spread in the region. In their discussion, Riyadh was urged to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future economically and socially in the region but it is unclear if King Salman has heeded the request. Iran was also on their agenda as Tehrans regional policies in the Middle East have been of concern for both Riyadh and Washington. The need to address Irans destabilizing regional activities was agreed upon, the White House Statement noted. Irans increasing regional role and influence as well as its proclaimed military and defense breakthrough have raised eyebrows of several Middle Eastern countries; the Gulf States especially. Chicken will be the best-positioned protein due to its low price position in times of pressure on consumer spending power but rises in production costs and the long-term impact of COVID-19 threaten to disrupt the sector, according to Rabobank. As Morocco is poised to regain its place within the African Union during the organizations summit hosted by Ethiopia on January 30-31, King Mohammed VI flew to Addis Ababa on Friday to attend the event that will be a landmark for Morocco and for the continent, as well. Last July, King Mohammed VI informed African leaders attending the AU summit in Kigali, Rwanda, of his countrys wish to return to the fold, saying, Morocco should not remain outside its African institutional family, and it should regain its natural, rightful place within the AU. Two months later, the kingdom formally submitted a request to re-join the continental body, thus starting its readmission process. In the past few months preceding the summit, King Mohammed VI visited several East African countries where he discussed with his hosts the Kingdoms decision to return to the pan-African organization, after an absence of over 30 years. And during all of these meetings, including in Rwanda, Tanzania, Ethiopia and Nigeria, the decision was welcomed as a step forward towards enhancing Moroccos commitment to Africa, to its development and to the well-being of its citizens. The kingdom has actually expanded its economic ties with many countries on the continent, mainly through trade and investments, since it left the former Organization of African Unity (AUs predecessor) in 1984, following the admission of the Algeria-backed Polisario front which claims sovereignty over the Sahara. According to a governmental report on Morocco-Africa relationship, over the 10-year period starting in 2004, Moroccos trade with the rest of the continent grew by an annual average of 13% ($3.7 billion) in 2014, 42% of which was with sub-Saharan Africa. Last year, the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) underlined in its World Investment Report 2016, that the most remarkable change in Moroccos relations with Africa is embodied in its direct investments in the continent. In 2015 Morocco invested $600 million, with neighboring Mali getting the lions share, followed by Cote dIvoire, Burkina Faso, Senegal and Gabon, the report said. According to the African Development Bank, over the decade ending in 2016, Moroccos investment in sub-Saharan Africa represented 85% of its overall foreign direct investment (FDI) stocks, becoming thus the number one investor in West Africa and the second largest investor on the continent. It is therefore not surprising that more than forty countries have voiced support to Moroccos readmission in the continental body. How Scientific American and WIRED promote and endorse chemical violence against children Whats the formula for promoting chemical medical violence against babies and children? Big pharma, the vaccine industry, and the mass media shills have it down pat, but its starting to fall apart at the seams. Heres what they do. The vaccine industry and big pharma have scientists in laboratories mix dangerous chemicals with bacteria, viruses, and genetically modified organisms. Then, billion dollar corporations hand millions of dollars to the FDA to fast-track approve their untested, experimental drugs and toxic jabs for mass manufacturing and distribution to the general public via MDs, oncologists, pharmacists, and even elementary school nurses. From flu shots to psych meds and ADHD prescriptions, anything is game that the public thinks will help them get through the nightmare of their days (that are filled with depression and anxiety from OTC meds, GMO foods, bad jobs, and horrible school curriculum). The mass media just waits for chaos to ensue, and when it does, the frenzy begins, like sharks circling around chum. The CDC then creates mass hysteria with some new epidemic or pandemic, like Swine Flu, Bird Flu, Zika, Ebola, or even just the annual seasonal flu causing countless deaths (actually just one or two, and thats usually from pneumonia). Finally, the fraudulent, shill-filled websites like Scientific American and Wired perpetuate and propagate mad-sheeple syndrome through infectious disease propaganda, all while burying the facts and the truth about whats really going on, and how simple natural remedies can prevent, stymie, and cure just about any ailment under the sun. The power of the elements: Discover Colloidal Silver Mouthwash with quality, natural ingredients like Sangre de Drago sap, black walnut hulls, menthol crystals and more. Zero artificial sweeteners, colors or alcohol. Learn more at the Health Ranger Store and help support this news site. Vaccines, Mercury & Dirty Money Mass media rejects column and message for Americans written by Robert Kennedy Jr. In July of 2015, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. publishes a whistle-blowing article in Waking Times, but has to run it as a paid advertisement in USA Today. Though RFK Jr. is pro-vaccine and has had all six of his children vaccinated, he understands there are several major issues with the safety of todays vaccine ingredients and intense schedule that the CDC recommends (since 1998) and even enforces at gunpoint (in California). First of all, he tells us, vaccines account for $25 billion in annual sales for the trillion-dollar pharma industry. The CDCs decision to add just one vaccine to the already inundated and overwhelming schedule can 100% guarantee millions of customers and billions in revenue. Plus, the vaccine industry has complete immunity itself from lawsuits, so they can rush anything to market without safety testing, but rather just simply push propaganda on the news and voila! Kids today in the US cannot attend school without at least 50-plus doses of 14 different vaccines before age 18, which often includes an annual flu vaccine. Though the CDC says they removed mercury from all childhood vaccines, thats an outright lie, because the influenza vaccine is recommended for children, babies 6 months and older, and pregnant women, and the flu jab contains massive amounts of mercury. Right now, big pharma has over 270 new vaccines under development in hopes of boosting jab revenues to $100 billion in the next 8 years. Who will head up the CDCs mass vaccine propaganda promotion and marketing campaign? The main spokesperson (puppet and shill) for the vaccine industry is none other than Dr. Paul Offit, who invented the most dangerous vaccine ever, the Rotavirus vaccine called RotaTeq. Offit says kids can take 10,000 vaccines and walk away just fine. Side effects of RotaTeq include vomiting, diarrhea, severe stomach pain, blood in the stool, and intussusception, which means your intestines get blocked and twisted (this can cause death just days after the toxic jab). RFK Jr.s vaccine article scrubbed from history by mass media shills and the corrupt CDC Robert F. Kennedy Jr. authored an article entitled The Truth about Vaccines that was published in July of 2015 was virtually deleted from history, and scathing critical reviews were then published across the board for anyone looking for it. Heres how it all went down: Timeline for CDCs and mass medias cesspool of corruption: 2002: Dr. William Thompson, lead scientist at CDC, tells his superior Dr. Gerberding about MMR vaccineautism link she does nothing. 2004: Scientists at CDC destroy evidence showing MMR vaccine causes massive spike in autism cases among African American boys under age 3. 2005 2011: CDC promotes propaganda about hoax Denmark Study to bury the connection between MMR vaccine and autism, in case Dr. Thompson blows the whistle. 2011: Poul Thorsen, author of Denmark Study, indicted by federal grand jury for defrauding research institutions of grant money to fake vaccine study to discredit vaccine-autism link. 2014: Dr. Thompson confesses to the world about CDC corruption and vax-autism link cover-up: Biggest medical scandal in modern US medicine history. 2015: RFK Jr.s article Truth about Vaccines published in Rolling Stone and Salon.com. Later that year: RFK Jr.s articles retracted/removed from mass media publications and counter critic articles by shills published. 2015 current: Mass media blackout of Dr. Thompsons confession. 2016: Vaxxed documentary is released and blocked by all major theaters and film festivals, Mass media lies and says Vaxxed movie is about Dr. Andrew Wakefield, not Dr. William Thompson. 2016 2017: President Donald J. Trump appoints RFK Jr. to head up vaccine safety council and the mass media go into a frenzy to discredit RFK Jr. Is autism a form of Mad Hatter Syndrome? Media frenzy ensues to discredit RFK and keep mercury in high doses in influenza vaccines Just three years ago, eco-activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. blew the whistle on the dangers of mercury-loaded vaccines and how they play a major role in causing autism spectrum disorder. RFK Jr. also has a prolific new book published about it. If you look at the history books, Mad Hatter Syndrome, which was caused by exposure to too much mercury used in felt hats, caused many detrimental health symptoms and disorders, including central nervous system malfunctions, gastrointestinal trauma, sensory neural impairments, emotional instability, and more. Sound familiar? Think of most children with autism and Aspergers syndrome. When a major US public figure blows the whistle on something as monumental as the CDCs vaccine corruption, the mass media outrage spikes off the charts, in a frenzy to cover up the truth. Its so obvious if you look at it from a helicopter view, you can see the shills and charlatans scrambling for cover in all the huckster publications, like the Washington Post, Scientific American, and of course, Wired. They came out of the woodwork to denounce everything RFK Jr. authored, calling him a lunatic, anti-vaxxer, anti-science, and anything else they could think of to discredit him before the mass cleansing of immunization ingredients begins. Keith Kloor, ultimate shill and GMO huckster, a key figure in the mercury poisoning cover-up Newsweek 1/11/17: Keith Kloor authors a piece called, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Takes His Debunked Vaccine Concerns To Trump. Who is Keith Kloor and why is he attacking RFK Jr.? Kloor is a cohort and very good friend of exposed biotech shill Jon Entine. Kloor is a climate change hoax promoter who was enlisted by the chemical agri-business to spread propaganda written by industry insiders. Kloor also writes propaganda for Science Insider, a sleaze journalism blog for Discover, and rhetoric pieces for Slate. Kloor is crafty at writing tricky, brain-washing industry jargon, so Newsweek loved it when he wrote a piece attacking the character of Kennedy. See examples of the kind of science fakery pushed by Kloor and his cohorts at FakeScience.news. Watch for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and President Donald J. Trump to begin removing dangerous neurotoxins from vaccines soon, and then you will magically see the bottom fall out of the autism epidemic thats crippling the minds of so many young boys in this country. Sources for this article include: Wakingtimes.com http://science.naturalnews.com/ http://robertfkennedyjr.com/mercury-vaccines/ scientificamerican.com wired.com truthwiki.org truthwiki.org http://cdc.news/ truthwiki.org http://vaccines.news/ sanevax.org naturalnews.com truthwiki.org healthimpactnews.com scientificamerican.com truthwiki.org truthwiki.org THE TRUE COST OF ALL THAT 'CHEAP' LAOR THAT DESTROYED AMERICA THE BIG SECRET DEMOCRATS DO NOT WANT YOU TO KNOW: Heather Mac Donald of the Manhattan Institute has testified before a Congressional committee that in 2004, 95% of all outstanding warrants for murder in Los Angeles were for illegal aliens; in 2000, 23% of all Los Angeles County jail inmates were illegal aliens and that in 1995, 60% of Los Angeless largest street gang, the 18th Street gang, were illegal aliens. @MichaelAuslen Before President Donald Trump issued an executive order blocking refugee resettlement in the U.S., the Florida House already had its sights on the program. Last Friday, before Trump issued an executive order temporarily blocking refugee resettlements, House Speaker Richard Corcoran, R-Land O'Lakes, wrote a letter to the president calling refugee resettlement a "one-sided partnership that is particularly concerning." He further called for the federal government to provide the state with more detailed information about the refugees being sent to Florida. "We find the present arrangement for this program unacceptable and an abrogation of our duty to protect the safety of Florida residents," Corcoran wrote. "Consequently, the Florida House of Representatives is seriously re-evaluating Florida's role in these programs." Refugees are vetted by the United Nations and federal law enforcement before being assigned a state for resettlement. Corcoran's complaint, which echoes concerns raised by Gov. Rick Scott since late 2015, is that state officials are not given full background information that went into that vetting. It follows a belief held by the Trump administration that refugees are insufficiently investigated before arriving in the country and pose a risk to public safety, though the Florida Department of Law Enforcement told a House panel last week that there have been no acts of terrorism committed by refugees in this state. Scott in 2015 opposed efforts by then-President Barack Obama's administration to resettle additional Syrians in the country and demanded the federal government release more information about the refugees it had sent to Florida already, a request that was denied. "This is what the governor had been saying all last year with the Syrian refugees and so obviously the governor firmly believes that this information should be shared with state law enforcement so we can protect citizens in our state," Scott spokeswoman Jackie Schutz said Monday. Photo: Associated Press @stevebousquet and @MaryEllenKlas Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice Jorge Labarga on Jan. 11 -- not today, as earlier reported -- modified an earlier order and ended retired Justice James E.C. Perry's service as a senior justice effective tomorrow. Perry had been serving as a retired justice until the court completed final orders on cases he participated in before retiring Dec. 30. Download Perry (James E C) sj orders Labarga's action came in response to a decision by Perry that "he had decided to pursue other things" instead of serving to fill in vacancies on the court until September 2018, as the original order had allowed, said Craig Waters, spokesperson for the Florida Supreme Court. The ruling got attention Monday because House Speaker Richard Corcoran threatened to file a petition before Labarga's court, challenging the chief justice's action as in violation of the Florida Constitution. Labarga said in his order that the court "has a long tradition of assigning recently retired Justices to senior service for purposes of completing the work they already had begun on this Court before the dates of their retirement." He said the practice was intended to promote "judicial speed and economy" by "ensuring that justices who already have worked on those cases are available to continue to participate in them whenever necessary." The Constitution gives the chief justice the authority to assign a retired justice to temporarily fill a vacancy on the court but, Corcoran argued, that in effect made Perry an "eighth justice" on the Supreme Court. Download DRAFT 2017.xx.xx_Petition for quo warranto Corcoran argues that after Gov. Rick Scott appointed Justice Alan Lawson as Perry's successor, the court could decide whether to rehear the cases that the court hadn't completed before Perry's retirement or allow Lawson to receive the briefs and then vote on the case. The practice of having retired justices finish opinions that were in the pipeline before they retied has been employed by the court for the last 30 years, Waters said, and has never before been challenged as unconstitutional. Among the justices who have stayed on to complete orders of their unfinished work in recent years were both conservative a liberal judges including Justices Leander Shaw, Ben Overton, Raoul Cantero. Perry was an outspoken opponent of the death penalty in light of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision a year ago in Hurst v. Florida and Corcoran has objected to many of the court's rulings in recent years in which he was in the majority. The draft emergency petition drafted by the House's lawyers had Corcoran, acting "as a taxpayer." It challenged Labarga's legal authority as well as what the House concluded were unauthorized payments of taxpayer money to Perry. The court has, however, has not paid Perry anything, said Paul Flemming, spokesperson for the Florida Courts Administrator. As a retiree of state government, Perry would have forfeited his pension if he had he accepted any compensation from the state for the first year of his retirement, Flemming said. "There is no constitutional or legal justification for the Chief Justice's assignment of retired Justice Perry to the status of 'senior justice' or to assign him as a justice sitting on active cases before this court after retired Justice Perry resigned his commission," Corcoran's draft lawsuit reads. Labarga's order marks the second time in a week in which Corcoran's planned action against the judiciary was short-circuited. A week ago, Duval Circuit Judge Mark Hulsey III abruptly resigned, one day before a House committee was to have launched impeachment proceedings against him for allegedly making racist and sexist remarks from the bench. [Photo credit: House Speaker Richard Corcoran, R-Land O'Lakes. Scott Keeler / Tampa Bay Times] @JeremySWallace Donald Trumps frequent clashes with Mexico are already having an impact on Floridas relations with one of its top trading partners. A trade summit meant to foster better ties between Mexico and Florida businesses set for Feb. 22 in Orlando was abruptly postponed Monday less than a week after Trump threatened a 20 percent border tax on Mexican products coming into the U.S. and just days after the President of Mexico canceled his meeting with Trump over the tension. Understandably, there has been much uncertainty given the current state of negotiation and trade discussions between Mexico and the U.S., Doug Wheeler, president and CEO of the Florida Ports Council wrote to expected attendees of the summit. And while we remain encouraged about the opportunities to continue to increase ocean trade between Florida seaports and Mexico, we also feel discussions from this Summit would be more productive at a time when more information and clarity can be provided. The Florida-Mexico Trade Summit, promoted as Bridging the Future, was supposed to include Francisco Gonzalez Diaz, CEO of ProMexico, that nations economic development arm charged with selling Mexico to the world. But that was before a tumultuous first week the Trump administration and Mexico clashed over border walls, a tariff and visit schedules. A spokeswoman for the Florida Ports Council insisted the postponement was not a reaction to anything that happened last week and was instead just about needing to get more information about what happens next between the two trading partners. Mexico and Florida have seen a big increase in trade over the last few years. Just in 2015, there was a 21 percent increase in trade between the two, according to the most recent data available from Enterprise Florida. Total imports from Mexico to Florida have grown from $2.6 billion in 2013 to $3.2 billion in 2015. Cars have been the top important, growing from $500 million in imports in 2014 to more than $1 billion in 2015. @MichaelAuslen Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi on Monday morning praised the immigration executive order signed last week by President Donald Trump. In an intervew on Fox Business, Bondi said she "firmly believes" in Trump's order, which temporarily banned nationals of seven Islamic countries from entering the United States and blocked refugee resettlements. A judge halted parts of it late Saturday, and the order led to weekend-long protests at airports around the country. "We all knew this was coming," Bondi said. "And we have to remember this isn't a ban on religion. We all agree -- all attorneys general -- we agree on religious liberty in our country and in our world. This is about radical terrorists." She continued: "We need to get them (immigrants) here, but we need to get them here the right way." Attorneys general in 16 states, all Democrats, came out against the executive order Monday. Under former President Barack Obama, Bondi was a frequent critic of federal immigration policy and sued the administration over an executive order deferring deportation of 5 million immigrants. Photo: Attorney General Pam Bondi. (Will Vragovic, Tampa Bay Times) What about the Cold War warriors? What about the Jack Rodericks of the world, the quiet men whose battles were fought inside their heads and submarines off the coast of the Soviet Union for two months at a time, bunking nightly within feet of nuclear warheads that could and most figured would wreak destruction the likes of which weve thankfully never seen? Roderick, who has lived in Missoula with wife Gail for most of the last 55 years, was on four top-secret missions in 1960 and 1961 aboard the USS Growler. Armed with four Regulus nuclear cruise missiles, each the size of a small jet airplane, the Growler was one of four conventional diesel-electric submarines in the U.S. Navys early attempt to deter nuclear attack during the Cold War. They were replaced in 1964 by more advanced nuclear-powered subs, ones that could launch missiles without surfacing. It was a time of Fidel Castro, Nikita Khrushchev and Sino-Soviet Communism. Think JFK and the Bay of Pigs in 1961, and the Cuban Missile Crisis in 62. Think fallout shelters and emergency disaster drills under school desks. For years, including a subsequent 17-year career in the Air Force, Roderick didnt think or talk much about his days cooped up inside the red, otherworldly glow of the Growler. You know, this happened a long time ago, he said. Once you leave the service, its kind of like its gone. Nobody ever talks about it any more. It was something that maybe I was proud of, but nobody else really cared. Something happened last week that showed him he was wrong. *** For his 79th birthday, Roderick received a package delivered by his daughter Jackie White. Inside was a large album, painstakingly assembled by a friend of the family, Barbara Royce. When he opened it, Roderick was overwhelmed to find himself back in the Growler again. You dont have get much further than the first page to realize this is something special, he said. Royce figures she spent 550 hours since last July on the book. She worked on it daily for five to eight hours the last 2 months. Inside is the history of the sub and Rodericks role in it, in photos from the family and the internet and in text. Most compelling are re-creations of the innards of the Growler itself, composed of snippets of some 5,000 pictures Royce painstakingly copied and downloaded from video tours of the Growler. The impetus for Royces massive effort was a visit last June to New York Citys USS Intrepid Sea-Air Space Museum, where the Growler is preserved in virtually original condition. Royce made the trip with her daughter, Megan, as a graduation gift from Missoula Hellgate. Whites son, Hunter, now a senior at Hellgate, also went. They saw some Broadway shows, and at Rodericks urging took in the tour of his old submarine, something hes never done. Before they left Royce invited the Rodericks and their family to dinner to hear Jacks Growler stories. Royce said she had no clue what he was talking about. I mean, I loved it, but I had no working knowledge of the Cold War, no working knowledge really of World War II and how it played into the Cold War, she said. It was interesting, and we had a good time that night, but none of it made any sense. *** In New York, Royce begged out of the Growler tour, pleading claustrophobia. While she waited for the kids, she bought a couple of books at the gift shop and began studying up on the sub and submarine warfare in the 1960s. Her plan, she said, was to come back to Missoula with enough material to make a scrapbook to present Roderick, to thank him for his service. It became an obsession. This isnt me, she said. I never had any intent to do something like this. Its just the more I learned, the more I was in awe, and the more I wanted to learn. In her book is a picture of a plaque on the sub with names of the 408 crew members who served on its eight tours from 1959-1964. Another photo zooms in on Rodericks name. Royce said a million people visit the USS Growler each year and walk by that plaque with the names of the men who protected the nation during those tense times. When the tour guide learned Hunter Whites grandfather had been on the Growler, the two became joined at the hip, Royce said. Later she asked Hunter to write a note to his grandpa for her book. Papa, White wrote, I never realized the full scope of your time serving. You wouldnt believe how the tour guide just went on and on about how brave the men on the Growler truly were. I could not be more proud to call you my grandfather. You were very modest with your version of your time on the sub and I know when I tell my kids it will be the FULL story. Im still amazed by the things you have been able to do. *** Roderick recently found an item on the internet that gave him pause. One of the skippers on our boat said that in case theres an all-out war, the Growler would have been the first to shoot a nuclear warhead, he said. As an electrician mate, it was Rodericks job to attach boosters to the nuclear missiles before they were fired. The world is lucky he had to do it only in tests. Me and the safety officer would go up and close the hangar behind us, so it was just us in there, Roderick said. Id screw those things on and Id check the wires to make sure there was no stray voltage. Its sobering, he said, to think that if the worst of times had come, he could well have been the one to wire up the initial salvos of a nuclear holocaust. We thought there was a good chance we were going to fire those things, and we were ready to do it, Roderick said. I think we could have all done it without hesitation. We thought it was important. *** Jack Roderick was born Jan. 19, 1938, and grew up in Logansport, in north-central Indiana. He enlisted in the Navy in 1956 and began a 23-year career in the military. He served for a time as helmsman on the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga in the Mediterranean and North Atlantic. They said it was the largest, the fastest, the best and all that stuff, Roderick said. The largest warship in the world and here is Jack at the helm. Later he became a plane pusher, whose job it was to position airplanes on the flight deck of the Saratoga for takeoff and get them out of the way after they landed. It was a frightening, dangerous job, even for the unflappable Roderick. I didnt think I was going to live. I really didnt, he said. When a buddy found out that the Navy was looking for submariners, both men jumped at the chance. They applied, passed extensive testing, and were accepted. Among Rodericks first jobs was to paint and dress up the gangway. Later he spray painted the whole submarine black, singlehandedly. He was eventually assigned to the electricity gang working with the missiles. On the job, Roderick learned skills he carried to the Air Force, where he serviced high-speed SR-71 spy planes, and to a civilian career at Missoula Fireplace and Masonry, later Anderson Masonry. *** The Growler headed north out of Pearl Harbor in March 1960 for its first patrol with its numbers painted over. Its crew of 90 under Capt. Charles Priest Jr. had no doubt the mission was clandestine and dead serious. News reports proved the Soviets knew there were nuke-packing American submarines haunting their coastline, and theyd made it known if one were spotted in their waters they would force it to the surface. The Navy vowed to resist an almost certain death for the crew. I was pretty young and I wasnt a deep thinker, but I do remember the captain of the boat talking to each one of us, Roderick said. Priest told them one by one that their submarine duty was strictly voluntary. If a man didnt want to face such consequences he could quit at any time. That was our way out, Roderick said. But not one person that I know of took that option. Gail Page was a Missoula girl living in Hawaii with her cousin Carolyn Demin when she met Jack. They were married in Honolulu on Sept. 16, 1961, shortly before Jack was unexpectedly called to his fourth mission on the Growler. The norm was two, he said. More than half a century later, thanks to Royce and her book, Roderick can finally relate to his wife and family what a Cold War submariners life was like. Its gratifying to him that Hunter has gained an appreciation for his grandfathers military service. I think that happened for the whole family, though, Jackie White said. My dad was not only in the Navy, he was in the Air Force, and he was on the carriers, so weve heard stories meshed between subs, carriers and the SR-71. This never necessarily stuck out from any of the others. So when Barb started to go, Hey, did you realize ? and you see the pictures of the nuclear weapons that he slept right across from, then you really start getting the impact. It was like wow. Roderick doesnt think most people realize that even today there are people in submarines under the ocean, far away from their families, who have been under water for days, maybe weeks, maybe months. Theyre there, he said, and its not an easy job. Ed Jenne said he's not too concerned about anyone copying his style. The longtime Missoula illustrator's work is eye candy so detail-oriented few would even try. Not too long ago, he completed an illustration of downtown Missoula, viewed from the Southwest. The Garlington, Lohn and Robinson building wasn't quite complete, but he included it based on renderings. The ruler-straight black pen lines, rendered by hand and measured in fractions of a millimeter, boggle the eye. A specialist in historical illustrations, he laments the fact that construction of newer buildings has already altered the skyline. But you couldn't find a better evocation of Missoula circa 2016 than Jenne's version. If you've lived in Missoula long enough and kept your eyes peeled, you've probably seen Jenne's drawings. He's behind the label for Bayern Brewing's St. Wilbur Weizen, which featured a Saint Bernard busting through a wooden barrel. He designed the locomotive-themed logo for Iron Horse Bar and Grill. The Missoula restaurant, situated near the old depot, is named in honor of rail history. He produces illustrations for Montana Outdoors magazine, and drew the bugs for the Missoula Insectarium's displays. One of his most well-known drawings is a map of Missoula produced in 2003. The history buff is quick to point out how large sections of Reserve Street are still fields in his rendering. "One of the things I've liked is when people come back and say, 'We were from out of town and that map really helped us get around,'" he said. He's drawn some puzzles, too, including one of an imaginary town nestled on a mountainside. He said it's a point of pride when the drawings can draw a kid in. The same is true of adults. It means more "when people aren't just walking by, nodding their heads and saying it's nice," he said. If they look into it, then it really means something. *** Jenne grew up in Huntsville, Alabama, in a military family. He and his brothers used to draw planes landing on a runway. He continued drawing and got technical illustration work right after graduating from high school in 1972. He served in the Army and transferred to the University of Montana and earned a Bachelor of Arts, not in art, but in biology. He was still picking up jobs as an undergrad. He was filling out job applications that might use his degree, but he kept getting work in illustration. "After a while, I forgot about biology. I think sometimes we don't plan our lives our lives plan us," he said. He's worked as a freelance illustrator full time since 1985. He honed his research and technical skills to the point where he was commissioned by the Bureau of Land Management to create a 2006 illustrated poster of Garnet Ghost Town, as it was a century ago. "They were rather particular that I had it all right," he said. He collaborated with BLM historians and Forest Service workers. Recently, he completed an independent project: Yellowstone National Park, circa 1916. The center contains a map of the park, surrounded by vignettes of people, places and animals. Next, he'd like to draw a map of Glacier National Park, blending its people, its historic lodges and wildlife and fauna. Jenne said it took him time to develop his skills to work on projects that may have overwhelmed him when he was younger. The Discovery Map company was impressed enough with his work that they commissioned him for maps of Long Beach, California; Park City, Utah; Charlotte, North Carolina; the Black Hills of South Dakota, and Chicago. To give an idea of the depth of his research, he traveled to the Windy City for five days in 2006. He walked every block and took pictures of every building. The trick is to methodically take one side of the street in the morning to catch the morning light, then take the opposite side later in the day for the evening light. It's easier to take too many pictures than it is to go back and shoot more. He said those trips still give him flashbacks. "It's like you have too much information on your hard drive after awhile," he said. *** There's a small and friendly community of illustrators in Missoula, he said, most of whom chose the city for the lifestyle more than the career opportunities. He's happy to see younger artists like David Miles Lusk and Josh Quick keeping the craft alive. Quick, now well-known around town for his comics, concert posters and commercial work, got a job with Paradigm Architects when he was a teenager. He thought he wanted to be an architect, since it would allow him to draw for a living. It turned out that Jenne worked for the same office, and Quick would talk with him and get mentoring advice. "He was the most kind, open man," Quick said. Jenne would give the younger artist pointers that went beyond technique. "'Are you charging them what you're worth?'" Quick said. "That was his biggest thing. Understand your value even though you're a teenager." Quick notes that he wasn't the tidiest artist back then. "Ed showed me how to be clean in my illustrations," he said. A handful of Idowu Bamigbaye's fellow international classmates at the University of Montana are from Saudi Arabia, and he said Monday they're worried about traveling because of President Trump's executive order concerning immigrants and refugees. "A few people from Saudi, I don't think they will be traveling home again," said Bamigbaye, a master's student in psychology. Friday, President Donald Trump signed the order banning nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States for at least 90 days even if they hold visas and green cards. Sunday evening, though, the Department of Homeland Security said waivers had been granted to many with green cards that give people lawful permanent residency status. "It's really unfair," said Bamigbaye, from Nigeria. "Those people might be established here. They might have children and families here. They'll be badly affected." UM counts 11 students from those countries Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Yemen, Somalia and Syria, the last affected indefinitely. Saudi Arabia isn't one of the countries affected, but Bamigbaye knows the order has unsettled those students regardless. "They're still nervous." The 11 students affected by the order are in Missoula, and none was stranded at an airport, said Effie Koehn, interim director of the Global Engagement Office at UM. However, she said she did not know if any of their family members were stopped in travel as a result of the order. Monday, Koehn was in the process of setting up a time to meet with students this week to address their concerns. "We are trying there to give the support and guidance to the students as best as we can, and we are looking forward to the same support and understanding from the Missoula community," Koehn said. She said UM provides the immigration status of students only to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Otherwise, she said UM does not share their status. "This is private information, confidential," Koehn said. Monday afternoon, a UM spokeswoman did not have the number of faculty and staff affected by the ban. However, Mehrdad Kia, a professor of history and director of the Central and Southwest Asian Studies Center, said UM does have some faculty and staff from those countries, and he's talked with colleagues who are dismayed. "They feel humiliated," Kia said. "They feel frightened. And they feel targeted." They are also confused, he said. Can they leave the country to care for an ailing family member? Will they be allowed to return? What is their legal status if they leave? "They don't understand why they have been targeted other than the fact that they have been labeled as Muslims," said Kia, who directs them to attorneys. Trump also has banned all refugees from entering the United States for 120 days, and campuses have pushed back against his dictates. UM is among the universities asking that the temporary ban be "promptly reconsidered" given the hardship it imposes on students, faculty, and staff, and the values of fairness in the nation. Monday, UM President Sheila Stearns emailed the campus community a statement from the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities and said she supported its sentiments. "Public research universities are deeply concerned about the administration's new policy preventing visa and green card holders of seven countries from returning to the U.S. for 90 days," said the statement from the association, citing 17,000 students from the seven countries in the United States last school year. "The consequences of this action, along with the ban on refugees, reverberate far beyond the higher education community and are worthy of everyone's attention." Some students are stranded and unable to return to their research and work, and some faculty may not be able to return to teach, the statement said. Some are separated from their families. "But the impact of this decision goes beyond those immediately impacted," the statement said. "Our nation's universities are enriched and strengthened by the talent, insight, and culture that international students, faculty, researchers and staff bring. "With appropriate and effective vetting, international students from all countries and of all religions have long been a core part of our campus communities and that should continue uninterrupted." In the email, Stearns said UM is a member of the APLU, and the statement reflects her "immediate thoughts on the matter." "I realize that the executive order, the court responses, and the ensuing challenges and changes to policy brings many questions and concerns from those both directly and indirectly affected at the University of Montana," she said. "Please know that we are following this matter closely and working to clearly define our responsibilities and how best to address the needs and concerns of our campus community members." In response to the ban, the School of Journalism was circulating a petition in front of Don Anderson Hall on Monday and offering hot cocoa and coffee to show support for foreign students. "We the undersigned strongly support the presence of foreign students and scholars from all countries and all faiths at UM," read the petition. "We applaud the University of Montana for its efforts to welcome visitors from outside the United States, and we oppose the White House ban." Dean Larry Abramson said the School of Journalism teaches its students to be citizens of the world, and interacting with people from different places, such as Somalia, Iraq, and Iran, shows the truths about those countries. How else will people who have concerns address them? UM's journalism students study abroad to Germany last summer to cover the refugee crisis, and Japan this spring to cover the lingering effects of the radiation leaks from the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant and he said universities in the United States need to welcome others the same way. "I don't know that any other sector of society is as directly affected," Abramson said of campuses. Kia, who has lectured about Islam and the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia, said the response from Main Hall was inadequate, a "carefully worded memo." "I feel very strongly that the so-called populist discourse of demonizing a certain group of people because of their religion and faith has really crossed the line here," Kia said. For one, he said, the facts don't match the ostensible threat. Kia wanted to know the number of U.S. citizens hurt or killed by citizens of those seven countries in the U.S. The Cato Institute, promoting conservative public policy, posted an answer on its website: "Foreigners from those seven nations have killed zero Americans in terrorist attacks on U.S. soil between 1975 and the end of 2015," according to the Cato post. "Six Iranians, six Sudanese, two Somalis, two Iraqis, and one Yemeni have been convicted of attempting or carrying out terrorist attacks on U.S. soil. Zero Libyans or Syrians have been convicted of planning a terrorist attack on U.S. soil during that time period." Kia wondered why Saudi Arabia, which sent terrorists in the 9/11 attack, and Egypt, given that one of the 9/11 pilots was Egyptian, weren't on the list. "Some have concluded that any country which has had any Trump tower building or hotel has been excluded from the list," he said. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said Sunday in an NBC broadcast that the list comprises "countries of concern" already identified under the Obama administration and disputed that Trump's business ties influenced the order. Donald Trump has been president for one week and already hes in deep trouble with a broad spectrum of the public, the media, government agencies and other nations around the globe. Why? Primarily because hes trying to run government like a business that old and totally false premise so often called for by clueless politicians who simply dont understand the difference between private business and public governance. It didnt take long for Team Trump to step into quicksand when, first day on the job, Trumps press secretary, Sean Spicer, challenged the figures on the number of people who attended the inauguration. Spicer was so wrong about so many things that the Washington Post nailed him with their four Pinocchio award for having so blatantly lied about easily provable facts and saying he actually deserved five Pinocchios because his lies were so extremely at odds with the truth. But hey, never one to miss an opportunity to be hung by their own tongues, Trumps top advisor, Kellyanne Conway, told national media that Team Trump had alternative facts to dispute the figures of the crowd size at the inauguration and the number of riders on the D.C. metro system which, by the way, was significantly higher for the Womens March against Trump, both for participants and riders. But coming up with the term alternative facts did provide enormous levity for those with any logic or sense. Nor was anyone particularly surprised when the Donald decided to order the removal of all information about climate change from the White House website. But sticking your head in the sand of denial does not make the increasing warming trend of the planet go away just because you remove information pertaining to it. Quite the contrary. In what will become a predictable series of unexpected consequences to his brash actions, government agencies and scientists reacted by releasing vast amounts of information on the impacts of global warming. Team Trump responded in predictably petulant fashion by throwing a tantrum, ordering a hiring freeze on government agencies and slapping a no contact order on agencies communicating with the public or other agencies. Again, it would be hilarious were it not so absolutely clueless to think that Trump can run the U.S. government as if it were one of his casinos. But again, hes doing just what any CEO might do after a corporate takeover. Unfortunately for him and his administration, the size, function and complexity of the United States government and the 324 million Americans it serves dwarfs any comparison with corporate structure or operation. The Donald simply doesnt get that part yet, and while he can freeze hiring, he cant freeze the retirement of 10,000 baby boomers a day, many of them government workers, whose jobs will now fall on the shoulders of the workers left since, sorry, cant hire any replacements. Equally facetious was Trumps exemption of the military from the hiring and contracting freeze. Were he really concerned about outgoing expenditures in a CEO sort of way, hed go immediately to the biggest cost center with the most expensive and corrupt contracting practices and start lopping heads and freezing expenditures in a sector of government that spends $2 billion a day a whopping $83 million an hour. But having larded his cabinet with retired generals, looks like its hands off the military while they attempt to squeeze other already underfunded agencies. Or how about that wall on the Mexican border for which he promised to make Mexico pay? His great idea is a 20 percent tariff on imported Mexican products. While it did a great job of enraging our southern neighbor it didnt take long for even mildly astute observers to point out that the new tax would, in fact, be paid for by Americans who buy and consume 80 percent Mexicos exports. Its only been a week, but not a day goes by that Team Trump doesnt dig itself further into a hole of derision, disbelief, and determined resistance by an ever-widening sector of Americans and the international community. While Trump seems personally unaware of the mounting blowback, you can bet congressional Republicans are keeping an eye on the approval meters especially those with re-election on their minds. At some point, unless they want to hand Congress back to the Democrats in a few short years, they will have to rein in their wacky leader and bring sense and sensibility back to office of the president of the United States. Last week the Montana House Judiciary Committee pulled the rug out from under police chiefs and news organizations who jointly supported a simple measure to clarify that booking photos are public information and should be treated as such. Unbelievably, the committee chair submitted a request to amend the bill to instead prohibit the release of these photos. He did so despite the fact that no one spoke in opposition to the original bill at the hearing Jan. 18. And despite the fact that the intent of House Bill 236 is to at last provide the obvious answer to the question of whether the mugshots taken of suspects upon their arrest should be made available to the public. For a long time, each county in Montana answered this question individually, leading to a situation in which mug shots were routinely released by some counties, such as Yellowstone, and routinely withheld in others, such as Missoula. That changed in October 2015, when a district court case helped set a statewide precedent after the judge ruled that Park County was required to release the booking photo of a registered violent offender who was charged with aggravated assault and attempted deliberate homicide. Attorney General Tim Fox later referred to the ruling to explain his decision not to offer a new ruling in a Gallatin County case that also concerned booking photos. For most county attorneys in Montana, as well as the state attorney general, that settled it: Mugshots would henceforth be released along with arrest records. Missoula County Attorney Kirsten Pabst was among these sensible souls; she immediately informed the Missoula County Sheriffs Department that booking photos were to be treated as part of the arrest record and considered public criminal justice information. And for the past year, the Missoulian has published mugshots along with relevant crime stories. Gallatin County, on the other hand, resisted the ruling and began insisting that anyone seeking access to mugshots should be required to file a motion and secure a court order each and every time. So, although the issue was indeed settled for the most part, legislative clarification has been needed to make the law crystal clear to the lone holdouts. Thus Rep. Frank Garner, a Republican from Kalispell, introduced a straightforward bill this legislative session to accomplish that clarification. The four-page bill is an easy read, and includes a simple addition to state statute clarifying that booking photographs are included in the definition of initial arrest records, meaning they are public information. Notably, the bill has the support of nearly every news organization in the state as well as the Montana Association of Police Chiefs. However, the Judiciary Committee ignored this support and prepared amendments to the bill to prohibit the release of booking photos until after the person is convicted of a crime, with some limited exceptions. Chairman Alan Doane said he thinks the public release of booking photos is comparable to revenge porn and counter to the spirit of innocent until proven guilty. But this reasoning makes no sense. Law enforcement officials often provide mug shots to news media when asking for the publics help identifying or locating a suspect. What good would it be to wait to provide these photos until after the person is caught and convicted? A photo doesnt mean a suspect is guilty any more than an arrest report does. All it means is that an individual has been charged with a crime. Remember, a lot of people booked into the Missoula County Detention Facility are subsequently released on bail. People have the right to know who in their community has been arrested and what crimes they are being charged with as a matter of public interest and public safety, and to hold our criminal justice system accountable. Mugshots are far and away the most accurate way to identify an individual. Providing only a suspects name can lead to community confusion if the name is a common one, as in John Smith or Jane Anderson. Eliminating the possibility of such confusion is precisely why booking photos are taken in the first place. The original version of the bill should be passed out of committee for a full vote in the House without further complication. If the proposed amendments are made, however, the bill should be killed. With all the recent press from the Montana Office of Public Instruction, I have yet to see a platform of what Elsie Arntzen means by putting Montana students first. During a critical time when she could (should!) be advocating for state public education bills, including much-needed increases for special education funding and school funding to serve 19-year-olds, the superintendent was apparently too busy to attend these hearings. It appears from the press coverage she has been too busy unraveling programs that do put Montana kids first, including Graduation Matters and the ACT assessment for high school students. Even though both of these issues had a groundswell of support from the field of educators across Montana, it seems Arntzen's politics have clearly clouded her view of what it means to put Montana kids first. Political games do not belong in the business of education our children, Arntzen, and your shenanigans are not going unnoticed. Jenny Wallace, Helena My son is 8 and attends public school in Montana. He was born with several strikes against him from the beginning that he did not ask for. He has eosinophilic esophagitis, food allergies, asthma and autism and has been sick since he was an infant. My son will undergo anesthesia for his 12th endoscopy next month, which is more than many adults will endure in their lifetime. Each surgery costs about $10,000, and his monthly disease treatment adds up to approximately $1,800. We are very fortunate in that my husbands employer provides group health insurance; however, it doesnt cover everything and has limits. This is where we have to rely upon Medicaid under Medicaid expansion, as well as the Affordable Care Act. Prior to the ACA, children with these issues were uninsurable due to pre-existing conditions and lifetime caps. My family is not asking for a government handout and have always paid our way. However, if my son loses his Medicaid and his coverage under the ACA, he will certainly face regression, become seriously ill and could lose all the progress he's made thus far. This could literally bankrupt families, which will then be passed onto the consumer. Sen. Steve Daines has already made it clear that he intends on voting to take health care away from thousands of Montanans. I am asking for your help to write or call Daines and ask that he reconsider his vote by standing up for Montana. There are many other families, just like mine, who will be devastated and will suffer severe consequences. Thank you. Shannon Salmonsen, Butte BILLINGS The Cinnabar herd of bighorn sheep that lives just north of Yellowstone National Park has been slow to recover from an outbreak of pneumonia in 2014. During the spring survey the numbers werent bad, said Karen Loveless, a Fish, Wildlife and Parks biologist in Livingston. But the lamb recruitment is not great. And were seeing that again this year. Thats discouraging. The outbreak of disease initially resulted in the deaths of 34 sheep out of a herd of 89, many of them rams. Because of the deaths FWP closed Hunting District 305 to bighorn sheep hunting. Id sure like to open it, Loveless said. But Ill wait and see what we get this spring. If ram numbers remain low I dont want to offer a tag for hunters if its unlikely to be filled. So far the disease outbreak seems to be isolated to the Cinnabar herd, which lives on the west side of the Yellowstone River in the Gardiner Basin. Bighorns on the east side of the river, the Corwin Springs herd, seem to be doing fine. Likewise, bighorn sheep numbers in nearby Yellowstone National Park, just south of Gardiner, are OK. Loveless said some of the sheep from the uninfected herds may move into the Cinnabar habitat to help repopulate the herd. We know rams certainly move around during the rut, she said. The continued scarcity of lambs in the Cinnabar herd is not unusual. Bighorn sheep in other areas have suffered from an inability to rebuild their numbers after a pneumonia outbreak. The bacteria seems to persist in some ewes and may infect their milk, killing weak newborns. Although there are plenty of predators in the area, including mountain lions, Loveless said their numbers havent increased so they arent likely to be a factor in the lack of lambs. Downriver farther, the Point of Rocks bighorn herd had a pneumonia outbreak, yet still had good lamb recruitment, but then got sick again. The sheep dont have immunity to a bacteria carried by domestic sheep. Its believed that when bighorn rams wander and come in contact with domestic sheep they may carry the pneumonia back to infect their herds. A bighorn sheep herd in the Tendoy Mountains of southwestern Montana suffered continued outbreaks of pneumonia. Despite several attempts to rebuild the herd with bighorns captured and transplanted to the Tendoys, the group never rebounded. So in 2015 FWP enlisted hunters to help remove all of the animals. Most were killed, leaving FWP to harvest the few remaining that hunters were unsuccessful in taking. FWP plans to repopulate the Tendoy-area herd with bighorns that are free of disease in hopes that the animals will thrive once again. Loveless is optimistic that the outbreak in the Gardiner Basin wont spread to surrounding herds, but more information will be available after FWP flies the region in March to count wildlife. The Gardiner Basin is steeped in bighorn sheep history. Evidence of ancient sheep traps built by early Americans has been found in the rocky cliffs near Gardiner along the Yellowstone River. Surrounding peaks have names like Big Horn, Ramshorn and two versions of Sheep Mountain. Unlike some other places in Montana, the Gardiner Basin sheep are native herds. Copyright 2022 HT Digital Streams Ltd All Right Reserved Born in London, England, Thomas C. Porter came to America when he was 8 years old in 1843. He was among the early prospectors at Alder Gulch in 1864, but he left for Butte in October of that year. Together with Dennis OLeary, Joseph Ramsdell, and William Parks, he developed Buttes first smelter on the lower reaches of Town Gulch (Dublin Gulch), probably just east of the intersection of Wyoming, Copper, and the Anaconda Road today. But Porter was also Buttes first schoolteacher. Porter conducted a school for seven students for three or four months during the winter of 1865-66. The school building was a log cabin on Broadway where the Butte Hotel was later built, the parking structure across from the old City Hall today. Grandly and likely jokingly styled Oatman Hall, the log cabin was replaced in 1879 by the St. Nicholas Hotel, the largest in Butte, with a dining room that could accommodate 100 patrons. The log cabin school was reportedly constructed by David Meiklejohn so his children could have an education, but it was maintained and paid for by subscription, which meant voluntary contributions by residents. Even when enrollments were low and supporting families few, bachelors subscribed liberally to maintain the school. Meiklejohn went on to become Buttes Police Chief in 1887-88, when he lived in a home at the corner of Mercury and Dakota. Porter was unpaid as a teacher. Presumably he had time on his hands during the winter and sustained himself with his mining ventures, although the Ramsdell Smelter he partnered in was considered by many to be a failure, a waste of a $7,000 investment. After that first winter, Porter passed the teaching responsibilities on to Colonel Wood, the first salaried teacher in Butte, a man who was also a fine fiddler and taught dance along with traditional subjects. Porter continued his mining ventures and in 1882 was elected Public Administrator of Silver Bow County, which had been carved out of Deer Lodge County the previous year. One of the first seven students, W.L. Robbins, was still living in Butte in 1937, at 3043 Phillips Ave., when he recalled living in Mr. Porters cabin on Quartz Street and attending the school on Broadway. By 1879, Buttes exploding population, given as 2,911, excluding 363 more in Walkerville, included 189 children aged 10 to 21, 257 aged 5 to 10, and 215 under age 5. There were 255 students attending seven or eight schools scattered across the district from Walkerville to Meaderville and from the East Side to the Travona. By 1888, one- to three-room schools in the neighborhoods were overshadowed by the new high school at East Granite and Arizona and the older Central School at Broadway and Academy (Dakota), later the site of the Butte Public Library. The Central School building had 11 rooms in two stories and evolved over time to serve as the high school while the old high school became Washington School, which served as a junior high and elementary school in later years. It was replaced by a new school on the same site in 1915, the Washington School most people recall. On Jan. 27, 2017, Robert Bob Edward Woods of Pocatello, Idaho passed away peacefully surrounded by his loving family in his hometown of Butte, Montana. He fought a very courageous battle with pancreatic cancer. Bob was a devoted husband and family man, kind, honest, and hard-working. He was a passionate outdoorsman who enjoyed fishing, camping, and going for RZR rides. He will forever be remembered for his sense of humor, storytelling, and his ability to always hunt in areas with no game. His boys will forever remember their experiences with their dad at hunting camp. The son of Margaret (Corcoran) Woods and Courtland Grice, he was born in Anaconda, Montana on July 17, 1946. Later he was adopted and raised by Harry Woods. Bob attended St. Peters Parochial School in Anaconda and graduated from Butte High School in 1964. Soon after graduation he married his high school sweetheart, Janice Marie Day, on Dec. 18, 1965. Together they had four children and enjoyed 51 years of marriage. He proudly served his country with the U.S. Navy. After his honorable discharge in 1969, Jan and Bob returned to Butte and raised their four boys. Bobs career began as a printer with The Montana Standard prior to joining the service. After returning from the service he worked for the Anaconda Company as a boiler maker and then for Stauffer Chemical as a pipefitter for 21 years. When Stauffer closed in 1994, Bob moved to Pocatello, Idaho to work at FMC Chemical and finally retired after working for Idaho National Laboratory (INL) for nine years. Bob was preceded in death by his son, Shane Woods; his mother and father; his mother and fatherin-law, Martha and Charles Day; his sister, Peggy Varner; and his brother-in-law, Woody Slagle. Survivors include his wife, Janice; his children, Bob (Margie) Woods of Butte, Clint (Terri) Woods of Gaylord, Michigan, and Travis (Lana) Woods of Anchorage, Alaska; sisters, Betty Slagle, Carol Woods, Karen (Ralph) Niland, Janet (Manuel) Madrid, and Terri (DeeO) Whitehead; and his brother-in-law, Rich Varner. Bob is also survived by his grandchildren -- Zach, Mason, Paige, Cierra, Mike, Evan, Austin, and Nash Woods, as well as numerous nieces and nephews who were very dear to him. A very special thank you to all the staff at Easter Seals Highlands Hospice for their compassionate care at helping Bob remain strong and dignified. In lieu of flowers, please make donation to the American Cancer Society, Easter Seals Highlands Hospice, or charity of donors choice. Bob's family will receive friends at 10 a.m. Wednesday morning in St. Ann's Catholic Church where the Funeral Mass will be celebrated at 11 a.m. Entombment will be in Holy Cross Cemetery. Express condolences at www.wayrynen-richards.com or go to www.mtstandard.com. -30- The Cinnabar herd of bighorn sheep that lives just north of Yellowstone National Park has been slow to recover from an outbreak of pneumonia in 2014. During the spring survey the numbers werent bad, said Karen Loveless, a Fish, Wildlife and Parks biologist in Livingston. But the lamb recruitment is not great. And were seeing that again this year. Thats discouraging. The outbreak of disease initially resulted in the deaths of 34 sheep out of a herd of 89, many of them rams. Because of the deaths FWP closed Hunting District 305 to bighorn sheep hunting. Id sure like to open it, Loveless said. But Ill wait and see what we get this spring. If ram numbers remain low I dont want to offer a tag for hunters if its unlikely to be filled. So far the disease outbreak seems to be isolated to the Cinnabar herd, which lives on the west side of the Yellowstone River in the Gardiner Basin. Bighorns on the east side of the river, the Corwin Springs herd, seem to be doing fine. Likewise, bighorn sheep numbers in nearby Yellowstone National Park, just south of Gardiner, are OK. Loveless said some of the sheep from the uninfected herds may move into the Cinnabar habitat to help repopulate the herd. We know rams certainly move around during the rut, she said. The continued scarcity of lambs in the Cinnabar herd is not unusual. Bighorn sheep in other areas have suffered from an inability to rebuild their numbers after a pneumonia outbreak. The bacteria seems to persist in some ewes and may infect their milk, killing weak newborns. Although there are plenty of predators in the area, including mountain lions, Loveless said their numbers havent increased so they arent likely to be a factor in the lack of lambs. Downriver farther, the Point of Rocks bighorn herd had a pneumonia outbreak, yet still had good lamb recruitment, but then got sick again. The sheep dont have immunity to a bacteria carried by domestic sheep. Its believed that when bighorn rams wander and come in contact with domestic sheep they may carry the pneumonia back to infect their herds. A bighorn sheep herd in the Tendoy Mountains of southwestern Montana suffered continued outbreaks of pneumonia. Despite several attempts to rebuild the herd with bighorns captured and transplanted to the Tendoys, the group never rebounded. So in 2015 FWP enlisted hunters to help remove all of the animals. Most were killed, leaving FWP to harvest the few remaining that hunters were unsuccessful in taking. FWP plans to repopulate the Tendoy-area herd with bighorns that are free of disease in hopes that the animals will thrive once again. Loveless is optimistic that the outbreak in the Gardiner Basin wont spread to surrounding herds, but more information will be available after FWP flies the region in March to count wildlife. The Gardiner Basin is steeped in bighorn sheep history. Evidence of ancient sheep traps built by early Americans has been found in the rocky cliffs near Gardiner along the Yellowstone River. Surrounding peaks have names like Big Horn, Ramshorn and two versions of Sheep Mountain. Unlike some other places in Montana, the Gardiner Basin sheep are native herds. HAMILTON Larry Robinson knows hes a lucky man. He could have easily died on the night of Dec. 18 after being ejected through a side window of his pickup as it rolled several times across a field on the southern edge of Hamilton. Unconscious, with blood turning the snow red under his head, Robinson was at the mercy of the elements that frigid night. He might have died if it hadnt been for Oso. Bobbie Widder was sitting in her car waiting for her husband to come out of the Lone Pine Convenience store with her soda when she noticed the large, three-year-old yellow Labrador retriever walk by. It was really, really cold out that night, Widder said. When my husband came back outside, I asked if he had seen the dog. I didnt want to take off and just leave it there in the cold. At the time, there were no other customers at the store and traffic was sparse. The couple found Oso shivering next to the store. He was skittish and shaking like crazy, Widder said. He was right there on the north side of the store. And when they looked up from the dog, they spotted Robinsons pickup truck upside down in the vacant field right across the road. They both ran to the man crumpled in the snow. Widder remembers the fence post that was just a foot away from his head. If he would have hit that, it probably would have been over, she said. My husband held the guys head out of the snow. He asked if he was hurt. The guy told him his back hurt a little. We didnt even know that he was bleeding from his head until we got home, Widder said. My husband had blood all the way up his arm. Robinsons longtime partner, Denise Linnell, had been waiting for him to arrive back home after a long day of thawing pipes from underneath trailer homes in the East Fork of the Bitterroot. I was really starting to get worried, she said. You know, hes no spring chicken any more. Robinson was transported via ambulance first to Marcus Daly Memorial Hospital and then to St. Patrick Hospital in Missoula, where stayed for 12 days in the intensive care unit. His ribs were broken in 17 places. His back was cracked, pelvis broken, kidneys bruised and the doctors drained 2 quarts of liquid from around his lungs so he could breathe again. It took 17 staples to seal up the cut on his head. I know Im a very lucky man, Robinson said late last week at his Hamilton home. Robinson doesnt remember the wreck. He has no idea how he ended up being ejected through one of the side windows. He doesnt know how he avoided having the truck roll over on top of him. All I can remember is all of a sudden being out there in the snow, he said. I was unconscious and then I woke up in the field. It was really cold. Now safe back at home, Robinson said the accident has taught him a lesson that he wishes everyone would take to heart. Ive always been one of those guys who never wore my seat belt, he said. I never thought I needed it. Was I ever wrong. Ill never drive again without one. He hopes when the day comes again to drive that Oso will be willing to crawl back into the passenger seat. Hes always gone everywhere I go, Robinson said. Ive had him since he was a pup. Hes pretty much been with me all the time. Robinson doesnt doubt that his dog played a big role in helping him to survive that night. Oso survived the wreck without a scratch. He could have easily picked up and run home afterwards. He knew the way back here, Robinson said, with a smile. Instead, he stuck around and he found help. I know he loves me. Widder said someone probably would have eventually spotted the overturned truck. I dont know for sure if we would have seen him if it hadnt been for that dog coming by, she said. From what I hear, hes kind of famous for taking that dog everywhere he goes. I guess thats why theyre called mans best friend. BILLINGS An external investigation that Superintendent of Public Instruction Elsie Arntzen said is examining Montanas use of the ACT test is not an investigation, but a human resources review. "Its really just a workplace policy and procedure review, said Jim Kerins, a partner in the firm OPI is planning to hire. The Office of Public Instruction announced Friday that it is hiring CMS Community and Management Services, a Helena firm, to investigate Montanas reporting of ACT scores. Montana switched to using the college-readiness exam in 2015 to report required high school test scores to the U.S. Department of Education. Arntzen declared that Montana, under previous Superintendent Denise Juneau, was out of compliance with the feds because the ACT doesnt align with state education standards or have scores that fit into federal reporting categories, nor has the state developed a system to fit scores into those categories. She also alleged that the state falsified last years ACT scores, reporting them all as proficient. Juneau has argued that the standards issue was well known and that test score reporting was intended to be amended. Speaking to an assembly of school administrators in Great Falls last week, she cited a new investigation. We are under an investigation right now, and its an external investigation, she said, according to the Great Falls Tribune. Im sorry, I am a woman of integrity and I do believe that falsification of data, student data not that it would harm the student because they receive their own test scores but they had two years to work on this since it was agreed that the ACT would be the only benchmark test. The ACT does not comply with our Montana state standards, nor does it comply with what the federal government wanted for this assessment and it had to deal with different levels of proficiency. So when the level was filled in, and it was filled in falsely, that means all of our students that took the ACT were proficient? CMS hasnt signed a contract with the state yet, Kerins said. He described his usual work as pretty mundane: looking at workplace policies, job description, communication procedures, ensuring that employees have ways to report complaints. The federal reporting is going to be part of what we look at, he said. But the review is not a definitive, this did or didnt comply with federal reporting standards. Im certainly not an education policy expert, Kerins said. OPI spokesman Dylan Klapmeier said the comments made in Great Falls were taken out of context. Theres not an external investigation being conducted on us. ... The way it was reported made it appear that OPI was put under an investigation. When pressed about how the comments were out of context, Klapmeier said it was just a mix-up in the way that the words were used and the words were interpreted. Earlier at the conference, Arntzen did say we are doing an external review to make sure the procedures going forward with that test is going to be beneficial to all of those juniors, in reference to the ACT. Arntzen earlier said not following federal requirements could put federal funding at risk; however, a review of 31 states' compliance with testing requirements found that none of them met every federal requirement, and none had their federal funding threatened, including some which use the ACT. In California, state education officials are in the midst of a showdown with federal officials because its use of a test the feds didn't sign off on. State officials have held their ground despite a response from feds citing "many possible enforcement actions and remedies available to be applied by the department, including the withholding of funds, according the Edsource, a California education news outlet. Unlike California's test, 12 states use the ACT or SAT, another college readiness exam, for federal accountability, according to a database of state tests by Education Week. At least seven states have won permission from the feds to use those tests, but still must go through the peer-review process. Smart Rating: 95.29 Run Time: 2 hours, 45 minutes Starring: Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Leonardo DiCaprio Two years before the Civil War, Django (Jamie Foxx), a slave, finds himself accompanying an unorthodox German bounty hunter named Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz) on a mission to capture the vicious Brittle brothers. Their mission successful, Schultz frees Django, and together they hunt the South's most-wanted criminals. Their travels take them to the infamous plantation of shady Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio), where Django's long-lost wife (Kerry Washington) is still a slave. Allbee & Barclay, PC, 12/13/2016 17171 appeal for draina... 2,192.00; Alliant Energy 12/09/2016 17164 Community Cent... 9.10, 12/09/2016 17164 City Hall Utilities 7.72, 12/09/2016 17164 Post Office Utilities 20.38, 12/09/2016 17164 Maintenance She... 39.35, Total Alliant Energy 76.55; Brockhouse Well & Pump Service 12/13/2016 17177 parts for Gould je... 210.00; CBI Bank & Trust 12/19/2016 safety deposit bo... 16.50; CBI Bank & Trust CC 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-gas for F250 45.05, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-diesel for lo... 34.86, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-pick set & b... 12.37, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-nuts &bolts 1.05, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-shop towels 3.94, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-galvanized ... 2.59, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-socket set 14.99, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-spray paint 5.29, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-mogul base... 41.80, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-sprocket 37.79, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-hook, peg, ... 49.23, 12/13/2016 17169 Juan-18ga galv, c... 68.72, 12/13/2016 17169 Kathie-stamps 594.00, Total CBI Bank & Trust CC 911.68; Century Link 12/13/2016 17175 phone bill 120.26; City of Muscatine 12/13/2016 17180 27.86 ton salt@$... 1,938.22, 12/13/2016 17180 Nov refuse 6,700.00, 12/13/2016 17181 27.86 ton salt @ ... 1,938.22, 12/13/2016 17181 Nov refuse 6,700.00, Total City of Muscatine 17,276.44; Currys Express Mart Inc. 12/13/2016 17170 diesel for loader 42.00; Doolins, 12/13/2016 17178 bingo supplies 76.89; Eastern Iowa Light & Power 12/20/2016 electricity for stre... 191.52; Internal Revenue Service, 12/31/2016 Fed Tax 472.46; Iowa Prison Industries 12/13/2016 17173 posts & bases 189.60; Lance Wilson 12/09/2016 17168 CC Deposit Refu... 75.00; Muscatine Power & Water 12/13/2016 17176 electricity for MS 66.95, 12/13/2016 17176 electricity for PO 45.98, 12/13/2016 17176 electricity for stre... 1,012.49, 12/13/2016 17176 electricity for stre... 985.39, 12/13/2016 17176 electricity for CC/... 133.44, 12/13/2016 17176 electricity for CC/... 113.16, 12/13/2016 17176 electricity for park 54.82, Total Muscatine Power & Water 2,412.23; Pacific Visions Contractors, LLC 12/13/2016 17179 winterize sprinklers 95.00, 12/13/2016 17179 winterize sprinklers 51.40, 12/13/2016 17179 winterize sprinklers 43.60, Total Pacific Visions Contractors, LLC 190.00; Quad-City Times 12/13/2016 17172 Nov minutes 35.55; Quill 12/13/2016 17181 post it dispenser, ... 64.60, 12/13/2016 17181 paper towels 25.49, 12/13/2016 17181 raffle tickets for bi... 50.97, 12/13/2016 17181 3 cash boxes 102.81, 12/13/2016 17181 paper towels, Pin... 69.90, Total Quill 313.77; RK Dixon 12/13/2016 17174 Jan contract, Nov... 30.32; Todd Shutt Painting 12/08/2016 17161 paint entry, CC, o... 2,950.00,; TOTAL 27,782.77 NOTICE OF PROBATE OF WILL, OF APPOINTMENT OF EXECUTOR, AND NOTICE TO CREDITORS IN THE MATTER OF THE ESTATE OF GEORGE W. RITSON, JR., Deceased. To All Persons Interested in the Estate of George W. Ritson, Jr., Deceased, who died on or about January 7, 2017: You are hereby notified that on January 10, 2017, the last will and testament of George W. Ritson, Jr., deceased, bearing date of January 20, 1999, was admitted to probate in the above named court and that Kevin A. Ritson was appointed executor of the estate. Any action to set aside the will must be brought in the district court of said county within the later to occur of four months from the date of the second publication of this notice or one month from the date of mailing of this notice to all heirs of the decedent and devisees under the will whose identities are reasonably ascertainable, or thereafter be forever barred. Notice is further given that all persons indebted to the estate are requested to make immediate payment to the undersigned, and creditors having claims against the estate shall file them with the clerk of the above named district court, as provided by law, duly authenticated, for allowance, and unless so filed by the later to occur of four months from the second publication of this notice or one month from the date of mailing of this notice (unless otherwise allowed or paid), a claim is thereafter forever barred. Dated January 16, 2017. Date of second publication 30th day of January, 2017 Kevin A. Ritson Executor of the Estate 210 W. Iowa St., PO Box 662 Wilton, IA 52778 Robert DeKock #2295 Attorney for the Executor DeKock Law Office, P.C. 227 Mulberry Ave. Muscatine, IA 52761 Probate Code Section 304 COMMENCING AT THE POINT WHERE THE SOUTH LINE OF SECTION 4, TOWNSHIP 78 NORTH, RANGE 2 WEST OF THE 5TH P.M. MUSCATINE COUNTY, IOWA, INTERSECTS WITH THE EAST RIGHT OF WAY LINE OF MUSCATINE COUNTY ROAD X-54, THENCE SOUTH ALONG THE EAST RIGHT OF WAY LINE A DISTANCE OF 208 FEET THENCE EAST A DISTANCE OF 210 FEET THENCE NORTH TO A POINT ON THE SOUTH LINE OF SAID SECTION 4 WHICH IS 210 FEET EAST OF THE POINT OF BEGINNING; THENCE WEST ALONG THE SOUTH LINE OF SAID SECTION 4 TO THE POINT OF BEGINNING, ALL IN SECTION 9, IN TOWNSHIP 78 NORTH, RANGE 2 WEST OF THE 5TH PRINCIPAL MERIDIAN IN MUSCATINE COUNTY, IOWA, LESS AND EXCEPT THAT PART USED FOR PURPOSES OF ROAD. AKAA PART OF GOVERNMENT LOT 3, IN SECTION 9, TOWNSHIP 78 NORTH, RANGE 2 WEST OF THE 5TH PRINCIPAL MERIDIAN, IN MUSCATINE COUNTY, IOWA, DESCRIBED AS FOLLOW& COMMENCING AT THE POINT WHERE THE NORTH LINE OF SAID SECTION 9 INTERSECTS WITH THE EAST RIGHT OF WAY LINE OF COUNTY ROAD X-54-1 THENCE SOUTH ALONG THE EAST RIGHT OF WAY LINE A DISTANCE OF 208 FEET; THENCE EAST A DISTANCE OF 210 FEET; THENCE NORTH TO A POINT ON THE NORTH LINE OF SAID SECTION 9 WHICH IS 210 FEET EAST OF THE POINT OF BEGINNING; THENCE WEST ALONG THE NORTH LINE OF SAID SECTION 9 TO THE POINT OF BEGINNING, COMMONLY KNOWN AS 1107 MOSCOW ROAD, MOSCOW, IA 52760 (THE "PROPERTY"). TAMPA, Fla. David William Altenbernd died on Jan. 23, 2017, at the age of 96 in Tampa. He was born Jan. 18, 1921, in Muscatine. He graduated from Muscatine High School and then Iowa State University with a degree in electrical engineering. He met his wife, Floy (Alton), at Iowa State where they married in 1941. They were happily married for nearly 75 years before she died in May 2016. He was a World War II veteran, serving in the U.S. Army Signal Corps from 1942 until 1946, as an expert in radar on both the East and West coasts of the U.S. and on Okinawa. After military service, he worked as an electrical engineer in Iowa and New Jersey. In 1954, he returned to Muscatine to run the contracting business his father owned. Floy became an art teacher in the public schools. He and Floy raised their children in Muscatine and supported them in all of their endeavors. In 1972, they sold the family business and joined the Peace Corps. Their posting in Kenya was the beginning of more than 30 years of service to people in Africa and Haiti. After their term in the Peace Corps, they worked with the Presbyterian Church, USA. Dave oversaw the construction and development of hospitals, dental clinics, schools and school curriculum in several African countries, including Congo (Zaire), Kenya, Zambia, and Lesotho. He also spent time guiding construction at a hospital in Haiti. After retiring, he continued to serve, traveling to Mexico and the hurricane-damaged parts of Mississippi to help with construction projects. He and Floy enjoyed traveling the country in their RV, visiting friends and new places. He is preceded in death by his wife and son Richard. He is survived by Chris and Sue Altenbernd, of Tampa; Pat and Sam Johnson, of Northfield, Minnesota; Peggy and John Lazar, of Brook Park, Ohio; his sister, Ellen Irwin of Fort Lauderdale, Florida; grandchildren, Ben Johnson and wife Aimee, Ashley Altenbernd, and Bryce Altenbernd; and great-granddaughter, Penelope Johnson. He was a kind, honest and generous man, who inspired all who met him. A memorial service for Dave and Floy will be held in Muscatine later this year. Smart Rating: 94.95 Run Time: 9 hours, 21 minutes Starring: Simon Srebnik, Michael Podchlebnik, Motke Zaidl Director Claude Lanzmann spent 11 years on this sprawling documentary about the Holocaust, conducting his own interviews and refusing to use a single frame of archival footage. Dividing Holocaust witnesses into three categories survivors, bystanders and perpetrators Lanzmann presents testimonies from survivors of the Chelmno concentration camp, an Auschwitz escapee and witnesses of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, as well as a chilling report of gas chambers from an SS officer at Treblinka. Smart Rating: 100.00 Run Time: 2 hours, 57 minutes Starring: Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan Widely regarded as one of the greatest films of all time, this mob drama, based on Mario Puzo's novel of the same name, focuses on the powerful Italian-American crime family of Don Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando). When the don's youngest son, Michael (Al Pacino), reluctantly joins the Mafia, he becomes involved in the inevitable cycle of violence and betrayal. Although Michael tries to maintain a normal relationship with his wife, Kay (Diane Keaton), he is drawn deeper into the family business. Les blattes ou cafards (Blatta orientalis) sont des insectes qui appartiennent a la famille des Blattoptera. Ils se caracterisent par leur forme allongee, leurs ailes [] : , , , , - 28 . Philip Ondari Onyancha is the serial killer and former G4S security guard who shocked Kenyans by confessing that he had killed 18 women in 2009. Seven years on, journalist Dennis Onsarigo spoke to the Kamiti Maximum Prison inmate and preacher about his troubled past and the voice that instructed him to commit the gruesome murders. The growth that used to be at the back of your head and your fox-like eyes are gone. You look different! What happened? I am a different person now. I am very busy. During the day, I take care of bookkeeping at the prison record office and I also double up as a preacher. Why did you tell police that you are safer in prison than outside? Because members of the cult could easily kill me for having betrayed them and spoken about their activities. I was never born a serial killer. I was molded into one. I have now denounced the cult and I am a changed man. I know the families of the victims will find it hard to forgive me, but I ask for forgiveness. I swear that after the murders, I never feasted on the victims blood (as was speculated). Do you think your childhood contributed to the kind of man you became? I grew up watching a lot of pornography. By the time I was joining Kenyatta Mahiga High School, I was struggling with sexuality. I was sexually molested by our house help and grew up believing that I could get anything I wanted if I used force. How was your life in school and how did you join the underworld? My troubles were manifested when I joined Form Two. I used to sneak from class to go to a female teachers house where we would drink and do everything. She introduced me to the underworld. In no time, I was trapped. I started performing poorly in class and other teachers noticed. Something was pulling me to the teachers quarters every night. Someone was speaking to me, a voice was calling my name and I did its bidding. In Form Three, I was accused of sodomizing a fellow student and because nothing could be proved, the administration did nothing to me. What happened after you left school? I never went back to collect my certificate, but my association with the underworld had become stronger. I still used to get instruction from the voice, and I would do whatever I was told to. The first time I was at my place of work and the voice told me to go to Nyeri. So, I went to Nyeri. The same voice would tell me that a certain woman will ask me for directions, and that would happen. Did you ever feel guilty about the people you killed? Yes. By the time I was being arrested, I had been toying with the idea of coming clean. I had wanted to call in to a radio station show and confess. After being caught, I confessed all my prior crimes to investigating officers who were following up on the murder and rape of a boy, my first victim. And the second murder? I was working for a utility company when I met my second victim. I strangled her along Riverside Drive and then dumped her body in a pit latrine. I would meet a lady and the moment I shook her hand, she would allow me to lead her anywhere, not knowing the devil was the one leading me. The hardest part was to get the women to shake my hand. The easiest part was strangling them. After killing them, I would snap back to reality. What happened after you snapped back to reality? I would feel so bad. I felt like I was trapped between good and evil. I would recall hearing my victims plead for mercy as I killed them, but I didnt remember them dying. I even tried doing it to my wife when I wasnt under a spell of the voice but it didnt work. Did the voice choose the victims for you? Yes. I was to kill 100 women. The killing that troubled me most was Hellen Nyamburas. She was 25 years old and I met her at Nkurumah Road. After the killing, her body lay there for several days. I went back more than 10 times to look at her body and asked myself if what I did was real. When police removed her body from the scene, I was in the crowd that had gathered to witness the operation. Were you a captive of the underworld or just an agent of the devil? When all this was happening, I was going through hell. Every time I killed someone, the voice instructed me what to do, and I would see other people. The people would urge me on and made sure I did exactly what the voice told me to do. Did you ever speak to your victims? No. I never communicated with the women I killed at all. It became evident to my colleagues at work that I was no longer interested in work. Even my wife complained that I was no longer coming home, so she asked me if I had another woman. What about the teacher who enlisted you into the underworld? Elizabeth Wambui was the teacher. There was a time we met and she denied knowing me (Wambui was arrested in connection with the alleged cult activities in Onyanchas former school. She told police that she had nothing to do with any cult). When a member of the cult speaks publicly about it, his powers wane. You have been in jail for seven years and you might be freed in a couple of years. How does that make you feel? I know my name and face are unforgettable and when I am feed, I would have to find a way of getting around in a society that once bayed for my blood. Source: KTNs Case Files THREE RIVERS Authorities have arrested a man on suspicion of murder after the body of a prominent member of the South Bay's Chinese community was found in a shallow grave in Tulare County. KNTV reports 38-year-old Christopher Ellebracht was arrested following the discovery of the body of Gin Lu "Tommy" Shwe's body about 230 miles away from Cupertino, where he went missing earlier this month. The 70-year-old Shwe was a local Realtor and former school board member. Authorities say he was reported missing on Jan. 18, when he left a local health club. Police say he was strangled. Police say Ellebracht was arrested after detectives learned he tried to cash a $10,000 check from Shwe's account. They also saw video of him buying a shovel at Home Depot the morning of Shwe's disappearance. Efforts to reach him or his attorney were not immediately successful. PHILADELPHIAWhen the check hits the table after a three-course meal at the homey EAT Cafe, it looks a little unusual. The receipt slip reads: The total above is only a SUGGESTED price. Please write here the amount you wish to pay. The meal is valued at $15, plus $1.20 in tax. Some pay it. Some pay more. And many pay a few dollars, or nothing at all. Weve had some graduate students come that are so grateful to have real food, and maybe they leave a couple of dollars, said Mariana Chilton, a professor of public health at Drexel University and founder of the restaurant. Even those who are not paying are not looking at it as a free meal. Theres a dignity to this place. EAT, which stands for Everyone at the Table, opened in October as one of about 50 experimental restaurants across the country that are transforming the way people think about food assistance and charity. They feed the needy and the non-needy side by side, giving low-income people the chance to eat a nutritious sit-down meal somewhere other than a soup kitchen. I couldnt stand the idea that you have these gorgeous restaurants with nice food, and there are these families who are struggling who could never tap into that, said Chilton. I wanted to make a place where families could come experience some joy. No two pay-what-you-can cafes are alike. They might be run by Christian missionaries or secular volunteers; they might ask diners to help if they cant pay. But each one has an owner with a deep sense of duty and a high threshold for pain. Its hard enough to run a normal restaurant; one study pegs the first-year failure rate at 60 percent. Try running a restaurant where your guests dont even have to foot the bill. I felt my heart expand For Denise Cerreta, the idea came as a spiritual awakening. Fourteen years ago, she had just converted her Salt Lake City acupuncture clinic into a small cafe, which was a financial failure. One day, with my spiritual senses, I heard, Go to donation, let people price their own food, she said. The next person that walked through the door, I said, No more pricing; price your own. I was a little bit shell-shocked. And at the moment I did that, I felt my heart expand. Her One World Cafe served curries and lasagnas and salads, and earned mostly glowing publicity, except from Rush Limbaugh, who called it an embarrassment to American business. There were bumps along the waybounced paychecks, a staff walkoutthat Cerreta attributed to her own inexperience. But for a few years, the cafe turned a small profit. Other charitable folks around the country began asking Cerreta how to start their own cafes. She started the One World Everybody Eats foundation, offering business plans and mentoring to community restaurant owners, eventually closing her cafe to help others start their own. Weve always embraced that theres no one way or right way to do this, said Cerreta. We try to meet people where theyre at and help them increase food security in their community. The psychic rewards can be enormous. Cafe owners tell of the hundreds of thousands of meals theyve served, the people who cry after eating their first square meal in years. But getting to that point means toiling through years of bureaucracy, fundraising and doubt. First, you have to find the right location: If the neighborhood is too poor, a cafe wont get enough paying customers, and if its too rich, it will be inaccessible to the people its trying to help. And then there are the neighbors. Our neighbor businesses were concerned that we would be attracting shopping carts stacked up 10 deep, said Bob Pearson, a One World board member who operated the Common Table in Bend, Ore., for about two years. The restaurants tend to attract the food-insecureworking poor who have trouble making ends meetbut nearly every operator deals with residents who think it will be a soup kitchen. And sometimes, theyre hostile. When Libbie Combee opened Mosaics Cafe in Bartow, Fla., after a $200,000 renovation, she faced resistance from residents who were determined to shut us down, said Combee. It got nasty. Some jurisdictions arent sure how to regulate them. Because Combee started her cafe through her religious ministry, she said the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulations division of hotels and restaurants told her she was exempt, even though she asked to be regulated like a normal restaurant. When neighbors got word that she was operating an unregulated restaurant, the bad PR forced its closure. She provided $24,000 worth of meals in the 10 months she was open. Now, she is $46,000 in debt. Volunteers, or not? For a cafe to be sustainable, Cerreta says, 80 percent of customers need to pay the suggested price to offset the 20 percent who pay little or nothingthough some cafes make it work with other ratios, and the many cafes that are run as nonprofits supplement with grants. The tricky thing is to compel those who can afford it to pay, and to pay extra, without scaring away those who truly need a free meal. Cerreta used to leave the price up to the customer. When it was so anonymous, I think it was maybe tempting for people that would take five friends to lunch, she said. Her cashiers began to tell people the suggested value of their meal. That worked, but some poverty researchers discourage that approach. Requiring low-income people to state, face-to-face, that they cannot pay the suggested amount could potentially shame them out of using the cafe at all. For some participants, its still going to feel like a charitable feeding experience, particularly if theres something that makes them feel like they are different from the average diner, said Elaine Waxman, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute. Chiltons is the first community cafe to be founded by a poverty research center. Thats why, at EAT, the check is simply placed on the table in a traditional black plastic sleeve. There is no volunteering for meal credits. The last thing anyone should do is require anyone whos super poor to volunteer. Give them a job! said Chilton. I dont want anyone to feel like they have to be worthy to come into our place. It also perpetuates a stereotype that people who arent working are just sitting around all day. Being poor is a full-time job in itself, said Waxman. But the One World board members say the volunteer-for-food model keeps the cafes functioning. Others say it provides job training and a chance for low-income people to work alongside middle-class volunteers. I think it gives them a sense of dignity and belonging, where they too have participated in their meal in some way, said Dorothea Bongiovi, who founded two JBJ Soul Kitchen cafes in New Jersey with her husband, Jon Bon Jovi. Diners can volunteer for one hour in exchange for a free meal for up to four family members. Staff members, some of whom are trained in social work, connect volunteers with other services. The food is a vehicle to get them into the Soul Kitchen to get them resources that they might not be aware of, she said. Instead of calling it pay-what-you-can, Bongiovi prefers pay it forward. You have to love on people Aside from profit, loss and the number of meals served, there is little data on these cafes. One study found that when consumers were asked to name the price they would pay for a product, they were less likely to buy it, because they felt bad they could not pay the appropriate price. But a broad, multi-restaurant study that examines a community restaurants impact on the poor has not yet been undertaken. Theres potential for something like this to have a bigger impact than can be mentioned in the profit margin, said Julia Weinert, assistant director of poverty solutions at the University of Michigan. Pearson says that for every 100 inquiries the organization receives, only about a dozen cafes actually open, and one-third of all community cafes have closed. Depending on location, he estimates it takes $30,000 to $100,000 to get a cafe off the ground, and then another $50,000 a year to operate it. Kevin and Mary Bode say they are aware of the bumpy road ahead as they prepare to open the Knead Community Cafe in New Kensington, Pa., outside Pittsburgh, next month. They bought and renovated a building near some of the poorest blocks in all of Pennsylvania, said Kevin Bode. Their challenge? Finding a chef with top skills who is also on board with our mission to help raise somebody up, said Mary Bode. The person that we get has to have a servants heart. As hard as the job is for owners, its also tough on chefs. When many of your ingredients come as donationsground turkey one week, couscous the nextevery weeks menu is a Chopped challenge. The chef has to be part teacher, part social worker, too. You have to love on people, and you dont have to do it from a distance, said EATs chef, Donnell Jones-Craven. Some cafes are seeking out high-profile restaurateurs as mentors. EAT Cafe has partnered with Vetri Community Partnership, a foundation run by famed Philadelphia chef Marc Vetri and restaurateur Jeff Benjamin, author of Front of the House, who trained the EAT staff. Aside from the Vetri involvement, two experimental pay-what-you-can locations of Panera Bread, and the occasional celebrity guest chef at JBJ Soul Kitchen, the concept has not had much crossover with the corporate and prestige restaurant world. Thats partly because, as the concept scales up, it loses its personal connectiona key factor to its success in small communities. Still, the restaurant world has begun to take notice. The James Beard Foundation announced this month that Cerreta would be this years recipient of its humanitarian award. When a board member told her about the prize, I said, Oh, James Beard? I hadnt heard of it, said Cerreta. A customer who cares At the EAT Cafe on a recent Friday night, the vibrant green dining room was filling up with guests. A table of gray-haired baby boomers sat across from a table of 20-something students, and the piped-in jazz swirled around the room along with the smell of roasted vegetables. There was chicken potpie and meatloaf on the menu, and bread pudding with creme anglaise for dessert. When she first learned about the pay-what-you-can concept, I had never heard of such a thing, said 87-year-old Calla Cousar, a longtime resident of the neighborhood who joined an advisory panel that Chilton set up to solicit community input. Now, Cousar comes once a week. As a mentor to local teens, shes going to start bringing groups of them here for dinner, so they can eat something other than fast food, she said. She motioned to the tables, the silverware, the glasses of nicely garnished basil lemonade. I want to expose them to this. Ocean rise already is worsening the floods and high tides sweeping California this stormy winter, climate experts say, and this months damage and deaths highlight that even a state known as a global leader in fighting climate change has yet to tackle some of the hardest work of dealing with it. The critical steps yet to come include starting to decide which low-lying cities, airports and highways, along with threatened landmarks like San Franciscos Embarcadero, to hoist above the rising water and which to abandon and where to start getting the many billions of dollars for those climate rescues. For Napa County, the threat of rising waters was illustrated this month when flood waters and high tides flooded Highway 37 near Novato, closing a vital link between Solano, Napa and Sonoma counties for days. People always tell us were ahead of the curve on climate change, said Larry Goldzband, head of a regional San Francisco Bay commission that late last year stepped up regional efforts to identify and prioritize communities and infrastructure at risk from rising sea level. As proud as Californians are of their climate-change efforts, I always think, Man, if we are ahead of the curve, I feel sorry for the rest of the country, Goldzband said. A 2009 study by the Pacific Institute, a California-based environment think-tank, estimated $100 billion in property was at risk from ocean rise in California, two-thirds of it in the low-lying San Francisco Bay region. Thats far more than the state takes in from income taxes each year. Experts say the real cost of raising, shielding or evacuating vulnerable spots, which include mass-transit systems, power plants and sewage plants, could be far higher. Astronomical. The San Francisco airport? What would it cost to replace that? asked Gary Griggs, director of the Institute of Marine Sciences at UC Santa Cruz. Griggs is part of a scientific working group requested by Gov. Jerry Brown to examine whether new evidence on melting and potential ice-sheet collapse in the Antarctic, whose ice holds almost 90 percent of the Earths fresh water, means sea-level rise may be even higher than the 3 feet projected for California by the end of the century. The Pacific off California has risen just about 8 inches overall in the past century. For the next three decades or so, the accelerating pace of sea rise primarily will make worse the flooding and erosion from big storms like this months in California. Probably until mid-century, short-term events ... are going to be more damaging than sea-level rise itself, Griggs said. In January, a series of powerful storms brought more than a foot of rain to parts of the San Francisco Bay, triggered record 34-foot waves off the Central Coast, killed at least five people and prompted the evacuations of thousands around the state. The dead included a cab driver who slid off a wet road and into a swollen estuary off Oaklands airport, which along with San Franciscos bayside airport is one of the big sites expected to be hit more and more often by flooding as the Pacific Ocean rises a foot over the next 30 years. Brown, who declared an emergency in much of the state this month because of flooded towns and highways, crumbled roads and rockslides, has vowed to fight if the fossil-fuel friendly Trump administration goes after Californias landmark programs to reduce climate-changing carbon emissions. Browns administration in 2015 also sought to speed up planning for dealing with sea rise and other climate change. On a sparkling afternoon after three storms brought some of the heaviest rain and surf to California in decades, ecologist Fraser Shilling stood on a highway bridge north of San Francisco, looking over sprawling miles of floodwater and salty bay water swallowing the highways exit ramp, and drowning salt marshes and fence posts as far as the eye could see. State Route 37 is a busy highway for tens of thousands of commuters and truckers in and out of wine country. Shilling, a co-director of the Road Ecology Center at UC Davis, had forecast it wouldnt be seeing this kind of regular high water for at least another 20 years. This is the new normal, says Shilling, who believes sea rise already is changing conditions on the ground more than some state agencies realize. And all of our infrastructure is not accommodating the new normal. Pumps and bulldozers labored to clear water from another stretch of the state highway, two weeks after the storms. State and local governments acknowledge that low-lying sites like State Route 37 will be hit by sea-rise worsened floods and tides more and more, before the bay claims them completely. But authorities are stymied by the financial and political difficulties of raising billions to elevate or protect the highway, or reroute it through pricey vineyards inland. As it is now, substantial state funding isnt expected for this particular highway until 2088, long after parts of it are expected to be regularly submerged. Our biggest challenge is how to fund and build it before it goes underwater, said Kate Miller, executive director of the transportation authority for Napa County. In December, the Napa County Board of Supervisors discussed the challenges of keeping Highway 37 in operation. Elevating the roadway could cost from $1.2 billion to $4 billion, Miller told supervisors. About 13 percent of Highway 37 trips on an average weekday start in Napa County, she said. If Highway 37 were abandoned in the future, that could put pressure on transportation planners to widen Highway 121 in Napa and Sonoma counties to four lanes, supervisors noted. California might not really start funding its rescues from sea rise until a major part of the public is inconvenienced, said state Sen. Jerry Hill, a Democrat from San Mateo County. Hills prediction of what would free the funds: If a low-lying stretch of U.S. Highway 101 near San Franciscos old Candlestick Park floods, and much of the Bay Area suddenly could not get to work. That will be the wake-up call, when the rubber hits the road, he said. When the water hits the tailpipe. At the womens rights and anti-Trump rally on Jan. 21, we were all energized by the size, unity and spirit of the assembled citizens. When our congressman, Mike Thompson, spoke of conviction, courage and determination that this is the time to stand up, we all roared with strong approval and understanding. We were there to stand up for the rights of women to control their own bodies, the right to adequate health care for all Americans, the right to marry whomever one may choose and the right for all people, of all colors, ethnic backgrounds, religious beliefs and socio-economic status to determine their own future; in other words, the right to self-determination without influence from the corrupt and small greedy segment of the one-percenters. These rights are bestowed to all our citizens from the basic structure of our bill of rights and our democratic system of government. They should include every race, gender and class. I feel compelled to point out that the balance of power is off-kilter not only in Washington, but right here at home in the Napa Valley. I was shocked to read that a wine industry lobby spokesman felt compelled to call Forge Pizza with a courtesy call, to tell the owners they shouldnt be getting in the middle of a dispute between Napa Vision 2050 and the Napa wine industry. Yes, Vision 2050 is providing the needed resistance to expansion of vineyards into our hillsides, where the future of our water will be determined by whether we can enact and enforce sufficient protections for our watersheds. The environmental groups that comprise Napa Vision 2050 are totally supportive of the wine and tourism industry, but not at the expense of the citizens rights to a healthy, sustainable and quality future. Vision 2050 understands that with climate change, we dont have the time to allow any more mistakes. 2016 was the hottest year on record, for the third year in a row. If we want to ensure that theres adequate water supply in the future, we must protect our Countys watersheds at all cost, even if that means capping the allowable deforestation on our hills for more wine grape production. Portions of the wine industry lobby are, unfortunately, led by that small greedy segment of the very wealthy; by the same kind of bullies that many of us feel are stealing our rights at the national level. The wine industry creates thousands of jobs and donates millions to needy causes. But now some in the industry are turning a blind eye to residents rights and are seemingly interested in turning Mother Earth into a toxic, unlivable planet in the name of quarterly profits. Is our level of democracy at risk right here at home? Yes it is. Last year, when the Water, Forest and Oak Woodland Protection Initiative was drafted and more than 6,300 citizens stood up to get it on the ballot, County Counsel mandated it be pulled at the last minute due to a supposed small legal technicality. Most disturbing is that the other two measures that the county actually helped get to the voters, contain these same legal technicalities. Why was the watershed initiative jerked from the ballot? Its hard not to draw the conclusion that the long arm of the bully segment within the wine industry reaches deeply into our county political machine, perhaps because some within the industry saw this initiative as a real threat to their continued vineyard expansion into our hillsides, at the expense of our watersheds. The issue will be decided in the Court of Appeal this summer. One need look no further than the friends who have filed in support of the watershed initiative to understand whats at stake: California Native Plant Society, California Wildlife Foundation, Corporate Ethics International, Environmental Defense Center, Forest Forever, Forest Unlimited, Greenbelt Alliance, Save the Bay, Planning and Conservation League, Friends of Harbors, Beaches and Parks, Environmental Protection Information Center and Sierra Nevada Alliance. This watershed initiative example and the fundraiser show that democracy is in trouble in Napa County. If a small group dedicated to a sustainable future cant even hold a fundraiser without being attacked by big business, we need to stand up. Local businesses should not be forced to pick a side when it comes to supporting a sustainable future for Napa County. Why would holding a fundraiser for a small community group alienate the wine industry lobby? This is a clear illustration of the over-sized influence this industry has in our community. Local residents have a right to organize and share information about a sustainable vision for our community. Whats at stake on the national level is exactly whats at stake here at home. So lets all stand up, right here, right now, to ensure our democracy shines with a brilliance never seen before. Mike Hackett Angwin Now aren't we lucky. We get to witness the metaphorical equivalent of the Sack of Rome, a relatively lower-key version of an almost universal historical drama that has been played out countless times over centuries after the fall of one human society or another following the assault by its enemies. To the winner go the spoils, the vandals have seized the city after their long siege. Now comes the looting and pillage, the destruction of all that came before. All that had been so laboriously built, all that had been so compassionately intended to relieve the suffering of millions, All that had been constructed through thousands and thousands of hours of work, collaboration, barely conceded mutual cooperation, and hard-won compromise. Tear it down. Burn the city. That has been the all too often repeated story. It has occurred all over the world, throughout all civilizations. It is occurring today, see it on TV Same old insufferable self-aggrandizement by the winners, the "trumpeting" of their new ascendancy, their rewriting of the social code, changing the narrative to reflect their "glory," replacing mundane "facts" with vain self-congratulations and boasting. Rationalizing away all disagreement , repeating their version of "the truth" in an overthrow or suppression of anything that contradicts their opinion. Making virtues of their faults. Oppression always justified as the work of self-styled "Freedom Fighters," armed mobs, militias, vigilantes, "liberation warriors," defenders of one group's freedom to do whatever they want at the expense of someone else's. Rule of the strong. You're wrong. We're right. You lose, we win, ha, ha. Guess we should just count our blessings and feel fortunate that we don't live in a time or place where this "victory" would be accompanied by mass graves, piles of skulls, roads lined with desperate refugees, weeping masses of the helpless victims of rape, torture and murder -- as has happened and is happening now. So many times and places that we have been witness to even in our own brief lifetimes. You don't have to look too far to see it: Kosovo, Serbia, Croatia, Vietnam , Cambodia, Cuba, Bangladesh, Somalia, Sudan, South Africa, Argentina, Iran, Iraq, Palestine, Israel, Syria, Afghanistan, Guatemala, Korea, Nicaragua, Chechnya, the list goes on and on throughout our past and will continue on and on throughout our future. Conflict is us. It's what we do best. Trash others on social media, shoot them over traffic incidents, go to war to get your way. Everyone loves a good fight. They make the bestsellers. It is so much easier to tear things down than to build them up. And we are all involved. Don't mess with me, I have a gun, I have a black belt , I'm a lawyer, I'll sue you! Go to h***, F*** you! We never appreciate what we have until we lose it. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Yin and Yang. Love and hate Peace and War Life and Death Greatest Show on earth. Charles Jeremias Napa Fourth of five parts With hundreds of wineries in the Napa Valley, many on either Highway 29 or Silverado Trail between Napa in the south and Calistoga in the north, its probably hard for first-time visitors to decide which wineries to visit. This five-part series will examine five wineries, all on Highway 29, from south to north, that will make your visit memorable. You want to make sure you have plenty of time to enjoy each of these special places. And remember to bring your attitude of fun to make this an adventure and a trip to remember. Beringer Vineyards 2000 Main St., St. Helena 866-708-9463 or 707-257-5771 In 1876, brothers Jacob and Frederick Beringer established Beringer Vineyards with a dream of making wines that would rival the finest in Europe. Today, Jacobs great great-grandson, Chief Winemaker Mark Beringer, guides what is now Californias longest continually operating winery and one of Napas finest producers. With more than 1,600 acres farmed across Napas best appellations, as well as Sonoma County and Paso Robles, Beringer is recognized as one of the regions preeminent producers with a rich portfolio of wines. After spending years working at Benzinger, Duckhorn and Artesa, in 2015, Mark Beringer came home to Beringer Vineyards, joining as Chief Winemaker and following in the footsteps of acclaimed Winemaker Emeritus Laurie Hook. He said, Im absolutely thrilled to be making wines for the very winery that my ancestor built, and be part of the next chapter in this important story of Beringer and of the Napa Valley. Two tours are of interest, the Taste of Beringer Tour, $50 per person plus tax; and the Legacy Cave Tour, $30 per person plus tax. Tours are offered throughout the day, reservations are recommended. In the one-hour Taste of Beringer Tour, guests will be introduced to Beringer Vineyards rich winemaking and culinary arts history. Following a brief walking tour of the property and demonstration vineyard, guests will be seated in the historic Rhine House family kitchen to explore the art of wine and food pairing and to enjoy a specially selected flight of Reserve wines paired with seasonal culinary treats prepared by Beringers own Hudson House chefs. Guests of all ages are welcome for the 30-minute Legacy Cave Tour that guides you through the Old Winery and historic tunnels, while exploring Beringers long history and commitment to quality. Guests 21 years and older will taste a selection of three wines during the tour. The winery is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., seven days a week. The St. Helena Historical Society will hold its inaugural History Becomes Art show and auction to help raise funds for a permanent home for the societys collection of St. Helena historical treasures. The event will be held from 1 to 4 p.m., Saturday, Feb. 11 at the Gallery at Brasswood, Brasswood Estate, 3111 St Helena Hwy., St Helena. History Becomes Art was the brainchild of artist Thomas Arvid, who is known for his passion for art and wine. He suggested that the historical society create an art fundraiser depicting St. Helenas historic photos as seen through the eyes of contemporary artists. Helen Berggruen is one of the 18 artists who is contributing to the art show. Her John Allison Water Truck painting was inspired from an 1887 photograph of John Allison taken on Oak Avenue in St. Helena. According to the Historical Societys notes to the original photograph, Allison was the towns street superintendent and part of his job was to sprinkle the streets to keep the dust down in the summer. But in 1887 he had to stop sprinkling because there was no water in the reservoir. The tower of St. Helenas first city hall, on Oak Avenue, can be seen in the background of the painting. On Allisons wagon were the advertisements he sold, including an ad for paint dealer and sign painter James Rutledge. There was also a real estate and insurance ad for George Beach. According to artist Berggruens biographical statement, The Napa Valley has been my home base since the early 1970s. The landscape of the Valley, with its mighty tractors and trucks, has exercised a profound influence on my work. Another painting is entitled Harvest at Charles Krug Winery by artist Steve Quartly. An 1882 photograph depicts wagons loaded with grapes being driven in front of the Krug winery. The Charles Krug Winery was built in 1872 and was sold in 1943 to the Mondavi family, which still operates it. Quartlys impressionistic rendering of the famous setting transforms the black and white photograph into a vibrant, colorful scene that has a Mediterranean flavor revealing Quartlys Southern California roots. Quartly has also submitted a second painting entitled St. Gothards Rest/Grandview/Las Alcobas. The painting was inspired by a photograph of the St. Gothards Hotel and Restaurant dating from about 1911. According to the notes to the original photograph, St. Gothards Hotel was built as the home of Marie Vance and her daughters family, the Andersons. It was later converted into a hospital for a time. Most recently, the property was known as the Grandview Apartments. Today the property is currently being totally reimagined as the luxury hotel Las Alcobas Napa Valley which is scheduled to open soon. These are just three of the paintings being offered at the History Becomes Art auction, and, according to event chairperson Susanne Salvestrin, the artwork continues to pour in. Artists include Thomas Arvid, Clifford Bailey, Theo Fabian Becker, Helen Berggruen, Leigh Ann Culver, Greg De Lucca, Wyn Ericson, Layla Fanucci, Lin Weber, Nancy Willis and others. To permit attendees to preview the pieces before the event, each artist has their own page showing the artwork with dimensions, the original historic St. Helena/Napa Valley photo (with description) that inspired it, the artists bios and a website link at historybecomesart.shstory.org. Tickets to the Feb. 11 auction event may be purchased at historybecomesart.brownpapertickets.com. The cost is $150 per person. Artisan hors d oeuvres by Tre Posti will be served along with Brasswood and other wines. There will be live music provided by the Mike Greensill Duo. Sponsors of the event include Trinchero Family Estates, Alan and Sarah Galbraith, David and Kim Phinney, Niebaum Coppola Estate and Mr. & Mrs. William Harlan. The St. Helena City Council will hold a special meeting to discuss the Turley Flats affordable housing project at 2:15 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 31, at Vintage Hall. Calistoga Affordable Housing (CAH) is asking the city to increase its contribution to the 8-unit project on Pope Street, and to waive the requirement that CAH pay for a performance bond to ensure the units are built. (Natural News) On the official Day 2 of the new administration, President Donald J. Trump continues to dismantle the legacy of his predecessor using all executive means at his disposal, fulfilling his promise to Make America Great Again. This morning, the president signed documents that will advance the eventual approval and construction of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipeline projects, both of which were stalled by President Barack Obama over the false notion of climate change/global warming. More on that in a moment. As reported by Bloomberg, We are going to renegotiate some of the terms, and if they like, well see if we can get that pipeline built, Trump said, who then added: If were going to build pipelines in the United States, the pipes should be made in the United States. As further noted by Zero Hedge, Trump said his order streamlines the very cumbersome manufacturing regulations. He then called the regulatory process a tangled up mess. (RELATED: Watch Trump dismantle the Administrative State by checking in at BigGovernment.news) To reporters in the Oval Office, Trump said the terms and conditions regarding the pipelines will be renegotiated by the United States, which has reserved the right to do so. The move is making a number of factions in the U.S. happy, including labor unions, which will have a role in building prospective pipelines, and Americans who are tired of sending their sons and daughters to fight in the volatile Middle East, where the U.S. currently gets the lions share of its oil. As Bloomberg noted further: The moves, taken on Trumps fourth full day in office, are a major departure from the Obama administration, which rejected the Keystone proposal in 2015 and has kept Dakota Access blocked since September. Environmentalists, concerned about climate change and damage to waters, land and Native-American cultural sites, now face an executive branch thats less sympathetic to their efforts. For the oil industry, it heralds more freedom to expand infrastructure and ease transportation bottlenecks. Natural News founder and editor Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, understands there are still legitimate concerns about the safety of the environment, especially land and resources belonging to Native American tribes whose resources could be adversely affected by any subsequent pipeline leak or spill. I support energy independence but Im also a huge supporter of environmental protection, Adams said. Thats why I have announced a donation of water quality lab testing to all Native American communities that may be affected by these two pipeline projects. (See related articles on NaturalNews.com for details of his announcement.) For his part, Trump has also not abandoned environmental concerns. In announcing plans earlier this week to cut more than three-quarters of existing federal regulations, the president said he and his administration would focus on the redundant, economy-killing portions of federal regulations but would ensure that protections for land, water, and air remained firm and in place. (RELATED: Whats the latest in global warming science? Find out at ClimateScience.news) The executive actions Trump signed Tuesday include a directive the president noted would speed up environmental reviews and approvals for high-priority infrastructure projects. We intend to fix our country, our bridges, our roadways, he said. We cant be in an environmental process for 15 years if a bridge is going to be falling down or if a highway is crumbling. As for the Obama administrations objections, the former president couched the bulk of his rejection of both projects in an environmental cloak, but that was never true. The American Thinker notes that Obamas decision to kill the Keystone XL pipeline was because he ostensibly agreed with his State Department that the project would not serve the national interests of the United States. How improving domestic oil production versus sending American troops overseas to fight in countries rich in oil is not in our best interests makes sense when you understand Obamas true motivations: Billionaire Warren Buffett, whom Obama has bestowed the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and famous Democratic donor, owns most of the oil-carrying trains. Investors Business Daily noted in 2011: As oil production ramps up in the Bakken fields of North Dakota, plans to use the pipeline to transport it have been dashed. As a result, North Dakotas booming oil producers will have to rely even more on the Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) railroad, which Buffett just bought, to ship it to refineries. Buffetts Berkshire Hathaway has agreed to buy Burlington Northern Santa Fe in a deal valuing the railroad at $34 billion. Berkshire Hathaway already owns about 22% of Burlington Northern, and will pay $100 a share in cash and stock for the rest of the company. Unlike Trump and Adams, whose environmental concerns are real, Obamas concerns are more aligned with greenwashing by Corporate America and his corporatist pals. J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for Natural News and News Target, as well as editor of The National Sentinel. Sources: ZeroHedge.com Bloomberg.com Investors.com (Natural News) George Soros, who fancies himself a god and intends to remake the world, is the Lord of Chaos and pursues a world order that is demonic, not divine. (Article by William F. Jasper from TheNewAmerican.com) I admit that I have always harbored an exaggerated view of self-importance to put it bluntly, I fancied myself as some kind of god. So confessed George Soros (shown) in his 1987 book The Alchemy of Finance. George Soros use of past-tense verbs in the admission above might lead some readers to assume his psychological deity complex was a passing narcissism that the maturing billionaire has conquered in the three decades since it was written. That would be a false assumption; if anything, the 86-year-old currency speculator has grown more megalomaniacal with each passing year. It is a sort of disease when you consider yourself some kind of god, the creator of everything, but I feel comfortable about it now since I began to live it out, Soros told the British newspaper The Independent in 1993. Yes, the hedge-fund mogul has been living out his delusional fantasies, sometimes elevating himself from merely a god, to actually being God. Naturally, claiming such supernatural attributes entails more than a bit of madness, something Soros has also publicly discussed on more than one occasion. Next to my fantasies about being God, I also have very strong fantasies of being mad, Soros once explained in a British television interview. In fact, my grandfather was actually paranoid. I have a lot of madness in my family. So far I have escaped it. Has the delusional billionaire really escaped the madness? He told his biographer, Michael T. Kaufman, that he views himself as the conscience of the world. And he is spending billions of dollars to remake the world to fit his fantasies. If a homeless derelict were to declare himself God and the conscience of the world, he would be ignored, shunned, or locked up; madmen with wealth and power are praised and sycophantically courted. The Roman emperors Nero and Caligula are notorious for their murderous megalomania. They assigned themselves god status, but ruled as demented demons. Soros may not possess their dictatorial powers, but then, they didnt possess his wealth and global influence. We intend in this article to examine some of the vast activist networks and political campaigns that George Soros funds. Certainly, the super-rich should have as much right as any other citizens to participate in the political system that governs us all. But Soros appears to be perfectly comfortable operating both within and outside the law to destroy (he would say reform) our political-economic system. In his book Soros on Soros, the would-be god says: I do not accept the rules imposed by others. After years of operating with impunity, he has become so brazen that he appears not to worry about doing the illegal, as well as the immoral. It is our contention that the prima facie evidence of criminal activity by George Soros and those he funds is sufficient to demand official investigations by Congress, the U.S. Department of Justice, and state attorneys general. Utilizing the subpoena and other investigatory powers not available to the private citizen, these officials have the duty to take on powerful interests that are corrupting and undermining the rule of law in America and endangering the freedoms we hold dear. At the very least, the Internal Revenue Service which recently denied Tea Party groups non-profit status could take away the tax-exempt status of Soros huge foundations, or force them to cease funding radical groups. And if federal authorities exercise even a fraction of the zeal they expended on prosecuting and persecuting conservative commentator Dinesh DSouza, Soros the god-man could end up in jail. Organizing Chaos Over the past several years, American cities have been plunged into racial and civil turmoil at a level we have not experienced since the 1960s and 1970s. The anti-police riots in Ferguson, Baltimore, Milwaukee, and elsewhere have morphed into anti-Trump riots across the country, with many of the same organizations and individuals serving as instigators: Black Lives Matter, MoveOn.org, International Action Center, ANSWER Coalition, and other far-left, fake grassroots groups. They reliably perform on cue because they are lavishly funded by the Soros Open Society Foundations (OSF), the other big tax-exempt foundations (Rockefeller, Ford, Carnegie, et al.), and activist pass through organizations, such as the Tides Foundation, that bundle and launder hundreds of millions of dollars in dark money to the street revolutionaries. Black Lives Matter (BLM), which has become one of the most efficient riot-making operations, has been especially blessed with largess from the billionaire elites. As The New American noted in a 2014 article (Rioting for a Reason), BLM was founded by Patrisse Cullors, Alicia Garza, and Opal Tometi, three black lesbian Marxists who idolize communist terrorist revolutionaries Assata Shakur and Angela Davis, as well as the Black Panther Party and the Black Liberation Movement. Naturally, for Soros, that qualifies BLM for oodles of cash. An investigation of Soros/OSF financials by the Washington Times in 2015 found that Soros had showered BLM and its related network of activist organizations with more than $33 million. Not bad, but that was only seed money. The Ford Foundation, which has been funding revolution for decades, announced a few months ago it intends to raise $100 million in pooled donor funds for a newly formed Black-Led Movement Fund, of which the BLM (and its rioters) will be major beneficiaries. Following the Trayvon Martin shooting in Florida in 2012, Black Lives Matter grew from a hashtag slogan to a nationwide phenomenon, thanks largely to funding from Soros and a huge boost from the major media. However, BLMs big break came with the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014, and the organized unrest that followed. Two of the BLM groups that played a central role in the Ferguson unrest (that included riots, arson, shooting, and looting) are the Organization for Black Struggle (OBS) and Missourians for Reform and Empowerment (MORE), both of which are hardcore Marxist-Leninist organizations run by veteran communists who have been leading riotous protests for decades. A top founder/leader at OBS is Jamala Rogers, a professional community organizer since the 1970s and veteran member of the Revolutionary Communist League, the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, and the radical Black Power movement. MORE is simply the rebranded Missouri chapter of ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), the former national organization of paid activists inspired by Marxist strategist Saul Alinsky and founded by 1960s SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) radical Wade Rathke. Like ACORN, the white social justice leaders at MORE pay protesters (mostly black or people of color) to create street theater that can be exploited to advance their causes. Some of MOREs rent-a-mob activities in Ferguson were exposed in 2015 when black protesters occupied MOREs offices and threatened the white radicals because they hadnt been paid as promised. To placate the angry protesters, MORE provided them with documents showing that they had dispersed the funds appropriately. Where did the money go? The accounting documents list, among other things, payments for cellphones, walkie-talkies, banners, T-shirts, art supplies, van rentals, gasoline, catering, training sessions, organizer salaries, etc. In other words, virtually everything needed to give a purely AstroTurf production the appearance of a grassroots protest. Where did the funding come from? The Washington Times investigation found that one line of Soros funding for police reform in 2014 amounted to $5.4 million, with about half of those funds earmarked to Ferguson, with the money primarily going to OBS and MORE. Another significant recipient of Soros cash is Colorlines, an online news site that helped parlay Ferguson into a national road show. More than 500 of us have traveled from Boston, Chicago, Columbus, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, Nashville, Portland, Tucson, Washington, D.C., Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and other cities to support the people of Ferguson and help turn a local moment into a national movement, wrote Akiba Solomon, a writer at Colorlines. Readying the Rioting The anti-Trump demonstrations and riots both before and after the election follow a pattern that we have seen over and over again, from the protests of Occupy Wall Street to Black Lives Matter to Dream Act/Open Borders. Not only are the tactics the same, but many of the same groups and individuals keep reappearing in all of these seemingly spontaneous outbreaks of organized chaos. Were the Not My President rioters that illegally blocked streets and freeways, set fires, threw Molotov cocktails, injured police officers, destroyed property, and defaced public buildings with graffiti day after day following the November 8 election merely Soros rent-a-mobs? There is good reason to believe so. Not only were well-known Soros-funded organizations such as Black Lives Matter and MoveOn.org prominently involved, but Soros-funded groups such as Washington Community Action Network (Washington CAN) ran advertisements on Craigslist and in newspapers for full-time organizers to Fight the Trump Agenda! at $15/hour, plus paid vacation and benefits. Many of the anti-Trump rioters traveled across state lines, which means they not only violated state laws against rioting and inciting to riot, but also federal law against the same crimes. Specifically, the rioters could be (and should be) charged under Title 18 U.S. Code 2101, which provides that whoever travels in interstate or foreign commerce to incite a riot; or to organize, promote, encourage, participate in, or carry on a riot; or to aid or abet any person in inciting or participating in or carrying on a riot or committing any act of violence in furtherance of a riot shall be fined under this title, or imprisoned not more than five years, or both. As to be expected, Soros PR minions deny that their boss has anything to do with the mayhem caused by those he funds. George Soros is not funding these (anti Trump) protests, Soros spokesperson Michael Vachon said in an interview with Value Walk. Of course, Soros also denied funding the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement. But financial records showed that he had provided millions of dollars to the Tides Foundation, which then passed through funding to the OWS activists. This is why official congressional and prosecutorial investigations are necessary. Soros and the other funders of the riots, subversion, and anarchy will continue to deny the obvious, as they have been doing for decades. The undercover videos of James OKeefes Veritas Project have exposed top Democratic Party operatives boasting of their illegal activities, such as voter fraud, busing in demonstrators, fomenting riots, initiating fights, illegal funding, etc. This is happening on a massive scale and can only be stopped by utilizing the same legal bulwarks that are used against organized crime. The financial records of the funders and organizations involved must be subpoenaed, and individuals placed under oath, where they will face the full penalty of perjury. As the saying goes, follow the money, and prosecute those who are financing the ongoing demolition of America. Investigation and prosecution of the rioters and especially those who fund and direct them is important not only for redress of the crimes already committed and social harm already done, but also to deter plans for similar future havoc. Dark Money Campaign Cash According to a survey of official records by the Center for Responsive Politics, George Soros gave $19.5 million in political contributions during the most recent election cycle. That does not include funds he gave to nonprofits and activist groups that are not officially backing a particular candidate or ballot measure, but are nonetheless actively involved those campaigns. The Soros hypocrisy meter hits the highest levels when it comes to dark money, which the liberal-left media invariably associate with those labeled conservative. For the past two decades, Soros has led and funded the campaign finance reform movement. However, at the same time that he was decrying the corrupting influence of money on politics, he was pioneering the funding of 527 Groups (so-called due to their status under Section 527 of the IRS Code) which can raise unlimited funds for political campaigns. He has organized Democracy Alliance, bringing together dozens of billionaires and millionaires to provide rivers of cash to his favored candidates and causes. Voter Fraud It is impossible to sustain our system of representative government if the election process is corrupted. Groups that encourage non-citizens to vote and that work to make it difficult-to-impossible to enforce election security and verify voter identity are undermining our Republic. The Soros network has generously funded many of these open border and open voting groups, such as the American Council of La Raza, America Votes, ACLU, Americas Voice, American Bridge 21st Century, and Project Vote. Although charges of widespread vote fraud, particularly involving illegal aliens, have been dismissed by the establishment media, there is ample reason to believe this fraud is significant and should be officially and aggressively investigated. Coopting the U.S. Government In a 2005 interview, National Public Radios Steve Inskeep noted that Soros has been described as the only private citizen with his own foreign policy. Inskeep remarked to Soros: Uzbekistan, the Open Society Institute was actually receiving grants from the US State Department and spending millions of dollars of US government money on various programs. That was under President George W. Bush; it was not an isolated incident, and got much worse under President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Its easy to be a philanthropist when youre spending other peoples money in this case (and others), American taxpayers money. Soros has similarly hijacked U.S. government policy (not by force, but by collusion) in Ukraine, Egypt, Albania, the European Union, and elsewhere invariably with disastrous results. He has also been exposed as one of the major forces behind the calamitous refugee crisis that is swamping Europe with a tsunami of Muslim migrants and that is threatening to do the same here, thanks to Soros-Obama-Clinton-Kerry collusion. A May 2016 internal report of the International Migration Institute (IMI), an official project of Soros Open Society Foundations, boasted of providing the funding for the Sutherland Report, the blueprint for Europes migration catastrophe authored by Goldman Sachs billionaire Sir Peter Sutherland, now the UN secretary-generals special representative on international migration. The same report by top IMI staffers Anna Crowley and Kate Rosin, entitled Migration Governance and Enforcement Portfolio Review, calls for accepting the current crisis as the new normal. Soros also provides funding for the Columbia Global Policy Initiative (CGPI) at Columbia University, which hosts the secretariat for Peter Sutherlands UN migration office. The Media Echo Chamber How does George Soros manage to keep getting away with it? Obviously, his billions have bought a lot of influence. One of the major keys to his success is the Teflon shield he has been provided by the establishment corporatist media, which also act as his echo chamber. Thats by design. A September 27, 2007 e-mail from John Podesta to Soros, Peter Lewis, Steve Bing, and other left-wing billionaires outlined his plans for parlaying the vast network they had financed into a media echo chamber that would control the political discourse. At the time, Podesta was president of the Soros-funded Center for American Progress. He went from that post to be Hillary Clintons campaign chairman. Now that this enhanced infrastructure is in place grassroots organizing; multi-issue advocacy groups; think tanks; youth outreach; faith communities; micro-targeting outfits; the netroots and blogosphere we need to better utilize these networks to drive the content of politics through a strong echo chamber and message delivery system, Podesta wrote. Non-partisan voter registration can be highly effective in delivering progressive voters to the polls, Podesta states in the memo. The Sandler family and [Open Society Institute] are already deeply involved in funding organizations to do this work in communities of color and with respect to unmarried women. This further underscores our point above regarding the ostensibly non-partisan nature of the Soros focus on voter registration. Several thousand hacked e-mails released by WikiLeaks and DCLeaks have provided plenty of damning evidence to justify initiating a whole series of investigations into the Lord of Chaos. Not surprisingly, the controlled establishment media has almost completely ignored this bonanza, prompting an editorial from Investors Business Daily this past September 19 entitled The Bizarre Media Blackout of Hacked George Soros Documents. Bizarre indeed. However, it would be worse than bizarre it would be serious nonfeasance of office for our elected and appointed officials to evade their responsibilities to investigate and prosecute the malefactors of great wealth who undermine our society while posing as its saviors. Read more at: TheNewAmerican.com Stay informed on the evils of George Soros at the upcoming web site Soros.news. (Natural News) The gene editing technology known as CRISPR-Cas9 has been a subject of controversy ever since it was developed. CRISPR -Cas9 gives scientists the ability to conduct genome editing with a quickness and ease never seen before. Regardless of the inherent concerns that come along with gene editing, this technology has undoubtedly changed the world of basic and applied biology indefinitely. Perhaps one of the most concerning aspects about CRISPR-Cas9 was the inability for scientists to turn off the gene altering sequence. The potential for wrong genes to be snipped away and the consequential introduction of rogue genetic changes in human or animal DNA into the gene pool was (and still is) rather terrifying. Now, however, scientists claim that they have found a way to hopefully mitigate this tremendous risk. In a new study, researchers say that they have found a tiny protein that can actually turn off Cas9 and prevent it from creating unwanted gene alterations. They say that the protein works on human cells at least if they are in a petri dish. (RELATED: Read more news about modern science at Scientific.news.) Understanding CRISPR-Cas9 Technology CRISPR-Cas9 technology is actually comprised of two parts. CRISPR stands for clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats. You see, DNA is made up of short blocks of repeating base pairs that are set apart by spacer DNA. Through the action of bacteria copying and inserting the viral DNA sequence into the CRISPR region, two strands of RNA can be produced. After that, the RNA then associates with an enzyme known as Cas9, which is described as acting like a pair of guided scissors. Cas9 hones in on the targeted viral DNA and cuts it away. Then, the DNA is repaired by the cell and the deleted piece of DNA is replaced with a substitute portion of DNA, which is supplied by the scientists. The CRISPR/Cas9 technology is often explained as a find and replace function for genetics. Essentially, CRISPR finds the targeted piece of DNA, and Cas9 snips it out of the DNA sequence. (RELATED: Also see more news about genetically modified organisms at GMO.news) The off switch The concerns about unintended DNA alterations primarily lie at the feet of the Cas9 portion of the technology. Sometimes, it cuts the wrong portion of the DNA. It also has a tendency to remain present and active for too long, resulting in the potential for it to make more, unintended cuts to the DNA. It takes just about 24 hours for just half of the Cas9 enzyme to be degraded by cell, which means it has plenty of time to make off-target alterations. Study author Joseph Bondy-Denomy, a microbiologist from the University of California at San Francisco, claims that an off switch would make the Cas9 tech quite a bit safer. Based on the logic that in order to replicate, viruses often insert their own DNA into the bacterias genome, commandeering the cells genetic equipment to copy viral DNA, it would seem that viruses must also possess a way to reverse the process and deactivate CRISPR/Cas9. Otherwise, it is possible that the bacteria might identify the viral DNA in its own genome, which would invariably lead to self-destruction. Bondy-Denomy told Live Science, Cas9 should make an RNA that will then cleave the virus that happens to be in its own genome its not smart enough to know its in its own genome. The research group posited that if the bacterial cell is stable and its not self-destructing, then perhaps this virus is making an inhibitor protein. Although the team was able to identify four potential anti-CRISPR proteins, only two seem to have worked in initial petri dish testing. And while these proteins seem to deactivate the CRISPR-Cas9 process, the scientists have not yet actually proved that this new find will prevent off-target gene editing. The research team has no idea if the proteins will actually prevent unintended DNA snipping and editing, nor do they know how long the proteins will linger in the cells or what kind of effects they may also produce. Sources: LiveScience.com BerkeleyScienceReview.com (Natural News) Social media giant Google, buying into the nonsensical Democratic Party claim that fake news fed to hundreds of alternative media sites by Russian propagandists helped Donald Trump defeat Hillary Clinton, has made good on a promise to financially punish those sites. As reported by Zero Hedge, Scott Spencer, the director of product management for sustainable ads at Google, wrote in a blog post on Wednesday that the company has banned 200 publishers from accessing the AdSense advertising service because they (supposedly) post fake news stories. Google said it had cracked down on sites that contained ads for: illegal products; misleading advertisements; bad ads on mobile; ads that it determined were attempting to cheat the system; and promoting and profiting from bad sites. That said, the emphasis for the action was on the fake news category, which of course has been a dominant narrative of the angry Left since Clinton lost her second bid for the White House. (RELATED: Find out all the news that Google and others dont want you to see at Censored.news) In 2016, we saw the rise of tabloid cloakers, a new type of scammer that tries to game our system by pretending to be news, Spencer wrote. Cloakers often take advantage of timely topicsa government election, a trending news story or a popular celebrityand their ads can look like headlines on a news website. But when people click on that story about Ellen DeGeneres and aliens, they go to a site selling weight-loss products, not a news story. Okay, fair enough. But theres more, and as always, the devil is in the details. Weve had long-standing policies prohibiting AdSense publishers from running ads on sites that help people deceive others, like a site where you buy fake diplomas or plagiarized term papers, Spencer continued. In November, we expanded on these policies, introducing a new AdSense misrepresentative content policy, that helps us to take action against website owners misrepresenting who they are and that deceive people with their content. Are you beginning to get the picture? And this change, right after the November elections, no doubt? As Zero Hedge and others have noted, Google, Facebook and Yahoo were heavily criticized by the angry Left, which accused the social media sites of publishing phony news, by which they meant news not from trusted sources like the Washington establishment media (Washington Post, CNN, New York Times, Politico, etc.). From November to December 2016, we reviewed 550 sites that were suspected of misrepresenting content to users, including impersonating news organizations, Spencer wrote. We took action against 340 of them for violating our policies, both misrepresentation and other offenses, and nearly 200 publishers were kicked out of our network permanently. [Emphasis added] Thus far, the company has not identified those 200 publishers. Granted, there have been occasions where fake news has made it atop Googles News Feed, which is some pretty valuable real estate on the Internet, including a story that claimed Trump actually won the popular vote (he didnt; but all of Clintons popular vote advantage came from one state, California). But there have been plenty of fake news stories published by the very same establishment media that Google would never dream of banning, even though stories from those publishers are often at the top of the news feed. Examples of some recent fake news stories by the mainstream media include: The Russians did it The Washington Post: The paper mainstreamed the narrative that The Russians Hacked the Election with a shoddy piece of journalism reporting that Russian intelligence gave hundreds of alternative media sites (including ours) propaganda in the form of news aimed at helping Trump and hurting Clinton. (Playing her role, Clinton would later blame it on some grudge Russian President Vladimir Putin held against her.) Trump told his supporters to vote multiple times CNN: Like him or not, there is no doubt that the MSM did its best to destroy Trump during the campaign, and that, of course, included ginning up fake news. CNN was, of course, in the thick of that. As Mediaite reported, the bottom-feeder news network made up a claim that Trump told his supporters to commit voter fraud by voting early and often. In fact, Trump was lamenting that, If you go to university center, theyll give you a new ballot, theyll void your old ballot. Theyll give you a new ballot, and you can go out and make sure it gets in. Now in some places, they do that four or five times, but we dont do that. So by tomorrow, almost everyone will have their new ballots in. See scores more of them here. (RELATED: What is the mainstream media attempting to lie about today? Find out at MediaFactWatch.com) What well eventually see out of Google are arbitrary decisions about what does, and does not, constitute publishers attempts to deceive people with their content like politically incorrect facts about the political Left that Google and others favor. J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for Natural News and News Target, as well as editor of The National Sentinel. Sources: NewsFakes.com ZeroHedge.com Local media The Bangkok Post reported that the S26T has a submerged displacement of 2,600 tons and is equipped with an air-independent propulsion [AIP] system. The S26T is reportedly to be based on the Type 039A SSK of the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) also refered as Yuan class. It is a fairly recent design first commissioned in 2008 with a displacement of 3,600 tons and a length of 75 meters. It may feature an air-independent propulsion (AIP) system as an auxiliary system to a regular diesel-electric power. Admiral Jumpol Loompikanon, spokesman for the Royal Thai Navy, said the submarine would allow the Navy to study tactics and how to protect Thailand from submarine threats. In Orange Countys ancient past, crocodiles lived here and existed longer in this area than anywhere else in California, a new Cal State Fullerton fossil study reveals. The student-led fossil study of Orange County and California, which included examining teeth of extinct crocodiles and horses by geology graduate Michelle Barboza and fellow researchers, discovered that the large aquatic reptiles lived in California for almost 10 million years after what previous research has shown. Crocodiles arent well-studied in California, and before this study, scientists thought they went extinct 16 million years ago, said Barboza. Our study shows this hidden history of crocs living in Orange County and in California up until 6 million years ago. Barboza is the lead author of the study, which outlines the discovery extending the presence and history of crocodiles in California. She conducted the collaborative study for her undergraduate thesis, graduated in August with a bachelors degree in geology, and is now a graduate student at the University of Florida studying vertebrate paleontology. The fossils studied are from collections at the John D. Cooper Archaeological and Paleontological Center a partnership between CSUF and OC Parks the Ralph B. Clark Regional Park Interpretive Center in Buena Park, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles and San Diego Natural History Museum. The study was published today in PaleoBios, an open-access, peer-reviewed journal at UC Berkeley. Co-authors are James F. Parham, assistant professor of geological sciences, who directed the study; undergraduate geology major Brian Kussman; geology graduate student Gabriel-Philip Santos; and Jorge Velez-Juarbe of the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles. The researchers initially had set out to establish the age using fossil teeth of the extinct horse of a prominent geological rock layer known as the Oso Member from the Capistrano Formation. This formation is found underneath many of the roads, homes and business of southern Orange County, mostly near Lake Forest and Mission Viejo, noted Kussman. This rock unit formed from erosion of the Santa Ana Mountains and is made of sandstone and siltstone deposited when much of Southern California was covered by shallow seas, Kussman explained. The importance of establishing the age of the Oso Member allows scientists to compare it to other fossil sites in Southern California, noted Parham, the Cooper Centers faculty curator of paleontology. As a result, we can learn when and where different species lived and how that changes through time, Parham said. Barboza pointed out that the rock formation is filled with fossils of animals that lived both in the ocean and on land in Orange County over 5 million years ago, but had not been described until this study, which also identifies the wealth of fauna in the county. The significance of this study is it gives us a picture of what Orange County used to look like millions of years ago, said Barboza, who is pursuing a career in paleontology and science education. Rhinos, elephant-like creatures, called gomphotheres, horses and crocodiles were the animals that lived here. Before graduating from CSUF, Barboza was a research scholar in the California State University Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation program, a paleontology summer intern on the Panama Canal Project through the University of Florida and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, and conducted summer research in Argentina. 19:01 With RBI easing the weekly cash withdrawal limits for certain accounts, the Election Commission is set to ask candidates contesting assembly polls in five states to open current accounts to tide over currency crunch in meeting election expenses. The central bank today announced lifting of daily restrictions on cash withdrawals from ATMs as well as current accounts. The latest move comes close on the heels of the Election Commission expressing its displeasure to the RBI for rejecting the request to enhance the cash withdrawal limit for candidates to Rs 2 lakh per week. After the decision of the RBI, the Election Commission has decided to ask all candidates to open current accounts for meeting election expenses, sources said. Such a move will help candidates to have enough hard currency as well as overcome problems faced with the existing Rs 24,000 per week cash limit set on savings accounts, the sources said. Candidates are bound to open an election account for meeting poll-related expenditure which is monitored by the EC. Since there is no mention of any specific category of account that needs to be opened, candidates mostly opt for savings account. The requested page is currently unavailable on this server. Back to [RTHK News Homepage] JAMMU: The Jammu and Kashmir government has signed an MoU with the Centre for the development of two mega solar parks in the rocky mountainous region of Ladakh with a total capacity of 7500 MW. Minister for Science & Technology, Sajjad Gani Lone today said the government has proposed development of one each Mega Solar Park in the districts of Leh and Kargil. "The State Government has signed MoU with the Government of India for the development of two Mega Solar Parks of 5000 MW capacity in Leh district and 2500 MW capacity in Kargil district," Lone informed the House in reply to a Question by Congress Legislative Party Leader Nawang Rigzin Jora. However, he said the work on these projects has not been started as yet in view of non-availability of land and lack of proper infrastructure in Ladakh for transmission of power generated from the proposed parks. Read also: New Technique For Safer Nuclear Fuel, Waste Management Twitter Releases NSLs That Forced It To Reveal Users' Data NEW YORK: Twitter on Saturday became the latest tech giant after Yahoo, Cloudflare and Google to release national security letters (NSLs) from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) that forced them to reveal user data to the government. The tech companies have been speaking up since the last eight months about the NSLs "that came with gag orders that prevented Twitter from telling the public or the targeted users about the government's demands in two letters it received in 2015 and 2016", Tech Crunch reported. The FBI recently lifted these gag orders, allowing Twitter to acknowledge the NSLs for the first time. In the newly published NSLs, the FBI asked Twitter to turn over "the name, address, length of service, and electronic communications transactional records" of two users. The micro-blogging site said it gave a "very limited set of data" in response to the requests and demanded more freedom in keeping their point. "Twitter remains unsatisfied with restrictions on our right to speak more freely about national security requests we may receive, Twitter associate general counsel Elizabeth Banker wrote in a blog post. "We would like a meaningful opportunity to challenge government restrictions when 'classification' prevents speech on issues of public importance," Banker added. Twitter has already disclosed these two letters and informed the targeted users and is suing the Department of Justice in an effort to speak more publicly about secret requests for user data. Read Also: Datamail Launches Voice-Based Social Media Feature Gmail Users Can't Send Javascript Files From February 13 New Delhi [India], Jan 30 (ANI-NewsVoir): Hollywood's most glamorous stars celebrated their achievements wearing platinum jewelry at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards and related parties. Linear diamond earrings and statement rings were the top jewelry trends tonight. Designers prefer precious to create masterpieces in platinum. Platinum Guild International is pleased to share that leading red carpet jewelry brands such as Tiffany and Co., Neil Lane and Fred Leighton chose to style A-list celebrities in rare and enduring platinum. The following stars chose to wear platinum jewelry to celebrate their achievements: Natalie Portman in Platinum by Tiffany and Co. -Earrings with mixed cut diamonds, set in platinum (USD 50,000) -Bracelet with mixed cut diamonds, set in platinum (USD 125,000) -Ring with diamonds and a yellow sapphire, set in platinum (USD 105,000) Emma Stone in Platinum by Tiffany and Co. -Earrings with diamonds and chrysophrase, set in platinum (USD 25,000) -Ring with diamonds, set in platinum (USD 9,500) Kerry Washington in Platinum by Neil Lane -Stud earrings with diamonds (20 carats), set in platinum -Bands with diamonds, set in platinum Nicole Kidman in Platinum by Fred Leighton -Arrow pendant earrings with diamonds and onyx, set in platinum Evan Rachel Wood in Platinum by Tiffany and Co. -Earrings with mixed cut diamonds, set in platinum (USD 50,000) -Ring with diamonds and tanzanite, set in platinum (USD 60,000) Amanda Peet in Platinum by Fred Leighton -Art Deco Waterfall earrings with diamonds, set in platinum -Art Deco bracelet with diamonds, set in platinum Laura Carmichael in Platinum by Neil Lane -Drop earrings with diamonds, set in platinum Erin Moriarty in Platinum by Neil Lane -Necklace with diamonds set in platinum. (ANI-NewsVoir) Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday sought the opposition's support for smooth functioning of the Budget Session of Parliament in an all party meet, but opposition members made a vocal protest against the budget presentation on February 1, around a month earlier than usual. Opposition members also said they will raise the issue of demonetisation, ceasefire violations and internal security in the brief session - ten days in total and eight working days. Trinamool Congress had announced it will not attend the all party meeting, and the first two days of the Parliament session protesting demonetisation. Ruling National Democratic Alliance member Shiv Sena was also missing from the meeting. Talking to reporters after the meeting, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar said the Prime Minister appealed to the opposition members to ensure peaceful debate in parliament, even if there are political differences. "The Prime Minister called Parliament a 'Maha Panchayat' and said that differences may arise between parties but democracy should win and there should be debate in Parliament," he said. Ananth Kumar said parties agreed that debate should take place. "All parties, especially those in the opposition, said they wanted debate and both houses should function," he added. Asked about the absence of Trinamool Congress, and Shiv Sena, the minister said: "There are elections going on, there are some civic elections as well." Opposition leaders meanwhile said they aired their objections to the budget date, before the start of assembly elections in five states on February 4, in the all party meeting, adding that they wanted to debate demonetisation issue in the session. Talking to reporters after an all-party meeting in the Parliament Library Building, Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia said the decision to advance the budget was against democratic practices. "The way the government has decided to present the budget on February 1 is undemocratic. Our government in 2012 postponed the budget till elections," he said. Scindia said his party would raise issues like demonetisation, increase in ceasefire violations on the Line of Control and security scenario in the country. "This half of the session is short, so we have asked the government to allocate two days for discussing these issues and three days for motion of thanks to the President's address," he said. Communist Party of India-Marxist leader Sitaram Yechury said the decision to have an early budget will have consequences. "They will only have data till the second quarter of the year, the figures of the third quarter will not be there. "Demonetisation has had such adverse impact on the economy. Its effect will not be taken into account because the figures will not be available," Yechury said. "The government should postpone the budget." He said his party too wanted a discussion on demonetisation. Asked about the opposition's demand to postpone the budget, Ananth Kumar said: "This is the nation's budget, for the benefit of the nation. The Supreme Court has given its verdict." The Trinamool meanwhile hardened its stance, announcing that its members will not attend Parliament on the first two days of Parliament session. "Trinamool MPs will not be present in Parliament on the first two days of the Budget session in protest against demonetisation, which was implemented without taking Parliament into confidence, and restrictions on withdrawal limits from bank accounts which are still in force," said a party statement. The session's first day - January 31 will see President Pranab Mukherjee address a joint sitting of both houses and the Economic Survey will also be presented. The budget will be presented on the second day -- February 1. The session will have a break from February 9, be reconvened on March 9 and end on April 12. --IANS ao/vd/vm ( 625 Words) 2017-01-30-18:16:07 (IANS) Oxford University Press India (OUP) organised an interactive Nelson English skills workshop for primary and secondary school teachers on Monday. The workshop was led by Heather French, a trainer who has over 25 years of classroom experience in British and international primary and secondary schools around the world. The NES (Nelson English Skill) workshop introduced teachers to latest interactive methods for effective teaching skills to help them achieve high standards by using Nelson English Skills for their regular classroom teaching. "OUP's teacher training workshops have always been appreciated, and has enabled to foster a two-way communication with the teacher, and better understand their work environment, needs and challenges," said Sivaramakrishnan V, Managing Director, Oxford University Press India. The workshop, held at RN Shah School in Juhu, Mumbai, by Heather French saw participation from over 35 school teachers. French emphasised on how learning could be an even more delightful experience for students if teachers understood the thoughts of children and made them overcome their problems which they face on a day-to-day basis. Heather brought in her rich global experience to captivate the minds of the teachers, as she made them understand about grammar, comprehension, speaking and handwriting skills in their classroom teaching. She stressed on the need for teachers to continuously introduce new methodologies in teaching and assessing young learners on these above key skills. She kept her focus on exploring practical activities in classroom teaching for the benefit of students. (ANI) The 65th edition of Miss Universe pageant started on high note with TV host and comedian Steve Harvey, who is hosting the pageant again this year, making fun of his embarrassing mistake of announcing the wrong winner at the pageant's 2015 edition. He says that he had taken all precautions not to do that again. The pageant started with a clip showing him making plans with a group of boys and suggesting them to have an eye of everything. He later introduced the reigning Miss Universe Miss Philippines Pia Wurtzbach who said that: "Steve thank you for making me the most popular Miss Universe." Harvey replied back with his funny one liners: "Thank you for making me the most popular host." Harvey made headlines after he mistakenly gave the Miss Universe crown to Miss Colombia Ariadna Gutierrez-Arevalo while Miss Philippines Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach was the actual winner. Following the incident, he apologised multiple times but the internet enjoyed making fun of the "Family Feud" host in numerous memes that have landed online in the past few days. The 65th edition of Miss Universe pageant is taking place at the Mall of Asia Arena, Pasay in Philippines. Roshmitha Harimurthy will represent India at the contest. The peagant will be special as former Miss Universe and Bollywood actress Sushmita Sen will be on the judges panel, who won her Miss Universe crown in Manila itself in 1994. --IANS nv/vgu/ ( 252 Words) 2017-01-30-06:26:06 (IANS) The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) on Monday slammed Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi's call for crushing Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) divisive politics and accused the Gandhi family for creating disharmony and disintegrity in the country. RSS leader Rakesh Sinha took a jibe at Rahul saying that he has poor understanding of history and he makes remarks on politics and ideology according to his poor understanding. "RSS is a reality, its force is creating unity and integrity in this country and it is their (Rahul Gandhi's) family which has created disharmony and disintegrity in this country and has created a gap between rich and poor. It is their policy and their politics," he said. Rahul in a joint press conference with Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav had said that the Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance would put an end to the anger being spread by the BJP and RSS. "We want to stop the aggression that RSS-BJP is spreading and the false promises they are giving. We want to give the youth of UP a new path, a new politics," he said. Uttar Pradesh will be voting for a new state assembly in a seven-phase election between February 11 and March 8. Out of the 403 assembly seats, Congress will be contesting in 105 seats and the Samajwadi Party will field its candidates in rest of the 298 seats. Last year, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi got surrounded in controversy over his remark regarding Mahatma Gandhi's assassination. A local RSS functionary, Rajesh Kunte, had filed the case against Gandhi for claiming at an election rally on March 6, 2014 that the right wing organisation had killed Mahatma Gandhi. Rahul was granted bail on the basis of personal surety by Maharashtra's Bhiwandi court in November last year. Gandhi had in September withdrawn his petition filed in the apex court, challenging the case and said he would face the trial. He expressed his readiness to face the trial after the top court refused to interfere with the criminal proceedings pending against him before the trial court. (ANI) Congress legislator Umang Singhar today alleged that several policemen committed loots and perpetrated sexual assaults in Bhutia and Holibayda villages in Madhya Pradesh's Dhar district on the pretext of nabbing criminals recently. "Nearly 125 police personnel including two Additional Superintendents of Police swooped on the villages, lobbed tear gas shells and opened fire early Wednesday morning purportedly to apprehend miscreants. However, some policemen barged into homes of tribal folks and committed atrocities. Four women were raped and belonging of villagers looted," Mr Singhar told media here. He claimed that police refused to register a case at the Tanda police station. Later, he went along with rape victims to hospital for their medical examination but the Dhar Superintendent of Police tried to suppress the matter. Consequently, the women were examined by a lady doctor instead of a panel. Besides, a victim's husband was even booked in a false case. Mr Singhar, who brought the victims to the state capital, demanded that a first information report (FIR) be registered in connection with the atrocities and a high-level judicial probe be ordered. He also sought the SP's transfer and suspension of two Addnl SPs, who were involved in the action. He said he would meet Director General of Police Rishi Shukla and approach the State Commission for Women over the matter. UNI PS SW SHK 1600 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0044-1128508.Xml Even after Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav's annoyance over the SP's alliance with the Congress, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav is still confident that Netaji will campaign for the party in the assembly elections. The Chief Minister said today, ''I am confident that he will campaign for us. Electorate should not worry. Netaji will come around for sure.'' Talking to a private news channel here, Mr Yadav said, ''We can win alone but alliance will firm up the verdict. We will win anyway, but the alliance with the Congress will ensure a big margin of victory." He said his best chance at acquiring a second consecutive term lies in voters recognising that his government has delivered on development for one of India's most-backward states. "Now, when the phones ring, they are answered," he said, referring to the implementation of key infrastructure projects like intra-city highways as well as special helplines launched for women in distress. The Chief Minister also rejected allegations of lawlessness and lack of development in UP as charged by the opposition and claimed, ''I have worked on law and order. This is incorrect to say that there has been no development in UP. I have worked diligently towards UP progress." He also exuded confidence that his party will retain power and form the government in UP again. The interview comes a day after Mr Yadav and Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi held a roadshow in Lucknow to give a show of strength of the alliance and thereafter Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav said he opposed the alliance and said he would not campaign for his son. Mr Mulayam Singh Yadav had last night said SP was capable enough to contest and win the Assembly elections alone in UP. "I am against the alliance formed between the Samajwadi Party and the Congress. I will never acknowledge this alliance. The Congress was in power for so long, but it did not do anything for the development of the country. I will not campaign in this election," the SP patriarch told a TV channel. "The alliance has squandered the chances of many of our leaders for the next five years by not allotting tickets to them. I will request the party cadres to speak against the alliance and take it to the people," he added.UNI MB SW SHK 1552 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0196-1128496.Xml More protestors joined the agitation of the Jat community on Monday while security forces and authorities were on high alert in 19 districts where the protests are being carried out. At various protest points in different districts of Haryana, the number of protestors, including women, was higher than that on Sunday. In Jhajjar district in south Haryana, the district administration ordered the suspension of all calling services, including Internet services like 2G, 3G, 4G, Edge, voice calls and GPRS, SMS services and bulk messages provided on mobile networks from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. on daily basis, with immediate effect. Jhajjar District Magistrate Ramesh Chander Bidhan directed the telecom service providers to ensure compliance of these orders. "Any person found guilty or in violation of these orders would be punished under Section 188 of the Indian Penal Code," he said. The authorities have ordered that all liquor shops within the jurisdiction of five km around Rasalwala chowk and Jhajjar-Bahadurgarh Road in Jhajjar district would remain closed till further orders. Fatehabad Deputy Commissioner N.K. Solanki said that borders of the district have been sealed and police personnel have been deployed at all important markets, residential areas and government and private institutions. He said that heavy police force has been deployed near the venue of dharna at Dhani Gopal Chowk in Fatehabad town to control any situation. Kurukshetra Deputy Commissioner Sumedha Kataria imposed Section 144 in the district, prohibiting open sale of petrol, diesel and other inflammable materials. Owners of petrol pumps have been instructed not to sell petrol or diesel to owners of unregistered vehicles or those without number plates, she said. With bitter memories of last year's large-scale violence fresh in the minds of people, Haryana remained on high alert on Sunday as a section of the Jat community started fresh protests in some districts. Paramilitary forces and Haryana Police were monitoring the situation in Jat-dominated districts of Rohtak, Jhajjar, Jind, Bhiwani, Sonipat, Fatehabad, Kurukshetra, Panipat and others. The call to resume the protests has been given by the All India Jat Aarakshan Sangharsh Samiti (AIJASS) headed by Jat leader Yashpal Malik in 19 districts. The Jats are demanding fulfillment of demands like release of youths arrested during the Jat agitation last year, jobs to kin of Jats killed in the agitation and action against officials responsible for firing on Jat agitationists. The Haryana government has requisitioned 55 companies of central police forces and ordered the deployment of 7,000 Home Guards, besides the Haryana Police personnel, in districts where trouble was expected. The Jat agitation in February last year left 30 people dead and over 200 injured. Rohtak, Sonipat, Panipat, Jhajjar, Jind, Hisar and some other districts were the worst affected during the Jat agitation. Government and private property worth hundreds of crores was damaged and set on fire. Large-scale looting of commercial and business premises and even motorists was reported from the 10 worst affected districts. --IANS js/vd ( 502 Words) 2017-01-30-16:40:07 (IANS) The arrests were made in posh Jubilee Hills area in a joint operation by personnel from the local police station and the Commissioner's Task Force. Police seized 370 grams of cocaine worth Rs 17 lakh, which the accused were carrying to deliver to their customers. They also seized Rs 46,000 in cash, a Ford car, a motorcycle and 12 cell phones from their possession. The arrested men include 38-year-old Mandela James of South Africa and 27-year-old Drake Owen, a national of Ghana. Both were drug peddlers who were supplying drugs from Mumbai. The other arrested include two consumers. They have been identified as Abhishek Kumar, an artist and G.Srinivasulu, both residents of Hitec City here. J.E. Naveen Kumar and M. Srinivas, both natives of Karnataka and employed here, were also arrested for selling drugs. According to B. Limba Reddy, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Commissioner's Task Force, the African nationals were in India on business visas and were supplying drugs from Mumbai to both the sellers and consumers. Mandela James, said to be the kingpin of the racket, had engaged Drake Owen and the two were selling cocaine to their customers in Hyderabad. The arrests were made when the Africans reached Jubilee Hills checkpost on Monday to deliver cocaine to Abhishek and Srinivasulu. --IANS ms/sm/bg ( 243 Words) 2017-01-30-16:34:10 (IANS) Himachal Pradesh paid tributes on the occasion of 69th anniversary of Father of the nation Mahatma Gandhi as various tributes programmes and brief silence programmes were organised here today.Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, Local Member of Assembly Nand Lal and Deputy Mayor of Shimla Tekinder Singh Panwer and others citizens offered floral tributes and observed silence before Mahatma Gandhi's historic statute at Ridge ground here this morning. Himachal Pradesh Congress Committee also paid tributes at a function at Rajiv Gandhi Bhavan at state party Office where former MLA Harbhajan Singh Bhaji and other party activists paid tributes and offered flowers on the portrait of Mahatma Gandhi. State Council for Science, Technology & Environment, HP Shimla staff gathered in conference hall and observed silence at 1100 hrs for 2 minutes in the memory of those who gave their lives in the struggle for India's freedomSimilar programmes were held in other parts of the state where a large number of people, students and people from public lives take oath to follow the path of non-violence shown by the Mahatma.UNI ML AE SHK 1749 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0292-1128756.Xml Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) President Sukhbir Singh Badal today asked the Election Commission to take note of AAP Convener Arvind Kejriwal's night stay at the residence of a terrorist in Moga immediately. In a statement here, Mr Badal said the night stay by Kejriwal at the residence of Khalistan Commando Force (KCF) General Gurinder Singh alias Jaswinder Singh Ghali had vitiated the poll atmosphere in Punjab and given a fillip to the radical forces. "This kind of conduct must be snubbed immediately," he said. The SAD president said Kejriwal also had a moral responsibility to tell the Punjabis why he had stayed at the residence of a dreaded militant in Moga two days back. "Not only did you stay at the residence of the KCF terrorist but also held a meeting with the radical elements besides making calls to foreign countries". He said Punjabis had the right to know why Kejriwal was holding repeated meetings with the extremist elements. "Earlier you met Babbar Khalsa International (BKI) front organisation Akhand Kirtani Jatha members, including RP Singh at Mohali. You have also held meetings with radical elements who organised a separatist conclave more than one year back". Mr Badal said all these incidents proved that Kejriwal was hand in glove with radical elements. He said it also proved that the AAP convener was ready to go to any extent to get a few votes, even compromise with the unity and integrity of the country. He said it was impossible to believe that the Moga AAP leadership did not know that they were putting up Kejriwal in a terrorist's house. "In fact, it was deliberate. The AAP leadership wanted to send a signal to the radical elements that it was one with them". Mr Badal said this kind of politics was very dangerous for Punjab. He said terrorist Gurinder alias Jaswinder Ghali was involved in triggering off a bomb in Mandi Mustafa locality of Baghapurana in which a priest was killed. He said Gurinder was also responsible for placing tails of cows in temples to incite communal hatred. He asked Kejriwal to explain what message he was sending to the Hindu community by aligning with the forces who were bent upon inciting communal hatred. He said peace and communal harmony had been achieved in Punjab after a long struggle. "We should not let it be frittered away by opportunistic outsiders who are only interested in grabbing power, even by rising on the shoulder of extremist forces," he added. UNI DB RSA SNU 1836 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0292-1128788.Xml Shri Hindu Takht Chief Panchanand Giri Maharaj today accused Aam Aadmi Party supremo Arvind Kejriwal of being hand-in-glove with the pro-Khalistan radical groups. Addressing a press conference here, he said as per protocol, AAP convener Kejriwal, being a Chief Minister, could have stayed in any state guest house or even in the house of any local AAP leader. However, the AAP supremo chose the house of "terrorist" Gurwinder Singh who is working for Khalistan Liberation Force (KLF).Giri Maharaj declared that Hindu Takht will openly work against the AAP and tell the people how Mr Kejriwal and his party were associated with the anti-Punjab and pro-Khalistan forces. UNI DB AE SNU 1817 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0292-1128811.Xml Samajwadi Party President Akhilesh Yadav has claimed that the wave in support of the SP-Congress alliance was blowing across the state and BSP and BJP were nowhere in the contest. He said the Samajwadi Party will form the next Government in the state and it will be a great honour for Mulayam Singh Yadav, who is the philosopher and guide of the party.Akhilesh Yadav addressed election meetings in Etah and Kasganj district today, considered to be the bastions of the Samajwadi party. In all the meetings, the dais was splattered with the posters carrying the photographs of the Congress President Sonia Gandhi, Congress Vice-president Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi and Dimple Yadav, Kannauj MP and wife of the Chief Minister. In both the districts the Congress leaders attended the meeting. "There is no challenge before the Samajwadi Party in the elections as the `Haathi' (election symbol of BSP) is no position to challenge the `Cycle' (election symbol of the SP) and same is the position of `Kamal' (election symbol of the BJP) which is already on the distant third position,'' said Akhilesh Yadav.Referring to recent upheavals in the party Akhilesh Yadav said, "We saved the party and also the election symbol, now with your support we wish to carry forward the movement of Samajwadi in UP so vote the party for another five year term for all round development of the state''. "We are contesting the election to form the Government in UP. I do not see any contest in the elections as the strength of the Samajwadi Party has tremendously increased after forging an alliance with the Congress and has also boosted the morale of the rank and file of the Samajwadi Party,''said Akhilesh Yadav addressing the meeting at the Ggovernment inter college ground in Etah.Reiterating that there is no challenge before the SP in the elections Akhilesh Yadav said, "polling in the first phase of the elections on February 11 would show which party would form the next government in the state''. He said the BSP did nothing for the state except installing the stone statue of the elephants and the BJP; despite being in power at the Center for the last three years has nothing to show to the people as to what they did for the development of the state in last three years.Samajwadi Party is also grappling with the rebellion from the party leaders in Etah district. SP has denied ticket to Ashish Yadav, sitting MLA from Etah city seat, which is in the fray as Lok Dal candidate. Ashish Yadav is the son of Ramesh Yadav, Chairman of UP Legislative Council.Canvassing support for the SP candidate Jogendra Singh Yadav, SP president said, "we honoured them by giving them the exalted office of the chairman of the Legislative council. I am the member of the same House. Now they are not with the party, it's for you to assess in this election as to who is your well wisher''.Accusing the BJP of copying the manifesto of the Samajwadi Party Akhilesh Yadav said, "it's good to see that they are following the path of socialism. BJP is in power at the Centre for the last three years and we hoped that they would come out with some new idea in their manifesto but they preferred to cut and paste our manifesto''.UNI MB SNU 1918 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0400-1129123.Xml BJP national spokesperson and Delhi MP Meenakshi Lekhi today hit out at the Congress, saying that the Gandhi family cannot open its mouth on the issue of corruption. Addressing a press conference here, Ms Lekhi said, "The family which is neck-deep in corruption and which has been named in various scams cannot speak on corruption." She said Punjab has witnessed Congress' regime as well as 10-year of development under the Akali-BJP coalition. "Hence, in order to carry on the pace of development and maintain communal harmony and peace in the state, the electorate of Punjab will once again form the coalition Government in Punjab and our contribution to this Government will be more than what it was during the last elections," she added.Attacking the AAP, the BJP MP said, "The people of Delhi are neither getting ample drinking water nor do they have round the clock access to electricity. The roads and gullies are in bad condition, no new schools have been opened and the AAP Government failed to contribute to the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan. The people of Delhi are fed up with AAP and Kejriwal is busy dreaming of coming into power in Punjab. I think he has forgotten that one cannot fool all the time. They have fooled Delhi; they can't do the same in Punjab."In response to a query, she said SYL canal was no longer an issue as the Badal Government had returned the land to the farmers. She, however, said Prime Minister Narendra Modi was determined to provide ample water to farmers. He is working on a plan to feed the farmers of Punjab, Haryana and Jammu-Kashmir with waters of the Indus, she said. Citing figures, Ms Lekhi said, "You just have a look at the 55-year-rule of Congress in Punjab and the 10 year rule of the coalition Government. You will get to know the difference. Ten years back Punjab's budget was Rs 5,000-crore, today it stands at Rs 25,000-crore which the Akali-BJP Government is spending openly for the development of the state," she said."Similarly, no stadia were there in Punjab during Congress' tenure, today there 28. Six airports are coming up -- two international and four domestic, the Mohali Airport is already functional. Ten years back there were mere three railway bridges, today there are 65. Earlier, there were 66 high-level bridges, but the count rose to 102 during our tenure. No flyovers were there a decade back, today we have hundreds of them and thousands under construction. "Punjab has an AIIMS today, six-lane roads are there, every village is linked via a metalled road and every city has access to clean drinking water and effective sewerage system. Thirteen Universities and 10 Meritorial schools came up during our regime and hundreds of colleges and educational centres were opened. Under the Mai Bhago Scheme, 4, 82,703 bicycles have been provided to the girls, free medical treatment up to Rs 50,000 and interest-free loans up to Rs. 50,000 have been provided". She appealed to the people of Punjab to vote for the alliance candidates and help from a coalition Government for the third consecutive time.UNI DB AE SNU 1950 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0292-1129117.Xml People of the state today registered their protests over killing of two workers by suspected cadres of a Kuki militant outfit. The main road at Sekmaijin areas were blocked. Three workers were earlier kidnapped by Kuki militants from Maphou dam project area of Ukhrul district and two of them were found dead on Sunday last. The bodies of Laishram Tompok (28) and Kangujam Thoi (22) were kept at JNIMS morgue which were not claimed by members of the JAC. Members of the JAC also submitted a memorandum to Chief Minister Okram Ibobi Singh demanding arrests of the militants involved in the killing. They demanded proper compensation and a job to the next of kin of the deceased. UNI NS AD2205 -- (UNI) -- C-1-1-DL0108-1129458.Xml Former Union Minister Shashi Tharoor today appealed to the Mumbaikars to give a chance to the Congress party in the ensuing Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) election for a change in the metropolis and its development. Addressing the mediapersons here after releasing a booklet allegedly containing irregularities in the Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party-led BMC for last 24 years, he said, ''The electorates you have given 20 years to Sena-BJP, give one chance to Congress for a change and for the development of the city.'' The booklet has highlighted several scams and irregularities done in the Corporation in last 20-22 years. He said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP-led Government were harping on transparency in governance, but claimed that the Congress was ahead of them in terms of transparency. Mr Tharoor further alleged that, ''when you demand some queries through Right to Information Act, the BJP Government does not provide it, Prime Minister is yet to give details of his qualification. To garner the Hindu votes, they are now talking about Ram Mandir. The matter is sub-judice, how can BJP build the temple, this is nothing but vote bank politics of BJP. Which they are playing for more than past 20 years.''UNI ST SS HK SNU 2226 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0169-1129461.Xml A day after receiving a formal proposal from his estranged cousin and Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) President Raj Thackeray about having a pre-poll alliance for ensuing Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) election, Shiv Sena President Uddhav Thackeray today ruled out any possibility of alliance.He told reporters that Shiv Sena would go all alone not only in Mumbai but also in all other local bodies. Mr Thackeray also took a potshot at BJP, saying those who want to have friendly contest, they are free to have it.Meanwhile. state Revenue Minister Chandra Kant Patil appealed to the Sena to have alliance with BJP in other local bodies, except BMC. He also appealed the junior partner in the state government to stop making sarcastic comments against BJP.UNI BJP SS HK SNU 2228 -- (UNI) -- C-1-DL0169-1129473.Xml "The Department of Homeland Security will continue to enforce all of President Trump's Executive Orders in a manner that ensures the safety and security of the American people," Efe news quoted a statement by the DHS on Sunday. Trump's decree, the DHS statement emphasized, "affects a minor portion of international travelers, and is a first step towards re-establishing control over America's borders and national security." The magnate sparked enormous controversy and confusion on Friday by signing the executive order designed to combat jihadist terrorism. The order suspends for 120 days the entry of all refugees and the issuing of visas for 90 days for citizens from seven countries -- Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Iran -- until new mechanisms can be put in place to screen them more effectively. The temporary ban on Saturday created chaos and outrage around the world, while numerous travelers found their access to US territory blocked and protests were staged at several US airports. Federal judge Ann M. Donnelly blocked part of the controversial ban in response to a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union against Trump's executive order that called its constitutionality into question. After the judge's ruling, federal judges in Virginia, Seattle and Boston issued similar rulings. --IANS vgu/ ( 260 Words) 2017-01-30-03:40:06 (IANS) His remarks on Sunday, came a day after the co-chair of the Republicans Overseas organisation in Israel Marc Zell, told a local that the delay is happening at Israel's request, Xinhua news agency reported. "Our position has always been, and will always be, that the US embassy needs to be here, in Jerusalem," Netanyahu said. He also called on other countries to move their missions to Jerusalem. "I believe that over time most of them will indeed come here, to Jerusalem," he said. The idea of moving the US embassy to Jerusalem was discussed in the past but never carried out for fear it will spark fresh tensions in the region. Statements released by Trump's team during his election campaign repeatedly stated his determination to move the embassy. However, after his inauguration White House spokesman Sean Spicer said several times that discussion about the issue is in its very early stages. --IANS vgu/ ( 192 Words) 2017-01-30-04:36:06 (IANS) "She was hit with a bullet in her neck and suffered for two hours", Middle East Eye quoted the eight-year-old's grandfather as saying. "The daughter of Shaykh Anwar Al-Awlaqi is martyred in the US raid in Yemen today. Obama killed his son and now Trump kills his daughter," Jihadist group Al Maqalaat tweeted. The raid that killed Awlaki's daughter was part of a dawn attack in southern Yemen on Sunday that killed a US commando and around 30 people including al-Qaeda suspects and civilians, the US military and local Yemeni officials said. It was the first combat casualty of the Trump administration and its first operation in the war-damaged Arabian Peninsula nation against a powerful al-Qaeda branch that has been a frequent target of US drone strikes. Medics at the scene said 30 people were killed, including 10 women and three children. Anwar al-Awlaki was an American and Yemeni imam and Islamic lecturer, who US government allege was a senior recruiter and motivator. He was killed in a US drone strike in 2011. --IANS vgu/ ( 213 Words) 2017-01-30-05:34:07 (IANS) Defending his travel ban on certain Muslim-majority nations which invoked massive outrage and confusion across the globe, President Donald Trump insisted that his decision would protect the United States from terrorists. "U.S. would continue showing compassion to those fleeing oppression. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave. We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say," Trump said in a statement, CNN reports. He pushed back on criticism suggesting his executive order amounts to the "Muslim ban" he proposed as a candidate. Trump made it clear that the move was not a Muslim ban, and asserted that it was not about religion and that it was about terror and keeping America safe. The statement is the latest attempt by Trump's White House to explain the controversial order, which the President signed at the Pentagon on Friday. The move halted US refugee entry into the US for 120 days, and barred all citizens of seven predominantly Muslim nations from entering the US for three months. Trump cast the move as in line with the previous administration's moves to combat terrorism, writing: "My policy is similar to what President (Barack) Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months." Trump, in his statement Sunday, wrote those countries "are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror." Trump said the US would "again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days." "I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering," he wrote in his statement. (ANI) In the wake of U.S President Donald Trump's sweeping immigration order banning citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. for at least the next 90 days, Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky has announced free housing for people left stranded as a result. Trump's order also stops the admission of all refugees for the next four months, and bans people fleeing war-torn Syria indefinitely, CNN reports. "Not allowing countries or refugees into America is not right, and we must stand with those who are affected," Chesky tweeted. The sudden order has left many people with legal visas, including refugees, stranded at airports in the U.S. and the Middle East. In a Facebook post, Chesky gave a few more details, saying the offer of free housing applied to "refugees or anyone else who needs it in the event they are denied the ability to board a U.S.-bound flight and are not in your city/country of residence." He also asked people to email him at Airbnb for more details. Airbnb has a history of putting its network of housing in 191 countries to work to help the victims of natural disasters, most recently after wildfires in Chile and earthquakes in Italy. World leaders are also opening their doors to those affected by the ban. Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted: "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada" Trump's order also calls for a review into suspending the Visa Interview Waiver Program, which allows travelers from 38 countries -- including close allies -- to renew travel authorizations without an in-person interview. (ANI) A senior Palestinian official said that UN Secretary General Antnio Guterres should apologise for the remarks he made earlier on Jerusalem. Israel Public Radio reported on Sunday that Guterres earlier stated that: "It's clear as the son is clear that the Temple, which was demolished by the Romans, is a Jewish temple." Palestinian National Authority (PNA) minister for Jerusalem affairs Adnan al-Huseini, told Xinhua news agency that "he (Guterres) neglected the UNESCO resolutions, which clearly said that the al-Aqsa Mosque is purely an Islamic heritage." Al-Huseini added that Guterres' remarks "are a violation to all human, diplomatic and legal rules and laws and a violation to his position as the secretary general", adding "he (Guterres) should apologize to the Palestinian people for his remarks". Guterres said he is not intending to present any political initiative "to resolve" the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, although he supports the two-state solution and ready to extend his hand to help the two sides if it is needed. Meanwhile, Ahmed Majdalani, the official in Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), said in an emailed press statement that the remarks of Guterres "is a strike to the credibility of the UN as a global organization that should stay to the side of the occupied people and be against the power of the occupation." The Palestinians want the eastern part of the city of Jerusalem, which was occupied by Israel in 1967 while Israel, which annexed the eastern part of the city, insists that the whole city is the eternal capital of the state of Israel. --IANS vgu/ ( 272 Words) 2017-01-30-07:32:06 (IANS) Five people were killed after gunmen opened fire in a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers, the mosque's president told reporters.A witness told Reuters that up to three gunmen fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre."Why is this happening here? This is barbaric," said the mosque's president, Mohamed Yangui.Quebec police on the scene said there had been fatalities and that two people had been arrested."There are many victims ... there are deaths," a Quebec police spokesman told reporters.A witness said a heavily armed police tactical squad was seen entering the mosque. Police spokesman Etienne Doyon declined to say whether there was still a gunman inside the mosque.Police later tweeted: "The situation is under control."Yangui, who was not inside the mosque when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. He did not know how many were injured, saying they had been taken to different hospitals across Quebec City.Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Twitter: "Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families."Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them North African emigrants.In June 2016, a pig's head was left on the doorstep of the cultural centre."We are not safe here," said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque but not yesterday.Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now "very worried" and thinking of moving back to Morocco.Canadian Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said in a tweet that he was "profoundly saddened by the loss of life and wounded."Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the vast majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies.In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of the province was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood.In the neighboring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris.Zebida Bendjeddou, who left the mosque earlier yesterday evening, said the centre had received threats."In June, they'd put a pig's head in front of the mosque. But we thought: 'Oh, they're isolated events.' We didn't take it seriously. But tonight, those isolated events, they take on a different scope," she said.Bendjeddou said she had not yet confirmed the names of those killed, but added: "They're people we know, for sure. People we knew since they were little kids."REUTERS SDR 1001 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0431-1128142.Xml Canada will offer temporary residency to any travelers stranded by US President Donald Trump's orders temporarily barring people from seven Muslim-majority countries, a senior official said.Yesterday Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen told a news conference he did not know how many people might be eligible but said only a small number of passengers trying to fly to the United States from Canada had been denied boarding.Trump's abrupt decision on Friday, which also affects refugees, left people around the world uncertain of whether they would be allowed to enter the United States."Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if they need it, as we have done so in the past," Hussen said.The government of Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has so far refrained from criticizing the United States, which takes 75 per cent of all Canadian exports, preferring instead to stress Canada is open to refugees.The Canadian Council for Refugees called on Ottawa to pull put of its so-called Safe Third Country agreement with the United States, under which Canada returns asylum seekers crossing the US border.Such a move would be diplomatically insulting and Hussen said the pact would remain unchanged for now.Local and national politicians in Canada have already condemned Trump's ban. Yesterday, the opposition New Democrats called for an emergency debate in the federal Parliament.Earlier in the day, more than 200 Canadian technology company founders, executives and investors called on Ottawa to immediately give temporary residency to those displaced by Trump's order."Canadian tech companies understand the power of inclusion and diversity of thought, and that talent and skill know no borders," the letter said.Canada is eager to attract skilled tech workers from abroad while also retaining employees and students who are often lured away by global companies. More than 300,000 Canadians work in California's Silicon Valley.Bob Vaez, the Iranian-born chief executive of tech firm Event Mobi, on Sunday canceled plans to accept an industry award in Las Vegas.Trump's move could push many event organizers to seek alternative locations for their events, he said."Are they going to keep their conferences in the US, knowing that so many people are going to be barred?" he said.In November, Canada introduced new visa measures that would allow tech companies to quickly recruit foreign talent. REUTERS AKC 0409 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0432-1128083.Xml Tens of thousands of people gathered in the Myanmar city of Yangon today for the funeral of Ko Ni, a Muslim lawyer shot dead the previous day who was involved in efforts to amend a military drafted constitution.The 63-year-old was an expert in constitutional law and adviser to Aung San Suu Kyi's ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party, that came to power in April. He was also a prominent member of Myanmar's Muslim minority.His killing, amid heightened communal and religious tension in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, appears to be a rare act of political violence in the former capital that coincided with a tough security operation in a northwestern region populated mostly by Muslims.Police have arrested a 53-year-old man, suspected to be the lone gunman who shot Ko Ni in the head while the lawyer held his grandson outside Yangon's international airport on Sunday evening.He had just returned from a trip to Indonesia, where Myanmar government officials and Muslim community leaders discussed with Indonesian counterparts issues of reconciliation.Taxi driver Nay Win, 42, was also killed when he attempted to apprehend the gunman, state media reported.Police Colonel Myo Thu Soe told Reuters the suspect, Kyi Linn, was from central Myanmar's Yinmabin township who has served two stints in jail for trafficking religious antiques.Kyi Linn was last released in a 2014 amnesty by then-President Thein Sein, he said, adding that the suspect had not given clear answers during interrogation."We cannot say exactly why he killed or who was behind him," Myo Thu Soe said.Reuters was unable to contact Kyi Linn's family for comment and it was not clear if he had legal representation.An estimated 100,000 mourners, including family members, lawyers, NLD activists and members of Yangon's diplomatic corps, attended Ko Ni's funeral beginning at a Muslim cemetery in northern Yangon.Suu Kyi was not in attendance and has yet to comment on the killing. Her party said on Sunday Ko Ni's death was "a great loss for which there is no substitute".LEGAL MASTERMINDKhin Maung Htay, a colleague of Ko Ni's at the Yangon-based Laurel Law Firm, said Ko Ni was instrumental in devising the role of "state counsellor" for Suu Kyi, enabling her to lead the government.The 2008 constitution, drawn up by the then ruling military, bars Nobel laureate Suu Kyi from the presidency because she has family members who are foreign citizens.Ko Ni was working on amendments that would further challenge the role of the military, which retains a quarter of parliamentary seats and controls security ministries under the charter.Aung Shin, a member of the NLD's central committee, said the murder was a "well-planned, fearless conspiracy" to kill a man who had extensive legal expertise and an ability to communicate the flaws of the 2008 constitution to the public.Ko Ni was also spearheading a new Interfaith Harmony Bill that would include provisions on hate speech, hate crimes and discrimination, according to two experts working with him on the draft legislation.Family members and friends told Reuters that Ko Ni had received death threats connected to his political work, but the motive for the killing was not known.The timing of the killing was a matter of particular concern, said the International Crisis Group (ICG) think-tank, since it comes just months after deadly attacks on police near the border with Bangladesh blamed on insurgents from the Rohingya Muslim minority.It was essential "that no stone is left unturned in finding the truth about this incident and who may have been behind it", the Brussels-based group said in a statement.The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said on Monday 69,000 people were now estimated to have fled to Bangladesh since the launch of a sweep by the security forces in response to the attacks on Oct. 9 in which nine policemen were killed.More than 23,000 people have been internally displaced, the office said."In a context of strong anti-Muslim sentiment, rampant hate speech on social media, and virulent Buddhist nationalism propounded by some senior monks, this crime could embolden others and unleash further violence," the ICG said. REUTERS PS GC1629 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0421-1128659.Xml Oscar-winning filmmaker Asghar Farhadi will boycott this year's ceremony in protest at U.S. President Donald Trump's "unjust" ban on people from his country - Iran - and six others.Announcing his decision, the director, who won the 2012 best foreign language film award for "A Separation" and is nominated again this year, compared the Trump administration to Iranian hardliners as both use the fear of outsiders "to justify extremist and fanatic behaviour by narrow-minded individuals"."Hardliners, despite their nationalities, political arguments and wars, regard and understand the world in very much the same way," Farhadi said in a statement, published by the New York Times and some Iranian media."In order to understand the world, they have no choice but to regard it via an 'us and them' ... This is not just limited to the United States; in my country hardliners are the same," he said, announcing he would not attend the Oscars even if he were given special permission to travel.Taraneh Alidoosti, the female lead of Farhadi's "The Salesman", which is nominated for this year's foreign language Oscar, has already announced she would boycott the ceremony in protest at Trump's "racist" travel ban.Farhadi is unpopular with Iranian hardliners who criticised "A Separation" as it illustrated gender inequality in Iran and the desire by many Iranians to leave the country.Sociologist Ebrahim Fayyaz was quoted in Iranian media calling it "the worst Iranian film ever" as it was incompatible with Islamic morality and the ideal of defying the West.Trump imposed a temporary travel ban on citizens of Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen as a first step in a policy he says will keep terrorists from entering the United States.The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences called the ban "extremely troubling" after noticing that Farhadi and his cast and crew could be barred."The Academy celebrates achievement in the art of filmmaking, which seeks to transcend borders and speak to audiences around the world, regardless of national, ethnic or religious differences," it said today.REUTERS PS AN1814 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0421-1128882.Xml American coffeehouse chain, Starbucks, has promised to hire 10,000 refugees over five years in response to President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily barring refugees access to the United States and banning entry for anyone from seven majority Muslim countries. Starbuck's chief executive Howard Schultz said that he had "deep concern" about the president's order and would be taking "resolute" action, starting with offering jobs to refugees, reports the Guardian. "We are developing plans to hire 10,000 of them over five years in the 75 countries around the world where Starbucks does business," he told employees in a strongly-worded note. He added that the move was to make clear that the company "will neither stand by, nor stand silent, as the uncertainty around the new administration's actions grows with each passing day." Schultz said the initial focus would be in the U.S. and for refugees who had served as interpreters for the US military, but it is not yet clear when the five-year period would begin, or whether people would be employed direct by Starbucks or by suppliers. Technology firms were prominent among U.S .businesses voicing concern at the executive order. Earlier, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said that as an immigrant himself, he would "continue to advocate" on the issue. On Sunday, the Google co-founder and Alphabet president, Sergey Brin, was photographed among people protesting at San Francisco airport over the immigration measures. (ANI) The Ministry of Interior (MoI) said the detained Taliban leader has been identified as Abdullah and was held from the vicinity of Khanabad district in northern Kunduz province, reports Khaama News. Another senior Taliban leader identified as Abdul Wakil was also arrested during the same operation, MoI said, adding that an automatic rifle was confiscated from the detained militants. The anti-government armed militant groups including the Taliban insurgents have not commented regarding the report so far. Menwhile, the group leader of the Taliban in Zabul province, Mawlavi Hamid, was killed in a blast triggered by a premature explosion in this province. Zabul is among the relatively volatile provinces in southern Afghanistan where the Taliban insurgents are actively operating in some of its districts. Militants believed to be affiliated with the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist group have reportedly shifted to this province in a bid to expand their insurgency in some restive districts. (ANI) Austria plans to ban the Muslim face veil in public places, the centrist coalition government said today as it announced a package of policies aimed at countering the growing appeal of the far-right Freedom Party (FPO).The FPO has topped opinion polls for months, boosted by Europe's migrant crisis and the influx of large numbers of often Muslim asylum seekers, and last month its candidate came close to winning Austria's presidential election.With a parliamentary election due next year, Chancellor Christian Kern of the centre-left Social Democratic Party (SPO) is trying to regain the political initiative by forging a swift agreement with his conservative coalition partner on a package of measures ranging from immigration to education."We believe in an open society that is also based on open communication. Full-body veils in public spaces stand against that and will therefore be prohibited," said the text of the coalition agreement published on Monday.The term used would apply to the Muslim burka and niqab, which cover all or most of the face. It was not immediately clear whether the ban would include other non-Muslim garments.The FPO has called for a ban on "fascistic Islam" and Muslim symbols comparable to an existing law that forbids Nazi symbols. Mainly Catholic Austria is home to around 600,000 Muslims in a total population of about 8.7 million.UNEMPLOYMENTMembers of the conservative People's Party, the junior coalition member, have pushed for tougher security and immigration measures, including the electronic tagging of former jihadists and greater use of video surveillance, which were also included in the new agreement.The SPO has focused more on measures to cut unemployment, obtaining a programme to help over-50s find work.The deal also included a reduction in social charges for employers that take on more staff and a plan to make foreign multinationals, particularly online companies, pay the same tax on advertising revenue as newspapers.Unemployment in Austria currently stands at 5.9 per cent, according to EU-harmonised data.Earlier this month Kern proposed returning to a system that gave local workers priority for jobs in sectors that employ a high number of workers from poorer eastern European member states. A similar proposal was included in the agreement.That system was in place provisionally from 2004 to 2011 after many former Communist countries joined the bloc, and Kern has said he wants to push for Brussels to allow its reintroduction.Brussels is unlikely to accept such a demand because free movement of people is a key element of the EU's single market. Fear of unrestricted immigration from poorer member states was a key factor behind Britain's vote last June to leave the EU. REUTERS PS BL2010 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0421-1129319.Xml Norway's Lutheran Church voted today in favour of new ceremonial language that will allow its pastors to conduct same-sex marriages, bringing it into line with several other mainstream Protestant denominations abroad.Last April the annual conference of the Church - to which nearly three quarters of Norwegians said in 2015 they belonged - backed the principle of same-sex marriages, but did not agree on a wording..Monday's decision involved modifying the marriage text to make it gender-neutral, removing the words "bride" and "groom". The new liturgy will come into effect on Wednesday.In 2015 the French Protestant Church allowed gay marriage blessings, while the U.S. Presbyterian Church approved a change in the wording of its constitution to include same-sex marriage."I hope that all Churches in the world can be inspired by this new liturgy," said Gard Sandaker-Nilsen, leader of the Open Public Church, a movement within the Lutheran Church that campaigned to change the rules.Norway became the second country in the world after Denmark to allow same-sex registered partnerships in 1993, and it has allowed civil same-sex marriage since 2009.Some 73 per cent of Norwegians were members of the Lutheran Church in 2015, according to the national statistics agency. The number has gradually declined in recent decades.REUTERS PS BL2014 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0421-1129335.Xml Two more missing Pakistani activists have reappeared after vanishing earlier this month, their families told Reuters today, but relatives were unable to shed any light on who had been holding the men or why.Waqas Goraya and Ahmed Raza Naseer, who went missing from the eastern city of Lahore and from southern Punjab province, respectively, returned on Saturday, but their families waited to get them to safe places before informing the media.They were among five well known activists who went missing within days of one another in Pakistan earlier this month, only one of whom remains unaccounted for.All five had contributed to blogs or were involved in social work critical of human rights violations or the influence of the military, leading to speculation they may have been arrested - although the government has repeatedly denied police were holding the men.The military and other state agencies have declined to make any official comment.In their absence, the five were accused on social media and some mainstream television programs of blasphemy against Islam, a highly charged allegation in Pakistan that could put their lives at risk from hardline religious groups.Two of the families confirmed receiving death threats from a known Islamist militant group but asked Reuters not to publish details. The whereabouts of the fifth activist, Samar Abbas, are still unknown, his brother Ghazanfar Abbas told Reuters.Two other missing activists, writer and professor Salman Haider and blogger Aasim Saeed, also returned on Saturday.Naseer's brother Tahir said that his brother was in good health and had not spoken about who had been holding him since his disappearance on January 7."He did say that he was questioned for two days and that he had to hand over all his data, from bank details to email information," said Tahir Naseer.Waqas Goraya's wife, Mescha, said she had not yet met with her husband but confirmed speaking with him on the phone and added that he was "at a safe house" whose location "cannot be disclosed to anyone for security reasons".She said she had not asked where he had been, and did not plan to "unless he talks by himself".Goraya was visiting Pakistan from the Netherlands with his wife and son when he went missing on Jan. 4.Yesterday, activist Saeed's father told Reuters that his son had been detained by "state agencies" while visiting Pakistan from Singapore, but did not specify which one. REUTERS PS BL2023 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0421-1129345.Xml Two suspects were under arrest on Monday after a shooting at a Quebec City mosque on Sunday evening killed six people and wounded eight, but police declined to give details of their identity or possible motives."Legal procedures are now underway and we cannot make any comment on the identity of the suspects," Royal Canadian Mounted Police national security superintendent Martin Plante told a news conference. He added the suspects, both men, were not previously known to police.One suspect was arrested at the mosque, where police were called at about 8 p.m. local time, and the other turned himself about an hour later, Quebec City Police Inspector Denis Turcotte said.Police said they were confident there were no other suspects involved in the attack by two gunmen during evening prayers at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Qubec.Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau earlier called the shooting "a terrorist attack on Muslims."The suspects were students at Universit Laval, according to media reports, but police did not confirm this.The shooting came over the weekend that Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, after U.S. President Donald Trump halted the U.S. refugee program and temporarily barred citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States on national security grounds.Trump's action was widely condemned in the United States and abroad as targeting Muslims.FATHER OF FOUR AMONG THOSE KILLEDFive people were critically injured in the mosque attack and remained in intensive care, three of them in life-threatening condition, a spokeswoman for the Quebec City University Hospital said on Monday.Another 12 people were treated for minor injuries, she said.A father of four, the owner of a halal butcher near the mosque, was among those killed, said Pamela Sakinah El-hayet, a friend of one of the people at the mosque.The mosque concierge was killed, as was Ahmed Youness, a 21-year-old student, El-hayet told Reuters. One of El-hayet's friends, Youness' roommate, was in the mosque at the time of the shooting. He was unharmed, she said, but in total shock.Ali Assafiri, a student at Universit Laval, said he had been running late for the evening prayers at the mosque, near the university in the Quebec City area. When he arrived, the mosque had been transformed by police into a crime scene."Everyone was in shock," Assafiri said by phone. "It was chaos."Universit Laval is the oldest French-language university in North America, with 42,500 students.There was an outpouring of support for the mosque on social media, and vigils were planned for Montreal and Quebec City, the provincial capital, as well as Edmonton later on Monday.While the motive for the shooting was not known, incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies.Pope Francis offered his condolences to Cardinal Gerald Cyprien LaCroix, Archbishop of Quebec, who was visiting Rome on Monday. Francis said he was praying for the victims of the attack."The pope underlined how important it is in these moments that everyone remains united in prayer, Christians and Muslims," the Vatican said in a statement. REUTERS CJ BL2115 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0400-1129413.Xml An Arizona man was convicted today of charges that he provided support to Islamic State by helping a New York City college student travel to Syria, where he died fighting for the militant group.Ahmed Mohammed El Gammal, 44, was found guilty by a federal jury in Manhattan on all four counts he faced, including providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization. REUTERS AKC BL2332 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0432-1129519.Xml France vowed today to act as defender of Iran's nuclear deal, which US President Donald Trump has threatened to tear up, but said it was imperative Tehran abide strictly by the conditions of the accord.Arriving in the Iranian capital for a two-day visit, French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said it was in the "common interest" that the 2015 accord under which Tehran agreed to curb its nuclear programme in return for lifted sanctions was obeyed.During the US election race Trump had branded it "the worst deal ever negotiated", telling voters he would either rip it up or seek a better agreement."I'm coming as the defender of the accord, but to be vigilant and explain that they (the Iranians) must be irreproachable," Jean-Marc Ayrault told reporters after landing in Tehran."We harbour real concerns about the US administration's attitude towards this agreement," he said.The deal was brokered by the United States, Russia, China, Britain, Germany and France. Paris took one of the hardest lines against Tehran in the negotiations, but has been quick to restore trade ties.Major French corporations including planemaker Airbus , oil major Total and automobile manufacturers Peugeot and Renault have all signed deals.Ayrault said that while Tehran had "largely" kept to the terms of the deal, it had pushed the spirit of the accord over the past year by carrying out several ballistic missile tests."We want this agreement to be respected. It is in the common interest of the international community that it is," Ayrault said.The foreign minister is due to meet Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and the powerful Secretary of Supreme National Security Council, Ali Shamkhani.The visit, which includes an economic conference where some contracts may be concluded, will provide an opportunity for talks on Syria. Paris is a vociferous opponent of Iran's backing of Syria's leader, Bashar al-Assad."We will discuss our disagreements, notably on Syria. "We had hoped Iran would be less aggressive in the region," Ayrault said, referring to the period since the nuclear deal.Yesterday, Trump spoke by telephone with Saudi Arabia's King Salman, a close US-ally in the Middle East. A White House statement said the two leaders agreed on the need to address "Iran's destabilizing regional activities." REUTERS AKC BL2337 -- (Reuters) -- C-1-1-DL0432-1129522.Xml Demonstrators participate in a protest against U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order barring U.S. entry to all regugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens, in front of the White House, in Washington D.C., the Unite States, Jan. 29, 2017. (Xinhua/Yin Bogu) WASHINGTON, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Thousands of protesters rallied in front of the White House on Sunday while demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily barring all refugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens from entry into the U.S.. The Lafayette Square before the White House was packed by protesters against Trump's ban from noontime as more demonstrators were still arriving, witnesses said. Demonstrators participate in a protest against U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order barring U.S. entry to all regugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens, in front of the White House, in Washington D.C., the Unite States, Jan. 29, 2017. (Xinhua/Yin Bogu) They wielded poster boards bearing messages such as "Ban Trump" "Refugees Welcome" and chanted "No hate! No fear! Refugees are welcome here!" Protests are also scheduled throughout the day in Philadelphia, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle and Chicago, said a CNN report. In Boston's Copley Square, thousands of people also gathered to protest the immigration ban, according to a report from the USA Today. Demonstrators participate in a protest against U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order barring U.S. entry to all regugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens near the White House, in Washington D.C., the Unite States, Jan. 29, 2017. (Xinhua/Yin Bogu) Earlier on Sunday, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway said the international travel disruptions in the wake of the ban was "a small price to pay" for greater security of the United States. On contrary, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Sunday said Democrats are considering legal actions to overturn the order. Protesters hold posters at the San Francisco International Airport in the United States, Jan. 28, 2017.Protesters took to San Francisco International Airport on Saturday afternoon to denounce U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order banning entry of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries. (Xinhua/Xu Yong) A federal judge in New York on Saturday night granted an emergency stay temporarily halting the removal of people who, though with previously approved refugee applications or with valid visas, had ben detained following Trump's refugee and immigration order. Similar rulings were later issued in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state, said a TheHill news daily report. Under the order, refugees from all over the world will be suspended U.S. entry for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Demonstrators participate in a protest against U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order barring U.S. entry to all regugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens near the White House, in Washington D.C., the Unite States, Jan. 29, 2017. (Xinhua/Yin Bogu) WASHINGTON, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Donald Trump and King Salman bin Abd Al-Aziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia on Sunday agreed to support setting up safe zones in Syria and Yemen. In a telephone talk between Trump and King Salman on Sunday, the leaders also agreed to support other ideas to help the refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts, the White House said in a statement, without elaborating. Trump has called for creating a safe zone in Syria, seeing the plan as a way to stem immigration of Syrian refugees to Europe and elsewhere. Over the phone, Trump and King Salman agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of radical Islamic terrorism and working jointly to address challenges to regional peace and security, including the conflicts in Syria and Yemen. They also agreed to "rigorously" enforce the agreement on Iran's nuclear programs, which Trump has expressed opposition to, and address Iran's "destabilizing" regional activities, according to the statement. In addition, the two leaders discussed an invitation from the Saudi King for Trump to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future, economically and socially, for the people of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the region. DUBLIN, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Irish police said on Sunday they have seized guns, ammunition and up to 30 kg of heroin and cocaine in an operation targeting the organized crime gangs. The operation was made on Saturday evening during the search of a house in County Kildare, about 50 km from Dublin. An AK47 assault rifle and a quantity of ammunition were found during the operation, police said, adding that they uncovered 20 kg of cocaine and 10 kg of heroin, with estimated street value of 3 million euros. The firearms and drugs were hidden in various rooms around the house, some within furniture, others in concealed compartments, according to police. No arrests have yet been made, police said. In a statement, Irish Tanaiste (Deputy Prime Minister) and Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald said Saturday evening's operation underlines again the fact that police are "being relentless and resourceful in tackling the menace of organized crime gangs." U.S. President Donald Trump speaks by phone with the Saudi Arabia's King Salman in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, U.S. January 29, 2017. (REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst) WASHINGTON, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Donald Trump and King Salman bin Abd Al-Aziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia on Sunday agreed to support setting up safe zones in Syria and Yemen. In a telephone talk between Trump and King Salman on Sunday, the leaders also agreed to support other ideas to help the refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts, the White House said in a statement, without elaborating. Trump has called for creating a safe zone in Syria, seeing the plan as a way to stem immigration of Syrian refugees to Europe and elsewhere. Over the phone, Trump and King Salman agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of radical Islamic terrorism and working jointly to address challenges to regional peace and security, including the conflicts in Syria and Yemen. They also agreed to "rigorously" enforce the agreement on Iran's nuclear programs, which Trump has expressed opposition to, and address Iran's "destabilizing" regional activities, according to the statement. In addition, the two leaders discussed an invitation from the Saudi King for Trump to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future, economically and socially, for the people of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the region. OTTAWA, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Canada's Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said Canadian permanent residents from seven countries targeted by a U.S. President Donald trump's executive order can still enter the United States. Trump Friday signed the executive order which prohibits citizens of Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya from entering the U.S. in the coming three months, and also bans refugees from Syria indefinitely. Trump said the order would help protect Americans from terrorist attacks. Canada was caught up in the executive order because of some Canadian dual citizens. Hussen told a press conference in Ottawa Sunday that Canada has been assured by the White House that they can enter the U.S. if they have a valid Canadian permanent resident card and a passport from one of the seven countries affected. Dual citizens with a Canadian passport are also allowed into the U.S. Saturday, the U.S. State Department said Canadians with dual citizenship from the seven countries will be denied entry for the next three months along with citizens from those countries. Hussen says Canada will provide temporary shelter to any people stranded in the country because of the ban, but he noted that there are currently no people stuck in Canadian airports. Hussen said his ministry has been in contact with American officials throughout the weekend. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau Saturday expressed Canada's welcome to refugees a day after Trump signed the executive order. "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength," Trudeau tweeted Saturday. He followed it up by tweeting a photo of himself greeting a young Syrian refugee. WASHINGTON, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Leaders of the United States and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) committed themselves on Sunday to further strengthening cooperation on fighting radical Islamic terrorism, the White House said. U.S. President Donald Trump spoke by phone with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan of the UAE and they reaffirmed the strong partnership between the two countries, the White House said in a statement. They also discussed recent developments in the Middle East, including the fight against the Islamic State (IS) group and joint efforts to address the conflict in Yemen and elsewhere in the region. During the talk, Trump raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative, according to the statement. In addition, the two leaders underscored their commitment to close consultations on issues of mutual concern. SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- A University of California, Berkeley, researcher has described how to make and measure the properties of a crystal that have a structure that repeats in time, namely a time crystal. Norman Yao, a UC Berkeley assistant professor of physics, has also predicted what the various phases surrounding the time crystal should be akin to the liquid and gas phases of ice in a paper published online recently in the journal Physical Review Letters. While conventional crystals have an atomic structure that repeats in space, like the carbon lattice of a diamond, time crystals repeat in time because they are kicked periodically, sort of like tapping Jell-O repeatedly to get it to jiggle, Yao was quoted as saying in a news release from UC Berkeley. The breakthrough, Yao argued, is less that these particular crystals repeat in time than that they are the first of a large class of new materials that are intrinsically out of equilibrium, unable to settle down to the motionless equilibrium of, for example, a diamond or ruby. "This is a new phase of matter, period, but it is also really cool because it is one of the first examples of non-equilibrium matter," he said. "For the last half-century, we have been exploring equilibrium matter, like metals and insulators. We are just now starting to explore a whole new landscape of non-equilibrium matter." Two groups followed Yao's blueprint and have already created the first-ever time crystals. The groups at the University of Maryland and Harvard University reported their successes, using two totally different setups, in two papers posted online last year, both with Yao as a co-author. Time crystals were first proposed in 2012 by Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek, and last year theoretical physicists at Princeton University and UC Santa Barbara's Station Q independently proved that such a crystal could be made. According to Yao, the UC Berkeley group was "the bridge between the theoretical idea and the experimental implementation." The time crystal created by Chris Monroe and his colleagues at the University of Maryland employs a conga line of 10 ytterbium ions whose electron spins interact, similar to the qubit systems being tested as quantum computers. To keep the ions out of equilibrium, the researchers alternately hit them with one laser to create an effective magnetic field and a second laser to partially flip the spins of the atoms, repeating the sequence many times. As the spins interacted, the atoms settled into a stable, repetitive pattern of spin flipping that defines a crystal. Yao worked closely with Monroe as his Maryland team made the new material, helping them focus on the important properties to measure to confirm that the material was in fact a stable or rigid time crystal. Yao also described how the time crystal would change phase, like an ice cube melting, under different magnetic fields and laser pulsing. From the perspective of quantum mechanics, electrons can form crystals that do not match the underlying spatial translation symmetry of the orderly, three-dimensional array of atoms, Yao said. This breaks the symmetry of the material and leads to unique and stable properties we define as a crystal. A time crystal breaks time symmetry. In this particular case, the magnetic field and laser periodically driving the ytterbium atoms produce a repetition in the system at twice the period of the drivers, something that would not occur in a normal system. "Wouldn't it be super weird if you jiggled the Jell-O and found that somehow it responded at a different period?" Yao said. "But that is the essence of the time crystal. You have some periodic driver that has a period 'T', but the system somehow synchronizes so that you observe the system oscillating with a period that is larger than 'T'." by Evan Duggan VANCOUVER, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau led a procession of political leaders, community groups and dancers through Vancouver's historic Chinatown Sunday morning for the city's annual Chinese New Year Parade. Under a heavy rain and flanked by Canadian Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan and Chinese Consul General to Vancouver, Liu Fei, Trudeau walked surrounded by photographers and his stern security unit up Pender Street - the main artery Vancouver's 130-year-old Chinese district. Spectators crammed shoulder-to-shoulder along the sidewalks as fire crackers snapped over a din of drums. British Columbia's Premier Christy Clark greeted spectators and handed out lucky red envelopes to children along the 1.3-kilometer parade route, wishing them a happy new year. Spectators watched from above from the balcony of Chin Wing Chun building, one of the many historic Chinese association buildings that have resided along Pender Street for decades. Lion dancers dressed in silver, purple and red lurched and bobbed to the backing of drum beats outside the Chinese Cultural Centre. The event marks the largest assembly of lion dancers in all of Canada and attracts nearly 100,000 spectators. At one intersection a massive golden dragon writhed and danced under the control of about a dozen young men. Vancouver is home to more than 400,000 Chinese-Canadians. Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson said the event comes at an important time as a showcase of diversity and inclusion. It shows a contrast between Canada and what he called a "distressing" immigration executive order issued over the weekend by U.S. President Donald Trump that banned travel to the U.S. by citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries. "We're marching in our streets to celebrate multiculturalism and and we need to stake that strong role as a city and a country," he told Xinhua. "I love the Chinese New Year Parade because it brings all cultures together to celebrate the Asian culture and that's what we do in Vancouver," he said. "It's inclusive of all cultures but we highlight the strengths of each people. It's a very mixed crowd celebrating the lunar New Year." Richard Lee, a member of British Columbia's provincial government, told Xinhua he has been attending the parade since the 1980s. The parade used to attract thousands, and now it attracts tens of thousands, he said. "It's a new start to the year. We forget the past and we look forward to a bright future," Lee said. "The year of the rooster is very positive. When the rooster makes some noise, it's the beginning of the day. It's a bright future." Penny Lim joined spectators on the sidewalk near the Millennium Gate, a massive archway that signals the entry to Chinatown on Pender Street. She gripped a camera that hung around her neck. She said her father moved to Vancouver from Guangdong province. Born here, Lim has been coming to the parade for decades to film and photograph the lion dancers. "The colors are quite exciting," she said. "When I was young, I didn't appreciate them, but the combinations of orange, pink, yellow; I think is quite vibrant." She said the event is a showcase of Canadian diversity. "It's a connection to our heritage, and mainly it's festive and a lot of fun. Great for people-watching and great for photography." WELLINGTON, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- New Zealand's top two export commodities, meat and dairy, both fell in value in 2016, the government statistics agency said Monday. The total value of all export goods was 48.4 billion NZ dollars (35.24 billion U.S. dollars) in 2016, down 544 million NZ dollars (395.87 million U.S. dollars) from the previous year, according to Statistics New Zealand. It was the second annual fall in a row for exports. The biggest fall by value was for meat and edible offal, the second largest export group, with sales down 909 million NZ dollars (681.84 million U.S. dollars) to 5.9 billion NZ dollars (4.29 billion U.S. dollars), and the quantity down 7.4 percent. The United States accounted for three-quarters of the fall in beef, while the European Union accounted for nearly half of the fall in lamb. "The large fall in meat exports for 2016 reflects a decline from the record meat season in 2015 for both value and quantity," international statistics senior manager Nicola Growden said in a statement. "The 2016 year's meat exports have returned to levels similar to those seen in 2014." The quantity of milk powder, butter, and cheese exported rose to a new high of 3 million tonnes, but the value of dairy exports dropped by almost 3 percent 11.2 billion NZ dollars (8.15 billion U.S. dollars). The quantity of dairy exports had been rising since 2013 and was 14 percent higher than then, with China accounting for 25 percent of the total in 2016, up from 23 percent in 2015. The value of imported goods was 51.6 billion NZ dollars (37.56 billion U.S. dollars) in 2016, down 1.7 percent from the annual high in 2015. The fall was led by cheaper oil and petrol, and partly offset by a rise in cars, trucks and parts. In 2016 the annual trade deficit of 3.2 billion NZ dollars (2.33 billion U.S. dollars), or 6.6 percent of exports was smaller than the deficit of 3.5 billion NZ dollars (2.55 billion U.S. dollars) for the 2015 year, which saw the largest annual deficit since 2008. by Peter Mertz DENVER, the UNITED STATES, Jan. 28, (Xinhua) -- Colorado's premier Chinese New Year's party made history in 2017 by drawing huge crowds to downtown Denver's Civic Center Park. It was the first time the Yip Foundation's event was held at a national-caliber, historic venue, and more than 500 people crowed in the Year of the Rooster with rousing song and cheer. "Tremendous energy here tonight, everybody's having fun," said Guinness Book record yo-yo holder John Higby, 41, who just returned from a successful tour in China. "China is such an unusual place filled with good people," Higby told Xinhua Saturday night, as the crowd cheered behind him. Higby was one of more than 20 performers and entertainers on hand to excite a crowd that was filled with new millennials, as well as Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper. "Look around this room," Hickenlopper told Xinhua. "It is filled with excitement - with Latinos, Chinese, blacks, whites, Indonesians - all kinds of people from all walks of life," Hickenlooper said. "This is what America is all about." Sounds of frivolity reached the 12-meter ceilings of the 1909 neoclassic building, and red drapes, lanterns and banners -- traditional Chinese New Year colors -- adorned the spaces below. Loud sounds of music, song, and mirth filled the air. The annual Yip New Year's party also doubles as a critically needed fundraiser toward furthering the group's focus on helping poor children in rural areas. In 2017, the group's primary focus will be rural, poor children in China and southeastern Colorado," Yip Foundation cofounder Jimmy Yip said. Yips said although China, like America, had money, sometimes impoverished, remote areas got overlooked, and that's where the foundation stepped in. "What an amazing, direct connection between China and the USA," said Yip Foundation Vice-President Okie Arnot, a volunteer who helped the Yips with their first fundraiser 15 years ago, "It's all about helping children." It began in 2012, shortly after Linda and Jimmy Yip's 19-year-old son Nathan was unexpectedly and tragically killed in a car accident. Since 2002, the foundation raised more than 4 million U.S. Dollars - money targeted toward building schools and orphanages and helping poor children in Africa, South America, China and the United States. "They turned a tragedy into triumph," said Gary Corbett, one of hundreds of volunteers who donated time Saturday to help the Yip Foundation raise money. "That is something unique and very attractive about the Yip Foundation, it is almost completely volunteer," Arnot told Xinhua, "The money goes straight to the children." The Saturday night party lasted until midnight, and used all three-floors of the civil center, that re-opened in September 2016 after a 6 million U.S. Dollars renovation. 2017 celebrants enjoyed delicious food and drink, cross-cultural games, music, and crowded red-laced booths filled with calligraphers, fortunetellers, and cultural knick-knacks shops. "It's all about closing cultural gaps, and that is necessary for peace," said Corbett, an auctioneer who was dressed in a 19th-century, vintage, all-white suit and tails and a white, wide-brimmed hat. In the early hours of the party, Corbett took to one stage wielding a microphone, encouraging donations to support the foundation. Within minutes he had raised close to 100,000 U.S. dollars. "Their role helping children in rural Colorado is simply amazing," said Hickenlooper of the Yips. "Education breeds confidence, and confidence breeds hope," the governor said. "A lack of education shouldn't define your success, and thanks to the Yips, every town in Colorado is sharing in that success," he said. "The Yip's goal in four years is that every town in rural Colorado will have abundant, redundant broadband," Hickenlooper said as the crowd roared in appreciation. SYDNEY, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Leading Australian technology companies are livid after U.S. President Donald Trump announced changes to visa laws on Sunday, and are petitioning the Australian government to act. The changes could see workers affected across the sector, with industry group TechSydney saying many employees are dual-nationals who are required to visit, and work in the United States as part of their duties. Hichame Assi, HotelsCombined chief executive, and also a dual national British-Syrian who moved to Australia in 2008, is one of those affected, and can no longer travel to the U.S. for the next 90 days due to the new rules. "We employ people of all nationalities, including dual-nationality Australians," Assi said in a statement on Monday. "These developments in the U.S. are not only disruptive to our business and our people, they're very troubling and are creating more tensions at a time when empathy is required." The new visa rules will not result in any changes to citizens solely of Australia, and 36 other countries that are currently allied with the United States. Demonstrators participating in a protest against U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily barring all refugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens from entry into the U.S. march towards Capitol Hill in Washington D.C., the Unite States, on Jan. 29, 2017. Protesters rallied in front of the White House on Sunday while demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily barring all refugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens from entry into the United States. (Xinhua/Yin Bogu) WASHINGTON/NEW YORK, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Thousands of protesters rallied in front of the White House on Sunday while demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily barring all refugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens from entry into the U.S.. Hundreds of protesters gathered Sunday at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York to demonstrate against the ban. The protesters, hoisting signs like "Bridges, not wall" "Dump Trump," chanted loudly "No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here," and "Build a wall, we'll tear it down" in front of JFK's Terminal 4. Steve Golden is one of a group of volunteer attorneys that are trying to help those held up by custom officials at JFK since Saturday. They did not sleep over the past 24 hours. He escorted an unidentified lady who was just freed by the custom to her relatives' vehicle. "Most of these people are green card holders, some are people with visas, lots of people have families, homes and pets here, they are simply being detained because of the new process. I believe the executive was unconstitutional." Golden told Xinhua. Janie Lynch, a teacher from Flushing, Queens, said, "we are here because we are all brother and sisters, and the U.S. is supposed to be open to everybody, whether you are tired, are poor, are yearning for free." "I just cannot let this happen, injustice will end to be injustice to everybody, we simply cannot sit back, we cannot remain neutral on a moving train, it's happening." In the city's downtown battery park, hundreds of protesters also braved the winter chill to demonstrate against the president's executive order. The Lafayette Square before the White House was packed by protesters against Trump's ban from noontime as more demonstrators were still arriving, witnesses said. They wielded poster boards bearing messages such as "Ban Trump" "Refugees Welcome" and chanted "No hate! No fear! Refugees are welcome here!" Protests are also scheduled throughout the day in Philadelphia, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle and Chicago, said a CNN report. In Boston's Copley Square, thousands of people also gathered to protest the immigration ban, according to a report from the USA Today. Earlier on Sunday, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway said the international travel disruptions in the wake of the ban was "a small price to pay" for greater security of the United States. On contrary, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Sunday said Democrats are considering legal actions to overturn the order. A federal judge in New York on Saturday night granted an emergency stay temporarily halting the removal of people who, though with previously approved refugee applications or with valid visas, had ben detained following Trump's refugee and immigration order. Similar rulings were later issued in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state, said a TheHill news daily report. Under the order, refugees from all over the world will be suspended U.S. entry for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Demonstrators participate in a protest against U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily barring all refugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens from entry into the U.S. near the White House in Washington D.C., the Unite States, on Jan. 29, 2017. Protesters rallied in front of the White House on Sunday while demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily barring all refugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens from entry into the United States. (Xinhua/Yin Bogu) CANBERRA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Australian government will not scrap its renewable energy targets (RETs) despite criticism from former Prime Minister Tony Abbott, the Education Minister Simon Birmingham said on Monday. Abbott, who was ousted by Malcolm Turnbull in September, 2015, has voiced concerns that the government is "losing touch" with its traditional voters by keeping its current renewable energy targets. But Birmingham, speaking to Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) radio on Monday, said the government was committed to doing its bit to reduce the effects of climate change. He said the government's 23 percent target was reasonable compared to the opposition's plans for a 50 percent target. "We have no plans to change it and the real focus of the debate around the RETs shouldn't be our 23 percent target by 2020, it should be how (Opposition Leader) Bill Shorten is going to actually address the 50 percent target the Labor Party announced, what on earth that will cost, how on earth it will be implemented," Birmingham said. On Sunday, Abbott said the Turnbull government must scrap the RETs or 'face the fury' of disgruntled Liberal voters. He predicted that the added public cost to achieve the renewable energy targets would not be welcomed. "Our own policy is to lift renewable power from 15 percent to 23 percent within four years at the cost of 750 U.S dollars per household," Abbott told a Young Liberals conference in Adelaide on Sunday. "This is where the public are not mugs. This is why our first big fight this year must be to stop any further mandatory use of renewable power." Abbott's comments come after it was revealed newly-inaugurated U.S President Donald Trump was considering scrapping his own nation's RETs and withdrawing from the Paris climate change agreement. Also on Monday, Birmingham rejected Abbott's claims the Turnbull government was stagnating; the Education Minister said Parliament had been "getting a lot done" since the government was re-elected in July last year. "Of course in the last few months of last year we managed to get through significant pieces of legislation that had been stalled or delayed in the previous parliament: the Australian Building and Construction Commission, the Registered Organisations (bill), tax cuts for hardworking middle income Australians, changes to support volunteer firefighters, significant budget savings through our omnibus savings bill," Birmingham said. "I think the Turnbull government's getting a lot done, we have a lot on our agenda, and we're going to keep working hard and implementing it." Meanwhile government backbencher John Alexander has said the Parliament needed a shift from its current 'adversarial' nature to be one which is more complimentary of good policies in order to 'get more done' for the Australian people. He said it was often the case that policy was howled down by the opposing party purely because it was easier than agreeing on "positive ideas". "I think we need a contest of positive ideas to find vision and to find better policies," Alexander said. "As soon as somebody comes up with an idea and puts it out, it's a targeted attack, and that constricts the development of great policy and I'd like to see a more positive attitude." JOHANNESBURG, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- South Africa and China need more documentaries and films with storylines that people can relate to, a South African filmmaker said on Sunday. Noxolo Bhengu shot a documentary last year in Nanjing, China about her life there. The documentary, titled "The Mould," will be released mid 2017 on the local South African and international film festival circuits. The documentary portrays Bhengu's life leaving South Africa for China to make her dream come true, a road traveled by few. It features her life in China during the past two years. In an interview with Xinhua, Bhengu said she had to get rid of stereotypes to get used to life in China. "I discarded many stereotypes that I had and instead, I opened myself up to laugh, eat and live, speak, like the Chinese locals do," Bhengu said. "What I have learnt through this documentary film and my life in China was incredible." The documentary shows that it is possible to achieve one's dreams if one is resilient and opens up to the world. She said the documentary is meant to awaken dormant dreams and realize them. "It's about silencing everything that tricks your mind and your entire being into believing that you can't do it. It's about opening yourself up to people and their environments," said Bhengu. "Destiny helpers are everywhere. Even in the most painful and isolating places. They are there. It's about wholeheartedly being yourself." Bhengu is passionate about making documentaries that touch on what people face in their daily lives. Many ordinary Chinese people appear in the documentary, including students, street artists, dancers and curious on-lookers they met while shooting the documentary. These people they met while filming started as curious onlookers. They became friends of Bhengu and "then powerful subjects whom Bhengu interviews and eventually become integrated into her China story." She said the Chinese people who feature in the documentary are part of the "mould" because they formed her community and shaped her world and contributed to how she experienced China. Talking about China and South Africa or Africa, Bhengu said, "We are so closed off to each other. We rely on cultural stereotypes presented to us in films and elsewhere on television. Most of these stereotypes are hyper presentations and some are completely false." "Framing of our differences and similarities needs to come from a place of sincerity, it needs to come directly from the people," she said. The director and cinematographer of the documentary, Lucy Jacobs, said, "The possibility of continuing 'The Mould' story into another format such as television and thus reaching into the untapped artistry that exists in China is an exciting prospect." "I am open to document more journeys less traveled through cross-artistic exchanges between South African and Chinese nationals," Jacobs said. Jacobs said as members of the young generation, they should create content which reflects an updated and vibrant picture of China and South Africa. MANILA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has accused the United States of building "depots" in the Philippines to store live ammunition, warning that he would abrogate a bilateral treaty if Washington is indeed building permanent structures on Philippine soil. "Here is my worry. They (The Americans) are making depots, they are unloading arms in the Philippines now, in Palawan, Cagayan de Oro and Pampanga," he told a news conference in the presidential palace after midnight Sunday. "I am serving notice to the Armed Forces of the U.S.: Do not do it. I will not allow it," Duterte said, citing a provision in the Visiting Forces Agreement signed by both countries that no permanent facilities should be built on the Philippine territory. He said "a depot by any other name is a depot ... It is prohibited under the law. It's not allowed by the treaty," he said. Duterte said building a depot and stoking them with live ammunition is dangerous to the Philippines and its people, describing it as a magnet for attack. "I won't allow that. You place us all in danger," he said, vowing to stop the construction. Philippine Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said last week that the U.S. military will start building facilities in Philippine military camps this year. Lorenzana told reporters that the plan is part of the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) that Washington and Manila signed in 2014. Aside from the Basa Air Base in Pampanga province near Subic and Clark, the former U.S. military bases that were converted into economic zones, the U.S. armed forces also plan to build facilities in Antonio Bautista Air Base located in Palawan, the Fort Magsaysay in Nueva Ecija province on Luzon island, Lumbia Air Base in Cagayan de Oro province in the southern Philippines, and Mactan-Benito Ebuen Air Base in Cebu in central Philippines. The Philippine constitution bars the presence of foreign military bases, troops, or facilitates on Philippine soil. However, Duterte said the U.S. troops can still conduct joint military exercises with Philippines troops. CANBERRA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Australian mental health service ReachOut on Monday urged students, teachers and parents to "act early" to prevent bullying, after it was revealed a quarter of young Australians were bullied in the past 12 months. ReachOut surveyed 14 to 25-year-olds across the nation, and results showed that one in four had been bullied in the past year. Just more than half of all reported bullying cases occurred at high school, but, surprisingly, 25 percent of respondents who had been bullied had experienced it at a workplace. A quarter of all incidences also occurred in an online environment. ReachOut CEO Jono Nicholas told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) that it was important to call out bullying early and at the source. "We know this is a really big concern for young people and their parents," Nicholas said. He added that victims of bullying are often too scared to speak out to parents or teachers, so help from the outside could help end the cycle. "Often people hope that it will go away, hope that if they're quiet it will magically change," he said. "The most important thing to do is to act early." One former high school student, Isabel, 20, said while she was bullied for only a year throughout high school, she still felt the residual effects in her everyday life. Meanwhile, Nicholas said there were programs and pathways in place to help those who are bullied end the cycle. "We want young people, who experience bullying, and their parents to know that you don't have to put up with it," he said. "There are things you can do right now to address bullying behavior." SYDNEY, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Victoria Police have denied that they have become "risk averse" after the Bourke Street Mall tragedy in which five people were killed. Graham Ashton, chief commissioner of Victoria Police, said that it's a myth that police are anything but tough on crime. "There's a bit of a myth around that the fact that we're somehow soft on crime - nothing could be further from the truth," Ashton said in comments published by The Guardian on Monday. "People can talk about being hard, people like to think they're hard and tough - the fact is we have been hard, we have been tough and we've been consistently like that since I've been in this role." Dimitrious Gargasoulas, 26, was formally charged with five counts of murder in January after he allegedly drove his car into the pedestrian-only section of the Bourke Street shopping mall in Melbourne's CBD, killing five. It has since been revealed that Victoria Police officers had multiple opportunities to stop Gargasoulas' vehicle earlier in the day, requests that were denied by police chiefs. Former chief commissioner Kel Glare, who ran Victoria Police from 1987-1992, became the latest former police chief to attach the state's response to a law and order "crisis." Glare's group, the Community Advocacy Alliance, said modern policing is not working. "We're being dismissed as dinosaurs that don't understand modern policing," Glare told Melbourne radio station 3AW. "But modern policing has got us to this point." The group says policing has become "risk averse" and chases needed to happen. "In my view, in most instances, you have to chase," Glare said. "There will be accidents and the community and the police will just have to accept that." SYDNEY, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Low job numbers and slow population growth continue to plague the growth of Tasmania's economy, a report has found. The Deloitte Access Economic report, released on Monday, said the state had stable growth in most areas, particularly retail, domestic visitor numbers and house prices in Hobart. Chris Richardson, an economist with Deloitte, said the steady growth was largely due to the state not being impacted by the "mining bust" and strong spending in recent years. "This is a state that since the middle of 2013 has been spending at the same rate as the rest of Australia," Richardson told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) on Monday. "That is a relatively good outcome given that Tasmania has rather weaker population growth." The report noted that while the state's population growth was at its strongest in five years, it was still weak compared to the rest of Australia. Richardson also pointed out that employment remained a problem, with the state having fewer full-time jobs than six years ago. "Over the past five years or so there's been no net gain in jobs in Tasmania," he said. "If you divide the overall job numbers into full-timers and part-timers there are now fewer full-timers than there were back in 2011." Peter Gutwein, Tasmania's Treasurer, said while the report was encouraging, more work was needed. "That is why job creation and economic growth remains our number one priority, and why we have implemented a Northern Economic Stimulus package, so that we can continue to grow the economy and create jobs," he said. People who have been rescued after their boat sank off Malaysia's Sabah state arrive in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, on Jan. 30, 2017. (Xinhua) KOTA KINABALU, Malaysia, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Three Chinese tourists on board a boat which sank off Malaysia's Sabah state on North Borneo were confirmed dead early Monday after being rescued. Three Chinese tourists have passed away among the 25 people rescued so far, while six people remained missing, said Ahmad Puzi Ab Kahar, Director General of Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency. The Chinese tourists who were rescued and the bodies of those passed away arrived in Kota Kinabalu early Monday. Chen Peijie, Chinese Consulate General in Kota Kinabalu, said the surviving Chinese tourists suffered different degrees of injuries and would be sent to nearby hospitals for treatment. Shahidan Kassim, a minister in the Malaysia's Prime Minister's Department, told a press conference Sunday night that 23 people were rescued by tug boats and fishermen, after the skipper and a crew member were rescued earlier on Sunday. According to him, the skipper said the boat was broken by strong wave before wrecked in bad weather and rough sea. The boat went missing on Saturday when travelling from Kota Kinabalu, the state capital, to Pulau Mengalum, a popular tourist island, 60 km west to Kota Kinabalu. A total of 31 people were on board, including 28 tourists from China and three crew members. Shahidan said Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, maritime police as well as Malaysian navy and airforce have joined the search efforts. CARACAS, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Six people died on Saturday after a small plane crashed in Venezuela, authorities said Sunday. The BE-58 aircraft was en route from the northern Venezuelan city of Barcelona to the touristic area of Margarita off the South American country's northern coast when it went down, according to a press release from the attorney general's office. Other details of the flight were not released, and the cause of the crash is yet to be determined. The attorney general has launched a probe, said the statement. YANGON, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar's ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party has condemned the assassination of its legal adviser U Ko Ni, calling for arrest of the mastermind behind the plot, the NLD said on Monday. Saddened by the assassination, the NLD said the death of U Ko Ni is an irreparable loss to the party and State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi, denouncing the assassination plot as a terrorist act that opposes the path of the NLD. The party led by Suu Kyi called for non-extreme acts in response to the incident and staying in peace to cope with it, while continuing implementation of the party's political path. The NLD's legal adviser was gunned down at the Yangon international Airport Sunday afternoon upon his arrival back from Indonesia. The gunman also killed a taxi driver who had tried to capture him before he was arrested by the police and bystanders. U Ko Ni was shot in the head at point-blank range by the gunman at the airport's taxi stand near terminal-1. Initial investigation revealed that the attacker U Kyi Lin was a resident in Mandalay region. U Ko Ni was a prominent practicing lawyer and consulted various clients for the past four decades. He established the Laurel Law Firm in 1995. U Ko Ni's funeral will be held on Monday, according to the 88-Generation Peace and Open Society. SYDNEY, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- An Australian investment banker has been sentenced to a year in jail on Monday, after releasing fake news' to the ASX about a small mining company receiving a line of credit from China. Benjamin David Kirkpatrick, 44, former executive chairman of Waratah Resources, pleaded guilty to breaching disclosure requirements and authorising false information subsequently released to the stock market. In 2013, Kirkpatrick's firm made an announcement to the ASX detailing an alleged 100 million Australian dollar trade finance facility with the Bank of China, which according to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission "no such facility had been established or agreed upon". Kirkpatrick allowed the misinformation to circulate for a period of 11 days, and Waratah was found to have breached its legal obligations to its clients. Before taking up the position at Waratah, Kilpatrick had served as a director at UBS in Sydney, and was also a senior investment banker at Macquarie Bank. Due to the conviction, Kilpatrick is banned from managing a corporation for five years. WELLINGTON, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The 250th anniversary of the first encounters between New Zealand's indigenous Maori and the first British explorers to the country will be marked with a national commemoration, Arts, Culture and Heritage Minister Maggie Barry said Monday. The "First Encounters 250" series of events would commemorate the early meeting of Maori and Europeans during Captain James Cook's 1769 voyage to New Zealand, Barry said in a statement. The government had committed 3.5 million NZ dollars (2.54 million U.S. dollars) to a commemorative voyage around New Zealand by a flotilla including a replica of Cook's ship, the Endeavor, Barry said. The Endeavor replica would visit four of the main James Cook landing sites as well as other harbors from October to December 2019. Jenny Shipley, New Zealand's first woman prime minister, who led the country from 1997 to 1999, would chair the National Coordinating Committee for First Encounters 250. "It is a commemoration for all New Zealanders to own, a commemoration which will lead to a greater understanding of our unique heritage in the Pacific and who we are as New Zealanders," Shipley said in a statement. "The flotilla will be a celebration of two epic voyaging traditions - Polynesian and European - and the historic foundations of our nation." A national opening ceremony would be staged in the eastern North Island city of Gisborne in October 2019, to be followed by scientific conferences, cultural performances and exhibitions. "This anniversary will be a spectacular three-month-long event which will provide impetus for tourism and create significant opportunities for regional economic development," said Shipley. Further details of the commemoration would be announced later this year. The event is likely to rekindle debate over the events that followed, including the British colonization of New Zealand, or Aotearoa as it is known in Maori, and decades of bloody war between the two races. In October last year, Maori groups named Oct. 28 as a national day to commemorate the 19th Century wars fought against the Britain and its colonial settlers. The British Crown signed a treaty with the Maori tribal chiefs in 1840, promising to respect the lands and rights of the indigenous people, but a series of battles in the ensuing years saw vast tracts of land confiscated and turned over to colonists. Over the last two decades, successive governments have negotiated settlements of reparation with various tribal groups, but resentment has continued at the lack of recognition of what were once known as the "Maori Wars," but are now known as the "Land Wars" or the "New Zealand Wars." Many Maoris still resent the fact that the wars are not part of the New Zealand school history curriculum and that there is no statutory commemoration day. Miss Universe 2015 Pia Wurtzbach (L) crowns Miss Universe 2016 Iris Mittenaere of France in Pasay City, the Philippines, Jan. 30, 2017. (Xinhua/Rouelle Umali) MANILA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- A 24-year-old model from France was named the 65th Miss Universe here on Monday, winning the coveted crown for France again after six decades. Iris Mittenaere beat 85 other beauties to take the title from Pia Wurtzbach of the Philippines at the Mall of Asia Arena in Manila. In her first news conference as Miss Universe, she said she is proud to bring the coveted Miss Universe crown to France and Europe. She expressed hope that Europeans will watch and closely follow the prestigious pageant again after her win. "I think France and Europe really need a Miss Universe (after six decades). I think we need a Miss Universe because French people love beauty pageant but they don't really know Miss Universe because our country never wins (after 1953)," she said. "After this year, I think a lot of people will know and will watch Miss Universe. I think French people will love Miss Universe now and every year they will be watching Miss Universe." She said that it has been her dream to become a Miss Universe and her advocacy is to spread the importance of education especially for children and young women. Mittenaere, who was born the northern French town of Lille, is pursuing a degree in dental surgery. She said she hopes to spread the message of good dental hygiene and oral health. Asked during the final question and answer portion to "name something over the course of your life that you failed at, and tell us what you learned from that experience," Mittenaere answered through an interpreter, "I failed several times in my life. So I thought that I failed the first time that I went out in the (dentistry registry) because my name was not on the list. And the very next day I found that I was in the new book. So, I think that when you fail you have to be elevated and you have to try again and keep going." She fulfilled her dream to bring home the crown again after 1953 when Christiane Martel became the first Miss France to win Miss Universe. Miss Haiti Raquel Pelissier, 25, came in the second, while Miss Colombia Andrea Tovar, 23, was placed the third. The judging panel this year includes Miss Universe 1993 Dayanara Torres from Puerto Rico, Miss Universe 1994 Sushmita Sen from India, Miss Universe 2011 Leila Lopes from Angola, TV and films producer Francine LeFrack, Paper Magazine editorial director Mickey Boardman and "The Real Housewives of Atlanta" star Cynthia Bailey. Steve Harvey hosted the coronation with America's Next Top Model judge Ashley Graham as the backstage host. The popular host plunged into controversy in the 2015 Miss Universe pageant last year when he erroneously announced Miss Colombia as the winner instead of Miss Philippines. The last time the Philippines hosted the Miss universe was in 1994. SANTIAGO, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Chile still has 14 municipalities, two regions and one province on red alert as wild fires continue to rage in the country. Chilean President Michelle Bachelet has announced that the country will continue with its various measures to deal with the blazes, one of the biggest natural disasters in the country for decades, according to a government report released on Sunday. Meanwhile, the number of people under arrest on suspicion of having started the fires has risen to 43, she added. "We are certain that if certain fires were begun intentionally ... those responsible will be prosecuted," said the president after a meeting with ministers and the director of the National Emergency Office (ONEMI). According to ONEMI, of the 127 registered fires, 50 are under control, 14 have been extinguished and 63 remain active. Currently, 343 people are in shelters, 2,970 have left their homes, 1,061 houses have been destroyed and 11 people have died, most of them firefighters. Around 7,000 people are engaged in firefighting and control activities, and 44 airplanes and helicopters are working across the country, mostly in the central and southern regions. In addition, the army has stepped up patrols in at-risk forest areas to prevent new fires, and public access to affected areas has been restricted. Overwhelmed by the scale of the disaster, the Chilean government called for international aid a week ago. Till now Argentina, Brazil and a number of other countries have sent expert teams to help fight the blazes. Protesters hold posters at the San Francisco International Airport in the United States, Jan. 28, 2017. Protesters took to San Francisco International Airport on Saturday afternoon to denounce U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order banning entry of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries. (Xinhua/Xu Yong) WASHINGTON, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Attorneys general from 15 U.S. states and the District of Columbia Sunday condemned President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily barring refugees and seven Muslim-majority countries' citizens from entry into the United States, calling it "unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful." In a joint statement, the 16 state attorneys general, all Democrats, vowed they will quickly act and "use all of the tools of our offices to fight this unconstitutional order and preserve our nation's national security and core values." "We are confident that the Executive Order will ultimately be struck down by the courts. In the meantime, we are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created," they said in the joint statement. "Together we are the chief legal officers for 130M+ people & we won't hesitate to protect their rights," New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman tweeted. "Let me be clear -- Discrimination based on national origin is illegal," Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said in a statement Saturday. Other state attorneys general are from California, Pennsylvania, Washington, Massachusetts, Hawaii, Virginia, Connecticut, Vermont, Illinois, New Mexico, Iowa, Maine, Maryland and the District of Columbia. Under the executive order Trump signed Friday, refugees from all over the world will be suspended from entering the United States for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The total population from these countries exceeds 130 million. The ban sparked chaos across U.S. international airports and continuous protests nationwide in the past two days. Throughout Sunday, tens of thousands of protesters rallied before the White House, at more than 30 U.S. airports, and in the central downtown of big cities including Boston, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle and Chicago. Rushing to the rescue, Trump on Sunday argued that the presidential action is aimed to protect the United States' own citizens and border and is not a Muslim ban as many media reports have described. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban," the newly-inaugurated U.S. president said in a statement, saying there are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. "We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days," he said. Moreover, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway said earlier on Sunday the international travel disruptions in the wake of the ban were "a small price to pay" for the greater security of the United States. A federal judge in New York on Saturday night granted an emergency stay temporarily halting the removal of people who, though with previously approved refugee applications or with valid visas, had been detained following Trump's order. Similar rulings were later issued in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state, and more U.S. states are now expected to follow suit. Related: Trump's entry ban on 7 Muslim states met by world criticism CAIRO, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- The recent temporary entry ban imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump on visitors from seven Muslim states has been received by world and regional criticism. BEIJING, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- China's environmental inspections will cover all provincial regions this year, according to the Ministry of Environmental Protection (MEP). Inspectors will monitor local conditions and push local governments to fulfill their responsibilities, the MEP said. China launched central environmental inspections in 2016, when inspection teams were dispatched to 15 provincial areas including Beijing and Shanghai. Last year, inspectors looked into 33,000 cases and imposed fines totalling 440 million yuan (about 64 million U.S. dollars). A total of 720 people were detained and close to 6,500 were held accountable for environment-related wrongdoing. China is fighting pollution and environmental degradation after decades of growth left the country saddled with problems such as smog and contaminated soil. HOUSTON, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- People in Houston, the fourth-largest U.S. city, took to the streets on Sunday to protest against President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily barring refugees and seven Muslim-majority countries' citizens from entry into the country. With a heavy police presence on Sunday afternoon, more than 1,000 people gathered in downtown Houston, waving banners and shouting slogans such as "No Ban, No Wall," "Hate is not accepted here," "We are all immigrants," "Refugees are welcome here," "Houston welcomes you" and "Stop Isolationism." The protest lasted several hours and ended peacefully. Another protest was also held at Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport on Sunday evening. The order signed by Trump Friday suspends the entry of all refugees to the United States for 120 days, halts admission of refugees from Syria indefinitely and bars residents from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen from entering for three months. Texas Senator Borris L. Miles also spoke out against the order and encouraged his Republican colleagues to follow suit. In a statement e-mailed to Xinhua Sunday night, Miles condemned Trump's "Muslim Ban," saying the executive order is "in direct conflict with the principles and foundations" of the United States, which was built on diversity. He applauded the people who have protested Trump's order and encouraged his Republican colleagues to speak out against it and show support for all Texans. People protest against U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order banning entry of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries, at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, Illinois, the United States, on Jan. 29, 2017. (Xinhua/Ting Shen) LOS ANGELES, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Some 2,000 people blocked the driveway outside the international terminal building of Los Angeles' LAX Airport on Sunday from afternoon to night, in a mass gathering to protest President Donald Trump's "Muslim ban" issued two days ago. The new policy imposes a 90-day ban on travel to the United States by citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program, triggering protests across the country this weekend. Many protesters here waved black placards with only one word "No" and chanted slogans such as "We said no" and "No Trump, no hate." Some of them sat in line on the driveway and faced off with riot police, blocking traffic into the terminal building until they were persuaded to leave by airport security staff. So far there were no arrests and police said they had no plan to disperse the demonstrators. Due to the chaos, lots of passengers missed their flights. LAX authority tweeted at 8 p.m. (0400 GMT Jan. 30) asking passengers to "check flight status with airline if you are flying to or from LAX today." Sunday afternoon, hundreds of people gathered near the Fresno Yosemite International Airport, which is near the famous Yosemite National Park, 500 km north of Los Angeles, to protest the executive order on immigration. Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times on Sunday cited LA Police Chief Charlie Beck as saying that his department won't comply with Trump's orders for police officers to help the federal government detain undocumented immigrants for deportation. "This is not our job, nor will I make it our job," Beck said in an interview with the Los Angeles Times. KUNDUZ, Afghanistan, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Afghan air force killed three Taliban militants in the country's northern province of Kunduz overnight, an army source said on Monday. "On a confirmed tip-off, the army's air force carried out an airstrike Sunday night against a Taliban hideout in Hajji Nawab locality on northern outskirts of provincial capital of Kunduz city, killing three militants and injuring four others," Nastraullah Jamshidi, a press officer of army's Corps 209 Shaheen based in the region, told Xinhua. A Taliban militants' bunker together with a handful of weapons and ammunition were also destroyed following the raid, he added. In addition, the army personnel also detained two militants of Islamic State (IS) terrorist group in Khwaja Pista village of the province, 250 km north of Afghan capital of Kabul, he said. The Kunduz and neighboring Baghlan and Takhar provinces have been the scene of heavy clashes over the past couple of months as Taliban has been trying to challenge the government forces in the once relatively peaceful region. The Taliban militant group has yet to make comments. KOTA KINABALU, Malaysia, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Two crew members of the boat carrying Chinese tourists that went missing off Malaysia's Sabah state were arrested to facilitate investigation, police said Monday. KATHMANDU, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese tourist died of high altitude sickness in Nepal's Solukhumbu district along the Everest region on Sunday, police confirmed. The Chinese embassy in Nepal has also confirmed the death of the tourist. The 51-year-old Chinese national breathed his last in Gorak Shep located at 5,164 meters above sea level. He was trekking towards Qomolangma base camp with three other compatriots and a local porter guide. Inspector Pradhumna Adhikari based in the district told Xinhua over phone that "A Chinese tourist was rescued from Gorak Shep through helicopter on Sunday morning. He was taken to Pasang Lhamu hospital in Lukla after he complained of altitude symptoms but he died on the way." The hospital confirmed that the reason of his death is high altitude sickness. Pasang Sherpa, an administrative officer in the hospital, told Xinhua that they received the Chinese tourist at 7:30 a.m. (local time) but he was already dead. According to Tourist Police Office Lukla, the Chinese tourist started trekking on Jan. 23 from Lukla, the gateway to world's highest peak Qomolangma. After the incident on Sunday morning, the team members have however continued their trek to base camp located at an altitude of 5,364 meters. Although the dry winter is not a suitable time for trekking in the Everest region, few foreign tourists prefer solo trekking in this season, according to the Department of Tourism. The Chinese national was also trekking in the region without the support of any official trekking agencies. More than 10,000 foreign trekkers visit the Everest region annually for trekking and mountaineering, mostly from China, the United States, Britain, Canada, Japan and France. MANILA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Two children, aged two and five, were killed and three others wounded by a home-made bomb that went off Monday morning on the southern Philippine island of Basilan, an army spokesman said. Lt. Col. Franco Raphael Alano said in a statement that the three wounded were two children, both aged four, and a 25-year-old woman. The four children were reportedly playing when the bomb exploded. Alano said the bomb was planted in a trail frequently used by villagers in Al-Barka, a town in Basilan. No group has claimed responsibility for the blast but the military blamed the incident on the Abu Sayyaf militants that operate on the island province. The military said that two children were also killed in December last year when a home-made bomb also exploded in Piyang village, also in Al-Barka. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has ordered the military to crush the Abu Sayyaf before June this year. Abu Sayyaf is the most radical Islamist group in the Philippines that carries out kidnappings for ransom, executions and bombings in the southern Philippines. The military said there are about 400 Abu Sayyaf criminals operating in the province of Sulu and nearby Basilan. The Philippines has been fighting the Abu Sayyaf militants since 2002. Duterte and his defense secretary Delfin Lorenzana claimed that the violent group has linked up with the Islamic terrorists that plan to carve out a caliphate in the southern Philippines, home to the country's Filipino Muslims. People who have been rescued after their boat sank off Malaysia's Sabah state arrive in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, on Jan. 30, 2017. Three Chinese tourists on board a boat which sank off Malaysia's Sabah state were confirmed dead early Monday after being rescued. Three Chinese tourists have passed away among the 25 people rescued so far, while six people remained missing, said Ahmad Puzi Ab Kahar, Director General of Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency. The Chinese tourists who were rescued and the bodies of those passed away arrived in Kota Kinabalu early Monday. (Xinhua) BEIJING, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Foreign Ministry on Monday asked Malaysia to maintain its search and rescue effort for Chinese nationals from a boat that sank off Malaysia's Sabah State on North Borneo on Saturday evening. Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang also expressed hope that Malaysia would report the developments promptly. "In the meantime, China hopes the Malaysian side will carry out fair and objective investigation to find out the truth as early as possible," said Geng. According to Chinese Foreign Ministry, 20 Chinese tourists had been rescued, with three dead and five missing. Geng expressed deep condolences to the victims, adding that the Chinese Consulate General's Office based in Kota Kinabalu, the state capital, had sent staff to coordinate rescue work with the search and rescue center. The boat carrying 31 people, including 28 tourists from China, went missing on Saturday after sailing from Kota Kinabalu in Malaysia to Pulau Mengalum, a popular tourist island, some 60 km west to Kota Kinabalu. KOTA KINABALU, Malaysia, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Two crew members of the boat carrying Chinese tourists that went missing off Malaysia's Sabah state were arrested to facilitate investigation, police said Monday. In a social media posting, Sabah police chief Ramli Din said both men had been held under Section 304A of the Penal Code for causing death by negligence. The skipper and a crewman were the first to be rescued after their boat went missing on Saturday. It was carrying 28 Chinese tourists and three crew members. 20 Chinese tourists were rescued later Sunday, and three were found dead. Search and rescue effort are ongoing for the six that remained missing, with Brunei joining the effort in a 1,500 square nautical miles area. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said on social media posting that he saw the tragedy seriously and want a detailed investigation to find out the cause of the incident. However, for the time being, the full focus should be on the search and rescue efforts for the six that have not yet been found, he said. MOSCOW, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Russia's Defense Ministry on Monday called on international organizations and other countries to provide aid for residents of the Syrian city of Aleppo. "Humanitarian aid from Kazakhstan was sent from the Syrian port of Tartus (to Aleppo). Earlier, aid came from Armenia, Belarus and Serbia. However, aid from other countries and international organizations, whose representatives in their offices have repeatedly talked about the plight of the Syrian people and the humanitarian disaster in the country, hasn't been received so far," said Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov. Besides water and bread, residents in Aleppo also need glass, cement, pipes and construction materials, he said. Konashenkov said a peaceful life has returned to Aleppo and other towns. Locals are rebuilding their houses, and schools and hospitals have reopened. Last month, the Syrian government forces recaptured the city from rebel forces which had been occupying the city since 2012. The five-year civil war in Syria has killed more than 300,000 people and caused a serious refugee crisis. WELLINGTON, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- New Zealand Prime Minister Bill English on Monday said he disagrees with the United States' entry restrictions on citizens from seven mainly Muslim countries. However, English said he had not made his views known to U.S. President Donald Trump, Radio New Zealand reported. Trump has issued an executive order preventing people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia and Sudan from entering the United States for 90 days, and suspending refugee entries to the U.S for four months as well as banning refugees from Syria indefinitely. English had been under mounting criticism for failing to condemn Trump's immigration order, but on Monday he said he would not implement such a ban in New Zealand and disagreed with it. "We don't agree with the policy. We have yet to see just what turns out to be the long-term policy for the U.S., because this is a temporary measure," English said in the report. "It does appear to have created some real chaos in the short term." The Red Cross, which is the primary provider of refugee settlement support in New Zealand, welcomed English's response and said it would like to see a practical response from New Zealand through an emergency refugee intake. In the current global climate support for refugees and upholding obligations to protect them had never been more important, said Anne Smith, acting secretary general of the New Zealand Red Cross. "The majority of refugees are women and children, an emergency intake could assist some of these families who are most vulnerable," Smith said in a statement. In June last year, the New Zealand government raised its much criticized refugee quota from 750 to 1,000 a year from 2018. The government came under international pressure to double its quota at the height of the Syrian refugee crisis in 2015, but insisted on sticking to its three-decade-old annual quota of 750 refugees, before it yielded and agreed to take extra Syrian refugees. ADEN, Yemen, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Two operatives of the Yemen-based al-Qaida branch were killed by a U.S. drone strike in the southeastern province of Shabwa on Monday, military source said. The drone raid came hours after a previous operation that killed eight al-Qaida militants and 12 civilians. "The U.S. drone fired missiles and targeted a vehicle carrying al-Qaida men in the rugged mountainous region of Bayhan in Shabwa province," the sources, based in Shabwa, said on condition of anonymity. Residents near the scene confirmed to Xinhua that they saw "a destroyed car with two charred bodies." On Sunday, U.S. special forces launched a pre-dawn raid in Yemen's central province of al-Bayda, killing eight members of the local al-Qaida outshoot, including senior commanders. Twelve civilians were also killed. Medical sources in the area said the civilians killed included several women and children, including an eight-year-old daughter of al-Qaida ideologue Anwar al-Awlaki, who was killed in a U.S. drone attack in 2011. In Washington, the Pentagon said one U.S. commando was killed and three others wounded in a fierce firefight early Sunday with al-Qaida militants in central Yemen, the first counterterrorism operation authorized by President Donald Trump since he took office. Yemen's central province of al-Bayda and the neighboring southeastern Shabwa province, where dozens of al-Qaida members are believed to be based, have been the focus of American-led airstrikes. Yemen, an impoverished Arab country, has been gripped by one of the most active regional Al-Qaida insurgencies in the Middle East. The Yemen-based Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), also known locally as "Ansar al-Sharia," emerged in January 2009, claiming responsibility for a number of terrorist attacks against Yemen's army and governmental institutions. The AQAP and the IS-linked terrorists took advantage of the security vacuum and ongoing civil war to expand their influence and seize more territories in southern Yemen. Security in Yemen has deteriorated since March 2015, when war broke out between the Shiite Houthi group, supported by former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, and government forces backed by a Saudi-led Arab coalition. Over 10,000 people have been killed in ground battles and airstrikes since then, many of them civilians. by Magdalena Stoczek, Chen Xu KOZIENICE, Poland, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Working on a construction site in the snow-covered dense forest in Poland and unable to return home for Chinese Lunar New Year in the past five years, Dong Zifeng, a Chinese engineer, said they must establish Chinese enterprises' reputation for high quality. Located in the southeastern part of Poland, Kozienice Power Station is the second-largest substation in Poland, which provides more than half of the electricity supply for the capital Warsaw. In 2014, the Pinggao Group of China won the bid to reconstruct the plant, and is expected to complete the project by the end of September this year. The Chinese workers were still working on the project on the eve of the most important festive season in China which falls on Jan. 28 this year, also known as the Spring Festival. After a two-hour drive from the capital Warsaw, Li Xiao, a project manager from Pinggao Group's Polish branch, and engineer Xu Haoliang arrived at the construction site of the Kozienice Power Station, while snowflakes danced in the air in a temperature close to minus 10 degrees Celsius. "I've just heard a Polish colleague say Zifeng was still coordinating work on the construction site," Xu said. Li and Xu put on helmets and boots and carefully went through the icy and muddy path toward the direction where Dong and the Polish engineers were coordinating setting up cables by workers. Seeing his Chinese colleagues approaching him from afar, Dong excitedly waved to them. All born in the 1980s, the three young men tightly gripped together their red, frozen hands. This is the group's second project in the country, with the first being in Zydowo in northern Poland, which is the first power plant contract a Chinese company signed within the European Union (EU). The Zydowo project fulfilled the EU's requirements and standards and was listed as a national key project by the Polish government, an important milestone in the Belt and Road Initiative proposed by China to build a trade and infrastructure network connecting Asia with Europe and Africa, said Li, manager of the Zydowo project. "In addition to the project construction, we also helped the local government repair and renovate roads and churches, which helped us win a good reputation among the local people and the authorities. We also organized various cultural activities in cooperation with the Chinese Embassy in Poland, including the Chinese Culture Festival, taiji performance, Chinese teaching, etc.," Li said. The Pinggao Group has succeeded in inking five power general contract projects in recent years, with a total contract value of 1.5 billion RMB (218.7 million U.S. dollars) by the first half of 2016. "Next, we will continue to expand our presence in Poland, using the Polish branch as the basis for the Pinggao Group's presence in Europe and the countries along the Belt and Road," Li added. Back in the office, the three men watched the Spring Festival Gala presented by China Central Television online while eating their lunch. During the first program "Beautiful Chinese New Year," a cheerful song and dance number, the three men couldn't hold back their tears. Looking at a picture of his nearly two-year-old child, Xu said: "The child was not even one year old when I left. Each time he has just begun to feel familiar with me, I had to leave him. This kind of feeling is hard to put into words." Dong, who has not been home for five years in a row, said "As a representative of Chinese enterprises 'going global,' we must weave this safety power grid and establish the reputation of Chinese enterprises for best quality here in Poland." BEIJING, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Chunyun, the 40-day Spring Festival travel rush, is showing how China's high-speed train services make rides home faster and more comfortable. Xu Rui, a migrant worker in Guangdong Province, used to spend most of the time traveling home to southwestern Yunnan Province on a lumbering old-fashioned train. Thanks to the Shanghai-Kunming high-speed railway, the 16-hour-ride was shortened by half. The west-east artery incorporated Yunnan into the high-speed railway network for the first time. "Traveling home meant sitting through a whole day of an ordeal tougher than a nightshift," Xu said. "But now if I leave in the morning, I can have dinner at home." The fare is just over 100 yuan (14.5 U.S. dollars) more than the slow train but "totally worth it," said Xu. Young migrant workers like him care more about time and comfort, he said. In 2016, over half of the more than 2.7 billion passenger trips on railroads were made on bullet trains. The grueling experience of crossing China on train -- once cramped, smelly and with interminable queues for the lavatory -- have become a distant memory. The bullet trains are equipped with adjustable seats, efficient toilets, power sockets and some with WiFi. On some of these trains, passengers can even pre-order meals from a menu of varied bentos, steamed stuffed buns, dumplings and chicken rolls with a delivery from www.ele.me. Experience prior to the ride is also better as most tickets are now bought online instead of waiting in line at the station. This year, 66 percent of train tickets for chunyun are bought via mobile phones. Frequency of services is another reason behind the popularity of high speed trains. Bullet trains between Guangzhou and Nanning, capital city of southwestern Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, resemble shuttle buses run at 11-minute intervals. More than 80 percent of big cities will have access to 30,000 kilometers of high-speed track by 2020. China's rail network, with the world's largest fleet of bullet trains, has the world's best safety record, according to data compiled by the International Union of Railways and the European Railway Agency. Chinese high-speed trains also score high in punctuality -- 98.8 percent depart on time and 95.4 percent arrive on time in 2015. TEHRAN, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- People in the Iranian capital Tehran on Monday attended a funeral ceremony honoring 16 firefighters who died in a massive fire and subsequent collapse of a 17-story building in Tehran on Jan. 19, Tasnim news agency reported. A host of senior Iranian officials, firefighters, rescue squads and ordinary people attended the funeral service to pay tribute to the firemen who lost their lives in the line of duty. The remains of 15 firefighters were retrieved from the rubble of the collapsed building after a week-long operation; one firefighter died in hospital after the building collapse, Tasnim said. Tehran's mayor Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf confirmed earlier the death of 20 in the collapse of the 54-year-old building with 600 commercial shops. Preliminary investigations identified electrical malfunction as the the initial cause of fire. YANGON, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Myanmar's Mandalay regional police said on Monday that the gunman who shot dead a legal advisor of the ruling party is not a native resident in Mandalay, although he was initially identified as living in the city. U Ko Ni, legal advisor of Myanmar's ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party, was gunned down at the Yangon international Airport on Sunday afternoon upon his arrival back from Indonesia. The gunman U Kyi Lin was originally identified as a Mandalay resident. But Mandalay region police chief Han Tun told the press that the authorities traced the address shown in the ID card which the gunman left when he was arrested, but found he was not actually residing at the address. Meanwhile, Mandalay Region Security and Border Affairs Minister Colonel Myo Min Aung told reporters at the parliament Monday that the gunman is further identified as an ex-prisoner from Mandalay prison who was sentenced to 27 years' jail term for stealing Buddha statue, but was once released in 2014 under amnesty order after serving for 11 years' term. The prominent legal adviser of the NLD, who is also parliamentary lawyer, was gunned down at the airport Sunday 5:00 p.m. local time, upon his arrival back from a senior leadership program in Jakarta. The gunman also killed a taxi driver who had tried to capture him before he was arrested by the police and bystanders. U Ko Ni was shot in the head at a close distance at the airport's taxi stand near arrival terminal-1. The NLD has condemned the assassination of U Ko Ni, calling for prompt exposure of the mastermind behind the plot, according to its Monday announcement. It said the death of U Ko Ni is a irreparable loss to the party and State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi, denouncing the assassination as a terrorist act that opposes the path of the NLD. It called for non-extreme acts in response to the incident and staying in peace to cope with it, while continuing implementation of the party's political path without losing sight. TEHRAN, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Russia's Lukoil company hopes to reach an agreement with Iran to develop two oilfields in the country, Press TV reported on Monday. Talks with the National Iranian Oil Company are underway about developing the Ab Teymour and Mansouri oilfields in western Iran, said Gati al-Jebouri, Lukoil's head of upstream operations in the Middle East. Lukoil had done "significant amount of analysis as to how potentially develop the project," and presented its technical proposals and views to the Iranian side, Press TV quoted al-Jebouri as saying. "We would like to have some decision during the first half of 2017 from the Iranian side but there are no strict deadlines to this process," al-Jebouri said. He said the two sides would start negotiations on contractual terms if the development plans were accepted by the Iranian side. Lukoil is currently developing the second phase of West Qurna oilfield in neighboring Iraq, Press TV said. SINGAPORE, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Singapore on Monday condemned the attack at the Islamic Cultural Center in Canada's Quebec City which has resulted in the loss of many lives and injuries. There can be no justification for an attack on a sacred place of worship and extended deepest condolences to the bereaved families, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) said in a statement. The ministry also revealed there are no reports of any Singaporeans directly affected or injured by the incident thus far. According to Quebec Provincial Police, six people have been killed and eight wounded after a shooting at a mosque in Quebec City on Sunday evening. PARIS, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- French President Francois Hollande on Monday denounced "with utmost firmness" the mosque shooting incident in Canada's Quebec City which killed at least six people and injured many others. "The terrorists wanted to attack the spirit of peace and tolerance of the citizens of Quebec," Hollande said in a statement released by his office. The French president expressed "sympathy, affection and solidarity" with Canadian officials, saying "France stands alongside the victims and their families." At least six people were killed and eight others wounded when gunmen opened fire at a Quebec mosque during evening prayers on Sunday. According to reports, two suspects were arrested in connection with the attack, which Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described as a "terrorist attack on Muslims." ADDIS ABABA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Zambian President Edgar Lungu will host a high-level meeting on the implementation of the Common African Position (CAP) on ending child marriage in Africa in collaboration with the African Union (AU) Commission. The event will be held on Tuesday on the sidelines of the 28th AU summit in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa in line with the 2017 AU theme "Harnessing the Demographic Dividend through Investments in Youth," according to a statement from AU on Monday. The AU Commission launched a continental campaign in May 2014 to end child marriage on the continent. Several activities have been undertaken by the pan-African bloc together with its member states and partners on national launches, capacity building workshops, as well as monitoring and evaluation, noted the statement. The high-level breakfast event will provide a platform for assessing the implementation of CAP on ending child marriage, adopted by AU heads of state and government at the 25th Session of the AU Assembly in Johannesburg, South Africa, said the statement. The event will focus on establishing a high-level monitoring and evaluation forum on the implementation of the CAP. The AU Assembly has called on the AU Commission to develop a plan of action for the implementation of the CAP on ending child marriage in Africa and to submit a biennial report to the Assembly on the progress. The African Common Position Ending Child Marriage affirms the importance of strong network of child welfare and law enforcement structures in ensuring justice for child brides, says AU. KABUL, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The hardliner Islamic State (IS) group has been attempting to expand and consolidate its gripe in the eastern region of the war-battered Afghanistan, locals said. A branch of the Iraq-Syria based extremist group, the militants loyal to IS who surfaced in Achin district of eastern Nangarhar province along the border with Pakistan's tribal areas nearly two years ago, have gained grounds in parts of Kot, Pachiragam, Dehbala, Haskamina and Ghani khil districts. IS militants which are notorious for their brutality, attacked security checkpoints in Ghani Khil district last week but fled away after suffering casualties and leaving three dead bodies behind. "Attack on security checkpoint in Ghani Khil district demonstrate that Daesh (IS) attempt to expand activities in the eastern region," a local analyst Tahir Zaland told local media recently. He also warned that negligence by government would enable the "terrorist group" to enlarge its clutch and create more law and order problems in the area. Emerged in 2015, militants loyal to the IS have enlarged its foothold along the border areas with Pakistan's tribal areas with committing barbaric acts ranging from beheading people and burning residential houses to intimidating the people living around. The hardliner group, according to local media reports, has set on fire more than 200 residential houses in Kot district, besides killing and kidnapping scores of people including women and children. Daesh or IS armed group, according to locals have increased their propaganda to recruit fighters. The militant group have their radio to propagate in IS favor and also distribute pamphlets in Nangarhar and the neighboring Kunar and Nuristan provinces to motivate people, especially youngsters to join the armed outfit in the war against government. "Dozens of civilians have been languishing in the custody of Daesh (IS) insurgents in Nangarhar. Availing the opportunity the armed outfit has been recruiting the jobless youngsters into their ranks," member of Nangarhar provincial council, Zabihullah Zamarai told local media. Zamarai also warned that "negligence by government to take necessary steps against enemies" would prove catastrophe. by Peter Mertz DENVER, the United States, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- A second day of protests erupted at Denver's biggest airport Sunday in response to restrictions on Muslims entering America. As local politicians lined up against President Donald Trump's controversial new immigration policy, Colorado universities also cautioned members of their Muslim communities to stay home and not travel at this time. "We're back in the stone ages, courtesy Donald Trump," said a 30-year-old Aurora woman who told Xinhua she was Iranian. The crowd of 200 protesters holding signs denigrating Trump and his policies inside Denver International Airport (DIA) was smaller than Saturday's crowd of 500, but protesters told Xinhua they plan on returning each day. "The best thing about Trump is that it (the ban) energizes educated people who understand U.S. history and law, and are repulsed by his performance," a protester, Abdul Hussein, told Xinhua at DIA. "The anti-Trump, liberal movement is just beginning, and he brought it on," Hussein said. Among the DIA protesters on Sunday was a Syrian refugee who was now an American citizen. He told Xinhua he was "utterly shocked" America would abandon its immigrants so easily. Both Democrats and Republicans took shots at the new president, with Colorado's Democratic Governor John Hickenlooper taking charge. "What is going on in Washington, D.C. is confusing, to say the least," Hickenlooper told Xinhua. "This country is built on a lot of diversity that's not going away in one four-year period," Hickenlooper said, referring to Trump's presidential term. Republican Mike Coffman, a U.S. House representative, was also critical, saying he would never support "a blanket travel ban for people solely on ethnic or religious grounds." Democrat Ed Perlmutter, a U.S. representative from Colorado's 7th District, responded Sunday to Trump's executive orders saying he would "continue fighting for inclusiveness." "America is a country of all people, not just Trump supporters," Hickenlooper said. The University of Colorado said it would offer advice to its Muslim students this week, and the University of Denver strongly encouraged its Muslim students, staff and scholars not to leave the country. Colorado State University officials said at least three of their international students had been stopped returning to the United States. Officials said they had been in contact with them, offering support. On Saturday, an Iranian husband and wife doctor team was detained by police at DIA for two hours before being released. In response to a law suit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union, a federal judge, appointed by former president Barack Obama, ruled Saturday that those Muslims in transit who hold valid visas could legally enter the country. But the U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued a statement immediately afterwards saying they would enforce the Trump ban anyway. Trump's executive order barring citizens from seven Islamic countries from entering the United States has triggered huge protests at about 30 airports across the country over the weekend. Trump officials reminded the nation Sunday that the ban would only stay in place for 90 days, until a clear policy toward Muslims is developed. The ban also suspended the admission of all refugees for 120 days. Choi Soon-sil (C), the jailed confidante of impeached South Korean President Park Geun-hye, arrives for hearing arguments at the Constitutional Court in Seoul, South Korea, Jan. 16, 2017. (Xinhua/Lee Sang-ho) COPENHAGEN, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- A Danish court ruled on Monday that the daughter of Choi Soon-sil, a longtime confidante of South Korea's impeached President Park Geun-hye, must remain imprisoned for another four weeks as additional information is needed to reach a decision for her extradition. South Korean dressage rider Chung Yoo-ra, Choi's daughter, was arrested by North Jutland Police on Jan. 1 based on an international inquiry via Interpol. On Jan. 2, the Court of Aalborg decided to imprison the 21-year-old for four weeks up to Jan. 30 while Danish authorities deal with South Korea's request for her extradition. The processing of Chung's extradition case started on Jan. 6 after the Danish authorities received an official request from the South Korean authorities. On Jan. 27, the Danish Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions asked the South Korean Ministry of Justice to provide more information regarding Chung's extradition. "We have asked the (South) Korean authorities to answer some follow-up questions. Until we receive these answers, we can not reach a decision on the question of extradition," said Mohammad Ahsan, deputy director from the Office. David Schmidt Hvelplund, a special prosecutor from the District Prosecution Service of the North Jutland Police, said it is standard procedure to request an extended detention in extradition cases. Chung's mother Choi is charged with using her friendship with Park to extort funds from large businesses including Samsung Group and meddling in state affairs though she has no government position and security clearance. Chung is alleged to have received illegal favors when entering a prestigious South Korean university. She is also accused of being behind comprehensive economic crimes in collusion with her mother. Chung denied having participated in fraud and extortion, according to local media reports. "I have not received any money personally from Samsung. I've only used the money I got from my mother," she was quoted by the Danish news agency Ritzau as saying at the Court of Aalborg. She also rejected all accusations that she is abusing her mother's position to gain access to an elite university, according to Ritzau. DHAKA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Bangladeshi cabinet has approved a new dowry prohibition law keeping a provision of 14-year jail term for inciting suicide and life sentence for critically injuring women over dowry. Cabinet Secretary Mohammad Shafiul Alam told reporters on Monday that a convicted will be handed maximum life term for critically injuring a victim over dowry. Alam said the draft law has defined various kinds of crimes which are to be considered dowry-related violence. He said the draft law also kept a provision of compensation for a dowry victim. For a minor torture for dowry, Alam said an accused might be sentenced with imprisonment ranging from one to three years with fine. The new draft law was made following the vociferous demands of women's and human rights organizations as the extent of dowry violence is increasing in the country. Scores of housewives in Bangladesh are killed yearly mostly by their husbands and in-laws on dowry demands, despite laws preventing such demand. The Bangladeshi government enacted laws over dowry in 1980 with the maximum five years sentences punishment, but many poor families opt not to file cases. THE HAGUE, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Dutch government declared late Sunday it rejects the executive order by U.S. President Donald Trump banning entry of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries and asked the United States for clarification. Dutch Foreign Minister Bert Koenders issued a joint statement with his German counterpart, Sigmar Gabriel, saying that the two countries' embassies in Washington "are urgently examining the consequences of the U.S. executive order for our citizens and residents with a double nationality," according to a release on the website of the Dutch Foreign Ministry. "We are determined to protect the rights of our citizens and residents, and will discuss swiftly within the European Union (EU) about the necessary steps," the statement said. The executive order by Trump bans citizens of Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya from entering the United States in the coming three months, and also suspends refugees' entry for four months, in a bid to "protect Americans from terrorist attacks." While emphasizing the resolve by the two countries to counter the dangers of terrorism effectively, the two foreign ministers highlighted that the war against terror "can only be won with a clear compass that rests on a solid foundation of values." "In Europe, it is not our policy to stigmatize people on the basis of their background or their religion. We absolutely do not believe travel bans against millions of people because of their nationality, background or religion is the right means in the struggle against terrorism," they stated. The Dutch foreign minister also issued a joint statement with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte over the issue earlier in the day. "The Netherlands believes that refugees who flee war and violence deserve a safe haven, no matter what their background or religion is," they said. "We are alert to the possibility that potential terrorists abuse asylum procedures. Against this background, we are disappointed about the U.S. travel ban for residents of seven Muslim countries. We reject this travel ban." The declaration was in response to calls by opposition parties to reject the controversial ban. "I want Rutte to speak out against this measure and that he will urge other EU countries to make a clear statement," said GroenLinks (GreenLeft) frontman Jesse Klaver. The Socialist Party's (SP) Emile Roemer, PvdA's (Labor) Lodewijk Asscher and D66's (Democrats) Alexander Pechtold also showed their dissatisfaction with the same words. As expected, Geert Wilders, leader of the right wing populist Party of Freedom (PVV), was happy with the ban. "No more immigration from any Islamic country is exactly what we need, also in the Netherlands," Wilders said. "Islam and freedom are incompatible." Around 70 people demonstrated in front of the entrance of Amsterdam Schiphol Airport on Sunday night to protest against Trump's ban. After the protesters tried to enter the airport, the police held the group and one person was arrested. They carried banners with words such as "Trump psychopath" and "Stop Trump and Wilders." KOTA KINABALU, Malaysia, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The owner and two crew members of the boat carrying Chinese tourists that went missing off Malaysia's Sabah state were arrested to facilitate investigation, police said Monday. The skipper and the crewman were suspected of causing death by negligence, said Sabah police chief Ramli Din. The two crew members were the first to be rescued after their boat went missing on Saturday on the way from the state capital Kota Kinabalu to Pulau Mengalum, a popular tourist island some 60 km to the west. The owner was arrested later Monday, and police has launched a full probe into the accident, including whether the boat was overloaded and whether it was operated with license and insurance, Ramli told Xinhua. "We will investigate from all angles, pertaining to negligence if any," he said. Ramli said the boat was carrying 27 Chinese tourists instead of 28 as reported earlier. One tourist registered for the trip but cancelled the visit after seeing the boat was full. That brings the number of unaccounted for down to five, including a crewman, not six as reported earlier, he said. Brunei joined the search effort in a 1,500 square nautical miles area on Monday. Ahmad Puzi Ab Kahar, director general of Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, told Xinhua over phone that no new survivors were found and the search and rescue would continue. The passengers and crew were left adrift at sea after the boat sank in rough sea, before 20 Chinese tourists were rescued Sunday. Three tourists were found dead. The tourists were sent back to Kota Kinabalu early Monday and admitted to a hospital. All suffered from sunburn and dehydration but were in stable conditions, according to the hospital. A Chinese tourist who went to Pulau Mengalum for snorkeling on Saturday recalled the bumpy trip in bad weather. "It almost broke my waist," she told Xinhua. She also recalled the crowded boat and the fact that many passengers were not wearing life jackets. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said on a social media posting that he saw the tragedy seriously and want a detailed investigation to find out the cause of the incident. MOGADISHU, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Seven people were injured in a landmine explosion that hit a restaurant in Middle Shabelle region of southern Somalia on Monday, police said. Police officer Abdifitah Abukar told Xinhua that among the wounded were two soldiers who were at the restaurant in Burane village at the time of the explosion. A witness said the bomb might have been planted in the restaurant, which he said is frequented by government soldiers. Militant group Al-Shabaab has claimed responsibility for the explosion while warning it would continue its attacks against the Somali government. President of the Republic of Chad and rotating African Union chairperson Idriss Deby speaks at the opening ceremony of the 28th African Union (AU) Summit in Addis Ababa, capital of Ethiopia, on Jan. 30, 2017. The 28th AU Summit held under the theme "Harnessing the Demographic Dividend through Investments in Youth" opened on Monday at the AU headquarters in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa. (Xinhua/Li Baishun) ADDIS ABABA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The African Union (AU) will appoint a special envoy this year to mobilize and advocate for the youth, said the AU Commission chairperson. Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma made the remarks on Monday during the opening of the 28th AU summit in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa. Dlamini-Zuma called for more jobs by involving the young people in Africa to unlock their full potential, which she said is economically prudent and a democratic imperative. The 28th AU summit is held from Jan. 30 to 31 under the theme "Harnessing the demographic dividend through investments in the youth." The African continent has 200 million young men and women aged between 15 and 24, and by 2025, a quarter of the world's youth will be African, said the chairperson. "As the rest of the world ages, Africa will remain a young continent. This is the comparative advantage we have, which must be translated into a demographic dividend," she said. "To harness this resource, we must firstly provide all Africa's boys, girls and young people with opportunities to be in school, complete secondary education, have access to vocational training and universities, and to expand their knowledge of science, mathematics, engineering and technology," she said. The chairperson also underlined the need to address youth unemployment on the continent by creating jobs and economic opportunities for young people through economic diversification, agriculture modernization, and agro-processing. "Since 60 percent of the unemployed are young, with their unemployment rate doubling that of adults, we must resolve to decisively tackle youth unemployment," she said. In this regard, Dlamini-Zuma hailed the African Development Bank strategy for jobs for youth in Africa 2016-2025, which aims to create 25 million jobs and impact 50 million youth. The bank estimates that reducing Africa's youth unemployment rate could translate to a 10-percent to 20-percent increase in the continent's GDP, according to the chairperson. MOSCOW, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Russia and the new U.S. administration have broad prospects for cooperation, primarily regarding anti-terrorism, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Monday. "There is a determination to reach results, but the practical work lies ahead," Lavrov told a press conference, commenting on Saturday's first phone conversation between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump since the latter's inauguration. Lavrov said the conversation revealed "mutual respect and willingness to communicate without sermons" on the basis of the national interests of both countries. According to Lavrov, Putin and Trump agreed that work at the level of experts and within the framework of their subsequent contacts will "definitely take place" with the details and timing yet to be coordinated." Lavrov said he sees "practically unlimited possibilities" in joint actions against the Islamic State as the two presidents stressed during the call to prioritize anti-terrorism. The top diplomat said there could be professional dialogue between Russian and the U.S. armies to elaborate concrete measures to suppress terrorism in Syria. Russia can also provide additional aid, primarily in exchange for intelligence, to combat IS in Iraq, Lavrov said. In addition, the Russian foreign minister said Moscow expects a clarification of Trump's recent proposal to create security zones in Syria. "As I understand it, the U.S. initiative is aimed at creating zones where migrants could feel safe and alleviating the migration burden for countries surrounding Syria, other countries in the region, Europe and the United States itself," he said. Related: Putin, Trump express willingness to cooperate: Kremlin MOSCOW, Jan. 28 (Xinhua) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump agreed to stabilize and deepen bilateral cooperation during a phone conversation on Saturday, the Kremlin said. "The two sides expressed willingness to work actively together to stabilize and develop Russian-American cooperation on a constructive basis, as equals, and to mutual benefit," the Kremlin said in a statement issued after their first phone conversation since Trump's inauguration last week. Full story RIYADH, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) on Monday expressed "grave concern" at an executive order signed by the U.S. president banning nationals of seven OIC member states from entering the United States. In a statement, the OIC urged the U.S. administration to reconsider this blanket decision and "maintain its moral obligation," saying it "will further complicate the already grave challenges facing refugees." "As a result of this ban many of those fleeing war and persecution have been adversely and unjustly affected," the statement said. "Such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism at a critical time when the OIC has been engaged with all partners, including the U.S., to combat extremism and terrorism in all their forms and manifestations," the statement added. The executive order signed on Friday by U.S. President Donald Trump bars citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. for a period of 90 days. The countries listed are Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Iraq, with dual nationals included in the ban. Certain visa categories, such as those for diplomats, are exempt. There have been reports of legal U.S. residents, known as green card holders, being turned away from U.S.-bound flights. YANGON, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The gunman's assassination plot on a legal adviser of Myanmar's ruling party is assessed to aim at destabilizing the nation according to initial investigation, said a press release of the President's Office Monday evening. U Ko Ni, legal adviser of the National League for Democracy (NLD) party, was gunned down at the Yangon international Airport on Sunday afternoon upon his arrival back from Indonesia. The government is continuing to make urgent investigation into the incident for further exposure of those behind the scene, the release said, adding that security measures are being specially tightened. Mandalay regional police said on Monday that the gunman U Kyi Lin, who shot dead the legal adviser, is not Mandalay resident although he was originally so identified. The authorities traced the address shown in the ID card which the gunman left when he was arrested, but he was found not actually residing at the address. Meanwhile, Mandalay Region Security and Border Affairs Minister Colonel Myo Min Aung told reporters at the parliament that the gunman is further identified as an ex-prisoner from Mandalay prison who was sentenced to 27 years' jail term for stealing Buddha statue, but was once released in 2014 under amnesty order after serving for 11 years' term. The prominent legal adviser of the NLD, who is also parliamentary lawyer, was gunned down at the airport Sunday 5:00 p.m. local time, upon his arrival back from a senior leadership program in Jakarta. The gunman also killed a taxi driver who had tried to capture him before he was arrested by the police and bystanders. U Ko Ni was shot in the head at a close distance at the airport's taxi stand near arrival terminal-1. BAGHDAD, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Iraqi parliament on Monday approved new defense and interior ministers in Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi's cabinet, the official Iraqi television reported. The new defense minister, Erfan al-Haiyali, and interior minister, Qasim al-A'raji, were sworn in after the parliament approval, state-run Iraqiya channel said. Erfan al-Haiyali, also known as Erfan al-Hadithi, is a prominent army officer, who works for the elite Counter-Terrorism Service forces. He was sentenced to death during the reign of Saddam Hussein for participation in a coup attempt but fled the country. A'raji, the interior minister, is a prominent figure in the Shiite Badr Organization, headed by Hadi al-Ameri, whose organization was previously known as Badr Brigade, which maintains longtime ties with neighboring Iran, where it was first established during the 1980-1988 Iraq-Iran war. Former interior minister Mohammed al-Ghabban resigned in July after a bombing that killed and injured hundreds of people in Karrda district in central Baghdad. The former defense minister, Khalid al-Obeidi, was sacked in August after the parliament passed a vote of no-confidence against him over allegations of huge graft in his ministry. ADDIS ABABA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The 28th African Union (AU) Summit opened on Monday in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa with a recognition of many socio-economic gains on the continent. The two-day summit is held under the theme "Harnessing the Demographic Dividend through Investments in Youth." Speaking at the opening of the summit, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, Chairperson of the AU Commission, hailed progress on areas from free movement of persons to railway development to ending child marriage. The chairperson hailed the fastest economic growth being registered by African countries including Ethiopia, DR Congo, Cote d'Ivoire, Mozambique, Tanzania, and Rwanda, which are also amongst the fastest-growing economies in the world. She commended 13 African countries for making commitment to lead in launching the single African aviation market in 2017. Dlamini-Zuma noted that countries such as Rwanda, Ethiopia, Kenya and South Africa have started to open their skies for fellow African countries, while urging more countries to join in. She also hailed progress on gender equality and women's empowerment, improvements in their representation in the public spheres, reduction of maternal and infant mortality, the push for financial inclusion and economic participation, and for land rights. Noting with concern that fighting broke out again in South Sudan, she urged the parties involved to honor the agreement to ensure peace, reconciliation and justice. File photo taken on March 30, 2013 shows a boy picks up fish at Zanzibar, Tanzania. The Zanzibar Island is a famous tourist site featuring ancient architectures, green Indian Ocean seawater and white beaches. (Xinhua/Qi Lin) ARUSHA, Tanzania, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Tanzania's semi-autonomous archipelago of Zanzibar is facing a serious shortage of sand for the construction industry, a senior official has said. Hamad Rashid Mohamed, Minister of Agriculture Natural Resources Livestock and Fisheries, said that the Isles' government is considering instituting a ban on sand mining as the resource has been depleted in the Indian Ocean Island. "Our study shows that in Unguja and Pemba islands, sand for construction has been exhausted due to the high demand of the construction materials. That's why we're thinking of banning sand mining and start importing the materials to meet the isles' growing demand," the minister said. "We have remained with few pockets where sand is available. So, we need to protect those areas, because most of the time they are overwhelmed with farming activities and human settlements," he said. He suggested the need for Zanzibar engineers and other players to start thinking about the alternatives to sand in the construction industry. He said for the last 10 years Unguja mined 2,658,503 tonnes of sand, while in Pemba 200,959 tonnes of sand during the same period. During the period, 522 hectares of land were involved in sand mining, while 150 hectares of land in Pemba. Currently, Zanzibar remains with only 14 hectares of land which are rich with sand, the area which is not enough to meet the Isles' sand demand. File photo taken on June 19, 2009 shows boats sail at sunset off the coast of the Zanzibar Island, Tanzania. The Zanzibar Island is a famous tourist site featuring ancient architectures, green Indian Ocean seawater and white beaches. (Xinhua/Tu Jingsheng) It is estimated that Unguja Island mines three hectares of sand per month, while half hectares of sand in Pemba per month. Sand scarcity is expected to affect construction activities in the tourist island of Zanzibar, the semi-autonomous archipelago off the coast of East Africa. BAGHDAD, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Iraqi Foreign Ministry on Monday expressed "regret" over the latest restrictions by U.S. President Donald Trump on the entry of Iraqi nationals into the United States, and asked Washington to "reconsider" the travel ban on Iraqi citizens. "It is very unfortunate that such U.S. decision issued against an allied country (Iraq), which is linked with the United States in a strategic partnership," the foreign ministry said in a statement. "It is necessary that the new U.S. administration reconsider this wrong decision," the ministry said. "Iraq has a real desire to strengthen the strategic partnership between the two countries." The ministry's statement came after the parliament's foreign affairs committee voted for recommendations that the Iraqi government should demand "reciprocation" and take countermeasures against the Trump decision. "We reject the decision of President Trump as Iraq is on the frontline of fighting terrorism, and we are the side who gives martyrs and sacrifices for a war that we fight on behalf of the whole world," said Hanan al-Fatlawi, a member of the foreign affairs committee. "It is unfair that Iraqis are treated in this way," she told a press conference after a committee meeting to discuss the U.S. decision. "We ask the Iraqi government to take a similar action against the United States decision," she said, adding that the parliament committee has demanded that the Iraqi Foreign Ministry contact the U.S. government for review of their decision. "Iraq is a sovereign country and will be forced to reciprocate, and that would affect negatively cooperation, including military cooperation in the war on Islamic State (IS) group," said Ahmed al-Jubouri, another lawmaker from the committee. Trump's order has caused a uproar in Iraq, where more than 5,000 U.S. troops are deployed. On Friday, Trump put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily barred travellers from Iraq and six other Muslim countries, saying the measures would help protect Americans from terrorist attacks. LONDON, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- A petition calling on the British government to cancel a planned state visit to Britain by U.S. President Donald Trump has been signed by more than a million people. The petition grows by thousands of new signatures every hour, but Downing Street has insisted the visit by the U.S. president will go ahead. British Prime Minister Theresa May's official spokesperson said: "An invitation has been extended to President Trump and accepted." Media in London were quoting unnamed sources at Number 10 saying that cancelling the invitation would undo everything achieved by May during her official visit to the White House last week. The source added: "America is a huge important ally. We have to think long term." The petition was launched by solicitor Graham Guest after Trump signed an executive order on Friday, under which refugees from all over the world will be suspended from entering the United States for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The total population from these countries exceeds 130 million. Under parliamentary rules in Britain, an official petition must be considered for a full debate in the House of Commons if it achieves 100,000 names. Britain's foreign secretary is scheduled to make a statement about the issue to Members of Parliament (MPs) in the House of Commons later Monday. Britain's main opposition Labour party were among a growing group of organisations urging the government to stop the visit. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said: "Donald Trump should not be welcomed to Britain while be abuses our shared values with his shameful Muslim ban and attacks on refugees' and women's rights." "Theresa May would be failing the British people if she did not postpone the state visit and condemn Trump's actions in the clearest terms." London mayor Sadiq Khan described Trump's ban on refugees and immigrants from certain countries as "shameful and cruel." "The U.S. has a proud history of welcoming and resettling refugees. The president can't just turn his back on this global crisis -- all countries need to play their part. While every country has the right to set its own immigration policies, this new policy flies in the face of the values of freedom and tolerance that the U.S. was built upon," said Khan. In Trump's original executive order, the ban would apply to people holding dual passports if one of those passports was for one of the seven designated nations. This was amended after May ordered her foreign secretary Boris Johnson to contact the U.S. authorities, allowing British passport holders access to the United States even if they held second passports from one of the named countries. Protests against Trump's measures are planned for later on Monday in a number of major British cities. No date has been fixed for the proposed state visit. ISLAMABAD, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Afghanistan's top envoy to Pakistan Omar Zakhilwal said his government is open to unconditional peace negotiations with the Taliban insurgents. "We are in contact with the Qatar office and also a number of influential individual Taliban leaders and commanders but there are no formal negotiations," the Afghan ambassador told Xinhua in Islamabad on Monday. The remarks came after foreign and Afghan media reported senior Afghan officials had met the Taliban political representatives in Qatar. The Afghan government and the Taliban had not officially commented the reports. "Taliban could bring any proposal to the negotiating table but we have ruled out preconditions for talks," Zakhilwal said when asked about the Taliban's certain conditions ahead of the talks. Taliban negotiators have publicly called for reopening of their political office in Qatar, lifting of UN sanctions on their senior leaders and release of prisoners. "We are open to any and all opportunities for peace talks. We can find our way with the Taliban if external support to them stops," the Afghan envoy said. Regarding the Taliban's long-standing call for the withdrawal of foreign troops, he said war in Afghanistan provides opportunity for the foreign troops to stay. "If there is no war, then there is no reason for their stay in our country - therefore, if Taliban genuinely want the foreign troops to leave Afghanistan, peace, not war will do that," Zakhilwal said. When asked if he expects rise in violence in the coming spring and summer, he said the security situation will be "challenging," adding that the guerrilla type and terrorist attacks are difficult to prevent entirely, but the Afghan security forces will "endure as they have proven themselves by now." Taliban traditionally launch their so-called Spring Offensive usually in April that marks the beginning of fighting season in the war-torn country. A former Taliban minister Agha Jan Mutasim said there could be rise in fighting this year if the Taliban and the government failed to come to the negotiation table. Mutasim, who was the close confidant of the Taliban founder Mullah Omar, had been involved in peace efforts while living abroad in Turkey and the United Arab Emirates. Speaking to Xinhua on Skype, he urged Kabul and the Taliban leaders to use the opportunity of the winter lull in the fighting and start political process. "Rise in violence will diminish the chances of dialogue," the former Taliban minister said. About the threat of the Islamic State or Daesh in Afghanistan, the Afghan ambassador admitted that Daesh activists operate in some areas but they would not take roots in the country. "They are in small number but are dangerous. Their approach is not popular among Afghans. Their model does not go with the psyche of Afghans. If Taliban join the peace process, Afghanistan will not have the IS problem," the envoy said. KIGALI, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Rwanda is ready to host the Aviation Africa 2017 forum scheduled for next month in the Rwandan capital Kigali, according to the Rwanda Civil Aviation Authority (RCAA). The high-level meeting and exhibition slated from Feb. 22 to 23 will focus on all aspects of the aviation industry including maintenance, repair and operations (MRO), business aviation, defense and commercial aviation. Speaking to reporters on Monday, Tony Barigye, chief public relations at RCAA, said that the Rwandan aviation industry is ready to host the forum that promotes the growth of aviation sector in Africa. "The meeting will be an opportunity for the Rwanda aviation to showcase the achievements recorded for the past few years, and the industry's vision," he said. Aviation Africa 2017 will be the second event in the Aviation Africa series, the first having been held in May 2015 in Dubai, according to event organizers. The conference is expected to attract more than 2,700 aviation experts to discuss opportunities and challenges in Africa's aviation sector. According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA) latest forecast, Rwanda is one of the ten African countries whose aviation market is expected to grow by 7-8 percent each year on average over the next 20 years, doubling in size each decade. According to Frank Murangwa, acting chief executive of Rwanda Convention Bureau (RCB), hosting the event is part of Rwanda's bid for holding more international conferences through the Rwanda MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions) Initiative. For the past decade, Rwanda has been expanding its aviation industry with the government making renewed commitment to support the sector. The small central African nation has injected 19 million U.S. dollars to upgrade and expand Kigali International Airport and embarked on construction of Bugesera Airport that costs 818 million dollars. BEIJING, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Some 258.1 million visitor trips have been made in China during the first four days of the Lunar New Year holiday, which started Friday, a 14.2 percent increase compared with the same period last year, according to official data. From Friday to Monday, China's tourism revenue reached 316 billion yuan (about 45.95 billion U.S. dollars), up 16 percent year on year, data from the China National Tourism Administration (CNTA) showed. The CNTA previously expected that China will see 343 million visitor trips during the week-long Lunar New Year holiday, a growth of 13.6 percent from the holiday last year. It also estimated that over six million Chinese people will travel abroad during the holiday. In a separate statement on Monday, the CNTA asked local authorities to step up efforts to ensure travel safety during the holiday after recent tragedies, warning that the rise in tourist number will increase the chance of accidents. A boat carrying 27 Chinese tourists sank off Malaysia's Sabah state on North Borneo on Saturday evening. A total of 20 Chinese were rescued, three were found dead, and four are still unaccounted for. Also, a man died after being attacked by a tiger in a zoo in the eastern Chinese city of Ningbo on Sunday afternoon. DUBAI, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Expo 2020 Dubai, the first world expo to be held in the Arab world, will award 47 construction contracts worth 11 billion dirhams (3.0 billion U.S. dollars) this year, state news agency WAM reported on Monday. The construction contracts, which are open to local, regional and international businesses, include the third and final infrastructure package for the Expo's support areas, said WAM. Another 98 non-construction contracts, totalling more than 360 million dirhams (98 million dollars), will also be distributed "before the end of the year." The non-construction contracts include legal advisory services, event management and merchandising. Expo 2020 will be held under the slogan "Connecting Minds, Creating the Future." The Dubai government said it is "on track to complete the majority of construction a full year ahead of the event opening in October 2020." In 2016, Expo 2020 Dubai awarded over 1,200 contracts, investing more than 2 billion dirhams (544.5 million dollars) in the economy. ADDIS ABABA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The newly appointed United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Monday expressed keen interest to work with the African Union (AU) and its member states. "The African Union is working for unity, peace and progress for all people in every corner of this great continent," he told AU heads of state and government at the opening of the 28th AU summit on Monday in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa. He said the UN would work closely with the AU as the pan-African bloc endeavors towards realization of its development agenda and ensuring peace and security across Africa. "You can count on the full support of the United Nations for all your efforts to strengthen national institutions, to maintain the rule of law, ensure accountability, promote good governance, facilitate the peaceful transition of power and prevent violent extremism," he said. Implementing agenda 2063 and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), promoting peace and security, and human rights are among the major areas that the UN envisages to work with AU, according to the secretary-general. Guterres also commended African nations for providing large number of peacekeepers around the world, and for their "most generous host of refugees." He also expressed his keen interest to work with AU to present "concrete proposals to the security council on predictable, reliable financing for AU peace operations". He noted that Africa as a continent encompasses some of the world's fastest growing economies. The world is in the second year of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals and Africa has adopted a plan that is even more far-reaching and ambitious: Agenda 2063, he said. "For the people of Africa to fully benefit from the global partnership for sustainable development, these two agendas need to be strategically aligned," he said. He also praised the recent socio-economic transformations on the African continent, saying that "much of Africa has seen significant social and economic progress." GENEVA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Klaus Schwab, founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum (WEF), praised on Friday Chinese president Xi Jinping's commitment last week to act as a responsible leader amid lingering challenges tainting the international landscape. "President Xi sent a clear message in Davos that he believes China's future not only lies within the international community, but that it is also ready to act as a responsive and responsible leader by helping create a fairer, more equitable and sustainable world," Schwab told Xinhua in a written interview. "As President Xi himself identified, a coordinated and interconnected approach to global cooperation can produce a 'win-win' for the world, as it looks to navigate a path forward through a world beset by slow, uneven growth and the realities of climate change and terrorism," he added. Xi paid a state visit to Switzerland on Jan. 15-19. During his visit, he met with his Swiss counterpart Doris Leuthard, opened the 47th WEF annual meeting in Davos and convened with high level international organization representatives in Geneva and Lausanne. In Davos, the Chinese president called on the international community to face up to the problems caused by the globalization instead of dodging them. Xi stressed the importance of developing a dynamic innovation-driven growth model, a model of open and win-win cooperation featuring a well-coordinated and inter-connected approach, and a model of fair and equitable governance in keeping with the trend of the times, and a balanced, equitable and inclusive development model. Schwab said that many of the points raised by Xi were relevant to the Forum's theme this year: Responsive and Responsible Leadership. "The priorities set out by President Xi are entirely consistent with these aims," the German economics professor highlighted while lauding the leadership qualities of the Chinese president. "For me, true leadership incorporates brains, soul and heart: which means leaders must have intelligence, wisdom, passion and compassion," he said, adding that "few leaders have been able to combine all these traits, but President Xi is among those who have." KIGALI, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Scores of alleged M23 rebels fled to Rwanda on Sunday evening through Rwanda's border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Rwanda's ministry of defense said Monday. The ministry said in a statement that a group of 30 unarmed people claiming to be M23 combatants crossed into its territory in the border's Bugeshi sector, Rubavu district. "The individuals are said to have fled from combat action by DRC Armed Forces (FARDC). They have been registered in Rwanda and those in need of medical attention have been received by the International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC) in accordance with international humanitarian law," said Rene Ngendahimana, Rwanda's defense spokesperson. M23 used to be the most prominent rebel group operating in eastern Congo before it was repulsed by UN forces fighting with the Congolese national army. In 2012, more than 25,000 Congolese refugees entered Rwanda as a result of resurgence of conflict in eastern DRC. Close to 18,000 live in the Kigeme refugee camp in southern Rwanda and another 7,766 are housed at the Nkamira transit camp in Rubavu. In 2013, over 1,000 rebels fled to Rwanda and Uganda before their leaders signed a peace agreement with DRC government. Under that agreement, the rebels who fled to neighboring countries were to be repatriated back to Congo within a year. That has proved difficult due to questions over an amnesty. The M23 rebels want a blanket amnesty but the DRC government insists some must be tried for crimes committed in eastern Congo. The crisis in the DRC escalated in April 2009 following mutiny by a group of soldiers of the Congolese army claiming the Congolese government had violated a 2009 peace agreement. They formed the M23 rebel group, which is mainly made up of soldiers from a now-defunct National Congress for the Defense of the People (CNDP). SRINAGAR, Indian-controlled Kashmir, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The five Indian troopers, who were rescued alive last week from snow near the Line of Control (LoC), dividing Kashmir, died in hospital on Monday, officials said. The troopers were trapped after a snowbound track they were walking on caved in at Machil sector of frontier Kupwara district, about 165 km northwest of Srinagar city, summer capital of Indian-controlled Kashmir. "The five army soldiers who had been trapped under snow and subsequently rescued after a gruelling daylong mission have succumbed to their injuries," an Indian army official said. Following their rescue from the snow on Saturday, the troopers were admitted at a local medical facility. According to Indian army spokesman the troopers were airlifted to base hospital in Srinagar for specialized treatment on Monday. "The troopers were evacuated to Srinagar despite persistent poor weather conditions for specialized medical care, unfortunately all the brave hearts succumbed to their injuries today," the spokesman said. The troopers were part of a routine patrol in the area. Monday's deaths have put the death toll of troopers in the recent snow fury to 20. Last week 15 troopers were killed after avalanches hit them at three different places in Gurez and Sonamarg. It took two days for army rescue teams to retrieve bodies from the snow mounds in Gurez. Officials said bodies of 14 troopers which could not be airlifted from Gurez due to inclement weather were brought to Srinagar in military helicopters on Monday. "The mortal remains of the brave soldiers will be taken to their native places tomorrow for last rites," the spokesman said. The snow also claimed several civilian lives including four members of a family. Last year, 10 Indian troopers were buried under an avalanche on Siachen Glacier near LoC in the region. It took several days for the military to retrieve their bodies. LoC is a de facto border that divides Kashmir into India and Pakistan controlled parts. Meanwhile, authorities have issued fresh avalanche warnings in the region and cautioned people living in avalanche prone areas to avoid venturing out. Kashmir has a rugged terrain. Landslides and avalanches are often triggered from its mountains during frequent rains and heavy snowfall, the region receives. A group of women from a remote village in the outskirts of Garissa county in Nothern Kenya are busy fetching contamited water from a drying water pan for domestic use, Jan. 18, 2017. Pastoralists from the area have been hardly hit by drought and fermine with majority of them loosing hundreds of livestock through drought. (Xinhua/Stephen Ingati) NAIROBI, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations has said that more than 17 million people are currently in crisis and emergency food insecurity levels in the Horn of African region. FAO said on Sunday widespread drought conditions in the Horn of Africa have intensified since the failure of the October-December rains with only one-quarter of expected rainfall received. FAO Deputy Director-General, Climate and Natural Resources, Maria Helena Semedo warned that if response is not immediate and sufficient, the risks are massive and the costs high. "The magnitude of the situation calls for scaled-up action and coordination at national and regional levels. This is, above all, a livelihoods and humanitarian emergency -- and the time to act is now," Semedo said in a statement received in Nairobi. The UN food agency said the 17 million people in need of urgent humanitarian assistance are in Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Uganda. Currently, close to 12 million people across Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia are in need of food assistance, as families face limited access to food and income, together with rising debt, low cereal and seed stocks, and low milk and meat production. Herdsmen sell their livestock at a local market in Garissa, northern Kenya, Jan. 16, 2017. As Kenya grapples with a severe drought that has affected close to 2 million people, many herdsmen have to live on the income from selling the livestock. (Xinhua/Stephen Ingati) A pre-famine alert has been issued for Somalia and an immediate and humanitarian response is highly required. Acute food shortage and malnutrition also remain to be a major concern in many parts of South Sudan, Sudan (west Darfur) and Uganda's Karamoja region. "We cannot wait for a disaster like the famine in 2011," Semedo said, adding that repeated episodes of drought have led to consecutive failed harvests, disease outbreaks, deteriorating water and pasture conditions and animal deaths. She said the drought situation in the region is extremely worrying, primarily in almost all of Somalia but also across southern and southeastern Ethiopia, and northern Kenya. "As a consequence, with the next rains at least eight weeks away and the next main harvest not until July, millions are at risk of food insecurity across the region," Semedo said. Bukar Tijani, FAO Assistant Director-General and Regional Representative for Africa, warned that insecurity and economic shocks affect the most vulnerable people. "The situation is rapidly deteriorating and the number of people in need of livelihood and humanitarian emergency assistance is likely to increase as the dry and lean season continue with significant negative impact on livelihoods and household assets as well as on the food security and nutrition of affected rural communities," he said. FAO called for joint priorities to increase and include enhanced coordination, increased and systematic engagement of member states and effective response to member states' identified needs, as well as strengthened resource mobilization efforts. GENEVA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Referring to the executive order by U.S. President Donald Trump banning entry of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights warned Monday that "discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law." "The U.S. ban is also mean-spirited and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism," his office quoted Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein as stating via twitter. With regards to international organizations, United Nations agencies jointly appealed to Washington to withdraw Trump's anti-refugee decision, reminding that "the needs of refugees and migrants worldwide have never been greater, and the U.S. resettlement program is one of the most important in the world." WINDHOEK, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- About 355 Namibian farmers and government staff have benefited from training with Chinese experts on skills from rice farming to compost making, said Namibia's agriculture permanent secretary Percy Misika. Through a project under the Tripartite Agreement on South-South Cooperation (SSC) signed with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and China, which started in 2015 and will end this year, Chinese experts were assigned to work with locals to maximize skills and knowledge transfer. Misika told Xinhua that the two-year cooperation has been excellent. The training range from rice cultivation, horticulture, compost making and virology to meat residue analysis. "The introduction of special crops with well-developed roots such as Chinese long beans and pumpkins with stronger roots which have better water and fertilizer absorption ability will ensure the availability of vegetables during dry periods," he said. Following the interventions of the Chinese experts, rice yields increased significantly from, according to him. "This significant increase was also realized to the newly introduced method of mechanical transplanting of seedlings into the rice paddies. The new method not only helped to reduce labor costs but also shortened the planting time," he added. Meanwhile, Misika said as for future cooperation, discussions are underway for Phase 2 of the SSC project between the tripartite parties. "No specific areas have been decided upon yet as discussions are still in their early stages. It is however anticipated that Phase 2 will build on the excellent results obtained in Phase 1 particularly in rice production," he said. THE HAGUE, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Four major mosques in the Hague, Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Utrecht on Monday decided to provisionally close their doors during all joint prayer moments following an attack on a mosque in Quebec, Canada. The mosque leaders held an emergency meeting on Monday after the attack in Quebec on Sunday when gunmen opened fire at a mosque, killing six people. The mosques said in a common statement, "we feel obliged to close our mosques in the Netherlands during prayer." The four mosques are the Blauwe Moskee (Blue Mosque) in Amsterdam, the Essalam Mosque in Rotterdam, the As-Soennah Mosque in The Hague and the Omar Al Farouk Mosque in Utrecht. "The mosque is an open building that anyone can enter at any time of the day," the statement continued. "We therefore regret that we must take these rigorous security measures." The closure measure of the four mosques has so far not been followed by others. The Dutch National Coordinator for Security and Counter-terrorism (NCTV) has been in contact with several mosques and Muslim organizations and issued a declaration to Xinhua stating there were currently no general measures needed to protect all mosques. "The NCTV is alert to the security situation of mosques and consults regularly with mosques," the NCTV stated. "Security measures are always taken on the basis of threat and risk. At present, the NCTV recommends no additional general security. If necessary, locally appropriate measures are taken." The terrorist threat level in the Netherlands has been "substantial", level 4 on a scale of 5, since March 2013. Level 4 means the chance of an attack in the Netherlands is real, but there are no specific indications that terrorists are preparing to carry out an attack. Six were killed and several others injured when gunmen opened fire in the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center during evening prayers on Sunday. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the shooting, calling it a "terrorist attack on Muslims." SKOPJE, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- After several hours of intensive meetings on Sunday night here to sign a coalition agreement between the VMRO-DPMNE party and the party of ethnic Albanians DUI, VMRO-DPMNE leader Nikola Gruevski announced that no coalition had been concluded. As head of the party who won the majority of parliamentary seats in the Dec. 11 elections, Gruevski was mandated by President Gjorge Ivanov on Jan. 9 to create a new government of Macedonia and was given 20 days to achieve this. A few hours before the deadline expired, officials from the two parties said VMRO-DPMNE and DUI had already agreed on the governing coalition but at midnight, the representatives declared the opposite, saying it was impossible to reach an agreement. Gruevskis's party won the elections by a narrow margin -- 51 seats against the 49 seats won by main opposition party SDSM led by Zoran Zaev. However, in order to form the new government, one party needs to have at least 61 seats in the 120-seat parliament. After receiving the mandate from the president, VMRO-DPMNE started talks with the party of DUI led by Ali Ahmeti, which won 10 seats. A few days ago, Ahmeti's party, as well as the other ethnic Albanian parties, signed a joint platform in which they decided to stay together. They presented seven requests to the ruling party of Gruevski in which the most important one was the use of the Albanian language as a second official language in Macedonia. The parties didn't agree on all points of the platform which was set as a condition for the creation of a governing coalition. Soon after declaring the failure of talks, the representatives of VMRO-DPMNE said in a press release that Macedonia should hold new parliamentary elections as it was the only way to get out of the political crisis. Even representatives from DUI said the two parties had failed to agree on several issues which made the creation of a coalition impossible. Now, based on the country's constitution, the president should give the mandate to form the government to the second party who won most of votes, in this case,the SDSM. by Liu Tong, Xue Fei, Lin Hao KOTA KINABALU, Malaysia, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Yang Yaoru, a 24-year-old girl from China's eastern Jiangsu province, could never imagine she could repeat the adventures of "The Life of Pi," though not on her own. Lying in bed at a hospital in Kota Kinabalu (KK), the capital of the eastern Malaysian state of Sabah, Yang recalled to Xinhua how in two days after the boat capsized on Saturday, she and around 20 Chinese tourists and Malaysian crewmembers floated in the sea after high waves sank their boat, cast them back and forth but did not destruct their hope of life. Yang is one of the 20 Chinese citizens that have been rescued by Malaysian search and rescue forces on Sunday. It was not easy for Yang, who as one of millions of Chinese citizens, are increasingly keen to spend the Spring Festival Holiday going abroad for travel and leisure instead of staying at home. A busy accountant, Yang only got the chance to discard work and brought her mother to the beach and sunshine in Sabah of Malaysia during the seven-day holiday. On that day, they were about to go snorkeling on Mengalum Island, 55 km away from KK. It all went well at first, but after around 40 minutes, the boat, a catamaran, suddenly broke down. Then some people noticed that water start to flood in. Everybody was so scared and panicked, and then jumped into the water, with some people crying, said Yang, noting that some people even asked for God's help. When they realized that crying does not help, everybody tried to rely on their life instinct. Yang did not know when all the people, with life jackets on, began to seize each other's hands and float in the water as a group. "We know that if we want to have a better chance of survival, we have to stick together," said Yang. "At that time, everybody was scared, but if we stick together, our fear will be diminished." "If you float in the sea alone, I guess nobody can last very long," she said. The power of unity encouraged everybody, some people began to locate the nearest island while others tried to find a cellphone that can still receive signal, almost exhausting all possible self-help measures. Every time they heard ships passing by, they tried to swim to the right direction but failed all the time. Some, though only met when they first boarded the boat, encouraged each other while some others, weighed down by sunburnt bruises and dehydration, also entertained the idea of giving up. Yang knew a young woman, who not only organized people to save themselves, but also had a daughter who share her mother's tough character, never crying during the process. "But later, the mother's life jacket broke while she exhausted all her strength," recalled Yang, with tears in her eyes. "We have no choice but have to let her go." Yang also worried about her mother. "One thought I had at that time is that I must bring my mother home, so that even if I die, my father still has a chance to have a baby with my mother." As humanity has shown in every disaster, people fight for food and water when they are desperate. According to Yang, one of the crewmember tried to snatch water from children. "We had to convince him to calm down and tell him that our motherland is powerful enough to organize search and rescue missions," said Yang. With such a conviction in mind, Yang and her fellows weathered high waves and suffered skin ulceration due to prolonged stay in the water and finally had enough strength to get rescued by a passing fishing boat. "After this, nothing is more important than being alive," she said. KOTA KINABALU, Malaysia, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- No new survivors of a boat carrying Chinese tourists sank off Malaysia's Sabah state were found Monday, while authorities have launched investigation into the accident, arresting the boat owner and two crew members. Ahmad Puzi Ab Kahar, director general of Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, told Xinhua via phone that no new survivors were found and the search and rescue would continue. Speaking to a press conference, Ahmad Puzi said the search area had been expanded to 2,400 square nautical miles, involving assets from his agency as well as Malaysian navy and air force. Neighboring Brunei has sent aircraft to search its waters. The search faces challenges caused by strong wind and rough sea, but "that were not the excuses and problem for us to continue the operations," he said. Meanwhile, Malaysian authorities have started investigation into the accident. Prime Minister Najib Razak said on a social media posting that he saw the tragedy seriously and want a detailed investigation to find out the cause of the incident. The skipper and the crewman were arrested for suspecting causing death by negligence, said Sabah police chief Ramli Din. The two crew members were the first to be rescued after their boat sank on Saturday on the way from the state capital Kota Kinabalu to Pulau Mengalum, a popular tourist island some 60 km to the west. The owner was arrested later on Monday, and police has launched a full probe into the accident, including whether the boat was overloaded and whether it was operated with license and insurance, Ramli told Xinhua. "We will investigate from all angles, pertaining to negligence if any," he said. Ramli said the boat was carrying 27 Chinese tourists instead of 28 as reported earlier. One tourist was registered for the trip but cancelled the visit after seeing the boat was full. That brings the number of unaccounted for down to five, including a crewman, not six as reported earlier, he said. China's Consulate General in Kota Kinabalu said the new figure would have to be verified. The passengers and crew were left adrift at sea after the boat sank in rough sea, before 20 Chinese tourists were rescued Sunday. Three tourists were found dead. The tourists were sent back to Kota Kinabalu early Monday and admitted to a hospital. All suffered from sunburn and dehydration but were in stable conditions, according to the hospital. A Chinese tourist who went to Pulau Mengalum for snorkeling on Saturday recalled the bumpy trip in bad weather. "It almost broke my waist," she told Xinhua. She also recalled the crowded boat and the fact that many passengers were not wearing life jackets. ISTANBUL, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- One person was killed and two others wounded on Monday when a gunman opened fire in a restaurant in Istanbul, local media reported. According to the Hurriyet daily, the man fired shots within a popular restaurant in Istanbul's Asian district of Beykoz, sparking panic among the public as the incident was reminiscent of the attack on the city's Reina nightclub on New Year's Day, in which 39 people were killed in a shooting spree by an Islamic State militant. Preliminary police reports showed the latest assault was not terror related and the attacker has been detained, the daily said. The gunman shot dead a person who allegedly killed his father 12 years ago, Hurriyet said, noting two other people were injured in the shooting. Istanbul has come under a series of terror attacks over the past one and a half years. GENEVA , Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations special rapporteur on torture, Nils Melzer, on Monday appealed to U.S. President Donald Trump not to reconsider the acceptability of waterboarding and other methods of torture used as interrogation techniques. In a statement published on Monday, the UN expert stressed that without any doubt, waterboarding amounts to torture. "Any tolerance, complacence or acquiescence with such practice, however exceptional and well-argued, will inevitably lead down a slippery slope towards complete arbitrariness and brute force," he cautioned. "I urgently appeal to President Trump to carefully consider not only U.S. legal obligations, doctrine and tradition, but also the consolidated legal and moral views of the entire international community before allowing the re-introduction of methods or interrogation that are more closely associated with barbarism than with civilization," he added. The UN special rapporteur noted that the United States has always publicly affirmed its belief in the rule of law and respect for truth, and called on the United States to live up to the standards the nation has set both for itself and others. "If the new administration were to revive the use of torture, however, the consequences around the world would be catastrophic," he warned. Trump said earlier last week that he is ok with torturing terrorists in order to "fight fire with fire." "When ISIS is doing things that nobody has ever heard of since medieval times, would I feel strongly about waterboarding? As far as I am concerned, we have to fight fire with fire," Trump said during an interview with U.S. TV network ABC. Trump said he has recently met the senior intelligence officials who told him that torture "absolutely" works, but according to Melzer, contrary to popular belief, torture simply does not work. "Torture is known to consistently produce false confessions and unreliable or misleading information," he said, "Faced with the imminent threat of excruciating pain or anguish, victims simply will say anything --regardless of whether it is true -- to make the pain stop and try to stay alive." The expert recalled the 2014 U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee Report, which concluded that the CIA's use of enhanced interrogation techniques, including waterboarding, was "not an effective means of acquiring intelligence or gaining cooperation from detainees", a conclusion echoed by countless law enforcement agencies and scientific studies worldwide. "Even if torture did work, that does not make it legally or morally acceptable," he added. "Let us be clear: if you are looking for military advantage in war, you can argue that chemical weapons 'work', or terrorism 'works' as well." DAMASCUS, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem warned on Monday of any attempt by foreign powers to establish safe zones in northern Syria, state news agency SANA reported. Al-Moallem made the remarks at a meeting with visiting United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi, where both agreed that imposing safe zones, as proposed by U.S. President Donald Trump, would be "unsafe" and violate the sovereignty of Syria, if without coordination with the Syrian government. On Wednesday, Trump said he "will absolutely do safe zones in Syria" for refugees fleeing the war in the country, amid reports that he will task the Pentagon to prepare a plan for setting up safe zones in northern Syria. Turkey agreed on the idea, as Ankara has long been seeking to create such zones in northern Syria, especially when it has forces there fighting the Islamic State (IS) group and Kurdish-backed militias. In separate phone calls with Trump on Sunday, Saudi King Salman and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen to help refugees "displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said in a press release. Earlier in the day, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said his country may support the U.S. initiative to establish safe zones for refugees in Syria, noting that the plan would require close cooperation with the UN and approval from the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad. Related: Turkey says awaits results of U.S. study for safe zones in Syria ANKARA, Jan. 26 (Xinhua) -- Turkey is awaiting the outcome of an anticipated order by U.S. President Donald Trump to form a safe zones plan in Syria, said the Turkish foreign ministry on Thursday. The ministry further stressed that Ankara has long been supportive of the idea. Full story MOSCOW, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Russia and the new U.S. administration have broad prospects for cooperation, primarily regarding anti-terrorism, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Monday. RIO DE JANEIRO, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Brazilian Federal Police arrested former billionaire Eike Batista on Monday morning in Rio, as he disembarked from a flight from the New York City. The police had been trying to arrest Batista since last week. Policemen arrived at his house on Thursday only to find out that Batista had fled Brazil late Tuesday, leaving the country with a German passport - the businessman has dual citizenship. Batista's lawyers denied that he had been trying to avoid justice, and said Batista had a scheduled business meeting in New York. The Brazilian Police alerted Interpol, which put him on an international watchlist. The police feared that Batista would manage to get to Germany, which does not have extradition treaties with Brazil. On late Sunday, Batista took a plane back to Rio, saying he wanted to "answer to Justice" and "settling things down." Batista, who used to be Brazil's richest man before his oil company OGX went bankrupt, leading to the collapse of his whole business empire, is accused of paying hefty bribes to the Rio de Janeiro authorities in exchange for favors to his business. Batista's EBX Group made several contracts with the public sector in Brazil. According to the Federal Prosecution Office (MPF), Batista engaged in actions of corruption by paying a bribe of 16.5 million U.S. dollars to former Rio de Janeiro state governor Sergio Cabral. Cabral is already in jail for other accusations, but was also indicted in this case. NAIROBI, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- About 6.5 million children are at risk of hunger in Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia due to severe drought that is ravaging several parts of the Horn of Africa region, Save the Children has warned. The charity said in a statement received in Nairobi on Monday that nearly half a million children in the region are already suffering from severe malnutrition. "Thousands of families (in Somalia) are on the move in search of food and water, and many are now crossing the border into Ethiopia -- which is dealing with its own effects of the drought -- in search of help," it said. Several seasons of either failed or erratic rainfall have led to severe water shortages and the death of livestock, leaving nearly 15 million people across the three countries in urgent need of assistance. According to the charity, 77 percent of children being screened on arrival in Dollo Ado camp are showing signs of malnutrition. It said with the next rainy season expected to bring below-average rainfall across the region, the situation for already desperate children and families in Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya will only get worse, leaving millions at risk of hunger, and even death. "The lives of millions are at stake. We must not allow many of the same past errors that resulted in the deaths of 130,000 children under five during the last Somalia famine alone, to be repeated," said John Graham, Ethiopia Country Director for Save the Children. With nearly half its population (five million people) facing severe food and water shortages, the charity said Somalia is now on the verge of a famine. Malnutrition rates across Somalia have already reached critical levels and are expected to worsen in the coming weeks. In Ethiopia, the drought is forcing many children to drop out of school, leaving them at risk of early marriage and forced migration. While the Ethiopian government worked to mitigate the effects of last year's drought, the country is appealing for 948 million U.S. dollars in funding -- of which it has already committed over 47 million dollars -- to help 5.6 million people in need. In Kenya, more than 1.25 million people are in urgent need of food, with hunger levels expected to worsen over the coming months. Save the Children said it's working to alleviate the effects of the drought in Somalia, Ethiopia and Kenya, including support for refugees crossing from Somalia into Ethiopia's Dollo Ado camp. KIEV, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Fighting flared up with a new vigour in eastern Ukraine, killing at least 10 people and injuring dozens of others in the past day, reports said on Monday. According to the officials from the conflicting parties, the battles have concentrated in the outskirts of Donetsk, the stronghold of independence-seeking insurgents. At least five Ukrainian soldiers were killed and 14 others wounded during the battles with rebels in the Kiev-controlled Avdeevka town, which lies 20 kilometers north of Donetsk, said the government military spokesman Olexandr Motuzyanyk. Besides, three residents of Avdeevka, two women and a man, were wounded during the shelling in the town. Civilian casualties have been also reported in the rebel-controlled areas around Donetsk. Eduard Basurin, a senior insurgent commander, said two civilians were confirmed dead and three others were injured as the result of the battles in Makeevka and Gorlivka towns. According to Basurin, three rebel soldiers have been killed and four others wounded in the fighting over the last 24 hours. The past day's bloodshed, for which the sides blamed each other, marked the worst outbreak of violence in the conflict in eastern Ukraine in the more than a month. On Dec. 24, 2016, the sides started a comprehensive ceasefire, which has brought a relative calm to the conflict-ravaged region. The confrontation between government troops and rebels in eastern Ukraine has been raging since April 2014, claiming some 10,000 lives. BRUSSELS, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- European Union (EU) foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini on Monday denounced the attack at a mosque in Canada's Quebec which claimed at least six lives and injured many others. Mogherini said in a statement that the attack had shown once again that terrorism was a threat for citizens all over the world, no matter what their religion, belief or nationality. "We express our deepest sympathy and offer our sincere condolences to the families of the victims and to the authorities of Canada," she said. "Like Canada, the EU firmly supports freedom of religion and diversity as a source of strength of our societies, and will keep protecting and promoting it." she added. At least six people were killed and eight others wounded when gunmen opened fire at a Quebec mosque during evening prayers on Sunday. According to reports, two suspects were arrested in connection with the attack, which Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described as a "terrorist attack on Muslims." Demonstrators participating in a protest against U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily barring all refugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens from entry into the U.S. march towards Capitol Hill in Washington D.C., the Unite States, on Jan. 29, 2017. Protesters rallied in front of the White House on Sunday while demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily barring all refugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens from entry into the United States. (Xinhua/Yin Bogu) by Mahmoud Fouly CAIRO, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- As controversial as it is, the recent entry ban imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump on visitors from seven Muslim-majority states is reckless and dangerous to world order, said Egyptian political experts. President Trump signed on Friday an executive order to put a 90-day ban on the entry of people from Syria, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Sudan, Somalia and Iran, while barring all Syrian refugees indefinitely. The decision has been widely disapproved by the seven countries in question, Western governments including those of Canada, Britain, Germany, France, Sweden, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Czech, as well as major world and regional bodies like the United Nations (UN), the European Union (EU) and the Arab League (AL). "What Trump did is a reckless move that does not reflect the real U.S. policy in this regard," said Bashir Abdel-Fattah, political expert and researcher at Cairo-based Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies. He added that Trump wants to prove through the decision that he can adopt a U.S. foreign policy contrary to those of his predecessors and that he can turn his electoral campaign anti-immigration promises into actions. "The decision is criticized inside and outside America itself. The whole world condemns this decision. So, I believe it will not form a general tendency of Trump's policy," Abdel-Fattah told Xinhua. Following widespread protests at airports across the United States, a federal court in New York issued an emergency stay allowing all refugees inside the country or in transit with a valid U.S. visa, which challenges deportations under Trump's order. "Trump's measure is temporary anyway even if implemented, as it was rejected by the federal court that allowed those relevantly detained to be released," said the political researcher, arguing that the U.S. president wanted to challenge those who doubted his ability to take anti-migration measures that would anger many Arab and Muslim states. In response to Trump's restrictions, Sudan summoned the U.S. charge d'affaires in Khartoum to protest the ban and Iran made a similar move, besides slamming it as "a great gift to extremism" and "an open affront against the Muslim world." Although there is no official comment from the Egyptian leadership, a senior lawmaker at the parliament's foreign affairs committee told a local newspaper that Trump's move would not contribute to fighting terrorism as much as it might lead to growing rates of extremism worldwide. "Trump's decision is shocking, as it will anger the people of the concerned seven states and will lead to further clashes," said Egyptian lawmaker Tarek al-Khouli, urging the U.S president to reconsider such measures in order not to contribute to chaos across the world. For his part, Hassan Nafaa, a political science professor at Cairo University, viewed the entry ban as "extremist and racist," saying it would have very serious impacts regionally and internationally. "It is Trump's right to take the necessary measures to fight terrorism, but it is not his right at all to consider all the peoples of specific Muslim states necessarily terrorists until proven otherwise," the professor told Xinhua. Nafaa lamented that the ban involves millions of people who have nothing to do with terrorism but happened to belong to states where terrorism grows for some reason. "One of these countries is Iraq, where the aggressive war launched by the United States is the main reason for prevailing terrorism," he said, warning that "if the president of the world's biggest power continues to adopt this kind of behavior, it will cause perplex to the whole world order." Related: Trump's entry ban on 7 Muslim states met by world criticism CAIRO, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- The recent temporary entry ban imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump on visitors from seven Muslim states has been received by world and regional criticism. U.S. President Donald Trump (L-R), joined by Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, Vice President Mike Pence, senior advisor Steve Bannon, Communications Director Sean Spicer and National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, speaks by phone with Russia's President Vladimir Putin in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, U.S. January 28, 2017. (REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst) MOSCOW, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Russia and the new U.S. administration have broad prospects for cooperation, primarily regarding anti-terrorism, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Monday. "There is a determination to reach results, but the practical work lies ahead," Lavrov told a press conference, commenting on Saturday's first phone conversation between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump since the latter's inauguration. Lavrov said the conversation revealed "mutual respect and willingness to communicate without sermons" on the basis of the national interests of both countries. According to Lavrov, Putin and Trump agreed that work at the level of experts and within the framework of their subsequent contacts will "definitely take place" with the details and timing yet to be coordinated. Lavrov said he sees "practically unlimited possibilities" in joint actions against the Islamic State as the two presidents stressed during the call to prioritize anti-terrorism. The top diplomat said there could be professional dialogue between Russian and the U.S. armies to elaborate concrete measures to suppress terrorism in Syria. Russia can also provide additional aid, primarily in exchange for intelligence, to combat IS in Iraq, Lavrov said. In addition, the Russian foreign minister said Moscow expects a clarification of Trump's recent proposal to create security zones in Syria. "As I understand it, the U.S. initiative is aimed at creating zones where migrants could feel safe and alleviating the migration burden for countries surrounding Syria, other countries in the region, Europe and the United States itself," he said. A girl looks at a mirror in a war-shattered neighborhood of east Aleppo City, north Syria, on Dec. 20, 2016. (Xinhua/Ammar Safarjalani) MOSCOW, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Russia's Defense Ministry on Monday called on international organizations and other countries to provide aid for residents of the Syrian city of Aleppo. "Humanitarian aid from Kazakhstan was sent from the Syrian port of Tartus (to Aleppo). Earlier, aid came from Armenia, Belarus and Serbia. However, aid from other countries and international organizations, whose representatives in their offices have repeatedly talked about the plight of the Syrian people and the humanitarian disaster in the country, hasn't been received so far," said Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov. Besides water and bread, residents in Aleppo also need glass, cement, pipes and construction materials, he said. Konashenkov said a peaceful life has returned to Aleppo and other towns. Locals are rebuilding their houses, and schools and hospitals have reopened. Last month, the Syrian government forces recaptured the city from rebel forces which had been occupying the city since 2012. The five-year civil war in Syria has killed more than 300,000 people and caused a serious refugee crisis. RIYADH, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Houthi militias shelled the United Nation office in southern Saudi Arabia near the border with Yemen, Al Arabiya local news reported on Monday. The shells damaged the front windows, walls and reception of the building, it said. It is the first time that an international body in Saudi Arabia was targeted since the Saudi-led coalition declared war on the Houthis in March 2015, as Houthi rebels usually attacked local military and civilian targets such as homes and schools in the past. LONDON, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Japanese Embassy to Britain remained silent one day after a detailed media report said that it had been paying a British think tank to propagate against China. An official with the Japanese Embassy in London acknowledged on Monday morning that the Embassy had received an enquiry letter from Xinhua seeking confirmation and comments on the Jan. 29 The Sunday Times report. But the Japanese Embassy has failed to reply so far. The Times report claimed that Japan had been paying 10,000 pounds (12,475 U.S. dollars) per month to a British think tank to hype up "China threat" among British high-level politicians. It said that the Japanese Embassy in London reached a deal with the Henry Jackson Society (HJS), a registered charity, to wage a secret propaganda campaign against China. A spokesman from HJS told Xinhua on Monday that the society works with organizations and governments in promoting liberal democracy, human rights and international security. The spokesman refused to say whether the alleged financial deal with Japan is part of its efforts to promote democracy and human rights. "We can never reveal specific details. Our position on this is well known and we will continue to support the values that free and democratic societies uphold," the spokesman said. British media said that the financial deal was reached in response to growing cooperation between China and Britain. This weekend, former British foreign secretary Malcolm Rifkind acknowledged that the HJS, founded in 2005, had approached him to put his name to an article published by the Daily Telegraph last August, expressing concerns about China's involvement in Britain's Hinkley Point C nuclear plant. The article -- titled "How China could switch off Britain's lights in a crisis if we let them build Hinkley C" -- raised fears that "no one knows what 'backdoor' technologies might be able to be introduced into the building of a power plant". The Sunday Times said Japan's secret public relations war on China reflects Tokyo's concerns about the "golden decade" of Sino-British cooperation. SOFIA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Bulgaria's interim government held its first meeting Monday, with interim Prime Minister Ognyan Gerdzhikov vowing to race against time to complete its commissions. "We are not like the ordinary cabinets with a four-year horizon ahead, we are going to take a 100 metres run," Gerdzhikov said, quoted by a statement of the interim cabinet. Gerzhikov demanded information on the preparation of the Bulgarian EU Presidency, saying it was a very important issue for the country. Bulgaria will assume the six-month rotating presidency of the Council of the European Union on Jan. 1, 2018. Gerzhikov also said Bulgaria's judicial reform was an important issue for the country's EU Presidency. Other priorities of the interim cabinet were the succession, stability, and continuing the successful absorption of the EU funds, he said. "Dialogue with the business and the civil society is another important priority," he added. Bulgaria's interim government took office on Jan. 27, after the GERB party-led coalition cabinet resigned in mid-November last year. NAIROBI, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Kenyan wildlife authorities have invested in strong measures to ensure swift response to attacks on human beings by carnivores and big mammals in protected parks, officials said on Monday. Director General of Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) Kitili Mbathi said deaths linked to wildlife attacks have reduced dramatically thanks to quick response by rangers manning national parks and game reserves. "Though deaths linked to wildlife attacks are a rare phenomenon nowadays, we have put strong measures in place to ensure they do not occur. We always prioritize saving the lives of citizens who encounter hostile animals," Mbathi told Xinhua. Mbathi said Kenya has always prioritized the safety of visitors to wildlife sanctuaries though it is hard to predict when the attacks can occur. "Our animals are not in a zoo but in free range territories where they can attack humans at the slightest provocation. Nevertheless, we always encourage visitors to the parks to keep a distance from the roaming wildlife," Mbathi said. He clarified that killing an animal that has attacked a human being is always the last option. "We only kill an animal if the lives of human beings in the vicinity are in grave danger. Rangers usually tranquilize an animal in a bid to rescue the victim," Mbathi told Xinhua. He disclosed that wildlife rangers recently managed to dis-empower a leopard that had attacked a passerby at Tsavo National park and could not kill it because it was too old and fragile. Kenya was in the global spotlight mid last year when lions strayed from Nairobi National Park and roamed in the nearby residential areas. Wildlife rangers managed to return the big cats to the parks after combing the residential areas while armed to deter attack on passerby. In another tragic incident, a stray lion nicknamed Mohawk was shot dead by rangers when it attacked people on the southern edges of Nairobi National Park. The death of the big cat elicited condemnation from the Kenyan public and wildlife campaigners. GAZA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- A senior Islamic Hamas official said Monday his movement refuses to participate in the municipal elections in the Palestinian territories before ending an internal Palestinian split that has been going on for around 10 years. Salah al-Bardaweel, one of the senior Hamas officials in Gaza, made these remarks in a special interview with Xinhua in response to the Palestinian consensus government's declaration that it has decided to hold the municipal elections in the Palestinian territories on May. "The movement won't let any municipal elections to be held in the Gaza Strip and will boycott it in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip," said al-Bardaweel, that his movement had violently seized control of the coastal enclave in 2007 after it routed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas security forces. Hamas accepted to join the municipal elections that was due to be held for the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in October last year. A Palestinian court decided to postpone it because Hamas courts in Gaza deprived dozens of Abbas Fatah Party's candidate to run in the municipal elections. Al-Bardaweel said the reason his movement wont participate in the elections or allow holding it in Gaza "is because of the illegal measures and verdicts decided or made to set up a date for the elections and then postpon it and then decide a new date without coordination with Hamas movement and other factions." Officials in the consensus government of Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah had earlier stated that the government is determined to decide a new date for holding the municipal elections on May 6. They said that the next Palestinian cabinet meeting is scheduled to make this date final. Al-Bardaweel stressed that the measures of the consensus government "are violating the Palestinian law, and therefore, Hamas rejects these illegal measures," adding that "the priority is for ending the internal division which began in 2007, and any elections held amid division won't succeed." The municipal elections were supposed to be held in the Palestinian territories to elect new municipal council members in 391 municipal council in the West Bank and 25 councils in the Gaza Strip. If the municipal elections were held in October, it was supposed to be the first that held in the Palestinian territories in ten years. Although Hamas movement had forcibly seized control of the Gaza Strip, and routed Abbas security forces, it trades accusations with Abbas Fatah Party that it is behind 10 years of internal political and geographical division between the two parts of the Palestinian territories; the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Over the past 10 years, and in spite of Palestinian, Arab and international mediations, leaders of the two rivals; Hamas and Fatah, had so far failed to implement a series of deals and understandings signed in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Egypt to end their internal feuds and split. Meanwhile, al-Bardaweel told Xinhua that following the meetings held last week in Cairo between a senior Hamas delegation and senior officials in the Egyptian security intelligence, the movement is waiting to get positive results soon, mainly concerning the opening of Rafah border crossing with Egypt. Asked about controlling the borderline area between the Gaza Strip and Egypt, al-Bardaweel said that Hamas has been always acting to control security on the borders and exert efforts to protect the national security of Egypt, adding that Hamas would never accept any attempts to violate Egypt's national security. "In the last meetings held in Cairo, Hamas agreed with Egypt to keep in contact and continue future meetings and bilateral consultations," said al-Bardaweel, adding "no new dates had been set up for future meetings." Ismail Haneya, deputy chief of Hamas, arrived in Gaza Friday through Rafah crossing with Egypt. Haneya has been away for more than four months staying in Qatar. He has been holding talks for the last two days with senior security officials in Egypt on his movement's security cooperation with Egypt as well as the situation in Gaza. He told reporters on Friday that his talks in Qatar and Egypt were positive and fruitful. "We agreed to keep in permanent contact to improve the situation in Gaza," Haneya told reporters at Rafah crossing point between Egypt and Gaza. The crossing is to open temporarily for four days on Saturday, according to Haneya. US President DonaldTrumpsigns an executive memorandum on defeating the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria after signing it in the Oval Office of the White House on January 28, 2017, in Washington, DC. (AFP PHOTO/MANDEL NGAN) WASHINGTON, Jan.30 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order under which the federal government will need to remove two regulations for every new one put forward. Under the order, the U.S. federal agencies will propose rules they want to drop and the White House will review them. Rules on emergencies and national security are made exceptions. The order, aimed to fulfill one of his campaign promises, will benefit both U.S. small and large businesses, said Trump on Monday, reiterating his another campaign pledge that he will try and cut 75 percent of regulations. "Regulation has been horrible for big business, but it's been worse for small business," he told a group of small business owners in White House. "We're going to be doing a big number on Dodd-Frank," he added, calling the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law a "disaster." Canada, Australia and Britain all have similar policies requiring existing rules be repealed before a new one is issued, said a TheHill news daily report. Monday's directive follows a packed week of new executive orders from Trump and came amid nationwide protests against his last Friday order temporarily barring entry into the United States for people from seven Middle East and North African countries and refugees from all over the world. UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations on Monday condemned a terrorist attack on a mosque in the city of Quebec, Canada, voicing its belief that Canada and Canadians "will come together to reject any attempts to sow division based on religion." "We are following developments in the investigation of the horrific attack on a mosque in Quebec," UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at a daily news briefing here. "We condemn this apparent act of terrorism on a place of worship." "We trust that Canada and Canadians, who have shown such leadership in promoting diversity and tolerance, will come together to reject any attempts to sow division based on religion," he said. "We send our condolences to the people, to the families of the victims and wish a speedy recovery to those who were wounded," he added. Gunmen opened fire in the mosque in Quebec Sunday night, killing six people and wounding eight others, reports said, adding that Canadian police said they arrested one man outside the mosque and another suspect turned himself in. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the attack, calling it a "terrorist attack on Muslims." AMMAN, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Jordanian Finance Minister Omar Malhas said on Monday that his country will soon take measures to offset its budget deficit. The government will increase sales taxes, remove tariffs on several commodities, including some food, and raise prices for telecom services, said Malhas. But 70 percent of commodities used by Jordanians will not be affected, he added. Jordan will also cut spending by the public agencies, the minister said. Malhas said the measures are part of a deal that Jordan signed with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 2016, which required the kingdom to take specific economic reforms. Jordan's Minister of State for Media Affair Mohammad Momani said the economic reforms prove the strength of the Jordanian economy. In July 2016, Jordan signed a letter of intent with the IMF to borrow 700 million U.S. dollars through its Extended Fund Facility program. The budget deficit in Jordan is expected to hit about 800 million dinars (1.13 billion dollars) in 2017, according to Malhas. BERLIN, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday slammed the U.S. decision to ban entry of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries as anti-Muslim bias. Anti-terrorism efforts should not justify general suspicion against a specific group of people, Merkel told a press conference prior to her talks with visiting Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. "The essential and also resolute fight against terrorism in no way justifies general suspicion against people of a specific faith, in this case people of the Muslim faith or people of a certain background," she said. "This approach, in my view, contradicts the basic tenets of international aid to refugees and international cooperation," the chancellor said. Merkel said the German government would do its best to find out how those with dual citizenship of Germany and the seven listed countries would be affected legally because of the travel ban. "We're clearly having close consultations with our European partners about this entire issue," she added. Under an executive order signed by U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday, refugees from all over the world will be suspended from entering the United States for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The total population from these countries exceeds 130 million. The ban sparked chaos across U.S. international airports and continuous protests nationwide in the past days. TEHRAN, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- In a conference held in Tehran on Monday, the Islamic republic and Russia marked 515 years of relations between the two countries, official IRNA news agency reported. Iranian Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance, Reza Salehi Amiri, hailed the high level of Iran-Russia politico-economic relations, urging for further expansion of cultural relations. As a major step in cultural front, both countries should play an effective role in the campaign against the thought of extremism in the region, Salehi Amiri told the gathering. The conference is an auspicious move at the time when the bilateral ties have reached a new strategic level, he said, describing the gathering as a suitable opportunity to promote new ties between the two countries. Such a gathering will play an important role in bringing elites of the two states closer to each other, he was quoted as saying by IRNA. Also, in a message to the conference, Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif called for diversification of relations with Russia. "Stronger ties between the two countries will contribute to peace and stability in Central Asia and the Middle East," Zarif said, according to Tasnim news agency. Zarif said that the two neighbors should maintain broad relations and try to diversify and promote ties in all directions, adding that the conference could pave the way for closer cultural interaction and stronger links between the two peoples. Attended by Russia's Ambassador to Tehran Levan Jagarian and Iran's envoy to Moscow Mahdi Sanai, the conference was held at the Iranian Foreign Ministry's Center for International Research and Education. TEHRAN, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev will make an official visit to Iran seeking to strengthen ties with the Islamic republic in diverse areas, local media reported on Monday. The Azerbaijani ambassador to Tehran, Bunyad Hasanov, made the announcement here in Tehran. "Azerbaijan is keen to expand economic and trade cooperation with Iran," he was quoted as saying. The two countries have seen bilateral ties growing particularly over the past few years after President Hassan Rouhani took the office in 2013. The bilateral trade in 2016 showed a 45 percent rise, reaching 320 million U.S. dollars. In August last year, Rouhani and Aliyev met in Baku and urged to bolster cooperation in commerce, industry, energy and transportation. The two sides signed six bilateral documents, including an intergovernmental protocol of intent on cooperation on the North-South international transport corridor project. "The crucial goal of Iran and Azerbaijan is to develop a free trade," Rouhani said, adding that "Iran is negotiating with the Eurasian Economic Union on custom tariffs, and is interested in reaching similar agreements with Azerbaijan in this regard as well." He underlined cooperation in the banking sector, saying that "we try to enhance banking ties to a level which leads to the development of mutual trade and economic relations in all fields." The two countries were developing cooperation in investment, industry, technology, car manufacturing and pharmaceutical fields, he added. LAGOS, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Nigerian Navy said it has arrested nine suspected oil thieves in the southern Delta state in its ongoing "Operation Water Sweet" . About 42 illegal refining camps, 3,000 metric tons of suspected stolen crude oil and 1,000 metric tons of illegally refined diesel were destroyed during the operation, Mohammed Garba, the navy's commanding officer, told reporters Monday in commercial city of Warri. The feat was achieved in the last one week, he added. The operation also led to several arrests, including three high profile members of the criminals involved in pipeline vandalism, he said. Oil theft had drastically reduced the nation's oil revenues, Garba added, noting that the Nigerian Navy would have zero tolerance on oil theft and other crimes at the sea. The naval boss said some of the criminals have been interrogated and handed over to the Nigeria Police Force and the Department of State Services for further investigation and possible prosecution. NICOSIA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Plans to conclude an early agreement on a Cyprus solution in the immediate future have been put on ice as a result of Turkey's unwillingness, Cypriot government sources said on Monday. "It is evident to us that the Turkish government is not currently interested in making any moves on Cyprus because of its preoccupation with constitutional changes that will turn the country's government system from a parliamentary one into a presidential system," the sources told Xinhua on condition of anonymity. They added that Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is not prepared to make a compromise on Cyprus that would result in losing the support of nationalists at a referendum on the constitutional amendments, expected to take place early in April. Turkey occupied 37 percent of Cyprus's territory, almost double the population ratio of Turkish Cypriots in a 1974 military operation prompted by a coup engineered by the military rulers of Greece at the time. Turkey's decisions on security arrangements after a solution are crucial for a successful conclusion of the negotiations going on for almost 22 months. The sources said that Cypriot community leaders, President Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci, will concentrate for the next two months on narrowing down remaining differences on chapters already discussed, such as territorial adjustments, restitution of properties and power sharing. The chief advisors of the two leaders had a meeting on Monday aimed at preparing a meeting between Anastasiades and Akinci on Wednesday. "They did not touch upon the substance of outstanding issues but they rather focused on the program and the methodology to be followed for overcoming existing differences," a source told the official Cyprus News Agency. The source added that it was decided to continue negotiations on all issues to narrow differences and reach agreement on as many points as possible. Two rounds of negotiations held in Switzerland earlier in January with the participation of the three guarantor powers -- Greece, Turkey and Britain -- had an inconclusive outcome. The sources said that Turkey pushed the talks into an indefinite adjournment, after sending its nationalist deputy Prime Minister Tugroul Turkes to meet the Turkish delegation at the Mont Pelerin talks and make additional demands for according the rights of free movement, residence, trade and business to all Turkish citizens after a Cyprus solution. Political analyst Petros Zarounas wrote in his twitter account on Sunday that the purpose of the Turkey's mission was twofold -- to slow down the negotiations until after the referendum and to exhort free visas for all Turks from the European Union. But European Commission spokesman Margaritis Schinas advised Turkey on Monday to avoid negotiating publicly. Schinas said that the European Union is part of the negotiations but it would like to talk inside the negotiations. NEW YORK, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Ivanka Trump, eldest daughter of U.S. President Donald Trump, has been criticized for wearing a fancy silvery gown as protests erupted all over the country against his father's order banning refugees and travelers from some countries. The response on the social media was fierce after Ivanka Saturday tweeted a photo of herself and husband Jared Kushner dressed for a black tie event. She was in a 5,000 U.S.-dollar silvery gown by Carolina Herrera. "Let them eat cake!" mocked the tweets and Instagram comments on Ivanka's accounts, comparing her to Marie Antoinette, the French queen who is popularly criticized for her lavish spending, and for being out of touch with the common people of her country. It was not unusual for the first daughter to share pictures and videos of her daily life, but this one was badly timed, many local media outlets noted. Over the weekend, hundreds of protesters gathered at international terminals all over the country after President Trump signed an executive order on Friday barring all refugees from entering the U.S. for 120 days. The order also bars the admission of refugees from Syria indefinitely and halts entry to the U.S. for three months to residents from seven Middle East and North African countries. BERLIN, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday expressed concern over violation of a ceasefire agreement in eastern Ukraine, saying the on-the-ground situation was "alarming," Deutsche Presse-Agentur (DPA) reported. Merkel picked up the Ukraine issue at a press conference held here ahead of her talks with visiting Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. The chancellor said the ceasefire deal signed two years ago in the Belarusian capital of Minsk had failed, saying that parties concerned should work on implementing the ceasefire even if the path is difficult. Merkel described the situation of conflicts between Ukrainian forces and rebels in eastern Ukraine as "alarming." The Minsk ceasefire was signed by leaders of Russia, Germany, France and Ukraine on Feb. 12, 2015 after intensive negotiations. Violations of the ceasefire have been reported almost on a daily basis in recent months. Photo shows the city appearance of Paphos, western coast of Cyprus. (Photo courtesy of Paphos District Administration) NICOSIA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The picturesque city of Paphos on the western coast of Cyprus officially kicked off its one-year journey as southern European Capital of Culture on Saturday night. Thousands of people gathered in the central square of the city to listen to inaugural speeches and watch dancing and singing performances, despite temperature dipping close to freezing point in perhaps the coldest day of this winter. Paphos in the south Europe and the Danish city of Aarhus in the north will get the attention for cultural events in the European Union throughout 2017. Paphos, a city with a population of 33,000, beat the capital Nicosia in a contest for the title of European Capital of Culture for this year, after presenting a rich file based on its historical heritage going back to the 12th century BC. Mayor Phaedon Phaedonos said in an address to the crowd that throughout the year, the city will organize events related to visual arts, music, theater, dance, photography, cinema, architecture, gastronomy and literature. Paphos is amphitheatrically built on the lower part of the slopes of a 600-meter hill and is one of the main tourism destinations in Cyprus, attracting about 33 percent of visitors. Mayor Phaedonos said that the city counts on its role as European Capital of Culture to enrich tourist product and attract more visitors. LONDON, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said Monday that time was running out for Prime Minister Theresa May to reach a Brexit compromise with Britain's devolved governments. May traveled to Cardiff for a joint ministerial meeting with the leaders of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. It was the first meeting of the leaders since the vote by the Supreme Court that the British government needed a vote by the Westminster parliament to trigger the article 50 process to start Britain's exit from the European Union. The court also ruled that Britain's relationship with Brussels would be determined by Westminster. Sturgeon has been insisting that Scotland, where the vast majority voted against leaving the EU, wanted a deal that maintained its membership of the European single market. After the meeting in the Welsh capital, Sturgeon told a media briefing that "time is running out" to reach a compromise with the British government. Sturgeon said she remained to be convinced and needed to see tangible evidence that proposals for a differentiated Brexit deal for Scotland are being taken seriously by May's government. In Glasgow, the Herald newspaper commented that Sturgeon's remarks will give rise to speculation that she could announce a second referendum on Scottish independence from Britain as early as March. She said in terms of her being able to judge whether Scotland's voice will be heard in the Brexit negotiations, the next few weeks are very important. The First Minister of Wales, Carwyn Jones, also said the interests of Wales had to be protected in any Brexit deal. "Britain is going to leave the EU, but it is how we will leave the EU, ensuring that all four parts of the UK have their say on how this should happen," Jones said. May pledged to engage the devolved governments in the Brexit process, but she said they will not agree on everything, adding "but that doesn't mean we will shy away from the necessary conversations". An official joint communique after the Cardiff meeting said: "Consideration of the proposals of the devolved administrations is an ongoing process. Work will need to be intensified ahead of triggering Article 50 and continued at the same pace thereafter." Among the politicians at the private meeting were Arlene Foster and Michelle O'Neill of the Northern Ireland Assembly, the British government's Brexit Secretary David Davis and trade secretary Liam Fox. After the Cardiff meeting May traveled to Dublin for a meeting with the Irish prime minister Enda Kenny. The pair discussed the impact of Brexit on the border between the Irish republic and Northern Ireland. There has been an open border between both sides since the 1920s, but that could change depending on the deal Britain negotiates with Brussels. Ireland would remain a member of the EU. ANKARA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Turkey reopened its embassy in the Libyan capital Tripoli on Monday, more than two years after the mission was closed, Turkish Foreign Ministry announced in a statement. "Activities of the Turkish embassy in Tripoli have resumed Monday with a reduced staff at the initial stage," the ministry said in a statement on its website. Turkey closed its embassy in Tripoli and consulate in Benghazi for security reasons in 2014, as its consulate in Misrata, a town in northwest Libya, has remained open. Preparations of reopening the mission have been supervised by Turkish Ambassador to Libya, Ahmet Aydin Dogan, who until now has been based in Tunis. "The reopening of the embassy will allow Turkey to make bigger contributions to build peace and stability, as well as reconstruction in Libya," the statement added. The reopening of the Turkish embassy in Tripoli comes months after Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu visited Libya on May 30, 2016 to issue an endorsement for a recently founded national government and start a process to reopen the embassy in Tripoli. Turkey had high hopes for a strong alliance with Libya after the 2011 NATO-backed ouster of longtime strongman Muammar Gadhafi and was the first country to appoint an ambassador to the new authorities in Tripoli in September 2011. CAIRO, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Iran, Lebanon and Algeria condemned on Monday a deadly shooting attack at a mosque in the city of Quebec in Canada late Sunday. Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Bahram Qasemi called the attack "inhumane and criminal" and extended condolences to the families of the victims. "Terrorism is not limited to a region or a handful of countries but all countries in the world could be the target of criminal actions of terrorist and extremist groups," said Qasemi. In Lebanon, Prime Minister Saad Hariri strongly condemned the shooting on his Twitter account. "Terrorism has no religion!" he said. The Algerian government also expressed condemnation. "This act is vainly trying to destabilize societies and undermine the cohesion, diversity and peaceful coexistence of religions and cultures," said Abdelaziz Benali Cherif, a spokesman for Alegira's foreign ministry. Three masked gunmen broke into a mosque in Quebec on Sunday evening, killing six people and injuring eight others. Local media say the attackers have been arrested. PRAGUE, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The Czech military on Monday signed a contract to purchase 20 Pandur armoured vehicles for 2.07 billion crowns (83 million U.S. dollars), the Czech Defense Ministry said in a statement. According to the contract, the Czech army will receive six vehicles for the military command and 14 liaison Pandurs. The vehicles will be equipped with special communication and electronic system of the latest generation. The Tatra Defense Vehicle company (TDV) won the contract. TDV is a part of Czechoslovak Group whose licence contract with General Dynamics European Land Systems-Steyr GmbH makes it the exclusive producer and seller of the Pandurs in the Czech Republic and on selected markets of eastern Europe and Asia. UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The head of the United Nations refugee agency, Filippo Grandi, on Monday said he is "deeply worried" by the uncertainty facing thousands of refugees around the world who are in the process of being resettled to the United States after the country suspended its refugee program last week. Grandi's statement came after U.S. President Donald Trump's Friday signing of an Executive Order that, among things, suspends the U.S. refugee program for 120 days and, according to media reports, bars entry of refugees from several mostly Muslim countries, including Syria, until further notice. Grandi, the UN high commissioner for refugees, underlined once again the position of the the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) that refugees should receive equal treatment for protection and assistance, and opportunities for resettlement, regardless of their religion, nationality or race. According to a news release from UNHCR, more than 800 refugees were set to make America their new home this week alone, but instead find themselves barred from travelling to the United States. UNHCR estimates that 20,000 refugees in precarious circumstances might have been resettled to the United States during the 120 days covered by the suspension announced Friday, based on average monthly figures for the last 15 years. "Refugees are anxious, confused and heartbroken at this suspension in what is already a lengthy process," the press release said. "Refugees share the very same concerns about security and safety that Americans have," the press release said. "They themselves are fleeing war, persecution, oppression and terrorism." "The individuals and families UNHCR refers to governments for resettlement are the most vulnerable -- such as people needing urgent medical assistance, survivors of torture, and women and girls at risk," it said. "The new homes provided by resettlement countries are life-saving for people who have no other options." The vast majority of the world's refugees are hosted in developing countries, and less than one percent will ever be resettled globally, the UN agency said. "Those accepted for resettlement by the United States, after a rigorous U.S. security screening process, are coming to rebuild their lives in safety and dignity. UNHCR hopes that they will be able to do so as soon as possible." "Resettlement has been a sign of tangible solidarity with the world's most vulnerable refugees," the press release said. "It is also an important way governments and communities can help share responsibility with major refugee-hosting countries, which have been shouldering the brunt of the displacement crisis in recent years." Meanwhile, the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) issued a statement on child refugees that might be affected by the new U.S. policy. "The needs of refugees have never been greater," the statement said. "Worldwide 28 million children have been uprooted by conflict, driven from their homes by violence and terror. They need our help." "The United States has a long and proud tradition of protecting children fleeing war and persecution," the statement said. "We trust that this support will continue and that the recent measures will prove to be temporary. All refugee children need our support." UNICEF said it is committed to continuing its work with governments and other partners around the world to help some of the most vulnerable children everywhere, from Syria to Yemen to South Sudan. GENEVA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi on Monday said that he is deeply worried by the uncertainty facing thousands of refugees around the world who are in the process of being resettled to the United States. A statement issued by the UN refugee agency UNHCR on Monday said that this week alone, over 800 refugees were set to make America their new home, but instead find themselves barred from travelling to the United States. UNHCR estimates that 20,000 refugees in precarious circumstances might have been resettled to the United States during the 120 days covered by the suspension announced Friday, based on average monthly figures for the last 15 years. "Refugees are anxious, confused and heartbroken at this suspension in what is already a lengthy process," the statement noted. According to UNHCR, the vast majority of the world's refugees are hosted in developing countries, and less than 1 percent will ever be resettled globally. "The High Commissioner underlines once again UNHCR's position that refugees should receive equal treatment for protection and assistance, and opportunities for resettlement, regardless of their religion, nationality or race," the statement concluded. U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Friday last week enacting a vetting process for refugees coming into the United States, in the name of guarding against terrorist threats. BUENOS AIRES, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Argentina's President Mauricio Macri on Monday tightened immigration law to bar entry of migrants with a criminal record and speed up the deportation process. Macri signed an emergency decree that modifies the existing law, citing "a critical situation that calls for the adoption of urgent measures," state news agency Telam said. The decree notes "recent acts by organized crime" and the state's "difficulty in expelling foreign nationals" due to the complex procedure in place, which can "take up to seven years to process." According to the decree, the number of foreigners in Argentine prisons has increased in recent years, reaching 21.35 percent of the total prison population in 2016. In neighboring Bolivia, which has a large migrant population living in Argentina, lawmakers from both the ruling and opposition parties criticized the measure as "xenophobic." Some 30 percent of Bolivians living abroad are in Argentina. "We are going to coordinate with the Foreign Affairs Ministry (to form) a representation to Argentina, so the Legislative Assembly can be heard," Deputy Victor Gutierrez, of the opposition Democratic Unity (UD) party said. Gutierrez said Macri was simply echoing the words and actions of U.S. President Donald Trump, who over the weekend issued a controversial, temporary ban on travelers from seven mainly Muslim countries. Argentina's tough immigration law comes on the heels of a statement by its Minister of Security Patricia Bullrich, who said more than a third of prisoners convicted of drug trafficking and other charges were of Bolivian, Peruvian or Paraguayan origin. BRUSSELS, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The European Union (EU) auditors on Monday urged regulators to further simplify the Financial Regulation that governs the operation of the EU Budget. The move came after the European Commission, the executive arm of the EU, is proposing an "ambitious revision" of the Regulation. European Court of Auditors (ECA) Monday published a new opinion to address the changes the Commission proposed. "These changes provide an important opportunity to improve the financial management of the EU. The proposal is a step in the right direction. But, as it stands, it does not go far enough," said Lazaros S. Lazarou, the Member of the ECA responsible for the Opinion. The Financial Regulation sets out general rules on the EU budget, how to account for the spending and the results. The Commission is proposing putting together many existing reports into an "integrated financial reporting package." The auditors warned that this would create a package that would run to thousands of pages and would include significant duplication. Meanwhile, according to the auditors, there is scope for significant simplification and additional flexibility in the existing arrangements. Therefore, some detailed changes to budgetary management arrangements proposed by the Commission could be averted. The ECA contributes to improving EU financial governance by publishing reports on EU finances and opinions on proposals for new or revised legislation with a financial impact. Its opinions are used by the legislative authorities -- the European Parliament and the Council of the EU -- in their work. BUCHAREST, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Romania will participate from Feb. 1 to 10 in the multinational military exercise Sea Shield 17, in the Black Sea, together with other seven countries, the Romanian Naval Forces (SMFN) announced Monday. Some 2,800 troops from seven NATO member states -- Bulgaria, Canada, Greece, Romania, Spain, the United States and Turkey -- plus Ukraine, will take part in the exercise, the SMFN said in a statement. NATO standard procedures of battle against air, underwater and terrestrial threats will be tested in the exercise, which will take place in the eastern area of the Black Sea, with 11 surface vessels and four aircrafts from Romania, as well as a submarine, five military ships and six aircraft from foreign partners. The exercise is the first for the Romanian Naval Forces in 2017 and until the end of this year, the country's marines will be involved in some 50 drills, according to an activity plan of the SMFN. DUBLIN, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- Ireland will carry out a "complete review" of U.S. preclearance in Ireland after the Donald Trump administration's decisions on immigration over the weekend, Prime Minister Enda Kenny said on Monday evening. "I've asked for a complete review of the preclearance facilities in Ireland," he said in a joint press conference with British Prime Minister Theresa May. "In respect of the policy introduced by the American government, I disagree with it." Ireland's Dublin and Shannon airports are among some sites in the world that offer preclearance to passengers travelling to the United States. By clearing customs and immigration checks before departure, they are then treated as domestic arrivals on reaching the United States. On Friday, U.S. President Trump signed an executive order enacting a vetting process for refugees coming into the United States, in the name of guarding against terrorist threats. Under the order, refugees from all over the world will be suspended U.S. entry for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. British Prime Minister May arrived here on Monday for her first visit to Ireland since she took office in July 2016. During their talks, Both May and Kenny reaffirmed their commitment to maintaining the Common Travel Area and agreed to continue working together to this end. Their discussions also touched on the importance of both countries' future cooperation in key areas such as agriculture and food, energy, security and criminal justice, education and culture. UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations on Monday condemned the terror attack on a mosque in Quebec, Canada, in which six people were killed. "We are following developments in the investigation of the horrific attack on a mosque in Quebec. We condemn this apparent act of terrorism on a place of worship," said Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for the Secretary-General Antonio Guterres at the daily news briefing. "We trust that Canada and Canadians, who have shown such leadership in promoting diversity and tolerance, will come together to reject any attempts to sow division based on religion," he said, adding that "We send our condolences to the people, to the families of the victims and wish a speedy recovery to those who were wounded." A 27-year-old man was held on Monday in connection with a shooting in a mosque in Quebec City that killed six men and wounded eight others, officials said. $50,000 robbery in Central According to reports, at about 4.30 pm, Primchand Maye was at his fathers business place R. Maye Hardware at Perseverance Road in Chaguanas, when two gunmen entered and announced a hold-up. The bandits ordered Maye to hand over the $50,000 payroll and then snatched the $10,000 gold chain from around his neck. The bandits then fled the scene. A report was made to the Chaguanas Police and detectives were yesterday reviewing closed-circuit (CCTV) footage in a bid to identify the suspects. Investigations are continuing. Yesterday, several employees were interviewed as police are not ruling out an inside link to the robbery since the bandits staged the hold-up just when the payroll was being handled by the proprietors 2 SRPs held, then released However, after the witness failed to cooperate with investigators, the SRPs were released from custody at 6 pm on Saturday. At about 9 pm on Friday, the constables were on mobile patrol in the Diego Martin area when they stopped a 19-year-old man who allegedly committed a traffic offence. It is alleged the constables demanded $4,000 from the teenager, to avoid being charged. The teen made arrangements with a male relative to pay the money and on Friday night the constables were told to meet the person with the money at a certain location in Diego Martin. Newsday understands that police were contacted and told of the transaction that was about to take place. The man was told to place specific, identifiable markings on the money before giving it to the two SRPs. When the two officers arrived and were handed the money, police officers who were in hiding, moved in and arrested the officers. The SRPs Friday night at a cell in St James Police Station. On Saturday afternoon, the witnesses - the teen and the man who handed over the money to the SRPs - both filed a statement saying they wanted no further police action against the SRPs. This led to the SRPs being released from custody. Sources said that a charge of wasteful employment of police time is being considered against the two civilians. A report on the incident is expected to be forwarded to Acting Commissioner of Police Stephen Williams for a determination on whether further action is warranted against the two SRPs. Killer driver released from police custody Police sources told Newsday that the man who hails from DAbadie was released from custody late Friday night after statements were recorded from him. Police sources added that while the man has been allowed to go home, officers will conduct further interviews with him. A file is expected to be compiled by investigators and sent to the head of Police Traffic Branch and then to Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Roger Gaspard SC, for further instructions. It was reported that at about 10.30 pm last Thursday Carla Collins and her sons Kamari, eight months and Kamani, two years, were the backseat passengers in her husband Keston Collins car which he was driving south along Mausica Road. As he drove the car across the Priority Bus Route (PBR) intersection, a car which was speeding east along the Bus Route, broke the traffic light (which was on red) and slammed into the right side of Collins car. The impact caused Collins car to spin and smash into another vehicle which was parked at the side of the intersection. Carla and her sons were flung out of the car and onto the road of the Bus Route, with the impact killing them almost instantly. Collins sustained minor injuries. The speeding driver was unscathed. Female job seeker goes missing A missing persons report was made yesterday to the Penal Police Station when she failed to show up. Relatives said Simms left home on Saturday morning to meet the man known to them only as Mr Kenny at a restaurant in Penal. Video footage from a surveillance camera at the establishment has since revealed that Simms did meet with him and left the restaurant in his company just after 1 pm the same day. Yesterday a distraught Jennifer Hamid said her niece never stays away from home and all calls to her cell phone so far have gone unanswered. Checks with relatives and friends have also proved futile. Simms, she said was unemployed and was in search of a job. The man who she met while at another job had promised her employment, Newsday was told. She was last seen wearing maroon colored top, black pants and a pair of slippers . Anyone with information can contact the Penal Police Station or the nearest police station. RBC opens possibilities Lalo Goordial, an RBC Royal Bank client of 25 years, described his experience: I used to go to Carlton Centre, but this (High Street) is a convenient location and if anything, the customer service and ambiance are even better here. It is good to see friendly faces as well, because I know that they merged staff from both branches. I look forward to seeing what improvements they make as they continue to deliver quality service. Prior to the 8 am opening, the High Street staff began their day with a team breakfast, which was an opportunity for the employees, a combination of High Street and former Carlton Centre branches, to interact and prepare for their new experience. RBC Managing Director Darryl White, who was at the branch on opening day, said the merger was an opportunity for the Bank to deliver on its commitment to its clients in the San Fernando community and environs. We have brought together two strong and experienced teams to serve our clients and the community of San Fernando. Its in keeping with our strategy to get closer to our clients so we can more effectively and efficiently address their financial needs and life goals. We are able to achieve this on multiple fronts that include our digital innovations such our mobile banking app and Internet banking, which now complement our established channels such as ATMs, teller phone banking and our client contact centre. Our branch network remains an important feature of this outreach to clients as the branches are a trusted place where our clients can come for service and advice, White said. White and High Streets Branch Manager, Devanand Birju, spent the morning alongside their staff, greeting clients and assisting them with their transactions. This has been quite an experience for us, Birju said. Our employees have been highly engaged throughout the process and we could not have been successful without them. Retail Assistant, Chanelle Ramsingh, who had worked at the Carlton Centre branch, said she was looking forward to the changes. I worked at that branch for five years and because of the open communication and shared vision, I am excited by this new opportunity to grow and improve with an expanded team and new customers. We are adapting well and are bonding as a unit because we are all dedicated to serving the needs of our customers. They didnt just open the doors to this branch today, they opened doors to new opportunities for everyone involved. Birju said clients, too, shared their feedback and were anticipating the expanded and upgraded facility. At every stage of this process, we got feedback from our customers and spoke to staff, and everyone understood the need for change and improvement. At the end of the day, this was a very successful merger of both branches, Birju added. White also noted: We have a clear strategic vision at RBC and at the heart of it all is the benefit of our customers and the communities in which we operate. According to educator and maths master, Dr. Fayad Ali, Ive banked with RBC for 15 years and theyve always been competitive in terms of providing better products and service to clients. I enjoy the fact that they are always in contact and communicate offers that benefit me. Although technology is changing banking, I appreciate that they still provide old-fashioned one-on-one customer service and they are never to busy to discuss any matter. They took a very positive approach with regard to this merger of branches and showed that it is really all about us, the customers. Dangerous hole in road Krishna Ramtahal, 70, of Apple Blossom Avenue, Petit Valley told Newsday that on November 28, while he was walking on the pavement he fell into the hole as he stepped off the pavement onto the road. He said he is now raising funds to seek medical attention in Miami for the fractured shoulder. The hole is on the corner of Phillip Charles Avenue and Mon Coco Road. I was heading east and as soon as I was going to approach Phillip Charles Street the hole was at the end of the pavement just before I step onto the road, Ramtahal said. There was no caution tape, no sign indicating a hole was there...nothing. I fell straight into the hole and fractured four ribs, my shoulder and got several cuts about my body, he added. Ramtahal said he is fearful that it can happen to someone else, and it may cause someone to lose their life. He said several letters were written to the corporation and the Ministry, however, up to date the hole remains the same. I stayed six days at the General Hospital in Port-of-Spain but I left because I was not getting the support I needed at that hospital. I am still in constant pain, especially in one of my shoulders. I got a lot of soars on my back so I went to a private institution for medical attention. I am pleading with them to fix the hole before it kills someone. Ramtahal said he was told by the corporation that the Ministry of Transport and Works was responsible for fixing the hole. However, when he contacted the Ministry he was directed to the Diego Martin Regional Corporation. Licensing Office moving to Caroni He added that the Licensing Office on Wrightson Road will continue to operate but on a scaleddown basis because heavy equipment will no longer be licensed there. Sinanan said the intention is to improve the efficiency of the Licensing Department using stateof- the-art technology and doing away with all archaic systems, which he said will redound to the benefit of all who use the department. He pointed out that while there may be an increase in traffic heading along the Old Southern Main Road to Caroni as a result of the shift, he believes the situation will not be too bad. Sinanan said road works in Caroni have improved the traffic situation tremendously and he expects operations in the central area to progress speedily. He said people should not be too worried about making the shift from Portof- Spain to Caroni and added that in every situation change is inevitable. He said that contrary to popular belief the Government has no intention of making the Licensing Office in Caroni a white elephant. The new Caroni office was built by the last administration as part of a decentralisation plan. On another issue, the minister said that two weeks ago he took a note to Cabinet to adjust the speed limit from 80 kilometres per hour but that the note has not yet been approved as there has to be some alterations to it. He said once the note is approved it will be taken to Parliament and the public will be informed of the new speed limit. He expects approval shortly and added that it will benefit the motoring public who has been clamouring for an increase in the speed limit. The minister also assured that the public will see a general improvement in the way business is conducted by the Ministry of Works and Transport. Bolstered by the support of over 40 countries, Morocco is set to take a seat at the 28th African Union summit in Addis Ababa on January 30-31 despite the desperate maneuvers of the pro-separatist Chair of the pan-African organization executive body, Dlamini Zuma. Outgoing Zuma acknowledged, during a meeting last Thursday with Moroccos foreign minister Salaheddine Mezouar and head of Foreign Intelligence Service Yassine Mansouri, the inevitability of Moroccos admission to the African Union after it secured more than the minimum votes by the 54 member countries. Yet she stubbornly continues desperate maneuvers to obstruct the Kingdoms return to its African institutional family. She told her Moroccan interlocutors that the Kingdom will be notified of its admission by the end of the summit as a way to prevent Morocco from taking a seat during the current summit. The presence of King Mohammed VI in Addis Ababa at the head of a high-level Moroccan delegation, along with the rapid endorsement by the Moroccan Parliament of the Constitutive Act of the African Union, indicates Moroccos determination to take a seat during this 28th summit. The attendance of the King reflects in itself Moroccos confidence that the Summit will render justice to the Kingdom, which has abandoned its seat 33 years ago in protest for the bias of the predecessor of the African Union, the Organization of African Unity, which admitted a puppet state sponsored by Algeria and unrecognized by the UN in a Cold War context. The case of South Sudan, which was invited to take a seat at the African Union summit even before it ratified the AU Constitutive Act, is another example that disproves Zumas statements. Bottom line, inviting a state to take its seat remains a sovereign decision of the summit and the heads of state attending it, while Zumas objection rather expresses a personal grudge in countering Moroccos return to its institutional family by all means. Even more so that she dedicated her tenure to defending a separatist thesis sponsored by Algeria in Moroccos southern provinces. These anti-Trump protestors could be just what the donkey ordered to help Democrats boost turnout in 2018. Photo: David McNew/Getty Images Without question, January 20 was a depressing day for left-of-center Americans generally, and Democrats in particular. Its a mistake to sugarcoat that fact, or to minimize the potentially disastrous implications of a President Trump and a radically conservative Republican Congress. But there is a silver lining for the Donkey Party that could be a lot shinier than depressed Democrats realized when Donald Trump took the oath of office: At that moment, they handed off the terrible political burden of being held responsible for a status quo in Washington and in national life that sizable majorities of citizens simply dont like. Even as some Clinton supporters probably could not help thinking of the Inauguration Day they had imagined and expected, they should remember that what they failed to secure was hardly a bowl of cherries. Consider this election-eve tableau from one of the many Doomed Democrats pieces floating around since November 8: Standing with some 30,000 people in front of Independence Hall in Philadelphia the night before the election watching Hillary Clinton speak, exhausted aides were already worrying about what would come next. They expected her to win, of course, but they knew President Clinton was going to get thrashed in the 2018 midterms the races were tilted in Republicans favor, and thats when they thought the backlash would really hit. The backlash, that is, to a decade of Democratic control of the White House. The control is gone, and with it, more than likely, the backlash. For the first time since 2006, Democrats can look forward to midterm elections without a sense of foreboding, given the long history of poor showings in nonpresidential contests for the presidential party. And 2006 itself should offer solace. After all, George W. Bush brought a Republican Congress in with him in 2004 after a campaign in which he barely bothered to appeal to voters beyond his partys base. Within two years, Karl Roves plans for an enduring GOP majority were in shambles, control of Congress was gone, and Bushs approval ratings were at 40 percent and headed down. Given the already low popularity of Trump and the GOP and for that matter, of much of their common agenda a bad midterm is not at all hard to envision. Yes, the GOP will benefit from a ridiculously positive Senate landscape in 2018. And yes, it will also continue to benefit, at both the U.S. House and state-legislative levels, from the effects of its overwhelming control of the last decennial redistricting cycle (though its worth noting the GOP was supposed to have had a lock on the House in the last decade, too, until it ended in 2006). But even if there are factors that might limit Democratic gains in 2018, significant gains are likely. Indeed, the antiWhite House sentiment that usually fuels out-party performance in midterms may be compounded two years from now by an underlying anti-Washington mood that could turn on Donald Trump with a special intensity. As one Democratic strategist recently suggested: All those people who voted for both Obama and Trump look like reliable anti-Washington voters primed to boomerang against the GOP now that the other guys are in charge. There is, however, one structural handicap Democrats have recently had in midterms. Their coalition now depends heavily on precisely those voters who have been, since time immemorial, least likely to participate in nonpresidential elections: young and minority voters. Conversely, the Republican base skews older and whiter, and older and whiter voters are disproportionately more likely to show up for midterms. As President Obama recently said: What I was able to do during my campaigns, I wasnt able to do during midterms. I didnt crack the code on that. For Democrats, cracking the midterm code more than likely means generating the kind of serious grassroots mojo that will help motivate and then mobilize turnout. And thats where Inauguration Day and the day just after it offered another bit of potential good news for Democrats: The massive marches and protests we are seeing make the progressive uprising against George W. Bush look like a sandbox temper tantrum. That is only more true after this past weekend and the massive backlash against Trumps temporary travel ban against seven Muslim countries. There is nothing about Donald Trump (or Paul Ryan or Mitch McConnell) that suggests these protests will go away any time soon. And already, some Democratic thinkers can envision a passionate, if diffuse, grassroots movement emulating the tea partys success eight years ago in channeling public fear and frustration into pressure on officeholders in both parties and into preparation for the midterms. Indeed, this could be just what the donkey ordered: a relentless grassroots campaign of resistance to Trump and his allies, combined with a strategically and tactically flexible cadre of Democrats in Congress prepared to wage guerrilla warfare against GOP plans while staying alert to opportunities to exploit GOP divisions. Such divisions (not to mention confusion and disarray) are popping up everywhere, on issues ranging from defense spending to taxes to Obamacare. And the leadership of a lone-wolf eccentric like Donald Trump means they will probably continue to erupt. But even if total partisan war consumes Washington, a campaign of progressive resistance could not but help Democrats turn out their vote in 2018. Some Democrats worry about the lack of any one national leader. Obviously enough, Republicans didnt have one either in 2010 or 2014. And in fact, the effectiveness of Democratic resistance to the new regime both in Washington and around the country almost certainly depends on no longer wasting energy on replaying 2016s contest for national leadership. They should not transfer those divisions into a DNC-chair fight, which is far more damaging than anything that could be gained from having an ideal person in that essentially marginal job (as Theodore White once put it, party chairs are the fools gold of American politics). So donkeys would be well advised not to look back, but to realize in this dark hour for their cause, things actually are looking up. If the early days of Donald Trumps presidency represent not the high point of his strange appeal but the beginning of some sort of pro-right-wing realignment, then progressives have bigger problems than how they do in the next few months or years. But more likely, the turbulent reign of Trump will undo either him or his party, or both, and the next midterms and perhaps even the off-year elections of 2017, in Virginia and New Jersey will show that all the obituaries for the doomed Democratic Party are vastly premature. If Americans continue to have a jaundiced view of politics and 21st-century life, the guy who promised to make America great again is probably going to get a healthy portion of the blame. Giuliani is the first Trump-linked official to seemingly publicly admit that the new travel and refugee ban was originally intended to be a Muslim ban. Photo: Drew Angerer/Getty Images Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, during a Saturday interview on Fox News, seemed to indicate that the executive order President Trump signed on Friday was, by design, the best legal way to fulfill Trumps desire to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. without illegally banning Muslims. Recounting the process which led to the new executive order, Giuliani said that Trump had asked him to put a commission together to come up with the right way to implement Trumps oft-proposed Muslim ban, legally. To accomplish that, the commission, which included lawmakers and lawyers, then decided that instead of religion, danger would be the focus, according to Giuliani. During his presidential campaign, Trump had repeatedly called for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the U.S., citing fears of terrorism. The new presidents executive order temporarily bans citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries, as well as all refugees, from entering the United States, including an indefinite ban on Syrian refugees. The areas of the world that create danger for us, which is a factual basis, not a religious basis, Giuliani remarked on Saturday, Perfectly legal, perfectly sensible. This statement by Giuliani could become very problematic for the Trump administration in litigation over intent/pretext of executive order. pic.twitter.com/MrRuDFJGwD JP Schnapper-Casteras (@jpscasteras) January 29, 2017 The seven countries included in the ban, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen, were chosen because they had already been selected under an amended 2015 Obama administration bill, which had restricted those countries citizens from the U.S. visa waiver program, having identified the nations as safe havens for terrorists. In fact, no terrorists from any of the seven countries in the Obama bill or Trump order have conducted fatal attacks in the U.S. over the past three-plus decades, and Obamas bill, at the time, was largely seen as a measure of security theater, following recent terrorist attacks both in the U.S. and around the world. Trump administration officials have also pointed out that the list of banned countries can, and likely will, grow. Giuliani, Trump, and members of the Trump administration have all repeatedly insisted that Trumps new executive order is not a Muslim ban. Giulianis comments on Saturday suggest it was instead intended as a legal substitute: Sit there and think about what youve done. Photo: Drew Angerer/Getty Images In a lot of ways, Donald Trumps national security adviser, Mike Flynn, seems more like the president than most of his appointees. But the qualities that Flynn shares with Trump a flair for provocation, an inability to shut up, a weird kid who shares his name are reportedly causing a rift in their relationship. Less than two weeks into the Trump presidency, Flynn has gotten on the nerves of the president and others in his administration, according to the New York Times. Why? Flynns overbearing, he talks too much, and he presided over a chaotic and opaque N.S.C. transition process, the Times says. Flynn also likes to push the boundaries of whats typically thought acceptable in D.C. Trump liked that when Flynn was chanting lock her up and calling Islam a cancer, but those antics have apparently become less amusing over time. Recently, for example, Flynn had to be talked out of going to DeploraBall, a Trump inauguration event where the Sieg heil! had to be explicitly banned, because at those kind of things you never know. But more than Flynns grating personality, it was his conspiracy-peddling son, who had to be fired from the Trump transition in December, that annoyed Trump most, the Times says. Speaking of the Michael Flynn Jr., on Sunday he tweeted a message in support of what he called Trumps #MuslimBan. Also Sunday, Trump said his executive order barring entry to the U.S. for some immigrants is not a Muslim ban. Later, the younger Flynn deleted his Twitter account. Protestors rally during a demonstration against the immigration ban for seven Muslim-majority countries at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017, in New York City. Photo: Stephanie Keith/Getty Images President Donald Trumps executive order to temporarily ban citizens or refugees arriving from seven predominantly Muslim countries sparked chaos at airports across the United States. Protests broke out at air terminals, and arrivals were detained for hours, including for green-card holders, though the White House later walked back its restrictions on legal permanent residents. Federal judges in New York, Massachusetts, and other regions also issued temporary and emergency stays on the ban. According to Governor Andrew Cuomos office, at least six people were still being held at JFK Airport as of late Sunday night, of the approximately 50 people who were initially barred from entering the country when the order went into effect. Early reports suggest that one person still remained in custody as of Monday morning, and at least two people had been deported back to their home countries of Iran and Sudan. Still, given the confusion of the rollout theres still some doubt about the total number of detainees. A volunteer attorney told WCBS 2 that Customs and Border Patrol were not fully complying with judges orders to turn over the names of those being kept. Theres no transparency to the process, New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman said on CBS This Morning, who, along with 16 other attorneys general, is planning to challenge the orders. Dozens detained in JFK have now been released but after spending hours sometimes more than a day trapped in limbo in the terminals. Among them: a SUNY doctoral student from Iran; a 76-year-old Sudanese who had been held for more than 30 hours; a father and son from Iran who were reportedly told they could be deported back to Iran and barred U.S. entry for five years, or face indefinite detention, until they were released 33 hours later; and an elderly Iraqi woman, detained for 36 hours and finally released Sunday night. Her son, an active-duty soldier in the U.S. Army, flew up from South Carolina when his mom was stopped. He, too, ended up waiting more than 30 hours in the airport. Protesters marching against President Trumps anti-immigrant executive orders in New York. Photo: Spencer Platt/Getty Images Protests against President Trumps anti-immigrant executive actions particularly the one on Friday that banned refugees and citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the U.S. expanded and spread on Sunday. These followed numerous large protests at American airports on Saturday, which immediately came together after news spread that U.S. visa-holding immigrants were being detained and deported by border authorities at various ports of entry after being caught in limbo by Trumps order. On Sunday, crowds large and small amassed in numerous cities and airports throughout the U.S., continuing a nationwide backlash to Trumps immigration policies. Below are some images and videos of those crowds as shared on social media. Thousands took to Manhattans Battery Park to protest Trumps executive order. Public speakers included Mayor de Blasio, Democratic senators Chuck Schumer, Kirsten Gillibrand, and Cory Booker, as well as Democratic representatives Carolyn Maloney and Nydia Velazquez: The best protestor in Battery Park pic.twitter.com/RgA68QvOG2 Jia Tolentino (@jiatolentino) January 29, 2017 Someone printed out the Mike Pence tweet for the Battery Park #MuslimBan protest pic.twitter.com/WmZwzsXxJh Andrew Katz (@katz) January 29, 2017 A huge protest also took place in Bostons Copley Square, where speakers included Democratic senators Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey, as well as Boston mayor Marty Walsh: A photo from the start of today's rally in Boston. Carlos Arredondo holding the peace flag pic.twitter.com/znMDxRJNO4 Jack Lepiarz (@Lepiarz) January 29, 2017 20,000+ at Copley Square in Boston from a 10th floor office. Literally 200+ more every minute from all 4 corners #MuslimBan pic.twitter.com/COv7sRt9ym Ben Doernberg (@BenDoernberg) January 29, 2017 Interesting to note this is the still-growing crowd in Copley Square, just steps from the Boston Marathon finish line: pic.twitter.com/vC6C6fN4dn Nancy Chen (@NancyChenNews) January 29, 2017 These crowds at Copley Square are massive. All ages here voicing their concerns about the President's immigration order.@7News pic.twitter.com/q1QzVblvpI Kerri Corrado (@KerriCorrado) January 29, 2017 There were also big crowds in Washington, D.C.: Protesters in front of statue, erected by Congress, commemorating the French citizen, Gen. Lafayette, for fighting in American Revolution. pic.twitter.com/NTO4izAPwK Ben Kesling (@bkesling) January 29, 2017 Outside Trump Hotel, heading toward the Capitol. Never seen this kind of thing in DC. Crowd keeps coming & coming, growing bigger & bigger. pic.twitter.com/ia72umkHoT Garance Franke-Ruta (@thegarance) January 29, 2017 The view from the steps of the Capitol pic.twitter.com/F92qfh8UYl Hamza Shaban (@hshaban) January 29, 2017 Protesters leave their signs in front of the Capitol. pic.twitter.com/SqDozMFSpc Ben Kesling (@bkesling) January 29, 2017 And the protests continued for a second day at Dulles International Airport as well: Crowd at Dulles getting larger, cheering all passengers exiting international flights. pic.twitter.com/1pXGiPCbBv Ariel Zambelich (@azambelich) January 29, 2017 The protests at Dallas Fort Worth Airport continued into Sunday, too: Great way to share info at Dallas airport protest #NoBanNoWall #nomuslimban pic.twitter.com/VVafVrqqqd Medea Benjamin (@medeabenjamin) January 29, 2017 Most amazing protest at Dallas airport. Packed, diverse, lots of families. This is the America I love. #NoBanNoWall #OccupyAirports pic.twitter.com/da1cPjn9ES Medea Benjamin (@medeabenjamin) January 29, 2017 Sunday night protesters appear to have shut down at least part of Los Angeles International Airport: Protesters spilling outside the arrivals hall and onto the street at LAX pic.twitter.com/0UviHa32Wu Kirk Siegler (@KirkSiegler) January 29, 2017 Entire arrivals level of LAX shut down by a protest march @NBCLA pic.twitter.com/eHQbRBTbGG Kenny Holmes (@KHOLMESlive) January 30, 2017 Protesters chanting "We won't go 'til you let them in!" @NBCLA pic.twitter.com/yuSyd9IwMY Kenny Holmes (@KHOLMESlive) January 30, 2017 Theres also another protest in Denver: Protest begins at Denver airport. More expected. If you're among those going, please share pics and stories here on social! @KDVR pic.twitter.com/U3YwaPeqcJ Chris Parente (@chrisparente) January 29, 2017 At Philadelphia International Airport: And in Pittsburgh as well: Pittsburgh airport chant: "No hate, no fear, yinz are welcome here" pic.twitter.com/lh7QA2rIiX James R. Hagerty (@JamesRHagerty) January 29, 2017 In Cleveland: In San Francisco: The scene here at SFO in San Francisco. You can hear the protest throughout the int'l terminal pic.twitter.com/4huDRfWrjW Alex Kantrowitz (@Kantrowitz) January 29, 2017 In Birmingham, Alabama: Crowd at BHM is easily 1,000 now. pic.twitter.com/BUDY5HQpf4 Blake Ells (@blakeells) January 29, 2017 Also in Atlanta: Hundreds flooding the busiest airport in the US, Atlanta's Hartfield-Jackson, to protest Trump's #MuslimBan pic.twitter.com/g2aqNhaogl Colin Holtz (@cdholtz) January 29, 2017 And at Orlando International Airport: And in Kansas City: Protest at Kansas City International Airport. pic.twitter.com/Gk3mZDdaWo Megan Strickland (@StricklyMeg) January 29, 2017 More signs as the crowd of protesters continues to grow at @KCIAirport showing there displeasure with President Trump's immigration order pic.twitter.com/Z1vEzHzF6V Bob Cronkleton (@cronkb) January 29, 2017 Plus in Detroit: The protest at Detroit Wayne County Airport officially starts at 4, but a large crowd has already gathered. pic.twitter.com/zqOQWPTHD4 Jay Skebba (@JaySkebba) January 29, 2017 If your headed to #DTW this afternoon there is a Trump Ban Protest going on and traffic is backed up with large crowds pic.twitter.com/6PyzeEVOkl The Bushman Show (@BushmanOnAir) January 29, 2017 Also in Portland, Oregon: The Port of Portland has closed the arrival deck to traffic to provide a safe place for protesters. pic.twitter.com/62Bdx5MQpW Mayor Ted Wheeler (@tedwheeler) January 29, 2017 Chants echo through the airport as hundreds peacefully protest in #Portland. pic.twitter.com/6PjYDiOKjE Jon Shadel (@jdshadel) January 29, 2017 And in Portland, Maine: 4000 people showed up to Portland Int'l Jetport today to protest!!! So honored to have had the opportunity to join them. #NoBanNoWall pic.twitter.com/JOHLnC88jT Taylor Combs (@taylor_combs96) January 29, 2017 In Charlotte, North Carolina, also: Protesting the Muslim immigration ban at Charlotte airport. pic.twitter.com/gRraRrIdz2 Patricia Tilburg (@ProfTilburg) January 29, 2017 And in Providence, Rhode Island at the State House: The crowd has grown in size here at RI State House pic.twitter.com/YdfO6tOQKy Kim Kalunian (@KimKalunian) January 29, 2017 Protests are also set to continue for a second night at Chicagos OHare Airport starting Sunday. Heres what the scene looked like there during the massive protest on Saturday night: And here is an apparent demonstration from a Chicago suburb on Sunday as well: Its heartening to see a Trump protest even in the middle of a quiet, working-class Chicago suburb. pic.twitter.com/nqWJPWIa4l Son Dang (@dangson) January 29, 2017 A new protest is also planned in Seattles Westlake Park on Sunday night. Here is what the protest at Seattle-Tacoma Airport looked like on Saturday: Trump promised a big number on Dodd-Frank. Photo: Andrew Harrer/Getty Images President Donald Trump signed an executive order Monday requiring government agencies to repeal two regulations for every new one adopted. The one in, two out rule also calls for the cost of any new regulation to be offset by eliminating regulations with an equal cost. It will be up to the White Houses Office of Management and Budget to determine those costs and to provide guidance to agencies scrambling with a rule that has been called a childish mistake. At issue for critics of this seemingly arbitrary rule is the emphasis on quantity of regulations over quality. The one in, two out rule appears to be based more on a slogan than logic. As William Gale of the Brookings Institution, who served on George H.W. Bushs Council of Economic Advisers, told the Washington Post, the number of regulations is not the key. Its how onerous regulations are. This seems like a totally nonsensical constraint to me. As Trump signed the executive order Monday morning, he also spoke to reporters about his plans to roll back Dodd-Frank financial regulations. Were going to be doing a big number on Dodd-Frank, he said. The American dream is back. The lawyers rushing to Americas airports over the weekend to fight Trumps travel ban are just the first soldiers to the front in what could be a long war. Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images The news over the weekend of widespread judicial intervention to stop implementation of President Trumps travel ban may have created the misleading or at least premature impression that the whole thing is about to go down in flames as a violation of law and Constitution. That is not at all clear. As an excellent summary from the legal website Just Security explains, there were five relevant judicial orders issued over the weekend: in New York, Boston, Virginia, Seattle, and Los Angeles. All involved stays to stop detention and deportation decisions until legal challenges to the order were heard, and all involved people who had some prior right to be in the United States under the system Trump displaced on Friday. There is some doubt about the nationwide applicability of the judicial stays, though the New York and Boston actions did indeed appear to reach beyond the particular detainees at those cities airports. There could be others emerging today. But in any event, the order remains in legal limbo, and no judge has yet done anything to lessen the orders effect on people who were not in physical limbo when the order came down. These orders [do not] have any impact on folks affected by the Executive Order who havent been stuck at airports either because theyre already here in the United States (and now cant leave), or because theyre somewhere overseas (and now cant get here). Put another way, a series of very important legal battles were fought this weekend, but in the broader context of this Executive Order, they were but minor skirmishes in comparison to the legal war thats necessarily coming Before anyone assumes too quickly the Trump administration is going to lose that war, it should be remembered this is an area of law where presidents have an unusual degree of leeway, as a New York Times take on the situation notes: [T]he president has broad legal authority to restrict immigration. Under the Immigration and Nationality Act, he can restrict any class of aliens he deems detrimental to the interests of the United States without needing legislation or congressional approval. The question that could be resolved very soon is whether the sloppiness of the travel ban and its chaotic implementation raise enough statutory, constitutional, or international issues to override this presumption of presidential authority. Briefs are currently being prepared on both sides of all those issues, you can be sure. Not-at-all short-fingered President Donald Trump. Photo: Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images Donald Trump insists that his Muslim ban, or extreme vetting that is definitely not a ban, or his ban of something but not Muslims, is going extremely smoothly. It really is a massive success story in terms of implementation on every single level, explained a senior administration official. And yet news has depicted scenes of chaos, confusion, and inhumane treatment of innocent people. The administration has thus been forced to supply a series of defenses: 1. President Obama did the same thing. My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months, insists Trump. Multiple fact-checkers have examined this claim and found it wanting. In response to intelligence linking two refugees from Iraq to a bomb attack on American forces there, the Obama administration slowed, but did not stop, its refugee-admission process in order to tighten its screening. A tightening of vetting procedures in response to specific intelligence about a single country is not the same thing as a sweeping halt in the absence of a reported breach. 2. Only 109 people were detained. Its not clear where Trump got this figure, but the Department of Homeland Security announced that in the first 23 hours alone, 375 people were detained. 3. There were some big problems, but it was caused by Deltas computer system. Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,..... Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 In fact, problems began Friday night, and Deltas system went down Sunday night, and was fixed after a few hours. 4. The premier president loves surprises. Possibly the most interesting defense is that the administration was unable to use the normal interagency review process because it would have tipped off the terrorists. What we couldnt do was telegraph our position ahead of time to ensure that people flooded in before that happened, before it went into place, said White House spokesman Sean Spicer. If we had telegraphed that ahead of time, then that would have been a massive security problem. President Trump, as usual, put the argument in pithier terms: If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 This defense suffers from two enormous flaws. First, it assumes that allowing agencies tasked with security to have input on a policy would be tantamount to publicizing the policy. The president is supposed to be able to discuss plans in confidence without assuming they will be leaked immediately. That is how the federal government works. If the only way to announce a foreign-policy move was to keep new policies a closely guarded secret within the administration, then this kind of amateurism would be standard. There is a long record of American presidents announcing surprise foreign policy decisions that were planned in advance by officials other than a speechwriter in his early 30s and a Breitbart lunatic. The second problem with this defense is that it assumes terrorists were sitting around the world, planning to enter the United States to launch an attack, and able to enter at any time, but lacking any special urgency. (Perhaps they were waiting for the fares to drop.) An announcement of one weeks notice would have given them just the motivation they needed to hop on a plane. This bears no relation to reality. People from the countries banned by Trump already face an extensive, 20-step vetting process that can take up to two years. None of them could have legally made it through within a week, or anything close. And once you realize this, it becomes clear that Trumps policy was not only bungled in its implementation but conceptually flawed. Trump originally proposed a Muslim ban. But he had to back away from this policy given that it is both unconstitutional and transparently unenforceable (how do you prevent a terrorist from lying about his religion?). This forced Trump to relabel his policy extreme vetting. But the reality is that vetting is already extreme. Trump has not identified any weak points in the vetting procedure. Indeed, there is no connection whatsoever between his policy and any terror incidents in the United States. Radicalized domestic American terrorists have all come from countries not on Trumps list. His policy grows out of a need to take some kind of action. In a way, it makes perfect sense that he would skip the normal interagency review input from security experts would only reveal that Trumps plan has no relationship to any security objective. The purpose of this policy is to retroactively justify Trumps campaign fearmongering. Angela Merkel said the ban is not justified. Photo: Michele Tantussi/Getty Images As U.S. airports swelled this weekend with protests condemning President Trumps executive order barring immigrants from seven Muslim-majority nations, leaders from around the world joined the chorus of criticism. Among those taking issue with the ban, which also halts all refugee admissions to the U.S. for 120 days and bars Syrian refugees indefinitely, were American allies and leaders of the nations targeted. On Monday, the Iraqi parliament voted in reciprocate and institute a travel ban on Americans, while the countrys foreign ministry took a more diplomatic line, requesting that Trump reconsider this wrong decision. Iran too promised reciprocal measures in a statement that called the ban an obvious insult to the Islamic world. Meanwhile, in Yemen an official said the ban supports the terrorists and sows divisions among people, while Sudan called for the immediate removal of its name from the list of banned countries. In the U.K., Prime Minister Theresa May, who was at the White House Friday before Trump signed the executive order, issued a tepid comment, saying she does not agree with this kind of approach. The current and former mayors of London were harsher in their criticism. Sadiq Khan called the ban shameful and cruel, while Boris Johnson, now the British foreign secretary, tweeted this: We will protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals home and abroad. Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) January 29, 2017 Across Europe, leaders struck the same tone. Swedens minister of foreign affairs said shes deeply concerned about the ban. The French foreign minister said, Terrorism knows no nationality. Discrimination is no response. Italys deputy foreign minister said the ban will make the world less secure. Angela Merkel, who, Trump says, hed like to emulate, said through a spokesman that she regrets the ban, which is not justified. Closer to home, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to issued an invitation: To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 28, 2017 Despite these strongly worded statements from across the globe, not everyone outside the U.S. opposes Trumps executive order. As Breitbart reports, rising populist leaders are giddy about the whole thing. Among others, Breitbart cites praise from Dutch politician Geert Wilders, who was convicted of inciting racial violence in December. Once the full scope of President Trumps executive order became clear, thousands gathered at JFK International Airport to protest it. Photo: Konstantin Sergeyev The executive order President Trump signed on Friday, which temporarily banned residents of seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the U.S., quickly unleashed chaos. As a result of unclear wording and rushed implementation, the order not only excluded refugees its main target but also so-called lawful permanent residents, who by dint of their green cards are supposed to be allowed to come and go from the country as they please. On Friday and in the days that followed, a bunch of people got on airplanes to the U.S. under the very justified assumption they would be allowed into the country after all, theyd played by the rules by filling out a bunch of paperwork at some point or another only to be detained and in some cases sent back upon their arrival here. They had been effectively illegalized in transit. Its not an exaggeration to say this was an act borne out of fear and scaremongering, not a careful analysis of terrorism risks. Even commentators who dont have a problem with the government taking aggressive national-security actions were outraged by Trumps order, and in an interview with Jeanine Pirro, sometimes-Trump-adviser Rudy Giuliani straightforwardly described the EO as having originated with Trumps desire, stated during the campaign, to institute an all-out ban on Muslims entering the U.S. Therefore, its a useful worst-case example of what can happen when fear of scary, mysterious others gets out of control. And right on time, yesterday Vox published a piece by Brian Resnick running down 7 lessons from psychology that explain the irrational fear of outsiders. Its a really useful guide for anyone unfamiliar with this type of research, and perhaps the most important point it makes is that opinions and feelings about out-group members are more likely to be freighted with strong, visceral emotions that have the effect of shutting down rational thought. Statistics about how unlikely Muslim refugees are to commit terrorist attacks simply dont pack the same emotional punch as stories about attacks that have occurred. But whats been so interesting about the last few days has been the fact that, while millions of Americans surely support the ban, theres also been a massive outpouring of spontaneous altruism in support of the refugees and green-card holders who have been affected, or who could be affected. All weekend, protesters filled both airports and the streets to register their disgust at the new policy there were endless videos of them cheering people who got released from detention, and celebrating the ACLU court challenge that led to a temporary stay on part of the EO. This, too, is a well-established aspect of human nature. Whatever our flaws and tendency toward fear of outsiders, humans also have a sometimes astounding capacity for compassion and altruism. Many of us really do rush toward disasters hoping to help victims, and in those moments we dont care a whit about what those victims look like or where they came from, nor do we have any expectation the victims will be able to return the favor. Its a fascinating part of what Homo sapiens is as a species; theres a reason searching for altruism on Google Scholar returns so many results. Theres no easy way to square these two sides of humanity the side that would applaud the EO and the side that would fill the streets with people demanding its rescission. But a few paragraphs from Resnicks piece do stand out: Our brains are built to be vigilant. Were constantly on the lookout for threats. Thats why stories about immigrants committing crimes, stories about neighbors losing jobs to immigrants, and assertions that immigrants arent loyal to their adopted countries, are all extremely powerful (regardless if they are true). Once you can get that one story out there, its enough to start the cycle of people thinking this way and changing how people think about these out-groups, Cikara says. People are very sensitive to anecdotes, more than they are to abstract representations of data. Our minds have evolved to think in mental shortcuts heuristics but in the modern age they can lead us astray. This weekend, as a result of the massive outcry that shook the country, news outlets produced an endless series of stories of people who had been cut off from, or treated like an enemy by, a country theyd made their homes Ph.D. students and taxi drivers and dads and moms and refugees. Some of the accompanying videos are inspiring: Its hard not to watch this one of crowds cheering reunited families at Dulles International Airport, for example, without feeling, at least for a moment, proud to be a human being. Resnicks right stories matter more than numbers. And positive stories matter, too. As does the fact that so many people spontaneously decided to head to airports to protest the treatment of people they had never met and probably never would meet. People are complicated, and it isnt all bad news. Photo: Craig Warga/Bloomberg via Getty Images The news that American Apparel is going under hit me hard. American Apparel makes up roughly half my wardrobe and roughly all of what I wear most days. I live in their thigh-high stockings; I recall bad dates when I glance at the tight-fitting, too-short dresses in my closet; every time I see a green AA zip hoodie I am overcome with happy memories of my college roommate. It had been a rough couple of years for the brand its CEO was ousted, the company twice filed for bankruptcy, and thered been discussion of outsourcing production a few months ago. And throughout its existence, American Apparel got a lot of flak. But it made beautiful basics, paid fair wages, launched the migrant-rights-focused Legalize LA campaign, and provided thousands of American jobs. And now its closing its headquarters and stores, and Donald Trump is tweeting nothing about it. The official exit is said to happen by April (thats when all its physical stores will close; its unclear what will become of the brand after that). Whatever becomes of the brand, the low stock in stores and online (where all items are 40 percent off) makes it clear that fans like me have been hoarding. So: Its sad, but we must move on. Tight, short dresses are easy to find. But what of the rest of American Apparels all-stars? We searched for some suitable replacements. The Hoodies The American Apparel Version: Is there any more iconic item American Apparel made (or anything that screams college student more) than the Unisex Flex Fleece Zip Hoodie? I doubt it. First things first: There are a number of hoodies for women and men left. The Replacements: Most obvious is sustainably minded Alternative Apparel, which sells pretty good hoodies Ive always thought they pill a bit quicker than American Apparels, but how can you beat the champion? for a similar price. People are obsessed with that American Giant hoodie (the start-ups attention to detail means the U.S.-made hoodies are well-stitched and sturdy), and though its $89, it has a lifetime warranty. And American-worker brand Carhartt sells a nice zip-up for men and women (both from $40). The 50/50 Tees The American Apparel Version: What a product this was! The tees were the kind youd sleep in, then just not bother to change out of on your way to work the next day. Theyre also the uniforms of plenty of servers around town at high-casual restaurants. AA isnt sold out yet. There are lots of mens crewneck shirts left in particular. The Replacements: You should probably size down for the tighter fit you might have gotten with the 50/50 tees, but Everlane offers a comparably priced ($15) V-neck tee in ten different colors. Its super soft (though 100 percent cotton, not a polyester-cotton blend). If you want the poly-cotton feel, you can try Next Levels T-shirts, which often go for under $10 on Amazon, but its not the way to go if youre looking for manufacturing transparency. In this $20 two-pack of tees, made by Hanes for Urban Outfitters, the grey V-necks are a poly-cotton blend; Urban also has a cute boy fit crew neck. And this semi-sheer white V-neck from Isabel Marant is expensive, but currently half off at $110. Men should consider this Todd Snyder slub-cotton T-shirt (which is made in a family-owned factory in Canada) and this soft, gray, cotton-blend, rounded-hem Buck Mason tee. (P.S.: The Strategist has looked at mens and womens T-shirts before.) The Thigh-High Stockings The American Apparel Version: A personal favorite Ive probably owned 30 pairs of AAs warm thigh-highs. Theyre mostly a cotton blend, plus a little elastane and nylon, and whereas almost every other thigh-high Ive tried has meant Im tugging at them all night, trying to force them to stay up, these truly get the job done. You can still buy a pair only in red, but worth it. (Also, they are flirty as hell. American Apparel used to sell a T-shirt with Sasha Grey on the front in nothing but these stockings, and I lost the shirt, and thats now high on my regret list.) The Replacements: Heres a U.S.-made pair Im going to start trying, from SockDreams. They have a similar textile makeup and length as AAs. ASOS sells a cute pair for under $10. At Saks there are sporty socks from Ilux that look like those AA ones with a stripe at the thigh; Ilux also offers a solid-black cashmere-silk-nylon blend (currently on sale). And this Seattle-based Etsy sock shop sells cable-knit thigh-highs that look a lot like American Apparels. The Winter Leggings The American Apparel Version: Okay: So, American Apparels normal leggings were kind of bullshit. They tore at the seams pretty quickly, they werent really warm, they didnt provide any support. But the winter ones were beautiful thick and warm, never tore once after hundreds of wears, easy to wash, didnt fade. The Replacements: A close friend swears by the Seattle-based, Vietnam-made Girlfriend Collective leggings, which you can currently buy for just the cost of shipping; the company says its marketing budget is devoted to giving out sample leggings for that price. The leggings are comfortable, warm, and make your butt look great; plus theyre made from recycled water bottles. (P.S. The company is SA8000-certified.) Also good are the Outdoor Voices Hi-Rise Warmup Leggings. Theyre more expensive, at $95, but they have a hidden pocket, and youll be following in the footsteps of the fashion set. And Uniqlo has a $20 pair of Heattech leggings that likely wont be as supportive, but are thin and light and warm. (I wear the unlined Heattech leggings with a waist warmer as if theyre tights, but theyre a touch see-through on their own and provide about the same amount of warmth that average tights do.) The Seamed Pantyhose The American Apparel Version: These were the star of many a super-sexualized, highly criticized advertisement. (American Apparel was bad sometimes.) But wearing them made you feel so, so good and they were affordable, around $20. The Replacements: Wolford has a pair that are softer and smoother and just as flattering, if quite a lot more expensive, at $57; the dance company Capezio sells pretty seamed fishnets for $21. The Crop Tops The American Apparel Version: What will summer be without AAs megacollection of tiny crop tops? The variety! The cotton-spandex tee crops, the long-sleeved crop tops, the loose-fitting crops (great for sleeping in), the crop-top hoodies. (To what kind of event does one wear a crop-top hoodie? Who knows, but we should mourn it anyway.) The Replacements: Urban Outfitters has some nice ones ($34). Barneys sells what, at $450, we could call an investment crop top, made of silk and cashmere, from Proenza Schouler. Like with many American Apparel items, dancewear companies offer similar styles, like these short-sleeved Capezio crops. The Sweatpants The American Apparel Version: AAs California Fleece Slim Fit sweatpants have legions of fans. Theyre soft and then they get better with every wash and wear. (And lest you think the brand was popular with only NYU students: My Missourian mother quickly ordered five pairs of these sweats, for wearing around the house, when she heard the brand was shutting down.) The Replacements: If you can stomach spending $140 on sweats, Everlanes cashmere pants for women are absurdly soft and comfortable. And if you cant stomach that, the brand also has a $58 cotton-poly terry-fleece pair. And the Strategist has recommended sweatpants before, from Outdoor Voices. The Fingerless Gloves The American Apparel Version: You know how those gloves that supposedly work with your iPhone totally do not work at all? American Apparels fingerless gloves (only blue ones are left) solved that. And at $12, it wasnt that big of a deal when you inevitably lost a glove. The Replacements: Bloomingdales has some wool-nylon ones from the mens store; at $44 theyre pricier, but most of AAs gloves were acrylic. A brand called Vital Salveo sells a gray pair that extend over the wrist like short arm warmers, like AAs did, and are similarly priced at $14. The Backpacks The American Apparel Version: The stores backpacks had a huge fan base, who loved the cotton-canvas, nylon Cordura, and denim bags, which came in plenty of colors and patterns. The Replacements: Amazons Basics line has an excellent simple offering thats only $17. Everlane sells a black-colored cotton-twill backpack ($80) thatll fit your laptop and is reinforced on the bottom, so you can feel more comfortable placing it on the ground; Everlane also offers a smaller classic bag ($58). An obvious answer is a Herschel bag, which is similarly simple and comes in plenty of colors (from $42). Baggu makes a machine-washable light nylon bag in black ($32) and a few fun patterns. Carhartt which, like AA did, has its factories in the United States sells a Legacy Classic Work Pack in Carhartt brown for $42. Itll fit your laptop and its water-repellent. Finally, dont knock the Jansport Classic Superbreak bag; this teal one is just $29. The Gold Lame Leggings The American Apparel Version: Let me tell you, do these ever come in handy after everyones had five cocktails at a house party. Suggestion: Buy anything weird at American Apparel thats left, like this odd leopard-print suspender catsuit thing ($12 after the discount code, take40) and, of course, the shiny lame leggings (still available in a few sizes!). Just do it. Add them to your cart now. Anyway, to be honest, should we even celebrate Halloween or wear costumes anymore if American Apparel doesnt exist? I guess we have to, so The Replacements: Amazon sells these crazy wet look skater-flare skirts (from $7), and Nasty Gal sells things like these currently-on-sale sequined gold leggings ($41). For men theres gold bomber jackets on Amazon ($37). The Strategist is a new site designed to surface the most useful, expert recommendations for things to buy across the vast e-commerce landscape. Some of our latest conquests include the best notebook, black T-shirts, fashion-editor-approved jeans, toothbrush, and apartment decor. Note that all prices are subject to change. If you buy something through our links, New York may earn an affiliate commission. What does his comment about grandmas and children have to do with the protests? Reply Thread Link bc of the taxi boycott Reply Parent Thread Link I think cab drivers are protesting against the ban. Not that Rob stopped his car and gave it to these hordes of grandmas and children while he tweeted about them. Reply Parent Thread Link LOL wow, that's even more douchey than I expected. Reply Parent Thread Link what a piece of shit Reply Parent Thread Link probably because it's monday morning, but i still don't get it. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link for real, why didn't he order some limos for them if he was so concerned?? lax has other options Reply Parent Thread Link It sounds sad Reply Parent Thread Link I don't know that there was a taxi boycott at LAX, but I was there last night and traffic was a mess so people were walking to and from the airport. I didn't see any grandmas or kids walking though. Reply Parent Thread Link Fuck off Reply Thread Link Shut the fuck up, Rob. Reply Thread Link he is LITERALLY the worst. Reply Thread Link I choose to believe that nobody on the cast really liked him all that much, it's the only way I can enjoy Chris :/ Reply Parent Thread Link i think it's pretty evident through the bloopers Reply Parent Thread Expand Link amy aint shit either Reply Parent Thread Expand Link That photo is so awkward, it's like he asked the photographer to take one quickly next to the barrel to show he's somewhere where Unicef is/was. Reply Thread Link He needed a quick photo so he could score sympathy points with the underage girls he was going to hit on later at the hotel bar. Reply Parent Thread Link i mean, are we really sure he didn't just go to a californian garbage dump and spray-painted unicef on an old water-canister? (yeah i kno he didn't, but honestly he's so low(e), i wouldn #t be surprised) Reply Parent Thread Link Naaah, he's in someone's backyard in Arizona shooting a YouTube Red exclusive. Reply Parent Thread Link @upulie @RobLowe I don't think children are allowed in a car with registered sex offender Rob Lowe. Martin Connolly (@Mardcon) January 30, 2017 Edited at 2017-01-30 02:08 pm (UTC) this reply tho <3 Reply Thread Link got 'em Reply Parent Thread Link Crying & laughing emoji Reply Parent Thread Link Oh snap lol Reply Parent Thread Link EPICCCCC EPICCCCC Reply Parent Thread Link omg Reply Parent Thread Link perfect Reply Parent Thread Link i'm almost willing to get a twitter account just to re-tweet that. Reply Parent Thread Link BlooooooP Reply Parent Thread Link yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaas Reply Parent Thread Link Cackling yaaaaas Reply Parent Thread Link lmao yesssssss!!! Reply Parent Thread Link Goddamn. I actually gasped and put my hand over my mouth. Reply Parent Thread Link Wait, is he actually a registered sex offender? Reply Parent Thread Expand Link deceased Reply Parent Thread Link martin ilu Reply Parent Thread Link snatchedT Reply Parent Thread Link Don't hold back!!! Reply Parent Thread Link d a m n Reply Parent Thread Link It's nice that Rob Lowe can go to a refugee camp, get a firsthand view of how terrible that experience is, and yet still be an utter dickhead about it. What a shitty human being. Also, are people coming off regular flights complaining? From everything I've seen people have been pretty chill about any delays from the protests. Reply Thread Link tell them Sana Reply Parent Thread Link They had to carry their own luggage?! The horror!! Who can survive in such terrible conditions?! The humanity!! Ok Rob Lowe that sucks for grandmas (the kids can deal tbh) but some people have war in their countries.gif Reply Thread Link won't someone please think of the people with luggage???! Reply Parent Thread Link the real victims here! Reply Parent Thread Link He's pretty capable. He could have always offered to help those Grandmas with their luggage. Reply Parent Thread Link Can he and Scott Baio just fuck off already? Reply Thread Link Chris Traeger would be disappointed in you, Rob. Reply Thread Link Sam Seaborn would be disappointed too. Reply Parent Thread Link Number Two would be disappointed in him. Reply Parent Thread Link Fake concern to cover up his own bigotry. Also: Saw and helped or saw, tweeted about it and drove off? Reply Thread Link saw grandmas and little children dragging heavy luggage for for BLOCKS just trying to get home. There's this thing. It's called a bus. Reply Thread Link Aren't these taxi boycotts only for an hour/a few hours? Reply Parent Thread Expand Link and he cares enough to tweet but not to help this frail old lady? smh Reply Parent Thread Link bash the shit out of him bee it's time to impeach osp Reply Thread Link I think it will be very hard to impeach him because it comes down to a vote. Republicans are most likely not going to vote him out. And Impeaching doesn't mean you leave office. Pres Clinton was impeached but not removed from office. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link I think Repubs will vote him out the second they can. He's a loose cannon and they know it. They'll use him as much as they can to push through their legislation and as soon as he's no longer useful they'll impeach him and do the same with Pence. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link Impeachment is a 2 step process, that has to happen in the House of Representatives and later confirmed by the Senate - Clinton was impeached by the House, but acquitted by the senate. When people say he was impeached... I guess it's technically right, but not fully. Reply Parent Thread Link then how do we get him out if impeaching isn't enough? Reply Parent Thread Expand Link remember, republicans voted nixon out. it's all about placating to the trump voters, setting it up for him to take the fall when the ACA gets repealed, and washing their hands of him when they put pence in. that's why it's important that any health care program gets named Republicare, instead of Trumpcare. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link And then we get Pence. :( Reply Parent Thread Link Now that's a great idea and TV I want to watch. I hope Turner will simulcast it on [adult swim], for all str8 young males who watch it to remember their fav channel is Anti-Trump Edited at 2017-01-30 05:04 pm (UTC) Reply Thread Link I mean are any celebs even gonna want to attend the dinner? Edited at 2017-01-30 05:05 pm (UTC) Reply Thread Link I hope more celebs will attend this roast. Like legit A-lister comedians and actors, so the ratings will be huge. You know Donnie loves them Nielsen Reports more than porn. Reply Parent Thread Link Trump will probably get rid of the roast. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link Scott Baio and James Woods? Reply Parent Thread Expand Link oh course some will, those that want to give him a chance. And we'll be ready with pitchforks, stakes and kindling. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link if fallon shows up, he really deserves to be slapped and punched Reply Parent Thread Link For reference: This is a roast to support the press. Not really a question if celebs will attend, the question is will Trump.For reference: https://youtu.be/2X93u3anTco Reply Parent Thread Link azealia banks would attend Reply Parent Thread Link I wondered about that. No one is going to want to show up? He's alienated almost everyone .. But a WH even is different than an inauguration? Idk Reply Parent Thread Link i can hear this gif Reply Parent Thread Link lmao Reply Parent Thread Link so everyone will be attending this instead. here for it. Reply Thread Link im ready to block altogether any news organization that participates of this. this is real. propaganda is working. a coup is taking place in the military. we gon die if people don't get together and bring the GOP down and take some Dems with em, like trash Schumer and Feinstein. Reply Thread Link What's this about a coup in the military? Reply Parent Thread Link basically this. #6: How this is playing out now is this: if Trump were to tell the CBP to disregard the judicial orders on his EOs, then the entire foundation of judicial supremacy -- that courts have the final say on the meaning of the law -- collapses. It no longer becomes meaningful to have a court order; a court order is just a piece of paper, subject to the whim of the Supreme Leader and his fancy. It is the Executive branch that has the military power; the President who is Commander-in-chief. Our traditions of civil control over the military have kept the military from becoming, as it is in other countries, its own independent power. We don't have military leaders stalking around with guns threatening to foist their will -- for good or for evil -- on civilians. We trust that the Executive is checked by the Legislative and Judicial Branches. That the Executive won't just go rogue, run roughshod over the other branches, take the armed services with him to back him up. https://www.facebook.com/luisro/posts/10158156358180483?pnref=story this is also v important: https://medium.com/@yonatanzunger/trial-balloon-for-a-coup-e024990891d5#.b2fyg97ci Reply Parent Thread Expand Link He needs to be impeached. Idk how much this can be constantly stressed. He's violating the law as we speak. If that isn't enough to impeach him, idk what is tbqh. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link I enjoyed watching the correspondents' dinner but not this year. I mean, is Tr*mp even gonna allow people to make fun of him? Reply Thread Link omg...i didnt understand your comment so i googled it and found that she and her husband opposed intergration. wow such trash.... Edited at 2017-01-30 05:31 pm (UTC) Reply Parent Thread Link Nice to see that someone actually brought it up! Reply Parent Thread Link omg what. i had no idea Reply Parent Thread Link expose it! Reply Parent Thread Link The actual White House Correspondents Dinner is going to be a shitshow. Reply Thread Link No one will attend and then Trump will cancel and claim he's too good for it. Reply Parent Thread Link Too many people showed up and the heroic commander in cheeto had to cancel to prevent a human crush. Reply Parent Thread Link Right? I can't imagine what it's going to actually look like. Reply Parent Thread Link can't wait to watch the shit out of this (while decidedly boycotting all clips and airings of the WHCD) samantha bee Reply Thread Link I wonder what comedian would Trump even get for the actual dinner?? Reply Thread Link this asshole can fuck right off Reply Parent Thread Link op said comedian tho Reply Parent Thread Link this bitch would... Reply Parent Thread Link I appreciate that you managed to find the most annoying gif of Fallon to drive home how fitting a pick he'd be Reply Parent Thread Link Larry The Cable Guy might be able to take some time away from those Prilosec commercials. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link Dan Nainan Reply Parent Thread Link I feel like it looks even more fake after seeing him do that. Like... his hair doesn't look right....real. Reply Parent Thread Link good. i hope people fuck with him at every turn. it'll burn him inside. Reply Thread Link i can't even imagine what kind of z-list asskisser they could get to host the whcd this year Reply Thread Link maybe someone in the country music field? Reply Parent Thread Link Bo Bice probably. Reply Parent Thread Link literally who Reply Parent Thread Expand Link 3...2...1... and welcome the Blue Collar Comedy Tour! "You might be a redneck..." Reply Parent Thread Link OP are you trying to make me not work rn, this is the PERFECT post for me I wanna cuddle with it and never let it go Reply Thread Link I'm glad GRRM gave a shout out to Sharon Kay Penman since The Sun in Splendor is such an obvious influence on ASOIAF. Reply Thread Link ooh is that good then? I'm trying to prioritise women authors and if that's a good read I'm on it Reply Parent Thread Link I enjoyed it. It's a telling of the War of the Roses and while it focuses mainly on Richard III, it jumps from character to character. I enjoyed it quite a bit. Reply Parent Thread Link I loved it! It's one of my favourite books and great once you great hang of all the names (she identifies them differently which helps b/c there are a lot of same names). Reply Parent Thread Link Ugh, I love the Sunne is Splendour soooo much, it's such a great book. Reply Parent Thread Link i read that book so quickly and felt all of the emotions you are describing. Reply Parent Thread Link I can't work with China Mieville's style. And Abercrombie is fun but every novel is firmly barbarian fantasy. Reply Thread Link I love Joe Abercrombie's work so much. I would argue Best Serves Cold and Red Country are less barbarian fantasy. Still has barbarian characters, but Best Serves Cold is more of a political and revenge story while Red Country is a western fantasy with white Indians. IDK. They're all violent tho. *shrug* Reply Parent Thread Link The only book of his I like is Best Served Cold. Reply Parent Thread Link I don't mind it, it's just that he has a very clear surrounding set in which he plays/writes. I'm curious about what else. Reply Parent Thread Link I don't like China's writing eith. I don't get what all the fuss is about. Reply Parent Thread Link Ditto for China Mieville. Reply Parent Thread Link like i want to read LOTR but they're too dense and all i want to do is procrastinate when i look at them. maybe in 10 years. ursula's earthsea series and american gods are in my to-read list this year. i'm planning on reading arrival (the short story collection on which the movie is based) by ted chiang first though. Reply Thread Link I had a hard time getting thought LOTR too. What I found helped was that first I watched the films, then I picked one character I really loved and read it just for that character. Which is to say I read every chapter but I used the character I picked as motivation to get to the next bit with them. By the time I was done with book 2 I was really into the story and reading the book just to read it. I finished all 3 in a week. Edited at 2017-01-30 10:33 pm (UTC) Reply Parent Thread Link I only just barely got through the first LOTR recently. I have a giant combined volume and I pull it down and read a chapter or two at a time in between other stuff. Oop, It's not the most honest way to read, but it works for me. Ursulas Earthsea is on my list this year too. Reply Parent Thread Link I plan to re-read them at some point along with The Hobbit. I actually originally read the books in 7th grade originally, and used those for my reading log that I had to do for English. I first read The Hobbit in 5th grade, so they weren't that hard to read - but they do take a while to read. Reply Parent Thread Link I read the hobbit a few years ago and it wasn't too time-consuming but that one was written for kids and LOTR was written for adults, so it's a faster read. I've tried reading the first LOTR book and it's not like it's hard or anything, it just requires a lot of concentration to remember all the places/characters/creatures/events. Reply Parent Thread Link American Gods was really good. I read it between Halloween and Christmas (work was crazy so I had to fit it in when I could)and it was the perfect time for it. Also, reading it through the election was super interesting because it brought up a lot of issues that are in the Midwest that the electiom stirred up and I'm from the Midwest and it just nailed a lot of my feelings of my home state and region. Reply Parent Thread Link i fucking love the goblin emperor. love nice characters tbh - nice doesn't mean "simple" or "boring"!! for the same reason, tho they're very different books, love the heartstrikers series. they're kind of silly but i love the setting of slightly futuristic + MAGIC IS BACK. loved it in the shadowrun setting, love it here. anybody have good recs for fantasy books about interesting ~nice characters? Reply Thread Link It was so good! I really loved Goblin Emperor a lot. I was worried throughout that there was going to be an awful twist and ruin everything, but it was so....pleasant? Her other series though, written under her real name is enjoyable but fucking weird. And. Like, not everyone is good, but Lynn Flewelling's series are really good. Reply Parent Thread Link right?? it's like "oh no this is all gonna end in pain and death isn't it" but it's just... a story of maia being really sweet to everyone and overcoming a lifetime of abuse on the way. what a goddamn sweetheart. you mean the nightrunner series, yea? i'll check it out! Reply Parent Thread Link Reading a book about WW2 refugees in Morocco and the North Korean one recommended in the ontd book club. Think I'm going to have to add something light soon. Reply Thread Link what're they called? are they good? Reply Parent Thread Link The first is the 1947' published The Field The second one is In Order To Live: a north Korean's girl journey to freedom. Non fiction, the information important enough to ignore style.The first is the 1947' published The Field http://www.letterenfonds.nl/nl/boek/1035/en-de-akker-is-de-wereld Reply Parent Thread Expand Link Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer Reply Parent Thread Link Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl Reply Parent Thread Link I'm also curious about what book you're reading. I'm finishing Yes, Please by Amy Poehler. It's been okay, some nuggets of wisdom, nothing too heavy but also boring sometimes. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link as I said below i'm reading HP book #1, its a re-read. I'm having a little HP book club with my friends~ and i'm trying to take notes about it lol. I have a use for all the paper tabs I bought in japan! I meant to read The Lightning Thief for the ONTD reading challenge but I got hit with the urge to read HP instead. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link The Hating Game, still. I'm struggling so much with it, they're both so annoying. Reply Parent Thread Link Murder In The Mystery Suite still although I'm finally finishing it up. After that, I'll start World After by Susan Ee. Excited for that because I LOVED the first book in the series. Reply Parent Thread Link Yesterday I finished Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami and We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie I'm thinking I might give myself a day of rest before I start my book for the Feb section of the oNTD book challenge Reply Parent Thread Expand Link The Summer That Melted Everything, rec'd in a book post last year. I'm over a third of the way in and nothing much has happened yet, so I'm hoping it'll pick up soon. Reply Parent Thread Link the green mile Reply Parent Thread Link The Church of Dead Girls by Stephen Donbyns Definitely a slow burn. Reply Parent Thread Link I'm reading Peter the Great by Robert Massie (for the ontd book club). It's a biography but it really reads like an epic novel. Reply Parent Thread Link Rereading Vorkosigan series for the nth time. already up to Komarr Reply Parent Thread Link I've never been into science fiction but Octavia Butler's books sound amazing. I'm going to try to check her out and some authors as well. PS. I'm so behind on the reading challenge, my goodness. Reply Thread Link Her books ARE amazing. This whole post is going to me just worshipping my favorite authors, lol. Reply Parent Thread Link Kindred is awesome I'm in the middle of the Seed to Harvest series and it is a mindfuck Reply Parent Thread Link Seconding Kindred. Really dark, really interesting. Reply Parent Thread Link i've only read Kindred but it was amazing. also a graphic novel adaptation of it was just recently released and that looks stunning as well. I'd gladly read that too. Reply Parent Thread Link kindred and the lilith's brood collection are fucking amazing. i am obsessed w octavia. Reply Parent Thread Link Echoing the Butler is amazing chorus. Her books are so mesmerizing and complicated and they've really stuck with me for years. Reply Parent Thread Link I'm so close to finishing HP. I am 3/4ths done. I think I can finish the rest by tonight. Just barely making it for the reading challenge. I hope its ok I don't post anything on the goodreads forum about it, maybe for the next month I will b/c idk what i'm gonna read for that. Reply Thread Link is this your first time??? How exciting if it is!!!! I kinda think people who didn't grow up with the phenomenon kinda miss out, but I love it when people get into it at any age and they loooove it Reply Parent Thread Link oh no I grew up with it lol! I'm re-reading it b/c I introduced my friend to the movies tho lol. I'm trying to get her to read the books too. Reply Parent Thread Link yess i LOVE when people who have only seen the movies finally give the books ago bc they just lose their mind at how amazing and so. much. better. it is Reply Parent Thread Link I've been re-reading the series in between my library books. I was waiting for my hold book in come in, decided I hadn't read them that recently, so I started reading them again. I read the first 3 books within a few days, because they're shorter. After I finish my current library book, I'm going to re-read the 5th one. I've always loved the series. I actually went to Borders at midnight to get the 6th & 7th books when they came out and I think I pretty much read all the books within a day. Reply Parent Thread Link I feel like Garth Nix is underrated on fantasy levels. He has yet to disappoint me. Reply Thread Link yes! he is one of my all time favorites! Reply Parent Thread Link THIS Reply Parent Thread Expand Link The Old Kingdom series is so amazing. I wasn't sold on Keys to the Kingdom but I will forever love Sabriel. Reply Parent Thread Link mte! I was scanning his for this name through all of these and no mention. I read Sabriel around the time when I was waiting for a new HP book and it changed me. Shame that it hasn't been adapted for tv or film yet, especially as there are similarities between it and Game of Thrones (but Sabriel was first). Reply Parent Thread Link i appreciate the new flow of book posts on ontd! science fiction is probably the only genre i've never been into or dabbled in outside of a school assignment. Reply Thread Link On the topic of science-fiction, I feel like William Gibson is a literary one hit wonder or smth. Like Neuromancer was AMAZING (+I really liked his Fragments of a Hologram Rose short) but the sequels were sOOooOoo much more worse in comparison, like really bad fanfic? And then I tried to give Pattern Recognition a shot, and while I liked the main character Cayce and the premise had a lot of potential, the writing was just so amateurish :/ idg why he didn't just stick with the Burroughs-lite thing he had going for him in Neuromancer because that really worked. Reply Thread Link His orientalism is dated . Reply Parent Thread Link I completely agree. He's an interesting and smart person but not a talented writer. lmao, yes, Burroughs-lite. I think he tried to find his own voice but maybe his own voice wasn't that great? idk Reply Parent Thread Link The fact that none of them recommended Dune or The Left Hand of Darkness, or Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. SMH. Reply Thread Link Ikr! Shocked by Dune not appearing at least once Reply Parent Thread Link Jealous hoes tbh. Dune is a masterpiece if you can get past the latent homophobia. Reply Parent Thread Expand Link i think it's because this list seems to veer more on the fantasy side?? i never got why people just lumped sci-fi and fantasy together because i go crazy hard for science-fiction (and agree with your picks :>!!) but literally could not care any less about dragons and magic or w/e. gimme da future ya'll Reply Parent Thread Expand Link I have to read Dune and The Left Hand of Darkness for my science fiction course this semester. I'm not looking forward to Dune tbh, just because it's so huge, but TLHoD sounds interesting. I'm not really big on science fiction though, so we'll see how I go. Reply Parent Thread Link yeah those are surprising exclusions for sure Reply Parent Thread Link those are more sci-fi than fantasy Reply Parent Thread Expand Link I read The Left Hand of Darkness earlier this month and it was incredible. it was so well-built and intricate and emotional. I'm very new at sci-fi but I'm trying to read more this year. Reply Parent Thread Link Just a few months after oil prices began to crash from its US$100 level in 2014, BPs chief executive Bob Dudley warned the industry that it needed to prepare for lower for longer. At the beginning of 2017 - with oil prices relatively stable at over US$50 for a couple of months now - the UK oil supermajor said it in its 2017 Energy Outlook edition that oil resources are abundant, and those that are known today dwarf the expected global consumption of oil out to 2050 and beyond. In BPs predictions for a future world in the next 20-30 years, the abundance of potential oil reserves and supply may lead to low-cost producers pumping ever-increasing amounts of that oil and higher-cost producers getting gradually crowded out, group chief economist Spencer Dale said. This abundance of oil resources contrasts with expectations of slowing growth of oil demand, Dale noted. BPs supply-demand expectation suggests that oil prices may not only be lower for longer, but that they may be lower for even longer. Low-cost oil producers may try to use their competitive advantage to increase market share, BP said, and they may be tempted to pump more oil before the demand growth starts to abate. This may lead to quite significant pressures to dampen long-run prices, Dale commented in a presentation of BPs outlook, as quoted by the Financial Times. According to BPs latest energy outlook (which, of course, should not be viewed as the ultimate authority on global oil outlooks and dynamics), cumulative oil demand until 2035 is seen at around 700 billion barrels, significantly lower than recoverable oil in the Middle East alone. BP has pegged demand for global liquids including oil, biofuels and other liquid fuels rising by around 15 million bpd by 2035, to reach 110 million bpd by then. OPEC is expected to account for almost 70 percent of the worlds supply growth, with supply increasing by 9 million bpd to 48 million bpd by 2035. On the other hand, non-OPEC supply is expected to grow by just over 4 million bpd by 2035. U.S. liquids output is seen rising by 4 million bpd to reach 19 million bpd by 2035, with the highest growth expected mainly in the first half of the period, pushed up by tight oil and natural gas liquids production. Related: Robots Over Roughnecks: Next Drilling Boom Might Not Add Many Jobs However, the expected growth in the U.S., as well as rises in Brazil, Russia and Canada, would be largely offset by declines in higher-cost and more mature producing regions. The result, according to BP: Middle East OPEC, Russia and the U.S. would raise their combined share of global liquids supply to 63 percent by 2035 from 56 percent now. These oil supply-demand assumptions are part of BPs most likely path for energyand in particular, oildemand. There are three main variables on which global oil supply behavior would depend: the cost and feasibility of low-cost producers to significantly increase supply; the extent to which prices respond to increased supplies of low-cost oil and the impact on producers economies; and the ability of higher-cost producers to compete by amending tax and royalty regimes. Broadly speaking in terms of energy demand, BP has identified three uncertainties for its most likely energy scenario: faster mobility revolution, the speed of transition to lower-carbon economies, and risks to gas demand. Although BP expects the number of electric cars to jump from 1.2 million in 2015 to around 100 million by 2035, it sees demand for cars from the growing middle class in emerging economies overpowering the effects of improving fuel efficiency and electrification. The implications of the rapidly growing EV fleet, at least in the base-case scenario, arent a game changer, Dale said. Related: Is The Oil Crisis Over? Oil Majors Report Positive Cash Flow BP also admitted that renewables are the fastest-growing fuel source with expected 7.6-percent annual growth - and sees continuing gains in competitiveness quadrupling renewables in power generation over the next 20 years. So the inevitable question - when will oil demand peak - was also tackled in BPs energy outlook. In its base-case scenario, the oil giant expects oil demand to start declining during the mid-2040s. However, this projection hinges on many factors. Slower than expected global GDP growth, faster fuel efficiency improvements, faster alternative-fuel vehicle mass adoption, or stricter climate policies may result in oil demand starting its drop much earlier, BP said. The oil groups base-case forecast for oil demand peak is generally in line with the International Energy Agencys (IEA) World Economic Outlook 2016, which expects that global demand for oil will continue to rise until 2040, chiefly due to the lack of easy alternatives to oil in the road freight, aviation, and petrochemicals industries. By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: Donald Trumps first week in office as U.S. president has brought major upheaval. And it looks like the new leader could be about to cause some massive shifts in the oil market. Thats because of a proposed tax on U.S. imports with big implications for crude flows coming into America. President Trump and the Republican U.S. Congress have been discussing a potential new tax on all imports. Which has been quoted at 20% a substantial burden on shipments entering America. That includes crude oil. A commodity where U.S. refiners still import some 10 million barrels daily. Such a move would raise the cost for imported oil significantly. And push U.S. refiners to favor domestic crude supplies. Theres been some doubt over the last several weeks about whether Trump would follow through with the import tax. But last Thursday new White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said at a press conference that the government is still strongly considering the measure. That means a big shift could be coming for oil flows in America. And heres what that means for crude buyers, and for investors. The new import tax would be a negative for refiners. Which would be unable to shift away from imported crude oil immediately and would see input costs for their operations rise almost overnight. Refiners would almost certainly start looking to increase domestic oil usage. Which would boost prices for U.S. products like West Texas Intermediate relative to global blends like Brent due both to actual demand as well as speculative buying from investors jumping on the trend. Related: Why A Trade War Wont Derail U.S. Energy Exports To Mexico That would in turn be good for U.S. oil drillers. Who would suddenly benefit from world-leading pricing. One big question is: how much domestic crude can U.S. refiners take? Many facilities on the Gulf Coast are configured to use heavy crude (formerly coming from suppliers like Venezuela), while a good portion of new U.S. shale oil supplies consist of lighter crude that might not fit refinery specs. That could push refiners to seek increased heavy oil supplies from local producers benefitting heavy oil plays in the western U.S. and even Alaska. Watch for more news over the coming weeks on whether the import tax will pass, and for an ensuing jump in American crude prices. Heres to crisis and opportunity. By Dave Forest More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: In just thirteen words, a U.S. judge has summed up the problem with almost everything thats happened since Donald Trump became US President: I think the government hasnt had a full chance to think about this. That was how Judge Ann Donnelly of the federal district court in Brooklyn summed up the situation that erupted over the weekend when airports began to implement the now infamous Muslim Ban. Which by the way President Trump says isnt a Muslim Ban, and is working very well. But lets look closer to home at decisions which impact on the industry. Using the powers of the Executive Order, he brought back the Dakota Access and Keystone XL projects. With the Dakota Access decision, his intention is to allow the development of a 1,100-mile pipeline to transport 450,000 barrels a day from the Bakken fields of North Dakota to Illinois. For months now there have been clashes between protesters and private security forces, as those against the completion of the project refuse to stand aside. Its around 75% there and only the crossing of Lake Oahe remains. The tribespeople argue that the pipeline has the potential to burst or leak and contaminate their water supply. The chairman of the Standing Rock Tribe David Archambault II wrote to President Trump, warning him not to use his own power alone. This change in course is arbitrary and without justification. The law requires that changes in agency positions be backed by new circumstances or new evidence, not simply by the presidents whim. The problem with the Dakota Access pipeline is not that it involves development but rather that it was deliberately and precariously placed without proper consultation with tribal governments. While new evidence in support of the pipeline is lacking, there is also the issue that the US army corps of engineers is currently undertaking an environmental impact statement prompted by the warnings that the pipeline could poison a water supply not only for the tribe but also millions of people living nearby. This enables authorities to explore different potential routes. President Trump has asked the army to think about dropping the review, and take all actions necessary and appropriate to speed up the development - the implications of which do nothing to counter Donnellys argument that people have not had a chance to think about this. Related: Fundamentals Be Damned Oil Price Correction Likely Furthermore, as reported in The Guardian, Trump has held a stake in Energy Transfer Partners, the Texas-based company behind the Dakota Access project. The investment was disclosed last year but Trumps spokesman has said, without providing evidence, that the president has sold his stake in the business and therefore removed the potential conflict of interest. As vox.com notes, an approval of some pipeline appears likely its just which route. And a disconcerting question about why President Trump is refusing to consider a route that wont risk drinking water. (At this point, we are reminded of the fact that the guy who predicted the housing bubble collapse in 2008 Dr Michael Burry, who made $1bn betting against Wall Street, is now focussing all his trading on one commodity water.) Moving to Keystone XL now. Weve previously discussed how this was a priority for Republicans under the Obama administration and even though Josh (not so) Earnest said it was certainly possible that the then president would change his mind, he didnt. Obama argued it would undermine Americas global leadership on climate change. President Trump, a man with bigger things on his mind than climate change (a concept he once ascribed to the Chinese as a means of waging industrial war on America) overturned that in just five days. This 1,179-mile pipeline would carry 830,000 bpd of Albertas oil sands product from Hardisty, Canada to Steele City, Nebraska. In typical form, hes asked the State Department to approve this plan in no more than 60 days. "If we can get that pipeline built. A lot of jobs; 28,000 jobs. Great construction jobs," he said. However the State Department which reported on the proposal under Obama came up with a different figure when it looked into it. It suggested there would be between 2000 and 4000 direct construction jobs, depending on how long the project took to complete. Once complete, 35 people would be needed to maintain it, with 15 temporary jobs. Interestingly the company that is behind the pipeline, TransCanada, didnt dispute those numbers. As with all things Trump, there is no excuse for surprise when he does things he always said he would do. Even though the Pew Research Center reported that 65% of Americans believe renewable energy should be prioritised over fossil fuels, Trump campaigned on getting the coal miners back to work. He also came out with his America First strapline, with all the ghastly echoes that brings, and a natural step was for the President to decree through a third Executive Order on the same day that all new and upgraded pipelines in the US would use materials and equipment produced in the United States, to the maximum extent possible and to the extent permitted by law. Related: Iran To Export More Oil In February This potentially poses a problem for TransCanada as only about 50% of the pipe suppliers were American. The rest came from Italy, India and Canada. Of course, Trumps support for the coal workers may prove to be his trickiest sleight of hand. He vowed to resurrect the industry but overlooked the fact (perhaps because he didnt have time to think about it) that the reason that the US coal industry has declined in recent years is precisely because the US natural gas industry blew up the market. Competition caused by increased production led to reduced prices and people turned their backs on coal. The much-repeated insistence that the new administration would remove cumbersome regulatory burdens will not support coal they would enable oil and gas supply in the States to increase. A report issued by Goldman Sachs last week suggested that if the two new pipelines go ahead, US oil output could rise by 1.5m bpd in 2018, which would almost double its current projection. As we know higher oil production usually means higher gas production too. The next natural step is to wonder what impact this will have on the fledging deal struck by OPEC and some non-OPEC countries. How long will they abide by an agreement to cut production when the US sails ahead and puts America First? No-ones going to want to come in last, and that is going to make for a rocky time ahead. If only thered been time to think about that first. By Precise Consultants More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: In his first week in office, President Donald Trump created a diplomatic crisis with Mexico regarding the border wall, who will pay for it, and a proposed 20 percent tariff on all goods coming into the U.S. from its southern neighbor. The Trump administration received immediate push back on his proposed tariff, even from some Republican lawmakers. But the proposal did not come out of nowhere. The president and his Republican allies have been floating a proposed border-adjustment tax for months, one that has raised the ire of some in the refining industry. If the tariff or border-adjustment tax became law, it would have profound implications for the energy trade between U.S. and Mexico, a cross-border trade in oil, gas and refined products that goes in both directions. Bloomberg notes that if the U.S. slapped a tariff specifically on Mexican goods, Canadas oil industry would receive a huge boost. It would attract more Canadian crude because it would be cheaper, Bart Melek, the head of global commodity strategy at TD Securities in Toronto, told Bloomberg. It just makes Mexican oil more expensive by 20 percent so it gives Canada a comparative advantage. Last week, President Trump signed an executive order to advance the Keystone XL pipeline, which would allow an additional 830,000 bpd to flow to the U.S. if constructed. Mexico meanwhile, would get hit hard by the tariff. Mexico produces heavy oil and much of it is refined along the U.S. Gulf Coast. Because of its proximity, the heavy Maya blend, as it is known, trades at a premium to other varieties of heavy oil, such as Canadas Western Canadian Select. Its a short ride from the Bay of Campeche to Texas and Louisiana. The tariff would only be negative for Mexicos oil sector, which has been suffering from steady decline for years as its aging giant oil fields deplete. Pemex, the state-owned oil company, has been unable to replace lost output. Mexico produced 2.3 million barrels per day of crude oil in 2015, and the declines are expected to continue. As part of OPECs deal with non-OPEC countries, Mexico promised to cut production in the first six months of 2017 by 100,000 bpd, although the contribution was a clever bit of rebranding, describing the inevitable depletion as a production cut. Related: Is The Oil Crisis Over? Oil Majors Report Positive Cash Flow Nevertheless, if Mexico suddenly saw its oil hit with a 20 percent tariff, and it lost market share from its largest customer where it sends about 60 percent of its exports it could damage Mexicos oil industry, potentially accelerating the decline rates. The Maya blend would have to be discounted, undercutting the finances of already cash-strapped Pemex. One mitigating factor is the structure of the contracts. Mexico exports roughly 550,000 bpd to the U.S., which is traditionally traded under long-term contracts. Unlike the spot trade, the contracts would be much trickier to change, so the effect of the proposed tariff is unknown at this point. Natural gas trade between the two countries would also be affected. Texas shale gas drillers stand to benefit immensely from the growing demand in Mexico for natural gas. Gas exports to Mexico have tripled since 2010 to just over one trillion cubic feet in 2015. A handful of large gas pipelines are currently under construction between Texas and Mexico, which will connect shale gas from the Eagle Ford and Permian Basin to Mexican buyers. Pipeline capacity is set to double between 2016 and 2018. This gas trade could be directly damaged by cross-border tariffs, raising the cost for refiners and utilities on both sides of the border. But volumes moving between the countries would take an additional hit if a trade war slowed manufacturing activity in northern Mexico, reducing industrial demand for gas. Plus, the rapid transition from coal and oil to natural gas in Mexicos electric power sector could slow. The combined effect would be to severely reduce Mexican demand for American gas. (Click to enlarge) Related: Robots Over Roughnecks: Next Drilling Boom Might Not Add Many Jobs On top of the existing trade in oil and gas, Mexico liberalized its energy sector after seven decades of state-owned control, allowing private companies to bid on offshore acreage. The oil majors arrived in full force, with interest from ExxonMobil, Chevron and many others. Again, since the policy has not been laid out with specifics, it is unclear whether or not some international companies might rethink their development plans due to the deteriorating relationship between the U.S. and Mexico. Of course, there are plenty of reasons to think that the tariff will never see the light of day. First, putting the energy trade in jeopardy might spook lawmakers, not to mention the vast economic ties in other sectors. In addition, the tax could raise gasoline prices if U.S. refiners have to pay more for imported fuel, a move that is always politically dangerous. Moreover, the tariff would probably violate WTO trade rules, so its implementation is highly suspect. It would almost certainly be met with retaliatory measures from Mexico, inciting a trade war. That could deter even some of the most bellicose members of the Republican caucus. By Nick Cunningham of Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: Political parties in the Kurdistan autonomous region of Iraq are quarreling over the share each of them gets from oil trade, according to the secretary of the Kurdistan Social Democratic Party, Muhammad Haji Mahmoud, who spoke to the Voice of America. According to Mahmoud, the five parties all set up oil companies to ensure revenue streams in 2014, after the latest government entered into office. Now, however, they seem to be unhappy with their share of the goodies, and are insisting on a bigger piece of the pie. A governmental crisis hit Kurdistan two years ago, after the end of President Massoud Barzanis term in office. Barzani refused to relinquish control and remained in office, although unofficially, as this goes counter to Kurdish laws. His partythe Kurdistan Democratic Partyis currently in power, its power solidified in late 2015 after PM Nechirvan Barzani expelled four ministers from another party, Gorran, from the cabinet for, as EKurd Daily put it, instigating violent unrest for political gain. The Kurdistan autonomous region is home to some of the largest oil fields in Iraq, and the Regional Governments problems dont end with local parties. The KRG has been locked in arguments with the central government in Baghdad over payments for oil exports, and allegedly over oil shipments made without approval from Baghdad. Related: Independent Audit Confirms Saudi Aramcos Huge Oil Reserves Earlier this month, Iraqs Prime Minister, Haider al-Abadi, accused the KRG of shipping more crude to Turkey than it was supposed to as per the OPEC November agreement on output cuts. According to Al-Abadi, Kurdistan was exporting more than the 17 percent stated in the budget. This 17-percent portion amounts to 250,000 bpd from fields under the control of the KRG. However, as Reuters notes, this allocation does not include the fields around Kirkuk a wealth of oil that is under the de facto control of Erbil, but are officially under the umbrella of the Baghdad-run North Oil Company. By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: Lukoil hopes it will begin the development of two oil fields in Iran later this year, after the conclusion of negotiations currently held with the National Iranian Oil Company. This is what Lukoil vice president and chief of Middle Eastern operations Gati al-Jebouri told media yesterday. Currently, Lukoil and NIOC are discussing the cost structure of the two projects, and the Russian company hopes that the Iranian side will reach a decision by the end of June, although no firm deadlines have been set, Al-Jebouri also said. Earlier this month, Lukoil was named in a list of 29 foreign companies approved by NIOC for participation in oil and gas field tenders, to take place later this year. The Russian company has not concealed its eagerness to return to Iran: as soon as the Western sanctions on Tehran were lifted, Lukoil President Vagit Alekperov went to Iran to meet with Iranian oil minister Bijan Namdar Zangeneh, who announced to the press that Lukoil was the first foreign oil firm to sign a memorandum of understanding. Before the sanctions, Lukoil operated the Anaran oil field in Iran. Related: Why Colombias Oil Industry Might Never Recover According to a recent report by Irans Financial Tribune, Russian companies have so far signed preliminary agreements for the development of seven oil and gas deposits in the country. These companies except Lukoil and Gazprom, who were included in the 29-company list will be included in a second list of approved foreign oil and gas players. Names include Rosneft, Zarubezhneft, and Tatneft. All the approved bidders will be offered the International Petroleum Contract a new form of contract developed by Bijan Zanganehs ministry in a bid to facilitate the return of foreign oil companies into Iran and quench their concerns about making a profit from their potential operations there. The main difference with the old buyback scheme is that foreign companies will be allowed to book Iranian reserves and acquire interests in local energy businesses. By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com More Top Reads From Oilprice.com: By Jason Williams Taxpayer Association of Oregon The front page Sunday Oregonian ran a story about the proliferation of Oregon lawmakers who are using campaign funds to pay their own salary. I recognize the problem and I think we need to pay Oregon legislators an actual decent wage. Our elected officials should be paid the same as most Oregonians and be set to the median wage of Oregon workers. Right now Oregon lawmakers make around $1,800 a month half of the states average wage. You cant have a citizens legislature of ordinary people without making it possible for them to serve. Already they have to take nearly seven months out of the year to serve. How many people can afford to do that? As a result, too many Legislative bodies are filled with the same occupations lawyers, government employees and the higher income earners. Low-paying lawmaker wages also penalizes rural lawmakers the most. They have to travel extreme distances just to keep in contact with their constituents. It can take Senator Ted Ferrioli nearly 8 hours to travel from one end of his district to another. It takes 5 hours for him to travel from home to the State Capitol. By tying it to median wages, it means that they are paid the same as what most Oregonians are paid. If the economy goes down, and wages drop, then the politicians wages drop with everybody else. Lawmaker wages would only rise when everyone else wages rise. This also prevents lawmakers from having to vote on their own increases. Our Legislature needs fresh new blood, new ideas and more everyday people. We need to remove the barriers that penalize rural lawmakers. Lets set lawmaker wages to Oregonians wages and open the political door to new people to serve. P.S. The best way to bring in new people is term limits. But no one expects that to happen anytime soon. State Representative Vic Gilliam announced his resignation today with a public Facebook post. Gilliams successor will be chosen by a joint meeting of the Clackamas and Marion County Commissions. In December 2015, Gilliam announced that he was diagnosed with ALS. His announcement comes as a bit of a surprise. When the Oregon House of Representatives met earlier this month for their organizational session, they adopted House Rule 6.10 (5) which made it possible for another Representative to read remarks for Gilliam on the House Floor. This suggests Gilliam had originally intended to continue serving into the 2017 session. UPDATE: Gilliams resignation is effective on the first day of the 2017 Regular session. Gilliamss resignation will be effective February 1st, according to House GOP office. Thats the first day of the 2017 session. #orleg Chris Lehman (@CapitolCurrents) January 30, 2017 UPDATE 2: House Republican Leader Mike McLane issued a statement on Gilliams announcement: During my time in the Legislature, Vic was a wonderful colleague and an even better friend. As a freshman legislator, I remember looking up to Vic as a statesman, who handled the peoples business with dignity and class, but without taking himself too seriously. As the Republican Leader, I came to rely on him for his counsel, his moral clarity and his unfailing wit. People like Vic are increasingly rare in this world. While his time in the Legislature has come to a close, I believe his legacy will fill the halls of the Capitol for years to come. He is, and will always be, the embodiment of what it means to be a public servant in Oregon. All of us in the House Republican caucus, past and present, are honored to have had the privilege of serving with Vic. We will continue to update this article as additional information becomes available. Gerontology Club-First Meeting Monday, January 27, 2020 2-3:00 pm in Hill Hall 337Join the Ger Club at the first meeting of the semester! We will be discussing and planning our Senior Prom that we host in the spring. Hope to see you there! Goal: $2,000.00 Achieved: $.00 DATE: Saturday, September 21, 2019 TIME: 9:00 am - Registration 10:00 am - Ceremony Time 10:15 am - Walk begins Place: Jordan Valley Park 635 East Trafficway Street Springfield, MO 65806 Team: Missouri State GER Club Donations - https://act.alz.org/site/TR/Walk2019/MO-GreaterMissouri?fr_id=12687&pg=entry The end of Alzheimer's disease starts here. AT LEAST FIVE MILLION FOUR HUNDRED THOUSAND PEOPLE IN AMERICA SUFFER FROM ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE. Their FIFTEEN MILLION CAREGIVERS are giving up their jobs, benefits, opportunities for promotions and raises, and their social lives to care for these individuals. Healthcare for people with AD will cost 236 BILLION DOLLARS in 2017 ALONE! Sadly, these are not the worst effects of this disease. It destroys memories, families, and millions of lives. Alzheimer's is the SIXTH LEADING CAUSE OF DEATH IN AMERICA. TOGETHER WE CAN FIGHT ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE! If you can spare a few dollars, please click on the link below to donate: Thank you for joining our movement! The end of Alzheimer's disease starts here. Follow us on Instagram: @MSUGERONTOLOGYCLUB Hyperloop technology by Hyperloop One, which can cut down travel time from Delhi to Mumbai to just an hour, could be taken up by the central government soon. Hyperloop is a high-speed travel solution technology based on propelling a vehicle through a near-vacuum tube at a speed faster than an airplane. Through this technology, travel time between Mumbai and Chennai could come to just an hour, while Bengaluru to Chennai could just take 20 minutes, down from one hour. Bengaluru to Thiruvananthapuram which currently takes 70 minutes flight time could come down to just 30 minutes. Alan James, Hyperloop's VP for world wide business development, said the speed could be as high as 1,080 km per hour. "Hyperloop offers aviation-like speed, train-like capacity and metro-like convenience," he told The Financial Express. Five routes from India qualified to the final stage of a global competition conducted by the company. Alan James told the newspaper that the routes proposed have active involment from their respective state governments and a leading Indian university. He said that the company will first evalute the business cases of these entries and then discuss further national projects with the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways. The company is set to hold the final leg of its competition on February 27 and 28, in New Delhi. If You Enjoy My Articles, Please Consider Supporting My Writing By Giving A Donation Of Any Amount. Thank you! Ghana Media Center for Social and Economic Justice (Ghana Media Center) is calling on the Speaker of Parliament to raise the bar of governance, by applying the law to punish individuals involved in the Mahama Ayariga bribery scandal which has rocked the house presently. It is disappointing that corruption has becoming epidemic in all the three arms of government; the Executive, Legislature, and the Judiciary. These are supposed to be our centers of integrity. Unfortunately they have become centers of bribery and corruption. Whether the MP for Bawku Central, Mahama Ayariga, framed up the bribery allegations or Boakye Agyarko indeed tried to bribe his way out of the vetting, should not be taken as your word against my word situation. The issue is that there has been a plethora of bribery allegations against the Parliaments of the fourth republic over the years. The Speaker has not been able to purge the house of any of the previous allegations. The MP for Nadowli/Kaleo, Honorable Alban Bagbin is on record as having said that MPs take bribes. Member of Parliament for Effiduase/Asokore K.T Hammond also hinted of corruption against the then Speaker of Parliament, Rt Honorable Doe Adjaho, and the majority members of Parliament in the transaction involving the sale of Merchant Bank to Fortiz. The Speaker threatened to refer the matter to the Privileges Committee but again we heard nothing thereafter. Honorable P. C. Appiah-Ofori also alleged that members of Parliament took $5,000 each in order to approve the Ghana Telecom to Vodafone deal. Some ordinary members of society have also made allegations of corruption against Parliament. Prof. Stephen Addae has revealed that Parliamentarians used their positions to take bribes for their girlfriends. Martin Amidu has also alleged that MPs demand for money in the delivery of their work. All these allegations have gone uninvestigated, and unpunished. The Speaker, Right Honorable Professor Mike Ocquaye, is faced with the opportunity to purge the house of all the Charlatans who have found their ways into Parliament. In this regard, Ghana Media Center is calling for a thorough truly independent investigation into the Mahama Ayarigas bribery allegations, and hopes to see severe consequences for those found guilty in the scandal. Source: James Kofi Annan/[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 President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo is currently in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to participate in the 28th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the African Union. The two day seminar starts from 30th and ends on 31st of January. Prior to the summit, a meeting between the various Heads of State was held last Sunday and they considered a report to be presented by the President of Rwanda, Paul Kagame, on institutional reforms of the AU aimed at enhancing the continental body's governance systems. The Assembly is also expected to consider the 2016 Annual Report of the AU Commission, which is expected to focus on the implementation and domestication of Agenda 2063, economic integration, the continental passport as well as peace support and peace-keeping missions. In a statement copied to Peacefmonline.com from the Presidency reads: PRESIDENT ATTENDS 28TH AU SUMMIT IN ETHIOPIA The President of the Republic, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, will leave Ghana on Saturday, January 28, 2017, to attend the 28th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the African Union, which is being held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The meeting of the Heads of State will take place from January 30 to January 31, 2017, under the theme, Harnessing the Demographic Dividend through Investment in the Youth. The Summit will also elect a new Chairperson of the African Union Commission. Prior to the commencement of the Ordinary Session of the Assemble on Monday, a retreat for the Heads of State will be held on Sunday, January 29, immediately after a breakfast meeting with the new Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres. The President will return home on Wednesday, February 1, 2017. Eugene Arhin Ag. Director of Communications Source: Chris Joe Quaicoe/ email: [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 .comment-link {margin-left:.6em;} Welsh Liberal Democrats Councillor for Cwmbwrla Ward, City and County of Swansea - Please buy my novels at Author Page The states largest teacher union condemned President Donald Trumps executive order banning refugees and immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. New York State United Teachers issued a statement on the matter. As educators, our classrooms are sanctuaries and our students are family. Every day, across this state we teach and model lessons in tolerance, inclusion, respect and understanding to our students, who hail from more than 140 nations and practice many different faiths, the statement read. New York State United Teachers completely rejects as antithetical to American ideals this executive order, which unconstitutionally singles out refugees based on their religion. We urge our members to continue to fight this and every other form of discrimination. This is not who we are as Americans. The SUNY Board of Trustees last week also adopted a resolution that reiterated its commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion. The resolution reaffirmed that its university police do not participate in the enforcement of federal immigration law unless compelled to do so by a court order or other legal means; and it does not use immigration status or country of origin or immigration status as a factor in admissions decisions. Undocumented students are allowed to pay resident tuition as long as they meet state criteria. SUNY officials continue to advocate for financial assistance for undocumented students and The resolution added SUNY maintains its commitment to having diverse campuses. The University also believes that religious tolerance is maximized through education and encourages persons of all faiths to teach others about their faith and religious practices. The Associated Press is reporting that SUNY officials have asked students and faculty to suspend any travel plans to Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. SUNY officials estimate that there are more than 22,000 international students enrolled from 180 countries. You may know I have been fighting illness for the better part of the last couple of years. One of the things thats been a casualty of that has been my participation in volunteering for and raise money for Special Olympics. On Saturday, knowing a needed a Streetwise for Monday's paper, I took a ride up to West Mountain for the Capital Region Winter Regional Games, and I was strongly reminded what I have been missing. First of all, the folks at the mountain do a fabulous job providing a venue for the event, while still keeping the mountain open for its day-to-day skiers. Of course, some of those skiers were busy volunteering, as were college and high school students, parents and many others. But what really struck me was the excitement of the athletes, who were competing in alpine, Nordic and snowshoeing. Thats what I had really forgotten about. I had forgotten the pure joy you see from the athletes, whether they are 6 years old or pushing 70. Its just fabulous, and everyone involved deserves a great deal of credit. FORT EDWARD The Fort Edward woman accused of seriously injuring her stepdaughter last fall has rejected a plea deal offer that would send her to state prison for up to 7 years. Marissa Bickford-Rice would be required to plead guilty to second-degree assault for the attack that left 4-year-old Kaiden Starr Rice near death last September. Bickford-Rice allegedly slammed the girls head on a hard floor, and has been held in Washington County Jail since the Sept. 21 incident at the Lower Wright Street home where the family lived. They (the Washington County District Attorneys Office) made an offer. It was not accepted, said Bickford-Rices lawyer, Washington County Public Defender Michael Mercure. The criminal case will likely be handed off to a special prosecutor in the coming weeks, as the Washington County District Attorneys Office recently hired a lawyer who worked in Mercures office as an assistant district attorney. District Attorney Tony Jordan acknowledged the potential conflict of interest Monday, and said his office would likely step away from the case. Bickford-Rice has pleaded not guilty to the criminal charges, and was in Washington County Family Court on Monday to answer civil severe abuse and neglect charges filed by the Washington County Attorneys Office. That case was postponed though, as lawyers awaited the outcome of the criminal case. Deputy County Attorney Dan Martindale said a guilty plea as was being discussed in criminal court would result in a motion for summary judgement in the Family Court case requesting a finding of severe neglect. Acting Washington County Family Court Judge Ted Wilson. I think were stalled in the criminal case at this moment, Mercure told Wilson. Wilson also heard petitions for custody of Kaiden Starr Rice as well as a son that Bickford-Rice bore while in jail last fall. The childs father, James Rice, has custody of the boy. Wilson is handling the case because Washington Countys judges recused themselves, as it became known that a relative of Bickford-Rices works for the county Department of Social Services as a Child Protective Services supervisor. That relative, Jeannine Bickford, is among those who have sought custody of the infant son, Landon. Kaiden has been slowly recovering from her injuries, and remained this week at Sunnyview Rehabilitation Hospital in Schenectady. She suffered a stroke after she was injured, and continues to have limitations because of the injuries. Members of the local child abuse awareness group Hands Across NY demonstrated outside the courthouse Monday before Bickford-Rices hearings. GLENS FALLS When Tori Riley talks about her goals for the Adirondack Regional Chamber of Commerce, she talks about preparing a workforce with the skills that potential employers want and points to the need for towns to plan for future businesses. How do we expect them to sell their towns to potential businesses if we do not have a multi-skilled, professional workforce? asked Riley, who is into her eighth month as the chambers president and CEO. We need to engage in the community and make people aware of what is available and what we need to do. Riley points to the work the town of Malta did in preparing for the GlobalFoundries computer-chip manufacturing plant. But, she notes, the region is still trying to catch up in providing the skilled workers the plant needs. Closer to home, she praised the collaboration that was needed to bring the Market 32 store to Fort Edward and said that future projects will require the same kind of collaboration among public and private organizations, and can also benefit from working across town lines. When you look at planning for our future, its something we need to do collectively, Riley said. There are 17 towns and eight villages (in Washington County), and each of them have people who are simultaneously investing in new facilities and new businesses. Before coming back to the chamber, Riley was vice president and economic development specialist with Saratoga Economic Development Corp. She also worked as the chambers program management director from 2004 to 2008 and was president of the Washington County Local Development Corp., a position she held for five years before joining SEDC. She is the chambers first female president and CEO. In her time at the chamber, Riley has embarked on a publicity push, focusing on communication and recruiting of members and has seen a complete turnover of her staff. Honestly, thats just kind of the way it has worked out, she said. Thats the way it has worked out. We have a really good team together. They are all about awareness, education and information, she said. We are pushing resources and programming. We are really working, advocating and lobbying for all the sectors we represent. In terms of workforce, she said she is impressed with the works of the regional BOCES and the SUNY schools. The growth of our businesses is dependent on a viable workforce, she said. The key is finding workforce skills from professional to semi-skilled. Riley said another way towns and villages can encourage business is through working with businesses and through a strong planning department. Planning and zoning take the gamble out of your investment, she said. You get what you expect to get. The reason you see things come to fruition, is because you have years of planning, she said. HUDSON FALLS The Hudson Falls Central School District was flagged on a state audit as having moderate fiscal stress, which school officials attributed to some short-term borrowing. The New York State Comptrollers Office gave the Washington County school district a fiscal score of 50 percent. Hudson Falls was one of nine districts statewide rated in that moderate class. The fiscal stress score is based upon a variety of factors including the size of the districts surplus, whether the district is running a deficit, amount of short-term debt and amount of cash on hand. Hudson Falls fiscal stress score increased from 38.3 percent in 2015 to 50 percent in 2016. Among the reasons for the downgrade of the more than 2,300-student district is it had less cash on hand at the end of the 2016 fiscal year on June 30. The district had $162,927, which is about 4.7 percent of monthly expenditures. By contrast, the district had $1,194,702 in the bank at the end of fiscal year 2015, which is 35.3 percent of its monthly expenses. School officials said the district took out a short-term $850,000 bond anticipate note that it paid off in 2016. The loan was needed to cover expenses until Hudson Falls received EXCEL aid funding in July for a building project. Kevin Polunci, director of business services for the district, said that the fiscal stress designation is a little misleading and does not reflect the districts current financial condition. When auditors looked at the districts books in late June 2016, school officials had just paid some large bills, which left its funds below the recommended year-end fund balance. When the money arrived, it put us right back where we needed to be, he said in an email. We are also operating at an A+ bond rating, meaning we are borrowing at the best possible rates and have stable financial backing. The district also has other reserve funds it can tap for a specific purpose, Polunci added. Superintendent Linda Goewey said in a statement that the designation is not a case of money mismanagement. As a district, weve continued to maintain and grow programs for our students and community while limiting the impact on our taxpayers. I applaud the school district business office for making this possible, she said in an email. Greenwich Central School District ranked in the lowest tier of susceptible to fiscal stress with a score of 36.7 percent. Superintendent Mark Fish said the district has been in that category for the last couple years. Its fiscal standing has not worsened nor improved. School officials were cited for their use of fund balance, according to Fish. The district ran deficits in 2014 and 2015, but its revenues exceeded expenses by 0.3 percent in 2016, according to the audit. The board has done a really good job of balancing programs for students and maintaining faculty and staff the best that we can, exploring new opportunities for kids as expectations change, he said. At the same time, we recognize that wed like to get back to a break even, or even better situation. The restoration of the aid cut known as the Gap Elimination Adjustment did not help Greenwich that much, Fish added. Fish said school districts have to live within a property tax environment and fight for aid in Albany. A total of 59 school districts in the state have been designated as being in some form of fiscal stress. This is a decrease from 82 last year, according to a news release from the New York State Comptrollers Office. Fiscal stress in many school districts has declined, especially for those in the most severe condition, said New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli in a news release. School officials should be commended for working to keep their districts out of financial harm, but should be careful not to amass excessive levels of fund balance in order to do so. iStock/Thinkstock(NEW YORK) -- Several members of the science and medical communities are warning that Donald Trumps executive order to largely ban travelers from seven majority Muslim nations will likely wreak havoc on universities, students and professors in the coming weeks, as well as the U.S. medical field, which relies on international doctors to fill significant gaps. The Association of American Medical Colleges released a statement saying they are "deeply concerned" about the order's effects. "The United States is facing a serious shortage of physicians," the AAMC said in the statement. "International graduates play an important role in U.S. health care, representing roughly 25 percent of the workforce." One medical resident based in Brooklyn has been unable to return home from a trip to see family in Sudan, according to officials at Interfaith Medical Center in Brooklyn, NY. It was the first time in two years he went home, according to LaRay Brown, President/CEO of the medical center. Brown said Dr. Kamal Fadlalla told him that he tried to board a plane back to the U.S., but was turned away. "We are committed to him," Brown told ABC News. "We want him back." Brown said they want to hold Fadlalla's residency spot, but that it will likely create hardship on other physicians who pick up his cases while he remains stuck in Sudan. Medical students also face disruption. In scientific fields, doctoral and post-doctoral students often spend years working on lab research before applying for competitive professorships at various institutions. The key months for interviews in those positions are January and February. Medical students who apply to residency in the fall are matched with an institution in March. Now institutions must consider whether or not to admit those applicants who no longer have valid visas to enter the U.S. The current executive order could mean students, who have spent years in the U.S., face diminished chances of acceptance. Joshua Plotkin, Professor of Biology at the University of Pennsylvania, said one post-doctoral student in his lab was stranded abroad in Europe when the executive order was implemented and could risk missing key interviews in the coming weeks. Plotkin said the student wished to remain anonymous at this point. "They are separated from their home and spouse and their job and what's really heartbreaking for me, they have several faculty job interviews," Plotkin explained. He said these interviews are the result of years of research and study. "The issue is the faculty jobs in science are so competitive and rare," Plotkin explained. "The same person trying to get in next year is very likely to have completely different outcome." Plotkin said that the student, who was born in Tehran and educated in Europe, is married to a U.S. citizen and holds a green card. While a waiver will reportedly allow green card holders to enter the U.S., Plotkin said lawyers have advised the student to wait until they have more guidance and can be assured the student would not be sent to Iran if they showed up at a U.S. border office. President Trump's executive order, which he said is aimed at protecting the nation from terrorists, suspends for 90 days immigration to the U.S. from seven countries -- Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Somalia, Iraq, Iran and Libya. It also suspends for 120 days the entry of refugees into the U.S. and indefinitely bans Syrian refugees from coming into the country. The Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates said they are "in the process of evaluating the potential impacts of this order." Many in the scientific community point out that the ban could mean losing highly educated students who may have spent years at U.S. institutions, which devoted resources to their work. Jen Golbeck, Ph.D and associate professor of Computer Science at University of Maryland, started an online database to connect people stranded abroad with others willing to help. She said knows of one Florida student from Iran, who was stranded in England after his student visa was no longer valid in the U.S. "The impact it's going to have on academics in the U.S. is chilling," Golbeck said. "It's been a scientific leader for decades not because we're smarter, but because we draw best minds to universities." She and others have been trying to find another lab potentially willing to help the student, who has decided to remain anonymous, continue his research in the event he can no longer come back to the U.S. Hazhir Rahmandad, an associate professor of System Dynamics at M.I.T., said the ban could affect the scientific communities in profound ways in years to come. "A lot of people going for Ph.D. programs and graduate admission," Rahmandad said, "are very likely not be able to come to U.S., even if we admitted them." "Going forward we would not hear from many of these applicants," he said. Rahmandad said he has one student affected by the ban, who is unable to leave and whose family will likely be unable to visit if the ban remains in place. "We are losing a lot of talent and potential collaborators, who cannot work with us because they cannot join our team or come to conferences here, and we can't retain talent," he added. Copyright 2017, ABC Radio. All rights reserved. Welcome Guest! You Are Here: The executive measure established Trump's chief strategist Steve Bannon as a regular attendee, whereas the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Director of National Intelligence will be allowed to participate only "where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed." "This is unusual,"John Bellinger, an adjunct senior fellow in International and National Security Law at the Council on Foreign Relations and former l, wrote on Saturday. "In the Bush administration, Karl Rove would not attend NSC meetings," Bellinger said. "According to former Chief of Staff Josh Bolten With his permanent seat at the NSC meetings, Bannon has been elevated above the director of the CIA, Mike Pompeo, who was not offered an open invitation. CNN national security correspondent Jim Sciutto noted on Sunday that the move was "certainly unprecedented." "You're putting in someone who is not Senate confirmed and taking out who need to be Senate confirmed," Sciutto told CNN's Jake Tapper. "It raises questions about whose voices will be most prominent about key national-security decisions in the country." Former Secretary of Defense Bob Gates told ABC on Sunday morning that sidelining the DNI and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was "a big mistake." "Adding people to the NSC never really bothers me," Gates said, referring to Bannon's new role on the committee. "My biggest concern is that, under law, there are only two statutory advisers to the National Security Council the DNI, and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff." "Pushing them out," Gates said, is "a big mistake. They both bring perspective, judgment, and experience to bear that every president whether they like it or not finds useful." A shadow National Security Council Jared Kushner is Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser. Priebus is Trump's chief of staff. "Bannon has been working on the long-term strategic vision that will shape the Trump administrations overall foreign policy approach," Rogin reported, citing transition officials. He "is committed to working on the buildup of the military and is also interested in connecting the Trump apparatus to leaders of populist movements around the world, especially in Europe." Prior to joining the Trump campaign, Bannon was the CEO of the far-right website Breitbart News a website known for its antiestablishment, white-nationalist positions on issues such as immigration and trade. A week into his presidency, Trump has already prioritized a number of agenda items that reflect Bannon's own nationalist views, including a border wall and a crackdown on immigration and refugee admissions. He also echoed Bannon's claim that "the media is the opposition party." Breitbart who was paid by Trump's campaign They will be "fighting for influence in a team of strong personalities who are busily carving up issues, making plans and nurturing already close relationships" with Trump, Rogin wrote, referring to Bannon, Kushner, and Priebus. The secretary of energy and director of the Office of Management and Budget were also removed from the committee's list of "regular members," and the deputy secretary of state will no longer be invited to every committee meeting. The chair of the Council of Economic Advisers will not be invited even "when issues to be discussed pertain to their responsibilities and expertise." Unilateral moves Trump already seems to be marginalizing the influence of career officials with extensive federal experience at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the State Department, the Department of Defense (DoD) and the Justice Department. On Saturday, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani told Fox that he helped draft Trump's "extreme vetting" executive order after Trump called him and asked how to do a "Muslim ban" "legally." Officials told CNN that the order was a unilateral move. After seeing the order, the DHS interpreted it to mean that green card holders from the banned countries who have already been subjected to intense vetting would be allowed to reenter the US from trips abroad. But that interpretation was overruled by the White House, which later said that green card holders would be allowed in only on a "case-by-case" basis. As a result, the order was imprecise and open to interpretation and legal challenges. "The president has created a target-rich environment for litigation" with the order," Wittes wrote. Lawyers and civil-rights organizations were already challenging the constitutionality of the ban hours after it was signed, arguing that the ban violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment by "explicitly disapproving of one religion and implicitly preferring others." Lawyers representing two Iraqi refugees who were detained at John F. Kennedy airport in New York filed legal challenges to the order, and a federal judge in Brooklyn issued an emergency ruling Saturday evening to stay the continued deportation of travelers. Most of the media's attention was focused on protests in America's largest cities, including New York City, Boston, San Francisco, and Washington, DC all of which are liberal hubs. But at the same time, protests were sprouting up in smaller cities, including several in states and counties that swung Republican in the 2016 election. Take a look at some of the protests in Republican-leaning states and counties: About 1,800 people rallied in Turner Park in Omaha, Nebraska, on Sunday. In Missoula, Montana, several hundred protesters took part in the Missoula Peace March on Sunday. Hundreds more descended on Boise Airport in Boise, Idaho, on Sunday. People at Salt Lake City International Airport in Utah spontaneously started singing "America the Beautiful" during their protest on Saturday. A crowd gathered in Tulsa, Oklahoma, for the "No Walls in Tulsa" rally and march on Friday. A few dozen protesters demonstrated at Louisville International Airport in Louisville, Kentucky, on Sunday. In Huntsville, Alabama, a group of clergy and community activists held a "Prayer for Tolerance" press conference Monday. Protesters in Knoxville, Tennessee, numbered in the dozens on Sunday. Thanks for signing up for our daily insight on the African economy. We bring you daily editor picks from the best Business Insider news content so you can stay updated on the latest topics and conversations on the African market, leaders, careers and lifestyle. Also join us across all of our other channels - we love to be connected! On Monday (January 30, 2017) Dr Bawumia paid an unannounced visit to the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority (GPHA). This is the second time Dr Bawumia is paying such visit to a public institution. Dr Mahamudu Bawumia on Wednesday (January 18, 2017) paid a surprise visit to the Registrar-Generals Department to familiarise himself with the challenges facing the State outfit. During his visit, he met with the Registrar General, the staff of the Department and ordinary Ghanaians who had gone to register their businesses. READ ALSO: Businesses to be registered in 24 hours The people who had come to register their businesses expressed their displeasure at the bureaucratic processes in registering their establishments. The German automaker moved back into the top spot despite being hit by a massive emissions cheating scandal that rocked its reputation. The carmaker, once a paragon of German industry, was plunged into its deepest-ever crisis after it emerged in September 2015 that it installed emissions-cheating software in millions of diesel engines worldwide. However, the crisis seemed to have little effect on the firm's standing with drivers as it announced this month that annual sales rose 3.8 percent in 2016. The results were boosted by strong performance in China which helped push total sales to 10.3 million, after slipping to 9.93 in 2015. VW group also includes the brands Audi, Porsche and Skoda. On Monday Toyota said it sold 10.175 million vehicles worldwide last year, a 0.2 percent increase. The annual figures come as the industry faces an uncertain outlook year with President Trump threatening punitive tariffs on imports into the United States in a bid to force them to manufacture and hire there. Trump targeted Toyota in one his fiery tweets, criticising its ongoing project to build a new factory in Mexico and threatening it with painful tariffs. He has also pledged to review several trade deals that he says are detrimental to American workers. Japan's Kyodo News agency reported Monday that Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda will meet Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday, ahead of the latter's scheduled summit next week with Trump. Toyota said it could not comment on the report, while Japan's chief government spokesman Yoshihide Suga would not confirm it. Toyota shares ended flat Monday. "Toyota has problems in China, whereas VW is very strong in China and is using it as en engine of growth," said Hans Greimel, Asia editor for Automotive News. "That's the difference that matters," he told AFP. "They might be neck-and-neck right now but maybe long term you have to be a big player in China, and Toyota is still playing some catch-up there." "In the US, another key market, Toyota has a big advantage over VW but it is running out of steam because it is not able to tap the boom there for SUVs as much as its rivals." Volkswagen admitted in September 2015 to installing so-called "defeat devices" in 11 million vehicles worldwide, after their existence was revealed by the US Environmental Protection Agency. The software caused engines to reduce emissions of harmful nitrogen oxide when they were undergoing regulators' tests The confirmation ended months of speculation that the two operators were exploring a deal to help fend off Reliance Jio whose recent arrival shook up India's ultra-competitive mobile network market. It also sent Idea shares soaring by a whopping 26 percent on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE). "Vodafone confirms that it is in discussions with the Aditya Birla Group about an all share merger of Vodafone India (excluding Vodafone's 42% stake in Indus Towers) and Idea," Vodafone said in a statement. "Any merger would be effected through the issue of new shares in Idea to Vodafone and would result in Vodafone de-consolidating Vodafone India. "There is no certainty that any transaction will be agreed, nor as to the terms or timing of any transaction," the statement added. A merger between Vodafone India and the Mumbai-based Idea Cellular would turn India's multi-billion dollar telecommunications market on its head, according to global brokerage firm CLSA. The group of analysts has estimated that the pair would command a combined revenue market share of 43 percent, ahead of rival Bharti Airtel, which would hold 33 percent. Reliance Jio, which began operations with great fanfare last year and is owned by India's richest man Mukesh Ambani would have 13 percent, according to CLSA's research. The 4G Jio network launched in September with an audacious free service for the rest of 2016, followed by vastly cheaper data plans and free voice calls for life. It forced rivals to dramatically slash their tariffs and left them scrambling to match the deep pockets of Jio, which is backed by India's hugely wealthy energy-to-chemicals conglomerate Reliance Industries. In afternoon trade Idea stocks were up 26.86 percent, or 20.90 points at 98.70 rupees on the BSE's Sensex index following the announcement. The 32-year old was on campaign platforms to solicit votes for National Democratic Congress flagbearer, President John Dramani Mahama prior to the December 7 election. However, John Mahama lost the elections to the New Patriotic Partys Nana Akufo-Addo. Even though he was not happy about the outcome, the 2010 best actor in a leading role in the movie Maidens explained: It's elections, somebody wins, somebody loses, and we just have to bury the hatchet and move on. Ghana is for us, lets all see how best we can develop the countryIm sad that we (NDC) lost, but Ive been okay, he said. READ ALSO:Diamond Jubilee: Ghana @60 celebration is a waste- Afia SchwarzeneggerHe, however, revealed that he has now taking up farming in addition to his numerous business set ups. Im doing more of farming; Im doing more of livestock rearing and vegetable farming. Thats what Ive been up to. Farming is always something Ive always had love for, its just that farming needs a lot of time and these days I have some time on my hands, so thats what Im doing now. Its something Im going to take up very seriously, he revealed. According to Wanluv, he doesnt support the idea of Socrate Sarfo holding a ministerial position because he has not impacted the country positively. He produces movies full of obscene scenes that are shown on television, which in the end influence our children negatively," Wanluv said. Speaking to Accra FM, Wanluv da Kubolor said: "He doesnt make good impression as far I am concerned, therefore, I cannot support him to be the [Deputy] Minister of Creative Arts. "I know a lot of people who can perform that role better than he would. People like Gyedu-Blay Ambolley and Panji Anoff are better alternatives, he stressed his point. President Akufo-Addo nominated Catherine Ablema Afeku as the minister for Tourism and Creative Arts. However, the race for who becomes her deputy has become a matter of public debate. The likes of Socrate Sarfo and Kojo Antwi have all been mentioned as possible names to be considered for the position. Socrate Sarfo declared support and campaigned for the New Patriotic Party and Mr. Akufo-Addo in the 2012 and 2016 polls and the portfolio is seen by many as a reward for his efforts towards the partys success at winning back power. But the Konkonsa hit maker said was corrupting the morals of impressionable Ghanaian children, making him unsuitable for the position. The applicants, who alleged breach of their rights, are Mr Osisomo Ake, Daboy Clinton, Ebikimi Mathew and Bubaiyenumubofa James. The applicants were said to have been arrested by the Nigerian Army in Okaki Community in Rivers sometimes in January 2016. According to the applicants lawyer, Mr Gabriel Egbule, they were arrested on allegation of terrorism and vandalism of oil pipeline in the state. Egbule said that the applicants were flown to Abuja from the state in August 2016, that since their arrest; they had been in the custody of the army. According to the lawyer, the army is now being charged to court for breach and enforcement of fundamental human right because it failed to charge the applicants since they were arrested." At the resumed sitting on Monday, one of the applicants lawyers, Mr Osaze Ebie, informed the court that the defendant had served it a notice of preliminary objection which it had also replied with a counter objection. Mr Bala Adukwu, the defendant counsel prayed the court for more time to enable the defendant study and reply to the counter affidavit it received from the applicants. Adukwu said that new issues were raised by the applicants and that the defendant needed more time to react to the issues. READ ALSO: Gynecologist warns against fake dildos on Ghanaian market According to reports, 26 motorbikes and three tricycles were seized after an unannounced operation by the Police. Other areas around the Half-Assin District in the Western Region were also affected. READ ALSO: Carpenter butchered in Peki Motorists were also arrested for various traffic offenses including overloading and riding without license. ASP Charles Mensah who is the District Crime Officer said motorists who had been arrested will be arraigned before court for the law to deal with them, while warning those who managed to escape to report themselves to the Police or forget about getting their vehicles back. READ ALSO: Wife Wilson, 27, and Ann Mutura, 24, have become viral sensations for their modesty, case in point, their $1 wedding which they attended in what we would refer to as 'house clothes'. Instead of worrying over an expensive wedding, the pair found a way around their money problem and settled for far less than expected. BBC reports that Wilson and Ann initially postponed their wedding twice in 2016 over their inability to raise the $300 (240) fee. Finally deciding to get married with the lowest budget available, Wilson spent only $1 on two budget wedding rings which still caused a cheer among the witnesses as the pair exchanged their vows. Thankfully, other expenses such as the license fee, were settled by their church. The couple has been hailed online for their brave move, with social media users noting just how expensive weddings have become in recent times. After dating for three years, Wilson and Ann appealed to friends to help them raise some cash for their wedding, all to no avail. Speaking with BBC, Wilson says that his older brother had advised him to live with Ann without the hassles of a wedding. However, the fruit seller and his fiancee wanted much more and would not settle for anything less than "a permanent and blessed union". "As a [Christian] couple, we wanted to marry and live with dignity in order to avoid other temptations," said Ann. In the same vein, the pair settled for a very, very...... very low-key wedding ceremony which took place in Nairobi, without a wedding cake, flowers or decorations. Dressed in jeans, T-shirts and trainers, their only assets, two shiny steel circles that served as wedding rings, Wilson and Ann had their dream come true. Pastor Jasper Ojwach from the Community Christian worship center in Nairobi told the BBC that Wilson left the congregation shocked when he ran out of the church to buy the wedding rings. Wilson received hearty cheers when he pulled out the rings from his pocket after the exchange of vows. The couple has also expressed their surprise over the positive reaction their rather frugal wedding has garnered online. "I believe money should not stop young people like us from getting married. If people love each other and want to marry they should," Ann said. The Mutura's were celebrated so much so that they have received gifts from companies and individuals who were moved by their story. Following the bribery scandal that rocked parliament recently, legislators from the Minority have given different accounts of alleged bribery allegations. The Bawku Central member of Parliament, Mahama Ayariga, on Friday, January 27 accused Mr. Agyarko, then a Minister nominee, of attempting to bribe the ten minority members on parliaments Appointments Committee with GHc3000 each, in a bid to lure them to approve him as the Energy Minister. The allegation came hours after the Minority had refused to support the approval of Mr. Agyarko and Yaw Osafo Maafo. Concerns were raised over some statements the two nominees made before the committee during their vetting. Mr. Ayariga alleged that the money was given to the Minority Chief Whip, Mubarak Mohammed Muntaka by the Chairman of the Appointments Committee, Osei-Owusu for onward disbursement; a claim, both the Chairman and Muntaka subsequently rubbished. Mr. Pelpuo responding to suggestions that the Minority front seems to be divided on ClassFM, he said It is too early to say that [there are divisions]. Let us wait and see what happens. Residents in the community said the situation has led to many deaths hence there is no health facility nearby. According to report by Starr FM, the village has a population of 1000 and the only means of transport to the community is motor bikes commonly known as 'Okada'. Read also: Government begins National ID project Most 'Okada' riders are reluctant to ply the deplorable road. The Assembly Member for the area Isaac Amanor said, the situation is very troubling and something urgent. He said government must fix the road network and provide a CHP compound in the community to provide basic health services to the community. Read more: Wrongly jailed teacher demands GHC10m compensation The short ceremony was held at Ghanas embassy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on Saturday. Ms Shirley Ayorkor Botchway although part of the 13 was not sworn in because she was in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, where she was representing Ghana at a meeting of Foreign Affairs Ministers in preparation for the AU summit from January 29 to 31, 2017. A statement from the Presidency said Nana Akufo-Addo who arrived in the Ethiopian capital on Saturday [January 28] will prior to the commencement of the Ordinary Session of the Assembly on Monday, attend a retreat for the Heads of States on Sunday, January 29, 2017 immediately after a breakfast meeting with the new Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres. Donald Trump provoked a fierce backlash at the weekend after signing an executive order banning people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from travelling to America. But it has sparked protests across the US, and drawn condemnation from the wider world. In Ghana, the move has drawn opposition, especially from Muslims, who deem it to be an assault on their religion. The outrage from protesters shared different view. Many have also expressed their disappointment with what has been called a Muslim ban. Appearing before the Appointments Committee of parliament on Monday, Ms Djaba said that the Bill was not passed last year because time elapsed. READ ALSO: She, however, indicated that the Bill will now have to be taken back to cabinet because there is a new parliament. When asked if she had a timeline on when this will be achieved, she said that It will be difficult to give timelines on the Affirmative Action Bill until I am approved. The Bill seeks to identify and redress areas of social, cultural, economic and educational imbalance in Ghana, especially as they relate to discrimination against women, and to promote the full and active participation of women in public life by providing for a more equitable system of representation in electoral politics and governance. It aims to ensure the progressive achievement of gender equality in political, social, economic, cultural and educational life within five years, and to address the gender imbalance in the public and private sector. Sylvester Mensah "our choice for president 2020". Our hope for years to come." It is unclear whether Sylvester Mensah has a hand in the manufacturing of the posters. But a statement issued and signed by the former CEO of NHIS asked members of the NDC to ignore the posters. He said, "My attention has been drawn to a poster in circulation announcing my interest in contesting the next Presidential Primaries of the National Democrat Congress (NDC). I wish to place on record that I have neither circulated nor caused to be circulated any such poster announcing my intentions." "I am persuaded that our attention as NDC for the moment should be focused on understanding why we lost the 2016 general elections, rebuilding our party, strengthening the grassroots and restoring hope and confidence in our membership" However, posters of former Vice President Paa Kwesi Amissah-Arthur as a presidential aspirant of the NDC have emerged. Read more: NDC demands Nana Addo must retract inaugural speech and personally apologize Former Minister of Finance and Economic planning Dr. Kwabena Duffuor has said he will not contest the presidency in 2020 on the ticket of the National Democratic Congress (NDC). According to him, "For the avoidance of any doubt, I wish to put on record that I have no intention, whatsoever, to contest for any elective public office." Mahama Ayariga had earlier indicated on Accra-based Radio Gold that Mr Agyarko, then Energy Minister-designate, had attempted to bribe the members of the Appointments Committee of parliament with GHc3000 each, in a bid to lure them to approve him as the Energy Minister. READ ALSO: Mahama Ayariga dares critics to go to court The NDC Member of Parliament said they (the minority) received the money thinking it was sitting allowance for being part of the Appointments Committee only to be told it was coming from the minister designate. He said they rejected the money and asked that the money be returned to him. The Chairman of the Appointments Committee, Mr Osei Owusu, the minority chief whip in parliament, Mubarak Muntaka, and the Energy Minister have denied the claims. Muntaka, a member of the minority in parliament and a Member of Parliament for Asawase in the Ashanti region, strongly denied receiving money from Osei-Owusu and that he was at a loss as to why Ayariga would make up such an accusation. But speaking on Accra-based Citi FM, Mr Suhuyini, who has been solidly behind Mr Ayariga on the claim said Alhaji Muntaka is only trying to massage the truth in the bribery scandal. What I want to put on record is that this is about who is lying and who is telling the truth. This is about responsibility and perhaps the position of our chief whip. Remember the position of the chief whip in parliament is to ensure that members of parliament are catered for. Their welfare matters are his responsibility. And as a leader, he is going to have more information, you tend to know better. And perhaps you tend to understand the repercussions that other members may not have the opportunity to. So in circumstances like this the leader may decide to take an unpopular position, but it does not make him a bad leader. And that has to be established moving forward. And to a large extent I understand where Alhaji Muntaka is coming from. I think he is doing his job as expected of him...he is managing the information. He was managing the information, and by way of managing the information, he did not categorically say Ayariga was lying, Suhuyini indicated. Meanwhile, Mahama Ayariga, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa and Alhassan Suhuyini have petitioned the Speaker of Parliament Mike Oquaye to probe the matter. In a joint petition to the Speaker, the three MPs said: We jointly request you to carry out an internal enquiry into the veracity of the claims made by us in the allegation of attempted bribery of the Minority Members of the Appointments Committee of Parliament by a ministerial nominee. According to him, "For the avoidance of any doubt, I wish to put on record that I have no intention, whatsoever, to contest for any elective public office." Dr Duffuor in a statement said, "I have served my country in various capacities and consider myself a statesman who is retired from active politics". Meanwhile, the family of former President John Mahama has indicated that they will impress upon him not to contest the Presidency in 2020. A younger brother of ex-president Mahama who spoke to the media said they are advising their kinsman to take a rest from active politics. Ibrahim Mahama said "John has given his all in politics to the NDC and Ghana and we think it is just fair that we allow him to rest. We were very supportive and instrumental in convincing him to partner Prof. Mills, and when the time came for him to contest for President, we supported and advised him to go for itnow we have advised him not to make a comeback in 2020." Read more: NDC demands Nana Addo must retract inaugural speech and personally apologize Some members of the opposition National Democratic Congress have said that their best candidate for the 2020 presidential election will be ex-president Mahama. However, posters of former Vice President Paa Kwesi Amissah-Arthur as a presidential aspirant for election 2020 on the ticket of the NDC have emerged. The posters, which show a smiling Amissah-Arthur wearing a black suit, matched with sea blue shirt and a tie, have since gone viral on various social media platforms, especially Facebook. Below is the full statement by Kwabena Duffuor: RE; KWABENA DUFFUOR TO RUN FOR PRESIDENT IN 2020 My attention has been drawn to various publications on some media outlets and social media suggesting that I intend to contest for President in 2020. For the avoidance of any doubt, I wish to put on record that I have no intention, whatsoever, to contest for any elective public office. I have served my country in various capacities and consider myself a statesman who is retired from active politics. God bless Ghana. SGD He told the Appointments Committee that, per his job description, he would be policing his colleagues. He added that, the ministers may use their monitoring and evaluation departments to generate information he needs... "My job is partially to police my colleagues". He said, he would ensure government machinery works in efficient, effective and timely. Akoto Osei added that the Chief of Staff handles the presidency but he is going to handle the results-churning machinery of government. He is to ensure that government machinery works. "Each sector ministry is going to come up with a set of performance indicators in their sectors that cabinet will have to approve. If the Finance Minister said that we were going to raise 17.5 per cent of GDP as revenue for the year 2017, that is the indicator and we will agree that every quarter he will come and report on how far he is reaching that goal. According to her, she criticized former president Mahama but did not insult him. Prior to the 2016 general election, Otiko Afisa Djaba is reported to have made some unsavory comments about former President Mahama. She said "John Mahama and the NDC are very wicked, incompetent and desperate and do not deserve another four years in office. The eight years of economic mismanagement is enough and I encourage Ghanaians to say no to the NDC at the December 7 polls and bring in Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo." Again, speaking to electorates at Asawase in the Ashanti region, she admonished the electorates to vote against President Mahama because his time was up. According to her, the president does not care about the welfare of Ghanaians. "President Mahamas time is up President Mahama is extremely wicked and so he must step down. We need change, we need someone is is passionate about this country. You have to vote massively for Nana Akufo Addo. We need change this year. Your time is up President Mahama. Speaking at the vetting committee, she said, "I owe former President John Mahama no apology... The President is my brother and I spoke from my conviction". "My comment about he being an embarrassment was in relation to SADA, it was in relation to SADA that I said he had embarrassed Northerners and the Northern chiefs themselves had come to say same," she said. According to him, several scholars have researched the creation of regions, with some recommending as many as 20 regions instead of the current ten. I feel Im lucky to be heading this ministry because it looks like there is a meeting of minds on this area. The NDC mentioned it in their manifesto and the NPP and the President also believe there is the need to create more regions, so we all agree with this, he said. He said he will ensure that chiefs and all stakeholders are involved in the exercise in order to build consensus on the need for new regions. READ ALSO: Group kicks against splitting of Volta Region President Akufo-Addo, during the 2016 electioneering, promised to create four new regions. The four regions that we have chosen are those that we want to reshape and create new regions out of them. Were talking about the Western North region which I committed myself to and the manifesto also committed itself to, the creation of the Ahafo region out of the Brong-Ahafo, another express commitment on my part and backed by the manifesto, the northern region. "They were many times higher than FAKE NEWS @CNN," he wrote. CNN's public relations team responded to Trump's tweet, citing cumulative numbers from Nielsen Media Research. Cumulative numbers measure audience reach, while ratings the statistic Trump referred to measure the average number of people watching a given program. "According to Nielsen cumulative numbers, 34 million people watched CNN's inauguration day coverage on television. 34 million watched Fox News," the CNN communications account said in a tweet, which was shared thousands of times and became the basis of several news stories. On Wednesday, CNN host Chris Cuomo doubled down on the claim: The cumulative number is technically correct. (CNN, however, rounded it. The precise numbers show Fox News with 34.4 million viewers and CNN with 34.2 million.) But it's a statistic that's rarely, if ever, used in the cable news industry, according to experts. "It's a factual statistic, but I literally never used cumulative ratings once when I edited TVNewser,"Brian Flood, a media reporter at TheWrap, told Business Insider in an email. "Not once." Instead, it's most common for networks to provide ratings for a specific hour or program to boast about their audiences. That's the spot where Fox News handily outpaced CNN throughout Inauguration Day. Take a look at some of the numbers from Nielsen: Noon to 12:30 p.m. (oath of office and inaugural address): CNN: 3.375 million total viewers Fox News: 11.768 million total viewers 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. CNN: 3.047 million total viewersFox News: 10.483 million total viewers 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. CNN: 2.326 million total viewersFox News: 7.901 million total viewers Primetime (8 p.m. to 11 p.m.) CNN: 4.528 million total viewersFox News: 6.958 million total viewers Those numbers make it clear that Fox News easily outpaced CNN in inauguration ratings, almost tripling CNN's numbers at some points in the day. Before it engaged in a fight with Trump, CNN conceded in a press release that it came in second to Fox News. "CNN ranked a strong #2 in cable news during the Inauguration of President Donald Trump yesterday, January 20th," the release said. Erik Wemple, a media critic for The Washington Post, said that he had "seen some of the silliness" over the ratings and that cable news networks often engage in "puerile spats" over such things. But he said that this time, CNN perhaps escalated it further than normal. "When there's a fact-check of the president, it moves away from the realm of standard cable-news bickering," he told Business Insider in an email. ABC's David Muir asked Trump in the interview if he was "all concerned" that his executive action, which he went on to issue two days later, would "cause more anger among Muslims around the world?" "Anger? There's plenty of right now. How can you have more?" Trump said. Muir asked whether Trump thought it could "exacerbate the problem." "David, David I mean, I know you're a sophisticated guy," Trump said. "The world is a mess. The world is as angry as it gets. What, you think this is going to cause a little more anger? The world is an angry place." But as the order was put into practice, the detention of two Iraqi refugees who had been granted asylum in the US on Saturday sparked a wave of protests around the country and world. Lawyers representing the two Iraqi refugees swiftly filed legal challenges to Trump's executive order, and a federal judge in Brooklyn issued an emergency ruling Saturday evening to prevent the continued deportation of travelers. The ruling, a temporary emergency stay, now allows those who landed in the US and hold a valid visa to remain. Federal judges in Virginia, Massachusetts, and Washington also made emergency rulings on various aspects of the executive order. This is in line with 2016 NIPPON Foundation global appeal, #thinkleprosynow campaign. The Campaign is a social responsibility initiative geared at creating conducive environment for people affected by leprosy, educating all stakeholders to play an important role, and advocating non-stigmatization of the leprosy patients. With this they have taken action with like-minded organizations in local communities to raise our voices against stigma and discrimination faced by people living or who have been affected by leprosy across all sectors. The #THINKLEPROSYNOW campaign is not just to give the patients food and clothing materials, but to bring the message of non-stigmatization to the footstep of everybody. The campaign hopes to educate the following facts about leprosy that : Leprosy is caused by a germ; It is not hereditary; It is curable; the earliest sign of leprosy is a skin patch with loss of feeling; it is transmitted from one person to another by a patient who is not on treatment; patients who are on treatment or have completed treatment are no longer a danger to the public; treatment is available in every LGA and is free of charge; show love and care for people affected by leprosy just as you care for all others who are ill; stop the stigma and discrimination against persons affected by leprosy and finally , nobody should be called a leper. Recently at the JCIs visit to Ogbomoso in Oyo State, the Medical Social Worker, Bowen University, Mr Adeniyi Olaleye, explained that leprosy is a major problem, and if people are not immune from the bacteria, they will be affected. The JCIN Amb Olatunji Oyeyemi pointed out that the campaign is not just to give the patients food and clothing materials, but to bring the message of non-stigmatization to the footstep of everybody. One of the patients pleaded with the campaign organizers to help them alleviate hunger, and give their children much needed support. Another patient cried out that the shame of returning home as a result of the leprosy sickness, has kept them away for so long, and thus needed help to get out of it. Also at the JCIs campaign in Lagos, Oyeyemi stated further that Leprosy is curable, and so people should not discriminate against them. In the same vein the JCI Secretary General, Arrey Obenson, advocates The leprosy patients and their families should not be stigmatized, but given opportunity to contribute to the development of the society. Events will take place across the country in Benin City, Benin State, Ikeja, Lagos State, Keffi Nassarawa State, Iberekodo, Ogun State, Port Harcourt, Rivers State, and Owerri, Imo State. This is the maiden edition and it promises to be filled with relevant real estate industry information. In 2016, the sector was really affected by the economic downturn and the implications continue to play out in 2017. This session would bring together great minds as we discuss the issues and what developers and investors can do differently. The purpose of having this conference early in the year is to create a platform for strategic planning and an avenue to forge partnerships that will create value. It will be an avenue for real estate experts, investors and government representatives to set the tone for commercial activities for the real estate industry for the year. Real Estate Outlook 2017 is taking place at Landmark Towers, Victoria Island, Lagos on Thursday, February 2, 2017. This is an invitation-only event. The event starts at 9am with an exhibition and the conference commences at 10am. The first session will cover topics like real estate, economic and investment outlook and rethinking the value proposition in real estate. The second session will cover topics like creating disruptive real estate business models and secrets of selling in a recession. Both sessions will also have panel discussions. Vanguard News disclosed that the driver's inflammatory comment about the demise of Buhari made the northerner extremely furious. The victim said, The body of the President should be thrown into River-Niger for fish and other wild animals to do justice on him. He is very wicked. Report says that the jubilant taxi driver who was rendered temporarily unconscious following the pummeling was finally resuscitated at the Temple Clinic Junction, Asaba. PM Express reports that the suspect, Taofeek Wasiu whose father is an Islamic cleric, was arrested while robbing at a Mosque located at Governors Road in Ikotun area of the state where he went and pretended to be praying with other worshipers. While everyone was busy with the prayers, Wasiu was said to have attempted to steal a motorcycle parked by a worshiper, Yakubu Shaibu, when luck ran out on him. The Ogun State-born suspect, it was learned, had sneaked out of the Mosque, unlocked the motorcycle and was driving away when someone who knew the owner raised an alarm and he was pursued by other motorcycle operators and was eventually apprehended at Idimu and handed over to the police at Idimu Division. During interrogation, the police found out that Wasiu was released from prison custody just last month after spending 18 months for stealing two motorcycles in a similar manner. He admitted that he had been stealing motorcycles and selling them at getaway prices because stealing in Mosques. I have been stealing motorcycles from Mosques in the past. It is safer to steal at Mosques and easy to escape because the worshippers would be deep in their worship and very few people will notice you. My father is an Imam and has his Mosque at 10, Ifelodun Street in Ejigbo. I have stolen from our Mosque several times. I was sentenced to prison where I spent 18 months and while in prison, I promised myself never to steal again but I dont know what pushed me into it. The petitioner told the court that there was no more love between them. He said that the respondent started showing disrespect to him in 2014, but they were reconciled through court intervention. My wife is so rude; she refused to change her attitude, even when I complained." She has no respect for me; Mujidat does things on her own will." She also attends parties without informing me. I have also caught her in acts of infidelity." Mujidat does not care for me and our children. I can no longer cope with this marriage, please terminate our relationship," he told the court. In her response, the respondent denied the allegations against her. She appealed to the court to reconcile her and her estranged husband. The President of the court, Mrs Omolara Abiola, cautioned the couple to restrain from further misunderstanding, until the next adjourned date. Abiola, however, warned the respondent to desist from going out without the approval of her husband. She also urged the respondent to show respect to the petitioner. His personal assistant, Alhaji Mutairu Salawudeen Bello, who confirmed the death of the serial polygamist who was at one time at loggerheads with some Muslim clerics over his many wives, said he actually predicted his death and knew when he was about to go and as such, the family was fully prepared. Alhaji Bello wrote on his social media account on the demise of the preacher who was hated by many due to his insistence that there was nothing wrong in marrying many women: With gratitude to Allah (SWT), we announce the death of Alhaji Mohammed Abubakar Bello this afternoon. He was aged 93 years. He died after a brief illness. Baba had told us that his time was up. He told me personally during his last moment that he has completed his divine assignment and was ready to meet his creator. He told us to remain dedicated to the cause of Islam and urged us all not to deviate from all his teachings on righteousness, piety and total submission to the will of Allah. He warned us to shun adultery, but that we should marry our women because it is Hallal before Allah. Punch reports that Hamzat, a father of three and a graduate of Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (LAUTECH), was employed as a contract security staff at the company and rose to the position of an operator in the brick making company before he was promoted with a new salary of N215, 000, but the very next day, he was nabbed for stealing. It was gathered that the management of the company decided to accelerate his promotion when it was discovered that he was a graduate with his salary tripled and to thank the company for the offer, he connived with another staff, Adebayo Kazeem, to steal the bags of cement. During interrogation, Hamzat confessed to the crime, saying he was the one that masterminded the theft. I masterminded the crime. I only co-opted Adebayo into the plan. Initially, Adebayo discouraged me; he said it was not possible to steal cement at the company. After much pressure, he told me to carry the gateman along in order to be successful, which I eventually yielded to. I had an accommodation problem. I was desperately looking for funds to house my family. That was what pushed me into the crime. Emmanuel who resides in Abuja was sentenced after he pleaded guilty to the charge of vandalism. The judge sentenced the defendant after he pleaded for mercy and promised not to commit crime again. Since the defendant is a first time offender who seem remorseful and promised to change his ways, I hereby sentence you Emmanuel to two years imprisonment. The sentence is with effect from Dec. 24, 2016, when he was arrested,he said. Dimgba also ordered that the items recovered from him be forfeited to the Federal Government but be kept with the NSCDC to implement the order of the court. The prosecutor, Joanne Orjichukwu, told the court that the defendant was first arraigned on Jan. 15 but was adjourned for review of facts and evidence of witnesses. She said the evidence of a witness, Thomas Ogbebor, who is a Deputy Superintendent of Corps (DSC) of Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corp was taken. In his evidence, Thomas Ogbebor, said on Dec. 24, 2016 Akinwale James, a staff of Abuja Electrical Distribution Company (AEDC) and a NSCDC officer attached to their office in Utako brought the accused. Ogbebor said the accused was arrested at about 1:20 am of the same date, while cutting cables from a transformer, located at Tropicana Hotel in Utako District, Abuja. He said during interrogation, the accused confessed to the crime, and thereafter the scene of crime was visited where he cut the cables and other components of the transformer. The witness further said that when the scene was visited, it was discovered that the transformer was not working due to the damage caused by the defendant. He added that items recovered from the defendant are cable, 1m of 16mm conductor and 2 transformer bars. The prosecution told the court that she will like to tender the defendant statement and items recovered to be admitted in evidence. She also urged the court to convict the defendant based on his plea of guilt. The defendant, a 42-year-old resident of Zone E, Apo Resettlement, Abuja, was reported at the Wuse Zone 3 Police Station on Dec. 22, 2016. The Prosecutor, Mr Adeniyi Oyeyemi told the court that the matter was reported to the police by one Mr Hassan Abubakar of the Supreme Court. According to the prosecutor, the defendant wrote a false petition against the complainant to the Inspector General of Police alleging that the complainant is a 419 man, that he had been playing people around. Oyeyemi told the court that the defendant went ahead to write another petition to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) just to ensure that he tarnished the image of the complainant. According to Oyeyemi, an investigation by the police to find out if the complainant was really a 419 man as alleged by the defendant, shows that it is not true. The prosecutor said that the crime of the defendant contravenes the provision of Section 392 of the Penal Code. The defendant however denied the allegation and pleaded not guilty to the crime. Meanwhile, Magistrate Abdulmumini Omeiza granted the defendant bail in the sum of N250, 000 with one surety who must be a Federal Civil Servant not below GL 06. The magistrate said that the surety must live within the court jurisdiction and must deposit to the court one of his recent passports. Omeiza said that the surety must also show evidence of payment of utility bill to the court. According to Zambezi Reporters, the man who was decked in a suit and tie, allegedly walked into a supermarket in one of the cities of that country and while the security men were not looking, he managed to stuff different varieties of the items inside his bag and was about walking out of the shop when he was accosted. NAN reports that the councils include Birniwa, Kafinhausa and Kirikasamma. The children were administered Oral Polio Vaccines (OPV) and antigens against other child killer diseases in the ongoing January round of Immunisation Plus Days (IPDs) exercise. Malam Umar Bello, the Manager, National Programme on Immunisation (NPI) in charge of Birniwa, said that 42,000 children were immunised against the disease in the area. He explained that some 315 health workers were deployed for the conduct of the exercise in the area. In Kafin-Hausa, more than 88,726 children were inoculated against Wild Polio Virus (WPV) in the exercise. The Immunisation Officer in the area, Mr Muhammad Sarawa, said that over 90,000 doses of oral vaccines were provided to ensure successful campaign against the disease. Sarawa explained that some 527 health workers were deployed to the eight districts for the exercise in the area. He called on parents to present their children for immunisation to protect them against polio and other diseases. The manager commended the council, religious and community leaders for mobilising participation in the exercise. Meanwhile, the Kirikasamma Local Government Council said it had targeted 53,000 children for immunisation against polio in the ongoing exercise. The Immunisation Officer of the council, Mr Ibrahim Bura, commended parents for presenting their children for the exercise. The President of NMA, Prof. Mike Ogirima, made the appeal in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday in Abuja. Ogirima attributed the increasing number of quacks in the medical profession to the dissolution of the MDCN. He said the dissolution of the regulatory body by the federal government along with other governing boards of federal parastatals, agencies and institutions on July 15, 2015, had affected the smooth operations of the council. He listed some of the functions of the body to include monitoring, discipline and adjudication of reported cases of alleged quackery and non-renewal of licence by doctors, among others. He lamented that the council had become handicapped and ineffectual with the dissolution of the regulatory body, giving rise to incidences of quackery and professional misconducts among doctors. Ogirima noted that in the councils efforts at arresting the trend, constituted a monitoring committee comprised of the NMA and Director of Medical Service at the federal and state levels. However, he said that the committee had not been as effective as expected as it lacked the bite due to the absence of the regulatory body. Ogirima described quacks as unlicensed persons who either did not undergo medical training in medical school or who failed to complete the programme within the stipulated time or period. The don said that the influx of these quacks had further increased the nations disease burden, mortality rate as well as maimed a lot of innocent people. Based on complaints we receive as an association, I think quackery is on the increase. Because of economic recession, patients cannot afford the high cost of medical bills from orthodox hospitals; they revert to alternative care, spiritual homes and places where they cannot get quality health care. And at the end of the day they are maimed as a result of wrong approaches or wrong treatment given to them. These are some of our findings during the course of investigating complaints regarding fake doctors. Before a person is labeled a medical doctor, that person must be licenced to practice and having underdone adequate training in that field, he said. Ogirima attributed failure by some doctors to renew their licences on logistics challenge. Some doctors are reluctant to renew their licence because MDCN is not forthcoming. For 20 months now that council has not been functioning just because of one careless circular from a former Permanent Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Health, said the NMA president. He, however, disclosed that there was an online renewal method currently being put in place to address that. He regretted that the councils regulatory body remained non-functional when other non-medical and health regulatory councils like COREN and NUC have been functioning. The council is not a board but a regulatory body, so its dissolution is the main reason why we are having piled up of cases to deal with because there is no tribunal to deal with such issues. Mr Usman Dutse, National President of the union told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on telephone in Lagos that the warning strike would end on Feb. 6. According to him, the strike will affect all federal and state-owned polytechnics and Colleges of Technology. We have issued a circular directing all our members to down tools from 12.00 noon today (Monday)." For about a year now, we have been receiving a fraction of our salary due to a cut from the budget office." Also, our allowances were withdrawn due to the shortfall; non-implementation of the NEEDS assessment conducted some years back." There are also issues of interference from the governing councils of some institutions and victimisation of our members." Some states like Osun, Oyo and Edo have not paid salaries for several months." There are also issues of establishment of Polytechnic Commission and HND/B.Sc dichotomy," Dutse said. He said that after the warning strike, the union would hold a National Executive Council meeting to decide the next line of action. Mr Adeyemi Aromolaran, ASUP Chairman, Yaba College of Technology chapter, Lagos, also confirmed the chapters readiness to comply with the directive on the national strike. Aromolaran told NAN that the chapter would begin the strike after its congress. Yes, we have been directed to commence a one-week strike by our national body." We are holding a congress now to deliberate on the issue and we are ready to comply with the directive." We will direct all our members to down tools with immediate effect." The strike is very important following recent developments in the polytechnic sector, he said. Meanwhile lecturers of the Lagos State Polytechnic (LASPOTECH), Ikorodu Chapter, complied with the strike directive. Mr Uthman Olayinka, General Secretary, Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP), LASPOTECH chapter, told NAN that the strike began at noon as directed. Olayinka said the strike was total and comprehensive as all lecturers are expected not to lecture or participate in any academic activity until the strike elapses. He said that the union had informed the management of the action and also sent a letter of notification to Gov. Akinwunmi Ambode of Lagos State. witnesses told AFP on Monday that the people were travelling under military escort in northeast Nigeria,. But according to travellers who survived the attack and local rescuers, at least 15 trucks laden with food were seized when the Islamists struck at the Korowaso forest on Saturday. "The attackers appeared from the bushes as the convoy slowed down at a part of the road riddled with potholes and opened fire on the vehicles," said one of the drivers, Idrissa Kyari. "They killed 15 people and injured nine while many passengers fled into the bush after subduing the military escorts. They also took away 15 trucks carrying food into the bush." Two students from of University of Maiduguri were killed in the attack with three others injured, said a teacher at the university on condition of anonymity. Masida Umar, a civilian vigilante assisting the military against Boko Haram, said: "We evacuated 24 dead bodies and several injured to hospital. "Many people fled into the bush and have not been seen despite deployment of a search team." Umar said there were fears Boko Haram may have captured those who fled. The militia member said the rebels were believed to have launched the attack from Sambisa forest, which connects with Korowaso. Last month Nigeria's military claimed to have dislodged Boko Haram from their last stronghold in the former game reserve after a months-long offensive. But residents in the area have said fighters were still hiding in areas on the edge of the forest. Military and police authorities declined to comment on the incident when contacted by AFP. The 90-kilometre (55-mile) Maiduguri-Damboa road was nominally reopened last February, allowing motorists to ply the highway but only under military protection. It had been closed in 2013 following a spate of deadly attacks on motorists, as Boko Haram seized swathes of territory in Borno and two neighbouring states. In the last two years a coordinated fightback against Boko Haram involving Nigerian troops and soldiers from Cameroon, Chad and Niger has successfully clawed back lost territory. That has put pressure on Boko Haram, substantially cutting its food, fuel and weapons supplies. As a result Boko Haram has carried out raids on farming communities as well as highway ambushes in its search for food and fuel. Welcome to the Pulse Community! We will now be sending you a daily newsletter on news, entertainment and more. Also join us across all of our other channels - we love to be connected! Suleman said it would be double standard on the governments part, if he is invited by the DSS, and El-Rufai is left to go untouched. Speaking to Daily Post, the Man of Gods spokesman, Phrank Shaibu said The Governor of Kaduna State confessed that he paid money to some Fulani herdsmen as compensation to stop the killings in Southern Kaduna. That means he knows those who have committed atrocities against Christians. He must be made to produce them to answer to charges of murder and other crimes. Theres no end to the killing of Christians in Kaduna. Those behind the heinous crime are known to the Governor. Yet no one has been charged for murder. Instead people like us who speak the truth are being persecuted. The Federal Government must not give the impression of partiality or suggest that Christians are the target of this administration. Which is worse? Saying the truth or offering money to murderers? Did El-Rufai offer money to ghosts? For you to pay someone money, the person must have a known and fixed address. As chief security officer of the state, was it not his business to arrest and put these hoodlums on trial? How come no one has been caught or being prosecuted for the massacre in Southern Kaduna? Obviously, theres more to it that meets the eye. According to reports, Apostle Johnson Suleman will be at the DSS headquarters in Abuja, on Monday, January 30, 2017, in the company of 30 lawyers. Some political observers have also questioned why Governor Nasir El-Rufai was not arrested when he allegedly posted a tweet, threatening people who offend Fulanis in 2012. Other people are of the opinion that the Man of God stepped on 'big toes' when he openly praised Governor Ayo Fayose, who has been a thorn in the flesh of the Buhari administration. The picture was made available by the Presidency. According to the Presidency, the picture was taken at the Abuja House in London, UK. Buhari embarked on a 10-day vacation to the United Kingdom on January 19, 2017. A statement from the Presidency had said Buhari will use the period of his vacation to undergo routine medical check-up. However, no sooner had the President's vacation commenced than rumours began to swirl that he had passed on. The Presidency has been issuing pictures every other day to quell those rumours. A source told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday in Owerri that Onyechere was kidnapped around 8 p.m in Ikenegbu axis of Owerri where he had gone with his driver to do some shopping. The source who spoke under condition of anonymity, said the gunmen numbering five trailed Onyechere to a popular supper market in Ikenegbu and forced his driver out of his car before they sped off with Onyechere. It is sad, the following day for the lifeless body of Oncheyere to be found a few streets away from Maris Junction, Ikenegbu Owerri after he was shot several times, the source revealed. The source added that his driver who put up initial resistance was shot twice on the legs before Onyechere was kidnapped. The details of the assassination are still sketchy as at the time of filling this report. He gave the advice on Monday in Adikpo, headquarters of Kwande Local Government Area during Citizens Engagement Forum organised by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC). Represented by Mrs Juliana Or, the Director, Local Government Affairs, Zam urged the Nigerians to expose corrupt people. He noted that corruption does not only destroy the economy, it also causes hardship for the masses. In his remarks, ICPC chairman, Mr Ekpo Nta, called on Nigerians to rise up and take decisive action against corruption instead of remaining silent or neutral when the few fraudulent people in their midst are perpetrating corruption. Represented by Mrs Rasheedat Okoduwa, the Commissioner of Public Enlightenment at ICPC, Nta said that anybody that keeps silent and fail to take action against corruption is encouraging the act. The need to wage war against corruption is because it denies us almost everything good including the future that we hope for, he said. To eradicate corruption, Nta stressed the need for Nigerians to speak with one voice and declare that the country needed credible, responsible and incorruptible leaders who would discharge their duties creditably. Based on the foregoing, the commission is using this forum to communicate the importance of integrity, accountability, transparency and building robust citizens network against corruption, he said. Chief Hillary Ikima, the Chairman, Kwande LGA Traditional Council, promised to spread the lessons learnt from the forum to his people. The prosecution said the accused disappeared with the complainants (Mrs Mercy Apene) bag containing a Samsung laptop, one iPad, an ATM card and N50,000. The accused committed the offence on Oct. 4, 2016 opposite Grand Hotel, Asaba, Police Prosecutor Blessing Okafor told the court. She said the offence contravened Section 390(6) of the Criminal Code, Laws of Delta State 2006. The accused was, however, granted bail in the sum of N70,000 with a surety in like sum. The Magistrate, Mrs Okonkwo Akanume, who gave the ruling, said the surety must be a civil servant and should reside within the courts jurisdiction. In addition, she said the surety mush have landed property in the state capital and provide two passport photograghs. The market is also known as the Glorious market. According to Daily Trust, the fire started at about 10.15pm last Friday in the market located beside the G. Agofere Park. Eyewitnesses say the fire began from an area occupied by dealers in aluminum who are found at the rear of the market. Traders had retired home after the day's business when the fire incident occured. Confirming the incident, the Divisional Police Officer in charge of Fegge Police Division, Ribiu Garba, said the fire incident affected the U.S.A Line. Daily Trust reports that Garba was one of the first to arrive the scene. The founder of Omega Fire Ministries Worldwide was invited by the DSS for allegedly asking his members to kill Fulani herdsmen. Suleman is expected to appear at the head office of the DSS on Monday, January, 30, 2017 by 10 am, reports say. Sources close to the Man of God have also confirmed that he received an invitation, adding that 30 lawyers will accompany him to Abuja. According to Daily Post, the presidency source said The decision of the DSS to invite the said preacher for talks this week over the statements he is reported to have made is in clear demonstration of the agencys duty that does not require any kind of presidential directive as is being speculated on the Social Media. Anyone, especially leaders, who engages in such questionable conduct, ought to at least be asked a few questions. We just hope religious leaders will also at least call on the said pastor to behave in a Christ-like manner. ALSO READ:DSS invites Apostle Suleman over inciting comments The source also said Is CAN aware of this kind of statement? Is it in line with Christian conduct? Why havent there been a condemnation of this kind of criminal conduct? There is some understandable outrage about cases of violence in Southern Kaduna, yet this coming from a religious leader is certainly even more outrageous. Some political observers think the Man of God should face the full wrath of the law making inciting comments. The information is in a statement by the Secretary of the association, Dr Peter Ekwueme in Enugu on Moday. He noted that the NMA wanted to build formidable partnership with the NYSC to improve the quality of medical services at the disposal of youth corps members. He added that the NMA was working on a robust collaborative programme with officials of the NYSC to address health challenges encountered by corps members posted to the state. The secretary said the Enugu State Chairman of the NMA, Dr Cajetan Onyedum, in company of other officials of the association, has already embarked on a situation assessment visit to the NYSC orientation camp in Awgu Local Government Area. The visit ended with a robust discussion with the NYSC state Coordinator, Alhaji Ahmed Ikaka, who expressed gratitude for the wonderful cooperation and support he was getting from the state chapter of the NMA. THE GUARDIAN NEWSPAPER Output drops as companies combat rising energy costs Operators in the real sector relying on diesel and gas for production now grapple with higher operational costs amidst drop in capacity utilisation levels. Nigerias foreign exchange earning is improving on the back of rising oil prices but manufacturers say challenges abound as energy costs rise above 40 per cent of operating costs. Reps grill police chiefs over loss of arms, officers deaths The House of Representatives Committee on Public Accounts has grilled officers in the top echelon of the Nigeria Police over their handling of the deaths of policemen across the country. The deaths were reportedly caused by religious bigots, bandits, hoodlums and militants. Fayose alleges plan by DSS to detain Suleiman, Oyedepo Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose, has warned the Department of State Services (DSS) over the planned detention and trial of Apostle Johnson Suleiman of the Omega Fire Ministries Worldwide and the General Overseer of Living Faith Church Worldwide International (Winners Chapel International), Bishop David Oyedepo, describing it as indirect invitation to religious crisis in the country. VANGUARD NEWSPAPER How Trumps immigration policyll affect Nigerians Unless the Federal Government reviews its visa policy with the United States of America, Nigerians will no longer enjoy visas to the US with two-year validity, according to an Executive Order issued on Friday by President Donald Trump.TURKISH SCHOOL: 20-yr-old kidnappers nurse, informant nabbed Two suspects, including a 20-year-old nurse, Felicia Weinoh, who specialized in treating victims and members of the kidnap gang who abducted eight schoolgirls and staff at the Nigeria Turkish International College, NTIC in Isheri North Area of Ogun State have been arrested by the police.Nigeria not ready for investment of pension assets in infrastructure CEO, AIICO PensionThe Pension Reform Act, PRA, the enabling law governing the Contributory Pension Scheme, introduced in 2004, was amended in 2014 with the aim of addressing challenges experienced by the nascent industry. THE NATION NEWSPAPER Trump adamant as world leaders criticise travel ban World leaders kicked at the weekend against United States President Donald Trumps controversial immigration order. CBN queries five banks for manipulating forex rates Five commercial banks have been queried for manipulating foreign exchange (forex) transaction rates, The Nation learnt at the weekend. Wike, Amaechi clash over helicopters Transport Minister Rotimi Amaechi spoke yesterday on the two helicopters the Customs Service turned over to the Air Force at the weekend. THE PUNCH NEWSPAPER US judgment: Well push for Kashamus arrest, says NDLEA The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency has said it will push for the arrest of Senator Buruji Kashamu as the agency says it has been emboldened and strengthened by the latest ruling of a United States court, which ruled that the senator must face drug charges. Jonathan, Wike blocked Rivers from taking possession of helicopters Amaechi A former Governor of Rivers State, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, has blamed former President Goodluck Jonathan and Governor Nyesom Wike for the inability of the state to take possession of the two helicopters, which were seized by the Nigeria Customs Service and handed over to the Nigeria Air Force last week. China Exim bank approves N408bn for Lagos-Ibadan rail project The former militants under the auspices of Leadership, Peace and Cultural Development Initiative, have urged the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) to embark on people-oriented projects in the region. The group made the demand in a statement by its Press Secretary, Mr. F.O. Wainwei and made available to newsmen on Monday in Yenagoa. They also urged the Chairman of the commission, Sen. Victor Ndoma-Egba, to fulfill his promise to undertake projects that would bring the long-awaited development in the region. They, however, commended Ndoma-Egbas interface with the relevant stakeholders. The interface with the stakeholders of the region is a step in the right direction; but beyond that, such meetings should be backed up with actions. We, however, wish to reiterate here that we would not hesitate to go against anyone in the commission who has no interest of the Niger Delta people at heart. The NDDC is for the development of the people and the Niger Delta region and not for personal gains, they said. The initiative equally called on the Federal Government to appoint indigenes from the oil-producing areas into various positions in the commission. The group appreciated the selfless inputs of the chairman of the commission, especially the positive plans for the region highlighted during his recent visit to the Governor of Rivers. They further advised other members of the board of NDDC to follow the footsteps of the chairman and desist from seeing the commission as a means to achieving their personal ambitions. Akande (played by Idowu) while battling the vices of life is on a journey to self discovery. The teaser reveals Akande moves from the city to a small town to find work as a teacher. In his voyage, he gets help from Sadaus character who works with him as a teacher's assistant. The movie directed and produced by Asurf Oluseyi also stars Ali Nuhu, Toyin Aimakhu, Rahama Sadau, Ali Nuhu, Tunbosun Aiyedehin, Ibrahim Daddy and Tomiwa Kukoyi. Heres a breakdown of the movies synopsis: Hakkunde is an intriguing story of a young graduate who battles everything including love, family, discrimination, drug abuse, tradition and insecurity. It follows his journey to self-discovery and actualization. The story is characterized by actions and reactions that defines the everyday Nigerian society, with its ups and downs and with a particular focus on the life of a job hunting graduate Akande who found himself in totality while searching for a job, and a better life. Hakkunde written by Tomi Adesina was shot in Kaduna and Lagos, Nigeria. This is Oluseyi's first full length film. The producers of the movie are yet to reveal the exact date it will be released this year. On March 5, 2016, Asurf Oluseyi won the award for Best Short Film at the 2016 Africa Magic Viewers Choice Awards (AMVCA) for his production titled A Day With Death. Wike is seeking to stop the police from investigating allegations, petitions of crimes and various acts of criminality during the December 2016 Rivers re-run election. The Inspector-General of Police Ibrahim Idris and a Deputy Commissioner of Police, Mr Damian Okoro, who are first and third defendants in the suit, told the court that it lacked jurisdiction to entertain the matter. Counsel to the IGP and deputy commissioner, Mr Deji Morakinyo told the court that the defendants had filed a notice of preliminary objection to Wikes motion on interlocutory injunction. Morakinyo told the court that the issue of jurisdiction was of importance and should first be decided before the substantive case can be heard. The counsel added that the defendants would oppose any application that sought to prevent the police from carrying out its constitutional duties. Counsel to Wike, Mr Mike Ozekhome (SAN) while arguing the motion, told the court that the action of the police to constitute a panel to investigate the crisis that trailed the re-run election was illegal. He said it was in the interest of justice for the court to ask that the investigation be suspended pending the outcome of the suit, saying that the investigation was the matter in contention. Trial judge, Justice Gabriel Kolawole said the proceeding for Monday was for the defendants to show cause why they should not be restrained from investigating the allegations following the re-run election. Kolawale, however, noted that he saw no irreparable damage that the plaintiff would suffer if the police went ahead with its investigation. According to him, even if the investigation is conducted, the court has the power to set aside the report of the investigation, for being conducted while the matter is still pending in court. He said it was left for the defendants to decide whether or not to go ahead with the investigation knowing that it could be over ruled by the court. This time, they are at each other's throats over helicopters. It all began when two Bell 412 security surveillance helicopters, found their way to the country's premier port in Apapa, Lagos. Early reports suggested that the helicopters had been impounded by Customs because no one had come forward to claim them. That bit of news riled Wike who tongue-lashed Customs for choosing to play politics with property belonging to the people of Rivers State. According to Wike, the helicopters were purchased by the Amaechi led administration. However, he couldn't claim them because the State couldn't afford what was required in custom duties. The Rivers Governor also said he wrote a letter to President Buhari demanding that the helicopters be handed over to the Air Force since the federal government had refused to grant waivers on the helicopters. And then, it all went political from here. According to Wike, Amaechi bought the helicopters because he couldn't deliver good governance to the people of Rivers during his spell as Governor. The immediate past Rivers State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi, could not provide the people of Rivers State with good governance that was why he had to recourse to the purchase of Armoured Helicopters", Wike said in a statement signed by his aide, Simeon Nwakaudu. The statement continued: Rivers State Governor has no need for Armoured helicopters because he has provided the good people of Rivers State with good governance and they are happy with him. In any case, Rivers State is not at war with any country, hence there is no need for armoured helicopters". Amaechi would have none of it, though. The current Minister of Transport said he acquired the helicopters to curb the criminal activities of kidnappers and militants in Rivers. Amaechi also lamented that Wike had chosen to play politics with the 'birds'. The former Rivers Governor said he procured the helicopters in collaboration with the Federal Government through the Office of the National Security Adviser (NSA). To show their support, the Federal government through the office of the NSA contributed $15million, about half of the total sum, towards the purchase of the helicopters. Also, the then former President Goodluck Jonathan administration granted waivers to the Rivers State government to purchase and import the helicopters, Amaechi clarified. The minister said Wike (who served as Minister of Education in the Jonathan cabinet) convinced the former President not to have anything to do with the helicopters afterwards. It was obvious why the President Goodluck Jonathan administration acted the way it did and Nyesom Wike, the present Governor of Rivers State was an integral part, a major player in the whole conspiracy to block and prevent Rivers State government from taking possession of the helicopters. Then, as a minister in President Jonathans cabinet, Wike inundated President Jonathan with fake stories of how then Governor Amaechi wanted to use the helicopters for Presidential campaigns against Jonathan, how Amaechi will use the helicopters to support President Jonathans opponents before and during the presidential elections and all sorts of concocted tales that created a false impression that the Amaechi government in Rivers State would use the helicopters against and to fight President Jonathan, and not to secure lives and property. Wike then, was already nursing the ambition to run for the office of Governor of Rivers State. He didnt care about the security of lives and property. The helicopters were procured by the Amaechi administration to curb the wanton menace of criminals in the State (which has since worsened under Wikes watch), but in his usual habit, Governor Wike has decided to abandon and dump the helicopters, because he does not care about the safety and security of lives and property in the State. Sad, very sad. There you have it, people--it's all power and politics for these guys. Wike doesn't want to have anything to do with anything that has Amaechi on it. That's what this is all about. This has nothing to do with whether Rivers can afford to pay duties on the helicopters or not. This has nothing to do with the federal government refusing to grant waivers to the Rivers State government. This has everything to do with the long running, bitter politics between Amaechi and Wike. This is APC Vs PDP politics at play here...at the expense of the good people of Rivers State. This is dirty ol' mudslinging between two men who hate the sight of the other. The bigger question has been submerged in the politics, sadly. Which is--Does Rivers still need these helicopters to combat crime within its borders? Will those helicopters prove useful in the grand scheme of things? Amaechi and Wike would not waste an opportunity to drag themselves in the mud. This helicopter incident was a glorious opportunity for them both. Unfortunately, the overall interests of the people have been relegated to the background yet again. Someone needs to tell these men that their constant fights and endless bickering have become tiring and irritating to watch and read. This latest episode is pettiness at its silliest. Some religious leaders have surprisingly advised Christians to respond with violence, while others have offered peaceful alternatives such as praying. Archbishops, Most Reverend Ignatius Kaigama, and Adewale Martins fall into this second category. They disclosed this in different interviews at the 50th anniversary celebration of the Association of Sacred Heart of Jesus and Immaculate Heart of Mary, held at St. Agnes Catholic Church, Maryland, Lagos State. In his message, the Archbishop of Lagos, Most Reverend Martins said: "What is expected, however, is that we do not go out to attack anybody. We are not permitted to be aggressors. The President of the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria (CBCN) and Archbishop of Jos, Most Reverend Kaigama, echoed similar sentiments saying, The phrase, kill them or retaliate is not in the vocabulary of Jesus Christ. Our religion does not allow us to kill." In spite of these statements, both archbishops agreed that Christians have the right to defend themselves if need be. The Archbishop of Lagos said that every human being has the fundamental right to life and to protect his or her life as well. Christian, and everyone at that, has the right to defend themselves when threatened. He was supported by archbishop Martins, who said the fact that Christianity does not permit killing "doesnt mean we should sit down and allow destruction of our lives and properties. You have a right to self-defence when threatened. Divine and human laws allow it." Moving on, he noted that living in the North must not be easy, he also called for prayers. It is not easy to be a Christian in some of these Northern states and therefore, we must join forces with the Christian community in prayer. The church is in trouble. Many things that hold us together are being destroyed but our faith cannot be destroyed. When we hold onto Jesus, we shall overcome," he said. Danbatta made the statement whilst delivering a lecture at the 46th Convocation Ceremony of the University of Nigeria (UNN), Nsukka. During his lecture, Danbatta urged policymakers to leverage on the potential of ICT sector to grow the economy citing the NCC's contributions as evidence of the possibilities. ALSO READ: Regulator will now fine telcos N5 million for unwanted text messages It is in the interest of the country to harness potential that exist in the information-driven age to facilitate socio-economic development, he said, according to a Nigeria CommunicationsWeek report. He also said the sector has grown exponentially over the last couple of years and urgently needs a push to sustain its growth and benefit the nation at large. Adama Barrow's return will cap days of anxious waiting in the tiny former British colony that was thrown into chaos when long-time president Yahya Jammeh refused to step down after losing a December vote. Gambians said they were looking forward to their freedom after two decades of Jammeh's iron-fisted rule in the former British colony, and would be welcoming at the airport. "I'm 100 percent a Barrow supporter and I'm more happy than I can say," said Kanamo Sansou, sitting with his friends at Serrekunda market close to the capital Banjul. "He will be different in all aspects... we have been living under dictatorship for 22 years," added pensioner Ibrahima Gaye. "You can go home at night and sleep without worrying you will be arrested before daybreak," he said. A senior government official had told AFP that Barrow would be returning at 1600 GMT on Thursday, saying: "It is important for him to come to avoid the void." 'Building pillars of reform' The official said the priority would be "putting into place the pillars of reform and human rights". "People are very happy and it's elating". Diplomats had urged Barrow to return quickly to curb the impact of the political crisis on the tourist-reliant economy, already in a fragile state. The UN envoy for West Africa, Mohamed ibn Chambas, who briefed the Security Council on The Gambia, stressed that the United Nations was working to bolster stability. The UN official is due to fly to Banjul for Barrow's return. Swedish ambassador Olof Skoog, who holds the Security Council's presidency, said: "We shouldn't just turn our back on Gambia now and walk away to the next situation but really make sure that we stay the course and support democracy." Immunity for Jammeh? Barrow will be staying at his own residence until further notice while State House, Jammeh's former seat of power, is assessed for potential risks. His first job is to deal with an internal crisis after it emerged his choice for vice president, Fatoumata Jallow-Tambajang, may be constitutionally too old for the role. Around 4,000 west African troops remain in The Gambia charged with ensuring safety, as it is believed rogue pro-Jammeh elements remain in the security forces that were once under his personal control. The new president must also deal with latent ethnic tensions between Jammeh's minority Jola people and the majority Mandinkas, to which Barrow belongs. Jammeh finally left the country on Saturday and went into exile in Equatorial Guinea under threat of regional military intervention. The authorities have accused the former strongman of plundering state coffers and making off with $11 million (10 million euros). But the new government has that confirmed Jammeh will be permitted to keep a fleet of luxury cars, including two Rolls Royces. Barrow has told Jammeh he will have all the rights legally ensured to an ex-president, which under Gambian law include immunity from prosecution, barring a vote by two-thirds of the national assembly. Trump on Friday gave an executive order barring citizens from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from entering the U.S. for the next 90 days A majority of the 275,000 residents of the camp located in north-eastern Kenya are Somali. About 100 refugees who were preparing to leave for the United States have been blocked in a transit centre of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), said Mohamed Ilka-Ase, one of the refugees. The feeling is really devastating, the refugees left everything they had, including businesses, careers going back to Dadaab will mean starting over again as refugees, like we did in 1991, he said. More than 90 per cent of Dadaabs residents are Somalis, some of who have lived there since the early 1990s, when the collapse of Mohamed Siad Barres dictatorship plunged the country into chaos. Others have arrived in recent years, fleeing the instability created by the violent campaign of the militant Islamist group al-Shabaab. Officials from the US embassy and IOM visited us and told us how sorry they were and now we are going to return, Ilka-Ase said. Christelle van Rosmalen, resettlement officer for the UN refugee agency UNHCR at Dadaab, said that IOM has cancelled all the scheduled flights for Somali refugees, and they will remain in the IOM transit centre till further notice. We were booked for a flight, everything was ready, including permits, said another refugee, Adan Barre, who had a flight from Nairobi to Louisville, Kentucky. We were suddenly told we should wait for 121 days; we have nowhere to go back." Our food ration card in Dadaab has been blocked and alien IDs have been taken away, since we got resettlement, Barre complained. Barre said: According to the UNHCR database, we are in America. We sold everything we had, we have spent more than 20 years waiting for this day, now that it is here, we cant go, it is really traumatising". Van Rosmalen said that UNHCR had stopped submitting new cases for resettling Somalis in the U.S. for the coming months. We will focus on the cases already submitted to the U.S. and ensure they are up to date, she added. Kenya has announced plans to close Dadaab, which it regards as a recruiting ground for al-Shabaab. Two suspects in the shooting were arrested, he said. Police did not rule out the possibility of a third suspect who had fled the scene. The motive of the attack was not immediately clear. Police set up a perimeter around the mosque. A few dozen people were inside the Islamic Cultural Center when the shooting began just after 8:00 pm (0100 GMT Monday), CBC reported, citing its French-language service Radio-Canada. According to CBC, Quebec City Police Constable Etienne Doyon said at the time of the attack mostly men were gathered at the mosque for evening prayers. The center's director said at least five people were killed, but that information had not been confirmed by police, CBC said. According to witnesses cited by Radio-Canada, two men entered the center and opened fire on the people inside. Quebec's prime minister, Philippe Couillard, said in a series of Twitter posts that the government was "mobilized to ensure the security of the people of Quebec." "Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence," he wrote. "Solidarity with Quebec people of Muslim faith." The Islamic Cultural Center of Quebec, which is also known as the grand mosque of Quebec, had already been the target of hate: a pig's head was left on the doorstep last June during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. The attack comes as Canada has vowed to open its arms wide to Muslims and refugees after US President Donald Trump's controversial immigration ban Friday sparked travel chaos and outrage around the world. Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of Trump's order, the immigration ministry said Sunday. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. Trump has suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Hussen, who is of Somali origin, did not condemn the US measure but stressed that Canada would continue to pursue an immigration policy based on "compassion" while at the same time protecting the security of its citizens. "We welcome those fleeing persecution, terror and war," he said, echoing a welcoming Twitter post by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Saturday. According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one out of five people in the country are foreign-born. "President Trump reiterated our ironclad commitment to defend the ROK, including through the provision of extended deterrence, using the full range of military capabilities," the White House said in a statement, using an acronym for the South's formal name. "The two leaders agreed to take steps to strengthen joint defense capabilities to defend against the North Korean threat." Pentagon chief James Mattis is due to travel to South Korea on Wednesday and Japan on Friday on his first trip as defense secretary. The trip comes amid worries in the two long-standing American allies about the direction of US policy in their region under President Donald Trump. During his campaign, Trump threatened to withdraw US forces from the two countries if they did not step up their financial support for their defense. But the White House insisted that the trip "reflects the close friendship between our two countries and demonstrates the importance of the US-ROK alliance." Seoul and Washington agreed last year to install the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in the South after a string of North Korean nuclear and missile tests -- prompting strong objections from China, which fears it will undermine its own ballistic capabilities. Earlier this month, Hwang warned that North Korea's nuclear and missile capabilities are accelerating at an "unprecedented" pace, as he called for the "swift" deployment of the anti-missile system. Within South Korea, voices opposing the THAAD installation have grown louder, with some opposition candidates pledging to scrap the agreement if they win a presidential election due this year. Turning the ship before it hits the iceberg The case against the local woman who allegedly fired a gun into a vehicle was continued when one of the victims did not show up for court to testify on Monday. The case against the local woman who allegedly fired a gun into a vehicle was continued when one of the victims did not show up for court to testify on Monday. Local resident Robin Young, 54, is charged with attempted murder for the March 18 incident. Judge Kent Jasperson also issued a material witness warrant for Steven Castro, who was scheduled to provide his account of what occurred last month when Young allegedly fired a round which struck a vehicle Castro was sitting in. Prosecutor Michael Vieta-Kabell said Castro decided to leave the courthouse before providing testimony. He was here for a while, and then he left, Vieta-Kabell said. Judge Jasperson, in his discretion, issued whats called a material witness warrant for Mr. Castro. I can issue a warrant and bring him before the court and explain to him the ramifications of being under a subpoena and the requirement of him being here to testify, and what sanctions can be placed on him for not doing that, Jasperson said. According to court records, Castro and another individual showed up at a residence along the 1800 block of Simkins Road to perform repairs on one of several homes on the property. Vieta-Kabell alleges Young shot at the vehicle shortly after it arrived at the residence due to a history of bad blood between both individuals. Vieta-Kabell also requested a no-contact order between the individuals involved in the case, which Jasperson eventually granted. Young was released on April 1, after her longtime friend Zulema Galindo said she posted the $120,000 bail for her friends release. Galindo said she put up at least two properties she owns to help free Young. She spoke about her friends community involvement over the years. What she is charged with is not like her, Galindo said following the proceedings. I dont think the accusations are 100 percent real. She did a lot of work collecting money for needy children. She has donated money for a lot of causes, but nobody knows this. I know it because Ive known her for a while. Nye County Sheriffs deputies arrested Young last month after she allegedly fired the gun into the vehicle at a property on 1850 W. Simkins Road, where she occupies a trailer. The bullet struck the right-front quarter panel inches away from the passenger seat according to the arrest report by Nye County Sheriffs Office. Young, 54, is charged with attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon, discharging a gun into an occupied vehicle, discharging a gun where a person might be in danger, and injury to a vehicle. She is scheduled to appear back in court on Oct. 7. Alicia Wade, the first high school graduate in her family, is busy these days with a demanding full-time job and first apartment. She graduated early a year ago from Mid-City High School in Davenport and credits the IJAG, or Iowa Jobs for America's Grads, program for part of her motivation. Wade, 18, was born to teen parents who didn't finish school. Her dad was in prison for several years. Her mom lives in Eldridge with her younger siblings. When she was a student at Mid-City, Wade was enrolled in an IJAG class taught by Sarah Brennan. She learned basics about growing up, getting a job and a place to live. Brennan is in her second year as an IJAG education specialist and is one of four in Davenport. The others are James Porter at Central, Aaron Sass at North and Cynthia Safford at West. The foursome made an IJAG presentation at the Davenport School Board's committee-of-the-whole meeting in early January, and Superintendent Art Tate saluted the program. He also noted it is one district effort that exists in relative obscurity. "This is an outstanding program," he said. Job, life skills In class, Brennan teaches life and job skills, including how to write a cover letter and resume, which tends to bore the students, she said. She also has advice for renting an apartment, signing a contract and what is expected in the way of a deposit. The program focuses on six skills: personal, leadership, communication, employment, job success and career development. Brennan teaches juniors and seniors at Mid-City. She has four daily classes, with a total of 35 to 40 students in the program. Students such as Wade are in IJAG until they graduate, then Brennan follows them for another year, offering continuing support to the students while tracking their job success. In Davenport, more than 95 percent of the IJAG students graduate from high school and get additional schooling and/or a job. This is a great return-on-investment for students, said Laurie Phelen, president and CEO of the program, which is based in Des Moines. The students in IJAG are very bright and talented, Phelen said. "If we ignite their passions, they pay it forward," she said. Wade said she loves her job helping clients at REM, a Davenport-based organization that provides services to adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities. She works in a group home and has three clients. She is responsible for their transportation and personal care, working with clients who have suffered brain injuries or who live with mental illness. "I work full time, lots of hours," she said. 'Learned helplessness' When students are looking for jobs, IJAG teachers take them to the Iowa Workforce Development office, or they visit the public library to search for jobs online, Brennan said. Some students have "learned helplessness" and lack motivation, the teacher said. She attributes the problem to a lack of personal support systems and inadequate role models. For Wade, that is not the problem. She is determined to succeed and does not like to make excuses, even if her early life was a challenge. Born in Davenport and raised by her grandmother in Decatur, Illinois, Wade returned to Davenport in junior high and attended Wood Intermediate School. In high school, she started at the Kimberly Center, which also is where her parents met. She transitioned to Mid-City High School when it opened in 2014. An honor roll student, Wade liked the Kimberly Center, because her classmates were close-knit and were confronting a variety of challenges. At Mid-City, she eventually bonded with teachers such as Brennan, as well as the school's case workers. Wade graduated in January 2016, at the age of 17. Brennan said she wept at the ceremony, and the two continue to stay keep in touch, including during Wade's occasional visits to the school. Career research Teachers such as Brennan do in-depth career research and practice interviewing skills in their IJAG classes. She gets help. For example, Davenport School Board member Julie DeSalvo, who works for MidAmerican Energy, recently volunteered at Central High School's program and conducted mock interviews with the students. Although not all students find success through IJAG, Brennan said, most of them do, and she hears from many like Wade after they have graduated. The kids may be complimentary, talking about how they used a resume and cover letter to get a job, even though they didn't like the class on resume writing. For now, Wade is focused on her job, and she hopes to start classes soon to earn a medical-assistant degree. For the REM job, she has completed training in CPR, or cardio-pulmonary resuscitation, and in medication management. She works second shift and enjoys the later time slot, because, "It lets me sleep in." Most of all, Wade loves working with her clients. "When I leave work, I feel like I've really helped someone," she said. In the time you spend reading this story, someone in America will be killed or wounded by gun violence. They will be one of the 93 people killed, or perhaps one of the seven children and teens who die, or one of the more than 200 people injured each day, according to everytownresearch.org. Those statistics and the human tragedy behind them led more than a dozen people to band together Sunday for a meeting with Amber Gustafson, the Iowa Chapter Leader of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America. The nonpartisan gathering featured people of all political leanings discussing their experiences with gun violence and what can be done to diminish it in the future. I got involved with this after Sandy Hook, Gustafson said. I remember I was waiting to pick up my daughter from school and watching it unfold on TV, and I was thinking, That school looks just like my daughters, this couldve happened here, and I realized I needed to do something. What Gustafson has done is to travel around the region speaking to formal and informal gatherings, helping to start grassroots organizations to deal with the issue of gun violence. Shes quick to mention shes a gun owner, a Republican and a supporter of the Second Amendment, but also advocates for stronger background checks and sensible parameters on ownership and safety. States that have implemented background checks have already prevented nearly 300,000 gun sales to domestic abusers, she said. In states with stronger background checks, there are 47 percent fewer women shot, 47 percent fewer gun injuries in domestic violence situations and 53 percent fewer law enforcement officers shot and killed in the line of duty. This is something that affects us all. Judging by the stories shared by attendees, its had an impact on a number of lives in the Quad-Cities. Im a survivor of gun violence, Davenports Karene Nagel said, in a soft, shaken voice that still echoed its memory. Its something that has stayed with me and never gone away. It was when I was in high school in the beginning of the '70s and it was over a road rage incident, thats all I really want to say about it. But its something . . . I . . . once youre shot at, once youve almost been killed, its something you dont forget. Sara Olson-Smith, now of Davenport, was a counselor working down the street from Columbine High School after the shooting in Colorado. This is an important issue, the former Littleton, Colorado, resident said. It has been for a long time, and its something that needs to be addressed. Those feelings are what led Emilene Leone of Davenport to invite Gustafson to speak locally. Im concerned about my childrens safety, and about the safety of families in our area, she said. Thats why its important to come together and address these issues and take action to help protect our communities. I still remember the impact that Mothers Against Drunk Driving had when it was organized, said Lynn Drazinski of Davenport. I figured that if they could have that major of an impact over the years, we can do the same thing with this group. For more information, Gustafson encourages people to seek them out on Facebook, visit everytown.org or thetrace.org or text JOIN to 644-33 to get alerts and information. Were not looking to abolish or take away guns, were hoping to make it more safe for gun ownership and for people in this country, Gustafson said. If you talk to law enforcement around the state, around the country, theyre all behind this. Because they know that fewer guns in the hands of dangerous people or potentially dangerous people leads to a safer community, and thats what this is all about. 1. Gusty winds chill the air A good Monday to all. Here's the latest forecast for the final days of January from the National Weather Service. Today we will see increasing clouds with a high near 37 degrees. South winds between 5-10 mph will increase to 10-15 mph in the afternoon. Winds could gust as high as 25 mph. Tonight will be mostly cloudy with a low around 31 degrees. Winds could gust as high as 25 mph. Tuesday will be mostly cloudy and breezy with a high near 39 degrees and a low around 26 degrees. 2. Traffic alert: Blackhawk Road in Rock Island A portion of Blackhawk Road in Rock Island is closed to traffic at this hour because of a large structure fire in the 2900 block of Blackhawk Road. The Rock Island Fire Department reports that Blackhawk Road west of 30th Street has been shut down. Firefighters are at the scene of a working fire at Jake O's Grille, 2900 Blackhawk Road. 3. Stranger Things' is upset winner of SAG Awards' TV prize Youth was served as the kid-dominated "Stranger Things" proved the surprise Screen Actors Guild Awards top TV winner Sunday, with "Shameless" star William H. Macy scoring his own upset victory over Jeffrey Tambor of "Transparent." "Stranger Things," Netflix's supernatural thriller that earned breakout buzz in its freshman season, deprived three-time consecutive winner "Downton Abbey" of one last trophy for its concluding year. The streaming service claimed a leading four awards as the traditional broadcast networks were shut out, something they're getting used to. Viewers saw a heavy doses of politics amid the glitz. Read more. 4. Moline police seek your help The Moline Police Department is calling on the community's assistance in identifying the pictured suspects. They are suspects in an armed robbery that occurred over the weekend at a motel in Moline. If you can identify them or have information regarding the armed robbery you are asked to contact the Moline Police Department at 309-524-2140 or Crime Stoppers of the Quad-Cities at 309-762-9500. 5. Home Show unveils new ideas for home improvement Even with the absence of winter's thick blanket of snow, there's a case of cabin fever settling in across the Quad-Cities, and what better remedy than heading out to gather new ideas for improving your home. Nearly 140 area businesses will be on hand as the Quad-Cities Builders & Remodelers Association hosts its 40th anniversary Home Show this weekend. From Friday-Sunday, vendors representing the building industry's spectrum will fill the QCCA Expo Center in Rock Island to display products and services, offer solutions for inside and outside the home, and showcase new trends and technologies. Read more. 6. World Series trophy in Q-C today The Chicago Cubs World Series Trophy will be displayed from noon to 1:30 p.m. today at the River Music Experience, 129 N. Main St., Davenport. The public is invited to take photos of (and with) the Commissioner's Trophy. Cubs fans already are camped out waiting for their chance to see history. Question the timing all you want, but last weeks legal filing by Attorney General Lisa Madigan to stop paying state employee wages without an official appropriation is long overdue and is completely consistent with a 2016 Illinois Supreme Court ruling and with her (and the governor's) opposition to a similar lawsuit brought by social service providers. Back in 2015, after the General Assembly and the governor couldnt come to terms on a budget deal, AFSCME and other unions went to court and asked a judge to force the state to pay state workers even though there was no official appropriation for the salaries. That ruling remains in place today. But this passage in the Illinois Constitution pretty much says it all: "The General Assembly by law shall make appropriations for all expenditures of public funds by the State." So the state Supreme Court ruled in March of 2016 on a different case that the portion of AFSCME's contract with the state requiring payment of back wages could not be honored without a proper legislative appropriation. In other words, no appropriation, no payment, even with a contract. It was a completely reasonable decision. The governor shouldn't be able to sign contracts and then force state payment without an actual appropriation. The potential for abuse is mind blowing. Just imagine if Rod Blagojevich could've paid whomever he wanted, how much he wanted without any legislative permission. Gov. Bruce Rauner's position against a lawsuit brought by human service providers is also completely in line with that 2016 Supreme Court decision. The service providers say their signed state contracts mean they should be paid in full even though the General Assembly hasn't approved the appropriations to do so. Never once has Gov. Rauner said those providers ought to be paid without a formal budget in place. But there he was last week saying that Attorney General Madigans motion would directly harm state workers while urging her to drop her legal motion. Hes been fighting the state employee unions since Day One and has said he wants to help social service groups, yet he wants state workers paid without an appropriation but doesnt want social service providers paid the same way? Cmon, man. I was born at night, but not last night. Whats he really up to? Give me a minute and I'll get to it. House Republican Leader Jim Durkin's reaction to AG Madigans move appeared to fly in the face of common sense: "This decision clearly undermines the legislature's duty to negotiate a bipartisan solution." I was in Decatur to give a speech last week about the prospects for the Senate's much-touted "grand bargain" when I found out about AG Madigan's motion. My speech, as initially written, gave that bipartisan effort no better than a 50-50 chance to spur a final deal. If the attorney general had filed her motion last year after the Supreme Court ruling, we wouldn't be in this mess today, and Leader Durkin most certainly knows it. Nothing focuses the General Assembly's bipartisan attention quite so much as a massive crisis. So, why didn't she file it last year? I'm told she wanted to give the General Assembly and the governor some time to work things out. They eventually agreed to a stop gap budget, so she laid low. But that stop gap budget expired at the end of December and the General Assembly left town last week without making significant progress. There will naturally be widespread suspicions that AG Madigan acted on behalf of her father. The Illinois Republican Party explicitly made that very point when it claimed the attorney general "decided to put Speaker Madigan's power politics ahead of hard-working families in an effort to shut down state government." That last sentence is the key here. The governor has done all he could to avoid a shutdown because a shutdown means all the emphasis would then be on quickly passing a real budget and the tax hikes which go along with it to reopen the governments shuttered doors. And that means the governor will lose much (or most, or possibly even all) of his beloved "leverage" to force through his various anti-union/pro-business economic reforms. And that leverage, whether he admits it or not, is the extreme pressure thats been put on social service providers and the people they serve since this impasse began 18 long months ago. The attorney general has asked the judge to allow the governor and the General Assembly to delay any order until February 28th to give them time to work out a deal. Get on it, folks. Your digital subscription includes access to all content on our agricultural websites across the nation. Access unlimited content and the digital versions of our print editions - This Week's Paper. DES MOINES A bill intended to give local school boards more decision-making authority ran into several challenges Monday, including testy exchanges among subcommittee members. Freshman Rep. Amy Nielsen, D-North Liberty, accused subcommittee Chairman Greg Forristall, R-Macedonia, of being a mean bully when he questioned whether she understood school funding law. During her first subcommittee meeting as a House member, Nielsen asked whether House File 26 solved the problems Forristall cited as reasons to give school boards home rule authority similar to that given cities and counties through an amendment to the state Constitution. The bill calls for school boards to exercise any broad or implied power not inconsistent with state laws. That doesnt extend to levying taxes. Nielsen wondered about unintended consequences of the change, especially those stemming from the language calling for state laws relating to schools and school boards to be liberally construed. Now Democrats are complaining were too liberal, Forristall said. The bill has the support of the Iowa Association of School Boards, School Administrators of Iowa, Professional Educators of Iowa, Area Education Agencies, Rural School Advocates and Urban Education Network. Melissa Peterson of the Iowa State Education Association had the same question as Nielsen, however. She wondered what problem lawmakers were trying to solve. There are other bills that address specific problems without calling for such a large legislative change. Margaret Buckton of the Rural Education Advocates and Urban Education Network said the bill goes to the overarching philosophy of who makes decisions about local school operations. Too many times, she said, school districts need to change laws when a common-sense decision would solve their problem. As long as districts are held accountable and follow state law, they should be given more latitude, Emily Piper of the Iowa Association of School Boards told the subcommittee. She thought the legislation needed a better definition of home rule, however. The bill now goes to the Education Committee. According to Callow, the group has not followed through on the threat and has not yet released any installments of Davenport's data on its multiple platforms. President Donald Trump on Monday denied his immigration order was to blame for the chaos at the nation's airports over the weekend, instead pointing to computer glitches, protesters and even the "tears of Senator Schumer." "There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter the country," Trump wrote in a series of early morning tweets. "This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world!" In another tweet, Trump defended his decision to take swift action on his proposed travel ban, saying there are "a lot of bad 'dudes' out there." "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the 'bad' would rush into our country during that week," Trump said. Trump's order temporarily suspends all immigration for citizens of seven majority Muslim countries for 90 days. But he enters his second week in office amid a global backlash to his policies. European Union officials denounced his immigration order as a dangerous embrace of isolationism and inequality, while the international aid group Doctors Without Borders accused Trump of keeping people "trapped in war zones, directly endangering their lives." In Iraq, two lawmakers there said the Iraqi parliament has approved a "reciprocity measure" restricting the entry of Americans into Iraq. Meanwhile, it's unclear how Trump's order would make the nation safer. The order does not address homegrown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. And the list of countries in Trump's order doesn't include Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. The president tweeted early Monday that only 109 out of 325,000 "were detained and held for questioning" following his executive order to bar individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries. The Homeland Security Department has used 325,000 as the number of international air travelers who arrive every day to the U.S. "Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer," he added. Trump was referring to a Delta systems outage Sunday night that led to departure delays and cancellations of at least 150 Delta flights. However, the chaos started Saturday as protesters packed some of the country's major airports to demonstrate against the executive order. Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer tweeted Friday that "Tears are running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty" over the ban. Trump has defended his order by saying it's not a "Muslim ban." In a background call with reporters Sunday, a senior administration official declared the order's implementation "a massive success story," claiming it had been done "seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism." Yet there appeared to be widespread confusion among authorities tasked with carrying out the order and how it would be applied to certain groups, like U.S. legal permanent residents. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday saying that, absent information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a "dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination." That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent U.S. residency "green cards" will not be barred from re-entering the U.S., as officials had previously said. It remains unclear what kind of additional screening they will now face. "You have an extreme vetting proposal that didn't get the vetting it should have had," said Ohio Sen. Rob Portman, who urged the new president to "slow down" and work with lawmakers on how best to tighten screening for foreigners who enter the United States. "In my view, we ought to all take a deep breath and come up with something that makes sense for our national security" and reflects the fact that "America's always been a welcoming home for refugees and immigrants," he said. White House press secretary Sean Spicer on Monday morning defended the closed-mouth discussions that preceded Friday's announcement, saying that "I think there are some people who might not like the way it was done, but they were all consulted in the process." Interviewed on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," Spicer said officials put the safety of the American people first and said officials didn't want to "telegraph" what they were going to do. He acknowledged "the secret way we had to roll this out" and said that it was because of "security reasons." A federal judge in New York has issued an emergency order temporarily barring the U.S. from deporting people from the seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trump's 90-day travel ban. The order barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. The Department of Homeland Security said Sunday the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. Justin Rhodes almost missed out on a shot at national television exposure for his signature barbecue beef brisket sandwich first savored by bikers attending the 75th Sturgis motorcycle rally. His JRs BBQ Rhodehouse of Piedmont was one of four area eateries approached by representatives of the Travel Channels "Secret Eats With Adam Richman," a cable show spotlighting obscure culinary delights served in out-of-the-way places. Rhodes recalled receiving an email inquiry from representatives of the show back in June. I almost deleted it because it seemed like one of those fake, phishing emails, Rhodes said. Good thing he didnt summarily click the message into the trash file, because he is joining three other local restaurateurs to be featured Wednesday on an episode of "Secret Eats." Also featured on the episode entitled Sturgis Secrets will be the Blind Lion speakeasy in Rapid City, Jambonz Grill & Pub in Sturgis and the Deadwood Social Club. All segments were filmed in August during the 76th Sturgis motorcycle rally. According to the network, the show featuring the four Black Hills restaurants is set to broadcast at 10 a.m. Rapid City time. (Viewers should check their local listings to verify.) Rhodes wasnt the only restaurateur reticent when the Travel Channel came calling. Blind Lion owner Tony DeMaro also wasnt quite sure what to make of an inquiry he received via text message, which happens to be the same method patrons use to request an evening reservation at his underground Prohibition-era styled speakeasy nestled in the basement of Murphys Bar & Grill on Main Street in Rapid City. We were kind of freaking out because we didnt know what the show was about, DeMaro said. "Secret Eats" producers travel far and wide to find well-hidden gastronomic treasures. Richman, host and renowned foodie who previously hosted "Man vs. Food" on the channel, takes viewers on a tour of out-of-the-way venues. That's how the show got its name. The four restaurants featured on the show were sworn to secrecy until the network released the shows schedule just a couple of weeks ago. Rhodes is the only one to not have a bricks-and-mortar location. Richman and the Travel Channel film crew caught up with him serving barbecue at a catered event, the Black Hills State University-sponsored Jacket Ride, a benefit for the universitys military veteran students. It was at Scott Peterson Motors in Sturgis. The show will feature Rhodes El Frito-Q!!! Texicano sandwich, smoked Texas-style beef brisket and pepper jack cheese on a white bun, slathered with spicy sriracha mayonnaise, covered with pickled jalapenos, red onions, Fritos corn chips and topped with a barbecue sauce drizzle. Rhodes said the film crew spent six to seven hours at the event. Richman was very easy to work with during the long day of production, he said. Hes not a showboat TV star. Hes down to earth, laid back, Rhodes said. DeMaro heard the episode featuring the four Black Hills spots might not be broadcast because it was the final show in the current season, but his excitement was over the top when the network called to tell him the show would indeed air this week. I was screaming like a 15-year-old girl at a boy band concert, DeMaro said. Their featured dish, Chicken Confit, is slow-cooked in rendered duck fat with different peppers and spices. Confit (pronounced con-fee) is a process of cooking a meat at low temperature in its own rendered fat, then storing the cooked meat in the fat to preserve it. The meat absorbs the duck fat, making it "incredibly tender and rich," DeMaro said. The chicken is served with heirloom fingerling potatoes and caramelized Brussels sprouts, all smothered in a Dijon mustard sauce and garnished with chives. DeMaro flew the chef who originally concocted the dish, Carlos Osario, from Washington state to Rapid City for the filming. The chemistry between Osario and Richman should be fun to watch, he said. Both men were swapping stories of mutual chef friends from around the country. They werent strangers anymore. It was like they had been friends for years, DeMaro said. Deadwood Social Club co-owner Louie LaLonde said Richman and the Travel Channel crew worked around the restaurants schedule during the frenetic pace of the motorcycle rally, spending the entire day at the restaurant above the iconic Old Style Saloon No. 10 on Main Street. These guys stretched it out and were good at making themselves right at home. Of course we asked them to do that, LaLonde said. Head chef Caleb Storm said he and another chef developed the Deadwood Social Clubs featured off-menu dish for the show, Wild Boar Poppers. Poppers are mild cherry peppers, hollowed out and piped full of a sriracha and onion- and chili-powder-infused cream cheese filling. The peppers are then wrapped in wild boar bacon and deep-fried. Storm was able to film his segment in the morning before the restaurant had to begin serving meals to hundreds of bike week visitors. It was a little hectic for us. We were trying to prep for a rally day, serving 400 to 500 people. We were all running around quite a bit, but they made it work for us, Storm said. Storm said Richman helped calm some initial jitters by advising him to ignore the camera. I was a little nervous being on camera," he said. "I havent done it very much. He made it so easy. That (advice) helped me out tremendously. Cheree Schriver, owner of Cajon, soul food-themed Jambonz Grill & Pub in Sturgis, said Richman also helped her daughter, kitchen manager Meagan ODriscoll, deal with the lights and camera. Of course she was nervous, but he was so good with her, Schriver said. Schriver said Jambonzs featured dish is a Cajun take on a Black Hills favorite, Indian tacos, but she declined to detail her recipe. Im not going to tell you whats in it, she said. Schriver said filming her segment caused the shutdown of the small kitchen at the Junction Avenue restaurant for more than two hours on Wednesday of rally week. She said her customers patiently waited out the delay, with some people even giving taped interviews for the show. Schriver said the timing of the "Secret Eats" broadcast couldnt be better. Its tough in Sturgis in the winter time. I'm grateful for any exposure I can get, Schriver said. Currently the Blind Lion is open on Friday and Saturday evenings only. The Travel Channel exposure could change that. So few people know we exist and even fewer know we have a food program, so this is going to be the opportunity of a lifetime, DeMaro said. Rhodes hopes to expand his catering business into an actual sit-down barbecue smokehouse. Currently he sells take-out barbecue meats and sandwiches from a space in Summerset from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. every other Saturday, perhaps expanding to every Saturday this spring. It was a great experience, Rhodes said. Probably the highlight of my career so far. Storm said the Travel Channel exposure will benefit far more than the individual restaurants featured. Its awesome exposure," he said, "not just for the Deadwood Social Club, but for the Black Hills as a whole." PIERRE | The former administrator of South Dakota's investment-for-visa program appears ready to change his plea in a high-profile financial misconduct case. Attorney General Marty Jackley said that Joop (yoop) Bollen is scheduled to appear in court Wednesday for a change-of-plea hearing. An attorney for Bollen declined to comment to The Associated Press. Bollen previously pleaded innocent to felony charges that accuse him of diverting more than $1.2 million from an account created as part of a contract with the state to protect it against costs or liability from the EB-5 visa program. Authorities say the money was mostly replenished. The charges deal with a company Bollen founded that previously handled South Dakota's participation in the EB-5 visa program. The Rapid City Regional Airport is trying a new approach to increasing its business this spring, which officials hope will eventually add more flights. A new digital marketing strategy was approved by the Airport Board of Directors this week to market the airport and the Black Hills as a destination to people in Chicago, Minneapolis and Dallas. This is the first time the airport has attempted to market to inbound traffic rather than outbound, said Toni Broom, deputy airport director for finance and administration. In the past, the airport had winter campaigns in local media to stimulate outbound traffic. "So this is a bit of a change for us," Broom said. The board approved the 2017 Spring Digital Strategy with Lawrence & Schiller, a Sioux Falls-based advertising agency, in the amount of $56,000 on Tuesday. It is a small part of a larger marketing plan for the airport, which will include a full analysis of data to determine final markets and target audiences for the next one to two years, according to a memo from airport executive director Patrick Dame to the airport board. It was approved ahead of the full plan because officials hope to make an impact this summer. Data shows travelers typically book flights 45 to 55 days in advance, according to the memo. The Chicago and Minneapolis markets are already targeted by the South Dakota Department of Tourism, and the Dallas area "indexes high with our potential audiences," Dame said in the memo. "We chose those three for this particular campaign because we know the South Dakota Department of Tourism and other tourism entities are marketing heavily in Chicago and Minneapolis," Broom said. "Dallas also shows a high propensity of people who would come to the Black Hills." Lawrence & Schiller will create a new home page for the airport. This is needed to direct travelers to an interactive, clean and professionally designed page where flights can be booked along with a complete Black Hills vacation package, Dame wrote. The airport is planning a website overhaul in the near future, and the new home page will be incorporated into that, he said. The media strategy will focus on introducing the option to fly to the Black Hills while communicating the benefits of flying. The markets are recommended based on current inbound airport traffic, market population and driving distance to Rapid City. The target audience is families that are active, affluent and spend time outdoors. They will also target active empty nesters. The campaign will run until early April. Two members of South Dakota's all-Republican congressional delegation support President Donald Trump's decision to temporarily suspend America's refugee program. U.S. Rep. Kristi Noem said in a statement that her first priority is the safety of the American people, adding that she shares Trump's concerns about America's ability to screen refugees, especially those from "terrorist hotbed areas." "I support putting a temporary pause on accepting refugees from terrorist-held areas at least until the administration can certify that asylum seekers do not present a safety threat to the U.S," Noem said. Natalie Krings, a spokeswoman for U.S. Sen. Mike Rounds, said in a statement that until the administration is confident that it's able to process the high number of refugees expected with high certainty, "we should not be allowing this group of refugees into our country." "Terrorists have shown they are willing to infiltrate countries posing as refugees," Rounds said in a statement. "We must make certain our top U.S. intelligence officials are satisfied that we have all the information needed to properly vet certain refugees to make sure they don't have ties to terrorism." Trump signed an order Friday suspending refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely barring the processing of refugees from Syria. It also temporarily bars citizens of seven majority Muslim nations from entering the U.S., but there's confusion about how it applies to certain groups, like U.S. legal permanent residents. A spokesman for GOP Sen. John Thune didn't immediately comment. Immigration lawyers in South Dakota are hearing concerns from families who have resettled in the U.S. from now-banned countries. Taneeza Islam, a Muslim-American immigration lawyer in Sioux Falls, said she has spoken with clients who wonder when they'll be able to see family members overseas. "There's a feeling of panic," said Islam, adding that she thinks the order is unconstitutional and discriminatory. Invasive species like noxious weeds can be a serious problem for farmers. They can spread rapidly, become impossible to control once they've spread, decrease crop and livestock production and ultimately decrease the value of land. Brenda Sievers, Plant Industry Program Manager for the South Dakota Department of Agriculture, is here to help. In partnership with the Association of South Dakota County Weed and Pest Boards and the South Dakota Weed and Pest Commission, Sievers came from Huron to the Black Hills Stock Show to try and help farmers identify and eradicate weeds and pests they find on their property. The idea, she explained, is to get the message out before spring arrives and farmers begin planting season. People come up to her stand asking what she's selling, Sievers said, and she tries to use the opportunity to explain her cause. "We're not selling anything," she said. "We're just here for information." Sievers said the Weed and Pest Commission has been coming to the Stock Show for at least 15 years. They also travel to the Sioux Empire Farm Show, Watertown Winter Farm Show, Dakotafest, and the South Dakota State Fair. Benjamin Franklin once famously quipped that in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes. While theres some truth to what Franklin said, we certainly dont need a system where Americans are taxed at death. The idea that death could be a taxable event might come as a surprise to some people, but believe it or not, the IRS sometimes and unfairly views death as a final chance to help fill its coffers. I strongly disagree, which is why Im continuing my years-long fight to permanently repeal the estate tax or the death tax, which is a far more accurate characterization. The reality of the death tax hits families at the worst possible moment. The last thing families need to worry about when theyre grieving the loss of a loved one is how and when theyll deal with the long arm of the IRS. The underlying premise of the death tax, which is re-taxing wealth that has already been taxed, is fundamentally unfair. It also hits every family differently. In South Dakota, for example, family-owned farms and ranches are often land rich and cash poor. On paper, a family with a several-thousand acre farm might seem far wealthier than whats reflected in the family checkbook or savings account. Anyone who has run a farm or ranch knows that land alone doesnt pay the bills. The land represents an opportunity to earn a living, put food on the table, send kids to school, and keep the operation running from one day to the next. Without it, the farm doesnt exist. The IRS takes the opposite approach. It only sees lines on a balance sheet. The IRS lumps land value with other assets, like cash in bank accounts and the owners home. In too many cases, the land and other assets can put the farm owner and his or her family directly in the crosshairs of death tax. Some people argue that with smart lawyers and accountants and complicated estate planning, individuals can avoid having to pay the death tax at all. While that might be true for some of the wealthiest people who can afford both the ongoing time and financial burden of effective estate planning, thats not the case for everyone. Estate planning comes at a cost, and every dollar spent on a lawyer or accountant is a dollar that isnt reinvested into growing a business, hiring new employees, or boosting paychecks. That money isnt used as effectively as possible while the individual is alive, long before the death tax may even apply. Abolishing the death tax would give Americans greater peace of mind so they can focus on what really matters, and thats why Im committed to this fight. According to the American Farm Bureau, thousands of farms in South Dakota would exceed the death taxs exemption level today, just based on the value of their land. My primary interest in taking up this cause has always been to protect those farmers and ranchers and to put this onerous tax six feet under once and for all. President Trump is making short work of campaign promises, and last Tuesday he signed executive orders reviving the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines. The resurrection is good news for the economy, but one question is whether he'll sink the projects with his protectionist impulses. Mr. Trump signed an executive order inviting TransCanada to apply again for a permit for the Keystone XL pipeline, which the Obama Administration rejected to indulge the anti-carbon obsessions of Democratic campaign donors. Another Trump directive aims to expedite the Dakota Access pipeline, which is 90 percent finished but was halted by President Obama amid protests. A federal judge ruled that the government had met its legal obligations, but the Obama Administration suspended work anyway. Such carve outs for progressive constituencies are one reason voters rejected Democrats in November, and the pipelines promise broader prosperity. Keystone is predicted to spin off 20,000 construction and manufacturing jobs, many of them to be filled by union workers, and add $3 billion to GDP. The pipeline could move 830,000 barrels a day along the route from Alberta to Nebraska; up to 100,000 would come from North Dakota, where a glut of crude has to travel by rail to reach refineries built to process it. The efficiencies will ripple across the oil and gas industry. The Keystone order directs the State Department to make a recommendation within 60 days for a prompt approval, though environmental groups will file lawsuits in every eligible jurisdiction. The objections are specious: President Obama's State Department concluded on several occasions that Keystone would have no meaningful effect on climate or emissions. Moving oil by pipeline emits less carbon and is safer than trains. As for Dakota Access, you may have noticed the months-long rally around Standing Rock Sioux protests. The tribe claims the pipeline will harm its land and water, but Dakota Access does not run beneath the reservation. The route, which was altered 140 times in North Dakota to protect cultural resources, cuts along private land where other pipelines run. The tribe lost in federal court but has vowed to fight President Trump's order. One danger here is President Trump's campaign promise to "renegotiate some of the terms" that included bromides about how "we'll build our own pipes, like we used to in the old days." He floated royalty payments during the campaign, and a separate order on Tuesday directed the Commerce Department to develop a plan to use U.S. steel and iron in all new pipelines. TransCanada has said in past months that it's "fully committed" to Keystone XL, but the company may not be eager for another politician to direct its investment decisions. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Mr. Trump is looking to ensure taxpayers the best possible deal. Reminder: Taxpayers pay nothing. The State Department estimated that when Keystone is finished and pumping oil, local governments will collect more than $55 million a year in property taxes. About 70 percent of the resulting refined products from Keystone would stay in the U.S., which will push down gas prices as another benefit, according to a study from IHS. That already sounds like a good deal. Meanwhile on the livefeed for "The Resistance," Senate Democrats are proposing a trillion dollars in direct federal spending on public works and no doubt hoping to persuade President Trump to go along and divide the GOP. But Republicans in Congress should not agree to a dollar of new such spending without more streamlining in permitting. Private investment projects like Keystone and Dakota Access are the superior route to creating jobs and boosting incomes, which President Trump has long said is his first priority. Mr. Trump's best move would be to ditch his floated Keystone conditions and enjoy taking credit for the resulting economic growth. He could even attend the next ground-breaking ceremony. Sentencing of Russian top anti-corruption official set for April 14 MOSCOW, January 30 (RAPSI) The Moscow City Court will pass a sentence upon Lieutenant General Denis Sugrobov, the former head of the Interior Ministry's Economic Security and Anti-Corruption Department who stands charged with organizing a criminal group, lawyer Eduard Isetsky told RAPSI on Monday. Earlier, a prosecutor asked the court to sentence Sugrobov to 22 years in high-security prison. According to Isetsky, the prosecutor demanded to give other officers on trial prison terms ranging from 17 to 21 years. According to investigators, Sugrobov and his deputy Boris Kolesnikov tried to provoke a Federal Security Service (FSB) officer by offering him $10,000 a month for his protection. Sugrobov was charged with organizing a criminal group, abuse of power and bribery last May. Kolesnikov was arrested in February 2014. In June, he jumped out of a window during questioning at the Investigative Committee. Later the Basmanny District Court said no evidence was found of assisted suicide. In total, 10 defendants are involved in this case with case materials making 393 volumes. Thirty persons are recognized as aggrieved parties, thirteen of whom seek to recover in total 218 million rubles (about $3.5 million) from the defendants. High-ranking Crimean Tatar Majlis member charged with separatism MOSCOW, January 30 (RAPSI) Investigative Department of the Federal Security Services (FSB) Directorate for Crimea and Sevastopol has charged deputy chairman of Majlis of Crimean Tatars, Ilma Umerov, with public calls for separatism, RIA Novosti reported on Monday. According to the FSBs press-service, the defendant has refused to testify. Investigation documents will be transferred to the local Prosecutors Office shortly. In the spring of 2016, a criminal case over calls for violation of Russias territorial integrity was launched against Umerov. He was questioned by the FSB and as a suspect in the case pledged not to leave country. On April 26, the Supreme Court of Crimea granted a lawsuit filed by then republics Prosecutor Natalia Poklonskaya and banned the Majlis of Crimean Tatars as extremist organization. This ruling was upheld by the Supreme Court of Russia on September 29. On May 20, the Moscow City Court ruled that Dzhemilev, along with another leader of the Majlis, Refat Chubarov, are banned from entering Crimea for five years. The regional officials claim that the Tatar leaders activity incited inter-ethnic hatred. Bills on criminal liability for obstructing driveway of ambulances reach State Duma MOSCOW, January 30 (RAPSI) Russian State Duma will review bills introducing criminal punishment for obstructing driveway of ambulances if such disruption caused grave harm to a persons health or death of a person, a statement on the lower house of parliaments website reads on Monday. According to authors of the bills, if a person suffers grave harm to health, one responsible for obstructing ambulance may be sentenced up to two years in prison. A criminal may be sentenced up to five years in prison if his actions caused a person to die. Bills also propose to toughen administrative liability by increasing administrative fine up to 1500 rubles (about $25) with cancellation of driving license for up to a year. Current legislation reads that obstructing driveway of ambulance which is moving with activated blue beacons and siren may result in a 500-ruble fine (about 8$) and cancellation of driving license for up to 3 months. These initiatives are related to a dramatic incident which occurred on January 10. A driver of a car refused to let ambulance pass on its way to a person in danger. As a result, medical professionals could not reach that person in time. The National Weather Service in Missoula says a significant winter storm will move into the area Monday night, potentially dumping 6 to 8 inches of snow by Wednesday from Polson to Stevensville and 8 to 12 inches of snow in Condon, Seeley Lake and Superior. The weather service said Sunday afternoon that there was still some uncertainty about where the band of snow will form "but the likely area looks to be over west-central/northwest Montana, including the Mission valleys, Seeley-Swan valleys, Highway 200 in the Ovando/Potomac region, I-90 corridor stretching from Lookout Pass to Deerlodge and Missoula/northern Bitterroot valley.'' A Canadian cold front is predicted to move in Tuesday evening, dropping temperatures to the single digits or low teens by Wednesday morning. Light to moderate snow could linger into Wednesday along and south of the I-90 corridor, but the weather service said there is "quite a bit of uncertainty'' about that prediction. Privacy Policy RealChoice is a BlogSpot blog. You get whatever privacy you get when you post on a blog. As Blogmistress of RealChoice, I do not collect information on my users or those who post comments. I will delete spam and offensive comments, and thoroughly cooperate with law enforcement, as I did in the case of Ted "Operation Counterstrike" Schulman, if people make terroristic threats on my blog. So fight nice, kids. America must return to conservative principles of less government,reduced taxes, less spending and a balanced budget! Cut,cap and balance! Trumps Alternative Facts on Mexico (LIES) vs. the TRUTH The U.S. Has Ripped Off and Bitterly Oppressed Mexico for Nearly 200 Years and Has No Right Whatsoever to Dictate to It January 30, 2017 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us On Friday, January 27, a scheduled meeting between Donald Trump and Mexicos president Enrique Pena Nieto collapsed. That same day, Trump tweeted: Mexico has taken advantage of the U.S. for long enough. Massive trade deficits & little help on the very weak border must change, NOW! It would be difficult to pack more lies into 140 characters. Weak border?!? In 1846 the U.S. invaded Mexico and stoleyes, stoleabout 55 percent of its territory. The U.S. Southwest from Texas to California and north to states like Nevada and Colorado was once part of Mexico. Now I can just hear these reactionary fools saying, Well, Bob, answer me this. If this country is so terrible, why do people come here from all over the world? Why are so many people trying to get in, not get out? ...Why? Ill tell you why. Because you have fucked up the rest of the world even worse than what you have done in this country. You have made it impossible for many people to live in their own countries as part of gaining your riches and power. Bob Avakian, BAsics 1:14 The border between the two countries is one of the most heavily militarized zones in the world. The air is prowled by drones and surveillance aircraft; patrol boats scour the waters of the Pacific and Gulf of Mexico; the land crawls with tens of thousands of heavily armed law enforcement agents of every conceivable variety, hundreds of vigilantes, and contains several large military bases; the border itself is scarred with barbed wire, razor wire, and yes, walls. All of it on one sidethe U.S. side. All of it aimed at preventing impoverished immigrants seeking work from reaching the U.S. And those who do manage to get inside the U.S. encounter a landscape dotted with concentration camps called detention centers, where even children are subjected to what can only be called torture. Massive trade deficits?!? A cornerstone of U.S. wealth and global power has been ruthless domination of Mexico. For over a century some of the most profitable and powerful pillars of the U.S. economythe great agricultural regions of California, the rich mines of the West and Southwestdeveloped on the backs of Mexicans and their descendants. For several decades now, bitter exploitation of Mexican and Central American immigrants in every corner of this country has been pivotal to the profitable development of U.S. capitalism. Immigrants work in key industries in every state of the countryin low-wage factory and field jobs, or driving a taxi or sweeping floors. All face rampant racist discrimination and insult in every sphere of their lives, and those who are undocumented live in fear every day that they will be fired because of their legal status, or rounded up by the immigration police. Mexico has taken advantage of the U.S.?!? What Is Capitalism? by Bob Avakian 3-part excerpt from Revolution: Why It's Necessary, Why It's Possible, What It's All About. U.S. capitalism-imperialism has sucked almost limitless wealth out of Mexicoits rich and varied agriculture; its oil production; the maquiladoras that line the border and subject young women to extreme, relentless exploitation and abuse. Most of all, it has forced millions of people to leave behind their families, their friends, their communities... and try to make a desperate journey across difficult terrain, past soldiers, border agents, and racists so they can hopefully find work at some shit job in the U.S. Imperialism is literally sucking the calcium out of the bones of farmworkers. If you think thats exaggerationlearn something about the farmworkers of Guanajuato. Now Trump is moving to greatly expand the number of people who will be deported, by declaring that virtually anyone picked up for any offense is a criminal. He says he will punish cities where police dont go along with a federal mandate that they inquire about and turn over all immigration information they have to immigration authorities, so people can be put in detention and deported. Trumps spokesman said, Were going to create more detention space for illegal immigrants along the southern border to make it easier and cheaper to detain them and return them to their country of origin. Renegotiating Exploitation In 1994 the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) between the U.S., Canada, and Mexico went into effect. This week Trump tweeted, I will renegotiate NAFTA. If I cant make a great deal, were going to tear it up. Trump threatens that this will make Mexico ... treat the United States fairly with respect. Another of Trumps big lies is that NAFTA has victimized the U.S. and enriched Mexico. But whos fucking over who here? As Laura Carlsen of the Center for International Policy wrote, NAFTA has cut a path of destruction through Mexico. Wages have plummeted, prices and unemployment have risen. One illustration of thatover two million Mexican farmers and their families have been driven from their land because massive imports of heavily subsidized U.S. grain have undercut their ability to make a living. Find out more about the revolution Find out about BA, the leader of the revolution U.S. capital has poured into Mexico, taking advantage of Mexicos cheap labor (i.e., deeply exploited people) to cut their overall costs of production, while disrupting the development of Mexicos overall economy. NAFTA has opened Mexico up to even more thorough and devastating imperialist plunder. It has helped impoverish millions of Mexican people and enrich U.S. imperialism. But this is not enough for a fascist section of the U.S. ruling class coalesced around Trump, who are out to impose even more ruthless exploitation of immigrants in this country and unrestrained domination of Mexico. Trump is out to bring Mexico to its knees. Think about it. Who the hell is Trump or the U.S. to impose its will on the people of the world, and then demand You better be nice to us? The U.S. has no right to do this! Trump demands to renegotiate NAFTA so that it is even more beneficial to the U.S. and squeezes even more out of Mexicos people. This threat would greatly worsen the conditions of the Mexican peoplemore unemployment, more children living in poverty, a society already being torn apart by the murders and violence of drug cartels going to new levels of mayhem. There Is No Immigration Problem; There Is a Capitalism Problem Bob Avakian wrote: There is nothing sacred to us about the USA, as it is presently constituted, or about the borders of the U.S. as they are presently constituted. Quite the opposite. BAsics 3:20 The U.S.-Mexico border was created through brutal conquest, and has served domination and exploitation since. In the hall of mirrors that is Trumpworld, Mexico pushes around spineless America, and the border is a sieve letting in criminals who wreak havoc upon this country. In the real world, the border is a hyper militarized war zone that crushes the lives of countless people hoping for a chance to work. Mexico and its resources have been bled white by a century of U.S. imperialist domination, and millions of its people are sufferingliving on the brink of starvation in a land rich in agricultural potential; scuffling for small change in a country that ships so much of its wealth to the U.S. In this country, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) is being beefed up for whole new levels of round-ups of immigrants. People are being forced into the shadows, living with the constant fear that their child, or parent, or loved one, will suddenly disappear. The federal program that lured tens of thousands of young people to turn their personal information in to federal authorities, thinking they would avoid deportation, instead put them on lists that can be handed over to immigration police, and be swept up at any time. If this sounds like what happened in Nazi Germany, thats because it is. And its what these fascists are developing the ability to do hereif they are able to succeed. What Trump is trying to unleash against Mexican and Central American immigrants, and against the country of Mexico, is not a pendulum swing to the right. It is an utterly illegitimate, fascist escalation of repression. This must not be allowed to happen. It must be vigorously opposed and defeated as part of going up against the entire fascist program of Trump-Pence. But more than that, we have to repeat the question Bob Avakian has repeatedly raised: why do we even have borders, and the divisions between people they enforce and concentrate? Why cant we get beyond that into a freely living community of human beings everywhere on this planet? We canby making REVOLUTIONand a big part of that revolution will be forging the links between the masses of people in Mexico, and their struggle against both imperialist domination and their own exploiters and oppressors, and the masses of people in the U.S., in a struggle to get rid of this imperialist system, once and for all. For full coverage and the current issue of REVOLUTION click here Kathmandu, Nepal: The Government of Japan has decided to extend financial assistance of US Dollar 15,387, equivalent to approximately Nepalese Rupees 1,668,000, to Damak Municipality Office under the Grant Assistance for Japanese NGO Projects Scheme. Damak Municipality Office, a municipality office in Jhapa, will be provided with a secondhand fire engine from Myozai Fire Department, Japan, through coordination with the Tokushima-Nepal Friendship Association, under the Project for Provision of a Secondhand Fire Engine for Damak Municipality. Tokushima-Nepal Friendship Association is a Japanese NGO based in Tokushima, Japan. A Grant Contract relating to this project is scheduled to be signed and exchanged at the Embassy of Japan to Nepal on 31st January, 2017, between Mr. Shinya MACHIDA, Charge dAffaires a. i. of Japan to Nepal, and Mr. Yubaraj DAHAL, Executive Officer, Damak Municipality Office. This grant assistance will be used to implement the project in Damak Municipality by providing a secondhand fire engine from Japan so that the capacity of Damak Municipality Office to respond to incidents of fire will be improved. Damak Municipality is located in Jhapa District, south-east of Nepal. It was established in 1982 and the population is about 100,000. The Fire Section was started in 1993 and eight staff, including drivers, fire fighters and commanders are employed there. Currently, Damak Municipality Office owns one fire engine which is used for firefighting in the municipality as well as surrounding areas. Last year, it was called out more than 80 times. Due to the increased population caused by urbanization and also demand from surrounding area, it is getting more difficult to respond to all the incidents. Thus, the newly obtained fire engine from the Government of Japan will help the municipality to respond to the needs of residents and will make it possible to better protect them from incidents of fire. The Embassy of Japan in Nepal expects the success of this project will benefit the local people of Damak and will also enhance the cordial friendship between the peoples of Japan and Nepal. Kathmandu, Nepal: A meeting of the Legislature-Parliament has on Monday endorsed the Bill on Election Offences and Punishment, 2016 on. With this endorsement of the bill, three elections related bills have been endorsed so far. The way would be paved for the elections only after the two remaining bills on Bill to Amend and Integrate Laws Related to Local Election and Bill to Amend and Integrate Laws Related to Political Parties are indorsed from the parliament. These two bills are still under discussion at the State Affairs Sub Committee. The second meeting called for 2:30 pm had endorsed the same bill as first meeting called for 1:30 was postponed after Home Minister Bimalendra Nidhi did not turn up on time. If you're feeling generous and just can't pass up the opportunity to get me a present, some suggestions are listed here GALLERY: A look at Chinese New Year celebrations in Santa Maria and around the world Blog Archive Nov 2022 (10) Oct 2022 (64) Sep 2022 (60) Aug 2022 (61) Jul 2022 (55) Jun 2022 (60) May 2022 (73) Apr 2022 (60) Mar 2022 (58) Feb 2022 (65) Jan 2022 (69) Dec 2021 (106) Nov 2021 (84) Oct 2021 (58) Sep 2021 (67) Aug 2021 (62) Jul 2021 (54) Jun 2021 (50) May 2021 (58) Apr 2021 (44) Mar 2021 (57) Feb 2021 (64) Jan 2021 (93) Dec 2020 (82) Nov 2020 (62) Oct 2020 (50) Sep 2020 (45) Aug 2020 (51) Jul 2020 (56) Jun 2020 (53) May 2020 (70) Apr 2020 (66) Mar 2020 (169) Feb 2020 (211) Jan 2020 (184) Dec 2019 (54) Nov 2019 (56) Oct 2019 (55) Sep 2019 (63) Aug 2019 (54) Jul 2019 (69) Jun 2019 (56) May 2019 (65) Apr 2019 (68) Mar 2019 (72) Feb 2019 (76) Jan 2019 (62) Dec 2018 (55) Nov 2018 (69) Oct 2018 (90) Sep 2018 (82) Aug 2018 (58) Jul 2018 (36) Jun 2018 (47) May 2018 (44) Apr 2018 (64) Mar 2018 (63) Feb 2018 (68) Jan 2018 (92) Dec 2017 (85) Nov 2017 (64) Oct 2017 (82) Sep 2017 (54) Aug 2017 (89) Jul 2017 (60) Jun 2017 (86) May 2017 (84) Apr 2017 (62) Mar 2017 (86) Feb 2017 (91) Jan 2017 (113) Dec 2016 (109) Nov 2016 (100) Oct 2016 (82) Sep 2016 (95) Aug 2016 (84) Jul 2016 (84) Jun 2016 (99) May 2016 (93) Apr 2016 (106) Mar 2016 (145) Feb 2016 (125) Jan 2016 (103) Dec 2015 (83) Nov 2015 (80) Oct 2015 (100) Sep 2015 (111) Aug 2015 (94) Jul 2015 (98) Jun 2015 (151) May 2015 (125) Apr 2015 (109) Mar 2015 (122) Feb 2015 (113) Jan 2015 (135) Dec 2014 (131) Nov 2014 (115) Oct 2014 (146) Sep 2014 (112) Aug 2014 (128) Jul 2014 (94) Jun 2014 (104) May 2014 (140) Apr 2014 (132) Mar 2014 (81) Feb 2014 (89) Jan 2014 (141) Dec 2013 (100) Nov 2013 (96) Oct 2013 (99) Sep 2013 (94) Aug 2013 (95) Jul 2013 (95) Jun 2013 (91) May 2013 (139) Apr 2013 (179) Mar 2013 (73) Feb 2013 (76) Jan 2013 (85) Dec 2012 (59) Nov 2012 (71) Oct 2012 (85) Sep 2012 (70) Aug 2012 (71) Jul 2012 (53) Jun 2012 (51) May 2012 (52) Apr 2012 (52) Mar 2012 (69) Feb 2012 (76) Jan 2012 (70) Dec 2011 (60) Nov 2011 (54) Oct 2011 (57) Sep 2011 (75) Aug 2011 (72) Jul 2011 (64) Jun 2011 (76) May 2011 (56) Apr 2011 (73) Mar 2011 (114) Feb 2011 (71) Jan 2011 (80) Dec 2010 (92) Nov 2010 (82) Oct 2010 (73) Sep 2010 (95) Aug 2010 (86) Jul 2010 (81) Jun 2010 (76) May 2010 (71) Apr 2010 (74) Mar 2010 (74) Feb 2010 (82) Jan 2010 (101) Dec 2009 (108) Nov 2009 (182) Oct 2009 (136) Sep 2009 (102) Aug 2009 (120) Jul 2009 (151) Jun 2009 (136) May 2009 (180) Apr 2009 (145) Mar 2009 (113) Feb 2009 (113) Jan 2009 (124) Dec 2008 (108) Nov 2008 (69) Oct 2008 (89) Sep 2008 (76) Aug 2008 (75) Jul 2008 (87) Jun 2008 (80) May 2008 (99) Apr 2008 (93) Mar 2008 (115) Feb 2008 (147) Jan 2008 (162) Dec 2007 (124) Nov 2007 (95) Oct 2007 (67) Sep 2007 (42) Aug 2007 (78) Jul 2007 (75) Jun 2007 (123) May 2007 (110) Apr 2007 (108) Mar 2007 (92) Feb 2007 (136) Jan 2007 (119) Dec 2006 (41) Nov 2006 (34) Oct 2006 (12) Sep 2006 (13) Aug 2006 (13) Jul 2006 (16) Jun 2006 (12) May 2006 (21) Apr 2006 (38) Mar 2006 (27) Feb 2006 (25) Jan 2006 (18) Fred Korematsu, a civil rights activist who was incarcerated simply for being an American-born citizen with Japanese heritage, is the subject of today's Google Doodle. Korematsu, who died in 2005, went into hiding after President Franklin D. Roosevelt's order to place Japanese-Americans (as well as German-Americans and Italian-Americans) in internment camps. About 120,000 Japanese-American men, women and children were "relocated" for years. The Google Doodle explanation says: He was 22 years old and working as a foreman in his hometown when Executive Order 9066 was signed in 1942 by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The order sent more than 115,000 people of Japanese descent living in the United States to incarceration. Rather than voluntarily relocate to an internment camp, Korematsu went into hiding. He was arrested in 1942 and despite the help of organizations like ACLU, his conviction was upheld in the landmark Supreme Court case of Korematsu v. United States. Consequently, he and his family were sent to the the Central Utah War Relocation Center at Topaz, Utah until the end of WWII in 1945. It wasnt until 1976 that President Gerald Ford formally ended Executive Order 9066 and apologized for the internment, stating "We now know what we should have known then not only was that evacuation wrong but Japanese-Americans were and are loyal Americans. Fred Korematsus conviction was overturned in 1983 after evidence came to light that disputed the necessity of the internment. Five years later President Ronald Reagan signed the The Civil Liberties Act of 1988 citing "racial prejudice, wartime hysteria and a lack of political leadership" as the central motivation for Japanese internment. In 1998, President Bill Clinton awarded Korematsu with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the countrys most distinguished civilian award. Fred Korematsu can be remembered fighting for civil rights and against prejudice throughout his life, famously saying: "If you have the feeling that something is wrong, don't be afraid to speak up." The doodle by artist Sophie Diao-herself a child of Asian immigrants-features a patriotic portrait of Korematsu wearing his Presidential Medal of Freedom, a scene of the internment camps to his back, surrounded by cherry blossoms, flowers that have come to be symbols of peace and friendship between the US and Japan. After two days of protests at San Francisco International Airport in response to detentions under President Trump's executive order imposing a federal travel ban on seven majority-Muslim countries, all five detainees at the local airport were released yesterday according to officials from the airport and Customs and Border Protection. Four detainees were released early Sunday afternoon with the fifth and final detainee released soon after. Local CBP advises 4 individuals that were detained under Executive Order have been released. 5th and final individual still being processed. flySFO (@flySFO) January 29, 2017 Local CBP confirms the last person detained a SFO by the Executive Order has been released. flySFO (@flySFO) January 29, 2017 Touching video shows an elderly Iranian couple embracing after their release, which was advocated by the Asian Law Caucus. The two were reportedly detained for 30 hours. #SFO: elderly Iranian couple held 30+ hours released. Reports of additional travelers detained still coming in. Protests continue.#MuslimBan AsianLawCaucus (@aaaj_alc) January 29, 2017 Good work by @aaaj_alc staff attorney Elica Vafaie who worked on the release of an elderly Iranian couple held overnight. #SFO #happymonday pic.twitter.com/PQYBR5bkUn Mansi (@mansiesq) January 30, 2017 President Trump's executive order of last week, which was temporarily stayed by a federal judge in Brooklyn as quickly as Saturday evening, drew immediate protests at international airports across the country as dozens of travelers were caught in its net. The countries on the 90-day travel ban list are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Trump's order also bars refugees from entry to the US for 120 days and bans Syrian refugees indefinitely. As word of local detentions spread, beginning at 3 p.m. on Saturday, activists flooded SFO's International Terminal, where protestors still remained as of Sunday evening. Memorable sign #MuslimBan #SFOprotest: "Give me your tired your poor your huddled masses yearning to breathe FREE" pic.twitter.com/pH6Jhm2tRm Pamela Larson (@PamReporting) January 30, 2017 At #sfoprotest last night. Love how woke this city is. And thank you, @flySFO for your solidarity with the people. https://t.co/FXp9h5WM9h pic.twitter.com/dvSm1fn8Fl Sheba Najmi (@snajmi) January 30, 2017 On Sunday, protesters shut down the terminal altogether, delaying flights and altering schedules. Trump protest at SFO only getting bigger, security checkpoints shut down in international terminal. #sfoprotest pic.twitter.com/c8hOaff3Kt Kurtis Alexander (@kurtisalexander) January 30, 2017 I was supposed to fly home from SFO tonight but police/TSA shut terminals down because of peaceful protest. I still support protesters. 1/2 Nunc Est Infernum (@profceastman) January 30, 2017 The #NoMuslimBan protest at SFO shut down the escalators. Exciting, massive crowd all day. pic.twitter.com/54DtyZHFtj jenya cassidy (@oneunionmom) January 30, 2017 80-year-old Abdollah Mostafavi, a green-card holder who splits his time between Canada, the US, and his native Iran, was one of the travelers detained at SFO. Mostafavi was bound for hip replacement surgery in San Francisco, per the AP, when he was stopped suddenly and detained for six hours before being released into the arms of his 46-year-old daughter and his grandson. He said it seemed they had the order to detain them but had no idea what to do next, his daughter, Mozhgan Mostafavi, told the AP. Her father had been held for hours in a room with as many as 15 other Iranians, she said. "I dont know any Iranians who have been in a terrorist attack. Its so dehumanizing. Its so insulting. I grew up during the Revolution in Iran and I feel that same suffocation. Its hard to breathe. There were early reports on Saturday that one detainee was sent to county jail for detention, a loose thread amidst other stories of releases. Incredible energy still at SFO as some detainees being released; can confirm 1 person sent to county jail for detention pic.twitter.com/9RPGgbu3Ac Sana Saleem (@sanasaleem) January 29, 2017 lawyer working with an individual detained at SFO, received news 30 year old Iranian man put in jail Pamela Larson (@PamReporting) January 29, 2017 Thousands of activists at SFO over the course of the two-day protest were supported with supplies like food and water and even good cheer provided by a brass band. This is awesome--someone showed up with In-N-Out and pizza and is handing it out to the protesters at SFO. pic.twitter.com/ggaJnJNCUA Jenny Luna (@J2theLuna) January 29, 2017 Band at SFO protest. Huge energy as protesters demand release of detainees pic.twitter.com/L4tpg3Ha0f Brian Nguyen (@bhngyn) January 29, 2017 A brass band leading protestors through the International Terminal at SFO. pic.twitter.com/AWzLxqPMag Sergio Quintana (@svqjournalist) January 30, 2017 Sharon, a Catholic nun from SF, killin it at the SFO protest pic.twitter.com/mgwja4234s Madison Pauly (@msjpauly) January 29, 2017 Local official entities also appeared to support the protestors. BART, which many used to access SFO, encouraged riders to travel and emphasized inclusivity. You can take BART to all kinds of weekend events - also, direct service to SFO is running great right now. SFBART (@SFBART) January 28, 2017 All races, colors, religions, genders, ages, disabled, veterans, orientations, sexes & those of foreign national origin are welcome on BART. SFBART (@SFBART) January 29, 2017 When some Twitter users criticized the transit agency's tweet "propaganda" and politically motived, BART responded that "This is a list of federal protected classes. It is neither political nor controversial. #BayAreaRidesTogether" Even SFO management affirmed the rights of protesters in a statement issued yesterday "regarding the President's Executive Order relating to immigration:" We appreciate all those who have so passionately expressed their concerns over the President's Executive Order relating to immigration. We share these concerns deeply, as our highest obligation is to the millions of people from around the world whom we serve. Although Customs and Border Protection services are strictly federal and operate outside the jurisdiction of all U.S. airports, including SFO, we have requested a full briefing from this agency to ensure our customers remain a top priority. We are also making supplies available to travelers affected by this Executive Order, as well as to the members of the public who have so bravely taken a stand against this action by speaking publicly in our facilities. According to ABC7, more protestors of Trump's immigration ban could be headed to SFO today. Previously: Protesters Pack SFO To Decry Detentions Under Trump's Immigration Ban Second Day Of Protest Hits SFO As Airbnb Offers Free Rooms To Those Affected By Travel Ban The San Francisco Police Department is reportedly investigating a death case today, after a man was found dying on a San Francisco street. Update: An SFPD spokesperson has since confirmed that the death is being investigated as a homicide. According to Hoodline, the victim has been identified as 58-year-old Marco Diaz Perez. NBC Bay Area reports that passing officers were flagged down at 9:15 Sunday morning by a witness who said that "there was someone with severe injuries on the ground" near the intersection of Mission Street and Excelsior Avenue. The man, who police say did not appear to have been shot, was rushed to San Francisco General Hospital. He was pronounced dead when he arrived, NBC reports. As always, anyone with any information on the slaying is urged to call SFPD's Anonymous Tip Line at 415-575-4444 or to text a tip to Tip411 with SFPD at the beginning of the message. Related: Brazen Afternoon Shooting In San Francisco Claims Life Of Teen The weekend brought a flurry of public statements from Silicon Valley executives denouncing President Trump's refugee and general travel ban for residents of seven majority-Muslim nations, with varying degrees of outrage and criticism. Mark Zuckerberg spoke about his "concerns,", Tim Cook invoked MLK, and Google CEO Sundar Pichai, himself an immigrant from India, recalled staff from abroad and called the move a "painful" one. And while Trump tried to make peace with an industry that largely denounced his candidacy with a few exceptions at that mid-December summit at Trump Tower, six weeks later most tech industry leaders are sounding alarm bells over the immigration issue as it strikes at the heart of their global mode of doing business. Also, a large number of those employed in tech are either immigrants themselves, or the children of immigrants, and the conflation of immigration with terrorism, or the "stealing" of jobs from Americans, is an insult to most. The New York Times posted a pair of stories, one noting that the industry's "ambivalence" toward Trump following the election had turned to anger, by and large, with so many CEOs taking to social media on Saturday and Sunday to express their outrage. Google co-founder Sergey Brin took part in the protest at SFO reportedly saying "I'm here because I'm a refugee." (Brin came to the US with his parents fleeing the Soviet Union when he was 6.) Netflix CEO Reed Hastings took to Facebook saying, "Trump's actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all. Worse, these actions will make America less safe (through hatred and loss of allies) rather than more safe." Tesla CEO Elon Musk posted to Twitter encouraging people to read the "source material" of Trump's order, which you can do here. Reading the source material is better than reading other people's opinions about the source material https://t.co/HKIYKbdb3g Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 30, 2017 In this post Monday on the NYT's Bits blog, tech writer Jim Kerstetter discusses the obvious trouble the entire industry is facing when travel and immigration bans suddenly change the way they do business. While the tech industry might appreciate the lower taxes and less regulation that Mr. Trump has promised, the industry is globalist to the core. If you want to be an internet company, youd be better be willing to operate all over the world. And if you want to compete with the likes of Google and Apple, youd better be willing to hire engineers and salespeople from all over the planet. The biggest shock for the industry may be yet to come: Bloomberg reports that the Trump Administration has already drafted an order that will overhaul the process of issuing H-1B work visas. While reform for the foreign work visa program is already underway, with Democrats in Congress working on their own proposal, the Trump draft order strikes a tone similar to the one in his campaign, suggesting that precious American jobs are being given away. H-1B visas are currently limited to 85,000 per year for those holding undergraduate and advanced degrees. Per the draft obtained by Blooomberg, the order reads, "Our countrys immigration policies should be designed and implemented to serve, first and foremost, the U.S. national interest. Visa programs for foreign workers should be administered in a manner that protects the civil rights of American workers and current lawful residents, and that prioritizes the protection of American workers -- our forgotten working people -- and the jobs they hold." Also impacted will be the worldwide science community, where many people hold dual citizenships and travel on work visas. As the SF Business Times reports, various CEOs at Bay Area biotech and scientific research firms were speaking out against Trump's executive order over the weekend, with Paul Hastings of Redwood Citys OncoMed Pharmaceuticals calling it "an insult to any person, regardless of ethnicity or religion," and CEO Jeff Huber of cancer diagnostic firm Grail Inc. writing on Medium "I am saddened and ashamed of our administrations behavior in these actions." Scientists fear that indefinite bans will have hugely negative impacts on academic research, which relies on collaboration between teams across the globe. Hani Goodarzi, an assistant professor at UCSF, told the Business Times, "There is no question that academics are hard hit by this ban. Between conferences, workshops and collaborations, todays science is a global effort. Also, because postdoctoral students from other countries often spend an average of 10 to 12 years as US residents on student visas, it often means they can be separated from their families due to travel restrictions. Due to the visa restrictions and lengthy processing times that were already in place," Goodarzi told the paper, "scholars from these listed countries were afforded few reunions with their relatives and loved ones back home. This ban has radically aggravated the situation." One young scientist, an Iranian national named Samira Asgari, had been studying in Switzerland and had accepted a job in Boston when Trump's executive order stranded her on a layover in Frankfurt. She tells The Verge that she was taken out of a boarding line for her Boston flight and told she wouldn't be able to go to the US for at least 120 days. Meanwhile neither she nor her boyfriend have jobs or a home because they were en route to a new home in Boston. A petition gathering signatures from the scientific community denouncing the ban already has more than 12,000 signatures, including 37 Nobel laureates and 7,000 US faculty members. Though protests are expected to continue for a third day today at San Francisco International Airport, a much larger protest on the immigration issue looks to be taking shape for next weekend in downtown SF, on February 4, as Hoodline reports via this Facebook event. Previously: All SFO Detainees Released After Second Day Of Immigration Ban Protests SIOUX CITY - Find out the stories behind the Sioux City Public Museums current exhibit, A History of Brewing in Sioux City, at a series of upcoming programs. The series begins with The Science and Art of Craft Brewing on Thursday, February 2 at 6:30 p.m. Presenter Dave Winslow, owner of Jackson Street Brewery, will describe how the brewing process works, how he got into brewing and the difference between craft breweries and traditional breweries. Pieces of equipment from his business will be shown as examples. After a time for questions, the audience will be invited to walk over to the brewery located behind the museum on 5th Street to look at the brewing setup. Februarys History at High Noon presentation titled, Sioux City Brews will be held on Thursday, February 16 at 12:05 p.m. Presented by Matt Anderson, Curator of History, the program will trace the history of brewing in Sioux City back to 1860 when Rudolph Selzer established Northwest Iowas first brewery. With the notable exception of periods when state or federal law prohibited the manufacture of alcoholic beverages, brewing was a significant component of Sioux Citys industrial economy between 1860 and 1960. Local brewing re-emerged with microbreweries in Sioux City later. Local beer memorabilia collectors will highlight items from their personal collections at the Exhibit Reception & Discussion on Thursday, March 2 from 5 7 p.m. Several artifacts in the exhibit such as crates, bottles, cans, promotional merchandise and advertising pieces are on loan. Refreshments will be served. Attendees are invited to bring artifacts related to Sioux Citys breweries from their own collections. On display through March 12, A History of Brewing in Sioux City features Sioux Citys early breweries, their products, and the impact state and federal prohibition laws had on the industry locally. The Sioux City Public Museum is located at 607 4th Street in downtown Sioux City. Admission is free. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday 1 to 5 p.m. For more information, call 712-279-6174 or visit www.siouxcitymuseum.org. Could Hidden Figures pull off a surprise win at next months Oscars? Sundays Screen Actors Guild Awards suggested its entirely possible. The film won Best Performance by an Ensemble essentially that groups Best Picture besting La La Land, Manchester by the Sea and Moonlight, the three expected to battle it out. Considering actors account for more Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences members than any other branch, that could be a sign. Emma Stone (from La La Land), Viola Davis (Fences) and Mahershala Ali (Moonlight) won as expected, but Denzel Washington (Fences) beat Casey Affleck (Manchester), revealing a crack in Afflecks stranglehold on the Best Actor prize. Between now and Feb. 26, expect plenty of jockeying before we learn whos going home with Oscar. If Washington wins, itll be his third, putting him in that rare class that includes Meryl Streep, Jack Nicholson, Ingrid Bergman, Katharine Hepburn (who got four), Daniel Day-Lewis and Walter Brennan. While film actors were a bit more reserved in their acceptance speeches, television winners followed Meryl Streeps Golden Globes lead and called out President Trump for some of his actions, including his executive order on immigration. Most heated was David Harbour, one of the stars of Stranger Things, who got a standing ovation after saying, We will shelter freaks and outcasts, those who have no home. We will get past the lies. We will hunt monsters. And when we are at a loss amidst the hypocrisy and casual violence of certain individuals and institutions, we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy what we have envisioned for ourselves and the marginalized. Stranger Things won Best Performance by an Ensemble/Drama; Orange Is the New Black (starring former Sioux Cityan Lori Petty) got Best Ensemble/Comedy. Individual winners were Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Veep), William H. Macy (Shameless), Bryan Cranston (All the Way), Sarah Poulson (The People v. O.J. Simpson), Claire Foy (The Crown) and John Lithgow (The Crown). Iowan Ashton Kutcher introduced the show and welcomed everyone in airports that belong in my America. You are part of the fabric of who we are. We love you and we welcome you. Louis-Dreyfus, the first winner, followed and said the immigrant ban is a blemish and it is un-American. Others followed suit until Taraji P. Henson, one of the stars of Hidden Figures, related current events to her film. When we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race, we win. Love wins. Every time. Lily Tomlin won the Lifetime Achievement Award, which was presented by her friend Dolly Parton. SIOUX CITY -- Aaron Iacino, a risk manager for Innovative Business Consultants of Sioux City, recently attended an extensive training session at the Treasure Coast Public Safety Training Complex in Fort Pierce, Florida. The facility is home to the National Preparedness Institute and hosts training for safety professionals from all over the world. At the facility, Iacino attended courses to gain credentials to become a U.S. Department of Transportation hazardous materials instructor. Venture School is an intensive six-week course where people who have what they think are great business ideas work with experienced mentors and possible investors to test those ideas and see if they really are all that great. The John Pappajohn Entrepreneurial Center program helps entrepreneurs learn if a market really exists, or if the business can prosper with modifications. STORM LAKE, Iowa | Two have been charged with felonies after a fight that left blood and damaged property throughout a Storm Lake apartment Sunday. A release issued by the Storm Lake Police Department said police responded to a call at an apartment complex in the 600 block of Superior Street at 3:20 a.m. for a woman who was losing a large amount of blood. Police observed Charlene Smith, 35, lying on the floor in a semi-conscious state. Police also noted heavy damage to the walls, windows and property, as well as blood pooled throughout the apartment. The investigation, police said, showed that Smith became angry with Shawn Rowell, 22, of Storm Lake, during a party at the residence. Smith began destroying property with a softball bat and her hands. Rowell, who had departed prior to Smith destroying property, returned. Police say he and Smith engaged in a physical confrontation. Rowell then fled the scene, but turned himself in at 6 p.m. Sunday. Smith was treated and released from Buena Vista Regional Medical Center. Rowell also sustained injuries. Smith was charged with second-degree criminal mischief, willful injury, going armed with intent and assault while participating in a felony all felonies. Rowell was charged with second-degree criminal mischief and willful injury causing injury, both felonies. Both were transported to Buena Vista County Jail. SIOUX CENTER, Iowa | Jewish scholar Jared Goldfarb will present two lectures at Dordt College on Feb. 6. An independent educator and licensed tour guide based in Jerusalem, Goldfarb will speak on "The Disappearing Dead Sea: Politics, Theology and the Environment" at 3 p.m. in the Science and Technology classroom 1606, on the Sioux Center campus at 498 Fourth Ave. NE. In addition, Goldfarb will give the lecture "Considering Israel/Palestine: The Bible, Geopolitics, Narratives and More" at 8 p.m. Feb. 7 at the college's classroom 1606. Sponsored by Dordt's theology department, both lectures are free and open to the public. "Dordt is fortunate to have such an engaging and knowledgeable speaker visiting our campus," theology professor Ben Lappenga said. "For our students and the wider community, this is a wonderful chance to engage the many pressing issues related to Israel and the Middle East." Before Judge John Ackerman Justin Ames, 37, Sioux City, forgery; sentenced Jan. 23, deferred judgment, two years probation. Jaime Miguel Espinoza, 29, Sioux City, possession of a controlled substance -- third violation; sentenced Jan. 23, five years prison suspended, three years probation. Jennifer Lee Ferraguti, 26, Sioux City, operating a vehicle without owner's consent, possession of a controlled substance; sentenced Jan. 25, 90 days jail, two years probation. Fernando Murillo, 45, Sioux City, assault on a peace officer; sentenced Jan. 24, five years prison suspended, three years probation. Scott Robertson, 33, Sioux City, possession of a controlled substance -- third violation; sentenced Jan. 23, five years prison suspended, three years probation. Before Judge Jeffrey Poulson Aaron John Privett, 26, Sioux City, conspiracy to possess with intent to deliver a controlled substance; sentenced Jan. 23, 10 years prison suspended, three years probation. Gerald Lee Dickes Jr., 32, Sioux City, possession of a controlled substance -- third violation, operating while intoxicated -- third offense; sentenced Jan. 26; five years prison. Jacob Clinton Lammers, 28, Meriden, Iowa, possession of a controlled substance -- third offense (two counts); sentenced Jan. 26, five years prison suspended, two years probation. SIOUX CITY | Forums have been set by the League of Women Voters of Sioux City and other groups for people to hear updates from Iowa legislators. The forums run from 10 to 11:30 a.m. on the last Saturdays of the month at the downtown Sioux City Public Museum. Siouxland legislators discuss pending state issues and the public is invited. The Feb. 25 forum will be co-hosted by the League of Women Voters of Sioux City and Sioux City Go. The March 25 forum will be co-hosted by the league and Morningside College. The first forum of the year was held Jan. 28, with three legislators and more than 100 people attending. That event was sponsored by the league and Leadership Siouxland. LE MARS, Iowa | The trial for a Le Mars man charged with killing his sister has been continued. In granting a defense motion to continue Thomas Bibler's trial, District Judge Jeffrey Neary on Monday rescheduled the trial for May 16 in Plymouth County District Court. Bibler's trial had been set for Feb. 14. Public Defender Billy Oyadare last week had asked for the continuance, saying in his motion that Bibler is currently undergoing a number of evaluations that are essential to his defense. The results of those evaluations might not have been available by the time of the February trial date. Earlier this month, Oyadare filed notice that he intends to offer evidence to support Bibler's defense of insanity and/or diminished responsibility. Bibler, 34, is charged with first-degree murder, willful injury and going armed with intent in connection with the June 11 stabbing death of Shannon Bogh, 27, of Le Mars. Bibler is accused of assaulting Bogh in her home at 591 15th St. SW with an edged weapon. She died a short time later at the Le Mars hospital. A witness to the stabbing identified Bibler as a suspect, and Bibler was arrested without incident in his apartment about 30 minutes after the assault. SIOUX CITY | Event staff are encouraging those interested in attending to sign up soon for Sioux City's 19th annual Daddy Daughter Date Night. The event, themed "Safari," will take place from 5:30 to 8 p.m. Feb. 7 through 9 at the Long Lines Family Rec Center, 401 Gordon Drive. The event is open to fathers and their daughters ages 5 and up and has a limited amount of space available. Both the father and daughter must pre-register for the event. A payment of $15 per person is required at the time of registration and includes a catered dinner by Central Catering, music by Monster Karaoke & DJ Services and photo booths by Izzon Photo Booth. Registration is available online at https://webtrac.sioux-city.org or with Sioux City's Parks and Recreation office at 712-279-6126. DES MOINES -- A bill intended to give local school boards more decision-making authority ran into several challenges Monday, including testy exchanges between subcommittee members. Freshman Rep. Amy Nielsen, D-North Liberty, accused subcommittee Chairman Greg Forristall, R-Macedonia, of being a mean bully when he questioned whether she understood school funding law. During her first subcommittee meeting as a House member, Nielsen asked whether House File 26 solved the problems Forristall cited as reasons to give school boards home rule authority similar to that given cities and counties through an amendment to the state Constitution. HF 26 calls for school board to exercise any broad or implied power not inconsistent with state laws. That doesnt extend to levying taxes. Nielsen wondered about unintended consequences of the change, especially those stemming from the language calling for state laws relating to schools and school boards to be liberally construed. Now Democrats are complaining were too liberal, Forristall said. The bill has the support of the Iowa Association of School Boards, School Administrators of Iowa, Professional Educators of Iowa, Area Education Agencies, Rural School Advocates and Urban Education Network. However, Melissa Peterson of the Iowa State Education Association had the same question as Nielsen. She wondered what problem lawmakers were trying to solve. There are other bills that address specific problems without calling for such a large legislative change. Margaret Buckton of the Rural Education Advocates and Urban Education Network said the bill goes to the overarching philosophy of who makes decisions about local school operations. Too many times, she said, school districts need to change laws when a commonsense decision would solve their problem. As long as districts are held accountable and follow state law they should be given more latitude, Emily Piper of the Iowa Association of School Boards told the subcommittee. However, she thought the legislation needed a better definition of home rule. HF 26 now goes to the Education Committee. The following companies are subsidiares of D.R. Horton: 10700 Pecan Park Austin Inc., 11241 Slater Avenue NE LLC, 2 C Development Company LLC, 8800 Roswell Road Bldg. 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Read More Consolidated Edison, Inc., through its subsidiaries, engages in the regulated electric, gas, and steam delivery businesses in the United States. It offers electric services to approximately 3.5 million customers in New York City and Westchester County; gas to approximately 1.1 million customers in Manhattan, the Bronx, parts of Queens, and Westchester County; and steam to approximately 1,555 customers in parts of Manhattan. The company also supplies electricity to approximately 0.3 million customers in southeastern New York and northern New Jersey; and gas to approximately 0.1 million customers in southeastern New York. In addition, it operates 533 circuit miles of transmission lines; 15 transmission substations; 64 distribution substations; 87,564 in-service line transformers; 3,924 pole miles of overhead distribution lines; and 2,291 miles of underground distribution lines, as well as 4,350 miles of mains and 377,971 service lines for natural gas distribution. Further, the company owns, operates, and develops renewable and energy infrastructure projects; and provides energy-related products and services to wholesale and retail customers, as well as invests in electric and gas transmission projects. It primarily sells electricity to industrial, commercial, residential, and government customers. The company was founded in 1823 and is based in New York, New York. President Trump invoked the specter of violence against LGBT people as part of his justification for signing an executive order last Friday afternoon that bars people from several Muslim-dominated countries from entering the U.S. for at least 120 days. He also cited the attack on the LGBT nightclub in Orlando last year to explain, in a memo issued Saturday, why he is developing a Plan to Defeat the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. Related: 156 LGBT Officials Urge Trump Towards LGBT Support But LGBT legal activists were among the throngs of people denouncing the immigration restrictions. The new policy is blatantly unconstitutional and betrays our nation's commitment to religious freedom, said Shannon Minter, legal director for the National Center for Lesbian Rights. It endangers the lives of countless people, including LGBT people, in the targeted countries. Trump's mention of sexual orientation is a distraction and does not mitigate the unlawfulness or reprehensibility of the new policy in any way. Rachel Tiven, chief executive officer for Lambda Legal said, LGBT people refuse to be pawns in Mr. Trump's dangerous and inhumane game. We utterly reject his discrimination against Muslims in the guise of concern trolling for LGBT rights. If he really wants to help LGBT people, he can pledge to retain the executive orders that help protect us and to nominate a Supreme Court justice who supports equal treatment of all regardless of their sexual orientation or gender identity. Not all LGBT reaction was harsh. Gregory Angelo, president of the Log Cabin Republicans national LGBT group, said, "There is nothing wrong with taking a thoughtful pause to reassess our country's immigration policy -- policy that both Republicans and Democrats agree is broken." He applauded President Trump "for becoming the first-ever Republican president to issue an affirmation in support of the gay community via executive order." "Regardless of one's feelings on these policies, this represents an important milestone in LGBT and Republican history, said Angelo. Reaction to the executive order was swift and dramatic from all quarters of the U.S. and world, with protesters gathering outside the White House and at international airports around the globe. By Sunday, Trump issued a statement saying, To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. President Trump compared his executive order to action taken by President Obama in 2011, suspending for several months the processing of applications from Iraqi nationals seeking to enter the U.S. The suspension was taken after the FBI found evidence that two Iraqi nationals who entered the U.S. as refugees had engaged in terrorist activities. Specifically, Trumps executive order states that the United States should not admit those who engage in acts of bigotry or hatredor those who would oppress Americans of any race, gender, or sexual orientation. It says its purpose is to protect Americans by ensuring that those admitted to this country do not bear hostile attitudes toward it and its founding principles. The order suspends for 90 days the entrance of both immigrants and nonimmigrants from any of seven designated Muslim-dominated countries, saying their entrance would be detrimental to the interests of the United States. The order also suspends the U.S. refugee program for 120 days while various federal agencies amend the program to ensure that those approved for refugee admission do not pose a threat to the security and welfare of the United States. It directs that the refugee program changes include to the extent permitted by law amendments to prioritize refugee claims made by individuals on the basis of religious-based persecution, provided that the religion of the individual is a minority religion in the individuals country of nationality. This latter sentence is aimed at giving priority to applications filed by Christians from Muslim nations. President Trump explained that provision to CBN. In Syria, he said, They were chopping off the heads of everybody, but more so the Christians, so he thought it unfair that the U.S. was allowing more Muslims than Christians into the U.S. Related: 156 LGBT Officials Urge Trump Towards LGBT Support CNN fact-checked that point and cited Pew research indicating that, in 2016, 99 percent of Syrians entering the U.S. were Muslim, compared to less than one percent Christian. However, the Syrian population is 93 percent Muslim. And the numbers of Muslims and Christians allowed into the U.S. from all countries were roughly the same. The order specifically identifies Syrians seeking refugee status as detrimental to U.S. interests and suspends their entry until such time as I have determined that sufficient changes have been made [to the refugee program] to ensure [their admission] is consistent with the national interest. The order also calls on Homeland Security to expedite the implementation of a biometric entry-exit tracking system for all travelers to the United States. The order applies to people arriving to the U.S. from seven specific nations: Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, and Somalia. Numerous media organizations have reported that, while many of Trumps business interests are located in Muslim-dominated countries, none are located in any of the seven targeted nations. National Public Radio also noted that No Muslim extremist from any of these places has carried out a fatal attack in the U.S. in more than two decades. The ACLU has filed a lawsuit to stop the immigration ban and a federal judge in New York temporarily blocked the orders call for deportation of immigrants arriving at U.S. airports with valid visas, green cards, or refugee status. Federal judges in other states took other actions that stopped parts of the order. But the Department of Homeland Security vowed to forge ahead with enforcement, saying it retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety. In a January 28 memo concerning ISIS, President Trump directed the Secretary of Defense to present to him within 30 days a preliminary draft of a comprehensive strategy and plans for the defeat of ISIS. ISIS is responsible for the violent murder of American citizens in the Middle East, including the beheadings of James Foley, Steven Sotloff, and Peter Abdul-Rahman Kassig, as well as the death of Kayla Mueller, states the memo. In addition, ISIS has inspired attacks in the United States, including the December 2015 attack in San Bernardino, California, and the June 2016 attack in Orlando, Florida. During his campaign for the presidency last year, Trump repeatedly cited the attack on the Orlando nightclub Pulse, frequently in the context of his proposal to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. The gunman who murdered 49 people and injured 102 others at the nightclub in June of last year was an American-born U.S. citizen whose parents had immigrated from Afghanistan. The gunman called 911 during the attack and declared his allegiance with the Islamic State (aka ISIS or ISIL), but investigators did not find any evidence beyond his statement that the shooter was directed externally by any terrorist organization. David Richardson is taking the discussion away from the bathroom. In an attempt to avoid pitfalls from previous sessions, Richardson, an openly gay Florida lawmaker, is preparing to fight for civil rights on different terms. In an interview with public broadcasting station WFSU, Richardson said a three-pronged approach is needed to pass a comprehensive bill protecting LGBT Floridians from discrimination in matters of housing, employment and public accommodations. There seems to be more of an appetite to address the housing component of the comprehensive bill, Richardson told WFSU. And there seems less interest in dealing with the public accommodation bill, quite frankly, because of the bathroom component. Richardson, a Miami Beach Democrat, represents house district 113 in Tallahassee. In previous sessions, Richardson has advocated for LGBT protections in the states youth foster care programs, introduced a bill to permit recognition of same-sex parents on their childs birth certificate and led efforts to clean up Floridas prison system. Having been through a bathroom bill dilemma and observed North Carolina lawmakers suffer through a similar fate, Richardson said he understands some topics are better left alone. You have to ask yourself, do you want to try to get something accomplished or do you want to get nothing accomplished?, Richardson asked during his WFSU interview. Im a legislator who is willing to move incrementally as long as it doesnt violate my core values. Richardson is entering his third term in the Florida House of Representatives. The 2017 legislative session begins in March. This article was published in 2017. For the latest on Maru, check out this article from 2022. Theres a new coffee shop open in Los Feliz, the small neighborhood in Los Angeles that borders Silver Lake and Hollywood. A lot of small and independent businesses line the streets here, including a fair share of coffee spots. One of the newest to hit the scene is Maru Coffee, a minimalist and tranquil spot that fits into the eclectic makeup of Los Feliz perfectly. A dream conceived by co-founders Jacob Park and Joonmo Kim more than three years ago, Maru finally began serving coffee in late September. On a visit, you may catch Park behind the barhes not just an owner, but also the head barista and a certified Q Grader. Co-founder Kim is also in-house most days and manages the business side of things. Its an amazing feeling to see your vision come to life, he tells me. Maru is from an old Korean word San Ma Ru which means mountaintop, Kim tells me, it is our representation of high quality as good coffee beans come from high elevation, he says. Inside, youll find the standard coffee menu with espresso drinks made on a sleek Synesso MVP. Kalita and Kono drippers are also on hand for pour-overs, alongside a Mahlkonig EK 43 and Mazzer grinders. Maru plans to feature three roasters at a time; on a recent visit, the shop carried Coava Coffee Roasters, Sweet Bloom Coffee Roasters, and Stereoscope Coffee. If you happen to have the time to stay and drink inside, youll get your beverage served in a stylish ceramic cup by Notary Ceramics from Portland, Oregon. Maru also serves a selection of herbal, green, and black teas. For now, pastries come from LAs Cake Monkeywith treats like slices of babka, doughnuts, and savory bacon jam twists available to pair with your coffee. There are a lot of cafes to choose from in the vicinity of Los Feliz, but they all offer something different to coffee patrons. Maru is a cafe with a mellow vibe, somewhere to get away from the chaos of the city. There is a comforting tranquility in the simplicity of it all. Tatiana Ernst is a Sprudge staff writer based in Los Angeles. Read more Tatiana Ernst on Sprudge. Flowing from the shadow of Vitosha Mountain, Bulgarias 9,000-year-old capital mixes buckling sidewalks with constant revitalization. In Sofia, you will find slowly crumbling buildings perched alongside modern craft beer shops and a newly designed rapid transit metro running in tandem with rusting trams. Out of these competing eras has emerged the specialty coffee scene. The Sofia coffee community has many small basement roasters and online-only retailers, but few specialty cafes. Though some coffee roasters source high-quality beans and have equipment to deliver a wonderful cup, the process from roast to extraction often lacks the essence of a specialty shop. The cafes that do overcome this challenge find they face a demand problem. For now, these shops tend to focus on education, teaching the art of craft coffee, and that black can taste better than white. Here are a few places where you can find a complex cup in Sofia. Dabov Specialty Coffee Brainchild of five-time Cup of Excellence judge Jordan Dabov, Dabov Specialty Coffee has been working to bring the worlds best coffee to Bulgaria since 2008. They sell roasted beans to over 100 shops in Sofia and recently began to make their mark on the citys cafe scene. While a planned mixed cafe space including a roasting facility and cupping area waits on permits and construction, their small space west of the National Palace of Culture has opened its doors to customers and coffee enthusiasts. The pop-up style shop aims to build awareness and customers for the next wave of specialty coffee to hit Sofia. Pulling shots with a Sanremo Opera, Kees van der Westen Mirage, and Mahlkonig EK 43, Dabov doesnt skimp when it comes to having the best coffee gear. Most importantly, they want every shot they pull to be your best ever. With quality beansincluding the 2016 Guatemala Cup of Excellence winnerand single origins from all over the world, Dabov has one of the widest selections of coffee in Sofia. In addition to classic espresso drinks, the pop-up offers liquor-based coffee cocktails, drip coffee, and a welcoming atmosphere. This shop seeks nothing less than to raise the bar for the Sofia craft coffee scene. If you want to see what Sofias bright specialty coffee future looks like then swinging by Dabov is a must. Chuckys Coffee & Culture Chuckys Coffee & Culture prides itself on being the first craft coffee shop in Sofia. Owner Ivan Chavdarov worked in coffee in Athens for eight years before returning to Bulgaria and opening Chuckys Coffee House near Vitosha Boulevard in 2014. The shop started as an experiment, something Chavdarov never saw succeeding. He remembers thinking hed be forced to close it in three to six months. To his pleasant surprise it took off. Using educational workshops to introduce a new breed of customers to craft coffee, the shop quickly became a success. Chuckys offers a Bulgarian-style espresso blend and a few single origins on bar. They also offer a variety of brew methods from AeroPress and V60 to Turkish coffee. The small downtown location fills up around lunchtime and weekend mornings with people swinging by for a quick takeaway coffee or a longer chat with a friend. There is a second shop, called Chuckys Coffee Store, outside the city center. Chuckys represents the old guard in the scene, a snapshot of where specialty coffee in Sofia began. Fabrika Daga Fabrika Daga, Rainbow Factory in English, also broke onto the craft scene in 2014. The name joins two concepts: Daga, meaning rainbow, a nod to the 19791992 beloved comix magazine of the same name, and Fabrika emphasizing their we-make-it-ourselves-mindset. Located close to the National Gallery of Art, the central location makes it easy to grab an espresso, latte, or brewed coffee while walking about the city or heading to work. The shop draws a large crowd at lunch and for brunch on the weekends. They serve up a number of Bulgarian classics all made in-house. Dont let good food fool you; they are serious about coffee, too. A team of dedicated baristas pulls shots on a La Marzocco Linea Classic. With first-time specialty coffee drinkers regularly walking in upon hearing rumors of fantastic coffee, Fabrika Daga has become a destination for people all over Bulgaria. After tasting the blend or one of the three single origins on bar, all provided by Dabov, these customers rarely leave disappointed. Its constant process of evolution has made Fabrika Daga a must stop on a Sofia coffee tour. Matthew Simmons is a freelance journalist. This is Matthew Simmons first feature for Sprudge. Photos by E.S. North for Sprudge Media Network. Albion Park Harness Racing Club in Queensland, Australia has taken on an international flavour this weekend. Canadian driver Serge Masse made a flying visit to the sunshine states premier track on Friday and landed a winner when successful aboard the Grant Dixon-trained His Bluffen in the Egmont Park Stud Sprintlane Trotters Mobile. (Click here to watch the replay). Masse, with more than 2,900 career driving victories in his native country, fired His Bluffen straight to the lead before the trotter scored a career-best effort in a time of 1:57.4 for the 1,660m trip. The track record currently belongs to another Dixon-trained trotter in Our Overanova at 1:56.2. Masse is currently on holidays downunder and caught up with his good friend David Aldred from Racing Queensland who helped organize the drive. I have driven in New Zealand previously at Alexandra Park, but this is my first experience in Australia; its a wonderful country and it was great opportunity, Masse said. The lightweight reinsman is based at Fraser Downs on the west coast of Canada and has enjoyed tremendous success over a long period of time. Masse, a native of Quebec, started his harness racing career back in 1977 before moving west at the age of 24. His best pacer was 2002 Western Canadian Pacing Derby champion Landmark Hall, who went on to win 49 races, earn a mark of 1:48.2, and bank more than $900,000 lifetime. Meanwhile, another Canadian driver, Donald Dupont, made his first appearance at Albion Park on Saturday driving Hear The Call for trainer Grant Dixon in the The Secure Parking Pace over 1,660m. Dupont, who finished seventh from a second tier post nine start, hones his skills at a number of tracks, but has enjoyed strong success at Pompano Park in Florida. He has enjoyed much success with the talented pacer Duc Dorleans. (With files from Australian Harness Racing) The Meadows Racetrack & Casino has increased to $20,000 the total-pool guarantee for its Monday, Jan. 30 Pick 4 wager as part of the United States Trotting Association's Strategic Wagering Initiative. While $5,000 Pick 4 guarantees are regular features of each card, The Meadows quadrupled the pot when Saturdays Pick 4 was uncovered, resulting in a carryover of $4,019.64. Minimum wager for the Pick 4 (Races 4-7) is 50 cents. Since Pennsylvania law requires a minimum per-race wager of $2, a player wagering at the 50-cent level must bet at least four tickets. First post for Mondays program is 1 p.m. (The Meadows) Donald Trumps first act as president was a visit CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, where he addressed gathering of CIA employees. His journey directly in the swamp took place almost immediately after his inauguration, and was clearly an urgent first priority Serenading Langley The CIA is a headquarters of the Deep State and the Shadow Government. It is the nexus of criminality, and of the Bushes and Clintons, and the world-managing elite. The CIA enjoys a virtually unlimited black budget and virtually unlimited power that is beyond the reach of law, and beyond the control of the White House. Yet here was Trump ingratiating and sweet talking the agency that, under order of John Brennan (on behalf of Hillary Clinton and the Bushes), actively engaged in unprecedented efforts to destroy him. Trump swooned, in sickly sweet fawning fashion: Nobody feels stronger about the CIA and the intelligence community than Donald Trump. Nobody.I am so behind you. Youre going to get so much backing, youre going to ask Please Mr. President, dont give us so much backing. Were gonna do great things. We have not used the real abilities we have, weve been restrained. We have to get rid of ISIS. Radical Islamic terrorism has to be eradicated off the face of the earth. It is evil. This is a level of evil that we havent seen. Youre going to do a phenomenal job, but youre going to end it. This is going to be one of the most important groups towards making us safe, toward making us winners again, toward ending all of the problems, the havoc and fear that this sick group of people has caused. I am with you a thousand percent! I love you, I respect you, and you will be leading the charge. Is Trump naive, uninformed, or playing some Orwellian game? How many people attending his speech, the people he expects to lead the charge are, in fact, key managers of Islamic terror assetsthe very creators and managers of ISIS? The CIA is, in fact, the very sick group of people responsible for orchestrating international terrorism and untold atrocities. How does Trump plan on the CIA ending Islamic terrorism when it is the institution he loves and respects is the institution that foments and continues to spread this fear and havoc? Does Trump know that the CIA is, in addition to being the worlds leading manager of terrorism, also the propaganda ministry of the United States? Does Trump realize that the CIA controls the corporate mainstream media organs that relentlessly and savagely attack him around the clock,and that many of the individuals that he is glad-handing may well be the very same individuals who are orchestrating the vicious propaganda and ongoing coup attempts directed at him and his presidency? Was Trumps fawning speech an admission of surrender, and that he will change nothing except the top leadership (switching out Brennan for Mike Pompeo ), because he believes nothing needs to be changed? What did he mean when he said that the CIA had been restrained? In what way is the CIA, which is more powerful and more aggressive today than at any other time in its unsavory history, restrained?The magnitude of terrorism, violence, criminality and war has reached unprecedented levels, to the brink of world war. Will the CIA therefore be allowed, under Pompeo and Trump, to continue engaging in even more terrorism, false flag operations, regime destabilizations and coups, assassinations, narcotrafficking, financial fraud, corruption, media control and disinformation, and treasonon an even greater unrestrained scale? Trump openly supports enhanced interrogation and torture, which means he supports methods perfected and utilized by the CIA. To head off political pressure, Trump says he will allow Defense Secretary Mattis, who is against torture, to overrule him, and allow Mattis to decide on a case by case basis whether to torture prisoners. Is Trumps unapologetic enthusiasm for torture an example of what he expects to be among the unrestrained abilities and great things he wants the CIA to display? The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence, the CIA does not function primarily as a central clearinghouse and producer of national intelligence for the government. Its basic mission is that of clandestine operations, particularly covert actionthe secret intervention in the internal affairs of other nations. Nor was the Director of CIA a dominantor much interestedfigure in the direction and management of the intelligence community which he supposedly headed. Rather, his chief concern, like that of most of his predecessors and the agencys current Directorwas in overseeing the CIAs clandestine activities. As written by former CIA veteran Victor Marchetti in the classic expose,he CIA does not function primarily as a central clearinghouse and producer of national intelligence for the government. Its basic mission is that of clandestine operations, particularly covert actionthe secret intervention in the internal affairs of other nations. Nor was the Director of CIA a dominantor much interestedfigure in the direction and management of the intelligence community which he supposedly headed. Rather, his chief concern, like that of most of his predecessors and the agencys current Directorwas in overseeing the CIAs clandestine activities. There is also the management of entrenched CIA businesses, which include looted and laundered trillions in secret bank accounts and shell companies, and the management of a vast network of CIA political assets throughout Washington and in the corporate world. What, if anything, does Trump intend to do, for instance, about the massive CIA enterprise that remains in the control of the Bush/Clinton network, which is bitterly opposed to Trump? While there may be CIA operatives and employees, including current and former veterans who do not support the criminal operations of the agency, these rank and file operatives have not dictated CIA policy since its creation. These good guys are the minority, and their reform and whistleblowing efforts have largely been in vain, and met with deadly force. Is there any sign that that Trump and Pompeo seek to reform the CIA at all, into an institution that answers to its own government? Or do Trump and Pompeo merely seek to somehow co-opt this above-the-law apparatus, retaining its worst elements, towards their own designs (whatever they may be)? Trumps war on terrorism: waging war with itself? Trump promises a total war against Islamic terrorism and ISIS. How does Trump wage a total war against Islamic terrorism when the agency of which he is the biggest fan, that he supports one thousand percent, is responsible for the creation and ongoing use of Islamic terrorism, as military-intelligence assets for Anglo-American geopolicy? Does Trump realize that the CIA is funding and arming ISIS, Al-Nusra and Al-Qaeda? Does Trump understand that the CIA is responsible for decades of false flag terror operations, including 9/11? (On 9/11, Trump seems to believe a variation of the consensus official narrative blaming outside Islamic terrorists, possibly the Saudis, and George W. Bush for failing to kill Osama bin Laden. Therefore, the CIA is blameless. He holds this view, despite firsthand experience that goes against the official story .) Does Trumps total war on terrorism include waging war against the vast network of CIA assets that are currently engaged in destabilization operations across the Middle East? What is his plan for the Free Syrian Army (FSA), Al-Nusraall of which are CIA fronts? How can the existing networks remain in place without disaster? Will Trump pit officially sanctioned US military forces against the CIA proxies that have been working on orders from the Obama administration? Will Trump shut down ongoing military and intelligence operations throughout the region? How will he cut off the funding of terrorists (sources which include Washington and the CIA, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Israel)? What will be done with the hundreds of proprietary cells and CIA-aligned foreign intelligence networks? Many have compared Trumps professed anti-establishment goals to President John F. Kennedys fatal efforts to take down the Deep State and the CIA. More specifically, if Trump dares dismantle the CIA and the imperial foreign policy that has been in place since the end of the Cold War, he would place himself in the same dangerous position as JFK faced during the Bay of Pigs operation against Cuba. JFK paid with his life for ruining the CIAs game. Imagine the repercussions for Trump, if he ends the conquest of the Middle East and Central Asia. The incompetence excuse It is difficult to predict Trumps plan based on his rhetoric, which has been consistently inconsistent . According to his web site , Trumps primary issue with the Bush/Cheney/Obama/Clinton/Biden (McCain) Middle East program is that he believes that his predecessors recklessly squandered opportunities and unwittingly or stupidly allowed ISIS to happen. It was correct, in Trumps view, to go into Afghanistan to avenge 9/11 (which he believes was an act of an outside enemy, not a false flag operation), but wrong to go into Iraq. But, according to Trump, once in Iraq, the US should have taken the oil, prevented the oil from going to ISIS, and done a better job preventing the rise of ISIS. Similarly, Trump seems to believe that (1) Libya was needlessly destroyed by Clinton and Obama, and that Gadhafi could have been removed more surgically, without letting terrorists run wild, and (2) Syria could have been toppled surgically by Obama, who lacked the courage to go in. Here also, Trumps narrative is that mistakes allowed ISIS to spread. Now, however, Syria is too much of a mess and must be cleaned up differently. The overarching problem, in Trumps limited view, again is that mistakes created power vacuums from which ISIS, unwittingly set loose by Obama/Clintons incompetence. Nowhere in this Trump narrative is there mention of the CIAs creation and ongoing management of Islamic terrorismincluding Al-Qaeda and all fronts of the Islamic Stateon behalf of Anglo-American interests around the world. No inkling that Islamic terrorism is, in fact, the key component of American geostrategy.. If Trump grasps any aspect of these amply documented facts, he has so far shown no signs of it. It is not known if he is naive, uninformed, selectively biased, or if he has been deluded or manipulated by the many advisers that he trusts. Or if he has some plan that has yet to be revealed. The disinformation ministry to stop itself? Trump promises to wage war against radical Islam on an ideological and cultural basis. This suggests that Trump and Pompeo wish to counter Muslim extremism with counter-propaganda. This ignores that fact that the CIA itself is a leading disseminator of radical Islamic thought. The CIA, and its international proxies, is behind extremist rhetoric and propaganda, including material broadcasted over the media and the Internet. Trump does not seem to grasp that radical Islam is a symptom, and not a cause. And it is merely a tool, and a weapon used to carry out the geopolitical agenda of the (amoral and non-religious) world elite. The real enemy is not religion, but those who manipulate and distort religion for war purposes. The real enemy therefore is again the CIA itself, and its propaganda. Just as it is foolish to allow the CIA to continue arming, funding and guiding ISIS terrorists in the field while also fighting them, it is foolish to have the CIA create anti-extremist propaganda while Langley is still guiding the extremist rhetoric being utilized by the terrorists. If Trump fails to stop the CIA itself and its entire war on terrorism, including its propaganda, he stops nothing. Trumps resource warriors The war on terrorism and the conquest of the Grand Chessboard is, in essence, a resource war that has been waged over geography involving oil and gas supplies, and oil and gas distribution routes: pipelines, sea transport, etc. Will Trump continue this, and how? Trumps selection of Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State is telling as well as ominous. Tillersons ExxonMobil has been a major beneficiary of the war on terrorism, and a major player in energy deals connected to 9/11 and all subsequent conflict. Tillerson was executive vice president of ExxonMobil Development Company, and oversaw many of the companys Caspian Sea holdings. ExxonMobil was one of the members of Dick Cheneys secret task force, the US National Energy Policy Development Group (NEPDG). As detailed extensively in Mike Rupperts Crossing the Rubicon, the NEPDGs targeting of Middle East and Central Asian energy fields served as a virtual map of battle for the war on terrorism and a central motive behind 9/11. In addition, according to Ruppert, who detailed the case in The Elephant in the Living Room (From the Wilderness 3/30 02) , ExxonMobil engaged in bribery. Major bribes totaling $1 billion were paid by ExxonMobil and BP Amoco to Kazakhstans then-president Nutsulstan Nazarbayev to secure equity rights in Kazakh oil fields during the 1990s. Dick Cheney, then-CEO of Halliburton was a sitting member of the Kazakh state oil advisory board. The activities of Cheneys NEPDG as well as the numerous bribery scandals, have been aggressively covered up. Tillerson must certainly know about all of this. Does Trump? Is this the kind of foreign policy agenda he and his national security team embraces? If so, it is pure globalism of the most rapacious kind. More questions Trump wants better relations with Russia. Cooperation between Trump and Putin has temporarily headed off imminent superpower conflict towards World War 3 over Syria. This conflict would have exploded in earnest if Hillary Clinton had won the presidency. But what do better relations with Russia mean in terms of the geostrategy, and energy? Recall that Russia has been intimately involved with its own vast energy agenda throughout Central Asia and the Middle East. Russia was reluctantly cooperative with the Bush/Cheney administration throughout the Afghanistan and Iraq conquests. Deals were made. Russia could have, but did not, militarily oppose Bush/Cheney. Is Trump going to revert to something similar, in which he and Tillerson (who has longstanding ties to the heads of state of all nations, including Russia) cut Russia in on deals-a cooperative superpower management of Syria and the rest of the Grand Chessboard? What are Trumps plans for Iran, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, etc.? How will Trump balance the competing interests of Russia and Israel? How will Trump and Pompeo deal with the Mossad? Israel and Netanyahu have belligerently demanded regime change in both Syria and Iran, and continue to engage in provocative actions to force reactions out of the Syrian and Iranian governments. Trump is staunchly pro-Israel. Given that stance, and his lack of opposition to the Israeli lobby, what are the chances that he will push a policy in Syria that goes directly against the demands of Tel Aviv? But what are Trumps views on Chinas numerous cooperative deals with Russia throughout the world, including the Middle East, Central Asia, Africa, etc.? How will Trump balance warmer relations with Moscow while adopting a more belligerent policy towards Beijing. A lone voice of reason Shortly after his election win, Trump met with Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii). Gabbard, an Iraq War veteran, is firmly and boldly against the regime change in Syria. She is a staunch and open critic of the CIAs direct and indirect arming and funding of all Islamic terrorists and against support of countries that support terrorists. She calls the Syrian conflict an illegal war that must stop. On January 4, 2017, Gabbard introduced HR 258, the Stop Funding Terrorists Bill, which would prohibit the use of American government funds to provide assistance to Al-Qaeda, Jabhat, Fatah al-Sham, and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), and to countries supporting these organizations, and for other purposes. This bill aims squarely, boldly, at the CIA. More recently,Gabbard visited Syria and met with Assad. She has been willing to accept political flak from all sides to change the course of US policy. She has also met with the families of veterans and other American citizens affected by the Syrian conflict According to Gabbard, my visit to Syria has made it abundantly clear: Our counterproductive regime change war does not serve Americas interest, and it certainly isnt in the interest of the Syrian people. As I visited with people from across the country, and heard heartbreaking stories of how this war has devastated their lives, I was asked, Why is the United States and its allies helping Al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups try to take over Syria? Syria did not attack the United States. Al-Qaeda did. I had no answer. Having met with Gabbard, who may have been considered for a cabinet position at some point, Trump has no excuse: he has been advised by someone with an authoritative point of view that is deeply critical of the CIA and its use of terror proxies. Does Trump agree or disagree with Gabbard? To drain or not to drain the CIA swamp Nothing in his rhetoric suggests that he is against the war on terrorism. In fact, he is gung-ho for it, with relish. He simply has his own opinion on how it should be carried out. It seems highly unlikely that Trump can or will reverse the central geostrategic agenda that has been the cornerstone of imperial policy since the 1970s. Nor does it seem likely that Trump can or will eradicate the criminal element from the national security apparatus that has stopped all challenges to its primacy since the end of World War II. Langley has not been successfully cleaned up or reformed since its inception. If his fawning words are to be taken at face value, Trump is in love with the CIA, and wants the CIA to love him. At the very least, he is going overboard to win them over. Reince Priebus as a mole. Trump, however, has shown nothing but ardor for Priebus, his superstar, since the election. Priebus is not the only figure behind Trump who demands scrutiny. The entire Trump administration is crawling with neocons and former neocons. How many of them have ties to Langley? Trump is surrounded by enemies, within his administration as well as outside. He must protect himself from all of these individuals, if he is even bothering to identify them. Former CIA operative Robert Steele believes that Trump has already been penetrated by the CIA , and names White House Chief of Staffas a mole. Trump, however, has shown nothing but ardor for Priebus, his superstar, since the election. Priebus is not the only figure behind Trump who demands scrutiny. The entire Trump administration is crawling with neocons and former neocons. How many of them have ties to Langley? Trump is surrounded by enemies, within his administration as well as outside. He must protect himself from all of these individuals, if he is even bothering to identify them. But because Trump appears unlikely, unwilling, or unable to eradicate the true root of terrorismthe CIA itself and all military-intelligence agencies that utilize and control terroriststhe world faces a future of continued zero-sum/endless anti-terrorism, as the CIA continues sending terrorists to commit violence and murder, at the same time that the commander-in-chief continues to sends the CIA out to go after them, in a surreal and idiotic waste of resources and lives. Nothing is clear except this: If Trump does not drain the swamp that is the CIA, he will not end Islamic terrorism, nor dismantle globalism. He will fail to make America great. If he does not end the war on terrorism entirely, humanity itself remains in grave peril. The Waikato Regional Council is calling for tenders to occupy up to 240 hectares of fish farming space in the Firth of Thames. The space is in the Coromandel Marine Farming Zone which is about 10 kilometres west of Coromandel Town, and once operational, will be the first fish farming zone off the North Island. Fish would be farmed in sea cages and the regional council believes the 300 hectares zone could eventually support the production of about 8000 tonnes of farmed fish roughly comparable to the production of farmed salmon in the Marlborough Sounds. Senior coastal policy advisor Graeme Silver says council began preparations for a tender last year after an expression of interest in taking up space. Shellfish aquaculture around the Coromandel and Firth of Thames, and related processing, generates just under $100 million of revenue a year and directly employs over 550 people, making us second only to the Marlborough Sounds in terms of production and employment. We believe that, over time, successful fish farming in the Firth of Thames zone could generate additional revenue of over $50 million. Several years ago there was strong interest in farming kingfish and hapuku in the region. The Coromandel zone was subsequently established in 2011 by a central government amendment to the Waikato Regional Coastal Plan Then the global financial crisis struck and interest in fish farming waned. But recently theres been renewed interest in taking up space in the zone. Space available in the zone will be released for development by the tender process which council is announcing, says Graeme. The successful bidder or bidders will be selected by considering their environmental management practices, the economic benefits to the community, and any monetary contribution to council and central government. Successful tenderers will then need to apply to the council for a resource consent. Graeme says it is essential that environmental risks are adequately managed and mitigated through a comprehensive resource consent process. Any application for a resource consent to farm fish would have to be accompanied by a site specific assessment of potential environmental effects and a monitoring plan, including a baseline survey. The resource consent process will determine whether that impact is sustainable. The major risks from fish farming are nutrients from feed and fish wastes stimulating the growth of algae, and farm operations interfering with marine wildlife. We believe these risks can be minimised through appropriate resource consent measures and a staged approach to development to ensure any emerging problems are dealt with. Graeme says from an environmental protection perspective, the relatively deep Coromandel Marine Farming Zone was a preferable area, compared to the Wilson Bay Marine Farming Zone in the Firth of Thames. More information for potential tenderers is available at www.waikatoregion.govt.nz/aquaculture or by calling Senior coastal policy advisor Graeme Silver on 0800 800 401. The 300ha Coromandel Marine Farming Zone is about 10 kilometres west of Coromandel Town. Police say the suspect told the arresting officer he fired about "four or five rounds" indiscriminately at a tree, less than a mile away from an elementary school. hidden A group of Canadian technology company founders, executives and investors on Sunday called in a letter for Ottawa to immediately give temporary residency to those displaced by a U.S. order banning the entry of people from seven Muslim-majority countries. The open letter said U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order, which temporarily bars travelers from Syria and six other countries and also puts a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States, had already "impacted several in our community." "Canadian tech companies understand the power of inclusion and diversity of thought, and that talent and skill know no borders," said the letter, signed by more than 200 industry players. "Many Canadian tech entrepreneurs are immigrants, are the children of immigrants, employ and have been employed by immigrants." Signatories included John Ruffolo, head of the venture arm of one of Canada's biggest pension funds, and Tobias Lutke, chief executive officer of e-commerce software company Shopify, which went public in 2015 and is valued at around $4.6 billion. The Canadian government has not said what, if any, tangible action it could take, but in tweets on Saturday Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Canada welcomed those fleeing war and persecution and posted an archived picture of him greeting Syrian refugees arriving in Toronto in 2015. Canada is eager to attract skilled tech workers from abroad while also retaining existing workers and students that are often lured away by global tech firms. More than 300,000 Canadians currently work in Silicon Valley in the United States. Last year, Canada benefited from the raucous U.S. election campaign, with new Canadian work permits for highly skilled workers from the United States soaring nearly 54 percent in the first eight months of the year. One Ontario-based software developer, Sortable, ran an ad campaign targeting tech workers that extolled Canada's calm political climate. In November, Canada introduced new visa measures that would allow tech firms to quickly recruit foreign talent, including fast approvals and 30-day work permits. "Policies such as (Trump's) put everybody in the business community on edge because all global firms have a multicultural work force. But it's also an opportunity," Jim Balsillie, former co-CEO of BlackBerry Ltd, said in the Globe and Mail newspaper on Saturday. "If Canada can quickly implement the global skills visa for tech talent  we can reinforce our country as the place to attract the best talent." The U.S. tech industry, a major employer of foreign workers, hit back on Saturday at the sudden executive order on immigration, with some leaders calling it immoral and un-American. Reuters hidden General Motors Co and Honda Motor Co are expected on Monday to announce an expansion of their collaboration on fuel cell technology development, people familiar with the plans said following a notice of a press conference. GM and Honda on Friday said two senior executives would hold a news conference in Detroit with Michigan's Lieutenant Governor, Brian Calley. Mark Reuss, GM's executive vice president for global product development and Toshiaki Mikoshiba, chief operating officer for Honda's North American region, are scheduled to make "an important advanced technology announcement," the companies said. The statement did not elaborate. Honda and GM formed an alliance in 2013 to develop next-generation fuel cell system and hydrogen storage technologies, aiming for the 2020 time frame. Vehicles powered by fuel cells earn credits for automakers under federal and state rules aimed at reducing emissions of greenhouse gases that allow them to sell larger, petroleum-fueled vehicles that typically earn higher profits. GM has been working on hydrogen as a fuel for cars for more than half a century. It created a test car using hydrogen in a modified Chevrolet Corvair in the mid-1960s. Honda in December began leasing its hydrogen fuel cell Clarity Fuel Cell in Southern California. Fuel cell vehicles combine hydrogen and oxygen to produce electricity, which runs a motor. Unlike lithium-ion battery electric vehicles, a fuel cell vehicle already has a driving range nearing that of conventional gasoline-powered cars and trucks, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists. The lack of hydrogen fueling stations and the high cost of development are among the obstacles to high volume sales of such vehicles. Reuters hidden By Asheeta Regidi Karnataka is considering banning ride-sharing services like UberPool and Ola Share, on the grounds that the service is illegal. The final decision on the issue will be taken after meeting with the aggregators on Monday. Ride-sharing is a grey area under the law. Applicable laws have neither expressly permitted not prohibited it, making the issue a confusing one for aggregators. Given the benefits of ride-sharing, in terms of reduction in traffic congestion, pollution levels and lowered prices to the users, the government should consider legalising this service. Karnataka laws silent on ride-sharing Under Karnataka laws, aggregators are required to acquire a license under the Karnataka On-Demand Transportation Technology Aggregators Rules, 2016. As per these rules, they are required to hold a contract carriage permit issued under the Karnataka Motor Vehicles Rules, 1989. Both these rules, and also Form KMV 42, under which a contract carriage permit is issued, do not contain any specific clauses prohibiting or permitting ride-sharing. Of course, the Karnataka Transport Authority has the authority to attach further conditions, and the precise terms of the grant to services like Uber and Ola are not publicly known. The Karnataka Transport Minister has clarified that a contract carriage permit only allows point to point pick-ups and drop-offs. No customers can be picked up or dropped off in between rides, as happens in the case of ride-sharing services. The result of this is that while ride-sharing services are not expressly illegal, the specific conditions under the contract carriage permits granted to Ola and Uber render it illegal. Similar confusion seen with surge pricing Ride-sharing isnt the first grey area to have arisen under the aggregator regulations. Last year, a similar issue was seen on the issue of surge pricing, which was similarly neither expressly prohibited nor permitted under any of these rules. Finally, the stand taken by the Karnataka government and also the Delhi government by warning the aggregators against surge pricing laid the issue to rest. This makes the surge pricing clearly illegal in these states. There was, however, better clarity on this issue in the laws, in terms of a prescription of the maximum fare that could be charged, and in some cases, a mandate to charge fares only at the rates fixed by the government. In the case of ride-sharing, however, even this basic clarity is missing. Only non-commercial, private ride-sharing is legal under national laws Ride-sharing on a non-commercial basis, i.e., between private persons, and not for a charge, is legal under national laws like the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, and the rules issued thereunder. However, these rules again remain silent on commercial ride-sharing services like that done by UberPool and Ola Share. Similarly, the advisory for the regulation of aggregators issued by the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways issued in October 2015 is also silent on this. Other states stand on ride-sharing is not clarified Apart from Karnataka, other state-level aggregator regulations in India, Delhis City Taxi Scheme 2015 and the Maharashtra City Taxi Rules, 2016 are also silent on the issue of ride-sharing. Again, in the absence of any clarity under the law, one has to turn to the stand taken by the state governments on the issue. Unlike in the case of surge pricing, the Delhi government has so far not taken any stand on the legality of commercial ride-sharing. Similarly, even the Maharashtra government has not taken any stand. One indication of the state governments attitude towards ride-sharing is the recommendation made by the Delhi Chief Minister in support of carpooling during the famous Odd-Even scheme implemented in Delhi to fight pollution levels. While this recommendation certainly does not lend legality to ride-sharing in Delhi, it indicates that the government may be more supportive of it. Governments should consider the benefits of ride-sharing Considering the increasing pollution and traffic congestion levels in city, ride-sharing may prove to be an excellent solution. The benefits to the environment as well as to the people in terms of cheaper transportation is unquestionable. Uber, for example, claims that the use of its ride-sharing service UberPool has saved around 4,40,623 litres of fuel and over 10,37,000 kg of carbon emissions. The question of safety does remain, but this can be addressed by issuing suitable rules. Even abroad, many countries have begun to legalize ride-sharing. For example, ride-sharing services have been legalised in Australia, Pennsylvania and California. In France, only drivers with commercial licenses are allowed to operate ride-sharing services. The Karnataka government has stated that it will consult with the aggregators before imposing a complete ban on the ride-sharing services. It is hoped that the Karnataka government, and other state governments, will take the benefits of ride-sharing into consideration and legalize ride-sharing services in India. The author is a lawyer with a specialisation in cyber laws and has co-authored books on the subject. tech2 News Staff A few days ago, US President Donald Trump issued an order halting the arrival of all refugees into the US for 120 days. He also banned the citizens of six Muslim-majority countries, including Iran, from entering the country for 90 days. Various federal courts have outright rejected Trumps order. Despite being illegal, the order has sown a great deal of confusion at airports and other countries. Silicon Valley is particularly perturbed by this order and a number of CEOs have taken steps to fight the ban. The various tech companies responded to the order in their own way, some more strongly than others. Airbnb: Free housing for refugees Airbnbs co-founder and CEO, Brian Chesky tweeted out that his company will provide free housing to anyone not allowed in the US. He even asked anyone in need of urgent housing to contact him directly. Airbnb is providing free housing to refugees and anyone not allowed in the US. Stayed tuned for more, contact me if urgent need for housing Brian Chesky (@bchesky) January 29, 2017 Any Airbnb host willing to support this initiative can volunteer their home as well. Google: Crisis fund for immigration While Google CEO Sundar Pichai didnt say much against Trumps immigration ban other than to express concern, the company has donated almost $4 million to organisations that are championing the cause for immigration. A USA Today exclusive report states that Google will donate $2 million, matched by an equal amount from employees, to fund the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Immigrant Legal Resource Centre (ILRC), International Rescue Committee (IRC) and the Office of The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Lyft: Donations to ACLU Lyft founders John Zimmer and Logan Green took a firm stance against Trump, stating that they stand firmly against his actions. The co-founders together promised to donate $1 million in funding to the ACLU over the next four years. Tesla, SpaceX: Help me amend the ban, Elon Musk Elon Musk, the founder of Tesla and SpaceX took to Twitter to criticise Trumps immigration ban. Rather than just make strong statements or donate money to charity, Musk believes that the ban is here to stay and rather than fight it outright, he hopes to get Trump to modify it. Please read immigration order. Lmk specific amendments. Will seek advisory council consensus & present to President. https://t.co/qLpbsP4lEk Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 29, 2017 In another tweet to the public, Musk asked for suggestions on specific amendments to the ban and other changes that he can propose to Trump after seeking advisory council consensus. (Also read: Silicon Valley CEOs statements on Trumps anti-immigration order) Uber: 24/7 legal support fund Ubers method of dealing with Trumps immigration ban have been met with harsh criticism for its opportunism, resulting in the trending #DeleteUber tag on Twitter. The tag was preceded by an image of people deleting the Uber app from their phones. Surge pricing has been turned off at #JFK Airport. This may result in longer wait times. Please be patient. Uber NYC (@Uber_NYC) January 29, 2017 It all started on 28 January when mass protests were being held outside JFK for the release of immigrants and against their detention. A taxi union was present at the strike as well and Ubers tweet promising no surge pricing at JFK was seen as an attempt to undermine that unions strike. Uber denies any intention of doing so, and while the companys intentions may have been misinterpreted, the company had to quickly step in and take clarify its stance on the ban. To that end, Uber immediately apologised and issued a statement stating that it was setting up a $3 million legal defence fund for drivers affected by the ban. This fund will enable 24/7 legal support as well as translation surfaces to affected drivers, said Travis Kalanick, Uber CEO. Support for the ACLU Among the protests, various tech CEOs pledged to match ACLU donations of those who responded to them with receipts. The list includes investor Chris Sacca, Stripe CEO Patrick Collision, Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield, Xamarin CEO Nat Friedman and many more. The ACLU was the organisation that challenged Trumps order in a federal court and won. Teams of volunteer ACLU lawyers have also been helping out immigrants for free at various airports in the US. tech2 News Staff A woman from Lleida in Spain has approached the court to grant her the status of permanent disability, claiming to be allergic to Wi-Fi signals, according to a report in El Paise. The condition is known as electromagnetic hypersensitivity, where sufferers claim to fall ill because of electromagnetic fields. There is a considerable debate in the scientific and medical community over whether or not the condition is real. Tests have shown that people who claim to suffer from electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS), cannot tell accurately if they are in an electromagnetic field or not. According to the World Health Organisation, EHS is not a medical condition, there is no scientific basis to link EHS to exposure to electromagnetic fields and that it is unclear of EHS represents a single medical problem. However, the symptoms of EHS are considered real, no matter what the cause is, and its effects vary in severity. Doctors have suggested that the discomfort can be caused by environmental factors such as bright or flickering lights, uncomfortable furniture, glare and noise. Although considered a psuedomedical condition, the Spanish court will now decide if the woman should be granted permanent disability. The woman stands to get a monthly pension from the government, if the claim is passed. In 2015, a French court granted disability rights to a woman who claimed that she was unable to go into urban areas because of Wi-Fi hotspots, according to a report in The Independent. She managed to convince the court, and was awarded with a 500 (Rs 42,481 appox) a month disability allowance. In 2009, fake news stories on the condition circulated as a fall out of a PR campaign to generate buzz around an album by a UK DJ named Steve Miller. The stories are about how Miller is suffering because of exposure to Wi-Fi signals. Miller's album was called Electrosensitive. Irrational fears of radiation by telecom infrastructure in India has contributed to the call drop problem. A number of civic bodies, local residents or municipal authorities randomly take down, dismantle or cut electric supply to telecom infrastructure. The limits for the Radio Frequency Field (Base Station Emissions) of cellular infrastructure in India is ten times more stringent than the levels recommended by WHO, and could be adversely affecting our growth story. hidden Silicon Valley took the lead over the weekend in corporate resistance to President Donald Trump's clampdown on immigration, financing legal opposition, criticizing the plan, as well as helping employees ensnared by his executive order. In an industry that has long depended on immigrants and celebrated their contributions - as well as championing liberal causes such as gay rights - there was little initial consensus on exactly how to respond to Trump's move on Friday. But, while most in the tech industry stopped short of directly criticizing the new Republican president, they went much further than their counterparts in other sectors, who were mostly silent over the weekend. Most of the major U.S. banks and auto companies, for example, declined to comment in response to Reuters inquiries. Trump ordered a temporary ban on travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries and a 120-day halt to refugee resettlement. The action triggered a global backlash, and sowed confusion and anger after immigrants, refugees and visitors were kept off flights and left stranded in airports. [nL1N1FI0JO] Bigger companies such as Apple Inc, Google and Microsoft Corp offered legal aid to employees affected by the order, according to letters sent to staff. Several Silicon Valley executives donated to legal efforts to support immigrants facing the ban. And Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk and Uber head Travis Kalanick both said on Twitter that they would take industry concerns about immigration to Trumps business advisory council, where they serve. Kalanick has faced opposition on social media for agreeing to be part of the advisory group. Kalanick in a Facebook post on Sunday called the immigration ban "wrong and unjust" and said that Uber would create a $3 million fund to help drivers with immigration issues. Among those affected by the ban was Khash Sajadi, the British-Iranian chief executive of San Francisco-based tech company Cloud 66, who was stuck in London. Like many tech workers, he holds an H1B visa, which enables foreigners with special expertise to work for U.S. companies. Sajadi said he hoped big tech companies such as Google and Facebook would take legal action to protect affected employees. That could help set a precedent for people in similar situations - but at smaller companies. "Ultimately, I think them simply speaking up is not going to move the needle with people" who are not wealthy and do not live on the East or West Coasts, he said. 'Tech against Trump' protest The response from tech companies has been as forceful as it possibly can be, said Eric Talley, a corporate law professor at Columbia Law School. One of the difficult aspects of reaction to the Trump administration in its first couple of weeks is trying to balance the interest of expressing legitimate concern ... against the potential cost of being out too far ahead of everyone else, he said. The tech industry also has other issues where it may find itself opposed to Trump, including trade policy and cyber security. The president of Mountain View, California-based startup incubator Y Combinator, Sam Altman, wrote a widely read blog post urging tech leaders to band together against the immigration order. He said he has spoken with a variety of people about organizing but remains unsure about the best course of action. The honest answer is we dont know yet, he said. We are talking with legal groups and tech groups, but this is so unprecedented that I dont think anyone has a manual. At Lyft, co-founders John Zimmer and Logan Green pledged on the companys blog to donate a million dollars over the next four years to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which won a temporary stay of part of Trump's executive order on Saturday night. [nL1N1FJ01X] Slack collaboration service co-founder Stewart Butterfield and Union Square Ventures partners Albert Wenger and Fred Wilson promised to match contributions to the ACLU. Michael Dearing, founder of venture capital firm Harrison Metal, started an effort called Project ELLIS, short for Entrepreneurs' Liberty Link in Silicon Valley, to help startups and smaller tech companies with immigration issues. "ELLIS" is a also a reference to New York Harbor's Ellis Island, where millions of immigrants arrived. In less than a day, the group has handled two cases, he said. Dearing said the idea was to "get people in touch quickly with the ... resources they would have access to if they were in a Google or an Apple or a Microsoft. Dave McClure, the founding partner of 500 Startups and an outspoken critic of Trump, said his venture capital firm will soon open its first fund in the Middle East and will shift its attention to supporting entrepreneurs in their native countries, if bringing them to the United States proves impossible. Investing in entrepreneurs in other countries is probably one of the best things we can do to promote international awareness and understanding, he said. Rank-and-file employees were already prodding executives to go further over the weekend. Shortly after learning of Trumps order, Brad Taylor, a 37-year-old engineer for web analytics firm Optimizely, began organizing Tech Against Trump, a protest scheduled to take place on March 14. In addition to holding a rally in Palo Alto, California, organizers of the event were urging tech workers at companies that have remained silent on Trump to walk out of their offices. Taylor said he was heartened by tech leaders statements over the weekend but wants to see the industry go further. The purpose of this is not to be against tech, but to urge them to be on the right side of history, he said. Reuters hidden The U.S. technology industry, a major employer of foreign workers, hit back on Saturday at President Donald Trump's sudden executive order on immigration, with some leaders calling it immoral and un-American. Trump's order temporarily bars citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the United States even if they hold valid visas or permanent residence permits, a move that caught many companies off-guard. Netflix Inc Chief Executive Reed Hastings called it "a sad week" and added: "It is time to link arms together to protect American values of freedom and opportunity." Apple Inc CEO Tim Cook sent a letter to employees saying Trump's order was "not a policy we support" and promised to help affected employees. "We have reached out to the White House to explain the negative effect on our coworkers and our company," Cook added. Elon Musk, the South African-born founder of Tesla and SpaceX who met recently with Trump, said on Twitter: "The blanket entry ban on citizens from certain primarily Muslim countries is not the best way to address the countrys challenges." Airbnb co-founder and CEO Brian Chesky said: "Not allowing countries or refugees into America is not right and we must stand with those who are affected." Airbnb will provide free housing to anyone not allowed into the United States, Chesky said. Aaron Levie, the outspoken founder and CEO of online storage company Box Inc, said: "The executive order on immigration is immoral and antithetical to our values." Stranded Friday's order could be a major headache for tech companies, potentially leaving employees stranded overseas and unable to return to the United States. Alphabet Inc's Google urgently called back employees from overseas and told ones who might be affected by the ban not to leave the United States. CEO Sundar Pichai said in an email to staff that more than 100 Google employees were affected by the order, according to a Google executive. One Google employee of Iranian nationality with legal U.S. residency made it back to the United States just hours before the order took effect, the executive said. "We're concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the U.S.," Google said in a statement. Microsoft Corp President and Chief Legal Officer Brad Smith said in a company-wide email posted on LinkedIn that 76 company employees were citizens of the seven countries in question and held U.S. work visas, and thus were directly affected by the order. He said the company had not determined how many people with green cards, or permanent residence status, might be affected. "As a company, Microsoft believes in a strong and balanced high-skilled immigration system," Smith said in the post. "We believe in the importance of protecting legitimate and law-abiding refugees whose very lives may be at stake in immigration proceedings." Uber Technologies Inc CEO Travis Kalanick, who has faced criticism from some employees for participating in President Trump's business advisory council, said in a statement that the company would compensate drivers from the seven countries who might not be able to return to the United States for three months or more. He said the company knew of about a dozen affected employees. "This ban will impact many innocent people - an issue that I will raise this coming Friday when I go to Washington for President Trumps first business advisory group meeting," Kalanick said. Facebook Inc CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a post on Friday that was "concerned" about the order and voiced support for immigrants. Reuters Nimish Sawant Over the weekend, US President Donald Trump passed an executive order halting the arrival of all refugees into the US for 120 days. He also banned the citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries, including Iran, from entering the country for 90 days. This order was naturally criticised by the tech movers and shakers from Silicon Valley. Google co-founder Sergey Brin, participated in the protests at the San Francisco international airport in his personal capacity. Companies such as Airbnb, Google, Uber have also announced measures and funds to help out people. American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the organisation that challenged Trumps order in a federal court and won, has received funds from investor Chris Sacca, Stripe CEO Patrick Collision, Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield, Xamarin CEO Nat Friedman and many more. Teams of volunteer ACLU lawyers have also been helping out immigrants for free at various airports in the US. India has a lot of high skilled professionals working in the US. And although India is not on the list of countries banned from entering the US, the executive order does raise some fears among the Indian IT community, as have been expressed by some friends working in the US. We spoke to Shivendra Singh, vice president, Global Trade development at Nasscom to clear some doubts that many people may have. He mentioned that Nasscom has always been talking about the importance of a diverse and inclusive work force, not just in the US but also UK and other countries. "We feel that diversity and inclusion are necessary grounds for breeding innovation. From the US perspective, this is what makes the Silicon Valley the talent magnet that it is," said Singh Stressing on the importance of highly skilled Indian professionals in the technology sector, Singh said that India is on very good terms with the US. "We support the thought that India is a friend, which Trump has mentioned in the past. Our prime minister was among the first leaders to call Trump on his victory. India is one of the world's fastest growing economy. There are 10 out of 15 top tech companies in the US which have a huge stake in India. There is bilateral trade of upto $100bn with the role of IT companies being important. Indian IT industry is the largest export market in the US. We continue to bring value to corporate America," said Singh. On the Trump executive order, Singh said that Nasscom supports skilled migration and we should look at that as skilled worker mobility, whereas the order encompasses a lot many people apart from those in the workforce. "We do acknowledge the issues which have been raised by our US company CEOs, it supports our arguments that any kind of diversity and inclusion, which has been talked about, definitely breeds innovation. We support open, unhindered business both in India and the US," said Singh. Recently, R Chandrasekhar, president of Nasscom had said that the industry requires high-skilled workers which are not available in the US. He said that according to data available, Indian IT companies have created 4.11 lakh jobs in the US of which 1.5 lakh are direct employment. Besides job creation, Indian IT industry has also contributed to the US economy in terms of tax payment, social security outgo and CSR activities. Speaking about the Nasscom delegation which is set to visit the US next month, Singh said that this was a routine ongoing activity. "For a number of years, we have gone to the US, met members of the administration, met members of the Congress and highlighted the value contribution India gives to the US. We will continue to address the issues pertaining to visas if any. For instance, in December 2015 also there was an issue with the visa where there were supplementary visa fees levied on the H1B's. We will bring these to the notice of the authorities," said Singh. This Page has moved to a new address: Sorry for the inconvenience Redirection provided by Blogger to WordPress Migration Service Youth jailed for 6 months for taking drugs in B'baria UNB, Brahmanbaria : A mobile court has sentenced a young man to six months' jail for taking drugs in Sarail upazila yesterday. The convict was identified as Jasim Uddin, 22, son of Abul Hashem of Syedtula village in the upazila. Police said as Jasim was a drug addict, he used to torture to his parents physically for money and vandalize furniture of the house. A team of Sarail Police Station, led by its sub-inspector Abdur Rahman, arrested Jasim from his house on Sunday morning following a written complaint lodged by his father Hashem. Later, Jasim was produced before the mobile court, led by executive magistrate and assistant commissioner (land) Moushumi Bain Hira, who handed down the verdict. Honey farming makes many people self-reliant in Sylhet, Narsingdi Sylhet Correspondent : Honey cultivation on mustard fields in the Gowainghat Upazila in the Sylhet district has gained popularity recently. Meanwhile, it has made many people, especially a good number of unemployed youths self-reliant through cultivating honey. Witnessing continuous success of others, more farmers of the Upazila are being engaged in honey cultivation on the aisles of mustard fields which added a new dimension to the agriculture. Now the famers here are passing very busy time in setting up honeycomb boxes beside mustard fields at different areas in the district. According to Gowainghat Upazila Agriculture office, many farmers have started box system bee cultivation and honey collection in different areas of the upazila here. Applying scientific box system bee cultivation, around 50,000 to 60,000 bees make honey in a box where one bee is female. There have 5 to 10 bee frames in the box. Those frames are called beehive, sources added. Gowainghat Upazila Agriculture Extension Officer M Anisuzzaman said this. For its continuity they take primary project in the log land of Baon Haor in Muslimnagor. By this they start honey cultivation in the mustard field. General former are very interested The produce honey visa a visa mustard in the same field. By this they make prelist and extra income. 9 PM club member of Muslimnagor said, after Aman cultivation they use this land to produce mustard At the same field they cultivate bee. M Anisuzzaman informed if the former give proper training it make a new horizon in agri economy. He said, bee help to the growth of mustard. It take positive result. Farmers are refitted economically. Bee cultivator Naimul Hque said, he receive training from BSIC about bee-cultivation. He set 56 bee-box in Jaflong and collect 2/3 Kgs honey every week trice. Price of per kg honey is Tk 800-100 By small capital extra money is earned by cultivating bee in mustard field, Local MP Emran Ahmed well come this project. He hope for further development of agri management of Gowainghat by this project. He assure about his co-operation to the former. Narsingdi Correspondent adds: Many of the rural men and women specially self-committed persons are becoming active towards attaining their social dignity after being engaged in various income generating activities independently. Nurzzaman Gaji a Islamic scalar and self committed person of Jinerdee union under Polash upazila of Narsingdi district become a successful small- entrepreneur through Honey farming. When contacted with Nuruzzaman Gaji, he said when he was receiving Imam training from Islamic Foundation, Narsingdi in the year1998, he then inspired on honey farming from his lesson and later he had started his honey farming business from local bees with 8 boxes. He said after taking training from local BSCIC office on Honey bee farming in 2012, he then started his honey farming business on large scale with 28 boxes by taking loan of Taka 2,00000 from Islamic Bank. He said when some cash crops specially mustard, litchi, donia, kalijira and pumpkin become flooded with flowers, he then starts his professional works along with his appointed workers in different districts using 60 boxes He said, honey farming works begins from December 1st week and continuing up to June. He said yearly he collected about 500 kilograms of honey from different flowers when flooded. He said after preprocessing the collected honey in his local processing plant and then he started marketing He expressed his satisfaction that his yearly net income from honey business about taka three lakh. Additional Director (Administration and finance) Department of Agriculture Extension, Khamar Bari Dhaka, Mohammad Abdul Aziz and Deputy Director Narsingdi Latafat Hossain recently visited the local honey processing plant of Nurzzaman Gaji and expressed satisfaction. Additional Director Abdul Aziz said proper attention and technological support can make the honey production a huge profitable business for the country. He said many unemployed people can be involved in honey farming and the marketing process of honey, which will ultimately help reduce poverty apart from giving a boost in the country's export earnings. He also said if the government takes proper steps, honey production will get a boost in the country, ushering in a new opportunity for export. Canada offers temporary home to those stranded by Trump order Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has come in support of immigrants in the wake of US travel ban. AFP, Ottawa : Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of US President Donald Trump's travel ban, the immigration ministry said Sunday. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. Hussen did not indicate how many people could be concerned by this measure, but he said that the Canadian authorities were so far unaware of anyone stranded in the country by the US order. Trump on Friday suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Hussen, who is of Somali origin, said the Trump administration had assured Ottawa that Canadians holding dual nationality with those countries would not be affected by the US ban. He said that people from those seven countries who have a valid Canadian permanent residency card can still enter the United States. However, under the US order, the ban will apply to people from the targeted countries who are passing through Canada. More than 35,000 Canadians with dual citizenship are also citizens of one of the seven countries, he added. Hussen did not condemn the US measure but stressed that Canada would continue to pursue an immigration policy based on "compassion" while at the same time protecting the security of its citizens. "We welcome those fleeing persecution, terror and war," he said, echoing an open-arm Twitter post by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Saturday. Leaders of a group of Canadian technology companies urged the government to provide "targeted" visas for temporary residence in Canada to those displaced by the Trump order. "Canadian tech companies understand the power of inclusion and diversity of thought, and that talent and skill know no borders," the leaders said in a joint open letter. Hussen, questioned about their proposal, said that Canadian authorities were continuing to monitor developments in the situation, but had not made a decision. An opposition Canadian party, the New Democratic Party, called Sunday for an emergency debate in parliament on the Trump order. The US ban will have "disastrous implications" for thousands of people, an NDP spokeswoman said. According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one out of five people in the country are foreign-born. Saudi-led coalition's attacks in Yemen 'may amount to war crimes': UN A man stands at the site of Saudi-led air strikes that destroyed several houses in Yemen\'s capital Sanaa. Reuters United Nations : A Saudi Arabia-led military coalition has carried out attacks in Yemen that "may amount to war crimes," UN sanctions monitors reported to the world body's Security Council, warning coalition allies including the United States, Britain and France that they are obligated to respect international humanitarian law. The annual report by the experts who monitor sanctions and the conflict in Yemen, seen by this news agency on Saturday, investigated 10 coalition air strikes between March and October that killed at least 292 civilians, including some 100 women and children. "In eight of the 10 investigations, the panel found no evidence that the air strikes had targeted legitimate military objectives," the experts wrote in a 63-page report presented to the Security Council on Friday. "For all 10 investigations, the panel considers it almost certain that the coalition did not meet international humanitarian law requirements of proportionality and precautions in attack," the report said. "The panel considers that some of the attacks may amount to war crimes." The experts said Saudi Arabia is leading a military coalition made up of Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco and Sudan. Saudi UN Ambassador Abdallah Al-Mouallimi said the accusations in the report were unfounded, that the coalition has been "exercising maximum restraint and rigorous rules of engagement," and that there had been transparent investigations into any incidents. "In some cases errors were acknowledged and responsibility accepted. Corrective measures including compensation to victims were taken," he said. The UN experts said US officers were supporting coalition logistical and intelligence activities, while the coalition's chief of joint operations told the experts that officers from France, Malaysia and Britain were also present at the Riyadh headquarters. "All coalition member states and their allies also have an obligation to take appropriate measures to ensure respect for international humanitarian law by the coalition," the UN experts wrote. "The panel finds that violations associated with the conduct of the air campaign are sufficiently widespread to reflect either an ineffective targeting process or a broader policy of attrition against civilian infrastructure," the report said. The UN experts said that although they were unable to travel to Yemen, they have "maintained the highest achievable standard of proof." A spokesman for the British UN mission declined to comment on a leaked document, but added: "We take reports of alleged violations of international humanitarian law by actors in the conflict very seriously." A senior US State Department official said: "We urge all sides to take steps to prevent harm to civilians. Ending the conflict in Yemen requires a durable cessation of hostilities and a comprehensive political solution." Trump`s first major test as travel ban uproar spreads People march in support of immigrants and refugees in Seattle, Washington on Sunday. AFP, New York : Donald Trump faced mass protests worldwide Sunday over his ban on travelers from seven Muslim countries entering the United States, in a backlash that poses an enormous test for his administration. The measures, introduced just one week after he took office, were criticized by allies, caused confusion among border guards and galvanized Democrats looking for a way to bash Trump. There was growing unease among Republican lawmakers also. Four federal judges moved to halt deportations, around 300 people were stopped or detained worldwide and US civil rights lawyers warned the battle could head to the Supreme Court. Thousands of noisy demonstrators poured into major airports for a second day, showing support for immigrants and refugees affected by Trump's contentious travel restrictions. "I just hope that we can pass this difficult period while maintaining our values as a country," said Saif Rahman, a 38-year-old Iraqi-born US citizen who was called in for additional screening after flying into Dulles airport, near Washington DC. An executive order signed by Trump suspended the arrival of all refugees for a minimum of 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. Lawyers accompanied by interpreters set up shop in airports and fought for the release of those detained on arrival-many were mid-air when Trump signed the decree on Friday. At least 109 people were held upon arrival to the United States despite holding valid visas. It was unclear how many were still detained late Sunday. Top Trump aides downplayed the number as "a couple of dozen" as Canada said it would offer temporary residence to those stranded in the country by the ban. Under fire from all quarters, Trump issued an official White House statement to deny it was a Muslim ban and blast the media for its coverage. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion-this is about terror and keeping our country safe," he said. Trump's order-which falls short of his campaign promise to ban all Muslims from coming to the United States-ignited the biggest controversy since he took office. The president also slung Twitter insults at Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, fellow Republicans who criticized the ban. He called them "weak on immigration" and said they were "looking to start World War III." Trump, a property tycoon who has never previously held elected office, sees himself making good on a key but highly controversial campaign promise to subject travelers from Muslim-majority countries to "extreme vetting". Such steps would make America safe from "radical Islamic terrorists" he said. Economic Watch: Made by China in America wins big stateside Xinhua, Beijing : Chinese companies in the United States are replacing their "Made in China" label with "Made by China," and are doing well out of the move, with many jobs created. Earlier this month, railcar-maker China Railway Rolling Stock Corp (CRRC) was awarded a contract to provide 120 subway trains for Boston, following a deal in 2014 which produced 284 trains for the city. In March last year, the corporation won a 1.3 billion U.S. dollar contract to provide 846 subway trains for Chicago. The trains will be assembled at CRRC plants in Springfield,Massachusetts and Chicago, creating hundreds of jobs. A CRRC representative told the Caixin Magazine that the latest Boston deal is a direct result of the 2014 arrangement. Only they can produce trains that meet Boston's standards, and so the city had not re-opened bidding on the latest contract. The rise of the CRRC in the United States has highlighted the fact that Chinese manufacturers are climbing the food chain by abandoning cheap goods and providing quality products for developed countries, building a better reputation in picky consumer markets. The CRRC is just one Chinese manufacturer with sights set on the United States and supplying the market from workshops in North America, employing a local workforce. Autoglass-maker Fuyao Glass has just opened a facility in Dayton, Ohio with an investment of 600 million U.S. dollars, the most a Chinese company has ever invested in the state. The plant already employs about 2,000 people and Fuyao expects this number to grow to around 2,500 by the end of 2017. "Through my brother's eyes, I saw factory after factory close. Unemployment grew. Dayton became hollowed out," said Stephen Orlins, president of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations. "But I have watched the rebirth of a community because of Fuyao Glass," he added. Nadia thriving in acting, dancing at a time Sheikh Arif Bulbon : Familiar dance artiste and TV actress-model Nadia Ahmed always feels comfortable to introduce herself as a dance artiste. But she has to be engaged with acting most of the time. Besides maintaining time to acting, she regularly tries to give time to dancing. On February 4, 9, 11 and 25 she will take part in four dance shows in Dhaka, Coxs Bazar and Bogra. So besides acting, Nadia has to manage extra time for dancing. As an actress, Nadia always feels an attraction from her soul to dancing. She believes there is no alternative than practice. So she regularly practices dancing. From Monday Nadia has started shooting of a new serial titled Alpo Swolpo Golpo. She is acting in role of Ina. Montasir Bipon is making the serial. Intekhab Dinar is working against Nadia in this serial. While talking about the serial actress Nadia told this correspondent, Script of the serial is in a word outstanding. For the first time I am working under Bipons direction. He has been trying a lot to cast me for many days. Due to mismatch of bat and ball I could not work. At last, I am working under his direction. I hope it will be a nice work. Director Montasir Biponj informed that within very short days the serial will go on air in any satellite channel. Nadia has already finished shooting of three single episodes plays recently. Abu Raihan Jewel and Imran Rana made these two plays. Another play has been made from Bangladesh Television. ICT finalizes report against 4 Netrokona war criminals The investigation agency of the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) on Monday finalized probe report against four alleged war criminals from Netrokona. The accused are Azizur Rahman, 65, Ashak Ali, 82, Md Shahnewaz, 88, and Khalilur Rahman, 72, of Durgapur upazila of Netrokona. Of these, apart from Khalilur all the accused are behind bars right now."We have found evidences of five kinds of crimes including murder and rape against these four. Of the four, Khalilur was the commander of local Al-Badr Bahini," Abdul Hannan Khan, chief coordinator of the agency, told the newsmen at a press briefing held at its office. The probe agency boss said during the investigation they have found involvement of the accused with the killing of 22 people, rape of a woman, looting of 15 houses and setting fire to seven of those in Durgapur and Kalmakanda upazila in Netrakona. "There were five accused in the case but Ramjan Ali, 78, died of old age complications in police custody on September 30, 2016. So we left his name out of the list," said M Sanaul Huq, senior coordinator of the investigation agency. According to the agency, all the accused were involved with politics of either Muslim League or Jamaat-e-Islami in the early 70's and subsequently joined Razakar and Al-Badr as the war started. "We initiated the probe on April 30, 2015, and recorded testimonies of 79 people while making this 546-page report. It is 46th probe report from the agency," Khan added. Trump`s Vox News : ISIS has been trying for years to convince Muslims around the world that the West - and especially the United States - is at war with Islam. President Donald Trump's new executive order on immigration will make it much easier for it to make its case. The executive order - which bans all immigrants and visa holders from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US for 90 days, bans all refugee admissions for 120 days, bans Syrian refugees indefinitely, and puts Christian refugees at the front of the line - plays right into the ISIS narrative. No immigrants from any of the seven countries on the list - Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Sudan, and Somalia - have killed Americans in terrorist attacks in the US. Not one. What immigrants and refugees from most of those countries are doing, however, is fleeing repression, violence, and war - in the case of Iraq and Yemen, wars started or supported by the US itself. By blocking refugees from several Muslim countries and prioritizing Christian ones, the Trump administration seems to be sending the message that the US doesn't care about Muslim suffering. ISIS propagandists couldn't have said it better themselves. ISIS's vision of the US war on Islam has been a hard sell - until now ISIS (and al-Qaeda before it) has long focused its propaganda on a putative laundry list of crimes the US and its Western allies have supposedly committed against Muslims around the world. It seeks to convince Muslims living in the West that their governments are against them, and that they must therefore take up arms and defend Islam against these attempts to destroy it. For instance, in one issue of its online propaganda magazine Dabiq, ISIS warned that, "Muslims in the crusader countries [i.e., the West] will find themselves driven to abandon their homes as the crusaders increase persecution against Muslims living in Western lands." The biggest problem with that argument is that, while the US is involved in several wars in Muslim-majority countries - and does support dictators who repress Islamist political parties in several others - the US is a pluralistic, liberal democracy where people of all faiths (and no faith) are free to practice their beliefs as they see fit, with very few restrictions. Protest over killing of JL man halt traffic in city Staff Reporter : The ruling Awami League (AL) leaders and activists demonstrated in capital's Nadda area on Monday demanding punishment to killers of a Jubo League man, freezing traffic in major parts of the city. Police requested the protesters to break their demonstration around 45 minutes after it began around 11:30am. The demonstration had by then caused traffic clog which spread out to nearby areas. "We assured them of capturing the culprits soon. They cleared the streets after our assurances," said Rafiqul Islam, Assistant Commissioner of Gulshan Zone of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP). Jubo League activist of Ward No 18, Md Mainuddin, 40, was murdered on January 23. He was called out from his home at night and beaten and stabbed to death, said Anisur Rahman Sujon, nephew of the slain JL leader. On January 24, the victim's mother filed a murder case accusing Shaju, Shuvo, Abid, Shahin, Jahir and some other named people. "But police are yet to capture the culprits," said Sujon. Nur Hossain challenges death penalty Staff Reporter : Nur Hossain, a deathrow convict and expelled leader of Narayanganj Awami League, on Monday challenged the death penalty awarded to him by a trial court in Narayanganj seven murder case. Lutfar Rahman Akand, a lawyer for Nur, submitted two separate appeals with the High Court seeking acquittal of the former Vice-President of the district Awami League. Citing the appeal petition, lawyer Lutfar told the reporters that his client was not present on the spot when the seven people were murdered. Without considering the point, the trial court sentenced him to death in two cases filed over killing of seven people including Narayanganj City Corporation Ward Councillor Nazrul Islam, his driver and three associates, and senior lawyer Chandan Sarkar and his driver. On January 16, Narayanganj District and Sessions Judge's Court found 35 people, including 25 former RAB officials and Nur Hossain, guilty of abduction and murder of seven people and destroying evidence. The court handed down death penalty to 26 people, including Nur and 16 former RAB men, and jailed nine other accused for various terms, from seven to 17 years. Eminent citizens suggest honest and capable persons on EC Staff Reporter : Members of the civil society on Monday suggested the search committee to pick honest, capable, non-partisan and accomplished individuals with moral responsibility for reconstituting the Election Commission (EC) who will be able to conduct the next general election in an impartial and transparent manner. The search committee held a meeting in the afternoon with 12 eminent personalities of the country's civil socie ty at the Supreme Court Judges' Lounge in Dhaka. "We suggested the search committee to form the new Election Commission with honest, capable and accomplished individuals with moral responsibility who can conduct the next general election in transparent and impartial manners," Sultana Kamal, rights activist, told reporters after the meeting. The other eminent personalities attended the meeting are: former judge of the High Court division of the Supreme Court Justice Abdur Rashid, former Vice-Chancellors of University of Dhaka Professor A K Azad Chowdhury and Professor S M A Faiz, Professor Serajul Islam Choudhury, Professor Dr Abul Kashem Fazlul Haque, Local Government Expert Professor Dr Tofayel Ahmed, former Chief Election Commissioner A T M Shamsul Huda, former Election Commissioners retired Brigadier General Muhammad Sakhawat Hussain and Muhammed Sohul Hussain, former Inspector General of Police Nurul Huda and Secretary of SUJAN Dr Bodiul Alam Majumdar. They started their meeting about 4.30pm. After about one and a half hours meeting the civil society members spoke with the media. Sultana Kamal said, "Search committee will perform according to their process. They discussed with us today (Monday). They wanted to know what kind of election commission people expect." Professor A K Azad Chowdhury said, "We suggested the search committee to pick those persons who have strong moral values and have glorious record of dedication for the country. Former Chief Election Commissioner A T M Shamsul Huda said, "Such an election commission should be formed so that people can keep trust on it. We also suggested for those persons who did not have any political affiliation. They must be honest, capable and non-partisan." However, he said that they did not mention any name for the CEC or EC posts in the meeting. He thought that the search committee should not disclose any name if suggested in future. And, actually they should not do this. Professor Dr Abul Kashem Fazlul Haque said, "We participated in the meeting. What kind of values should have with the members of the reconstructed body of the EC was discussed in the meeting." Although time is short there is still the opportunity to form a law for constructing the Election Commission, he said in the meeting. Cabinet Secretary Mohammad Shafiul Alam, who is acting as mnember secretary of the search committee, said after the meeting, "The committee heard from the 12 eminent personalities of the civil society. They suggested for reconstruction of the Election Commission. We recoreded their speeches. Their main speech was to pick honest and capable persons for reconstructing the Election Commission. They did not suggest any name for the posts." The search commiitte would hold another meeting with some other members of the civil society on February 1 in the same place, said the Cabinet Secretary. The persons are: former Chief Election Commissioner Mohammad Abu Hena, Barrister Rokanuddin Mahmud, Editor of the daily Samakal and Chairman of the board of directors of the Press Institute of Bangladesh (PIB) Golam Sarwar, Editor of The Daily Star Mahfuz Anam and retired Major General Abdur Rashid. Earlier on January 25, President Abdul Hamid formed the six-member search committee, headed by Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain, after holding a series of talks with 31 political parties over reconstitution of the EC. The other members of the search committee are: Justice Obaidul Hassan, a High Court judge, Muhammed Sadique, chairman of Bangladesh Public Service Commission (BPSC), Masud Ahmed, Comptroller and Auditor General of Bangladesh, Professor Syed Manzoorul Islam, trustee board member of Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB), and Shireen Akhter, Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Chittagong University. The tenure of the incumbent commission expires next month. According to the gazette notification published on January 25, the search committee will recommend two names each for the posts of the EC chief and four election commissioners. Later, the President, on the Prime Minister's advice, will appoint the EC chief and other commissioners. 6 killed in Canada mosque shooting A day after Trudeau condemns Trump`s ban Mail Online : Police have arrested two students - one 'of Moroccan origin' - over the murder of six people shot dead in the Quebec City mosque carnage a day after Canada's Prime Minister condemned Donald Trump's immigration ban. Gunmen opened fire on worshippers as they prayed at Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center at around 8pm last night in an attack branded 'cowardly' and 'barbaric'. Witnesses claimed the masked killers shouted 'Allahu Akbar' in what sounded like a Quebecois accent as they went on the rampage, killing six and leaving eight injured. Police have arrested two people with one said to be 'of Moroccan origin' and both understood to be students from Quebec's Universite Laval. The shooting unfolded after a weekend which has seen US President Donald Trump's divisive and controversial 'Muslim immigration ban' spark widespread protests across America. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had said that his country remains open to all immigration, insisting 'diversity is our strength'. One attack suspect was detained at the mosque and the other was caught after a chase that ended near l'ile d'Orleans around 15 miles from the scene. There are reports this morning that one suspect called emergency services to 'confess to his crime' because he 'felt bad' about the atrocity and wanted to shoot himself. According to Le Soleil, the 27-year-old's Mitsubishi was pursued towards Felix-Leclerc highway before he stopped the vehicle himself. He is said to have had at least one handgun and two weapons 'that resembled AK-47s' on his back seat. The same website says searches have since taken place at two addresses in the city. This morning, one of the victims was named as Abdelkrim Hassen, a married father of three who worked in IT for the government. Trudeau has described the mass killing as a 'terrorist attack on Muslims'. 1m sign petition to stop Trump`s visit to UK The Telegraph.cu.uk : Donald Trump's state visit to the UK is expected to be debated in Parliament after senior Conservatives joined more than a million people calling for it to be cancelled. The petition calls for the visit, which is due to take place in the summer, to be abandoned because of the risk it will "embarrass" the Queen. However, a Downing Street source has told the BBC that cancelling the trip would be "populist gesture" and "undo everything" achieved by Theresa May during her trip to the US last week. Senior Conservatives joined Jeremy Corbyn, the Labour leader, in calling for the visit to be suspended while Mr Trump's controversial immigration ban is in place. The internet petition quickly smashed the 100,000 signatures needed to be considered for a debate in Parliament, with at one point more than a thousand people signing each minute. However Downing Street sources confirmed that Mrs May will not be withdrawing her invitation to President Trump because it remains "substantially in the national interest". Ruth Davidson, the leader of the Scottish Conservatives, said that the visit "could not possibly occur" while the travel ban is in place. "State visits are designed for both the host, and the head of state who is being hosted, to celebrate and entrench the friendships and shared values between their respective countries. "A state visit from the current president of the United States could not possibly occur in the best traditions of the enterprise while a cruel and divisive policy which discriminates against citizens of the host nation is in place. "I hope President Trump immediately reconsiders his Muslim ban." Mr Corbyn said Mr Trump's state visit should be called off until he cancels the 90-day ban on citizens from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen entering the US. He said: "Is it really right to endorse somebody who has used this awful misogynistic language throughout the election campaign, awful attacks on Muslims, and then of course this absurd idea of building a wall between themselves and their nearest neighbour?" He added: "I think we should make it very clear we are extremely upset about it, and I think it would be totally wrong for him to be coming here while that situation is going on. I think he has to be challenged on this." Labour MP Dan Jarvis said it was "very likely" there would be an urgent question in the House of Commons on Monday to discuss the travel ban. ...but Mr Trump is adamant Stand off continues at US airports People gather at Copley Square in Boston, Massachusetts to decry US President Donald Trump\'s sweeping executive order, which restricts refugees and travellers from seven Muslim-majority countries. BBC Online : The Trump administration is standing firm over its ban on immigration from seven countries despite court rulings and mass protests against it. In a statement, President Trump said visas would once again be issued once "the most secure policies" were in place, and denied it was a Muslim ban. The move has been widely condemned. Sixteen state attorneys general have said the order is unconstitutional. Several federal judges have temporarily halted the deportation of visa holders. Mr Trump's executive order, signed on Friday, halted the entire US refugee programme for 120 days, indefinitely banned Syrian refugees and suspended all nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries. Those who were already mid-flight were detained on arrival - even if they held valid US visas or other immigration permits. It is not known how many others were turned away at airports overseas as they tried to board flights to the US. Thousands gathered at airports around the country to protest on Saturday, including lawyers who offered their services for free to those affected. Further demonstrations were held on Sunday, including protests outside the White House and Trump Tower in New York. As well as the ban on all refugees, travellers who have nationality or dual nationality of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen are not permitted to enter the US for 90 days, or be issued an immigrant or non-immigrant visa. This includes those who share dual nationality with allied countries, including the UK, although Canada has been told its dual nationals are not affected. But there remains much confusion. The UK Foreign Office put out a statement saying that only those dual nationals travelling from one of the blacklisted seven countries would be subject to extra checks - those travelling between the UK and US would not be affected. However, one Scottish veterinary student -- who travels on an Iranian passport -- was unable to fly home from her holiday in Costa Rica because she was told her transit visa for the US was no longer valid. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said US Green Card holders - legal residents - would also not be affected, but some have been detained since the order came into effect. What does the White House say? Mr Trump tweeted early on Sunday that the US needed "extreme vetting, NOW" but later, in a statement, tried to offer more reassuring words, saying: "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. "We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days," he said. Media captionDonald Trump supporters give their views on the ban from New York's Staten Island In a tweet on Monday morning, Mr Trump placed the blame for any perceived chaos at the airports on protesters, "the tears of Senator [Chuck] Schumer" and Delta Airlines, which had a computer issue on Sunday which led to the cancellation of 170 flights, and another 110 on Monday. Delta has more than 5,400 flights a day. Mr Trump also said "only 109 people out of 325,000" travelling, had been detained for extra questioning - a figure Mr Priebus had given to the media on Sunday. But the statements have failed to allay concern among some in the Republican party. The Republican chair of the US Senate Foreign Relations committee, Senator Bob Corker, said the executive order had been "poorly implemented", particularly for Green Card holders, and the "administration should make appropriate revisions". Democratic Senate Minority leader Chuck Schumer said the US now appeared "less humanitarian, less safe, less American" and said the Democrats would introduce legislation to overturn it. Fear, uncertainty and small acts of rebellion at Dulles airport - BBC's Jessica Lussenhop in Washington DC Image caption Lawyers gathered to represent those facing travel bans Ali worked for three years as an interpreter for the US Army and gained admittance to the US through a Special Immigrant Visa. He now has a green card, and returned to Iraq for his father's funeral, only to be delayed for hours for questioning at Dulles. "We are not terrorists. We are not bad people," said Ali. "It's so hard. I hope they will change their minds on this position." In a joint statement, 16 attorneys general, from states including California, New York and Pennsylvania, said they would "use all of the tools of our offices to fight this unconstitutional order" and, until it was struck down, would "work to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created". Late on Saturday, federal Judge Ann Donnelly, in New York, ruled against the removal from the US of people with approved refugee applications, valid visas and "other individuals... legally authorised to enter the United States". The lives interrupted by Trump`s immigration ban Al Jazeera News : Ali, a 33-year-old Iranian-American engineer and tech start-up consultant living in Los Angeles, has no idea when he might see his mother again. Ali's mother, a 66-year-old retired school principal in Tehran who typically visits the United States once a year, is prohibited from entering the country for the next 90 days under President Donald Trump's landmark executive action on immigration. The order bans citizens from the Muslim-majority countries of Iran, Syria, Iraq, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, and Yemen from entering the US. Trump's executive order also bans refugees for the next 120 days and bars Syrian refugees indefinitely. When Ali, who was born in Tehran, turned on the television to learn the news on January 27, he says he was both stunned and devastated. "I feel [utter sadness]," he said over the telephone from an Iranian restaurant in California. "It's baffling It is upsetting to me, it is upsetting to my wife and it is upsetting to my family. They live their own lives, they come visit for a short time and then they go back. They don't pose a threat to anybody, they don't cause harm to anyone, they love the culture in the US." Ali, who has been a US citizen since 2013, and who had arrived in 2002 to study, asked to remain anonymous out of fear of reprisal in the US and for his family in Iran. His older sister also lives in Orange County and works in press relations. Not long after moving to the US, Ali met Deborah, a writer and philanthropist from California. They married in 2008. He received his bachelor's degree in electrical engineering at California State University and later completed his master of business. He eventually became the vice president of a tech start-up in California before becoming a consultant. "America is great," he explained. "It is the land of opportunity. You have the opportunity to do anything, to become anyone, to be successful, to contribute to society and I feel like I as a citizen and my wife as a citizen, we have done that. We have aspired to be successful. We contribute to society. I feel like with these executive actions it's thinning that shining city on the hill - the promised land that everybody looks to." Next hearing on Feb 2 Court Correspondent : The Special Judge Court-3 of Dhaka on Monday adjourned the hearing of the Zia Orphanage Trust graft case against BNP Chief Begum Khaleda Zia, the party's Senior Vice Chairman Tarique Rahman and four others till February 2. BNP Chairperson Khaleda Zia was asked to appear before a Dhaka court on Thursday in Zia Orphanage Trust graft case filed by the Anti-Corruption Commission. Judge Abu Ahmed Jomadar of the Special Judge Court passed the order on hearing arguments from the prosecution and the defence in presence of Khaleda Zia at the make-shift court set up on Bakshibazar Alia Madrasa playground. On the next date the court will also hear the petition filed by Khaleda Zia's lawyers seeking further investigation into the case. Earlier, her lawyer submitted the petition saying that investigation into the case conducted by the ACC was faulty. Besides, BNP leader is scheduled to place her statement in self-defence on the same date. Meanwhile, Khaleda Zia left her Gulshan residence at about 10 am and appeared at the court at 11.15 am. She left the court for her residence after the proceedings of the court. On January 26, the court fixed January 30 as the date of hearing and asked the BNP Chairperson to appear before the court. On that date, the court issued warrant of arrest against Tarique Rahman in the case. The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) filed the Zia Orphanage Trust graft case on July 3, 2008 with Ramna Model Police Station accusing Khaleda, her eldest son Tarique, who has been residing in the UK since 2008, and four others for misappropriating over Tk 2.10 crore that was received as grant for orphans from a foreign bank. Other four accused persons are: former BNP lawmaker Kazi Salimul Haque, businessperson Sharfuddin Ahmed, former premier Khaleda Zia's Principal Secretary Dr Kamal Uddin Siddidqui and late President Ziaur Rahman's nephew Momenur Rahman. HC starts hearing on death reference UNB, Dhaka : The High Court on Monday started hearing the death reference and appeals of the condemned convicts in a case filed over the killing of 13-year old boy Rajon in Sylhet in 2015. An HC bench of Justice Md. Jahangir Hossain and Justice Jahangir Hossain started hearing the death reference and the appeals. Deputy Attorney General Jahirul Haque Jahir presented the paper book of the case. On November 8, 2015, Sylhet Metropolitan and Sessions Judge's Court handed down death penalty to four persons, including Saudi expatriate Quamrul Islam, for killing Rajon. On July 8, 2015, Sheikh Samiul Alam Rajon, son of Sheikh Azizur Rahman of Badeali village in Sadar upazila of Sylhet, was brutally tortured to death over a theft at Sundar Ali Market in Kumargaon area of the city. Mahmoud Abbas due tomorrow UNB, Dhaka : Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas arrives here on a three-day official visit on Wednesday to advance the 'special relations' with Bangladesh. A special flight carrying Abbas and his entourage will land at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in the afternoon, said a Foreign Ministry official on Monday. The visit is taking place at the invitation of President Abdul Hamid. President Hamid will receive Abbas on his arrival at the VVIP terminal of the airport. Palestinian Foreign Minister Dr Reyad Al Malki, Chief Justice of Palestine and the Minister of Religious Affairs Mahmoud al-Habbas, Palestinian Authority Spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh, Majdi al-Khalidi and senior military and civil officials will accompany the Palestinian President during the visit. Abbas, who had made a stopover in Dhaka in February last year, will meet his Bangladesh counterpart Abdul Hamid and have bilateral talks with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina during the visit. Both sides will discuss bilateral, regional and international issues at the meetings. A memorandum of understanding (MoU) on formation of joint commission at foreign minister-level is likely to be signed, Foreign Ministry officials said. There will be a meeting between Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali and his Palestinian counterpart. Abbas will visit Savar National Martyr's Monument and pay respect to the martyrs of Liberation War. He will also visit Bangabandhu Memorial Museum in Dhanmondi. President Hamid will host dinner in honour of his Palestine counterpart. The Palestinian President will leave Dhaka on the afternoon of February 3. Bangladesh supports Palestinian people for their struggle for an independent homeland, especially the capital-the holy city of Jerusalem-and Bangladesh remains always vocal in the UN, OIC, NAM over Palestinian issues. The Undead Archives I have finally salvaged my pre-Blogger TDR archives and added them into Blogger. They are almost totally in the form of one giant post for each month. And the formatting strayed from the originals. Sorry. But historians everywhere can rejoice that this treasure trove of my thoughts is restored to the world. The best bang for your buck! This option enables you to purchase online 24/7 access and receive the Sunday, Tuesday & Thursday print edition at no additional cost * Print edition only available in our carrier delivery area. Allow up to 72 hours for delivery of your print edition to begin. 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Frustration may build up and you may end up taking your sexual stress out on your partner. If you are able to adopt sextoy in a timely manner, you can get rid of those problems. I want to have more exciting sex than Im having now. I want more variation in masturbation I want to get even stronger pleasure than I do on my own. If you have any of these problems, please stay with me until the end. What is sex toys for Indian? Sextoy, as the name implies, is a toy used during sex and masturbation. It is a generic term for vibrators, Egg-vibrators, Electric massagers, dildo, handcuffs and condoms. They are used to make regular sex more exciting or to make masturbation more pleasurable. Because sextoy is very stimulating, it can help you to get rid of the problems and frustrations of being in a rut of sex with your partner for a long time, or if you are unhappy with the lack of pleasure in sex with your partner. The ability to satisfy your desires with movement, texture, and size, which cannot be done by a normal human being, can help you to be satisfied with sex and, as a result, improve your relationship with your partner. It is also said to help improve sexual dysfunction (inability to get an erection or ejaculate) and difficulty in feeling during sex (insensitivity), which is attracting more attention than in the past. In recent years, the demand for sextoy has increased due to the spread of smartphones and the Internet and the increasing number of people using online shopping. Even those who are concerned about the appearance of sextoy (and find it difficult to purchase) can now easily obtain it by using mail order. In the case of online shopping, most of the stores have taken steps to ensure that the contents of the products delivered to you are not revealed, so you can purchase them without your family members knowing. Until a while ago, you had to go to the store where the adult goods were sold to buy them, so it was quite a hurdle to overcome. Also, many people may have an image that sextoy is somehow embarrassing to own. But nowadays, some of them are so stylish and cute that you cant believe they are sextoy at a glance. More and more people are using them for travel and outdoor use because they are not too bulky and are suitable for carrying around. Sextoy situation in India Before introducing the recommended sextoy for Indians, lets talk about one of the sextoy situations in India in recent years. In India, due to the high concentration of population, the following six cities have particularly high sales of sextoy in India. Mumbai Kolkata Bangalore Delhi Chennai Hyderabad These cities account for roughly 70 percent of sextoy sales in India. In the future, the percentage of sextoy use will gradually increase in other cities in India as well. If you never talk about sextoy publicly, that girl in your neighborhood might be a sextoy user too. If you are interested in sextoy, you dont have to suppress your desire for it. What are Sextoys for beginner? Among all sextoys, sextoy for beginners are vibrators, dildo, masturbators, Sex Lubricants, and condoms. Sex Lubricants and condoms, which are familiar to people who have had sex, are also a great beginners sextoy. I will explain the details of each toy later, but there are many sextoy products that are painful to use and can only be used after some anal expansion. I assume that the Indian readers of this article are people who have not had much experience with sextoy. If such people use professional sextoy suddenly, they are at risk of injury or trauma. Therefore, to introduce sextoy, you need to start with a beginners version and gradually become familiar with it. Advantages of using sextoy for Indians There are three advantages of using sextoy for Indians You can masturbate in a wide variety of ways. Can have stimulating sex Can develop new sexual zones If you try to masturbate with your own fingers or hands, it tends to be a pattern. However, with sextoy, you can easily masturbate in a variety of ways. You will definitely be fascinated by the attraction of new stimulation. Also, your daily sex life will be more exciting than ever. There are many things in sextoy that are visually stimulating and give you a strong and intense feeling of pleasure. This allows you to see your partners promiscuity in a way that you wouldnt normally see it. When you are in a relationship, sex with your partner may become a pattern, but it can also eliminate these problems. It can also lead to the development of new sexual zones (which is the training of sexual stimulation to allow you to feel orgasms). For more information on the development of new sexual zones, see the following articles [Women's Erogenous Zone]How to find and develop, 7 hidden sexual zones !![In India] In this issue, we will dissect the female erogenous zone! ..." Many of you may be like that. Men, in particular, shou... Thus, the use of sextoy can only be a good thing for the men and women of India. Sextoy for beginner men in India So, lets continue with the recommended goods for Indian sextoy beginners. For ease of understanding, we will introduce them by gender. Lets start with the men! The following five goods are recommended for novice Indian sextoy men Masturbator Cock rings Love Doll Sex Lubricants Toys for the prostate Lets check each one in detail. Masturbator The masturbator is a sextoy for men that elaborately reproduces a womans vagina, mouth, and anus, and is one of the most popular sextoy products. It is used by men to masturbate, and it is popular because it provides stronger stimulation and pleasure more easily than using hands. Most are made of good quality silicone, and their softness is something that cannot be achieved with ones own hands. They can provide stronger pleasure than a real womans vagina, so be careful not to overuse them. (You wont be able to have an orgasm in a womans vagina anymore.) Again Male masturbators are a wonderful toy. I do not need any favourite timing, bothersome bargaining. You do not have to worry too much. Revolutionize your masturbation time! ! ! Made in Japan is a wonderful kinky toy.#sextoysindia #SexToyIndia #Japanhttps://t.co/4k70QGzoTP pic.twitter.com/tRVdxTKPpa SEXToys India PR (@SextoysIndia) November 12, 2018 Some of them are disposable, while others can be washed and used over and over again, so its fun to buy a few to use depending on your mood. If you want to know more about masturbator, please click here Really pleasant male masturbation and how to do it Are you in a rut with your daily masturbation routine? I'm going to show you five ways men masturbate that you might ... [For Beginners] How to choose and use a male masturbator without fail Gentlemen.Have you ever used a masturbator? The person who sees this article is probably the one who has not experien... Cock Ring A cock ring is literally a ring-shaped sextoy that is worn on a mans penis. It maintains an erection by binding the penis with a ring of rubber and blocking blood flow. It is sometimes used as an accessory to be worn on the penis, and may be made of metal or plastic as well as rubber. In some cases, cock rings have parts or vibrators attached to them that stimulate the vagina, so they kill two birds with one stone, giving a woman pleasure while maintaining an erection. Cock rings are also sometimes used to treat erectile dysfunction. It can help with erectile dysfunction, where the penis doesnt get hard when you get an erection or doesnt last long when you try to insert it. Men who are prone to breakage or who are unsure of the hardness and size of their erections can use a cock ring to increase the size of their penis and maintain an erection for a longer period of time. Cock rings vary in price from around RS700 to over RS2000 with a vibrator function. Some of them do not fit your penis, so you should check the size of the cock ring before you buy. You should know the size of your partners or your own penis when it is erect. [Penis enlargement] What is a cock ring? Types and usage Cock rings can make your penis bigger and harder. It also makes sex with women more fulfilling and increases your sat... Love Doll Love dolls, also known as Dutchwives, are dolls with the appearance of a woman who can experience simulated sex. There are dolls that look like a woman, but they have no face and only have their breasts and lower torso cut off, and some dolls are so realistic that they can actually be mistaken for real women. Some expensive dolls can cost more than 1 million yen, and the quality of the doll is easily influenced by the price. The higher the price, the higher the quality of the doll will be, the closer it will be to the real woman, and the cheaper the doll will be, the less elaborate it will be, making it look like a real doll! Something is wrong! That is also true. You cant go wrong if you choose a balance between price and taste. There are stores that allow you to make custom-made love dolls, so you can create a girl of your choice. You can make a girl of your choice. You can start with inexpensive love dolls at first, and once you get used to it, you can try custom-made love dolls. If you want to know more about Love doll, please click here Thorough explanation of the charm of sex dolls! Have you ever heard of sex dolls that are used primarily for pseudo-sex purposes? It is a doll that is quite close to... Sex lubricants Sex lubricants are used as a substitute for lubricating fluid during sex or as a lubricant for men to use masturbator rules. It is not uncommon for women to have difficulty getting wet, depending on their physical condition, or to have difficulty getting wet due to their constitution. Forcing the penis into the vagina at such times can cause painful intercourse. There are various types of Sex Lubricants, some with a warming effect, some with a cooling effect, and some with a scent. Changing the Sex Lubricant used during play is recommended as a good sex accent. If you want to learn more about Sex Lubricants, click here. What is sex lubricant?Explain the difference and usage of each ingredient The word "sex toy" may seem like a hurdle to overcome, but lotion is actually one of the most familiar sex toys. Many... Toys for the Prostate Another sextoy for men is prostate toys. The most famous prostate toys include Enemagra, which was originally a prostate massager developed by an American urologist to treat an enlarged prostate line. Modern prostate toys are imitations of Enemagra that have spread as sextoy for men. Many people think of prostate toys as being used by gay men, but in fact they are often used by straight men. What is the prostate? The prostate is an organ found only in men. It is a walnut-sized organ located deep in the pelvis, just below the bladder, and its primary role is to protect and nourish sperm. You cannot touch the prostate gland from outside the body, but you can touch it by inserting a finger or sextoy through the anus. By inserting a finger or sextoy through the anus and touching the prostate and developing it, you can feel intense orgasms. Orgasms felt in the prostate are mainly dry orgasms, which are orgasms that do not involve ejaculation. (You can also feel orgasms with ejaculation through prostate stimulation.) The prostate is called the male G-spot, and dry orgasms can be much more intense than ejaculation. Therefore, men who are able to develop a prostate can become addicted to the pleasure. sextoy for beinner women in India The following are the recommended goods for Indian women who are new to sextoy. The following three are recommended for use by women who are new to sextoy. Vibrator. Dildo Electric Masserger Lets check out what each one is in detail. If you want to check out womens toys, click here. [BEST25]Sex Toys for Women in IndiaThat Can Help You Have an Orgasm There are many women who pretend to feel orgasm during sex. But don't worry, you don't have to pretend to feel orgasm... Vibrators A vibrator is a sextoy that vibrates with an Egg-Vibrator to provide stimulation and is often referred to simply as a vibrator. Some vibrate as well as rotate, and there are many variations of sextoy. It is quite a popular sextoy, and is well recognized by people who do not know much about sextoy. Its usage is similar to that of a massager, but it is more compact and easier to carry than a massager, and many of them look as cute as a lipstick or a macaroon, so they are popular among women. For a while, a famous influencer on twitter said, This is good! You may have heard of the topic of this article by introducing the recommended vibrators. Vibrators are great for women to use on their own, but they are also recommended for men who have difficulty satisfying women with sex. Since it is powered by electricity, it is far less tiring than moving your hands by yourself. This makes it easier to satisfy a woman with sex because you can caress her for longer than usual. Vibrators are mainly used on the female side, but they can also be used on men. When used on men, they are used to attack the nipples and glans, and in both cases it is recommended to wear a condom for hygiene reasons. Introducing how to use the vibrator, its purpose, and how to choose it! Vibrator uses the vibrations caused by the rotation of the motor to provide stimulation. It is one or two of the most... Dildo A dildo is a model sextoy made to mimic a male penis. It can be made of silicone, elastomer (think of it as a material similar to PVC), metal or glass. A dildo can be used by a man for his female partner during sex, or by a woman for masturbation to get pleasure from it. They are mainly inserted into women, but some can be used in the male anus as well. It is sometimes used synonymously with vibrators, but the vibrator is not the same thing as a vibrating device. A model of a penis that does not vibrate is a dildo. Some of them have suction cups that can be attached to the floor or wall so that you can enjoy realistic masturbation without using your hands. For fun, there is a dildo made in the shape of your partners penis. This one is also popular as a gift, and if youve been together for a long time and are having trouble finding a gift for your partner, you might want to pick one. To learn more about dildo, please click here. What is Dildo: Orgasms with Dildos for Men and Women A dildo is a model of a male organ that is used by women for masturbation and by men to stimulate the prostate gland. Th... Electric Masserger A Electric Masserger is a hand-held electric massager, also known as a handheld massager, and can usually be purchased at electronics stores. It was originally designed to relieve stiff shoulders and back pain, so the hurdle of buying one in a physical store is quite low. Many people may have seen or used it in some form or another, as it is often installed in leisure hotels. Such a massager is highly recommended for beginners because it is easy for women to get pleasure from it when they use it during masturbation. It is larger than Egg-Vibrator and vibrations are stronger than those of Egg-Vibrators and vibrators, so even just hitting the clitoris can give you a great deal of pleasure. For those women who have never had an orgasm during sex with their man, the massager may be a good way to get a feel for what it feels like to have an orgasm. It looks and feels like an electric massager, so you wont have to feel awkward if your roommate finds out. If you are in a rut of having sex with your partner, if you want to feel an orgasm through masturbation, or if you are thinking of using a sextoy, why dont you try it from a simple massager? To learn more about Electric Masserger, click here. What is a massager? Introducing types, selection methods, and usage Originally, the Magic-wand vibrator and the massage machine were sold as a home massage machine used for the back and th... How to choose a sextoy for Indian Now that weve covered the different types of sextoy, heres how to choose one. Especially if you are trying sextoy for the first time, pay attention to the following three points: Does the size fit you (the partner)? Does the size fit you (your partner)? Is the environment able to produce sound without problems? Price range First of all, the choice of size is quite important. Most sextoy are used against or inserted into the genitals, but the genitals are very delicate organs for both men and women. For this reason, using an inappropriate size may cause damage. Secondly, the environment should be able to produce sound without problems. Some sextoys not only wear, but also rotate and vibrate. Its easier to get pleasure from something that moves than something that doesnt, but the fact that it moves means that the internal rotors make some noise. If you live in a house with thin walls or if you have roommates, you may not be able to concentrate because of the noise, so it is best to choose one that is silent or has a low noise level. Especially in India, where many people live with their families, it is very important that you dont have to worry about sound when you use it. Finally, there is the price range. The price range of sextoy ranges widely, from around RS500 at the cheapest to RS10,000 or more at the highest. Its good to consider how much money you can afford and how much you want to buy. Do you want your family to not find out about sextoy? I live with my family and want to use sextoy without them finding out! If you are a man, you should buy a camouflage sextoy that does not look like a sextoy at first glance. For men, there are many masturbators that do not look like a sextoy, and for women, there are vibrators that only look like cosmetics. If you choose such a type, youll be safe in case your family members find out. How to buy sextoys in India The best way to purchase sextoy is through online shopping. For more information on how to purchase sextoy, please see the article below. Sextoy is one of them. Therefore, you can easily get sextoy in India by using online shopping. SexToysINDIA is a long established and stable sextoy store and you can have sextoy delivered to any place in India. They also offer cash on delivery, so those who are worried about shopping with a credit card do not have to worry. Of course, the latest security is in place, so your information will not be taken out when you use your credit card. To begin with, many people may be concerned about whether they are legally allowed to purchase sextoy. ikmAs it turns out, its not illegal. Right now, it is not open to the public because the Indian adult market is still in the development stage, but it will gradually spread from now on. Take advantage of sextoy and open the door to new pleasures and culture. Cautions for Indians using sextoy When using sextoy, keep the following three things in mind Keep sex toys clean Watch out for electrical leakage Beware of the heat generated by the body while using a sex toy As I mentioned earlier, many sextoy products are used for the delicate zone. Therefore, it is most important to keep the sextoy itself clean. It is very important to keep the sextoy itself clean, because if a slight scratch is created by friction, bacteria can enter and breed there. It is safe to wear a condom when using the masturbator, just in case. In addition, many sextoy devices are powered by a power source, so if they are not waterproof, there is a possibility of electric shock or malfunction due to wetness. Some may even develop heat during continuous use. If the fever becomes too much, you may get burned, so be careful. If you get a fever during use, stop driving the sextoy immediately and refrain from using it. You will enjoy sex more if you keep it safe and use it correctly. Summary What did you think? In this article, we have introduced the recommended sextoy for the beginners of sextoy in India. The sextoy market is growing rapidly in India and it will continue to grow steadily in the future. As India is a rather closed-minded country, it can be difficult to be open about ones sexual habits and values. However, being faithful to ones desires by properly dissolving ones sexual desire is very effective for ones physical and mental health. If this is your first time to learn about sextoy, or if you are interested in using sextoy, why not give it a try? Indian Sextoys for ur best! will introduce you to sextoy and other trivia about sextoy, sexuality, and sexuality for men and women. I want to read more! If you think its a great idea, please bookmark it. CARBONDALE Organizers estimated 200 supporters participated Sunday in the Southern Illinois March for Life, an event sponsored annually by the Murphysboro Knights of Columbus, held on or around the anniversary of Roe v. Wade a landmark Supreme Court case in which the court established a constitutional right to abortion. The local march followed the national March for Life, which took place Jan. 27 in the nation's capital. The demonstration started at 1 p.m. at the Carbondale Town Square Pavilion, and marchers carried signs along Illinois 13 to Wall Street and back to the pavilion. Participants were of all ages from families with small children, to teenagers and SIU students. For too long Ive watched other people come out and fight for things I believe in, Leslie Morgan, of Murphysboro, said about the march. So I decided to come out and give a voice to the little ones. Organizer Jeff Chmiola, of the Murphysboro Knights of Columbus, said community members from across Southern Illinois showed up to the event, coming in from places like Anna, Herrin, Cobden and Christopher. SIU students also joined the event, including members of the Newman Catholic Student Center and Saluki Catholics. Since 1973, with the Supreme Court ruling of Roe v. Wade, almost 60 million lives have ended due to abortion, said Kasey Schwartz, president of Saluki Students for Life and a second year masters student. One third of our generation is gone. We werent able to be a voice for our missing generation, but we are able to be a voice for the next generation. Were out here today to be a voice for the voiceless, she said. Were tired of organizations like Planned Parenthood telling women that they arent strong enough, worthy enough and capable enough to be parenting students. We want those women to know that they are not alone and we can help them, Schwartz said, noting the SIU organization Pregnant On Campus, which provides resources to pregnant and parenting students. Chmiola said about a dozen churches were invited to the event. Crystal Elliott, 16, of Murphysboro, said that as a Christian, I feel abortion is wrong, a baby is a person too. Crystal was joined by her mother, Marzena Elliott, who agreed, An unborn child has life and we dont have the right to take that away. The pro-life supporters received approval in the form of honking and thumbs up from several passersby. The goal, Chmiola said, is to proclaim the fact that all life is sacred in Gods eyes, from conception to death. The march is one of several pro-life events the Knights of Columbus hold every year, including Life Chain, which is a nationwide 90-minute public prayer to end abortion, and a pro-life dinner, which helps raise money for supplies like rally signs. Most of the pro-life events are held in October, which is recognized as Respect for Life month. Members of Illinois' largest public-employee union are voting on whether to authorize a strike as contract talks with Gov. Bruce Rauner's administration remain stalled. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31 vote is being held from Monday through Feb. 19. The vote doesn't guarantee a strike, but will indicate whether union members want to give their bargaining committee power to walk off the job. State labor regulators have declared the 2-year-old talks at "impasse." That allows the Republican governor to impose a contract and the union to strike. Earlier this month AFSCME offered a compromise that included forgoing general wage increases for four years. A Rauner spokeswoman called it "superficial." Rauner's administration says it seeking "commonsense changes," such as requiring a 40-hour work week. The Associated Press Responses from Illinois two Democratic U.S. senators, Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth, and two Republican congressmen that represent Southern Illinois, Mike Bost and John Shimkus, to President Donald Trumps executive order on immigration are below. Trumps executive order issued these three primary dictates: - For 120 days, suspends all refugee admissions - Indefinitely bans Syrian refugees from entering the United States until such time as I have determined that sufficient changes have been made to the USRAP (US Refugee Admissions Program) to ensure that admission of Syrian refugees is consistent with the national interest." - For 90 days, bans travel from the following seven Muslim-majority countries: Libya, Syria, Iraq, Sudan, Iran, Yemen and Somalia. It remains unclear exactly how the executive order will affect green card holders from any of these countries, and people with dual citizenship with one of these countries and the U.S. The executive order in its entirety can be found here. Rep. Mike Bost, R-Murphysboro "Congressman Bost believes the top priority of the federal government is to keep the American people safe. It has become clear that we need a top-down review of our vetting process, and that it can be conducted in a manner that respects the rights of law-biding citizens. In the wake of terrorist attacks in Paris and elsewhere, Congressman Bost voted for bipartisan legislation to pause the intake of refugees from certain high risk locations until our screening systems are improved. Given the world we live in today, taking steps to strengthen our national security is simple common sense." Statement provided by George OConnor, communications director for Bost Rep. John Shimkus, R-Collinsville My record on this issue is clear, and has not changed: I support a vetting process that ensures every refugee, migrant or foreign national is not a security threat prior to his or her admission to the United States. Thats why I supported bipartisan legislation to stop the resettlement of Syrian and Iraqi refugees until our nations top security officials can be certain that each individual poses no threat to our homeland. The reality is our world has grown more dangerous, and our enemies more emboldened in the last eight years. It would be irresponsible to ignore these threats, and to allow our inadequate screening of those entering our country from unstable or hostile regions to continue as is. This temporary halt will give Congress and the new Administration time to evaluate and improve the vetting process, and in the meantime gives (United States Department of Homeland Security) Secretary (John) Kelly authority to grant exceptions to the restrictions as needed. One of those exceptions must be to green card holders, who have already undergone extensive screening. America is an extraordinarily compassionate country, and we should continue to use our unique capabilities to help those in need around the world. So far we have contributed more resources to help Syrian civilians than any other nation, more than $4.5 billion since the start of the crisis. We should continue to provide humanitarian assistance, not only together as a nation, but individually to any of the dozens of non-governmental and faith-based aide organizations doing important work there. Finally, as Ive said for months, the most immediate way the U.S. can help refugees fleeing Iraq and Syria is to establish and guarantee safe havens within the region where they can receive vital humanitarian assistance. Statement appears on Shimkus government website Joint statement from U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth, D-Illinois "U.S. Senators Tammy Duckworth and Dick Durbin on Monday called on the U.S. Department of Homeland Securitys (DHS) Office of Inspector General to immediately initiate an independent investigation into the agencys potentially illegal implementation of President Trumps executive order. This rushed and poorly drafted Trump Administration initiative endangers our national security by limiting travel from certain Muslim-majority countries, and it may violate long-standing immigration law in its treatment of legal permanent residents by undermining vital rights like due process and equal protection that are guaranteed by the United States Constitution. On the day after the executive order was issued, approximately 18 people were detained at OHare International Airport, including several legal permanent residents. "'The chaotic execution of this [Executive Order] raises serious concerns in regard to whether taxpayer dollars were efficiently and effectively spent, rather than wasted on unwarranted and unjust detentions of lawful permanent residents (LPRs) and others who posed no security threat, and who had already been authorized by the US government to enter our country, Duckworth and Durbin wrote, in the joint statement. 'We are deeply concerned by [Customs and Border Protections] failure to respond to time-sensitive congressional oversight inquiries and allegations that the agency refused to permit attorneys to meet with detained LPRs at OHare and other airports across the country.' "The Senators letter requests an investigation into: How DHS & the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) prepared to implement the executive order and what guidance they provided to the White House during development of it; What guidance and training was provided to CBP employees to make sure the executive order was implemented in a consistent and fair manner that protected the constitutional rights of all detained individuals; How DHS & CBP determined which information to share with the public and whether they kept a list of all detained individuals; Whether CBP officers at airports were informed of the court orders and given instructions on how to comply with them; Whether CBP officers violated any court order. If so, who directed such actions; what will be done to hold violators accountable; and what will CBP do to prevent violations of the rule of law from ever occurring again; What complaints about violations of court orders have been received and how they were resolved. 'We are particularly alarmed by allegations that CBP Officers and potentially other Department personnel, failed to comply with a temporary restraining order that directed CBP to provide detained LPRs at Dulles International Airport with access to attorneys. Such allegations should not be taken lightly and require swift investigative action by your office. Duckworth and Durbin added. The United States Constitution means little if law enforcement agents disregard it, or if Americans are unwilling to defend its principles and respect foundational constitutional rights, from due process to equal protection under the law. The American people are relying on your independent investigators to serve as a check against a powerful law enforcement agency that may be violating the civil rights of LPRs and operating in violation of the law.'" The full text of the letter is as follows: VIA ELECTRONIC DELIVERY The Honorable John Roth Inspector General Office of the Inspector General U.S. Department of Homeland Security 245 Murray Lane SW Washington, DC 20528-0305 Dear Inspector General Roth: We are writing to request that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) immediately initiate a comprehensive investigation into DHS implementation of Protecting the Nation from Terrorist Entry into the United States by Foreign Nationals, an Executive Order (EO) signed on Friday, January 27, 2017. The chaotic execution of this EO by DHS and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) personnel raises serious concerns in regard to whether taxpayer dollars were efficiently and effectively spent, rather than wasted on unwarranted and unjust detentions of lawful permanent residents (LPRs) and others who posed no security threat, and who had already been authorized by the United States Government to enter our country. Reports indicate CBP Officers detained LPRs at OHare for a prolonged period of time with no access to legal counsel. We are deeply concerned by CBPs failure to respond to time-sensitive Congressional oversight inquiries and allegations that the agency refused to permit attorneys to meet with detained LPRs at OHare and other airports across the country. CBPs refusal to allow detained legal permanent residents to meet with legal counsel is especially troubling in light of the determination by the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York that it is likely the removal of the detained individuals would have violated their rights to Due Process and Equal Protection guaranteed by the United States Constitution. We are particularly alarmed by allegations that CBP Officers and potentially other Department personnel, failed to comply with a temporary restraining order issued by Judge Leonie M. Brinkema of the United States District Court, Eastern District of Virginia, that directed CBP to provide detained LPRs at Dulles International Airport with access to attorneys. Such allegations should not be taken lightly and require swift investigative action by your office. We must ensure that CBP is held accountable for following the law and respecting our Nations system of checks and balances. Accordingly, we request that DHS OIG investigate DHS and CBP implementation of the Executive Order signed on Friday, January 27, 2017. Specifically, we request that DHS OIG investigate: How DHS and CBP prepared to implement the EO and what guidance DHS and CBP personnel provided to the White House during development of the EO; What guidance and training were provided to CBP Management and Officers to make sure the EO was implemented in a consistent and fair manner that protected the constitutional rights of all detained individuals; How DHS and CBP determined what information to share with the public; Whether DHS and CBP kept a list of all detained individuals and if not, why not; Whether, when, and how CBP officers at airports nationwide were informed of court orders affecting implementation of the EO, including what specific information and instruction CBP officers were provided regarding compliance with court orders; What steps DHS and CBP took to ensure that all DHS and CBP personnel complied with all relevant court orders; What complaints CBP received regarding its compliance with the relevant court orders and how these complaints were resolved; Whether CPB officers took action that was contrary to any court orders and if so, what actions were taken, where were they taken and who directed such actions; What justifications CBP officers have proffered for any actions contrary to any court orders; What actions CBP has taken, or plans to take, to hold CBP Officers accountable for any violations of a Federal Court order; and Any remedial actions CBP has instituted to prevent any violations from occurring again. The United States Constitution means little if law enforcement agents disregard it, or if Americans are unwilling to defend its principles and respect foundational constitutional rights, from due process to equal protection under the law. The American people are relying on your independent investigators to serve as a check against a powerful law enforcement agency that may be violating the civil rights of LPRs and operating in violation of the law. If you have any questions about this request, please contact Benjamin Rhodeside on Senator Duckworths staff at 202-224-2070 or by email at: Benjamin_Rhodeside@duckworth.senate.gov. Thank you in advance for your prompt consideration of my request. Sincerely, Tammy Duckworth & Dick Durbin United States Senators Joint statement and letter provided to The Southern via email from Sen. Duckworths office Compiled by Reporter Molly Parker SANTEE -- Richard Rentz of Bamberg County, chairman of the South Carolina Peanut Board, greeted those attending the 38th Annual South Carolina Peanut Growers' Meeting in Santee on Thursday with an indisputable fact -- "There is no such thing as a normal year. No two years are alike, and 2016 brought us the hottest July on record, a hurricane and a tropical depression. The meeting drew a record 400 industry reps and agriculture agents who came to be educated and informed about research-based management of peanuts. Presenters from in state, Georgia and North Carolina presented the latest recommendations on peanut varieties, disease and insect control, precision agriculture, irrigation and more. Displays filled the lobby where mingling brought about new connections between growers and suppliers as well as the opportunity to reconnect with old friends. What was normal this year was the continued support from the (South Carolina) Department of Agriculture, Rentz told the group. Hugh Weathers, SCDA commissioner, commended the team that worked diligently to secure and distribute financial aid to farmers who faced devastating losses in 2015 and 2016. While acknowledging that these are unusual times in Washington, Weathers said the prospects look good for agriculture in the upcoming year. We have a great nominee to lead the Department of Ag, and he will do a great job of representing the South and the diversity that is agriculture, the commissioner said. Dell Cotton, Peanut Growers Cooperative Marketing Association manager, provided statistics and comparisons of data relating to peanut acres grown, yields and production from 2005 to 2016. In 2016, South Carolina farmers grew 108,074 acres of peanuts, down slightly from the 109,000 in 2015, Cotton said. Yields for South Carolina were 3,300 tons and production for the Southeast as a whole was 2,072,690 tons, both down from 2017, he said. Demand, however, exceeded production in 2016 by 95,210 tons for the United States as a whole, he said. Maria Balota, Virginia Tech extension specialist, discussed the work being done with peanut varieties and quality evaluation. She covered the objectives of the research, noting that varieties are tested in-house in trials and then across the region for three years. Current research focuses on developing higher oleic trait varieties, Balota said. This program is the pipeline for all the Virginia-type varieties, she said. We work with representatives across the industry. David Jordan of North Carolina State University gave a view of peanut production from The Old North State," referring to North Carolina's official state song. He said the formula for a successful crop included using crop rotation, improved varieties, wise management practices, planting in a favorable soil and having favorable weather, among other things. Clemson Extension Peanut Specialist Dan Anco covered variety performance and top choices for growers. Emphasis was placed on cultivating varieties resistant to tomato spotted wilt virus, South Carolinas number one problem for peanut growers. He presented numerous grafts and trial results and provided additional information in the Peanut Money Maker 2017 Production Guide, which was distributed to attendees. Nathan Smith gave a cost and returns outlook for 2017. He directed growers to Clemsons Agribusiness website http://www.clemson.edu/extension/agribusiness/ for a wealth of information on cost analysis. Basically, what we need is a little better yields for sure this year, Smith said. Marianne Copelan of the SCDA provided a marketing update. More information on promotions, related activities and a peanut newsletter can be found at http://aboutpeanuts.com/. Tom Dobbins, director of Cooperative Extension at Clemson University, presented a Distinguished Team Award to members of the CU Extension Service. Corrin Bowers of the South Carolina Peanut Growers Association followed with association updates. Via a video link from Washington, D.C., Bob Redding gave the groupan update on the Farm Bill. J. Tyron Spearman of The Spearman Agency, Tifton, Georgia, spoke on politics and marketing as related to peanuts. Spearman produces the Peanut Marketing News, which those interested can sign up to receive at spearmanagency@friendlycity.net . In his Jan. 26 newsletter, Spearman said, Domestic food use for peanuts is predicted to increase 1.9 percent and is presently up 3.3 percent. Exports are predicted to decrease 13 percent, with present levels up 4.5 percent, Spearman wrote. He gave a world view of what producers might anticipate for 2017, with exports to China being a major factor. Additional presentations included Clemson Weed Specialist Mike Marshall on weed control, Clemson agricultural engineer Kendall Kirk on precision ag topics and Marketing and National Peanut Board Communications Specialist Keegan Treadaway with a national marketing update. South Carolina is known more for peaches than oranges when it comes to fruit, but researchers in the state could play a key role in saving the nations citrus industry from an insect-borne disease that has devastated crops in Florida and threatens other states from California to Texas. Feng Luo, an associate professor in the School of Computing at Clemson University, is leading a $4.3-million study aimed at protecting citrus crops from Huanglongbing, a bacterial disease that has affected at least 10 states, including South Carolina. Once the disease takes hold, the promise of a big, sweet orange ends up small, bitter and lopsided. All citrus trees can be affected, including lemon, lime and grapefruit. The disease has no known cure and has infected about 75 percent of Floridas citrus crop, which is a $9-billion industry for the state. Florida is taking the brunt in the United States, but this should concern anyone who enjoys eating oranges or drinking orange juice, Luo said. The worse it gets, the more expensive citrus products will become, and the more jobs will be lost. We need to stop the spread of this disaster. A collaborative approach will be necessary to arrive at a solution. Scientists involved in the grant include: Yong-Ping Duan of the U.S. Department of Agricultures Agricultural Research Service in Florida; Fred Gmitter, Zhanao Deng, Liliana M. Cano, all of the University of Florida; Marylou Polek of the USDAs Agricultural Research Service in California; and Olufemi Alabi of Texas A&M University. Luo will use his expertise in bioinformatics to help a team of researchers from across the country figure out which citrus trees are most resistant to the disease and to develop new varieties. The project aims is to select naturally occurring mutants from commercial citrus cultivars under the current high HLB pressure in Florida citrus groves, he said. It will allow HLB-tolerant/resistant cultivars to be developed and deployed at a much quicker pace without regulatory constraints. Funding lasts five years and comes from the U.S. Department of Agricultures National Institute of Food and Agriculture. The Clemson award was among $13.6-million in grants recently announced by the USDA to combat Huanglongbing. The threat: Huanglongbing means yellow dragon disease in Chinese, a nod to its discovery in China in 1919. It has occurred in about 40 countries around the world and is also known as citrus greening and HLB. The disease is spread by the Asian citrus psyllid, a winged insect no longer than a grain of rice. The nymphs feed on new shoots and leaves, removing sap from the plant and injecting a pathogen. The leaves curl and twist, as the bacteria hinders growth of new shoots and roots. Symptoms include asymmetrical, blotchy yellowing or mottling on leaves with patches of green on one side and yellow on the other. Twigs and small branches die. New shoots grow with smaller leaves that sometimes are erect and resemble rabbit ears. It usually takes about 3-5 years for a tree to die from Huanglongbing. The USDA has warned that it could destroy the domestic citrus industry in our lifetimes. In nine years, the number of orange trees in Florida declined from about 80 million to about 60 million, according to the USDA. Grapefruit trees have experienced an even greater drop, going from a peak of about 14 million trees to about 5 million, the department reported. The Asian citrus psyllid has been detected in 15 U.S. states or territories, leading to full or partial quarantine. Those locations include Alabama, American Samoa, Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Guam, Hawaii, Louisiana, Mississippi, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, South Carolina, Texas, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, according to the USDA. Experts do not believe the disease has the potential to spread to the peach and apple trees that are important to the agricultural economy of South and North Carolina. This bacteria and its insect vector are restricted only to citrus and its relatives, Gmitter said. Research strategy: Some trees are showing more resistance to Huanglongbing than others. Luo will analyze data provided by collaborators to help understand the genetics underlying the disease-resistant trees. He will use the techniques of transcriptome profiling and comparative genomics. As an expert in bioinformatics, Luo is well qualified to the lead the research. Bioinformatics is the science of collecting and analyzing complex biological data such as genetic codes. Luo has done previous research with the USDA, which led to the work targeting Huanglongbing. Clemsons world-class supercomputer will help enable the project. The universitys Palmetto Cluster ranks as the worlds 155th most powerful supercomputer, according to the most recent Top500 List. Commendations from top officials: Praise for Luo and his team came from across the Clemson University College of Engineering, Computing and Applied Sciences. Eileen Kraemer, the C. Tycho Howle Director of the School of Computing, said the research reflects the high quality of research done in the school. Were honored that Dr. Luo has been chosen to lead this project, she said. He is a highly regarded expert in bioinformatics and highly deserving of the award. Congratulations to Dr. Luo and his team. Douglas Hirt, associate dean for research and graduate studies, said the size of the grant underscores its urgency. This is absolutely critical research for the citrus industry and anyone who enjoys citrus products, he said. With Dr. Luo and the Palmetto Cluster, Clemson University is well-positioned to play a leadership role in tackling this global problem. Anand Gramopadhye, dean of the college, said Luo and his team are doing critical research that could have immediate real-world impact. The award is a testament to Dr. Luos expertise in bioinformatics and the world-class facilities available to Clemson researchers, Gramopadhye said. I congratulate Dr. Luo and his team. Here is an educational fact that probably isnt discussed much outside the academic world: Most historically black colleges and universities, such as Jackson (Miss.) State and Alabama State, are in Southern states, meaning a vast sea of red for congressional districts on the electoral map. In many of those states, Republicans control the governorships as well as the state legislatures. That logically means it is incumbent upon historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) to maintain at least a working relationship with Republican lawmakers and policymakers. With Donald Trump surprisingly winning the presidential election, add the White House to the Republican-controlled list on the federal level, joining both chambers of Congress. The U.S. Supreme Court also will be a member of that list. The United States 105 HBCUs comprise only 3 percent of the nations colleges. But HBCUs produce more than 50 percent of black attorneys in this country, 40 percent of black engineers and most of the black public school teachers. Johnny C. Taylor Jr. has a history of dealing with Republican government officials. He is president and CEO of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, a help-advocacy group based in Washington that operates on behalf of 47 mostly public HBCUs in the United States. A Drake Law School graduate, Taylor serves on the corporate board of Gallup, the research-based polling and consulting company, and on the board of trustees of The Cooper Union, a private college in New York City. Taylor answers 10 questions regarding what might be in store for HBCUs in dealing with the new commander in chief and the Republican Party: Question: Generally speaking, what do you think the Donald Trump administration means for the future of HBCUs? Answer: I am optimistic that, under a Trump administration, HBCUs will be a higher education priority as they have been in past Republican administrations. Q: What is your assessment of and reaction to Betsy DeVos being appointed as the next secretary of education? And, of course, what her appointment means to historically black colleges? A: Frankly, we dont know much about what a Secretary DeVos will do when it comes to higher education. Most of her work we know of is around school choice, a secondary education issue. That being said, we are busy preparing briefings that will quickly get her up to speed on higher education issues generally and the black college community in particular. At this point, none of us knows whether or not she will be good for black colleges, but we are hopeful. Q: Will you miss the Obama administration in relation to HBCUs? A: I am on record regarding my frustrations with (the Obama) administrations relationship with, and treatment of, HBCUs over the past eight years. So Id prefer to deal with how we can influence the Trump administration to ensure our collective HBCU interests are protected and our collective voices heard. We should also never lose sight of the fact that (Thurgood Marshall College Fund), as a higher education advocacy organization, will advocate for HBCUs as aggressively as we have done for the last three decades. Q: Since most HBCUs are in heavily congressional Republican areas in the South, what role does that scenario play in the larger picture? A: (Thurgood Marshall College Fund) is deliberate with our engagement on both sides of the political aisle. We made a decision early on to intentionally foster relationships with Democrats and with Republicans for this very reason. Some of our biggest HBCU champions in the U.S. Senate have been Republicans. Now that the Republican Party controls the entire federal government, (the fund) is in a good position to engage with the GOP because of our positive working relationships that pre-date this current election. When it comes down to the budget and appropriations process in Congress, Republicans will largely decide how much funding should go to HBCUs and other federal agency HBCU accounts. In addition, as some 33 states have Republican governors, we are also working to build those bridges at the state level as well. To be clear, though, no part of this should suggest we are abandoning our long-standing friends in the Democratic Party. Q: Have you personally dealt with Trump before? And what are your top priorities with the Trump administration, especially since Trump didnt openly mention any policy ideas/proposals regarding HBCUs during the campaign season? A: I have not personally met Trump, but I have interacted with key members of his team. I look forward to developing a substantive and positive working relationship with him and his key advisers at the White House as well as other federal agencies. Our work will continue to focus on issues surrounding our HBCUs. We have three main areas of focus for the new administration: (1) critical infrastructure funding to improve campuses that have suffered from years of deferred maintenance something we believe will help create jobs that will reduce the stubbornly high unemployment rates in our most fragile communities; (2) education-related funding to remove financial barriers for students seeking to break the cycle of poverty restoration of year-round Pell Grants and increased resources for non-traditional students; and (3) focus on high school financial aid literacy programs so students from fragile communities make better higher education choices. Q: What could the Trump administration do the most to affect HBCUs in a positive manner? And the negative? A: The best thing the Trump administration can do to most affect HBCUs in a positive manner is invite the HBCU community for an open dialogue at the policy table. This will allow both sides to hear and listen to the HBCU community to get a clear understanding of our needs, and how certain regulatory and public policy proposals could impact HBCUs. For example, we know cutting Pell Grants and making abrupt changes to programs like Parent PLUS are not helpful and cannot happen again for any student. (NOTE: The Department of Education in the Obama administration changed the definition of what it considered negative criteria for parents credit checks in the Parent PLUS program. That, of course, complicated matters. Before 2011, parents typically were approved for Parent PLUS loans for their college-bound children if they didnt have delinquencies of more than 90 days and no foreclosures, bankruptcies or defaults. But the Department of Education expanded the definition to include debts that had been termed a charge-off (a declaration by a creditor that a consumer is unlikely to pay off a specific debt), or debts sent to collection agencies. That change adversely affected many black, low-income parents, especially those with expectations of sending their children to HBCUs. It made for some messy situations because some loan borrowers suddenly were denied loans after having been approved the year before, according to an educational policy analysis performed by New America, a prominent think tank based in Washington.) Q: What about the state legislators? A: The phrase all politics is local is 100 percent accurate. It is true that the majority of the publicly supported HBCU funding comes from the federal government; many times those resources are disbursed through state governments, and local legislators set tax and zoning laws that can impact our schools. Q: What is the value of having both Democrats and Republicans on your staff at the Thurgood Marshall College Fund? A: There is tremendous value in having diversity of thought and personal political affiliation here at Thurgood Marshall College Fund. First, it fosters an open dialogue so that our organization can see all sides of policy proposals and political positions. Second, having people on both sides of the aisle working at TMCF in certain roles allows us to have a seat at the Republican and Democratic tables. Last, Washington is all about relationships. We have been effective in our advocacy, fundraising and partnerships because of our ability to have staff that can champion HBCUs in both Democratic and Republican circles. We leveraged relationships and submitted proposals for HBCU support language to be included in the 2016 Republican and Democratic national party platforms. We organized an HBCU National Convention Program for HBCU students to attend both the 2016 Republican and Democratic National Conventions as official volunteers. Thurgood Marshall College Fund is a known and respected partner on both sides of the aisle. Q: Hillary Clinton spoke at several HBCUs during her campaign. Did her appearances affect HBCUs at all? A: Secretary Clinton has long been an HBCU supporter. We, at (Thurgood Marshall College Fund), were very pleased when she introduced her New College Compact, which included a $25 billion investment in HBCUs. The very fact that she thought enough of our community to specifically call out HBCUs and to propose significant investment in these historic institutions cannot be overstated. Recognition by someone of her stature reinvigorated HBCU supporters because it raised awareness of our issues, educated new audiences about our value and highlighted to the media that covered the campaigns about our historical and current relevance. Since its inception in 1993, the Downtown Orangeburg Revitalization Association has won a number of awards for success and innovation in encouraging the development, redevelopment and improvement of downtown Orangeburg. In 2016, DORA and the late Jimmy Evans were recognized for efforts to improve the citys center. DORA was awarded two Main Street South Carolina Inspiration Awards during the Municipal Association of South Carolina's annual meeting in July. The late Jimmy Evans, president and owner of AMCO Construction Co., was posthumously honored with the 2016 Main Street S.C. Downtown Service Award. Evans died in January 2016. A year later, Orangeburgs downtown has suffered the loss of one of its leading proponents from across decades. Henry B. Allen, 90, owner of Palmetto Office Supply on Russell Street, died Jan. 19. Allen became involved with the business in 1962, expanding it multiple times over the years. Known as "Orangeburg's Most Unusual Store," Palmetto Office Supply continues to offer products from supplies and furniture to teaching aids and greeting cards. Family members, including his wife of 65 years, Sue Crigger Allen, have been a reason that the business over the years has been honored for customer service. We always think of giving good service and we also stress it, Allen said. It is nice to have it confirmed by your customers. We make every effort to give good service. It is my idea that customer service is something you can do that our competitors cant always or dont always do. Orangeburg loved Allen and his business, most recently recognizing Henry and Sue as grand marshals of the annual Christmas parade in 2015. And Allen loved Orangeburg. When he was honored with the Orangeburg County Chamber of Commerces Small Business Person of the Year in 2000, Allen said: "All that I have done is for the love of the city of Orangeburg. When you love the city as much as I do, it makes you want to work hard in taking care of it." Allen did plenty for Orangeburg, particularly downtown, investing in the business and the future of the area. Expansions by Palmetto Office included a second front when the Green Stamps store closed, another when Western Auto closed, another when the Christian Book Store closed and yet another when a physical fitness facility relocated. He added awnings and made other improvements in 1996 as a participant in the DORA facade-improvement program. Allen was active in DORA since its inception, serving on the board of directors. He served on the chamber of commerces board of directors and was a member when the Orangeburg Festival of Roses began in 1972. Then-President Dede Cook said in presenting the chambers top award to Allen in 2000: "It is always a tough job to choose the winner of this award. Anyone who has met Mr. Allen knows what type of person he is. As a huge supporter of the chamber and the community, he is very deserving of this honor." And Henry Allen is most deserving of being remembered as a successful businessman and pillar of the Orangeburg community. We use cookies on our website to give you the most relevant experience by remembering your preferences and repeat visits. By clicking Accept, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies. A Post-National Framework for Peace and Stability in the Middle East The Syrian crisis, about to enter its sixth year, has created the largest humanitarian disaster since the Cold War, causing hundreds of thousands of deaths and creating the worst refugee crisis of our generation. Yet, the Syrian crisis is hardly the only fire burning in the Middle East. Since the beginning of the 20th century, the Middle East has been stuck in endless wars and an ever-worsening cycle of violence and extremism. Beyond the devastating human cost of these conflicts, instability in the Middle East has the potential to destroy the global order. In his recent article "Toward a Global Realignment," Zbigniew Brzezinski warns that if not contained the current violence in the Middle East can spread to Russia's southern and eastern territories as well as the western portion of China.[1] Mr. Brzezinski is not the only one sounding alarms about the increasing instability in the Middle East. General David Petraeus has described the Syrian conflict as a "Chernobyl, a potential geo-strategic catastrophe."[2] The flood of refugees into Europe was a major driver behind Brexit and the rise of nationalism across Europe, which threatens to unravel the continent's post-nationalistic framework. Mr. Brzezinski warns that America's quest for a one-sided militarily and ideologically imposed outcome in the Middle East is an act of prolonged and self-destructive futility. Instead Mr. Brzezinski encourages the United States to forge a cooperative relationship with Russia, China, and the EU, who can partner with more established and historically rooted countries in the Middle East to shape a wider framework for regional stability. The Current Framework of the Middle East The framework for the Middle East was laid out at the beginning of the 20th century with the fall of the Ottoman Empire, mostly on a nationalistic basis. Nationalism is defined as a political movement to unite people into nations based on shared language, race or religion. This idea emerged in Europe in the 19th century, and spread to the Middle East in the early 20th. Nationalism held that the boundaries of a nation should as much as possible coincide with one culture. The Armenians and Assyrians were the first victims of nationalism in the Middle East. The Young Turks, in an effort to Turkify the new republic, executed a systematic campaign to exterminate the Assyrians and Armenians from eastern Turkey, a plateau they had inhabited for 3,000 years. As many as 1.5 million people were killed in what is today known as the Armenian Genocide. Two other nationalist movements, Arab nationalism and Zionism, were also gathering strength and about to collide. Zionism was born in Europe in the 19th century. Its founder, Theodore Herzl, was once a member of the German nationalist fraternity (Burschenschaft). Zionism's founding was not a reaction to the Holocaust, which occurred 40 years after the Zionist movement emerged. It was a nationalist movement to build a nation for the Jewish people. David Ben-Gurion, who was born in Poland, and then immigrated to Israel in 1906, wrote (quoted in Wikiquote, 2016), For many of us, anti-Semitic feeling had little to do with our dedication to Zionism. I personally never suffered anti-Semitic persecution. We emigrated not for negative reasons of escape but for the positive purpose of rebuilding a homeland."[3] European-educated Arab intellectuals from the Levant were also eager to establish an Arab homeland. In 1911, they founded the Young Arab Society, Al Fatat, in Paris. Their goal was to gain independence and unify Arab territory under the Ottoman Empire. In 1919, Ben-Gurion (quoted in Wikiquote, 2016) wrote, "We, as a nation, want this country to be ours; the Arabs, as a nation, want this country to be theirs."[4] Tensions between Arabs and Jews grew. In 1947, the Arabs rejected the UN partition plans for Palestine, and Arab nationalists vowed to eradicate the new Zionist entity. Between 1947 and 1949, more than 700,000 Palestinians were expelled from their homes. Later, a series of laws in the newly declared state of Israel prevented them from returning to their homes or claiming their properties. Towns and streets, which had traditionally carried Arabic names, were given Hebrew ones. Against this backdrop, the Arab-Israeli conflict has continued for 67 years. Kurdish nationalists have demanded a homeland partitioned out of territories in parts of Iraq, Iran, Turkey, and Syria. The Kurdish-Turkish war, which has escalated with the Syrian crisis, has caused tens of thousands of deaths and created masses of refugees. Turkey, in its effort to combat Kurdish nationalism, has restricted the use of the Kurdish language in Turkey. At one point the Kurdish language, dress, folklore, and names were prohibited. Today, the Arab countries of the Levant have collapsed into proxy, sectarian and civil wars. In the Middle East there are three competing regional projects, all exacerbating the regional conflicts and contributing to the radicalization of the population. Turkey's Neo-Ottomanists are trying to extend Turkey's influence in the Middle East; Iran cloaked in a Shia theocracy is extending its regional influence through a network of proxies and regional allies; and Israel remains strongly nationalist and is becoming increasingly right wing. In the middle of this regional dysfunction, ISIS has sprung up with an appalling mix of fascism and religious extremism, and Al Qaeda has gained a foothold on the Mediterranean. Religious radicalism and terrorism thrive in the Middle East today. These conflicts are polarizing and each side rallies its base using the most divisive issues, often religion. The governments of Iran, Turkey and Saudi Arabia have all been accused or are at least suspected of supporting the most sectarian, often-terrorist groups, even ISIS, in their bid for regional influence. While the Middle East is becoming increasingly unstable, its strategic importance as an oil supplier to the United Stated is diminishing. According to the International Energy Agency's World Energy Outlook, the United States will surpass Saudi Arabia as the biggest oil producer by the end of this decade, and will become self-sufficient in energy production by 2035.[5] The United States' shift away from the Middle East started during the Obama administration as it pivoted to Asia. An estimated $5 trillion, $1.2 trillion of which is in American goods, is traded through the South China Sea shipping lanes each year, which is a vital national security interest for the United States. President Donald Trump also campaigned with the promise that the United States would disengage from the Middle East and prioritize fighting terrorism. The continued crises in the region however, risks sucking the United States back into the Middle East. A stable Middle East is of vital importance to China. It is estimated that there are around 5000 Chinese from the Uighur region fighting alongside radical Islamic groups in Syria. The recent suicide attack against the Chinese embassy in the Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan was ordered by Uighur militants active in Syria.[6] China, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan are, and will be for the foreseeable future, heavily dependent on the flow of oil passing through the Strait of Hormuz. The E.U. is in desperate need of stability in the Middle East as well. They are struggling to deal with the flood of immigrants coming from the region and with the threat of radicalized European Jihadists fighting in Syria. In many proxy wars, regional players manipulate their external backers and not the other way around.[7] None of these major powers wants to be dragged into these conflicts in the Middle East as long as their geostrategic interests are protected. A New Framework Many blame the current arbitrary borders of the Middle East for its many troubles. The British and the French drew up these borders after the defeat of the Ottoman Empire. In the early 1900s under Ottoman rule there were provinces -- Baghdad, Basra, and Mosul -- that corresponded to today's Iraq. The other provinces were those of Damascus, Beirut, Aleppo, and Deir al Zor, plus the district of Jerusalem, which had special administrative status. These areas included today's Syria, Lebanon, and much of Jordan, Israel and Palestine. Mixed communities with a myriad number of religions, sects, and ethnicities populated these provinces. The new colonial borders divided communities and restricted the movement of people and commerce, but they were not a cause of war. It was the nationalists who caused wars. The territorial claims of the different nationalist movements that sprung up in the late 19th and early 20th century overlapped and set the stage for conflict. Nationalism as a cause of war, authoritarianism, and racism is well established. The role of nationalism in European wars, including the two world wars, is well documented. After decades of war, Europe had to build a new framework for a lasting peace. It began with the Schuman Declaration in 1950. It laid the foundation of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) the first supra-nationalist organization in history. Pooling coal and steel production -- in the words of the Declaration -- made war between historic rivals not merely unthinkable, but materially impossible."[8]Then through successive steps including de-emphasized borders, Europe led the world in pioneering a post-nationalist experiment and established peace.Post-nationalism is also the best framework to resolve the myriad conflicts in the Middle East. Candidate Countries The selection of countries for this new framework aims to defuse existing tensions that exacerbate the current conflicts and fuel extremism. These countries are Turkey, Iran, Israel, Syria, Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq, and Jordan. Membership in the bloc would be available on a rolling basis and might include other countries like Egypt, whose membership could provide a tripartite peace with Iran and Turkey to anchor the new bloc. Alternatively, Egypt could be part of a North African bloc. Armenia should be considered for membership in this new bloc as well. Armenians were the first victims of nationalism in the Middle East and deemphasizing its border with Turkey would give Armenians peaceful access to areas they have been forced out of including the revered Mount Ararat. The Gulf Cooperation Council countries (GCC) would continue to develop their own relationships and would not be part of this proposed post-nationalist bloc. Historically, the GCC's main strategic threats have been Arab nationalism, pan-Islamic movements, and Iran. All these risks would be reduced with the creation of the proposed post-nationalist bloc. The Pillars of the New Framework While this proposed framework borrows heavily from the European experience, it is not a proposed union. This proposed framework is built with a series of multilateral agreements between the named countries aimed at replacing the current framework which is built of nationalistic bases with a post nationalist framework built on three pillars, deemphasizing borders, multiculturalism, and regional projects. In this new bloc, borders would be frozen where they are and deemphasized, with the ultimate goal of guaranteeing the free movement of capital, people, goods and service within the bloc. Borrowing from the example of the ECSC, a regional body would be created to manage the regions water and energy resources, as well as transit roots for energy from the Gulf area and Russia to the West. All these, especially water rights, are a source of conflict, and are best managed on a regional basis. According to scientists with the World Resource Institute (WRI), water shortages are expected to intensify and will exacerbate conflicts. Israel, Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and Turkey will all be facing severe water stress by 2040, according to the WRI.[9] Combating terrorism will likewise be a focus of cooperative police forces in the region. Multiculturalism is the third pillar of this new framework, and is the antithesis of nationalism. Where nationalists aim for the primacy of their culture and language in specific regions, often to the exclusion of others, multiculturalism is the celebration of all cultures and religions as equals. Multiculturalism is not meant to mix different cultures and religions together to create a new identity, nor does it weaken people's connection to their religion and traditions. The Europeans paid special attention to this issue when structuring their post nationalist framework. They made multiculturalism a foundation of their new post-nationalist framework. In contrast with the nationalistic fervor of old Europe that emphasized language as a central part of national identity, in the E.U. there is no official language. All of the 24 languages spoken in the E.U. region are official E.U. languages.[10] Post-nationalism is a different polity than pre-nationalists empires many of which were also composed of many cultures and religions like the Ottoman empire. Those Empires were governed by one religious group or one clan. This new proposed framework for the Middle East would not simply replicate the E.U.; greater autonomy would be granted to local governments, and a single currency is not necessary for a post-nationalist framework. This is also not a proposed military pact, and is not an invitation to disarmament. Countries in this new proposed bloc will maintain their military treaties with non- member countries, such as Russia's agreements with Syria and the United States' agreements with Turkey. Creating a new bloc with deemphasized borders, regional projects, and multiculturalism should defuse most of the regional conflicts. Since Iran is a majority Shia country, and Turkey is a majority Sunni country, the focus of the countries in this new-shared bloc will be on the shared values of both religions. Christianity and Judaism also share the values that are common to these two forms of Islam. This should defuse religious extremism as well. The conflicts of the Middle East today are regional, the Kurdish question, the Israel-Palestinian conflict, and the Syrian crisis are all regional, zero-sum conflicts. Regional conflicts require regional solutions. A Prerequisite for Peace not a Product of Peace Some believe that post nationalism will be the result of peace and that creating a post-nationalist bloc would be putting the cart before the horse. The European experience proves otherwise. After decades of conflicts and two world wars, Europeans sought an escape from the nationalism that had devastated the continent. The political elite took the lead in the search for a new structure for governance. The result was the E.U., a pioneering experiment in interdependence and multiculturalism. In 2012, the E.U. was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Explaining the Nobel Committee's decision, Chairman Thorbjorn Jagland argued that the E.U. has transformed Europe, "from a continent of wars to a continent of peace."[11] While it is possible to argue about the economics of the project, such arguments ignore the fact that the purpose of the E.U. was to prevent war. The Middle East has transitioned from a religious empire to a region torn by nationalism, now it needs to move toward post nationalism as its third political act, to bring stability to the region. The Alternative Many have argued that the promotion of liberal democracies is a precondition to peace in the Middle East, and the neoconservatives have pushed for regime change in many countries in the region, only to see violence, and extremism reach new heights. Peace building by focusing individual conflict has yielded precious little despite decades of international efforts. Alternately, the region could undergo further segregation and population transfer as proposed by people such as Michael Bernstam.[12] This approach will lead to ethnic cleansing and the creation of small warring, unsustainable states. How do we get there? It took Europe a cataclysmic war to abandon nationalism and seek an alternative framework. Moving the Middle East to a post nationalist structure will require that the regional actors be exhausted by and realize the futility of the current wars. It will also require a paradigm shift in thinking both inside and outside the region. Post nationalism in Europe remains a deeply misunderstood process in the Middle East. Many on the left believe that the E.U. is a capitalistmanifestation to create open markets and help big business. Islamists see it as areconstitution of Christendom. And nationalists are still attached to their dreamsand view the E.U. as a union of mature nations that have already achieved theirnationalist aspirations. Middle Eastern nationalists also argue thattheir brand of nationalism is different than the European variety. Arabs argue that theirnationalism is rooted in liberation nationalism and that the Zionists use the Holocaustas a reason to hold on to their nationalist project. But all these views ignore the history of the development of post nationalism in Europe, and the history ofnationalism in the Middle East. Work on the new framework should be initiated by local politicians, most likely from Iran and Turkey, with the consent of the major global powers. It would involve direct negotiations between potential member nations on the first steps toward and the overall parameters of the new structure. The E.U. can provide technical expertise, drawing on it vast experience in regional post nationalist frameworks. Other countries, most importantly Israel and Syria, can join these negotiations. It will be an evolving project that will be built one treaty at a time with an overarching goal of replacing the current zero sum structure with a new post nationalist framework. Peace-building institutes, like the Carter Center and The Norwegian Center for Conflict Resolution (NOREF), can take a leading role by hosting politicians and activists from the region to explore and promote this new solution. Potential Obstacles There will be resistance to such new framework from Islamists and nationalists inside the region. There are also potential obstacles from outside the region; the U.S might want to continue to isolate Iran. Russia is increasingly suspicious of post nationalism, and U.S.- Russian rivalry and mutual suspicion has the potential to prevent this project from moving forward. For those who see too much chaos in the Middle East to even ponder post-nationalism, it is worth keeping in mind that the E.U. was born in the aftermath of World War II when war, genocide and religious rivalry had swept the continent. The E.U. has been an evolving, contentious project that took shape in the shadow of the Cold War, in a divided Europe governed by many right-wing military dictatorships well into the 1970s. The E.U. was a top-down project engineered by a few visionary statesmen that allowed Europe to develop into what it is today: peaceful, democratic, and liberal. All of this human progress is at risk today by the escalating violence and dysfunction in the Middle East. Considering the decreasing strategic importance of the region to the U.S., and the potential seismic geopolitical impact of the continued instability in the Middle East, the U.S. should aim to stabilize the region as it continues to disengage from it. Patiently guided by long-range vision, The U.S. and in partnership with China, Russia and the E.U., should help guide local countries to seek a new post nationalist regional framework. Bibliography Beehner, Lionel. "How Proxy Wars Work: And What That Means for Ending the Conflict in Syria." Foreign Affairs. Nov. 12, 2015. https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2015-11-12/how-proxy-wars-work Bernstam, Michael. "Redraw Country Lines in the Middle East." Forbes. Dec. 23, 2015. http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2015/12/23/redraw-country-lines-in-the-middle-east/#78181fda7765 Brzezinksi, Zbigniew."Toward a Global Realignment." The American Interest 11, No. 6, (April 17, 2016). http://www.the-american-interest.com/2016/04/17/toward-a-global-realignment/ Dzyubenko, Olga. "Kyrgystan says Uighur militant groups behind attack on China's Embassy."Reuters. Sept. 7, 2016. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-kyrgyzstan-blast-china-idUSKCN11C1DK Mackey, Peg. "U.S. to overtake Saudi as Top Oil Producer: IEA." Reuters. Nov. 12, 2012. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-iea-oil-report-idUSBRE8AB0IQ20121112 Noren, Alexander. 2012 Nobel Prize Award Ceremony. video. 80 min. 2012. http://www.lectoro.com/index.php?action=search&ytq=2012%20Nobel%20Prize%20Award%20Ceremony Petraeus, Gen. David (ret.). Address to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Syria. Sep 22, 2015. Youtube video. 1 min. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScBrQaDzgpA Prospero, a blog published by The Economist. http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero. Schuman, Robert. "The Schuman Declaration -- 9 May 1950." European Union. Last updated Dec. 12, 2016. https://europa.eu/european-union/abouteu/symbols/europe-day/schuman-declaration_en WikiQuote. David Ben-Gurion.Last updated on July 1, 2016. https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/David_Ben-Gurion. Originally published in David Ben-Gurion, Memoirs (The World Publishing Company, 1970), 36. WikiQuote. David Ben-Gurion. Last updated on July 1, 2016. https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/David_Ben-Gurion. World Resources Institute Blog. http://www.wri.org/blog [1] Zbigniew Brzezinski, "Toward a Global Realignment," The American Interest, 11, no. 6 (April 17, 2016), http://www.the-american-interest.com/2016/04/17/toward-a-global-realignment/. [2] Gen. David Petraeus (ret.), Address to Senate Armed Services Committee on Syria, Youtube video, 1 min, September 22, 2015, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScBrQaDzgpA. [3] Wikiquote, David Ben-Gurion. Last updated on July 1, 2016. https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/David_Ben-Gurion. [4] Ibid. [5] Peg Mackey, "U.S. to overtake Saudi as Top Oil Producer: IEA," Reuters, Nov. 12, 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-iea-oil-report-idUSBRE8AB0IQ20121112. [6] Olga Dzyubenko, "Kyrgystan says Uighur militant groups behind attack on China's Embassy," Reuters, Sept. 7, 2016, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-kyrgyzstan-blast-china-idUSKCN11C1DK. [7] Lionel Beehner, "How Proxy Wars Work: And What That Means for Ending the Conflict in Syria," Foreign Affairs, Nov. 12, 2015, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2015-11-12/how-proxy-wars-work. [8] Robert Schuman, The Schuman Declaration -- 9 May 1950, European Union, last updated Dec. 12, 2016, https://europa.eu/european-union/about-eu/symbols/europe-day/schuman-declaration_en. [9] Andrew Maddocks, Robert Samuel Young and Paul Reig, "Ranking the World's Most Water Stressed Countries in 2040," World Resources Institute (blog), Aug. 26, 2015, http://www.wri.org/blog/2015/08/ranking-world's-most-water-stressed-countries-2040. [10] "Multiculturalism and the E.U.," Prospero (blog) The Economist, April 30, 2015, http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2015/04/multilingualism-and-eu-0. [11] Alexander Noren, 2012 Nobel Prize Award Ceremony, video, 80 min, 2012, http://www.lectoro.com/index.php?action=search&ytq=2012%20Nobel%20Prize%20Award%20Ceremony. [12] Michael Bernstam, "Redraw Country Lines in the Middle East," Forbes, Dec. 23, 2015, http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2015/12/23/redraw-country-lines-in-the-middle-east/#78181fda7765. Political and cultural commentary from the perspective of radical common sense. Opposition to the AMERICAN BIPOLARCHY and ideological fanaticism in all forms. Don't take our word for anything: figure it out for yourself. By Azernews By Nigar Abbasova Despite oil producers high compliance with supply cut deal, rising oil output in the U.S. is still setting the alarm bells ringing in the energy market. Oil prices negatively reacted to the signs of growing output in the United States on January 30 extending slight declines amid forecasts that high activity in the U.S. could partly overshadow output cuts. Brent crude futures dropped almost 28 cents to $55.24 a barrel, while West Texas Intermediate (WTI) was 27 cents down and stood at $52.90 per barrel, Reuters reported. Rig count from Baker Hughes showed that drillers added some 15 oil rigs last week, bringing the total count to 566, a record-high figure since November 2015. Meanwhile, International Energy Agency (IEA) forecasts total U.S. output growth of 320,000 bpd in 2017 to an average of 12.8 million bpd. Monthly Energy Review of the Agency said the volume of petroleum import from OPEC countries averaged 3.428 million barrels per day in the first ten months of 2016, as compared to averagely 2.829 million barrels per day in the same period in 2015, with the highest volume of import falling to a share of July (3.803 million bpd) and the lowest being observed in January (3.052 million bpd). The volume of oil import from non-cartel states in the reported period averaged 6.631 million bpd, as compared to averagely 6.619 million bpd in the same period in 2015. Oil production from countries outside the OPEC currently represents about 60 percent of world oil output, according to the EIA. All hopes for rebalancing are now pinned on reductions being made by OPEC in tandem with other major producers. A strong start by the cartel and other producers in implementing a supply cut deal increased optimism that reductions would by far exceed any rise in the U.S and oust glut in the global inventory. By Azernews By Rashid Shirinov Azerbaijans State Committee on Property Issues will hold another auction for privatization of state-owned enterprises on February 28, the Committee said on January 30. The auction will include 75 objects of state property, including 20 joint stock companies, 29 small enterprises and facilities, 25 non-residential areas and an unfinished building. The majority of small enterprises offered for privatization are located in Baku, Shaki, Mingachevir, Sumgayit, Lankaran and other regions of Azerbaijan. The most expensive objects among the auctioned ones will be a petrol station in the Sabail district of Baku ($307,870), an atelier in the Nasimi district, and "Mardakan" restaurant in the Khazar district of the capital. The price of the latter two objects is $277,760. The third stage of privatization in Azerbaijan started in the framework of the presidential decree dated May 19, 2016. Under the decree, the acceleration of the state property privatization process has been defined as an important direction of the economic policy. The portal for privatization privatization.az, launched in July 2016, reflects all necessary information about the facilities, their addresses, location, and even initial cost and aims at facilitation of the process. The website is available in two languages - Azerbaijani and English. Why Azerbaijan is special section available on the website explains the reasons and advantages of investing in the country. The privatization process is designed to attract both foreign and local investors, as well as improve the business environment of Azerbaijan. By Azernews By Nigar Abbasova The wine export of Azerbaijan, the country with traditionally widely developed vine-growing, hit $3.5 million in 2016. Head of the Wine Exporters' and Producers' Association of Azerbaijan Elchin Madatov said that the country also launched wine export to new markets such as China, Vietnam, Japan, South Korea, the U.S. and some European countries. He made the remark while addressing a conference dedicated to the results of the state program on socio-economic development of Azerbaijani regions in 2014-2018. Talking about the measures that stipulated the growth, Madatov pointed to introduction of an export promotion mechanism, as well as promotion of the Made in Azerbaijan brand. Within the mechanism, entrepreneurs have received loans worth 440,000 manats ($ 230,750) since November 2016 for supplies of wine. In tote, the sphere received loans worth 40 million manats ($ 20.9 million), he said. Madatov went on saying that local wine-makers will participate in two exhibitions to be held in China and Germany in 2017. He emphasized that wine-making has switched to a new level of development in Azerbaijan due to programs implemented in the country. In certain Azerbaijani regions, plantings of grapes are being expanded and the range of domestically produced wines increases. We are now observing a new trend - consumers are starting to prefer local wines and, at the same time, our wines find their customers abroad, said Madatov. Five major wine-growing regions of the country are Shamakha, Ismaily, Gabala, Gandja, Tovuz. Local grape varieties in Azerbaijan include White Shani, Derbendi, Nail, Bayanshire, Gamashara, Ganja Pink, Bendi, Madrasa, Black Shani, Zeynabi, Misgali, Khindogni, Agdam Kechiemdzheyi, Tebrizi, and Marandi. Among the grape sorts used to produce Azerbaijani wine are Pinot Noir, Rkatsiteli, Pinot Blanc, Aligote, Matrassa, Podarok Magaracha, Pervenets Magaracha, Ranni Magaracha, Doina, Viorica, and Kishmish Moldavski. Azerbaijan became a member of the International Organisation of Vine and Wine in June 2014. The country has focused since then on the development of vines and wineries as important contributors to the economy and agriculture. Today, Azerbaijan produces 20 million bottles of wine per year, while the annual production capacity of the countrys wineries is 100 million bottles. President Ilham Aliyev, addressing a recent Cabinet meeting, tasked the economic entities, the Ministry of Taxes and other to seriously examine this matter. Most of these plants were built in recent years. Major funds have been invested in them and modern equipment installed. How can it be possible for plants with a production capacity of 100 million bottles to produce only 20 million bottles of wine? Either the investor does not know the value of his money or the production is actually higher but it is accounted for. As the saying goes, there is illegal production. Therefore, we need to restore order in this area, he said. By Azernews By Laman Ismayilova Amazing modern remakes of famous paintings were presented at an exhibition "Reincarnation" opened at Azerbaijans National Art Museum. The exhibition featured "reincarnated" art works in the avant-garde style based on the paintings of modern Azerbaijani artists, as well as art works of world famous artists and sculptors, Trend Life reported. Artists Elshan Sarkhanoglu, Mamed Rashidov, Vugar Guliyev, Aydin Askerov, Elshan Karaca and Emin Gahramanov displayed a brand new interpretation of fifteen paintings and 5 sculptures. Many visitors were delighted by the opportunity to discover a creative reinterpretation of the famous paintings. Amina Melikova, the head of International Relations and Innovations Department of the Azerbaijan National Art Museum informed the guests about the project. "Azerbaijans National Art Museum celebrates its 80th anniversary this year. "Reincarnation" became the first exhibition dedicated to this solemn day. The idea to implement the project came from a group of Azerbaijani artists. Each chose several works included in the Museum Fund and created their own variations. After the exhibition, the works will be transferred to museum's fund", said Melikova. The Azerbaijan National Art Museum is a treasure house that preserves our national moral values and cultural heritage. This treasure house, holding more than 17,000 artistic exhibits, has a rich working history. The Art department was separated from the Azerbaijan State Museum in 1936 and organized as an independent museum by decision of the Council of People's Commissars. In 2011 the Museum was declared to be of first National and then European Museum Standard (EUMS), meeting international standards and criteria, as appropriate for a museum and implying high quality museum services and professional experience. By Azernews Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev is taking part in a conference dedicated to the results of implementing the State program on socio-economic development of Azerbaijani regions' in 2014-2018. The head of state made an opening speech at the conference, stressing that Azerbaijans economy was developing, and the main tasks have been fulfilled. President Aliyev added that the main indicators of Azerbaijans economy are positive. Azerbaijans agriculture sphere grew by 2.6 percent, the countrys non-oil industry - by 5 percent, despite the fact that the global oil price fell by 3-4 times, he said. We were able to ensure this development due to work carried out over the preceding years and deep reforms implemented in 2016. Of course the ongoing global economic and financial crisis negatively affected our work as well, but I believe that Azerbaijan managed to get out of such a hard situation with minimal losses in comparison with other countries, Ilham Aliyev said. More than 100,000 permanent jobs were created last year. This process has been going on since 2004. The president went on to say that Azerbaijan was able to maintain the currency reserves of the country's State Oil Fund. "I think this is very significant," he said. "The majority of oil-rich countries spent a part of their currency reserves, while we tried to save, and succeeded. We are going to need our currency reserves for today, tomorrow, and these reserves are a factor that strengthens our economic opportunities, economic independence in general, President Aliyev said. Ilham Aliyev went on to add authoritative international economic institutions also highly assessed the work carried out by Azerbaijan in 2016. The biggest global non-governmental economic institution among them - the Davos World Economic Forum, which unites all the world leaders, as well as worlds political and economic elite, - once again gave a positive outcome in its report on Azerbaijan, he said. Thus, in terms of competitiveness of countries, Azerbaijan has stepped up, settling for 37th place, he said. According to another indicator of inclusive development among the developing countries, these estimates bring together about 80 developing countries, and Azerbaijan shares first and second places in this rating. This is the assessment given to our work by the leading international economic institutions. Of course, we are doing our work not for the rating, but naturally, when such opinions are voiced, this pleases us even more, and at the same time, it is a kind of a signal to all financial structures in the world, Ilham Aliyev said. So today its not a problem for Azerbaijan to get a loan for any project. Even our current policy is that we are not especially prone to attracting foreign loans. Azerbaijani president noted that from now on, it is necessary to seek to have the work done using the internal capabilities, because the growth of external debt is not a positive factor. In Azerbaijan, this indicator stands at a very good level, at about 20 percent, he said. This is a higher figure compared to previous years, and the reason is the devaluation of the manat. During the previous periods, our foreign debt didnt exceed 10 percent. Nowadays, this is also an acceptable level, but we must try so that this figure wouldnt grow, but on the contrary, would decrease. In order to reduce the external debt, we must take foreign loans with utmost care, Ilham Aliyev said. But we can take foreign loans for projects of strategic importance for Azerbaijan. In short, I believe the overall economic development in 2016 should also be positively assessed. In particular, the dynamics of the work carried out in the countrys districts was also preserved, he said. Much work was done in Azerbaijans districts last year, he added. Social and economic development of the districts and implementation of state programs have changed the image of our districts. The Azerbaijani president reminded that todays conference is the 14th in a row. It has been 14 years already that in the beginning of each year we evaluate the work done, identify shortages and compile an action plan for the future, he said. This year too we are holding this meeting, remaining true to this tradition. He expressed hope that the discussions to be held at the conference will make it possible to form an opinion about the work to be additionally implemented in 2017. While compiling the regional development programs we obtained conclusions from districts and the third state program, which is being discussed by us today, was drawn up and adopted in 2014 based on the proposals received and considering the strategic directions of the country, Ilham Aliyev added. President Aliyev said the programs are aimed at solving all the existing problems, the social issues worrying people. These programs are very concrete, and specific objectives are set in them, he added. Ilham Aliyev noted that both the first and the second programs were successfully implemented, expressing confidence that the result of implementation of the third program will be the same. The president said the adoption of the state program in 2014 is a historic event, because the development of Azerbaijani districts, diversification of the countrys economy, the implemented measures and infrastructure projects have created todays reality. If we hadnt adopted the program on my initiative at that time, of course, we wouldnt have achieved todays success in the districts, Ilham Aliyev said. All our districts and cities have become well-maintained, beautiful, he said. Our main cities Baku, Ganja, Sumgait delight the eye, they are a kind of example for the world. Improvement work was carried out in all our cities and major infrastructure projects were realized. This contributes to todays dynamic development of Azerbaijan, as well as the effective use of these opportunities by business structures, said Ilham Aliyev. The president went on to say that Azerbaijan is becoming an attractive country for international tourism. In particular, the steps taken in connection with visa have been a turning point in this area, President Aliyev said. Of course, Azerbaijan is an attractive country for tourism. First of all, there is a rich cultural heritage in Azerbaijan. Our historical monuments, ancient culture attract tourists. On the other hand, Azerbaijan is a modern country and the tourism infrastructure has developed very well here, said President Aliyev. He added that more than 300 hotels have been built in Azerbaijan since 2014 and there are the hotels of the worlds leading hotel chains in Baku. Our excellent cuisine, beautiful climate, patriotic and hospitable people all this attracts tourists. There is stability and security in Azerbaijan. Visa simplification has already been done, Ilham Aliyev said. We just have to organize the work correctly and a strong tourism industry must be created in our country. We have to use the experience of the countries that have great experience in this area, added President Aliyev. He also said that in order to cherish the art of carpet weaving, create jobs, and expand the export opportunities, Azerbaijan has created the Azerkhalcha Scientific and Creative Production Association, and its first factory has already been opened in the city of Fuzuli. I attended its opening ceremony. There should be 10 of these factories this year, noted the president The head of state noted that the traditional art should be protected, and a carpet weaving industry should be created. Azerbaijani carpets both hand-woven and machine-woven should be promoted throughout the world, and this must turn into a source of large income, said President Aliyev. Other speakers at the event included Minister of Economy Shahin Mustafayev, Minister of Agriculture Heydar Asadov, head of Azerbaijan Fruit and Vegetable Producers and Exporters Association Bashir Guliyev, chairman of Hazelnut Producers and Exporters Association Ismayil Orujov, chairman of Wine Exporters' and Producers' Association Elchin Madatov, head of Azerbaijan Tourism Association Nahid Baghirov and head of Fish meal manufacturing plant Zaur Salmanov. The head of state made a closing speech at the conference. By Azernews By Nigar Eyvazova The restoration of diplomatic relations with Russia is impossible as long as the territorial integrity of Georgia is violated, said Zurab Abashidze, the special envoy of the Georgian Premier on settlement of relations with Russia. The restoration of diplomatic relations is not on the agenda, he said while talking to reporters in Tbilisi on January 30, TASS reported. He noted that "the issue of the restoration of diplomatic relations with Russia linked to the issue of Georgia's territorial integrity within the internationally recognized borders of the country." "If there are serious joint steps for the peaceful restoration of Georgia's territorial unity, at some point this issue [the restoration of ties ] will be on the agenda. As for the abolition or simplification of visa regime, diplomatic relations do not interfere in it, said Abashidze. Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Moscow is ready to go on the abolition of visas with Georgia, but this issue is strange to discuss, as long as the countries do not have diplomatic relations. "If the Russian Federation has the political will, we are ready to make joint efforts for a phased settlement of the most complex problems in the relations between the two countries, Abashidze added. Earlier talking to Izvestia, Abashidze did not rule out that at the next meeting with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin may discuss the restoration of diplomatic relations between the two countries. If my esteemed colleague Zurab Abashidze has indeed made such a statement, it can only be welcomed. As is known, Russia has not severed diplomatic relations in September 2008, and the barriers to their recovery were not there, so that the timing of positive changes in this question depends solely on Tbilisi, Karasin told Izvestia commenting on the issue. A next round of talks between Zurab Abashidze and Grigory Karasin is scheduled for the first half of February, 2017 in Prague. Reportedly, the meeting will focus on the issues of the two countries cooperation in trade, economy, transport, culture, humanitarian aspects and current issues. Tbilisi broke diplomatic relations with Moscow in 2008. The relations between Georgia and Russia have pushed all limits when Georgian troops launched military operations to retake the breakaway Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions on August 8, 2008. Russian armed forces entered the regions to stop the military attacks by Georgian troops. After four days of tense fighting, Georgian forces were expelled from South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Both sides agreed to a ceasefire on August 12. Tbilisi immediately cut all diplomatic ties with Russia just a while after the bloody skirmish. Abashidzes first meeting with Karasin took place in December 2012. Later, the senior diplomats held meetings in the Czech capital of Prague between 2013 and 2016, with the latest of them on October 19, focusing on cooperation in trade, economy, transport, culture, humanitarian and current issues. In late 2016, the parties confirmed that they intend to continue to pursue the normalization of relations. Russian President Vladimir Putin previously said that does not preclude the return of a visa-free regime with Russia for Georgian citizens, for this, according to him, there is every reason. By Azernews By Kamila Aliyeva Iran has said it may cancel its high-profile, $7-billion Peace Pipeline project with Pakistan over lengthy construction delays, with would deprive energy-starved Pakistan of the some 22 million cubic meters of gas a day it would have received from its neighbor. Irans National Gas Company Head Hamid Reza Araqi said that if negotiations fail to come up with a way to feasibly realize the project, it could be cancelled entirely, Mehr reported. The gas project has faced repeated delays since it was conceived in the 1990s to connect Iran's giant South Pars gas field to India via Pakistan. Pakistan and Iran finally signed the initial agreement in 2009, while India withdrew from the deal beginning as the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project Under the deal, Iran was to provide 22 million cubic meters per day of gas. Pakistan was slated to begin importing Iranian gas imports in early 2015, but the country has not yet begun construction of the related pipeline, nor has Iran completed its project to transit South Pars gas to the Pakistani border. Iran was planning to build a 180-kilometer pipeline. The pipeline was intended to connect Iran's giant South Fars gas field with Pakistan's southern Baluchistan and Sindh provinces. Tehran previously offered Pakistan a loan worth $500 milliona third of the cost of Pakistans portion of the pipelineto start pipeline construction in Pakistans territory. This offer was later revoked due to financial problems caused by sanctions. Earlier, Pakistan's Minister of Petrolium Shahid Khaqan Abbasi said that for the implementation of the pipeline, all sanctions against Iran should be lifted. Some U.S. unilateral sanctions against Iran, including a ban on transactions with Iran using USD, which creates obstacles for foreign investors to do business with the Islamic state, are still remaining in place. Also, Pakistan urges Iran to reduce the price of gas. Pakistan claims that the alleged price of gas from Turkmenistan, which will go on the TAPI pipeline in the future, is less than the price of Iranian gas to be delivered through the Peace Pipeline By holding 157.8 billion barrels of recoverable crude oil reserves, Iran possesses the world's fourth largest reserves of crude oil. The Islamic Republic also holds 34 trillion cubic meters of proven gas reserves, sharing 18.2 percent of total global gas reserves, which puts the country in the top of the world's gas holders list. This post is prompted by a number of things that have left me pondering how as Christians we are to bring about change in our churches. When we strongly b... 7 years ago Bentley Systems, a leading provider of software solutions for sustaining infrastructure, has joined hands with US-based Analytical Graphics (AGI) to set up the new Cesium Consortium. Cesium is an open source, browser-based virtual globe, first developed by AGI in 2011 for the aerospace and defence communities. Cesiums unparalleled performance in streaming very large datasets through a browser to desktops, tablets, and smart phones has enabled it to become the virtual globe of choice for geospatial viewing, said a statement from Bentley. The consortium will now enable AGI and Bentley to collaborate on the cesium roadmap to better accelerate and support the requirements for building infrastructure modeling (BIM) and for owners of infrastructure assets, it stated. In addition, the consortium will support feature development, priority bug fixes, expansion of outreach efforts, and the hosting of social coding events such as code sprints and bug bashes. Bentley Systems is adopting cesium to visualise and interact with highly-detailed infrastructure engineering models set in the reality context of their surrounding environment. The digital engineering models are created with Bentleys MicroStation and BIM applications, and the context is provided through reality meshes, created from digital photography and scanning devices using Bentleys ContextCapture. Keith Bentley, the founder and chief technology officer of Bentley Systems, said: "We are thrilled to join the Cesium Consortium as a founding member. I commend AGI for their leadership and vision, not only for creating an open source solution for highly performant 3D web-based applications but, more importantly, for fostering an ecosystem to leverage it." "I expect Bentley and our users will build cesium-based Web clients for immersively viewing BIM (building information modelling) models, reality context, asset databases, IoT (Internet of Things) streams, and myriad other Geo3D services. We look forward to working hand in hand with AGI and future members of the consortium to expand cesium as an open standard," he added. Bentleys work to date, he stated, illustrates the advantages that the infrastructure community can expect from cesium. Data created with both MicroStation and ContextCapture can be exported to 3D Tiles, an open format developed by the cesium team to stream massive geo-coordinated 3D datasets. We are very excited to collaborate with Bentley. Bentley shares our vision and technical approach and has already done some fantastic work with cesium and 3D Tiles, remarked Patrick Cozzi, the cesium founder. Bentleys support will be key within our submission team proposing 3D Tiles as an Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Community Standard, he added.-TradeArabia News Service The Higher Colleges of Technology (HCT), the UAEs largest applied higher education institution, has entered into a strategic partnership with the UKs Higher Education Academy (HEA), in preparation for HEA accreditation to be submitted later this year. The partnership was formally signed by Dr Abdullatif Al Shamsi, HCT vice chancellor, and Professor Stephanie Marshall, chief executive of the HEA, at a ceremony in London. The agreement was signed in the presence of the UAE Minster of State for Higher Education Dr Ahmad Belhoul Al Falasi. This new relationship builds on the previous HEA work with HCT to prepare for the accreditation of HCTs Teaching Skills Enhancement Programme (TSEP), which was aimed at young Emirati academic teachers many of whom were recruited from industry into teaching. The new accreditation process is also aimed at Emirati staff as HCT seeks to further develop in-country capability and capacity. The HEA will work closely with staff at HCTs Academy for Developing Emirati Faculty (HADEF) with the goal to have the new HEA accredited course from February 2018. Successful participants of the course will become associate fellows of the HEA. Dr Abdullatif Al Shamsi said: We are very pleased be taking this work forward in a strategic partnership with the HEA. Teaching quality is core to our offer at HCT and the accreditation of our staff development programme is a key building block in maintaining and enhancing our reputation as a great place for students to study. The vice chancellor added that the agreement will enable HCT to provide an accredited and internationally recognized training programme, for developing and licensing its faculty, in line with UK the professional criteria. This will support the main HCT objective of putting in place a national programme to award international fellowship in teaching at HCT, which will lead to the establishment of a Centre of Excellence in teaching, thus promoting national capacities in the area of higher education, Dr Al Shamsi said. Professor Stephanie Marshall said: I am delighted to welcome HCT as a strategic partner. Accrediting continuous professional development, aligned to the Professional Standards Framework (PSF), is a vital step in sustaining and improving teaching. We know that staff who reflect on and develop their practice are very well-placed to help students towards successful outcomes. Im confident we will achieve this while meeting the HCTs need to specifically develop Emirati teaching staff. Dr Al Shamsi said the parties cooperation in the area of professional development will reflect the UAEs National Qualification Authoritys (NQA) plans for aligning its system with the British education qualifications system. HCT already has 36 Associate Fellows and three HEA Fellows on its staff, with some now preparing to apply for HEA Senior Fellowships. TradeArabia News Service Iran has signed deals with a number of European companies including Spanish Cepsa and Italian Eni to rent 35 oil tankers, said a top official. All of the 35 deals are voyage charter, Sirous Kianersi, managing director of the National Iranian Tanker Company (NITC) was quoted as saying in the Iran Daily report, which cited Mehr News Agency. In January, Iranian oil ship reached Spain's Algeciras while two other Iranian tankers also left the Persian Gulf for the Netherlands, the report said. Engie (formerly GDF Suez), a leading global energy group, has been awarded the contract and achieved financial closing for the greenfield Fadhili independent power project (IPP) in Saudi Arabia, the most efficient cogeneration plant in the country. Located in the east of the kingdom, 50 km northwest of Jubail Industrial City, the Fadhili project is a combined cycled gas power plant with a capacity of 1,507 MW. It will produce the equivalent of the electricity consumption of 1.4 million people. It will also produce 1,447 tons per hour of steam and 768.8 tons per hour of feed water. Saudi Electricity Company (SEC) will be the off-taker for electricity and Saudi Aramco for the steam and feed water under 20-year purchase agreements. As per the deal, Engie will have a 40 per cent equity ownership in the project company, while SEC and Saudi Aramco Power Holding Company (Saphco) will each hold a 30 per cent stake. Engie will work on this project together with South Korean Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction Co. for Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) and with Siemens for the gas turbines supply. The scope of work will include the construction of a 380 kV substation to be transferred to SEC in 2018 for ownership, operation and maintenance. On the contract win, Isabelle Kocher, CEO of Engie, said: "Being awarded the Fadhili project reaffirms our leading position as independent power producer in the Middle East. We are also proud of the continued trust of SEC and Saudi Aramco, our long-term partners in Saudi Arabia." "Over the last few years, the group has earned a reputation of being a reliable developer and operator of electricity and water facilities in the country. The Fadhili project is in line with our strategy that aims at concentrating on low CO2 activities via renewable energies and gas for power generation," noted Kocher. "It also demonstrates our commitment to meet the exacting standards of performance expected by our customers," he noted. According to him, the commercial operation of the Fadhili plant is scheduled at the end of 2019. Total investment cost for the project is $1.2 billion and will be partially financed through $950 million of non-recourse project finance debt provided by MUFG, KfW Ipex, SMBC, National Commercial Bank, Korea Exim Bank and Islamic Development Bank, he added.-TradeArabia News Service High-end optics and precision electronics manufacturer Olympus Corporation today launched its regional headquarters for Middle East and Africa (MEA) in Dubai, UAE. Olympus president Hiroyuki Sasa flew in from Tokyo to inaugurate the office in the presence of Abdulrahman Al Owais, UAE Minister of Health and Prevention. The inauguration was also attended by Stefan Kaufmann, executive managing director, Olympus Europa; the consul generals of Japan Hisashi Michigami, and Germany Gunter Rauer; Marwan Abdulaziz Al Janahi, executive director of Dubai Science Park (DSP); and leading personalities from the regions business sector. Olympus Corporation is world leader in high-end optical and digital precision technology for sectors including healthcare, life sciences, energy, petroleum, construction, aviation, mining and precious metals such as gold and platinum. The new MEA affiliate will be led by healthcare veteran Maurice Faber, regional managing director, who will oversee operations in 72 countries that make up Olympus MEA. The 2,000 sq m Olympus MEA Regional Headquarters located in Dubai Science Park, covers a vast territory stretching from the western shores of the African continent across the Levant and the Middle East to Iran and Turkey. The Dubai RHQ, reports in to Hamburg-based Olympus Europa, which acts as the regional centre for the larger EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) region. Our presence in the region will help further expand Olympus operations so that we can support our business partners requirements, effectively promote growth and problem solving strategies designed locally, said Faber. Al Janahi said: "Our partnership with Olympus further demonstrates Dubai Science Park's commitment to supporting Dubai's vision towards an innovation-based economy. Olympus' new headquarters at Dubai Science Park, a member of Tecom Group, will provide state-of-the art technology to the region and equip local talent with skills and expertise. The Olympus RHQ will have one of the most advanced Repair & Service Centre to conduct all major repairs within the region. It will also have a Training Centre to train partners and clients on its high-technology instrumentations, as well as stock critical equipment to supply clients as replacements while their items are being serviced. - TradeArabia News Service Have an event, trend or general energy happening youd like to see in the Energy Journal newsletter? Send it to Star-Tribune energy reporter Heather Richards at heather.richards@trib.com. Sign up for the newsletter at www.trib.com/energyjournal. This week in numbers Friday oil prices: West Texas Intermediate (WTI) $53.17, Brent (ICE) $55.52 Natural gas weekly averages: Henry Hub $3.26, Wyoming Pool $3.2, Opal $3.23 Cheney and coal In a recent interview, U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney laid out some of her priorities on the House Natural Resources Committee as well as her opinion of how government can help the coal industry and her take on clean coal technology. A transcript of the energy portion of her interview is available here. Ozone spike For the second weekend in a row, the Upper Green River Basin has seen ozone levels spike, leading state regulators to call for low-emission days from local producers. The Upper Green was a focal point of state emissions regulations. Its unique geography and heavy industry development has led to smog-like conditions in years past. Emission controls increased to capture fugitive emissions, and state rules were developed with environmental and industry collaboration to address venting and flaring. However, it's been close to six years since the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality called for ozone action days. Making the list An unofficial list of infrastructure projects that the new president may consider for federal support has been circulating in Washington, including Wyoming's proposed Chokecherry and Sierra Madre wind farm and the TransWest Express transmission line, both developed by Power Company of Wyoming. Wyoming receives coal worker grant A grant program from the Obama era will provide Wyoming up to $2 million to retrain coal workers affected by the layoffs. The Wyoming Department of Workforce Services and various local partners applied for the grant in May. Close to 500 coal miners lost their jobs in Gillette and Wright last spring due to an ailing coal market. Earnings tell a tale Halliburton experienced a loss for 2016 but projected hope for the coming year. The large oil services company has taken over a large market share during the downturn and seeks to increase prices now that the oil and gas market is stabilizing post-downturn. Izaak Walton League talks climate change Friday, Feb. 3, 6 p.m. potluck dinner, 7 p.m., presentation, at the Izaak Walton League Lodge at Fort Caspar Campground, just past Fort Caspar Museum. Dan Cooper will present Global Weirding, a Texas PBS series on climate change by Katharine Hayhoe. There will be a brief discussion after each episode. Dr. Hayhoe is a climate scientist, evangical Christian, and a remarkable communicator. Any religious person, or anyone skeptical that religion can be part of the solution, should see this. County pioneers meet The Natrona County Pioneer Association will conduct its Winter Quarterly luncheon meeting at 12:30 p.m., on Sunday, Feb. 5, at the Senior Center, 1831 East 4th Street. The luncheon cost will be $5 for those 60 years old and older. The speaker will be author Don Merback. Anyone interested is invited to attend. Contact Vaughn Cronin at 315-4659 for more information. Super Bowl at the Elks Super Bowl Sunday at the Casper Elks Lodge. Bar opens at 2 p.m., beer and drinks specials, raffles and door prizes. This is going to be a potluck, so take a favorite snack to share with everyone. Members, significant other and guest accompanied by a member. For more information, call 234-4839. Casper Charla begins Would you like to practice conversational Spanish or help others learn? Come and join the Casper Charla! Te gustaria platicar en espanol? Ven y charla con nosotros! Todos son bienvenidos! Come and join us on the second Wednesday of each month this spring. We meet at a different restaurant each month and partake in food, drink and conversation. All levels of Spanish are welcome, from beginning to native-speakers. Nos reunimos los miercoles en varios restaurantes en Casper. Ven por una copa, un antojito o simplemente una charlita. Wednesday, Feb. 8, 5-7 p.m.: El Toro; Wednesday, March 8, 5-7 p.m.: Guadalajara; Wednesday, April 12, 5-7 p.m.: La Costa; Wednesday, May 10, 5-7 p.m.: La Cocina. Beekeepers meet Natrona County Beekeepers Association will meet at 7 p.m., on Thursday, Feb. 9, in the basement of the College Heights Baptist Church, 600 West 21st Street. This group is for those thinking about becoming a beekeeper or those who already have hives. A group order to purchase bees is in the works. Freedom Fund lunch set During the civil rights era of the 1950s and 60s, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) hosted Freedom Fund banquets to raise money for legal aid for folks who had been arrested while attempting to register to vote and fighting for their civil rights. Following that tradition, the Casper Branch of the NAACP is hosting its annual Freedom Fund luncheon from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., on Sat., Feb. 11, at the Parkway Plaza, 123 East E St. Lunch will be served at 11:30 a.m. Henry Allen, past president of Colorado Springs Branch NAACP, and current president, Pikes Peak Southern Christian Leadership Conference, will address the topic, America 2017 through the Eyes of Martin Luther King, Jr. Allen served 24 years in the U.S. Army and worked as a sheriff until his retirement. NAACP members and the general public are invited to attend the luncheon. Tickets cost $30 (checks made to Casper NAACP) with lunch choices: salmon, strip steak au jus, or vegetarian pasta. To make reservations, call Joanne Tanner at 234-6266 by Feb. 6. Woman as president is topic of forum Why its Harder for a Woman to Become a President than a Prime Minister is the subject Dr. Stephanie Anderson will address at the next Democratic Womens Forum on Saturday, Feb. 11. Her talk will follow the noon buffet luncheon at the Ramkota Hotel dining room. An associate professor of political science at the University of Wyoming, Dr. Anderson has wide experience in international relations, having studied in various foreign countries, as well as focusing her research on the European Union (EU) as an international actor. Democratic Forums are open to all persons interested regardless of gender. Luncheons are $15 per person, including tax and gratuity. Reservations are requested by calling Jerre at 234-8625 by Thursday (Feb. 9) prior to the meeting. NARFE has social Casper Chapter #358 of the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association (NARFE) will have a no-host Social Meeting at noon on Feb. 28, in the meeting room at the Casper Senior Center at 1831 East 4th Street. Father Daughter Dinner at Elks Lodge The annual Father Daughter Dinner and Dance at the Casper Elks Lodge is Feb. 25. Doors open at 6:30 p.m., dinner at 7 p.m. Music by Good Times Only. If you dont have a daughter, borrow one and come down for dinner, dancing and door prizes and get your picture taken. Ticket prices are fathers, $10; daughters ages 14 and up, $9; ages 8 to 13, $8, and ages 7 and under are free. For more information, call 234-4839. Elks Sweetheart Ball Sweetheart Ball Dinner and Dance in the Casper Elks Lodge Ballroom on Saturday, Feb. 11. Dinner begins at 6:30 p.m. in the ballroom. Menu options are prime rib, $25; crab legs, $35, or $55 for both. Price includes a $5 drink ticket. We will have a theatre production with a pirate theme. This play is not age appropriate for children. Members, significant other and guest accompanied by a member. For more information, call 234-4839 or 237-2432. Mardi Gras Bingo Mardi Gras Bingo, sponsored by Reveille Rotary of Casper, is 6 to 8 p.m., on Tuesday, Feb. 28, at the Casper Senior Center, 1831 E. 4th Street. Enjoy Bingo fun for the whole family. Tickets are $20 for two Bingo cards. There will be eight $25 games, nine $50 games, one $250 game and one $500 game. Concessions will be available (including homemade slices of pie). Proceeds benefit Wyoming Dementia Care. Tickets can be purchased from any Reveille Rotary member or at First Interstate Bank Downtown. Casper police are looking for a 25-year-old woman who has been missing since Tuesday. Brittany Border was last seen in Casper, police said. She is described as a white woman, roughly 5 feet 6 inches tall, with brown hair and blue eyes. She may be traveling in a dark green 2010 Toyota RAV4 with expired Wyoming tags. Anyone with information is asked to call Casper police at 307-235-8278. CHEYENNE The Wyoming House advanced legislation Monday that would allow people to carry weapons on college campuses, elementary and secondary schools, at government meetings and in the Wyoming Legislature. The three bills cleared the first of three votes in the House on Monday morning. They must pass the Senate before becoming law. A lawmaker proposed amending one of the bills guns on campuses at the request of the states higher education leaders, to allow college boards of trustees to control firearms use on campus. The majority of the House shot down the proposal. Many lawmakers commented that gun bills tend to sail through the Wyoming House. Recent history has shown the Wyoming Senate has killed gun bills. Rep. Mike Madden said there have been gun bills in seven of the 11 sessions hes served in Cheyenne. Debate on the House floor has taken hours, he said. Madden is chairman of the House Revenue Committee, which is discussing whether to increase taxes to fill the states $400 million revenue gap. No matter what you do, this bill is going to pass, he said about the guns on campus bill. We can talk about it for another four hours in here. And then its going to go to the other body and they will take care of what they think is right or wrong. Armed on campus Rep. David Northrup, a Powell Republican who is chairman of the House Education Committee, proposed the amendment that would have given trustees more power. College boards of trustees are intimately involved with the safety of students, faculty and staff on each campus, said Laramie Republican Rep. Dan Furphy. This amendment is extremely important to them, they have a decision in this process, he said. The school itself takes a lot of input from the students, professors and others involved. And so the trustees should have this option to make a decision with all the input, so I would strongly support this amendment. Rep. Tyler Lindholm pushed back. The University of Wyomings trustees are appointed by the governor, he stated. The trustees of the states seven community colleges are elected. In Utah, which has a similar law as House Bill 136, the responsibility of student safety lies on the Legislature, he said. They dont depend on their trustees to make that decision for them, the Sundance Republican said. They depend on their elected officials to make that decision for them. Ultimately, the amendment failed, and the bill passed. The thing to this amendment is to gut the bill, said Rep. Mark Jennings, a Sheridan Republican. The argument that prevailed in the House was that people needed to protect themselves from mass shooters, who dont respect gun prohibitions. People may think theyre safe, but they are not, said Rep. Bo Biteman, the bills sponsor. There are no metal detectors, no law enforcement presence. The Sheridan Republicans statement isnt completely true. The University of Wyoming has a police department. Some community colleges have security guards. Sheridan College, with campuses in Sheridan and Gillette, has a police department with officers in both locations. Armed at meetings House Bill 137, which would allow people to carry firearms to the Wyoming Legislature and state and local government meetings, passed with no debate. The Wyoming Association of Municipalities opposes the bill because some city and town councils in Wyoming want to prohibit guns at meetings. Armed at school House Bill 194 is sponsored by Rep. John Eklund and a group of mostly moderate Republicans. Eklund said the bill attempts to strike a balance between Second Amendment gun rights and the opposition to guns in schools by most educators. The bill is aimed at boards of education over rural schools that are far from the nearest police station or sheriffs office, Eklund said. The school districts could authorize some personnel with valid conceal carry permits to have guns at elementary and secondary schools. The identities of the people who will have guns will not be subject to Wyoming public records laws. Rep. Robert McKimm of Afton referenced the 1986 Cokeville Elementary bombing. In our smaller districts this is needed, he said. I can tell you if certain laws were put into place, this might not have happened. Thermopolis Republican Rep. Nathan Winters said there were people at two rural schools in his area of the state that requested such a bill, so he signed up as a co-sponsor, he said. Winters also echoed Maddens comments about gun bills typically passing the House and failing the Senate. If were trying to get full rights, this will kind of crack the door open, said Eklund, the primary sponsor. Opponents to BH194 roughly fell into two camps: Representatives who dont believe guns should be in schools, and lawmakers who believed it was too much of a compromise on the Second Amendment. I support Second Amendment rights, but I cannot support anything that puts guns in schools, said Casper Democrat Debbie Bovee, a retired teacher. University of Wyoming students, faculty and staff from the seven Muslim-majority nations listed in President Donald Trumps recent travel ban should not leave the U.S., school President Laurie Nichols said in a statement Monday. The UW presidents statement affirmed the schools support of all international students, faculty and staff and said it will be communicating with Wyomings congressional delegation. Another letter from Nichols addressed at least one student who was barred from entering the U.S. to join a graduate program at UW. The student was traveling to Wyoming when the ban was issued, forcing him to return to his home country, Mary Katherine Scott, UWs acting director of international programs wrote in an email to the Star-Tribune. The university is working to find other staff, faculty or students who also may not be able to return. For students, scholars, faculty and staff who are citizens of these seven countries, travel is of concern, Nichols wrote. I caution you to not leave the U.S. until the executive order is lifted. I have asked our International office to offer assistance as needed, including answering questions, and, in particular, to offer assistance with any forthcoming travel plans. Trump signed an executive order late Friday preventing people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the U.S. for 90 days. Federal judges in several states have issued orders that temporarily block the government from deporting people with valid visas who arrived after Trumps travel ban took effect. But some people from those countries remain caught in legal limbo, stranded while traveling abroad or visiting home during the recent holiday break. UW has more than 800 international students and about 100 international employees. About 60 of them are from one of the seven countries in the ban, said Scott. The impact of the ban on UW is unclear right now, she added. We will be monitoring news sources closely for any developments on this issue, and reaching out to students, faculty and staff, as well as their departments and colleges, that may be impacted once we have more details, she said. Trumps order also suspended refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely barred the processing of refugees from Syria. Wyomings congressional delegation all issued similar statements regarding the ban, noting the importance of vetting refugees while not preventing entry from people being persecuted for their religious beliefs. Wyomings U.S. Sen. John Barrasso wrote in an email Monday morning that ... a religious test or ban is against everything our country stands for. We need to remember that some of our best sources of information that keeps our nation and our troops safe comes from our Muslim friends and allies. Rep. Liz Cheney echoed similar sentiments in an emailed statement to the Star-Tribune. We know ISIS and other terrorist organizations have used the refugee programs to infiltrate and attack the West. President Trumps Executive Order temporarily halts these programs since we do not have the ability to effectively vet refugees, Cheney wrote. As the Executive Order is implemented, we must ensure we dont prohibit entry for people who are being persecuted for their religious beliefs or who supported and worked with Americas armed forces. Sen. Mike Enzi said in a statement that officials must ensure the country has proper safeguards on the vetting process for people wishing to come to the United States. It is important, however, that we implement any such changes with clarity for all those involved, he said. The Associated Press and Star-Tribune reporters Laura Hancock and Heather Richards contributed to this report. Halima hid under the bed and tried not to watch as the soldiers slit her brothers throat. It was 1999 in Sierra Leone and the country was in the middle of a bloody civil war. Halima waited until the killers left, then crawled out and ran to her brother Salim, who was not breathing. She held him, prayed for a moment, then ran from the house. Two days later, with a false passport, she flew to the United States. She was granted asylum and now lives here with her family, including four U.S. citizen children. I had known Halimas story for almost a decade since I was her immigration attorney. She is just one of the many people Ive met during a 20-year career practicing the type of law that exposes me to people who come from countries where politics is not as simple and sanitized as a panel discussion on CNN. There was Muhammad, who had once been a member of the Nawaz party in Pakistan and made the mistake of being a vocal district officer and opponent of the Taliban when they took over his northern town and ordered medical workers to stop dispensing free vaccines. He was beaten, his father was shot and he was forced to flee the only home hed ever known. The Taliban are still there. There was Javier from Guatemala, whose family had been attacked by rebels during the Civil War in the mid-80s because they refused to provide assistance, and then were persecuted by the government when, ironically, they wrongly thought his family had provided that guerrilla aid. There was Brahim from the Ivory Coast, who had been a vocal coordinator for college students in favor of a political candidate named Ouattara, and who had been imprisoned and tortured when the presidents men maintained their power by essentially putting the challenger under house arrest and disrupting the election. There was Ousmane, from Algeria, who had marched against the Armed Islamic Forces in his hometown of Medea, trying to protect the democratically elected president from an Islamic insurgency. His sister was raped, he was beaten and the police were too afraid to arrest any of the attackers. There were more. Mohan from the Sudan. Isaias from El Salvador. Lassana from Guinea. Emanuel from the Congo. Every single one fled a country that was mired in a political maelstrom because one group of people could not accept the peaceful relinquishment of power. I tell you these stories as a reminder that even though you might not celebrate the man and the message in the ascendant in Washington, you have to honor the process. We transition from one person to the next, one party to the next, one mission to the next, without guns. We do it without force. We do it with votes and voices. The angry feminist marches in the streets but is not forced to hide under her bed. The impassioned college student writes op-eds against the administration but does not do it from a prison cell. The doctor who thinks birth control is a right, not a privilege, writes that prescription from an office and doesnt fear that police will break down his door and haul him away. To those who are angry, mournful, anxious and disgusted today I say: Celebrate the country you live in, that gives you the freedom to oppose Donald Trumps administration. To those who do celebrate unreservedly, remember that those on the other side of the divide are your fellow citizens. And to all, embrace the process that perpetuates a freedom and an individual dignity that, believe me, is the exception to a universal rule. Several of our fellow Wyoming legislators have argued against the effort to rein in the federal government using Article V of the Constitution, claiming that it is too risky. We want to set the record straight for Wyomingites who might hear it said that this essential part of our Constitution, the ability for states to push back against Washington, could harm that most sacred founding document. Article V is the section of the Constitution that allows for amendments. One method, which has been used 27 times in our nations history, is for a two-thirds majority of Congress to propose amendments that must then be ratified by three-quarters of the states. The other lesser-known method allows states directly to propose amendments via a convention of states. This is what the Convention of States Resolution, currently under consideration in the Wyoming Legislature, is all about. Heres how it works. First, 34 state legislatures (two-thirds) must pass a resolution calling for a convention to propose amendments. The resolution must specify particular topics that can be proposed as amendments at the convention. Some legislators have repeatedly referred to the Article V convention as a constitutional convention. It is not. It is a limited-purpose convention solely for the purpose of proposing amendments, and only related to the subjects specified in the resolution. Once 34 states have passed resolutions to deal with a specific topic, Congress must call the convention. The word in the Constitution is shall, meaning it must. The convention is only composed of delegates from the states, and the federal government has no role in the convention. Each state has one vote, a fact guaranteed by the Constitution itself and by 250 years of legal precedent. We are only too happy to report, therefore, that the Article V process makes Wyomings voice equal to Californias. As it should be. At the convention the states, through their delegates, decide on the convention rules. Once the rules are passed, proposals for specific amendments are made, revised and debated by the convention body. Moreover, anything that manages to get through the convention must still be ratified. That is much more difficult. In fact, it takes fully 38 states, or three-quarters, to ratify any amendment that comes out of an Article V convention. If 13 state legislatures dont ratify an amendment, it wont become part of the Constitution. Needless to say, this is a difficult process. Its never been successfully used in our nations long history. And thats the way that our Founders, in their great wisdom, intended it. They didnt want the Constitution to be easily changed. This is why fears of a runaway convention are overblown. In spite of making it difficult, the Founders did want states to push back against an out-of-control federal government using this process. In fact, this part of Article V was met with unanimous approval at the 1787 Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia when Virginia delegate George Mason proposed it. His argument was that there may come a day when the federal government exceeds its authority, necessitating the direct involvement of the states. That day has long since come and gone. And while things appear to be getting better in Washington, who knows how long it will last? We must use the momentum that swept change into the White House to put states back in charge, while we still can. The Convention of States Resolution deals with three specific and essential areas: imposing fiscal restraints on the federal government, limiting federal power, and putting in place federal term limits. Imagine what would happen if conservative states like Wyoming used this process to limit a federal government that has killed jobs in Gillette, drawn Riverton into the Wind River reservation and closed public access roads at random throughout our great state. This process isnt risky. The real risk is continuing to do nothing. We hope that our colleagues and the people of this great state will fight with us to restore the constitutional balance of powers and put states back in charge, using the Article V process that our Founders gave us. KABUL, Afghanistan The only insurgent leader to sign a peace pact with Afghanistans government will return to the country within weeks, his chief negotiator says, in a move that could shake up Afghan politics and complicate the much wider war against the Taliban. Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a former warlord who battled U.S. forces after the 2001 invasion and nursed a bitter rivalry with other Afghan factions, agreed to lay down arms last year. Amin Karim, his chief negotiator, told The Associated Press earlier this week that he would return to the capital in a matter of weeks, not months. Hekmatyar is seen as a potential rival to President Ashraf Ghani and Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, who have governed the country through a U.S.-brokered power-sharing agreement. His return could inject new political uncertainty as the government struggles to confront a reinvigorated Taliban. The former warlord battled the Soviets in the 1980s and then took part in the civil war that erupted after their withdrawal, clashing with the so-called Northern Alliance, in which Abdullah was a leading figure. Hekmatyar was driven out when the Taliban seized power in 1996, but returned after the American invasion, vowing to resist the foreign occupation. His forces were largely confined to just two provinces, however, and have carried out few attacks in recent years. He is believed to be in hiding somewhere in the eastern Kunar province, where he enjoys popular support, and to make occasional trips into Pakistan across the nearby border. Last year he became the only insurgent leader to sign a peace agreement with the Afghan government, in what many hoped would provide a model for a wider reconciliation with the Taliban. But he has yet to return to the fold. His Hezb-e-Islami party wants his name taken off the U.N. and the U.S. Treasury lists of wanted terrorists. Karim declined to say whether Hekmatyar would return to Afghanistan without first being removed from the lists, and there has been no indication that the U.N. or Washington is considering his removal. Hekmatyar, like Ghani, hails from Afghanistans ethnic Pashtun majority, and a revitalized Hezb-e-Islami could become a powerful player in the 2019 parliamentary elections, says Andrew Wilder, vice president of the Asia Program at the U.S. Institute of Peace. WASHINGTON Congress is ready to start major work this week on dismantling the Affordable Care Act, but conservatives are fuming over lost momentum that they fear could doom a repeal. Lawmakers missed a nonbinding deadline to deliver details of a repeal plan Friday and left a Republican retreat in Philadelphia without reaching consensus on a replacement package that an increasing number of Republicans want to see agreed to before the 2010 law is taken apart. Complicating the effort, Congress is struggling to find its footing with an unpredictable administration whose actions in only one week have distracted from what lawmakers thought was the top item on the Republican agenda. Some conservatives worry that delay could be costly, perhaps even fatal, sapping lawmakers drive to repeal and sidelining the effort in favor of other priorities, such as keeping the federal government running. Right now you are seeing the question of replace stopping the momentum of repeal, said James Wallner, a former Senate aide and group vice president for research at the conservative Heritage Foundation. Before you know it, you are into the late summer or fall because you have to do stuff like funding the government, and you havent done (repeal) yet. You can see very quickly how you end up in a place where youre just trying to shore up the existing system. But former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a sometime adviser to the president, insisted that Congress will not get sidetracked with Trump at the top. It is inevitable that it will be replaced, Gingrich said of the health-care law. There is a very deep awareness, which the president has emphasized, that you cannot leave 23 million people worried about their health insurance, Gingrich said. You cant just repeal with a vacuum and you go from the Democrats owning it to us owning it. Why should we rush in to own their problem? Scott Jennings, political director for former President George W. Bush, said Sunday that Republicans cant afford to put health care on the back burner, though it may get less news coverage because of what he called hysteria and protests over Trumps unrelated order to bar refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries from the U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan has outlined an agenda that calls for delivering repeal and replace legislation to Trumps desk by early April. The measure currently funding the government expires at the end of April and will be a priority. So will repeal, Ryan said Friday. American Airlines has decided to suspend its new daily nonstop flights from Tucson to New Yorks John F. Kennedy International Airport from May through mid-December, citing lower than expected demand for the flight. Passenger loads on the JFK flights that began at Tucson International Airport in October are growing, but that growth has been slower than expected, according to American Airlines and the Tucson Metro Chamber of Commerce, which organized a fund to guarantee minimum revenue from the route. The current plan is for the last flights to operate May 4, and then service will resume on Dec. 15 and 16, according to information from American Airlines and the chamber released by the Tucson Airport Authority. Customers who have already bought tickets on the JFK route for travel during the suspension period will be contacted by American to make alternative travel arrangements, or to offer a full refund. American Airlines was willing to continue the flight through the summer but that may have jeopardized the availability of the flight over the holidays and high winter season next year, the chamber said. The Tucson Airport Authority was told last week that the flight wasnt meeting expectations and American was mulling suspension for the summer. At last weeks airport authority meeting, board member Bill Assenmacher said American was reluctant to operate the flight at below minimum capacity over the summer, because it would likely drain much of the $1 million in funding local businesses have pledged to guarantee Americans revenue on the JFK flights. Assenmacher, who also chairs the Tucson Metro Chambers air-service task force, said revenue per passenger is down on the Tucson-JFK route largely because American has faced stiff price competition from other carriers' one-stop flights to New York. That has prevented American from collecting an expected premium on its five-hour, nonstop route, for which paid fares have averaged about $350 roundtrip. A decision on suspending the flights for the summer had to be made now because airlines have to plan their schedules far in advance, according to American and the Tucson chamber. A nonstop flight from Tucson to New York can be booked now for December travel. American was courted for the Tucson-JFK nonstops based on the airports experience with New York nonstops in 2007 and 2008 and projections of how many passengers using connecting flights or the Phoenix airport would switch to the American nonstop. Though detailed reports are not yet available, initial data suggest the flights have done well in attracting passengers who would have taken connecting flights to JFK or LaGuardia Airport, while data on passengers using Newark is inconclusive, officials said. We've collected a few front pages from newspapers.com to give you a look at some Jan. 30 papers in history. With a subscription to newspapers.com you can search the Arizona Daily Star and many other newspapers using keywords or dates, and download articles or pages. Before being submerged in scalding water, allegedly by the woman who recently adopted her, a Tucson 5-year-old lived with a foster father now imprisoned for sex crimes against children. The girl, who is in critical condition, had been shuttled from one troubled home life to another before 911 responders found her severely burned on Dec. 29. State authorities had removed her from her biological parents and placed her, as a toddler, in the Sierra Vista home of David Frodsham, where she lived with other foster children from 2013 until January 2015. Frodsham was arrested in 2016 after federal authorities accused him of sexual misconduct with children and of providing at least one child to an alleged child pornographer, Randall Bischak, for sexual contact. The foster father eventually pleaded guilty to counts involving a child over age 15, in return for prosecutors dropping other charges. The names of child sex victims are not public record and would not be published by the Arizona Daily Star. Previous reports on his case quote a federal criminal complaint as saying Bischak and Frodsham allegedly met for consensual sex with children present. The biological mother of the Tucson child says she raised concerns with state workers that while living in Frodshams home, her toddler daughter had repeated urinary-tract infections, which can be a sign of sexual abuse in children, but says those concerns went unanswered. From Frodshams home, the little girl had to commute nearly 90 minutes each way to see her biological parents in Tucson. She initially would cry until she fell asleep after she left her parents, said Beth Breen, a former taxi driver for children in state custody. Breen took the child back and forth for nearly a year, ending in March 2014. The little girl would scream in fear around strange men, Breen said, making it nearly impossible for male drivers to take her, and so Breen said she became her regular driver. Breen would sing to her and the girl would watch movies on a DVD player Breen bought for the drive. Breen has had trouble sleeping since she realized, about a week ago, that the little girl in the news was the toddler shed transported. After the recent news reports, Breen looked up the childs adoptive parents on social media and saw family photographs that confirmed her fears: This was the same girl she had known. We spent a lot of time together. We would sing songs and play I spy, Breen said. I would know that child anywhere. I have always had a special place in my heart for her. Arizona Department of Child Safety records show that the girls biological mother, Michelle Tremor-Calderon, was nearly reunified with the child before her parental rights were terminated in 2015. What Calderon desperately wants now and she has asked Tucson attorney Lynne Cadigan to help her is to see her hospitalized daughter and, if the little girl is not going to survive, to say goodbye. The child was adopted last summer by Samantha and Justin Osteraas and given a new name, law enforcement records and accounts on social media show. Samantha Osteraas, 28, was arrested Jan. 5 after the girl suffered third-degree burns over 80 percent of her body, from the upper chest down, sheriffs records show. Osteraas might have waited up to six hours to seek medical treatment, court records say. She told 911 dispatchers she didnt realize she was bathing her daughter in scalding water. Deputies also noted bruises to the childs neck and left arm, and saw blood and signs of trauma on her upper lip. Hours after the incident, the 5-year-old was reported to be in respiratory and organ failure. She remains at Banner-University Medical Center in a medically induced coma. DCS spokesman Darren DaRonco said Samantha Osteraas did not have a history as a perpetrator with the child-welfare agency before this case. After the arrest, the DCS removed the Osteraas three young biological children from the familys home near North Shannon Road and West Lambert Lane. It is unclear whether they have been reunified with their father. Samantha Osteraas, charged with two counts of child abuse, was released Thursday from the Pima County jail on a bond of $25,000. Calderon learned a little more than a week ago that the hospitalized girl was the child shed lost. Calderon has not seen her daughter since July 2015, but, like Breen, looked up the adoptive parents on social media and saw her daughter in their family photos. The girl was taken from her in April 2013 following a domestic fight between Calderon and the childs father, Jonathan Hileman. She remained in foster care while her parents, who struggled with cocaine addiction, worked toward reunification. The girls father, who is a registered sex offender from a 1999 crime involving an adult victim, had failed to notify police about his new address, and that was another factor in their case, at least initially. Throughout the dependency case, Hileman continued to relapse while Calderon began to sustain her sobriety, reports show. As of May 2014, Calderon was moving toward reunification with her daughter when she violated a court order by letting the father, who was not allowed unsupervised visitation, to be at home with them. The couple tried to remedy that significant error by later separating, records show. In February 2015, Hileman relinquished his parental rights. Calderon said he did this primarily to help her regain custody of their daughter. A couple of months later, in April 2015, court records showed Calderon to be in full compliance with her case plan. But the behavior of their then-3-year-old child was deteriorating around this time, DCS records show. She had prolonged temper tantrums, urinated on herself and cried for prolonged periods after her visits. The childs caseworker and a DCS-appointed family therapist testified this was because the child was having difficulty relating to her mother, that the mother had inappropriate conversations in front of the child and didnt know how to meet her daughters emotional needs. In the end, a judge severed Calderons parental rights based on her violating the courts orders related to Hileman, the length of time the child had been in out-of-home care without successful reunification well beyond the nine months required by law and the serious negative behaviors the child would exhibit around her mother but reportedly would not display when away from her. Calderon tried to appeal the termination, but was not successful. They took her away, she said last week, and look what theyve done to her. Calderon repeatedly told Breen, the driver, that she thought something was wrong while her daughter lived in Sierra Vista. Calderon said she was always on the watch, fearful her daughter was being mistreated so much so that it was brought up as a problem in her trial to sever her parental rights. At one point, Calderon called Sierra Vista police to have a welfare check done at the house, and this was not well-received by the DCS, according to both the mother and DCS records. I did address my concerns to the case manager and she had no concerns, Calderon said. She told me the (Frodsham) home was a good home and nothing like that was going on there. The repeated urinary-tract infections, which records show were treated following medical visits, were blamed mostly on the child consuming too many sugary drinks. Records show the caseworker thought it was Calderon who was teaching her daughter to fear men and told her to stop more than once. Breen, who also thought the Frodsham home seemed like a safe placement, said she feels guilty she didnt take Calderons fears more seriously. When I was transporting her, her mom kept saying, Somethings not right, somethings not right, Breen said. I kept reassuring her that it seemed like a good home. Frodsham was licensed to have up to five foster children at a time, male and female, with the ages ranging from birth to 11, the DCS reported. DCS officials said they could not comment further on the case. Breen said several foster children of various ages were living in the home when Calderons child was there, including one other toddler. Frodsham was licensed as a foster parent in Arizona from 2002 until January 2015, when he was arrested on charges of aggravated drunk driving. His license was then suspended due to suspension of his fingerprint clearance card. Frodsham was later charged with sex crimes after federal authorities, in 2016, alerted Sierra Vista police about his alleged involvement with Bischak, a former U.S. Army specialist. The Department of Homeland Security was investigating Bischak for allegedly producing and distributing child pornography. Frodsham, who was indicted on seven counts related to sex crimes against children, pleaded guilty in June 2016 to three counts, including two counts of sexual conduct with a minor and attempted sexual conduct with a minor, said Cochise County Attorney Brian McIntyre. Frodsham is now serving a 17-year prison sentence with the Arizona Department of Corrections and will be required to register as a sex offender for life. There is an investigation pending on Bischak in Cochise County, but thats on hold until his federal case is done. Bischak was indicted on multiple counts of child pornography in a case pending in U.S. District Court in Tucson. Calderon has a small collection of photographs from her visits with her daughter, along with photos she collected of bruises and scratched feet she feared indicated her daughter was being mistreated in foster care. Months after her rights to her daughter had been severed, she learned about Frodshams arrest. She agonized over that, thinking until now it was the worst news she could ever hear. Subscribe to stay connected to Tucson. A subscription helps you access more of the local stories that keep you connected to the community. University of Arizona officials criticized U.S. President Trump's immigration and refugee ban, saying the approach violates the principles on which university communities are based. UA President Ann Weaver Hart expressed "serious concerns" about the executive order, which bars U.S. entry to citizens of seven countries that are majority Muslim. Those countries are: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. "We are deeply concerned for the well-being and treatment of our foreign students, scholars, researchers and professors," she said. Hart urged international students to postpone their international travel plans until the "matter is resolved." There are 174 students, scholars, faculty and staff members from those countries at the University of Arizona, 28 of whom are UA employees with permanent resident status, according to Pam Scott, a UA spokeswoman. That also includes 81 undergraduate and graduate students. The UA, which is home to about 12,000 international students and staff in total, does not know of any student, scholar, faculty or staff member who may be unable to return to the United States or detained at airports, said Suzanne Panferov, associate vice president of global initiatives. "This seems to be the final nail in the coffin of sorts," she said. The UA was already experiencing reduced international student enrollment. Now with the executive order, a perception that the U.S. is not open to immigrants and refugees would worsen the matter. International students and scholars' fear really came to the surface last fall, she said. "Students have been asking if they could travel home." The global initiatives office will continue to provide resources and work with students and scholars with overseas travel plans, Panferov said. It plans to launch web resources intended for those who might be affected, as well as others who might be traveling to one of the seven banned countries. The political infrastructure for this sort of ban on immigration has already been in place before Trump took office, said Ana Ghoreishian, an Iranian-American PhD student in the UA's history department who immigrated about 30 years ago. Only this time, it lacks political subtlety and is happening at a new level of bluntness. "I really feel like we're in a crisis and a difficult situation as a collective," she said of the political climate surrounding the ban. "I just really hope that we try to understand each other's position and try to find ways to move forward." Ghoreishian said she has friends and relatives who had planned on coming to the U.S. on student visas and friends in the U.S. who had planned on traveling to the Middle East for research. "Now they can't do that." On top of that, now Iran is saying it will ban Americans. "I can't go to Iran," she said. "I can't do my work. I can't see my friends and family. It's emotional. Aside from all the violations of international law and human rights, these are very real things to people." Ghoreishian said she was pleasantly surprised that the UA president took a position on the matter and that she hopes the university would extend its vast resources to help students, scholars, faculty and staff members who may end up in tough situations as a result of the executive order. She does not foresee traveling to Iran any time soon, she said. "I'm just not going to take that risk." As a tax-increment financing district, Rio Nuevo is able to offer economic incentives and pursue deals with companies looking to expand or relocate to Tucson in ways that cities and counties cant. Thats a big part of why Pima County is interested in leasing several of its downtown properties to Rio Nuevo. In December, the Board of Supervisors unanimously approved giving the state sales-tax-funded body options to lease a parking lot at 72 E. Broadway, between South Scott and Sixth avenues across from the new Tucson Electric Power building, and a vacant lot just north of the Arizona Riverpark Inn at 335 S. Freeway, near the Cushing Street underpass at Interstate 10. This is the first time the county has pursued such an arrangement with Rio Nuevo, according to John Moffatt, county economic development director. Such arrangements would also insulate any deal against another lawsuit like the one filed by the conservative Goldwater Institute against the county over last years World View deal. If were involved, (Goldwater) just wont challenge us, said Fletcher McCusker, chairman of Rio Nuevos board. In the World View deal, the county agreed to finance and construct a launch pad and headquarters for the space balloon company at a cost of about $20 million, money that would be paid back and then some over a 20-year lease. Those facilities are now complete. In its lawsuit, Goldwater alleges the deal violates the Arizona Constitutions gift clause, which among other things prohibits public bodies from lending their credit in the aid of a corporation. Rio Nuevo is exempt from the clause, a status affirmed by an opinion from Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich in 2015. Though he said hed have to examine the details of any future Rio Nuevo plan to develop the properties, Jim Manley, Goldwaters lead attorney, said his organization probably wouldnt be bringing a gift-clause claim against Rio Nuevo. In October, Pima County Superior Court Judge Catherine Woods denied the countys attempt to have the gift clause count thrown out, after having previously allowed the other three counts of the lawsuit to move ahead. The county argues it was well within its legal right to pursue the World View deal, but officials told the Star that until there is a ruling one way or another, pursuing those sorts of deals looks a little less attractive. Until she (rules), were going to take the conservative approach, Moffatt said. Im not going to shy away (from deals like that) just because we havent got a court ruling, County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry said. But on the other hand, if it could be done in another manner, I would certainly pursue that as well. Earlier, he said the Rio Nuevo deal mitigated against the possibility of future claims from Goldwater. Moffatt said that by avoiding legal action, sour notes that could turn otherwise interested companies away can also be avoided. These site selectors talk to each other all the time, Moffatt said, referring to corporate executives who make decisions about expansions or relocation plans. We dont want to get the reputation that we cant do deals. For Huckelberry, avoiding another lawsuit was one more benefit of a deal with Rio Nuevo, the others having to do with its ability to aggressively recruit potential employers with a number of incentives. Rio Nuevo can donate land, lease buildings at sub-market rates, allow lessees to pay an excise tax instead of property tax, and other measures that save companies or developers significant money. Because of where the properties are located, the Government Property Lease Excise Tax could also be abated for up to eight years, though that measure would have to be undertaken by the city of Tucson. Were unlimited in terms of what we can do to make development happen, said McCusker, who added later that even if Goldwater prevails in its suit against World View, the incentives Rio Nuevo can offer would still be much greater. They have more tools than we do, Huckelberry said of Rio Nuevo, whose track record with the recent Caterpillar deal made the county even more comfortable to pursue deals with the public-improvement district. With Caterpillar, Rio Nuevo will build the company a $43 million headquarters on land it purchased from the city land it will eventually donate to the company and then lease the building at cost to the company. The city of Tucson is exploring another deal with Rio Nuevo comparable to the countys for a number of properties it has acquired along the so-called Sunshine Mile as a part of the Broadway expansion project, according to McCusker. While the lease option for Rio Nuevo has been approved, any final lease would wait until Rio Nuevo has found a company interested in either of the properties, according to McCusker. As laid out in a December memo from Huckelberry, the leases for both properties would be at market appraised value, and there would be additional limitations, such as the number of floors that could be developed as residential or retail, to promote adding to the downtown employment base. A multistory facility of up to 200,000 square feet with adequate parking could be accommodated at the freeway property, whose yearly market ground lease was estimated at $140,000 by a third-party appraiser, and one of up to 345,000 square feet could fit at the Broadway property, whose yearly lease would likely be around $163,000, according to the same memo. Manley said he was pleased to hear that any potential lease to Rio Nuevo would be at market rate. The fact that Goldwaters suit was a factor at all in the countys consideration of turning to Rio Nuevo could be seen as a victory of sorts, according to Manley, an analysis Moffatt took issue with. Its not a victory for them, its the fact that were not going to be crazy and go do something that is still under evaluation, Moffatt added. Though officials are bound by nondisclosure agreements to not discuss negotiations with specific businesses, Huckelberry, Moffatt and McCusker said there are large employers interested in sites like the two county-owned properties. McCusker said that since the Caterpillar deal was announced, a number of similarly large companies have expressed interest in relocating to Tucson, a city that is now on the radar of major, recognizable companies. Over the next couple months, a contractor hired by the Arizona Department of Transportation will be slowly making its way north from Nogales along Interstate 19, clearing trees, shrubs and other materials within 30 feet of the highway. ADOTs reasoning is simple: trees close to roads can turn an otherwise unexceptional loss of vehicle control into a fatal or incapacitating incident. As noted by the Federal Highway Administration, Trees are the single most commonly struck objects in serious roadside crashes, and such crashes annually account for more than 4,000 fatalities and 100,000 injuries. I-19 has seen more than its fair share of those fatalities, according to a July 2016 ADOT study on tree-involved crashes obtained by the Road Runner. The agency looked at crashes on just over 500 miles of roadway around the state between 2010 and 2014, of which I-19 accounted for a little over 11 percent of total mileage. However, four of the nine fatalities in the study period were along I-19, as were a third of the 22 serious, incapacitating crashes and 30 percent of all 416 tree-involved incidents. Those high figures are why I-19 and Arizona 87 near Payson were the first selected for the federally funded effort. Each project will cost around $1 million, according to contract information. Other top priorities include nearby stretches of Interstate 10, Arizona 92 south of Sierra Vista and Arizona 79 northwest of Oracle Junction. Work for other locations has yet to be scheduled, ADOT spokesman Steve Elliott wrote in an email. But the plan is to address all of them in upcoming years. But if the I-19 experience is any indication, ADOT may run into some opposition. While it is unlikely to slow or alter the project, a number of Green Valley residents have taken issue with the removal of trees along the highway, which bisects their unincorporated community, and proposed alternatives to improving safety along I-19. At a Jan. 20 meeting, roughly 100 people almost unanimous in their opposition to the project gave ADOT officials a piece of their minds, as reported in the Green Valley News. Green Valley resident Barbara Blake, a critic who attended the meeting, later told the Road Runner that when those who supported the project were asked to raise their hands, just one went up. Don Weaver, president of the Green Valley Council, said many attendees were upset at the lack of public outreach before the project got going and the potential environmental or aesthetic impacts of losing the trees themselves. He clarified that he was simply summarizing views heard, not taking a position on them. For Blake, dropping the speed limit along I-19 and increasing enforcement could accomplish ADOTs safety goals without removing trees. Its 65 mph in there, she said of the lower limit near Green Valley. Nobody goes 65. Gary Harkless, another attendee, agreed, saying that a reduced speed limit coupled with zero-tolerance enforcement would also cut down on noise. Additionally, Harkless and other residents said that the trees slated to be removed already help cut down on highway noise, which he anticipates rising once theyre gone. Harkless was also skeptical that the data cited by ADOT didnt paint as bleak a picture as suggested by the agency. To the degree that there is a problem with tree-related crashes, Harkless suggested that may simply be a reflection of there being more crashes in general along I-19. Elliott said his agency appreciates the beauty trees add to highways and the connection people have with them, but added: ADOTs first priority must be public safety. In response to the lower speed limit proposals, Elliott said that dropping it on I-19 to 55 mph would create an unacceptable safety risk due to the larger discrepancy between law-abiding drivers and the many drivers who would likely stick to interstate speeds. Elliott also addressed the relationship between roadside trees and noise, which he said research shows is minimal. According to the Federal Highway Administration, a stand of trees 100 feet thick and 20 feet tall would reduce sound by five decibel points, which is barely a whisper, he wrote. Despite the opposition in Green Valley, Elliott said the project is expected to be finished by March. While acknowledging the concerns raised, he also said that the 30-foot swath would spare many trees, though there is not an exact count of trees likely to be removed. What do you think? Check out the poll in the online version of this story to weigh in. DOWN THE ROAD Starting Wednesday morning, traffic on West Ina Road between Interstate 10 and North Silverbell Road will be shifted to the north side of the road and reduced to one lane in each direction to accommodate the massive Ina interchange project. The roads I-10 intersection will shut down for over two years starting Feb. 15. The east side of the West Nebraska Street-South 12th Avenue intersection will be closed to traffic Monday and Tuesday to accommodate underground electrical work. On Wednesday and Thursday, the west side of the intersection will be closed. Both closures will last from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Both directions of 12th will remain open. The work is part of the larger 12th Avenue reconstruction project, on which milling and paving is expected to start in late February and finish in March. One of Arizonas renowned mining engineers was Louis Davidson Ricketts (1859-1940.) His contributions to mining operations in Arizona and Mexico in the late 19th and early 20th centuries enabled the greater development of second-grade ores on a massive scale for a profit. Originally from Maryland, Ricketts was a graduate of Princeton University, where he received dual degrees of doctor of science in chemistry and economic geology. In his first assignment he was a Colorado mine surveyor. Phelps, Dodge & Co. tapped the talented young metallurgist to conduct multiple surveys of the mineral resources of northern Mexico in 1895. Ricketts recommended several mining properties then owned by the Guggenheim family, who made their money as merchants and also held multiple investments in smelters in the United States (including ownership of the The American Smelting and Refining Co.) and Mexico. Upon Ricketts recommendation that they would be a wise investment, the northern Mexico properties became part of Phelps Dodges Moctezuma mining operation in 1897. William E. Dodge, Jr. and James Douglas hired Ricketts as general manager of the Moctezuma Copper Co. to develop the newly acquired properties, which included building a five-mile-long narrow-gauge railroad line that connected the mine at Pilares to a large concentrator with a daily capacity of 500 tons and two 42-inch blast furnaces. A town was also built to service the mine at Nacozari. The mine itself proved a profitable venture, yielding an average 3 percent copper in a copper market of 14 cents a pound with an average cost of 9 cents per pound to mine. Ricketts also designed several large concentrators for the Detroit Copper Mining Co. One, known as the West Yankie concentrator, began operations at Morenci, Arizona in February 1900, following installation there of some of the earliest conveyor belts in the Southwest in the 1890s. Ricketts contributions were also invaluable in the reopening of mining operations at Globe, where he built a surface plant and reopened mines of the Old Dominion Copper Mining and Smelting Co., while serving as general manager for the Old Dominion Mine. In 1905, he went on to construct a large washing plant at Dawson, New Mexico benefiting Phelps Dodge coal mines. Two years later he became president and general manager of the Cananea Consolidated Copper Co., designing and constructing a new concentrator in Cananea, Mexico. The Calumet & Arizona Copper Co. enlisted Ricketts services in 1911 to design a smelter two miles below Clifton. The same year, Ricketts and John C. Greenway convinced the Calumet and Arizona to obtain an option on the available stock of the New Cornelia Copper Co. at Ajo. Their interest was in the massive sulfide ore deposit, which they believed contained 50 million tons of copper. But extraction would be costly, as the deposit lay over 120 million tons of low-grade copper ore overburden estimated to cost $6 million to remove. However, Ricketts engineering acumen enabled him to discover a method for treating the oxidized overburden on a large scale. Using the Ajo leaching process, which he is credited with developing, Ricketts proved that the overburden could be processed with sulphuric acid, enabling its copper content to be recovered by electrolysis. This discovery, made at a small one-ton-per-day plant at Douglas, evolved into a 5,000-ton leaching plant which removed the overburden at a profit. Ricketts also served as consulting engineer for Inspiration Consolidated at Miami, exploring ore bodies and developing the mine by sinking twin hoisting shafts, constructing a plant and railroad, and building Arizonas first flotation mill to extract low-grade copper at 14,000 tons of copper per day in 1915. He was held in high esteem by Arizona Gov. George W.P. Hunt, who christened him First Citizen of Arizona at the San Francisco Exposition of 1915. In 1921, Ricketts again partnered with Greenway in building the 47-mile Chihuahua & Oriente Railroad to serve mining interests in Chihuahua, Mexico. Ricketts continued to give Phelps Dodge sound advice, recommending that despite declining output of the mines in Ajo, Bisbee and Jerome during the Great Depression years, the priority remained in exploration and development of new ore deposits. He also supported the interchanging of scientific knowledge among competing companies to better exploit new ore discoveries. PHOENIX Gov. Doug Duceys repeated assertions that he is not the one fighting to keep deferred-action recipients from getting licenses to drive are not true, a spokeswoman for Attorney General Mark Brnovich said Friday. Since taking office two years ago, Ducey has refused to overturn a 2012 executive order by predecessor Jan Brewer denying licenses to those who are in this country illegally but allowed to remain and work under policies of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. A federal appeals court already has enjoined as unconstitutional part of that order covering dreamers; a separate lawsuit by other deferred-action recipients still being denied licenses by the Arizona Department of Transportation is making its way through trial court in Phoenix. During the last year, Ducey has repeatedly sidestepped questions from Capitol Media Services about his decision to leave Brewers order denying licenses in place. The governor said Brnovichs office is pursuing the issue and he wants to see what the courts ultimately rule. The governor also said its not up to him to decide whether to settle this latest lawsuit. Instead, Ducey said those decisions are being made by Brnovichs office. On Friday, however, Brnovich spokeswoman Mia Garcia said thats not true. The Governors Office and ADOT (state transportation department) are being represented by outside counsel in this matter, she said. It was Brewer who, on her own, hired Douglas Northup to defend her executive order, without going through the Attorney Generals Office. And Northup continues to represent the Ducey administration in court. Please refer to them for comment, Garcia said. Gubernatorial press aide Daniel Scarpinato said Duceys numerous prior statements about reasons for leaving the executive order in place and about Brnovich running the litigation were in error. He said the governors comments were not designed to mislead, but that instead were likely mistaken due to the fact that he inherited multiple lawsuits from the Brewer administration when he took office in January 2015. That includes one case since decided by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals declaring that Arizona cannot legally deny licenses to those in ex-President Obamas Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. But the current case involving those in other deferred-action programs another one Ducey said was being handled by Brnovich was filed in 2016, after Ducey had been governor for more than a year. And it specifically names Ducey as a defendant because he has the power to rescind Brewers order. A federal judge late last week rebuffed a bid by Northup to throw out the lawsuit filed by some deferred-action recipients who are not DACA recipients but also have been denied a license to drive. Judge David Campbell said there is evidence that the five individuals who sued are being denied the same driving privileges that ADOT grants to others who have similar legal status. He said that gives them standing to bring their case to federal court. The judge also rejected claims by Northup that they actually can get a license if they produce certain other evidence. Indeed, when asked during oral argument where a person could go to learn of this policy and how to comply with it, defense counsel was unaware of any place where it has been publicized, Campbell wrote. The lawsuit has its roots in Obamas 2012 decision creating DACA, which allows those who arrived in this country illegally as children to remain if they met other conditions. Those who qualify are issued Employment Authorization Documents (EAD) permitting them to work legally in this country. Brewer, in her executive order, directed ADOT not to provide licenses to DACA recipients, saying they are not qualified under a 1996 state law that states licenses are available only to people whose presence is authorized by federal law. But federal appellate judges pointed out that Arizona has long issued licenses to those in other deferred-action programs, requiring only their EAD as proof. Appellate Judge Harry Pregerson wrote that Brewers order was motivated by a dogged animus against DACA recipients. In the new ruling, Campbell separately refused Northups bid to dismiss the governor from the lawsuit. He said Northup would first have to prove the decision by ADOT to expand the list of who is not entitled to licenses was simply a way of trying to stop the first lawsuit by DACA recipients by showing they were not being singled out. But Campbell said its a whole different story if ADOT is denying licenses to these other deferred-action recipients to comply with the 2012 executive order. That puts Ducey, who has left the order in place, directly in the role of denying the licenses to these deferred-action recipients. BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) Montana Gov. Steve Bullock has blocked for now the impending slaughter of hundreds of Yellowstone National Park bison over disease concerns until a temporary home can be found for 40 of the animals wanted by an American Indian tribe. Bullock prohibited the transfer of any park bison to slaughter in a letter to the park obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press. The Jan. 19 letter was not previously publicized and invoked an executive order used by Bullock's predecessor, fellow Democrat Brian Schweitzer, to stop slaughter shipments in 2011. About 200 bison have been captured in recent weeks attempting to migrate from the park into Montana. Federal and state officials aim to kill up to 1,300 bison this winter using hunting and shipments to slaughter. It's an attempt to drive down the size of the park's herds, which currently number about 5,500 animals. The killings are carried out under a state-federal agreement meant to prevent the spread of the disease brucellosis from bison to livestock. Last year, the park kept alive 40 captured bison for future relocation to northeast Montana's Fort Peck Indian Reservation part of a faltering effort to establish new herds outside the park and reduce Yellowstone's annual slaughters. Those plans stalled after state veterinarian Marty Zaluski said Montana law prohibits the animals from being moved outside the Yellowstone area, despite past relocations of park bison to Colorado for a federal research program. Months or years of additional tests are needed to certify the animals are disease free, state livestock officials said Wednesday. The 40 bison already have tested negative for brucellosis multiple times, officials said, but there's worry the disease still could appear, Zaluski said. Yellowstone Superintendent Dan Wenk had notified the state that the 40 animals wanted by the Fort Peck Assiniboine and Sioux tribes likely would be slaughtered to free up space at the capture facility where they've been held since last March. Bullock's prohibition on moving park bison "saved those bison from being shipped to slaughter. There's no doubt about that," Wenk told The AP. "In the long term, we would still like to find a way to get bison to Native American tribes," he added. Bullock spokeswoman Ronja Abel said the governor's move to block slaughters would stay in effect until a resolution is found for the 40 bison. She said state and federal officials were investigating if the animals can be kept temporarily at a Department of Agriculture research facility just north of the park. Once that issue is resolved, the park plans to begin shipping other bison to slaughter. Meat from slaughtered animals is distributed to American Indian tribes across the region. "We recognize the park's need to cull their herd," Abel said. "We are trying to work toward a solution as fast as possible and hopefully we can come to a resolution by early next week." No transmissions of brucellosis from bison to livestock have been recorded. That's in part because thousands of migrating animals were killed over the past several decades as soon as they left the park. Jonathan Proctor with Defenders of Wildlife said Bullock's slaughter prohibition was great news. But he said it did not negate the state's resistance to moving bison out of the Yellowstone area for restoration elsewhere. "We still need a real long-term solution and the Fort Peck Reservation provides that solution," Proctor said. Help India! By TwoCircles.net Staff Reporter Hyderabad: The first medical camp of the eighth annual India Health Initiative (IHI), a program created by US-based India Muslim Relief and Charities (IMRC) to provide medical services to economically disadvantaged members of society in India started on January 28, Hyderabad. A total of 1,002 patients were treated for different ailments in the first two days. IMRC has been organising annual India Health Initiative for poor and needy this year for the past eight years. Support TwoCircles Day one of the medical camp in Hyderabad saw 443 patients treated for different ailments at Indo-US public school, Hafiz Baba Nagar. The patients were provided with free medicines after free check-up of vital health signs. On Sunday, Day 2 of medical camp at Indo-US public school, Shaheen Nagar 559 patients were treated for different ailments. The eighth annual initiative sees doctors from USA: Dr. Irfan Moin (Geriatrics), Dr. Jerome Stefenko (General Surgeon), Dr. John Rosenberg (ER Physician), Dr. Farida Ghogawala (Gynaecologist), Dr. MK Ahmed (Paediatrician), Dr MY Ahmed (Surgeon), Dr Sana Ahmed (Paediatrician), Dr Mohammad Haq (Internal Medicine), Dr Noureen M Haroon (Ophthalmologist) and one Clinical Pharmacist, Tenzin Jangchup render their services at four camps in Hyderabad, four camps in Barabanki (UP) along with three more camps in line at Dehradun (Uttarakhand). The India Health Initiative was started by IMRC in 2010. Since its inception, IMRC has successfully conducted seven India Health Initiatives comprising of medical camps across different rural areas, poor localities and slums in India. This annual program is unique because it provides basic education in healthcare with an emphasis on preventive health care to the community; and provides technical training to the local doctors and medical students. IMRC has always been concerned about the health of people belonging to poor rural areas and those living in slums under abject poverty. This annual programme since last seven years has been targeting such population, who cant afford health care. Every year we organise this camp and treat thousands. Last year we were able to treat 5,775 patients across Kerala, Telangana and UP, said Manzoor Ghori, Executive Director of Indian Muslim Relief and Charities (IMRC). This all becomes possible due to the US-based doctors who volunteer themselves for this noble cause, he added. Help India! By Soroor Ahmed, Twocircles.net The strategy of All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen in the poll-bound Uttar Pradesh is different from the one adopted during the campaign ahead of Bihar Assembly election of October-November 2015. In Bihar, its supremo Asaduddin Owaisi never missed any opportunity to criticise chief minister Nitish Kumar, RJD chief Lalu Prasad and the Congress party as well as the BJP. This was the stand taken by him in spite of the fact that a large number of Muslims of the state continue to have a soft corner for Lalu Prasad for the role he played in checking the communal menace in the post-Bhagalpur riots years. He came to power four months after the infamous communal flare up of October-November 1989 in which hundreds of people, mostly Muslims, were killed. Support TwoCircles In Uttar Pradesh, Owaisiwhose party is contesting in several seatsis selective in criticising the so-called secular parties. Be it in Aligarh, Saharanpur, Sambhal or Lucknow, he has been extremely critical of chief minister Akhilesh Singh Yadav for betraying his old father. He has also ridiculed the Yadav familys domination over the Samajwadi Party. Owaisi has also, of course, targeted Congress, which has been out of power for the last 27 years. In comparison to Bihar, he has been criticising the BJP and prime minister Narendra Modi more in speeches in UP. More than riots and other communal issues, he would flay demonetisation and foreign policy of the NDA government. He would name cities like Aligarh, Moradabad, Saharanpur, Lucknow etc in this regard as lakhs of workers have been left without jobs after note ban. But what is worth noting is that Owaisi is not directly hitting out at Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati. Mulayam Singh Yadav and Akhilesh might have failed in checking the Muzaffarnagar riots of September 2013, yet the Samajwadi Party has one thing to claimthat is, its firm stand against the rioters during the Ram Janmabhoomi movement days. Be it Lalu Prasad or Mulayam Singh Yadav, both became heroes in the eyes of Muslims for their role in the 1990s. A sort of Muslim-Yadav alliance emerged. But Mayawati has no such thing to project before Muslims today, though it is also true that she has not harmed the community either. Her political plank had always been different. It is for the first time this year that she is seriously trying to woo Muslim votersthough it is also true that she had been distributing tickets to Muslims liberally in the past too. She is trying to win over Muslims after she felt that the Brahmins, who helped her to come to power in 2007, deserted her in 2014 Lok Sabha election. An overwhelming number of them voted for the BJP. Needless to say, unlike in Bihar, Brahmins form a sizeable vote bank in UP. This time also, the BSP fears that they would vote in favour of the BJP. As in UP, where Mayawati is strong, there is no such scope for AIMIM to attract Dalits. So, Owaisi is soft towards the BSP. In Bihar, one of the six candidates put up by his party was a Dalit. In his election speeches in UP, Owaisi would repeatedly talk of taking Muslims and Dalits together. He would remind the people as to how in Hyderabad he had tried to win over Dalits and that he was the first leader to pay attention to the case of Rohith Vemulas suicide. In UP, he would refer to Ambedkars contribution in Constitution making. At one or two places, Owaisi would just say: Behenji se apna haq lenge (We would take our right from Behenji, that is Mayawati). This single-liner is loaded with meaning, that is, he is not ruling out any post-poll proximityif a need arises. Some reports suggested that AIMIM was keen to have some sort of pre-election alliance with BSP, but Mayawati was not interested in it. A political party is free to adopt any policy it wants. But Owaisis strategy raises one question: if he can be so lethal in his attack on Lalu Prasad, Mulayam Singh Yadav, Nitish Kumar and Akhilesh Singh Yadav for ignoring Muslims, why is he silent on Mayawati? The answer seems to be simple. For Owaisi, championing the cause of Muslims is secondary. What is primary for him is the expansion of his party AIMIM. Owaisi was selective in contesting elections. His party did not fight in Bengal because there was no BJP, but threw his hat in Maharashtra, Bihar, and UP as BJP is a strong force. The presence of BJP, Owaisi felt, would help AIMIM expand its base. Similarly, in UP it is not attacking Mayawati because politically she may suit AIMIM and help it expand its base. Had the plight of Muslims been the priority, Owaisi would have asked some really uncomfortable questions from Behenji too. Lastly, what Owaisi misses while attacking the family rule in SP is that he is himself the product of the same dynasty politics. But he would always shower praise on the role of his grandfather, father, and younger brother Akbaruddin Owaisi. A different yardstick indeed. Last night, when Muslims in Quebec attended their local mosque for their evening prayers, three armed terrorists entered and shot the place up. Six are dead and eight are injured. This morning, Muslims who went in for their morning prayers found the building cordoned off and surrounded by police cars and ambulances. This is the latest in many terrorist attacks against Muslims, and the community has responded. Muslims respond to their persecution Abdel Majid Sharif, a Muslim living in Montreal, called the attack very painful, and said that he was hurt when he found out the news. On tolerance of other religions, he said, The mighty Lord teaches us to respect each other, as well as to love each other, and to live in harmony. He also said some of the few sensible words ever spoken in the inter-Religion debate: Whatever country, whatever religion, were all the creation of the Lord. Sharif has been a practicing Muslim in Canada, attending the mosque that was attacked, for close to four decades, and claims he has never been subjected to prejudice or persecution due to his Islamic choice of faith. However, he did say that his daughter-in-law and sister-in-law have encountered problems due to their Muslim faith. In the wake of the shooting, he says he feels less safe being a Muslim. He said, There are some people in the world who dont know the value of a human being or the value of religion. All religions teach us to thank the Lord. Jews do it in their way, Christians in their way, Hindus in their way. Were all one family. We must respect each other, love each other. Last night, there was a shooting incident at a mosque in Quebec City. Six people were killed, while eight have been injured. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has condemned the incident as a terrorist attack, and senseless violence. Eyewitness accounts According to witnesses, the attack was perpetrated by three shooters at the Islamic centre of Quebec City (its mosque) while Muslims were saying their Sunday evening prayers. The first police call was placed at around 8pm (1am in our GMT time zone). A police spokesman has released a statement saying that two arrests were made by Quebec police following the incident. Local news outlet Le Soleil reports that police are looking for a third suspect who is still out there. However, contrary to this news report and eyewitness accounts, spokeswoman Christine Coulombe has said, Nothing right now makes us believe that there would be other suspects related to this event. Le Soleil also reported (although how reliable their reports are remains to be seen, since the polices official statement contradicts their report) that one of the suspects was armed with an AK-47 and another was 27 years old. Canadian PM has spoken out Justin Trudeau, the Canadian Prime Minister, has spoken out in rage upon discovering that the incident in Quebec had happened. He said that collectively, his team and his government condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge. He said that despite the fact authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, he described the incident in itself as heart-wrenching. He said, of Canada and its people, Diversity is our strength, and said that tolerance of all religions and walks of life is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. According to police, the victims of the Quebec mosque attack were aged 35-70. The two-storey mosque, equipped with the latest CCTV technology, is thought to have contained over 50 people at the time of the incident. Mohamed Yangui, president of the mosque, who was elsewhere at the time of the shooting, said he received terrified calls from the Muslims who were doing their evening prayers at the mosque. He called the attack barbaric. Police secured the mosque after the shooting Following the attack, Quebec police secured the building and ensured they had evacuated everyone inside. The area was cordoned off around the mosque. The premier of Quebec (Philippe Couillard) confirmed that the attack was a terrorist act, and said that the city and all of Canada stands behind its Muslim population. He called the incident barbaric violence. Rallies will be held in places across Quebec City to show solidarity for the victims of the attack. Quebec Mayor Regis Labeaume looked petrified at a press conference following the incident and was quoted as saying, I want to express my revolt to this villainous Crime. Public safety minister for Canada, Ralph Goodale, was deeply saddened by the attacks. Canadian politician Manon Masse said that one or two people have assumed the right to kill our fellow Muslim Quebec citizens, and that the moment that intolerance goes from debate to murder, solidarity is essential. The number of deaths following a shooting incident at the Islamic Cultural Centre in Quebec, Canada has been reported at five by Reuters. The shooting happened during evening prayers and resulted in multiple fatalities and many were injured. The injured were sent to hospitals around the city. CTV News reported that two people have been arrested and that the police will treat the incident as "terrorism." Quebec Mosque killers wore masks According to CBS's French Language service, a witness told how two masked men had entered the mosque and opened fire shouting "Allahu Akhbar!" After the shooting, the police responded and Reuters reported that "A witness said a heavily armed police tactical squad was seen entering the mosque." It was reported that the men were thought to have Quebec accents, so while the police have not released details of the arrested men, they may be locals. Islamaphobic incidents on the rise in Canada Islamaphobic incidents have been on the rise in Quebec for the past couple of years and the incident took place at a mosque where a pig's head was put on display in June last year. The tensions first arose in 2013 when blood was spattered around a mosque and then in 2015 when the wearing of the face-covering, or niqab, became a Federal election issue. Many of the people in Canada supported a ban on the headgear, especially during citizenship ceremonies. Again, in 2015 Police said that a Mosque in Ontario was set on fire. This happened a day after the Paris attack by suicide bombers and gunmen who killed innocent civilians in a public place. The backlash against extremist Muslims has been festering in the country and with the Trump election win, the rise of the right is becoming more evident across Europe and in Canada. The incident has frightened many in Quebec and one person said that he would seriously think about leaving the country and returning to Morrocco. The aftermath of Sunday night's incident was filmed and posted to Youtube. Many police vehicles and crime scene tapes were visible at the scene. Watch aftermath of shooting outside Quebec mosque On Facebook and Twitter, there were shocked reactions from the public and a lot of sympathy and sorrow is being expressed. However, there were also some tweets which expressed the fact that not all are sympathetic to the Muslim population in the city. There is a lot of speculation on Twitter, that because the shooters shouted "Allahu Akhbar!" that it may have been Muslims killing Muslims - but in reality, nobody yet knows who carried out the attack, or why. Only two and a half minutes to midnight - the newly updated time the world will end and humankind with it. Or at least, this is what is stated by the Doomsday Clock, a symbolic clock that represents the countdown to the end of the world. The closer it gets to midnight, the more we are at risk of catastrophe. What does the shift of the Doomsday Clock hand mean? Designed in 1947 by the independent, non-profit organisation Scientists Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists of the University of Chicago, the Doomsday Clock was symbolically created to show the risk of a fatal atomic war; now, it says when we are generally near to any life threatening disaster. Since the Doomsday Clock was invented, the clock has been moved 21 times. The clock nearest to midnight was in 1953 (2 minutes), when Russia detonated its first atomic bomb, triggering fears across the world; this new clock update is the second closest to oblivion since 1947. Why the life expectancy of humanity is shorter The recent shortening of minutes is primarily due to the recent election of Donald trump, especially because of his stance on climate change, to the almost uncontrolled proliferation of nuclear weapons in recent years (in India, Pakistan, Russia and China), and to the entry of new holders of nuclear weapons (North Korea and maybe Iran). All these reasons convinced Lawrence Krauss and David Titley, the scientists who lead the organisation, to move the clock hands. In addition, other "minor" causes contribute to the new update: rising nationalism, the international arms race and the decreased confidence in science and progress. Trump: the most serious threat in 60 years? Although Trump officially took office less than two weeks ago, Trump remains the greatest threat, according to the organisation's members. In the report released by the organisation, the President of the United States is the most cited danger. Never before has the Bulletin decided to advance the clock largely because of the statements of a single person, wrote the two scientists on the document. In their opinion, other threats - already quite worrying - were worsened by the Trumps appearance. These are all times in which President Trump has signalled that he would make matters worse, either because of a mistaken belief that the threats posed by nuclear weapons and climate can be ignored or that the words of a president of the United States do not matter to the rest of the world, the two scientists wrote in the New York Times. it is a rather disturbing prospect if you think that Donald Trump will be at the White House for (at least) another four years. Therefore, according to the Doomsday Clock, its 70th birthday will probably be one of the last that we will be able to celebrate. We must hope that the two scientists be incredibly pessimistic or, at least, that the clock is broken. The Mikado This duplicates entries in my journal, Funny the World , which I have been writing since March 2000. The reason for starting a mirror blog is for people who prefer to subscribe thru an rss feed.The title is a quote from, "Is this a time for airy persiflage?" (light banter). Authorities deal with animal cruelty and abuse on a regular basis, which led to tougher statutes for such crimes in some states. Most offenses are now considered felonies. Anyone who maliciously and intentionally tortures, neglects, poisons or kills an animal would be charged with a felony for such abuse. Police were subsequently shocked and appalled to find the massacre of seven Dogs along a rural road in North Carolina. Investigation initiated for justice of seven dogs murdered and left for dead The site of a massacre of seven dogs found murdered along Morgan Academy Road in Union County launched a police investigation. Authorities would not disclose how the Animals were discovered or who found them. The location where they were found is right outside of Charlotte, North Carolina and the animals appear to have been dumped there some time ago before they were found. The neck of each dog was broken, and all sustained a gunshot wound to the head. The dogs appeared to be hunting dogs but were later discovered to be three German Shepherd dogs, a Beagle, and two hound dogs. One of the dogs looks like a Lab mix, and all seemed to be healthy looking pets prior to the incident. None of them had a microchip that could lead to the identification of their owner. Rescue group seek dignity for the deceased dogs When police discovered the gruesome scene, rescue group Pawsitive Impact NC Dog Rescue was called to be part of the investigation. Despite their horror, the group posted the grisly photos of the dogs on Facebook in an attempt to generate leads. The dogs were all given names by the group and were removed so they can be cremated so they can leave this world with dignity. They were named Bailey, Baker, Clyde, Rhett, Ingrid, Scarlett and Sophie. Prior to cremation, the dogs were examined by Dr. Josh Humphrey of the Ballantyne Veterinarian Clinic. He confirmed that each dog suffered from broken necks and bullet wounds. After the discovery of the dogs and the posted photos on Facebook, Pawsitive Impact NC Dog Rescue and the Union County Sheriffs Office is asking for the publics help. Hopefully, someone will recognize any of the dogs that could lead to their owner. Anyone with information should contact the authorities. A March for Science in D.C. is currently emerging as a response to the bias of the Trump administration's dismissal of general scientific evidence. In the meantime, this week, the well-respected Bulletin of Atomic Scientists have now set their Doomsday Clock closer to midnight, thanks to President Trump. The same D.C based science group supports the March for Science which will be an event inspired by last week's Women's March, which took place after Trump's inauguration in Washington. The changes to the Doomsday Clock were agreed to over fears that the planet is closer to a catastrophic disaster than at any time since 1953. The clock is now at two and a half minutes closer to midnight than the three minutes it was in 2015. The March for Science in Washington doesn't have a date yet, but in relation to the organization's resistance, a People's Climate March to protest Trump's scrapping of President Obama's climate policies is set for April. Rachel Bronson of the bulletin referred to these issues during their international news conference Thursday morning when they revealed the new time. Marching the clock hands forward for science The effect that the Doomsday Clock has is largely symbolic, being that scientists blame Trump's presidency and everything he stands for why they changed it. According to Rachel's statements during the press briefing, she specified two reasons. The first was over Trump's cavalier and reckless language around nuclear weapons and threats, and second; his growing disregard of scientific expertise which refers to climate change. Ironically enough, when the clock hands last stood at two minutes in 53, it was over the nuclear race between the (then) Soviet Union (now the Russian Federation) and the U.S. Trump's connection with Russia (currently under investigation) has dominated the headlines throughout his campaign and into his presidency, and now over sanctions with one of the world's greatest nuclear threats. Fighting for climate change facts Thanks to Trump, the Doomsday Clock is now two and one-half minutes to midnight https://t.co/oh41ZWTBJ8 pic.twitter.com/S0eWBWmXb2 NYT Opinion (@nytopinion) January 27, 2017 Thomas Pickering and Pennsylvania State University professor David Titley who was the head of the U.S. Navy's Task Force on Climate Change collaborated for a column that was published in "The New York Times" opinion pages this week, about their decision. In their op-ed, they say that prior to Trump's election, climate change was already a concern due to international leaders not taking action to march carbon emissions back from devastating levels. Other issues such as North Korea's development of nuclear weapons, the fragility of the Iran nuclear deal to keep them from producing nuclear weapons, and the tense relations between the U.S. and Russia under the Obama administration, were already looming over the Doomsday Clock. 'Midnight in America' The group is aware that their pro-science symbolism would be mocked. Especially when the Doomsday Clock itself is made of cardboard. But the rationale behind their decision remains solid. One can attribute the dismissal of their science to Trump supporter's anger of the elites of the scientific community. So, it would infuriate Trump supporters, even more, to know that 15 Nobel laureates are behind the Doomsday Clock decision. Those present at the press briefing were Thomas Pickering, the mentioned David Titley and theoretical physicist Lawrence Krauss. Rachel Bronson also said that Trump is rejecting the advice the conclusions of intelligence experts. She said that while action spoke louder than words that words still mattered as they increase the chances of accidents and miscalculation. These scientists felt that his "loose talk" and "dangerous rhetoric" do not promote confidence and are dangerous to decision making. One might recall that during Hillary Clinton's acceptance speech last July at the Democratic Convention, she said that Trump was taking the Republican Party from Morning in America to Midnight in America. Now that he is President, scientists literally agree that the world is closer than it's been in 63-years. Donald Trump has kicked off the start of presidency with controversy, and it only seems as if that theme will continue. As he has in the past, the new president is once again going after the media, while defending his controversial policies in a wild multiple-tweet rant on Twitter. Trumps Twitter trouble Over the last 48 hours, Donald Trump has been forced to deal with heavy backlash over his executive order that banned Muslim refugees from entering the United States. Protests quickly broke out, most notably at Kennedy International Airport in New York after reporters of multiple Muslim detainees being held inside. Two detainees contacted the ACLU to help file a lawsuit against the Trump administration, leading to a federal judge to issue a temporary "stay" on the issue at hand. In addition, Trump's war with The New York Times has only escalated, which was seen on his offical Twitter account on January 29. Somebody with aptitude and conviction should buy the FAKE NEWS and failing @nytimes and either run it correctly or let it fold with dignity! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 "Somebody with aptitude and conviction should buy the FAKE NEWS and failing @nytimes and either run it correctly or let it fold with dignity!," Donald Trump wrote on Twitter early Sunday morning, as he continued his attack on The New York Times. Trump's bitter battle with the newspaper has been an issue for sometime, as the current President of the United States is calling for the news outlet to be shut down. Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world - a horrible mess! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 In a follow-up message on Twitter, Donald Trump responded to the opposition to his recent executive orders on immigration, citing the ongoing trouble in Europe in relation to the mass migration of refugees into several countries. "Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW," Trump tweeted out, before adding, "Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world - a horrible mess!" The recent actions taken by the former host of "The Apprentice" has only highlighted the wide political divide in the country, and it doesn't look like it will change anytime soon. The executive order President Trump signed Friday sparked protests at airports across the country. More are planned today. NPR (@NPR) January 29, 2017 Moving forward Donald Trump shocked the world with his election win over Hillary Clinton, but many people were still doubting whether or not he would follow through with his many campaign promises. After only a week in office, it appears that Trump's critics are having their worst nightmares come true, and it's only the beginning. After Donald Trump was declared the winner of the 2016 presidential election, he vowed to break records at his inauguration. After only 200,000 people showed up in person to watch him be sworn in, the new president blasted the media for reporting the numbers to the pubic. Trump on Twitter Over the last year and a half, Donald Trump has used Twitter as his top form of communication to the American people. Trump's relationship with the press has only continued to deteriorate, prompting the billionaire real estate mogul to increase his use of social media. After the attendance numbers for his inauguration were announced, Trump and his administration quickly lashed out at the press. As he has in recent weeks, Trump has labeled many media outlets "fake news," including his top target CNN. As seen on his offical Twitter account on January 24, Trump is back to his social media habit of bashing the press, while also dragging the entire city of Chicago into his rant. Congratulations to @FoxNews for being number one in inauguration ratings. They were many times higher than FAKE NEWS @CNN - public is smart! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 25, 2017 "Congratulations to @FoxNews for being number one in inauguration ratings," Donald Trump wrote on his personal Twitter feed. Not stopping there, the new president went on to bash CNN in the process. "They were many times higher than FAKE NEWS CNN," Trump said of CNN's Inauguration Day ratings, before adding, "public is smart!" Inauguration Day ratings: Fox triples CNN, MSNBC combinedhttps://t.co/ce5CYEZPCU pic.twitter.com/CoT3fJPTsH The Hill (@thehill) January 22, 2017 In a follow-up tweet, Donald Trump made a threat to the city of Chicago about the increase in crime in the city. "If Chicago doesn't fix the horrible "carnage" going on, 228 shootings in 2017 with 42 killings (up 24% from 2016), I will send in the Feds!" Trump wrote. If Chicago doesn't fix the horrible "carnage" going on, 228 shootings in 2017 with 42 killings (up 24% from 2016), I will send in the Feds! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 25, 2017 Press problems Over the last week, Donald Trump and his team have engaged in a heated war of words against the mainstream media, with Fox News being an exception. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer and Presidential Counsel Kellyanne Conway have gotten into tense situations with members of the press, including one-on-one interviews, and during press conferences. The backlash has gotten so intense that Conway is now receiving Secret Service protection due to apparent threats, while reports have circulated that Spicer could lose his job as press secretary. Outright Lies, Constant Tweets & "Alternative Facts": Inside Trump's Orwellian War with the Media https://t.co/H3BhVkAngv pic.twitter.com/WCYaFshk3m Democracy Now! (@democracynow) January 24, 2017 Moving forward During the campaign trail, Donald Trump referred to the media and journalists as "dishonest" and "terrible" people, which appears to be a theme that he is sticking with in the White House. With the relationship between Trump and the press at an all-time low, it doesn't appear like both sides will be able to get on the same page anytime soon. One of the first actions Donald Trump took when getting into the White House was to sign an executive order banning Muslim refugees from entering the United States. Just a day after the order became law, Iraqi refugees were detained in New York City, leading to an impromptu protest. Trump protest Donald Trump has caused constant controversy since the start of his campaign for president. Critics have since labeled the billionaire real estate mogul a "racist," "prejudice," "xenophobe," and an "Islamaphobe" due to his controversial proposals. Trump's hard-line stance in regards to preventing the spread of Islamic terrorism has resulted in serious backlash from his critics, which has only increased over the last 48 hours. On Friday, Haider Sameer Abdulkhaleq and Hameed Khalid Darweesh, two Iraqi refugees, were detained at Kennedy International Airport. In response, as reported by PIX 11 in New York on January 28, protests broke out. Protesters gather at JFK Airport's Terminal 4 after refugees detained following Trump's immigration ban https://t.co/d470isufl1 pic.twitter.com/ACKp5XdBUW PIX11 News (@PIX11News) January 28, 2017 After Abdulkhaleq and Darweesh were detained at JFK airport, they quickly contacted the American Civil Liberty Union (ALCU) and filed a lawsuit against Donald Trump and his administration over the executive order. The New York Taxi Workers Alliance and the AFT Union sent out statements to show their support for the protests, which continued to grow during the day on Saturday. According to AFT Union, an additional protest is planned for 6 p.m. local time at the airport, to be taking place at Terminal 4. Moore responds Filmmaker Michael Moore has been one of the most vocal critics of Donald Trump, and within minutes of the news of the JFK airport protest, he expressed his support on Twitter. "Everybody in NYC area-- head to JFK Terminal 4 NOW! Big anti-Trump protest forming out of nowhere!" Moore tweeted out on Saturday afternoon, before adding, "Ppl mobilizing against Trump's Muslim ban." Everybody in NYC area-- head to JFK Terminal 4 NOW! Big anti-Trump protest forming out of nowhere! Ppl mobilizing against Trump's Muslim ban Michael Moore (@MMFlint) January 28, 2017 Despite the backlash, Donald Trump has not yet issued a public respond to the criticism, though he's not expected to walk-back any of his decisions. As the United States, and the world, wonder what the former host of "The Apprentice" will do next, only time will tell how it will impact the American people. President Donald Trump is shaking up the National Security Council (NSA), headed up by retired general Michale Flynn, in dumping the Director of National Intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Shockingly, President Trump has essentially replaced the two heads with Steve Bannon, the former executive chair of Breitbart News and now Chief Strategist and Senior Counselor to Trump. The move has sent shockwaves throughout Washington and is a signal of a deep distrust of the NSA bureaucracy on the part of Trump, and presumably Gen. Flynn. The Director of National Intelligence and the chair of the Joint Chiefs will participate in a limited role, only "where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed." Steve Bannon elevated at National Security Council; Joint Chiefs dumped In Steve Bannon, Trump has an ear he trusts inside the regular principals' meetings held by the NSA. It also means that Mr. Bannon will have more access and exercise greater influence on issues of national security. In many presidential administrations, the NSA has more direct influence over national security than even the Secretary of the Department of Defense. It was Bannon that overruled Homeland Security on the issue of "green cards" in Trump's controversial executive order banning Muslims from U.S. shores. Steve Bannon personally overruled DHS decision not to include green card holders in travel ban https://t.co/YQnOrz2V0U #StopPresidentBannon pic.twitter.com/fx41Jxw0nw Raw Story (@RawStory) January 29, 2017 Bannon has been controversial with his media should "keep its mouth shut" crack. During an interview on ABC's "This Week" hosted by Martha Raddatz, White House press secretary Sean Spicer defended the move. Mr. Spicer cited Bannon's experience as a naval officer and stated that the move would streamline the decision-making process in the White House. He also said having Bannon in those meetings is "crucial." .@PressSec Spicer defends order giving Steve Bannon NSC seat: Having chief strategist in those meetings "is crucial" https://t.co/xtD9IEwc78 pic.twitter.com/j1xbjvHPG9 This Week (@ThisWeekABC) January 29, 2017 McCain, Gates don't like it one bit Republican Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, does not like the idea of the chair of the Joint Chiefs being shut out of the process on national security issues. He labeled the role of the Joint Chiefs as "indispensable." A man that served under President George W. Bush and President Barack Obama, Robert Gates, also was critical of the move. The former Defense Secretary under two administrations said on the same show that the move was a "big mistake." Former Defense Sec. Bob Gates calls sidelining DNI, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs from NSC meetings a "big mistake" https://t.co/cgE5F9sj87 pic.twitter.com/UuviVjcU1E ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) January 29, 2017 Former security adviser to Obama 'appalled' Former UN ambassador and national security adviser Susan Rice (under President Obama) is appalled at the move. Late Saturday night Susan Rice tweeted from her account that the action taken by Trump is stone cold crazy. This is stone cold crazy. After a week of crazy. Who needs military advice or intell to make policy on ISIL, Syria, Afghanistan, DPRK? https://t.co/Mmyc139w3M Susan Rice (@AmbassadorRice) January 29, 2017 Pence may chair NSC meetings in lieu of POTUS. Never happened under Obama. UN Ambassador sidelined from Cabinet and Sub cabinet level mtgs. Susan Rice (@AmbassadorRice) January 29, 2017 With News that Uber was allegedly trying to cash in on New York City's taxi driver strike following Donald Trump's immigration ban by turning off surge prices, many liberals are switching to rival company Lyft. However, the best way to support progressive politics is to use neither one. Surge pricing has been turned off at #JFK Airport. This may result in longer wait times. Please be patient. Uber NYC (@Uber_NYC) January 29, 2017 Both Uber and Lyft have anti-worker polices Some liberals say that Uber is trying to profit off the strike. Some who are more inclined to conspiracy theories say that they are working with President Trump to break the strike. Uber has denied this and said that they don't support ban. You know what else both ride-sharing companies are against? Unions. Don't let the fact that for 30 seconds. Lyft became a liberal darling under the hastag #DeleteUber on Twitter fool you, the company hates unions. They both opposed laws in Seattle that would require drivers to be unionized. Uber went as far as to buy an ad during a Seahawks game They also have no worker protections and no workers compensation. The way things work, is that if a driver gets hurt, they're on their own. If a driver wants to put up some protective screens (like in conventional cabs) he has to pay for it out of pocket. This can become a problem since many Uber drivers market themselves as a ride home from parties for people who are intoxicated. Several people have gotten injured this way. Additionally, they don't do much to protect customers either. There are mountains of stories of Uber and Lyft drivers committing sexual assault on their customers. The reverse is also true. Furthermore, both Uber and Lyft classify their employees as "independent contractors." This means that other conventional employee protections don't apply to them. It also protects them from liability in case a rogue driver or passenger breaks the law. Disability discrimination rampant The other major problem with both Uber and Lyft have a major problem with Disability discrimination. They are currently fighting lawsuits in Chicago and several other major cities to say that the Americans with Disabilities Act doesn't apply to them. They say they have services for disabled riders but most of them are severely understaffed. Many of them lack cars. Perhaps its biggest problem, from the Progressive standpoint, is that both Uber and Lyft are being used, happily I might add, as a reason to dismantle mass transit. The reasoning, such as it is, is that with the ride-sharing services, we don't need government funded mass transit. While it hasn't taken off quite yet, it's clear that it's in the arsenal of those who want to dismantle all public services. This would be a mistake since there is currently no "free market" solution to the quandary of how to provide transportation to the disabled who can't drive. So the best thing those who are resisting the government dismantling agenda is to actually use public transit. Ruth Alisha Merrill is a new cast member of Alaskan Bush People and fans of the show would like to know more about Noah Browns new love interest. Of course, Merrill did not appear under her real name on the television show but with the name of her character -- Rhain Alicia. Is it a coincidence that Merrills acting name is Rhain, which is similar to Noahs younger sister Rain? Did the producers of ABP miss that there was already a member of the Brown family with a similar name, or are they intentionally confusing viewers? Rhain versus Rain Apparently, Discovery Channel is not even trying to hide that Alaskan Bush People is fake. Ruth Alisha Merrill appearing as Rhain Alicia seems to be intended to get the show in the headlines and viewers talking. Quite obviously, the network is certainly succeeding in that. In contrast to Noahs younger sister Rain, Rhain has perfect white teeth, properly styled hair, and smiles a lot. Does the character of Rhain reflect what Rain could be once she is older? It is crucial for viewers to remember that in any reality television show, even in Alaskan Bush People, everything is fake or more adequately described carefully scripted. What Merrill has to say Watching Noah Brown interact with Rhain Alicia on Alaskan Bush People becomes more interesting when one turns the sound off. Rhain smiles at Noah, looks at him intently, swings her hips, and walks graciously across a board that happens to be placed like a small teeter totter conveniently in the Alaskan wilderness. As for Merrills words on the show, she corrects Noahs pronunciation of simular and asks him to teach her tai chi. Her concluding comment, I think we are both really happy with each other makes one wonder if not only Alaskan Bush People is fake, but also Rhain Alicias relationship to Noah? Who really is Ruth Alisha Merrill? Numerous online sites report that Ruth is from Oregon and that she is 26 years old. She s reportedly interested in fishing and hunting and intends to change her legal name Ruth Alisha Merrill to her characters name of Rhain Alicia. Noah, who is 24 years old, mentions on that Rhain Alicia comes from the lower states, but that she still seems to be comfortable with the Brown folks in the Alaskan wilderness. A closer look at the scenes of Ruth Alisha Merrill and Noah has sparked rumors that the two might have gotten married during a recent Brown family trip to Las Vegas. Both Noah and Rhain Alicia are wearing rings on their fingers. The only question is -- are they married to each other or are the rings, like "Alaskan Bush People" just fake? Love is in the air https://t.co/x1bvBzLp4n Alaskan Bush People (@AlaskanBushPPL) January 18, 2017 Brown men treat women as their own personal project? Discovery Channel describes Noah, who is the fifth oldest son of the Brown family, as a guy who would like to invent a serving robot, sail around the world, and find his own dream girl. The network calls Rhain Alicia Noahs own personal project. Noah sounds a lot like his father Billy Brown, the Alaskan Bush People family patriarch. Thirty-seven years ago, Billy Brown met his dream girl Ami, snatched the 15-year-old girl from her family, and took her to the Alaskan wilderness. Like his son Noah, Billy was a can-do kind of guy. The similarity between father and son are frightening; especially if one listens carefully to how Noah speaks about Rhain. Noah says that the fact that Rhain Alicia (Ruth Alisha Merrill) is happy with a tent and content in the woods makes her the perfect woman for me. During the Alaskan Bush People Discovery Channel video, Ruth Alisha Merrill speaks into the camera and says that when she first met Noah in Hoonah, Alaska, he scared her -- and that was the way it all started. Does Ruth Alisha Merrill know about the true family background of Billy Brown? If Ruth Alisha Merrill would ask the mother and brother of Billy Browns wife Ami, she would hear a sincere warning beware! After only one week in the White House, Donald Trump is facing heavier backlash than at anytime in his brief political history. After signing the controversial "Muslim ban" executive order, Trump's critics came out swinging, including actor Alec Baldwin. Baldwin on Trump Over the last year and a half, Alec Baldwin has appeared on "Saturday Night Live" and has played the part of a satirical version of Donald Trump. Baldwin's impression has received rave reviews, but has not gone over well with the former host of "The Apprentice." Trump has gone on multiple social rants about the show, blasting Baldwin as "not funny," while calling for "Saturday Night Live" to be canceled. While Baldwin often mocks Trump with humor, he has gotten more serious at times when it comes to criticizing the new commander in chief. As seen on his offical Twitter account on January 29, Baldwin is not happy with Trump's recent moves in office. 1- This country had a calling card. We all knew what it was. It wasn't Wall Street or Hollywood or the right to bear arms that brought... ABFoundation (@ABFalecbaldwin) January 29, 2017 2- that brought countless people, America's future, to this country. It was freedom. Freedom was our calling card. Trump wants to kill that ABFoundation (@ABFalecbaldwin) January 29, 2017 3- Trump's gotta go. ABFoundation (@ABFalecbaldwin) January 29, 2017 "1- This country had a calling card. We all knew what it was. It wasn't Wall Street or Hollywood or the right to bear arms that brought," Alec Baldwin wrote on his Twitter account. In his second tweet, the actor added, "2- that brought countless people, America's future, to this country. It was freedom. Freedom was our calling card. Trump wants to kill that." Making his third point, Baldwin kept it short and sweet, stating, "3- Trump's gotta go." All the indignation is fine. But we gotta get him out! We must demand a competency test! He is ill! Mentally ill! ABFoundation (@ABFalecbaldwin) January 29, 2017 Just two hours later, Alec Baldwin went back to Twitter to express his disdain for Donald Trump. "All the indignation is fine. But we gotta get him out!," he wrote, while adding, "We must demand a competency test! He is ill! Mentally ill!" On Sunday morning, Baldwin once again used Twitter, this time with a bit more humor to attack the new president. when I travel back to the US, I hope they have a box for me to check that reads "Muslim Irish Catholic." ABFoundation (@ABFalecbaldwin) January 29, 2017 Fighting back with humor "When I travel back to the US, I hope they have a box for me to check that reads "Muslim Irish Catholic,'" Alec Baldwin wrote. Baldwin, and millions more across the country, have lashed out over Trump's executive order referring to the aforementioned "Muslim ban." As of press time, a federal judge has issued a temporary "stay," though it's unknown how long it will last. In response, Trump used his own Twitter account to defend his executive order, citing safety concerns for the American people. The Chinese Lunar New Year Family Day event held at the Kogod Courtyard of Smithsonian's American Art Museum in Washington on Saturday drew thousands of Americans, mostly parents with young children. [Photo by Chen Weihua/China Daily] On Saturday, the first day of the Chinese Lunar New Year, the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington was filled with Chinese music and shouts of joy of young children. For the fourth year in a row, the museum's Kogod Courtyard was bustling with Chinese culture, with demonstrations of traditional paper-cutting, bristle dolls, dough sculpting, mask coloring, New Year's card making, Beijing folk artists' paintings and calligraphy, along with crowds making for a festive atmosphere. Following the lion-awakening ceremony performed by David Skorton, secretary of the Smithsonian, and Chinese Ambassador to the US Cui Tiankai, shows by the Yong Han Lion Dance Troupe from Johns Hopkins University, the Beijing Chinese Orchestra and Beijing Acrobats in turn served up an auditory and visual feast. Among the audience was Ajay Bhatt and his family from Chevy Chase, Maryland. Growing up in New York, Bhatt used to go to New York's Chinatown to watch the Chinese New Year's parades from a very young age. "We always had to cover our ears because their fireworks were very, very loud. But it was a lot of fun," he said. "So, it's a lot of good memories celebrating the Chinese New Year." Now he had brought along his 3-year-old son Gabriel, who just got his face painted, to the museum in Washington's Chinatown to celebrate the Chinese New Year. "It's a great event for families. We are very happy that the Smithsonian is putting this on," Bhatt said. "It's very important for kids to participate in cultural events from around the world." Shakirra Cook, 13, was particularly interested in Asian culture because "it's beautiful," she said, calling it thrilling to take part in the cultural activities and meet diverse groups of people. "I love the languages that they speak, and I would like to learn them," she said. "I'm self-teaching myself Japanese, and I want to learn Chinese." She was waiting in line to try on a traditional Chinese costume, in her case a pink embroidered dress, and have her picture taken. The new Miss Universe Iris Mittenaere of France waves to photographers during a press conference after being crowned the winner at the Miss Universe pageant at the Mall of Asia Arena in Manila on January 30, 2017. [Photo/VCG] MANILA - A 24-year-old model from France was named the 65th Miss Universe here on Monday, winning the coveted crown for France again after six decades. Iris Mittenaere beat 85 other beauties to take the title from Pia Wurtzbach of the Philippines at the Mall of Asia Arena in Manila. In her first news conference as Miss Universe, she said she is proud to bring the coveted Miss Universe crown to France and Europe. She expressed hope that Europeans will watch and closely follow the prestigious pageant again after her win. "I think France and Europe really need a Miss Universe (after six decades). I think we need a Miss Universe because French people love beauty pageant but they don't really know Miss Universe because our country never wins (after 1953)," she said. "After this year, I think a lot of people will know and will watch Miss Universe. I think French people will love Miss Universe now and every year they will be watching Miss Universe." She said that it has been her dream to become a Miss Universe and her advocacy is to spread the importance of education especially for children and young women. Mittenaere, who was born the northern French town of Lille, is pursuing a degree in dental surgery. She said she hopes to spread the message of good dental hygiene and oral health. Asked during the final question and answer portion to "name something over the course of your life that you failed at, and tell us what you learned from that experience," Mittenaere answered through an interpreter, "I failed several times in my life. So I thought that I failed the first time that I went out in the (dentistry registry) because my name was not on the list. And the very next day I found that I was in the new book. So, I think that when you fail you have to be elevated and you have to try again and keep going." She fulfilled her dream to bring home the crown again after 1953 when Christiane Martel became the first Miss France to win Miss Universe. Miss Haiti Raquel Pelissier, 25, came in the second, while Miss Colombia Andrea Tovar, 23, was placed the third. The judging panel this year includes Miss Universe 1993 Dayanara Torres from Puerto Rico, Miss Universe 1994 Sushmita Sen from India, Miss Universe 2011 Leila Lopes from Angola, TV and films producer Francine LeFrack, Paper Magazine editorial director Mickey Boardman and "The Real Housewives of Atlanta" star Cynthia Bailey. Steve Harvey hosted the coronation with America's Next Top Model judge Ashley Graham as the backstage host. The popular host plunged into controversy in the 2015 Miss Universe pageant last year when he erroneously announced Miss Colombia as the winner instead of Miss Philippines. The last time the Philippines hosted the Miss universe was in 1994. Do you "like"? Do you "tweet"? Do you tube? Does your business do any or all of these things and, if so, does it really ... On Wednesday, at the Federal Reserves meeting, they raised mortgage rates for the first time in 2017, and the market expects it to just be the first of many. In December, the Fed moved to raise rates from a range of 0.5% to 0.75%. Afterwards, they elected to raise them again, another 25 basis points to a range of 0.75% to 1%. The Federal Funds Rate represents the overnight rate which financial institutions provide short-term lending to one another, and it is the basis for capital markets liquidity. According to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, only one official voted against the action Neel Kashkari, who preferred to maintain the existing target range for the federal funds during the March meeting. Experts now say that rate increases will continue throughout 2017, with the next hike coming as soon as this summer. Rising inflation will predominantly dictate the next monetary policy decision, but another short-term rate hike should be expected by the end of the summer, said Lawrence Yun, National Association of Realtors chief economist. One expert explained that it was indicated by Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen that more rate hikes are on the way this year. As anticipated, the FOMC went forward with the first rate hike of 2017, said Curt Long, National Association of Federally-Insured Credit Unions chief economist. Given that inflation is rising and approaching the Feds 2% target, Fed officials had little choice but to raise rates, Long said. Chair Janet Yellen has indicated that more rate hikes are on the way later this year. However, Yellen also cautioned that should the economy take an unexpected turn, the Fed is not locked into a policy path, according to CNBC. The big question still remains how many rate hikes is the market expecting in the near future? Overall, we still expect that in response to rising inflation, the Fed will hike rates by a total of four times both this year and next, taking the fed funds target range to between 1.50% and 1.75 by end-2017, and to between 2.50% and 2.75% by end-2018, Capital Economics Chief Economist Paul Ashworth said. Meanwhile, other experts are predicting a more conservative three rate hikes this year. Todays FOMC decision to increase the target rate and the updated Fed officials economic projections that continued to show a median of three hikes this year are in line with our expectations in the March forecast released earlier today, Fannie Mae Chief Economist Doug Duncan said. We believe the Fed could stay on course to achieve its dual mandate with a gradual monetary normalization, which would allow housing to continue to expand. Major focus will be on adequately funding existing schemes to ensure their timely completion before the next general elections. Illustration: Uttam Ghosh/Rediff.com. Budget 2017 is expected to focus majorly on recasting and re-orienting existing flagship programmes of the Narendra Modi government with added funds to ensure their completion before the next general elections and to make sure that benefits of schemes reach the last mile. Officials said the rural development sector in particular could see a jump in allocations in all its major schemes and programmes, followed by schemes related to poverty alleviation and social sector. The possibility of slew of big schemes and a lot of mega announcements looks remote, with the exception of revising income tax slabs to mollify the middle classes and a reference to the Basic Income Transfer Scheme. The budgetary outlay could see significant increase in infrastructure, social sector schemes, micro, small and medium enterprises, rural sector and job creation. Officials say that as long as the government can ensure last-mile delivery and better targeting of beneficiaries, the existing programmes are sufficient to reach out to millions who work in the informal sector, to rural India as also the salaried classes. The centrally sponsored schemes, and those in which the states also contribute, have to be recast and improved upon, they said. Such an approach is not only consistent with the prime ministers vision to observe the current year as garib kalyan varsh, or year dedicated to the welfare of the downtrodden, but will also go towards meeting the immediate electoral challenges of the government. Recast of mega programmes Major focus on adequately funding existing schemes to ensure their timely completion before next General Elections. Rural Development Sector, schemes related to poverty alleviation, social sector could see recast and re-orientation. No major alteration in indirect taxes likely as the GST is expected to take care of them. Lot of mega announcements looks remote, though tweaking in tax rates and some sort of income transfer is a possibility. The small and medium sector, hit hard by demonetisation could see some sops, so also micro-irrigation. Elections to five states, including the key state of Uttar Pradesh, start within three days of the Budget being presented. The Bharatiya Janata Party also needs to prepare for polls in Modis home state of Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh, which are due by December. The government, according to officials, has found itself on the horns of a dilemma after the demonetisation exercise failed to deliver upon its expectations. Before Prime Minister Narendra Modis note ban announcement on November 8, 2016, the Budget planners in the finance ministry were working on the assumption that the upcoming 2017-18 Budget will be incremental, while the 2018-19 Budget will be transformational. The idea was to fix the gaps in and ensure better implementation of the existing schemes. The economic impact of demonetisation has meant now even 2017-18 will see a populist Budget. The note ban decision, and its impact, impelled the Budget planners to factor in the gain that the prime minister had promised to the people after 50 days of pain of its currency swap decision. With job growth at a low and impact of demonetisation likely to dent it further, the government is looking at a significant increase in funds for rural development, with special focus on poverty alleviation in rural areas through a targeted approach. An official said the much-anticipated universal basic income scheme, or UBIS, could find a passing reference in the Budget. According to officials, this recasting of the Budget would also mean more funds for agriculture -- kitty for existing programmes like Soil Health Cards, e-NAMs (National Agriculture Market), irrigation and micro-irrigation schemes, rather any new announcements. But Opposition parties have waded into what is turning out to be the Modi governments Achilles heel. On Sunday, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav released the Samajwadi Partys manifesto for the UP polls. He said three years have passed but people are still searching for the prime ministers promised achche din, or better days, which are nowhere to be seen. After the current round of elections in 2017 to seven states (UP, Uttarakhand, Manipur, Punjab, Goa now; Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh later this year), there are a series of important elections in 2018. By March of 2018, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura go to polls. It will be the turn of Karnataka to elect a new Assembly in May 2018, and by end of 2018 Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Mizoram will go to polls. The BJP is a key player in several of these states, and success here is crucial, if it is to return to power in 2019. Union Budget 2017: Complete Coverage Seeking to downplay Mulayam Singh Yadavs outbursts over the alliance between the Samajwadi Party and the Congress, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Monday said he is sure that his father will take part in campaigning and will be most happy when the SP is voted back to power. I am sure Mulayam Singh Yadav will campaign for us. He (Mulayam) will be most happy if Samajwadi Party comes to power in the state, the SP president said. Akhilesh was addressing a series of public meetings in Etah, Jaithra, Patiyali and Kasganj. Voicing displeasure over the alliance between the SP and the Congress, Mulayam on Sunday had said he would not campaign for it in the assembly polls. "I am completely against the alliance. I will not campaign for it," Mulayam had said on a day his son and Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi held their first joint press conference in Lucknow and held a road show displaying great bonhomie. Mulayam, who had rejected the possibility of an alliance for the assembly polls before being deposed as party president by Akhilesh, had said, "Congress ruled the country for a long time and made it laggard. We always fought against Congress." The Samajwadi Party is capable of contesting elections alone. In the past, it fought alone and formed government with a majority. No occasion arose for effecting an alliance, he had said. Akhilesh alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party has copied his party's poll manifesto and accused the Modi government of harassing people by demonetisation. On alliance with the Congress, he said, Bicycle (SPs election symbol) had been strengthened by the cooperation of hand (Congress poll symbol). He claimed that the BJPs sankalp patra has been taken from the SP manifesto and no one can compete with his party on the basis of works undertaken by its government. "Where are the achche din (good days) and Rs 15 lakh in the bank account of people promised by the BJP ahead of 2014 assembly election," Akhilesh asked. "People can see that we have done a lot of progress in every sphere in the last five years... We started Samajwadi ambulance service. The dial 100 for emergency police service was introduced to curb crimes and provide safety to the people, he said. Although though there were posters of Sonia Gandhi, Rahul and Priyanka along with Azam Khan and Ram Gopal Yadav on the stage, posters of Mulayam Singh Yadav were conspicuous by their absence. On the demonetisation move of the Modi government, the Akhilesh accused the Centre of harassing the common people and sought to know whether corruption and black money have been eradicated. "Poor people were harassed by forcing them to stand in long queues at banks, while the rich people did not face any problem at all," the SP leader alleged. A day after launching full fledged campaign of SP-Congress alliance, Akhilesh rebuffed the disgruntled elements in his party saying real friends are known only in times of crisis. "When it is darkness all around, you come to know who all are with you," Akhilesh said in an obvious reference to local MLA Ashish Yadav who has decided to contest as Independent candidate after denial of party ticket as well to as his father Ramesh Yadav, the chairman of Uttar Pradesh Vidhan Parishad. The party has given him a lot of respect... he has the biggest chair of the House of which I am a member, Akhilesh, an MLC, said referring to Ramesh Yadav. Both Ramesh Yadav and Ashish are considered to be Mulayam Singh and Shivpal Singh Yadav supporters and had openly criticised Ram Gopal Yadav. Speaking from the dais shared by local SP and Congress leaders, Akhilesh attacked BJP and BSP and stressing that his partys bicycle will run fast with the hand of the Congress. Seeking another term and support for his party nominees, Akhilesh asked as to what was the way to achche din as they have still eluded the countrymen after a passage of around three years of BJP government at the Centre. Speaking about the Bahujan Samaj Party, the Samajwadi Party president alleged that it could only set up elephants. Several leaders from BJP and Congress also joined the party in the presence of the chief minister. Please turn JavaScript on and reload the page. Loading... Checking your browser before accessing the website. This process is automatic. Your browser will redirect to your requested content shortly. Please wait a few seconds. Hanoi, January 29 (VNA) The maritime sector is stepping up its administrative reform, enabling all of Vietnams vessels operating domestic routes to apply administrative procedures online. Director of the Vietnam Maritime Administration Nguyen Xuan Sang said it is a noticeable step, promising to create a turning point in the maritime sectors administrative procedure reforms. He cited that the maritime sector is one of the first sectors to connect to the National E-information Portal. According to the director, the Vietnam Maritime Administration proposed cutting time for administrative procedures. It mapped out and submitted to the Ministry of Transport a plan on the perfection of nearly 130 administrative procedures in the maritime sector. It also made public its administrative procedures in order to create favourable conditions for organisations, individuals and businesses. According to the Deputy Director of the Maritime Administration of the northern coastal province of Quang Ninh, Vu Ngoc Bich, as one of the countrys biggest sea ports, Quang Ninh port was selected to become the first to implement administrative procedure reform, including e-procedures. The national one-stop-shop mechanism has been carried out at the port since mid-2015, and the Maritime Administration of Quang Ninh province has coordinated with relevant authorities to implement the e-procedure for all vessels, Deputy Director Vu Ngoc Bich added. Le Xuan Tien, an official of the Bac Dang Transport Limited Company, acknowledged that thanks to administrative procedure reforms, processing time for vessels coming or leaving ports in Quang Ninh province has been reduced. Ship owners can register for e-procedures before the vessel moors or leaves port, helping businesses and traders save time and costs. The Maritime Administration of Quang Ninh province and other port authorities nationwide have posted administrative documents at their offices. If businesses submit their documents online, processing time for the documents only takes 15 minutes or less. Dao Trong Hung, a representative of Vietfrach, said declaring documents under the one stop shop model has become easier, the model now requires only 10 papers instead of 36 papers previously for vessels coming to the port and 6 papers compared to 17 papers previously when the vessel leaves port. With significant improvements, many enterprises revealed that the mechanism has helped maritime transport firms save hundreds of millions of Vietnam dong a month. Nguyen Hai Nam, Director of the Maritime Administration of Ho Chi Minh City, said his administration developed a website and information on the sector, port, vessels and administrative procedures that has been continuously updated. The initiative aims to disclose information, administrative procedures, and create favourable conditions for enterprises and individuals to understand legal regulations. Director Nguyen Hai Nam said starting from March 1 this year, the Maritime Administration of Ho Chi Minh City introduced e-procedures to Vietnams sea vessels operating domestic routes. Under the programme, the ports officials can receive, approve and check documents online. Ship owners and agents do not need to submit documents at the port office in person. However, the director admitted there are still some difficulties in implementing the programme, including payment method as fees are mainly paid in cash at port offices. Binh, Deputy Director of the Maritime Administration of Quang Ninh, said to effectively implement the national one-stop-stop mechanism, it is necessary to perfect features and add search tools on the national e-information portal. He proposed that the use of e-signatures should be approved and ports can issue e-leaving licenses, together with e-payment and e-invoices so ship owners and dealers do not need to come to port offices to receive and submit documents. VNA/VNP HA NOI Viet Nam expects to achieve US$3 billion as its total export value of vegetables and fruits this year, exceeding the vegetable and fruit industrys target of $2.4 billion. After many years of export value under $1 billion, in recent years, the export value has made a breakthrough, which is why it was able to exceed the target this year, although there were many difficulties, Huynh Quang au, deputy chairman of the Viet Nam Vegetable and Fruit Association, told Viet Nam News. This year and beyond, the vegetable and fruit industry will face long-term difficulties, including climate change, which would result in a reduction of vegetable and fruit output and quality, and land accumulation for the industry, au said. Meanwhile, most enterprises of the industry are small- and medium-sized units with less capital, said au, adding that technical barriers in vegetable and fruit importing countries have also increased further. However, in recent years, Viet Nams vegetable and fruits have entered markets with strict ruless, such as the United States, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, as well as Australia, New Zealand and Chile, following 4-5 years of successful negotiation by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. Further, farms and enterprises have produced vegetable and fruit products meeting the quality and food safety standards in those countries, he said. That would be the basis for promoting exports this year and beyond, au said. Nguyen o Anh Tuan, head of the ministrys Institute of Policy and Strategy for Agriculture and Rural Development, said this year, enterprises and farmers would pour in investment into fruit, cashew and shrimp because those products have great potential in production and business. In particular, they would invest in high-technological and clean agriculture to create leading brands for the global market, he said. The enterprises would focus on processing farming, forestry and fishery products to create new value and improve the level of Viet Nams products in the international market. Fruit has great potential as peoples income increases, so does the demand for high-quality fruit, he said. Last year, the nations total export value of vegetables and fruits was $2.4 billion, $200 million higher than the yearly target. Solutions Meanwhile, Mai Van Tri, director of the Southern Fruit Research Institute (SOFRI), said export value of the vegetable and fruit industry has not met the industrys potential because there are many kinds of fruits with low prices that do not have high export volume despite the high output. For instance, Viet Nam mainly exported dried jackfruit or material of fresh jackfruit. Tri said local enterprises could process soft dried jackfruit to reduce the import of this product, Some other kinds of vegetables and fruits such as pomelo and purple sweet potato have output which just meets local demand, but not high enough to export. Enterprises have not diversified their fruit processing and not seen sustainable development in material region for export processing, he said. inh Cao Khue, general director of ong Giao Export Food Joint Stock Company, said, so far, there are a small number of vegetable and fruit material regions nationwide that meet the demand of the processing industry. In the north, there are pineapple regions in ong Giao, Ninh Binh and Lao Cai provinces, which produce a total of 70,000 tonnes per year, of which 50 per cent is used for local consumption and 50 per cent is for export processing. Luc Ngan District in Bac Giang Province and Thanh Ha District in Hai Duong Province have high longan output, but the period for harvesting and processing this product is just one-and-a-half months. Meanwhile, other special fruit products, including orange in Ha Giang Province, Ham Yen-Tuyen Quang Province, Cao Phong-Hoa Binh Province and Luc Ngan-Bac Giang Province, have output that is enough to meet domestic consumption requirements. In fact, Viet Nam has many areas that can be used develop material regions of vegetable and fruit for export processing, bringing higher economic efficiency to provinces, Khue said. Central highlands provinces such as ak Nong and Gia Lai could develop material regions of passion fruit, Japanese sweet potato, sweet corn, spinach and pepper because there is high demand for these products in the global market. Meanwhile, the northern provinces of Lao Cai, Son La and Lai Chau are suitable to grow pineapple instead of rubber trees, which have a low level of development in these provinces. The state needs to plan and develop material regions connecting with the development of processing factories and expanding the regions to neighbouring provinces, Khue said. ong Giao Export Food JSC has enough material of pineapple for export processing because along with material regions in Ninh Binh Province, the company must combine with regions in the neighbouring provinces of Thanh Hoa, Thai Binh, Hai Duong and Bac Giang, as well as Ha Giang and Tuyen Quang. Additionally, Khue said Viet Nam should promote advertising at international fairs for farming products to study and expand export markets, including fairs in Germany, France, Russia and Japan. Pham Cong Dung from the Department of Agricultural Forestry and Fishery Processing and Salt Industry said the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has promoted restructuring of agriculture and planned material regions with advantages. For export activities, the ministry has cooperated with relevant state offices to enhance trade promotion activities for Vietnamese fruit products to increase market share, he said. Each trade office of Viet Nam in foreign countries would conduct marketing activities for local fruits for the Vietnamese community living abroad and the locals. The ministry would control further import of fruits through technical barriers under international rules to protect local fruits in a legal manner and stop illegal fruit imports, he said. VNS By Bach Lien January 27 marks the start of the Year of Rooster, the tenth ranked of the Chinese zodiac animals, another Lunar New Year. In Chinese and Vietnamese culture, the rooster represents fidelity and punctuality, as it wakes people up. People born in this year are believed to be kind-hearted, hard-working, courageous, independent, humorous, optimistic, honest and have pride in their inner self. Born in August 1945 in Ha Noi, Professor Nguyen Van Huy, one of most famous researchers of ethnology of Viet Nam, is among a few renowned Vietnamese researchers born in the Year of the Rooster. Those who know about his life and career can see that he has several characteristics of people born in the year of the rooster: hard-working, courageous and optimistic. 1945 is most remembered in Vietnamese history for the famine that occurred in northern Viet Nam from October 1944 to May 1945, during the Japanese occupation of French Indochina. Up to 2 million people are estimated to have died of starvation in this period. Huy was born several months after the end of this famine but like most Vietnamese people living in the North then, he experienced a difficult childhood. Those hard years gave birth to his determination and courage. He is best known as the founding director of Viet Nam Museum of Ethnology (1995-2006). Huy enthusiastically took part in field trips with the Viet Nam Institute of Ethnology to remote and mountainous areas bordering China and Laos in the 1960s, surveying then little known ethnic minority groups. Along with his colleagues, he conducted the first sociological surveys of ethnic groups across the country. He wrote approximately 60 journal articles and more than 10 books, among which are Faces, Voices and Lives: Experience of a Director in Building a Museum for Communities (The Gioi Publishers, Ha Noi, 2008) and Vietnam: Journeys of Body, Mind and Spirit (co-edited with Laurel Kendall, University of California Press, Berkeley, 2004). For his contributions to preserving cultural heritage, he received Frances prestigious award Chevalier de LOrdre des Arts et des Lettres (Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters ) (in 2007), Aid to Artisans Award (2002), and the Rockefeller 3rd Award (Asian Culture Council, 1999). Heritage of Vietnamese scientists and scholars After his retirement from the Viet Nam Museum of Ethnology, Huy assumed the post of director of the Heritage of Vietnamese Scientists and Scholars. Over the last seven years, he and his colleagues have worked to preserve heritage and documents about Vietnamese scientists and scholars. His efforts have enticed many people to read the documents useful for their research. From the stories about the lives of scientists, we can draw a panorama of the history of the development of Viet Nams science history in particular and Viet Nams history in particular, Huy said. Through the heritage and documents that the centre has collected, young people will understand better how hard professors and well known doctors in the country studied and worked to become leading professors and doctors, he adds. Young people today will learn how to contribute to society. Moreover, by learning about the lives of the scientists, they will better know about the difficult years in the history of Viet Nam. He believes that heritage is not something to be kept solely in a museum, but should be brought to the community. Family is my great school Huy is also the founder and director of a museum dedicated to his father Nguyen Van Huyen, where displays nearly 400 objects and documents of the 20th century on the life and career of the late Minister of Education and cultural researcher. Nguyen Van Huyen was Minister of Education for 29 years and was honoured several times for his contributions to the countrys education sector. Huys mother is well-known painter Vi Kim Ngoc. Since I was a child, my parents encouraged me and my brothers and sisters to take part in social activities. But they also taught us about the importance of the family and how to show love to the family, he recalls. Family was my great school where I learned many important things, he said. A road passing through the Viet Nam Museum of Ethnology was named after his father, where he devoted talent, time and passion for years to turn it into a beautiful cultural spot, where Vietnamese people and international tourists can discover the essence of Viet Nam. VNS MANILA - A 24-year-old woman from Paris won the Miss Universe crown on Monday, in a three-hour show in the Philippine capital that focused on diversity and overcoming life struggles, besting 85 hopefuls from all over the world. Iris Mittenaere, who is pursuing a degree in dental surgery, won the 65th edition of the annual competition hosted for the third time by the Philippines. "I was very surprised I won, I feel blessed," said Mittenaere, who had been described on the Miss Universe website as hoping "to advocate for dental and oral hygiene" if she won. "Miss Universe was a dream, every girl wants to be Miss Universe...the stage is amazing, everything is amazing." She added, "I want to help people, I want to understand people, I want to meet people, thats why this is a dream for me." Raquel Pelissier of Haiti is the first runner-up, while Andrea Tovar of Colombia placed second runner-up. Thirteen contestants were picked for the swimsuit round of the finals after a preliminary competition last week, before being pruned to nine for the evening gown segment, and then to six. Rounding out the top six were Maxene Medina of the Philippines, Chalita Suansane of Thailand and Mary Esther Were of Kenya. REUTERS ONG NAI The southern province of ong Nai will build 20,000 houses from now until 2030 to meet the accommodation needs of workers, students and people with low incomes. As per the plan approved by the provinces Peoples Committee, 17,815 houses will be constructed for workers and people with low incomes, while 2,185 hostel rooms will be built for students. The project will cost around VN12.2 trillion (US$542.2 million), the funds for which will come from the provinces budget and investors. Currently, 45 social housing projects are being implemented in ong Nai, according to the provincial peoples committee. While construction has started in six projects, the remaining are submitting documents for approvals or waiting for approval from investors. The southern province is also building a bus route to connect industrial zones with social housing areas and workers boarding houses. The bus timings will be planned to suit the workers work hours. The province is also laying down policies that encourage businesses themselves to construct houses for their workers. By the end of 2016, the province had built 556 social houses, and in 2017, ong Nai is expected to build 901 houses. Around 1,333 houses will be constructed in 2018, 4,629 in 2019 and 12,581 in 2020. VNS WASHINGTON President Donald Trump and Saudi King Salman want to "rigorously" enforce the Iran nuclear deal, the White House said on Sunday, despite the US leaders long opposition to the agreement. The pair, in a phone conversation, also spoke of the need to address Irans "destabilizing regional activities", fight the spread of "radical Islamic terrorism" and establish safe zones in war-ravaged Syria and Yemen, the White House statement read. No further details were provided about those plans. Trump opposed the nuclear agreement signed by Israels arch-foe Iran and world powers, including the United States, in 2015 and has said he wants to undo it. Some of his key nominees have adopted an openly anti-Iran stance, including secretary of state candidate Rex Tillerson, who is seeking a complete revision of the accord. Israeli President Netanyahu said last month that there were many ways of "undoing" the Iran nuclear deal and that he would discuss that with Trump. But before he left office, former president Barack Obama warned against rowing back the pact, emphasizing its "significant and concrete results." The deal places curbs on Tehrans nuclear programme in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions. Tehran is a major foe of both Washington and Ryad. The Sunni majority Saudi kingdom is engaged in a power struggle with the Shiite country for dominance in the region. Trump and King Salman "agreed on the importance of rigorously enforcing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran and of addressing Irans destabilizing regional activities," the White House said. Trump also spoke by telephone with the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, committing to "further strengthen cooperation on fighting radical Islamic terrorism," the White House said. It said the pair also discussed establishing safe zones for refugees displaced by conflict in the region, and the crown prince "agreed to support this initiative." AFP ANKARA Turkey has called on Germany to reject asylum requests by several dozen Turkish soldiers, who reports suggest fear jail over last years failed coup if they return home. Days before German Chancellor Angela Merkel is due to visit Turkey, Defence Minister Fikri Isik said on Sunday Germany should "absolutely" reject the requests. German media reports on Saturday said that 40 Turkish troops, mostly high-ranking and stationed on NATO bases, were seeking asylum in Germany. "German courts and German authorities must assess this very carefully, and they must absolutely not accept their asylum requests," said Isik. In a video posted on the state-run news agency Anadolus website, the minister added it was his "expectation" that Germany would not approve the applications. The Turkish officers seeking asylum were quoted in German media as saying they feared jail and possibly torture back home. Isik said they were accused of involvement in the July 15 attempted overthrow of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. He appeared to suggest any approval would have an impact on relations, which are already strained by Berlins repeated expressions of concern over the magnitude of the post-coup crackdown. "For a country like Germany that has very strong cultural, social and political relations with Turkey, it would be strictly unacceptable to give protection," he said. German Chancellor Merkel is due to come to Turkey on Thursday in what will be her first visit since the failed putsch. Merkel is expected to discuss the refugee crisis as Turkey has been vital to European Union (EU) plans to stop the mass flow of migrants from the Middle East and Africa into the bloc, especially to Germany. Some 43,000 people have been arrested on suspicion of having links to coup plotters. One of the officers seeking asylum insisted he had no connection to the coup attempt or sympathy for those behind it, and was quoted as saying: "If I return to Turkey I risk imprisonment, or perhaps torture." Isik added that he would discuss the matter with his German counterpart at a NATO security conference next month. Around three million Turkish-origin people live in Germany, the legacy of a massive "guest worker" programme in the 1960s and 1970s. AFP Estate planning seminar slated WATERLOO -- Dupaco Community Credit Union will join forces with First Community Trust to present a free seminar from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. Wednesday on the topic of estate planning. The seminar will be at the Cedar Falls Public Library, 524 Main St. There is no cost or obligation to attend the seminar, and all are welcome. For reservations, call Suzana Sumar, First Community Trust, at 859-3461. Couple receives ag recognition IOWA FALLS -- John and Beverly Gilbert have been chosen as the recipients of the 2017 Practical Farmers of Iowa Sustainable Agriculture Achievement Award. The award is granted each year to an individual or couple who has shown exemplary commitment to sustainable agriculture, shared their knowledge with others and been influential in efforts to foster vibrant communities, diverse farms and healthy food. The award was presented to the Gilberts on Jan. 20, during Practical Farmers 2017 annual conference in Ames. The Gilberts operate Gibralter Farms, a 770-acre diversified row crop, dairy and livestock farm, with one of their sons and his wife -- John C. and Sarah Gilbert -- and one of John's five brothers, Greg, and his wife, Barb. In addition to growing traditionally bred corn, soybeans, hay, oats and a variety of annuals for forage, the family milks 50 to 60 Brown Swiss cattle and raises antibiotic-free, pasture-farrowed pigs to sell to Niman Ranch. The farm, which sits along a mile of Southfork, a tributary of the Iowa River, also features a restored shallow water wetland, a prairie marsh remnant, woodlands and numerous conservation practices meant to help protect soil and water quality -- including terraces, extensive grass headlands and waterways and stream buffers. BCEDC program begins Feb. 28 INDEPENDENCE -- Registrations are being accepted for the 2017 Leadership Development Program presented by the Buchanan County Economic Development Commission. Some of the topics to be covered include Servant Leadership, recruiting and managing volunteers, project management, group dynamics and decision making and conducting effective meetings. Cost is $150 per person. The program will meet on eight consecutive Tuesdays, 8:30 to 11 a.m., Feb. 28 to April 18, with most meetings taking place in Independence and one meeting each in Jesup and Winthrop. Registrations are due by Feb. 20 at www.growbuchanan.com and then follow the link in Bulletin Board. Junk King now serving area WATERLOO -- Junk King is now serving Waterloo, Cedar Falls and surrounding communities. Junk King, headed by Jim and Jennifer Marlin of Waterloo, offers junk removal services to residents and businesses. Customers can schedule a pick-up with the online booking system. Pricing is based on the amount of junk removed, and 60 percent of the junk collected is recycled. For more information, go to www.junk-king.com. Workshop for farmers slated WATERLOO -- The Iowa Agricultural Development Division will host a free Beginning Farmer Workshop from 8:30 to 11 a.m. Feb. 16 at Hawkeye Community College's Tama Hall 117. The workshop is open to anyone interested in learning about beginning farmer programs in Iowa. The agenda includes an overview of USDA-Farm Service Agency and Iowa Finance Authority Beginning Farmer Programs as well as an ag lender panel discussion The event is free, but registration is required at IowaFinanceAuthority.gov/IADD. HCC open house set for Feb. 18 WATERLOO -- Hawkeye Community College will host an open house from 9 a.m. to noon Feb. 18 about a new grant supporting veterans, service members and their spouses and children looking to earn commercial drivers' licenses. The event will take place at the Regional Transportation Training Center, 6433 Hammond Ave. Hawkeye is one of seven technical and community colleges across the country to receive funding from a U.S. Department of Transportations Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration program. The open house is an opportunity to meet instructors, tour the training facility, learn about program options and discuss financial assistance. For more information or to RSVP, go to www.hawkeyecollege.edu/go/open-house. NOTE: This story has been updated to reflect that the restaurant will now open the week of Valentine's Day, not this Wednesday as earlier reported. CEDAR FALLS Justin Buck is fired up about River Place, the growing residential-commercial development in downtown Cedar Falls. So much so, hes firing up a brick oven pizza restaurant there. Bucks Urban Pie restaurant is scheduled to open there the week of Valentine's Day. Itll be the final ground-floor commercial tenant, filling out the commercial space at the 200 State St. building. Itll be a fast-fired Neapolitan type of pizza, said Buck, who moved back to the area from Arizona. We have an oven imported from Italy that rotates on the inside. It times out to about 90 seconds to 2 minutes as far as preparation time to cook. What were really focusing on is a fast-service, fast-casual type experience, he said. The customer should be able to be in and out of the building in five minutes with a pizza. But if youre not in a hurry, and you just want to sit down and enjoy some pizza and drinks with friends and family, well be able to serve you that way. The restaurant will have about 2,300 square feet of inside seating plus an outdoor patio. Im hoping to employ possibly 25 to 30 people, he said, with four to 15 at any given time, depending on the day and level of business. Buck, Blake Keating and Derek Hamil are partners in the restaurant. I spent the last seven years in Phoenix, working for the University of Phoenix, Buck said. I had over 10 years of experience in restaurants and bars before. We talked to a couple of franchises and felt we knew the Cedar Valley better than any of those franchises. So it was something where we felt comfortable putting together our own type of concept, really, to fit this area. Wed like to grow in the first couple of years, Buck said. Were focused on here, initially, to make sure we do this right, and then possible some other spots in eastern Iowa, maybe Marion or Cedar Rapids. Well see what happens, six months to a year, to see where we want to go. Buck and his partners liked the River Place location, and specifically a plaza planned just north of 200 State, adjacent to their restaurant space. We looked at multiple locations in Cedar Falls, but once we saw this location down here and talked to Mark (Kittrell, River Place developer) and the rest of the crew here, what its going to draw as far as tourism or just community gathering opportunities, its something that were willing to put in the time for the next couple of years while this comes to completion to be a part of it. Its going to really grow and do a lot for the downtown. Plus, with a built-in clientele with apartments in the same building, for us its a lot of opportunity, Buck said. In addition to apartments, the upper level of 200 State St. houses Mill Race, a shared co-working space for entrepreneurs, professionals and people working remotely for employers online. We cant see, really, a better opportunity. Business-wise, its going to grow. I cant see it going any other direction, as long as were doing what we need to be doing. Neapolitan pizza with a crust that goes through a curing or fermentation process had caught on in the Phoenix area but was not as prevalent here, Buck said. Its also a one-price, build-your-own pizza. I just saw the opportunity why not take a chance and see where we can go with it? I figured it gives me a lot more opportunity. He also plans to live at River Place. I can take an elevator to go to work, he joked. FAYETTE Cases closed. Literally and figuratively. The 5-decade-old mystery of how a pair of steamer trunks that once belonged to a talented stage actress ended up in the attic of a Charles City home has been solved. Loyal and Norma McLean first discovered the two cases in 1962 in the attic of a Charles City home they had just purchased. The luggage remained largely untouched in the familys attic for the next 54 years when, upon closer examination last year, family members noticed a C.A. Taylor Trunk Works manufacturers guarantee on one of the trunks. Dated Sept. 30, 1920, the document included the name Zanita Graf and an address in Fayette. The McLeans granddaughter, Leah Reineke of Council Bluffs, researched the original owner of the travel cases and quickly discovered Graf is a celebrated alumna of Upper Iowa University, but found nothing to link Graf to Charles City. Ultimately, the family decided UIU would make a perfect home for the two forgotten steamer trunks and donated them in December. However, recent media reports on the McLeans donation of the cases to Upper Iowa University caught the attention of Betty Salpekar of Woodstock, Ga. Seeing the stories about the donation, she realized she finally had an answer to her own familys long-standing mystery: Whatever happened to the trunks? Soon after, Salpekar contacted UIU Archivist Janette Garcia and the two pieced together all of the details to finally solve both families age-old riddles. Graf studied oratory and liberal arts at Upper Iowa University, earning her bachelors degree in 1913. She made her professional stage debut in 1917 with the Deveraux Dramatic Company, one of the most talented acting companies of its time. Her casting as Beauty in the play Everyman sparked a very prosperous stage acting career. While Graf participated in transcontinental tours throughout the United States and Canada that would explain her need for the trunks, there was no evidence linking the former stage actress to Charles City. Graf passed away in 1930. It turns out Salpekars mother, Delores Nicholson, herself a 1957 alumna of Upper Iowa University, purchased the trunks at a Graf Estate auction in Fayette in 1956 or 1957. Salpekars father was employed at the Oliver tractor factory in Charles City at the time and the family moved there in the summer of 1957. The trunks were placed in the attic of the familys new home, where Delores mainly utilized them for storage. In early 1962, Salpekars parents sold the house to the McLeans and moved to Cedar Rapids. A few days after the move, Delores realized the trunks hadnt been delivered to the new house. She called the moving company, but they denied any knowledge of their location, insisting they had emptied the attic. Salpekars mother settled on the notion the movers had stolen the trunks, and a family mystery was born. Sharing similar sentiments as the McLeans, Salpekar said her family is very happy the Charles City couple donated the trunks to UIU, where they are in good hands and appear in the University Archives Zinita B. Graf exhibit at Fayette Campus. Located in Henderson-Wilder Library at Upper Iowa Universitys Fayette Campus, the University Archives are free and open to the public. In addition to the Zinita B. Graf exhibit, there are numerous other special displays. Persons wishing to donate items to the University Archives may contact UIU Archivist Janette Garcia at (563) 425-5722 or garciaj26@uiu.edu. WAVERLY Scott Cawelti, University of Northern Iowa professor emeritus, will examine four films by director Steven Spielberg during Wartburgs Keep on Learning community education series, beginning Thursday. Cawelti will review Spielbergs filmography, contributions to world cinema and stylistic and thematic hallmarks using Jaws, Schindlers List, Saving Private Ryan and Lincoln. Cawelti taught writing, film and literature courses for 40 years at UNI, where he earned both his bachelors degree and doctorate. Classes continue Feb. 9, 16 and 23 in the Heritage Room of Saemann Student Center. Coffee will be served at 9 a.m., followed by the class from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. Prior registration is not required. The first class of each session is free; a $35 fee due at the second class covers the rest of the sessions. For more information, call 352-8491 or email alumni@wartburg.edu. CEDAR FALLS The Community Foundation of Northeast has held its fall 2016 grant cycle awards, distributiing $429,104 in grants to 36 nonprofit and government entity projects serving Black Hawk County. Grant recipients and the project the grant will fund are listed below by funding areas. Art and Culture Waterloo Community Playhouse, Waterloo Community Playhouse Season of Engagement. Community Betterment Evansdale AMVETS Post 31, Energy Efficiency Project. Cedar Valley Crime Stoppers. St. Pauls United Methodist Church, Community Center. Volunteer Center of Cedar Valley, Service-Learning: Engaging Youth in Service to the Cedar Valley. Education Covenant Medical Center-Retired & Senior Volunteer Program (RSVP), RSVP Primetime Program. Greater Cedar Valley Alliance Foundation, Leader in Me: Culture, Leadership, and Academics 2017. Grout Museum District, Museum District. Junior Achievement of Eastern Iowa, Cultivating a Skilled and Productive Workforce. Quota Club of Waterloo, Cops n Kids Literacy Program. The Job Foundation: Financial Stewardship Mentoring Program. Environment City of Waterloo, 2016 Ash Tree Replacement Project. The Nature Conservancy in Iowa, Wetland Restoration for Reduced Flood Risk, Improved Water Quality and Increased Outdoor Recreation. Human Service Allen Hospital/Unity Point Health, Allen Child Protection Center. Big Brothers Big Sisters of Northeast Iowa, One-to-One Mentoring. Bring Your Families to Christ Ministries, Bringing Your Families to Christ Ministries. Cedar Valley Friends of the Family, Safe Shelter & Housing Stability. Cedar Valley Gearheads Ministry, 17 in 2017. Christian Community Development-House of Hope, House of Hope. East Side Ministerial Alliance, EMA Volunteer Income Tax Assistance Program. Exceptional Persons, Employment Services-Enclave. Family and Childrens Council of Black Hawk County, Parent Education. Getting Ahead in the Cedar Valley Fund, Getting Ahead in a Just Getting-By World Program. Girl Scouts of Eastern Iowa and Western Illinois, Leadership and Character Building for Girls. Iowa Heartland Habitat for Humanity, Irving Square Development. Lutheran Services in Iowa, Healthy Families America-HOPES in Black Hawk County. National Inventors Hall of Fame, Camp Invention STEM Program for Elementary Children in Black Hawk County Summer 2017. Northeast Iowa Food Bank, Cedar Valley Food Pantry. Operation Threshold, Housing and Fair Lending Program. Riverview Center, Awareness of Services and Recruitment of Volunteers Campaign. Salvation Army, Operating Support. SuccessLink, SuccesLink/Success Street. The Homestead, Childrens Autism Project Center. Waypoint Services, Waypoint Domestic Violence Program Support. Wildwood Hills Ranch, Scholarships for Black Hawk County At-Risk Youth. YMCA of Black Hawk County, Latino and Multicultural Services. Grants are awarded through CFNEIAs competitive grant process. The Foundation has a fall and spring grant cycle for Black Hawk County. The 2017 spring grant cycle is currently open. Grant guidelines and applications can be found at www.cfneia.org/grants. Completed applications must be submitted no later than midnight April 1. CEDAR FALLS A Waterloo man has been arrested for allegedly holding people at knife-point while he searched for his misplaced cell phone in a Cedar Falls mobile home over the weekend. Cedar Falls police arrested William Kennedy Shindoll, 22, of 2100 W. Ninth St., on Saturday for first-degree robbery. He was taken to the Black Hawk County Jail, and bond was set at $250,000. According to court records, Shindoll had been at a mobile home in the 700 block of West Ridgeway Avenue on Saturday afternoon. He left and returned a short time later in search of his phone. When he was unable to locate the phone, he became aggressive, pulling out a knife and demanding its return, records state. He lined up people inside the mobile home and patted them down and then made them write their names, home addresses and contact information and eventually demanded compensation for the phone He received $130 in cash and left, telling people inside the mobile home not to call police, court records state. Officers stopped Shindolls Mercury Monterey minivan before it left the mobile home park. Officers recovered the notebook with the names and the cash and found a knife hidden in the engine compartment, records state. As for his cell phone, it was later discovered in the center console of his vehicle, according to police. WATERLOO A federal grand jury has indicted a Waterloo man who was found with a handgun during a traffic stop in December. Authorities allege John Daniel Forehand III, 30, of 612 Keystone St., was barred from handling firearms because of a 2010 drug conviction and a 2011 conviction weapons conviction. On Dec. 12, Waterloo police stopped him in the area of Westfield Avenue and Commercial Street for having excessive window tint on his red Dodge Charger. During the investigation, police found loose marijuana on the floorboard and a .22-caliber Walther P22 handgun with the serial number scratched off inside a bag, according to court records. Also in the bag was a digital scale and a childs cup with marijuana residue. Forehand was arrested on state gun charges in December, and a grand jury returned an indictment charging him with possession of a firearm by a felon in U.S. District Court on Wednesday. The indictment was unsealed on Monday. CEDAR FALLS The University of Northern Iowa is discouraging students from seven Muslim nations from traveling outside the United States for at least 90 days due to the immigration order announced Friday by President Donald Trump. The administration responded Monday to the executive order that bans refugees and citizens of seven Muslim-majority nations for a period of time. The university warned students from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen if they leave the country they may not be able to return. The statement notes the ban could be expanded to other countries. The two other regents universities the University of Iowa and Iowa State University issued similar advisories. Iowa State has 4,131 international students, including 115 who are from countries specified in the executive order. At ISU, a graduate student, a postdoctoral researcher and a visiting scholar have been blocked from entering the country. Officials said all three are from Iran. The graduate student was scheduled to arrive over the weekend but was denied permission to board his flight in Stockholm. The postdoctoral researcher has been working in the College of Engineering since July 2015 and is trying to return to campus. The visiting scholar was expected to start this week. The Cedar Falls campus has just five students from the countries on the ban list. It was not clear their home countries. But the university has a number of students from other Muslim-majority countries that could be impacted if the order is expanded. Last year a total of 211 international students were from Saudi Arabia. The UNI statement encouraged international students to contact an immigration attorney if they plan to travel outside the United States. The letter stated the administration will monitor actions related to the order, which faces challenges in the court system. UNIs Office of International Programs has been meeting regularly with international students to keep them informed. The university affirmed its commitment to diversity on campus. We stand firmly behind UNIs vision statement, which asserts that we will be a diverse and inclusive campus community. Consistent with our values statement, we are a caring and safe community, characterized by civility and respect, which stands in solidarity against any actions that exclude, discriminate against or silence members of our community, reads the statement. The letter was signed by Interim President Jim Wohlpart and incoming President Mark Nook. Separately, the Ethnic Minorities of Burma Advocacy and Resource Center, or EMBARC, likewise encouraged those working with refugees to postpone any trips until there is more clarity on the executive order. EMBARC largely works with refugees, who would be part of a 120-day blanket ban on refugees entering the country per the executive order. EMBARC also supports the refugee community and reached out to the White House to say as much. Refugee resettlement is a proud Iowan, and American, legacy. It is the embodiment of our commitment to human rights, compassion, religious freedom and diversity, it said in a statement. Right now, we have the opportunity to reaffirm these values by being more, not less, welcoming to people no matter where they come from. DES MOINES When Caleb Helland was 10 years old, he was having roughly 10 atonic, or head-drop, seizures as a result of his intractable epilepsy. After two weeks of cannabis oil treatments, the Mason City boys atonic seizures stopped completely and never returned, his mother said. That was roughly a year-and-a-half ago. Hes way more aware of his surroundings. Hes a lot more alert, just more with it, Cassie Helland said of her son, who is now 12. Hes in a wheelchair, and he doesnt speak, but he smiles a lot. You can just tell by looking at him that hes kind of more there. Caleb Helland is one of the many dramatic success stories advocates like his mother relay to state legislators as they consider the future of Iowas medical cannabis program. Iowa lawmakers in 2014 passed a limited medical cannabis program that allows residents to possess cannabidiol, a medicinal byproduct of the marijuana plant, for treatment of intractable epilepsy, even though that runs afoul of federal laws. The law was passed with a July 1, 2017, expiration date, leaving state legislators this year with, essentially, three options: Extend the current program. Extend and expand the current program. Allow the law to expire, which would end the program. Since the programs 2015 implementation, 222 cannabidiol registration cards have been issued in Iowa, according to the Department of Transportation, which issues the cards. Critics of the program, including many who use it, say it does not create an avenue for Iowans to obtain cannabidiol, which is produced only in other states, many of which do not sell to nonresidents. Thats why Cassie Helland and her fellow advocates have spent the past two years pressing state lawmakers to expand the program, sharing their personal success stories. Caleb still experiences the occasional grand mal seizure, Cassie said, but the head-drop seizures that completely stopped were more frequent and more alarming. Those were really bothersome because they were on and off all day long, so they really interrupted his daily routine and activities, Cassie said. Cassie is one of the states 222 cannabidiol registration cardholders, although her family has been fortunate to not have to use it. Caleb was accepted into a clinical trial at the University of Iowa through which he receives his treatments. But Cassie said she does not know how long the trial will continue, and at some point she may need the card to obtain oil for Calebs treatments. And Cassie said she knows many families who have to use the card to get oil from states such as Colorado. If they dont pass this or if they dont renew the bill or think of something different, its not going to directly affect my son, Cassie said. But we dont know how long the study is going to go on for. ... (And) I do know families that will be directly affected by it because theyre not in the study. Advocates for expansion of the program say they would like more forms of medical cannabis to be legalized and more ailments, such as cancer and post-traumatic stress disorder, to be covered and for the medicinal products to be produced and sold in Iowa. We are hopeful for a more comprehensive program that will help more Iowans, said Sally Gaer of West Des Moines, co-founder of the advocacy group Iowans 4 Medical Cannabis whose daughter has a rare form of epilepsy. We have kids with epilepsy that need THCA (another compound of the marijuana plant) because the (oil) doesnt work for them, so they need a different component of the plant. So we need to help those kids. Among state lawmakers, opponents of expansion or the program in general say the state should not pass a law that conflicts with federal law and they should not be making decisions that are better left to medical experts. One key state legislator, who is drafting the medical cannabis bill that will be considered in the Iowa House, said he thinks it is important the program be extended, but he is uncertain whether it will be expanded. We have to extend the current program. I dont think theres any question about that, said Rep. Clel Baudler, R-Greenfield, chairman of the House Public Safety Committee. Expansion? Theres a question. ... I think I can safely say that the (expiration) date of July 1, 2017, will be eliminated and the present program can continue. Baudler said approval of program expansion would require time, education and want from my (House Republican) caucus. House Speaker Linda Upmeyer of Clear Lake said before proceeding with new state legislation, she wants to hear the intentions of the federal government and the new administration regarding medical marijuana. I dont know where well land, Upmeyer said. We are breaking federal law no matter what we do. I would appreciate the federal government to make a decision on how they want this to be approached, and then the state can take the appropriate action. So I think thats kind of step one, knowing that. Rep. Peter Cownie, R-West Des Moines, oversaw a proposal that failed to pass the Iowa House in 2016. While he has handed off that responsibility this year to Baudler, Cownie said he remains hopeful legislators pass a program expansion. Its my hope that the Legislature will act because of that (July 1 deadline) and hopefully pass something thats a better bill, a better law, Cownie said. The current law, while good-intentioned, hasnt really been able to do a lot of good for people who need help. DES MOINES A bill intended to give local school boards more decision-making authority ran into several challenges Monday, including testy exchanges between subcommittee members. Freshman Rep. Amy Nielsen, D-North Liberty, accused subcommittee Chairman Greg Forristall, R-Macedonia, of being a mean bully when he questioned whether she understood school funding law. During her first subcommittee meeting as a House member, Nielsen asked whether House File 26 solved the problems Forristall cited as reasons to give school boards home rule authority similar to that given to cities and counties through an amendment to the state Constitution. HF 26 calls for school boards to exercise any broad or implied power not inconsistent with state laws. That doesnt extend to levying taxes. Nielsen wondered about unintended consequences of the change, especially those stemming from the language calling for state laws relating to schools and school boards to be liberally construed. Now Democrats are complaining were too liberal, Forristall said. The bill has the support of the Iowa Association of School Boards, School Administrators of Iowa, Professional Educators of Iowa, Area Education Agencies, Rural School Advocates and Urban Education Network. However, Melissa Peterson of the Iowa State Education Association had the same question as Nielsen. She wondered what problem lawmakers were trying to solve. There are other bills that address specific problems without calling for such a large legislative change. Margaret Buckton of the Rural Education Advocates and Urban Education Network said the bill goes to the overarching philosophy of who makes decisions about local school operations. Too many times, she said, school districts need to change laws when a commonsense decision would solve their problem. As long as districts are held accountable and follow state law they should be given more latitude, Emily Piper of the Iowa Association of School Boards told the subcommittee. However, she thought the legislation needed a better definition of home rule. HF 26 now goes to the Education Committee. WATERLOO Applications are being accepted for County Beautification funds from Green Scene. Nonprofit groups that want to enhance their property by planting trees only may apply. Green Scene is a local nonprofit organization run by volunteers for the purpose of improving Black Hawk Countys environment by planting trees. Green Scene uses half of the proceeds from the organizations annual May plant sale for planting projects and the remainder for the Street Trees program offered to cities within the county. Each area school also is offered a free tree for the observation of Arbor Day. Requests are due Feb. 28 and should include a sketch or plan for where trees will be planted and a price quote from a nursery noting the size and cost of trees. Last year funding was given to Holmes Junior High, Cedar Bend Humane Society, Cedar Valley Arboretum, Landmark Commons and the Western Home Foundation. Send applications to Green Scene, P.O. Box 2004, Waterloo 50704. For more information, call Ruth at 236-3646, Ann at 232-7306 or Peggy at 234-8965. Applicants will be notified by email at the end of March. CalExit? Go Ahead. Make My Day. I cant imagine why any sane person would think it would be a wonderful idea to cede California geographically to a foreign power. Is there some lunatic reason you think it would be cool to let Communist China or Iran set up across an imaginary line dividing California from the surrounding states? "We won't and they won't. The United States government can't afford to allow foreign powers to set up in one of our former states, especially not one that has so much infrastructure that can be used as a platform against the U.S.. "It has nothing to do with States Rights or the rights/wrongs legality/illegality of secession: it has to do with the very simple strategic principle of "We can allow no hostile or competitive nation level peers within our hemisphere." "It's the same reason that while Texas secession is theoretically attractive, it won't and can't happen because the United States can't and won't allow it it would spark a nearly immediate invasion of Texas by the Fed and a new War of Independence or Civil War. Likewise for California. "CalExit would be temporary only. It would end as soon as D.C. got serious about saying, "Okay, you've had your fun, now it's over." "However, while it was temporarily active, a number of things would happen that would be beneficial to the U.S. and America as a whole in the long run: "California secedes, and almost immediately the new nation of California breaks up into at least four states/areas including the Big Valley, the Interior, Northern California, and Coastal California (probably comprised of SoCal Coastal, SF, and Silicone Valley and *maybe* the Imperial Valley.) The Interior (Mojave etc) and probably the Big Valley elect to stay with the U.S. as part of the Union. "Northern California could go two ways, stay with the Union and petition to become it's own state, or form it's own State of Jefferson in combination with Southern Oregon (maybe). Most likely, NC stays with the U.S. "Coastal California suddenly finds several things have happened: SoCal, SF, and Silicon Valley find themselves on their own sans a majority of their actual productive areas and citizens and tax base. Coastal California also finds themselves in possession of several increasingly hostile U.S. military bases that the U.S. cannot afford to allow them to keep, nor afford to lose. "Coastal California finds itself being charged with violation of the sedition acts and high treason (making war upon the U.S.), with an active enemy within their borders that is specialized in having a monopoly on the organized and disciplined application of force, and a lot of military hardware and no real military of its own. "Coastal California finds itself invaded by the U.S.. At some point shortly after, its secession comes to an end. "At some point immediately after that, the people in charge of, behind the rebellion, and supporting it find themselves charged with treason and sedition, convicted, and then given due process of whatever sort. "After that, it's a bit up in the air what happens to SoCal they could find themselves reduced to an occupied U.S. territoial holding, or simply brought back to heel and into the Union as was the South after the Civil War. Bad for California. "Not so bad for the U.S. in the long run, although heavily disruptive in the short run. "Depending how it occurs and what happens, the U.S. gains anywhere from 1 to 3 or 4 new Red States and a Territory where the back of the predominately Blue Bloc has been broken. Alternately, it gets back a defeated state that goes Red, as the back of the California Blue Bloc has been broken. "An awful lot of California Leftist politicians, industrialists, and Hollywood idiots find themselves charged with sedition and treason, and hanged or imprisoned. (I prefer hanged, but Federal prison works too.) "The Left loses an awful lot of Electoral Votes, plus an example gets made that is unmistakable to the rest of the U.S. Left. "No, we arent going to let California go just because some conservatives are all butthurt about what asshats lefty Californians (who may not even be a majority of the population) have done or said in the past. "No, we're not going to let California go, but the process of not letting them go could be extremely beneficial for the U.S. in the long run. "(And vastly entertaining for people like me, too. I have popcorn.) "We can also lose a lot of asshats in the process." Ironbear Commenting on Realistically Speaking, This Is a Fools Errand @ Daily Pundit The pigeons used to roost on the roof of the decrepit Ellis Hotel in downtown Waterloo. Now the chickens are coming home to roost for Black Hawk County after a succession of government officials left the hotels remains buried for decades on the site, now the County Jail parking lot. Once again, the jails parking lot is sinking atop the buried, settling hotel remains. They were improperly disposed of when the hotel was demolished in 1986. Members of the county Board of Supervisors voted 4-1 last week to support an estimated $500,000 fix involving a full basement-level excavation of the parking lot along the East Fifth Street side of the jail. Consultants said a full-depth removal of the lot, some 12 to 15 feet deep, was the only way to guarantee it will not continue to sink. Cheaper options, including a partial excavation down five feet, were considered. Supervisor Craig White cast the only vote against the measure, saying he supported a cheaper option. County building maintenance superintendent Rory Geving acknowledged there was a chance for hidden costs, including hazardous material being discovered. If we go down 12 to 15 feet we dont know exactly whats in there, he said. Theres always that potential risk. Theres more than a potential risk. Asbestos was discovered in the rubble nearly 12 years ago during a previous excavation. In November 2004, Iowa Department of Natural Resources officials, touring the site with county officials, said the Ellis rubble contained asbestos, confirming a finding by then-Black Hawk County Solid Waste Management Commission director Gary Wilcox. They found a piece of transite, an asbestos-bearing siding material, in a test hole along with bedsprings and other material from the demolished hotel. In February 2005, the supervisors voted to permanently cover the asbestos-laden rubble for $90,000, as opposed to $450,000 for removing it. The area was to be reinforced, hard surfaced and fenced off from the general public. If any other future construction occurred on the site, the material would have to be excavated and hauled away, said then-city/county building official and county maintenance superintendent Louis Cutwright. That may be the only choice today. County officials inherited a problem they did not create. Previous county officials literally covered over the problem. And the city of Waterloo bears some responsibility for this fiasco. According to Courier files, the hotel was vacated and city inspectors red-tagged the five-story structures upper levels as unsafe to occupy following a November 1983 arson fire. In February 1986, the Waterloo City Council guaranteed a $27,500 loan from the Waterloo Industrial Development Association to Ellis owner O.J. Keiper to demolish the building. The city took over demolition by agreement with Keiper in September 1986 when work stalled. The city resumed demolition with a new contractor shortly thereafter. A caption under a picture in the Oct. 8, 1986, Courier reports crews were hauling rubble to the Black Hawk County Landfill. An Oct. 24, 1986, Courier article quoted city officials as saying city crews would begin filling the site the following week. But in the spring of 1993 almost three years after voters approved a $14.5 million referendum to build a new jail on the site the jails general contractor told supervisors some of the Ellis rubble was still buried there. The situation is a mess. We see no good option for the county but to bite the bullet and clean it up once and for all. Most the money, about $350,000, would come from reserve funds in the sheriffs room and board fund, recovered from inmates. But county officials will have to come up with other revenues for the remaining $100,000 or more, if costs run higher. It appears increasingly likely the taxpayers will be on the hook for at least some of the bill. Even if federal funds are found to assist with the cleanup, thats still taxpayer money. And thats outrageous, unfair and wrong. This Blog AMICOR is a communication instrument of a group of friends primarily interested in health promotion, with a focus on cardiovascular diseases prevention. 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And he sat in the middle of the floor and tried to stare at me. He was off a little in his line of sight and those blind eyes made me sad. I sat up and mumbled some more and Boza came over and laid his head on my lap. Yes, Boza is a good boy and since I am in tune with him, I know he needs to go out to do doggy business But, hey it is cold -32.3 C. and that means -26.14 in F So happy doggy and mumbling bear went outside to do doggy business. My breath tinkled as it froze instantly when I breathed out. Boza danced a doggy cold paw paw dance and down the mountain we went. Happy doggy soon became interested in why it seemed so cold beyond normal and soon he did his business and started for home. I found myself all alone standing at the bottom, in the valley and yelled out, Hey stink butt, where are you going? Boza did not listen and actually did not care. I found him at the gate waiting for the lumbering bear to get there. (To be truthful, Boza did come back several times to make sure I was alive! But always ran away. Kinda like hurry up dad!) We got inside where it is a much more pleasant +20 degrees C. and Boza ate three packs of dog food, then went back to bed. I ate two wraps with ham and Boza woke up just enough to eat bites of ham and went back to bed. Of course I am wide awake, thus I worked on some projects of mine and am writing this post 4:55 a.m. and it is warming up. -31.4 and settling at that * * * * * I want to mention something about my trip the other day to the Big Village My bus ride back to the Tiny Russian Village bus stop was interesting. The bus was basically packed and they made room for me near the front, since I would get off first. I guess I look like a public information terminal, because everyone always tries to ask me this and that. For Russians who do not know me, they talk to fast for me to gather their meaning many times. Just like English speakers talk to fast for non English speakers to comprehend many times. My brain is in English and the Russian is slow, from that But after everyone finds out I am an American, they were all excited. They were not understanding what this American would want to get off the bus at Kommuna or Tiny Russian Village. In fact they were worried. Worried enough to point out everything that might be an issue. That is a Russian for you. Always trying to help in one form or another I got off the bus at my stop and then I heard the bus driver make an exclamation. He just realized who I was. He turned to the bus passengers and told them about the Gazette and the American and Russian Sweetie (Svetochka.) Small town and small area, people know and remember everything. The bus got silent and I could feel everyone staring at me, as I put on my snowshoes. I ignored them and they just sat their with faces pressed against the windows of the bus. When I was done, I stood up and looked at them. I smiled and waved goodbye and everyone on the bus all waved and smiled. They were so excited. The very back of the bus made me almost giggle. Three babushkas were all fighting to get their faces in the last window to look at me. It was seriously wonderful. They had lost that worry about a stranger look and garnered the look, that he is one of us, even if a little different. They knew I was familiar and happy here. They also knew I was normal in this part of the world Regardless, I gave them something to talk about! As I turned to leave, I gave a thumbs up and everyone waved and smiled some really huge Russian smiles. The bus driver honked and off the bus went. That is what I love about Russians; 99% of them are the most wonderful people you would ever meet. They love strangers from other lands and they love to gossip. They showed me what is special about Russians; they were worried about me at first and then when they found out who I was, they became even more so attached to me. But they knew I lived here and I was no fool to worry about And yes a new American lost in this tiny Russian area would need to be worried about. Because you would find him or her frozen to death before they figured out about the way of life and its survival I just love Russia * * * * * Vova found the energy to walk to one of his girlfriends Vova realized that he needed a gal for a night. There is one gal who just loves him and she is really smitten with him. She was going to come to our village, but the weather is just too bad and Vova after huffing about lazy people, all of a sudden, realized if he wants a date, he better get moving Therefore, last night at about 5 p.m. Vova dressed like an Eskimo headed out. He knew he had a blazed trail to walk on, for I had already broken the ground all the way to the main road. Vova left the Tiny Russian Village, Vodka Flask in hand, singing his favorite songs and looking forward to a wonderful night. He said, do zavtra see you tomorrow. and disappeared from sight I smiled * * * * * I had a good night. No music blasting from Vovas home, no one wanted something, no one at all. Boza and I were alone for the most part. There is one babushka at the top of the village and she does not bother anyone. We (Boza and I) had the village to ourselves Peaceful night WtR Ann Gray Consulting LLC: How This Faith-Based Consulting Firm Is Revolutionizing the Marketing Industry 2022-11-03 | Ann Gray and her dedicated team at Ann Gray Consulting LLC are here to guide you through the process of elevating your social media presence. They are a faith-based organization with deeply held beliefs of integrity, honesty and ethics. See a romantic musical update of Romeo and Juliet set in a turf war between rival teenage gangs with two lovers who cross battle lines for love. January is "Oscar Best Pictures" month! This romantic musical update of 'Romeo and Juliet' won TEN OSCARS including Best Picture in 1961. It's the tale of a turf war between rival teenage gangs in Manhattan's Hell's Kitchen and the two lovers who cross battle lines for love. As always, our license to show movies for FREE at Tractor means that we can't use the NAME of the film in advertising outside our taprooms. We support our local cinemas and you should too! Do a little research to find out the title of this week's movie, or shoot us a message here on Facebook! Our Monday Night Film Club features a popcorn bar with all proceeds going to the Beer for a Better Burque non-profit beneficiary of the month. Jan 30, 2017 | By Benedict To celebrate the start of the Year of the Rooster, the Rose Kennedy Greenway park in Boston is hosting an unusual 3D printing project, created by artist Chris Templeman. Over the course of the year, a 3D printer will print out more than 2,000 3D printed plastic roosters for visitors to keep. Chris Templeman, Make and Take, 3D printed rooster Templeman is part of the Artisans Asylum fablab in Somerville, MA, and thought up the ambitious "Make and Take" 3D printing project as a way to commemorate the start of Chinese New Year, which began on January 28. The unique piece consists of a 3D printer surrounded by an eight-feet-tall transparent polycarbonate case, with the 3D printer programmed to print out small plastic roosters, over and over again, for the remainder of the year. 2017 is, of course, the Year of the Rooster. 2,000 plastic roosters will be 3D printed for Make and Take Make and Take provides a wonderful opportunity to pair old with new to engage The Greenways public art audience with a classic artform reimagined with todays technology, said Lucas Cowan, Greenway Conservancys Public Art Curator. Im delighted to commission a local artist from the maker community to showcase art, technology, and Chinese culture. Excitingly, visitors to the Rose Kennedy Greenway will get a chance to take home a 3D printed rooster for themselvesif they happen to see Make and Take at the right moment. Thats because each printed fowl will pop out of the bottom of the plastic case once printing is complete, which will be around every 3-4 hours. 2,000 3D printed roosters will be made over the course of the year. The original porcelain rooster from the Museum of Fine Arts The digital 3D model used to print each rooster comes from a 3D scan of a Chinese porcelain figurine from an exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. The 3D printed replicas of the figurine, however, will be printed in PLA. This contrast between the original porcelain and the new PLA is significant, with Templeman using the 3D printing process to make a statement: The work speaks to the democratization of manufacturing, he explains. With technologies like the 3D printer used for Make and Take, individuals can now produce objects once made exclusively by wealthy enterprises. Raised in Cleveland, Ohio, Templeman now lives and works in Somerville, Massachusetts, where he is an artist, engineer, and educator. Much of his work takes place at Artisans Asylum, and he frequently collaborates with other artists at New American Public Art. A Key theme of his work concerns the importance of increasing public access to manufacturing technologyMake and Take being an obvious example of his philosophy. Make and Take shines a light on how accessible technologies make it possible for everyone to design and realize their ideas with significantly fewer resources, Templeman says. In encountering Make and Take, the public is invited to view a marvel of modern technology: the ability to print physical objects. The 3D printer, while remaining to be a curiosity, can be purchased for the cost of a laptop. It is on its way to democratizing manufacturing and fabrication just as the computer and the Internet have democratized information. Chris Templeman's Make and Take (2017) Be sure to check back with us on February 16 next year in case somebody is laser cutting miniature dog figurines. Posted in Fun with 3D Printing Maybe you also like: Jan 30, 2017 | By Benedict Telecommunications company BT has spent 25,000 ($31,000) on a 3D printer for its distribution center in Leicestershire, England. The 3D Systems MJP 2500 Plus 3D printer is being used for prototyping and creating spare parts. BT (British Telecommunications) is a British multinational company that provides telephone, internet, and television services in roughly 180 countries around the world. Last year it acquired cellphone network EE for 12.5 billion, and currently has assets worth more than 38 billion. As in many industries, telecommunications can benefit from new and advanced manufacturing techniques, whether for installing new phone lines, producing internet routers, or simply fixing up existing equipment. Because of this, BT has recently installed a 3D System 3D printer at its distribution center in Leicestershire, where it will use the additive manufacturing machine for a number of purposes. Since purchasing its new 3D printer in December, BT has wasted no time in setting it up, with the ProJet MJP 2500 Plus reportedly fired up for the first time in mid-January. BT says it is using the printer for various purposes, including fabrication of spare and replacement parts that are no longer available from suppliers, fast production of urgently needed parts, and rapid prototyping of new items during the research and development stage of product development. The telecommunications company believes the 3D printer will help improve many aspects of life at the distribution center. Speaking to V3, BTs Andy Fielden, CIO Supply Chain and Cables, explained how the 3D printer has allowed BT to provide the stock items at the point of use without having to order, store, and distribute the itemthus significantly reducing cost and time to market. He added that the 3D Systems machine has enabled BT to print low volume items for our internal engineers and easily prototype and test new ideas. The idea of investing big money into a high-quality 3D printer came about after one engineer suggesting that 3D printed plastic needles (below) could be used to thread fibers. The idea was eventually turned into actuality on a MarkerBot Replicator 2X, a much more affordable desktop 3D printer, and the 3D printed pieces helped save the research lab a small amount of money. Before this, an engineer at Openreach (the BT subsidiary that deals with the UKs telephone cable network) had built her own 3D printer to show others how the technology could benefit BT. BT staff have said that, as 3D printing technology improves, they will consider adding to their additive manufacturing equipment, with the main focus of the technology being small-batch production of various parts. BT Lead Consultant Iain Monteath told V3 that BT was particularly attracted to 3D printers that let you print flexible and solid parts in one, since they could enable the company to print entire objects in one go. The 3D Systems ProJet MJP 2500 Plus has a build volume of 295 x 211 x 142 mm, a resolution of 800 x 900 x 790 DPI with 32 layers, and a typical accuracy of 0.1016 mm per 25.4 mm. Posted in 3D Printer Maybe you also like: my name wrote at 2/17/2017 10:35:37 PM:is this an adverticement for 3D Systems?Mike wrote at 1/31/2017 7:30:24 PM:Why is this news? A company buys a mid-range 3D printer. Who cares? Jan 30, 2017 | By Tess French 3D printing startup Prismadd is breaking into the big leagues as it kicks off production at its Montauban industrial 3D printing plant, equipped with five, soon to be seven, industrial 3D printers. The company, which signed a six million euro contract with European aerospace giant Airbus, expects to ship its first 3D printed titanium structural parts, designed for Airbus A350 aircraft, by the end of March this year. Prismadd was founded in 2014 through a collaboration between Montauban-based aeronautics manufacturer Farella, Grigny-based powder manufacturer Rhonatec, and Montigny-le-Bretonneux-based 3D printer company Creatix3D. In 2015, Prismadd joined We are Aerospace, an international industrial group founded by Chatal, Espace, Farella, and Armor Meca. Led by its president Philippe Riviere, Prismadd has grown significantly over the past few years, and is now ready to begin its industrial-scale additive manufacturing. As 37-year-old Riviere commented, We are transitioning from startup mode to industrial production. We are Aerospace president Pascal Farella echoed the statement, saying, Prismadd is becoming the spearhead of additive manufacturing. left-right: Philippe Riviere, president of Prismadd and Pascal Farella, president of We are Aerospace Currently, Prismadd has a total of 5 production sites, including its facility in Montauban, which specializes in additively manufacturing aerospace parts made of titanium and inconel (a nickel-based metal alloy); a factory in Grenoble which produces stainless steel parts for the energy, transport, and luxury sectors; a plant in Saint-Etienne which produces aluminum parts; Prismadd Atlantic, which specializes in plastic tooling parts for the aeronautics industry; and, most recently, a factory in Nagoya, Japan where aluminum and titanium parts are 3D printed. According to Prismadd, the company is also seeking to break into the North American aerospace and automotive industries, and is planning on opening three more of its facilities in Canada, Spain, and Asia. Currently, the company employs 38 people in its 3D printing factories and has a turnover of about three million euros a year. The quickly growing 3D printing company is confident that by the year 2021 it will achieve a turnover of 21 million euros. In terms of equipment, Prismadd has a versatile range of 3D printing technologies. As its website points out, at its various locations it is operating a number of plastic-based 3D printers including FORTUS 900, Projet 5000, and Spro 230 3D printers; and various metal 3D printers, such as the ARCAM Q10, SLM 125, ProX 100, ProX 300, and ProX400. As the company scales up its production, and with clients as established as Airbus, there is little doubt that Prismadd will continue to rise within the industrial 3D printing sector. Posted in 3D Printer Company Maybe you also like: Jan 30, 2017 | By Tess A couple living in Berkeley, California were tragically found dead in their home last Monday, possibly due to carbon monoxide poisoning. Sources are speculating that the poison may have been caused by the couples 3D printer, though others have denied this. An investigation into the cause of death is still underway. The couple, Valerie (32) and Roger Morash (35), who had met while studying at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, were found dead in their Berkeley, CA home last week. The couples pets, two cats, were also found. Valerie was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute and Roger was a video game developer. Though the definitive cause of death has not been released, many sources are speculating that they died from carbon monoxide poisoning. Carbon monoxide (CO) is a toxic odorless, colorless, and tasteless gas that is produced by fuel-burning machines, such as cars, stoves, furnaces, etc. Strangely, though no autopsy has been released, sources such as The Daily Mail have suggested that a 3D printer or laser cutting machine was responsible for the carbon monoxide emissions. The machine was reported as being a laser 3D printer, though a friend of the couple said they owned a small commercial laser cutter and a small desktop 3D printer, neither of which were likely in use at the time of the couple's death. Roger (35) and Valerie (32) Morash Allen Rabinovich, a friend of the couple, stated: This is all pure speculation. The device named in the KPIX CBS article (laser 3D printer) doesnt even exist, and we are in contact with the police, who are still working on official investigation results. Wed like to ask the press to refrain from speculating until official results come out. Whether we know tonight or a week from now wont change the fact that two amazing human beings have passed far too soon. Our focus right now is on preserving and magnifying their legacy. The results of the autopsies, which were completed on Wednesday, have yet to be made public. Because of this, it is best to ignore both the conclusions of The Daily Mail (implicating the 3D printer) and the conclusions of other 3D printing media outlets (ruling out involvement of the 3D printer based on no concrete evidence). A private memorial service for the couple, who were avid 3D printing enthusiasts, was held on Friday in Berkeley, CA. Friends and family of Val and Roger Morash also set up a GoFundMe campaign to raise money for family travel and funeral costs. So far, theyve raised over $15K, some of which will be donated to a cause of the familys choosing. Of course, it can be easy to jump to conclusions after tragic events, but until conclusive evidence is given by authorities, it cannot be assumed that a 3D printer or laser cutter was the cause of the couples death. Likewise, we cannot, at this point, strictly rule it out. Photos from Facebook Posted in 3D Printer Maybe you also like: Jay wrote at 3/23/2017 11:21:01 PM:You have the same problems when you burn scented candles or insense or when you burn toast or overheat your old non-stick pans or burn the bacon. Not to mention nail polish remover and many cleaning products.Tech community wrote at 2/4/2017 3:41:52 PM:There is a big community of laser cutters and 3D printer users which are waiting for conclusion related to their machines and materials. Easily thousands of people who don't want to be next. We are waiting for answer what's happens or at last to exclude any reasons.Eric Spidell wrote at 1/31/2017 6:48:01 AM:Why would anyone even begin to think that a 3D printer which uses relatively low heat (Not LASERS) could emit CO? And a Carbon Dioxide laser (CO2) would also not be the suspect as the 2 gasses are VERY different. So much fail going on here. Here is an idea... CHECK THE HOME HEATER!!! THE MAIN CAUSE OF CARBON MONOXIDE(CO) DEATHS IN THE USA!!!. What a total stretch to try to put 3D printers in a bad light. Seems like Australia and their "police" with pictures of toy guns hit California. So much bad publicity going around needs to be hit hard with common sense.SpyerSecol wrote at 1/30/2017 10:23:40 PM:CO2 or carbonDIoxide and CO or carbonMONoxide are 2 very different chemicals. One is poisonousin small quantities, the other takes LARGE amounts of gas to kill.Robin Leech wrote at 1/30/2017 7:41:39 PM:I would speculate that they made their own laser sintering 3D printer or something and used a home-made CO2 laser and had a canister of C02 that leaked. Carbon monoxide detectors in my opinion are maybe more important than smoke detectors, especially if you live in a small house. You're more likely to smell smoke and get out or deal with a fire than you are to notice an odorless gas.Chuck wrote at 1/30/2017 6:29:09 PM:Thanks, I was waiting for 3ders to comment. I was wondering about this event and this confirms my suspicions that the "jury is out" on what actually happened.MarcC wrote at 1/30/2017 2:56:54 PM:Absolutely Tragic ALL makers out there when you heat materials to melt or burn them in addition to an obvious unpleasant smell and the risk of fire there is a greatly increased and very real fatal risk from the emitted fumes particularly from some materials but all of them if preformed in confined or poorly ventilated spaces. https://www.directplastics.co.uk/whats-in-those-fumes.html by Espen Sommer Eide It is a tingling sense of presence in the room, when I finally press play on the generated audio file, and hear my trained deep-learning neural net try to formulate new and never before spoken sentences in a language where the last fluent speaker passed away in 2003. When Edison invented the phonograph, it was soon conceived as a means not primarily to play music, but to hear voices of dead persons. The voices recorded on the phonograph were experienced as sounds without bodies, as spirits in space. Listening intensely to the sound, at first I can hear only static noise, but deep inside it various spectral shapes and pulses are starting to make themselves present. I think this is what it must have felt like for Edison when he played his first ghost-like recording of a human voice. Two early versions of experiment: Recently there have been big breakthroughs in the field of artificial intelligence and machine learning. Over a period of just a couple of years, it has found new and novel uses in everything from self-driving cars and medical image processing to automatic translation algorithms, including speech recognition and natural language processing. Companies such as Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft and the Chinese firm Baidu are currently competing in hunting down and clearing out whole computer science departments at universities around the globe, in order to employ the best heads in the field. One of the technologies driving this revolution goes by names such as deep learning and deep neural networks. In short, the form of computing that is inspired by the brain and its billions of neurons working in parallel to interpret and act in accordance with its surroundings. What has made this old idea of neural networks make such a comeback is the recent availability of big data large data sets used in the training of the networks, and also the speed of parallel processing in modern GPU chipsets. As an artist and electronic musician with a keen interest in language and computing, I came across an article published fall 2016, where a group of Google scientists had turned towards the field of audio to try to improve artificial speech[1]. What triggered my imagination was not the fact that they had succeeded in making computer speech sounding much more natural, but the weird by-products of trying the technology out on musical material and other sounds. I had to try this out myself and I fearlessly installed the necessary software on one of Google's cloud-based computing engines to run the tests. My first experiments were with a collection of water-insect field recordings, and also with my own music to see if it could learn to "sound" like tracks of my musical projects phonophani or alog (possibly putting me out of work in the process!). Water insects: Phonophani music: The really big step forward compared to previous techniques is that the trained model is on a sample-by-sample level, so the algorithm really doesn't care if the sounds used for training are a factory siren, a water insect or a piano. The neural network becomes a black box where it is hard to visualise what is actually going on inside. It learns by itself with no instructions on how to replicate the sounds it is fed. And if not correlated with some strictly labelled material it just babbles away meaninglessly like it is speaking in tongues. Or in case of musical material it sounds like a stuttering of half thought-out musical phrases. One big challenge for working with music and deep learning will be the access to a big dataset. In computer vision research, large databases of tagged visual material are readily accessible, and have been for a decade or so. This is what has made the striking visual art of the various neural deep dreaming projects possible (inspired by the 2015 Google inceptionism project[2]). But in the field of music and sound large datasets for this purpose are just now being assembled for the first time[3]. I turned my experiments back towards language again. Would it be possible to train a deep learning network for a dead language? I have in my previous art projects worked extensively with languages that are endangered or already extinct so called dying languages[4]. Every ten days a language disappears, and at that rate, within a few generations, half of the approximately 6000 languages in the world today will be extinct. The concept of a dying language is a highly complex mechanism. In order for language to survive, it is of central importance that the language is in use, especially in normal households, and between generations of a family. Can a language be kept and conserved for future generations, or is a language alive only when actively used and spoken between people in a society? Can a language be detached from a people's culture, knowledge and identity? Among the family of Sami languages (of the indigenous groups of northern Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia), several of the languages are already extinct or with very few and old speakers left, but efforts are being made to help revive some of them. From a contact in the Freiburg Research Group in Saami Studies, I got hold of the last remaining recorded material from an already dead language, Akkala Sami, from north-west Russia. One of the last speakers, "Piotr", tells a story and sings a song. What if I trained a deep learning model to speak this lost language, using this material for the training? Could it be a way to hear the language spoken again, as if it were living? Could it give any insights into how it sounds that are not already present in the final recordings? Could it somehow give a language its illusive sense of presence back? Original story used for training (excerpt): Three stages in the learning process[5]: From the vantage point of art, it is not so important whether what comes out of this experiment keeps intact the meaning of some speaker, some knowledge, correct grammar etc. I only care for the sound itself, the material content, or the medium itself. Some of the uncanniest generated files are the ones that are almost silent, where only the breathing and some small sounds of the mouth between words are generated. This babbling, or "dreaming" as it is often also called when the neural network is turned inward on itself, is an excellent method to highlight the pure audible element of speech. Also it makes clear what is unique to a certain language, and therefore a possible answer to the question of what is lost if the language is lost. In the end, I would not label my experiments a success. They are a sketch of a rudimentary idea, a proof of concept at most. In my experiments with musical material, it is not the quality of the musical results that interests me, but the sense of an outside presence or otherness in the sounds generated without a plan or program formulated by a human consciousness. I think this is a central part of my experience of any "deep" art, that there is some singular and unknown method or secret autonomous algorithm working within the piece that makes it endlessly fascinating. In short, the work becomes a character a face in front of you but not necessarily a human face. The oft-cited Turing test is used to measure the success of an artificial intelligence like the one I have created. In this case a slightly amended version, a Turing test for art. In the original test, a human subject is to determine whether he or she is fooled by the machine to count it as a human consciousness. Much can be argued against such a simplistic test, but I think its biggest flaw is that it is fundamentally anthropocentric in its approach. Why should a human determine what intelligence is? If we at any point should meet a form of artificial intelligence in this "strong" sense, it will be characterised by its total otherness, and not in any way comparable to our way of thinking. It will be like the black box of the deep learning layers, where we will not ever be able to visualise its multi-dimensional structure. Similarly to the question of whether animals can think or feel like us, the whole question of intelligence becomes too narrow in scope. What matters is our natural reactions and emotions when put in front of the other. Final generations: This is how far the experiment got before publishing this text. The result of one and a half month of 24 hour deep learning Akkala Sami on a cloud-based cpu-server. I felt something happening the final few days, it was as if the voice was starting to coalesce into less stuttering less like Schwitters "Ursonate" and more flow, and maybe less anger and shouting? Or is it just my mind playing tricks with me? It is one of the biggest challenges to know when to quit. Just one more hour of learning Just one little change of code and try again The main weakness in my experiment was the limited amount of source material. I would need access to a larger data corpus of a language to move further. This highlights the increased importance of archives in the future. The world must become even more "data-centric". How will artificial intelligence change a world characterised by homogeneity and the destruction of diversity? Will artificial intelligence make possible a new way of preserving the unique and singular? A preserving of the past by making it present all around us? In the case of my experiment the next logical step will be to team up with linguists and computer scientists to move the idea further. Still, it is a case in point that I, with my limited specialist knowledge of the technology, was capable of running experiments of this kind[6]. The technology will become even more democratised when the prices of fast GPU processors come down to a consumer level. How could artificial intelligence assist in the creation of art? Will it be a new form of post-human art, as some speculate? The bigger question is what deep learning will mean for art and culture, for creativity, for social studies and the humanities. This is a future that I, and many others will discover and take part in shaping over the coming years. by Jalees Rehman Words are routinely abused by those in power to manipulate us but we should be most vigilant when we encounter a new class of "plastic words". What are these plastic words? In 1988, the German linguist Uwe Porksen published his landmark book "Plastikworter:Die Sprache einer internationalen Diktatur" (literal translation into English: "Plastic words: The language of an international dictatorship") in which he describes the emergence and steady expansion during the latter half of the 20th century of selected words that are incredibly malleable yet empty when it comes to their actual meaning. Plastic words have surreptitiously seeped into our everyday language and dictate how we think. They have been imported from the languages of science, technology and mathematics, and thus appear to be imbued with their authority. When used in a scientific or technological context, these words are characterized by precise and narrow definitions, however this precision and definability is lost once they become widely used. Porksen's use of "plastic" refers to the pliability of how these words can be used and abused but he also points out their similarity to plastic lego bricks which act as modular elements to construct larger composites. The German language makes it very easy to create new composite words by combining two words but analogous composites can be created in English by stringing together multiple words. This is especially important for one of Porksen's key characteristics of plastic words: they have become part of an international vocabulary with cognate words in numerous languages. Here are some examples of "plastic words"(German originals are listed in parentheses next to the English translations) see if you recognize them and if you can give a precise definition of what they mean: exchange (Austausch) information (Information) communication (Kommunikation) process (Prozess) resource (Ressource) strategy (Strategie) structure (Struktur) relationship (Beziehung) substance (Substanz) progress (Fortschritt) model (Modell) development (Entwicklung) value (Wert) system (System) function (Funktion) growth (Wachstum) supply (Versorgung) quality (Qualitat) welfare (Wohlfahrt) planning (Planung) Even though these words are very difficult to pin down in terms of their actual meaning, they are used with a sense of authority that mandates their acceptance and necessity. They are abstract expressions that imply the need for expertise to understand and implement their connotation. Their implicit authority dissuades us from questioning the appropriateness of their usage and displaces more precise or meaningful synonyms. They have a modular lego-like nature so that they can be strung together with each other or with additional words to expand their authority; for example, "resource development", "information society", "strategic relationship" or "communication process". How about the word "love"? Love is also very difficult to define but when we use it, we are quite aware of the fact that it carries many different nuances. We tend to ask questions such as "What kind of love? Erotic, parental, romantic, spiritual? Who is in love and is it truly love?" On the other hand, when we hear "resource development', we may just nod our heads in agreement. Of course resources need to be developed! Porksen published his book during the pre-internet, Cold War era and there have been new families of plastic words that could perhaps be added to the list in the 21st century. For one, there is the jargon of Silicon Valley that used by proponents of internet-centrism. Words such as digital, cyber, internet, online, data or web have entered everyday language but we rarely think about their actual meaning. The word internet, for example, technically refers to a bunch of servers and input devices and screen connected by cables and routers but it has taken on a much broader cultural and societal significance. An expression such as internet economy should elicit the important question of who is part of the "internet economy" and who is left out? The elderly and the poor have limited access to the internet in many countries of the world but we may gloss over this fact when we speak of the internet. The words innovation, integration, global and security/safety have also become key plastic words in the 21st century. How do these plastic words become vehicles for the imposition of rigid views and tyranny? Two recent examples exemplify this danger. The British Prime Minister Theresa May justified Britain's decision to leave the European Union after a campaign characterized by anti-immigrant prejudice and nationalism in a speech by invoking Britain's new global role: "I want us to be a truly Global Britain the best friend and neighbour to our European partners, but a country that reaches beyond the borders of Europe too. A country that goes out into the world to build relationships with old friends and new allies alike." It is difficult to argue with the positive connotation of a Global Britain. Global evokes images of the whole planet Earth, and why shouldn't Britain forge new relationships with all the people and countries on our planet? However, the nationalist and racist sentiments that prompted the vote to leave the European Union surely did not mean that Britain would welcome people from all over the globe. In fact, the plastic words global and relationships allow the British government to arbitrarily define the precise nature of these relationships, likely focused on maximizing trade and profits for British corporations while ignoring the poorer nations of our globe. Similarly, an executive order issued by the new American president Donald Trump within a week of his inauguration banned the entry of all foreigners heralding from a selected list of Muslim-majority countries into the USA citing concerns about security, safety and welfare of the American people. As with many plastic words, achieving security, safety and welfare sound like important and laudable goals but they also allow the US government to arbitrarily define what exactly constitutes security, safety and welfare of the American people. One of the leading enforcement agencies of the totalitarian East German state was the Stasi (Ministerium fur Staatssicherheit Ministry for State Security). It allowed the East German government to arrest and imprison any citizen deemed to threaten the state's security as defined by the Stasi. How do we respond to the expanding use of plastic words? We should be aware of the danger inherent in using these words because they allow people in power corporations, authorities or government agencies to define their meanings. When we hear plastic words, we need to ask about the context of how and why they are used, and replace them with more precise synonyms. Resist the tyranny of plastic words by asking critical questions. Reference: Porksen, U. (1988). Plastikworter: die Sprache einer internationalen Diktatur. Klett-Cotta. English translation: Poerksen, U. (1995). Plastic words: The tyranny of a modular language. Penn State Press. In case you needed something adorable to cheer you up after this weekend's political shit show (#NoBanNoWall), know that baby elephant seals are popping up all over the California coast. Each year, from December through March, colonies of northern elephant seals gather on beaches for their birthing and mating rituals. The New York Times reported that the breeding colony (called a rookery) at Point Piedras Blancasabout an hour north of San Luis Obispo on Highway 1had packed in tightly to protect the pups from being swept away by the big waves. The scene can be raucous: Newborn pups squeal, females cry out while giving birth, and floppy-nosed, 2.5-ton males snort and fight for mating and territorial dominance. To see the action, there are viewing areas at both Piedras Blancas and Ano Nuevo State Park, where another big colony gathers north of Santa Cruz. There is also a live webcam if you'd prefer to check out the action from the safety of your desk. 6. Mesa, Ariz. There was a time when you couldnt talk about retirement without mentioning Arizona. And Mesa is one of the reasons why. The city offers the sixth-lowest average effective property taxes and the 18th-lowest average effective income tax rate. 7. Raleigh, N.C. Although health insurance here can get pricey, Raleigh rises toward the top when it comes to cost of living, sales tax and housing costs. The states capital is also awash in art galleries, local boutiques and diverse dining options. 8. Pittsburgh, Pa. This citys attractiveness is tilted in favor of those who are especially health conscious. The city ranks sixth for average health care expenses and also has the eighth-most medical facilities per resident. 9. Saint Petersburg, Fla. Florida hasnt completely lost its grip on retirees. Although the cost of health insurance is fairly high about $8,300 per year, on average Saint Petersburg is a standout when it comes to affordability and the number of medical facilities per resident. 10. (tie) Tampa, Fla. Like Saint Petersburg, Tampa is a pretty inexpensive place to live, making it another attractive option for early retirees. The city also offers an impressive 10 medical facilities per 1,000 residents. 10. (tie) Henderson, Nev. Finally, theres Henderson, about 16 miles northeast of Las Vegas. Along with being a safe city, it gives retirees their pick of a whole host of quality medical facilities. In the end, where you will want to retire early depends a lot on the health of your nest egg. To find out if youve saved enough, check out SmartAssets retirement calculator. The Angriest is a blog by award-winning Australian playwright and science fiction critic Grant Watson. Current regular features on this blog include episode-by-episode rewatches of Star Trek, a weekly comic book review column called The Pull List, and occassional reviews of Akira Kurosawa's films in chronological order. In 2016 Grant was awarded Best Fan Writer at the Australian Science Fiction Achievement "Ditmar" Awards. You might also like to check out FictionMachine , which is where Grant puts all of his full-length film criticism. Singapore January 30, 2017 DIGIMARCON, a globally recognized digital marketing conference is coming to Singapore this fall. DIGIMARCON ASIA PACIFIC 2017 takes place September 20 21, 2017, at the luxurious Marina Bay Sands Expo and Convention Centre, Singapore. The event will temporarily transform Singapore into a digital marketing hot zone, hosting some of todays top marketing thought leaders, business professionals, sales professionals, entrepreneurs, designers and executives all coming together to discuss the latest trends, technologies and best practices in todays digitized environment. Among the topics included on this years agenda: Content marketing trends Social media dos and donts Data mining and analysis The latest in lead nurturing The future of SEO and SEM DIGIMARCON ASIA PACIFIC 2017 will be brimming with keynote presentations, panel discussions, breakouts, networking opportunities, as well as hands-on product demonstrations offered by representatives from todays hottest technology organizations. Each year, we are honored to have executives and professionals participate in our events and serve as ambassadors on behalf of top brands they represent, says Aaron Polmeer, organizer of the event. Our 2017 agenda carries on this tradition. We have also continued our tradition of inviting some of the worlds most inspirational and insightful speakers to take the stage and discuss the latest marketing, sales trends and technology. To be part of DIGIMARCON ASIA PACIFIC 2017, visit http://digimarconapac.com About DIGIMARCON ASIA PACIFIC 2017 DIGIMARCON ASIA PACIFIC 2017 is a marketing event like no other: the agenda is specifically designed to help attendees learn how to build traffic, enhance brand awareness, improve customer service and make better use of todays hottest digital tools. Media Contact Company Name: DIGIMARCON, LLC Contact Person: Aaron Polmeer Email: aaron@digimarcon.com Phone: (800) 805-5385 Address:1500 Broadway City: New York State: NY Country: United States Website: http://digimarconapac.com MARKET RESEARCH REPORTS AND INDUSTRY Personal Accident and Health Insurance Market, Personal Accident and Health Insurance Market Research, Personal Accident and Health Insurance Market Report, Personal Accident and Health Insurance Market Analysis, Personal Accident and Health Insurance Market Size, Personal Accident and Health Insurance Market Share Personal Accident and Health Insurance in Malaysia Key Trends and Opportunities to 2020 report provides a detailed outlook by product category for the Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment, and a comparison of the Malaysian insurance industry with its regional counterparts. It provides key performance indicators such as written premium, incurred loss, loss ratio, commissions and expenses, combined ratio, total assets, total investment income and retentions during the review period (20112015) and forecast period (20152020). The report also analyzes distribution channels operating in the segment, gives a comprehensive overview of the Malaysian economy and demographics, and provides detailed information on the competitive landscape in the country. The report brings together Radiant Insightss research, modeling and analysis expertise, giving insurers access to information on segment dynamics and competitive advantages, and profiles of insurers operating in the country. The report also includes details of insurance regulations, and recent changes in the regulatory structure. Download full research report @ http://www.radiantinsights.com/research/personal-accident-and-health-insurance-in-malaysia-key-trends-and-opportunities-to-2020 Synopsis Personal Accident and Health Insurance in Malaysia Key Trends and Opportunities to 2020 report provides in-depth market analysis, information and insights into the Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment, including: An overview of the Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment The Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segments growth prospects by category A comprehensive overview of the Malaysian economy and demographics A comparison of the Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment with its regional counterparts The various distribution channels in the Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment Details of the competitive landscape in the personal accident and health insurance segment in Malaysia Details of regulatory policy applicable to the Malaysian insurance industry Request a Free Sample Copy of this Report @ http://www.radiantinsights.com/research/personal-accident-and-health-insurance-in-malaysia-key-trends-and-opportunities-to-2020/request-sample Scope This report provides a comprehensive analysis of the personal accident and health insurance segment in Malaysia: It provides historical values for the Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment for the reports 20112015 review period, and projected figures for the 20152020 forecast period. It offers a detailed analysis of the key categories in the Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment, and market forecasts to 2020. It provides a comparison of the Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment with its regional counterparts It provides an overview of the various distribution channels for personal accident and health insurance products in Malaysia. It profiles the top personal accident and health insurance companies in Malaysia, and outlines the key regulations affecting them. Reasons to Buy Make strategic business decisions using in-depth historic and forecast market data related to the Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment, and each category within it. Understand the demand-side dynamics, key market trends and growth opportunities in the Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment. Assess the competitive dynamics in the personal accident and health insurance segment. Identify growth opportunities and market dynamics in key product categories. Gain insights into key regulations governing the Malaysian insurance industry, and their impact on companies and the industrys future. Browse All Reports of This Category @ http://www.radiantinsights.com/catalog/insurance Key Highlights The personal accident and health segment accounted for 4.2% of the industrys direct written premium in 2015. Changing lifestyle patterns and the prevalence of diseases such as diabetes, respiratory disorders and other critical illnesses led to a rise in healthcare expenditure, which is generating a demand for health insurance. The threat of cancer, diabetes and respiratory disorders has encouraged personal accident and health insurers to expand their product portfolios. The Malaysian personal accident and health insurance segment is highly competitive, and contains both domestic and foreign insurers. Read more related reports by Radiant Insights: Reinsurance Market in Malaysia http://www.radiantinsights.com/research/reinsurance-in-malaysia-key-trends-and-opportunities-to-2020 Life Insurance Market in Canada http://www.radiantinsights.com/research/life-insurance-in-canada-key-trends-and-opportunities-to-2020 About Radiant Insights, Inc Radiant Insights is a platform for companies looking to meet their market research and business intelligence requirements. We assist and facilitate organizations and individuals procure market research reports, helping them in the decision making process. We have a comprehensive collection of reports, covering over 40 key industries and a host of micro markets. In addition to over extensive database of reports, our experienced research coordinators also offer a host of ancillary services such as, research partnerships/ tie-ups and customized research solutions Media Contact Company Name: Radiant Insights, Inc. Contact Person: Michelle Thoras, Corporate Sales Specialist USA Email: sales@radiantinsights.com Phone: (415) 349-0054, Toll Free: 1-888-202-9519 Address:28 2nd Street, Suite 3036 City: San Francisco State: California Country: United States Website: http://www.radiantinsights.com/research/personal-accident-and-health-insurance-in-malaysia-key-trends-and-opportunities-to-2020 The mobile signal booster market analysis is provided for the international regions (North America, Europe, China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan) including development history, competitive landscape analysis, and major regions development status. eMarketOrg.com adds Global Mobile Signal Booster Market Research Report 2017 of 128 pages, profiling 10 companies supported with 142 data tables and figures to the IT and Telecom segment collection of it library. Mobile signal booster market products by 2 types are discussed in this study, which is a professional and in-depth look on the current state of the cell phone signal booster industry. The mobile signal booster market analysis is provided for the international markets by regions covering North America, Europe, China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan including development history, competitive landscape analysis, and major regions development status. This is the latest, professional and in-depth study on the current state of the Mobile signal booster industry. Firstly, the report provides a basic overview of the industry including production market share by type, consumption market share by application as well as regional overview. The cell phone signal booster market analysis is provided for the international market including development history, competitive landscape analysis, and major regions development status. Complete Global Mobile Signal Booster Market Research Report 2017 is available at http://emarketorg.com/pro/global-mobile-signal-booster-market-research-report-2017/ . Secondly, development policies and plans are discussed as well as manufacturing processes and cost structures. This 2017 mobile signal booster market report also states import/export, supply and consumption figures as well as cost, price, revenue and gross margin by regions. Then, the report focuses on global major leading industry players with information such as company profiles, manufacturing base, competitors, product type, application and specification, production, price, revenue, gross margins and overall business overview. Upstream raw materials and downstream consumers analysis is also carried out. What s more, the mobile signal booster market development trends and marketing channels are analyzed. Finally, the market factors effecting the mobile signal booster industry are assessed, and overall research conclusions are offered. In a word, the report provides major statistics on the state of the mobile signal booster market and is a valuable source of guidance and direction for companies and individuals interested in the market. The 10 mobile signal booster market companies profiled in this 2012 2022 research include SureCall, weBoost, Bird Technologies, Cisco Systems, CommScope, Digital Antenna, Nextivity, Remotek Corporation, Shenzhen Phonetone Technology and Smoothtalker. Get your questions on this 2017 mobile signal booster market report answered via http://emarketorg.com/inquire-before-buying/?product-id=85352 . On a related note, Global Digital Signal Processors Market Research Report 2017 provides sales value and production output of digital signal processors. This report talks about companies like Altera Corporation, Analog Devices, Ceva, Broadcom Corporation, Freescale Semiconductor, Infineon Technologies AG, LSI Corporation, Marvell Technology Group, MIPS Technologies and NXP Semiconductors. Applications of digital signal processors market into segments like consumer electronics, automotive, healthcare and others are studied at length in this report of 122 pages available at http://emarketorg.com/pro/global-digital-signal-processors-market-research-report-2017/ . Yet another study titled Global Audible & Visual Signaling Devices Market Research Report 2017 is spread across 121 pages, supported with 142 data tables, figures and talks about companies like Siemens AG, Honeywell International, Inc., ABB Ltd., Rockwell Automation, Inc., Eaton Corporation PLC (Cooper Industries), Emerson Electric Co., Patlite Corporation, R. Stahl AG, E2S Warning Signals, NHP Electrical Engineering Products Pty Ltd., Federal Signal Corporation, Werma Signaltechnik GmbH, Potter Electric Signal Company, LLC and Tomar Electronics, Inc. Read more at http://emarketorg.com/pro/global-audible-visual-signaling-devices-market-research-report-2017/ . Explore more reports on IT & Telecom market at http://emarketorg.com/cat/information-technology-telecom/page/2/ . About Us: eMarketOrg.com aims to provide businesses and organizations market intelligence products and services that help in making smart, instant and crucial decisions. Our database offers access to insights from industry leaders, experts and influencers on global and regional sectors, market trends, user behaviour, for companies as well as products. With data and information from reputable and trusted private and public sources, our clients are never short of statistics and analysis that are up to date. Contact Details: Ronald Alden | sales@emarketorg.com Connect With Us: Market Research Blog: http://emarketorg.com/blog/ News on current market trends and more: http://emarketorg.com/news1/ Follow Us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/emarketorg Follow us on G+ https://plus.google.com/collection/w7ioaB Media Contact Company Name: EMarketOrg.com Contact Person: Ronald Alden Email: sales@emarketorg.com Phone: +91-8793334224 Country: India Website: http://emarketorg.com/pro/global-mobile-signal-booster-market-research-report-2017/ ALA - Advanced Logistics for Aerospace has been awarded one of the UK-Italy Business Awards by the UK Department for International Trade at the January 26th Ceremony in Milan. ALA was chosen among several companies thanks to its investments in the UK market, bringing specific expertise, systemic know-how and new job opportunities. In 2016 ALA acquired the Anglo-French group STAG and its controlled companies Spectech UK, Spectech France, Spectech US and ACES. As of the beginning of 2017, all controlled companies, to include those of the former STAG Group, trade with the ALA Advanced Logistics for Aerospace single and global Brand. "Being a protagonist in the UK market is as key part of ALA strategic priority for 2020, independently from Brexit. This award is a confirmation that we are on the right path," said, Roberto Scaramella, CEO of ALA. "This award incentivizes us to further explore others opportunities, as we just opened a trading office in Texas, USA and we are about to begin commercial operations in China." The UK-Italy Business Awards acknowledge achievements by Italian companies and individuals who invested in the UK. The Awards Ceremony is organized by the UK Department for International Trade and the British Consulate-General in Milan in cooperation with Borsa Italiana - London Stock Exchange Group. AF buys next lot of Pegasus tankers The Air Force has awarded a $2.1 billion contract to Boeing for the third Low Rate Initial Production lot of KC-46A Pegasus tankers. This award includes 15 aircraft and associated spare parts. The first two production lots for seven and 12 aircraft respectively were awarded in August 2016. This award brings the total number of tankers purchased by the Air Force to 34. "This program is moving forward at a steady rate," said Brig. Gen. Duke Z. Richardson, the program executive officer for tankers. "We are getting aircraft on contract and moving them down the production line, meeting test requirements, and preparing for iron on the ramp." The first aircraft delivery is scheduled for McConnell Air Force Base, Kansas, which is the first active duty Air Force operating location (OL) for the Pegasus. That delivery will be followed by deliveries to Altus AFB, Oklahoma, the Pegasus training location, and Pease Air National Guard Base, New Hampshire, the second OL. "Placing an order for another 15 aircraft is an important milestone for the KC-46 program," said Col. John Newberry, the KC-46 System Program manager. "I know the warfighter is excited about bringing this next generation capability into the inventory." An online petition seeking cancellation of US President Donald Trumps State Visit to the UK has quickly crossed the one-million signature-mark to be considered for a debate in British Parliament, amid international uproar over his controversial immigration ban on people from seven Muslim nations. The petition titled Prevent Donald Trump from making State Visit to the United Kingdom on the UK Parliament website was created on Saturday afternoon and rapidly collected the 100,000 signatures needed for it to be considered for a debate in the House of Commons. The issue will be discussed in the House Commons on Tuesday for a date to be set for the debate. Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen, the petition reads. Donald Trumps well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore, during the term of his presidency, Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official State Visit, it adds. British Prime Minister Theresa May had communicated the invitation to Trump on behalf of Queen Elizabeth II during her US visit last week. At least Six people have been killed and eight wounded in a shooting at a Quebec City mosque, city police said on Sunday. Authorities reported two arrests in what Quebecs premier and Canadas prime minister called an act of terrorism. Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre President Mohamed Yangui reported the number of dead late Sunday in a telephone call from the provincial capital. Yangui said the shooting happened in the mens section of the mosque. He initially said five males had died and he worried that some were children. He said he wasnt at the center when the attack occurred but he got some details from people on the scene. He said an estimated 60-100 people would have been there at the time of the shooting. We are sad for the families, he said. Both Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard characterized the attack as a terrorist act, which came amid heightened tensions worldwide over US President Donald Trumps travel ban on certain Muslim countries. We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge, Trudeau said in a statement. It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country, he added. Canadian law enforcement agencies will protect the rights of all Canadians, and will make every effort to apprehend the perpetrators of this act and all acts of intolerance. Quebec City police spokesman Constable Pierre Poirier said two suspects were arrested. Police said the mosque had been evacuated and things were under control. Trudeau said on Twitter that he spoke to Quebecs premier and was being briefed by officials. The prime minister said the government had offered any & all assistance needed. Trudeau had earlier reacted to Trumps visa ban for people from certain Muslim-majority countries by tweeting Saturday: To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength (hash) WelcomeToCanada. Trudeau also posted a picture of him greeting a Syrian child at Torontos airport in late 2015. Trudeau oversaw the arrival of more than 39,000 Syrian refugees soon after he was elected. Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard termed the act barbaric violence and expressed solidarity with the victims families. The mayor of Gatineau, Quebec near Canadas capital of Ottawa, said there would be increased police presence at mosques around his city following the attack. The New York Police Department said it was stepping up patrols at mosques and other hours of worships in its city. The NYPD issued a statement Sunday night saying Critical Response Command personnel had been assigned to extended tour coverage at certain mosques. NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something, New York City Mayor Bill Blasio said on Twitter. Our prayers tonight are with the people of Quebec City as they deal with a terrible attack on a mosque. We must stand together, Blasio said in another tweet. Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said on Twitter Sunday that he was deeply saddened by the loss of life. His office said no motive had been confirmed. In the summer of 2016 a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre. The incident occurred in the middle of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. Practicing Muslims do not eat pork. Bhoomata Brigade chief and gender rights activist Trupti Desai, who shot to fame for spearheading the agitation seeking parity to women over their restricted entry into places of worship, has now announced to launch a new campaign for a liquor-free Maharashtra. I am going to launch the statewide campaign soon, and it will start from Pune. There are more men who consume liquor but its the women suffer most because of it. Liquor consumption also increases domestic violence; Hence I am keen on setting up Taigiri groups that would extend support to women suffering in such cases, said Desai. If a district like Chandrapur can successfully implement a flat ban on liquor, why not entire Maharashtra state follow suit, Desai said. If Guardian ministers of each district initiate the process, liquor ban can be implemented in a few days, she felt. Desai alleged that the state government seems to be not concerned with key issues of liquor consumption and its impact on lives of people, especially women in this state. After holding a couple of meetings with the members of the Brigade, I will soon launch the campaign, Desai said. I am going to follow the path of Mahatma Gandhi during my agitation across the state. If the state fails to take appropriate steps, then I am going to intensify the agitation, Desai warned. Answers Africa is one of a kind platform created for Africans both locally and in the diaspora and those seeking for more in-depth information about Africa. We have always focused on creating the highest quality informational contents right from the beginning. We share the most relevant information on the latest and trending news, events, people, and places in Africa. We produce contents across various categories including Politics, People, Love and Romance, Nature, Entertainment, Technology and pretty much everything else that Africans may find relevant. We aim to answer the most relevant questions about Africa in areas of entertainment, famous people, emerging technologies while we also engage with various distribution capabilities to connect with Africans in need of information who rely on our website to keep in touch with the world that is changing so fast. 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When it comes to discussing issues surrounding terrorism, American Counterterrorism and National Security Expert, Phil Mudd, occupies a globally significant position. He has voiced his interest in the fight against terrorism and insecurity on many popular media platforms, both print and broadcast, such as CNN, BBC, CBS, MSNBC, al-Jazeera, ABC, NBC, Fox, The New York Times, ... Jim Hoffer: Biography, Wife Mika Brzezinski, Children and Net Worth Jim Hoffer is an Emmy Award-winning journalist who works as an investigative reporter for Eyewitness News, New York City. In his over two decades of investigative journalism, Hoffer has been at the front lines of several crucial stories from the 9/11 attack to the crash of American Flight 587 to the 2003 Blackout. On top of ... The Ups and Downs of Erin Mcpikes Journalism Career and Other Facts About Her Personal Life Erin McPike is a journalist working for the Independent Journal Review (IJR) as a White House Correspondent but she gained widespread recognition for her coverage of general news. Whether its breaking news or some mainstream story, McPike has a reputation of baring the facts. As a journalist, her work as a White House Correspondent for Independent ... Bert Kreischer Is Married To LeeAnn Kreischer With 2 Kids Meet His Family Those familiar with Bert Kreischer mainly have the image of a large-bellied party man whose college life inspired the National Lampoon film, Van Wilder. It is an image that one would not naturally associate with a wholesome family. The standup comedian still maintains his wild party animal image on stage. But, back at home, he is ... How Brendan Greene Became a Game Designer to Look Out For and Facts About His Failed Marriage The name Brendan Greene may not easily ring a bell in the larger society but for gaming enthusiasts, he is considered a god and this is because of his invention of the video game, Player Unknowns Battlegrounds, also called PUBG. Based on the popular last-man-standing/battle royale concept, Greenes creation has taken the gaming world by ... WFAAs Sonia Azad Bio Does The Reporter Have A Husband Or Boyfriend? Emmy Award-winning journalist and Health & Wellness reporter Sonia Azad is on the news segment News 8 Daybreak for the television station WFAA-TV in Dallas, Texas, a channel which she joined in October of 2015. Besides her time on the news, Azad is also a marathon runner and a certified yoga instructor. She has covered major news ... This Is Everything You Should Know About Caroline Heldman, Her Career Portfolio and Other Facts Love it or hate it, there is no escaping the fact that feminism has come to stay in our world. The movement has continued to garner momentum over the years and this is due to the sustained push by several women, and even men, including the likes of Caroline Heldman. A Professor of Politics at ... Understanding The Enigma That Is Gavin McInnes, The Controversies He Has Stirred and All About His Wife Gavin McInnes is a polemical English-born writer and TV personality, who is best known for his racist and fascist ideologies, as well as his co-ownership of Vice Media and Vice Magazine. He is also an actor a Dan sent me newspaper clippings. Articles. Photographs. Everything that supported his research. It was both fascinating and eerie because one of the first children to be diagnosed with autism was born in Baltimore, Maryland just outside of my hometown. I remember distinctly having to re-record Dan saying the word two with three different inflections in order to properly time the visuals to the audio. Dan was so nice about it, and we both couldn't help but laugh. I will miss Dan's gentle voice. It had a nurturing quality, much like a parent reading a storybook to a child. I couldnt help but smile whenever I heard him speak. I was honored and excited to contribute to this. I was just beginning my journey into the world of animation and film, and it was before receiving formal instruction from the Motion Design department at Ringling College. The fact that this presentation was going to be shown at AutismOne absolutely thrilled me as a young advocate still finishing my senior year of high school. I will never forget the very first time I spoke on the phone with Dan Olmsted. It was spring of 2013, and I was 19 years old. I was already writing for Age of Autism as their youngest contributor, and sibling advocate. Dan wanted me to assist him in creating a video on research that he, Teresa Conrick, and Mark Blaxill had collected for a presentation. This film would become, How Mercury Triggered The Age Of Autism. It was shown at the AutismOne 2013 Conference, and I was told it was received positively. They were sure to tell me that everyone gasped when my animated needle pierced the United States map turning it blood red. It made me feel good as a budding animator that my simple imagery made an emotional impact. It was Monday, January 23, 2017 at approximately 6:00p.m., and I was in my Immersive Media Studio Class developing an animation for the planetarium in Bradenton, Florida. Just moments after I presented my initial concept, I received a message from my mother with a link from Age of Autism. All she said was, Im so sorry All I could muster was the word, No. I was in disbelief. I wanted to cry. I wanted to run. I was stuck fighting the impulse to cry while still in class. I've had many trying moments recently I've had to power through. This moment completely broke my concentration. I do not give in to tears easily. I have to stay strong for myself, my brother and my family. I see no use in crying if all it will do is make me feel defeated. However, in this moment, we lost Dan, and I couldnt take it. As soon as I left the classroom, I burst into tears and called home. My mom asked me, Are you okay? I replied, No. This is not okay. I am NOT okay. Today, Im still not really okay. This is too surreal to me. Dan had only one wish for everyone at Age of Autism: To continue forward with advocating and protecting our loved ones. He referred to us as the rebel alliance, and that we fought for good. I appreciate this analogy, especially since my brother Anthony is so enthusiastic about Star Wars. I have decided to dedicate my spring thesis in Dans memory out of respect for how supportive and kind he was to me. Dan, where ever you are... I promise to never stop fighting. I promise to never stop advocating. You were one of the most intuitive and kind souls Ive ever had the good grace to meet. You gave me the strength to critically assess the end goal, to dig deep into issues, and to avoid trouble. You handled everything with such diplomacy, and you guided others in a concerned and gentle manner. I will never forget your encouragement, and will always try to emulate your intellect and kindness for as long as Im alive. I will miss you. WASHINGTON, Jan. 29, 2017 - President Donald Trump has promised to announce a Supreme Court nominee this week, while Congress begins to move measures to kill new regulations on the energy industry. This also is a big week for industry meetings and conventions, including the annual winter policy conference of the National Association of State Departments of Agriculture in Washington and meetings of the wheat, cattle and dairy sectors. Trump said last week that he would announce his nominee on Thursday. Trump's favorites for the nomination are believed to include Neil Gorsuch of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Thomas Hardiman of the 3rd Circuit and William Pryor of the 11th Circuit, all appointees of George W. Bush. Trump told Republicans lawmakers that he would make good on his promise to appoint a justice who will uphold and defend our constitution. The nominee would replace the late Antonin Scalia and, assuming the nominee is reliably conservative, essentially restore the ideological balance that existed before Scalia's death a year ago. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell guaranteed in an interview Friday with the Morning Consult that Trump's nominee would get confirmed, and he didn't rule out using the so-called nuclear option to do so, eliminating the 60-vote requirement to move Supreme Court nominations. Democrats previously abolished the 60-vote rule for confirming lower-court and executive branch nominations. The Senate continues to move slowly on cabinet nominations. Senators will vote on Rex Tillerson to be secretary of state on Monday and then will vote Tuesday on perhaps the least controversial nomination of all - Elaine Chao, wife of the Senate GOP leader, to be Transportation Secretary. But committee votes on Trump's nominees for Interior and Energy, Ryan Zinke and Rick Perry, were postponed last week and haven't been rescheduled. Another critical nomination for agriculture, Labor nominee Andy Puzder, has yet to get a hearing. The House will start using its authority under the Congressional Review Act to eliminate regulations that were imposed late in the Obama administration. The CRA allows lawmakers to consider a resolution to kill a rule within a limited time after the agency has issued a rule and notified Congress. The House is scheduled to vote Wednesday on a CRA resolution of disapproval for the stream protection rule issued by Interior's Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement in December to protect surface water and groundwater from pollution from coal mines. A second resolution on Wednesday's schedule would ditch a rule issued in June by the Securities and Exchange Commission requiring companies to disclose payments made to governments for development of oil, natural gas or minerals. On Friday, the House takes up a resolution to kill the methane flaring restrictions released by the Bureau of Land Management in November. The states of Montana, Wyoming, and North Dakota have joined the energy industry in opposing the rule. Here's a list of agriculture- or rural-related events scheduled for this week in Washington and elsewhere: Monday, Jan. 30 National Association of State Departments of Agriculture winter policy conference, through Thursday, Grand Hyatt. Wheat Industry Winter Conference, through Thursday, Hyatt Regency. International Dairy Foods Association annual Dairy Forum, through Wednesday, Orlando, Fla. National Association of Conservation Districts annual meeting, through Wednesday, Denver. 6 p.m. - Senate Finance committee considers the nomination of Steven Mnuchin to be Treasury Secretary, 215 Dirksen. Tuesday, Jan. 31 9:30 a.m. - The Senate Judiciary Committee considers the nomination of Jeff Sessions to be Attorney General, 226 Dirksen. 10 a.m. - House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee holds organizational meeting, 2167 Rayburn. 10 a.m. - Senate Finance Committee considers the nomination of Tom Price to be Secretary of Health and Human Services. Wednesday, Feb. 1 Cattle Industry Convention, through Friday, Nashville. Crop Insurance and Reinsurance Bureau Annual Meeting, through Friday, Bonita Springs, Florida. 10 a.m. - House Foreign Affairs subcommittees hold hearing on the potential impact of a U.S.-UK trade agreement, 2172 Rayburn. 3:30 p.m. - AGree holds forum on Bipartisan Opportunities for the 2018 Farm Bill and Beyond, Meridian Institute, 1800 M St. NW. Thursday, Feb.2 All day - Food Tank Summit 2017, Jack Morton Auditorium, The George Washington University. 8:30 a.m. - USDA releases Weekly Export Sales report. 10 a.m. - House Agriculture Committee holds organizational meeting, 1300 Longworth. 10 a.m. - House Budget Committee hearing on the Congressional Budget Office's updated baseline, 1334 Longworth. Noon - Cato Institute holds forum on the border adjustable tax proposal, B-340 Cannon. Friday, Feb. 3 #30 Aiken, SC (29801) Today Foggy this morning. A few showers developing during the afternoon. High near 80F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 30%.. Tonight Showers this evening then scattered thunderstorms developing overnight. Low 67F. Winds SSE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 60%. STEPANAKERT, JANUARY 30, ARTSAKHPRESS: The statement says the sides agreed to strengthen joint efforts to fight the spread of the influence of the Islamic State militants. They agreed that it is necessary to address "Iran's destabilizing regional activities. The Saudi media reported the two leaders discussed also the strategic relations between the two countries. The talk lasted more than an hour. Assyrians Excluded From Iraq's Reconstruction Plans Christian refugees in a camp for internally displaced people in a church yard in Erbil, Iraq (September, 2014). ( World Watch Monitor) Christians are being excluded from the reconstruction plans for northern Iraq, further eroding the likelihood of their return once Islamic State has been militarily defeated there, an alliance of UK-based charities has warned. Iraqi Christians firmly believe that Iraq is their spiritual homeland; their presence dates back at least to the 3rd Century. Before 2003, there were approximately 1.5 million Christians in Iraq, but estimates now range from 200,000 to 500,000. Approximately 70% of Iraq's Christians are from the Chaldean Catholic tradition, while the remainder are Syriac Orthodox, Syriac Catholic, Armenian and Protestant. After the Allied invasion of Iraq, many Christians fled the Baghdad area for the north, where some towns (such as Qaraqosh) had been almost 95% Christian before 2003. It's estimated that at the time Mosul was invaded by Islamic State in June 2014, only about 3,000 Christians were left from the 35,000 there in 2003. Now the UK coalition of mainly Christian charities working in Iraq and Syria says it's "clear" that leaders of religious minority communities are being excluded from the National Settlement plan being put together by Iraq and other regional powers and presented to the UN. The 88-page report, Ensuring Equality, which brought together contributions from 16 NGOs, adds that it is vital that Christians and other minority populations have support for their political and security concerns if they are to feel reassured enough to return to Mosul or the surrounding Nineveh Plains region, rebuild their communities and undertake any reconciliation process. "This must include full citizenship status and the rebuilding of churches and community centres," says the report. Participating charities have repeated the oft-reported claim that Christians are not being supported by the international donor institutions, such as the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and are having to rely on churches that are trying to run their own aid programmes with limited funds. The NGOs who contributed include Aid to the Church in Need, the Assyrian Church of the East Relief Fund, the Syrian Network for Human Rights, Syrian Christians for Peace, the Evangelical Christian Alliance Church in Lebanon and the Alliance Church of Jordan. "All the NGOs involved in this report state that the vast majority of Christians and other 'minorities' avoid UNHCR camps and facilities because of continuing discrimination and persecution," the report says, adding: "It is utterly unacceptable that a place of sanctuary should be a place of fear that repels those it is designed to save and protect." However, it says that those who remain outside UNHCR camps "have fared ... unequally in the allocation of international aid, funding, political support, media attention, and asylum placements". The report urges the UNHCR to scrap its "need not creed" approach and acknowledge minorities' particular experiences. It calls on the UNHCR to open more mobile registration units to enable asylum-seekers outside UN camps -- who tend to be non-Muslims -- to register. It also urges the UNHCR to employ more non-Muslim registration and security staff, and translators, to reduce discrimination against non-Muslims. It recommends that Western governments giving aid should promote tolerance of minorities by objecting to materials or media outlets that promote extremism, and says the UNHCR should give converts from Islam to Christianity urgent protection, because they "face a high risk of assassination -- even at the hands of fellow migrants in Europe". The report also recommends that the Balkan states that have expressed a desire to take Christian refugees as part of their "EU allocation" should be helped to do so. "At present this is being undermined by pressure and threats from Germany and the dead hand of political correctness," it claims. A similar call for more international aid was issued this week by a 14-member delegation of church leaders, who visited Baghdad and Erbil. The group, brought together by the World Council of Churches, met officials from the Baghdad and Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and the UN. After a briefing from the UN Humanitarian Co-ordinator in Iraq, Rev. Frank Chikane, moderator of the WCC's Commission of the Churches on International Affairs, said: "The international donor support is woefully inadequate to meet the continuing need, leaving the host communities and the KRG to carry the burden on their own." In the Kremlin, the Russian Foreign Minister on Wednesday (25 Jan.) accused the European Union of "avoid[ing] the discussion on the problems of Christians in the Middle East [by] putting itself under the infamous mask of political correctness". Meanwhile the Al-Monitor news website reported last month that the viability of the project for Iraqi national reconciliation, outlined in December in the "national settlement" document, is threatened by its exclusion of the country's minority populations, such as its Assyrian Christians. One of Iraq's few Christian MPs, Yonandam Kanna, secretary-general of the Assyrian Democratic Movement, told the website that the settlement did not include any clause determining the fate of disputed minority areas, control of which is sought by Arab Iraq and the semi-autonomous Kurdish region -- such as the Nineveh Plains for the Christians and Shabaks. He added: "Minorities do not have a say in this and they are not even allowed to determine their own fate. The settlement does not take into account the views of Christians or Yazidis, or any other less influential minority groups." Mr. Kanna has previously criticised the national reconciliation projects put forward by the larger political groups for failing to provide guarantees that people who have committed atrocities against minorities, such as Yazidis and Christians, would be brought to justice. Another Christian Iraqi MP told a conference in Washington DC last summer that the Iraqi Parliament "does not take minorities into account". Global charity Open Doors, with others, has produced a detailed report on the vital contribution that Christians make in Iraq (and Syria). The report's co-ordinator Rami* (not his real name) said: "We need recognition for the vital role of the Church in rebuilding and reconciliation... Maintaining the presence of Christians is not only about them; it is for the good of society as a whole. In the reports and research we've conducted, we have mapped, in a way, all the contributions Christians have given to Iraq." The report begins: "When Christianity spread across what we now call the Middle East and we see that since then until now Christians have contributed to societies in literacy, in health, in translating and contributing to the Arabic language. Some of the best early centres of learning in the world were founded by Christians. Christians were among the first to introduce charitable works and NGOs. We see them involved in politics, and in the development of the Iraqi state. Christians are among the most well-known business people. And in the future Christians, alongside other numerical minorities, are vitally important for the stability of [Iraq]. Policy-makers and researchers agree that we need to maintain diversity in order to counter extremism and radicalisation. We need diversity to ensure sustainable peace and lasting stability in the Middle East." The way that Open Doors is tackling these issues, Rami told World Watch Monitor in November, involves working with indigenous church leaders, engaging with governments and decision-makers across the globe, and trying to collect One Million Voices in a petition in support of a campaign to bring "Hope to the Middle East". Smith fired three rapid shots into the air and the police followed with a volley from their .303 Lee Enfields. One of the policemen had an arrow sticking out of his leg. Like all Biami arrows it would be a bugger to remove and help and an airstrip was two days walk away. Still covered in suds, he emerged to see his police scrambling for their rifles and retreating towards the house-come-office of Obeimi Base Camp. By the time Smith (pictured on the cover of my book Bamahuta) had wrapped a towel around his waist and buckled on his holster and revolver, several more of the exquisitely carved but decidedly nasty arrow heads were sticking through the wall. GEOFF Smith was in the shower when the business end of a Biami war arrow penetrated the thin saksak wall just above his head. As the thunderous boom of the firearms echoed and died a strange silence fell over the base camp. The Biami attackers had melted away into the forest greenery and disappeared. These attacks were a regular occurrence in the Nomad Sub-District in the late 1960s and early 1970s. They were designed to unnerve the police and kiaps and were part of the ongoing war the Biami were waging against the gavamani (government). When in Biami country you slept with your revolver and took it with you to wash and attend to your other personal needs. Another of the Biamis favourite tricks was to knock off any stragglers at the end of the patrol line. On most of our patrols it was the kiap at the rear and the sergeant up front, a reverse of the traditional order. Several months before this latest attack the Administration issued Press Statement No 539 announcing that the last two restricted (dangerous) areas in New Guinea the Hewa area north of Mount Hagen and part of the Mianmin area in the West Sepik District are being derestricted because theyre now regarded as safe for all outsiders. The statement was published by John Ryan's short-lived New Guinea News Service which publicly challenged Acting Administrator, A.P.J. Newman, and secretary of the Administrators Department, TW Ellis, to test the honesty of Press Statement 539 by walking alone and unarmed (at New Guinea News Service expense) through the Biami people near Nomad, 350 miles north-west of Port Moresby. Ryan went on to explain that the Biami were not officially regarded as dangerous and the area had never been restricted to outsiders. However, thats simply because of politics and the winds of change! he added. The Biami area is peopled by scores of practising cannibals who repeatedly attack Government patrols the March 25 Press Statement is a blatant untruth, simply for political mileage in Australia and among Australias allies overseas and neighbours in South-East Asia. The Acting Administrators response was particularly naive, insipid and galling. He said, Well, Ive talked to a few people who participated in the Scoutabout (in Port Moresby) over the weekend and I saw what the effect of walking 16 miles round here had on them. Knowing Mr Ellis (55) and myself (52) and our physical condition Im quite sure that much as wed like to take up the challenge we just couldnt. I dont reject the challenge on the grounds that its unsafe. I reject the challenge on the basis that Mr Ellis and myself couldnt physically undertake the walk (Newman and other journalists laughed). Apart from the fact that there were plenty of kiaps over 50 still patrolling through the forests and mountains what really irked me about this response was that the Australian Administration was knowingly putting peoples lives at risk by their lies people like me and Geoff Smith and all the other kiaps who served in places like Nomad. A year or so later, just short of Papua New Guineas declaration of self-government, Craig McConaghy and I arrested and brought to trial seven cannibals from the Nomad area at no insignificant risk to ourselves and our police. Such is political expediency. It still exists in all sorts of ways. Poorly resourced and equipped and under-strength police in Papua New Guinea risk their lives every day and receive nothing but criticism for their efforts. The same thing happens in Australia and elsewhere in the world. Police, soldiers, nurses, paramedics, firefighters and a host of other caring people are exploited by cynical politicians in pursuit of questionable agendas and some of them die in the process. But thats just politics, isnt it? Footnote: Ive been back to Nomad and Obeimi (now Mogalu) several times and the Biami (Bedamini) people are peaceful and settled. Some of their children have attended university and have senior positions in government. Editor's note: Phil Fitzpatrick's 'Bamahuta' is one of the iconic novels written by expatriates about Papua New Guinea. It is available from Amazon Books here for $US10 plus postage - KJ Singapore Changi Airport recorded a 6.3% rise in airfreight throughputs versus prior year to reach 1.97m tonnes in 2016. The Asian hub, the worlds 15th largest cargo hub by volumes in 2015, ended 2016 with a strong December, handling 177,360 tonnes, up by 8.4% on the same month in 2015. Changi Airport welcomed two freighter carriers Neptune Air and Silkway West Airlines to its family of over 100 passenger and cargo airlines last year, while freighter airline K-Mile Air resumed operations to Singapore. A spokesperson for the airport authority said: In terms of airfreight throughput, growth was recorded across imports, exports and transhipments. Perishables and pharmaceuticals were segments that performed well, contributing a significant portion of Changis total cargo throughput. The top five country markets for airfreight were China, Australia, Hong Kong, the US and India. To strengthen its pharma cargo handling capabilities, Changi Airport last year formed a community of cargo partners to attain IATAs Center of Excellence for Independent Validators on pharmaceutical handling (CEIV Pharma) certification. Said the airport spokesperson: Under a community approach, at least one company from each of the supply chain nodes airlines, ground handlers, freight forwarders will undergo the CEIV Pharma certification. The group of companies consists of Singapore Airlines Cargo, dnata Singapore, Global Airfreight International, Expeditors Singapore, CEVA Logistics Singapore, and Schenker Singapore. Beyond the establishment of a CEIV Phama certified community, Changi Airport Group also joined Pharma.Aero, an organisation focused on achieving reliable end-to-end air transportation for pharma cargo. In October 2016, the DHL Express South Asia Hub, a 24-hour express hub facility located within Changi Airfreight Centre, was officially opened. This has tripled DHL Express cargo handling facility in Singapore and allows shipments to be processed six times faster. Together with SATS upcoming e-commerce AirHub, expected to open later in 2017, these developments will boost Changis position as a leading air cargo hub in Asia, added the spokesperson. Changi Airport Group chief executive Lee Seow Hiang said: 2016 was a record-breaking year for Changi Airport, with passenger traffic and cargo throughput both registering new peaks. Despite a backdrop of economic and socio-political uncertainties, we maintain a positive outlook for the year ahead. We see opportunities in emerging markets within Africa and Eastern Europe. At the same time, we will continue to grow our long haul routes to Western Europe, and strengthen our connectivity within the region to secondary cities in South East Asia, China and India. Share this story January 27, 2017 GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip Reham Kahlout, 19, is making her way in the world of comedy in the Gaza Strip, a society that has not generally been accepting of women taking part in acting roles that break with customs and traditions. Society refuses my roles. It sharply criticizes my acting with young men and finds it a disgrace. It considers acting to be a waste of time and makes fun of comedians without showing any respect to them, Kahlout told Al-Monitor. Despite this negative social outlook on Kahlouts career choice, her family helped her and encouraged her to keep going. Yet they did not allow her to complete her university education in the field of cinema and acting, as they forced her to study law at the University of Palestine in Gaza and keep acting as a secondary option for the future. Kahlout found her hobby when she was a child, and she started acting when she was 16 years old. She took part in small roles at school and then participated in 2015 in the stand-up comedy show Bas Ya Zalameh (Stop it, Man!). In the show, young men from Gaza appear in short stand-up comedy clips that sarcastically deal with the Palestinian reality and customs and traditions. The clips are posted on the shows YouTube channel, which has about 97,000 subscribers and about 17 million views. The show started in 2012 and is still ongoing. Remarkably, the male actors in this show are forced to wear a veil, put on makeup and soften their voices to appear as women, given the lack of actresses who have the courage to break into the world of comedy and defy society. Through my participation in comedy roles, I am trying to encourage talented girls to act and break with the societal barriers, Kahlout said. She added, Freedom of choice and initiative cannot be monopolized by men. Women must also be given this chance away from any restrictions. Kahlout represents a very small number of girls who have the courage to defy societys negative outlook on actresses who take part in shows with young men. These include Serine al-Barkooni, 21, who graduated from the Press and Information Section of the College of Intermediate Studies at Al-Azhar University in Gaza. She took part in several episodes of "Bas Ya Zalameh" and will soon join the stand-up comedy show called Summer Cloud, which sarcastically deals with the economic issues plaguing Palestinian society such as poverty and unemployment. This show is broadcast on social media websites. Barkooni told Al-Monitor, Customs and traditions require girls to stay home until a suitable groom comes to marry them, and that is what I'm trying to rebel through my participation in comedy shows. Barkooni said that she broke with societys limits thanks to the help and support of her family, who greatly contributed to strengthening her fight against societys negative perception. Had I taken part in serious shows where drama is involved, I could have received less severe criticism, but society considers that a girls participation in comedy shows makes her lose her femininity, she added. Dardah al-Shaer, a professor of sociology at Al-Aqsa University in Gaza, said societys negative outlook on female acting in comedy shows is attributed to two main factors, namely that Islamic Palestinian society sanctifies women through several aspects and does not allow them to work outside the house or offer services to other people. Shaer told Al-Monitor, This is why women's participation in comedy shows that make people laugh is out of the ordinary and violates the sanctity attributed to women. This prompts society to criticize such behavior. As for the second factor behind societys negative perception of comedian actresses, Shaer said, Palestinian culture is relatively rough due to the occupation and the political, economic and tragic conditions experienced by society. This makes soft feminist behavior out of the ordinary. Film critic Nawras Abu Saleh said that the girls participation in the local comedy business is an added value for the fledgling Palestinian comedy. He indicated that most of the locally produced comedy shows are created by individuals who have a hidden talent in comedy and who decided to resort to acting to show their talent and develop the acting industry in the Palestinian territories. Abu Saleh told Al-Monitor, Womens insistence on participating in comedy shows reflects their determination to bring about change in the negative societal phenomena that are dealt with in comedy shows. It also reflects their desire to change societys outlook on womens participation in comedy shows knowing that such participation is deemed to be against customs and traditions. He believes that Palestinian comedy is mostly black satire as it deals with negative political or social aspects and puts them in a cynical framework that reflects rebellion against reality. Abu Saleh said that social networking sites such as YouTube and Facebook are serving as platforms for this comedy in the absence of any interest on the part of local Palestinian television channels to broadcast these works for many reasons, most notably society's perception that criticizes the participation of girls in these roles. Also, these channels are always busy covering serious events imposed by the political reality in Palestinian society under the occupation. Abu Saleh said that changing this outlook requires raising awareness and bringing about change in the old culture, and this is partly a responsibility that the Palestinian educational and cultural system, such as schools, universities, TV channels and radio stations, has to assume. For this to be done, Kahlout said she will not let societal barriers stop her from achieving her dream of becoming a famous actress. January 30, 2017 When former Iranian President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani died Jan. 8, it was thought that his death might be another nail in the coffin of Saudi-Iranian dialogue, and thus usher an era of additional tension between Tehran and its Arab neighbors. Yet a personal condolence letter from Saudi King Salman bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud to the family of Rafsanjani, followed by a visit of Kuwaits foreign minister to the Iranian capital Jan. 25, give a different indication. Indeed, Kuwaiti Foreign Minister Sabah al-Khaled al-Ahmad al-Sabah came to Tehran with a letter from the emir of Kuwait, Sabah al-Ahmad al-Jaber al-Sabah, on behalf of the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), about the necessity of improving relations. On Jan. 26, Kuwaits Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled al-Jarallah told reporters that the Iranian side showed understanding and readiness to react positively to the letter, saying, The message and its content focused on laying the foundations for a joint dialogue based on the abstention from interfering in Gulf affairs and respecting the sovereignty of the GCC states and all the UN [Security] Council articles. It will be a breakthrough in the bilateral relations between the Gulf and Iran. An official Iranian source in Tehran told Al-Monitor without elaborating on the details, The letter proposed an Iran-GCC dialogue based on three principles as a basis for dialogue." The source hinted that the language used in the letter was very respectful, which is noteworthy given the many acrimonious exchanges between Saudi and Iranian officials in the past year. An official Kuwaiti source told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity that the letter is based on the final statement of the GCC summit that was held in Bahrain on Dec. 7, 2016. The Kuwaiti Foreign Ministry started contacts with Tehran directly after the summit. It is probably a long track, but regional peace and stability require all involved parties to cooperate, the source said, adding that this does not mean embassies are going to open again immediately, nor that Iran is necessarily going to send pilgrims to hajj this year. He concluded, Though we hope this will happen." Mahdi Ahouie, a Tehran University professor and an Iranian foreign policy expert, told Al-Monitor, The Iranian government is determined to avoid an open confrontation with any of the present actors in the Persian Gulf, including its Arab neighbors. Our approach to Persian Gulf security is based on the simple fact that we are all sitting in the same boat here. If our neighbors are damaged, we may also not remain safe from the consequences. He added, The rise of [US President Donald] Trump might provide further encouragement for rapprochement between Iran and the Gulf states. Trump is an unpredictable person, and his excessive and severe positions may take everybody by surprise. The US allies in the region are also no exception [as potential targets] for this [behavior]. What we are a little skeptical about in Tehran is whether the GCCs current gesture of conciliation is merely tactical, buying time to examine how Trump will treat Iran and the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or whether they are seeking a real, lasting relationship with Iran. Ahouie said the first step is for Saudi Arabia to stop the rhetorical war and media propagation against Iran, and stop portraying Iran as the cause of all evil in the region. Only then we can have a healthy conversation, he said. Though Iran and its Arab neighbors deviate on almost everything, they agree on skepticism toward each others intentions. Ankara-based analyst Ali Bakeer told Al-Monitor what the Arabs want from Iran, saying, The Arab neighbors are keen on having good relations with Iran, but this cant be without Tehran ceasing to interfere in the internal issues of the Arab countries, ending the sectarian policies and stopping the use of terrorist tools in achieving its national objectives. Bakeer, a staunch critic of Iran who writes for Qatari daily Al-Arab, added, Building trust needs an appropriate environment that is not mature yet. We need initiatives that exceed seizing media exchanges; that is a typical Iranian step. He added, Iran is everywhere in the Arab world. If Iran really wants to build trust, then it should show a change in its approach in Syria, Yemen, Lebanon, Iraq and Bahrain. Then it will not be difficult to see whether it is serious. Relations between Iran and its southern neighbors chiefly Saudi Arabia deteriorated severely in 2016, mainly after Riyadh executed Saudi Shiite opposition figure Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr. In response, angry Iranian protesters stormed Saudi diplomatic compounds. Diplomatic ties with Iran were immediately severed by Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, while other GCC countries either downgraded relations, as in the case of the United Arab Emirates, or summoned Tehrans ambassador. Yet this is not the only problem hindering better relations between the two sides. The wars in Yemen and Syria, unrest in Bahrain, the war on the Islamic State in Iraq, along with power sharing in Lebanon are all areas where the interests of Iran and the Gulf countries, and especially Saudi Arabia, are confronted. Yet even these rather recent crises arent the genuine cause of tension at least between Islamic Iran and its neighbors. Indeed, there are other causes that go back in history to 1979, when Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini succeeded in toppling Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi of Iran. Any rapprochement that doesnt take into consideration the roots of the conflict will only act as a circumstantial truce that might collapse whenever another storm hits. The main Gulf monarchy, Saudi Arabia, is concerned about what it calls the Islamic Republics export of its revolution, while Iran cant forget the role the Gulf monarchies played in supporting Saddam Husseins Iraq in his 1980-88 war with Iran to defend the Eastern Gate of the Arab world, according to the rhetoric used back then. These arent issues that can be solved in a meeting or two; they werent solved when Rafsanjani and late King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia normalized ties in the 1990s, and they will not be solved today as long as both sides arent willing to go directly to the core of the conflict, meaning their deep mutual mistrust, and stop exchanging phobias. The Albuquerque Forum on Faith and Politics: An... PLEASE NOTE! Due to the March 23, 2020 NM DOH Public Health Order, These Event Listings Are Not Accurate! All non-essential businesses are closed, public gatherings are prohibited! (One day some of these events will be rescheduled or will resume, but they are not happening now!) The patrol route took us deep into the heart of the Kukukuku country, so I was issued with a Smith and Wesson .38 calibre revolver and a Lee Enfield .303 carbine. I was supposed to accompany Assistant District Officer John Mundell on this patrol but he had to return to Kerema within a week of setting out, so I carried on under the benign guidance of Alex. MY first patrol, in late 1969, involved walking from Kerema to Kaintiba Patrol Post. Along the way, I was to join Catholic priest Father Alex Michelob who would teach me the art of surveying road routes through the mountainous jungle. I soon gave up carrying both: the revolver was wildly inaccurate beyond a range of five metres and my police sergeant was a much better shot with the carbine. Officially, the area had been declared "controlled" only a very few years before, possibly not long before John Stringfellow's army patrol in the area. I gather that this was done mostly to satisfy the United Nations that Australia was on trajectory in pacifying the whole territory. The track between Kerema and Kaintiba was very tough going for even a fit and experienced bushman, let alone a novice kiap like me. For the first few days I struggled to get to grips with stifling heat, incessant rain, and muddy and slippery tracks. Two weeks into the patrol I got malaria and was obliged to lay up on my camp sleeve bed until the curative effects of Chloroquine took effect. The Chloroquine treatment was only marginally less awful than the disease. The Kukukukus who accompanied our patrol were the usual suspects: small, wiry, strong and very mercurial in nature. They were always armed to the teeth, with small one pound axe heads attached to long, black palm handles being the weapon of choice for close fighting. Then there were the usual bow and arrows for distance work. Happily, a steady supply of twist tobacco, rice and tinned meat kept them pretty contented most of the time. Some of the Kukukukus wore the thigh bones of enemies they had killed in battle. The women had necklaces holding the tiny mummified hands of babies that had died in infancy. All the people wore capes made of beaten bark to keep off the rain and help stay warm at night. I soon purchased a cape for myself, as it was more serviceable than my slouch hat. They derived much amusement from seeing me slogging up the muddy track wearing it. Each morning around dawn, Father Alex would say mass using a rough bush table as an altar. He put on his robes, arranged the chalice and other paraphernalia and said mass. He was invariably surrounded by the Kukukuku warriors, who squatted near the crude altar and paid close attention to his every move, sometimes muttering quietly amongst themselves. It was a remarkable sight, especially when the sun rose over the mountains silhouetting Alex with chalice raised, his robes glinting as he moved quietly through the mass. Anyway, after 32 arduous days I arrived back in Kerema 15 kilograms lighter, covered in infected leech bites and convinced I had demonstrated that I had the "right stuff" to be a proper kiap. Like John Stringfellow, I count myself incredibly fortunate to have had the opportunity to walk in that country in those days when it was still basically untouched by modernity. January 30, 2017 On Jan. 30, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani took to the podium to state that independence is not equivalent to isolation remarks that can be interpreted as a response to hard-liners continued criticism of the governments foreign policy. Rouhani, who was speaking at the founder of the Islamic Republic Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeinis mausoleum ahead of the 38th anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, said, Independence doesnt mean isolation, and it means the absence of the domination of others over the destiny of the country. He added, We are neither xenophiles nor xenophobes we are Muslim, revolutionary and Iranian. Rouhani went on to say, With the guidance of the supreme leader, we engage in constructive engagement with the world to the benefit of our people and the national interest. Noting the upcoming May 2017 presidential election, he said, We have an important test before history in the months ahead, and the dear people of Iran will go to the ballot box to shape another epic. It should be noted that since Rouhani came to the office in 2013, which was surprising and unexpected, as he wasnt a high-profile politician known by most people, hard-liners have been attacking him, accusing him of bowing to the West and not being harsh to the United States over its violation of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). In a direct hit at Rouhani, Mohsen Rezaei, a former Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander and Rouhanis rival in the 2013 presidential election, tweeted Jan. 30, If one gets angry over the criticisms of those inside the country, and one smiles at the obstructionism of foreigners, this means that there is a problem. Moreover, on Jan. 30, judiciary chief Ayatollah Sadegh Larijani asked Rouhani to learn a lesson from the bitter experience of the JCPOA. Hinting at US President Donald Trumps Jan. 27 executive order to ban the entry of citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries, including Iran, Larijani argued, I ask the government, president and especially the Foreign Ministry to take lessons from experiences such as the important and bitter experience of the JCPOA, and show a decisive, appropriate and proportional reaction to the unbalanced, illogical and inhumane behavior of the United States. It is noteworthy that Rouhani and Larijani have in recent months repeatedly traded barbs over a series of issues. In the latest clash, Larijani accused Rouhani of having received money from notorious billionaire Babak Zanjani, who has been sentenced to death on corruption-related charges, during the 2013 presidential election. Larijani said, The Islamic Republic doesnt seek influence [in the region]; rather, it is the values of the Islamic revolution that have found their way to the region. When people of the region see the behavior of hegemonic regimes and witness the commitment of the Islamic Republic to its humane and ethical principles and support for the oppressed and poor people, they automatically become interested in these values. The Iranian judiciary chief added, Domination and influence will not come to exist through the dispatch of a few [Iranian] experts to other countries. If this was the case, the Americans would have had influence in Iraq and Afghanistan with all the equipment and tools they have. Instead, the Islamic Republics influence is spiritual and faith-like. Furthermore, in an interview with the semi-official ISNA news agency published on Jan. 30, Deputy Foreign Minister Majid Takht-Ravanchi said, We have had no talks with Trumps team and there have been no plans for doing so, and there is currently no plan for engagement [with Trumps administration] in the future. January 30, 2017 Senior Hamas official Ismail Haniyeh went home to the Gaza Strip after a 4-month sojourn in Qatar. Haniyeh decided to return from Qatar even though the process of his appointment as Hamas leader had not yet been finalized. Hamas' supreme body, the Shura Council, had elected Haniyeh to replace current political bureau chief Khaled Meshaal. Residents of the Shati refugee camp in Gaza welcomed Haniyeh with great excitement on Jan. 27, hoping to hear good news from him regarding Hamas-Egypt relations after the series of meetings he held with Egyptian intelligence heads in Cairo. However, Haniyeh kept mum. In the near future, he will have to make one of the most difficult decisions of his life: whether to accept the conditions dictated to him by Egypt for a significant easement of the blockade on the Gaza Strip, or remain entrenched in his position and continue to cope with the harsh situation there. Almost no one in Hamas today thinks that the movement can continue to rule over more than 1.8 million residents in the Gaza Strip indefinitely without the end of the closure or at least a significant loosening. The head of Egypts general intelligence, Khaled Fawzy, knows this, and told Haniyeh loud and clear: You must hand over to us any wanted person we ask for, whether he was directly involved in terror attacks in the Sinai Peninsula or just assisted jihadi agents. Other Hamas officials who participated in the Cairo talks included Mousa Abu Marzouk and Ruhi Mushtaq, who were stunned by the Egyptian ultimatum. Any such suspects extradited to Egypt could be sentenced to death. Handing over suspects to another state, whether they are Hamas operatives or belong to other organizations, is likely to be seen in the movement as unforgivable surrender and betrayal. A security source in the Palestinian Authority who is familiar with the content of the Cairo talks told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity that the Hamas leaders asked to hold negotiations and reach a compromise, but the Egyptians would not budge. After consulting with Hamas official Mahmoud al-Zahar, Haniyeh floated a proposal: Hamas would allow Egyptian intelligence agents to cross-examine suspects in the Gaza Strip, but not hand them over on demand. It is unclear from this proposal what would happen afterward if the cross-examination indicates involvement of the suspect in attacks against Egyptian soldiers. Would Hamas allow the extradition or demand that legal proceedings take place in Gaza? Either way, the Egyptians rejected the proposal outright. The chiefs of Egyptian intelligence told Haniyeh and his escorts: Either you agree to our demands and receive easements on the blockade and the opening up of a new page in our relations, or youll condemn the entire Hamas movement to death. Haniyeh kept silent on the subject when he returned to the Gaza Strip. But in an interview with Egyptian news agency MENA, Zahar tried to downplay the controversy. There is an improvement in relations with Egypt, claimed Zahar, but certain issues still remain unresolved, issues that need to be resolved. The heads of the Egyptian intelligence units gave Haniyeh an incentive to agree to their terms and to convince those in Gaza that the Egyptians are serious about their intentions. Fawzy promised, in the name of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, that Cairo will now implement a series of easements in the Rafah crossing. The crossing will remain open for longer hours and the quota of transit visas from Gaza to Egypt will be increased. The easements will continue for a few weeks in the hope that Haniyeh will return with a positive answer. If he fails to attain agreement to the Egyptian demand, Haniyeh will be forced to cope alone with the severe ramifications. But aside from Egypts key demand from Hamas, several agreements were reached between the sides in Cairo. The Hamas delegation committed to increasing its patrols along the length of its border with Egypt to avert the infiltration of armed operatives into Egyptian territory. Hamas also agreed to allow Egyptian forces to pursue suspects and conduct searches within Gaza in the course of its operations. Most surprising, the Egyptians demanded that the Hamas leadership maintain quiet on its Israeli border as well. As security deterioration or violent confrontation with Israel can shake up the entire region, Hamas leaders were requested to carry out a series of steps to prove that the movement is placing less emphasis on resistance activities and more on welfare activities to improve the lives of Gaza residents. Egypt is using the carrot-and-stick approach. The more that Hamas proves it is shifting its focus toward alleviating the harsh conditions of the residents in the Gaza Strip and the more it accedes to Cairos security demands, the more the blockade will be eased and the Hamas regime will be strengthened. January 30, 2017 Turkish Chief of General Staff Hulusi Akar, the countrys highest-ranking military officer, visited the disputed Kardak islands in the Aegean Sea Jan. 29. Akar and the commanders of the Turkish army, navy and army forces visited the twin islands (known as Imia in Greek) on the anniversary of a crisis between Turkey and Greece that brought the two countries to the brink of war in 1996. Both pro-government and opposition media outlets in Turkey interpreted the generals visit as a response to a Greek courts decision to not extradite military officers who had fled the country as suspects in the July coup attempt and who are also suspected of being followers of the Pennsylvania-based Turkish preacher Fethullah Gulen. The hard-line secularist and vehemently anti-government Sozcu described the visit as a Threat to Greece for not handing over FETO-ists, and the pro-government Star also used the word threat (gozdagi) on its front page and connected Akars visit to the Greek ruling. The Turkish government and many of those who dislike Gulen refer to him and his network as FETO, or the Fethullah Gulen Terror Organization, accusing them of masterminding the failed putsch. As this article went to publication, Turkeys semiofficial Anadolu Agency reported that the Greek and Turkish coast guards were patrolling the waters around Kardak. The Greek court decision and Turkish generals move risk opening old wounds between Greece and Turkey. While the two countries had experienced friendly relations from the 1930s until both joined the US-led North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1952, their relations turned sour over the Cyprus question and the status of disputed islands on the Aegean Sea. Several times from the early 1960s until the late 20th century, the two neighbors and nominal allies came close to a shooting war. But with the earthquakes that hit central Greece and northwest Turkey in the summer of 1999, Greeks and Turks began to see each other as less of a threat and more like partners. Since the turn of the 21st century, politicians in both countries have refrained from stoking xenophobia and nationalist sentiments for domestic political gains. By the 2010s, relations had so improved that some Turkish leaders debated whether Ankara should contribute to the European Union and International Monetary Fund-sponsored bailout package for Greece. The renewal of old disputes with Greece could bring additional problems to Turkey especially with the EU. Athens is an EU member, while Ankara is not. Relations between the European club and the Turkish government are already tense because of the refugee crisis, the EUs refusal to fulfill its promise to liberalize its visa requirements for Turkish citizens (partly because of Ankaras refusal to amend its anti-terror laws) and the overall deterioration of democratic standards and rule of law in Turkey. As Al-Monitors Semih Idiz pointed out in November, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan likes to give the appearance of abandoning his countrys EU aspirations and seeking acceptance in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. According to the Turkish daily Hurriyet, EU Commission spokesperson Margaritis Schinas said at a press conference Jan. 30, An important criterion for our pre-accession partners is good neighborly relations. Akars Kardak stop had its domestic detractors, too. While a senior parliamentarian from the main opposition Republican Peoples Party called the visit touristic, Col. Ali Turksen, a retired Turkish naval special forces commando who had played a key role in the 1996 crisis, belittled Akars effort and claimed that Greek patrol boats blocked his entry to the Kardak islands. In a series of tweets, Turksen suggested the episode weakened the Turkish militarys image, which he blamed on Akar and Erdogan. Gulsen went on to say he was absolutely opposed to the passage of the constitutional amendments that would give Erdogan his dream of an imperial presidency. A popular lunch spot near Huntsville Hospital is closing its doors for good this week. Little Paul's Barbecue shut down today after 15 years of business on 815 Madison St. S.E. Danielle Sanford, who owns the eatery with her husband Sen. Paul Sanford, said they announced the closure Sunday afternoon to employees. "When we originally opened it, we didn't think we would do it forever," she said. "We wanted to do other concepts and pursue other things, but this takes a lot of time and we haven't been able to do that. We've watched our kids grow up and leave and this is like the third child that's never going to grow up. And we're kind of ready to be empty nesters." Sanford expects the news to be "a little shocking" for Little Paul's customers who have been regulars at the Medical District restaurant. "We've had a special relationship and we've gotten to know them over the years and it's been wonderful," she said. "We've made a lot of friends and met a lot of great people." Sanford isn't sure what the future holds for the building. She said they have 30 days to vacate the facility, which is owned by Sonny and Dianne Hollingsworth and filled with memorabilia from her husband's late grandmother. She said the community may "see us again in something else." "We're just ready to open a new chapter and in order to do that, we have to close this one," she said. "But it's nice being able to close something on your own terms because you want to and not because you have to." Paul Sanford was appointed to the Alabama Small Business Commission in 2014 because of his experience as a small business owner. The Commission was created to encourage innovation and promote policies to help new and expanding business with 50 or fewer employees. The Republican senator, who plans to continue his work in the Alabama Senate, posted a press release about the closure on the front door of Little Paul's. "Danielle and I will take some well deserved time off, reflect on the past 15 years, and then forge a new path and see where that leads," he said in a statement. "I am certain that regardless of the endeavor we pursue, Huntsville will be just as supportive as they have been with Little Paul's Barbecue." One Alabama city could be among the big losers nationwide if some of the Trump Administration's trade policy proposals result in a trade war. Decatur is seventh nationally among cities that rely on exports as a percentage of their gross domestic product, according to the Brookings Institution's Metropolitan Policy Program. The Washington, D.C. think-tank released a list today ranking cities that might undergo a bigger shock in the event of trade impacts from policy changes. Columbus, Ind., landed at the top of the list, due to its reliance on machinery manufacturing, which Brookings calculated at just a little over 50 percent. "An 'America first' economic policy is ... a matter of significant import for the nation's local patchwork of cities, small towns, and rural areas," the Institute stated in its report. "Export intensity--measured as the export share of GDP--is highest in smaller energy- and manufacturing-oriented metros." According to Brookings, 29.1 percent of Decatur's GDP is export-based, with 7,867 jobs directly related to exports. In total, exports account for $563 million in GDP in 2015, according to the University of Alabama's Center for Business and Economic Research. As a percentage of state total exports, Decatur accounts for almost three percent. Statewide, Alabama exports have hovered just under $20 billion over the last few years, mostly from small or medium-sized businesses with fewer than 500 employees. About 560,000 jobs in Alabama are supported through exports. It remains to be seen just how Alabama might be affected by the Trump Administration's decision last week to pull out of the Trans-Pacific Pact, a 12-country trade agreement which was aimed at lowering trade barriers between nations along the Pacific. TPP included Canada and Mexico, two countries among the top three nations taking Alabama exports. Trump has also talked of renegotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement with Canada and Mexico. Alabama Secretary of Commerce Greg Canfield said TPP's passage was uncertain even before Trump took office. "We're feeling better about the future, based on what we're hearing about negotiating more with the countries individually," he said. "Trade is very important, but we want fair trade." Ben Flanagan | bflanagan@al.com See Alabama photographer's snazzy 'moving' portraits of celebrities from SAG Awards red carpet Tuscaloosa-born photographer Miller Mobley makes a living shooting portraits of A-list celebrities, and CNN wanted to take advantage of it at the Screen Actors Guild Awards Sunday night. The news network enlisted Mobley's help to shoot about a dozen "moving portraits" of nominees making their way into the Shrine Auditorium, creating some truly unique images of folks like Jeff Bridges, Viggo Mortensen and Taraji P. Henson. Watch each of them now, as Mobley takes you through the process. (CNN) Don't Edit Milly Bobby Brown The 'Stranger Things' star and best ensemble drama co-winner. CNN approached Mobley about working together before they agreed to collaborate on Sunday night's project involving about 30-45 seconds with each actor in a 10-by-12-foot space once they finished their walks on the red carpet. Don't Edit Danielle Brooks The "Orange is the New Black" and co-winner for best television ensemble comedy. Mobley said he shot about 60 actors' portraits in total, with CNN posting 13 on their Instagram page so far. He said he doesn't know if or when they will use the rest, which include Felicity Huffman, Laurence Fishburne, Barry Jenkins, Uzo Aduba, Kyle Chandler, Anthony Anderson and Courtney B. Vance. Don't Edit Jeff Bridges The best supporting actor nominee from "Hell or High Water." Mobley said the process of shooting the portraits and getting them posted to Instagram was tough, but definitely worth it considering the final products. He shot in 4K using a Red camera before handing files off for a little color correction and post-production before CNN uploaded to share publicly. Don't Edit Taraji P. Henson The "Hidden Figures" star and her co-stars walked away from SAG with the award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. Mobley said Henson was one of his favorites from the shoot, calling her a perfect example of how the actors could let readers into their larger-than-life personalities through physical action in such small window of time. Don't Edit Don't Edit David Harbour Longtime character actor David Harbour and his "Stranger Things" co-stars took home Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series. Mobley had about 30-45 seconds with each actor after their walk on the red carpet. He said a CNN publicist and a few others would hit the carpet to scout any talent who would want to participate before they came in for the shoot. They'd reached out to a few actors' publicists ahead of time. Don't Edit Dev Patel "Lion" star Dev Patel scored a nomination for best supporting actor. "[CNN] gave me freedom to come up with an idea that was realistic," Mobley said. "It was a hard thing to do because you were so limited, to a 10-by-12-foot space. You want to keep it somewhat simple and classic. I wanted to put a table in front because I thought the reflections were cool to give it more of a reveal situation. I like how you tilt up and don't see who it is yet." Don't Edit Sarah Paulson "The People vs. O.J. Simpson" star won Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Miniseries or Television Movie. "I wanted to get into it to show my career just a sense of range, that I'm not limited to just taking photographs," Mobley said. "I can work with this level of talent when it comes to motion. I think that says something in terms of production and working with that level of people. That was my approach to it." Don't Edit Naomie Harris The "Moonlight" star was nominated for best supporting actress. "They seem to be popular," Mobley said. "This was the first time I've done this kind of thing. I think people just find them more exciting on Instagram when there's motion and you're scrolling through and seeing their personality." Don't Edit Taylor Schilling The "Orange is the New Black" actress accepted the award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a comedy. "It's a cool concept," Mobley said. "I like the idea of doing something right there in the moment and it's pushed out to millions of people. It's fun being a part of a social campaign for one of the biggest media outlets in the world." Don't Edit Don't Edit William H. Macy The "Shamless" star won Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Comedy Series and was one of many who had a few things to say about Donald Trump. Having shot so many portraits of celebrities over the last few years, Mobley wanted to experiment with live-action photography, mixing it with still sensibilities while giving readers something totally fresh. Don't Edit Tracee Ellis Ross The "Black-ish" star was up for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series. Don't Edit Jim Parsons This time, the "Bing Bang Theory" actor actually won for his part in the cast of "Hidden Figures." Don't Edit Viggo Mortensen The "Captain Fantastic" star was up for best lead actor. Don't Edit Ben Flanagan | bflanagan@al.com More on Miller Mobley Learn more about Miller Mobley through our in-depth podcast interview about his life and work. ALSO: Mobley tells us what it's like to shoot portraits of the President and Michelle Obama Mobley reflects on shooting the late Philip Seymour Hoffman's portrait Learn more about his work at millermobley.com. (Courtesy of Miller Mobley) Don't Edit 55,000+ Fans Celebrate the Electrifying 15th Anniversary Honda B The marching bands of eight HBCUs came together for a mass band finale at the 2017 Honda Battle of the Bands Invitational Showcase. (Photo by Honda North America) (Honda) Two Alabama university bands displayed their musical talent and showmanship in front of more than 55,000 fans during the 15th Anniversary Honda Battle of the Bands. Alabama A&M University's Marching Maroon & White and Alabama State University's Mighty Marching Hornets were two of eight Historically Black Colleges and Universities marching bands selected to perform in the annual invitational Showcase held at Atlanta's Georgia Dome. The showcase was also streamed live on CampusInsiders.com. Alabama A&M alumnus Ruben Studdard made a surprise performance at the event. The showcase was one of the final events at the Georgia Dome which is nearing demolition. The Georgia Dome's replacement, the Mercedes-Benz Stadium, is currently under construction and is scheduled to open on July 30, 2017. Watch Alabama A&M University's performance here. Watch Alabama State University's performance here. 'Bama State Style,' a reality show following Alabama State University's Mighty Marching Hornets Band, (including Stingettes and Honey Beez dancers) premiered early January on Atlanta's ASPiRE Network. girls.jpg Andrew Joseph Harbison, 28, is charged with the Jan. 28, 2017 burglary at an east Birmingham home. Two girls, 8 and 14, were home alone and hid in closet until police arrived. (Jefferson County Jail) Police today announced formal charges against an accused burglar who broke into a Birmingham home where two young girls were home alone over the weekend. Andrew Joseph Harbison, a 28-year-old Bessemer man, is charged with second-degree burglary and possession of burglar tools, said police spokesman Sgt. Bryan Shelton. The break-in happened early Saturday morning in the 9700 block of Redlane Road in the Roebuck area of east Birmingham. Shelton said the girls - ages 8 and 14 - called 911 at around 9:45 a.m. and told a dispatcher that they could hear someone in their kitchen. They hid from the intruder and weren't harmed. At the scene, one officer went to the rear of the house and saw someone walking through the residence. Another officer was at the front door when the suspect walked out of the house carrying stolen items, according to police. "The girls did an excellent job staying calm and helping officers catch the suspects," Shelton said Saturday. "This is a situation an adult could find scary and be frozen with fear, unable to act. For an 8-and-14-year-old to think and respond was an example of bravery and cunningness. They outsmarted a criminal, and won a victory for crime fighting. Too bad we can't hire them yet." The girls were honored by the responding officers. Court records show Harbison was arrested on burglary and theft charges in 2012, but those charges were dismissed. He remained in the Jefferson County Jail Monday with bonds totaling $55,000. Arthur Orr and Terri Collins on Jan 30 2017.jpg Sen. Arthur Orr, R-Decatur and Rep. Terri Collins, R-Decatur, speak at a news conference at the Alabama State House on Jan. 30, 2017. (Mike Cason/mcason@al.com) Two Alabama lawmakers are sponsoring a bill that would require Alabama students to take the citizenship examination before graduation from high school. Sen. Arthur Orr and Rep. Terri Collins, both Republicans from Decatur, said the future of a successful government depends on informed citizens. Orr said surveys have shown an "astounding" deficit of knowledge among adults about how the government works. According to a news release from the Alabama Civics Education Initiative, which is supporting the legislation, Newsweek asked 1,000 citizens to take the citizenship test in 2011. Twenty-nine percent could not name the vice president, 73 percent could not say why we fought the Cold War and 44 percent could not define the Bill of Rights. "(We) certainly need to have as a citizen of this country a working knowledge of our government," Orr said. "It's incumbent on all of us to vote, to participate and to understand federal state and local govenments and how they operate." Orr sponsored a similar bill last year, but it did not pass. The bill would require students to correctly answer at least 60 of 100 questions used on the civics portion of the naturalization test immigrants take to become citizens. Students could take the test as many times as necessary. "I believe that that is a great way to make sure that we are working through our education system with students who will have a better understanding of their government," Collins said. Orr said about 15 other states have passed similar legislation. A trove of information about Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, President Donald Trump's controversial nominee for U.S. Attorney General, disappeared from a popular online research service within the past two weeks. As of Jan. 17, extensive personal, professional and financial details about Sessions, his family and his properties were available via subscribers-only sections of the LexisNexis website. But by Jan. 25, nearly every mention of Sessions was scrubbed from the site. It is not clear on what day exactly the information was removed, but it happened within five days of Trump's inauguration on Jan. 20. Yet extensive information about Trump himself remains posted on the site, as does information about a number of his cabinet nominees, including Secretary of State nominee Rex Tillerson, Navy Secretary nominee Philip Bilden and Ben Carson, Trump's Housing and Urban Development Secretary nominee. Carson was once a leading presidential primary contender, and was subject to significant security measures during the 2016 campaign. Information about Eric Holder, President Barack Obama's first attorney general, is also available via LexisNexis, though details about Loretta Lynch, Obama's second attorney general, could not be easily located on the site. LexisNexis is a popular online service used by professionals, companies and law enforcement agencies to conduct research on individuals and businesses. (Screenshot | LexisNexis) It is currently unclear how the information about Sessions came to be taken down. Sarah Isgur Flores, a spokeswoman for Sessions, said that the Sessions camp did not take down the information or request that it be erased. "This sounds like it's probably a question for the Marshals or Secret Service about their protocol about when and what measures they take for protectees," she said via email Wednesday. "My guess is this is [Standard Operating Procedure with] a new cabinet secretary." Asked if she intended to state that "no one associated with Sessions took steps to make this happen," she responded, "correct." Joe Casey, a spokesman for the U.S. Secret Service, said via phone Friday afternoon that the agency would not have been in a position to make such a request, and that it did not do so. "Mr. Sessions wouldn't be a protectee of the United States Secret Service. I would check with the [U.S. Department of Justice] initially and also with the U.S. Senate," he said. Nikki Credic-Barrett, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Marshals Service, said Monday that the agency was also not responsible for the information about Sessions being taken down. "The U.S. Marshals Service did not facilitate or request the removal of Sessions' information from Lexis Nexis," she said via email. The press offices of the Justice Department and Secretary of the Senate did not respond to requests for comment Friday. LexisNexis declined via email Friday to say whether it had taken down the information about Sessions or if it had received any requests to do so. "As a matter of policy, we do not comment on information in our services that may be suppressed for legal or security reasons," the company wrote in an official statement. But LexisNexis does have a "LexisNexis Individual Requests for Information Suppression Policy" posted on its website that details how the company handles such requests. "Individuals may request to opt-out of having personal information about themselves made available through certain LexisNexis products and services, in accordance with legal requirements or if permitted by LexisNexis policy," the policy states. It goes on to explain what types of people might be eligible to have the service remove their information from its online databases. "Public and elected officials, including law enforcement officers, and private individuals who are facing a substantial risk of physical harm or who are victims of identity theft may request to have personal information about themselves suppressed from LexisNexis products and services available to subscribers of our restricted public records products," the policy states. Updated at 1:56 p.m., Jan. 30, 2017 to include comment from the U.S. Marshals Service Yet these latter practices have increasingly been part of PNGs political system, rendering the notion of trouble-free democratic elections a facade. Those who believe in this ideal demand an election based on policy-driven ideological contests, rather than material wealth and tribal allegiances that often create disharmony. But elections in PNG over the years have fallen short of this ideal standard. Like many democracies, the people have always looked forward to the opportunity of choosing their political leaders through a process of free and fair elections. THE Papua New Guinea national elections, due in June this year, promise to be momentous. But controversies surrounding the electoral system are not unique to PNG. Many countries, including the established democracies as demonstrated in the recent US elections, face similar challenges. The PNG Electoral Commission (PNGEC) has come under increased scrutiny in recent weeks for some of its decisions. For instance, its recommendation for changes to electoral laws that sought to increase the 2017 candidate nomination fee from K1,000 to K10,000 has raised concern among potential candidates. A primary reason for this proposed law is to offset the high cost of running elections. PNG is known for having one of the most expensive elections in the world. However, the proposed law may be argued as unconstitutional on the basis that the increase in the nomination fee is unreasonably excessive and suppressive of the constitutionally guaranteed right of ordinary citizens to stand for public office. A fee of K5,000 may be more reasonable. The Electoral Commissioners decision to print the ballot papers in Indonesia also warrants scrutiny. It is the first time electoral ballot papers have been fully outsourced to private companies overseas. The Commissioner argued that the PNG government printery is nearly three times more expensive when compared to the costs in Indonesia. But the Commissions cost saving measure is open to risks. There are concerns of electoral fraud such as printing of extra ballot papers. The government printery is not immune to this concern as it has been an issue observed in previous elections but the use of private companies overseas, and away from public view, may heighten the risk. The call out of police and defence force personnel to curb tribal fights in the resource-rich Hela Province at the beginning of this month indicate the kinds of challenges law enforcement officers may face more of this election year. With the suspension of police recruitment in 2017, apparently due to funding issues, there could possibly be a strain on law enforcement officers during the election period. Public activism and protests marred much of 2016. While the ONeill government is commended in some quarters for leading development in areas like mining and resource exploration, building infrastructure and organising international sporting events, it is mostly criticised for significant setbacks in the economy through over spending and maintaining a deficit budget, and a lack of respect for rule of law. The bloody protests of 2016 exemplified the growing discontent. Whether this will lead voters in the coming election to oust ONeills Peoples National Congress party (PNC) is yet to be revealed. But if history is anything to go by, both the Somare and Mekere governments, under similar spotlight, lost power after the 2011-12 impasse and the 2001 shooting of university students respectively. The new cybercrime legislation comes into effect this year. It will be interesting to see how this is enforced against PNGs active social media community whose activities will mostly likely intensify during the election period. Depending upon how this law is enforced, its compatibility with the constitutional right to freedom of speech may be a subject of future court proceedings. Tertiary students and non-governmental organisations were active during the summer holidays carrying out community awareness on good governance and elections. I was invited to one event in Gumine District, Simbu Province in December. The rally was themed as the Gumine Leadership Conference (GLC) and was attended by hundreds of community members. Speakers include intending candidates, students, youth and women leaders and senior government officials. The idea for the GLC started through Facebook discussions, an example of how social media activism can translate into community mobilisation. Organisers of the program now hope to continue GLC as an annual event. Rallies like GLC and many others that have taken place throughout the country and will continue to do so in the coming months, intend to raise awareness and inform the voters consciousness in the hope that people will commit to political change within their communities. Traditionally, tribal allegiances often played a critical role in deciding voters preferences. People align with a candidate in their own tribe or clan despite the candidate lacking meaningful leadership qualities to successfully represent them in parliament. This was predominant during the first past the post system where a voter has only one preference. However, the introduction of preferential voting in 2007 saw a shift in this practice. A voter now has three preferences. It has certainly allowed greater freedom for voters to choose a better candidate. But in some areas, the comfort of having three votes means voters can auction two of their three preferences to the highest bidder (an intending candidate), shrewdly encouraging bribery. The increase in district services funding over the last five years might give the incumbent MPs an advantage in this election either if they have invested in development or if they are able to siphon off the funds as campaign money. Normally, only about one half of PNGs incumbent MPs are returned. It will be interesting to see if this ratio increases this time round. Papua New Guineans have long waited for the year 2017. It promises challenge as well as change. Will the people reinstate prime minister Peter ONeill and the PNC party to government despite the serious allegations of corruption that are yet to be cleared by the courts? In the absence of the anti-corruption team, Task Force Sweep, some have even wondered if the prime minister will ever get prosecuted. ONeill is confident that PNC will return to power. Perhaps the people will place faith in someone untainted by Waigani politics. Who are the fit and proper persons to lead the nation? The return of writs in July will provide some answers to these lingering questions. Bal Kama is a PhD Candidate at the ANU College of Law and a sessional lecturer at the University of Canberra Faculty of Business, Government and Law. U.S. Rep. John Katko supports efforts to ensure those entering the U.S. are properly vetted, but he has concerns with President Donald Trump's controversial executive order that impacts the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program and blocks citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. for 90 days. "Through my work on the House Homeland Security Committee, I have come to the distinct conclusion that ISIS and other bad actors are trying to infiltrate the West through the refugee process," Katko, R-Camillus, said in a statement provided to The Citizen Sunday. "Indeed, we saw this come to fruition with the attacks on Paris last year. "In this heightened threat environment, we must be ever vigilant to ensure all individuals entering this country are properly vetted. I believe the president's intent was to accomplish that goal. However, I have concerns with this executive order, including the fact that it could potentially deny entrance to our country to lawful, permanent residents and dual citizens." Katko, who chairs the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Transportation and Protective Security, led a task force that focused on ways to combat foreign fighter travel. The panel issued a report, which included several recommendations for preventing terrorists from entering the U.S. President Trump signed the order Friday, which suspends the refugee admissions program for 120 days and prohibits citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the U.S. for 90 days. It also imposes an indefinite ban on Syrian refugees entering the U.S. The American Civil Liberties Union filed a petition Saturday in federal court after several individuals were detained at airports throughout the U.S. The detainees included an Iraqi man who had spent time as an interpreter for the U.S. Army. A federal judge issued an emergency stay which allowed for the release of those who were detained at airports. There's also confusion about whether the executive order applies to green card holders who are legal permanent U.S. residents. The Department of Homeland Security had said that the order does apply to green card holders, but the Trump administration reversed course Sunday and said those with green cards wouldn't be blocked from returning to the U.S. Critics of the executive order have labeled it a "Muslim ban," since the prohibition applies to nations with predominantly Muslim populations. Others have raised questions about whether the action is constitutional. Trump first promised to take such "extreme vetting" measures when he was campaigning for president. When he released a proposal to ban Muslim immigrants from entering the U.S., Katko questioned the constitutionality of the plan. "We should be a nation that accepts refugees and those fleeing oppression, but appropriate screening procedures need to be in place," Katko said Sunday. "On Homeland Security, I have consistently been supportive of appropriate, thoughtful policy to strengthen our vetting procedures and ensure the safety of the American people. I am confident that we can work in Congress to produce a more streamlined vetting process for refugees entering our country." Protests continued throughout the country Sunday in response to Trump's executive order. A group of central New Yorkers organized a rally at Syracuse Hancock International Airport. Democrats, including Gov. Andrew Cuomo and U.S. Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer of New York, have been critical of the order. Several Republicans have also spoken out against the action, including some of Katko's colleagues in Congress. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman joined his counterparts from 15 other states in condemning Trump's "un-American executive order." The group of attorneys general pledged to "use all of the tools of our offices to fight this unconstitutional order and preserve our nation's national security and core values." Trump issued a statement Sunday insisting that his order isn't targeting Islam. The goal of the action, he said, is "keeping our country safe." "There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order," he said. "We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days." Academic Park Yu-ha has disputed the widely held narrative of sexual slavery and victimisation under Japan during WWII. Seoul, South Korea While leaving a Seoul courtroom last Wednesday, Park Yu-ha was photographed doing something she had not done in a long time: smiling. Park had just been acquitted of criminal defamation charges stemming from the contents of her 2013 book, Comfort Women of the Empire, a work of scholarly research into the so-called comfort women women and girls from Korea, China, the Philippines and elsewhere who worked in brothels for the Japanese military during World War II. Wednesdays acquittal was the latest phase in a long legal struggle for Park, 60, a professor of Japanese literature at Sejong University in South Korea. Last year, a civil court found Park guilty of defaming former comfort women with her writings and ordered her to pay the nine women who filed a lawsuit 10 million Korean won each, about $8,500. Parks disputing of the widely held narrative of victimisation was almost unheard of for a Korean academic, and made her a target of online vitriol and harassment, accused by internet users, domestic media and civic groups of being a pro-Japan traitor, and callously undermining the comfort womens quest for justice. OPINION: South Koreas political morass Symbols of Japanese occupation In South Korea, the plight of the women, and the several dozen elderly survivors, are emotive symbols of Koreas suffering during its time as a colony of Japan. Within South Korea, there is a strong consensus of victimhood and a narrative that thousands of women and girls were tricked or kidnapped by the Japanese military, then forced into what was effectively sexual slavery. Park has maintained that she does not deny that many comfort women suffered, and that some were held against their will, but painted an unusually nuanced picture in her book. After extensive research into historical documents and transcripts of former comfort womens testimonies, Park said she found evidence that some women worked willingly with the Japanese, and that there were Korean collaborators who worked to recruit the women, which meant that not all of them were mobilised by the Japanese military. In announcing the verdict, the court posited that Parks freedom of expression must be legally protected, even if some of the claims contained in her book are questionable. The court also said it could not establish that Parks intention was to defame the comfort women. Park welcomed the ruling, but says she is not celebrating yet. I definitely feel better, more comfortable. I appreciate the courts recognition, but I cant be certain that this is over, Park said in a phone interview; the plaintiffs in the case have not yet said whether they will appeal against the ruling. READ MORE: South Korean monk critical after sex slavery deal protest A flashpoint for South Korean and Japanese relations The ruling in Parks favour comes at a time when the comfort women issue has again become a flashpoint in relations between South Korea and Japan. Only a little more than a year ago, in December 2015, the two countries signed an agreement that they said amounted to a final and irreversible resolution to the comfort women issue. Under the terms of the agreement, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe issued an apology and the Japanese government agreed to donate 1bn yen ($8.8 million) to set up a fund to support former comfort women. The agreement was quickly condemned by a small number of vocal comfort women and their advocates, who argued that they were not consulted on the terms of the agreement, and that Abes apology would not suffice since it was issued via his foreign minister. Michael Breen, a Seoul-based historian and author of The New Koreans: The Story of a Nation, says the persistence of the dispute is evidence of the symbolic importance the comfort women issue has acquired in South Korea. The issue has come to represent all the unpleasantness of the Japanese occupation, Breen said. The agreement also mentioned that Japan was concerned over the statue of a comfort woman that sits on the pavement across from the Japanese embassy in Seoul. The statue was installed by local artists in 2011 outside the embassy, where, since 1992, comfort women and their supporters have gathered every Wednesday for protests. The sculpture depicts a young woman clad in traditional Korean attire, seated in a chair, her gaze directly facing the embassy building. Japanese officials have asked their counterparts in Seoul to have the figure removed, but the South Korean government has demurred, possibly concerned about a public backlash if the statue were cleared away. With Seoul in the middle of winter, passersby have put a yellow ski hat on the statue and wrapped it in blankets and scarves. Drinks, snacks and bouquets of flowers lie at its feet. On Friday afternoon, Lee Sung-cheol, 25, sat beside the statue, on an elevated platform beneath a plastic sheet with two companions. The three young men are part of a network of young people who watch over the statue 24 hours a day. They say their objective is to prevent the statue from being removed, and to draw attention to the issue of comfort women. The comfort women suffered during war, and it is important to learn the lessons of history, Lee said. We hope that in future generations the mistakes of war wont be repeated. READ MORE: Japan recalls South Korea envoy over comfort women Politicised statue, diplomatic fracas In late December, a comfort woman statue was installed outside the Japanese consulate in Busan, South Koreas second-largest city. There are similar statues in parks and other public places around the country, but this was the second put up near a Japanese diplomatic building. Police quickly removed the statue on the grounds that the private group that carried out the installation did not have legal grounds to do so on public property. After a series of protests, the police allowed the statue to be returned. A diplomatic fracas ensued. The Japanese government strongly objected and temporarily recalled its ambassador from the embassy in Seoul and the consul general from Busan. In an illustration of how disagreements over history can scuttle bilateral cooperation between the two countries, Japan also called off high-level economic talks on the issue of currency swaps. Kim Byungki, a professor of Politics and International Relations at Korea University, says that Seoul and Tokyo have no easy options in resolving the dispute. South Korean President Park Geun-hye is currently under impeachment amid allegations of influence peddling, leaving a power vacuum in government. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is seeking closer security cooperation from Seoul and is unlikely to want to revisit this issue, Kim said. When they signed the agreement, the two sides both wanted to put the final stamp on this issue; they didnt want a painful re-examination of it. The whole agreement is now in real question, but its not easy to annul or renegotiate a diplomatic agreement like this once it is already signed, Kim said over the phone. In the immediate aftermath of her legal victory, Park said she is looking forward to being able to once again focus on her teaching and research work. She said that despite the controversy her work has sparked, she has no plans to move on to a different area of study, that she remains committed to the goal she set for herself early in her academic career. I dedicated 20 years to understanding the comfort women issue and Im not going to stop now, she said. I want to do more meaningful research that can contribute to understanding between Korean and Japanese people. Gov. Andrew Cuomos free college tuition proposal is supported by most New York voters, according to the latest Siena College poll. The poll found 60 percent of voters surveyed support the plan to offer free college tuition to any State University of New York institution for students whose families earn no more than $125,000 annually. More than three-quarters of Democrats and a majority of independents -- 53 percent -- back the tuition-free college plan. Most Republicans, however, oppose the governors proposal. The proposal, which would also offer students free tuition to City University of New York schools, would cost an estimated $163 million a year. The free college tuition program would be phased in over three years. Beginning this fall, families earning up to $100,000 year would be eligible. The ceiling would be raised to $110,000 next year and $125,000 in 2019. Its one of several items on Cuomos agenda thats supported by New York voters. By a 74 to 23 percent margin, voters support extending the millionaires tax and 77 percent endorse the governors plan to allow ridesharing companies, such as Uber and Lyft, to operate in upstate New York. Theres overwhelming support for Cuomos $2 billion Clean Water Infrastructure Act, an initiative that would fund projects across the state, and a proposal to give preference in state purchases of more than $100,000 to American-made goods and products. Cuomos agenda for 2017 is chock full of proposals some new, some old and many of them enjoy strong bipartisan support, while several others are supported by a majority of New Yorkers despite Republican opposition, Siena pollster Steve Greenberg said. Other proposals supported by at least a majority of voters: Cuomos plan to double the middle class child care tax credit for families earning between $60,000 and $100,000. Two-thirds of voters, including 74 percent of Democrats and 58 percent of Republicans, support increasing the credit. A $10 billion renovation project for John F. Kennedy International Airport is also supported by two-thirds of voters. The plan to close Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant in 2021 is supported by 54 percent of voters, including 61 percent of Democrats and a plurality -- 43 percent -- of Republicans. By a narrow margin, 52 percent of voters support the DREAM Act, a bill that would grant state tuition assistance to the children of undocumented immigrants. Two of Cuomos proposals are opposed by a plurality of respondents. By a 52 to 43 percent margin, voters oppose the completion of the Empire State Trail which would stretch from Albany to Buffalo and from New York City to Canada. And a plurality of voters -- 49 percent -- oppose raising the age of criminal responsibility in New York, which would ensure 16- and 17-year-olds are treated as minors in certain criminal cases. The Japanese American was forced into an internment camp during WWII and subsequently spoke up for Muslim Americans. An earlier version of this story said that Fred Korematsu was born in 1917. That was incorrect. He was born in 1919. US President Donald Trumps executive order to ban immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries is being compared to the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. Barely two months after the Pearl Harbor attack in 1941, nearly 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry residing on the countrys western coast were branded a military threat and put inside internment camps across the country. But a 23-year-old Japanese American, Fred Toyosaburo Korematsu, defied Executive Order 9066 by President Franklin D Roosevelt and went into hiding instead of voluntarily relocating to an internment camp, where conditions were often harsh. Korematsu was finally arrested in May 1942 and convicted of defying the government order. He fought the case all the way to the Supreme Court but the top court ruled against him. READ MORE: Six other times the US has banned immigrants He was released after the end of World War II but the conviction remained on his record until it was overturned in 1983, by a court that said the internment was racially motivated. Who was Fred Korematsu? Korematsu was born on January 30, 1919, in Oakland, California, to Japanese immigrant parents, who moved to the US in 1905. Google Doodle is marking what would have been his 98th birthday. OPINION: Fred Korematsu Why ignore a true hero? Korematsu was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honour in the US in 1998. The then US president, Bill Clinton, said: In the long history of our countrys constant search for justice, some names of ordinary citizens stand for millions of souls. Plessy, Brown, Parks to that distinguished list, today we add the name of Fred Korematsu. Speaking out for Muslim Americans In the wake of September 11, he spoke out against the dangers of racial profiling Arab Americans and urged US leaders not to repeat the wrongs inflicted upon Japanese Americans. No one should ever be locked away simply because they share the same race, ethnicity, or religion as a spy or terrorist, he said. If that principle was not learned from the internment of Japanese Americans, then these are very dangerous times for our democracy. He filed two amicus curiae briefs with the Supreme Court on behalf of American Muslims being held at the notorious Guantanamo Bay prison. Certainly after 9/11, it was the Japanese American community and my father that spoke out first when the government talked about rounding up Arab and Muslim Americans and putting them in camps, his daughter, Karen Korematsu, told Al Jazeera in 2014. Becoming a civil liberties icon About 70,000 of the Japanese Americans interned during the war were American citizens. Families lost their businesses and homes, and were branded as traitors. You had 48 hours to decide what you would take with you. You didnt know where you were going, Karen explained. OPINION: The militarisation of war on terror in the US US President Gerald Ford formally ended Executive Order 9066 in 1976 and offered an apology. We now know what we should have known then not only was that evacuation wrong, but Japanese Americans were and are loyal Americans, he said. The US Congress apologised in 1988. Compensation of $20,000 was paid to each of the victims. Fred Korematsu turned his humility and humanity into powerful advocacy on behalf of all of us, writer Barbara Field wrote in an earlier article for Al Jazeera. By the time Korematsu died in 2005, he had become an icon of civil liberties. An American story Unlike the Japanese internment, which elicited barely any public reaction, thousands of Americans have rallied in support of those affected by Trumps decision. People have been camping out in front of airports across many cities, calling for the release of immigrants detained inside the airports. Fear is ignorance, said Karen. We continue to be a land of immigrants. Thats what America means to the world. If we dont set the right example, we cant expect the world to follow suit especially when we are talking about civil and human rights. As my father said, and I say, this isnt just a Japanese American story. This is an American story. Los Angeles, United States The few blocks of Iranian American-owned businesses on Westwood Boulevard known as Little Persia were busier than usual on the Sunday after US President Donald Trump signed an executive order barring people from Iran and six other Muslim-majority countries from entering the country. Families and friends poured onto the street outside Saffron & Rose Ice Cream Shop. And there isnt usually a long wait at the iconic Shaherzad Restaurant, a culinary stalwart in a community that mostly came here from Iran following the tumultous 1979 Iranian Revolution and the Iran-Iraq War, but today, there are no free seats. Families are gathered around plates of stew, grilled meats and rice dishes. Some diners are students from the nearby University of California, Los Angeles. There were a number of protests across the city at the federal building nearby, at churches, at the airport where people of Iranian origin were detained. But few people in the area wanted to talk about the executive order. They are here to eat with friends and family. They are here to forget, some say, the reality that some of them are now effectively stranded in the US citizens of the affected countries have been advised by legal aid organisations to cancel international travel plans; they can leave, but its possible that they wont be allowed back. Certainly, whats worrying us is the sudden change without precedent, said a man in his 20s who asked to be called Dan, so as not to affect his citizenship status. Over the past week, I havent even been able to concentrate on my work. Right now, I dont know what my next move would be, but Im considering leaving the country, said Dan, who is an Iranian working at a tech company in the US. Trump reminded him of the former Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The campaign that Trump ran was word-by-word copied from Ahmadinejad, he added, explaining that Ahmadinejad also ran on a populist platform and, he said, drove the countrys economy to a state that is only just being repaired by current President Hassan Rouhani. Things are going to really get worse and the next president is going to have to undo everything that Trump does. Responding to hate with affection At Gallery Eshqh (or Love Gallery) business-owner and artist Bahman Bennett, 68, sells Sufi designs and words of boundless love printed in warm, saturated colours on garments, carved into iPhone cases, stamped onto throw pillows. He says he is doing with his art what protesters of multiple ethnic identities are doing, miles away at the airport: offering up overwhelming shows of affection in response to hate. If everyone comes together and supports each other against this matter, [the government] can see, he said. Arash Saedinia, 43, an Iranian American English professor and rights activist, has been on the frontlines of the demonstrations at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). Last nights protest was phenomenal. We saw black, brown and white people, young and old, hijabs and yarmulkes. The crowd was as diverse as this city and so we know that the opposition to Trumps order is widespread and vigorous, he told Al Jazeera via email. Its important to emphasise the intersectionality of the protest, in both composition and content. Were in solidarity in our support of all affected by this disgraceful, unconstitutional order. Saedinia and Bennett are two of many in the Iranian American community. In Los Angeles alone, there are reportedly hundreds of thousands of people of Iranian origin. The city is often referred to in the Iranian American community by its unofficial moniker, Tehrangeles, because of the communitys size and contribution to the citys social and economic infrastructure. The vast majority of Iranians in Los Angeles have at least one family member, friend, and/or colleague who is a permanent resident, who travels abroad as a green card holder, who visits the United States to see loved ones, who is literally designated a resident or nonresident alien by the United States government, Saedinia said. But for Bennett, where there is love, there is hope. Everything will be back to normal in a month, he said, emphatically. Im sure, 100 percent! The government is not going to give him permission to do something like that to the people [that is] against the law in America. Because hes new, he wants to show hes different. But nothing [will be] different. The rule [of law] and the policy is from before, he is supposed to follow it. We will resist Bennett says Iranian Americans working in law and other fields are active on Instagram and Facebook. Mitra Ebadolahi, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union advocacy group chapter in the southern Californian city of San Diego, talked to Al Jazeera from New Yorks JFK Airport, where protests broke out over the detention of people arriving from the seven countries. Within hours, an army of lawyers and Americans who treasure fairness and decency had mobilised to halt this executive order, Ebadolahi said. We will continue to resist. Hear this, Trump administration: We will not allow you to shred our precious freedoms and destroy our beloved constitution. If you insist on violating our laws, we will see you in court and on the streets. READ MORE: Six other times the US has banned immigrants Still, Bennett will not be leaving the country any time soon. As long as the government does things like that, Im not going to trust them, he said. I can go easily, but will they let me come back? Theyll say, Oh you have a beard, stay out.' Of a handful of business owners who spoke to Al Jazeera, Bennett was the only one who would go on the record. Many people are afraid to talk out right now, said one store owner, explaining that he worried the publication of his name would jeopardise his citizenship. The store owners fears over citizenship and safety are reflected in several American communities protesting against the ban across the country. Its unconstitutional! proclaimed one Little Persia visitor, who asked to be identified only as Rahim, offering no further comment on the matter. Tehran Last April, Saeed Qurbani, 34, a computer engineer, left for the United States after winning a green card lottery. Qurbani and his wife had applied five times before they finally won it in 2014, and moved a year later to southern California upon a friends advice. Saeeds mother, Nayereh, 54, says her son was planning to return home, for the first time in a year, for a family reunion during Norouz [the Persian New Year] in March. However, following US President Donald Trumps executive order on visa bans for the citizens of several countries, including Iranian nationals, Nayereh fears she might not see her son for some time. I am so sad and simply dont understand why he [Trump] has banned Iranians! she told Al Jazeera. My son was going to come home for New Year celebrations. I have been counting the days to reunite with him. It is really hard to imagine that Saeed is locked up there and cant get in and out. Nayereh is one of the thousands of Iranians who are still reeling from Trumps executive order on visa bans for Iranian nationals. It is unfair and ridiculous to put such a ban on Iranians. Iranians have never been violent or terrorists! This [decision] will rip our family apart, she said with tearful eyes. READ MORE: Immigration ban Hope trumps fear for Iranian Americans It is unbelievable. I had visited the US during the worst times between Iran and America. I never imagined that after the nuclear deal the situation will get worse! by Mahmoud Kashani, a factory owner Iranians have traditionally built a sizable community in the United States. For decades, the US has been the number one destination for thousands of Iranian citizens seeking better educational and job opportunities. US Department of State issues approximately 35,000 visas for Iranians annually, including student and tourist visas. Since there are no diplomatic relations between Iran and the US, Iranians apply through various US consulates in the region. The exact number of visas issued is, therefore, hard to work out. According to the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans,1.5 million Iranians lived in the US in 2012. In 2003, Irans Interests Section in Washington said that it held passport details of 90,0000 Iranians living in the US. High-profile citizens from the Iranian American community have included Firouz Naderi, a senior NASA director; Bijan, the late fashion icon; Pierre Omidayr, the eBay founder; Omid Kordestani, executive chairman at Twitter and Salar Kamangar, a senior executive at Google, to name but a few. According to a report by the Iranian Medical Society, as of 2013, 5,050 physicians and medical university graduates have ended up in the US. Mahmoud Kashani, 68, is a factory owner who regularly visits the US for business and to visit with his two sons who have been studying there for many years, is still shocked by the news. It is unbelievable. I had visited the US during the worst times between Iran and America. I never imagined that after the nuclear deal the situation will get worse! Kashani says he had hoped that the landmark nuclear deal would further ease tensions between Iran and the US. I have my multiple entry visa and was about to book a ticket for [Persian New Year] to the States, but it is vaporised now and gone into the air! Iranian Oscar-winning director Asghar Farhadi, whose new film, The Salesman, has been nominated for best foreign language feature length movie, issued a harshly worded letter on Sunday and said he would not attend the academy award ceremony. I express my criticism of the unjust conditions enforced on some of my compatriots and the citizens of the other six countries who were going to legally enter the United States of America and hope that the current situation will not give rise to further rift between nations, wrote Farhadi. READ MORE: Trumps Muslim ban This could never happen in America Saeeds sister, Elham Qurbani, 30, says she had initially planned to apply for a US student visa and join her brother, but was advised by her immigration lawyer that the chances were not good. I feel pity for my mom and dad to go through such pain and anxiety, said Qurbani who is about to leave for Australia on a student visa next week. She recounted the story of their neighbour, whose son, Vahid, has been studying in a North Carolina State University and wanted to return home after seven years. Two weeks ago, his mother was so excited that she will see her youngest son after a long time! Now, I dont know how she feels! It is ridiculous that highly educated Iranians are barred from travelling to the US, but some countries with the worst records of violations are not! Meanwhile, Nayereh says she spoke with her son on Saturday night and urged him not to risk his situation -still being a green card holder in the US by travelling. Saeed told me that the news was shocking and that he was feeling as if he is locked up in a prison; beautiful and green, but still feels like a prison. Ali, a 33-year-old Iranian-American engineer and tech start-up consultant living in Los Angeles, has no idea when he might see his mother again. Alis mother, a 66-year-old retired school principal in Tehran who typically visits the United States once a year, is prohibited from entering the country for the next 90 days under President Donald Trumps landmark executive action on immigration. The order bans citizens from the Muslim-majority countries of Iran, Syria, Iraq, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, and Yemen from entering the US. Trumps executive order also bans refugees for the next 120 days and bars Syrian refugees indefinitely. When Ali, who was born in Tehran, turned on the television to learn the news on January 27, he says he was both stunned and devastated. I feel [utter sadness], he said over the telephone from an Iranian restaurant in California. Its baffling It is upsetting to me, it is upsetting to my wife and it is upsetting to my family. They live their own lives, they come visit for a short time and then they go back. They dont pose a threat to anybody, they dont cause harm to anyone, they love the culture in the US. Ali, who has been a US citizen since 2013, and who had arrived in 2002 to study, asked to remain anonymous out of fear of reprisal in the US and for his family in Iran. His older sister also lives in Orange County and works in press relations. Not long after moving to the US, Ali met Deborah, a writer and philanthropist from California. They married in 2008. He received his bachelors degree in electrical engineering at California State University and later completed his master of business. He eventually became the vice president of a tech start-up in California before becoming a consultant. America is great, he explained. It is the land of opportunity. You have the opportunity to do anything, to become anyone, to be successful, to contribute to society and I feel like I as a citizen and my wife as a citizen, we have done that. We have aspired to be successful. We contribute to society. I feel like with these executive actions its thinning that shining city on the hill the promised land that everybody looks to. READ MORE: Immigration ban Hope trumps fear for Iranian-Americans Student detained Early on January 29, a federal judge in Brooklyn issued an emergency stay on Trumps travel ban, allowing the release of hundreds of detained green-card holders and effectively blocking their deportation. Yet, hundreds, perhaps thousands, more remain in limbo around the world. Vahideh Rasekhi, an Iranian linguistics PhD student at Stony Brook University in New York, was one of the hundreds detained across the country . She had travelled home in November and was returning to her graduate studies when she was held at Terminal 7 in John F Kennedy airport. Rasekhi told her friends that after she was held, American border officials forced her on to a plane bound for Kiev, Ukraine, despite the emergency stay on Trumps order. I get a message saying they are on a plane and taxiing and leaving the gate, said Thurlough Martin Smyth, 38, a friend and fellow student of Rasekhi at Stony Brook, who was in touch with her during the ordeal. I called her and said that there is a court order in effect which prevents your removal from the country so just get off the plane. She said, No one is listening to me. No one is paying attention, everyone is ignoring me.' Rasekhis plane was reportedly taxiing on the runway when the aircraft was brought back to the terminal after lawyers from the International Refugee Assistance Project intervened. Following the traumatising ordeal, Rasekhi, who is also the president of the schools Graduate Student Organization, disembarked from the aircraft, and was eventually released. She is a really generous, warm, sociable [person], Smyth added. She cares about her research and just wants to come and finish what she started and be free to come and do that. Dread and hope Noora Mustafa , an 18-year-old high school senior and first generation Libyan-American from Houston, Texas, was equally stultified by Trumps move. Im scared and feel betrayed by the country Ive lived my whole life in, she said in a video. It kind of bounces between straight up fear and bewilderment. Mustafa fears for her brother-in-law, a Libyan national, US green card-holder, and orthopedic surgeon in his 30s who travels between Texas and Libya frequently to visit family. When can he see his family again? she asked. My family and all of us are kind of shell-shocked in a way and we cannot believe that this is really happening. You feel like this would never touch you, especially when you are born and raised in America and this is the country you know you have a sense of pride [in]. And then when something like this happens, it kind of feels like your mum or dad are slapping you right in the face. Malek Jandali, 44, a German-born Syrian-American pianist called the move un-American. At first, it was disgusting we were all anticipating this but when it actually happened it became reality, said Jandali, who performs at Carnegie Hall regularly and has a concert there on February 4. Closing doors to the worlds needy people is not what America should stand for. Jandalis father, a retired surgeon, and mother, a former physics and chemistry professor, are Syrian refugees who fled Aleppo in 2011. They are currently awaiting their citizenship interviews, a process that has now been thrust into uncertainty. But the musician is optimistic American values will prevail in his parents favour. I am worried but at the same time I am optimistic because we have a constitution and I still believe in the American values of freedom, justice, [and] freedom of speech, he added. Right to a normal life More ambiguous is the future of Khaled and Sameer, a gay Syrian couple in Gaziantep, Turkey, who planned to arrive in the US sometime in the next month. After a gruelling two-year application process that involved passing interviews with Homeland Security, medical checks, and cultural orientation screenings, a stroke of Trumps pen has impeded their journey to begin a new life all this after fleeing war-torn Aleppo and Homs. Both asked to remain anonymous to avoid persecution in Turkey for their sexual orientation. We are in shock, said Sameer. I dont know what to say. We should be now preparing our stuff to travel. Weve been waiting for two years. We have dreams. We have the right to live. We have the right to have normal lives. We are humans. They fought back tears as they scrambled to articulate what they had lost and what they would do next. Our dream of living freely somehow, just having some dignity, being able to walk out on the street holding hands or just not afraid that something might happen to us any minute we were just hoping to be relieved from that feeling, you know? said Khaled. And just to have all that taken away from us in a blink of an eye is crazy. Its scary. We feel lost. We dont know what to feel. The couple is now considering transferring their visa referral to Canada. Back in Los Angeles, Ali, the Iranian-American tech consultant, hopes to one day have children, but he shudders at the possibility that his his mother might not be there to share that moment, that is if Trumps ban stands after its 90-day debut. I would want my mother here when our newborn arrives, you know, he said. Its heartbreaking. In response to Trumps immigration ban, Iran announced reciprocal measures, saying they will suspend visas for US passport holders until the US reverses Trumps executive order. The gravity of the political chain reaction has has left Ali wondering if hell even be able to go back and visit his family, given his dual citizenship under the new American administration. For now, Ali will hold on to the memories he does have of his mother in the US, who last visited in 2014. We go to sightseeing places, he reminisced. We go to the beach, we go to Disneyland, we go for hikes, we take a road-trip together and she really embraces the culture of the US. Dorian Geiger is a Canadian journalist, award-winning filmmaker, and a social video producer at Al Jazeera English. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram . In the course of one excruciating day, with Donald Trumps recent executive order on immigration, Dania Albabas family found themselves torn apart and indefinitely isolated from one another across five countries. Albabas parents moved to the United States more than two decades ago to complete their studies and find work as doctors. After the war broke out in Syria in 2011, her grandparents left their cement factory in Damascus to join their children in Houston. Albaba, 22, is a first-year medical student at the University of Texas Medical Branch, in Galveston. She and her siblings were the first generation born in the US with American citizenship. Following Trumps recent executive order on immigration, she now stands at the centre of a family thrown into turmoil. Her aunt was stopped on Friday in Dubai, en route to visit her family in the US. Albabas grandparents, who are green card-holding residents, now have no recourse to visit their 11 children living overseas. Her cousin, who was granted American asylum after being tortured in Syria, had his family barred from visiting him on the day they received their visas. Unable to return to war-torn Syria, the US is the only home Albabas family knows. She reflects on the wrenching changes of this week, and the new reality of being a Muslim in Trumps America. On Wednesday, I was at my parents house, and everyone was talking about my Aunt Saanas trip. We are renovating the house right now, in preparation for her arrival, and they wanted to finish everything on time. I went upstairs on Facebook, where I saw a posting about Trumps executive order blocking access to citizens of several countries, including Syria. I ran downstairs to tell my mom that nobody could enter the country any more. They all started freaking out, my grandmother started crying. It would be my aunts first time in the United States, and since she just got married, it was meant as a sort of honeymoon, as well. We were shocked, but I wasnt as surprised as my family was. They had a lot more faith in the system, thinking that this could never happen in America. Trump would never block refugees from coming, they thought. I told them he has been saying these things from day one. My aunt was travelling from Saudi Arabia and had to transit through Dubai. She arrived and got on to her plane to the United States. Five minutes before her flight was about to take off, people from the airport walked on and told her: You have to get off. Youre not allowed in the United States any more. They sent all her luggage back to Saudi Arabia, and then she had to return, too. She was distraught. Even though she knew about the planned executive order, nobody thought it would all come into effect this quickly. Now, she and her husband just need to wait and see what happens. They dont really know what to do. My grandparents used to live in Syria. They owned a cement factory and had 11 kids. Their children live around the world now, in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, London, the Emirates, Jordan, Syria, and three of them are here in the United States. After the war in Syria, they got their green cards and moved to the US to be with my parents. They spend most of the year in the US, but a few months a year, they fly back to Saudi Arabia to visit my aunt and my uncle who lives in Jordan. Now, they are really in limbo. They cant go back to Syria. They cant really live in Jordan. The US has been their home for four years. READ MORE: Trumps first week Executive overdrive I also have a few family members who moved here since the war broke out in Syria. My uncles wife is an American citizen, so they were able to come here with their two children. I have an aunt, as well, who just got refugee status and moved here in December, after two years of extreme vetting. She made it just before the ban. Another cousin, who was imprisoned and tortured in Syria, sought asylum here after his brother was killed. My cousins family still lives in Jordan, and just received a visa to visit the US on the day the ban was declared. Yesterday, my grandmother was on the phone all day, in tears. She doesnt want to be split up from her family, and she doesnt want to be trapped here for two or three years until she can apply for citizenship.That would be the only way she can visit any one of her other children. The area I live in voted overwhelmingly for Trump. People have felt emboldened to express their hatred against me, too. Sometimes while driving, Ive come to a stop next to another car and looked over to see someone glaring at me, glaring like they want to kill me. Ive had others stop their cars right in front of mine, and get out to just stare at me. Its a threat. So, its been a little tougher since the election. While I dont want to have blind faith in any system, I do have some faith in the American system. I am an American citizen, theres only so much that can happen to me. Im just hoping for the best. I was listening to the radio right before Trump was elected. A man whose grandparents survived the Holocaust was saying: If people tell you that they hate you, you better believe them. If they dont want you in their country, you should take them at their word. They are telling you how they genuinely feel. With Trumps statements on Muslims, Mexicans, and his actions against women, I took him for his word. I think a lot of Muslims, many who even supported him, did not. They thought he would never actually do the things he said. But look what has happened now, all of this enacted in just the first week? Its so disappointing, and I have no words left. Im done trying to convince people. As told to Barret Limoges Harvard law lecturer Ian Samuel offers a legal perspective on the immigration ban and explains how you can resist it. On Friday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, suspending the US refugee programme for 120 days, and banning Syrian refugees from entering the country until further notice. Ian Samuel, a lecturer at Harvard Law School, explained the executive order and just what is wrong with it to Al Jazeera. Al Jazeera: What is the problem with the executive order? Ian Samuel: The United States immigration statute had, for 50 years, prohibited the kind of discrimination that this travel ban engages in, and moreover, the US Constitution prohibits targeting people because of their religion, which this travel ban is a very lightly disguised attempt to do. No civil servant who is covered by ordinary protections of the meritorious protection board is obligated to do illegal things in the course of their duties, and thats exactly what this travel ban asks them to do, it asks them to do something illegal. Could this executive order go to the Supreme Court? Samuel: I wouldnt be surprised. This is the kind of controversy that could make it to the Supreme Court, and it could make it there fairly quickly. This is a rule of law issue. I could see [this] being the Trumps administration first major defeat in the Supreme Court, where they find out that, actually, this is a country of laws. How can people respond to this new regulation? Samuel: There is no government programme that is self-executing. Everything that the government does, everything that the White House does, it requires thousands and thousands of people to carry it out, and those people are typically career civil servants theyve often been in the government for a long time, and many of them have profound discomfort with this travel ban. And the thing about this travel ban is not that its just a bad idea it is a bad idea but its also illegal. So, if you are a federal civil servant, whos been asked to do something illegal, I think what you should do is just say, no. And there are a whole lot of people who are out there behind you. Is this response a form of civil disobedience? Samuel: I actually think this isnt a form of civil disobedience because the whole premise is that you being asked to do something illegal. You are not engaging in civil disobedience; what you are saying is, I am not going to violate the law, and you are asking me to do something that violates the migration status, and you are asking me to do something that violates the constitution. For more on this interview watch our Facebook video here. Fifteen years after suffering defeat at the hands of the United States, the Taliban are rapidly retaking territory in Afghanistan. Wide swaths of the country are now under their control. But the prize for the armed group is the city of Lashkar Gah, considered the gateway to the rest of the country. Al Jazeeras Steve Chao travelled to the frontline to meet the last defenders of this vital city. He found a ragtag group of Afghan soldiers and police, poorly trained and short on supplies, but full of determination to take on the Taliban in fierce firefights. Chao also documents the true cost of war at a busy emergency hospital, where he meets patients injured in the long-running conflict. Watch the full documentary here: Afghanistan: Taliban at the Gate. The fresh clashes in Syrias Idlib region between a dozen important Islamist and extremist rebel movements are battles for turf and authority on the ground but they also mirror northern Syrias ever-changing complexities, as local, regional and international actors change policies and tactics. These actors and their aims fluctuate almost on a monthly basis, which helps explain last weeks face-off between former al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat Fateh al-Sham (JFS), on one side, and the independent Islamist movement Ahrar al-Sham and half a dozen smaller allies, on the other. The core battle between JFS and Ahrar al-Sham (AS) flared last week after JFS attacked some smaller Islamist groups that were close to AS, notably Jaish el-Mujahideen. JFS accused them of selling out the revolution against the Syrian government by attending the Russian-Turkish-Iranian-sponsored political talks in Astana, Kazakhstan. It also suspected rebels of passing on JFS locations and coordinates to foreign parties that have recently been bombing JFS. Several smaller Islamist rebel groups found themselves in danger of being destroyed by the much stronger JFS and quickly moved to form a coalition with AS, which, in turn, promised to protect them from JFS attacks. These intra-Islamist rebel tensions increased sharply, in part due to the fallout from the rebel defeat and evacuation of Aleppo and other besieged towns, which pushed more rebels into the Idlib region. Consequently, dozens of small and increasingly vulnerable rebel groups, whether secular or Islamist, face their inevitable moment of reckoning: will they side with the hardline JFS and work towards creating a mini-Islamic state or an emirate, while continuing to fight the Bashar al-Assad regime? Or would they remain as part of the secular-nationalist Free Syrian Army coalition and move closer to AS, the powerful Islamist rebel group that projects itself as more pragmatic and locally anchored than JFS? Post-Aleppo dilemmas Rebel groups confront these issues now because regional and international players have changed the entire political and military equation in northern Syria, following Russia, Iran and Hezbollahs successful assistance to Assad in regaining control of Aleppo. Turkey is also actively engaged with local allies in northern Syria, as it simultaneously fights the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) and Kurdish groups that seek a more autonomous region along the Turkish border. Russia and the United States have stepped up their air attacks against some armed groups, including JFS, while Russia, Turkey and Iran have initiated a new political process in Astana that aims to end the entire Syrian war through political negotiations that lead to a new constitution. This follows successful Turkish-Russian mediation to end the Aleppo battle and siege. OPINION: Syrias Civil War One conflict, multiple battles All these developments have squeezed JFS and AS, who find themselves as the next major target for air and ground attacks by the Syrian government and other regional and global powers. These two groups have worked together in recent years, when they primarily fought ISIL or the Syrian government, including forming a large coalition named Jaish al-Fateh in early 2015 that conquered Idlib. Neither of them attended the Astana talks, which increases their status as likely targets for Turkish, Russian, Iranian or American bombs. Some groups might react to the current evolving environment by slowly shifting from a military to a political battle, hoping to find a place to survive, in new forms, in a reconfigured Syria that might emerge in the coming years. by All smaller Syrian rebel groups, regardless of their secular, Islamist or extremist orientation, now face the same dilemma: they might be attacked by JFS and other hardline groups if they join political talks to achieve a ceasefire and a new constitution; if they ignore the political talks, they will be attacked militarily by the government and foreign powers, in a severely imbalanced military equation that augurs badly for them, as Aleppo showed. Turkeys involvement Complicating this equation is Turkeys efforts to entice Syrian rebel groups to join its fight against ISIL and autonomy-seeking Kurdish groups in the north, in return for Turkish support and even potential future protection and patronage in a decentralised, new Syria. This highlights the problem that has plagued hundreds of Syrian rebel groups since 2012: unless they unite and coordinate to act jointly on the basis of their collective numbers and local legitimacy and support, they remain easy prey for their more technologically advanced foes, whether the Damascus government, its foreign backers, Turkey or the US. This reality may explain why both JFS and AS now seek to attract or pressure smaller groups to join them or else they all risk annihilation. OPINION: Syrias Civil War One conflict, multiple battles The attacks last week, especially on Jaish al-Mujahideen, may be only the beginning of a longer campaign by JFS to consolidate its power base, in Idlib especially. AS, for its part, is protecting and bringing into its orbit Jaish al-Mujahideen, Suqour al-Sham, Faylaq al-Sham, and other small groups that have been attacked or threatened by JFS. Whichever of them emerges stronger will face the larger inevitable battle against ISIL, the Syrian government, and foreign powers. Some groups might react to the current evolving environment by slowly shifting from a military to a political battle, hoping to find a place to survive in new forms in a reconfigured Syria that might emerge in the coming years. Whether that happens will be clarified in the months ahead, when new conditions, actors, and tactics will surely emerge, as they have in the past few weeks. Rami G Khouri is a senior public policy fellow at the Issam Fares Institute at the American University of Beirut and a non-resident senior fellow at Harvard University Kennedy School. The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial policy. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto needs an overhaul of his foreign policy towards the US. Miguel Guevara was born and raised in Cuernavaca, Mexico. He holds an MA in public policy from Harvard University. On January 26, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto faced off with US President Donald Trump on Twitter. They both took credit for cancelling a meeting they were scheduled to have in Washington DC on January 31. Political commentators and the Mexican public had been asking for a cancellation of the meeting after Trump decided to stick to his position that Mexico will have to pay for a wall along the US-Mexico border. The online standoff was seen an embarrassment for President Pena, who has advocated for dialogue with Trump. It is time that the Mexican government switches gears and moves forward with tougher policies on the US, seeking to break its economic dependence on US markets. Not doing so will bring great perils to Mexico and set a bad precedent for Latin America. Economic dependence For much of the 20th century, the Mexican state encouraged nationalism based on the idea that Mexico was at its core a Latin American country (not a North American one), sharing a common revolutionary heritage with its southern neighbours. In a radical departure from this ideology that gave birth to Mexico on the eve of the 20th century, the Mexican government started improving relations with the US in the 1990s. This change was led by a group of US-educated technocrats who populated the Mexican government and pushed the idea that Mexicos future lay north, neglecting relations with other Latin American countries. One of their main arguments was that looking north benefited Mexico as the US economy was bigger and thus held better prospects for Mexico. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which Mexico, the US and Canada signed in 1994, was the cornerstone of that political consensus, paving the way for significant economic dependence. As a result, Mexicos economy developed to cater overwhelmingly to US import needs; almost 80 percent of Mexican exports now go north across the border. Whole industries were dedicated to US consumer needs. For example, Mexico became the worlds seventh biggest car manufacturer with support from the US and a steady supply of US-made car parts; the vehicles it produces are almost exclusively exported to the US. Economic dependence led to political acquiescence to US domination of Mexicos foreign policy. In 2002, Mexico hosted the International Conference on Financing for Development which a number of Latin American leaders attended, including the late Cuban leader Fidel Castro. Amid pressure from the US, then Mexican President Vicente Fox called the Cuban leader and asked him to only attend the leaders lunch and then leave in order to please US President George W Bush, who was also in attendance. This sparked popular outrage in Mexico. In more recent years, the US has played an important role in Mexicos internal security decisions. As the number of Central Americans attempting to get into the US surged, the US government provided financial support to Mexico to help it detain and deport migrants en route to the US. As a result, in 2016 the number of migrants detained in Mexico increased threefold compared to 2012. True to the tradition of his predecessors accommodating the US at any cost, Pena tried to have a dialogue with Trump, despite his anti-Mexican posturing. In August 2016, while Trump was struggling in the polls, he invited him to his office. The visit was widely criticised within Mexico and prompted the organiser of the meeting, then Finance Minister Luis Videgaray, to resign. After Trumps election, Videgaray came back to the cabinet as foreign minister. It was rumoured that he has close ties with Jared Kushner, Trumps son-in-law and adviser, and was tasked to manage the relationship with the new US administration. New Mexican foreign policy Mexicans are not happy with Penas approach. They are very proud of their heritage, their culture and its effect on the world, and see Penas weakness in front of Trump as humiliating. It is imperative that Pena listen to his people and stand up to Trump. It is time for the Mexican government to change its foreign policy towards the US and be bolder in its approach. Pena must be clear that Mexico will not tolerate Trumps tantrums. If Trump decides to pursue his populistic policies, then Mexico must be ready to seek alternatives and a future of its own. In doing so, Mexico can lead with an example of how developing countries can break free from the chains that tie them to industrialised powers. Last Thursdays Twitter embarrassment, just like the August one, was the result of Videgarays actions. He should resign and Pena should appoint an experienced diplomat who can introduce tough new policies to stand up to Trump. Mexico needs to be serious about leaving NAFTA. Mexico shouldnt be willing to tolerate any embarrassment for the sake of staying within NAFTA. The free trade agreement has brought positive results mainly to the north of Mexico, but many swaths of the agricultural south have deeply suffered from US competition. Small Mexican producers cant compete with the US subsidised industrialised farming. OPINION: Latino resistance under Trump In todays interconnected world, there are vast markets that the Mexican economy can tap into. China is one of them. Pena should consider very seriously strengthening relations with China. In recent years China has sought a closer relationship with Latin America, but Mexico hasnt been a major part of this endeavour because of its US focus. Mexico must also vow not to deport any foreign citizens in Mexico en route to the US. Pena should immediately instruct all federal agencies to stop detention and deportations of the 120,000 Central Americans who cross Mexico annually trying to reach the US. The government should provide shelter and humanitarian aid to them and stop mistreatment. Mexico should set an example for the rest of the Latin American countries to follow in facing an uncooperative US president and looking for foreign policy alternatives. If they dont do so, Mexico and other Latin American countries risk becoming Trumps backyard and being continually humiliated. Relations with the US are not as valuable as national sovereignty and that should never be compromised on. Miguel Guevara was born and raised in Cuernavaca, Mexico. He holds a Masters degree in public policy from Harvard Universitys John F Kennedy School of Government. He currently lives and works in California, where he collaborates with Latino community organisations. The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial policy. More than 90,000 people protested last night across Romania against the governments plans to pardon or reduce sentences of corrupt politicians. The January 29 protest is thought to be the biggest in Romania in 20 years and followed similar demonstrations last weekend. The Romanian government, an alliance of the Social-Democrats (PSD) and the smaller, liberal ALDE, intended to pass this week, by executive decree, two major changes to the penal code that would amount to a virtual amnesty for those found guilty of abuse of power, whether in the past or the future. One of the legal changes calls for the pardoning of prison sentences of up to five years for several types of crimes, including abuse of power. Another reduces future sentences for abuse of office to as little as six months, or even simply fines, and raises the threshold of punishable damages to state coffers. The government has claimed the changes are needed because of overcrowding of prisons. The law changes would clear Liviu Dragnea, head of the PSD and de facto leader of Romania, of his suspended two-year sentence for vote rigging in 2012. This could mean that Dragnea will finally be legally allowed to occupy the coveted prime ministers seat, currently held by his faithful ally Sorin Grindeanu. Among other notorious political and business figures serving jail time that could be freed is Dan Voiculescu, one of the richest Romanians, currently serving 10 years for abuse of power and money laundering. Voiculescus influential media empire, Intact, has been blatantly pro-PSD for years. The proposed legal changes have been criticised by numerous Romanian institutions dealing with the rule of law, including the prosecutor general, judge organisations and bodies investigating high-level corruption and serious crimes. The European Commission has also condemned the plans. The protests forced the government to call for quick public consultations on Monday morning. During the meeting, Minister of Justice Florin Iordache indicated that the changes might go through parliament, as opposed to being passed as executive orders as initially planned a sign the government was stepping back due to public pressure. Romania: Anti-corruption poster child Romania together with Bulgaria is thought to be the most corrupt country in the European Union. When Romania joined the EU in 2007, it was a conditional entry: the EU continued to monitor the functioning of the judicial system, largely because of corruption concerns and politicisation of the legal system. Because of these failings too, Romania is still not a member of the EU free movement of persons area, Schengen. Since 2008, responding to EU concerns, Romania stepped up its efforts to combat corruption. The National Anti-Corruption Directorate (DNA), now led by prosecutor Codruta Kovesi, intensified investigations of corrupt politicians and increased convictions, from tens to more than a thousand each year. Romania saw several waves of protests since 2012, some of them successful in checking abuses of power, and protesters today are mature and confident. by The arrests of high-profile individuals, including Social-Democrat and former Prime Minister Adrian Nastase, were broadcast live on TV to the satisfaction of many in Romania, who felt corruption was to blame for the countrys numerous ills. The EU and the United States praised Romanias anti-corruption efforts and Western media ran complementary articles about Ms Kovesi. While convictions came from all political camps, the DNA seems to have particularly hit the PSD, the most powerful party in post-socialist Romania. When the PSD won general elections in December 2016, many feared the DNA would come under attack. On January 18, the justice ministry proposed the changes in penal laws and the first weekend of major protests ensued. The executive decrees were initially meant to be adopted last week, but centre-right President Klaus Iohannis took advantage of his legal prerogative to run some executive sessions and blocked the passing of the orders that day. Propaganda war The PSD leader Liviu Dragnea criticised the protests last weekend as the beginning of a coup detat orchestrated by Iohannis, and an attempt to prevent the PSD from implementing its political programme meant to bring well-being to Romanians. The PSD was elected by 45 percent of voters, largely because of its economic programme of wage increases and tax breaks, which could benefit the poorest. But Dragneas insinuation that those who oppose the penal code changes also oppose increased prosperity for the poorest is disingenuous. The changes had not been announced by the party before elections. While some PSD voters may not unreasonably prioritise combating poverty over fighting corruption, hardly anyone in Romania would want jailed corrupt officials freed. The ground for the unpopular penal code changes was set by weeks of intensified negative coverage of the DNA and Kovesi in the pro-PSD media. The DNA was accused of being a tool of the Romanian secret services and the protesters were depicted as agents of billionaire George Soros a common defamatory tool in Eastern Europe. This was, surprisingly, paralleled by the negative DNA coverage in some high-profile Western media the same had previously praised the DNA. The media attack on the DNA exploited some very real vulnerabilities of the agency, which even well-meaning critics pointed out: a potential over-reliance on information coming from the secret services, whose functioning is opaque and whose evidence might not be acceptable to all courts; surprisingly high conviction rates which raise questions about the due process; the use of negative media coverage of those investigated even before charges are placed. The DNA needs more public scrutiny in Romania so that its modus operandi can be improved. But the DNAs critics of the past weeks were not interested in making anti-corruption efforts more transparent and efficient. They wanted to suppress them. Yet, the people protesting yesterday cut through the fog. Some of them are uncritical of the DNA given the lack of a proper analysis of the agencys work and the EUs consistent praise while others think the work of the agency needs to be subject to open and democratic scrutiny. But all protesters agree that corruption is a problem if not the biggest in Romania and see through the PSDs crude tactics of changing laws to pardon its allies. The PSD faces a fragmented and weak parliamentary opposition, but despite its considerable popular support, it has to watch out for the Romanian streets. Romania saw several waves of protests since 2012, some of them successful in checking abuses of power, and protesters today are mature and confident. The sophisticated civil society watchdogs emerging in the past few years are also bad news for anyone thinking they can just throw prison doors open. Claudia Ciobanu is a Romanian freelance reporter based in Warsaw. Her articles have appeared in the Guardian and Reuters among others. The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeeras editorial policy. The 2017 Convention Days in Seneca Falls will commemorate both the 1848 Women's Rights Convention that happened there and the 100th anniversary of full voting rights for women in New York state. Adopted at the convention was the Declaration of Sentiments. That and 11 resolutions to advance the "social, civil and religious condition of women" were signed by 100 women and men in attendance. In advance of this year's Convention Days, taking place July 13-16, organizers are seeking descendants of the signers to help honor them. Descendents can register at conventiondays.com or the Seneca Falls Visitors Center, 89 Fall St., Seneca Falls. Leaders convene on Addis Ababa to choose one of five candidates in the running to lead 54-member bloc. Addis Ababa, Ethiopia African heads of states have gathered in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, to elect a new chairman for the African Union Commission. Five candidates are in the running to replace outgoing leader Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, the first female to lead the bloc of 54 states, who is not seeking a second term in office after completing her four-year stint. Security in Addis Ababa, the seat of the AU, has been scaled up as dignitaries and diplomats lobbying for the candidates descend on the city. Those seeking the top job in the worlds second most populous continent are: Kenyas Foreign Minister Amina Mohamed, Abdoulaye Bathily, a Senegalese diplomat and academic, Chads Foreign Minister Moussa Faki Mahamat, Botswanas Foreign Minister Pelonomi Venson-Moitoi, and Mba Mokuy, a former political adviser from the ex-Spanish colony of Equatorial Guinea. The AU was supposed to pick a new leader in July last year but the election was postponed following three rounds of voting after candidates failed to garner the required number of votes. A candidate needs to secure at least a two-thirds majority, 36 votes, to be declared winner. More than 50 percent of the member states abstained from the second round of voting last year. The five hopefuls held a televised debate last month to try and persuade undecided countries how to vote and convince the public of their abilities. The African leaders will also vote on whether to re-admit Morocco into the organisation. Morocco, the only country on the continent which is not part of AU, applied to rejoin the bloc in July last year. Rabat withdrew from the union in 1984 to protest against the admission of disputed Western Sahara territories. Follow Hamza Mohamed on Twitter: @Hamza_Africa Chadian diplomat elected as the new AU Commission chairperson after seven rounds of voting in Addis Adaba. Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Chads Moussa Faki Mahamat has been elected as the new chairperson of the African Union Commission, in a vote held at the blocs headquarters in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, on Monday. After seven rounds of voting, the Chadian foreign affairs minister defeated favourites Amina Mohamed of Kenya and Senegals Abdoulaye Bathily. Two other candidates, Botswanas foreign minister, Pelonomi Venson-Moitoi, and Mba Mokuy, of Equatorial Guinea, also contested for the seat. The 56-year-old and father-of-five succeeds South Africas Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, the first woman to lead the bloc of 54 states, who did not seek a second term in office after completing a four-year term. Kenya was the first to congratulate the newly elected AU chief. Kenya congratulates him on a race well won. We pledge to work with him to defend the pan-African agenda of integration for Africa, as well as democracy, sovereignty and prosperity for all of its people, a statement by Kenyas State House spokesperson Manoah Esipisu said. Faki is not new to the workings of the AU, having previously served as the bodys chair of the Economic, Social and Cultural Council. Heads of state from the 54-member countries cast their vote in a private ballot. A candidate needs to secure at least a two-thirds majority, 36 votes, to be declared winner. The AU was supposed to pick a new leader in July last year, but the election was postponed following three rounds of voting after candidates failed to garner the required number of votes. More than 50 percent of the member states abstained from the second round of voting last year. Meanwhile, the AU is expected to vote on Tuesday whether Morocco, the only country in Africa that is not part of the organisation, will be re-admitted into the body. Rabat withdrew from the union in 1984 to protest against the admission of disputed Western Sahara territories. Follow Hamza Mohamed on Twitter: @Hamza_Africa At least three people die in a week in the overcrowded Moria refugee camp on Greeces Lesbos island. A third person has died in a week in the Moria refugee camp on Greeces Lesbos island, raising alarm about the grim winter conditions in overcrowded facilities that critics have denounced as deplorable. The dead man is believed to be about 20 years old and from Pakistan, a police official on the island said. Another man who shared his tent was critically ill and taken to hospital. The death at the islands Moria camp follows those of a 22-year-old Egyptian and a 46-year-old Syrian who shared a tent and died days apart. Greek media reported they had inhaled fumes from a heater, but authorities would not confirm or deny that. Greeces migration minister Yannis Mouzalas ordered an investigation into the deaths, the causes of which remain unclear. Steps would be taken to make the situation more manageable, he was quoted by the Athens News Agency as saying. We wonder how many deaths it will take for the government to wake up, said Stavros Theodorakis, leader of the small centrist party To Potami. At least 3,000 refugees and migrants are living in Moria, a hilltop former military base where conditions have deteriorated as they await, for months, word on their future. The United Nations refugee agency and other international organisations have urged Greece to improve conditions at its overcrowded facilities. Wanton loss of life Something has got to give. We cannot tolerate this wanton loss of life, said International Rescue Committee Greece director Panos Navrozidis, acknowledging that conditions in Moria did not meet humanitarian standards. READ MORE: Concern over EU plans to send refugees back to Greece As a mid-winter freeze gripped parts of the country earlier this month, thousands of asylum seekers endured sub-zero temperatures. Summer tents on Lesbos were weighed down by snow. Across Greece, more than 60,000 refugees and migrants most from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan have been stranded since last March, in formal or makeshift camps, which US-based group Human Rights Watch has described as deplorable and volatile. We dont know yet how they died, but we do know the thousands stuck on the Greek islands have been suffering horrendous conditions in the cold, trapped by the failure of the EU to offer protection and dignity, said Gauri van Gulik, Amnesty Internationals Europe director. Earlier this month, Germany announced its intent to start deporting newly arrived asylum seekers back to Greece, despite a five-year suspension of such returns due to the poor conditions in Greek camps. That decision came just a month after the European Commission recommended that member countries return refugees and migrants who first entered the EU in Greece back to that country. The announcements have been widely condemned by rights groups and humanitarian organisations. Four of the biggest mosques in the Netherlands to shut doors during prayers after attack on mosque in Quebec. Four of the largest mosques in the Netherlands said on Monday that they will shut their doors during major prayer meetings after six people were killed in an attack on a Canadian mosque . The Blue Mosque in Amsterdam, The Hagues as-Sunnah Mosque, Rotterdams Essalam Mosque and the Omar Al Farouq Mosque in Utrecht said in a statement: We feel compelled to close mosque doors during prayers. Additional safety cameras have also been set up at the Blue Mosque, which is in the southwestern suburbs of the Dutch capital. Several thousand people attend prayers at the four mosques daily. Merciless acts such as in Quebec contribute to the growing global hatred of Muslims, Said Bouharrou, of the Dutch Moroccan Council of Mosques (RMMN), told the AFP news agency. Six people died and eight were wounded late on Sunday when gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque, in a shooting Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a terrorist attack. A mosque is an open building that should be accessible at any time of day to all people looking for peace and calm. But we have to be alert against these terror attacks. Its disappointing that these stringent safety measures should be put in place, Bouharrou said, adding that mosque leaders were in close contact with the Dutch National Coordinator for Security and Counterterrorism. Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families. Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 30, 2017 The Netherlands will hold parliamentary elections in March with Islamophobic politician Geert Wilders leading in opinion polls. Wilders has advocated closing all mosques and Islamic schools and banning the Quran, the Islamic holy book, if he becomes the countrys next prime minister. Although no specific threats have been made against mosques in the Netherlands, Bouharrou said the RMMN was keeping a close eye on political developments,in the run-up to next months vote. There is considerable anxiety ahead of these elections. A politician like Mr Wilders has had clear viewpoints [about Islam] over the last few years, he said. In December, a court in the Netherlands found Wilders guilty of discrimination for leading a chant against Moroccans at a 2014 campaign rally. He was convicted of discrimination but sentenced to no punishment on Friday for comments he made at a March 2014 local government election rally in The Hague. When he asked supporters whether they wanted fewer or more Moroccans in your city and in the Netherlands, the crowd shouted back Fewer! Fewer! and a smiling Wilders answered: Were going to organise that. In 2015, Islamophobic harassment in the Netherlands rose sharply and at least 446 incidents of violent or verbal attacks were recorded, according to Dutch police. In 2014, police recorded 142 such incidents. Raids conducted in country that is not only a world leader in producing drugs, but also a leading consumer. Officials say six heroin laboratories have been destroyed in the south of Afghanistan, a country that is not only a world leader in producing drugs, but also a leading consumer. The Ministry of Interior said the laboratories were destroyed during a special military operation late on Saturday in Bando village in Helmand province. The ministry said 1,090kg of morphine, 15,175kg of ammonium chloride and 2,000 litres of liquid opium, which is used in making heroin, were also destroyed. The crackdown on these labs are part of efforts to fight drug addiction in Afghanistan, Zabihullah Dayem, a senior adviser to the counter-narcotics minister, told Al Jazeera. READ MORE: Afghanistans war on drugs This operation was conducted in an area under conflict, by which I mean an area that is under the Taliban or contested. At least six armed militants were killed, Dayem said. He added that conflict makes it difficult for law enforcement to conduct such operations frequently, as civilian casualties are feared. Afghanistan grows about 80 percent of the worlds opium, which is used to produce highly addictive heroin. An estimated 1.6 million Afghans are drug addicts, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Laila Haidari, an Afghan activist known as Mother to hundreds of former drug addicts, runs a drug rehab centre in Kabul. She told Al Jazeera that the government is not doing enough to fight the curse, referring to the drug epidemic in Afghanistan. She said that rather than destroying a few labs, authorities should focus on bringing awareness to the drug issue and change the mindset of people. They are not honest, they lie about numbers and release reports like these to prove that they are doing their job, whereas, nothing is being done about drug addicts in Afghanistan, she said. There are many people I know are selling and making these harmful drugs in laboratories across Afghanistan. Why are the authorities turning a blind eye to this? Maryam, a 26-year-old opium addict, told Al Jazeera that there is no escape from drug addiction in the country as drugs are readily available. I am fighting every day of my life, my husband is an addict as well and I have three children, she said, adding that she has no option but to beg on the streets. We have tried going to rehabilitation centres, but to be honest, it does not work. Many patience relapse as soon as they head out of the centres. READ MORE: Helping Afghanistans forgotten drug addicts Opium production in Afghanistan rose to 4,800 metric tonnes in 2016, up by 43 percent compared with the previous year, according the Afghan Ministry of Counter Narcotics and the UNODC in October. The report also showed a 91 percent decrease in eradication of opium production in 2016. There are powerful drug warlords who are running these laboratories, and the truth is, our government is too weak to confront them, Haidari said. Afghanistan is the safest place for terrorism and illegal drugs. Fatima Faizi from Kabul contributed reporting Members of parliament call on government to reply in kind to President Donald Trumps ban on Iraqis entering the US. Iraqi members of parliament have voted to call on the government to enact a reciprocal travel ban on US citizens, if Washington does not withdraw its decision to prohibit the entry of Iraqis. The move is a response to US President Donald Trumps executive order barring citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen from entering the United States for at least 90 days. The vote on Monday is not thought to be binding on the government of Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, whose government has made no official comment on the order. READ MORE: The lives interrupted by Trumps immigration ban The parliament called on the Baghdad administration to respond in kind to the American decision in the event that the American side does not to withdraw its decision, a parliamentary official who was present for the vote told AFP news agency, quoting text of the decision that was read at the session. Parliament voted by majority on calling on the Iraqi government and the foreign ministry to respond in kind, MP Hakim al-Zamili said. Sadiq al-Laban, another MP, confirmed that the vote was for a call on the government to enact reciprocal measures. We are against this stance from the new administration, Laban said, adding: We hope that the American administration will rethink this decision. Also on Monday, Iraqs foreign ministry urged the US to review the ban. We see it as necessary for the new American administration to review this wrong decision, the ministry said in a statement. It was not clear if the reciprocal move demanded by the parliament was intended to apply to US military advisers. Holders of visas for government and diplomatic business are exempt from the US ban. The Pentagon says its advisers are embedded with Iraqi field commanders in the campaign to recapture Iraqs second-largest city, Mosul, from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS). READ MORE: Six other times the US has banned immigrants Trumps decision led to the detention of incoming refugees at US airports, sparking protests, legal challenges and widespread condemnation from international leaders, rights groups and activists. It has also led to a growing backlash inside Iraq that could undermine relations between Baghdad and the US amid the battle for Mosul. Get your nationals out The parliamentary vote came a day after its foreign affairs committee made a similar call for Iraq to respond in kind to the US measure. US Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham said Trumps ban would affect military cooperation and security in other ways. This executive order bans Iraqi pilots from coming to military bases in Arizona to fight our common enemies, the two US politicians said in a joint statement. Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism, they said. Trumps travel restrictions drew condemnation from influential Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr. Get your nationals out before removing expatriates, said Sadr. Ko Ni, legal adviser to Aung San Suu Kyis party, was shot as he got into a taxi by an unknown assassin. A legal adviser for Myanmars ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party has been shot dead outside Yangons international airport, in what appeared to be a rare outbreak of political violence in the commercial capital. Police arrested a lone gunman, but a motive was unknown in the killing of 65-year-old Ko Ni on Sunday, a prominent member of Myanmars Muslim minority. A taxi driver who tried to stop the gunman was also killed, according to Zaw Htay, spokesman for President Htin Kyaw. We have detained and are questioning the gunman to find out why he killed him, and who is behind it or paid him to do it, Zaw Htay told Reuters. READ MORE: Malaysia Muslim countries should end Rohingya crisis A police official told Reuters the suspect was a 53-year-old Myanmar citizen from the central city of Mandalay. Mourners gathered in front of the home of Ko Ni on Monday. This is a crime and I request you find justice, senior party member Tin Oo told media, saying Ko Nis death was a loss for the whole country. The apparent assassination comes amid heightened tensions in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, where leader Aung San Aung San Suu Kyi is under pressure over a heavy-handed security operation in an area of the countrys northwest that is populated mostly by Muslims. Talking to his grandson Ko Ni had just embraced his young grandson as he stepped out of the airport terminal on his return from Jakarta, said the lawyers daughter Yin Nwe Khine. My father was talking to his grandson. Then, I heard a gunshot. At first, I thought it was a car tyre blowing out, then I saw my father lying on the ground, she said. Ko Ni, an expert in constitutional law, had spoken out about the powerful role the military retains in governing Myanmar, despite handing over power to Aung San Suu Kyis civilian administration in April. My father was often threatened and we were warned to be careful, but my father didnt accept that easily. He always did what he thought was right, said Yin Nwe Khine. READ MORE: Myanmar detains policemen over Rohingya abuse video A lot of people hate us because we have different religious beliefs, so I think that might be why it happened to him, but I dont know the reason. Ko Ni had joined Minister for Information Pe Myint on the visit to Muslim-majority Indonesia, billed as an opportunity to share experiences of national reconciliation. The delegation included several Myanmar Muslim leaders, some belonging to the mostly stateless Rohingya minority. Yanghee Lee, the UNs special rapporteur for Myanmar, voiced her outrage over Ko Nis killing, saying she had met him on her last trip to the country earlier this month, which included a visit to Rakhine. My deepest and most sincere condolences to the family of U Ko Ni the most prominent and respected Muslim lawyer of Myanmar, she tweeted, calling on Aung San Suu Kyis government to get to the bottom of his death. Parliamentary petition follows US presidents immigration crackdown on on Muslim-majority nations. More than a million people have signed a parliamentary petition demanding that US President Donald Trump is prevented from making a state visit to Britain. Mondays milestone far exceeds the 100,000 signatures needed to get parliament to consider debating the issue. The petition gathered the large number of signatures in less than 24 hours. Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official state visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen, the petition reads . We should not be honouring President Trump with a State visit and he certainly should not be invited to address both Houses of Parliament. ChukaUmunna (@ChukaUmunna) January 30, 2017 The response follows Trumps executive order banning visitors, refugees, and migrants from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the US. British Prime Minister Theresa May, the first foreign leader to visit the new president, formally invited Trump for a state visit during a meeting between the pair on Friday. Mays enthusiastic embrace of Trump and refusal to condemn his travel ban sparked outrage in the UK , earning her strong criticism from media personalities and politicians. Following the furore, May said in a statement that she disagreed with the ban. Earlier, she had said the issue was a matter for the US. Protests planned Several prominent personalities, including Somali-born Olympic champion Mo Farah and the British-Iraqi Conservative Party MP Nadhim Zahawi, said they were affected by the ban. British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said he would work to ensure British nationals were not affected by the ban. However according the US embassy in Londons website, British dual nationals with citizenship in the targeted countries were being advised not to apply for a visa. Johnson has reportedly sought clarification from his US counterparts over the issue. OPINION: Trumps Muslim ban is a dangerous distraction Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the UKs main opposition Labour Party, has called on the prime minister to postpone a state visit, writing on Twitter that Trump should not be welcomed to Britain while he abuses our shared values with [a] shameful travel ban. Meanwhile, European leaders including German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande have been forthcoming in their criticism of the ban. Protests are expected in cities across the UK on Monday evening against the discriminatory measures, including one outside the prime ministers residence at Downing Street. Nationals of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Yemen, are affected by the ban, which includes those who are dual nationals of states other than the US, and permanent US residents. The decision triggered mass protests at airports and town halls across the US in solidarity with those affected. Ko Ni, legal adviser to Aung San Suu Kyis party, was shot as he got into a taxi by an unknown assassin. Tens of thousands of people gathered in the Myanmar city of Yangon on Monday for the funeral of Ko Ni, a Muslim lawyer shot dead the previous day, The 63-year-old was an expert in constitutional law and adviser to Aung San Suu Kyis ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party that came to power in April. A prominent member of Myanmars Muslim minority, the lawyer was involved in efforts to amend a military drafted constitution. Police have arrested a 53-year-old man, suspected of being the lone gunman who shot Ko Ni in the head outside Yangons international airport on Sunday evening. Ko Ni had just embraced his young grandson as he stepped out of the airport terminal on his return from Jakarta, said the lawyers daughter Yin Nwe Khine. My father was talking to his grandson. Then, I heard a gunshot. At first, I thought it was a car tyre blowing out, then I saw my father lying on the ground, she said. The victim had just returned from a trip to Indonesia, where Myanmar government officials and Muslim community leaders discussed with Indonesian counterparts issues of reconciliation. Taxi driver Nay Win, 42, was also killed when he attempted to apprehend the gunman, according to state media. We have detained and are questioning the gunman to find out why he killed him, and who is behind it or paid him to do it, Zaw Htay told Reuters news agency. READ MORE: Malaysia Muslim countries should end Rohingya crisis An estimated 100,000 mourners, including family members, lawyers, NLD activists and members of Yangons diplomatic corps attended Ko Nis funeral at a Muslim cemetery in northern Yangon. Aung San Suu Kyi was not in attendance and has yet to comment on the killing. Her party said on Sunday that Ko Nis death was a great loss for which there is no substitute. The apparent assassination comes amid heightened tensions in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, where Aung San Suu Kyi is under pressure over a heavy-handed security operation in an area of the countrys northwest that is populated mostly by Muslims. Ko Ni, an expert in constitutional law, had spoken out about the powerful role the military retains in governing Myanmar, despite handing over power to Aung San Suu Kyis civilian administration in April. My father was often threatened and we were warned to be careful, but my father didnt accept that easily. He always did what he thought was right, said Yin Nwe Khine. READ MORE: Myanmar detains policemen over Rohingya abuse video A lot of people hate us because we have different religious beliefs, so I think that might be why it happened to him, but I dont know the reason. Ko Ni had joined Pe Myint, the minister for Information, on the visit to Muslim-majority Indonesia, billed as an opportunity to share experiences of national reconciliation. The delegation included several Myanmar Muslim leaders, some belonging to the mostly stateless Rohingya minority. Yanghee Lee, the UNs special rapporteur for Myanmar, voiced her outrage over Ko Nis killing, saying she had met him on her last trip to the country earlier this month, which included a visit to Rakhine. My deepest and most sincere condolences to the family of U Ko Ni the most prominent and respected Muslim lawyer of Myanmar, she tweeted, calling on Aung San Suu Kyis government to get to the bottom of his death. Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, head of Jamaat-ud-Dawa, taken in police custody to his home in the eastern city of Lahore. Pakistani police have placed Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, the alleged mastermind of coordinated attacks on the Indian city of Mumbai in 2008 that killed more than 160 people, under house arrest in the eastern city of Lahore. Saeed was taken into custody at the headquarters for Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), the religious charity he heads, late on Monday, a spokesman said. He has been arrested, and he is being taken in police custody to his home, Nadeem Awan told Al Jazeera. Awan added that dozens of JuD supporters were accompanying the police convoy to Saeeds home. We have received the detention orders from the government of Pakistan, and I believe that this is not aimed at me, but is an international conspiracy aimed at sabotaging the Kashmir struggle, Saeed told reporters, referring to the disputed Indian-controlled territory of Kashmir, before he was escorted by police to his residence. This is the wish of [Indian PM Narendra] Modi, at the prompting of [US President Donald] Trump, and the governments helplessness. The two countries have fought three wars over Kashmir, which both claim in full but control in parts. In 2012, the United States placed a $10m bounty for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Saeed, who is also the founder of the armed group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT). Saeed has long since distanced himself from LeT, which has claimed responsibility for several attacks on Indian security forces and civilians, saying he now only runs JuD as a charity. The United Nations and the United States, however, list JuD as a front for LeT. Both organisations, as well as Saeed as an individual, remain under international sanctions. Saeed has been accused by both the US and India of masterminding the 2008 Mumbai attacks, which killed 166 people in attacks across Indias largest city. READ MORE: US blacklists Pakistans Jamaat-ud-Dawa LeT has been banned as a terrorist organisation by Pakistan since 2002. In 2008, JuD was listed by Pakistan under a list of organisations subject to UN sanctions, including an assets freeze, arms embargo and international travel ban. The group continues to work openly across Pakistan, however, running a network of seminaries, releasing several publications and carrying out widespread humanitarian aid work. We have never broken any laws of this country. If they have a legal order, then we will follow the law, and the doors of the court are available to us to seek justice, said Awan, shortly before Saeeds detention. Four other men Abdullah Ubaid, Zafar Iqbal, Abdur Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Niaz are also to be held under the governments detention orders, local media reported, citing copies and footage of the detention orders. The men are being detained under Section 11-EEE of Pakistans Anti-Terrorism Act, which gives the government the power to arrest or detain terrorism suspects for up to 12 months. Jan. 30, 1937 George L. King, well known Town of Owasco resident, has filed his application for membership to the Volunteer Fire Department of that township and Thursday he demonstrated that he has the qualification of a firefighter. Through his prompt action he prevented a fire that might have done considerable damage had he waited for the arrival of his fellow townsmen and their truck. Mrs. King was backing the family car from the garage on East Lake Road when the motor backfired and started a blaze under the engine hood. Mr. King rushed to action immediately and with the aid of a small chemical hand tank extinguished the flames. Mr. King is one of the proprietors of the Imperial on Genesee Street. Jan. 30, 1962 Procino-Rossi Corp., manufacturers of macaroni products and spaghetti sauces, is celebrating its 45th anniversary. Founded in 1916 by Nick Procino and Alfred Rossi as a small bulk macaroni manufacturing plant in Syracuse, the firm moved to Auburn in 1919 and incorporated as a business in 1927. Procino-Rossi now sells more than 76 different sizes and shapes of macaroni products. In addition, they now produce a line of spaghetti sauces as well as dry macaroni. Recently in commemoration of the creation of the P-R trademark, John Swan of Rossotti Lithograph Corp., of North Bergen, N.J., presented a trademark wall plaque to Jack Procino and Nick Rossi, sons of the company's founders. Jan. 30, 2007 KENNETT SQUARE, Pa. For eight months, Barbaro took fans of horse racing and lovers of horses on a bumpy ride of hope and worry as he struggled to recover from devastating injuries suffered in the Preakness. That struggle ended Monday as Barbaro, the Kentucky Derby champion from Maryland, was euthanized at New Bolton Center veterinary hospital. He was 4 years old. Barbaro's surgeon, Dr. Dean Richardson brushing away tears and with his voice breaking said that, in the end, Barbaro's discomfort was just too great. Jan. 30, 2012 As he battled cancer, 19-year-old Brian Bisgrove enjoyed going down to a pond on the family farm for a bit of peace and tranquility. While struggling through treatments, the man who had began training to become a priest continued to try to make the most positive impact he could on the lives of others, and youths in particular. Bisgrove helped form Catholic youth groups and provided counsel for those who were going through tough times. A part of that was his vision for his family's farm, and for it to be used for others as he had used it for those struggling with life to be able to relax and find themselves. Two years later, after Brian passed in 1998, Jack Bisgrove donated the land in Owasco to Champions for Life to form Everest Park setting his son's vision into motion. The bill, if passed by the Knesset on Tuesday, will allow the confiscation of private Palestinian land in the West Bank. Palestinian politicians in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory have warned of dangerous consequences if Israels parliament passes a bill to legalise land grabs in the West Bank. Speaking to Al Jazeera, Hanin Zoabi, a Palestinian politician in Israels Knesset, said the bill is an act of annexation and part of Israels broader plans to expand settlements and Judaize Jerusalem. Zoabi, a member of the predominantly Arab Joint List electoral coalition, argued that Israels hardline Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is no longer worried about international criticism now that Donald Trump has become US president. Netanyahu wants there to be no rationale and no reason to negotiate with Palestinians, she said. Late on Monday, the Knesset delayed the final committee and plenary votes on the bill until Tuesday morning, according to local media. If passed, the bill will regulate settlement in Judea and Samaria [the West Bank] and allow its continued establishment and development by permitting the confiscation of private Palestinian land, according to its text. It will apply to 16 settlements and outposts. More than half-a-million Israelis live in Jewish-only settlements across the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, according to the Israeli rights group BTselem. Although all settlements are considered illegal under international law, there are more than a hundred outposts that were built without authorisation and are considered illegal by even the Israeli government. In practice, Israel has confiscated Palestinian land since its military occupation of the West Bank, including Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip started as a result of the 1967 Middle East war. Last building block of apartheid regime Though Prime Minister Netanyahu had previously opposed the bill, he has now declared his support for it. Writing on Twitter on Sunday, he said the bill would prevent recurrent attempts to harm the settlement enterprise. Mustafa Barghouti, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, described the bill as the last building block of a racist apartheid regime. Its very dangerous because it means legitimising any confiscation of private Palestinian land, he told Al Jazeera. Theyve been doing it in the past for a long time, but it means now settlements are the argument in and of themselves. READ MORE: The US embassys move to Jerusalem wont happen soon Barghouti argued that the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority should refer Israel to the International Criminal Court and end all security coordination with the Israeli army. In order to do that, he said Fatah, the party that dominates the Palestinian Authority, and Hamas, which de facto governs the besieged Gaza Strip, must establish a national unity agreement in order to present a unified strategy against Israeli settlement expansion. Israelis have determined they want the end of a Palestinian state as an idea, he said. Any more delay will mean Israel has a completely free hand to do what it wants, confiscating land and killing the possibility of statehood. Flurry of settlement construction Settlement expansion has been particularly rampant in recent weeks, particularly since the UN Security Council voted in favour of a resolution demanding the halt of settlement activity by Israel in the West Bank last year, with the US abstaining under the administration of former President Barack Obama. After that vote, Trump, who was sworn in on January 20, vowed to change things at the UN. In a plan to boost settlement expansion, Israeli authorities recently granted final approvals for the building of 153 settler homes in occupied East Jerusalem, with thousands more to follow. Under Netanyahus reign, settlements expanded some 23 percent between 2009 and 2014. Though Trump has not made official statements about settlement growth, Palestinians in the West Bank are already seeing the effects of his presidency on the occupied territory. READ MORE: Palestinian hip-hop group uses music as a weapon Najwan Berekdar, a Ramallah-based Palestinian activist from Nazareth, told Al Jazeera: I dont think Trump will condemn the settlements. He has not announced his objection to the settlement project. She added: The law [if passed] enhances apartheid, these steps taken by Israel, ruins their own reputation. If it passes, it will highlight its [Israels] real goal to occupy the whole of Palestine. The White House has announced that the US is in the early stages of fulfilling Trumps pledge to move the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a move that has been opposed by Palestinian leadership and by Palestinians in Israel and the West Bank. The law, like many Israeli laws, defies the principles of democracy, Berekdar said. It would ruin Israels relationship with Europe, and even the US since its [settlement building] illegal under international law. Canadian prime minister decries shooting at mosque that killed at least six as two suspects are arrested. At least six people were killed in a shooting at a mosque in Quebec City during evening prayers, police said. Gunmen fired on about 50 people inside the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre on Sunday at 8pm local time (01:00 GMT). Six people are confirmed dead they range in age from 35 to about 70, Quebec provincial police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told reporters, adding that eight people were wounded and 39 were unharmed. Police said two suspects had been arrested, but gave no details about them or what prompted the attack. The mosques president, Mohamed Yangui, was not inside the mosque at the time of the shooting. He received frantic calls from worshippers. He said: Why is this happening here? This is barbaric. Speaking to Al Jazeera by phone, he said: One of the administrators called me and said there was a shooting at the mosque. I am still in shock. I ran to the mosque I was told that one attacker was arrested at the scene while another one was arrested nearby. A terrorist attack on Muslims Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the shooting as a terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge. Muslim Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country, he said in a statement. The shooting came on the weekend that Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, after US President Donald Trump suspended the US refugee programme and temporarily barred citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the country. Philippe Couillard, premier of Quebec, said on Twitter that Sundays attack is a terrorist act, and called for solidarity with Quebecers of the Muslim faith. Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families. Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 30, 2017 The mosque leader Yangui added that the centre had not received any threats immediately before the attack. The neighbourhood is very peaceful. We have a good relationship with the government, the mayor of Quebec. We have no problem whatsoever, he said. Writing on its Facebook page after the attack, the centre said: All of our thoughts are with the children to whom we must announce the death of their father. The mosque was previously targeted in an Islamophobic attack. In June 2016, during Ramadan, a pigs head was left on the mosques doorstep along with a note that said bon appetit. Pork is forbidden in Islam. We are not safe here, said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque in the middle-class residential area, but did not on Sunday. Speaking to Reuters, Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now very worried and thinking of moving back to Morocco. OPINION: The death of multiculturalism in Quebec Basem Boshra, managing editor of the Montreal Gazette, told Al Jazeera that the centre is the citys biggest mosque of six, with some 5,000 members. Theres a pretty strong Muslim community in Quebec City, he said, adding that there were plans to lower flags at the national assembly as a mark of respect for the victims Ralph Goodale, Canadas public safety minister, said on Twitter that he was deeply saddened by the loss of life and injuries. Greg Fergus, an MP in Quebec, described on Twitter the attack as a terrorist act the result of years of demonizing Muslims. New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said police were providing additional protection for mosques in that city following the Quebec shooting. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something, he tweeted. Islamophobia in Quebec Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The full-face covering became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. Q&A: Quebec minister defends religious ban In 2013, police investigated an incident in which a mosque in the Saguenay region of the province was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighbouring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Its a sad day for all Quebecers and Canadians to see a terrorist attack happen in peaceful Quebec City, said Mohamed Yacoub, co-chairman of an Islamic community centre in a Montreal suburb. I hope its an isolated incident. Social media users express solidarity after attack on a Quebec City mosque leaves six Muslims dead and eight wounded. Soon after news broke that six Muslims had been killed in a shooting attack at a mosque in Canadas Quebec City during evening prayers, people of all backgrounds took to social media to express their solidarity. Gunmen fired on about 50 people inside the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre on Sunday at 8pm local time (01:00 GMT). At least eight people were also wounded in the incident. In a series of posts, Twitter users denounced the attack against Muslims and offered condolences to the families of the victims. https://twitter.com/johnconn9/status/826061963323142145 Twitter user Gregory Brown described Sunday as a sad day for Canada & the victims of this hateful act. We must stand against racism and othering, especially now, he said in a post. Mag Gardner, another Twitter user, urged her fellow citizens to stand together: #saintefoy. Canada: together we must stand tallno matter the background. True North strong and free. Mag Gardner (@maggardner) January 30, 2017 Justin Trudeau, Canadas prime minister, condemned the shooting as a terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge. Muslim Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country, he said in a statement . READ MORE: Americans raise $600,000 to rebuild burned Texas mosque While many in the North American country shared words of strength to each other via social media, others expressed concerns about Islamophobia in the country. Our 4 y.o. at bedtime: "Dad, do we have to be Muslims in secret now?" "No, love, #ACanadianIsACanadian."#SainteFoy mosque as she sleeps. Hakique Virani (@hakique) January 30, 2017 The incident took place a few days after US President Donald Trump barred citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen from entering the United States. READ MORE: Quebec City mosque attack: Six dead and eight injured Trumps move led to the detention of incoming refugees at US airports, sparking protests, legal challenges and widespread condemnation from international leaders, rights groups and activists. And on Twitter, some users said Trumps executive order referred to by many on social media as #MuslimBan prompted xenophobia beyond US borders. https://twitter.com/ZBandelhi/status/825901678507483136 Meanwhile in Canada, shooting in a mosque next to Quebec City. Thank you America for exporting your fear and xenophobia #SainteFoy Elba Nino (@elbitacool) January 30, 2017 Twitter users also celebrated the Canadian Muslims in government, posting images and profiles of civil servants. Canadian police detain one man as Muslim leaders call for greater protection of their community after shooting attack. Quebec City, Canada Canadian police have said only one of two men initially held in connection with a Quebec City mosque shooting which killed six people is now considered a suspect. The second man, who was initially reported as a second suspect, was now considered a witness, provincial police said on Monday. Authorities did not provide additional information about the identity of the suspect, or about the possible motive behind the shooting that left six worshippers dead and at least eight wounded at the Islamic Cultural Centre. Another 12 people attending evening prayers sustained minor wounds, according to a local hospital spokesperson. READ MORE: Social media tributes pour in after Quebec mosque attack The attack shocked people across Canada and sent ripples through the countrys Muslim community. Justin Trudeau, Canadas prime minister, condemned the shooting as a terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge. To the more than one million Canadians who profess the Muslim faith, I want to say directly: We are with you. Thirty-six million hearts are breaking with yours, Trudeau, who was expected to head to Quebec City later on Monday, said in the House of Commons in Ottawa. In Quebec City, Muslim leaders called for unity and greater security for their community in the aftermath of the shooting. I cant express the great pain that touched our community with this tragedy that took place in a place of worship, against people who were praying, Mohamed Labidi, president of the Islamic Cultural Centre, said during a press conference on Monday morning. We are touched by this solidarity and it diminishes our pain, Labidi said, breaking down in tears at the podium, where he was flanked by Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard. It hit us like a freight train. How could this happen in Quebec? Labeaume said. Couillard said the attack was a terrorist act that specifically targeted the Muslim community. We are all Quebeckers. All of us, a great people and a great nation, are united today, he said. READ MORE: Dutch mosques lock doors at prayers after Canada attack Hate crimes targeting Muslim-Canadians more than doubled between 2012 and 2014 a period in which such offences as a whole fell across the country. Last year, the Islamic Cultural Centre in Quebec City was the target of an Islamophobic attack. A pigs head was left on the centres doorstep, alongside a note that read, bon appetit. Pork is forbidden in Islam. The National Council of Canadian Muslims expressed outrage at Sundays attack and called for the country to come together in the face of senseless violence and hatred. We are heartened by the overwhelming support from fellow Canadians in this time of deep crisis. We must unite together against divisive forces that seek to harm our communities, said Ihsaan Gardee, the national councils executive director in a statement. The NCCM, a national lobby group that tracks anti-Muslim hate crimes, called on police to increase security around mosques and Islamic centres across Canada following the attack. Quebec Muslims are frightened right now, said Haroun Bouazzi, president of Montreal-based human rights group AMAL-Quebec. We are urgently waiting for answers as to how and why such a tragedy could occur. Labeaume said a vigil would take place in Quebec City on Monday evening, and another meeting is set for Tuesday to discuss steps moving forward, including additional safety measures for the community. The Quebec flag was flying at half-mast in front of the provincial legislature, and the government has also set up an online form where the public can send their condolences to the victims of the attack. Thank you for all the memories, Ornella Saragusti wrote in chalk on the wall of her home away from home Saturday. I can be my truest form of myself here, the 18-year-old UF economics freshman said. After decades across from UF, the Institute of Black Culture and the Institute of Hispanic-Latino Cultures, known as the IBC and La Casita, will undergo renovations near the end of the semester, said Gabe Lara, the director of Hispanic and Latino Affairs. Some students who found a home at the buildings said goodbye to the IBC on Friday and La Casita on Saturday, located at 1510 and 1504 W. University Avenue, respectively. Were not going away, said Diana Moreno, the assistant director of Multicultural and Diversity Affairs. Its a see you later. The new, larger facilities will have updated technology and more accessibility for disabled students, Moreno said. Construction, which will cost about $5 million, will end Spring 2018, Lara said. Those involved with the programs appreciate the universitys commitment to improving the buildings especially since UF is still predominantly white, Moreno said. Ashley White, a 20-year-old UF food and resource economics junior, said the programs current relationship with UF is a stark contrast to when the IBC was founded. In 1971, during events known as Black Thursday, students demanded space on campus by occupying UF President Stephen OConnells office, leading to the arrest or suspension of 67 people. Students also fought for La Casita, which opened in 1994. Rosana Resende, a UF Latin American Studies professor, said it was born of fire and activism. White said UFs help with renovations show IBC and La Casita are being taken seriously. It gives us something to look forward to in the future with race relations on campus, White said. Enjoy what you're reading? Get content from The Alligator delivered to your inbox Subscribe Now On Friday, Dale McPherson, the Black Student Union president in 1972 when the center opened, reflected on the time surrounding Black Thursday. McPherson said students knew OConnell, after whom UF named its OConnell Center, wouldnt be understanding. He said when OConnell was a judge, he ruled against UFs integration. We didnt have any particular hope about dealing with him, McPherson said. Vee Byrd, the director of Black Affairs, plans to maintain the IBCs hard-fought history. The renovated building will have a room to hold scrapbooks and declarations from decades ago. Were able to honor our rich history and honor those who fought, literally fought so hard, for us to have this facility, Byrd said. Students at IBC and La Casita said farewells with feelings of unease. Meriza Candia, a 22-year-old political science junior, said she hopes the new buildings have the same warmth, which carried many through laughter and tears. I want the same feeling to be there, she said I dont want it to be just another building. @romyellenbogen rellenbogen@alligator.org Gabriel Costa, a 20-year-old UF music performance and nutrition sophomore, paints the flag of Brazil onto his hand to decorate the front of La Casita. Students left their handprints on the building as a final farewell. Members of the UF community gathered around a man preaching about love on Friday a day after students and faculty members protested against a man wearing a swastika armband. Tyler Ellman, a Jewish UF student, said he organized the Liberation Rally on Holocaust Remembrance Day to bring the university community together, regardless of religion. More than 200 UF students, faculty and staff came to show their support on Turlington Plaza. On Thursday, Michael Dewitz stood in the same place on Turlington, wearing a swastika arm- band as protesters berated him for four-hours. Dewitz, 34, didnt appear at Fridays rally, but Ellman said University Police were notified of the protest beforehand to beef up security just in case. He said if Dewitz did come, Ellman planned to ignore him. Im really proud of The Gator Nation today, the 22-year-old UF theater and telecommunication senior said. Ellman, wearing a Star of David necklace and an Israel Defense Forces shirt, stood on the concrete bench surrounding the potato statue with local religious officials Rabbi Berl Goldman, 45, on his left and Rabbi Adam Grossman, 40, on his right. Goldman, of the Lubavitch Chabad Jewish Center, said he was happy the previous days protest remained peaceful and Dewitz wasnt harmed by protesters. Dewitz was, however, attacked off-campus by two men afterward, Gainesville Police said. Grossman, of UF Hillel, said Fridays rally was a showcase of what the world could be when people choose to love instead of hate. The hope of a rally like this is to not be an ending point but rather a starting point to more community, more collaboration, to rule out hate in our communities, he said. As the rally ended, the crowd joined together to sing John Lennons Imagine. Jacob Zieper, 21, said he wanted to celebrate his Jewish heritage after Dewitz directed a Nazi salute at him on Thursday. It kind of killed my morning, he said. As a proud Jewish student at UF, it can be scary to witness something like what happened. The UF Jewish studies senior said anti-Semitism is often ignored because some feel the Jewish community is no longer marginalized. When a diverse crowd attended the rally, it was meaningful, he said. Enjoy what you're reading? Get content from The Alligator delivered to your inbox Subscribe Now Were here, he said. Were proud of who we are as Jewish Gators Jewish Americans. Were not going anywhere. Later that night at Chabads weekly service, Goldman said he felt comforted to see those who went to Turlington to commemorate the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp. Sometimes through the most challenging or negative elements, something dark, the greatest light is represented. As thick crowds of college students exhausted the last call for alcohol and slowly scattered from Midtowns bar scene early Saturday morning, 101 Cantina closed its doors for good. After eight years across the street from UFs campus, where it served for many as a welcome escape from the stress of academia, the bar and restaurant announced Friday its run was over. Since August, Cantina faced foreclosure after its owners could not pay back $68,322 in debts owed to investors, Alachua County court records show. In September, the bars landlord demanded owners pay back $21,181 in overdue rent, according to court records. Erik Zika, Cantinas general manager, broke the news of the bars closing Friday in a bleak, long-winded Facebook post. With much heartache, the day that we never thought would happen is now upon us, the post read. This will be 101 Cantinas final night open in Gainesville. But for the night and into the morning Cantina hosted one final drunken celebration, a fitting send off for the Midtown bar. Jonathan Joseph, 21, said he heard about the closing Friday morning and knew he had to go one last time. The UF applied physiology and kinesiology senior went to Cantina at about 10 p.m., and even though he only stayed for 10 minutes, he took a final shot of tequila with three friends to celebrate. It seemed like a typical Cantina night, he said. @merylkornfield mkornfield@alligator.org Enjoy what you're reading? Get content from The Alligator delivered to your inbox Subscribe Now About 100 students and community members joined a musical procession Sunday to celebrate the completion of a hand-written Torah. In Jewish tradition, adding a new Torah, a religious text, to a community is an extremely special occasion, similar to a wedding, bar mitzvah or bat mitzvah, said Chanie Goldman, the co-director of the Lubavitch Chabad Jewish Center. The centers fifth Torah was carried under a canopy as members of the place of worship, located at 2021 NW Fifth Ave., sang and danced in celebration. The Torah is synonymous with the continuity and longevity of our people, she said. Its like were celebrating our fifth child. The scroll was dedicated in honor of the late Rabbi Menachem Schneersohon, an influential jewish leader known by many as The Rebbe, Goldman said. It typically takes a year for a Sofer, a specially trained scribe, to write an entire Torah by hand with quill and ink, according to the Chabad website. The scripture is complete with more than 300,000 letters. In addition to singing, dancing and listening to speakers, those who attended the ceremony had the opportunity to have a letter of the new Torah dedicated in their honor. Each letter in the Torah... represents each human being, Gold- man said. Although each letter is different, as each person is different, theyre all bound together in the same book. Chelsea Pincus, a UF communications and health science senior, said she visits Chabad for every shabbat, a Friday night dinner and religious service, and tries to help out around the center as much as she can. Its great to see role models and older people dedicating their time to grow Judaism on campus, Pincus, 21, said. Maia Groman said Sunday was the first time she was able to experience a Torah dedication in Gainesville, and the event was exciting for everyone at the center. Its a time for the community to get together and celebrate our heritage, said the 19-year-old UF advertising sophomore. Groman, who visits the center three to six times a week, said members of the center have leaned on each other since Michael Dewitz appeared on Turlington Plaza wearing a swastika armband last week. Enjoy what you're reading? Get content from The Alligator delivered to your inbox Subscribe Now Its definitely brought the community together, but weve always been strong, and we always will be, she said. Dewitzs presence sparked a four-hour protest on campus, with about dozens of students express- ing support for Jewish community members and scorn for the anti- Semitic emblem. It showed all of us how much support we have in our community and from the university, which was really an amazing thing to see, Groman said. @molly_vossler mvossler@alligator.org Members of the Lubavitch Chabad Jewish Center dance in celebration. The center welcomed its fifth Torah Sunday. Kimia Ghaffari held her hand to her throat Sunday, taking in the protest the Irani immigrant spent two days planning. With proud tears in her eyes, the 18-year-old UF chemistry freshman watched about 150 people she had brought together on Turlington Plaza speak out against President Donald Trumps immigration ban. On Friday, Trump signed an executive order barring people from seven Muslim-majority nations Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia from entering the U.S. for 90 days, the Associated Press reported. The order also barred the U.S. acceptance of Syrian refugees indefinitely. It was signed in the name of national security, but over the weekend, people across the country protested what many called a Muslim ban in airports and in the streets, including at UF and in Gainesville. People have said that America is the greatest country in the world so many times that they have started to believe that American people are the greatest people in the world, Ghaffari said. Theyve started putting the lives of American people over those in need. UF President Kent Fuchs released an email Sunday and said of UFs about 7,000 international students, there are about 200 undergraduate and graduate students, faculty and staff from the seven named countries in the executive order. Embracing all members of our community and maintaining a welcoming environment for talented students, faculty and staff from around the world are central to our values and identity as a university, he said. Though the Trump administration has claimed the ban is for U.S. safety, Ghaffari said its the most offensive thing shes ever heard. And though citizens from Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates have committed terrorist attacks in the U.S., they werent included in the Trumps ban. Trump and his family also have business interests in the three countries, NPR reported. Alan Alvarez Sophia Timm, a 20-year-old UF biology and anthropology junior, stands alongside Rana Al Nahhas, a 21-year-old UF psychology senior, who holds a sign that reads, "My family is not a threat." Ghaffari called the ban dehumanizing ban and said it would cause a divide between families, friends and countries around the world. Enjoy what you're reading? Get content from The Alligator delivered to your inbox Subscribe Now Its easy to insult someone as soon as you dehumanize them, she said. They dont think theyre banning people, theyre banning immigrants. Its not human beings to them its just a word. A federal judge ruled Saturday that people who had returned to the U.S. from the affected countries and were being detained in U.S. airports could not be sent back, although the White House said the ruling doesnt affect the executive order. When Nikka Vakhtiar, 18, heard of the ban, she was confused. It kind of just felt like out of the blue, the UF biology freshman said. Its not like there are any direct threats. Her confusion quickly turned to anger as she thought of her family in Iran, who wants to travel to her cousins graduation this summer. Vakhtiar left Iran when she was 6 months old. Now she doesnt know when shell see her family again. This completely threw us all off, she said. Im kind of scared about it. It feels like its just the beginning. Susanne Hill, the executive director of the UF International Center, wrote in an email that no students are currently studying in the countries affected by the ban. Alan Alvarez Samira Roostaie, a 30-year-old UF art history graduate student, holds a sign that reads, Muslim Rights are Humans Rights, while standing in a circle of more than 120 people. "Muslims are welcome here, the group chanted. On Sunday, protesters took to the street to share the same message of solidarity. About 15 people stood on the corner of Northwest 34th Street and West University Avenue to protest the ban. Taylor Spruce, a UF psychology freshman, held a sign reading, I stand with Muslim immigrants. The 18-year-old said her boyfriend has family in Iran and cant travel to his home country without fearing whether he can return. This ban affects us all, she said. On UFs campus, about 150 people chanted on Turlington Plaza as they spoke out against the ban. Protesters marched from Turlington along University Avenue to its intersection with Southwest 13th Street. While cars honked in approval, some spectators screamed in anger at the protestors. Participants shouted, No hate, no bigotry, no Muslim registry and Ban Trump, not Muslims. Ghaffari, who organized the protest, said she created the Facebook event Saturday evening to speak out. I was tired of being quiet, she said. Ghaffari was born in Iran and migrated to the U.S. with her parents when she was 9. Although shes an atheist, she said she feels like Muslim immigrants arent treated fairly. Theres this misplaced fear of terrorists when it comes to Muslims, she said. Were still being punished and still being treated as the other, as the enemy, even if we havent done anything. Alan Alvarez More than 120 people who gathered on Turlington Plaza march north on Newell Drive on Sunday afternoon while chanting, "Muslims are welcome here." At the beginning of the protest, Vasudha Narayanan, a UF religion professor, read a statement from President Fuchs addressing the protesters concerns. Narayanan said UF spokesperson Janine Sikes asked her to read Fuchs letter. The statement said UF supports its international community and keeps students records private. At about 6:45 p.m., Fuchs walked over to the protest from Tigert Hall, thanking protesters for supporting Muslim students, he wrote in an email. Rana Al-Nahhas, whose parents are Syrian immigrants, said she was glad Fuchs came to the UF protest. He wasnt there very long but the fact that he showed up meant so much for us, she said. I broke down seeing that many people out there to say that I am welcome here, I am safe, they do not accept this intolerance and this hatred and this fear. Margaret Clifford, a UF research assistant, wrote in an email that she sent a letter with 50 signatures to Fuchs on Sunday night regarding the ban. The letter asked Fuchs to ensure that UF community members affected by the ban wont be penalized monetarily, academically or professionally. Its important that we strongly and loudly oppose any legislation or cultural shift toward increased xenophobia, the 30-year-old said. The University of Florida is an international community and it is important to me that people, regardless of what passports they carry, feel safe to learn, to live, and to express themselves here. By Sunday night, another petition asking Fuchs to condemn Trumps executive order had gained 3,000 signatures. While UF students band together in protests, letters and petitions, Ghaffari said people should realize Muslims arent dangerous. She said she grew up accustomed to people treating her like a foreign animal, even her classmates in elementary school, but Trumps ban will make it worse. Im not going to bite you, she said. Somehow that elementary school kid became the president. Staff writers Catherine Dickson, Meryl Kornfield, Katelyn Newberg and Jimena Tavel contributed to this report. Behnaz, a 42-year-old UF science management masters student who wanted her last name to remain anonymous, stands with a group of more than 120 people on Turlington Plaza to protest President Donald Trump's muslim ban. "This is not together, this is segregation, she said. In 40-degree weather, about 20 protesters in Gainesville huddled together under overcast skies to protest a pipeline set to run through Alachua County. The demonstration, held on the corner of Northwest 34th Street and West University Avenue, aimed to bring attention to the construction of the Sabal Trail pipeline, a natural-gas pipeline set to run through Alabama, Georgia and Florida after its completion in March 2017, according to the Sabal Trail Transmission website. As it passes underneath Alachua County, near Newberry and Bronson, the pipeline may threaten residents drinking water, said Justin Goldsman, an event organizer and UF masters student. Goldsman, who also protested at Standing Rock Indian Reservation against the Dakota Access pipeline, said the cold weather on the Gainesville street corner was nothing compared to that of North Dakota, where protesters were at one point hosed down to persuade them to leave the construction site. Goldsman said residents of the county cannot ignore the Sabal Trails construction much longer. We can only make excuses for so long, the 23-year-old said. The protesters cheered as honking cars passed by. Jane McNulty, 59, kept her dog Katy, 13, in a stroller surrounded by blankets. At one point, when a car passed and someone yelled out, Make America great, McNulty laughed it off and shook her head. This isnt political, the Gainesville resident said. I would have been out here regardless of who became president. Stephanie Salagan, 35, who attended the protest, left her home in Montreal to warn people about fracking and pipelines. She said she was living in Canada in 2013 when a train carrying gas exploded in Quebec, killing 47 people and polluting the water. You have to act now before its too late, Salagan said. At the end of the day, remaining protesters walked to the 34th Street Wall and painted, No more pipelines in sky blue capital letters. Even as it began raining, Goldsman, enthusiastic to paint on the wall for the first time, said he hoped the message he left isnt washed away or painted over. Enjoy what you're reading? Get content from The Alligator delivered to your inbox Subscribe Now I dont know if it will do anything, he said. I hope it will. @merylkornfield mkornfield@alligator.org Jane McNulty, 59, and her dog, Katy, 13, protest against the Sabal Trail pipeline on the corner of West University Avenue and Northwest 34th Street on Saturday. About 20 protesters cheered when passing cars honked. AUBURN Drawings, masks and paper sculptures made from book pages are among the nearly 1,250 art pieces on display at the Schweinfurth Art Center for its biggest exhibit. More than 1,530 people visited the Auburn art center throughout the day Sunday for the opening of two separate annual exhibits, "Both Ends of the Rainbow" and "Three Lakes Sampler." "Both Ends of the Rainbow," sponsored by Nucor Steel, is a collection of art pieces by students and senior citizens in the Cayuga County area. Much of the gallery is student artwork, including work from students within 27 Cayuga County-area school districts. The exhibit also includes contributions from Cayuga Centers, Peachtown Elementary in Aurora, the Cayuga/Seneca Community Action Agency and a homeschool group. "Three Lakes Sampler" features art by students in the BOCES component districts of Cayuga, Skaneateles and Owasco lakes. The exhibits will remain open until March 5. While "Both Ends of the Rainbow" has continued for more than 30 years, Deidre Aureden, the Schweinfurth's program director said the exhibit's variety is reflected in the variety of art projects done by students year after year. This year's exhibit includes sculptures by Auburn High School students made from the pages of books. Meanwhile, students out of Cato contributed a variety of decorative masks. Aureden said the assortment of sculptures, in general, is notable this year compared with past "Both Ends of the Rainbow" exhibits. "We love to see variety," she said. "The quality of the art is always very high and it is this year, as well." For four hours Sunday, Charlie Rash sat alone waiting for someone to sign up with his Student Government party. Seeing a steady stream of people for Impact didnt really faze me, said Rash, the vice president for the newly formed Progress Party. Were kind of the David to their Goliath. Sunday was the first day students registered to run as Student Senate candidates for Spring elections. About 45 students qualified, all running with Impact Party, wrote UF Supervisor of Elections Eric Hobbs in an email. In Spring 2016, 289 students registered with Impact, 61 registered with Access Party and five registered as independent, according to Alligator archives. Senators are elected in Spring based on their college and year at UF. Hobbs said starting Sunday gave busy students the opportunity to sign up. Audra Weeks, 18, said she registered as a College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Impact senator because her friends, who are Impact senators, said she should. They seem to be making an impact on campus, said the UF agricultural education and communication junior. Within the last 15 minutes of registration, one person approached the Progress table, interested in running as a freshman or business senator, Rash said. It was a breath of fresh air to have him show up at the last minute, the 18-year-old UF finance freshman said, adding that the student hasnt officially registered. Interviewing continues today from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Tuesday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the Reitz Union Student Activities and Involvement Office. @paigexfry pfry@alligator.org Enjoy what you're reading? Get content from The Alligator delivered to your inbox Subscribe Now Cuba is an island trapped in time. Old American and Russian cars zip through crumbling avenues and around 1920s-era buildings. Some are painted bright colors, others are faded or outright falling into ruin. The Caribbean sun beats down intensely, made more gentle by a forgiving ocean breeze. Perpetual sounds of crowded streets, howling merchants, roaring automobiles and music fill the air. You will catch whiffs of diesel exhaust, hot food or perhaps just the sea. This was the Cuba I knew over Winter Break when I had the opportunity to travel there to perform journalistic activities one of the 12 special categories an American must fall into to travel to the communist island. Accompanying me was an American who was born and raised in Cuba, and through the aid of her family and friends still living on the island, I was able to see a side of the country that perhaps eludes many foreign visitors. My experience gave me hope for the future of U.S.-Cuba relations and American travel to Cuba. Of one thing I am confident: American visitors will love Cuba. They will love it not only for its pristine white beaches, coral reefs and majestic mountainsides, but for its vibrant music, dancing, rich history and cultural heritage. Then, there are the prices. When making the conversion to the CUC or Cuban peso (the two currencies on the island), housing, goods and food were generally half the price of what they would be here. Americans will also be drawn to a forbidden allure that still surrounds the island. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Cubas government has opened itself up to international tourism in an effort to curb extreme economic hardship. But the U.S., with its longstanding embargo against the island, forbids its citizens from engaging in tourism or other forms of commerce with Cuba in an effort to destabilize its government. Cubans on the island refer to this as the Blockade, which their leaders blame for many of the countrys woes and is symbolized by a noose in government-sponsored images. However, Americas Cold War-era policy toward Cuba began to change rapidly in the twilight years of the Barack Obama administration. Many will recall the deal Pope Francis helped broker between President Obama and Cuban leader Raul Castro in 2014 to re-establish diplomatic relations, an example of reconciliation for the world, ending a half century of estrangement. Then, in 2015, Secretary of State John Kerry raised the American flag over our new embassy in Havana, and just this past year, Obama became the first American president to visit Cuba in 88 years. The Obama administration, on their part, has instituted regulatory changes that make it easier for citizens to travel to the island, opening the way for relations to improve. Read a continuation of this column on American travel to Cuba and the death of Fidel Castro tomorrow. Ford Dwyer is a third-year student at the Levin College of Law. This is part one of a three-part series. Many UF students, faculty and staff may wonder why the university has not banned the individual wearing the swastika from our campus. The answer is rooted in the First Amendment and the role of state officials. As interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court, the First Amendment protects hateful, disturbing and offensive speech from government censorship at least as long as the speaker is peacefully expressing his views in a public space without threatening anyones physical security. But what about emotional security? Throughout our history, the First Amendment has asked us to put up with speech that evokes strong emotions based on a belief in the protective and healing power of discourse and the ability and willingness of citizens to come together and speak out against hate. In 1977, members of the Nazi Party sought a permit to march in Skokie, Illinois, wearing Nazi uniforms. More than half of Skokies residents were Jewish, and many among them were Holocaust survivors or relatives of Holocaust victims. The village of Skokie argued it could ban the march because it promoted hate, inflicted emotional harm and might provoke violence. A trial court and the state Supreme Court agreed and banned the march, but the U.S. Supreme Court ordered it could go forward. Ultimately, the Nazis didnt march in Skokie but relocated elsewhere. They were nonetheless drowned out by Americans expressing abhorrence for their beliefs. Today, a Holocaust museum stands in Skokie as a testament that offensive beliefs cannot harm us unless we let them go unanswered. What happened in Skokie, and whats happening now at UF, are exactly what our First Amendment envisions: engaged citizens with the courage of their convictions drowning out hateful speech with peaceful yet powerful counter speech. As Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis once wrote, the framers of the First Amendment knew that fear breeds repression; that repression breeds hate; that hate menaces stable government; that the path of safety lies in the opportunity to discuss freely supposed grievances and proposed remedies; and that the fitting remedy for evil counsels is good ones. In other words, the remedy for hateful speech is not silence enforced by an edict from on high. Instead, the remedy is our voices united against the speech we hate. Lyrissa Lidsky is a professor and the associate dean of international programs at the Levin College of Law. 1. The representatives of the Guarantors of the Peace, Security and Cooperation Framework for the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and the region (PSC Framework) held their third meeting in Addis, Ethiopia, on 27 January 2017, on the margins of the African Union (AU) Summit. The meeting was chaired by Minister of Foreign Affairs of []http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Appa-sourceTheAfric... The United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has called for the defence of the vulnerable while tormentors are brought to justice. We must always defend the vulnerable and bring tormentors to justice, he said in his message on the observance of the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust held on []http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Appa-sourceTheAfric... Which part of extreme vetting did liberals who lost the 2016 election not understand? President Trump is doing exactly what he said he would do during the campaign -- a concept foreign to liberals -- namely, suspend immigration from countries riddled with terrorist activity. Protests have erupted as a handful of travelers from these countries have been detained at airports, It was inevitable due to timing that there would be travelers caught en route, including diabetic grandmothers and former translators who worked with U.S. forces in Iraq caught in the transition as Trumps executive orders was implemented. But these media horror stories have obscured an essential fact. No one who is not an American citizen has a right, emphasis on the word right, to come here. It is the right of sovereign nations to control their borders in the manner they see fit based on the criteria their national interest demands. As the Department of Homeland Security stated clearly in a statement on the bans implementation: "The Department of Homeland Security will continue to enforce all of President Trump's executive orders in a manner that ensures the safety and security of the American people," the department said in an early morning statement. "President Trump's executive orders remain in place -- prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety," the statement continued. "President Trump's executive order affects a minor portion of international travelers, and is a first step towards reestablishing control over America's borders and national security." "No foreign national in a foreign land, without ties to the United States, has any unfettered right to demand entry into the United States or to demand immigration benefits in the United States," the department said. Which part of that do the protestors at the airports not understand? The media hysteria surrounding the bans implementation is seen in a BBC news story about how a transgendered Iraqi woman had her dreams shattered by Trumps executive order. Excuse me, but President Trump was not elected to address the concerns of transgendered Iraqi women. He was elected to protect American citizens and their nation from terrorism. Critics insist on describing the refugee ban as a Muslim ban. In truth, it is a geographic ban. So how were the seven countries Trump suspended immigration from selected? They were selected based on a law President Obama himself signed. According to the draft copy of Trump's executive order, the countries whose citizens are barred entirely from entering the United States is based on a bill that Obama signed into law in December 2015. Obama signed the Visa Waiver Program Improvement and Terrorist Travel Prevention Act as part of an omnibus spending bill. The legislation restricted access to the Visa Waiver Program, which allows citizens from 38 countries who are visiting the United States for less than 90 days to enter without a visa. Though outside groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union and NIAC Action -- the sister organization of the National Iranian American Council -- opposed the act, the bipartisan bill passed through Congress with little pushback. At the initial signing of the restrictions, foreigners who would normally be deemed eligible for a visa waiver were denied if they had visited Iran, Syria, Sudan or Iraq in the past five years or held dual citizenship from one of those countries. In February 2016, the Obama administration added Libya, Somali and Yemen to the list of countries one could not have visited -- but allowed dual citizens of those countries who had not traveled there access to the Visa Waiver Program. Dual citizens of Syria, Sudan, Iraq and Iran are still ineligible, however. Critics also forget how the Obama administration stopped processing refugees from Iraq for six month in 2011. Was that a ban on Muslim immigration? As the Federalist reminds us: Although the Obama administration currently refuses to temporarily pause its Syrian refugee resettlement program in the United States, the State Department in 2011 stopped processing Iraq refugee requests for six months after the Federal Bureau of Investigation uncovered evidence that several dozen terrorists from Iraq had infiltrated the United States via the refugee program. After two terrorists were discovered in Bowling Green, Kentucky, in 2009, the FBI began reviewing reams of evidence taken from improvised explosive devices (IEDs) that had been used against American troops in Iraq. Federal investigators then tried to match fingerprints from those bombs to the fingerprints of individuals who had recently entered the United States as refugees This is the president who said in a tweet: Slamming the door in the face of refugees would betray our deepest values. That's not who we are. Yet that is what he did. And at the time, with perfectly good reason. Who we are is a nation under attack by radical Islamic terrorists. That is why Obama did what he did and why Trump is keeping his campaign promise. Terrorists hiding amongst refugees? Where have we seen this before? Oh, yeah, among the unrestricted hordes admitted into Europe to bomb and kill in France, Belgium, Germany, and Turkey. We have admitted terrorists on student visas and on marriage waiver visas, as in San Bernadino. The critics who speak of a Muslim ban are the same people who ignored the ongoing slaughter of Syrian and Iraqi Christians and Yazidis by ISIS. As Investors Business Daily editorialized on the slaughter of Christians: The fanatical Islamist group torches an 1,800-year-old church built before the founding of Islam and forces the Christian residents of Mosul to convert, pay a tax, leave or face execution. This is what the West faces. 'From Boston to Zanzibar, there's a worldwide war on Christianity," Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul said at the Values Voters Summit last October, an annual conservative gathering. The number and intensity of attacks was so great, he said, that it's "almost as if we lived in the Middle Ages." That was an era when the swords of Islam had conquered much of the Middle East and North Africa and threatened the citadels of Christian Europe -- an era to which Islamist terror groups like the Taliban, Nigeria's Boko Haram and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) seem eager to return. Thousands of Christians in Mosul began fleeing the city after ISIL issued an ultimatum on Friday to Iraqi Christians living in Mosul that by Saturday at noon (5 a.m. ET), they must convert to Islam, pay a fine or face "death by the sword." Chaldean Catholic patriarch Louis Sako, who heads Iraq's largest Christian community, told Agence France-Presse: "Christian families are on their way to Dohuk and Arbil (in Kurdistan). For the first time in the history of Iraq, Mosul is now empty of Christians." Yet despite this ongoing slaughter of Christians, among the refugees the Obama administration sought to admit, less than one percent were Christians: As Fox News reported: The Obama administration hit its goal this week of admitting 10,000 Syrian refugees -- yet only a fraction of a percent are Christians, stoking criticism that officials are not doing enough to address their plight in the Middle East. Of the 10,801 refugees accepted in fiscal 2016 from the war-torn country, 56 are Christians, or .5 percent. Was this a ban on admitting Christians? We are asked to show compassion for potential jihadis but not for potential victims who publicly express their fear of unrestricted admission of refugees from hotbeds of terror? The protestors are wrong that such jihadists have a right to be here. The president under the Constitution has authority over immigration policy and the Constitution is not a suicide pact. Those who go abroad to be radicalized should not be readmitted. Those who believe Sharia law trumps the Constitution should not be allowed in, period. Give us your poor huddled masses yearning to breathe free, but not those desiring to end our way of life. That is what extreme vetting is all about. Daniel John Sobieski is a freelance writer whose pieces have appeared in Investors Business Daily, Human Events, Reason Magazine and the Chicago Sun-Times, among other publications. In recent days, news outlets have been reporting that 10th Circuit judge Neil Gorsuch has now risen to the top of President Trump's list of potential Supreme Court nominees. He apparently replaces Judge William Pryor, who was widely reported as previously leading the pack of potential nominees. Judge Pryor faced significant backlash from many on the right, including Evangelical Christians, criticizing Pryor's apparent support of the radical homosexual and transgender agenda. The danger in being the front runner for a spot on the High Court is that you receive intense scrutiny, and, as with most candidates, Judge Gorsuch is difficult to evaluate fully. Having spent some time digging into Judge Gorsuch's background, we have found many good indicators. First, we should say that we personally knew his mother Anne Gorsuch Burford, a lawyer whom President Reagan appointed in 1981 as director of the Environmental Protection Agency. Anne was both principled and fearless taking many arrows in her faithful pursuit of President Reagan's environmental agenda. Sadly, the Reagan administration failed to provide her the backing she deserved, leading to her early departure from that position. Judge Gorsuch's distinguished maternal pedigree should not be overlooked. As to Judge Gorsuch's judicial record, he authored the excellent opinion in United States v. Ackerman, 831 F.3d 1292 (10th Cir. 2016), which, in an alternative holding, determined that government accessing a person's emails constitutes a "search" under the revitalized property rights trespass test articulated by Justice Scalia in the case of United States v. Jones, 132 S.Ct. 945 (2012). Additionally, Judge Gorsuch wrote a concurring opinion in the 10th Circuit, in what became the Hobby Lobby case in the U.S. Supreme Court, determining that the religious freedom of Christian businesses trumps the "right" of a woman to have her employer subsidize the killing of her unborn baby. Finally, Judge Gorsuch is a vocal critic of the modern "Administrative State" advocating the elimination of the doctrine of "Chevron deferense," which has given unelected and unaccountable federal bureaucrats vast and unconstitutional power over just about every aspect of our lives. On the other hand, there is reason for pause with Judge Gorsuch's record. Judge Gorsuch joined in one opinion, United States v. Rodriguez, 739 F.3d 481 (11th Cir. 2013), which causes us to have some concern about his understanding of the relationship between the government and an armed citizenry. To be fair, Judge Gorsuch did not write the Rodriguez opinion his colleague, Judge Bobby Baldock, was the author. Nevertheless, Judge Gorsuch joined the opinion. He could have filed a principled dissenting opinion, or even a concurring opinion agreeing only in the judgment. The facts of the case are these. A New Mexico policeman observed Mr. Rodriguez, a convenience store clerk, carrying a concealed handgun. Carrying a concealed loaded handgun is illegal in New Mexico without a permit but legal if one has a license to do so. The officer, upon seeing a Rodriguez's handgun, detained him, then acting first and asking questions later forcibly disarmed Rodriguez. After finding out that Rodriguez did not, in fact, have a license to carry and, indeed, was a convicted felon, the officer placed him under arrest. Of course, hard cases make bad law. But the precedent from the Rodriguez opinion will affect police-citizen relations in New Mexico, and possibly elsewhere in the Tenth Circuit, for many years to come. Not bothering to figure out the legality of Rodriguez's firearm before detaining and disarming him, the officer's initial actions would have been the same even if Mr. Rodriguez had been a lawful gun owner. According to the 10th Circuit's opinion, the police are justified in forcibly disarming every armed citizen based on nothing more than the presence of a concealed firearm. This allows the police to treat every law-abiding gun owner like a criminal which, in many cases we have seen, includes rough treatment such as grabbing him, twisting his arm behind his back, slamming him down on the ground, and handcuffing him. Far too many police officers do not like anyone to be armed other than themselves and have taken it upon themselves to intimidate those who dare to exercise Second Amendment rights. Under the Rodriguez decision, only after being forcibly disarmed and detained would a citizen be entitled to demonstrate that he was lawfully exercising his Second Amendment rights. The Circuit Court based this decision on Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968) the "stop and frisk" doctrine. One of the holdings from Terry is that, if the police have "reasonable suspicion" that a person is both "armed and dangerous," they can temporarily seize his weapon to keep everyone safe. Of course, anyone with a smidgeon of common sense knows that just being an "armed" law-abiding citizen does not also make a person "dangerous" any more than a police officer with a gun should be considered dangerous. Unfortunately, the Rodriguez opinion allows the police to conflate the two concepts and treat all armed persons as if they were automatically dangerous. According to the panel opinion joined by Judge Gorsuch, the mere presence of a loaded concealed firearm "alone is enough to justify [the officer's] action in removing the handgun from Defendant's waistband for the protection of himself and others." To be sure, Rodriguez did not raise a Second Amendment claim before the court, and the court cited various Fourth Amendment cases to justify its bad decision. But judges cannot completely hide behind precedent. Judge Gorsuch was free to express his disagreements with those precedents, even if he felt obliged to concur in the result. But that is not what he did. Instead, the court went so far as to quote Justice John Marshall Harlan II in Terry for the pre-Heller assertion that "'concealed weapons create an immediate and severe danger to the public.'" Is that what Judge Gorsuch thinks of the 14.5 million law-abiding Americans with concealed carry permits? That they are an immediate and severe danger to the public? Fortunately, the Framers disagreed, emphasizing in the Second Amendment that an armed populace is not only beneficial to, but indeed "necessary to" the preservation of a "free state." Unfortunately, in almost all of the countries of the world, the government considers an armed citizen a threat. But in the United States, the police should consider an armed citizenry one of the sources of strength of the nation. It is hard to imagine a better way to discourage law-abiding people from carrying guns than to do what the 10th Circuit did, and sanction the police forcibly disarming anyone seen carrying a gun. At the end of the day, a single opinion such as this is not be enough to derail a Supreme Court nomination, especially since Judge Gorsuch did not even write the opinion. But he certainly did join the opinion. And if he is nominated to the High Court, a pro-gun United States senator or two should most certainly inquire as to this decision and ask Judge Gorsuch to explain whether he really believes that the police should be free to treat all armed citizens as though they were dangerous criminals. Lawrence D. Pratt is executive director emeritus of Gun Owners of America. Twitter: https://twitter.com/larrypratt. William J. Olson is an attorney in private practice in Virginia with William J. Olson, P.C. and represents Gun Owners Foundation. Twitter: https://twitter.com/Olsonlaw. Have you ever noticed how liberals always think that everyone else's money is theirs? Liberal CEOs of companies like Starbucks aren't content with contributing some of their own massive salaries to the political causes they like; they have to use their shareholders' money, too. The Starbucks CEO said that backing the redefinition of marriage to suit the whims of the 2% of Americans who are gay wasn't an economic decision. He admitted that even though it hurt the company, he'd decided that the morality he liked should be backed. A responsible CEO wouldn't declare that people he disagree with about redefining marriage shouldn't buy Starbucks stock, because his job is to increase shareholder value. Further, a responsible CEO wouldn't throw the company he runs into the middle of a highly controversial moral issue because he knows that both the shareholders and the company's customers aren't of one mind on the issue. Of course, by hurting his own company to help his causes, he earns accolades from liberals who aren't impacted if Starbucks loses money. As a result, when other liberals talk about how overpaid executives are, they don't talk about the ones who misuse their authority to advance liberal causes. Imagine if a marriage backer had done something similar. Oh, wait we don't need to. The CEO of Mozilla was forced to resign because he gave his own money, not the company's, to support a proposition defending marriage a proposition that went to an overwhelming victory, garnering massive voter support. That CEO made no public statement linking the company he led to a particular political stance, unlike the Starbucks CEO, yet liberals lionize the Starbucks CEO for effectively expropriating value from his shareholders while they condemn the Mozilla CEO for his private beliefs. Liberal CEOs are just following the lead of their brethren in government. The behavior of liberal CEOs is just a further example of liberals declaring themselves "caring" by using other people's money. Liberals think raising taxes on other people so they can hire more government workers and even trickle down a few dollars to the poor makes them philanthropists. Since FDR, liberals have viewed the government as their own little agent of change. Liberals believe that all tax dollars exist to further the liberal agenda not to improve the lot of Americans in general. That's why our tax dollars fund National Public Radio and the National Endowment for the Arts. Both organizations are nothing more than cash cows for liberal propaganda. Hardworking Americans are forced under threat of imprisonment to give their money over to their liberal masters to fund the programming liberals like. That's why huge amounts of taxpayer money goes to buy the votes of various supporters of liberal politicians. Whether it's obscene teachers' salaries in Chicago, which are used to buy the support of the teachers and their union in spite of the teachers' total inability to educate minority children, or increasing welfare spending even though 64% of the "poor" in America have either satellite or cable TV, the liberal bureaucrats in D.C. view your hard-earned money as their property to be used to advance their causes. Liberals go even farther and declare that the government lets this or that person keep his money by not taxing it, which is a bold proclamation that everything belongs to the government, in direct opposition to the Constitution. It's time that we started making liberals fund their causes with their own money. I listen to a Catholic radio station, and it is supported entirely by listener donations. There is no reason that liberals, or Protestants, should be compelled to fund that station any more than there is a reason I should be compelled to fund NPR. I don't think liberals should be forced to pay to put stained glass windows in the church I attend, just as I shouldn't be compelled to fund a Crucifix in a jar of urine. Defunding NPR and the NEA would be great first steps in emptying the swamp. Not only would the taxpayers save money, but a bunch of artsy-fartsy liberal yahoos will have to find honest work. Similarly, defunding Planned Parenthood will not only help keep minority babies alive, since PP targets minorities, but take money out of the Democrat machine. Over the past five years PP has funneled $22,000,000 to its PAC. While that money supposedly isn't from the federal government, denying PP government money will force it to choose between lavish salaries the head of PP makes $590,000 a year and helping Democrats. Given the love affair most big money managers have with liberals, as is shown by their support for Hillary, it'll be hard to put much pressure on liberal CEOs who abuse their position so long as their companies don't take a nose dive or maybe even if they do. (Witness the Target story.) But with Trump in office and the Republicans controlling the Congress, it's time to make liberals fund their own causes. Given that most liberal policies don't have broad backing and that liberals aren't too willing to part with their own money, shutting down the flow of taxpayer dollars to liberal causes will help end the amount of liberal propaganda, which is far larger than the number of liberals in America would justify. You can read more of Tom's rants at his blog, Conversations about the obvious, and feel free to follow him on Twitter. President Trump issued an executive order on January 27th suspending indefinitely admission of refugees from Syria and halting all potential refugee immigration from six other Islamic countries for a period of 90 days, after which time a significant percentage of 50,000 refugees worldwide could be admitted annually from the Middle East. During this interval, a new process will be put in place to significantly tighten vetting of all refugees from this region while giving preference to persecuted religious minorities. One need only look at the numerous terrorist attacks in Europe over the past year, due almost entirely to their open border policies regarding refugees from the Middle East, to conclude this is a common-sense order. However, it is being totally misrepresented by the media and the American Left as an anti-Muslim, racist and inhumane. The usual suspects on the Left, such as the ACLU and numerous advocacy groups are in a total meltdown. Some within this ideological assemblage are utilizing the threadbare tactic of isolating a few examples of true hardship as the image of all refugees from his region and the inevitable few that fall through the cracks, as happens when any new law or order is implemented, as confirmation of the heartlessness and illegality of Donald Trump and Republicans. Others on the Left attempt to make the case for the inhumanity of these orders by comparing this refugee flow to that of pre-and post-World War II wherein the globe was awash in displaced Jews and survivors of the most devastating five-year period in human history. This tactic of conflating two entirely different sets of circumstances to pull on the heartstrings of the American populace as a means of advancing a political or social agenda has been a tactic of the Left for far too long. Another part of their strategy that has gone on for far too long is intimidating and thereby shutting down all who may disagree or have another viewpoint on an issue they claim as their exclusive domain -- because of their compassion. The most common tactic is to claim that unless people are African-American, or female, or gay, or (fill in the blank) they are disqualified from expounding on any matter involving these groups, unless, of course, one agrees with the Lefts orthodoxy on matters relating to these groups. The other is to simply scream at the top of ones lungs that anyone who disagrees is racist, misogynistic, callous and ignorant. As many readers of these pages are aware, I am a refugee as well as a WWII survivor and displaced war orphan. I daresay very few citizens of this nation are more acutely aware of the suffering and hardships endured by children caught up in the maelstrom of war. But I am also aware that the first duty of this government is to protect the citizens of the United States. I was brought to America under the terms of the Displaced Persons Act of 1948, which allowed, over a four-year period, just 8,000 war orphans and 400,000 others, all of whom were displaced as of the end of the war in Europe and by December 1945 living in refugee in camps within the zones of US, France and British occupation, to immigrate to the United States. It should be noted that virtually all German, Austrian and Italian citizens were ineligible. In 1948 it was estimated there were upwards of 11 million displaced persons in camps and on the streets of innumerable devastated cities and towns in Europe. The Law required extraordinarily stringent vetting as well as enforcement in order to make certain those allowed to come ashore truly wanted to become productive and loyal American citizens. This screening took place not in the United States but in the various countries of Europe. Within the universe of non-German, Austrian and Italian refugees in postwar Europe there were no radicalized Islamic terrorists or others whose religion and upbringing promulgated conquest, intolerance, revenge and forced conversions at the point of a gun. Although displaced, those seeking asylum could be interviewed and the validity of their documentation verified. Is it not too much to ask, therefore, considering the nature and background of the societies from which todays refugees emanate, to subject them to equally stringent vetting? The Obama policy has been the equivalent of including all Germans under the Displaced Persons Act and not vetting them for their Nazi sympathies. But the true motivation of the vast majority of those on the Left is not compassion for the Middle East refugees, rather it is to use their misery and misfortune to advance their agenda. As their political and economic tenets, have been a spectacular failure wherever tried, they can only seize the reins of government through intimidation, fear, a pliable functionally uneducated populace, and by causing chaos by flooding the nation with both legal and illegal immigrants, some of whom are willing to kill and maim Americans, and whose first loyalty is not to this country but to a religion, ideology or another nation. Thus, the American Left is beneath contempt. Yet they see themselves as morally and intellectually superior when the vast majority are no more than part of a herd of sheep incapable of generating an original thought or concept. They willy-nilly throw around the accusation of Nazism and comparisons to Hitler whenever confronted by any opposition, yet they are todays Nazis in their determination to shut down by threats or violence free speech and assembly, severely limit religious freedom, undermine self-determination, control all economic activity, manipulate the media and transform the United States into a fascist nation. Having survived the end product of Nazism, I do not use that epithet lightly, but the actions of the Left over the past eight years plus the cynical manipulation of the Middle East refugee crisis, created in large part by the ineptitude and deliberate misfeasance of Barack Obama, compel me to do so. It is my fondest wish that we, as a nation, will take in those vetted refugees who truly desire to be Americans from the cauldron that is the Middle East, particularly Christians who have been systemically persecuted and murdered. I have experienced first-hand the compassion and charity of the American people. They are a populace that deserve far better than what the contemptable horde that is the American Left and its alter ego, the Democratic Party, are espousing and executing. The irrational left, which means virtually all the left, is apoplectic over President Trumps executive order halting immigration from terrorist-spawning countries. Its minions are complaining that the move is un-American, which in their world apparently involves playing Russian roulette with American lives. The New York Times just ran a teary-eyed piece lamenting immediate collateral damage imposed on people who, by all accounts, had no sinister intentions in trying to come to the United States, as the paper put it. The fake news is right there by all accounts slipped in casually in the hope the reader will slide by it unthinkingly. In reality, there are many people, from intelligence experts to politicians to social commentators to Muslims themselves, warning that theres no way to truly know these peoples intentions. One of the most striking reports on this front both because of its content and how the Fake News (mainstream) Media ignored it was an October 2015 Glazov Gang interview with Dr. Mudar Zahran, a leader of the Jordanian Opposition Coalition now living as a refugee in Britain. While calling himself an orthodox Muslim, he nonetheless issued an eyebrow-raising warning: Keep the Muslim migrants out of Europe. Whats more, he insists that they must be returned to their native lands. While Europe was the focus at the time (as the destination of most Mideast migrants), Zahrans warnings absolutely apply to the US. And what he says is troubling: Many if not most of the migrants are not what they appear (video below). First, wed always been told the issue was Syrian refugees uprooted by their nations civil war. Yet Zahran stated that many of the Muslim newcomers arent even Syrian. The proof is in the pudding, too. When we read stories about migrants committing crimes rape, murder, a terrorist act or something else the perpetrators generally are Afghani, Moroccan, Tunisian, Iraqi, Somali or some other nationality that doesnt happen to be Syrian. This is just casually mentioned in the reportages who aspect, and the relevant question doesnt occur to most readers. What the heck are these non-Syrian migrants doing in the West when the refugee scheme was sold to Westerners with a help the Syrians message? The next part of the con, states Zahran, is that 75 percent of those arriving from Syria come from safe area[s] because the Syrians in disaster areas cannot leave. But it gets worse. He also asserts that half the Syrian male migrants have actually held weapons and fought in the Syrian war. Then there are the truly malevolent fakefugees. As Zahran put it, I can authoritively [sic] confirm I have photos, I have images, I have pictures, I have names of terrorists who actually are already in Europe posting their photos in Europe on Facebook. This warning has been echoed by other Muslim figures as well. Also in 2015, Lebanese Education Minister Elias Bou Saab warned that 20,000 jihadis likely lurk in his countrys refugee camps, and Syrian ambassador Riad Abbas claimed that 20 percent of Muslim migrants entering Europe had Islamic State (IS) ties. How these miscreants could penetrate the West brings us to the third part of the con: Despite leftist claims to the contrary, there is no way to reliably vet the Muslim migrants. First, nations such as Syria simply dont have comprehensive, Western-style databases containing information on their citizens. Intelligence officials have acknowledged this, as has the Greek government and even former Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson. As Investors Business Daily put it in 2015, Syria and Iraq, along with Somalia and Sudan, are failed states where police records aren't even kept. Agents can't vet somebody if they don't have documentation and don't even have the criminal databases to screen applicants. Moreover, what good would the data be, anyway? As NYC Syrian community leader Aarafat Ralph Succar pointed out in 2015 while warning of IS infiltration in the US, you can bribe Syrian public officials and get government documents stating youre whoever you want to be. Said he, You can go to the Syrian government today and say to them, I need a piece of paper that says Im Tony Caterpillar. And they give it to you, reported the New York Post. As for the notion these migrants can be vetted, Succar has a simple response: [A]re you out of your mind? Yet even if we could weed out the fakefugees, it wouldnt matter because vetting informs only about what migrants are, not what they will become or what their children will be. This is relevant not only because radicalization often occurs in the West itself, but because studies show that younger generations of Muslims in the West are actually more jihadist-minded than their elders. Islam is the problem, as I recently wrote the gift that keeps on giving. And the calculation is simple: If one million Muslim migrants enter a nation over time and just 1/10th of one percent are or will become terrorists, thats 1,000 dangerous jihadists. Are you willing to bet, your life, that this estimate is liberal and not conservative? Yet as dangerous as terrorists are, theres a bigger picture here, a deeper con being perpetrated by the Arab world via the mass migrations. As Zahran warned, I have to be honest; you read Arab magazines and Arab newspapers [and] they are talking about, Good job! Now were going to conquest [sic] Europe. So its not even a secret. Zahran called this process the soft Islamic conquest of the West and noted that what Muslims couldnt do in the last 20 years, now the West is doing for us for free and even [is] paying for it. The last part of the migration con concerns why leftists care so much about fakefugees. Not only is there the ego-driven ideological imperative of preserving their multiculturalist dogma, but consider: The vast majority of U.S. Muslims now vote Democrat, with Obama having gotten 89 and 85 percent of their votes in, respectively, 2008 and 2012. In contrast, pious, church-going Christians favor Republicans by wide margins. Now note that while Christians are 10 percent of Syria's population and are being targeted for extermination by IS, only one half of one percent of the Syrian migrants admitted under Obama were Christian. Compassion? Does the Left really care about these migrants lives? Or just their future votes? Whatever the case, the treasonous or, as some would say, internationalist among the alt-left often speak about redistributing the wealth. They clearly dont mind spreading the terrorism around, either. Why not? The West wont long feel compelled to send soldiers to the Middle East if we bring enough of the Middle East to the West. More Muslims have arrived in the US just since 9/11 than did so during our nations entire history leading up to it. This, the handiwork of the left, has already resulted in hundreds more Westerners dying in jihadist attacks. How much more blood do you liberals want on your hands? Contact Selwyn Duke, follow him on Twitter or log on to SelwynDuke.com For decades, I've watched unions, both private-sector and public-service, collude with the Democratic Party to boost salaries, benefits, and pensions to levels unattainable to the average non-union American worker, all the time wondering, "How the hell are they ever going to keep that going?" For years, when we encountered one of those big, lumbering, quarter-million-dollar motor homes, my wife and I would joke, "There goes another retired lawyer or doctor." These days, based on publicly available data, our speculation is that it's likely a retired cop or fireman. We visited old college friends a couple of years ago at their very nice home on a lush fairway in the desert southwest. He's a retired public utility worker and union official, while she's a school administrator. While he was showing me the yard, I spotted a two-story Spanish Colonial-style mansion across the fairway and observed, "Looks like you have some very well-to-do neighbors." His response was, "That? Nah, he's a retired fireman." Today I spoke with my brother in California about this situation, and he informed me that he has seen on open public records that retired fire department captains in his home town are drawing $130,000 per year from the public trough. Are you beginning to see my concern? You dont have to be an actuary to calculate that the American dream many of these generously retired union workers, especially those from the public-service unions, are living is completely unsustainable, assuredly for coming generations, but most likely for current retirees as well. And that's despite all the desperate attempts by the unions' Democrat cronies to raise taxes, tolls, and public fees to fund the exorbitant salaries, benefits, and pensions of public-service employees and to pressure unionized industries into equally lucrative contracts for their blue-collar workers. Look at almost any major municipality in the so-called blue states, especially those cities that have been under Democrat control for decades, and youll likely find a looming pension crisis; ditto for private sector unions in those same states. But don't even think about suggesting a reasonable reduction in those salaries, benefits, and pensions to either the totally intransigent unions or their Democrat cronies, who will assure you they have some magical way to accomplish the impossible. There's a deepening reservoir of impossible-to-keep retirement commitments in those blue states being held back by a dam of desperate and disingenuous Democrat denial. And now comes what may be a small leak portending that pension dam disaster, which, when it breaks, is going to sweep away generations of American dreams in the fiscal waves and torrents of all that pent up political cronyism and greed. The Washington Post just reported that an ironworkers union in Ohio is doing the unthinkable: reducing benefits to its current pensioners, some by as much as 60%, to prevent the fund from sinking into insolvency as soon as 2024. According to the Post, these ironworkers make up only a tiny slice of the more than a million private-sector workers and retirees whose pension funds are predicted to be insolvent within twenty years. One of the largest, the Central States Pension Fund, which represents some 300,000 truckers, has already tried to reduce pensions but has been stymied in that effort by the federal government, which says the proposed cuts are insufficient to save the fund from insolvency. It's a good bet that Chicago will be the first major Democrat stronghold to default on its public-service union retirement commitments, but it's a sure bet that it is the entire State of California that is sitting on the nuclear incident of pension plan insolvencies, and when that Democrat unicorn reactor ultimately goes critical and melts down, as it most assuredly is going to do, it will shake this nation. We can hope it shakes some sense into Democrats and makes unions think twice about getting too greedy, but based on current attitudes, it's not likely. It will be interesting to see if all those retirees who get their fat pensions drastically reduced will still be voting slavishly Democrat when basic math wrapped around the hard fist of reality smacks them hard in the kisser. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) will hold a vote on whether to strike against the state of Illinois government because Governor Bruce Rauner is refusing to give in to their demands. A new contract has been under negotiation since 2015 and the union, whose pension plan threatens to bankrupt the state, is refusing to give in on a variety of issues while pressuring the governor to accede to their demands for wage and benefit increases. Daily Caller: The vote, which takes place between Jan. 30 and Feb. 19, is the latest attempt by union officials to pressure the governor to give into additional demands. AFSCME leaders have outlined a series of demands that would cost the state an additional $3 billion in wage and benefit increases, according to IllinoisPolicy.org. Demands include a raise for workers, a platinum-level health care plan with little cost to the workers, and overtime pay starting at 37.5 hours instead of the standard 40 hours. Rauner wants to freeze the salaries of state workers, who are the highest paid in the country when adjusted for the cost of living, according to the NW Herald. He is proposing that workers receive a healthcare plan that matches up with what they are paying (Bronze plan instead of platinum). The labor dispute between Rauner and the states largest public employees union has been going ever since the Republican businessman swept into office in 2014. The unions previous contract expired July 1, 2015, and a potential strike by state employees has loomed like a dark cloud over Springfield ever since. The battle heated up in May, when Rauner vetoed a bill that would have sent any unresolved labor negotiations between AFSCME and the administration to arbitration. Rauner said at the time the bill was promoted by AFSCME to remove him from bargaining and replace him with an unelected, labor-friendly arbitrator who can single-handedly impose the unions $3 billion demand on the taxpayers. Rauner described the unions demands as unsustainable, arguing taxpayers cannot afford AFSCMEs unreasonable demands. The governor said his offer is fair to both the taxpayers and AFSCME employees. His offer includes performance bonuses of up to 8 percent of a members salary, as well as additional health care options. The union has fought the governor tooth and nail on vitally needed changes to the state's pension plan that is both underfunded and ruinously expensive. Rauner has proposed leaving the pension plan as is for current state employees while altering it for future workers. The union went to court to block that measure. A strike would be a huge inconvenience for Illinois residents and bring to a standstill the work of the bureacracy. Rauner has shown a toughness not seen before out of an Illinois governor when it comes to budget issues, but he may be over a barrel with the union and their demands. The awful shooting that killed 6 people and injured 8 others has been characterized as an act of terrorism by the Canadian government. But despite the arrest of two suspected perpetrators, no names or identifying characteristics have been released. In the resulting information vacuum, waves of narrative-confirming speculation as to who is responsible for this atrocity have washed over people who ought to know better. At this point, the most conspicuous example of political posturing from ignorance so far is the face plant the Daily Beast executed yesterday. Scott Greer of the Daily Caller explains: The Daily Beast wrongfully accused two fictitious white supremacists as the prime suspects in the Quebec City mosque shooting Sunday night after falling for a bogus Reuters Twitter account. Late Sunday night, an unverified account pretending to be Reuters tweeted, Authorities have identified the suspects in #Quebec City shooting as white supremacists David M.J. Aurine and Mathieu Fournier. Notice that the name on the tweet is Reuter, not Reuters. How careless does one have to be to not notice this obvious evidence of a fake news operation? This is a perfect example of a story that is too good to check, as the old (but suddenly relevant) journalists joke has it. In the eagerness to confirm a narrative that would indirectly blame President Trump for an outbreak of anti-Islam violence in the wake of his seven-country entry pause, evidently, no one at The Daily Beast noticed. Actually investigating whether this was true, or whether Reuters has reported it anywhere else, was a bridge too far for the Beasts who publish daily news (including fake news). The Beast wrote: It is certainly possible that racists attacked the mosque, but it is far from unthinkable that other motives have been at work, including schisms among Muslims themselves. Until the Canadian authorities decide to break their silence, there is no point on speculating. The great irony here, as Greer points out, is that: ... [t]he Daily Beast is a frequent critic of the fake news phenomenon and has published several articles denouncing fabricated stories as a threat to American democracy. I am not familiar with Canadian or Quebec laws on libel, but it strikes me that the sheer obviousness of the fakery may hand a large judgment to the three men named, if they even are real people. How far will the mayor of a sanctuary city like New York go to shield illegal aliens from deportation who break the law? If the offense is "minor," the illegal should be protected from the feds, says New York mayor Bill de Blasio. That includes grand larceny and drunk driving. The Hill: "If youre a drunk driver and youre an undocumented immigrant, why should there be a place for you in this country? Tapper asked. "Jake, there are 170 offenses in that law that are listed as serious and violent crimes that lead to automatic cooperation between the city of New York and our federal partners, DeBlasio replied. So any serious and violent crime, were going to work with them. Is grand larceny or drunk driving a very minor offense? Tapper followed. Drunk driving that does not lead to any other negative outcome, I could define as that, DeBlasio said. According to Mothers Against Drunk Driving, nearly 10,000 Americans are killed each year as a result of drunk driving, or 27 people per day. President Trump signed an executive order on Wednesday stating the government will "strip federal grant money from the sanctuary states and cities that harbor illegal immigrants," according to press secretary Sean Spicer. One assumes that de Blasio means death or serious injury resulting from drunk driving when he speaks of "negative outcome." But the reality is, many drunk drivers will drive drunk again, putting the driving public at risk. De Blasio seems perfectly willing to put the lives of New Yorkers at risk in service to a political agenda. We don't know how many illegal aliens have been convicted of vehicular homicide as a result of their driving drunk. That's because the government refuses to keep statistics. DHS says vehicular homicide is not reason enough to detain an illegal alien to deport him. So de Blasio is perfectly comfortable in saying that drunk driving alone is not a serious offense. One would hope the new administration would come down hard on cities that shield illegal aliens from deportation for serious offenses like drunk driving and grand larceny. The mayor of New York City might find these offenses "minor," but Mothers Against Drunk Driving would surely beg to differ. As the left goes into full tantrum mode, virtue-signaling is breaking out in Hollywood, on campus, and even throughout those elements of corporate America that serve markets they believe are populated by Trump-haters. Hollywood had yet another award show in which it pats itself on the back last night, and the privileged and pampered took the opportunity to proclaim their love for the downtrodden who may have to wait a few days while immigration authorities vet them. It was a union-sponsored gala, run by the Screen Actors Guild, so of course the leftism was especially intense. And silly: Academia is also behaving according to longstanding patterns, as always combining virtue-signaling with self-interest. A dirty little secret of the vast higher education industry is that Middle Eastern students from wealthy countries usually pay the inflated full price for tuition and become lucrative cash cows, since no discounts off list prices (aka scholarships) are required when an emir or king of a petrostate is paying for his subjects education on these shores. The Wall Street Journal: More than 17,000 students from the seven countries listed in Mr. Trumps order were enrolled at U.S. schools in the 2015-2016 year, according to the Institute of International Education, while more than 2,000 such teachers and researchers were at U.S. colleges and universities Many college presidents and higher-education associations, including the Association of American Universities, which represents 62 major schools, and the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities, representing 237 state and land-grant institutions and affiliated organizations, issued statements Saturday condemning Mr. Trumps order and warned it could damage the U.S. role as a leader in global academics. A petition called Academics Against Immigration Executive Order had attracted nearly 15,000 signatures Sunday, including at least 5,000 from faculty. The signatories included 35 Nobel Prize winners and came from colleges and universities from around the nation. The petition was drawn up by a group of Iranian academics and former academics on Thursday evening, said Maryam Saeedi, a professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon University and one of the organizers. I dont remember any such protests when President Carter suspended issuance of visas to entrants from Iran. In corporate America, companies that primarily locate in large cities, and especially those that appeal to younger, affluent urban dwellers, are also adopting a political posture. Consider this blast email sent by Lyft (the taxi-substituting competitor for Uber) to those registered with it: Defending Our Values We created Lyft to be a model for the type of community we want our world to be: diverse, inclusive, and safe. This weekend, Trump closed the country's borders to refugees, immigrants, and even documented residents from around the world based on their country of origin. Banning people of a particular faith or creed, race or identity, sexuality or ethnicity, from entering the U.S. is antithetical to both Lyft's and our nation's core values. We stand firmly against these actions, and will not be silent on issues that threaten the values of our community. We know this directly impacts many of our community members, their families, and friends. We stand with you, and are donating $1,000,000 over the next four years to the ACLU to defend our constitution. We ask that you continue to be there for each other - and together, continue proving the power of community. John & Logan Lyft Co-Founders Update. Doug Mainwaring sends us an email he received from the "People's Action Team" urging a boycott of Uber for being insufficiently against Trump: Given the volume of fake news flying around about the Quebec mosque shooters, one must be cautious until the Canadian authorities speak out on the record. Nonetheless, given the reports blaming white supremacists and President Trump for the shooting, it is worthwhile considering what local outlets in Quebec and the U.K. Daily Mail are reporting. From the Montreal Gazette: According to Radio-Canada and LCN, the two suspects in Sundays terror attacks in Quebec City are Alexandre Bissonnette and Mohamed Khadir. The Daily Mail: Instead of bringing Muslim refugees to the U.S., where they will be 10 or 20 times as expensive to maintain, the obvious solution that is kindest to the most suffering people would be to house them near where they came from, in a religious environment that is not as offensive to them as ours. Remember that most Muslims from the Middle East are offended by women in short skirts (not to mention parading around in pussy hats and vagina costumes). And as for open homosexuality, well, the Prophet says practitioners should be killed, and he is the most perfect human being who ever lived, so that means pious Muslims must follow his injunctions. And if you are Jewish, the Koran has some awfully unkind things to say, so the newcomers brought here at taxpayer expense will mostly be quite hostitle, if not lethal. It is simply cruel to expect refugees to adapt to life in a country that so contradicts their deeply held religious beliefs. Thats why I am delighted by this report from Reuters, via Conservative Treehouse: Saudi Arabias King Salman, in a phone call on Sunday with U.S. President Donald Trump, agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, a White House statement said. Trump, during his presidential campaign last year, had called for Gulf states to pay for establishing safe zones to protect Syrian refugees. A statement after the phone call said the two leaders agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of Islamic State militants. The president requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts, the statement said. [] A senior Saudi source told Reuters the two leaders spoke for over an hour by telephone and agreed to step up counter-terrorism and military cooperation and enhance economic cooperation. But the source had no word on whether the two leaders discussed Trumps order to put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily ban travelers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries. The source said Saudi Arabia would enhance its participation in the U.S.-led coalition fighting to oust Islamic State from its strongholds in Iraq and Syria. The White House statement said the two leaders also agreed on the need to address Irans destabilizing regional activities. SPA also mentioned Trump and the King had similar visions on confronting whomever seeks to destabilise security and stability in the region and interfere in the affairs of other countries, an apparent reference to Riyadhs arch-foe Iran. Both countries share views about Iranian policies in the region, the Saudi source said, suggesting Trump agreed with Riyadhs suspicion of what it sees as Tehrans growing influence in the Arab world. Iran denies it meddles in Arab countries. (read more) I would suggest that Ashley Judd pay them a visit, and be sure to wear her pussy hat when she does. Editor Lifson wrote a stellar piece this morning on the "virtue-signaling" by the left with regards to President Trump's executive order on refugees. Hipster companies like the ride service Lyft have been especially vocal about countering the ban on Muslim refugees. Not to be outdone, Starbucks chairman and CEO Howard Schultz sent a memo to its employees, informing them that the company plans to hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years in the 75 countries where Starbucks does business. Fox 31: We are living in an unprecedented time, Schultz wrote in the memo, which listed several actions the company says it is taking to reinforce our belief in our partners around the world. The refugee hiring proposal, Schultz wrote, will begin with a focus on people who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel. Schultz also reiterated Starbucks support for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA, which helps undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children get drivers licenses, enroll in college and secure jobs. The program was created by President Obama through an executive order in 2012. And Schultz said the company is ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families should any proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes affect their businesses. We are in business to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time, Schultz wrote. That will not change. You have my word on that. Schultz is the latest business executive to weigh in on the travel ban. Earlier Sunday, General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt wrote to employees that he shared their concern over the order, and added that GE has many employees from the countries named in the ban. Several tech executives have also publicly denounced the travel ban. How very noble of Starbucks to hire refugees the bulk of whom are illiterate, low-skilled workers. The majority of migrants who have recently arrtived in Europe are "unemployable." To work at Starbucks, one would assume that the refugees would have to be able to read and understand that there's a difference between a latte and an espresso. So good luck with that, Mr. Schultz. Besides the difficulty in finding enough refugees who would actually qualify to work for a Western business, there is the very real possibility that refugees from the Middle East and Africa would no more want to work at Starbucks than any young Westerner who doesn't want to work for minimum wages. A barista is the bottom of the barrel when it comes to entry-level jobs, and the refugees might figure it's better to receive all the freebies being offered by western European countries than go out and work for a living. The grandiose announcement by Starbucks sure sounds good. But let's wait and see what actually transpires over the next five years. If Starbucks is able to hire half the 10,000 refugees it is promising, it will have done better than expected. The medias failure to report that Donald Trump might well win the 2016 election is a debacle for Americas intelligentsia on the order of the 2008 mortgage crisis and 2003 Iraq WMD slam dunk. These fiascoes all stemmed from knowledge management organizations rotted with intellectual bias, groupthink, and perverse incentives. All three featured decision-makers and intellectual cheerleaders from similar social and educational milieus. Yet only the mainstream media have so far evaded tangible consequences, or real self-assessment, for their historic stumble. The financial crisis cratered entire companies, cost many executives their jobs and wealth, and then saddled the industry with new regulations. After WMD in Iraq went from slam dunk to, in military parlance, WTF, a reorg of the intelligence community soon followed. Yet the television anchors, reporters, and pundits who missed the biggest political story in modern times remain happily in place, their tears from Election Night powdered over, now focused on exposing the lies of the very man theyd assured their audiences would never be president. Rather than resign in embarrassment, the top producers and editors of the major media have actually doubled down, filling their platforms with stories so consistently inclined against Trump the president and his policies as to be essentially indistinguishable from editorials. They (rightly) fulminate against fake news while spiking and slanting their Trump coverage with feverish intensity, never seeing the irony. The journalism academy offers no corrective, instead cheering the status quo from the sidelines. The Goal Is Not to Fear Trump, But For Trump to Fear You, reads a representative headline from the house organ of the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism (of which Im an unlikely graduate). So whats the solution? Unlike intelligence officers or investment bankers, journalists are not accountable to government officials or their regulatory proxies, a good thing for 1st Amendment absolutists such as myself. But the media tradition of holding power to account which drove such persistent demands for change in the finance and intelligence worlds after their respective train wrecks apparently cannot be aimed at the mirror. Even the medias corporate overlords seem strangely indifferent to the market forces that come from insulting half their potential customers and seeing their product approval drop to the level of exploding cell phones. From these unaccountable circumstances, one glimmer of hope does emerge. Its now essentially impossible for industry apologists to deny that the major media are biased in the strictest sense of the vast bulk of their employees being prejudiced in favor of ideas endorsed by the Democratic Party and the bien pensants of New York, D.C., Hollywood, and Silicon Valley. Even Politico felt obliged to report that its 2016 poll of the White House press corps showed that not one respondent registered as a Republican, and just one reporter of 16 planned to vote for Trump. In tacit recognition of these facts, media leaders now insist that their organizations can be balanced, or at least fair, despite the systemic cognitive bias of their newsrooms. Were assured that the personal views of reporters shared with coworkers, friends, spouses and especially bosses dont hamper their coverage one bit. As the media reporter for one of Americas most influential papers tweeted me not long ago regarding the overwhelmingly Democratic voting record of journalists [a]nd why would voting record be proof of journo bias one way or the other? You can't be fair if you vote? This deflection demonstrates the failure of journalism to keep up with the science and practice of other knowledge industries, the very processes to avoid confirmation bias and groupthink the media demanded be adopted by the intelligence community and Wall Street after their train wrecks. The issue is not whether an individual reporter, or even an entire newsroom, who strongly holds one set of views can be fair to those who hold another. The issue is whether a knowledge organization that has no concern about the known effects of groupthink, or related factors such as the one cognitive science calls process losses, can produce optimal analysis and forecasts. It cant. It might be too much to expect media executives to plunge into newly emerging best practices of analysis and forecasting. But there is a modest step that even a New York Times editor would be hard pressed to dismiss (at least outside his newsroom): add intellectual diversity to news media recruiting goals. If the events of 2016 showed anything, it was how out of step the major media were with the nation theyre supposed to cover. Focused on increasing the representation of women and racial, sexual and religious minorities on the assumption such folks would bring new perspectives to the newsroom media executives remain content with staffs that contain few if any employees who think anything like the half of the country that voted for Donald Trump. Addressing the recruitment issue might allow media executives to demonstrate they have some idea of the inescapable lesson of 2016: for the major media, as for the intelligence community and Wall Street, systematic bias is dangerous malpractice. Mark Sauter became a television and print reporter after serving in the U.S. Army. He now works in the financial industry. The views expressed here are entirely his and do not reflect those of his employer. A Syrian refugee who was hoping to give birth in America may see her dreams foiled by Donald Trump. The Badat family sat crammed together on their couch Sunday morning, desperately trying, call after call, to reach the other side of the world. It took half an hour to get through to Ankara, Turkey, where they had left their pregnant daughter, Enas, and her husband three months ago. Back then, it seemed only a matter of time before the young couple would join the Badats and their three younger children in Bloomfield Township in the Detroit suburbs, where they had gained entry as Syrian refugees. Then President Trump issued his visa ban. Overnight, their world shifted. By the time they reached Enas over a shaky WhatsApp connection Sunday morning, everyone on both sides of the line was crying. It took so long to be pregnant; I wanted you to be able to help me, said Enas, 25 and due in March. She appeared on the phones tiny screen in a black hijab, sitting before a tattered gray curtain. The family just came to America three months ago. They immediately expected to bring other family members along with them. Enas's need is severe; if she doesn't give birth in America, her baby will not be an American citizen. Crying in her black burka, she looked desperately unhappy that she was not about to create a new American who could anchor her to our society. Keep in mind that the Washington Post published this as a sympathetic story. They see nothing disturbing about admitting a fundamentalist hijabi to America; they see nothing disturbing about her obvious attempts to create an anchor baby; and they see nothing disturbing about reporting the generous living arrangements and benefits American taxpayers are paying for: Since arriving in the Detroit area three months ago, the family has been guided by other immigrants, who have helped them secure the two-bedroom apartment in Bloomfield Township, chipped in to help them rent furniture and arranged private English lessons after discovering that the local adult-education classes were full. Do you think "other immigrants" paid for their two-bedroom apartment, as the cleverly worded sentence implied? I think it much more likely that you, the taxpayer, paid for it. Are we going to get our green cards? Are we going to be allowed to stay here? Nour wondered. We dont know anything anymore. Nor does the WaPo see a problem with the family's sense of entitlement. It's a total disconnect from reality. The narrative has become so preposterous that it's no wonder the mainstream media have become totally unrelatable to large numbers of Americans. Ed Straker is the senior writer at NewsMachete.com. President Trump said he will reveal his choice for Supreme Court justice to replace Antonin Scalia on Tuesday night at 8:00 P.M. eastern time. Veteran SCOTUS watchers are all over the map as far as whom the president will nominate, as there doesn't appear to be a consensus choice among experts, or Congress, for that matter. CNN: The decision to announce his Supreme Court nominee in prime time was Trump's idea, an aide said, in an attempt to draw a larger audience Tuesday evening than he would receive during the day. It is modeled after President George W. Bush's introduction of Chief Justice John Roberts in an evening appearance in the East Room of the White House. After the death of late Justice Antonin Scalia, President Barack Obama nominated Merrick Garland, but the Republican majority prevented his confirmation. This move maintained the vacancy on the court -- leaving a space open for Trump to make his pick. Scalia was a right-leaning voice on the court, and Trump's pick is expected to fil l his place. Trump said in an interview with "60 Minutes" after he was elected that although he thought the issue of same-sex marriage was "settled," he planned to appoint anti-abortion rights justices. There are three major candidates whose names have been mentioned most often: Thomas Hardiman, currently a judge on the 3rd Circuit; William Pryor, who sits on the 11th Circuit and is a former Alabama attorney general; and 10th Circuit judge Neil Gorsuch of Colorado. All are under the age of 55 and, to varying degrees, would be acceptable to most conservatives. But Donald Trump loves to surprise people, so he may not choose a nominee from among these three. As a surprise pick, some pundits are suggesting he nominate Senator Ted Cruz. Senator Cruz still wants to be president, so it is unlikely he would accept a nomination to the high court. But with Trump, you never know. We just learned that the secession movement in California is actually picking up steam: A campaign for California to secede from the rest of the country over Donald Trump's election is gaining momentum, with supporters allowed to start collecting signatures for the measure to be put to a vote. California's Secretary of State Alex Padilla gave the green light on Thursday for proponents of "California Nationhood" -- also known as Calexit -- to start collecting the nearly 600,000 signatures needed for the measure to qualify on the November 2018 ballot. The 585,407 signatures required by July 25 represent eight percent of registered voters in California -- the most populous state in the country with nearly 40 million residents and the world's sixth-largest economy. There is even talk that California will withhold taxes to the federal government to fight President Trump: Officials are looking for money that flows through Sacramento to the federal government that could be used to offset the potential loss of billions of dollars worth of federal funds if President Trump makes good on his threat to punish cities and states that dont cooperate with federal agents requests to turn over undocumented immigrants, a senior government source in Sacramento said. The federal funds pay for a variety of state and local programs from law enforcement to homeless shelters. California could very well become an organized non-payer, said Willie Brown, Jr, a former speaker of the state Assembly in an interview recorded Friday for KPIX 5s Sunday morning news. They could recommend non-compliance with the federal tax code. It's fair to say that California has declared war on President Trump. I guess that's what happens when California votes so differently from how the the other 49 did. Mrs. Clinton beat Mr. Trump by 30 points in California, or 4 million votes. Where do we go from here? First, California is indeed one of the top GDPs in the world. However, it is also an overtaxed and highly regulated state, as any business person will tell you. I'm not sure that many industries or taxpayers will stay behind if they have to change their passports from the U.S. to the Republic of "choose your gender" California. Second, California may find out that all of those military bases, and the jobs that they create, will start packing east the minute California leaves the rest of us. Third, and very important, how are all of those interest groups going to work together when they don't have President Trump to blame for everything? What happens when President Jerry Brown calls for more tax increases to pay for a state with unsustainable public-sector contracts? They currently face a $1.6-billion deficit because of lagging tax revenue collections. So it won't happen. California will remain a state, and that is a good thing for them and the rest of us. However, one good thing about California being a foreign country is that an L.A. Dodgers vs Texas Rangers final would literally be a World Series. The winner will finally be the actual world champ. P.S. You can listen to my show (Canto Talk) and follow me on Twitter. A new report has revealed that Fitbit could slash 10 percent of its workforce to save around $200 million in costs. Rumors indicate that Fitbit is compelled to make such a decision because the fitness bands market is slowing down. On Monday, the wearable technology company is expected to announce its problematic Q4 2016 financials and confirm its laying off up to 10 percent of its employees. At the moment, the company employs approximately 1,600 people so such a reduction could result in up to 160 employees losing their jobs. On the other hand, this decision would allegedly help the San Francisco-based company to save approximately $200 million in revenue. Fitbit has yet to comment on this report. By laying off employees, the company is reportedly looking to diversify its business portfolio. Many cheap fitness bands from Chinese brands and smartwatches with integrated fitness tracking features are gaining in popularity while the market as a whole is experiencing a decline in sales. Due to that state of affairs, Fitbit decided to diversify into other prospects like developing its own app store and acquiring Pebble. The company reportedly intends to build an app store to better support third-party developers and extend its list of software partners. In December, Fitbit confirmed that its acquisition of Pebble cost the company approximately $40 million. Nearly 40 percent of former Pebble employees mostly software engineers have been offered new jobs at Fitbit. The acquisition has allowed the company to obtain Pebbles operating system, smartwatch apps and all related cloud-based services. It is also rumored that Fitbit will stop manufacturing fitness bands in a bid to make a more serious push into the smartwatch market. This could explain why the company recently decided to acquire Vector Watch, a European luxury smartwatch maker. Given recent developments, Fitbit may launch a more traditional smartwatch supported by a dedicated app store in the near future. Provided the company decides to follow that course of action, it could soon start competing with other smartwatch manufacturers like Samsung, LG, and Apple. More information on the matter will likely follow soon, possibly even next month once the annual Mobile World Congress 2017 kicks off. Google Canada launched a special YouTube channel dedicated to promoting Canadian film. The launch of the channel marks the beginning of a new collaboration between Google Canada and the Canada Media Fund (CMF), the two organizations announced on Thursday. The partnership was started to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Confederation, i.e. the date Canada was established through the 1867 Constitution Act. The new YouTube channel will be managed by BroadbandTV (BBTV) and host a broad range of popular Canadian movies and television series produced in the last two decades. The digitization process will be conducted by Deluxe Toronto while Google Canada and CMF will curate the contents of the channel. The new initiative was partially funded by Telefilm Canada, a federal audiovisual company. Other partners supporting the project include LAssociation quebecoise de la production mediatique (AQPM) and the Canadian Media Producers Association (CMPA), two associations of Canadian content creators. CMF is also planning to use the new YouTube channel as an opportunity to experiment with some new business models which it might utilize in the future while also promoting classic Canadian film. The catalog of hosted content will include movies and series produced since 1995. The content will range from childrens programming and documentary films to dramas and performing arts. Google Canada specifically thanked the Canadian media industry for making this initiative possible by agreeing to license a vast library of content it owns. While the YouTube channel in question was started to promote Canadian culture and celebrate the 150th anniversary of the Federation, Google and its partners will likely keep it operational for the foreseeable future. The announcement of Googles initiative comes shortly after the Mountain View-based tech giant voiced strong opposition to a proposed Canadian tax reform designed to save the countrys struggling media industry at the expense of foreign Internet companies like Google, Amazon, and Facebook. Googles collaboration with the very media players the Canadian government is trying to save by increasing taxes on advertising through foreign firms may be interpreted as a message to Ottawa that there are ways to help the domestic industry without directly hurting Internet giants, but it remains to be seen whether that strategy will be effective. Jay Y. Lee, the Vice Chairman of Samsung Electronics, will likely face another arrest warrant shortly, the South Korean media reported on Sunday. Investigators are legally obliged to wrap up their investigation into a corruption scandal connected to Lee by the end of February, and any related arrest warrants must be requested before their probe is concluded. The investigation can theoretically be prolonged by an additional month but theres currently no information on whether that will happen in this case. The special prosecutors office already had one arrest warrant for Lee thrown out in mid-January, so any additional requests must be backed by new evidence. The final stage of the investigation into political corruption in South Korea entails interrogating President Park who is currently awaiting impeachment. Authorities are expected to talk to President Park in early February, after which theyll decide whether to seek another arrest warrant for Lee or try prolonging their probe until the end of March. One investigator told Yonhap News Agency that the team is perfectly prepared to request another arrest warrant for Lee seeing how their time to do so is running out. The original request was rejected due to the fact that investigators only presented circumstantial evidence that a Korean court deemed worthy of a trial, but not reason enough to put Lee in jail until the trial is completed. Seeing how Lee was already prohibited from leaving the country, the court decided hell be able to face charges against him as a free man. While Lee initially admitted to paying some money to a close associate of President Park, he claimed he was coerced to do so by Park and expected nothing in return. On the other hand, the South Korean High Prosecutors Office is currently trying to prove that approximately $37 million Lee paid to several organizations connected to President Parks associate directly influenced the controversial 2015 merger of Cheil Industries and Samsung C&T. More information is expected to follow soon as Park will be interrogated over these allegations in the coming days. Korean authorities already announced more similar investigations into other corporations in the country after the case against Samsung moves to trial. Tourists in San Bernardo, Argentina killed a baby dolphin that they pulled out of the water to take selfies with, the Argentinian newspaper La Capital reported on Friday. The dolphin was reportedly dragged out of the water and left for dead after the tourists were done with shooting pictures. An eyewitness told La Capital that the atrocity was committed by a larger group of tourists who surrounded the dolphin and didnt seem concerned for the animals well-being while taking photos. Following their selfie session, the dolphin was left stranded and was reportedly still breathing when the perpetrators told the eyewitness that the animal was already dead and left the scene. Argentinian authorities have yet to comment on the report from La Capital. The incident occurred earlier this month and a video depicting it was posted by C5N last Monday and can be seen below. Unfortunately, this isnt the first time tourists in Argentina killed a dolphin for completely selfish purposes. A similar incident was recorded in February of 2016 when a tourist pulled a young Franciscana dolphin out of the water in Santa Teresita with the intention to take selfies with it. That rare animal also didnt survive its encounter with humanity. Even though dolphins breathe air just like humans do, these aquatic mammals are extremely sensitive to temperature changes and dragging them out of the water can easily have fatal consequences, as evidenced by these incidents. Furthermore, even if a dolphin doesnt experience a thermal shock when it gets stranded, it cannot survive outside of the water for a long time because the weight of its body will eventually crush its organs. Theres currently no information on whether Argentinian authorities are investigating the latest incident in San Bernardo. Currently available information suggests that the baby dolphin in San Bernardo died of dehydration and overheating after being passed around for pictures for too long. This latest tragedy is yet another reminder for humanity to be responsible towards nature but it remains to be seen whether authorities will use this incident to set a precedent for heavily sanctioning all people who believe their selfies are more important than animal lives. President Trump and his administration are currently drafting an executive order designed to prompt an overhaul of the U.S. work visa program which will likely hurt Google, Facebook, and the rest of the Silicon Valley. Bloomberg obtained a copy of President Trumps draft and reports that the document declares its been drafted primarily with the interests of the United States in mind. The order will likely force the American tech giants to reduce the amount of foreign talent they bring in by making them prioritize hiring U.S. nationals whenever possible. The initial draft of Trumps executive order allegedly still allows companies to acquire foreign talent but forces them to primarily do so when it comes to filling highly paid positions. If signed, the order will likely add more tensions to the already shaky relationship between President Trump and Silicon Valley which took a hit on Friday after Trump prevented nationals of seven mostly Muslim countries from immigrating to the United States in the next three months. The President and his administration defended the immigration ban as a temporary measure designed to buy them enough time to come up with a new visa vetting process. However, if these latest reports are to be believed, opponents of the ban will be just as strongly opposed to the new vetting process. The list of companies that have already publicly voiced their opposition to President Trumps stance on immigration includes the likes of Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, Uber, Lyft, Netflix, and Salesforce. The new U.S. administration is likely taking these controversial steps to combat alleged abuse of the H-1B visa program which some previously claimed was used to bring in cheap foreign labor at the expense of American workers. However, no systematic abuse of this work visa program was ever proven, which is an important part of the reason why the tech industry is now unified in its opposition to the course of action taken by President Trump. Even if Trump signs the executive order in question, it remains to be seen how much power this document would have seeing how the U.S. Congress is currently working on its own reforms of the visa system that are planned to be passed into laws. Nonetheless, the clash between the newly elected President and the Silicon Valley will likely continue in the coming weeks. The Galaxy S8 info keeps on coming, as a new render just surfaced. If you take a look at the provided image, youll get to see a new, unofficial render of the Samsung Galaxy S8 which should provide us with more info as to what will the device look like. This is not an actual leak of the device, it is just a render created by a third-party source and it is based on recent Galaxy S8 rumors and leaks, so keep that in mind. In any case, the phone that is shown off here does not have a physical home key below the display, and the Galaxy S8 is not expected to ship with such a button either. Weve seen quite a few rumors suggesting that Samsung is ready to ditch the physical home key, though it remains to be seen if that info is accurate. In any case, this phone also features a curved display, and interestingly enough, it has a dedicated hardware button for the Bixby artificial intelligence assistant which has been mentioned in various leaks, and the companys exec more or less confirmed that it is coming. The Bibxy button is placed below the phones volume rocker keys, on its left-hand side, while the power / lock button is located on the right side of this smartphone. The third-party Galaxy S8 handset which is shown off here comes with a symmetrical design, similar to the one weve seen on the Galaxy Note 7, and this phone also seems to be made out of metal and glass. Now, if rumors are to be believed, Samsung is ready to introduce two variants of the Galaxy S8, the regular (smaller) Galaxy S8, and its larger variant, the Galaxy S8 Plus. Both of these devices are said to ship with curved displays, and both of them could come with the companys S Pen stylus, at least if a recent leak is to be believed. Qualcomms Snapdragon 835 64-bit octa-core SoC will fuel the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus, while Android Nougat will come pre-installed on the companys new flagships. The Galaxy S8 devices are expected to land on March 29th, and well definitely get to see more rumors and leaks before Samsung introduces these two devices, so stay tuned. Viber is doing its part to help out those families affected by Trumps latest Executive Order, which calls for the ban of people entering the US from seven different countries. Viber is offering up free calls to those in the US to those seven countries, or vice versa. This way everyone can get in touch with their loved ones and make sure that everything is going well. The Executive Order from President Trump had left over a hundred people stuck at airports across the country, from flights that were already in the air when the order was signed by the President. This led to many protests across the country, many at the countrys largest airports. Currently the travel ban is still in effect, but that may change, or at least be altered in the next few days. Its likely that Viber wont be the only one offering up free international calls to the effected countries which include Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen. But right now they are the first to do so. Viber has around 800 million users around the world, and actually the majority of their users are in the Middle East, which includes those seven countries that are part of this travel ban. When it comes to tech companies, many of them have released statements about the travel ban, and none of them are siding with the president on this one. In fact, Google and Alphabet co-founder, Sergey Brin was found at the San Francisco Airport protests over the weekend. He stated that he was there in a personal capacity and not in a professional capacity, and would not give any statements. The good news is that those that have family in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Sudan, can go ahead and call them using Viber for free. Now this likely wont last forever, so if you are wanting to call your friends and family, youll want to do so now. The company hasnt said how long theyll be offering up free calls, but itll likely be for the duration of this travel ban, which is about 4 months. The ZTE Hawkeye might be turned into an Android flagship following the feedback ZTE received from the online community. Jeff Yee, Vice President of Technology Planning and Partnerships at ZTE told Mobile Syrup that the Shenzhen-based company is considering redesigning its experimental smartphone from the ground up after the community which voted for the Project CSX winner voiced its displeasure about the current prototype. Yee admitted that people apparently arent interested in the mid-range version of the Hawkeye but reiterated the companys willingness to continue supporting the project as transparently as possible and eventually deliver a phone that consumers want to use. He said that the Chinese phone maker initially wanted to create a mid-range phone because the plan was to deliver a device accessible to a broad range of consumers, but that didnt work out. However, ZTEs executive is still confident how latest developments wont significantly impact the firms plans to launch the Hawkeye by the end of the year as he believes ZTE can still make that release window. Yee also revealed how members of the four-man team that designed the original Hawkeye volunteered to revise their creation in accordance to what the community wants and even offered to attend the upcoming Mobile World Congress 2017 at their own expense. In overall, the project is not dead and will likely be reenvisioned shortly. Finally, Yee said how its possible ZTE will integrate the eye-tracking technology developed for the Hawkeye into its other future smartphones. Priced at $199.99, the Hawkeye was envisioned as a mid-range smartphone with eye-tracking technology and a case capable of sticking to many surfaces. However, a significant portion of the online community was disappointed after ZTE launched the Hawkeye Kickstarter campaign earlier this month. As it turns out, many consumers were hoping that the Hawkeye will not only be a unique device but one that can also go toe-to-toe with contemporary Android flagships. Due to the nature of Kickstarter, ZTE was unable to change its initial funding goal and reward tiers, which is why the company recently started an online poll asking users to name one thing they would like to change about the Hawkeye. The inclusion of a high-end processor was the most popular response and seeing how the Hawkeye is currently sitting at less than 10 percent of its Kickstarter funding goal with only 19 more days to go, the Chinese phone maker will likely alter and relaunch its crowdfunding campaign in the near future. While Yee pointed out how that decision still isnt final, more information on the Project CSX winner will likely follow soon. This blog is written solely by John Ray, who has a Ph.D. degree in psychology and 200+ papers published in the academic journals of the social sciences. It does occasionally comment on issues in psychology but is mainly aimed at giving a conservative psychologist's view on a broad range of topics. There are very few conservative psychologists.The blog originated in Australia and many (but not most) posts discuss Australian matters. Australians have an unusually good awareness of events outside their own country. Australian newspapers feature news from Britain and the USA not as an afterthought but as a major part of their coverage. So Australians do tend to have a truly Western heart, which is the reason behind the old name for this blog. So events in Australia, Britain and the USA all feature frequently here, plus occasional coverage of other places, particularly Israel.SCOTUS is the Supreme Court of the United States, the highest court in the landThe "GOP" stands for "Grand Old Party" and refers to the Republican party. The GOP is at present center/Right, while the Democrats have been undergoing a steady drift Leftwards and now have policies similar to mainstream European Leftist parties.The ideological identity of both parties has however been very fluid -- almost reversing itself over time. In the mid 19th century, the GOP was the party of big government and concern for minorities while the Democrats advertised themselves as "The party of the white man" -- an orientation that lasted into the mid 20th century in the South. The Democrats are still obsessed with race but have now flipped into support for discrimination AGAINST whites.Was Pope Urban VIII the first Warmist? Below we see him refusing to look through Galileo's telescope. People tend to refuse to consider evidence if what they might discover contradicts what they believe.Climate scientist Lennart Bengtsson said. The warming we have had the last 100 years is so small that if we didnt have meteorologists and climatologists to measure it we wouldnt have noticed it at all.The term "Fascism" is mostly used by the Left as a brainless term of abuse. But when they do make a serious attempt to define it, they produce very complex and elaborate definitions -- e.g. here and here . In fact, Fascism is simply extreme socialism plus nationalism. But great gyrations are needed to avoid mentioning the first part of that recipe, of course.Beatrice Webb, a founder of the London School of Economics and the Fabian Society, and married to a Labour MP, mused in 1922 on whether when English children were "dying from lack of milk", one should extend "the charitable impulse" to Russian and Chinese children who, if saved this year, might anyway die next. Besides, she continued, there was "the larger question of whether those races are desirable inhabitants" and "obviously" one wouldn't "spend one's available income" on "a Central African negro".Hugh Dalton, offered the Colonial Office during Attlee's 1945-51 Labour government, turned it down because "I had a horrid vision of pullulating, poverty stricken, diseased nigger communities, for whom one can do nothing in the short run and who, the more one tries to help them, are querulous and ungrateful."The book,, authored by T.W. Adorno et al. in 1950, has been massively popular among psychologists. It claims that a set of ideas that were popular in the "Progressive"-dominated America of the prewar era were "authoritarian". Leftist regimes always are authoritarian so that claim was not a big problem. What was quite amazing however is that Adorno et al. identified such ideas as "conservative". They were in fact simply popular ideas of the day but ones that had been most heavily promoted by the Left right up until the then-recent WWII. See here for details of prewar "Progressive" thinking.R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reasonFranklin Delano Roosevelt was a war criminal. Both British and American codebreakers had cracked the Japanese naval code so FDR knew what was coming at Pearl Harbor. But for his own political reasons he warned no-one there. So responsibility for the civilian and military deaths at Pearl Harbor lies with FDR as well as with the Japanese. The huge firepower available at Pearl Harbor, both aboard ship and on land, could have largely neutered the attack. Can you imagine 8 battleships and various lesser craft firing all their AA batteries as the Japanese came in? The Japanese naval airforce would have been annihilated and the war would have been over before it began. FDR prolonged the Depression . He certainly didn't cure it. WWII did NOT end the Great Depression . It just concealed it. It in fact made living standards worse Joe McCarthy was eventually proved right after the fall of the Soviet Union. To accuse anyone of McCarthyism is to accuse them of accuracy! The KKK was intimately associated with the Democratic party . They ATTACKED Republicans!People who mention differences in black vs. white IQ are these days almost universally howled down and subjected to the most extreme abuse. I am a psychometrician, however, so I feel obliged to defend the scientific truth of the matter:The average African adult has about the same IQ as an average white 11-year-old and African Americans (who are partly white in ancestry) average out at a mental age of 14. The American Psychological Association is generally Left-leaning but it is the world's most prestigious body of academic psychologists. And even they have had to concede that sort of gap (one SD) in black vs. white average IQ. 11-year olds can do a lot of things but they also have their limits and there are times when such limits need to be allowed for. America's uncivil war was caused by trade protectionism . The slavery issue was just camouflage, as Abraham Lincoln himself admitted . See also here Leftist psychologists have an amusingly simplistic conception of military organizations and military men. They seem to base it on occasions they have seen troops marching together on parade rather than any real knowledge of military men and the military life. They think that military men are "rigid" -- automatons who are unable to adjust to new challenges or think for themselves. What is incomprehensible to them is that being(to use the extreme Prussian term for following orders) actually requires great flexibility -- enough flexibility to put your own ideas and wishes aside and do something very difficult. Ask any soldier if all commands are easy to obey. Trump criminalises the Muslims Obama bombed President Trumps executive order on Muslim migration, stopping all refugee admissions and barring people for 90 days from entering the US from seven Muslim-majority countries Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen- is illiberal, wrong and harmful. Theres a grim irony in a US ban on refugees fleeing destruction and depravation in Yemen, Iraq, Syria and other countries America has done so much to destabilise. The US, under the Obama administration, was happy to sell arms to its special Saudi Arabian ally and back a Saudi-led coalition attacking Yemen that has killed 131 people at a wedding and 140 civilians at a funeral. Now Trumps America has made you a criminal for having been born in a place riven by war. You were not an innocent victim of a bomb Made In America. You were a suspect. If America ever stood for anything, it never stood for anything so ignoble. For a man who professed to epitomise a rebellion against the elite, Trumps sure got it in to for the ordinary citizens of those countries. If youre an Iranian diplomat, youre ok. The travel ban does not not extend to you. Trump supporters should consider that. Like you, I wonder why why Trumps ban doesnt include Saudi Arabia, Egypt or Pakistan, counties whose citizens have attacked the US? Like you, I wonder why there were no protests at Saudi Arabias ban on US and UK citizens born in Israel? Many are upset and are giving full throat to their disgust. But a lot of it is misdirected. The Mirror leads with the news that Trump is not welcome in the UK. The way to ridicule a bansturbator like The Donald is not ban him. Its to usher him in and show him that reason trumps his house of cards. The petition seeking to prevent Trumps state visit is popular. But, boy, is it weak. Its a change of tone from all that news of Her Majesty being strong, stoic and enduring. Prince Andrews mother is not so easily embarrassed. And, yeah. Monarchy beats democracy. Hows that for progress? Paul Sorene Posted: 30th, January 2017 | In: Reviews Comment | TrackBack | Permalink (ANSAmed) - NAPLES, JANUARY 30 - Collaboration between the Philosophy Festival (Festival della Filosofia) in Magna Grecia and Attica region will become permanent, after several agreements were signed with the Greek regional government to strengthen cultural and tourism development. Several activities will be held in Greece as part of the festival created in Italy's southern Campania region. The festival focuses on youth. Attica governor Rena Dourou has met in Athens with representatives of the festival under chairperson Giuseppina Russo. The regional government underscored that the festival could become a permanent fixture for bringing students from across Europe to Greece ahead of a campaign centering on culture, classical philosophy and ancient tragedies. Dourou noted that ''this is the third year that we are hosing the Philosophy Festival, which will be held March 20-26, 2017, with the participation of 700 Italian students and teachers. It is the only festival in the sector that focuses on adolescents.'' Russo noted a ''connection with Greece due to that new humanism that Europe is highly in need of. This is why we have for years been focusing on young people, making them experience philosophy by valorizing the 'genius loci' through philosophical-theatrical walks, workshops, dialogues with important philosophers and competitions involving students from across all Italy.'' (ANSAmed). 40 Syrians arrive in Italy via 'Humanitarian corridor' Mostly from Aleppo, Homs and Damascus (ANSAmed) - FIUMICINO, JANUARY 30 - A group of 40 Syrian refugees, including several women, children, sick and elderly, arrived at Rome's Fiumicino airport on Monday under the 'humanitarian corridor' programme promoted by the S. Egidio community, Federation of Evangelical churches in Italy and Waldensian Table. The new arrivals - coming primarily from the cities of Aleppo, Homs and Damascus - take to 540 the number of refugees arriving in Italy under the programme since December 2015. Overall, 1,000 refugees are due to arrive by the end of the year. (ANSAmed). Serbia-Qatar: improving economic ties, boosting investments (ANSAmed) - BELGRADE, 30 JANUARY - Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic on Monday received Qatari FM Sheikh Mohammed Bin Abdulrahman Bin Jassim Al Thani, who said his country was interested in cooperating with Serbia in many areas. Nikolic expressed the hope Al Thani's visit would be used in the best possible way to present all the advantages of investing in the Serbian economy. Al Thani said Qatar was interested in cooperating with Serbia in areas such as the defense industry and the hi-tech sector, including in potential cooperation in manufacture of satellites, as well as in many other areas. Qatari FM also met Serbian PM Aleksandar Vucic with whom he agreed that both countries had an interest in establishing a partnership and developing their cooperation. (ANSAmed) (ANSAmed) - BELGRADE - Campaigns for Serbia's spring presidential elections are heating up and early parliamentary elections may also be held at the same time. Ahead of finding out on February 12 who the official candidate will be for the party holding the government majority - the conservative SNS under Prime Miniser Aleksandar Vucic, supported by over 50% of voters - positions and alliances are shaping up. Over the weekend the Democratic Party (DS, in the opposition) - former governing party led by former president Boris Tadic, which plunged from 30% of voters to the current just over 6% in only a few years - has made official its support for Sasha Jankovic, an ombudsman that is very popular in intellectual and leftist circles but who many doubt will be able to make it into a possible run-off. ''Jankovic incarnates the values and principles on which the Democratic Party was founded,'' DS chief Dragan Sutanovac said, announcing the party's decision. The other noteworthy candidate in the opposition is Vuk Jeremic, former foreign minister who was the President of the 67th session of the United Nations General Assembly between September 2012 and September 2013. A young, ambitious politician, Jeremic is known at both the national and international level and would be better able to compete if a run-off were to be held. Labor and Social Affairs Minister Aleksandar Vulin urged Jankovic and Jeremic to make known who is funding their campaigns. The campaigns must be costing millions of euros, he said, and the money can only be coming from abroad. ''Neither one is the head of a party that gets funds from the state budget, nor are they entrepreneurs. The only possibility is that they are getting money from abroad,'' Vulin said. The minister added that the law does not prohibit this, but that it is in any case good to keep the level of transparency high and to know who is funding the presidential candidates. As concerns the nationalist far-right, the candidates so far are Vojislav Seselj, leader of the radical party (SRS), who was acquitted in recent months on war crimes charges by a UN-backed court in The Hague, and Bosko Obradovic, head of the Dveri movement. It is not yet known who the government candidate will be: whether incumbent Tomislav Nikolic will run again or whether Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic will be running. Vucic has said he thinks he is the only one able to win the presidential elections in the first round. Foreign Minister and Socialist leader Ivica Dacic supports Vucic as candidate. If the prime minister chooses not to run, the Socialist Party will nominate its own candidate, Dacic said. The election date has not yet been set but April 9 has repeatedly been mentioned as a possibility. 3rd Philosophy Festival in collaboration with Attica 'Expecting 700 students and teachers from Italy' 20-26/3 (ANSAmed) - NAPLES, JANUARY 30 - Collaboration between the Philosophy Festival (Festival della Filosofia) in Magna Grecia and Attica region will become permanent, after several agreements were signed with the Greek regional government to strengthen cultural and tourism development. Several activities will be held in Greece as part of the festival created in Italy's southern Campania region. The festival focuses on youth. Attica governor Rena Dourou has met in Arthens with representatives of the festival under chairperson Giuseppina Russo. The regional government underscored that the festival could become a permanent fixture for bringing students from across Europe to Greece ahead of a campaign centering on culture, classical philosophy and ancient tragedies. Dourou noted that ''this is the third year that we are hosing the Philosophy Festival, which will be held March 20-26, 2017, with the participation of 700 Italian students and teachers. It is the only festival in the sector that focuses on adolescents.'' Russo noted a ''connection with Greece due to that new humanism that Europe is highly in need of. This is why we have for years been focusing on young people, making them experience philosophy by valorizing the 'genius loci' through philosophical-theatrical walks, workshops, dialogues with important philosophers and competitions involving students from across all Italy.'' (ANSAmed). (by Cristiana Missori) ROME - Libyan designer Raja El Rayes presented 15 queen-like creations at the 18th edition of World of Fashion in Rome on Sunday. "My dream is that all my creations might soon carry the label 'Made in Libya'. My desire is to make known the traditions and rich culture of my homeland," said El Rayes. Bright colours, silver thread cotton, loom-made silk and embroidery are the ingredients of her brand 'Rujji', launched in 2013, for Libyan women who love "dressing up and feeling like a queen". Her first catwalk show dates back to 2010, and she presented her work at AltaRoma for the first time ever this year. "I grew up surrounded by the silk carpets my father made," said El Rayes, explaining the roots of her love for fashion and design. Her dream has always been to establish a fashion academy in Tripoli, but the project ran aground shortly after the fall of Gheddafi. "Before the revolution I was working with Gabriella Ferrera, president of the Euromediterranean Academy in Catania, on the idea of opening a fashion academy in the Libyan capital," El Rayes continued. She had already paved the way with 'Nadi al Banat' (the Girls' club), a meeting place "where I had organised sewing courses for young girls with the last remaining elderly seamstresses able to perform this kind of work, to ensure our vast cultural heritage does not die out". The Rujji catwalk show in Rome reminded the West that despite the crisis "in Libya women continue to get married and fabrics continue to be produced on the domestic market", the designer said. She sources the fabrics for her creations directly from Tripoli, where she has a few remaining relatives. "I have been in Italy for nearly 30 years," El Rayes continued. However, her heart continues to beat in Libya and she travelled between the two countries continuously until three years ago, the last time she returned home. The most expensive items in her collections are her wedding dresses, one of which is embroidered with the words of the songs that are traditionally sung during the five days of celebrations. "Often gold thread is used for this kind of embroidery," she said. Her creations cost between 400 euros and 2,500 euros. "It depends how long it takes to create them," she explained. Al Arabiya English, by Sonia Farid E gyptian president suggests ground-breaking legislation to ban Muslim husbands from verbally declaring their spouses divorced. (Shutterstock) Cant we have a law that makes divorce only effective when it is documented? asked Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in a televised speech he gave at the Police Day celebration on January 24. If marriage is documented then the same should apply to divorce. Sisi then addressed the Azhar Grand Imam Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, who was among the attendees: Dont you agree with me, your eminence? He then playfully added, You are giving me a hard time, your eminence! Sisi was referring to verbal divorce through which a Muslim husband can end the marriage through uttering the words, I, hereby, divorce you. Throughout the few days that followed the speech, the issue of verbal divorce has become the talk of the town with growing speculations over an imminent legislation and equally growing debates on the possibility of changing what is seen as an integral part of Islamic family law. For journalist Mahmoud Bakri, what seemed like a joke between Sisi and Tayeb is actually an indication of the tension between the presidency and al-Azhar as far as religious discourse is concerned. This is not the first time Sisi criticizes al-Azhar for not embarking on serious attempts to adapt religious laws to modern times and to correct untruthful conceptions of Islamic ideology, he wrote. True, Sisi has been calling for a reform in Azhar as a means to combat terrorism both in Egypt and the Islamic world, but now his criticism was also directed at the way al-Azhar handles family law. Controversy Bakri noted that talk about banning verbal divorce started in mid-2016 based on a book entitled Verbal Divorce Ban for Documented Marriages in Egypt by professor of comparative jurisprudence at al-Azhar University Saad al-Din al-Helali. A committee to discuss the matter was formed by al-Azhar. It included representatives of the four Islamic schools of thought as well as historians and theologians and they agreed against the ban. Bakri argues that Sisi is asking al-Azhar to reconsider its position. This puts al-Azhar is a very awkward situation since it either takes the presidents request seriously or risk an escalation of tension with the presidency. Sisis call for banning verbal divorce stirred much controversy among religious scholars. Islamic preacher Khaled al-Gindi, who had previously filed a lawsuit against the prime minister, the Ministry of Justice, and al-Azhars grand imam to demand banning verbal divorce but dropped it following Sisis speech, argued that verbal divorce does not count. There are two contracts, one for marriage and another for divorce. Only the second can annul the first, he said. If a man divorces his wife verbally 20,000 times, this has no value whatsoever. Gindi noted that verbal divorce was only valid at a time when all contracts were verbal and documentation did not exist. Verbal contracts were totally eliminated in 1931 and ever since every deal has to be documented. Professor of Islamic law at al-Azhar University Ahmed Kereima argued that all transactions were originally verbal and the words said were translated into action. Any contract is based on wording because wording is indicative of an intention to do a certain action, he said. Documentation is only an administrative formality that aims at preserving the rights of the parties involved in this contract. According to Kereima, verbal divorce has been valid since the establishment of the Islamic nation and is agreed upon by the four schools of thought and by the majority of scholars. It is also part of the Quran and the prophets teachings, so demanding otherwise is absolutely unacceptable because this would be a secularization of Gods laws. When asked if banning verbal divorce would reduce growing divorce rates as Sisi said in his speech, Kereima replied in the negative. When a man divorces his wife verbally while he is angry or ill or without meaning it, he can seek advice from al-Azhar which can then find a way out for him since divorce has to be based on a firm intention to end the marriage, he said. Plus, society needs to adapt to the rules of Islam not the other way round. Egypts Grand Mufti Sheikh Shawki Allam said that Dar al-Iftaa, the institution in charge of issuing religious edicts, receives an average of 3,200 inquiries about verbal divorce. After thorough investigation of each case and after looking into the husbands intentions and the circumstances under which verbal divorce took place, only three of them prove to be an actual divorce, he said. Proof Preacher Mazhar Shahin said that there are hundreds of cases where women are trying to prove that they were verbally divorced and cannot remarry because of that. All these women remain in limbo for they are neither married nor divorced and have no right to remarry because no document proves they were divorced, he said. Shahin added that as guardian of the Egyptian nation, Sisi has the right to restrict the permitted, as he put it, if this is in the best interest of his nation. MP and professor of theology Amna Nosseir said that Sisis request sent ripples across stagnant water, as she put, since it brought back to the forefront one of the most critical problems Egyptian families face. I think that the Committee of Religious Affairs at the House of Representatives should start taking the necessary steps towards drafting a legislation that bans verbal divorce, she said, adding that she will fully provide members of the committee with the scholarly help they would need in this regard. MP and secretary general of the Committee of Religious Affairs at the House of Representatives Amr Hamroush said that the committee will be ready in a few days with a draft law that regulates verbal divorce. We will meet with representatives of major religious institutions and prominent scholars to discuss the law and make sure it does not contradict Islamic law, he said. The law aims at protecting Egyptian families from disintegration and at preserving the rights of the wife and the children and it will include fines and jail sentences for violators. MP and member of the same committee Mohamed Shaaban argued that the new law is a manifestation of respect for women as stipulated in Islam. A woman will no longer be under the mercy of a few words said by an angry husband during an argument, he said. ANSAmed - Tomorrow's events in the Mediterranean (ANSAmed) - ROME, JANUARY 30 - The following are some of the main events scheduled for tomorrow in the Euro-Mediterranean area: ROME - Migration Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos will be taking part in a joint hearing at the House Foreign Affairs and Constitutional Affairs Committees. DUBAI/RIYADH - EU Labour Commissioner Jyrki Katainen will be visiting the UAE and Saudi Arabia, where he will be meeting with the government and the business community (until 1/2). BRUSSELS - European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker will be receiving Antonio Tajani, the new president of the European Parliament. (ANSAmed). (ANSAmed) - ROME, JANUARY 30 - The Italian foreign ministry has described as "excellent" Monday's meeting between Foreign Minister Angelino Alfano and the director of the International renewable energy agency (IRENA) Adnan Amin in Abu Dhabi. "Italy is fully committed to supporting IRENA in promoting the use of renewable energy," Alfano said. "The Italian public and private energy sector has a recognised leadership in the production of energy from alternative sources such as wind, solar and geothermal power." (ANSAmed). Israel finds creative solutions to agricultural crisis Researchers present sweet cucumbers, desert raspberries (ANSAmed) - Tel Aviv, January 30 - New locally grown fruits and vegetables are soon to find their way into Israeli supermarkets in response to the crisis in the sector, agricultural researcher Boaz Horowitz told the economic newspaper Mammon on Monday. "We were looking for creative solutions that would allow us to measure ourselves against the crisis that has affected agriculture in Israel and in the Arava' (southeast Neghev) in particular," Horowitz said. The novelties include peppers that 'reject' insects and kiwano, a local variety of African cucumber with a sweet banana-like taste and rich in Vitamin C. Other specialities include white furry Ponpon mushrooms that taste like seafood (which is forbidden to practicing Jews) and are already arousing interest among restauranteurs. Researchers in Arava have also developed a local variety of the Japanese pumpkin, which is said to have beneficial properties, and a special kind of raspberry that can withstand the aridity of the Neghev. (ANSAmed). Premier Foods brand Mr Kipling has released a seasonal range of packaging designed by agency BrandOpus to help consumers celebrate Valentines Day. The limited-edition packaging features quirky messages such as Fancy a kiss on the French Fancy packs and Love you Cherry much on Cherry Bakewells. Kelly Davis, marketing controller for Mr Kipling, said they had a lot of fun creating the cheeky messages. BrandOpus definitely delivered on brief with this. Mr Kiplings new special-edition packs look contemporary and striking without compromising on brand standout, she said. These fun and engaging packs will tap the impulse nature of the cake category, giving shoppers a new reason to buy Mr Kipling - and if it spreads a little love, then all the better. Mr Kipling has a history of releasing seasonal ranges for Halloween, Christmas and Easter. Following a successful Valentines Day edition of its Fondest Fancies last year, it decided to redesign all the favourites for this year. BrandOpus recently designed the packaging for Allied Bakeries new-look Allinson brand. UiO researchers have a goal: More solar and wind energy in the electricity grid We waste enormous amounts of electricity from the wind and sun. Intelligent machines and large batteries will put an end to that Waste. SOCIAL PROBLEM: We generate more and more electricity from the sun and wind. Unfortunately much of the most environment-friendly energy is lost because it is so difficult to regulate. Researchers have now started developing smart technology to overcome the problem. Photo: NTB Scanpix Get into a car, drive 80 kilometres an hour day and night without stoppingfor five months. The distance you will then have covered is equivalent to the length of the electricity grid in Norway. It is a formidable supply line but, if used without storage, it has limited possibilities, with the generation of electric current continuously adapted to the amount we use: the amount of electricity that is fed into the grid must be exactly the same as what we take out. ENERGY STORAGE: If we are going to have any chance of solving the worlds climate problems, we will have to find ways of storing solar and wind energy, says Sabrina Sartori. Photo: Ola Sther Grey, wet, no wind. Thats the weather today. But tomorrow? Maybe sun from a clear sky and a fresh breeze, speculates structure physicist Sabrina Sartori at the University of Oslo, where we meet her under the glass roof of Forskningsparken AS. Sun when we need it least The sun and wind account for a steadily increasing amount of the electricity that we consume. Unfortunately, this energy generation is difficult to regulate. It is slavishly dependent on the weather; when the wind slackens and the sunrays disappear behind the clouds, it is of no help to have installed capacity in the electricity grid. The output from both the solar cell panels and the wind turbines will drop dramatically regardless. Fortunately in Norway we have large hydropower plants with reservoirs where the power generation can be rapidly adjusted up and down, whereas other countries have to rely to a greater extent on electricity from polluting coal and gas power plants when the sun and wind fail them. Yet it is not just that the supply of resources varies; our energy needs vary as well from hour to hour, from day to day, from summer to winter. The electricity from the solar cell panels is most plentiful when we need it least, in the middle of summer. A problem for society Energy storage! says Sabrina Sartori emphatically. Energy storage will be extremely important in the coming years. If we are going to have any chance of solving the worlds climate problems, we will have to find ways to store solar and wind energy so that we can use that energy when we need it and not at the moment when it is generated. We cant do that effectively at present. I think that is a major problem for our societywhich we have set out to solve. Sabrina Sartori is an Associate Professor at the Department of Technology Systems and works with new systems for energy storage. She studies how the materials are structured atom by atom. Her research includes hydrogen storage in cars, and hydrogen systems and batteries intended for the storage of renewable energy. The left-over energy after a day with a lot of sun and wind ought to be stored in energy systems and used when there is a need for it. For instance, we need batteries with the enormous capacity that is needed if we are going to be able to efficiently transfer energy from solar and wind power over to the electricity grid. These batteries are currently under development. New research project Sartori has just become the head of a new research project called INTEGRARE, which is Italian for integrate. The goal of this project is precisely to develop a much better integration of renewable energy sources into the Norwegian electricity grid. To be able to forecast the weather precisely and to make the grid capable of adapting to changes from hour to hour may turn out to be a key to greater use of electricity from the sun and wind. Its difficult to plan the generation of energy from solar cells and wind turbines. We simply do not have the knowledge and expertise to do so, she admits. Precisely this important knowledge is what the researchers in the new project hope to acquire for themselvesand the society. Must be able to forecast Our goal is to bring more energy from the sun and wind into the electricity grid while managing to maintain the balance between generation and consumption, says Professor Frank Eliassen at the Department of Informatics, which is also participating in the research project. To do that, it is necessary to be able to predict the magnitude of the generation of energy as accurately as possible in a given period the next 24 hours, the next hour, the next fifteen minutes. Knowledge about the short-term variations in wind and solar intensity is important so that the supply to the electricity grid from these sources can be adapted to the constant variations, adds Sartori. In order to do that, of course, we need as accurate weather forecasts as possible: how strong the wind will blow, how intensely the sun will shine. However, it is not easy to determine the magnitude of the energy production from the state of the upcoming weather. We cannot do that yet because we do not know enough about the amount of energy generated by different types of weather. It is difficult to predict the future, so the researchers fall back on the past. However, not all methods are equally suitable for predicting future local energy generation. In this project, we will find methods that employ historical data about actual electricity generation during various weather conditions so as to get the best possible prediction. If we are able to make accurate predictions on the basis of historical data where we have the result and can check whether we get it right there is also good reason to believe that we can predict future energy generation, says Eliassen, who has specialized in precisely the field of energy informatics. Teaching computers The researchers in the project will get computers to make decisions that economize on important energy resources. More specifically, they intend to develop methods to enable computers to learn particular tasks on the basis of both historical data and experimental observations. In order to do this, the researchers use what they call machine learning. They try to develop a mathematical, statistical scheme that can estimate the electricity generation for the next 24 hours, the next hour or the next quarter-hour when the weather forecast is issued for the relevant area. Of course, this requires that the weather report be correct. Frank Eliassen thinks the project can result in better systems for prediction, which energy companies can employ. I think these improvements can be the basis for a business concept, he asserts. An important objective for the project is to make the electricity grid flexible enough to receive the energy from solar cell panels and wind turbines. When we know how the weather will be tomorrow, we can adapt the use of the electricity grid to determine when we ought to use the energy stored in batteries and when we ought to use directly generated energy. This can be an effective way to prevent us from wasting enormous amounts of renewable solar and wind energy as we unfortunately do at present, notes Sartori. INTEGRARE is a so-called seed project. The researchers have high hopes that it will develop into a major European project. For the problems we are trying to solve are found in all countries that are trying to develop the most environment-friendly power supply in existence solar and wind energy, says Sabrina Sartori. "South Africa, especially Johannesburg might look quiet at night, but actually, beneath it there is so much energy, color and life," said Bleda. "For me, the freedom iPhone photography gives is quite amazing. It offers the photographer access to so many apps like Slow Shutter Cam, one of my favorites. Experiment and play as much as you can and be as imaginative as possible; theres so much to discover with iPhone." The airline will presently operate in ACMI leases and Charters and later in the summer will introduce its scheduled flight operation. The company has been established with the mission to efficiently meet the demand for passenger and cargo service linking underserved destinations in the Middle East and Africa to Europe through Greece, as a centrally located hub. Air Mediterranean Director, Andrew Hallak states: We are extremely proud to have reached this important milestone, as we look to begin commercial operations and conveniently connect Europe to destinations in the Middle-East and Africa, which are currently being improperly served. It was a difficult task, but our experienced team worked hard and stepped up to the challenge and we now have our approved AOC in hand, ready for the next step. The airline is expected to begin commercial operations by late January 2017, initially offering its first Boeing 737-400 aircraft for charter and ACMI/wet leases while it awaits its second addition to the fleet in 2nd Quarter 2017 also a Boeing 737-400. SX-MAH is configured with 162Y (economy) seats and is now available for charters based in Athens, Greece. Hallak explains: In order to properly serve our initial routes for the scheduled operation, we are waiting for the addition of our second B737 expected in Q2 2017. Until then, well be chartering out SX-MAH for full adhoc charters and ACMI/wet lease operation, and continue this through the summer. Its quite interesting that despite us trying to keep a low profile until AOC approval, weve received plenty of requests which are now progressing. We appreciate the markets enthusiasm and we look forward to serve. Air Mediterranean is also working on adding a third aircraft to the fleet in 3rd Quarter 2017 for the summer season. It is examining the option of either adding an additional B737-400 or introducing a next generation Boeing 737-800. Newport-based business Avana Bakeries has shut its doors for good, with the loss of 161 jobs. The company, which is owned by Food Utopia and has been operating in south Wales for more than 60 years, ended production on Friday (27 January). Food Utopia said it regretted that it could not find a way to keep the Avana Bakeries site financially viable. John James, regional secretary officer for the Bakers Food and Allied Workers Union said Avana Bakeries had had a real family atmosphere. Its difficult to understand that a business that has been in operation for so long has suddenly come to an end, he said. They are keeping 10 people on for the Cake Academy, which is owned by Food Utopia, but we feel this closure could have been avoided. The site had been threatened with closure two years ago when 2 Sisters, which owned the company at the time, launched a strategic review following the loss of a major contract with Marks & Spencer. The business, which was also previously owned by Premier Foods, was acquired by Food Utopia from 2 Sisters. Newport councillor Chris Evans told British Baker he was devastated for the workforce at Avana Bakeries. Theyve done nothing wrong, apart from be loyal to their employer, from which they have accepted redundancies in the past. They have worked incredibly hard to try and turn the company around, he said. The Congress runs January 31 to February 1 at the St Regis Saadiyat Island Resort, bringing together more than 600 experts and specialists from around the world. Among them are heads of space agencies, executives from leading space and aviation companies, government ministers and prominent academics and researchers. Representatives from Arab space agencies and organizations involved in the space sector participated in a special panel discussion on the second day of the event, during which they will discuss the importance of the space sector for Arab states on a number of levels. Participants will present the infrastructural elements available to the region, and explore ways to promote the region as a center for space projects. Delegates will discuss the benefits of space activities, and their contributions to the development of science, technology and research throughout the Arab world. Other benefits to be explored include economic growth and diversification, encouraging advanced scientific research among students and graduates, and forming long-term global partnerships. Dr Mohammed Al Ahbabi, Director General of the UAE Space Agency, is to lead the session, which includes a number of esteemed speakers. Among them are Dr. Mohammed Ahmed Al Amer, President of the Central Informatics Organization in Bahrain; Dr. Ezzedine Oussedik, Director General of the Algerian Space Agency; Mahmoud Hussein, Vice President of Egypts National Authority for Remote Sensing and Space Sciences; and Eng. Salem Humaid Al Marri, Assistant General Manager of Scientific and Technical Affairs at the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Center. Dr Khalifa Al Romaithi, Chairman of the UAE Space Agency, said: This session falls under the UAE space sectors strategic goals, which focus on building and strengthening international relationships and partnerships in the field, including developing bilateral relations with Arab states. This was the impetus behind us organizing of the meeting, which will review Arab capabilities in the field and develop a framework for maximizing our mutually beneficial results. Dr Mohammed Al Ahbabi said: Throughout the past, Arabs have made significant contributions to astronomy that have helped mankind develop space sciences. We believe it is necessary to revive this great legacy by unifying Arab efforts through developing collaborative space projects with the aim of improving current capabilities and contributing significant scientific research to the space community. Dr Mohammed Ahmed Al Amer, President of the Central Informatics Organization in the Kingdom of Bahrain, thanked the United Arab Emirates for organizing this important congress and the Arab discussion session that will gather him with his counterparts from other Arab countries. He noted that this is the first such regional gathering of its kind to coordinate efforts and search for means of cooperation with one another in order to enhance capacities and realise our leaderships visions. Dr Al Amer also said that the Arab space session ultimately served the people of the region and meets their aspirations. Dr. Ezzedine Oussedik, Director General of the Algerian Space Agency, said: The Global Space Congress represents an opportunity to share and exchange information surrounding the strategies and policies currently being implemented by Arab parties in the field of applied space technologies. It will also contribute to promoting and strengthening sustainable cooperation in development and economics throughout the Arab nation. Mahmoud Hussein, Vice President of the National Authority for Remote Sensing and Space Sciences, noted that Egypt is currently developing its space capabilities, including infrastructural elements at assembly centers, testing and launching spacecraft, and attracting investments and participation to regional and African projects. He continued: Egypt is seeking to build a generation of young engineers, because human elements are of the utmost importance in building our own capacities for this strategic sector. In this context, Egypt recognizes the importance of regional Arab cooperation in order to integrate capabilities and resources and to exchange knowledge and experiences. Salem Humaid Al Marri, Assistant General Manager of Scientific and Technical Affairs at the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Center, spoke of the UAEs achievements in space sciences and activities over the past 11 years. Al Marri said: What the UAE has achieved so far reflects its forward-looking aspirations and vision in scientific development, as well as instilling a culture of scientific research. In addition, it is a reflection of an economy strengthened by sustainable diversification based on innovation and knowledge. The airline said in a statement: We regret to inform that a guest during boarding of flight number 101 from Muscat to London Heathrow was bitten by a centipede which was hidden in the pocket of his jacket. Immediately after the incident, Oman Air Team requested for medical attention and the affected guest was taken for treatment accompanied by his family. Oman Air apologises for the inconvenience caused to its valued guests, confirming giving its utmost priority to the safety and wellbeing of the guests, and extends its appreciation for their understanding and cooperation. Flight WY 101 departed with a delay of 1 hour and 18 minutes. Inclusion of the new routes will enable both airlines step into new market while offering passengers various possibilities to travel. With the expansion of the existing codeshare agreement, Pakistan International Airlines will be able to sell Turkish Airlines beyond Istanbul points of Atlanta, Johannesburg, Atina, Amsterdam, Tashkent, Moskova, Miami, Boston, Houston, Washington, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago with its own airline code and flight number in addition to the already existing cooperation on Istanbul Karachi/ Islamabad/ Lahore vv. routes; while Turkish Airlines will market Pakistan International Airlines operating flights from Karachi and Islamabad to Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Muscat and from Lahore to Dubai and Abu Dhabi with its own airline code and flight number. Turkish Airlines currently operates 7 frequencies each on the Istanbul Karachi/Islamabad/Lahore vv. routes. The expanded codeshare cooperation provides passengers with more feasible connections as well as seamless travel opportunities between and beyond destinations of Turkey and Pakistan. Pakistan International Airlines Jeddah and Madinah flights and as well as 8 domestic routes from Karachi, Islamabad and Lahore are appended to the renewed SPA in force since January 1st, 2017, which abled Turkish Airlines to reach Pakistan domestic destinations. The new SPA also involves Turkish Airlines all American destinations besides most of the European points. As a matter of course, Turkish Airlines and Pakistan International Airlines will continue to collaborate to enhance the tourism potential and cultural interactions between Turkey and Pakistan while promoting business travel between two brother countries. CEO and Deputy Chairman of Turkish Airlines, Bilal Eksi stated that the passengers will be able to travel with easier connections and more flexible alternatives. He also indicated that; The more the frequencies between two countries are increased in the future, the further the cooperation between two carriers will be expanded so as to enable passengers to travel with even shorter connection times and more comfortable travel opportunities. Regarding the expansion of the cooperation, CEO of Pakistan International Airlines, Bernd Hildenbrand said; Pakistan and Turkey are brotherly countries and have close cultural and business cooperation in various areas including aviation. PIA values its commercial relations with Turkish Airlines and expansion of this codeshare will add more value to our commercial ties and be equally beneficial for our customers. We will continue to explore more commercial avenues in future, as well. Ramachandran is an industry veteran, bringing with him over 20 years of aviation experience in both the commercial and operational side of the business. Rohit has worked at global and regional airlines, including KLM, Singapore Airlines, and more recently Air Arabia and its JVs and subsidiaries where he was responsible for the commercial organization. Jazeera Airways Chairman Marwan Boodai said: As CEO, Ramachandran will be aiding the Board with the development of the airlines strategy, and working with the management team on implementation. We look forward to working with Ramachandran to take the airline to new heights. Ramachandran said: Kuwait has dynamic travel market that presents interesting and unique opportunities for Jazeera Airways as it embarks on ambitious new ventures both on the ground, in terms of facilities, and in the air. I look forward to working with the management team and everyone at Jazeera Airways on realising these opportunities. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Overnight January 30 a blaze ripped through Tbilisis Childrens World shopping center and Gold market jewelry trade center in Georgia, local media reported. The fire erupted at 03:00, we dont know the cause of it. Everything has burnt, the entire merchandise. Its a tragedy, a witness told Rustavi 2 TV. According to Georgian media, 26 firefighting units attempted to tackle the fire, and only at dawn they were able to contain the blaze. Tbilisi Mayor Davit Narmania has arrived at the scene. Police are investigating the incident, with a criminal case being launched to determine the cause of the fire. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Chelsea Clinton, daughter of former US Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and former US President Bill Clinton, participated in the anti-Trump immigration ban protest in New York City. No ban, no wall, Chelsea tweeted. Yes. We will keep standing up for a country that matches our values and ideals for all, she added. Yes. We will keep standing up for a country that matches our values and ideals for all. pic.twitter.com/yfVlX5sL3f Chelsea Clinton (@ChelseaClinton) 29 2017 . Hillary Clinton also supporters the protesters via Twitter. On January 27, Donald Trump signed executive orders on suspending refugees arrivals to the United States for 120 days. Mr. Trump's order directs the State Department to stop issuing visas to Syrian nationals and halts the processing of Syrian refugees. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Two Senators, Republicans John McCain and Lindsey Graham are consistently trying to start the Third World War, US President Donald Trump said, reports TASS. Trump opposed to the warning of the two Senators who said the new executive order on immigration control is more contributing to the escalation of terror threat rather than strengthening the US security. The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong - they are sadly weak on immigration. The twoSenators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III, Trump tweeted. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Saudi Arabia's King Salman agreed to create safe zones in Syria and Yemen for refugees during a phone conversation with US President Donald Trump, the White House said in a statement, Reuters reported. The statement says the sides agreed to strengthen joint efforts to fight the spread of the influence of the Islamic State militants. They agreed that it is necessary to address "Iran's destabilizing regional activities. The Saudi media reported the two leaders discussed also the strategic relations between the two countries. The talk lasted more than an hour. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. World famous movie star Antonio Banderas has been urgently hospitalized with acute chest pains in Great Britain, the Sun reports. According to media reports, the 56 year old actor, who is living in Great Britain since 2015, fell ill during an exercise and was hospitalized on January 26. Doctors discharged the actor after performing several health checks. Banderas thanked the doctors in an interview and labeled the happening as an episode. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Young Armenian painter Suren Mesropyan, who departed for Slovakia only few months ago, has already presented his own exhibition. Around 45 paintings of the Armenian artist will be presented January 29 February 27 in Bratislavas CT GALLERY. Both representatives of arts and ordinary art fans attended the opening of the exhibition entitled Colors of Life. Thanking the exhibitions organizer and coordinator Kristina Kleinertova and other attendees, Suren Mesropyan said Colors of Life is his first individual exhibition, which is aimed at Bringing the bright colors of Armenia to Europe. Asked what is arts and painting for him, and what Slovakia is like compared to Armenia in terms of achieving success in arts, Suren Mesropyan said: For me arts, namely painting, is first of all a lifestyle, also to some extent a way of expressing ideas and perceptions. He added there are numerous similarities between Armenia and Slovakia. Slovakia is a little larger by territory than Armenia, and perhaps thats the reason why people here are also very sociable and hospitable, he said. Asked whether its possible to be engaged in arts in Slovakia and make a living by it, Suren said the issue of earning money through arts exists everywhere, however he didnt want to compare the two countries, and simply mentioned that making money is never a priority for a painter. Suren is planning to return to Armenia because he is closely linked to his homeland. Travelling directly helps to expand world view for people and namely for artists, it is a way of improvement, he said, assuring he will return to Yerevan, the colorful and lively city, very soon. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. Former Mayor of Gyumri Vardan Ghukasyan is going to take part in the upcoming parliamentary elections. He told Armenpress he is going to nominate his candidacy through the Tsarukyan alliance. I have made a decision to participate in the elections, I am being nominated by the Tsarukyan alliance, with a ranked voting list, he said. In response to a question how he assesses his chances, the former Mayor said: If I decided to be nominated, I assess it positively. YEREVAN, JANUARY 30, ARMENPRESS. An event to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the murder of Armenian journalist of Istanbul Hrant Dink will be held in the city of Sydney on March 19, the Armenian National Committee of Australia (ANC-AU) reported. Dinks widow, Rakel Dink will be the main speaker at the event. Talking about the event, ANC-AU Managing Director, Vache Kahramanian said: "We all remember when the funeral of Hrant Dink saw many tens of thousands of Turkish people march in Istanbul, chanting 'We are all Hrant! We are all Armenian!'. This heralded hope in a country that has trouble dealing with its Armenian past, and proved that Hrant did not die in vain. Dink, the editor-in-chief of the Armenian Agos newspaper, was shot dead by a teenager on Jan. 19, 2007 outside his office in Istanbul. Dink`s assassination organizer Yasin Hayal was sentenced to life imprisonment and the perpetrator Ogyun Samast was sentenced to imprisonment for 22 years by the decision of the court on January 17. 2012. In October 2014 Istanbul's 5th High Criminal Court made a decision to start the trial into the murder of Hrant Dink from zero. The Pacific Coast, and California in particular, has worked its magic on a host of American composers over the years, from figures like Henry Cowell and Lou Harrison, who started out here, to such postwar emigres as Stravinsky and Schoenberg who arrived here with centuries of European musical history packed inside their valises. But no one has fused those strains the freedom and sunny openness of the California milieu with the expressive depth and constructive rigor of late Romanticism with the facility and grace that Adams has shown over a long career. By Dezan Shira & Associates Editor: Maxfield Vandel Brown With over 625 million inhabitants spanning 10 member states, ASEAN is endowed with a diverse workforce capable of supporting a multitude of manufacturing and service based investments. For those exploring opportunities or actively investing in the region, the benefits of being able to house entire value chains within the bloc must simultaneously be tempered with an understanding that availability of talent and the regulatory conditions under which staffing takes place are largely determined at the member state level. Navigating the dynamics of individual members is therefore a critical precursor to narrowing a search for opportunity within ASEAN and an integral component of strategic planning and expansion. Assessing talent hubs in ASEAN The most immediate staffing consideration for investors regards the type of labor that a given investment will require. While ASEAN can provide a wide range of skillsets to meet all ends of the value chain, the availability of talent is not uniform across the region. Per the World Economic Forum, markets ability to attract investment, and thus provide profitable opportunities, hinges on sets of variables unique to the stage of development of the economy in question. Offering investors arguably the most divergent economic conditions of any regional bloc, ASEAN states range from low income jurisdictions to some of the most advanced economies in the world. Broadly speaking, talent within ASEAN can be categorized within three pools outlined by the World Economic Forums Global Competitiveness Report of 2016-2017. RELATED: Payroll and Human Resources Services from Dezan Shira & Associates Factor driven Characterized by low levels of education and incomes, factor driven economies in ASEAN are best positioned to provide low cost manpower for the execution of basic manufacturing. Enjoying lower wages than China and many other traditional manufacturing locations, Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar are rapidly becoming choice locations within ASEAN for China plus one production. Under a China plus one arrangement, ASEANs factor based economies would provide the basic components for more complex production lines based in China. Alternatively, factor based jurisdictions can also effectively serve as low cost production hubs for consumer goods targeting ASEANs emerging middle class. Following years of strong FDI inflows, consumer spending is flourishing in Indonesia, and similar trends are expected to hit critical mass in the Philippines and Vietnam by as early as 2018. Although costs within factor driven economies tend to be extremely competitive, institutions within these states often lack transparency and lag on the enforcement of labor regulation. It is therefore important to conduct thorough due diligence with contractors and to keep an eye on regulatory authorities for upcoming changes. Efficiency driven Boasting basic regulatory infrastructure and competitively priced labor, efficiency driven economies make up the bulk of nations within ASEAN. Broadly speaking, ASEAN states at this stage in their development can be utilized for increasingly complicated manufacturing, assembly of multiple components into more complex goods, and the provision of limited value add services. Including ASEAN members such as Vietnam, the Philippines, and Thailand, efficiency based talent hubs are largely characterized by higher levels of education and stronger regulatory infrastructure than found in factor driven economies. The extent of education, infrastructure, and thus capacity to service differing areas of production is largely dependent on the extent of a countrys development. Those considering investment in economies such as Vietnam which are in a transitionary phase between factor and efficiency driven competitiveness may find sourcing high skilled talent for service employment to be difficult compared to more developed jurisdictions such as Thailand. Innovation driven At the high end of the value chain are Malaysia and Singapore ASEANs innovation based economies. With technology and tools in place to provide professional services, conduct high value add manufacturing, and assemble complex components, competitiveness of talent within these economies is heavily dependent on education. Fortunately, institutions within both countries are well entrenched and investors should be confident that rule of law and procedures for handling contracts and labor disputes will be firmly observed. It should, however, be noted that concerns over mounting regulation of the labor market have arisen in recent years particularly in Singapore. The tradeoff between innovation economies in ASEAN is largely that of optimization for price. While Malaysia is certainly well on its way to foraging the competitiveness necessary to rival more developed competitors, it currently lags behind Singapore regarding hiring and firing practices, as well as flexibility in the determination of wages. Investors seeking a more fluid hiring environment as well as more education and expertise will naturally find Singapore to be a more enticing opportunity, while Malaysia will find appeal for those seeking slightly reduced advantages at a discounted price. RELATED: Labor Mobility in ASEAN: Current Commitments and Future Limitations Optimizing the onboarding process Talent availability Irrespective of the human resources required for a given operation, availability of qualified workers is an issue of critical importance for every investment. In Singapore, for example, despite being ASEANs most advanced economy, more than 11 percent of business leaders interviewed by the World Economic Forum indicate struggles in sourcing qualified workers from domestic labor pools. At the other end of the developmental spectrum, nearly 20 percent of business leaders in Laos report similar concerns about sourcing qualified talent a clear indication that, while the competitive position of markets may differ, the ability of markets to capitalize on these advantages remains tied to the ability of the workforce to meet external demand. To mitigate the challenges of limited labor availability, it is highly recommended that thorough premarket entry analysis be conducted between ASEAN countries that provide the competitive advantages needed by a given investment. During this process, it is also worth considering the role that international sourcing of labor can play in managing domestic shortages of talent. The ability to attract and retain foreign personnel can vary significantly between markets, and, in some instances, provides a significant boost to otherwise sparse domestic labor pools. General hiring considerations Whether hiring domestic workers or sourcing labor from abroad, the conditions under which hiring takes place must be considered closely. Involving issues such as determination of salaries, social insurance obligations, and the regulation of onboarding a concern for the sourcing of foreign workers in particular labor market rules can have a significant impact on the ease with which labor pools in ASEAN can be exploited. While hiring conditions should be factored into decision making at all levels of the value chain, labor market optimization is of heightened importance in more developed markets such as Singapore and Malaysia. In these markets, absent the impediments of corruption and regulatory uncertainty that come to mind in jurisdictions such as Laos and Myanmar, compliance times and complexity of labor regulation often top investors lists as the most pressing challenge facing their investments. Contracting Upon the selection of markets and workers within them, understanding the structure of contracts is an important asset that can be utilized to the advantage of investments at all ends of the value chain. For low cost manufacturers seeking to fill large orders on short notice, hiring temporary workers can be a significant resource. In this regard, comparing caps on fixed term labor contracts allows for effective planning and can maximize flexibility in investment. For more complex investments, particularly those where education and intangible skillsets are of great importance, the utilization of probationary periods can be an effective tool to vet employees and to test their abilities in the field. Understanding the limits on these trial periods is thus an important consideration with regards to compliance and planning. This article is an excerpt from the December issue of ASEAN Briefing Magazine, titled Human Resources in ASEAN. In this issue of ASEAN Briefing, we discuss the prevailing structure of ASEANs labor markets and outline key considerations regarding wages and compliance at all levels of the value chain. We highlight comparative sentiment on labor markets within the region, showcase differences in cost and compliance between markets, and provide insight on the state of statutory social insurance obligations throughout the bloc. Annual Audit and Compliance in ASEAN For the first issue of our ASEAN Briefing Magazine, we look at the different audit and compliance regulations of five of the main economies in ASEAN. We firstly focus on the accounting standards, filing processes, and requirements for Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines. We then provide similar information on Singapore, and offer a closer examination of the city-states generous audit exemptions for small-and-medium sized enterprises. Managing ASEAN Expansion from Singapore In this issue of ASEAN Briefing Magazine, we look at the benefits of using Singapore a hub for the management of regional operations throughout ASEAN. We firstly focus on the position of Singapore relative to its competitors, such as the Netherlands and Hong Kong. We then provide step-by-step instructions on corporate establishment, and provide expert insight on maximizing returns through the reduction respective tax burdens. The Guide to Manufacturing in Indonesia Choosing if, where, and how to establish foreign manufacturing operations in Indonesia can be a significant challenge. While the archipelagos vast diversity may initially seem daunting, a number of options are available which will allow entry and operations to be conducted in a seamless manner. In this issue of ASEAN Briefing, we discuss Indonesia as a hub for manufacturing within Southeast Asia, and provide guidance on how to select and establish operations within the country. SAIL is worried over domestic coking coal price hike effected by state-owned CIL. CIL arm Bharat Coking Coal Ltd this month increased the prices of coking coal by about 20 per cent. New Delhi: Worried over domestic coking coal price hike effected by state-owned CIL, the country's largest steel maker SAIL today said it is in negotiations with the miner on the issue as it is difficult for the company to absorb the increase. "We are under negotiations with them and working model will come out," Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) Chairman P K Singh told PTI on Coal India Ltd's recent hike in coking coal prices. CIL arm Bharat Coking Coal Ltd this month increased the prices of coking coal by about 20 per cent. Another subsidiary of the world's largest miner Central Coalfields Ltd has also increased price of metallurgical coal this month. "We are in dialogue with them (CIL). We have told (them) that at this stage it is difficult for us to absorb (the hike in coking coal price). They have agreed to form a committee," Singh said. The panel which will be constituted will have members from both the state-owned firms. SAIL too is a state-owned firm and is a prime consumer of coking coal as well as a major customer of CIL's metallurgical coal. "We have an MoU with Coal India. Once we are in that MoU that pact remains applicable for the entire financial year. MoU means we also have an assured offtake from Coal India and We take coking coal from them. We take domestic coking coal supply only from Coal India," Singh said. According to an official, the price of various grades of coking coal of CIL varies between Rs 2,400 and Rs 5,050 per tonne. Asserting that SAIL was unable to recover its cost of production, he said there was a lot of pressure on its operations. On possibility of price increase by the steel PSU, he said "it will depend on market situation". Of its total requirement, SAIL imports 86 per cent of metallurgical coal, while the rest is sourced indigenously. The steel PSU has existing captive coking coal production of nearly 0.5 million tonnes per annum. The global coking coal price which was at USD 80 per tonne in January last year rose to USD 283 per tonne in December, Indian Steel Association Secretary General Sanak Mishra said. However, in early January, global price of metallurgical coal came down to USD 193 per tonne, Mishra said. EMD for Indian bidders has been kept at Rs 50 lakh while it will be USD 75,000 for foreign players. New Delhi: The Service Tax Department will auction liquor baron Vijay Mallya-led now-defunct Kingfisher Airlines' corporate jet in March to recover dues of Rs 535 crore. The department in Mumbai has invited online global bids for sale of Corporate Jet Airbus A319 stationed at the Mumbai International Airport belonging to Kingfisher Airlines, which has already been attached by it. The bidding will be conducted by MSTC, the selling agent of the Service Tax Department, on March 15-16, an auction notice stated. As part of the pre-bid verification, bidders can seek clarification from the department regarding the aircraft, its particulars, equipment and any related documents at least 24 hours prior to submission of bid in the e-auction. "The bidder will not raise any dispute regarding the terms and conditions of the e-auction or about the particulars of the aircraft or contest the same once he has been declared as the successful bidder for the aircraft," said the guidelines for the e-auction. The prospective bidders shall have to submit interest free pre-Bid Earnest Money Deposit (EMD) to MSTC by March 14. EMD for Indian bidders has been kept at Rs 50 lakh while it will be USD 75,000 for foreign players. In March last year, the department in a petition to the Bombay High Court had claimed that Mallya's total disputed liability in respect of service tax was to the tune of Rs 535 crore. It was also claimed that Mallya had collected a large sum of money as service tax from flyers of the now-grounded Kingfisher Airlines on behalf of the government, but the same was not deposited in the government treasury. Mallya, whose group company owes over Rs 9,000 crore to 17 banks, had left the country on March 2, 2016. Lenders to the now-non-functional airline and tax authorities have been putting under the hammer various movable and immovable assets of KFA, but have failed to get any buyers. The merger would involve Idea issuing new shares to Vodafone and would result in Vodafone deconsolidating Vodafone India. The all-share deal that could help the groups counter the fierce competition in the market. London: Vodafone said on Monday it was in talks to merge its Indian operations with rival Idea Cellular in an all-share deal that could help the groups counter the fierce competition in the market. In a short statement, Vodafone said it was in talks with Idea's parent, conglomerate Aditya Birla. It said any merger would involve Idea issuing new shares to Vodafone and would result in Vodafone deconsolidating Vodafone India. Shares in Vodafone were up 3.5 percent in early trading. The government had in November banned high value notes, which accounted for 86 per cent of the entire currency in circulation. RBI has extended the 90-day breather from getting accounts classified under non-performing asset (NPA) category for loans up to Rs 1 crore. New Delhi: The Reserve Bank is expected to extend the deadline for asset quality review (AQR) of lenders by a few months because of the unusual situation in the financial sector following demonetisation, bankers said. The cleaning up exercise that is required should be done properly, they said. A senior bank official said lenders may require few more months for proper implementation of AQR as most of their staff was busy with demonetisation for two month. Besides, RBI has extended the 90-day breather from getting accounts classified under non-performing asset (NPA) category for loans up to Rs 1 crore. This dispensation is applicable to dues payable between Nov. 1 and Dec. 31. This will also come in the way of AQR for which RBI had set a deadline of March 2017, said the official. The government had in November banned high value notes, which accounted for 86 per cent of the entire currency in circulation. The RBI had embarked on the exercise from Dec. 2015 and asked banks to recognise some top defaulting accounts as NPAs and providing for them. The niche political outift is firm that there should be no distortion of facts related to Rajput Queen Padmavati. Bhansali's 'Padmavati' is one of the most anticipated films of the year. Mumbai: The attack on Sanjay Leela Bhansali on the sets of his film 'Padmavati' in Jaipur for alleged distortion of facts was extremely shocking, with celebrities from the film industry coming out to support the filmmaker on Twitter. Rumours had been set afloat stating that the director had conceptualised a dream sequence where the infamous Alauddin Khilji would be shown being physically intimate with Rani Padmavati. However, the director's team had sent out an official statement which squashed the rumours. "We clarify that there is no dream sequence or any objectionable scene between Rani Padmavati and Alauddin Khilji. We have been carefully researching and making the film. In spite of this, the attack on the shoot and crew was uncalled for and was extremely damaging to the image of the beautiful city of Jaipur," an excerpt from the statement had read. However, this hasn't ended the worries for the tam, which had to stop their shoot in Rajasthan. The Rajput Karni Sena, a niche political outfit, has sent out four diktats to the team, to be religiously followed. 1. The title of the film needs to be changed from 'Padmavati' to something more appropriate. 2. No intimate scenes between the actors playing Alauddin Khilji and Rani Padmavati are to be shown. 3. No further distortion of historical facts under the guise of creative liberty. 4. The Sena be shown the film before its theatrical release. The CEO of Sanjay Leela Bhansali Productions, Shobha Sant, however, has clarified that it isn't within their jurisdiction to change the title of the film. While the official statement has clarified that there's no existence of the scene in question or distortion of historical facts in the script, they are yet to comment on the Sena being shown the film before release. It remains to be seen how Bhansali's team decides to respond to the surprise ultimatum. 'Padmavati,' starring Deepika Padukone as the eponymous queen, Shahid Kapoor as her husband and king Rana Rawal Ratan Singh and Ranveer Singh as the antagonistic Alauddin Khilji, is slated for a Diwali, 2017 release. Sushant and Sanjay Bhansali have been close from the time Sushant aspired to be in the movies. As a form of protest against the vandalism on Sanjay Leela Bhansalis Padmavati sets in Jaipur at the hands of some members of the Rajput community, Sushant Singh Rajput dropped his last name on Twitter for a day. The actor was met by much flak for the move by trolls on the site who claim that he, in fact, has shamed the community by dissociating with it. Says the actor, I decided to drop Rajput from my name to make my stance on this issue very clear. I want to say that these self-proclaimed representatives of the community do not represent everyone with that surname. If they have a problem with something, there are other ways to express it, but violence is definitely not the solution, and that too on a mere speculation. Sushant and Sanjay Bhansali have been close from the time Sushant aspired to be in the movies. He had met SLB at the outset and the filmmaker had assured him that he would keep him in mind for future roles. And he did. SLB did offer Ram-Leela to Sushant, but at that time Sushant was committed to Shekhar Kapoors Paani, which ultimately never got made. Sushant, who was fielding trolls on Monday, added, These paid trolls are used to shut voices across all sectors on digital platforms. They may have a certain effect in shaping public opinion because people generally think that these platforms are a true representation of general consensus. But the truth is, the entire digital area is mere a seven per cent of what people generally think and talk about. People around must know this. As many as 21 people, including 15 soldiers, have been killed since last week because of avalanches. New Delhi: Global warming and heavy shelling by Pakistani troops are triggering avalanches in Jammu and Kashmir that have claimed the lives of 15 Armymen since last week, Army Chief General Bipin Rawat said on Sunday. Ceasefire violations and use of heavy weapons by Pakistani troops are leading to loosening of soil. When there is a heavy snowfall on such a loose soil and if there is a slope, it triggers danger of an avalanche, he told reporters after paying homage to Major Amit Sagar, who lost his life in an avalanche in Sonamarg on January 25. He added that avalanches were being reported from areas which in the past did not have so many incidents. Global warming is also leading to cracks in glaciers There are avalanches in areas which had not reported such cases earlier. Avalanches have occurred in Dawar areas, Machil sectors, Gen. Rawat said. As many as 21 people, including 15 soldiers, have been killed since last week because of avalanches and snowfall-related incidents in the Kashmir Valley. Gen. Rawat said Jammu and Kashmir has been witnessing heavy snowfall over the past 72 hours, and is likely to record similar conditions for the next two-three days. The Army, he said, has been taking help of the Snow and Avalanche Study Establishment, a laboratory under the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), to map avalanche-prone areas. The Army withdraws troops from places at risk of avalanches, but that cannot be always done in positions vulnerable to insurgency. In the weather that is prevailing in Jammu and Kashmir, the soldiers have been deployed to counter the terrorists and infiltrators. They are doing their duty despite the adverse conditions, Gen. Rawat said. Major Amit Sagar is an example. He volunteered to serve in the area knowing the difficult conditions, he added. The Army Chief said that the bodies of the martyred soldiers are still in Jammu and Kashmir because of the weather conditions, but all efforts are being made to bring them down. I want to assure the families of soldiers affected by the avalanche in Jammu and Kashmir that we are with them, Gen. Rawat said. Weather is playing a spoilsport in bringing back the bodies of their dear ones, he added. Bullet with turn On February 3, 2016, 10 soldiers from the Madras Regiments 19 Battalion went missing in Siachen after an avalanche. Lance Naik Hanumanthappa, 33, was dug out from 30-feet deep snow after he miraculously survived for five days. He later succumbed to his injuries. In January 2016, four soldiers lost their lives after being hit by an avalanche in Siachen. In one of the most devastating avalanches, about 135 Pakistani soldiers died after being buried under tonnes of snow when an avalanche hit them near Siachen in April 2012. The forum urged both government of India and Myanmar to divert investment on border fencing. Earlier, both the faction of NSCN has opposed the construction of border fencing which has started at Pangsha village on international border. (Photo: PTI) Guwahati: Opposition to the fencing of international border has started spreading across the border with two students federations of Myanmar joining the protest. In a joint statement sent to this newspaper, the Eastern Naga Students Federation and Naga Students Organisation of Myanmar have threatened to take action to stop the ongoing fencing work. Terming as an act of cruelty the move to segregate the Naga families through border fencing initiated by Myanmar, the students forum said that border fencing is a mockery to Act East policy of India. The forum urged both government of India and Myanmar to divert investment on border fencing and utilise it on development of road, infrastructure, health, education and economy, saying, We hereby appeal to New Delhi and Naypyidaw to stop immediately such cruel moves and instead expedite talks for peace and development through investment in all those Naga-inhabited areas. Pointing out that more than 10,000 students from Eastern Nagaland (Myanmar) are studying in present Indian state of Nagaland, the forum feared that the fencing would directly hamper career of the students as it would stop them from getting education in their own homeland. ENSF president Reego Shonshei Tangshang and general secretary Juvsangthong S. Makury maintained that Nagas neither have cultural division nor social differences. We have been living as one family despite divide and rule policy of India and Myanmar and that our inherent right to live together cannot be stolen, said the students. Nagas were divided without consultation in 1953 by then Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and his Burmese counterpart U Nu. However, Nagas do not accept this cowardice act till today, said the forum. The association accused the India and Myanmar governments of not only dividing the Naga brothers but also demolishing the sovereign rights of Nagas to live together. Earlier, both the faction of NSCN has opposed the construction of border fencing which has started at Pangsha village on international border. The EC earlier in the day passed an order directing the Goa police to register a criminal case against Kejriwal. Panaji: Acting on the Election Commission's orders, the Goa Chief Electoral Officer on Sunday directed the North Goa district collector to lodge an FIR against AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal for his bribery remarks made at a poll rally in the state. The EC earlier in the day passed an order directing the Goa police to register a criminal case against Kejriwal. "The CEO has directed the North Goa Collector to file an FIR against Kejriwal before January 31. We have got directions from the EC," a senior official said here. The commission had earlier censured Kejriwal for his speech at a rally at Mapusa in North Goa. Kejriwal had said at the rally that people should accept the money offered by BJP and Congress but vote for AAP. The poll body today also termed as "scurrilous" the AAP leader's claim, in response to the censure, that the commission was encouraging bribery by restraining him from making such statements in future. The commission said FIR/complaint be lodged against the AAP leader under provisions of the Representation of the People Act dealing with bribing of voters and relevant sections of IPC. "Being Chief Minister of Delhi and a star campaigner of AAP in Goa, he is expected to conduct in an exemplary manner in election campaigns in a law abiding manner so as to be a role model for others to emulate but he has on several occasions violated provisions of MCC by breaking his assurance to EC... "The Commission directs that necessary legal action be initiated by filing an FIR/complaint against Arvind Kejriwal for the statements...compliance report in this regard should be sent to the Commission latest by 3.00 PM on January 31," the poll panel said earlier on Sunday. Candidates in UP, Uttarakhand and Punjab can spend Rs 28 lakh each for electioneering. The Election Commission has asked RBI to reconsider its decision at the earliest. New Delhi: The Election Commission has written a sharply-worded letter to the Reserve Bank of India following the Central Banks refusal to increase the weekly cash-withdrawal limit for candidates contesting Assembly election in five states, and asked that the bank comply with its orders. The letter, written by director general of EC Dilip Sharma and addressed to RBI governor Urjit Patel, expresses serious concern about the cursory manner in which the issue has been dealt with. (It) appears that the RBI has not realised the gravity of the situation... It is reiterated that it is the constitutional mandate of the commission to conduct free and fair elections and to provide level-playing field to all candidates... In order to facilitate proper conduct of elections, it is imperative that directions issued by the commission are complied with, EC has said in the letter dated January 28. On January 24, Election Commission had requested RBI to enhance the withdrawal limit for candidates to Rs 2 lakh from Rs 24,000 per week imposed post demonetisation. The EC had said that with a weekly withdrawal limit of Rs 24,000, a candidate would be able to draw only Rs 96,000 during the election process, which lasts three to four weeks, making it difficult to meet their campaign expenditure. The poll panel had said that despite paying through cheques, candidates will need hard cash for petty expenses, especially in rural areas where banking facilities are negligible. Candidates in UP, Uttarakhand and Punjab can spend Rs 28 lakh each for electioneering. The limit in Goa and Manipur is Rs 20 lakh each. The EC in its letter also said that its returning officers would issue certificates, attesting to the fact that the person was a candidate in the fray and be allowed to withdraw Rs 2 lakh cash per week. This facility, it had said, should be extended till March 11, the day of counting. Candidates, it had said, are bound to open an election account for meeting poll-related expenditure, which is monitored by the EC. The EC has asked RBI to reconsider its decision at the earliest. Trinamool Congress will boycott first two days of Budget session over note ban. New Delhi: Despite Prime Minister Narendra Modis appeal to Opposition parties to keep political differences aside and let Parliament function, the crucial Budget session which begins today appears to be in trouble already. Though Mr Modi reached out to the Opposition at an all-party meeting on Monday, several Opposition parties said they have decided to corner the government over key issues like demonetisation and advancing the date of the Budget session. The Congress party has even threatened to try and disrupt the finance ministers Budget speech. The Trinamool Congress, which did not attend the meeting, has decided to boycott the first two days of the Budget session, including the Budget presentation. The Shiv Sena also did not attend the meeting though no official reason was given. The Trinamool Congress, which was at the forefront of the agitation against demonetisation, resulting in a virtual washout of the Winter session, has 34 MPs in the Lower House. Branding the Parliament as a Mahapanchayat, Mr Modi sought the cooperation of all parties in the smooth running of the House. He said that Parliament should function despite differences that may crop up during the poll season. The reasons given by the TMC for skipping the Budget were many, including Saraswati Puja on February 1, and the recent arrest of their top leaders, Sudip Bandopadhyay and Tapas Pal. Trinamool MPs will not be present in Parliament on the first two days of the Budget session in protest against demonetisation which was implemented without taking Parliament into confidence, TMC leader Kalyan Banerjee said after the partys parliamentary party meet chaired by Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata. The Congress, on the other hand, has taken strong objection to the shifting of the presentation of the Budget by almost a month, from February 28 to February 1. Senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad said that he has asked the government to avoid announcing any sops or concessions in the Union Budget that may skew the playing field in the upcoming Assembly elections in the BJPs favour. Mr Azad gave the example of United Progressive Alliances 2012s decision to postpone the Union Budget due to Assembly elections. The Government should not have advanced the Budget Session, especially when state Assembly elections are coming up, he said. He also said that government should call another all-party meeting before the next phase of the Budget session. The government, however, asserted that the Budget will be presented as scheduled, rejecting the Oppositions allegations that it will impact the upcoming Assembly elections. The Supreme Court and Election Commission, it said, have already given their judgment on this. Parliamentary affairs minister Ananth Kumar said during the meeting the Prime Minister sought the support of all parties and said, In election time, there can be some differences among us, but Parliament is Mahapanchayat. It should function. The governments efforts will be that the budget should benefit all and takes the country forward, Mr Kumar said. In the meeting, the Congress and CPI-M demanded that there be a discussion on demonetisation in the current session. CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury said that there should be discussion on demonetisation for two days as it has severely impacted people across India they have suffered due to this irrational move. He also said that presentation of Budget on February 1 is unscientific as it will not take into consideration the statistical data of the third quarter that comes only in mid-February. The ordeal went on for around four hours, after which the miscreants fled at around 4 am. Gurugram: In a shocking incident, two women were allegedly gang-raped inside a poultry farm in Mandpura, Pataudi, on Saturday. According to reports, around six people broke into a poultry farm in Pataudi on Sunday, held the eight residents of the farm captive, robbed and gangraped two women. The men, who had covered their faces with clothes, allegedly tied up the residents of the farm in their individual rooms and thrashed them. The ordeal went on for around four hours, after which the miscreants fled at around 4 am. "A case has been registered under Sections 395 (dacoity), 397 (robbery with attempt to hurt/cause death), 376D (gang-rape) and 458 (trespassing) of the IPC, and sections 25, 54 and 59 of the Arms Act at the Pataudi Police Station under relevant Sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Arms Act against unknown people," said Tanya Singh, Superintendent of Police, Pataudi. Voicing displeasure over the alliance between SP and Congress, Mulayam Singh Yadav said he would not campaign for it in the assembly polls. Lucknow: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, who forged an alliance between the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Congress for the upcoming elections in the state, said on Monday that his father and SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav would campaign for the party. Speaking to NDTV, Akhilesh said that he was confident that SP would win the elections alone, but an alliance with the Congress would "firm up the verdict". Read: Akhilesh accuses BJP of copying SPs poll manifesto I am sure Mulayam Singh Yadav will campaign for us, Akhilesh said. Voicing displeasure over the alliance between Samajwadi Party and Congress, SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav on Sunday said he would not campaign for it in the state assembly polls. "I am completely against the alliance. I will not campaign for it," Mulayam said on a day his son and Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi held their first joint press conference in Lucknow and held a road show displaying great bonhomie. Mulayam, who had rejected the possibility of an alliance for the assembly polls before being deposed as party president by Akhilesh, said, "Congress ruled the country for a long time and made it laggard. We always fought against Congress." "Samajwadi Party is capable of contesting elections alone. In the past, it fought alone and formed government with a majority. No occasion arose for effecting an alliance," he said. Addressing a rally on Monday, Akhilesh said Netajis respect will increase if the freshly forged alliance forms the next government in the state. "If we win, it will be Mulayam Singh whose respect will increase the most," Akhilesh said while addressing a rally in Etah. He also used the occasion to train guns at the Bahujan Samaj Party (B SP), saying if Mayawati-led party comes to power then it will construct more elephants in the state. "If elephant's size increases then imagine what size elephant she will construct," said Akhilesh. 'I have always fought against the Congress and now the party is moving away from its ideology', he said. Lucknow: Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav and Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Sunday made their first public appearance together after forging a poll alliance a week ago, and claimed that they would defeat the BJPs politics of hate in the coming Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh. The new partners dressed identically in white kurta and black jacket smiled, hugged each other and exchanged bouquets at a press conference, and later launched their joint campaign through a roadshow in Lucknow. But late in the evening, SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav said in Delhi that he did not approve of the alliance, and would not campaign for the candidates. In an interview to a news agency, he said that the SP was capable of contesting the elections on its own. I have always fought against the Congress and now the party is moving away from its ideology, he said. He also expressed anger at the denial of tickets to some leaders. What will our leaders who have been denied tickets do now? Will they sit at home for five years? he asked. Mr Gandhi, 46, who opened the media conference, said that the alliance was the confluence of the Ganga and the Yamuna, out of which the Saraswati of development would come out. Mr Yadav, 43, said that he and the Congress leader were like the two wheels of the same bicycle (SPs election symbol). We were together in the Lok Sabha, we know each other, the UP CM said. Agar cycle ko haath mil jaye to aur tez chalegi, he said and added that the people had waited for achche din premised by the BJP, but in vain. Mr Gandhi said that the alliance was for three Ps: progress, prosperity and peace, to which the UP CM added one more P (people). UP votes in seven phases starting February 11. The two leaders helped each other in facing uncomfortable questions about the rocky relationship between the two parties in the past. The two said the alliance was backed by their personal equation. Mr Gandhi admitted that there were differences between the two parties, but said, We are looking to the future. We will give a government that fulfills the aspirations of the youth and works for the poor and farmers. This is our common minimum programme. Its non-negotiable. Akhilesh also agrees with me on this, the congress vice-president said. The two leaders garlanded a statue of Mahatma Gandhi and then embarked on a 15-km roadshow on a customised bus with UP Vijay Rath written boldly on it. The bus also had the symbols of both parties and photographs of Congress president Sonia Gandhi and SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav. The new slogan UP ko yeh saath pasand hai (UP relishes this alliance) was also written in bold letters. The CMs daughter, Tina Yadav, was also on the bus. The entire route was packed to capacity with people lurking from rooftops and trees to watch the two leaders together. Thousands of SP and Congress workers followed them. The idea was to send a message to minorities that the alliance can provide a tough challenge to the BJP. During the press conference, the two leaders also evaded several questions. When asked to explain the Congress recent slogan 27 saal, UP behaal, Mr Gandhi said, I had said Akhilesh is a good boy, but he was not allowed to work. On differences over seats in Amethi and Rae Bareli, he said it was a peripheral issue, and not a central one. Asked if Mulayam Singh Yadav and Sonia Gandhi would join the campaign, Mr Gandhi said he wouldnt disclose their strategy, and the CM only said that the alliance had the blessings of both senior leaders. There were also no clear answers to questions regarding the roles of Priyanka Gandhi and Dimple Yadav in the campaign. To a question if Rahul Gandhi would be the PM candidate in 2019, the CM did not say anything, but Mr Gandhi said the alliance for LS polls was open for discussions. On being asked why Mayawati was not part of the secular alliance, the CM said, Jagah kaise de dete unhe? Kitni jagah leti hain woh, unka toh chunav chinh hathi hai. Mr Gandhi however said, I respect Mayawatiji and Kanshi Ramji personally. BSP ran government and committed mistakes but the respect is intact. BSPs Mayawati called the pact a conspiracy to indirectly benefit the BJP. It is on the lines of dil mile na mile haath milate rahiye they have come together at the BJPs instigation to stop the BSP from forming a government, she said. BJP leader Siddharth Nath Singh said that the bicycle now did not have Mulayam Singh Yadavs hand. UP will reject the alliance of bhrashtachari (corrupt) andgundachari (goons) in the polls, he said. The victim was stabbed by the barber with a pair of scissiors. New Delhi: A 20-year-old youth was allegedly stabbed to death at a barber shop over the usage of a comb in southeast Delhi's Badarpur area, police said on Sunday. A PCR call was received today at 1.30 pm saying that a man had been stabbed by a pair of scissors and he was critical, said a senior police officer. During inquiry, it was found that the accused brothers Raghubir Thakur (25), and Navami Thakur (30), had a scuffle with deceased Pawan in their shop over the usage of a comb. The matter aggravated and Raghubir caught Pawan by the hair and Navami stabbed him with a pair of scissors, police added. Pawan was rushed to the Apollo Hospital where doctors declared him brought dead. Both the accused have been detained and are being interrogated, police added. Uddhav brings up entry of criminals in BJP days after Sena severs ties with latter. Mumbai: After ending the saffron alliance, Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray blasted the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and chief minister Devendra Fadnavis on Sunday. He also said that the chief ministers image has been maligned and questioned whether he became the CM of goons, referring to entry of alleged criminals in the BJP. The longstanding war of words between the Shiv Sena and BJP has reached its peak after the alliance was broken two days ago. The chief ministers earlier image has been maligned. Now, one fears if he will be seen as a CM of goons. Nobody wants to talk about the issues I raised pertaining to transparency. But why are people not talking about achhe din? Mr Thackeray said. I will not speak any more (on what Mr Fadnavis said) because I will also suffer from a sore throat, he said, in a veiled reference to Mr Fadnavis drinking water twice during his speech last night owing to a sore throat. Mr Thackeray said the BJP had failed to honour its poll promise of building a Ram temple at Ayodhya. They (BJP) must be looking for the bricks they had collected earlier. If they find those bricks, maybe they will build the temple. You (BJP) will build the temple, but when? the Sena chief asked. The Sena chief did not spare BJP Mumbai president Ashish Shelar for terming the Sena Kauravas and Mr Fadnavis Lord Krishna. No one can become Prime Minister by delivering a speech at the Red Fort. In the same way, one cannot become Krishna by merely declaring oneself so, he added. Meanwhile, former Congress leader Devendra Amberkar joined Shiv Sena on Sunday, blaming Mumbai Congress chief Sanjay Nirupam. He was welcomed by the Sena chief at the latters residence Matoshree. Mr Amberkar alleged that Mr Nirupam is a dictator and is serving no justice to the Marathi people. Nirupam is prepared to destroy the entire party. He is acting as a dictator, Mr Amberkar said. The leaders Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh background also helps him manoeuvre internal politics of the saffron parivar. Mumbai: If political pundits are to be believed, Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, the blue-eyed boy of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, is eyeing a space in national politics. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is also gradually projecting the leader on the national scene, and recent indications suggest that Mr Fadnavis (aka Mr Clean Image) has a bright future in the power corridors of Delhi. Sensing his partys push, Mr Fadnavis has started working steadily on the ground. Recently, Mr Fadnavis appointed Manoj Munde as Officer on Special Duty (OSD) in Delhi. Though the work norms for this position has still not been finalised, sources told to The Asian Age that bridging relations across the political spectrum will be hidden work for him. Mr Fadnavis, however, denies harbouring any ambition to enter national politics. Speaking to The Asian Age on Sunday, he said, Prime Minister Modiji has been setting new benchmarks of responsive governance and transparency. All the BJP CMs are replicating that model in their states. We are fortunate to have the backing of Modiji as PM and Amitbhai Shah as party president. Now, the only pressure we face is to deliver, and we will achieve that. Mr Fadnavis inclusion in the group of CMs that deal with the ambitious digital payment programme of the Centre also indicates his growing stature. Chandrababu Naidu, Naveen Patnaik and Shivraj Singh Chauhan, the chief ministers of Andhra Pradesh, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh respectively, are other heavyweights in this group. It may be mentioned here that Mr Fadnavis had recently evaded a question on harbouring prime ministerial ambitions at the Powai IITs Mood Indigo festival. The CM had said, The aspirations of those who wish to be PM never have been fulfilled. Take the example of Sharad Pawar or Mulayam Singh Yadav. So let me remain chief minister. The leaders smarts has always aided him, and he is unmatched as a politician in the second-rank leadership of the BJP at the national level. Other choices of the PM for chief ministership in various BJP-ruled states have not shone as brightly as the Maharashtra CM. Besides, time is on his side. At the age of 46, Mr Fadnavis is CM of the second largest state in the country with his clean image intact. The leaders Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh background also helps him manoeuvre internal politics of the saffron parivar. Though he is from the RSS, Mr Fadnavis has earned image of a moderate leader carefully. In the last two years, Mr Fadnavis has been cultivating his image as that of a vote-attracting leader. The BJP is utilising his charisma for the ongoing civic bodies and zilla parishad elections, which will also prove to be Mr Fadnavis biggest battle. Speaking about the CMs challenges, veteran political analyst Prakash Bal Joshi said, The Maharashtra CMs post is the most important one after a central cabinet berth in the country. Mr Fadnavis has been successful age, image and administrative skills are with him. He only has to prove himself in these elections. If the BJP thinks of bigger changes before the 2019 general elections, he may be taken to Delhi for a national role. The attack comes as Canada has vowed to open its arms wide to Muslims and refugees after Trump's travel ban. Police survey the scene after a deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City, Canada. (Photo: AP) Quebec City: Six people died and eight were injured after gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque, a shooting that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned on Monday as a "terrorist attack." Police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told journalists that two suspects were arrested following the attack that police were also treating as an act of terrorism. Trudeau said in a statement that "we condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge." "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, city and country." According to witnesses interviewed on local television, two masked gunmen entered the cultural center around 7:15 pm yesterday. The motive of the attack was not immediately clear. Police quickly set up in the mosque's vicinity. Coulombe said those killed were between ages 35 and 70. Police did not rule out the possibility of a third suspect who had fled the scene. "It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence," Trudeau said. "Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear." Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said in a series of Twitter posts that the government was "mobilized to ensure the security of the people of Quebec." "Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence," he wrote. "Solidarity with Quebec people of Muslim faith." Police stationed near the mosque told AFP that they had been preparing for this type of attack "because it's happening all over the world." "I don't understand why here -- it's a small mosque," said a man who was inside the center at the time of the attack. "It's not Montreal or Toronto." The mosque has already been the target of hate: a pig's head was left on the doorstep last June during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Other mosques in Canada have been targeted with racist graffiti in recent months. The attack comes as Canada has vowed to open its arms wide to Muslims and refugees after US President Donald Trump's controversial immigration ban Friday sparked travel chaos and outrage around the world. Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of Trump's order, the immigration ministry said Sunday. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. Trump has suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Judge blocks deportation of travellers and refugees from 7 Muslim nations stranded at US airports. Protesters gather at the OHare International Airport after more than a dozen people were detained, including green card holders, in Chicago on Saturday. They were detained following President Donald Trumps executive order that bans legal US residents and visa holders from seven Muslim-majority nations from entering the US for 90 days and puts an indefinite hold on a programme resettling Syrian refugees. (Photo: AP) New York: A federal judge on Saturday blocked the deportation of travellers and refugees from seven Muslim nations stranded at US airports under an order from President Donald Trump, after a lawsuit filed on behalf of two Iraqis with ties to US security forces. In the lawsuit filed in federal court in Brooklyn, New York, the two men challenged Mr Trumps directive on constitutional grounds. The suit said their connections to US forces made them targets in their home country and that the pair had valid visas to enter the US. The lawsuit highlights some of the legal obstacles facing Mr Trumps new administration as it tries to carry out the directive, which the President signed late on Friday to impose a four-month ban on refugees entering the US and a 90-day hold on travelers from Syria, Iran and five other Muslim-majority countries. US district judge Ann Donnelly ordered the authorities to refrain from deporting previously approved refugees as well as approved holders of valid immigrant and non-immigrant visas and other individuals... legally authorised to enter the US from the countries targeted in Mr Trumps order. The American Civil Liberties Union, which sought the temporary stay, said it would help about 100 to 200 people who found themselves detained in transit or at US airports. I am directing the government to stop removal if there is someone right now in danger of being removed, Ms Donnelly said. No one is to be removed in this class, Trump was unrepentant on Sunday defending his policy in the face of growing outrage across the globe and from Americans at home. Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world - a horrible mess! he tweeted to his followers. Trump has issued a controversial executive order banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. Washington: There is a possibility in the future of including Pakistan in the list of countries from where immigration has been banned, a top White House official indicated on Sunday, acknowledging for the first time that Pakistan was under consideration to be put in that category. The reason we chose those seven countries was, those were the seven countries that both the Congress and the Obama administration identified as being the seven countries that were most identifiable with dangerous terrorism taking place in their country, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, told CBS News. Trump has issued a controversial executive order banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia. Now, you can point to other countries that have similar problems, like Pakistan and others. Perhaps we need to take it further. But for now, immediate steps, pulling the Band-Aid off, is to do further vetting for people traveling in and out of those countries, Priebus said. This is for the first time that the Trump Administration has publicly acknowledged about considering putting Pakistan into that list. Currently as per the executive order, visitors from countries like Pakistan and Afghanistan are subject to extreme vetting. Priebus said the executive orders were signed after a lot of planning. Were not going to advertise to the world that were going to put a stop or at least a further vetting on travel in and out of our country from these seven places, he said. Some people have suggested, that, well, maybe we should have given everyone a three-day warning. But that would just mean that a terrorist would just move up their travel plans by three days. Identifying too many people in these countries and giving them a heads-up in these countries would only potentially flag the executive order for bad order, Priebus said. The President has a call with leadership in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and other countries around world. And Im sure this topic may come up, he said. Priebus asserted that Americans have to be protected first. These are countries that harbour and train terrorists. These are countries that we want to know who is coming and going in and out of to prevent calamities from happening in this country, he said. Were not willing to be wrong on this subject. President Trump is not willing to take chances on this subject. He was elected president in many respects because people knew that he was going to be tough on immigration from countries that harbour terrorists, Priebus said. I cant imagine too many people out there watching this right now think its unreasonable to ask a few more questions from someone traveling in and out of Libya and Yemen before being let loose in the United States. And thats all this is, he said. Tehmina Janjua, countrys permanent representative to UN Geneva office, set to replace Aizaz Chaudhry. Islamabad: Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is likely to appoint Tehmina Janjua as the new foreign secretary in February. If appointed, she will be the countrys first woman to hold the post. On seniority basis, Masroor A. Junejo should replace Aizaz Chaudhry as the foreign secretary, but his chances are bleak, reports the Daily Times. The post will fall vacant after Mr Chaudhry will move to the US as ambassador next month. Envoy to the US Jalil Abbas Jilanis term expires in February. In the seniority list of foreign service of Pakistan, Masroor Junejo is the senior most. He is followed by high commissioner to India Abdul Basit, high commissioner to the UK Syed Ibn-e-Abbas and former envoy to France Ghalib Iqbal. According to sources, till now, Janjua has been tipped and considered favourite for the foreign secretarys slot. She has been the permanent representative of Pakistan to the United Nations Geneva office since October 6, 2015. Ms Janjua joined foreign service of Pakistan in 1984. She studied french literature at the Quaid-e-Azam University and received a masters in international affairs from Columbia University in 1989. She served in Pakistans missions to New York City and United Nations before serving as the director of foreign secretarys office between 2004 and 2005. She served as the director general of strategic planning in the foreign secretarys office and in 2011 became spokesperson of the ministry of foreign affairs of Pakistan. She served as the ambassador of Pakistan to Italy between December 2011 and October 2015. On October 6, 2015, Ms Janjua became Pakistans envoy to the UN office in Geneva. In December 2016, Janjua, became the first woman and the first developing country representative to preside over the convention on certain conventional weapons. The government is not considering Mr Basit as he is more close to the military establishment. The government is facing criticism from the opposition and retired diplomats for not appointing a full-time foreign minister. Currently, the foreign office is being run by adviser to PM on foreign affairs Sartaj Aziz and special assistant to PM Tariq Fatemi. Police charged the accused with rape of a child, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a child and unlawful contact with a minor. The accused began abusing a 9-year-old boy at furry parties he hosted at his home in 2009, police said. (Photo: Representational Image) Warminster: Police have arrested a fifth person who is accused of repeatedly sexually abusing a boy in Pennsylvania while dressed in animal costumes. Police say 57-year-old Kenneth Fenske, of Quakertown, began abusing a 9-year-old boy at "furry" parties he hosted at his home in 2009. The abuse continued for years. Four other men who allegedly participated in the child predator ring have been arrested in Pennsylvania and Virginia. Officials say the victim is related to one of the men in the group. The victim lived with his grandmother, but is now in foster care. Police on Friday charged Fenske with rape of a child, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a child and unlawful contact with a minor. An attorney was not listed for him. Analysts have said Israels most right-wing government in history is seeking to rapidly take advantage of the election of Donald Trump. Jerusalem: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday he would ask Parliament to vote on adopting a law legalising unauthorised Jewish settlements built on Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank. Late last year lawmakers approved draft legislation that would retroactively grant legal status to wildcat settlements across the West Bank in defiance of international law, prompting strong condemnation from the United States. A statement from Mr Netanyahus office said the new bill would be submitted for parliaments approval on Monday to allow us to regularise once and for all settlements in (the West Bank) and prevent repeated attempts to damage them. The international community considers all Israeli settlements in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank to be illegal, whether they are authorised by state institutions or not. They are also seen as a major stumbling blocks to peace efforts as they are built on land the Palestinians see as part of their future state. The legislation is seen as seeking to placate pro-settlement members of Mr Netanyahus ruling majority. Analysts have said Israels most right-wing government in history is seeking to rapidly take advantage of the election of Donald Trump, who has indicated he will be far less critical of settlements than previous US presidents. According to anti-settlement group Peace Now, there are around 2,000 homes built on land owned by Palestinians in the West Bank. Around 300 people were stopped or detained worldwide, while four federal judges moved to halt deportations. Sydney: President Donald Trump will honour a deal struck under his predecessor to accept refugees from remote Pacific camps, Australia's prime minister said Monday amid immigration chaos in the United States. In November, Canberra negotiated a "one-off" deal with the outgoing Obama administration to settle an unspecified number of the 1,600 boatpeople Australia held in offshore processing centres in Nauru and Papua New Guinea. There were fears that Trump, who on Friday signed an executive order to suspend the arrival of refugees to the US for at least 120 days and bar entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries, would scupper the deal. Following a phone call between the leaders Sunday, Australia Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said the agreement would proceed. "We also discussed the resettlement arrangement of refugees from Nauru and Manus, which had been entered into with the previous administration, and I thank President Trump for his commitment to honour that existing agreement," Turnbull told reporters. He declined to provide further details on the deal, saying it was for US authorities vetting people on the islands. "So this is a matter that is entirely in the hands of United States government's agencies." Turnbull did not join in with international criticism of the Trump travel ban, saying he would not comment on the policies of sovereign nations. Amid confusion in the US, where immigration authorities have struggled to implement the ban, thousands have protested at several airports. Around 300 people were stopped or detained worldwide, while four federal judges moved to halt deportations. The US order suspends the arrival of Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. Canberra has come under fire from rights groups and the United Nations for its treatment of people seeking to arrive by boat, many from war-torn areas. The government puts such boatpeople in offshore detention camps and blocks their resettlement in Australia, even if found to be refugees. Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said such policies would continue. "I want to be very clear, though, today to people smugglers and people who would seek to exploit this announcement into an opportunity to put more people onto boats, that the government's resolve remains as strong as it's ever been," he told reporters of the US deal. by Kamran Chaudhry In 2013 the Joseph Colony was set on fire. A crowd of 3 thousand Muslims wanted to avenge an alleged blasphemy. Christian lawyer warns of risk retaliation in sponsoring cases of religious persecution. Leaders of Punjab have "great alliances with jihadist groups". Lahore (AsiaNews) - Pakistani Christian leaders have expressed "deep disappointment" for the acquittal of the 115 suspects in the arson attack on an entire Christian neighborhood in Lahore in 2013. An anti-terrorism court acquitted all the accused of having set fire to more than 150 houses, shops and two churches and forcing hundreds of Christians to flee. Rojar Randhawa Operations Management at Caritas Pakistan Lahore (CPL) told AsiaNews. "It's a sheer disappointment. The message is clear for us; those who attack minorities and openly preach hate can go scot-free. Perhaps the pictures and video footages clearly showing faces was not enough evidence. Where is the national Action Plan. The reference is to the policy to combat terrorism adopted in 2015 by the government in Islamabad following the Taliban attack on a military school in Peshawar. CPL was among several Christian organizations which distributed food and non-food items when over 3000 strong mob set ablaze more than 150 houses belonging to Christians in Lahore's Joseph colony in 2013. The attack was supposedly to "take revenge of the blasphemy" committed by a Christian Sawan Masih two days earlier. Residents were forced to flee and at least 35 people were injured. The mob looted, stoned, doused in acid and then burned the Christian settlement. Blasphemy carries a mandatory death sentence in Pakistan where there is a significant risk of mob violence in such cases. However the courts have never convicted those who attack Christian settlements. In 2011, the Anti-Terrorism Court in Faisalabad acquitted all 70 Muslims in Gojra carnage after the continued absence of witnesses in trials as well as due to a lack of evidence. Ten Christians were killed, seven of them burned alive, while four Churches were destroyed in Gojra and the nearby Korian village following a blasphemy allegation. Ijaz Farhat Advocate High Court and former President of Christians Lawyers Association of Pakistan CLAP blames both public pressure and laziness of Christian leaders. "The victims are hijacked by NGOs, many try to flee the country and nobody pursues the case. The Church leaders only visit the day court passes judgments. Christian lawyers are at high risk when taking up cases of minority persecution. Nobody provides us security from the crowd of hundreds waiting outside the court", he said. Irfan Mufti Muslim director of South Asia Partnership Pakistan, a member of South Asian civil society movement, said the court judgment shows strength of religious lobby. "We had no expectations; our faith in legal system has shattered. The political leaders of Punjab province and the ruling elite have strong alliances with jihadi groups. There is no justice for minority who continue to be victimized". by Fady Noun During his many years in the Vatican, his love for Lebanon never faded. His diplomatic career and service to the Church were followed by writing books in his last years. Beirut (AsiaNews) The Maronite Patriarch, Cardinal Bechara al-Rahi, paid tribute on Sunday to Bishop Edmond Farhat (83), 40 days after his death in Rome (16 December 2016). Born in Lebanon, in the village of Ain Kfah, a hidden pearl in the Byblos-Jbeil region amid the olive groves, this Maronite bishop was little known to the faithful in Lebanon, since he had been picked by the Vatican to serve the Church in Rome itself. After a stint at Vatican Radios Arabic service, Bishop Farhat spent nearly 20 years (1970-1989) as a member, then as under-secretary of the Synod of Bishops, a body set up by Pope Paul VI in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, to assist him on the pastoral level in the spirit of collegiality the Council had encouraged. Afterwards, his proven qualities of discretion and conviviality, as well as his familiarity with the Muslim world, led John Paul II to attach Edmond Farhat to the Vatican diplomatic corps. In fact, it was the great pope who ordained him bishop (he had been consecrated priest by Patriarch Mouchy in 1959). Bishop Farhat, proclaimed Honorary Archbishop of Byblos, was nuncio first to Algeria, then Libya and Tunisia, and finally to non-Arab countries, like Turkey, Turkmenistan, Slovenia and Macedonia. He concluded his diplomatic career in Austria (2009). Finally, free with his time, Mgr Farhat devoted himself to what gave him the most joy: writing. His efforts resulted in several books, including a reference book on The Vatican, its Meanings and Monuments, the first guide to the Vatican in Arabic (2015), published by the Vatican Publishing House (VPH). "Why the Vatican? The author explained that, "First, because it is a universal heritage, and because the Arab world has been open to culture, especially to the Catholic Church, since the Middle Ages. The Vatican Library contains more than 2,500 Arabic manuscripts: the oldest Arabic manuscript in the world is preserved in the Vatican and probably the oldest copy of the Quran is in the Apostolic Library. So there is still interest in the Vatican." Cardinal Leonardo Sandri, prefect of the Congregation for Eastern Churches, welcomed the publication of the book as "a bridge to the cultural reality of the Vatican, especially religious faith", emphasising the importance of this publication since it demonstrates the possibility of "open dialogue" between "Christian communities" and "Muslims". Among the nuncios numerous articles and speeches there is the one that marked one of the moments of the ceremony of the installation of a statue of Saint-Maron in a niche in the exterior facade of Saint Peter's Basilica during the Pontificate of Benedict XVI (2011). On that occasion, he spoke in a language whose secret he held as it related to the "wandering Aramaean" that was Saint Maron, the 4th century monk, father of the Maronite Church that became a nation, whose 1,600th anniversary falls this year. In spite of his prolonged stay in the Vatican, where his entire ecclesiastical career took place, Bishop Edmond Farhat kept alive the flame of his attachment to Lebanon. "He loved and served the Church and Lebanon with all his heart, in the image of Christ who came to serve and not to be served," said Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Secretary of State of the Vatican at the funeral ceremony in Rome that preceded the transfer of his remains to Lebanon. He rests today in the ground at Jbeil, in the family cemetery. "There is nothing stronger than a man who joins his hands," writes Kierkegaard. This could describe Edmond Farhats life. Putting together the most beautiful papal prayers of the 20th century, his book Quand les papes prient, When popes pray (Tequi editeur), plunges us into this current of grace that led the Church to the great jubilee of the year 2000 as well as to the turbulence of the third millennium of the history of the Catholic Church. The country of 30 million is home to 1.7 million Catholics. On Chinese New Year or Spring Festival, many ethnic groups get together to celebrate the New Year following to their own customs and traditions. Kuala Lumpur (AsiaNews) At the start of Chinese New Year celebrations, Malaysias Catholic churches celebrated the Holy Eucharist in a hue of colours and customs. The Chinese New Year or Spring Festival, which in some communities is also called the Lunar New Year, coincided with the Fourth Week in Ordinary Time. Parishes have been adorned with red lanterns and banners with Chinese script, as well as decorations and red envelopes called Ang Pao. In some parishes, lion dance troupes complete with gongs and cymbals performed after Mass. After the Eucharist, priests handed out mandarins, ubiquitous symbol of good luck and fortune, to parishioners. Malaysia is a multiethnic country and its Catholic population includes Chinese, Indians, and Eurasians, as well as Dayak and Kadazan in the States of Sabah and Sarawak, in Malaysian Borneo. Ethnic Chinese communities make up a large part of Malaysias 1.7 million Catholics, in a country of about 30 million people. For some parishioners, the integration of cultural elements in their festive ritual is a solemn gesture, a reminder that Christians are "people of God" from various nations. For Elizabeth Robert of Holy Family Church in the Archdiocese of Kuala Lumpur, the traits of her culture are the bases of her personhood and make her feel the fullness of being Catholic. Elizabeth, who is Tamil Indian, told AsiaNews that earlier this month, churches celebrated Mass during the Tamil harvest festival known as Ponggol. "During the Ponggol festival, churches performed the traditional boiling of milk as a symbol of prosperity and made decorations called kolam from many types of colourful grains like lentils, green peas, rice, maize, and others as an offering of the first fruits of Gods harvest." According to her, being Catholic and having her own culture enable her to "spiritualise" her cultural state and Catholic faith and thus experience the full bloom of God's creation in all its splendour. "With the arrival of the Chinese New Year, I see the oneness of Gods people and the coming of the spirit of diversity that makes us one nation and one people, all for Gods glory." Chinese New Year is one of Malaysias main festivals. The others are Hari Raya Aidil Fitri (Eid), celebrated by Muslims, Gawai and Kaamatan, celebrated by the indigenous people of Sarawak and Sabah respectively, and Deepavalli, the festival of lights, celebrated by Malaysian Hindus. Local churches have not incorporated any elements from Deepavalli because it is a religious and not a cultural feast. Salman Haider had disappeared in Islamabad on January 6th. Before him, two bloggers went missing in Lahore. Another missing blogger makes contact with the family. No news of the president of the Civil Alliance of Progressive Pakistan. Islamabad (AsiaNews) - Salman Haider, a famous Pakistani professor and poet and one of the five intellectual activists who disappeared more than three weeks ago, has returned home. This was confirmed by Zeeshan Haider, his brother, who also described his health condition as "good", without adding further details. The situation of the three other bloggers and activists seized, including the president of the Civil Alliance of Progressive Pakistan, remains unknown. Haider, a professor at the Fatima Jinnah Women's University in Rawalpindi, disappeared on 6 January on the outskirts of Islamabad, where he was on a business trip. Countless citizens have spoken out for his release, and those of the other activists including intellectuals, Christian and Muslim religious leaders. While the family rejoices for his return, the motivations of those responsible for the kidnapping and detention remain obscure. From the beginning the suspicions have fallen on police, as the professor and other activists had long denounced the rampant religious extremism in the country and the attitude of some radical factions within the security forces and government. In particular, Haider led campaigns against enforced disappearances in Balochistan province. A study by the Commission on Enforced Disappearances last December 2016, shows that from 2011 in that province the bodies of 936 missing persons were found. In recent weeks, alongside supporters of activists took to the streets to demonstrate, some Islamic extremists made accusations of blasphemy a crime punishable with the death penalty in Pakistan - against those who demanded the return home of colleagues and friends. One of these extremists, a well-known TV presenter, is under investigation for having incited to undertake violent actions and for spreading "hate speech." Two gunmen opened fire on the faithful in a prayer hall of an Islamic Cultural Centre. Six people are dead and eight wounded, some serious. "The Holy Father again strongly condemns the violence that engenders such suffering; and, imploring God for the gift of mutual respect and peace." Vatican City (AsiaNews) Pope Francis strongly condemned last nights Quebec City massacre and all forms of violence in a telegram to citys archbishop, Cardinal Gerald Cyprien Lacroix, whom he met this morning (pictured), assuring him of his prayers for the victims of the mosque attack. The Holy Father stressed the importance of remaining united, Christians and Muslims, in prayer at such moments. The cardinal, who was visiting Rome, left immediately for Canada. The telegram signed by Secretary of State Card Pietro Parolin reads: Having learned of the attack which occurred in Quebec in a prayer room of the Islamic Cultural Centre, which claimed many victims, His Holiness Pope Francis entrusts to the mercy of God the persons who lost their lives and he associates himself through prayer with the pain of their relatives. He expresses his profound sympathy for the wounded and their families, and to all who contributed to their aid, asking the Lord to bring them comfort and consolation in the ordeal. The Holy Father again strongly condemns the violence that engenders such suffering; and, imploring God for the gift of mutual respect and peace, he invokes upon the sorely tried families, and upon all persons touched by this tragedy, as well as upon all Quebecers, the benefits of the divine Blessing. In a statement, the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, also expressed its "great sadness and indignation" perpetrated against Muslim faithful while in prayer in Quebec City in their place of worship. This meaningless gesture has violated the sanctity of human life, and the respect due to a community in prayer and their place of worship. The Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue strongly condemns this act of unprecedented violence, and wishes to convey its fullest solidarity with the Muslims of Canada, assuring them of fervent prayers for the victims and their families. The attack against the Centre culturel islamique de Quebec (Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre) was carried out during evening prayers, around 8 pm, in the men's section. About fifty people had were in the place of worship; six were killed and eight wounded, some of them serious. The victims were all men, aged 35 to 70 years. Two men were arrested. Police rule out that a third gunman was involved as some early reports had indicated. A witness told Radio-Canada that he saw two men with black mask and that one had a "strong Quebec accent". Photo: Credit L'Osservatore Romano. "The media dont speak about it," they do not make the news. "They with their martyrdom, their testimony with their suffering, even giving their lives, offer life, Christians sow for the future and in other churches." Vatican City (AsiaNews) - The greatest strength of the Church today is in small persecuted Churches of Christians who suffer martyrdom. And "today there are more of than in the first centuries," although "the media dont speak about it," they do not make the news, said Pope Francis at Mass celebrated this morning in Santa Marta. Without memory there is no hope, the Pope said, basing his homily on the reading from the Letter to the Hebrews. The first Reading of the Mass is an exhortation to remember the whole history of the people of the Lord. The liturgy in these days focuses on the eleventh chapter of Hebrews, which speaks of memory and first of all, a memory of docility, the memory of the docility of so many people, beginning with Abraham, who was obedient, who went out from his own land without knowing where he was going. In particular, the section of Hebrews 11 read in todays Mass dealt with other memories: the memory of the great works of the Lord, accomplished by Gideon, Barak, Samson, David; so many people, the Pope said, who have done great things in the history of Israel. There is also a third group we remember: the martyrs, those who have suffered and given their lives, as Jesus did, who were stoned, tortured, killed by the sword. The Church, in fact, is this people of God, sinful but docile, which does great things and also bears witness to Jesus Christ, to the point of martyrdom: The martyrs are those that carry the Church forward, they are those who support the Church, who have supported her [in the past] and [who] support her today. And today there are more than in the first centuries. The media doesnt speak of them because they're not newsworthy, but so many Christians in the world today are blessed because [they are] persecuted, insulted, incarcerated. There are so many imprisoned solely for carrying a cross or for confessing Jesus Christ! This is the glory of the Church, and our support, and also our humiliation: we who have so much, everything seems so easy for us, and if we are lacking something we complain. But let us think of these our brothers and sisters who today, in numbers greater than in the first ages, are suffering martyrdom! I cannot forget, Pope Francis continued, the testimony of that priest and that sister in the Cathedral of Tirana [Albania]: years and years of imprisonment, forced labour, humiliations, for whom human rights did not exist. Then the Pope recalled that the greatest strength of the Church of today is in the little Churches that are persecuted: And we too its also true and just we are satisfied when we see a great ecclesial act, which has great success, Christians who demonstrate and this is beautiful! Is this strength? Yes, its strength. But the greatest strength of the Church today is in the little Churches, tiny, with few people, persecuted, with their Bishops in prison. This is our glory today, this is our glory and our strength. A Church without martyrs I would dare to say is a church without Jesus, the Pope said in conclusion. He then invited those present to pray for our martyrs, who suffer so much for those Churches that are not free to express themselves: they are our hope. And the Pope recalled that in the first ages of the Church, an ancient writer said the blood of Christians, the blood of the martyrs, is the seed of Christians: They, with their martyrdom, their witness, with their suffering, even giving their life, offering their life, sow Christians for the future and in other Churches. Let us offer this Mass for our martyrs, for those who are now suffering, for the Churches that suffer, who do not have liberty. And let us thank the Lord for being present with the strength of the Holy Spirit in these our brothers and sisters who today are bearing witness to Him. by Trung Tin Hundreds of people attended Mass of thanksgiving for the Catholic organizations twenty years of activity. There are also hundreds of children helped by the center, the majority of them non-Christians. Aid for orphans, HIV-positive, disabled and autistic. Catholic Volunteer: Fighting against "discrimination" in families and communities. Ho Chi Minh City (AsiaNews) - The Catholic community in Ho Chi Minh City has celebrated the 20th anniversary of the "Charity in love" Group linked to the church and at the forefront of work to help children who are sick, orphaned or abandoned by their families. On the eve of the celebrations for the Lunar New Year of the Rooster, on January 21 last a Mass of thanksgiving was celebrated among workers, children living in the community and the faithful. The Sunday mass was celebrated by Fr. Anton Nguyen Ngoc Son, former deputy director of Caritas Vietnam and Fr. Nguyen Thanh Tin, Ba Chuong parish priest in the archdiocese of former Saigon. The twentieth anniversary of the association was attended by about 300 children who benefit from the activities and projects promoted by "Charity in love". There are some Catholics among them, but most of them do not profess the Christian faith. Some are in care because HIV-positive or living with AIDS, transmitted by their parents. Still others have physical disabilities or mental health problems, and for this are relegated to the margins of society. Sunday mass, say the leaders of the association, was also an opportunity to thank the sponsors, supporters, volunteers and non-Catholics who support the projects and make this important contribution possible. People who "work in silence" to "lend a hand even to the last," the poorest communities, to those who have been forgotten or relegated to the margins by the race for economic progress. Speaking to AsiaNews Fr. Anton Nguyen Ngoc Son says that he was mandated by Card. Francis Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan to "take care of the poor, the wretched, the underprivileged Vietnamese children". Not only through his appointment as vice-director of Caritas, but also and above all in the daily commitment to those most vulnerable and neglected among the population. "The children - continues the priest - always try to give courage, telling them they have to live with joy, peace and hope." According to official statistics from Catholic workers in the office in Ho Chi Minh City, there are about 200 thousand children with autism problems in Vietnam today. And every year there are at least 15 thousand new cases, which add up to a million and more prone to mental illness or personality disorders of various degree and importance. In addition, there are at least six million orphans and physically disabled nationwide. These include the blind, the disabled, the deaf and dumb, and autistic. In particular, in the former Saigon alone there are 54 thousand children with disabilities and 3 thousand orphans. Recently, the " Group Charity in love" has promoted a project in collaboration with the University of Hoa Sen, focused on the care of mental problems. The program monitors the activities of the human mind and aims to find new answers for those suffering from mental illness, depression, schizophrenia or paranoia. The Catholic entity operates is shared with enthusiasm and dedication by the volunteers who work at the various support and recovery projects. "It's nice to spend time - says a young man - with children in need. I hope that children benefit from such support and a better education. I also hope that there are less and less discrimination towards children with difficulties within our families and communities". Yangon (AsiaNews / Agencies) - A prominent Burmese lawyer, a Muslim, was shot dead at Yangon International Airport, Myanmar. The murder took place yesterday and caused a stir: in addition to being a prominent personality of the Islamic community in a predominantly Buddhist nation, Ko Ni was also a consultant of the National League for Democracy (NLD), the party of Aung San Suu Kyi now in power. According to witnesses, the killer opened fire at point-blank range against the lawyer and activist, a few minutes after his arrival at the airport. When he was hit, Ko Ni had a child is his arms, maybe a grandchild. A taxi driver, hit by stray bullets, has also died. The Burmese police have arrested a suspect: 53 year old Kyi Lin, a native of Mandalay, in the center of the country. However, so far there are no further details on the reasons which prompted the man - interrogated at this time - to shoot and kill. Political murders are very rare in Myanmar. There have been months of violence against the minority Muslim Rohingya in western Rakhine State, but many do not believe the assassination is sectarian. His daughter Yin Khine New reports that he was "often threatened" for having condemned the great influence, even today, of the military on the national political scene. In fact, despite the fact that today Myanmar is led by a secular and civil party, 25% of seats in parliament remain the preserve of the army and any constitutional amendment is subject to the generals agreement. However, his daughter does not exclude sectarian motivations. "Many people - she says - hate us because we have a different religion, so this could be one of the reasons why it happened, but there are no certainties." In 1988 he participated in the student revolts and was jailed as a political prisoner. A constitutional law expert, he had collaborated with the leaders of the NLD to change the plan enacted by the military. In the recent past he had campaigned in favor of the persecuted Muslims, demanding rights and justice for all. This had won him many enemies both from the political and confessional point of view. Kyee Myint, former president of Myanmar Lawyer Network, defines Ko Ni as "a close friend" whose face "was the true expression of democracy in the country." His death, he added, is "a great loss for everyone." Activists and international NGOs have condemned the murder at this time and launched appeals to the government of Myanmar and the police, to ensure the guilty receive justice and clarify the real motives behind the assassination. In a creative augmented reality campaign launched today, leading processing and packaging trade show AUSPACK has added a new dimension to the events experience, and demonstrated that AUSPACK 2017 will be the place to experience bleeding-edge innovation and technology developments that are shaping the processing and packaging industrys future. In an exciting first-time initiative, AUSPACK has teamed up with augmented reality (AR) specialist Omniverse Foster Packaging, to d eliver a unique direct marketi ng experience for the processing and packaging industry trade show. Its a physical-to-virtual promotion, taking potential visitors beyond the box into an immersive experience of what AUSPACK has to offer, says Anne-Marie Mina, event executive at Exhibitions & Trade fairs, organiser of AUSPACK. Were excited to bring this exclusive experience to our audience, to demonstrate how AR can transform packaging into a dynamic marketing tool that is set to revolutionise the industry. The physical promotional platform is a printed cartonboard box, which will be mailed out as a flat pack and which users can fold into a box. The AUSPACK audience can expect this in the mail any time in the next week, and can activate the experience on receipt of the box, Ms Mina says. Easy step-by-step instructions are printed on the carton: By downloading the AUSPACK AR app (available on GooglePlay or the App store) and hovering an iPhone or Android device over target areas on each side of the packaging, the user is transported into the AR experience. Changes to Australias new Country of Origin Labelling laws The Australian government has amended Australias new Country of Origin Labelling laws just months after they came into operation. The amendment, from November 2016, changes the label requirements for priority foods that are packed in Australia. If these foods are grown, produced or made in a single overseas country, this must now be stated on their label. Previously, this was only required if the product contained no Australian ingredients. Such goods are also now exempt from varying Australian content labelling, which requires certain products to provide batch-by-batch information to consumers of the Australian content of individual batches of product upon request. FoodLegal Online training available The changes resulting from the amendment have been incorporated into FoodLegals online video training series on the new Country of Origin Labelling scheme (previous users have been updated on the precise changes). The series of eight modules is designed to assist businesses make the transition to the new system, which came into effect on 1 July 2016. It addresses the complexities of the system, including whether a food is a priority food, the meaning of substantial transformation, and changes to the definition of Made in Australia. Watch the first video module by clicking here. Related articles Free newsletter Subscribe to our FREE newsletter service and well keep you up-to-date with the latest breaking news, cutting edge opinion, and expert analysis affecting both your business and the industry as whole. Please enter your email address below and click on Sign Up for daily newsletters from Australasian Lawyer. http://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2017/01/29/news-bulletin-the-list-of-muslim-nations-in-trumps-socalled-muslim-ban-are-ones-obama-choose-n2278021 As the Left and some Republicans lose their minds over President Donald J. Trumps executive order on immigration, lets not forget that the list of concerned countries that the Trump administration outlined in the order is based on the one signed into law by the former Obama administration. So, it looks like the Obama White House set the groundwork (viaMic News): According to the draft copy of Trump's executive order, the countries whose citizens are barred entirely from entering the United States is based on a bill that Obama signed into law in December 2015. Obama signed the Visa Waiver Program Improvement and Terrorist Travel Prevention Act as part of an omnibus spending bill. The legislation restricted access to the Visa Waiver Program, which allows citizens from 38 countries who are visiting the United States for less than 90 days to enter without a visa. Though outside groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union and NIAC Action the sister organization of the National Iranian American Council opposed the act, the bipartisan bill passed through Congress with little pushback. At the initial signing of the restrictions, foreigners who would normally be deemed eligible for a visa waiver were denied if they had visited Iran, Syria, Sudan or Iraq in the past five years or held dual citizenship from one of those countries. In February 2016, the Obama administration added Libya, Somali and Yemen to the list of countries one could not have visited but allowed dual citizens of those countries who had not traveled there access to the Visa Waiver Program. Dual citizens of Syria, Sudan, Iraq and Iran are still ineligible, however. So, in a nutshell, Obama restricted visa waivers for those seven Muslim-majority countries Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen and now, Trump is looking to bar immigration and visitors from the same list of countries. Yet, I dont remember the Left freaking out over this. I certainly dont remember them going indiscriminately insane when the Obama White House stopped processing Iraqi visas for six months whensurprise! Al-Qaeda operatives feigned refugee status to get relocated to Bowling Green, Kentucky. And yes, some of the applicants worked as intelligence assets and interpreters for the U.S. military, according to ABC News. But remember, that was when a Democrat was in the Oval Office, so it was okay back then. Heres the text of the order. Via The Atlantic this is what it will and will not do. Most importantly, the publication adds that this technically isnt a Muslim ban, as people from Indonesia, the worlds most populous Muslim country, can still visit the country: Who is affected? For 120 days, the order bars the entry of any refugee who is awaiting resettlement in the U.S. It also prohibits all Syrian refugees from entering the U.S. until further notice. Additionally, it bans the citizens of seven countriesIraq, Iran, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, and Yemenfrom entering the U.S. on any visa category. This appears to include those individuals who are permanent residents of the U.S. (green-card holders) who may have been traveling overseas to visit family or for workthough their applications will be considered on a case-by-case basis, a senior administration official said Saturday. [] Is this a Muslim ban? Technically no. The ban includes seven majority Muslim countries, but by no means are these states the most populous Muslim countries, nor are they among the top sources of Muslim immigration to the U.S., nor have they produced terrorists in the same numbers as other Muslim countries not on the list. So, its not really a Muslim ban and the nations that Trump listed are the ones that were drafted by Obama. By Toby Walsh, Professor of AI at UNSW, Research Group Leader, Data61 Shutterstock If you were about to start playing a game of online poker, you might want to think again. Humankind has just been beaten at yet another game, this time Heads-Up No-Limit Texas Holdem poker. This is a milestone moment for artificial intelligence (AI). The first game that humans lost to machines was backgammon. In 1979, the world backgammon champion was beaten by Hans Berliners BKG 9.8 program. In 1997, Gary Kasparov who was the reigning world chess champion lost to IBMs Deep Blue program. Kasparov remarked that he could smell a new form of intelligence across the table from him. Other games have since fallen to the machines: Checkers, Othello, Scrabble,the general knowledge quiz Jeopardy!, even the classic arcade game Pong. Most recently, the ancient Chinese board game of Go fell to the machines. In March last year, one of the leading Go players on the planet, Lee Sedol, was beaten 4-1 by Googles AlphaGo program. And to rub our faces in it, over the Christmas break, AlphaGo anonymously played dozens of the worlds leading Go players online and won convincingly. Why poker? Go has been described as the Mount Everest of board games. It is far more complex than chess or many other games. However, it is less of a challenge than poker. Like the real world, poker is a game of uncertainty. Players dont know what cards the other players have. Or what cards will be dealt in the future. In a game like chess or Go, by comparison, all the players can see the board. Everyone has complete information. This makes Chess and Go much easier to program than poker. Poker also requires understanding the psychology of the other players. Are they bluffing? Should you fold? Should you bluff? Finally poker involves betting. When should you bet? What should you bet? This again adds to the challenge of writing a poker program that plays as well as or better than humans. Over the last three weeks, four of the top poker players have been locked in an exhausting 120,000 game match at the Rivers Casino in Pittsburgh. Their opponent is Carnegie Mellon Universitys Libratus program, written by my colleague Professor Tuomas Sandholm and his PhD student Noam Brown. Libratus is set to win the tournament later today, finishing ahead of the humans with more than US$1 million (A$1.32m) of notional winnings. The pros can be consoled by sharing out the actual US$200,000 (A$265,000) prize pot. In order to reduce the influence of sheer luck on the result, the tournament used duplicate hands. This means that two decks of identically shuffled cards are used to two separate tables. On one table, a human player is simultaneously dealt their hand, call it hand A, and the AI is dealt hand B. On the other table (situated in another room), the AI player is dealt hand A and human player dealt hand B. This means that even if one player receives an unusual number of lucky hands, then this will be mirrored for the other player in the duplicate game. This also explains why so many games have been played. The end result is that we can say with statistical confidence that Libratus is better than the human players. How to win at poker The details of how Libratus plays are still secret. But we can make some educated guesses based on the Carnegie Mellon University teams previous work. Perhaps most interesting is that the victory depends more on Good Old Fashioned AI (GOFAI) than on the currently fashionable deep learning processes. Like IBMs Deep Blue in chess, Libratus used a lot of brute force calculation as to how to play best. We know it calls upon Pittsburghs Supercomputing Centre to play out every end game. And each night, Libratus uses this supercomputer to refine its strategy. In case you think this is unfair on the humans, the pros also get together at night after each match to compare performance and plan for the next day. Libratus also takes advantage of game theory, the branch of mathematics made famous by the movie A Beautiful Mind about John Nash. Libratus looks to play strategic moves that cannot be bettered whatever its opponent does. What next? Poker is still not solved. Libratus only plays the two player version of Heads-Up No-Limit Texas Holdem poker. Adding more players increases the complexity greatly. So it will be a few years yet before computers can play well against four or more players. But this is another example of how in narrow focused domains AI is starting to take over from humans: reading mammograms, transcribing Chinese, beating human pilots in dogfights the list increases almost weekly. Not surprisingly, many people are wondering where this all ends. Will computers eventually take over all the jobs? A widely reported study from the University of Oxford in 2013 estimated that 47% of jobs in the US were at risk from automation in the next two decades. There were several limitations in the Oxford study. Ironically, one was that it automated the task of predicting which jobs were under risk. The study used machine learning and a small training set of 70 hand labelled jobs to predict which of over 700 professions was under risk. This is where you can help. I am calling on the wisdom of the crowd to see if we can make a better prediction. Please take a few minutes to complete our survey. At the end, you can nominate a charity to receive a donation in recognition of your time and effort. Even before the results of our survey are in, its clear that some jobs such as taxi driver, truck driver, radiographer and now poker pro are under threat. Of course, technology will also create other new jobs. But whether as many get created or destroyed remains an interesting open question. To keep ahead of the bots, humans will need to play to their strengths like creativity and emotional intelligence. We also should look to augment rather than replace humans. Together humans and machines can outperform machines or humans alone. The best chess player today is a human working with a computer. Together, we can be super-human. Toby Walsh does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above. Originally published in The Conversation. Expats living in Australia could find themselves caught up in the confusion over the decision by American President Trump to deny entry to people from seven, mainly Muslim, countries in an immigration crackdown.They are being advised that if they are looking to travel to the United States for work or to visit family and friends and they have a passport from, were born in, or have dual citizenship of the banned countries they may be turned back or even detained and questioned. It has created confusion for people with connections to the seven countries; Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen and despite worldwide condemnation the Department of Homeland Security has confirmed that the ban remains in place.Those looking to travel to the US in the coming weeks who do not yet have a visa are likely to find that are unable to get one with the American Embassy and consulates in Australia already refusing applications. Students wishing to travel to the US could also be affected.In one high profile case a schoolboy from Melbourne who was born in Australia but has dual Iranian citizenship has been refused a visa to go on a school trip to visit Orlando and Washington.There is confusion at Australian airports as passengers with valid visas not allowed to board flights to the US and those that do facing not being allowed in to the US at the other end.The Australian Government's Smarttraveller website has updated its notifications warning travellers to the US about the controversial new rules. It explains that citizens of the seven banned nations will no longer be allowed to apply for the standard electronic travel authorisation (ETSA) which travellers must complete before heading to the US.The ETSA is an online application that determines entry eligibility based on security or police risks and even those who have previously been issued with an ETSA are likely to have it revoked.Australian airline Qantas said that due to the change to US entry conditions it will try to help affected customers and offer refunds if necessary for people unable to travel who have already booked their flights while Virgin Australia is advising international travellers to ensure they have the documentation required to enter the US.'Travellers are advised that visa and other entry and exit conditions can change at short notice. Travellers should contact the nearest Embassy or Consulate of the United States for the most current information,' said an Australian Foreign Office spokesman.'The Australian Embassy in Washington is engaging with US officials on the potential implications of the suspension for Australian travellers, including dual nationals,' he added. Dears, I am applying for 190 visa for NSW My occupation is Software engineer with bachelor degree 15 points And the age is 28. 30 points With 5 years of experiences. 10 points Ielts 6. 0. Points Nsw invitation. 5. Points The total is 60 points I know that it is too hard to get invitation with 60 points for software engineer But my wife is Microbiologist and she can assest her qualification by Vetasssess and she will take ielts to get band 6 also she is 28 years old Can i get the partner skills which is 5 points for the 190 visa Nominated by NSW As Microbiologist not listed in NSW occupation list Thank you all I have a question! The form 80 is always sent for external checks? Or it can be only for the department? I am asking this because my husband been asked by the CO for rhe form 80 yesterday after 10 months of silence. We are applying for offshore partner visa and I am scared it will take another 10 months in case is sent for external checks! Thanks!!!! The industry calls for further incentives to boost electric, hybrid demand and rollback of infrastructure cess Steps to revive consumer demand following demonetisation, an extension of incentives for hybrid and electric cars, and timely implementation of GST are on the auto industrys wish-list for Union Budget 2017-18. In the short term, the economy has been shaken and this Budget will have to put it back on growth track. We are also expecting an extension of incentives and infrastructure development support for electric vehicles from the upcoming Budget, said Pravin Shah, president and chief executive (automotive), M&M Ltd. He added, Further, the political support which was so critical for GST has suddenly seemed to have waned in the aftermath of the demonetisation drive. Even in its present less-than-ideal form, GST is a big game changer and the government must bring it back on top priority. Passenger vehicles will attract highest 28 percent tax under GST, while luxury vehicles will draw some additional tax. We expect the government to take some steps to really spur vehicle demand. This could be related to taxation to customers or excise duty for the industry. Right now, we need to charge up the consumer sentiment, and if that comes through, the automotive industry will realise its full potential, Anurag Mehrotra, executive director of Marketing, Sales and Service at Ford told Autocar India. Automobile industry body Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) has recommended a 12 percent tax rate for electric vehicles and a 10 percent rebate for hybrid vehicles from the applicable GST rate. SIAM also suggested a rollback of the R&D cess on import of technology and the infrastructure cess levied in the previous Budget. It also appealed to the government to have a provision for used vehicle business in GST law, otherwise which organised pre-owned vehicle business will become unviable. Sudhir Rao, Chairman and MD, Skoda told Autocar India, Budget is likely to be neutral to keep things going until the GST is implemented. I dont expect any major policy announcements from the Union Budget at this stage. I think a whole lot of stuff will be rolled out when the GST is implemented. SIAM further urged the government to continue the current tax sops on R&D expenditure in an effort to boost manufacturing. Last year, the Finance Minister proposed to reduce the weighted deduction from 200 percent to 150 percent with effect from April 1, 2017, to March 31, 2020. It is recommended that the weighted deduction of 200 percent should continue till March 31, 2020. This will provide an immense boost to innovation and the manufacturing sector of the country, mainly the automobile sector, said Vishnu Mathur, director general, SIAM. Carmakers also called for the implementation of a vehicle modernisation scheme under which owners scrapping their old vehicles get monetary incentives to buy a new one. One of the focal decisions for the automotive sector from this Budget is on GST roll-out and how different vehicle categories will be taxed. Another area which deserves attention is the vehicle scrappage policy or the proposed 'Voluntary Vehicle Fleet Modernisation Plan' which will keep older cars off the roads. This will benefit the environment, reduce fuel consumption and propel further demand for greener and efficient vehicles, said Sumit Sawhney, country CEO and MD, Renault India. Niggling problems aside, the Zest has been a solid workhorse on our intercity trips. Being based in Pune, with an office in Mumbai, means frequent trips back and forth, at least a couple of times a month, to wrap up my bit for the magazine. My primary means of covering the 310km round trip for the past few months has been the Tata Zest. I got the car from an ex-colleague who was using it before me, and while it shows 22,353km on the odo as I write this report, Im responsible for putting only about the last couple of thousand kilometres on it. Its been a faithful companion on my Mumbai trips and I really appreciate the fact that it packs the 1.3-litre Quadrajet diesel motor, and that too the 90hp one. Its got plenty of torque on tap for quick overtakes at highway speeds and when youre cruising with minimal throttle input, its a real slow sipper as well. Out on the Mumbai-Pune expressway, it easily manages 19-20km to the litre, while the overall mileage (which also includes a fair amount of city driving) is just a tad under the 17kpl mark. Good mileage means it does a fair distance on a tank of diesel. This XMA variant features the F-Tronic AMT (Automated Manual Transmission) gearbox and Im impressed at just how fuel efficient the car is. However, I have a fair bit of gripes regarding the way this AMT works. Normally, for any automatic or AMT gearbox, one would assume that the moment you get off the brake after slotting it into D, the car would start creeping ahead. No such luck here, as the Zest doesnt budge without throttle input. Thats not a problem if youre just setting off, but if youre trying to inch along in bumper-to-bumper traffic, or worse, manoeuvring it in tight parking spaces, youll find modulating the power quite tricky. And when driving briskly, though the tiptronic mode is a saving grace to a certain extent, the shifts are just too slow. You get a pronounced head-nod each time the car shifts up and, frankly, it gets annoying really fast. Quite a shame considering that its a fairly decent handling machine. Sure, it rolls around a bit, but chucking it around the bends isnt really a scary affair. And the ride quality is pretty good too. Speaking of reliability, twice weve had the intercooler hose pop off its mounting once when I was driving and again when my colleague was, before me. Now this isnt a catastrophic failure, but once that hose pops, you lose turbo pressure and the car goes into limp-home mode. Its an easy fix if you have a pair of pliers to work the hose clip, but you really need to let the engine cool down before you reach for that hose. Its not an easy reach either. Recently, the car was sent to the company to sort this issue out, and so far, Ive done three trips to Mumbai and a whole lot of driving around Pune without the problem recurring. Lets just hope it stays that way. Fingers crossed! The first day of IRTA testing at Sepang just concluded as the rain that started to fall on the Malaysian circuit at around 4 p.m. made it impossible for the riders to improve their times.As a result, Ducatis test rider Casey Stoner placed at the top of the timesheets scoring a 159.680 while Andrea Dovizioso was just behind in second place with a time of 159.797. Making his debut in the factory Ducati Team, Jorge Lorenzo only managed to get the seventeenth place with a time of 201.349.Today was positive, and the best thing about it was that we got a lot of dry track time, Stoner said. Its been hanging in the balance really with the weather because the track takes so long to dry and if it rains at all within twelve hours, youre going to get very little track time. Its great that we got out there straightaway this morning and started putting in some good laps, reconfirming what we felt earlier in the week. Dovizioso said too he is pleased with the results so far. The pace was good right from the start, using the same motorcycle as in Valencia and without any particular changes. He says he has to readapt now to ride without the wings that have been banned. The bike behaves differently and it needs a lot of fine-tuning.The team has a lot of work to do and its true that the rain messed up its plans a bit. However, Ducati hopes it can pick up fast from where it left on Wednesday, when it gets back on the track and move the bike further forward, especially in the chassis area. Photo by Paul Clinton. General Motors may just have a game-changer on its hands with the 2017 Chevrolet Bolt EV, a lithium-ion-powered hatchback that's fun to drive and provides enough charge to meet most commutes. It's the most capable EV on the market that's not named Tesla with a much more affordable price $37,495 before the $7,500 federal credit. In California, where it went in sale in December, buyers can knock another $2,500 off the price tag with a state rebate. The entry price is for the LT trim; buyers can also choose the Premium trim. The Bolt EV is aiming for mass-market appeal, as initial marketing seeks to education potential buyers and emphasize that it's a car first, and a green car second. When driven under ideal conditions, the Bolt EV could reach the U.S. EPA's range of 238 miles. Automotive journalists were given a chance to drive the vehicle in Northern California on a route that started in the Palo Alto area, headed north to Maverick's Beach in Half Moon Bay, and then on to Fort Point near the Golden Gate Bridge. It ended near AT&T Park. The route showed off the Bolt EV's strengths its smooth, easy power delivery from a stop up to freeway speeds and stable handling around curves on woodsy back roads. Photo by Paul Clinton. The Bolt EV brings plenty of design and engineering innovations to the table, including the design of its LG-supplied battery pack. The pack, which weighs more than 900 pounds, lays flat on the chassis like a carpet and seems to steady the vehicle to reduce body sway. The liquid-cooled pack stores 60 kilowatt-hours of energy. DC fast-charging is enabled by a Combined Charting System (CCS) port that uses the SAE standard for electric vehicle charging. A public CCS charger can deliver about 90 miles of range in 30 minutes. Achieving a full charge on a 110-volt circuit could take up to 50 hours. Chevrolet has partnered with Aerovironment, a defense contractor that's providing a $699 fast charger to Bolt EV buyers. The Bolt EV's comfortable, roomy cabin includes two digital displays an 8-inch instrument panel and 10.3-inch center screen that provide an array of driving data, including a battery-life indicator; power output; maximum, minimum, and average range; energy usage; media data; and Bluetooth devices. General Motors is making the Bolt EV available to commercial and government fleets, but not rental fleets. New York City has already ordered 50 for its car sharing fleet. Photo courtesy of FCA. Fiat Chrysler has begun a major expansion of its dealerships, and may add as many as 400 new stores in the U.S., dealers familiar with the plan told Automotive News. FCA now has 2,500 U.S. dealerships that sell Chrysler, Jeep, Dodge, and Ram vehicles. By comparison, Ford maintains more than 3,000 dealerships in the U.S., while General Motors has 4,200 dealerships in North America, including about Chevrolet 3,100 dealers. FCA has already begun the expansion in some markets, including Houston. An FCA spokesman declined to comment on the plans. Nokia is back in the smartphone race, and its recently released Nokia 6 Android smartphone is taking over. The Android smartphone is going on its 2nd flash sale today. The Nokia 6 was announced at the CES 2017 earlier this month. Shortly after, the smartphone went on a flash sale. In literally just a minute, the smartphone was sold out. If this isn't an indication of how much people love and support the Nokia brand, nothing is. Thankfully, the Nokia 6 is back on another flash sale today, for those who are waiting for the opportunity to get their hands on this. The smartphone features a 5.5-inch full HD display along with 2.5 Gorilla Glass protection. As for what's underneath, it is run by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 processor paired with 4GB of RAM with 64GB storage. The storage space is also expandable up to 128GB via microSD. The Nokia 6 also features a 16-megapixel PDAF rear camera with f/2.0 aperture and an 8-megapixel front camera. As for the battery life, this Android smartphone packs a 3000 mAh battery. Naturally, the device supports Wi-Fi, USB-OTG, GPS and Bluetooth v4.1. It also has a fingerprint scanner in the home button. The Nokia 6 is also equipped with dual amplifier speakers with Dolby Atmos technology. It will be run by the latest Android 7.0 Nougat operating system. Very similar to the first flash sale, the smartphone will be available for $258 USD. As of the moment, the Nokia 6 Android smartphone is only available in China. The first flash sale of the smartphone booked a whopping 1 million registrations with only 10,000 units up for sale. HMD Global also hinted its plans on launching more smartphones at the Mobile World Congress 2017 in Barcelona. It is expected that more Android smartphones from Nokia will be coming out soon. Check out this post to see more smartphones debuting on the Mobile World Congress. Vartan Ghukasian, the controversial former mayor of Gyumri, said on Monday that he will join an alliance formed by businessman Gagik Tsarukian to participate in Armenias upcoming parliamentary elections. Tsarukian announced his return to politics last week nearly two years after resigning as leader of the Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK) under strong government pressure. He said he will run for parliament at the head of a new electoral bloc that will comprise the BHK and other groups. The party founded by Tsarukian claims to be in opposition to President Serzh Sarkisian. The tycoon has avoided publicly criticizing the government in recent months, however. I have decided to run on the Tsarukian bloc ticket, Ghukasian told RFE/RLs Armenian service (Azatutyun.am). I feel that I can do a lot for my homeland, my city and my people more than many others can. The once powerful ex-mayor made clear that he has had no links with Sarkisians Republican Party of Armenia (HHK) ever since he stepped down in October 2012 after losing the HHKs backing. I have had no connection to the Republican Party for the past five years, he said. The ruling party threw its weight behind Samvel Balasanian, a local businessman who was elected Gyumri mayor later in 2012. Incidentally, Balasanian was affiliated with Tsarukians BHK at the time. He teamed up with the HHK to controversially win a second term in an October 2016 municipal election. Ghukasian governed Armenias second largest city for almost 13 years. His tenure was marred by scandals and controversies. Critics, including independent media outlets, accused him of leading a clan that controlled much of the local economy and tolerated no competition. Ghukasian was also embarrassed by his notoriously unruly elder son Spartak. The latter was sentenced to 18 months in prison in 2007 for provoking a street gunfight between two groups of young men in Gyumri. He was granted parole six months later. In April 2013, Vartan Ghukasian, Spartak and two dozen other men were rounded up by the Gyumri police following the killing of a man connected to the ex-mayors most bitter local rival. Ghukasian was set free after spending several hours in police custody. One of his nephews was arrested and charged with murder. The Armenian police subsequently claimed to have confiscated large quantities of weapons from both clans. The police chief, Vladimir Gasparian, vowed to put an end to their dominance of local affairs. Ghukasian faced fresh accusations of violent conduct later in 2013.He and several of his loyalists allegedly beat up the father of another Gyumri resident accused of murdering his daughters fiance. The ex-mayor denied the allegations. In 2007, Ghukasian narrowly survived an apparent assassination attempt when unknown gunmen opened fire on his motorcade outside Yerevan, seriously wounding him and killing three of his bodyguards. 30 January 2017 10:52 (UTC+04:00) By Rashid Shirinov The most common way that Armenian service members die outside of combat is by their own hand or by hand of their fellows. The homicide has outpaced suicide, disease and all other forms of death in the military besides combat, says Armenian media commenting on the rising number of non-combat deaths in the Armenian army. Chairman of the Helsinki Citizens Assembly Artur Sakunts told Tert.am that both suicides and murders saw a fourfold increase in 2016 against the previous years record. No institutional changes were initiated to improve the situation with human rights in the armed forces, he noted. The president of Journalists for Human Rights, Zhanna Aleksanyan, added that fatal acts of violence among servicemen increased in number especially after the April escalation. The increasing number of soldier deaths has unavoidably triggered public concern and angered the families of the deceased conscripts. Armenian mothers are afraid of sending their sons to Army and therefore the families try to find any opportunity to keep their sons far from that horror. Most recently, soldier Shavarsh Galstyan ended his own life in the occupied Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan. Armenias investigation committee reported that his body was found in area close to troops frontline. A bullet wound has been revealed in his jaw. A criminal investigation with inciting suicide allegation was launched. The soldiers relatives, however, are convinced that he was killed. Galstyans grandmother talking to local media stated that she had spoken to her grandson three days prior to the incident, who told her that he was being transferred to another position. The soldier, however, did not explain why, saying only that it was a complicated story and he could not talk about it over the phone. The soldiers aunt also does not believe that the soldier could have committed suicide. She is convinced that the weapon was put in his hands after he had been killed. It is clear to us that this was not a suicide. The inside of the kids hands are bruised: they had been tied. Its evident that he was tortured, beaten, and only then was the weapon put in his hands. His face is completely swollen He was my sisters only child; how can she live after this? How could they do such a thing? I demand fair investigation; please ensure that those who are guilty are punished, the aunt told Armtimes.com. He had only 3 months of service left, and look what they did to him. He knew well that his mother would be left alone, how could he have committed suicide, even if he had been driven to it? He would have never resorted to this, he would have found a way out. I do not know how, but I am sure he was killed, the aunt said. I just want Serzh [Sargsyan] to know that the curses of all these soldiers parents will reach him; let him not think that he will get away with this. They claim [our soldiers] die from enemy bullets, but 50 percent of the soldiers are killed by their own bullets. Experts claim that poor relations among soldiers and officers in the Armenian army are a driving factor behind the servicemen's deaths in non-combat conditions. Officers' willful treatment of soldiers, the humiliations they continue to bare on them often result in armed incident that ultimately claim the lives of servicemen. --- Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 11:07 (UTC+04:00) The Armenian armed units shattered ceasefire with Azerbaijan a total of 7 times throughout the day, Azerbaijan`s Defense Ministry reported on January 30. The Armenian armed forces, stationed in Armenia`s Aygepar and Chinari villages in Berd district subjected to fire the positions of the Azerbaijani armed forces located in Alibayli and Kokhanabi villages in Tovuz district. The ceasefire was also violated in nameless hills in Fuzuli district. Armenia captured Nagorno-Karabakh and seven surrounding districts from Azerbaijan in a war that followed the Soviet breakup in 1991. More than 20,000 Azerbaijanis were killed and nearly 1 million were displaced as a result of the war. Armenia still controls fifth part of Azerbaijan's territory and rejects implementing four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding districts. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 14:00 (UTC+04:00) By Rashid Shirinov Mothers of Armenian soldiers, who died in non-combat conditions, gathered in front of the Presidential Office last week to remind about their dead sons, who were left forgotten by the Armenian authorities. Why do they remember all soldiers, but not our sons? For what this separation is done?! said Irina Gazaryan, mother of soldier Arthur Ghazaryan, deceased in 2010. The police urged mothers to leave the territory with a view no to affect the work of the Presidential Office. However, women, holding placards with portraits of their sons, kept demonstrating in front of the Presidential Office for two hours. They criticized the attitude of Armenias former and current ministers of defense to the soldiers deceased or killed in non-combat conditions. Gazaryan said that many incidents with mysteries circumstances took place during the tenure of former minister Seyran Ohanyan. The protestors also criticized new Defense Minister Vigen Sargsyan. The parents noted that a few months ago, they had filed an application to meet with him, but the request was rejected by the ministry. Nana Muradyan, mother of soldier Valery Muradyan, who died in 2010 in non-combat conditions, does not believe the case of his sons death will be properly examined. The decision to close the case has been cancelled for the second time. They deliberately play for time so that we fail to brought the case to the European Court of Human Rights, she said. Meanwhile, statistics of non-combat losses of the Armenian Armed Forces continues to grow steadily. Armenian media state that a total of 206 deaths were recorded in the Armenian army from 2010 to 2015. A large part of them, 48, were suicides, and 43 murders. As for 2016, a total of 162 deaths were registered in the Armenian Armed Forces, including 51 cases in non-combat conditions. Chairman of the Helsinki Citizens Assembly Artur Sakunts recently told Tert.am that both suicides and murders saw a fourfold increase in 2016 against the previous years record. No institutional changes were initiated to improve the situation with human rights in the armed forces, he noted. --- Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 22:27 (UTC+04:00) By Rashid Shirinov Last week, Armenian diplomacy has once again suffered a heavy blow in the international arena. The Armenian delegation to PACE has tried to bribe Chairman of the PACE Committee Vladimir Aryev by offering a cognac in exchange for not recognizing Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan; however the attempt has failed. Yesterday the deputies from Armenia were chasing after me with a bottle of cognac and wanted me to refuse recognizing Nagorno-Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan, Aryev wrote in a social network. As it turned out, Armenian diplomats did not like the paragraph of the report developed by Aryev, where he stated the impossibility of monitoring the state of media in Azerbaijan, Georgia and Moldova, because part of their territories are under the control of occupying forces. However, Aryev explained the Armenian diplomats that the paragraph concerning Nagorno-Karabakh is based on the international legal norms and documents about the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, and hinted at the inadmissibility of any attempts to exert such pressure on him. In the end, PACE ignored all objections of Armenian representatives and adopted the resolution without changes. A number of experts have called this incident another example of cognac diplomacy by Armenians. The Armenians have always tried to use their vaunted cognac to bribe officials in order to solve political issues in their favor, and such attempts continue to this day," said political analyst Fikrat Sadigov. He noted that many Europeans, including the members of the PACE, are well aware of the true essence of the issue, and clearly understand whose territories are occupied and who is the occupant country. A sober-minded European politician will not deny the fact that part of Azerbaijan is occupied by Armenia, as well as the fact that it is possible to move the situation forward only after withdrawal of Armenian troops from the occupied territories, said Sadigov. Failure at the PACE showed the Armenian deputies that cognac will not help in this case. The Armenian emissaries had to start with at least a box of cognac in such case, famous Russian expert, publicist and public figure Dmitry Verkhoturov joked about the unsuccessful attempt of Armenians. Political analyst Peter Tase, in turn, said that the underhand tactics of the Armenian delegation to the PACE is unacceptable. International community must denounce those intentional acts that violate the ethical and moral values enshrined by the rules approved by the PACE, Tase noted. He added that the international community has almost always turned a blind eye to the corruption practices used by the Armenian top officials. Thus, the Armenian diplomats have again failed in their attempts to distort the historical reality about the Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan. --- Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 22:01 (UTC+04:00) By Rashid Shirinov In early January, Armenian media outlets reported about an "incredible growth" of the country's exports. However, now it turns out that the figure was artificially increased through re-export, which is widely practiced by Armenia. Then, it was reported that Armenian exports only to Russia in January-November 2016 increased by 54 percent in comparison with the same period of 2015, thus making up $337,3 million. As for the total exports from Armenia in 2016, it has allegedly grown by 20 percent up to $1.8 billion. Allegedly, Armenia increased exports of tomatoes to Russia by more than 42 times compared to the same period of 2015. Head of the Alternative research center,Professor Tatul Manaseryan shed light on the data. Exports did not increase, it is a lie there was not a real growth. The growth was achieved only due to the criminal re-export, he said, noting that the re-export was mainly applied to the goods imported from Turkey, including tomatoes, jewelry and textiles. In particular, he highlighted the Armenian FEZ Meridian, which is engaged in re-export. Jewelry are imported from Turkey to Armenia and then get transported to Russia, Manaseryan said. And this is despite the fact that Russia imposed sanctions on Turkey. Here comes a big political problem. Thus, the growth of exports from Armenia were resulted from the re-export, which is detrimental for the local business, healthy competition, and for the Armenian economy as a whole. --- Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 12:55 (UTC+04:00) By Rashid Shirinov Azerbaijans State Committee on Property Issues will hold another auction for privatization of state-owned enterprises on February 28, the Committee said on January 30. The auction will include 75 objects of state property, including 20 joint stock companies, 29 small enterprises and facilities, 25 non-residential areas and an unfinished building. The majority of small enterprises offered for privatization are located in Baku, Shaki, Mingachevir, Sumgayit, Lankaran and other regions of Azerbaijan. The most expensive objects among the auctioned ones will be a petrol station in the Sabail district of Baku ($307,870), an atelier in the Nasimi district, and "Mardakan" restaurant in the Khazar district of the capital. The price of the latter two objects is $277,760. The third stage of privatization in Azerbaijan started in the framework of the presidential decree dated May 19, 2016. Under the decree, the acceleration of the state property privatization process has been defined as an important direction of the economic policy. The portal for privatization privatization.az, launched in July 2016, reflects all necessary information about the facilities, their addresses, location, and even initial cost and aims at facilitation of the process. The website is available in two languages - Azerbaijani and English. Why Azerbaijan is special section available on the website explains the reasons and advantages of investing in the country. The privatization process is designed to attract both foreign and local investors, as well as improve the business environment of Azerbaijan. --- Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 18:04 (UTC+04:00) The Association of Azerbaijani Hazelnut Producers and Exporters has proposed to simplify the export of hazelnuts from the country. Association Head Ismayil Orujov has voiced the offer while addressing a conference dedicated to results of third year implementation of The State Program on Socio-Economic Development of the Regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan in 2014-2018 in Baku on January 30. Among other proposals, Orujov mentioned the necessity to train highly qualified specialists - agronomists and experts, open laboratories in the major regions of hazelnut production, implement and enhance the appropriate analyses, as well as improve access to financing sources, including through the provision of concessional loans. Azerbaijan is one of the few countries in the world with appropriate weather conditions for hazelnut cultivation; hazelnuts grown mostly in the northern regions are generally ripe by the end of July and harvested from mid-August to mid-September. Orujov noted that to date, producers of hazelnuts in Azerbaijan have received preferential loans worth 10 million manats. He said that Azerbaijan ranks fourth in terms of hazelnuts exports.Azerbaijan grows 35,000 tons of hazelnut, 90 percent of which are shipped abroad, he noted. Last year alone, we exported hazelnuts worth $105 million. Nearly 25 countries, including Italy, Germany and Russia are the main consumers of our hazelnuts. Growing and processing of hazelnuts is one of the main areas providing Azerbaijan with foreign currency. Overall, hazelnuts are produced in Baku, Absheron, Ganja-Gazakh, Sheki-Zagatala, Upper Karabakh, Lankaran, and other regions of the country. The country produces such types of hazelnuts as Atababa, Ashrafli, Ghalib, Ganja, Sachagly, Topgara and Yagly, while the most popular types of these nuts are Atababa and Khachmaz. -- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Tuesday For the public BHS Spaghetti Dinner Fundraiser: 5-7 p.m. before the January Jazz Concert in the Commons Area of BHS. Cost for adults will be $8 and age 12 and under will cost $5. This event is hosted by the BHS Fine Arts Boosters. Children and Adult Immunization Clinic: 3-7 p.m., Parkview Conference Center, 1216 S. Eighth St., Beatrice. Appointments necessary. Call 402-223-2366. Bring Insurance or Medicaid Card to appointment. Sponsored by Beatrice Community Hospital and Health Center. Warrens Community Table: 5:30 p.m.-6:30 p.m., free meal, Christ Church Episcopal, Fifth and Lincoln streets, Beatrice. Feeding ministry sponsored by the Christian community. Open each Tuesday evening. 402-223-5538. Hamburger Night: 5:30-7 p.m.at Beatrice Eagles Aerie #531, 119 N 19th Street. Serving hamburger, french fries, tater tots or a bowl of soup. Clubs/organizations Weight Watchers: 5:30 p.m. weigh in, meeting at 6 p.m. at The Flowing Springs, 2211 Sunset Drive, Beatrice. For more information, go to www.weightwatchers.com or http://www.facebook.com/wwbeatrice. Support groups Caring and Sharing Grief Group: 8 a.m., Country Cooking in Beatrice. The program will be sharing and visiting with others. Members are encouraged to bring a guest. For more information, contact Ethel Hartman at 402-228-3681. Alcoholics Anonymous: 8 p.m., STEP meeting, The Salvation Army Community Center, Seventh and Market Street, Beatrice. Alcoholics Anonymous: noon, open meeting, First Presbyterian Church, 321 N. Fifth St., Beatrice (use west entrance). Narcotics Anonymous: 6:30-7:30 p.m., meeting, St. John Lutheran Church, 701 N. Sixth St., Beatrice. New Liberation Group of Alcoholics Anonymous: 8-9 p.m. open meeting, 1200 Summit St., Beatrice. TOPS (Take Off Pounds Sensibly) Club: 6 p.m. weigh-in, 6:30-7 p.m. weekly meeting and program, Parkview Village, 1200 S. Eighth St., Beatrice. 402-228-2557. TOPS (Take Off Pounds Sensibly) 796: 9 a.m., weekly meeting, St. Pauls Lutheran Church, 114 Lavelle St., Diller. 402-793-5396; 402-766-3780. Wednesday For the public Free Tax Help: AARP Foundation Tax-Aide 1-5 p.m. at the Beatrice Public Library, 100 N. 16th Street. This is for Taxpayers with a low and moderate income, with special attention to those age 60 and older, Please bring the following with you (if it pertains), A copy of last years income tax return, W-2 forms from each employer; unemployment compensation statements; SS-1099 if paid by Social Security benefits; 1099, 1099 INT, 1099 DIV, 1099-misc, 1099-R; all forms indicating federal income tax paid; dependent care provider information; all receipts or canceled checks if itemizing; Social Security cards or other official documentation for yourself and all dependents. Clubs/organizations Eagles Auxiliary: will meet every first and third Wednesday of the month at 7 p.m. Beatrice Fiscal Fusion BNI: meet at 7:30 a.m. at Back Alley Eatery, 124 S. 23rd Street, Beatrice. Support groups Alcoholics Anonymous: 8 p.m., meeting, Salvation Army Community Center, Seventh and Market Street, Beatrice. Al-Anon: 8 p.m., meeting, Centenary United Methodist Street, Beatrice. 30 January 2017 11:22 (UTC+04:00) By Laman Ismayilova Baku has hosted a colorful Japanese Film Festival aimed at promoting the Japanese culture in Azerbaijan. The three-day festival featured five Japanese films such as "You're a good kid", "Letter", "Around Us", "The meeting with the mother of Pekoros" and "Tales of the city Kaytan". Japanese Ambassador to Baku Tsuquo Takahashi, addressing the opening ceremony, spoke about political, economic and cultural ties between Azerbaijan and Japan. He stressed that this kind of events will contribute to further strengthening the friendly bilateral relations between the two nations. The ambassador expressed his hope that Japanese film festival will help Azerbaijani people to better understand Japanese culture. Last the year Baku hosted Japanese Culture Day, while an exhibition of Azerbaijani and Japanese artists entitled "Azerbaijan meets with Japan took place in Berlin. Diplomatic relations between Azerbaijan and Japan were established in 1992. Relations between the two countries have continued to develop steadily. Japan was one of the first countries to support Azerbaijan's forward-looking oil strategy. Japan has a fascinating and multifaceted culture; on the one hand it is steeped in the deepest of traditions dating back thousands of years; on the other it is a society in a continual state of rapid flux, with continually shifting fads and fashions and technological development that constantly pushes back the boundaries of the possible. --- Laman Ismayilova is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Lam_Ismayilova Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 14:44 (UTC+04:00) By Laman Ismayilova Amazing modern remakes of famous paintings were presented at an exhibition "Reincarnation" opened at Azerbaijans National Art Museum. The exhibition featured "reincarnated" art works in the avant-garde style based on the paintings of modern Azerbaijani artists, as well as art works of world famous artists and sculptors, Trend Life reported. Artists Elshan Sarkhanoglu, Mamed Rashidov, Vugar Guliyev, Aydin Askerov, Elshan Karaca and Emin Gahramanov displayed a brand new interpretation of fifteen paintings and 5 sculptures. Many visitors were delighted by the opportunity to discover a creative reinterpretation of the famous paintings. Amina Melikova, the head of International Relations and Innovations Department of the Azerbaijan National Art Museum informed the guests about the project. "Azerbaijans National Art Museum celebrates its 80th anniversary this year. "Reincarnation" became the first exhibition dedicated to this solemn day. The idea to implement the project came from a group of Azerbaijani artists. Each chose several works included in the Museum Fund and created their own variations. After the exhibition, the works will be transferred to museum's fund", said Melikova. The Azerbaijan National Art Museum is a treasure house that preserves our national moral values and cultural heritage. This treasure house, holding more than 17,000 artistic exhibits, has a rich working history. The Art department was separated from the Azerbaijan State Museum in 1936 and organized as an independent museum by decision of the Council of People's Commissars. In 2011 the Museum was declared to be of first National and then European Museum Standard (EUMS), meeting international standards and criteria, as appropriate for a museum and implying high quality museum services and professional experience. --- Laman Ismayilova is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Lam_Ismayilova Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 10:40 (UTC+04:00) By Nigar Abbasova The Belarusian State Committee for Science and Technology has drafted a road map on cooperation with the Azerbaijani National Academy of Sciences (ANAS). Tofig Babayev, the head of the Regional Information Technologies Academy (RITA) told Trend that the final version of the document, which will cover main directions of cooperation between the sides, will be soon submitted for the consideration of the ANAS. The road map covers the issue of using mobile robots in different state departments of the country. The cooperation of the sides in this direction should be decided at the managerial level, he said. Babayev mentioned that the issues of cooperation were discussed in a regular meeting of the Science Council on scientific-technical cooperation between Azerbaijan and Belarus in October 2016. Mobile robots, developed by Belarusian State University of Informatics and Radio-electronics jointly with the Institute of Machine building may be used in the sphere of agriculture for the elimination of the consequences of emergency situations. The device is able to independently extinguish a forest fire, process agricultural lands, and examine dangerous objects. In November 2016, Baku hosted the first meeting of the joint working group for cooperation in science and technology between Belarus and Azerbaijan. The event discussed the development mechanisms and prospects for the bilateral cooperation in the field of innovations and the need to strengthen the collaboration between ANAS and Belarusian research centers. The sides signed a protocol on cooperation in science and technology. -- Nigar Abbasova is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @nigyar_abbasova Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 17:13 (UTC+04:00) By Amina Nazarli Talks on a new EU-Azerbaijan strategic agreement, targeting to replace the 1996 partnership and cooperation agreement, will be launched very soon, said Christian Danielsson. Director General for Neighbourhood and Enlargement Negotiations at the European Commission told APA that the Commission together with an experienced team led by the Director of the European External Action Service Devin Luke, who worked on various agreements in the area of 'Eastern Partnership', will start negations with Azerbaijan on the new agreement. He said that the negotiations timeline will depend on the achievements and at this stage it is impossible to say when they will end. Our goal is to conduct effective negotiations. Our cooperation will be based on the existing "Partnership and Cooperation Agreement", but will also cover new areas, he said. Danielsson added that they look forward to fruitful cooperation with Azerbaijan in new spheres. We cherish the hope that we can reach an agreement between the parties in the sphere of trade, which would facilitate trade and cover a range of sectors, he emphasized. The new agreement envisages the compliance of Azerbaijans legislation and procedures with the EUs most important international trade norms and standards, which should lead to the improvement of Azerbaijani goods access to the EU markets. In November 2016, the European Council adopted a mandate for the European Commission and the high representative for foreign affairs and security policy to negotiate on behalf of the EU and its member states, a comprehensive agreement with Azerbaijan. The agreement will follow the principles endorsed in the 2015 review of the European Neighborhood Policy and offer a renewed basis for political dialogue and mutually beneficial cooperation between the EU and Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan has become a country of direct priority to the EUs strategy in its wider neighborhood since the last enlargement of the European Union in 2007. Azerbaijan affects Europes interests, mainly in a regional energy strategy. -- Amina Nazarli is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @amina_nazarli Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 17:44 (UTC+04:00) By Kamila Aliyeva Qatar's Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammad bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani will today arrive in Baku on an official visit. Sheikh Mohammad bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani will meet with his Azerbaijani counterpart Elmar Mammadyarov as part of his two-day visit to the country. Following the meeting, the two will hold a joint press conference. A next meeting of Azerbaijan-Qatar Joint Economic, Trade and Technical Intergovernmental Commission will be organized in the short run. The first meeting of the joint commission was held on December 9. After the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1994, the key directions of cooperation between Azerbaijan and Qatar have been determined as ties in the field of investment, the exchange of experience in the field of oil and gas, and supply of the Azerbaijani agricultural goods to the Qatar market. Given the fact that Azerbaijan and Qatar has a simplified visa regime, close relations between the two countries in tourism sphere is also of utmost importance. The sides currently consider cooperation in civil aviation. The Azerbaijani State Customs Committee reported that the trade turnover with Qatar amounted to $129,550 in January-November 2016, while some $67.410 of the sum fell to a share of export to this country. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 17:54 (UTC+04:00) By Laman Ismayilova Azerbaijans Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov met a delegation led by Christian Danielsson, Director General for Neighborhood and Enlargement Negotiations at the European Commission in Baku on January 30. The sides had a broad exchange of views on the current level and future development priorities of bilateral relationship between Azerbaijan and the European Union, as well as the participation of Azerbaijan in the Eastern Partnership program. They stressed the importance of beneficial cooperation in various fields between Azerbaijan and the EU, Azertac reported. Mammadyarov commended the decision of the European Union Council to give a mandate to the EU Commission to launch negotiations with Azerbaijan on strategic partnership agreement and expressed his conviction that this agreement will provide a framework for the comprehensive development of bilateral relations between the EU and Azerbaijan. Danielsson expressed the EUs intention to deepen the dialogue and cooperation with Azerbaijan. The delegations of the sides are set to launch the negotiations on the agreement soon. The new deal will replace the 1996 partnership and cooperation agreement. The sides also discussed the issues of partnership in the energy field between Azerbaijan and the EU, as well as implementation of TAP and TANAP projects. Previously, the delegation led by Christian Danielsson was received by President Ilham Aliyev. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 10:16 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Thousands are gathering in front of the White House to protest new US immigration restrictions, with more demonstrations planned around the country, Sputnik reported. Thousands are expected at a demonstration in front of the White House to protest what many are calling US President Donald Trump's "Muslim ban." On January 27, Trump signed an executive order suspending the nation's Syrian refugee resettlement program indefinitely, temporarily suspending all refugee entry programs for four months while vetting processes are tightened, and barring entry for nationals of seven mostly Muslim countries, even, perhaps, those with valid visas. The midday protest is drawing what participants are calling thousands, bearing signs calling the travel bans "un-American" and "unconstitutional." Among those joining the protests are newly elected Senators Cortez Masto and Kamala Harris. The affected countries are Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 12:47 (UTC+04:00) Saudi Arabia's King Salman has backed U.S. President Donald Trump's request to have safe zones in war-torn Syria and Yemen as the two leaders agreed to strengthen bilateral economic and energy cooperation, the White House has said. "The President requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said after Trump and the Saudi King had their first telephonic conversation on January 29. "They agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of radical Islamic terrorism and also on the importance of working jointly to address challenges to regional peace and security, including the conflicts in Syria and Yemen," the White House said. Trump earlier said he "will absolutely do safe zones in Syria" for refugees fleeing violence in the war-torn country. Saying Europe had made a tremendous mistake by admitting millions of refugees from Syria and other Middle Eastern trouble spots, Trump told ABC News in an interview: "I don't want that to happen here." According to a document seen by Reuters on Wednesday, Trump is expected to order the Pentagon and the State Department in coming days to craft a plan for setting up the "safe zones," a move that could risk escalation of U.S. military involvement in Syria's civil war. The White House further added that Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad bin Zayid Al Nuhayyan in another telephone call also supported the idea of safe zones in Syria and Yemen. "The two leaders reaffirmed the strong partnership between both countries and committed to further strengthen cooperation on fighting radical Islamic terrorism. They discussed recent developments in the Middle East, including the fight against ISIS and joint efforts to address the conflict in Yemen and elsewhere in the region," the White House said. The Trump administrations idea of setting up safe zones for civilians in Syria was greeted with caution by Russia and Turkey, which have taken the lead in the latest peace efforts to end the six-year war in Syria. Ankara said it had always supported the idea, but both Ankara and Moscow warned such plans would require careful consideration. The idea of safe zones was earlier excluded by the Obama administration for fear it would bring the United States into direct conflict with Syrian President Bashar Assad and Russia. Armed conflict continues in Syria since March 2011. Government troops are confronted by militants of different armed groups. Russia has begun airstrikes on terrorist facilities in Syria since 30 September 2015. The Russian military involvement follows an official request from President Bashar Assad to President Vladimir Putin. A nationwide ceasefire began in Syria on December 30, 2016, to pave the way for new peace talks on Syria. Russia and Turkey serve as guarantors of the ceasefire deal, paving the way for negotiations between the Syrian regime and rebels. Following the Astana talks, Russia, Iran and agreed to create a trilateral group on monitoring the Syrian ceasefire. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 14:48 (UTC+04:00) The restoration of diplomatic relations with Russia is impossible as long as the territorial integrity of Georgia is violated, said Zurab Abashidze, the special envoy of the Georgian Premier on settlement of relations with Russia. The restoration of diplomatic relations is not on the agenda, he said while talking to reporters in Tbilisi on January 30, TASS reported. He noted that "the issue of the restoration of diplomatic relations with Russia linked to the issue of Georgia's territorial integrity within the internationally recognized borders of the country." "If there are serious joint steps for the peaceful restoration of Georgia's territorial unity, at some point this issue [the restoration of ties ] will be on the agenda. As for the abolition or simplification of visa regime, diplomatic relations do not interfere in it, said Abashidze. Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Moscow is ready to go on the abolition of visas with Georgia, but this issue is strange to discuss, as long as the countries do not have diplomatic relations. "If the Russian Federation has the political will, we are ready to make joint efforts for a phased settlement of the most complex problems in the relations between the two countries, Abashidze added. Earlier talking to Izvestia, Abashidze did not rule out that at the next meeting with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin may discuss the restoration of diplomatic relations between the two countries. If my esteemed colleague Zurab Abashidze has indeed made such a statement, it can only be welcomed. As is known, Russia has not severed diplomatic relations in September 2008, and the barriers to their recovery were not there, so that the timing of positive changes in this question depends solely on Tbilisi, Karasin told Izvestia commenting on the issue. A next round of talks between Zurab Abashidze and Grigory Karasin is scheduled for the first half of February, 2017 in Prague. Reportedly, the meeting will focus on the issues of the two countries cooperation in trade, economy, transport, culture, humanitarian aspects and current issues. Tbilisi broke diplomatic relations with Moscow in 2008. The relations between Georgia and Russia have pushed all limits when Georgian troops launched military operations to retake the breakaway Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions on August 8, 2008. Russian armed forces entered the regions to stop the military attacks by Georgian troops. After four days of tense fighting, Georgian forces were expelled from South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Both sides agreed to a ceasefire on August 12. Tbilisi immediately cut all diplomatic ties with Russia just a while after the bloody skirmish. Abashidzes first meeting with Karasin took place in December 2012. Later, the senior diplomats held meetings in the Czech capital of Prague between 2013 and 2016, with the latest of them on October 19, focusing on cooperation in trade, economy, transport, culture, humanitarian and current issues. In late 2016, the parties confirmed that they intend to continue to pursue the normalization of relations. Russian President Vladimir Putin previously said that does not preclude the return of a visa-free regime with Russia for Georgian citizens, for this, according to him, there is every reason. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 12:32 (UTC+04:00) By Kamila Aliyeva Iran seeks to lift visa restrictions with a number of countries in an effort to help boost the mutual tourism ties with the target countries. The country plans to abolish visas for travelers from 36 countries, including tourists from Russia, said Iranian Vice President for Cultural Heritage and Tourism Zahra Ahmadipour, Lenta.ru reported. A full list of countries is not named yet. Currently, Russians who plan to visit Iran are obliged to obtain entry visas in advance in the consular department of the Iranian Embassy in Moscow. The term of visa issuance is less than 10 days, the fee is 35. In July 2016, Iran increased its visa on arrival extension from 1 month to 3 months, while citizens of 190 countries can obtain visa on arrival at the countrys airports with one-month validation. Also, the citizens of Turkey, Lebanon, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Bolivia, Egypt, Syria and Armenia can travel to Iran and stay in the country without visa from 15 to 90 days under the visa requirement regulations. Meanwhile, the Iranian Foreign Ministry declared that for now, American citizens will be barred from entering their country. The Islamic Republic announced that they have decided to bar Americans from entering their territory in response to US President Trumps new decree to halt the entry of citizens from 7 majority Muslim countries including Iran. The ban is a clear insult to the Islamic world and especially to the wonderful Iranian nation, the Iranian side said. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Shams Al-Badry speaks to a crowd of hundreds that gathered outside the State Capitol Sunday night to protest President Trump's ban on immigration. Al-Badry is a refugee who escaped Iraq with her family in 1993. Maysoon Shaheen and son Mohammed listen to speakers during the rally protesting President Trump's immigration ban Sunday night at the State Capitol. Shaheen is an Iraqi refugee, but her sons were born in America. Hundreds gathered at the State Capitol Sunday night for a rally and candlelight vigil protesting President Trump's immigration ban. Shams Al-Badry admitted she would never have had the opportunity to stand among hundreds on the north steps of the State Capitol if she had been turned away as a refugee. Speaking in front of demonstrators protesting President Donald Trumps executive action to halt entry of refugees for 120 days, Al-Badry, who escaped worn-torn Iraq in 1993, said she hopes her dream will extend to the refugees of today -- and for years to come. Holding signs and waving foreign flags -- including those of Iraq and Syria -- local protesters gathered on Sunday evening to stand in solidarity with refugees and immigrants, including undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. who face deportation. The crowd, which spilled across the street and onto Centennial Mall, swelled to over 300 people, according to Nebraska State Patrol Lt. Todd Kinghorn. Rev. Karla Cooper said work to organize the event began after she and co-organizer Jeannette Eileen Jones heard stories about refugees being denied entrance into the U.S. on Saturday. Although the focus was on the plight of refugees, Cooper said Sunday's protest was also a statement against Trumps other executive actions, including orders to renew the process for completing the Dakota Access Pipeline and to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. Anything that is marginalizing and hurting people, we need to stand together because were better than that, Cooper said. Were better than hate, were better than ignorance. Joyce Hahn, who works at Lincoln Literacy, a center that teaches English to refugees and immigrants, came to protest all of Trump's policies. But the immigration ban was the one that hit the hardest for her. Immigrants and refugees are like my family, Hahn said. But for the first time theyre saying they dont feel safe here. Several speakers rallied the crowd, including Lincoln state Sen. Patty Pansing Brooks, who quoted Emma Lazarus, the poet of "The New Colossus," whose words are etched on the Statue of Liberty. We need to widen our circle of compassion, Pansing Brooks said. Our beacon of humanity is vital to our very essence, to our moral fiber, to our economic prosperity, to our national security. Trumps executive order, signed Friday, blocks any visitors from Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen, Syria, Iran and Iraq for 90 days. Immigrants detained in U.S. airports in the hours following the order were allowed to leave after the American Civil Liberties Union secured an injunction from a federal judge late Saturday. The Trump administration walked back some of the policy Sunday, allowing green card holders from the sanctioned countries to return to the U.S. Danielle Conrad, executive director of ACLU of Nebraska, spoke at the rally and praised her organizations role in helping lessen the burden of Trumps executive action. The ACLU has always held accountable those who hold the reins of power, she said. We will continue to do so no matter who sits in the Oval Office. Conrad also praised U.S. Sen. Ben Sasse, who was quick to condemn Trumps ban. Other speakers included UNL professor Hope Wabuke and Rev. Stephen Griffith of the Faith Coalition of Lancaster County. Griffith said Trumps ban violates all of my religious beliefs and betrays our American principles." Speaker Shirl Mora James of the Nebraska Dream Alliance and a member of the Nebraska Hispanic Bar Association labeled Trumps actions cold-blooded bigotry at its finest." Trumps executive order is a thinly-veiled effort to ban and scapegoat Muslims, and it does not make America safer, Mora James said. Banning people based solely on the country that they come from is ineffective and overreaching. As the afternoon sun turned to twilight, protesters held up candles, lighters, and phones and sang This Little Light of Mine." Joseph Denicola, 23, was surprised by the turnout. I hope this will bring attention to the fact that we as a country, we as a people, do care about immigrants, especially those refugees who cant come into our country, Denicola said. For Al-Badry, the protest showed that people are ready to fight. If President Trump keeps doing this, there are going to be more and more protests, Al-Badry said. "And its not just one nationality that are here, or one race. Its a diverse array of individuals who are standing against hate." 30 January 2017 16:30 (UTC+04:00) By Kamila Aliyeva Iran has said it may cancel its high-profile, $7-billion Peace Pipeline project with Pakistan over lengthy construction delays, with would deprive energy-starved Pakistan of the some 22 million cubic meters of gas a day it would have received from its neighbor. Irans National Gas Company Head Hamid Reza Araqi said that if negotiations fail to come up with a way to feasibly realize the project, it could be cancelled entirely, Mehr reported. The gas project has faced repeated delays since it was conceived in the 1990s to connect Iran's giant South Pars gas field to India via Pakistan. Pakistan and Iran finally signed the initial agreement in 2009, while India withdrew from the deal beginning as the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project Under the deal, Iran was to provide 22 million cubic meters per day of gas. Pakistan was slated to begin importing Iranian gas imports in early 2015, but the country has not yet begun construction of the related pipeline, nor has Iran completed its project to transit South Pars gas to the Pakistani border. Iran was planning to build a 180-kilometer pipeline. The pipeline was intended to connect Iran's giant South Fars gas field with Pakistan's southern Baluchistan and Sindh provinces. Tehran previously offered Pakistan a loan worth $500 milliona third of the cost of Pakistans portion of the pipelineto start pipeline construction in Pakistans territory. This offer was later revoked due to financial problems caused by sanctions. Earlier, Pakistan's Minister of Petrolium Shahid Khaqan Abbasi said that for the implementation of the pipeline, all sanctions against Iran should be lifted. Some U.S. unilateral sanctions against Iran, including a ban on transactions with Iran using USD, which creates obstacles for foreign investors to do business with the Islamic state, are still remaining in place. Also, Pakistan urges Iran to reduce the price of gas. Pakistan claims that the alleged price of gas from Turkmenistan, which will go on the TAPI pipeline in the future, is less than the price of Iranian gas to be delivered through the Peace Pipeline By holding 157.8 billion barrels of recoverable crude oil reserves, Iran possesses the world's fourth largest reserves of crude oil. The Islamic Republic also holds 34 trillion cubic meters of proven gas reserves, sharing 18.2 percent of total global gas reserves, which puts the country in the top of the world's gas holders list. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 14:31 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has hailed expansion of ties with Russia. Zarif said that expansion of ties between the two countries plays a significant factor in protecting security in Central Asia and the Middle East, ISNA news agency reported. He made the remarks through a message addressing a conference marking 515 years of ties between Iran and Russia. His message was read out at the conference. According to the foreign minister, the ties between the two countries also contribute to the development of the regional countries. --- w us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 15:57 (UTC+04:00) The phone call between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday was a display of mutual respect between the two men, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on January 30. "The conversation which took place on Saturday between Presidents Putin and Trump was good, I would say, in both the political and human the human sense," Lavrov told reporters. "They have agreed to continue work at the expert level, both as part of their further contacts, which will surely be held, and the time and details, which are yet to be agreed," Lavrov added. In the call, their first conversation since Trumps inauguration, Putin and Trump agreed to try to rebuild U.S- Russia ties and to cooperate in Syria. Trump has said he wants a rapprochement with Moscow if he can get along with Putin, who says he is also keen to mend ties. The Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, in turn, said it was too early to talk about any possible deals with the United States over sanctions on Russia, but that President Putin could meet Donald Trump before the G20 in July. "To start with we must fix the date and time of a meeting between the two presidents. Aides are working on this now," he said, adding that a meeting could happen before a G20 summit scheduled to take place in Hamburg on July 7-8. Peskov said that Putin and Trump had not discussed sanctions in their phone call on Saturday, their first conversation since Trump's inauguration. "The conversation was good, it was constructive, and practically, from the viewpoint of beginning the discussion of a number of issues concerning regional and international security placement of the main emphasis on the issues of possible cooperation in the fight against terrorism, as well as very positive from the viewpoint, perhaps, that the heads of state noted respect as a very important principle of bilateral relations," Peskov told reporters. Putin and Trump also discussed the situation in the Middle East and the Arab-Israeli conflict, anti-terror efforts, the sphere of strategic stability and non-proliferation, the Iranian nuclear program, the situation on the Korean peninsula as well as the situation in eastern Ukraine. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 17:29 (UTC+04:00) By Kamila Aliyeva The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the second largest inter-governmental organization after the UN, expressed grave concern at US President Donald Trumps executive order banning nationals of 7 OIC member states from the United States and excluding those holding valid visas and permanent residence cards from entry. The OIC General Secretariat is sure that this decision will further complicate the already grave challenges facing refugees, Trend reports. Trump's order bars citizens from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from entering the U.S. for the next 90 days. The bans, though temporary, took effect immediately, causing havoc and confusion for would-be travellers with passports from these countries. The seven Muslim-majority countries targeted in President Trump's executive order on immigration were initially identified as "countries of concern" under the Obama administration. As a result of this ban many of those fleeing war and persecution have been adversely and unjustly affected, the OIC reminded. Such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism at a critical time when the OIC has been engaged with all partners, including the U.S., to combat extremism and terrorism in all their forms and manifestations. The OIC called upon the United States government to reconsider this blanket decision and maintain its moral obligation to provide leadership and hope at a time of great uncertainty and unrest in the world. European leaders, the United Nations and international groups have condemned Trumps order . The UN refugee agency and the International Organization for Migration called on the Trump administration to continue offering asylum to people fleeing war and persecution, saying its resettlement programme was vital. The International Rescue Committee, a humanitarian aid and refugee assistance group, called Trump's decision to suspend refugee admissions "harmful and hasty" . Meanwhile, the EU is concerned that some Member States may follow the example of Donald Trump and restrict migration policies, RIA Novosti reported with the reference to a diplomatic source in Brussels. The EU institutions have concerns that a number of EU member states may follow the decision of Donald Trump, the source said not specifying which EU states he had in mind. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 30 January 2017 17:42 (UTC+04:00) Iranian President Hassan Rouhani plans to pay a visit to Moscow in the near future, Iran's Ambassador to Russia Mehdi Sanai said on January 30. He said the visit details are being planned currently, the Iranian website YJC reported. Earlier Rouhani was expected to visit Moscow in January. Moscow and Tehran have managed to maintain a strategic alliance and close political and military ties. Iran and Russia have recently voiced their intention to develop all-out cooperation in the energy sector - from swapping oil and gas to involving Russian companies in the development of Iran's oil and gas fields. Russian companies are keen on participating in the development of oil and gas fields in Iran and eye projects for increasing Iranian oilfields recovery rate. The two had quite limited economic cooperation until recently, as the goods turnover heavily amounted to $1 billion a year. The goods turnover between Russia and Iran increased by 80 percent in 2016. Iranian sources say in the first seven months of the current solar year (that end on March 20), Iran exported to Russia goods worth $86.5 million. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Significant clinical benefit of Agendias MammaPrint test and other advances in the improved treatment of breast cancer recognized at ceremony during ECCO2017 Irvine, CA, USA and Amsterdam, the Netherlands, January 30, 2017 / B3C newswire / -- Agendia, Inc., a world leader in personalized medicine and molecular cancer diagnostics, congratulates its co-founder and Chief Research Officer, Professor Laura van t Veer, Ph.D., on winning the European Cancer Organizations (ECCO) Clinical Research Award for innovation in breast cancer diagnosis, and the development of diagnostics for implementation in daily clinical practice, including treatment guidelines, regulatory policies and reimbursement. The ECCO Clinical Research Award is presented biannually, during the ECCO European Cancer Congress, in recognition of the contribution to the integration of scientific research and clinical practice in the field of cancer. Dr. Laura van t Veer received the award jointly with Emiel Rutgers, MD, Ph.D., breast surgeon at the Netherlands Cancer Institute at a ceremony on Sunday 29 January at the opening of the third day of the ECCO2017 Congress in Amsterdam. Dr. Laura van t Veer is one of the inventors of MammaPrint 70-Gene Breast Cancer Risk-of-Recurrence Assay which assesses the likelihood of metastatic recurrence. By identifying women who are at low genomic risk of disease recurrence, and therefore at little or no benefit from chemotherapy, the assay assists physicians and their patients around the world in choosing the most appropriate treatment regimen, and sparing many from suffering unnecessary side effects. Evidence of MammaPrints potential to transform international clinical practice was recently published in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine following the positive outcome of the MINDACT trial, a phase 3, prospective, randomized trial including nearly 7,000 patients, across 112 institutions in nine European countries. Martine Piccart, MD, Ph.D., a previous winner of the ECCO Clinical Research Award in 2009, was a co-principal investigator of the trial. Dr. Laura van t Veer, co-founder and Chief Research Officer of Agendia, and Professor at the University of California, San Francisco said: I am very proud to accept this joint award with Emiel Rutgers. We have seen the initial research in this field grow from an idea, to a market-leading gene-expression test, the clinical benefit of which is supported by the highest level of evidence. As a result, women of all ages with early-stage breast cancer are now able to make informed decisions about their treatment based on whether or not they will benefit from chemotherapy. We still have work to do, but for me, that is the real reward. Mark Straley, Chief Executive Officer of Agendia said: We congratulate Laura on receipt of this prestigious international award. ECCOs recognition of the patient benefit of MammaPrint, its clinical utility, which is underpinned by the MINDACT trial, and the unmet medical need that it addresses is a fitting tribute to Lauras trailblazing research and her dedication to improving outcomes for women with early stage breast cancer. In addition to the ECCO Clinical Research Award, Dr. Laura van t Veer was awarded the coveted European Inventor Award in the Small and Medium Enterprises Category from the European Patent Office in 2015 for MammaPrint, the European Union Women Innovator Award second prize in 2014, and the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) Lifetime Achievement Award for Translational Research in Breast Cancer in 2007. About Agendia Agendia is a privately held, leading molecular diagnostics company that develops and markets genomic diagnostic products, which help support physicians with their complex treatment decisions. Agendias breast cancer tests were developed using an unbiased gene selection by analyzing the complete human genome. Our offerings include MammaPrint, a 70-Gene Breast Cancer Risk-of-Recurrence test, and BluePrint, a molecular subtyping assay that provides deeper insight leading to more clinically actionable breast cancer biology. In addition, Agendia has a pipeline of other genomic products in development. The company collaborates with pharmaceutical companies, leading cancer centers and academic groups to develop companion diagnostic tests in the area of oncology. For more information on Agendia or the MammaPrint and BluePrint tests, you can visit Agendias patient site at www.KnowYourBreastCancer.com or the corporate site at www.agendia.com. Follow Agendia, Inc. on Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn to keep up-to-date with the latest news. About MammaPrint MammaPrint is a FDA-cleared in vitro diagnostic test, performed in a central laboratory, using the gene expression profile of breast cancer tissue samples to assess a patients risk for distant metastasis within 5 years. MammaPrint also carries the CE Mark which certifies the use of the test in the European Union. MammaPrint is indicated for use by physicians as a prognostic marker only, along with other clinical-pathological factors. The test is not intended to determine the outcome of disease, nor to suggest or infer an individual patients response to therapy. About MINDACT MINDACT was a collaboration between the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) and the Breast International Group (BIG). A unique phase 3 prospective, randomized, controlled study of 6,693 patients recruited across 112 European cancer centers, the MINDACT trial showed that 46% of breast cancer patients considered for chemotherapy, whose tumors were classified MammaPrint Low Risk, had excellent survival without chemotherapy, and could thus be candidates to avoid this toxic therapy. The trial provided the highest level of clinical evidence (Level 1A) and confirmed the clinical utility of using Agendias MammaPrint 70-Gene Breast Cancer Recurrence Assay to help predict clinical outcome in women with early-stage breast cancer. Contacts Leon Melens (Netherlands media) / Jen Lewis & Daniel Gooch (EU media) Instinctif Partners +31 6 538 16 427 / +44 20 7866 7905 This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. Scott Speer (US media) FleishmanHillard +1 (310) 482-4283 This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. Thank you for reading! Please log in, or sign up for a new account and purchase a subscription to continue reading. This weekend the water level in Isabella Lake is expected to reach and maybe even exceed the restricted pool allowed by the U.S. Army Corp Civitas Poll finds roughly three in four N.C. voters back school choice, with higher levels of support from black voters School choice doesn't have to be a partisan issue, and a new study suggests it most certainly is not.Eighty-one percent of North Carolinians agree that parents should have a say as to where their child attends school, the Civitas Institute, a conservative advocacy group based in Raleigh, says in a new poll.Bob Luebke, education policy analyst at Civitas, on Thursday presented the survey's results to lawmakers, lobbyists, and policy analysts at a luncheon celebrating National School Choice Week North Carolina is a national leader in the school-choice movement, said Darrell Allison, president of Parents for Educational Freedom in North Carolina, a co-host for the event.Allison told attendees.The poll surveyed 811 voters ages 25 to 54, 44 percent of whom voted for President Donald Trump, and 41 percent of whom voted for Hillary Clinton. The poll was conducted Jan. 17-18 via landline phone, cellphone, and tablet, and has a margin of error of 3.7 percent. Seventy percent of those surveyed said they think lawmakers should expand education options for families.Thirty-nine percent of respondents said they would be "much more likely" to vote for a candidate who supports school choice. Twenty-seven percent were "somewhat more likely," and 16 percent were less likely to vote for such a candidate.When asked what letter grade they would assign traditional public schools, 5 percent of respondents gave an A, 28 percent a B, and 45 percent a C. The remaining 16 percent graded schools with a D or F.The poll asked respondents to identify primary reasons for sending a child to a traditional public school. Thirty-four percent said other options are unaffordable, and 23 percent said their public schools are doing a good job. Nineteen percent said they are committed to public schools, and 7 percent said they have no other options.The poll showed Democrats and Republicans are split by a narrow margin, with 87 percent of Republicans and 78 percent of Democrats supporting a parent's right to choose their child's education.Breaking it down, 84 percent of African-Americans back school choice, compared with 70 percent of white respondents.said Luebke.North Carolina's Opportunity Scholarship Program recently came under fire from Gov. Roy Cooper, who says the program is a poor use of funds that should go to traditional public schools. U.S. Secretary of Education nominee Betsy DeVos supports private school vouchers and charter schools. Teachers, unions and other proponents of traditional public schools have criticized DeVos and her positions on school reform.For his part, Cooper said he doesn't plan to fund the voucher program in his 2017 budget. Opportunity Scholarships aren't likely to disappear, however, since program is by law guaranteed a total $145 million over the next 10 years.Seventy-one percent of those polled said they favor or strongly favor Opportunity Scholarships. Twenty-nine percent opposed, strongly opposed, or had no opinion about the program.Opportunity Scholarships give low-income students up to $4,200 a year for private school tuition and expenses. The program today serves about 5,300 students, a number set to reach a total 36,000 by 2027.Lt. Gov. Dan Forest told attendees at the luncheon.he added. The Big Sky Chapter of the Mule Deer Foundation will hold its 11th annual banquet and auction at the Elks Lodge in Billings on Feb. 11. The social hour begins at 5 pm. with a silent auction and raffles. Dinner will begin at 6:40 p.m. followed by a fundraising auction featuring a signed guitar by Ted Nugent, an African hunt for four, vacation packages to Hawaii and Cabo San Lucas. Tickets are $30. Table packages include a gun gift. For reservations or additional information contact Vester Wilson at 698-7740 or vwilson3@hotmail.com or online at www.muledeer.org. To learn more about the Mule Deer Foundation, visit www.muledeer.org, or contact Marshall Johnson, regional director, at 850-8785 or email him at marshall@muledeer.org. One issue dominated testimony to the School Funding Interim Commission last year a backlog of major maintenance statewide. But legislators disagree on how best to help districts or if they can afford to do so at all. A district court judge ruled in 2008 that the Montana Constitution requires the state to chip in for significant school repairs and updates. Yet, state leaders have repeatedly failed to provide enough funding or to adjust regulations about district budgets that make it difficult to save money. The challenge is largely two-fold: State assistance must be adequate and it also must be equitable, so a student in Grass Range receives an education equal to one in Missoula. Two programs the state had used to assist some schools in recent years went unfunded or underfunded in the 2015 session. This session, legislators are debating how much responsibility the state has to pay for these projects and the fairest way to divide the money between the states more than 400 districts. The discussion is heading in a reasonable direction, Montana Quality Education Coalition Director Dianne Burke said. But its not going where it needs to go because really theres that adequacy aspect unaddressed. Theres no money. Legislators and educators agree: The need is clear. Until Missoula passed its $150 million bond, Sentinel High School was one blown boiler away from canceling school for a week or two weeks to fix that boiler, take care of all the broken pipes and then all the water, said Sen. Tom Facey, D-Missoula, a retired teacher who led the interim commission. St. Ignatius had a $3.5 million bond that failed and the guy just wanted to fix stuff. He didnt want to build a damn thing. Without the state involved, it puts pressure on homeowners, small business. Almost a decade ago, a first-of-its-kind inventory of thousands of school buildings across the state identified more than $360 million in needed repairs, a figure education advocates and architects say has grown. The average age of a school building in Montana is 53 years. Although the core structure could last decades longer, some periodic maintenance is needed. Roofs deteriorate; aging boilers fail and parts are no longer available; windows seep energy that drives up district bills; a rural district has to make accessibility improvements for a student with disabilities; electrical wires and internet cables must be replaced; and walls must be moved to adjust class sizes as enrollment or accreditation standards change. Because of how the state regulates school finances to ensure an equitable education, most districts cannot simply save money for major repairs. Schools must return unspent money to the state each year except for a small amount they roll over to smooth out cash flow dips. Districts can create a building reserve fund but to fill it they must pass a bond, levy more taxes or be lucky enough to have oil and gas revenues. The smallest districts dont have enough tax base to pay for the costly projects while the needs of the largest districts dwarf the existing state assistance. There is such an enormous backlog in most districts, its probably going to take years and years to get caught up, Rep. Kathy Kelker, D-Billings said. Montana has operated two main programs to help districts finance repairs in recent years. The Quality Schools Grant Program solicited applications from districts and typically paid out about $30 million every two years to complete about 50 projects. Education advocates said the program gave an unfair advantage to schools with grant writers while leaving hundreds of others without any help. In 2015, legislators did not fund the program at all. This session, the governor has proposed about $5 million, the result of slowed timber harvests and the loss of some riverbed rents after a lawsuit. Another program, funded by the same sources, promised to help districts pay interest on bonds. So many participated that payments were prorated. Without a new revenue source to support it, the program is effectively dead. So far, three bills are being considered as possible solutions. House Bill 66, written by Facey and co-sponsored by Rep. Amanda Curtis, D-Butte, would set aside a little money for every district in a new state-managed account. Each district would be credited an $8,000 base payment plus extra for every quality teacher, an estimated annual cost of about $5 million. Districts would have to petition the state for access to that money by providing a matching amount of local funds, details on the project and a long-term facilities plan. Facey also has proposed Senate Bill 5, which would make it easier for schools to borrow from the Montana Board of Investments INTERCAP loan program and pay back the loans during a longer period of time, allowing districts to fund projects without increasing taxes for local residents. He hopes schools could combine the loans with the new savings accounts created by HB 66. The INTERCAP bill passed the Senate 42-8 and appears set to pass the House next week after a 94-6 preliminary vote on Friday. Republicans are crafting a different proposal to pair with the INTERCAP loan changes. Billings Rep. Jeff Essmann, also a member of the interim commission, and Conrad Sen. Llew Jones, who leads the Finance Committee, said details are not finalized. One idea being considered is to divert some interest money, and maybe principal, from the Coal Severance Tax Trust Fund into a new facilities account that would provide grants to a limited number of projects each year and require applicants to have a local match. Is it better to try to get a little bit of money to everybody or to get more effectively spent money to the districts that have engaged in the planning process? I prefer the planning and ranking approach, Essmann said. The other issue were going to have to face at some point is that were in the slow and deliberate phases of voluntary consolidation in some of the districts. At some point they may realize their communities would be better off if they maintained one building instead of two, one set of teachers instead of two,'' he said. "Its better those communities make those decisions on their own terms, but it may not be in our best interest as a state to try and preserve every building at this point. Jones said requiring a local match, likely with a bond or levy, is one way the state can ensure schools spend wisely. Its amazing how much more frugal we are if we tell our local people weve got to participate, he said. Montana Rural Education Association Executive Director Dennis Parman, a former deputy state superintendent, said he is encouraged by the discussions but cautious during a session where a tight budget is forcing cuts to many programs. I want to wait to see what happens, he said. I feel like everybody is truly doing what they can and then its gonna be what its gonna be. On Sunday, President Donald Trump issued a statement regarding his most recent executive order calling for "extreme vetting" of people traveling to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries. White House: "This is not about religion - this is about terror" Visa hold will last for 120 days, Trump says Protests have erupted across the country, including in Florida Here is the full text of President Trump's statement: America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave. We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say. My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering. The order, which in addition to "extreme vetting" called for a suspension of admission of refugees into the country for 120 days, resulted in confusion as U.S. airports struggled to carry out the new directive. The detaining of two Iraqi nationals with ties to the U.S. military sparked a legal challenge from the ACLU Saturday that resulted in an emergency stay of the order, effective nationwide. The order has also sparked protests in airports around the country, including in Tampa and Orlando. Though Fridays are busy for former school teacher Jackie Harper, Everyday Hero host Bill Murphy met her at the Salvation Army in Tampa on a Friday. For years on this day, she and other volunteers have provided a lunch for the homeless and underserved. And not just any lunch: a hot, balanced meal. For the five and a half years that weve been here, weve tried never to give them a sandwich because we know that sandwiches are something that they come in contact with all the time," said Harper. " But a hot, balanced meal is a horse of a different color." Those hot, balanced meals are served up with love and compassion by Harper and others like Robert, a retired member of the U.S. Air Force; Tina, who spent years with the Tampa Police Department; and Rita, who helps Harper load lunches that will go to the bed-ridden. The Salvation Armys Captain Andy Miller says this extra love goes a long way. When it gets personalized with somebody like Jackie and her team, the people have more than just a warm meal, Miller said. They get their spirit that comes with them as well. That she helps them. That there are people in the community that care and want them to do better. On average, more than 100 people will be fed each Friday. They all will also receive personal hygiene bags. Working with her Rivers of Life Ministry, Harper says for many of these people Fridays meal will be all they eat that day. It is the least that I can do to give somebody a hot meal and help make their day better," said Harper. "Help make their week better. Many of them tell me without me, without our ministry, they wouldnt get a hot meal for the week." Harper said many people are a just a pay check, or even less, away from being homeless. Until that changes, this is where youll find her. Im not a hero, Harper said. Im just doing my one percent in the world to make this place a better place. I would never see myself as a hero. Just an everyday citizen doing her part." Public comments were taking place in Bradenton on Monday at the second day of a hearing on Mosaic's request to expand phosphate mining in east Manatee County. Public comments continuing Monday after 1st meeting Thursday Overflow crowd attended Thursday Mosaic meeting Proposal would extend mining to another 3,800 acres PREVIOUSLY: Mosaic mining expansion hearing packed The mining company, which gained notoriety after a radioactive sinkhole formed at its plant in Mulberry, wants to rezone more than 3,800 acres of land in Manatee for mining. The issue has created a heated public debate. Currently, the area is zoned as agricultural, but Mosaic wants to use the land to expand its phosphate mining. Many residents packed the Manatee County Commission chambers Thursday to voice opposition to the proposal. A standing-room-only meeting and a long list of public speakers forced the meeting to continue Monday. Residents said they have concerns after the sinkhole and leak at Mosaic's plant in Mulberry. However, Mosaic officials said Manatee County would not be affected because this plan doesn't include any stacks of gypsum. Currently, Mosaic mines on 7,000 acres of land in the county. The proposal being voted on would extend mining near the northern edge of Myakka City. "I'm very scared," Manatee County resident Ricky Mafera said. "I'm very scared for my family, my neighbors. (Mosaic is) going to be a nuisance. It's a 24/7 operation. We won't ever have the peace and tranquility. I've been out there for 25 years, since 1992. It was supposed to be a protected land on all the Manatee County maps and everything, and they weren't supposed to be able to mine that. "How Mosaic got around that, I don't know." Not all residents at the meetings have opposed the expansion idea. "I have no objections to the expansion, and I'm not really sure what all the fuss is about unless it's about unanswered questions," said Linda Eneix, a Manatee County resident. If the county approves the Mosaic request today, they would still need additional approval, including a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers permit. At Lockwood Elementary on a recent Friday, the youngest students at school practiced m sounds as if they had just raided a pan of fresh cookies. These were students who would likely be at home if not for a targeted program Lockwood began about five years ago, focusing on students who arent enrolled in Head Start or another high-quality preschool but will enter traditional kindergarten next school year. Students attend school in two classes; one meets Monday and Wednesday, the other meets Tuesday and Thursday, and they alternate Fridays. They get a curriculum and atmosphere similar to what theyll encounter next year in kindergarten, helping them start school on a level playing field with kids who attended preschool. We look at it as an investment in the future of these kids, said Lockwood superintendent Tobin Novasio. It actually saves our taxpayers money over time. About a quarter of students who go through the program have ended up in Lockwoods advanced-track kindergarten class, a higher proportion than usual. And fewer of those students have required academic interventions which require time, staff, and therefore money as they get older. Its a program that Lockwood funds through its traditional school year budget a nod to the importance of early education, no matter what name the program has. A federal preschool development grant has supported the establishment and growth of several formal public preschool programs in Montana, but proposals for state funding havent gained much traction; a $37 million proposal from Gov. Steve Bullock failed in 2015, and Republican lawmakers appear likely to reject a $12 million ask this year. While research on the effectiveness of public preschool is mixed, most shows that programs lead to better academic, social and career achievement for students. Social skills are a major focus on the Lockwood program. As teacher Moriah Krafft called out students' names during attendance, some stood up and beamed. Others tentatively edged out of their seats, and some looked as if they were hoping to become invisible if they held still. When you come to a school this size for those students, its sometimes scary, elementary school assistant principal Jenny Fox said. They come back next year for kindergarten and theyre confident in themselves. That confidence extends to basic tasks like learning to use a fork to eat school lunch or wielding a pencil. For example, students learned the mountain-like pen strokes that make up the letter M but didnt jump into writing exercises. Instead, they collected alphabet magnets scattered throughout the room and picked out the correct letter. As Krafft listed off animals like moose and minx, a student chimed in, Whats a manatee? Krafft gave a quick answer, then deflected into another question: Does zoo start with an 'm'? Sessions typically lasted shorter than five minutes, with students zipping between chairs, a group carpet and other tasks around the room. As long as you can keep them going, you can keep them engaged, Krafft said. Lockwood plans to keep the program going, prioritizing it even if budgets get tight; in a perfect world, they could expand it. But that would require more money for a district looking to cope with funding cuts that accompany enrollment dips for this school year and likely next year. Is it likely to happen with the budget situation in Helena? Novasio asked, reflectively. Probably not. From the law enforcement community to the business community, people who live here alongside the border in Eagle Pass are saying the same thing national security should be a top priority for all Americans. In a Texas town, a chamber president and a sheriff have different views on illegal immigrants But they both believe that the border wall will not offer long-term results However, when it comes to the discussion of building a wall, they disagree with President Donald Trump. They say if that were to happen, U.S. and Mexico relations could be strained. In Eagle Pass, Texas, population 27,000, cross-border commerce is big business. Last year, one of only two international bridges here saw $27 billion worth of commerce flow through its gates. "There is truck traffic coming through all the U.S. ports, land ports on pretty much a 24-hour basis," said Billy Davis. Local business owner and Chamber of Commerce President William Davis does not want a border wall. "The message that we're sending with the wall is that we don't want you. And that is so far from the truth because we want our Mexican counterparts to come and patronize our businesses," said Davis. Inside the Maverick County Detention Center, Sheriff Tom Schmerber is holding 90 female immigrants for federal authorities. We can put the biggest wall, the highest wall in the country and theyre still going to go through it," said Schmerber. "I believe strongly that we need to control the border." The 65-year-old Texas lawman and retired Border Patrol agent maintains he has legal duty to maintain a solid relationship with the federal authority. "I do agree we need to help the Marshalls. We need to help the Border Patrol," said Schmerber. "That is the only way we can control the illegal aliens." However, Schmerber and the chamber president agree, the wall talk is shortsighted. Instead, they advise the Trump Administration to improve foreign relations and find a smarter way to invest in the borders. "We need to spend the money in a smart way ... not throwing the money away," said Schmerber. "I know it's another country. But they are our friends," said Davis. In response to President Donald Trump's immigration order, coffee giant Starbucks has announced plans to hire thousands of refugees, and other U.S. companies are also pushing back. Starbucks CEO says he will give jobs to 10,000 refugees Refugees will be hired in 75 countries where company operates Airbnb to offer free housing to those denied entry to US Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz said the company will give jobs to 10,000 refugees in the next five years. The refugees will be hired in all 75 countries where Starbucks operates, he stated. Schultz also said in a memo to employees that people who served with U.S. troops will be hired first. The memo stated that Starbucks would help its Mexican partners if they are hit by any new trade or immigration rules. There are more than 65 million citizens of the world recognized as refugees by the United Nations, and we are developing plans to hire 10,000 of them over five years in the 75 countries around the world where Starbucks does business, wrote Schultz. And we will start this effort here in the U.S. by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support. Message from Howard Schultz to @Starbucks partners: Living Our Values in Uncertain Times https://t.co/WoHkS3N9fB Starbucks News (@Starbucksnews) January 29, 2017 The Starbucks move invited protest from supporters of the refugee ban. #BoycottStarbucks were the highest trending terms on Monday. Airbnb is also pushing back against Trump's immigration order. The homestay service, which operates in almost 200 countries, is offering free housing to those denied U.S. entry under the executive order. CEO Brian Chesky tweeted out the offer Saturday, saying "Not allowing countries or refugees into America is not right, and we must stand with those who are affected." If you would like to help temporarily house these people in need, sign up here: https://t.co/y0ctQprO3u Thank you for your generosity! https://t.co/mIVOqZZ529 Airbnb (@Airbnb) January 30, 2017 Uber's CEO promised to help his drivers affected by the order setting aside money for their legal defense. Uber competitor Lyft donated a million dollars to the American Civil Liberties Union. The ACLU is the biggest beneficiary of the refugee ban backlash. It received more than $24 Million this weekend. A big part of that's due to big donors matching funds from other small donors. Big donor's such as venture capitalist Chris Sacca of ABCs hit prime-time show Shark Tank. Sacca tweeted: "You guys are the best. You give me hope. Thank you. Because of you, I'm matching my own match and giving $150,000 to the @aclu. #resist The ACLU said donations came from 356,306 people many of whom had never supported the group before. The group plans to increase staffing and prepare more legal challenges against President Trumps Executive Orders. Even major Wall Street banks spoke out against the refugee ban. Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein said on Monday the ban is not something the company supports and it has the potential to disrupt the firm. An external investigation that Superintendent of Public Instruction Elsie Arntzen said is examining Montanas use of the ACT test is not an investigation, but a human resources review. "Its really just a workplace policy and procedure review, said Jim Kerins, a partner in the firm OPI is planning to hire. The Office of Public Instruction announced Friday that it is hiring CMS Community and Management Services, a Helena firm, to investigate Montanas reporting of ACT scores. Montana switched to using the college-readiness exam in 2015 to report required high school test scores to the U.S. Department of Education. Arntzen declared that Montana, under previous Superintendent Denise Juneau, was out of compliance with the feds because the ACT doesnt align with state education standards or have scores that fit into federal reporting categories, nor has the state developed a system to fit scores into those categories. She also alleged that the state falsified last year's ACT scores, reporting them all as proficient. Juneau has argued that the standards issue was well known and that test score reporting was intended to be amended. Speaking to an assembly of school administrators in Great Falls last week, Arntzen cited a new investigation. We are under an investigation right now, and its an external investigation, she said, according to the Great Falls Tribune. Im sorry, I am a woman of integrity and I do believe that falsification of data, student data not that it would harm the student because they receive their own test scores but they had two years to work on this since it was agreed that the ACT would be the only benchmark test. The ACT does not comply with our Montana state standards, nor does it comply with what the federal government wanted for this assessment and it had to deal with different levels of proficiency. So when the level was filled in, and it was filled in falsely, that means all of our students that took the ACT were proficient? CMS hasnt signed a contract with the state yet, Kerins said. He described his usual work as pretty mundane: looking at workplace policies, job description, communication procedures, ensuring that employees have ways to report complaints. The federal reporting is going to be part of what we look at, he said. But the review is not a definitive, this did or didnt comply with federal reporting standards. Im certainly not an education policy expert, Kerins said. OPI spokesman Dylan Klapmeier said the comments made in Great Falls were taken out of context. Theres not an external investigation being conducted on us. ... The way it was reported made it appear that OPI was put under an investigation. When pressed about how the comments were out of context, Klapmeier said it was just a mix-up in the way that the words were used and the words were interpreted. Earlier at the conference, Arntzen did say we are doing an external review to make sure the procedures going forward with that test is going to be beneficial to all of those juniors, in reference to the ACT. Arntzen earlier said not following federal requirements could put federal funding at risk; however, a review of 31 states' compliance with testing requirements found that none of them met every federal requirement, and none had their federal funding threatened, including some which use the ACT. In California, state education officials are in the midst of a showdown with federal officials because its use of a test the feds didn't sign off on. State officials have held their ground despite a response from feds citing "many possible enforcement actions and remedies available to be applied by the department, including the withholding of funds, according to Edsource, a California education news outlet. Unlike California's test, 12 states use the ACT or SAT, another college readiness exam, for federal accountability, according to a database of state tests by Education Week. At least seven states have won permission from the feds to use those tests but still must go through the peer-review process. Dan Wallach A driver arrested in connection with driving while intoxicated struck a Beaumont police vehicle around 1:30 a.m. today in the 2500 block of Sweetgum Road and the officer managed to drive his damaged patrol vehicle to stop the suspect vehicle at the 2800 block of Louisiana. The officer was westbound on Sweetgum en route to a call. If you are one of the 63,400 Yellowstone County residents who have requested absentee ballots, House Bill 287 is for you. It will save you the hassle of having to renew your absentee ballot request next year and in future even-number years. It will save Yellowstone County taxpayers about $40,000 in printing and mailing costs. Savings in time and taxpayer costs will be seen in all 56 Montana counties. Many voters on the absentee list dont realize that present state law requires county elections offices to delete all the names on the absentee list on Feb. 1 of even-number years. Law requires county election officials to mail letters to each person who was on the list, telling them they have to respond in writing to get back on the list for another two years. Its a big waste of time and money. About one in five fail to respond because they think theyre already on the list. These folks are very unhappy when the election draws near and they dont get a mail ballot. Then they have to contact the elections office, and end up voting in person at the county office or their polling place. One year ago (the last time Yellowstone County deleted its absentee mailing list and started over) there were about 53,000 names. Now there are more than 63,000. Clearly, most voters in Montanas most populous county prefer mail ballots and their number is growing. What about voters who move? Nothing changes. Voters register at their new elections office or notify their office that they moved within the county. What if voters move, but dont notify the elections office? Mail ballots cannot be forwarded, so the ballot will be returned to the election office, which then sends a letter that can be forwarded, explaining what the individual can do to get a ballot. Elections offices already update voter rolls with mailing address changes from the U.S. Postal Service. HB287 is sponsored by Rep. Bryce Bennett, D-Missoula, but it has Yellowstone County roots. Election administrator Bret Rutherford helped draft the bill and told The Gazette that he intends to testify for it in Helena. Enough is enough. Lets get this thing done, Rutherford said. County election officials from across the state have tried to persuade lawmakers to make the absentee voter list permanent in previous sessions. Let 2017 be the year that the list finally becomes as permanent as a voter wishes. HB287 is scheduled for a hearing Thursday in House State Administration Committee. Four lawmakers who represent Yellowstone County districts are on that panel, Geraldine Custer, Jessica Karjala, Dennis Lenz and Peggy Webb. We call on these representatives to help their fellow lawmakers understand this sensible bill that will save taxpayers time and money while sparing them the confusion of present law. Remember, Yellowstone County lawmakers: Most citizens who voted for you cast mail ballots. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Ted Williams isn't against a new hospital opening in Orange, but he doesn't think the county can afford to pay for it. "It's going to be a money pit," said Williams, 73. Williams was one of several hundred who gathered at the Orange County Convention Center in Orange late last week to hear the county's proposal for a hospital district, which would be government-funded. County officials began investigating the possible creation of a hospital district last month when Baptist Orange Hospital announced it would end emergency services on Jan. 12. County Judge Stephen Brint Carlton said the hospital could be owned and operated by the county or the county could contract it out to a private hospital group, which would run the facility. Kenneth Prosperie said he doesn't want his taxes to go up to pay for a new hospital. "You're going to give the people of the county heart attacks, and you're trying to do a good thing," said Prosperie, 57, of Bridge City. Under Texas law, the property tax rate for the hospital district cannot exceed 75 cents for every $100 that the property is valued. Someone with a house valued at $100,000 could pay about $750 a year. The median price for homes in Orange County is $140,000, according to Zillow.com, an online real estate database. Others said they were worried about the lack of emergency care options available in a county that has a number of industrial sites and a large elderly population. Orange resident Terrie Salter said she was concerned about the distance she would need to travel to a hospital in Jefferson County and how the influx could affect ER wait times. "We recently had to stay in the ER a long time," said Salter, 46. The county has two private freestanding emergency rooms, but under federal law, they are unable to accept Medicare or Medicaid. At the beginning of the meeting, the majority of the attendees raised their hand, indicating they were in support of or undecided about the hospital district. Several residents raised their hands against the district. Carlton, who said legally as county judge he cannot take a position on the issue, said the hospital could help stimulate the county's growth economically by creating jobs and attracting more industries. "Not having a hospital in Orange County would put us at a severe disadvantage," he said. County Commissioners Johnny Trahan, Barry Burton and John Gothia all said they support for the creation of the hospital district. "I don't like paying taxes, but I think it's something we need," Gothia said. Precinct 4 Commissioner Jody Crump said he's "not leaning either way." Crump, who represents the district on the western edge of Orange County, said many people in his district go to the hospitals in Jefferson County. The creation of the district would ultimately be up to county voters to decide. There are two ways for the measure to get on a ballot, through a petition with at least 100 signatures of registered voters or through legislation. Gothia said even if voters approved the district in a November election, it would still be a long time before residents would see a hospital. Gothia suspected it would take a minimum of three to five years to get the hospital up and running. NKrebs@BeaumontEnterprise.com Twitter.com/Natalie_Krebs The American Association of Retired Persons launched a national ad campaign targeted at Republican legislators, urging them to protect Medicare and Medicaid, The Hill reports. Here's what you should know. 1. The lobbying group spent an unspecified seven-figured amount centering on President Trump's campaign "about leaving Medicaid and social security benefits untouched." 2. President Trump's Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said in January 2017 the president would keep his promise to leave Medicare and Medicaid intact. 3. The AARP fears the President will privatize the sector, thereby "increasing costs and risks for seniors." 4. AARP CEO Jo Ann Jenkins wrote in a letter "We will continue to oppose changes to [the] current law that cuts benefits, increases costs or reduces the ability of these critical programs to deliver on their benefit promises." Healthcare encountered a number of changes this past month, with a new presidential administration making its way into the White House and the industry's future remaining relatively uncertain. Here are 30 updates from the past month. Judge blocks $37B Aetna, Humana deal Judge John Bates of the U.S. District Court ruled in favor of the Department of Justice and blocked the proposed Aetna and Humana deal. In a 156-page opinion, Judge Bates ruled the deal would significantly reduce competition in the Medicare Advantage market in 364 complaint counties and three complaint counties in Florida. Massachusetts Department of Public Health updates DON regulations for existing freestanding ASCs The Massachusetts Department of Public Health updated its state medical regulations on Jan. 11, 2017, allowing existing freestanding ASCs to apply for a determination of need without an acute care hospital affiliation. The DPH will continue to mandate applicants submitting plans to build a new ASC to affiliate with either a Health Policy Commission-certified ACO or existing independent community hospital. US woman dies from superbug resistant to 26 antibiotics A superbug resistant to 26 different antibiotics killed a 70-year-old Nevada woman in September 2016. The CDC reports the patient returned to the United States in August 2016 following an extended trip to India. Upon admission on Aug. 18, 2016, providers first diagnosed the patient with systemic inflammatory response syndrome, which the CDC reports the infected right hip seroma likely caused. The patient later went into septic shock and died in early September 2016. Envision Healthcare Corp. expands in Arizona through Oro Valley Anesthesia acquisition Colorado-based Envision Healthcare Corp.'s physician services division acquired Tucson, Ariz.-based Oro Valley Anesthesia. The anesthesia group provides patient care at eight ASCs as well as two hospitals throughout Tucson. Over the past few years, Envision strengthened its presence throughout the state by acquiring anesthesia, neonatal and emergency medicine physician groups. Advocate Sherman Hospital receives board approval for $12.7M ASC The Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board gave Elgin, Ill.-based Advocate Sherman Hospital the green light to build its ASC in Elgin. The 15,000-square-foot surgery center costs an estimated $12.7 million. The surgery center is a joint venture between Deerfield, Ill.-based Surgical Care Affiliates, 13 physician investors and Advocate Sherman Hospital. Frontier, Liberty Endoscopy Center open GI-based ASC in New York Frontier Healthcare Holdings and Liberty Endoscopy Center partnered to open a gastroenterology-facing ASC in New York, where the two companies are located. The center has three procedure rooms, with the potential to add a fourth. Outpatient rotator cuff repairs increase 272% in a decade A recent article in Journal of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons found between 1996 and 2006, there was a 272 percent population-adjusted increase in outpatient rotator cuff repairs. The rate of complications and adverse events following orthopedic surgery performed at an ASC ranges from 0.05 percent to 20 percent. Proposed Athens Surgery Center becomes reality The year-long process will come to a close for the Athens (Ga.)-Limestone Hospital with the groundbreaking of its $25 million surgery center. The state issued a certificate of need in September 2015, but the hospital took more than a year to file a signed construction contract. The Joint Commission, CMS ban secure text messaging use for care orders After allowing physicians to use secure text messaging to send care orders, The Joint Commission and CMS are revising their position and are banning the practice. The Joint Commission originally banned the practice in 2011. Surgery Partners opens ophthalmology-driven ASC Nashville, Tenn.-based Surgery Partners is opening a surgery center in Beverly Hills, Calif. The 20,000-square-foot center marks the ASC management company's second surgery center within the Beverly Hills region. AAFP pens letter to CMS over OPPS/ASC proposed rule In December 2016, the American Academy of Family Physicians sent a letter to CMS with suggestions on its Medicare's 2017 hospital outpatient prospective payment system and ASC payment system final rule. Physician burnout up 25%+ in 4 years In the "Medscape Lifestyle Report 2017: Race and Ethnicity, Bias and Burnout," Medscape found physician burnout totaled 51 percent this year, with reported cases increasing by more than 25 percent over the last four years. Emergency medicine physicians reported the highest burnout rate amongst practicing physicians at 59 percent, with obstetrics and gynecology providers trailing closely behind at 56 percent. UnitedHealthcare, FitBit team up on wellness program Hopkins, Minn.-based UnitedHealthcare is now including the FitBit Charge 2 device in the UnitedHealthcare Motion's wellness program. Through the deal, UnitedHealthcare Motion participants can use the device to earn up to $1,500 in Health Savings Account or Health Reimbursement Account credits annually. Wills Eye Hospital files suit for classification as ASC CMS and Philadelphia-based Wills Eye Hospital are at odds over the agency classifying Wills Eye as an ASC. Wills Eye reestablished inpatient care services at its main building in 2013 and then applied for Medicare enrollment as a hospital. Prior to adding these services, the eye center fell under ASC classification. CBO: ACA repeal could cause 26M to lose coverage by 2026 A recent Congressional Budget Office report found if legislators dismantle the ACA through the Restoring Americans' Healthcare Freedom Reconciliation Act of 2015, 32 million Americans could lose coverage by 2026. Republican senators bring ACA alternative to the table Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) and Sen. Susan Collin (R-Maine) introduced a proposal to former President Barack Obama's ACA. The senators say the alternative would grant states more power over healthcare policy while also providing Americans more access to affordable coverage and work to cover millions of Americans who presently lack insurance. The ACA hits peak popularity, despite looming repeal Despite a possible repeal of the ACA looming, Americans responded positively about President Barack Obama's health law. Forty-five percent of respondents said the ACA is a "good idea," while the remaining 41 percent said the law was a bad idea. 84% of medical personnel are unsure of MACRA's requirements, survey finds Providers spanning the nation are unsure about what CMS' Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act will require of their practice. 359k physicians to participate in CMS' Alternative Payment Models in 2017 CMS announced that 359,000 physicians intend to participate in four of CMS' Alternative Payment Models in 2017. Physicians rate top 5 patient privacy threats from EHRs The "Medscape EHR Report" asked physicians to rank the top five patient privacy threats. The top patient privacy concerns among physicians in relation to EHRs are: 1. Hacking and misusing information: 60 percent 2. Loss of patient information through a malfunction: 57 percent 3. Unauthorized access to patient information: 57 percent 4. HIPAA compliance: 35 percent 5. Internal sabotage of records: 24 percent Google, Boston Scientific 2017 New Year's Resolutions: Jumpstart digital health startups Marlborough, Mass.-based Boston Scientific's annual Connected Patient Challenge co-sponsored by Mountain View-Calif.-based Google aims to revolutionize data analytics in healthcare by awarding a $50,000 prize to an analytic-based start-up. Allergan fails to disclose 2014 merger talks The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission fined Parsippany-Troy Hills, N.J.-based Allergan $15 million for failing to disclose its 2014 merger talks with Actavis, also based in Parsippany-Troy Hills. The SEC said Allergan never provided timely disclosures about its potential deal with Actavis. CVS' Adrenaclick auto-injector to hit the market Woonsocket, R.I.-based CVS Health will soon release its Adrenaclick auto-injector. CVS decided to launch the Adrenaclick auto-injector on the market and sell the product for $109.99 per two-pack before potential discounts. Physician groups continue to critique Trump's HHS pick Physician groups spanning the nation continue voicing their opposition of Rep. Tom Price, MD, who is President Donald Trump's primary pick for HHS secretary. National Physicians Alliance, a nonprofit, multispecialty organization, questioned Dr. Price's trading practices while Clinician Action Network collected 8,000 signatures on a letter voicing their opposition of Trump's HHS pick. Trump's take on pharmaceutical companies: 'Getting away with murder' President Trump took on pharmaceutical companies last week saying such companies were "getting away with murder" based on their pricing practices. Sylvia Mathews Burwell defends ACA as time as HHS secretary comes to a close During a speech at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., HHS Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell maintained her support of the ACA and questioned the validity of Republicans' replacement plan. Ms. Burwell said promises concerning a replacement plan are unrealistic. She said, "As for silver bullets, they don't exist. If something sounds too good to be true, it usually is." Surgeons rank as No. 1 highest-paying job in these 16 states Surgeons had the highest ranking average annual salary of $247,520 in these 16 states: 1. Nevada 2. Arizona 3. Florida 4. Georgia 5. Tennessee 6. South Carolina 7. North Carolina 8. Virginia 9. Kentucky 10. Illinois 11. Wisconsin 12. Michigan 13. New Jersey 14. Vermont 15. Kansas 16. Nebraska Cigna anticipates 500k new customers in 2017 After adding 330,000 customers in 2016, Bloomfield, Conn.-based Cigna's CEO David Cordani aims to add 500,000 in 2017. In its Securities and Exchange Commission filings, Cigna said it spent $145 million on merger-related transaction costs in 2016. It spent $35 million in 2015. Data breaches jump 40% in 2016 An Identity Theft Resource Center and CyberScout report found the nation tracked 1,039 total data breaches in 2016, an all-time record. This figure equates to a 40 percent jump compared to 2015. The business sector comprised 45.2 percent of all data breaches last year, with the healthcare sector trailing behind at 34.5 percent. Healthcare stocks start out 2017 with strong gains On 2017's first trading day in the United States, healthcare company stocks are creeping up. These gains reflect a contrast to last year, with the S&P 500's healthcare index falling 4 percent in 2016. BISMARCK, N.D. President Donald Trump's executive order on immigration means that more than 40 refugees scheduled to resettle in North Dakota in the coming weeks won't do so. Trump's order suspends refugee admissions in the U.S. for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria. Lutheran Social Services of North Dakota CEO Jessica Thomasson said nearly two dozen refugees were scheduled to arrive in North Dakota in the next week, and a similar number of refugees were scheduled to arrive during the rest of February. All of those trips are canceled. Trump's order also temporarily bars citizens of seven predominantly Muslim nations from entering the U.S. Thomasson said that means uncertainty about travel for hundreds of refugee families already settled in North Dakota. North Dakota's two largest universities have cautioned their international students not to travel due to President Trump's executive order on immigration. North Dakota State University late last week emailed students from the seven countries, urging them to meet with an adviser if they have plans to travel outside the U.S. The email says, "most likely, it will be recommended you do not leave." The University of North Dakota in a weekend Facebook post cautioned international students not to travel, "even to Canada." UND International Programs Director Katie Davidson said in an interview that international staff and faculty also are being urged to stay put. The order has sparked widespread protest, including from some Republicans. But Rep. Kevin Cramer and Sen. John Hoeven, North Dakota's two Republicans in Congress, both back the move. Cramer said current immigration and refugee policies haven't kept the country safe, and that Trump is "pulling America's head out of the sand." Hoeven said terrorism is a "very real threat" and that a review of the nation's refugee policy is reasonable. Democratic Sen. Heidi Heitkamp said she thinks Trump's move will hurt the war on terror, and she calls it "outrageous." An employee at Gillette, Wyo.-based Campbell County Health mistakenly sent the Social Security numbers and W-2 information of 1,457 employees to someone impersonating a hospital executive, according to the Gillette News Record. The 66-year-old employee contacted police about the incident on Jan. 25. "It appears that an unauthorized individual, impersonating a CCH executive, contacted an employee requesting W-2 information for all of our employees who had taxable earnings in calendar year 2016," CCH CEO Andy Fitzgerald said. "Unfortunately, before it was determined that the request was fraudulent, the employee provided these files." Mr. Fitzgerald said no protected health information was released. CCH is working with investigators and a cybersecurity team to identify the impersonator. The system has pledged to pay for identity protection services for impacted patients. The following healthcare layoffs were reported by Becker's Hospital Review in January. They are listed below, beginning with the most recent. 1. Texas hospital shutters sexual assault forensic unit as part of layoffs Mission (Texas) Regional Medical Center closed its sexual assault forensic unit, or SAFE Place, reports The Monitor.The closure was part of 40 layoffs that took place at the hospital, according to Javier Iruegas, CEO of MRMC. Employees affected by the layoffs include two sexual assault nurse examiners, or SANE nurses, among others. 2. Long Beach hospitals lay off 130 employees amid financial challenges Long Beach (Calif.) Memorial and its two sister hospitals in Long Beach laid off 130 employees, or less than 3 percent of staffing, according to a hospital statement. The hospitals attributed the layoffs to financial challenges brought on by today's healthcare environment. 3. Memorial Hermann to cut workforce by 112 Houston-based Memorial Hermann Health System is laying off 112 employees, or less than 1 percent of its 25,000-employee workforce, according to a Houston Chronicle report. The layoffs primarily affect people in leadership positions, according to the article. This includes vice presidents, senior vice presidents, managers and directors. 4. Theranos lays off 40% of workforce Palo Alto, Calif.-based blood testing startup Theranos laid off 155 employees. As the company pivots toward commercializing its miniLab testing platform, it is "re-engineering" operations and streamlining the organization, it said in a news release. 5. CHI St. Alexius cuts workforce by 2.7% amid rising costs CHI St. Alexius Health in Bismarck, N.D., laid off 52 employees, or 2.7 percent of its total workforce, reports The Bismarck Tribune. The hospital attributed the layoffs to rising costs. 6. MD Anderson to cut about 1,000 jobs The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston plans to eliminate about 1,000 jobs, or 5 percent of its 20,000-person workforce, as it tries to improve its financial health. At a press conference, MD Anderson officials said between 800 and 900 workers will be laid off, and an additional 100 to 200 jobs will be cut through retirement and attrition, according to the Houston Business Journal. The job cuts will not affect any physicians. Culture. Productivity. Strategy. Execution. These ideas will never go out of style for hospital and health system leaders. The following leadership articles were published by Becker's Hospital Review in the last week. 1. 5-minute read: 6 fundamentals for success from Stuart Levine How can you help your organization earn top-notch results in 2017? In a Jan. 24 webinar hosted by Passageways, Stuart Levine, chairman and CEO of international consulting and leadership development company Stuart Levine & Associates, highlighted six strategies for leaders to reap success in the year ahead. 2. Healthcare in 2017: Amid the uncertainty, these changes are certain We are living through a truly transformative period in health for both consumers and the organizations who serve those consumers. 3. 5 tips for being an active learner at every stage of life There are many reasons to maintain a lifelong thirst for knowledge. Many people believe continuous skill acquisition is a critical factor for retaining professional relevance. Being knowledgeable about a broad range of topics equips one to engage in a diverse set of subject matter. And, learning is fulfilling. 4. 50 things to know about the hospital industry | 2017 The hospital industry looks much different in 2017 compared to 2010. Changing economic, regulatory and consumer demands have accelerated large-scale reform in healthcare delivery across the country. And despite the drastic shift in the U.S. political landscape, healthcare experts expect the drive to reduce healthcare costs, increase efficiency and demonstrate value to remain steady or intensify. 5. 4 thoughts on business strategy As 2017 starts and the world changes in many ways, including technology, the labor force, globalism, politics and more, we find it helpful to relook at strategy and what's working and what's not. Here are four thoughts on strategy. 6. To integrate or innovate? As the business of healthcare undergoes radical transformation, many hospital executives are focused on two primary alternatives to keep pace: innovate or integrate with a partner. But this doesn't have to be an "either or" choice. 7. What President Trump's executive order means for hospitals & physicians: 14 key thoughts President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Jan. 20 to reduce the economic burden of the ACA. Fourteen academics and leaders of healthcare companies and hospitals discuss the executive order's implications on hospitals and physicians. 8. The corner office: Children's Hospital of Orange County CEO Kim Cripe on the value of unfettered curiosity Kimberly Chavalas Cripe was named president and CEO of Children's Hospital of Orange County in Orange, Calif., in 1997. At the time, the hospital was struggling to stay afloat amid massive financial losses. John Noseworthy, MD, president and CEO of Rochester, Min.-based Mayo Clinic, and the Cleveland Clinic issued statements over the weekend on an executive order signed by President Donald Trump, which places strong restrictions on travel and immigration to the U.S. from several Muslim-majority nations. President Trump's order, which he signed Friday, temporarily bans travel to the U.S. by citizens of seven Middle Eastern countries, including Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. In practice, this has prohibited even legal U.S. residents from re-entry into the country, including many scientists and physicians. The rule also suspends the entire U.S. refugee admissions system for 120 days and the Syrian refugee program indefinitely, according to The Guardian. Dr. Noseworthy on Sunday issued the following statement: "Although questions remain about the order's implementation, Mayo Clinic remains steadfast in supporting our patients, staff, families and community. Each year, we welcome thousands of visitors from across the globe, many of whom receive care from our incredibly talented and diverse team members. We value our international staff and partners, and are privileged to train a broad range of medical personnel from around the world. Mayo Clinic is a place of compassion, respect and trust, and our collective diversity helps make us the best place to work and receive care. We are actively monitoring the situation, exploring ways to ensure that the needs of our patients and staff are met, and will share new information as it becomes available." Cleveland Clinic posted the following statement on its website: "Recent immigration action taken by the White House has caused a great deal of uncertainty and has impacted some of our employees who are traveling overseas. We deeply care about all of our employees and are fully committed to the safe return of those who have been affected by this action." Suha Abushamma, MD, a medical intern at Cleveland Clinic, was detained upon arrival at John F. Kennedy International Airport Saturday morning, then sent back to her point of origin in Saudi Arabia 20 minutes before a federal judge issued a temporary injunction that blocked the deportation of travelers detained at airports. Cleveland Clinic also published a statement from Dr. Abushamma: "I want to personally thank everyone for their support and well wishes. Although this has been a difficult experience, I am grateful to be safe with my family in Saudi Arabia. Please know that I am deeply committed to my medical career and to helping patients at Cleveland Clinic." The Senate Finance Committee is poised to vote Tuesday on the candidacy of Rep. Tom Price, MD, R-Ga., for the position of secretary of HHS. Rep. Price faced two hearings to vet his nomination, the first in the Senate health committee and the second in the Senate finance committee. At both hearings, Democrats grilled Rep. Price on his potential conflicts of interest in the stock market, as well as his views on drug prices, ACA replacement plans and Medicare and Medicaid. Republicans upheld Rep. Price's qualifications and called the attacks on his ethics merely partisan politics. Despite concerns from Democrats, The New York Times Washington correspondent Robert Pear wrote last week that Rep. Price is likely to be confirmed because he has strong support from Republicans who hold a majority in the Senate. The session will be live-streamed at 10:00 a.m. ET here. More articles on leadership and management: Long Beach hospitals lay off 130 employees amid financial challenges Cleveland Clinic, CEO of Mayo Clinic issue statements on Trump's travel ban Pre-existing condition bill to be introduced in House President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Jan. 27, which bans nationals from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen from traveling into the United States for 90 days, bans Syrian refugees indefinitely and suspends the U.S. refugee program for 120 days, according to The Wall Street Journal and New York Times. Several physicians who are citizens of one of the countries included in the travel ban who were traveling overseas attempted to return this past weekend and were affected by the executive order. A few were detained for hours before returning home while others were unable to board their flights back to the U.S. On Jan. 28, a federal judge issued a temporary injunction that blocked travelers held at airports from being detained. Here are five physicians who were affected by President Trump's travel ban. Note: This is not an exhaustive list. Suha Abushamma, MD. Cleveland Clinic. Dr. Abushamma, a Sudanese citizen and resident at Cleveland Clinic, had been traveling in the Middle East before returning to the United States on Saturday, according to Cleveland.com. She was denied entry into the United States after President Trump issued his executive order and spent 10 hours detained in New York before being sent back to the Middle East. Tarek Alasil, MD. Yale-New Haven (Conn.) Hospital. Dr. Alasil, a Syrian native and an ophthalmology resident at Yale-New Haven Hospital, was on a medical mission trip in the Bahamas when President Trump issued the executive order. He attempted to return to the United States this past weekend, cutting his trip short, according to the CT Post. He was detained by custom agents although he has a green card and is a permanent U.S. resident. He has since been released and reunited with his family. Sarwa Aldoori, MD. Advanced Health Care of Bakersfield (Calif.). Dr. Aldoori, who was born in Iraq, is a family physician. She traveled to Saudi Arabia earlier this month and was on an eight-day religious pilgrimage when President Trump signed his executive order. She returned to the U.S. and was detained for nine hours at the airport before being released and reunited with her family, according to a report in The Grand Island Independent. Dr. Kamal Fadlalla. Interfaith Medical Center (New York City). Dr. Fadlalla, a second-year resident in internal medicine at Interfaith Medical Center, attempted to end his trip to his home country of Sudan early after President Trump issued the executive order, according to ProPublica. He boarded a plan from Africa back to the U.S., but was then called off the plane and held at the airport for four hours before returning to his family's home in Sudan. He remains in Sudan and the Committee of Interns and Residents/SEIU Healthcare union lawyers are working on his case. Amir Heydari, MD. Centegra Health System (Crystal Lake, Ill.). Dr. Heydari is a bariatric surgeon with dual citizenship in Iran and the U.S. who has lived in Chicago for more than 40 years, according to the Chicago Tribune. He had been traveling in the Middle East to visit family when the executive order was signed. He returned to the U.S. and was held for questioning at O'Hare Airport before being released. For questions or comments on this list, contact Laura Dyrda at ldyrda@beckershealthcare.com. President Donald Trump on Friday signed an executive order that places significant restrictions on travel and immigration to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority Middle Eastern countries, which could have significant long-term effects in the U.S. healthcare industry, in addition to the immediate effects felt by providers who have been denied re-entry to the U.S. after traveling abroad. President Trump's order temporarily bans travel to the U.S. by citizens of seven Middle Eastern countries, including Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. In practice, this has prohibited even legal U.S. residents from re-entry into the country. The rule also suspends the entire U.S. refugee admissions system for 120 days and the Syrian refugee program indefinitely, according to The Guardian. Medical students and graduates of foreign medical schools will find out in March if they matched with a residency program in the U.S. However, President Trump's executive order has raised concerns that applicants from the seven indicated countries will be disregarded because of uncertainty on whether they will be able to enter and reside in the U.S., according to STAT. Many say the order will exacerbate an already significant physician shortage in the U.S. Many international physicians have built their careers in the U.S and have helped relieve the strain of the shortage. For example, 30 percent of American transplant surgeons began their careers in foreign medical schools, according to the National Institutes of Health. Even with the percolation of foreign physicians in the U.S. healthcare system, the Association of American Medical Colleges previously warned that the U.S. physician shortage will rise to between 61,700 and 94,700 by 2025, according to Forbes. Two hundred and sixty people from the countries affected by President Trump's executive order have applied for medical residencies in the U.S., each of which could "be seeing 3,000 patients each if they were all to match," Atul Grover, MD, PhD, executive vice president of the AAMC told Forbes. More articles on physician issues: WVU Healthcare to offer palliative care across system Why physicians find this topic difficult to discuss with patients What PCPs really think about repealing the ACA Boston-based Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Burlington, Mass.-based Lahey Health have signed a letter of intent to merge after years of on-again, off-again negotiations, according to The Boston Globe. It is the fifth time the organizations have discussed combining operations in the past six years. This is the first time they have filed a letter of intent. Talks between the two institutions failed in the past over disagreements as to who would lead the combined entity. Beth Israel CEO Kevin Tabb, MD, has reportedly agreed to lead the merged entity, along with a hospital board comprised of an equal number of representatives from both organizations, according to the article. "We are engaged in ongoing discussions, exploring the opportunity to combine our two systems and create the region's premier integrated healthcare delivery system, one that would offer patients exceptional care and unparalleled value, while keeping care in the community whenever possible," said Dr. Tabb. "I am confident that the affiliation path will position Lahey Health for further success and growth," said Howard Grant, MD, CEO of Lahey Health. "I look forward to working to bring the benefits of this combined organization to the people of Massachusetts." The following hospital lawsuits were reported in the past month, beginning with the most recent. 1. Ex-UPMC Health Plan executive pleads guilty in $846k embezzlement case The former senior director of Pittsburgh-based UPMC Health Plan pleaded guilty to embezzling $846,000 from UPMC by putting ghost workers on the payroll. 2. Feds accuse Texas health system of engaging in $20M kickback scheme The federal government intervened in a whistle-blower lawsuit alleging East Texas Medical Center Regional Healthcare System, an 11-hospital nonprofit system based in Tyler, participated in a kickback scheme. 3. Appeals court: UPMC was not negligent after 2014 data breach Three Pennsylvania Superior Court judges upheld a former ruling that Pittsburgh-based UPMC wasn't negligent in a 2014 data breach. 4. Strong Memorial Hospital employee accused of stabbing hospital visitor Police say a 22-year-old employee of Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, N.Y., stabbed a man who was visiting a patient at the hospital Jan. 21. 5. Norman Regional Health System in Oklahoma accused of billing fraud A qui tam, or whistle-blower, complaint filed in 2014 and unsealed Jan. 17 alleges Norman (Okla.) Regional Health System, the system's former COO and six radiologists engaged in a fraudulent billing scheme. 6. Federal court refuses to dismiss false claims suit against Prime Healthcare A California federal court denied three motions brought by Prime Healthcare Services in a lawsuit alleging the Ontario, Calif.-based hospital chain violated the False Claims Act. 7. WellSpan York Hospital faces suit over heater-cooler-related infection risks Twelve patients filed a civil lawsuit against WellSpan York (Pa.) Hospital that alleges the hospital failed to protect them from exposure to nontuberculous mycobacterium during open-heart surgery. 8. Patient allegedly steals physician's white coat to escape Texas hospital after arrest A 33-year-old woman was charged with a felony after police say she took a physician's white coat and used it to escape police custody at UMC Brackenridge Hospital in Austin, Texas. 9. Appeals court reduces judgment against HCA to $188M in breach of contract suit The Missouri Court of Appeals reduced a judgment against Nashville, Tenn.-based Hospital Corporation of America by more than half in a breach of contract suit brought by the Health Care Foundation of Greater Kansas City. 10. Penn Health System settles improper billing allegations for $845k Philadelphia-based University of Pennsylvania Health System agreed to pay the federal government $845,000 to resolve False Claims Act allegations. 11. Abington Hospital pays $510k to settle drug diversion allegations Abington (Pa.) Hospital-Jefferson Health will pay the United States $510,000 to resolve allegations that shortfalls in its internal controls allowed one of the hospital's pharmacists to divert more than 35,000 pills from Feb. 1, 2010, to Aug. 20, 2013. 12. Cedars-Sinai sues HealthCare Partners over unpaid bills Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles filed a lawsuit Jan. 3 against HealthCare Partners, alleging the El Segundo, Calif.-based medical group owes the hospital more than $6 million. 13. Aetna wins $41.4M suit against Texas hospital over billing scheme A federal judge ruled Aetna may collect up to $41.4 million in restitution from Humble (Texas) Surgical Hospital, concluding the five-bed hospital violated federal anti-kickback laws. More articles on health law: 5 latest healthcare industry lawsuits, settlements Walgreens to pay $50M kickback settlement CHS executives ink $60M settlement in investor suit A Texas federal judge ruled Friday that the state cannot mandate healthcare providers to bury or cremate fetuses, saying in his ruling the proposed law was vague, imposed an undue burden on providers and carried potential for irreparable harm, according to The Texas Tribune. U.S. District Court Judge Sam Sparks also wrote in his ruling that Texas had proposed the new rule "before the ink on the Supreme Court's opinion in Whole Woman's Health was dry," according to the report. The Supreme Court decided in a 5-3 vote in June to reverse two provisions in a Texas law that justices said "placed a substantial obstacle in the path of women seeking an abortion, constitute an undue burden on abortion access, and therefore violate the Constitution." One of these laws required physicians who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital and required abortion clinics in the state to have facilities comparable to an ASC. Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, which sued Texas in December to stop the rule, said Judge Sparks' decision shows that the law is "unnecessary, unconstitutionally vague and manifestly insulting to women," she said in a statement, according to the report. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a news release that his office plans to appeal the decision, adding that Judge Sparks' ruling "reaffirms that the abortion lobby has grown so extreme that it will reject any and every regulation no matter how sensible," according to the report. Becker's Hospital Review has named the following CEOs to the 2017 edition of its list, "60 rural hospital CEOs to know." The 60 CEOs on this year's list possess extensive experience in healthcare management, demonstrating their commitment to offering high-quality, accessible care to rural populations. Under the CEOs' leadership, many of their institutions have earned recognition as top-performing rural hospitals in the nation. For inclusion on this list, individuals must serve as CEOs of hospitals in "rural" areas, located outside major metropolitan areas. Becker's Hospital Review analyzed compilations by ranking and award agencies, such as The Leapfrog Group's listing of top rural hospitals and the National Rural Health Association's list of top rural community hospitals. The editorial team also accepted nominations for the list. Note: Individuals cannot pay for inclusion on the list. This list is not a ranking. Names are presented in alphabetical order. Sponsored By: athenahealth partners with hospital and ambulatory clients to drive clinical and financial results. We offer network-based medical record, revenue cycle, patient engagement, care coordination, and population health services, as well as Epocrates and other point-of-care mobile apps. athenahealth connects care across a national network of 87,000 providers and 91.7 million patients. Our network provides clients better insight across their own organization as well as the ability to learn from the experience of every other provider on the network. Throughout the network, we infuse the knowledge clients need to thrive in a changing industry directly into their workflow, from clinical guidelines to payer rules. We take on back-office work at scale so providers can focus on patients, not paperwork, and get paid more, faster. Robert Allen, MBA. CEO of Park City (Utah) Medical Center. Mr. Allen serves in dual roles as CEO of Park City Medical Center as well as vice president of clinical and outreach services of Salt Lake City-based Intermountain Healthcare. [READ MORE] Duke Anderson. President and CEO of Hillsdale (Mich.) Hospital. Mr. Anderson joined Hillsdale Hospital as COO in August 2006 and participated in a 10-month transition plan to become hospital CEO. [READ MORE] Donald Babb. CEO and Executive Director of Citizens Memorial Healthcare (Bolivar, Mo.). Mr. Babb led CMH through its transformation into a fully integrated healthcare delivery system since he became founding CEO in 1981. [READ MORE] Karen Barber, RN. CEO of Yoakum (Texas) Community Hospital. Karen Barber has served as CEO of Yoakum Community Hospital since 2006. Ms. Barber joined the hospital as a nurse in 1992. [READ MORE] Rebecca Beck. President of Hawkins County Memorial Hospital (Rogersville, Tenn.) and Hancock County Hospital (Sneedville, Tenn.). Ms. Beck has headed the 50-bed Hawkins County Memorial Hospital and Hancock County Hospital, a critical access hospital, since January 2015. [READ MORE] Syd Bersante, RN. Market President of St. Elizabeth Hospital (Enumclaw, Wash.). Ms. Bersante took over as market president for CHI Franciscan Health's Pierce County in Washington in 2015. [READ MORE] Darrold Bertsch. CEO of Sakakawea Medical Center (Hazen, N.D.). Mr. Bertsch has more than 18 years of experience in healthcare management and a career spanning nearly four decades in the healthcare industry. [READ MORE] Gary Black. President and CEO of Lenoir Memorial Hospital (Kinston, N.C.). Mr. Black joined Lenoir Memorial Hospital as CFO in 1986 and transitioned to CEO in 1992. [READ MORE] Dan Brinkman, RN. Regional CEO of the East Hawaii Region of the Hawaii Health Systems Corp. (Honolulu). Mr. Brinkman joined Hilo Medical Center in 2007 as CNO, transitioning to regional COO in 2014. [READ MORE] James B. Bross. CEO of St. Luke's Hospital (Columbus, N.C.). In July 2016, Mr. Bross became CEO of St. Luke's Hospital, a critical access hospital about 100 miles west of Charlotte, N.C. [READ MORE] Katherine Bunting, PhD, RN. President and CEO of Fairfield (Ill.) Memorial Hospital. Prior to joining Fairfield Memorial Hospital in 1998, Dr. Bunting spent nearly two decades at Richland Memorial Hospital in Olney, Ill. [READ MORE] Dennis Burke. President and CEO of Good Shepherd Health Care System (Hermiston, Ore.). Good Shepherd Health Care System includes a 25-bed critical access hospital, medical group and home health services. [READ MORE] Charlie Button. President and CEO of Star Valley Medical Center (Afton, Wyo.). Star Valley Medical Center's board appointed Mr. Button CEO in 2012. [READ MORE] Paul Chodkowski. CEO of St. Anthony Summit Medical Center (Frisco, Colo.). Mr. Chodkowski became CEO of St. Anthony Summit Medical Center, a 35-bed hospital with about 200 employees, in 2005. [READ MORE] Jason Cleckler, BSN. CEO of Delta (Colo.) County Memorial Hospital. Before taking on the CEO role in October 2011, Mr. Cleckler was Delta County Memorial Hospital's interim CEO as well as chief clinical officer. [READ MORE] John Dalton. President and CEO of Inland Hospital (Waterville, Maine). John Dalton became CEO of Inland Hospital, a 48-bed community hospital serving central Maine, in 2006. [READ MORE] Thomas Dee. President and CEO of Southwestern Vermont Health Care (Bennington). Mr. Dee took over as CEO of Southwestern Vermont Health Care, which includes Southwestern Vermont Medical Center, in 2009. [READ MORE] Kris Doody, RN. CEO of Cary Medical Center (Caribou, Maine). Ms. Doody joined CMC as a certified nurse's aid at age 15. [READ MORE] Desiree Einsweiler. CEO of Palo Alto County Health System (Emmetsburg, Iowa). Ms. Einsweiler became CEO of Palo Alto County Health System, a 25-bed critical access hospital, in 2012. [READ MORE] Sean Fadale. President and CEO of Community Memorial Hospital (Hamilton, N.Y.). Community Memorial Hospital's board of trustees appointed Sean Fadale CEO in August 2012. [READ MORE] Warren Forgey. President and CEO of Schneck Medical Center (Seymour, Ind.). Mr. Forgey, a fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives, became president and CEO of SMC in April 2015. [READ MORE] Jill Fuller. President and CEO of Prairie Lakes Healthcare System (Watertown, S.D.). Ms. Fuller took the helm of Prairie Lakes Healthcare System in November 2009, before which she served as chief nursing officer for nine years. [READ MORE] Ed Harding. President and CEO of Bay Area Medical Center (Marinette, Wis.). Mr. Harding has served as president and CEO of Bay Area Medical Center since December 2010. [READ MORE] Jason Hawkins, MBA. President and CEO of J.C. Blair Memorial Hospital (Huntingdon, Pa.) and Fulton County Medical Center (McConnellsburg, Pa.). Mr. Hawkins took charge of J.C. Blair Memorial Hospital, sitting just under 200 miles outside of Philadelphia, and Fulton County Medical Center, located about 175 miles outside Philadelphia, when the two hospitals combined leadership teams in September 2015. [READ MORE] John Henderson, MBA. President and CEO of Childress (Texas) Regional Medical Center. Mr. Henderson has been at the helm of Childress Regional Medical Center since 2001. The hospital is about 250 miles northwest of Dallas. [READ MORE] Leonard Hernandez. CEO of Coffey Health System (Burlington, Kan.). Mr. Hernandez became CEO of Coffey Health System, a 36-bed hospital with nine staff physicians and 13 outpatient specialty physicians, in September 2015. [READ MORE] John Hill, MBA. President and CEO of Bozeman (Mont.) Health Deaconess Hospital. When he took over as president and CEO of the 86-bed, Level III trauma center in August 2016, Mr. Hill had more than two decades of healthcare executive experience. [READ MORE] Ned Hill. President and CEO of Northern Hospital of Surry County (Mount Airy, N.C.). Mr. Hill took over as president and CEO of Northern Hospital of Surry County in October 2014. The hospital sits about 100 miles north of Charlotte, N.C. [READ MORE] David Keith. President and CEO of McAlester (Okla.) Regional Health Center. Mr. Keith joined McAlester Regional Medical Center, located about 130 miles southeast of Oklahoma City, in 2011. [READ MORE] David Kilarski. CEO of Sandhills Regional Medical Center (Hamlet, N.C.). Mr. Kilarski joined Sandhills Regional Medical Center, about 90 miles from Charlotte, N.C., as CEO in 2016 and immediately got to work. [READ MORE] Steve Massey. President and CEO of Westfields Hospitals & Clinic (New Richmond, Wis.). Westfields Hospital & Clinic is a critical access hospital in a city of roughly 8,700 residents nearly 50 miles northeast of Minneapolis. [READ MORE] Frank May. CEO of Yampa Valley Medical Center (Steamboat Springs, Colo.). Mr. May has been at the helm of the nonprofit, 39-bed, acute care hospital since April 2012. He previously served as Yampa Valley's COO, CFO and compliance officer. [READ MORE] Kim Miller, MBA. President and CEO of Beaver Dam (Wis.) Community Hospitals, Inc. Ms. Miller has more than 18 years of CEO experience. She became president and CEO of Beaver Dam Community Hospitals in 2006. [READ MORE] Patrick O'Donnell. President and CEO of Summit Health (Chambersburg, Pa.). Mr. O'Donnell became CEO of Summit Health, about 160 miles from Pittsburgh, in 2013. [READ MORE] Vince Oliver. CEO of Island Hospital (Anacortes, Wash.). Mr. Oliver received the American Hospital Association's Shirley Ann Munroe Leadership Award in 2015 in recognition of his work as an innovative rural hospital leader. [READ MORE] Anne Platt. CEO of Sutter Amador Hospital (Jackson, Calif.). Although she studied art history in school, Ms. Platt eventually found her way to finance and then healthcare. She became CEO of Sutter Amador Hospital in 2005. [READ MORE] Amy Pollard, BSN, RN. President and CEO of Noyes Health (Dansville, N.Y.). Ms. Pollard joined Noyes Health, a nonprofit system with a 67-bed hospital roughly 300 miles northwest of New York City, as president and CEO in 2011. [READ MORE] Jayne Pope, MBA, RN. CEO of Hill Country Memorial Hospital (Fredericksburg, Texas). Ms. Pope has led Hill Country Memorial Hospital, which is about 100 miles west of Austin, since 2013. [READ MORE] MaryEllen Pratt. CEO of St. James Parish Hospital (Lutcher, La.). St. James Parish Hospital is a 25-bed critical access hospital about 45 miles south of Baton Rouge, La., and 45 miles northwest of New Orleans. [READ MORE] Denise Ray, BSN, RN, MBA. CEO of Piedmont Mountainside Hospital (Jasper, Ga.). Ms. Ray's medical training and 28-year career in healthcare made her well qualified to lead Mountainside. [READ MORE] Steven Rose, RN. President and CEO of Nanticoke Health Services (Seaford, Del.). Nanticoke Health Services is approximately 40 miles from Dover, Del. [READ MORE] Ed Rush. President and CEO of Iredell Health System (Statesville, N.C.). After serving as CFO and then COO at Frye Regional Medical Center in Hickory, N.C., Mr. Rush took the helm at Iredell Health System in October 2004. [READ MORE] Maria Ryan, PhD, MSN. CEO of Cottage Hospital (Woodsville, N.H.). A board-certified family nurse practitioner, Dr. Ryan has been Cottage Hospital's CEO since November 2006. [READ MORE] Robert Schmitt, CPA, MBA. CEO of Gibson Area Hospital & Health Services (Gibson City, Ill.). Mr. Schmitt joined GAHHS as CFO in 2002 and was promoted to CEO in 2007. He has more than 25 years of healthcare leadership experience. [READ MORE] Rachelle H. Schultz. President and CEO of Winona (Minn.) Health. Ms. Schultz has been in healthcare management for more than two decades. In her current role, she heads a 99-bed acute care hospital, clinics and a 134-bed nursing home, among other services. [READ MORE] Emmett C. Schuster. President and CEO of Gibson General Hospital (Princeton, Ind.). Mr. Gibson has 15 years of healthcare leadership experience. [READ MORE] Dennis Shelby. CEO of Wilson Medical Center (Neodesha, Kan.). Mr. Shelby has led Wilson Medical Center, a hospital about 150 miles southwest of Kansas City, Mo., since July 2011. [READ MORE] Michael Stewart, MBA. CEO of Navarro Regional Hospital (Corsicana, Texas). Mr. Stewart became CEO of the 162-bed acute care hospital, located 60 miles outside of Dallas, in April 2014. [READ MORE] Erik Thorsen, MBA. CEO of Columbia Memorial Hospital (Astoria, Ore.). After serving as the hospital's CFO and then COO, Mr. Thorsen took over as CEO in 2010. [READ MORE] Russell Tippin. CEO of Permian Regional Medical Center (Andrews, Texas). Mr. Tippin serves as CEO of Permian Regional Medical Center, approximately 300 miles northwest of El Paso. [READ MORE] Joanne Urbanski, MSN, BSN. President and CEO of South Haven (Mich.) Health System. Ms. Urbanski has been president and CEO of South Haven Health for the past decade, before which she was COO of the hospital. [READ MORE] Terri Vieira. President and CEO of Sebasticook Valley Health (Pittsfield, Maine). After serving as acting CEO since April 2013, Ms. Vieira became CEO of Sebasticook Valley Health in July 2013. [READ MORE] Louis Ward. CEO of Mayers Memorial Hospital District (Fall River Mills, Calif.). Mr. Ward became CEO of Mayers Memorial in November 2015 after spending time as the interim CEO, COO and director of support services. [READ MORE] Pete Weber, RN. President and CEO of Gordon Hospital (Calhoun, Ga.). Mr. Weber began his time at Gordon Hospital in May 2009 after leaving his post as president and CEO of Texas Health Huguley in Burleson. [READ MORE] Randy Wertz. CEO of Golden Valley Memorial Healthcare (Clinton, Mo.). Mr. Wertz will retire in July 2017 after spending 28 years at the helm of Golden Valley Memorial Healthcare. [READ MORE] Warren West, MBA. CEO of Littleton (N.H.) Regional Healthcare. Mr. West has more than 30 years of healthcare and management experience, and he began his tenure as CEO of a 25-bed, critical access hospital in the White Mountains in 2007. [READ MORE] Bernard Wheatley, DBA. CEO of Schneider Regional Medical Center (St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands). Since April 2013, Mr. Wheatley has been CEO of the umbrella entity for three facilities: Roy Lester Schneider Hospital in St. Thomas; Myrah Keating Smith Community Health Center in St. John; and Charlotte Kimelman Cancer Institute in St. Thomas. [READ MORE] Mike Wiltermood. CEO of Enloe Medical Center (Chico, Calif.). Mr. Wiltermood has more than 25 years of experience in hospital leadership. [READ MORE] Gerald Worrick. President and CEO of Ministry Door County Medical Center (Sturgeon Bay, Wis.). Mr. Worrick has overseen Ministry Door County Medical Center for more than 28 years. [READ MORE] Michael Zimmerman, MBA. CEO of Sierra Vista Hospital (Truth or Consequences, N.M.). Mr. Zimmerman has led Sierra Vista Hospital since April 2014. [READ MORE] Policy experts and consumer advocates are continuing to encourage consumers who don't have employer-based health insurance and are looking for individual plans to enroll through the ACA exchanges before Tuesday's deadline, reports The New York Times. Experts and consumer advocates said while lawmakers continue to discuss repeal and replace policies, the health plans offered under ACA exchanges for 2017 coverage, as well as the subsidies to offset premium costs for low-income consumers, will remain intact until 2018. Sabrina Corlette, a research professor at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., told NYT unless something "drastic" occurs, consumers will be covered through the end of 2017. The deadline to signup for health insurance this year through the ACA exchanges is Jan. 31 for coverage beginning March 1. The Pennsylvania Department of Health and the CDC will not conduct further investigations in to a mold outbreak discovered in 2015 that contributed to five patient deaths at Pittsburgh-based UPMC hospitals despite the findings of an internal report that detected mold on hospital bed linens, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. The findings of the internal report completed in May 2016 were filed Jan. 26 in a lawsuit motion. The lawsuit was filed by the families of two patients who died after stays at UPMC hospitals. The report states mold similar to fungus detected during the 2015 outbreak was identified on bed linens supplied to the hospital by Paris Healthcare Linen Services in DuBois, Pa. Sign up for our FREE E-Weekly for more coverage like this sent to your inbox! "The facts of this investigation don't support the conclusion that infections resulted from exposure to linens," said the state health department in an emailed statement, according to the Post-Gazette. The CDC reportedly stands by the conclusions the agency with the help of state and county health departments reached in 2016. Even though that investigation never identified a specific source for the outbreak, the CDC determined infections were linked to the improper use of negative-pressure rooms. CDC spokesman Thomas Skinner told the Post-Gazette in an email that the agency's investigation did not point to the outsourced linen service. "If linens were involved most likely there would have been cases more widespread throughout [the] facility and especially cutaneous infections," said Mr. Skinner. No warnings have been sent to the 160 other hospitals that receive linens treated at the DuBois facility. More articles on infection control: Top 10 infection control stories, Jan. 23-27 Texas reports first case of a pregnant woman acquiring Zika locally WHO warns of possible avian flu pandemic To continue following the latest news and information for Bedfordshire and surrounding areas, simply enter your full postcode below Conviviality has seen a surge in sales Bargain Booze owner Conviviality Retail has seen a surge in half year sales, helped by a string of acquisitions. Revenue rocketed 211% to 782.5 million in the 26 weeks to October 30, while the firm swung back into profit. Pre-tax profit came in at 7.4 million, compared to a 4 million loss in the same period last year. The group's performance was boosted by the 200 million acquisition of drinks supplier Matthew Clark, pop-up bar firm Peppermint and wine wholesaler Bibendum. Conviviality chief executive Diana Hunter said: "These strong results demonstrate our competitive advantage, the broad customer base we have developed and the robust nature of Conviviality as the UK's leading drinks wholesaler, distributor and solution provider to our customers. "The recent acquisitions have resulted in Conviviality being well positioned in its market with a resilient business model that provides unique positioning for its suppliers and customers. "We are also pleased to report that the Group continues to trade in line with expectations for the full year." The company has also undergone a restructure creating three separate business units - Conviviality Direct, Conviviality Retail and Conviviality Trading - which Ms Hunter also flagged as contributing to the strong results. Conviviality runs Bargain Booze off-licences and the Wine Rack high street chain. There is reportedly growing interest in shifting operations to Frankfurt Germany's financial regulator is hosting more than 20 banks to set out guidelines for setting up shop in Frankfurt following Brexit. Bafin has brought together 50 representatives from those lenders for a full-day workshop addressing growing interest in shifting operations to the city following Britain's divorce from the EU. The invite-only event - held at Bafin's Frankfurt office - is understood to have drawn major US banks including Goldman Sachs, which recently played down reports that it could cut London staff by half to around 3,000 and organise transfers to New York and to a new subsidiary in Frankfurt. Citigroup and Morgan Stanley were also set to attend, according to reports. Citigroup, which employs around 9,000 UK staff, is looking to shift its broker-dealer business to the EU, but will make a decision over the coming months. All three banks declined to comment. Representatives from the European Central Bank and Bundesbank were also reportedly at the event. Neither confirmed their attendance. Global lenders, including JP Morgan and HSBC, have said that parts of their businesses would be moved from the City in response to Brexit and Prime Minister Theresa May's decision to rule out single market membership. It means UK-based banks are likely to lose passporting rights - which allow financial services to trade freely within the EU's single market - and raises the possibility that London will lose out to rival EU financial centres such as Amsterdam, Paris, Frankfurt and Dublin. HSBC has said it is on course to move 1,000 jobs from its London office to France, while around 4,000 of JP Morgan's 16,000 UK staff could be shifted abroad. Barclays is eyeing a number of EU cities as part of Brexit contingency plans, and could end up bulking up its Dublin offices as a result. However, it is not clear whether London jobs would be moved, or if new staff would be hired. The Prime Minister said she held "positive" talks with bank bosses and business chiefs after a trip to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, earlier this month, insisting that her vision of a "global Britain" would keep posts in the UK. However, Goldman Sachs chief executive Lloyd Blankfein reportedly "talked tough" in his meeting with Mrs May and said there was no reason why European financial centres would not emerge as "effective rivals" to London, according to the Financial Times, citing sources. Earlier this month, Mr Blankfein said New York is already gaining from Brexit as the US bank pulls back on previous plans to shift operations to Britain. Vodafone's Indian arm would be part of the country's largest telecoms firm if the merger goes ahead Vodafone has confirmed its Indian unit is in discussions to merge with Idea Cellular, a deal that would create the Asian country's biggest telecoms firm. In an unscheduled announcement, the telecoms giant said talks are under way with Idea's owner, the Indian conglomerate Aditya Birla Group, about an all share merger. "Vodafone confirms that it is in discussions with the Aditya Birla Group about an all share merger of Vodafone India (excluding Vodafone's 42% stake in Indus Towers) and Idea. "There is no certainty that any transaction will be agreed, nor as to the terms or timing of any transaction," Vodafone said. Vodafone's shares rose 3.28% to 199.7p on the news, with the firm rising to the top of the FTSE 100. Neil Wilson, senior market analyst at ETX Capital, said: "We have no more details than that but it seems Vodafone is taking the Indian tiger by the scruff. "India has become a trouble-spot for Vodafone, with losses there severely hurting the rest of the group. "Vodafone recently posted a whopping five billion euro write-down from 'increased competition' in India. "This was down to a 14% drop in data prices, caused by free promotional offers from Reliance Jio as it shakes up the market by offering almost free data. "The Idea tie-up looks like a way to limit the casualties on either side. "A merger could help the combined group maintain higher prices and take on the likes of Reliance Jio. "Something had to be done and this merger might be the way to strengthen Vodafone's hand in the Indian price war." The North Dakota Legislature will consider a bill to let farmers or those with home kitchens sell their goods directly to consumers. This helps restore some of that historical food culture where people would sell their goods to their neighbors, says Annie Carlson, who owns and operates Morning Joy Farm in Mercer. House Bill 1433, sponsored by Rep. Luke Simons, R-Dickinson, would allow informed end consumers to purchase food products which could include raw milk, baked goods or other products for home consumption. Such transactions would be allowed at farms, ranches, farmers markets, farm stands or home-based kitchens. Jared Hendrix, who served as Simons campaign manager, says the bill is called the North Dakota Food Freedom Act. Simons raises organic, grass-fed beef and describes himself as a Constitutionalist. He and Hendrix say the bill is based on a similar law in Wyoming. Kenan Bullinger, director of the division of food and lodging for the North Dakota Department of Health, says the health department will be watching the bill with interest. Supporters of the bill met with representatives from the Department of Agriculture and Department of Health. We had a great understanding and thought we could agree to support a cottage food law, Bullinger says. However, he has some concerns with the bill as written. The raw milk portion of the bill worries him. Disease outbreaks from raw milk are reported monthly around the country, he said. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says 26 states reported 81 disease outbreaks from raw milk from 2007 to 2012, causing 979 illnesses and 73 hospitalizations. The CDC also reports the incidence of raw milk-related outbreaks has increased. The majority of outbreaks involved at least one child younger than 5. When they added the raw milk thing to it, thats where we take a little bit of an exception, Bullinger says. Carlson hopes the bill does not become known only for its stance on raw milk, since it is more expansive than that. However, she believes people who know what they are buying and the risks involved should be able to purchase raw milk and raw milk products. Under the present state law, people have to own a share in a dairy animal to obtain raw milk. The proposed change would allow anyone to buy it. If you have to buy it directly from the farmer, you know what youre purchasing, Carlson says. In a free country, we have the right to buy raw milk, Simons says. Many home-prepared products already can be sold without licensing or inspection, Bullinger says. Such sales are restricted to community or nonprofit events and do not includes sales from homes or farms. Baked goods with a low potential for being hazardous, such as breads, lefse, fruit pies, candies, cookies, bars and other things that do not need to be refrigerated already can be sold direct to consumers, as can several others items including jams, jellies, eggs and some beverages. HB1433 would open up what could be sold to include some foods that could be hazardous if not prepared, handled or stored correctly, Bullinger says. He does not know what the departments official stance on HB1433 will be, but officials will lend assistance as the bill moves through the legislative process to make the idea work. I think its a great opportunity for some people to make a few bucks, Bullinger says. Simons believes the bill will face opposition from his fellow Republicans, but Hendrix has heard from plenty of people who support the idea. Hendrix doesnt see any great concerns to food safety from the proposed change. There is certainly no epidemic of people dying after eating food from their own kitchens, he says. Under the proposed law, producers would have to inform buyers that the products are not licensed, regulated or inspected. Consumers would assume all risk for purchasing, using or ingesting the products and would be legally responsible for any damages or death. Simons says lawsuits for negligence still would be possible under the legislation. Plus, word of mouth and market principles would take care of businesses with problems, he says. Carlson has an inspected kitchen and catering business, so not much will change for her if the bill passes. But she says the $100,000 it took for her to get her kitchen up and running is prohibitive for many people. HB1433 would give people a way to test out whether they want to make that kind of investment. Inspected kitchens only are inspected once per year, but under the bill, consumers would be their own inspectors, Carlson says. Its basically giving consumers the right to purchase from whomever they choose but also the responsibility of those choices, she says. Prime Minister Theresa May has met with Taoiseach Enda Kenny in Dublin to discuss Brexit. The border between the UK and Republic of Ireland is one of the key priorities as the UK leaves the EU. Earlier this month as the Prime Minister set out her 12 objective Brexit plan, Mrs May said maintaining the common travel area between the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland was a priority during the negotiations. Mrs May said that "no-one wants to return to the borders of the past". Theresa May welcomed to Govt Buildings in Dublin for talks with Taoiseach Enda Kenny on #Brexit pic.twitter.com/GJcXQw7RDR Ed Carty (@EdCartyPA) January 30, 2017 Read more: Read More During their meeting they discussed the current political crisis in Northern Ireland. Speaking afterwards Mr Kenny said: "We have once again reiterated our joint and continuing commitment to the Good Friday Agreement and its Institutions and our shared desire to see a fully functioning Executive back in place as soon as possible. "I emphasised to the Prime Minister the importance of finding a way forward on outstanding commitments, and in particular on issues like the Legacy Institutions under the Stormont House Agreement, and the Irish language. "We will maintain very close contact over the coming weeks and we both hope that the current election campaign will be calm and respectful." Mr Kenny continued: "We considered the enormous challenges that Brexit presents for Northern Ireland given the unique circumstances that apply there, including its particular geography and history. "We are agreed on the importance of our two governments working together to ensure that the framework of the Good Friday and successor agreements is fully preserved in the upcoming Brexit negotiations and outcomes. We discussed the necessity of ensuring the continued free flow of trade on the island and the need to avoid a hard border. "I made clear that, in my view, any manifestation of a hard border would have very negative consequences. For our part, we will continue engage with our EU colleagues on the challenges of Brexit for the peace process, as well as issues arising from the nature and depth of the unique economic and trading ties between Ireland and the UK. "Our two governments are agreed that a close, and friction-free, economic and trading relationship between the UK and the EU, including Ireland, is in our best interests." The meeting follows the joint ministerial summit in Cardiff where the DUP and Sinn Fein met with the Prime Minister. It was attended by DUP leader Arlene Foster and Sinn Fein's leader in Northern Ireland Michelle O'Neill. Northern Ireland's politicians have pushed Prime Minister for a greater role in the Brexit negotiations. DUP leader Arlene Foster and Sinn Fein's Northern Ireland leader Michelle O'Neill attended the Joint Ministerial Committee, with the leaders of the Scottish and Welsh Assemblies in Cardiff, chaired by Prime Minister, Theresa May. The Northern Ireland leaders also pressed Theresa May for a greater role in the Brexit negotiations. Sinn Fein's health minister Michelle O'Neill said Northern Ireland should have 'designated special status' within the EU. Speaking after the talks, Ms O'Neill said: "I told Prime Minister May that the Government at Westminster should respect the vote of the people in the north and that we should be designated special status within the EU. "It is regrettable that the Democratic Unionist Party continue to stand with the Tory party on Brexit against the democratically- expressed wishes of the cross-community majority in the north who voted to remain, and against the best interest of our economy, public services and powersharing institutions." Mrs Foster, who was First Minister until recently, said she and Mrs O'Neill would have to work together. However, Mrs May has previously made it clear that the devolved administrations wouldn't be given a decisive role in the UK's departure from the EU. Meanwhile Nicola Sturgeon has said she will judge whether Scotland's voice is going to be heard in the Brexit process before Article 50 is triggered, warning that "time is running out" to reach a compromise with the UK Government. She said she needs to see "tangible evidence" that UK ministers will take forward the Scottish Government's proposals for a differentiated deal on European single market membership and a review of the devolution settlement. The First Minister's comments will give rise to speculation that she could announce a second referendum on independence as early as March. Consideration of the SNP administration's proposals for the Brexit process are to "intensify" between now and the triggering of Article 50, following a meeting between the Prime Minister and devolved leaders in Cardiff on Monday. Speaking after the Joint Ministerial Committee on EU negotiations talks, Ms Sturgeon said she "remained to be convinced" that her Government's proposals are being taken seriously. She added: "I came here today determined to find some grounds for compromise, some way of trying to square the circle of the UK-wide vote to leave and the Scottish vote to remain, but I also came with a very direct message to the UK Government, that so far the compromise or the attempts at compromise have come only from the Scottish Government. "There has been no willingness to meet in the middle on the part of the UK Government. "In terms of me getting a sense of whether Scotland is going to be listened to at all, that period between now and triggering of Article 50 is absolutely crucial. "The next few weeks are not going to resolve every issue of Brexit, but in terms of me being able to judge whether Scotland's voice is going to be heard at all in this process... the next few weeks are very important." Asked if such a timescale could see her announce another vote on independence by March, she added: "I'll do what needs to be done to protect Scotland's position. We are running out of time for this process. It can't go on indefinitely and it won't go on indefinitely. "This is one of the last key opportunities for me to make clear to the Prime Minister that I have to see some movement on her part, and over the next few weeks she has got the opportunity to demonstrate whether that movement is going to be forthcoming." Scottish Secretary David Mundell confirmed "inter-governmental discussions" on proposals brought forward by the devolved administrations would be intensified. "The question is not about can there be differentiation (for Scotland), the question is whether Scotland would benefit from differentiation, and that's what really has got to be at the heart of these intense discussions," he said. "Is it necessary to have a separate deal for Scotland, is the wish for a separate deal for Scotland driven by ideology or is it really based on economic fact and Scotland's future needs? "That is what we need to have a full and frank discussion about in the weeks ahead." A spokesman for Welsh First Minister Carwyn Jones said the position of the UK Government and the Welsh administration is "not identical but not irreconcilable at this stage". The DUP's Sammy Wilson has launched an attack on the BBC and defended his party's distribution of a leaflet of "facts" around the botched Renewable Heating Incentive scheme. The East Antrim MP said that there was not the same reporting after it was revealed that the Department of Agricultural promoted the RHI scheme when Michelle O'Neill was minister. Mrs O'Neill has said she was unaware of how costly the botched scheme was until February last year and that the scandal was entirely of the DUPs making and she was not answerable "in any way" over the matter. The BBC defended its journalism saying RHI coverage "was based on the BBCs core editorial principles of fairness, accuracy and impartiality". Read More Speaking on Monday's Stephen Nolan Radio Ulster show, Sammy Wilson accused the BBC and others of bias against his party and Arlene Foster in their coverage. "Maybe [Michelle O'Neill] was unaware of the flaws in the scheme, maybe theses things did pass her by. "But had a DUP person said that there would have been immediate calls from the BBC for public inquiry, that she should be part of the inquiry and that she should give answers to these questions. "Not a squeak, not a cheep from the BBC. "All I am saying is when Arlene Foster promoted the scheme and was writing letters to the bank to encourage them to lend money, this was some kind of scandal." Mr Wilson said that it was "not wrong" for Michelle O'Neill's department to promote the scheme but if the department was aware of the flaws in the scheme while encouraging people on to it then "all the criticisms directed at Arlene Foster should be equally directed at Michelle O'Neill". "But the BBC have given her a by-ball again and this illustrates how this was all about the DUP. "There are questions about Arlene Foster but none of Michelle O'Neill. Why are BBC not asking for questions of her? He added: "It was hysterically stirred up and the venom was directed at Arlene Foster "And the BBC gave every Tom, Dick and Harry and Sean Mick and Barry an opportunity to have a go at the DUP over this. It was a scheme which was flawed." Mr Wilson also repeated his claim that the scheme in other parts of the UK were also flawed. When it was put to Mr Wilson that his statement was untrue, the MP responded: "For you to say there was increases in a scheme that was initiallydesigned to cost 400m to make electricity instead of using coal to use wood pellet burners that it goes up from 400m to one thousand million pounds per year and that shows there is cost controls "Catch yourself on." We need your consent to load this Social Media content We use a number of different Social Media outlets to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content. Manage Preference Mr Wilson was also asked about a DUP leaflet titled "The Facts" distributed to the public ahead of the election. In it it says RHI costs have been capped, there will be no overspend in the scheme and all recipients of the business scheme will be named. This is despite the DUP Economy Minister Simon Hamilton telling the Assembly there would be a 2m overspend for next year in the scheme and a court imposing a temporary ban on the naming of those on the scheme. The DUP veteran denied the leaflet was misleading. "This is an attempt to put some balance into the whole issue because we are not getting that from the BBC and other media," he said. "The media have facilitated our enemies in putting out the information." He added: "Simon Hamilton has introduced regulation which are doing away with the higher subsidy than then cost of the pellets. Because the scheme has to be tapered in that there will be a period before all the inspections take place. "The scheme is designed to ensure that all the source of the overspend is eliminated. However, with all of these things you can not turn the tap off overnight. "The costs have been capped, there will be no future overspend." On the matter of the naming of those on the scheme, Mr Wilson added: "We have given a commitment, we are quite happy for recipients to be named. "But it is like any action of government - Donald Trump is doing the same in America. He is signing executive orders but all of these things can be subject to judicial review. "What the leaflet is stating is that it is our intention to publish the names. "And if the courts stand in the way of that, then we can't deliver on it." A BBC spokeswoman responded: We remain satisfied that the design, operation and potential cost of the RHI scheme raised issues of legitimate public interest. "Our role has been to report, investigate and facilitate debate about what happened. We have reflected different opinions and given BBC audiences the opportunity to make their views known. "Everything that we have done has been based on the BBCs core editorial principles of fairness, accuracy and impartiality. These principles and the professionalism of our staff will continue to guide our coverage of the RHI story. Sinn Fein was also asked for a response. Michelle ONeill knew well in advance that she would succeed Martin McGuinness Sinn Fein has indicated that it will be able to work with DUP leader Arlene Foster after the Assembly election. The party's leader in Northern Ireland, Michelle O'Neill, said that republicans wouldn't be setting any pre-conditions on entering negotiations with the DUP in five weeks' time. The move holds out the possibility that, despite current hostilities, the two parties may well be able to do business after Northern Ireland goes to the polls on March 2. Ms O'Neill was speaking as she prepared to attend today's Joint Ministerial Committee, with the leaders of the Scottish and Welsh Assemblies in Cardiff, which will be chaired by British Prime Minister, Theresa May. Relations between Sinn Fein and its former coalition partner had deteriorated so badly in recent times that some observers believed the two parties could never again work together while Mrs Foster remained DUP leader. However, in an interview with the Sunday Business Post, Ms O'Neill ruled out setting preconditions for entering post-election talks with the DUP. "We have delivered Arlene Foster standing aside in terms of forcing the election by Martin McGuinness's resignation," she said. But she warned: "We will only have meaningful talks if there is real intent on behalf of the DUP." She repeated that her party wouldn't tolerate "arrogance" and would seek equality, respect and parity of esteem. Ms O'Neill also revealed that there was nothing surprising about her appointment as party leader and that she had known that she was destined for the job for a considerable time. "Both Gerry and Martin told me that I was going to be the new leader. They would have talked to me about it over the past few months," she said. Her remarks confirm reports that her leadership is a coronation by the upper echelons rather than as a result of a democratic decision-making process in the wider party. But Ms O'Neill dismissed allegations by the DUP that she was simply Gerry Adams's puppet as "pettiness" by that party. She said that she "absolutely can" take decisions even if Mr Adams disagrees with them, but she stressed her party's collective leadership approach. "I am still part of Gerry's team. He still is our president so we will be working very closely," she said. Responding to unionist criticism that she hasn't condemned the IRA and that she had acknowledged only republican victims of the Troubles, Ms O'Neill said: "I can clearly say that I regret the conflict happened, that there were losses on all sides. "I grew up in a small village that suffered on all sides. I don't believe in a hierarchy of victims." Meanwhile, in a statement yesterday, Ms O'Neill accused the Government of trying to impose Brexit "against the will of people in the north and (in) Scotland". She said: "I look forward to meeting with Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon and Welsh First Minister Carwyn Jones to discuss possible joint approaches to Brexit. "I will lay out the reasonable and achievable objective of the north being designated special status within the EU. I will again be raising with Theresa May the democratic imperative to respect the vote in the north to remain in the EU, the impact of Brexit, and the undermining of the agreements and political institutions by the Tory government." However, Mrs May last night made it clear that the devolved administrations wouldn't be given a decisive role in the UK's departure from the EU. The Prime Minister said she hoped that today's meeting would be constructive but warned there wouldn't be agreement "on everything". She stressed that the Supreme Court ruling on triggering Article 50 had set out "beyond doubt" that relations with Brussels would be determined by her government and Parliament. Mrs May said: "The UK voted to leave the EU, and the UK government has a responsibility to deliver on that mandate and secure the right deal for the whole of the UK." Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon warned Mrs May that she must take proposals from the devolved administrations seriously. Teenager Shane Patton with his mother Julie, who told the trial of the massive impact his death had on his family, and how his grandmother Mary had to watch as he was buried on her 70th birthday The father of a Donegal teenager killed by a drunk driver from Londonderry with nearly 500 convictions has rejected an apology from his son's Northern Irish killer, saying: "He's sorry he got caught." Shane Patton was killed on July 12, 2012 in Drumkeen, Co Donegal when his car was hit by a drunk driver travelling at around 100mph. The teenager had only just finished his leaving certificate exam and had dreams of working as a car mechanic. The man behind the wheel, Eamon Lynch, was handed an 18-month prison sentence in Letterkenny Circuit Court, sparking outrage from many due to his staggering criminal background. The father-of-three from Londonderry had 483 convictions, including 280 traffic offences as well as 50 convictions for burglary. When he hit the teenager in his car, he had no licence, tax, insurance and was drunk behind the wheel. Following the tragedy, Lynch crossed the border back into Northern Ireland, but was extradited before Christmas under a European arrest warrant. During his trial he pleaded guilty to careless driving and also wrote a letter of apology to the Patton family. Speaking to the Belfast Telegraph, Shane's father Martin Patton branded the 18-month sentence a "disgrace." "Death by dangerous driving is almost a petty crime in this country," he said. "It's very frustrating for the family, it's not going to change and it's going to happen again. I've seen numerous cases where they only get a year or two in jail, that's even for dangerous driving." "We won't be accepting (Mr Lynch's) apology, he can shove that. He's sorry that he got caught, he'd skipped across the border." He added: "It's just happening too many times in this country, I don't know how it's going to change. It's actually a disgrace the sentences that are handed out." Remembering his son Shane, he said: "He'd just finished school by two weeks. He had a course lined up in Londonderry to become a mechanic. For him it was always cars, cars, cars." "He was working since he was 16, he didn't drink or smoke. "It's still really hard on his younger brother and sister (Jason and Dina). There's not really much we can do about it, we just want his story to get as much publicity as possible. Something needs to be done." The Irish Independent reported that during Mr Lynch's trial, the court heard how he was driving his Toyota Celica with his partner just after midnight on July 12, 2012 when the crash happened. CCTV footage from a local service station had captured the entire incident. Garda forensic examiners estimated that Lynch was travelling at 165kph (100mph) on a road with a 100kph (62mph) speed limit. Shane Patton, of Cloghroe, Drumkeen, emerged from a side road, but Lynch was travelling so fast that he did not have time to take evasive action and smashed into the teenager's car. During the trial, the teenager's heartbroken mother Julie Patton read a victim impact statement out to the court. Mrs Patton said that her entire family were heartbroken that their "happy, beautiful boy" had been taken from them. She said Shane's brother and sister, Dina and Jason, did not have someone to help them with their homework and how she set the table for four people instead of five. She added how his grandmother Mary had to watch Shane being buried on what should have been a celebration of her 70th birthday. Letterkenny Circuit Court also heard how Shane, who had passed his driving test aged just 17, had only ever wanted to be a mechanic. While in school he would tell teachers what was wrong with their cars. The court also heard how Shane Patton's car was in good condition, and was taxed and insured. Glen Ullin City Councilman Sid White says no sooner did he move to take advantage of a unique way to create sales tax revenue for his city, than the Legislature moved to take it away. Thats how White perceives the timing of a bill that will be heard Tuesday morning by the Senate Finance and Taxation Committee to remove the ability of home-rule governments to levy their own tax on motor fuels. White proposed the idea to raise about $15,000 a year for Glen Ullin, based on estimated annual fuel sales in town of 750,000 gallons. He thought a 2-cent tax could help finance street sealing and other infrastructure projects, tapping motorists who use the town but dont live there, and providing some property tax relief for senior citizens. He said he had hoped to get the ball rolling so the towns residents could vote in the spring and the city could start banking the revenue and mapping out what work it could afford to do. But soon after the Bismarck Tribune published a story about the towns plans, a bill was introduced by Sen. Lonnie Laffen, R-Grand Forks, to remove it from taxable opportunities under home-rule charters. Laffen said the bills timing is no coincidence: Had he not read about the plan when he did, it would have been too late to get the bill in the hopper. We didnt realize that home-rule cities could levy their own fuel tax. Were not sure if its a good idea, or a bad idea, but we want to have a discussion about it, Laffen said. The Legislature reserved the gas tax for state roads, and were not sure how a home-rule city would use it. Laffen said theres also some concern that the tax would spread like wildfire, and suddenly gas stations outside city limits would have a price advantage, or some would move there to remain competitive. Were not sure we want to push all that business outside city limits, he said. White said he hopes his testimony at the committee hearing and an appearance by the League of Cities will sway the committee to keep the tax in place. Im trying to fight for cities to make their own decision, instead of having the state Legislature decide what we can and cant do. It doesnt cost the state anything to do this. Why would they oppose it? he asked. The Tax Department says no other home-rule government has adopted the tax, though a few have kicked the idea around. Kathy Strombeck, a State Tax Department research analyst, said the challenge could come in collecting the tax. The state has no history of administering local fuels taxes for cities or counties, she said. Laffen said he doesnt expect the committee to vote immediately. The hearing is scheduled at 10 a.m. in the Lewis and Clark Room at the Capitol. Barra McGrory said there was no "imbalance" in assessing cases Prosecutors in Northern Ireland have pursued five times more prosecutions against alleged paramilitaries than soldiers in the last five years. Since November 2011, the region's Public Prosecution Service (PPS) has taken decisions to prosecute seven Troubles-related cases linked to republicans, three linked to loyalists and two involving the military. In the same time period, there was a decision to pursue a prosecution in a case linked to alleged police criminality, but that was later dropped. The PPS collated the number of legacy case files examined, included those where no prosecutions were mounted, in response to a request by the Press Association. The disclosure comes amid an ongoing public debate on whether there is an imbalance in the way former security force members are treated by the legal system in Northern Ireland. At the weekend, Northern Ireland Secretary James Brokenshire insisted there was a "disproportionate focus" on the State. Northern Ireland's Director of Public Prosecutions Barra McGrory QC has strongly rejected claims prosecutors are part of a "witch-hunt" against ex-soldiers. Commenting on the breakdown of legacy case decisions, which cover the period since his appointment in November 2011 until January 2017, Mr McGrory said: "The simple and clear reality is that we deal with cases as they are referred to us, in accordance with the Code for Prosecutors. "There is no imbalance of approach within the PPS." The PPS said it had made decisions in a total of 17 legacy cases since November 2011. A no prosecution decision was made in one republican case, one soldier case and two involving police. A PPS spokeswoman said: "We have identified 17 cases which can be described as legacy in which the PPS has taken prosecutorial decisions since 2011. "Eight of these cases relate to alleged offences involving republican paramilitaries and there have been prosecutions in seven of these. "Proceedings are still active in three of these cases. "Of the four cases that have been concluded, there were two convictions and two in which proceedings were discontinued, one following the death of the defendant. "Three of the 17 cases related to alleged loyalist paramilitary activity. There were decisions to prosecute in each of these cases. "A conviction has been secured in one case and the other two cases are currently active. "A further three cases involved former soldiers. "Two of these are currently proceeding as prosecutions and the third resulted in a decision not to prosecute. "The final three cases involved police officers. In two of these a decision was taken not to prosecute. "In the third case proceedings were initiated but subsequently discontinued." In December, it was announced two former soldiers are to be prosecuted for allegedly murdering Official IRA commander Joe McCann in Belfast in 1972. Another former soldier, Dennis Hutchings, who is in his 70s and from Cornwall, was charged with attempted murder in 2015 in connection with the shooting of 27-year-old John-Pat Cunningham, who had learning difficulties, in Co Tyrone in 1974. The retired corporal major spoke at a rally in London on Saturday which saw around 1,000 people demonstrate against alleged harassment of former soldiers. The PPS is currently assessing files on soldiers involved in the Bloody Sunday shootings in Londonderry in 1972 that resulted in the deaths of 14 civilians. Further to Mr Brokenshire's Sunday newspaper opinion piece, the Government issued another statement on Monday to stress he was not criticising the legal authorities in the region. "There is a broad consensus that the current system was not designed to address the legacy of the past, and is not working to meet the needs of victims and survivors on all sides," said a spokesman. "This is not a criticism of any individuals, not least the police and prosecuting authorities all of whom uphold the law independently of government. "Rather it is a recognition that we need new and better structures for addressing these issues." The spokesman said proposed mechanisms to deal with legacy issues, which were set out in the 2014 Stormont House Agreement but have since stalled amid political discord, provided a "better way to deal with legacy investigations, in a manner that will be balanced, fair and proportionate and recognise the needs of all victims". Top medical professionals have warned that problems within Northern Ireland's health service have reached critical levels, with 2,000 nursing posts left unfilled. The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) and the British Medical Association (BMA) have both raised serious concerns about the future of health and social care services in light of the political crisis. Their concerns come after the Health Department cancelled meetings with health and social care staff to discuss the delivery of proposed health service reforms that were to make the region's health system "fit for the 21st Century." The reforms announced in October to improve services, cut waiting lists and care for an ageing population, have been thrown into uncertainty by the collapse of Stormont and lack of agreed budget. RCN Northern Ireland director Janice Smyth said the health service is "full to capacity and staff cannot work any harder." She warned that there are "upwards of 2,000 nursing vacancies in Northern Ireland when you take into consideration hospitals, community and independent nursing homes". "Nurses are working more and more hours and this pressure is causing stress and making staff unwell. "Nurses are already broken but what is most frustrating about all of this is that we have been warning this would happen for years," she added. Ms Smyth said it is essential that the proposals set out in the October report, Delivering Together, are implemented. "It is essential that we now press on with the reform and modernisation of health and social care and that the new minister continues the momentum that Michelle O'Neill (former health minister) began. "We congratulate Michelle on her appointment as leader of Sinn Fein within Northern Ireland but we will miss the energy, drive and commitment to working in partnership with nurses and other health staff that she demonstrated during her time as health minister. "Our health and social care service is in crisis and implementing the minister's vision is the only way forward. This work must continue irrespective of the election and its outcome." Dr John D Woods, chairman of the BMA's Northern Ireland Council, said: "The problems in our health service are currently at a critical point. "In secondary care, we have spiralling waiting lists that are getting longer due to poor workforce planning and rising demand on services. "The crisis in primary care with GP practices facing closure across the country is well documented." He added: "We welcomed the publication of the health minister's vision for health in October past and we would urge that the momentum of this process is maintained." A review into Northern Ireland's health service was commissioned in January last year by Stormont ministers seeking advice on how to improve services, cut waiting lists and care for an ageing population. At the time Professor Rafael Bengoa, chairman of the expert panel behind the review, said Northern Ireland faced "a stark choice". "It can either resist change and see services deteriorate to the point of collapse over time, or embrace transformation and work to create a modern sustainable service," he said. A prosecutorial decision on a man whose palm print was allegedly found on a getaway vehicle used in the Kingsmill massacre is set to be announced within two weeks, a coroner has been told. The already long-delayed inquest into the murders of 10 Protestant workmen gunned down in rural south Armagh in 1976 was again put on hold last year with the dramatic announcement that detectives had apparently matched the print to an individual. Two months later a 59-year-old man was arrested in Newry, Co Down. He was released pending a police file being sent to prosecutors for assessment. A preliminary inquest hearing in Belfast on Monday was told that the Public Prosecution Service (PPS) has written to Coroner Brian Sherrard to inform him that a decision on whether a case will be taken against the suspect is imminent. The letter, dated January 26, said it was "reasonably anticipated that a prosecution decision will issue within the next two weeks". At an early inquest hearing, a lawyer for the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) said detectives believed the print belonged to the arrested man. Prosecutors had been awaiting additional investigative material from the police before making a final decision. Belfast Coroner's Court heard that material was passed on recently. Mr Sherrard welcomed the indication from the PPS. "The decision will to some extent guide our next steps in this process," he said. The coroner said if the decision was not to prosecute then he would move to reconvene the inquest at the earliest opportunity. The textile workers were shot when their minibus was ambushed in an attack seen as a reprisal for loyalist killings in the same area. Those on board were asked their religion and the only Catholic was ordered to run away. The killers, who had been hidden in the hedges, forced the 11 remaining men to line up outside the van before opening fire. One man - Alan Black - survived, despite being hit 18 times. The getaway vehicle was left abandoned across the Irish border and the palm print was subsequently recovered. Following re-examination by forensic scientists in May 2016, a potential match was found on the police's database - a week after a fresh inquest into the shootings opened in Belfast. No-one has ever been convicted of the murders, which have been widely blamed on the IRA, even though the organisation never admitted responsibility. At Monday's hearing, which was attended by Mr Black and number of bereaved relatives, the coroner also expressed concern not all material from the Irish police - An Garda Siochana - had yet to be disclosed to the legal parties in the inquest. He said he would address the issue. "There is a cross-border element to it (the case) and we would not be able to proceed properly in this matter in the absence of disclosure of this material from An Garda Siochana," he said. Irish Taoiseach Enda Kenny vowed in 2015 that all Garda files related to the murders would be handed over to the Coroner's Service in Northern Ireland. A Catholic church has been "significantly damaged" in an arson attack. It happened in the Donegall Street area of Belfast on Monday between 4.30pm and 5.30pm. Police said it appears someone tried to set fire to a "heavy set of 25 foot long velvet curtains valued at 10,000". The fire alarm alerted the Fire Service who put the fire out. In a statement on Monday night Bishop Noel Treanor said he was "deeply shocked and appalled". He said: "This criminal action is a violation of the sanctity of the Church and an attack upon the local community that has caused significant damage to the property and left the local congregation distressed and deeply upset. Places of worship hold deep significance for the entire community and for their congregations and they should not be targeted. "The police and Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service were called to the scene and are currently investigating the cause of the fire. I pay tribute to these emergency services who acted quickly to bring the fire under control and have prevented further damage to this most beloved place of worship in the heart of the city of Belfast. "I am reassured by the many messages of support that the local clergy have received from across the community. Their support bears testimony to the fact that the repercussions of this action are felt by all within the community. "I would appeal to anyone who may have witnessed suspicious behaviour in the vicinity of the Church this afternoon to contact and assist the PSNI at Tennant Street with their investigations on 101)." Party colleagues have paid tribute to a Sinn Fein activist who died in a road accident in south Armagh on Saturday. Tim Woods, a father-of-two, aged 52, was in a one vehicle crash at around 3.30pm on the Castleblayney Road near Keady in Co Armagh. Shortly before the accident he had spent an afternoon out campaigning in the Keady area with his party colleagues for the forthcoming Assembly elections. Mr Woods was described as a dedicated member of the McVerry' McElvanna Sinn Fein Cumann in Keady. The Lord Mayor of Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough, Councillor Garath Keating, said he knew Mr Woods well and he paid tribute to his friend as "intelligent, witty and thoughtful". "He was very charismatic and personable. He had spent most of Saturday afternoon out and about doing election work," he told the Belfast Telegraph. "He was due to return to Keady on Saturday evening to meet with Cathal Boylan (Sinn Fein's candidate for Newry and Armagh). "We were absolutely shattered when the news filtered through to everyone on Saturday night. It's very difficult for any family to deal with. "He was a social worker and was very engaged in the local community. He was an Armagh native and moved up to Keady some years ago. I remember he would have served on things like Halloween committees giving young people projects to work on." He added: "My enduring memory of him is of his good natured banter at any meeting. He was very quick minded and always able to defuse any tension with something witty. He was just very much loved and his company was enjoyed at any meeting or social outing." Mr Boylan, who was due to have a meeting with Mr Woods on Saturday evening, paid his own tribute in a statement. "I am shocked and deeply saddened at the news that Sinn Fein party activist Tim Woods was killed in a car crash," he said. "My thoughts and prayers are with Tim's family as they come to terms with the news of his tragic death and I extend my condolences to them on behalf of myself and the party locally." He added: "Tim was a valued friend and party activist. He was a man of great wit and charm and will be sadly missed by all who knew him. It's still hard to take in that he has been so tragically taken from us." Michaela Boyle, Sinn Fein candidate for West Tyrone, added her own condolences: "Thoughts are with all our activists in Armagh tonight following the tragic death of Tim. Prayers for Tim's family and friends at this difficult time," she said. Detectives investigating the haul last July also seized 16,000 in cash from a house connected to the pair. Two men are to stand trial over an alleged plot to post up to 140,000 worth of cannabis to a house in Belfast, a judge ordered today. Chef Jian Bo Yu, 39, and his co-accused Mei Feng Yu, 42, are allegedly linked to a 7kg consignment intercepted after being sent from Scotland. Detectives investigating the haul last July also seized 16,000 in cash from a house connected to the pair. The defendants, both of Iveagh Drive in the city, are jointly charged with attempted possession of Class B drugs with intent to supply, and possessing criminal property. They appeared before Belfast Magistrates' Court today for a preliminary enquiry hearing. District Judge Fiona Bagnall backed prosecution submissions that both men have a case to answer. She returned the pair for trial at Belfast Crown Court on a date to be fixed. They are expected to remain in custody until those proceedings get underway. At a previous hearing lawyers representing Jian Bo Yu claimed he knew nothing about the drugs package. It was also contended that the cash seized from the address was a loan from other members of the Chinese community for him to start his own food business. Hurricane Fly winning the Champion Hurdle at Cheltenham with Ruby Walsh in 2013 Hurricane Fly visited the racecourse to meet his adoring fans The Hurricane Fly statue which was unveiled at Leopardstown yesterday One of Northern Ireland's best-loved racehorses has been immortalised in bronze at the racecourse which saw some of his most famous victories. A statue of two-time Cheltenham Champion Hurdle winner Hurricane Fly - owned by Belfast's George Creighton and Crossgar-based Rose Boyd - has been unveiled at Leopardstown racecourse in Dublin. Rose is the mother of Fiona Boyd-Armstrong, a co-founder with her husband David of the popular Shortcross Gin brand. Now aged 13, and two years into his well-earned retirement, Hurricane Fly holds the world record for most Grade 1 (or Group 1) races won by any racehorse. He also won the Champion Hurdle at Cheltenham twice, no fewer than eight Grade 1 races at Punchestown and another two at Fairyhouse. However, Hurricane Fly always saved his best performances for Leopardstown, where he was unbeaten in 10 starts at Grade 1 level. 'The Fly' won the Istabraq Hurdle in 2012 and the same race again in 2013 and 2014, when it became the Ryanair Hurdle. One of Hurricane Fly's finest achievements was winning five successive BHP Insurance Irish Champion Hurdles. A spokesman for the Boyd and Creighton families said they were delighted to provide the bronze of the champion by renowned Irish equine sculptor Siobhan Bulfin. "Year after year 'The Fly' gave so many great and thrilling moments - winning in his own way," he said. "The affection and support of the Leopardstown racegoers was unique. "We are honoured that the 'people's champion' will have a permanent base at Leopardstown and will always be part of the Leopardstown story," he said. And Pat Keogh, CEO of Leopardstown Racecourse, paid tribute to the legendary horse and its owners. "We are delighted that thanks to the generosity of the Boyd and Creighton families, Hurricane Fly will be coming back to Leopardstown," he said. "His statue will be there to remind us and future generations of his wonderful achievements." Prime Minister Theresa May, pictured at a press conference with Turkish prime minister Binali Yildirim, refused to condemn Donald Trump's ban on refugees Britons with dual citizenship will be exempt from Donald Trump's controversial travel ban, the Foreign Office has confirmed. The US president's team has told Boris Johnson that Britons who have shared nationality with one of the seven mainly Muslim countries will not be stopped from entering America. But UK dual citizens travelling to the United States directly from one of the banned countries will face extra checks. The Foreign Secretary has spent the day speaking to the President's senior adviser Jared Kushner and chief strategist Stephen Bannon about the implications of immigration curbs. His officials later issued guidance about what the border clampdown means for the UK. The statement said: :: The ban only applies to individuals travelling from one of the seven named countries - Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. :: Travellers to the US from anywhere other than one of those countries will experience no extra checks regardless of nationality or place of birth. :: UK nationals travelling from one of those countries are not included in the ban even if they were born in one of the affected states. :: D ual citizens from one of the seven countries travelling to the US from outside those countries are not affected. :: D ual nationals might have extra checks if they travel directly from one of the seven countries. Mr Johnson earlier branded Mr Trump's controversial policy, which includes a bar on all refugees, "divisive and wrong", and criticised the decision to "stigmatise" people based on their nationality. Prime Minister Theresa May faced a backlash after repeatedly refusing to criticise Mr Trump over the ban when questioned about the policy during a press conference on a visit to Turkey. No 10 later said the Prime Minister did "not agree" with the policy and would act to help UK citizens. Mr Trump issued a statement insisting he had not imposed a Muslim ban and said the US would "continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression". He said: " America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. "America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave. We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say. "My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. "The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. "There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. "I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering." The new 5 coin minted in her honour The Queen at her coronation in 1953 The Queen will become the first British monarch to reach their Sapphire Jubilee The Queen is to make history when she becomes the first British monarch to reach their Sapphire Jubilee. On February 6 - the anniversary of the day she became Queen - Elizabeth II will have reigned for 65 years. The Queen's silver jubilee in 1977 saw her travel 56,000 miles around the world in celebration, journeying from Western Samoa, Australia and New Zealand to Tonga, Fiji, Tasmania, Papua New Guinea, Canada and the West Indies. But there are no grand festivities planned to mark the head-of-state's new milestone. The Queen is, at this stage, not due to be out and about on official engagements on the landmark day. The sovereign, who missed church over Christmas due to a heavy cold, will undoubtedly be matter of fact about this historic occasion. In 2015, when she thanked the nation for its kind messages after overtaking Queen Victoria to become the longest-reigning monarch in British history, she admitted bluntly that the royal record was "not one to which I have ever aspired". She added: "Inevitably, a long life can pass by many milestones. My own is no exception." The Queen celebrated her 90th birthday last year and had a busy schedule commemorating the occasion, with a walkabout, beacon lighting and a black tie dinner for family and friends in Windsor on her actual birthday. A weekend of national celebrations, including a party on The Mall, was held for her official birthday in June. It is likely that any large-scale jubilee celebrations will be reserved for the Platinum Jubilee in 2022 - although any events will take into account the fact that Queen is due to turn 96 that year. The Duke of Cambridge is about to become a full-time royal this summer and will increase his official duties on behalf of the Queen. William and the Duchess of Cambridge are carrying out an engagement on Monday, February 6, but not to do with the Queen's record-breaking reign. They will be attending Place2Be's Big Assembly at a London school to mark Children's Mental Health Week. Royal gun salutes will be staged in London on February 6, as is the tradition. Benoit Hamon casts his ballot as part of the second round of the primaries in Trappes (AP) Benoit Hamon will be the Socialist Party candidate in France's presidential election after beating ex-prime minister Manuel Valls in a primary run-off vote. Mr Hamon's win sends the divided Socialists, weakened by the unpopularity of outgoing President Francois Hollande, into a tough presidential battle behind a candidate with limited government experience and hard-left politics that could alienate some centre-left Socialist voters. With ballots counted at 60% of polling stations, Mr Hamon had almost 59% of the vote to Mr Valls's 41%. Mr Valls immediately conceded defeat in the face of the result that appeared like a clear condemnation of both his and Mr Hollande's polices. With the ruling party having settled on its candidate, the race for the presidential Elysee Palace begins in earnest, although the outcome of the two-round general election vote in April and May looks increasingly uncertain. Leading conservative candidate Francois Fillon, who also previously served as prime minister, was rocked during the past week by allegations that his wife, Penelope, held a fake but handsomely paid job as a parliamentary aide. Financial prosecutors are investigating. At a campaign rally in Paris on Sunday - where a boisterous crowd gave Penelope Fillon a standing ovation and chanted her name, Mr Fillon said, "We have nothing to hide." "Through Penelope they are trying to break me," he said. "I will never forgive those who chose to throw us to the wolves." A priority for Mr Hamon, a 49-year-old former junior minister and, briefly, education minister, will be to rally the Socialists, split ideologically and wounded by Mr Hollande's five-year tenure as president. The party is also squeezed by rivals on both flanks. Fiery far-left leader Jean-Luc Melenchon and centrist Emmanuel Macron, Mr Hollande's former economics minister, are both making hay by appealing to disappointed Socialist voters. Early polling has suggested the Socialist candidate will struggle to advance to the presidential run-off in May, where far-right leader Marine Le Pen could be waiting, campaigning on anti-Europe, anti-immigration and anti-Islam themes. The turnout on Sunday, at around 2 million voters, was more robust than in the primary's first round of voting a week ago, but still suggested a lack of enthusiasm among the 44-million French electorate. Mr Hamon was not as tainted as Mr Valls by Mr Hollande's unpopularity because he rebelled and quit the government in 2014. Mr Valls served as Mr Hollande's prime minister for more than two years until last December, when it became clear the president could not win a second term. But having to defend the government's economic policies and labour reforms against Mr Hamon proved an uphill fight. Mr Hamon's signature proposal for a 750 euro "universal income" that would be gradually granted to all adults also proved a campaign masterstroke. It grabbed headlines and underpinned his surprise success in the primary's two rounds of voting, first against six opponents and then against Mr Valls in the run-off. Sharply criticised by Mr Valls as unrealistic and ruinous, the no-strings-attached payments would cushion the French in an increasingly automated future, as machines take their jobs, according to Mr Hamon. AP Boris Johnson has rejected comparisons from Conservative and Labour MPs between Donald Trump and the Nazis, saying it "demeans the horror of the 1930s". Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) said Mr Trump was a fascist like Hitler, while fellow Labour veteran Mike Gapes (Ilford South) branded the Prime Minister "Theresa the appeaser" given the speed at which Mr Trump has been invited for a state visit. Tory MP Ben Howlett (Bath) also cited the Second World War, highlighting a 1940 speech by Winston Churchill and a "dangerous trend towards nationalism, which we've not seen since the 1930s". However, the Foreign Secretary rejected the comparisons. Responding to Mr Howlett, he said: "I completely agree that we must stand up against bigotry and nationalism. "But I must say that I do draw the line, I do draw the line, at the comparison that's been made relentlessly this afternoon between the elected government of our closest, most important ally, a great democracy, and the tyrannies, the anti-democratic, cruel and barbaric tyrannies of the 1930s. "I think continuing to use the language of appeasement demeans the horror of the 1930s and trivialises our conversation." The comments came during an urgent statement in the Commons, where Mr Johnson faced pressure to stand up to the new US president after his controversial travel ban on refugees and citizens from several mainly Muslim countries. Mr Howlett said: "Is the Foreign Secretary aware of the speech in 1940 by Winston Churchill, where he said each one hopes that if he feeds the crocodile enough, the crocodile will eat him last, in reference to those countries that remained neutral in the war? "This dangerous trend towards nationalism, which we've not seen since the 1930s, inflicting itself upon the western world has wrongly been defined as populism. "It's clear that this executive order needs to be condemned. Does he (Mr Johnson) agree with me that this House must make its stand here and now, for the weight of history stands on our shoulders?" Bolsover MP Mr Skinner added: "Will the Foreign Secretary just for a moment try to recall, along with me, as I hid underneath the stairs when two fascist dictators, Mussolini and Hitler, were raining bombs on towns and cities in Britain? "Now this Government are hand-in-hand with another fascist - Trump. "And what I say to him - do the decent thing and ban the visit. This man is not fit to walk in the footsteps of Nelson Mandela." Mr Johnson dismissed the Hitler comparison and insisted it is in Britain's interests to work with the new president. He said: "I hesitate to say it, but your memory must be at fault if you think Mussolini rained bombs on this country. "But I hear the comparison that he makes, I don't accept that comparison. "I believe it's in our interests to work with our American friends and partners to show our disquiet where that is appropriate and to get the best deal for UK nationals and dual nationals." Labour MP Mike Gapes (Ilford South) went on to call Theresa May "Theresa the appeaser", given Mr Trump was having a state visit far quicker than his predecessors. Mr Gapes said: "Can the Foreign Secretary confirm that George W Bush was president for more than two years before he made a state visit, that Barack Obama was president for more than two years, and that many previous presidents didn't have state visits at all, although they did visit this country in their duties? "Why on earth has Theresa the appeaser got him here within a few months?" The "appeaser" label prompted angry scenes from outraged Conservative MPs, though Commons Speaker John Bercow said the matter "is one of taste, rather than of order". Mr Johnson said: "I do find it distasteful, distasteful, to make comparisons between the elected leader of a great democracy, the elected leader of a great democracy, and 1930s tyrants. "I really have to say I think it is, I think it is inappropriate." Donald Trump has yet to determine how Mexico will pay for a massive wall at the border that he has promised to build, a senior aide said. White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said that a "buffet of options" remains. He said the options include a tax on goods coming across the border, import and export taxes and even a tax on drug cartels or fines to people who come to the US illegally. Mexican president Enrique Pena Nieto last week cancelled a meeting with Mr Trump amid tensions over his plan to build a wall at Mexico's expense. Mr Priebus said it is early in the planning process but the broader point is that Mr Trump is fulfilling a campaign promise to build the wall. AP European Parliament Brexit negotiator Guy Verhofstadt said on Monday the EU has 'fewer friends than ever in the United States' The European Parliament's chief Brexit negotiator says Donald Trump poses a serious threat to the EU because he is working with far-right groups on the continent to engineer the bloc's disintegration. Guy Verhofstadt said on Monday that the EU has "fewer friends than ever in the United States today". He said US President Mr Trump and his advisers had joined with European far-right movements in "undermining the EU". Mr Trump himself had spoken "very favourably of the fact that other countries will want to break away" from the 28-member bloc after the UK. Mr Verhofstadt says Mr Trump is one of three threats facing the EU, along with radicalised political Islam and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Mr Putin, he says, is trying to undermine the EU with cyber-attacks and financing anti-European far-right political parties, including the Party for Freedom in the Netherlands and France's National Front. AP Referring to Brexit, Mr Verhofstadt said Mr Trump has, under the "enormous political influence of his chief political adviser Steve Bannon, sent people to Berlin and Paris to prepare the ground for similar referenda. Asked about what he referred to as Trump's "anti-Muslim" policy to ban refugees and citizens of selected Muslim-majority countries from entering the US, Mr Verhofstadt said Mr Trump has been influenced by the European far-right rather than the other way round. He added: "We invented nationalism in the 19th century in Europe but we apparently have forgotten what disaster, what atrocities that so-called national identity thinking and nationalism has created in Europe. "The problem is not national identity itself, it's when national identity is based on ethnicity and not values, that the problems start in Europe. "Twenty million people have died because of nationalism in Europe. "So putting your political thinking and the future organisation of Europe on nationalist ideas is the most stupid thing that you can do. It's playing with fire, knowing what it has created in the past." AP Protesters at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport at the weekend. (Photo by G. Morty Ortega/Getty Images) A defiant Donald Trump has said he has nothing to apologise for after his travel ban on refugees to block "people who want to do bad things to America". His White House chief of staff Reince Priebus added that the new US president's action "doesn't affect green card holders moving forward" and officials were using "discretionary authority" to ask "a few more questions" at US airports. Last night, there was a growing global backlash against Mr Trump's travel ban on refugees. The US president has temporarily barred citizens from seven mainly Muslim countries - Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen - from entering the country. Despite chaotic scenes at US airports, Mr Trump told reporters on Saturday the order was "not a Muslim ban" and: "It's working out very nicely". All refugees have also been barred for four months but those from war-ravaged Syria are blocked indefinitely as part of a plan to stop "radical Islamic terrorists". Well over half a million people have signed a petition to cancel Mr Trump's state visit to the UK, meaning it must be needed to be considered for debate by MPs. The US president accepted an invitation to visit Britain later this year, where he is due to be hosted by the Queen and would be treated to all the pomp and ceremony accorded to a state visit. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, Lib Dem leader Tim Farron and SNP foreign affairs spokesman Alex Salmond all called for the trip to be cancelled. The Labour party leader said: "Donald Trump should not be welcomed to Britain while he abuses our shared values with his shameful Muslim ban and attacks on refugees' and women's rights. "Theresa May would be failing the British people if she does not postpone the state visit and condemn Trump's actions in the clearest terms. That's what Britain expects and deserves." But a No 10 spokesman said: "An invitation was extended and has been accepted." And Taoiseach Enda Kenny is facing calls to snub Mr Trump's invite to the White House for St Patrick's events in March. The travel ban is being implemented in Ireland at US immigration pre-clearance facilities at Dublin and Shannon airports. The Green and Labour Party leaders are urging the Taoiseach to boycott the traditional gifting of a bowl of shamrock to the US president on St Patrick's Day amid a growing global backlash over the immigration crackdown. Mr Trump confirmed last week that his St Patrick's Day invitation to Mr Kenny, originally extended in a 10-minute phone call last November, still stands. The DUP said last night that they had accepted an invitation when Mr Trump was elected, and that position had not changed. The SDLP leader Colum Eastwood has already said he would not attend. He added last night: "I would urge the Irish government to take every step possible to ensure that these discriminatory checks and bans are not enforced at our airports. "We should have no hand, act or part in implementing this ban. "They should do so to stand against the dangerous principle and precedent of this ban but also as part of their duty to protect the rights of Irish citizens who hold dual citizenship with those countries who are facing this immigration ban." Sinn Fein did not state whether it intended to attend the White House for the St Patrick's week events, but party president Gerry Adams said: "This arbitrary ban and the refusal to offer sanctuary to refugees runs counter to international obligations, equality and decency. Generations of Irish fled starvation, poverty and conflict to make a new life and contribute to building America." "I believe that the Irish Government should not allow Irish airports to enforce this fundamentally unjust order." MINOT -- Less than six months after opening its doors, Minot's opioid treatment clinic is busier than its corporate owners expected it might be at this point. Community Medical Services has seen its client base grow to about 53 people since starting up in August. "That's pretty rapid," Mark Schaefer, CMS regional manager in Minot, said of the growth. "It's definitely faster than what they expected." The Minot facility is North Dakota's first opioid treatment clinic using drug therapy with methadone to assist in client recovery. CMS operates four methadone clinics in Arizona, four in Montana and one in Alaska. It is setting up a clinic in Fargo that is scheduled to open in late spring or early summer. Heartview in Bismarck also is preparing to open a clinic. Most clients at Minot's CMS clinic are from the Minot area but some also come from places such Bismarck, Jamestown, Williston and Grand Forks because closer treatment options don't exist at this time, Schaefer said. About 95 percent are self-referred and come with a strong motivation to complete the program. "The phrase I hear most often is, 'I just can't do this anymore,'" Schaefer said. "They are ready to change. They just need the tools and the assistance to get going." Some clients have been through the courts or other addiction programs and see a need for methadone treatment, he said. CMS works with other treatment programs and a client's other medical providers in coordinating care. Client demographics show an age range from 19 to 62. Some trace their addiction to prescription painkillers and others to street drugs. Some have struggled with addiction only a couple of years while others may have conquered an addiction years ago only to find themselves relapsing after taking a prescription painkiller. The first step for a potential client is an initial screening. The clinic only works with opioid addictions of more than a year, Schaefer said. Clients are initially assessed by the clinic physician and a counselor. They continue to receive counseling, and they visit the clinic daily to receive their methadone. Over time, they are able to reduce visits and take a limited amount of the treatment drug home with them. Methadone is controlled by the federal Drug Enforcement Agency. Although methadone does not create a drug-induced high, it is addictive, Schaefer. Methadone helps stabilize clients, who in most cases can be weaned off the drug. The experience in CMS's Arizona clinics shows about an 80 percent success rate in eliminating opioid abuse, he said. Clients typically continue with a clinic and methadone use for two years. "It's definitely long-term treatment," Schaefer said. However, he added, "Within three days we see a different person, and the most common phrase they use is, 'I just feel normal.'" Once addicted to an opioid, a person might no longer get the "high" but needs the drug to avoid feeling ill, he said. During that withdrawal, methadone serves to reduce drug craving. Overdoses can occur with relapses so methadone plays an important role in both preventing the relapse and reducing the reaction should an opioid be re-introduced into the body. CMS also is piloting the use of Suboxone in Arizona to possibly add it to its treatment pharmacy. Schaefer said Suboxone can be a preferred alternative for some clients, especially after reaching the stage where they are able to reduce clinic visits and add self-dosing at home. Clinic services are self pay, but CMS is working with the state on Medicaid and with private insurers to eventually provide coverage. A voucher program does exist that can provide subsidies to low-income individuals. About a dozen clients are taking advantage of that program in Minot, Schaefer said. The out-of-pocket cost of $85 a week for treatment often is less than people had to come up with, sometimes illegally, to obtain illicit drugs, Schaefer said. About half of clients are employed when they seek help, and they are able to become better employees as a result of addressing their addictions, he said. The other half often are able to join the workforce. "We have had many, many clients getting jobs. They are working toward reunification with their family," Schaefer said. Parenting improves and so does family economics. One client was excited to say she was able to get her hair done something she never had money to do while addicted. "That daily routine is a new routine for them," Schaefer said. "It becomes a new routine that doesn't involve those negative things." In pioneering a new service in North Dakota, CMS worked with the Department of Human Services to establish the necessary state rules and clinic policies. CMS still works closely with the North Central Human Services Center in Minot. Schaefer said it also was necessary to meet federal licensing rules and to work with local entities, including residential treatment programs to develop policies so residents can participate in the opioid treatment. Schaefer said it is too early to say what CMS's caseload in Minot will look like into the future, but the clinic is staffed to accommodate up to 70 clients. The clinic employs three nurses who work separate shifts to fulfill the facility's nursing needs. It has two counselors, one of whom sees clients via telemedicine from Montana. An internal medicine doctor, board-certified in addiction treatment, sees patients via telemedicine and also in person during visits four times a year. Schaefer said CMS is seeking a local provider for those medical services. Client appointment hours are between 6 a.m. and 11 a.m. weekday mornings and for a couple of hours Saturday mornings. Schaefer is a Minot native who worked with various local service agencies before joining CMS. In his new role, he has sought to get the word out about the clinic's services through meetings with community groups and leaders. He said CMS's goal is to educate people not only about its services but also about other addiction services that exist in Minot. CMS also strives to be a good neighbor in north Minot in keeping an unobtrusive presence. "We are very grateful about how it's been received," he said. The opening of a clinic had been delayed while the city investigated to make sure a methodone facility would be an asset and not a liability. Schaefer said the clinic is addressing a problem that impacts local residents and their families. "The people struggling with it are already here," he said of opioid addiction. The clinic doesn't add to the problem but it can be a solution, he added. "When they are coming here, they are not getting into trouble," he said. "They are getting connected with family and they are doing better." A holocaust survivor commemorates the people killed by the Nazis at the former Auschwitz Nazi death camp (AP) Historians in Poland have put online what they say is the most complete list of Nazi SS commanders and guards at the former German death camp of Auschwitz. The Institute of National Remembrance said on Monday that the SS KL Auschwitz Garrison list is based on data from archives in Poland, Germany, Austria, the US and elsewhere. The work - which was carried out by historian Aleksander Lasik, the institute and the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial - has more than 8,500 entries. Most of them include the date and place of birth, nationality, military service and party affiliation. Some have a photo attached. The dates of service at Auschwitz are being verified pending publication. Some 1.1 million people, mostly Europe's Jews, were killed at Auschwitz, which the Nazi Germans operated in occupied Poland. AP Burma politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of a long-time adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered at a cemetery for his funeral. Ko Ni, a prominent member of Burma's Muslim minority, was shot in the head at close range as he walked out of Rangoon airport on Sunday. The Ministry of Information said in a video posted on state-run MRTV that the gunman was arrested after he wounded a taxi driver who tried to stop him from fleeing. The ruling National League for Democracy party issued a statement denouncing the assassination and adding authorities are trying hard to track down accomplices of the arrested gunman. The NLD said Ko Ni was irreplaceable, both to Ms Suu Kyi and the party. AP An exterior view of Adolf Hitler's birth house in Braunau am Inn, Austria. (AP/Kerstin Joensson) The owner of the house where Adolf Hitler was born is going to high court to challenge the Austrian government's right to take possession of the property, according to reports. The challenge is in response to last month's parliamentary approval of a government bill to expropriate the house after she refused to sell it. The daily Kurier, in a report for its Tuesday edition, says owner Gerlinde Pommer has asked Austria's Constitutional Court to rule against the government move. Hitler was born in 1889 in the house in Braunau am Inn, a town on the German border. Officials want to remodel the property's facade to eliminate its draw as a shrine for admirers of the Nazi dictator and to offer it to an agency that runs workshops for disabled people. AP The shooting happened in a mosque in Quebec City (AP) Quebec mosque attack suspect Alexandre Bissonnette has been charged with six counts of first-degree murder. Bissonnette has also been charged with five counts of attempted murder in connection with the shooting at a mosque late on Sunday. Quebec police had earlier said that a second man arrested following the attack was now being treated as a witness. Six people, ranging in age from 35 to 65, were killed in the shooting at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre, while five were in critical condition and 12 others suffered minor injuries. The six people who died have been identified as Mamadou Tanou Barry, 42; Abdelkrim Hassane, 41; Khaled Belkacemi, 60; Aboubaker Thabti, 44; Azzeddine Soufiane, 57; and Ibrahima Barry, 39. Bissonnette has made a brief court appearance at which he did not enter a plea. He appeared in a white prisoner jumpsuit, and stared at his feet and fidgeted during the hearing. His next court date is February 21. At the beginning of Prime Ministers Questions last week, Theresa May said this: I am sure that the whole House will join me in sending our thoughts to the friends and family of the police officer who was shot in Belfast over the weekend. The Police Service of Northern Ireland does a superb job in keeping us safe and secure, and has our fullest support. Leader of the Opposition Jeremy Corbyn had little option but to echo her. I join the Prime Minister in expressing condolences Im sure of the whole House to the family of the police officer who lost his life over the weekend in Northern Ireland, he said. He said nothing about the PSNI and went straight on to matters Brexit. One of his harassed spokespeople later said that he had meant to say nearly died. Corbyn strews gaffes and errors wherever he goes and it can be hard to make sense of them. Not least because hes known to be privately anti-EU but to have been forced by his colleagues to campaign (tepidly) for Remain, observers are still trying to work out what this meant: Labour is not wedded to freedom of movement for EU citizens as a point of principle, but I dont want that to be misinterpreted, nor do we rule it out. What can we learn from the exchange about the injured policeman? Well, that for all his long-expressed concern about Northern Ireland, Mr Corbyn didnt know the facts about a major event from three days previously, and that praising the police still sticks in the craw of this long-standing terrorist supporter. Much more clear was his virtue-signalling tweet on Saturday implicitly criticising President Trumps orders restricting entry from Muslim countries: If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. Mr Corbyn is not the brightest, and he has a startling ability to give hostages to fortune, so there were plenty of responses reminding him that among the sides he has chosen over the years have been the Chavez regime that has ruined Venezuela, the murderous bigots of Gazas Hamas, Bashar al-Assad, gay-hanging Iran, President Putin, whatever he does, and of course violent Irish republicans. In 1984 he was on the board of the hard-left Labour Briefing, which supported the IRA after the Brighton bombings where it had murdered four and just missed the prime minister. You should have stood up for Britain when it was fighting the IRA Jez, said one response. Physician heal thyself. Another post showed a 1987 news report featuring Mr Corbyn telling a London meeting in support of the terrorists killed at Loughgall: Im happy to commemorate all those who died fighting for an independent Ireland. And much was made of a 2016 tweet from Labour Councillor Gareth Snell, now Labour candidate to fight a key by-election in Stoke-on-Trent next month, about the IRA supporting friend of Hamas. Theres plenty of dirt to dig on Mr Corbyn, but of course unlike most of his colleagues and traditional Labour voters he doesnt see it as dirt. He not only appointed to his inner circle Seumas Milne, accused by critics of Stalinist sympathies, and Andrew Murray, who succeeded Mr Corbyn as chairman of the virulently anti-West Stop the War Coalition, but in December last year added Jayne Fisher, head of Sinn Feins London office for many years. Shes to be in charge of stakeholder engagement, whatever that is, and is very lovely. Its hardly a surprise that Baroness (May) Blood later that month told Talkback that she believed hes helping to destroy the Labour party. As President of the Labour Party of Northern Ireland (LPNI), after years of unsuccessfully pleading with HQ to allow it to stand candidates, she wistfully hoped that he will slowly come to realise weve got to be recognised. Like the Labour Party in Great Britain, Mr Corbyns powerbase is mostly among new, naive members who havent a clue about politics, but worship the Marxist dunderhead they elected leader who hasnt had a new thought in 40 years. The only consolation is that at times this useful idiot must be as much of an embarrassment to newly respectable Sinn Fein as he used to be an asset. Last Tuesday US President Donald Trump signed an executive order to allow the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline through the Standing Rock Indian Reservation. The aim of the pipeline is to create a direct route to transport crude oil from the North Dakota Bakken region through South Dakota and Iowa and into Illinois. The construction of this pipeline could destroy ancestral burial grounds and poison the water supply for the sovereign Lakota nation who live on the Standing Rock Reservation, as well as the millions of Americans downstream who rely on the Missouri River. In recent months thousands of people from across the globe (including here) have joined in solidarity with the Lakota people at Standing Rock in order to protest its construction. I would earnestly hope that our political representatives would take their first opportunity to voice the opposition felt by many of their ordinary constituents to Mr Trump's issuing of this executive order. DR STEPHEN JAMES MINTON By email A charity connected to UVF boss Winkie Irvine is running three large wood pellet boilers in the middle of the heavily built-up Woodvale district of Belfast. The 200kw furnaces provide heating for accommodation at Cambrai Court, McCallum Court and Mount Eden Court. The sheltered properties are managed by the Woodvale Shankill Community Housing Association (WSCHA), which is responsible for the upkeep of hundreds of social homes. Leading loyalist Irvine sits on the charitys seven-strong board. Planning applications to install wood-chip boilers at McCallum Court and Mount Eden Court were made in April 2015 seven months before the now notorious Renewable Heating Incentive (RHI) was capped. The WSCHA only sought planning permission for a similar boiler at Cambrai Court last December, however Sunday Life understands it has been operating for more than a year without official approval. Belfast City Council, which is reponsible for planning issues, said: The council has received applications for all three boilers. Planning permission has been granted for boilers at McCallum Court and Mount Eden. The council is currently considering a planning application for a boiler at Cambrai Court. Until November 2015 anyone accepted onto the now discredited RHI scheme, which was launched in 2013 by then Enterprise Minister Arlene Foster, was paid a 1.60p government subsidy for every 1 of energy they burned. The fallout from the botched initiative, that is expected to cost the taxpayer 480m over the next 20 years, led to the collapse of the Stormont Assembly. The DUP has been heavily criticism for its role in promoting the scheme, particularly as a number of relatives of senior party members have benefited. Expand Expand Expand Expand Expand Expand Previous Next Close Woodvale and Shankill housing association wood burning boilers. Winston 'Winkie' Irvine Cambrai Court, Shankill boiler Cambrai Court, Shankill boiler Cambrai Court, Shankill boiler Cambrai Court, Shankill boiler / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Woodvale and Shankill housing association wood burning boilers. Among its biggest detractors has been the UVF-linked PUP, which now finds itself dragged into the RHI mess due to Irvines ties to the Woodvale boilers. The UVF commander took to Twitter this week to complain about Sunday Lifes revelations, moaning: Spouting lies and fabricating facts maybe (sic) of interest to some people, but hardly surprising. But the reality is that Irvine sits on the board of the WSCHA. The housing charity is also facing sham tender claims made at an employment tribunal over its awarding of a lucrative building contract to the WGS construction firm, of which Irvine is a director. WHSCA was contacted by Sunday Life so it had an opportunity to explain why it decided to install three RHI boilers at its sheltered accomodation complexes, however no one from the housing association has returned our calls. Although two of the boilers have been granted planning permission and the third is awaiting approval, concerns have been raised about the furnaces close proximity to houses. Asked if building control had approve the boilers, the council said: A building regulations application is required for the installation of a boiler, and the siting of the flue-pipe to prevent hazard to the health of any person is considered prior to the approval of that application. To ensure compliance with the Data Protection Act, we cannot disclose information in relation to specific addresses in the city. Sunday Lifes revelations about the boilers will heap more pressure on Irvine, who is understood to be seething after this newspaper detailed his growing involvement in the building trade. The UVF boss is a director of the WGS property firm awarded a lucrative contract by the WSCHA for maintenance work on hundreds of its social homes in the Woodvale district. But a WSCHA whistleblower who is taking an unfair dismissal case against the housing charity has claimed in court that the contract was awarded to WGS after a sham tender process. This has led senior UVF figures to ask questions about Irvines business interests in the area. A shamed ex-prison officer who quit her job after being caught holding hands with a killer rapist is set to fight a dog fouling charge. Ruth Ann Oliver is accused of permitting her schnauzer-type dog to foul in Belvoir Forest Park on the outskirts of south Belfast in April last year. Oliver appeared briefly before Belfast Departmental Magistrates Court last week and told District Judge Ken Nixon she intended to contest the charge. Judge Nixon adjourned the case until February 2. In 2011, disgraced Oliver, of Clover Braes in Craigavon, was caught holding hands with sex killer Ken Callaghan in a Tesco supermarket. Notorious Callaghan was out on day release at the time when a Sunday Life reporter spotted the pair together. At the time Oliver was a night duty officer at the Prisoner Assessment Unit in north Belfast where Callaghan was being held. Callaghan was jailed in 1987 after he broke into a womans house in east Belfast, battered her with a hammer and then raped her as she lay dying. When Sunday Life revealed the pair were at the Tesco together, Oliver was suspended from the Northern Ireland Prison Service and she later resigned with a disciplinary hearing pending. The Prison Assessment Unit where she worked was shut as a result and Callaghan was returned to jail. Expand Close Sunday Life front page from April 24 2011 / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Sunday Life front page from April 24 2011 Sunday Lifes exposure of Oliver and Callaghan hand-in-hand earned Chief Reporter Ciaran Barnes Scoop of the Year and Print Journalist of the Year at the CIPR Northern Ireland Media Awards. cwoodhouse@sundaylife.co.uk sex killer: Ken Callaghan A housing charity which includes UVF boss Winkie Irvine on its board has applied for planning permission to install a massive wood pellet boiler cabin at a west Belfast development. The Woodvale and Shankill Community Housing Association (WSCHA) has lodged the application for the boiler cabin at Cambrai Court a development of around 30 flats near the Shankill Road with the city council and it was advertised in the local press last week. A local source has told Sunday Life the boiler was put in place last year and expressed concerns about how close it is to nearby homes. The application concerns a 200kW wood pellet burner at 258 Cambrai Court. Top loyalist Irvine is a director of the WSCHA which is responsible for renovating and maintaining hundreds of houses in the area. WSCHAs application for a 2.8m by 12m wood pellet cabin states: Installation of a 200kW Wood Pellet Boiler with a self contained cabin to serve new heating system. Beside the flats complex is blue steel box with two flues visible from Cambrai Street and it is next to a row of modern houses. Letters of notification about the planning application have been sent to 13 residents, according to document filed with the Planning NI. The charity recently made headlines when it was accused of safety breaches and conducting a sham tender process at an industrial tribunal preliminary hearing. The case being brought by a building surveyor, who was employed by WSCHA, is set to proceed this year. Earlier this month Sunday Life reported on a pre-hearing review of a tribunal which heard details of the surveyors allegations. He accused the charity of letting out potentially dangerous properties and made allegations of mismanagement against the board. The tribunal has not yet heard the response of the WSCHA to claims made by the surveyor. A summary of the surveyors allegations were published online by the Tribunals Service. Dakota Access Pipeline protesters and North Dakota law enforcement, both in a show of good faith, started cleaning up camps and clearing out barriers Monday. "Cleanup is underway," said Joe Britt, head of construction for the Oceti Sakowin camp. "It's the busiest camp has ever been. ... People are out there really working." Britt said about 200 people were there Monday cleaning up trash. At the same time, online videos showed law enforcement officers beginning to dismantle the barricade they erected in October on the Backwater Bridge. Britt said four front-end loaders, dump trucks and a half-dozen Bobcats were put to work. Snow was moved into horseshoe-shaped piles surrounding large rollout Dumpsters to block any trash from blowing away in the wind. Britt said he and his team are also sorting items, including sleeping bags and winter clothing, so they can be donated to those in need in Bismarck and on other Native American reservations. Food scraps will be moved to nearby farms to finish composting, he said. It is paramount for public safety, and to prevent an environmental disaster, that the camps be cleared prior to a potential spring flood, Gov. Doug Burgum said in a statement issued Monday. Once the floodwaters recede, the land will need to be cleaned and eventually restored to pre-protest conditions. The cleanup comes after months of protests against the 1,172-mile crude oil pipeline over fears that a leak where it crosses the Missouri River would contaminate the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation's water supply. A few hundred remaining protesters have agreed to clean up and leave the Oceti Sakowin camp, situated within a floodplain on U.S. Army Corps of Engineers land, for safety reasons before potential spring floods come. Were not trying to forcefully remove anybody, said Hans Youngbird Bradley, brownfields coordinator for the tribe's environmental protection agency. Were just there to clean up the abandoned camps. A Corps of Engineers representative indicated the agency is prepared to hire contractors to complete the cleanup after the camps are vacated. Protest organizers have called for acts of civil disobedience nationwide as a new way to express opposition to the pipeline project. Islamic State (IS) has been expanding steadfastly beyond its heartland of Iraq and Syria since the declaration of a caliphate on June 29, 2014. Over half of the 50,000 foreign fighters drawn to Iraq and Syria have since perished. But the IS narrative has spread and its subculture has been seeded worldwide. Today, the threat in South and Southeast Asian countries is not so much from returning foreign fighters, who are coming home demoralized and in small numbers. Rather, these countries are seeing domestic threat-groups coopted by IS, and their own citizens radicalized and militarized by IS propaganda. Some of these individuals and groups are being directed and influenced by the foreign fighters in Iraq and Syria who form part of the IS external operations wing. Meanwhile, Southeast Asia is emerging as one of the battlefields of IS. IS has successfully mounted attacks in Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. In a June 2016 IS video, a Filipino, an Indonesian and a Malaysian appeared together, urging Muslims in their native languages to fight in Syria or the Philippines. If you cannot go to [Syria], join up and go to the Philippines, Malaysian IS figure Rafi Udin said in the 20-minute video. IS and its supporters now regard Mindanao, in the southern Philippines, as a part of its territory. Beyond Asia The two dozen foreign fighters operating in the Philippines include people from different parts of Asia as well as other continents. Among recent foreign fighters killed was Nadir Ali Ahmad (alias Abu Naila), a Belizean national. Together with his local wife, Kadija, they were killed in Maasim in the Sarangani province of the Philippines on Jan. 7, 2017. Abu Naila was hosted by a local IS group Ansar Al-Khilafah Philippines (AKP) until its leader, Mohammad Jaafar Maguid (alias Tokboy), was killed on Jan. 5 at Angel Beach Resort in Sarangani province. Philippine National Police chief Gen. Ronald dela Rosa said Abu Naila wanted to fight in Syria, but he first went here in the Philippines to train. In April 2016, Moroccan bomb-maker Mohammad Khattab was killed in Basilan, and his local wife, who was allegedly engaged in terrorist support activity, was captured. The Moroccan terrorist wanted to organize and unite all the kidnap-for ransom-groups to be affiliated with an international terrorist organization, Armed Forces of the Philippines Chief of Staff Hernando Iriberri said at the time. The leader of the Philippine branch of IS, Isnilon Hapilon, was reportedly wounded by a military operation in Lanao del Sur last week. Recruits While Philippines security forces are fighting a relentless battle against a dozen groups that pledged allegiance to IS chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, neighboring countries are disrupting the flow of foreign fighters to Mindanao. A series of raids in mid-January in Malaysia led to four arrests and fears that its westernmost state, Sabah, has become a transit station for South and Southeast Asians seeking to join IS Philippines (ISP). The first arrest, a 31-year-old Filipino watch seller, was made in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, on Jan 13. ISP had tasked the man with recruiting Malaysian, Indonesian, Bangladeshi and Rohingya fighters and bringing them for training to the southern Philippines. He was offered 4,000 Malaysian ringgit (U.S. $903) per recruit by Dr Mahmud bin Ahmed, a 37-year-old former lecturer in comparative religion at Universiti Malaya and one of several Malaysians operating in the southern Philippines. Also arrested in Kota Kinabalu was the prospective bride of the Filipino man, a 27-year-old Malaysian woman from Selangor recruited two months earlier through social media. They had planned to fly to Sandakan before entering Marawi City, Mindanao, and then linking up with Dr. Mahmud in Butig, Lanao del Sur. The other arrests were two Bangladeshi salesmen in Kuala Lumpur, age 27 and 28, who were also to join Dr Mahmud in the southern Philippines. Shifting to land The initial IS inroads to the islands of Sulu, Basilan, and Tawi Tawi in Western Mindanao was through the Abu Sayyaf Group. But since President Rodrigo Duterte pressured his commanders to eliminate both ASG and IS and their associated groups, the threat groups are shifting to land. ISP leadership moved to Central Mindanao and is working with Islamic State Lanao, led by the Maute brothers. With the IS base in Basilan shifting to Lanao del Norte, the unfamiliar terrain has made Hapilon and his associates more vulnerable. The security forces will need the support of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), a group that has entered the political mainstream but awaits a peace deal with Duterte. What is important for the Philippines is to work hard to engage threat groups that genuinely seek peace and fight the groups unwilling to enter the mainstream. If conflict persists, both seasoned and newly recruited foreign fighters will use the Philippines as a base, threatening both national and international security. The opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and not of BenarNews. Malaysian officials released an undated photo of this boat that sank off the state of Sabah on Jan. 28. Malaysian authorities on Monday scoured 2,400 square nautical miles off the eastern state of Sabah as they searched by air and sea for four Chinese tourists and a crewman after a boat carrying 30 people sank over the weekend. As of 7 p.m. Monday (local time), authorities confirmed that three Chinese nationals had died while 20 tourists and two crewmen had been rescued. Authorities told reporters the search would go on through the night. The owner had breached procedures, including overloading the boat, Sabah state Police Commissioner Ramli Din told state news agency Bernama. The owner and the two rescued crewmen were being held in police custody. Police will also investigate whether negligence led to the deaths of the tourists, Ramli said. The high-speed boat carrying a crew of three and 27 tourists all from China was on its way to Mengalum island, a tourist destination 56 km (35 miles) northwest of Kota Kinabalu, the state capital, when it encountered heavy and pounding waves and sank on Saturday morning, according to authorities. The boat had left the jetty in Kota Kinabalu around 9 a.m., but when it failed to reach the island 12 hours later, the tour company filed a report the vessel was missing. China concerned Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak announced that authorities were monitoring developments after Chinese President Xi Jinping on Sunday had demanded all-out search and rescue efforts, Xinhua news, Chinas official news agency, reported. Xinhua added that an emergency team, led by an official from Beijings national tourism administration, had been mobilized to handle the incident. Yesterday was the first day of the Chinese Lunar New Year and it should have been a happy day. Unfortunately, such a bad thing happened, Chinas consul-general in Sabah, Chen Peijie, told Bernama on Sunday. The Chinese call for an all-out search effort stemmed from concerns tied to the March 2014 disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, which was carrying 239 passengers and crew from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. The passengers included 153 Chinese nationals. I take the Sabah boat capsize tragedy very seriously, and I want a thorough investigation to identify the cause of the incident, Najib said in a Facebook post Monday. Investigators had reported that 28 passengers were on board, but, late Monday, a top official in the state clarified the figure. Our latest investigations shows only 27 tourist from China boarded the boat. So four tourists and one crewman are still missing, Ramli tweeted. Vessel broke The Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA), said 20 tourists and the two crewmen were plucked from the sea by passing fishing boats on Sunday after having spent close to 32 hours in rough and choppy waters near Brunei, it said in a statement. Ahmad Puzi Kahar, head of the MMEA, said the boat broke after being hit by waves and sank about an hour into the one-and-a-half hour trip to the island after interrogating the crew. Malaysian authorities have deployed 13 vessels, two aircrafts and three helicopters with neighboring Brunei deploying a vessel and an aircraft in the mission, the MMEA said on Monday. ein Google-Unternehmen Google-Dienste anzubieten und zu betreiben Ausfalle zu prufen und Manahmen gegen Spam, Betrug und Missbrauch zu ergreifen Daten zu Zielgruppeninteraktionen und Websitestatistiken zu erheben. 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Sofern relevant, verwenden wir Cookies und Daten auerdem, um Inhalte und Werbung altersgerecht zu gestalten. Wir verwenden Cookies und Daten, umWenn Sie Alle akzeptieren auswahlen, verwenden wir Cookies und Daten auch, umWahlen Sie Weitere Optionen aus, um sich zusatzliche Informationen anzusehen, einschlielich Details zum Verwalten Ihrer Datenschutzeinstellungen. Sie konnen auch jederzeit g.co/privacytools besuchen. A lot has happened since my last blog post more than seven months ago. In the fall I made several trips - in October to Wyoming for the annual meeting of ... 3 years ago During his first week in office, President Trump has signed a number of executive orders, affecting a range of policies from trade to health care to immigration. Here is what you should know about executive orders: What is an executive order? An executive order is an official document, signed by the president, used to manage the Federal Government. Are executive orders legally binding? Yes, assuming they are limited to the scope of the executive action allowed by a president, an executive order has the power of federal law. While a president cannot directly create a new law or sign an executive order that violates existing law, he or she can use an executive order to specify how laws will be carried out or direct how a federal agency will carry out a task. By what authority can a president issue an executive order? As the Congressional Research Service notes, The U.S. Constitution does not define these presidential instruments and does not explicitly vest the President with the authority to issue them. Nonetheless, such orders are accepted as an inherent aspect of presidential power. Their authority is assumed to be derived from implementing the Take Care Clause (The President] shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.) of Article II, Section 3. How many executive orders have been issued? As of today, there are 13,765 executive orders. Since the Hoover administration they have been numbered consecutively, so you can tell how many have been published by looking at the number of the latest issued by the most recent president. Where are executive orders found? After they are signed by the president, the text of the executive order is entered into the Federal Register. (You can find the text of all executive orders since the administration of President Clinton online here). Have presidents always used executive orders? Yes. George Washington was the first president to sign issue an executive order. The only president who did not issue an executive order was William Henry Harrison, who died 31 days after taking office. Which president issued the most/fewest executive orders? Franklin D. Roosevelt issued the most (3,522), followed by Woodrow Wilson (1,803) and Calvin Coolidge (1,203). John Adams, James Madison, and James Monroe all tie for the fewest (excluding Harrison) with one each. Can an executive order be overturned? Yes. The president is free to revoke, modify, or supersede his own orders or those issued by a predecessor. The Supreme Court in Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer also established the framework for determining whether an executive order is Constitutional. What are the most notable executive orders? While its difficult to choose the most noteworthy out of 13,000 executive orders, here are six worthy of notice: Unnumbered (Lincoln): Authorized the suspension of Writ of Habeas Corpus. Executive Order 8807 (FDR): Established the Office of Scientific Research and Development, which created the atomic bomb. Executive Order 9981 (Truman): Abolished racial discrimination in the U.S. military and eventually led to the end of segregation in the services. Executive Order 9066 (FDR): Authorized the Secretary of War to prescribe certain areas as military zones, clearing the way for the deportation of Japanese Americans, German Americans and Italian-Americans to internment camps. Executive Order 10730 (Eisenhower): Sent Federal troops to maintain order and peace during the integration of Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. Executive Order 5658 (Hoover): An executive order on the form, style, and safeguarding of executive orders and proclamations. (Note: I excluded the Emancipation Proclamation since they are similar, but not quite the same, as executive orders.) Dr. Hans Wildschutte, biology, has his eye on finding answers to the serious global issues of antibiotic resistance and novel drug discovery. The research in Wildschuttes lab focuses on finding environmental bacteria that can kill one or multiple pathogens. A paper, Environmental Pseudomonads Inhibit Cystic Fibrosis Patient-Derived Pseudomonas aeruginosa, recently accepted by the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology, is another step toward that goal. The Pseudomonads findings are an important discovery in the battle against antibiotic resistance. Wildschutte also ties his labs research into his undergraduate Introduction to Microbiology class that follows the Small World Initiative (SWI), which addresses antibiotic discovery through an innovative citizen science curriculum. The bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa infects the lungs of cystic fibrosis patients and causes a serious life-threatening illness. Most strains of P. aeruginosa are multidrug resistant, which complicates cystic fibrosis treatment, leading to failure of the treatment in patients or adverse effects from advanced antibiotic drug regimens. The study, in collaboration with Dr. John. J. LiPuma, a physician treating cystic fibrosis patients at the University of Michigan, looked at 30 different pathogens isolated from the lungs of patients with cystic fibrosis and tested 330 environmental isolates against them. The cystic fibrosis-derived pathogens are useful in research because they are opportunistic and only infect people who have cystic fibrosis or a compromised immune system. When we first started this, we knew some of the cystic fibrosis pathogens were multidrug resistant, Wildschutte said. Simply by co-growing them together, we can see what environmental isolates are able to inhibit the growth of these pathogens. For example, one of the pathogens was impacted by 30 different strains and another pathogen was inhibited by more than 35 isolates, Wildschutte said. Its pretty remarkable. The next step in the research involves creating mutations within the environmental strains so they can no longer kill the pathogens. Of the thousands of mutants generated, the researchers identified between five and 10 that lost the ability to kill the pathogen. We then have to find out where this mutation is in the entire genome, Wildschutte said. We optimized genetic techniques that allow us to identify what mutated genes are involved in antibiotic production. The results allow us to pinpoint gene clusters involved in antibiotic production. The research has been very productive to date. Its the first study that has been done in such a broad context, Wildschutte said. We are looking at multiple environmental isolates and their range in activity against multiple different pathogens. If we pick strains from distinct environments and that are inhibiting different pathogens, then that increases our chances of identifying something new. Thats the approach that weve developed at BGSU, and so far, we havent found the same thing twice. The problem with antibiotic resistance is serious, he said. We are approaching the pre-antibiotic era prior to the 1940s when we didnt have antibiotics. Essentially people will start dying from simple infections because they will be infected by bacteria that are resistant to all antibiotics. The success to date allows him to extend the research to demonstrate how the different strains are producing unique compounds. Its a pipeline now that weve generated, Wildschutte said. We have a unique collection of 330 strains that we are just going through now. It has taken three years to get the process up and running, but that now has significant success because of the number of environmental strains that have activity and the broad utility of the research workflow application. The paper is co-authored by BGSU colleagues Drs. Robert McKay, Ryan Professor of Biology, and Daniel Wiegmann; Drs. LiPuma and David Sherman, both University of Michigan; BGSU graduate students Payel Chatterjee and Elizabeth Davis and Michigan graduate student Fengan Yu, and BGSU undergraduate student Sarah James, who graduated last year. Together with his appointment of Betsy DeVos as Secretary of Education, yet another Trump administration official has ties to the Acton Institute. The Washington Free Beacon reported today that President Trump has appointed Victoria C. G. Coates, Ph.D., to serve as senior director for strategic assessments at the National Security Council (NSC). An art historian by training, she has a long record of service in foreign policy circles. While blogging pseudonymously at RedState.com, her work attracted the attention of Donald Rumsfeld, who later asked her to work as a researcher on his 2011 autobiography, Known and Unknown. She advised Rick Perrys 2012 presidential campaign, then became an adjunct fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, the foreign policy think tank founded by Clifford May. Coates then served as a national security adviser to Senator Ted Cruzs presidential campaign and in his Senate office. On more than one occasion, Coates has also shared the insights produced by her uniquely blended passions with the Acton Institute. Last November 3, she explained the thesis of her book Davids Sling: The History of Democracy in Ten Works of Art that democracies, and not merely autocracies, had produced great works of art as part of the Acton Lecture Series. Her presentation, filmed inside Actons Grand Rapids headquarters, may be viewed here. She also discussed her lecture in an episode of Radio Free Acton. Coates touched on some of the most consequential issues in modern diplomacy including creeping socialism, Brexit, negotiating with hostile regimes, and the core of modern Western civilization as part of a distinguished panel at the Acton Institutes Crisis of Liberty in the West conference in London on December 1. The British and American elections of 2016 both addressed issues of sovereignty and national identity, as the electorates were asked if they wanted to succumb to the gravitational pull of the soft socialism emanating from Brussels and Washington, and accept a future of safe but inescapable mediocrity, she said. That popular rejection is rooted in the core of our shared, transatlantic identity as part of Western civilization which at its best rests on three interrelated foundation stones: liberty, the Judeo-Christian moral code, and the equal value of each individual all of which are actually inclusive, not exclusive. Her wide-ranging lecture intertwined Renaissance statues and the diplomatic protocol demanded by Iranian president Hasan Mouhani; how Michelangelos artwork reflects the tension between the classical republicanism and the Medicis dynastic machinations; and the subtext of Raphaels Transfiguration as a call to liberate the Eastern Orthodox Church from the infidel a project still notably incomplete. Five centuries later, there are external enemies that are targeting our countries for precisely those principles our populations have just voted to defend. Those totalitarian and zealous foes consider freedom and equality anathema, and its not enough for them to reject them; they feel compelled to eradicate them from the earth. The Western patrimony in art and with its affirmation of objective standards of excellence should be fiercely protected and celebrated as something exceptional that can be offered to, but not imposed on, any peoples. Her speech, which was recorded, may be viewed here. It begins at approximately the 78 minute mark (1:18). The Bible has been under attack in the western world for over 200 years but never more intensely than today. These attacks have taken different forms and have come from many different corners of the academic world, from philosophers, to scientists, to textual critics. In the specialized world of archaeology the attacks have increased dramatically in the past 50 years. Once a specialization filled with Bible believing individuals, the field of archaeology is now overrun with atheists and skeptics, agnostics and those committed to the destruction of the Bible as a source of true historical information. These attacks on the Bible are a part of a sweeping movement in western culture. Spearheaded by academic elitists in the university and the public educational system, the news and popular media, and the entertainment industry, these revisionists cloak themselves with supposed objectivity, purity of motives, and the superiority of science over the "uninformed", "unscientific", religious community. They regularly mock those who question their world-view and their conclusions by name-calling and the worst forms of anti-Bible and anti-Christian propaganda. They have powerfully infected the church by turning Bible believing Christians against the very Scripture which is the foundation of truth and life in this world. Instead of contending for the Bible, Christian academics, pastors, and lay-persons are making egregious accommodations to these destroyers of faith and truth. In these days of intense spiritual battle, God has called ABR to step into the gap to contend for the truth and to assist the church in this critical hour. ABR is a non-profit ministry dedicated to demonstrating the historical reliability of the Bible and to give answers to questions being asked by believers and non-believers alike. We do this by using original archaeological fieldwork and research along with studies in other apologetic disciplines. We take on the bold claims of skeptics and critics. We challenge the bizarre anti-biblical propaganda that is purveyed upon the public as gospel through television and print media. We uphold the gospel of Jesus Christ, which is God's message for the salvation of all mankind! It can be tough to be a vegetarian. You have to work harder than everyone else to make sure youre getting all the nutrients your body needs. So, when its time to take a Companies in South Africa are embracing digital technologies at an increasing pace. Although these technologies provide endless opportunities and business benefits, companies should realise that there are many threats involved across all business units when adopting digital transformation trends without having a plan in place. Charl Ueckermann, CEO at AVeS Cyber Security and an expert in the implementation of digital information strategies for some of the largest brands in South Africa, urges companies to prioritise the handling of digital transformation trends to fit their overall business strategies and not be caught off guard. However adopting cloud, big data, mobile and social technologies haphazardly comes with risks, says Ueckermann. Most things come together with a plan. Digital transformation is the same. Haphazard deployment does not achieve digital transformation. It also puts company networks, data, reputation and business continuity at risk. Yet, many companies are allowing technology to drive digital transformation across the enterprise when strategy should drive it. Companies need to prioritise the handling of digital transformation trends, based on their fit with their overall business strategy and to avoid associated risks. It is very difficult to handle all trends and apply them to all business units at once. That is why a digital transformation roadmap is crucial to successfully leverage technologies as well as manage risks. Four megatrends affecting business The four megatrends affecting businesses positively for those who have leveraged them well and negatively for those who have not are cloud computing, mobile technologies, social technologies and big data. Studies, such as the 537 Harvard Business Review, show that simply hopping on the bandwagon to implement emerging technologies will not boost business outcomes. Instead, real and meaningful benefits are achieved by companies that implement the most appropriate technologies to transform their core business capabilities. Companies that know what core business capabilities they want to bolster with digital technologies and have a clear strategy for achieving digital transformation are more likely to get where they want to be, whether it is empowering employee mobility, improving customer insights, streamlining business processes or increasing revenues. Each business will have different transformational objectives so defining the digital transformation goals is an essential first step. These goals should obviously align with the businesss overall objectives and will inform the roadmap for digital transformation, from identifying which trend will be targeted first and choosing the most appropriate enabling technologies to the phases of implementation in each area of the business. Mobile initiatives implemented most With empowering employee productivity and mobility a priority for most businesses, mobile initiatives are the most frequently adopted of the four megatrends and have already transformed business operations and changed the way people work. Efforts in this area include equipping employees with smartphones and tablets and developing mobile applications for customers, employees and partners to use. Companies need to become the masters of how they will deploy, manage and continually evolve their digital services to achieve true transformation; hypothetically from the point of deciding that allowing employees to use mobile devices for work, to the point of making infrastructural and security provisions to manage a bring-your-own-device (BYOD) environment. Things can go horribly wrong though if it is not strategic. There are some warning signs that a business is in need of a proper roadmap to target digital transformation trends. For instance, a disgruntled employee has left the company and you have no way of recovering the business information on his personal laptop. Alternatively, there has been a malware outbreak on a couple of computers because there has been no control or rules around the use of third party applications or cloud storage services. If you are seeing these symptoms then it is time for a proper roadmap that will help to ensure that your digital transformation ambitions dont jeopardise the business, concludes Ueckermann. NEW YORK, USA: Starbucks plans to hire 10,000 refugees worldwide over the next five years in response to President Donald Trump's travel ban, the head of the US coffee-chain company said Sunday. Starbucks plans to hire 10,000 refugees worldwide over the next five years in response to President Donald Trump's travel ban, the head of the US coffee-chain company said | AFP/File | Saul Loeb "I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise," Starbucks chairman and chief executive Howard Schultz said in a letter to employees posted on the company's website. "We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question." Schultz, a Democratic Party supporter, said that Starbucks had been in contact with employees affected by the new Republican president's executive order signed Friday. The decree suspends the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The CEO said the refugee hires would be fleeing war, persecution and discrimination in the 75 countries where the company operates. "And we will start this effort here in the US by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support," he said. Schultz also defended Mexico, which Trump has said will have to pay for a wall along its long and porous border with the United States to deter immigrants, perhaps by the US imposing a 20 percent tariff on Mexican imports. "Building bridges, not walls, with Mexico," he wrote, voicing support for the country that has provided Starbucks with coffee for three decades and where nearly 600 Starbucks coffee shops employ 7,000 people. "We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. "But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same." Schultz is close to Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential candidate who lost to Trump in the November election, and supported her during her White House campaign. But he has dismissed persistent rumors that he would seek the highest office in the land. AB InBev is allowed to offer certain employees severance packages, though the two firms may not now retrench staff. Minister of economic development Ebrahim Patel could teach US president Donald Trump a thing or two about protecting jobs (creating them is another thing). The conditions Patel and the competition authorities attached to approval of the two highest-profile mergers that were ruled on last year have made a huge difference to the job prospects of thousands of workers in SA. Those conditions wont prevent Coca-Cola Beverages SA (CCBSA) or Anheuser-Busch InBev from restructuring their operations, but they do prevent them from making easy casualties of workers. AB InBev, which is not accustomed to being restrained when it comes to slashing costs, has had to tread with some agility around its plans to bring the local operations into line with the ascetic conditions that prevail in the rest of its global business. But the company is nothing if not determined. And so for the first time ever the entire cohort of middle-and upper-level managers at SA Breweries were invited to consider taking a voluntary severance package. In mid-December a memo went out to all 5,000-plus employees notifying them of the plan to offer the 1,000 or so management employees voluntary severance. They had until January 20 to accept what one of the affected employees described as a very generous package. Two weeks ago, on return from year-end holidays, they received an e-mailed reminder and were told the deadline had been extended. Presumably, having got a whiff of how very keen AB InBev was to bag SABMiller, the competition authorities had gone big on the employment conditions. The merged entity is never allowed to retrench an employee (at any level) as a result of the merger. For the first five years any retrenchment will be assumed to be a result of the merger, unless the company can prove otherwise. Thereafter any retrenchment will be presumed not to be a result of the merger, unless the employee can prove otherwise. The conditions dont even allow AB InBev to make a voluntary severance offer to employees below supervisory level. And because the overall employee number has to be maintained, AB InBev will have to replace any of the managers who accept the voluntary severance offer by employing the same number of workers at sub-supervisory level. Over at CCBSA, control of which is about to be sold back to The Coca-Cola Company, management is navigating the conditions attached to approval of its plan to merge four of the five authorised Coca-Cola bottlers in SA. The company says it has no intention or even desire to reduce the number of employees, but it wants to close some operations and transfer workers to other sites. Analysts say the operations that are being brought within the CCBSA umbrella are of different operational standards. The Shanduka bottling operations have received little investment in upgrades in recent years and are lagging the operations run by Amalgamated Beverage Industries and the Gutsche family. CCBSA would not comment on specifics but confirmed it was planning the closure of five sites, which are based in Bushbuck Ridge, Port Shepstone, Tzaneen and Louis Trichardt, effective March 6. In an e-mailed response to inquiries the company says it is in the final stages of consultation with employees about redeployment from the five sites. While it is always a difficult decision to decommission operating sites, CCBSA continuously identifies ways in which to optimise our operations proactively to create sustainable opportunities for our employees, while we ensure the best possible customer service and consumer satisfaction. The company says it has to act to mitigate the impact of SAs low economic growth and unprecedented increases in some raw material costs. It is emphatic that no employees will be retrenched or financially negatively affected as a result of the planned closures. Far from adversely affecting employees, the move to larger sites does, says CCBSA, present them with greater opportunities for promotion and career growth. Food & Agricultural Workers Union (Fawu) general secretary Katishi Masemola is not entirely convinced. He is concerned that affected workers will be enticed to accept the redeployment without fully appreciating the consequences. Workers at Port Shepstone have been told their transport to the larger Durban site will be covered by the company, but thats an additional 90-minute journey each way, which means their working day will be three hours longer, says Masemola, who would like to see more discussion between the company and the unions central office to ensure workers interests are protected. The general secretary says the company is aware that if the workers refuse to be redeployed it will have to wait for three years. In terms of the Patel agreement it has to maintain its total permanent employment number that time. The agreement provides for the monitoring of compliance by the merging parties. A complaint regarding allegations of noncompliance could trigger rule 39 of the Competition Act, which provides for certain remedies. In the extreme, the competition commission can revoke approval of the merger. This puts a lot of pressure on Masemola and his union colleagues, who are likely to be doing the monitoring. Its unlikely that CCBSA would risk allegations of noncompliance. It is not just the SA rationalisation plans that are at stake. Within hours of AB InBev confirming the 79bn takeover of SABMiller last October, the Coca-Cola Company announced it was exercising its right to buy SABMillers (now AB InBevs) 54% stake in Coca-Cola Beverages Africa, of which CCBSA is a large part. The Coca-Cola Company has not yet approached the SA competition authorities for approval for that acquisition but any concerns around its current rationalisation exercise could make the companys second appearance before the authorities even more painful and drawn out than the first. Major Catholic Outlets in U.S. Pass Over Archbishops Death in Silence | Main | You Cant be Pro-Peace (Or Pro-Palestinian) If You Dont Hold Palestinian Leaders Accountable January 30, 2017 Netanyahu Supports Silent on Trump Travel Ban "PM's anti-Jewish support for Trump's anti-Muslim decree" is a front-page headline of Haaretz's English print edition yesterday. Similarly, Haaretz's online headline states: "Netanyahus anti-Jewish Support for Trumps anti-Muslim Decree." But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has not expressed any support for President Trump's move against immigration. In fact, Netanyahu has come under criticism for keeping silentabout Trump's executive order. The Times of Israel reported yesterday: Former Likud party stalwart Dan Meridor on Sunday harshly criticized Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for failing to condemn the new US administrations entry ban on citizens from certain Muslim states, arguing that the Jewish state should place Jewish values above political expediency. . . In December 2015, Netanyahu himself issued a statement rejecting then-presidential candidate Trumps vow to ban Muslims from entering the US. On Sunday, however, he did not comment on the matter, and his spokesperson refused to respond to several Times of Israel queries. In December 2015, Netanyahu himself issued a statement rejecting then-presidential candidate Trumps vow to ban Muslims from entering the US. On Sunday, however, he did not comment on the matter, and his spokesperson refused to respond to several Times of Israel queries. Nor does the analysis by Chemi Shalev accompanying the erroneous Haaretz headline substantiate the claim that Netanyahu supports Trump's executive order. Shalev instead focuses on the timing of Netanyahu's tweet expressing approval Trump's decision to build a wall on the Mexican border -- in close proximity to the executive order regarding Syrians and Muslim immigrants. Shalev writes: On Saturday, the Israeli prime minister applauded Trumps decision to set up a wall with Mexico, with the disputable claim, phrased in Trump-style syntax, I built a wall along Israel's southern border. It stopped all illegal immigration. Great success. Great idea.? Netanyahus intervention on a topic that is in sharp political dispute in the U.S. is questionable enough, but the timing of his decision to identify so strongly with Trump, just after the president issued his executive order on Syrian refugees and Muslim immigrants - a move viewed widely as a declaration of hate against Muslims - is a reckless gamble. Posted by TS at January 30, 2017 05:54 AM Guidelines for posting This is a moderated blog. We will not post comments that include racism, bigotry, threats, or factually inaccurate material. Post a comment Spur Corporation gave a credible performance in the first half of its financial year, but its franchise, RocoMamas, sizzled in the period, growing existing restaurant sales by 45%. Spur CE Pierre van Tonder.Picture: Financial Mail Spur CE Pierre van Tonder said the group had delivered a satisfactory trading performance in the context of declining consumer confidence and disposable income locally, and deteriorating economic conditions in the rest of Africa. In a trading update, the group said total group sales for continuing operations in the six months to end December 2016 rose by 10.4% to R3.8bn while existing restaurant sales had increased by 4.1%. "Despite the slowing economy, RocoMamas continues to show strong growth, while the robust results from The Hussar Grill highlights the resilience of the higher-income consumer," said Van Tonder. "Our focus in the second half of the year will continue to be driving growth through value promotions, aggressive marketing and through expanding our local and international restaurant base," he said. The Hussar Grill produced growth in total restaurant sales of 58% and growth in existing restaurant sales of 38.3%. RocoMamas reported a jump in total sales of 113.3%. Spur Corporation acquired a 51% stake in RocoMamas in March 2015. RocoMamas found mostly in Gauteng has a menu that goes beyond the typical burger joint; it is all about customisation. Known for their artisanal-style "smashburgers", the franchise also serves chicken wings and ribs as their core offering. The smashburger concept originated from the US and refers to the process of smashing a ball of ground beef on a hot grill to seal in the juices, rather than squeezing them out. This reportedly results in a medium to well-done burger that is juicy. The Spur Steak Ranches eked out growth in total sales of 4% with existing restaurant sales of 2%. Captain Doregos sales fell by 15.8%. A net 13 new outlets were opened locally during the period. Internationally, six new outlets were opened including the groups first restaurants in New Zealand (Spur), Ethiopia (Spur) and Oman (RocoMamas). Spur Corporations share price surged more than 1% in intraday trade following the release of the update. In the past year, Spurs share price has seen growth of 13%, putting it ahead of Taste, which is down 36% in the same period. Famous Brands leads the pack with growth of 23.39%. According to the Student Brands' Students and Their Money' Poll 2017, transactions in the student space are primarily driven by cash, with 94% of transactions either taking place with cash or debit card. With 62% of the base holding accounts with financial institutions, there is room to provide credit based on the scores that are held with the credit bureaus for these individuals. The research also found that students exhibit different loyalty behaviour based on how they access funds for spending sprees. Store account holders are more driven by the personality of the brand, while cash spenders and debit cardholders are more concerned with affordability of their purchase whereas credit card holders have more focus on the quality of the products for the money they spend. Overall students are less concerned of the level of service that they receive and are more concerned about either how to make their money stretch further how to get more for what they spend. South African students have savvy perspectives when it comes to their money and how they spend it, says Daryl Bartkunsky, CEO of Student Brands. Proudly South African not a top requirement While 81% of the respondents indicated that they would try to purchase Proudly South African, only 28% of them said that they would only purchase South African goods. Store account holders buck the trend in terms of being proudly South African, with 60% of the respondents saying that they would look for locally produced goods. Debit cardholders tend to be swayed more by price than where the goods are made. Students are split 50/50 as to whether loyalty to a specific retailer provides them with better bang for their buck rather than hunting for the best price. Over 80% of the respondents indicated that they preferred to shop in malls, while only 11% indicating that they would utilise online shopping. Rewards programmes, budgets Only 37% of students said that they did not know what rewards programmes entailed or that they did not below to a rewards programme, with over 60% of the students indicated that they belonged to a loyalty programme and were actively redeeming points earned on their purchases. Living on student budget is not an easy ride. Over 90% of the respondents indicated that they had their own source of income and were responsible for making their own purchases; students indicated that they were spending on average R3000 per month on goods and services. Taking the average student population of 940,000 this indicates that they contribute R33 billion to the local economy per annum. Millennials go green, with 81% of the respondents indicating it mattered to them if stores they were shopping from had a green policy in place and were taking active measures to manage their carbon footprint or affect the environment. Students are aware that they will be responsible for cleaning up problems that have been created for them by their forefathers. They are inclined to support a retailer that is aware of this and taking active steps to make a difference to their future. Click here to view the pdf. In September 2015, United Nations member states adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) , designed to provide a pathway to sustainability. While the goals are wide-ranging, said Professor Mamokgethi Phakeng , a keynote speaker at the recently concluded World Sustainability Forum, "it is striking how closely they speak to critical problems for the African continent". She described the set of goals as a script that could have been written in Africa. Professor Mamokgethi Phakeng, DVC Research and Internationalisation, UCT Prof Phakeng is the deputy vice chancellor, Research and Internationalisation, at the University of Cape Town. Her focus at the forum, held for the first time in Africa during its sixth iteration, was on the role of African universities and research in achieving the SDGs. Challenges related to MDGs remain A number of challenges resulted in Africa not performing well in the previous Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), now replaced with the SDGs, and these challenges remain, she pointed out. "We can sit here and critique the way the MDG targets were defined as making it hard for Africa to progress, or even spend time talking about how African governments are not doing much or not enough to support research, but that will not change the weaknesses that we have," she said. In Prof Phakeng's view, university-based research is pivotal to achieving sustainable development and delivering on the SDGs, but it is an area in Africa that is sorely lacking. This is largely due to historical factors as African universities, most set up post-independence, focused on training programmes catering to the public sector and were structured as mainly undergraduate training institutions. "African governments in the post-independence era did recognise the importance of research and so whenever they saw the need for research to support their development ideals, they sometimes set up independent research institutes and centres, usually away from the universities, and they funded them separately and this sort of created the idea that research happens at institutes elsewhere outside the university," she explained. African research output The result is that African research makes up only 1% of global outputs, noted Prof Phakeng, who pointed to a number of explanations including; low numbers of active researchers per capita and per higher education employee due to high teaching loads, low levels of investment in research and development in African countries, low proportion of GDP going to research and low GDP itself, US and EU funders favouring Northern authors low research collaboration and knowledge exchange between academia and industry in Africa aging scientists, and various factors leading to a pervasive brain drain in Africa. During her keynote, Prof Phakeng highlighted three areas of focus for universities to contribute to achieving the SDGs: capacity building, collaboration, and engagement with government and industry. "Capacity building is important for us. African universities need to have educational offerings that ensure that students study in Africa and remain in Africa... We need to up our game in terms of quality of vocational and research programmes that we offer... We need to make sure that we are in a position to access scholarships that are made available to developing countries for students to study at our universities and not always send them to study out there. We also need to make sure that the universities that are on the continent, that have the capability, have the benefit of training those students from other African countries - an exchange within the continent and institutions," explained Phakeng. Centres of excellence Strengthening intra-African collaborations and sharing of teaching and research infrastructure are also critical. Developing centres of excellence may help Africa expand in these areas, suggested Prof Phakeng, but she also acknowledged that sustainability is not just an African problem, but an international one. Within North-South partnerships, however, Africa's researchers need to speak up and no longer take on a subordinate role as they have a lot to offer, she maintained. Lastly, beyond the need for acquiring funding - which is necessary if Africa is to influence the global research agenda, industry and government buy-in is an integral part of achieving success with the SDGs, said Phakeng, "they need to be in on it as well". The sixth World Sustainability Forum took place 27-28 January 2017 at the Southern Sun Cape Sun in Cape Town. For more info, click here. Professor Jeffrey Sachs, director of The Earth Institute. Image source: www.adb.org Sachs, Quetelet professor of sustainable development and professor of health policy and management at Columbia University in the US, believes China's journey to industrial development should serve as a blueprint for Africa in ending extreme poverty on the continent and becoming a key player in the world economy. China, emphasised Sachs, invested heavily across most of these six types of capital, reducing extreme poverty in that country from more than 80% in 1980 to roughly 5% today - modern technology makes societal transformation at such a huge scale and within such a short space of time now possible. The six key areas of investment, according to Sachs: 1. Business capital: ensuring Africa is attractive to international business investment is critical - it's the type of investment featured prominently in the news, but isn't the only kind that requires significant consideration. 2. Infrastructure: Africa is way overdue for breakthroughs in modern infrastructure, said Sachs, in terms of energy, transport, communications etc. 3. Human capital: investing in the development and wellbeing of people through health services, nutrition programmes, promoting safe and secure environments, and access to secondary education and beyond. 4. Intellectual capital: research, development and innovations that are relevant specifically to the African context. 5. Social capital: this refers to building trust in communities - trust with each other and trust in our governments, notes Sachs: "This is a huge challenge because societies function on trust, and when trust doesn't exist, societies do not work." 6. Financial capital: making worthwhile, long-term investments into the various forms of capital. Apart from its physical infrastructure, China also invested heavily in health and education. According to Sachs, "the dramatic improvement of education per child in China is absolutely one of the key explanatory factors for China's remarkable economic growth during the past 35 years, and this is again something I think needs to be replicated in Africa and other places in the world where the challenge remains to overcome extreme poverty". Double African investment During its economic boom, explained Sachs, China's investment rates were roughly 40-50% of its national income. He believes Africa needs to double its current saving and investment rates if it is to successfully achieve the SDGs: "If Africa can substantially raise its investment rates across these six areas of investment and do so in an intelligent way, then Africa's overall economic growth rate could double from 5% per year to 10% per year. Poverty would plummet and these investments could be undertaken in a way that promotes social inclusion, especially by ensuring that every child has the chance for a decent, hopeful start of a life, adequate nutrition, and a quality education, because there is nothing more important to social inclusion than the equal access to capital in all its forms in health, nutrition, brain development and education." Critical role of the university sector According to Sachs, the academic and university sector has several critical roles to play in achieving sustainable development and meeting the targets of the SDGs, including partnering with government bodies and branches to provide the technical know-how and knowledge they lack, educating future leaders, and performing context-relevant research. "I believe the convening power of universities to be a neutral ground where government, the business sector, civil society, and leading scientists can come together to brainstorm and to forge common cause," he said. The sixth World Sustainability Forum took place 27-28 January 2017 at the Southern Sun Cape Sun in Cape Town. For more info, click here. The Minister of Finance announced the Special Voluntary Disclosure Programme (SVDP) in the 2016 Budget Speech. The legislation governing the SVDP finally came into effect on 19 January 2017 when the Rates and Monetary Amounts and Amendment of Revenue Laws Act (Revenue Laws Act) and the Rates and Monetary Amounts and Amendment of Revenue Laws (Administration) Act (Revenue Laws Administration Act) were published in the Government Gazette. The two pieces of legislation mentioned above set out the rules of the tax SVDP. The rules applicable to the exchange control (Excon) SVDP are governed by two circulars released by the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) in July and October 2016 as well as a third circular released on Friday, 27 January 2017. This article will focus mainly on the rules applicable to the tax SVDP, but we will also refer to the Excon SVDP where applicable. We reported on the previous draft versions of the SVDP legislation in our alerts of 15 April 2016 and 29 July 2016. Circumstances under which the SVDP is available The substantive provisions of the tax SVDP are contained in s14 to s18 of the Revenue Laws Act. In terms of s15(2) of the Revenue Laws Act, the amount payable in terms of the SVDP will be equal to the amount of the receipts and accruals not declared to the South African Revenue Service (SARS) as required by the Estate Duty Act or the Income Tax Act, from which an asset, situated outside the Republic and held by the person during the period 1 March 2010 to 28 February 2015, was wholly or partly derived. Section 15(3) allows taxpayers who disposed of an asset that was wholly or partly derived from receipts and accruals not declared to SARS as required by the Estate Duty Act or the Income Tax Act, before 1 March 2010, to also make use of the SVDP, unless the asset was disposed of by way of a donation or disposal on loan account to a trust. Section 18 of the Revenue Laws Act states that if a person is a beneficiary or a donor in relation to a foreign discretionary trust, the person may also elect that any asset situated outside the Republic as contemplated in s18(2), which was held by the discretionary trust during the period 1 March 2010 to 28 February 2015 be deemed to have been held by that person for the purposes of all tax Acts. Amounts payable in terms of the SVDP Section 16 of the Revenue Laws Act states that the amount subject to tax in terms of the SVDP will be 40% of the highest value of the aggregate of all assets situated outside South Africa between 1 March 2010 and 28 February 2015 that were wholly or partly derived from receipts and accruals not declared to SARS as required by the Estate Duty Act or the Income Tax Act. In terms of s16(2), the value referred to in s16(1) is the market value of the asset in terms of the relevant foreign currency and translated to rand at the spot rate on the last business day in South Africa on or before the end of each year of assessment. In other words, if an asset was held from 1 March 2010 to 28 February 2015, one will look at the market value in rand on the last day of each year of assessment, being 28 or 29 February. In terms of s16 of the Revenue Laws Act, the highest of these market values will be multiplied by 40% and this amount will then be included in the first year of assessment ending on or after 1 March 2014, which in the case of individuals, will be the 2015 year of assessment. If an asset was disposed of before 1 March 2010, the tax payable will be calculated in a similar manner with the only difference being that the asset will be deemed to have been held during the period 1 March 2010 to 28 February 2015 for purposes of s15 and s16. Where the value of such an asset cannot be determined, SARS can agree to accept a reasonable estimate of the value of the asset. In terms of s17 of the Revenue Laws Act, an asset referred to in s15 that was held and not disposed of on the last day of the year of assessment on or before 28 February 2015 must be deemed to have been acquired on that day at a cost equal to the value of the asset under s16 in the relevant foreign currency. In other words, the asset declared in terms of the SVDP will have a new base cost which, for capital gains tax purposes, will apply when the asset is later disposed of. This provision does not appear in previous draft versions of the legislation. Procedural aspects and consequences of successful application The process for the SVDP is dealt with by the Revenue Laws Administration Act. It states in s2 that a SVDP application must be made under Part B of Chapter 16 of the Tax Administration Act (TAA), which means that the process will be the same one applicable to normal VDP applications. Section 2 further states that an application may not be made by or on behalf of a trust or in respect of receipts and accruals from which an asset that has been disclosed to SARS under an international tax agreement was wholly or partly derived. Persons may not apply for the SVDP if they are aware of a pending audit or investigation in respect of foreign assets or if such an audit or investigation has commenced unless the scope of the audit or investigation is in respect of other assets, ie other than foreign assets or foreign taxes, for example PAYE. An important change is that SVDP applications can now be made until 31 August 2017, whereas the draft legislation stated that SVDP applications could only be submitted until 30 June 2017. If a SVDP application is successful, no understatement penalties will be levied and SARS will not pursue criminal prosecution for a tax offence. Taxpayers should be aware that future income, including income received in the 2016 year of assessment will be fully taxed and will not be subject to the SVDP. It is also possible that successful applicants will have to pay interest on the outstanding tax from the due date of their tax return for the 2015 year of assessment. In terms of the media statement released by National Treasury on 30 September 2016, SARS and the SARB have established a joint application process. The statement states that applications for tax relief under the SVDP may be made in the new SVDP section of the VDP01 form that has been available on SARS eFiling from 1 October 2016. According to the statement, applications for Excon relief may be made on the new SVDP01 form, also hosted on eFiling. Comment Taxpayers should be aware that the SVDP process does not affect the availability of the normal VDP process which applies in terms of the TAA. However, from 1 September 2017, taxpayers will no longer be able to receive tax relief under the SVDP. With regard to Excon relief, the SARB released exchange control circular 4/2017 on 27 January 2017, which states that the Excon SVDP will now also be available until 31 August 2016. The rules of the Excon SVDP are contained in exchange control circular 6/2016, which we reported on in our alert of 15 July 2016, and in exchange control circular of 8/2016. Maize is South Africa's staple food and some people eat it up to three times a day. According to the South African Department of Science and Technology, 86 percent of maize and 85 percent of soy in South Africa are genetically modified and most are sprayed with the weed killer Roundup which contains glyphosate. According to the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), a subdivision of the World Health Organization (WHO), there is strong evidence that glyphosate can cause cancer. Institutes in countries where glyphosate is in high use, for example, Argentina and Canada, have carried out studies assessing whether the use of the weedkiller could lead to kidney diseases, birth defects or childhood cancer. In the beginning, glyphosate was only used before seeding to get rid of weeds but biotechnology opened up new possibilities through the use of genetic modification. Now plants can be engineered to be resistant to poisons like glyphosate so that the weedkiller can be sprayed directly onto the crops. Many countries, including Germany, are highly critical of the use of glyphosate. In June 2016, the European Commission reduced its licensing of the product from 15 to 1.5 years following protests from member states. Other institutions, including the US Environmental Protection Agency and the European Food Safety Authority, object to the IARC's findings. Poison or promise? "Why is South Africa poisoning its people?" This is how Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi, the president and founder of South Africa's Inkatha Freedom Party and traditional prime minister of the Zulu nation, titled a recent press release. "It is disturbing that the government has abandoned its responsibility for the well-being of South Africans," the press release read. Toren Wing is one of the co-signers of the press release and chairperson of the South African Traditional Doctor's Union. Even though no official statistics on cancer have been published since 2011, Toren Wing stated in an interview with DW that the rate of cancer is rising in South Africa. "I work with about 500 doctors and the word from the doctors on the ground is that cancer is exploding in the country," he said. "Cancer used to be one in a thousand. Then some twenty or thirty years ago the figure was one in twenty-seven. Now the number is one in three." Corporations versus farmers "Our concern is the lack of any kind of research into the possible effects of glyphosate on humans," said Haidee Swanby, a researcher at the African Center for Biodiversity (ACB), in an interview with DW. Her institution campaigns against the activities of Monsanto, the main producer and provider of glyphosate in South Africa. "The issue in Africa around those chemicals is that people don't wear safety gear, they often don't understand the language that the instructions come in. I've seen people mixing with their hands in open drums, I've seen people storing herbicides in their kitchen and people using empty containers to go and fetch water from the river," said Swanby. The managing director of Monsanto in South Africa, Kobus Steenekamp, denies any negative effects on human health. "We still believe that it's a safe product to use and we are guided by many internal studies. Glyphosate is still guaranteed and there is a full review of safety in the use. We still challenge the classification of the IARC," he said. "So many things are put in place like protective clothing, for instance." Environmental impact Glyphosate is the most-used weed killer in the world. In 2006 South Africa's farmers sprayed two million liters per year, according to the African Center for Biodiversity. Now, the amount is more than five times higher. While there continues to be a debate on the pesticide's effect on humans, the effect on the environment is clear. For example, weeds which were meant to be killed off by the pesticide have become resistant. The emergence of these so-called superweeds means that new chemicals have to be introduced into the cycle. Swanby sees this as good business for big enterprises like Monsanto: more superweeds, more pesticides. But she questions the role of her country in this industrial domination of the agricultural section. "South Africa has played a big role in helping to promote the use of GMOs in other countries. So definitely South Africa is a wonderful place for Monsanto. We are a very industrialised, agricultural country and we are very powerful on the rest of the continent. It's a perfect springboard," she said. A success story? Monsanto's Steenekamp sees a success story in genetically modified crops and glyphosate in South Africa. According to him, the productivity is higher on a smaller surface. Whereas in the 1970s two tons of crops were produced per hectare, Steenkamp claims that today the amount has more than doubled. He sees his company as the solution to food scarcity and even as a protector of biodiversity. "Traditionally when you spray an insecticide over a maize field, you would have killed all the non-target or beneficial insects as well," he said. "Now you also protect all the other biodiversity." The African Center for Biodiversity has joined the UK's Pesticide Action Network, Canada's Biotechnology Action Network and the international Friends of the Earth organisation to oppose the use of glyphosate. According to them, glyphosate causes serious decreases in biodiversity by eradicating wild plants which are an important food source for many insects and birds and is highly toxic to aquatic life. Mariam Mayet, director of the ACB, wrote in a press release that "South Africa is at a crossroads: either it must abandon Monsanto's GM maize or face an economic, social and ecological crisis." The demand for background screening services in South Africa - and Africa as a whole - has continued to increase over the last five years, presenting a 14% rise in the uptake of vetting solutions by businesses during this period. This highlights the importance of conducting comprehensive background screening checks both pre- and post-employment. This is according to Managed Integrity Evaluations (MIE) Annual Background Screening Report - which summarises findings from the organisations vetting services conducted in the past year - released on 30 January 2017. MIE Director and CEO, Ina van der Merwe, says, Something that has always been - and always will be - essential to business success, is hiring the right people with the right skills, qualifications and experience for a particular position. Failing to do so can cause an organisation serious financial as well as reputational harm." In high demand by businesses across industries, MIE conducted a total of 561,346 qualification checks in 2016 increasing by 17% when compared to 2015. MIEs qualification checks are processed through the National Qualifications Register (NQR), which has a database of over 3.8 million graduate records and 25 subscribing tertiary institutions. Van der Merwe says, As a whole, cross-border qualifications from African and international institutions, are the most likely to be misrepresented, fraudulent or inconsistent as candidates believe foreign qualifications will not be checked or verified. Risks in this regard are also on the rise increasing from 40% in 2015 to 42% in 2016." Criminal records In terms of criminal record checks, van der Merwe reveals that MIE completed 741,560 checks of which 10% of candidates had a criminal record. An even more concerning statistic is that out of the 10% of candidates with a criminal record - 48,167 candidates did not disclose their criminal history on application. . We also noted that the Manufacturing and Mining industries are at greater risk as these sectors recorded the highest number of candidates with criminal histories ranging between 18% and 20%. Using the Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS) when verifying the criminal record statuses of candidates, all fingerprints captured are electronically checked against the South African Police Service (SAPS) database. There are no ifs or buts when it comes to the accuracy of this process. If you have omitted information about a criminal offence well know about it, she says. Credit checks Van der Merwe says, The demand for verifications of a candidates credit history has declined in recent years due to the amendment to the National Credit Act (NCA) in 2015. MIE conducted 462,466 credit checks on candidates in 2016 and 17% of candidates had an unfavourable credit history." Keeping this statistic in mind individuals qualified to work in the financial industry handling cash or finances, may not be suitable to do so due to an unfavourable credit record. MIE forecasts continued growth in the demand for background screening services across the African continent as well as increased awareness and uptake of services available to assist in identifying suitable vendors and combatting procurement fraud. Due to the development of various smart vetting solutions available to organisations, it is important to include candidate and supplier screening into your organisational strategic planning and partner with a reputable background screening company to achieve these goals, van der Merwe concludes. The University of Zululand (UniZulu) has completed its two-pronged investigation into "degrees for sale" and "sex in exchange for marks" scandals. University management launched the investigation in October last year following an explosive Sunday Times report that claimed more than 4,000 students allegedly paid for fake degrees over a period of 20 years and that some male lecturers were passing female students in exchange for sex. An insider at UniZulu who has seen the preliminary report into the investigations said the probe not only confirmed the existence of the two subjects of the investigation, but also implicated academics, staff members and administrators at the university. At least three of those implicated have resigned since the university launched investigations in November last year. However, UniZulu spokesperson Gcina Nhleko was coy when responding to queries on the matter. "There are preliminary findings but we cannot communicate them until we get permission. These pertain to both investigations because, whilst they are separate, there is a holistic approach in solving/investigating them." She admitted that some of those implicated had since resigned. "Depending on the provision of Popi Act [Protection of Personal Information Act] we may disclose information without using people's name," she said. On Sunday, Thulani Maphosa, a spokesperson for UniZulu workers aligned to the National Education, Health and Allied Workers Union (Nehawu) said they knew that the university had conducted a probe into the allegations, but were not aware of any findings. Maphosa said one UniZulu employee had faced disciplinary action pertaining to the "sex-for-marks" scandal, "but the charge sheet was later amended to exclude those charges". "At the moment we cannot say anything. We will only comment once we have seen and analysed the preliminary report," Maphosa said. Earlier this month, BDlive reported that UniZulu received more than 80,000 applications for undergraduate studies, but had space for only 5,000. UniZulu's main campus is situated in KwaDlangezwa, 19km south of Empangeni and about 142km north of Durban. The Protection of Personal Information Act (PoPI) may not have been made effective yet, but businesses need to make compliance one of their top priorities for 2017. This is according to Wayne Clarke, managing director of Metrofile Records Management, who states that the appointment of the Information Regulator by the President is imminent. Maksim Kabakou via 123RF From the appointment of the regulator, companies will officially have one year to update their databases and practices or risk facing massive fines, or even imprisonment for liable individuals. While many businesses have already proudly proclaimed that they are PoPI compliant, there is a startling number of companies that are not, he says. We see quite a few companies that are either behind schedule on their PoPI compliance plans, or that have not started a meaningful compliance strategy at all. In fact, the 2015 Records and Information Management Trends Index commissioned by Metrofile, indicated that 22% of South African companies have not started to implement compliance measures related to their record storage and management. Clarke notes that South African businesses should realistically already have started their PoPI implementation processes, in order to ensure compliance by the cut-off date. Converting any companys records and information systems to reach a state of compliance, is a long and expensive process, which is why organisations realistically require a multi-year time frame. That said, it is not impossible for a company to reach a state of compliance within 12 months. The first step, according to Clarke, is to outsource the companys conversion strategy. In light of the significant pressure that is now on unprepared businesses, the decision to outsource their PoPI related responsibilities such as secure record storage, management and destruction, may be an ideal solution especially considering the enormous penalties and reputational damage that could result from a violation. Keep in mind however, that accountability cannot be outsourced to an information management provider. A company is still responsible for ensuring and enforcing its own compliance. Clarke provides the following PoPI checklist to further assist businesses: Month 1: Find a service provider fast Now is the time to find a PoPI compliance service provider. Reputable law firms are often considered the best options for lead service providers in this instance, but specialist record storage, software and training service providers are also viable options, depending on the nature and needs of the business. Month 2: Classify and understand The first step in the companys PoPI compliance plan, is to start classifying the information that is kept on file. Know exactly which of the companys data contains personal information, determine why it is being retained, and define how long it needs to be kept. If the information in question is not essential to the companys operations, earmark it for deletion. Month 3: Conduct an internal audit Your companys contract with the chosen service provider should be in the final processes of being negotiated. Utilise the first weeks of October to conduct an initial internal audit of the companys processes used to collect, record, store, disseminate and destroy personal information. Use the information gathered in this audit to make an initial assessment of where information is at risk or is being duplicated. Month 4: Deal with unnecessary information The first of PoPIs compliance conditions, is the purpose requirement. The service providers first task should be to assist in destroying all pieces of personal information that the company does not need. Both digital and physical files need to be processed by a reputable document destruction service, in order to guarantee that no information is compromised. Month 5: Transparency is key A company must notify its data subjects, where, how and why their data is being stored. With this in mind, the company now needs to start work on a process to inform clients the name and address of the company processing their information, whether said information is voluntary or mandatory, and what this information will and will not be used for. At the same time, the service provider should already be in the process of updating and securing the companys information and data backup system. This is no quick process, and a company needs to be prepared to work around any interruptions that might be caused by this over the coming months. Month 6: Evaluate data capturing processes The compliance condition for this month is information quality. With the service provider still updating data storage, this month should be spent in consultation with them on how to maintain data value, and devising reasonable processes for employees to follow in order to effectively capture and file accurate information. Month 7: Staff training While in the process of changing employee procedures, this month is also the time to address the compliance condition of responsibility. All company employees are responsible for conforming to the regulations regarding clients, employees and company personal information. Therefore, the company-wide policies, responsibilities and roles for data handling, have to be established and complied with. Month 8: Focus of secondary data processing For the compliance condition of additional processing, the service provider and the company this month need to lay down clear-cut processes for the further processing of existing information. Conducting client updates and sharing information between departments must be in line with the same regulations that apply to initial data collection. Keep in mind that the company also requires a procedure to deal with data subject objections and requests. Month 9: Information security The PoPI legislation requires all-round security as part of its compliance conditions. This should be the service providers forte, meaning that now is the time to officially gain clarity from the service provider on the following functions, going forward: How personal information will be protected from unauthorised or unlawful access, unnecessary mutilation or deletion. How to ensure the reliability of personal information, both from a technical and operational standpoint. How these standards will be ensured with all parties that receive data from, or process data on behalf of your company. Month 10: Define boundaries The penultimate compliance condition to address is the restriction of processing. A defined boundary needs to be established regarding the processing of personal information. Keep in mind that a company cannot claim ownership of any personal information, and the company now needs to relay clear instructions to its employees on what they can and cannot do with said information. Discuss the framework whereby clients and employees will provide consent and be furnished with a clear and understandable indication of how their information is used. Month 11: Time to troubleshoot If all is going to plan, the majority of the companys PoPI compliance procedures are in place and ready to be utilised. Keeping in mind that the company should be ready to engage the regulator and the public from next month, the service provider now needs to assist in systems checks and final troubleshooting of the existing procedures and systems. Month 12: Client and stakeholder involvement Data subject involvement is the final compliance condition to master. With the majority of the companys PoPI conditions in order, the company should be ready to withstand the intense scrutiny of its existing and potential clients. If you have not done so already, inform your clients of their right to update or delete personal information from any of the companys systems. Remind the client that they may, at any time, request a validation from the company as to whether their personal information is held. They are also entitled to a description and reason for the retention of said personal information. Deadline month: Engage the Regulator The Information Regulators powers are in full effect at the end of this month, and so are the penalties for non-compliance. By now, your company needs to be in a position to declare the processing of personal information to the Regulator. The company now needs to look towards maintaining its levels of compliance. Under the new regulator, companies need to commit to annual reassessments of their information systems. The regulator will also continuously be looking at new types of personal information, and businesses will need to stay abreast of these changes as they happen. It is important for businesses to understand that they can achieve most if not all of the requirements set out in the PoPI Act. There are of course more and less vital aspects of PoPI, and companies reporting honestly to the new Information Regulator, are likely to be given additional time to attain compliance with some of PoPIs less pressing points. This grace will of course be reliant on the level of compliance that the company has already attained, Clarke concludes. SAN FRANCISCO: A technology industry alliance devoted to making sure smart machines don't turn against humanity said on Friday that Apple has signed on and will have a seat on the board. Denys Kuvaiev via 123RF Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Facebook, IBM, and Google-owned British AI firm DeepMind last year established the non-profit organisation, called 'Partnership on AI', which will have its inaugural board meeting in San Francisco on 3 February. Apple "has been involved and collaborating with the partnership since before it was first announced and is thrilled to formalise its membership", the alliance said in an online post. Major technology firms joined forces in the group, with stated aims including cooperation on "best practices" for AI and using the technology "to benefit people and society". Creation of the group came amid concerns that new artificial intelligence efforts could spin out of control and end up being detrimental to society. The companies "will conduct research, recommend best practices, and publish research under an open license in areas such as ethics, fairness, and inclusivity; transparency, privacy, and interoperability; collaboration between people and AI systems; and the trustworthiness, reliability, and robustness of the technology", according to a statement. Internet giants have been investing heavily in creating software to help machines think more like people, ideally acting as virtual assistants who get to know users and perhaps even anticipate needs. SpaceX founder and Tesla chief executive Elon Musk in 2015 took part in creating non-profit research company OpenAI devoted to developing artificial intelligence that will help people and not hurt them. Musk found himself in the middle of a technology world controversy by holding firm that AI could turn on humanity and be its ruin instead of a salvation. A concern expressed by Musk was that highly advanced artificial intelligence would be left to its own devices, or in the hands of a few people, to the detriment of civilization as a whole. People joining tech company executives on the Partnership board included Dario Amodei of Open AI along with members of the American Civil Liberties Union; the MacArthur Foundation, and the University of California, Berkeley. Source: AFP WASHINGTON, USA: The robots of the future will be coming soon, rolling along at a lumbering pace with those goods you just ordered. The six-wheeled, knee-high robots from startup Starship Technologies are part of a new wave of automated systems taking aim at the "last mile" delivery of goods to consumers. Starship is launching a pilot project of robotic deliveries of parcels, groceries and prepared foods in early February in the US capital Washington, with a similar test taking place in Redwood City, California. The startup, created by two of the founders of Skype, Ahti Heinla and Janus Friis, has already begun testing in several European cities as part of an effort to bring new efficiencies to local delivery. The goal is to enable delivery within a radius of two miles (three kilometers) within 15-30 minutes of an order, for $1 or less, with the autonomous robots traveling on sidewalks and alerting consumers of their arrival via a smartphone app. Starship spokesman Henry Harris-Burland said the founders were looking to "disrupt" an industry which had seen little efficiency improvement from new technology. "We're trying to solve real social and economic problems," Harris-Burland said during a demonstration of the delivery bots in Washington. "This will take cars and vans off the road. We can also provide deliveries to the elderly and handicapped who have difficulty getting around." The company, which has its business office in London, engineering in Estonia and some 90 employees, announced in January it had raised $17.2 million, led by Daimler AG with other investors as it moves to expand its testing and partnerships. Designed for cities and suburbs While the Starship robots roll at a modest pace of around four miles (six kilometers) per hour, Harris-Burland said they offer a more efficient and economical delivery model than drones, which are being tested by online retail giant Amazon and others. The rolling robots are far less expensive to build and operate than drones and face fewer regulatory issues. He said drones might be better-suited to remote and rural areas, while the Starship bots are designed for cities and suburbs, where they can roll along on sidewalks. "We don't see these as competing with drones, we see it as complementary," Harris-Burland said. The Starship robots, which look like high-tech plastic picnic coolers, can carry about 20 pounds (nine kilograms) of goods, suited to three to four grocery bags. They do not offer heating or chilled compartments because rapid deliveries would not need them, according to Harris-Burland. They will not have the capacity to leave items on doorsteps, he said, because "customers will get delivery within 30 minutes, when they are home" and collect the goods at the door. Starship has agreements for testing with the delivery firm Postmates in Washington and DoorDash in California, as it works toward a commercial model with other partners and retailers. When the pilot begins in February, consumers will be able to order pizza, toothpaste, milk or eggs through the services which may use humans or robots. Visual localisation technology gives it the edge over competitors Starship is not the only robotic delivery startup looking to disrupt the sector. California-based startup Dispatch has raised $2 million in venture funding to begin testing of its rolling robots. Another California firm, Savioke, has agreed to provide delivery bots to hotels and apartment complexes. Starship says one of its strong points is its "visual localisation" technology that allows for real-time mapping using nine cameras on each robot to help navigate along sidewalks and circumvent obstacles, people, and pets. "We can see every crosswalk, every traffic light, every pothole," Harris-Burland said. "A lot of companies have mapped roads but no one has mapped sidewalks." The navigation is done by artificial intelligence, and the bots are "99 percent autonomous," according to the spokesman. "We want a human being able to oversee the robot's journey and to intervene whenever there is a problem," he said. Harris-Burland said the company's tests so far in Europe have shown the system works, with no problems related to theft or vandalism. The lids of the devices are locked until the customer opens it with a smartphone. If anyone tries to steal it, an alarm will sound, and if it is hijacked the company can track it "to the nearest inch," he said. Source: AFP The Gauteng government has concluded a wide-ranging investigation into financial irregularities at 34 provincial licensing centres, identifying a syndicate that could involve hundreds of officials who have been accepting bribes in exchange for clearing unpaid fines. In coming days, 19 officials at licensing and testing centres across Gauteng will be suspended, and criminal charges could be instituted against the private individuals and businesses that participated in the scam, Gauteng roads and transport MEC Ismail Vadi said during a briefing in Johannesburg. "The investigation shows a clear trend of syndicated crime that probably involves a further 394 officials from the centres in Tshwane, Ekurhuleni, Sedibeng and West Rand, who could possibly be charged for 2,791 fraudulent transactions. The total financial loss to the government is estimated to be R42-million," Vadi said. The officials involved had been shifting unpaid fines or outstanding licence fees to deceased road users. The province-wide crackdown followed the arrest of 15 council officials and 71 suspensions. The City of Johannesburg announced yesterday a further seven licensing officials had been arrested on fraud and corruption charges and appeared in the Johannesburg Specialised Commercial Court. Mayor Herman Mashaba has promised a crackdown against corruption in the city, appointing former Hawks boss Shadrack Sibiya to head an internal investigative unit. Vadi dismissed assertions that his department or former city administrations had "taken no substantive action" against licence centre fraud. The investigation follows the discovery in 2013 of "ghost users" that were created by two employees to defraud the licence fees fund. These officials were dismissed, leading to the more extensive probe in 2015. The department would work with metros and municipal departments to ensure the continuation of vehicle services due to the redeployment of staff, Vadi said. - TMG Digital/BusinessLIVE Source: The Times #Newsmaker: Siya Metane - MD at SlikourOnLife Siya Metane, better known in the music industry as Slikour, is making waves with his new venture - SlikourOnLife, part of OnLife Networks... He describes the company as "an approachable platform, a place for brands to have the power, where stories are told, and which creates inventory for clients to buy. Were creating communities that brands can plug into authentically. Were selling what no digital agency can sell were selling the truth, the culture, and were bringing worlds together." Briefly tell us about your role? Briefly tell us about your role? Metane: As the MD of SlikourONLife, I focus on the short term and long term vision of the company, and on new business opportunities. SlikourONLife is a platform for sharing information on urban culture and music, featuring videos and interviews to give substance to the music and to musicians who may not have access to traditional platforms, and offering a more cohesive and accessible place for their videos than YouTube. My role involves ensuring that our content is relevant to our audience. Our business is built on the hacker marketing model. This means that as long as we deliver relevant content to the consumer we'll grow our platform. We share our learnings with clients when approaching their digital strategy for the urban youth market. What is your main business challenge? What is your main business challenge? Metane: Transformation is a real challenge in South Africa, not only inside some businesses but also with suppliers. The South African cultural creative entrepreneur is almost an unheard-of phenomena and every day we go up against the lack of transformation. On top of this, our advanced insight into our market challenges a lot of traditional or global norms. The positive is that there are brand marketers who understand that the South African story is unique and making it special is how you win the market. These are the bold groundbreakers who depend on us to deliver concepts, ideas and content that justifies their argument internally and everything weve delivered has met the required KPI's. I think the general challenge in South Africa is not making our uniqueness special; instead we want to run from it and look outside. What trends do your predict for your industry in 2017? What trends do your predict for your industry in 2017? Metane: I think the world is really breaking away from traditional ways of consumption i.e. TV, radio, etc and the only thing thats stopping those that are not on their mobile is affordability and devices, but I can say that South Africa is ready for the digital transition. When I was young we could never afford MNET but we aspired to get it because we knew we were missing out. Today, digital is like the new MNET, and people either wish they had the right devices or enough data because there's always something they're missing out on. What will your core strategy be this year? What will your core strategy be this year? Metane: My core strategy is always to stick to the script and let the main thing always be the main thing, but always take it to a higher level. In real terms, the main thing for me is love for the music, the culture and sharing it so others can appreciate it. If I get that right and I do it better every year then everything else falls in place. Most important attributes needed to do your job? Most important attributes needed to do your job? Metane: There are too many egos, too much smoke and mirrors. You need to always remind yourself that you are a servant of the culture and you have the responsibility to guide businesses that want to utilise the culture in their strategies, influencer campaigns or just for association in the most authentic way. The question I ask myself all the time is how do we take this unique culture of ours and collaborate with some of the greatest brands to create a special story that reflects the aspiration of South Africans. The right marketing reflects who we are and most South African masses can't claim to possess anything except the equity of their culture. How do we make that special and through collaborating with brands? What's at the top of your bucket list? What's at the top of your bucket list? Metane: Growing up in a place that made me find most of my role models on television or a tape, I can honestly say that the life I'm living is a big bucket of possibility so why limit myself with a list when I found residency in the bucket? :) With the steadfast development of digital transformation, it is abundantly clear that technology allows for more data opportunities from the increasing connected consumer. Dawn Rowlands Social platforms, chat apps and video content are now where the majority of people spend their time, because internet users primarily want one thing: to get their dose of content and people all in one place. Hence why social apps like Facebook and Instant video have been so successful, they slot in a context where people can continue to access content and chat to their friends. Any 'interruption' that doesn't fit into this model is bound to annoy and dis-engage, unless the utility value brought is disproportionately high. Digital is everything not everything is digital? was the theme at dmexico, Europes biggest trade fair for digital marketing, which took place in Germany this past September. It resonated with me as I have seen this within the statistics across our SSA region. The facts speak for themselves With reference to the graph below, the share of mobile devices is fairly evenly distributed, showcasing that 65% of the 186.9 million Nigerian population are interacting online. According to research conducted by the GSMA, 46% of the population in Africa subscribed to mobile services, equivalent to more than half a billion people. The regions three dominant markets Egypt, Nigeria and South Africa together accounted for around a third of the regions total subscriber base. Multi-screen video consumption At Dentsu Aegis Network, we have been future proofing our business and pushing our vision of 100% digital by 2020. As mobile and internet adoption in Africa rises, the amount of mobile internet subscribers tripled in the last five years to 300 million by the end of 2015, with an additional 250 million expected by 2020 according to the GSMA. This is why our investments in digital and hiring the correct people are at the core of our plans for the future. The increase in mobile subscriptions and number of feature phones and smartphones, is attributed to a number of factors. In certain regions the declining data cost - specifically in Nigeria, where they currently pay on average $1.65 for 1GB of data; with Tanzania having extremely affordable data costs of R14 per Gig; and the cost of data in Ghana, it is GHS0.0225 per megabyte. Due to the data cost becoming more affordable, the consumers online presence will escalate and opportunities for brands to interact with them will become more prevalent. The average selling price of smartphones across Africa has dropped dramatically. Notably with low income groups, affordability has always been an obstacle which stops those in rural areas from owning and using internet devices and services. Telecommunication giants have dramatically reduced cost on smartphones, one example of this was MTN Nigeria, offering two smartphones for less than $50. The Orange Rise 31, includes a bundle with three months worth of voice minutes, SMS and data as stated by GSMA. These types of bundles and costs have taken strides in overcoming the affordability barrier. Although voice and SMS still account for the major revenue and have continued to be resilient, the ever looming threat of IP-based services is changing at a rapid rate owing to the adaption of smartphones and access to mobile broadband being cheaper and accessible. With this being said, apps like WhatsApp, Viber and Skype are truly taking a prominent place in the communications landscape. This is why it is crucial for communications/media businesses to ensure their capabilities and tools are able to keep abreast with the changing African consumer. The power of localisation: tech start-ups Mobile is the go to platform for generating, distributing and consuming innovative digital solutions and services in Africa. There are many reasons for this which have been outlined, such as the growth of advanced mobile networks, the growth and adoption of smart devices, people seeking rich content whilst on the move, and the lack of any other alternative. Even though global businesses such as Facebook and Google have tried to localise their offering to reach the tech generation consumer, the need for local solutions that speak and appeal to locals which address their unique needs, socially, and the economic difficulties the consumers face, can only be combated with a niche understanding of their landscape. Global businesses are increasingly challenged as agility can be more easily achieved by local businesses or small local tech start-ups. Technology hubs and start-up investments in Africa have increased drastically, with the range of tech start-ups funded and sizing of deals showcasing the development of this growing ecosystem. The GSMA stats found that in 2015, 125 African tech start-ups raised approximately $185 million, with Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa gaining more than 80% of the funding. Even though this amount is miniscule in comparison to the 27.3 billion raised by start-ups globally in 2015, this has displayed the need for more investment to fund start-ups in Africa. With the number of acquisitions in this past year alone, Africa is going to see a rise in investments, as we see more potential to grow our operating model in the region, through digital and creative hubs. Our business also sees the need to invest in start-ups. In September last year the decision was made to not acquire, but open Isobar, the global full service digital marketing agency in Kenya. Kenyan creativity was meeting high-tech and clients in Kenya were thirsty for award winning creativity and digital expertise. Making these critical decisions and seeing the need to invest at crucial times in a market, gives your business the ability to meet the need and truly innovate. Recent statistics say that there are approximately 310 active tech hubs across Africa, with 180 accelerators or incubators, according to the GSMA. The diversity in the tech start-ups that were given funding and the size of the deals showcase the huge developments of this network. The attraction to Africa for its wealth of opportunities to innovate without stringent rules and regulations, as opposed to other first world countries makes Africa open to creating and innovating on an astronomical level. The major players and kingpins Operating in a globalised world, we cannot ignore that the majority of spend from brands for digital advertising is with Google and Facebook. They both have identified that Africa still has a large proportion of untapped internet users and with advertising budgets moving to digital marketing, their presence will continue to rise. The majority of spending by brands on digital advertising is going to Google and Facebook and together, they accounted for 75% of all new online ad spending in 2015, according to the Internet Trends report published this month by Mary Meeker of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, the US venture capital fund. In the US, 85 cents of every new dollar spent on digital went to the two companies in the first quarter of 2016. Digital is rapidly becoming advertisings biggest source of revenue. Although television still holds a large portion of the pie in Africa, in the US, digital spend will soon overshadow television in the US come 2017, according to eMarketer. The explosion of video Going hand in hand with the increase of mobile sales and internet adoption rates, is the ever growing video consumption across the SSA region. The media world has changed drastically; it is now convergent, interconnected and fully transparent to technology and is therefore measurable. This shift in media has caused everyone to re-evaluate and think beyond initiated transactions, emails, push notifications and traditional advertising. Rather, businesses need to be thinking about live connections, coherent ecosystems, emotions translated into data, people and dynamics. The proliferation of smart devices across all markets has seen a change in how content is consumed and how attention shifts throughout the day. When we look at video consumption across the major online networks (Google, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter etc.) the stats are frightening. This is driven largely by internet enabled devices, compounded by Generation Y and Generation Z, who are making sure that this trend accelerates. The explosion of screens has resulted in the fact that consumers are always on, 24/7. It is a reflection of how consumers media behaviour has changed, since the paradigm shift of internet-enabled communication. The new consumer is converged, fully-integrated through multi-media and multi-screen. From the below visual on the Nigerian consumer it is evident that the combination of Live TV and smartphones, delivers 64% share of time spent on video content consumption. Leveraging a combination of broadcast content and smartphone content will deliver highest impact for video content. Share of mobile devices In Ghana video content is equally consumed from traditional and online sources, with the majority online being those aged 16-24. 48% of Ghanaians consume TV whilst 52% consume online videos. Average time on TV is 1.5hrs/day and average time on online video 1.65hrs/day, according to TNS Connected Life Research. Programmatic media buying will be an even bigger player come 2017, as it is about leveraging technology that can assist marketers in reaching the most relevant audiences for a specific product or service. Analysing video consumption rates such as the above give marketers a well-rounded insight into when campaigns need to go live. This allows the planning, execution or buying and optimising of advertising campaigns to be done in the most effective ways using real time data to guide the next decision in a campaign, e.g. indicate which creatives are working the best, or easily refine a media plan to only target the top five placements that delivered the best results over the past 24 hours. Millennials are video crazy, no longer is the brand the hero of the marketing narrative. Continuing into 2017, one needs to make young people the heroes of the brand story. This means giving them the tools to tell their own story, with 38% of Kenyan how-to videos created by 18-21 year olds. Brands need to understand this shift and how to adapt their strategies accordingly. Video will continue to rise in 2017. Having more affordable smart, cheaper data cost, simplicity of content creation and video technology all aid the era of video playing an even larger role in marketing than ever before. Traditional TVCs are broadening their spectrum to online and the competition between traditional TV and online will continue to escalate. The likes of Netflix and Showmax are still trying to gain traction in Africa, but improved infrastructure and connectivity will certainly increase going into 2017. With the explosion of memes, images, videos, civilian journalism, how-to videos generated by the consumer themselves, it is going to be tough for brands to get the attention and engagement of the consumer. If your business or brand wants to play in the video space, it will have to be something completely different and better, to go up against the rest. Science in the art of data and analytics Marketers and creatives can no longer create beautifully created PPTs and creative presentations without solid data and the science of analytics. Having a fleet of tech tools will optimise your digital technology to track user behaviour, engagement across multiple channels and recognise purchase intent. Consumer data is priceless in making the best decisions for any brand. Having access to the best tools in analytics will be a matter of necessity going into 2017. The digital economy is the economy The pace of change is relentless, customers dont buy brands anymore, they join brands, and those which embrace it the most within their industry are the ones that are going to survive. Digital transformation means that we can change the way that people experience our brands like never before. The next five years are going to be a constant state of change, data is becoming a new currency and if a company cannot adopt to test and learn to quickly launch products to the market, those companies will be left behind. Banks are grappling with how to deal with the financing of transactions involving Ford Kugas - of late notorious for their tendency to burst into flames. Sergey Soldatov via 123RF One bank said it required guarantees from the car manufacturer before it would process financing applications for the vehicle. At least one WesBank client was told that, before financing could be approved, he would have to get a guarantee from Ford that a replacement part fitted to the car is safe. The bank has said that this was not official policy. Fifty-one Kugas, including one in which Reshall Jimmy burnt to death, have caught fire, prompting Ford to recall 4,556 of the vehicles assembled between 2012 and 2014. Ford said the Kugas, except for Jimmy's, had caught fire because of a faulty coolant system. The company was unable to explain what caused the fire in Jimmy's car. Renaldo Vilonel, who is selling his 1.6-litre Kuga because he is emigrating, said he bought the car six months ago. Shocked at the amount he was offered by the Somerset West Ford dealership he decided to sell his car privately. "It was only then that I learned of Jimmy's death and the other fires. I thought I would have problems trying to sell it, but I found a buyer." Vilonel's joy was short-lived. He was told that, for the finance from WesBank to be approved, he would have to get guarantees from Ford on the parts that had to be replaced. "I was told that I needed to get a roadworthy certificate and technical inspection report, but that wasn't the problem. The problem was that, for the sale to be signed off, the bank needed a certificate from Ford guaranteeing the repairs and replacement parts, and that the car's electrical system had been checked out and given the OK." He said when he asked why all this was necessary he was told that it was because the vehicle was a fire hazard. But the dealership said it could only give him a letter stating that the repairs would be done. Vilonel said that when he told WesBank that he could provide a written undertaking by the Ford dealership that the repairs would be done, the bank was still apprehensive. WesBank spokesman Rudolph Mahoney said the bank's call centre workers were looking after the buyer's interests. Absa spokesman Lies Squire said that Ford was providing each customer with a letter confirming that the vehicle had been repaired and a guarantee on the parts replaced. Standard Bank spokesman Ross Linstrom said his bank did not require such a guarantee. Nedbank declined to comment. Source: The Times TOKYO: Toyota lost its crown as the world's top-selling automaker in 2016, company figures showed Monday, with the Japanese giant overtaken by Volkswagen as the industry prepares for an uncertain trade environment under Donald Trump. Bjoern Wylezich via 123RF The German automaker moved back into the top spot despite being hit by a massive emissions cheating scandal that rocked its reputation. The carmaker, once a paragon of German industry, was plunged into its deepest-ever crisis after it emerged in September 2015 that it installed emissions-cheating software in millions of diesel engines worldwide. However, the crisis seemed to have little effect on the firm's standing with drivers as it announced this month that annual sales rose 3.8 percent in 2016. The results were boosted by strong performance in China which helped push total sales to 10.3 million, after slipping to 9.93 in 2015. VW group also includes the brands Audi, Porsche and Skoda. On Monday Toyota said it sold 10.175 million vehicles worldwide last year, a 0.2 percent increase. The annual figures come as the industry faces an uncertain outlook year with President Trump threatening punitive tariffs on imports into the United States in a bid to force them to manufacture and hire there. Trump targeted Toyota in one his fiery tweets, criticising its ongoing project to build a new factory in Mexico and threatening it with painful tariffs. He has also pledged to review several trade deals that he says are detrimental to American workers. Japan's Kyodo News agency reported Monday that Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda will meet Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday, ahead of the latter's scheduled summit next week with Trump. Toyota said it could not comment on the report, while Japan's chief government spokesman Yoshihide Suga would not confirm it. Toyota shares ended flat Monday. "Toyota has problems in China, whereas VW is very strong in China and is using it as en engine of growth," said Hans Greimel, Asia editor for Automotive News. "That's the difference that matters," he told AFP. "They might be neck-and-neck right now but maybe long term you have to be a big player in China, and Toyota is still playing some catch-up there." "In the US, another key market, Toyota has a big advantage over VW but it is running out of steam because it is not able to tap the boom there for SUVs as much as its rivals." Volkswagen admitted in September 2015 to installing so-called "defeat devices" in 11 million vehicles worldwide, after their existence was revealed by the US Environmental Protection Agency. The software caused engines to reduce emissions of harmful nitrogen oxide when they were undergoing regulators' tests VW agreed this month to plead guilty to fraud and pay fines amounting to $4.3 billion in the United States to close its emissions cases with the Department of Justice. Source: AFP The death of former Novus Holdings CEO and chairman Lambert Retief has created uncertainty about one of the company's most important printing contracts. Although Retief resigned from his executive position years ago, he continued to play a central role in Novus through a management agreement with Media24. 123RF That deal set the terms of the relationship between Novus (previously Paarl Media Group), Media24, which owns 66% of Novus, and Retief for decades. It is now set to be rewritten. At stake is Novus's single most valuable contract, the printing of all Media24's newspapers and magazines. About 31% of Novus's annual revenue comes from the contract, which industry sources say is on terms that are favourable to Novus. A statement issued ahead of Novus's 2015 listing, said the printing deal could only be terminated if the management deal between Novus, Media24 and Retief was terminated. Last Thursday, just after announcing Retief's death, Novus informed shareholders that the management deal "has terminated upon Mr. Retief's passing on Wednesday, 25 January 2017". This was the first time minority shareholders were made aware that Retief's death could trigger termination. The prelisting statement merely said the deal had "indefinite duration and is expected to continue for the foreseeable future." Novus confirmed last week that Media24 had the right to terminate the printing agreement on six months' notice. "Novus Holdings and Media24 are currently engaged in negotiations around the renewal or extension of the printing agreements and are in the process of finalising new terms," said Novus. Media24 CEO Esmare Weideman dismissed one analyst's suggestion that Media24 would use the opportunity to abandon printing some of its titles and focus on online versions. "With regards to the digitisation of our publications, we have an excellent portfolio of printed newspapers and magazines and online properties. Print remains very much part of our future," said Weideman. For Novus shareholders, the uncertainty around the Media24 contract comes on top of uncertainty about the contract to print educational workbooks for the Department of Basic Education. This is the largest contributor to Novus's books and directories business. In its financial 2015 results, management referred to the renewal of the tender, due at the end of calendar 2015, and said it was reasonably confident of "continued involvement". Novus was awarded the tender in early 2016, but it was cancelled by the Treasury due to concern over irregularities in the process. Novus continued to print workbooks on an emergency basis during 2016. Novus has not informed shareholders what progress had been made in issuing a new tender. Minority shareholders are also waiting to hear of the outcome of the engagement with the competition authorities following the intervention of Caxton, which claimed the listing of Novus represented a change of control that had to be approved by the authorities. Source: Business Day South Africa will this week sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that is aimed at advancing the country's economic agenda with Thailand. South Africa's investment promotion agency, Invest South Africa, will sign the memorandum with the Board of Investment Thailand, in Bangkok, on Tuesday, said the Department of Trade and Industry (dti). Edhar Yuralaits via 123RF "One of InvestSA's objectives is to identify potential foreign investors and attract them to invest in the country, in an effort to grow the economy and create employment opportunities," said the agency's acing head Yunus Hoosen. "The MoU that we will be signing with Thailand is aimed at promoting and facilitating cooperation between the two countries on investments in automotive, agro-processing and electronics sectors. It will also enhance our collaborative efforts to attract investments into our countries," said Hoosen. Invest SA is optimistic that the implementation of the MoU will see Thai investors setting up manufacturing plants in South Africa which will result in job creation. Total trade between South Africa and Thailand in the first three-quarters of 2016 reached R29.9 billion, which is a 24.3 % increase from R24 billion achieved in the same period of 2015. Officials from the KwaZulu-Natal-based Richards Bay Industrial Development Zone (RBIDZ) will be part of the delegation. They will be on a mission to attract Thailand automotive component manufacturers to invest in the RBIDZ. InvestSA is South Africa's national investment promotion agency, providing one-stop-shop services to investors. This includes investment promotion, facilitation, and aftercare, all of which are geared at fast-tracking projects and reducing government red-tape. The Association of African Exhibition Organisers (AAXO) hosted the first-ever ROAR Organiser and Exhibitor Awards at the Ticketpro Dome in Johannesburg on 26 January 2017. The traditional-themed event celebrated the successes of the events and exhibitions industry in 2016 and was attended by over 330 guests. Guests at the AXXO ROAR Awards were invited to dress according to the traditional theme of the event. The ROAR Awards is centred on Respect, Opportunities, Achievements and Recognition, and acknowledged a range of categories for industry members. With exhibitors being a critical part of the success of the events industry, Reed Exhibitions MD and AAXO Chairperson Carol Weavings vision to champion the cause of AAXOs members was made possible through the ROAR Awards by also giving exhibitors an opportunity to be recognised at this glamorous event. Reed Exhibitions MD and AXXO Chairperson, Carol Weaving Reed Exhibitions was proudly recognised for four of our exhibitions in the ROAR Exhibition Organiser Awards category. Decorex Johannesburg was awarded Best Show of the Year, and World Travel Market Africa (WTMA), 100% Design, and Decorex Durban all won their categories. For WTMA, Best Trade Exhibitions: 6,001-12,000 square metres; 100% Design won Best Trade and Consumer Exhibition under 6,000 square metres; and Decorex Durban won Best Trade and Consumer Exhibition 6,000-12,000 square metres. On the success of the AAXO ROAR Awards, Carol Weaving commented: AAXO was created to bring quality, credibility and professionalism to the exhibition industry. It is good to see that we are steering in exactly the right direction." For more information on the AAXO ROAR Awards, please visit www.aaxo.co.za. 4G coverage has steadily been replacing 3G coverage in Africa in 2016 and in 2017 it looks likely to be the year higher speeds and better coverage will drive new data uses. Globally 4G provides six times the average speed of 3G. Image by 123RF In November 2016 OpenSignal published its report on levels of coverage and average speeds of 4G globally. This is based on 500,687 users and 17,065,628,107 sampling points. The global average for 4G download speeds is 17.4 mbps and the fastest is Singapore at 45.86 Mbps. LTE-Advanced networks deliver the top of the range speeds in the reported countries. The report only takes three African countries - South Africa, Tunisia and Morocco - all whom are in the vanguard of 4G roll-out. Tunisia exceeds the global speed average at 21.69 mbps, Morocco achieves 18.09 Mbps and South Africa 15.43 Mbps. On this basis, 4G in other African countries is most likely to be between 5-10 Mbps, the range at the bottom of Open Signal's sampled countries. OpenSignal data for coverage works on the basis of the percentage of times a user had access to a 4G network. So if 50% of the population has coverage, the availability of 4G data will be around 50% who have access. South Korea has the highest with 95.71% of the sample able to access 4G. South Africa has a 63.12% access to 4G, with Morocco on 59.82% and Tunisia on 53.72%. The report provides global speed comparisons of 3G(3.3 Mbps) 4G (17.4 Mbps) and Wi-Fi (10.8 Mbps). It does not break out these comparisons at a country level. However, most data users in Africa know that Wi-Fi and 4G deliver much faster speeds than 3G, even if the differential is much less pronounced. What the OpenSignal report does not measure - and which is key to many of the new and emerging data uses in Africa - is consistency. It's no good trying to stream a film on 4G (or indeed any connection) if the connection breaks in the middle and leaves it hanging just as the suspense is building. African regulators have long tracked Quality of Service for mobile voice and a significant number have fined providers who have fallen below the standards they have set. But so far no regulator has tracked the quality of data connections in Africa. Arguably this is more important in Africa because the majority of people access the internet on a mobile phone. Recently the Rwandan Government announced that it would achieve 92% population coverage by 2017. This is a little down from the 95% Olleh Rwanda Networks promised when we covered them in October 2015 but there or thereabouts. Two things mark out Rwanda as unusual against other African countries. Olleh Rwanda Networks is a single wholesale provider. Whatever else may be wrong with it, speed of attaining almost full coverage is not one of them. Secondly, Rwanda is a geographically compact country with a high population. Nevertheless, 4G coverage will soon match 3G coverage in a significant number of African countries. Increased speeds have to be matched by consumer friendly prices. Some countries have chosen to sell 4G as a separate premium product at a higher price to 4G. Others like Safaricom in Kenya have kept the same price for both 3G and 4G. The biggest fear among most Africa data consumers I talk to about 4G is that their bundle will simply run out more quickly. The #datamustfall campaign in South Africa pointed out that data rates in South Africa were still higher than for Nigeria, an undoubtedly higher cost country. Current data prices are still too high but when they get to the right point, 4G speeds and wider 4G coverage will deliver a whole new set of data uses. Source: Balancing Act publishes a wide range of video and other resources, which can be found on the original of this article on their website. Euromonitor Internationals previous article discussed how market size growth in developed markets has plateaued across many FMCG categories, and as a result, companies need to take a fine-tuned approach to growth strategy. In turn, this places a greater importance on strategic acquisitions as well as market share gains in companies existing categories as opposed to portfolio momentum driven growth. In the second article of this two-part part blog series, we illustrate several examples of how to use business intelligence to build and support an actionable growth strategy with a case study on Henkel AG in Western Europe. Henkel global company still betting on developed markets Henkel AG is a global beauty and home care company, with brands such as Persil and Dial. It remains mainly exposed to developed markets, making it a good case study for this strategy. As illustrated in Figure 1, Western Europe accounted for approximately half of Henkels global consumer retail value sales in 2015. The only emerging region where Henkel has expanded more aggressively was Eastern Europe. However, in other growth regions such as Asia Pacific, its presence remains rather small compared to rivals with Asia Pacific accounting for only 8% of Henkels global retail value sales in 2015. In contrast, Asia-Pacific accounted for 21% of Procter and Gamble and 23% of Unilevers sales, respectively. Figure 1: Henkel AG global retail value sales in 2015 Source: Euromonitor Passport Database using the Competitor Analytics tool Looking at Figure 1 above, the first strategic takeaway for Henkel is to focus more on growth markets such as Asia and Latin America. However, this article is not about growth markets. Instead, we will focus on how Henkel can find growth in developed markets, where market size growth is plateauing. From2010 to 2015 in laundry detergents, Henkels key category, posted a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of just 0.8% in Western Europe. Hair care, another key category, also did not perform well with a CAGR of just 0.7%. While Henkel may be seen as successful in these markets, looking at the competitive landscape, we will be able to find further growth opportunities. First step: Identify competitors To start, we need to identify and understand Henkels competitors in Western Europe. Euromonitor International has developed the Competitor Analytics tool, which introduces market overlap as a measure of competitive distance. By scanning across all possible country/category combinations available on Passport market intelligence database, the tool can objectively map competitive landscape for every fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) company. Henkels competitive landscape is displayed in Figure 2; the top competitors are listed on the right along with market overlap values, and the scatter plot on the left displays how competitive dynamics have evolved over 2008-2015. Figure 2: Having a good view of the competitive landscape is the first prerequisite for competitor analysis Source: Euromonitor International (Competitor Analytics) How to read the chart: The scatter plot summarises the competitive landscape for the selected company and shows how it has changed over time. The Y-axis shows market overlap, with companies trending upward becoming closer competitors to the selected company. The X-axis shows overall retail value sales for each competitor, with the vertical line showing the selected companys overall retail value sales. Competitors to the left of this vertical line are smaller by overall retail value and companies to the right are larger. The chart confirms that the largest competitive rivals for Henkel in Western Europe are Procter & Gamble, Unilever and L'Oreal (note they are the companies highest on the vertical axis). This may not be a surprise to anyone following the industry, but it is helpful to value the exact competitive distance between Henkel and its rivals. In this case, Henkel competes with its top three competitors for USD4.2 billion, USD2.9 billion and USD2.2 billion, respectively. The competitive landscape in Figure 2 also tells us that Henkels combined market overlap with its top three competitors, Procter & Gamble, Unilever and L'Oreal, is worth USD9 billion and is as large as its next 20 competitors combined. Hence, if Henkel AG is looking to expand in Western Europe where market size growth has been largely flat, it is imperative it understands its top three competitors and its biggest battlegrounds. Second step: Examine each competitive pair in detail - and assess competitive footprints Plotting company portfolios visually is a powerful way to identify white spaces and better understand the strengths and weaknesses of both companies. Figure 3 shows the competitive footprint between Henkel and Procter & Gamble in Western Europe. The colour shading refers to market share; the darker the colour the larger the market share, with numbers indicating which position the company has with 1 denoting the category leader. In addition, the dark gray squares indicate gaps in a companys portfolio. For example, Henkel has many gaps in the UK where Procter & Gamble is strong. Finally, lighter gray squares highlight where neither of the companies is present (e.g. automatic dishwashing in France). Figure 3: Competitive footprints - great way to identify white spaces or opportunities Source: Euromonitor International (Competitor Analytics) Using the competitive footprint above, we see that Henkel AG has the strongest competitive positions in its home market of Germany. There are no visible gaps for the categories shown and Henkels market share is strong. In fact, Germany accounts for approximately one-third of Henkels retail value sales in Western Europe, compared to 18% for Procter & Gamble. However, elsewhere in Western Europe, there are gaps in Henkels presence, notably in the UK and Nordic countries. Meanwhile, Procter & Gambles portfolio is much more dense with fewer gaps. In terms of categories, laundry detergents is key for Henkel AG, comprising some 30% of its retail value sales, whereas for Procter & Gamble it has more of a mix - laundry detergents and hair care being most important, along with nappies/diapers and shaving (Note: The last two categories are not listed on the chart above). For a very thorough analysis, we recommend assessing all major competitive pairs to better understand their respective product positioning, allowing you to view advantages your company might have over competitors in a given product category or market. Third step: Classify opportunities into action areas 1. Key markets - nurture and protect The previous article laid out several ways to identify key markets. For Henkel in Western Europe, markets displayed in the top left corner of figure 4 could be considered key markets. They represent five categories and nine countries, and combined, these 45 markets account for 63% of Henkels total consumer retail value sales in Western Europe. Figure 4: Competitive footprints with action areas These are costly markets for Henkel to lose and the company should prioritise innovations and marketing in those categories to maintain market share. Likewise, these country/category combinations present the largest potential prizes for competitors. The categories that fall in this group are laundry detergents, hair care, facial care, bath and shower and surface care. Unilever, for example, could win USD687 million in retail value sales if it grows its market share in hair care in Germany from its current 3.6% to Henkels current 31.6% share. While this may appear far-fetched, given that Unilever has likely already tried to grow in the category before, it is not entirely unrealistic for Unilever to push harder too. Hair care is one of Unilevers stronger categories. For example, in the UK and Turkey, Unilever has 18% and 22% value shares, respectively. L'Oreal is an even stronger contender to watch out for as it is traditionally very strong in hair care with value shares exceeding 30% in Belgium, Switzerland and France. There are different key competitors in every country/category making it essential for Henkel to continuously protect these categories with product innovation; something Henkel has been doing rather well. 2. Key categories - bring the best products to more countries (acquisition if possible) As companies usually expand with their strongest categories, the five core categories identified above are also best fit for geographic expansion. In Henkels case, these categories range from laundry to surface care. Laundry detergents account for 30% of retail value sales but Henkel also has notable gaps in the UK/Ireland and Nordic countries. The gap exists because Henkel has an agreement with Unilever to market its Persil brand in the UK/Ireland, and Henkel markets the brand elsewhere globally, therefore opportunities for introducing Persil to UK/Ireland could be limited. Facial care and hair care, however, present further opportunities. In facial care, Henkel is present in only nine of the 17 countries in Western Europe, thus expanding brands such as Diadermine and Aok could be an option. In hair care, there are also weaknesses in Spain and Portugal, which could be an opportunity for brands such as Taft and Syoss. The Western European region may not be the best fit for this type of analysis, as it is largely a single market, and companies are generally present in most countries. On the global level, however, more opportunities could emerge. For example, Henkel lacks presence in laundry detergents in many Asia Pacific markets, notably China. Getting into these markets could be of strategic interest for Henkel, especially since some of its hair care brands already have a presence in China. 3. Key countries - more focus on new products, possibly enter new related categories Henkel is typically noted for its strength in product development but being less aggressive in geographical expansion. Henkels acquisition of Spotless Group in 2014 was mainly motivated by category expansion in key countries; Spotless is strong in laundry aids and home insecticides with a focus on Western Europe, mainly France and Italy. This made it a good fit for Henkels laundry detergents in some of its core countries where Henkel is trying to expand. While category expansion ideas are harder to formulate in key markets, Henkel should continue to innovate/acquire categories. One approach is to identify win categories by looking at market commonality and complimentary fit to Henkel. This can be done by looking at its peer group globally if companies similar to Henkel are generally present in some categories Henkel is not, it could be a potentially good fit. Additional good fit categories are colour cosmetics, where Henkel has a low presence and competitors such as LOreal and Kao Group are strong, or the tissue and hygiene industry based on Procter&Gamble Co and Kao Group. Another option is to experiment with new formats and price positioning platforms. 4. White spaces - fill the white spaces Even though the EU is a single market and it is relatively easy to bring a product to other markets, there are over 30 gaps in Henkels Western European presence in its core countries/categories alone - more if smaller categories were added. Exploring the reasons why the company is not present here could be a good starting point for analysis, as these gaps are normally easiest to fill because they are located in the core countries or categories group. 5. Uncharted territories Uncharted territories are rarely strategically planned and usually the by-product of an acquisition. For Henkel in Western Europe, an uncharted territory could be to introduce, for example an ice cream brand in Spain. Top 10 attack moves In the companys existing markets, we can calculate potential strategic attack moves against major Henkels competitors: LOreal, Unilever and Procter & Gamble. These would boost market share since the company already has a brand or group of brands in the country/category and could potentially increase marketing expenditure or win new distribution agreements. Figure 5: Top strategic attack moves for Henkel in Western Europe in 2015 No Competitor Market category Henkel's market share Competitor's market share Potential prize - USD million 1 LOreal France - Hair Care 8.0% 55.9% 893.3 2 P&G UK - Hair Care 4.0% 29.7% 611.2 3 Unilever UK Deodorants 5.4% 60.1% 552.9 4 LOreal France - Facial Care 5.3% 21.6% 445.2 5 P&G Germany - Oral Care 1.4% 26.4% 442.7 6 LOreal Italy - Hair Care 9.9% 39.9% 387.2 7 LOreal Germany - Facial Care 5.8% 17.5% 370.9 8 LOreal France Fragrances 1.3% 16.1% 369.0 9 P&G Germany - Fragrances 0.2% 13.9% 340.6 10 P&G UK - Oral Care 0.4% 17.7% 310.6 Source: Euromonitor International (Competitor Analytics) These are country - category combinations where Henkel could seize the biggest prize if it succeeds in stealing share from its competitor. For example, Henkel is very strong in France overall, but has only 8% of the countrys hair care market, whereas LOreal has a share of nearly 56%. Even if it is a strong market for LOreal, consumers typically demand variety and Henkel could be in a good strategic position to expand here given Henkels focus on hair care. In any case, hair care in France should be high on Henkels agenda in Western Europe. Other such markets are listed in the table above. Competitive landscape as a way to increase your chances of growing your market share In this article, we showcased how a company can use Euromonitor Internationals competitive intelligence framework to identify growth opportunities in mature markets. Typically, mature markets present a challenge for businesses because market size growth is often minimal or flat, but some companies are able to achieve growth in this type of environment. We argue that mergers and acquisitions and strategy planning should take into account that complimentary fit is amplified in such markets. Competitive landscape analysis can help companies identify winning markets and increase the chance of success. In this case study, we highlighted top 10 attack moves for countries/categories where Henkel already has market share and could prioritize those areas for expansion. Additionally, we presented a framework that allows a business to consider spaces where the company may not have a presence. In these cases, traditional market attractiveness metrics such as market size growth projections, category fragmentation, retailer distribution and consumer trends may be added to assist with strategy. A more granular breakdown by segment could also be useful when targeting precise brand level opportunities. Euromonitor International can help. To learn more about our tools used to track and measure the competitive landscape, watch this video and request a demonstration today. The Chin National Front (CNF) held its sixth session of the 2nd central committee conference from 20 to 25 January, 2017. After the meeting CNF released a statement demanding Arakanese Armed Organizations not to initiate their activities in Platwa Township of the Chin state. Although the similar demand was made last year, those Arakanese Armed Groups are still in Platwa Township as said by the locals. Those armed groups also made various harassments to the local residents. So, the CNF release the demand continuously, said Saline Thla Hei, the general secretary of the CNF. The Arakan Army (AA) and the Arakan Liberation Army (ALA) are based along the India-Burma border near Platwa Township in Chin state where skirmishes occurred between the Burma Armys troops and the Arakan armed-groups. Due to those skirmishes, around 370 Chin nationals from the Pyin-soe village of Platwa Township run away for their life and cannot go home yet. Moreover, the Chin locals were forced to use as guides for those armed groups and lost their lives by landmines time and again in the battle zone. Rev. Tluang Ceu, the leader of the Chin Peace and Tranquility Committee(CPTC), said that Peace Process in Chin state was damaged due to the presence of the Arakanese armed-groups in their region. The Peace Process between the government and the CNF is going well. But, the armed activities of the Arakan armed-groups in the Platwa area caused disturbance to the government as well as CNF, said Rev. Tluang Ceu. It was learnt that the CNF has made revision on the annual activities and laid down plans for the future during the Central Committees 5-day Meeting at the Vitoria Headquarters. National-Level political dialogue has been undergoing to be held in coming February and CNF, Chin state government, political parties and civil society organizations will join together organizing the event. In addition, there were concerns about damaging the Union Peace Process because of the conflicts between the Burma Army and the Ethnic Armed Organizations (EAOs). As a result, the CNF puts a clause in its statement urging to address the political conflict by way of political dialogue. Translated by Zin Linn Over 200 representatives of Kachin civil-based organisations participated in the National-Level Political Dialogue (Preliminary) held at Majoi Gawknu of Shatapru Manau Ground from 25 to 26 January. However, the KPCC was not allowed to hold the meeting officially so it was only held as a preliminary meeting because the Kachin Independence Organisation (KIO) has not signed the nationwide ceasefire agreement yet. Dr Manam Tu Ja from the KPCC explained that it was better to hold the preliminary national-level peace dialogue rather than not holding any meeting. We want to hold it officially, but the KIO/KIA has not signed the NCA yet so it is not allowed to be held officially in the Kachin State. We can only hold a preliminary one so we dont feel satisfied. Nevertheless, we, the KPCC, have decided to arrange it even if its not an official meeting. Its led by the KPCC to listen to the public voice, said Dr Manam Tu Ja, who is also chairman of the Kachin State Democracy Party (KSDP). A draft version of the Kachin State Constitution compiled by the KPCC was revealed to the representatives of respective Kachin civil-based organisations at the two-day meeting and their opinion was heard. The state constitution draft will be submitted to the second session of the 21st Century Panglong Conference, which will be held next month. The representatives for the conference were also selected at the meeting. The KPCC comprises the Kachin Democratic Party (KDP), the Kachin State Democracy Party (KSDP), the Lhaovo National Unity and Developmement Party (LNUDP), and the Kachin National Congress (KNC). The KPCC plans to hold a Kachin Conference with Shawng lam Mungmasa Jasat Hpung (SMJH), an advisory group for peace and politics established by the KIO, before the second session of the 21st Century Panglong Conference is held. Translated by Thida Linn He was speaking at the launching ceremony of the 2016 Peace Process Reference Guide, which was compiled by BNI. The book launching ceremony was held at City Star Hotel in Rangoon on 27 January from 10 am to 12 pm. Nai Kasauk Mon explained that the peace process in Burma is weakening after 2016 and more conflicts have taken place in ethnic areas after the 21st Century Panglong Conference. The 21st Century Panglong [Conference] exposed the issue both sides couldnt agree on. The Burma Army wants to set up a federal [system] with the 2008 [Constitution]. The ethnic people dont want to set up the federal [system] with it. The opposite views emerged at the 21st Century Panglong [Conference]. Thats why conflicts and clashes have broken out after the 21st Century Panglong Conference. The Burma Army has seized the Kachin army (KIA)s bases. On the side of the ethnic [armed organizations], the Northern Alliance attacked Muse so more conflicts have been seen at the end of the 21st Century Panglong Conference, said Nai Kasauk Mon. The 2016 Peace Process Reference Guide uses facts and references in describing the number of clashes that broke out in ethnic areas within 2016, peace dialogues, the situation of local IDPs and refugees, ethnic armed organizations, and the peace process carried out by the new government. Mai Cherry Zahau, a human rights activist who led the discussion at the book launching ceremony, said: The word rebel was no longer used and the word ethnic armed organization has been used instead since 2014. Now, we seem to be stepping backwards. Now, the word insurgents has been used frequently. If we look from all side, there isnt anyone who will stand on the side of the ethnic people. Although the Karen National Union (KNU) has signed the nationwide ceasefire agreement, the Karen State and nearby areas that are under its control have encountered many issues last year including skirmishes, business projects carried out on pretense of development, and uncertain future of the IDPs and refugees. Journalists from ethnic-based media do not receive any security guarantees from armed organizations and they have to do self-censoring when they are writing the news, explained Nan Paw Gay, chief editor of the KIC (Karen Information Centre). Ko Htet Aung, the coordinator of the Peace Process Reference Guide, also explained that international donors have contributed to the compiling of the book but it was carried out independently without any influences from anyone. BNI has published the Peace Process Reference Guide since 2003 and this is its fourth edition, according to BNI officials. Translated by Thida Linn The UNFC made the claim in a statement issued on January 27 after the UNFCs central executive committee emergency meeting held in Chiang Mai, Thailand, from January 23 to 25. On 7 December, last year, the Shan State parliament approved the proposal to brand the Northern Alliance - Burma as a terrorist organization. Also at the three-day meeting, the UNFC central executive committee decided to hold a conference in late March. The KNU and NMSP verbally accepted at the meeting, held on January 25, at Tanintharyi Region Governments office, in Dawei City, for both sides to stop fighting and end the disturbance to civilians. At the meeting, in front of Tanintharyi Region Government, both parties agreed, albeit only verbally, to supervise their men in the region to avoid clashes and suffering to the local people thus allowing them to work in their orchards and plantations peacefully and freely, according to Nai Aye Ka, Chair of the NMSPs Dawei District. It was verbally that both sides agreed. There was no signing of documents. The [Tanintharyi] region government also mainly focused on these two points and held a discussion over the two points, said Nai Aye Ka. At this meeting, if we discuss the territory issue, it wont end. However, we will take time and discuss that, said Nai Aye Ka, adding that both sides will maintain the agreement of the two points and keep watchful eyes on each sides movements. Although the MNA tried to contact officials of the KNU delegation for confirmation of the meetings outcomes, MNA could not connect as the spokespersons phone was switched off. The Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), armed wing of KNU and the Mon National Liberation Army (MNLA), armed wing of NMSP, have clashed over 4 times sporadically since October, 2016. The most recent skirmishes between the two ethnic armed groups broke out on January 11 clashing twice on the same day. According to the details made during the ceasefire agreement signed between the NMSP and the then government in 1995 and also during the state level and union level ceasefire agreements signed in 2012, the Tatmadaw demarcated 18 locations for NMSP bases. This also included the Kin-chaung-pyar area, in Yebyu Township, where the recent skirmishes between the troops of the NMSP and the KNU took place, according to NMSP Headquarters. However, although the KNU signed have not only the state-level and union level ceasefire agreement but also the nationwide ceasefire agreement (NCA), the government and Tatmadaw have yet to assign areas for KNU bases. Four journalists were killed in Myanmar since last years military coup, and five others were killed before the putsch dating back to 1999, with the... BRN and SSN oppose any attempts to push ahead with large dams while conflict continues along Burmas major rivers, where Burma Army offensives and systematic abuses have displaced hundreds of thousands, and where ethnic peoples continue to be constitutionally denied their right to decide over natural resources in their homelands, read the statement. The IFC is a member of the World Bank Group which finances private sector initiatives in many developing countries including Burma. The IFC workshops, which are to include seminars about social and environmental impact assessments, are scheduled to start today, January 27, in Yangon, Kachin State capital Myitkyina, and Karenni State capital Loikaw. Sai Khur Hseng of the Shan Sapawa Environmental Organization and a joint-spokesperson for todays statement told Shan Herald that he strongly disagreed with the IFC operation. I strongly disagree with their activities, he said. Right now, dam constructions have been suspended. However, the IFC is pushing a hydropower agenda. This workshop is part of their plan to ensure the dams are built. Fridays statement noted that construction of mega-dams on the Irrawaddy and Salween rivers will have massive impacts on local residents and the environment. Pushing ahead with projects in conflict zones reinforces the root causes of conflict, and contradicts the NLD governments claims to be promoting democratic federalism, said Mi Ah Chai, the other joint-spokesperson for todays statement. The blueprints for hydropower projects on the Irrawaddy River include the 20,000-megawatt chain of Myitsone dams, while a Salween River proposal would include a series of dams in Shan State: the 7,100 MW Mong Ton Dam; the 1,400 MW Kunlong Dam; the 1,200 MW Nong Pha Dam; and the 200 MW Manntaung Dam. The project also includes plans for the 4,000 MW Ywathit Dam in Karenni State, and the 1,360 MW Hat Gyi Dam in Karen State. Three countries are involved in these projects: China (through three state-run firms: Three Gorges Corporation; Sinohydro; and China Southern Grid); Thailand, via its state-run arm Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand; and Burmas Ministry of Electric Power, alongside the International Group of Entrepreneurs (IGE), a firm controlled by the offspring of the late Aung Thaung, the long-time industry minister under Snr-Gen Than Shwes military regime. Once the proposed projects are completed, 90 percent of electricity produced is slated to be exported to China and Thailand. By Shan Herald Agency for News (SHAN) RHS students_edited-1.jpg Resurrection High School Students interact with map, flag and icon exhibits at Pascagoula Public Library on Tuesday during the kickoff of Mississippi's Statehood Bicentennial celebration. (Rex Bridges) Mississippi Statehood Bicentennial facts and icons were presented during a kickoff exhibit and celebration at Pascagoula Public Library. Nearly 300 students and adults visited the displays and interactive exhibits on Monday and Tuesday to learn about Mississippi history in a fun and visual way. The centerpiece icon of the event was the rare, 20-star U.S. flag, acquired by the Mississippi Department of Archives and History in 2001 and then restored. An original copy of the first Mississippi Constitution was also on display. Many questions were answered. Why is the 20-star flag special? The 20-star flag became the official U.S. flag on April 4, 1818, following the signing of the Flag Act of 1818 that declared that the U.S. flag be composed of 13 alternating red and white stripes representing the original colonies and white stars on a navy blue background representing each current state. The Flag Act stated that a star would be added to the flag for each new state on July 4 of the year following the admission of the state into the U.S. Twenty-star flags are very rare because they were only in use from April 4, 1818, to July 4, 1819. And of course, Mississippi was the 20th state. A very large flag, it is likely this flag was flown at sea aboard f U.S. ship. Thanks to expert repair Mississippians can enjoy it for many years to come as part of the MDAH Museum Division Collections. What was the statehood process like? The road to Mississippi's statehood began with the creation of the Mississippi Territory in 1798. This included both present-day Mississippi and Alabama. U.S. President John Adams appointed Winthrop Sargent the first governor of the Mississippi Territory. What was the Enabling Act of 1817? This act was the next step toward statehood by dividing the original Mississippi Territory along the Tombigbee River and naming the new eastern half "Alabama Territory." Citizens of the Mississippi Territory then held elections for a constitutional convention and formed a state government. Who attended the convention? On July 7, 1817, 48 men representing the Mississippi Territory assembled in Washington, Miss., near Natchez for the constitutional convention. After agreeing that statehood would be beneficial, convention members wrote and signed a state constitution on Aug. 15. What did this early constitution provide? It did not give all citizens equal rights. Only free, white, male residents, who either served in the state militia or were taxpayers, were eligible to vote. The constitution allowed white men the basic freedoms of religion, speech, press, and assembly, but also upheld and protected slavery. When was statehood approved? On Dec. 10, 1817, the U.S. Congress approved the constitution and Mississippi was admitted as the 20th state in the United States. Thus our countdown to Dec. 10, 2017, and 200 years of statehood has begun. Columnist Joanne Anderson may be reached at joandy42@yahoo.com. Seventy percent of people polled in Missouri, 72 percent in Nebraska, and 62 percent in Oklahoma oppose slaughtering American horses for human consumption. Photo by Jennifer Kunz/The HSUS 3.0K shares There was one particularly lucky and apolitical participant in the Trump inauguration a horse named Jakar, once destined for slaughter, rescued by an animal advocate, and eventually taken on by the Cleveland Police Department for law enforcement work. Jakar, along with other members of Clevelands mounted police force contingent, marched in the streets of Washington as part of the ceremony marking the transfer of power in our nation. Jakar works for water, hay, and oats. Hes respected and appreciated by the members of the police force where he works. He wasnt a hardship case, or an act of special charity. He was neither ill nor debilitated. Like most horses bound for slaughter, he was perfectly healthy, but was discarded by someone who didnt want him, and scooped up by a predatory and inhumane industry that kills horses for profit and sells their body parts in international markets. Its a remarkable betrayal for people to use the physical and behavioral attributes of horses and then sell them off to a kill buyer when theyre done with them. Americans would never accept that sort of use-and-dispose mentality in our treatment of dogs and cats shipping them off to some other nation to be slaughtered for human consumption when were done with them. Why would we do it for animals whove served us so loyally and who were indispensable in settling our nation? We expect a major fight over horse slaughter in Congress this year, given the new names on some of the key committees that will be involved in setting policy on the issue. President Trumps position on horse slaughter is unknown and will be the wild card factor. For years, President Obama and a bipartisan majority of lawmakers fended off the reopening of horse slaughter plants in the United States after we helped shutter the last three plants a decade ago. But this years fight promises to be one of our toughest ever on this issue. The pro-horse-slaughter crowd tries to turn reality on its head, arguing that they are helping horses by slaughtering them. The truth is, according to a raft of polling conducted through the years, Americans dont subscribe to their convoluted thinking. They dont support the inhumane treatment of horses or turning them into slabs of meat for foreign diners. These animals arent bred for food, and Americans just dont think they should be walked or dragged into slaughterhouses. Remington Research Group, a Kansas-City-based polling firm, just came out of the field with polling results in several Midwestern states, where a few elected officials are among the loudest voices for horse slaughter. These results remind us that opposition to horse slaughter is overwhelming and steadfast. Missouri 70 percent of those polled oppose slaughtering American horses for human consumption. 73 percent would oppose a horse slaughtering plant in their community. 74 percent oppose the use of federal tax dollars for the U.S. Department of Agriculture to allow horse slaughter plants to operate in the United States. Oklahoma 72 percent of those polled oppose slaughtering American horses for human consumption (63 percent in OK-02, Rep. Markwayne Mullins district). 75 percent would oppose a horse slaughtering plant in their community (68 percent in OK-02). 73 percent oppose the use of federal tax dollars for the USDA to allow horse slaughter plants to operate in the U.S (69 percent in OK-02). Nebraska 62 percent of those polled oppose slaughtering American horses for human consumption. 68 percent would oppose a horse slaughtering plant in their community. 66 percent oppose the use of federal tax dollars for the USDA to allow horse slaughter plants to operate in the United States. Oklahoma Congressmen Markwayne Mullin and Tom Cole and Nebraskas Adrian Smith all Republicans are the most outspoken advocates of horse slaughter. Our poll finds that their position is at odds not only with the beliefs of a majority of all Americans, but also with the views of voters in their states and districts. For example, 71 percent of Republicans in Oklahoma, 65 percent of Republicans in Nebraska, and 72 percent of Republicans in Missouri dont support using federal tax dollars to allow horse slaughter plants to operate in the United States. Theres not a single Congressional district in any of their states that favors horse slaughter. No one disputes that there are some homeless horses. But unlike the horse slaughter crowd that treats homelessness as an economic opportunity rather than a moral responsibility, were pitching in to help. Joined by the ASPCA and the Animal Welfare Institute in the Homes for Horses Coalition, The HSUS works to actively promote the welfare and protection of horses and other equines. We provide care and homes to horses in need, advance the highest operating standards for equine rescue and retirement homes, and promote responsible horse ownership. We assist in training thousands of horses to be rehomed at equine rescues through our Forever Foundation training program. The HSUS and its affiliates directly care for nearly 800 horses at several of our animal-care facilities. To help reduce overbreeding, The HSUS formed the Responsible Horse Breeders Council, comprised of horse breeders who work to decrease the number of surplus horses bred in the United States. More than 1,200 breeders have signed our Responsible Horse Breeders Pledge to help protect horses from neglect, starvation, and slaughter, by reducing the number of surplus horses in the United States. It would be a remarkable step backward to reopen horse slaughter plants in the United States. Whats needed, and what Reps. Vern Buchanan, R-Fl., Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., Ed Royce, R-Calif., and Michelle Lujan Grisham, D-N.M. are pushing, via the Safeguard American Food Exports (SAFE) Act, H.R.113, is a complete ban on the slaughter of American horses, including live exports to Canada and Mexico for slaughter. Only then will we offer proper thanks to animals whove helped our nation in ways that we cannot even properly measure. Please contact your U.S. Senators and Representatives and urge them to ban all horse slaughter. Ladies, it's time to search the back of your closet and the bottom of your accessory drawer and give new life to gently used formal dresses, purses, shoes and accessories. announced the official donation drop-off locations for its 10 th annual Prom Dress Day event to be held on March 25 at the in Easton. Donations of gently used prom dresses, purses, shoes and jewelry help high school girls glam up for that most important event, the prom. YWCA's Prom Dress Day provides affordable clothing, shoes, purses and accessories to local junior and senior girls. A wide selection of styles and sizes are needed, including plus sizes, to make Prom Dress Day a success. Donations may be dropped off at the following locations between Feb. 13 and March 3: Charles Chrin Community Center Firth Youth Center Hanover Township Community Center The Perfect Fit YWCA Bethlehem: 3893 Adler Place, Building B, Suite 180, Bethlehem (off of Highland Avenue) 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. Dresses and other donation items should be in "prom worthy" condition, with no noticeable stains or tears, and preferably less than five years old. For information, call 610-867-4669, ext. 104, or visit ywcabethlehem.org for more information. Do you have community news to share? To see it posted here and possibly in The Express-Times, send me an email. As a Senate committee nears a vote on Betsy DeVoss nomination as U.S. secretary of education, several Democrats on the panel continue to press concerns about the nominees financial disclosure and ethics agreement . Your ethics review process has revealed dozens of financial interests that you and your family hold through a complicated network of investment entities, assets, and trusts, says a Jan. 27 letter to DeVos spearheaded by Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. You have agreed to divest yourself of interests in more than 100 companiessome of which make money by collecting student loan debt, refinancing student loans, providing online learning platforms or education reference materials, or running for-profit educational institutions. We are concerned that if confirmed, you would continue to benefit from significant financial holdings in family trusts that may hold investments in companies affected by the Department of Educations activities, adds the letter, which was also signed by Senators Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, Christopher S. Murphy of Connecticut, and Margaret Wood Hassan of New Hampshire. DeVos vowed in a Jan. 19 ethics letter approved by the federal Office of Government Ethics that she would divest her stakes in 102 assets that hold potential conflicts of interest should she be confirmed as education secretary. But she also stated in the letter that she will remain as a trustee and beneficiary of three family trusts, of which she and her husband, Dick DeVos, are the sole beneficiaries. DeVoss financial disclosure provides details on only one of the three trusts, Family Trust 2, which appear to have indirect investments in education-related firms. You have disclosed the assets in only one of these family trusts (Family Trust 2), the letter from the six Democrats says. You have not disclosed the underlying assets in the other two (Family Trusts 11 and 12). Members of the Senate--and the public--therefore do not know whether these trusts contain investments (like those contained in Family Trust 2) in companies related to higher education that could pose conflicts of interest or misalign your incentives as the Secretary of Education. For example, the senators letter expresses concern that DeVos would retain interests that are connected to Performant Financial Corp., which is involved in student debt collection and has had contracts with the U.S. Department of Education in the past. Other observers have also expressed concerns that DeVos would retain direct or indirect investments in some education-related companies, such as a stake valued at between $5 million and $25 million in Neurocore LLC, a Grand Rapids, Mich.-based company that has claimed its biofeedback technology helps children with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder and autism perform better in school. Will you commit that neither you, nor your spouse, nor your children, nor your extended family beyond your spouse and children, will benefit financially from actions you take as secretary through any of the Attachment C entities in which you plan to retain a financial interest, including Neurocore? and other firms, the Democratic senators asked DeVos in the letter. That was one of seven questions in the letter that asks DeVos to reply by Monday, Jan. 30. Mary Bottari, the deputy director of the Center for Media and Democracy in Madison, Wis., which publishes several ethics watchdog newsletters on the web, said in an interview that DeVoss investments in education-related companies are particularly concerning despite her vow to divest of many of them. These types of financial ties present a conflict over the long term that is very difficult for the public to track, she said. Ed Patru, the head of the informal group Friends of Betsy DeVos, said the Democratic senators letter was a political exercise through and through. The Office of Government Ethics has cleared Betsy and affirmed that she will have no conflicts, he said. We think it would set a grave and dangerous precedent to substitute the OGEs non-partisan guidance with the personal opinions of partisan lawmakers on Capitol Hill. On Jan. 24, the chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, and the panels ranking Democrat, Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, held a brief debate on the Senate floor about the concerns over DeVos, including her ethics agreement and financial disclosure. Democratic senators on the committee have asked 1,397 followup questions after DeVoss Jan. 17 confirmation hearing, Alexander said. And, they are throwing around conflict-of-interest accusations, he said. But the OGE agreement has settled those concerns, Alexander said. Murray responded that there remain serious questions that remain regarding her ethics paperwork, her tangled finances, and her potential conflicts of interestquestions that Democrats have continued to demand answers to. Washington Teachers, at least two former education secretaries, and others with links to education are speaking out about President Donald Trumps executive order issued Friday that suspends refugee admissions into the U.S. for 120 days, bars all immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, and indefinitely bans refugees from Syria. For Rachel Rowan, a high school social studies teacher in Prince Georges County schools in Maryland, the controversy happens to match up with her lessons: This week, Rowan told us, shell be discussing the U.S. Constitutions Article II (the section governing the powers of the presidency) and what exactly executive orders are. And she said shell be emphasizing to them that looking at different perspectives is often the most productive thing they can do with an issue to learn about it and understand it. (We spoke with Rowan while she was on her way to attend a demonstration near the U.S. Capitol against the nomination of Betsy DeVos, Trumps pick to be education secretary.) Among other questions, shell be asking her students, Do you think the people who support that policy think of themselves as racist? Rowan also said she has refugee students in her classroom, but that she doesnt want to single them out in the current climate: Some offer their experiences. Some of them I know because they have confided in me. ... I dont put students on the spot to talk about heir personal experiences. As with many teachers, she also has to navigate tricky political terrain: Most of her students lean liberal or favor Democrats in some fashion, Rowan said. "[Trumps actions] dont align with the politics of my classroom right now, Rowan said. Also on her way to the DeVos protest was Jaime Goldman, a middle school English teacher in Silver Spring, Md. She said she planned to have her students read Emma Lazarus poem The New Colossus that is on the pedestal of the statute of liberty during her class on Monday. Like Rowan, she said she works in a diverse school where students have opinions about these issues. Goldman said she tries to make it clear that all opinions are welcome. But I try to share the facts. Thats the way I think I have influence and power to effect kids and make them think about whats happening around them, Goldman said of sharing literary work like Lazarus. I cant tell them, Im not allowed to say, I dont support this. But I try to present fiction texts, non-fictions texts, poetry, songs, to set an example and help that way. In November, Education Week photographers put together a photo gallery of Syrian refugee students and their adjustments to classrooms in the U.S. At the time. the U.S. Department of State estimated that of the 11,000 refugees admitted to the country over the previous year, 60 percent were children. Just over a year ago, we also wrote about the U.S. Department of Educations January 2016 guidance to schools to make Musliam, Arab, and refugee students in general feel welcome . (On the other hand, in the wake of Trumps executive order, some observers have pointed out that former President Barack Obamas administration stopped processing refugees from Iraq for six months in 2011 after concerns arose about Iraqi terrorists infiltrating the U.S.) And a 2016 study focused on the challenges refugee children face , and how those obstacles are often linked to parents understanding, or lack thereof, of their local school system. Heres some other reaction we picked up after the refugee and travel ban went into effect. Former Secretary of Education John B. King Jr. called on others in the education community to oppose Trumps action. Kings predecessor, former Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, had a similar message: No one wakes up saying, I want to be a refugee. They are fleeing for their lives. We fight for them & for our own humanity.#NoBanNoWall Arne Duncan (@arneduncan) January 29, 2017 DeVos hadnt posted about this on Twitter as of early Monday. We havent seen messages about this on social media from former secretaries Lauro Cavazos, William Bennett, Richard Riley, Rod Paige, or Margaret Spellings. However, Robert Pondiscio of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute sounded a somewhat different note. He argued that students should be taught to imagine this power in the hands of your worst enemy and that such executive actions are problematic regardless of which party is in power. The best time to be upset by overuse of executive orders is when YOUR partys POTUS is the one wielding the pen. Robert Pondiscio (@rpondiscio) January 29, 2017 Rep. Lou Barletta, R-Pa., a member of the House education committee, said the ban from Trump is just pragmatism: I have long called for suspension of refugee program while we cant properly screen applicants. Must know they are who they say they are. Rep. Lou Barletta (@RepLouBarletta) January 28, 2017 And the Heritage Foundation, a right-leaning think tank that supports school choice and a more limited role for Washington in schooling, said Trumps action is being blown out of proportion. The hysterical rhetoric about President Trumps executive order on refugees is out of control. Lets slow down and take a look at the facts. https://t.co/pQvU2X3QlJ Heritage Foundation (@Heritage) January 28, 2017 Meanwhile, American Federations of Teachers President Randi Weingarten highlighted her participation in protests around the country against the ban. Glad to have participated in last nites protests; thankful 4 the Judge Who Blocked Trumps Refugee Ban via @nytimes https://t.co/8atD5yX4xk Randi Weingarten (@rweingarten) January 29, 2017 National Education Association President Lily Eskelsen Garcia had the following statement: Educators oppose these ill-conceived, hateful actions because they are a drastic departure from our core American values. We dont teach hate, we do not tell people how to pray, and we do not ban people based on their religion. Matt Barnum of the 74, an advocacy and news organization, made a clear link between Trumps preferred education policy and his actions on Friday. Someone should tell Trump that immigration is just like #schoolchoice but for countries. Matt Barnum (@matt_barnum) January 29, 2017 Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., the top Democrat on the Senate education committee gave her support to refugees. Thank you to everyone gathering today in support of our friends & neighbors who for generations have come to America seeking refuge. Senator Patty Murray (@PattyMurray) January 29, 2017 And her counterpart, Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., the Senate education committee chairman, also questioned the ban, saying it was poorly executed and came close to an improper religious test. The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, which advocates for students civil rights and a strong federal oversight role in education, registered its opposition to the ban: Proud - today and every day - that the @ACLU is part of our civil and human rights coalition. Were with you. #NoBanNoWall #RefugeesWelcome Civil Rights (@civilrightsorg) January 29, 2017 Also check out our colleague Corey Mitchells look at how a Minnesota district handled an influx of children from Somalia , one of the seven countries from which immigration to the U.S. is temporarily banned. Photos: Ahad Al Haj Ali, 10, sits in a class for refugee students (Christine Armario/AP); Jaime Goldman, left, a teacher in Silver Spring, MD., and Karen Levush, a former teacher in the District of Columbia Public Schools, on their way to a protest against Betsy DeVos, President Donald Trumps nominee for education secretary. Follow us on Twitter at @PoliticsK12 . Betsy DeVos, President Donald Trumps pick to lead the U.S. Department of Education, is at the center of a social media maelstrom and has stirred more opposition than any other candidate for secretary in the departments more than three decade history. Over the past couple of weeks, educators and activists concerned about her appointment have made thousands of calls to congressional offices and organized a spate of protests in Washington D.C. , DeVos hometown of Holland, Michigan , and elsewhere. Still, shell probably be the next secretary of education. DeVos only needs Republican support to be confirmed. And the GOP controlls the U.S. Senate 52 to 48. That means, if all the Democrats vote against DeVos as expected, three senators would need to flip to defeat her. And that doesnt look likely, for reasons we explain further below. There may be an upside to DeVos as education secretary for Democrats, who have already started fundraising off the controversial nominee. More on that below. How do we know DeVos is likely to get support from all or most Republicans? Just watch her confirmation hearing. The most-talked about parts, of course, are where DeVos appeared confused about federal special education laws , and when she suggested that schools might need guns as protection from potential grizzlies. But the most important momentsin terms of DeVos prospects for confirmationwere her exchanges with the two moderate GOP senators most likely to vote against her, Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. Both are from rural states that arent likely to be enthusiastic about vouchers. Both Collins and Murkowski, however, seemed ready to back DeVos. Collins told DeVos that she has no doubt that you care deeply about the education of all children. And Collins bristled at Sen. Bernie Sanders, I- Vt., suggestion that DeVos was nominated primarily because of her status as a GOP mega-donor. Given your life-long work and commitment to education that suggestion was really unfair and unwarranted Collins said. Collins pressed DeVos on whether states or the feds should be making decisions about vouchers and charter schools, and DeVos told her states should be in the drivers seat. Murkowksi, who is one of a handful of senators who received a campaign donation from DeVos but was also endorsed by the National Education Association in her re-election bidwas tougher on the secretary designate. Still, she seemed to be in DeVos corner. Murkowski noted that some teachers in her state are worried that DeVos wouldnt require public, private, and charter schools to meet the same accountability standards. But she quickly added that DeVos gave very reassuring answers that you are not seeking to undermine or erode public schools. To be sure, DeVos needs every GOP vote she can get. If shes confirmed, she will likely be the first education secretary without Democratic support. Sen Al Franken, D-Minn., a member of the Senate education committee told MSNBC that every Senate Democrat would vote against her confirmation . And since the hearing, public education advocates have been turning up the pressure on Collins and Murkowski. The Andrew half of Politics K-12 tried calling Murkowski and Collins on Friday. The voicemail box and phone lines for Collins were all jammed up. Murkowski, who is one of a handful of senators on the committee that have received campaign donations from DeVos, has also received numerous phone calls, although her office declined to say how many, or whether the Alaska senator was rethinking her stance. Murkowski also tweeted last week that her phone lines had been overwhelmed with callers from the lower 48", making it difficult for Alaskans to weigh in. On social media, DeVos opponents are also targeting Sen. Patrick Toomey, a Republican from Pennsylvania, who has called DeVos a great pick, despite opposition from teachers in his state . And, in addition to an anti-DeVos demonstration across from the U.S. Capitol building Sunday, there were protests last week near the Nashville office of the education committee chairman, Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn. Alexander has been one of DeVos biggest champions. And numerous demonstrators told the Tennessean that Alexanders voice-mail box was full, making it impossible for them to register complaints about DeVos. DeVos has also gotten anti-endorsements from groups that dont typically take positions on the secrtary of education, like the Education Trust and the National Association of Secondary School Principals. At the same time, though, shes gotten an outpouring of support from prominent Republicans, and even some Democrats, including former Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut. Expect Republicans to bring that up when they vote on her confirmation, likely next month. A GOP Senate aide said Saturday that he expects DeVos will make it. This is all theater for the Dems to prove they are mad, the aide said. The same aide had previously predicted that DeVos would be confirmed by mid-Februrary. The Senate education committee is slated to vote on DeVos nomination Tuesday. The silver lining for Democrats: DeVos as education secretary may not be all bad for her opponents. She has become so controversial that Democrats are now fundraising off of her nomination. In an email circulated this weekend, the re-election campaign of Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsina state Trump unexpectedly wonasked for contributions of $5 or $10 to strengthen opposition to [DeVos] confirmation. Baldwin is expected to face a tough re-election bid in 2018. Follow us on Twitter at @PoliticsK12 . BENGALURU (PTI): ISRO has successfully tested its indigenously developed cryogenic engine in a major step forward for its landmark 'GSLV Mk III' rocket, scheduled for launch within the first quarter this year. Cryogenic engines are used in the upper stage of a rocket launch as they provide the maximum thrust to a launcher vehicle. The cryogenic upper stage, designated as C25, was tested on January 25 for 50 seconds at ISRO Propulsion Complex (IPRC) at Mahendragiri in Tamil Nadu, demonstrating all the stage operations, the space agency said. The performance of the stage during the test was as predicted, it said, adding that this was the first test in a series of two tests. The next one was planned for a flight duration of 640 seconds. The 50 second test is a significant milestone in the development of indigenous cryogenic propulsion technology, ISRO said, adding that the successful hot test of the stage in the first attempt itself demonstrates the agency's ability to work in new areas like cryogenic technology. The development of C25 cryogenic stage began with the approval of GSLV MkIII, the next generation launch vehicle of ISRO, capable of launching 4 ton class spacecraft in Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO). The vehicle consists of two solid strap-on motors, one earth storable liquid core stage and the cryogenic upper stage. The C25 stage is the most powerful upper stage developed by ISRO and uses Liquid Oxygen and Liquid Hydrogen propellant combination. The stage carries 27.8 tons of propellants loaded in two independent tanks. The first flight stage for 'GSLV MkIII-D1' mission is in an advanced stage of realisation. It is scheduled to launch GSAT-19 during first quarter of 2017. The flight engine has been successfully tested in the High Altitude Test facility and integrated with the flight stage, ISRO said. ISRO said the C25 stage was conceptualised, designed and realised by Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre (LPSC), ISRO's lead Centre for Propulsion, with support from various System Development Agencies from other three Centres of ISRO - Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC), ISRO Propulsion Complex (IPRC) and Sathish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC). An unrelated file photo. NEW DELHI (PTI): Having rejected indigenously built 'Tejas' as too heavy, the Indian Navy has launched a Request for Information to procure 57 multi-role combat aircraft for its carrier. Last month, Navy Chief Admiral Sunil Lanba had said the "present LCA does not meet the carrier capability required by the Navy". He had said the service would continue to support its development but "at the same time we will seek aircraft elsewhere which can operate on the aircraft carrier". The RFI, dated January 17, says the aircraft are "intended as day-and-night capable, all-weather, multi-role, deck-based combat aircraft which can be used for air defence, air-to-surface operations, buddy refuelling, reconnaissance etc. from IN aircraft carriers". The companies have been asked to respond by May. While it has not been specified whether the Navy wants single-engine or twin-engine multi-role carrier-borne fighters, sources said that given the role mentioned, the aircraft will be a medium-to-heavy, twin-engine one. At present, the Navy operates 45 MIG-29K jets, which from time-to-time face serviceability issues. Currently, six planes are compatible for aircraft carrier flying. They are Rafale (Dassault, France), F-18 Super Hornet (Boeing, US), MIG-29K (Russia), F-35B and F-35C (Lockheed Martin, US) and Gripen (Saab, Sweden). While F-18, Rafale and MIG-29K are twin engine jets, the remaining three have single engine. The government also wants to manufacture these planes in India and tender has asked the original equipment manufacturers to respond to it. It also sought to know at what level of Transfer of Technology (ToT) and deep repair expertise the company is willing to share with India. It also asked the vendor to specify critical technologies required and comment on its ability to absorb the aircraft manufacturing technology at the levels of sub vendor/supply chain elements in India through ToT from OEM and its partners. As regards the delivery schedule, the first lot of jets have to be delivered in three years after inking of the contract and all the 57 have to be delivered in the next three years. An internet imagery. NEW DELHI (PTI): Aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya backed by nuclear submarine INS Chakra besides fighting assets of the Indian Navy and Coast Guard have come together in the country's biggest inter-service 'Tropex' exercise along the western seaboard. The navy's annual Theatre Readiness Operational Exercise (TROPEX) got underway on January 24. The month-long exercise will have ships and aircraft of both the Western and Eastern Naval Commands, as also assets from the Indian Air Force, Indian Army and the Indian Coast Guard exercising together. The last edition of the exercise was conducted in January 2015. Tropex has grown in scale and complexity over the years and will see participation of major surface combatants and air assets of the Indian Navy including INS Vikramaditya, INS Chakra, Landing Platform Dock (LPD) Jalashwa, the recently commissioned destroyer INS Chennai, P-8I long range maritime reconnaissance and anti-submarine warfare aircraft operating alongside SU-30 MKI, Jaguars, AWACS, IL-78 Flight Refuelling Aircraft of the Indian Air Force and infantry units of the Indian Army. The exercise will be conducted in various phases, both in harbour and at sea encompassing the various facets of war-fighting and combat operations. Tropex-17 assumes special significance in the backdrop of the current security scenario, a statement by the navy said. The exercise is aimed at testing combat readiness of the combined fleets of the Indian Navy, and the assets of the Indian Air Force, Indian Army and the Indian Coast Guard. It will also strengthen interoperability and joint operations in a complex environment. WASHINGTON (AFP): US President Donald Trump and South Korea's Acting President Hwang Kyo-Ahn have vowed to "strengthen" their joint defence capabilities against the belligerent North, the White House has said. "President Trump reiterated our ironclad commitment to defend the ROK, including through the provision of extended deterrence, using the full range of military capabilities," the White House said in a statement on Sunday, using an acronym for the South's formal name. "The two leaders agreed to take steps to strengthen joint defence capabilities to defend against the North Korean threat." Pentagon chief James Mattis is due to travel to South Korea on Wednesday and Japan on Friday on his first trip as defence secretary. The trip comes amid worries in the two long-standing American allies about the direction of US policy in their region under President Donald Trump. During his campaign, Trump threatened to withdraw US forces from the two countries if they did not step up their financial support for their defence. But the White House insisted that the trip "reflects the close friendship between our two countries and demonstrates the importance of the US-ROK alliance." Seoul and Washington agreed last year to install the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in the South after a string of North Korean nuclear and missile tests - prompting strong objections from China, which fears it will undermine its own ballistic capabilities. Earlier this month, Hwang warned that North Korea's nuclear and missile capabilities are accelerating at an "unprecedented" pace, as he called for the "swift" deployment of the anti-missile system. Within South Korea, voices opposing the THAAD installation have grown louder, with some opposition candidates pledging to scrap the agreement if they win a presidential election due this year. The plan has also angered Beijing, which has imposed a string of measures seen in the South as economic retaliation, including effectively barring K-pop stars from performing on the mainland and not authorizing South Korean airlines to operate charter flights between the countries. Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Commending Safeway and lambasting Shoppers Mall, local senior Sharon Brooks said that she wants to see Brandons business community become more accessible to those with mobility issues. In mid-September, Shoppers Mall discontinued its scooter program, under which two electronic scooters had been available free of charge to those who needed them. The discontinuation came in part due to recent renovations to the guest service area, Shoppers Mall marketing director Candace McKenzie explained, noting that they werent left with enough space to store and charge the scooters. Tim Smith/The Brandon Sun Brandonite Sharon Brooks is disappointed that Shoppers Mall is no longer offering scooter services for the disabled. There were also liability concerns, McKenzie added, with Shoppers Mall the final location under Morguard Management, which oversees the mall, to still carry the service. While theyve received a number of complaints from a core group of individuals who used them, McKenzie pointed to walkers and wheelchairs that they now have available at guest services. Disappointed by this shift away from accessibility, Brooks said that she would like to see Shoppers Mall reconsider its decision and for other shopping centres to become more accessible. Safeway, she said, is fantastic. At Safeway, they dont only supply scooters, but staff members retrieve them for you, she shared, noting that once she gets to the checkout, staff always offer to walk groceries out to her vehicle. Where Brooks said shes unlikely to return to Shoppers Mall unless a friend can help her out, Safeway remains fair game. Brooks, 77, has neuropathy and chronic diabetic foot ulcers and is unable to walk long distances. On doctors orders, she restricts her movement within her apartment and between her vehicle and scooters. She has been dealing with chronic foot ulcers for the past 10 years and was informed last summer by her doctors that its scooter time. It has been a difficult transition for the independent senior, who explained: I have the attitude that I can do all this until I do it and it doesnt work. She has tried using the wheelchairs available at Shoppers Mall, but getting from her vehicle to guest services was too long a walk for her damaged feet, and once she got there the wheelchairs proved both too exhausting for her to operate and ill-sized, hurting her legs. Loading her personal scooter into her vehicle is too difficult a task for the senior, leaving her without access to Shoppers Mall, where she used to enjoy shopping. Recognizing that there are more people in Brandon than her with mobility issues, Brooks said that shed like to see more businesses follow Safeways example than that of Shoppers Mall. tclarke@brandonsun.com Twitter: @TylerClarkeMB Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. A number of intoxicated individuals kept police hopping overnight on Friday and three of them have been arrested for charges related to impaired driving. The first such impaired driver was arrested during a Friday evening traffic stop in the 1200 block of College Avenue, as outlined in a police media report. Suspected by police to have consumed alcohol, the 45-year-old man from East Petersburg, Pa, refused to comply with a police request to take a roadside screening device test, and was consequently arrested. The American was held in custody and was scheduled to appear for a bail hearing in court on Saturday morning. The second impaired driving arrest was made at about 1:30 a.m. on Saturday, during a traffic stop in the 2500 block of Victoria Avenue. A 24-year-old Brandon woman displayed signs of impairment, failed a breathalyzer and was arrested for impaired driving as a result. Shell face related charges and will appear in court on Feb. 2. A vehicle speeding northbound on 18th Street alerted the attention of police at about 3:21 a.m. on Saturday, when they pulled over an 18-year-old Saskatchewan woman who displayed signs of impairment. Arrested for impaired driving, the suspect provided breathalyzer samples with readings twice the legal limit. Also without a valid drivers licence, the driver, from Standing Buffalo First Nation, was held in custody to appear for bail hearing court on Sunday afternoon. As for other alcohol-related incidents, Friday afternoon saw police arrest a 35-year-old Brandon man arrested for breaching his undertaking condition to not consume alcohol. Also the subject of a warrant for assault, he was taken into custody and set to appear in court on Saturday morning. Another Brandon man, this one 38 years of age, was arrested for breaching a not to consume alcohol condition later that evening, was held in custody and released to appear in court on March 30. Police also arrested and detained five people for public intoxication from Friday night to Sunday. The Brandon Sun Lawmakers in Delaware are considering a bill that would require all public high schools in the state to offer at least one computer science course. The state house unanimously approved the legislation last week, and now its under consideration in the senate. The bill, which was sponsored by Democratic Rep. Debra Heffernan , would require computer science instruction in all public high schools by the 2020-21 school year. Last year, Heffernan told the Dover Post, There are a lot of jobs that are open in the technology area in Delaware and nationally that kids are not qualified for, and they dont even know about it. Katie Hendrickson is the advocacy and policy manager for Code.org . Through an email, she agreed that all high school students should have access to at least one computer science course. This is also an equity issue, because often students in rural areas or underrepresented minority students attend schools that dont offer computer science, she wrote. Heffernans bill would also allow a computer science course to satisfy one year of the total credit requirements in math with the exclusion of Algebra I, geometry, Algebra II or the equivalent courses starting with the 2018-19 school year. Hendrickson called that a step in the right direction. Allowing a computer science course to substitute for a core credit for graduation (such as math or science) is a policy that has resulted in greater student enrollment in computer science in other states, with more females and underrepresented minority students taking computer science, she wrote. It seems to be easier for students to fit computer science into their schedules if it counts towards a graduation requirement. Under Heffernans bill, computer science curriculum standards would have to be approved by the state board of education by the end of this year. Related stories: Already have an account? Log in here Brandon police have arrested a suspect allegedly responsible for spraying a man in the face with bear mace. We need your support! Local journalism needs your support! As we navigate through unprecedented times, our journalists are working harder than ever to bring you the latest local updates to keep you safe and informed. Now, more than ever, we need your support. Starting at $4.99/month you can access your Brandon Sun online and full access to all content as it appears on our website. or call circulation directly at (204) 727-0527. Your pledge helps to ensure we provide the news that matters most to your community! Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 28/01/2017 (2107 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. With federal legislation on the legalization of marijuana expected to be introduced this spring, Brandon City Council is starting the discussion about what impacts it may have at the municipal level. Coun. Lonnie Patterson (South Centre) recently inquired about the issue to city administration. This change will have implications in different city departments, Patterson said. Recognizing the passage and proclamation of this legislation is some time away, I would like to ask if any work is being done to prepare to respond to this change? City manager Scott Hildebrand said administration has done a preliminary review of the report by the federal task force on cannabis legalization, which was released last month. This was done in an effort to identify the issues municipalities may face with the legalization and regulation of cannabis by the federal government. The report identifies several areas that the provincial and municipal governments will be required to have input on, such as minimum age for purchase; promotion/advertising; marketing restrictions; taxing; public education campaigns targeting youth, parents and vulnerable populations; workplace safety and workplace impairment policies. Other areas to consider include regulation of wholesale and retail distribution, location of retail stores and overall public safety. There is lots of work ahead of us, Hildebrand said. Well continue to review our policies and regulations in preparation of the release of the proposed legislation and bring that information back to council. Mayor Rick Chrest said there will be a much clearer picture once the federal legislation is introduced, which will then enable the provinces to fit into that, followed by municipalities. Im sure there will be changes to some of the provincial acts that govern what we do the Municipal Act, the Planning Act, Chrest said. Its very difficult for any of us to really start knowing what effects it has at the municipal levels until we see what is rolled out at the federal level. So well be keeping an eye on it and well be ready when that should occur. While the federal legislation is expected to be introduced this spring, the timeline is unclear. Being such a controversial topic, the talks may be lengthy. It has the potential to be a very highly debated item, so I dont know at this point that anyone really has a fair read on how those debates may go and which directions, and ultimately what might end up coming, said Sandy Trudel, the citys director of economic development. Not a lot of time and effort has been spent on this topic in the economic development office. Until marijuana is legalized, its still viewed as an illegal activity, Trudel said. But they are curious to see what positive impacts legalization may have on Brandon. Were an entrepreneurial community, were the service centre, so it only makes sense that if it is to be legalized, and if there is opportunity for business, then one can assume that it will happen in Brandon as well, Trudel said. The issue is also on Brandon Chamber of Commerces radar, and president Terry Burgess said they will be taking the lead from the Canadian chamber of Commerce. At the Canadian Chambers annual general meeting last September, a decision was made to wait and see what the federal legislation looks like. From a business perspective, theres obvious concerns about marijuana usage in the workplace, no different than other drugs and alcohol, Burgess said. So its helping small business, medium and large businesses cope with some new challenges and realities if marijuana becomes legalized. Individual employers will be able to determine their own policies, dealing with impairment at work, Burgess said. While alcohol impairment is pretty easy to detect, an employee under the influence of marijuana may not be as obvious. Especially in jobs where you use heavy equipment, it can be a safety concern, Burgess said. The other question yet to be answered is how marijuana would be regulated. Burgess said they will be eager to find out if it will be sold through a controlled setting like alcohol, or if there will be a business opportunity. jaustin@brandonsun.com Twitter: @jillianaustin Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. More students are poised to qualify for bursaries as the result of a Brandon University board of governors decision on Saturday. Vice president of academics Steve Robinson, who serves as a resource to the board, introduced the motion to unanimous support. Whereas until that moment BU required bursary recipients to have a grade grade point average of 2 or a percentage of 75 per cent, these thresholds have now been removed. Those thresholds were thought to be too high, excluding too many qualified students from receiving access to bursaries, Robinson explained after the meeting. Now, any student who has been accepted at BU and has demonstrated a financial need also qualifies for bursaries. However, in the case of bursaries whose term of reference do not include academic criterion, academic achievement may be considered where two or more applicants have a similar financial need. This policy applies to bursaries administered through the Brandon University Foundation, Robinson explained a fund that is fed by various community donors. According to the organizations latest annual report, $1.36 million was distributed through scholarships and bursaries in 2015, representing 46.6 per cent of the years total disbursements of $2.82 million. tclarke@brandonsun.com Twitter: @TylerClarkeMB Todays guest blog is written by Diane Burbank, Principal of Woodside High School , Sequoia Unified School District, California I walk toward center quad, and its swirling like a hurricane. Usually, the center quad is more like a bee hive. Yes, with lots of energy and buzzing, but typically very organized, purposeful and familiar from day to day. But this morning, two days after the presidential election, students are swirling in different configurations; its unfamiliar, and as I get closer, it feels unsafe. Students are chanting, Stop the violence. Increase the peace. Si su puede. Were not leaving. The swirls are multiple, but not like gears working in unison. This is unrest. This is a direct result of the election results which were surprising not just to adults who voted but to teenagers who despite not being able to vote, are practicing how to exercise their voices. Like the rest of California, majority students were leaning Democrat, but not 100%. The conversation was well underway, significantly influenced by election night social media posts made by students that had raged through campus, and many of which were inflammatory (off school time, off school grounds, not on school equipment). Im not the first adult to arrive at the swirling quad, but I am the principal, so I wade in. There is no center or calm in this hurricane in the quad, yet. Thats what I have to create. I take the microphone that is usually reserved for introducing athletes or celebrating students of the week or announcing the big dance. Theres no stage, theres just this swirling. I get to the center and, using my quad voice, address the students, I understand, I understand. This is your principal, and I need you to listen to me. Staff members had already prompted students to return to morning class after the tardy bell rang, but students had politely refused or just looked through the adult making the request. I knew I had to ask students to do something that they would actually do for me. If I asked them to do something, and they didnt do it, they would KNOW they didnt have to do what the principal said, and I couldnt afford that. I stated that everyone would get a chance to speak, but first, I needed them to listen to me. Now, all eyes were on me. It wasnt quiet or calm at all, but I at least had their attention. I motioned for students to sit, waving my hand over the front of the crowd, and they began sitting. It was like a wave. I know this about humans; we all listen better when we are seated. The rowdier students were behind me, and this was the next challenge. I made direct eye contact with students with whom I had developed deep relationships over time. This was key. Using the two fingered I see you, you see me gesture followed by a hand motion imploring them to sit down, a connection was made with the rowdier kids in the back, and they too began to sit and wait for what would be said next. Id better have something good to say and make it quick. Dont Drop the Mic...Pass It I acknowledged that students had something to say and that we value student voice at Woodside High. Everyone would get the chance to use their voice as we turned center quad into a big outside classroom; but we would have some rules. I said, You know that we are a school who believes in student voice, so yes, you get to express that, but Im going to ask you to use academic language -- use your big words -- and talk about your perspective. No name calling. I think I even said no F-bombs, and students didnt snicker, they nodded. I passed the mic to the first student. All of a sudden, we had a structure and parameters to embrace student voice. And it was natural. That might have been a huge risk, passing the mic to an unscripted, highly emotional student. But really, it wasnt because of the five-year commitment our campus has had to working on student voice. From focus groups, to Student Voice surveys, to students at decision-making tables, to students submitting issue/concern forms, we honor student voice. So, a peaceful protest was logical; adults on campus didnt anticipate it just two days after the election, and we probably should have, but thats the thing about student voice -- its organic, it can be emotional, and it shouldnt be squelched or silenced. One benefit of student voice in this post-election climate is that students stay safe on campus. Their first instinct was to grab a mic at school rather than to leave campus and try to express themselves in a less-safe mob where they may not be heard and where they may encounter adults who dont have the educator tool belt for working with teenagers. Another benefit of having practiced student voice for five years now is that school staff were open to this outside classroom. As a school wide team, we understand and collectively have the skills, to support student voice. We do that by: Teachers worked the perimeter, encouraging students who had a viewpoint to go sit on the step and get in line to speak. Teachers engaged with students in the speaker line reminding them to use their big words. Trusted teachers and counselors sat next to students who were emotional. Staff fetched poster paper and markers for students to make new posters to replace signs that didnt follow the rules of using BIG words and avoiding name calling or F bombs. Certainly, I didnt do all the work; I wasnt alone in supporting student voice, it was a team effort. The peaceful protest lasted an hour and a half, involved 1,500 students, and around 100 impromptu and unscripted student speakers who shared details of their lives and practiced their voice. They felt heard and that was important. They were safe, and that was paramount. What Worked? A few things helped protect this energizing, active outside classroom. Kids had posted videos to social media and that prompted media to show up on campus. We kept the reporters at bay because what was happening was important and unique to campus and cameras would have changed it. Students may have performed for the camera rather than authentically sharing their story with their peers. They might have acted out for the camera rather than truly listening and appreciating their peers perspectives. It could have become a reality show rather than a reality struggle with election results. Sheriff officers were also on campus for support, but not in the center quad; there was no one to arrest, no one was unsafe. Instead, they helped to keep media off campus property. Finally, some frantic parents arrived on campus because their young teenager had texted Mom, big protest at school. Cool. And then had gone silent for over an hour. Parents were allowed on campus and as the protest entered into the second hour, I could see some hovering at the edges of the quad, watching. So, while media, sheriffs, and parents were present and interested (and had their own opinions!), they werent the show. The students were. Student Voice: A Myriad of Emotions Student voices reflected a myriad of emotions. Some were sad after seeing their mom cry for the first time. Others were appalled at the statement the election made about their rights as GLBQT youth and at the same time feeling threatened and angry that the glass ceiling clearly has not yet been shattered. Many student voices expressed fear that they or a family member will be deported to Mexico or forced to register as a Muslim. While many voices were heard, this protest doesnt mean we have checked the box of valuing student voice; we still have work to do. For true student voice to live on our campus, all students need to feel safe and empowered to continue expressing majority and minority view points as we move into this next era of life in America. As I framed for the students, it is easy to offer support when voices are in agreement. The question for schools and the country will be how we support one another when we are in disagreement. The voices became repetitive, the cement became hot, and honestly, it was lunchtime. It was intense! With less than ten students left in the speaker line, students were encouraged to take a break -- go get water, eat lunch, use the bathroom, go find a quiet classroom and reflect because it had been an intense experience and we all needed a break. The students who had become restless now had permission to take a break with the promise that the remaining students in line would have their turn. In the End I was a 7th grade classroom teacher when the Challenger Shuttle blew up, an assistant high school principal on 911, and a principal when prop 38 was passed. I have watched students in schools process a number of significant historical events in a number of different ways, and it is my hope that these teenagers will remember their experience processing the election results of 2016 as one in which their school valued their voice. It is my belief that Woodside High School students have a school memory of the power of their voice in defining this time in their nations history. They may not yet characterize the peaceful protest as special, but as they grow older and wiser, I think they will come to understand that not all students were prepared or encouraged to share their voices like they were at Woodside. As educators, we all have instincts, but well trained and grounded in research instincts are better honed to face volatile student situations like a post-election protest. My instincts have benefitted from the Quaglia Institute , which provides excellent training, grounded in research, and whole-heartedly committed to honoring the voices of students. Woodside students didnt have the opportunity to vote in the 2016 election, but they did experience a school system prepared to honor their voices, and engage them in a safe and meaningful conversation during a pivotal turning point in their nations history. Opinion Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Its the economy, stupid. That simple statement, which helped Bill Clinton win the 1992 United States presidential election, sums up the way many have responded to the introduction of a national carbon price in Canada by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Many even acknowledge that climate change is a pressing problem, but wonder why Canada would hamstring, kneecap or (insert whatever extremity-restricting metaphor you choose here) its economy when the country accounts for such a small portion of global greenhouse gas emissions. Why would we not wait for other countries to take action first and mirror their policies to avoid getting too far out in front? This argument formed the basis of national climate change policy under the previous federal government and has been continued by provincial politicians such as Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall and opposition politicians in Alberta. A price on carbon will create costs for Canadian businesses and industries that their competitors will not face if other governments do not institute comparable policies. However, too often competitiveness concerns have led to rhetorical statements about the destruction of the economy and massive job losses rather than a debate about what the other countries are likely to do, what the costs will be if Canada takes action on its own and whether these costs can be mitigated. The U.S. is a major competitor to Canada in many sectors of the economy. With Donald Trump becoming president, the prospects of a national price on carbon in the U.S. are slim to none, and that is being optimistic. For many, this has reaffirmed and increased concerns about placing Canadian companies at a disadvantage relative to their southern counterparts. However, it is worth remembering that under former president Barack Obama, there was little chance of a federal carbon-pricing policy either, as the Republican-controlled Congress was vociferously opposed to the idea. Even the Obama administrations Clean Power Plan, which mandated GHG emission reductions in power plants across the country, was subject to legal challenges by many states and industries. At the beginning of 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court blocked implementation of the plan pending resolution of these challenges. So while the prospects for a harmonized North American carbon price and other climate change policies might be worse under Trump, they were never very good to begin with. In reality, waiting for the U.S. to adopt new climate change policies could mean Canada does nothing or very little on the file. If Canada does take action on its own, what will be the impacts on our competitiveness? A 2015 report by Canadas Ecofiscal Commission examined the proportion of provincial economies that are emissions-intensive (industries that will face high costs under a price) and trade-exposed (industries that must compete with firms outside their jurisdictional borders). The report shows that across Canada, only specific economic sectors will face competitiveness concerns under carbon-pricing policies. Alberta and Saskatchewan are likely to be more affected than other provinces. But even in these jurisdictions, the portion of provincial GDP that faces high costs and is trade-exposed is not overwhelming at 18 per cent. Regardless of the numbers, the fever pitch of the rhetoric adopted by many politicians does little to address the concerns of these industries. A more constructive debate is one focused on how well-designed policy can address competitiveness issues. In provinces such as Quebec and Ontario, which have cap-and-trade systems, emissions permits can be distributed to firms at no cost, rather than asking them to purchase permits through an auction. In Alberta, which has adopted a tax to price emissions, rebates will be provided to firms based on their emissions per unit of production (emissions per barrel in the oil industry) relative to their industry peers. This incentivizes better performance on GHG emissions while assisting firms in adjusting to the tax. Some approaches may prove to be more effective than others, but that is the direction the discussion in Canada should take, as opposed to the debate on whether a price on carbon signals impending doom for the country. There is no denying that decisions about carbon pricing affect the Canadian economy, but those looking for a way to reduce the countrys GHG emissions, while minimizing the impact on competitiveness, are not stupid. Brendan Boyd is a post-doctoral scholar at the School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary. His column was also recently published by the Winnipeg Free Press. Opinion Hey there, time traveller! This article was published 30/01/2017 (2105 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current. Journalism in Canada is in a crisis. That much is clear from the past few years of plummeting ad revenues, sweeping staff cuts and a collapse of local news coverage in many parts of the country. But does all this amount to a crisis of democracy that calls out for public action? A new report from the Public Policy Forum makes a persuasive case for government action to make sure vital sources of information do not fall silent as the digital revolution erodes the financial foundations of the traditional news media. The report makes a series of sensible recommendations to level the playing field between traditional and digital media, ensure more online ad revenue goes to Canadian websites, encourage more local reporting, and have the CBC focus more on what it calls civic-function journalism. All this would be positive, but such measures will receive wide public support only if they are seen as ways to make sure the news media fulfills its role in a healthy, functioning democracy. They will fall on deaf ears if they are seen as just special pleading on behalf of an industry in trouble. Or, worse, if the public fears that any money involved will end up in the pockets of a few media moguls who have cynically enriched themselves while presiding over the decline. The Public Policy Forum report argues convincingly that much more is at stake. The traditional media are in crisis, with double-digit declines in revenue every year and one-third of journalism jobs lost in the past six years. The problem is that new digital media are not filling the gap. They are either too small or have no serious commitment to the essential function of news and information coverage traditionally carried out by newspapers and broadcast television. As the report warns: Established news organizations have been left gasping, while native digital alternatives have failed to develop journalistic mass, especially in local news. This is a loss for our common life as citizens, not just as news consumers. City halls and courthouses go uncovered, or badly covered. Communities increasingly lack vital information that acts as the lifeblood of daily discourse and decision-making. The reports main recommendations aim to bridge that gap. The most common-sense one is to change tax laws to remove tax deductions for advertising on foreign websites. The PPF estimates that would shift about $300 million to $400 million of digital revenue a year from the likes of Google and Facebook, which contribute nothing to news coverage in Canada, to Canadian media organizations, whether traditional or new-media startups. That kind of measure already applies to print media, and extending it to online ads makes eminent sense. Likewise, the report suggests applying GST and HST to digital subscriptions and revenue from foreign websites that dont produce news in Canada. Both measures would provide funding for a new Journalism and Democracy Fund with an initial investment of $100 million to foster digital-news innovation and civic-function journalism. Such a fund will be controversial and raise serious questions about who decides where the money goes. But the report makes a strong argument that an arms-length fund with a carefully crafted mandate would be better than extending tax credits to all media. That runs the risk that organizations that make no commitment to serious journalism will end up benefiting as much as those that do. The report makes an innovative proposal to increase local news coverage through a new service by the Canadian Press news agency. It urges that barriers to philanthropic or charitable financing of news initiatives be lifted. And it recommends that the CBC be forbidden from seeking advertising for online operations in order to keep its focus on public-service journalism, not ephemeral clickbait. All these proposals will meet with resistance in some quarters, but the Trudeau government should give them serious consideration. The crisis in news and information is not just a private matter for media companies and journalists to worry about. The stakes are much bigger, especially at a time when local coverage is drying up and its harder than ever to sort out reliable information from junk. The government should look at the wider picture and find ways to make sure Canadians continue to have the information they need for a robust democracy. This report is a good place to start. Toronto Star This post is by Ron Berger, Chief Academic Officer at EL Education. Democracy is more fragile than we may understand. We can do more than we think to preserve it. For more than 25 years I studied democracy with my public school students, and they questioned it. If democracy is so good, they wondered, why was the earth ruled for almost all of civilized history by monarchies and dictatorships? Why have so many countries in recent history lost their democratic governments and become autocratic? If democracy is so good, why isnt our classroom democratic? Here are some things they concluded: 1. Democracy was not the dominant governmental structure in history because Historically, not all people were respected The capacity of most people to make wise decisions was not trusted Literacy, formal education and reliable communication was not present for most of history, or was limited 2. Democracies crumble because People lose faith in the system: they believe they are not genuinely being heard, respected and protected and they seek an autocratic leader to fix things And/or, there is an external or internal military takeover 3. Families and schools are not democratic because adults do not trust kids to make good decisions My students learned something else about democracies: a better question than Is this country a democracy? is How democratic is this country? Democratic conditions in a country exist on a continuum. Countries are not stable in this regard: they drift. Democracies can become unstable because they drift away from democratic ideals. The United States is in constant drift. Sometimes we drift positively (e.g., at our founding, only white male property-owners could vote; gradually suffrage extended to many other citizens). Sometimes we drift negatively (e.g., in 1876, despite transportation and communication challenges, 83 percent of voters participated in presidential elections; today that level is below 60 percent). What does all of this mean for schools? Educator Deborah Meier reminds us that to preserve American democracy, kids need to practice it daily in school. They need to study civics and history and understand our governmental system. Just as importantly, they need to be engaged in civic and civil debate, decision-making and contribution within a democratic community. If they dont build that understanding, commitment, and habit now, they are likely to join the 95 million voters who did not cast a ballot in the last presidential election, or among those who voted without clear understanding of issues and structures. Even worse, they could be among those who do not fully respect the rights of other Americans. My students discovered that our classroom was not actually undemocratic. Though many decisions were non-negotiable adult decisions, students made important decisions together all the time. Unlike the junior high school student council of my youth, where the most consequential decision trusted to students was whether to allow chocolate milk in the cafeteria, my students made significant decisions every day about the nature of our work and the structures of our learning community. They built norms for respect and communication; they facilitated meetings; they managed projects. They learned that the more they demonstrated that they could be trusted to make wise decisions and treat others fairly, the more they would be in charge of their learning. By spring semester most years, our class was involved in a significant scientific research project for our local community that represented much of their academic day. For example, they did demographic studies of housing patterns on town roads; they tested homes in town for radon gas; they tested the quality of drinking water in peoples homes. Those projects were primarily managed by the students themselves. A commitment to democracy was instilled by this work in two ways: students built an understanding of their responsibility as citizens to contribute to the public good--to use their learning to make their community safer and better--and students also understood that they were being trusted to make consequential decisions, with the privileges and responsibilities this trust entailed. These democratic practices in our classroom, which I have shared with national audiences through writing and speaking, were often discounted by skeptics as not relevant broadly. Though our school was a regular public district school and many of the students were from low-income families, we were a small school in a tiny rural town--a single-school district. This was far from the world of large urban public school districts, said the skeptics, where citizens feel more removed from democracy, and basic skills in math and literacy are almost the sole focus of education. These skeptics felt that trusting urban students to manage projects--with democratic decision-making, civic learning and civic contribution--could not be considered in places where needs were so high and test scores are the only currency. In turns out the skeptics were wrong. Over the past 20 years, in my work with EL Education and the Deeper Learning networks, I have seen students of all ages engaged in powerful democratic work to contribute to their communities--through research, projects and civic action--working together with democratic decision-making to lead that work. To do this, they learned about the structures of local and national government, and they learned how to advocate for, and create, positive change. They focused on equity and compassion--treating all others with respect. And graduation rates, college acceptances and test scores in these schools have been consistently far above district averages. EL Education has been documenting examples of this kind of work--from schools within and beyond our school network--for 20 years, held in an open-source website, Models of Excellence . There are hundreds of projects done by students, most of whom come from public schools in low-income communities. Middle School students at Polaris Charter Academy, an urban public school in Chicago, worked with legislators, clergy, community leaders and police to address gun violence in their community. You can see the story of their project here: High school students at Springfield Renaissance School, an urban public district school in Springfield, Massachusetts, where every graduate has been accepted into college since the school opened, led energy audits of city buildings that saved the city hundreds of thousands of dollars, while helping the environment. They also led a scientific study of water quality in an urban pond that allowed it be reopened for recreation. You can see that project here: Sixth grade students from Genesee Community Charter School, an urban public school in Rochester, New York, spent two years researching and advocating for an urban revitalization plan centered on re-watering derelict downtown sections of the Erie Canal. Student work and advocacy succeeded in convincing the city to commit millions of dollars to the project. You can see that story here: We must not make a choice between focusing on academic skills, or instead, focusing on building the understanding and skills for civic contribution and respect for all of us who live in America. Projects like these build academic skills at the same time as civic understanding and commitment and forge an ethic of active, respectful citizenship. If our schools are not focusing deeply on this broader vision--the original purpose of public education--our democracy is in danger. Videos: EL Education Photos: David Grant A growing number of business leaders are voicing their concerns over US president Donald Trumps travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries and refugees. Tycoon Martin Sorrell , boss of advertising giant WPP, said he has an "instinctive dislike" of the measures, which has resulted in travel chaos and global protests. Martin said: "No immediate impact we are aware of in the first few days of the ban, but we are concerned about the impact it may have on our people and their families both inside and outside the USA and on innocent people generally. "As the grandson of Eastern European grandparents, who were admitted to the UK in the very late 19th and early 20th centuries, I have an instinctive dislike of such measures." His comments come after a number of prominent tech bosses - at firms such as AirBnb, Twitter, Uber and Tesla - lashed out at Mr Trumps move. Starbucks also weighed into the debate, saying it will hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years in response to Mr Trumps indefinite suspension of Syrian refugees. Howard Schultz, the coffee chains chairman and chief executive, said in a letter to employees that the hiring would apply to stores worldwide and the effort would start in the United States where the focus would be on hiring immigrants "who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel". The bosses of Apple, Google and Facebook also moved to criticise the presidents move. Apple chief executive Tim Cook wrote in a memo to employees: "It is not a policy we support. "We have reached out to the White House to explain the negative effect on our co-workers and our company." Mr Cook did not say how many Apple employees are directly affected by the order, but said the companys HR, legal and security teams are in contact to support them. "Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do," Mr Cook wrote - an apparent reference not only to the companys foreign-born employees, but to Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, the son of a Syrian immigrant. The US tech industry relies on foreign engineers and other technical experts for a sizeable percentage of its workforce. Netflix boss Reed Hastings pulled no punches, saying on Facebook: "Trumps actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all. "Worse, these actions will make America less safe (through hatred and loss of allies) rather than more safe. "It is time to link arms together to protect American values of freedom and opportunity." Reed Hastings Business lobby group the Institute of Directors said Mr Trumps move could "seriously undermine business and trade". The Institutes head of employment and skills policy Seamus Nevin said: "The sudden, severe and indiscriminate restrictions imposed on passport holders from seven Muslim countries could seriously undermine business and trade. "Both in the US and the UK, a number of industries including tech, rely heavily on highly skilled brainpower from across the world. "If businesses are restricted from accessing workers then many companies may have to rethink where they place their key staff in future, and that would ultimately have consequences for the prosperity of that country. "From a British perspective this will be worrying. "The Prime Minister has only just begun to prepare for a future trade agreement with the United States. "Trade deals are built on stable rules because businesses need certainty if they are to plan for future investments and job creation." Insurance giant Axa UK has said it will accept compensation claims from customers affected by the policy. Although not "technically covered", Axa flagged the unprecedented nature of Mr Trumps travel ban. In a statement, the group said: "In light of the sudden and unexpected decision by the Trump administration to block entry to the US for nationals from Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Iraq, Iran, Libya and Yemen, Axa Insurance UK confirms that individuals who have been denied entry as a result of the executive order will be able to claim on their policy. "Although not technically covered, we view the current situation as unprecedented and unforeseen and as such we are extending the cover under our policies. "For those intending to travel to, or return from, the United States of America, we recommend allowing extra time due to protests currently taking place at a number of airports." Ellen DeGeneres has made a generous donation to a gay Iraqi couple who managed to escape persecution and overcome the odds to find a new life together in America. Nayyef Hrebid and Btoo Allami were both serving with the military in Iraq when they first met and fell in love. Homosexuality is illegal in Iraq and punishable by death. If they find out about you, you either get tortured or get killed, Hrebid told DeGeneres. The risk to their lives led to Hrebid applying for asylum through his work as a translator while Allami was forced to flee to Lebanon. This kept them apart for four years. They remained in constant contact through Skype, until eventually Allami was able to join his partner. The pair now live in Seattle and concentrate on helping other LGBT refugees from the Middle East set up their new lives in America, after fleeing a war zone that tore their country apart. TV host Ellen DeGeneres gifted the couple with $25,000 to put towards their first home. Their story comes in midst of Trumps Muslim ban. Protesters gathered outside Philadelphia International Airport burst into song yesterday in solidarity with airport detainees. They sang Woody Guthrie's This Land Is Your Land to show support for people who had been detained because of Donald Trump's immigration restrictions. Several US flags waved in the background. Mr Trump's order suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria. The executive order has sparked widespread protests and denunciations from Democrats and a handful of Republicans. Sarah L Jorgensen of CNN tweeted the video last night. She reported "cars and buses honk as they go by to big cheers from crowd." She also noted that police expanded barriers to accommodate the protesters. Dublin's major bus station Busaras had to be evacuated after a dissident republican was caught on board a service to Derry with 1.6 kilos of high-grade explosives and three detonators, a court was told today. Patrick Brennan (aged 53) was arrested last June by officers from the gardas Special Detective Unit (SDU) at Busaras, in Store Street, in central Dublin, following a tip-off. Earlier this month, Brennan, of Lindisfarne Avenue, Clondalkin, Dublin 22, pleaded guilty to possessing four 400-gramme blocks of TNT and three electric explosive detonators on June 16, 2016. At the Special Criminal Court today, Detective Sergeant Padraig Boyce from the SDU told how Brennan had been under surveillance as part of an on-going investigation into the activities of IRA members in the Dublin area. Det Sgt Boyce said that on the day of the arrest, the married father of six was observed leaving his house at around 4.50am before immediately getting into a taxi. The taxi took the accused to the bus station in Dublins city centre, where he waited for around fifty minutes before boarding the Bus Eireann 5.55am service to Derry, the three-judge court was told. At all times, Brennan had a blue canvas bag in his possession and this bag was placed in the seat next to him when he was arrested under section 30 of the Offences Against the State Act aboard the bus by three SDU officers. Det Sgt Boyce told prosecution counsel Ronan Kennedy that gardai had made a significant discovery after Brennan was detained. He said: In the base of the bag there was four blocks of Trinitrotoluene, commonly known as TNT and three electronic detonators in good condition strapped to the TNT. On discovery of the explosives, the surrounding area was evacuated and the army was called, Det Sgt Boyce said. Brennan, who had been jailed for four years in 2005 for IRA membership, was the sole passenger on the bus at the time of his arrest, Det Sg Boyce added. Det Sgt Boyce told Mr Kennedy that he believed the quantity of explosives could have been used in the construction of six to eight separate car bombs. He said; From devices that have been recovered intact, 200 grammes (of explosives) have been used. And although the explosives werent armed, Det Sgt Boyce said the TNT had been lethally packaged and could have been detonated by a static charge whilst being moved. On hearing Det Sgt Boyces evidence, Mr Justice Tony Hunt said that he would have breathed a sigh of relief if he had been told he had been travelling on a bus that had four blocks of TNT on board. Diarmaid McGuinness SC, defending, said his client was a diabetic who, because of his medical condition, was also registered blind. Mr McGuinness said he hoped the court would take in to account the guilty plea when sentencing although his client - who has 13 previous convictions, mostly for road traffic offences - had accepted that any sentence imposed by the court will likely be severe. Mr Justice Tony Hunt, presiding, with Judge John O'Hagan and Judge Anne Ryan, remanded Brennan in custody until February 6. Members of the SIPTU union at Kerry Group plants in Charleville, Co Cork are to engage in two 24-hour work stoppages next week. The stoppages are scheduled for Monday, February 6 and Thursday, February 9. The union says management is refusing to attend the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) to discuss proposed changes to workers terms and conditions of employment. Workers at the food ingredient plants are currently conducting a 24-hour work stoppage which began at 7am today. SIPTU organiser, Terry Bryan, said: "The current 24-hour work stoppage will be followed by two more 24-hour stoppages next week. "The dispute will likely further escalate in the coming weeks if management continue to refuse to attend the WRC. "There is a collective agreement between the company and workers concerning dispute resolution which clearly states that should a matter remain unresolved between the parties it shall be referred to the appropriate third party body, in this case, the WRC." He added: "The items that are in dispute include proposed changes to shift patterns and terms, job rotation and appointments. "These matters were due before the Labour Court on November 28, 2016. However, management withdrew from that scheduled hearing and has now refused to attend a conciliation meeting at the WRC. "The further stoppages are avoidable if the company complies with its agreed dispute resolution procedures and attends the WRC." The Taoiseach will meet the British Prime Minister to discuss Brexit when Theresa May visits Dublin later today. But the meeting could be overshadowed over US President Donald's Trumps new immigration controls. This is Theresa May's first visit to Dublin since she became British Prime Minister and follows on from Enda Kenny's meeting with Theresa May in Downing Street last year. They have spoken in recent weeks on the phone to discuss the crisis in Northern Ireland and that issue will be up for discussion today. It is the first meeting between the two since Mrs May outlined her intentions to opt for a hard Brexit. And so the main focus of their talks will be how they can maintain the common travel area and no return to a hard border between North and South with the UK outside the single market, customs union and curbing immigration. But after a weekend where Donald Trump initiated a new immigration policy which will be an effective ban on Muslims, both leaders know that could be the only topic of questioning from reporters when they face the media this evening. Normally, issues related to students with disabilities draw only a fraction of the attention that other education topics garner. Not so when it comes to Betsy DeVos, an education choice advocate who is the Trump administrations pick for education secretary. Senators phone lines have been flooded with calls of opposition . Even some conservative educators who backed Trump are lukewarm on her selection . And special education advocates are right in the mix, especially because DeVos confirmation hearing included a rocky question-and-answer session on special education policy. Those organizations are urging senators to vote no on her nomination, or to delay a vote and ask DeVos for more assurances that she will support the rights of children with disabilities. A Senate education committee vote on her selection is scheduled for Jan. 31. Democratic senators on the committee have indicated that they will all vote no , but three Republicans in the full Senate would also have to vote no for her nomination to fail. The Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates is one of the groups that is requesting that senators vote down DeVos nomination. Prior to her appointment, DeVos was the chairman of the American Federation for Children, which supports school choice options such as vouchers and education savings accounts. We believe it is unconscionable to require a parent to give up their childs right to a free appropriate public education in exchange for taxpayer funded tuition support at a private school, COPAA wrote in a letter to senators. The Council For Exceptional Children, an international organization of special educators, administrators, professors and others in the field, is looking for assurances that DeVos will enforce all provisions of the IDEA , and would not allow IDEA funds to be used for private school vouchers. "[DeVos] made statements that have caused alarm among special educators, children and youth with disabilities and their families that she will not uphold the basic tenets of IDEA if she is confirmed as the U.S. Secretary of Education, the CEC letter said. Representatives from the National Down Syndrome Society met with DeVos two days after her confirmation hearing. The group posted a picture of DeVos with members of the group on Twitter Jan. 19, along with a statement that the organization applauds her commitment to special needs families. That post prompted a burst of social-media outragea representative comment said that the organization sold our children out" and the organization later posted on its Facebook page that it is nonpartisan and did not want to turn down a unique opportunity to meet with DeVos. This is the beginning of an ongoing interaction to ensure positive outcomes for all students with Down syndrome, and we will hold Mrs. DeVos accountable, NDSS wrote. Special Education and Vouchers in the Spotlight DeVos faced tough questioning from Democratic senators on whether students with disabilities should receive protections under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act if they accept vouchers to attend private schools. In one exchange, DeVos said that it should be left up to the states to decide if all schools that receive taxpayer funding be required to follow the IDEA. (IDEA applies to all public and charter schools. Private school students are entitled to some services under the IDEA, but those students do not have the same individual rights as public school students do) Pressed on her knowledge of IDEA as a civil rights law by Sen. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., DeVos acknowledged that she may have confused it. DeVos also said IDEA funding is an area that could be considered for an approach that would be somewhat different, in that maybe the money should follow individual students instead of going directly to the states. After the hearing, DeVos wrote a letter to Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., saying she is committed to enforcing all federal laws and protecting the hard won rights of students with disabilities. She also reiterated her commitment to a broader choice of educational options for students with disabilities. Isakson liked what he read, saying that the letter clearly outlines DeVos priorities and dedication to educating and protecting the rights of all students with disabilities. But other senators on the committee, such as Hassan, were less impressed. "[H]er letter does nothing to reassure me that she will enforce the IDEA or honor our commitment to ensuring that all students receive a free and appropriate public education. In addition, Mrs. DeVos failed to address the original question I posed to her in her confirmation hearing, which was about why she is comfortable with voucher programs that force parents and students to sign away their rights under IDEA, Hassan said in a statement. Photo: Betsy DeVos speaks during a December rally on Dec. 9 in Grand Rapids, Mich.Andrew Harnik/AP Update 7.10pm: British Prime Minister Theresa May has insisted there will be no return to a hard Border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, after Britain leaves the European Union, Writes Daniel McConnell Political Editor. She made her comments at a press conference in Government Buildings in Dublin after talks on Brexit with Taoiseach Enda Kenny. Mr Kenny backed Mrs Mays goal of securing a friction-free trading relationship with the European Union after Brexit. Mrs May said the UK will remain a reliable partner for Ireland, adding that familial ties between the two countries are strong. She said there will be no return to the borders of the past. She also reaffirmed the UKs commitment to the Belfast Agreement and successor agreements. The Taoiseach said helping Mrs May to agree a deal to keep UK-EU trade as close as possible would be an absolute priority for Ireland ahead of Brexit negotiations. Setting out her strategy earlier this month, Ms May strongly hinted that Britain could leave the European customs union (CU), stating she wanted frictionless cross-border trade, but had an open mind on whether it should be done through associate membership or a new agreement. Mr Kenny echoed her language, suggesting he would support the strategy during the divorce talks. Our two governments are agreed that a close and friction-free economic and trading relationship between the Untied Kingdom and the European Union, including Ireland, is in our very best interests, he told a press conference. And as the UK prepares for its formal notification under Article 50, we want to see that these deep trading ties between our two countries are recognised and facilitated. That will continue to be an absolute priority for my government, not just in our discussions with the British government, but also with our EU partners, as we prepare for the negotiation process on the EU side of the table. Both Mr Kenny and Mrs May insisted they do not want to see a return to the border of the past between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. There have been suggestions that leaving the tariff-free CU could imperil the soft border and see the reintroduction of customs checks and controls unless an agreement can be reached. Mrs May said staying fully in the CU would leave the UK unable to agree free trade deals with other countries from around the world, which she is aiming to do. But she said she was working towards maintaining the border rules currently in place and stressed that Britain and Ireland had open borders long before either of us were members of the European Union. We have of course said we do not want to see a return to the border of the past - that isnt just a phrase, actually it symbolises the sort of seamless, frictionless border that we want to see in the future, the prime minister said. Of course there are elements of full membership of the customs union that would restrict our ability to trade and do trade agreements with other parts of the world. But I believe, and this is what we are working on, that we need to find a solution which enables us to have as seamless and frictionless a border as possible between Northern Ireland and Ireland so that we can continue to see the trade, the everyday movements, that we have seen up to now. And of course we also want to ensure that we carry on with the Common Travel Area, which was in existence long before either of us were members of the European Union or its predecessors. Additional reporting: PA Update 6.25pm: Enda Kenny says he has held frank and constructive talks with Theresa May on Brexit. In a press briefing following talks this afternoon, the Taoiseach stressed the need to continue trade between Ireland and the UK and warned of the necessity to avoid a hard border with the North. Earlier: British Prime Minister Theresa May has landed in Dublin for discussions with Taoiseach Enda Kenny on the impact of Brexit, writes Daniel McConnell Political Editor. Mrs May arrived at Government Buildings shortly after 4.30pm for a full bilateral meeting with Mr Kenny amid great uncertainty as to what Brexit means for Ireland, North and South. The two leaders are due to give a press conference after 6pm. Theresa May arrives at Govt Buildings #iestaff pic.twitter.com/lcGTvngjc3 Daniel McConnell (@McConnellDaniel) January 30, 2017 Earlier today, Mrs May travelled to Cardiff to meet leaders from the devolved assemblies to hear their views on Brexit. Among those present was Northern Ireland's outgoing first minister Arlene Foster and the new Stormont Sinn Fein leader Michelle O'Neill. Ms O'Neill said she told Mrs May that the government at Westminster should respect the vote of the people of the North and that it should be designated special status within the EU. She also said she would be raising the issue with the Taoiseach and with EU political leaders. The Kenny-May meeting was also overshadowed by the impact of US President Donald Trump's restrictions on entry to the US. After it emerged several ministers here intend raising the issue at Cabinet tomorrow, Mr Kenny and Mrs May are expected to face questions on the controversy from the media in Dublin later. Donald Trump's executive order has caught the attention of The Boss. Bruce Springsteen didn't shy away from commenting on the situation at his concert in Adelaide, Australia. He said: "Tonight we want to add our voices to the thousands of Americans who are protesting at airports around the country the Muslim Ban and the detention of foreign nationals and refugees. America is a nation of immigrants and we find this anti-democratic and fundamentally un-American." He then began to play the song American Land as the crowd cheered on. American Land is Springsteen's version of the Pogues song Sally MacLennane, which celebrates the American-immigrant experience. Springsteen's version features the lyrics: "I docked at Ellis Island in the city of light and spire I wandered to the valley of red-hot steel and fire We made the steel that built the cities with the sweat of our two hands We made our home in the American land." Austria's governing coalition has agreed to ban full-face veils in courts, schools and other public places. The move comes as part of a package of reforms drawn up after more than a week of negotiations. The coalition of Social Democrats and the centrist People's party also agreed to prohibit police officers, judges, magistrates and public prosecutors from wearing head scarves in the interest of appearing "ideologically and religiously neutral" while serving the state. The French parliament passed an act more than six years ago that made France the first European Union country to ban the niqab and burqa, the full-face or face-and-body coverings worn by some Muslim women, in public places. Others have followed. New York lawmakers are pressuring Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, to more quickly to meet a decade-old state Supreme Court order to increase the state education budget by billions of dollars, according to the radio station WNYC . New Yorks highest court ruled in 2006 that the states funding formula left the states schools billions of dollars short. In response to the lawsuit, Campaign for Fiscal Equity v. State of New York, lawmakers built a new funding formula and promised to increase funding by $5.5 billion over the next four years. Instead, the state cut funding by $2.7 billion during the Great Recession. Cuomo has bragged in recent weeks that hes increased spending on the states school system by more than $6 billion, though not all of that money went into the states school funding formula. Opponents say that falls far short of the amount the court has ordered which they say would require a tax increase. Cuomos budget this year calls for a $1 billion increase in education aid. The state spends around $60 billion a year on education . Alliance for Quality Education, a group dedicated to increased school funding, said in a statement to WNYC that the governors budget this year is an unprecendented assault on the education of students of color, students in poverty and immigrant students. During his opening speech this year, according to WNYC, Democratic Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie said its a priority to completely address the court ruling. This year we will advance the goals of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity by setting a timetable to fully phase in foundational aid, Heastie said, according to WNYC. In an op-ed this week, Cuomos deputy secretary for Health and Human Services, Paul Francis, said groups like the Alliance for Quality Education have made up targets and called it a sham debate. Dont miss another State EdWatch post. Sign up here to get news alerts in your email inbox. And make sure to follow @StateEdWatch on Twitter for the latest news from state K-12 policy and politics. A man has been arrested on suspicion of murdering his wife after a woman's body was found in a car outside a UK supermarket. The 42-year-old man was arrested in the car park of a Lidl store in the Tile Cross area of Birmingham shortly before 5am on Monday. West Midlands Police said inquiries suggested that the victim, who was pronounced dead at the scene, had been attacked with a bladed weapon. Detective Chief Inspector Paul Joyce, from the force's CID, said: "At around 4.45am our officers traced a vehicle to the car park and found a man and a woman inside. "Tragically the woman was pronounced dead at the scene and the man was arrested on suspicion of her murder. "While her identity is yet to be confirmed, at this stage we believe her to be the arrested man's wife." The woman's family have been informed and are being supported by trained officers. Meanwhile, CCTV is being secured for review and forensic examinations are taking place at the car park and the couple's home. "I'd like to extend my deepest sympathies to the woman's family and reassure them that we are doing absolutely everything we can to provide them with the answers they so desperately need," added Mr Joyce. A 29-year-old man has died after being pulled from the sea following a late-night search off Brighton beach. Emergency services were alerted after the man went into the sea at Kings Road Arches at 11.40pm on Sunday. A man involved in the Brussels airport bombing last March has now been charged over the Paris terror attacks. Mohamed Abrini became known as 'the man in the hat' before being arrested by Belgian authorities last year. Jonathan Sexton, Sean O'Brien and Keith Earls will all train fully this week ahead of Ireland's Six Nations opener against Scotland on Saturday. The trio were "injury-managed" last week according to team manager Paul Dean, and will now be fully integrated with the squad as preparations continue for the tie. However Andrew Conway has been ruled out of this weekend's game after aggravating an existing groin injury. The Munster winger was called up to the Ireland squad for the first time last week alongside Niall and Rory Scannell. Paddy Jackson took Sexton's place in training last week, and full back Rob Kearney says they're well equipped to play with either out-half. We are all so used to it now, Kearney said. On a weekly basis, more often than not, youve got one person coming in where someone picks up a niggle. The way test rugby is going now, its par for the course. Paddy has been there all last week, running the plays, so hes more than equipped. In the UK - more than one million people have put their names to a petition calling for Donald Trump's State visit to Britain to be cancelled. It's quickly gained momentum after he imposed a 3-month ban on refugees entering the US - and people from seven mainly Muslim countries. Theresa May was "very happy" to invite Donald Trump for a controversial state visit to the UK, Downing Street said amid widespread outrage at his travel ban. Number 10 said the Prime Minister extended the invitation on behalf of the Queen and they "look forward to hosting the President later this year". More than a million Britons have signed a petition against the state visit and there was confusion over impact Mr Trump's executive order will have on UK dual national citizens. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said on Sunday that he had been assured by Mr Trump's team that Britons who have shared nationality with one of the seven mainly-Muslim countries covered by the restrictions would not be stopped from entering America. A mural lampooning US President Donald Trump in Dublin's Temple Bar by artist ADW. Photo: Niall Carson/PA Wire But an urgent notice issued by the US Embassy in the UK on Monday appeared to contradict guidelines issued by the FCO stating that dual UK citizens "from one of the seven countries travelling to the US from outside those countries are not affected". Whitehall sources said they expected the US mission's advice to be changed after the Foreign Office confirmed the position with the White House. Number 10 had been under pressure to explain why the honour of a state visit had been extended to the President so soon after taking office. The Prime Minister's spokesman said normal procedure was followed after recommendations were made by a committee for state visits which works within the Foreign Office. "There is no set timing that a president needs to be in office before they receive, or don't receive, an invitation for a state visit. "There is a process for state visits. Each year the Government looks at the recommendations that are made by the committee for state visits. Those recommendations are then put to Buckingham Palace, the Palace then needs to agree to the visit, then, historically, the invitation is extended on behalf of Her Majesty by the Government, and that is the process that took place this time," he said. In a subsequent statement, Downing Street said: "To be clear, the Prime Minister extended an invitation on behalf of the Queen - and she was very happy to do so. The USA is one of this country's closest allies, and we look forward to hosting the President later this year." Mr Trump remained unmoved by the worldwide condemnation of his move, responding with a tweet: "There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world!" Mr Johnson will face MPs to explain the chaotic situation around UK citizens who hold dual nationality with one of the countries covered by Mr Trump's order. A piece of graffiti on a wall in Shoreditch, east London, uses a parody of the Top Trumps card game to criticise US President Donald Trump. Photo: Kirsty O'Connor/PA Wire A statement on the US embassy's website said: "Urgent Notice: Per US Presidential Executive Order signed on January 27 2017, visa issuance to aliens from the countries of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen has been suspended effective immediately until further notification. "If you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time. "If you already have an appointment scheduled, please do not attend your appointment as we will not be able to proceed with your visa interview." But a UK Government spokesman insisted the FCO guidance "was cleared by the top team in the White House and they are in charge". A Government source said that after seeing the US Embassy guidance, Mr Johnson "sought clarity from the White House and was informed that the FCO statement was correct". The Prime Minister's spokesman said Mrs May "disagreed" with the travel ban, but the planned state visit would not be affected by it, or the petition to Parliament calling for it to be downgraded. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said: "It is outrageous. It is illegal as well as immoral. I think we should stand up for the values that we believe in; that is, we don't discriminate." Asked whether the Government needed to look at the bigger picture, he told the BBC: "The bigger picture is peace, justice and human rights, the bigger picture is - of course - good trade arrangements. I don't think the two things are mutually exclusive." Mr Corbyn said he would send a member of his team along to an anti-Trump protest in London later "and if I can I will be there". London mayor Sadiq Khan, who is a Muslim, wrote in the Evening Standard: "We must now rescind the offer of a full state visit for President Trump - until this ban is lifted. "I don't believe the people of London will support rolling out the red carpet until this happens." Tory peer Baroness Warsi, who was the first female Muslim cabinet minister, said the US president should not be given the honour. She told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: "Those who run and govern this country bowing down to a man who holds the views that he holds, values which are not the same as British values, I think is sending out a very wrong signal." Tory MP Sarah Wollaston has said Mr Trump must not be invited to address both Houses of Parliament from Westminster Hall, pointedly insisting "those who wish to fawn over him" should do so elsewhere. Number 10 said it was too early to comment on whether Mr Trump would address Parliament or not during his visit. Tory former foreign secretary Malcolm Rifkind warned it would be "pathetic" to cancel Mr Trump's state visit. He told BBC Radio 4's World At One: "I share the distaste of him that most people feel, but we can't hide the fact that we had a state visit from the president of China, despite China's long-term repression of the people of Tibet, and denial of human rights to the people of China as a whole. "Here we have a president, which, whatever we think of him, he is well-disposed to the United Kingdom, and it would be pretty silly, from everybody's point of view, simply to throw away that opportunity to develop that relationship." Ahead of her meeting with Taoiseach Enda Kenny today - the British Prime Minister's meeting the leaders of Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales to discuss Brexit. The UK Supreme Court's ruled that Theresa May has to get Parliament's approval on the process - but not that of Stormont, Holyrood and the Welsh Assembly. Officer Served Marijuana at Burger King Drive Thru, Arrests 'Nasty Boy' Two Burger King employees in Epping, New Hampshire, were discovered this past week selling marijuana through their employer's fast food drive-thru window. When the police went to visit the home of the Whopper, they were served marijuana alongside their food. One of the employees was charged with possession with intent to distribute, while the other was charged with conspiracy, as well as unlawful possession of alcohol (neither are over 21 years old). Local police discovered that there was a special procedure for buying marijuana from the Burger King drive-thru which might surprise some. When a person reached the speaker to order, they could ask if "Nasty Boy" was working. If the answer was yes, then by ordering "extra crispy fries" a person would receive marijuana along with the order. After Nasty Boy handed over a cup filled with marijuana, both he and his assistant manager were arrested. The Burger King and Intent to Distribute Not only do drug charges vary from state to state, they usually vary in severity depending on what a person was doing with the drugs, as well as the type and quantity of the drug involved. For Nasty Boy, he could be looking at 3 to 7 years in jail for a first distribution offense, if convicted, in New Hampshire (unless he had more than 5 lbs, then he could be looking at 20 years). Typically, repeat offenses carry stiffer penalties, so if this isn't Nasty's first time, he could be looking at even more time. Distribution of drugs is a serious crime and is usually charged as a felony. Even in states where marijuana is legal for recreational usage (which New Hampshire is not), the way "Nasty Boy" and his accomplice are alleged to have sold marijuana would likely still be illegal. Generally, in legal pot states, vendors must follow rather stringent regulatory schemes that are set up by the states. This is to ensure that there are consumer protections in place, as well as to make sure that any tax revenue is properly assessed and collected. Related Resources: A meeting between Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump is in the works, according to a spokesman for the Russian president. Mr Trump and Mr Putin had a much-anticipated hour-long discussion on Saturday, the first since the new US president assumed office last week. A female police chief has escaped the sack after she launched a drunken tirade at a junior colleague about the size of her breasts. Assistant Chief Constable Rebekah Sutcliffe, of Greater Manchester Police (GMP), told Superintendent Sarah Jackson that her "credibility was zero" after she had a "boob job" and berated her as a "laughing stock" who would be judged professionally "on the size of her tits". She then went on to pull down the front of her dress to expose her left breast and say: "Look at these, look at these, these are the breasts of someone who has had three children. "They are ugly but I don't feel the need to pump myself full of silicone to get self-esteem." Following a misconduct hearing late last year, a disciplinary panel ruled that she had breached standards of professional behaviour. But GMP Deputy Chief Constable Ian Pilling ruled on Monday that she could keep her job. The panel had stated her gross misconduct had taken her to "the very precipice of dismissal" but accepted it was out of character and recommended a final written warning would suffice. Ms Sutcliffe, who was the most senior female GMP officer at the time, verbally attacked her younger subordinate following a gala dinner at the national Senior Women in Policing Conference last May. The haranguing in the early hours of May 6 at Manchester's Hilton Hotel concluded when Ms Sutcliffe told her colleague she was no longer going to support a further promotion for her. Ms Jackson, who was appointed by Ms Sutcliffe as a temporary superintendent in a secondment role, later said she was "shocked, mortified, embarrassed and ashamed" at the comments made by her superior. She added that she had suffered "great anxiety from the night itself and since". Ms Sutcliffe's counsel, John Beggs QC, had handed the panel more than 200 pages of testimonials with many officers speaking of Ms Sutcliffe as "inspirational", "visionary" and "a strong leader". One unnamed female detective chief inspector at GMP said she is "a role model to many women in the organisation". Mr Beggs said she remained a role model, with "human frailties", who would "emerge as an even impressive senior leader" if allowed to. Announcing his decision at the force's HQ to follow the panel's recommendation, Mr Pilling said: "Despite being absolutely appalled at her behaviour and all too aware of the damage to public confidence I do not think I can take a different view without any significant reason to do so." Whether it's psych wave, dream pop or straight up punk, festival goers are in for an udder treat at this year's Groovin' the Moo festival, which will visit Canberra on May 7. A mix of local and international talent are gracing the touring regional festival's line up, including two of the top three triple J Hottest 100 winners in Tash Sultana and Amy Shark. UK band The Wombats are part of impressive contingent from overseas. The two stars, who made waves last year with Jungle and Adore, respectively, will be joining other local stars Methyl Ethel, Thundamentals, the Smith Street Band and Montaigne. There's also an impressive contingent from overseas with The Wombats (UK), who are said to be working on new material, The Darkness (UK), Against Me (USA), Dillon Francis (USA), Milky Chance (Germany), Architects (UK), Loyle Carner (UK), and Snakehips (UK). The Latham community have thanked firefighters for saving them from a close call extinguishing a fire that was burning perilously close to homes on Monday evening. Eleven units and two helicopters helped to put out the fire at Umbagong Park, which came within 50 metres of homes and created significant smoke in the area. Emergency services mopping up after Umbagong District Park grass fire in Latham which came within 50 metres of homes. Credit:Jay Cronan Emergency Service Crews had earlier warned the fire was burning in an easterly direction toward Dalley Crescent, Inglis Place, Mcfarlan Place and Moorehead Place. MacFarlane Street resident Keiran Guise said seeing the plumes of black smoke so close he told his wife to take their two month old son to family outside the suburb. Nando's franchisees across the country are in open rebellion against head office moves to get them to renovate or lose their stores for nothing. Many say they have been quoted hundreds of thousands of dollars to renovate their stores, with head office making franchise renewals conditional on renovations. Workers rip out shop fittings at Greensborough Plaza Nando's Credit:Vince Caligiuri Jayantha "Jay" Warnakula spent almost $400,000 to buy the Nando's restaurant at Greensborough Plaza shopping centre in January 2014. He spent the days after Christmas ripping out the expensive shop fittings after Nando's refused to renew his three-year franchise licence because, he claims, he refused to pay nearly a million dollars to renovate the restaurant. Wesfarmers should ditch its struggling discount department store Target and instead boost dividends or pump more cash into its star hardware chain Bunnings. That's the view of Kimber Capital's Greg Fraser, who argues Wesfarmers will be "bursting at the seams" once it sells its coal division for an estimated $2 billion. "What should Wesfarmers put on its shopping list?" Mr Fraser asked in a note to clients. "It has already forked out a small amount to let the Bunnings business have a crack at the UK homeware market, but this will take at least five years to measure its success or otherwise. Baby Wearable Tech May Be Dangerous, or Not? In our modern times of glasses made by Google, Bluetooth technology, and smart telephones, parents are increasingly wiring their children, and even their babies, up with wearable tech. While most parents and professionals would agree that being able to monitor where your child is via GPS is helpful, there is growing disagreement about wearables for babies. The market for such devices has exploded over the past few years. Now there are socks that measure a baby's pulse, pacifiers with thermometers, onsies that provide breathing a movement data, and a whole host of other types of baby-wearables that push your baby's data onto your smart phone's app. Generally, there has been no big news story about a baby being injured due to wearable technology. In fact, one such device maker claims that in the 300,000 units his company has sold, he has not heard of a single infant death. Nevertheless, there are currently no wearable tech items for babies that are approved by the FDA. Additionally, numerous studies have been published which discourage the use of wearables for infants. Why Not Wire Up Baby? According to the researchers and doctors, wearable tech for infants is understudied, and there are few regulations that cover the devices. Additionally, researches explain that wearables for babies are notorious for producing false positives, or false alarms, which will drive parents crazy, and could potentially be dangerous due to false diagnoses. One of the bigger fears of researchers is that parents will rely too heavily on the wearable technology which will lead to general bad parenting. Additionally, researchers warn parents that any wearable that claims to protect against Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) should be avoided. As SIDS has been studied for years now, researchers have found that cardiorespiratory monitors don't actually help prevent SIDS. Due to the lack of consensus among researchers, if you are considering using a piece of wearable tech for your baby, it might be best to do the following: Get your baby's doctor's opinion on the safety of the device Use good quality batteries, if required Follow all of the safety warnings that come with the product Use common sense and Google what you don't know. If your child is injured as a result of a baby wearable, you should contact a consumer protection attorney that can help you file a claim, and notify the FDA, FTC, and any other necessary government agency. Related Resources: In his first press briefing, Sean Spicer, Donald Trump's press secretary, inadvertently offered a key for understanding the new administration. In discussing inauguration crowd size, a topic that has consumed Trump during his first week in office, Spicer painted a picture. Imagine being the president, looking out over a sea of people while delivering the inaugural address. Then imagine watching cable news that night to hear people say that your crowd wasn't very big. "It's demoralising," he told reporters. That was Spicer's defence for a falsehood he'd told two days earlier, when he said Trump had attracted "the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration". This followed Trump's statement that between 1 million and 1.5 million had attended the event. (Estimates place the crowd at somewhere below 500,000.) Illustration: Andrew Dyson. Why does this matter? Because it indicates that the Trump administration will be based on feelings and perceptions, not facts and figure. And feelings-over-facts provides the ideal foundation for the administration's larger strategy of government by chaos. Take the refugee and visa ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries. The executive order, initially withheld from government lawyers and most intelligence officials, went into effect immediately after being signed on Friday. Border control agents had not been informed in advance, leaving them to interpret the order on the fly. Travellers, including green-card holders, boarded planes with valid visas only to find themselves denied entry at customs. In the chaos, some travellers were not only turned away but charged with immigration violations and barred from entering the US for the next five years. I ask him how many people are at the rally but he said he couldn't be sure but "a tremendous amount of people". "This is the best way to make our values known and our vision for America. Sometimes it is rallies and sometimes it is tweeting, it looks different day to day." From the crowd, he shouts into the phone that American democracy will win if citizens act. A thousand kilometres away the Catholic Archbishop of Chicago Blase Cupich releases a public statement, describing the executive order to turn away refugees as a dark moment in US history, "rushed, chaotic, cruel". "The world is watching as we abandon our commitments to American values." American values. I ring Damon Silvers in Washington, the director of policy and special counsel for the AFL-CIO, which is the US equivalent of the ACTU, to talk about American values, American democracy and what those of us who aren't American citizens can do to resist. He described the signing of the executive order in such close proximity to International Holocaust Remembrance Day as ironic. Not the word I would have picked, particularly since the White House statement on the day did not mention Jews. "We are an incredibly inclusive group and we took into account all of those who suffered," administration spokeswoman Hope Hicks told CNN on Saturday, in classic Holocaust denial mode. Anyhow, Silvers knew the executive order had been signed on Friday but it wasn't until Saturday morning he realised the full extent of the religious discrimination embedded in that order. He and thousands of lawyers across America began to organise. That alone should frighten the Trump administration, lawyers have turned into organisers, working for free, preparing habeus corpus petitions for detainees at airports across the US. According to The New York Times, by 9pm Saturday, Ann Donnelly, a judge of the Federal District Court in Brooklyn, ruled the government was "enjoined and restrained from, in any manner and by any means, removing individuals" who had arrived in the United States with valid visas or refugee status, after she heard from lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union that one of the people detained at an airport was being put on a plane to be deported back to Syria at that very moment. So how does Silvers feel about American democracy at 2am on Sunday. "It's a lot better now than it was at 10am . . . I believe very deeply in the democratic commitment of our people so I am optimistic about the future of American democracy but I am very concerned about the short term well-being of our country." What can Australians do to help? Silvers says: "The most important thing people can do in other countries is to contact institutions that matter, that are connected to the United States; and express your outrage." The most obvious manifestations are, of course, consulates and embassies, but also businesses. Tell them how the United States is perceived in the world right now. Stuart Marshall, an associate professor in anaesthetics at Monash University, is doing just that. Academics do a lot of pro bono work, particularly for academic journals. On Sunday he wrote them a letter saying he would not be doing any peer reviews or making any other contribution for the foreseeable future and published it on Twitter. The positive response was huge. "I make this decision with deep regret but I am no longer able to support businesses and organisations based in the United States in the light of recent events. "Your organisation and several others that I perform pro bono work for in the scientific community benefit financially from my work and pays taxes to the US government. This government has decided to systematically discriminate against academics and others on the basis of race, religion and nationality. Henceforth I do not wish to directly or indirectly support this action. I'm sorry it has come to this, as this does not reflect the America I respect and have a deep affection for, nor the Americans I know personally. I will review my policy when the discriminatory laws enacted in the last 24 hours have been reversed. I realise that this may have significant effects on my future academic career. However I would rather have a conscience than a career." He knows it's risky but it's the only thing he can think of which may have an impact. Time for us all to follow suit. @jennaprice Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has refused to join other world leaders in criticising Donald Trump's harsh new immigration measures, saying he would not "run a commentary on the domestic policies of other countries". Opposition Leader Bill Shorten, however, has blasted Mr Trump's clampdown, saying the controversial crackdown was "appalling and ought to be ended as soon as possible". Mr Turnbull, speaking a day after his first phone call with Mr Trump since the billionaire businessman was sworn in as US President, said that if the policies were found to harm the freedom of Australians to travel to the US, the Australian government would take it up with their American counterparts. But in contrast to the leaders of Britain, Germany, France and Canada, Mr Turnbull declined to condemn or signal disagreement with the new US executive order, which imposes a range restrictions - some temporary and some indefinite - on refugee intakes and other immigration to the US. This includes a three-month ban on virtually all citizens from seven majority-Muslim countries entering the US. Social media has delivered its verdict on Ivanka Trump's ballgown, posted to Twitter as chaos erupted in airports across the United States: Not a good look. On Friday afternoon, Donald Trump issued an Executive Order which essentially closed American borders to migrants and refugees from 7 predominantly Islamic countries, including refugees fleeing war-torn Syria. As a result, many citizens of these countries wishing to enter the US have been detained and kept in limbo at American airports. Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner dance at the Freedom Ball. Credit:Evan Vucci Protesters all over the country took to the streets and major airports to demonstrate against the legislation and show their support for those detained. Many activists, influencers and celebrities used social media to express their outrage over the "inhumane" nature of Trump's ban, some even joining protesters to show support for those refugees and immigrants impacted by the legislation. "It's been well established in research overseas that when you get more prisoners than there is space available to fit them, you get an increase in violence, especially among younger prisoners," Bureau director Don Weatherburn said. Police recorded 1101 assaults on prison premises in the 12 months to September 2016, a two-year increase of 37 per cent, while the assault rate per 1,000 prisoners increased by 25 per cent, the Bureau's figures show. The records do not specify whether the assaults involve inmates, staff or others. The number of assaults in NSW prisons has risen by 37 per cent in two years, as jails grow overcrowded. According to figures released on Monday by the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research, prisoner numbers reached 12,729 in December - including 4388 on remand, in custody pending trial - in a system designed for 11,000 inmates. The number of assaults in overcrowded NSW prisons has soared by 37 per cent in the past two years, as the prison population reaches a record high. While he said it was encouraging that the latest figures showed slowing growth in adult prisoner numbers, the prison population had surged 16 per cent in the past two years. It was not because of rising crime rates, Dr Weatherburn said. Rather, police were making more arrests for crimes liable to result in jail terms, more people were in custody under tougher bail laws and courts were handing out longer sentences. People were also spending longer on remand because of congestion in the District Court, which an Auditor-General's report found cost almost $81 million last financial year. The same report noted that prisoners in NSW have the lowest out-of-cell hours in the country - an average of 7.8 per day day - with inmate access to some services and resources deteriorating. "In NSW over the last 25 years both major political parties have simply tried to outdo each other on law and order," Dr Weatherburn said. "[They] fear that if they can be characterised as going soft on crime they'll be attacked by their political opponents, if not also by talkback radio and the tabloid media. Everyone seems to be demanding tougher penalties and any judge who hands out what the popular media would regard as a lenient sentence gets vilified." US research shows a 10 per cent increase in the prison population only reduces crime by 1-2 per cent, Dr Weatherburn said. For many offenders prison was "just a revolving door", with 48 per cent of NSW inmates back behind bars within two years of their release, according to 201415 Productivity Commission data. A group of inmates is expected to be charged after damaging the roof of a youth detention centre in Brisbane. In a standoff that lasted more than 12 hours, a group of detainees at the Brisbane Youth Detention Centre in Wacol climbed onto the roof with a number refusing to come down until almost 3am. Seven youths remain on the roof of the Brisbane Youth Detention Centre. Credit:Nine News Brisbane Police were called about 2pm and a number of the detainees came down shortly after, however seven youths remained on the roof into the night*. Nine News footage showed shirtless young men throwing items from the roof and stomping on and hitting air conditioning units. A male staff member also suffered an eye injury. A fourth Queensland LNP member has quit the party to join One Nation amid claims more sitting conservative MPs could be considering jumping ship. Former Logan MP Michael Pucci quit the LNP at the weekend to join One Nation as its campaign director. One Nation state secretary Jim Savage confirmed the defection and warned there had been "discussions" with more sitting LNP MPs. "I don't know what they're thinking but obviously one may suspect, and I suspect it but I might be totally wrong because I can't speak for others, but they're probably putting their toe in the pool to see how warm the water is," he said. The performance of trouble-prone Queensland Rail may be a factor at the ballot box, Transport Minister Stirling Hinchliffe says. It comes after commuters were forced onto buses on Monday morning on the Redcliffe Peninsula Line after trains were cancelled for more than three hours. Asked while he joined his fellow ministers in Rockhampton for community cabinet if he was concerned the ongoing train fiasco was going to be an election issue, Mr Hinchliffe said he knew people in south-east Queensland expected a reliable public transport network. "There are always issues, and standard and quality and indeed things like the safety of these networks are highly important matters for people when considering their position when it comes up to election time," he said. A man and woman have died in suspicious circumstances in a home on the Gold Coast. Neighbours raised the alarm on Matas Drive, Pimpama, about 6.30am after children from the home ran outside, police said. Officers arrived to find two dead bodies, a 52-year-old male and 40-year-old woman, who were known to each other but police would not confirm it was a domestic incident. Detective Inspector Mark Thompson said the deaths were being treated as suspicious and no third party was involved but it was too early to say whether the deaths were the result of a murder suicide. Robert Penny was initially ruled out as a suspect in the murders of his wife and her hairdresser because the crime seemed too brazen and violent for the retiree to have committed. But detectives now suspect Mr Penny might have been motivated to kill his 58-year-old spouse because he was having an affair with a young woman who became his second wife. Robert Penny, pictured with his wife Margaret Penny, was charged in 2015 with the murder of his wife and her hairdresser in 1991. Margaret Penny and her hairdresser Claire Acocks, 49, were found beaten and stabbed to death at the Old London Coiffure hairdressers in the western Victorian town of Portland in May 1991. "It didn't fit for me in that initial phase that Bob Penny could do that particular crime," Detective Rodney Graham Wilson told a second inquest into the unsolved murders on Monday. What Is a Marital Property Agreement? When people get married, they are entering into a legal agreement with their spouse that involves so much more than just property and assets. But when people divorce, their property and assets must be divided. How the property gets divided is generally governed by state law. However, spouses can contract around state laws using marital property agreements. Marital property agreements are frequently the driving force behind prenuptial or postnuptial agreements. However, they can also be entered into between spouses at any time. Generally, the purpose of a marital property agreement will be to change, or convert, or just clearly identify, the character of a piece of community property into separate property, or vice-versa. Another common use is to determine how future income from separate or joint property will be divided between the community and individual spouses (such as from a retirement account or pension). Converting Community or Separate Property In community property states, not all assets a spouse acquires during marriage will be considered community property. Separate property can be acquired by just one spouse through inheritances, gifts, or if property owned prior to marriage continues to grow through no community efforts. Through a marital property agreement, a spouse who receives an inheritance, or gift, or held premarital assets, can convert it, or just a piece of it, into community property. For example, if a spouse inherits their parent's home, they may want to own the property jointly with their spouse. Through a marital property agreement, one spouse can transfer their separate property interest to the community. Conversely, if one spouse has purchased something with community property that is so near and dear to their heart (like a car, instrument, or other valuable personal item), then via a marital property agreement, they can convert it to separate property. Enforceability of Marital Property Agreements With the exception of Ohio, married couples can enter into contractual agreements to alter the character of separately or jointly owned property. However, couples should be careful to make sure that the contracts they enter into with each other are enforceable as contracts between spouses are heavily scrutinized by courts. A big concern of the courts is that one spouse was taken advantage of by the other spouse at the time of contracting. If the terms, or transfer, do not appear to be fair, or reasonable, a court will likely investigate as to whether the disadvantaged spouse had full disclosure of all the facts, was cheated, or had opportunity to consult a lawyer. Related Resources: The heartbroken mother of baby Zachary Bryant, the youngest victim of Melbourne's Bourke Street rampage, says life without her little boy "isn't getting any easier". "Every move I make, every corner of the house and every sight we pass by reminds me of my child," Nawwar Hassan Bryant wrote on Facebook. "Memories of him are so deeply etched in my mind I automatically connect something I see to a memory of him." Three-month-old Zachary died at Melbourne's Royal Children's Hospital from injuries sustained when 26-year-old Dimitrious Gargasoulas allegedly drove his car into the busy CBD mall on the afternoon of January 20. Mr Gargasoulas has been charged with five counts of murder. A runaway emu that had its legs cuffed by police after running onto a Victorian highway has died. The bird was "crash-tackled" by a police officer as it tried to run into traffic on the Princes Highway at Newborough, in the state's south-east, on Saturday night. Emus can run at speeds up to 48km/h. Credit:Dana Battner Locals unsuccessfully tried to round up the emu, before police tried to catch it in their police car. The birds can run at speeds of 48km/h. WA's top cop has rejected suggestions the state's policing reform had failed, claiming an increase in domestic violence and meth-related crimes had caused officers to feel under pressure. The WA Police Union released a survey completed by 1100 officers, which found more than 70 per cent of them believe their workload has significantly increased over the past year and that their stations are under-resourced. In the survey the Police Union gave officers a chance to add comments, which painted a stark picture of the morale within the agency. One officer said: "All I see is that police officers in charge and higher are losing touch with reality." The last time Mikhail Gorbachev was in the news, he gave Donald Trump the benefit of the doubt. That thought has now vanished as the former Soviet president warns "it all looks as if the world is preparing for war". He says "the world today is overwhelmed with problems" and "policymakers seem to be confused and at a loss". He is referring to the Trump-Putin relationship and their intention to up the nuclear arms race. Judge Ann Donnelly, who who halted Donald Trump's refugee deportations. Credit:Twitter @bmarler Confusion seems the order of the day after Trump's executive pen struck a swathe of US visa holders on the weekend, banning those coming from seven majority Muslim countries, and excluding those from countries where the businessman-turned-president has commercial interests as our Chief Correspondent Paul McGeough points out. The world has reacted to the US President's ban with a backlash, jihadists welcomed it as a victory, while a rookie judge, Judge Ann Donnelly, took a stand for refugees and slapped a stay on the ban, which legal experts say is effectively nationally, throwing the situation at airports around the world into further disarray. US President Donald Trump has reiterated the country's ironclad commitment to defend South Korea, including through the provision of extended deterrence, using its full range of military capabilities, the White House said in a statement. Trump and South Korean acting President Hwang Kyo-ahn agreed during a phone call on Sunday to take steps to strengthen joint defence capabilities to defend against threats from North Korea, the White House said. President Donald Trump says America will defend South Korea. Credit:AP Trump and Hwang discussed the upcoming visit by the new US defence secretary to Japan and South Korea, where shared concerns about North Korea will top the agenda. The US and South Korea have agreed to deploy a Terminal High Altitude Area Defence system designed to protect against North Korea's growing nuclear and ballistic capabilities despite objections from China, which says the radar could penetrate Chinese territory. Police stormed the mosque, later confirming the situation was under control. Credit:Canadian Press/AP "Why is this happening here? This is barbaric," the mosque's president, Mohamed Yangui, said. Yangui, who was not inside the mosque when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. He did not know how many were injured, saying they had been taken to different hospitals across Quebec City. A regular at the mosque, Mohamed Oudghiri speaks with the media after the shooting on Sunday. Credit:Canadian Press/AP "This is deplorable," Yangui said . "I just got a call from the morgue asking me whether I could come in to identify five bodies." Trudeau who has been critical of US President's Donald Trump stance on Muslims and refugees, called the shooting a "cowardly attack" and restated his welcoming stance on migration. Alexandre Duval, journalist with Radio Canada Quebec, tweeted this photo as police arrived at the city's mosque after the shooting. Credit:Twitter/@alexduval88 The reason for the attack is not yet known but incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. In June 2016, a pig's head was left on the doorstep of the cultural centre. Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them North African immigrants. The face veil, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 national Canadian election, especially in Quebec, where the vast majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighbouring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. "These people go to their prayers peacefully every day but now some of them will never come back home from their prayers," Yangui said in French. "I'm shocked, I don't have words to describe how I'm feeling." Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard tweeted that the province was mobilising to assure the safety of Quebec City residents. "Quebec categorically reject(s) this barbaric violence," Couillard wrote. "We offer our solidarity to the loved ones of the victims and the injured and their families." The shooting came on the weekend that Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, after U.S. President Donald Trump suspended the U.S. refugee program and temporarily barred citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations from entering the United States on national security grounds. New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said police were providing additional protection for mosques in that city following the Quebec shooting. "All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something," he tweeted. 'Not safe here' "We are not safe here," said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque but not on Sunday. Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now "very worried" and thinking of moving back to Morocco. Mass shootings are rare in Canada, which has stricter gun laws than the United States, and news of the shooting sent a shockwave through mosques and community centers throughout the mostly French-language province. "It's a sad day for all Quebecers and Canadians to see a terrorist attack happen in peaceful Quebec City," said Mohamed Yacoub, co-chairman of an Islamic community centre in a Montreal suburb. "I hope it's an isolated incident." Jihadist groups on Sunday celebrated the Trump administration's ban on travel from seven Muslim-majority countries, saying the new policy validates their claim that the United States is at war with Islam. Comments posted to pro-Islamic State social media accounts predicted that President Donald Trump's executive order would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists. One posting hailed the US president as "the best caller to Islam," while others predicted that Trump would soon launch a new war in the Middle East. "[Islamic State leader Abu Bakr] al-Baghdadi has the right to come out and inform Trump that banning Muslims from entering America is a 'blessed ban,' " said one posting to a pro-Islamic State channel on Telegram, a social-media platform. The writer compared the executive order to the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, which Islamic militant leaders at the time hailed as a "blessed invasion" that ignited anti-Western fervour across the Islamic world. Several postings suggested that Trump was fulfilling the predictions of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American born al-Qaida leader and preacher who famously said that the "West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens." Awlaki was killed in a US drone strike in Yemen in 2011. Police at the scene of the mosque shooting. Credit:Canadian Press/AP Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau earlier called the shooting "a terrorist attack on Muslims." He was heading to Quebec City later on Monday, a spokesman said. US President Donald Trump called Trudeau to express his condolences "and offered to provide any assistance as needed," said Trudeau spokesman Cameron Ahmad. He gave no further details about of the call. Benabdallah Boufeldja, right, co-founder of the Islamic cultural centre, responds to reporters questions as Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard, left, looks on. Credit:AP The shooting came over a weekend when Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, speaking in response to Trump's order to halt the US refugee program and to temporarily bar citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. Trump's action, which the president said was aimed at protecting Americans from the threat of attacks by militant Islamists, was widely condemned in the United States and abroad as targeting Muslims. A police officer looks for evidence under a car in the area of a Quebec City mosque. Credit:AP Muslim leaders from Quebec joined the province's premier, Philippe Couillard, at a news conference Monday morning. "We're all Quebecers," Couillard said. "All of us. Each one of us. We are a large nation, a large people, but we're even more united today." Mohamed Labibi, president of the Islamic cultural centre, is comforted by Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard, left, and Quebec City mayor Regis Labeaume, right. Credit:AP "It's normal in times of crisis that everyone will speak the same voice of tolerance, integration and inclusion," he told reporters. "The real challenge will be three weeks from now, to continue saying this." Speaking after the news conference, which was also attended by several politicians, leaders of the mosque said that the suspect was not known to them. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau comments on the Quebec City mosque shootings in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill. Credit:AP But they said the shooting had followed acts of harassment and bigotry that had led the mosque to install eight surveillance cameras. The acts ranged from hate mail to swastikas painted on its doors to a pig's head left in front of the mosque last June. "We've had to be very, very vigilant, careful for our community," said Boufeldga Benabdallah, a co-founder of the mosque. The flag flies at half-mast on the Peace tower in Ottawa. Credit:AP "Six of our brothers they were," he said of those killed in the attack. "The prayed beside us, and they were shot in the back because they prayed." Several of the mosque leaders said that the gunman appeared to have targeted people who were praying when he arrived. Benabdallah, however, said that Muslims in the area were surprised and comforted by the outpouring of support from the broader society. Vigils planned for victims A father-of-four, the owner of a halal butcher near the mosque, was among those killed, said Pamela Sakinah El-hayet, a friend of one of the people at the mosque. The mosque concierge was killed, as was Ahmed Youness, a 21-year-old student, El-hayet told Reuters. One of El-hayet's friends, Youness' roommate, was in the mosque at the time of the shooting. He was unharmed, she said, but in total shock. Ali Assafiri, a student at Universite Laval, said he had been running late for the evening prayers at the mosque, near the university in the Quebec City area. When he arrived, the mosque had been transformed by police into a crime scene. "Everyone was in shock," Assafiri said by phone. "It was chaos." Universite Laval is the oldest French-language university in North America, with 42,500 students. Vigils were planned for Montreal and Quebec City, the provincial capital, as well as in Edmonton later on Monday. There was an outpouring of support for the mosque on social media. Citizens for Public Justice, a group of Canadian Christians, churches and other religious congregations, expressed their solidarity with the Muslim community of Quebec City. "Last night's shooting, targeting people of faith during their worship and prayer, is a deplorable attack on all Canadians and our most deeply-held values," the group's executive director, Joe Gunn, said. Motive unclear While the motive for the shooting was not known, incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The man who was charged, Alexandre Bissonnette, had a history of provocative views and anti-social behaviour, according to a report in the Quebec newspaper La Presse. The newspaper quoted Francois Deschamps, an official with a refugee advocacy organisation, as saying that Bissonette had make harassing comments against members of an online chat room. The organisation, Bienvenue aux Refugies, said in a Facebook post that Bissonnette had made remarks critical of feminists and foreigners, and that he had expressed sympathies online with the National Front, the far-right political party in France. The article quoted classmates of Bissonette as saying that he had been bullied and taunted at school, and was known for making insulting and offensive remarks. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. Pope Francis offered his condolences to Cardinal Gerald Cyprien LaCroix, Archbishop of Quebec, who was visiting Rome on Monday. Latest News Mortgage stress hits Australian households Learn seven ways to ease the interest rate burden, says broker New investor strengthens Invoice Finance Group Partnership will provide funding, new products for SMEs The Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC) has reported that in 2015-16, around $1 billion in funds related to property and real estate were transferred between China and Australia.Typically, AUSTRAC is notified of these matters via suspicious matter reports (SMRs) which are submitted by banks, money remitters and other financial institutions.Suspicion may be warranted and a report sent to AUSTRAC in a number of circumstances including if a bank or institution thinks a person is not who they claim to be, the information given relates to evading tax law or aiding criminal activity, or there is a chance of money laundering or terrorist funding.John Moss, AUSTRACs national manager of intelligence, told Australian Broker that these SMRs indicate a total of $3.36 billion of funds was sent between China and Australia in the stated time period.AUSTRAC data shows that the overall total amount of fund flows between Australia and China during 2015-16 was $76.7 billion, Moss said.The agency was constantly vigilant to identify increases in the number of suspicious transactions from a number of countries, including China, he added.Were confident that the agencys approach with our Chinese counterparts through a recently signed Memorandum of Understanding, as well as close collaboration with Australian law enforcement and other partner agencies such as the ATO, ACIC and FIRB is providing an effective response to protect the Australian community from such financial crime. Ko Ni, a member of Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party, was gunned down as he was waiting for a taxi outside arrivals around 5pm (1030GMT) by an assassin who also killed the driver. "According to our initial information, Ko Ni and the taxi driver were killed," a security source at the airport told AFP, asking not to be named. The driver tried to stop the assassin who tried to flee from the scene after close-shooting Ko Ni with a 9 mm pistol. "An unknown man shot him in the head while he was hiring a taxi. He was later arrested," the source added. Zaw Htay, a spokesman at the president's office, said Ko Ni had just returned from a government delegation trip to Indonesia. "He (Ko Ni) was shot while he was waiting for a car outside the airport. Ko Ni died on the spot," he told AFP. There were no reports on possible motives behind the murder. Yet it is rare for prominent political figures to be murdered in Yangon, the country's booming and largely safe commercial hub. But in recent years Myanmar has witnessed a surge of anti-Muslim sentiment, fanned by hardline Buddhist nationalists. Ko Ni, a long time member of the NLD and legal advisor to the party, often spoke out in favour of religious tolerance and pluralism. He was known for his legal advices to amend the country's 2008 Constitution which prohibits NLD leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi from becoming the country's president. In late 2015 Suu Kyi's NLD party won a landslide election victory, ending decades of military led rule. (With report from AFP) This blog is looking for wisdom, to have and to share. It is also looking for other rare character traits like good humor, courage, and honor. It is not an easy road, because all of us fall short. But God is love, forgiveness and grace. Those who believe in Him and repent of their sins have the promise of His Holy Spirit to guide us and show us the Way. Yardley Friends Meeting at 65 N. Main Street in Yardley will host the documentary Organic Roots on Friday, November 18 at 7 p.m. Join director Al Johnson for a showing of this film followed by a discussion of the last 50 years of this movement. Organic foods are part of our life today and a tool in our concern for... latest news October 31, 2022 Buddy TV In November, there are hundreds of new and returning TV showsit can be overwhelming to try and choose what to watch. That's why we've selected some of the best options... Where Andy Kim, Bob Healey stand on abortion, inflation and more The USA TODAY Network New Jersey asked Andy Kim and Bob Healey where they stand on key issues in the midterms. Here's what they said. Unlock 30+ premium stories daily hand-picked by our editors, across devices on browser and app. Full access to our intuitive epaper - clip, save, share articles from any device; newspaper archives from 2006. Curated newsletters on markets, personal finance, policy & politics, start-ups, technology, and more. Pick your 5 favourite companies, get a daily email with all news updates on them. 26 years of website archives. Data obtained by Business Standard through Right to Information (RTI) shows that just three Public Sector Units (PSUs) contributed almost 60 per cent the spending under Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) to the Swachh Bharat Kosh (Clean India Fund). The Swachh Bharat Mission (Clean India Mission) is Prime Minister Narendra Modis pet scheme and one of the first to be announced after his government assumed power in 2014. With Vodafone confirming discussing with the Aditya Birla Group over a potential merger with Idea Cellular, the prospects also brighten for a merger of (ABNL) with Grasim. Union minister of steel Birender Singh has asked the Joint Plant Committee (JPC) to expand its board to include representatives from hitherto unrepresented segments such as stainless steel, scrap and sponge iron. The Union government has begun the process for strategic disinvestment in assets of public sector undertakings, including three units of Steel Authority of India (SAIL), one of National Minerals Development Corporation (NMDC) and Ferro Scrap Nigam Ltd (FSNL). India's third largest software exporter has invested an undisclosed amount in San Francisco's cloud-based business commerce platform Tradeshift through its strategic investment arm Ventures. The quantum of the investment will be used to develop Tradeshift's innovative applications, trade financing solutions, platform and business-to-business marketplace ecosystem. After experiencing a rather strong cold wave condition coupled with rains around the Republic Day, maximum temperatures across most parts of North Indian plains including capital Delhi is expected to rise by 3-5 degrees and stabilise around that level thereafter till mid-February. According to the last weather bulletin issued by the India Meteorological Department (IMD), rise in maximum temperature is very likely over plains of northwest India during next three days and no large change thereafter. Amidst chill in ties, Pakistan has declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend South Asian Speakers' Summit to be held next month. "Pakistan and Myanmar which were among the countries in the South Asian nations invited to the Speakers' meet in Indore on February 18-19 have declined the invitation," official sources said. However, officials did not elaborate on the reasons given by Pakistan and merely noted that these two countries have written that they will not be able to attend the meet. The Summit, which is primarily an IPU initiative and not a SAARC activity, will be attended by Speakers of Parliament from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka among other countries, the sources said. Significantly, in 2015, India had boycotted a Commonwealth Parliamentary Union (CPU) meeting in Islamabad to protest against Pakistan's decision to not invite the Speaker of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. The discussions during the Speakers' Summit on achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will update the participants on implementation of the SDGs in their region and globally. Special emphasis will be laid on sharing experiences and increasing understanding about how parliaments in the region institutionalise the global goals, capture the synergies and build coherence at the policy level, IPU said on its website. Senior officials of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) are scheduled to meet in Kathmandu this week for the first time since the summit was postponed in 2016 to discuss various issues. The meet on February 1-2 to attend the Programming Committee will be the first meeting of the member states since the postponement of the 19th that was supposed to take place in Islamabad in November 2016, a Foreign Ministry official said. During the meeting, member states will discuss a number of issues, including the budget of the SAARC Secretariat and five regional centers of SAARC, according to Foreign Ministry sources. The matter relating to rescheduling the next SAARC summit will also come up during the meeting, to be attended by joint secretaries of the SAARC countries. Nepal, current chair of the SAARC, had decided to postpone the SAARC Summit until further notice after four nations Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh and India requested to postpone the summit in Islamabad scheduled for November 9 and 10, 2016, following escalation of tension between India and Pakistan. India and three other countries had blamed Pakistan for not creating a conducive environment and not co-operating on combating cross-border terrorism in South Asia for holding the SAARC Summit, while Pakistan has rejected the charges. The decisions made by the programming committee will be forwarded to the Standing Committee for endorsement. SAARC is a regional body founded in 1985 in South Asia, comprising Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. A Parliamentary petition to rescind the invitation for Donald Trump to make an official state visit has received nearly 1.3 million signatures in a matter of days, making it the fastest-growing such petition in Parliamentary history. Despite the numbers, the Prime Minister's Office has indicated that it will continue with the state visit as planned. The petition says that the visit should be canceled "because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen" and "Donald Trump's well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales." While other world leaders were quick to condemn Trump's illegal ban on Muslims entering the USA, UK Prime Minister Theresa May dragged her feet offering weak criticism only after noted bigots in her cabinet, including Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, made public statements indicating that Trump had gone too far even for them. But after public pressure, May did eventually make a public statement opposing the ban. As more signatures flood into the petition site, she may yet be swayed. In any event, the petition has crossed the 100,000 signature threshold, meaning that Parliament must consider debating it, and opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn has called for the visit to be canceled. The Government's action comes after Ms May repeatedly refused to comment on Mr Trump's policy at a press conference in Turkey on Saturday, leading to accusations that she is putting good relations with Mr Trump and the hopes of a post-Brexit trade deal ahead of human rights. In the wake of the press conference, Tory MP Sarah Wollaston said the President should not be allowed to address either House of Parliament on his pending state visit as a result of the policy. She was backed by other Tories including Heidi Allen and ex-foreign minister Alistair Burt. Prevent Donald Trump from making a State Visit to the United Kingdom [Petitions/Parliament UK] Pressure grows on May as a million people sign anti-Trump petition over 'Muslim ban' [Joe Watts/The Independent] Newly-elected US president Donald Trump's plans to reverse extension of Optional Practical Training (OPT) for science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) students could benefit immigrant-friendly nations like Australia, Canada and New Zealand, among others. OPT allows foreign STEM students to extend their stay in the US after completion of studies for 6-12 months under student visa. Foreign students are found to make use of OPT to either look for jobs or apply for further education or simply float around till the OPT term expires. The regime of previous US president Barack Obama had looked to extend the same to over three years but ran out of time with the country going into elections. Google, Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) and Taj Hotels are on the fast track to give a fresh look to Delhis National Rail Museum (NRM) and other heritage assets of the . By all accounts, growth has slowed after demonetisation. But while some analysts expect it to bounce back quickly after full remonetisation, others arent so sure. Visit of Commander of the Sri Lankan Navy Vice Admiral RC Wijegunaratne, Commander of the Sri Lanka Navy is on an official visit to India from 29 January to 02 February 2017. The visit is aimed at consolidating bilateral naval relations between India and Sri Lanka and to explore new avenues for naval cooperation. Commander, Sri Lankan Navy will hold bilateral discussions with Admiral Sunil Lanba, Chief of the Naval Staff and other senior officials of the Indian Navy on 30 January 2017. The Admiral is also scheduled to meet the Chief of the Air Staff, Chief of the Army Staff as well as the Director General, Indian Coast Guard. Calls on of the Honble Minister of State for Defence and Defence Secretary have also been scheduled as part of his official meetings in New Delhi. Naval cooperation between India and Sri Lanka has been traditionally strong, encompassing a wide span which includes operational interactions through bilateral exercises, Training, Port Calls, Hydrographic co-operation, Special Forces interactions, Capability Building and Capacity Augmentation initiatives. Two Advanced Offshore Patrol Vessels (AOPVs) are also being constructed for the Sri Lankan Navy at M/s Goa Shipyard Limited. In addition to New Delhi, the Admiral is also scheduled to proceed to Goa where he will be visiting Naval War College and Goa Shipyard Limited besides interacting with Flag Officer Commanding Goa Area. The Admiral would further visit the Training Command of the Indian Navy based at Kochi, where he would be briefed on training aspects and would also visit various training facilities/ professional schools. During his visit to Kochi, the Admiral would also interact with Sri Lankan Naval personnel undergoing training in India. The Commander, Sri Lankan Navys visit follows closely on the visit of the Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Sunil Lanbas visit to Sri Lanka wherein he also participated in the 7th International Maritime Conference, Galle Dialogue 2016. DKS/AC It has come to the notice of Ministry of Women & Child Development, Government of India that certain unauthorised sites/organisations/NGOs/individuals are distributing forms in the name of cash incentive under Beti Bachao Beti Padhao Scheme. The scheme has no provision for individual CASH TRANSFER COMPONENT by Government of India. Beti Bachao Beti Padhao scheme focuses on challenging mindsets and deep rooted patriarchy in the societal system, strict enforcement of PC&PNDT Act, advancing education of the girl child: focus is on issues of women empowerment on a life cycle continuum. It is not a DBT (Direct Benefit Transfer) scheme. . . It is a very serious matter and if any such incidence comes to your knowledge, please report it to the nearest police station and the concerned District Collector/ District Magistrate. Please do not fall in trap to any such fraud. Do not share your personal details in this regard. FIRs have already been filed by District Magistrates of Meerut & Muzzafarnagar (UP State) in the matter. The matter has come to notice in Lucknow as well. The Ministry of Women and Child Development had cautioned the media and public about this through their Press Release dated 4.1.2017. However, certain reports of unscrupulous elements still indulging in this fraud. Once again it is reiterated that distribution of such forms is completely illegal and there is no cash incentive associated in any form with the Beti Bachao Beti Padhao Scheme. . . Hours after landing in New York on Saturday, a doctor at the prestigious Cleveland Clinic was forced to leave the country based on an executive order issued by President Donald Trump that bans visitors from seven predominantly Muslim countries for 90 days. Most US corporate bosses have stayed silent on President Donald Trump's immigration curbs, underscoring the sensitivities around opposing policies that could provoke a backlash from the White House. While the leaders of Apple, Google and Facebook emailed their staff to denounce the suspension of the US refugee program and the halting of arrivals from seven Muslim-majority countries, many of their counterparts in other industries either declined comment or responded with company statements reiterating their commitment to diversity. The difference in response shows the pressure large swathes of corporate America faces to avoid tussling publicly with the new administration. such as aircraft maker Boeing and automakers Ford Motor and General Motors have already had run-ins with Trump over other issues, and they have much at stake in policy decisions that the administration will make on tax, trade and regulatory matters. Before office, Trump attacked Boeing over the cost of the future Air Force One program. Boeing Chief Executive Officer Dennis Muilenburg met with him earlier this month and said he and Trump had made progress on the Air Force One issue and the potential sale of fighter aircraft. Representatives from Boeing, General Motors and Ford declined to comment on Trump's immigration curbs. Wall Street, meanwhile, is hoping the new administration will ease some of the regulations introduced in the wake of the 2007-08 financial crisis and adopt a lighter touch in their enforcement. Industries including banking, healthcare and auto manufacturing "see themselves on the cusp of a new era of deregulation, and they do not want to do anything that would offend the new emperor," said Cornelius Hurley, director of Boston University's Center for Finance, Law & Policy. Trump had targeted both the tech industry and Wall Street during his presidential campaign, but once elected, he tapped former investment bankers, hedge fund managers and private equity investors to join his administration. With friends in high places, Wall Street may have less reason to be as outspoken about the new restrictions. "Bankers have direct access to this White House," said Erik Gordon, who teaches at the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business. "They don't have to protest publicly." Representatives of Goldman Sachs Group, Citigroup, Bank of America and Morgan Stanley declined to comment on Trump's immigration order. Wells Fargo & Co said in a statement that it was reviewing the executive order and its implications for staff and its business. JPMorgan Chase & Co's Operating Committee, which includes CEO Jamie Dimon, sent a note to staff saying it was reaching out to all employees affected and noted that the country was, "strengthened by the rich diversity of the world around us." To be sure, some CEOs were more outspoken. Nike CEO Mark Parker said the company did not support the executive order. "Nike believes in a world where everyone celebrates the power of diversity," he said in a statement. "Those values are being threatened by the recent executive order in the US banning refugees, as well as visitors, from seven Muslim-majority countries." Brent Saunders, CEO of US drugmaker Allergan Plc, tweeted: "Oppose any policy that puts limitations on our ability to attract the best & diverse talent." But many boardrooms kept quiet. Representatives for some energy companies, including Exxon Mobil Corp, for example, declined to comment. Good Corporate Citizens As the idea of corporate social responsibility has taken root, so have increasingly championed a range of causes, including gay rights, diverse workplaces and a global view. Many in corporate America are still trying to work out how to deal with a new government that takes a more conservative stance on some social issues and has an anti-globalisation platform. Those non-tech that did issue statements over the weekend tended to emphasise their role as good corporate citizens rather than openly criticise Trump's policies. Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz has put the coffee chain in the national spotlight before, asking customers not to bring guns into stores and urging conversations on race relations. In a letter to employees, he said Starbucks was developing plans to hire 10,000 refugees over five years across dozens of countries, but he did not directly criticise Trump's order. "I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack," he wrote. In his statement, General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt told staff that the company would engage with the U S government. "We will continue to make our voice heard with the new administration and Congress, and reiterate the importance of this issue to GE and to the business community overall," he wrote. One of the most immediate ways for corporate bosses to communicate with Trump about the immigration order will be the first meeting of his advisory panel of business leaders next week. Of the 19 leaders on that panel, only two, Elon Musk, who founded Tesla Motors and SpaceX, and Travis Kalanick, CEO of Uber Technologies, have spoken out against Trump's immigration curbs. A spokeswoman for Stephen Schwarzman, the billionaire chief executive of Blackstone Group LP whom Trump tasked to set up and chair the panel, declined to comment. Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of US President Donald Trump's travel ban, the immigration ministry has said. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. Hussen did not indicate how many people could be concerned by this measure, but he said that as of early Sunday afternoon, the Canadian authorities were unaware of anyone stranded in the country by the US order. Trump on Friday suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iraq, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Hussen, who is of Somali origin, said the Trump administration had assured Ottawa that Canadians holding dual nationality with those countries would not be affected by the US ban. He said that people from those seven countries who have a valid Canadian permanent residency card can still enter the United States. However, under the US order, the ban will apply to people from the targeted countries who are passing through Canada. More than 35,000 Canadians with dual citizenship have citizenship with one of the seven countries, he added. Hussen also stressed that Canada would continue to pursue an immigration policy based on compassion while at the same time protecting the security of its citizens. On Saturday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcomed immigrants to Canada, striking a sharp contrast with Trump's sweeping executive order restricting immigration the previous day. "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada," Trudeau posted on Twitter. According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one out of five people in the country are foreign-born. Canada has welcomed more than 39,670 Syrian refugees between November 2015 and the beginning of this January, according to government figures. MIT Professor Emeritus of Robotic Rodney Brooks has published a thought-provoking essay on the most concrete, most likely ethical questions that will be raised by self-driving cars; Brooks is uninterested in contrived questions like the "Trolley Problem" (as am I, but for different reasons); he's more attuned to the immediate problems that could be created by selfish self-drivers who use their cars to get an edge over the people who drive themselves, and pedestrians. (1) People will jump out of their car at a Starbucks to run in and pick up their order knowingly leaving it not in a legal parking spot, perhaps blocking others, but knowing that it will take care of getting out of the way if some other car needs to move or get by. That will be fine in the case there is no such need, but in the case of need it will slow everything down just a little. And perhaps the owner will be able to set the tolerance on how uncomfortable things have to get before the car moves. Expect to see lots of annoyed people. And before long grocery store parking lots, especially in a storm, will just be a sea of cars improperly parked waiting for their owners. (2) This is one for the two (autonomous) car family. Suppose someone is going to an event in the evening and there is not much parking nearby. And suppose autonomous cars are now always prowling neighborhoods waiting for their owners to summon them, so it takes a while for any particular car to get through the traffic to the pick up location. Then the two car family may resort to a new trick so that they don't have to wait quite so long as others for their cars to get to the front door pick up at the conclusion of the big social event. They send one of their cars earlier in the day to find the closest parking spot that it can, and it settles in for a long wait. They use their second car to drop them at the event and send it home immediately. When the event is over their first autonomous car is right there waiting for themthe cost to the commons was a parking spot occupied all day by one of their cars. (3) In various suburban schools that my kids went to when they were young there was a pick up ritual, which I see being repeated today when I drive past a school at the right time. Mothers, mostly, would turn up in their cars just before dismissal time and line up in the order that they arrived with the line backing out beyond the school boundary often. When school was over the teachers would come outside with all the kids and the cars would pull up to the pick up point^{\big 4}, the parents and teachers would cooperate to get the kids into their car seats, and off would go the cars with the kids, one at a time. When the first few families have fully driverless cars, one can imagine them sending their cars to wait in line first, so that their kids get picked up first and brought home. Not only does that mean that other parents would have to invest more of their personal time waiting in order to get their kids earlier, while the self driving car owners do not, but it ends up putting more responsibility on the teachers. Expect to see push back on this practice from the schools. But people will still try it. Early on in the transition to driverless cars the 1% will have a whole new way to alienate the rest of the society. If you don't think so, take a drive south from San Francisco on 101 in the morning and see the Teslas speeding down the left most lane. Six people died and eight were injured after gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque, a shooting that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned on Monday as a "terrorist attack". Police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told journalists that two suspects were arrested following the attack, that police were also treating as an act of terrorism. Trudeau said in a statement that "we condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge". "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, city and country." According to witnesses interviewed on local television, two masked gunmen entered the cultural center around 7.15 PM on Sunday. The motive of the attack was not immediately clear. Police quickly set up in the mosque's vicinity. Coulombe said those killed were between ages 35 and 70. Police did not rule out the possibility of a third suspect who had fled the scene. "It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence," Trudeau said. "Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear." Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said in a series of Twitter posts that the government was "mobilised to ensure the security of the people of Quebec". "Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence," he wrote. "Solidarity with Quebec people of Muslim faith." Police stationed near the mosque said that they had been preparing for this type of attack "because it's happening all over the world". "I don't understand why here -- it's a small mosque," said a man who was inside the center at the time of the attack. "It's not Montreal or Toronto." The mosque has already been the target of hate: a pig's head was left on the doorstep last June during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Other mosques in Canada have been targeted with racist graffiti in recent months. The attack comes as Canada has vowed to open its arms wide to Muslims and refugees after US President Donald Trump's controversial immigration ban on Friday sparked travel chaos and outrage around the world. Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of Trump's order, the immigration ministry said on Sunday. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. Trump has suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. US President Donald Trump is expected to sign a new executive order aimed at strangulating work-visa programmes, including the H1B and L1 visas used by Indian IT professionals, as part of a larger immigration reform effort, a top White House official has said. The executive order drafted by the Trump Administration not only strangulates H-1B and L1 visas, but also increases inspector raj and ends employment authorisation cards to spouses on such work visas, which was recently introduced by the previous Obama Administration. The draft of the order was leaked and published by some news websites yesterday. "I think with respect to H1Bs and other visa is part of a larger immigration reform effort that the President will continue to talk about through executive order and through working with Congress," White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told reporters at his daily news conference. "You've already seen a lot of action on immigration and I think whether it's that or the spousal visas or other types of visas, I think there's an overall need to look at all of these programmes. You'll see both through executive action and through comprehensive measures a way to address immigration as a whole and the visa programme," Spicer said. As per the leaked draft order, Trump would reverse Obama's extension of the duration of the optional practical training work visas, which allowed foreign students to stay in the US a bit longer after completion of their studies. Within 90 days of the signing of the executive order, the Secretary of Homeland Security would have to review all regulations that allow foreign nationals to work in the US and determine which of those regulations violate the immigration laws or are not in the national interest of America. It would also immediately terminate all parole policies. The executive order will also ask the Secretaries of Labour and Homeland Security to restore the integrity of employment-based non-immigrant worker programmes and better protect US and foreign workers affected by these programmes. The draft order seeks the administration to "consider ways to make the process of allocating visas more efficient and ensure that beneficiaries of the programmes are the best and the brightest." It also proposes to establish a commission or advisory committee to analyse the nation's current immigration policies and their impact on the American society, economy, work force, and the foreign policy and national security interest of the United States. The H1B visa is a non-immigrant visa that allows US companies to employ foreign workers in speciality occupations that require theoretical or technical expertise in specialised fields. The technology companies depend on it to hire tens of thousands of employees each year. Trump signed an executive order banning foreign nationals from seven predominantly Muslim countries to enter the US on Friday. The US border officials are checking the profiles of immigrants before allowing them into the country, a media report said. The move came in the wake of US President Donald Trump's executive order to temporarily bar US entry to refugees and citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations. The US officials are reportedly checking the pages of immigrants for their political views, The Independent reported on Sunday. A Houston-based lawyer Mana Yegani was quoted as saying that several green card holders, who have the right to live and work in the US, were detained by border agents at American airports hours after Trump's executive order came into force. According to the American Immigration Lawyers Association (Alia), border agents were checking the social media accounts of those detained and were interrogating them about their political beliefs before allowing them into the US. "I and my fellow lawyers had worked through the night fielding calls from people with legitimate visa being detained before entering the US or ordered back on flights to the Muslim-majority countries on the list," said Yegani, who works with the Alia. "The ban has affected travellers with passports from seven Muslim-majority countries and also green card holders who are granted authorisation to live and work in the US," a spokesperson from Department of Homeland Security said. The ban on Saturday created chaos and outrage around the world, while numerous travellers found their access to the US territory blocked and protests were staged at several US airports. "In one alleged incident a Sudanese PhD student at Stanford University in California, who has lived in the US for 22 years, was held for five hours in New York and in another a dual Iranian-Canadian citizen was not allowed to board a flight in Ottawa," the report noted. "These are people that are coming in legally. They have jobs here and they have vehicles here. Just because Trump signed something at 6 p.m. yesterday (on Friday), things are coming to a crashing halt. It's scary," Yegani said. The executive order bans immigration from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen under measures to "keep radical Islamic terrorists out". "I am establishing new vetting measures to keep radical Islamic terrorists out of the US," Trump said on Friday during the signing at the Pentagon after the swearing-in of Defence Secretary James Mattis, CNN reported. IKEA will initially sell an optional clip-on lamp and table to be used with the product, and plans to roll out more accessories in time. (Photo: Reuters) Rarely does an executive order announce a more straightforward and laudable purpose than the one President Trump signed on Friday: Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into the United States. But the presidents directive is unlikely to significantly reduce the terrorist threat in the United States, which has been a minuscule part of the overall toll of violence since 2001. The Germans criticised it. The British voiced their discomfort. The French, the Canadians and even some Republican senators in Washington stood in open opposition. prices extended declines on Monday, dragged down by signs of growing output in the United States that could partly offset output cuts by Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) and other producers. Uncertainty over the outlook for US policy also broadly weighed on financial after President Donald Trump introduced immigration curbs that sparked criticism at home and abroad. But trading was quiet with several Asian countries, including China, on holiday for the Lunar New Year. London Brent crude for March delivery had dropped 28 cents to $55.24 a barrel by 0417 GMT, after settling down 72 cents on Friday. NYMEX crude for March delivery was down 27 cents at $52.90 a barrel. The US weekly and gas rig count from Baker Hughes showed that US drillers added 15 oil rigs last week, bringing the total count to 566, the most since November 2015. The Opec and other producers, including Russia, agreed to cut output by almost 1.8 million barrels per day (bpd) in the first half of 2017 to relieve a two-year supply overhang. "We are in wait-and-see mode, I suspect at the moment. Oil has reached a fair value equilibrium level given the current supply and demand outlook," said Ric Spooner, chief market analyst at CMC in Sydney. "Until we get anything to really disrupt that, we may not see too much change," he said, adding the market may draw some comfort from official Opec figures for January output. Spooner said as, with other financial markets, Trump's ban on entry to the US for refugees and citizens from seven Muslim countries had contributed to a "risk-off" attitude. US oil production has been rising, with the Energy Agency forecasting total US output growth of 320,000 bpd in 2017 to an average of 12.8 million bpd. "The rise in US output should not be unexpected," ANZ bank said in a note. "However we expect the reductions being made by Opec will far exceed any rise in the US and quickly reduce the global inventory that has been built up over the past two years," it added. Hedge funds and money managers boosted bullish wagers on the US crude oil to the highest level since mid-2014, Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) data showed on Friday, as agreed output cuts by the world's top producers began to eat into a global glut. President has accused the US of building "depots" in the Philippines, warning that he would abrogate a bilateral treaty if Washington did not stop, a media report said on Monday. "Here is my worry. They (the Americans) are making depots, they are unloading arms in the Philippines now, in Palawan, Cagayan de Oro and Pampanga," he told a news conference in the presidential palace, Xinhua news agency reported on Monday. "I am serving notice to the Armed Forces of the US: Do not do it. I will not allow it," Duterte said late on Sunday night, citing a provision in the Visiting Forces Agreement signed by both countries that no permanent facilities should be built on the Philippine territory. "A depot by any other name is a depot ... It is prohibited under the law. It's not allowed by the treaty," he said. Duterte said building a depot and stoking them with live ammunition was dangerous to the Philippines and its people, describing it as a magnet for attack. "I won't allow that. You place us all in danger," he said, vowing to stop the construction. Philippine Defence Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said recently that the US military would start building facilities in Philippine military camps in 2017. Lorenzana told reporters that the plan was part of the Enhanced Defence Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) that Washington and Manila signed in 2014. Aside from the Basa Air Base in Pampanga province near Subic and Clark, the former US military bases that were converted into economic zones, the US armed forces also plan to build facilities in Antonio Bautista Air Base in Palawan, the Fort Magsaysay on Luzon island, Lumbia Air Base in Cagayan de Oro, and Mactan-Benito Ebuen Air Base in Cebu in central Philippines. The Philippine constitution bars the presence of foreign military bases, troops, or facilitates on Philippine soil. However, Duterte said the US troops can still conduct joint military exercises with Philippine troops. US immigration restrictions introduced over the weekend are bringing the technology industry together in unified anger like never before. We thank our sponsor for making this content possible; it is not written by the editorial staff nor does it necessarily reflect its views. Ever wonder what your furry best friend does all day while you're away? The Wicked Ball: Interactive Dog Toy will keep them entertained until you come home, and it's only $39.99 as part READ THE REST Starbucks says it will hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years, a response to President Donald Trump's indefinite suspension of Syrian refugees and temporary travel bans that apply to six other Muslim-majority nations. Howard Schultz, the coffee retailer's chairman and chief executive, said in a letter to employees yesterday that the hiring would apply to stores worldwide and the effort would start in the United States where the focus would be on hiring immigrants "who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel." Schultz, a supporter of Hillary Clinton during the presidential run, took aim at other parts of a Trump agenda focused on immigration, repealing former President Barack Obama's health care law and restructuring trade with Mexico. The letter said that Starbucks would help support coffee growers in Mexico, provide health insurance to eligible workers if the health care law is repealed and back an Obama-era immigration program that allows young immigrants who were brought to the country as children to apply for a two-year reprieve from deportation and a work permit. The move reflects the increasing complexity that businesses face when dealing with the Trump administration. Trump has met with CEOs at Ford, General Motors and Boeing and asked them to create jobs in the United States, while touting each announcement about new factory jobs as a success even if those additions had been planned before his presidential victory. But not all corporate leaders have embraced Trump. Schultz added that Starbucks would aim to communicate with workers more frequently, saying yesterday, "I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack. US President Donald Trumps clash with Silicon Valley over immigration is about to become more contentious. After the temporary ban on refugees and travellers from seven predominantly Muslim countries, Trumps next move could strike closer to home. His administration has drafted an executive order aimed at overhauling the work-visa programmes information technology companies depend on to hire tens of thousands of employees each year. If implemented, the reforms could shift the way American companies like Microsoft, Amazon and Apple recruit talent and force wholesale ... Defending his controversial executive order on banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering America, US President has insisted that it is "not a Muslim ban" as is "falsely" reported by the media. Trump signed the order on Friday which bans Syrian refugees and people from six other countries from entering the US. The move has triggered widespread outrage. The seven countries mentioned are Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order," Trump said. Trump said his administration will again be issuing visas to all countries once the US is sure that it has reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. "I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering," he said in a statement. Noting that America is a proud nation of immigrants, Trump said the country will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but will do so while protecting its own citizens and border. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave, he said. "We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say," Trump said, adding that his policy is similar to that of his predecessor Barack Obama who in 2011 banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. "The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror," Trump said. In series of tweets, Trump slammed Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham for being critical of his immigration policies. In a joint statement, the two Senators feared that this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. "At this very moment, American troops are fighting side-by-side with our Iraqi partners to defeat ISIL. But this executive order bans Iraqi pilots from coming to military bases in Arizona to fight our common enemies," the two Senators said. Thousands of protesters rallied in front of the White House on Sunday while demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports after US President Donald Trump's 'Muslim ban', media reports said. According to witnesses, the Lafayette Square before the White House was packed by protesters against Trump's ban from noontime as more demonstrators were still arriving, Xinhua news agency reported. They wielded poster boards bearing messages such as "Ban Trump" "Refugees Welcome" and chanted "No hate! No fear! Refugees are welcome here!" Protests are also scheduled throughout the day in Philadelphia, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle and Chicago, said a CNN report. In Boston's Copley Square, thousands of people also gathered to protest the immigration ban, according to a report from the USA Today. Earlier on Sunday, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway said the travel disruptions in the wake of the ban was "a small price to pay" for greater security of the US. On contrary, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Sunday said Democrats are considering legal actions to overturn the order. Under the order, refugees from all over the world will be suspended US entry for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. --IANS vgu/ President Trumps executive order on immigration indefinitely barred Syrian refugees from entering the United States, suspended all refugee admissions for 120 days and blocked citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries, refugees or otherwise, from entering the United States for 90 days: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Japan is scrambling to respond to intensifying trade pressure from United States (US) President Donald Trump, with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe planning to meet the head of Toyota Motor Corp this week and business lobby Keidanren planning a Trump task force. Abe will visit Washington on February 10 for talks with Trump at which the leader is expected to seek quick progress toward a two-way trade deal with Japan and discuss the automotive sector. Ahead of those talks, Abe will meet with Toyota Chief Executive Akio Toyoda, two sources told Reuters. One of them said the meeting would take place on Friday. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga denied a meeting had been set for Friday, while Toyota Motor Corp declined to comment. In a phone call with Abe on Saturday, Trump reiterated his pledge to create jobs in the and asked that the Japanese auto industry contributes, the Nikkei business daily reported, quoting unidentified Japanese government officials. The two leaders discussed the automotive industry, senior government spokesman Koichi Hagiuda told reporters after the phone call, without giving details. A White House statement said the two "committed to deepen the bilateral trade and investment relationship". Japan needs to craft a plan to show that its firms, car makers especially, will contribute to creating jobs, a former Japanese diplomat said. "I think that is the only way forward to make the bilateral summit a success," the diplomat said. "Trump only cares about numbers. Everything has to be linked to jobs creation," he added. "Symbolically, autos is a very big player." Abe has left the door open to discussing a free trade agreement (FTA) with the US, but some officials worry Japan would have little to gain while coming under intense pressure from Washington. Bilateral talks on specific sectors such as autos, however, are an option, officials have said. Trump, who last week dropped out of the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership pushed by his predecessor Barack Obama and favoured by Abe, has repeatedly attacked Japan's auto market as closed, in an echo of criticisms heard two decades ago. Japan has rejected that accusation, saying it does not impose tariffs on US auto imports nor put up discriminatory non-tariff barriers. Over the decades, Japanese automakers have developed SUVs, mini-vans and pick-up trucks specifically targeting American consumers' taste for bigger cars, while US brands have struggled to make inroads in Japan, where drivers overwhelmingly prefer domestic brands. Foreign-branded cars accounted for only 7% of the Japanese passenger car market, led by Germany. American brands collectively made up less than a third of 1% of passenger cars sold in Japan last year. Trump Task Force Toyota has come under fire from Trump for plans, announced in 2015, to shift production of its Corolla sedan to Mexico from Canada. Earlier this month, Japan's top automaker said it would invest $10 billion in the US over the next five years, the same as the previous five years. Toyota says it directly employed about 40,000 American workers as of December 2015, and indirectly more than 200,000 if dealers and suppliers are included. Japan's biggest business lobby Keidanren wants to beef up its information gathering and analysis of the Trump administration's policies, while also conveying data on Japan Inc's importance to the US economy, a Keidanren official said. "We will create a task force, the main purpose of which is to convey correct information about the contribution of Japanese firms in the United States," said another Keidanren official, who declined to be identified because he was not authorised to speak to media. Japan's government is already trying to give Trump's administration a crash course on its companies' contribution to US jobs and growth, with fact sheets showing, among other things, that Japanese companies created 839,000 jobs in America, second only to Britain. Tokyo came under harsh US criticism in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when Japan accounted for up to 60% of the US trade deficit. But now its share has shrunk to less than 10%, while China's has ballooned to nearly 50% - something Japanese officials are trying to stress to American counterparts. Automobiles and car parts account for about three-quarters of the overall Japan-US trade gap, making it an easy target. Japanese media have begun reminiscing about the heated US-Japan auto talks 20 years ago. A last-minute deal in June 1995 averted US tariffs on Japanese luxury cars when Japan's automakers crafted "voluntary plans" to boost purchases of American auto parts and expand production in the United States. Shares of IT companies such as TCS, Infosys and Wipro slipped up to 4% after US President Donald Trump introduced immigration curbs adding to fears that his 'America First' policy may prove detrimental for Indian software services firms. Following the stir caused by the assault on noted director over his upcoming Indian period drama 'Padmavati', Senior Advocate of Supreme Court KTS Tulsi offered his support to the director and called out the mischief-makers who had misled the crowd and resorting to violent methods to demonstrate their objection. Speaking to ANI, KTS Tulsi, Senior advocate of Supreme Court firmly refuted all allegations that the script of the film was meddling with history, adding that all period films are to an extent a dramatisation of an event. " has himself clarified, that there is no intimate scene between Padmini and Khilji," he said. Accusing the director of distorting the history of Queen Padmini and her contribution to Rajput history, a Hindu extremist group, Rajput Karni Sena launched the attack on the director and the movie set on Friday. Criticising Sena's mode of objection Tulsi said, "Somebody seems to have misled the crowd. This is not how culture is preserved. Supporting an artist's creative liberty he added, "Culture is preserved by tolerance and knowing that there is certain latitude that is enjoyed by artists. Bhansali was manhandled by protestors in broad daylight and alleged that the film has love scenes between Queen Padmini and Alauddin Khilji, played by actors Deepika Padukone and Ranveer Singh. Defending his actions the founder of Rajput Karni Sena Lokendra Singh Kalvi said, that the Friday fiasco was an act of provocation, and that no manhandling of history would be tolerated by the Sena. Clarifying his stand on his upcoming flick 'Padmavati', director has said that the periodic film shows no objectionable scenes between Rani Padmavati and Muslim king Allauddin Khilji, while expressing confidence that the people of Mewar would be proud of the movie made on their 'revered queen'. The official statement of the team said, "Sanjay Leela Bhansali has shot two films in Jaipur and despite his love for Rajasthan, for the safety of his crew, we have decided to stop the shoot and leave the city post the shocking incident where miscreants damaged property and misbehaved with the crew on the shoot of 'Padmavati'." The 53-year-old has called off his Jaipur shoot and has come to Mumbai after the vandalism on the sets of his film. Masaya Nakamura, the founder of Nakamura Amusement Machine Manufacturing Company (Namco) who unleashed Pac-Man fever on Japan and the United States, has died at age 91. Under his leadership, Namco built its business on Galaxian (1979) and Pac-Man (1980) and later console games like Ridge Racer (1983) and Tekken (1994). In 2007, the Japanese government honored Nakamura with an "Order of the Rising Sun" decoration. From Ars Technica: Nakamura originally founded the company as Nakamura Manufacturing, selling coin-operated children's rides to a department store in Yokohama, Japan. He later changed the name of the company to Nakamura Amusement Machine Manufacturing Company (NAMMCo!) and began producing electromechanical arcade machines like 1976's Namco F-1. Namco hit the big time when Nakamura shrewdly purchased the struggling Atari Japan from owner Nolan Bushnell for $500,000far higher than the $80,000 offered by Sega. The deal granted Namco an exclusive license to distribute Atari's games in Japan for ten years and led to the development and release of original games such as Gee Bee and Galaxian. President Rodrigo Duterte has called for a total overhaul of the Philippine National Police (PNP) in the wake of the alleged brutal killing of a South Korean businessman by corrupt police officials and also ordered the dissolution of all anti-illegal drug units within the PNP. Although he said he remains committed to the controversial war on drugs campaign as he added, "I will establish a new command. It could be a narcotics command or whatever," he said. "Cleanse your ranks. Review their cases. Give me a list of who the scalawags are," the CNN quoted Duterte as saying in a press conference late Sunday night. Last week, Duterte apologised to South Korean investors and ambassador to the Philippines, Kim Jae-Shin, for the murder of Jee Ick-joo and promised swift retribution. On Sunday, he gave any suspects still at large 48 hours to surrender, threatening to put a five million peso 'dead-or-alive' bounty on their heads. Jee's gruesome kidnap and murder has prompted accusations of a meltdown of discipline within the police force. The businessman was allegedly taken from his home in October, held for ransom and then murdered by high-ranking police officers. "As directed by the President, we are going to dissolve anti-drug units of the PNP in all levels, including the anti-illegal drugs group of the PNP," said PNP Chief Ronald dela Rosa. More than 7,000 people have died since Duterte declared crackdown on drugs in June 2016. The campaign has caused a backlash amongst human rights groups, who accuse him of turning a blind eye to killings by the police in the name of his war on drugs. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) on Monday slammed Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi's call for crushing Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) divisive and accused the Gandhi family for creating disharmony and disintegrity in the country. RSS leader Rakesh Sinha took a jibe at Rahul saying that he has poor understanding of history and he makes remarks on and ideology according to his poor understanding. "RSS is a reality, its force is creating unity and integrity in this country and it is their (Rahul Gandhi's) family which has created disharmony and disintegrity in this country and has created a gap between rich and poor. It is their policy and their politics," he said. Rahul in a joint press conference with Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav had said that the Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance would put an end to the anger being spread by the BJP and RSS. "We want to stop the aggression that RSS-BJP is spreading and the false promises they are giving. We want to give the youth of UP a new path, a new politics," he said. Uttar Pradesh will be voting for a new state assembly in a seven-phase election between February 11 and March 8. Out of the 403 assembly seats, Congress will be contesting in 105 seats and the Samajwadi Party will field its candidates in rest of the 298 seats. Last year, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi got surrounded in controversy over his remark regarding Mahatma Gandhi's assassination. A local RSS functionary, Rajesh Kunte, had filed the case against Gandhi for claiming at an election rally on March 6, 2014 that the right wing organisation had killed Mahatma Gandhi. Rahul was granted bail on the basis of personal surety by Maharashtra's Bhiwandi court in November last year. Gandhi had in September withdrawn his petition filed in the apex court, challenging the case and said he would face the trial. He expressed his readiness to face the trial after the top court refused to interfere with the criminal proceedings pending against him before the trial court. Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) chief Hafiz Muhammad Saeed has been put under house arrest along with four others including Abdullah Ubaid, Zafar Iqbal, Abdur Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Niaz. According to Geo New, Ministry of Interior, a couple of days ago, had included names of aforementioned masses in the Watch List as per UNSC 1267 Sanctions. A notification by the ministry said that the Ministry of Interior has "placed Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF) and Jamaat-Ud-Dawa (JUD) on the Watch List and have listed these organizations in the Second Schedule of the ATA 1997 (as amended)." "Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, Abdullah Ubaid, Zafar Iqbal, Abdur Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Niaz are reportedly active members of the aforementioned organizations within the meaning of Section 11EEE(1) of the ATA 1997 (as amended). As such, they must be placed under preventive detention." The notification also asks the Home Secretary to "kindly direct the concerned agencies to move and take necessary action" as the matter "is most urgent". Earlier today newspaper reports revealed that the United States has warned Pakistan to declare JuD as defunct else face sanctions. The group is most likely to be banned and its leadership will be arrested. According to some other reports, the United States assistant secretary of state in his meeting with Jalil Abbbas Jilani, Pakistani High Commissioner to the US, on January 11 this year raised the issue in the Asia Pacific Group on Money Laundering (APG)'s latest report. Reportedly, in the latest APG report, some key objections were raised regarding the activities and the financial traffic of JuD. The same were presented before High Commissioner Jalil Abbas Jilani. Saeed has been put under house arrest at the Qadisiyyah Mosque near Chouburji, Lahore. He is wanted by India and the United States for his alleged role in masterminding the 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai that claimed 166 lives. He even carries a bounty of 10 million USD (approx. Rs 66 crore) on his head for his role in the attack. Pakistan claims to have banned Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), but following the attack on the Indian Parliament in 2002, it re-emerged as Jamaat-ud Dawa (JuD). The United States has designated the JuD as a front for the LeT. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Nepali woman and her three-year-old daughter were found dead at their house in Pascoe Vale, a suburb near Melbourne in Australia, on Sunday. Their identities have not been ascertained and the cause behind their death is also not known, reports the Himalayan Times. Some neighbours have said that there was nothing out of the ordinary and they were 'pretty quiet' in their daily affairs. An investigation is underway. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards, recently held at Los Angeles, honored this past year's most outstanding performances in both television and film. While Denzel Washington (Fences) and Emma Stone (La La Land) won in the Best Actors' category, Violas Davis (Fences) and Mahershala Ali (Moonlight) took home the Best Supporting Actor award. Here's the list of all the winners who won a 2017 SAG Award, as reported by E! Online: Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture: Hidden Figures Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series: Stranger Things Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role in a Motion Picture: Emma Stone, La La Land Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role in a Motion Picture: Denzel Washington, Fences Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series: Claire Foy, The Crown Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series: John Lithgow, The Crown Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series: Bryan Cranston, All the Way Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in Television Movie or Miniseries: Sarah Paulson, The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture: Mahershala Ali, Moonlight Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture: Viola Davis, Fences Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series: Orange Is the New Black Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series: William H. Macy, Shameless Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series: Julia Louis-Dreyfuss, Veep Outstanding Action Performance by a Stunt Ensemble: Hacksaw Ridge Outstanding Performance by a Stunt Ensemble: Game of Thrones . (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Indian pacer Jasprit Bumrah, who was declared 'Man of the Match' during his side's narrow five-wicket win in the second T20I against England in Nagpur, has revealed that he just stuck to his basic plans and backed his strength which eventually turned out to be in his favour. "I was trying to have a clear plan, stick to a basic plan that I have, trying to back my strengths because if you have double thoughts then it won't work. I was just thinking that I would decide what ball I am going to bowl and I would be going to stick to that. I am very happy that I was able to stick to my plans. I backed my strength and I'm very happy that the result was in my favour," Bumrah said in a post-match interaction with the bcci.tv. Bumrah produced a stellar bowling performance in the final over conceding just two runs and taking two wickets in the final to help India level the three-match T20 series 1-1. Reflecting on the exceptional last over of his spell, Bumrah said, "I was not thinking too much obviously because six balls, eight runs you feel the situation is in the batting team's favour. So, I was thinking if we get a wicket anything could happen as the wicket was on the slower side and it is not easy to hit sixes over here because the ground is quite big. I was just trying to do whatever I know so that worked." With a new batsman at the crease and Jos Buttler trying to read Bumrah's slower delivery, England were under extreme pressure. The tourists required six runs from the last delivery to win the match and it was a daunting task for Bumrah whose tail was up. "We saw the wickets which were falling in the first innings. So, we saw that the wickets are on the slower side. So, we were trying to plan according to that like when we are going to bowl, at what length we are going to bowl, what variation of pace we are going to use. So, we are very happy that we levelled the series. The series is still alive and we will go to Bangalore and see how it goes," the 23-year-old explained. Besides Bumrah, veteran pacer Ashish Nehra also took two English wickets in successive balls and then took one more crucial wicket in the later part of the innings to help his side clinch a crucial win. The two teams will next face each other in what one can expect to be another thrilling series decider at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru on Wednesday. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A top Taliban leader in charge of recruiting members for the group has been arrested during an operation by the Afghan Police Forces. The Ministry of Interior (MoI) said the detained Taliban leader has been identified as Abdullah and was held from the vicinity of Khanabad district in northern Kunduz province, reports Khaama News. Another senior Taliban leader identified as Abdul Wakil was also arrested during the same operation, MoI said, adding that an automatic rifle was confiscated from the detained militants. The anti-government armed militant groups including the Taliban insurgents have not commented regarding the report so far. Menwhile, the group leader of the Taliban in Zabul province, Mawlavi Hamid, was killed in a blast triggered by a premature explosion in this province. Zabul is among the relatively volatile provinces in southern Afghanistan where the Taliban insurgents are actively operating in some of its districts. Militants believed to be affiliated with the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist group have reportedly shifted to this province in a bid to expand their insurgency in some restive districts. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Faced with instability due to not having a clear majority over the last 16 years, Uttarakhand will get another chance to choose a majority government in the coming two months. The Himalayan state of Uttarakhand, often referred to as the Land of Gods, was carved out of Uttar Pradesh more than 16 years ago on November 9, 2000. None of the parties got a clear majority, but the Indian Congress (INC) formed a government with the help of the PDF under the leadership of Vijay Bahuguna In the 2012 polls, it was a case of being so near yet so far for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) which won 31 seats as opposed to the 32 won by the Congress. In 2007, the BJP emerged as the largest party with 35 seats, one short of forming a majority in the 70-seat legislature, while the INC became the official opposition with 21 seats. Then the BJP had to rely on the support of the Uttarakhand Kranti Dal and three Independents to form the government. Such scenario leaves minor players such as the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and Independents with a decisive role in the government formation process in the state as it gets ready for another election and with political equations still largely unchanged. The exit of a majority of the top state Congress leadership, including former chief minister Vijay Bahuguna, and former cabinet ministers Yashpal Arya and Harak Singh Rawat, has somehow weakened incumbent Chief Minister Harish Rawat's position. The BJP acquiring the leadership and services of another former chief minister N D Tiwari and his son Rohit Shekhar should also be viewed as a jolt to the former. Pahari voters will decide the fate of "Pahari Yodhha" (Mountain Warrior) Harish Rawat in the Uttarakhand Legislative Assembly election being held on February 15, 2017, where a total of 722 candidates have filed their nomination papers for 70 assembly seats. One can say that defections and a switching of loyalties during the elections is not a new phenomenon in any poll-bound state, but in Uttarakhand's case, no one can ignore the fact that in the last eight months, 11 Congress legislators have left the party to join the BJP. Last year, Satpal Maharaj had also deserted the party to join the BJP later on. On other side, there is an aggressive and upbeat BJP, which has charged the incumbent Congress administration with failing to provide jobs for the youth and also for creating an "atmosphere of fear" in Uttarakhand. The BJP is claiming that the party in power will be dislodged with a two-thirds majority. The state government is also being accused of corruption, as the BJP has cited an example of a helipad that could have been built at a cost of Rs. one crore, but in actuality was constructed at a cost of Rs 12 crore. Also, there is the case of a toilet being built for Rs. One crore, when the actual cost is between Rs. 5 and Rs. 7 lakhs. The state government is currently constructing 50 helipads at different places to deal with emergencies in disaster-prone areas of the state. Chief Minister Harish Rawat's focus is trained on the disadvanatages faced by the general public due to demonetisation. The state government was quick to constitute a committee headed by Chief Secretary S. Ramaswamy to study the impact of demonetisation on revenue and the economy. The president of the Uttarakhand unit of the Congress party, Kishore Upadhyay, has said this year's election will be fought on the issue of demonetisation and its impact on the people. Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his last rally in Dehradun has described his government's decision to demonetise as a useful weapon to deal with fake notes and terrorism in one stroke. Since Uttarakhand has a large number of retired and serving army men as voters, the sense of nationalism always matters in an election campaign. So, Modi's special focus on demonetisation at his Dehradun rally has apparently its own political meaning in this state. Keeping in view the 'Fauji Factor' in the Uttarakhand assembly poll, which constitutes about 40 percent of the population, the BJP is highlighting the implementation of One Rank One Pension (OROP) scheme by the BJP Government in the centre. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's growing popularity and the decision of granting One Rank, One Pension (OROP) may prove beneficial for the BJP. The Congress is leaving no stone unturned, however, in trying to convince the people that the Modi government has instead cheated all ex-servicemen and their families. The Army, it is noteworthy, raises two of its most important regiments from the state - Garhwal and Kumaon. There are about two-lakh ex-servicemen in Uttarakhand, along with more than 80,000 people currently serving in the armed forces. And there are nearly 40,000 widows of the defence personnel in the state. In fact, as of 20 January, of the 60, 82, 823-strong electorate in Uttarakhand (total population is 1, 01, 16, 752), as many as 82,213 happen to serve presently in the three armed services (58,210 males and 24,003 females). The announcement of Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar that around 20 lakh pensioners have been paid OROP benefits so far and more than 99 percent of cases will be settled by January-end, has been well received by the faujis, serving and former. "By now, the government has compensated us substantially. I believe the words of the defence minister that the remaining issues, if any, will be resolved soon because he has been sincere in his work related to our armed forces," says Manish Nautiyal, an ex-Garhwal Rifles soldier. Vinay Rawat, who served the Indian Army for 20 years, supports this view. He says, "We have been hearing of the issue of OROP since long, but at least this government has taken the decision to implement it. There is no reason for it to have lingered for so long." Uttarakhand has population of 1.01 Crores (10,086,292), according to Census 2011, an increase from figure of 84.89 Lakh in 2001 census, of which male and female are 5,137,773 and 4,948,519 respectively. The Congress has promised 33 per cent reservation for women in government jobs, the setting up of a ministry of welfare for army personnel, and free smart phones to "every youth" with "free data and free calls for a year". However, barring the promise of job reservation for women, there is little new in the resolutions and none of them offers a long-term vision for the state. The BJP has not yet revealed its cards and maintained suspense over who will be its chief ministerial candidate in the hill state. With veterans like N D Tiwari, Vijay Bahuguna, Yashpal Arya and Harak Singh Rawat shifting loyalties, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seems to be in the driver's seat in 'Devbhumi' as Uttarakhand is known. Facing the possibility of anti-incumbency kicking in, the Congress has roped in election strategist Prashant Kishore to ensure that its control over Dehradun or Garsain, its future capital. Kishore, however, is yet to come up with a solution, and there are some questioning his autocratic style of functioning. Caste dynamics could also play a major role in the electoral fortunes of the state. Rajputs and Brahmins are predominant voters in the hilly areas of Kumaon and Garhwal, while the Terai region has a sizeable minority and Dalit population. The Congress, which is in the midst of a turf war between Kishore Upadhayay and Harish Rawat, may find it difficult to win over Dalit votes. The Rajput vote bank, however, appears to be in its pocket, ever loyal to Rawat. It is high time the Grand Old Party get its calculations correct and neutralise the BJP before it is too late. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Ten people, including nine members of a family, were killed on Sunday when the car they were travelling in fell into a canal in Mathura, police said. The accident occurred at the Mathura-Jajampatti road. The victims hailed from Bareilly. The driver of the car, en route from from Bharatpur, was also killed in the accident, a police official told IANS. "A rescue team has been deployed at the site but the locals are refusing to send the bodies for post-mortem as they want senior officials to come and assure that a small bridge over the canal would be widened as there have been many accidents in the past," the official adedd. --IANS md/ksk (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Afghan Air Force killed three Taliban militants in the country's northern province of Kunduz, an army source said on Monday. The air force struck on Sunday night at a Taliban hideout in Hajji Nawab locality, killing the three and injuring four others, Xinhua news agency reported. A Taliban bunker and some weapons were also destroyed in the air strike. --IANS in/mr (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Emmett Till was a 14-year-old black boy lynched after a Mississippi woman, Carolyn Bryant Donham, claimed he made "advances" on her. His killers were acquitted of kidnapping and murder by an all-white, all-male jury. Then, free of further legal jeopardy, they admitted to it. Their casual indifference and impunity helped catalyze the civil rights movement. Last week, we learned Donham admitted she lied. In a new book, The Blood of Emmett Till (Simon & Schuster), Timothy Tyson, a Duke University senior research scholar, reveals that Carolynin 2007, at age 72confessed that she had fabricated the most sensational part of her testimony. "That part's not true," she told Tyson, about her claim that Till had made verbal and physical advances on her. As for the rest of what happened that evening in the country store, she said she couldn't remember. (Carolyn is now 82, and her current whereabouts have been kept secret by her family.) The New York Times adds that "As a matter of narrow justice, it makes little difference; true or not, her claims did not justify any serious penalty, much less death." among thousands of lynchings of black people, this one looms large in the country's tortured racial history, taught in history classes to schoolchildren, and often cited as one of the catalysts for the civil rights movement. Photographs in Jet Magazine of Emmett's gruesomely mutilated body at a funeral that his mother insisted have an open coffin, to show the world what his killers had done had a galvanizing effect on black America. The Justice Department began an investigation into the Emmett Till lynching in 2004, Emmett's body was exhumed for an autopsy, and the F.B.I. rediscovered the long-missing trial transcript. But in 2007, a grand jury decided not to indict Ms. Donham, or anyone else, as an accomplice in the murder. "I was hoping that one day she would admit it, so it matters to me that she did, and it gives me some satisfaction," said Wheeler Parker, 77, a cousin of Emmett's who lives near Chicago. "It's important to people understanding how the word of a white person against a black person was law, and a lot of black people lost their lives because of it. It really speaks to history, it shows what black people went through in those days." If conscience is the fear of hell, at least she knows where she's going. Hollywood actor Ashton Kutcher opened the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards (SAG-AFTRA) by showing solidarity with protesters speaking out against US President Donald Trumps executive order banning citizens and refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US. "Good evening, fellow SAG-AFTRA members, and everyone at home, and everyone in airports that belong in my US. You are a part of the fabric of who we are, and we love you, and we welcome you," Kutcher said, reports ew.com. Before his speech, Kutcher spoke out against the "Muslim ban" on Twitter, citing wife Mila Kunis's own path to the US. "My wife came to this country on a refugee visa in the middle of the Cold War! My blood is boiling right now," Kutcher said in a series of tweets. "We have never been a nation built on fear. Compassion that is the root ethic of the US. Our differences are fundamental to our sustainability," he added. After his speech, Kutcher again took to the micro-blogging site and said: "If standing for the US that doesn't discriminate makes me a left wing actor who is out of touch. F*** it. As a US citizen, I respect my president but I do not respect this policy. I believe in protecting borders. I believe is enabling safety and security but we do so with honour. A better way." --IANS sas/nn/vt (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Leading Australian technology companies are livid after US President Donald Trump recently announced changes to visa laws. They are petitioning with the Australian government to act, a media report said on Monday. The changes could see workers affected across the sector, with industry group TechSydney saying many employees are dual-nationals who are required to visit and work in the US as part of their duties, Xinhua news agency reported. Hichame Assi, HotelsCombined chief executive, and also a dual national British-Syrian who moved to Australia in 2008, is one of those affected, and can no longer travel to the US for the next 90 days due to the new rules. "We employ people of all nationalities, including dual-nationality Australians," Assi said in a statement on Monday. "These developments in the US are not only disruptive to our business and our people, they're very troubling and are creating more tension at a time when empathy is required," Assi said. The new visa rules will not result in any changes to citizens solely of Australia, and 36 other countries that are currently allied with the US. Trump on Friday signed an executive order to restrict immigration from countries that he said are "compromised by terrorism." A White House official later named the restricted countries as Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia. --IANS in/ (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) CBFC Chairperson Pahlaj Nihalani says filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali has done so much for Indian tourism through his films. Condemning the recent attack on the filmmaker in Jaipur, Nihalani said the incident is a big blow to Rajasthan's tourism. Activists of Shree Rajput Karni Sena misbehaved with the crew of Bhansali's upcoming film "Padmavati" and vandalised the set in Jaipur last week. Describing it as a shameful act of violence against the finest living filmmaker in the country, the Chairperson of CBFC (Central Board of Film Certification) said: "Sanjay Bhansali has taken our cinema to every corner of the world. He is celebrated as a genius all over the world. And look at how much he has done for tourism in India." "His 'Khamoshi: The Musical' and 'Guzaarish' were shot in Goa and promoted the beauty of the coastal paradise. 'Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam' and 'Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-Leela' promoted Gujarati culture. 'Bajirao Mastani' took the Maratha warrior's story all over the world." "And now, 'Padmavati' is all set to open a new chapter of our rich heritage and culture in Rajasthan. But will the lumpen elements allow Bhansali to shoot in Rajasthan? Will he ever go back there? This is a big blow to Rajasthan's tourism. Once the state government had agreed to let Bhansali shoot in Jaipur, it was their responsibility to provide him protection." Nihalani asked why must filmmakers face danger while shooting outdoors in India? "Fiji, Mauritius and South Africa provide every safety and subsidy for Indian film shoots. In India, forget subsidies, even the well-being of your crew and equipment is not ensured," he said. Bhansali, a National Award-winning director, was accused for "distorting" history in the film about the medieval-era Delhi ruler Alauddin Khilji, who fell in love with Rajput queen Padmavati. Ajit Andhare, Chief Operating Officer, Viacom 18 Motion Pictures, the producers of "Padmavati", said the incident is a "huge low in the relations between politics and creativity". "We are celebrating the glory of the queen. We are dismayed at the ugly turn of events," he added. Veteran actress Shabana Azmi also condemned the "reprehensible attack on Bhansali". "Is it a mere coincidence that the attack on the film 'Water' many years ago was also in a Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled state? The guilty must be punished and the film industry should stand firmly together and do whatever it takes to ensure that such an incident is never repeated. This has reached flash point," she added. Acclaimed lyricist, screenwriter and ad guru Prasoon Joshi called Bhansali a "stalwart and a gentle soul". "Violence can never be the solution. The idea of democracy is not to feed the animal in us but to nurture human values." Filmmaker Sudhir Mishra asked the film industry to stand up together and demand for justice. "When you slap Sanjay, you slap all of us and we should not take it lying down." Filmmaker Rakesh Roshan was also left shocked. "If anyone had a grievance, things could have settled in a dignified way. I am with Sanjay all the way." --IANS skj/nn/vt (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali's production team has assured Shree Rajput Karni Sena that no intimate and/or romantic scene between Alauddin Khilji and Padmavati would be shown in his movie "Padmavati", the Karni Sena claimed here on Monday. A letter addressed to Giriraj Singh Lotwara, President, Shree Rajput Sabha, Jaipur, and signed by Shobha Sant of Bhansali Productions, reads: "As discussed with you, this is to specifically clarify that there is no romantic dream sequence or any objectionable or romantic scene between Rani Padmavati and Allauddin Khilji". The letter says that they have been carefully researching and making the film. "We are confident that Mewar will be proud of the film made on their revered queen. We do not want to hurt sentiments and would appreciate if all the social organisations and local people support us in making this film and making their queen revered by the world. "We will discuss this proposal made by Bhansali Productions before making a final call in a day or two. Though they have accepted almost all of our demands," Vivek Singh, a leader of Karni Sena, told IANS. "One of our demands still remains -- of seeing the movie before its release," Singh said. Bhansali or his team could not be reached for comment. Activists of Shree Rajput Karni Sena protested against and misbehaved with the crew of "Padmavati" in Jaipur's Jaigarh Fort last week. They also damaged some cameras and other equipment, forcing Bhansali to stop shooting. The incident elicited strong support from the Hindi film fraternity for Bhansali. Singh said: "We had earlier requested him (Bhansali) to show us the script, which he did not do. We are against distorting historical facts and we know that he has distorted historical facts." "Padmavati" tells the story of Alauddin Khilji, the medieval-era Delhi ruler, who fell in love with Rajput queen Padmavati. Actors Ranveer Singh, Deepika Padukone and Shahid Kapoor star in the film. --IANS as/rb-nn/bg (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The BJP on Monday alleged former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and then Finance Minister P. Chidambaram favoured industrialist Vijay Mallya in getting huge loans for bailing out the now defunct Kingfisher Airlines. Both the Congress leaders rejected the allegations and asserted that the letters from the liquor baron were a routine affair. If the Bharatiya Janata Party, citing letters by Mallya to both Singh and Chidambaram, pointed fingers at Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Vice President Rahul Gandhi, the Congress, in turn, attacked the Narendra Modi government over 'loans waiver' to Mallya and his fleeing the country. Reading out the contents of the letters to the media, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra claimed a bailout package was given to Kingfisher Airlines (KFA) on "Manmohan Singh's insistence". He said that Mallya was allowed to procure loans worth Rs 9,000 crore without proper papers or proper accounts. "Were there certain hidden hands pulling the strings from behind? Was the sinking ship (Congress) helping the sinking airlines (KFA)?," asked Patra. "We now have certain emails, letters and correspondence that reveal that those hands belong to Manmohan Singh and Chidambaram," said Patra adding that on Manmohan Singh's "insistence" the Income Tax Department "went soft" on Mallya and his accounts were also "unfrozen". "In letter after letter written to Manmohan Singh, Mallya says he needs the indulgence of the PM and certain funds are released," said Patra. Pointing to a letter "to Chidambaram", Patra claimed that the industrialist had asked the minister to ensure that the State Bank of India (SBI) grants him a no-objection certificate (NOC) allowing his company United Spirits Limited (USL) to raise over Rs 2,000 crore through issue of shares on a preferential basis. "The SBI which did not want to indulge with a defaulter called Mallya, was ready to give the NOC to the USL only because it was rebuked by Chidambaram," alleged Patra. Pointing fingers at the Congress' top leadership, Patra said: "Both Sonia and Rahul Gandhi need to come out in public and declare in whose behest the then Prime Minister and his Finance Minister sanctioned loans to Mallya. They need to come clean on this." Both Manmohan Singh and Chidambaram denied favouring Mallya and asserted that the purported letters were only among the hundreds of letters routinely received by the then UPA government. "All prime ministers and other ministers in any government, receive representations from various captains of industry which we in normal course, pass on to appropriate authority. This is what I have done and done with full satisfaction that we were not doing anything which was against the law of the land," said Manmohan Singh. "The letter(s) being talked about, is nothing else but an ordinary piece of letter which any government in my position would have dealt with," he added. Chidambaram too rebutted Patra's claim. "There is absolutely nothing in it if anybody says we want some forbearance, we want some policy changes. "If a letter to PMO is marked down to the Principal Secretary which is then forwarded to the department concerned, it is normal," said Chidambaram referring to Patra's allegation that the letters to the PMO were forwarded to the bureaucrat to ensure "Mallya is helped". "Please ask the present government whether they received representations at all in the last three years. If they say they haven't received any representation, that will be serious reflection of the way this government is functioning," added Chidambaram. Returning the fire, the Congress questioned the Modi government over Mallya's "escape from the country". "Who permitted Mallya to escape, who waived loans to him? We want to ask was it not the BJP which voted Mallya and brought him in the Rajya Sabha," said Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala. "Was Mallya tipped off to run away from India by a high ranking official inside the Modi government," asked Surjewala and wondered "why the Modi government has not sought his deportation from UK". "Why has Modi government waived Rs 1,200 crore owed by Mallya to SBI on November 16, 2016? Who is the helping hand for Mallya in the Modi government?" asked Surjewala. --IANS and-sid/rn (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A China-funded state-of-the-art stadium has been inaugurated in Malawi capital Lilongwe, adding to the slew of key infrastructure projects that Beijing has undertaken in Africa. The US $70 million Bingu National Stadium was officially opened by President Peter Mutharika before tens of thousands of Malawians here last week, Xinhua news agency reported. The stadium is one of the most imposing infrastructures funded by the Chinese government in the country, located in southeastern Africa, alongside a new Parliament building, a park with a 12-storey 5-star hotel, an international convention centre and 14 opulent presidential villas in Lilongwe. Beijing is also building a Malawi University of Science and Technology. Mutharika thanked the Chinese government for the continued support to Malawi and dubbed China as a "brother and a friend indeed". The Malawi leader described Malawi as the Chinese people's home in Africa and said that they (Chinese) were all welcome to the southern African country at any time. "Feel free in the country of your brothers and sisters: Malawi is your home in Africa," said Mutharika. Chinese Ambassador to Malawi Wang Shiting said in his remarks that his government would continue to support Malawi and Africa. Malawi is not the only country where China is engaged in building infrastructure. It is building roads, railways and telecom systems in many of the countries in Africa. China is eyeing Africa to tap into its vast natural resources with many of the state-owned companies investing in the continent. Last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced a $60 billion loan and aid package to Africa. The continent is already the biggest trading partner of China. More than 1 million Chinese, most of them labourers and traders, have moved to the continent in the past decade. India has also been involved in infrastructure building in Africa, but on a much lower scale. India focuses its engagement with Africa in the form of capacity building and providing training, which fetches it goodwill. In 2014, China's trade with Africa stood at $200 billion, while trade between India and Africa is at $70 billion. --IANS gsh/rn/bg (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Filmmaker Sooraj Barjatya has voiced his support for Sanjay Leela Bhansali by saying creative people must be respected and any disputes must be sorted peacefully. Bhansali, who is helming period drama "Padmavati", was attacked by activists of Shree Rajput Karni Sena last week in Jaipur, accusing the director of tweaking historical facts. Commenting on it, Barjatya said at the teaser launch of his show "Piyaa Albela" here on Monday: "It is very unfortunate. We are all creative people, and along with our traditions, all creative people should be respected. "We (at Rajshri Productions) have always treated everyone as family. And I think any questions are only answered when two parties sit down and come to a solution. It is a lesson for all of us. We should all work together and respect everyone's sentiments." "Padmavati" is a story of the medieval-era ruler Alauddin Khilji, who fell in love with Rajput queen Padmavati. The film stars Ranveer Singh, Deepika Padukone and Shahid Kapoor. Meanwhile, Barjatya is excited about "Piyaa Albela", to be aired on Zee TV. The show is based on spirituality. "The story has been with me for 8 years. I think the most important thing that everyone is going to love, is the base of story, which is spirituality. I keep hearing that youths don't have values, they have lost track, but I think today, majority of youth is moving towards spirituality," Barjatya said, adding that the tone of the show will be contemporary. --IANS iv/rb/bg (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Actress Viola Davis says the increase in black nominees for Oscars this year is not a direct response to last years #OscarSoWhite backlash, as all the nominees "deserve to be there". "There's a lot of typecasting -- age, sex, colour, dark-skinned, light-skinned," said Davis, who won the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role award at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday night. "Response to #OscarSoWhite? No. I think that every nominee from Naomie Harris to Octavia Spencer to 'Hidden Figures' to 'Fences' to 'Moonlight' to Mahershala Ali are up there because they deserve to be there." "They're not there because of the colour of their skin. They put in the work. So the answer to that is no," she added. --IANS sas/nn/vt (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) US Democratic Party members will hold a rally on the steps of the Supreme Court on Monday to call on President Donald Trump to rescind his executive order banning immigrants and citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries, the media reported. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi will lead the protest, which is slated to start at 6 p.m., the Politico news magazine reported. Both the House and Senate will be in session. "We are witnessing a historic injustice unfold, and we must keep the pressure on," Pelosi wrote in a letter to the House Democrats on Sunday. "Tomorrow (Monday), House and Senate Democrats will gather for a press event in front of the steps of the Supreme Court to demand the President withdraw his disreputable executive order. All Members are urged to come to express our solidarity." Lawmakers along with local refugees will also hold a candlelight vigil at the end of the demonstration. --IANS ksk/bg (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) With the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Monday lifting restrictions on cash withdrawal from current accounts, the Election Commission (EC) is set to ask candidates to open such accounts only, sources said. The poll panel had earlier asked candidates to open separate accounts for election-related expenses to be monitored by the poll panel, but had not specified if these should be current or saving accounts. Usually, most candidates would opt for savings accounts. However, with the RBI ending curbs on withdrawals from current accounts, cash credit accounts and overdraft accounts with immediate effect, the EC will ask candidates to open current accounts in order to be able to withdraw sufficient cash. The EC had earlier asked the central bank to increase cash withdrawal limit for candidates to Rs 2 lakh per week, but not got a positive response. With 200 million people, Uttar Pradesh (UP) has about the same population as Brazil; an economy the size of Qatars -- which has 2.4 million people, the same as the UP town of Bijnore; per capita gross domestic product (GDP) comparable to Kenyas; and an infant mortality rate that rivals The Gambia, a poverty-ridden, peanut-growing west-African nation. With 75 districts, 814 blocks and 97,607 villages, UP is larger, by population, than all but five countries. It holds the key to political dominion over India, but, in terms of health and nutritional outcomes, infrastructure and coverage indicators, it is widely considered a laggard, improving slowly, with wide disparities within. The per capita public expenditure on health (by both Centre and states) is the lowest in UP among the five states with 169 million voters going to polls between February 4 and March 8, 2017, our analysis shows. Goa, a state with less than 1 per cent of UP's population, spends more than five times more, per capita, on its citizens' health. UP's average spending is 70 per cent of the Indian average. As we will see, this low spending leads to fewer doctors, nurses and paramedics in healthcare institutions, leaves one in two children without full immunisation, 14 per cent of the state's households faced with "catastrophic" health expenditure, higher than 25 per cent of total household spending, and a health insurance coverage of 4.2 per cent compared to the Indian average of 15.2 per cent. Not enough doctors, hospitals poorer health outcomes In Uttar Pradesh, doctors accounted for more than half of all health workers, the highest such proportion in the country, according to a 2016 World Health Organisation study, probably a result of not having enough other health workers in the first place. UP also had the lowest share of female health workers, 19.9 per cent, compared to the Indian average of 38 per cent. For example, most of the 30 Indian districts ranked lowest in terms of density of nurses were located in UP, with some also located in Bihar and Jharkhand. UP, which had 16.16 per cent of the country's population, had only 10.81 per cemt of overall health workers. Although numbers based on the latest census data -- as yet unanalysed -- may have improved partly because of improvement due to the 11-year-old National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), UP's overall rankings are likely to be unchanged, given that UP still has a 50 per cent shortfall of the nursing staff at primary health centres (PHCs) and community health centres (CHCs). The latest government data on UP's government hospitals is not promising. The CHCs in UP are 84 per cent short of specialists, according to the Rural Health Statistics, 2016. The PHCs and CHCs, taken together, have only half the staff they should have. Although all PHCs have doctors, one in three PHCs does not have a lab technician. Of 36 Indian states and union territories, UP was third from the bottom in terms of infant mortality rate (IMR, deaths per 1,000 live births) across rural and urban areas, the latest Sample Registration System bulletin for 2015, released in December 2016, showed. Many relatively poor states do much better than Uttar Pradesh. UP has India's second-highest maternal mortality rate (MMR, deaths per 100,000 births), according to government data. UP also has the lowest sex ratio at birth among bigger Indian states, barring Haryana, according to 2014 SRS data, the latest available. Over the last decade, UP's IMR was higher than the national average, across genders. Although the overall IMR has improved from 73 in 2005 to 46 in 2015, the gap between UP's IMR and the India IMR remains large, as the following figure shows. UP is among the few Indian states where the mean age at marriage for women is still below the legal age of marriage of 18, data from the Rapid Survey on Children (RSoC) 2013-14 showed, pointing to the need to fight child marriage to improve the high IMR and MMR in the state. Deaths that don't trigger debates UP reports more than 75 per cebt of Japanese encephalitis (JE) cases reported nationwide. In 2016, of 1,277 Acute Encephalitis Syndrome (AES) deaths reported in India, 615 were in UP, as were 73 of 275 reported JE deaths nationwide. However, even in areas of eastern UP, where JE/AES kill people year after year, such deaths have not been an election issue. Uttar Pradesh has the lowest birth-registration coverage in India Legal identity is a fundamental human right. A child who is not registered at birth is in danger of being denied the right to an official identity, a recognised name and a nationality, as Unicef observed. The UN's sustainable development goals (SDGs) -- which India has signed on to achieve -- recognise this and exhort that by 2030, all member countries should provide a legal identity for all, including birth registration. The overall level of registration of births in India has increased to 88.8 per cent in 2014 from 85.6 per cent in 2013, according to the latest available data, and 16 states/union territories achieved registration of all births, by 2014. This birth-registration progress has eluded UP, which registers no more than 68.3 per cent of all births. If one avoids official statistics and looks at third-party surveys, such as the RSoC 2013-14 , UP's registration of births is among the lowest at just 39.1 per cent, while the national average is 71.9 per cent. UP -- along with Bihar -- is often accused of pulling down the national average on registration of births. Until 2016, the Civil Registration System (CRS) reports had a separate India analysis that used the term "excluding UP and Bihar" to indicate India's progress. Why UP citizens spend their own money on healthcare than most other states UP spends Rs 488 on the healthcare of each citizen every year, according to recent research by Brookings India, a think tank, based on the latest government data available (71st round of National Sample Survey Office data). That is higher only than Bihar and Jharkhand, and just 26 per cent of Rs 1,830 that Himachal Pradesh spends. With health-insurance reaching 4 per cent of UP's 200 million people (the all-India average is 15 per cent), and gaps in public infrastructure, more people depend on private facilities for out-patient healthcare than any other state, barring Bihar and Haryana. Human-resource gaps in the public sector contribute substantially to high out-of-pocket (OOP) spending by UP households. With low state spending and predominance of private healthcare sector, 80 per cent of all health spending is done by households themselves, lower only than Kerala, West Bengal and Odisha, according to Brookings research. (In arrangement with IndiaSpend.org, a data-driven, non-profit, public interest journalism platform. Oomen Kurian is Fellow at Observer Research Foundation's Health Initiative.. The views expressed are those of IndiaSpend. Feedback at respond@indiaspend.org) --IANS oomen/vm (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday urged the Election Commission to file an FIR against Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and Congress leader Amarinder Singh with the "same urgency" it showed while acting against him. In a letter to the poll panel, Kejriwal pointed out that Parrikar on Sunday asked voters in Goa to accept Rs 500 to attend political rallies but vote only for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The Aam Aadmi Party leader added that Captain Amarinder Singh, the Congress Chief Ministerial candidate, also made a similar appeal to voters in poll-bound Punjab. "When an FIR could be ordered against me for making such statements, I hope the Election Commission will seek the permission of the Prime Minister's Office to act against these two political leaders," Kejriwal wrote in his letter. The AAP leader's remarks came after the Election Commission told Goa officials to file an FIR against him for telling voters to take money from other political parties but vote for the AAP. The FIR has since been filed in Goa, which goes to the polls on February 4 along with Punjab. The AAP is a key contender for power in both states. Kejriwal had earlier alleged that the Election Commission was acting at the PMO's behest. "I appeal to the Election Commission that it should show the same urgency and energy to act against Parrikar and Captain Amarinder as it showed in my case," he added. --IANS vv-ruwa/mr (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Acting on the Election Commission's directive, authorities here have filed an FIR against Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for asking voters to take money from other parties but vote for his AAP, an official said on Monday. Goa's Chief Electoral Officer Kunal said the FIR was filed under the Indian Penal Code and the Representation of People Act at a local police station. "In pursuance of a direction from the Election Commission, returning officer of Mapusa has filed a complaint before the Mapusa police station. The matter is sub judice. "We will send a compliance report to the Election Commission," he said. Earlier this month, the Election Commission issued a show cause notice to Kejriwal, asking him to explain his comments made in Goa on January 8 where the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader exhorted voters to accept money from other political parties and vote for his party instead. In all his four speeches at various rallies in Goa last weekend, Kejriwal had said people should not just accept Rs 5,000 but demand Rs 10,000 from politicians keen on offering money but vote for AAP. The Congress has demanded that Kejriwal be arrested. "Asking voters to accept bribes is a serious issue. We demand the arrest of Kejriwal," said Congress spokesperson Sunil Kawthankar. --IANS maya/vd/mr (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A fire destroyed over 90 shops, houses, vehicles and a food depot in a commercial area in the Leepa Valley in the Pakistan-administered Kashmir, officials and residents told Pakistani media on Monday. Leepa Valley is to the east of Muzaffarabad, the capital city of the region. The fire, reportedly caused by electrical short-circuiting in a shop, destroyed millions of rupees' worth of merchandise, locals said. The blaze started arround 11.00 p.m. Sunday night and rapidly engulfed the entire market, Jhelum Valley's Deputy Commissioner Abdul Hameed Kiani told Dawn. Since nearly all affected structures were made from wood and connected with each other, the fire spread rapidly even as owners watched their belongings being reduced to ashes, he said. When the winter sets in, Leepa Valley becomes inaccessible to vehicles as the only road link to the area runs through the over-9,800 feet high Birthwar Gali. A state-owned food depot, where 1,400 tons of wheat flour was stored, was also reduced to ashes, Kiani said. A mosque was partially damaged in the blaze. --IANS ahm/vt (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Iris Mittenaere from France took her first walk as Miss Universe 2016 after host Steve Harvey announced her as the winner in Philippines on Monday. India's Roshmitha Harimurthy couldn't even make it to the top 13. Miss Universe 2015 Pia Wurtzbach crowned the 23-year-old Mittenaere, who was born in northern French town of Lille, at the glittering ceremony at Mall of Asia Arena. Mittenaere has kept herself busy the last five years by pursuing her degree in Dental Surgery. She has also been always fond of extreme sports, travelling the world and cooking French dishes. Miss Haiti Raquel Pelissier was announced the first runner-up while Miss Columbia Andrea Tovar was named the second runner-up at the ceremony, which had former Miss Universe and Bollywood actress Sushmita Sen on the judging panel. She said: "This is the moment where a Miss Universe is created. She gives an answer that connects larger consciousness so a well spoken Miss Universe is the idea and tonight I can see six of them right there." After Sushmita's victory back in 1994 in Manila itself, it was just Lara Dutta from India who clinched the title in 2000. Roshmitha, 22, failed to make it to the final 13 list of the pageant, which was also judged by Cynthia Bailey, Mickey Boardman, Leila Lopes, Dayanara Torres and Francine LeFrak. The 65th edition of the pageant raised global issues that need attention, including Donald Trump presidency and the ban on refugees that TV host and comedian Harvey asked the final six contestants. Harvey asked the contestant of Kenya what was she most excited about and what most concerns her when it comes to the Trump presidency. His next question was for Miss Thailand. "Given today's worldwide refugee crisis, do countries have an obligation to accept refugees or do they have the right to close their border?" he said. On a lighter note, the pageant started with Harvey making fun of his embarrassing mistake of announcing the wrong winner in the previous edition. Prior to the crowning moment, he introduced Wurtzbach who said: "Steve thank you for making me the most popular Miss Universe." Harvey replied with his funny one liner: "Thank you for making me the most popular host." Harvey made headlines after he mistakenly gave the Miss Universe crown to Miss Colombia Ariadna Gutierrez-Arevalo while Wurtzbach was the actual winner. --IANS nv-nn/vm (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Monday said here that he is fighting against an ideology that killed the Father of the Nation, Mahatma Gandhi. Interacting briefly with the media after his appearance in a Bhiwandi court, the Congress leader said that Gandhi was killed but his teachings would never be erased. "Meri ladaayi vichaardhaara ke khilaaf hai, woh vichardhara jisne Gandhiji ki hatya ki (My fight is against the ideology that killed Mahatama Gandhi)," he said. Rahul stressed said his fight is against those who killed Gandhi, "against those who removed Gandhi from the calendar". He said that Gandhi will live in the heart of India forever. "They have killed Gandhi, but they cannot erase him." After the hearing today, the court adjourned the matter until March 3. At the previous hearing, on November 16, 2016, the Chief Judicial Magistrate had granted bail to Rahul Gandhi, who is an accused in a defamation case filed by a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh activist, Rajesh Kunte. Kunte had filed the case against him for his speech in Bhiwandi on March 6, 2014, during the campaigning for the Lok Sabha elections. At a party rally, he had allegedly then said: "The RSS people had killed Gandhi." On January 30, 1948, Gandhi was assassinated by Nathuram Godse, a Hindu nationalist, who shot three bullets at him at a prayer meeting in New Delhi. --IANS qn/nir/vm (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The so-called "Hindu exodus" from Kairana in western Uttar Pradesh, which had grabbed headlines, is a non-issue in the electoral battle here. The real issue here is the widespread unemployment with candidates of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Samajwadi Party also fighting to secure their family turf. In June last year, Kairana's BJP MP Hukum Singh claimed that 346 Hindu families had fled due to the building communal tensions. The electorate in the constituency, in Shamli district, rejects the charge. "Migration from villages and smaller towns to cities is an issue of national concern but if someone says that only Hindus are migrating from Kairana, I can't believe. I know even many Muslim families which have migrated from Muzaffarnagar to Kairana after the 2013 riots," Sanjeev Malik (33), a school teacher, told IANS. "There might be one or two families who would have migrated from here but not due to the alleged threats and extortion by criminal elements belonging to a particular community as claimed by Hukum Singh," he added. But Nirmal Singh, a Gurjar, contradicts him. "Hindus here are in minority and they (Muslim) take advantage of it. Hindu families here feel insecure due to the criminal elements and left for safer places," Singh said. The BJP has pitted Hukum Singh's daughter Mriganka Singh from the seat while the SP has fielded Nahid Hasan, son of former MP late Munawar Hasan, who died in a road accident. Kairana will vote in the first phase of the Uttar Pradesh election on February 11. The Bahujan Samaj Party has fielded Diwakar Kashyap while Asaduddin Owaisi's AIMIM has pitted M. Massiullah. Singh represented Kairana in the state assembly seven times before he moved to the Lok Sabha in 2014. In the by-poll, Nahid Hasan won by defeating Hukum Singh's nephew Anil Chauhan. After BJP gave ticket to Mriganka, Chauhan joined the Rashtriya Loka Dal (RLD) to make the contest triangular. Md. Rasheed (22), a college student, told IANS: "Migration is not an election issue. Political parties brought up this issue for electoral benefits but it's not going to help them. Unfortunately no one talks of unemployment, education and health related issues." Hukum Singh, however, told IANS that law and order was an election issue and migration was related to it. "Security of people is an issue and I stand for them," Singh said, claiming that even a substantial numbers of Muslims would vote for his daughter. "They need jobs. Lack of employment has made the youths drug addict. I am fighting for their cause. They see hope in me," he added. Mriganka Singh told IANS: "I am a daughter of Kairana. A lot of work needs to be done as the aspiration of people increases by time." Haji Mehraj (38), a mobile engineer, said: "Despite all the problems, people of Kairana will vote on religious lines. Hindus will vote for Mriganka Singh while Muslims will vote for Nahid Hasan. "Ultimately, the electoral battle here is to save the dynasty," Mehraj said, referring the dominant Singh and Hasan families. Meharban Ansari, who runs a betel shop at Chowk Bazar area, told IANS that the main fight will be between Hasan and Singh families but he can't say who will have the last laugh. "RLD's Chauhan is leaving no stone unturned to defeat her sister Mriganka Singh. He will fetch some Jat and Gurjar votes. BSP's Kashyap will get Dalit and Kashyap votes. This equation can hurt the BJP. Even Muslim votes will be divided but to a lesser extant," Ansari said. Kairana has around three lakh voters, with Muslims being in majority (around 43 per cent). The rest includes Gurjars (11 per cent), Jats (10), Kashyaps (11) Dalits (12) and Brahmins and others (3 per cent). The Hasan and Singh families have dominated in the region for three decades. Before joining politics, Hukum Singh took voluntary retirement from the Army as a Captain. In 1974, he won his first election on Congress ticket. But he was defeated in 1977. He won the assembly elections of 1980 and 1985. After being defeated in three consecutive elections, Singh joined the BJP and won four elections continuously between 1996 and 2012. In 2012, Singh defeated Munawar Hasan's brother Haji Anwar Hasan. Rivalry between the Hasan and Singh families is known to everyone in the area. In 1996, Munnawar Hasan won the Lok Sabha election from Kairana. He has a unique records in his name. In a very short span of time he became members of all the four houses --Lok Sabha, Rajya Sabha, Uttar Pradesh Assembly and Uttar Pradesh Council. His father Akhtar Hasan represented Kairana in Parliament in 1984. After the death of Munawar Hasan, his son Nahid Hasan is carrying forward the political legacy of the family. (Brajendra Nath Singh can be contacted at brajendra.n@ians.in) --IANS bns/mr (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A little before an election that is being viewed as a mini-referendum on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's almost three-year rule -- as well as his most controversial decision: demonetisation -- a slew of slogans, credos and punchlines are flying thick and fast. Focusing on the ongoing slugfest between Mulayam Singh Yadav and his Chief Minister son Akhilesh Yadav, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has coined a series of mocking advertisements with slogans like "Baap-Bete ke Draame Hazaar, Nahin Chahiye Aisi Sarkar" asking voters to reject the ruling Samajwadi Party (SP) on basis of the power struggle within. The party has also plans to take on the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and SP with slogans like "Na bharshtachaar na gundon ka atyachaar, abki baar bas Bhajpa sarkaar" (No corruption, no musclemen, only BJP government). Its slogans also include: "Gundagardi ke thekedaar, nain chahiye Sapa sarkaar" (Don't need SP's goon contractors). The mandarins of the BJP election campaign point out that their slogans are targeted at the SP's failure to maintain law and order in the state, an issue BJP state general secretary Vijay Bahadur Pathak pointed out, close to the hearts of the people. The BJP's attack on the BSP is woven around its image of being a graft-friendly party which has lots of ill-gotten money. The SP, on its part, has also lined-up professionals to coin slogans that would benefit it in the forthcoming assembly elections where it is trying to retain power for a second time. While Akhilesh Yadav, mired in a power struggle with his father, remains the hot favourite for copy editors and slogan writers, with slogans like "Ye jawaani hain qurbaan, Akhilesh bhaiyya tumhare naam", "Vikas ka paiya, Akhilesh bhaiyya", "No Confusion, No Mistake, Sirf Akhilesh, Sirf Akhilesh" and "UP ki majboori hai, Akhilesh Yadav Zaroori hai". The message sought to be conveyed: Akhilesh Yadav is your manna. A "creative team", close aides told IANS, was involved in designing an advertisement blitzkrieg. This includes attractive slogans. Some enthusiastic workers of both parties who are pitching for a pre-poll alliance between the Congress and SP have coined a new slogan, seeking active participation of Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, daughter of Congress president Sonia Gandhi, and Dimple Yadav, MP from Kannauj and Akhilesh Yadav's wife. Hoardings of the two have come up at some places in Allahabad, the seat of the Nehru-Gandhi clan. The "Netaji" camp is so far sticking to old and time-tested slogans like 'Dharti Putra Mulayam Singh' and 'Jiska Jalwa Kayam hai, Uska Naam Mulayam hai". The Congress, which is trying hard to regain lost ground over the past several years, and is now seeking for a pre-poll understanding with the SP, the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) and some small regional parties, is focussing on the past and its slogans generally revolve around party greats like Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi. They also centre around secular politics, farmers, communal harmony and development. The BSP, which is making a feverish attempt to regain power in the state, which it lost to arch rival SP in 2012, is for the first time making a serious effort in political campaigning. With the tag line "Behenji Ko Aane do" appealing for the return to power of party chief Mayawati, strategists have drawn up a campaign that will focus on Dalits and minorities and the poor law and order in the state. And so for now, as the nomination process for the seven-phase poll begins on Tuesday, the sloganeering is set to achieve a feverish pitch with parties vying for attention and votes. (Mohit Dubey can be contacted at mohit.d@ians.in) --IANS md/vm (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Iraqi lawmakers have urged their government to counter the latest restrictions by US President Donald Trump on the entry of the nationals of seven Muslim countries, including Iraq, into the US, a media report said. Some members of the Iraqi parliament on Sunday rejected Trump's decision, saying Iraq should retaliate by barring US nationals from entering Iraq, Xinhua news agency reported on Monday. "We reject the decision of President Trump as Iraq is on the front line of fighting terrorism, and we are the side who gives martyrs and sacrifices for a war that we fight on behalf of the whole world," said Hanan al-Fatlawi, a female member of the parliament's foreign affairs committee. "It is unfair that Iraqis are treated in this way," she said at a press conference after a committee meeting to discuss the US decision. "We ask the Iraqi government to take a similar action against the US's decision," she said, adding that the parliament committee demanded the Iraqi Foreign Ministry contact the US government for review of their decision. "Iraq is a sovereign country and will be forced to reciprocate, and that would affect negatively cooperation, including military cooperation in the war on Islamic State (IS) group," said Ahmed al-Jubouri, another lawmaker from the committee. On Twitter, the Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr also condemned Trump's decision, calling it "Istikbar (arrogance)." Ahmed al-Asadi, spokesman of the predominantly Shiite Hashd Shaabi units, said in a statement that Iraq should "bar American nationals from entering Iraq and exile those who are inside Iraq". The Iraqi government declined to comment on the US decision, but Trump's order has caused fury in Iraq, where more than 5,000 US troops are deployed to help Iraqi forces in battles against IS militants in Mosul. On Friday, Trump put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the US and temporarily barred travellers from Iraq and six other Muslim countries, saying the moves would help protect Americans from terrorist attacks. --IANS in/ (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Hours after the JNU administration on Monday met a delegation of students protesting the changed admission procedure for M.Phil and Ph.D aspirants and urged them to call off their strike, a section of the students claimed that the university has agreed to their demands. "We asked the Vice Chancellor (M. Jagadesh) to keep the viva weightage to 10 marks and rest 90 for the written test. After a little back and forth, he agreed to settle with 20 marks for viva (interview) and 80 for the written test," the RSS-backed Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), whose members have been on a hunger-strike since January 24, said in a statement. Asking the students to end their strikes, the university officials promised to take up their demands during the Standing Committee on Admission on Tuesday and to approach the University Grants Commission (UGC) as well with the proposal later. Telling the students they will discuss "all their concerns, including marks for written test and viva-voce, deprivation points and intake of students within the UGC guidelines" of May last year. it said it was "in constant dialogue with all stake-holders and is always open to discussion on any outstanding issues to resolve them amicably." ABVP's Saurabh Sharma, who has been on a fast since January 24, said: "If our demands are sanctioned in the committee tomorrow we will call off our strike, else it will continue indefinitely and we will approach the MHRD (Ministry of Human Resource Development)." Sharma, a former JNU Students Union Joint Secretary, had earlier told IANS that they met the Vice Chancellor, who "assured us that our concerns will be heard". One striking student, Dileep Yadav was hospitalised when his condition turned critical after three days of hunger strike during which he abstained from even water. The UGC notification in contention was issued by the central body in May last year and was adopted by the JNU Academic Council on December 26 amid protests from students and teachers alike. Under the new method, the entrance test is to be reduced to a qualifying exam and selected students are to be admitted solely on the basis of viva-voce. --IANS vn/sm/vd (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) In a first for the Indian e-commerce industry, leading eyewear company Lenskart has launched a unique 'Lenskart Lite' app for Android users which requires no internet connection to shop from its website. The app is based on SMS technology. In the absence of internet, the app uses proprietary protocol on top of SMS to communicate with the internal system and, thereby, process the user's request. "With the changing online business models and evolving consumer behaviour with regard to online shopping, Lenskart aims to provide a hassle-free experience to shoppers through this initiative," said Peyush Bansal, CEO Lenskart, in a statement on Monday. When the internet connection is available, the app switches back to internet. The app requires internet only at the point of download and is a little over 1 MB in size. --IANS qd/na/bg (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Former prime minister Manmohan Singh and former finance minister P. Chidambaram on Monday rejected the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP's) allegation that they had favoured industrialist in getting loans. The two senior Congress leaders asserted that letters from the former liquor baron were only among the hundreds of letters routinely received by the then United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government. Citing several letters written by Mallya to both Manmohan and Chidambaram, Bharatiya Janata Party spokesperson Sambit Patra alleged that the two had helped the industrialist get huge loans for bailing out the now defunct Kingfisher Airlines. Rejecting the allegation, the Congress instead pointed fingers at the BJP and the Narendra Modi government over waiver of loans to Mallya and his fleeing the country. "All prime ministers and other ministers in any government, receive representations from various captains of industry which we in normal course, pass on to an appropriate authority. This is what I have done and done with full satisfaction that we were not doing anything which was against the law of the land," Manmohan Singh told the media here. "The letter(s) being talked about, is nothing else but an ordinary piece of the letter which any government in my position would have dealt with. It was a routine transaction," he said while reacting to Patra's allegations. Rebutting Patra's claims that Manmohan Singh had asked his then Principal Secretary to "ensure help" to Mallya, Chidambaram said forwarding letters addressed to the Prime Minister's Office or other ministries to the officer concerned was a routine affair. "There is absolutely nothing if anybody says we want some forbearance, we want some policy changes. "If a letter to PMO is marked down to the Principal Secretary which is then forwarded to the department concerned, it is normal," said Chidambaram. "Government, especially the PMO, or the Finance Minister's office etc, receive hundreds of representations everyday. No minister can deal with these representations personally and they are marked down to the officer concerned who take appropriate follow-up action. "Please ask the present government whether they received representations at all in the last three years. If they say they haven't received any representation, that will be the serious reflection of the way this government is functioning," added Chidambaram. "The Congress wants to know who permitted Mallya to escape, who waived loans to him. We want to ask was it not the BJP which voted Mallya and brought him in the Rajya Sabha," said Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala. President Pranab Mukherjee on Monday extended greetings and felicitations to the government and people of the Republic of Nauru on the eve of Nauru's National Day. In a message to Nauru President Baron Divavesi Waqa, Mukherjee said: "On behalf of the government, the people of India and on my own behalf, I convey warm greetings to your Excellency, the government and people of the Republic of Nauru on the occasion of your National Day." "Please accept, Excellency, my best wishes for your good health and success and for the progress and prosperity of the friendly people of the Republic of Nauru," he was quoted as saying by an official release here. "The traditional relationship of friendship and cooperation between our two countries has been growing stronger and has diversified to our shared satisfaction," Mukherjee added. India's dialogue with the Pacific Island Countries under the Forum for India-Pacific Islands Cooperation, particularly the FIPIC-I Summit held in Suva in November 2014 and FIPIC-II Summit in Jaipur in August 2015, has given us opportunities to better understand and address the challenges faced by the Pacific Island countries, the President said. Mukherjee also talked about collaboration between the two countries in creating a centre for excellence in Information Technology and initiative in solar electrification of two hundred homes in Oceanian country Nauru. "I am confident that the fruitful cooperation between India and the Republic of Nauru will continue to bring benefit to both our peoples," he added. --IANS sk/sm/vt (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The newly appointed UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres expressed keen interest to work with the African Union (AU) and its member states. "The African Union is working for unity, peace and progress for all people in every corner of this great continent," Guterres said at the opening of the 28th AU summit here on Monday. He said the UN would work closely with the AU as the pan-African bloc endeavours towards realisation of its development agenda and ensuring peace and security across Africa, Xinhua news agency reported. "You can count on the full support of the UN for all your efforts to strengthen national institutions, to maintain the rule of law, ensure accountability, promote good governance, facilitate the peaceful transition of power and prevent violent extremism," he said. According to the Secretary-General, implementing agenda 2063 and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), promoting peace and security, and human rights are among the major areas that the UN envisages to work with AU. Guterres also commended African nations for providing large number of peacekeepers around the world, and for their "most generous host of refugees". He noted that Africa as a continent encompasses some of the world's fastest growing economies. The world is in the second year of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals and Africa has adopted a plan that is even more far-reaching and ambitious: Agenda 2063, he said. --IANS vgu/ (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Pharmaceutical major on Monday said its wholly owned critical care subsidiary in the UK has entered into an agreement to acquire a portfolio of drugs from Mallinckrodt LLC for a consideration of $171 million. The company statement said: "... Wholly owned critical care subsidiary in the UK has entered into an agreement to acquire a portfolio of spasticity and pain management drugs from Mallinckrodt LLC in an all cash deal for a consideration of $171 million." The statement further said: "An additional $32 million (was) payable depending on financial performance of the acquired assets over the next three years." It is the company's seventh acquisition in the last two years, taking its investment for inorganic growth to Rs 3,000 crore across its pharmaceutical businesses. "All these acquisitions are expected to be value accretive and will improve our pharmaceutical segment's growth and EBITDA in percentage and in absolute terms," said company chairman Ajay Piramal. "This transaction is a step further in our strategy to make investments, in both internal developments and acquisitions, to expand our presence in the global generic hospital drug market, which is greater than $20 billion in size," he said. "This is our second acquisition in the last four months, following our acquisition of a portfolio of anaesthesia and pain management injectable drugs from Janssen Pharmaceutica NV," Piramal Critical Care's CEO Peter DeYoung added. also announced that it will demerge its healthcare and financial services businesses soon. "We want to ultimately look at as separate business for pharmaceuticals and financial services. In the medium term we will do that. All our acquisitions, and in some ways moving up in value chains and getting more critical mass are steps towards that," Ajay Piramal told reporters. Declining to give a timeline, Piramal said "we have not yet fixed timeline. I think the Board will decide, but the direction is moving towards that." Ajay Piramal curtailed his presence in healthcare after he sold erstwhile Piramal Healthcare's domestic formulations division for $3.7 billion to Abbott in 2010. The company entered into the finance business through strategic investments and joint ventures. Piramal Enterprises is growing largely organically with a CAGR of 17% over last the five years. As pressure mounts on Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who has so far not broken his silence on the protests by Kerala Law Academy students, police on Monday registered a case against Principal Lekshmi Nair on a complaint by a student about casteist remarks made by her against him. The united protest by the students reached its 20th day on Monday, demanding Lekshmi Nair's resignation due to her unbecoming behaviour and alleged nepotism. According to informed sources, Vijayan who also holds the Home portfolio, is unhappy about the manner in which the academy management led by its Director and Lekshmi Nair's father Narayanan Nair is behaving, even after huge public protests. Vijayan had on Sunday directed state CPI-M Secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan to call up the Director and his brother Koliyokode Krishnan Nair - a three time CPI-M former legislator. After they said that Lekshmi Nair's resignation will not be possible, the Chief Minister called up Krishnan Nair and told him strongly that the principal has to step down. The registering of the police case indicates that Vijayan now means business as three complaints by students against the principal were given days back but the police failed to act. Former Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan on Monday countered his party Secretary Balakrishnan's statement that the stir at the academy is just a student protest and nothing else. "It's not a student protest, it is a public issue and the state government must act and not succumb to the powerful," he told reporters here. Meanwhile, the health of former state Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President V. Muraleedharan, who is on indefinite hunger strike over the issue, deteriorated. The party leadership has decided that if Muraleedharan's health worsens, a new person would take his place. "We have already briefed Kerala Governor P. Sathasivam on the various violations of the academy and we are confident that he will act. "The state government is playing games and is giving ample time to the academy management to work out their strategy. The state government should act without any more delay," state BJP President Kummanem Rajasekheran told reporters on Monday. State Congress President V.M. Sudheeran said that the protest was started by its student organisation - KSU and now every political party has joined the stir. "The state government has done nothing even as the stir entered its 20th day. Now the state government at least should act based on the Kerala University Syndicate report which has already debarred the principal from examination duties and other key activities. "Anyone with an iota of morality would have resigned, after the University debarred her," said Sudheeran who also demanded that Vijayan urgently call an all party meeting to discuss the issues that have cropped up in the education sector. The private college, set up here in 1968, has till now enjoyed absolute support from successive state governments, enabling it to have an 11-acre campus besides a prime plot of land in the heart of the city, where it has built a commercial complex. Now with pressure mounting, Vijayan is understood to have given an ultimatum to his cabinet colleague State Education Minister C. Raveendranath to see that things are resolved at the earliest. Meanwhile, Lekshmi Nair is hoping that a petition that's coming up at the high court on Tuesday, gives them some relief. --IANS sg/sm/bg (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) President Ram Nath Kovind and Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday paid tributes to Mahatma Gandhi on his 70th death anniversary at his memorial at Raj Ghat here. Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu, Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Army Chief General Bipin Rawat, Navy chief Admiral Sunil Lanba and Air Chief Marshal B.S. Dhanoa were among those present. A "sarva dharma prarthana sabha" (all religion prayer meeting) was held to pay tributes to the "Father of the Nation". Congress President Rahul Gandhi went to Gandhi Smriti and paid tributes to Mahatma Gandhi. Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi also paid their respects at the Raj Ghat. Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated on January 30, 1948. The day is also observed as "Martyrs' Day". The President and the Prime Minister also paid their tributes through tweets. "On Martyrs' Day, we gratefully remember Mahatma Gandhi and the countless freedom fighters who sacrificed their all for our Independence," Kovind said. "We bow to all those martyrs who have sacrificed themselves in service of our nation. We will always remember their courage as well as dedication towards the nation," Modi tweeted. Union Ministers including Arun Jaitley and Mahesh Sharma also took to social media to pay their tributes to Mahatma Gandhi. --IANS mg/ps/pgh/bg (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Actor Saqib Saleem says he will go to any extent to get to the right vision of the script, but he has to believe in it. The actor, who has featured in films like "Mere Dad Ki Maruti", "Hawaa Hawaai" and "Dishoom", added that it has become important for actors to go that extra mile to add believability for the viewers. "If there is something or a material that I really like and truly believe in, then there is no limit. If I believe in the material, believe in the story that it is trying to say something which is going to bring a change, then I will go to any limit," Saqib, who made his Bollywood debut in 2011 with "Mujhse Fraaandship Karoge", told IANS over phone. Explaining his point, the brother of actress Huma Qureshi said: "For instance, I have been doing a film -- which has not been named yet. It also stars Taapsee Pannu. I play a gym trainer in the film and I believe in the story and the script so, I have put in six months before the film begins to get in the best shape possible." He says he believes that "if you are doing something, then you have to do it properly. You cannot do it half-heartedly. Otherwise, people also don't enjoy it". "Now, people are so used to seeing so many different things and seeing what the world is making. We have to be, if not ahead of them, at par with them. We have to give people stories which are real, and which people believe in. So, we have to go that extra mile to put our point across." For now, Saqib is enjoying all the applause coming his way for the digital video "Censor Virus - The New Plague", which takes a dig at the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC). It is Pocket Aces' Dice Media's latest video sketch in association with the BakkBenchers. It is a satire on how freedom of speech in India usually comes censored, and also stars Kartik Krishnan. --IANS sug/nn/vt (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) US President Donald Trump held telephonic conversations with the King of Saudi Arabia and the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi to seek their support for the creation of safe zones in Syria and Yemen, a White House statement said. The calls on Sunday made no mention of Trump's ban on the entry of citizens and refugees from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Syria, Yemen, Libya and Somalia, the Politico news magazine reported. In his call to Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the President "requested, and the king agreed to support, safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said. It was not immediately clear what Trump meant by "requested" safe zones in those two war-struck countries or what the Saudis are willing to do. The US President and King Salman also "agreed on the importance of rigorously enforcing the (nuclear) deal with Iran and of addressing Tehran's destabilising regional activities." The Saudi Arabian monarch also invited Trump to "lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism." However, the White House did not give details about Trump's conversation with Abu Dhabi's Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, other than to suggest the call went well and covered traditional subjects such as fighting terrorists. "The President also raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative," it added. --IANS ksk/soni/vt (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Supreme Court on Monday refused bail to godman Asaram Bapu, saying his health condition wasn't such that he can't be treated in Jodhpur and imposed a cost of Rs one lakh for relying on an alleged false report purportedly given by the jail superintendent on his health condition. Asaram, lodged in the Jodhpur Central Jail, is facing a trial under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) for allegedly sexually assaulting a minor girl. In jail since September 2, 2013, the 72-year-old guru was arrested after the 16-year-old girl lodged a police complaint on August 20, 2013, accusing him of sexually assaulting her at his ashram in Jodhpur. Noting that Asaram has difficulty in urination, the bench of Chief Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar and Justice N.V. Ramana said: "We are of the view that the present condition is not such a serious condition, as would entail the transfer of the petitioner from one jail to another, or to require him to be subjected to any kind of specialized treatment, at some different station." Rejecting plea by Asaram seeking modification of October 24, 2016 order refusing him bail, the bench in its order said: "The medical condition of the petitioner has been described as stable, and as such, there is no question of extending him the concession of bail on medical grounds." The bench described Asaram's condition as stable as it referred to the report of medical board of eight senior doctors of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences who had examined him on the directions of the court. "Findings from the extent of completed evaluation reveal the petitioner's (Asaram) medical condition as 'Stable'", the board had said in its September 21, 2016 report to the top court, bt noted the evaluation of his prostate ailment remained incomplete because of Asaram's refusal to undergo required tests. The court also imposed a cost of Rs 1 lakh on Asaram for filing a false report purportedly where the Superintendent of the Jodhpur Central Jail supported his medical condition. It was contended that the said that the jail superintendent had said this in response to an RTI query. In the course of the last hearing, Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta had described the report purportedly by the jail superintendent as being "forged". Rejecting Asaram's unconditional apology, the court directed registering of an FIR in the matter. --IANS pk/vd (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) US coffeehouse chain, Starbucks has pledged to hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years in the 75 countries where it does business in response to President Donald Trump's order banning travel from seven Muslim majority countries, the media reported. "We are living in an unprecedented time," chairman and CEO Howard Schultz wrote in a memo on Sunday, which listed several actions the company said it was taking to "reinforce our belief in our partners around the world." The refugee hiring proposal, Schultz wrote, will begin with a focus on people who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel, CNN reported. Schultz also reiterated Starbucks' support for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals programme (DACA), which helps undocumented immigrants who were brought to the US as children get driver's licenses, enrol in college and secure jobs. The programme was created by former President Barack Obama through an executive order in 2012. Schultz also said the company was "ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families" should any proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes affect their businesses. "We are in business to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup and one neighbourhood at a time," Schultz wrote. "That will not change. You have my word on that." Schultz is the latest business executive to weigh in on the travel ban, CNN said. Earlier on Sunday, General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt wrote to employees that he shared their "concern" over the order, and added that GE has many employees from the countries named in the ban. Several tech executives have also publicly denounced the travel ban which has resulted in worldwide condemnation. --IANS ksk (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti on Monday said that those trying to dilute article 370 were actually targeting the pluralistic and eclectic culture of the state known as "Kashmiriyat". Mufti was concluding the debate in the assembly on grants to the home ministry. Lashing out at voices against article 370 and article 35 which gives special status to the state in the union of Indian states, the Chief Minister said: "I see this as a conspiracy hatched by certain elements to target the composite culture of Kashmir. "Those who talk of article 370 should understand that it is not about special status but its essence lies in the heterogenous and pluralistic culture of the state. If the soul of Kashmiriyat is punctured, nothing can be more anti-national," she said. The Chief Minister also said that "they don't understand that Article 370 is a bridge between the state and India. It is because of Article 370 that the two nation theory based on religious lines was shunned and Jammu and Kashmir decided to go with India". She warned that the more people target article 370, "the more it will strengthen forces in the Valley who want to see only one faith, and one culture in Kashmir." In his speech, former chief minister and opposition National Conference leader Omar Abdullah had raised concerns saying that judicial means were being used to erode article 370. He warned the state government that if steps were not taken to defend the special position of the state in the court, the Opposition will be forced to rake up the issue. Omar had also accused Mehbooba Mufti of trying to implement the doctrine of National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and not the agenda of alliance the PDP has signed with the BJP. To which Mehbooba Mufti responded: "I don't believe in Doval or Dulat doctrine, but if they help me in implementing the agenda of alliance, I will salute them". While speaking about the rehabilitation issue she said that there were certain elements who keep trying to add fuel to the fire over the issue of rehabilitation of displaced Kashmiri Pandits. "We should not put conditions to the return of Kashmiri Pandits. They could not return to their roots without security. If we are not secure ourselves to move about without security, how can we ask them to go and live there without security?" --IANS sq/ahm/bg (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) With the government set to present the Union Budget 2017-18 on February 1, some of the leading tech companies and IT manufacturers are bracing up for the implementation of the much anticipated Goods and Services Tax (GST), demanding that the excise duty structure should be rationalised. "The IT industry has been seeking an extension of the excise duty differential benefit scheme to cover all the Information Technology Agreement (ITA) products including desktops, laptops, telecommunications equipment etc. This would mean a zero duty on all inputs for manufacturing of electronic components and parts," said Alok Ohrie, President and Managing Director, India Commercial, Dell-EMC. According to Rajiv Srivastava, Managing Director, HP Inc. India, IT manufacturers are bracing themselves for the GST implementation. "The government's objective should be to enable this transition from the current taxation system as smooth and orderly as possible -- both for itself and for businesses and consumers. It will be important to outline a roadmap for IT manufacturers for the implementation of the new GST policy well in time," Srivastava said in a statement. According to Ohrie, expected budget benefits include import substitution, attracting component manufacturers to set up base in the country and the creation of numerous jobs in the IT sector. "After Make in India and demonetisation, the next big disruption is GST. The government has to carefully take measures to remonetise the economy to return to high GDP growth while maintaining cost competitiveness," noted Vikas Agarwal, General Manager, OnePlus India. "From policy perspective, the tax structure should be rationalised and land acquisition policies should be simplified to enable local manufacturing at a larger scale," Agarwal added at a time when US tech giant Apple is seeking tax concessions to manufacture in India. "The government should look for special incentives for the component industry to make manufacturing far more sustainable in India. The extension of the duty differential scheme to the PC segment will definitely take India one step closer to making it an export hub," said Rahul Agarwal, Managing Director & CEO of Lenovo India. According to Samson Khaou, Managing Director, Dassault Systemes India, the government must pursue the positive momentum for the dynamic and ambitious national projects like Make In India, Smart Cities and Digital India. "Budget 2016 focused more on all-inclusive growth including boosting digital literacy, improved connectivity and access to technology across sectors. We hope to see a continued focus by the government of India in the realms of technological advancements," Khaou said. "We hope there is a robust policy to accelerate the utilisation of funds allocated to the IT sector so that there is a far-reaching impact of technology where every change at even the micro level will contribute towards actualisation of the larger goal of digitization," added Rahul Agarwal. --IANS na/bg (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Researchers have developed a reconfigurable radio that could help air traffic controllers see in real-time the location of every plane in the air -- even those flying across oceans. To design and develop the new reconfigurable, higher-bandwidth radio, NASA worked with Palm Bay, Florida-based Harris Corporation. With real-time global tracking, planes could fly with less space between them and take more direct routes. "It tremendously improves public safety and potentially saves a lot of fuel costs, because you no longer have to remain in the particular airline traffic lanes," said Jeff Anderson from Harris Corporation. The biggest selling point of the new device, which Harris sells as the AppSTAR, turned out to be its flexibility. With hardware and software both fully reconfigurable, the company could quickly and cheaply redesign the radio to fit any customer's needs, Harris programme manager Kevin Moran explained. The company has already entered into contracts with Virginia-based Aireon LLC that will use the radios to create the first space-based global air traffic control system. With Aireon flight tracking, powered by a radio developed by Harris Corporation, researchers hope that air traffic control agencies will be able to see in real time the location and heading of every plane in the air. For decades, airplanes have relied on radar surveillance via land-based radar stations. That has left huge gaps ? particularly over oceans ? where air traffic controllers have no real-time information. To compensate, pilots file detailed flight plans and are required to remain within prescribed lanes at different altitudes so air traffic controllers can estimate where they are and work to ensure there are no mid-air collisions. But that could change when a constellation of 66 satellites, owned by Iridium Communications Inc., goes into orbit equipped with AppSTAR radios. The radios are programmed to receive signals from new airplane transceivers called ADS-B, which automatically send out a flight's number, location, heading and other details. "Within seconds you can keep track of all the aircraft in the world," Anderson noted. Aireon has already signed contracts with a number of air traffic control agencies to integrate the space-based system into their flight tracking when the system goes live in 2018. A reconfigurable is also useful for NASA engineers. "A reconfigurable radio lets engineers change how the radio works throughout the life of (any space mission)," Thomas Kacpura, Advanced Communications Programme Manager at NASA's Glenn Research Center, explained in an official statement. "It can also be upgraded to work better with future missions or to enhance performance, just by adding new software," Kacpura added. --IANS gb/vm (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A train accident was averted in Gujarat after the security personnel found 40 clips missing from a railway track early on Monday, an official said. The discovery was made between Unjha and Kamli stations in Mahesana section. According to Western Railway chief spokesman Ravinder Bhakar, a Railway Protection Force constable on routine inspection found the 40 "pandoral clips" displaced from the track. "This could be the work of miscreants," Bhakar told IANS. "A case has been registered." As a precaution, the Bikaner-Secunderabad Express, which was set to cross the track, was halted. The train was later allowed to proceed. Following the incident, Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu again appealed to railway officials to stay alert. "Please be very vigilant, thwart these attempts of anti-social elements, playing with innocent and precious lives," Prabhu tweeted. In the last four months, three major train accidents occurred due to derailment. --IANS aks/mr (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Trinamool Congress on Monday hardened its stance against the central government by announcing that its members will not attend Parliament on Wednesday when the 2017-18 Budget will be presented. Still angry over the arrest of its MPs Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Tapas Pal by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in connection with the Rose Valley Group chit fund scam, the party said it would also not attend the all-party meeting, that took place on Monday. "Trinamool MPs will not be present in Parliament on the first two days of the Budget session in protest against demonetisation, which was implemented without taking Parliament into confidence, and restrictions on withdrawal limits from bank accounts which are still in force," a statement from the party office said. "In the ensuing session, Trinamool will, among other issues, raise the issue of illegal arrest of its Lok Sabha leader and another MP, which is a clear case of political vendetta by the ruling party at the Centre by misusing CBI and abusing its power." The reason the Trinamool MPs would not be attending Parliament on Budget day is also the Saraswati Puja, which is a "big day in Bengal", said party leader and MP Derek O'Brien. Custom has it that on Saraswati Puja people keep away from work and not even touch the tools of their trade. "Saraswati Puja is beyond a religious festival. It is a socio-cultural festival of Bengal," O'Brien added. --IANS dm/ksk/vt (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Donald Trump points to a member of the audience after speaking at the Central Intelligence Agency in Langley, Virginia (Photo: AP/PTI) In response to the US President Donald Trump's 'Muslim ban' order, Trump Hotels was trolled on Twitter by users who responded to their tweet by posting refugee stories and sharp criticism. The response to the tweet is a fallout of an executive order signed by Trump, limiting the flow of refugees into the US by instituting what the President has called "extreme vetting" of immigrants. The tweet dating back to 2011 asked Twitter users to share their favourite travel memory. According to a report in RT on Sunday, though the tweet had already gained response when it was posted, after the executive order, users vent their anger by flooding the tweet with sharp criticism. "That time I fled Communist Romania to a refugee camp in Austria, came to America, and years later became an executive at Google creating 10,000 of jobs," @LaszloBock2718 tweeted. In response to the tweet, some people shared their fears over the current political climate, while others shared stories and photos from relatives who were forced to flee fascist regimes before resettling in the US. "Earlier this week Trump Hotels Chief Executive Officer Eric Danziger revealed plans for the group's expansion across the US, once again raising concerns over potential conflicts of interest between Trump's business and his presidency," the report noted. Large scale protests have erupted across US airports calling for Trump's travel ban to be lifted. "I am establishing new vetting measures to keep radical Islamic terrorists out of the US," Trump said on Friday during the signing at the Pentagon after the swearing-in of Defense Secretary James Mattis, CNN reported. The ban on Saturday created chaos and outrage around the world, while numerous travellers found their access to US territory blocked and protests were staged at several US airports. (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.) US President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily prohibiting entry into the country for migrants from seven Muslim-majority countries and refugees from around the world led to confusion, angst and a wave of protests across the country. World leaders and prominent figures blasted Trump's travel ban as divisive, illegal, insulting and discriminatory. Trump signed an executive order Friday barring citizens from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Libya, Somalia and Sudan from entering the country for 90 days and also suspended the admission of all refugees for 120 days. The order bans entry of those fleeing from war-torn Syria indefinitely. While many countries lambasted the ban, Muslim-majority nations not on the blacklist have remained largely silent. Australia, which has implemented hardline policies against refugees, was one of the few nations to voice support for the ban. The ban is "not justified" and "supports the terrorists and sows divisions among people," Yemen's Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Affairs Minister Abdel-Malak al-Mekhlafi posted on Twitter. The Sudanese Foreign Affairs Ministry in a statement called on Washington to remove Sudan from the US list of states that sponsor terrorism. Iran called Trump's immigration order "insulting" and a "gift to extremists" and said it will also take "reciprocal measures in order to safeguard the rights of its citizens. British Prime Minister Theresa May also put out a statement saying her government did "not agree" with it, but said immigration was "a matter for the government of the US." A petition on the UK Government and Parliament website to prevent Trump from making a state visit to the UK passed the one million mark on Monday morning. Closer to home, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that refugees fleeing persecution, terror and war were welcome in Canada. Germany, France, Turkey, the Netherlands and New Zealand also condemned the ban. The United Nations' High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein denounced the move as illegal and mean-spirited. Pakistan, whose visa seekers have been put on "extreme vetting" under US President Donald Trump's new administration, on Monday said the new policy will affect international unity against terrorism. However, Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull became one of the few leaders to openly show support for the ban. "It is vital that every nation is able to control who comes across its borders," he said. Raucous protests erupted at US airport terminals from coast to coast. Tens of thousands of people protested outside the gates of the White House, in Boston's Copley Square and in New York's Battery Park, with its view over the Statue of Liberty, the Washington Post reported. Demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports. The protesters outside the White House pushed on, wielding poster boards with messages such as "Islamophobia is un-American" and "Dissent is patriotic," chanting "No justice! No peace!" and singing renditions of "This Land is Your Land." And in airports from Baltimore to Bangor, from Dallas to Denver, shouts of "Let them go!" and "Let them in!" reverberated Sunday. In many cities, demonstrators invoked the same chant: "No hate, no fear. Refugees are welcome here." Scenes of relief, anxiety and sorrow played out around the globe. Trump issued a statement late Sunday that offered little clarity, even as he defended his executive order as necessary to protect the United States from terrorism. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," Trump said in the statement. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe." Still, barely 48 hours after Trump issued his order, confusion reigned over its reach and its implementation, said the report. Even as the President and other top advisers defended the ban, some Trump officials appeared on Sunday to walk back one of the most controversial elements of the action: its impact on green card holders, who are permanent legal residents of the United States. "As far as green card holders going forward, it doesn't affect them," Trump's chief of staff, Reince Priebus, said on NBC News' "Meet the Press," contradicting what government officials had said only a day earlier. In a separate statement, Homeland Security Secretary John F. Kelly was less definitive, suggesting that green card holders' status would help them gain entry to the country but that they nonetheless would be subject to a "case-by-case" review. As of Sunday evening, officials said no one was being held at American airports, although lawyers said they believed that dozens were still being detained, the New York Times reported. Democrats planned to assemble on Monday on the steps of the Supreme Court in a show of solidarity with legal attempts to block Trump's travel ban. Some Republicans grew increasingly alarmed by the backlash to the order. "This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country," Senators John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said. "That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security." Meanwhile, a federal judge in New York temporarily blocked deportations nationwide. Her ruling was followed by similar decisions by federal judges in California, Virginia, Seattle and Boston. --IANS soni/bg (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has said no dual nationality Britons will be affected by US President Donald Trump's travel ban unless they travel to the US directly from one of the seven 'blacklisted' countries. The US President's team has told Johnson that Britons who have shared nationality with one of the mainly Muslim countries will not be stopped from entering America, Daily Mail online reported. But British dual citizens travelling to the US directly from one of the banned countries will face extra checks. It was feared more than 250,000 Britons with dual citizenship would be affected by the travel ban. Trump signed an executive order on Friday which prevents any citizen of seven Muslim-majority countries -- Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Syria, Libya, Sudan and Yemen -- from entering the US for 90 days. Latest figures show that more than 250,000 people who were born in Iraq, Iran and Somalia have dual British nationality. --IANS vgu/ (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Maharashtra Navnirman Sena on Monday said the Shiv Sena has rebuffed its proposal for an alliance for next month's civic elections in Mumbai. Senior MNS leader Bala Nandgaonkar said he personally went to Sena President Uddhav Thackeray's Bandra residence 'Matoshri' on Sunday with a proposal and submitted it to his team comprising Anil Desai, Rahul Shewale, Anil Parab, Subhash Desai and others. "They assured me it would be conveyed to their party chief," said Nandgaonkar, who is a close confidant of Raj Thackeray and enjoys a good rapport with Uddhav Thackeray. When asked about the MNS proposal on Monday afternoon, Uddhav denied outright about having received any such communication from his estranged cousin. "We have not received any proposal from any party... We have decided to fight on our own strength across Maharashtra," Uddhav said dismissively. Responding to this, Nandgaonkar glumly said: "If they are saying this, then I may be a liar." Elaborating, he revealed that in the past eight days, Raj called up Uddhav seven times since January 22. He followed it up by personally submitting an "unconditional alliance" proposal "in the interest of Mumbai" and since everybody desires the two warring cousins should come together again. Significantly, the MNS overtures started four days before Uddhav Thackeray on January 26 unilaterally snapped the 25-year-old ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party for the upcoming civic elections, though it continues to be partner in the state government and at the Centre. "Raj Thackeray made the gesture as 'a younger brother' and since he had made a commitment to the late Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray," Nandgaonkar said. Describing Uddhav as "a nice person", he admitted that though Uddhav was at home, he could not meet him (Uddhav), otherwise the situation would have been completely different. Saying "we are hopeful," Nandgaonkar pointed out that there is still time left and urged Uddhav to at least consider the MNS proposal, instead of summarily rejecting it. MNS corporator Sandeep Deshpande said an alliance could greatly benefit the Shiv Sena as it would prevent division of Marathi votes and in a municipal corporation elections, even a couple of hundred votes could make or mar the candidate's prospects. Plagued with desertions of its legislators and corporators across the state, the MNS is fighting a battle for sheer survival while the Shiv Sena is attempting to establish its supremacy over rivals by going alone in the state. --IANS qn/lok/vt (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Toyota Motors lost its title as the highest selling automaker in 2016 to German carmaker Volkswagen, a position the Japanese company had enjoyed since 2011, the media reported. According to figures published on Monday by the Toyota group, which includes its subsidiaries Daihatsu Motor and Hino Motors, the company sold a total of 10.175 million units in 2016, Efe news reported. Although the figure is 0.2 per cent higher than 2015, it is lower than Volkswagen's 10.3 million units (growth of around 3.8 per cent) sold in 2016 despite the German manufacturer's recent emissions scandal. The last time Toyota was world's No. 2 annual car seller was in 2011, when Japan's northeastern part was struck by an earthquake and a tsunami, severely affecting the firm's operations and cutting significantly its supply chains. Toyota was also trailing Volkswagen in the first half 2015. However, Volkswagen's emissions scandal in September severely affected its last quarter sales. --IANS ksk/vt (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) After the London-based parent of Vodafone India confirmed that the company was in discussions with the Aditya Birla Group for an all-share merger of Vodafone India (excluding Vodafones 42 per cent stake in Indus Towers) and Idea Cellular, social media erupted with speculation about the effects of the possible merger. One speculated about a name change: Idea was originally Birla+AT&T+Tata (then known as Batata). Now if there is a merger with Vodafone it should be called Batata Voda, punning on batata vada, a popular Mumbai street food. While there is no denying that critical illnesses like cancer and heart ailments require specialised attention, is there a need for a specialised policy for such ailments? How useful are critical illness (CI) covers for specific ailments when there are CI covers that cover different ailments? Struggling for political space, the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) has knocked at the doors of Shiv Sena for tactical adjustment in the upcoming civic polls in Maharashtra, but any truck between the two is unlikely to fructify with the latter showing little interest in it. Terming it as a "political move," MNS sources said "efforts are being made" to cosy up with Sena, which is gearing up to battle it out with the BJP after deciding against a pre-poll pact. But, the Sena has shown no serious interest in the MNS proposal. "We are fully ready for the polls. Unfortunately, we have to battle the BJP. Uddhavji has made it clear that he will not seek anybody's support or alliance. If anybody wants to support us, we will consider it sympathetically. However, seat-sharing or any tactical understanding is ruled out," Sena sources said. MNS sources, however, indicated that the party has not given up all hopes. Fuelling speculations of a covert understanding in the form of seat adjustment between the two parties, MNS's former legislator Bala Nandgoankar had gone to Sena chief's residence. Though he could not meet Uddhav, he handed over a letter containing the party's proposal. Sena sources said the party chief has virtually spurned the overtures from the MNS. The Raj Thackeray-led MNS, an offshoot of Shiv Sena, which had bagged 111 seats in urban civic bodies in 2012, is now finding itself alone. According to political observers, MNS is suffering from some sort of "trust deficit" and "credibility crisis," a perception its leaders and functionaries refuse to share. Five years ago, the MNS, riding on Raj's charisma and "anti-north Indian immigrant" agenda, had bagged 28 seats in Mumbai corporation, seven in Thane, 29 in Pune, four in Pimpri-Chinchwad, two in Nagpur and one in Akola. In Nashik, it cornered 40 seats and stormed to power, and got its candidate elected as mayor with the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) support. Raj had supported Sena in Mayor election in Mumbai and expected the gesture to be reciprocated in Nashik. But his estranged cousin Uddhav did not yield. Party insiders say majority of the 111 corporators as well as former MLAs have switched sides either to Sena or BJP. "Prior to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, Raj supported the candidature of Narendra Modi for prime ministership. If he wanted Modi to be PM, why did he field candidates against the Sena-BJP then," observers noted. Its detractors also charge that MNS had dropped mid-way several agitations that it launched, including the one against toll levy and Pakistani artistes. In the 2014 state polls, the MNS's strength in the Legislative Assembly nosedived from 13 to one. However, there has been no course correction and workers and leaders who had stayed back were left to their fate, party sources said. Despite getting power in Nashik and a good number of corporators in other cities, the party has not been able to achieve much, observers say. In municipal council and Nagar Panchayat polls held recently, the MNS could bag only seven seats as against 61 seats it secured five years ago. Recently, Raj Thackeray had said he was willing to go for a pre-poll alliance for the civic polls next month, but there were no takers. Refuting the negative perceptions, MNS vice president Vageesh Saraswat said his party will increase its tally in the urban civic bodies and Raj Thackeray is a charismatic leader who inspires Marathi youth. "We will replicate our Nashik development model elsewhere if given a chance," he said. BJP leader Madhav Bhandari said Raj Thackeray's style of functioning does not create confidence in the society's mind and there is no chance of revival for the party. He said Raj has not been able to fulfil the expectations he aroused when he made a splash on the state's political scene, after breaking away from the Shiv Sena. Congress leader Ratnakar Mahajan said he could not see any possibility of MNS reviving by its espousal of "parochial and regional politics". Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday expressed hope that the of Parliament will see peaceful debates despite political differences. Modi made the appeal at an all-party meeting in New Delhi, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar said. He said all parties agreed that debate should take place. "The Prime Minister said that differences may arise between parties but democracy should win and there should be debate in Parliament," the Minister said. "All parties, especially those in the Opposition, said they wanted debate and both Houses should function," the Minister added. Asked about the Opposition's demand to postpone the Budget, the Minister said: "This is the nation's budget, for the benefit of the nation. The Supreme Court has given its verdict." The of Parliament starts on Tuesday. The Budget will be presented on Wednesday. Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar did an Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday when he told residents of a slum near here that it is okay to accept Rs 500 from candidates to attend rallies, but they should cast votes for the BJP only. "...I understand if someone organises a rally and you take Rs 500 for moving around with (the candidate), that is not a problem. But when you vote, choose the lotus (BJP's poll symbol). This you must remember," Parrikar told the corner meeting at Chimbel, a suburb of the state capital. His advice came on a day when the Election Commission directed the state poll officials to file a FIR against Delhi Chief Minister Kejriwal for making a similar statement. Kejriwal, in his public speeches in Goa earlier this month, had asked people to accept money give by rival parties, but vote for the Aam Aadmi Party. Holding elections in Manipur has always been a tough task for the Election Commission. This time, the state is seized with an economic blockade, increased tensions between residents of the hills and plains and heightened threats from militant groups. Activist-turned-politician Iron Sharmila, contesting for the first time, has also added a new dimension to the state polls, which will be held on March 4 and March 8. The Congress will be looking forward to repeating the electoral success for the fourth time. In the concluding part of a five-part series, Business Standard analyses the performance of the state on economic and social indicators. Opposition and govt supporters now communicate in guerilla warfare mode T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan Govt should reduce its dependence on social media and revert, if not wholly then in large measure, to older forms of communication, at least on ... Some 114 km from Punjabs state capital Chandigarh, a group of men were engaged in an intense conversation in Jhande village of Ludhiana district. The men mostly farmers, dairy owners and retired servicemen had gathered at villages chaupal after days work to discuss life and politics. Their conversation soon broke out in a heated argument when it came to voting for the party in the state assembly elections scheduled on February 4. A few, who had earlier voted for the two traditional parties the Congress and the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), now wants a change in Punjab and are ready to experiment with the newbie Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). With 200 million people, Uttar Pradesh (UP) has about the same population as Brazil; an economy the size of Qatarswhich has 2.4 million people, the same as the UP town of Bijnore; per capita gross domestic product (GDP) comparable to Kenyas; and an infant mortality rate that rivals The Gambia, a poverty-ridden, peanut-growing west-African nation. With 75 districts, 814 blocks and 97,607 villages, UP is larger, by population, than all but five countries. It holds the key to political dominion over India, but, in terms of health and nutritional outcomes, infrastructure and coverage indicators, it is widely considered a laggard, improving slowly, with wide disparities within. The per capita public expenditure on health (by both Centre and states) is the lowest in UP among the five states with 169 million voters going to polls between February 4 and March 8, 2017, our analysis shows. Eleven people including a policeman and five forest officials were arrested after police busted a redsanders smuggling racket here, police said today. All the accused--a head constable, 5 forest department employees, two interstate and three local smugglers--were arrested in two separate operations in the district yesterday, for their alleged involvement in smuggling, said Superintendent of Police, P H Ramakrishna. Also, 29 red sanders logs weighing 1.5 tonnes, 17 cell phones and one four wheeler was seized in the operation conducted in Duvvur Mandal and near Maddimadugu locality in CK Dinne mandal here, the SP said. Y Alfred, the arrested policeman, who is presently attached to V N police station, earlier worked with the anti-red sander smuggling special task in Tirupathi. He was transferred to Kadapa for his alleged links with smugglers, the police officer said. The constable was arrested from Duvvur mandal, he said. Forest assistant beat officer S Subbarayudu, forest watchers--M Sivabramham, C Ganga Mahesh and K Balagopal and C Gangaraju--working in Maddimadugu forest beat, were arrested for allegedly assisting the smugglers, the SP said. While, Alfred who was acting a conduit for smuggling vehicles for transporting these logs to Bengaluru (Karnataka), Selam (Tamilnadu) and Neemuch (Madhya Pradesh), Subbarayudu and four forest watchers were helping the smugglers in collecting red sander logs from forest and in stocking them in a safe place, he said. Besides, two interstate smugglers C Amerendra Raju and Nityapoojaiah and two local gang members M Mallikarjuna Naik (Maddimadugu) R Satish Kumar and R Siva Sankar (Kadapa) were nabbed on a tip off based on information gathered from previously apprehended smugglers, the SP said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A 72-year-old woman, believed to be a Sufi mystic, was found with her throat slit in her house in Dhaka, police said today, amid a series of systematic assaults in Bangladesh targeting minorities, Sufis and bloggers. Nurjahan Begum, who lived alone, was found dead in her tin-roofed house near the Martyrs' Graveyard in the capital's Mirpur last evening, police officer Farukul Islam said. "Her throat was slit," the Daily Star newspaper quoted Islam as saying. The body was sent to Dhaka Medical College morgue for an autopsy. Citing locals, the paper said Nurjahan was known as Kheta Pagli and she had quite a following for the last eight years. Her followers considered her a "pir" or Sufi mystic. They built her the house and many of them gave her food and money. Locals said her followers had been looking for her since early afternoon. Failing to find her, they pushed the partly open door of her room in the evening and found her body covered in a blanket. There have been systematic assaults in Bangladesh in recent years specially targeting minorities, secular bloggers, intellectuals and foreigners. Over a dozen Sufi Muslims have been found with their throats slit in Bangladesh since 2013. The authorities blamed homegrown Islamist extremists for the killings. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) What was once a bus stand has been transformed into a 'book exchange counter', with the aim to create awareness about the benefits of reading at the Brahmaputra Literary Festival here, that comes to a close today. The bus stop-turned-stall, that bears a banner reading 'The world belongs to those who read books', is not a conventional book shop but more of an exchange counter named, 'My Bookstore... Bring a book, Take a book'. "Since local buses remain the major mode of public transportation in the city, we thought this idea can have some impact on people and draw their attention towards reading books," Anoop Khanna, the store owner said. The stall is adorned with messages by bibliophiles expressing their love for reading. One such message read, "I love books because they never ditch me. They are always there for me whenever I need them." In a reference to Valentine's Day that is merely a fortnight away, another message read, "I never get bored of dating books. And what can be a better way to end January by going on a blind date with a book!" An initiative by Priya Communications, the idea re-introduces the tradition of barter system where people can buy new books in exchange of the ones they have already read. "It is such a wonderful initiative at low cost. The government must think about it. Why not have similar things in all districts?" Khanna said. During the three-day-literary festival, the stall saw exchange of over 200 books in the first two days. "Books deposited and borrowed include books written in English, Hindi as well as Assamese. A 70-year-old man visited the stall multiple times and exchanged nearly ten of his books," a representative at the stall said. The stall is also hosting plays and activities with the theme "a professional by the day and a book lover by the night". "We have invited a musician, a magician and a cobbler who love reading books. They will perform and show what they do during the day time to earn money and in the evening they will showcase their love for reading," Khanna said. The festival was inaugurated by Union Minister Prakash Javadekar on January 28, making Assam the first state in North East India to host a literary festival. Organised by the National Book Trust (NBT) and the Assam government, the festival witnessed 60 panel discussions, book releases, readings and cultural events, including film screenings based on books. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Claiming that IRB Infrastructure has recovered Rs 2,880 crore from toll levy on Mumbai-Pune Expressway till November 2016, anti-toll activists have asked the government to stop the toll collection within 15 days. According to the activists, IRB paid Rs 918 crore upfront to Maharashtra government to collect toll and maintain Mumbai-Pune Expressway for 15 years (upto August 2019), but it has already collected Rs 2,880 crore till November 2016. "We want the government to withdraw the toll in the next 15 days or else we will have to move the competent authorities against the toll plazas," said Sanjay Shirodkar, an activist. "If the toll collection is not withdrawn we will file a complaint with the Anti-Corruption Bureau," he said. IRB had projected collection of Rs 2,869 crore by 2018. Another anti-toll activist, Shriniwas Ghanekar, said there will not be any need to compensate the company for toll loss as already excessive collection has been made. In the case of toll plazas at Kolhapur and other places like Bhiwandi and Ghodbunder Road, the state government had to compensate the operators when toll levy was stopped. Meanwhile, IRB said the toll collection on Expressway was as per the agreement. "Once again, we re-iterate that toll collection on Mumbai-Pune Expressway is in line with the prevailing concession agreement," IRB spokesperson said in a statement. Gross revenue assumed during the 15-year period needs to be calculated from the traffic numbers assumed by it in the bid submitted by taking into consideration the growth rate as well as tariff approved for the period by the government, IRB said in a statement. "If one takes them into consideration it will be clear that the project is likely to generate at best 15-16 per cent returns over a period of 15 years after factoring interest expense, maintenance cost as well as the initial investment of upfront amount and four-lane work capital cost," it said. Such long term projects of 15 years tenure need almost 8-9 years to break even, and so the assumption that project recovery is already done is completely wrong, IRB said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) African Union leaders grappled with Morocco's divisive bid to rejoin the bloc at a summit today and sounded alarm for the continent over US President Donald Trump's immigration ban. "The very country (where) our people were taken as slaves... Has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries," outgoing AU Commission chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told some 37 heads of state and leaders from across the continent. "It is clear that globally we are entering very turbulent times," she added. Trump's administration has faced outrage and widespread protests over the move to ban citizens from seven countries including Libya, Somalia and Sudan in Africa. In his opening address at the summit, new UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres didn't mention Trump's refugee and travel ban specifically, but criticised the closure of borders "even in the most developed countries in the world." All eyes at the summit are on a bid by Morocco to return to the fold 33 years after it quit in protest against the AU's decision to accept Western Sahara as a member. However proceedings began with the swift election of Chadian Foreign Minister Moussa Faki Mahamat, 56, as the new chairperson of the AU Commission, beating four other candidates. Faki won in a final battle against his Kenyan counterpart Amina Mohamed after seven rounds of voting, the Kenyan government said in a statement, praising a "valiant race" by their candidate. Faki takes on the role as his country's President Idriss Deby Itno hands over the rotating presidency of the AU to Guinea's Alpha Conde. Faki, a 56-year-old former prime minister, has been at the forefront of the fight against Islamists in Nigeria, Mali and the Sahel and has promised "development and security" will be top of his agenda as chief of the 54-member continental bloc. He said he dreams of an Africa where the "sound of guns will be drowned out by cultural songs and rumbling factories" and pledged to streamline the bureaucratic AU during his four-year term in office. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) African Union leaders meet today for a summit that has exposed regional divisions as they mull whether to allow Morocco to rejoin the bloc, and vote for a new chairperson. The two-day summit in Ethiopia comes after several shake-ups on the international stage: the election of US President Donald Trump and a new head of the UN, Antonio Guterres, who will address the opening of the assembly. Yesterday in Addis Ababa, Guterres praised Ethiopia's generosity in welcoming refugees from the region while battling its worst drought in 50 years. It is "an example that I would say needs to be thought about in a world where unfortunately so many borders are being closed," he said in a veiled dig at the US ban on travellers from seven Muslim countries, including Libya, Somalia and Sudan in Africa. Uncertainty over Africa's relationship with Trump's America is one of several issues demanding the attention of AU leaders -- from turmoil in Libya, radical Islam in Mali, Somalia and Nigeria, to stagnating peace efforts in South Sudan. However today's talks will be dominated by Morocco's bid to return to the fold 33 years after it quit in protest against the AU's decision to accept Western Sahara as a member. The membership of affluent Morocco could be a boon for the AU, which lost a key financier in late Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi and is working hard to become financially independent. Currently foreign donors account for some 70 per cent of its budget, according to the Institute for Security Studies. A Moroccan diplomat said yesterday the country had the "unconditional support" of 42 members of the bloc. However in a sign of the resistance Morocco is facing, 12 countries including heavyweights Nigeria, South Africa, Algeria, Kenya and Angola, requested a legal opinion from the AU on whether the bloc could accept a country that some members consider is occupying another member's territory. These nations have long supported the campaign for self-determination by Western Sahara's Polisario movement. Morocco maintains that the former Spanish colony under its control is an integral part of the kingdom, while the Polisario Front, which campaigns for the territory's independence, demands a referendum on self-determination. The AU's legal counsel, in a document seen by AFP, said the nations raised "fundamental concerns that have to be taken into account". However the decision to weigh Morocco's request ultimately rests with heads of state. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The interim ban on annual buffalo race in Karnataka will remain for at least another two weeks as the High Court on Monday decided to await the Supreme Court verdict on Jallikattu pending before it. "This honourable court will wait for the Supreme Court order on Jallikattu (bull taming sport) and accordingly decide on Kambala," Chief Justice Subhro Kamal Mukherjee heading a division bench said in his order. The case was then adjourned for two weeks. The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear all Jallikattu matters on Tuesday after the Centre filed a plea seeking to withdraw the January 6 notification, so as to allow the bull-taming sport in Tamil Nadu. A bench headed by Justice Dipak Misra had allowed all the applications related to Jallikattu to be filed. A division bench of the Karnataka High Court headed by Chief Justice had in November last passed an interim order banning all races until the disposal of PIL filed by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). Reacting to the court order, Committee President Ashok Pai said they would soon decide on resuming massive protests across the state. "We may decide to resume our protests, beginning from tomorrow itself. The only hope before us is the state government. We hope it issues the ordinance paving the way for conducting Kambala," Pai said The interim order hit Kambala organisers who were not permitted to conduct the event held in Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts in the coastal region. Kambala committees had filed an interim application, seeking vacation of the stay spurred by the success of the Jallikattu stir in Tamil Nadu. Amid continuing protests against the ban, Karnataka Cabinet on January 28 had decided to amend the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act to pave the way for Kambala. The protesters are demanding an ordinance, as was done in the case of Jallikattu to permit holding of the folk sport. The annual sport, held from November to March, involves a pair of buffaloes tied to the plough and anchored by one person. They are made to run in parallel muddy tracks in a competition in which the fastest team wins. It is believed to be held to propitiate the Gods for a good harvest, besides being a recreational sport for farmers. PETA, on the other hand, has been arguing that the agitators in Karnataka have taken a leaf out of the pro-Jallikattu protesters' book and begun to falsely label PETA India as 'foreign' and were now calling for banning the organisation. Facing growing demand for holding Kambala, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has said an ordinance could be brought in, if necessary, to allow the event after seeking legal opinion. He had also asked the Centre to take a favourable stand on Kambala as it did on Jallikattu, where both Tamil Nadu and Central governments, after facing public pressure moved swiftly to facilitate the sport. Actor Antonio Banderas was taken to hospital near his home in Surrey after he suffered from chest pain. The 56-year-old star was working out when he suddenly experienced agonizing pains in his chest, reported Mirror. According to multiple reports, the doctors kept the actor under observation but decided to release him after being satisfied he was safe to go home. Banderas, who is now recovering, later confirmed that he had an "episode." He also praised the medics who helped him during his health crisis. The actor moved to Britain two years ago and lives in a 2.4 million euro mansion in Cobham. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Senior West Bengal BJP leader Jayprakash Majumdar, arrested over alleged cheating charges, applied for bail in the Calcutta High Court today claiming he has been framed. The petition was moved before the court of Justice Joymalyo Bagchi, but was adjourned for the day as the state government prayed for time stating that it wanted to appoint a special public prosecutor to argue the matter. The petitioner's counsel, Phiroze Edulji, claimed Majumdar was framed for extraneous reasons and he should be set free on bail. The matter was adjourned for the day and is likely to be heard tomorrow. Majumdar, himself a lawyer, was arrested on charges of criminal conspiracy, fraud and cheating a person on January 14. Based on a complaint dated August 28, 2016, wherein Majumdar was accused of cheating the complainant and others of Rs 7 lakh, the BJP leader was arrested by the Bidhannagar Police Commissionerate. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Mohamed Abrini, the "man in the hat" bombing suspect caught on security cameras during the Brussels airport attack, has been charged in France over the November 2015 jihadist massacres in Paris, his lawyers said today. Belgium handed Abrini over to the French authorities for a day so that he could face charges related to the deaths of 130 people in the French capital. The 32-year-old was taken under armed guard to the Palais de Justice in Paris where he was charged by an investigating magistrate. A Belgian national of Moroccan origin, he was arrested in Brussels in April over his suspected involvement in the March 22 Brussels attacks and the Paris killings, both of which were claimed by the Islamic State group. Belgian investigators have said the Brussels airport and metro bombers who killed a total of 32 people were part of the same Brussels-based cell that orchestrated the Paris attacks. Dubbed the "man in the hat" from images caught on security cameras, Abrini fled Brussels airport without detonating his suitcase bomb, prosecutors say. His accomplices Najim Laachraoui and Ibrahim El Bakraoui set off their explosives, killing 16 people and themselves. Belgian authorities have already charged Abrini over the massacres in the French capital, leading his lawyers to complain that he risks being tried twice for the same acts. Two days before the Paris attacks, he was seen at a petrol station north of Paris with prime suspect Salah Abdeslam. Abdeslam is believed to be the only survivor of the jihadist team behind the carnage at the French capital's Bataclan concert hall, the national stadium and a handful of bars and cafes. A Belgian-born French national Abdeslam is suspected of driving one of the vehicles used in the attacks. He is in custody in France, where he is refusing to answer questions from investigators. The federal prosecutor's office in Belgium confirmed that Abrini had been "surrendered" to French authorities for a day "in the framework of the investigation related to the attacks in Paris on 13 November 2015." Eric Van Der Sypt, a spokesman, told AFP that the decision is based on "mutual agreements" between the two countries. "It's not uncommon that suspects in different cases are surrendered for one day or a few days," Van Der Sypt said. Abrini had a long record as a petty criminal growing up in the troubled Molenbeek area of Brussels with Abdeslam. Nicknamed "Brioche" after his days working in a bakery, he is thought to have given up training as a welder at the age of 18 before eventually gravitating towards extremism. Identified as a radical Islamist by Belgian investigators, Abrini is believed to have briefly visited Syria in 2015 and his younger brother Suleiman, 20, died there. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) China today asked Malaysia to speed up the search operations to rescue five Chinese tourists who went missing after a tourist boat sank in rough seas off Malaysia. Chinese Foreign Ministry also expressed hope that Malaysia would report the developments about the rescue operations promptly. Twenty Chinese tourists and two of the vessel's three crew members were rescued after the boat sank off Malaysia's Sabah state on Borneo island on Saturday. The sinking of the boat, the first day of the Lunar New Year holiday, sparked a major air and sea search covering some 400 nautical square miles. Twenty Chinese tourists survived hours in the water due to their life jackets and by clinging to objects from the boat, but three tourists died. "In the meantime, China hopes the Malaysian side will carry out fair and objective investigation to find out the truth as early as possible," Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said. Geng expressed deep condolences to the victims, adding that the Chinese Consulate General's Office based in Kota Kinabalu in Malaysia had sent staff to coordinate rescue work with the search and rescue centre, state-run Xinhua agency reported. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Congress and JDU today demanded a white paper on demonetisation and asked the Narendra Modi government to tell people what did it achieve by the note ban. "A white paper should be presented on demonetisation. The government should tell people what has it achieved after it. Let people who lost their jobs and faced hardships know. "The government has changed the narrative from black money to e-payments," Congress leader Sachin Pilot said in a debate at India Today's Budget Aaj Tak conclave here. He said people will respond to demonetisation in the elections and the Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance will win the UP Assembly polls. He said Prime Minister Narendra Modi had already announced several schemes in his December 31 speech and wondered what Finance Minister Arun Jaitley will say on the budget day. Pilot said the decision to scrap high-value currency notes "tarnished" the image of the Reserve Bank of India and its Governor as "several changes" were made in notifications. JDU's Pavan Varma wanted to know what steps the government intended to take after demonetisation. "We supported demonetisation, but we want to know how much ill-gotten money has been recovered and what steps have been taken to bring back black money stashed abroad," he said. Varma also stressed the need for bringing about electoral reforms and said all parties "have been evading this crucial issue". To this, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra said: "Yes, there has been discontent on this among people. The PM has very clearly said the issue needed to be discussed in the Winter Session. Let's have a discussion on this and bring a law." Responding to Opposition's criticism over BJP manifesto for UP polls promising construction of Ram temple, he said: "The issue is in its manifesto since party's 1989 Palampur Resolution". Attacking Trinamool Congress, which vociferously opposed the note ban, Patra said that while the West Bengal government claimed its revenue went down post rationing of notes, its MP Derek O'Brien in a tweet had said the state GDP spiked in the past two months. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Creative people - especially those working with art - tend to have disturbed sleep causing them to experience difficulty in functioning during the daytime, a new study has found. The study also found that people who are verbally creative tend to go to bed and wake up later than others, although they sleep for more number of hours. "Visually creative people reported disturbed sleep leading to difficulties in daytime functioning," said Neta Ram-Vlasov from the University of Haifa in Israel. "In the case of verbally creative people, we found that they sleep more hours and go to sleep and get up later," said Ram-Vlasov. "The two types of creativity were associated with different sleep patterns. This strengthens the hypothesis that the processing and expression of visual creativity involves different psychobiological mechanisms to those found in verbal creativity," Ram-Vlasov added. Creativity is defined by four characteristics: fluency - the ability to produce a wide range of ideas; flexibility - the ability to switch easily between different thought patterns in order to produce this wide range of ideas; originality - the unique quality of the idea relative to the ideas in the environment; and elaboration - the ability to develop each idea separately. The researchers sought to understand how two types of creativity - visual and verbal - influence objective aspects of sleep such as duration and timing (indexes such as the time of falling asleep and waking up) and subjective aspects - sleep quality. Thirty undergraduate students participated in the study, half of whom were majoring only in art and half of whom were majoring only in the social sciences. During the study, participants underwent overnight electrophysiological sleep recordings, wore a wrist activity monitor (a device that measures sleep objectively), and completed a sleep monitoring diary and a questionnaire on sleep habits in order to measure the pattern and quality of sleep. They also undertook visual and verbal creativity tests. The findings show that among all the participants, the higher the level of visual creativity, the lower the quality of their sleep. This was manifested in such aspects as sleep disturbances and daytime dysfunction. The researchers also found that the higher the participants' level of verbal creativity, the more hours they slept and the later they went to sleep and woke up. A comparison between the sleep patterns of art students and non-art students found that art students sleep more, but this in no way guarantees quality sleep: art students evaluated their sleep as of lower quality and reported more sleep disturbances and daytime dysfunction than the non-art students. The researchers add that possible explanations can be offered for the connections found between the two types of creativity and sleep patterns. Some dalit families of a village near here have alleged caste-based discrimination, saying they are prevented from getting a haircut or water in hotels. However, the administration has denied the allegations, saying they are politically motivated. "Local barber refuses to do a haircut saying we belonged to lower caste. We are also not being given water from hotels," Jagannath Ahirwar, a dalit, who is a resident of Naisamand village, told PTI today. According to him, there are about 70 dalit families who live in the village with the population of 1800. "The barber tells us that we would not be allowed to sit on same chair like other upper caste people or even not allowed to use same razor. We are offered tea in disposable cups but they refuse to provide water in glasses," he claimed. A similar issue had surfaced about a year back when a complaint was lodged with authorities who in turn visited the village and held a 'Sahbhoj' (community feast) in a bid to promote social harmony, which was attended by people of various castes. "We made efforts and organised Sahbhoj, which was participated by all. People have been living peacefully. But, such voices are being raised due to political reasons," said Sub-Divisional Magistrate (Berasia) Rajeev Nandan Shrivastava. He denied any caste-based discrimination, saying the allegations are being levelled due to personal enmity. However, Ahirwar claimed the district collector and the SDM didn't take notice of a complaint by his brother Lal Singh Ahirwar in this regard. "There was a brief respite after action was taken a year back. However, the situation remained unchanged since past three months. We have also called local MLA Vishnu Khatri in November last year but he didn't turn up," according to Ahirwar. When contacted, Khatri said complaints of casteism were found untrue by officials earlier. "Some outside leaders of a political party have got involved in this personal dispute of a couple of families. The officials had visited this village but complaints about caste-based discrimination were found untrue," Khatri claimed. However, Ahirwar alleged some dalit families in surrounding villages too have been facing the discrimination. Khatri said he would look into the matter. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A sudden surge in clashes between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed rebels killed at least seven people today despite a tattered truce in Ukraine's war-scarred east. The overall death toll reported for the past two days rose to 12 after the bloodiest outburst of violence since the former Soviet republic and its foes last month agreed an "indefinite" ceasefire. The fighting came as Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko urged German Chancellor Angela Merkel to step up economic sanctions against Moscow, and fears grew in Kiev that US support could wane should President Donald Trump draws closer to Russian leader Vladimir Putin. "Since Sunday, there have been continuing clashes and heavy attacks on our positions," Ukraine's 72nd army brigade spokeswoman Olena Mokrynchuk told AFP. The military in Kiev said three of its soldiers had died overnight. An AFP reporter in the town of Avdiivka near the de facto rebel capital Donetsk saw Kiev troops capture three rebels today. Two of them later died of their wounds. Electricity has been off since yesterday and water supplies are sporadic in Avdiivka amid the shelling and gunfire. The separatists also reported two civilians deaths from Ukrainian fire around Donetsk. The bloodshed put at risk yet another attempt by exasperated mediators to end one of Europe's bloodiest conflicts since the 1990s Balkans wars. The violence coincided with Poroshenko's visit to Berlin to meet ally Merkel -- the German leader who along with French President Francois Hollande helped hammer out a 2015 peace deal in the Belarusian capital Minsk that has failed to achieve results. "We are certain that today we need decisive and united action that can motivate Russia to sit at the negotiating table and fully implement the Minsk agreements -- particularly its security component -- to stop civilians from dying," Poroshenko said in Berlin before entering the meeting. "We believe that not only should the sanctions be maintained, but they should be intensified as well," he added. Merkel said she found the situation "worrying" but gave no indication on whether she intended to add to the pressure on Putin. Ukraine fears that staunch support from the United States could now dry up if Trump makes good on his campaign pledge to improve ties with Moscow. Ukraine worries that the war in the east will turn into a "frozen conflict" in which the rebels -- and their backers in Moscow -- control the country's former industrial heartland. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A Danish court extended today the detention of the daughter of Choi Soon-Sil, the woman at the centre of a corruption scandal that led to the impeachment of South Korea's president, until February 22, prosecution authorities said. Chung Yoo-Ra, the 20-year-old daughter of the woman dubbed South Korea's "Rasputin", is one of the figures in the influence-peddling scandal that sparked massive street protests demanding the removal of President Park Geun-Hye. Chung was detained in Denmark almost a month ago for overstaying her visa, after South Korean authorities issued a warrant for her arrest. Seoul then sought her extradition. The Danish Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions said the Aalborg district court had on Monday granted it more time to complete its processing of the case. "We have asked the Korean authorities to answer some follow-up questions. Until we receive these answers, we cannot reach a decision on the question of extradition," the office said in a statement. It said it believed it would take "some weeks to reach a decision after the information is received from the Korean authorities." Chung has denied any wrongdoing. The equestrian, who has reportedly bought horses and trained in Denmark in the past, has told police that she was in the country due to her involvement in the sport. Chung's mother, a confidante of Park, is accused of using her influence to secure her daughter's admission to an elite Seoul university, with a state probe revealing the school had admitted Chung at the expense of other candidates with better qualifications. The revelation touched a raw nerve in education-obsessed South Korea. Several professors at Ewha Women's University, including a former school president, have been investigated for allegedly giving Chung preferential treatment. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Shia cleric Maulana Kable Jawwad, who is known for his bitter relations with Uttar Pradesh minister Azam Khan, today appealed to Muslims not to vote for Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance in the upcoming assembly polls. "Congress always worked against the Muslims, while the ruling SP government did nothing for the community except betraying them. Now these parties are contesting polls in an alliance. I appeal to everyone, especially Muslims, not to vote for them in the election", he told a press conference organised by Sunni Ekta Front. When asked about the party he would support, Jawwad, who had recently met BSP leader Naseemuddin Siddiqui said, "Talks are on. I will decide about it in next three days." Coming down heavily on Akhilesh Yadav government, he alleged the present dispensation has "only given riots and by appealing in Supreme Court against Muslim youths, who were set free by the lower court, he (Akhilesh) has proved that he is "anti-Muslim". Jawwad, who is also a member All India Muslim Personal Law board (AIMPLB), has a good clout among the Shia community. He had, earlier, indulged in war of words with Khan over waqf properties issue. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Actors Ellen Page, Tim Robbins, and Chloe Grace Moretz were among the stars who joined activists to protest US President Donald Trump's immigration and travel ban on seven predominantly Muslim countries. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti joined the trio and hundreds of protesters at LAX Airport in Los Angeles for a second day of unrest, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The activists descended on the airport to protest the detention of travellers from countries on the list, including Iran, Iraq, and Syria. Moretz also joined Patricia Arquette and other activists during an LAX protest on Saturday. Similar protests were held at airports in New York over the weekend. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The US Department of Homeland Security has said the entry of green card holders into America is in national interest, amid reports of these legal permanent residents being detained at US airports and confusion over the controversial immigration crackdown by Trump administration. "In applying the provisions of the president's executive order, I hereby deem the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest," Homeland Security Secretary Gen (rtd) John Kelly yesterday said in a statement yesterday. "Accordingly, absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, lawful permanent resident status will be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determinations," he said. A green card is a document issued by the Department of Homeland Security allowing a person born outside the US to reside and work in the country and serves as proof that its holder is a permanent resident. The Department of Homeland Security said the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has immediately began taking steps to comply with the court orders. And at the same time it continues to work with departments of Justice and State to implement President Donald Trump's executive order imposing a travel ban on people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia for 90 days. The 90-day period will allow for proper review and establishment of standards to prevent terrorist or criminal infiltration by foreign nationals, the Department of Homeland Security said. Importantly, however, lawful permanent residents of the United States travelling on a valid I-551 will be allowed to board US-bound aircraft and will be assessed for exceptions at arrival ports of entry, as appropriate. "The entry of these individuals, subject to national security checks, is in the national interest," it said. In the first 30 days, DHS will perform a global country-by-country review of the information each country provides when their citizens apply for a US visa or immigration benefit. Countries will then have 60 days to comply with any requests from the US government to update or improve the quality of the information they provide, it said. DHS and the Department of State have the authority, on a case-by-case basis, to issue visas or allow the entry of nationals of these countries into the United States when it serves the national interest. As per the order, the Refugee Admissions Program will be temporarily suspended for the next 120 days while DHS and inter-agency partners review screening procedures to ensure refugees admitted in the future do not pose a security risk to citizens of the United States. The executive order does not prohibit entry of, or visa issuance to, travellers with diplomatic visas, North Atlantic Treaty Organisation visas, C-2 visas for travel to the United Nations, and G-1, G-2, G-3, and G-4 visas. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Italian Foreign Minister Angelino Alfano said today the European Union, having put up its own barriers, was in no position to judge US President Donald Trump's immigration decrees. Europe "is not in a good position to give opinions about the choices of others. Or is it that we want to forget that we too erect walls in Europe," said Alfano in an interview with the daily Corriere della Sera. During Europe's 2015 migrant crisis, as tens of thousands of desperate people arrived mainly from the war-torn Middle East, the Balkan countries shut their borders with Hungary putting up fences to stop the influx. Alfano, who was interior minister until December, noted however that Italy has taken a different position on refugees and migrants. Italy as a "world champion" rescuer of migrants crossing the Mediterranean and welcoming them to its shores, can attest to the fact that "security and solidarity can go hand in hand," he said. "Our vision is different (from Trump's) and up to now has shown to be successful with regard to security," he added, noting there was no conflating of migration and terrorism. Trump on Friday signed a three-month ban on travelers from seven Muslim countries and suspended the arrival of refugees to the United States for at least 120 days, provoking criticism and protests around the world. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Former Rajasthan minister Babulal Nagar was today acquitted by a local court of the charge of raping a married woman on the pretext of providing her a government job after prosecution failed to prove the case against him beyond reasonable doubts. Additional District Judge Prahlad Rai Sharma after hearing the prosecution and defence witnesses, said the prosecution failed to prove the case against him beyond reasonable doubts. The former minister, who was arrested by the CBI in 2013, was brought to the court from jail under heavy security cover in the morning, but the judgement was pronounced in the afternoon. Prosecution presented 19 witnesses whereas statements of 13 witnesses were taken from defence. Hearing both the sides, the court had reserved its decision. "Today, the court acquitted Nagar from rape charges," Nagar's counsel Purushottam Banwada told PTI. Nagar, who was Dairy, Khadi and Rural industries in the erstwhile Congress government, was accused of inviting the victim to his official residence in Jaipur on the pretext of getting her a government job. Later, the woman lodged a complaint at Sodala police station alleging that Nagar had raped her and threatened of dire consequences. She approached the court, after the local police allegedly tried hushing up the matter. An FIR was registered against Nagar on the court's direction, and he was booked for allegedly raping and beating the woman. Nagar was expelled from the cabinet. The CBI investigated the case and arrested Nagar on October, 25, 2013. Nagar had been lodged in Jaipur Central Jail since then and failed to secure a bail. (Reopens LGD49) Later, Nagar was released from the Jaipur central jail following the court's order. An unfazed Donald Trump has insisted his controversial decision to impose travel curbs on people from seven predominantly Islamic countries was "not a Muslim ban" as his White House doubled down to defend the step as a move to avoid a situation that exists in parts of Europe. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe," the US president said. To stress his point, Trump added: "There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order." Trump signed the order on Friday imposing an indefinite travel ban on Syrian refugees and a temporary curb on people from six other countries - Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen and Somalia - from entering the US for at least 90 days. The move has invited criticism and outrage at home and from international leaders. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has slammed the restrictions, saying it was "not justified" to target people based on their background or religion. French President Francois Hollande too has called for a "firm" response to the Trump administration "which has shown it has its own approach to the problems we all face." Germany and France are two major countries in Europe battling the huge influx of refugees escaping the war in Syria. But they have not imposed such travel restrictions. At home, Trump continued to face protests for the second day as thousands of demonstrators gathered outside the White House and at airports across the US, extending solidarity to those impacted by the travel ban. The protesters raised slogans, 'This is what America looks like!', 'The people united, will never be divided' and 'No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here,' as they waved the American flag and held placards, opposing Trump's order. However, the White House said the curbs were aimed at avoiding a situation existing in parts of France, Germany and Belgium today, pointing out the surge in terrorist attacks in European countries. Despite the global criticism, the Trump administration appears to have held its ground on the decision, saying the US is a sovereign country and it has the "right to develop a system in which we're selecting immigrants that we think will be able to make positive contributions to US society." "The reality, though, is that the situation that exists today in parts of France, in parts of Germany, in Belgium, etcetera, is not a situation we want replicated inside the US," a senior Trump administration official told reporters yesterday during a conference call requesting anonymity. "We don't want a situation where, 20 to 30 years from now, it's just like a given thing that on a fairly regular basis there is domestic terror strikes, stores are shut up or that airports have explosive devices planted, or people are mowed down in the street by cars and automobiles and things of that nature," the official said. Trump also said his administration will again be issuing visas to all countries once the US is sure it has reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. "I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering," he said in a statement. The US has always been the land of the free and home of the brave, he said. "We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say," Trump said, adding that his policy is similar to that of his predecessor Barack Obama, who in 2011 banned visas for Iraqi refugees for six months. Separately, in a series of tweets, Trump slammed senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham for their critical views about his immigration policies. "The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong - they are sadly weak on immigration. The two Senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III," his tweets said. The two Senators in a joint statement had expressed fear that the executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. "American troops are fighting side-by-side with our Iraqi partners to defeat ISIL. But this executive order bans Iraqi pilots from coming to military bases in Arizona to fight our common enemies," they had said. Family members of a 25-year old youth, working in Mumbai-based shipping company, today sought the intervention of the district administration to trace him, with whom they lost contact from last one month. Karthick Choudhary had gone to Canada on official duty some months ago and was in touch with the family till last month, his father, Rothas Singh Thala, a resident of Sulur on the outskrits, in a petition to the collector, said. Singh said that his son was working in a shipping company for the last seven years and was in Canada on official duty. However, he cannot be contacted after December and the company was not responding properly on his whereabouts, he said. In view of this, the family has sent a communication through e-mail to External Affairs ministry to provide information about Karthik, Meenakshi said. The father-daughter duo today approached the administration to prevail upon the Centre to get Karthik traced, Singh said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) "Fences", "Hidden Figures", and TV drama "The Crown" emerged as big winners at the Screen Actors Guild Awards, which saw many celebrities taking on to the stage to register their protest against US President Donald Trump's controversial immigration ban. "Fences" and "The Crown" picked up two acting honours, while the stars of "Hidden Figures" claimed the prize for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture. Denzel Washington was named outstanding performance by a male actor in a leading role for his role in "Fences", while his co-star Viola Davis took home the outstanding performance by a female actor in a supporting role. Outstanding performance by a male actor in a drama series went to "The Crown" star John Lithgow and Claire Foy topped the female category. The outstanding performance by a female actor in a leading role went to Emma Stone for "La La Land", which was the film's lone win at the ceremony. "Moonlight" star Mahershala Ali was named outstanding performance by a male actor in a supporting role. Ali indirectly addressed the immigration ban as he said, "And what I was so grateful about in having the opportunity to play Juan was playing a gentlemen who saw a young man folding into himself as a result of the persecution of his community, and taking the opportunity to uplift him and tell him that he mattered, that he was okay, and accept him. I hope that we do a better job of that." Mel Gibson-directed "Hacksaw Ridge" starring Andrew Garfield, Sam Worthington, Luke Bracey and Teresa Palmer was named outstanding action performance by a stunt ensemble in a motion picture. Bryan Cranston won the trophy for male actor in a television movie or miniseries for "All the Way", while actress Sarah Paulson won in the female category for "The People vs. O.J. Simpson". Paulson, meanwhile, encouraged people to donate to the American Civil Liberties Union, which challenges the immigration ban in court. "Any money you have to spare, please donate to the ACLU. It's a vital organization that relies entirely on our support." Outstanding performance by a male actor in a comedy series went to William H. MacCy for "Shameless" and Julia Louis Dreyfus won female actor in a comedy series for "Veep". In her acceptance speech, Louis-Dreyfus said, "I want you all to know that I am the daughter of an immigrant. My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France and I'm an American patriot and I love this country." "Stranger Things" took home the outstanding performance by an ensemble in a drama series, while "Orange is the New Black" was adjudged best comedy series ensemble. Outstanding action performance by a stunt ensemble in a comedy or drama Series was given to "Game of Thrones". Lily Tomlin was honoured with the lifetime achievement award. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Future Generali India Insurance Company (FGII) today said it has entered into a corporate agency tie-up with Bank of Maharashtra. "Bancassurance is one of the key avenues to distribute products. Our focus is to offer customised products, best customer service and sustain the trust of customers of Bank of Maharashtra," FGII Managing Director and CEO K G Krishnamoorthy Rao said in a release issued here. Currently bancassurance accounts for 5 per cent of Future Generali's total business. It has tie-up with over 100 banks across the country. "Through this partnership, we aim to immensely benefit our customers by providing them an ease of access while choosing from a diverse range of non-life insurance products, all under one roof," Bank of Maharashtra Managing Director and CEO Ravindra Prabhakar Marathe said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Former National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon today said the choice between continuing with or suspending dialogue with Pakistan was a "false binary" as talks and action against terrorism could go on simultaneously. His comments came on a day Pakistan declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend the South Asian Speakers' Summit in Indore next month. Making a distinction between what he called the "many Pakistans", Menon, during a discussion here, said while talks may be conducted with traders, ISI or the Pakistani army had an "institutional interest in hostilities with India". "I think, it is a false choice. If you stop talking, will terrorism stop? No. If you do talk, will terrorism stop? No. I think, it is a false binary. You talk if it is in your interest, if there are things you want to do. I think, it is in your interest. "Talks are not going to solve all the problems and those have to be dealt with separately. You have to counter terrorism while you are engaged in dialogue. It is not an either-or problem at all," he said. The discussion on 'Choices: Inside the Making of Indian Foreign Policy', a book authored by Menon, also saw the participation of former diplomats Shyam Saran and Ronen Sen at Sapru House here. Menon said in the age of "ultra-nationalism", India will have to make "difficult choices". Speaking on the role of leadership in foreign policy, Saran, a key player in the erstwhile UPA administration, said interventions made by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and former US President George Bush were crucial in pushing through the nuclear deal between the two countries. Sen, who was India's Ambassador to the US when the deal was being finalised, said he had received "incredible support" for his "headless chicken" comments that had landed him in a soup and attracted summonses from the privileges committees of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. He was let off the hook after he had tendered an apology. His remarks were seen as an affront to Parliamentarians. Meanwhile, both Saran and Menon batted for "strategic autonomy" over "strategic alignment" in India's foreign policy, dwelling on the issue of whether groupings such as the NAM were relevant anymore. However, Saran explained that any quest for autonomy did not necessarily have to be rigid and cited the example of India's alignment with the erstwhile Soviet Union when it served the country's interest. "Today, alignment with the US in certain areas is good for us and I agree with Ronen (Sen) that we found China more amenable, more sensitive to our interests, because of the prospect that we could be moving closer to the US," he said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Belgium has handed over Mohamed Abrini, the "man in the hat" bomber at Brussels airport last year, to France for questioning about the 2015 Paris attacks, federal prosecutors said. Abrini was captured in Brussels in April over his suspected involvement in the March 22 Brussels attacks and the Paris killings, both of which were claimed by the Islamic State group. "In the framework of the investigation related to the attacks in Paris on 13 November 2015, Mohamed Abrini was surrendered to the French judicial authorities for a period of one day," the prosecutor's office said in a statement. Eric Van Der Sypt, a spokesman, told AFP that the decision is based on "mutual agreements" between the two countries. "It's not uncommon that suspects in different cases are surrendered for one day or a few days," Van Der Sypt said. Belgian investigators have said the Brussels airport and metro bombers who killed a total of 32 people were part of the same Brussels-based cell that orchestrated the November 2015 Paris attacks that left 130 dead. Abrini, dubbed the "man in the hat" from images caught on security cameras, fled the airport without detonating his suitcase bomb after his accomplices Najim Laachraoui and Ibrahim El Bakraoui set off theirs, killing 16 people and themselves. Several sources close to the Belgian-led investigation have told AFP that the three bombers targeted passengers travelling to the United States and also Jewish and perhaps Russian targets at the airport. "That understanding has held up with later investigations, including with Abrini's alleged confession," a US law enforcement source told AFP. US sources said they are confident the airline check-in counters for flights to the United States, Israel and Russia were targeted. Abrini had a record as a long-time petty criminal who grew up in the troubled Molenbeek area of Brussels with Salah Abdeslam, the only survivor of the group that carried out the Paris attacks. Nicknamed "Brioche" after his days working in a bakery, Abrini is thought to have given up training as a welder at the age of 18 before eventually gravitating towards extremism. The Belgian of Moroccan origin was seen at a petrol station north of Paris two days before the November 13 attacks with prime suspect Abdeslam, who drove one of the vehicles used in the attacks. Belgian authorities have charged Abrini with "participation in the activities of a terrorist group and terrorist murders" over the massacres in the French capital. Identified as a radical Islamist by Belgian investigators, Abrini is believed to have briefly visited Syria last year and his younger brother Suleiman, 20, died there. He was known to security services for belonging to the same cell as Abdelhamid Abaaoud, one of the organisers of the Paris attacks who opened fire on bars, restaurants and a concert hall before he died in a police shootout shortly afterwards. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) With over a dozen prominent faces of Congress in Uttarakhand switching sides to BJP since last year, state Congress chief Kishore Upadhyay said those who have joined the saffron party ahead of polls were "greedy", describing them as "Bhasmasur" who would burn themselves as well the party they have joined. On reports of differences with Chief Minister Harish Rawat over some of the seat allotments as well as on formation of alliance with Progressive Democratic Front (PDF), the party state president said he and Rawat are like a pair of bulls who are working together to plough the field for Congress. He also claimed that Congress will form the government with two-thirds majority in the 70-seat Uttarakhand Assembly that goes to poll on February 15. "Those people who were greedy went to BJP. As many as 13 people have switched sides, it will not affect the Congress but will have a negative impact on BJP which has no (chief ministerial) face and people will decide in our favour. "Those who have switched sides have never served the party. They could not digest as they got more than what they deserved. They have become Bhasmasur for themselves as well as for the party they have joined. I don't think they will get acceptance in Uttarakhand politics," Upadhyay told PTI in an interview. Asked about the differences between him and Rawat, he said, "We are brothers. We are like the pair of bulls who are tied together to plough the field for the party. We are working for the Congress. I cannot think about going against Rawat. We can only support each other and serve the Congress". Since last year, over a dozen prominent faces in Congress, including former chief minister Vijay Bahuguna, Dalit leader Yashpal Arya and party veteran N D Tiwari, have joined the saffron party. Congress is grappling with rebellion from within the party in over half a dozen seats in the state, including Sahaspur, from where Upadhyay himself is the party's official nominee. Party leader Aryendra Sharma, who was a strong contender for the seat, has entered the fray as an Independent from there after resigning from all party positions. On Sharma's move, Upadhyay said, "I have full faith in him that he would accept the decision of the party and would withdraw from the fray. On formation of alliance with PDF, Upadhyay said, "Those who have found out the word PDF need to rethink. I want to know where is the PDF now. There was a time when it had seven MLAs. One of them died...Two joined Congress and so on". PDF was a conglomerate of three independents, three BSP and lone Uttarakhand Kranti Dal (UKD) candidates which had supported the state government. On possible outcome of the election in the state, he said Congress will from the government in Uttarakhand with two-thirds majority. "First reason is that since Harish Rawat became the chief minister in 2014, it is first time in 16 years that the feeling, which saw a huge struggle for the formation of the state, has been strengthened. People are talking about their struggle for formation of the state and discussing about its development, its people and resources". Upadhyay said people also want to change the notion that BJP and Congress form the government in the state alternate. He also hit out at the BJP-led central government, accusing it of trying to dislodge the "elected government" last year and asked the voters to give a fitting reply for such a deed. "Prime Minister Narendra Modiji should explain why they killed the Congress government on March 18. Why Uttarakhand devboomi was accused of defection. It was an elected government by the people. In a democracy, people have the power to give a befitting reply," he said. Accusing BJP government of making false promises before the polls, he said, "We are not those who come before election and say give me vote we will transfer money into your account, give pensions, reduce inflation, eliminate unemployment. And when in power, they work opposite and even control your money which is kept in the banks by imposing withdrawal limits. "Some shopkeepers told me that 60 per cent of their business was impacted due to demonetisation. Now you have to decide whether you will believe in 'jumla' or Congress which has the history of service and development," he said. Upadhyay also chastised BJP for forgetting the Ram Temple issue, which he said, was their main plank at some point of time. "If they could forget their movement against building Ram Temple and the money they collected for the purpose, BJP will take no time to betray anyone," he said. Listing out various agenda for the state, he said the main one is the women empowerment and reservation for them in government jobs. Greek police are investigating the deaths of three migrants in six days at a camp on the Aegean island of Lesbos, an officer said today. The police source told AFP authorities were awaiting a coroner's report on the deaths of a 20-year-old Egyptian, a 46-year-old Syrian and a third man who has still not been identified in the badly overcrowded camp of Moria. One man was discovered on January 24 and another on January 28. The two were found in the vicinity of the same tent -- one inside, the other outside, the source said. The third man discovered today was believed to be around 20 years old and from Pakistan. "We do not have signs that the deaths were drugs-related," the officer added. The Doctors of the World charity also reported that one more man was taken to hospital today in a similar incident. The group added that poor conditions at the camp posed "serious risk" to the life and health of the refugees and migrants held there. Some Greek media have cited carbon monoxide poisoning as a possible cause of death, as the cold weather has forced some migrants to use wood-burning stoves to keep warm. The UN refugee agency, which helps the Greek government manage the camps, declined to comment. Greece has over 60,000 refugees and migrants on its soil, the result of a series of border closures in the Balkans and eastern Europe last year. Many of the camps are overcrowded, especially on the islands facing Turkey. On Lesbos there are nearly 5,000 people in camps nominally built to hold 3,500, according to government figures. The Greek immigration ministry has refused to permit large-scale relocation from the islands to the mainland, fearing that such a move could jeopardise an EU-Turkey agreement that has helped stop further arrivals to the continent. There are frequent brawls in the island camps, with the residents tired of the long wait for asylum papers and fearful of being returned to Turkey. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Seeking to downplay Mulayam Singh Yadav's outbursts over the alliance between Samajwadi Party and Congress, Akhilesh Yadav today said he is "sure" that his father will take part in campaigning and will be "most happy" when SP is voted back to power. "I am sure Mulayam Singh Yadav will campaign for us. He (Mulayam) will be most happy if Samajwadi Party comes to power in the state," the SP president said. Akhilesh was addressing a series of public meetings in Etah, Jaithra, Patiyali and Kasganj. Voicing displeasure over the alliance between Samajwadi Party and Congress, SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav yesterday had said he would not campaign for it in the assembly polls. "I am completely against the alliance. I will not campaign for it," Mulayam had said on a day his son and Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi held their first joint press conference in Lucknow and held a road show displaying great bonhomie. Mulayam, who had rejected the possibility of an alliance for the Assembly polls before being deposed as party president by Akhilesh, had said, "Congress ruled the country for a long time and made it laggard. We always fought against Congress." "Samajwadi Party is capable of contesting elections alone. In the past, it fought alone and formed government with a majority. No occasion arose for effecting an alliance," he had said. Akhilesh alleged that BJP has "copied" his party's poll manifesto and accused the Modi government of "harassing" people by demonetisation. On alliance with Congress, he said, "Bicycle (SP's election symbol) had been strengthened by the cooperation of hand (Congress poll symbol)." He claimed that BJP's "sankalp patra" has been taken from the SP manifesto and no one can compete with his party on the basis of works undertaken by its government. "Where are the achchey din (good days) and Rs 15 lakh in the bank account of people promised by BJP ahead of 2014 Assembly election," Akhilesh asked. "People can see that we have done a lot of progress in every sphere in the last five years... We started Samajwadi ambulance service. The dial 100 for emergency police service was introduced to curb crimes and provide safety to the people," he said. Although though there were posters of Sonia Gandhi, Rahul and Priyanka along with Azam Khan and Ram Gopal Yadav on the stage, posters of Mulayam Singh Yadav were conspicuous by their absence. (REOPENS DEL 63) On the demonetisation move of the Modi government, the Akhilesh accused the Centre of harassing the common people and sought to know whether corruption and black money have been eradicated. "Poor people were harassed by forcing them to stand in long queues at banks, while the rich people did not face any problem at all," the SP leader alleged. A day after launching full fledged campaign of SP-Congress alliance, Akhilesh rebuffed the disgruntled elements in his party saying real friends are known only in times of crisis. "When it is darkness all around, you come to know who all are with you," Akhilesh said in an obvious reference to local MLA Ashish Yadav who has decided to contest as Independent candidate after denial of party ticket as well to as his father Ramesh Yadav, the Chairman of Uttar Pradesh Vidhan Parishad. "The party has given him a lot of respect... He has the biggest chair of the House of which I am a member," Akhilesh, an MLC, said referring to Ramesh Yadav. Both Ramesh Yadav and Ashish are considered to be Mulayam Singh and Shivpal Singh Yadav supporters and had openly criticised Ram Gopal Yadav. Speaking from the dais shared by local SP and Congress leaders, Akhilesh attacked BJP and BSP and stressing that his party's "bicycle" will run fast with the "hand" of Congress. Seeking another term and support for his party nominees, Akhilesh asked as to what was the way to "achchey din" as they have still eluded the countrymen after a passage of around three years of BJP government at the Centre. Speaking about BSP, the Samajwadi Party president alleged that it could only set up elephants. Several leaders from BJP and Congress also joined the party in the presence of the Chief Minister. India has provided USD 2.49 million to Nepal for the construction of postal highway which runs across the Terai region close to the Indo-Nepal border. "Ambassador of India Ranjit Rae handed over a cheque amounting to Nepalese rupees 249,710,698 equivalent to USD 2.49 million to Minister for Physical Infrastructure and Transport Ramesh Lekhak at the ministry's office at Singha Durbar in Kathmandu," according to a statement issued by the Indian Embassy here. A postal road is designated for the transportation of postal mail. It is also known as Hulaki Rajmarg which runs across the Terai region of Nepal, from Bhadrapur in the east to Dudhaura in the west, cutting across the entire width of the country. It is the oldest highway in the country constructed by Ranas to aid transportation and facilitate postal services. Ambassador Rae had inaugurated a campus building for Chautara Multiple Campus, Chautara in Sindhupalchok district situated in the east of Kathmandu last week. The building has been constructed with financial assistance of Nepalese Rupees 27 million provided by India under its Small Development Projects Scheme as part of India-Nepal Economic Cooperation Programme, the statement said. The three-storied building consists of 12 classrooms and separate rooms for campus office, accounts, store, meeting hall, computer room and science laboratories. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The 23-year-old Infosys techie who was allegedly murdered by a security guard had complained about his "advances" to the company but no action had been taken against him, her family member said today. Rasila Raju OP, who hailed from Kozhikode district of Kerala, was allegedly strangulated with a computer cable by the guard, Bhaben Saikia, after she chided him for staring at her. Her body was found in a conference room on the 9th floor of the Infosys building in Phase II of Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park at Pune last evening. "We will file a complaint for a detailed inquiry into Rasila's death. Earlier, while making calls here she had mentioned about the same security guard making advances towards her. Though she had complained to the company officials no action had been taken," her maternal uncle Manoj told PTI today. The alleged murder of the 23-year-old systems engineer has come as a shock to her family which was making arrangements for her marriage. A pall of gloom descended on the village of Kizhakkal Kadavu in the district as the of the death trickled in. "It is a rude shock for us. Rasila had made a call to her stepmother about 2.30 p m yesterday and was speaking casually," Manoj said. Saikia, a security guard from Terrier Security Services deployed at the campus, has been remanded in police custody till February 4 after police nabbed him at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus in Mumbai. Rasila had visited her native village only two months back. Her father Raju, who is working as a Home Guard with Kunnamangalam police station, left for Pune along with some relatives this morning around 8.00 a m following an intimation from her office last night that Rasila had "a medical emergency." Her relatives enquired with their contacts at Pune and got to know what had happened to Rasila. Her mother had died two years back due to cancer. Rasila's brother Rijeesh is working abroad. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Iraqi lawmakers voted today to call on the government to enact a reciprocal travel ban on Americans if Washington does not withdraw its decision to bar the entry of Iraqis. The call is a response to President Donald Trump's executive order barring citizens of Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen from entering the US for at least 90 days, a move he billed as an effort to make America safe from "radical Islamic terrorists". The travel restrictions, which come on the heels of repeated assertions by Trump that the US should have stolen Iraq's oil before leaving in 2011, risk alienating the citizens and government of a country fighting against militants the president has cast as a major threat to America. Parliament called on the Iraqi government to "respond in kind to the American decision in the event that the American side does not withdraw its decision", a parliamentary official who was present for the vote told AFP, quoting text of the decision that was read at the session. "Parliament voted by majority on calling on the Iraqi government and the foreign ministry to respond in kind," MP Hakim al-Zamili said. Sadiq al-Laban, another lawmaker, confirmed that "the vote was for a call on the government" to enact reciprocal measures. "We are against this stance from the new administration," Laban said, adding: "We hope that the American administration will rethink... This decision." Trump's decision led to the detention of incoming refugees at US airports, sparking protests, legal challenges and widespread condemnation from rights groups. And it has led to a growing backlash inside Iraq that could undermine relations between Baghdad and the US amid the battle for Mosul, the largest military operation yet in the war against the Islamic State group. The parliamentary vote came a day after its foreign affairs committee made a similar call for Iraq to respond in kind to the US measure. Hassan Shwairid, the deputy head of the committee, said that the call did not apply to the thousands of American military personnel in the country as part of the US-led coalition against IS. But US Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham said Trump's ban would impact military cooperation and security in other ways. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) An Israeli shot dead by a young Arab man in Haifa at the start of January was the target of a "terror attack", spurred on by the taunts of a girlfriend, authorities said today. On January 3, Guy Kafri was shot dead in the coastal city, shortly after Yehiel Illouz was wounded by gunfire elsewhere in the city of northern Israel. Authorities issued a gag order and launched an investigation and within a few days Mohammed Shinawi, a 21-year-old Arab, handed himself in, police said in a statement. The Shin Bet internal security agency said Shinawi had allegedly targeted Illouz, a rabbi, because of his "Jewish appearance" and then shot at a woman, but missed. Returning to his home in the Halisa district, he saw Kafri, a driver, and shot him dead. Police said Shinawi had told Shin Ben investigators he was motivated by a "hatred of Jews" as well as his growing religious observance and belief that Jews were "infidels who deserved death". Shinawi was allegedly pushed to carry out the attacks by his girlfriend calling him a "Zionist Jew" and "Jew lover". Arab Israelis make up about 17.5 percent of the Jewish state's population. Descendants of Palestinians who remained on their land after the creation of the state of Israel in 1948, they largely identify themselves as Palestinians. Shinawi was charged in Haifa district court on Monday with ideologically or religiously motivated premeditated murder and attempted murder. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Israel today said it was seeking clarification of whether US President Donald Trump's travel ban applies to tens of thousands of elderly Israeli Jews born in Middle Eastern countries. The executive order signed on Friday banned nationals of seven mainly Muslim countries for 90 days but has sparked confusion in its interpretation with people unsure whether they can travel. Israel is home to around 140,000 people born in the seven countries covered by the decree, including around 45,000 Iranians and 53,000 Iraqis, according to official statistics. The majority are over the age of 65 and many fled persecution. Their Israeli passports say where they were born. The US Consulate in Jerusalem referred a question by AFP to the US State Department, which several hours after being asked to respond was still unable to clarify whether the ban includes Israeli Jews. The Israeli authorities were also seeking clarification, foreign ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon told AFP. Michael Wildes, a partner at the Wildes and Weinberg immigration law firm in the US and a former public prosecutor, said the wording of Trump's order was unclear. He explained that the order refers to "aliens from countries" but does not explain how citizenship is defined. "Either Congress is going to legislate or the president is going to clarify the executive order but until then I advise anybody who hails from those countries against travelling." David Bier, an immigration policy analyst at the Cato Institute, agreed it was unclear how the law would be enforced. Meir Javedanfar, an Iranian-born Israeli and professor of Iranian politics at Israel's IDC Herzliya University, said Israelis born in those countries were "concerned" by the uncertainty. "It shows the chaos and lack of preparation (in the US)." Britain announced late Sunday its citizens had been given a partial exemption from the ban, allowing them to travel even if they originally come from one of the seven countries. The clarification came after Mo Farah, a Somali born four-time British Olympic gold medalist, was advised he might not be able to return to his home in the US despite not having Somali citizenship. Israeli ministers remained tightlipped over the ban, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stirred controversy by publicly supporting Trump's plan to build a wall along the southern border with Mexico. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Israel's parliament began discussions today on the final adoption of a bill that would allow it to appropriate hundreds of hectares of Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank. The text was approved by a parliamentary committee today morning, despite a spate of amendments by the opposition, and is scheduled for debate by MPs in the afternoon. Lawmakers are expected to vote on it tomorrow, with adoption seen as likely. Backed by the country's right-wing government, the bill has alarmed the international community and supporters of an independent Palestinian state. The Palestine Liberation Organisation labelled the bill a "declaration of war", and called on the international community to intervene. It would be the first time Israel has applied its own civil law to land it recognises as Palestinian-owned in the West Bank, law professor Amichai Cohen told AFP. Around 2,000 Israelis, including many settlers, protested outside Israel's parliament today in support of the law, an AFP correspondent said. The law would legalise at least 3,921 homes built in contravention of Israeli law, according to the anti-settlement organisation Peace Now. Israeli law distinguishes between settlements it considers legal and so-called "outposts", but the bill would legalise 54 of the latter, Peace Now said. The owners of the land would be compensated financially or with land elsewhere. The attorney general has told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the bill would be unconstitutional and could open up Israel to international criminal prosecutions. Even if passed by parliament, the bill could still be struck down by the Supreme Court. In a statement, Peace Now said the bill would "stain Israel's law books". "The draft law will practically allow the government and private individuals to steal lands of Palestinians without any legal implications," it said. International law considers all Israeli settlements in the West Bank, the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, to be illegal, and they are seen as a major obstacle to peace between Israelis and Palestinians. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain will attend an international conference in Bangkok next month where he will pitch for AAP government's healthcare measures including the mohalla clinic initiative, seeking to persuade the participating countries to adopt them. Jain will leave for Thailand tomorrow and attend the Prince Mahidol Conference on February 2 being organised by Prince Mahidol Foundation, the Royal Thai government and other global organisations. Noted Economist Amartya Sen, former Prime Minister of Norway and former DG of WHO, Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, will also attend the conference. "During conference, I will put forth reforms such as mohalla clinics by the Delhi government. Also, I will appeal to global leaders to adopt similar reforms in their countries so as to provide quality healthcare facilities to people," Jain said. The minister will come back on February 4. The Kejriwal government has plans to set up 1,000 mohalla clinics and around 122 poly-clinics with an aim to provide free primary healthcare to city residents closer to their home. The Prince Mahidol Award Conference is an annual event focusing on public health policy issues which are of global significance. Last week, former secretary-general of United Nations Kofi Annan-- who currently heads 'The Elders', an organisation of independent global leaders founded by Nelson Mandela-- had commended the AAP government's flagship mohalla clinic project. In a letter to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on January 25, Annan had said, "We understand that this initiative is proving very successful and we commend you on this impressive achievement." Currently, there are 106 such clinics in Delhi and according to a report published in The Lancet journal, close to 1.5 million (15 lakh) patients have visited them in the past year. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The members of Jat community in Haryana today continued their agitation in 18 districts of the state seeking reservation in government jobs and other demands. Amid elaborate security arrangements, the Jats held dharnas at several locations, which remained peaceful, officials said. "The dharnas remained peaceful in 18 districts," All India Jat Aarakshan Sangharsh Samiti (AIJASS) president Yashpal Malik told PTI over phone, adding from February 3 the Jats will hold dharnas in Delhi in support of those agitating in Haryana. "On February 3, we will begin with a dharna at Narela and then on the following days dharnas will be held in 11 districts of Delhi every day," he said. The call for the fresh stir has been given by some Jat outfits, especially those owing allegiance to AIJASS. Since yesterday, the members of Jat community have been staging peaceful dharnas at Ramayan village near Hisar-Bhiwani railway track, Jolilath village on Sonipat-Gohana road, Jassia village on Rohtak highway, Rasalwala Chowk in Jhajjar, Umrakheri village near Panipat-Shamli road, Bala village near Assandh road in Karnal and at some other places. From tomorrow, the agitation will begin in a couple of more districts, Malik said. Internet services have been suspended in the vicinity of dharna sites to check spread of rumours. Authorities have imposed prohibitory orders under Section 144 of CrPC in some areas of the sensitive districts, banning gathering of five or more people. Paramilitary forces are out in sensitive areas while heavy police force has been deployed to maintain strict vigil. The central forces have conducted flag marches in some sensitive areas, officials said. During a similar stir a year ago, there were 30 deaths and widespread destruction of property. This time, Haryana has been put on maximum alert, officials said. All the Deputy Commissioners and Superintendents of Police have been directed to ensure that highways and railway tracks are not obstructed and no damage is caused to property, they said. The state government has warned agitators against taking law in their hands. "People can protest peacefully, but if anyone takes law in one's hands, then strict action will be taken," a senior official said here. Rapid Action Force has been deployed at Munak canal in Sonipat district to ensure uninterrupted water supply to the national capital. The agitators had damaged the canal during last year's stir. Meanwhile, in Hisar, the dharna by Jats near Ramayan village was addressed by various leaders of the community on the second day of the agitation amid elaborate security arrangements. Ram Bhagat Malik, spokesperson of AIJASS claimed that the dharna would continue in a peaceful manner. While addressing a gathering, the leaders said those Jat or Khap leaders "who betrayed the community by siding with the government this time also, will have to face the consequences. The community will teach them a lesson. They have been trying to weaken the agitation". Notably, Rohtak and some of its neighbouring districts, including Sonipat and Jhajjar had been worst-hit by the violence which broke out during last year's Jat stir. Apart from the quota demand, the agitators are demanding release of arrested Jat youths from jails, withdrawal of cases registered during last year's agitation and grant of government jobs to the kin of youths killed and those injured during last year's stir. (Reopens DES32) Meanwhile, Kaithal District Magistrate Sanjay Joon has ordered closure of all liquor vends and shops within five km of Deoban village on Titram-Jind road with immediate effect. This order has been issued to prevent danger to human life, maintain peace and law and order on account of the ongoing dharna at the village. Deputy Excise and Taxation Commissioner will be responsible for enforcement of the order, which will remain in force till further orders, officials said. In view of the Jat agitation, Deputy Commissioner of Sirsa Sharandeep Kaur Brar has exhorted the people to cooperate with the district administration and not to believe in rumours. In case people find any anti-social element trying to vitiate the peaceful atmosphere, they should immediately bring it to the notice of the administration. Strict action will be taken against such anti-social elements, she said. Brar also directed the officers concerned to ensure that no objectionable audio or video or any other material which can disturb peace is broadcast or circulated through social media. Jihadist groups, including Islamic State sympathisers, have hailed the Trump administration's ban on travel to the US from seven Muslim- majority nations saying it would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists, according to a media report. Comments posted to pro-Islamic State social media accounts predicted that US President Donald Trump's executive order would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists, The Washington Post reported. One posting hailed Trump as "the best caller to Islam," while others predicted that Trump would soon launch a new war in the Middle East. "(Islamic State leader Abu Bakr) al-Baghdadi has the right to come out and inform Trump that banning Muslims from entering America is a 'blessed ban,'" a posting to a pro- Islamic State channel on Telegram, was quoted as saying. The writer compared the executive order to the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, which Islamic militant leaders at the time hailed as a "blessed invasion" that ignited anti- Western fervor across the Islamic world. Several postings suggested that Trump was fulfilling the predictions of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American born al-Qaeda leader and preacher who famously said that the "West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens," the report said. Awlaki was killed in a US drone strike in Yemen in 2011. Another posting on the Telegram channel "Abu Magrebi" said Trump's actions "clearly revealed the truth and harsh reality behind the American government's hatred toward Muslims." Leaders of the Islamic State have spoken frequently of their intention to drive a wedge between Western governments and their Muslim populations, and have welcomed outside help -- intentional or not -- in fulfilling that goal. In a 2015 essay in the Islamic State's English-language magazine Dabiq, the group said that its motivation for launching terrorist attacks in Europe was to provoke an anti- Muslim backlash that would force ambivalent Muslims to enlist with them. "Jihadists would have to argue to lengths that Obama, Bush, and others held anti-Islam agendas and hated the religion - not just radical terrorists," said Rita Katz, founder of the SITE Intelligence Group, a private organisation that monitors jihadist websites. "Trump, however, makes that argument a lot easier for them to sell to their followers," Katz was quoted as saying. The reaction to the ban from Islamic State sympathisers came as current and former US officials also expressed concern that the temporary ban would undermine the global fight against violent Islamic militants. "The effect will probably in some areas give ISIS some more propaganda," Senator John McCain told CBS . Trump last week issued a controversial executive order banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal today registered his protest with the Election Commission (EC) for its order to the Goa government to lodge an FIR against him and "sparing" the Congress and BJP leaders who, he alleged, had made similar comments for which he was "being targeted". In a letter addressed to the Chief Election Commissioner, the Delhi Chief Minister wrote that the EC had shown such an "urgency and energy" in his case that even the 2016 order of a Delhi court, wherein it had dismissed a plea for an FIR in a similar case, was ignored. He also brought media reports from Punjab and Goa to the EC's notice which claimed that Congress and BJP leaders too had asked the voters to accept bribe money but vote for them. Kejriwal claimed in the letter that only yesterday (January 29), Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh, during an election meeting in Lambi, told the voters to accept money. "He (Amarinder) told the people to take money if anybody offers it to them but vote for the Congress," he wrote. In another case, the AAP leader alleged that BJP leader and Union Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar, who is also a former Goa chief minister, said at election meetings that some parties were offering up to Rs 500 to come to their poll meetings and that they had no objection to it, but the voters should press the 'lotus' (BJP's poll symbol) button at the time of exercising their franchise. Kejriwal appealed to the EC for lodging FIRs against the leaders of the Congress and BJP with the "same urgency and energy" which he said was shown in his case. He hoped that the EC will soon seek the PMO's permission for lodging FIRs against these leaders. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The National Green Tribunal was today informed by DDA that it has alloted land on temporary basis to Delhi Police for parking impounded vehicles. The Delhi Development Authority (DDA) told a five-judge bench headed by NGT chairperson Swatanter Kumar that in compliance with its earlier order, land has been allowed at two sites -- Narela and Rohini -- for two years or till the area is designed as per policy. Advocate Kush Sharma, appearing for DDA, said no permanent structure shall be constructed on these sites and environmental compensation has already been identified as Rs 5,000 for each violation. "DDA would be entitled for 50 per cent of the parking share from Delhi Police," Sharma said. Meanwhile, NGT allowed the Delhi Jal Board's plea seeking direction to the Delhi government's transport department to allow registration of its new diesel vehicle, a truck required for maintenance of the sewage system. The bench allowed the application subject to the condition that it should be BS-IV complied diesel vehicle and GPS must be installed in it. The bench made it clear that the vehicle should play only for sewage cleaning purpose under DJB and not for private use and if the conditions are complied, the transport department should register the vehicle. The NGT premises also saw presence of a large number of defaulters to whom the green panel had earlier issued notices for not paying environmental compensation (EC) for violating its order on waste burning and dust pollution. The notices were issued on a plea filed by the East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC), through advocate Balendu Shekhar. The bench said those who were present before it today should pay EC within two weeks and issued fresh notices to the defaulters who were not served earlier. The bench was hearing a petition filed by Vardhaman Kaushik over worsening air quality in Delhi. It had earlier directed the Delhi government, DDA, Delhi Police and the municipal corporations to hold meeting and identify sites to be provided to ensure parking of impounded vehicles. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) An Arizona man was convicted on charges he helped a New York college student join the Islamic State group in Syria, a verdict Manhattan's top federal prosecutor offered as proof that civilian courts can handle terrorism cases. Ahmed Mohammed el-Gammal, a bespectacled suburban Phoenix man, did not immediately react as the jury foreman read the verdict yesterday to end the three-week trial. In a statement, US Attorney Preet Bharara cheered the verdict. "Once again, we have shown that terrorists and terrorist enablers can be brought to justice fairly, openly and swiftly in the crown jewel of our justice system civilian courts," Bharara said. The prosecutor called el-Gammal, 44, an "ambassador for ISIS right here in America," saying he actively touted and glamorized the group online, ultimately recruiting and helping Samy el-Goarany reach a training camp in Syria. Trial evidence consisted largely of social media communications between el-Gammal, el-Goarany and others before and after el-Goarany traveled to Turkey in January 2015. He reached Syria days later. Defense lawyers had warned jurors not to blame el-Gammal for online postings supportive of the Islamic State group and some of its worst tactics, including beheadings. The trial was the first Islamic State group-related prosecution to occur in Manhattan federal court, which has had more than a dozen terrorism trials in the last quarter century in buildings located just blocks from the World Trade Center towers that were destroyed in 2001. The jury foreman said jurors relied primarily on social media evidence, discounting trial testimony that included el-Goarany's mother, father and brother as government witnesses. The 24-year-old Baruch College student's brother and father both admitted lying to the FBI. The family received a letter in November 2015 saying el-Goarany had been killed fighting for the Islamic State group. Defense attorney Sabrina Shroff did not immediately comment on the verdict. In a closing argument last week, she said el-Gammal was not guilty and that he did not know el-Goarany was joining the group. She said el-Goarany engineered his own fate as he looked for meaning in life to erase feelings of inadequacy. In his closing argument, Assistant US Attorney Brandan Quigley told jurors to consider the social media they could not see. He noted that el-Gammal deleted 300 pages of Facebook messages and 969 or 970 encrypted messages related to the plot after el-Goarany told him he had trained with the Islamic State group. No sentencing date was set by US District Judge Edgardo Ramos. El-Gammal faces a mandatory minimum of 10 years in prison. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) At least one Pakistani soldier was killed when militants operating from Afghanistan targeted a border post in Khyber tribal district, the army said today. Terrorist fired at the border post in Khyber district, critically injuring soldier Waqas. Army said the injured soldier was shifted to the Combined Military Hospital in Peshawar where he succumbed to injuries. "Terrorists are resorting to fire from across the border taking advantage of weak border control on Afghanistan side. There is a requirement to check terrorists' freedom of movement on Afghan side of the border," it said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Madhya Pradesh government would seek a loan from New Development Bank (NDB) for renewal and repair of 1,500-km long district roads of the state. "The state Cabinet chaired by the Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan decided to seek a loan equal to 70 per cent of Rs 3,400 crore required for repair and renewal of major district roads," MP's Finance Minister Jayant Malaiya informed after the Cabinet meeting here this afternoon. "Seventy per cent of the total Rs 3,400 crore would be sought as loan from NDB while the state government would contribute the remaining 30 per cent," Malaiya said. Replying to a question, the minister said the loan was not for construction of new roads, but would be used for the repair and renewal of the existing roads. Informing about other decisions, Malaiya said, "The state Cabinet also approved the proposals to increase the MBBS seats in medical colleges at Rewa, Jabalpur and Indore." The Cabinet gave nod to proposals for increasing MBBS seats from 100 to 150 in Rewa Medical College, from 150 to 250 in Jabalpur's Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose Medical College and from 150 to 250 seats in Indore's MGM Medical College. Funds for expansion of these colleges along with construction of new medical colleges at Chhindwara and Shivpuri were also approved in the Cabinet, he added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) BJP today latched onto Mulayam Singh Yadav's disapproval of SP's alliance with Congress to hit out at the formation, saying it shows people and even Samajwadi Party workers are unhappy with the tie-up. Senior party leader and Union Minister Venkaiah Naidu termed the alliance as an attempt of two frustrated parties to give shelter to each other as he claimed that various surveys had projected Congress getting less than 10 seats in the 403- seat Assembly. The alliance underlined people's lack of faith in Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, prompting him to enter into an alliance with Congress even though SP had won a majority on its own in the last polls, he told reporters. "If the state government had done a good job, then what was need of an alliance when SP had got a majority on its own? It shows it has lost confidence. It has tied up with a party which destroyed the country with its corrupt rule rife with scams," he said. Akhilesh Yadav has given handle of his cycle (SP's symbol) to a hand (Congress' symbol) which destroyed the country, he alleged, asking people to consider it and vote for BJP which is fighting polls on developmental agenda. The SP government is remembered for lawlessness, corruption and attacks on dalits and women, he alleged, adding that Akhilesh may mislead people in Delhi with media advertisements but not those in Uttar Pradesh. "Mulayam Singh Yadav who founded the party is saying he will not campaign for the alliance. It shows even SP cadres are not happy," he said. Voicing displeasure over the alliance between Samajwadi Party and Congress, SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav yesterday had said he would not campaign for it in the assembly polls. "I am completely against the alliance. I will not campaign for it," Mulayam said. In a word of praise for Bihar Chief Minister and former ally Nitish Kumar, Naidu said while he had been working to develop Bihar and take it out of 'BIMARU' states, UP remained backward and problems of electricity, roads, water, education and health remained. Asserting that people will vote for BJP, he said the poor saw Prime Minister Narendra Modi as their "messiah". (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) NCP supremo Sharad Pawar has scotched rumours that his party was cosying up to BJP, saying it will never support the saffron party nor join hands with communal forces and compromise on secularism. "There are rumours being spread that NCP is growing close to BJP. This is absolutely false . NCP will never support BJP," he said addressing a public meeting in Vasco last night where he was canvassing for his party candidate Jose Philipe D'Souza. "We will never compromise on secularism. NCP will never be with the communal forces. Those who are favouring and spreading communalism, we will never be with them," said Pawar, who was recently honoured with the Padma Vibhushan, country's second highest civilian award. With Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray calling off their two-decade-old alliance with the BJP, speculation was rife that it could look at NCP to fill the crucial gap ahead of civic polls in Mumbai and other places in Maharashtra. During the public meeting last night, Pawar slammed Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the demonetisation holding him responsible for generating unemployment in the unorganised sector and spelling doom on various sectors including the powerloom industry. He accused PM of having taken the demonetisation decision to "misguide" and divert the attention of the people from his failure to bring back black money from abroad. "The PM overnight terminated a lot of currency and within a day, the entire country was standing in queues outside banks," he said. The former Union Minister also lambasted Manohar Parrikar for closing down mining industry in the state after he took over the reins in 2012 as the CM. "People who were dependent on the mining industry were forced to face a bleak future with one decision of Parrikar," he said. Pawar also accused then Congress-led central government for furthering the crisis in Goa's mining industry by allegedly revoking the environmental clearances granted to mining firms. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Describing the presence of a record five Indian-Americans in the US Congress as a "proud moment", well-known Indian-American and philanthropist Frank Islam has called for redoubling efforts to politically empower the community that comprises just one per cent of America's population. "Having gained electoral success, we must not rest on laurels. We must redouble our efforts to maintain and increase our participation in the political process, starting with local politics," he said at the 68th Republic Day celebration organised by the National Council of Asian Indian Associations (NCAIA). Islam said the November 2016 elections brought great joy for him because of the substantial political gains made by the Indian-American candidates in the congressional elections. "For the first time, we have an Indian-American senator in Senator Kamala Harris from California. Senator Harris is a rising star in American politics. She is a real talent. I am certain that you agree with me that she will scale many more heights now that she is on the national stage," he said. "We also saw Ami Bera from California returning to Washington for his third term, along with four new members: Ro Khanna from California, Washington State's Pramila Jayapal and Illinois' Raja Krishnamoorthi (and Harris)," he said. "It was a proud moment for all of us when all these fantastic five members were sworn in as members of the US Congress. What it means is we, finally, have several seats at the table!" Islam said. Addressing a gathering of several hundred people last night, Islam said it is critical for the minority community to be politically engaged not only as Indian-Americans but also as responsible citizens of this country. "I firmly believe engaging in political activities create a common cause and a unified people," he said. "Political engagement is one form of civic engagement that we should invest ourselves in to make our society and this nation a better place. Political engagement is especially important because it can provide the lever for progress in other forms of engagement," Islam said. In her remarks, Deputy Indian Ambassador to the US Reenat Sandhu said Indian-Americans have played a significant role in deepening the India-US ties. Jasse Singh, a supporter of US President Donald Trump, urged the community to support this fight against terrorism. The Indian-American community has a very important role to play in strengthening the bilateral ties, Singh added. NCAIA chairman Suresh K Gupta said with the Republican administration in place, the Indian-American community is very eagerly looking forward to playing a most enterprising and constructive role in the resurgence of the US. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denied today he had harmed relations with Mexico when he tweeted support for Donald Trump's planned border wall, accusing the "leftist media" of "Bolshevik" attacks. Israel built a more than 240-kilometre (150-mile) barrier along its border with Egypt, a route previously taken by many African illegal migrants and traffickers. Trump hailed the Israeli wall as an example last week, prompting Netanyahu to express his support for the new US president's plans to build a wall along the Mexican border. "President Trump is right. I built a wall along Israel's southern border. It stopped all illegal immigration. Great success. Great idea," Netanyahu tweeted yesterday. The comments angered Mexican officials, with the Mexican foreign ministry expressing Saturday its "deep surprise, disapproval and disappointment" over Netanyahu's statement. Today, Mexico called on Netanyahu to apologise. "We are expecting a clarification, a rectification. I think that an apology would be something appropriate in this case," Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray said. Referring to critics in the media, Netanyahu said: "They say 'you've hurt Mexico, you've ruined the relationship with them.' Who even referred to Mexico? We've had a good relationship with them and we will keep on having one." The Israeli leader, speaking at a meeting of his rightwing Likud party, accused the media of overplaying the dispute, failing to focus on the "fantastic success" of the fence built in southern Israel to prevent migrants and spreading "fake news". "I am not surprised. The leftwing media is on a Bolshevik hunting trip, brainwashing and character-assassination against me and my family," he said. Since the end of 2016, Netanyahu has been the subject of two police investigations regarding luxury gifts he and his family are alleged to have received and the other concerning meeting with the head of a prominent newspaper to try to negotiate better coverage. He denies any wrongdoing. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Delhi High Court today said there will be no eviction of anyone staying in unauthorised constructions at the Tahirpur Leprosy complex in East Delhi till April 25. A bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice Sangita Dhingra Sehgalalso issued notice to the Delhi government and DDA seeking their response before the next date of hearing. "As of today, demolition order has not being carried out. Please maintain status quo till April 25. Do not evict anyone from that place till that time," the bench said. It further said that the matter needed consideration. The court was hearing a plea by two minors, who are residents of Tahirpur complex, seeking "sympathetic consideration" from the authorities. Appearing for the minors, senior advocate Salman Khurshid said there was a demolition order and even the single judge of this court on January 17 had not granted any relief. The minors have approached the larger bench challenging the single judge's decision dismissing the pleas filed by those who had encroached in the area. The single judge had refused to interfere with the order of demolition issued by the authorities on December 23, 2016. Seeking setting aside of the single judge's order, the petitioners' counsel had said the decision has "virtually left the residents of Tahirpur Complex homeless, amidst peak winters, which is an outright violation of the Right to Life guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution. "The single judge had lamented that despite the government setting aside valuable land and money for maintenance of the complex at Tahirpur area here, the leprosy affected patients have been forced to squat and beg outside in public places due to the encroachment and illegal construction there," the court had said. The verdict had come as the single judge had dismissed the pleas by the residents of the unauthorised colonies which have come up on the land meant for the leprosy patients, against the eviction and demolition notices. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Sri Lanka today assured India that neither will its land nor water around it be used for any activity against Indian interests, amid increased Chinese naval forays into the Indian Ocean. "We assure the Indian government that nothing against India will happen in Sri Lankan land and waters around it," Sri Lankan Navy chief Vice Admiral R C Wijegunaratne said when asked about the docking of Chinese submarines there. The Sri Lankan Navy chief is on an official visit to India from January 29 to February 2. The visit is aimed at consolidating bilateral naval relations between India and Sri Lanka as well as explore new avenues for naval cooperation. Speaking to the media here, he asserted that Chinese presence in Sri Lanka was purely for economic reasons. "We have also invited Indian firms," he said. Wijegunaratne said security at the Colombo Port City (renamed Financial City) would be entrusted to the Sri Lankan Navy and not the Chinese as is being speculated. He also hoped that training of Lankan defence personnel at the Defence Service Staff College at Wellington in Tamil Nadu will restart. The Sri Lankan Navy chief held bilateral discussions with Navy chief Admiral Sunil Lanba and other senior officials. He is also scheduled to meet the Chief of the Air Staff, Chief of the Army Staff as well as the Director General, Indian Coast Guard. An interaction with the Minister of State for Defence and Defence Secretary has also been scheduled as part of the Sri Lankan Navy chief's official meetings in New Delhi. The Admiral is also scheduled to proceed to Goa where he will be visiting Naval War College and Goa Shipyard Limited besides interacting with Flag Officer Commanding Goa Area. He will further visit the Training Command of the Indian Navy based at Kochi, where he would be briefed on training aspects and visit various training facilities/professional schools. During his visit to Kochi, Wijegunaratne would interact with Sri Lankan Naval personnel undergoing training in India. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Against the backdrop of the controversy over upcoming Bollywood film "Padmavati", Hindu Janajagruti Samiti today asked filmmakers to be cautious about not "twisting" the history of Hindus in the name of cinema. "Filmmakers and actors should take lessons from the assault on Sanjay Leela Bhansali. It's the Indians who make the film fraternity earn their money. They cannot be allowed to hurt the sentiments of people and twist the glorious past of Hindus in the name of cinema," HJS spokesperson Ramesh Shinde told reporters here. Bhansali was assaulted on Friday by activists of a Rajput organisation at Jaigarh Fort in Rajasthan when he was shooting for the historical drama. The activists were angry over 'distortion' of Rajput history and especially the portrayal of queen Padmavati or Padmini. Shinde said people in Mathura have objected to script of Akshay Kumar-starrer "Toilet - Ek Prem Katha" as it "belittles the glorious tradition of the sacred city." "The Censor board too should take cognisance of the sentiments of people," he said. Shinde proposed that filmmakers should have a dialogue with leaders of community they want to make film on so that there is no opposition and they should give in writing they will not depict anything in mythology that is not true. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Amulya Kumar Patnaik, who has been appointed as Commissioner of Delhi Police, will have one of the longest tenures as the head of the force. Patnaik, who is 57-year-old, will retire in January 2020, thereby allowing him to serve at the top position of Delhi Police for almost three years. A 1985-batch officer of AGMUT cadre, Patnaik, who is currently the Special CP (Administration), will take over from Alok Kumar Verma, who has been appointed as the CBI Director. Patnaik has handled several critical assignments in Delhi Police and as the joint commissioner he had the rare distinction of heading both the Crime Branch and the Southern Range. He is known for his adept investigation skills and has been involved in detection of sensitive cases like kidnapping of a school boy by armed gangsters in Sarita Vihar which was solved in a record 12 hours. Some of the cases that he has handled include the parcel bomb case, the dreaded Asghar gang of dacoits and the Bombay blast accused. He was at the forefront of the police action to quell riots in two mammoth public rallies -- anti-Dunkel rally and Uttarakhand in 1994. In 1995, Patnaik took the initiative to launch 'Pratidhi', a Delhi Police programme to extend counselling and other assistance to victims of traumatic crimes, an initiative that is working successfully till date. During his stint as the IG of SPG, he is credited with the planning and managing the security of the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2003, who had undertaken the lone train journey ever undertaken by a Prime Minister. Patnaik handled the Central, East and South Districts of Delhi Police wherein his focus on preventive planning and police-community partnership led to a drastic fall in heinous crimes. He has taken steps like launching the Anti-Obscene Call Cell and Anti-Stalking Cell. As Special CP (Administration), he was part of the team which brought about the recently given large-scale promotions in Delhi Police. He has also served as SSP, Law & Order, Puducherry, and DGP in the sensitive north-eastern state of Mizoram. Patnaik is also a recipient of the President's Police Medal for distinguished service and the Police Medal for Meritorious Service. He also got the prestigious G-Files Excellent Contribution Award in the year 2015 for his outstanding track record of honesty, integrity and dedication to work. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Partially ending the nearly three months of cash rationing, the Reserve Bank today lifted caps on daily withdrawals from ATMs and current accounts, but retained the weekly limit of Rs 24,000 from savings bank accounts. The easing will come into effect from February 1. "On a review of the pace of remonetisation, it has been decided to partially restore the status quo ante," RBI said in a notification today. "The limits on savings bank accounts will continue for the present and are under consideration for withdrawal in the near future ... Limits on cash withdrawals through ATMs is being withdrawn from February 1," it said. The move comes as the remonetisation has reached almost 50 per cent now and a recent SBI Research report said around 70 per cent normalisation would be achieved by end-February. RBI last week had said the new currency notes in circulation had reached around Rs 9.8 lakh crore. The central bank move also comes amidst RBI rejecting a a request by the Election Commission to lift withdrawal limits for the candidates in five poll-bound states and a day ahead of the Budget Session of Parliament. The central bank said the limits on cash withdrawals from current accounts or cash credit accounts or overdraft accounts is withdrawn with immediate effect. RBI, however, said banks may, at their discretion, have their own operating limits as was the case before November 8, when the note ban was imposed. Following demonetisation, RBI had put withdrawal limit Rs 2,000 per day from ATMs and Rs 10,000 per week. Customers holding a current or overdraft or cash credit accounts, were allowed to withdraw up to Rs 50,000 in a week. Towards November end, RBI increased the caps on savings bank withdrawals to Rs 24,000 a week. Early January, it was further relaxed to Rs 4,500 per day from ATMs, but retained the weekly withdrawal limits. On January 16, RBI enhanced the ATM withdrawals further to Rs 10,000 daily, while keeping the weekly limits at Rs 24,000. The central bank also enhanced the limit on withdrawal from current accounts, overdraft and cash credit accounts to Rs 1,00,000 per week. With today's notification, a customer can withdraw Rs 24,000 in a day through the ATMs, but he will exhaust the weekly limit of Rs 24,000. The customer will have to wait for another week to withdraw beyond that. The notes that were scrapped on November 8 constituted 86 per cent or Rs 15.55 trillion of the currency in circulation. The central bank also urged banks to encourage their constituents to sustain the movement towards digitisation of payments and switching over of payments from cash mode to non-cash mode. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Always ready to volunteer their services for the country, residents of this town, located at a walking distance from the Indo-Pak international border, have one grudge -- this assembly constituency of poll-bound Punjab deserves more facilities. The residents recall how they had prepared themselves to volunteer just in case the country needed their services after tensions escalated between India and Pakistan following Indian Army's surgical strike across LoC in Jammu & Kashmir last year. "After the Army conducted the surgical strike, orders were issued for evacuation of villages within 10-km area along the border with Pakistan in Punjab. "However, despite several villages in Attari constituency being just 1 or 2 km from the border, people stayed put here. Everyone here decided that in case of war or any worst thing happening, we will move forward (towards Pakistan) along with our forces, but not retreat," 61-year-old Surjit Singh told PTI. Another resident, Harjinder Singh, a carpenter, said, "After the surgical strike, the residents here put up a brave front. Nobody left their homes. Everyone said we are the brave people of the Majha region of Punjab and if one has to die, let it be here and all said in one voice that they will move forward and not leave their homes." Perhaps the Attari residents draw inspiration from Sardar Sham Singh Attariwala, who was a general in the army of Maharaja Ranjit Singh and famous for his last stand at the Anglo-Sikh battle of Sabraon. There is a memorial dedicated to him which is located right in the main bazaar area of Attari. Two Howitzer guns have been placed in the memorial ground and these were dedicated by former Indian Army chief, General Bikram Singh, on February 10, 2014 to commemorate the 168th martyrdom day of General Sham Singh Attariwala. However, residents here lament that many villages in Attari constituency, which is next to the border with Pakistan; still continue to be in a bad shape. They claim there is hardly anything in the name of facilities including proper health and education facilities. Residents say that unsafe bridges over the defence drain create fear and four months back an accident involving a school bus killed seven students. Both Surjit Singh and another resident Jagtar Singh said Attari residents should get facilities it deserves. "There is a small hospital here, but without any facility. Doctors are not available. We have to rush to Amritsar, which is about 25 km from here, for even small things. Sewerage problem also remains unresolved. There are not much employment avenues for the youth," Jagtar said. He said border areas should be given good financial package so that entire belt gets developed and youth are gainfully employed. Attari is a reserved constituency, having a voter strength of over 1,71,586, from where senior Shiromani Akali Dal leader and Punjab Minister Gulzar Singh Ranike (59) is seeking re-election and among 10 other candidates, he faces Congress' Tarsem Singh D.C. (67), AAP's Jaswinder Singh Jahangir (39), BSP's Sukhwantjit Kaur (51) and CPI Gurdeep Singh (55). Harjinder Singh, Sakatar Singh, who is an 'arhitya' (commission agent) and fruit seller Wasim, also claim that this constituency is reeling under the impact of demonetisation. "The situation here has still not improved. Residents still have to wait for a long time in queues to withdraw money. I have to make payment to farmers, but I am unable to pay them. This is causing hardship to farmers, but we are helpless," said Sakatar Singh. Baba Jasbir Singh (60), a resident of Atalgarh village, located barely 1 km from the Indo-Pak Attari/Wagah border, talked about the problems faced by the farmers in cultivating their land situated across the barbed wire fence. "One member in a family is issued ID card and only he is allowed to go to take care of the land and the crops. There is fixed time from 10 a.M. Till 5 p.M. When one can go across the barbed wire fence. Suppose we return with trolley filled with crops or other stuff, it has to be emptied and got checked. So, there are practical difficulties which we face in taking care of our own land," Jasbir said. Notably, in 2012, Ranike had defeated Congress rival Tarsem Singh DC by 4,983 votes and in 2007 Rattan Singh of Congress by 19,083 votes. Ranike exuded confidence about his victory, saying people will vote for the SAD-BJP alliance, which has undertaken development, not just here, but across the state. "People know Congress is a sinking ship and it has nothing new to offer. AAP has no base here," he said. Tarsem Singh DC claimed people want to show the door to the Akalis, who have "looted" Punjab. He also talked about Congress' commitment to weed out the drug menace. AAP's Jahangir claimed people are desperately looking for a change this time and his party is on a strong footing. "People want to elect a clean and honest government this time," he said. Protests against Donald Trump's controversial travel ban on people travelling to the US from seven predominantly Muslim nations intensified today, with thousands of angry demonstrators gathering at many airports and streets amid mounting lawsuits and rumblings in the Republican Party over the President's executive order. Protesters in large numbers gathered outside the White House and raised slogans like 'This is what America looks like!', 'The people united, will never be divided' and 'No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here,' as they waved the American flag and held placards. The demonstrators were opposing Trump's order to block any visitors for 90 days from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Similar protests were held across the nation and at airports, where confusion continued to prevail over the order after a New York judge's order temporarily halting removal of individuals detained in the country. People gathered at Battery Park in Lower Manhattan, within sight of the Statue of Liberty, Boston's Copley Square as well as popular spots across San Francisco demonstrating and extending their support and solidarity with refugees and those impacted by the ban. Hundreds of protesters had gathered at the Dulles International Airport, while at the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, scores of Muslims pulled out their prayer rugs and knelt, and at least 50 people were taken into police custody. In a joint statement, Arizona Senator John McCain and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham called Trump's travel ban a "self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism." "This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security," the two Republican senators said. Other Republicans were similarly criticising his executive order. Representative Will Hurd from Texas called it "the ultimate display of mistrust." Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker, Tennessee, said the order "has been poorly implemented, especially with respect to green card holders." "This was an extreme vetting program that wasn't properly vetted," the Republican Senator from Ohio, Rob Portman told CNN. Already, a federal judge in New York blocked part of Trump's executive order on immigration, ruling that authorities could not remove individuals from seven Muslim- majority countries who had arrived in US airports after the order had been issued. Other judges had ruled against the order, as well, US media reports said. Also, 16 Democratic state attorneys general issued a joint statement calling Trump's move "unconstitutional, un- American and unlawful" and vowing to fight it in court. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Senior SAARC officials will meet here this week for the first time to discuss a new date for the 19th SAARC summit which was postponed by Pakistan last year after India and four others pulled out of it accusing Islamabad of not cooperating on combating terrorism. The meet on February 1-2 to attend the Programming Committee will be the first meeting of theSouth Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC)members since the postponement of the 19th summit that was supposed to take place in Islamabad November, a Nepalese Foreign Ministry official said. During the meeting, the member states will discuss a number of issues, including the budget of the SAARC Secretariat and five regional centers of SAARC, according to Foreign Ministry sources. The matter relating to rescheduling the next SAARC summit will also come up during the meeting, to be attended by joint secretaries of the SAARC countries. Nepal, current chair of the SAARC, had postponed the SAARCSummit until further notice after Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India requested to postpone the summit in Islamabad scheduled for November 9 and 10 last year, following escalation of tension between India and Pakistan. India and others had blamed Pakistan for not creating a conducive environment and not cooperating on combating cross-border terrorism in South Asia for holding the SAARC Summit, charges rejected by Pakistan. The decisions made by the programming committee will be forwarded to the Standing Committee for endorsement. SAARC, a regional body founded in 1985 in South Asia, member states include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, the Maldives, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Last week, Pakistan Prime Minister's advisor on foreign policy Sartaj Aziz said his country remains committed to hosting the 19th SAARC Summit at Islamabad at the earliest so that the objectives of regional cooperation under the SAARC umbrella can be pursued more vigorously. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Worried over domestic coking coal price hike effected by state-owned CIL, the country's largest steel maker SAIL today said it is in negotiations with the miner on the issue as it is difficult for the company to absorb the increase. "We are under negotiations with them and working model will come out," Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) Chairman P K Singh told PTI on Coal India Ltd's recent hike in coking coal prices. CIL arm Bharat Coking Coal Ltd this month increased the prices of coking coal by about 20 per cent. Another subsidiary of the world's largest miner Central Coalfields Ltd has also increased price of metallurgical coal this month. "We are in dialogue with them (CIL). We have told (them) that at this stage it is difficult for us to absorb (the hike in coking coal price). They have agreed to form a committee," Singh said. The panel which will be constituted will have members from both the state-owned firms. SAIL too is a state-owned firm and is a prime consumer of coking coal as well as a major customer of CIL's metallurgical coal. "We have an MoU with Coal India. Once we are in that MoU that pact remains applicable for the entire financial year. MoU means we also have an assured offtake from Coal India and We take coking coal from them. We take domestic coking coal supply only from Coal India," Singh said. According to an official, the price of various grades of coking coal of CIL varies between Rs 2,400 and Rs 5,050 per tonne. Asserting that SAIL was unable to recover its cost of production, he said there was a lot of pressure on its operations. On possibility of price increase by the steel PSU, he said "it will depend on market situation". Of its total requirement, SAIL imports 86 per cent of metallurgical coal, while the rest is sourced indigenously. The steel PSU has existing captive coking coal production of nearly 0.5 million tonnes per annum. The global coking coal price which was at USD 80 per tonne in January last year rose to USD 283 per tonne in December, Indian Steel Association Secretary General Sanak Mishra said. However, in early January, global price of metallurgical coal came down to USD 193 per tonne, Mishra said. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Saudi Arabia's King Salman has backed US President Donald Trump's request to have safe zones in war-torn Syria and Yemen as the two leaders agreed to strengthen bilateral economic and energy cooperation, the White House has said. "The President requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said after Trump and the Saudi King had their first telephonic conversation yesterday. During the call, the two leaders reaffirmed the longstanding friendship and strategic partnership between the US and Saudi Arabia. "They agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of radical Islamic terrorism and also on the importance of working jointly to address challenges to regional peace and security, including the conflicts in Syria and Yemen," the White House said. Trump and the Saudi King also agreed on the importance of "rigorously" enforcing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran and of addressing Iran's destabilising regional activities. Trump voiced support for the Kingdom's Vision 2030 economic programme. Both leaders expressed desire to explore additional steps to strengthen bilateral economic and energy cooperation. "The two leaders also discussed an invitation from the King for President Trump to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future, economically and socially, for the people of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the region," the White House said. "The President and King Salman closed by underscoring their personal commitment to continued consultations on a range of regional and bilateral issues," it said. According to the White House, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad bin Zayid Al Nuhayyan in another telephone call also supported the idea of safe zones in Syria and Yemen. "The two leaders reaffirmed the strong partnership between both countries and committed to further strengthen cooperation on fighting radical Islamic terrorism. They discussed recent developments in the Middle East, including the fight against ISIS and joint efforts to address the conflict in Yemen and elsewhere in the region," the White House said. "The President also raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative. The President and Crown Prince closed by underscoring their commitment to close consultations on issues of mutual concern," it added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Saudi Arabia's King Salman has backed US President Donald Trump's request to have safe zones in war-torn Syria and Yemen as the two leaders agreed to strengthen bilateral cooperation and "rigorously" enforce the Iranian nuclear deal, the White House has said. "The President requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said after Trump and the Saudi King had their first telephonic conversation yesterday. During the conversation, the two leaders reaffirmed the longstanding friendship and strategic partnership between the US and Saudi Arabia. "They agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of radical Islamic terrorism and also on the importance of working jointly to address challenges to regional peace and security, including the conflicts in Syria and Yemen," the White House said. Trump and Salman agreed on the importance of "rigorously" enforcing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran and of addressing Iran's "destabilising regional activities". Trump voiced support for the Kingdom's Vision 2030 economic programme. Both leaders expressed desire to explore additional steps to strengthen bilateral economic and energy cooperation. "The two leaders also discussed an invitation from the King for President Trump to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future, economically and socially, for the people of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the region," the White House said. "The President and King Salman closed by underscoring their personal commitment to continued consultations on a range of regional and bilateral issues," it said. According to the White House, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad bin Zayid Al Nuhayyan in another telephone call also supported the idea of safe zones in Syria and Yemen. "The two leaders reaffirmed the strong partnership between both countries and committed to further strengthen cooperation on fighting radical Islamic terrorism. They discussed recent developments in the Middle East, including the fight against ISIS and joint efforts to address the conflict in Yemen and elsewhere in the region," the White House said. "The President also raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative. The President and Crown Prince closed by underscoring their commitment to close consultations on issues of mutual concern," it added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Supreme Court today barred a woman and others from filing any PIL in any court in the country for making President Pranab Mukherjee as a party in her case and termed her petition as "absolutely malicious, vexatious and unjusticiable". "It is an assault on the Constitution, more so when the high constitutional authorities are involved. They have, with incurable audacity, made allegations against the respondents which are absolutely unacceptable and, in fact, can never be conceived of. "No litigant can be permitted to browbeat or malign the system. This is essential for maintaining the integrity of the institution and the public confidence in the delivery of justice. It is sheer malice. The question of issuance of any kind of writ does not arise. "On the contrary, we are disposed to think that the grievance that has been agitated is absolutely unjusticiable," a bench of Justices Dipak Misra and R Banumathi said. The apex court noted that petitioners Anindita and others have not been present in court after filing the petition and termed the plea as "vexatious and, in fact, is an expression of pervert proclivity". The bench said the present writ petition preferred under Article 32 of the Constitution "is absolutely the product of disgruntled minds obsessed with their own litigation" as they have approached the court earlier in some appeals but could not meet with success. "They have imagined situations which are beyond realm of any kind of justiciability. A Constitution Bench of this court in 2006 has clearly held that the President of India cannot be arrayed as a party to the litigation. Despite the said pronouncement, the petitioners being emboldened by some kind of imaginative faculty have described the President as Respondent No.1," the bench said. The apex court said that a litigant has space as far as he is concerned in the justice dispensation system, but he cannot assume the role that he is "the monarch of all he surveys" and "his ego, however colossal it may be, deserves condemnation and we do decry". Barring the petitioners from filing any PIL in future in any constitutional court, the court said that none of their petition under Article 226 or Article 32 of the Constitution shall be entertained unless they are personally grieved. "If the petitioners deviate from this direction, they shall be liable for contempt of this court," it said while dismissing the plea. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Supreme Court today refused to grant regular and interim bail on medical grounds to religious figure Asaram in a sexual assault case registered in Rajasthan. The bench headed by Chief Justice S Khehar also rejected an interim bail plea on health grounds in another sexual offence case lodged in Gujarat. "The instant plea is devoid of merit and hence dismissed," the bench, also comprising Justice N V Ramana, said while dealing with the bail plea on health grounds. The bench also rejected the plea for regular bail, after taking note of attacks on crucial witnesses and the attempts of the accused to delay the trial by examining prosecution witnesses on several dates. On October 28 last year, the apex court had asked Rajasthan government to respond to the plea of Asaram, facing trial in rape cases, seeking modification of the court's order directing him to undergo treatment at AIIMS in Jodhpur. The Gujarat Government had earlier told the top court that the rape case registered against Asaram would very likely proceed in an expeditious manner, adding that the trial would be completed within six months, so bail should not be granted to him in the case. The apex court had on November 18 last year sought the response of the Centre and five states on a plea seeking a CBI probe into the alleged murder of children through black magic and attacks on ten witnesses in the Asaram rape cases. Asaram was arrested by Jodhpur Police on August 31, 2013 and has been in jail since then. Two Surat-based sisters had lodged separate complaints against Asaram and his son Narayan Sai, accusing them of rape and illegal confinement, among other charges. The elder sister, in her complaint against Asaram, had accused him of repeated sexual assaults between 2001 and 2006 when she was staying at his ashram near Ahmedabad. A teenage girl had accused him of sexual assault at his ashram in Manai village near Jodhpur. The girl, who belonged to Shahjahanpur in Uttar Pradesh, was a student living in the ashram. Self-styled godman Asaram, facing prosecution in sexual assault cases lodged in Rajasthan, today failed to get relief from the Supreme Court which rejected his pleas seeking regular and interim bail on medical grounds. A bench comprising Chief Justice J S Khehar and Justice N V Ramana also rejected his interim bail plea on health grounds in another sexual offence case registered in Gujarat, saying the petition was "deviod of any merit". The apex court also observed that Asaram had placed a "fictitious document" to persuade the court to grant him bail and ordered registration of an FIR against those responsible for preparing and filing the alleged fake papers. "The instant act (of placing fictitious document through his 'parokar') constitutes a serious offence and it can't be let off merely by tendering an apology. We direct registration of an FIR based on the letter dated November 8, 2016 and also the affidavit filed in compliance of the order dated December 6, 2016," the bench said. "We direct the concerned investigating officer to complete the investigation thereof at the earliest and, in case an offence is made out, initiate criminal prosecution in accordance with the law against all the concerned parties," it said while rejecting the regular bail plea of Asaram. The apex court, while dismissing the regular bail plea, noted that trial in the matter was unnecessarily prolonged and the prosecution witnesses were being attacked, which has led to the death of two witnesses. "It is not possible for us to overlook the fact that trial in the matter was unnecessarily prolonged and one prosecution witness (Investigating Officer) was recalled for 104 days for his cross-examination. It can't be overlooked that when prosecution witnesses were examined, there were a number of attacks on the prosecution witnesses leading to the death of two of them. "We are of the view that accordingly, we find no justification in the prayer (seeking regular bail) made by the petitioner (Asaram)," the bench said. While rejecting his interim bail plea on medical grounds, the apex court said his present medical condition is "not so serious" which requires him to be transferred to another jail or another hospital as, according to the Rajasthan government, he is being treated in a hospital in Jodhpur which has all the facilities to treat him for the ailment. During the arguments, senior advocate Shekhar Naphade, who appeared for Asaram in interim bail matter, said as per the medical reports, Asaram was suffering from prostate problem and needed medical treatment for the ailment. Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for Rajasthan, argued that the medical condition of Asaram was stable and he had refused to undergo an MRI test without citing any reason. He said Asaram was being treated at the Mahatma Gandhi Hospital in Jodhpur since 2014 and high standard of treatment facilities are available there. The apex court, while rejecting Asaram's regular bail plea, noted that the petition was based on a communication issued by Jail Superintendent of Jodhpur Central jail. Regarding the "fictititous document", the bench said even the counsel for petitioner has said that it was "unreliable". On October 28 last year, the apex court had asked Rajasthan government to respond to the plea of Asaram, facing trial in rape cases, seeking modification of the court's order directing him to undergo treatment at AIIMS in Jodhpur. The Gujarat Government had earlier told the top court that the rape case registered against him would very likely proceed in an expeditious manner and the trial would be completed within six months, so bail should not be granted to him in the case. The apex court had on November 18 last year sought the response of the Centre and five states on a plea seeking a CBI probe into the alleged murder of children through black magic and attacks on ten witnesses in the Asaram rape cases. Asaram was arrested by Jodhpur Police on August 31, 2013 and has been in jail since then. Two Surat-based sisters had lodged separate complaints against Asaram and his son Narayan Sai, accusing them of rape and illegal confinement, among other charges. The elder sister, in her complaint against Asaram, had accused him of repeated sexual assaults between 2001 and 2006 when she was staying at his ashram near Ahmedabad. A teenage girl had accused him of sexual assault at his ashram in Manai village near Jodhpur. The girl, who belonged to Shahjahanpur in Uttar Pradesh, was a student living in the ashram. "The Big Bang Theory" star Simon Helberg and his wife Jocelyn Towne have slammed US President Donald Trump's immigration ban at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. While Simon held up a sign that carried the message "Refugees welcome", Jocelyn wrote "Let them in" across her chest to mark their silent protest, reported E! online. The couple posed for the shutterbugs at the SAG Awards red carpet and to send across a message to the Trump administration's new policy of banning refugees from entering the US. Simon and Jocelyn was the first ones to protest against the ban at the prestigious awards ceremony. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Former Uttar Pradesh minister Uma Kiran was today expelled by the Samajwadi Party for six years after she did not withdraw her candidature from Purkazi constituency which has been given to Congress following a pre- poll alliance between the two parties. Samajwadi Party (SP) President of state Naresh Uttam expelled her from the party for six years for not following directives of party High Command which asked her to withdraw her candidature from Purkazi, District SP President Shayam Lal told PTI here. Kiran, former state minister of state for handlooms, filed her nomination papers as an SP candidate from Purkazi which has been given to Congress after a seat-sharing agreement. SP also expelled Manish Chohan, the son of SP MLC Virender Singh, after he filed his nomination papers as an independent candidate from Shamli constituency which has been given to Congress. Earlier, party had given tickets to them but decided to leave these seats of Congress. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A burglar dubbed "Spiderman", notorious for daring acrobatic heists, went on trial today for a USD 100-million art heist in 2010 that saw works by Picasso and Matisse stolen from a Paris gallery. Vjeran Tomic, a balding 49-year-old who is a skilled rock climber, arrived in a blue overcoat and sweatshirt for his trial in Paris where he faces up to 20 years in jail if convicted of the robbery. He admitted to carrying out the heist after being arrested in May 2011 and compared himself to a famed thief from French literature as he spoke to reporters today. "What role did I have? Arsene Lupin," he told reporters with a smile, referring to the sly but charming character who ransacked rich Parisians' homes in stories first published at the start of the 20th century. Tomic and two alleged accomplices have been charged over the May 2010 robbery at the Modern Art Museum of five paintings by Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Ferdinand Leger and Amedeo Modigliani. All the artworks are still missing. Tomic is suspected of cutting through a padlocked gate and breaking a window to get into the gallery, one of the most-visited museums in Paris on the banks of the Seine. The museum's alarms had been awaiting repair for several weeks and Tomic is alleged to have somehow knocked out a security camera. Three guards were on duty that night, but the paintings were only found to be missing from their frames just as the museum prepared to open to the public the next day. When police arrested the Serb in May 2011, Tomic told them he had initially broken into the museum for Leger's "Still Life with Candlestick" from 1922, not thinking he would also be able to steal another four. Besides the Leger canvas, the other works stolen were Picasso's cubist "Dove with Green Peas" from 1912 -- alone worth an estimated 25 million euros ( USD 26.8 million) -- French contemporary Matisse's "Pastoral" from 1905, Braque's "Olive Tree near Estaque" from 1906, and Modigliani's "Woman with a Fan" from 1919. All but the Modigliani were hung in the same room in the museum, located in the well-heeled 16th district of Paris, which is run by the city and is home to more than 8,000 works of 20th-century art. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) A student union leader was today severely injured after two motorcycle-borne assailants opened fire at him on the entrance gate of UP college in Bhojubir area here, allegedly over an old enmity. Two motorbike-borne assailants, reportedly suspended students of the same college, opened fire at Sarvesh Singh with a countrymade gun, police said, adding they managed to flee after the incident. Sarvesh, who is pursuing his bachelors, sustained four bullet injuries, three in his hands and one on his back, police said. He was rushed to the nearby government hospital from where doctorsreferred him to a privatehospital in Sigra. Police have launched a manhunt to nab the culprits and further investigations are underway. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Syria's foreign minister today called on the country's refugees to return home, official media reported, without directly commenting on a US ban targeting them. Walid Muallem "renewed the invitation of the government to Syrian refugees living in neighbouring countries to return to their country", the SANA agency said. The minister "stressed the country was ready to receive them and grant them a dignified life", the agency reported, as Muallem met UN refugee agency chief Filippo Grandi. On Friday, US President Donald Trump issued an executive order to suspend Syrian refugee arrivals indefinitely and impose tough controls on travellers from seven countries, including Syria, for 90 days. The minister spoke after President Bashar al-Assad's forces yesterday retook control of a key region that supplies water to the capital. The army's recapture of Wadi Barada from rebels comes a month after Assad's forces pushed the armed opposition out of east Aleppo, taking back control of the whole of the northern city. Syria's rebels still hold to the northwestern province of Idlib, the Western Ghouta area outside the capital and areas in the south of the country. Syria's conflict has killed more than 310,000 people since it erupted in 2011 with the brutal repression of anti-government protests. The war has forced 4.8 million people to flee Syria, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Turkey has taken in more than 2.7 million Syrians, the UNHCR says, and is now the main host country. It is followed by Lebanon with more than one million Syrian refugees, according to the UN. The UNHCR says Jordan has taken in 655,000 Syrians, but Amman says the number is much higher at 1.4 million. At least another 228,000 Syrians have taken refuge in Iraq and 115,000 in Egypt, the refugee agency says. Syrian refugees have in increasing numbers travelled to, or tried to reach, Europe, making the perilous journey overground or by sea. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Congress today played down Samajwadi Party partriach Mulayam Singh Yadav's non-endorsement of its alliance with the regional outfit in Uttar Pradesh and claimed the people in the poll-bound state are in favour of the tie-up. The Sonia Gandhi-led party said Mulayam's comments opposing the alliance were his personal views. "Congress has aligned with Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Singh Yadav, and going by the tremendous response to (joint press meet of) Rahul Gandhi and Akhilesh yesterday, it is clear the people of UP favour the alliance between the two young leaders. It is time to support the new leadership," party leader and MP Shashi Tharoor said. He was addressing a press conference here after releasing a "chargesheet" against the two-decade-old rule of Shiv Sena-BJP combine in the Mumbai civic body, which goes to the polls on February 21. Asked about Mulayam voicing displeasure over the SP- Congress tie-up for the Assembly polls in the most populated State, the Lok Sabha MP from Thiruvananthapuram said the former UP Chief Minister was entitled to his personal views. "I am completely against the alliance. I will not campaign for it," Mulayam said yesterday. Asked whether the tie-up with Samajwadi Party will be extended to the Mumbai civic elections also, Tharoor said his party takes alliance decisions as per local conditions. Mumbai Congress President Sanjay Nirupam, who was present at the press meet, said it was too late to discuss an alliance with SP for the BMC elections, but his party is open to a post-poll pact with the UP-based party. "We are open to a post-poll alliance with the Samajwadi Party for betterment of Mumbai," he said. Referring to the Mumbai civic polls, Tharoor said the civic corporation, which has an annual budget of Rs 38,000 crore, was not efficiently managed by the Sena-BJP combine. The saffron combine, which had been voted to power four times in the civic body, has no competence to run the civic administration, the diplomat-turned-politician said. "They have betrayed people with their failure in governance. Rs 1 lakh crore budgetary expenditure is unaudited. A sum of Rs 28,000 crore had been spent on roads in the last 10 years but this year there was 13 per cent rise in number of potholes as compared to the previous year," he said. Tharoor said the "chargesheet" brought out by the Mumbai Congress highlights the civic body's "failures" related to providing water, roads, garbage disposal, solid waste management and running hospitals and schools. (Repens BOM23) Tharoor said the metropolis symbolises the pluralist values espoused by the Congress and appealed to the Mumbaikars to give his party a chance to run India's richest civic body. To a question on division in Mumbai Congress due to AICC General Secretary Gurudas Kamat's open criticism of Nirupam's style of functioning, Tharoor said the party leadership was aware of the issue. The General Secretary in-charge (Mohan Prakash) is seized of the matter, the former Union Minister said. "This is an internal matter of the Congress and will be resolved. Hitting out at the BJP for raising the Ram Mandir issue in Uttar Pradesh, Tharoor said the saffron outfit is not worthy of engaging in serious politics and the move was aimed at polarising society for votes. Asked about the Budget session of Parliament and whether the demonetisation issue will be raised again by the Opposition, the MP said his party was concerned about the adverse impact of note-ban on the economy. "Even elementary homework was not done before the decision was announced. Sixty-two notifications were issued in five weeks by RBI (related to note exchange and other norms). Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who spoke of good governance, needs basic lessons in good governance." "Demonetisation is a classic failure and a disaster for which people will have to pay a heavy price for a long time," the Congress leader said. Toyota lost its crown as the world's top-selling automaker in 2016, company figures showed today, with the Japanese giant overtaken by Volkswagen as the industry prepares for an uncertain trade environment under US President Donald Trump. The German automaker moved back into the top spot despite being hit by a massive emissions cheating scandal that rocked its reputation. The carmaker, once a paragon of German industry, was plunged into its deepest-ever crisis after it emerged in September 2015 that it installed emissions-cheating software in millions of diesel engines worldwide. However, the crisis seemed to have little effect on the firm's standing with drivers as it announced this month that annual sales rose 3.8 per cent in 2016. The results were boosted by strong performance in China which helped push total sales to 10.3 million, after slipping to 9.93 in 2015. VW group also includes the brands Audi, Porsche and Skoda. Toyota today said it sold 10.175 million vehicles worldwide last year, a 0.2 per cent increase. The annual figures come as the industry faces an uncertain outlook year with President Trump threatening punitive tariffs on imports into the United States in a bid to force them to manufacture and hire there. Trump targeted Toyota in one his fiery tweets, criticising its ongoing project to build a new factory in Mexico and threatening it with painful tariffs. He has also pledged to review several trade deals that he says are detrimental to American workers. (Reopens FGN27) Japan's Kyodo agency reported that Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda will meet Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday, ahead of the latter's scheduled summit next week with Trump. Toyota said it could not comment on the report, while Japan's chief government spokesman Yoshihide Suga would not confirm it. Toyota shares ended flat Monday. "Toyota has problems in China, whereas VW is very strong in China and is using it as en engine of growth," said Hans Greimel, Asia editor for Automotive . "That's the difference that matters," he told AFP. "They might be neck-and-neck right now but maybe long term you have to be a big player in China, and Toyota is still playing some catch-up there." "In the US, another key market, Toyota has a big advantage over VW but it is running out of steam because it is not able to tap the boom there for SUVs as much as its rivals." Volkswagen admitted in September 2015 to installing so- called "defeat devices" in 11 million vehicles worldwide, after their existence was revealed by the US Environmental Protection Agency. The software caused engines to reduce emissions of harmful nitrogen oxide when they were undergoing regulators' tests. VW agreed this month to plead guilty to fraud and pay fines amounting to USD 4.3 billion in the US to close its emissions cases with the Department of Justice. President Donald Trump today denied his immigration order was to blame for the chaos at nation airports over the weekend, instead pointing to computer glitches, protesters and even the "tears of Senator Schumer." "There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter the country," Trump wrote in a series of early morning tweets. "This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world!" In another tweet, Trump defended his decision to take swift action on his proposed travel ban, saying there are "a lot of bad 'dudes' out there." "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the 'bad' would rush into our country during that week," Trump said. Trump's order temporarily suspends all immigration for citizens of seven majority Muslim countries for 90 days. But he enters his second week in office amid a global backlash to his policies. European Union officials denounced his immigration order as a dangerous embrace of isolationism and inequality, while the international aid group Doctors Without Borders accused Trump of keeping people "trapped in war zones, directly endangering their lives." In Iraq, two lawmakers there said the Iraqi parliament has approved a "reciprocity measure" restricting the entry of Americans into Iraq. Meanwhile, it's unclear how Trump's order would make the nation safer. The order does not address homegrown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. And the list of countries in Trump's order doesn't include Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. The president tweeted early Monday that only 109 out of 325,000 "were detained and held for questioning" following his executive order to bar individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries. The Homeland Security Department has used 325,000 as the number of international air travelers who arrive every day to the US. "Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer," he added. Trump was referring to a Delta systems outage Sunday night that led to departure delays and cancellations of at least 150 Delta flights. However, the chaos started Saturday as protesters packed some of the country's major airports to demonstrate against the executive order. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Facing flak over his immigration and refugee policy, US President Donald Trump today defended his decision and questioned the integrity of the opposition Democratic party and the media for creating "all the outrage". "Where was all the outrage from Democrats and the opposition party (the media) when our jobs were fleeing our country?" Trump said in a tweet as he lashed out at both the media, whom he has now started describing as an opposition party and the Democratic party. Trump said only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. "Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of (Democratic) Senator (Charles) Schumer," he said. The Homeland Security Secretary Gen (rtd) John Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. "MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!" Trump tweeted. "There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world!" Trump said in another tweet to his 22.9 million followers. "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the 'bad' would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad dudes out there!" said the US President. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Bhoomata Brigade chief and gender rights activist Trupti Desai, who shot to fame for spearheading the agitation seeking parity to women over their restricted entry into places of worship, has now announced to launch a new campaign for a liquor-free Maharashtra. "I am going to launch the statewide campaign soon, and it will start from Pune. There are more men who consume liquor but its the women suffer most because of it. Liquor consumption also increases domestic violence; Hence I am keen on setting up 'Taigiri' groups that would extend support to women suffering in such cases," Desai told PTI today. "If a district like Chandrapur can successfully implement a flat ban on liquor, why not entire Maharashtra state follow suit," Desai said. If Guardian ministers of each district initiate the process, liquor ban can be implemented in a few days, she felt. Desai alleged that the state government seems to be not concerned with key issues of liquor consumption and its impact on lives of people, especially women in this state. "After holding a couple of meetings with the members of the Brigade, I will soon launch the campaign," Desai said. "I am going to follow the path of Mahatma Gandhi during my agitation across the state. If the state fails to take appropriate steps, then I am going to intensify the agitation," Desai warned. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Turkey reopened its embassy in Libya's capital Tripoli today after a closure of almost three years due to the security situation in the country, the foreign ministry said. The embassy has been closed since July 2014 but preparations to reopen the mission had been supervised in recent months by Turkey's ambassador to Libya, Ahmet Aydin, who until now had been based in Tunis. "As a result, activities of the Turkish embassy in Tripoli have resumed today Monday with a reduced staff at the initial stage," the ministry said in a statement. While Turkey closed its embassy in Tripoli and consulate in Benghazi in 2014, its consulate in Misrata has remained open. "The reopening of the embassy will allow Turkey to make stronger contributions to efforts to build peace and stability, as well as reconstruction in Libya," the ministry said Turkey had high hopes for a strong alliance with Libya after the 2011 NATO-backed ouster of longtime strongman Moamer Kadhafi and was the first country to appoint an ambassador to the new authorities in Tripoli in September 2011. But Libya has been riven by lawlessness and violence since, with rival parliaments and armed groups vying for control of the country and its vital oil wealth. A government based in the town of Tobruk, which did not control Tripoli but was recognised by the international community, often accused Turkey and Qatar of backing its Islamist rivals based in the capital. But Turkey strongly backed UN-brokered peace talks that led to an agreement in December 2015 to bring stability to the country. Fayez al-Sarraj formed a UN-backed government of national accord in Tripoli last year but it has struggled to assert itself further east, where a rival parliament and Khalifa Haftar's self-proclaimed Libyan National Army hold sway. Ankara has in the last few months moved to improve relations with several regional players, sealing normalisation agreements with Israel and Russia and improving relations with Gulf states. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Six alleged narcotic drug peddlers, two of them African nationals, were apprehended from Jubilee Hills here today, police said. The alleged drug peddlers were nabbed in a joint operation of different wings of Hyderabad Police, which also seized 370 gm of cocaine, Rs 46,000 in cash, 12 cellphones, one car and a bike from them. They were identified as Mandela James, from South Africa, Drake Owen, a Ghanaian, Abhishek Kumar, an artist, G Srinivasulu, J E Naveen Kumar and M Srinvas, a police release said. James, the alleged kingpin of the drug racket who operated from Mumbai, and Owen came to India on business visa and were engaged in garments export business. "The accused persons were supplying cocaine for Rs 3,500 per gram to locals, who in turn, were selling it to others for higher price," police added. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Even as the Raj Thackeray-led MNS knocked at the doors of Shiv Sena for a tie-up in the upcoming civic polls, Uddhav Thackeray today said he has not received any alliance proposal from anyone and reiterated that his party would fight the elections all alone. "We have entered the electoral battlefield with full resolve. No proposal for alliance has come to us from anyone. We will not have any alliance with anyone. We will contest on our own strength," the Sena president said, putting to rest the speculations about joining of hands of the estranged cousins. Responding to Uddhav's statement, MNS leader Bala Nandgaonkar said, "I had personally gone to 'Matoshree' (Uddhav's residence) and offered proposal for alliance in the interest of Mumbai. But if Uddhav Thackeray says that no proposal was given, then I am a liar." Nandgaonkar met the MNS president at 'Krishna Kunj', the latter's residence in Dadar. Meanwhile, an MNS source said that in the proposal, the party had asked Shiv Sena to give the party the seats that it currently holds in Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC). MNS currently has 28 corporators in the Sena-BJP ruled BMC. The MNS, which had bagged 111 seats in urban civic bodies in 2012, is now finding itself alone. According to political observers, MNS is suffering from some sort of "trust deficit" and "credibility crisis", a perception its leaders and functionaries refuse to share. Five years ago, the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena, riding on Raj's charisma and "anti-north Indian immigrant" agenda, had bagged 28 seats in Mumbai corporation, seven in Thane, 29 in Pune, four in Pimpri-Chinchwad, two in Nagpur and one in Akola. On January 26, Uddhav had announced that his party would contest the upcoming civic polls in the state all alone, putting to rest speculations about forging of ties with its ally BJP for upcoming civic polls. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Congress rebel Shilpi Arora, who is fighting as an independent candidate from Kichcha seat against Chief Minister Harish Rawat, today accused him of furnishing false information in his nomination papers. Arora, who filed a complaint with the Election Commission, accused the chief minister of providing false income details in his papers and claimed that he was possessing two PAN cards. She also claimed that his signature appeared to be different from the one used during his 2014 bypoll nomination from Dharchula. The rebel leader demanded that his nomination be cancelled. She registered her complaint along with BJP candidate Rajesh Shukla but EC officer Naresh Chandra Durgapal, after hearing both parties, dismissed it. Rawat's advocate Charan Singh termed the allegations false and said they were intended to gain publicity. On the allegation of Rawat's two PAN cards, he said the IT department had already been informed about this and currently the CM is using only on PAN card. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Benjamin Swartez, an artist from United States, wants to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi to brief him about his projects related to world peace and art therapy. Swartez has travelled 57 countries for providing art therapy to people of all age. "Among many others, I have brought my unique courses of art therapy to handicapped children in Argentina, India and to kids affected by war in Congo, Uganda, Israel and Bosnia," Swartez told PTI. "From Vadodara, I will be going to Jaipur where I will visit an orphanage and provide art therapy session to the occupants there. After that, I will go to Nepal for helping sex workers and rescue them," said Swartez, who runs an NGO Voices of Children in the US. "Recently I undertook Syrian Refugee Art Therapy project and taught therapy to over 800 former child soldiers for which I stayed for three months in Syria," he added. Swartez, another US based artist Robert Markey and pithora artist Mansingh Dhanji earlier joined hands for making paintings on the outerwall of Vadodara Municipal Corporation (VMC) owned Sir Sayajirao Nagargruh (town hall) located in Akota area of the city. Municipal commissioner of VMC Vinod Rao, said, "Changing the face of this town hall through this unique blending of western and pithora arts will attract more tourists to the city." Markey said "I have visited 8 countries including Sri Lanka and done mural paintings there with help of local NGOs there. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Madras High Court today directed the Tamil Nadu Government to file a detailed counter affidavit on allegations of police excesses on 'peaceful' protesters at Chennai's Marina Beach during the recent pro-jallikattu agitation. In a related development, the court's Madurai bench also ordered issuing a notice to the state government, DGP and district police officials on a PIL seeking a judicial inquiry into charges of police excesses on agitators in Alanganallur and some other places in Madurai district on January 23. Passing interim orders on petitions filed by two senior advocates seeking a CBI inquiry, Justice R Mahadevan directed state's Advocate General R Muthukumaraswamy to file a detailed counter affidavit within two weeks responding to the petitioners' averments. The judge sought explanation on three main points raised by the petitioners who alleged that the peaceful protesters were attacked, police were involved in violence and treatment was denied to the victims. Petitioners B Kumar and R Gandhi have sought a CBI inquiry into alleged police excesses against the pro-jallikattu protesters who held a week-long stir at the Marina Beach demanding that the ban on the bull taming sport be lifted. The counsel for Kumar, who also participated in the stir, claimed he had video evidence to show that police instigated violence and damaged vehicles. He also alleged that police forced their way into the houses of innocent people and damaged articles. At this, the Judge sought to know whether his client was directly involved in the agitation and affected by the action to which the counsel said he had enough material to prove his point and pressed for an independent probe. The Judge then said the government itself had made a statement that it would look into the demand for action against officials allegedly involved in the incidents. The counsel replied that "the City Police Commissioner had in a statement justified the Police action" and even said the video purportedly showing a police personnel torching a vehicle was morphed. Noting that the police do not know that such statements could go against them, the Judge said the government suo motu announced it will take action against any erring police personnel. Submitting that everything went on peacefully during the week-long protest, Gandhi questioned the need for the "sudden" lathicharge on the protesters and deployment of 15,000 police personnel on January 23. He sought to know under whose orders, the "peaceful protesters" were removed and lathi-charged. In Madurai, issuing notice on a petition by one P Kanagavel, a division bench comprising Justices A Selvam and P Kalaiarasan directed the State Home Secretary, the DGP, City Police Commissioner and the District Superintendent of Police to file counter affidavits before February 15. The petitioner alleged police had attacked peaceful protesters in Alanganallur village and Tamukkam Grounds, Sellur and Periyar bus terminus in the city. He claimed that several protesters were detained illegally. He prayed for a judicial inquiry into the police action, besides seeking a direction to the state government to provide proper treatment to those injured. When the matter came up for hearing, the Additional Advocate General (AAG) opposed it, saying a case had been registered against the petitioner as well and hence the PIL was not filed in public interest. He also claimed that 10 buses and three police vehicles were damaged in the violence by the agitators. A total of 48 people had been arrested and remanded in judicial custody, he added. The petitioner's counsel alleged police personnel had set fire to vehicles. Global telecom giant Vodafone today said it is in discussion to merge its India mobile business with Aditya Birla group's Idea Cellular -- a move that would create the largest telecom entity to take on rivals such as Airtel and Reliance Jio. "Vodafone confirms that it is in discussions with the Aditya Birla group about an all-share merger of Vodafone India (excluding Vodafone's 42 per cent stake in Indus Towers) and Idea," Vodafone said in a statement. Any merger will be effected through issuance of new shares in Idea to Vodafone and would result in de-consolidation of Vodafone India, it added. A Vodafone-Idea combined entity would have 43 per cent revenue market share as against the 33 per cent of Bharti Airtel currently and 13 per cent for Reliance Jio by 2018-19, a CLSA report had said. Vodafone did not share the details of the potential deal, saying, "there is no certainty that any transaction will be agreed, nor as to the terms or timing of any transaction". While Bharti Airtel is the largest telecom operator in India with 263.35 million mobile subscribers, Vodafone has 202.79 million users and Idea Cellular 187.68 million. With 32.84 per cent, Bharti Airtel has the maximum market share, but the combined entity of Vodafone India and Idea will command 43 per cent, say analysts. "Our analysis of a potential merger of Vodafone India with Idea Cellular reveals that such a mega deal would change the industry order," CLSA had said. (REOPENS DEL 17) In a BSE filing, Idea Cellular said it constantly evaluates various opportunities to enhance stakeholders' value. "As part of the exercise, the company has been in preliminary discussions with Vodafone," it said. Idea emphasised that the fundamental premise of preliminary discussion is based on "equal rights" between Aditya Birla Group and Vodafone in the combined entity. "In view of the fact that the discussion is at preliminary stage, the company is not in a position to share any further details... Further there is no certainty that the discussion with them will result in any agreement," the company said. Meanwhile, Vodafone sources said that the potential merger talk is all about remaining fully invested in the country and creating value through a larger enterprise. The merger, if it goes through, would create a new leader in the Indian mobile and data industry challenging rivals Bharti Airtel and Jio and hence further intensifying competition. "As per our analysis, a merger with Idea Cellular would be the best fit for Vodafone India, particularly as the two operators' operational strengths are complementary. Moreover, Vodafone India's potential merger with Idea Cellular would also pave the way for a backdoor listing of its business without going through an IPO process," CLSA had said in its mid-January note on the potential mega merger. The merger would help Vodafone India improve its positioning in the mass market while Idea Cellular would gain from Vodafone's strength in metro circles, it had said. "Not only would the combined entity become the industry leader but also a strong competitor in the data market with 3G spectrum across India and the highest 4G spectrum in the 1800 MHz band, enabling sufficient capacity spectrum," CLSA had said. At a time when the city was on high alert and police patrolling in Lutyens Delhi intensified, thieves struck a watch showroom in Connaught Place and allegedly decamped with "680 watches worth Rs 1.30 crore". The incident took place on January 28 at the showroom located in Regal Building, police said. According to the complainant, Mayank Barodia, "When we came to the shop in the morning, the guard informed us about the theft last night. We found that watches of brands like Seiko, Casio, Guess, Fossil, Titan, Omega, Longines, Rado, etc, had been stolen. "They also took away Rs 1.5-2 lakh in cash and all the watches that had come for repair... About 680 watches were stolen in all." The clasp on the shutter was found broken. The guard was not on duty that night since he was not feeling well and had gone to sleep, said Barodia. "We do not keep the CCTV cameras switched on since it's an old shop and the wiring is weak. The cameras are switched off at night," he added. Meanwhile, police are trying to scan CCTV footage of the nearby shops and bank ATMs to gain clues to the accused. It is suspected to be the handiwork of a gang that had also struck the showroom of an electronics major. Police are also questioning the employees of the showroom. "The accused haven't been identified yet but we are investigating the matter. They haven't yet shared the list of the items that have been stolen," said a senior police officer. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) The Centre today told the Delhi High Court it has been decided to grant a three-month provisional visa extension to a Yemeni student who is claiming refugee status and seeking that he be not deported to his country as his life is under threat there. The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and the Foreigner Regional Registration Office (FRRO) said the student was released from a detention centre at Lampur in Narela here on January 27 and his provisional visa would be extended for three months to facilitate his stay for seeking admission in a Ph.D programme of Delhi University. MHA and FRRO said that if he gets admission he shall be granted regular visa extension. However, if he fails to get into the Ph.D programme of the varsity, he would be asked to exit the country. The submissions were made in an affidavit placed before Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva who listed the matter for further hearing on March 20. In its affidavit, filed through central government standing counsel Rajesh Gogna, the government has said the Yemeni student was kept in the detention centre to restrict his movements till arrangements were made for deporting him as "there was every likelihood that the petitioner might go underground". The government has claimed that he was doing various courses from here to prolong his stay in India as he did not want to return to his country. It also contended that the request of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for granting him long- term visa cannot be considered as 35 Yemeni nationals arrived in India after January 2015 when the crisis in Yemen erupted and 26 out of them have already left. "So contention of the petitioner does not hold true," it said. The petitioner, in his plea filed through advocate Gunjan Singh, has contended that he is a Sunni Arab and his community has been targeted by Houthi rebels and other non-state actors such as al-Qaeda and the government there. According to his plea, he had a valid visa till October 31, 2016 and under the garb of extending it, he was kept at the detention centre at Lampur Sewa Sadan here. The Yemeni student had arrived in India in 2013 for studies and has done a post-graduate course in commerce from Pune University, the petition said and added that he has been given 'refugee' status by UNHCR and should not be deported. (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) By Kate Holton and Sankalp Phartiyal LONDON/MUMBAI (Reuters) - Britain's Vodafone Group confirmed on Monday it was in talks to merge its Indian subsidiary with local rival Idea Cellular in an all-share deal that would create a new market leader better able to contest a brutal new price war. Vodafone, the world's second-largest cellphone operator, has endured a tumultuous ride since it entered India in 2007, with fierce competition and a high-profile tax battle making a business contributing more than 10 percent of its revenues and profits its most unpredictable by far. "There is no certainty that any transaction will be agreed, nor as to the terms or timing of any transaction," Vodafone said on Monday of its talks with Idea. Last year the market was thrown into fresh turmoil with the launch of Reliance Jio Infocomm, the new 4G mobile broadband network built at a cost of more than $20 billion by India's richest businessman Mukesh Ambani as part of his Reliance Industries conglomerate. Jio has made an immediate impact with the launch of free voice calls and cut-price data services, forcing the country's three biggest operators - Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea - to slash prices and accept lower profits. Jio's aggressive assault on the market forced Vodafone to take a $5 billion writedown on Vodafone India last year, prompting Chief Executive Vitorio Colao to say at the time that the market would have to consolidate. "I think consolidation is the answer," he said. "You cannot defy the rules of economics." According to analysts at Berenberg, a combined Vodafone-Idea group would have around 375 million subscribers and around a 36 percent market share, well ahead of Bharti with around 260 million subscribers. Berenberg also said the two firms would complement each other geographically, although some overlaps could require divestments to satisfy the regulators. Shares in Vodafone were up 2.7 percent at 199 pence by 1211 GMT. Shares in Idea Cellular were up 25 percent, its biggest gain on record, adding 71 billion rupees ($1.05 billion) to its market value, while shares in Reliance Industries were up 2 percent and Bharti Airtel was up 7 percent. Idea said that the initial talks were based on equal rights between its owner, Aditya Birla Group and Vodafone, with Vodafone getting shares in Idea. MARKET TURMOIL Analysts have long expected consolidation in India's telecoms industry, where the market is divided into 22 geographical areas, or circles. Under the rules, companies are restricted on the percentage of airwaves they can own in each circle to prevent any one group becoming too dominant. Shares in market leader Bharti Airtel surged on hopes for reduced competition after saying last week its net profit for the December quarter slumped to its lowest level in four years because of competition from Jio. "The immediate benefit for the next one to two years for Idea and Vodafone would be to extract synergy values," said a telecoms industry analyst at a domestic brokerage not authorised to talk to the media. He added that a smaller field would also make it easier for Jio to "get a decent market share and make profits." As with some other joint ventures that Vodafone has, a merger would enable the firm to deconsolidate the business, leaving it as a shareholder benefitting from dividend payments. Vodafone also said on Monday that a deal with Idea would not include Vodafone's 42 percent stake in Indus Towers, the radio masts owner created by Bharti, Vodafone and Idea. Analysts at Morningstar said if successful the deal would reduce Vodafone's subscriber base by about 40 percent and lower its revenue growth rate. However it would lead to a small increase in its core profit margin because India has lower margins than the wider group. Less than a year ago Vodafone was still planning to float Vodafone India on the local stock exchange, despite a long-running battle with the government over a $2 billion tax claim related to its acquisition of the unit from CK Hutchison in 2007. For Vodafone a sale of the Indian business to Idea could reignite speculation about an eventual tie-up between Vodafone and John Malone's Liberty Global. The two have held merger talks before but analysts say Vodafone's ownership of numerous assets in emerging markets had complicated valuations for Liberty, which is mainly interested in the European operations. ($1 = 67.9329 Indian rupees) (Additional writing by Paul Sandle; Editing by Louise Heavens, Greg Mahlich) (This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.) Some investments are sensible and work out. Some are terrible, and don't. Can we stop the silly debate on protecting bad investments, and move on? Wants TDS to be cut from 10% to 2%, and applied on commission earned, not on gross invoice value The staffing industry, representing companies such as Team Lease and Quess, wants finance minister Arun Jaitley to resolve the tax anomalies it faces, in the upcoming Budget. Global telecom giant Vodafone today said it is in discussion to merge its India mobile business with Aditya Birla group's Idea Cellular -- a move that would create the largest telecom entity to take on rivals such as Airtel and Reliance Jio. "Vodafone confirms that it is in discussions with the Aditya Birla group about an all-share merger of Vodafone India (excluding Vodafone's 42 per cent stake in Indus Towers) and Idea," Vodafone said in a statement. Any merger will be effected through issuance of new shares in Idea to Vodafone and would result in de-consolidation of Vodafone India, it added. A Vodafone-Idea combined entity would have 43 per cent revenue market share as against the 33 per cent of Bharti Airtel currently and 13 per cent for Reliance Jio by 2018-19, a CLSA report had said. Vodafone did not share the details of the potential deal, saying, "there is no certainty that any transaction will be agreed, nor as to the terms or timing of any transaction". While Bharti Airtel is the largest telecom operator in India with 263.35 million mobile subscribers, Vodafone has 202.79 million users and Idea Cellular 187.68 million. With 32.84 per cent, Bharti Airtel has the maximum market share, but the combined entity of Vodafone India and Idea will command 43 per cent, say analysts. "Our analysis of a potential merger of Vodafone India with Idea Cellular reveals that such a mega deal would change the industry order," CLSA had said. In a BSE filing, Idea Cellular said it constantly evaluates various opportunities to enhance stakeholders' value. "As part of the exercise, the company has been in preliminary discussions with Vodafone," it said. Idea emphasised that the fundamental premise of preliminary discussion is based on "equal rights" between Aditya Birla Group and Vodafone in the combined entity. "In view of the fact that the discussion is at preliminary stage, the company is not in a position to share any further details... Further there is no certainty that the discussion with them will result in any agreement," the company said. Meanwhile, Vodafone sources said that the potential merger talk is all about remaining fully invested in the country and creating value through a larger enterprise. The merger, if it goes through, would create a new leader in the Indian mobile and data industry challenging rivals Bharti Airtel and Jio and hence further intensifying competition. "As per our analysis, a merger with Idea Cellular would be the best fit for Vodafone India, particularly as the two operators' operational strengths are complementary. Moreover, Vodafone India's potential merger with Idea Cellular would also pave the way for a backdoor listing of its business without going through an IPO process," CLSA had said in its mid-January note on the potential mega merger. The merger would help Vodafone India improve its positioning in the mass market while Idea Cellular would gain from Vodafone's strength in metro circles, it had said. "Not only would the combined entity become the industry leader but also a strong competitor in the data market with 3G spectrum across India and the highest 4G spectrum in the 1800 MHz band, enabling sufficient capacity spectrum," CLSA had said. About 70,000 tax officers and employees in the country will wear black bands at work today, on Martyrs Day, to protest some recent decisions taken by the GST Council headed by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. The associations representing them said the decisions are heavily tilted towards the states which is not good for the sovereign function of the Centre to levy and collect taxes. While extending their support for successful and smooth implementation of Goods and Services Tax (GST), the associations demanded that the same has to be done in a rational and transparent manner. "However, in the present set of things and decisions, which has been taken in the recent meeting of the GST Council, it is felt that the basic structure of the scheme is being compromised and the same may lead to utmost chaos which may be detrimental not only to the revenue but also to the industry, trade and commerce in general," the associations said in a statement issued yesterday. The Council had in its January 16 meeting agreed to give states the powers to levy tax on economic activity within 12 nautical miles of territorial waters and to administer 90 per cent of the tax payers under Rs 1.5 crore annual turnover besides certain provisions of Integrated GST. These and other decisions are being objected to by the officers working under Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) who feel that there is an urgent need for their review. The associations said they believe in Constitutional methods of protests only to make their voices heard and to draw the attention of decision makers. The action plan of the movement will start with wearing of black bands by 70,000 officials of CBEC on January 30, Martyrs Day, it said. The members of Indian Revenue Service (Customs and Central Excise), All India Association of Central Excise Gazetted Executive Officers, All India Central Excise Inspectors' Association and All India Central Excise and Service Tax Ministerial Officers Association will participate in tomorrow's symbolic protest. Referring to the contentious issue of dual control over the assessees, the associations said the duality of control would in turn lead to spurt in litigation amongst the states thereby increasing the burden on the courts that are already burdened. "Any decision taken in haste may lead to a situation wherein the national interest gets jeopardised and the trade and industry suffers which would not be in the interest of the nation and its economical growth," they said. Global coffee giant Starbucks has said it will hire 10,000 refugees over next five years as it vowed to not "stand silent" in the face of US President Donald Trumps order to ban people from seven Muslim-majority nations and assured it will continue to nurture the human spirit. "I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise. We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question," Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz said in a message in the wake of Trumps order that has upended lives in the US as well as across the globe. Schultz said the company will take specific actions to ensure people around the world that it will "neither stand by, nor stand silent as the uncertainty around the new Administrations actions grows with each passing day." The Starbucks Chief announced that the company has had a long history of hiring young people looking for opportunities and a pathway to a new life around the world. "This is why we are doubling down on this commitment by working with our equity market employees as well as joint venture and licensed market partners in a concerted effort to welcome and seek opportunities for those fleeing war, violence, persecution and discrimination," he said. Schultz said Starbucks is developing plans to hire 10,000 refugees over five years in the 75 countries around the world where it does business, including India. "And we will start this effort here in the US by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support," he said. Starbucks will also strengthen its business in the "critically important market" Mexico, which has been a target of Trumps policies. Schultz said the company has been open for business in Mexico since 2002, and have since opened almost 600 stores in 60 cities across the country, which together employ over 7,000 Mexican partners. "We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same," he said. He also outlined Starbucks plans to ensure healthcare coverage to its employees in the wake of Trumps plans to scrap Obamacare. "We are in business to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time ? whether that neighborhood is in a Red State or a Blue State; a Christian country or a Muslim country; a divided nation or a united nation. That will not change. You have my word on that," Schultz said. Trumps executive order, which imposed a minimum 90-day ban on immigrants and refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries (Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen; refugees from Syria have been barred indefinitely), has sparked an outpouring of criticism. It has been a year since Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared the setting up of an Rs 10,000 crore fund of funds to support start-ups under the aegis of a 'Startup India, Standup India' banner. The move was widely appreciated and was also showcased as the government's big effort to support entrepreneurship ecosystem in the country. The government promised that the initiative would enable creation of 18 lakh jobs and that a 6X multiple factor (in terms of additional debt and equity investment) would make the fund's impact about Rs 60,000 crore. The idea of the government providing funding support is not new globally and even in India states like Karnataka had their KITVEN fund operational since 1999, which has had a above average success track record, and is running its 4th fund with several successful exits. Just by the scale of the Central fund, much was expected. Though a number of people, including this writer, were sceptical whether the state should get into funding. There were good reasons for the scepticism. In India there are already successful angel investors/seed funds/venture capital/private equity available in the country. There is no dearth of funds available for innovative ideas. On the contrary if any, investors chase the few good ideas. It took the government about 6 months till June 2016, when it was announced that the cabinet had approved funding for this scheme and expertise of SIDBI would be uitlised in deploying it. In September 2016, it was again announced that six centres of excellence to promote and fund start-ups under National Initiative for Development and Harnessing Innovation (NIDHI) would be setup. There was no clarity whether this was a part of the earlier start-up fund proposed or was a separate initiative. The curious thing is, nearly a year after a grandiose Rs 10,000 crore sum was announced, there seems to be no start-up which has been funded under this corpus. The government should clarify in the budget what is the current status of the start-up fund, how many, if any start-ups have been funded, who is monitoring the fund, whether the fund is being run by professionals or government bureaucrats. Unless there is clarity, one would not have a clear picture of what happened to the start-up fund. It was announced today that the Gift Voucher Shop (GVS), the Irish company behind the One4all multi-store gift card brand, has reported a 21% increase in sales year-on-year in 2016. One4all Gift Card sales for the final quarter of 2016 surpassed 96m in Ireland and 37m in the UK. The biggest increase in 2016 overall was in online sales, which went up by 31% for the year. This upsurge in sales in 2016 is part of a continuing trend for One4all. The business has succeeded in building upon an exponential growth in recent years - growing 26% in 2015, up from 13% in 2014 by focusing on an improved online purchasing process, wider distribution, a wide-reaching Christmas advertising campaign and major additions to the gift card's retail line-up. One4all formed landmark partnerships in 2016, most notably with Littlewoods Ireland and Penneys One4all is the first third-party gift card to be accepted in Penneys stores. Iconic UK brand M&S also joined the One4all Gift Card in the UK in late 2016, a major coup for the business. Furthermore, One4alls continued growth helped drive over 114m of incremental sales to Irish retailers in 2016, as gift card redemptions rose 33% year-on-year. In particular, spending in Electrical retailers saw an increase of 46%, while Fashion retailers benefitted from a 43% increase and Hotels & Spas saw a 43% increase in One4all Gift Card redemptions. Consumers spent over 35 million in One4all Gift Cards in December 2016, demonstrating the hugely beneficial impact gift card sales have had on the retail sector in the run-up to Christmas. Commenting on One4alls 2016 sales, Group CEO at the Gift Voucher Shop, Michael Dawson said, "The biggest increase in 2016 sales was online, as our online sales increased by more than 31% in Ireland and a massive 61% in the UK." He added, "This is reflective of both a society that is moving online across the board and our continued efforts to capitalise on this trend by refining and improving our online experience. We expect to see this trend continue in 2017, and have plans for new and innovative products to continue to command the gifting market." Source: www.businessworld.ie About us UK Prime Minister, Theresa May is to travel to Dublin today to meet the Taoiseach, Enda Kenny. The talks are likely to focus on arrangements for the common travel area (CTA) between the UK and Ireland once Brexit is complete. The two governments will also aim to make the inevitable customs controls once the UK has left the EU single market as unobtrusive as possible. Sources believe the Irish government is likely to remain tight-lipped on the actual Brexit negotiations. At best, Theresa May might reiterate her ambition for transitional arrangements to avoid a cliff-edge Brexit in early 2019, once the two-year negotiating period is complete. However, to do so will require the agreement of all remaining EU-27 countries. European counties may also be reluctant to provide clarity on a transitional deal, precisely because it will give the EU leverage in the forthcoming negotiations. Theresa May herself has warned that she is prepared to walk away with no deal rather than a bad deal. Davy Stockbrokers suggest the leaders will find it difficult to assuage fears of a cliff-edge Brexit, whereby the UK might revert to WTO trade rules in 2019 should it fail to secure either a transitional arrangement or bilateral EU trade deal once the two-year negotiation process is complete. Such a scenario would be particularly problematic for Irelands economy given the UKs large share of exports and the high tariffs that could be imposed on the agricultural sector. According to Davy Stockbrokers, "So the possibility of the UK leaving the EU under WTO rules, without any bilateral trade deal, cannot be ruled out. In this case, UK exports would automatically be subject to EU common external tariffs. Past analysis has suggested that these would average 4.5% for UK exports, but with enormous variation across sectors. Presumably, the UK would retaliate in kind, by imposing similar tariffs on imports into the UK." Theye added, "Such a scenario would be especially problematic for Ireland. The UK accounts for 17.5% of Irish exports. EU tariffs on meat are close to 50% and 30% for dairy products, so the agricultural sector could be badly hurt were these tariffs be imposed on Irish exports. The Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) has calculated that on average exports to the UK could be subject to a 12% minimum tariff, with exports declining by 30%. So the outcome of the Brexit negotiations will be especially important for Ireland." Source: www.businessworld.ie About us It was announced today that SuperValu has signed a new contract with WIN|WIN, the Irish rewards and loyalty programme provider, which will deliver 10 million in direct revenue to Irish hotels in 2017 through SuperValus Getaway Breaks. The Getaway Breaks programme is part of the recently relaunched SuperValu Real Rewards scheme which rewards customers for their loyalty. Real Rewards has about 1 million customers who can earn points by shopping in SuperValu and who are benefiting from a growing list of exciting partners, where they can collect and use points on a wide variety of goods and services. SuperValus Getaway Breaks offers customers an average of 30% savings on hotel and holiday home breaks at Irelands leading destinations. Through the new and improved Getaway Breaks, SuperValu is adding an additional 100 hotels to the programme, over 25 of which will be added to the Inspired collection - an exclusive selection of Irelands finest premium four and five star hotels. Commenting on the announcement, SuperValu Managing Director, Martin Kelleher said, "As our Real Rewards programme continues to grow in popularity, we are pleased to be partnering with another Irish company, WIN|WIN, to deliver a 10 million revenue boost to Irish hotels this year. The expanded Getaway Breaks programme is another demonstration of SuperValus efforts to thank our customers by offering them an even bigger selection of great value breaks at quality holiday destinations across Ireland." Source: www.businessworld.ie An Enterprise Ireland trade visit to Arab Health in Dubai, the largest healthcare exhibition and conference in the MENA region, is taking place today. The trade mission is being led by Minister for Employment and Small Business, Pat Breen who will participate in a number of engagements to build on the strong relationship Enterprise Ireland has with healthcare institutions and Government bodies in the UAE including - Neuro Spinal Hospital, the Dubai Health Authority, Abu Dhabi Health Services and VPS Healthcare Group - a healthcare provider with a network of hospitals, medical centres, pharmaceutical manufacturing and pharmacy retailers globally. The exhibition has become a strategically important event for established companies in the region to build on existing market presence as well as for smaller companies and high-potential start-ups, providing them with a holistic overview of the opportunities and market environment in the region and access to key players and potential partners. Enterprise Ireland will host a stand for 20 client companies at Arab Health 2017 - 12 clients exhibiting and the remainder attending the conference. Amongst the Irish exhibits will be; drug delivery systems, medical devices, digital health technologies and pharmaceutical products. The client companies exhibiting on the Enterprise Ireland stand are - Aerogen, AmRay Medical, CF Pharma Ireland Ltd., Crospon,Fleming Medical Ltd., IPC Polymers, Kastus Technologies, Locatible, Miravex Ltd.,Novaerus, Sedana Medical Ltd., Synchrophi Systems Ltd. and 3D4 Medical. Speaking on his arrival at Arab Health, Minister Breen said, "The United Arab Emirates presents growth opportunities for Irish companies and is already a significant consumer of Irish goods. In 2015 Enterprise Ireland client company exports to the UAE were in excess of 124M." He added, "By providing a platform for Irish companies to present their solutions and network with leading healthcare professionals, Arab Health is an ideal opportunity to position Ireland as a source of world-class high tech products and solutions for the UAE healthcare sector." Source: www.businessworld.ie About us Silicon Valley took the lead over the weekend in corporate resistance to President Donald Trump's clampdown on immigration, financing legal opposition, criticizing the plan, as well as helping employees ensnared by his executive order. In an industry that has long depended on immigrants and celebrated their contributions - as well as championing liberal causes such as gay rights - there was little initial consensus on exactly how to respond to Trump's move on Friday. But, while most in the tech industry stopped short of directly criticizing the new Republican president, they went much further than their counterparts in other sectors, who were mostly silent over the weekend. Most of the major U.S. banks and auto companies, for example, declined to comment in response to Reuters inquiries. Trump ordered a temporary ban on travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries and a 120-day halt to refugee resettlement. The action triggered a global backlash, and sowed confusion and anger after immigrants, refugees and visitors were kept off flights and left stranded in airports. Bigger companies such as Apple Inc, Google and Microsoft Corp offered legal aid to employees affected by the order, according to letters sent to staff. Several Silicon Valley executives donated to legal efforts to support immigrants facing the ban. And Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk and Uber head Travis Kalanick both said on Twitter that they would take industry concerns about immigration to Trump's business advisory council, where they serve. Kalanick has faced opposition on social media for agreeing to be part of the advisory group. Kalanick in a Facebook post on Sunday called the immigration ban "wrong and unjust" and said that Uber would create a $3 million fund to help drivers with immigration issues. Among those affected by the ban was Khash Sajadi, the British-Iranian chief executive of San Francisco-based tech company Cloud 66, who was stuck in London. Like many tech workers, he holds an H1B visa, which enables foreigners with special expertise to work for U.S. companies. Sajadi said he hoped big tech companies such as Google and Facebook would take legal action to protect affected employees. That could help set a precedent for people in similar situations - but at smaller companies. "Ultimately, I think them simply speaking up is not going to move the needle with people" who are not wealthy and do not live on the East or West Coasts, he said. The response from tech companies has been "as forceful as it possibly can be," said Eric Talley, a corporate law professor at Columbia Law School. "One of the difficult aspects of reaction to the Trump administration in its first couple of weeks is trying to balance the interest of expressing legitimate concern ... against the potential cost of being out too far ahead of everyone else," he said. The tech industry also has other issues where it may find itself opposed to Trump, including trade policy and cyber security. The president of Mountain View, California-based startup incubator Y Combinator, Sam Altman, wrote a widely read blog post urging tech leaders to band together against the immigration order. He said he has spoken with a variety of people about organizing but remains unsure about the best course of action. "The honest answer is we don't know yet," he said. "We are talking with legal groups and tech groups, but this is so unprecedented that I don't think anyone has a manual." At Lyft, co-founders John Zimmer and Logan Green pledged on the company's blog to donate a million dollars over the next four years to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which won a temporary stay of part of Trump's executive order on Saturday night. Slack collaboration service co-founder Stewart Butterfield and Union Square Ventures partners Albert Wenger and Fred Wilson promised to match contributions to the ACLU. Michael Dearing, founder of venture capital firm Harrison Metal, started an effort called Project ELLIS, short for Entrepreneurs' Liberty Link in Silicon Valley, to help startups and smaller tech companies with immigration issues. "ELLIS" is a also a reference to New York Harbor's Ellis Island, where millions of immigrants arrived. In less than a day, the group has handled two cases, he said. Dearing said the idea was to "get people in touch quickly with the ... resources they would have access to if they were in a Google or an Apple or a Microsoft." Dave McClure, the founding partner of 500 Startups and an outspoken critic of Trump, said his venture capital firm will soon open its first fund in the Middle East and will shift its attention to supporting entrepreneurs in their native countries, if bringing them to the United States proves impossible. "Investing in entrepreneurs in other countries is probably one of the best things we can do to promote international awareness and understanding," he said. Rank-and-file employees were already prodding executives to go further over the weekend. Shortly after learning of Trump's order, Brad Taylor, a 37-year-old engineer for web analytics firm Optimizely, began organizing "Tech Against Trump," a protest scheduled to take place on March 14. In addition to holding a rally in Palo Alto, California, organizers of the event were urging tech workers at companies that have remained silent on Trump to walk out of their offices. Taylor said he was heartened by tech leaders' statements over the weekend but wants to see the industry go further. "The purpose of this is not to be against tech, but to urge them to be on the right side of history," he said. (Reuters) Source: www.businessworld.ie About us Goldman Sachs Group Inc CEO Lloyd Blankfein became the first major bank CEO to speak out against President Donald Trump's order to halt arrivals from several Muslim-majority countries. In a voicemail to employees on Sunday, Blankfein said the policy was not one that the bank endorsed. "This is not a policy we support, and I would note that it has already been challenged in federal court, and some of the order has been enjoined at least temporarily," Blankfein told employees. Blankfein said Goldman would work to minimize potential disruptions to employees and their families caused by Trump's order, according to a transcript seen by Reuters. Most U.S. corporate bosses have stayed silent on Trump's immigration curbs, underscoring the sensitivities around opposing policies that could provoke a backlash from the White House. While Apple Inc, Alphabet Inc's Google and Facebook Inc emailed their staff to denounce the order, many of their counterparts in other industries either declined to comment or responded with company statements reiterating their commitment to diversity. JPMorgan Chase & Co's operating committee, which includes CEO Jamie Dimon, avoided directly denouncing the policy. In a note to staff over the weekend, the firm said it was reaching out all employees affected and noted that the country was "strengthened by the rich diversity of the world around us." Other banks, including Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo & Co, said they were reviewing the executive order and its implication on staff. The U.S. hedge fund industry was virtually silent on the immigration restrictions. Representatives for most major firms -including Bridgewater Associates, Renaissance Technologies, Millennium Management and Two Sigma Investments - did not respond to requests for comment over the weekend. Private equity firms, including Blackstone Group LP whose CEO Stephen Schwarzman chairs Trump's advisory panel of business leaders, also would not comment on the travel ban. Trump's decision to select current and former Goldman bankers to high-profile positions in the administration has put the Wall Street firm back in the spotlight. Since the financial crisis, Goldman has worked to improve its image with ordinary people by focusing on its philanthropic and diversity initiatives, as well as its role in job creation. Former Goldman president Gary Cohn left the bank in December to become the head of the White House National Economic Council. Other former Goldman bankers in the Trump administration include Treasury Secretary nominee Steven Mnuchin and White House adviser Steve Bannon. (Reuters) Source: www.businessworld.ie Starbucks Corp Chief Executive Officer Howard Schultz said on Sunday that the company planned to hire 10,000 refugees over five years in 75 countries, two days after U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order banning refugees from certain countries. Trump on Friday put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily barred travelers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries, saying the moves would help protect Americans from terrorist attacks. The order sparked widespread international criticism, outrage from civil rights activists and legal challenges. Starbucks in a letter from Schultz told employees it would do everything possible to support affected workers. The hiring efforts announced on Sunday would start in the United States by initially focusing on individuals who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where the military has asked for such support, Schultz said. Schultz has been outspoken on various issues and has put Starbucks in the national spotlight, asking customers not to bring guns into stores and urging conversations on race relations. Schultz said on Sunday that if the Affordable Care Act is repealed and employees lose healthcare coverage, they would be able to return to health insurance through Starbucks. Trump and a Republican-controlled legislature are seeking to undo much of the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare. Schultz will step down as CEO in a few months to focus on new high-end coffee shops, handing the top job to Chief Operating Officer Kevin Johnson, a long-time technology executive. He will become executive chairman in April. Schultz also affirmed the company's commitment to trade with Mexico, another subject that has been front and center of Trump's campaign. (Reuters) Source: www.businessworld.ie LOGAN There was a historic moment in the field of Mormon studies 10 years ago. That was when the Utah State University Religious Studies program created the Arrington Chair. Named for former USU professor and Mormon scholar Leonard Arrington, it was the first endowed professorship at a secular university in the world specifically focused on Mormon history and culture. Philip Barlow has held the position since. Barlow said an increasing amount of other scholars around the nation are realizing the importance of studying Mormonism. More universities have also followed USU in creating endowed professorships. He said Mormonisms size and youthfulness is taken into consideration, the national interest in studying the religion is disproportionately strong. The field of Mormon Studies has been growing quite a bit over the last generation, he said. But the formal establishment of it in the academies signals a new maturity in the academy and in the Mormon culture that recognizes that this is a good thing to have an academic, even-handed, fair, but scholarly rigorous treatment of Mormonism. According to Barlow, there are several reasons for the increasing interest. One is simply the availability of material to be studied. Because of the mandate members of the LDS church have to keep records, Barlow said the amount of records is incomparably rich for a movement so young. Another reason is the religions relative youth, which is less than 200 years old. Barlow pointed to work done by non-Mormon scholar Jan Schipps, who argued that while Mormonism is a Christian religion, it differs enough from traditional Christianity that it can be considered a new religious tradition. Barlow said that idea makes it a gold mine for scholars who want to understand how a religion adapts, expands and moves past cultural, national or language boundaries just like the early Christian and Islam movements did. That same process happens in Mormonism, Barlow said. Only we can study it much more thoroughly because it is alive and here and the Mormons are with us. It is sort of like we have a time machine and can go back to the second century of the Christian era. In addition to those reasons, Barlow said the LDS church is just plain interesting. Mormonism is a fascinating thing, he said. It is perhaps the most controversial, colorful, disproportionately-impacting religious movement on the wider culture in American history for a religion that was born here, that was native to America. The church itself has aided the recent growth in scholarly interest. Barlow said the church had been more protective and leery of being misrepresented in the past, but has been more transparent and less defensive in the last 10 to 15 years. It has even aided USUs program. In October, the LDS church donated $1 million to USUs Mormon studies program to help ensure the Arrington Chair lives on. Barlow said the donation came no strings attached with hopes Mormonism will get treated fairly out in the world. In the age of the internet, there are all sorts of self-appointed commenters that arent always fully-equipped to do that at an academic level, Barlow said. The $1 million donation is about one-third of what USU needs to create a permanent position once Barlow leaves. Another $500,000 was donated anonymously in a matching grant. Barlow said there is currently no degree specifically in Mormon studies, but that some get a degree in religious studies and focus on Mormonism. He said the study of Mormonism benefits everybody, not just Mormons. Mormonism is not just for Mormons any more than the study of Russia is just for Russians or the study of the United States is just for Americans, he said. It is really a much more important topic than that. You dont understand the culture that youre operating in if you just have a street-level understanding of the religion around you. Similarly, you dont really function as a competent citizen out in the world if you dont understand something about the formal study of politics or history. Designated a National Blue Ribbon School last fall, Edith Bowen Laboratory School was recently ranked first among Utah's 58 charter elementary schools and 68th among 2,636 charter elementary schools evaluated nationally. Edith Bowen Laboratory School has been listed among the top three percent of Americas charter elementary schools, recently receiving a first place ranking from Niche.com among Utahs 58 charter elementary schools and a ranking of 68 among 2,636 charter elementary schools evaluated nationwide. Niche.com describes its website as a nationwide tool to help families choose which schools and neighborhoods best meet their needs. Niche rigorously analyzes public data, surveys, reviews and outcomes to provide community and school rankings, grades and profiles. Its 2017 charter elementary school rankings are calculated based on four weighted factors including academics (50%), comparative district analysis (20%), teacher data (20%) and culture and diversity (10%). Statistics are largely obtained from the U.S. Department of Education. Edith Bowens overall ranking is an A grade. The schools teachers are rated A+. Its just an absolute honor for our kids, our families and our school, said Dr. Dan Johnson, Edith Bowen Laboratory Schools director. Im excited for the next phases of how we move forward, and I think it just is a testimony to how hard people work and how important education is. Johnson considers Edith Bowens greatest strength to be how true the school has been to its mission, which is to educate students with place-based and project-based learning. Rather than focusing on programs, Johnson says the school emphasizes what kids need to know and what they need to be able to do. We provide them with opportunities to be able to think and to design and to construct, and it builds powerful learners, he said. I think the next step for us is to make sure we do not turn away from what we know that works. We havent designed our school to have rigid direct instruction, but rather to create a community of collaborators and a community of learners. I think the next steps are that the faculty and students need to be even more engaged in that kind of work because its going to build kids who really, truly love learning. It is so awesome, it really is. Its one of the amazing experiences of my life to watch how this has been developed. Edith Bowen Laboratory School received another prestigious honor in September 2016, having been selected among one of just three schools in Utah to be named a National Blue Ribbon School. Johnson appreciates how Edith Bowen, as part of Utah State Universitys College of Education, gives perspective teachers an opportunity to experience the schools award-winning environment firsthand. I think its important that teachers learn how to teach this way, he said, and to see the impact it can have on kids.
jennifer@cvradio.com Heidi Rutchey walks into 1st District Court, where she was ordered to have a mental competency evaluation, Thursday, Dec. 12, 2013, in Logan, Utah. Rutchey is charged with killing her two-year-old son. LOGAN A 45-year-old River Heights mother, Heidi Marie Rutchey has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, in the death of her two-year-old son, more than three-years ago. Rutchey and her defense attorney, David Perry, appeared in 1st District Court Monday morning. He entered the plea to one charge of murder, a first-degree felony and asked the court for a mental evaluation to be done, to determine her mental condition at the time of the crime. Judge Thomas Willmore said he would grant Rutchey time for the evaluation and ordered her to appear again April 19. Last November, she was found competent to stand trial after being sent to the Utah State Hospital for treatment in January 2014. Rutchey was arrested in October 2013, a month after Cache County Sheriffs deputies found her two-year-old Eli, dead inside her River Heights apartment.

will@cvradio.com How many Europeans took part in Women's Marches? Published on January 30, 2017 Story by Ana Valiente Translation by: Mike Slaski en es fr it de pl What are the international repercussions of the Global Women's March? One week on, we look at the huge number of European cities that mobilized to condemn misogyny, machism, hate and intolerance. The flashpoint was the inauguration of Donald Trump, but ultimately the marches were a call in favour of human rights. "But it doesn't stop here. Now we must put on comforatable shoes, get together with friends and family and make history. The actions continue." Following the Women's Marches across all world two weeks ago, we can draw three conclusions. One: in Europe, not all countries mobilize in the same way. Two: we live in a very interconnected world, and you it's impossible to predict the scope of a Facebook event. Three: that when there is an injustice or something you do not agree with, it's important to make it known because, as ridiculous as it seems, there's always someone who shares the same worry. It's well known, when it comes to the matter of revolutions, two heads (or 440,000) are better than one. This march, which began as a Facebook event against the inauguration of Donald Trump's misogynist comments, has inspired some 5 million people around the globe (nearly half a million in Washington alone) to protest against a political reality that, althoughdemocracatic, they consider to be unjust. The president's attitude cannot be overlooked. Because it's not only the minorities who will lose out: the whole of society will move backwards. In Europe, where attendance figures have not been published, participation has been well spread geographically. In total, 75 cities in 29 countries across the continent organised "Sister Marches", in which men and women took to the streets to share their anger. For themselves, but above all for international community. The four countries with the most marches have been the UK, with marches in 15 cities; France, with 8; Germany, with 7 and Portugal, with 5. (Map based on information from Women's March Global) Nevertheless, the winds of protest didn't blow through Europe in it's entirety. In the majority of countries, only one or two cities (principally capitals) joined the movement. Cyprus, Estonia, Croatia, Malta and Ukraine, have remained on the margins. In the Balkans, with the exception of Kosovo and Serbia, there were no manifestations. To what do we owe this absence? We can't forget that Europeans are fighting their own battles, and individual marches reflected this. Poland is a good example of how mobilizations can acheive something real; the recent #CzarnyProtest in Warsaw managed to stop the government from enacting a prohibitive abortion law. There may not have been a march in Macedonia, but women there are becoming increasingly politically active. While Donald Trump and his (mostly male) entourage sign laws to withdraw American financial support from international NGOs which assist and advise in matters of family planning, sexual health and abortion, many ask what purpose this protest has served. Is it time to throw in the towel? Never. Because history is cyclical, and as Noam Chomsky said: "You don't win victories tomorrow." Story by Ana Valiente Spanish freelance journalist based in Madrid. Currently exploring the boundless world of documentary filmmaking. Translated from La Marcha de las Mujeres, en 75 ciudades europeas | BY Ricki Green | Australian-owned brewery Coopers recently celebrated Australia Day with a national campaign of digital billboards, creating the biggest ever displayed on oOh!medias large format digital network. The campaign via KWP!, celebrated Coopers as a truly Australian brand with two different creative messages centering on the famous Coopers Pale Ale and on Coopers Australian identity. The campaign appeared simultaneously on 40 of oOh!s large format digital roadside billboards nationally as well as a range of oOh!s Fly assets throughout the day. Noel Cook, group director for oOh! Road, said the campaign marks the first time a single advertiser has made use of oOh!s national large format digital network on this scale. Says Cook: Were proud to have been able to deliver the simultaneous use of nearly all of our large format digital screens in our Road division for Coopers. Coopers has been using Out of Home advertising extensively throughout the summer, but wanted to create additional impact specifically on Australia Day. The capabilities of our dynamic network mean that we could display relevant messages that were time and region specific; with scale, to deliver truly unmissable impact to a massive number of people all over the country for Coopers. Says Cam Pearce, marketing and sales director for Coopers: We wanted to make a large national impact during one of the biggest days the Australian summer to highlight our iconic Australian beer. The assets were a great fit for Coopers because it allowed us to be dynamic with our messaging, displaying tailored creative to a number of different audiences all around Australia while building on the massive scale of our summer campaign. World Rugby commentators Greg Clark and All Black legend Christian Cullen give us their thoughts after the third round of the series. World Rugby: January 30, 2017 - As South Africa clear space for more silverware and all 16 teams hop across the Tasman to Sydney, Christian Cullen and Greg Clark looked back on a weekend of top rugby action. The World Rugby commentators had the best seat in the house over the weekend in Wellington and were pleasantly surprised by some of the sides who put their hand up on Saturday and Sunday. I really enjoyed the rugby, said Clark. I wasnt quite sure whether the teams would get up for it after the break, but there was some wonderful rugby sevens played. The final was Fiji against South Africa, so who can complain? Cullen had praise for some of the teams that sit further down the standings. You know that Fiji and South Africa are going to be there or thereabouts but Ive enjoyed watching the Canadians and the Scots this weekend. Clark added that consistency is key: I said during the commentary of the bronze medal match that the Canadians are the big improvement, from a 13th-place finish in Dubai and Cape Town to a fourth-place finish in Wellington. Consistency is key for these sides who want to bridge the gap with Fiji and South Africa. Scottish consistency is starting to come through now since their first tournament win in London last year. Theyve been competitive for the last three rounds and hopefully Canada can build too. Hosts New Zealand will be disappointed with a sixth-place finish on home soil after crashing out in the Cup quarter-finals against Fiji on Sunday. Cullen was pragmatic in his outlook: For me the two best teams made the final. I think New Zealand are struggling a little bit at the moment and have a few new guys in the squad, but theyll learn a lot from this weekend and in fairness Fiji are a quality side. The focus now moves to Sydney where the second round of the womens tournament joins up with the mens for what promises to be a thrilling weekend of rugby. With temperatures set to rise on and off the pitch, Clark is urging fans to bring shades and sun cream. The big news is that the Aussie women are going to be performing on their home soil in front of a packed house if they do make it through to the semis and the final. So its a three-day event for the very first time and its going to be a scorcher! Click here to find out where you can watch the second round of the HSBC World Rugby Womens Sevens Series on Friday and Saturday and click here to find out where you can watch round four of the mens. | BY Lynchy | Australia: After a stellar 20-year career in advertising, Todd Sampson, non-executive chairman of Leo Burnett Australia, has quit the business. Sampson stepped down as CEO in August 2015, replaced by Peter Bosilkovski in Sydney and Melinda Geertz in Melbourne. To the public, Sampson is best known in Australia for his TV appearances hosting ABCs Redesign My Brain, Network Tens Body Hack and of course as co-star of ABCs The Gruen Transfer. Says Sampson: After nearly 10 years and over eight of them as a CEO, its time for me to finally say goodbye to Leo Burnett. I have always believed your job as a leader is not complete until your succession is in place and thriving and that is the reason I stayed on over the last year as a non-executive Chair. I can confidently now say my job is done. Peter Bosilkovski in Sydney and Melinda Geertz (below) in Melbourne are doing outstanding jobs and Leo Burnett, a company I will always love, has gotten stronger and stronger. Over 20 years ago, I was studying an MBA and my marketing lecturer fell down and broke her back. As a result she got a series of guest lecturers to substitute and one of those was a creative director from an advertising agency. He spoke about ideas, imagination and how an individuals mind could change almost anything. That lecture was the start of a 20 year advertising journey that would twist and turn around the globe and eventually lead me here. Im very thankful for everything this industry has given me. Ive worked with some of the most vibrant, diverse and clever minds on three continents and Im proud to have been a part of it. Says Bosilkovski (above right): Todd may be leaving the industry in a formal capacity, but the impact, influence and invaluable contribution he has had on Leo Burnett and the advertising industry as a whole will always be remembered. During his time as CEO, we won Agency of the Year 12 times on a local, regional and global level and were in the worlds Top 10 Creative agencies three times. Monday, January 30, 2017 at 11:31AM For the latest Shot on iPhone campaign, Apple enlisted a group of photographers to capture life from dawn until dusk using the low light camera on iPhone 7. The people, sights and scenes the photographers encountered over the course of the night created a spectacular display of nighttime photography, which, beginning today, will be displayed in 25 countries. Featuring a number of photographers, the new campaign features the work of two Canadians, Toronto's Jennifer Bin and Montreal's Benjamin Plouffe Jennifer Bin, originally from Toronto moved to Shanghai 2 years ago, and it was there that she fell in love with shooting on iPhone. She has 5 images in the campaign, all taken in Shanghai. Benjamin Plouffe, originally from Montreal, now lives in South Korea and has two images in the campaign. Benjamin is an art director and travel photographer. He liked the ease of shooting on iPhone, and used it as he would have used a DSLR. Monday, January 30, 2017 at 12:25AM It might not be enough to placate Ubers critics but its at least a good place to start. The ride-sharing company is said to be creating a US$3 million defense fund to help cover the legal, translation, and immigration fees its drivers might need following U.S. President Donald Trumps travel and immigration ban. Uber CEO and founder Travis Kalanick calls the ban wrong and unjust in a new note he shared on his Facebook and Ubers newsroom. According to the post, Kalanick says they are reaching out to their employees who have been affected by the measures and they hope to help these people. Kalanick has said he plans to bring the measures to Trumps attention during this Fridays meeting of the White House economic advisory group, which he is part of. Uber received tons of flak after it continued service at JFK during a one-hour taxi service strike that protested Trumps immigration ban on January 28. Users have been deleting their accounts in protest of this. Uber has apologized for the confusion and said they turned off surge pricing or the JFK rides at the time because they wanted to let people know that it was possible to get to JFK at normal prices, especially last night [ which was the night of the protest]. Sourcce: TechCrunch The parents of two students hired Chromebooks from the school at a cost of $50 for the year, two more had paid roughly the same amount to fix devices they bought the previous year, one said their child's school had no BYOD policy and the rest paid between $300 and $480 for either a laptop or iPad. The requests represented a small fraction of the MyWay cards in use across the city but appear to have increased in frequency as use of the cards and the public transport system has grown. "It's on my mind all the time," he said. "I did the right thing and contacted them about my long service leave. I was someone who just needed help for one year after decades in the workforce. I did what they'd asked at the time. I can't pull the money out of nowhere now." Following earlier reports from the Wall Street Journal and Reuters, Bloomberg is now saying that Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam has approached Greg Maffei, CEO of Liberty Media, which controls Charter. All reports cite people familiar with the matter, but name no names, and Verizon, Charter and Liberty are no commenting on the reports. Reuters said that no formal proposal has yet been made for a tie-up, citing sources on Thursday. Charter last year became the second biggest cable operator in the US after taking over Time Warner Cable for $78 billion and Bright House Networks for $10.4 billion. Earlier this year John Malone, chairman of Liberty, talked of a combination of cable operators buying T-Mobile US from Deutsche Telekom. He also said: One could contemplate in a Trump administration Comcast and Charter could merge. According to JP Morgan, quoted by Reuters, Charter has a network potentially reaching 49 million US homes, including areas in California, Texas and Florida where Verizon sold its fixed-line business to Frontier Communications. Reuters also quotes McAdam telling Wall Street analysts last year that a Verizon-Charter deal would make industrial sense. Bloomberg said that Verizon has looked at more than 10 other options aside from Charter, including large media companies, network and cable operators and fibre-optic service providers. The financial news service also said that Bloomberg Intelligence analysts Matthew Kanterman and Joshua Yatskowitz believe that Verizon would need an additional $16.9 billion of pre-tax synergies for the deal just to break even. Verizon Market cap $203 billion Bought AOL Bidding for Yahoo, but deal in doubt because of Yahoos security breaches 111 million mobile customers 4.6 million TV customers (via FiOS fibre) 7 million internet customers Charter Communications Featured Post Human Rights Tribunals: Excessive force and murder -- San Diego Border, Standing Rock and Tohono O'odham Nation Maria Puga and twins Daniela and Daniel near where Anastacio Hernandez Rojas was murdered by U.S. Border Patrol. He was beaten and tasered a... White Mesa Ute Spiritual March to Shut Down Uranium Mill Mohawk Warrior Society Book Launch Lakota Jean Roach: The True Story of Leonard Peltier Justice for Dad: Taylor Dewey Shares the Harsh Road to Justice Justice Dept Files Lawsuit Against Rapid City Hotel Western Shoshone Ian Zabarte Speaks on Radiation Archive Search This Blog About Censored News Censored News is published by Brenda Norrell. Since 2006, Censored News has received more than 20 million pageviews. As a collective of writers, photographers and broadcasters, we publish news of Indigenous Peoples and human rights. Contact publisher Brenda Norrell: brendanorrell@gmail.com From the publisher Censored News is published by Brenda Norrell, a journalist in Indian country for 40 years. Norrell created Censored News after she was censored and terminated as a staff reporter at Indian Country Today in 2006. She began as a reporter at Navajo Times during the 18 years that she lived on the Navajo Nation. She was a stringer for AP and USA Today and later traveled with the Zapatistas through Mexico. She has been blacklisted by all the mainstream media for 14 years. Contact brendanorrell@gmail.com Translate News / International by Staff Reporter There are unconfirmed reports of a UK-based Zimbabwean man who has been arrested in Birmingham after stabbing his wife to death.According to Birmingham Mail , the 42-year-old man was found around 5am in a car with a dead body believed to be his wife.Zimbabweans on Social Media claim the couple was Zimbabwean.More to follow... News / Local by news24.com Port Elizabeth - A 22-year-old Zimbabwean man studying in Port Elizabeth was swept out to sea in rip currents on Sunday afternoon, NSRI spokesperson Chris Lambinon said.According to News24.com , when the man disappeared under the water at the beach, which Lambinon described as "barely accessible", a massive rescue operation was activated.Sardinia Bay Surf Lifeguards, who had been on duty at the swimming beach 100m away, started the search for him and a sea rescue craft was towed to Sardinia Bay, and pulled over the sand dunes to launch at the scene.The Eastern Cape health department's medical helicopter Aeromed 3, Coastal Water Rescue rescue swimmers, NSRI Port Elizabeth and sea rescue swimmers along with the police all went out to look for him, said Lambinon.His body was spotted in the surfline, 500m to the west, but the rough sea and rocks made it difficult for the rescue swimmers and the rescue craft to reach him.The search had to be suspended at last light and a police dive unit will continue with a search and recovery operation on Monday morning.His parents were visiting him from Zimbabwe at the time and are being helped by the police's trauma counsellors. News / Local by Staff Reporter Local urban authorities are littered with uncollected solid waste as service delivery continue to plummet under the watch of the MDC-T run councils, living the generality of the urban dwellers exposed to health hazards, a senior Government official has said.Ministry of Environment, Water and Climate's Deputy Director Natural Resources, Mr Tanyaradzwa Mundoga cited the City of Harare as the major culprit and said it should come up with proper waste management systems."There is a lot of uncollected solid waste all across the city. With these torrential rains that we have been experiencing over the past few weeks there is bound to be leaching of unwanted stuff into drinking water."City of Harare should come up with proper waste management systems, by making an effort to remove illegal dumps. According to international standards, dumping sites should be lined to prevent leaching of polluted water into people's households," Mundoga said.Mr Mundoga revealed that Government was investigating the extent of leaching of polluted water from the Pomona dump site."As it is now we are yet to establish to what extent leaching from Pomona has spread to the city's water bodies including boreholes," said Mundoga.On November 5, 2016, the Harare north community was engulfed in thick smoke from the burning trash at the City of Harare's Pomona dumpsite.The plume of smoke choked the residents of Pomona, Marlborough, Mt Pleasant, Avondale, Avonlea and even reached as far as Dzivaresekwa.The smoke reportedly spread across the city reaching Glen View, and Mbare to the south of Harare as well as Beatrice, Chegutu and Kadoma.A fire of a similar proportion erupted in 2013. Our Promise: Welcome to Care2, the world's largest community for good. Here, you'll find over 45 million like-minded people working towards progress, kindness, and lasting impact. Care2 Stands Against: bigots, racists, bullies, science deniers, misogynists, gun lobbyists, xenophobes, the willfully ignorant, animal abusers, frackers, and other mean people. If you find yourself aligning with any of those folks, you can move along, nothing to see here. Care2 Stands With: humanitarians, animal lovers, feminists, rabble-rousers, nature-buffs, creatives, the naturally curious, and people who really love to do the right thing. You are our people. You Care. We Care2. News / Local by Mary Charamba A father of the late Roman Catholic-run Kana Mission hospital administrator who committed suicide has also died.Earlier today, Bulawayo24.com revealed that the administrator Delani Ngwenya reportedly committed suicide on Sunday after a driving lesson to his wife went horrible wrong.Tragedy struck when Ngwenya was teaching his wife how to drive a newly acquired vehicle.Somehow, when approaching their house, she mistakenly stepped on the accelerator instead of the the brakes thereby driving straight into the house where Delani's mother, a visitor and his father were sitting, sources told this publication.She together with her husband's mother a visitor identified as Mrs Chamunorwa died on the spot.Delani's father was rushed to a Harare hospital for treatment.Details reaching Bulawayo24.com now state that Delani's father has died.Delani hanged himself. The president of Canadian labor union Unifor has come out in support of Donald Trumps planned renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). While recently speaking with The Detroit News, Jerry Dias revealed about his belief that NAFTA has been terrible for U.S. and Canadian workers. I disagree (with) Trump on so many things but one thing I do agree with him on is that NAFTA has been a disaster for American and Canadian workers. Its clear. I am anxious to renegotiate NAFTA and this is just another example, he said. Dias statement came shortly after General Motors announced it would lay off over 600 people this year at its CAMI Assembly Plant in Ingersoll, Ontario. The automakers official word on the layoffs is that theyre a response to expected decline in production at the facility for the current Equinox and the end of production of the existing GMC Terrain. However, Dias believes that it is also to do with the fact that the next-generation Terrain will be built at a factory in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. The announcement is as a result of both. If they werent moving the Terrain to Mexico than we wouldnt be having this problem, he said. PHOTO GALLERY Back in September, when we first saw the Grandland X out and about, we werent even sure what it was. Now though, we have a pretty good idea what to expect. Still, if you need further proof regarding this being a Peugeot 3008-like crossover, simply look at its boxy rear-end design and long bonnet and you should arrive at the same conclusion we did. And yes, the Grandland X will also be sharing its underpinnings and probably, some power units as well, with the aforementioned 3008 crossover. According to Autocar, despite the Peugeot 3008 only featuring front-wheel drive, Opels version of the car should have a more rugged image, which means that both two and four-wheel drive versions could be offered, with a choice of a six-speed manual or six-speed automatic transmission. In terms of power units, since the 3008 features a turbocharged 1.6-liter petrol as well as turbocharged 1.6-liter and 2.0-liter diesel engines, we can expect more of the same for the Grandland X whenever Opel decides to lift the curtains. As for the interior, the cabin layout should differ from what Peugeot did with the 3008 and its multi-level cockpit design. Since Opel/Vauxhall already unveiled the Crossland X sub-compact model, the Grandland X is definitely next in line, so if we dont see it in Geneva, it will likely make its debut during the Frankfurt Auto Show in September. Once launched, it should compete directly with the likes of the Nissan Qashqai and the Honda HR-V. Photo Credits: CarPix for CarScoops PHOTO GALLERY Chinese authorities are investigating a man for attempted murder, after going on a rampage in his SUV. With the dash-mounted camera recording, the man is seen targeting the driver of an Audi, ramming him on two occasions, and then trying to run him over as he steps out and makes a run for his life. According to the videos description, the assaulter is a contractor who claims that his victim, a developer, owns him a lot of money. Luckily, his target seems to have walked away from the incident, but another developer is said to have sustained injuries, after being pinned against a wall. Its unknown how the footage ended up on the internet, but its the evidence that will likely land him in jail, make him pay for damages, and perhaps a small fortune as compensation, not to mention that he can probably wave goodbye to the alleged debt. Warning: Some may find the video disturbing VIDEO A man had to be rescued via helicopter after becoming stranded in his Nissan pickup on Humboldt Bays North Jetty in California last week. In footage captured by local photographer Tyler Whiteside, the man in question could be seen driving along the jetty despite huge waves crashing into his vehicle and slamming it into the concrete barriers. Despite the treacherous conditions, the man remained defiant and continued to drive along the jetty before the red Nissan got stuck. The driver then casually walked around the stranded pickup, seemingly looking for a way out of his predicament. A couple walking on the beach called 911 and reported the incident and before long, local coast guards arrived at the scene but determined it was too dangerous to attempt a land rescue. Consequently, a helicopter had to be called in to rescue the man. In a statement, the U.S. Coast Guard Sector Humboldt Bay confirmed the news saying The Coast Guard rescued a man from the Humboldt Bay north jetty Thursday after he became stranded in his vehicle during a period of high surf and high tide. Despite the high winds and waves, the pickup wasnt swept away and as of late last week, remained on the jetty as recovery specialists waited for conditions to improve to retrieve it. VIDEO Iwao was too young to work in animation prior to the war. He was hired to work at Disney in 1945 at the age of 20. From the image caption: Mr. Takamotos father, Chitoshi; mother, Akino; brother, Norito; and sister, Kimoko; are all at Manzanar [internment camp]. Iwao graduated from Thomas Jefferson High School in Los Angeles in 1942. How did he get the job at Disneys? He phoned for an appointment, brought samples of his work, and a week later was hired. In an interview I conducted with Iwao in 1999, he spoke in greater detail about his experience being interned and how he entered the animation industry afterwards. By the early-1950s, he had became one of the most trusted clean-up artists at Disney and worked closely with both Milt Kahl and Marc Davis before beginning his long and illustrious H-B career in 1961. The next photo is Bennie Nobori, who had worked at Disney prior to being interned. Ive never heard of him but examples of his work from an internment camp newspaperhere and herereflect a strong Freddie Moore influence. Other Disney artists who were interned during WWII were veteran animator and writer Bob Kuwahara and Chris Ishii. According to Michael Barrier, Kuwahara was the first Disney artist whose job was just to draw story sketches. Kuwahara left Disney in 1937 to go to MGM, which is where he was working when he was taken away by the government. After the war, he moved to NY where, among other things, he created the theatrical cartoon character Hashimoto-san for Terrytoons. Read a short bio written by Kuwahara himself here. Ive previously written about about Ishiis WWII experience on the Brew. In that earlier piece, theres a photo of Ishii working on the camps newspaper comic. Below is another photo from December 12, 1942, the day he was inducted into the U.S. military. It has the following caption: Chris Ishii two years ago worked as an artist for Walt Disney, he tried to join the army but was turned down for slightly flat feet, then his draft board classed him 1-A but before his hopes were realized he was evacuated from California and his new draft number said 4-C, undesirable alien. In the center Chris created, for center newspapers, a cartoon character Little Neebo, humorously depicting the trials and tribulations of a little Nisei boy in evacuation centers. Here Chris realizes his deepest ambition as he is finger printed by an army sergeant after having been sworn into the Army of the United States, to be sent to Camp Savage, Minnesota. After the war, Ishii became a top East Coast designer and eventually served as the creative director of UPA-NY in the late-1950s as well as co-owner of Focus Productions in the 1960s and 1970s. In the UC image archive, I found a photo of a wooden pin created by Chris Ishii featuring his character Lil Neebo. Ishii, who had become an assistant to Ward Kimball in November 1940, went out on stike at Disney in 1941 along with the other Japanese-American artists who worked at the studio including Tom Okamoto, Masao Kawaguchi and James Tanaka. Below is a 1943 photo of James Tanaka working at Famous Studios in New York. The caption accompanying his photo says, James worked for five years in the studios of Walt Disney and secured his present position [at Famous] while at the Rohwer Relocation Center in Arkansas. The archive also has a photo of Tom Inada working at Famous. The photo caption says: He had just finished a commercial art course at the Sacramento Junior College in California when all persons of Japanese ancestry were evacuated from the west coast. He lived for a year at the Tule Lake Relocation Center. And heres a pic of Tom Inada and James Tanaka working together at Famous. Below is a 1945 image of Michiko Kataoka (second from left), who had been interned at Manzanar and was attending UCLA at the time of this photo. Judging from her age in the photo and the uniqueness of the name, Id harbor a guess that she is the artist who went by the name of Michi Kataoka and who worked at UPA as a background painter for a brief period in the early-1950s. Another female Japanese artist of note, Gyo Fujikawa, who had worked in the advertising art department of Disney in the early-1940s, and was responsible for designing the elaborate Fantasia theater program that was given to audiences during its initial theatrical engagement. Fujikawa escaped internment by staying on the East Coast, where Japanese people were not detained by the government, and enjoyed a long career as an illustrator. This excerpt from her L.A. Times obituary explains more about her story: It was Disney who Fujikawa said changed the way she handled bigots during World War II. Unlike her parents and younger brother, she escaped internment because she was living in New York; only Japanese residing on the West Coast were sent to the camps. But Fujikawa traveled frequently, and when people became suspicious of her, she often told them she was really Anna May Wong, the Chinese American actress. According to her nephew, Fujikawa took secret delight in this masquerade. But when she told Disney that she often lied about her heritage, he exploded. Damn it! Why should you say that? Youre an American citizen, he said. From that moment on, Fujikawa recounted recently, thats exactly what I did tell them. Below are a couple newspaper articles about Gyo Fujikawa. One piece is from 1935, before she joined the Disney studio, and the other piece is from 1958, after shed established a successful career as an illustrator in New York City: San Jose, California-born Jimmy Murakami was eight years old when he was interned at Tule Lake in North California. I was very, very bitter to be an American citizen treated this way, he said in an interview many years later. My older sister died in the camp and the rest of us came out pretty bad. In the 1950s, Murakami went to Chouinard art school and was hired at United Productions of America (UPA) where he worked on the groundbreaking Boing Boing Show. Afterwards, he globetrotted around the world, working at many different studios: Pintoff Productions in New York City, Toei Animation in Tokyo, TVC in London, and various studios in Italy, before he returned to Los Angeles to launch his own commercial studio, Murakami-Wolf, in 1965. He later worked on British classics like The Snowman and When the Wind Blows before settling down in Dublin. Heres a video of Murakami recounting the comical story of how he and his brother had to come up with American names when they started attending school and unintentionally used the same name: The youngest artist of the bunch is Willie Ito, who was born in 1934. He was placed into a desert concentration camp in Topaz, Utah, at the age of seven. In time, Ito also attended Chouinard and was hired in July 1954 at Disney, where he worked as an inbetweener on Lady and the Tramp. Ito spent much of the 1950s working at Warner Bros. in Chuck Jones unit, and later worked on Bob Clampetts Beany & Cecil tv cartoons, before becoming a key artist at Hanna-Barbera throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Hes pictured below with layouts artists Jerry Eisenberg (seated) and Dick Bickenbach from the filming of the 1963 Hanna-Barbera tv special TV special Here Comes A Star (photo via Yowp blog). If anybody can add more details about these artists or other Golden Age Japanese artists, please share. Right now Washington D.C. is packed again with people protesting Trump's unAmerican racist nativism. A new generation is rising. #WeWillWin pic.twitter.com/idjBIik4e5 Jerry Saltz (@jerrysaltz) January 29, 2017 With these retweets, Stanton joins Finding Dorys co-director Angus Maclane, who had already started reposting tweets yesterday that expressed opposition to the travel ban. Ellen DeGeneres, the voice of Dory, posted the following tweets after the news of Trumps Finding Dory screening: For me, America is great because of all the people who came here. Not in spite of them. #NoBan Ellen DeGeneres (@TheEllenShow) January 29, 2017 P.S. My grandparents were immigrants. The woman making us pizza right now is Muslim. And I'm grateful for all of them. #NoBan Ellen DeGeneres (@TheEllenShow) January 29, 2017 The only person who has directly addressed the screening of the film is Albert Brooks, the voice of Marlin, who tweeted the following: Odd that Trump is watching Finding Dory today, a movie about reuniting with family when he's preventing it in real life. Albert Brooks (@AlbertBrooks) January 29, 2017 The reactions of the people involved with the film were relatively muted compared to the reaction from others on Twitter: Official White House photo: pic.twitter.com/sbqTx4squN Dan Ozzi (@danozzi) January 29, 2017 Trump's 3pm "Finding Dory" screening ends, a story about families being reunited, he immediately affirms his stance on separating families. pic.twitter.com/Bc8ihifttn Maggie Jordan: (@MaggieJordanACN) January 29, 2017 Trump is hosting a screening of FINDING DORY. A film about compassion, love, tolerance. I say 15 mins till he switches to HUMAN CENTIPEDE 3. Bilge Ebiri (@BilgeEbiri) January 29, 2017 according to the public white house schedule, you watched Finding Dory, & then immediately started tweeting about WW3. honestly fascinating. https://t.co/RYl7oGzW5j Tyler Oakley (@tyleroakley) January 29, 2017 UPDATE (Monday, 9:30pm PT): On her daytime talk show, Ellen DeGeneres addressed the White House screening of Finding Dory, pointing out that the messages in the Disney/Pixar film were at odds with Trumps travel ban: Even though Dory gets into America, she ends up separated from her family, but the other animals help Dory. Animals that dont even need her. Animals that dont even have anything in common with her. They help her, even though theyre completely different colors, because thats what you do when you see someone in need you help them. Watch the entire clip below: Photo: Nursestogether Fentanyl, the powerful opioid currently preoccupying public health authorities, isn't just a problem on the streets. About a dozen Quebec nurses have been temporarily suspended over the last decade for stealing quantities of the drug from the workplace, says a Canadian Press analysis of the Quebec Order of Nurses' disciplinary council decisions. While 12 suspensions were handed out between 2006 and 2016, the actual number of thefts was much higher, since most cases were only detected after multiple incidents that went on for months or even years, the documents show. In the most severe cases, patients were deprived of their medication by nurses who replaced the fentanyl in pills or drips with water or an intravenous saline solution. "Unfortunately, drug appropriation and substitution by other substances are too frequent at this time," the disciplinary council wrote in a 2012 decision. "When a nurse appropriates these medicines and, in addition, substitutes water for this medication, the patient does not receive the medicine to which they are entitled and the suffering continues." In some cases, nurses consumed the stolen drugs on the job, with one admitting to having injected herself up to three times in a single work shift. Male nurses were disproportionately represented, accounting for 50 per cent of the suspensions while making up only 10 per cent of the order's membership. The nurses used different methods to outwit the security measures in place in order to obtain the fentanyl, an opioid 50 to 100 times more powerful than heroin. Those included altering patient registries, writing false prescriptions, retrieving discarded partially-used doses and falsifying signatures. The nurses' suspensions ranged from six months to three years. None were permanently banned from the profession. If one adds to the list suspensions that were ordered for the theft of other powerful narcotics, such as morphine and dilaudid, the total number of cases climbs into the dozens, according to Canadian Press estimates. The number of fentanyl thefts over the past ten years is not a cause for alarm, according to the disciplinary body. The number of nurses with dependence problems has also remained stable over the last five years, it says. In the year 2015-2016, the disciplinary board examined a total of 48 cases of drug theft -- not all of which involved nursing staff or powerful narcotics, according to the order's records. That compares to 47 cases the year before and 53 in 2013-2014. Although a black market exists for reselling drugs, the order's records indicate the stolen fentanyl did not go that route, according to order of nurses spokeswoman Joanne Letourneau. Since not all incidents of drug theft result in a suspension, the numbers cited above do not paint a full picture of the problems surrounding drug or fentanyl theft. Some cases are resolved before the suspension stage if there is a lack of evidence, or if the council believes the act was isolated and not a danger to the public, Letourneau said. A mediation process can also be used. The order says it can't say how many complaints about the theft of fentanyl have been substantiated, since it does not compile data on narcotic theft. Photo: The Canadian Press The federal government moved to clear up confusion that surrounded a U.S. travel ban on citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries by announcing that Canadian citizens and permanent residents with roots in those countries can still cross the border. Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said Sunday that the White House has given assurances that permanent residents of Canada can enter the U.S. provided they have a valid Canadian permanent resident card and passport from one of the seven affected countries. On Saturday night, the prime minister tweeted that the White House confirmed that dual citizens with a Canadian passport are also allowed into the U.S. The confusion stemmed from an executive order signed Friday by President Donald Trump, which said that people from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya would be barred entry to the U.S. for three months. It was initially unclear Saturday whether Canadians who are also citizens of the affected countries would be allowed to cross the U.S. border, as the State Department said that dual citizens were included in the ban. Canada received no prior warning that the ban was to be imposed. U.S. officials have not publicly commented since on how the ban affects Canada. Instead, they are relaying their position through their Canadian counterparts. Hussen held a news conference in Ottawa on Sunday to try to clear up some of the confusion created by the American ban. And while people in Canada with roots in the countries involved have expressed relief that they can still enter the U.S., the policy still affects their families. "After a couple of days of frustration in our community, this is promising news," said Bijan Ahmadi, president of the Iranian Canadian Congress. He said he's glad to hear that both citizens and permanent residents are free to travel to the United States, but he's still waiting to hear something else from Canadian officials. "As an organization, we strongly condemn this policy, and we believe that every politician in Canada from different parties should condemn the policy," he said. "This is discrimination against people not because of any specific security threats that a specific person posed to the United States, but because of their race, background and religion," he added. Hussen was asked at the news conference about why he hadn't denounced the order. "Every country has the right to determine their policies. I can only tell you that we will continue our long-standing tradition of being open to those who seek sanctuary," he said. He said Canada will provide temporary shelter to any people stranded because of the ban, but he noted he doesn't know of anyone stuck in a Canadian airport. He also noted that Canada will not raise the number of refugees it plans to accept this year's target is 25,000 in response to the ban, in spite of widespread speculation that tweets sent out by the prime minister suggested Canada would accept more people. On Saturday afternoon, Justin Trudeau tweeted, "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada." Hussen said that, as always, cases would be evaluated based on merit. Municipal leaders across the country also expressed their support for refugees affected by the ban. "I offer any support I can to Prime Minister Trudeau and Premier Wall in their commitment to assist people affected by the recent U.S. refugee ban," said Saskatoon mayor Charlie Clark in a Facebook post. The mayors of Toronto, Edmonton and Vancouver are among the others who voiced support for refugees. Meanwhile, the Prime Minister's Office said that Trudeau briefed the premiers on how his government clarified the ban's application in Canada. B.C. Premier Christy Clark, who appeared with Trudeau at Vancouver's Lunar New Year parade Sunday, said she will stand up for Canadian and British Columbian values. "We believe that people who are seeking refuge around the world should be able to find safe haven here in our province," she said. Private industry also got involved. Members of Canada's tech community signed an open letter calling for the federal government to offer visas to people whose lives have been left in limbo because of the immigration ban. Photo: The Canadian Press UPDATE: 10:15 a.m. Quebec provincial police say following their investigation, only one of the two people arrested in connection with a deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City is considered a suspect. Police say in a tweet that the second person is considered a witness, but they did not name him. Police said earlier they had arrested two suspects. UPDATE: 7 a.m. Police say one of the suspected gunmen involved in a horrific shooting at Quebec City mosque that left six people dead called 911 late Sunday indicating he wanted to co-operate with authorities. A police spokesman says the man waited for officers who arrested him without incident not long after the bloody massacre at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec in Quebec City's Ste-Foy neighbourhood. Police say they received reports of shots being fired at the mosque just before 8 p.m., when many had gathered at the building for evening prayers. They say one suspect was arrested not far from the mosque and the second suspect, who called 911, was arrested a short time after just east of Quebec City's downtown core. The six people killed in the attack were between the ages of 35 and 60. Nineteen people were injured in the attack five remain in hospital in critical condition while 14 have been treated and released. A Quebec court clerk has confirmed the names of the suspects in the attack on a Canadian mosque in which six people died. Court clerk Isabelle Ferland identified Alexandre Bissonnette and Mohamed el Khadir as the suspects. Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard says the attack is an attack on all Quebecers. UPDATE: 10:42 p.m. Quebec provincial police say six people died and eight others were injured in an attack at a Quebec City mosque on Sunday that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described as a "terrorist attack." Police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe said 39 other people survived Sunday's shooting and that two people were in custody. Trudeau issued a statement to denounce the incident, calling it a terrorist attack. Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard also called the incident a terrorist attack and said the national assembly will lower flags to half-mast. Neighbourhood resident Carol-Ann Andrews said such an attack was "pretty surprising" for Quebec City. "My thoughts went immediately to what was happening in the United States with all the laws and all the immigrants that are not allowed to come back," she said. "Unfortunately there are people in the world whose minds are not totally OK so it could have given them an idea to get rid of other people. It's pathetic." Asked whether she feels safe, she replied, "We're not safe anywhere any more." Police blocked the area off, while a coffee shop stayed open beyond normal hours and served free coffee. The mosque is across the street from a big stone church. In Montreal, a vigil is planned for 6 p.m. on Monday night outside the Parc subway station. UPDATED: 10:05 p.m. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has released a statement on the shooting attack at a Quebec City mosque, calling it a terrorist attack. It was with tremendous shock, sadness and anger that I heard of this evenings tragic and fatal shooting at the Centre culturel islamique de Quebec located in the Ste-Foy neighbourhood of the city of Quebec," Trudeau said in the statement. We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge." The prime minister offered his condolences to those affected, while noting reports on how many have died in the shooting have still gone unconfirmed. While authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, it is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence," Trudeau said. Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country." Reports have surfaced that up to five people have been killed in the building, though police have yet to confirm that number. Two suspects have been detained. UPDATED: 9:01 p.m. The president of a Quebec City mosque says he has been told that five people have been killed in the building. Mohamed Yangui says he heard the news from witnesses. Police tweeted there were deaths and injuries but didn't say how many victims there were. They said two suspects were in custody. The mosque in question had a pig's head left outside the building last June. The head was wrapped in paper and accompanied by a note that read "Bonne (sic) appetit." Prominent Quebec politicians denounced the incident, which came in the middle of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. Politicians across Quebec and Canada have also denounced Sunday night's shooting. UPDATED: 8:30 p.m. Some reports say there are up to five dead and 10 other people injured in a Sunday night shooting at a Quebec City mosque. Police, however, still have not confirmed how many have died nor how many have been injured in the incident. UPDATED: 8:03 p.m. Police still haven't confirmed the number of people killed in a Sunday night shooting at a Quebec City mosque. Two suspects are reportedly in custody, however. Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard reacted on Twitter by calling it "barbaric violence." "All our solidarity is with those who are close to the victims, the injured and their families," he said. The mosque in question had a pig's head left outside the building last June. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also weighed in on the tragedy. "Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City," he tweeted. "My thoughts are with victims & their families." ORIGINAL: 7:05 p.m. Quebec City police say there have been fatalities at a shooting incident at a mosque in the provincial capital. Police tweeted there were deaths and injuries but aren't saying yet how many victims there are. They say two suspects are in custody. A live video feed on a Facebook page of a mosque showed images of multiple police vehicles and yellow police tape. Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale tweeted Sunday he is deeply saddened by the loss of life. His office says no motive has been confirmed. Facebook Photo: Contributed A search is expected to resume this morning for a missing hiker on Vancouver Island. Spencer Hunt of Victoria went missing Saturday afternoon on a hiking trip with his family near Nanaimo. Hunt, 20, set off ahead of the group and has not been seen since. Spence is a little bit competitive and I think he wanted to be the first there, his mother Debbie Hunt told CTV. Nanaimo and Port Alberni search and rescue teams and RCMP scoured the Ammonite Falls area Saturday night and Sunday without success. The weathers not good, it's hovering around freezing, it's been raining for most of the day. Spencers not really dressed for the weather, Nanaimo RCMP Const. Gary OBrien said. Ground and air searches will resume today. with files from CTV Vancouver Island Photo: The Canadian Press Masaya Nakamura, the "Father of Pac-Man" who founded the Japanese video game company behind the hit creature-gobbling game, has died. He was 91. Nakamura, who died on Jan. 22, founded Namco, part of Bandai Namco, in 1955. It started out as just two mechanical horse rides on a department store rooftop but went on to pioneer game arcades and amusement parks. Bandai Namco, formed in 2005 from a merger of two game companies, confirmed Monday that Nakamura had died. Pac-Man, designed by Namco engineer and video game maker Toru Iwatani, went on sale in 1980, at a time when there were few rival games, such as Space Invaders. The plucky yellow circle with the huge mouth was a huge hit. It's estimated to have been played more than 10 billion times: Guinness World Record has named it the world's most successful coin-operated arcade game. The idea for Pac-Man's design came from the image of a pizza with a slice carved out. Nakamura reportedly chose the word "Pac," or "pakku" in Japanese, to represent the sound of the Pac-Man munching its prey. "Pac-Man is a gamer friendly game with tons of cute characters and that's why it was loved for such a long time," Iwatani said in 2015 at a New York red carpet premiere of "Pixels," that featured Pac-Man creatures and featured him in a cameo role. Photo: The Canadian Press Provincial Health officer Dr. Perry Kendall Prescribing medicinal heroin to prevent overdose deaths might appear to clash with common sense, but the provincial health officer in B.C. is backing the idea because he says European-style drug treatment programs work. The arrival of the powerful opioid fentanyl drove B.C.'s death toll to a new peak last year of 914 overdose deaths, almost 80 per cent higher than the 510 deaths recorded by the provincial coroner in 2015. Dr. Perry Kendall said he wants support from colleagues in health care and law enforcement to push the province to create treatment programs that prescribe a pharmaceutical-grade version of heroin, called diacetylmorphine. "It may be counterintuitive for people, but they have been shown to improve functioning, improve physical health, improve mental health," said Kendall. "They certainly get people out of illegal drug markets and many of those people have gone on to have relatively stable lives." Vancouver's Crosstown Clinic in the Downtown Eastside is the only clinic in North America that provides supervised medicinal heroin. Dr. Michael Krausz, the University of British Columbia's Providence health care leadership chair of addiction research, said people are dying while next steps are debated rather than using the successful blueprint from Europe. "I'm frustrated that things are so obvious and we are waiting another month and another month," he said. "Every day, we are losing more young people." Krausz helped start drug treatment projects in Europe, and much of his work was done in Switzerland when it was gripped by a heroin overdose crisis similar to B.C.'s. Krausz said Switzerland, followed by Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark and other European countries, started drug treatment programs that included prescribed heroin, heroin substitutes and immediate detox and counselling services. Drug overdose deaths declined and lives were changed and saved, he said. "What you see is there is no overdose crisis in Zurich," said Krausz. "There is no overdose crisis in Basil and there is no overdose crisis in Berlin or Hamburg. The numbers did decline over the last decade, where in some cities they are not even collecting or publishing numbers." B.C. Health Minister Terry Lake said if he gets evidence to support the plan, he will follow through. Photo: Contributed Six people were killed and five critically injured Sunday night in shooting at a mosque in Quebec City. Here's a timeline of the police response: At 7:50 p.m., police receive several calls from the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec reporting that shots had been fired. Police quickly arrive on site and arrest one suspect. Officers go inside the mosque and realize there are many victims. The attack is considered a major incident. All available police staff in Quebec City, including canine units, are called in. Police set up a security perimeter around the site. At 8:10 p.m., a second suspect calls 911 asking to speak with investigators. He tells police he will wait for officers at an access road near the Ile-d'Orleans bridge. Police go to the meeting spot and arrest the suspect. More officers go to the mosque to provide support for those on scene. A command post is established. At 10 p.m., an RCMP national security task force is deployed. Security is increased at other mosques in the city as well as the Universite Laval campus. Photo: The Canadian Press It's a green Monday in Maine. The first tangible results of state voters' decision to legalize marijuana are being felt as possession and home growth of marijuana becomes legal. Voters narrowly passed the ballot question in November, and the waiting period between the vote and legalization has expired. Contentious aspects linger, including what rules should govern businesses that will sell marijuana, such as retail stores and social clubs. The Legislature has been hammering out those details, and they will take months to fully craft, meaning it will be months before marijuana businesses open in the state. But it's legal to smoke it as of Monday. It's also legal to gift it, grow it and possess up to 2.5 ounces of it. "It's huge. No longer will we be punishing adults for using a safer substance than alcohol," said David Boyer, campaign manager for the ballot question. "We're not making criminals out of thousands of Mainers who choose to use marijuana." The marijuana legalization vote was close, passing by only about 4,000 votes, and opponents of the spread of marijuana have vowed to continue to push for restrictions in the state. Legalization also sparked a row between legislators and Republican Gov. Paul LePage. Lawmakers on Jan. 26 unanimously approved legislation delaying the retail sale of marijuana until February 2018. But LePage at first declined to sign off on such a delay because of concerns he has about funding and oversight. He ended up signing it on Jan. 27. LePage's signing of the bill also closed a loophole that could have allowed Mainers under 21 to possess pot. Cities and towns have also considered moratoriums on the establishment of marijuana businesses, and some have already approved such temporary bans. Many local officials have said they don't want to get into the business of issuing marijuana licenses until the state rules are firmly in place. Scott Gagnon, chairman of Mainers Protecting Our Youth and Communities, has said that legalization will bring a "huge cultural change for Maine" and that cities and towns are right to be cautious about whether they will allow sales within their borders. Massachusetts, California and Nevada also legalized recreational marijuana with a referendum last year. Maine also has a long-standing medical marijuana program, and supporters of recreational pot have vowed that broader legalization will not interfere with it. Photo: Contributed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau plans to travel to Quebec City later today in the wake of a deadly shooting at a local mosque. Trudeau also plans to make a formal statement about the tragedy in the House of Commons, where Parliament is resuming after the Christmas break. No other details were immediately released. The prime minister has condemned the incident as a terrorist attack. Six people between the ages of 35 and 70, were killed in the bloody massacre that took place Sunday at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec in Quebec City's Sainte-Foy neighbourhood. At least 12 other people were taken to hospital with minor injuries, according to the Centre Hospitalier Universite Laval. Police had two suspects in custody Sunday night one was arrested not far from the mosque while another was arrested just east of Quebec City's downtown core. Photo: CTV Troops are arriving in northeastern New Brunswick to help after the devastating ice storm that has been linked to two deaths and more than two dozen hospitalizations from carbon monoxide poisoning. Paul Bradley, a spokesman for the province's Emergency Measures Organization, said that as of Sunday evening 31 people had been treated for exposure to the gas in some instances from the fumes created by generators. NB Power still had close to 20,000 customers without electricity, and local residents were saying areas of the Acadian Peninsula including Lameque, Miscou and Shippagan islands had some of the most intensive damage. In the small community of St. Leolin on the Acadian Peninsula, Mayor Mathieu Chayer said the community is mourning the death of 74-year-old Lorraine Clement, who RCMP said passed away on Thursday as a generator was in her garage. Police have said an autopsy has yet to be carried out in her death, or in the death of a 62-year-old man who investigators say died at his home in Petite Riviere de lile on Lameque Island as a generator was running. Premier Brian Gallant said the soldiers would be deployed from Gagetown to areas hardest hit by power outages to help local authorities check on residents, clear debris, and distribute basic necessities. Photo: The Canadian Press UPDATE: 10:20 a.m. The victims of a mass shooting at a Quebec City mosque were fathers, businessmen, a university professor and others who had gathered for evening prayers, a Muslim community leader said Monday as he recalled through tears the horror of the attack that killed six and injured 19 others. "It's a very, very big tragedy for us," said Mohamed Labidi, the vice-president of the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec, the mosque where the attack happened Sunday night. "We have a sadness we cannot express." Labidi said the victims were shot in the back. "Security at our mosque was our major, major concern," he said. "But we were caught off guard." The shooting took place just before 8 p.m. Sunday. Witnesses described chaos as worshippers scrambled to find friends and loved ones, while police responding to the scene called for backup. One suspect was arrested shortly after the shooting. Police said earlier they had arrested two suspects, whom court documents identified as Alexandre Bissonnette and Mohamed El Khadir. Police did not immediately clarify which man was the suspect and which one the witness. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard moved swiftly to label the shooting a "terrorist attack." Trudeau is planning to travel to Quebec City later Monday as the country reels from the deadly shooting. In Quebec, Couillard said the attack had hit all Quebecers hard. "All Quebecers are united in the solidarity we express today," he said. "Our society is a very open, tolerant and hospitable one, but we are not different from other societies, we have the same devils, xenophobia, racism...we should not be complacent in our society." The mosque targeted in the attack said in a statement posted on its Facebook page late Sunday that it was grateful for the many messages of compassion it had received. It is not the first time the mosque has been the target of threats. Last summer, a gift-wrapped pig's head was placed at the entrance to the building. Authorities said the six men killed in the shooting were between the ages of 39 and 60. Of the 19 people injured all men two remained in critical condition on Monday, hospital officials said. Majdi Dridi of the Muslim Association of Canada, said he knew two of the victims. One was a work colleague who was a father of three little girls, he said. "I don't know what to say, I just hope that his family and his children can have the patience to accept what happened," Dridi said. Vigils are expected to be held in Montreal, Quebec City and Halifax later on Monday. A number of Canadian Muslim groups have expressed shock and anger at the attack. "Quebec Muslims are frightened right now," said Haroun Bouazzi, president of AMAL-Quebec, a Muslim human rights group based in Montreal. "We are urgently waiting for answers as to how and why such a tragedy could occur." The National Council of Canadian Muslims called on law enforcement agencies around the country to increase security around mosques and Islamic centres. "We are horrified by this despicable act of violence," the council's executive director Ihsaan Gardee said in a statement. "This act of wanton murder must be punished to the fullest extent of the law." Gardee added that the council was "heartened" by the support expressed for the Muslim community by other Canadians. Photo: The Canadian Press President Donald Trump on Monday denied his immigration order was to blame for the chaos at the nation's airports over the weekend, instead pointing to computer glitches, protesters and even the "tears of Senator Schumer." Later he shifted the focus away from the weekend's immigration turmoil, signing an executive action aimed at cutting regulations for small businesses. White House officials called the directive a "one in, two out" plan, requiring government agencies requesting a new regulation to identify two others they will cut. Trump signed the order in the Oval Office surrounded by small business leaders, saying it would "massively" cut regulations and calling it the "biggest such act that our country has ever seen." Trump's business announcement came as protests continued around the country over his immigration order. Early Monday, he took to Twitter to defend the move, saying that only 109 out of 325,000 people "were detained and held for questioning." Trump also said swift action was important, noting that there are a "lot of bad 'dudes' out there." Trump's order temporarily suspends all immigration for citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries for 90 days. Top Trump aides also defended the order, comparing it to a 2011 policy on Iraqi refugees. In 2011, President Barack Obama imposed additional checks on Iraqi refugees after two Iraqis were charged with terrorism offences in Kentucky. Trump also announced he will reveal his pick for the Supreme Court at 8 p.m. Tuesday. The court has had eight justices since the death last year of Justice Antonin Scalia. Obama nominated Merrick Garland for the post, but Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell refused to take up the nomination. Responding to criticism that his sudden immigration action caused unnecessary chaos at airports in the U.S. and abroad, Trump tweeted Monday that "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the 'bad' would rush into our country during that week." Photo: CTV A fatal rollover crash in North Vancouver has caused traffic to backlog on Monday morning. The incident occurred around 4 a.m. when a white Lexus rolled off the Trans-Canada Highway near Lynn Valley off-ramp. The driver of the vehicle died. There is no further information on him at this time. Several light poles were taken out and highway traffic is now down to a single eastbound lane. Crews are continuing to investigate. Police have not released information on what caused the collision. with files from CTV Vancouver Messages You have no messages Ice Rescue Training Jan. 28 2017 Photo: Mike Biden Photo: Mike Biden Photo: Mike Biden Photo: Mike Biden Photo: Mike Biden Photo: Mike Biden Photo: Mike Biden Photo: Mike Biden Photo: Mike Biden Photo: Mike Biden 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Local photographer Mike Biden captured the Penticton Fire Department training for ice water rescues, Saturday in Skaha Lake. Local fire crews hold a handful of similar training sessions each year, with members taking turns being rescued by their colleagues. Dry suits protect the firefighters from the icy water. The Penticton Fire Department says they respond to about two ice rescues a year, often it is a deer or dog stuck on the ice. Photo: CTV Some of those in B.C.'s muslim communities say they're concerned for their own safety after a deadly shooting at a Quebec mosque. What was supposed to be a celebration of the BC Muslim Association's 50th anniversary Sunday night in Surrey took a much more sombre twist after news spread of the attack. "Obviously we are concerned as a community," association president Daud Ismail told CTV Vancouver. "We are concerned about the safety of our properties... about the safety of our women, our children." Six people died and many others were injured in Sunday's shooting, which Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described as a "terrorist attack." A university professor was among the victims. Bilal Cheema said the country is not immune to acts of terror. "We need to take a moment to reflect and remember the people impacted by this in our prayers," he said. Candles have been left at a makeshift memorial at the Jamia Masjid mosque on West 8th Avenue in Vancouver. with files from CTV Vancouver Photo: The Canadian Press Washington state's attorney general said Monday he is suing President Donald Trump over his executive order that suspended immigration from seven countries with majority-Muslim populations and sparked nationwide protests. The move makes Washington the first state to announce a legal action against the Trump administration over one of its policies. "If successful it would have the effect of invalidating the president's unlawful action nationwide," Attorney General Bob Ferguson said at a news conference. Trump signed the executive order Friday suspending immigration for citizens of the seven countries for 90 days. Ferguson was one of 16 state attorneys general who released a statement Sunday calling Trump's immigration action "un-American and unlawful." Trump's order sparked large protests around the country over the weekend, including one that drew 3,000 people to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. Trump has repeatedly said the move is aimed at protecting the nation against extremists looking to attack Americans and American interests. Ferguson said the lawsuit against Trump, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and high-ranking Trump administration officials would be filed later Monday in federal court in Seattle. The complaint seeks to have key provisions of the executive order declared unconstitutional, Ferguson said. The state is also asking for a temporary restraining order against enforcement of the order. "We are a country based on the rule of law and in a courtroom it is not the loudest voice that prevails, it's the Constitution," Ferguson said. "At the end of the day, either you're abiding by the Constitution or you are not. And in our view, the president is not adhering to the Constitution when it comes to this executive action." Declarations of support from Amazon and Expedia two Washington state-based businesses will be included in the declarations, said Ferguson, who was joined at the news conference by Gov. Jay Inslee. The complaint claims that Trump's actions are separating Washington families, harming thousands of state residents, damaging the state economy, hurting Washington-based companies "and undermining Washington's sovereign interest in remaining a welcoming place for immigrants and refugees," Ferguson said. Inslee said the "inhumanity" of Trump's order is obvious. "This is un-American, it is wrong, and it will not stand," Inslee said. "The clear intent of this executive order is to discriminate against one faith amongst all God's children." Asked if he fears retaliation from the Trump administration, Inslee said "there's no predicting this president, but we will not yield, we will not be leveraged, we will not be threatened, we will not be intimidated." Hi everyone!! As you can clearly see, it's me, Roary. I look pretty serious, don't I? Well, I look serious because today there ar... Sri Lanka: 'Vijaya' brand of cement launched 30 January 2017 Oliver Impex (Pvt) Ltd launched its latest brand of cement to the construction market in Sri Lanka at a special event attended by key stakeholders from the construction industry and distributors from around the island. The cement will be marketed under the name Vijaya Cement, which is a high-quality product which is SLS 107 certified and with strength class of 42.5 N, said the company. Mohamed Saly Mohamed Faris, director of Oliver Impex (Private) Ltd, said,"Our main aim is not to compete but to fill the vacuum which currently exists in the market." Oliver Impex which is a diversified importer of commodities decided to venture into the import of cement owing to the drastic increase in demand for this building material over the last few years. To facilitate the new venture, Oliver Impex will have its own warehousing, transportation and distribution network to make this product competitive in the market. The company would also make available warehousing solutions in the distributors premises as well. The company responsible for manufacturing the cement was founded in 1935 by Jaidayal Dalmia, while the cement division of Dalmia Cement Bharat Ltd - India (DCBL) was established in 1939 and enjoys a heritage of over 75 years of expertise and experience. DCBL cement plants in India have grown manifold in terms of capacity; and are also acquiring some new plants to increase the volume and expand further. The venture is a collaboration between India and Sri Lanka. Published under Pakistan: APCMA calls for higher duty on Iranian cement imports 30 January 2017 All Pakistan Cement Manufacturers Association (APCMA) is urging the government to put a 20 per cent import duty on Iranian cement, claiming that Iranian producers are "dumping" the building material in border markets. "The local market in areas adjacent to the Iranian border and the coastal area of Balochistan are flooded with Iranian cement. Domestically produced cement is losing its markets, as it is unable to compete with Iranian offerings due to their duty and tax evasions," PCMA's Chairman, Mohammad Ali Taba, was quoted as saying by the Pakistani daily The Nation. However, Iranian producers dismiss any dumping allegations. "Accusing Iranian exporters of dumping is old news," says the head of Cement Employers Association, Abdolreza Sheikhan. "Pakistani producers, who have higher energy costs, pressure their government every once in a while to expand their market reach." According to Sheikhan, Iranian cement is primarily exported to Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan and the closest Pakistani market to the Iranian border. The city has no cement production and needs to import the industrial material, which consequently leads consumers to choose between Iranian offerings from just across the border, or local cement produced in that countrys northern provinces. "Iranian cement is shipped at its finished price and not any lower," said Sheikhan, adding that the volume of Iranian shipments to Quetta is 'insignificant', which does not constitute dumping. Published under Etheostoma etnieri Cherry Darter photo by Tennessee Aquarium Cambarus manningi Greensaddle Crayfish photo by Guenter Schuster Quadrula quadrula Mapleleaf Mussel photo by Guenter Schuster Species Richness Map Previous Next After more than a year of data collection, analysis and mapping, the University of Georgia River Basin Center and the Tennessee Aquarium Conservation Institute recently published a comprehensive survey of aquatic animals in Southeastern watersheds. This first-of-a-kind study used information on where aquatic animals live gathered directly from field researchers, universities, museums and government agencies. The reports creators hope it will serve as a call to action for protection and restoration, helping to chart future conservation efforts in the region. Among scientists, the Southeast is renowned as a hotspot for freshwater wildlife, but the life that teems beneath the surface of its rivers and streams a veritable underwater rainforest remains relatively unknown to the general public. After decades of being overlooked, conservationists think the time has come for the region to take its rightful place in the spotlight. The Southeasts rich aquatic communities are globally significant. Theres nothing else like our biodiversity anywhere else on the continent or anywhere else in the temperate world, said Dr. Duncan Elkins, the studys coordinator and a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Georgia River Basin Center. All southeastern states have incredible aquatic life, but the study spotlights areas with higher diversity and at greater risk of imperilment. Take one look at the reports heat maps, and the Southeasts ecological significance becomes impossible to ignore. The maps use colors to represent the variety of species in a given area warmer colors indicating greater diversity and are based on the distribution of almost 1,050 fish, crayfish and mussel species in almost 300 watersheds spanning 11 states. The vivid red-and-orange bullseye centered on Middle and Southeast Tennessee, Northwest Georgia and Northern Alabama clearly shows why this region is so biologically significant. The Southeast has an incredible number of species, and it's really important that we focus our attention on protecting places where we can get the most bang for our buck, said Tennessee Aquarium Conservation Institute Director Dr. Anna George. By highlighting the regions most diverse watersheds, the study will help to focus future scientific research and guide conservation groups to areas where intervention can have the greatest impact. The need is great for us to act to protect our species, George continued. This project allows us to visualize, across the Southeast, where those places are that are so critically important for our water and wildlife. Scientists scored each watershed based on three characteristics: the number of species it contained, the conservation status of those species and how widespread each species was. Areas containing a larger variety of species, many endangered or threatened species or species found in few or no other locations were ranked higher. According to the study, the 10 highest-priority watersheds are: 1. Pickwick Lake (Middle Tennessee/Northern Alabama) 2. Wheeler Lake (Middle Tennessee/Northern Alabama) 3. Cahaba (Central Alabama) 4. Upper Clinch (Northeast Tennessee/Southwest Virginia) 5. Middle Coosa (Northeast Alabama) 6. Lower Duck (Middle Tennessee) 7. Conasauga (Southeast Tennessee/Northwest Georgia) 8. Lower Coosa (Central Alabama) 9. Etowah (Northwest Georgia) 10. Caney (Middle Tennessee) The story of the Southeasts freshwater ecology is one of both unrivaled diversity and rampant imperilment. Experts place the regions plethora of aquatic wildlife on equal footing with that of species-rich tropical ecosystems. More than 1,400 species reside in waterways within a 500-mile radius of Chattanooga, Tenn., including about three-quarters (73.1 percent) of all native fish species in the United States. More than 90 percent of all American mussel and crayfish species live within that same area. More than a quarter of the species included in the study are found nowhere else in the world, yet 28 percent of Southeastern fish species are considered imperiled, more than doubling during thelast 20 years fueled by intensive human development and a lack of financial support for regional conservation efforts. The publication of the Tennessee Aquarium Conservation Institute and River Basin Center study, which was created through a National Fish and Wildlife Foundation grant, comes at a crucial time for Southeastern aquatic ecosystems. Efforts to study and safeguard freshwater species in the region continue to struggle due to anemic funding and a lack of federally protected lands, especially compared to less-diverse regions, such as the Western United States. The studys creators say they hope it will serve as a master plan to guide research and conservation work that will ensure the long-term survival of waterways that dramatically impact the human communities that rely on them. Rivers and streams in the U.S. are the arteries that flow through our landscape, and they carry a measure of the health of the landscape with them, George said. Right now, those rivers are having heart attacks. What we're doing is like visiting a doctor to learn how to take better care of the health of our rivers. Weve identified some of the most important places to start a small change in our habits and how we take care of our waters. And over time, just like walking a mile turns into running a race, those small changes will add up to big differences for the health of the countrys rivers and streams. About the study Undertaken between July 2015 and September 2016 Analyzed fish, crayfish and mussel distribution across 290 watersheds Study area encompassed 11 states Based on data on almost 1,050 species collected from field researchers, government agencies, museums and universities Studys 14 member advisory board included diverse representation including state and federal agencies, tribes, and academia Five local chapters of the National Wild Turkey Federation (NWTF) have raised and donated $5,000 to the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency (TWRA). This donation will be utilized towards the purchase of a tractor and mowing implement that will help maintain habitat along 270 linear miles in the South Cherokee Wildlife Management Area (WMA) in Cherokee National Forest. The South Cherokee WMA covers over 350,000 acres in southeast Tennessee. The area offers an array of fishing and hunting opportunities as well as many other activities. The tractor and implement will help maintain early successional habitat on about 9,000 acres. This habitat will not only greatly provide for turkeys, but many other species including pollinators, songbirds and bats, said David Whitehead, WMA manager. The five NWTF chapters are adjacent to the South Cherokee WMA and include the Southern Appalachian Chapter in Monroe County, the Cherokee Chapter in Chattanooga, the Hiwassee Chapter in McMinn County, the Tri-State Longbeards Chapter in Copperhill and the White Oak Longbeards Chapter in Cleveland. We cant forget our partnership with the Forest Service. We couldnt do this without them. We greatly value them and the NWTF, said Mr. Whitehead. This donation is part of larger Partners for Wildlife program between the NWTF, TWRA and the Cherokee National Forest. The group works towards improving early successional habitat along linear roadways through the purchase of the tractor and implements, the purchase of native plant seeds for sowing in managed areas and volunteerism. For more information on this program, contact NWTF Regional Director Tim Yates at 423 463-4260. This phase diagram shows how changing the experimental parameters can 'melt' a time crystal into a normal insulator or heat up a time crystal to a high temperature thermal state. Following a blueprint created by UC Berkeley physicist Norman Yao, physicists at the University of Maryland made the first time crystal using a one-dimensional chain of ytterbium ions. Each ion behaves like an electron spin and exhibits long-range interactions indicated by the arrows. To most people, crystals mean diamond bling, semiprecious gems or perhaps the jagged amethyst or quartz crystals beloved by collectors. To Norman Yao, these inert crystals are the tip of the iceberg. If crystals have an atomic structure that repeats in space, like the carbon lattice of a diamond, why can't crystals also have a structure that repeats in time? That is, a time crystal? The University of California, Berkeley assistant professor of physics describes exactly how to make and measure the properties of such a crystal, and even predicts what the various phases surrounding the time crystal should be -- akin to the liquid and gas phases of ice. This is not mere speculation. Two groups followed Yao's blueprint and have already created the first-ever time crystals. The groups at the University of Maryland and Harvard University reported their successes, using two totally different setups, in papers posted online last year, and have submitted the results for publication. Yao is a co-author on both papers. Time crystals repeat in time because they are kicked periodically, sort of like tapping Jell-O repeatedly to get it to jiggle, Yao said. The big breakthrough, he argues, is less that these particular crystals repeat in time than that they are the first of a large class of new materials that are intrinsically out of equilibrium, unable to settle down to the motionless equilibrium of, for example, a diamond or ruby. "This is a new phase of matter, period, but it is also really cool because it is one of the first examples of non-equilibrium matter," Yao said. "For the last half-century, we have been exploring equilibrium matter, like metals and insulators. We are just now starting to explore a whole new landscape of non-equilibrium matter." While Yao is hard put to imagine a use for a time crystal, other proposed phases of non-equilibrium matter theoretically hold promise as nearly perfect memories and may be useful in quantum computers. An ytterbium chain The time crystal created by Chris Monroe and his colleagues at the University of Maryland employs a conga line of 10 ytterbium ions whose electron spins interact, similar to the qubit systems being tested as quantum computers. To keep the ions out of equilibrium, the researchers alternately hit them with one laser to create an effective magnetic field and a second laser to partially flip the spins of the atoms, repeating the sequence many times. Because the spins interacted, the atoms settled into a stable, repetitive pattern of spin flipping that defines a crystal. Time crystals were first proposed in 2012 by Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek, and last year theoretical physicists at Princeton University and UC Santa Barbara's Station Q independently proved that such a crystal could be made. According to Yao, the UC Berkeley group was "the bridge between the theoretical idea and the experimental implementation." From the perspective of quantum mechanics, electrons can form crystals that do not match the underlying spatial translation symmetry of the orderly, three-dimensional array of atoms, Yao said. This breaks the symmetry of the material and leads to unique and stable properties we define as a crystal. A time crystal breaks time symmetry. In this particular case, the magnetic field and laser periodically driving the ytterbium atoms produce a repetition in the system at twice the period of the drivers, something that would not occur in a normal system. "Wouldn't it be super weird if you jiggled the Jell-O and found that somehow it responded at a different period?" Yao said. "But that is the essence of the time crystal. You have some periodic driver that has a period 'T', but the system somehow synchronizes so that you observe the system oscillating with a period that is larger than 'T'." Yao worked closely with Monroe as his Maryland team made the new material, helping them focus on the important properties to measure to confirm that the material was in fact a stable or rigid time crystal. Yao also described how the time crystal would change phase, like an ice cube melting, under different magnetic fields and laser pulsing. The Harvard team, led by Mikhail Lukin, set up its time crystal using densely packed nitrogen vacancy centers in diamonds. "Such similar results achieved in two wildly disparate systems underscore that time crystals are a broad new phase of matter, not simply a curiosity relegated to small or narrowly specific systems," wrote Phil Richerme, of Indiana University, in a perspective piece accompanying the paper published in Physical Review Letters. "Observation of the discrete time crystal... confirms that symmetry breaking can occur in essentially all natural realms, and clears the way to several new avenues of research." Yao is continuing his own work on time crystals as he explores the theory behind other novel but not-yet-realized non-equilibrium materials. Sartorius grew dynamically in both divisions in fiscal 2016 according to its preliminary figures and achieved its financial targets raised at mid-year. "The year 2016 was highly successful for Sartorius, both operationally and strategically," commented CEO Dr. Joachim Kreuzburg. "Our Bioprocess Solutions Division is continuing to expand strongly. As a supplier for the biopharmaceutical industry, the division addresses a very dynamic market and is additionally gaining market share in the important North American market. Also, our Lab Products & Services Division achieved its targets, reporting profitable organic growth, and has considerably sharpened its strategic positioning, especially with biopharmaceutical lab customers, due to our two recent acquisitions." Business Development of the Sartorius Group Sartorius increased its sales revenue by 18.2% in constant currencies to 1,300.3 million euros in fiscal 2016, up from 1,114.8 million euros a year ago (reported +16.6%). All regions recorded double-digit growth rates, contributing to the company's excellent business performance. Regionally, Asia|Pacific and the Americas expanded at the strongest rates, with sales up 21.2% to 285.8 million euros and up 21.0% to 445.4 million euros, respectively. This significant expansion was driven in part by some large equipment projects in Asia, while, in the Americas, it was fueled by further market share gains with single-use products and overproportionate growth contributed by the most recent acquisitions. In the EMEA region, Sartorius recorded an increase in sales by 14.7% to 569.1 million euros. (All regional figures in constant currencies) Earnings in the reporting period rose overproportionately again relative to sales. Sartorius thus increased its underlying EBITDA by 23.6% to 325.4 million euros, and its respective margin rose from 23.6% to 25.0%. Relevant net profit for the Group grew by 23.5% from 107.4 million euros to 132.6 million euros. Earnings per ordinary share totaled 1.93 euros (2015: 1.57 euros4) and earnings per preference share 1.94 euros (2015: 1.58 euros). The Group's key financial indicators continued to remain at a strong level, despite three acquisitions executed in 2016. At the end of the reporting period, the company's equity ratio was 42.0%, and the ratio of net debt to underlying EBITDA stood at 1.5 (Dec. 31, 2015: 44.9% and 1.3, respectively). In view of its continued strong organic growth, Sartorius accelerated the implementation of its investment program. Besides extending its Group headquarters in Goettingen, Germany, the company started to expand its single-use filter and bag production plant in Yauco, Puerto Rico, earlier and to a greater extent than initially planned. Capital expenditures rose in the reporting year from 113.1 million euros to 152.1 million euros; the respective ratio of capital expenditures to sales revenue was 11.7% following on 10.1% a year ago. Sartorius employed 6,911 people worldwide at year-end 2016, thus 11.7% or 726 more people than a year earlier. Of this number, 77 people joined the company due to acquisitions. Business Development of the Divisions The Bioprocess Solutions Division, which focuses on single-use products for the manufacture of biopharmaceuticals, proved to be the growth engine in the reporting year yet again. Within a continued dynamic market environment, the division increased its sales by 22.1% in constant currencies to 975.0 million euros (reported +20.5%). Organic growth was around 20%; acquisitions contributed around 2 percentage points. Driven by economies of scale, underlying EBITDA of the Bioprocess Solutions Division rose overproportionately relative to sales by 27.5% to 273.5 million euros. The division's margin reached 28.0% compared with 26.5% a year ago. The Lab Products & Services Division, which offers instruments and consumables primarily for the pharmaceutical sector and public research, also continued its positive business development in the reporting year. Its sales revenue increased 7.9% in constant currencies to 325.3 million euros (reported +6.5%). The companies acquired at mid-2016, IntelliCyt and ViroCyt, contributed about 3 percentage points to this gain. Underlying EBITDA for the division rose 6.5% to 51.9 million euros. Its margin of 16.0% was at the previous year's level as expected because the positive effects of economies of scale were temporarily diluted by the recent acquisitions. Positive Outlook for Fiscal 2017 Sartorius expects to grow profitably again in the current year. Specifically, management projects that Group sales revenue for the full year will grow by about 8% to 12%. The company's underlying EBITDA margin is forecasted to gain around half a percentage point over the prior-year figure of 25.0%. Due to further investments in strong organic growth, Sartorius projects a capex ratio of around 12% to 15%. In view of the two divisions, management anticipates that sales for Bioprocess Solutions will grow by about 9% to 13% and the divisions underlying EBITDA margin will rise by around half a percentage point compared with the prior-year figure of 28.0%. For the Lab Products & Services Division that partially depends on general economic trends, Sartorius projects that assuming an overall stable economic environment, sales will increase by about 6% to 10% and the division's underlying EBITDA margin will rise by about one percentage point(2016: 16.0%). Amid a tumultuous weekend spurred by President Trump's executive order on immigration, Chicago tech leaders sounded off from tweeting updates at O'Hare protests to making a six-figure donation to a refugee organization. The executive order, which drew nationwide protests this weekend, temporarily halts immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, including by individuals who already have valid visas, and puts an indefinite hold on Syrian refugees. Advertisement The move drew concern and criticism from tech leaders in Chicago, Silicon Valley and beyond. Maryam Saleh, a vice president of programs at health-tech hub Matter, is a citizen of Canada, Britain and Iran. She said she realized over the weekend the ban could apply to those in the U.S. with green cards, which includes her. Advertisement I think its sorted out, but basically for a few days essentially I couldn't leave the country, which is really unfortunate, she said. Saleh said she's keeping an eye on the news to see whether she would be able to travel to Canada without having problems. She said if the bans take off, she'll have to reconsider where she lives. "I don't want to live in a place where I'm not welcome," she said. Other tech leaders also let their voices be heard. Cards Against Humanity co-founder Max Temkin, PayPal director of software development Harper Reed and others tweeted from protests Saturday at OHare International Airport. Kate Garmey, founder of creative consultancy Drink Tank, attended the Saturday night protest at O'Hare with friends, including YWCA Metropolitan Chicago CEO Dorri McWhorter . Garmey and others tweeted that they left ORD Camp, an invite-only innovation summit that took place over the weekend, to participate in the demonstration. She said she took part in the Women's March the weekend before; it had been her first. Garmey said she did not previously identify as political, but opposing the ban is "something we owe to one another as Americans." "I think for many this has transcended a feeling of choice. There's a real obligation that many people feel to be present," she said. "This isn't an issue that directly affects my family but, make no mistake, this is an issue that affects all of us." Others spoke with their pocketbooks: Jason Fried , co-founder and CEO of Basecamp, said he would donate $200,000 to the International Rescue Committee, doubling his initial donation after at least 100 people sent him receipts from their own donations to the organization. Fried told Blue Sky it was a personal donation and not related to Basecamp, so he was not discussing the issue with employees. It was "just something I did because I believe it was the right thing to do," he wrote in an email. Looks like were going to get to 100 very easily! Big hearts out there! Thank you. Will send $200k to https://t.co/5CgK3zTrQV @theIRC. Jason Fried (@jasonfried) January 29, 2017 Some leaders spoke from personal experience as they rebuked the order. Shradha Agarwal , co-founder and president of Outcome Health, formerly ContextMedia, spoke out in a Facebook post on Saturday. I landed in the United States of America on Sept 4th, 2004. That's 12+ years ago. And I'm still not a citizen. Not because I don't want to be, she said. I want it so bad to have my vote count. But it's because that's how broken our system is. Heart aches for those detained despite legal status. Immigration is misunderstood. I'm here legally for 12yrs /still not citizen/ employ 620 Shradha Agarwal (@shr4dha) January 29, 2017 Terry Howerton , founder and partner at TechNexus, wrote in an email to Blue Sky, "I've largely remained silent since the election, more focused on business and those close to me. But I can't and won't stay silent." Howerton said he has employees who can't leave the U.S. now, and that he is an investor in companies built by immigrants. On a personal level, he said he and his family care for a teenage girl, a classmate and friend of his daughters, who is trying to get a green card. The girl grew up in America but was left behind when her parents moved abroad, he said. He placed blame on Congress for failing to pass "comprehensive and rational immigration reform." He sits on the executive council of TechNet, which lobbies on behalf of the technology industry. Christians don't refuse refugees. Brave, moral Americans don't embrace bigotry, ignorance. Leaders don't idly await a constitutional crisis. Terry Howerton (@terryhowerton) January 29, 2017 Sprout Social CEO Justyn Howard shared a message with employees, writing, "on the topic (of) human rights there is no gray area. We do not support President Trump's unconstitutional immigration policy." He also tweeted several times about the ban. "Speaking publicly about polarizing subjects always carries risk but silence-for-profit is not a business we want to be in," Howard wrote in a statement to Blue Sky. "We respect the varied beliefs of our team, our customers and our families and don't take a stance lightly." Dick Burke, CEO of Chicago-based Envoy (previously called VisaNow), said the company has been involved in the aftermath of Friday afternoon's order. He said the company, an immigration services provider that helps workers and employers through the visa process, had attorneys at O'Hare to help anyone that needed it. He cited the company's strong legal talent and proprietary technology as boons to employers managing global workforces, and a strength for his business. "We know that the need for high-skilled labor in the United States is real with nearly 2.4 million STEM jobs expected to go unfilled in the United States by 2018; we know that immigrants drive innovation and growth both on Main Street and throughout STEM industries; and we know that the continued ability of employers to hire, deploy and manage a global workforce plays a crucial role in helping our country remain competitive in today's economy," he wrote in an email to Blue Sky. "For these reasons, I don't worry about the impact on our business, and we are hopeful that President Trump, his advisors and our lawmakers will keep in mind the numerous benefits of bringing high-skilled talent to this country to inform additional immigration policy changes," Burke said. Other leaders said theyd help employees and customers that needed it. Kunal Kapoor, CEO of Morningstar and an immigrant from India, wrote to employees that when considering which new policies might affect the company this year, he did not expect immigration policies to be one of them. His message to employees read, in part: "We are monitoring the situation closely for both the well-being of our employees traveling globally and for longer-term consequences. We are actively reviewing our immigration data so we know who in our community may be affected and can take appropriate action. And we will follow up. If you know of someone impacted personally or concerned for their status, please reach out to your manager or HR representative for guidance." Todd Connor , a U.S. Navy veteran of the Iraq War and CEO of veterans incubator Bunker Labs, took issue with the executive order. "This executive order is un-American, anti-business, hurts entrepreneurs ability to start and grow businesses, and is inconsistent with the values that military veterans have fought for," he wrote in an email to Blue Sky. "The Bunker Labs is full of people that have spent time in the countries now banned from travel, and the consensus belief is that this is going to do far more harm than any conceivable good." Steven Collens , CEO of Matter, called the executive order insane. For any business thats operating internationally, this is a challenge, and for a lot of the smaller entrepreneurial businesses that ultimately have an eye on a global presence, (this) could make it a little harder or a lot harder. In addition to cruel & un-American, Trump's actions were profoundly incompetent. Homeland Security, Customs nor embassies were even briefed. Steven Collens (@scollens) January 29, 2017 Shawn Riegsecker , founder and CEO of digital advertising and media management software developer Centro, said to his knowledge none of his employees were directly affected by the executive order. But he said the company did lose one employee a few months ago because she feared what might happen as an immigrant. We did have someone in our engineering department make the decision to leave and go back to her home country, because she just did not like the tenor of what was going on at the national level, and just didnt feel like, as an immigrant, she felt like this was place she wanted to raise her 2-year-old son, he said. We actually lost a great employee. On a personal level, Riegsecker said: I just feel that fundamentally we should be focusing on much more impactful and important issues in our economy, and I think this is confusing, I dont think its helpful, and I think the first week is a show of poor leadership right now as it relates to ... the issues that we need to be focusing on, he said. George Bousis , founder and CEO of gift-card marketplace Raise, said in an email: "I'm both concerned and incredibly hurt to hear of the recent ban on refugees in the United States." He noted his family's history as Greek immigrants and added that "the diversity, inclusion and cultural identity of each of our employees is at the very core of our success as a company." Brian Fitzpatrick , chief technology officer of Tock and co-creator of ORD Camp, called the immigration order "immoral and illegal." He said it hurts Americans, including green card-holders, who have family abroad. "Cutting these people off doesn't make any sense, but more importantly, it creates stress and distraction that is completely unnecessary, he wrote in an email to Blue Sky. Every American business needs employees focused on winning in global markets, not spending their time worrying about their grandparents getting stopped at airports or deported. Majed Moughni has lived the American dream: He climbed the ladder from impoverished refugee to hotel dishwasher to valet for Ford royalty. Today he's a lawyer, sitting at a chair and desk in an office that all once belonged to a Ford chief executive officer whose Lincoln Continental he used to park. Moughni sees the business case for Ford's senior executives to aggressively court Donald Trump after the president spent months criticizing automakers for making cars in Mexico. Their silence so far on Trump's order halting immigration from seven Middle Eastern countries is another matter, and he can't hide his disappointment. Advertisement "I'm a product of what Trump is trying to ban," Moughni said. "It's careless. This is a country of immigrants." Automakers are walking a tightrope as they court Trump, whose policies on clean-air standards, corporate taxes and trade will affect their fortunes. They have to balance that against other considerations closer to home: The traditional three U.S. automakers are based in Michigan, which backed Trump's surprise victory but also has a substantial Middle Eastern population troubled by his executive order on immigration. Advertisement Ford's hometown of Dearborn has been referred to as America's Muslim Capital, with more than 30 percent of the population of Arab descent. From 2005 to 2015, the state accepted 19,545 refugees from Iraq and Syria two of the seven countries affected by Trump's ban. "People would say that if you landed here at 9 p.m., you can have a job at 9 the next morning," Ibrahim Kazerooni, the imam at Dearborn's Islamic Center of America, said in an interview. "We have many people in our community who work at Ford. We're a part of this community." Plans for 26 refugees to immigrate to the Detroit area from Iraq and Syria in the next week have now been canceled, said Lynne Golodner, spokeswoman for Samaritas, formerly known as Lutheran Social Services of Michigan, which has a contract with the state to help asylum seekers settle and find employment. Trump took special aim at Ford during the campaign and the automaker has worked to get back in his good graces. Executive Chairman Bill Ford, a great-grandson of the founder Henry, has said he can always get hold of Trump, or the president calls him. CEO Mark Fields visited the White House on back-to-back days last week to discuss jobs, fuel-economy standards and even Oval Office decor. Still, Ford and its auto-industry peers in the Detroit area have been largely silent on the immigration order. Christin Baker, a Ford spokeswoman, declined to comment. Representatives for General Motors, Fiat Chrysler, Toyota, Nissan, Hyundai and Honda also passed. "They should be proactive and stand up for the Muslim community," Ford engineer Mohammad All, 26, said during a protest Sunday at Detroit Metropolitan Airport. He entered the U.S. from Iraq in 1997 after years in a Rafha, Saudi Arabia, refugee camp. "The stand Mark Fields took was more about helping Ford and the bottom line than about human rights." Moughni's is one of countless stories that show the entwined relationship of the auto industry to the region's immigrant population. Protesters also gathered Sunday in Hamtramck, a 2-square-mile city within the borders of Detroit whose longstanding ties to the auto industry include a GM factory that makes sedans and the Volt plug-in hybrid. A Polish enclave for most of the last century, Hamtramck now has a vast Muslim population because of immigration from Bangladesh, Yemen, and to a lesser degree, Bosnia. "This is what immigration looks like!" was one frequent chant. Advertisement Hamtramck has the nation's first Muslim-majority city council, and the panel's top vote-getters in the last two elections descend from Yemen another of the nations affected by the decree. Automakers are afraid of Trump, Councilman Saad Almasmari said in an interview at the rally: "That's why they keep silent." It was in Hamtramck that Moughni's father newly arrived in America ahead of his family landed a job on the assembly line at a Chrysler plant. The father saved up enough to buy plane tickets for his family, including his eight kids, and eventually managed to afford a Chrysler LeBaron. Moughni was 6 when he and his family moved to America in 1977 to escape civil war in Lebanon. The Chrysler gig lasted only about two years, until Moughni's father joined the thousands of autoworkers swept from the industry after an oil shock. The father worked as a cashier at a convenience store, while Moughni did his part to make ends meet. "It wasn't much of a life growing up with your dad not having the financial means to raise eight kids," Moughni says. At 12, he started mowing lawns and picking weeds for neighbors. By 15, he worked at a Domino's Pizza. At 18, he was hired at the newly opened Ritz-Carlton hotel in Dearborn first as a dishwasher, and later as a parking valet. It was the Ritz job that helped Moughni pay his way through undergraduate school at the University of Michigan at Dearborn. It also introduced him to Bill Ford, Edsel Ford II and Harold "Red" Poling, the CEO who steered Ford through the early-1990s recession. Moughni got to know Poling by name. When Poling died in 2012 and the office Ford rented for the retired CEO right across from the Ritz came up for lease, Moughni seized on the opportunity. The late Poling's former space, complete with the red leather chair and mahogany desk, has been home to Majed A. Moughni Law Offices for about three years. Advertisement "It was meant to be," Moughni says. Moughni sees common ground with Trump, and in fact made an unsuccessful run for Congress about six years ago as a Republican with a motto to keep jobs and production in America. But for companies like Ford, which he notes has many engineers from India, he doesn't understand why CEO Fields hasn't spoken out on the immigration issue. "As far as Ford and Mark Fields and Bill Ford cozying up to Trump, I don't think that's a bad thing" for the company, Moughni said. That said, "they should be outraged as well that this policy may trickle over to other parts of the world." Fields, he said, "should speak out." With assistance from Jamie Butters Keith Naughton and John Lippert Starbucks says it will hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years, a response to President Donald Trump's indefinite suspension of Syrian refugees and temporary travel bans that apply to six other Muslim-majority nations. Schultz said in a letter to employees Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, that the hiring would apply to stores worldwide. (Richard Drew / AP) A chorus that began in Silicon Valley is gaining voices across corporate America, as more business leaders from other industries speak out against President Donald Trump's travel ban prohibiting entry of migrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries or touted their commitments to diversity. Some were relatively subdued, using the moment to reaffirm corporate values. Advertisement "We want every one of you to know of our unwavering commitment to the dedicated people working here at JPMorgan Chase," the bank's operating committee, which includes CEO Jamie Dimon, wrote in a memo. Others were specific, announcing plans to hire refugees, as Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz did Sunday. Advertisement "There are more than 65 million citizens of the world recognized as refugees by the United Nations, and we are developing plans to hire 10,000 of them over five years in the 75 countries around the world where Starbucks does business," Schultz said in a letter to employees. Others openly opposed the president's order. Nike CEO Mark Parker wrote that the company's values of diversity "are being threatened by the recent executive order in the U.S. banning refugees, as well as visitors, from seven Muslim-majority countries. This is a policy we don't support." Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein echoed that sentiment, saying in a voicemail to employees that Goldman does not support the policy, "and I would note that it has already been challenged in federal court, and some of the order has been enjoined at least temporarily." The growing number of statements objecting to the ban may indicate Corporate America is sounding a more critical tune after months of either touting the jobs they will create following Trump's election or remaining quiet as the president, who has shown no restraint at using Twitter to lash out at critics, transitioned into his first term. "Every single CEO of any company of magnitude is thinking and feeling pressure and trying to decide what to do" to speak out about the ban, said Sydney Finkelstein, a professor at Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business. "S ome are speaking out naturally. Others are being more deliberate and strategic and recognize there could be a downside." Technology industry executives, many of whom were critical of Trump during the campaign and whose workforces are especially dependent on high-skilled visas, were first out of the gate with criticism. Advertisement CEOs including Google's Sundar Pichai, Apple's Tim Cook and Netflix's Reed Hastings expressed their concern about the ban. "Trump's actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all," Hastings wrote in a statement. Yet while Silicon Valley executives may have given the rest of Corporate America air cover to join in the critique, the groundwork for speaking out on political issues was laid long before Trump's travel ban. In recent years, business leaders have increasingly engaged on social issues or political hot-buttons, whether the topic was gender pay, racial justice or LGBTQ rights. Corporations were at the forefront of state-level fights to push back on legislation seen as limiting gay and transgender rights; more than 200 corporations signed on to a letter by the Human Rights Campaign opposing North Carolina's law limiting some transgender rights. Some, including PayPal and Deutsche Bank, even chose not to expand their businesses in the state because of the controversial bill. "Employees do hold their CEOs and leadership accountable for defending those values when the line has been crossed," said Leslie Gaines-Ross, Weber-Shandwick's chief reputation strategist. After years of communicating and focusing on diversity and inclusion as a corporate value, she says, CEOs "do feel under a lot of pressure right now, and are trying to figure out what to say about Trump's ban and how to speak to their employees. They've set a high bar and an expectation that diversity really matters. That is adding a lot of fire power to getting CEOs to speak up." Some of the statements from CEOs have included not only concerns but personal reflections. "I am deeply concerned, as many of you are, with this fracture in our society," wrote MasterCard CEO Ajay Banga, who was born in India. "I am an immigrant into this wonderful country. I came here midway through my career and have over the past years made this my home and pledged my allegiance to all that the Constitution stands for." Advertisement Chobani CEO Hamdi Ulukaya, who has come under fire from some on the extreme right for his hiring and advocacy of refugees, wrote to employees: "While there's still some confusion about the immediate impact of this action, I've directed our Legal and HR teams to explore whether any member of our company or their family members are affected and provide whatever assistance they need. We'll have their backs every day and every step of the way." Other statements reflected an urgency to reassure employees who had spoken up with concerns. "I want to thank all those who have reached out to me in the last 48 hours or so sharing your views," wrote Tim Ryan, U.S. chairman of PwC. "I have heard heartbreaking stories of people who had to cancel plans to visit loved ones or have friends who were outside the country when the order was issued and are not able to re-enter. Some have also written simply to share their fear, concern and desire to help those who need help." He also suggested specific actions. "I'm asking all of us to be guided by our values, to support each other and to listen and support those who need it," Ryan wrote. "One lesson I've learned over the past few months is that when there are difficult issues affecting our people, silence isn't an option. ... In the meantime, I ask you to treat each other with care." Schultz echoed similar themes. "If there is any lesson to be learned over the last year, it's that your voice and your vote matter more than ever," Schultz wrote. "Starbucks is doing its part; we need you to use the collective power of your voices to do the same while respecting the diverse viewpoints of the 90 million customers who visit our stores in more than 25,000 locations around the world." The wife of a prominent Chicago bankruptcy attorney is moving forward with a lawsuit against her condo association for forcing her to share the elevator with dogs. A Chicago federal judge has ruled that Holly Geraci's housing discrimination lawsuit against the Union Square Condominium Association, where she shares a penthouse with her husband, Peter Francis Geraci, can proceed on all but one count. Advertisement Geraci, who says she has a fear of dogs, claims the condo association not only denied her request to keep the canines from riding the elevator with her, but retaliated by encouraging residents to verbally attack her and by divulging private information about her condition. "We had people on the board that seemed to have a campaign to just drive us out," Geraci said Monday. "Having these meetings about us and vilifying us everywhere. It's very uncomfortable to live like that." Advertisement When she and her husband moved into the Union Square condo development in River North in 2000, the building didn't allow dogs, but made an exception for their older cairn terrier, which weighed 10 pounds. In 2004, the building opened the door for dogs of all kinds, Geraci said. Union Square permits residents to own dogs, but requires owners to "acquiesce" to concerns and requests when sharing confined spaces such as elevators, according to Geraci's lawsuit. Geraci said she suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder after being attacked by a German shepherd when she was a child, and has a fear of large dogs. After "negative" encounters with dogs and their owners, Geraci filed several complaints with the condo association, asking that she be able to ride the elevator without dogs. The situation came to a head in 2013, when she and dog walker Robin DiBuono got into a physical altercation on the elevator, resulting in the first of four lawsuits filed by the Geracis against Union Square. While Geraci claims she was "beaten up," a jury found in favor of DiBuono and awarded her $275,000 in damages. Geraci said they are appealing the decision. Union Square had filed for summary judgment in Geraci's March 2015 suit, which claimed the association was violating the Fair Housing Act and the Illinois Human Rights Act by not making accommodations for her disability. The federal judge's ruling, issued Thursday, said Geraci has grounds to pursue the case. "We look forward to trying the case and having the jury find in favor of the association," said Graham Miller, an attorney representing Union Square. Whether or not the Geracis prevail in the case may be moot. In July, they paid $8.63 million for the 6,000-square-foot penthouse at the Ritz-Carlton Residences, taking possession two years after their bid sparked a legal battle with a Mexican billionaire over the right to buy the unfinished 40th-floor digs along North Michigan Avenue. Geraci said it may take two years to complete the new space, at which time the couple plans to vacate Union Square. The new penthouse will feature an express elevator from the lobby to their apartment. Advertisement Until then, Geraci's demands remain simple. "I want to be able to get up and down in my elevators without being accosted by dogs," she said. rchannick@chicagotribune.com Twitter @RobertChannick Walgreens Boots Alliance and Rite Aid are revising their proposed merger, slashing more than $2 billion from the purchase price and pushing the closing date back six months while they await regulatory approval. The tentative deal, which was supposed to close Friday, is now scheduled to close July 31 to give the companies more time to get the thumbs-up from the Federal Trade Commission. Advertisement The deal, previously valued at $17.2 billion, including debt, is now valued at between $14 billion and $14.6 billion, said Walgreens spokesman Michael Polzin. Deerfield-based Walgreens now will pay $6.50 to $7 a share for Rite Aid common stock, depending on how many Rite Aid stores must be divested. That's down from the $9 a share Walgreens originally agreed to pay. Advertisement Walgreens now will pay $7 a share if 1,000 or fewer stores have to be sold, and $6.50 a share if 1,200 stores must be sold. The new price reflects the additional stores that might have to be sold, Polzin said in an email. Walgreens earlier expected it might only have to sell about 500 stores. Walgreens announced in December that it would sell 865 Rite Aid stores to Fred's Pharmacy for $950 million to address FTC concerns about the deal. But Bloomberg News, citing unnamed sources, reported this month that those divestitures hadn't satisfied the FTC. A spokeswoman for the FTC declined to comment Monday. Polzin said the deal with Fred's remains in place. He declined to comment on to whom Walgreens might sell the additional Rite Aid stores. It's likely, however, that Walgreens will try to sell those stores to Fred's as well, said Joseph Agnese, a senior equity analyst with CFRA Research. An attempt to reach Fred's for comment Monday was not immediately successful. Agnese said Monday's announcement shows Walgreens is committed to completing the deal with Rite Aid. Drugstores are under financial pressure as government insurance programs such as Medicare and Medicaid cut drug reimbursements, and Walgreens likely is looking to grow to help offset that pressure, he said. "I think Walgreens is highly motivated to get the deal done, so I think they're going to do what they can to achieve that goal this year," Agnese said. Advertisement lschencker@chicagotribune.com Twitter @lschencker West Side rapper Twista said Chicago needs after-school programs -- not federal troops -- to stem violence. "We need, like, after-school programs and money put back into the communities and stuff like that so that we can help ourselves, not, like, the National Guard coming in," Twista said in a video TMZ posted Sunday. Advertisement "You see what happened every time you have a martial law type of thing and you bring that type of mentality to the neighborhoods and bring, like, a federal type of law to override the law of the city and things like that. It's a bad experience every time. Nobody would agree that that's a good idea. I'm pretty sure none of the families in Chicago want to walk outside their doors and see that type of thing happening going on up and down the streets, like when they step outside. So I think it's a problem that we can more so fix amongst ourselves, and I look at it as a big wake up call for us to stand up and start to do things ourselves." MOST READ ENTERTAINMENT NEWS THIS HOUR Advertisement President Donald Trump tweeted last week that "if Chicago doesn't fix the horrible 'carnage' going on, 228 shootings in 2017 with 42 killings (up 24% from 2016), I will send in the Feds!" The president's tweet did not specify what form that could take. South Side rapper-turned-actor Common echoed Twista's sentiment when he told a TMZ camera crew last week that "we've got to take care of our own." RELATED STORIES: Trump reportedly claimed 2 were shot dead in Chicago during Obamas speech. But it never happened. President Trump, keep your 'Feds' to yourself Late-night TV hosts mock Trump for his Chicago violence tweet Watch the latest movie trailers. Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 122 Sophie Turner as Jean Grey, anger management student, in "Dark Phoenix." The film, the latest in the "X-Men" franchise, costars James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender and Jessica Chastain. Read the review. (Twentieth Century Fox) Some comedians tell you everything about their personal lives where they live, their marital status, what their home life is like, etc. while closely guarding their actual deep-seated hang-ups. Louie Anderson, a seasoned comedian with over three decades of stand-up work under his belt, does the exact opposite, serenely dishing out heavy helpings of his childhood-influenced psychological makeup throughout his act, and never touching on the logistics of his current world. Inner demons and vulnerabilities may be fair game, the Minnesota-born Anderson seems to be implying, but that other stuff is private. Advertisement During his early show Sunday night at City Winery the first of two back-to-back performances even his recent Emmy win for his role as Christine Baskets on the FX show "Baskets" went unmentioned, despite Christine's face being prominently featured on the shirt Anderson wore under his black suit coat. Alternately standing and sitting throughout his 70-minute set ("My knees hurt because they were made for a smaller model," he quipped about 20 minutes in as he settled into his chair on stage), Anderson seemed more intently and intentionally present than any other comedian I've ever seen. Though his set never lagged or meandered, he was constantly scanning the audience for connections to be made. Advertisement Notably, Anderson's crowd work never involved insults or mockery. Instead he would start a conversation and then simply see where it would lead. After finding out that a man in the audience was named Jerry, he started reminiscing about a now-defunct restaurant in St. Paul called Jerry's Fried Chicken. Discovering that another audience member was 29 years old led him to a discussion of how 29 is the turning point for figuring out what to do with your life. "What's your profession, sir?" he asked one audience member after he had supplied Anderson with the acronym BMR for basal metabolic rate (like most of Anderson's jokes about being overweight and there were a lot this one had a darker, almost medical bent to it). When the man replied that he was a doctor, Anderson was quick to shoot back: "How do I look? Am I gonna make it?" Frequently wiping sweat from his face with a tissue, Anderson would be the first to admit that his appearance doesn't scream healthiness and well-being. "I'm on a health kick," he said a bit later. "That's what I call it. You know, so I could kick something again." Anderson is the kind of guy who makes all of this seem less like self-deprecation and more like self-acceptance. Sitting on stage clutching the mic stand to his chest like a child would a favorite stuffed animal, he exudes contentment, excitement and an uncanny ability to make you feel like you're sharing an inside joke. "My mom, she was the best," he said confidently. "You'd a loved her." He then gave a profoundly unhurried and understated impression of his mom waiting for a slow waiter to bring her a glass of water at a restaurant. Anderson has frequently stated that his character on "Baskets" is based on his mother, and this turn showed his remarkable ability to channel her smallest gesture for both emotional and comedic depth. On the darker side, he offhandedly talked about wanting to kill his dad at least a half dozen times. Once again he took unexpected tacks with these bits, always approaching the subject obliquely, in the midst of a recollected conversation with one of his 10 siblings or a muttered childhood threat. Anderson's sunny fatalism allows him to get away with exploring the darkest corners of abuse and resentment without sounding bitter or angry. Even the controversy around President Donald Trump can't faze him. After starting out a joke with "I have a little empathy for Trump " and being met with a loud boo from a man near the stage, Anderson patiently asked the man what alternate solutions he had. Advertisement "I got no solutions!" the guy shot back. "See UberEats." Anderson replied cryptically, before going on to explain that while reading the news is depressing, eating is enjoyable and imploring us all to stop reading the news and start ordering food. Unfazed, he continued with his original joke a nonpolitical commentary on the similarity between Trump's hair and his own. But it was his uncomplicated and almost poetic take on Chicago's current winter weather that encapsulated his comedic sensibilities (and deep Midwestern roots) best. So many comedians remark on Chicago's cold weather with clamoring hyperbole. Anderson countered with a simple truth: "It's that cold where if you're a Midwesterner you go, 'Not so bad.'" That also seems to sum up Anderson's view on life itself: Sure it has its ups and downs, but overall? Not so bad. Zach Freeman is a freelance writer. ctc-arts@chicagotribune.com Advertisement Twitter@ZachRunsChicago Treating an underactive thyroid gland during pregnancy comes with benefits and potential risks, according to a new study. (Getty Images) Many women may be affected by an underactive thyroid gland, but new research suggests that treating it in pregnancy comes with benefits and potential harm. "Our findings lead us to believe that overtreatment could be possible," study co-author and Mayo Clinic endocrinologist Juan Brito Campana said in a Mayo news release. Advertisement Campana and his colleagues advise a more nuanced approach when deciding whether or not to treat a pregnant woman for a mildly underactive thyroid. The thyroid is a butterfly-shaped gland in the neck that produces hormones vital to metabolism, growth and maturation. But the gland can produce too much hormone (hyperthyroidism) or two little (hypothyroidism), according to the U.S. National Institutes of Health. Advertisement A mildly underactive thyroid gland "subclinical hypothyroidism" causes a slight rise in levels of thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH) in the bloodstream, the Mayo researchers explained. This condition is estimated to occur in about 15 percent of pregnancies in the United States. Doctors have long known that hormonal treatment for a mildly underactive thyroid can reduce the risk of pregnancy loss. "A recent analysis of 18 studies showed that pregnant women with untreated subclinical hypothyroidism are at higher risk for pregnancy loss, placental abruption, premature rupture of membranes, and neonatal death," said Dr. Spyridoula Maraka. She is a Mayo endocrinologist and lead author of the study, published in the BMJ. "It seemed likely that treating subclinical hypothyroidism would reduce the chance of these deadly occurrences," she said in the news release. "But we know that treatment brings other risks, so we wanted to find the point at which benefits outweighed risks." Current guidelines recommend thyroid hormone treatment for pregnant women with subclinical hypothyroidism, the Mayo team noted. But could treatment have its own downside? To find out, Maraka's team tracked data from more than 5,400 pregnant women with subclinical hypothyroidism. The researchers found that only 16 percent received thyroid hormone treatment. And, as expected, women who received treatment had a lower risk of pregnancy loss. However, these women also had higher rates of preterm delivery, gestational diabetes, and preeclampsia (a dangerous spike in blood pressure during pregnancy), the findings showed. Advertisement But the link between thyroid hormone treatment and lower risk of pregnancy loss was seen only among women with higher levels of TSH before treatment, and not in those with somewhat lower levels, the investigators found. "On the basis of our findings, continuing to offer thyroid hormone treatment to decrease the risk of pregnancy loss in pregnant women with [higher levels] is reasonable," the study authors wrote. However, Campana said, if TSH levels are relatively low, "it may be best to leave subclinical hypothyroidism untreated." The researchers also believe their findings "could facilitate an informed conversation between patients and clinicians about starting thyroid hormone treatment." Two doctors who often deal with these cases said the study furthers understanding of the issue. "There may be a benefit in not supplementing those with slight increases of TSH but only treating those with higher levels more benefit, less risk," said Dr. Gerald Bernstein, an endocrinologist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. Advertisement "As with many things, this is a clinical decision and it is best to get the recommendations of your ob-gyn and endocrinologist," Bernstein added. Dr. Anthony Vintzileos is chair of obstetrics and gynecology at Winthrop-University Hospital in Mineola, N.Y. He said the issue has been a complicated one, and the current study was retrospective in nature meaning it could not prove that the hormone treatment caused the heightened risks to pregnancy. That means better, prospective trials may be needed to settle the issue, Vintzileos suggested. "In the meantime, I agree with the authors that the results of their study can be used to facilitate an informed conversation between patients and clinicians about thyroid hormone treatment," he said. RELATED STORIES: What a pumping room should look like for nursing mothers, and why A parent's guide: When to keep your sick kid home from school Advertisement Are heartburn drugs during pregnancy linked to asthma in kids? My maternal grandmother was alive for the first six years of my daughter's life, and I often wonder how odd my parenting style appeared to her a style I would label generously as "Jump Up at Every Whimper and Smother the Baby With Kisses." My grandmother was born in 1918, during a slightly less affectionate era. In 1928's "Psychological Care of Infant and Child," psychologist John Watson advised a literal hands-off approach. Advertisement "Never hug and kiss them, never let them sit in your lap," he wrote. "If you must, kiss them once on the forehead when they say good night." (If you must!) Advertisement "Shake hands with them in the morning," he advised. Watson's advice was mostly dispensed with by the time my grandmother raised her own kids in the 1940s and '50s, thanks to British psychologist John Bowlby's attachment theory, which showed that reassuring physical and emotional connections (eye contact, hugs) produce physically and mentally healthier people. By the time I was a child in the early '80s, Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish ruled the day. Their 1980 manual, "How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk" (Scribner) has sold more than 3 million copies in more than 30 editions around the world. Now Faber's daughter, Joanna Faber, has teamed up with co-author Julie King to produce the just-released "How to Talk So Little Kids Will Listen: A Survival Guide to Life With Children Ages 2-7" (Scribner). Adele Faber, whose gentle advice I adore, penned the foreword. Joanna Faber and King expand her decades-old advice and tackle topics that weren't even on the radar in 1980. (Hello, internet.) It's well worth your time if you have little people in your life. Here are three highlights: When kids lie: "Instead of accusing and interrogating, state the obvious," Faber writes. When you see a chocolate-smeared face and a missing piece of cake, for example, say, "I see you ate the cake," rather than, "Did you eat the cake?" Advertisement "If she protests, don't call her a liar," Faber writes. "Accept the feeling behind the protest. 'It's not easy to resist eating chocolate cake when it's sitting right in front of you. I bet you wish you hadn't eaten it!'" "How to Talk So Little Kids Will Listen" is by Joanna Faber, daughter of Adele Faber, who wrote "How to Talk So Kids Will Listen," first published in 1980. (Simon and Schuster) Express your own feelings. "I'm very upset that the cake was eaten." Hatch a plan. "Next time you're tempted, let me know. I'm sure we can find a way to help you wait." Then help the child make amends. "We're going to need something for dessert when our friends come over. Can you get out some cookies and arrange them nicely on a plate?" When kids beg: Hell hath no fury like a 5-year-old shopping for some other kid's birthday gift. King says to spell out guidelines ahead of time. "We're only shopping for Elena's birthday present today. Nothing for us!" ("Elena's birthday present" could just as easily be "groceries," "school supplies," you name it.) Advertisement Encourage your child to create a wish list that you bring to the store and update regularly to consult when your child's own birthday or other gift-receiving opportunity rolls around. "When a kid pines for something, you can just write it down," King writes. "Instead of saying, 'Don't be so spoiled, you just got a Lego set last week. You're never satisfied!' Try, 'Wow, that looks pretty cool. You really like the spaceships.' Take out the pen and add to his list: 'Star Wars' jumbo Lego set." (Not a bad idea for grown-up Target runs.) When parents overpraise: It's tempting to hover around our kids and heap praise upon them, but overwhelming evidence shows a steady stream of "Great job!" and "You're a genius!" can backfire, causing kids to take fewer risks out of fear of losing the lavish labels. I like King's analogy. "Think about how you would feel if you were cooking dinner with your partner sitting a few feet away saying, 'Nice technique slicing those onions. Good choice of cooking oil. The carrots are very evenly diced. You're displaying a very effective grip on that can opener.'" Advertisement I would feel like dumping the whole mess in the trash and ordering Thai food. Point(s) taken. hstevens@chicagotribune.com Twitter @heidistevens13 RELATED STORIES: Helping your child comfort a grieving pal For 2017, a pledge to be the light my kids need Advertisement Are you facing mom bias at work? U.S. Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit, Judge Diane Sykes speaks in a discussion during the Federalist Society's National Lawyers Convention in Washington, Saturday, Nov. 19, 2016. (Jose Luis Magana / AP) First Skokie's own Merrick Garland had his dreams of becoming a Supreme Court justice dashed; now a second Chicago-area judge may have suffered the same fate. U.S. Appeals Court Judge Diane Sykes who sits on the 7th Circuit in Chicago was said to be on the shortlist of judges being considered by President Donald Trump to replace the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. Advertisement Trump last year included the George W. Bush appointee on a list of eight judges he said he was considering. But on Monday, White House press secretary Sean Spicer seemed to inadvertently rule Sykes out, telling reporters at a news conference that Trump has decided who he'll nominate and is "100 percent sure he's the pick" a statement that appears to rule out a woman's nomination. Advertisement Spicer scrambled to correct himself, carefully referring thereafter only to "the individual" who Trump had picked, but the sheepish smile on his face seemed to be an acknowledgment that he'd let the cat out the bag. Sykes grew up in Milwaukee and started her career as a journalist with the Milwaukee Journal, going on to serve on Wisconsin's Supreme Court. Among her more notable opinions was her recent ruling that Chicago's restrictions on firing ranges are unconstitutional. If she isn't picked this time, she may still hold hope of replacing Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, who is 83, though at the age of 59, Sykes was herself already the oldest on Trump's shortlist, and risks being overlooked in favor of a younger candidate next time around. We'll know about Scalia's mooted replacement soon enough. Trump has said that he'll announce his pick Tuesday night. kjanssen@chicagotribune.com Twitter @kimjnews After more than a half-century of living a lie, Carolyn Bryant Donham decided to tell the truth. Emmett Till never grabbed her by the waist and said, "You needn't be afraid of me, baby I've (done something) with white women before." She can't remember now if the 14-year-old Chicago youngster even whistled at her on his way out the door. Her confession to historian and author Timothy Tyson in 2007 may have helped clear Donham's conscience and bring her to this place of "tender sorrow" she says she now feels for Till's deceased mother. But for African-Americans and many others who are just learning of this revelation in Tyson's new book, "The Blood of Emmett Till," it does nothing. We already knew her story was a lie. So did the judge who presided over the murder trial of her husband and another man in 1955. So did most of the people who lived in the tiny town of Money in the heart of the Mississippi Delta. But the all-white jury acquitted them anyway. So we will not spend a moment lamenting what should happen to this now 82-year-old woman who, years after the statute of limitations has expired, may have perjured herself by lying to the judge. For us, Carolyn Bryant her name at the time will remain merely a footnote in history, yet a modern testament to the racist and iniquitous legal system that has long refused to give African-American men fair judgment. We will not elevate the status of her lie by calling it a catalyst for the civil rights movement. We will not ask her to step forward tomorrow and warn America about the consequences of hatred. After this, we will not bother to think of her again. Instead, we will use the courage and wisdom of Mamie Till-Mobley to drive us forward. On Aug. 28, 1955, Emmett Till was beaten and shot for reportedly whistling at a white woman while visiting relatives in Mississippi. The body of the black 14-year-old from Chicago was discovered days later in the Tallahatchie River. The accused killers were later acquitted by an all-white jury. Till's mother, Mamie Till Mobley, insisted on an open-casket funeral back home in Chicago, allowing tens of thousands of people to view his mutilated body, publicly illustrating the violence of Jim Crow segregation. If there is a single incident that ignited the spirit of a fledgling civil rights movement, it was Emmett Till's mutilated body lying in an open casket in a South Side mortuary. Few of us could have endured the pain of having a son's battered, disfigured face on display for thousands of people to line up and see the way Till-Mobley did. The world would also see what Jim Crow had done to her only child when Jet magazine and the Chicago Defender published pictures of the open casket. Till-Mobley realized something back then that was not as obvious as it is today. In order to achieve things worthwhile, there must be sacrifice. So when it came to her son's legacy, she gave, and gave and gave until her own death in 2003. Since he was slain in 1955, Emmett Till's story has been shaped by the lie that Bryant told. While his murder has been used to highlight the atrocities of the Jim Crow South, it has also painted Till as a clueless teenager who was killed because he didn't understand the social mores of the Deep South. This is how history has told it: The teenager had gone down south, as many northern black kids did during that era, to spend the summer with relatives. While standing around outside a corner store with his cousins, Till started bragging that he had a white girlfriend back in Chicago. His cousins didn't believe him, so they dared him to ask the white woman working behind the counter for a date. Till went inside to buy two cents worth of bubble gum and on the way out, he turned to the woman and said, "Bye, baby." That's when 21-year-old Carolyn Bryant apparently began formulating her lie. She claimed that Till had grabbed her, made sexual advances, flirted with her and then wolf-whistled at her as he walked out the door. Three days later, her gun-toting husband, Roy Bryant, and his half-brother, J.W. Milam, went to the home of Till's great uncle, Rev. Moses Wright, rousted Till from bed and drove off with him in their truck. Days later, Till's mutilated body was found in the Tallahatchie River with a 75-pound cotton gin fan tied around his neck. After their acquittal, Bryant and Milam admitted to the killing in an interview with Look magazine. But to believe the depiction of what happened at the store, you'd have to also believe that Till was ignorant about the caste system that existed for blacks in the South. You would have to believe that he didn't have a clue that something as mundane as whistling at a white woman could get a black child killed. And you would have to believe that someone as smart and socially conscious as Till-Mobley would have left that sort of thing to chance. She always insisted that she had not. Just as black mothers and fathers today teach their sons how to act when stopped by the police, parents in the 1950s told their sons how to behave around whites who had the freedom to issue their own justice upon blacks. We have learned enough about Till-Mobley over the years to know that she would have had that talk with her son. Bryant's admission proves that Emmett Till was not a naive kid who did a stupid thing. He was a black kid who paid the price for a scared white woman's lie. Carolyn Bryant Donham doesn't deserve any accolades for finally telling the truth. She was a coward then and she's a coward now. If you want to know what courage is, look at Till-Mobley. She was brave enough to use her sorrow to reignite a movement. Gene Herrick / AP Carolyn Bryant in 1955. Carolyn Bryant in 1955. (Gene Herrick / AP) (Gene Herrick / AP) In the PBS documentary, "The Murder of Emmett Till," filmed prior to her death, Till-Mobley told how she came to the decision. "I decided then that I would start at his feet and work my way up, maybe gathering strength as I went. I paused at his midsection, because I knew he would not want me looking at him. But I saw enough that I knew he was intact. I kept on up until I got to his chin and then I I was forced to deal with his face. I saw that his tongue was choked out. I noticed that the right eye was lying on midway his cheek, I noticed that his nose had been broken like somebody took a meat chopper and chopped his nose in several places. As I kept looking, I saw a hole, which I presumed, was a bullet hole and I could look through that hole and see daylight on the other side. And I wondered was it necessary to shoot him? Mr. Rayner (the funeral director) asked me, he said "Do you want me to touch the body up?" I said, "No, Mr. Rayner, let the people see what I've seen." I was just willing to bear it all. I think everybody needed to know what had happened to Emmett Till." She fought long and hard to keep her son from becoming a forgotten victim of Jim Crow South. Till-Mobley made sure her son would be remembered as a martyr. dglanton@chicagotribune.com Twitter: @dahleeng Protesters join Senate and House Democrats at a rally outside the Supreme Court on Jan. 30, 2017, to protest President Donald Trump's executive order on immigration. (Shawn Thew / EPA) WASHINGTON Chicago-area Democrats in Congress lashed out Monday at what party leaders called President Donald Trump's "hateful" executive order on immigration, and several joined an evening protest outside the Supreme Court. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, a New Delhi-born Democrat from Schaumburg, addressed a huge throng of protesters who cried out, "No ban. No wall," in front of the high court. Advertisement "I took an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution," the first-term lawmaker told the crowd. "The executive order that was just issued is an assault on the Constitution, it hurts working families and the economy, and it divides our country." "It's time to fight back. Are you ready for the fight?" Krishnamoorthi asked. Advertisement The crowd roared back with one of former President Barack Obama's campaign chants: "Fired up. Ready to go." Sen. Tammy Duckworth was at the protest. Democratic Reps. Jan Schakowsky of Evanston, Brad Schneider of Deerfield, Dan Lipinski of Western Springs, Bill Foster of Naperville and Cheri Bustos of East Moline planned to attend the protest, aides said. People at the rally held placards including one that said: "Will trade racists 4 refugees." Schakowsky, in an interview earlier Monday, said she had addressed demonstrators at O'Hare International Airport on Sunday and thanked lawyers who were assisting travelers who were held for secondary processing. It was on Friday that Trump triggered a firestorm by ordering that no refugees be admitted to the U.S. for 120 days and the arrival of citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen be halted for 90 days. Two Republican congressmen from Illinois, Reps. Randy Hultgren and Adam Kinzinger, said they had misgivings about the measure. Hultgren, from west suburban Plano, said that the vetting of refugees entering the U.S. already was thorough. It's a long, difficult process that typically lasts 18 months or longer for a "vulnerable" family, he said. He said Trump's "overly broad" order had had "unintended consequences," singling out the rejection of Syrian Christians at Philadelphia's airport. Advertisement Rep. Adam Kinzinger, a Republican from the Joliet area, said Sunday in a blog post that Trump's executive order had "caused confusion among those asked to enforce it," while media reports had "muddled facts and fiction." "I urge the administration to clarify the specifics on what should and should not be done to best protect our homeland," the post said. Kinzinger said he was deeply concerned by reports that people with green cards and people who assisted the U.S. were being denied entry or subject to delayed entry. Kinzinger, an Air National Guard pilot, did not vote for Trump and wrote in an unspecified candidate. Before the rally, Democrats from the state spoke out in harsher terms. "I am outraged, and I condemn in the strongest terms, the executive order ... aimed at the world's most vulnerable people," Rep. Danny Davis of Chicago said in a statement. Advertisement Schakowsky said Trump's order "had struck fear in the hearts of millions of Americans" and predicted protests such as those at O'Hare would not stop. Illinois is an immigrant-rich state, and millions of people nationwide "feel this is counter to American values," she said. She condemned Trump's order as "immoral" and "extremely dangerous" to national security since the U.S. relies on cooperation from several Muslim countries in the war against terror. Schakowsky also predicted that House Republicans who support the order will be at risk in the 2018 midterm elections. Foster, in a statement, said: "History has not looked kindly on us when we've prevented people fleeing violence from seeking refuge in this country." Rep. Luis Gutierrez of Chicago, a pro-immigration voice in Congress, will address the executive order from the House floor Tuesday, said Doug Rivlin, his spokesman. Daywatch Weekdays Start each day with Chicago Tribune editors' top story picks, delivered to your inbox. > Gutierrez asked for a head count of people held up at O'Hare, as well as their names and visa status, but has not gotten a response from the Department of Homeland Security, Rivlin said. Advertisement Lipinski thinks the executive order is "ill-conceived and harmful to innocent individuals," spokesman Isaac Sancken said. Rep. Mike Quigley of Chicago strongly opposes what he called the "shameful, un-American Muslim ban," said Tara Vales, his spokeswoman. He and Schakowsky have joined more than 30 Democratic colleagues in sponsoring a bill to allow so-called sanctuary citiesChicago is oneto continue to receive federal funding, Vales said. Rep. Peter Roskam, a Wheaton Republican, did not respond to Tribune questions about whether he supported Trump's immigration order. kskiba@chicagotribune.com Twitter @KatherineSkiba Angelica Mora hugs her mother Maria Carmen Mora at their North Side home in Chicago July 15, 2012, as her brother Emmanuel Mora (far right) talks about the beating death of their father Delfino Mora (inset, left), as he was collecting cans in a West Rogers Park alley Tuesday. (Michael Tercha, Chicago Tribune) A Facebook posting of a video showing a deadly attack on a 62-year-old immigrant this week led to murder charges against a North Side 16-year-old, officials said. Malik Jones, 16, of the 2400 block of West Thorndale Avenue, was charged late Saturday with first-degree murder in the slaying of Delfino Mora, police said. Jones, charged as an adult, was ordered held without bail by Judge Adam Bourgeois Sunday during an appearance in Cook County Court and is scheduled to appear for a preliminary hearing Monday. Advertisement Mora, of the 6000 block of North Washtenaw Avenue in the West Rogers Park neighborhood, was found unconscious but breathing in an alley in the 6300 block of North Artesian Avenue just before 8 a.m. Tuesday. He was taken to St. Francis Hospital in Evanston in critical condition and died at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday An autopsy by Cook County medical examiner's office found that the 5-foot-7-inch Mora died from blunt head trauma in an assault. Jones was with two other individuals who have not been charged in the incident when he confronted Mora Tuesday morning, asking him what he had in his pockets, prosecutors said. Jones then punched the victim in the jaw and he fell to the ground, hitting his head on the concrete, prosecutors said. Advertisement The attack was videotaped on the defendant's cell phone by one of the other individuals and was later put on Jones' Facebook page, prosecutors said. Jones had given his phone to that person before confronting Mora. "It feels to us like they're making fun of my dad because he couldn't defend himself," said Angelica Mora, 17, Delfino Mora's youngest child. "They think posting a violent video makes them tough. It's like they want to get famous." The attack happened about 5 a.m. Tuesday. A passerby found Mora's body three hours later with blood streaming out of his nostrils and vomit next to his head, prosecutors said. A witness who knows Jones saw the video and passed it on until it eventually was seen by a co-worker of the victim's son, prosecutors said. The co-worker then got in touch with the victim's son, who identified his father in the video, prosecutors said. The video was then taken to police by witnesses. Jones was arrested Saturday with the cell phone. A search warrant was obtained and police seized the video as well, prosecutors said. Prosecutors also said that Jones admitted to detectives that he had hit Mora. Maria Carmen Mora, 59, said her husband of more than 40 years was a hard worker and the patriarch of the family that includes 12 children. The family started out very poor in Mexico, she said, so her husband, who had built his home in Michoacan, Mexico, came to the Chicago area to work home construction to support their children. A work accident about 15 years ago left him without full use of his right arm, she said, so he was unable to continue working. But Valentin Mora, 38, said his father's disability didn't keep him stuck inside. He would often walk around the neighborhood and collect cans to help support the family. Advertisement "He didn't like to sit at home he liked to get up in the morning, grab the mail and collect cans," his son said. "He liked the extra money." Valentin Mora said his father had six girls and six boys, ranging in age from 17 to 40 years old. The family lived in its current North Side residence for more than 15 years, he said, and his father was well known in the neighborhood. Daywatch Weekdays Start each day with Chicago Tribune editors' top story picks, delivered to your inbox. > Emmanuel Mora, 20, the family's youngest son, said his father was always smiling and making jokes, especially to make his 4-year-old grandson, Rodrigo Mora, laugh, he said. His father taught himself to play guitar, Emmanuel Mora said, and loved to strum and sing in his three-person band. He said his father would often play his guitar at home while Rodrigo sat alongside, idolizing and mimicking his grandfather's style. Delfino Mora loved entertaining family and friends with humor and music, family said. "For now, things are really tough, but we're trying to stay strong," Emmanuel Mora said. "My mom is now the head of the family, and she's showing us how strong she can be. We're trying to be strong for her, too, because we don't want her to get sick or depressed." Angelica Mora said she was looking forward to having her father at her graduation from Mather High School next year. Advertisement "I think he'll still be there," Angelica Mora said. "I won't be able to see him, but he'll be there." The family is planning to take Delfino Mora's body back to Mexico to be buried sometime this week, Emmanuel Mora said. jjaworski@tribune.com, bdoyle@tribune.com Twitter: @Jim_Jaworski, @tribdoyle The last of three men charged in the "Pick 'Em Out and Knock 'Em Out" slaying of a 62-year-old father of 12 has been sentenced to 33 years in prison. Malik Jones, 21, pleaded guilty Monday to murder and robbery in the 2012 killing of Delfino Mora during the vicious street game, a video of which was posted on Facebook and circulated until a co-worker of Mora's son saw it. Jones was sentenced to 25 years for the murder and eight additional years for the robbery, according to prosecutors and court records. Jones, Nicholas Ayala and Anthony Malcolm were each charged with first-degree murder and robbery in Mora's slaying. Malcolm is serving 30 years in prison after being convicted in July 2013, and Ayala is serving 27 years after pleading guilty in February 2014. Evidence presented in the case pointed to Jones as the one who started beating Mora while Malcolm recorded the attack on Jones' phone. Mora, an immigrant from Mexico who lived in West Rogers Park, had worked construction jobs after moving to the United States, but had a work accident about 17 years ago. He sometimes went through the neighborhood to collect cans to help support his family, according to his relatives. Early on July 10, 2012, Mora was in an alley in the 6300 block of North Artestian Avenue when Ayala, Malcolm and Jones attacked him. Jones first confronted Mora, asking him what he had in his pockets, prosecutors said. "I think I'm gonna knock out this (expletive)," Jones said, then started the video recorder on his cellphone, according to trial evidence. As Malcolm held the phone, Jones punched Mora once in the jaw. Mora fell and struck his head on concrete. Jones took $60 from Mora's wallet, prosecutors have said. It was about 8 a.m., three hours or so after the attack, before a passerby found Mora, blood streaming from his nose. He died the next day. The video of the attack was posted and shared on Facebook until a co-worker of one of Mora's six sons saw it. The video was located by investigators on Jones' Facebook page, and investigators tracked down the three. Jones, of the 2400 block of West Thorndale Avenue, was the first of the three charged. When Malcolm was convicted, Cook County Criminal Court Judge Joseph Claps said it was "a sad travesty that Mr. Delfino Mora died because of the actions of people who were apparently thinking what they were doing was a game." Twitter @ChicagoBreaking Two men were killed and three other people were wounded in Chicago over eight hours Sunday, police said. The most recent fatal shooting happened about 11 p.m. in the Southwest Side's Brighton Park neighborhood, where a 31-year-old man was killed in the 3500 block of West 38th Place. He was standing in the yard of a house when someone fired shots from a silver SUV and he was shot in the back. He was pronounced dead at the scene. Advertisement He was identified as Jesse C. Montes Deoca, of the same block where he was killed, the Cook County medical examiner's office said. He was pronounced dead at 11:30 p.m. after suffering multiple gunshot wounds, the office determined following an autopsy Monday. About 5:35 p.m. on the Northwest Side, 23-year-old Jordi Ibarra was shot to death. Advertisement Ibarra was found with a gunshot wound to the head in the 6200 block of West Grand Avenue, on the border between the Galewood and Belmont Central neighborhoods, according to police. He was taken to Loyola University Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead. Police released no information about the circumstances of the shooting. About 6:50 p.m. on the Northwest Side, a 16-year-old boy was shot in the right foot in the 1900 block of North Pulaski Road, according to police. The boy was walking in the Hermosa neighborhood when he heard shots and felt pain. He went in a private vehicle to Sts. Mary and Elizabeth Medical Center, where he was in good condition. About 6:45 p.m. on the West Side, a 51-year-old woman was shot in a robbery in the 4700 block of West Erie Street in the West Garfield Park neighbrhood, police said. The woman was shot in both legs when someone tried to rob her, and she was taken to Mount Sinai Hospital in good condition, according to police. About 3 p.m. on the South Side, a 22-year-old man was shot in the Englewood neighborhood in the 6300 block of South Racine Avenue, according to police. The man suffered a gunshot wound to the left arm and a graze wound to a lower part of the body, and went to the University of Illinois at Chicago Medical Center in a private vehicle. He was in good condition. No one was in custody in the shootings. A 3-year-old boy and an off-duty Cook County sheriff's deputy were among 27 people shot across Chicago over the weekend, a drop from last weekend but enough to push the number of people hit by gunfire so far this year to nearly 300. With two days to go in January, the number of shootings and homicides in the city is close to the entire first month of 2016. Last year ended up being the most violent year in decades. As of Monday morning, 295 people had been shot in Chicago this month, two shy of the entire month last year, according to data kept by the Tribune. At least 52 homicides have been recorded, five fewer than all of January last year. Chicago Police Department statistics are lower because they do not include shootings on expressways, police-involved shootings, homicides in which a person was killed in self-defense, or pending death investigations. But still, its numbers are close to last year too. As of Monday morning, the department had logged 49 homicides, one short of the 50 it recorded all of last Janary. The department did not provide statistics on the number of people shot so far this year, but instead it released figures on the number of "shooting incidents." Those incidents could include more than one person shot. There have been 220 shooting incidents this month compared with 219 last January, the department said. A total of 231 incidents were reported for all of January last year. The level of violence so far this year prompted President Donald Trump to tweet last week that he "will send in the Feds!" if the city doesn't reduce it. By the end of the week, Police Department brass had come up with a plan to flood the city's most violent neighborhoods with hundreds of extra officers over the weekend. The officers assigned to tactical, gang, saturation and mission teams saw their regular days off canceled from Friday through Sunday, according to police sources familiar with the change. The city's beat officers also were given the option of earning overtime by working weekend days off, the sources said. Adding so many officers to the street on their days off is more typical during hot summer months or special occasions, such as when the president is visiting the city. Shootings were down, but the weekend was not the least violent this month. The second weekend of the month saw only two killed and seven wounded. Over this past weekend, four people were shot to death and 23 people were wounded, according to Tribune data. The weekend was markedly colder than last weekend, when 54 people were shot, six of them fatally. There were seven attacks that wounded three or more people, according to police. This past weekend, a 3-year-old boy was grazed by a bullet in a Southwest Side home early Saturday when someone fired shots into the residence. A 23-year-old man was shot in the arm in the attack. Both were listed in good condition. Two hours earlier, an off-duty Cook County sheriff's deputy was among three people shot in a nightclub district of the Gold Coast neighborhood. A person has been charged. Police have released no details about the shooting. Gloria Pinex talks about Chicago police Officer Raoul Mosqueda, who shot and killed her son in 2011 but who is in line to become a field training officer. (Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune) (Terrence Antonio James / Chicago Tribune/Chicago Tribune) Activists gathered outside a South Side police station Monday to voice outrage that a Chicago police officer involved in a controversial 2011 shooting is now in training to mentor rookie officers. The Tribune revealed last week that departmental records show that Raoul Mosqueda is training to become a field training officer, a post in which seasoned officers give on-the-job education to new officers. Advertisement In January 2011, Mosqueda fatally shot motorist Darius Pinex after he tried to drive away from a traffic stop. But at a civil trial in 2015, Mosqueda gave testimony that clashed with a police recording, raising doubts about the lawfulness of the traffic stop. The city settled a lawsuit from Pinex's family for about $3.5 million. On Monday, Pinex's mother, Gloria Pinex, joined a handful of activists outside the Englewood police station, where Mosqueda was once stationed, to call for his firing and label him as unfit to train others. Advertisement "He's going to train somebody? He needs to be trained," Pinex said. "How did y'all let that man get promoted?" she asked of the department. Activists aired complaints about a host of shootings by police and contended that the proposed new post for Mosqueda is further evidence that police officials don't take officer accountability seriously. The move to field training officer would not be a promotion in rank though it comes with a pay bump of a few thousand dollars and supervisory responsibilities and department spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said top police officials have little control over who becomes a field training officer. New trainers, he said, are chosen through a process involving an application, testing and screening. Under the union contract, top officials have no discretion over who wins the jobs, Guglielmi said. Mosqueda who could not be reached for comment is one of two prospective field training officers who fatally shot a motorist under controversial circumstances, records show. The other, Michael St. Clair II, fatally shot William Hope Jr. in 2010, and a federal jury in 2012 awarded about $4.6 million to Hope's family after ruling the officers unlawfully detained Hope and used excessive force. St. Clair was cleared of any wrongdoing in the Hope shooting by the Independent Police Review Authority, but that agency is continuing to review the Pinex case more than six years after he was shot. That means IPRA could still recommend that Mosqueda be disciplined or even fired. Daywatch Weekdays Start each day with Chicago Tribune editors' top story picks, delivered to your inbox. > The officers are poised to join a program that attracted heavy criticism in the U.S. Department of Justice's recent report on the Police Department. Superintendent Eddie Johnson has sworn to improve the program as part of the department's broader effort to bolster training in the wake of the scandal sparked in late 2015 by video of an officer shooting teenager Laquan McDonald 16 times. The federal report castigated police officials for failing to offer incentives to good cops to become field training officers and allowing "problematic police officers to continue acting as FTOs." Advertisement Mosqueda and his partner stopped a car driven by Pinex, who had a history of drug arrests, in the South Side's Englewood neighborhood on Jan. 7, 2011. Mosqueda later reported that they stopped the car because they heard a police dispatch saying it was involved in an earlier shooting. The officers boxed in the car and exited with guns drawn. The officers alleged Pinex refused orders, putting the vehicle in reverse, hitting a light pole and then gunning the car forward. Mosqueda fatally shot Pinex in the head, though his partner also opened fire, records show. Investigators found a gun beneath the driver's seat, police reports showed. At the trial over the Pinex family's lawsuit, however, a recording emerged that contradicted Mosqueda's testimony and called the lawfulness of the traffic stop into question. Mosqueda had claimed the dispatch had matched Pinex's vehicle, but the recording didn't match the specifics of his Oldsmobile Aurora and didn't mention anything about a shooting. dhinkel@chicagotribune.com Twitter @dhinkel Clifton Banks, 36, was charged with two counts of attempted murder related to a Gold Coast shooting early onJan. 28, 2017. (Chicago Police Department) Chicago police on Monday made an arrest in a weekend Gold Coast shooting that left at least two men injured, including an off-duty Cook County sheriff's deputy. Police said Clifton Banks, 36, of the 8700 block of South Emerald Avenue in the Gresham neighborhood, was charged with two felony counts of attempted murder and is to appear before a judge Monday. Advertisement Authorities said Banks was identified as the gunman in a shooting that happened after an argument in the 1200 block of North State Street, near Division Street, about 3:30 a.m. Saturday. Investigators said the shooting was not gang-related. Initially, police said three men were shot, including a 39-year-old who suffered a graze wound to the head, a 33-year-old who was shot in the back and a 30-year-old who was shot in the left leg. Advertisement Officials said the off-duty sheriff's deputy was the 39-year-old who was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital. His name has not been released. Daywatch Weekdays Start each day with Chicago Tribune editors' top story picks, delivered to your inbox. > Sophia Ansari, a spokeswoman from the sheriff's office, said he's been assigned to a Cook County courtroom detail for several years and is an 11-year veteran of the department. The two attempted murder counts are related to the 39-year-old off-duty deputy and the 30-year-old shot in the leg, said Officer Nicole Trainor, a police spokeswoman. It's not clear what happened to the 33-year-old, who was first reported as being in serious condition, and why there is no corresponding charge for his injuries. "It says that (Banks) was arrested because he intentionally fired a firearm which struck those two victims, but it doesn't mention a third victim," Trainor said. "Originally we had three people shot; I'm not sure why it's two counts." Banks was one of two people who were questioned immediately after the shooting, first in a nearby parking garage across from McFadden's Restaurant and Saloon then at a police station. The second person was released and not charged, a police statement said. Banks is expected to appear in central bond court at 2600 S. California Ave. Monday afternoon. "Our narrative does have that three people were shot," Trainor said. "Maybe they will talk about (the discrepancy) in court." President Donald Trump 's immigration ban had repercussions Monday at colleges and universities throughout the Midwest, with officials urging some students and scholars not to leave the country. The University of Illinois joined several other major research institutions Northwestern University , Purdue University , DePaul University and the University of Notre Dame among them in urging students and staff from the seven Muslim-majority countries most affected by the new policy to defer travel abroad "until there is fuller assessment." Trump's executive order, signed Friday, freezes entry of all refugees to the U.S. for 120 days, halts Syrian refugees indefinitely and places a 90-day moratorium on the arrival of citizens of the predominantly Muslim countries of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. In response, students and faculty began canceling personal and academic trips overseas. School leaders scrambled throughout the weekend to assess which students, faculty and academic programming would be affected by the restrictions and to ascertain whether anyone was stuck abroad. They also warned of the policy's long-term effects on higher education. Advertisement "We are greatly concerned about the negative consequences for members of our community and their families arising from President Trump's recent executive order instituting changes in immigration policy," said U. of I. President Timothy Killeen , who originally is from Wales and was a green card holder before becoming a U.S. citizen. There are more than 150 people from the affected countries at U. of I.'s Urbana-Champaign campus and 184 students, research scholars, faculty and staff at UIC , school officials said. U. of I. is not aware of any students, faculty or staff who are currently overseas and unable to return to the United States, Killeen said. There were more than 17,000 students from the seven countries studying in the United States during the 2015-16 academic year, according to the nonprofit Institute of International Education. The American Association of State Colleges and Universities, which has a membership of 420 four-year state colleges and universities, said the ban could have a negative effect on students and scholars across the country. But the organization has been struggling to issue definitive counsel to its members because of confusion in the way the executive order has been implemented and who is affected. Advertisement Protesters rallied at O'Hare International Airport on Jan. 28, 2017, after travelers were held, including those with green cards and visas, following President Donald Trump's executive orders on immigration. (Chris Sweda / Chicago Tribune) (Chris Sweda / Chicago Tribune/Chicago Tribune) "There's no question we are obliged to play by the rules," said Barmak Nassirian, director of federal policy for the association. "But the implementation of the executive order, I dare say, has been very chaotic." The Trump administration has issued conflicting statements on how green card holders should be treated with respect to the executive order, a reflection of the chaotic rollout of the president's first major national security initiative. The Department of Homeland Security first said the ban extended to legal U.S. residents, then reversed course Sunday night when Secretary John Kelly issued a statement deeming "the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest." In addition to the confusion in academia, the ban led to mass protests at major international airports throughout the weekend as arriving travelers were held by immigration authorities, and in some cases, sent back to their home countries. U.S. citizens and those holding green cards were among those stopped and questioned by immigration authorities. Dozens of Chicago-area lawyers camped out at O'Hare International Airport throughout the weekend to assist travelers who were being detained. Of the 17 people held at O'Hare on Saturday, three had student visas to allow them to legally enter the country, according to a database maintained by lawyers at the airport. All three are listed as being from Pakistan, which is not one of the countries listed in the ban. It was not immediately clear which schools those students attend or the reason they were held. University of Illinois President Timothy Killeen meets with the Chicago Tribune EditorialBoard on July 12, 2016. (Phil Velasquez / Chicago Tribune) Mercedes Badia-Tavas, president of the Chicago chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said she thinks universities are making the right decision in issuing travel advisories. Until the situation becomes more certain, there's too much risk involved for some travelers, she said. "That's the problem when you don't have clear instructions on how you implement the order," Badia-Tavas said. "Everyone shoots in the dark and they start detaining everyone." University leaders across the country criticized the executive order, including the president of Purdue University, which has about 100 students and 10 faculty from the affected countries. None have been stranded outside the United States, according to the school. Advertisement "The President's order related to immigration is a bad idea, poorly implemented, and I hope that he will promptly revoke and rethink it," Purdue President Mitch Daniels , former Republican governor of Indiana, said in a statement. "If the idea is to strengthen the protection of Americans against terrorism, there are many far better ways to achieve it." Northwestern University also cautioned that students from the affected countries should not travel abroad. Northwestern has 71 students, scholars and faculty from Iran, including graduate students with student visas and faculty and scholars visiting the university as postdoctoral candidates and researchers, according to statistics from Northwestern's international office. "We believe strongly that there is no legitimate basis for depriving students and scholars from those countries who have already obtained visas from entering the United States to study and conduct research at Northwestern or elsewhere," Northwestern President Morton Schapiro said. He also pledged "all the necessary actions to protect our students, faculty and staff," including not providing federal authorities information on someone's immigration status. Notre Dame President the Rev. John Jenkins also called on Trump to rescind the executive order, saying it will "demean our nation." While some universities strongly urged against traveling abroad, others issued softer warnings. At the Illinois Institute of Technology, which has the second-highest number of international students among Illinois schools, the provost warned citizens of the affected countries that they "likely will not be allowed to return" to the United States. University of Chicago leaders reaffirmed their commitment to foreign-born students but also advised citizens of those countries to "carefully consider" before traveling outside the United States. U. of C. President Robert Zimmer also penned a letter to the White House asking the administration to commit to welcoming students and scholars from other countries. Hearing these messages of inclusion from management, whether it's a university president, a CEO or a school principal, is critical for those affected by Trump's order, said Maryam Kouchaki, an assistant professor of management and organization at Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management. Advertisement "They feel really alone, not respected, not valued," said Kouchaki, who is Iranian and holds a green card. "Research has shown exclusion hurts." At Oakton Community College in Des Plaines, as word got out that one of its math tutors, Hessan Noorian, was detained for several hours at O'Hare after coming back from Iran, officials made counselors and other resources available for students worried about how the executive order could impact them. At Monmouth College, a private, liberal arts school in western Illinois, administrators planned to meet Monday night with about a dozen students from Syria who have visas to study in the United States. They hoped to offer encouragement, answer questions and quell fears. "I think everyone is equally confused and unclear right now," college spokesman Duane Bonifer said. "We're telling our students just to go to class, continue to work on their degree ... they've got the college's support." Daywatch Weekdays Start each day with Chicago Tribune editors' top story picks, delivered to your inbox. > Meanwhile, the ban also is creating dilemmas for some university staff who are U.S. citizens working closely with the listed countries. Northwestern professor Elizabeth Shakman Hurd was scheduled to leave next month for Iran for a two-week seminar and tour to study politics, religion and other international issues. But after Iran issued a ban reciprocating the one imposed by Trump's order, Hurd said her plane tickets and spot on the enrichment tour may go to waste. Advertisement She said she will have to teach upcoming courses about Iran, including "International Politics and the Middle East," without the firsthand knowledge she planned to bring home from her trip. "This will have a chilling effect on academics in the United States that I think we cannot even begin to estimate at this point," said Shakman Hurd, a political science professor. "It's going to really hamper our ability to do our jobs." Chicago Tribune's Ally Marotti and Stacy St. Clair contributed. drhodes@chicagotribune.com vortiz@chicagotribune.com Protesters gather Jan. 29, 2017, outside the international terminal at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport two days after President Donald Trump ordered travel restrictions on seven Muslim-majority countries. (Armando L. Sanchez / Chicago Tribune) (Armando L. Sanchez/Chicago Tribune) BBC journalist Ali Hamedani left his native Iran in 2009 with no intention of returning to the land that had imprisoned his family. These days, even though he holds a British passport, Hamedani's birthplace roused enough concern to warrant three hours of questioning at O'Hare International Airport on Sunday, two days after President Donald Trump ordered travel restrictions on seven Muslim-majority countries. During that time officers seized Hamedani's phone and he wasn't allowed to use the bathroom, he said. Advertisement "They never used the word detained, so I wasn't under any kind of arrest but I was questioned two times regarding my place of birth, which is Iran, and regarding my work," Hamedani said. "They ask about my Facebook and they check my Twitter." Hamedani missed his connecting flight to Los Angeles but considered that a small misfortune compared with the disappointment suffered by a group of LGBT asylum-seekers he met at an airport in Turkey. They had fled Iran for Turkey and were bound for the U.S. until Friday evening's announcement by Trump ruined those plans. Advertisement "Their flights are canceled," Hamedani said. "They cannot go back to Iran, and they cannot come to America. I don't know what we can do for them, but at least we can think about them." He added, "Immediately, (when) the news came up, they were crying." Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 63 People protest President Donald Trump's immigration and refugee order at O'Hare International Airport on Jan. 28, 2017, in Chicago. (Chris Sweda / Chicago Tribune) Trump's executive order freezes entry of all refugees to the U.S. for 120 days, halts Syrian refugees indefinitely and places a 90-day moratorium on the arrival of citizens of the predominantly Muslim countries of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. At least 50 people were held Sunday at O'Hare for further questioning, including those from non-Muslim countries like Mexico, according to lawyers at the scene. It was unclear whether the questioning of the Mexican travelers was related to Trump's order. A 19-year-old German national working in the suburbs as an au pair broke down in tears as she was waiting for her friend, a German citizen born in Iraq, after the friend was held for questioning. The young women have been in the U.S. working for families since August 2015. They extended their visas to stay another year and were returning Sunday from vacation in Mexico when they were swept up by the new policy. "I am afraid they won't let her go," said the 19-year-old, who asked not to be identified out of concern for her immigration status. "I think it's crazy. It's discriminating against these people." The woman is a Muslim who was born in Serbia, a country not affected by the ban. After about an hour, her friend was released. On Saturday, more than a dozen travelers were placed in custody. All of them had some kind of legal status in the United States, lawyers said. Though all the detainees were eventually released as a result of a court ruling Saturday that effectively suspended some of Trump's travel ban, the presidential directive has stoked fears among the immigrant community whether they are refugees or permanent residents. Advertisement Adding to the confusion, the Department of Homeland Security on Sunday issued a statement saying it will "continue to enforce all of President Trump's Executive Orders" while at the same time vowing to "comply with judicial orders." For the second straight day, hundreds of protesters occupied an area at Terminal 5 of O'Hare with signs reading "No Ban, No Wall," while chanting slogans like, "Refugees welcome here! No hate, no fear!" Police stood at the entrances of the arrival doorways and loosely around metal barricades where protesters rallied. Rozi Bhimani, of Evanston, waved a poster with the image of a woman wearing a star-spangled hijab bearing the words "We the people." The daughter of a Pakistani father, Bhimani said she wanted to vocalize her opposition to the travel ban on Middle East countries. "I want to send a strong message that we want to see the rule of law and court orders enforced," she said. "I will be very concerned if the executive branch does not listen to the judicial branch." In Morton Grove, about 500 people packed the basement of the Muslim Education Center on Sunday while hundreds more spilled upstairs and outside the building, during a demonstration calling for sanctuary and support for Muslims and other minority groups against recent Trump administration actions. Advertisement "Each day it's imperative we live in concern and know what our government is doing. It's also imperative that we don't live in fear but live in hope, that, as a collaboration, we can make an impact. This march/rally is to empower all marginalized groups and give hope for the future. We can make a difference together," said Dilnaz Waraich of the Muslim Community Center. Protesters carried signs, heart-shaped balloons and cameras, and they included elderly couples with canes and wheelchairs, babies in strollers, and all ages in between. "Our local governments must stand in firm solidarity with our Muslim and Arab neighbors in showing their opposition to these immoral executive orders by passing sanctuary laws declaring their commitment not to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement," said Lesley Williams of Jewish Voice for Peace Chicago. At O'Hare, more than 150 pro bono attorneys were camped out to aid people who were being held by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Attorney Richard Goldwasser said he returned to the airport at 6 a.m. Sunday to offer legal resources to people who may need it. "We came here today not knowing what to expect, how stringent they were going to apply the executive order, and I'm not sure they know," he said. "One of the problems from the beginning yesterday was the CBP (U.S. Customs and Border Protection) is not giving us any information. Are they holding people? Who are they holding? Their names?" Advertisement Trump's executive order garnered sharp condemnation from several prominent figures in Chicago, including Cardinal Blase Cupich, who characterized the measure as "a dark moment in U.S. history." "The world is watching as we abandon our commitments to American values," Cupich said in a statement. "These actions give aid and comfort to those who would destroy our way of life. They lower our estimation in the eyes of the many peoples who want to know America as a defender of human rights and religious liberty, not a nation that targets religious populations and then shuts its doors on them." Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan denounced Trump's order as "unconstitutional, unAmerican and unlawful" as she joined 15 other attorneys general, including those from California and New York, in opposition to the ban. "We are confident that the Executive Order will ultimately be struck down by the courts. In the meantime, we are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created," Madigan said Sunday in a statement. Also Sunday, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel stopped by the attorneys' table at O'Hare to drop off coffee and pastries. He told the volunteers that the city supports them and that he was working on getting a list of the people who were taken into custody. U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly, joined by other local officials, addressed the media at a news conference inside the airport wearing a pink "pussyhat." Advertisement Kelly said she wants to put pressure on Customs and Border Protection to be more transparent and allow the lawyers access to detainees. "We are all standing united to help the people being detained. We are very concerned about them," she said. Trump issued a statement Sunday afternoon defending the travel ban as a step in "keeping our country safe." He said the seven countries named in the executive order were previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. "America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border," Trump said in the statement. Abed Aburomman, 29, had been pacing around the terminal Sunday at O'Hare and reading a chemistry textbook as he waited for officials to release his brother, who is Jordanian. Aburomman, a U.S. citizen and a student at Illinois Institute of Technology, was supposed to host him at his home near Midway. Instead, his brother, who had a visa to stay in the U.S. for 45 days, was sent back to Jordan. Advertisement Aburomman, who said he's been living in the U.S. for 10 years, said he understands a country's right to protect its borders but thinks the evaluations should be done on a case-by-case basis. "It's a generalization, it's a stereotype, which is never OK," he said. Aburomman said he is engaged to be married in August. He doesn't think his family, who live in Jordan, will want to attend his wedding after this ordeal. Because Jordan was not affected by Trump's travel ban, attorneys said it was hard to say whether he would have been sent back under less tense circumstances. In the 10 years since Hanan Hameed moved to the U.S., a family friend has traveled back and forth from their native Iraq with relative ease through his green card. When Hameed went to pick him up from O'Hare on Saturday, she ended up waiting for several hours as he and a dozen others were held. Daywatch Weekdays Start each day with Chicago Tribune editors' top story picks, delivered to your inbox. > For Hameed, her family was able to secure refugee status in 2007 because her mother worked as a translator for the U.S. government. After five months in Damascus, Syria, Hameed and her family relocated to Charlottesville, Va., where she finished high school and graduated from the University of Virginia. Even after obtaining her U.S. citizenship and working for the Department of Labor, Hameed questions her future in a country she considers her adopted homeland. Advertisement "That's the only thing that bothers me," Hameed, 24, said. "Do invest all my future in this country or should I pack up and leave? It is a problem if I feel I'm living in a country where I will never be accepted. I will always be a Muslim from Iraq. I lived in a place where bad people have done terrible things, but do I have to be painted in the same brush?" Chicago Tribune's Nancy Stone and Genevieve Bookwalter contributed. tbriscoe@chicagotribune.com nmoreno@chicagotribune.com echerney@chicagotribune.com Gov. Bruce Rauner, seen here Friday, is locked in a dispute over a new contract with the largest state employee union. (Jose M. Osorio / Chicago Tribune) Welcome to Clout Street: Morning Spin, our weekday feature to catch you up with what's going on in government and politics from Chicago to Springfield. Topspin Voting begins Monday in a first-ever strike authorization vote by Illinois' largest state worker union. Advertisement The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31 is taking the unprecedented step of asking its nearly 30,000 members who are eligible to strike if they would be willing to do so in order to counter the contract demands coming from Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner. Over the next three weeks, union members at 711 work sites across the state will have opportunities to cast ballots on the question. The secret ballot vote is open to all AFSCME members, except those with security-related jobs who aren't allowed to strike. It is not open to nonunion members, including those who pay so-called "fair share" fees to compensate the union for its contract negotiation services. Advertisement There is no current plan to strike, however. The question put before workers is whether to authorize the union's collective bargaining committee to call a strike down the road, as contract negotiations with the Rauner administration have been stalled for the past year. Rauner tried to implement some of his new contract terms late last year, after a state labor panel concluded that the union and the administration had reached an impasse in their negotiations for a contract to replace the one that expired in July of 2015. But the union went to court and managed to halt implementation of those new terms, for now. The idea behind the strike vote is that it would give the union negotiators a new tool to use in pressuring Rauner back to the bargaining table. The Rauner administration has been critical of the union for having "rushed to authorize a strike," and has called on AFSCME to help implement Rauner's new contract instead. Voting is scheduled to go through Feb. 19, and none of the ballots cast will be counted until the voting has concluded, AFSCME spokesman Anders Lindall said. The voting comes at a strange time for the Rauner administration and the union, which find themselves on the same side of a separate but related issue the question of whether state government workers should be paid during the ongoing budget stalemate. The two sides succeeded in securing a court order in the summer of 2015 that required the state to keep issuing state worker paychecks on time and in full. The order took pressure off officials to make a budget deal, and it ensured that state workers wouldn't suffer as a result of the political battle at the Capitol. But Attorney General Lisa Madigan reopened that issue last week, arguing to a judge that the order should be lifted. An undoing of the court order could change the situation for state workers contemplating the wisdom of a strike: If they're already expecting to have to go without pay, that could make it easier to get on board with a strike. (Kim Geiger) What's on tap *Mayor Rahm Emanuel's schedule wasn't available. Advertisement *Gov. Rauner has no public schedule. What we're writing *After Trump criticism on Chicago violence, Emanuel touts police smarts. *Timing questioned in AG Madigan's state payroll move. *Illinois treasurer to launch tax-free savings accounts for people with disabilities. *Interest payments on Illinois' mountain of unpaid bills adds to enormous cost of budget impasse. *Rauner avoids taking stand on Trump refugee executive order, says it's for courts to decide. Advertisement *Fear, anger at O'Hare: Travelers freed after being held over Trump executive order, lawyers say. *Chicago advocates condemn Trump's order to bar refugees, review visa process. *CPD Supt. Eddie Johnson on wait list for kidney transplant. *Cook County courts raise bonds for gun crimes but suspects getting out faster. *Obama Foundation considers closing roads in Jackson Park. *Chicago police announce expanded technology to curb shootings. Advertisement What we're reading *Park Ridge man gets 10 days in jail for killing bicyclist while driving drunk. *Teens in Facebook Live attack indicted; lawyers call case 'sensationalized.' *Ranking the top 100 most important people in Chicago Blackhawks history. The No. 1 person once sued to try to stop one of former Gov. Pat Quinn's biggest accomplishments. From the notebook *Things go better with Koch? Gov. Bruce Rauner was among three governors invited to the past weekends California gathering of the donor network headed by conservative billionaire industrialist Charles Koch, chairman and CEO of Koch Industries. A spokeswoman from the governor's office confirmed Rauner's attendance, saying the event was "an opportunity to talk to about the advancements Illinois has made on criminal justice reform." Rauner was invited in 2015 but did not attend. The Washington Post reported the network plans to spend as much as $400 million on policy and political campaigns in the next election cycle. The network is made up of about 700 donors who give a minimum of $100,000 a year. Other Republican governors invited were Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey. (Rick Pearson, Monique Garcia) *Lawmaker calls for election breach probe: A Democratic state lawmaker says he will introduce a measure requiring the Illinois State Board of Elections to investigate a breach of the voter registration database federal officials have blamed on foreign hacking. The resolution from Sen. Michael Hastings of Tinley Park requires the state's election board to produce a report outlining the nature of the breach, system audits and preventive measures "to ensure similar cyber interferences never happen again." Advertisement Hastings is also pushing a nonbinding resolution asking Congress to revive its investigation into Russia's involvement in the presidential election. "Russia should not have any influence on the destiny of the American people," Hastings said in a statement. "Elections are a sacred practice established by our founding forefathers to advance our democracy and protect our nation's independence." (Monique Garcia) *Durbin weighs in on Aurora mayor race: Democratic U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin over the weekend endorsed state Rep. Linda Chapa LaVia for mayor of Aurora. In a statement, Durbin said Chapa LaVia has a platform that every candidate should have if they are speaking directly to families, who really want to know if this election can make any difference in their lives." Chapa LaVia is among a field of four candidates for mayor, which also includes Rick Guzman, assistant chief of staff in the mayor's office, and Alds. Richard Irvin and Mike Saville. ( Democratic U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin over the weekend endorsed state Rep. Linda Chapa LaVia for mayor of Aurora.In a statement, Durbin said Chapa LaVia has a platform that every candidate should have if they are speaking directly to families, who really want to know if this election can make any difference in their lives."Chapa LaVia is among a field of four candidates for mayor, which also includes Rick Guzman, assistant chief of staff in the mayor's office, and Alds. Richard Irvin and Mike Saville. ( Rick Pearson *The Sunday Spin: On this week's show, Chicago Tribune political reporter Rick Pearson's guests were Greg Baise, head of the Illinois Manufacturers Association; Rep. Steve Andersson, of Geneva, the Illinois House Republican floor leader; and Democratic state Rep. Elaine Nekritz, of Northbrook. Listen to the full show here. Follow the money *So far this month, there's been $3.6 million in campaign contributions and transfers, according to the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform. *Track Illinois campaign contributions in real time here and here. Advertisement Beyond Chicago *White House scales back refugee ban for green card holders. *Court rulings on Trump travel ban first on long legal path. *McConnell: We don't have religious tests in this country. *U.S. commando killed in Yemen in counterterrorism effort. *Gunmen kill several people at Quebec City mosque. Illinois' Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner on Sunday avoided taking a stand on President Donald Trump's controversial order on immigration and refugees, suggesting the courts should resolve the issue. Rauner previously has supported a pause in accepting Syrian refugees out of fears he expressed of potential immigration of terrorists supporting the radical Islamic State following the November 2015 attacks in Paris. But following a tumultuous weekend featuring the detainment of legal residents and protests at some of the nation's airports, including O'Hare International Airport, the Rauner administration said the courts should be the arbiter. "The governor has been supportive of tightening the vetting process for Syrian refugees because of ISIS attempts to infiltrate refugee flows -- but he's opposed to immigration bans that target any specific religion," a statement from Rauner's office said. Advertisement The Rauner administration statement did not specifically address provisions of Trump's executive order that favored immigration of Christians and others over Muslims. "Serious concerns about the executive order have been raised. We urge swift resolution of these concerns through the courts to ensure we are a nation that is both secure and welcoming of immigrants and refugees," the statement from Rauner's office said. Several federal courts temporarily blocked provisions of Trump's executive order, including bans on the entry of legal residents holding green cards from the seven Middle East nations the president targeted, including Syria. Rauner was among three governors invited to this weekends California gathering of the donor network headed by conservative billionaire industrialist Charles Koch, chairman and CEO of Koch Industries. A Rauner spokeswoman confirmed the governor's attendance, saying the event was "an opportunity to talk to about the advancements Illinois has made on criminal justice reform." The The Washington Post reported the network plans to spend as much as $400 million on policy and political campaigns in the next election cycle. The network is made up of about 700 donors who give a minimum of $100,000 a year. In November 2015, Rauner and governors from more than half the states sought a moratorium on resettling Syrian refugees after a series of terrorist attacks in Paris. A Syrian passport linked to the siege turned out to be fake. Between Rauner's announcement and mid-December, 871 Syrians started new lives in Illinois, according to the Refugee Processing Center, which is run by the State Department. Rauner last year said his office was looking into its legal options and wanted a review of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's acceptance and security processes. His office would not detail what action Rauner has taken since then. The federal government administers refugee resettlement programs in cities across the country, but states play a supportive role, offering social services and housing. The federal screening process takes 18 to 24 months and involves multiple agencies. A ruling from the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago bolstered the department's lead role. A unanimous three-judge panel in October held that Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, now the vice president, had no authority to block Syrian refugees from being placed in his state. American Civil Liberties Union Lawyer Omar C. Jadwat, center, speaks outside of the U.S. District Court in New York, where a judge issued an emergency stay for those detained at airports, in Brooklyn, New York, on Jan. 28, 2017. (Andrew Gombert / EPA) In the weeks after the Nov. 8 election, when Donald Trump secured a surprise victory to become president of the United States, the American Civil Liberties Union received so much money in online donations -- more than $15 million -- that an official with the 100-year-old organization called the flood "unprecedented in our history." That was before Trump had even sworn the oath of office. Advertisement Eleven days ago he did just that, then spent his first week as president signing executive orders and making good on some of his campaign promises, spurring massive protests across the country and the world -- about women's rights, the environment and what Trump calls his "extreme vetting" of travelers to the U.S. from seven predominantly Muslim nations. Amid the swift and intense backlash, the ACLU seems once again to be benefiting directly. Advertisement This weekend alone, the civil liberties group received more than $24 million in online donations from 356,306 people, a spokesman told The Washington Post early Monday morning, a total that supersedes its annual online donations by six times. In an interview with CNN, the ACLU had a one-word reaction: "Wow." Before the donations had soared to $24 million, Anthony Romero, ACLU executive director, told Yahoo News he was blown away by the influx. "I've never seen anything like this," Romero told Yahoo News. "People are fired up and want to be engaged. What we've seen is an unprecedented public reaction to the challenges of the Trump administration." The money flowed in from the pockets of people who had never donated before, CNN reported, but it also came from big names in Hollywood, who spent the weekend tweeting that they would match donations up to tens of thousands of dollars and who were called upon at the Screen Actors Guild Awards to give to the ACLU. "I would like to make a plea for everyone, if they can, any money they have to spare please donate to the ACLU," actress Sarah Paulson, who was honored for her role in "The People V. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story," said to applause during her acceptance speech. "To protect the rights and liberties of people across this country, it's a vital organization that relies entirely on our support." It was a lawsuit filed by the ACLU Friday night that prompted a New York federal judge 24 hours later to halt the deportations of people from seven predominantly Muslim countries who had been detained at U.S. airports following a Trump executive order that targeted them. Ride-sharing company Lyft announced a $1 million donation, to be paid out over the next four years, to the ACLU. Advertisement "This weekend, Trump closed the country's borders to refugees, immigrants, and even documented residents from around the world based on their country of origin," Lyft wrote in an email to customers. "Banning people of a particular faith or creed, race or identity, sexuality or ethnicity, from entering the U.S. is antithetical to both Lyft's and our nation's core values. We stand firmly against these actions, and will not be silent on issues that threaten the values of our community." Among the celebrities and high-rollers pledging to match the donations of ordinary Americans was "Modern Family" actor Jesse Tyler Ferguson, pop star and music producer Sia, entrepreneur Tony Fadell, venture capitalist and "Shark Tank" investor Chris Sacca, and Worldreader's president and co-founder, David Risher, as well as Facebook's vice president of ads and business platform, Andrew "Boz" Bosworth, and other Silicon Valley names. On Twitter, donors were using the hashtag #ACLUmatch to find the deep pockets willing to double their modest gifts. Romero told Yahoo News that as of early Sunday evening the ACLU's membership had more than doubled since the November presidential election, spiking from 400,000 to over a million. It will be organizations like his, focused on defending civil liberties, that will be at the forefront of the pushback against Trump's agenda, Romero said. "With Republicans controlling both houses of Congress and the Democrats in disarray and lacking any spine," Romero told Yahoo News, "the two pincers (opposing Trump) have to be litigation and citizen action." Advertisement Google has created a crisis fund that could raise up to $4 million for four immigrant rights organizations. Google has confirmed a USA Today report that it is funding an initial $2 million for the fund that can be matched with up to $2 million in donations from employees. The money will go toward the American Civil Liberties Union, the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, the International Rescue Committee and the U.N. Refugee Agency. Company executives are also donating separately to the effort. Google says in a statement that it's concerned about the impact President Donald Trump's order to temporarily suspend immigration from seven Muslim majority nations will have on the company's employees and their families. The Associated Press contributed to this report. In this photo provided by Office of George H.W. Bush on Monday Jan. 23, 2017, former President George H.W. Bush and his wife Barbara pose for a photo at Houston Methodist Hospital in Houston. The 92-year-old former president is recovering from pneumonia. His wife, Barbara, has been discharged from the same facility after completing treatment for bronchitis. (Jim McGrath / AP) HOUSTON Former President George H.W. Bush was released Monday from Houston Methodist Hospital where he received treatment for pneumonia for more than two weeks. Bush, 92, was experiencing breathing difficulties when he was admitted Jan. 14. During his treatment, which included a stay in intensive care, doctors inserted a breathing tube and connected him to a ventilator. Advertisement "He is thankful for the many prayers and kind messages he received during his stay, as well as the world-class care that both his doctors and nurses provided," Bush spokesman Jim McGrath said Monday. Bush has been allowed to return to his Houston home, McGrath said. Advertisement The nation's 41st president was joined at the hospital by his 91-year-old wife, Barbara, who spent five days there for treatment of bronchitis until her release a week ago. The couple's 72-year marriage is the longest of any presidential couple in U.S. history and the former first lady was with her husband during much of his stay, including when she was hospitalized for her own treatment. They were "essentially therapy for each other," Dr. Clint Doerr, one of the physicians treating Bush, said last week. Bush, who served as president from 1989 to 1993, has a form of Parkinson's disease and uses a motorized scooter or a wheelchair for mobility. He was hospitalized in 2015 in Maine after falling at his summer home and breaking a bone in his neck. He was also hospitalized in Houston the previous December for about a week for shortness of breath. He spent Christmas 2012 in intensive care for a bronchitis-related cough and other issues. Despite his loss of mobility, Bush celebrated his 90th birthday by making a tandem parachute jump in Kennebunkport, Maine. Last summer, Bush led a group of 40 wounded warriors on a fishing trip at the helm of his speedboat, three days after his 92nd birthday celebration. George Herbert Walker Bush, born June 12, 1924, in Milton, Massachusetts, also served as a congressman, CIA director and Ronald Reagan's vice president. Associated Press Melania Trump has finished her first week as first lady - a title that automatically makes her one of the most prominent women in the country. And yet she was barely visible. She cut an elegant figure at her husband's swearing-in and at the inaugural balls. But two days later, she returned to New York, as she had said she would, to tend to her 10-year-old son, Barron, who remains in school there. Meanwhile, she has given little indication of how much she intends to embrace the life of a public figure. She is said to be building her staff. But she has made no public appearances since a prayer service the morning after the inauguration, given no media interviews as first lady and has not indicated with any specificity what she has planned for her new role. Photos through the years of Melania Trump, America's new first lady. "There's a public expectation for communication, and she's not providing it," said Lauren Wright, a political scientist and author of "On Behalf of the President." "It's interesting that there doesn't seem to be a willingness to shape her public image, despite the public interest." By any measure, Melania Trump's East Wing has gotten off to an unusually slow start. Last week came word that the first lady had made her first hire: Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, a New York party planner, who will serve as a senior adviser, according to a person with knowledge of the appointment. Still, several key positions on her staff have not yet been filled, including chief of staff, communications director and press secretary. That last job is so essential that a volunteer has stepped in to field calls. The volunteer, Jessica Boulanger, is a former Capitol Hill staffer who is now the senior vice president for communications at the Business Roundtable. Most striking, the Trump team has not yet named a social secretary, a position responsible for planning all White House events. Most previous administrations filled the job before Inauguration Day. Amid the silence, some members of the public are rushing to assumptions. Internet wits spent days dissecting the first lady's facial expressions and body language during the inauguration, painting several interactions with her husband as fraught - a moment when he left Melania several paces behind him as he met the Obamas on the White House steps, and another when she appeared to frown behind his back. The Twitter hashtag #FreeMelania caught fire. But all seemed well on the couple's official social-media accounts. Although occasionally reactive to jibes, neither responded to the Twitter conjecture, which came amid a fire hose of larger administration controversies. President Donald Trump's @POTUS account tweeted a thank you to his family, with photo of his wife smiling. Melania, who has not tweeted from her personal account since Election Day, has sent only one message from her new @FLOTUS account, saying that she is "deeply honored" to serve as first lady. She entered the White House with the lowest favorability ratings of any modern first lady. Only 37 percent of the public had a favorable view of her in a Gallup poll released Jan. 16, while the same percentage gave her an unfavorable rating. Michelle Obama, Laura Bush and Hillary Clinton each had a favorability rating above 55 percent when she became first lady. Americans are accustomed to seeing the first family together, said Myra Gutin, a communication professor at Rider University and author of "The President's Partner." And the Slovenia-born former model's decision to live in New York for now may be compounding any negative perceptions of her. (She has said she intends to return to Washington on weekends to see the president.) "She could be giving the administration a little bit of a softer touch, because we do make certain decisions about a president based on his family," Gutin said. "Ivanka and her family are there, but with Mrs. Trump and Mr. Trump's younger son, it would be a different kind of feeling." Melania Trump's quiet first week may signal that she is reluctantly grappling with how to embrace the increased scrutiny. Or she could simply be taking her time to determine how she will make an impact. "Each first lady takes on the role and makes it their own. That evolves over time," said former White House social secretary Ann Stock. "First (priority) for every president and first lady is settling in their family." Michael D'Antonio, a Donald Trump biographer, said Melania "seemed eager to preserve her privacy" when he met her. "Her husband playfully begged her to tell me he was a great husband and she complied. However, she fled the room as soon as possible," D'Antonio recalled. "I expect her to be gracious when acting as first lady, but I would not be surprised if she limits herself to a minimal engagement with the role." Does it matter that she's taking her time with the job? One former White House official noted that staffers who arrive after an administration's early days can have a hard time finding traction within the larger organization - assuming, of course, that Melania Trump cares about wielding influence in that space. The job is more than ceremonial: Federal courts have ruled that the first lady is a de facto public official, and Congress has authorized staffing to support her assistance to the president, said MaryAnne Borrelli, a professor of government at Connecticut College and author of "The Politics of the President's Wife." Meanwhile, there are 228 years of tradition surrounding the role, and Melania Trump will be measured against the women who came before her - whether or not she chooses to play along. Michelle Obama, whom Melania Trump has said she admires, was also a reluctant first lady. She, too, worried about raising her children in the spotlight. But from the beginning, she positioned herself as a vital part of her husband's administration. While billing herself as "mom-in-chief," Michelle Obama nonetheless had a team building her agenda when she entered the White House; in her second week, she began a tour of federal agencies, thanking the employees for their work. Other first ladies, though, have waited months before rolling out their agendas. Melania Trump has so far cited one issue she hopes to champion - cyberbullying, which is said to affect about a quarter of adolescents. Experts in the field say they have not yet heard from the first lady but are eager to collaborate. On Jan. 18, President Barack Obama told reporters in his final news conference that he would comment on his successor's actions only at "certain moments where I think our core values may be at stake." He managed to stay quiet for less than two weeks. Obama, who is still on vacation with his family after leaving office this month, issued a statement through his spokesman Monday encouraging Americans to publicly protest President Donald Trump's move to ban citizens from seven majority-Muslim countries - as well as refugees from across the globe - from entering the United States. He also contested Trump's claim that Friday's executive order was based in part on decisions made during his administration, including identifying the same seven countries as harboring terrorism threats and slowing the processing of visas for Iraqis after evidence surfaced that two Iraqis seeking resettlement had been linked to terrorist activity in their homeland. "With regard to comparisons to President Obama's foreign policy decisions, as we've heard before, the President fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion," Obama spokesman Kevin Lewis said in a statement. Obama's decision to speak out - after pledging to do so in rare instances - underscores the predicament he and many of his top advisers find themselves in just days after leaving the White House. While the president repeatedly emphasized the need to ensure a smooth transition and not interfere with the workings of the new administration, the adoption of a policy antithetical to the values he espoused while in office caused him to break his silence. While some former presidents eventually came to criticize their successors - Theodore Roosevelt broke with William Howard Taft, whom he worked to get elected in 1908 and then ran against four years later - they have generally sought to stay quiet. Even Roosevelt told Taft after returning from a vacation overseas that while some progressives were disappointed with the new administration's direction, "I will make no speeches or say anything for two months. But I will keep my mind open . . . as I keep my mouth shut." "I don't think it's very common at all for an ex-president to be commenting on the performance of his successor," presidential historian Robert Dallek said. "This current incumbent is so out of sync with what the normal behavior of a president is that it calls for ex-presidents to respond." During his last news conference, Obama sketched out the criteria for what would prompt him to speak out as a private citizen. He said threats to some of the key ideas he championed - including tolerance for minorities, immigrants and political dissent, as well as the need for broad voter participation among Americans - could prompt him to weigh into the public discourse. "I put in that category if I saw systematic discrimination being ratified in some fashion. I put in that category explicit or functional obstacles to people being able to vote, to exercise their franchise," he said. "I'd put in that category institutional efforts to silence dissent or the press. And for me, at least, I would put in that category efforts to round up kids who have grown up here, and for all practical purposes are American kids, and send them someplace else, when they love this country." Several journalists put in requests for comment to Obama's office in the wake of the executive order, Lewis said, and while the former president is trying to take time off with his family, "he's reading the news like everyone else." Presidential historian Douglas Brinkley - who discussed Obama's post-presidential role with him - said the former president had initially hoped to avoid commenting on the political issues of the day. "Donald Trump's thrown a monkey wrench into those plans," Brinkley said, adding that while "he's not going to be getting into the nitty-gritty of the policy fights"or serving as "a Democratic Party operative," he's "going to have to stay very engaged" on a few key issues. "He'll be a voice of dissent, but done in a calm and reassuring way," said Brinkley, a Rice University history professor. "There was no way Barack Obama could have stayed silent on this immigration ban." The very structure of Obama's post-presidential office - which includes a few of his top White House communications aides - highlights the extent to which he is already positioning himself to engage in political advocacy. Obama - who in his farewell address called on supporters to engage in political organizing to advance progressive goals - praised the idea Monday of Americans taking part in peaceful protests in the wake of the executive order. "President Obama is heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country," Lewis said. "Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake." Over the past year, Obama and several of his closest allies expressed concern that he had been unable to transfer the enthusiasm he generated onto either another political candidate or the Democratic Party more broadly. In recent weeks, however, liberals have managed to organize major protests on issues including women's rights and support for immigrants and those seeking asylum. "What is notable about the grass-roots response to Trump has been is that it is exactly the response that President Obama called for in his farewell address," former White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer wrote in an email. While Obama expressed his opposition to Trump's latest policy announcement in fairly diplomatic terms, other members of his former White House team have been more forceful in expressing their dismay. Susan E. Rice, who served as Obama's national security adviser during his second term, could not contain her outrage at the idea that Trump gave his chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon a regular seat on the National Security Council's principals committee and that the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff would sit in only as needed. "This is stone cold crazy," she tweeted early Sunday morning. "After a week of crazy." Washington state's attorney general declared Monday that he was suing President Donald Trump over his temporary ban on immigration from seven countries with majority-Muslim populations, making it the first state to announce a legal action against the Trump administration over one of its policies. Trump's executive order also suspended the United States' entire refugee program and set off nationwide protests over the weekend, including one that drew 3,000 people to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. "If successful it would have the effect of invalidating the president's unlawful action nationwide," Attorney General Bob Ferguson said at a news conference. Ferguson was one of 16 state attorneys general who released a statement Sunday calling Trump's immigration action "un-American and unlawful." Trump has repeatedly said Friday's order suspending immigration for citizens of the seven countries for 90 days is aimed at protecting the nation against extremists looking to attack Americans and U.S. interests. Ferguson said the lawsuit against Trump, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and high-ranking Trump administration officials would be filed later Monday in federal court in Seattle. The complaint seeks to have key provisions of the executive order declared unconstitutional, Ferguson said. The state is also asking for a temporary restraining order against enforcement of the order. "We are a country based on the rule of law and in a courtroom it is not the loudest voice that prevails, it's the Constitution," Ferguson said. "At the end of the day, either you're abiding by the Constitution or you are not. And in our view, the president is not adhering to the Constitution when it comes to this executive action." Declarations of support from Amazon and Expedia two Washington state-based businesses will be filed with the lawsuit, said Ferguson, who was joined at the news conference by Gov. Jay Inslee. The complaint claims that Trump's actions are separating Washington families, harming thousands of state residents, damaging the state economy, hurting Washington-based companies "and undermining Washington's sovereign interest in remaining a welcoming place for immigrants and refugees," Ferguson said. Inslee said the "inhumanity" of Trump's order is obvious. "This is un-American, it is wrong, and it will not stand," Inslee said. "The clear intent of this executive order is to discriminate against one faith amongst all God's children." Asked if he fears retaliation from the Trump administration, Inslee said "there's no predicting this president, but we will not yield, we will not be leveraged, we will not be threatened, we will not be intimidated." Inslee said he learned the hard way over the years "you do not back down to bullies." Ferguson said he has been in contact with other attorneys general but at this point Washington state was acting on its own regarding the legal action. The Port of Seattle said over the weekend that people who were detained at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport as a result of Trump's order have been released. U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal said Sunday that two individuals were released. One is a citizen of Sudan and the other a citizen of Yemen, both countries named in Trump's order. Associated Press Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor talks with students during a bicentennial colloquia at the University of Michigan on Jan. 30, 2017, in Ann Arbor, Mich. (Carlos Osorio / AP) ANN ARBOR, Mich. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor on Monday said future diversity on college campuses is a key to diversifying society at large, noting that the number of black students at the University of Michigan is a "real problem." Sotomayor received an honorary degree and participated in a forum about the future of university communities as part of a series of events this year celebrating the University of Michigan's bicentennial. Advertisement Sotomayor, the first Hispanic on the Supreme Court and daughter of Puerto Rican-born parents, was asked by a moderator what a university will need to look like in the years ahead to be inclusive and innovative. "It's going to look a lot like Michigan," she said to applause, "but with even greater diversity." Advertisement The percentage of black undergraduate students at the University of Michigan has been pretty steady in recent years at less than 5 percent. Hispanics are 5.5 percent. White undergraduates are 65.4 percent. The U.S. is "making large improvements toward" an equal society, Sotomayor said, but "we're still far from it." "When you look at the number of African-Americans at the University of Michigan um, there's a real problem," she said. "And why is diversity important? ... For me, the answer is quite simple: It's because until we reach that equality in education, we can't reach equality in the larger society. It starts here and it ends here." Sotomayor said university President Mark Schlissel told her about Michigan's national rankings in a number of categories. "You need to figure out how you engage everyone in receiving that quality education," she said. Michigan voters in 2006 said race couldn't be used as a factor in admissions at public universities. In 2014, the Supreme Court ruled that the constitutional amendment was legal. Sotomayor vigorously disagreed with the decision. A university spokeswoman, Kim Broekhuizen, said getting more black students is "imperative" to making the campus more diverse and inclusive. She said the ban on using race as a factor in admissions is a hurdle. The university has been sensitive to concerns that too few blacks are enrolled. In October, Robert Sellers was appointed as chief diversity officer as part of broader efforts to improve diversity. There's also an $85 million, five-year plan in a number of areas, including recruitment and outreach. Advertisement Associated Press People march during a protest against an executive order on immigration from President Trump at Gerald R. Ford International Airport in Grand Rapids on Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017. (Neil Blake / AP) WASHINGTON President Trump continued Monday to adamantly defend his immigration order temporarily banning entry into the United States for migrants from seven Muslim-majority countries and refugees from around the world, despite mounting criticism and questions that stretched from Capitol Hill to the United Nations. Trump's order has sparked protests from coast to coast, court cases challenging its constitutionality, unease in cities worldwide and a host of questions about the limits of its scope. Advertisement The ban's impact continued to reverberate around the world. Refugee groups worried that some 20,000 people could be affected by the 120-day suspension of refugee admission. Lawyers sought to confirm how many people remain detained in the United States, while a lawsuit argued that dozens of people had been forced to give up their green cards by Customs and Border Patrol agents. Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project, said the situation at airports remains "chaotic and fluid" and lawyers are "having trouble independently verifying anything because the government will not provide full access to all the detainees." Advertisement Gelernt said that by Monday afternoon, no list of detainees had been turned over, adding that the ACLU could be back in court within a day to get the list so it could obtain more definitive information. On Monday, in what could be the first volley in an intense legal battle, Bob Ferguson, Washington state's attorney general, said he plans to file a federal lawsuit seeking an immediate halt to the order's implementation. Ferguson is the first state official to declare plans to file such a suit, but he may not be the last. A day earlier, Ferguson joined 15 other state attorneys general in calling the measure unconstitutional. Eric Schneiderman, the New York attorney general who joined in that message, is reviewing possible options "and that could certainly include litigation," Amy Spitalnick, a spokeswoman, said Monday. White House officials have played down the anger and chaos over the order, holding a briefing with reporters Sunday evening to argue that the rollout was "a massive success story." On Monday, Trump used his now-customary morning tweets to blame others for the disorganized implementation and to minimize its impact on travelers. Trump's order was followed by two days of intense protests at airport terminals across the country, meaning both weekends of his presidency so far have been marked by heavy public demonstrations against him. In his tweets Monday morning, Trump had blamed "big problems at airports" on the demonstrators themselves, an airline's technical problems and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., who teared up while discussing the ban. (Delta suffered technical issues Sunday evening -- 48 hours after Trump signed the immigration order -- that canceled about 150 flights.) "Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning," Trump tweeted. "Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage. . ...protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer." Hours later, former president Barack Obama -- in his first public criticism of Trump since leaving office -- endorsed the protests that have emerged nationwide and rejected his successor's attempt to link the travel ban to the Obama administration. Advertisement Obama feels "heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country," Kevin Lewis, a spokesman for the former president, said in a statement. "Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake." Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 66 Supporters of President Trump rally in favor of his immigration ban executive order Saturday at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) Alluding to Trump's questionable claim that his ban was based on Obama administration decisions, Lewis said that the former president "fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion." On Capitol Hill, Democrats sought to capitalize on the growing public outcry and said they were hoping to pass legislation rescinding the ban and planning to delay confirmation votes for Trump's Cabinet nominees. Some Republicans have also spoken out against the ban, including Sens. Lindsey Graham and John McCain, top defense hawks who issued a joint statement bluntly worrying that the order could "become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism." Criticism also emerged in other quarters. State Department diplomats have been circulating a document objecting to Trump's order since he announced it Friday. According to a draft version of the memo, first reported by the Lawfare blog, the dissenters say the ban will not deter attacks on American soil, but will generate ill will to U.S. citizens. Iraqi parliament leaders called for retaliatory visa restrictions on American citizens, while a petition called on Britain to cancel Trump's state visit amid the furor. In a statement, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees expressed concerns about "the uncertainty facing thousands of refugees around the world who are in the process of being resettled to the United States." Advertisement According to the agency, more than 800 refugees were set to go to America this week but are barred, and the 120-day halt on refugee resettlement could impact as many as 20,000 refugees. "Refugees are anxious, confused and heartbroken at this suspension in what is already a lengthy process," the agency said. In airports around the world, sorrow and relief mixed together as travelers entered an unknown future. Trump's virtually unprecedented executive action applies to migrants and U.S. legal residents from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Libya and Yemen, and to refugees from around the world. People subject to the ban include dual nationals born in one of the seven countries who also hold passports from U.S. allies such as the United Kingdom. At Dulles International Airport, lawyers and Democratic members of congress had been unable to get information from Customs officials. Late Sunday, Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Va., said he was told there were no people in Customs custody at Dulles. Dozens of demonstrators gathered at Dulles to welcome international visitors, along with volunteer lawyers gathered to monitor any potential problems. Customs agents at Dulles forced lawful permanent U.S. residents to give up their green cards this weekend, according to a complaint filed Monday in Alexandria federal court. Tareq Aqel Mohammed Aziz and Ammar Aqel Mohammed Aziz were flying from Yemen to the U.S. Both had been granted immigrant visas because their father, who lives in Flint, Mich., is a U.S. citizen. Advertisement When they arrived at Dulles Saturday morning, the Aziz brothers were handcuffed and their immigration paperwork was seized, according to the complaint. They were given documents to sign and allegedly told that if they did not, they would be removed from the U.S. and barred from coming back for five years. They were not allowed to see attorneys. Under pressure, their attorneys say, they signed documents they did not understand, giving up their American visas, and agents stamped "cancelled" on those visas. Attorneys are asking for their visas to be returned, the forms they signed to be invalidated and for them to be returned to the United States. Attorneys say about 50 to 60 other legal permanent residents were likewise tricked into giving up their status at Dulles. The lawyers say they hope to learn the identities of those individuals through the discovery process. The Aziz brothers were compelled to buy tickets, at their own expense, for a flight back to Ethiopia, and when they arrived their passports were confiscated, leaving them in limbo. Anthony Romero, executive director of the ACLU, said anyone with a valid visa should be able to enter the U.S., even if they are abroad, and the ACLU is working to investigate reports that is not happening. Advertisement In the long run, Romero said, ACLU lawyers will work to get the executive order thrown out permanently, and they will seek to have its implementation delayed while they press their case. This court battle could take years, he said. Romero said they believe the executive order violates the Immigration and Nationality Act, some ratified treaties and - perhaps most acutely -- the First Amendment, because it seems to target Muslims. The order's exception for those from minority religions in majority Muslim countries "is clearly the smoking gun that this has targeted individuals of the Muslim faith." "That dooms it from a first amendment perspective, in our view," Romero said. The Council on American of Islamic Relations on Monday filed a sweeping challenge to the executive order, alleging its "purpose is to initiate the mass expulsion of immigrant and non-immigrant Muslims lawfully residing in the United States." The lawsuit lists 27 plaintiffs, some of them activists and council officials and others students with visas, lawful permanent residents, refugees and others who allege Trump's order will deny them citizenship or prevent them from traveling abroad and returning home. Among them is a doctor who the suit alleges is working in an underserved area in the United States. Advertisement "In the event he is prevented from returning to the United States, the area he serves will be lacking an essential physician to provide critical care to a substantial population in the United States," the lawsuit says. Gadeir Abbas, who joined with others to file the suit, said the lawyers are "confident that we can win, and fortunately, President Trump and those around him make it very easy to reveal that bigotry. They can't keep their mouths shut." Department of Homeland Security officials said the executive order does apply to green card holders, who may be let in to the country with a waiver. The directors of each large port of entry, such as airports, have the authority to determine on a case-by-case basis whether a green card holder may be let in. Since Friday, dozens of green card holders at large airports in New York, Los Angeles and elsewhere have been admitted, officials said. The officials also said Friday's confusion has abated in these large airports because people subject to the ban are not being permitted to board flights overseas and so are not arriving at American airports. In Seattle, two men whose visas were revoked and who were put on plane to be deported were allowed to enter the U.S. after a federal judge issued an emergency ruling in their favor, said Matt Adams, the men's lawyer. Adams said the men - one an engineer from Sudan who was coming to the U.S. for a conference, the other a visitor from Yemen who was coming to see family - "literally had to get pulled off the plane as they were deporting them." Advertisement The men dropped their lawsuit after they were allowed to enter the U.S., Adams said. "What we've seen is now with the national stay in effect, if anyone were to arrive, then the government's precluded from trying to immediately deport them like they were doing on Saturday," Adams said. However, Adams said that more lawsuits were likely, noting the number of people getting stopped as they tried to board planes abroad. The Department of Homeland Security noted that "less than one percent" of international air travelers arriving Saturday in the United States were "inconvenienced" by the executive order - though the situation described by lawyers and immigrant advocates across the country was one of widespread uncertainty and disorder at airports where travelers from the targeted countries were suddenly detained. Trump wrote on Twitter that Homeland Security Secretary John F. Kelly "said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!" In other messages, Trump again cast his order as necessary to protect the country: "There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world! Advertisement "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad 'dudes' out there!" The seven countries under Trump's ban do not include several that have been tied to terrorists involved in major attacks or attempted plots in the United States. White House officials through the weekend and Monday continued to justify the ban by citing the Sept. 11, 2001, attack, Boston Marathon bombing and San Bernardino, Calif., shooting rampage. None of these attacks involved people born in countries listed on the ban. The Washington Post's Rachel Weiner, Ellen Nakashima, Juliet Eilperin and Carol Morello contributed to this report. President Donald Trump sits during a meeting to sign executive orders in the Hall of Heroes at the Department of Defense on Jan. 27, 2017. in Arlington, Va. (Pool / Getty Images) State Department diplomats on Monday circulated various drafts of a memo objecting to President Donald Trump's executive order last week to suspend the nation's refugee program and deny U.S. entry to citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries. The document is destined for what's known as the department's "Dissent Channel," which was set up during the Vietnam War as a way for diplomats to signal directly to senior management their disagreement with foreign policy decisions. The communications are typically confidential, and may even be done anonymously if any of the signatories fear retaliation. Advertisement Several versions of the draft are floating around the State Department, as diplomats weigh in and ask for revisions. More than 100 diplomats have signed, according to diplomats familiar with the matter. Yet even as it was still being circulated, White House press secretary Sean Spicer said Trump's travel ban makes the United States safer, and had this to say to the dissenters: "And these career bureaucrats have a problem with it? I think they should either get with the program or they can go." Advertisement The memo probably will be submitted to acting secretary of state Thomas Shannon, a holdover from the Obama administration who will be in charge of the department until a new secretary of state is confirmed. The Senate is expected to vote on Rex Tillerson's nomination this week. As the memo underscores, the staff he will lead, if confirmed, is not fully on board with the administration's agenda. The State Department officially acknowledged the existence of the memo Monday morning, and vowed to respect it - and the right to dissent. "The Dissent Channel is a long-standing official vehicle for State Department employees to convey alternative views and perspectives on policy issues," acting spokesman Mark Toner said. "This is an important process that the Acting Secretary and the Department as a whole value and respect. It allows State employees to express divergent policy views candidly and privately to senior leadership." According to a draft version of the memo, first reported by ABC News, the dissenters say the ban will not deter attacks on American soil, but will generate ill will toward U.S. citizens. "A policy which closes our doors to over 200 million legitimate travelers in the hopes of preventing a small number of travelers who intend to harm Americans from using the visa system to enter the United States will not achieve its aim of making our country safer," it said. "Moreover, such a policy runs counter to core American values of nondiscrimination, fair play and extending a warm welcome to foreign visitors and immigrants." Over the decades, employees of the State Department have submitted hundreds of dissent memos, which are restricted to policy matters and not to personnel issues. Most dissents remain private, and it is not known how effective they are in influencing policymakers. One critical memo burst into public view in July, when 51 diplomats signed a cable they submitted through the Dissent Channel that urged the Obama administration to adopt a more aggressive Syria policy and consider using military force. It is not clear how many more State Department employees will sign the latest dissent memo, particularly after Spicer's remarks. The memo's criticisms parallel many of those made by human rights activists and immigration lawyers. Advertisement In one of the early versions making the rounds, the memo acknowledges that the visa process can be improved, largely through more cooperation among agencies. "We do not need to alienate entire societies to stay safe," the memo states. "And we do not need to sacrifice our reputation as a nation which is open and welcoming to protect our families. It is well within our reach to create a visa process which is more secure, which reflects our American values, and which would make the Department proud." Separately, more than 100 former officials who have served Democratic and Republican administrations issued an open letter urging Trump to rescind his executive order on refugees and immigrants. The signatories all worked on foreign policy and national security. They include senior officials from the White House, State Department and CIA, and retired generals and admirals. Among them are former secretary of state Madeleine Albright and former CIA director Michael Hayden. Sick of the status quo, Illinoisans are leaving our state in record numbers. But politicians continue to peddle the same old snake oil. The reasons for the exodus aren't a mystery. Public polling shows the No. 1 reason Illinoisans want out is high taxes. So what's the response from the Illinois Senate? Raise taxes again, forcing the families that stay in our state to pay more for the sins of the political class. It's insanity. Illinoisans deserve better. Advertisement The Senate plan now on the bargaining table in Springfield has been branded a "grand compromise." A grand compromise with whom? Taxpayers clearly don't have a seat at that table. The multibillion-dollar tax-hike plan is a handshake between politicians and special interests that does nothing to fix our state's structural overspending. In fact, another tax increase will be the final nail in the coffin for Illinois. No one should be surprised at how out of touch the 13 bills that make up the "compromise" really are. The Senate leaders involved have been working together for nearly two decades, putting in place many of the policies that are now taking a toll on our state. What's new is that the heat is on. Calls to "do something" echo throughout Illinois. Advertisement After decades of living in the Springfield bubble, Senate leaders have indeed done something. They've forgotten the common Illinoisan in their tone-deaf "compromise." Among the Senate plan's many faults: It doesn't end Illinois' broken defined-benefit pension system. It brings no relief to local governments from expensive state mandates. It bails out Chicago Public Schools without requiring any reforms from the district. It makes no reforms to the state's largest and most expensive welfare program, Medicaid. And it includes a watered-down, two-year property tax freeze that does little to protect communities from higher tax burdens. We need to change the debate. Illinois lawmakers can't continue to tinker around the edges with proposals that are weak on reform while taking billions of dollars more from residents. Thankfully, a bold proposal from the nonpartisan Illinois Policy Institute provides a framework lawmakers should use to craft the next state budget. The Illinois Policy Institute's plan balances the state budget without tax increases. It is exactly what the General Assembly needs as a starting point for real compromise. The institute's plan gets politicians out of the retirement-planning business by putting the state on the path to ending the broken defined-benefit pension system once and for all. It demands the state prioritize students over administrators in higher education. It streamlines Medicaid spending to better focus on the state's high-need residents. And it calls for a fair contract with unionized state workers, who are currently the highest-paid in the nation when adjusted for cost of living. No serious budget plan is complete without addressing Illinoisans' biggest tax burden: property taxes. The institute plan imposes a five-year property tax freeze that reforms expensive Springfield mandates, and ends a great number of state subsidies that fuel local overspending. Illinoisans deserve to feel secure in knowing that ever-higher property tax bills will not force them out of their homes. But they can't get that security in this state, which is home to the nation's highest property taxes. So they leave. The Senate "compromise" will serve only to force even more Illinoisans out of our state. Until state lawmakers make an honest effort to curb unaffordable spending, they have no right to ask for another dime from taxpayers. Advertisement Jeanne Ives is a Republican state representative from Wheaton. Related articles: The type of candidate Democrats love to hate Sell the Thompson Center: Cash out and let new owners reimagine or demolish it Rauner to Illinois senators: 'Please don't give up' From Cullerton and Radogno, 2 choices for Illinois senators: Something or nothing. President Donald Trump meets with CEO of General Motors Mary Barra, left, CEO of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles Sergio Marchionne, right, and other auto industry leaders in the Roosevelt Room of the White House on Jan. 24, 2017, in Washington, D.C. (Pool / Getty Images) On Tuesday, President Donald Trump met with the chief executives of Detroit's Big Three auto manufacturers. You can vaguely sense what he was looking for from them when he tweeted: "Will be meeting at 9:00 with top automobile executives concerning jobs in America. I want new plants to be built here for cars sold here!" Advertisement The CEOs of the auto firms said nice things about Trump afterward. But buried in the Detroit Free Press' write-up of the meeting were these interesting paragraphs: "In recent months, automakers have announced plans to invest billions of new dollars in the U.S. and create thousands of new jobs developments for which Trump has, at least in part, taken credit. Advertisement "However, in nearly every case those investments were either in the planning stages for months or were made possible by changing market conditions, though (Ford CEO Mark) Fields has said that a belief that Trump will improve the business climate in the U.S. has also played a role in Ford's decisions." Apparently, it's even more complicated than that. Bloomberg News reports that given where the United States is in the current business cycle, the last thing auto manufacturers want to do is go on a huge domestic investment splurge: "New assembly plants cost General Motors Co., Ford Motor Co. or Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV about $1 billion the sort of investment companies look to avoid making as a market peaks. And while factories boost jobs, economic gains from building them are being undercut by automation and pressure to compete with lower-wage countries including Mexico. " 'This is the nightmare scenario for auto companies, which are being asked to make huge capital investments right before a slowdown in sales,' said Dan Luria, an analyst who has advised the United Auto Workers union. 'It seems like hardly the time to spend billions on new plants.' "After the U.S. auto market's 68 percent surge since 2009, sales will be roughly flat through 2020, researcher LMC Automotive said in a report last week. After setting a record with nearly 17.6 million vehicles last year, the industry will keep coming up short of that level through the end of the decade, LMC said." Then there's the awkward issue of what the Big Three will do if Trump really does try to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement with higher trade barriers against Mexico. Mexico is an attractive manufacturing hub in part because of lower wages but also because of its plethora of free-trade agreements with other countries. Unless and until Trump's trade negotiators can get duty-free access to the same number of countries that Mexico can, it's not terribly logical for auto manufacturers to relocate their plants to the United States. Trump's economic vision seems to be that any car bought in the United States should be made in the United States. But as a previous Detroit Free Press story noted, it's just not economically feasible to produce, say, the Chevrolet Cruze in the United States: "There probably wouldn't be a Cruze hatchback if GM had to build it in the United States. The Cruze hatch is the poster child for why interconnected global manufacturing footprints make automakers stronger. Chevy sold about 184,300 Cruze sedans in America last year all built in Lordstown, Ohio. It brought 4,500 hatchbacks in from Mexico. GM wouldn't have invested millions of dollars for that few vehicles at its plant in Lordstown, Ohio, but it makes sense to build them in Mexico, where that body style is popular and they sell well. Without Mexican production, the 4,500 Americans who bought Cruze hatchbacks might be lost to other car brands." Advertisement I bring all of this up because it illustrates the abject lack of knowledge that Trump and his trade/economic advisers seem to display when it comes to the automobile sector. And this is during an economic upswing. Imagine what happens if the economy starts to run out of steam. Washington Post Daniel W. Drezner is a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. As President Donald Trump prepares to name a successor to Justice Antonin Scalia, the conventional wisdom is that the choice will not change the liberal-conservative balance on the court. After all, this argument goes, if Trump chooses any of the names on his previously published list, the court and the country will simply be swapping one conservative justice for another. That understanding is incorrect and, as the Senate considers Trump's nominee and the impact on the court, could be dangerously misleading. This will come as a surprise to many, but in a number of important areas, including the rights of criminal defendants and freedom of speech, the justice was actually quite liberal, as that term is commonly applied. Of Scalia's approximately 879 opinions, including comments on denials of petitions for certiorari, I have counted 135 as liberal and a number of others as arguably liberal. Advertisement No doubt, Scalia was personally a committed conservative and originalist. He relied on that pair of approaches to render conservative opinions on abortion, the right to die, women's rights, rights of gays and lesbians, obscenity, the death penalty, habeas corpus, the exclusionary rule relating to illegal searches and seizures, regulatory takings of private property, gun rights, establishment of religion, states' rights, standing to challenge federal regulatory statutes, the scope of the commerce clause, the Freedom of Information Act and more. Yet Scalia's commitment to his jurisprudence led him to write many important liberal opinions, although they are less well-known than his conservative decisions, with their often provocative language. Advertisement For example, Scalia took a liberal approach on questions of what constitutes an unreasonable search or seizure. He protected homes from searches by heat-detectors seeking signs of marijuana plants or dogs sniffing around a house to detect narcotics. He dissented when the court upheld the taking of a DNA sample from the mouth of someone arrested on one offense and then charged with another crime based on a DNA match. Invasive searches to detect the commission of other crimes, he said, violated the Fourth Amendment and due process. He insisted that any interference with personal property by law- enforcement officers amounted to a search that required a warrant or exigent circumstances, such as when the police affixed a GPS device on a suspect's car without a warrant. When it came to the Sixth Amendment's right to trial by jury, Scalia once again was a leader of the liberal position. He insisted that juries, not judges, make the critical decision of whether an action amounted to a hate crime, and therefore was subject to more severe punishment. Scalia made the powerful point that judges were part of the state, and that trial by jury was designed to protect Americans from the state. On matters involving the First Amendment, Scalia advocated a broad scope for freedom of speech. Notwithstanding Trump's argument that flag-burners should be subject to criminal prosecution, Scalia joined the opinion of liberal justice William Brennan striking down laws making flag desecration a crime as unconstitutional. He wrote his own opinion striking down a law prohibiting cross-burning that intimidated African-Americans. Scalia's First Amendment prohibited making distinctions based on the content of a statement. He opposed extending the limited protections afforded obscenity to animal cruelty and violence on First Amendment grounds. However, to the dismay of many liberals, he rejected all attempts by those who sought to curtail the influence of money in politics by voting to hold all limitations on campaign contributions and spending unconstitutional under the First Amendment's right to freedom of speech. When the time comes to evaluate Trump's nominee to the Supreme Court, we should not be misled by statements that he or she is a conservative in the mold of Scalia. The reality is much more nuanced. The odds are that we are going to have a nominee who not only follows Scalia's conservative opinions, but also rejects his liberal ones. In short, the court without Scalia is likely to be a lot worse than the one with him still serving. Washington Post David M. Dorsen, a Washington lawyer, is author of "The Unexpected Scalia: A Conservative Justice's Liberal Opinions," to be published Feb. 24. Rep. Mick Mulvaney, R-S.C., testifies before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee during his confirmation hearing to be the next director of the Office of Management and Budget in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on Jan. 24, 2017, in Washington, D.C. (Chip Somodevilla, Getty Images) Rep. Mick Mulvaney has a Zoe Baird problem. The South Carolina Republican is President Donald Trump's pick to head the federal Office of Management and Budget. He failed to pay more than $15,000 in payroll taxes for the nanny who helped care for his triplets from 2000 to 2004. Advertisement Baird was President Bill Clinton's pick for attorney general in 1993. She would have been the first woman to hold the post, but she withdrew her name after it was revealed that she hadn't paid taxes for a nanny and a chauffeur who were in the country illegally. Mulvaney's shown no sign of withdrawing and Trump apparently isn't going to nudge him. "The fact of the matter is that nobody is more qualified and more prepared to fight to rein in Washington spending and fight for taxpayers than Mick Mulvaney," a transition team spokesman said. "Congressman Mulvaney raised the issue surrounding the care of his premature triplets immediately upon being tapped for this position, and he has taken the appropriate follow-up measures." Advertisement It's about time. Those triplets are teenagers now. But it wasn't until Mulvaney was preparing for the confirmation review process that a light bulb went on over his head. The nanny! He quickly determined that he owed $15,583.60 in federal FICA and unemployment taxes, which he paid. He's still waiting for word on penalties and interest, plus a bill for unpaid state taxes. On Wednesday, Mulvaney struggled to explain his thought process to a Senate committee. "In my mind, she was a baby sitter," he said. "I did not consider her a household employee for purposes of withholding." Political opportunity has a way of bringing clarity to such situations. In 2008, just as he began angling for a possible Cabinet job, former Sen. Tom Daschle suddenly realized he should have paid taxes on the car and driver provided to him by a consulting client. President Barack Obama nominated Daschle to head Health and Human Services, but he was forced to withdraw. Wilbur Ross, Trump's nominee for commerce secretary, just fired a household worker he'd employed since 2009 who was in the U.S. illegally. Mulvaney surely knew better. As a state lawmaker and in Congress, he has supported measures that would bar governments from hiring applicants with outstanding tax debts or penalties. It's hard to imagine he really believed the person he paid to take care of his children didn't have a real job (or a real employer). You know what else is hard to believe? Almost a quarter-century after the first Nannygate, here we are again: A longtime public servant, in line for a Cabinet-level post, is forced to play catch-up on taxes for a household employee who was paid under the table. It's a temptation familiar to every parent who ever recoiled in alarm at the cost of child care. A caregiver's wages take a huge bite out of our own, even before Social Security, Medicare and state and federal unemployment taxes. Why not skip all of that and just pay in cash? It's easy to rationalize, because the employee might prefer it that way too. The parents pay less, and the baby sitter takes home more. Win-win, right? Wrong. Household employers who stiff Uncle Sam aren't just cheating their fellow taxpayers. They're cheating the nannies. With no tax history, it's almost impossible to qualify for a credit card or mortgage. And after a lifetime of working under the radar, what happens when it's time for the aging hired help to retire? There are consequences for employers if they get caught. Mulvaney got hit with penalties and interest. There's an embarrassing blot now on his Wikipedia page. He'll probably take some more heat in the confirmation process, but we don't expect the Senate will do the right thing and reject him. Advertisement The rest of us might think the worst that can happen is an unpleasant encounter with the IRS, but that's not the case. We'll probably never face a Senate confirmation hearing. But we do have to look in the mirror. Related articles: Are we really stuck with President Donald Trump? The danger of Steve Bannon on the National Security Council Trump's rash overreach on immigration Trump should go nuclear with his Supreme Court pick Advertisement How Trump's immigration crackdown will backfire Let's see: I am confused, I guess. President Donald Trump banned refugees from seven terrorist havens and people are going nuts protesting at airports. When Bill Clinton, during a State of the Union address in 1995, stated that we have to be very strict on who we allowed to enter the country, Democrats agreed. When Jimmy Carter banned Iranians in the '70s, Democrats agreed. Advertisement What does all this tell us? Folks, all of this whoop-dee-doo is political. Democrats are still refusing to get over the election results, so anything Trump does or says will be scorned. Hollywood will be indignant as usual and its stars will threaten to leave the country again. Advertisement I wish all this political blather would cease. Let's worry about keeping our citizens safe. Stay tough on border security. Don Lass, Oswego See the winner here. Extras: Advertisement "We have to find this miracle they call, 'Hair Club for Men' ." Jim O'Neill, Chicago Advertisement "We finally got rid of him. He's their problem now!" Richard Godley. Arlington Heights "Seriously, are you Putin us on?" Kurt Gubitz, Chicago "Adjust the color. It's too orange." Ross Rozen, Matteson "Don't take us to your leader!" John Hermanowicz, Lake Zurich "Maybe we should wait for four years before we decide to engage with this planet". Advertisement Wally Salganik, Buffalo Grove "Do you think Mom will recognize him?" Scott Carter, Manhattan "I'm confused - WE are the alien creatures, right?" Bob Ory, Elgin "This is the worst scripted/reality television show the humans have created" Advertisement Rich Lange, Woodridge "The experiment failed." John O'Halloran, DeKalb "I can't remember the last time I had a bad hair day" John Connolly, Medinah "I believe you are correct, that is Mork's brother, Dork from Ork! Dave Donofrio, Gurnee Advertisement "Man, what planet is that dude from?" Mike Rourke, Chicago "Recalculating..." Lauren Miller, Chicago "It's not hair, its a landing pad, the BEST landing pad. BELIEVE ME, we can trust it." Rhonda Imhoff, Boise, Idaho "I think they will be less scared of us if we come back in four years" Dean Jacobson, Yorkville Advertisement "Wait, this might be one of Rod Serling's missing Twilight Zone Episodes!" Tim Collins, Antioch "Look, I know that our mission is 'to boldly go where no one has gone before' but this one makes me feel a bit queasy. " Dan Wehrenberg, Chicago "No Bob, that language is not why they call it 'swearing him in'." Stephen Mitchley, Darien CT Thousands of motorcycle fanatics attend the 33rd annual Chicago Motorcycle Show and Swap Meet at the Pheasant Run Resort and Convention Center in St. Charles over the weekend. (Linda Girardi / The Beacon-News) With hopes of warmer weather around the corner, people who love to ride motorcycles decided if you can't ride them, join them. Thousands of motorcycle fanatics attended the 33rd annual Chicago Motorcycle Show and Swap Meet at the Pheasant Run Resort and Convention Center in St. Charles over the weekend, where there was lots of chrome and the aroma of leather. Advertisement "We are riders, so this is something nice to do during the wintertime," said Brian Hardrath, who came from Milwaukee. Organizers from Michigan-based Paragons Promotion estimated 8,000 to 12,000 people from throughout the Midwest would walk through the doors. Advertisement The event, held as a "celebration of bikes, bikers and lifestyle we love," was previously held at McCormick Place and moved to St. Charles six years ago. Thousands of motorcycle fanatics attend the 33rd annual Chicago Motorcycle Show and Swap Meet at the Pheasant Run Resort and Convention Center in St. Charles over the weekend. (Linda Girardi / The Beacon-News) "The biker believes in the freedom of the road with the wind blowing through their hair," said a Paragons representative known as the "Mohawk Man." "Only in America do we have the freedoms that we have. A lot of these guys are veterans or active-duty service members," he said. He said the show is as much a tribute to veterans. American pilots that flew bombers in World War II and returned home organized clubs, in part because of the similarities of experiences during missions, he said. "Those bombers weren't sealed and the winds would whistle through the aircraft," he said. "When the servicemen returned home, they started clubs." He said for many of today's veterans and active servicemen, a motorcycle ride can be a stress-reliever from the reminders of war. "Riding on the open roads is great therapy," he said. Advertisement About 125 new and customized models, from Harley-Davidson to Triumph, were on display, as well as biker leather gear and accessories. Vendors said it is a chance to talk face-to-face with people about what's new and how they can customize their bikes. Master mechanic Dan Massingill of Fox River Harley-Davidson in St. Charles built a 2017 Harley-Davidson street glide decked out in chrome with a white finish, custom-made handle bars, steering and motor. "We built this one for the show. We wanted one that would pop. You can't get any brighter than with chrome," Massingill said. The estimated price was $40,000. He said people appreciate the heritage and pride associated with the Harley-Davidson American-built motorcycles that began in 1903 in Milwaukee. So what is that love for bikes? Most riders agreed it is the "feeling of freedom" and the sense of empowerment they get when revving the engine, as well as the rush they get with the wind blowing through their hair. Advertisement Tina Hauptman was a representative for Milwaukee-based d3 Riffs that sells custom leather half chaps designed to protect the rider's legs below the knee to the boot from flying debris and heat from the engine. She rides a 2007 Harley-Davidson FXST Softail. "It is my escape from reality. I started riding mini bikes on a farm. It's something in my blood," Hauptman said. Hardrath, 50, describes his time on a motorcycle as an "interaction" between rider and machine. "If you've got to explain it to someone, it's likely they won't understand it. It's something you fall in love with and have to do," Hardrath said. Linda Girardi is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News. Back- to-back prayer vigils for two young men murdered a couple weeks apart would be tough, even if temperatures weren't hovering in the mid-20s. But Saturday's services were even more compelling as the victims, 26-year-old Andrew Dockery and 20-year-old Terrelle Suggs, both of Aurora, were members of the same extended family. (Denise Crosby/Chicago Tribune) Back- to-back prayer vigils for two young men murdered a couple of weeks apart would be tough, even if temperatures weren't hovering in the mid-20s. But Saturday's services were even more compelling as the victims, 26-year-old Andrew Dockery and 20-year-old Terrelle Suggs, both of Aurora, were members of the same extended family. Advertisement Dockery's vigil was held in the 400 block of Melrose Avenue in Aurora, where he was killed in a drive-by shooting as he was standing outside around 7 p.m. New Year's Eve. Some of the same mourners who gathered to pray on this far southeast side street then traveled to the second prayer vigil held near the intersection of Orchard and Jericho roads, where Suggs' car crashed after he was shot in the head Jan. 13 by someone in another vehicle. "It's hard to comprehend," said Luanda Dockery, stepmother to Andrew Dockery and aunt to Terrelle Suggs. "The family was still struggling to deal with Drew's murder when we got hit with the second death." Advertisement "God," she added, tears yet again gathering in her eyes, "is the only thing getting us through this." While the same-day vigils for two relatives is unprecedented, it was not the first time family members were killed in separate shootings and so close together. The Rev. Dan Haas, who has led these public outdoor services for murder victims for more than two decades, recalls two brothers, also killed within a couple weeks of each other, in the early days of Aurora's surge in gun violence. The second victim, he said, prompted the first prayer vigil in 1994, led by the family's priest, the Rev. David Engbarth, now retired as pastor of Our Lady of Good Counsel Church and living in Florida. Haas and Engbarth formed the Prayer Coalition for Reconciliation and began holding these services after the second brother's death, to bring more attention to the city's escalating murder rate back then. And although gang violence has seen a dramatic decrease since those dark days, Haas and the other ministers who gathered Saturday at the sites of Dockery's and Suggs' slayings continued to call upon individuals, families and the community as a whole to come together so no more blood is shed. At this stage of the investigation, neither Aurora nor Montgomery police are ruling out gang involvement in both slayings. And the message Haas hit home time and again at both Saturday vigils was that "retaliation is not acceptable." Expand Autoplay Image 1 of 14 Audrey Horton Mother of Andrew Dockery stands next to a memorial for her Son in Aurora, IL on Saturday, January 28, 2017 | Sean King - The Beacon-New (Sean King / The Beacon-News) "We can't resolve conflict by violence against each other," he declared, first to the crowd that gathered on Melrose Avenue; then again to an even larger group that congregated off Orchard Road just north of Jericho Road in Montgomery. Haas and other ministers who've had a front-row seat in this fight against gun violence, including Warehouse Church Pastor Randy Schoof, used their few minutes in front of each vigil crowd to ask for divine help, not only in healing families but the community, as well. We are our "brother's keeper," they emphasized. And right now, the blood of our brother is on the ground. Advertisement "Revenge is not the answer," Haas said. "But rather, love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you." After reading the names of those murdered in 2016, Aurora's Community Coordinator Cheryl Maraffio also asked for cooperation from those attending the vigil on Melrose Avenue, where Dockery was killed in the final hours of that year. Neighborhood groups, working with city officials, can make a difference in bringing calm to the area, she said in her plea for a few good leaders to step forward. "We want to hear what you have to say," she told them. "We want to hear your voice." Likewise, police from both jurisdictions (Aurora: 630-256-5500; Montgomery: 630-897-8707, ext. 9058) want to hear from those who could offer clues to these drive-bys that not only claimed more lives but drew two families, some of them intersecting, into mourning. "You look around, you see people and you wonder, do they know who did this?" asked Terrelle's mother, Ayanda Suggs. "Do they know what happened but are choosing to stay quiet?" "Murder was not in the plan for them," said Haas of the two young men whose names on white crosses now join the list of gun violence victims. Advertisement "They did not get to see their talents, their potential, their futures realized." Dcrosby@tribupub.com Katherine Muhlenbruc, 25, was charged with two counts of drunken driving after being stopped by Riverside police Jan. 27, 2017. (Riverside Police Department) A Franklin Park woman who had consumed three "potent" drinks at a bar told police she would have sobered up if she had continued to drive her car and had not been pulled over for driving erratically, Riverside authorities said. Instead, Katherine Muhlenbruc, 25, was charged early Friday with two counts of drunken driving, police said. Advertisement Muhlenbruc was stopped by Riverside police about 4:15 a.m. after she was seen crossing a double yellow line in her 2000 Volkswagen several times in the 3600 block of Harlem Avenue, according to a news release from the Riverside Police Department. She told police she had been at a bar in Darien, about 10 miles away, where she had consumed three Sex on the Beach drinks and "wasn't that drunk," according to the news release. The drink contains vodka, schnapps and juice and is "extremely potent," police said. Advertisement Muhlenbruc also allegedly told police she was driving to a White Castle in Berwyn to "sober up." According to police, Muhlenbruc failed six roadside sobriety tests. At the Riverside police station, her blood-alcohol level was 0.15. A level of 0.08 is the intoxication level in Illinois. At the station, she claimed she was not intoxicated and would have sobered up eventually if she had continued to drive and not been stopped by the police, according to the release. Muhlenbruc also was charged with driving with no insurance, improper lane usage and driving in the wrong lane, police said. "Unbelievably, the defendant in this case was so intoxicated that she actually tried to convince the officer that she was driving to sober up," police Chief Tom Weitzel said. "Numerous avenues are available to those who chose to drink to get home safely, such as Uber and Lyft. Driving around to sober up is not one of them." A 27-year-old University Park woman was seriously injured and charged with driving under the influence after the car she was driving crashed head-on with a semi truck early Sunday on Interstate 80 near Minooka, Illinois State Police said Monday. Breanna Simmons was driving a 2003 Ford Focus eastbound on I-80 about two miles east of Ridge Road when her car collided in the center lane with a semi heading west and driven by a California man, police said in a news release. The crash occurred shortly after 3 a.m. Sunday, police said. Advertisement Simmons had to be extricated from her car and was airlifted to an area hospital with life-threatening injuries and remains in critical condition, police said. Along with driving under the influence of alcohol, Simmons also was charged with improper lane use, state police said. There were no passengers in her vehicle and the driver of the semi declined medical help, police said. Advertisement Police said the crash remains under investigation. Eighteen area high school seniors, many of whom have spent years working both in and out of the classroom toward their goal of attending a military service academy, cleared a major hurdle Saturday when they received congressional nominations from Rep. Dan Lipinski, D-Western Springs. Lipinski, who is authorized to nominate 10 students per open slot at each academy annually, doled out nominations to six West Point hopefuls, 10 Naval Academy hopefuls, and one nomination each for students who seek to attend the Air Force Academy and the Merchant Marine Academy. The nominees included 13 boys and five girls from within Lipinski's congressional district. Advertisement "There is no greater commitment that anyone can make than to say that they are willing to give all, absolutely all, for their country," Lipinski told the nominees, who gathered Saturday morning surrounded by family, for a nomination ceremony at the Johnson-Phelps VFW in Oak Lawn. "To say I'm going to do all this, make all these sacrifices, and these sacrifices are to serve others. There's nothing greater that you can do." While receiving a congressional nomination is only the "first step" on the path toward acceptance at one of the nation's prestigious military academies less than half of Lipinski's nominees typically get in Clifford DeTemple, a U.S. Coast Guard reservist and commander at Scott Air Force Base, said the students and their families should be very proud of their nominations. Advertisement "This is a pinnacle of your life. This is a great achievement already," he said, speaking during the ceremony. "That means you got what it takes to be chosen as the 1 percent of even less than 1 percent of the population to go." DeTemple encouraged the nominees to remain focused, prepare themselves both physically and mentally, and recognize that at the academies, as in life, there are no guarantees. "There is no guarantee that your alarm clock is going to go off, there's no guarantee that your roommate's not gonna snore and keep you up at night. No guarantee, but you need to be prepared," he said. "There's no guarantee that your first day through the chow line you're not going to spill tomato soup all over your uniform and be doing pushups until you can't do a single one again, because you got it on your uniform. And there's no guarantee to graduate, so just because you've been accepted doesn't mean you're going to graduate. So that means you need to study hard and be prepared." DeTemple told nominees that attending the academies would change them for the rest of their lives, for the better, and advised families to support their loved ones once they embark on their military journeys. "Once they're gonna come home for that first holiday, to take that break they're going to be a different person," he said. "It's going to be better. They might be quieter, or they might be a lot more talkative, because they haven't talked for the last three months at school because they've been studying so hard. "You need to understand that and accept it and help give them the support in either direction that they're gonna be." Justin O'Connell, a St. Rita student who earned a nomination for the Naval Academy, did not hesitate when asked what appealed to him about a career in the military. "Being able to lead," said O'Connell, of Mount Greenwood, who comes from a family with a strong military tradition. "Like how my grandfather, my dad were both in the military. It's something that I wanted to do to pass down the tradition, hopefully in the future, that my kids do the same thing. The biggest honor to me is being able to serve my country." Advertisement Justin's father, Robert O'Connell, an Army veteran, expressed pride in his son and offered him the following advice: Daily Southtown Twice-weekly News updates from the south suburbs delivered every Monday and Wednesday > "Follow your orders, keep your mouth shut, do what you're supposed to, and you'll get along," he said. "And study hard." Patrick Fox, an Oak Lawn resident who hails from Ireland and called becoming a U.S. citizen in 1990 one of the proudest moments of his life, said he felt "ultimate pride" for his son P.J., a West Point nominee. P.J., who attends Richards High School in Oak Lawn, said he'd worked tirelessly toward his goal of attending a military academy since learning about them during his sophomore year. "The opportunity that both my parents were provided here definitely shows what an amazing country this is and what it can do," said P.J., who is a member of the National Honor Society, runs track and cross country for Richards, and has worked as a ball boy for the Chicago Bears the past three seasons. "Anything I can do to help that country is what I want to do with my life." Lipinski's district director, Joe Bonomo, said two of the nominees James Beecher, who attends Benet Academy in Lisle, and Drew Litynski, who attends Lockport High School already have been accepted to West Point. The rest of the nominees will receive their decisions in the coming months. Advertisement zkoeske@tribpub.com Twitter @ZakKoeske So, Amy Blagojevich is upset with former President Barack Obama for not commuting her father's sentence for corruption, saying her family has suffered an emotional toll because of his conviction. Sorry, Amy, but you're blaming the wrong person for your family's suffering. Your father made light of the serious charges against him and turned his defense into a traveling circus roadshow. He is the one to blame for your family's suffering, not the former president. Red, Chicago Advertisement To Bob of Homer Glen: You wrote President Donald Trump should stop campaigning and start governing. For gosh sakes, Bob. The man started writing executive orders after his inauguration and hasn't stopped. Palos Heights Advertisement To the person who wrote in and said, "If you don't support health care for everyone, don't call yourself pro-life." The issue is not pro-life. The issue is the spiraling costs to the middle class and the government, itself. Families have lost their tax deductions. If you don't buy insurance, you are penalized. The cost is $1.76 trillion more than what was budgeted. Premiums have skyrocketed and health insurance companies have pulled out of the ACA citing rising costs. Would it not be beneficial to cut some of these costs and pass the savings on to helping the poor? Or is it that simple? Daily Southtown Twice-weekly News updates from the south suburbs delivered every Monday and Wednesday > Palos Heights Kudos to President Donald Trump for being concerned about the sovereignty of our nation as well as the safety and security to the American citizens. Who cares if there are travel restrictions and limitations from travelers from potentially dangerous Middle Eastern countries. Trump is willing to make decisions quickly, which is the total opposite of career politicians who are just concerned about the political ramifications. Here's a bona fide leader. Hail to the chief. Don, Orland Park Interesting that even as President Donald Trump put in his illegal executive order banning Muslims, he exempted those Muslim countries where he has significant business interests. Even Saudi Arabia, home of Osama bin Laden and most of the 9/11 terrorists was exempted because Trump has business dealings there. So much for draining the swamp of corruption. Everything Trump does will be based on his financial interests. Thanks, informed conservatives. William, Oak Lawn What's Speak Out? Speak Out allows readers to comment on the issues of the day. Email Speak Out at speakout@southtownstar.com or call 312-222-2427. Please limit comments to 30 seconds or about 120 words and give your first name and your hometown Franklin Park officials and representatives from Digital Realty stand next to the artwork from the Motorola building that will be donated to the village. (Alex V. Hernandez / Pioneer Press) The village of Franklin Park hosted a demolition event last week at the former Motorola Headquarters property. San Francisco-based Digital Realty, which specializes in digital infrastructure for cloud-based computing, first entered the village in 2012 when it purchased the property at 9333-9377 Grand Ave. In 2016, Digital Realty purchased the 18.5-acre former Motorola Headquarters property, at 9401 W. Grand Ave., which had been vacant for nearly 20 years. Advertisement "We've had a great amount of success at our campus in Franklin Park that's right across the street [from the former Motorola building]. And so we'd like to continue to expand within the village and within close proximity to the campus we already have here," said Edward Pendarvis, the director of acquisitions and investments at Digital Realty. For the new facility's construction, Digital Realty plans to recycle as much as it can of the former Motorola's building materials during the demolition. Additionally, Digital Realty plans to build a 78,000-square-foot ComEd substation to handle its new 470,000-square-foot data storage center's increased use of the village's electrical grid. Advertisement "Once this building comes down, the plan is to redevelop the site, much as we have next door, in order to continue to add a data center expansion in Franklin Park," Pendarvis said. "Data centers are really the backbone of the internet. The internet lives in the buildings that we manage, and our tenants are some of the largest technology firms in the world. Those firms run their technology platforms out of our business. Because of this, the buildings are very specialized and allow our servers to exist so they can be run efficiently and effectively for our customers." Part of the reason that Digital Realty first moved into the village is its close proximity to multiple fiber optic providers, utility substations as well as short travel times to O'Hare International Airport and the Chicago Loop, according to a news release provided by the village. "The village is thrilled to grow with Digital Reality," Village President Barrett Pedersen said. "This demolition marks a historic return of tech-based investment and innovation to the village." During the demolition event on Jan. 25, village officials said that two bas-relief sculptures located on the building's exterior are to be removed by Digital Reality and donated to the village for public display. Village officials said that artwork will be put in storage while a new permanent location is considered. Alex V. Hernandez is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press. State Rep. Kathleen Willis, D-Northlake, said she would like to see Gov. Bruce Rauner reinstitute his bipartisan budget groups in an effort to break the state's budget stalemate. She issued a statement following Rauner's State of the State Address last week, expressing hope the governor would bring back those groups. Advertisement "Since day one, I have been committed to working with Democrats and Republicans alike to bring more money to our local schools, fund critical services, and create jobs in our community. However, since Gov. Rauner took office two years ago, the backlog of debt has escalated from $4.5 billion to over $10 billion and counting. At the same time, seniors and people with special needs have seen their vital services slashed while thousands of college students are leaving Illinois for out of state universities," she said in the statement. "While Gov. Rauner seems optimistic about our potential to come together and pass a budget, he and all members of the General Assembly must acknowledge how much damage has been caused by the inability to compromise. Moving forward, legislators from both sides of the aisle must work to find common ground and pass real reforms that will improve our business climate without hurting hard-working middle-class families," she added. "I hope to see the governor agree to reopen the discussion and resume the bipartisan budget working groups immediately. Passing a full, balanced budget must be our first priority, followed by enacting reforms that will grow our economy and help middle-class families thrive." As part of the Science on Screen series, the Wilmette Theatre will show "Jurassic Park," followed by a Field Museum expert to talk about the evolution of the dinosaurs. (Universal) Which do you think you'd be more likely to attend? A lecture on evolutionary history with an emphasis on dinosaurs or the same lecture preceded by, and perhaps interpolating, the film "Jurassic Park"? Chances are good you'd choose the latter. That's one of the main reasons Wilmette Theatre Executive Director Wendy Sharon applied for a Science on Screen grant from Boston's Coolidge Corner Theatre and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation one that will fund a Feb. 4 screening of "Jurassic Park" and a post-screening lecture by Dr. Peter Makovicky, chair of the Department of Geology at The Field Museum, specializing in "dinosaurian evolutionary history." The Wilmette will also pair two more screenings "Anaconda" on March 28 and "The Birder's Guide to Everything" on April 22 with two more discussions with Field Museum experts during its first season as a Science on Screen presenter. Advertisement "It's hard to find really good, high-quality programs for kids," said Sharon. "There aren't a lot of great movies for them out there, so we thought linking some appealing films with a science component as part of a program would appeal to our community." That's what the Sloan Foundation has been about since 1934, enhancing the public's understanding of science and technology by funding projects in print, radio, film, television, theater and the internet. In 2005, it became involved when the independent Coolidge Corner Theatre created the first Science on Screen series. The series is now in its 12th season, with 34 more independent theaters across the country offering the concept. Advertisement The Wilmette Theatre is the only Illinois theatre taking part. "The main idea is to make science more accessible and more interesting, I think to more people in the general public, especially kids," Sharon said. "It's kept growing every year, it's well-received by audiences and it gives scientists an opportunity to get out into the community and develop enthusiasm for the work they're doing." Each theater is allowed to develop its own programs and choose its own scientific experts, as long as one of the films in each series was funded by the Sloan Foundation. That turned out to be a simple requirement for the Wilmette, since the foundation was involved in the 2013 production of "A Birder's Guide to Everything," featuring Katie Chang an alum of the theater's Actors Training Center. "A Birder's Guide" will be screened April 22 with guest speaker Mary Hennen, director of the Chicago Peregrine Program and Birds Assistant Collections Manager at the Field Museum. Hennen will bring a live falcon (rescued due to a disability) to the program. Hennen's affiliation with the Field Museum led to a partnership between the theater and the museum for all of this season's Science on Screen presentations. In addition to Dr. Makovicky's Feb. 4 discussion, Field Museum Conservation Biologist Dr. Lesley de Souza will share her expertise in the biology of the tropics after the March 28 film "Anaconda," set in the Amazon jungle. "It's a fun film, kind of campy, I think, but it matches well with the very interesting work Dr. de Souza has done in the Amazon," Sharon said. Science on Screen series When: 2 p.m. Feb. 4, 7 p.m. March 28 and 2 p.m. April 22 Advertisement Where: 1122 Central Ave., Wilmette. Tickets: $10 for adults, $8.50 for students and seniors. Information: 847-251-7424; www.wilmettetheatre.com Two Glenview residents who live in the same apartment complex were charged last week with stealing items from retail stores and then selling them, according to police officials. Police charged Jane Kang, 26, and Nate Barker, 33, both of the 3200 block of West Lake Avenue, on Jan. 26 with continuing a financial crime enterprise after an investigation in the 1900 block of Tower Drive, according to a Glenview Police Department report. Kang was also charged with retail theft, it said. Advertisement The pair committed "several retail thefts" in the Glenview area, and the police investigation lasted about two weeks, Glenview Police spokesperson Sgt. Jim Foley said, adding that they live in different units. "It was a wide variety of stuff (they took). There was no rhyme or reason to it," Foley said. Advertisement Kang and Barker are still in custody each on a $25,000 bond, and they were both assigned court dates of Feb. 16, according to the Cook County Sheriff's Office. akukulka@chicagotribune.com Twitter @Akukulka11 Pizza Bowl, the annual awareness and fundraising event of the District 113 Education Foundation, gave attendees the chance to indulge in the area's best pies while supporting their local schools. The fifth annual Pizza Bowl drew more than 250 people Sunday to Deerfield High School for the opportunity to sample pizza and desserts from local establishments. Advertisement For the first four years, attendees voted for their favorite pizza with a trophy going to the winner, according to Barbara Sereda, the co-president of the foundation along with Susie Wexler. When desserts were added three years ago, so was the Baker's Cup for the baker with the most tallies. This year there was a decision to crown no winners. Sereda said she and Wexler came to that conclusion before the event. Advertisement "With everything that's going on it turned out to be a good idea not to have the competition," Sereda said. "We took the competition out of it because we want to recognize all of our participants. This was a tremendous event." Wexler said the pizza and desserts were donated by the suppliers for an event that brings the community together. "We have a great combination of pizza and desserts," Wexler said. "We had the jazz bands from the two high schools," she added referring to Deerfield and Highland Park High School. The foundation raises an average of $20,000 a year to supplement programs at the schools that are not part of the Township High School District 113 budget, according to Sereda. Individuals at the event were quick to share their pizza opinions. Gary Kamen and his son Josh Kamen, a Deerfield High School student, had a difference of opinion. Gary Kamen said Lou Malnati's Pizzeria was the best while Josh Kamen chose WA-PA-GHETTI's. "I like the dough," Josh Kamen said. Anna Neblo of Highwood, who is a student at Oak Terrace Elementary School, seconded Josh Kamen's opinion. Domino's Pizza was the favorite for Norah and Erin Dignam who came to the Pizza Bowl from their Chicago home with their father, District 113 Superintendent Christopher Dignam. Advertisement "It's the cheese," Norah Dignam said. Their dad opted to speak diplomatically about the high quality of all the food at the event. "For all of us in the District 113 community this is a big opportunity to come together and support the foundation," Dignam said. "We are thankful for all they add." Deerfield Mayor Harriet Rosenthal said she appreciates the community support in Deerfield, Highland Park, Bannockburn, Riverwoods and Highwood. "This is a great turnout," Rosenthal said. "We're grateful for those who donated the pizza and the delicious desserts. We appreciate what the foundation provides that the schools cannot." Other pizza makers at the event were Il Forno and the Italian Kitchen from Deerfield, Bella Via from Highland Park, Buffo's from Highwood, and Rosati's from Bannockburn. Advertisement Participating bakeries were Sunset Foods, Dunkin' Donuts, Breadsmith and Doughy Delights from Highland Park, Deerfields Bakery and Nothing Bundt Cakes from Deerfield, Panera Bread from Bannockburn and Bent Fork from Highwood. Steve Sadin is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press. A boy is seen taken away by a woman in this surveillance video. [Photo/Weibo] A three-year-old boy was rescued by police just 15 hours after he was kidnapped by a woman on Thursday, two days before the Spring Festival. A Shenzhen resident surnamed Zhao reported shortly after 17:00 on Thursday that his son had gone missing while playing near home. The family searched for him for over an hour but could not find him. The local police found via surveillance video that shortly after 15:40 the boy was taken away in a taxi by a middle-aged woman, whom the family did not know. The police identified the woman as 34-year-old migrant worker from Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region. She was unemployed and lived in a hotel in Shenzhen. When the police arrived at her hotel, they found that the woman surnamed Wei took the boy to the hotel but had checked out and left. Police found that Wei appeared at the Luohu Railway Station in Shenzhen shortly after 17:00 and they concluded that she had left Shenzhen by train. With help from railway police, they found that Wei boarded a train with the boy to Wuchang, Huhan province, at 18:00. Wei was spotted on the train. When the train arrived in Wuchang shortly after 6 am Friday, the police arrested the woman and rescued the boy. Wei said she took the boy to fake as her own son to repair the relationship with her former boyfriend. Wei gave birth to a boy in 2015 in Shenzhen, who died shortly after. Wei broke up with her boyfriend soon after the birth however the boyfriend was unaware of the babys death. This year she wanted to meet her ex-boyfriend in Hubei for Spring Festival. This is going to be my travel year, or, I hope it is going to be my travel year. With everything that is happening in the USA what the year will bring is very uncertain and I, like many others, watch unfolding events there with dismay. If sane heads prevail, my plans for the year are , Sydney in June to see my family, then onto Japan in August, followed by Huston USA in Oct./Nov for the International Quilt Festival. Then on to Guatemala in South America. You might ask why Guatemala? Well friend Pam is taking a group there and I plan to join them. I had been tossing the idea around for a while and then I received this wonderful gift from her. This is a 'Huipil ' which comes from Guatemala. It is a vintage piece from the highlands around Lake Atitlan. The Mayan women usually wear their traje (traditional dress), which consists of a huipol (blouse), corte, (skirt) and Faja (belt). These designs date back to before the Spanish Invasion. in the 1600's. I am surprised by just how heavy the fabric is. The blouse is made of two pieces of fabric, woven on a back strap loom and then joined with embroidery across the centre to achieve the width needed to make a garment. The embroidery design in then transferred onto the fabric and stitched. Back of stitching. You can see how the neck has been scalloped and then faced. Front of stitching. Close up of stitching. I love this piece and would also like to buy one with the bird embroidery on it. You can see lots of other examples here. Save Save Deng Weihua, a villager in the Dengjia village is interviewed by a reporter from China Daily website. The village is an exemplary spot for resettlement in Yiyang county, Jiangxi province. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn] Since Jiangxi province's authorities implemented the Building a Beautiful and Neat Countryside initiative, people are littering less and not polluting rivers, Hejia village resident He Longjin said. Instead, the East China residents are "naturally cultivating an atmosphere to encourage more to dedicate themselves to hard-work and farming instead of just hanging around, He told China Daily website. More than one villager said living standards have definitely improved and the entirely new look of the village makes this lunar new year the best ever. Villagers have responded to the local authority's call to "Build Your Own Beautiful Hometown" with improvements to their homes and pavilions. The Building a Beautiful and Neat Countryside plan was initiated by the provincial government and financed and subsidized by provincial, municipal and county-level authorities, at 30%, 40% and 30%, respectively. Huang Jie, director of the Rural Work Department in Yiyang county, added that villagers are widely motivated to get involved in this plan, given the prospect of creating an elegant village environment and the detailed compensation strategy made for families and areas. We aim at a broader picture when we carry out the plan, like combining the design of the villages reconstruction with the proposal of the local tourism industrys further development, and take targeted measures to help residents lift themselves out of poverty. For example, we encourage villagers to collect garbage and waste togethe,then hand it over to a specified spot. Staff from the village committee give them living goods in exchange, Huang said and explained the vision of the local authoritys implementation of the plan. The local authority of Yiyang county in Jiangxi province is processing a unified program to improve living conditions of residents in both towns and villages, which include urban and rural cleaning projects. These include projects such as construction of needed garbage incinerators, re-building shanty towns and the transformation of some qualified areas into smart towns that can perform to the best of their potential, both geographically and economically. A specific working team has been organized to carry out the plan. Staff on the working team have done their best to help me. I was worried most about the three farm cattle that I had at my previous house in the village. If I moved into the transitional shelter, then how could I take care them? said Tang Jingen, a resident in Tangjia village, explaining why he hesitated before signing the reconstruction deal. After I expressed my worry to the staff, they negotiated with me in time to reach a reasonable price that I could accept and then buy the cattle. Thats the reason why I could spend such a pleasant lunar new year without worry. Financial burdens caused by farmland being expropriated is a common problem faced by many families. Yu Jiacai, a Tangjia village farmer over 50, even planned to leave his wife and children, to seek jobs in other cities. My family has been in extreme poverty for a long time and Im too anxious to find a job to support them, theyre all counting on me, he said. Staff reported his case to the local civil affairs bureau, which finally expanded the number of residents who could get basic income. This affected his family and even improved the payment standard for him, with an extra 20,000 yuan in subsidy money given to him, which is the most the local authority could provide under the current social assistance policy. The special working teams members sacrifice much time and effort to help residents with their hometowns transformation. Jiang Ke, the director of the urban and rural plan monitoring team, insisted he keep on working, even right after he had surgery. Its just my responsibility. I would try my best to not let my personal situation get the working plan stuck in some phases. 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. License for publishing multimedia online 0108263 Registration Number: 130349 Registration Number: 130349 Protesters leave placards near the US Capitol Building after Sunday's protest in Washington DC around 4:30 pm. Throughout the day, thousands of demonstrators gathered at airports and the US capital to protest an executive order that temporarily bars refugees, migrants and even green-card holders from seven mostly Muslim countries from entering the US. They also denounced President Donald Trump's order to build a wall on the border with Mexico. [Photo by Zhao Huanxin / chinadaily.com.cn] WASHINGTON - Thousands of protesters rallied in front of the White House on Sunday while demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports after US President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily barring all refugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens from entry into the US. The Lafayette Square before the White House was packed by protesters against Trump's ban from noontime as more demonstrators were still arriving, witnesses said. They wielded poster boards bearing messages such as "Ban Trump" "Refugees Welcome" and chanted "No hate! No fear! Refugees are welcome here!" Protests are also scheduled throughout the day in Philadelphia, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle and Chicago, said a CNN report. In Boston's Copley Square, thousands of people also gathered to protest the immigration ban, according to a report from the USA Today. Earlier on Sunday, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway said the international travel disruptions in the wake of the ban was "a small price to pay" for greater security of the United States. On contrary, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Sunday said Democrats are considering legal actions to overturn the order. A federal judge in New York on Saturday night granted an emergency stay temporarily halting the removal of people who, though with previously approved refugee applications or with valid visas, had ben detained following Trump's refugee and immigration order. Similar rulings were later issued in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state, said a TheHill news daily report. Under the order, refugees from all over the world will be suspended US entry for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. BRUSSELS - The government of Walloon Region on Sunday presented a statue of rooster, which symbolizes the region, to the Chinese Embassy in Belgium to celebrate the Chinese "Year of the Rooster." Qu Xing, Chinese ambassador to Belgium, Rene Collin, Minister of Tourism of Walloon Region, and Richard Fournaux, Mayor of Dinant, witnessed the ceremony during a reception held by the Dinant city to celebrate the Chinese New Year. This statue was made to celebrate the 45th anniversary of the establishment of China-Belgium relations. Rene Collin said that Walloon Region has a long and promising relationship with China. The Chinese New Year Parade held in Dinant earlier Sunday indicated that both Walloon Region and China wished to promote their relationship further, he said. This was the first time the parade was held outside Brussels in Belgium. It was organized by the Chinese Embassy in Belgium, the government of Dinant and associations of Chinese community in Belgium. A man holds a sign during a protest held in response to President Donald Trump's travel ban, in Seattle, Washington, US, January 29, 2017. [Photo/Agencies] WASHINGTON - Attorneys general from 15 US states and the District of Columbia Sunday condemned President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily barring refugees and seven Muslim-majority countries' citizens from entry into the United States, calling it "unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful." In a joint statement, the 16 state attorneys general, all Democrats, vowed they will quickly act and "use all of the tools of our offices to fight this unconstitutional order and preserve our nation's national security and core values." "We are confident that the Executive Order will ultimately be struck down by the courts. In the meantime, we are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created," they said in the joint statement. "Together we are the chief legal officers for 130M+ people & we won't hesitate to protect their rights," New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman tweeted. "Let me be clear -- Discrimination based on national origin is illegal," Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said in a statement Saturday. Other state attorneys general are from California, Pennsylvania, Washington, Massachusetts, Hawaii, Virginia, Connecticut, Vermont, Illinois, New Mexico, Iowa, Maine, Maryland and the District of Columbia. Under the executive order Trump signed Friday, refugees from all over the world will be suspended from entering the United States for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The total population from these countries exceeds 130 million. The ban sparked chaos across US international airports and continuous protests nationwide in the past two days. Throughout Sunday, tens of thousands of protesters rallied before the White House, at more than 30 US airports, and in the central downtown of big cities including Boston, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle and Chicago. Rushing to the rescue, Trump on Sunday argued that the presidential action is aimed to protect the United States' own citizens and border and is not a Muslim ban as many media reports have described. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban," the newly-inaugurated US president said in a statement, saying there are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. "We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days," he said. Moreover, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway said earlier on Sunday the international travel disruptions in the wake of the ban were "a small price to pay" for the greater security of the United States. A federal judge in New York on Saturday night granted an emergency stay temporarily halting the removal of people who, though with previously approved refugee applications or with valid visas, had been detained following Trump's order. Similar rulings were later issued in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state, and more US states are now expected to follow suit. Canadian police officers respond to a shooting in a mosque at the Quebec City Islamic cultural center on Sainte-Foy Street in Quebec city on January 29, 2017. [Photo/VCG] OTTAWA - Five people were killed after a shooting in Canada's Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center on Sunday, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) reported. The CBC quoted Quebec City Police as saying that more people are feared wounded when gunmen fired on dozens of people in the center around 8 pm local time (0100 GMT Monday). A man from the center told the CBC that at least five people were killed, but that information has not been confirmed by police. Witnesses said two suspects have been arrested and the police has cordoned off the center. Canadian Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale tweeted Sunday night that he is deeply saddened by the loss of life. His office says no motive has been confirmed. Premier of Quebec Province Philippe Couillard tweeted that the province is mobilizing to assure the safety of Quebec City residents. He added that "Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence" and offered solidarity with the families of the victims and wounded. MOSCOW - Russia's Defense Ministry on Monday called on international organizations and other countries to provide aid for residents of the Syrian city of Aleppo. "Humanitarian aid from Kazakhstan was sent from the Syrian port of Tartus (to Aleppo). Earlier, aid came from Armenia, Belarus and Serbia. However, aid from other countries and international organizations, whose representatives in their offices have repeatedly talked about the plight of the Syrian people and the humanitarian disaster in the country, hasn't been received so far," said Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov. Besides water and bread, residents in Aleppo also need glass, cement, pipes and construction materials, he said. Konashenkov said a peaceful life has returned to Aleppo and other towns. Locals are rebuilding their houses, and schools and hospitals have reopened. Last month, the Syrian government forces recaptured the city from rebel forces which had been occupying the city since 2012. The five-year civil war in Syria has killed more than 300,000 people and caused a serious refugee crisis. WELLINGTON - New Zealand Prime Minister Bill English on Monday said he disagrees with the United States' entry restrictions on citizens from seven mainly Muslim countries. However, English said he had not made his views known to US President Donald Trump, Radio New Zealand reported. Trump has issued an executive order preventing people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia and Sudan from entering the United States for 90 days, and suspending refugee entries to the US for four months as well as banning refugees from Syria indefinitely. English had been under mounting criticism for failing to condemn Trump's immigration order, but on Monday he said he would not implement such a ban in New Zealand and disagreed with it. "We don't agree with the policy. We have yet to see just what turns out to be the long-term policy for the US, because this is a temporary measure," English said in the report. "It does appear to have created some real chaos in the short term." The Red Cross, which is the primary provider of refugee settlement support in New Zealand, welcomed English's response and said it would like to see a practical response from New Zealand through an emergency refugee intake. In the current global climate support for refugees and upholding obligations to protect them had never been more important, said Anne Smith, acting secretary general of the New Zealand Red Cross. "The majority of refugees are women and children, an emergency intake could assist some of these families who are most vulnerable," Smith said in a statement. In June last year, the New Zealand government raised its much criticized refugee quota from 750 to 1,000 a year from 2018. The government came under international pressure to double its quota at the height of the Syrian refugee crisis in 2015, but insisted on sticking to its three-decade-old annual quota of 750 refugees, before it yielded and agreed to take extra Syrian refugees. PARIS - At least 65 people were wounded in a traffic accident on Monday along a highway in Les Yvelines department in western Paris, local authorities have said. A big pile-up occurred early Monday morning on the A13 highway, after two buses, a semi-trailer and four cars crashed into each other, Les Yvelines prefecture said. At least 65 people were injured with five in critical condition in the accident. Dozens of rescuers are in place to help evacuate the victims. The cause of the accident is yet to be known. File photo shows Zambia's President Edgar Lungu attends a signing ceremony at the Elysee Palace in Paris, France, February 8, 2016. [Photo/Agencies] ADDIS ABABA - Zambian President Edgar Lungu will host a high-level meeting on the implementation of the Common African Position (CAP) on ending child marriage in Africa in collaboration with the African Union (AU) Commission. The event will be held on Tuesday on the sidelines of the 28th AU summit in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa in line with the 2017 AU theme "Harnessing the Demographic Dividend through Investments in Youth," according to a statement from AU on Monday. The AU Commission launched a continental campaign in May 2014 to end child marriage on the continent. Several activities have been undertaken by the pan-African bloc together with its member states and partners on national launches, capacity building workshops, as well as monitoring and evaluation, noted the statement. The high-level breakfast event will provide a platform for assessing the implementation of CAP on ending child marriage, adopted by AU heads of state and government at the 25th Session of the AU Assembly in Johannesburg, South Africa, said the statement. The event will focus on establishing a high-level monitoring and evaluation forum on the implementation of the CAP. The AU Assembly has called on the AU Commission to develop a plan of action for the implementation of the CAP on ending child marriage in Africa and to submit a biennial report to the Assembly on the progress. The African Common Position Ending Child Marriage affirms the importance of strong network of child welfare and law enforcement structures in ensuring justice for child brides, says AU. US President Donald Trump meets with British Prime Minister Theresa May in the White House Oval Office in Washington on Friday. [Photo/Agencies] More than one million United Kingdom residents have signed an online petition calling for US President Donald Trump to be blocked from making a state visit to Britain. The petition argues Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as the head of the United States government but that he should not be invited to make such a trip into an official state visit because that would "cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen". However, Downing Street confirmed that British Prime Minister Theresa May will not be withdrawing her invitation to the US president, saying it would undo everything Theresa May achieved during her visit to the US last week. According to government protocol, any petition that can muster 100,000 signatures or more is automatically considered for a debate in Parliament. Graham Guest, the petition's creator, told the Guardian newspaper that "Donald Trump's well-documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore, during the term of his presidency, Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official state visit". At the time of writing, 1,085,014 people had signed the online petition and the number was rising quickly. Contact the writer at wangmingjie@mail.chinadailyuk.com WASHINGTON - Former President Barack Obama praised protesters who amassed across the country in opposition to President Donald Trump's immigration orders, breaking his silence on political issues for the first time since leaving office. "The president fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion," Obama's spokesman, Kevin Lewis, said. In his first statement on behalf of the former president, Lewis said Obama was "heartened" by the amount of engagement taking place in US communities. Lewis, a former White House official, pointed out that Obama used his last official speech as president to talk about Americans' responsibility to be "guardians of our democracy," even in nonelection years. "Citizens exercising their constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake," Lewis said. Lewis didn't specifically invoke Trump's immigration order. But he rejected comparisons between Trump's recent actions and Obama's foreign policy decisions. Trump said he took cues from Obama by temporarily banning travel to the US from citizens of seven countries that Obama's administration identified as places of terrorism concern. But Obama's designation related strictly to eligibility to enter the US without a visa; he never considered a travel ban. Obama's office also circulated excerpts from a speech the former president gave in November 2015, in which he called the idea of a ban on Muslims "shameful.""That's not American. That's not who we are. We don't have religious tests to our compassion," Obama said in the aftermath of attacks in Paris that prompted calls for the US to restrict Syrian refugees from entering the United States. Trump and the White House have vigorously disputed the notion that Trump's order is a "Muslim ban." Trump halts all refugee admissions for 120 days, suspends the Syrian refugee program indefinitely and also suspends entry to the US from seven majority-Muslim countries for 90 days. But the White House has stressed that dozens of other Muslim-majority countries aren't included. Lewis' comments mark the first time Obama has weighed in on Trump's actions since Obama left office on Jan. 20. In his final weeks as president, Obama said he planned to follow George W. Bush's example by giving his successor room to govern without being second-guessed. Yet Obama pointedly reserved the right to speak out if Trump violated what Obama called basic American values. He suggested a ban on Muslims or a move by Trump to deport immigrants brought to the US illegally as children would cross that threshold. Alexandre Bissonnette, a suspect in a shooting at a Quebec City mosque, is seen in a Facebook posting.[Photo/Agencies] QUEBEC CITY - A French-Canadian university student was the sole suspect in a shooting at a Quebec City mosque and was charged with the premeditated murderof six people, Canadian authorities said on Monday, in what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called "a terrorist attack." Court documents identified the gunman in the attack on Sunday evening prayers as Alexandre Bissonnette, 27, and charged him with six murder counts and five counts of attempted murder with a restricted weapon. The slightly-built Bissonnette made abrief appearance in court under tight security wearing a white prison garment and looking downcast. Prosecutors said all of the evidence was not yet ready and Bissonnette, a student at Universite Laval, was set to appear again on Feb. 21. No charge was read in court and Bissonnette did not enter a plea. "The charges laid correspond to the evidence available,"said Thomas Jacques, a representative of the prosecutor'soffice, when asked why Bissonnette was not charged with terrorism-related offences. Among the six men killed were a butcher, a university professor, a pharmacist and an accountant, according to policeand Canadian media. The government of Guinea said in a statement that two of itscitizens were among those killed in the mosque attack. Police declined to discuss possible motives for the shootingat the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec. "They consider this a lone wolf situation," a Canadian source familiar with the situation said. In Washington, US government security experts were leaningto the view that the gunman most likely was motivated by hatredfor Muslims, a US government source familiar with official reporting said. To kick off the new year, Bethel English (BE) Church, located in Irvine, hosted a two-night revival, called 'Gospel Revolution,' from January 20 to 21. "The heart behind GR17 is to just call our people in the beginning of the new year to Praise Jesus, to hear the Proclamation of the Word, and to respond in Prayer," said Justin Kim, the lead pastor of BE Church. "Corporately, we want to start off on the right note in the new year. Individually, we are hoping and praying that each attendee will be renewed, rejuvenated, and refreshed by the good news and that they will radically respond to the revelation of who Jesus is and what He has done for us through His life, death, and resurrection," Kim added, saying that BE Church hopes to hold the event on an annual basis. This year was the first. (Photo : Christianity Daily) Bethel English Church hosted its revival event, 'Gospel Revolution,' from January 20 to 21. Jong Park, the lead pastor of Redemption Church in Chicago who the guest speaker for the event, spoke on the first night on why one must be united with Christ, and what happens once he or she is united with Christ. On why we must be united with Christ, Park said, "When we are not united with Christ, we're united with something else," namely, with sin. Speaking from Galatians 2:20, Park said that "our old self" is united with "Adam." "We are addicted to sin in our union with Adam," he added. "The only way we can break the unity with Adam is to be united with Christ, the second Adam." Park referred to the story of the paralytic found in Mark 2:1-12, in which Jesus says to the paralytic in verse 5, "Son, your sins are forgiven." (Photo : Christianity Daily) Jong Park from Redemption Church was featured as the main speaker at the 'Gospel Revolution' revival nights hosted by Bethel English Church. "What could he possibly do that was so bad?" Park asked. "Yet Jesus says, 'Your sins are forgiven.' It shows us that sin is primarily in the heart." "We must see how dire our situation is," he continued. Once someone is united with Christ, he receives "pardon from sin, and power to overcome it," Park explained. And two things happen: the sinner dies with Christ, and Christ lives in him. "This is not a command to obey," said Park. "This is a discovery to be made, a gift to marvel at, a truth on which to place our faith." press@cdaily.co.kr - Copyright , #BethelEnglishchurch President Trumps recently announced executive order, restricting immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries, has sparked protests around the country, particularly at airports. The executive order restricts the visa process for immigrants from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen, although it reportedly makes exceptions for Christian refugees, as well as other religious minorities. It will be in effect for 120 days until U.S. officials can implement a more secure vetting process. Although the White House and the bans supporters argue that it is necessary for national security, others say it is unconstitutional and goes against Americas foundational principles to enact such a ban, which they say is based on religion. Protestors of the immigration ban gathered at many of the nations airports over the weekend to support refugees and condemn the ban. The New York Post reports that more than 2,000 people, including celebrities, engaged in a protest at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York, where 12 refugees were detained. At Denver International Airport, protesters held signs in support of refugees and reportedly sang Refugees are welcome here. Similar protests occurred in Portland, Oregon, Newark, New Jersey, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and San Diego, California. According to Fox News, protesters also staged rallies in opposition to the executive order in Washington D.C. and other cities. Stories of refugee families who had been waiting years to be granted entry to the U.S. also began to emerge. The Gospel Herald tells the story of a Christian Syrian family who were stopped at the Philadelphia airport over the weekend and told they had to return home to Doha, Qatar. The family had been working for 15 years to be able to join family members already in the U.S. They were reportedly turned away even though they had visas. Trump, however, has pushed back against the criticism, and has said that the immigration order is not a Muslim ban: America is a proud nation of immigrants, and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression. But we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. This is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as president I will find ways to help all those who are suffering, said Trump. Some political commentators have also noted that there is precedent for this kind of immigration ban, such as when the Obama administration temporarily banned immigrants from Iraq in 2011. Proponents of the new policy and those who oppose it remain deeply divided. As Christian blogger Denny Burk notes: Our nation is so divided right now. It feels like we are pulling ourselves apart at the seams. For what its worth, I want you readers to know that I dont want to be a part of that. In a public discourse that is increasingly marked by cynicism and back-biting, Im hoping and praying for wisdom to prevail. To learn more about what the executive order actually entails, see the full text here, or to read a summary of its main points, click here. Photo courtesy: Thinkstockphotos.com Publication date: January 30, 2017 An abortion facility in New Mexico recently closed its doors, becoming the third surgical abortion facility in the U.S. to close in just the first month of 2017. LifeNews.com reports that the Whole Womens Health abortion chain moved from Texas, across the border into New Mexico where laws restricting abortion are extremely relaxed. The clinic even referred underage girls from Texas who wanted abortions to their New Mexico facility because New Mexico does not require parental consent. When they found out the abortion facility was moving to New Mexico, pro-life advocates began an intense campaign of prayer. Pastors Manny and Grace Lardizabal of Albuquerque, New Mexico led a prayer team to the New Mexico-Texas border, near where the clinic is located. Amazingly, when the Lardizabals and their prayer team showed up at the abortion facility on the day it was scheduled to open, they found out that it failed to open due to the work of a pro-life advocacy group which pointed out that the clinic was not complying with zoning ordinances. Financial issues drove Whole Womens Health into New Mexico, and it is likely that financial issues also drove them out, said Troy Newman, President of Operation Rescue. Abortion numbers are down and the border area is over-saturated with abortion facilities after the courts allowed two El Paso abortion businesses to reopen a couple of years ago. There just isnt enough demand for abortions, which in itself is an answer to prayer. Photo courtesy: Thinkstockphotos.com Publication date: January 30, 2017 On January 13th, Compassion International told the sponsors of 130,000 Indian children that, barring an unlikely turn of events, it would cease operations in India in mid-March. The announcement came a year after the Indian government told the organization that it could no longer receive funding from outside the subcontinent. While the news dismayed Compassions donors, it shouldnt have come as a surprise to those familiar with the deteriorating state of religious freedom in India. Compassions announcement comes shortly after Open Doors International released its World Watchlist, which ranked the worst countries in which to be a Christian. North Korea, of course, ranked first again. The next twelve countries are either overwhelmingly Muslim or, like Nigeria, are suffering from an Islamist insurgencyin this case, Boko Haramthat targets Christians. Then at #15, just behind Saudi Arabia, is India. Why? India is neither Islamic nor a repressive dictatorship like North Korea or China. David Curry, the CEO of Open Doors, told Morgan Lee and Mark Galli of Christianity Today that the situation in India reflects the rise of what he calls ethnic nationalism, in which what it means to be an Indian is defined in religiousin this case, Hinduterms. An Indian who is a Christian or, for that matter, a Muslim, is regarded as less than truly Indian, because Hinduism is at the heart of what it means to be an Indian. This ideology goes by the name Hindutva, which literally means Hinduness. Its an ideology that belies the western image of India as a land of Gandhi, gurus, and nonviolence. Theres nothing peaceful or tolerant about Hindutva. On the contrary, the man who assassinated Gandhi was an adherent of Hindutva and felt that Gandhi had betrayed the Hindu community. The current ruling party in India, the BJP, is ideologically committed to the idea of Hindutva. As Vice News put it, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in addition to being implicated in the 2002 massacre of 2,000 Muslims while governor of Gujarat, has also been accused of promoting India's majority religion of Hinduism to the detriment of Christianity, Islam, and other faiths. The ruling partys commitment to Hindu supremacy is perhaps best reflected in the various laws prohibiting religion conversion that I told you about on BreakPoint a year ago. Six Indian states have enacted laws in the past several years that effectively ban conversions from Hinduism to Christianity or to Islam. This is the political and cultural context in which Compassions decision must be seen. The Indian government knows that the money coming from outside of India is highly unlikely to be replaced by donations from within India. It also knows that it can use all the help it can get: 44% of Indian children under five are underweight and 72% of its infants suffer from anemia. So why block Compassion International? Because nationalism in the form of Hindutva trumps helping malnourished children. What can we do about it? The good news is that, unlike North Korea or Somalia, we do have some political leverage. India wants to increase its annual trade with the USA five-fold over the near term. Christians should let the Trump administration know that such increases must be accompanied by a greater respect for religious freedom on the subcontinent. And of course we should pray. Curry told Christianity Today that he would feel much better if he felt that the American church was at least praying for persecuted believers. At least, indeed. BreakPoint is a Christian worldview ministry that seeks to build and resource a movement of Christians committed to living and defending Christian worldview in all areas of life. Begun by Chuck Colson in 1991 as a daily radio broadcast, BreakPoint provides a Christian perspective on todays news and trends via radio, interactive media, and print. Today BreakPoint commentaries, co-hosted by Eric Metaxas and John Stonestreet, air daily on more than 1,200 outlets with an estimated weekly listening audience of eight million people. Feel free to contact us at BreakPoint.org where you can read and search answers to common questions. Eric Metaxas is a co-host of BreakPoint Radio and a best-selling author whose biographies, children's books, and popular apologetics have been translated into more than a dozen languages. Publication date: January 30, 2017 Russian evangelicals would have loved to listen in on the first phone call between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin this past weekendbut for opposite reasons from many Americans. As the recent presidential campaign turned US attention to Russiawith reports of Trumps alleged ties to the Russian president as well as alleged hacking by Russian operatives in hopes of influencing the electionRussians were following American politics too. The hope for a new understanding between Russia and the USA is very strong, especially for evangelicals, said William Yoder, spokesman for the Russia Evangelical Alliance. Russias evangelical minority, roughly 1 percent of its population of 143 million, finds itself living and serving in the East-West tension between its nationalistic government and the outside evangelical groups that support its gospel work in the heavily Orthodox country. Yet Putins popularity spans across religious groups in Russia, and ... 1 President Trump's Travel Ban Does Not Go Far Enough "The ban on travel from these seven nations is a good start, but does not go far enough. We should discuss the existential threat posed by Islam." -- Randall A. Terry WASHINGTON, Jan. 30, 2017 / Christian Newswire / -- Randall A. Terry, M.A. Diplomacy, Concentration in International Terrorism, and producer of the documentary "What Would Muhammad Do? Islamic Terrorism Explained," releases the following and is available for comment: A brief overview of President Trump's travel ban from seven Muslim nations vindicates his decision. Syria is in civil war, and is a breeding ground for ISIS. Somalia is a failed state, with regular kidnappings for ransom by Islamic terrorists, and Muslim terrorists running much of the country. Libya is in chaos, with large swaths under the control of Muslim terrorists; Iraq has multiple cities and tens of thousands of square miles under the control of ISIS; Yemen is a continual site of Muslim terrorist attacks, with large number of known Sunni and Shiite terrorists. Sudan has been racked by civil war (Muslim vs. Christian) for generations, with Muslim terrorists kidnapping, enslaving, or slaughtering Christians by the thousands. Iran - with a long history of training and arming Muslims terrorists - has the dubious distinction of being a State Sponsor of Terrorism, where the Mullahs help recruit, arm, and dispatch Muslim terrorists. Yet anti-Trump forces suggest that President Trump's efforts to protect Americans from terrorism rivals abandoning Jews at the outset of WWII. That is absurd. The nations on this list are clearly connected to Islamic terrorism. The Jews were not connected in any way to terrorism; rather, they were the victims of state sponsored terrorism from the Nazis. The potential problem with President Trump's Executive Order is that it does not go far enough on two counts: First, the list of nations; second, identifying the existential threat of Islam to the West. Almost all the Muslim terrorist attacks in the U.S. were committed by Muslims from Pakistan, Egypt, Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kuwait, and the biggest villain of all: Saudi Arabia. Most of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi Arabian Muslims, who were in America legally. We should remember that Saudi oil sheiks are the number one private financiers of Islamic terrorism in the world. Hence, American gas pumps help fund Muslim terror. The Islamic terrorist attacks in Boston, San Bernardino, and Chattanooga were all committed by Muslims who were in the U.S. legally from nations NOT on the current list. If we are going to curtail the number of Muslim terror attacks in western nations, we must discuss expanding the list of nations from which immigrants are prohibited entry, or greatly curtailed by EXTREME vetting. But beyond foreign born Muslim terrorists, a significant amount of Islamic terrorism in America, Canada, and Europe was committed by Muslims who were citizens of the countries in which they attacked such as the Orlando terrorist - born in those nations after their parents emigrated from a Muslim nation. A handful - such as Alton Nolan who beheaded Colleen Hufford in Oklahoma - are converts to Islam, not born of Muslim parents. The biggest problem with the current ban and the wagons circling to defend it, is that they avoid the glaring truth: we are dealing with MUSLIM terrorists. ISLAMIC terrorism. MUSLIM Jihadists. The brutality of ISLAMIC SHARIA LAW. Whether we like it or not, this is about Islam. The inescapable truth written in blood spilt by Muslim terrorists from the dawn of Islam to this very day is that by its own admission, Islam is a religion of the sword. Muhammad the Founder of Islam -- after winning the battle of Badr, ordered his men regarding hostages: "Let not one of them escape without paying a ransom or losing his head." When the Jews of Medina rejected him as a prophet, he ordered his followers: "Kill any Jew who falls under your power." After subjugating multitudes through war and terror, Muhammad boasted: "I have been given superiority over the other prophetsI have been made victorious with terror (cast in the hearts of the enemy)spoils have been made lawful to me" Muhammad made this claim: "I have been commanded to fight people until they testify that there is no god but Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of AllahIf they say it, they have saved their blood and possessions from me" These quotes are not "taken out of context." They are part of the bloody battle plan left by Muhammad to his followers; this is the script that Muslim terrorists follow. Islam the brutal, oppressive ideology and law code of Islam is the driving force of Muslim terrorists today. Terrorists have not "hijacked the peaceful religion of Islam." No. They are following the words and example of Muhammad, the Founder of Islam. The defenders of President Trump's Executive order should discuss what many of them know to be true: Islam is at war with us. We must systematically begin to prohibit entrance to immigrants who follow the ideology and "prophet" that commands them to decapitate hostages, slaughter Jews, enslave women, and pursue world domination for Islam through terror. Media may review new documentary "WWMD" at www.WWMD-TV.com. home World Archaeologists discover possible medieval synagogue near Sea of Galilee Archaeologists have uncovered the ruins of a medieval building that could have functioned as a synagogue at the site of Huqoq, near the Sea of Galilee in Israel. The building, which was constructed between the 12th to 13th centuries, sits on top of the ruins of a fifth-century Roman synagogue that contains striking mosaics, Live Science reported. Last June, archaeologists discovered two mosaic panels that depict prominent Biblical scenes. One panel showed the parting of the Red Sea, with soldiers being swallowed by large fish, while the other depicted Noah's ark, with animals, such as lions, leopards and bears. Jodi Magness, the director of the Huqoq excavation project, presented the research at the joint annual meeting of the Archaeological Institute of America and the Society for Classical Studies in Toronto this month. Some of the remains of the fifth-century synagogue were reused in the medieval building. Magness said that the medieval builders reused the north and east walls of the ancient synagogue, along with the ancient columns and pedestals. While it is unknown what the medieval building was used for, Magness maintained that it was clearly a public building. She stated that the building was likely a church, a mosque or a synagogue. Historical accounts say that the Crusaders fought against the Mamluks (a Muslim people) for the control of the area around Huqoq in the 12th and 13th centuries. While there is no historical information about a Jewish population in the area at that time, there is one clue that suggests that the building was a synagogue. Benches that line the east, north and west walls were discovered by the archaeologists. Magness noted that such benches are commonly seen in synagogues. "So far, I've found very little evidence of a Jewish presence in the area, which makes this structure both extremely exciting and frustrating," said Arnold Franklin, a history professor at Queens College of the City University of New York. Another clue comes from an account of an early 14th-century traveler named Ishtori Haparchi, who "visited Huqoq a then called Yakuk a and reported seeing a 'synagogue with a very old floor.' We speculate that perhaps our building is that synagogue," Magness said. home World Boko Haram militants use babies to carry out suicide bombing missions, officials warn Islamic militant group Boko Haram are now using infants as a cover to carry out suicide bombing missions, according to Nigerian officials. On Jan. 13, two female suicide bombers were able to pass through a vigilante checkpoint in the town of Madagali, Adamawa State because they were carrying babies. The two suicide bombers were able to detonate their devices, killing themselves, two babies and four others, BBC reported. Two other women were stopped at a checkpoint, where they detonated their bombs, according to officials. Since the town was liberated from Boko Haram in 2015, over 100 people have died in four separate attacks carried out by female suicide bombers. The town's security was boosted after 56 civilians were killed in a deadly bombing last month. People who are entering the town are searched by local vigilantes, and then by the military, according to the Daily Beast. The search is carried out by members of the Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF), a group of locals helping the military fight Boko Haram. The jihadist group has tried using infants in suicide bombing missions in the past but without success. Last November, soldiers shot a female suicide bomber carrying a baby at a checkpoint in Maiduguri. The bomb exploded as a result of the shot, killing the suicide bomber and the baby. Yusuf Mohammed, an advisor to CJTF, said that the group will be more vigilant in its inspections. "Now that the CJTF is aware of this trick, it is going to be more vigilant. No one is going overlook any lady because she is pregnant, or because she is carrying a baby," said Mohammed. On Friday, the Defence Headquarters issued a statement warning Nigerians about the new tactic used by Boko Haram, the Daily Post reported. "The two recent suicide bomb attacks in Madagali, Adamawa State are instructive in this regard," Brigadier General Rabe Abubakar, Acting Director Defence Information, said in the statement. "The DHQ wishes to seize this opportunity to appeal to members of the public to be patient and cooperate with the military and other security agencies while carrying out thorough security search and checks as the essence is to nip in the bud the murderous intention of the Boko Haram suicide bombers," he added. He urged the public to help the military and other security agencies by providing them with useful information about Boko Haram. home World Brexit 'obsession' has overshadowed issue of Christian persecution, says Prince Charles The Prince of Wales has bemoaned that the public has paid a lot of attention to Brexit while the problem of Christian persecution in the Middle East has been largely ignored. Prince Charles expressed his concern about the plight of Christians at a Lambeth Palace reception hosted by the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Reverend Justin Welby, Telegraph reported. The prince, who was a guest of honor at the event, told his fellow guests that he believed a major report about religious persecution had "sunk without a trace" because it was overshadowed by Brexit. "People are more interested and obsessed with Brexit than persecuted Christians," Charles said at the event on Thursday. He said he was dismayed that there has been little coverage of the report published by Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), a Catholic charity that supports persecuted Christians. Religious Freedom in the World Report 2016, which was launched in November, highlighted the decline of religious liberty in many parts of the world. The report noted that the most severe form of persecution was experienced by Christians and Yazidis in Syria and Iraq due to the rise of the Islamic State. The prince posted a video message supporting the study, but it received little attention from the mainstream media. "Prince Charles complained that the Aid to the Church in Need report had sunk without trace because people were so obsessed with Brexit," a source at the Lambeth Palace event said. Charles' comments were well-received by the ACN, which acknowledged the donation it had received from the Prince of Wales' Charitable Foundation. "Despite highlighting the genocidal attacks on Christians and other minorities in the Middle East, the secular press showed little interest in the Religious Freedom in the World Report and there was no national television coverage," said Neville Kyrke-Smith, ACN's national director. "It is those who are suffering at this time who are left abandoned unless ACN and other charities respond to their terrible plight," he added. The Lambeth Palace event was part of the 50th-anniversary celebrations of the Anglican Centre in Rome, which was established to improve relations between Anglican and Catholic churches. Cardinal Vincent Nicholls, the leader of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, was one of the attendees of the event. home US Chili's restaurants back out from Planned Parenthood fundraiser after receiving complaints Chili's restaurants in Kentucky and Indiana have canceled a Planned Parenthood fundraiser after complaints from pro-life advocates. Earlier this week, Planned Parenthood posted a promotional code that could be used to request Chili's to donate 15 percent of the pre-tax meal purchase to the abortion organization, Life News reported. According to the image posted by Planned Parenthood, the voucher can be used at Chili's locations that are participating in the give back program, and it is valid whether the food is purchased for dining in at the restaurant or for takeaway. The voucher indicated that the restaurant will donate 15 percent of the meal purchase to Planned Parenthood between now and the end of March. On Thursday, Chili's announced that the Planned Parenthood fundraiser has been canceled. The restaurant chain stated that the decision to participate in the fundraiser was made by a local franchise partner, not the national corporate office. "Yesterday, we learned that an independent franchise partner of Chili's in Indiana and Kentucky made the decision to host a Chili's Give Back Event on behalf of Planned Parenthood Indiana and Kentucky. While our franchise partner had the best intentions; we have received growing feedback and concern from community members regarding the Give Back Event," the restaurant chain said in a statement. "We will more clearly communicate the focus of Chili's charitable giving efforts, so that our restaurant managers and franchise partners can feel empowered to support local organizations that bring communities together," it added. This was not the first time a Chili's restaurant attempted to participate in a fundraising campaign for Planned Parenthood. In 2011, a Chili's restaurant in California launched a fundraiser for the abortion organization, but it was eventually canceled after it received complaints from pro-life advocates. The management received numerous calls from members of the Sacramento community who expressed their concern about the restaurant making a donation to Planned Parenthood. "The event was canceled after hearing growing concerns from our guests," said a spokesman for Chili's parent company, Brinker International, Inc. Although the fundraiser was canceled, the restaurant located at Truxel Road still made a $200 donation to Planned Parenthood Mar Monte's Sacramento chapter, as compensation for the last minute cancellation. home World Christians are being ignored in Iraq's reconstruction efforts, charities warn A coalition of UK-based charities has warned that Christians are being excluded from reconstruction plans for northern Iraq, further diminishing the likelihood of their return once ISIS is defeated in the region. The coalition, composed of 16 nongovernmental organizations, have produced an 88-page report highlighting how leaders of religious minorities are being excluded from the National Settlement plan being drawn up by Iraq and other regional powers and presented to the U.N. The report added that the political and security concerns of Christians and other minorities must be addressed so that they will be convinced to return to Mosul or the surrounding Nineveh Plains to rebuild their communities. The charities that contributed to the report include Aid to the Church in Need, the Assyrian Church of the East Relief Fund, the Syrian Network for Human Rights, Syrian Christians for Peace, the Evangelical Christian Alliance Church in Lebanon and the Alliance Church of Jordan, World Watch Monitor reported. The report noted that Christians are not getting the support they need from international donor institutions, such as the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). They have to rely instead on churches that are running their own aid programs with limited funds. "All the NGOs involved in this report state that the vast majority of Christians and other 'minorities' avoid UNHCR camps and facilities because of continuing discrimination and persecution," the report stated. "It is utterly unacceptable that a place of sanctuary should be a place of fear that repels those it is designed to save and protect," it continued. The report added that those remain outside UNHCR camps "have fared ... unequally in the allocation of international aid, funding, political support, media attention, and asylum placements." It calls on UNHCR to abandon its "need not creed approach" and acknowledge the experiences of minorities in its camps. It also urges the organization to add more non-Muslim registration, security staff and translators in its facilities to reduce discrimination against minorities. Last month the Iraqi parliament Speaker Salim al-Jabouri announced that the Sunni blocs in the parliament have prepared a version of the national settlement. Yonadam Kanna, the secretary-general of the Assyrian Democratic Movement and a member of the Iraqi parliament, objected to the settlement document because it did not include any clause determining the fate of disputed minority areas disputed by the Kurds and Arabs. These areas include the Nineveh Plains for the Christians and Shabaks, Tal Afar for the Turkmens and Sinjar for the Yazidis. "Minorities do not have a say in this and they are not even allowed to determine their own fate. The settlement does not take into account the views of Christians or Yazidis or any other less influential minority groups," he said. Kanna has previously criticized national reconciliation projects prepared by larger political groups for failing to provide guarantees that those who have committed atrocities against religious minorities would be brought to justice. home World Former chaplain of the Queen urges Christians to leave Church of England for more conservative churches A former chaplain to the Queen of England has encouraged Christians to leave their Anglican churches for more conservative congregations. Rev. Gavin Ashenden recently stepped down from his post as a Chaplain to the Queen after he criticized the reading of a Quran during a service at a Scottish cathedral. Passages denying that Jesus was the Son of God were recited at the service marking the Feast of the Epiphany. He explained in his blog that he resigned his post so that he could speak out on important issues without drawing attention to the Queen. He said that while serving as her chaplain, there was a danger that the media might construe his views as those of her Majesty. In an interview with Rev. Jules Gomes for The Conservative Woman, Ashenden stated that the Church of England has become more comfortable with politics than spirituality. He lamented that the hierarchy of the Church "have become so politicised that it matters more now that you are a feminist than a theologian or a baptised Christian." Ashenden advised Christians who seek to be faithful to Gospel to leave their church and look for one that has "kept as much of the historic, apostolic and biblical values as possible." He also hinted that he himself would also leave the Church, which he said was dying. "I'm not sure I see much point in a Church that just wants to be accepted as a sort of not too irritating chaplain to a secular and hedonistic culture, which is what it seems to be becoming. I want to remain a faithful Anglican, but increasingly it looks like that is only possible outside the CofE," he said. In an interview with Christian Today, he warned that the Church would collapse within decades if it refuses to defend conservative Christianity. He pointed out the yearly decline in the Church of England and contrasted it with the growth of churches in Russia and China. He said that the difference was that the Russian and Chinese churches had "not made an accommodation with the culture." He said that he does not see any signs that the Church will change its policy of accommodation with the secular culture. "It has abandoned certain key and apostolic norms," he remarked. home US Missouri Lawmaker introduces bill that would ban all abortions in the state A Missouri lawmaker has introduced legislation that would outlaw abortions in the state without any exceptions. House Bill 709 or the "Missouri Right to Life Act," which was presented to the legislature by Rep. Mike Moon on Monday, would recognize the unborn children as persons from the moment of conception, according to Ozarks First. Under the legislation, law enforcement officers, officers of the court, and any licensed or state regulated entities would be required to enforce a section of the Missouri Constitution, which indicated that "no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law." The bill would also repeal a curent law that acknowledges the preemption state law by the federal government and U.S. Supreme Court rulings. A second reading of the bill took place last Tuesday but it has not gone to committee. The measure will take effect on Aug. 28 if it is passed by the legislature. Lawmakers in other states are also considering measures that would place an outright ban on abortions. In Idaho, a lawmaker has expressed plans to introduce a legislation criminalizing abortion. Under the proposal, both the woman who procured an abortion and the abortionist would be charged with first-degree murder. Sen. Dan Foreman said that the measure would not include exception for cases of rape or incest because he believes that the baby should not be punished for the father's crimes. "People find themselves, in many cases, with unwanted pregnancies and the easy answer is to just terminate the baby," Foreman said. "We're looking at killing innocent kids, and it's not up to us to just kill it to solve someone else's personal problem," he added. In Texas, Rep. Tony Tinderholt submitted the bill known as the "Abolition of Abortion in Texas Act," which declares that unborn children are entitled to human rights from the moment of conception. "A living human child, from the moment of fertilization upon the fusion of a human spermatozoon with a human ovum is entitled to the same rights, powers, and privileges as are secured or granted by the laws of this state to any other human child," the bill stated. Under Tinderholt's legislation, abortions performed in cases when the mother's life is at risk would not be prosecuted as murder. home World Pakistan acquits 115 people who were charged with torching Christian homes An anti-terrorism court in Pakistan has acquitted 115 people who were suspected of burning more than 100 houses of Christians at Joseph Colony in Lahore over blasphemy allegations in 2013. Judge Chaudhry Muhammad Azam acquitted the suspects on Saturday, saying the evidence presented by the prosecution was insufficient to convict them, Indian Express reported. Ghulam Murtaza, the defense lawyer, argued during the hearing that the prosecution had not provided a "single evidence" to establish the charges against the suspects, noting that the case had already lingered for more than three years. He asked the court to acquit the suspects given the lack of proof. A prosecution lawyer disputed Murtaza's claim and argued that the prosecution team had presented enough evidence to convict the suspects. "This incident not only spread a wave of terrorism in Lahore but also brought a bad to name to Pakistan," the prosecution lawyer stated. The judge, however, sided with the defense and acquitted all the suspects. The incident stems from allegations that a Christian had made derogatory remarks against the prophet of Islam, Muhammad. Sawan Masih was accused of blasphemy by his Muslim friend Imran Shahid after they quarreled under the influence of liquor. On March 8, 2013, thousands of protesters went to the Joseph Colony and set fire to over 125 residential properties, shops, motorcycles, rickshaws and a church after rumors circulated that a Christian had committed blasphemy. No casualty was reported, but hundreds of Christians were displaced, and a number of people were injured in the clash between the police and the arsonists. The authorities initially booked more than 1,000 Muslims, and 80 were nominated. The police later arrested the 115 suspects who were acquitted on Saturday. Sawan, a 26-year-old road sweeper, told the police that the real reason for the blasphemy allegation was a property dispute between him and his friend. He was tried in court and sentenced to death in 2014. "Both Imran and Sawan are close friends and the former has made the allegation only to settle a personal score because they had quarreled over some petty matter." said Dilawar Masih, whose house and shop were destroyed by the fire. home US Russell Moore, Jim Daly hails Trump for pro-life stance Prominent evangelical leaders Russell Moore and Jim Daly have expressed their optimism about the direction of the new presidential administration with regards to the issue of abortion. In an interview with The Christian Post, Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), commended President Donald Trump for reinstating the Mexico City policy, which blocks federal funding to family planning organizations overseas that perform abortions. Moore also said that he is hopeful about Trump's Supreme Court pick. "The names I am hearing, I have a positive reaction to those people," he added. "The main thing though is to convince, to make sure our people know that when it comes to the issue of life, and abortion particularly, things aren't settled just because of an election. We have to consistently be diligent over a long period of time," Moore continued. Daly, president of Focus on the Family, said that Trump reminds him of his former bosses in the business world due to the president's penchant for speaking bluntly. "But I can't argue with the first week's performance when it comes to life. It's astonishing," Daly told The Christian Post. Daly also mentioned that he met with Vice President Mike Pence and Kellyanne Conway, who assured him that they are committed to upholding a pro-life stance. "[I]t's almost as if they don't care what people say about them. I'm really stunned by that," Daly remarked. Focus on the Family and ERLC both hosted the Evangelicals for Life Conference at the JW Marriot Hotel in downtown Washington D.C. Attendees of the three-day event were also encouraged to join the participants of the annual March for life at the National Mall for a rally and a march to Capitol Hill. More than 50 speakers were scheduled to participate in the conference that coincided with March for Life on Jan. 27. On Thursday, Moore opened the conference with a message about addressing the issue of human dignity based on the framework provided by the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Other speakers at the conference include Life Training Institute President Scott Klusendorf, Pastor Matt Chandler, Pastor Todd Wagner, Pastor Glenn Packiam and Baptist Convention of Maryland/Delaware Executive Director Kevin Smith. home US Trump says new refugee policy will prioritize persecuted Christians President Donald Trump has vowed that persecuted Christians who are seeking asylum in the U.S. will be given a priority under his new refugee policy. On Friday, the president signed an executive order temporarily blocking refugees from Syria and other predominantly Muslim countries. He also established a religious test for refugees from Muslim nations to give preference to Christians and other minority religions over Muslims. In an interview with CBN's the Brody File, Trump explained that the Syrian Christians have been "horribly mistreated" and claimed that they were having difficulties in trying to enter the U.S. as refugees. "Do you know if you were a Christian in Syria it was impossible, at least very tough to get into the United States?" Trump said. "If you were a Muslim you could come in, but if you were a Christian, it was almost impossible and the reason that was so unfair, everybody was persecuted in all fairness, but they were chopping off the heads of everybody but more so the Christians. And I thought it was very, very unfair," he continued. The executive order prohibits asylum seekers from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya and Yemen from entering the U.S. for 90 days while refugees from Syria are barred indefinitely. Christian Freedom International president Jim Jacobson commended the order saying, "The Trump administration has given hope to persecuted Christians that their cases will finally be considered." Rev. Scott Arbeiter, the president of World Relief, stated that there is no evidence to prove that the Obama administration has discriminated against Christian refugees. According to the Pew Research Center, the U.S. admitted 38,901 Muslim refugees and 37,521 Christian refugees in 2016. Only one percent of Syrian refugees that were resettled in the U.S. last year were Christian, which makes up five percent of the country's population. The Obama administration had planned to admit 110,000 refugees in 2017, but Trump is likely to reduce the number to 50,000. World Relief, which is the humanitarian arm of National Association of Evangelicals, has resettled thousands of Muslim refugees in the U.S. with the help of 1,200 evangelical churches. Arbeiter said that a petition opposing Trump's order has already garnered 12,000 signatures from evangelical Christians. 5 Egyptian Coptic Christians Brutally Murdered, Their Bodies Found With Throats Slashed In a span of two weeks, five Coptic Christians in Egypt met exactly the same horrible fate: brutally murdered with their throats slashed. The killing spree started on Jan. 3 when a Coptic Christian store owner in Alexandria had his throat slashed twice from behind by a Muslim man who later confessed to killing the Christian for selling liquor in his store, the World Watch Monitor (WWM) said in a report. On Jan. 6, the Coptic Christmas holiday, two more Christiansa 60-year-old man and his 48-year-old wifewere found dead in their beds in northern Egypt. Again, their throats were found slit. The authorities claimed robbery was the motivedespite their findings that no valuables were taken from the Christian couple's home. In its report, WWM noted that the police in Egypt "are keen not to label the incidents as sectarian." "Copts have been terrified by the nature of the killings and believe the victims were singled out because of their faith," the Christian persecution watchdog body said. On Jan. 13, a fourth Coptic Christiana 35-year-old surgeonwas found dead, again with his throat slit in his residence in Upper Egypt. Just like in the previous similar killings, no valuables were taken away from his house. The latest Coptic Christian killing occurred on Jan. 16 when a 37-year-old married father of two was found in his Cairo residence by his brother. Just like the four other Christian victims, his throat was likewise slashed. And once again there was no sign of robbery. "There was no sign of a struggle everything was in its place. ... His wallet was still in his pocket with 400 Egyptian pounds [$21] in it," the victim's brother said. Egypt is ranked as the 21st worst nation persecuting Christians, according to Open Doors USA's 2017 World Watch List. Earlier this month, the Associated Press reported that Egyptian prosecutors decided to drop the case against a Muslim mob accused of stripping a Christian grandmother naked and parading her in the streets in Egypt. The prosecutors said they didn't have enough evidence to convict the accusedeven though they heard testimonies supporting the victim's claims from family members and the police officers who were present at the scene of the alleged crime. The incident happened in May 2016 when a group of about 300 Muslims stripped naked 70-year-old Souad Thabet and paraded her through the streets of her village in Minya province. Egypt has an estimated population of nine million Christians, mostly Orthodox Copts, accounting for about 10 percent of Egypt's population, which is overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim. Baptist Minister Challenges Franklin Graham Over Donald Trump Refugee Policy A Baptist minister has challenged support for Christian humanitarian charity Samaritan's Purse, because its chief executive Franklin Graham defended US President Donald Trump's refugee policy. Many Christian leaders have strongly criticised Trump's actions. But last week Graham, the outspoken son of celebrated preacher Billy Graham, said Trump's restriction on Syrian refugees entering the US was "not a Bible issue". In response Mark Wingfield, the associate pastor at Wilshire Baptist Church in Dallas, described Graham as a "twisted Christian witness". His church has previously got into trouble with other Baptists for voting to allow gay marriage ceremonies. Wingfield argued that the command in Deuteronomy 10 to "love the stranger" is Biblical justification for taking in Syrian refugees. "As a result of this policy, people will die," he wrote for Baptist News Global. "Immigrants who need to flee horrendous situations will be trapped and will die. And then others will die because America's protectionism will breed more terrorism and more hatred. How in God's name is any of that biblical?" Franklin Graham has openly supported President Trump, most recently defending the order banning refugees from certain areas of the Middle East. "It's not a biblical command for the country to let everyone in who wants to come, that's not a Bible issue," he told the Huffington Post. "We want to love people, we want to be kind to people, we want to be considerate, but we have a country and a country should have order and there are laws that relate to immigration and I think we should follow those laws. Because of the dangers we see today in this world, we need to be very careful." Samaritan's Purse provides a range of humanitarian aid around the world, and also runs the "Operation Christmas Child" program, which sends shoeboxes of presents to children for Christmas. Graham is the charity's CEO and President. Wingfield wrote: "Do you really want to send a dose of hatred along with that shoebox of Christmas trinkets? Does handing out Christmas gifts counterbalance Graham's declaration that many of those who receive them would not be welcome in America? "If you are outraged by Franklin Graham's misrepresentation of Christian doctrine, channel your support somewhere else, like World Vision or any of the reputable denomination-based relief agencies." Graham is no stranger to controversy, and has regularly been criticised for his opinions, particularly regarding Islam, which he has described as a "very wicked and evil religion". Graham says it is incompatible with American values: "True Islam cannot be practised in this country. You can't beat your wife. You cannot murder your children if you think they've committed adultery or something like that, which they do practice in these other countries," he once told CNN. "I don't agree with the teachings of Islam and I find it to be a very violent religion." He was described as "notoriously Islamophobic" by Islamic pressure group CAIR, who successfully lobbied for him to be excluded from Trump's inauguration ceremony. Trump has divided Christians, receiving support from charismatic pastors Paula White, Bill Johnson and others but condemnation from voices as diverse as conservative pastor John Piper, and liberal writer Rachel Held Evans. Other members of Graham's family have strongly disagreed with Franklin and spoken out against Trump. Bishop Angaelos Condemns Refugee Policies That Discriminate Bishop Angaelos, a leader in a church that is a frequent victim of extremist Islamist attacks, has spoken out against refugee policies that discriminate. He warns of the dangers of seeking revenge. Bishop Angaelos leads the Coptic Orthodox Church in the UK. As the main church in Egypt, the Coptic church has suffered from an escalation of Islamist attacks in recent months, such as December's church bombing in Cairo. The Bishop has previously written written about forgiveness for such crimes. President Donald Trump's latest restriction of refugee access to the USA has prompted a large number of Christian leaders to speak out on behalf of the refugee. In a statement today, the Bishop acknowledges that terrorist attacks have led to "growing uncertainty and global anxiety" regarding security, and an "underlying scepticism" over border security, at the same time as the perception of a "lack of compassion" for refugees. He says: "As a Church that frequently finds itself at the receiving end of lethal terrorist attacks, we understand far too well the need to protect communities and individuals. "At the same time however, we must not do so in a way that compromises our integrity or goes against the humaneness with which we must address the vast majority of those who do not directly or indirectly advocate for, aspire to, or inflict harm on others." He appears to criticise an aspect of Trump's executive order, that will ultimately prioritise refugees who are religious minorities in the countries they are fleeing from. "In seeking to protect individuals or a particular sector of a community, it is imperative that we do not alienate others, especially when it means denying the basic human rights and freedoms of those most vulnerable," he says. Along with numerous other Christian groups today, Bishop Angaelos appeals to the Bible to argue for supporting refugee programs. "We believe that God instructs us to provide refuge and hospitality to all humanity indiscriminately," says the statement. "He does not stop there in His instruction, but goes further to urge us to love all, even those who consider us their enemies." He warns against the human tendency to seek revenge or to behave in the same way as the people who seek to harm us. "While our human brokenness has led to the conflict and vulnerability we see in the world, we must not allow that same brokenness to lead us into dehumanising others, considering them less worthy of God-given rights and freedoms," says Bishop Angaelos. He also called on all people in positions of authority to uphold "crucial values of love, acceptance and mercy". Bishop Angaelos concludes with: "We pray wisdom for leaders, safe passage and refuge for the vulnerable, and a realisation, by those who seek to inflict harm and terror on others, of the value and sanctity of every life." Bishop Urges Christians To 'Buy Sword And Defend Themselves' Against Islamist Radicals Seeking To Slaughter Them Christians should "buy a sword and defend themselves" against Islamist extremists who threaten to slaughter them. The advice came from Bishop Diamond Emuobor, chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria as reported by the Daily Post. The Christian leader said there is biblical basis for Christians arming themselves against their enemies, citing Luke 22:36. "Jesus says in the book of Luke that those who have no sword should sell their coats and buy one for the defence of their lives," Emuobor said. "We are all human beings. Nobody should catch you like a snail and slaughter because you believe in Jesus Christ," the bishop said. Emuobor made the call as the persecution and slaughtering of minority Christians in Nigeria by Islamist extremists continue unabated. According to the Catholic News Agency, Islamist violence and terrorism has killed more than 12,000 Christians in Nigeria, destroying some 2,000 churches. Boko Haram militants have done much of the killings, but in the past year a new source of Islamist terror has emerged. The group is called the Fulani Herdsmen Terrorists (FHT). The Fulani terrorists have killed dozens of Christians in just the past few weeks alone, according to International Christian Concern (ICC). This January the Fulani attackers attacked the predominantly Christian village of Kwayine in Adamawa State, killing 10 people and destroying homes. The ICC said that although Nigeria has been waging a military campaign against Boko Haram, military authorities have refused to act against the Fulani terrorist group. "This is yet another example of the government's failure to provide adequate protection for Christian communities in this region and refusal to stamp out the radical movements that cause these deadly attacks," said ICC Regional Manager Daniel Harris. "The government's refusal to recognise the Fulani militants as what they are, Islamic terrorists, threatens religious freedom and the lives of Christians in this region," he added. Bishop Joseph Bagobiri of the Diocese of Kafanchan said the FHT, although not very known in the West, is becoming a huge menace to Christians and moderate Muslims alike. The group's aggression, the bishop said, "has turned into religious persecution." Bishop Vows To Continue Campaigning For Change On Gays In Church Of England The Bishop of Liverpool has vowed to continue campaigning for gay marriage, days after the C of E announced it would not change its teaching following more than two years of debate. Known for his pro-LGBT stance, Rt Rev Paul Bayes, described himself as a "bastard bishop" as he stood by a report published last week that refused to offer gay couples an official blessing in church. Giving an insight into the depth of division in the Church, he admitted conservative colleagues could not even be in the same room as him because of his liberal stance. The report published by the C of E's House of Bishops on Friday refused to change its stance that marriage is exclusively between one man and one woman. It insisted it would offer "maximum freedom" for LGBT couples within the current laws and teaching of the Church and promised "a fresh tone and culture of welcome and support for lesbian and gay people". Bayes acknowledged many on the liberal wing of the C of E would feel an acute "sense of betrayal" after he spoke in support of gay marriage but endorsed the report by the body of bishops as a whole. "I believe that the suggestions in the report, insufficient as they are, are nonetheless necessary; that they will help LGBT people in the church, will make a church less toxic than the one we have now," he wrote in a post on the blog ViaMedia.News. But he added he would continue to work for "greater freedom" for LGBT couples in the Church. "I will continue to seek the right way to be a bishop, in this season on this matter when those who disagree with me outnumber me," he wrote. "I will struggle for a church where the love of the loving will be honoured, whomever they love. "I will reach for and advocate for and enable the maximum freedom now, and I'll pray and work and hope for still greater freedom later." The Bishop of Liverpool's comments come after the conservative Bishop of Maidstone, Rt Rev Rod Thomas, welcomed the report but raised concerns the promise to allow "maximum freedoms" might lead to "a wide range of church activities and practices which effectively undermine the Church's doctrine". In a statement on Saturday he wrote: "Our current agreement to work together is provisional and that future work must take place within the parameters of the Church's doctrine." GAFCON UK, a conservative grouping within the wider Anglican Communion, also welcomed the report but said it was not confident it would maintain the status quo for long. "We need to express our serious reservations about the many ambiguities in the text relating to how we as Anglicans understand truth and goodness, sin and salvation, and how we should carry out pastoral and liturgical practice," a statement released on Friday read. "We are concerned that the emphasis on freedom given to clergy in terms of pastoral practice, and the possibility of further revision to the church's teaching in future, will do nothing to prevent a trajectory which aligns with the ethics of contemporary culture rather than the challenging but life-giving teaching of the Bible." Canada's PM Says Mosque Shooting A 'Terrorist Attack On Muslims' Six people were killed and eight wounded when gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque during Sunday night prayers, in what Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a "terrorist attack on Muslims". Police said two suspects had been arrested, but gave no details about them or what prompted the attack. Initially, the mosque president said five people were killed and a witness said up to three gunmen had fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre. Police said only two people were involved in the attack. "Six people are confirmed dead they range in age from 35 to about 70," Quebec provincial police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told reporters, adding eight people were wounded and 39 were unharmed. The mosque's president, Mohamed Yangui, who was not inside when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. "Why is this happening here? This is barbaric," he said. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement: "We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge. "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country." The shooting came on the weekend that Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, after US President Donald Trump suspended the US refugee programme and temporarily barred citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States on national security grounds. A Canadian federal Liberal legislator, Greg Fergus, tweeted: "This is an act of terrorism the result of years of sermonising Muslims. Words matter and hateful speeches have consequences!" The premier of Quebec province, Philippe Couillard, said security would be increased at mosques in Quebec City and Montreal. "We are with you. You are home," Couillard said, directing his comments at the province's Muslim community. "You are welcome in your home. We are all Quebecers. We must continue together to build an open welcoming and peaceful society". New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said police were providing additional protection for mosques in that city following the Quebec shooting. "All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something," he tweeted. "Not safe here" French President Francois Hollande condemned the attack. "The terrorists wanted to attack the spirit of peace and tolerance of the citizens of Quebec," Hollande said in a statement on Monday. "France stands shoulder to shoulder with the victims and their families." Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them from North Africa. In June last year, a pig's head was left on the doorstep of the cultural centre. "We are not safe here," said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque in the middle-class, residential area, but did not on Sunday. Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now "very worried" and thinking of moving back to Morocco. Mass shootings are rare in Canada, which has stricter gun laws than the United States, and news of the shooting sent a shockwave through mosques and community centres throughout the mostly French-language province. "It's a sad day for all Quebecers and Canadians to see a terrorist attack happen in peaceful Quebec City," said Mohamed Yacoub, co-chairman of an Islamic community centre in a Montreal suburb. "I hope it's an isolated incident." Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of the province was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighbouring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Zebida Bendjeddou, who left the Quebec City mosque earlier on Sunday evening, said the centre had received threats. "In June, they'd put a pig's head in front of the mosque. But we thought: 'Oh, they're isolated events.' We didn't take it seriously. But tonight, those isolated events, they take on a different scope," she said. Bendjeddou said she had not confirmed the names of those killed, but added: "They're people we know, for sure. People we knew since they were little kids." Christian Activists Arrested For Disarming Warplane Bound For Saudi Arabia Two Christians have been arrested in the UK after "trying to disarm a warplane" bound for Saudi Arabia. Rev Dan Woodhouse, a Methodist minister, and Sam Walton, a Quaker activist, released a statement saying they had entered the BAE Systems' site in Warton, Lancashire, with the aim of neutralising the planes. The two men said they were trying to stop the delivery of fighter jets to the Saudi government, which they said was due to happen in the next few weeks. They insisted their effort would have saved lives. Police confirmed two people have been arrested on suspicion of criminal damage following the incident. Rev Woodhouse, a Methodist minister in Leeds, said: "Stopping or even delaying Saudi Arabia having more planes with which to bomb Yemen would save innocent lives and prevent war crimes. "We are clear that the real crime taking place is arming despots, who frequently use arms on their own people, are known to use torture and the death penalty, and who will almost certainly be using the planes sent from BAE Warton to continue to commit crimes against humanity." Mr Walton said: "We did not take these steps lightly but we have no other option. "We have been active in opposing the arms trade to Saudi Arabia for years, and in the face of wilful government denial that there is a problem with arming Saudi, including willingness to suspend our own due process of law, and complete unwillingness to consider stopping arming Saudi Arabia, we must take this action." A spokeswoman for BAE Systems said: "The incident is now being investigated by Lancashire Police and we are assisting them with their inquiries." Christian Families Among First To Be Sent Back Home Under Trump Travel Ban Two Christian families have been denied entry to the United States and sent home. They were among the first casualties of President Donald Trump's travel ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries. Two brothers, their wives and two children from Syria were turned away from Philadelphia International Airport in the United States and sent back, according to a source in Beirut. Trump signed the controversial executive order on Friday banning people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the United States. All refugees are also banned for 120 days and refugees from Syria are banned indefinitely. Trump said the ban was "not about religion". He said in a statement: "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days." But there are fears the ban could act as a recruiting tool for Islamic State. Besides prohibiting travel from seven Muslim-majority countries, the ban prohibits entry to all refugees, regardless of origin, for 120 days and indefinitely for refugees from Syria, which has been ravaged by a deadly war since 2011. After the 120 day period is over, priority will be given to Christian refugees, Trump told the Christian Broadcast Network. Of more than 3,000 people who entered the US yesterday, more than 100 were detained for questioning. After the British Government became so concerned it contacted the White House, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson was reassured by Trump advisers that British nationals with dual citizenship will not be banned from entering the US, at least not if they are travelling from Britain. The ban only affects people travelling directly from those seven countries to the US. However, the two Christian families from Syria were returned to the Middle East from Philadelphia in spite of reassurances from Trump that the executive order would give priority to admitting Christian refugees. A source told AFP. "Six people, including Syrian Christians, were turned back at Philadelphia airport on Saturday and were back in Beirut on Sunday." Just hours before they were sent back, Trump had told the Christian Broadcasting Network, referring to Christian refugees in general: "We are going to help them. They've been horribly treated." Christian Humanitarian Charities Horrified At Trump's Refugee Ban Christian charities are reacting with horror at Trump's move to block all refugees from entering the US. President Trump signed an executive order on Friday that banned all refugees fleeing war in Syria from coming to America and halted any entry for people from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Libya, and Yemen for 90 days. The block prompted widespread condemnation from around the world with the European Parliament saying it would never choose isolation and inequality over openness and equality. Iraq's parliament called for reciprocal action after it was one of seven countries named in the motion. The United Nations also announced its opposition with UN human rights chief Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein saying the ban was "mean-spirited and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism". The White House insisted the measure did not amount to a Muslim ban and insisted it would prioritise Christians fleeing persecution. Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 But Christians NGOs united in their defiance and lambasted Trump's plan as a rejection of Christian values. A coalition of evangelical leaders including Leith Anderson, president of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAoE), Samual Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference who prayed at Trump's inauguration, and Richard Stearns, president of World Vision US, wrote to Trump condemning the plans. "The Bible teaches us that each person including each refugee, regardless of their country of origin, religious background, or any other qualifier is made in the Image of God, with inherent dignity and potential. Their lives matter to God, and they matter to us," a statement read. "While the U.S. has in recent years received only a fraction of 1 percent of the world's refugees annually, we believe the refugee resettlement program provides a lifeline to these uniquely vulnerable individuals and a vital opportunity for our churches to live out the biblical commands to love our neighbors, to make disciples of all nations, and to practice hospitality." Lobby group In Defense of Christians executive director Philippe Nassif called for a quick end to the ban and said it would be better to focus on creating safe zones for Christians in the Middle East. "It is important to understand that Christians, Yazidis, and other religious minorities in Iraq and Syria have been victims of genocide perpetrated by ISIS, and formally recognized by the US Congress," he said. "It is our belief at IDC that these genocide victims who seek asylum should be prioritized and given accommodation on the basis of this status. But that does not mean banning all refugees." Christian Aid's head of advocacy, Tom Viita, said the President should read his Bible before implementing such policies. "At the heart of the Christian faith is a clear command to 'love the stranger' and to stand with the vulnerable, whoever they may be," he said. "To follow Christian teaching means to welcome people in need - whatever their faith - not prioritise people who happen to share one's own beliefs. "A rejection of refugees, whatever their faith, is a rejection of Christian values. Trump would do well to read his bible before enacting discriminatory policies." He accused Trump of "ripping up" post-World War Two treaties designed to protect people. Persecution charity Open Doors' CEO Lisa Pearce said Trump was right to recognise the persecution faced by Christians but said he was wrong to target one religion for protection. "Prioritising one religion over another only exacerbates the already severe worldwide trend of religious persecution," she told Christian Today. "We encourage a need-based approach that treats all faiths equally and works toward the comprehensive strengthening of religious freedom around the world." Sudanese Judge Sentences Czech Missionary, Local Christians To Long Jail Terms A Czech missionary has been sentenced to 20 years in jail in Sudan after he was found guilty of spying and inciting hatred. Two Sudanese Christians, Rev Hassan Abdelrahim and Abdelmonem Abdumawla, were given sentences variously reported as 12 and 14 years. Petr Jasek was sentenced in Kartoum, Sudan, on Sunday after being charged of "entering the country without a visa... spying... taking pictures of military installations... inciting hatred... and publishing fake news," his lawyer Omar al-Faruk Shmina said, according to ENCA. He has already been in prison for more than a year after being detained in December 2015. It is thought he was in the country helping local Christians, who are a minority. The Czech foreign ministry in Prague condemned the verdict, saying they were confident it was not backed by facts. It confirmed that Jasek had been sentenced and said it would start immediate talks with Sudanese officials to secure his release. The court put his sentence at 24 years but Czech officials said it was 20 years. He was charged alongside Sudan Church of Christ leader Hassan Abdelrahim and Darfuri graduate Abdulmonem Abdumawla. They were also first detained in December 2015, alongside another Church of Christ pastor, Kuwa Shamal, who was released earlier this month. Release International, a charity helping persecuted Christians, said they would appeal the verdict. A statement said Jasek was detained along with three others for funding the medical treatment of a Darfur student burnt at a rally. They were subsequently accused of funding rebel movements and charged with at least seven crimes, including 'waging war against the state' and spying, the charity added. The case has attracted significant international attention. In October, the European Parliament adopted an Urgency Resolution, calling for the "immediate and unconditional" release of the four men on trial "on charges of highlighting alleged Christian suffering in war-ravaged areas of Sudan". Court dates have been frequently delayed and postponed several times without warning when a witness, translator or the judge failed to appear. One Western diplomat observed a hearing in November, according to World Watch Monitor and said: "The prosecutor has nothing new. It was just a repetition of what has already been said... They didn't have any evidence to support their accusations." Facebook Founder Meets Texas Pastors: Is Mark Zuckerberg Drawing Closer To Christianity After Abandoning Atheism? Is Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg seeing the light of Christianity and being drawn to it? First, he declared that he's no longer an atheist. Now, he has met with pastors of a church in Texas to learn more about their ministries and how they serve the people. In a recent Facebook post, Zuckerberg wrote that he "met with ministers in Waco who are helping their congregations find deeper meaning in a changing world." He said the meeting helped him "understand just how important community is, and how we're all just looking for something we can trust." "We may come from different backgrounds, but we all want to find purpose and authenticity in something bigger than ourselves," the 32-year-old billionaire added. Aaron Zimmerman, an Episcopal priest from Waco, Texas said he and other religious leaders were stunned to learn that they would be meeting Zuckerberg on Jan. 18, the Baptist Press reported. "You could have knocked me over with a feather," said Zimmerman, the rector at St. Alban's Episcopal Church. He said they were doubly surprised when Zuckerberg told them that he came not to give a speech but to ask questions and listen. "The clergy spoke 90 percent of the time. That impressed me a lot," Zimmerman said. As Christian Today previously reported, Zuckerberg posted a message on Facebook last month announcing that he has abandoned atheism. In a post wishing everyone a "Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah," Zuckerberg answered a commenter who asked why he wrote the greeting, asking, "But aren't you atheist?" Zuckerberg responded with a definitive "no," adding, "I was raised Jewish and then I went through a period where I questioned things, but now I believe religion is very important." Before that, Zuckerberg labelled himself an atheist on his Facebook profile. Later, however, he removed his religious preference from his page, according to Patheos. The first inkling of Zuckerberg's apparently evolving spirituality came in August last year when he and his wife met Pope Francis in Vatican City. In a statement he posted on Facebook about that Vatican meeting, Zuckerberg said he and Pope Francis talked about efforts to help poorer communities connect to the Internet. "We told him how much we admire his message of mercy and tenderness, and how he's found new ways to communicate with people of every faith around the world," wrote Zuckerberg. The James County Historical Society will meet on Sunday, February 5 at 2:30pm at the Ooltewah United Methodist Church Our meeting next week will be a continuation of our imaginary walk down the streets of James County. We will have discussions, memories, photos, etc to aid us in our tour. Bring a friend and let's see what fun and interesting memories are brought to the forefront. All are welcome. Italian Avalanche Survivors Recall 'Miracle' When 'Angel' Rescuers Saved Them They thought they would all perish in their icy grave. But just as they were about to give up hope, the survivors heard the voices of "angels" above them who eventually rescued them from a devastating avalanche that buried a resort hotel where they were staying in Italy on Jan. 18, CBN News reported. Italian rescuers saved the lives of at least 11 of the guests and staff who were inside Hotel Rigopiano when the massive wall of snow struck, killing 29 others, according to CNN. Nine of those rescued, including four children, were pulled from air pockets in the snow-covered wreckage. The two others were found sheltering inside a car outside the destroyed hotel. One of the survivors, 22-year-old Girogia Galassi, told reporters how her faith and those of others were tested to the limit as they laid stuck under an icy debris, hoping and praying for someone to find and rescue them. She said "it felt like a bomb" when the avalanche struck them. "I felt glass exploding all around me," she recalled. She said they survived by drinking ice water. But ironically, despite being covered by tonnes of snow, they had difficulty finding drinking water that was sustaining them, causing them to panic. It was at that point when they started hearing voices above them, which renewed their hope. "When we heard a rescuer it was as if an angel was talking to us, as if someone had come to pick us up literally from under the ground," Galassi said. She said she felt she "was born again" after her "angel rescuers" lifted her up and took her away from the wreckage. "It was a miracle," she gushed. One of those who found refuge inside a vehicle parked just outside the hotel described what happened, The Local reported. "My wife told me she had a headache so I went to the car to get some pills for her," Giampiero Parete, a 38-year-old chef, told rescuers. "As soon as I got out I felt this wind and then this deafening noise of trees cracking, trunks cascading down the hillside. Then the hotel collapsed under this enormous wave of snow and half the mountain. My car was the only thing that escaped, by a few centimetres," he said. Pope Scores Victory In Latest Round Of Vatican Condoms Row Albrecht von Boeselager has been reinstated as Grand Chancellor or foreign minister of the Knights of Malta chivalric and charitable order in what is being described as a "Papal coup". Boeselager was a victim of a Vatican row over condoms after the contraceptives were distributed during charitable work in 2013 in Myanmar. He was ordered to resign by British Grand Master Mathew Festing in the presence of Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, an ultra-conservative critic of the Pope. Festing, whose appointment would normally be for life, was himself asked to stand down by Pope Francis last week after he refused to cooperate with the Vatican commission set up to investigate the sacking Boeselager. Boeselager had had official oversight of the Myanmar projects. He has always insisted he stood by Catholic teaching banning the use of condoms. The order's sovereign council said in a statement issued from its headquarters in Rome that it had dropped disciplinary proceedings against Boeselager. Ludwig Hoffmann von Rumerstein of Austria is interim Grand Master until a new election is held. Pope Francis wrote to the orders's council on Friday and said he wished to "renew the spirituality of the Order, specifically of those members who take vows." The Knights of Malta was founded in the 11th century. Festing, 67, was asked by Pope Francis personally to step down. Boeselager had been fired by Festing because he was said to have supported the use of the condoms. Festing then opposed the Vatican's enquiry into the dismissal of Boeselager because he said it was interference in the order's sovereign affairs. "Considering the legal irrelevance of this group and of its findings relating to the legal structure of the Order of Malta, the Order has decided that it should not cooperate with it," the order stated on its website, in reference to the enquiry. According to Crux Now, the justification for the Festing-Burke move against Von Boeselager was that between 1989 and 2014, when he was in charge of the order's international humanitarian arm, Malteser International, it financed aid agencies that distributed condoms to prevent AIDS among prostitutes in Myanmar, Kenya and South Sudan. Von Boeselager says when he found out about this, the projects were closed. He has said that to suggest he is other than a loyal Catholic obedient to church teachings is "absurd". The Catholic blog One Peter Five analyses the latest move in saga, which it describes as a "Papal coup", and asks: "What lies hidden beneath the stories we are being told? Why is this nearly thousand-year-old sovereign, lay religious order involved primarily in the sort of charitable works Francis lauds the target of such an aggressive (and arguably illegal) intervention from Rome? What leverage is being brought to bear by the Vatican to coerce behaviors within the Order that seem, on the surface, entirely contrary to self-preservation and good sense?" Malta Today comments: "There is no escaping that a rivalry between Cardinal Burke and Pope Francis has been framed onto the Knights-Vatican feud. Burke was appointed to the job or the Order's patron by Francis in November 2014, largely seen as a demotion for the former head of the Holy See's supreme court, the Apostolic Signatura, and to instead assume a largely ceremonial role as the Knights' liaison with Rome. "Burke is an outspoken critic of the Church's direction under the leadership of the Argentine pontiff." Conservative Catholic commentator Chris Gillibrand told Christian Today: "The contrast between the spiritual and intellectual poise of Benedict could not be greater. As Benedict fades, Francis is being released from all restraint and is making the Church in his own image and not God's. He constantly accuses others of his own faults. He preaches mercy but shows no mercy in his governance of the Church. He said the order's "sin" was to be a conservative order. "He is giving the Knights of Malta a punishment beating, as a warning to others, a proxy for their patron, Cardinal Burke." President Trump, Please Think Again: Evangelical Leaders Plead For Rethink On Refugee Ban Senior evangelical leaders have written to President Trump and Vice-President Pence urging them to reconsider Trump's executive order freezing the US refugee programme. Among the signatories to the letter are Leith Anderson, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, Richard Stearns, president of World Vision US, Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, and Scott Arbeiter, president of World Relief. The letter obtained by Politico says: "As evangelical Christians, we are guided by the Bible to be particularly concerned for the plight of refugees, individuals who have been forced to flee their countries because of the threat of persecution." It says: "While the US has in recent years received only a fraction of 1 percent of the world's refugees annually, we believe the refugee resettlement program provides a lifeline to these uniquely vulnerable individuals and a vital opportunity for our churches to live out the biblical commands to love our neighbors, to make disciples of all nations, and to practice hospitality." It says that while vetting those considered for resettlement is important, the US screening process is already very thorough and that "our nation can continue to be both compassionate and secure". Referring to the extensive ministries among refugees many churches have, the letter says: "We would ask that you reconsider these decisions, allowing for resettlement of refugees to resume immediately so that our churches and ministries can continue to live out our faith in this way." Separately, World Relief issued a condemnation of Trump's order suspending the refugee programme for 120 days. "The lengthy delay imposed in this ban further traumatizes refugees, most of whom are women and children, keeps families separated and punishes people who are themselves fleeing the terror we as a nation are rightly fighting to end," said Scott Arbeiter, World Relief President. World Relief's statement said: "No refugee enters the United States who is not approved by the State Department and vetted with great care by the department of Homeland Security and other US agencies. This process, often lasting 18-24 months, includes biometric scans, multiple interviews, and other safeguards." Arbeiter added: "We stand with refugees. Standing with us are many thousands of American citizens in congregations and communities across the nation who have joined us in this cause. We do so remembering that many of our ancestors came to this nation fleeing the persecution of their day. In a day in which the world faces the greatest humanitarian crisis we have known we cannot be slow to act. Far too much is at risk." The World Evangelical Alliance issued a coded rebuke yesterday that did not name Trump but referred to "recent developments". In its "Call to Welcome Refugees" it calls on Christians to "actively love and welcome refugees" and on Christian leaders to "deepen their biblical understanding of forced displacement and to intentionally minister in ways intended to create space in the hearts and minds of others for refugees." Will Sir Mo Farah Escape Donald Trump Travel Ban? Confusion Reigns Confusion reigns after Olympic gold medallist Sir Mo Farah, who was born in Somalia, was told he will not personally affected by President Donald Trump's travel ban. Contradictory advice has emerged from the US Embassy in London. Sir Mo, a British citizen, was told by the Foreign Office last night that the ban will not apply to him. He said he was "relieved" that he would still be able to return to the US where his wife and young family live after he finishes this spell of training in Ethiopia in March. The American Embassy in London appeared to onflict the advice from Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, who under pressure to clarify his remarks, told the House of Commons this evening that British passport holders would definitely not be affected by the travel ban. And Trump himself on Twitter appeared to show no regrets: If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 The US Embassy says on its website: "Per U.S. Presidential Executive Order signed on January 27, 2017, visa issuance to aliens from the countries of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen has been suspended effective immediately until further notification. "If you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time. "If you already have an appointment scheduled, please DO NOT ATTEND your appointment as we will not be able to proceed with your visa interview. Please note that certain travel for official governmental purposes, related to official business at or on behalf of designated international organizations, on behalf of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or by certain officials is not subject to this suspension." This advice appears to imply that Sir Mo is among those with dual nationality from one of the seven named countries cannot in fact hope to travel to the US at this time. Sir Mo condemned Trump's executive order. He wrote on Facebook: "On 1st January this year, Her Majesty The Queen made me a Knight of the Realm. On 27th January, President Donald Trump seems to have made me an alien. "I am a British citizen who has lived in America for the past six years working hard, contributing to society, paying my taxes and bringing up our four children in the place they now call home. Now, me and many others like me are being told that we may not be welcome. "It's deeply troubling that I will have to tell my children that Daddy might not be able to come home to explain why the President has introduced a policy that comes from a place of ignorance and prejudice. "I was welcomed into Britain from Somalia at eight years old and given the chance to succeed and realise my dreams. I have been proud to represent my country, win medals for the British people and receive the greatest honour of a knighthood. My story is an example of what can happen when you follow polices of compassion and understanding, not hate and isolation." Southern Baptist Mission Trustee Resigns Rather Than 'Support False Religion' The fallout from a controversial religious liberty case that saw Southern Baptist entities lining up to defend the construction of a mosque in New Jersey has seen a trustee of its International Mission Board resign and the IMB tweak its policies on campaigning. A judge in the long-running case ruled that Baptists had been treated better than Muslims by planning authorities that had required the Islamic Society of Basking Ridge to provide more than twice as many parking spaces as churches and synagogues. Both the SBC's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission and the IMB had supported the mosque on religious liberty grounds. The ERLC and its head Russell Moore had been fiercely criticised from within the denomination for doing so. According to Baptist Press, Rev Dean Haun, pastor of First Baptist Church in Morristown, Tennessee, resigned from the IMB trustee board in November over the issue. He told Baptist Press the decision "was one of the most heart-wrenching decisions that I've ever had to make in my ministry because I feel like I've been a faithful Southern Baptist all my life". He said the involvement of the IMB in the case "at least borders on" an "unholy alliance" with followers of a religion that denies the deity of Christ and the atonement, and that it did not fit the IMB's mission and purpose. He told Tennessee's Baptist and Reflector: "If we defend the rights of people to construct places of false worship are we not helping them speed down the highway to hell? I want no part in supporting a false religion even if it is in the name of religious freedom." Haun said he believes Islam does not deserve to be protected like other religions in America because it is not a religion. "In my opinion Islam, which means to 'submit,' is a geo-political movement that seeks to replace our values and even our faith with Sharia law. I doubt if the situation were reversed if the Muslims would stand up for our religious liberty." In a statement to Baptist Press apparently conceding one of Haun's points, IMB president David Platt said: "As a result of discussions among IMB trustees and staff over recent months, we have revised our processes for our legal department filing any future amicus briefs. IMB leaders are committed in the days ahead to speak only into situations that are directly tied to our mission." Southern Baptist Russell Moore Warns Trump Actions Could Harm US Interests Overseas Russell Moore, a leading figure in the large US-based Southern Baptist Convention, has urged Donald Trump to adjust his new refugee policy and warned that the President's actions could harm US interests overseas. Moore today released a letter he intends to send to the President and Vice-President Mike Pence, citing the SBC's resolution last year to support refugees as "Scripture calls for and expects God's people to minister to the sojourner." Moore heads the public policy division of the usually conservative SBC and has been an outspoken critic of the new President. Trump has ignited controversy with an executive order that has temporarily halted a refugee program from six Muslim countries, and indefinitely halted the acceptance of Syrian refugees into the USA. It also states it will in future prioritise refugees who are religious minorities in the countries they are fleeing which would lead to Christian and Yazidi refugees in Iraq and Syria being preferred. Moore described that not accepting Jewish refugees during World War II as one of "nation's darkest chapters". The letter says the SBC is sympathetic to desires to strengthen the vetting procedures for incoming refugees. However it highlights the plight of 'legal permanent residents' of the USA who have been caught in the aftermath of Trump's executive order, such as the well-publicised case of an Iraqi interpreter who fought for the US military being refused re-entry to the country. Moore argues that Trump's policies could negatively impact relations with the Muslim world, and harm missionaries working in those countries: "Southern Baptists are among the many Americans living in majority-Muslim countries to carry out the biblical call to love their neighbors. "We are deeply concerned that the order will cause widespread diplomatic fallout with the Muslim world, putting Southern Baptists serving in these countries in grave danger and preventing them from serving refugees and others who are in need with humanitarian assistance and the love of the gospel." The letter states that it supports some improvement in how refugees coming into the US are vetted. "Achieving the right balance between compassion toward refugees one of the most vulnerable groups of people among us and protection of Americans is crucial if the United States is to remain a model for freedom around the world," says Moore's letter. "It is one thing to debate whether the vetting process is adequate. It is quite another to seek to potentially turn our backs on Syrian refugees permanently." Moore, as the reforming president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission within the SBC, has been a strong critic of Donald Trump, particularly the new President's stance on immigration, and his moral character. As a result, Moore has been sharply criticised by other Baptists who have even threatened to withhold funding to groups related to his work, or the Southern Baptist Convention itself. Trump Refugee Ban 'A Dark Moment In US History', Warns Catholic Archbishop Trump's ban on immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries is "chaotic, cruel, and oblivious" to reality, the Catholic Archbishop of Chicago is warning. Cardinal Blase Cupich condemned the new President's executive order as a "dark moment in US history" after Trump temporarily halted the entire US refugee programme and indefinitely blocked anyone fleeing Syria from coming to America. The White House insisted the move was not a "Muslim ban". But the Catholic archbishop pointed out the order focuses "on Muslim-majority countries" and makes "an exception for Christians and non-Muslim minorities, but not for Muslims refugees fleeing for their lives". In a statement released on Sunday, Cupich branded the order as "contrary to both Catholic and American values". He said it was "rushed, chaotic, cruel and oblivious to the realities that will produce enduring security for the United States". He added: "The world is watching as we abandon our commitments to American values. "These actions give aid and comfort to those who would destroy our way of life. "They lower our estimation in the eyes of the many peoples who want to know America as a defender of human rights and religious liberty, not a nation that targets religious populations and then shuts its doors on them." Evangelical and Catholic leaders issued widespread condemnation to the order, even though Trump insisted Christians fleeing persecution would be exempt from the ban. Rt Rev Dr Russell Barr, general moderator of the presbyterian Church of Scotland said he was "horrified" by the order. "History is littered with instances in which human distrust, xenophobia, and discrimination has sewn hatred and conflict; our own desire for self-preservation taken at the exclusion of others," he said on Monday. "And yet throughout history the bible has called Christians to live beyond hatred and fear, demonstrating a radical hospitality where the stranger finds welcome and refuge is provided for those who are oppressed." The comments comes after Pope Francis told a group of Catholic and Lutheran pilgrims that you cannot be a Christian and ignore a refugee. "It's hypocrisy to call yourself a Christian and chase away a refugee or someone seeking help, someone who is hungry or thirsty, toss out someone who is in need of my help," he said at the meeting in October. "If I say I am Christian, but do these things, I'm a hypocrite." Trump Will Announce Supreme Court Nomination Tuesday Donald Trump will announce his choice for the Supreme Court on Tuesday, he has confirmed. The President tweeted on Monday afternoon that he had bought forward publishing his nomination, previously set for Thursday, amid a mounting furore over his refugee ban. I have made my decision on who I will nominate for The United States Supreme Court. It will be announced live on Tuesday at 8:00 P.M. (W.H.) Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 His vow to replace the late Judge Antonin Scalia with a hardline conservative is credited with winning him support among evangelical Christians concerned about upcoming legal fights over gender neutral bathrooms and a business' right to turn down services for gay couples. The nine person court is currently divided equally 4-4 along conservative versus progressive lines, with one decisive seat vacant. The President nominates his choice of candidate, typically someone in line with his political views, but they must be approved by the Senate before appointed. Senator Chuck Schumer, the Democrats' Senate leader, has vowed to fight "tooth and nail" anyone Trump nominates who is not "mainstream". Trump has already released a list of 21 judges as nominees and is thought to be sticking to that list. Read our analysis of the favorites here. Although the next appointment will tilt the balance of the crucial decision making panel, Trump's next four years as President could give him the chance to nominate another one or possibly two people to the Court. Three judges are 78 or older including 83-year-old liberal Ruth Bader Ginsburg, whom Trump called on to resign in July after she called him a "faker". The appointments are all lifetime positions and there is no limit to how long they can stay unless they are impeached, which last happened in 1805. Since 1970 the average tenure has been 26 years, meaning Trump's influence over American politics and judiciary could extend well beyond his term as President. If the balance shifted to a 6-3 conservative bias, the possibility of repealing the landmark Roe Vs Wade abortion ruling could be raised. Read our explainer on why the Supreme Court was so important for evangelicals. Why God's Joy Is Different From The World's Happiness The most natural pursuit there can be is the pursuit of happiness. I don't think I've ever met anyone (and I doubt anyone has) with the resolve to live a sad and depressing life. There's nothing wrong with pursuing happiness. But what does that pursuit look like to you? Many of us might sometimes pursue happiness by looking to the definition that the world gives us. The world wants us to believe that we gain happiness by gaining material wealth and possessions or by having things our way. But Matthew 6:19 says, "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal." As Christians, we are to look to God's joy and not the happiness of this world. How does the joy that comes from God differ from the happiness of this world? There are three major differences between the two. God's Joy Looks To The Eternal Matthew 6:20 shows us the first important difference between the happiness of the world and of God's kingdom: "But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal." The joy that comes from God lasts for an eternity whereas the happiness of this world does not. It doesn't matter how having the latest smartphone will make you happy because it will only last as long as the next release. But God's joy has no limit. It starts with the joy of salvation and lives on to the age to come. God's Joy Endures Through Hardships James 1:2-3 tells us, "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness." The joy that comes through God's Spirit is one that lasts through the ages, but it's also one that lasts through great trial. The world teaches us to be happy only when things are going our way, when there's no sickness, trial, struggle or lack. But God's Spirit causes us to "rejoice in the Lord always" (Philippians 4:4) even when hardships come. God's Joy Comes Unconditionally God's joy is a gift freely given, not one duly earned. The world wants you to believe that happiness is to be pursued intently and vigorously. But God's joy was the one that came down from heaven as manthough He was Godto earth to give us life. Jesus made a way for us to experience His joy and gives it to us based not on our merit but on His faithfulness. Romans 5:8 tells us, "But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Christ's death, burial, and resurrection made a way for us to experience true and lasting joy. Why I Won't Sign The Petition Against Trump's State Visit To The UK I'm not really a demonstrative person, but I will make an exception this evening. There's a rally in my home town billed as a "Peaceful demonstration against Trump's Muslim ban" and I feel I ought to go. The weather, according to the Facebook invitation, is eight degrees and cloudy, so it shouldn't be too bad. If that sounds a bit less than a white-hot rage against injustice, it's perhaps because the demonstration and many others like it has become conflated with a petition that's already the second largest in UK history. It says: "Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen." It's already topped a million and a quarter signatures, and is surpassed only by the one calling for a second referendum on leaving EU. Well, we know what happened to that one, and this is going the same way. The government has said the visit will be going ahead because it remains "substantially in the national interest". Just to be clear: I'm appalled by Trump's action on refugees. I think it will do limitless harm to some of the most vulnerable people in the world. People will die, because of a piece of populist paranoia not grounded in any sort of rational analysis of the real situation. You know what? America's refugee policy is working just fine. And that CBN interview when Trump alleged that under Obama, "If you were a Muslim you could come in, but if you were a Christian, it was almost impossible"? That was a flat-out lie. According to the Pew Center, in 2016 the US admitted almost the same numbers of Muslims and Christians in 2016, at 37,521 to 38,901 respectively. Furthermore, "Overall, a far larger total number of Christian refugees than Muslim refugees have entered the US since fiscal 2002." Given the relative numbers of Christians and Muslims in conflict regions, that means under Obama there was a massive bias to Christians. Trump's order is a terrifying foreshadowing of the shape of things to come: destructive, chaotic randomness without the slightest nod to effectiveness, justice or basic humanity, generated by a man uniquely unqualified for the office to which he was elected. It takes a lot to get me out on a demo, as I say, but for him I'll make an exception. Why, then, my lack of enthusiasm? Because that petition goes beyond protest to policy, and makes demands of the British government it would be utterly stupid and counter-productive to agree to. It appeals to a sort of moral absolutism to which Christians are particularly attracted and it would be disastrous. After the Brexit vote, Britain is staring into the economic abyss. We desperately need a decent trade deal with America. Donald Trump is a petulant child, but Theresa May held his hand and walked away with his good will. Refusing him the honour of a state visit with all the trimmings meeting the Queen included would be a monumental insult and the height of political folly. And for what? Virtue signalling: the pleasure of saying, "We're better than you are", with the click of a mouse. I'm sure some of those who've signed that petition are friends of mine. They all, I'm sure, have the right instincts, in terms of moral outrage. But when the real lives of real people are involved, sometimes you have to do what's expedient rather than what you feel like doing. As it happens, no one knows that better than the Queen. During her long reign she has shaken hands and made polite conversation with people she knows have committed every crime under the sun, including murder and torture. She's done it because it was her duty. Christians don't always get this. I'm sure some will read what I've written and think how dreadful it is that considerations of economics and defence and intelligence should override our horror at the awfulness of Trump. Well: it is. But the world is pretty dreadful sometimes, and to make it a little less dreadful it needs people who will get their hands just dirty enough to be able to do some good. It doesn't mean we approve of them or that we don't see how badly they're behaving. It means we know we have to work with what we have to get the best results we can. So I am not joining in the vitriol directed against Theresa May, and I won't be signing that petition. But I will be out on that demonstration tonight even if it rains. Follow Mark Woods on Twitter: @RevMarkWoods Saturday afternoon another Arp joined the ranks of Victory Lane specialists at Boyd's Speedway in Chattanooga/Ringgold. The annual "Cabin Fever" special event draws competitors for all over the region, but at the end of the day one local racer stood victorious in the four divisions of competition. Michael Arp, 44 of Ringgold, the distant cousin to legendary Super Late Model ace Skip Arp of Georgetown, Tn., raced to his career first win in the Sportsman division. Against 38-other competitors Arp piloted his # 75 "Arp's Lawn Service, Stateline Fasteners, Harrison Transmission, Todd Morrow Racing, T1MCo Graphics, Boyd's Speedway, A.M.P Energy, LLC" sponsored MastersBilt / 602 to National Title Pawn Victory Lane after setting second fast time to fellow local racer Booger Brooks. In the feature it was smooth sailing for the "Dirty Girl" with neighbor Josh Walker finishing second. Alabama's Andrew Bailey ran third wih Dalton racers Logan Walston and Reed Johnson rounding out the Top 5. In the Super Late Model main event action Morristown, Tn.'s Shannon Buckingham won the $3,500 prize, while Loudon's Corey Hedgecock took the Crate Late Model feature. A partnership affiliated with Wile Interests has started construction on a third retail component in the Katy Green mixed-use development. The 15,000-square-foot center, at the southwest corner of the Katy Freeway and Greenhouse Road, will give area office workers more dining options. The new retail will join Starbucks, Chick fil-A, Snap Kitchen, Corner Bakery, Potbelly Sandwiches, SmashBurger, Verts Kebap, Masala Wok and others in Katy Green. President Donald Trump's executive order Friday has thrown Americans into the streets, airports and online to protest the ban on immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries coming into the U.S., but some are targeting Trump's daughter Ivanka after she posted a photo on social media. Trump's eldest daughter and trusted confidant posted a caption-less photo of her in a shimmering ball gown with her husband Jared Kushner next to her in a classic tuxedo on both Instagram and Twitter. Social media quickly jumped on her case commenting on and replying to the posts with criticisms of insensitivity on Ivanka's part, considering the national climate over the weekend. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Vanity Fair Spain and Mexico Editorial Director Lourdes Garzon is under fire for a controversial message posted Thursday. "Our Mexican compatriots are such crybabies," the tweet, which has since been removed, read. It was seemingly in response to first lady Melania Trump's Vanity Fair Mexico cover, which went viral on the same day. The magazine featured Melania twirling diamond necklaces with a fork, as if they were pasta noodles. The image struck many as an insensitive and bold display of wealth from the wife of the U.S. president who's vowed to make Mexico pay for a border wall and has threatened to impose a 20-percent tax on goods imported from Mexico. RESPONSE: Former Mexican President responds to Trump's proposed tax on imports from Mexico A statement made on Vanity Fair's website reads that Garzon's Twitter account was hacked, and that she did not post that remark herself. (Story continues below.) However, the outlet has still seen backlash as a result of the tweet and the controversial cover. Some skeptics believe that the statement was intentionally made and cited the magazine's tasteless cover as evidence of publishers with a lack of good judgment. One chef with Houston ties, La Fisheria owner Aquiles Chavez, tweeted to the editor: "Without a doubt the rose-tinted world in which you live doesn't allow you to see beyond your own absurd and foolish banality." It was a snowy weekend at Big Bend National Park, and no one's complaining. "Brrr! Winter strikes again! A light dusting of snow settled on the Chisos Mountains last night and this morning the roads crew was busy!" the national park announced on their Facebook page Saturday. MASON, Ohio Neighbors came out Sunday in Mason to show their support for a Muslim woman targeted by an anonymous flyer claiming her family had ties to terrorism. A crowd lined the streets outside the Mason Community Center holding signs and shouting slogans in solidarity. Flyers were posted in Rawd Saleh's neighborhood last weekend with the words "neighborhood terrorist warning." This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate 3 1 of 3 File/WLWT-TV Show More Show Less 2 of 3 File/WLWT-TV Show More Show Less 3 of 3 The flyers included a copy of a 13-year-old newspaper article that claimed her father's arrest in a convenience store crime ring may have been connected to terrorism. No link was ever found. The rally came together after a few neighbors reached out to her to show their support. It quickly grew into Sunday's large gathering. Rawd Saleh called the gathering heartwarming but said it wasn't about her. "Today is about every hate crime that has happened across the nation," Saleh said. "We can't let one person's view destroy a whole neighborhood or a whole city." The crowd chanted slogans like "stay strong, we belong," and "this is what democracy looks like." Saleh, who wears a hijab, said she will not be bullied. "It's my right to cover my hair, it's my right to practice my religion and now people who may be targeted like I was will know they have the support," Saleh said. According to an incident report filed by Mason police, one man went to police after reading the flyer. He said he never considered his neighbor might be connected to terrorism, but described them as secretive. Mason police passed the information along to the FBI. It's not clear if they are investigating the source of the flyer. A police supervisor WLWT spoke to Sunday had no information on that. -- Story originally published on wlwt.com Redfin, the Seattle-based online real estate brokerage firm, has formed Redfin Mortgage in an effort to streamline the home buying process and keep fees down. Based in Dallas, the company will start making loans in the first half of 2017 to Redfin customers buying homes in the Houston, Austin, Dallas and San Antonio markets. It will not initially handle refinance loans. As a society, we seem fascinated with being good. We call infants that arent too fussy good babies. A well-behaved canine is known as a good dog. When people pass from this life, we like to describe them as a good man or good woman. We often refer to pro athletes that bounce from one team to another, as good players. So, being good is a good thing, right? It is unless we have the choice between being good and being great. In his classic book on business, Good to Great, Jim Collins discusses an extensive study comparing companies that were good, in terms of results produced over time, with companies that consistently achieved great performance for at least 15 years. ---- His opening statement sums up his conclusion: Good is the enemy of great.Without going into the factors that transformed companies from good to great, Collins asserts, Few people attain great lives, in large part because it is just too easy to settle for a good life. And therein lies the problem, the tendency to settle rather than strive for more than just good.Oswald Chambers, in his devotional book, My Utmost for His Highest, takes a similar view. He states, good is the enemy of the best. However, he offers this idea in another context. There are many good things we can get involved with in life, Chambers observes, things that can consume our time, energy and resources. However, these can compete with the best things we could do, activities and pursuits were uniquely qualified, gifted and even called to pursue.Whether were doing a job, running a company, parenting, or determining how to experience meaningful lives, the ability to distinguish good from great, or good from best, could make the difference in whether we experience life at its most fulfilling and rewarding.Why is this important for followers of Jesus Christ? Because in knowing weve been made in the image of God, part of our universal calling is to reflect His character, including the excellence with which He created and orders everything around us. At the end of the creation account, the Lord inspected everything He made, and it was very good (Genesis 1:31). He didnt say it was just okay, or not too bad, but very good.Similarly, in serving the Lord, were not to settle for less than the best we can do. As the apostle Paul exhorts in 1 Corinthians 10:31, So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. For emphasis, Paul restates this in another letter: And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him (Colossians 3:17).In His parable of the talents, Jesus described how different servants chose to put into use the talents their master had entrusted to them. He said of the servants who had used those resources wisely, their master commended them with, Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things (Matthew 25:23).Were unique, not only in our abilities but also in the gifts God has entrusted to us. The gifts I have and the calling God has given me probably doesnt match your gifts and calling. So how we use our abilities and exercise our gifts, striving for excellence and choosing the best, rather than the merely good, will look different from one person to the next.The key is found in found in Ecclesiastes 9:10, which tells us, Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might. If were spending considerable time, effort and resources in doing something we cant give our very best if good is the best we can do rather than great then maybe we need to re-evaluate our commitment to it. If were not convinced we can do something for the glory of God, maybe its time to redirect our efforts, concentrating on pursuits where we can see God clearly at work through us.Good is good, except when it keeps us from the best, or from being great at whatever we do. Robert J. Tamasy is a veteran journalist, former newspaper editor and magazine editor. Bob has written hundreds of magazine articles, and authored, co-authored and edited more than 15 books. These include the newly re-published, Business At Its Best, Tufting Legacies, The Heart of Mentoring, and Pursuing Life With a Shepherds Heart. He edits a weekly business meditation, Monday Manna, which is translated into more than 20 languages and distributed via email around the world by CBMC International. He also writes two blogs, www.bobtamasy.blogspot.com, and www.bobtamasy.wordpress.com. He can be emailed at btamasy@comcast.net. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate John Runions has been searching for his daughter, hoping for the best, but also expecting to find her body discarded in a remote area. Runions and his search crew did indeed find a body on Jan. 28, 2017 near Kansas City. That discovery came a week after they found another body during their search for Jessica Runions. But, neither set of remains belonged to his 21-year-old daughter, who has been missing since Sept. 8, 2016, when she left a party in Kansas City with friends. ISLAND MYSTERY: Woman vanishes from South Padre, leaves investigators puzzled "Two bodies two weeks in a row?" John Runions told the Kansas City Star. "It's unbelievable. ... We're not going to stop looking until we find her. And if we find other people along the way, that's good. Families deserve closure." The first remains found on Jan. 21 were identified as 21-year-old Brandon Herring, of Raytown, Mo. Herring had been reported missing in November. Police are investigating his case as a homicide. FOUND: Man missing for six weeks after hospital discharge located by family The second set of remains found in a wooded area hasn't been identified yet, although police are also considering it a suspicious death. Jessica Runions' great-aunt, Janice Runions, was glad the search party found the remains that they did, so at least two families can end their wondering. But, the Runions are hoping someone would find their missing child. >>>Click through the above gallery for photos of Jessica Runions, as well as a look at missing persons cases in Texas. Hundreds of chanting anti-Trump protesters swarmed the Houston airport Sunday, packing Terminal E to capacity until police barred entry to non-ticket holders. With less than a week left till the Super Bowl, a diverse swathe of Houstonians - including around 50 lawyers offering free legal help - voiced their opposition to President Donald Trump's recent executive action that banned citizens from seven majority-Muslim nations from entering the country and suspended the Syrian refugee resettlement program. "There's a lot of fear in the community," said Arsalan Safiuallah, an attorney with the Council on American-Islamic Relations who attended the George Bush Intercontinental Airport. "I'm upset because I don't think this is constitutional." The IAH protest kicked off at 5 p.m., and lawyers on scene quickly learned of an Iraqi man detained en route back to Houston from traveling abroad. "Is it a crime to travel to visit your family?" asked his worried friend, 28-year-old Mohammed Jalil. "Only because he is Muslim." SIDE EFFECTS: Trump's immigration ban could hit Texas Rangers pitcher The delayed traveler's plane landed just before 2 p.m., but 5:30 p.m. he still hadn't been released from customs. When 29-year-old former government employee Yehiya Aljuboory was finally released around 6 p.m., the enthusiastic protesters greeted him with raucous applause. But even after Aljuboory walked free, the demonstrations continued. In an apparent reference to a 2001 hip-hop song, protesters chanted, "Move Trump, get out the way, get out the way." Sunday's civil unrest came on the heels of a wave of demonstrations nationwide in opposition to President's action. The divisive order resonated deeply in Houston, where more than 20 percent of people were foreign-born in 2013, according to nonpartisan think tank the Migration Policy Institute. "I don't think I've ever seen the city as galvanized as this," said Houston resident Bev Caplan, 39, one of about 1,000 to turn out at an earlier Discovery Green protest that kicked off around 1 p.m. UNEXPECTED REACTION: Trump's immigration ban gives new life to 2011 tweet There, several women wore hijab and one man blew a Shofar, a musical horn played over Jewish holidays. A few demonstrators danced in blocked-off protest space near the George R. Brown Convention Center, where crowds chanted "Say it loud, say it clear; Hate is not accepted here; Refugees are welcome here." U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Houston, vowed Sunday to introduce legislation repealing Trump's executive order, to hold hearings on homeland security and the vetting process and to defund agencies implementing actions such as those mandated by Trump's order as the government reviews the system. Jackson Lee called the executive order "thoughtless" and "non-deliberative," and said it had caused confusion among local customs officials. "I'm unused to an idea of associating one faith with hate," Jackson Lee said. "Who knows who is next on the list?" Roughly 40 people had been detained under the order in San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York City, the congresswoman said. In the aftermath of the President's controversial action, the ACLU filed a highly publicized suit against the order - and a federal judge Saturday granted a stay to immigrants already here on a visa. One of the suit's plaintiffs - Haider Alshawi - finally made his way home to Houston on Sunday to reunite with his wife and their young son. But Jackson Lee worried the order would hurt the country's intelligence-gathering abilities by sowing distrust, she said, noting that the order directed the Department of Homeland Security to more broadly review who is let into the country. Although widespread protests in the city have at times taken law enforcement "by surprise," officials said they believed Houston is ready to host Super Bowl week festivities. "I am not in any way concerned about the ability of this community to handle this," she said. Executive assistant Chief of Police Matt Slinkard said "no large adjustment" of resources was needed to ensure safety of protesters or Super Bowl Live attendees Sunday. Still, demonstrators in Houston said they planned to participate in future protests this week. The Super Bowl, they said, puts Houston protests in the national eye and gives more weight to their actions. Afia Jalali, who has spent four decades in the U.S. after moving from Pakistan when she was 2 years old, said the Super Bowl was a "great platform" to show that "even in a place like Texas, Houston won't stand for this." Jalali, wearing a Texans jersey, a U.S. flag headscarf and Houston Rockets earrings, said her four children have asked questions like, "Where are we going to go?" The protest, she said, was "uplifting." "We're not in this alone," she said. King Charles I of England, Scotland and Ireland was beheaded by his own subjects on Jan. 30, 1649. This event during the English Civil War reverberates to our own time and in conflicts that have carried over into U.S. history. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Texas university presidents urged students to be cautious as they traveled after President Donald Trump signed executive actions on immigration. Federal officials closed the border to refugees and temporarily blocked citizens of seven majority-Muslim nations from entering the U.S. over the weekend. The White House said the executive action aims to strengthen the country's borders and sovereignty. Protests around the nation and in Houston called the action discriminatory and unjust, as families separated by the action worked to reunite. Universities around Texas enroll hundreds of students from the seven countries as undergraduates and doctoral students, and over the weekend, university leaders reached out to students over email and on social media. Rice University President David Leebron said Sunday he was "deeply concerned" about the order. PUBLIC SENTIMENT: Protests gather around Houston in response to Trump's ban "We have many wonderful students from these places," said Leebron in a message to Twitter posted Sunday. Rice enrolls 32 graduate students who are from Iran. University of Texas at Austin President Greg Fenves said Sunday that UT has 110 students and faculty members who are citizens of the seven countries. "The talents that brought them to UT are deeply valued, and their perspectives represent an essential part of the university," he said in a statement. Spokesman J.B. Bird told the Houston Chronicle that no students abroad on official travel are citizens of the seven countries currently banned. There are 280 University of Houston students enrolled this semester who are citizens of the seven countries, including 219 from Iran and 36 from Iraq, spokesman Mike Rosen said. One student, from Iran, is out of the country currently, he said. CELEBRITY SMACKDOWN: Kim Kardashian slaps down Trump's ban in a tweet Baylor College of Medicine's president said in a campuswide email on Sunday that college leaders are trying to understand the policy's implications. He urged anyone potentially affected by the order who is scheduled to leave the country on business to contact the college's general counsel. At Texas A&M University, where students are planning a protest of the ban on Monday evening, more than 200 students enrolled in fall 2016 are from the seven countries. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate The Conroe community soon will be able to get a glimpse of the World War II experience from the sky. The vintage heavy bomber, known as the B-17 Flying Fortress Texas Raiders, is moving permanently to a hangar at General Aviation Services on the north side of Conroe-North Houston Regional Airport in early February. A public ribbon-cutting ceremony with WWII veterans in attendance is scheduled for March with the Conroe/Lake Conroe Chamber of Commerce. The first public event is expected to be in April, which will give people a chance to tour the cockpit and soar in the first B-17 to be restored as a "flying museum." The Commemorative Air Force Gulf Coast Wing, which is a nonprofit organization that maintains and operates the Texas Raiders, asks for donations of $5 for children under the age of 12, $10 for adults and $20 up to a family of five to help support the aircraft as an educational tool to honor and remember those who served in WWII. CAF Spokesperson Nancy Kwiecien said Texas Raiders, which is celebrating 50 years of service to the CAF this year, has resided in the greater Houston area since the early 1970s at Ellington Field Joint Reserve base and David Wayne Hooks Airport in Spring. However, the CAF has been looking for a better facility for the plane, according to Kwiecien. She said a significant amount of space coincidentally became available at the Conroe airport, which provides better public access for people to see and experience the plane more easily. Additionally, she said the airport is easier to operate the big bomber. "The B-17 can't reside just anywhere," Kwiecien said. The United States deployed 12,731 of the bombers by the end of WWII as "the largest armada the world had ever seen," according to information from the CAF. However, Kwiecien said only nine of those aircraft can still fly. To put size into perspective, the popular Cessna-172 single engine airplane carries four people with a wingspan of 36 feet. The 20-foot-tall B-17 carried a crew of 10 and has a wingspan of 104 feet. But, it had its flaws and eventually the aircraft evolved into the larger B-29 and then B-52 model. Yet, it remains an important part of American history. "The B-17 wasn't even pressurized," she said. "The men who flew in them had to wear electric suits to keep warm and oxygen masks to breathe. WWII ended and technology moved past this particular model of bomber. The B-17 was very much the airplane of its time in WWII." In 2016, the Texas Raiders flew 230 hours as one of the last Boeing B-17's ever built. It was manufactured by Douglas Aircraft Corporation in Long Beach, Calf., at the end of July 1945. "She wasn't born here in Texas but she got here as quick as she could," Kwiecien said. While WWII combat ended before Texas Raiders flew overseas, Kwiecien said the warplane did serve during the Korean War. The aircraft's military career included scouting, search and rescue and weather reconnaissance. After the war, this B-17 went on to become a seismic survey aircraft and in 1967 was acquired by the CAF to be restored to her military configuration. The bomber has been in continuous operation since she was manufactured with time out for three different major restorations in the last 70 years. It is currently being painted in Longview. Harold Hutcheson, manager of the Conroe Visitor's Bureau is pleased to welcome Texas Raiders and the CAF to Conroe. "She will be a great addition to our community and we look forward to working with her crew," he said in a statement. The hangar at General Aviation Services will host a CAF twin-engine cargo plane from World War II, the Navy JRB-6. This year, both aircraft will appear at public events at Conroe airport, as well as other events across the country. For more information, visit www.B17TexasRaiders.org. The CAF has more than 11,000 members and a fleet of 166 airplanes distributed throughout the country to 76 CAF units for their care and operation. For more information, visitwww.commemorativeairforce.org. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Fresh high-school graduates may go to college with the dream of expanding their horizons, pushing their comfort zone, and delving into the world of higher education. But with the price of tuition, they also view graduating college as a return on their investment. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, college tuition and fees have increased 63 percent since 2006, so it's no surprise that students may want every penny they paid working towards their future. THE ONE PERCENT: Where rich kids go to college in Texas A recent study covered by The New York Times revealed a number of interesting data points about the finances of students going to and graduating from America's colleges. Based off millions of anonymous tax records, the groundbreaking study notably shows the income mobility of students after they received their diploma. Interestingly enough, big name universities like SMU or Rice rank lower for moving students out of poverty. These schools also they have a higher proportion of rich, well-off students on their campus, as previously reported on Chron.com. Smaller, less well known Texas colleges rate substantially higher in this metric, with Texas A&M International coming in at No. 3 nationally for moving students from the bottom 40 percent, to the top 40 percent economically. SMU, the Texas university with the most students from the 1 percent came in at 1,570. At SMU, 23 percent of students come from the top 1 percent, while only 3.3 percent come from the bottom 20 percent. In contrast at Texas A&M International in Laredo less than 1 percent of students come from the the income category, while 26 percent come from the bottom 20 percent. Click through the gallery above to see which Texas colleges pull students out of poverty the most. The schools are ranked by their mobility rate, with their position nationally shown. Check out the video above to see why older Americans over 60 are drowning in student debt. Average retail gasoline prices in Chattanooga have fallen 3.9 cents per gallon in the past week, averaging $2.00 per gallon on Sunday, according to GasBuddy's daily survey of 170 gas outlets in Chattanooga. This compares with the national average that has fallen 3.3 cents per gallon in the last week to $2.26 per gallon, according to gasoline price website GasBuddy.com. Including the change in gas prices in Chattanooga during the past week, prices Sunday were 47.5 cents per gallon higher than the same day one year ago and are 5.3 cents per gallon lower than a month ago. According to GasBuddy historical data, gasoline prices on January 30 in Chattanooga have ranged widely over the last five years: $1.53 in 2016, $1.92 in 2015, $3.03 in 2014, $3.18 in 2013 and $3.31 in 2012. Areas near Chattanooga and their current gas price climate: Knoxville- $2.01, down 3.3 cents per gallon from last week's $2.04. State of Tennessee- $2.07, down 3.0 cents per gallon from last week's $2.10. Huntsville- $2.07, down 3.5 cents per gallon from last week's $2.11. "For the 22nd straight day, the national average for a gallon of gasoline has dropped, the longest such streak since last summer, said Patrick DeHaan, senior petroleum analyst for GasBuddy. "Average prices now stand at their lowest thus far in 2017 and the lowest since before Christmas, thanks primarily to weak demand for gasoline and also bulging inventories of gasoline. "Soaking weather on the West Coast has certainly dampened motorists appetite for gasoline, while in the Midwest, weak demand has led to a surplus of winter gasoline, leading some stations in the region to offer the nation's lowest price: $1.52 can be found at a gas station in Oxford, Ohio. But before motorists celebrate such cheap gas, the sweet deal likely won't stick much longer as we've been waiting since last week to see such loss-leaders to disappear. However, we may continue to see the national average moderate during the next week, with the exception in the Great Lakes- where a price adjustment of sorts is still expected." With his mother and father in the courtroom for support, a Spring man told a federal judge Monday that he deeply regretted downloading sexually explicit child pornography and that he'd been working to address what he considered "a glitch" in his psyche. U.S. District Judge Kenneth M. Hoyt sentenced Jacob Riley Garner, 23, to the mandatory minimum of five years in prison, followed by 10 years of supervised release. He must register as sex offender and he is prohibited from using electronic media and contacting the minor victims in his case. Garner signed a plea agreement Sept. 12, admitting he received and possessed child pornography. Once he followed up on that plea Monday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Kimberly Leo withdrew an additional charge of accessing child pornography. Garner, who last worked as the assistant manager at a comics and gaming store in The Woodlands, was indicted in March. His attorney, Joshua B. Lake, said his family members were shocked to learn he had been collecting child pornography. According to his plea, agents executing a search warrant at Garner's home found more than 2,500 images and 14 videos of violence, bondage and bestiality involving prepubescent children. Garner stood before the judge Monday, speaking in a soft voice. "I'm so sorry for what I've done," he told the judge. "I'm disgusted and ashamed by my actions. There's a glitch in my system." Lake told the judge his client was not disputing the facts the prosecutor presented, including the fact that Garner committed illegal conduct with minor relatives. "They are what they are. They're horrendous," he said. But he said a doctor who evaluated Garner found him to be an excellent subject for treatment. The judge said Garner's young age was one factor in granting him a shorter sentence, but he cautioned the defendant to remember his own past behavior when he is a free man. "It's a mind game," Hoyt said. "The conclusion I have with your situation is that all the prison time and all the therapy you will receive will not prevent you from having that urge." Garner was one of more than 135 people charged as a result of Operation Pacifier, a national sting by FBI agents on a child pornography site called Playpen that operated on the dark web, a portion of the Internet that can't be accessed through search engines. The FBI got permission from a federal magistrate judge in Virginia to keep Playpen site running and set up a "watering hole" sting for visitors who logged onto the site. FBI personnel used hacking software to detect the IP addresses and then tracked them down to physical addresses all over the country. On Friday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order barring Syrian refugees and citizens of seven Muslim-majority nations from entering the United States. After a whirlwind of spontaneous protests around the country, Trump defended the executive order by claiming "this is not about religion," -- a stark difference in tone from a campaign promise he delivered in December of 2015 which called for a "total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States" until lawmakers "can figure out what the hell is going on." AUSTIN -- A band of lawmakers focused on improving the state's crippled Child Protective Services system unveiled its legislative priorities Monday, though none of its solutions include adding more caseworkers. Instead, the working group of Texas House members wants to decentralize where decisions are made by reorganizing the Department of Family and Protective Services into own agency and by creating a stronger community network to help find the right homes for children. Lawmakers said they also want to help families fostering their own kin receive monthly state or federal stipends. "While money matters, and it does matter, money is not the silver bullet. If money alone were the fix, then the child welfare system would already have been fixed long ago," said Rep. James Frank, R-Wichita Falls. As House lawmakers unveiled their plans to improve a system that has dominated headlines since a federal judge declared the foster care system left kids worse off than when they entered, Senate lawmakers grilled DFPS Commissioner Hank Whitman over the slow progress reforming the system. Lawmakers last fall OK'd well over $100 million in emergency funding to hire more than 800 workers and give significant raises to some 7,000 CPS employees in hopes of stemming the tide of caseworkers fleeing their jobs due to low pay and massive caseloads. "We gave you the money you asked for," Senate Finance Committee Chairwoman Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, told Whitman in a budget hearing Monday. "We gave you the 12,000 caseworkers you asked for. We want to see results. We've got to see results." The lawmakers hope their actions will help turn around the state's beleaguered Child Protective Services system which has let hundreds of abused and neglected children go unseen for weeks by case workers juggling overwhelming caseloads. One children's advocate was split on the recommendations from House lawmakers. Kate Murphy, a senior policy advocate at Texans Care for Children, cheered moves to help families better afford fostering family members and for the state agency to build strong community partnerships. She was hesitant to support separating DFPS, which manages CPS, from the Health and Human Services Commission. "The proposal to turn DFPS into a stand-alone agency raises some serious questions. We want to make sure CPS is dedicating its time and funding to taking care of kids instead of managing the logistics of creating an independent agency," she said. The three main pieces of legislation from the legislative working group comes more than a year after a federal court judge declared portions of the state's foster-care system unconstitutional, shining a spotlight on how the state handles children before, during and after they enter state care. The summers final Live on the Waterfront concert was held Wednesday evening at Prince Arthurs Landing. The popular series in Thunder Bay has completed nine weekly shows that began on July 13. Wednesdays concert was unique as it was held one hour later in the evening to mesh with the 10 p. The Cress Gallery of Art at UTC will present Conrad Bakker, the Spring 2017 UTC Diane Marek Series visiting artist, Feb. 6-9. There will be an artist's lecture on Tuesday, Feb. 7, 5:30 p.m. at 201 Derthick Hall, 624 Vine St., followed by an opening reception in the lobby of the Fine Arts Center, 752 Vine St. Mr. Bakker appears in association with his exhibition featuring two ongoing bodies of work: Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library and Book Club and Untitled Project: The Crystal Land. The exhibition dates are Feb. 7-March 22. In Gallery II are UTC Department of Art 2016-2017 Lillian B. Feinstein Scholarship Recipients: Mirel Crumb and Emaleigh Grantz. The Gallery and all events are open to the public; admission is free. Gallery hours are 9:30 a.m.7:30 p.m., Monday-Friday and 1-4 p.m. on the weekends. Mr. Bakker makes carved and painted sculptures of everyday objects and positions them in a wide variety of contexts to reveal and critically comment upon the political economies and relational networks between persons and things. This exhibition features two ongoing bodies of work, Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club and Untitled Project: The Crystal Land both based on the personal library and geologic interests of the late, conceptual artist and land art pioneer, Robert Smithson. Currently a professor of Art at the University of Illinois, Urbana Champagne, Mr. Bakker received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Calvin College, Grand Rapids, Mi., and a Master of Fine Arts from Washington University, St. Louis, Mo. Among his awards are grants from the Creative Capital Foundation, The Illinois Arts Council, and the Joan Mitchell Foundation. His work has been the subject of articles and reviews in publications such as Frieze, Contemporary, Flash Art, Art Forum, ArtUS, Art Papers, Sculpture, UOVO, the Chicago Tribune, the New York Times, and the New Yorker magazine. Over the past two decades Mr. Bakkers work has been shown in numerable exhibitions including those at the Tate Modern (London), Galerie Analix Forever (Geneva), Farbfabriken Center for Contemporary Art and Architecture (Stockholm), the New Museum of Contemporary Art (New York City), the Renaissance Society of the University of Chicago; Art in General, Artists Space, and Apex Art (all New York City), Lora Reynolds Gallery (Austin, Tx.), the Contemporary Art Museum Houston, the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, in mailboxes everywhere, and on his own front lawn. For more information about the Cress and Diane Marek Series: visit www.cressgallery.org or contact the director/curator by email at ruth-grover@utc.edu or call 304-9789. If requiring accommodations for this event, contact the UTC Department of Art at 425-4178 or email Patricia-Kelley@utc.edu or contact the UTC Disability Resource Center at 425-4006, email Michelle-Rigler@utc.edu. The Cress is n the lobby of the UTC Fine Arts Center, 752 Vine St., corner of Vine and Palmetto Streets. Parking: after 5 p.m. on weekdays and all day on weekends, visitors to the Cress may park free in any nearby lot not marked 24 hour reserved. Before 5 p.m. on weekdays, visitors may find limited nearby street parking or park in the 5th Street Garage near MacKenzie Arena for a $4 fee and stroll across campus to Vine St. or ride the circulating campus CARTA shuttle from the 5th St. stop to the Vine and Palmetto stop. For more information about parking visit www.cressgallery.org. We attempted to send a notification to your email address but we were unable to verify that you provided a valid email address. Please click here to update your email address if you wish to receive notifications. Otherwise, you may click here to disable notifications and hide this message. Ridge View to keep on sharing The Galva-Holstein and Schaller-Crestland School Districts have reached a tentative agreement that will likely reflect Schaller-Crestlands consolidation to a single... Pipeline company sought to limit required safeguards for soil Navigator CO2 Ventures wanted to reduce its obligations to sample and restore topsoil for the construction of its proposed carbon... U.S. Will Not Ban Canadian Dual Citizens and Permanent Residents: Immigration Minister CIC News Aa Accessibility Font Style Serif Sans Font Size A A Minister Hussen adds that Canada will offer temporary residency to people stranded by ban After a weekend of confusion following U.S. President Donald Trumps executive order to temporarily suspend immigration from seven specific countries, it now appears that dual citizens of those countries and Canada will be able to travel to the U.S. The countries in question are Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan, and Libya. The ban is due to run for 90 days, though in the case of Syrian refugees the ban is indefinite. Permanent residents of Canada who are citizens of one of those countries are also expected to be exempt from the executive order, which was signed on January 27. According to the latest information from both sides of the border, these individuals may enter the U.S. provided they have a valid Canadian Permanent Resident Card and a passport from one of the seven affected countries, and be otherwise admissible to the country. (Update: since this article was first published, it has been reported that some Canadian dual citizens and permanent residents have been denied entry to the U.S., despite the Ministers remarks.) On Saturday, January 28, a number of reputable media outlets in Canada reported that the opposite would be true. The Canadian Press, whose content is syndicated across media including the National Post and Global News, among others, reported that Canadian dual citizens and permanent residents would not be able to enter the U.S. while the ban is in effect. However, the situation was clarified the next day by Canadas recently-appointed Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, Ahmed Hussen, who held a news conference in Ottawa to try to clear up some of the confusion created by the American ban. The American administration has confirmed that Canadian dual nationals are not affected by this executive order. Moreover, we have been assured by the White House that Canadian permanent residents with a valid Canadian Permanent Resident Card and a passport from [one of] those seven countries can still enter as before, stated Hussen, who happens to be a Somali refugee who gained Canadian citizenship 15 years ago. We are aware that the executive order does apply to those from the seven countries transiting through Canada. Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if they need it, as we have done so in the past. Minister Hussen went on to reveal that there are around 35,000 dual citizens of Canada and the countries specified by the Trump administration. The American immigration ban goes further with regard to refugees from Syria. Trumps order directs the U.S. State Department to stop issuing visas to Syrian nationals and halts the processing of Syrian refugees indefinitely. This is in stark contrast to the Canadian position, which actively promotes and expedites the resettlement of Syrian refugees. Around 40,000 Syrian refugees have been settled in Canada since the Trudeau government took office in November, 2015. Canada remains open There is a certain poignancy in the fact that Minister Hussen is the new face of Canadas immigration project. Imagine if those initial reports had been true, and Canadian dual citizens of those affected countries were banned under this under. If there was no diplomatic exception for high-level government officials, then Canadas Minister of Immigration would himself have been banned from traveling to Canadas largest trading partner, says Attorney David Cohen. The whole thing is a carry over from the disturbing campaign promise to ban Muslims from entering the United States. The order has been delivered by a week-old administration that has quickly become drunk on power. The silver lining is that Canada has a government that espouses compassion and fairness, both in its words and its actions. Long may that continue. A final note It should be noted that the American immigration executive order does not change Canadas immigration policy. Minister Hussen stated that Canada will continue a long-standing tradition of being open to those that seek entry . . . And also view immigration as a great, great way to boost our economic growth and the prosperity of all Canadians. Canadian dual citizens and permanent residents from the affected countries wishing to travel to the U.S. are encouraged to ensure that they have the correct documentation required. If you need legal advice or services, please use this contact page to consult with a legal expert. Persons in the U.S. affected by this order may explore Immi, a free online program that seeks to educate immigrants, people on visas, and green card holders on their legal status, as well as explain options for staying in or leaving the U.S. Click here to learn more. (Update: Since this article was first published, the government of Canada has temporary public policy for foreign nationals affected by the U.S. Executive Order. To learn more, read this news article.) If you wish to know more about your Canadian immigration options, please fill out a free online assessment form. 2017 CICNews All Rights Reserved The Tennessee Congress of Parents and Teachers, Inc. released the following statement on the nomination of Betsy DeVos as Secretary of Education: Tennessee PTA is the oldest all-volunteer child advocacy association in Tennessee. As an association, Tennessee PTA annually presents legislative priorities, position statements, and resolutions identifying advocacy positions. Here are a few of our positions that are threatened by the nomination of Betsy DeVos as U.S. Secretary of Education: Tennessee PTA supports public education The foundation of our American society is to provide free public education so that every child may achieve their dreams. We need a strong leader in the U.S. Department of Education that has experience in the public school system and is aware of the concerns of parents, teachers, and students within the system. Tennessee PTA Board of Managers does not feel Ms. DeVos has the needed awareness for public education. We support the availability of education for all children. Tennessee PTA supports higher education as priority in the State - The 'Drive for 55' highlights the gap between high school and post-secondary education within the state. It was the use of federal funding that started the reforming of public education in Tennessee and the improvements in student access to information. Obtaining a higher education often requires an awareness of grants, scholarships, loans. Tennessee PTA Board of Managers stresses the importance of post-secondary education to our students. We do not feel Ms. DeVos has the needed preparation to take over higher education opportunities. Tennessee PTA has long supported our exceptional children - The Individual with Disabilities Act and 504 plans are well established federal laws that have assisted parents and schools to partner on educating exceptional children. Ms. DeVos's response about IDEA and the lack of understanding of a federal law within disability education runs counter to Tennessee PTA's long standing commitment in this area. Tennessee PTA each year stands against vouchers - Parents should be empowered with real choices, if the integrity of public schools remains intact. We acknowledge charter schools as one avenue to school reform and support them when designed in accordance with the National PTAs resolutions and position statements. We oppose diverting public funds to private and parochial schools through vouchers or similar efforts such as school choice. Tennessee PTA Board of Managers believes that all schools receiving public funds should be held accountable to the same standards and requirements. We do not feel that Ms. DeVos shares these same beliefs. Tennessee PTA Board of Managers opposes the confirmation of Betsy DeVos as Secretary of Education. Please take our concerns into consideration and make the best choice for the children of the United States and for their education. Respectfully, Larry Davis Tennessee PTA Vice President of Child and Youth Advocacy Recipient: U.S. Senate View the PDF of this letter here. Dear Senator, On behalf of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and the 251 organizations listed below, we urge you to oppose the confirmation of Betsy DeVos to be the next U.S. Secretary of Education. All parents and students in this country a majority of whom are of color or are low-income[i] want the best education, support and dignity for their own children. We stand with them and cannot support a nominee who has demonstrated that she seeks to undermine bedrock American principles of equal opportunity, nondiscrimination and public education itself. The Secretary of Educations role as an enforcer of education and civil rights laws[ii] is central to advancing our shared vision of an inclusive and diverse system of high-quality public education that enables every student to live up to their potential. DeVos has demonstrated no previous commitment to ensuring equal educational opportunity in schools. Moreover, in her hearing before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee on January 17, 2017, she failed to demonstrate that she is capable of and committed to enforcing the law as is required of the agencys chief executive. Betsy DeVos deference to state flexibility, even with regard to compliance with federal civil rights laws such as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA); her claim that demonstrating support for Title IX enforcement guidance would be premature; and her lack of support for accountability for all schools receiving federal funds only serve to reinforce our conclusion that her inadequate previous experience and missing record of support for students civil rights make her unfit to serve as Secretary of Education. When compared with Secretaries of Education throughout the history of the department, DeVos lack of experience stands out. She has never been an educator or worked directly with children and families in public schools. She has never led a school, district or state agency tasked with educating students. She has never been a public school parent or a public school student. This lack of experience makes her uniquely unfamiliar with the challenges and opportunities facing the nations students, families, educators and schools. The U.S. Department of Education is responsible for implementing and enforcing laws protecting students from discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex and disability and those laws that provide for educational opportunity from early childhood through graduate school. The person responsible for leading that department must absolutely be committed to enforcing federal laws on behalf of every single student in this country without regard to LGBTQI status, family income, race, ethnicity, home language, gender, religion, disability or immigration status. Our nations Constitution, economy, future and children deserve no less. Sincerely, National (103) The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights The Advocacy Institute African American Ministers In Action (AAMIA) All Our Children National Network American Association of People with Disabilities American Association of University Women (AAUW) American Atheists American Dance Therapy Association The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) American Federation of Teachers American Friends Service Committee Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) Americans for Religious Liberty Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, AFL-CIO (APALA) Black Womens Blueprint Center for American Progress The Center for Civil Rights Remedies at UCLAs Civil Rights Project Center for Law and Education Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) CenterLink: The Community of LGBT Centers Champion Women Childrens Defense Fund Clearinghouse on Womens Issues Communications Workers of America Council of Administrators of Special Education CREDO Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund Disability Rights, Education, Activism, and Mentoring (DREAM) Equal Justice Society Equal Rights Advocates Equality Federation Family Equality Council Feminist Majority Foundation Four Freedoms Forum Franciscan Action Network GLSEN Harriet Tubman Collective Healthy Teen Network Helping Educate to Advance the Rights of the Deaf (HEARD) Hispanic Federation Immigration Equality Action Fund In Our Own Voices, Inc. Jewish Women International (JWI) Judge David L. Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law Know Your IX Labor Council for Latin American Advancement Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law League of United Latin American Citizens Learning Disabilities Association of America Legal Aid at Work (formerly Legal Aid Society-Employment Law Center) MANA, A National Latina Organization NAACP NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. National Action Network National Alliace of Black School Educators National Alliance for Partnerships in Equity (NAPE) National Alliance to End Sexual Violence National Association of Secondary School Principals National Association of Social Workers National Black Justice Coalition National Center for Transgender Equality National Coalition Against Domestic Violence National Council of Asian Pacific Americans (NCAPA) National Council of Gray Panthers Networks National Council of Jewish Women National Council of La Raza National Council on Educating Black Children National Council on Independent Living National Education Association National Employment Law Project National Immigration Law Center National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty National Partnership for Women & Families National Urban League National Womens Law Center OCA Asian Pacific American Advocates The Opportunity Institute Parent Advocacy Consortium Partners for Each and Every Child People Demanding Action People For the American Way PolicyLink Poverty & Race Research Action Council Progressive Congress Action Fund Project KnuckleHead Roosevelt Institute Saving Our Sons & Sisters International School Social Work Association of America Secular Coalition for America Service Employees International Union Southeast Asia Resource Action Center (SEARAC) Southern Poverty Law Center Stop Sexual Assault in Schools Students Resisting Trump, a project of Students for Education Reform Action Network TASH Teaching for Change The Trevor Project United Spinal Association Women Enabled International Womens Intercultural Network (WIN) World Without Genocide at Mitchell Hamline School of Law YWCA USA State and Local Groups (149) ADAPT Montana Advocates for Children of New York ALSO Youth, Inc American Federation of Teachers/North Carolina American Samoa Alliance against Domestic and Sexual Violence Arizona Coalition to End Sexual and Domestic Violence Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families Arkansas Coalition Against Sexual Assault Bradbury-Sullivan LGBT Community Center Brain-Body Health Technology Institute, LLC Bright Futures LLC CO California Down Syndrome Advocacy Coalition California Foundation for Independent Living Centers CDCRC Inc. Center for Pan Asian Community Services, Inc. (CPACS) Chapel Hill-Carrboro Federation of Teachers Chesapeake Down Syndrome Association Chicago Coalition for the Homeless Citizens Against Government Overreach Citizens for Educational Awareness Citizens for Public Schools Coalition for Equal Access for Girls Collaborative Parent Leadership Action Network Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault Community 4:12 Community Resources for Independent Living Connecticut Alliance of School Social Workers Creative Learning Enterprises, Inc. Dayle McIntosh Center Deb Davis Advocacy Decoding DyslexiaMD Directions for Youth & Families Disability Action Center Disability Policy Consortium of Massachusetts Education Law Center-PA Education Opportunity Network Education Rights Network Elmhurst Action for a Better Tomorrow Faculty Senate, Wheelock College Fannie Lou Hamer Center For Change Florida Association of School Social Workers Florida Council Against Sexual Violence Fort Wayne Urban League Girls Inc. of Long Island Grow Your Own Teachers Illinois Gwinnett Parent Coalition to Dismantle the School to Prison Pipeline (Gwinnett SToPP) Illinois Association of School Social Workers Independent Living Resource Center San Francisco Indiana Coalition to End Sexual Assault Institute for Womens Studies and Services, MSU Denver Iowa Coalition Against Sexual Assault Iowa School Social Workers Association (ISSWA) Jane Doe Inc., the Massachusetts Coalition Against Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence JF STEM Institute Kalamazoo Gay Lesbian Resource Center Knoxville Area Urban League Latino Engagement and Action Council Lesbian Health Initiative (LHI) LGBT Center of Raleigh Los Angeles LGBT Center Los Angeles Urban League Loud Voices Together Educational Advocacy Group Louisiana Association of Special Education Administrators Louisville Urban League Made in Durham Manhattan, Community Board 2 Maryland Multicultural Coalition/State Chapter of NAME Michigan Alliance for Special Education Michigan Coalition to End Domestic & Sexual Violence Michigan NOW Michigan Unitarian Universalist Social Justice Network Minneapolis Urban League Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault Minnesota School Social Workers Association Montana Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence Mountain State Centers for Independent Living National Association of Social Workers, CT Chapter NC Coalition Against Sexual Assault NCJW Peninsula Section Nebraska Coalition to End Sexual and Domestic Violence New Jersey Institute for Social Justice New York State Coalition Against Sexual Assault New York State School Social Work Association Nollie Jenkins Family Center, Inc. North Carolina Justice Center Ohio School Social Work Association Open Arms Rape Crisis Center & LGBT+ Services OUT in the High Country OutReach LGBT Community Center Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape Placer Independent Resource Services Planned Parenthood Keystone Public Advocates Inc. Quality Education for Every Student R.E.A.C.H. (Resources for Educational Advocacy and Classroom Help) Resource Center Restorative Schools Vision Project (RSVP) Rich Educational Consulting, LLC Rockland County Pride Center Rocky Mountain Victim Law Center Ruth Ellis Center Sacramento LGBT Community Center Sandy Mislow LLC SC Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault SHK Global Health SKIL Resource Center Southwest Pennsylvania National Organization for Women Student Advocacy Inc. Teachers Unite The Chicago Urban League The DC Center for the LGBT Community The LGBTQ Center of Long Beach The LOFT LGBT Community Services Center The Pride Center at Equality Park The Urban League of Greater Atlanta Tri-County Independent Living Urban League of Greater Madison Urban League of Hampton Roads, Inc. Vermont Network Against Domestic and Sexual Violence Voices for Schools Wisconsin Coalition Against Sexual Assault Womens City Club of New York Womens Law Project Wominsport Youth Justice Coalition YWCA Allentown YWCA Aurora YWCA Binghamton and Broome County, Inc. YWCA Bradford YWCA Greater Austin YWCA Greater Lafayette YWCA Greater Portland YWCA Kankakee YWCA La Crosse YWCA Mount Desert Island YWCA National Capital Area YWCA Northcentral PA YWCA of Asheville and WNC YWCA of Kaua`i YWCA of Rochester and Monroe County YWCA of the Greater Capital Region YWCA Pierce County YWCA Princeton YWCA San Antonio YWCA South Hampton Roads YWCA Spokane YWCA Union County YWCA Warren YWCA Yakima Hoax, conspiracy, propaganda, or just a moneymaker for Macedonian teenagers? The definition of fake news has been debated to death since the election. But that debate has mostly referred to one thing: the spread of inaccurate, misleading, or otherwise invented articles passed as real news. The fake news conversation has taken place in the realm of words, but thats missing a big part of the story. Much of the content that circulates on Facebook are images, often memes. Whats in a meme? Memes are built for social media, and for viral sharing. They typically combine an image with big, block letters. Theyre not attached to an article, and theres often no way to trace their source. And while Facebooks algorithm is notoriously elusive, it seems to favor images and video over text; images have the potential to reach more readers than articleswhether fake, real, un-partisan or hyper-partisan. Take, for example, the most-shared post on Breitbarts Facebook page in 2016: Sign up for CJR 's daily email The posts implication is that while Democrats vilify Republicans, Democrats are the ones who riot, beat innocent voters, destroy property, and torch American flags. But it doesnt say so outright. This post was shared more than half a million times. By comparison, the most-shared article link on Breitbarts Facebook page had 97,000 shares. In fact, on Breitbarts Facebook page, images and videos are overwhelmingly more popular than links. Images made up just 5 percent of Breitbarts total posts in 2016, but they accounted for half of the pages most-shared posts. Breitbarts total Facebook posts for 2016 Breitbarts 100 most-shared Facebook posts in 2016 Total shares from Breitbarts Facebook posts in 2016 In other words, although Breitbart posted 12 times more links out of Facebook than images and videos combined, images and videos account for 79 percent of the total shares out of these top 100 posts. This disparity is even greater when you sum up the total shares of those 100 posts. While Breitbart is a partisan news site and not explicitly a generator of fake news, this type of content sometimes hardly resembles news. Take the second-most-shared Breitbart post of 2016, from July, shared 218,000 times by December 31: Hillary Clinton was cleared by the FBI. Bill Clinton and Loretta Lynch met on a plane. But Breitbart implies causality by putting those two facts next to each other, overlaid on a triumphant photo of Hillary Clinton that has nothing to do with the events referenced. Breitbarts caption to this photo is ***UNPRECEDENTED CORRUPTION***. There is no date on the photo itself, no attribution to Breitbart, and no context. A reverse-image Google search comes up with hundreds of similar memes that overlay white text on this same image. Whats more, Breitbart explicitly aims to be shared as widely as possible. In August, Breitbart launched a We are Breitbart Instagram page, which Breitbart News Editor-in-Chief Alexander Marlow described as digital ammunition to blast across social media. From Breitbarts own article: Conservatives often ask, How can I help break Establishment Medias stranglehold and get the truth to Americans who need it? says Marlow. The answer is simple and powerful: follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and now Instagram and share and blast the digital bullets we provide for you far and wide. It worksand Establishment media are taking notice. In effect, Breitbart fans are encouraged to share pieces of information without context in order to break the existing media structures. And Facebook is helping them do it. Related: 7 photos that captured the absurdity of the election Out of the top 10 shared posts on Breitbarts Facebook page, nine are images and one is a video. Only one features a image of Trump. One calls vice-presidential candidate Tim Kaine creepy. Three focus on the FBI investigation of Clinton, and two speak out against Obamas apology to Japan for dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki: There are a few misleading claims this image makes. First, the idea that a million lives were saved by dropping the bombs is speculative (a video on Breitbarts Facebook page specifies American liveseven more questionable). Second, this image does not appear to be of Hiroshima or Nagasaki. But perhaps that is irrelevant to the purpose of the image, which is to put words in the mouths of Breitbarts viewership. In December, Facebook announced partnerships with FactCheck.org, Snopes, and other organizations to fact-check and flag articles. But according to PhillyVoice, FactCheck.org says it found just four false stories in over a month of looking at flagged posts, and that If he had a larger staff, [Director Eugene] Kiely said expanding to images and memes would be a logical move. Indeed. These readymade, easily alterable images are the perfect vessel for the spread of false information. Breitbarts 10 most-shared posts of 2016 #1 #2 #3 #4 #5 ***DEAR HIROSHIMA: OBAMA MAY BE SORRY, BUT AMERICA IS NOT*** Breitbart 2016511 #6 #7 #8 #9 Breitbart 2016118 #10 Breitbart 2016104 Breitbarts 5 most-shared links of 2016 #1 (13th most-shared post overall) Fact-Check: FALSEIndeed, Clintons ninety percent claim is false according to her troubled charitys own tax filings. Posted by Breitbart on Wednesday, October 19, 2016 #2 (15th most-shared post overall) The Doctor is In! Posted by Breitbart on Wednesday, November 9, 2016 #3 (20th most-shared post overall) Secret Service officers told at least one source that she began yelling, screaming obscenities, and pounding furniture. Posted by Breitbart on Tuesday, November 15, 2016 #4 (21st most-shared post overall) "every time you spend $8 on 1 of their flavors you're lining the pockets of cop hating communists." Posted by Breitbart on Friday, October 7, 2016 #5 (30th most-shared post overall) "After witnessing 50 years of failure from the Democratic Party, compounded by a growing hostility to religion in their Posted by Breitbart on Friday, November 4, 2016 Pete Brown, senior research fellow at the Tow Center for Digital Journalism, contributed content analysis to this article as part of the Platforms and Publishers project, which receives funding from the MacArthur Foundation, the Open Society Foundations, the Knight Foundation, and Amy Abrams. Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today Nausicaa Renner is digital editor of CJR. AKRON, Ohio - Investigators are searching for an Akron man charged in a shooting that wounded his cousin. An arrest warrant charges Gary Franklin II, 24, with felonious assault in a Friday shooting on Oakdale Avenue, police said. Franklin is accused of firing several shots at his 37-year-old cousin during a fight over a woman. The shots hit the cousin in the legs, police said. The cousin ran from the house and flagged down a police officer on West Market Street near Oakdale Avenue. The cousin received treatment for non-life-threatening injuries at Summa Akron City Hospital. Franklin should be considered armed and dangerous, police said. Anyone with information on his whereabouts is being asked to contact the Akron Police Department's detective bureau at 330-375-2490. If you'd like to comment on this story, visit Monday's crime and courts comments section. Dorothy Lichtenstein Dorothy Lichtenstein, widow of artist Roy Lichtenstein, posed in 2012 at the National Gallery of Art beside "Whaam!" a 1963 oil and magna on canvas by her late husband. Dorothy Lichtenstein, the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation and The Ohio State University announced on Monday that the foundation had donated $6 million for two endowed chairs to OSU. (Manuel Balce Ceneta) CLEVELAND, Ohio - The Roy Lichtenstein Foundation of New York, named for the world-famous Pop Artist and Ohio State University alumnus, announced it has established two $3 million endowments at OSU to support endowed chairs in art history and studio art. Dorothy Lichtenstein, the artist's widow, said in a statement released by OSU that, "for a number of years, Roy's family and the foundation have been looking for the most promising way to enhance the Ohio State program. "Happily, as the Ohio State Arts District begins to take shape and the Columbus art and museum scene expands, we think these professorships can build on this momentum. For us, it is 'Right Time - Right Place.' " Roy Lichtenstein with "Double Glass" in 1985. The $6 million endowment gifts will support the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation Endowed Chair of Art History and the Roy Lichtenstein Endowed Chair of Studio Art. "We are delighted and honored to carry forward the creative spirit and intellectual inquiry of alumnus and world-renowned artist Roy Lichtenstein," said Ohio State President Michael V. Drake, according to the OSU press release. "These complementary chairs will elevate the arts and humanities across the university, broadening horizons for students and faculty for years to come," he said. The statement said the university is planning a national search for candidates. The endowments recognize the "formative influence" OSU played in the career of Roy Lichtenstein (1923-97), one of America's most celebrated 20th-century artists. Lichtenstein is known for his dramatic, comic strip-style imagery. The artist received a bachelor of fine arts at OSU in 1946 and his master of fine arts in 1949. He taught studio courses in the School of Fine and Applied Arts between 1946 and 1951. From 1951 to 1957, Lichtenstein and his first wife, the former Isabel Wilson, lived in Cleveland, where they befriended the late Joseph and Algesa O'Sickey, both artists and designers. In 2015, Joseph O'Sickey's estate auctioned early works by Lichtenstein that O'Sickey had collected in the 1950s, before Lichtenstein created his signature Pop style. During the Cleveland years, Lichtenstein taught at the now-defunct Cooper School, worked as a draftsman at Republic Steel, decorated display windows at Halle's department store, designed dials for Hickock Electrical Instrument Co. and made project models at an architectural firm, according to the catalog of a 1993 retrospective exhibition at the Wexner Center at OSU. "The board of the foundation has seized upon this opportunity at Ohio State to fund this vision and share our enthusiasm," Jack Cowart, executive director of the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation, said in the OSU press release. "We are pleased that new art and new research are now Ohio State's legacies strengthened by Roy Lichtenstein's Foundation and his family." Cutest Cat Contest 2017 A Japanese study, released last week, says cats are as smart as dogs when it comes to accessing memories. Two-year-old Hazel Mae, pictured with her canine companion, Laney lives in Lakewood with Alexis Coykendall.(photo courtesy Lexi Coykendall) CLEVELAND, Ohio - While many humans have long argued that dogs are smarter than cats, a new study suggests otherwise: cats may be just as smart as dogs - and humans. A team of Japanese scientists tested 49 domestic cats to see if they could remember which container of food they ate out of after a 15-minute delay, even though the container had been emptied. The study was released Wednesday. The experiments revealed cats could "retrieve and utilize the 'what' and 'where' information from a single past event" - like recalling which container they had eaten from. Researches also said cats performed equally to dogs in tests about understanding human gestures and facial expressions. RELATED: Later this week we'll be unveiling pictures of all the cats entered in cleveland.com's contest to find the Cutest Cat in Greater Cleveland. Look for the photo galleries to start running this week at cleveland.com/best. They will be organized in alphabetical order according to the cat's name. "Understanding cats more deeply helps establish better cat-human relationships," said Saho Takagi, a psychologist at Kyoto University. She told the BBC she believes this proves "cats may be as intelligent as dogs, as opposed to the common view most people hold that dogs are much smarter." In the interview, Takagi said cats, as well as dogs, use memories of a single past experience, which may imply they have episodic memory similar to that of humans. "Episodic memory is viewed as being related to introspective function of the mind; our study may imply a type of consciousness in cats," she told BBC reporter Helen Briggs. "An interesting speculation is that they may enjoy actively recalling memories of their experience like humans." Experiments have shown dogs also appear to have memories linked to specific times and places. The same team of Japanese scientists previously found that, in similar tests, dogs had memories of from which food bowls they had eaten. Last year, a team of scientists from Hungary found dogs were able to recall their owner's actions, even when they were not specifically instructed to do so. CBL & Associates Properties, Inc. (NYSE:CBL) on Monday announced that it has closed on a sale-leaseback transaction for five Sears department stores and two Sears Auto Centers at CBL malls, providing CBL with control of these locations for future redevelopment. CBL has acquired the locations for a total consideration of $72.5 million. Sears will continue to operate the department stores under new 10-year leases. Under the terms of the leases, CBL will receive aggregate initial base rent of approximately $5.075 million, with Sears also responsible for paying common area maintenance charges, taxes, insurance and utilities. CBL will have the right to terminate each Sears lease at any time (except November through January), with six months advance notice. In addition to CBLs termination right, after a lock-out period of four years for the Sears store at Jefferson Mall, two years for the other four Sears stores and one-year for the two Sears Auto Centers, Sears may terminate each store lease upon six months notice. Upon termination by either party, Sears has the option to relocate its operations at each mall to a location of up to 15,000 square feet. We are pro-actively transforming our market-dominant shopping centers to meet the changing preferences of consumers. This transaction provides CBL with the opportunity to redevelop prime real estate and attract exciting new uses at some of our best shopping centers, said Stephen Lebovitz, president & chief executive officer. The leaseback of the real estate by Sears will generate income to CBL and gives us control over the timing of closures while we finalize our redevelopment plans at each location. The five locations acquired include the Sears parcels at Cross Creek Mall in Fayetteville, N.C.; Brookfield Square in Brookfield, Wi.; Hamilton Place Mall in Chattanooga; Eastgate Mall in Cincinnati; and Jefferson Mall in Louisville, Ky. The two acquired Sears Auto Centers are located at Northgate Mall in Chattanooga, and Volusia Mall in Daytona, Fl. RPM Industries.JPG RPM International's corporate headquarters in Brunswick Hills Township, Medina County. RPM says a lawsuit filed by Danish flooring company Ulfcar Production ApS accusing it of misappropriating trade secrets and seeking $100 million in damages is baseless and "without merit." (Donna J. Miller, The Plain Dealer) MEDINA, Ohio -- RPM International Inc. says a lawsuit filed by Danish flooring company Ulfcar Production ApS accusing it of misappropriating trade secrets and seeking $100 million in damages is baseless and "without merit." The lawsuit, filed in March 2016 with the Montgomery County District Clerk in Conroe, Texas, accuses RPM and its United Kingdom-based flooring subsidiary, Flowcrete Group Ltd., of misappropriation of trade secrets "resulting from their failed attempt to acquire a Belgium company Polyols 3 SPRL." An RPM spokesman said via email that "While the litigation is in the early stages, management believes the claims are without merit, and will vigorously defend against them." Ulfcar and RPM both tried to buy Polyols 3, but Ulfcar says that after it won the bid, Flowcrete "made an agreement with the sole technical employee of Polyols 3 to provide them with the Intellectual Property and Know-How they had been attempting to acquire." Ulfcar says Flowcrete acquired knowledge of confidential formulas during the bidding process that it used to develop a competing product. Ulfcar says that Flowcrete and RPM Belgium were once the two largest customers of Polyols 3, but that they both "claim to have developed the technology themselves and no longer purchase the product." Ulfcar is seeking damages, including lost profits and unjust enrichment of at least $100 million, as well as a permanent injunction barring any further use of Ulfcar's trade secrets. RPM recalls the circumstances differently, saying: "RPM's UK-based Flowcrete business did consider acquiring Polyols 3, but pulled out of discussions in 2009. RPM International Inc. was not involved." "Ulfcar then purchased the business in 2011 for only about $400,000, which makes the $100 million claim in the lawsuit far off base," RPM said. "The acquisition of Polyols 3 was short-lived, as Ulfcar was liquidated in 2012, and its owner, Niels Vangsted, was banned as a company director in Denmark. The Ulfcar business that filed the lawsuit is a new company that was only just formed in 2014." Ulfcar says the trial date is set for July 24 in Montgomery County, Texas. RPM disagreed. "While the suit has been filed, there is no trial date, and it has not yet been determined whether a Texas court can have jurisdiction over a dispute with RPM and its international subsidiaries," the company said. "RPM believes the lawsuit is baseless, without merit and an attempt to generate publicity to force a settlement," it added. When I was a little girl I loved horses so much that just passing by the white-fenced pastures in Lexington and seeing them spoke to my senses like nothing else. My window would be rolled down and I would take in the whiff of horsie air and I would keep my gaze on them until we drove where I could no longer see them. And then I would sit back in my seat and feel like I just captured a bit of beauty I craved in my life and I magically stored it away in my mind to keep. I was a horse owner and I knew it. My life growing up did not consist of riding lessons or having a pony I only owned a horse in my mind with a tag of one day. I am sure as a child I thought having ANY horse would be wonderful and I wouldnt be too picky if I was ever that lucky. But as I got older and around horses more, I realized no matter how beautiful a horse is, no matter how nice I am to a horse some horses just dont like you. Some horses have not had proper training and some horses may be head shy never letting you pet them. And then... there is that ONE horse. THE horse who gives you his soul. The horse who connects with your heart in a way no other horse can or no other human can. When you connect with that horse, chances are it is when you are first learning how to handle horses. And while some horses may have made you timid or aggravated trying to convey what you want to them know, you come across that one horse who gets you. I had ridden several of my friends horses and always had good luck bonding with them at least in the way of not getting bit, bucked or bruised. I loved them all. But when I met Smokey, I learned what that special bond truly was. Smokey was a horse out at the ranch I was visiting with a friend. God transitioned my one friend to leave the ranch with her horse just about the time I had met Sherry (Smokeys owner) at the gym I worked for and she had told me I could visit her horse anytime. Sherry had issues that year where she couldnt be with Smokey as much, so it was a help to her for me to love on him, ride him, groom him and I could learn how to take care of a horse to see if I wanted to really have one of my own. The more Sherry and I talked, and the more Smokey took to me, Sherry insisted that I called him my horse and that she might even give him to me one day. One Day. Was one day here? Was it time for me to have a horse? Not just any horse this horse who let me bare my naked soul to him with tears I cried as I brushed him. This horse who stood still and put off heat from his muscles when I reached to give him a long hug that I needed when I was at my worst. Going through a painful divorce years ago, Smokey was a big part of my healing. I had never closed off my heart before and that was my problem Id give it to anyone, because I had so much love to give. But I was naive and kept getting hurt. At this point in my life I knew I was not to give my heart away again (to a man) and I needed time for the Lord to change my life and teach me. Meanwhile, my heart was still alive and I needed to put it in a safe place. Thats where Smokey knew exactly what to do. Smokey knew I needed to give him my heart. And he gave me his. He was patient in the things I didnt know how to do and he even taught me how to do them. The first time I attempted putting on his bridal by myself it was wrong and he shook his head at me. So I turned it around and he nodded at me. What a smart horse! He taught me if I didnt have the saddle tight enough he wouldnt go with me on him. I got off and checked the saddle and tightened it and then he was happy to do whatever I asked. He never let me get into trouble. He always looked out for me. I felt safe and protected. And then, Smokey taught me something else. Leadership. After being a doormat woman in my dissolved marriage, it was a lot to learn how to get my confidence back. How to have a life for me which was what God wanted for me. To be that bold woman He created me to be. So, the tables turned and I began gaining confidence with Smokey. I was leading around this 1,000 pound animal who trusted me. I worked him in the round pen and we rode in the arena. I still spent hours grooming him and singing to him. I had a special song I sang, You go to my head by Billie Holiday. I would call out to him in the pasture of horses, Smokey Love! and then I would start singing that song until he came to me. Id sing it on the way back to the barn. It has been eight years that I have loved this special horse and a lot has transpired. The Lord blessed me with the man He intended to have my heart my Jason, whom I knew as a child. Marrying Jason, I moved back to my home of Kentucky and Jason and I started a horse ranch. I wanted Smokey but his owner was still enjoying him and I really wanted to go ahead and buy some horses. We have six horses on our nine acre ranch and two of them, we have been raising since they were six months old. Legend (my colt) and Suede (Jasons filly) are two years old now and even though my Legend is special he still isnt Smokey. Legend will make a great horse one day, but he is still young and we have to work through some trust issues. Smokeys owner Sherry has come to a place in her life where she needs to let him live with me. I have waited for this opportunity not knowing if it would ever happen. Just last year, I finally settled it in my heart that Smokey was just a very special horse that was once in my life but I would never see again. Until a few weeks ago when I got a message from Doug, Sherrys husband telling me I should get in touch with her. My heart leapt out of my chest thinking this just might mean I had a chance to have Smokey! When Sherry and I began talking in messages on Facebook and texting, we both knew it was time for me to bring Smokey home to Kentucky! Sherry has been most gracious to share Smokey with me. He is HER horse and always will be a heart never forgets and neither does a horse. But now, Smokey will be MY horse just as he always was in my heart. Tomorrow, I will come to Chattanooga see Smokey and see if he still remembers me. It has been three years! Will he remember what I call him? Will he remember our song? Will he remember my hugs? Pegasus Equine Transport is who we used to deliver four of our horses last year and we will use them tomorrow to pick up Smokey. But we will be there too. We will be there to let Smokey know hes coming home to Kentucky with us. I will call to him Smokey Love! I will start singing, You go to my head and you linger like a haunting refrain and I find you spinning round in my brain like the bubbles in a glass of champagne. Will he remember? Will Smokey remember my face? My smile? My hugs? Will he know my voice? Im not the woman in pain anymore. I am not the woman who barely knew how to saddle a horse. I have come a long way. Will Smokey see that? Will our trust be even greater now that I have more experience? Will he miss the mess that I was when I needed him all those years ago? I still need him. My love is the same if not greater, for Smokey. And as far as being a mess I am not in that confused state I used to be, but I am dealing with something very emotional in which I will need Smokey to help me get through. My Mama is dying. My pal, my confidant, my biggest fan in life. This will be written about more in the coming months, but for now, Smokey will be my shelter I run to when I am feeling sad. He will be happy to share his heart when I am missing Mama. Mama knew my heart for Smokey and she is so happy to know that I am getting him. I had given her an oil painting my friend Hollie Berry painted of us and it was one of her treasures. Mama is at peace. It is a day-to-day thing right now and she may surprise us and stick around for a lot longer, but she is at peace. I will get to stop in to see her tomorrow for some hugs and special mother-daughter time and then we will go get Smokey. I hope Mama gets to come home from the hospital and I will get to see her again after I get Smokey home. I hope to come back to Chattanooga in a few more days if she gets to come home from the hospital. Every day is a blessing. Every day happens as it should. It is not mine to plan, but to accept what the Lord has in store and I stay excited to watch Him in all He does, because it is His best. Stay tuned for the continuing story of Smokey - The Reunion. The City of Cleveland is conducting their first "Citizen Community Survey''. The goal of the survey is to assess the attitudes and opinions about the quality of life in Cleveland. Fourteen key categories are covered in the survey to help city leaders better understand the priorities of the community. Paper copies of the survey and drop boxes are available at the following locations: Cleveland/Bradley Chamber of Commerce, 225 Keith St. S.W.; Cleveland/Bradley Public Library, 795 Church St. N.E.; Cleveland Municipal Building, 190 Church St. N.E.; and Impact Cleveland, 1075 Blythe Ave, S.E. The survey is also accessible through the city's website. "We invite you to attend one of the public information meetings listed below for more information about the survey and upcoming city projects," officials said. District 1-George R. Stuart Elem. School Library (802 20th St. N.W.), Jan. 24, 6:30 p.m.; District 2 - Cleveland/Bradley County Public Library (795 Church St,), Jan 26, 6:30 p.m.; District 3 - Legacy Senior Living Center (2235 Candies Lane N.W.), Feb. 2, 6:30 p.m.; District 4 - Mayfield Elementary School (501 20th St, N.E.), Feb. 7, 6:30 p.m.; District 5-Cleveland High School Library (850 Raider Dr.), Feb. 9, 6:30 p.m.; or Gen. Forum - Museum Center Five Points (200 Inman Street E), Feb. 15, 3 p.m. "We ask that you consider taking a few minutes of your time to complete the survey and return it before Feb. 24," officials said. "Thank you in advance for taking the time out of your busy schedule to complete our survey. Your feedback is extremely important to us. This will assist us in prioritizing funding and developing a more effective plan for Cleveland's future." For questions regarding the survey, contact Beverley Lindsey in the City manager's office at 423-472-4551 or by email at blindsey@clevelandtn.gov. watch now In the wake of President Donald Trump's executive order barring immigrants from seven predominately Muslim countries, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz vowed to hire 10,000 refugees globally. "We will neither stand by, nor stand silent, as the uncertainty around the new administration's actions grows with each passing day," Schultz said in a message to employees posted on the company's website on Sunday. "There are more than 65 million citizens of the world recognized as refugees by the United Nations, and we are developing plans to hire 10,000 of them over five years in the 75 countries around the world where Starbucks does business." Schultz said the effort would begin in the U.S., focusing hiring efforts initially on people who served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel. Trump signed an executive order on Friday to block refugees from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the U.S. Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz. Getty Images Syrian refugees were indefinitely banned. Passport holders of Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen faced a three-month hold, while refugees from those countries faced a four-month ban. Attorney generals from California, New York, Washington DC and 13 other states have condemned the move and pledged to fight the "unconstitutional" move, Reuters reported. "Green-card" holders, or those already granted the right to live in the U.S., were not exempted. The executive order set off large-scale protests across the U.S., particularly in places where immigrants were detained as they tried to enter the country. Schultz added that his company was planning to take other actions to counter Trump policies. With the new administration planning to repeal the Affordable Care Act, Schultz said he reaffirmed the company's commitment to providing employees with health insurance. President Donald Trump arrives aboard Air Force One at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, January 26, 2017. Jonathan Ernst | Reuters President Donald Trump's decision to impose strict travel restrictions on foreign citizens from seven countries linked to terror touched off a turbulent weekend of spontaneous protests. As waylaid travelers were detained at airports around the world, the American Civil Liberties Union filed suit to free two Iraqi detainees at New York's John F. Kennedy Airportwinning an 11th hour ruling that effectively freed those being held at one of JFK's terminals. CNBC captured the scene outside of Brooklyn's federal courthouse on Saturday evening, where thousands of demonstrators took to the streets to rally against Trump's order. 'The New Colossus' Tom DiChristopher, CNBC The crowd outside the courthouse grew steadily throughout the night. Protesters held aloft signs and chanted slogans. At one point, protesters began singing "This Land Is Your Land." A number of people began reciting part of "The New Colossus," the inscription on the base of the Statue of Liberty. 'Immigrants are welcome here' Tom DiChristopher, CNBC The emotional crowd called out a variety of cheers, and denounced Trump's policies. Some of those creative chants included "No ban. No wall. Liberty for one and all," and "love, not hate. Immigrants are really great." 'ACLU, thank you' Tom DiChristopher, CNBC The crowd burst out into cheers when someone emerged from the court to announce the judge had granted a stay. Protesters hugged one another. On the periphery of the crowd, a small brass band began playing, and people began dancing. They chanted, "ACLU, thank you" and "The people united will never be defeated." 'Today is a wonderful day' Tom DiChristopher, CNBC ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero came out and addressed the crowd after the organization scored its victoy. "Today is a remarkable day," he said. "We've shown today that the courts work." Tom DiChristopher | CNBC The East Ridge Police Department is partnering with the Tennessee Highway Safety Office for its annual Seatbelts Are For Everyone (SAFE) campaign. This statewide initiative is designed to increase seatbelt usage and child passenger safety restraint usage through the implementation of occupant-protection programs, public events, and checkpoints throughout local communities across Tennessee. The SAFE campaign begins Feb. 1 and concludes on Aug. 1."The East Ridge Police Department believes that seat belt do save lives.We want to remind drivers and passengers to buckle up for themselves, for loved ones, for all citizens of East Ridge," officials said.This year will be the fourth year that the THSO has sponsored the SAFE campaign. Last year yielded the following results:1,717 child restraint violations21,562 seat belt citations723 other seat belt enforcement activitiesIn 2015, Tennessees average seatbelt usage rate was 86.23 percent, said THSO Director Vic Donoho. Last year, we soared to 88.95 percent. Through increased education, enforcement, and community involvement, were striving for 90 percent or higher.This year, participating agencies will pay special attention to nighttime seatbelt enforcement. Tennessee has seen a disproportionate percentage of unrestrained fatalities between the hours of 6 p.m. and 5:59 a.m. Historically, approximately 50 percent of Tennessees traffic fatalities are unbelted. That percentage increases to nearly 60 percent when nighttime crashes are examined, officials said. Friday's U.S. immigration decree is reverberating well beyond the targeted seven Muslim-majority countries on President Trump's list. Indonesiahome to the world's largest followers of Islam at 220 millionis not among the seven but Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi told Reuters over the weekend that her government held "deep regrets about the policy." A spokesperson from Jakarta's embassy in Washington meanwhile told AFP that the move would negatively affect the global fight against radicalism, adding that it was wrong to link terrorism with one religion. Protesters gather outside Terminal 4 at JFK airport in opposition to U.S. president Donald Trump's proposed ban on immigration in Queens, New York City, U.S., January 28, 2017. Stephen Yang | Reuters Passport holders of Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen are now forbidden from entering the world's largest economy for the next 90 days, with Syrian refugees indefinitely banned, according to an order that Trump signed into effect on Friday. Politicians in Malaysia, where 60 percent of the 28 million-strong population is Muslim, also voiced concern. On Sunday, Ong Kian Ming, an MP from the opposition Democratic Action Party (DAP), called Trump's policy "inhumane" and urged Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak to condemn the action, local news reported. Neither Najib nor Indonesian President Joko Widodo have addressed Friday's news. Both head of states offered Trump their congratulatory messages upon his November election victory but like other governments, fears about increased U.S. protectionism and 'America First' policies have clouded their respective relationships with Washington. For now, the U.S. immigration order isn't expected to hit political and economic ties with Jakarta or Kuala Lumpur but it could bring longer-term social costs. "While Trump's policies may not affect bilateral relations, it will certainly sway public perception, against the U.S," Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani, Malaysia analyst at BowerGroupAsia, told CNBC in anticipation of the ban on Friday. Many expect Trump's policies, perceived as unjust and discriminatory, could result in a decline of American soft power in Muslim-majority regions, which former U.S. president Barack Obama attempted to carefully rebuild in the aftermath of the Bush regime. watch now Amazon is considering "other legal options" against President Donald Trump's controversial executive order related to immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, CEO Jeff Bezos said in an email to employees Monday. "This executive order is one we do not support," Bezos said in an email obtained by CNBC. Bezos said Amazon's policy team in Washington D.C. is reaching out to senior White House officials "to make our opposition clear." The CEO also said the company is reaching out to congressional leaders to "explore legislative options" and is "working other legal options as well." Bezos said Amazon will also support Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson, who is filing a lawsuit in federal court against the president, the Department of Homeland Security and other White House officials. WHEN: Today, Monday, January 30th WHERE: CNBC's "Squawk on the Street" Following is the unofficial transcript of breaking news on CNBC's "Squawk on the Street" (M-F, 9AM-11AM ET) today, Monday, January 30th. Following is a link to the article on CNBC.com: http://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/30/snap-to-choose-nyse-for-ipo-source.html. All references must be sourced to CNBC. BOB PISANI: WE'VE BEEN TALKING ABOUT THE FACT THEY MAY FILE PUBLICLY THIS WEEK, THEIR IPO. AND WE ARE NOW ABLE TO REPORT TO YOU THAT, ACCORDING TO A SINGLE SOURCE, SNAP IPO WILL BE LISTED HERE AT THE NEW YORK STOCK EXCHANGE. THIS HAS BEEN A VERY FOUGHT OVER LISTING, TOM FARLEY, THE CEO OF THE NEW YORK STOCK EXCHANGE, FOR SEVERAL WEEKS WHEN SNAP ANNOUNCED THEY WERE GOING TO DO SOMETHING WAS WEARING THE SPECTACLES YOU MIGHT RECALL, CARL, THE SNAP SPECTACLES AT A NUMBER OF DIFFERENT EVENTS TAKING PICTURES ON THE FLOOR AND WALKING AROUND WITH HIM. SO HE MADE NO SECRET OF HIS EAGER DESIRE TO GET THE LISTING. AGAIN, WE CAN REPORT RIGIHT NOW ACCORDING TO A SINGLE SOURCE IT WILL BE LISTED HERE AT THE NEW YORK STOCK EXCHANGE. OF COURSE I HAVE A CALL INTO TOM FARLEY TO GET A COMPLETE CONFIRMATION ON THAT. ANYTHING ELSE, WILL REPORT IT BACK TO YOU AS SOON AS I HAVE IT. About CNBC: With CNBC in the U.S., CNBCin Asia Pacific, CNBC in Europe, Middle East and Africa, and CNBC World, CNBCis the recognized world leader in business news and provides real-timefinancial market coverage and business information to approximately 381 millionhomes worldwide, including more than 94 million households in the United Statesand Canada. CNBC also provides daily business updates to 400 million householdsacross China. The network's 15 live hours a day of business programming inNorth America (weekdays from 4:00 a.m. - 7:00 p.m. ET) is produced at CNBC'sglobal headquarters in Englewood Cliffs, N.J., and includes reports from CNBCNews bureaus worldwide. CNBC at night features a mix of new realityprogramming, CNBC's highly successful series produced exclusively for CNBC anda number of distinctive in-house documentaries. CNBC also has a vastportfolio of digital products which deliver real-time financial market news andinformation across a variety of platforms including: CNBC.com; CNBC PRO, thepremium, integrated desktop/mobile service that provides live access to CNBCprogramming, exclusive video content and global market data and analysis; asuite of CNBC mobile products including the CNBC Apps for iOS, Android andWindows devices; and additional products such as the CNBC App for the AppleWatch and Apple TV. Members of the media canreceive more information about CNBC and its programming on the NBCUniversalMedia Village Web site at http://www.nbcumv.com/programming/cnbc. For more information aboutNBCUniversal, please visit http://www.NBCUniversal.com. The Cleveland Clinic has held its fundraiser at Trump's Mar-A-Lago resort in Palm Beach since 2011. The next fundraiser at the resort, on Feb. 25, is dubbed "Reflections of Versailles: A Night in the Hall of Mirrors," with tickets ranging from $1,250 to $100,000 a person. The Cleveland Clinic, under fire for plans to host a fundraiser next month at President Donald Trump 's Florida resort even as Trump's travel ban forced one the renowned hospital's doctors to leave the United States, said Monday it will not commit to holding that event at the resort next year. When asked Monday by CNBC if it still planned on holding the event next month given the travel ban uproar, clinic spokeswoman Eileen Sheil said, "No change for this year." "But we are not committed after this year's event," Sheil added. When asked if that lack of commitment was a reaction to the travel order and subsequent fallout from it, Sheil said: "We're getting a lot of feedback from our communities and want to be very considerate of that." On Saturday, Dr. Suha Abushamma was forced to leave New York after landing there, and fly to Saudi Arabia as a result of Trump's executive order barring visitors from seven largely Muslim nations for 90 days. Abushamma holds a passport from Sudan, one of the seven nations. A STAT News story about Abushamma's departures mentioned the fact that her employer, the Cleveland Clinic, was hosting its fundraiser at Trump's resort. STAT also noted that Trump was chairman of the event in 2014. Dr. Adeel Khan, a resident of internal medicine at the hospital, tweeted the STAT story on Monday, noting the fundraiser "at a Trump resort," and addressing Cleveland Clinic CEO Dr. Toby Cosgrove's Twitter handle, saying "This needs to stop." Tweet Other medical professionals not affiliated with the clinic also reportedly criticized the scheduled fundraiser. Cosgrove reportedly turned down Trump's offer to name him secretary of Veterans Affairs, an offer that was made before the travel ban. President Donald Trump's decision to ban immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries has sparked criticism across Europe. A look through Europe's newspapers reveals concerns that such a policy will boost terrorism with some even interpreting it as a war on religion. Above all, the European media has highlighted a global outcry against the latest decision. In Germany, the newspaper Handelsblatt published the headline "Trump's religion war" when reporting the latest immigration curbs in the U.S., where thousands of people have protested against the ban. Trump denied on Sunday that his policy was based on religious grounds. Instead, he said it was about keeping the country safe. The German tabloid Bild said the "horror of Trump" could affect German citizens, including artists, entrepreneurs and politicians. Other German media outlets, Der Spiegel and Deutsche Welle, looked at the legal side of the ban. Political scientists and legal experts believe that there are several opportunities for lawsuits against Trump's immigration ban. "It was simply pushed through in haste and without consideration and you could see it in the results on the ground. It makes the United States look like a banana republic," Jonathan Hafetz, a law professor at Seton Hall University told Deutsche Welle. In France, most of the newspapers were focused on domestic politics but the economic paper Les Echo noted the outcry against Trump. "Trump sows trouble with his Western allies," was its lead headline. Le Monde reported comments from protestors in U.S. airports that the ban wasn't "worthy" of the United States. After the 2016 election, executives at some companies, like American Electric Power, expressed enthusiasm for how Trump's infrastructure promises, regulatory reductions and tax code changes might affect their companies. Others brought up concerns that isolationist policies might change their business operations abroad. "Our perspective is that the United States is tightly woven with its trading partners," said Union Pacific CEO Lance Fritz in its January call. "Our consumers benefit greatly from free and open international trade." Many of the Trump mentions in earnings calls came not from the executives, but from analysts and reporters looking for answers to how the new president's policies might make a difference for a company. "I'm going to ask the Trump question since I get it five or six times a day," said a Citigroup analyst in an earnings call for Analog Devices after the election. "So who knows what this guy is going to come up with policy-wise, but maybe (you could) share with us your thoughts on how you think this impacts you." Executives at Kinder Morgan told analysts they didn't think that Trump's support for the Keystone XL pipeline has had much effect on the company's own Trans Mountain pipeline business. TE Connectivity said that it might see some benefit from Keystone and EPA changes floated by Trump, but "that's not assumed right now." Other companies, like Dow Chemical and Wynn Resorts, simply wanted to point out that they have a connection to the new administration. Wynn CEO Stephen Wynn said he has reason to believe that the White House shares the company's desire to build trade relationships in China. "As you know, I am acquainted with the administration," Wynn said. "Several of us in our business were sitting within 30 feet of President Trump when he took his oath of office on the platform last Friday." SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk is looking to help improve President Donald Trump's controversial anti-Muslim immigration ban. On Friday, the Trump administration announced that it was barring from the U.S. travelers from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Musk, who is himself a South African immigrant to the U.S., expressed disapproval shortly after the policy was announced. The Chicagoist will be launching later but in the meantime please enjoy our archives. The stance was evident when Mrs May met Wall Street bosses at the World Economic Forum in Davos 10 days ago to discuss her strategy for leaving the EU, according to several people briefed on the closed-door meeting. Goldman Sachs' chief executive has emerged as a thorn in the side of UK prime minister Theresa May, warning that European financial centres could challenge London unless her government gives more priority to the City in Brexit negotiations. Lloyd Blankfein, head of the US investment bank for over a decade, asked Mrs May where financial services ranked in her top three priorities for Brexit, according to the people. "Blankfein talked tough," said one of the people. "He said there was no reason why European financial centres can't set up as effective rivals." The Goldman boss mostly asked questions of Mrs May, and delivered them in a light-hearted way, the people said. Despite the cordial mood, some Wall Street bosses in the room detected a deeper concern about the UK's position in Mr Blankfein's comments. "There was a particular exchange between them," said one person. More from the Financial Times Post-Brexit Britain cannot just copy out EU laws Negotiating Brexit will be a tortuous business How Europe can avoid falling into Trump's trap Goldman was one of the biggest donors to the Remain campaign in last June's referendum and employs about 6,000 staff in the UK, its main European operation. Mr Blankfein has expressed bemusement to colleagues over how Mrs May appears to treat finance like any other industry, despite its major contribution to the UK economy and its exchequer. Bankers looked on enviously in October when Mrs May gave Nissan a guarantee that its terms of trade would not be hurt by Brexit, winning a commitment from the Japanese carmaker to expand production at its plant in Sunderland. Mrs May's meeting with Wall Street executives came only hours after her address to the Davos elite, outlining plans for the UK to "step up to a new leadership role" in the global economy after Brexit and remain a "great global trading nation". Some foreign bank bosses were still reeling from an earlier speech by her in London, in which she confirmed for the first time that the UK would not be staying in the EU's single market or customs union. City bankers fear this outcome could cut them off from EU clients. Goldman Sachs will work to minimize the effects on its employees from President Donald Trump's executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, CEO Lloyd Blankfein said. In a Sunday evening voicemail to employees, Blankfein said the investment bank does not support the immigration ban, and he noted it had already been challenged in federal court. A spokesman for Goldman Sachs confirmed the voicemail to CNBC and called it "our official response." "If the order were to become or remain effective, I recognize that there is potential for disruption to the firm, and especially to some of our people and their families," Blankfein said. "I want to assure all of you that we will work to minimize such disruption to the extent we can within the law and are focused on supporting our colleagues and their families who may be affected." The message came following the Trump administration's announcement that it would temporarily bar U.S. entry to travelers from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Blankfein ended the voicemail by quoting from the company's business principals: "'For us to be successful, our men and women must reflect the diversity of the communities and cultures in which we operate. That means we must attract, retain and motivate people from many backgrounds and perspectives. Being diverse is not optional; it is what we must be.' Now is a fitting time to reflect on those words and the principles that underlie them," Blankfein said. Google executives are matching their deeds with donations. The search-engine giant has created a $2 million crisis fund that can be matched with up to $2 million in donations from employees, totaling $4 million, for four organizations: the American Civil Liberties Union, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee and UNHCR. It is Google's largest crisis campaign ever. Separately, company executives are giving money to the cause. The campaign was disclosed in a memo sent by Google CEO Sundar Pichai and confirmed by a Google spokeswoman late Sunday. The grant comes a day after Pichai voiced strong objections to President Trump's controversial immigration ban and company co-founder Sergey Brin participated in a protest at San Francisco International Airport. Executives at Apple , Microsoft , Netflix , Uber, Airbnb and Tesla Motors have denounced the policy, which was temporarily stalled by a federal judge in New York Saturday night. The order could greatly disrupt the businesses of tech companies, which rely heavily on foreign-born workers. In a staff memo, Pichai said the move affects at least 187 of the Internet giant's staff. "We're concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the U.S.," Google said in a statement. "We'll continue to make our views on these issues known to leaders in Washington and elsewhere." Protesters gathered at Google 's headquarters on Monday to protest immigration policies from the new federal administration, using hashtag "NoBanNoWall." A crowd at the Mountain View, California headquarters, as well as offices in San Francisco, New York, Seattle, and around the world, held signs reading "Ban fascists, not religions," and "Free hugs for an Iranian." A person at the rally told CNBC that Google CEO Sundar Pichai and cofounder Sergey Brin spoke there, and Brin expressed gratitude for being admitted to the United States from the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Here's a picture of Pichai and Brin speaking. The demonstration was organized by employees, and more than 2,000 attended, according to a person who was there. The demonstration came after a executive order restricting travel from seven Muslim-majority nations and indefinitely banning Syrian refugees spurred protests over the weekend at airports around the country. Google established a $4 million fund for the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee, UNHCR and American Civil Liberties Union, (one of the main organizations fighting the ban). The keynote speaker at Google's Mountain View headquarters was Soufi Esmaeilzadeh, a product manager on Google Assistant, who was on a plane from San Francisco to Zurich when rumors began to leak that the executive order would be signed. watch now Amid outcry over a wide-reaching immigration crackdown, Google is featuring a Japanese-American civil rights activist who was interned during World War II. On Monday, Google's U.S. homepage features Fred Toyosaburo Korematsu, a Japanese-American who tried to enlist in the military during World War II, but was turned away due to his ethnicity, according to Google's official blog. At 22, Korematsu went into hiding to avoid being relocated into an internment camp, and was later arrested and sent to a camp until 1945, Google's blog said. Korematsu was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom after his conviction was overturned, according to Google's blog. Korematsu's birthday, Jan. 30, is officially recognized as Fred Korematsu Day in California, Hawaii, Virginia and Florida, Google's blog said. The illustration, known as the Google doodle, comes a day after Google established a $4 million fund for the American Civil Liberties Union, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee and UNHCR. watch now The ransom demand arrived one recent morning by email, after about a dozen guests were locked out of their rooms at the lakeside Alpine hotel in Austria. The electronic key system at the picturesque Romantik Seehotel Jaegerwirt had been infiltrated, and the hotel was locked out of its own computer system, leaving guests stranded in the lobby, causing confusion and panic. "Good morning?" the email began, according to the hotel's managing director, Christoph Brandstaetter. It went on to demand a ransom of two bitcoins, or about $1,800, and warned that the cost would double if the hotel did not comply with the demand by the end of the day, Jan. 22. More from New York Times: In New York music scene, two behemoths vie for the top Trump's trade war may have already begun How Republicans will try to roll back Obama regulations Mr. Brandstaetter said the email included details of a "bitcoin wallet" the account in which to deposit the money and ended with the words, "Have a nice day!" With the 111-year-old hotel brimming with eager skiers, hikers and vacationers, some having paid about $530 for a suite with a panoramic view and sauna, Mr. Brandstaetter said he decided to cave in. Guests had already complained that their electronic room keys were not working, and receptionists' efforts to create new ones had proved futile. Bashing down the doors was not an option. The reservation system for the hotel in the village of Turracherhohe, about 90 minutes by care from Salzburg, was paralyzed. "We were at maximum capacity with 180 guests and decided that it was better to give in," he said. "The hackers were very pushy." Intel CEO Brian Krzanich told employees the company does not support an executive order banning incoming travel from seven predominantly Muslim countries, The Oregonian reported on Monday. "I have heard from many of you, and share your concern over the recent executive order and want you to know this is not a policy we can support," Krzanich told employees, according to The Oregonian. Many technology CEOs spoke out expressly against President Donald Trump's immigration order over the weekend, but Krzanich said publicly only that Intel was in favor of "lawful immigration." Tweet: "as a company co-founded by an immigrant, we support lawful immigration. We will provide impacted employees with Intel's full support" Intel is Oregon's largest private employer, according to the newspaper. Krzanich came under scrutiny during the presidential campaigns for hosting a fundraiser for Trump, which he later cancelled. For more on Intel's stance, see the full article at OregonLive.com. "The travel ban is the wrong approach and will likely be counterproductive," Hooks added, saying it hinders a Koch goal of promoting a free and open society. "We believe it is possible to keep Americans safe without excluding people who wish to come here to contribute and pursue a better life for their families," Brian Hooks, a co-chairman of the Kochs' seminar network, said in a statement. The leaders of the conservative network aligned with billionaires Charles Koch and David Koch on Sunday said they opposed P resident Trump 's controversial ban on immigrants from predominantly Muslim countries. The statement marks the first public criticism of the Trump administration from the Kochs, who oversee one of the most influential outside operations in conservative politics with a staff, budget and voter-turnout operation that rivals the Republican Party. Charles Koch, 81, refused to support Trump's candidacy and had denounced the Republican's proposed ban on Muslims during the campaign as "reminiscent of Nazi Germany." Koch did not refer to either Trump or his immigration order during public remarks Sunday afternoon to the more than 550 ultra-wealthy donors gathered at a luxury resort in the California desert for the network's annual winter summit. During the meeting, however, Koch leaders stressed they were willing to work with the Trump administration and the Republican-controlled Congress. They also indicated they would throw their political might into opposing Republicans, if they bucked the network on key priorities, such as reducing government spending and regulations. "We see big opportunities to work with the new administration and this new Congress," Hooks said. "It's this network's unique role to hold all politicians accountable, regardless of political party." He warned of a dramatic swing back to the left in upcoming elections if Republicans lost sight of the economic worries that drove voters to Trump. More from USA Today: Outrage over Trump's immigrant ban helps ACLU raise more money online in one weekend than in all of 2016 Once again, images show colossal crowds taking to the streets against Trump About 150 flights canceled after Delta grounds U.S. flights Likely flash points with the GOP include $1 trillion infrastructure plan Trump pushed during the campaign and a possible plan to impose a 20% border tax on imports from Mexico that the network's leaders say will drive up costs for consumers. "A $1 trillion government stimulus is a bad idea under Democrats and it's a bad idea for a Republican," Hooks said to loud applause from the audience that filled that ballroom of the Renaissance Indian Wells Resort and Spa. Although network did not engage in the presidential race, its donors spent heavily to shape 2016 federal and state elections. All but one of their favored U.S. Senate candidates, Nevada's Joe Heck, won, helping the GOP retain control of the chamber. Over the weekend, Koch officials said they intend to raise and spend $300 million to $400 million to influence policy and politics over the next two years. That's a significant jump from the $250 million Koch groups plowed into politics during the 2016 election cycle and does not include the millions more donors that will send to other parts of the Koch operation to fund Charles Koch's philanthropic work, scholarships and grants to universities to advance his free-market ideas. Donors, who pay $100,000 annually to the network, spent Sunday talking about policy fights, the election ahead and an array of programs the network backs ranging from a project to help former inmates start businesses to the $26 million investment Koch's foundation and company have made to a non-profit that supports Historically Black Colleges and Universities. In all, 11 elected officials were slated to make appearances at the three-day event. They included three governors, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner and several U.S. senators. All are Republicans. A few chief executives joined protests against President Donald Trump's temporary ban on immigration from seven Muslim countries, but a larger group of CEOs remained publicly silent over fears of being targeted by the president, CNBC's Andrew Ross Sorkin said Monday. The Financial Times' Gillian Tett said on CNBC's "Squawk Box" that she had spoken with CEOs who were privately upset by the executive order but worried about speaking out. "Squawk Box" co-host Sorkin said he had heard the same from his C-level sources. "I had similar conversations with executives over the weekend, all of whom ... seemed to be upset about at least the implementation of this program," Sorkin said. "They are scared out of their minds about being attacked ... and what that's going to do for their business." Tett said the CEOs she contacted were especially worried about the risk of speaking out in the context of Trump's potential backlash and that of his supporters. "The danger is twofold: firstly, the fact that you've got a president who will tweet out statements that can be very damaging to the share price," Tett told "Squawk Box." "But secondly, of course, you've got a lot of people who agree with what he's doing and who will take revenge against companies whether that's on social media or [via] boycott," she continued. Tett said she hoped CEOs, especially those with seats on Trump's various advisory councils, would band together to push back on the president's controversial legislation. "Maybe they should be trying to use some of their joint industry forums. Because people have come out and said, 'Yes, we love parts of [the] economic policies,' but it does not mean you have to endorse everything," Tett said. "The really key question is, 'Will those CEOs who are now sitting on that advisory council actually use that power or are they just doing it for pure vanity play?" Tett asked. Mark Cuban, billionaire entrepreneur and outspoken critic of Donald Trump, told CNBC on Monday the Republican president has a communications problem. Everyone is waiting to see how Trump's management style evolves, Cuban said in a "Squawk Box" interview. "Everything seems rushed," citing this weekend's handling of the rollout of Trump's temporary immigration travel ban. In the first 23 hours, 109 people were denied entry upon arrival. According to NBC News, 173 were denied boarding of incoming flights to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. "Leadership can mean a lot of different things to a lot of people. But at some point, you have to communicate with people who don't agree with you," said Cuban, who campaigned for Democrat Hillary Clinton during the presidential campaign. "Just tweeting is not communicating," he continued, arguing that only a small number of Americans are on Twitter. "It's really the media that communicates with more of us." In a four-part tweet storm over the weekend, the Dallas Mavericks owner and "Shark Tank" investor wrote: "1) We already know @google @Microsoft and other tech companies have had their businesses disrupted and have had to deal with 7 country ban. "2) how many other businesses, large and small are having to deal with disruptions to the lives of employees and their families ? "3) let's not forget the disruptions and costs to airports, airlines and police depts that had no idea this was coming "4) and as @realDonaldTrump noted, FAKE PASSPORTS are a real issue. So just how effective will this ban be? How fast will bad guys react?" 1) We already know @google @Microsoft and other tech companies have had their businesses disrupted and have had to deal with 7 country ban. 2) how many other businesses, large and small are having to deal with disruptions to the lives of employees and their families ? 3) let's not forget the disruptions and costs to airports, airlines and police depts that had no idea this was coming 4) and as @realDonaldTrump noted, FAKE PASSPORTS are a real issue. So just how effective will this ban be? How fast will bad guys react ? Earlier on "Squawk Box," presidential counselor Kellyanne Conway said there was no reason to delay carrying out the executive order. Trump tweeted about his reasoning to do it right away: "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there!" "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there!" Cuban said: "Me personally, I think his tweets are ridiculous. But I'm glad he does then, because it gives us a window how he thinks and when he thinks" about the issues. Cuban said Trump is "reasonable" and seems open-minded in one-on-one meetings. "But all that is thrown out the window when he tweets and when he communicates with the media." "This dichotomy makes things very difficult for business," the Mavs owner said. For example, the travel restrictions make it confusing for employers' of foreign-born workers, Cuban said. "Now you have to give consideration to where they're from, what they're circumstances are, what type of travel that person is doing. Are they a risk?How does that impact my future hiring?" Photos: Protesters Fill O'Hare Terminal Again In The Face Of Trump's 'Muslim Ban' By aaroncynic in News on Jan 30, 2017 4:48AM More than a thousand demonstrators flooded OHare International Airport for the second night in a row Sunday to protest President Donald Trumps executive order banning refugees and others from several predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. They were joined by local and state politicians alarmed by the federal ban. Were here to stand against religious bigotry, hate, and the singling out of groups in our society for persecution, Cook County Commissioner Jesus Chuy Garcia told reporters prior to speaking at the rally. That is what this is beginning to look like. All of us as good Americans have a responsibility to stand against it and to say that if one is picked on, it is a threat tomorrow to the well-being and liberty of other Americans." Several local politicians also joined the demonstration including Rep. Jan Schakowsky, Ald. Ricardo Munoz, State Rep. Theresa Mah and more. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel also stopped by and briefly spoke with a handful of reporters after shaking hands with some of the lawyers and others inside the airport. Since Trump signed the order Friday afternoon, travelers worldwide have been impacted, many of whom were in transit after the order was signed and found themselves detained at airports around the U.S. upon their arrivals. Airports across the country have been scenes of worry and protest. The theme of all of our press conferences and protests has always been unity and resistance, said Hatem Abudayyeh, Executive Director of the Arab American Action Network. The racist, anti-immigrant, anti-black, anti-women and anti poor people rhetoric that Trump rode to victory in the elections was of course going to lead to the vicious racist policies of today. All of us are here in resistance to these racist, xenophobic and Islamaphobic policies from a president who doesnt have a mandate from the people of the United States. Inside the airport, volunteer lawyers, many of whom have been taking shifts at O'Hare since Friday, filled several tables near the arrivals gate and stood by holding signs offering help to anyone who might need it. While a judge issued an emergency stay on Saturday night that allowed Saturday's arrivals and in-transit travelers to stay in the country, the Trump administration has shown little signs of backing down, only pulling back slightly to allow those with green cards granting them permanent residence. Later, the Department of Homeland Security issued a formal order declaring legal residents exempt. If you can't find your loved one at internat'l terminal 5 of @ORD #Ohare come to tables across from McDonald's for legal help. #NoBanNoWall Emily Benfer (@e_catalyst) January 29, 2017 Back outside, the crowd stayed for hours after the initial press conference, chanting no wall, no registry, no white supremacy and no papers, no fear, immigrants are welcome here. watch now Why with the wall aren't the losers them and not us? Pollo Feliz Mexican restaurant chain Last week people began calling for Mexicans to stop buying US products under a string of hashtags including #AdiosStarbucks, #AdiosWalmart, #AdiosMcDonalds, #AdiosCocacola and #AdiosProductosGringos. Consumers are rallying support for Mexican counterparts of American goods, for example the amusement park La Feria Chapultepec in Mexico City instead of Disneyland. "I am a patriot, a true Mexican cry of war," said one person in Spanish under the hashtag #adiosstarbucks alongside a photo of abag of local Oaxaca coffee. Local businesses are even calling for roasted chicken fans to support their establishments under the hashtag #elmejorpollodemexico. "Why with the wall aren't the losers them and not us?" Pollo Feliz, a restaurant chain, wrote in a Facebook post with a photo of Trump, KFC's Colonel Sanders and McDonald's Ronald McDonald peering over a brick wall. Mexican businessman Carlos Slim, a Trump critic who controls the Mexican telecommunications company America Movil , called for "national unity" on Friday and encouraged consumers to support Mexican business and "buy what is produced in Mexico." He remarked that Mexico since the inauguration of Trump has been "the most surprising example of national unity that I've had the pleasure of seeing in my life." "We have to back the president of Mexico so he defends our national interests," he added. watch now Alianza Por La Salud Alimentaria, a network of international and Mexico-based consumer groups, called for a a similar action in a campaign called "Consumers cry war" launched two days before Trump was inaugurated into office. The campaign calls on Mexican consumers to support local businesses and the government to increase its minimum wage. "The pronouncements and threats of the President-elect of the United States are irrational and inadmissible," the campaign said in a statement. "But this must generate a rational response to radically change the national development model and restore the sovereignty and health of food." It's unclear how the movement to boycott has affected USbusinesses in Mexico. Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz said in a statement on Sunday that the company, through its local partner Alsea, has been sourcing coffee from Mexican producers for 30 years and have donated $2 million to support coffee producing communities in Oaxaca. "We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans," he said. "But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same." Walmart told BuzzFeed News it had no comment about the boycott. McDonald's and Coca-Cola did not immediately return a request for comment to BuzzFeed News. Mexico's foreign minister Luis Videgaray said further meetings with Trump administration officials in coming days are not ruled out, according to a report Monday. He said there is no tentative date yet for a meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto. But, the minister said, if the peso is a gauge of relations with the U.S., last week was a good week. The briefly rose about 1 percent against the U.S. dollar Monday morning after netting a gain of more than 3 percent in volatile trade last week. Morgan Stanley told its employees it will provide support to individuals and families affected by President Donald Trump's immigration restrictions. "We are closely monitoring developments around the new U.S. travel restrictions imposed this weekend. While no individual employees were impacted in their travel to date, we are concerned for those individuals and their families who could be impacted and will provide them support as needed," the company said in a memo to employees on Sunday Citing public safety, Trump issued a surprise executive order over the weekend limiting entry into the United States from seven Muslim-majority countries. The move created disruptions for several U.S. companies whose employees were caught in limbo while traveling overseas, and sparked protests around the world. "We value immensely the contribution of all our employees from all over the world. Continuing to draw on talent from across the globe is a key element of Morgan Stanley's culture and ultimately to our success in serving our clients," the company added. On Monday, CNBC confirmed that Lloyd Blankfein, chief executive of Goldman Sachs , said the investment bank will work to minimize the effects on its employees from Trump's executive order. White House spokesman Sean Spicer said Monday that the ban is a "small price to pay" for safety. Adam Steltzner never imagined he would be the chief engineer of NASA's mission to Mars. He was a mediocre student in high school and he disliked physics. He wanted to pursue music and theater. But one glance at the night sky changed that. "I got curious," the rocket scientist tells Todd Henry on the podcast "The Accidental Creative." Steltzner, then 21 years old, "followed [that curiosity] down to the local community college to take an astronomy course." He didn't know what he would major in, how far he would pursue his education or even his career trajectory, he explains in his book "The Right Kind of Crazy." The future rocket scientist just knew he was interested. Several years later, he earned a doctorate in engineering and landed a job at NASA, where he served as a lead engineer of the Mars Exploration Curiosity Rover mission. Former president Barack Obama said he's "heartened" by American civic engagement, following a weekend of spontaneous protests in the wake of President Donald Trump's executive order related to immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. "Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake," Obama spokesman Kevin Lewis said Monday in a written statement. Lewis referenced Obama's farewell address, in which the outgoing president called on Americans to get involved to demand change. It's not just that every person is created equal and endowed with certain unalienable rights, but, Obama said, "it's the insistence that these rights, while self-evident, have never been self-executing; that we, the people, through the instrument of our democracy can form a more perfect union." Over the weekend, demonstrators rallied against Trump's order, which imposed travel restrictions on foreign citizens from Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Iran, Somalia, Libya and Yemen. Crowds outside of airports shouted, "Let them in!" and cheered when detainees were released. A federal judge subsequently granted an emergency stay, barring the deportation of people with valid visas who landed in the U.S. amid the uncertainty and chaos of Trump's order. The American Civil Liberties Union and other activist groups filed a class action lawsuit on Saturday, seeking to challenge the president's order, as acrimony widened over the policy and the number of detainees waylaid in transit appeared to swell. People demonstrate at Trump International Hotel and Tower in New York City, to fight against the proposed changes to the American healthcare system proposed by the Trump Administration and Republicans. Approval ratings for Obamacare which Trump intends to repeal increased by 6 percentage points, to 47 percent of the public on the heels of Trump's inauguration, according to the Morning Consult/Politico survey. Approval for the law also increased by 11 points or more among urban voters, voters with incomes between $50,000 and $100,000 annually, and adults age 18 to 29, according to the poll, which surveyed 1,992 registered voters. The survey had a margin of error of 2 percentage points. A Morning Consult summary of the results noted that support for the ACA grew by a greater extent among voters who thought the country was on the "wrong track," with approval for Obamacare increasing by 13 percentage points among that group. In contrast, public disapproval of the Affordable Care Act, which had stood at 52 percent at the beginning of January, fell to 45 percent after Trump took office, the survey found. Shortly after being sworn in as president, Trump signed an executive order authorizing heads of federal departments to take actions to reduce fiscal or regulatory burdens on individuals, health-care providers and insurers, and states from the ACA. On the heels of that order, the Health and Human Services Department suspended ads and outreach encouraging people to sign up for Obamacare plans on the federal marketplace HealthCare.gov. However, on Friday, the Trump administration partially reversed that suspension, and said that automatic emails, phone calls and social media messages to prod people to sign up for HealthCare.gov plans would continue. Open enrollment in individual health plans like those sold on that and other Obamacare exchanges, ends Tuesday. The Republican-led Congress has voted to set repeal of Obamacare in motion, at the same time GOP leaders discuss replacing the ACA with other health-care legislation. But recordings secretly made last week at a Philadelphia retreat attended by congressional Republicans revealed how a number of them are worried about what that a replacement plan will look like, and the potential political fallout from it. The ACA has been credited with increasing the number of Americans with health insurance coverage by 20 million. There is concern among Republicans that if a replacement plan leads to a significant reduction in the number of insured people, the GOP will suffer for it in the midterm elections of 2018. watch now A petition to stop President Donald Trump's state visit to the United Kingdom has gathered a million signatures since Saturday. The petition states that Trump should be allowed to enter the U.K. in his capacity as head of the U.S. government, but he should not be invited to make an official state visit because "it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen." "Donald Trump's well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore during the term of his presidency Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official State Visit," the petition read. Trump's visit to London was announced last week during U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May's trip to the U.S. and is expected to take place later this year. "The government's position is that an invitation has been extended to the President and it has been accepted," Downing Street, the official residence of the prime minister, told CNBC. Asked whether parliament will debate this petition, the Downing Street spokesperson said it is one for the houses to decide. Parliament debates any petition that has more than 100,000 signatures. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn took to Twitter to criticize May, saying she would be failing the people if she failed to postpone the state visit. Tweet1 Corbyn also tweeted that Trump should not be allowed to enter the U.K. Tweet2 Meanwhile, London Mayor Sadiq Khan tweeted that Trump's travel ban, announced on Friday, is shameful and cruel. Tweet3 Trump signed an executive order to temporarily block refugees from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the U.S. The countries are Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Updated: Trump Is No Longer Planning To Speak In Milwaukee This Thursday By Rachel Cromidas in News on Jan 30, 2017 5:20AM Getty Images / Photo: Pool Updated: Tuesday afternoon reports suggest that President Donald Trump is longer planning to travel to Milwaukee Thursday to give an economic speech. We will update this post when more information is available. President Donald Trump is reportedly planning a trip to Milwaukee this Thursday, where he will deliver an economic address on the topic of manufacturing. From there, he'll head to his Florida resort, according to CNN. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is reporting that Trump is considering using Sate Fair Park or the Harley-Davidson Museum as the site of his visithis first time in Wisconsin since stopping through during his "Thank You" Tour. He is scheduled to attend the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C. that morning before flying out. Trump is also slated to announce his nominee for the Supreme Court vacancy on Thursday. Russian buyers have long been active in Miami real estate, but now they appear to be more interested than anyone else. Searches originating from Russia topped the list of international interest in miamire.com, the official website of the Miami Association of Realtors, in November 2016. This is the first time Russia has led other countries in Miami interest since the association began tracking web clicks in 2013. Brazil topped the list in November 2015, with Venezuela, Argentina and Columbia following. Russia came in fifth. A much stronger dollar may be a factor in pushing South Americans down the list, but a much stronger relationship between Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, and President Donald Trump may also be bringing in more Russian interest. Miami, Florida Joe Raedle | Getty Images Following Trump's victory in November, Russian interest in the U.S. luxury real estate market jumped 35 percent, according to Knight Frank, a global real estate consultancy. Russian interest in the U.S. had dropped off dramatically in previous years, as the U.S. imposed economic sanctions on Russia. "This is consistent with buying relationships with the new administration and Russia," said Jonathan Miller, president of Miller Samuel, an appraisal and research firm. Trump not only has a better relationship with Putin than did President Barack Obama, but he also has a history of doing big real estate deals with the Russian rich. In 2004, he bought a distressed Palm Beach, Florida, mansion for $41 million and then four years later sold it to Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev for nearly $100 million. "Without a doubt, the No. 1 [for the interest] is the fact that the Russians seem to be happy about the result of the election," said Christopher Zoller, chairman of the board of the Miami Association of Realtors. "Knowing what they think they're going to see going forward, I think that gives them more confidence." Scott McIntyre | Bloomberg | Getty Images The head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund isn't worried about the ongoing U.S. sanctions on his country. Jobs and businesses, says Kirill Dmitriev, CEO of the RDIF, are key to reconnecting Russia and the U.S. "We really are open to strategic cooperation with U.S. leading corporations," Dmitriev said to CNBC's "Power Lunch" earlier today. He says his focus is on opportunities that create jobs both in the U.S. and in Russia, particularly ones that harness the infrastructure in Russia together with "U.S. capabilities and know-how." This shared economic interest in jobs, says Dmitriev, is the key to restoring relations between the two countries. Late last year, the outgoing Obama administration imposed additional sanctions on Russia following allegations by U.S. intelligence of Russian interference in the U.S. elections. The 2016 sanctions came on top of 2014 sanctions imposed by the American government and the European Union after Russia took control of Crimea. On Saturday, U.S. President Donald Trump talked by phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin, which was described as "positive" and "a significant start to improving the relationship between the United States and Russia that is in need of repair," by the White House in a statement. However, Trump said on Friday it was "very early" to talk about lifting any sanctions. The Russian Direct Investment Fund was founded in 2011 by the Russian government to encourage direct investment in the country. Companies managed by the fund include hospital chains, children's shops, diamond producers and pharmaceutical companies. President Donald Trump announced an executive order banning incoming travelers from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen, leaving 109 travelers detained at airports over the weekend. White House chief of staff Reince Priebus later clarified that the order " doesn't include green card holders going forward ." "I had literally at least two or three dozen people contact me over the weekend asking me if they should just go back home give it up," said Vivek Wadhwa, an engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University's Silicon Valley campus. The weekend's travel ban is sending shock waves through the immigrant community in Silicon Valley and some are wondering if they should leave the U.S. altogether, one expert told CNBC. Still, with permanent residents temporarily affected by the travel ban, some tech workers are asking, "What if it could be me next?," said Wadhwa, author of "The Immigrant Exodus: Why America Is Losing the Global Race to Capture Entrepreneurial Talent." Indeed, a draft obtained by Bloomberg indicated that skilled immigration reform could be the next target of the Trump administration. Wadhwa had previously told CNBC that some of Trump's changes might actually be good for curbing abuse of skilled visas. "They've been waiting five, 10, 15 years for their green cards," Wadhwa told CNBC's "Closing Bell" on Monday. "And now, is it worth it? Even if they get their green card, what if Trump decides he doesn't like Hindus anymore? .... Or he doesn't like people from Pakistan?" The Trump administration has defended the ban, noting that it "temporarily inconvenienced for the safety of us all." But Wadhwa said it is scaring away talented engineers from America's technology companies and "making America look like a banana republic." Technology companies across the country said they did not support the travel ban, and the mood is dark across the California tech sector, Wadhwa said. "It's a threat to their business and their employees are terrified," Wadhwa said. "A lot of people here are on temporary visas. What happened this weekend was they realized, even if they are on a green card a permanent resident visas they could still be ejected from the United States." 'Chronic' Unemployment Of Young People Of Color Tied To Crime: Study By Stephen Gossett in News on Jan 30, 2017 7:22PM Getty Images / Photo: Bill Pugliano A study released on Monday indicates a strong connection between violent crime and joblessness, which runs alarmingly high among young black men in Chicago. Among certain age ranges, it is the worst in the nation, the report found. Prepared by the University of Illinois at Chicagos Great Cities Institute, the report was presented on Monday at the Chicago Urban League among officials such as U.S. Sen Dick Durbin, U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky and Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle. Perhaps the most alarming conclusion in the report, titled Abandoned in their Neighborhoods: Youth Joblessness Amidst the Flight of Industry and Opportunity, is that joblessness among black 20 to 24-year-olds rose to 60.2 percent in 2015, up from 58.7 percent the year prior. Black men and women within that age range both had a higher jobless rate (roughly 60 percent for either gender) than New York (50.3), Los Angeles (48.4), the state of Illinois (51.6) at large and the country overall (45.2). Young Latinos meanwhile have had a particularly difficult job of rebounding from the recession. Latinos in Chicago, ages 16 to 19, actually continued to decline after 2010. Joblessness among young people of color in Chicago is chronic and concentrated, the report found. The decline in available jobs is directly tied the decline of manufacturing sector in Chicago and the emptying out of jobs from neighborhoods, a contrast from the professional level services downtown, the report notes. Forty-three percent of black men between the ages of 20 and 24 are neither employed nor attending school, researchers found. Thats a sobering contrast to when Chicagos manufacturing employment thrived decades ago: In 1960, only 22.3 percent of black man within the age range were unemployed or out of school. While proposed anti-violence solutions in Chicago tend to revolve around tougher sentencing and increasing police stops, researchers argue that the chronic unemployment options for young people of color are a significant influence as well. While rampant joblessness may not completely explain violence, we learn from young people that it is no doubt a contributing factor and conversely, providing a job can mitigate the conditions that lead to criminal activities, the report states. Sarkawt Shams left Iraq for the US on a special immigrant visa in 2013 when he felt the risk to his life was too great. During his four years working for the US consulate in Baghdad and Erbil, Mr Shams would go to great lengths on his commute to avoid detection. His parents had finalised their visas to join him in Washington and were weeks away from taking their flights. His wife of two years was preparing for her final visa interview in March. More from the Financial Times: Trump seeks to shift blame for travel chaos What are executive orders and why is Trump using them? Airline stocks in retreat amid Trump travel ban fallout "She was crying all night," Mr Shams says, describing his wife's reaction to Donald Trump's temporary ban on US entry for seven Muslim-majority nations. "I cannot leave and she cannot join me . . . all we can do is dream." The ban has affected hundreds of Iraqis who worked for the US government and intelligence services. "The risks for these people are really high. They will be targeted," says Mr Shams, an Iraqi Kurd. "This really is a matter of life or death." Mr Shams has been told that travelling to Iraq will invalidate his permanent residence status, but "I'm not going to leave my wife or my family behind", he says. "Even if I have to risk my life, I have to go back." Presidential counselor Kellyanne Conway told CNBC on Monday there was no reason to delay carrying out the executive order on temporarily banning travel for "foreign nationals or citizens" from seven Muslim-majority countries. Appearing on "Squawk Box," Conway said President Donald Trump needs to tweet to get the real information out. "This total misinformation and what I would say information 'underload' about the facts and figures ... are astonishing." Trump tweeted this morning: "Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,..... "protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN! "There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world! "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there!" Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,..... protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN! There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world! If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there! In the first 23 hours, 109 people were denied entry upon arrival. According to NBC News, 173 were denied boarding of incoming flights to the U.S. from the seven countries: Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. The number affected on Saturday was 375, compared with 325,000 travelers who arrive on average daily. After a weekend of protests and detentions of foreigners at American airports, Trump defended his move. He said the executive order he signed Friday was strictly about national security and not religion. "This is a very narrowly prescribed situation, executive order," for 90 days, Conway said. "Here it is: If you are a foreign national or citizen of one of these seven countries that were first identified by President Obama in 2015, then you cannot come to the United States at this moment." After the arrest of two Iraqis on federal terrorism charges in Kentucky that year, the State Department stopped processing Iraq refugees for six months, according to The Washington Post. "If you have a special situation, you'll be evaluated on a case by case basis," Conway told CNBC on Monday. "This country has an interest in the full faith and credit or our green card or LPR [lawful permanent resident] program," Conway said. "That is not who this narrowly prescribed, temporary halt is meant to apply to." On Saturday, a federal judge in New York temporarily barred the U.S. from deporting detainees from the countries covered in the order. In a background call with reporters on Sunday, a senior administration official declared the order's implementation "a massive success," claiming it had been done "seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism." But Republican Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham on Sunday denounced Trump's order, calling it "hasty" and warning it could prove counterproductive in the fight against terrorism. Addressing of the execution of the order, Conway said: "Keeping the country safe is the president's first obligation. And why would you delay implementation of a measure that's meant to meet that objective." "[Trump's] first objective is not to mollify protesters who will never be happy even after they benefit from his rollback of regulations, his tax relief package, his infrastructure [spending], and his making health care more affordable," she said. Trump's move also drew sharp rebuke from Silicon Valley, which relies heavily on immigrant workers, some of whom have helped start Alphabet 's Google, Facebook , eBay and Yahoo . Google co-founder and Alphabet President Sergey Brin who came to the U.S. from the Soviet Union joined protesters at San Francisco International Airport on Saturday night to show his personal support for the travelers caught up in Trump's order. Brin told a Forbes reporter "I'm here because I'm a refugee." Ryan Mac tweet Facing backlash from users, Uber said it would create a $3 million defense fund to help cover the legal expenses associated with the executive order. Customers became angered after the ride-hailing service did not shutdown service at New York's Kennedy International on Saturday, in solidarity with a work-stoppage called by a cab-driver group. Other companies also came out against the Trump order. Starbucks' outgoing CEO Howard Schultz vowed to hire 10,000 refugees globally, and Airbnb is offering free lodging to refugees not allowed in the United States. "You don't need to be a Muslim, a Green Card holder, or a refugee, or have a friend like Rasheed to feel the impact of this radical remaking of America." When a college student gets an engineering degree and goes to start his or her own company, investors know that student succeeded in a system that attracts the smartest minds from all over the world. Foreign airlines buy Boeing planes because Boeing is a company founded in a society that believes in merit, talent, inclusiveness, and competition. Succeeding in Americaeither as an individual or as a companyis based on the notion that you are competing against the best ideas and the most talented individuals, regardless of what they believe or where they were born. That's the American brand. And that brand has worked really well for us. That brand is the reason why a nation with 5 percent of the global population can be the world's biggest innovation engine. The words on the Statue of Liberty welcoming immigrants to America through a "Golden Door" weren't just a poetic metaphor. They were an economic prophesy. Our belief in an open, welcoming, competitive society is our gold mine. It's what has made our businesses innovative and our economy strong. Donald Trump is destroying America's brand as a beacon for the talent. Over the weekend Trump informed the world the United States is no longer a welcoming nation, that our government no longer believes in the concept of individual merit and worthiness, and instead finds specific groups of people and religions wholly unworthy of the opportunity to earn the title "American." You don't need to be a Muslim, a Green Card holder, or a refugee, or have a friend like Rasheed to feel the impact of this radical remaking of America. You just have to know that the more a nation closes itself off from the world, the more economically stagnant it becomes. No one is buying jet engines manufactured in Uzbekistan, and the graduates of Turkmenistan's universities aren't creating the world's next innovative companies. Even China, the alleged great economic threat Trump can't stop talking about, has a per capita income lower than Romania and Costa Rica. That should come as no surprise, given that both Cost Rica and Romania are ranked by Freedom House as being more open than China. Of course, the impact of Trump's Executive Orders is about more than just our national brand. Recently my youngest daughter came to my office and asked me if we would let some of our Hispanic and Muslim friends hide in our basement, should they need it. "Like Anne Frank," she said. I've written online enough to know that even hinting at the possibility that we might be traveling down some of history's darkest roads brings out a hysterical outcry and people citing "Godwin's Law," which is the idea that invoking Hitler automatically invalidates any argument. Citing Godwin's Law means you view history as though it were the Star Wars movies. That view of history is wrong. Only George Lucas thinks the story of an Evil Empire starts in the middle. In real life, every story has a beginning. But it doesn't take going full-Fuhrer to damage our country. It might be as simple as telling the world you're no longer welcome in America, and you should take your hopes, dreams, and talent elsewhere. And if that's who we've become, we all lose. Commentary by Dustin McKissen, the founder and CEO of McKissen + Company, a strategy, marketing, and public relations firm based in St. Charles, Missouri. He was named one of LinkedIn's "Top Voices" in 2015 and 2016, and is currently pursuing a PhD in Organizational and Industrial Psychology. Follow him on Twitter @DMcKissen. For more insight from CNBC contributors, follow @CNBCOpinion on Twitter. President Donald Trump's far-reaching travel ban could be used as fuel for terrorist groups in the affected areas to turn people against the United States, perpetuating the terrorist threat, International Rescue Committee CEO David Miliband told CNBC on Monday. "This is a propaganda gift for all those who would do harm to the United States," Miliband told "Squawk Box." "We ... know that ISIS and others are saying that the only people who will defend Muslims are them, and that's obviously very dangerous." Trump said the ban does not target people by religion and the travel restrictions were similar to a six-month ban by the Obama administration on visas from Iraq in 2011. Miliband said that the hasty order and its chaotic implementation were flawed for a number of reasons. He took issue with the isolation of people in the Middle East, namely Iraq, who help the U.S. military run its operations. He said that the International Rescue Committee is supposed to resettle about 3,500 of them, most of whom are translators or have similar supporting jobs, in the United States this year. "These are people who have literally risked their lives for the national security of the United States," he said. "They are targeted in Iraq for supporting the U.S., and so the substance of the policies really needs to be looked at." The other countries on Trump's order are Libya, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Miliband also argued that "hasty policymaking makes for bad policy," and that the administration would have been better off conducting a review of the vetting policies that were already in place before imposing any kind of ban. Responding to Kellyanne Conway, who spoke on CNBC earlier Monday about the ban, Miliband said he would encourage the administration to backpedal, and backpedal fast. "I would say to her, it's always tough to do a U-turn," said Miliband, a British Labour Party member and former foreign secretary of the United Kingdom. "The green card change is the first of the minor U-turns. But I've been in government. I know it's much better to do a U-turn fast than to have it pulled out of you over months and years." "It would be difficult to overstate the hardship and dangers the first American advisory team lived through. Our Iraqi soldiers shared the danger." I also survived an assassination attempt in January 2005. Had it not been for another interpreter in whom I placed my utter trust and confidence, with my life, I should not have survived my tour. This Iraqi interpreter, whom I will refer to as Abdallah, survived his own assassination attempt. He was later one of the first recipients of a Special Immigrant Visa, and came to live with me for the first 8 months he was in the United States. This man served U.S. forces in combat for 7 years, participating in the 2nd Battle of Fallujah during which he stormed buildings and accompanied advisers in the stack as we fought the insurgents room by room. He is a veteran of literally hundreds of missions, including Special Operation Forces anti-terrorist missions. He also served as an interpreter for a U.S. army general officer in Iraq. In sum, this man is one of the bravest and most dedicated men I have met in my life. This is a man who has completely committed to the service of the United States. And despite all his service and bravery, he was still vetted extremely by the following agencies in order to get his Special Immigrant Visa: the DHS, the FBI, the DIA, the NSA, and the State Department. And he required sponsorship by a general officer. His story at least has a partial happy ending. He settled in a town close to where I live. He married and bought a house. He became a U.S. citizen. He and his wife had a child. Several members of his family have joined him in our country. Some have found employment, others have started businesses. Theirs is an Iraqi story, but it is an American story, epic in scope and born out of a lifetime of combat and hardship, and tempered by virtue and courage. Until Friday. The elected President signed an executive order banning people from seven countries, including Iraq. The inclusion of Iraq, and of people already in the U.S., makes no sense. Iraq is at least in name an ally. We have American troops right now as I write this, working with Iraqi forces in combat against ISIS in/around Mosul. There are Iraqi interpreters right now risking their lives, their families, what treasure they might have, and their sacred honor for the sake of the U.S. war in Iraq. The executive order signed by the President is ill-conceived, and misses its target. The extension of the ban to green card (recently reversed) and Special Immigrant Visas holders endangers our troops currently in contact, and all future troops who will need the services of interpreters, on whom their lives will depend. It persecutes, without due process, men and women who served the U.S. in combat, and have already gone through the extensive vetting by our security and intelligence agencies. It provokes a fight with people who have survived the worst Al Qaeda and ISIS could offer, and with people who given a choice, chose America. I was there on Jan 30th 2005, the first Iraqi free elections. I saw the Iraqis chanting and waving their purple-stained fingers in the air despite the attacks by Al Qaeda to keep them from voting. I fought for democracy, and for people who are committed to democracy. I did not fight, and bleed, to betray the people who hazarded all they have, for the sake of decency, for the sake of democracy. Commentary by Michael J. Zacchea, a combat-wounded, medically retired U.S. Marine. He was awarded two bronze stars for valor and meritorious service in Iraq, and a Purple Heart. He co-authored a book with CNBC's Ted Kemp, The Ragged Edge: A US Marine's Account of Leading the Iraqi Army Fifth Battalion (Chicago Review Press), which is due to be published April 1, 2017. For more insight from CNBC contributors, follow @CNBCOpinion on Twitter. Obama Calls Out Trump Immigration Ban In 1st Statement Since Transition By Stephen Gossett in News on Jan 30, 2017 9:42PM Photo: Tyler LaRiviere Less than two weeks after leaving office, former President Barack Obama joined the chorus of those supporting protests against Donald Trumps immigration-ban executive order. President Obama is heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country, read the statement from Kevin Lewis, spokesperson to the former president. It was Obama's first statement since leaving office. Presidents of course tend to limit comment about or criticism of their immediate successors, and the statement doesnt go so far as to name Trump or call out his executive order out specifically. But the implication is impossible to miss. Obama believes that American values are at stake, the statement read. He also defended himself against Trump's misguided charge that his actions are similar to ones take by Obama in 2011. The statement read in full: "President Obama is heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country. In his final official speech as President, he spoke about the important role of citizens and how all Americans have a responsibility to be the guardians of our democracy not just during an election but every day. Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake. With regard to comparisons to President Obamas foreign policy decisions, as weve heard before, the President fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith." Trumps executive order lifted the nations refugee program for 120 days, suspended Syrian refugees indefinitely, imposed a 90-day entry ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The order sparked chaos and protests at airports in Chicago, Los Angeles, New York City, Washington D.C., and San Francisco over the weekend, as even travelers with green cards and visas were extendedly detained. Even before President Donald Trump announces his Supreme Court pick Tuesday night, one Democratic senator threatened to hold up the choice, potentially sparking a second straight year of partisan clashing over the vacancy. Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., told Politico on Monday that he will filibuster Trump's choice. He called it a "stolen seat" because the Republican-controlled Senate did not vote on Merrick Garland, whom former President Barack Obama nominated last year for the late Justice Antonin Scalia's vacant seat. Merkley's threats potentially set up another year of heated rhetoric over the court seat. Last year, Obama and Democrats repeatedly accused Republicans of playing politics by blocking Garland's nomination. A filibuster would mean Trump's nominee would need 60 votes to get confirmed, and Republicans have 52 Senate seats. However, Democrats would risk Republicans ending the filibuster and losing it in future fights. White House spokesman Sean Spicer slammed the potential filibuster move on Monday. "Before they've even heard who this individual is, some of them are absolutely saying 'no.' That just shows this is all about politics," the press secretary said. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., previously indicated that he could oppose Trump's pick if he is not "mainstream." Trump said he will announce the choice at 8 p.m. ET on Tuesday. Reports indicate he is considering Neil Gorsuch, a judge on the federal appeals court's 10th Circuit, and Thomas Hardiman, an appeals judge for the 3rd Circuit. Over the weekend, activists and celebrities began using Twitter to urge a boycott of Uber using the hashtag #DeleteUber. The movement started after the New York Taxi Workers Alliance called for a temporary halt to rides heading to John F. Kennedy airport as a gesture of solidarity with visitors who were held there after Trump's sudden order to restrict entry from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Uber continued to send drivers to JFK and announced it would not charge surge pricing: No surge from Uber. Despite Uber's insistence it was not trying to break the taxi strike and CEO Travis Kalanick's opposition to the travel ban, the movement continued into Monday morning, with critics making a big deal of Kalanick's role on Trump's Economic Advisory Board. Meanwhile, competitor Lyft donated $1 million to the ACLU, which is fighting Trump's travel ban in court. For a lot of people, that was a clear reason to delete Uber and install Lyft instead: Delete Uber, install Lyft. Now Lyft usage is surging, and it's passed Uber in daily downloads, according to TechCrunch. But the #DeleteUber crew seems to have missed Lyft's own ties to the Trump administration. In 2015, financier Carl Icahn made a $100 million investment into Lyft. His interests are represented on its board of directors through John Christodoro of Icahn Capital. Icahn did a lot more than Kalanick to help get Trump elected. He was an early and vocal supporter of Trump during the campaign, claiming that the businessman would be much better for the economy than Hillary Clinton, and Trump appointed Icahn as a special advisor on regulation in December. Icahn isn't the only Trump advisor with a connection to Lyft. Founders Fund, the venture capital firm founded by Trump advisor Peter Thiel, led Lyft's B round and invested in the next two rounds as well. A Lyft spokeperson told CNBC, "We don't always agree with our investors and aren't afraid to say so. We do respect their right, and that of every American, to freedom of expression." Kalanick has made no secret of his libertarian political views, which are more closely aligned with Republicans. But if activists are upset about his support of Trump, boycotting Uber for Lyft isn't necessarily the solution. Maybe they should take a taxi instead. Britain's cities are overwhelmingly dependent on their European counterparts for trade, according to new research, underscoring the risk to jobs and growth in the U.K. post-Brexit. An annual report from the Centre for Cities think tank found that the European Union (EU) is, by some distance, the biggest export market for almost every British city. The report also showed the U.K. would need to drastically increase trade to other international markets in order to offset a downturn in exports to the EU. Currently, 46 percent of exports from U.K. cities are delivered to the EU which is three times more than to the US and 11 times more than to China, according to Centre for Cities' research. "Securing the best possible EU trade deal will be critical for the prosperity of cities across Britain, and should be the Government's top priority as we prepare to leave the single market and potentially the customs union," Alexandra Jones, chief executive of Centre for Cities, said in a note. "While it's right to be ambitious about increasing exports to countries such as the U.S. and China, the outcome of EU trade negotiations will have a much bigger impact on places and people up and down the country," she added. The Centre for Cities report estimated that if exports to the EU decreased by 10 percent, as a consequence of Brexit, the country's urban areas would have to nearly double export trade to China or increase exports to the U.S. by almost a third to counterbalance the loss from the EU. Protesters gather outside Terminal 4 at JFK airport in opposition to U.S. president Donald Trump's proposed ban on immigration in Queens, New York City, U.S., January 28, 2017. U.K. government claims that it had won clarification and concessions from the U.S. on its crackdown on visa rules were thrown into confusion Monday after the U.S. embassies were reported to have issued contradictory advice. On Saturday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order that people travelling to the U.S. from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen would be refused visa entry to the U.S. However, the U.K.'s Foreign and Commonwealth Office, headed by foreign secretary Boris Johnson, issued Sunday what it claimed was a clarification of the details of the highly controversial travel ban. The clarification included: The Presidential executive order only applies to individuals travelling from one of the seven named countries. The executive order does not apply to people travelling to the U.S. from anywhere other than one of those seven countries and there will be no extra immigration checks. U.K. citizens, even if they born in one of the seven countries, travelling from those countries to the U.S. are not covered by the executive order. Dual citizens of one of the seven countries travelling to the U.S. from outside those countries are also excluded from the order. Dual-citizens arriving from any of the seven named countries may, however, be subject to extra checks, the FCO confirmed. However, according to several media reports, U.S. embassies in Berlin and London Monday issued an "urgent notice" on their websites, warning people of dual nationality not to apply for visas or attend visa interviews as their applications would not be processed. That notice has since been taken down from the London embassy's website. Later Monday, the U.S. embassy in London issued a new advice, reversing it previous guidance and backing the original U.K. clarification. Representatives of the U.S. embassy were unavailable for further comment at the time this article was published. President Trump has defended the ban, saying that it was strictly about national security and not religion. Marine veteran Troy Therrien, 46, from Sturgeon Bay, Mich., takes part in a march with other veterans and activists outside the Oceti Sakowin camp where "water protectors" continue to demonstrate against plans to pass the Dakota Access pipeline adjacent to the Standing Rock Indian Reservation, near Cannon Ball, N.D. Stephen Yang | Reuters A U.S. military veterans group announced new efforts to support the Standing Rock Native American tribe and protesters who oppose completion of the Dakota Access pipeline, just days after President Donald Trump took action to move the project forward. Those efforts include developing the capability to deploy thousands of veteran volunteers to Standing Rock, potentially putting the White House in a politically difficult position. They come as tensions have escalated between protesters and law officers in recent weeks. Veterans Stand launched a fundraising drive on GoFundMe last week to support a network of protesters camped out near Cannon Ball, North Dakota. It seeks to raise $500,000 to buy supplies for campers, provide car rides for volunteers and create a rapid response ability. It has raised about $19,000 in two days. The 4,000 could have easily turned into 20,000, because that's how we're trained to operate. Anthony Diggs communications director, Veterans Stand "We stand in unity with our brothers and sisters in Standing Rock (and beyond) and our community is ready to mobilize," the group said on the GoFundMe page. About 4,000 veterans traveled to the reservation in North Dakota last month to support the protest by the Standing Rock Sioux tribe, environmentalists and other activists, according to figures provided by Veterans Stand. The Standing Rock Sioux oppose completion of Energy Transfer Partners ' Dakota Access pipeline because it would pass beneath a source for the tribe's drinking water and construction would disrupt sacred land, they say. Dakota Access pipeline route, source: Energy Transfer Partners The project, which would deliver oil from North Dakota to Illinois, is nearly complete except for a small portion about half a mile north of the reservation. That stretch requires an easement from the Army Corps of Engineers. Protesters won a temporary victory under former President Barack Obama when the Corps denied the easement. The Corps launched a new environmental impact study with the goal of identifying new routes for the pipeline an option Energy Transfer Partners said it would not consider. Problems for Trump Anthony Diggs, communications director for Veterans Stand, said the new campaign is motivated in part by Trump's presidential memo ordering the Army Corps of Engineers to expedite its environmental review and consider other actions that would pave the way for the project's approval. The group's ongoing support sets up a potential confrontation between veterans and an outspoken president who frequently praises the military but rarely holds back when challenged. Trump suffered backlash during the presidential campaign after he made disparaging comments about Khizr and Ghazala Khan, the Pakistani-American parents of a fallen U.S. soldier. The couple spoke out against Trump's policies, including a ban on Muslim immigration to the United States. The president ignored a reporter's request to make a statement to the Standing Rock community after signing the presidential memo. White House press secretary Sean Spicer later said Trump would speak to all parties involved. watch now The presence of veterans among protesters has a potent effect, Diggs said. Energy Transfer Partners, the government and local authorities knew it would be a public relations disaster "if they had veterans standing in solidarity in peaceful protest being fired upon with rubber bullets on live TV." Veterans Stand is focusing on delivering aid to protesters remaining at the camp, and will hold off on deploying volunteers so the group can avoid complicating logistics or stretching resources, Diggs said. The decision to send more volunteers will be made with tribal leaders, he added. "We still have people on the ground out there, but we want to make sure we're going out there in service," he said. Still, Diggs said the veterans group has the ability to rapidly scale up its presence if necessary. "The 4,000 could have easily turned into 20,000, because that's how we're trained to operate," he said, referring to the December deployment of volunteers. Tensions escalate Veterans Stand said it was also taking new steps because "turmoil and uncertainty at Standing Rock has increased significantly" in the last two weeks. Diggs said an escalation took place this month after the Morton County Sheriff's Department and private security firms began moving to clear protest camps. Rob Keller, a spokesman for the sheriff's department, said authorities had not tried to remove protesters. Instead, sheriffs and National Guard troops responded to the actions of some of the camp's more militant activists. Those people recently cut wire blocking access to a contested bridge and a fence along the Missouri River, and attempted to reach a drill pad for the Dakota Access pipeline located on private property, he said. The White House on Monday continued to defend its controversial executive order related to travel from seven Muslim-majority countries and downplayed concerns it will make the United States less safe. After a weekend of confusion at airports and protests across the country, White House spokesman Sean Spicer fielded numerous questions about President Donald Trump's order, maintaining that Trump signed it to secure the country. He also downplayed the detention of travelers at U.S. airports, arguing that they were "temporarily inconvenienced for the safety of us all." "I think the president's No. 1 goal is the protection and safety of the United States and its people," Spicer said. The order indefinitely bars Syrian refugees from entering the country. It also suspends all refugee admissions for 120 days and blocks all citizens of the seven largely Muslim countries from entering for 90 days. Many Democratic lawmakers and some Republicans have criticized the White House for the planning and application of the order, as some lawful visa holders were detained coming into the United States. Others have argued it will prove counterproductive in the fight against terrorism, saying it will send a message that the U.S. does not accept Muslims. Spicer did not directly answer a question about critics, including lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, arguing that the order would play into terrorist rhetoric and make the U.S. less safe. He contended that some people may not have "read exactly what the order said and are reading it through misguided media reports." The press secretary said that 109 people out of the 325,000 travelers who entered the country on the first day of the order were detained. He did not say how many people were affected since. "I'm sorry that some folks may have had to wait a little while," Spicer said. Trump cited the same statistic in a tweet defending the travel order on Monday morning. He instead blamed a Delta Air Lines computer problem, protesters and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer for the problems at airports. A judge blocked part of Trump's order late Saturday, preventing the U.S. from deporting people with valid visas or who are legally authorized to enter the country. The White House and Department of Homeland Security, however, have said the order remains in full force. Some of the criticism of the order has focused on what appeared to be its quick application. One report indicated that the DHS secretary only found out about it as Trump signed it. Spicer maintained that "all appropriate agencies and individuals that needed to be a part of the process were." White House spokesman Sean Spicer said Monday the Trump administration didn't telegraph its immigration ban beforehand because there was a brief period time to "ensure the people of the United States were safe." In an interview on Monday on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," following President Donald Trump's executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, Spicer asked what would have happened if the U.S. didn't act and "somebody was killed?" "Three hundred and twenty-five thousand people flew into this country from airports and 109 people were affected and slowed down in their travel. I understand that is an inconvenience but at the end of the day that is a small price to pay as opposed to somebody losing their life because a terrorist attack was admitted," Spicer told MSNBC. Spicer did not say that a threat was imminent. Late Friday, the Trump administration announced that it would temporarily bar entry to travelers from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen due to terrorism concerns. A federal judge granted an emergency stay Saturday to bar deportation of people with valid visas who landed in the U.S., following chaos and detentions. Shortly after Spicer's interview, Trump tweeted about people being detained, saying the big problems at airports were caused by a Delta Airl Lines computer outage. @realDonaldTrump: Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,..... @realDonaldTrump: protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN! Spicer also spoke about Trump's decision to give his chief strategist Steve Bannon a spot on the National Security Council. "He brings to the table a much greater scope of the political landscape vis-a-vis the world the geopolitical and national security affairs," he said. SYRACUSE, N.Y. Loretto plans to add 20 Medicaid-eligible, assisted-living program beds at its Sedgwick Heights location at 1100 James St. in Syracuse. The New York State Department of Health approved the organizations request to do so, Loretto said in a news release issued Jan. 30. This takes us from 120 to 140 assisted-living program beds at the Sedgwick Heights community, Rick Mills, executive director of housing at Loretto, said. This means that 20 of our existing beds will now become eligible for residents through the Medicaid program. Loretto, headquartered at 700 E. Brighton Ave. in Syracuse, is a network of agencies providing long-term care services for older adults in Central New York. Loretto last year applied for the additional Medicaid-eligible beds in its assisted-living program. It was responding to the state Health Departments assisted-living program opportunity for development. The state made the opportunity for development available through a budget initiative to expand the states assisted-living program by 6,000 beds over seven years. We are always working to find new ways to keep up with the growing demand for our services, Penny Abulencia, senior VP at Loretto, said in the release. These additional beds help us to support our mission to provide care for families and individuals at all income levels, especially with the growing demands from the aging population in our community. Thanks to the aging of Baby Boomers, there are more than 128,000 people needing some kind of elderly care right here in Onondaga County. Sedgwick Heights offers an adult home program for older adults who require some assistance with activities of daily living. It also provides an assisted-living program for medically stable individuals who qualify medically for a nursing-home facility. In addition, Sedgwick Heights offers respite stay for individuals who need a temporary-living setting with support services, such as immediately after a hospital stay or while caregivers are away. The Sedgwick Heights approval followed the state go-ahead to add 38 Medicaid-eligible beds in the assisted-living program at the Bernardine back in October. The Bernadine is a retirement community located at 417 Churchill Ave. in Syracuse. The approval brings the number of assisted-living program beds at the Bernardine to 108, which are part of a total of 148 beds at the location. The designation of these additional beds at Sedgwick Heights and the Bernardine brings the total number of Medicaid-eligible beds in the assisted-living program in the Loretto system up to 352. Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com Confusion, Invasive Questioning As Travelers Held At O'Hare On Sunday By Stephen Gossett in News on Jan 30, 2017 5:21PM Confusion and fear carried over for a second day at OHare International Airport on Sunday with lengthy detentions, invasive questionings of detainees and reports of travelers visiting from outside the banned-countries list being held. Iran-born BBC journalist Ali Hamedani, a British citizen, was held for two hours at OHare on Sunday. Hamedani was made to surrender his phone and password to authorities, who then searched his social media. They were looking to find about any kind of political views, whether I'm supporting anybody - any kind of extremist idea or not," Hamedani told BBC Radio 5 Live, according to the Independent. They also asked me questions about whether I have been trained by the military, if I had been trained in military bases in Iran or when was the last time I was back home in Iran. It wasn't pleasant at all. To be honest with you, I was arrested back home in Iran in 2009 because I was working for the BBC and I felt the same this time, Hamedani added. When phone was siezed it took me a few mins to remember here is the US and no one can question me about my viewes. He was reading my tweets. Ali Hamedani (@BBCHamedani) January 29, 2017 As many as 50 people were detained on Sunday, lawyers told the Tribune. Barius Elhalab, a 19-year-old American-passport holder, was held for more than three hours on Sunday and asked by authorities, Do you love your country? the Sun-Times reports. Barius Elhalabi, the 19-year-old Lebanese man held with an American passport, said agents asked him, "Do you love your country?" pic.twitter.com/3Jly9zzit4 Nader Issa (@NaderDIssa) January 29, 2017 Travelers with documentation from outside Trumps restricted list of seven Muslim-majority nations were also impacted. Abed Romman, 29, waited to greet his brother, who was born in Syria but was traveling with a passport from Jordan, on Sunday. After more than five hours, Romman learned from volunteer lawyers that his brother would be sent back, according to the Sun-Times. Travelers arriving from Mexico were also held, lawyers told the Tribune. Its not clear if these instances were related to Trumps immigration ban. U.S. Customs and Border Protection did not return a request for comment. More than a thousand protesters demonstrated at Terminal 5 at O'Hare for the second consecutive night on Sunday. Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Rep. Jan Schakowsky and Cook County Commissioner Jesus "Chuy" Garcia were among those on hand. Photos: 30+ People Who Were Psyched To Jump In The Lake Saturday For Annual Polar Plunge By Rachel Cromidas in Arts & Entertainment on Jan 30, 2017 5:49PM A couple hundred people turned out despite Saturday's dreary weather to take the 16th annual Polar Plunge into frigid Lake Michigan. The event, hosted by the Lakeview Polar Bear Club, has raised over $300,000 over the years for families in need of help paying medical expenses. Our photographer Tyler LaRiviere caught the polar plungers in action as they ran from Oak Street Beach into the water. Mambo Guzman, a first-time plunger, told him it was exhilarating, but also painfully cold. "Nothing can prepare you for when the water hits." If you missed this polar plunge and that description doesn't dissuade you, another local organization, Special Olympics Chicago, is hosting one on March 5. Rahm To Host DREAMers, Urges Chicagoans To Be 'Welcoming' Of Immigrants By Stephen Gossett in News on Jan 30, 2017 4:18PM Getty Images / Photo: Scott Olson As executive orders from President Donald Trump target certain immigrants and American sanctuary cities alike, Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Sunday called on Chicago residents to offer welcoming words or host a meal for immigrants and pledged he would do the same. Emanuel said in a statement that he will host DREAMers from Chicago Public Schools and Chicago City Colleges for a meal, a conversation, and a recognition and celebration of all that unites us, rather than what divides us. Like several other large cities, Chicago has been on the front lines against Trumps recent immigration-crackdown policies. Emanuel vowed that the city would remain a sanctuary city, meaning local law enforcement and government would not assist federal agencies with immigration crackdowns; and large groups of protesters, lawyers and politicians flooded OHare International Airport this weekend after more than 60 travelers were reportedly detained as a result of Trumps ban. Emanuel was on hand at the Sunday protest at OHare. At the same time, Chicagos progressive wing has urged Emanuel to do more to protect undocumented residents. Last week Ald. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa (35th) called on the mayor to remove carve-outs and loopholes from Chicagos Welcoming City Ordinance. Hatem Abudayyeh, Executive Director of the Arab American Action Network, made the same call at protest against Donald Trumps immigration on Sunday night at OHare. Rahm said in his statement: One hundred years ago, the people of Chicago opened their hearts and their homes to my grandfather when he immigrated to this great city, fleeing the pogroms of Eastern Europe in search of freedom and opportunity. In that spirit, in the coming days my family and I will host DREAMers attending Chicago Public Schools and Chicago City Colleges for a meal, a conversation, and a recognition and celebration of all that unites us, rather than what divides us. I am asking every interested resident of the City of Chicago to join us by hosting a similar meal in your own homes and at restaurants in your own neighborhoods, or by sharing welcoming words through a phone call or email. At a moment of unease and vulnerability for so many, lets come together as a city and put action behind our words and the values we hold dear as a welcoming city. Lets show the world that the City of Big Shoulders is also a city of big hearts. 2022 Voters Guide Here is a look at what is on your local ballot. Find more here. Read the e-Edition MU Ukrainian students have trouble reaching family in homeland Vlad Sazhen and Alina Rohulia talk about the power outages in Ukraine caused by Russian strikes, leading to difficulty in keeping touch. You are here: Home China has released a short list of eight names for the country's first Mars spacecraft, which is scheduled to launch by 2020. The eight names-- "Fenghuang" (phoenix), "Tianwen" (questions for heaven), "Huoxing" (Mars), "Tenglong" (soaring dragon), "Qilin" (Kylin), "Zhuque" (rose finch), "Zhuimeng" (chasing dreams) and "Fengxiang" (flying phoenix), were the top names chosen from over 14,500 choices submitted through more than 35,900 proposals entered by people worldwide. China plans to launch its first Mars spacecraft by 2020, which will orbit, land and explore the Red Planet. Proposals were accepted from August last year. The eight names were selected via a jury review and online polls. The final choice will be announced around Space Day, April 24, according to a moon probe and space program center under the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence, which solicited the proposals. The decision by President Donald Trump to impose a broad immigration ban on seven countries may have an impact he didn't foresee. The ban, a 90-day moratorium on admissions and re-entry in the United States unveiled on Friday, isn't about H-1B visa-holders specifically. And it doesn't grow out of the his voiced concerns about the use of that visa to displace U.S. workers. Instead it affects tourists, business and student visas. Those with permanent residency, or green cards, are also affected. Trump's ban, issued through an executive order, affects all visa types in seven countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The action is ostensibly intended as an anti-terrorism measure. It targets some, but not all, Muslim-majority countries; Saudi Arabia, for instance, is not on the list. Aside from inflaming civil liberties groups, sparking court fights and spontaneous demonstrations last night at various U.S. airports, the move is also giving the tech industry a renewed voice and a rallying point on immigration. This comes at the same time the Trump administration is expected to begin pushing for H-1B reforms. Among those speaking out was Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, whose Twitter feed included a steady stream of retweets critical of Trump's action. "The Executive Order's humanitarian and economic impact is real and upsetting. We benefit from what refugees and immigrants bring to the U.S.," wrote Dorsey, and "This EO goes against our principles." [ To comment on this story, visit Computerworld's Facebook page. ] The tech leaders looked beyond the seven-country ban to make a broad push for immigration reform. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg urged Trump to help the "750,000 Dreamers benefit from the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program that allows them to live and work legally in the US. I hope the President and his team keep these protections in place." A federal court ruled late Saturday that the U.S. could not deport citizens of the banned countries who had already arrived in the U.S. It was prompted by a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union. Trump's move was put into place so fast it literally affected people in transit. "This was done with almost no notice," said Carl Shusterman, a Los Angeles-based immigration attorney. He said his office received a leaked draft of the executive order last Tuesday and began advising people about what was in the pipeline. "I think this is causing a lot of chaos for really no reason at all," said Shusterman. Trump's order prompted tech firms to scramble to locate and notify affected employees, and to issue statements over the weekend. "As an immigrant and as a CEO, I've both experienced and seen the positive impact that immigration has on our company, for the country, and for the world," wrote Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in a posting on LinkedIn on Saturday. "We will continue to advocate on this important topic." Microsoft said it has identified 76 employees who are citizens of the seven countries who have a U.S. visa and are affected. But it also said there may be other affected employees who have green cards. The seven countries cited by the Trump administration have had no role in the ongoing H-1B visa debate. In 2014, nearly 70% of all H-1B visas were issued to people born in India, according to U.S. data. Ron Hira, associate professor of public policy at Howard University, ran an analysis of the visas issued in the 2013 fiscal year alone and found a total of 1,220 H-1B visas, new visas or renewals, from workers in all seven countries. In that year, Iran had the largest number of visa holders, with 810. It was followed by Syria, with 280; Libya, with 53; and Iraq, at 46. The Sudan accounted for 18 visas; Yemen, 11; and Somalia, 2. In 2013, Microsoft was the top employer of H-1B-visa workers from the seven countries, with 31. It was followed by Qualcomm at 21, and Google at 15, according to Hira. "The Iran numbers suggest to me that it is foreign students who graduated from U.S. universities" as well as having family ties in the U.S., he said. Iran's Foreign Ministry, in a statement carried by Iranian media, called the U.S. move "insulting" and an "open affront" and said it is considering a reciprocal response. The Trump order also has broad impacts. "If a company wants to hire a worker from one of those countries, they won't be able to get a visa for at least 90 days," said Stephen Yale-Loehr, a professor of immigration law practice at Cornell University. "Foreign national employees on work visas who are temporarily overseas may not be able to return." The Computing Research Association, in a statement, warned that the Trump order "may also discourage foreign-born researchers from bringing their talents to the U.S. in the future, which would have significantly detrimental impacts on our national competitiveness." This story, "Trump immigration ban means a war with tech" was originally published by Computerworld . You ever think what your phone goes through on a typical day? It probably gets pretty grimy and gross. But many phones can't handle getting wet, much less actually washed. Well, now a company in Japan is doing something about that, creating a smartphone that users can actually scrub clean with soap and water. But is that one feature enough to make it appealing? In IT Blogwatch, we make sure all our devices are squeaky clean. So what is happening? Rafael Farinas has the background: Kyocera...introduced...the next model in its lineup of washable devices: the Kyocera Rafre. The smartphone is resistant to regular washes with soap and water...The Rafre is the second washable smartphone, preceded by Kyoceras DIGNO Rafre released in December 2015. Not entirely sure what that means? Andrew Grush explains: As for its water and soap proof specs? The Rafre has MIL-STD-810G certification, alongside IPX5, IPX8, and IPG5X ratings...that means it is dust, water, and shock resistant...also...it can handle both regular and body soap, in case you like jumping in the tub with your phone of course. But how does it manage to be waterproof? Evan Selleck is in the know: One...interesting aspect of the handset is the Smart Sonic Receiver technology...The handset doesnt have a traditional earpiece at the top...so water and dirt cant slip in. Instead, Kyocera uses the Smart Sonic Receiver tech to send vibrations through the phones display to the users eardrum to pass sound along. This all sounds intriguing, but what else do we know about it? Cosmin V. has some details: The Rafre...doesn't stand out through specs...it...sports a 5-in. display that supports HD (720p) resolution, and packs 2GB RAM and 16GB of internal memory (expandable up to 200GB via microSD card). ... The back side features a 13-megapixel camera with Kyocera's proprietary image-processing AINOS Engine, and...phase detection autofocus...on the front there's a secondary 5-megapixel selfie shooter...the phone runs Android 7.0 Nougat and it's powered by a 3,000 mAh battery. Any other interesting features? We let the people at Kyocera tell us themselves: The new Rafre features...a...cooking app that can be operated with hand gestures...Simple hand movements allow users to scroll through recipes, set timers and even answer calls without having to touch the device. ... Also...when the alarm clock rings the handset simultaneously reads out the weather forecast for the day. Users can...change settings so...the alarm goes off earlier on days with forecasted rain, thus mitigating potential delays and allowing better time management. Interested in getting one? Lulu Chang has some bad news for you (depending on where you live): Alas, the Kyocera Rafre will only be available in Japan when it launches in March...if youre an American with a need for a web-surfing bubble-bath companion, youre going to have to look for something [else]...That said, if the Rafre proves popular in its home country...it may make its way around the globe. ... Its unclear...what pricing will look like, but...the phone will be available in pale pink, clear white, and light blue. Anything else we need to know? Not really, just watch this: Police in Cockrell Hill, a community in southwest Dallas, admitted to losing digital evidence from as far back as 2009 after the departments server was compromised with ransomware. Cockrell Hill Police Department Chief Stephen Barlag said, As a result, all bodycam video, some photos, some in-car video, and some police department surveillance video were lost. Immediately, the police blamed Russian hackers, but Barlag later told WFAA that experts told him it more likely originated in Ukraine. The official press release, however, states, It is unknown for certain where the virus originated from. The ransomware attack occurred in December, according to a press release issued last week. The malware had been introduced onto the network from a spam email that had come from a cloned email address imitating a department-issued email address. The server and all computers were immediately disconnected from the internet and Cockrell Hill contacted the FBI Cybercrimes unit. The ransom demand was nearly $4,000 and the feds said paying was no guarantee the decryption key would be provided. So, the police decided not to pay and to instead wipe the server. As a result, the cops lost eight years of data stored on the server. The press release read: This virus affected all Microsoft Office Suite documents, such as Word documents and Excel files. In addition, all body camera video, some in-car video, some in-house surveillance video, and some photographs that were stored on the server were corrupted and were lost. No information contained in any of those documents, videos, or photographs was extracted or transmitted outside of the Police Department. Files that were affected did go back to 2009, however hard copies of ALL documents and the vast majority of the videos and photographs are still in the possession of the Police Department on CD or DVD. It is unknown at this time how many total digital copies of documents were lost, as it is also unknown how many videos or photographs that could have assisted newer cases will not be available, although the number of affected prosecutions should remain relatively small. The police department claimed the virus was OSIRIS, but as Bleeping Computer pointed out, There is no OSIRIS ransomware. Its quite possible that the departments server was infected with the Locky ransomware, which a few days prior had come out with a new version that appended the .osiris extension at the end of encrypted files. Chief Barlag told WFAA, Everything that was lost is gone. Our automatic backup started after the infection, so it just backed up infected files. As for the lost data, he added that none of this was critical information. That, however, depends on what side of the jail cell you're sitting, said Dallas criminal defense attorney J. Collin Beggs. He claimed hed been asking for video evidence since last summer and now there is definitely no video evidence to be turned over. Beggs asked the FBI if the ransomware incident even occurred, but the feds came back with the FBI could not confirm or deny the existence of an investigation. This was just one in a series of recently reported ransomware attacks such as the one that hit D.C.s CCTV system and another that locked up a hotels electronic key lock system. Eight days before President Trumps inauguration, ransomware affected 123 of 187 D.C. police network video recorders; about 70% the CCTV system was out of commission for about 48 hours. The police refused to pay the ransom, instead choosing to replace the software on the devices and restart them. It took three days to restore the system. A four-star hotel in the Austrian Alps had its electronic key lock system, reservation and cash desk systems in a chokehold due to ransomware. The hotel paid the ransom as it couldnt confirm reservations of new arrivals or program new key cards to let guests into their rooms. A recent IDC survey found 84% of U.S. consumers are concerned about the privacy of their personal information, with 70% saying their concern is greater today than it was a few years ago. These concerns of consumers should also alarm businesses: Consumers are willing to switch to another bank, medical center or retailer if they feel their personal information is threatened, the survey found. "Consumers can exact punishment for data breaches or mishandled data by changing buyer behavior or shifting loyalty," said Sean Pike, an analyst at IDC, in a statement. The survey, released last week, polled 2,500 U.S. consumers about their privacy concerns across four verticals: Financial services, healthcare, retail and government. Younger consumers, aged 18 to 35, were more concerned for their privacy than older consumers, aged 36 to 50, the survey found. The younger age group also had a 56% likelihood of switching business providers based on an impending hacker threat, compared to 53% for the older group. Meanwhile, women were more likely to switch than men, by a difference of 8 percentage points, for an impending hacker threat. If a breach affected them directly, 78% of all consumers said they would switch to another business from the one where the breach occurred. IDC said that with retail businesses, many consumers are not aware of the amount or kinds of information that retailers collect. Such information can include the items a shopper has bought and at what time of day, and even how long a customer lingers in a store. The survey found that shoppers increasingly are willing to evaluate a store's track record for protecting personal information. "It is in a retailer's best interest to define what information they are tracking firmly and clearly, and to provide consumers methods to manage those preferences," IDC's report said. "Retailers who do not take consumer data protection seriously may find that they permanently lose customers to competitors that offer more transparency and manageability of their Personally Identifiable Information." For the healthcare sector, IDC's survey found that increasing numbers of ransomware attacks will impact consumer confidence for a particular provider. New guidance under HIPAA (the health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) notes that ransomware attacks like those at Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center and Kansas Heart Hospital are considered security incidents that could lead to finding a breach of federal Protected Health Information. In the financial sector, IDC said, federal laws that have capped consumer liability for fraud at $50 have helped banks "become very good at catching and even predicting fraudulent charges." Even so, 60% of respondents in the IDC survey said they would switch their financial service provider based on a potential threat to their personal information. IDC advised businesses to engage consumers with security-specific advertisements and other messaging that show the business takes steps to protect personal information. Only 38% of consumers in the survey said they had actively engaged a business about security before being entering into a business arrangement. IDC noted that consumers who have been burned by a security breach may respond to a security-specific pitch by a competitor. This story, "Privacy worries are on the rise, new poll of U.S. consumers shows" was originally published by Computerworld . It feels like a lot longer, but its only just over a year since MPs gathered in Westminster Hall to debate the idea of banning Donald Trump from the UK. Now that hes President, and a new petition is in the offing to oppose his State Visit, we revisit some of the Conservative contributions to that debate: Paul Scully MP There are examples of when people have been excluded from this country. I have heard of a number of cases in which people have been excluded for incitement or for hatred; I have never heard of someone being excluded for stupidity, and I am not sure that we should start nowI hope that over the course of the debate we will be able to concentrate on practical ways that this country can tackle immigration and community cohesion, rather than worrying about the ego of one man. The hon. Gentleman makes some really interesting points. The examples he uses, however, are surely more about Donald Trump being a bigot than hatred. Britain is pretty good at roasting beef. Does the hon. Gentleman not think it would be better to just roast Trump? Philip Davies MP The hon. Lady said that she does not want any exceptions, but I have heard large number of my constituents make similar remarks to those of Donald Trump. She may disagree with them, but lots of my constituents agree with what Donald Trump said, whether I like it or not. Does she think that they should be expelled from the country as a result of their views? Donald Trump has been waging what might be described as a one-man campaign against political correctness for some time now. As someone who has had their own campaign against political correctness for some time here in this Parliament, nobody will be surprised to hear that I can relate to that. In the race to become the next President, he has been gaining support with a political manner that could be described as blunt directness. He is definitely straight-talking and, as a Yorkshireman, I certainly applaud him for that tooLots of people in this room who are always talking about the rights of minorities seem very quiet all of a sudden when people who have a minority opinion have the nerve to express it. What about the rights of those minorities in this country? Sir Edward Leigh MP We all lament the divisiveness of politics, which seem particularly divisive in the United States when viewed from afar, from our side of the pond. Does a debate such as this really help? Would banning Mr Trump, which would be even worse, really help? Most of us in this room oppose Mr Trump for demonising his opponents. If we ban him from the country, are we not in danger of doing the same? Like it or not, Mr Trump is also a contender to be the Head of State of arguably the most powerful country on the planet, a country which is a vital ally of ours. We have welcomed to this country Saudi and Chinese leaders, not to mention Mr Ceausescu, whose crimes are far worse than anything Mr Trump can dream up. This is also an attempt to shut down an honest debate about immigration. As soon as one mentions immigration, one is labelled a right winger or a racist. That is not the way to solve the problem of integration. On the point about 1.6 billion Muslims, thank God there are not 1.6 billion Trumps. Tom Tugendhat MP As the first amendment to the US constitution makes clear, freedom of expression is essential for a free people. That is why, although I may not like what has been said and although I am absolutely sure that I would not support it, it is no place for me or this House to criticise a man running for elected office in a foreign country. We might not wish him here, we might not like him here, but we should not vote against his ability to speak or his right to travel when we, too, value the same rights of libertyI think that Donald Trump is crazy and has no valid points to make, but I will not be the one to silence his voice. Victoria Atkins MP His comments about Muslims are wrong. His policy to close borders, if he is elected as President, is bonkers. If he met one or two of my constituents in one of the many excellent pubs in my constituency, they may well tell him that he is a wazzock for dealing with the issue in that way. I sense that my constituents, whether in New York or Tetney, in Minting or Mablethorpe, feel that their values are more than robust enough to survive anything that Mr Trump may say. We in Lincolnshirein fact, we in the United Kingdomshould have enough confidence in our values to allow him to say whatever he wants in New York, New York, or in New York, Lincolnshire, or anywhere else in the world, because our British values are stronger than some among us here today appear to fear. Alex Chalk MP The hon. Lady is making a powerful speech, but may I suggest that this is actually about buffoonery? Ultimately, buffoonery should be met not with the blunt instrument of a ban, but with the classic British response of ridicule. Steve Double MP I wonder how long the list would be if our country began to ban people because they said things we did not like. Ignorant and unpleasant as Donald Trumps comments are, he is not alone in saying such things. For starters, we would have to ban the Prime Minister of Hungary who has, I believe, said equally offensive things about Muslims. The way we deal with bigotry and prejudice is by confronting it head on, not trying to avoid it. Banning someone like Donald Trump risks making him a martyr. Kwasi Kwarteng MP we are simply adding fuel to this whole media circus, and that is playing exactly into Donald Trumps hands. A ban, if it happened, would be a headline throughout the world. It would simply reignite all the publicity that he generated with his outrageous policy and would exacerbate the situation. It would make it more likely that he would be the eventual victor in the Republican nomination fight, and he may wellwho knows?win the election in November. Then we would be in the absurd situation in which we would have banned the President of the United States from coming to Britain. That would be an insane situation to be in. People may say that he has no chance of becoming President, but look at the odds on the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) becoming the Leader of the Opposition. Dr Sarah Wollaston MP We have seen in Europe what happens when an entire people are demonised for no reason other than their race, so I do not think that we should trivialise this discussion; it is a really important debate. Nor do I think that the result of the US presidential election will be decided on whether the Home Secretary decides to exclude Donald Trump. In fact, I would argue that, should Donald Trump be excluded from one of the USs oldest allies, that would send a very clear message to the people of the United States about what we feel about those who demonise an entire people for no reason other than their religionI say this to Donald Trump. Just reflect on the consequences of your kind of religious bigotry. Marcus Fysh MP Mr Trumpthe Donald, the orange prince of American self-publicityHe has said things that many of us would not, and the addition of celebrity has been somewhat grotesque. To say that he would ban Muslims from entering America was too simplistic, unhelpful and wrong. I do not think that there is any evidence that he does not believe in democracy itself, however, so talk of fascism is a bit overblownAlthough they have been cynically expressed and exploited by Mr Trump, peoples concerns about the terrorist challenge need to be addressed. However, we need to work positively with Muslim communities, rather than demonising them. Where better for Mr Trumps spurious opinions and characterisations to be debated and debunked than here in the UK, the crucible of modern democracy, in which heads are no longer lost for dissent? Who would not want to watch him being pricked, poked and prodded on Have I Got News for You? Let him come. Bad opinions and characters have been allowed in Britain beforenot a few of them home-grown. We would not want to allow him any victimhood with which further to hoodwink people. I hope that if he came, honest British Muslims would have their say, and even more people would decide to use their good sense and not vote for him. Less seriouslywho knows?up close, we might get to see just what is under that hair. You are here: Home A man has died in hospital after he was attacked by a tiger in a zoo in the eastern Chinese city of Ningbo on Sunday afternoon. The attack occurred around 2 p.m. at the Tiger Hill enclosure in Ningbo Youngor Zoo, according to the administrative committee of Dongqian Lake Tourist and Holiday Resort in the city, where the zoo is located. The tiger was shot dead by the police. The surveillance footage is currently being reviewed. Nicky Morgan is MP for Loughborough, and is a former Education Secretary. Having campaigned for Britain to remain an EU member, and being also on the One-Nation wing of the Conservative Party, I may not be at the top of all Conservative Home readers wish lists as a new columnist. But the Conservative Party is a broad church so Im delighted to take up the opportunity. And where else to start other than by noting that is impossible to exaggerate just how absolutely useless Her Majestys Official Opposition is at the moment. From Jeremy Corbyns abysmal performances at Prime Ministers Questions to the chaos of their position on this weeks Article 50 Bill, they demonstrate how unfit for office they are every day. That might not matter so much if Britain were not engaged in a momentous change in the direction of our country. We are leaving the EU and all MPs need to be fully engaged in making our exit the least painful and most sensible it can be. It was, then, a surprise for me actually to agree with something that Diane Abbott said last week (indeed, this has never happened before). She was asked about Labours position on the Bill, and whether they would whip their MPs to support it. In reply, she said that it would be wrong were people in London to second-guess a decision taken by people outside London, and not to support the triggering of Article 50. She has a point and all MPs need to be aware of this danger as we begin the Article 50 Bill proceedings. Post-Brexit, much is being written about identity politics. We clearly live in a divided country with significant inequalities and communities that are not cohesive. We need to encourage people to find ways of belonging that dont foster hatred, and allow people to mix with others from different backgrounds. Traditionally, one of the ways of doing this was for people to step forward for public service to be school governors, church wardens, councillors, charity trustees, and to join political parties. My belonging has come via the Conservative Party. Ive been a party member for almost 28 years. Ive been a voluntary party office-holder, a council candidate, a PPC for six and a half years in a Labour-held marginal and then an MP sitting for a marginal seat. Like many ConservativeHome readers, I know what it is like to knock on endless doors, sit up until midnight writing In Touches which few people ever read, organise branch events, sell raffle tickets and set up street stalls. Ive made friends, travelled the country, learnt about different issues and been forced to confront inequalities because of my support for the Conservative Party. Many years ago, as a member of Battersea Conservatives, I remember meeting someone who by then worked in the City of London, but who had arrived in the capital decades before with his mother, who was from the Middle East. When asked why he supported the Conservatives, he said that it was because ladies from the local Conservative Womens Organisation had welcomed his mother, and helped her to adjust to life in a very different part of the world. So, in dealing with Brexit, we need to be true to what makes us strong as a Party. The best part of the Prime Ministers recent Lancaster House speech was: I want this United Kingdom to emerge from this period of change stronger, fairer, more united and more outward-looking than ever before. I want us to be a secure, prosperous, tolerant country a magnet for international talent and a home to the pioneers and innovators who will shape the world ahead. I want us to be a truly Global Britain the best friend and neighbour to our European partners, but a country that reaches beyond the borders of Europe too. A country that goes out into the world to build relationships with old friends and new allies alike. I want Britain to be what we have the potential, talent and ambition to be. A great, global trading nation that is respected around the world and strong, confident and united at home. I cant think of a single Conservative MP who would disagree with this paragraph. We need to keep this desire for a country and a party which is united and outward-looking at the forefront of our minds as we debate the Bill. As someone who has been asking questions about the Governments plan for Brexit partly because the monumentally incapable official Opposition is not doing its job I am now being bombarded by constituents and others asking me to oppose the Bill. But I was clear last week that I will be voting in favour of it. There was no threshold requirement in the original Referendum Act, and whilst I do not want to see a hard, destructive Brexit, MPs must uphold the fair and open democratic vote which took place last June. To those who think there is an option for Parliament to vote down the Article 50 Bill, my response is that this would simply open up a new crisis in our democracy, as MPs would appear to be second-guessing the referendum result, and undermining the very things that last weeks Supreme Court judgment upheld Yes, the Article 50 Bill needs to be subjected to high-quality debate and scrutiny in both Houses of Parliament. Failing to pass it wouldnt stop the clock on Brexit but it would stir up more public anger, create demand for more extreme views to be voiced, and be a nail in the coffin for our parliamentary democracy. And it is this democracy which ultimately will ensure we get the most advantageous Brexit for Britain. The visitors from abroad who have addressed both Houses of Parliament from Westminster Hall are: Albert Lebrun, Charles De Gaulle, Nelson Mandela, Pope Benedict XVI, Aung San Suu Kyiand Barack Obama. Any decision about whether Donald Trump should follow in their footsteps will be taken not by the Government, but by the speakers of the two houses. John Bercow can be relied upon to ensure that the President doesnt speak from beneath that famous hammer-beam roof, but is shunted off to another part of the building, presumably the Royal Gallery. Trump will seethe at having closed to him what was open to Obama. But this is far from being the only indignity that will be heaped on his shoulders. A petition urging that the President not be invited to make a state visit because it would cause embarrassment to her Majesty the Queen has smashed through the 100,000 ceiling it needs to be debated in Parliament, and is soaring up, up and away towards a million signatures. Ruth Davidson believes that the visit could not possibly occur in the best traditions of the enterprise while a cruel and divisive policy which discriminates against citizens of the host nation are in place. Alistair Burt has said that there should be a joint decision to delay the visit. Debates about Trump in the Commons have form. One took place a year ago in Westminster Hall, as it happens on banning him from Britain. (What goes around comes around.) Most of the MPs present did not support a bar, but the session was a carnival of Trump-bashing. A debate on the new petition would doubtless display less contempt and more alarm, but its form might not permit a vote on a motion. A separate backbench business debate, however, would allow for a division. Sources that ConservativeHome spoke to yesterday said that such a debate is possible before the half-term recess. However, the Government has a history of turning a blind eye to such votes. It would find it more difficult to ignore the result of an Opposition Day Motion. Jeremy Corbyns call for the state visit to be cancelled is, more by luck than planning, perhaps his best-yet tactical gambit. Tory MPs were queueing up yesterday to complain about the Presidents banning order. Beside Burt, we counted James Cleverly, Nusrat Ghani, Anna Soubry, Paul Scully and, significantly, Sajid Javid. Were Corbyn to follow up his words yesterday with an Opposition Day debate in due course, it is hard to imagine Conservative MPs trooping through the lobbies with him. But in the present volatile atmosphere one cannot be sure. Labour may take this route after half-term. The main difficulty for Theresa May comes if British citizens are caught up in the ban: there are some 250,000 people who have dual British nationality and were born in Iraq, Iran or Somalia. This problem seems for the moment, anyway to be solved (though both the drawing up and implementation of the order, with a ban on some green card holders being first implemented and then withdrawn, has been so chaotic than anything could happen yet). One reading of yesterday evenings clarification about the status of British dual citizens is that it shows the influence Theresa May has in the White House. Another is that it demonstrates a wider attempt by the new administration to bring some order to a policy whose design was reportedly carried out without consultation with the Justice Department, the State Department, or the Department of Defense. National Security Council lawyers may have been prevented from evaluating it. It is also claimed that that Customs and Border Protection and U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services, the agencies tasked with carrying out the policy, were briefed very late while Trump was actually signing the order itself. (Its key part, for those who want to read it in full, is section 3c.) Where does all this leave the state visit? Very simply, if the President of China who heads a government infinitely more noxious than Trumps can make one, then so should the President. There were few protests and petitions before Xi Jinping addressed Parliamentarians in the Royal Gallery less than eighteen months, ago. The contrast between the noise now and the silence then is a classic illustration of left-wing infantilism. Protests at the horror of what happens in China in particular, its forced organ harvesting have largely been confined to a small band of Christians, represented on this site at the time by Fiona Bruce, Fiona Hodgson and Benedict Rogers. But neither Trumps concession to Britain nor the question of double standards are likely to deter some MPs. The bottom line is that he promised a Muslim ban during his campaign, and has crafted a policy that effectively delivers one however limited, inconsistent, ineffective and damaging to Americas interests it may be. His priority is to send a signal to those who voted for him that he is delivering the bar he promised, and never mind what the rest of the world thinks. But if he doesnt care what it thinks, he cant complain when it kicks up rough. This is shaping up to be an unhappy visit. Problems with the Prince of Wales over climate change are only the overture. The Prime Minister will be hoping that yesterday evenings clarification draws the sting from the protests. The Governments line is taking shape roughly as follows: Look, we dont approve of this ban and have said so. But we have at least ensured that it doesnt cover British citizens. And, remember, these are temporary measures. There is unlikely to be any blanket ban on anyone come the summer. Trump is likely simply to toughen up the visa regime that Obama left him. Lets wait and see what happens. Anyway, we need this guy for trade and Brexit. It will persuade most Tory MPs, but how big will the dissenting minority be? Flash Protesters leave placards near the US Capitol Building after Sunday's protest in Washington DC around 4:30 pm. [Photo by Zhao Huanxin / chinadaily.com.cn] Thousands of protesters rallied in front of the White House on Sunday while demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily barring all refugees and seven Mideast and North African countries' citizens from entry into the U.S.. Hundreds of protesters gathered Sunday at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York to demonstrate against the ban. The protesters, hoisting signs like "Bridges, not wall" "Dump Trump," chanted loudly "No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here," and "Build a wall, we'll tear it down" in front of JFK's Terminal 4. Steve Golden is one of a group of volunteer attorneys that are trying to help those held up by custom officials at JFK since Saturday. They did not sleep over the past 24 hours. He escorted an unidentified lady who was just freed by the custom to her relatives' vehicle. "Most of these people are green card holders, some are people with visas, lots of people have families, homes and pets here, they are simply being detained because of the new process. I believe the executive was unconstitutional." Golden told Xinhua. Janie Lynch, a teacher from Flushing, Queens, said, "we are here because we are all brother and sisters, and the U.S. is supposed to be open to everybody, whether you are tired, are poor, are yearning for free." "I just cannot let this happen, injustice will end to be injustice to everybody, we simply cannot sit back, we cannot remain neutral on a moving train, it's happening." In the city's downtown battery park, hundreds of protesters also braved the winter chill to demonstrate against the president's executive order. The Lafayette Square before the White House was packed by protesters against Trump's ban from noontime as more demonstrators were still arriving, witnesses said. They wielded poster boards bearing messages such as "Ban Trump" "Refugees Welcome" and chanted "No hate! No fear! Refugees are welcome here!" Protests are also scheduled throughout the day in Philadelphia, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle and Chicago, said a CNN report. In Boston's Copley Square, thousands of people also gathered to protest the immigration ban, according to a report from the USA Today. Earlier on Sunday, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway said the international travel disruptions in the wake of the ban was "a small price to pay" for greater security of the United States. On contrary, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Sunday said Democrats are considering legal actions to overturn the order. A federal judge in New York on Saturday night granted an emergency stay temporarily halting the removal of people who, though with previously approved refugee applications or with valid visas, had ben detained following Trump's refugee and immigration order. Similar rulings were later issued in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state, said a TheHill news daily report. Under the order, refugees from all over the world will be suspended U.S. entry for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. CORNWALL, Ontario The City of Cornwall announced in a statement on Monday that the traffic lights at the Water St. and Cumberland intersection would be turned off on Wednesday, Feb. 1. The traffic lights were originally installed by the Federal Bridge Corporation to accomodate the additional traffic that was being diverted to Cumberland Street while construction was taking place on Brookdale Avenue. "Now that Brookdale Avenue has reopened, traffic volumes on Cumberland Street have eased," the City of Cornwalls statement on the matter reads. "In the coming months, the Citys Engineering Department, together with other departments, will assess the need for permanent traffic signals at this intersection both from a vehicular and pedestrian point of view. A report will be presented to City Council in May. " In the meantime, traffice at the Cumberland and Water St. intersection will return to its original state with traffic from Cumberland regulated by a stop sign. Any weekend that involves some sunshine, a really (really) good cinnamon roll, a snuggle session with your 2-year-old, an unexpected laugh-until-your-stomach-hurts moment, a new pair of shoes, an extra 30 minutes of sleep in the morning and McConnels ice cream is alright in my book. But really it was the perfect weekend. I hope you had one that was just as good. Here are some bits and tips from my world as of late. { Above: Elin and I hunting for sea glass and anemones in some tide pools. The weather yesterday was nothing short of glorious so we ended the last few hours of the weekend at our favorite, Butterfly Beach. { Im completely obsessed with documenting our lives and vacations with Artifact Uprising photo books. We just got back our 60+ page book from our trip to Australia and New Zealand and I cant stop flipping through it. The velvety paper quality and color are so good Ive been telling all my friends about it. } { Some new shoes arrived from the Who What Wear shoe collection and Im itching to wear them with a monochrome white look. The wood heal touch adds that bit of 70s that I love. } { I recently discovered the most beautiful website called Stories + Objects that will quickly have you romanticizing about traveling somewhere. Each month they showcase a destination through photos, short films and interviews that provide a raw glimpse into another culture. An object, its creator/cultivator and their story bring to life the heartbeat of that area and its as if you went there, fell in love and brought home one special thing that you can only find there. Read about this salt from a small town in France here. I cant stop thinking about a getaway to the French coast now. } { Scent line up at the moment: Aqua di Parma Peonia, Tom Ford Soleil Blanc, Le Labo The Noir 29 and the classic Chloe. } { Elins mini Superego gold glitter sneakers that make her jump higher she says. Of course I told her I agreed. } { More finds from Stories + Objects. Dreaming of Turkey after wearing this Turkish Rose Oil. } Flash Japan has been paying 10,000 pounds per month to a British think tank to hype up "China threat" among British high-level politicians, local media reported Sunday. A detailed report carried out by The Sunday Times said that the Japanese Embassy in London reached a deal with the Henry Jackson Society (HJS), a registered charity, to wage a propaganda campaign against China. It said that the deal was reached in response to growing cooperation between China and Britain. This weekend, the former British foreign secretary Malcolm Rifkind acknowledged that the HJS, founded in 2005, had approached him to put his name to an article published by the Daily Telegraph last August expressing concerns about China's involvement in Britain's Hinkley Point C nuclear plant. The article, titled "How China could switch off Britain's lights in a crisis if we let them build Hinkley C", raised fears that "no one knows what 'blackdoor' technologies might be able to be introduced into the building of a power plant." The Sunday Times said Japan's secret PR (public relations) war on China reflects Tokyo's concerns about the "golden decade" of Sino-British cooperation. The HJS has not responded to Xinhua's interview request. Close Apple continues to update its iOS and this has caused more problems for hacking groups like Pangu to come up with an iOS jailbreak. The least most expect is an iOS 10.2 jailbreak though even that has been hard to come by. Lucas Todesco did come out with one with the Yalu iOS 10.1.1 jailbreak but as most know, the crack is a bit complicated to use. There were suggestions that a crack of iOS 10.2 would be coming out, one brought up by Stefan Esser. To date, nothing has come close to that with Apple moving forward with the latest iOS 10.2.1, Forbes reported. That said, hackers who are presumably working on an iOS 10.2 jailbreak may find their efforts for naught. The Cupertino company is expected to announce a cut again on which operating systems will be signed. Todesco has tried to convince most to avoid updating to iOS 10.2 since it makes his iOS 10.1.1 jailbreak useless, as covered in a previous post. Some may heed his request while others will go ahead, fearing bug and security issues that iOS 10 has been rendering the past months. The fact that the Yalu iOS 10.1.1 jailbreak is semi-tethered, the Italian hackers crack is expected to be useless as well soon. Given those scenarios, would the Apple Jailbreaking Community still be seriously awaiting an iOS 10 jailbreak? the answer to that may be divided considering the waiting game leaves a lot to be desired. Add the aggressive updates being made by Apple and the effort to come up with a hack becomes totally senseless. There is no definite number to show how many iPhone or iPad owners are still relying on iOS jailbreaks. Pangu made its mark with iOS 8 but things got chippy when iOS 9 started to take the spotlight. iOS 10 has been hard OS to crack so it will be interesting if an iOS 10.2 jailbreak would still make sense moving forward. See Now: What Republicans Don't Want You To Know About Obamacare Close A rare skin condition has caused an Indian teenage girl to be thrown out of school. 16-year-old Shalani Yadav suffers from Erythroderma, an inflammatory skin disease that is known as Red Man Syndrome which cannot be treated by doctors. Her skin 'sheds' every six weeks, causing fear among her classmates and schoolmates. To prevent her skin from flaking off, she needs to soak her body in water every hour during the day and night. After soaking, she needs to smear moisturizer every three hours all over her body to prevent it from drying off and hardening. The Sun reported that Shalani was born in a family of eight, making it difficult for them to buy the cream as they simply cannot afford it. She had shed her skin every 45 days since she was born. Because of her snake-like appearance, the school decided to throw her out because other children were afraid of her. According to Daily Mail, Shalani's mother, Devkunwar has sought help from several doctors but none could cure her. Every time Shalani's skin came off, it caused her excruciating pain. "The disease is not killing her but taking her life bit by bit," she said. Devkunwar is a caregiver in a state-funded community center. Her two other children Sejal, 15, and Price, eight, are normal and have no serious health problems. Her husband Rajbahadur, a daily wage worker said that Shalani was born with scaly skin all over her body, from the sole of her feet to her head. Shalani wanted to study. She said everybody in her family was suffering because of her condition. "But what is my fault? What sin did I commit to be cursed with such a disease. I want to live. Please help me, if you can," said Shalani. See Now: What Republicans Don't Want You To Know About Obamacare Close New research has found that playing with Barbie dolls even just once can make young girls think they need to be thin. The study can be detrimental to a child's health, and those as young as 5-years old might get the impression that having a skinny body is ideal. The study was published in the journal Body Image, where 160 Australian girls aged five to eight were interviewed by researchers. The study concluded that girls only had to play with dolls or look at an image of the dolls (Barbie) to think that they needed to be thin. According to Daily Mail, Marika Tiggemann, international body image expert advised that parents should not give their daughters Barbie dolls, especially when they are young. If they already had Barbies, parents should encourage them to do more than just dressing them up and making the Barbies look pretty. This may lead to children believing that appearance or being thin was very important. She explained that "exposure to Barbie promoted internalisation of the thin ideal in this sample of girls." Being thin is good but being exposed to Barbie gave young girls the impression that looking pretty was more important. Being fat was bad. Not only being thin was good but being thinner was better. In response to the new research, the toy company Mattel, which manufactures the Barbie toys, said the study failed to accurately represent realistic play experiences. The toy maker has recently released a number of Barbies with different body shapes, including a curvy Barbie. Tiggeman said the curvy Barbie was a good start for Mattel but more could be done to properly represent realistic real life bodies. Researchers have also claimed that playing with thin dolls could make young girls be more likely to develop eating disorders as they grow up, according to The Recorder. See Now: What Republicans Don't Want You To Know About Obamacare Close Finland is committed to their campaign in making the country tobacco-free. By 2040, the Scandinavian government wants to see less than 2 percent of adults smoking. Four years ago, NACS reported that 16 percent of Finns aging 15 to 64-years old smoke every day. The smoking rate in Finland has significantly dropped in the last few years because of smoking bans, prohibitions on tobacco advertisements and even retail displays. Kaari Paaso, head of harm prevention unit of Finland's Ministry of Health and Social Affairs said that their approach in getting rid of all tobacco products is revolutionary. Milder tobacco products such as e-cigarettes or any alternatives are not being considered. He said that the government wants to phase out all nicotine products. The cost for vendors to sell tobacco has significantly increased as they will now have to pay an annual surveillance fee of $536 for officers who will check on the compliance. The fee is paid on a municipal level so that a vendor with 10 checkouts could pay more $5,000 per year in addition to its licensing fee, according to a report by CNN. Smoking inside private vehicles is already prohibited when there are teens 15 years old and below inside the car. People will also be banned from smoking on their balconies if it disturbs their neighbors. Smokers could be fined if smoke spreads on to the other spaces. Finland wants to prevent the appeal of smoking to teenagers, the stage when people usually get to try the habit for the first time. Candies, chocolates or sweet snacks, shaped as pipes or cigarettes will now be limited according to new policies. Flavors in e-cigarettes will also be in discussion as it may entice young people to smoke. Kelly Henning, director of the public health program at Bloomberg Philanthropies, said that the country has come very far in their campaign. Finland has put in place policies at the highest possible level to completely ban tobacco smoking. See Now: What Republicans Don't Want You To Know About Obamacare Close A new research suggests that depression could pose a similar risk as high cholesterol, obesity and smoking in causing cardiovascular deaths. Mental health issues are not commonly looked into as contributors of heart disease. German researchers looked into the health information of 3,428 European men, 45 to 74 years old, and followed up after 10 years. Analysts found out that death due to cardiovascular disease during the study period is strongly associated with the classic risk factors such as diabetes, high blood pressure, high blood cholesterol, obesity and smoking. There were 557 cases of all-cause mortality and 269 fatal cardiovascular deaths recorded. In the research, depression was determined by a checklist of anxiety, fatigue and mood symptoms. The mental health problem accounted for 15 percent of cardiovascular deaths, while high cholesterol and obesity had eight to 21 percent. Diabetes posed a lesser risk with only five to eight percent coronary deaths. Two risk factors that accounted more deaths than depression are smoking and high blood pressure. Smoking accounts 17 to 20 percent cardiovascular deaths while high blood pressure has 30 to 34 percent. Researchers believe that depression should be addressed to prevent additional risks to the heart. Treating mental health problems such as depression has a tangible benefit on the patient, unlike high blood pressure or cholesterol. Heidi May, a cardiovascular researcher at the Intermountain Medical Center Heart Institute in Salt Lake City, agrees with the German researchers. She said the results are in line with what is being reported in other studies. May believes that there is a growing recognition to screen and treat depression to avoid cardiovascular outcomes such as death. She said that depressed people are more likely to smoke, become more sedentary and even skip their medication. These behavioral and physiological changes happening in the body of an individual suffering from depression can put them more at risk of cardiovascular death. See Now: What Republicans Don't Want You To Know About Obamacare Close The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) warned parents about homeopathic tablets marketed by Hyland's containing belladonna. It can create unpredictable responses in children that are 2 years old and below, potentially putting children's health at risk. Homeopathic teething tablets have been around since the 1900s. It has always been used to provide temporary relief to babies growing their first set of teeth. In 2010, the FDA originally issued a safety alert against the tablets after lab results showed they contained inconsistent amounts of belladonna. The agency has received more than 400 reports of seizures and deaths that reference homeopathic teething products. However, it has not been proven whether the deaths are related to the teething products that have been placed under review. FDA said that some tablets had belladonna levels that exceed the amount that is claimed on the label. They have contacted the Standard Homeopathic Company in Los Angeles that manufactured the Hyland's homeopathic teething products. The company did not agree to a recall but has discontinued its product on Oct. 7. According to Fox6 Now, Mary C. Borneman, a spokeswoman for Hyland's said that they discontinued the product because of their commitment to parents who trusted them. They didn't want to put the parents in a place between them saying the product was safe and the FDA warning. According to WCPO, the products did not go through proper screening and evaluation from the FDA. It has not been approved and cannot be considered as safe and effective. The FDA was able to confirm its original laboratory assessment of Hyland's homeopathic teething products in 2010. The agency confirmed on Friday that indeed the product had inconsistent amounts of belladonna. Dr. Janet Woodcock, director of the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research said that they "recommend that parents and caregivers not give these homeopathic teething tablets to children and seek advice from their health care professional for safe alternatives." If the child experiences seizures, difficulty breathing, lethargy, muscle weakness, excessive sleepiness, constipation, skin flushing, difficulty urinating or agitation after using homeopathi teething products, parents should seek medical care immediately. See Now: What Republicans Don't Want You To Know About Obamacare Flash Attorneys general from 15 U.S. states and the District of Columbia Sunday condemned President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily barring refugees and seven Muslim-majority countries' citizens from entry into the United States, calling it "unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful." In a joint statement, the 16 state attorneys general, all Democrats, vowed they will quickly act and "use all of the tools of our offices to fight this unconstitutional order and preserve our nation's national security and core values." "We are confident that the Executive Order will ultimately be struck down by the courts. In the meantime, we are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created," they said in the joint statement. "Together we are the chief legal officers for 130M+ people & we won't hesitate to protect their rights," New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman tweeted. "Let me be clear -- Discrimination based on national origin is illegal," Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said in a statement Saturday. Other state attorneys general are from California, Pennsylvania, Washington, Massachusetts, Hawaii, Virginia, Connecticut, Vermont, Illinois, New Mexico, Iowa, Maine, Maryland and the District of Columbia. Under the executive order Trump signed Friday, refugees from all over the world will be suspended from entering the United States for 120 days while all immigration from so-called "countries with terrorism concerns" will be suspended for 90 days. Countries included in the ban are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The total population from these countries exceeds 130 million. The ban sparked chaos across U.S. international airports and continuous protests nationwide in the past two days. Throughout Sunday, tens of thousands of protesters rallied before the White House, at more than 30 U.S. airports, and in the central downtown of big cities including Boston, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle and Chicago. Rushing to the rescue, Trump on Sunday argued that the presidential action is aimed to protect the United States' own citizens and border and is not a Muslim ban as many media reports have described. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban," the newly-inaugurated U.S. president said in a statement, saying there are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. "We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days," he said. Moreover, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway said earlier on Sunday the international travel disruptions in the wake of the ban were "a small price to pay" for the greater security of the United States. A federal judge in New York on Saturday night granted an emergency stay temporarily halting the removal of people who, though with previously approved refugee applications or with valid visas, had been detained following Trump's order. Similar rulings were later issued in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state, and more U.S. states are now expected to follow suit. Continue Reading Below Advertisement Threatening notes started appearing at the tenants' doors, and their water was cut off. These people were living in a dark building with no water that might collapse at any minute while paying a just-barely-not-illegal amount of rent to a lunatic who was now their burglar and kumite opponent. Nicole Macy, not to be outdone in the psycho department by her husband, got in on the action. She never kicked anyone in the chest, but she broke in and poured ammonia on the tenants' clothes, bedding, and electronics. And since all of this is stupidly illegal, it won't surprise you to find out that Kip Macy was accused of three felony conspiracy charges, three burglary charges, two stalking charges, two grand theft charges, one misdemeanor vandalism charge, and a felony count of shutting off service because of some silly laws they still have on the books against terrorizing the handicapped. Nicole Macy faced three conspiracy charges, three burglary charges, two stalking charges, two grand theft charges, one charge of cutting phone service, and one count of misdemeanor vandalism. San Francisco PD As well as several general counts of unlordlike conduct. Continue Reading Below Advertisement Proving they never got around to considering the consequences of their actions, the two maniacs borrowed money from their parents to post a $500,000 bond and fled the country. They were found in Italy after Kip's mom reached out to bail bondsmen to track them down. The two still aren't quite sure what they did wrong, though in an interview with 20/20, Kip admitted he did "regret, you know, having moved the Mexicans' stuff into the hallway." That's pretty big of you, Kip. Security News Kaspersky Launches Partner Program Updates, Adds Regional Focus, MSP Options Sarah Kuranda Share this Kaspersky Lab is updating its partner program, the company said Monday, rolling out changes to drive a regional partner structure and more selling options for managed service providers. Senior Vice President of B2B Sales Michael Canavan said the new program focuses on four areas: increased regional support, advanced rewards and technology offerings, a new managed service provider offering and new regional Partner Summits. The new program will take effect April 1. The new regional structure will realign the company's partner sales managers from previously large territories to more geographic territories with less coverage and a more focused partner network. Canavan said this shift will allow for partner sales managers to work more closely with partners in each region. [Related: Kaspersky Lab's North American Channel Chief Bois Leaves Security Vendor] Kaspersky will be backing up this regional structure with new regional Kaspersky Lab Partner Summits, which will be held in 2017 in Dallas, Chicago, San Diego, Miami, Minneapolis and Boston. Director of Channel Marketing Kevin Lozeau said the regional Partner Summits, as opposed to a single national partner event, will allow the company to engage more one-on-one with partners. "It's really about building a better relationship and having that better and more focused relationship with the partners. That becomes the cornerstone of all of the changes in the 2017 partner program," Canavan said. Kaspersky also rolled out updates to its managed services program, adding integration with popular PSA tools, including ConnectWise. The company also expanded its enterprise program to MSPs, adding a managed service provider specialization to its enterprise specialization for Kaspersky Anti Targeted Attack. "Strategically, [MSPs are a] big focus for us at Kaspersky because we're definitely seeing the migration of our VAR partners to managed securities. [This program] allows them to leverage existing technology, but allows us to bring our security to the forefront of the MSP partner," Canavan said. Michael Knight, president and chief technology officer at Greenville, S.C.-based Encore Technology Group, said the new partner program represents a "key shift" for Kaspersky. He said the majority of Kaspersky partners before could only get limited attention from reps because of the previous structure. He said the new regional emphasis will allow Kaspersky to put more focus on its partners, especially net new partners in different regions, as well as gain deeper visibility into their needs in each region. "I think that this is absolutely the right move for Kaspersky to look into getting deeper with existing partners and vetting out partners as a whole," Knight said. Knight said the MSP-focused additions, which Encore Technology Group has already used some of in the past, provides more options for partners to tailor their solutions to their customers. Knight said it is key for partners to know their customers and their needs and how they have to consume technology. "I think that Kaspersky is really starting to put the rubber to the road in a lot of those types of initiatives. In order for a partner to be successful, they have to have the right type of customer. It is incumbent on the partner to make it viable for the customers, but to do that you have to have the manufacturer actually focusing on the feature sets for each type of partner and verticals," Knight said. The changes to the partner program come on the heels of the departure of North American channel chief Leslie Bois, who left the company in December to take a new role at a startup. Canavan said he remains responsible for the channel responsibilities at Kaspersky for the foreseeable future. "For right now, that responsibility is still on my shoulders, which I embrace and enjoy," Canavan said. "I think we have a great team working together with channel operations." Lozeau said these changes will be the bulk of the updates partners can expect from Kaspersky regarding its partner program this year. That being said, he said Kaspersky will build on this foundation throughout the year, adding enterprise specializations and enhancements to the managed services program. Have you ever felt like you were following through on what God called you to do? But, it seemed he was punishing you? Perhaps, he's called you to love a difficult person. Perhaps, he's called you to serve in a difficult spot. Perhaps, he's called you to wait on him. Perhaps, he's called you to stay put in a place you don't want to. Paul went to Macedonia saying, "God had called us to preach the gospel (in Macedonia)." (Act 16:10) There, he cast out a demon in a woman, saying, In the name of Jesus Christ I command you to come out of her! (Acts 16:18) Only to land himself in prison when the owners of the woman realized they lost "their hope of making money." (Acts 16:9) If I was Paul, I might throw my hands up in the air and say, "Thanks a lot, God. You really know how to send a woman out and then let her down." Paul and crew were stripped, flogged, beaten and thrown in jail. What do you do when it seems God - led you, but now he's fled you? It's easy to feel angry, frustrated and indifferent in this place? Years back, God called me to start a company. I seeking God with all my heart. I was obedient in the work, diligent in the process and hopeful in prayer, yet it didn't happen. It tanked so badly, there were tens of thousands of dollars on the line. That was tough. What is tough place has God called you to? Here's how Paul responds, within the walls of his prison: About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. (Acts 16:25) Imagine that? Beaten, wounded and imprisoned, yet still singing, praising and evangelizing... This act, brings me to a place of pause: What if rather than seeing my disgrace, I believed God, for me, would about-face my situation? And, in this I could give praise? Did Paul believe this? Did he know his good God would most certainly do a good thing? Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everyones chains came loose. (Acts 16:26) When we believe in God's power, his power tools break down high walls. When we are in the center of God's will, God works a way out for us. When we are worshipping, God is working on our behalf to open doors. I think Paul believed in the power of God. What if we believed too? When that person hurts us. God can shake us in love that heals. When that dream fizzles. God will quake new dreams in us; He has a plan. When pain surfaces: Through God all things are possible. We will wait. When we see no way out: God will mine gold in our heart through this. When we feel bad: Jesus' forgiveness rattles our soul in unwarranted acceptance that feels like peace. God will show up and when he does the power of his work - will set you free. Until, then, like Paul, "Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD." (Psalm 27:14) About Kelly Balarie's book, Fear Fighting, Awakening the Courage to Overcome Your Fears: Author and Speaker, Kelly Balarie didnt always fight fear for a large part of her life, she was controlled by it. Yet, in her book, Fear Fighting: Awakening Courage to Overcome Your Fears, with God, Kelly charts a new course. Join Kelly, on the journey to go and grow with Christs bravery, the Spirits counsel and Gods unending love that squelches fear. This book reads like a love letter from God, while offering practical heart-calming prayers, anxiety-reducing tips, and courage-building decrees that will transform your day. www.fearfightingbook.com Take part in the 4 Days to Fearless Challenge. Get all Purposeful Faith blog posts by email - click here. If President Donald Trump is still using his personal, unsecured Android smartphone, as reported, he is surely creating bucketsful of worry for White House communications security staff. As CIOs and Chief Information Security Officers already know, any organization can install strong security technology into a network or a smartphone, only to be defeated if end users don't use it or follow safe cyber practices. "The most vulnerable parts of communications are the people, and if they aren't taking precautions, problems exist," said Chris Perry, chief operating officer for Secured Communications, a provider of encrypted VPNs for mobile devices used by governments and companies. "There is a White House communications group that does nothing but communications technology solutions for the president and his staff," Perry said Friday. "But the weakest link in any communication is the end user. You can have all kinds of end-to-end encryption, but in the end, if you aren't using that piece of equipment and related tools, you are very vulnerable. That's true in any environment, in government or the private sector." White House officials didn't respond when asked repeatedly about Trump's reported use of his Android phone for tweets after he'd been in the White House for several days. The U.S. Secret Service referred questions on the matter to the White House. Trump didn't turn over his Android phone when given a secure device just before his inauguration, according to the The New York Times. Reports have indicated Trump is using an older Galaxy S3 or S4, which is "asking for a disaster," Nicholas Weaver, a computer security researcher at the Computer Science Institute, said in a blog post. "President Trump's continued use of a dangerously insecure, out-of-date Android device should cause real panic. A Galaxy S3 does not meet the security requirements of the average teenager, let alone the purported leader of the free world." Weaver said if Trump were enticed to click on a link to a cyber exploit with his phone, the phone could become a bug that could record everything in audio or video around it and then transmit that information to an attacker. "Even a brand new, fully updated Android or iPhone is insufficient: The President of the United States is worth a great many multiples of expensive zero-day exploits." Hackers could also learn where the phone is through GPS, which could also be an indication of where the president is located, said Jack Gold, a mobile security analyst at J. Gold Associates. If a nation-state really wanted to attack Trump's phone or another device, it could rely on a brute force attack performed by supercomputers to break encryption on his password to gain access to files, applications and other material, Gold added. "The working assumption should be that Trump's phone is compromised by at least one probably multiple hostile foreign intelligence services and is actively being exploited," Weaver added in his blog. Some analysts have said that if Trump is merely using the Android device to send out tweets, he might not have created an internal security problem. But even then, it isn't clear that he, or someone else, has set up his Twitter account in secure ways to prevent someone from spoofing his @realDonaldTrump or @POTUS accounts and sending out false statements. "We don't even know if the tweets are really from him," Gold said in an interview. "It's not an overblown concern, because if someone tweets 'I'm about to attack Russia' on his account, that could cause a war or a financial panic. That's why this is such a major issue. The implications are catastrophic." The president's official account, @POTUS, already has revealed sensitive information that hackers might be able to exploit. A hacker who uses the name WauchulaGhost found that @POTUS was secured to a Gmail address that could be guessed as belonging to a Trump aide in charge of social media. WauchulaGhost urged several White House officials in a tweet to change their emails and fix their security settings to stop a hacker from conducting a simple password reset on an account to figure out an email and try to compromise it. Last year, Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman, John Podesta, was hacked by suspected Russian cyberspies through a spearphishing attack sent to his Gmail address. Later, his emails were stolen and then leaked publicly. Security experts suggested that Twitter users can prevent exposure of their email addresses over Twitter by going to their account's security settings and clicking, "Require personal information to reset my password," which forces anyone trying to reset the password to enter the correct email address or phone number to continue. Also, Twitter users can set up an option in security setting and checking "verify login requests," which secures the account with two-factor authentication. The user would then need to enter both a password and one-time code sent to a mobile phone or generated by an authenticator app. It isn't clear whether Trump's Twitter accounts have any such protections. "It's troubling to me to not know how well Trump is being protected or how protective he is of his profile or his whole electronic persona," Gold said in an interview. "Trump's going to do what he is going to do," he added. "This is a man who has said he knows cyber better than anyone. I'm not sure he's an expert. I'm sure people are advising him. I'm sure they are whispering in his ear. The problem is if he's listening." This story, "Trumps unsecure Android phone highlights common security dilemma" was originally published by Computerworld . It is suspected that Ukrainian-based hackers took the Cockrell Hill Police Department's server for ransom last month, resulting in the loss of video evidence. The police chief decided not to pay the ransom and instead had the server wiped, according to WFAA in Texas. The television station reported that the police chief does not believe this was a targeted attack by terrorists. Cybercriminals are thought to have casted a wide net with spam and an unsuspecting police department employee invited the malware in upon clicking on a link. According to Acronis, the latest update of the Locky crypto-ransomware variant, Osiris, is behind this attack. Acronis New Generation technology that proactively prevents zero-day infections, discovered this new mutation. It currently bypasses all (to our best knowledge) antivirus/anti-malware software, including Windows Defender. Accoridng to a press release, once the Cockrell Hill Police Department became aware that files on the server had been corrupted by a computer virus, they immediately disconnected the server and all computers from the internet and all state database systems and were able to contain the virus. The virus had been introduced onto the network from a spam email that had come from a cloned email address imitating a department issued email address. An internet webpage showed that if the police department paid $4,000 in Bitcoin, then the police department's online contents would be released. The FBI Cybercrimes unit recommended that the police department isolate and wipe the virus from the servers. This virus affected all Microsoft Office Suite documents, such as Word documents and Excel files. In addition, all body camera video, some in-car video, some in-house surveillance video, and some photographs that were stored on the server were corrupted and were lost, the police department stated in its release. Files that were affected did go back to 2009, however hard copies of all documents and the vast majority of the videos and photographs are still in the possession of the Police Department on CD or DVD. It is unknown at this time how many total digital copies of documents were lost, as it is also unknown how many videos or photographs that could have assisted newer cases will not be available, although the number of affected prosecutions should remain relatively small, the press release said. Details of Osiris Acronis noted some details of this strand of ransomware: We can't seem to find the page you are looking for. You may have typed the address incorrectly or you may have used an outdated link. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Three stories and 25,000 square feet of new, class-A office space is set to hit the Greenwich market this spring. Located a five-minute walk from the Greenwich train station at 330 Railroad Ave., the former Connecticut Light & Power building is undergoing a substantial renovation and will soon house Greenwichs Granoff Architects with openings for a handful of other tenants. It will join several newly remodeled office buildings in town, competing for tenants in Fairfield Countys most expensive office space submarket. At $60 a square foot, the average office rent in Greenwich exceeds the countys second-priciest submarket, Stamford, by almost 60 percent, according to a January report by commercial real-estate company RHYS. Granoff Architects founder Richard Granoff and his business partner Jeffrey Mendell bought the historic building from Eversource Energy in March. Since then, Granoffs firm has been working to restore its former glory while simultaneously modernizing it. Granoff said playing up the structures historic and industrial roots has been a prominent part of the renovation plan. Its a decision that helps distinguish the building from local counterparts. Across Greenwich and Fairfield County, landlords have made modernizing their properties a priority. In late 2014, Greenwich Office Park unveiled its roughly $14 million renovated campus complete with many amenities and shuttle to the train. This spring, Pickwick Plaza at the top of Greenwich Avenue plans to finish a large-scale renovation of its office, restaurant and retail spaces. Granoff said 330 Railroad Ave. will represent an investment north of $8 million by his firm. A state tax credit will return some of that money to his pocket, he added. Last fall, his application was accepted for the 1928 building to be added to Connecticuts Register of Historic Places. Its inclusion means the state must approve his renovations, but thats worth the resulting distinction and tax credits, Granoff said. Around 30 other Greenwich structures are included on the list. While walking around the unfinished building last week, Granoff pointed out where, in the coming months, his firms front desk, conference rooms and his own corner office will sit. We gutted the entire building and, now, its really a new building inside the shell of an old one, Granoff said. New, floor-to-ceiling windows flood the building with natural light and its popular, exposed brick, industrial style with plenty of parking make it an attractive option, he said. Landscaping, an interior green wall full of plants and technological elements, such as a daylight harvesting system that controls the buildings shades and lighting as the sun moves, will soon round out the renovations. The building will serve as a living portfolio and headquarters for Granoff Architects once the firm moves into the buildings first floor. Commercial real-estate firm Newmark Grubb Knight Frank is working on finding tenants for the rest of the office space, which lends itself primarily to financial service groups, Granoff said. This place was worthy of restoring, Granoff said, whos been searching for such a project to transform into his firms offices for years. They just dont make them like they used to. A rendering and virtual tour of 330 Railroad Ave., can be seen on Granoffs website at http://www.granoffarchitects.com/#/3685. Contact the writer at MBennett@greenwichtime.com, 203-625-4411; Twitter @Macaela_ STRATFORD This is almost too ghoulish to be true Fright Haven, the frightful attraction that opened last Halloween, will be collecting blood on Friday, Feb. 10 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. But before you call your senator, congressman and every other authority figure that comes to mind, you should know that the blood thats collected will be for the American Red Cross, and not for any scream-generating attraction at Fright Haven. The blood drive is being staged in part to draw attention to Fright Havens Valentines Day Massacre event, where visitors might discover that Cupids arrows arent quite as romantic as once thought. Cupid has had enough of matchmaking, and is ready to wreak havoc on all the thankless hearts of the world, said one of Fright Havens organizers, Charles Rosenay. Part haunted house, part graveyard, part mind-bending illusion, Fright Haven sends its visitors through a labyrinth with one scare after another. It uses a combination of live actors, pneumatically operated witches and ghouls, and an assortments of sounds, smells and optical illusions designed to make your hair stand on end. But, this Vanentine-themed massacre will only take place for two days: Friday, Feb. 10 and Saturday, Feb. 11, from from 7 to 10 p.m. on both nights. Fright Haven is in the Stratford Square Shopping Plaza, 411 Barnum Avenue Cutoff next to L.A. Fitness and Ninety Nine Restaurant (across from Home Depot). Its open to all ages but the attractions recommended for 13 and over. The blood drive comes during a severe winter blood shortage. Since Dec. 1, more than 350 blood drives have been canceled nationwide because of to severe weather, resulting in over 13,000 uncollected blood and platelet donations, the Red Cross said.. The need for blood doesnt pause for severe weather its constant, said Alyson Barraza, communications manager for the Connecticut Blood Services Region. Right now, blood and platelet donations are being distributed to hospitals faster than they are coming in. Eligible donors of all blood types are critically needed. Donate blood at the Blood Drive, or purchase tickets now on sale at Fright Havens website. jburgeson@ctpost.com; MILFORD A Milford man has been separated from his wife and children after President Donald Trump banned immigration from predominantly Muslim countries. NBC Connecticut reports that Fadi Kassars wife and two daughters, who he hasnt seen in two years, had been stranded at an airport in Kiev, Urkraine on Saturday. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate NEW HAVEN As he sat in an immigration holding room, Dr. Tarek Alasil ran a mental checklist of worst-case scenarios. The Yale University ophthalmology resident said he wondered how long he would be separated from his wife and two American-born children. Would he be forced to return to his native Aleppo in Syria, where the atrocities of a civil war have been compared to the Holocaust? Would it short-circuit his pending U.S. citizenship application? Alasil, 35, cut short a medical mission treating indigent cataract patients in the Bahamas on Saturday on the advice of Yale colleagues and immigration lawyers who urged him to return to Connecticut immediately. Despite having a green card and being married to a U.S. citizen, Alasil was detained by customs agents carrying out an executive order from President Donald Trump. The controversial ban made no distinction from permanent residents such as Alasil, a resident of Orange, with visitors from seven predominantly Muslim, countries. It sparked widespread protests at major U.S. airports Saturday and Sunday. This is our life, Alasil said Sunday. I consider this home now. Security theater The soft-spoken Alasil was eventually allowed to board a later flight to Boston on Saturday night, but not before his ordeal attracted the attention of U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn. This has nothing to do with security, Himes said. Its security theater. In fact, itll make the country more dangerous. It has really created a huge problem for doctors, students and law-abiding green-card holders. Himes, who serves on the House Intelligence Committee, said his office consulted with fellow Democrats Jerrold Nadler and Nydia Velazquez, both of New York. They were dealing with similar cases at John F. Kennedy Airport. This man has no business in the Oval Office, Himes said of Trump. A Trump administration official said Sunday night the White House was erring on the side of caution over convenience. It did not want to telegraph its plans to terrorists to give them time to change travel plans, according to the official, who said individual cases of green-card holders will be treated on a case-by-case basis. The official said the policy mirrors a 2011 action by President Barack Obama singling out refugees from Iraq. While Alasil was driving back to New Haven on Sunday, 1,000 protesters flooded the baggage claim area of Bradley International Airport in Windsor Locks to rail against the policy. They were joined by Lt. Gov. Nancy Wyman, state Attorney General George Jepsen and representatives of the American Civil Liberties Union, which successfully petitioned a judge for a court stay Saturday delaying Trumps executive order. Policy critics said religious profiling which they believe the order encourages violates civil liberties and civil rights. That type of religious litmus test is unconstitutional and un-American, said David McGuire, executive director of the ACLU of Connecticut. Former U.S. Rep. Rob Simmons, R-Conn., a decorated Vietnam veteran and former CIA officer, defended the steps taken by Trump. The unfortunate fact of the matter is that over the last six or eight years that the Obama administration has shown little consideration for those who come into this country from other parts of the world that are engaged in jihad against us, Simmons said. Simmons acknowledged the executive action needed refinement in its treatment of green-card holders such as Alasil, however. I dont think they should have been included, but if they are, I think its pretty easy to fix, Simmons said. In 2005, Alasil came to the U.S. to study medicine on a J-1 visa, which provides work and educational exchange opportunities for foreign nationals. He did an internal medicine residency in Southern California and fulfilled his Visa requirements by seeing patients in Fall River, Mass., which he said is considered an under-served community. I really enjoy being part of this culture, said Alasil, a hardcore fan of the Los Angeles Lakers. He is in his third and final year of residency as an ophthalmologist at Yale. The training here is second to none, he said. America is great because of the system that is place. During the presidential campaign, Alasil said, he figured Trumps tough talk was just that talk to win over voters. When he left for the Bahamas Jan. 22, he said, he had no inkling that Trumps executive order would come down so fast or include green card holders. He probably has to put more thoughts into those orders that hes implementing, Alasil said. The orders have to make sense. Early departure Alasil said he was supposed to stay in the Bahamas for another three weeks and committed to treat many more cataract patients, who often fly to Nassau for surgery. I felt guilty that I disappointed the Bahamian people who put a lot of faith in us, said Alasil, who is Muslim. After consulting with an immigration attorney and Yale colleagues, Alasil said he decided to return home Saturday, but was stopped before boarding a flight to Boston through Baltimore. Green card or not, his Syrian passport was a red flag. I can see it in his eyes that he doesnt completely believe in what hes doing, Alasil said of the immigration agent. They asked about if there is anybody in my family who is still in Syria. I told them that they left everything behind because of the war. Alasil missed his flight, but was cleared to book another flight a few hours later. Honestly, I wanted to find another flight right away before they changed their mind, Alasil said. nvigdor@hearstmediact.com; 203-625-4436; http://twitter.com/gettinviggy Exhibition on Children Victims of Chernobyl Accident Opened to Public Submitted by: Juana Arts and Culture Havana Photography 01 / 30 / 2017 A graphic exhibition entitled Chernobyl children in Cuba will be exposed to the public until February 8th at the Jose Marti National Library, reported Juventud Rebelde daily. The exhibition by Peruvian artist Sonia Cunliffe and based on a research by journalist Maribel Acosta, includes photos that show the Cuban Revolutions support to over 26 thousand children victims of the nuclear accident in the Ukraine. The photographs belong to the archives of the dailies Juventud Rebelde and Granma. The catalog of the exhibition includes statements made by the Director of the Fine Arts Museum Jose A. Fernandez Torres in which he says that the creator of the exposition represents a historic fact. The exhibition also includes audiovisual testimonies and a summary in a moving environment the human aspects and commitment of the Cuban people to return the health and joy of those that lose their faith at a certain moment of their lives, says Fernandez. 29 Ocak 2017 Pazar, 18:27 The investigation put together to silence Cumhuriyet essentially collapsed the moment it emerged that it was being conducted by a prosecutor himself facing FETO charges. In spite of this, a remand order was issued by Penal Bench of the Peace number 9 in a decision in which reports and articles were equated with terrorism. In the course of three months, there has been no deviation from this stance, which is constantly reiterated, in rulings on objections made against the remand order and in review of remand. The unfounded nature of the Cumhuriyet investigation became evident from the outset through the failure for any concrete evidence to be adduced apart from news reports. This explains the effort to lend the investigation legitimacy through the raising of accusations and discussions of a change to its editorial line and editorial policy informed by interpretations and suppositions couched in such terms as, Cumhuriyet suddenly changing its statist, traditional, secular and neo-nationalist line and targeting the state. In fact, as is stated in the articles under which the Cumhuriyet Foundation was established, the purpose of Cumhuriyets existence has been deemed to be the establishing of true democracy and winning over society to secularism. As to the basic principles to be observed in achieving these aims, these are indicated to be the Declaration of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and the path of enlightenment that Ataturks revolutions and principles have opened up. Along with the absence of the component of any crime from the publications cited by the prosecution as evidence of guilt, there is also absolutely no breach of these principles. The news reports serving as grounds for remand are as follow: THE DANGER IN THE STREET * The newspapers headline on 17 July 2016 took the form The danger in the street and, by turning posters of our President that were attached to tanks into headline news, the incident of going out into the street and standing up for democracy was seen as being dangerous ... The headline news underlying this particular accusation against Cumhuriyet set out to convey a concern that was widely felt in society. Cumhuriyet, in passing on this concern in this report, made no statement at all that portrayed going out into the street in opposition to a coup as being a danger. On the contrary, it was stressed that certain worrying events in the course of these street demonstrations were the work of certain groups that broke off from the citizens who went into the streets in opposition to the coup. On top of this, the warning was made that these groups actions overshadowed the democratic protests. Part of the report read as follows: The actions of certain groups that broke off from the demonstrations being held outdoors following the 15 July coup attempt in Turkey, which has experienced the 6-7 September events and the Maras and Madmak massacres that have become black stains on history, are overshadowing democratic protests. DEMOCRATIC SHORTCOMING * The rally that was held at Yenikap and was staged in opposition to the coup with more than five million people in attendance was targeted with it headlined Democratic shortcoming ... That the failure to invite the HDP to the rally at Yenikap was a major shortcoming was expressed by many politicians and commentators, not least the CHP. Cumhuriyet also perceived the absence of the HDP from the venue to be a shortcoming but made no statements that targeted the rally. In the report in Cumhuriyet on the Yenikap meeting, those in attendance were described as, Millions of citizens who opposed the coup and the size of the crowd was stressed. THE INTELLIGENCE AGENCYS LORRIES * Under the title, The very weapons that Erdogan said were non-existent, information and photographs that should have been kept confidential relating to the halting of the intelligence agencys aid lorries, which has been substantiated by the courts to be a FETO plot, were published as headline news ... The reports that led to journalist Can Dundar and our Ankara representative Erdem Gul being sentenced to five years imprisonment were considered by the court to amount to the publishing of confidential documents. With the Constitutional Court ruling that there had been a breach of rights in which it determined that Can Dundar and Erdem Guls detention was in violation of the law and statute, it being stated that what they were charged with amounted to journalistic activity, the Serious Crime Court decided to release them. In breach of one of the basic rules of law of non bis in idem, i.e. that a second investigation cannot be launched into the same act and a punishment cannot be awarded for a second time for the same act, the report about the intelligence agencys lorries has been included in this investigation. INTERVIEW WITH THE PROSECUTORS * The inclusion in Cumhuriyet newspaper of reports and one interview relating to the Ergenekon prosecutors in the 17-25 December coup attempt process and their interviews with general publications manager Can Dundar The interviews conducted with the prosecutors have been put forward as evidence of terrorism in total disregard of the fact that in these interviews, which were conducted in line with one of the most fundamental rules of journalism, the breaches of the fundamental principles of penal law and unlawfulness of the 17-25 December investigations were also queried and opposing questions were also asked AYDIN ENGINS ARTICLE * The article written by Aydn Engin on 13 July 2016 and entitled Peace in the world so at home what? The 15 July coupists proclaimed themselves to be called the Peace at Home Council in the announcement they had read out on state television. The attempt is made to create a link between the coup and the article penned by Aydn Engin two days prior to the coup simply due to the reference to Ataturks Peace at home and peace in the world statement. In fact, Engin in his article was inquiring whether the rhetoric of peace being touted in foreign policy on that date would have a domestic impact. He stands accused of terrorism for a column that contains an outright call for peace. KADRI GURSELS ARTICLE * Through the making of messages with subliminal content in the column entitled Erdogan wants to be our father that Kadri Gursel wrote on 12 July, rebelling against an elected President and other such illegitimate means were proposed ... The penal bench of the peace has made a tragicomic accusation by following the lead of the investigating prosecutor who has adroitly detected the subliminal message in Gursels article criticising Erdogan. In fact, Gursel in this article suggests that Erdogan wishes to be the countrys father for humorous effect and recommends lighting a cigarette and not putting it out in opposition to Erdogan so as to signal that he has finished himself off politically even if it will have no other effect. The bench, however, considers this article to be rebellion! SAME HEADLINE AS ZAMAN * The appearance of the same headline in Zaman newspaper and Cumhuriyet newspaper on 16 February 2016 (Bomb at the heart of the state) Conclusions are drawn from the appearance entirely by coincidence of the same headline of Bomb at the heart of the state about a bomb that went off in Merasim Street in one of Ankaras most central locations at a distance of ten metres from the Chief of Staff, Forces Commands, Parliament and the Prime Ministers Office. In fact, in the world of journalism other newspapers have found themselves going snap with their headlines on more than one occasion and this kind of unwelcome coincidence is a frequently encountered thing. The following examples can be cited of snapping headlines that derive from the nature of the reported events and can be said to be coincidences: * The Sozcu and Ozgur Gundem newspapers, in their 15 March 2016 editions, had the identical headlines A plague on your Prime Ministry in connection with the bomb that went off in Ankaras Kzlay Square. * On 27 March 2014, in reporting the cassette plot against Deniz Baykal, the headline Baykal Cassette Earthquake appeared in Haberturk and Cassette Earthquake in Politics in Zaman newspaper. * The Sozcu and BirGun newspapers compared the Prime-Minister of the day, Erdogan, to Hitler in their 21 February 2014 editions. Sozcu came out with the headline, Look at the Coincidence, while BirGuns was We noticed a resemblance between you and someone. * As to the pro-government newspapers, they have appeared with common headlines especially in the Gezi period and in connection with the Egyptian coup. On top of this, these headlines, rather than being coincidence, were prepared and planned snaps resulting from prior mutual negotiations. TENS DEAD IN THE BASEMENT * In the report entitled, Raid on the basement tens dead, the attempt was made to portray PKK terrorists as being innocent and it was reported that the injured were not taken into ambulances ... It was stated in the reports that the allegations were raised by HDP spokespeople. Over and above this, the alleged violation of the right to life was covered in a balanced manner drawing on information obtained from official sources. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein described the news emanating from the South-East as being worrying and called for an independent investigation to be launched. The European Court of Human Rights passed measure orders in the course of the events in Cizre. NUSAYBIN DEMOLISHED * Events in which Nusaybin was targeted and trenches rigged with bombs were dug and our citizens and our soldiers and policemen were killed by the PKK terrorist organisation were covered as Nusaybin demolished ... The report was based on a photograph that was taken in Nusaybin and showed the town having been fully demolished. It was stated in the report, Yuksekova, Sur, Cizre and Srnak. And now Nusaybin, too. The ruined towns left over from operations and clashes. SAYING GULENISTS IS ALSO A CRIME The bench did not consider the serial about FETO that our lawyers submitted to the file to be evidence of the newspapers anti-FETO stance. It is asserted in the decision that in the first articles of the series, It is not said to be a terrorist organisation and it is stated far more to be the Gulen movement or the Gulenists. In fact, the series, which addressed from various perspectives the way in which the devotees of Fethullah had organised within the state for years and had transformed into FETO, was even entitled FETO and its Servants. THERE IS NO EVIDENCE CONCERNING FETO It is asserted in the remand order that, In connection with electing members of the Cumhuriyet Foundation management board, illegal actions were taken so that persons would be included in management who had connections with the FETO terrorist organisation or wished to enter cooperation with this organisation, and this matter is pending before the judiciary. In fact, not a single piece of evidence was adduced as to any member of the management board having connections with FETO. In the file, alongside the above, the attempt has even been made to put forward as evidence for the charges certain opinion pieces and other newspaper reports which are entirely subjective and totally unfounded, and have for the most part been penned on the basis of personal opinions and thoughts or even personal grudges, and social media posts of a similar nature. STORY LINK US Dollar to British Pound Exchange Rate Forecast Advances amid Trump Jitters US Dollar (USD) Firms as Investors Seek out Safe Havens Pound (GBP) Weakens on Fear of Weaker UK-US Relations USD/GBP Forecast: Central Bank Decisions the Week Like this piece? Please share with your friends and colleagues: The US Dollar to British Pound exchange rate plunged on Tuesday afternoon as the Pound strengthened while the US Dollar was undermined by the latest Trump jitters and US economic concerns.Tuesday afternoons US consumer confidence results from January disappointed investors, falling to 111.8 despite being predicted to come in at a stronger 113. While the figure was broadly solid, it worsened market concerns that the Trump administration would not enjoy a honeymoon period from consumers.[Previously updated 30/01/2017]The US Dollar to British Pound exchange rate advanced on Monday as Sterling was kept pressured by ongoing concerns of post-Brexit trade while jittery investors firmed in the safe haven US Dollar following high uncertainty during the new US Trump administration.USD/GBP tumbled from 0.8080 to 0.7967 last week, falling further from this months three-decade-high of 0.8338.While the US Dollar weakened last week on uncertainty about the Trump Presidency and underwhelming US Gross Domestic Product (GDP) figures, investors firmed in the currency on Monday.US President Trump issued a controversial executive order over the weekend, barring those flying from several Muslim-heavy countries from access to the US for a minimum of 90 days.The order sparked criticism from various politicians and business leaders and led analysts to fear that the US was closing itself off to vital skilled immigrants.Despite being a US issue, the demand for safe haven currencies that followed as investors looked to avoid losses saw the US Dollar rise regardless.Before the latest controversial Trump move emerged, analysts were feeling generally optimistic about the future on UK-US relations.UK Prime Minister Theresa May met with Trump during Fridays American session and things appeared to go smoothly, with May claiming that Trump supported NATO 100% despite his previous criticism of the group.However, no details emerged on any possible UK-US trade talks and analyst hopes for stronger ties began to fade following the Trump Muslim ban too.Theresa May has been swamped with calls from UK politicians to condemn Trumps actions and even reject an invitation for Trump to visit Britain. While Downing Street has stated Trumps visit will not be rejected, investors are increasingly concerned that UK-US relations could quickly sour.Investors are likely to react to this weeks influential US data and central bank decisions regardless of underlying uncertainty about the US Trump Presidency.Tuesday will see the publication of UK data such as Decembers consumer credit and mortgage approvals figures.Key US data will also be published on Tuesday, including Q4 employment cost figures and Januarys highly anticipated consumer confidence print.Economic sector figures will be published on Wednesday, including US manufacturing PMI. However, the main event will be the Federal Reserves first policy decision of 2017.Britains Super Thursday will follow with the Bank of England (BoE) holding its own first policy decision of 2017, as well as a press conference from BoE Governor Mark Carney.However, the underlying anxiety and uncertainty in US and UK markets lately could prevent either the US Dollar or Pound from heavily benefiting. International Money Transfer? Ask our resident FX expert a money transfer question or try John's new, free, no-obligation personal service! ,where he helps every step of the way, ensuring you get the best exchange rates on your currency requirements. TAGS: Currency Predictions Daily Currency Updates Poun Forecasts We must rethink the U.S. response to infectious disease. Here's why. You might have watched Meryl Streep playing Margaret Thatcher in the 2011 film The Iron Lady. If so, you probably recall the opening scene. The former PM, stricken by a form of dementia, slips her security guards and wanders off to her local corner shop to buy a pint of milk. I certainly recall the scene, because that corner shop is my local one in London, just a 30-second walk from our front door. And the couple who run it, Nita and Kishore Shah, have a fleeting role as themselves serving the Streep version of Mrs T. The Shahs have been running their shop Victoria Greeting Cards for 27 years. They are the hub of the local community. Meryl Streep, playing Mrs Thatcher in the film The Iron Lady. This scene was filmed at a corner shop close to Dominic Lawson's home and run by a couple whose business is about to receive a shattering blow as a result of the politicians' actions It is a mixed one: the store is on the edge of the Longmoore council estate and the freehold is owned by the council. But this part of London, Pimlico, is also dotted with the homes of MPs and civil servants, being close to Parliament and Whitehall. They should take the trouble to listen to Mrs Shah (much the more voluble one of the couple). She has certainly been bending my ear about the shattering blow her little family business is about to receive as a result of the politicians' actions. On April 1 there is to be a 'revaluation' of business rates across the country. It is the first one in seven years, and, as business rates are based on property values, the increase for shops in Central London will be dramatic. Mrs Shah tells me that her business rates, over the next three years, are set to rise by a total of 20,000. The Shahs are, in the phrase adopted by the Prime Minister, 'just about managing'. How are they to recoup anything like that from raising their prices? As Nita puts it: 'If I put the price of something up by 20p, the customer says: 'I can get it cheaper than that at Tesco.' ' And indeed, there is a Tesco in the next street. So why, with a supermarket so close, would it be a blow to the community if the Shahs she is 56 and her husband is 62 shut up shop for good? It's not just because they pack a remarkable range of useful everyday goods into their little store: if they don't have something you want, they make every effort to get it in for you. And Mr Shah will deliver it personally if the request is from an elderly local who struggles to walk. In the past, they gave credit to the more impoverished of the council estate tenants. Hub of the local community: Nita and Kishore Shah, who had a fleeting appearance in The Iron Lady, pictured, have run their shop in Pimlico, London, for 27 years As Mrs Shah pointed out to me with a characteristic chuckle, 'When you came in the other day and realised you'd mislaid your wallet, I let you pay later'. And she'll hold a set of my house keys for the plumber on a day when I am expecting a visit from him, just in case I am out when he calls. Nor could the Shahs possibly work longer hours to make up the extra taxes soon to be demanded by the Government. Do the politicians understand what it's like to run a small business like this? For all of the past 27 years they have been opening up seven days a week, at 6 o'clock each morning. They drive in every day from their home in Croydon: they have to, as the trains aren't running that early. When I asked what time they got up in the morning, Mrs Shah said: 'We wake up around 3.45 am and we don't usually get to bed before 11pm. It's a long day.' Then she paused, and with another of her chuckles, went on: 'And I'm always cheerful, as well!' She is, too. If ever I come in with what she sees as a gloomy expression, Mrs Shah upbraids me for it: 'That's life! You just have to get on!' But even her perennial good humour is being tried by the imminent threat to her and her husband's shop. 'Do the politicians understand what it's like to run a small business like this? Do they realise how you have to juggle stock, to make sure you don't buy in too much or too little? With this increase in business rates, I think: what's the point? I might as well work round the corner at Tesco and have a regular salary and none of the hassle.' Mrs Thatcher, the daughter of corner grocery store owner, understood the real-life problems small businesses like the Shahs' shop have And, she adds: 'What will take our place when we're gone? Yet another charity shop or a nail bar?' She's probably right: charity shops are exempt from business rates. And nail bars staffed mostly by Vietnamese who may or may not be trafficked do seem to be popping up with increasing frequency in the High Streets. Obviously, there is a much wider issue here than just the future of Mr and Mrs Shah's corner shop. Business rates are a strange form of tax on enterprise, being based on property values, rather than profits and hence divorced from the ability to pay. This was one reason Margaret Thatcher introduced a poll tax to replace the domestic version of the rates: she was, in part at least, concerned for the retired lady living in a relatively valuable property, who was taxed as if she were a big burden on the local utilities. So she wanted the taxes based on head count, reflecting the actual use of services. We all know how disastrously that ended up; and so politicians are, more than ever, leery of changing the peculiar system known as business rates which leaves people like the Shahs as its victims. And, as Mrs Shah exclaims: 'What do you get for the business rates? Nothing! I can't use the bins outside for our rubbish they're only for residents.' We don't mention Mrs Thatcher in our conversations. But the real version of the woman the Shahs served in that film understood their real-life problems: she had been the daughter of a corner grocery store owner. Does our second woman prime minister have the same visceral sympathy for the small businessman and businesswoman? If not, we will all be the poorer. Have business rates affected you? Email us at money.mail@dailymail.co.uk BA flies the flag for shoddy service BA or easyJet? It's the dilemma for many of us when planning a round-trip short-haul flight out of London. EasyJet will always win on price, but the national flag carrier offers benefits not available on budget airlines, such as a free meal . . . or it did until recently. A few weeks ago, BA started charging for food on European flights, and it has not been going well. I hadn't realised this until I got on my Gibraltar-bound plane a week ago and regretted not bringing a packed lunch. I sat in the middle of the aircraft row 16 on a flight due to leave Heathrow at 12.35pm. It was not until almost three hours later (at 4.23pm Gibraltar time) that the two stewards operating what they called 'our new cabin service' asked me what I'd like for lunch. It was a paltry choice. By then we were well past Madrid and would soon be descending. National embarrassment: BA still represents Britain in the eyes of countless foreign travellers but now offers worse performance than a budget carrier for three times the price So some of my fellow passengers would not even have been able to obtain a glass of water for which a payment was also required. And no cash was allowed apparently, that is too much of an inconvenience for BA. On the return flight to Gatwick, I went by easyJet. That flight left Gibraltar at 12.25pm and I was served my 6.50 meal of main course, snack and drink by 12.40pm. Admittedly, I was in the front row, so served first but I could see the whole thing was being operated much more rapidly than on the BA flight, even though eEasyJet was flexible enough to take cash. For those interested in value as well as service, my easyJet fare (including the premium for a front row seat and priority boarding) was 41.89. The BA flight cost 110.70. Oh, and BA charges for baggage in the hold, just like budget airlines. I chose BA for the outgoing flight because the easyJet equivalent left at the crack of dawn. But if I were a holidaymaker anxious to have more time in Gibraltar's sunshine, an earlier start would actually be an advantage. BA is no longer the Government's responsibility it was successfully privatised 30 years ago but it still represents our country in the eyes of countless foreign travellers. So when it offers worse performance than a budget airline, for almost three times the price, it amounts to a national embarrassment. It offers six swimming pools, 30 bars and cafes, a cinema and the tallest slide on any ship in the world - so it's no wonder that the MSC World Europa - dubbed a 'floating palace' - is said to be hosting England's WAGs during the World Cup in Qatar. The luxury 1billion cruise liner - which usually costs 2,434.80 for nine nights - has set sail for Doha and was spotted making its way through the Suez Canal on Wednesday, according to The Sun, ahead of setting up base at the Doha Port. WAGs set to live aboard the vessel during the 2022 FIFA World Cup - which is taking place from 20 November to 18 December - include air hostess Georgina Irwin, 26, who is engaged to goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale, 24, Phil Foden's girlfriend Rebecca Cooke, 22, and Harry Maguire's wife Fern, 27, reported the publication. Guests will be living the high life, thanks to onboard beauty salons, boutiques, dodgems, 14 ocean-view Jacuzzis and the longest dry-slide at sea titled The Venom Drop to keep them entertained between matches. But while the wives and girlfriends of the football stars will lap up the luxury of the swanky ship - complete with its very own shopping mall, roller disco rink and a range of clubs for children - it's said that players won't be allowed on board as they are set to form their own strict Covid bubble at the Souq Al Wakra hotel in Doha. A super saver mum who has revealed how she only spends $17 a day on groceries for her family-of-five, and shared her tips on how others can cut down their food bills. Sarah Jenner, a mum-of-seven from Mareeba in Far North Queensland, has four children who still live at home with her. She spends only $120-140 a week on groceries, which includes everything from food to toilet paper. Super mum: Sarah Jenner (pictured) is a single mum who only spends $120-150 a week on her groceries Growing family: Ms Jenner has seven children (pictured), four of whom still live at home Ms Jenner said that $60-70 per week is spent on dinner, and around $30 a week on fruit. The remaining $20-50 breakfast and lunches, essentials like milk and bread, and non-food items. Her dinners are healthy too, full of meat and vegetables, making sure her kids get all the nutrition they need. Simple but delicious: Ms Jenner said that she makes sure she plans all her meals and buys meat in bulk HOW TO CUT DOWN YOUR GROCERY BILL Sarah said that she had four main tips for cutting down your food bill: 1. Plan all your meals so you know what you're buying and don't waste food 2. Buy frozen vegetables. They are just as nutritious and won't go bad in the fridge 3. Go back to basics and make things you know your family will eat 4. If you think people are particularly hungry, put a plate of bread and butter on the table too Advertisement 'People tell me they cant afford vegetables or can't afford very many vegetables,' Ms Jenner told Daily Mail Australia. 'But I live in the country, where fruit and vegies are more expensive, and I do it. We don't have an Aldi or a market, just shops where things cost more.' An average week of dinners for the mum's family includes spaghetti and meatballs, roast chicken, sausage hot pot, rissoles and vegetables, and shepherd's pie. 'The sort of food I cook is fairly basic,' the mum explained. 'But it fills the kids up and is healthy.' 'I want to make sure I'm feeding them healthy food, with lots of vegetables and protein.' Breaking it down: Per week Ms Jenner spends $60-70 on dinners, $30 per week on fruit, and the rest on breakfast, lunches and non-food items Ms Jenner said that one of the most important things she does to ensure her grocery bill stays low is plan all the family's meals. 'I plan everything,' she said. 'Then you use everything up you buy. If you don't plan and you forgot about something in the fridge thats a waste.' When it comes to what exactly she buys in the supermarket, the mum said that it's all about simplicity. 'I buy bulk packs of meat, and split them up for different meals,' she explained. 'I buy frozen vegetables and fresh fruit.' SARAH'S MEAL PLAN WEEK ONE Spaghetti Bolognese Rissoles and vegetables Vegetable pasties Sausage rolls Fried rice Sausages and vegetables Chicken stir fry with rice Advertisement SARAH'S MEAL PLAN WEEK TWO Spaghetti and Meatballs Sausage hotpot Rissoles and vegetables Roast chicken and vegetables Shepherds pie Sausages with gravy and vegetables Macaroni beef Advertisement 'I keep it simple': Some of her recipes include sausage rolls (left) and Shepherd's Pie (right) 'I want to feed my kids well on a low income': Ms Jenner said that being a single parent taught her a lot about money management Ms Jenner said that a lot of the recipes she uses are either learnt from her mum, or ones that she invented herself. 'I've been a single parent for a long time,' she said. 'Being on a low income has taught me a lot of skills.' 'I want to feed my kids well on a low income. People talk about eating Two Minute Noodles, but I wouldn't want to be feeding that to my kids every night. I want them to be healthy.' You can view all of Sarah's recipes for her two week meal plan on her blog. They married at first sight, and now they are all living under the same roof. The couples on season four of Channel Nines controversial show will be open to temptation when episode one of the series kicks off on Monday. The relationship experts behind Married At First Sight Australia revealed to the Today Show this season will put more pressure on newlyweds than ever before. By placing all the couples in the same apartment block they will not only test their bond, but see if they are able to resist temptation. Scroll down for video The couples on Married At First Sight Australia will be open to temptation on season four of the show as they all live together under the same roof Weve brought them all together to really test the bond that theyve got but also there are temptations that go on, relationship psychologist John Aiken said Today host Lisa Wilkinson asked if there would be 'corridor creeping' to which Mr Aiken (far left) said: 'call it what you like' The new show format prompted Today host Lisa Wilkinson to ask just what happens if one of the newlyweds falls for someone elses bride or groom. Relationship Psychologist John Aiken said it is something that can happen in real life, and thats what they wanted to test. Weve brought them all together to really test the bond that theyve got but also there are temptations that go on, he said. Corridor creeping you mean, Lisa interjected. Well call it what you like its another element to the experiment that we really wanted to amp up, Mr Aiken concluded. Each week the couples will have a commitment ceremony where they grill the experts about their match-making choices For the first time all the brides and grooms will meet before they tie the knot, with separate hens' and bucks' drinks Season four promises to be bigger than ever before, with 20 singles getting hitched. Each week the couples will have a commitment ceremony where they grill the experts about their match-making choices and decide whether or not to stay together. But dating expert and psychologist Mel Schilling stayed coy on the Today Show, refusing to give away if any of the couples lasted the distance. There are some fantastic relationship journeys, she said. The experts are not letting slip whether any of the couples stay together, instead saying there are some 'fantastic relationship journeys' But it seems one bride may already have forgotten about her television husband, with Womans Day reporting single mum Lauren has already moved on with another man. According to the publication, Lauren posted photos of herself and a mystery man called Jake to Facebook. When your boyfriend randomly decides to book a last minute trip, she captioned a photo of two boarding passes both citing the same last name, prompting Womans Day to question whether they may even have recently wed. New Idea magazine also reported there would be drama on camera, with fights at one wedding. Married At First Sight Australia will air on Channel 9 at 7.30pm Monday. Mandy Watkins, 48, is the creative director and owner of Hush, the luxury clothing brand. Originally from Australia, she moved to London 15 years ago where she lives with her husband and two children. I was working as a fashion buyer in Hong Kong in 2000, when I met and fell in love with the man who is now my husband. Roo was on holiday from London, and we dated long-distance for 18 months. It was a big risk moving countries to be with him I didnt know anyone else here. Mandy Watkins, 48, is the creative director and owner of Hush, the luxury clothing brand I was excited to be on such a great new adventure, and to be able to live with Roo for the first time, but I wasnt prepared for the British winter. I grew up in Melbourne and Id never experienced anything colder than 10c so it was a shock. I got a job in marketing but I didnt enjoy it. I had no idea what I was doing. And I had a 90-minute commute. It really affected my morale; all I wanted to do was stay home and curl up on the sofa. I went shopping for pyjamas to keep me warm, but I found the options either too girly and covered in kittens, or too come hither. I didnt want either. That was my lightbulb moment: I realised there was a gap in the market. I wanted to lounge around in something more chic and attractive than a baggy tee and scruffy tracksuit bottoms, but that was comfy enough to help me feel cosy. A few months later I was made redundant. It was a blessing in disguise my redundancy package was the capital I needed. I wrote up a business plan for my luxury loungewear company but I couldnt afford to do anything about it. A few months later I was made redundant. It was a blessing in disguise my redundancy package was the capital I needed. The first collection, in 2003, was tiny: nightwear, vest tops, and a cardigan barely enough to fill a 12-page catalogue. At the start I knew the names of all my customers. Now 14 years later there are 40 people in the Hush office and weve become a successful womenswear and accessories brand. Im still not a fan of British winters but I have that first one to thank it led me to my dream. A young mother has taken on a role as a good samaritan by offering to help other families prepare their kids for school. Naomi Killalea, a 26-year-old mum from Sydney, offered to help struggling families buy their back to school supplies. The mum posted on Facebook that local parents could contact her if they needed some help. Heart of gold: Naomi Killalea (pictured with her daughter) posted on Facebook offering to help local families who are struggling Spending spree: The 26-year-old has said she will buy back to school supplies for parents who need the help Ms Killalea told Daily Mail Australia that she had the idea when shopping for back-to-school supplies with her daughter last week. 'I saw a family, and the mum told the kids that there was a sale so they could all have a new pair of shoes,' she explained. 'One of kids was so excited about getting new school shoes he was almost crying.' 'I just thought, a lot of people are doing it tough and wanted to do something to help.' The 26-year-old went home and decided to share a heartfelt post on social media offering help. 'Tomorrow is back to school. Most of us are excited (mums and dads included), but I know this is a hard time for many,' she wrote. 'Many people struggle and some can't afford to buy the back to school basics for many reasons. So me and my family would like to extend to offer to take you and your child shopping to pick out new schools supplies.' 'A lot of us turn a blind eye to this': The mum took to Facebook to spread the message, and is encouraging others to do the same Lucky: Ms Killalea said that she and her partner (pictured with her daughter) were 'blessed enough' to give their kids what they want and need Budget conscious: Ms Killalea said that she is good at budgeting and her partner tells her to buy something if it makes her happy The mum offered to buy school shoes, bags, pens and pencils, books and other supplies that were needed. 'My partner and I are blessed enough to afford what our children need and want,' Ms Killalea explained. 'I'm quite good at budgeting, and my partner is always telling me to buy something if it will make me happy. 'I thought, with this spare money we have how can I spend it to make me happy? I realised that seeing a child happy with new things for school would make me happy.' 'Seeing a child happy would make me happy': The mum said that one family has already reached out and that she is helping them Good example: Ms Killalea also said that doing good deeds teaches her daughter how to make the world a better place One family has already reached out to Ms Killalea, and she's arranging with them a time to go shopping. 'If I can reach out and help one family, that will have an impact,' she said. 'I volunteer for a charity called The Movement, and I see how some people in the community struggle. I want to help however I can.' The mum is encouraging other parents who have some money spare to do the same thing in their local communities, knowing that the more people who help the bigger impact it will have. Ms Killalea said that by doing charity work, she's also being a good example for her daughter. 'We hope this [post] reaches someone in need and that my daughter will learn how to make this world a better place by helping others,' she wrote. With her mind-boggling social media following, impressive acting pedigree and experience working as a model for the likes of Dior, Yves Saint Laurent and Prada, Sarah Ellen might seem like a natural choice as the face of BONDS. Which is perhaps why the iconic Australian underwear label has snapped up the 19-year-old ex-Neighbours star to be the face of their autumn/winter 2017 campaign. Sarah follows in the footsteps of huge Australian exports such as Miranda Kerr, Iggy Azalea, Kelly Gale and Ruby Rose. On Monday morning, she said she was 'honoured and humbled' to announce her new gig. Floral face: Australian actress and model, Sarah Ellen (pictured), is the new face of iconic Australian label, BONDS Great pedigree: Sarah (pictured) follows in the footsteps of huge Australian exports such as Miranda Kerr, Iggy Azalea, Kelly Gale and Ruby Rose In the campaign, the 19-year-old social media star is seen sporting a series of BONDS outfits. These include a floral bomber jacket and matching lingerie, and a sports-luxe-inspired crop top and knickers. The collection has an edgy, predominantly monochrome feel - which fits well with Sarah's personal aesthetic. Black and white: In the campaign Sarah is seen sporting a number of edgy, predominantly monochrome outfits (pictured) While she now has a combined social media following of close to three million, Sarah (pictured) said that she doesn't think sharing snaps is the be all and end all to life Life online: 'If there is pressure [to look a certain way] then I don't feel it,' the actress and model said But while she now has a combined social media following of close to three million, Sarah said that she doesn't think sharing snaps is the be all and end all to life: I try to spend a healthy amount of time offline as well as online 'If there is pressure [to look a certain way] then I don't feel it,' the actress and model said. 'Although it's important to have a presence on social media, we shouldn't let it take over our lives!'. 'I try to spend a healthy amount of time offline as well as online. I'm a big believer in people being themselves and celebrating their individuality.' Mixing it up: Sarah said that she tries to spend a 'healthy amount of time offline as well as online' Upwards trajectory: She shot to fame at just age 14 for uploading a video to YouTube, and has since starred on Neighbours and modelled for the likes of Maybelline Australia Sarah Ellen shot to fame at age 14, when she uploaded a quirky video 'dancing her eyebrows' to a funky beat on YouTube. The 30-second clip swiftly went viral and established the teenager as an Internet Queen. She later went on to star as the offspring of Scott (Jason Donovan) and Charlene (Kylie Minogue) on Neighbours, and has also since secured modelling contracts with fashion chain Supre and Maybelline Australia. 'I've been blessed with some amazing opportunities in Australia over the last couple of years, and I'm excited to see what I can create locally and internationally this year,' Sarah said. 'I really love acting and this is a major priority for me at the moment.' Ashley Graham lit up the red carpet at the Miss Universe awards in the Philippines, wowing the waiting crowds in a stunning gold gown. The sheer beaded Roberto Cavalli ensemble, which was worn with a form-fitting black leotard underneath, showed off the 28-year-old's famous figure to full effect, ensuring all eyes were on her as she made her way into the pageant on Monday morning local time. New Yorker Ashley, who arrived in the Philippines last week, is the backstage host at this year's pageant and clearly couldn't have been more thrilled with her choice of outfit, taking to Instagram shortly before the pageant aired, posting an image of herself along with the caption: 'And so it begins... feeling #confidentlybeautiful.' Golden girl: Ashley Graham dazzled on the red carpet at the Miss Universe pageant in the Philippines, wearing a sheer beaded dress Shine bright: The 28-year-old happily beamed at the cameras as she showed off her curves in the glamorous gown Confident: Ashley took to Instagram earlier in the day to share an image of herself on the carpet, explaining that she felt 'confidently beautiful' about her appearance Her confident statement on social media comes just a few days after she was praised online for proudly posting a picture of her cellulite on Instagram. The model found some time to soak up a bit of sunshine on the beach while resting and relaxing on Wednesday, and took the opportunity to snapshot of the 'lumps, bumps, and cellulite' on her thighs. The image of Ashley's bikini-clad lower half created a stir online, as more than 294,000 people liked the post, with many taking to the comments section to thank her for displaying a realistic depiction of female beauty. 'I workout. I do my best to eat well. I love the skin I'm in. And I'm not ashamed of a few lumps, bumps or cellulite... and you shouldn't be either,' she wrote when sharing the image, using the hashtags: #beautybeyondsize #lovetheskinyourein. Candid: On Wednesday, Ashley took to Instagram to proudly post a snapshot of the 'lumps, bumps, and cellulite' on her thighs Role model: She was quickly praised for sharing the candid image of her cellulite on her Instagram page One Instagram user, Marina Luiza Schulz Homrich, told Ashley that her constant promotion of self-love is helping her overcome an eating disorder. 'You have no idea how much idea how much you are helping me on my journey to win anorexia; thank you for all the body positive messages,' she wrote. Ashley's body-positive message has also struck a chord with many people tuning in to watch the Miss Universe contest this year, with many taking to Twitter and Instagram to celebrate the fact that a curvy star had been chosen as the host. 'Ashley Graham as one of the hosts makes #MissUniverse more badass. The world is finally seeing the real definition of beauty,' Mary Ruth Baloy posted on Twitter. Earlier during the pageant proceedings, Ashley also took the time to lend her support to Miss Canada Sierra Bearchell, who spoke out against body-shaming last week on Instagram, revealing that she has been the subject of much criticism from online trolls in the past who have made cruel comments about her weight. Travel in style: Ashley enjoyed a luxurious trip to the Philippines, posting an image of her seat on her social media accounts 'I was recently asked, "What happened to you? Why have you gained weight? You are losing points." This was a reference to my body of course. While I am first to say I am not as lean as I was when I was 16, 20, or even last year, but I am more confident, capable, wise, humble and passionate than ever before,' she wrote. 'As soon as I started to love who I was rather than always trying to fit what I thought society wanted me to be, I gained a whole new side of life. This is the side I am trying to bring to the @missuniverse competition. 'The side of life that is so rare to find: self-worth and self-love. We always focus on the things we wish we could change rather than loving everything we are.' Speaking out in support of Sierra earlier this week, Ashley noted that she hopes to see women of all shapes and sizes competing in the Miss Universe pageant one day. She said: 'My hope and my dream is that women of all shapes and all sizes and clearly we have so many different ethnicity that are in Miss Universe right now are able to compete and able to win and not have anybody have to talk about their weight because that is the most ridiculous thing.' The oft-uttered adage may suggest that talking to yourself is 'the first sign of madness'...but according to a top psychology professor, having a chat with oneself is actually perfectly normal. Inspired by a Mumsnet thread in which a user admitted to pretending out loud to be a top-selling author while alone, Radio 4 show's Woman's Hour asked Professor Molly Andrews, from the University of East London, to reveal exactly what self-chatting means. Reassuringly, the eminent professor told host Jane Garvey that those who fantasised during 'self-chats' were simply easing the 'dreariness' of daily life. Scroll down for video Escaping out loud? A Woman's Hour discussion today saw listeners admit they frequently chat out loud to themselves, something Professor Molly Andrews, from the University of East London The post that inspired the Woman's Hour conversation; a Mumsnet user admitted to pretending she was a famous novelist and talking out loud while alone One particular post on Mumsnet caught the eye of the show's producers. Written by user PrettyRicky, it saw her revealing that she liked to pretend she was being interviewed by Woman's Hour about her 'hugely critical acclaimed novel' but had been aghast when her husband had come home and caught her mid imaginary discussion. Andrews, Professor of Political Psychology and Co-director of the Centre for Narrative Research at the London university, said it had long been acknowledged that talking to oneself is common. She told listeners: 'I don't think it's mad to talk to yourself, we do it all the time. 'We're unique in the animal kingdom in being able to imagine. Far from it being a source of madness, it actually gives us the ability to think about other worlds. It's critical in what it means to be human.' We're all at it: the discussion prompted a flood of tweets about the subject Jane Garvey, pictured right with Jenni Murray, hosted the chat on Woman's Hour today The programme also took to the streets of London to ask women whether they talked to themselves and found the answer firmly in the affirmative. And on social media, there was a small mountain of tweets, with many written by people who admit to talking to themselves frequently. @rachaelphillips wrote: '@BBCWomansHour @MumsnetTowers love this segment. I'm always talking to myself. It helps me get clear on ideas and my own thought process.' @chezza_p added: 'We all do it. Who hasn't chatted through their Desert Island Discs or shared the heartache of their latest album?' @HippyRockChick wrote: 'Talking to yourself is usually the best way to get any sensible discussion. Just worry when you answer back...' @jododsley poured fourth: 'All the time, constantly, even w other people in the room occasionally. Perspective from outer self.' Explorer Sarah Outen, who often goes on long expeditions alone tweeted the show: 'Rowing solo across oceans has made me the ultimate talk to yourself-er.' Andrews said of Outen's tweet: 'It points out the idea that we are 'other' to ourselves. She's both the narrator and the audience. 'This dynamic in-conversation is something that we commonly do. We don't necessarily articulate it out loud. We imagine counter positions to our own and play those out and those are all equally ourselves. Not one homogenous self.' One young American couple is living the dream, traveling nonstop around the world and all without trust funds. Natasha Alden, 27, and Cameron Seagle, 26 from Lansing, Michigan, and Charlotte, North Carolina, respectively have been doing their jet-set thing for about three-and-a-half years now, trotting around the globe on savings and some extra cash from freelancing. And the wonder isn't just that they've made their trip work financially. They've also happily stuck together despite meeting just days before deciding to travel together. Worldwide love: Natasha Alden, 27, and Cameron Seagle, 26, have been traveling the world together for years (pictured in Serbia) Beginnings: Natasha, from Michigan, and Cameron, from North Carolina, met shortly before Natasha's college graduation Quick decision: Cameron decided to accompany Natasha for part of her long-term travels, which she had been planning and saving up for for quite a while (pictured in Lesotho) The two have now visited about 50 countries together (pictured left: Albania; right: Slovenia) Natasha had been planing her big extended getaway for a while, having caught the travel bug while studying abroad in Australia. She saved up through part-time jobs, and sold her car for some extra cash right before she left. Something else happened right before she left that would change the course of her trip she met Cameron the night before college graduation. With Natasha due to leave not long after their first meeting, the pair jointly decided, on a whim, that Cameron would come and join her on her travels, so he booked a flight to meet her in Norway a few months into her trip. Cameron had some savings, too, from summer jobs, and also counted on his former airline employee dad to score him some free flights. Their parents were both on board, in fact and Natasha's were especially happy she'd found someone to travel with. A goal in mind: Natasha had saved money from part-time jobs, while Cameron had held summer gigs (pictured in South Africa) Planning: After about a year, they moved in together in New York City to start saving again (pictured left: Rovinj, Croatia; right: Morocco) Impressive: They stuck to a budget while living in a small place in the Bronx and managed to save $50,000 in a year (pictured: Turkey) Off they go! They set out then and haven't looked back since (pictured in Turkey) They said the challenges of traveling together and being with each other 24/7 has made their relationship stronger (pictured in Turkey) After two months of traveling together following just two real-life dates back in the US Cameron flew home to finish up his senior year. But six months later he was back out traveling with Natasha again, meeting up with her in Southeast Asia. Eventually, their savings ran out, and the spontaneous couple shacked up in a small, inexpensive apartment in the Bronx in New York City. There, they took two jobs each to save up in order to hit the road again, foregoing things like eating out to fund their next trip. 'It wasn't hard, at least not for me,' Natasha told Stuff.co.nz. 'I had this goal: I knew if I lived below my means now, I could experience what I wanted later.' After a year, they'd jointly saved $50,000 and were ready to take off. They each booked a one-way ticket to Riga, Latvia for $240 each. Flashback! Cameron first flew out to Norway to meet up with Natasha over three years ago (pictured) Going solo: Natasha did some traveling on her own after Cameron returned home for his senior year of college (pictured in Ecuador) They said they are always meeting new people but it is difficult to form longterm friendships (pictured in Marrakech, Morocco) Future goals: They hope to set up a base for travel in Japan soon and start working on opening their own hotel (pictured in Cape Town, South Africa) Since they started, the couple has hit about 50 countries, including Lithuania, Poland, Cyprus, Turkey, Italy, Morocco, Slovenia, Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Croatia, Greece, Zimbabwe, Zambia, South Africa, and the Seychelles. Photos they share on social media and their website, The World Pursuit, show them enjoying the whitewashed buildings of Santorini, hiking Nosal Mountain in Poland, relaxing at Turkish baths in Istanbul, having a romantic night out in Italy, and riding camels in the Sahara Desert. In 2016 alone, they meditated in Morocco, took a gondola ride in Venice, snapped colorful buildings in Slovenia, hiked in Serbia, went paragliding over Albania and Macedonia, enjoyed nature in Croatia, and spotted giraffes and Zebras in South Africa. They try not to spend more than $40 each every day, which they say isn't hard if they eat cheap and stay in Airbnb housing. They also make a little extra cash through freelance writing and photography. Spots: They have been to Turkey, Italy, Morocco, Slovenia, Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Croatia, and Greece (pictured: Crete) Their parents approved of the plan, even though they didn't know each other well at first (pictured in Italy) Low spending: The couple tries to keep their budget to $80 a day total (pictured in South Africa) Scrimping: They often stay at Airbnbs to save cash, and eat for cheap (pictured in Venice) Disaster: One of their worst memories was New Year's in Cambodia, when half the island got food poisoning (pictured before disaster struck) The whole thing has been a blast. Natasha and Cameron told Daily Mail Online that one of their favorite memories was from a recent ocean safari they went on in Mozambique. 'We spent a day swimming with over a dozen whale sharks, giant manta rays, a hammerhead shark,' they say. Then finished the day with prawn curry drinking coconut waters as we watched hundreds of southern Right whales breaching just a few hundred meters off shore all while the sunset. It was a perfect day.' Though traveling together can test even the longest relationships, the couple said they think their jet-setting has made their love stronger. 'It is incredibly difficult at times, spending 24/7 with each other in some very stressful situations,' they admitted. 'Driving across Africa has been our greatest test so far with hectic border crossings, bribes, long days, and horrendous roads.' Adventure: They said every day is different and there is no routine (pictured in Greece) Earning potential: They do freelance writing and photography work for a bit of extra cash (pictured in Zimbabwe) Documenting it all: They also run a website called The World Pursuit (pictured in Zambia) Another continent: They are currently traveling through Africa (pictured in Malawi) And while they've had the opportunity to meet lots of people from all over, forming long-term friendships is hard. The couple admitted to a few other downsides as well. 'It's very difficult to keep a routine since days can vary so wildly,' they said. But at the same time, 'nothing ever becomes routine or monotonous. We live lives in which we are always seeing new and incredible things. It challenges our perceptions of the world and we both feel we continue to grow as people.' One of their worst experiences actually turned out to be one of their best stories. They remember one night in Koh Rong, and island in Cambodia where they spend NYE, that turned out to be a disaster. 'Everyone was excited to celebrate their holiday there. However, bad ice was brought on to the island and about half the island ended up with severe food poisoning,' they recalled. 'The bathrooms in all the guesthouses became a mess, people were passing out from dehydration, and the one ferry of the island broke down.' Jealous: They've seen a lot and share updates on social media (pictured left: Macedonia; right: Italy) A lot of their activities are outdoorsy, and they seem to do a lot of hiking (pictured in Poland) Checking out the animals: They recently went on safari in South Africa (pictured in Namibia) They said it has been incredibly difficult and extremely rewarding (pictured in Zimbabwe) Though they've already traveled more than most people do in a lifetime, there are still plenty of places they would like to go. Natasha dreams of experiencing Sri Lanka, while Cameron would like to see Japan somewhere Natasha has already been. In fact, they are thinking of settling in Japan for a bit as a sort of travel base, where they can also grow their travel website and plan opening a hotel somewhere. For now, though, just enjoying the ride 'We're currently driving our truck we purchased in Cape Town across Africa. It has been incredibly difficult and extremely rewarding,' they said. Queen Letizia proved she meant business as she arrived at a ceremony in the Royal Palace in Madrid donning a bold red suit. The mother-of-two plumped for her favourite hue once again after donning the same colour on Thursday. The 44-year-old was joined by her husband, King Felipe, at a Cervantes commemoration ceremony at the Royal Palace in Madrid, Spain. Felipe VI of Spain and Queen Letizia arrived at the Palace of Zarzuela on the outskirts of Madrid for a Cervantes event on Monday afternoon The couple proved they're still very much in love as they gazed adoringly into each other's eyes The ceremony officially closed the celebrations marking the 400th anniversary of the death of Miguel de Cervantes and was attended by more than 200 authorities and cultural personalities. The Cervantes Institute regularly meet at the palace. The Cervantes Institute, which is named after famed Don Quixote author, Miguel de Cervantes, is a worldwide non-profit organisation created by the Spanish government in 1991. The Cervantes Institute is the largest organisation in the world responsible for promoting the study and the teaching of Spanish language and culture, something which the monarchs are no doubt passionate about. The couple proved they're still very much in love as they gazed adoringly into each other's eyes at the event. Queen Letizia proved she meant business in Madrid donning a bold red suit Spain's King Felipe VI (C-L) and Queen Letizia (C-R) pose for a group photo during the event 'Cervantes is alive' at the Royal Palace King Felipe (C-L), Queen Letizia (C), Spanish Vice Prime Minister, Soraya Saez de Santamaria (L), Minister of Culture, Inigo Mendez de Vigo (2R), and Spanish actress Concha Velasco (R) pose for a group photo Queen Letizia (L) and Spanish actress Concha Velasco pose for a photo during the event Just last week, the Queen, who was resplendent in a wine red gown, welcomed foreign diplomats to the royal palace in Madrid on Thursday. The impeccably-dressed royal displayed her trim figure in a striking, floor-length red gown with embroidery as she joined her husband at the prestigious event. The mother-of-two wore her hair in its signature low chignon and wore dazzling diamante drop earrings at the event. Her husband looked equally dapper in a smart suit as they welcomed the foreign ambassadors to their home. It's already been a busy January for the Spanish royals and there was no let-up for Queen Letizia and King Felipe VI as they headed west to an agricultural fair earlier this week. The ceremony officially closed the celebrations marking the 400th anniversary of the death of Miguel de Cervantes. It was attended by more than 200 authorities and cultural personalities The petite Queen displayed her trim figure in the figure-hugging chic red suit The Cervantes Institute regularly meet at the palace. The Cervantes Institute, which is named after famed Don Quixote author, Miguel de Cervantes, is a worldwide non-profit organisation created by the Spanish government in 1991 The couple were smartly dressed as they arrived at the Commemoration Of Cervantes Death ceremony The ceremony officially closed the celebrations marking the 400th anniversary of the death of Miguel de Cervantes Her husband looked equally dapper in a smart suit as he accompanied his wife to receive foreign ambassadors at the Royal Palace on Thursday Harry Potter fans paid tribute to the late Sir John Hurt this weekend in a truly magical way. The actor, who died on January 27 at the age of 77, was in scores of films during his long career, including three of the Harry Potter films as wandmaker Ollivander. And on Saturday, the day after he passed, many fans of the films and books turned out at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Orlando, Florida to honor the Golden Globe and BAFTA winner. I remember every wand I've ever sold, Mr Potter... John Hurt, who played Ollivander in the Harry Potter films, died at the age of 77 on Friday RIP: Harry Potter fans paid tribute to him at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Orlando Magical: Fans raised their wands up at his shops in Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade Give it a wave: The crowd made the touching gesture simultaneously There were already quite a few fans in town for the park's A Celebration of Harry Potter Expo this weekend. The day after his passing, fans in both Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley where Ollivander's shop actually was in the books and films were led in a moment of tribute to the the star. In photos shared online, a huge crowd can be seen holding up wants toward the Ollivander's shops. The park-goers, who were dressed up in hats and robes, make for quite a touching image as they waved the wands in unison. Big group: Lots of fans were in town for the Harry Potter celebration event Party: The park was hosting a three-day expo celebrating the films and books King words: Tributes to the last actor have poured in on social media 'As the second day of #HPCelebration begins, wands are raised outside Ollivanders in memory of John Hurt,' the official Pottermore Instagram account wrote. Quite a few of the film's other stars were on hand to join in as well, as they were present for a celebrity Q&A session. Warwick Davis (Professor Flitwick), Tom Felton (Draco Malfoy), Evanna Lynch (Luna Lovegood), Matthew Lewis (Neville Longbottom), and Oliver and James Phelps (Fred and George Weasley) were there. Several also took to social media to share words and memories about the actor, including J.K. Rowling herself. The genius: J.K. Rowling, who created the Harry Potter universe, also shared kind words More places to buy: In the books and movies, Ollivander's wand shop is in Diagon Alley but the park also has a second shop in Hogsmeade Goodies: A lot of people were dressed in costume and had purchased wands Presence: Hurt was in the first and last two Potter films 'So very sad to hear that the immensely talented and deeply beloved John Hurt has died. My thoughts are with his family and friends,' she wrote. Bonnie Wright, who played Ginny Weasley, also tweeted: 'John Hurt. What an acting legend. Rest in peace dear Sir. Wand shopping won't be the same without you.' Stephen Fry, who voiced the Harry Potter audiobooks, added: 'Oh no. What terrible news. We've lost #JohnHurt as great on the stage, small screen and big. A great man & great friend of Norfolk & #NCFC.' These pictures show a 10-year-old girl slowly being transformed into a tree as a result of a rare condition. The girl, known only as Shahana, suffers from epidermodysplasia verruciformis (EV) - also known as the 'tree man illness'. She first showed signs of being plagued by the rare condition when she was just six-months-old. Growths broke out on her body, but these quickly spread to affect her nose, cheeks, chin and earlobes. The girl, known only as Shahana, suffers from epidermodysplasia verruciformis - also known as the 'tree man illness Her family, from a remote village in the northern part of Bangladesh, are believed to currently be seeking treatment for her at the Dhaka Medical College Hospital. But despite her appearance, she said that her classmates don't judge her and are welcoming towards her, it is reported. 'I get itching in face and knees in the morning and night,' she told a local news agency. EV is a rare and inherited skin disorder which creates wart-like lesions anywhere on the body. She first showed signs of being plagued by the condition when she was just six months. Growths broke out on her body, but these spread to her nose, cheeks, chin and earlobes Her family, from a remote village in the northern part of Bangladesh, are believed to currently be seeking treatment for her The condition is caused by infection with HPV and can create widespread skin eruptions, including wart-like lesions and reddish-brown pigmented plaques. WHAT IS EV? EV is a rare and inherited skin disorder which creates wart-like lesions anywhere on the body. The condition is caused by infection with HPV and can create widespread skin eruptions, including wart-like lesions and reddish-brown pigmented plaques. In order to inherit the disease two abnormal EV genes, one from each parent, must be present. No serious treatment against EV has been found, yet several treatments have been suggested. Advertisement In order to inherit the disease two abnormal EV genes, one from each parent, must be present. No serious treatment against EV has been found, yet several treatments have been suggested. Notable cases include a Romanian man named Ion Toader who was diagnosed with the condition in March 2007, and the Dede Koswara, from Indonesia. Shahana's story comes just two weeks after a Bangladeshi man suffering from the same condition was treated. Abul Bajandar has had at least 16 operations to remove 11lbs of growths from his hands and feet since his condition came to doctors' attention a year ago. Doctors believe he could become the first person to be cured of the disease, provided the warts do not grow back. Erectile dysfunction. It's one of the most traumatic experiences for a man. Not only can it shatter his self-confidence, but it can also contribute to the breakdown of a relationship. Despite there being an array of factors, a few too many trips down the local pub could also be to blame. Here, Dr Adam Simon, chief medical officer at Push Doctor, explains exactly how alcohol affects the penis. Despite there being an array of factors, a few too many trips down the local pub could also be to blame for erectile dysfunction The embarrassing condition is caused by the contraction of blood vessels, he explained. Usually, they open up to allow blood to reach the penis before shutting to prevent it from leaving. But too much alcohol prevents the body from completing the latter, meaning an erection is unable to be maintained. But because alcohol affects everyone differently, there is no set limit to prevent it from ever happening, he told the Daily Express. He added: 'However, do remember that there are many reasons why we're advised not to drink more than 14 units a week. 'Drinking more than this amount - which roughly equates to around six glasses of wine or six pints of beer - can cause sex and fertility issues for both men and women.' The embarrassing condition is caused by the contraction of blood vessels - which can happen through excessive alcohol consumption It is known that alcohol can be detrimental to sperm levels and also make them less effective. Danish researchers found in 2014 that drinking just five units of alcohol every week could reduce the quality of a mans sperm. And the more alcohol consumed, the weaker the quality of the sperm, their study found. WHAT IS ERECTILE DYSFUNCTION? Erectile dysfunction, also known as impotence, is the inability to get and maintain an erection. It is a very common condition, particularly in older men. Half of all men between the ages of 40 and 70 will have it to some degree, experts suggest. Erectile dysfunction can have a range of causes, both physical (such as the narrowing blood vessels) and psychological (depression). It is primarily treated by tackling the cause of the problem, whether this is physical or psychological. Source: NHS Choices Advertisement In the long term, excessive alcohol consumption also reduces testosterone levels, leading to a loss of libido and is toxic to the testes. This harms sperm while they're being produced and can stop them reaching the egg, experts claim. But this can be remedied by men reducing the amount that they drink, according to Dr Patrick O'Brien, from the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. Also known as impotence, erectile dysfunction is the inability to get and maintain an erection, the NHS says. It is estimated that half of all men between the ages of 40 and 70 will experience the common condition at some point in their life. Treatment is geared towards medication such as Viagra. This is used to manage it in the majority of cases. However, statins and drugs to control blood pressure are both frequently given to help men overcome the condition. Going to the theatre is usually considered a treat. But new research suggests that the activity, common among middle class families, could actually have medical benefits for the elderly. Watching a show just once a week could help to cut the risk of mental decline in pensioners, scientists claim. By stimulating the brain, it helps to prevent mild cognitive impairment (MCI) - the stage between decline from ageing and dementia, a study found. Watching a show just once a week could help to cut the risk of mental decline in pensioners, scientists claim It is estimated up to 20 per cent of over 65s suffer from MCI - meaning their symptoms are worse than expected for a healthy person of their age. Symptoms can include forgetting or repeating the same question, problems with reasoning and planning or problem-solving. While being easily distracted, struggling to find the right words or having problems with visual depth perception are also signs. Slowing down this decline has been a goal for many years, leading researchers from the Mayo Clinic in Arizona to investigate. Study author Professor Dr Yonas Geda: 'Dementia has become a global epidemic, causing substantial burden not only for society but also for caregivers and patient families. 'Indeed, cognitive, intellectual, or mentally stimulating activities are associated with a decreased risk of cognitive decline and dementia. He was behind previous research which found an association between mentally stimulating activities and decreased odds of MCI. The new study followed 1,929 adults over the age of 70 who were were cognitively normal at the start. By stimulating the brain, it helps to prevent mild cognitive impairment (MCI) - the stage between decline from ageing and dementia, a study found They were monitored until they developed MCI - with the average duration being around four years, the study published in JAMA Neurology found. Participants were asked how often they played board games, knitted and engaged in social activities. Other events such as going to the theatre were also recorded. WOMEN'S BRAINS GO DOWNHILL EARLY Women's brains start going downhill in their 50s a decade earlier than previously believed, scientists warned last week. On average the female mind loses up to 5 per cent of its sharpness between 50 and 60, researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles, found. But they said the drop-off did not seem to be caused by the menopause, noting that there was not a sharp acceleration in the decline of mental faculties. They also said it is not a warning of dementia but a normal feature of ageing and could be held in check or even reversed. The findings were based on a study that followed more than 2,000 healthy women, enrolled in their 40s, for ten years after the menopause. Advertisement Professor Geda suggested that elderly persons who engage in mentally stimulating activities at least once a week are at a significantly decreased risk. Researchers also looked for those who had the APOE gene, a well-known risk factor for both MCI and dementia. They found that carriers of the gene have a higher risk of developing MCI regardless of their mentally stimulating activities. However, those who had the gene who reported engaging in stimulating activities had a lower risk of MCI. Professor Geda added: 'Engaging in mentally stimulating activities in late life was associated with a decreased risk of incident MCI. 'More specifically, playing games and engaging in craft activities, computer use, and social activities significantly reduced the risk of incident MCI. 'We observed that engaging in mentally stimulating activities even in late life may be protective against new-onset MCI.' But he said future research is needed to understand the mechanisms linking mentally stimulating activities and cognition in late life. A simple breath test could soon be used to detect two kinds of aggressive cancers. The test has proved successful in detecting stomach and esophageal cancers in 300 trial patients - with 85 percent accuracy. Both cancers tend to be diagnosed too late - at which point the chance of surviving five years is slim. Experts claim this discovery by researchers at Imperial College London could be a game-changer for diagnosis and death rates. It could also save thousands from having to endure painful endoscopy exams, which involves forcing a tube down one's throat to inspect their stomach. Breakthrough? The test devised by Imperial College London has proved successful in detecting stomach and esophageal cancers in 300 trial patients - with 85 percent accuracy 'At present the only way to diagnose esophageal cancer or stomach cancer is with endoscopy,' lead researcher Dr Sheraz Markar told the European Cancer Congress 2017 last week. 'This method is expensive, invasive and has some risk of complications. 'A breath test could be used as a non-invasive, first-line test to reduce the number of unnecessary endoscopies. In the longer term this could also mean earlier diagnosis and treatment, and better survival.' The trial was based on the results of previous research that suggested differences in the levels of specific chemicals between patients with stomach or esophageal cancer and patients with upper gastrointestinal symptoms without cancer. The new research aimed to test whether this 'chemical signature' could be the basis of a diagnostic test. In the new study, the research team collected breath samples from 335 people at three different London hospitals. Of these, 163 had been diagnosed with stomach or esophageal cancer and 172 showed no evidence of cancer when they had an endoscopy. All the samples were analysed with a technique called selected ion flow-tube mass spectrometry, which is able to accurately measure small amounts of different chemicals in mixtures of gases such as breath. Researchers measured the levels of the five chemicals in each sample to see which ones matched to the 'chemical signature' that indicated cancer. The results showed that the test was 85 percent accurate overall, with a sensitivity of 80 percent and a specificity of 81 percent. In the longer term this could also mean earlier diagnosis and treatment, and better survival This means that not only was the breath test good at picking up those who had cancer (sensitivity), it was also good at correctly identifying who did not have cancer (specificity). Dr Markar said: 'Because cancer cells are different to healthy ones, they produce a different mixture of chemicals. 'This study suggests that we may be able detect these differences and use a breath test to indicate which patients are likely to have cancer of the esophagus and stomach, and which do not. 'However, these findings must be validated in a larger sample of patients before the test could be used in the clinic.' Over the next three years, the researchers will continue with a larger trial, using the test with patients who are being given an endoscopy for gastrointestinal symptoms but not yet diagnosed with cancer. This will assess the ability of the test to pick up cases within a group that is likely to contain only a small percentage of cancers. The team is also working on breath tests for other types of cancer, such as colorectal and pancreatic, which could be used as first-line tests in general practice surgeries. Having diabetes could be an early warning sign of one of the deadliest forms of cancer, scientists claim. Half of those diagnosed with pancreatic cancer had been told they had type 2 diabetes the previous year, a study found. This form of the disease is known to be particularly hard to diagnose in its early stages as symptoms are often rare. Many only discover they have it when it's too late and are considered to be incurable, researchers said. But a rapid deterioration in existing diabetes or a new diagnosis could be an easy way to diagnose it, experts believe. Scientists found that half of those diagnosed with pancreatic cancer had been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes the previous year A team of international researchers analysed nearly a million type 2 diabetics in Italy and Belgium who had been told they had pancreatic cancer. Some 50 per cent were diagnosed within one year of also being told they had the lifelong condition, they found. Researchers also found they were nearly at four times the risk of being diagnosed with the disease in the first three months of their diabetes treatment. They were also found to switch to incretins - metabolic hormones that stimulate the pancreas to produce more insulin - if they were diagnosed with cancer. A rapid deterioration in existing diabetes or a new diagnosis could be an easy way to diagnose pancreatic cancer, experts believe Injecting insulin was associated with a seven-fold increased risk of being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. WHAT IS PANCREATIC CANCER? Pancreatic cancer is caused by the abnormal and uncontrolled growth of cells in the pancreas a large gland that's part of the digestive system. Around half of all new cases are diagnosed in people aged 75 or over. It's uncommon in people under 40 years of age. It's not fully understood what causes pancreatic cancer, but a number of risk factors for developing the condition have been identified. Cancer of the pancreas is difficult to treat. It rarely causes any symptoms in the early stages, so it's often not detected until the cancer is fairly advanced. If the tumour is large, treating the cancer will be more difficult. Source: NHS Choices Advertisement Medical records and the type of diabetic medicines they are prescribed could be a tool in identifying those at risk, scientists from the International Prevention Research Institute in Lyon said. Study author Professor Philippe Autier said: 'Because the pancreatic cancer finally becomes symptomatic and is thus diagnosed, it looks like it is the intake of incretin drugs that could be the trigger of the pancreatic cancer. 'While in reality, it is the pancreatic cancer that causes a deterioration of diabetes, which is followed by the prescription of incretins. This phenomenon is called "reverse causation". 'Our study also shows that the reverse causation observed for incretin drugs is also observed for other anti-diabetic therapies, in particular for insulin therapy. 'Doctors and their diabetic patients should be aware that the onset of diabetes or rapidly deteriorating diabetes could be the first sign of hidden pancreatic cancer, and steps should be taken to investigate it.' The findings were presented at the European Cancer Congress 2017 in Amsterdam. Talia Rosko was only two months old when she was diagnosed with a rare and terminal liver disease in late 2015. Doctors in Jackson, New Jersey, told her parents, George and Farra, that unless she received a transplant, Talia likely wouldn't live past the age of two. Seven months later, amid their desperate fight to find a donor, the family employed a local college student, then-21-year-old Kiersten Miles, as a nanny. Little did they know she would be their answer. Within three weeks of caring for the Roskos' three children, Kiersten told them she wanted to see if she was a match for Talia. Tests revealed she was. This month, doctors successfully completed a liver transplant for the now-16-month-old. Now, while still in recovery, Kiersten dedicated her energy to raising awareness of the desperate need for more organ donors. Bravery: Kiersten Miles, 22, from New Jersey decided to donate part of her liver to her 16-month-old charge Talia after she was diagnosed with a rare liver disease Tragic: An ultrasound showed that Talia had biliary atresia - a condition where the liver's ducts are backed up with bile. The organ had been completely decimated and she needed a new one Luck: Kiersten (left) was recommended by a friend to the Roskos as a summer nanny. She grew very attached to little Talia and decided she wanted to be tested as a potential match George told PIX 11: 'We brought [Talia] to her two-month check-up and our pediatrician right away said her eyes were off. 'She said we have to go see a specialist immediately.' George and Farra took their daughter for an ultrasound and biopsy - which resulted in a diagnosis of biliary atresia. The rare disease occurs when the liver's ducts become backed up with bile, destroying cells and the liver itself. The ultrasound had shown Talia's liver to be completely obliterated. Doctors told George and Farra that their daughter would need a Kasai - a procedure that surgically removes the backed-up ducts and and gallbladder, and replaces them with a segment of the small intestine. But it was only temporary, and Talia ultimately needed a transplant. The little girl went on the transplant list In June, around the same time that Kiersten, then 21, was hired to be a summer nanny for the Roskos' three children. Kiersten said she became quickly attached to Talia, who was nine months old then. She'd only known the Rosko family for three weeks when she decided she wanted to be tested as a potential match for Talia so she could donate part of her liver. Talia's mother Farra told Kiersten: 'This is not like donating blood, This is serious. You need to like do research. She was like, "I already did." She was like, "I'm compatible"' Recovering: In a 14-hour operation in Philadelphia, doctors successfully completed the transplant. Talia's parents said she bounced back and is recovering well 'I was like, "Kiersten this is not like donating blood, This is serious. You need to talk to your parents and you need to like do research",' Talia's mother Farra told Pix 11. 'She was like, "I already did." She was like, "I'm compatible".' On January 11, after six months of testing and paperwork, Kiersten was taken to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. The donated organ went right across the street to the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia to be placed in Talia. The operation lasted about 14 hours and was successful. Before the surgery, Kiersten had been told that she would never be able to donate again - even if one day she had a child in the same situation and she was a match. But that didn't matter. Awareness: Kiersten says she hopes more people will sign up to become organ donors. New Jersey is 44 out of 50 when it comes to the percentage of residents on the organ donor list She told WTXF: 'It's such a small sacrifice when you compare it to saving a life. Some of her doctors said she possibly wouldn't have made it past two years old. 'All I had to do was be in the hospital for a week and a five-inch scar. I don't know, it just seemed like such a small sacrifice to me.' Talia's parents said she bounced back very quickly - and was even discharged after only nine days when the average hospital stay is 14 days. Kiersten said her first two days of recovery were the worst but that she's feeling better now. She says she hopes more people will decide to become organ donors. New Jersey, the girls' home state, ranks 44 out of 50 states, in regard to the percentage of residents registered as organ donors. She said: 'Yeah it's a few months of recovery but it's definitely worth it.' I used to smoke 30 a day (though I haven't touched a cigarette for 14 years). This led to COPD and it's getting worse. I'm on several inhalers and pills to remove phlegm, and eight cylinders of oxygen a fortnight. I get in a panic when I stress myself in any task. Is there any progress being made to relieve the effects of COPD? - Terry Duncan, Bridlington, East Yorkshire COPD, or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, is an umbrella term for what were previously referred to as chronic bronchitis and emphysema, and is often caused by smoking COPD, or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, is an umbrella term for what were previously referred to as chronic bronchitis and emphysema. These separate but commonly co-existing lung conditions both make it difficult to take in enough oxygen. Bronchitis leads to inflammation of the lining of the airways and increased mucus production. Emphysema is where the alveoli (tiny air sacs in the lungs) are destroyed. Those with COPD have limited airflow in and out of the lungs and their lung tissues are less able to absorb oxygen into the blood or to pass carbon dioxide out. This leads to breathlessness, coughing, mucus production and wheezing. Though smoking is the main cause, air pollution can also contribute, as can pollution in the home from open fires, cleaning products, fluff and dust. It's important you do all you can to ensure you're in the cleanest possible air. The aim of treatment is to control symptoms, reduce flare-ups (usually due to infections) and improve your quality of life. The mainstay are inhalers. These usually involve a combination of three drugs: bronchodilators to ease spasm in the airways; anticholinergics to reduce mucus secretion; and glucocorticoids (steroids) to reduce inflammation. Pulmonary rehabilitation (exercise programmes that train you to breathe better) also has a major role, as does oxygen therapy, which you are already using. Illustration of healthy human lungs. Those with COPD have limited airflow in and out of the lungs and their lung tissues are less able to absorb oxygen into the blood This is recommended for patients with low blood oxygen levels when at rest or those in whom oxygen levels drop when merely walking. Long-term oxygen therapy improves survival and quality of life, and it may be that you are eligible for an oxygen concentrator (a machine that concentrates oxygen from the air) rather than having to receive regular deliveries of cylinders. Ask your GP. Write to Dr Scurr To contact Dr Scurr with a health query, write to him at Good Health Daily Mail, 2 Derry Street, London W8 5TT or email drmartin@dailymail.co.uk - including contact details. Dr Scurr cannot enter into personal correspondence. His replies cannot apply to individual cases and should be taken in a general context. Always consult your own GP with any health worries. Advertisement Recently a group of drugs called PDE-4 inhibitors have come to the fore in the treatment of COPD (PDE-4 are enzymes found in the cells of the immune system). These reduce inflammation in ways that steroids do not and may also help relax the muscle in airway walls. One example is roflumilulast, but it has to be prescribed by a chest physician and, according to guidelines, should be given only as part of a clinical trial. Another option is lung volume reduction surgery. In some patients, the loss of alveoli may lead to large bubbles in the lungs called bullae, which trap air. These can make it hard for air to get in and out of the alveoli that are still functioning. Removing these bubbles allows the healthier parts of the lungs to function better. This is major surgery, but it is worth asking your chest physician if you might be suitable. My son, aged 19, has gynaecomastia. His doctor said it will go away, but he's very conscious of it and it's preventing him from going to university until it's rectified. He insists the only operation he can have without leaving scarring (through the nipples) is available just in India. We're worried and want him to be treated here, which we will pay for. Can you advise? Name and address supplied. Gynaecomastia, or male breast enlargement (some people refer to them as moobs), is so common in teenage boys Gynaecomastia, or male breast enlargement (some people refer to them as moobs), is so common in teenage boys it can almost be considered a normal part of their development it affects about half of them to some extent. It occurs because of fluctuations in hormones, both male and female, that boys experience in puberty this causes the glandular tissue to enlarge. The 'swelling' reduces once this hormonal flux settles down between the ages of 18 and 22. Even so, it can be psychologically distressing for some people, and your son is no exception. The emotional turmoil and self-consciousness he is experiencing is clearly such that, despite the reassurance from his doctor that the condition will improve in time, he is determined to have surgery. I suggest a two-fold approach. Have a candid discussion with him about the need to confront his anxiety and try to persuade him to seek referral to a psychologist, through his GP, to help him come to terms with his feelings. Gynaecomastia can be psychologically distressing for some people, but is reduced once the hormonal flux settles down between the ages of 18 and 22 Dissuade him from travelling abroad for treatment. One reason is that it is difficult to be completely certain that the surgical care in another country, whether India or elsewhere, is safe. Another issue is that as with any surgery there may be some post-operative complications, such as infection. It will be harder for him to manage these if he has travelled home. It is possible to have a minimally invasive operation for the condition in the UK, whereby excess tissue is removed via an incision in the nipple. WHAT IS GYNAECOMASTIA? Gynaecomastia (sometimes referred to as 'man boobs') is a common condition that causes boys' and men's breasts to swell and become larger than normal. It is most common in teenage boys and older men. Signs vary from a small amount of extra tissue around the nipples to more prominent breasts. It can affect one or both breasts. Sometimes, the breast tissue can be tender or painful, but this isn't always the case. Source: NHS Choices Advertisement The procedure involves liposuction, where the tissue is sucked out using a small tube. This is not available on the NHS as it is considered to be cosmetic/aesthetic surgery, and is non-essential such procedures are very much rationed in these straitened times. However, you have signalled your willingness to support the procedure financially. To ensure you see a plastic surgeon with the necessary expertise, I suggest you go to the website of the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons and look for a recommended specialist in your region. The website has a section on gynaecomastia and describes the procedure in more detail, specifically noting a 3mm to 4mm scar at the nipple. You will not find a technique elsewhere that leaves a smaller scar than this. Do not accept the services of a surgeon who is not a member of this organisation. And even if your son does plan to go ahead in this way, it would still be wise for him to have at least one or two sessions with a psychologist. How much do you need to spend on shampoo? Last week, Dr Laura Waters, a chemist from the University of Huddersfield, found that the hair of women who spent 40 on a top brand was no cleaner than the hair of those who paid 1 for a supermarket one. Her conclusion was that if you just want clean hair, 'then price doesn't matter'. But what if your issue is dandruff or sensitive skin around the scalp? Last week a chemist from the University of Huddersfield found the hair of women who spent 40 on a top brand was no cleaner than the hair of those who paid 1 for a supermarket one We asked Dr Anton Alexandroff, a consultant dermatologist at the Leicester Spire and Nuffield Health hospitals, and Iain Sallis, a consultant trichologist at Hairmedic trichology clinics, to assess health claims about various shampoos and rate them out of ten. HEAD & SHOULDERS Clinically Proven Solutions anti-dandruff shampoo, 5.33 for 250 ml, Boots The claim: This shampoo is designed to fight stubborn dandruff and provide seven-day protection. VERDICT: 'Half of cases of dandruff flakes of skin shedding from the scalp are caused by seborrhoeic dermatitis, a form of eczema linked to an overgrowth of yeast,' says Dr Alexandroff. (The other half are caused by psoriasis, where an overproduction of skin cells leads to a build-up of itchy, sore patches.) 'The active ingredient is selenium sulphide a chemical that helps clear away the yeast that causes seborrhoeic dermatitis. 'I'm not sure about the seven-day protection, but using it every day for a week should treat the issue. 'However it contains the detergent sodium lauryl sulphate, which can cause dermatitis, as well as the preservative methylisothiazolinone, which can trigger an allergic reaction. So, it could address one skin condition but spark another.' 6/10 NILAQUA Towel off shampoo, 9.95 for 500 ml, purpleturtle.co.uk The claim: This product cleans hair without water or rinsing, say the manufacturers. Comprised of water and a small amount of detergent, it is applied to dry hair, massaged in and towelled off. VERDICT: 'This is for people such as the elderly who may find it difficult to wash their hair,' says Iain Sallis. 'It does clean hair, but by solely using a product like this, the microbial content of the scalp may increase and cause itching and flaking.' 2/10 if used all the time (but 10/10 if used occasionally) T/GEL Therapeutic shampoo, 6.99 for 250 ml, amazon.co.uk The claim: A medicated shampoo aimed at treating itchy, flaky scalp disorders such as psoriasis and seborrhoeic dermatitis. VERDICT: 'The active ingredient is coal tar,' says Dr Alexandroff. 'This thick brown substance, which has long been used as a treatment for psoriasis, works by reducing inflammation and itching. 'The shampoo contains salicylic acid, which helps remove scales of skin. 'It's only a small concentration, so won't cause irritation, as larger amounts might. 'Anecdotally, I have seen many patients who have been happy with the results. But it smells terrible.' 7/10 KLORANE Shampoo with quinine and B vitamins, 6 for 200 ml, Boots The claim: This aims to fortify thinning hair by strengthening keratin (a protein in hair). The manufacturer also claims that it encourages micro-circulation the circulation in small blood vessels of the scalp, stimulating hair growth. VERDICT: 'Vitamins can't be absorbed through the hair as it is a dead material,' says Iain Sallis. 'Quinine, which comes from tree bark and is a former malaria medication, may make hair temporarily feel thicker, by plumping it up, but it won't stop it from thinning. 'And I don't see how this can improve circulation of the scalp.' 3/10 NIROZAL Anti-dandruff shampoo, 9.19 for 100 ml, Superdrug The claim: Treats and prevents dandruff and associated inflammation. VERDICT: 'This shampoo contains ketoconazole, an anti-fungal agent that kills the yeast associated with seborrhoeic dermatitis,' says Dr Alexandroff. 'It tends to be more effective than the selenium compounds that are found in other dandruff shampoos. 'You might need to use it every day for a week to see a real difference, but it is an excellent product.' 9/10 SELSUN Dandruff shampoo, 3.99 for 100 ml, chemistdirect.co.uk The claim: A medicated shampoo for treating dandruff and seborrhoeic dermatitis. Reduces greasiness and slows down the growth of the skin cells on the scalp that cause dandruff. VERDICT: 'This shampoo which contains selenium sulphide has been around for many years and I've known many patients who have used it effectively,' says Dr Alexandroff. 'However, all shampoos remove oil and grease, not just this one the greasier the scalp, the more likely yeast will grow. 'But it's easily as good as the Head & Shoulders product assessed here. 7/10 ALPECIN Caffeine shampoo, 5.55 for 250 ml, Boots The claim: Caffeine promotes hair growth and has been proven to slow down hereditary hair loss, according to the manufacturers. VERDICT: 'A few scientific papers have found that when caffeine was used on hair, the growth phase (the time when an individual hair is growing before eventually being shed) lasted between 8 per cent and 15 per cent longer,' says Iain Sallis. 'But other research also found too much caffeine can reverse this effect. 'And that longer growing phase probably won't make a huge difference if you are suffering from hair loss. It may help rather than cure thinning hair.' 6/10 EUCERIN Calming urea shampoo, 10.99 for 250 ml, Superdrug The claim: This product soothes and reduces itchiness of the scalp and moisture loss. VERDICT: 'This contains urea, which is an anti-inflammatory that can also moisturise the skin,' says Dr Alexandroff. 'It's not strong so can be used as often as needed. Overall it is effective for treating an itchy or dry scalp. 'It's claimed that this seals in moisture, but inevitably when you rinse the scalp, most of the shampoo washes off. 'However, some of the urea could remain and so help to moisturise the scalp.' 7/10 NIOXIN System 2 cleanser for fine/ thinning hair, 12.97 for 300 ml, gorgeousshop.com The claim: This removes hair product build-up and daily grime, which allows nutrients, including B vitamins to penetrate the scalp. VERDICT: 'This shampoo is good for any type of fine hair, thinning or not, as it is an effective volumising product,' says Iain Sallis. 'Its high protein content builds around the hair like a small scaffold and also temporarily swells the hair shaft, making hair look thicker and feel fuller. 'Results are instantaneous as it plumps up volume as soon as you use it.' 8/10 YES TO CARROTS Dry scalp relief shampoo, 3.99 for 280 ml, Boots The claim: This will soothe dry and flaky scalps in eight days, say the manufacturers. It contains kukui tree seed oil (from a flowering tree which grows in Hawaii) and carrot seed oil. VERDICT: 'I couldn't find any medical literature to support claims for the effectiveness of carrot seed oil on dry or flaky scalps,' says Dr Alexandroff. 'Kukui tree seed oil, however, is a well-known mild antiseptic, so it could calm redness or itchiness. 'But any oil will soothe a dry and flaky scalp. For an itchy head you could apply olive oil, leave for a few minutes and rinse.' 3/10 BOOTS EXPERT Dry itchy sensitive shampoo, 3.49 for 200 ml, Boots The claim: It contains glycerine and aloe vera to leave hair feeling soft and moisturised while caring for the scalp. VERDICT: 'This product is for scalps that may be too sensitised to stronger medicated shampoo with ingredients such as coal tar,' says Iain Sallis. 'The glycerine draws in moisture from the atmosphere and keeps it in the scalp (a dehydrated scalp can become itchy very easily). 'Aloe vera is used extensively in cosmetics for its natural moisturising and anti-microbial properties. 'Overall, this sensitive shampoo is a great half-way house for people who suffer from mild or seasonal scalp issues.' 8/10 A third Pakistani activist named only as Asim by his family for safety reasons who went missing earlier this month is safe, his family told AFP on Sunday. The news comes a day after two of the other disappeared men were confirmed as secure. The activist was among five who went missing more than two weeks ago, sparking fears of a government crackdown and resulting in protests. Pakistani rights activists hold images of bloggers who have disappeared 'Asim contacted us by phone on Sunday morning and told us that he is well,' a relative requesting anonymity told AFP, saying the family had been receiving threats. On Saturday, academic Salman Haider and another blogger whose family asked not to be named were reported safe by their families. Two others remain unaccounted for. The five men - who campaigned for human rights and religious freedom - went missing from various cities between January 4 and 7, triggering nationwide protests. No group has claimed responsibility. Missing rights activists, Waqas Goraya, Salman Haider, and Asim Saeed, during a demonstration to condemn the missing human rights activists, in Islamabad, Pakistan But Human Rights Watch and other rights groups said their near simultaneous disappearances raised concerns of government involvement, which officials and intelligence sources have denied. 'These abductions bear all the hallmarks of the modus operandi of the Pakistan state,' Saroop Ijaz, representative of Human Rights Watch in Pakistan told AFP. 'The release, again which is coordinated. The onus lies on the state to either come clear about what has happened or to hold the perpetrators accountable,' Ijaz said. The returned activists have not yet recounted what happened to them or where they have been the past few weeks. Pakistan has had a history of enforced disappearances over the past decade, but this has mainly been confined to conflict zones near the Afghanistan border or to Balochistan province where separatists are battling for independence. A virulent social media campaign painting the missing as blasphemers triggered a flood of threats despite denials from their worried families, with observers saying the claims could place them in danger. Pakistani journalists and local residents gather out the home of Salman Haider, a university professor and rights activists, following news of his return The charge, which can carry the death penalty, is hugely sensitive in deeply conservative Muslim Pakistan, where even unproven allegations have stirred mob lynchings and murder. Rights groups say Pakistani activists and journalists often find themselves caught between the country's security establishment and militant groups including the Taliban. The full weight of Donald Trump's election as the President of the United States is now being felt. Unlike his predecessors, he seems determined to walk the talk of his campaign. Expectations that he would become more 'presidential' and moderate his views have been belied. Trump: Great for India? Consequences The flaws, both moral and practical, in his policies are also becoming apparent. Take the decision to block Muslim travelers from Iraq and Iran. Now Iraq is the country that the US willfully devastated through a war, and now it is refusing to deal with its human consequences. As for Iran, Mr Trump may not know it, that in the Islamic world there is probably no other country whose middle class is more pro-American than the Iranians. And the irony is that the Saudis, who are responsible for funding terrorism all over the place and whose nationals allegedly carried out the horrific 9/11 attack are not on the Trump exclusion list. Donald Trump attends the Republican Hindu Coalition's Humanity United Against Terror Charity event Indeed, there is no record of American citizens being killed by nationals of Yemen, Syria, Somalia or Sudan either. Another strange policy measure has been to remove the Director National Intelligence and the Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff from the National Security Council. Instead, he has included his right-wing strategic adviser Stepen Bannon, a former media and financial executive, to the NSC. The American NSC, as its name suggests, is the principal adviser to the President on foreign policy and security and its principal job is to coordinate the work of other departments. The removal of two key staffers is bound to affect the institutional capacity of the body. More important, it will give freer rein to controversial NSA chief Mike Flynn. The hapless travelers who have been blocked from the US, from their loved ones, families and jobs, have only one alternative - turn to the courts. But it will not be plain sailing for other Trump policies, principally, his effort to upend the world trading order and bottle up China in the mainland. The 'Hindus For Trump' event held at the Edison in New Jersey roused the support of 5,000 US-Indians Trade war Recall, earlier this month, the US secretary of state designate Rex Tillerson declared that America would 'send China a clear signal that, first, the island building stops and, second, your access to those islands also is not going to be allowed.' In effect, the US would blockade China from accessing the military bases they have constructed on Mischief Reef, Subi Reef and Fiery Cross island in the Spratlys chain. The tribunal that heard the Philippines claim against China did not make any judgment on who owns the features. So any effort by the US to blockade China would constitute an act of war. The Chinese have in the past couple of years strengthened their positions on the islands and built hangars and point air defence systems. So far, the US policy had been to carry out Freedom of Navigation Operational Patrols. But last year, the US did privately warn China not to begin any reclamation or construction on Scarborough Shoal, an area which even the arbitral tribunal clearly said was within the Exclusive Economic Zone of the Philippines. But the Obama policy was criticised for being ineffective. It remains to be seen what 'avatar' of Trump we will see in the region - the hawk or the deal maker. The issue of trade, of course, is paramount in the relationship between the US and China and the world is bracing for a possible trade war which will damage not only the US and China but could have a wider fallout. Rough ride Companies in South-east Asia who are linked with the US and China through supply chains will also be affected. A slow-down in Chinese exports would lead to a reduction in their import of raw materials from countries in South-east Asia, Australia and Africa. Of course, any effort by the US to hike tariffs would be challenged by China in the WTO and it is possible that this could actually be resolved by a deal between the US and China. But with Trump you never know. In all this, India is a bit player. We will not be directly affected by the trade war, though we need to worry about pressure on IPR issues relating to pharmaceuticals, and of course, to business process outsourcing. Navy Seals get the Bollywood treatment saving innocent Indians from the threat of jihadists with green lightsaber guns Notwithstanding the nice readout of the Trump phone conversation with Modi, we need to watch out because of the nature of the new administration which seems to believe that it alone has the answer to everything, and in any case, no one else has problems, only the United States. If we are prepared to play the role of a supine partner it s okay, but if India wants to stand up to the US on issues that matter to it and pursue its own national interest, we should be prepared for a rough ride. So far, India and the US had steadily developed a congruence of interests in a range of areas, today, all bets are off. Sikh activists shout slogans in support of Sikh leader Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale As the Punjab polls near, India's mainstream political parties are again courting those connected to the state's militant past. On the streets of the Sikh heartland, small retail stores have openly started selling T-shirts with the face of slain militant leader Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale printed on their front. Also available at stalls are calendars bearing pictures of Sikh extremists killed in security operations of the 1980s and 1990s. According to the sellers, Bhindranwale souvenirs are a hit with customers. 'There is a rising demand for posters, T-shirts and photos of kharkus (extremists). That is why we sell them,' said a shopkeeper in Amritsar, who requested not to be named. Banned in the 1980s, memorabilia of Punjab's militancy first resurfaced in the state almost a decade-and-a-half ago. The Golden Temple in Amritsar India. In 1984 it was the scene of an assault by the Indian Army as they sought to flush out Sikh separatists. In 2003, a year after Shiromani Akali Dal leader Parkash Singh Badal lost power to Capt Amarinder Singh, Bhindranwale was declared a martyr by the Akal Takht - the highest seat of the Sikh temporal authority in Amritsar. The head of the Akal Takht is an appointee of the SGPC, which was then - and is even now - controlled by the Badals. Khalistani objects, slogans and the 2003 co-option of the dead militant figure both by moderates like the SAD and radicals aside, supporters of a separate Sikh homeland lost popular support long back in Punjab. Captain Amarinder Singh is leading the GOP charge in poll-bound Punjab Since the mid-1990s, Khalistan has never been a rallying point in state elections. But mainstream political parties of Punjab have routinely been accused of dabbling with separatists. The approach to the 2017 elections is no different. Khalistani supporters in New York holding images of Bhindranwale march to press for a separate nation. For the Sikh diaspora though, the most urgent problem plaguing Punjab is drugs for which they blame both Akalis and the Congress. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, whose Aam Aadmi Party is debuting in Punjab's Assembly elections, is facing the same accusations of courting pro-Khalistan elements among Sikhs living abroad. In past elections, the Badals and Capt Amarinder Singh have hurled similar allegations and counter-allegations at each other. At present, there are mainly two Khalistan advocacy groups in the state. One is the Dal Khalsa that pledges no allegiance to the Indian Constitution. The other is Simranjit Singh Mann's Shiromani Akali Dal (Amritsar), which is struggling in electoral politics for over years now. Sikhs commemorating the 31st anniversary of the assault known as Operation Blue Star, which saw the storming of Sikhism's holiest shrine the Golden Temple in Amritsar, by Indian troops on June 6, 1984 Unlike SAD (Amritsar), the Dal Khalsa does not participate in state or national polls. 'We boycott elections under Indian dispensation,' said Kanwarpal Singh, the group's spokesman. 'We are a votary of an independent, sovereign Punjab. We want Sikhs to be given the right of self-determination,' he said, insisting that his group has no truck, covert or overt, with any political party. A fierce opponent of the Badals for their alleged misuse of SGPC and other religious institutions, the Dal Khalsa clarified it had nothing in common with AAP either. Former Punjab chief minister and Congress candidate Amarinder Singh paying obeisance at Golden Temple after his victory in Lok Sabha 'AAP is not pro-Punjab or pro-Panth (the Sikh community),' Singh said. 'It's a pro-Indian party, with strong nationalistic streaks. We are poles apart.' Fringe Khalistani leaders overseas share the Dal Khalsa's ideological position. On numerous occasions, they have been seen protesting visits of Indian Sikh leaders - from across the political spectrum - to their countries of residence. They would oppose the Badals, Capt Amarinder Singh and even then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the first Sikh PM, alike. New York-based Sikhs for Justice, for example, has even accused Manmohan Singh of 'funding crimes against humanity perpetrated upon the Sikh community in India' as finance minister. Back in Punjab, the Badals have now come under fire from moderate Sikhs as well, largely because of their handling of religious issues. After all, they also govern the community's top religious administration, the SGPC. The dominant bloc of moderate Sikhs was stunned when the Akal Takht pardoned Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Raheem in 2015. He was accused of blasphemy for dressing up like Guru Gobind Singh. Many Sikhs felt the pardon was orchestrated by the Badals. The ruling family, however, denies the charge. Sikh protests forced the Akal Takht to revoke its remission later but not before it had dented its institutional credibility. 'Those who are worried about their faith and want to restore the glory of their religious institutions cannot be termed extremists,' said Kiranjot Kaur, a senior SGPC member. Repairs begin at the Golden Temple after the operation in 1984 in Amritsar 'It's their right to work democratically to cleanse the system of malpractices.' In New Jersey, 53-year-old Dilvar Singh Sekhon runs a successful gas business. Sekhon, who migrated to the US back in 1996, is pro-Khalistan. But at present, his concern is not his 'political demand' for a separate nation but drugs in Punjab. 'Punjab's youth are in a crisis. They are drowning in drugs,' he rued. After accusing filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali of disrespecting Hindu history, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad has dared the Bollywood director to restart shooting for the period drama on legendary Rajput queen Padmavati in any part of the country. Bhansali Productions on Sunday denied any romantic scene involving Padmavati as part of the movie script and said it respects the sentiments of the community. The Hindu nationalist organisation appeared unmoved. Five people were detained for creating a nuisance on the sets of Sanjay Leela Bhansali's film in protest last week 'First, Bhansali will not be able to shoot the film anywhere in the country. Even if he does so, he will not be able to release the film,' VHP general secretary Surendra Jain told Mail Today in an exclusive conversation. On Friday, Bhansali was roughed up at Jaigarh Fort in Jaipur by members of Rajput Karni Sena, which claimed that the movie was a distortion of their community history and portrays 'Rani Padmavati' in poor light. Director Sanjay Leela Bhansali has been asked to guarantee that he will not distort the image of Rani Padmavati, portrayed by Deepika Padukone (left). The film also stars Ranveer Singh (right). The VHP described the attack as a reflection of the popular mass sentiment. 'What happened in Rajasthan was not perpetrated by VHP, but was the reflection of the popular anger and spontaneous mass sentiment,' said Jain. 'There is a new awakening across the country where people are ready to save their culture and history and religious symbols.' Deepika Padukone plays Rani Padmavati in Sanjay Leela Bhansali's next (File picture) The VHP leaders said Sanjay Leela Bhansali and 'those like him' who continue to disrespect Indian and Hindu history for money must desist from taking Hindu community for granted. 'We cannot allow them to overrule Indian history and culture in the name of creative licence,' Jain said, adding a veiled threat that in future 'how the society will react in such situations cannot be predicted'. 'Jauhar' Sanjay Leela Bhansali was assaulted by members of Rajpur Karni Sena in Rajasthan The VHP leader said, 'Rani Padmini's 'jauhar' needs no historical proof as it is well established. 'Even today, you can visit the fort of Chittorgarh and see where she performed 'jauhar' along with hundreds of others. 'Now, to show her as a lover of Allauddin Khilji or to demean her 'jauhar' is unfortunate. 'This not just hurts the memory of those who performed 'jauhar' but also disrespects the tradition and history of Mewar.' Jauhar was an old tradition in northwestern parts of the country, that faced foreign aggression in 13th and 14th century, wherein women would perform mass immolation to save themselves from falling into the hands of marauder. Padmini, also known as Padmavati, is a legendary 13th-14th century Indian queen known for her beauty and dignity in the face of death The practice draws its origin in Hindu goddess Parvati throwing herself into a pyre to protest her husband's disrespect. Jain said, 'It has become a fashion in the Indian film industry to take liberty with our historical characters. They muddle the character's role so much that the historical significance of our heroic figures is completely lost.' The protesters allegedly got incorrect information about the film from a Ranveer Singh (pictured) interview For a few coins VHP General Secretary Surendra Jain 'They want to earn money at any cost. Bhansali and some other of this Bollywood brigade have become authorities in history and culture,' said Jain. Bhansali Productions has denied all such allegation. 'There is no romantic dream sequence or any objectionable/ romantic scene between Rani Padmavati and Allauddin Khilji. It was not part of the script,' Shobha Sant, CEO of the Bhansali Productions said. Sant said it was misconception and their team has clarified it to members of Rajput community. 'We are trying to present Rani Padmavati's courageous nature. We will make a film which will make the country proud on Rani Padmavati,' she said. Rajput groups want Bhansali to change title Protests over Padmavati took a new turn Monday with Rajput groups coming up with fresh demands of title change and a review before the release even as Bhansali productions made it clear that there is no romantic dream sequence between Rani Padmavati and Alaudin Khilji. The demand was raised at a joint press conference which was convened by Rajput Sabha to announce that they and Karni Sena agree over the demand that there will no distortion of historic facts in the movie. However, the president of the Rajput Sabha said they have also demanded a screening committee be formed by the group to screen the movie before its release but Bhansali productions are yet to act on the request. Karni Sena activists protest against the shooting of Sanjay Leela Bhansali's 'Padmawati' During the press conference, some of the members of the Karni Sena raised another demand that the film's title should be changed and there should be no film in the name of Padmavati at all which was supported by the state president of Karni Sena Mahipal Singh. 'There is no romantic dream sequence or any objectionable/romantic scene between Rani Padmavati and Allauddin Khijli. It was not a part of the script. It was misconception and considering the sentiments of the community, we have clarified to them,' said Shobha Sant, CEO of the Bhansali Productions. 'We are trying to present Rani Padmavati's courageous nature. We will make the film which will make the country proud on Rani Padmavati,' she said. Mahipal said he put forward the sentiments of the youths of the Rajput community by demanding the title change. 'We are thankful to the Bhansali productions that they have agreed to our demand that there will be no distortion of the historic facts in the movie,' he said. Sant, however, said the demand to change the title did not come up in their previous discussions with the group. They have made this fresh demand for which I have nothing to say. 'This is not in my jurisdiction. They also did not raise this point in our discussion held before,' Sant said. Karni Sena members created a ruckus and manhandled Bhansali while the director was shooting the movie at Jaigarh Fort in Jaipur on Friday. The incident drew sharp reactions from the film industry with members demanding action against the miscreants. In a surprise move and ignoring 28 colleges under its legislation, the Delhi government has decided to establish a Punjabi chair at JNU. The Centre of Indian Languages under the School of Language, Literature and Culture Studies of JNU will set up the chair in Punjabi language, as the Delhi government has signed an agreement with JNU. Travel and tourism minister Kapil Mishra said, 'The agreement has been signed to promote the research work in Punjabi language from JNU. Delhi government has signed an agreement with JNU to establish Punjabi chair in the varsity. 'The project was in pipeline since last four to five years but finally got approved this year. 'Annually we will release a sum of Rs 50 -60 lakh on this project. The total money sanctioned by the Delhi government to run this agreement is Rs 7 to 8 crore. Hansraj Suman, member of academic council Delhi University, countering minister Kapil Mishra's statement said, 'Delhi Government has no business to do. They blow their own trumpets. 'Delhi government has 28 funded colleges, out of which 16 are fully funded by the government, and to 12 colleges the government donates 5 percent only,' adding, 'Out of them Lakshmibai College is available for Punjabi. There is no other college under Delhi government where student can apply for Punjabi language.' The chair will be headed by the professor with some research students. The Centre of Indian language has already started chairs in Bengali, Marathi, Tamil, Kannada and Assamese at JNU. In JNU, a committee under Rajib Dashgupta has been set up to upgrade the Centre of Indian Language. A senior professor from JNU wishing anonymity said 'In October 2016, the academic council of JNU decided to upgrade the Centre of Indian Languages with School of Indian Languages and very soon the chairs will be turned into Master courses.' 'Through establishing the chair in Punjabi in JNU campus we will be able bring out comparative literature of Punjabi to understand the social environment of that language in literature.' This research will not be limited to one specific language. Apart from Punjabi chair, JNU will also introduce chairs in Odia, Malayalam and Telugu. Donald Trump signed an order for the temporary ban of seven Muslim-majority countries and all refugees from entering United States. The said order signed by Trump on Friday, January 27, is a way to establish "new vetting measures to keep radical Islamic terrorists out of the United States of America." "We don't want them here," said Trump. "We want to ensure that we are not admitting into our country the very threats our soldiers are fighting overseas." According to the order, countries banned from Us are the Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. It was also added that these countries are just the start and that Trump could add more. However, some of the world leaders were not happy to Trump's move. "The needs of refugees and migrants worldwide have never been greater and the US resettlement programme is one of the most important in the world," said the United Nations refugee agency and the International Organization for Migration on a joint statement. "The reception of refugees fleeing the war, fleeing oppression, is part of our duties," France's foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said. Numerous advocacy and aid groups have expressed their outrage. Several people have come for rally against the US president. "It's not a Muslim ban, but we were totally prepared," Donald Trump insisted. "It's working out very nicely. You see it at the airports, you see it all over." Cracking his whip against corruption, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar has ordered a CBI inquiry into an alleged scam involving the building of mobile towers on army land and the misappropriation of funds. A recently retired lieutenant general and a senior high-profile officer, who was indirectly part of surgical strikes on Pakistan, are likely to be under the scanner during the probe. After the CBI inquiry into the alleged case of corruption was launched, the retired Lt Gen had lost his appointment as a member of the Armed Forces Tribunal, senior government sources told Mail Today. Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar has ordered a CBI inquiry into an alleged scam involving the building of mobile towers In one of the instances to be probed, senior army officers had allegedly got cell phone towers belonging to a private cellular service provider firm on military cantonment land while allegedly favouring private firms and individuals in the process. 'One of the complaints was received by the Defence Ministry from army officials regarding misappropriation of funds in installation of mobile towers inside the Hissar cantonment. There were also complaints about other such cases on different locations and that is why, a CBI inquiry has been recommended in the case by Parrikar,' sources said. The recommendation for the CBI probe was sent earlier this month. According to sources, the private firm, which installed the three cell towers had also constructed bus shelters inside the Hisar military station, had been given permission in a hush hush manner allegedly in connivance with authorities there. The matter had come to light after two colonel-rank officers raised the flag against the alleged corrupt practices going on in the Hisar military station, including the installation of the mobile towers and unnecessary renovation of old residential buildings inside the campus, sources said. Union Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar speaks at an exhibition organised to promote cashless transactions Senior army sources said the officers were also asked to keep quiet by the senior officer and they were given very poor ratings in their annual confidential reports by them. To suppress the matter, one of the Colonels posted at Ambala, who wrote a complaint to the Defence Minister and the then army chief General Dalbir Singh Suhag, was made to face disciplinary proceedings for writing directly to Parrikar about his grievances and bypassing the chain of command. The retired Lieutenant General, who took part in the Pathankot operations, had strong links with higher ups in the force and could manage to get the matter hushed up, the sources alleged. Sources claim that when this alleged scam took place in Hissar, the senior high profile officer was commanding the station and was later posted to a very important assignment at Army Headquarters. The prospect of significant numbers of green hydrogen-powered electric cars on UK roads moved a step closer today as two of the worlds biggest car-makers joined forces to 'mass-produce' fuel cells. General Motors - which owns Britain's Vauxhall - and Honda announced the motor industrys first joint fuel-cell manufacturing operation in Michigan. It said the advanced fuel cell technology will be applied 'to each companys future products' within three years. General Motors and Honda will open a fuel-cell manufacturing operation (above, Honda's hydrogen powered electric vehicle called Clarity) The collaboration will mean smaller and much lower cost systems than at present, said the companies. Honda currently has three hydrogen powered electric vehicles called Clarity in the UK. But motor industry executives say the new announcement means there will be significant numbers of fuel cell cars on UK roads by 2020. In a joint statement, GM and Honda announced establishment of the auto industrys first manufacturing joint venture to mass produce an advanced hydrogen fuel cell system that will be used in future products from each company. The new operation called Fuel Cell System Manufacturing, LLC will operate within GMs existing battery pack manufacturing facility site in Brownstown, Michigan, south of Detroit. It said: Mass production of fuel cell systems is expected to begin around 2020 and create nearly 100 new jobs. The companies are making equal investments totalling $85 million (68 million) in the joint venture. Futuristic: Toyota, Hyundai, Honda (seen above), BMW, and Daimler are among those who have developed fuel cell cars for general use by motorists The fuel cell cars work by a process of reverse electrolysis in that the hydrogen has a chemical reaction at a catalyst membrane in the car. This produces energy in the form of electricity which powers the electric motors. The other residue is pure water created by the hydrogen and oxygen atoms re-uniting to form H2O. Toyota, Hyundai, Honda, BMW, and Daimler are among those who have developed fuel cell cars for general use by motorists. Clean fuel firm ITM Power is opening hydrogen fill-up stations across the UK including recently at the National Physical Laboratory in Teddington. It is part of a planned hydrogen superhighway network of refuelling stations for pollution-free fuel-cell cars. The joint GM- Honda statement said: Honda and GM have been working together through a master collaboration agreement announced in July 2013. It established the co-development arrangement for a next-generation fuel cell system and hydrogen storage technologies. Honda began delivery of its all-new Clarity Fuel Cell vehicle to U.S. customers in December 2016 The companies integrated their development teams and shared hydrogen fuel cell intellectual property to create a more affordable commercial solution for fuel cell and hydrogen storage systems. Toshiaki Mikoshiba, chief operating officer of the North American Region for Honda Motor Co., Ltd. and president and chief executive officer of American Honda Co., Inc. and Honda North America, Inc. said: 'Over the past three years, engineers from Honda and GM have been working as one team with each company providing know-how from its unique expertise to create a compact and low-cost next-generation fuel cell system. He added: This foundation of outstanding teamwork will now take us to the stage of joint mass production of a fuel cell system that will help each company create new value for our customers in fuel cell vehicles of the future. The Fuel Cell System Manufacturing (FCSM) joint venture will be operated by a board of directors consisting of three executives from each company that will include a rotating chairperson. In addition, a president will be appointed to rotate between each company. GM and Honda are acknowledged leaders in fuel cell technology with more than 2,220 patents between them, according to the Clean Energy Patent Growth Index. GM and Honda rank No. 1 and No. 3, respectively, in total fuel cell patents filed in 2002 through 2015. Mark Reuss, GM executive vice president, Global Product Development, Purchasing and Supply Chain said: The eventual deployment of this technology in passenger vehicles will create more differentiated and environmentally friendly transportation options for consumers. Experts said fuel cell vehicles can operate on hydrogen made from renewable sources such as wind and biomass. Water vapour is the only emission from fuel cell vehicles. Honda began delivery of its all-new Clarity Fuel Cell vehicle to U.S. customers in December 2016 following a spring 2016 launch in Japan, with those to the UK following more recently. Flybe shares slipped this session after the airline reported a slow start to 2017, blaming 'uncertain customer confidence and poor weather'. For the first three weeks of January, revenue per seat and yield are both down 1.0 per cent year on year with seats sold flat at 38 per cent. Shares in the small cap firm have fallen 1 per cent at 45p. The trading statement shows Flybe is only selling around two thirds of its available seats The poor start to 2017 follows a solid third quarter. Revenue rose 13.5 per cent for the three months ended December 2016, compared with a 5.7 percent increase in the first half. Revenue per seat also rose 0.2 per cent over the period versus a decline of 6.9 per cent in the first half. But compared to the year before load factor slipped to 67.2 per cent, from 68.9 per cent. Laith Khalaf, analyst at Hargreaves Lansdowne, said: 'The trading statement shows Flybe is only selling around two thirds of its available seats, and in the first few weeks of 2017 revenue per seat sold fell backwards, which is not an encouraging combination. 'This reflects the fact its a challenging time for the European airline industry as the costs of jet fuel have risen and overcapacity on many routes is keeping prices down.' Uncertainty arising from the UK's decision to leave the European Union and a string of attacks in Europe and lower appetite for corporate travel have dampened expectations for the industry in the year ahead. Last week EasyJet warned that the impact of a weaker pound and rising fuel prices on its bottom line for the current financial year would be harsher than expected. The second biggest budget airline in Europe after Ryanair said profits would be 35million lower than it had expected . Flybe cautioned back in November that the Brexit vote could affect the aviation industry 'operationally and commercially,' and posed short-term challenges because of the pound's sharp slide. The following month, it named Christine Ourmieres-Widener, former head of rival CityJet, as chief executive. Ourmieres-Widener said in a statement this morning: 'There is much to be done... my first priority is to look to rebuild passenger unit revenue and to challenge all our costs.' Analysts expect Flybe to pursue additional codeshare agreements with long haul airlines operating into Heathrow, after the airline announced in December new routes from Edinburgh and Aberdeen to Heathrow starting in March 2017. Codesharing is a business arrangement where two or more airlines share the same flight. The company said the new routes would allow for connectivity with its codeshare partners and that it would add further connectivity over the coming months. Do you have an innovative, growth-focused business that needs a bit of help to take it to the next level? A competition in China is giving away a total of 1million of equity-free capital to the best and brightest manufacturing, technology and science-based entrepreneurs around the world. Entries will be shortlisted by experts in their sector, before 20 UK companies are selected to pitch at the national final in March which will take place at crowdfunding platform Seedrs' headquarters in London. Land of opportunity: Shenzhen is known as the 'Silicon Valley' of China There are five categories open to entrepreneurs: internet and mobile internet, electronic science and technology, biological/life science and technology, advanced manufacturing, and material and energy (which includes energy saving and environmental protection). The applications will be scored and reviewed by a team of judges including professional investors and prominent figures from the start-up business community. The first place winner at the national final, which is being jointly held by Seedrs and venture capital fund Interbridge, will receive 10,000, the second place will get 5,000 and third place 3,000 in each country. After being whittled down to 10, the entrepreneurs will be flown out on an all expenses paid trip to the city of Shenzhen, known as the 'Silicon Valley' of China. There they will compete in the global final of the Innovation & Entrepreneurship International Competition for a 100,000 cash pot. The UK finalists will compete against seven other nations - the United States, Australia, Canada, Israel, Japan, India and Germany. Jeff Lynn, co-Founder and chief executive at Seedrs, says: 'Not only is a huge cash injection up for grabs, but IEIC is giving entrepreneurs the opportunity to pitch in front of some of the leading investors and mentors in the early stage arena. 'IEIC is building bridges amongst global startup communities and will be an invaluable experience to ambitious young business founders.' The competition is supported by China's Ministry of Science and Technology of the PRC, the State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs and the Shenzhen Government. Applications for competition are open until the 28th February 2017. Entrepreneurs who want to apply to the London division can do so here. Islamist suspects arrested in Austria were planning to establish a caliphate in the country, police have claimed. Heavily armed SWAT teams supported by hundreds of other officers detained 14 people in Graz and Vienna last week over suspected ISIS links. Justice Ministry official Christian Pilnacek has since revealed they are being investigated for attempts to try to set up a 'parallel society... an attempt to create a kind of theocracy in Austria.' Islamist suspects arrested in Austria were planning to establish a caliphate in the country, police have claimed (file picture) Pilnacek said two of the 12 locations raided were Muslim social centers also used as mosques. The people arrested also are suspected of recruiting around 40 people to fight for Islamic extremist groups in the Middle East, he said. The police sweep came less than a week after police in Vienna detained a 17-year-old they describe as belonging to 'radical Salafist' circles who they said has confessed to experimenting with building a bomb. But the prosecutor's statement said Thursday's operation had been planned for 'a longer time,' suggesting no immediate link. Pilnacek did not rule out some overlap to Mirsad Omerovic, a Serbian-born Islamic cleric sentenced last year in Graz to 20 years in prison for recruiting dozens of young men to fight for the Islamic State group. But he said he could not say there was a 'direct connection' in the cases of all of those detained. Heavily armed SWAT teams supported by hundreds of other officers detained 14 people in Graz (file picture) and Vienna last week over suspected ISIS links Most of them, including some with Austrian nationality, had Balkan antecedents, he said. State broadcaster ORF, citing the public prosecutor in Graz, said a Syrian national also was among the detained, who ranged in age from 21 to 49. Konrad Kogler, Austria's chief security official, told reporters that data from about 140 mobile phones and other electronic devices must be evaluated, meaning 'weeks and months of work ahead of us.' Austria has not experienced the attacks that have rocked other nations in Europe. But Interior Ministry figures show that approximately 300 people have left or tried to leave Austria to fight for radical groups in the Middle East since 2012. Iranian director Asghar Farhadi said he will not attend next month's Academy Awards Ceremony. He added hardliners in both Iran and the US acted with the same mentality Oscar-winning Iranian director Asghar Farhadi said Sunday he will not attend next month's Academy Awards ceremony. In a statement, he compared US President Donald Trump's visa ban on seven Muslim countries to the actions of hardliners in his own country. Farhadi, nominated for best foreign language film for 'The Salesman,' said in a statement that while he had initially planned to attend the ceremony, he had been forced to change his mind. Scroll down for video Trump signed an executive order called 'Protection Of The Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into The United States,' on Friday prohibiting entry to the United States to all nationals of seven Muslim-majority states: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Farhadi said he had planned to attend but was forced to change his mind. Pictured: Farhadi, center, congratulating Shahab Hosseini, left, who won best actor at Cannes for his performance in Farhadi's film 'The Salesman' Trump signed an executive order on Friday prohibiting entry to the United States to all nationals of 7 Muslim-majority states - Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen Visas will not be issued to citizens of these countries for 90 days. National Iranian-American Council president Trita Parsi told the Los Angeles Times that Farhadi, an Iranian national, would only be able to get out of the ban by applying to and receiving an artistic exception. Farhadi, 45, said: 'I neither had the intention to not attend nor did I want to boycott the event as a show of objection, for I know that many in the American film industry and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences are opposed to the fanaticism and extremism which are today taking place more than ever.' He added: 'However, it now seems that the possibility of this presence is being accompanied by ifs and buts which are in no way acceptable to me even if exceptions were to be made for my trip.' He said hardliners in United States and Iran acted with the same mentality. He elaborated: 'For years on both sides of the ocean, groups of hardliners have tried to present to their people unrealistic and fearful images of various nations and cultures in order to turn their differences into disagreements, their disagreements into enmities and their enmities into fears.' He added: 'Instilling fear in the people is an important tool used to justify extremist and fanatic behavior by narrow-minded individuals.' Asghar Farhadi's film 'The Salesman,' which was filmed in his native Iran, is nominated for best foreign film at the Academy Awards. His film A Separation won the award in 2012 A White House source told People that Farhadi could receive a waiver that would allow him entry to the US and attendance at the Oscars but did not elaborate. Farhadi's lead actress, Taraneh Alidoosti, had already announced that she would boycott the annual awards ceremony in Los Angeles over Trump's 'racist' visa ban. The 33-year-old actress wrote on Twitter: 'Trump's visa ban for Iranians is racist. Whether this will include a cultural event or not, I won't attend the #AcademyAwards 2017 in protest.' Responding to Alidootsi's planned boycott, 'Arrival' director Denis Villeneuve, from Canada, said he thought it 'was a bad idea.' He told the Los Angeles Times: 'It's not about trying to boycott, it's the opposite. 'It's about building bridges between cultures. It's more powerful to come. 'It's time to talk, not to be silent.' Taraneh Alidoosti, star of Farhadi's film 'The Salesman,' said she plans to boycott the Oscars. 'Arrival' director Denis Villeneuve said he thought this 'was a bad idea' 'Racist': Taraneh Alidootsi said she will not attend the Oscars in protest of Trump's visa ban on seven countries including Iran Farhadi won the best foreign language Oscar in 2012 for his film 'A Separation.' The subjects of 'The White Helmets,' an Oscar nominee for short subject documentary about the volunteers who rescue victims of attacks in Syria, will also be unable to attend, it emerged later Sunday. Producer Joanna Matasegara said in a statement: 'We have always said that if we were to be nominated, we would bring Raed Saleh, the head of the White Helmets, who has spoken many times in Washington DC, and Khaled Khateeb, the young cinematographer who risked his life over and over again, as our guests. 'They've been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. These people are the bravest humanitarians on the planet, and the idea that they could not be able to come with us and enjoy that success is just abhorrent." The White Helmets say on their website that their unarmed rescuers have saved more than 78,500 lives in Syria. Raed Saleh, left, and Khaled Khateeb, right, are the subjects of documentary 'The White Helmets.' They were nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize last year for their work in saving Syrian lives. They would not be able to attend the Oscars under Trump's ban The White Helmets is nominated for Best Documentary Short at this year's Academy Awards Asghar Farhadi won Best Foreign Language film for 'A Separation' in 2012. He was also nominated for Best Original Screenplay They were nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize last year, although the award went to Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos. A spokesperson for the Academy Awards said: 'The Academy celebrates achievement in the art of filmmaking, which seeks to transcend borders and speak to audiences around the world, regardless of national, ethnic, or religious differences. 'As supporters of filmmakers, and the human rights of all people, around the globe, we find it extremely troubling that Asghar Farhadi, the director of the Oscar-winning film from Iran A Separation, along with the cast and crew of this years Oscar-nominated film The Salesman, could be barred from entering the country because of their religion or country of origin.' Miss Colombia showed there no hard feelings after she hugged Steve Harvey, just over a year after his infamous gaffe when he incorrectly announced the winner of the Miss Universe 2015 pageant. Ariadna Gutierrez, Miss Colombia 2015, was left in floods of tears after Harvey crowned her as Miss Universe - only to crown another contestant Miss Philippines Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach, the winner moments later. The excruciating moment was matched by millions and sparked an angry backlash against the host who swiftly took to Twitter to apologize. But it appears that Harvey has now put all that behind him. Miss Colombia showed there no hard feelings after she hugged Steve Harvey (left and right) during the dress rehearsals for the 65th Miss Universe, just over a year after his infamous gaffe During the dress rehearsals for the 65th Miss Universe which will air live on ABS-CBN tomorrow, he shared a hug with the new Miss Universe Colombia 2016, Andrea Tovar. 'Steve, no more mistakes,' Tovar joked after their embrace at the Mall of Asia Arena Sunday, ABS reports. Harvey has described the moment he announced the wrong winner in December 2015, as 'four minutes of pure hell.' Gutierrez was still blowing kisses and waving to her adoring fans when Harvey, who realized his terrible error, was forced to break the news. 'Folks, I have to apologize,' he told the crowd, the shame already evident on his face, 'The first runner-up is Colombia. Miss Philippines stared wide-eyed at the audience, her lip quivering as Miss USA whispered into her ear and she realized what exactly those words meant. Ariadna Gutierrez, Miss Colombia 2015, was left in floods of tears after Harvey crowned her as Miss Universe - only to crown another contestant Miss Philippines Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach, the winner moments later The crowd, and audience viewing the event on TV, watched in heartbreak and horror as the crown had to be removed from Gutierrez and placed on Miss Philippines Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach's head 'Miss Universe 2015,' Harvey then dramatically clarified, 'Is Miss Philippines.' The crowd, and audience viewing the event on TV, watched in heartbreak and horror as the crown had to be removed from Gutierrez and placed on Miss Philippines Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach's head. Harvey immediately tweeted after the show, spelling both women's countries wrong as he tweeted: 'I want to apologize emphatically to Miss Philippians and Miss Colombia. He then deleted the tweet and re-wrote it, saying he felt terrible and apologized 'wholeheartedly to Miss Colombia and Miss Philippines' for his 'huge mistake'. 'Secondly, I'd like to apologize to the viewers at that I disappointed as well,' he wrote in a separate tweet. 'Again it was an honest mistake.' 'This was a terribly honest human mistake and I am so regretful.' 'I don't want to take away from this amazing night and pageant. As well as the wonderful contestants. They were all amazing,' he continued to tweet, before once again 'emphatically' apologizing to Gutierrez and Wurtzbach. Harvey, who was hugely apologetic, held up the card revealing the correct winners Social media exploded with criticism for Harvey over the incident. Even fellow celebrities took aim at the host's mistake. Just a few weeks later, Jamie Foxx pretended to announce the wrong movie at the 73rd annual Golden Globe Awards in January 2016. The 48-year-old jokingly named Straight Outta Compton as the winner for the category, Best Original Score for a motion picture, while presenting at the awards show on Sunday in Beverly Hills. Before opening the envelope, the actor said: 'And the winner is...Straight Outta Compton,' even though the the film was not nominated. His co-host and the audience burst out laughing at the nod to Harvey's infamous gaffe. The 65th Miss Universe, presented by Harvey and model Ashley Graham, will air live tomorrow. The former secretary of Adolf Hitler's propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels has died, aged 106. Brunhilde Pomsel, who began working for Goebbels in 1942 as he stepped up his vile propaganda campaign against Jews, desensitising Germans at the height of the Holocaust. After her boss died in Hitler's bunker - killing his six children and then committing suicide with his wife - at the end of the war Pomsel disappeared into obscurity. Brunhilde Pomsel (pictured, left, last year) said that as a young woman (right): 'I was a stupid, politically uninterested little sausage of simple means' It was only in 2011 that she re-emerged, when a German newspaper published an interview with her, prompting a flurry of interest in the last surviving members of the Nazi leadership's inner circle. She died in her sleep in Munich on Friday and her death was confirmed last night by Christian Kroenes, the director and producer of a documentary about her, A German Life. In the documentary Pomsel talked about her three years working for the man responsible for spreading Hitler's poisonous ideology in newspapers and across the airwaves. She said: 'I wouldn't see myself as being guilty. Unless you end up blaming the entire German population for ultimately enabling that government to take control. That was all of us. Including me.' Goebbels (right) with his wife and children and Hitler, who Pomsel described as 'The Boss' She was inside the Fuhrer's bunker in Berlin in May 1945 when he shot himself as the Red Army closed in on his lair. Pomsel described in the film how she was told to keep the Nazi top brass supplied with alcohol 'in order to retain the numbness' and stave off the reality of their imminent defeat by the hated Russians. Born in 1911, she left school in 1926 and started an apprenticeship with a Jewish wholesale manufacturer. But as the Great Depression hit Germany - leading to the rise of the Nazis - she became unemployed, before getting a job as a shorthand secretary for Jewish insurance broker Dr Hugo Goldberg. Dr Goldberg, like many Jews, fled Germany after Hitler gained power in 1933 but Pomsel began working for author Wulf Bley, who was closely connected to the Nazi Party. Pomsel was interviewed for the documentary, A German Life, last year She used these connections to get a job with the German Broadcasting Station radio channel and joined the Nazi party herself. Goebbels spent much of his time at the radio station, making manic speeches in his increasingly shrill voice, and her offered a job as his assistant. Thrilled to be working with the second most important person in the Third Reich, she jumped at the opportunity. But she insisted that she was not aware of the 'Final Solution' - the extermination of millions of Jews in death camps in Germany, Austria and German-occupied Poland - until after the war and said Goebbels must have kept correspondence about it away from her sight. After the war Pomsel was captured by Soviet troops and jailed for five years. Astonishingly, after being released from prison in 1950, she went back to working in broadcasting in democratic West Germany until her eventual retirement in 1971. She is not thought to have married or had children. Mr Kroenes said he spoke to Pomsel on her birthday, January 11, when she had sounded perfectly lucid. An almost bald man sits in front of the pleated orange curtain in a public photobooth, carefully arranging a few strands of straggly hair across his gleaming pate in a ludicrous attempt at a comb-over. Finally ready, he beams into the camera. But the flash fails to go off, so he leans forward to fiddle with the controls and that, of course, is when the picture is taken. Gregor Fisher in the Hamlet cigars commercial from the mid-1980s, set in a photobooth, was voted the greatest ad of the 20th century Twice more he is taken unawares by the flash: once, when the seat abruptly gives way under him. Then, with just the top of his head visible, a gentle plume of smoke rises, accompanied by a mellow voiceover: Happiness is a cigar called Hamlet . Ten years after the first airing of that 1987 TV commercial, featuring the Rab C. Nesbitt actor Gregor Fisher, it was voted the greatest ad of the 20th century by a special jury at the International Advertising Festival in Cannes. John and Jackie Jennedy pose in a Boston photo booth in 1956 during a summer holiday The sheer haplessness it depicted was all the funnier because wed all been there ourselves, experiencing the unique misadventures of the photobooth. Everyone, surely, had wrestled with the adjustable round seat to get it at the right level, or just irresponsibly twizzed it round and round, or struggled to get money in the slot, or sabotaged friends passport pictures in an early incarnation of todays photobombing phenomenon. Then there was the solemn ritual of hanging around outside the booth for five minutes (though it always seemed like an eternity), waiting for the slight hiss and clank which announced that the strip of pictures was about to drop. And when, eventually, it did, there would be a fight with your friends to see the images first, with someone always, always, excitedly forgetting they would still be wet and smudging them with a thumb. Happy days! But now, 20 years since the last Hamlet ad, the public photobooth itself is set to follow tobacco advertising into oblivion. Online photo-messaging services such as Instagram and Snapchat had already diminished its relevance in our 21st-century world, but last week the Home Office delivered the fatal blow, declaring that all visa and passport applications can now be made digitally, and ID photographs uploaded from mobile phones. So the photobooths only remaining raison detre is, much like that Hamlet cigar, going up in smoke. Robert Redford and Barbra Streisand joke around and pull faces in front of a photobooth camera Kylie Minogue (right) puckers up while posing with a friend in a photobooth in February 2015 For those of us whose teen years especially were greatly enhanced, if not actually defined, by mucking around in photobooths, this seems terribly sad. The passport photo of Liverpool singer Cilla Black taken in a photobooth in 1964. Last week the Home Office announced that passport photos can now be uploaded from mobile phones Im sure Im not alone in being able to chronicle the progress of my adolescence from those little rectangular pictures, barely bigger than stamps. In fact, there was one booth in particular, at Chapel Street Station in my home town of Southport, Merseyside, that was like a staging-post of my childhood. First, when I was ten or 11, there were the pictures in which my friends and I crammed as many of us as possible into the cramped space before someone in a uniform arrived to tell us off. Robyn Pearl and Brian Viner, in 1982, in one of the many photobooth shots that captured Viner's teenage years Then, at 15 or 16, there were the self-consciously moody ones with a mate, fancying that we looked a little like Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend of The Who. Or the plain silly ones of us pulling daft faces. And then, at 18 and 19, came the poses with girlfriends, some of them more than a little saucy if memory serves. But then, maybe it doesnt. They were the selfies of their age. The only way, without grappling with a cumbersome Polaroid camera, that we could capture and immortalise a moment without having to wait a whole fortnight an eternity! for that moment to be devalued by the journey to and from the developers. Besides, it always seemed to me that the people who developed my photographs would do their absolute best to return them either out of focus or over-exposed. The photobooth might have allowed only two choices of backdrop (with the pleated orange curtain, or without) but it felt like a much better way of recording friendships. One of the other joys is that future celebrities also took pictures in photobooths just like the rest of us, long before their PRs and make-up artists mucked in which means we can see their unvarnished appearance in the days before they were famous. The king of rock and roll: Elvis Presley perfects his trademark lip curl Now, though, the age of the photobooth is ending, and they will soon be gone from our stations, supermarkets and Post Offices. It is an era that began in 1925 when a Russian-Jewish immigrant called Anatol Josepho, who had developed an instant photograph machine he called the Photomaton, opened a studio on Broadway, in New York. The new technology caused a sensation. Josepho kept his studio open until 4am every day, and within six months almost 300,000 people, including the Governor of New York and his wife, had queued to buy a strip of eight instant photos of themselves for 25 cents. The next year, a wealthy businessman called Henry Morgenthau saw the potential in the machine and shelled out a mind-boggling $1 million for the American rights. It paid off. Soon there were thousands of them across the country, with a huge surge in use when the U.S. entered World War II. There was no easier way for the wives and sweethearts of military personnel to send pictures to their loved ones. By then, Josepho had moved on to other things (inventing the single-knob shower handle, no less). He had also sold the European distribution rights to the Photomaton, and it arrived in Britain in 1927, where it was another commercial hit though it also helped, in a small way, to unleash the Great Depression. Oscar winning smile: In a pre-fame photo Berkshire schoolgirl Kate Winslet poses in front of the pleated curtains In London, in September 1929, Clarence Charles Hatry, the head of the new Photomaton Parent Corporation, was accused of fraud. That led to a plunge in the London stock exchange that was a prelude to the catastrophic Wall Street Crash a month later. Despite that unfortunate association, photobooths eventually became even more popular here than in America. By 2010, there were four times as many of them in the UK as in the entire United States. But their chequered history continued. In the Fifties, many Woolworths stores had the curtains removed after complaints that young women were habitually stripping for the camera, and that some couples were even having sex. Rather more wholesomely, in Vincente Minnellis 1953 film The Band Wagon, starring Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse, there is a marvellous scene in which Astaire dances into a photobooth, poses for a picture, then dances out again. But it was the artist Andy Warhol, inspired by the photobooth to create striking multi-coloured images of actresses Marilyn Monroe and Audrey Hepburn, among numerous others, who really gave it artistic credibility in the 1960s. Wearing a dark t-shirt the young model Jerry Hall strikes a pose in her series of photobooth pictures Art mirroring life: Marilyn Monroe and her second husband, Yankee baseball player Joe Di Maggio, in a series of photobooth snaps. Similar images of Monroe would later be immortalised by the artwork of Andy Warhol Happily, while the photobooth seems certain to disappear from public places, it is enjoying a new lease of life as a party accessory. A company called Photobooths began with a single rental booth six years ago but now has hundreds of them and a year-long waiting list to hire them for school proms, weddings, barmitzvahs, and even divorce parties. I suppose its reassuring to know that old habits die hard, but it all seems a long way from my mates and me crowding into the ramshackle booth at Chapel Street Station not to mention dear old Gregor Fisher plummeting from view, before lighting up his consolatory Hamlet cigar. President Donald Trump accused senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) for trying 'to start World War III' after they released a joint statement criticizing his ban on immigration. The two senators slammed Trump's executive order restricting travel to the US from seven predominantly Muslim countries, saying his failure to properly vet the policy led to widespread confusion at airports across the country. They attacked Trump for punishing innocent people and questioned its efficacy, saying: 'We fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism.' The president fell back on his usual tactic against critics and suggested they focus their energies elsewhere 'instead of always looking to start World War III.' President Donald Trump accused senators John McCain (R-AZ), left, and Lindsey Graham (R-SC), right, for trying 'to start World War III' The two senators slammed Trump's executive order, saying it was not properly vetted and would likely spur terrorist recruitment rather than improve homeland security Trump signed an executive order on Friday barring any non-U.S. citizen traveling from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen from entering the United States for 90 days. The move, which also affected legal permanent residents and visa-holders from those seven countries, sparked an outrage as protesters gathered across the country. The ACLU won a temporary legal battle halting deportations, but more than 100 people were detained for hours before they were allowed into the US. McCain and Graham's statement said: 'It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trump's executive order was not properly vetted.' They also expressed concerns that the Departments of State, Defense, Justice and Homeland Security were not consulted on the matter. 'Such a hasty process risks harmful results,' they said. The statement supported green-card holders, interpreters who served the US military, and 'refugees who have been shown through extensive vetting to pose no demonstrable threat to our nation, and who have suffered unspeakable horrors, most of them women and children.' The two Congressmen went even further in their criticism, saying Trump's executive order could likely have the opposite effect on homeland security as a result of discrimination. The president fell back on his usual tactic against critics and suggested they focus their energies elsewhere 'instead of always looking to start World War III' Trump denied accusations of religious discrimination. The executive order bars any those from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the US for 90 days Trump doubled down on his policy on Sunday, and members of his staff defended the president on TV appearances, at times looking flustered They wrote: 'Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism... 'Our most important allies in the fight against ISIL are the vast majority of Muslims who reject its apocalyptic ideology of hatred. 'This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. 'That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security.' Trump denied accusations of religious discrimination, insisting that it was not a 'Muslim ban'. He said: 'This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order.' Trump lashed out at the two for speaking out, saying they were flat out 'wrong' and ' sadly weak'. He tweeted: 'The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong - they are sadly weak on immigration. 'The two senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III.' Sitting around a dining room table, U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) met with eight dairy farmers from Jim Falls, Boyd, Rice Lake and others as far as Albany, Minn., Saturday morning at Triple T Farms, co-owned by brothers Tom and Tony Bowe, in Chippewa Falls. Baldwin came to discuss her DAIRY PRIDE Act, which she hopes will enforce current Food and Drug Administrations regulation to properly label milk, yogurt and other dairy products. But, as these farmers know, there is a lot more that goes into dairy farming than labels. The group of nine chatted for nearly an hour about topics ranging from Sonny Perdue, President Donald Trumps pick for agriculture secretary, NAFTA and other trade agreements and immigration to the need for workers. A point of pride The Food and Drug Administration defines milk as the lacteal secretion ... obtained by the complete milking of one or more healthy cows. Baldwin and the dairy farmers agreed, products such as soy milk or almond milk, as well as those that misrepresent other dairy products, are hurting the dairy industry. People dont recognize a lot of effort was put into defining milk as a law so we can guarantee consumers when they are buying a product called milk, it is of highest quality and nutritional standards, Baldwin said. Currently these other products arent meeting those standards. Baldwins DAIRY PRIDE Act would require the FDA to issue guidance for imitation dairy products that are improperly labeled within 90 days, and report to Congress to hold the agency accountable. There is existing federal regulation, but Baldwin said the FDA has not enforced improper labeling regulations, leading to an increase in these products. Steve Schlanglen, a dairy farmer from Albany, Minn. and Associated Milk Producers, Inc. board member, said those mislabeled products lead to a lower demand of milk products, which puts farmers like himself and the seven others in the room in a tricky spot. Milk consumption has been dropping for several years and that is definitely a part of it, Schlanglen said. People believe theyre getting something really close or similar (to milk) and they arent, its not near the same nutrition. The label should be clear what it means. Of course, a successful dairy farm wouldnt be anywhere without its workers, and another major concern they discussed was the workforce, where they come from and who they are. A new ag face Baldwin said she has only briefly interacted with Trumps ag secretary pick, Perdue, but shes heard favorable reviews so far. The former senator from Georgia may not be from a dairy state, but Baldwin will make sure he knows Wisconsins needs at her scheduled meeting with him. We are Americas dairyland and were proud of that, Baldwin said. I want him to understand there are policies that need to be focused on that will disproportionately affect our state if not done right, especially as we head toward a new farm bill. She also wants him to be aware of the ag industry as a whole. Economic development in rural areas is also important for dairy farmers, such as good broadband connections, which affect farmers from marketing their products. Its not just policies that affect family farms, but also what affects rural communities and their well being, she said. The National Milk Producers and Midwest Dairy Coalition have endorsed Purdue and farmers like Schlanglen have confidence in him. A changing workforce Since she was elected to the U.S. Senate in November 2012, Baldwin said shes seen a dramatic shift in workers in the dairy industry. Family owned and operated is no longer enough to keep most farms going, as AMPI board member Mark Kaeding knows. In the Augusta-area alone, he knows farms employ Hispanics and Ecuadorians. With recent laws on immigration, Kaeding worries farmers will lose the employees they depend on to keep their farms going. When talking about ag workfroce, dairy is different because it is 24/7, 365 days a year, Baldwin said. The best approach we can take is recognizing we have workforce needs that include people who arent necessarily born here. Tom Bowes answer to his response to immigration policies was simple: Quick visas. Were competing with local manufacturers, labor market is tight all around and we dont have a very glorious job, Bowe said. Quick visas to get these workers here, thats the route we need to take. On the borders In addition to closing off workers, closing borders could also affect production. Sarah Schmidt, AMPIs director of public affairs, said Trumps conversations about building a wall on the Mexican border could very negatively impact the dairy industry. (Mexico) is one of our major exporters of non-fat dry milk, Schmidt said. Any kind of tariff rate or tax situation that would decrease our ability to bring non-fat milk into Mexico could significantly impact dairy farmers here in Wisconsin. On the northern end, Ontario, Canadas recent trade announcement to use condensed milk when crossing the border, thus easing transportation costs, also alarmed Baldwin. The U.S. depends on exporting a high-quality product. Baldwin hopes Purdue will get on that as soon as possible, before other provinces follow Ontarios lead. With topics turning toward the Trump Administration, Baldwin was also asked about her thoughts on the new president. She said he needs to be held accountable on his pledge to help the American people, but there are things she thinks will harm them, like the dismantling of health reforms. She said Trump has gone against his pledge to drain the swamp by putting billionaires in powerful positions. But overall she remains optimistic. We need cabinet secretaries who are working for the American people every day, not trying to enrich themselves or others in the administration, Baldwin said. The people of this state sent me to fight for the working people of my state, and my job hasnt changed. An elderly American dementia patient who was flown to Britain and dumped in a car park by his family had previously filed a restraining order against his 'volatile' son. Roger Curry, 76, was targeted by his son Kevin who would appear outside his house screaming and banging on the door until neighbours 'worried for his safety', local residents told Panorama. The elderly man was taken from his home in Los Angeles by his wife, Mary, and son, Kevin, to the UK where he was abandoned without identification in November 2015. He was found at Hereford bus station in the company of two men who flagged down a passing ambulance. As paramedics assessed him, one of the men described as having an American accent, but younger than Mr Curry vanished from the scene, leaving the elderly man to be cared for at a nursing home while police and social services tried to ascertain his identity. 'Volatile': The American dementia sufferer whose wife and son flew him from Los Angeles to the UK before dumping him in a car park without ID filed a restraining order against his son for 'domestic violence'. Pictured: His son Kevin and wife Mary Protection: Court records from 2000 show Roger filed for a restraining order against Kevin, pictured with his mother Mary, because of 'domestic violence' - and it was granted two months later Victim: Roger Curry, above, 76, was found at Hereford bus station in 2015, in the company of two men who flagged down a passing ambulance. One of the men - who spoke in an American accent - disappeared as paramedics helped Mr Curry Court records filed in 2000 show that the pensioner filed for a restraining order against his son because of 'domestic violence'. It was granted two months later. 'Their relationship has always been kind of volatile if you want to call it [that],' said Zenia Leon, a neighbour. 'Kevin, you could hear him at all different hours of the night, just pounding on their door trying to get in, screaming and yelling at them profanities.' She added: 'We worried for their safety.' According to court records, Kevin Curry has a criminal record stretching back to 1999. Mr Curry was finally flown back to America eight months after being found, and is now under the care of health authorities in Los Angeles. According to an investigation by the BBC1 programme Panorama, being screened tonight, court papers filed in Los Angeles state: 'In late 2015 Mr Curry was taken surreptitiously to England by his wife Mary Curry and his son Kevin Curry and abandoned there.' The mystery surrounding Mr Curry's identity led to numerous theories as to how he ended up in a Hereford car park. Abandoned: Roger Curry was flown back to America eight months after being dumped by Kevin and Mary, both pictured, without any kind of identification, and is now under the care of health authorities in LA Aggressive: A family neighbour told of how Kevin, above, who has a criminal record stretching back to 1999, would pound the family home's door down 'at all different hours of the night', screaming and yelling profanities He appeared to have been well looked after and was dressed from head to toe in new clothes from Tesco. As reported in the Mail last March, he was called Roger by staff caring for him after they heard him use the name Roger Curry. But police didn't know whether that was his real name or not. The pensioner told doctors and care home staff he was not from the area and had been 'training' nearby, but said little else. Mr Curry, pictured aged 18, perplexed authorities for months as they tried to find out who he was Police even contacted veterans' organisations in case Mr Curry was a former serviceman. Last year Sergeant Sarah Bennett of West Mercia Police said: 'We have a possible name but we have nothing else. 'We have no identity documents, no indication of where he's from or any family. 'We've trawled through the CCTV. We've also contacted the National Crime Agency. We've gone to Interpol. 'We've done a fingerprint search, we've done a DNA search and that hasn't yielded any results.' However, the clue to his identity came following a police appeal on BBC Midlands in March last year. After watching the news report, viewer Debbie Cocker searched the internet and found an old picture that looked like a younger version of the unidentified man. The photo came from a 1958 yearbook for Edmonds High School in Washington State and it showed an 18-year-old student called Roger Curry. Investigators then tracked down the Roger Curry pictured in the yearbook to a burnt-out house in an affluent suburb of Los Angeles. Bewildered: Mr Curry, above, was dressed in new clothes from Tesco and appeared to have been well looked after when he was found alone and confused in Hereford in November 2015 After being shown photographs, neighbours identified the mystery man as Mr Curry a former nurse who is married with two children. They then told how his family had been hit by tragedy. In November 2014 the family's house burnt down in the middle of the night. Neighbours did not see them again until August 2015, when they found Mr Curry and his wife who is also ill camping out in the yard of their burnt-out house. Their son Kevin had been bringing them food and they appeared to have been locked in behind the fence around the house. Neighbour Zenia Leon told Panorama that emergency services were shocked by what they found. She claimed they overheard the couple discussing what had happened, and said of Mr and Mrs Curry: 'They were talking together and they said they were here the night the house burnt down.' Miss Leon said Mr Curry was upset about his circumstances, adding: 'He was in tears. This is a big, burly macho man in tears saying, 'Who does this to their parents?'.' Lost and found: Mr Curry, who was found in the tiny country parish of Credenhill, Hereford, was finally identified following a police appeal on BBC Midlands when a viewer searched the internet and found an old picture that looked like a younger version of the man Kevin Curry told Panorama, which is being screened at 8.30pm tonight, that he had nothing to do with the abandonment of his father in England. He said his father became ill when they were visiting England on holiday and that he asked a friend to take him to hospital. But he could not explain why he had left Mr Curry in England for eight months without telling anyone who he was. Because of the high cost of care in America, elderly people are sometimes abandoned at hospitals in a practice called granny-dumping. A man in his fifties from Taunton, Somerset, was arrested last April on suspicion of kidnapping Mr Curry. He is on police bail and has not been charged. President Donald Trump (above) conferred by telephone with world leaders on Sunday President Donald Trump agreed with Arab leaders on Sunday to continue to enforce the Iranian nuclear agreement and to establish so-called 'safe zones' in Syria and Yemen, the White House said. Trump spoke by telephone with Saudi Arabia's King Salman and the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, though the White House did not say if the leaders discussed the president's controversial 'extreme vetting' measures against refugees from Muslim-majority countries, according to Politico. Trump 'requested, and the [Saudi] king agreed to support, safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts,' the White House said. The two leaders also 'agreed on the importance of rigorously enforcing the [nuclear deal] with Iran and of addressing Iran's destabilizing regional activities.' It was not immediately clear what mechanisms would be put in place to establish 'safe zones' in Syria. Carving out safe havens in the civil war-torn Middle Eastern country would most likely require a massive deployment of US ground troops, something that the American public is largely against. Trump opposed the nuclear agreement signed by Israel's arch-foe Iran and world powers, including the United States, in 2015 and has said he wants to undo it. Some of his key nominees have adopted an openly anti-Iran stance, including secretary of state candidate Rex Tillerson, who is seeking a complete revision of the accord. Trump spoke by telephone Sunday with Saudi Arabia's King Salman (left) and the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last month that there were many ways of 'undoing' the Iran nuclear deal and that he would discuss that with Trump. But before he left office, former President Barack Obama warned against rowing back the pact, emphasizing its 'significant and concrete results.' The deal places curbs on Tehran's nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions. Tehran is a major foe of both Washington and Ryad. The Sunni majority Saudi kingdom is engaged in a power struggle with the Shiite country for dominance in the region. Earlier on Sunday, Trump conversed by telephone with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull (left). On Saturday, Trump spoke with German Chancellor Angela Merkel (right) Trump also spoke by telephone with the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, committing to 'further strengthen cooperation on fighting radical Islamic terrorism,' the White House said. Earlier on Sunday, Trump conversed by telephone with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. The 25-minute conversation was their first since the billionaire's inauguration last weekend. Despite Trump's hard-line stance on immigration, he told Turnbull that the US would honor a previous agreement with Canberra about resettling migrants. Turnbull struck a 'one-off' deal with Obama in November to resettle refugees detained on Manus and Nauru in the US. On Saturday, Trump spoke with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russian President Vladimir Putin. The conversations gave the US president an early opportunity to explain new policies that have baffled and unnerved much of the rest of the world - particularly his order to temporarily halt all refugee arrivals. The Today show tried to make a cancer patient's wish come true by funding his wedding - but the 22-year-old died only hours after he was visited by host Stevie Jacobs. Mr Jacobs was visibly moved when he read a eulogy for the deceased man, Jordan Lorenzi, outside a Melbourne hospital in a segment aired Monday morning. 'I only got to meet this young man, who is extraordinary, for a short amount of time, but I was touched by his courage, his soul, and his pure love for his mum and his dad, and his fiancee,' Mr Jacobs said, his voice trembling. The Today show tried to make a cancer patient's wish come true by funding his wedding - but the 22-year-old died only hours after he was visited by host Stevie Jacobs Mr Jacobs was moved to tears when he read a eulogy for the deceased man, Jordan, outside a Melbourne hospital in a segment aired Monday morning Jordan and his fiancee Lenae wanted to get married as soon as possible, because they didn't know how long Jordan would be around 'Sometimes the smallest moments leave the biggest impression.' Mr Lorenzi and his fiancee Lenae Kaenear wanted to get married as soon as possible, because they didn't know how long Mr Lorenzi would be around, the couple told the Today show in an interview recorded Saturday. 'Just to be able to call her my wife,' Mr Lorenzi said from his bed at the John Fawkner Hospital. The Today show donated $10,000 to Jordan's family and another $10,000 to be divided between the hospital and cancer researchers. Jordan is pictured in bed flanked by his parents and holding his fiancee's hand Hearing Stevie Jacobs's eulogy from outside the hospital on Monday morning, anchors Karl Stefanovic and Lisa Wilkinson seemed moved as well The couple, who are from Avondale Heights, Victoria, received an envelope with $10,000 and two diamond rings from the Today crew. Still, there wasn't enough time to make their dream come true. Mr Lorenzi passed away early on Sunday morning, his parents told the Today show. 'At his family's request, we decided to run that segment in loving memory of Jordan,' Mr Jacobs said. 'Also, his mum Diane wanted to highlight this terrible disease he was suffering from, Ewing's sarcoma.' It was announced that the $10,000 would be donated to Mr Lorenzi's family instead. And, in a generous gesture, the Today show matched that donation and promised $5,000 to the John Fawkner Hospital, and $5,000 to research into Ewing's sarcoma. Donald Trump's 'extreme vetting' executive order to ban travellers from seven Muslim majority nations has resulted in international confusion and panic. The President on Friday blocked people from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from entering the United States for at least 90 days. What could the executive order mean for Australians who planned on travelling to Donald Trump's America? Scroll down for video President Donald Trump is pictured holding up a signed Executive Order in the Oval Office of the White House on Saturday Demonstrators poured into JFK airport all throughout Saturday to express their disagreement with Trump's order There were fears President Trump would scrap the Visa Waiver Program, which allows citizens of 37 countries to visit the U.S. for leisure or business for a short period without a visa. The VWP was not scrapped in the executive order. However, the Visa Interview Waiver Program was suspended - meaning those wanting to renew their visa will now need to have an interview at the U.S. Consulate. Other Australians will be affected. Dual Nationals Australians who are dual citizens of Iran, Iraq, Sudan, or Syria may be blocked from entering the U.S. Those dual nationals are no longer allowed to apply for the standard electronic travel authorisation - ETSA - which travellers must complete before heading to the U.S. 'It's not hard to feel like s*** when you flee Iran, build a life in Australia, become a citizen, run small businesses that employ people and are now told that you now can't even travel to the United States,' Sam Dastyari said on Sunday Labor Senator Dastyari says he is still uncertain whether he would be granted entrance to the U.S. if he travelled today People chant and hold signs as they protest against the travel ban at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport arrivals gate in Dallas, Texas on Sunday The ESTA is an online application that determines entry eligibility based on security or police risks. 'Any of these Australians who have previously been issued an ESTA are likely to have the ESTA revoked,' the government's Smart Traveller website says. All those affected will have to apply for a non-immigrant visa at a US embassy or consulate. Of the 65,000 Iranian-born Australian citizens, most have dual nationality, Sydney Morning Herald reports. This includes Labor Senator Sam Dastyari, who says he is still uncertain whether he would be granted entrance to the U.S. if he travelled today. Zabihollah Zarepisheh of Iran celebrates after being released from being held in Terminal 4 for over 30 hours at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York on Sunday Kayla Razavi, whose family emigrated from Iran, addressed the crowd during the San Francisco protest Saturday afternoon More than 1,000 people gathered at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport to protest Trump's order that restricts immigration on Saturday He said the process to renounce Iranian citizenship would cost about $20,000 in legal costs. On Facebook, Senator Dastyari said thousands of Australians felt 'targeted'. 'It's not hard to feel like s*** when you flee Iran, build a life in Australia, become a citizen, run small businesses that employ people and are now told that you now can't even travel to the United States,' he said on Sunday. 'That's how my family and the many thousand Australians born in the countries targeted feel.' Senator Dastyari was born in Iran and migrated to Australia with his family when he was five-years-old. Demonstrators gathered in San Francisco International Airport Saturday to protest against the ban on immigration on Saturday Hundreds of people demonstrate outside Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Sunday Australian Travellers Australians who have travelled to any of the seven nations since March 2011 are not allowed to apply for a mandatory security check needed for entry to the United States, the Smart Traveller website says. WHAT IS TRUMP'S IMMIGRATION ORDER SUPPOSED TO DO? Ban refugee entries from all countries for 120 days. Refugees can be accepted on a case by case basis, including if they are a religious minority facing religious persecution. Block refugee entries from Syria indefinitely. Cap refugee intake at 50,000 per year. Ban visa and immigration entries for 90 days from Muslim-majority countries on banned list, including Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Iran, Libya, Yemen and Somalia. Suspend visa issuance to countries of particular concern. Advertisement Most people who travelled to one of these countries will have to apply for a visa and will be no longer eligible for an ESTA under the Visa Waiver Program. 'If you are affected by these changes and wish to travel to the United States, you will need to apply for a non-immigrant visa at a US Embassy or Consulate,' the website says. 'Exceptions from these travel restrictions will be made for Australians who have travelled on official Australian Defence Force or Australian Government business. No exceptions will be made for government officials or ADF members who are dual citizens of Iran, Iraq, Syria or Sudan.' The restrictions may be waived on a case by case basis if you travelled on behalf of an organisation, governments on official duty, a humanitarian NGO, or as a journalist or on legitimate business-related purposes. You should be unaffected if you have not travelled to one of the seven countries since 2011 and do not have dual citizenship with one of those countries. Hundreds of protesters arrived at Chicago O'Hare airport to protest against Trump's executive order on Saturday One of the JFK protesters demanded more protection for immigrant families, as some were detained around the US A sea of protesters gathered outside of Terminal 4 of JFK after people from Muslim countries were detained at border control Refugees WHO EXACTLY IS BANNED FROM THE U.S? Any non-US citizen from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen is now barred from entering the United States. That covers visa-holders from those seven countries who were out of the United States after Friday, when President Donald Trump signed an executive order with the temporary ban. They cannot return to the US for 90 days. There's an exemption for immigrants and legal permanent residents whose entry is in the US national interest, but it's unclear how that exemption will be applied. Visa holders already in the US will be allowed to stay. Customs and Border Protection is notifying airlines about passengers whose visas have been canceled or legal residents scheduled to fly back to the US Airlines are being told to keep them off those flights. Source: Associated Press Advertisement The executive order President Trump signed on Friday also suspended the U.S. refugee program for 120 days. Refugees could still be accepted on a case by case basis. Refugees from Syria have been banned entrance indefinitely. Federal Labor wants to know what conditions Australia has agreed to in exchange for Donald Trump locking in a US deal to accept asylum seekers from Nauru and Manus Island. It's understood Mr Trump agreed to honour the agreement struck under the Obama administration during a 25-minute phone conversation with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on Sunday. 'What I'm calling on the government to do is clarify it and say unequivocally that this is going to happen,' opposition immigration spokesman Shayne Neumann told ABC radio on Monday. Australian Response A spokeswoman for Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says officials are in talks with US counterparts to get clarity on how the temporary ban on those from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen may affect dual nationals. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, actress Nicole Kidman, and Ms Bishop's partner David Panton attend the 2017 G'Day Black Tie Gala in Hollywood on Saturday Port Authority Police Department blocked an entrance as protesters gathered outside Terminal 4 at JFK airport Demonstrators gathered in the international arrivals area at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport to protest on Saturday 'The Australian embassy in Washington is engaging with US officials on the potential implications of the suspension for Australian travellers, including dual nationals,' a spokeswoman told AAP in a statement. All travellers are being warned that rules could change at short notice. 'Travellers should contact the nearest embassy or consulate of the United States for the most current information,' the spokeswoman added. In February 2016 the US Department of Homeland Security added Libya, Somalia and Yemen to its existing list of Iran, Iraq, Sudan and Syria, limiting the visa waiver program travel for those who'd travelled there. Ms Bishop attended the 2017 G'Day Black Tie Gala on Saturday in Los Angeles. Ms Bishop attended the 2017 G'Day Black Tie Gala on Saturday in Los Angeles (she is pictured with John Travolta) Mazdak Tootkaboni is pictured being embraced during a demonstration at Logan International Airport in Boston, Massachusetts. Tootkaboni is a US green card holder from Iran and a professor at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth, but he was still separated from other passengers and questioned While in LA, she said she'd had 'constructive' conversations regarding the two allied countries. 'I have had two very constructive conversations now over the past two days with Vice President Mike Pence and he reiterated the significance of the Australian and United States relationship,' Bishop said, according to Daily Telegraph. 'He was very well briefed on all of the details of the United States and Australian alliance and I am confident that we will continue to build our alliance and it will continue to go from strength to strength.' Ms Bishop would not confirm if Australians had been denied entry to the U.S. Mehdi Radgoudarzi (centre) made his way through the arrival pick up area with his wife Susan (left) and daughter Niloofar (right) after being detained at San Francisco's SFO International Airport as a result of Trump's order People protested across the country on Saturday (pictured at JFK airport in New York) Australian technology companies have called on the federal government to condemn Donald Trump's US visa changes, which they say will impact staff. According to industry group TechSydney, a number of employees in the city's tech sector are affected by the weekend decision, including dual-nationals working in and visiting the US. HotelsCombined CEO Hichame Assi, a dual national British-Syrian who moved to Australia in 2008, can't travel to the US for the next 90 days even though he has a valid visa. 'We employ people of all nationalities, including dual-nationality Australians,' Mr Assi said in a statement on Monday. People gather at Copley Square in Boston on Saturday to decry US President Donald Trump's sweeping executive order, Demonstrators gather in Copley Square for the "Boston Protest Against Muslim Ban and Anti-Immigration Orders" Activists march to the US Capitol to protest President Donald Trump's executive actions on immigration in Washington on Sunday 'These developments in the US are not only disruptive to our business and our people, they're very troubling and are creating more tensions at a time when empathy is required.' Qantas will offer refunds to any passengers caught up in US President Donald Trump's immigration freeze on seven Muslim-majority nations. The airline said on Sunday it will change its processes and booking systems following advice from the US government regarding tighter entry conditions. 'Passengers booked on Qantas for travel to the United States who use a passport from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen, Libya have a number of options, including a change to their destination or a refund,' Qantas said in a statement. Virgin Australia said none of its crew or passengers were so far affected by the ban. Hillary Clinton tweeted out against the ban on Saturday night, saying she stands with those protesting the 'Muslim ban' One of the people detained on Saturday was an 88-year-old blind man, who was held for hours and had his medication taken from him at Dulles Airport in Virginia, the Daily Beast 's Betsy Woodruff reports 'Virgin Australia always advises its guests travelling internationally to ensure they hold the relevant documentation for entry into that particular country,' the company wrote in a statement supplied to Daily Mail Australia. Former Prime Minister Bob Hawke urged world leaders to accept the U.S. President. In an interview with Nine Network's 60 Minutes, the former Labor leader said leaders must not isolate him. Updates from the U.S. On Saturday, a federal court temporarily halted the deportation of visa holders or refugees, stranded at airports. Police stopped a man giving pizza to protesters who were chanting slogans outside Terminal 4 at JFK airport in New York City 'Muslims are welcome': One Chicago protester insisted that all should be able to come to the US regardless of their religion WHAT IS THE EMERGENCY STAY? The emergency stay issued Saturday evening by a federal court is a temporary measure that preserves the status quo pending a permanent ruling. It means that none of the travelers currently held at airports across the nation can be deported back to their countries. That is because Judge Ann Donnelly ruled that doing so would cause the travelers irreparable harm. The stay does not, however, mean that the travelers have to be let into the United States. It is unclear what will happen to those detained. The stay is not a ruling on Donald Trump's executive order enforcing the immigration ban. Lawyers had filed a petition on behalf of two out of 12 refugees detained at JFK airport. The men, two Iraqi nationals, had valid visas. One of them had worked for the US government for years. ACLU attorneys had filed a petition on their behalf, but the stay is effective nationwide. The lawyers who handled the case have also filed for class certification, which means other people affected by the order will be able to benefit from the stay as part of a class action. Advertisement On Saturday night, the federal court for the Eastern District of New York issued the stay Saturday evening after only two of 12 refugees held at JFK airport were released. They had been held for 14 and 24 hours respectively. Migrants around the country were detained, with about 375 travellers impacted by the order. Out of the 375, 109 were in transit to the US and denied entry. Another 173 people were stopped by airlines from boarding an aircraft to the US. An additional 81 travelers with green cards or special immigrant visas received waivers. Homeland Security said a temporary stay granted by a federal court will not stop Trump's immigration ban from being put in place. The agency said the court order affected a relatively small number of travellers who were 'inconvenienced' by security procedures upon their return. Stephen Miller, a senior adviser to the White House, also dismissed the stay order, saying nothing in it: 'in anyway impedes or prevents the implementation of the president's executive order which remains in full, complete and total effect.' It was also reported on Sunday a coalition of states is considering how it could legally challenge the ruling. On Sunday, White House official Reince Priebus revealed on NBC's Meet the Press that a big change has been made for permanent residents. 'As far as green card holders, moving forward, it doesn't affect them,' Priebus, Trump's Chief of Staff, said. The federal court for the Eastern District of New York issued an emergency stay (pictured) Saturday evening. The stay means that none of the travellers detained in airports around the country can be deported Secretary John Kelly clarified in a statement on Sunday all permanent residents would be allowed entry into the U.S. 'In applying the provisions of the president's executive order, I hereby deem the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest,' he said. 'Accordingly, absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, lawful permanent resident status will be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determinations.' Trump has defended the executive order but denied it was a 'Muslim ban'. 'America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border,' the White House Press Secretary said in a statement on Sunday. 'This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order.' Protests have raged at international airports across the country. Questions: The former stripper did not attend the inquest British police are facing calls to join a new 'international' investigation into the murder of a British millionaire who is said to have been lured to his death in Ukraine by his internet bride. The protracted Ukrainian police probe into the death of Barry Pring, 47, in Kiev in February 2008 has been dogged by allegations of corruption, incompetence and a cover-up. But UK detectives are unable to travel to Eastern Europe to investigate Mr Pring's hit-and-run death, and the alleged role of his former stripper wife Ganna Ziuzina, without the agreement of their counterparts in Ukraine. Last night Mr Pring's brother said British police must be allowed to join a new probe, to ensure the killer and any accomplices face justice. He spoke out after a UK coroner ruled last week that IT expert Mr Pring was 'unlawfully killed' after being 'tricked' into standing in a dual carriageway, where he was mown down by a car with stolen licence plates and lights switched off, travelling at up to 80mph. Miss Ziuzina, now 38, is living with her new partner in a 700,000 Spanish villa. Shaughan Pring, 54, called on the Prime Minister to intervene in the case. He cited Scotland Yard's joint investigation with Portuguese police into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann as a precedent. The dual probe involving the Met and officers from Portugal followed political and diplomatic pressure. Mr Pring said: 'The Metropolitan Police probe into Madeleine's case has shown UK detectives can be involved in investigating a major crime overseas involving a British victim. I would like something similar to happen in Barry's case. This has been going on for far too long. 'The Ukrainian police say they have no suspects, that just beggars belief I would like Theresa May to put pressure on the Ukrainian authorities to allow British police to help investigate.' Wedding: The protracted Ukrainian police probe into the death of Barry Pring, 47, (pictured with Ganna Ziuzina) in Kiev in February 2008 has been dogged by allegations of corruption New partner: Spanish land registry documents revealed she bought the house to share with partner Ivan Lister (pictured) New life: The 700,000 villa in Marbella, Spain, where Miss Ziuzina now lives UK police do not have 'jurisdiction' in Ukraine, meaning they could not bring murder charges over the case. But they could send officers to Kiev to be involved in a joint investigation, if their counterparts agreed to it. The Pring family's local Tory MP, Neil Parish, has vowed to raise the case in the House of Commons. A British law enforcement source, who has knowledge of the murder, told the Mail that a police inquiry would have been 'quite straightforward' had it been in the UK. Legal sources believe several people, including a relative and close friend of the 'Black Widow', may have been involved in the murder plot and subsequent cover-up. Mr Pring's relatives are considering legal action against Miss Zuizina. It is claimed a close friend of hers was a senior officer in the Ukraine police traffic department at the time of the murder. Shaughan Pring's call for a corruption-free investigation came after the Daily Mail revealed on Saturday that Miss Ziuzina dubbed a 'gold-digger' at the inquest is living with another wealthy UK businessman in Marbella. By the pool: Miss Ziuzina has a daughter with wealthy Mr Lister who has a 2million home Inquiries revealed she owns and lives in the property, complete with a swimming pool, just a few hundred yards from the Mediterranean. Spanish land registry documents revealed she bought the house to share with partner Ivan Lister, a property developer who has a 2million London home. The couple have a young daughter, born in 2013. Miss Ziuzina has also paid up to 130,000 for a three-bedroom flat in a brand new development a five-minute walk away, for her parents. A Daily Mail investigation on Saturday revealed the damning dossier of evidence against the ex-stripper, who initially insisted her husband had died in a simple road accident. The case was upgraded by Ukrainian police to a murder inquiry after the shambolic investigation was exposed by the Daily Mail in 2011. Miss Zuizina has previously denied any involvement in the death, but refused to give evidence at the inquest. She has not commented since the hearing last week. Mr Pring's friend Peter Clifford told the hearing: 'There is no reasonable doubt in my mind Barry was murdered, nor is there any reasonable doubt in my mind that Ganna Ziuzina either arranged for, or was complicit in, his murder.' Following Mr Pring's death, Miss Ziuzina was granted legal aid to fight for a major share of his 1.5million estate. Orthopaedic surgeon Mohammed Suhaib Sait, 54, is being investigated by BMI, Englands largest private hospital chain, which also treats NHS patients A senior NHS surgeon is being investigated by police over claims he carried out unnecessary surgery costing the taxpayer hundreds of thousands of pounds. Orthopaedic surgeon Mohammed Suhaib Sait, 54, is being probed by his employer BMI, Englands largest private hospital chain, which also treats NHS patients. He is being investigated on suspicion of fraud for billing for operations which were needlessly carried out, it is believed. Kent police became involved when a whistleblower made allegations against Sait, according to a Bureau of Investigative Journalism (BIJ) investigation. The BMI Hospital, Fawkham Manor in Longfield, Kent, which treats both NHS and private patients, suspended the surgeon in July 2016. He had already wound up both companies he runs. Sait is accused of inappropriate treatment of NHS and private patients. He still treats NHS patients at Darent Valley Hospital for the Dartford and Gravesham NHS trust. But since last year, doctors regulator the General Medical Council has stated that he is not allowed to see women alone in consultations without a chaperone. The central allegation against Sait, believed to be under investigation by the police and BMI, is that he carried out unnecessary operations. Many involved keyhole surgery (arthroscopy) said to be unnecessary or unsuitable to treat his patients conditions. Concerns were raised over a prolonged period with Fawkham Manor bosses, staff claim. Police are investigating alongside BMI, which has appointed an independent firm to carry out a review. But the NHS is not investigating, despite being aware of concerns. After Saits suspension, his patients were referred to other surgeons. Some patients scheduled for surgery had operations cancelled after they were deemed unnecessary by reviewing doctors, the reports say. One surgeon is said to have decided that half of the scheduled ops were questionable or unnecessary, while another doctor questioned treatment in all but one case. Several members of hospital staff came forward to raise concerns over the high level of minor procedures. Senior consultant general surgeon Andrew McIrvine said that he raised the issue in 2014 with the chief executives of both the NHS Darent Valley Hospital and Fawkham Manor. He then had a more official conversation with the chair of Fawkham Manors Medical Advisory Committee. But although he was told action had been taken, so far as he knows, nothing was actually done. The BMI Hospital, Fawkham Manor in Longfield, Kent, pictured, which treats both NHS and private patients, suspended the surgeon in July 2016 The allegations raise questions over the safety of patients treated within the private sector, where governance and transparency procedures differ from those within the NHS. Under the NHS choose and book system, patients are offered a choice of hospitals for procedures, which may include private hospitals. If a private hospital is chosen, it will be paid at an NHS rate. Minutes of the Dartford, Gravesham and Swanley Clinical Commissioning Group consistently refer to high levels of orthopaedic activity and overspends at Fawkham Manor. In March 2015, the clinical commissioning group said it would review orthopaedic procedures performed at Fawkham but later decided against this. If the accusations against Sait are proved, hundreds if not thousands of patients may be affected. The surgeon has worked at Fawkham Manor for around 15 years. He did not respond to questions delivered to his 3.1million detached and gated house in Kent. A spokesman for Fawkham Manor Hospital said: We decided to suspend practising privileges for a consultant in July 2016 following concerns. He has not worked at our hospital since then. NHS England said: [We] are aware of the allegations .. and continue to liaise with relevant organisations. Kent police said it would not comment until charges are brought, but the Mail has seen confirmation that it is investigating. A spokesman for the NHS said: All independent providers are accredited by the Care Quality Commission to ensure they provide the same quality and safety standards as the NHS. vTRG Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has confirmed that Australia will support Donald Trump's controversial Muslim visa ban and tough border control policies. Ms Bishop said Australia would stand by the president's executive order - despite backlash from the United Kingdom, Canada and a number of countries in Europe. The executive order bans all citizens and refugees from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States for the next 90 and 120 days respectively. 'I'm confident that the Australian government and the U.S. government will continue to support each other in ensuring that we can implement our strong immigration and border protection policies,' Ms Bishop said in Los Angeles. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says Australia will support Donald Trump's controversial Muslim visa ban and border control policies The newly-elected US President made an executive order banning all citizens and refugees from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States Treasurer Scott Morrison also jumped to Mr Trump's defence, reasoning that the newly-elected president was simply fulfilling an election promise 'The Australian government is working very closely with the administration and the US officials and we want to ensure that Australians continue to have access to the United States, as they have in the past, and people from the United States have access to Australia.' Treasurer Scott Morrison also jumped to Mr Trump's defence, reasoning that the newly-elected president was simply fulfilling an election promise. 'They've had an election and the president has implemented what he said he would do,' he said on 2GB radio on Monday morning. A spokeswoman for Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says officials are in talks with US counterparts to get clarity on how the temporary ban on those from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen may affect dual nationals. Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is also believed to have secured a deal with Donald Trump and the United States to accept asylum seekers from Nauru (pictured) and Manus Island Widespread backlash: Governments from United Kingdom, Canada and large chunks of Europe voiced their protest (as did thousands of Americans - pictured is Terminal 4 of JFK airport after people from Muslim countries were detained at border control) WHO EXACTLY IS BANNED FROM THE U.S? Any non-U.S. citizen from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen is now barred from entering the United States. That covers legal permanent residents - green card holders - and visa-holders from those seven countries who were out of the United States after Friday, when President Donald Trump signed an executive order with the temporary ban. They cannot return to the U.S. for 90 days. There's an exemption for immigrants and legal permanent residents whose entry is in the U.S. national interest, but it's unclear how that exemption will be applied. Visa and green card holders already in the U.S. will be allowed to stay. Source: Associated Press Advertisement 'The Australian embassy in Washington is engaging with US officials on the potential implications of the suspension for Australian travellers, including dual nationals,' a spokeswoman told AAP in a statement. All travellers are being warned that rules could change at short notice. 'Travellers should contact the nearest embassy or consulate of the United States for the most current information,' the spokeswoman added. Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is also believed to have secured a deal with Donald Trump and the United States to accept asylum seekers from Nauru and Manus Island - despite a vast majority coming from the banned countries. It's understood Mr Trump agreed to honour the agreement struck under the Obama administration during a 25-minute phone conversation with Mr Turnbull on Sunday. Mr Morrison told 2GB radio that the government had 'been able to secure the continuance of this arrangement under President Trump'. A woman won full custody of her seven-year-old daughter over fears her ex-husband would force the child to marry her cousin. The girl was put on the airport watchlist in October after telling her mother she was arranged to be married during a visit to her father's home country. She said she played with the cousin and he gave her sweets. 'Do you know, Dad said I have to marry him?' the mother said the girl told her. The mother, 27, given the pseudonym Ms Anthony in Federal Court court documents, claims she confronted the girl's father, 29, known as Mr Kellett, and he admitted it. A woman won full custody of her seven-year-old daughter after fears her ex-husband would force the child to marry her cousin (stock image) 'Yeah didnt you know? She will get married, [she] is mine and only mine, you and her step mum have no say in her life,' he allegedly said. '[Daughter]s life and future is in [his country]. She already has a husband arranged. 'You guys are nothing, you are just women, you have no right. [She] will get married to my nephew... she will become what I want her to become and nobody in the world can change that.' Mr Kellett denied he arranged the marriage, saying not only was underage marriage illegal in that country he would 'never subject her to such things'. He also claimed Ms Anthony had a drug and alcohol problem and that soon after the child's birth she told him she was 'not normal' and that she 'sees things and hears voices'. Judge Brana Obradovic in the Parramatta Federal Court ordered the child live with her mother, but granted Mr Kellett two nights a week and half of all school holidays. The couple married in 2007 when the mother was 17 before separating in March 2011 when their child was just two years old. The girl was put on the airport watchlist in October after telling her mother she was arranged to be married during a visit to her father's home country Mr Kellett married another woman in his home country in 2013 and had two children, but that marriage recently broke down. He returned to Sydney with a daughter from his second marriage but left his son with his estranged wife. Ms Anthony claimed her daughter told her she witnessed Mr Kellett 'choking his [second] wife and banging her head into a wall'. She also testified she was beaten and 'forced to have sex' in her own marriage, along with verbal and psychological abuse. She said Mr Kellett forced her to wear a religious article of clothing and replaced her wardrobe with clothes 'that elderly women would wear... he controlled everything I did'. 'It was my duty to serve his dinner and ensure that a fruit platter was ready for him by the time he finished his shower,' she said. The father denied her claims, instead arguing she was the violent one and she never cleaned the house while he worked 10 hour shifts. 'She would slap me across the face and would swear at me in an argument. I never retaliated,' he said. Judge Brana Obradovic in the Parramatta Federal Court (pictured) ordered the child live with her mother, but granted the father two nights a week and half of all school holidays Mr Kellett also claimed police called him to Ms Anthony's parents' house and told him the child would be taken by the state if he did not take her, because of her drug and alcohol problem. It was then in May 2011 he unilaterally took custody of the girl and was her primary carer from then on. Ms Anthony submitted she had been 'so effectively controlled and intimidated into doing what the father wanted she has been unable to challenge the parenting arrangements the father instituted unilaterally'. However, Mr Kellett failed to provide any evidence the call from police actually happened, and Judge Obradovic was not convinced by his testimony. 'If what the father says is correct, it is highly likely that evidence would exist' in police or child services records, he said. The court found the risk of the girl being forced into marriage was mitigated by her staying on the airport watchlist and the limited amount of time spent with the father. Council officials are searching empty properties of nursing home residents for bank statements showing how much they can afford to pay for care. If the authority finds the elderly person has savings or assets of more than 23,250, they will be made to fund their care with their money or by selling their home. The tactic to force vulnerable people to pay more for their care emerged in the case of a widow in her late 80s. The building that was once the now closed Longfield home in Cranleigh, Surrey, where Violet Dewsnap was living when council officers went to her house and searched her belongings Surrey County Council employees entered Violet Dewsnaps house to look for financial documents while she was living in a nursing home. They discovered she had 39,518 in savings enough to pay her 36,333 care bill. The authority, which last week proposed a 15 per cent council tax hike to fund social care, said Mrs Dewsnap had permitted officials to enter her home. A month later the retired cleaner, who had dementia, was judged mentally incapable of dealing with her affairs. She died in 2014 aged 90. The council is now trying to gain access to Mrs Dewsnaps estate to recover money it paid towards her care bills in Longfield home in Cranleigh. It is using a little-known legal process to take control of her assets. If she was alive and deemed incapable of dealing with her affairs, the council could have applied for a Court of Protection order called a deputyship to take over her finances. But now it must apply to the Probate Court for permission to administer her estate. Documents from the local authority suggest that if its move is resisted by family, its legal team would recover its costs from the estate. Mrs Dewsnap never remarried after her husband Thomas was killed in a car accident in 1949 aged 29. After being taken into hospital on three occasions, she was moved into the home in 2012. A former staff member said: She was admitted into Longfield because she was suffering from dementia. After she arrived the council emptied her home of her possessions. They threw everything into a lorry with mesh at the side. I dont know where they took it. Mrs Dewsnaps great-niece Joanne, 34, of Carlisle, Cumbria, said: I am horrified by how much councils can look into peoples personal finances when theyve paid taxes and national insurance all their lives. Campaigners branded the tactic used when an elderly person is admitted to a home or hospital and does not have family or friends to help an invasion of privacy. They questioned why officials need to enter elderly peoples homes when banks say they typically disclose such details if the individual gives written permission. Lib Dem MP Norman Lamb, a former care minister, said: This feels like an invasion of privacy and seems quite undignified Councils should not be chasing people with these issues at a time when they are old and at the end of life. Neil Duncan Jordan, of the National Pensioners Convention, said: These kinds of steps are not the solution to the care crisis and could lead to the most vulnerable being exploited. Councils need to stand up and be a lot clearer with the Government that they need more money to pay for care. Council officers discovered she had 39,518 in savings enough to pay her 36,333 care bill Other councils are understood to be taking similar steps to fill in a huge budget shortfall. An ex-employee in care departments of several major local authorities in the Home Counties said officials would typically seek financial over the past six years. He said: The vast majority of people who need nursing care do have family who can deal with their affairs but it did happen from time to time that we have to go into someones home when they didnt have anyone to help. If an elderly persons assets are more than 23,250 in England they must pay all their care costs. Councils are obliged to cover full fees only when assets fall below 14,250 in England. Caroline Abrahams, of charity Age UK, said: Councils are seeking to raise more money for social care in any way they legitimately can This all goes to show how incredibly hard-pressed they are and how financially fragile the care services on which hundreds of thousands of older people depend everyday have become. A Surrey County Council spokesman said: Nobody in Mrs Dewsnaps family could help manage her finances so she agreed that we should do it While we understand these situations are very difficult and sensitive, this is taxpayers money and we have an obligation to collect it. A former NRL player has been identified as just one of 607 crime bosses to be winning the war on drugs in New South Wales. It was revealed last week the NSW Crime Commission had admitted they were losing the war on drugs in the state with no less than 607 crime bosses dictating the narcotics on the streets, according to The Daily Telegraph. More than 150 drug lords are under active investigation, according to the publication, with cocaine, heroin, MDMA and ice imported from China, South America and Mexico. A former first grade rugby league player has turned into a drug lord (Stock Image) The former first grade player is one of 607 known crime lords ruling and dictating New South Wales streets (Stock Image) The former first grade rugby league player, from the 1990s, is believed to have run a sleuth of huge drug hauls and is just one of the hundreds of crime lords taking over NSW. The commission's report revealed small business owners were cashing in on drug importation and organised crime was 'out of control'. The unprecedented levels of crime was exacerbated by crime lords basing their operations overseas - out of reach for police - with gangland murders also on the rise. The ominous report said it was becoming easier for drug bosses to carry out murders in NSW. 'Crime figures will offer big money to have someone killed, and there are people in Sydney very willing to do it,' a source told the publication. Huge sums of money, up to $500,000 are being offered to murder. 'That shows you the sort of money that is being offered to carry out murder,' the source said. 'Some of the murders are not even business-related. They are just a personal dispute where instead of merely having a fist fight, a murder is organised.' Police are aware of the rugby league player turned drug boss, but are unable to lay charges. WASHINGTON Earth sizzled to a third-straight record hot year in 2016, with scientists mostly blaming man-made global warming with help from a natural El Nino thats now gone. Two U.S. agencies and international weather groups reported Wednesday that last year was the warmest on record. They measure global temperatures in slightly different ways, and came up with a range of increases, from minuscule to what top American climate scientists described as substantial. Theyre all singing the same song even if they are hitting different notes along the way. The pattern is very clear, said Deke Arndt of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA calculated that the average global temperature for 2016 was 58.69 degrees (14.84 degrees Celsius) beating the previous year by 0.07 degrees (0.04 Celsius). NASAs figures , which include more of the Arctic, are higher at 0.22 degrees (0.12 Celsius) warmer than 2015. The Arctic was enormously warm, like totally off the charts compared to everything else, said Gavin Schmidt, director of NASAs Goddard Institute of Space Studies in New York, where the space agency monitors global temperatures. The British meteorological office determined that 2016 barely beat 2015 by 0.018 degrees (0.01 Celsius). The World Meteorological Organization and other monitoring groups agreed that 2016 was a record, with the international weather agency chief Petteri Taalas saying temperatures only tell part of the story of extreme warming. The figures are based on ground-level temperatures. Satellite calculations also showed that it was the warmest year, Schmidt said. This is clearly a record, he said. We are now no longer only looking at something that only scientists can see, but is apparent to people in our daily lives. Temperature records go back to 1880. This is the fifth time in a dozen years that the globe has set a new annual heat record. Records have been set in 2016, 2015, 2014, 2010 and 2005. Arndt said the 0.07 difference for 2016 is actually one of the largest NOAA has seen between record years. Whats more important than any single record is the multi-decade clear warming trend since the late 20th Century, said Arndt, NOAAs climate monitoring chief. Schmidt said his calculations show most of the record heat was from heat-trapping gases from the burning of oil, coal and gas. Only about 12 percent was due to El Nino, which is a periodic warming of parts of the Pacific that change weather globally, he said. Arndt put the El Nino factor closer to a quarter or a third. El Nino disappeared last June. Even without it, Schmidt said this year probably wont break any records although it should be in the top five warmest. NOAA calculated that last year was the warmest year on record in the oceans, the Arctic and North America. The average amount of ice in the Arctic Ocean reached a record low for 2016, Arndt said. According to NOAA, 2016 was 1.69 degrees (0.94 degrees Celsius) warmer than the 20th Century average. The first eight months of 2016 all broke heat records. NASA has last year at 1.78 degrees (0.99 degrees Celsius) warmer than their mid-20th Century average and about 2 degrees warmer than the start of the industrial age in the late 19th Century. Of course this is climate change, its overwhelmingly climate change, said Corinne Le Quere, director of Englands Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, who wasnt part of the NOAA or NASA teams. Warming (is) nearly everywhere. The Arctic sea ice is collapsing. Spikes in fires from the heat. Heavy rainfall from more water vapor in the air. The effects are more than just records, but actually hurt people and the environment, said Oklahoma University meteorology professor Jason Furtado. Theyre harmful on several levels, including human welfare, ecology, economics, and even geopolitics, he said. Donald Trump has triggered chaos and confusion for travellers across the world, after issuing a 90-day travel ban for nationals from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Here we explain its implications. How many Britons could be affected? The US State Department confirmed yesterday that the temporary ban affects those who have dual nationality with any one of the largely seven Muslim countries. More than 250,000 Britons were born in Iraq, Iran and Somalia and have dual nationality. No figures are available for those with dual citizenship who were born in Syria, Libya, Sudan or Yemen, but it is likely to be tens of thousands more. The ban does not apparently affect people who were born in one of the seven countries, but who have sole British citizenship. President Trump, pictured in the White House, has remained defiant in the face of widespread criticism of the travel ban What does it mean? It had been feared that all these dual nationality citizens would be barred from travelling to the US. But late last night the Foreign Office confirmed that it had managed to secure several exemptions, after Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson held urgent discussions with White House officials. It said Mr Trumps executive order only applies to individuals travelling from one of the seven countries. Those travelling from anywhere else including the UK are not affected and will not have to experience extra checks, regardless of their nationality or place of birth. British citizens who happen to be travelling from one of those countries are also not affected by the order. The only dual nationals who might have extra checks are those coming from one of the seven countries for example a UK-Libya dual national coming from Libya to the US. What about those who already have a valid visa for the US? It doesnt matter. The ban applies to anyone travelling from the seven countries from now, whether they have already obtained a valid visa to travel to the US, or not. The US State Department said the US embassy will not grant entry to these people during the 90-day period. Diplomats have been exempted. What about those travelling via the US to another place? The ban also applies to the dual citizens travelling from one of the seven countries to another destination via the US. Does the ban apply if you have a Green Card? Initially, the US Department of Homeland Security stipulated that non-US nationals with a Green Card could fly to the US and would be considered on a case-by-case basis. But last night the Mr Trumps chief of staff, Reince Priebus, made it clear that the order would not affect green card holders going forward. It came after host of green card holders were blocked from travelling on Saturday. Boris Johnson's Foreign Office has confirmed no dual nationality Brits will be affected by the US 'Muslim ban' What does the UK government say about travelling? Number Ten appears to have been caught completely off guard by Mr Trumps travel ban. But as the implications became clearer Theresa May instructed Mr Johnson and Home Secretary Amber Rudd to seek an exemption to the ban for British dual-nationals. Yesterday Foreign Office officials were rushing to get more information from Washington about how the ban will work. A statement clarifying the impact of the executive order was not issued until late last night. As of yesterday morning the Home Office, which operates passport control at British airports, did not appear to have given Border Force guards or airlines any instructions about how to deal with passengers affected by the ban. This has raised the prospect that some were allowed to fly from the UK to the US, only to be detained by officials in America and sent back. The ban may also affect British basketball star Luol Deng, who was born in Sudan and holds both passports What do the airlines say? Are they offering compensation? Mr Trumps executive order has also caught the airlines by surprise, according to the International Air Transport Association. Yesterday airlines had not told passengers affected by the ban not to travel, and had not made it clear whether they will be turned away at check-in desks. However, British Airways said it had already offered affected customers a refund, or the opportunity to rebook their flight. Virgin Atlantic said it would look into all options for those affected including rebooking travel for a later date, or offering full refunds. How many people have been affected by the ban already? A US Homeland Security official said that roughly 375 travellers have been affected by the order so far. Of these, 109 were in transit to the US and denied entry. Another 173 were stopped by airlines from boarding an aircraft to the US. But there have been anecdotal reports of many people stuck in transit at airports around the world on their way to the US. An inquiry into 'fake news' will be launched today by a group of cross-party MPs amid fears the phenomenon is undermining democracy. The Culture, Media and Sport Committee is to examine rising concerns that the public is distrusting traditional sources of news and instead turning to the internet and social media. This new trend comes despite the fact the source of the stories is often unclear and it is not known whether the reports are factually accurate, a statement by the committee said. The Culture, Media and Sport Committee is to examine rising concerns that the public is distrusting traditional sources of news and instead turning to the internet and social media Senior MPs will also draw upon claims that voters in the US presidential election were subjected to unprecedented amounts of false information which may have influenced how they voted. The inquiry comes after it emerged the man behind one of America's biggest 'fake news' websites was a former BBC worker from London. Sean Adl-Tabatabai, 35, runs YourNewsWire.com, which has published scores of dubious stories, including claims that Queen had threatened to abdicate if the UK voted against Brexit. The story was shared more than 23,000 times on Facebook, according to the Sunday Times. His site also helped spread a conspiracy theory before the US election, which falsely claimed there was evidence connecting Hillary Clinton to a paedophile ring. It is understood executives at Facebook, Google and Twitter may be called into Parliament and questioned on whether they are doing enough to stop the trend. Damian Collins MP, chairman of the Committee, said: 'The growing phenomenon of fake news is a threat to democracy and undermines confidence in the media in general. It is understood executives at Facebook, Google and Twitter may be called into Parliament (Facebook boss, Mark Zuckerberg) 'Just as major tech companies have accepted they have a social responsibility to combat piracy online and the illegal sharing of content, they also need to help address the spreading of fake news on social media platforms. 'Consumers should also be given new tools to help them assess the origin and likely veracity of news stories they read online. 'The committee will be investigating these issues, as well as looking into the sources of fake news, what motivates people to spread it, and how it has been used around elections and other important political debates.' The term 'fake news' is repeatedly used by the new US President Donald Trump to dismiss stories in newspapers and on the television that he claims to be false. It refers to the growing phenomenon of widespread dissemination, through social media and the internet, and acceptance as fact of stories of uncertain accuracy. The committee says it will look at ways to respond to the phenomenon. One area they will look at is what responsibilities search engines and social media platforms have. Mr Adl-Tabatabai's website has now been blacklisted by a number of fact-checking bodies, including a Brussels unit that debunks Russian propaganda. The European Union's East StratCom Task Force criticised the site for publishing 'fake media stories that support Russia's policies'. One story published on the site this month warned of a far-fetched plot to assassinate president-elect Trump. Mr Adl-Tabatabai claimed the site was a legitimate news organisation, and said any alleged links with Russia were 'completely baseless'. Adl-Tabatabai said: 'We don't produce 'fake news'.' Google banned YourNewsWire.com from its advertising platform after receiving questions from The Sunday Times about the site. It joins more than 200 other publishers banned by Google from receiving advertising revenue since October. In December, a YouGov survey found two-thirds of Britons believed social media platforms should do more to filter misleading or fake news stories from users' feeds. The first time Paige Humphreys almost bled out she was four-year-old. She vomited up three litres of blood in front of her 'horrified' parents. Her father Andrew from Coraki in northern NSW told Daily Mail Australia there have been 'many bleeds since' and they often come without warning. 'That night she asked for a drink of water, then she needed to go to the bathroom, then she wanted more water. Paige Humphreys, pictured as a baby with her parents, has been sick since birth - her veins are under too much pressure The little girl looks like most other kids her age, according to her father, except she is pale and has a round tummy The youngster risks bleeding-out and has had emergency episodes where she has lost more than three litres of blood at a time 'When I went to get her the second glass of water she started throwing up blood. 'It was utterly horrifying to see. She lost three litres of blood - but when we got to the hospital they didn't believe us.. until she started vomiting blood again.' Since that frightful night Paige has been in and out of hospital with terrifying bleeds - and diagnosed with hypersplenism, pancytopenia and non-cirrhotic portal hypertension. Basically, her father Andrew explained, Paige's veins are under too much pressure because of a blockage to her liver. Paige's blood has to be diverted through her brain, where it slowly filters to her vital organs - this causes complex issues with her health. The nine-year-old's spleen is '100 times larger than it should be - and part of it has actually died' according to Mr Humphreys. The young girl has blockages in major veins to her liver which means blood is redirected through her brain - causing an extreme build up of pressure 'Her liver is also starting to die because it isn't getting the nutrients and oxygen it needs.' Now Paige needs to take handfuls of tablets every day just to avoid an emergency visit to the hospital - or worse, death. Paige mostly looks like other children her age - except she is quite pale and has a large belly - due to her swollen spleen. 'The spleen pushes on her lungs as well - so she can't breath deeply which means she can't run around like other kids her age.' Paige no longer goes to school and the family avoids 'public places' because of the cruel remarks directed at her bulging belly. 'Every time we go out people talk about how fat her belly is,' Mr Humphreys said. 'One little boy her age was bullying her one day and actually kicked her in the stomach. 'Her spleen ruptured that day and we haven't really been out in public since.' But five years after Paige's first major bleed and her rare diagnosis the family finally have hope. She is often in hospital and requires blood transfusions to keep her alive after each bleeding episode A doctor in Chicago has agreed to operate on Paige, and waive his professional fees to give the little girl a chance at living a 'normal' life. Doctor Riccardo Superina, thinks he can fix Paige with an Australian-first surgery that has a 90 per cent chance of success. 'He is the best doctor for this kind of surgery in the western world and thinks he can cure Paige.' With a cure the nine-year-old who 'just wants to be able to dance' will have the physical capacity to live an active life without the risk of bleeding out. Mr Humphreys wanted to be able to give Paige that second chance in time for her tenth birthday in March - but costs are proving a major hurtle. 'There are no loans available for us to get Paige better,' he said. 'So we have to ask for donations to be able to get to America for this surgery.' There is hope for the young girl to live a 'normal' life - but surgery is expensive and can only be done in Chicago Paige's parents are always on the lookout for the subtle signs 'something's not right' with their little girl. Her last bleed, where she lost two litres of blood, was in November last year. And while she struggles with a below-average red-cell count and low iron the youngster 'does her best' to enjoy life. 'She is often in a lot of pain - her spleen is like a waterbomb inside her stomach and could explode at anytime. 'She doesn't sleep at night - so neither do I - in fact since seeing her vomit all that blood when she was four I have been barely able to sleep. 'I wait until my eyes are so heavy I have no choice - but I prefer to be up, watching Paige in case anything happens.' Her parents need $300,000 to pay medical bills to cure their daughter and are fundraising to make it possible The struggling family have launched a 'gofundme' page and nail painting competition to help raise the money needed to get Paige to Chicago. Paige has already been under the knife more than 20 times since her initial diagnosis. But even the most advanced surgeries offered in Australia 'only have 50 per cent success rate' according to Mr Humphreys who is keen to see his daughter cured. The surgeries Paige has had so far have 'saved her life and kept her running' but her proud father hopes to be able to get the young girl to America so she never has to suffer from her condition again. The ongoing care of the young girl is already expensive with the family having to fork out 'hundreds of dollars' every month on her tablets alone. Paige's deadly disorder was caused by a staph infection which traveled up her umbilical cord at birth - but it wasn't until the child almost bled out aged four that she was diagnosed with the ultra rare disorders. The number of patients placed on mixed-sex wards has soared by 70 per cent in a single year despite a Government promise to end the practice. More than 7,100 patients were put on the controversial wards last year as the NHS grappled with rising demand and intense pressure on A&E services. That was 70 per cent higher than the number in 2015 and three times higher than in 2014, the new figures reveal. Ministers had pledged to end the undignified practice in 2010 but it is becoming increasingly common once more as the NHS struggles to cope. More than 7,100 patients were put on the controversial mixed-sex wards last year as the NHS grappled with rising demand and intense pressure on A&E services (file photo) Health officials said hospitals were so 'exceptionally busy', patients were being put wherever there was room. Many patients particularly the elderly find mixed-sex wards humiliating and sometimes threatening. Research has shown that patients are more vulnerable to assaults, with rates up to two times higher on mixed-sex wards. The Government announced a crackdown on the practice in 2010 following a Daily Mail campaign, and introduced a fining system the following year. Hospitals must now pay out 250 for every mixed-sex breach defined as a night spent by a patient on a mixed-sex ward. Initially, the penalties worked, and the figures fell from almost 19,000 in 2009 to a record low of 2,585 in 2014. But over the past two years they have risen back up to 4,407 in 2015, then to 7,163 in 2016. One of the NHS's largest hospital trusts appears to be defying the policy altogether by installing unisex toilets. Birmingham and West Sandwell Hospitals has just spent 1,265 converting 114 male and female toilets to become gender neutral. Jonathan Ashworth MP, Labour's health spokesman, called on Theresa May to get a grip and explain what she is going to do to fix the crisis The measure was intended to improve equality and diversity but critics said it 'flew in the face of logic'. Latest figures from NHS England obtained by Labour show that in December alone there were 739 mixed-sex breaches. In fact a quarter of hospital trusts 37 out of 152 put a patient on a mixed-sex ward at least once last month. The worst was Darent Valley Hospital in Dartford, run by Dartford and Gravesham trust, which had 151 breaches. Another 87 breaches were recorded by the William Harvey Hospital in Ashford, run by East Kent Hospitals. Jonathan Ashworth MP, Labour's health spokesman, said: 'Tory cuts to social care have seen hospital attendances rocket and now the key standard of single-sex wards is being undermined. 'The Prime Minister needs to get a grip and explain what she is going to do to fix the crisis she has created.' Former Liberal Democrat health minister Norman Lamb said: 'This is an embarrassment for the Health Secretary, who made great claims about the significant reduction in mixed-sex wards during the Coalition years. 'There is no excuse for failing to afford people the basic dignity of single-sex accommodation in a modern health service. This is a result of the impossible financial pressure the NHS is under.' Katherine Murphy, chief executive at the Patients Association, said: 'Single-sex wards are an important component of preserving patient dignity in hospitals. 'It is really concerning that over the past year there has been a sharp increase in the number of patients being placed on mixed-sex wards, as a result of mounting hospital pressures. 'Protecting standards of patient safety must remain at the very heart of the NHS, and eliminating mixed-sex hospital accommodation is central part of this.' Before the fines were introduced, the Mail had repeatedly highlighted the indignity of tens of thousands of patients sleeping in mixed-sex wards. Worse offender: Darent Valley Hospital in Dartford, run by the Dartford and Gravesham trust, had 151 breaches. Some hospitals tried to separate groups of patients of the same sex with flimsy curtains or screens. Dr Jacqueline McKenna, director of nursing and professional leadership at NHS Improvement, the hospital regulator, said: 'The aim of the NHS is to reduce mixed-sex accommodation and ensure privacy and dignity for all patients. 'But sometimes the need to treat has to take priority, particularly when hospitals are exceptionally busy. In some situations there is no alternative to men and women sharing accommodation. 'This includes situations where patients need urgent, highly specialised or high-tech care such as in intensive care units. 'When making this decision, staff must make sure that it is in the interests of all patients affected, and work to move patients into same-sex accommodation as quickly as possible.' More than 25,000 British motorists have joined legal action against car giant Volkswagen over the dieselgate emissions scandal. Motorists take their fight to the High Court today seeking a green light to proceed with the UKs first class action. The scandal erupted when VW was exposed as using cheat devices to fiddle emissions and fuel efficiency figures. If successful it could see VW landed with a bill of 3.6billion. Volkswagen reached a 15billion settlement with 500,000 owners in the US, but the German car giant offered nothing to motorists in Britain and Europe. More than 25,000 UK motorists have joined a High Court legal battle against Volkswagen (file picture) Lawyers spearheading the action say more than 25,000 consumers have joined the legal action since it was revealed by the Daily Mail at the beginning of January with more than 100,000 owners making contact. They are seeking 3,000 compensation per car for 1.2million Volkswagen, Audi, SEAT and Skoda vehicles in the UK. It comes as prosecutors in Germany announced at the weekend that they were investigating former Volkswagen chief executive Martin Winterkorn for fraud as they widened their probe into the scandal. Winterkorn, who resigned days after the scandal became public in September 2015 is one of 16 more suspects now under investigation in the criminal case centred on VWs creation, sale and concealment of the cheat devices in 11million vehicles. The High Court challenge also comes amid fury that while Volkswagen in the US where executives have also been arrested have pleaded guilty to fraud, paid hefty criminal and civil fines amounting to billions of pounds ($4.3billion). Law firm Harcus Sinclair acting on behalf of a number of legal groups including Slater and Gordon - is asking the High Court to grant the first UK group litigation order a British version of a US style class action - on behalf of consumers in England and Wales. A group litigation order is the Courts mechanism for handling claims involving a large number of claimants who share the same complaint. Submissions will be heard today by Barbara Fontaine, the Senior Master of the Queens Bench Division at the Royal Courts of Justice. Harcus Sinclair said that on Friday it had served a claim form on behalf of a sample 6,726 claimants in England and Wales but it noted: Over 25,000 consumers have joined the action since 9 January 2017. A claim form naming the remainder will be served within the next few weeks. It added: The scandal has affected 1.2 million cars in the UK alone, and current and previous owners of these cars are eligible to join the legal action. But lawyers fear privately VW may seek to delay proceedings in a bid to kick the case into the long grass and rack up costs. The scandal was exposed in the autumn of 2015 when environmental engineers at Transport & Environment (T&E) and the International Council for Clean Transportation (ICCT) revealed VWs cheating, which the firm admits. VW was exposed as using cheat devices to fiddle emissions and fuel efficiency figures (file picture) Affected cars include VW, Audi, SEAT and Skoda vehicles with 1.2, 1.6 and 2.0 EA 189 diesel engines manufactured between 2009 and 2015. The key allegation is that the affected cars should not have been certified as fit for sale because it is alleged that they produced higher levels of nitrous oxide or NOx emissions than the rules allowed. It is also alleged that the affected vehicles only passed official emissions tests because their engines were fitted with a defeat device which reduces NOx emissions under test conditions. The UK class action surrounds the fact that drivers paid a premium price for what they thought were clean diesel cars. Lawyers highlight figures from the governments Department for Rural Affairs that NOx emissions cause 23,000 premature deaths in the UK each year. Claimants have been signing up to the legal action via the website www.vwemissionsaction.com which was set up by Harcus Sinclair to provide more information about the case. Volkswagen has admitted equipping diesel cars with sophisticated software that turned on emissions controls when engines were being tested by the Environmental Protection Agency, then turned them off during normal driving. The software, called a defeat device because it defeated the emissions controls, improved engine performance but spewed out harmful nitrogen oxide at up to 40 times above the legal limit. A BBC investigation has found the 35 councils have changed their stance on term time fines since the case of Isle of Wight father Jon Platt. He overturned his fine in the High Court after arguing that his children had otherwise excellent attendance. Of 108 councils where data was available, 35 have altered their stance on the fines with 28 no longer issuing them altogether. A further five councils are currently reviewing the policy. For primary age children, North Yorkshire gets the best deal with 51 per cent of holidays given the green light there (file photo of primary school children above) The Torbay area of Dveon is the best place to live if you want to take secondary school children away during the term, with 51 per cent of all term time holidays given official approval Term-time holiday campaigner David Hedley said: 'There is very little clarity on what is allowed. 'So many people struggle to get time off during the school holidays especially those who work shift work in public services. 'It's not fair to continue to impose these very strict rules, the circumstances of the family should be taken into account. 'Families across the country are being penalised and it is ridiculous.' The figures for 2014-15 reveal the local authorities where the largest percentage of holidays were approved also include Shropshire and Herefordshire for both secondary and primary age children. Meanwhile, only a small percentage of holidays were approved for older children in Bracknell Forest, Leicester and Barnsley or for younger children in Luton, Rochdale and Bexley, London. Going on holiday outside of peak season can knock thousands off the price for a family, as travel companies force people to pay a premium during the school break. However, taking children on holiday during the term time has been banned since 2013 following new guidelines introduced by former education secretary Michael Gove. It has meant flouting parents have been slapped with fines of 60 per child, and many have been taken to court when they have refused to pay. The 2014-15 statistics appear to show many head teachers have been ignoring the rules and allowing parents to take their children away anyway. And this trend sped up in May 2016, when Isle of Wight father Jon Platt overturned his fine in the High Court, arguing that taking children away was legal as long as their overall attendance was excellent across the year. Councils and head teachers are now reluctant to enforce the ban because they know magistrates' courts will be unable to uphold the fines following the landmark case. The 2014-15 statistics from school registers also showed a record number of parents taking their children out of classes for holidays without approval of the head teacher. A total of 3.2million school days were lost compared with just 2.6million two years previously. Isle of Wight father Jon Platt overturned his fine in the High Court, arguing that taking children away was legal as long as their overall attendance was excellent Over the same time period the number of days of authorised holiday had fallen from 4.1million to just under 900,000. The Department for Education is supporting an appeal by Mr Platt's council against the High Court's decision, and the case will go before the Supreme Court later this year. A Department for Education spokesperson said: 'Children should not be taken out of school without good reason. 'The evidence shows every extra day of school missed can affect a pupil's chances of achieving good GCSEs, which has a lasting effect on their future, vindicating our strong stance on attendance. 'Local authorities and schools are taking tough action on addressing absence, as has been seen in the downward trend in overall absence figures in recent years.' A spokesman for Redbridge Council said: 'We are very proud of our high performing schools and students. Our most recent GCSE results were excellent. 'One of the reasons our students are able to achieve such results is because they attend school regularly and we discourage holidays during term time so that that are taken only when absolutely necessary.' Darren Paffey, cabinet member for education at Southampton Council, said: 'We want all children in Southampton to get a good education and the first step to achieving this is ensuring excellent school attendance. 'We support headteachers' efforts to enforce attendance rules, and do so in a way that is firm but fair.' Torbay in Devon is the best place to live if you want to take secondary school children away during the term, with 51 per cent of all term time holidays given official approval. For primary age children, North Yorkshire gets the best deal with 51 per cent of holidays given the green light there. The worst place for granting trips to secondary age children is Redbridge in London, where less than 1 per cent are granted, while for primary age it is Southampton, where 3 per cent are granted. The bill for Britain's foreign aid cash handouts in Pakistan has reached a staggering 420.3million, it was revealed last night. Aid officials admitted an extra 120million had been lavished on the controversial scheme dogged by claims of corruption than previously thought. Around 235,000 families are pocketing payments every three months to boost their incomes, funded by UK taxpayers, the Mail revealed last month. Lining up: A cashpoint queue in Peshawar, where some locals withdraw their aid cash An official report from Britain's aid spending watchdog a fortnight ago warned a quarter of recipients are not the country's poorest. Families get 4,500 rupees (34.50) a quarter, which they can spend however they want, as part of the Benazir Income Support Programme. British taxpayers currently fund 7 per cent of the BISP programme, although in previous years the UK contribution has been nearly 20 per cent. One in ten people get their money in envelopes at post offices, while others get cash cards that are regularly topped up with money that they can withdraw or use in shops. The most recent Department for International Development annual review admitted there were problems with the database of recipients, which it said 'needed to be strengthened'. A Dfid-commissioned study into the project also warned that those given cash cards were susceptible to being tricked out of money as they do not know how to use cash machines properly and are easily cheated. The most recent Department for International Development (pictured) annual review admitted there were problems with the database of recipients They included the example of one place where 'the village school master collects everyone's cards' and takes a 100 rupee (77p) cut from their money in return for helping them take it out. Pakistani newspapers reported in August that a nationwide probe was being launched 'after a growing number of complaints about fake accounts and alleged corruption' from project staff. Seven employees have been suspended on corruption charges and 125,714 suspicious accounts have been suspended. Yesterday aid minister Lord Bates told peers the Department for International Development had earmarked 420.3million for the project between 2012 and 2020, which is higher than the 300million it was previously known had been allocated. Tory backbenchers have called on the Government to ditch the commitment to spend 0.7 per cent of national income on foreign aid. A Dfid spokesperson said: 'Cash transfers get aid to those who need it, when they need it, and achieve value for taxpayers' money the recent Independent Commission for Aid Impact report strongly endorsed that. 'It is simply wrong to suggest that cash transfers in Pakistan are failing to reach the poorest people all beneficiaries are living on less than 90p a day.' Shadow ministers who vote against Brexit could be welcomed back into Labours top team within months despite Jeremy Corbyns three-line whip, it emerged last night. Mr Corbyn has attempted to lay down the law on the crunch Commons vote on triggering Article 50, the formal process for leaving the EU. His three-line whip means that shadow ministers who cannot accept last years referendum result will be forced to quit their posts or be sacked. Shadow ministers who vote against Brexit could be welcomed back into Labours top team within months despite Jeremy Corbyns three-line whip, it emerged last night Mr Corbyn told ITVs Peston on Sunday show that the Shadow Cabinet held a very frank and very long discussion about Brexit before agreeing a three-line whip But his deputy, Tom Watson (pictured), revealed that any sanctions will be only temporary with rebels set to be welcomed back to Labours top table within months. Two have already quit, saying they cannot accept Brexit. At least half a dozen more have warned they will rebel, including some of Mr Corbyns closest allies. The Labour leader said yesterday that it would be impossible for rebels to remain in the Shadow Cabinet after defying the will of the people. But his deputy, Tom Watson, revealed that any sanctions will be only temporary with rebels set to be welcomed back to Labours top table within months. He added: I hope those colleagues who feel they need to leave the front bench because they feel strongly that they have to represent the interests of their voters dont feel this is the end. Labour sources last night confirmed that those forced out over the Brexit vote would not face permanent banishment. YOU'RE NOT GOING TO GET THAT VETO, MAY WARNS STURGEON Theresa May will today warn Nicola Sturgeon (pictured) that she will not be given a veto over Brexit Theresa May will today warn Nicola Sturgeon that she will not be given a veto over the terms of Britains exit from the EU. Scotlands First Minister has demanded that Mrs May get the consent of the Scottish Parliament before triggering Brexit and warned that failure to do so could spark a second independence referendum. But the Prime Minister will use talks with the leaders of the devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland today to make it clear that Brexit will be driven from London. Speaking ahead of a meeting of the Joint Ministerial Committee in Cardiff, Mrs May said last weeks Supreme Court ruling on Brexit had put it beyond doubt that the final decision rested with the UK Government. Mrs May, who will fly to Dublin later for Brexit talks with Irish prime minister Enda Kenny, said she was committed to securing the right deal for the whole of the UK. But she added: We will not agree on everything, but that doesnt mean we will shy away from the necessary conversations and I hope we will have further constructive discussions. We have also had the Supreme Court judgment which made clear beyond doubt that relations with the EU are a matter for the UK Government and UK Parliament. We should not forget that that means MPs representing every community in the UK will be fully involved in the passage of Article 50 through Parliament. Miss Sturgeon wants Scotland to stay in the European single market even if the UK leaves, reflecting the majority Remain vote north of the border. She said the UK Government was showing no sign whatsoever of taking Scotlands position remotely seriously. Advertisement Mr Corbyn told ITVs Peston on Sunday show that the Shadow Cabinet held a very frank and very long discussion about Brexit before agreeing a three-line whip. Shadow Welsh secretary Jo Stevens and shadow education minister Tulip Siddiq have already resigned over the issue. Shadow business secretary Clive Lewis and shadow environment secretary Rachel Maskell, who are both close to Mr Corbyn, have also warned him they may go. The Labour leader is also facing potential rebellion by two party whips, Jeff Smith and Thangam Debbonaire, and at least two other members of his junior ministerial team, Daniel Zeichner and Catherine West. BANK REPENTS ON ECONOMY...AGAIN The Bank of England looks set to raise its growth forecasts for the economy this week in yet another admission that it was far too gloomy about Brexit. Governor Mark Carney who before the referendum warned that a vote to leave the EU could tip the country into recession is likely to concede that the outlook is brighter than previously thought. In November, the Bank raised its growth forecasts for 2017 from 0.8 per cent to 1.4 per cent, but further upgrades seem likely when its publishes its inflation report on Thursday. Advertisement Mr Corbyns stance has also sparked uproar among Labour Party members, many of whom are Remainers. The Labour Against Brexit group yesterday released a letter signed by 3,000 members accusing him of betraying your socialist values and saying he had made the wrong call over the issue. A group of 19 backbench Labour MPs, led by Heidi Alexander, have tabled a wrecking amendment to the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill. The amendment would effectively halt Brexit, although it appears to have little chance of success. The Brexit legislation has been rushed forward in the wake of last weeks controversial Supreme Court ruling that Theresa May cannot invoke Article 50 without the approval of Parliament. A two-day debate on the new law will begin tomorrow, with MPs voting on the issue on Wednesday night. MPs will then have a further three days next week to debate the more than 70 amendments, mostly tabled by Labour, the SNP and the Liberal Democrats. Mr Corbyn said yesterday that MPs had a duty to respect the referendum result. But Labour is demanding a meaningful vote on the Brexit deal, which would force Mrs May to go back to the negotiating table if MPs do not like it potentially delaying Brexit indefinitely. Government sources have described the idea as completely unworkable. Phil Shiner, pictured, faces a three week trial over claims he 'drummed up' allegations against British troops in the aftermath of the Iraq war British soldiers hounded by over their conduct in Iraq have been told to take comfort from the prosecution of the human rights lawyer behind many of the allegations. They have been sent a morale-boosting letter from top brass at the Ministry of Defence admitted that many soldiers had been pursued over manifestly false claims. Disgraced lawyer Phil Shiner today faces a three-week professional trial into claims he drummed up cases against British troops in the aftermath of the Iraq War. He is expected to be seen in public for the first time in more than two years after he withdrew his fight to have the hearings held in secret. The letter says the Ministry of Defence blames his firm - and another - for forcing troops with mental health problems to relive traumatic events a decade later. It says the department hopes soldiers directly affected by prolonged and public investigations will feel better now lawyers themselves are to be subjected to intense scrutiny. The 800-word letter, seen by the Daily Mail, was sent out in December and passed on to soldiers affected by multiple probes as part of what has been described as a witch-hunt. It said: The MoD hopes that the soldiers who have been directly affected by the prolonged and public investigations will take comfort for the fact that the actions of those lawyers who the MoD believes to have contributed to these manifestly false claims being brought are being subjected to intense scrutiny. The letter said two firms now faced a disciplinary tribunal after defence officials submitted a damning file to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) about their conduct. The file was sent after a 31million inquiry found claims against soldiers to be baseless. The watchdog then recommended that Mr Shiners firm Public Interest Lawyers (PIL) and Leigh Day should face disciplinary tribunal for breaching a code of conduct, which starts today. The letter said: By mid-2004 allegations had emerged that members of our Armed Forces had captured, tortured and murdered Iraqi civilians following a gun battle in southern Iraq in May that year. Mr Shiner, pictured, last year admitted a string of charges, including acting recklessly and without integrity Those allegations hung over those soldiers for a decade. The Al-Sweady Inquiry established conclusively that the allegations were false and that the soldiers, subjected to co-ordinated ambushes by insurgents, had acquitted themselves honourably. It said the MoD became concerned about the conduct of some of the lawyers through whom these allegations had been brought and sustained. In early 2005, armed with the Inquirys findings, the MoD took the unprecedented step of submitting a file to the SRA, which had already announced that it was looking at the inquirys report, it said. The MoD was particularly concerned that although lawyers must have known before the inquirys hearings that allegations were untrue, they blocked the MoDs application to spare many of the more than 200 soldiers from giving oral evidence. They withdrew the allegations only after the last soldier had testified, it said. The letter added: In doing so, they ignored the traumatic nature of the events, and the profound impact that reliving them would have on many of the soldiers, and especially those living with mental health problems. Mr Shiner is expected to attend day one of a three-week hearing into the allegations against him today. Defence chiefs have written to troops telling them to 'take comfort' over the prosecution of Mr Shiner At a preliminary hearing in December last year, Mr Shiner admitted a string of charges, including acting recklessly and without integrity as he drummed up cases against troops. If found guilty he could be fined or struck off. His firm collapsed in August last year after the Government withdrew legal aid funding. The tribunal is then due to hear the allegations against the firm Leigh Day over six weeks starting in March. Hundreds of British soldiers have been hounded by investigators as part of historical inquiries into the Iraq and Afghan wars. Soldiers have been put through an ordeal by investigators many years after the end of the conflicts often at the hands of the legal-aid funded human rights lawyers. Last week the Mail revealed how historical inquiries into troops were being blamed for triggering a recruitment crisis in the Army. Shock figures showed that only 6,910 cadets signed up in the past 12 months despite top brass setting a target of hiring 9,850. That represented a recruitment shortfall of nearly 3,000 troops or 30 per cent. Politicians and even a serving soldier said that by allowing ambulance-chasing lawyers to terrorise UK troops, potential soldiers had been put off joining. Starbucks announced its plan to hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years in an act of defiance against President Donald Trump. Two days after Trump signed an executive order barring entry to people from seven predominantly Muslim countries, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz outlined company-wide policies it would implement in response to the new administration. Schultz, who supported Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton during the campaign, also vowed to offer health care to its employees and support to undocumented immigrants as well as coffee growers in Mexico. Starbucks announced its plan to hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years in an act of defiance against President Donald Trump Schultz acknowledged the 'confusion, surprise and opposition' spurred by the executive order Trump signed on Friday and vowed that Starbucks would 'stay true to [its] values' Schultz acknowledged the 'confusion, surprise and opposition' spurred by the executive order Trump signed on Friday barring those traveling from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen from entering the United States for 90 days. The move, which also affected legal permanent residents and visa-holders from those seven countries, sparked an outrage as protesters gathered across the country. The ACLU won a temporary legal battle halting deportations, but more than 100 people were detained for hours before they were allowed into the US. The CEO sought to reassure his employees, writing: 'We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question. He vowed to increase communication platforms with his employees, and outlined the policies Starbucks would be implementing under Trump's administration. Schultz wrote: 'There are more than 65 million citizens of the world recognized as refugees by the United Nations, and we are developing plans to hire 10,000 of them over five years in the 75 countries around the world where Starbucks does business.' He said t he effort would initially focus on hiring immigrants 'who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel.' Schultz also took aim at other parts of a Trump agenda, including health care, immigration, and trade policies with Mexico Schultz also encouraged people to use their voices and vote. He said: 'We are all obligated to ensure our elected officials hear from us individually and collectively' Schultz also took aim at other parts of a Trump agenda and announced his support for 'Dreamers' should the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program be repealed. The CEO also vowed to support employees and business partners that might be affected by the repeal of the Affordable Care Act and any changes made to trade policies with Mexico. The move reflects the increasing complexity that businesses face when dealing with the Trump administration. Trump has met with CEOs at Ford, General Motors and Boeing and asked them to create jobs in the United States, while touting each announcement about new factory jobs as a success even if those additions had been planned before his presidential victory. But not all corporate leaders have embraced Trump. Schultz added that Starbucks would aim to communicate with workers more frequently, saying Sunday, 'I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack.' A study of 130,000 patients found certain women were more likely to survive breast cancer without a full mastectomy Surgery that spares women the ordeal of losing their breasts could be more effective at warding off cancer, a study has found. Women with early-stage breast cancer were more likely to survive if they had breast-conserving surgery and radiotherapy than if they had a full mastectomy, the researchers said. Their findings could mean thousands more women could keep their breasts following a cancer diagnosis. The study of 130,000 patients the largest ever conducted found certain women were up to a third more likely to survive if the offending lump alone was removed, rather than the whole breast. Women have been offered breast- conserving therapy, also known as a lumpectomy, for years. But researchers have been divided over whether it is the best option. Although it is less invasive, some surgeons have worried that simply removing the tumour might leave cancerous cells in place, which could spark secondary tumours. But the latest study suggests it could be more effective, possibly because the radiotherapy treatment that follows kills off any remaining cancerous cells. The Dutch researchers found women over 50 were particularly likely to benefit from breast-conserving therapy with survival rates of between 22 and 33 per cent greater than for mastectomies. For women under 50, breast-conserving therapy was linked to survival rates of between 9 and 17 per cent better than for mastectomies. Lastest study results show a lumpectomy, a therapy which conserves the breast rather than removes it fully as in a mastectomy, may be the best option for treating breast cancer Breast cancer is Britains most common cancer, with 55,000 women diagnosed each year. Of these, about half are diagnosed at an early stage of the disease. NHS guidelines say women with early breast cancer should be offered a choice of mastectomy or lumpectomy, with the final decision made jointly by the patient and the surgeon. Roughly 35 per cent of women in England with early breast cancer decide to have a full mastectomy, 57 per cent decide to have just the lump removed and then have radiotherapy, and 8 per cent have no surgery at all. BREATH TEST SPOTS STOMACH TUMOURS A breath test could quickly and accurately detect early stages of stomach and gullet cancer, researchers say. Currently patients have to undergo uncomfortable endoscopies, costing 400-600 for a diagnosis. But as the symptoms are easy to mistake for less serious conditions, both cancers tend to be discovered late. It means the chance of surviving five years is just 15 per cent. A trial with more than 300 patients found a breath test can measure levels of five chemicals linked to the cancers, and distinguish sufferers from those with other gastric conditions with an overall accuracy of 85 per cent. Dr Sheraz Markar, of Imperial College London, said: Because cancer cells are different to healthy ones, they produce a different mixture of chemicals. This study suggests we may be able detect these differences and use a breath test to indicate which patients are likely to have cancer of the oesophagus and stomach In the long term this could mean earlier diagnosis and treatment, and better survival. Advertisement The new results, to be presented today at the European Cancer Congress in Amsterdam, suggest the success of breast-conserving therapy depends on the stage of the disease. Women with tumours of up to around 2in and no cancer spread were more likely to survive with breast-conserving therapy than with a mastectomy, the researchers found. For women with a slightly more advanced form, who had small tumours but more cancerous cells in their lymph nodes, breast-conserving therapy was equally as effective as mastectomies. Study leader Professor Sabine Siesling, of the Netherlands Comprehensive Cancer Organisation, said: A considerably superior survival, both specific to breast cancer and from any cause of death, was found for breast-conserving therapy in the early stage. We believe this information will have potential to greatly improve shared treatment decision-making for future breast cancer patients. However, we would like to emphasise that these results do not mean that mastectomy is a bad choice. For patients for whom radiotherapy is not suitable or feasible for whom the risk of side effects of radiotherapy is high, or who have the prospect of a poor aesthetic outcome following breast conserving therapy, a mastectomy may still be the preferable treatment option. Rachel Rawson, of the charity Breast Cancer Care, said: It suggests for some patients, taking out the cancer without removing the whole breast may offer a better chance of survival. However radiotherapy given alongside the surgery can be gruelling, and for some women a mastectomy will always be the best option. Hundreds of niche fears have been medically recognised as phobias The image of Donald Trump suddenly grasping hold of Theresa Mays hand, as they walked together at the White House last Friday, alarmed and cheered Britain in equal measure. Not since the Australian premier Paul Keating the Lizard of Oz put an arm around the Queen during a state visit, has a physical gesture between world leaders prompted such speculation. Had Mr Trump stumbled and reached out for support, or was it merely symbolic confirmation of the very special relationship developing between The Donald and Mrs May? Over the weekend, a new explanation emerged: apparently, the President suffers from bathmophobia, the fear of stairs or slopes which he avoids wherever he can and if he cant, then he seeks reassurance from whoever is closest to him. This is an acknowledged condition and just one of hundreds of medically-recognised niche phobias: from a fear of buttons or gnomes, to an aversion to long words and the number 13, theres a phobia to suit all. Descendophobia Fear of walking down stairs or inclines There are more phobias attached to stairs than there were spectators cheering Donald Trump at his inauguration. While the Presidents affliction, bathmophobia, is all about the steps themselves, descendophobia is a fear of moving downwards, be it a slope, staircase or lift. There is also ascendophobia, a fear of moving upwards. Donald Trump, left, is said to have held Theresa May's hand during their meeting due to his dislike of staircases, aka Descendophobia According to a source close to the President, Mr Trump particularly dislikes staircases and the biggest nightmare of all for the self-confessed germophobe are stairs with a dirty handrail. No wonder he prefers Trump Tower in New York, with its gold-leaf lift, to the White House. Barophobia Fear of gravity People who suffer from barophobia are terrified about the effects of gravity on themselves, rather than the world around them. Some barophobes worry that gravity will suddenly cease to exist, sending them soaring upwards. Other sufferers fret that gravity will somehow become more forceful, crushing them to death. Koumpounophobia Fear of buttons A surprisingly common phobia and one that is very much on the increase. Amanda Wakeley, the fashion designer has the condition, something of an occupational hazard youd think. So, too, Poppy Delevingne, the model, who has acknowledged the trouble it has caused her professionally and personally. A friend wore a pair of jeans with multi-coloured buttons on the pockets, she has said I was hugging her and thought: Oh my God, whats that? When I saw them, I went green. Model Poppy Delevingne, left, and the late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, right, were both koumpounophobes, with a fear of buttons Steve Jobs, who in later years wore a black polo-neck jumper rather than a shirt with buttons, was probably the most famous koumpounophobe, a disorder that prompted his championing of touch-screen devices. The condition became much more widespread after the 2009 animated film Coraline, which told the story of a girl who discovers a parallel world with sinister characters resembling her own parents but who have buttons instead of eyes. Sesquipedalophobia Fear of long words This also appears to dog Trump. In an early campaign rally he explained why he no longer used the word incompetent to describe his opponents: I went to an Ivy League school. 'Im very highly educated. I know words, I have the best words ... but there is no better word than stupid. Right? Mock him at your peril. An analysis of his speeches suggests his simple English, using a vocabulary of a 10-year-old, was one of the reasons he connected with voters. Coulrophobia Fear of clowns Who, frankly, doesnt find Ronald McDonald or the Joker in the Batman films a little sinister? Coulrophobia is a relatively common phobia, usually starting in childhood. In 2013, Leighton Buzzard town council was forced to take down some posters promoting a circus because residents complained it triggered their coulrophobia. Pennywise the Clown, from Stephen King's IT, pictured, may be a reason why many fear clowns More recently, Britain was hit by a brief Killer Clowns epidemic, which spread here from America. Pranksters dressed as terrifying clowns would jump out from behind bushes, startling passersby and occasionally giving chase. Johnny Depp is a sufferer. Its impossible, thanks to their painted-on smiles, to distinguish if they are happy or if they are about to bite your face off, he has said. Omphalophobia Fear of the navel Paging Dr Freud! Omphalophobia is the fear of the belly button and has been linked to its association with the umbilical cord and the womb. Omphalophobes can be repulsed just by seeing or thinking about someones navel, which makes watching Strictly Come Dancing or The X Factor, where the contestants bare as much flesh as possible, something of an ordeal. Some sufferers describe their navel being touched as akin to having someone feel around their internal organs. Urgh! Papyrophobia Fear of paper Actress Megan Fox is one of many who fear something as innocuous, as innocent and as simple as a piece of A4. Megan Fox, pictured, has a particular issue with paper Some people dont like nails across a blackboard because it gives them goosebumps, she has said. I dont like dry paper. Scripts, newspapers or anything thats not laminated, I have to keep licking my fingers. 'If Im reading I have a cup of water to dip my fingers in. Im really neurotic. You dont say! Gnomophobia Fear of garden gnomes A phobia that is as English as a cup of Yorkshire Tea drunk out of an Emma Bridgewater mug in a conservatory in Melton Mowbray. And there are many who class this as less of a phobia and more of a prejudice: the snooty bigwigs at Chelsea Flower Show banned the little chaps from the society event for years. To sufferers, however, the mere sight of a red pointy hat poking out of the begonias, is enough to induce a severe panic attack. Oikophobia Fear of household goods A fear of all the objects in your home that could (but are very unlikely to) harm you: your toaster, your oven, your fridge, your bath, your plug sockets. Mind you, an estimated 30 Britons drown in their own bathtubs each year, so maybe oikophobes are on to something. Chiclephobia Fear of chewing gum Chiclephobes need to move to Singapore, a country where chewing gum has been banned since 1992 because of the mess it leaves behind those horrid blotches on the pavement. Sufferers, however, have more than distaste for a stick of spearmint. They find it genuinely terrifying. The most famous of these is Oprah Winfrey. One guest in my home sat at the dinner table, took out some gum from her mouth and put it on her plate. After she left, I threw the plate out. Triskaidekaphobia Fear of the number 13 There is a phobia attached to many numbers, but the most famous is 13, a number associated with bad luck as far back as Judas. Winston Churchill refused to dine at a table with 13 guests and hotels rarely have a 13th floor. Triskaidekaphobes often also suffer from Paraskevidekatriaphobia, a fear of Friday the 13th. Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia Fear of the number 666 Possibly the most fantastically named phobia, it originates from the Book of Revelation in the Bible, which says 666 is the number of the beast. After Ronald and Nancy Reagan left the White House in 1989 and moved to Los Angeles, they insisted on changing the address of their house from 666 St Cloud Road to 668 St Cloud Road. Venustraphobia Fear of beautiful women Donald Trump definitely does not suffer from this one. This social phobia kicks in after a man has a traumatic encounter with a stunner in their youth, which then only makes them more anxious when confronted by another gorgeous woman later. Globophobia Fear of balloons Like many phobias, this usually starts in childhood. It is a very real condition and sufferers will turn down party invitations for fear there might be balloons. Others are more specifically phonophobic they hate the sound of a balloon popping. Some have Globophobia - a fear of balloons - while others are phonophobic and fear them popping (file picture) Consecotaleophobia Fear of chopsticks The popularity of sushi means that the office desks and canteens of Britain are littered with chopsticks, which might as well be sticks of dynamite in the eyes of a consecotaleophobe. Xanthophobia Fear of the colour yellow Nearly all colours have a phobia attached to them: leukophobia (white), porphyrophobia (purple), prasinophobia (green) etc. Xanthophobes suffer around Easter time: daffodils, fluffy chicks, Cadbury creme eggs all horrifying. Omniphobia Fear of everything DONALD TRUMP, misguided Trident missiles ... just about everything seems a bit scary in 2017! A Sudanese-born not-for-profit founder has revealed she won't be able to go on a planned speaking tour in the US amid President Donald Trump's order to ban immigrants. Australian mechanical engineer, author and ABC presenter Yassmin Abdel-Magied, who has a dual nationality status, was booked as a keynote speaker at events in the US - where she was set to speak about a range of topics including multiculturalism. But the 25-year-old, who was 2015 Queensland Young Australian of the Year, will now be denied entry following the president's executive order to temporarily ban citizens from seven predominantly-Muslim countries. 'Looks like I'm banned from a visa to the USA for the next few months at least,' she wrote on Facebook. Yassmin Abdel-Magied (pictured), who has a dual citizenship with Sudan, reveals she won't be able to attend events in the US amid President Donald Trump's move to ban Muslim immigrants The Australian author and TV presenter was booked as a speaker ahead of events in the US The 25-year-old woman has taken to Facebook to reveal she won't be appearing at the events 'Their loss... and awkward for the people who've booked me for speaking gigs! "Sorry, I can't come cos they think I might be a terrorist!" 'In all seriousness though, #1930s are back. The irony of course being that no one from the banned countries has carried out a fatal attack on the US.' Her comments comes after President Trump signed an executive order to bar any non-U.S. citizen from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen from entering the United States. Ms Abdel-Magied, who founded not-for-profit Youth Without Borders when she was 16, told BuzzFeed one of the events she was expected to attend was 'ironically on multiculturalism'. 'This was imperative for a business I'm in the process of launching so it affects my income and future opportunities,' she said. The host of ABC's Australia Wide - a current affairs program about people and places around the country - said she feared for her cousins living in the States. 'This sort of policy has never been shown to reduce terrorism these moves are what led to the erosion of international norms, and soon enough, human rights,' she said. The host of ABC's Australia Wide said she feared for her cousins living in the United States The Australian author said she has been banned from the US following the president's executive order to temporarily ban citizens from seven Muslim countries, including Sudan The order includes legal permanent residents - green card holders - and visa-holders from those seven countries. They cannot return to the U.S. for at least 90 days. There's an exemption for immigrants and legal permanent residents whose entry is in the U.S. national interest, but it's unclear how that exemption will be applied. Visa and green card holders already in the U.S. will be allowed to stay. Australians who hold passports from one of the seven Muslim-majority nations implicated by the Trump administration immigration ban may be affected by the controversial order. John Lithgow meanwhile said while getting the Best Actor in a TV Drama prize for The Crown that 'unknown' actress Meryl Streep spoke his 'exact thoughts' in her Golden Globes speech Sarah Paulson urged her fellow actors and the television-viewing audience to donate to the ACLU while picking up the Best Female Actor in a TV Movie or Miniseries prize for People V. OJ In the night's most animated speech, David Harbour of Stranger Things vowed that he would 'punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the weak and the disenfranchised and the marginalized' Mahershala Ali, who won Best Supporting Actor for his role in the film Moonlight, spoke converting to Islam and how despite switching faiths he and his ordained-minister mother put aside their religious differences Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who won Best Females Actor in a Comedy for Veep, spoke about how her father Gerard 'fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France' Ashton Kutcher kicked things off by saying 'everyone at airports who belong in my America... we welcome you' while presenting the first award of the night Hollywood stars took a strong stand against President Donald Trump's immigration ban at the Screen Actors Guild awards in Los Angeles on Sunday night Advertisement Hollywood went after President Donald Trump and his sweeping ban on immigrants from seven Muslim nations on Sunday night as they gathered at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. A host of A-list stars used their time on stage at the event to speak out against President trump's executive order, from Ashton Kutcher and John Lithgow to the casts of Orange Is the New Black and Hidden Figures. Julia Louis-Dreyfus spoke about how her father came to the United States as an immigrant after fleeing the Nazi occupation in France, and called the ban a 'blemish' and 'un-American.' Moonlight star Mahershala Ali shared how his decision to convert to Islam led to a rift with his ordained-minister mother, but it was soon repaired because the two 'love each other and 'that stuff is minutiae, it's not that important.' David Harbour of the Netflix show Stranger Things spoke about standing up to bullies and punching people who 'seek to destroy the weak and the disenfranchised and the marginalized' while standing on stage with his Stranger Things castmates. And in the final speech of the evening, Taraji P. Henson spoke about the need to come together after winning the night's biggest honor, Best Film Ensemble, for her role in Hidden Figures. Henson said of the film, which tells the true story of the three African-American women working at NASA who were crucial in launching John Glenn into orbit: 'This story is of unity. This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race. We win. Love wins. Every time.' Scroll down for video The 16-ensemble cast of the Netflix show Stranger Things took the stage to accept their award for the best Ensemble in a Drama Series In the most animated speech of the night, David Harbour (center at microphone surrounded by the Stranger Things cast) took the stage with the rest of the 16-ensemble cast of the Netflix show and spoke about being united and standing up to bullies 'This story is of unity. This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race. We win. Love wins. Every time,' said Taraji P Henson of her film Hidden Figures, which won Best Film Ensemble (l to r: Octavia Spencer, Janelle Monae and Henson) I would just like to say that in light of all thats going on in the world today, its difficult to celebrate the already celebrated Stranger Things,' he said. Not realizing that he was going to deliver such a speech, his fellow cast-mates, including Winona Ryder, looked confused. Harbor continued: 'We are united in that we are all human beings and we are all together on this wonderful painful, horrible painful joyous exciting and mysterious ride that is being alive. 'We will as per Chief Jim Hopper punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the weak and the disenfranchised and the marginalized and we will do it all with soul with heart and with joy.' The 16-person cast was on stage to accept their award for the best Ensemble in a Drama Series, and seemed to have no idea that Harbour was planning on making the statement that he did. The cast looked shocked during his statement, and grew visibly excited and emotional while he was speaking. He received a standing ovation from his fellow Stranger Things actors, as well as from the audience. DAVID HARBOUR'S FULL SPEECH AT THE SAG AWARDS I would just like to say that in light of all thats going on in the world today, its difficult to celebrate the already celebrated Stranger Things. 'This award from you, who take your craft seriously, and earnestly believe like me that great acting can change the world is a call to arms from our fellow craftsmen and women to go deeper and through our art to battle against fear self centeredness and exclusivity of our predominantly narcissistic culture, and through our craft to cultivate a more empathetic and understanding society by revealing infinite truths that serve as a forceful reminder to folks that when they feel broken and afraid and tired, they are not alone. 'We are united in that we are all human beings and we are all together on this wonderful painful, horrible painful joyous exciting and mysterious ride that is being alive. 'Now as we act in the continuing narrative of stranger things, we 1983 mid-westerners will repel bullies, we will shelter freaks and outcasts those who have no home, we will get past the lies we will hunt monsters and when we are at a loss amidst the hypocrisy and the casual violence of certain individuals and institutions we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the weak and the disenfranchised and the marginalized and we will do it all with soul with heart and with joy.' Advertisement Ashton Kutcher kicked off the awards by saying: 'everyone at airports who belong in my America, you are a part of the fabric of who we arewe welcome you' Kutcher immediately followed his opening comments with a series of tweets, expanding on his opinion of the President's immigration ban Actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus, whose father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France said: 'The immigrant ban is a blemish and it's un-American' 'Im an American patriot, and I love this country, and because I love this country I am horrified by its blemishes,' said the Veep star (above with her father Gerald at a State Dinner in honor of French President Francois Hollande at the White House in 2014) The tone of the night was set quickly when Ashton Kutcher took the stage to deliver his opening remarks. The award host kicked off the show by saying: 'Everyone at airports who belong in my America, you are a part of the fabric of who we arewe welcome you.' Many other celebrities have made comments about the ban on Social Media, on the runway and in their speeches at the awards. Actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus kicked off her speech by mocking Donald Trump's first week in office, and his claims about inauguration attendance. Things then turned very personal as she spoke about her late father Gerald. 'I want you all to know that I am the daughter of an immigrant. My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France, and Im an American patriot, and I love this country, and because I love this country I am horrified by its blemishes,' she the Veep star. 'This immigrant ban is a blemish and it is un-American.' She then read a statement which had been released by the Writers Guild of America, saying: 'Our guilds are unions of storytellers who always welcomed those from the nations of varying beliefs who wish to share their creativity with America. We are grateful for them. We stand with them. And we will fight for them.' Mahershala Ali shared a very personal story of his as he accepted his award for best supporting actor in the film 'Moonlight' William H Macy accepted his award for the Best Male Actor in a Comedy Series for Shamelss during the awards, and actually thanked President Trump for: 'Making Frank Gallagher look normal' Bryan Cranston accepted an award for his portrayal of the 36th president of the United States, Lyndon B Johnson. He said, in his acceptance speech: 'I'm often asked how Lyndon Johnson would think about Donald Trump. And I honestly think 36 would put his arm around 45, and earnestly wish him success' Mahershala Ali shared a very personal story of his as he accepted his award for best supporting actor in the film 'Moonlight'. The actor said: 'What I learned from working on is that we see what happens when you persecute people. 'They fold into themselves and what I was so grateful about in having the opportunity to play Juan was playing a gentleman who saw a young man folding into himself as the result of the persecution of his community, and taking the opportunity to tell him that he mattered, that he was okay, and to accept him, and I hope that we do a better job at that. 'We kind of get caught up at the minutiae, and the details that make us all different. I think that there's two ways of seeing that; there's an opportunity to see the texture of that person and the characteristics that make them unique. 'And then there's the opportunity to go to war about it, and say that that person is different from me and I don't like that, so let's battle. 'My mother is an ordained minister, I'm a Muslim; she didn't do back-flips when I called her to tell her I converted 17 years ago. 'But I'll tell you now, we put things to the side, I was able to see her, she was able to see me. We love each other, the love is real, and that stuff is minutiae, it's not that important.' Actress Sarah Paulson accepted an Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a miniseries or Television Movie for 'The People v OJ Simpson: American Crime Story'. She made a plea to her fellow actors and actresses, as well as anyone who is watching the awards, saying: 'I'd like to make a plea for everyone if they can, any money that they have to spare, please donate to the ACLU to protect the rights and liberties of people across this country. It's a vital, vital organization that relies entirely on our support. So please, if you can.' Actress Sarah Paulson accepted an Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a miniseries or Television Movie for 'The People v OJ Simpson: American Crime Story' during the 23rd annual SAG awards Kerry Washington made her opinion clear while still on the red carpet. The Scandal actress said: 'A lot of people are saying right now that actors should keep our mouths shut when it comes to politics. But the truth is, no matter what, actors are activists because we embody the humanity and worth of all people. This union helps me to do that. I am Kerry Washington, and I am an actor' Washington also posted an Instagram before arriving at the awards of the safety pin that she is wearing on her dress. She said: 'I'll be wearing one of these tonight. On my arm. To show solidarity. We will not stop fighting for our safety and the safety of our fellow citizens and human beings' Kerry Washington made her opinion clear while still on the red carpet. The Scandal actress said: 'A lot of people are saying right now that actors should keep our mouths shut when it comes to politics. 'But the truth is, no matter what, actors are activists because we embody the humanity and worth of all people. This union helps me to do that. I am Kerry Washington, and I am an actor.' Washington also posted an Instagram before arriving at the awards of the safety pin that she is wearing on her dress. She said: 'I'll be wearing one of these tonight. On my arm. To show solidarity. We will not stop fighting for our safety and the safety of our fellow citizens and human beings.' These comments were in direct reference to President Donald Trump's attack on Meryl Streep after she very publicly criticized him in front of millions of people around the world at the Golden Globe Awards. The cast of Orange is the New Black stood on the stage after receiving the Best Ensemble in a Comedy prize, and star Taylor Schilling said: 'What unites us is stronger than the forces that seek to divide us.' One of the stars of that show, Diane Guerrero, was born in the United States to Colombian parents, and has spoken very publicly in the past at the devastation she experienced when at the age of 14 she returned home from school one day and discovered that her parents and older brother had been deported to South America. Actors Simon Helberg (L) and Jocelyn Towne (R) made their opinions about the controversial ban clear while on the red carpet- with Towne wearing the words 'Let them in' written across her chest, and Helberg holding a sign saying 'Refugees welcome' Actress Meryl Streep, who delivered harsh criticism of President Donald Trump and his policies during her speech at the Golden Globes, posed for a photo with Towne and Helberg The cast of Orange is the New Black stood on the stage after receiving the award for Best Ensemble in a Comedy, and star Taylor Schilling said: 'What unites us is stronger than the forces that seek to divide us' One of the stars of Orange, Diane Guerrero, was born in the United States to Colombian parents, and has spoken in the past about how her entire family was deported while she was at school one day (l to r: Elizabeth Rodriguez, Selenis Leyva, Guerrero, and Jackie Cruz) Sofia Vergara posted a photo to Instagram with Thandie Newton during the award show, captioned 'Immigrants'. Vergara is a Colombian-American actress, and Newton is English Steven Yeun and Alia Shawkat (right) spoke on stage during to present one of the awards, and Shawkat was more subtle with her disapproval of the President. She carefully expressed her opposition through a greeting in Arabic, 'assalamu alaikum', which translates to 'greetings' or 'peace be with you' Bryan Cranston accepted an award for his portrayal of the 36th president of the United States, Lyndon B Johnson. He said, in his acceptance speech: 'I'm often asked how Lyndon Johnson would think about Donald Trump. And I honestly think 36 would put his arm around 45, and earnestly wish him success.' Steven Yeun and Alia Shawkat (right) spoke on stage during to present one of the awards, and Shawkat was more subtle with her disapproval of the President. She carefully expressed her opposition through a greeting in Arabic, 'assalamu alaikum', which translates to 'greetings' or 'peace be with you' Lily Tomlin's speech, after receiving the Life Achievement award, poked fun at her fellow actors and actresses, but also spread a message of hope and change John Lithgow accepted an award for Male Actor in a Drama series for 'The Crown', in which he played United Kingdom Prime Minister Winston Churchill. He spoke directly to Meryl Streep during his acceptance, saying 'She managed to speak my exact thoughts' Lily Tomlin's speech, after receiving the Life Achievement award, poked fun at her fellow actors and actresses, but also spread a message of hope and change. The lifelong actress said: 'What sign should I make for the next march? So much to do: global warming, standing rock, LGBTQ issues, Chinese missiles, immigration... I feel like we could all go out and really change things.' John Lithgow accepted an award for Male Actor in a Drama series for 'The Crown', in which he played Winston Churchill. He spoke directly to Meryl Streep, referring to her Golden Globes speech that heavily criticized President Donald Trump's policies during his acceptance, saying the 'unknown' actress 'managed to speak my exact thoughts.' Indian-born Dev Patel (left) and British citizen Riz Ahmed (right) both spoke out against the ban on the red carpet Sunday 'I believe our country should be open and inclusive, particularly for refugees fleeing war-torn areas,' said John Legend on Sunday (above with Ryan Goling and wife Chrissy Tiegen on the red carpet) In a red carpet interview before the show, nominee Dev Patel said: 'I just flew in from India a day ago. When I heard the news it was utterly devastating. 'The first thing that came into my head was the children who arrive on these shores with hope in their hearts. It's horrible. It's divisive.' He then added: 'I hope something changes and something can be done because it really is terrible.' British-born Riz Ahmed, nominated for his work in The Night Of, said that if 'people care about the future of this country and the world, now was the time for people to make their 'voices heard' in his pre-show interview. And singer John Legend, who appears in La La Land, stated that President Trump's immigration ban was a disgrace to the citizen of the United States. "Everything our government does is being done in our name.I believe our country should be open and inclusive, particularly for refugees fleeing war-torn areas,' said Legend. 'They are fleeing terrorism, they are fleeing war, they are fleeing genocide.' 'HUMAN GIF FACTORY': WINONA RYDER'S REACTION TO COSTAR'S SPEECH SPARKS MEME FRENZY Winona Ryder stood alongside David as he spoke out, reacting with a series of increasingly expressive facial expressions to the passion in his voice. With looks of confusion, consternation, and eventually delight, she sparked a sudden flood of memes on social media. Dubbed a 'human gif factory' by one fan, the updates flowed. In his speech David implored his fellow actors to use their fame for good - alluding to the current political upheaval in the U.S. As David spoke, Winona wasn't alone in her surprise, or her growing admiration. The young cast of the show jumped around on stage in excitement both at their win, and at David's speech. Priceless: Winona's face got everyone talking on social media 'Ordering a drink?' Winona sparked a storm of with her facial expressions onstage Listening in: In his speech David implored his fellow actors to use their fame for good - alluding to the political unrest in the U.S. right now In his speech David implored his fellow actors to use their fame for good - alluding to the political upheaval in the U.S. right now What's he on about? At times it seemed Winona had not been warned about the speech And go: The multitude of expressions set social media alight Advertisement Antolin Garcia-Torres (pictured), who was charged in the murder of Sierra LaMar, will stand trial on Monday A suspected murderer will stand trial on Monday almost five years after a teenage girl disappeared on her way to school. Antolin Garcia-Torres, 25, could face the death penalty for allegedly killing Sierra LaMar in Morgan Hill, California, in 2012. But LaMar's body was never found, and Garcia-Torres' attorneys will argue she ran away from home and may still be alive. LaMar was just 15 when she disappeared while walking to the school bus on the morning of March 16, 2012. The incident sparked an outpouring of support from the local community and received nation-wide press coverage, prompting hundreds of volunteers to turn out for organized searches Her body was never recovered, but authorities found her a pair of pants she was wearing the day of her disappearance, not far from the bus stop. Her cell phone and handbag were also recovered. Garcia Torres, who told police he had never met LaMar, has pleaded not guilty. Without LaMar's body or an autopsy, murder weapon or witness statements, the prosecution faces a difficult battle in winning a conviction and death sentence, Mercury News reported. And if Garcia Torres is acquitted, he can't be tried again even if new evidence is recovered in the case. Antolin Garcia-Torres (left in 2012), 22, was charged with the murder of Sierra LaMar (right), who disappeared on her way to school in Morgan Hill, California A reward of $25,000 was offered after LaMar went missing, however her body has never been found But LaMar's parents are said to support District Attorney Jeff Rosen's decision to seek the death penalty, and prosecutors say there is enough evidence to incriminate Garcia Torres. Prosecutors claim her DNA was found in Garcia-Torres' car - including on a rope he stored in the trunk. DNA consistent to his was also found on LaMar's pants, prosecutors said. Garcia-Torres has countered that claim by saying he masturbated into tissues and threw them out of his car window while driving. Defense attorneys will also try to argue LaMar might not even be dead. In October, they tried to introduce they claim was written by the teenager as evidence she was planning to leave home, NBC Bay Area reported. Court documents obtained by the network claim the note, which was written in Spanish, reads: 'I hate my life... I will be in San Francisco by 3/16/12' - the same day she disappeared. Prosecutors claim LaMar's DNA was found in Garcia-Torres' car - including on a rope he stored in the trunk Sierra LaMar's parents speak during a press conference in May 2012 after Antolin Garcia-Torres was arrested The note was reportedly taken from the 15-year-old girl's locker at school by fellow students and then given to officials, the documents state. However, prosecutors have dismissed the note as a prank, saying it is clear it was not written by LaMar. Her younger sister said the note did not match LaMar's handwriting. Authorities have previously rejected the theory LaMar vanished because she ran away based on interviews with more than 100 of her friends and relatives, according to the San Jose Mercury News. Mr Kaba (left), 24, was allegedly part of a group of five men who went to a Notting Hill Carnival after-party (inset) in east London in the early hours of August 30. They are suspected of conspiring to murder a 23-year-old rival who was shot on the dance floor at the Oval Space nightclub in Cambridge Heath. The victim was chased out of the nightclub and shot twice by a gunman before being taken to the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel. He was treated for gunshot wounds to both legs, but survived the attack. The four men appeared at Thames Magistrates Court on October 28 charged with conspiracy to murder. The newspaper reported that the prosecution will allege Mr Kaba helped plot the attack and was present at the incident. Mr Kaba, who died in Streatham Hill (right), south London, on September 5, was being followed by an unmarked police car with no lights or sirens turned on in the minutes before the shooting, Inner South London Coroner's Court was told last month. With one flourish of his presidential pen, Donald Trump plunged airports across America and around the world into a maelstrom of chaos and confusion. His executive order for a temporary ban on all refugees and citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the US with immediate effect prompted a tidal wave of protest. Travellers with valid visas, asylum seekers whose claims had been approved, those of dual nationality, transit passengers and even some with legitimate green cards were either denied entry or prevented from boarding flights due to bring them to America. Donald Trump shakes hands with Theresa May in Washington last week as the leaders met for the first time And many more will not be able to visit the US as tourists or see relatives in the foreseeable future. We await clarification. It was a crude stroke by Mr Trump and some would say an illogical one. For example, there is no record of citizens of any of the banned countries committing terrorist acts in the US, yet Saudi Arabia which provided most of the 9/11 hijackers is not on the list. But brutal as it may be, it should not have come as a surprise. Throughout the presidential campaign, Mr Trump pledged to slash migration, at one stage even threatening a veto on all Muslims coming to America (not to mention a wall across the length of the Mexican border). He says this temporary ban will give the authorities time to organise the stricter vetting of migrants demanded by those who voted him in. And let us not forget that this type of sanction is not unique. President Obama barred all Iraqi refugees from entering the US for six months in 2011, amid a terrorism scare. Speaking during the press conference, May spoke up for Nato and free trade and repudiated Mr Trumps apparent enthusiasm for both torture and Vladimir Putin So what should Britain do? Theresa May, whose visit to Washington last week was so successful, has been accused by her critics of being too close to Mr Trump and too slow to criticise the ban. They are now campaigning for the Presidents planned state visit to Britain later this year to be postponed or even cancelled ostensibly to avoid embarrassment to the Queen. This would be an absurd over-reaction and hugely damaging to British interests. Yes, Mrs May must defend the interests of British citizens and shes right to disagree with the severity of these measures. But isnt it better to express these criticisms as a friend rather than an enemy? She showed in Washington by speaking up for Nato and free trade and repudiating Mr Trumps apparent enthusiasm for both torture and Vladimir Putin what can be achieved by firm but polite diplomacy, rather than antagonism. But critics have slammed her fr being to close to Trump and are even appealing to have him banned from Britain Could this friendship be the reason Britons with dual nationality are apparently being exempted from the ban? And as for the Queen, she has been inveigled by Downing Street over the years into entertaining infinitely worse characters, from Chinese dictators, through Arab and African despots, to the hideous Romanian tyrant Nicolae Ceausescu. Shes hardly likely to be embarrassed by a visit from the democratically elected president of the United States however brash and controversial he may be. In 2010, the Government promised to end the scandal of mixed-sex wards. Yet the number of people made to suffer this humiliation soared by 70 per cent last year to 7,100. This cannot be allowed to go on. True, NHS hospitals are under intense pressure for beds but theres no excuse for denying patients the basic dignity of single-sex accommodation. Even former international development minister Grant Shapps now admits aid spending is out of control. When will the Government get the message and finally abandon its ludicrous pledge to shovel 0.7 per cent of national income into this bottomless foreign pit, while our own pensioners are denied vital social care? Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly clarified what President Trump's extreme vetting executive order means for green card holders. The order bans people from seven high risk countries from emigrating to the country for 90 days. This caused chaos for green card holders travelling home yesterday leading to numerous protests as legal residents were detained at airports. Scroll down for video United States President Donald Trump is joined by Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly (R) during a visit to the Department of Homeland Security Today Kelly issued a statement saying: 'In applying the provisions of the president's executive order, I hereby deem the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest.' 'Accordingly, absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, lawful permanent resident status will be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determinations.' The statement is a response to the controversy surrounding what has been labelled the 'Muslim ban' because of the seven predominately Muslim countries that are affected. Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly said in a statement today that it is 'in the national interest' to let green card holders entry into the US Kelly made the remarks clarifying the legality of green card holders in response to Trump's executive order which blocks entry into the US for people from countries deemed high-risk On Saturday night, federal judge Ann Donnelly granted travelers an emergency stay which stopped people being detained because of the executive order. Kelly, a retired Marine Corps General was officially sworn in as the fifth Secretary of Homeland Security on the day of Trump's inauguration. He will be in charge of the construction of the Mexican border wall according to the Washington Post. There was quite a bit of confusion surrounding the order according to CNN. It reports: 'The Department of Homeland Security was left making a legal analysis on the order after Trump signed it.' 'A Border Patrol agent, confronted with arriving refugees, referred questions only to the President himself, according to court filings.' Today, Trump defended his sweeping order on immigration Sunday afternoon and and said he would find other ways to help those suffering from Syria's bloody civil war. The president said in a statement that 'America is a proud nation of immigrants' that'will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression,' but 'while protecting our own citizens and border'. He denied once again that his executive order, which bans visitors from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, seven predominantly Muslim countries, was a ban aimed at Muslim people. 'This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe,' he said. 'There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days.' New Zealand's most notorious gang the Mongrel Mob is on a violent collision course with Australian outlaw bikie clubs after invading the Northern Territory. NT police are monitoring a newly established chapter of the gang, who have been pictured partying and wearing the gang's patches in Darwin nightclubs. Reports have surfaced of Mongrel Mob members brawling with Hells Angel bikies and members of the public in various Top End nightclubs. NT police are monitoring a newly established chapter of the Mongrel Mob, who have been pictured partying and wearing the gang's patches in Darwin nightclubs. Police received reports of Mongrel Mob members brawling with Hells Angel bikies (pictured: Darwin members of the gang with Rebels bikies) An NT Police Spokesperson told Daily Mail Australia the Mongrel Mob pose a 'significant threat.' 'In NZ the gang is largely involved in violent crimes, property crime and street level drug dealing.' The spokesperson confirmed the gang has been involved in a number of nightclub assaults but said police have received no complaints. 'At present we are monitoring the gangs activities and building our intelligence holdings. The new Darwin chapter is believed to have been created three months ago by a New Zealand man with bikie ties who is employed by oil company Inpex. The Mongrel Mob, infamous for their bloody gang with rival The Black Power gang, have been pictured in several social media posts from the Opium nightclub in Darwins' Mitchell St. Social media posts show the gang have spread its tentacles into Melbourne, Sydney and the Gold Coast The Mongrel Mob is infamous for their bloody gang with rival The Black Power gang However after police raised suspicions the gang had ties to the nightclub's staff, the venue has gone up for sale online. The online advertisement cites 'genuine non business reasons for sale', with a $1.2 million plus stock at value price tag with Finn Business Sales NT. Opium owner Lenno Savage has vehemently denied the staff have any links to the brutal gang. Police have warned the public to remain vigilant of the group, which has established chapters across Australia. Social media posts show the gang have spread its tentacles into Melbourne, Sydney and the Gold Coast, where members brandish an Australian patch. Earlier this month New Zealand Police made multiple arrests at the funeral of a Mongrel Mob member after shots were fired at the procession on its way to the crematorium. Gangs and Organised Crime Division Detective Senior Sergeant Mark Stringer warned the public to remain vigilant of the group Delta Air Lines announced late Sunday that it has resolved its technical malfunction that led to the cancellation of scores of flights nationwide, leaving thousands of passengers stranded at airports for hours. The company tweeted on Sunday night that its ground stop has been lifted and that its planes have once again began departing for their domestic destinations, according to CBS News. 'I want to apologize to all of our customers who have been impacted by this frustrating situation,' Delta CEO Ed Bastian said in a statement posted to the company website. 'This type of disruption is not acceptable to the Delta family who prides itself on reliability and customer service. I also want to thank our employees who are working tirelessly to accommodate our customers.' Delta Air Lines grounded all domestic flights due to 'automation issues' on Sunday. Pictured are passengers at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta A Delta passenger sits on the floor while waiting in line at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta Delta Air Lines announced late Sunday that it has resolved its technical malfunction that led to the cancellation of scores of flights nationwide Earlier Sunday evening, Delta grounded all of its its domestic flights because of 'automation issues.' Delta spokesman Morgan Durrant said the airline was facing a 'systems outage' but flights already in the air were unaffected. The Atlanta-based airline responded to customer complaints on Twitter by saying it was experiencing technical issues and was 'working hard to get them fixed quickly to minimize the impact to our customers.' The Federal Aviation Administration said that international flights were exempt from the grounding. In August, Delta suffered a computer breakdown after a power outage in its operations center. The airline canceled more than 2,000 flights over three days. 'Delta teams are expeditiously working to fix a systems outage that has resulted in departure delays and cancellations for flights on the ground,' the company said on its website. 'Flights in the air remain unaffected. Some customers are experiencing delays upon landing, particularly at Deltas hub airports.' 'Delta apologizes to customers for the inconvenience.' The Atlanta-based airline is responding to customer complaints on Twitter by saying it is experiencing technical issues and is 'working hard to get them fixed quickly to minimize the impact to our customers' Travelers took to social media on Sunday to report outages and disruptions at airports in Atlanta, New York, Houston, Tucscon, Austin, and other cities The company fielded complaints from stranded passengers on Twitter, including Paul Sullivan (above), who says he was forced to pay for a hotel after his flight was missed Shade Robinson tweeted (above) that she was on a plane for an hour waiting to arrive at the gate Delta told customers that while flights in the air were unaffected, some delays for flights landing were reported Travelers took to social media on Sunday to report outages and disruptions at airports in Atlanta, New York, Houston, Tucson, Austin, and other cities. One passenger who identified herself as Lina Martinez tweeted that she was stuck in Memphis after her flight was diverted. Delta also scrambled to field complaints from stranded passengers. A company representative was busy answering questions from affected travelers on its Twitter feed. Christian leaders have spoken out against Donald Trump's plan to prioritize Christian refugees, as the president confirmed his decision in an interview on the Christian Broadcasting Network. The segment, which aired Sunday evening, was taped at the White House Friday, the same day Trump signed an executive order banning Syrian refugees indefinitely and closing US doors to visitors from seven predominantly Muslims countries. During the interview, the president pledged to give priority to Christians applying for refugee status, saying it had been easier for Muslim people to get into the United States than for Christians. Available evidence, however, shows that the US admitted 37,521 Christian refugees and 38,901 Muslim refugees in 2016. Trump's CBN interview came after the mogul denied that his executive actions represented a Muslim ban, and while protests took place across the nation against the immigration order. Scroll down for video Donald Trump confirmed in an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network (pictured) that his administration would prioritize Christian refugee applications CBN host David Brody asked Trump during the interview: 'As it relates to persecuted Christians, do you see them as kind of a priority here?' Trump replied: 'Yes.' When Brody asked again, 'You do?' the president continued: 'They've been horribly treated. Do you know if you were a Christian in Syria it was impossible, at least very tough to get into the United States? 'If you were a Muslim you could come in, but if you were a Christian, it was almost impossible and the reason that was so unfair, everybody was persecuted in all fairness, but they were chopping off the heads of everybody but more so the Christians. And I thought it was very, very unfair. So we are going to help them.' Numbers provided by the Pew Center show that the US admitted almost the same numbers of Christian and Muslim refugees in 2016 - 37,521 and 38,901 respectively. Bishop Joe S Vasquez (left) said: 'We believe in assisting all, regardless of their religious beliefs' and Jen Smyers (right), the associate director for immigration and refugee policy of Church World Service, said the day the immigration ban was signed was a 'shameful' one Syria's population is made up of 93 per cent of Muslim people and five per cent of Christians, according to a 2010 estimate by the Pew Center. 'We have no evidence that would support a belief that the Obama administration was discriminating against Christian populations,' Reverend Scott Arbeiter, the president of World Relief, the humanitarian branch of the National Association of Evangelicals, told the New York Times. Christian leaders have said they oppose Trump's decision to prioritize Christian refugees. 'We believe in assisting all, regardless of their religious beliefs,' Bishop Joe S Vasquez, who chairs the migration committee of the US Conference Of Catholic Bishops, told the newspaper. One of the religious leaders speaking out against the executive order was Jen Smyers, the associate director for immigration and refugee policy of Church World Service, a ministry with more than 30 denominations in its members. Smyers said that Friday, the day Trump signed the executive order setting up the immigration bans, was a 'shameful day' for the US. 'Christ calls us to care for everyone, regardless of who they are and where they come from,' World Relief's senior vice president of advocacy and policy Jenny Yang told The Atlantic. 'That has to be a core part of our witnessnot just caring for our own, but caring for others as well.' People kept marching in support of immigrants and refugees even after the sun had set Sunday in Seattle, Washington Demonstrators gathered during a candlelit vigil near the Naval Observatory on Sunday night in Washington, DC Hundreds of people gathered outside of Sterling Memorial Library at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut on Sunday for a vigil in support of refugees Anna Yaggi, a 15-year-old high school student, held a candle in front of Sterling Memorial Library at Yale University in New Haven. Hundreds turned out for the vigil Demonstrators gathered and held candles during a vigil near the Naval Observatory on Sunday night in Washington DC Protesters at one point shut down the lower level loop at LAX during a protest against the travel ban imposed by Trump Meanwhile, Trump defended his order on immigration Sunday afternoon, saying in a statement that 'America is a proud nation of immigrants' that 'will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression,' but 'while protecting our own citizens and border'. He denied once again that his executive order, which bans visitors from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, seven predominantly Muslim countries, was a ban aimed at Muslim people. 'To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe,' he said. 'There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. 'We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days.' He also placed part of the blame on his predecessor Barack Obama. 'My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months,' Trump said of his own measure. Obama's directive affected only refugees and came after a specific terror threat. Trump's order is broader and applies to all citizens from the seven countries included in the 90-day ban. Trump also said that those countries 'are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror'. The mogul told Brody during the rest of the interview that he had been relying on his own faith more since becoming president. 'The office is so powerful that you need God even more because your decisions are no longer, "Gee I'm gonna build a building in New York." These are questions of massive life and death,' he said. The mogul also said he thought he knew who he would pick as a Supreme Court justice but wasn't '100 per cent'. 'I think the person that I pick will be a big, big - I think people are gonna love it. I think evangelicals, Christians will love my pick and will be represented very fairly,' he added. The New York Police Department is stepping up patrols at mosques and other places of worship in the city after six people were shot dead in a mosque in Quebec City, Canada. 'NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something,' New York City Mayor Bill Blasio said on Twitter. 'Our prayers are with the people of Quebec City as they deal with a terrible attack on a mosque. We must stand together,' Blasio said in another tweet. Earlier de Blasio sent a message directly to Muslims living in the city: 'To my fellow New Yorkers who are Muslim: New York City will protect you. The NYPD will protect you. We will fight all hatred and bias.' The department says it's monitoring the situation in Quebec City. The NYPD issued a statement Sunday night saying Critical Response Command personnel have been 'assigned to extended tour coverage' at certain mosques. Scroll down for video NYPD is stepping up patrols of New York City mosques after the shooting of six in Quebec New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio pledged to Muslims: 'New York City will protect you. The NYPD will protect you. We will fight all hatred and bias.' The New York Mayor tweeted his support for Muslims in New York and the people of Quebec NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio, pictured on Monday, tweeted a number of positive messages regarding the shooting White university student Alexandre Bissonnette has been named as the sole suspect accused of killing six men at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center. Bissonnette, 27, was arrested alongside Moroccan-Canadian Mohamed el Khadir on Sunday night. On Monday afternoon, Surete du Quebec, the investigating police force, confirmed one of the men was no longer facing charges. A source later told Reuters police were looking at Bissonnette as a 'lone wolf'. The political sciences and anthropology student, who is from the affluent Quebec City suburb Cap Rouge, will appear in court sometime on Monday or Tuesday. Other students described him to DailyMail.com as a pro-Trump loner but a timid man who didn't seem capable of committing an act of terror. Six men aged between 39 and 60 were killed at the mosque and five remain in a critical condition in intensive care at the city's Hopital de l'Enfant-Jesus after the killings on Sunday night. Twelve others had less serious injuries and another 39 escaped from the mosque unharmed. Martin St. Louis holds a sign that reads 'la paix pas la guerre' (peace, not war) near a Quebec city mosque after a deadly shooting in Quebec City Police survey the scene after deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City on Sunday night Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume appeared visibly shaken. 'No person should have to pay with their life, for their race, their color, their sexual orientation or their religious beliefs,' Labeaume said. Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre President Mohamed Yangui said the shooting in the provincial capital happened in the men's section of the mosque. He said he wasn't at the center when the attack occurred, but he got some details from people on the scene. 'We are sad for the families,' he said. Ali Hamadi said he left the mosque a few minutes before the shooting. He said his friend and co-worker Abdelkrim Hassen, who worked in IT for the government, was killed. He said Hassen has three daughters and a wife. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau held a minute's silence for those killed in the attack at the House of Commons on Monday after an emotional speech. Alexandre Bissonnette is suspected of carrying out the Quebec City mosque massacre alone 'Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack,' he said, before issuing a heartfelt message to the country's Muslim community. 'Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. 'Last night's horrible crime against the Muslim community was an act of terror committed against Canada and against all Canadians. 'We will grieve with you. We will defend you. We will love you. And we will stand with you,' he said. On Sunday, Prime Minister Trudeau released a statement immediately after the attack where he deemed it an act of terror on Muslims. 'It was with tremendous shock, sadness and anger that I heard of this evenings tragic and fatal shooting at the Centre culturel islamique de Quebec located in the Ste-Foy neighbourhood of the city of Quebec. 'We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge. 'Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack': Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau gave an emotional speech in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill on Monday 'On behalf of all Canadians, Sophie and I offer our deepest condolences to the family and friends of all those who have died, and we wish a speedy recovery to those who have been injured. 'While authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, it is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. 'Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country. Canadian law enforcement agencies will protect the rights of all Canadians, and will make every effort to apprehend the perpetrators of this act and all acts of intolerance. 'Tonight, we grieve with the people of Ste-Foy and all Canadians.' Trudeau had reacted to Trump's immigration ban for people from some Muslim-majority countries by tweeting Saturday: 'To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada.' Trudeau also posted a picture of himself greeting a Syrian child at Toronto's airport in late 2015. Trudeau oversaw the arrival of more than 39,000 Syrian refugees soon after he was elected. Mohamed Oudghiri speaks with the media near a Quebec City mosque after the deadly shooting. Oudghiri is a regular of the Mosque In the summer of 2016 a pig's head was left on the doorstep of the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre. The incident occurred in the middle of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. Practicing Muslims do not eat pork. Francois Deschamps, an organizer of a refugee-support group in Quebec City, said the motive for Sunday's attack is unknown, but right-wing groups are very organized in Quebec City, distribute fliers at the university and plaster stickers around town. Deschamps said he has received death threats after starting a refugee support group on Facebook and people have posted his address online. 'I'm not very surprised about the event,' Deschamps said. Canada is generally very welcoming toward immigrants and all religions, but it's less so in the French-speaking province of Quebec which has had a long-simmering debate about race and religious accommodation. A teenage girl claims her Iranian father has been blocked from visiting the U.S. for her 16th birthday - after 11 years apart. Donald Trump has blocked people from seven Muslim majority nations - Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen - from entering the United States. A Muslim 15-year-old girl was among those protesting at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), where she told Australia's Nine News her father has been turned away. Scroll down for video Muslim girl Malikeh Sharifi, 15, breaks down at a protest at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) after discovering her father was blocked from returning from Iran President Donald Trump is pictured holding up a signed Executive Order in the Oval Office of the White House on Saturday Malikeh Sharifi's father was planning to travel from Iran for Malikeh's 16th birthday, the first time they would have seen each other in 11 years. 'He was supposed to be here this summer. He had all his paperwork and the other day he got an email saying he couldn't come because he is Muslim,' said Malikeh, who has lived in the U.S. for seven years. 'In eighth grade, it was my graduation. I got six scholarships for having a 4.7 GPA. But my dad wasn't there.' Malikeh said speaking to her father through FaceTime or over the phone was not the same as seeing him. 'I haven't seen my dad in 11 years, and when I was about to see him - he can't come,' she said. Hundreds of people demonstrate outside Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Sunday Malikeh said she had cried herself to sleep for 11 years without her father, but said she would not be deterred from being herself. 'I am American but I am not Donald Trump's version of American, nor will I ever be. 'I will fight to the death for who I am. I would rather die a Muslim than live a person I am not.' Daily Mail Australia has reached out to Malikeh for comment. Thousands of people have descended onto Battery Park in New York, Copley Square in Boston, and international airports across the U.S. The President on Friday blocked people from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from entering the United States for at least 90 days. 'I haven't seen my dad in 11 years, and when I was about to see him - he can't come,' Malikeh said Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, actress Nicole Kidman, and Ms Bishop's partner David Panton attend the 2017 G'Day Black Tie Gala in Hollywood on Saturday A spokeswoman for Ms Bishop says officials are in talks with US counterparts to get clarity on how the temporary ban on those from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen may affect dual nationals (Ms Bishop pictured with John Travolta) The executive order could also affect Australians with dual citizenship. Qantas will offer refunds to any passengers caught up in US President Donald Trump's immigration freeze on seven Muslim-majority nations. The airline said on Sunday it will change its processes and booking systems following advice from the US government regarding tighter entry conditions. 'Passengers booked on Qantas for travel to the United States who use a passport from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen, Libya have a number of options, including a change to their destination or a refund,' Qantas said in a statement. Virgin Australia said none of its crew or passengers were so far affected by the ban. 'Virgin Australia always advises its guests travelling internationally to ensure they hold the relevant documentation for entry into that particular country,' the company wrote in a statement supplied to Daily Mail Australia. Demonstrators poured into JFK airport all throughout Saturday to express their disagreement with Trump's order People chant and hold signs as they protest against the travel ban at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport arrivals gate in Dallas, Texas on Sunday A spokeswoman for Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says officials are in talks with US counterparts to get clarity on how the temporary ban on those from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen may affect dual nationals. 'The Australian embassy in Washington is engaging with US officials on the potential implications of the suspension for Australian travellers, including dual nationals,' a spokeswoman told AAP in a statement. All travellers are being warned that rules could change at short notice. 'Travellers should contact the nearest embassy or consulate of the United States for the most current information,' the spokeswoman added. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade had not received any requests for assistance from Australians travelling to the U.S., he told a press conference in Canberra on Monday afternoon. Zabihollah Zarepisheh of Iran celebrates after being released from being held in Terminal 4 for over 30 hours at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York on Sunday Kayla Razavi, whose family emigrated from Iran, addressed the crowd during the San Francisco protest Saturday afternoon Mazdak Tootkaboni is pictured being embraced during a demonstration at Logan International Airport in Boston, Massachusetts. Tootkaboni is a US green card holder from Iran and a professor at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth, but he was still separated from other passengers and questioned Mehdi Radgoudarzi (centre) made his way through the arrival pick up area with his wife Susan (left) and daughter Niloofar (right) after being detained at San Francisco's SFO International Airport as a result of Trump's order One of the people detained on Saturday was an 88-year-old blind man, who was held for hours and had his medication taken from him at Dulles Airport in Virginia, the Daily Beast 's Betsy Woodruff reports On Saturday, a federal court temporarily halted the deportation of visa holders or refugees stranded at airports. But Homeland Security said the temporary stay granted will not stop Trump's ban from being put in place. On Sunday, White House official Reince Priebus revealed on NBC's Meet the Press that a big change has been made for permanent residents. 'As far as green card holders, moving forward, it doesn't affect them,' Priebus, Trump's Chief of Staff, said. Secretary John Kelly clarified in a statement on Sunday all permanent residents would be allowed entry into the U.S. More than 1,000 people gathered at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport to protest Trump's order that restricts immigration on Saturday Demonstrators gathered in San Francisco International Airport Saturday to protest against the ban on immigration on Saturday A sea of protesters gathered outside of Terminal 4 of JFK after people from Muslim countries were detained at border control Demonstrators gathered in the international arrivals area at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport to protest on Saturday 'In applying the provisions of the president's executive order, I hereby deem the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest,' he said. 'Accordingly, absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, lawful permanent resident status will be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determinations.' Trump has defended the executive order but denied it was a 'Muslim ban'. 'America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border,' the White House Press Secretary said in a statement on Sunday. 'This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order.' A woman who had her hearing restored burst into tears when she finally heard her husband speak after surgery. Cora Lutes, who lives in Norfolk, Virginia, lost her hearing when she was just two years old and relied on hearing aids throughout her life. But her condition worsened and Lutes was told the only viable option was to undergo surgery to receive a cochlear implant. Her husband James Lutes captured the moment his wife burst into tears at the sound of his voice. Cora Lutes, who lives in Norfolk, Virginia, received a cochlear implant. Pictured in the doctors office (left), she began smiling when she picked up the sound of her doctor's voice Lutes became emotional when her husband James started talking to her. She couldn't stop laughing and the joy was written all over her face Cora told him he was loud, said it was 'amazing', and covered her face with both hands as she cried with joy James uploaded the video, which has racked up more than five million views, writing: 'When I met her she was still able to hear. 'But after I joined the Navy she slowly got worse and lost her hearing completely.' After doctors said surgery was the only option, Cora received a cochlear implant, which is a small hearing device fitted under the skin behind the ear. James stood by and filmed his wife as the device was turned on in the two-minute clip. Cora initially said she could only hear a loud squeaking noise, and started smiling when she could pick up her doctor's voice. Her doctor explained that it would take some time for her to adjust to the device, before encouraging James to speak up. When he asks, 'How's my voice sound?' Cora laughs and the joy is written all over her face. James can be heard repeating the question, to which Cora responds, 'You're loud!' She continues laughing, stunned that she can hear again, and says: 'It's amazing.' Cora is soon overcome with emotion, and covers her face with both hands as her doctor scoots into the frame and tries to comfort her. James uploaded the video, which has racked up more than five million views, writing: 'When I met her she was still able to hear.' But her condition worsened, and Cora underwent surgery to receive a cochlear implant, which is a small hearing device fitted under the skin behind the ear Advertisement Alexandre Bissonnette is suspected of carrying out the Quebec City mosque massacre alone White university student Alexandre Bissonnette has been named as the sole suspect accused of killing six men at a Quebec City mosque. Bissonnette, 27, was arrested alongside Moroccan-Canadian Mohamed el Khadir on Sunday night after six men were shot dead at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center during evening prayers. On Monday afternoon, Surete du Quebec, the investigating police force, confirmed one of the men was no longer facing charges. A source later told Reuters police were looking at Bissonnette as a 'lone wolf'. The political sciences and anthropology student, who is from the affluent Quebec City suburb Cap-Rouge, will appear in court sometime on Monday or Tuesday. Other students described him to DailyMail.com as a pro-Trump loner but a timid man who didn't seem capable of committing an act of terror. Six men aged between 39 and 60 were killed at the mosque and five remain in a critical condition in intensive care at Quebec City's Hopital de l'Enfant-Jesus after the killings on Sunday night. Twelve others had less serious injuries and another 39 escaped from the mosque unharmed. Among the victims is a government IT worker, the mosque's concierge, a halal butcher who worked next door and an Algerian-Canadian professor from the university where Bissonnette is enrolled. They were shot as they observed evening prayers at the mosque which said security had become a 'major' concern. El Khadir was picked up by police at the mosque but Bissonnette fled in his Mitsubishi and was arrested in nearby Ile d'Orleans around 20 minutes later after calling 911, Le Soleil reports. Police found two rifles and an AK-47 in the car. Court clerk Isabelle Ferland earlier identified the pair as the two men arrested in connection with the shooting. Police are not seeking anyone else in connection with the attack which was is being treated as an act of terror. Scroll down for video Bissonnette fled the scene in his Mitsubishi but called 911 himself later to turn himself in, local media reported. His car was spotted on the side of the road with a police vehicle behind it on Sunday night Bissonnette is a student at Laval University. A friend of Bissonnette's said he was pro-Trump and conservative but did not think he was capable of violence Crime scene: Two people were initially arrested for the attack at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center on Sunday night. Police continued working at the mosque late into the night (above) A police officer stood guard at the men's entrance to the mosque, one of the largest in Quebec, late on Sunday night as forensic investigations continued Quebec City Police continued to work at the scene late into the night on Sunday as investigators questioned Bissonnette and Mohamed el Khadir A classmate told DailyMail.com that Bissonnette was pro-Donald Trump and that they had engaged in political arguments about the president. 'Based on the conversations that I had with him during the American presidential campaign, it's true he is pro-Trump,' the student, who asked to remain anonymous, said. He added that he Bissonnette had 'never demonstrated' a violent side but that he didn't 'fit in' among peers. Fellow students said Bissonnette didn't 'fit in well' at the university where he is studying political sciences and anthropology 'Yes, he was conservative in the political sense but despite the profound differences between us, he never showed or suggested that political violence or terrorism was something he was capable of. 'He didn't fit in well at university.' Laval University's rector said he would would assist authorities in any way he could but has not yet confirmed Bissonnette's enrollment. Neither he nor el Khadir was known to police before Sunday night's atrocity. Police searched Bissonnette's home in Cap Rouge overnight. They were seen searching el Khadir's apartment which is less than a kilometer from the mosque on Monday, TVA reports. The shooting came as protests erupted across the US in response to President Donald Trump's immigration ban against seven Muslim-majority countries which Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned earlier on Sunday. Prime Minister Trudeau gave an emotional speech at Ottawa's House of Commons on Monday, telling peers: 'Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack.' The parliament observed a minute's silence to honor the victims. The prime minister also issued a message of support to the country's Muslim community. 'Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack': Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau gave an emotional speech in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill on Monday 'Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. 'Last night's horrible crime against the Muslim community was an act of terror committed against Canada and against all Canadians. 'We will grieve with you. We will defend you. We will love you. And we will stand with you,' he said. President Trump called Prime Minister Trudeau to offer his condolences on Monday afternoon. 'This is another senseless act of violence that cannot be tolerated. We condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms. Laval University professor Khaled Belkacemi was among those who were killed 'It's a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant, and why the president is taking steps to be proactive instead of reactive when it comes to our nation's safety and security. 'We are of course praying for those injured in the attack, and are keeping in close contact with officials in Quebec and Canada,' White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said. Quebec Police have given no suggested motive for the killings but confirmed it was being treated as an act of terror. They are also looking in to whether a pig's head left outside the mosque last year is connected to the incident. 'We're still in the early stages of the investigation, we're still trying to determine all the facts associated with the incident and not interfere with the progress of the investigation so we're not going to discuss the specifics at this time,' Martin Plante of the Gendarmerie royale du Canada said at a press conference on Monday morning. Among the victims is Laval University professor Khaled Belkacemi who worked in the agricultural sciences department. 'I want to express on behalf of the entire university community my profound sadness in announcing the death of Khaled Belkacemi, who was a victim of the attack at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center. 'I echo the comments of the head of the FSAA in honoring the kind and professional skills of our colleague. He was a passionate and engaged in the faculty's work. 'His remarkable body of work will outlive his unexpected death which has saddened us profoundly,' rector Denis Briere said. Two thousand police officers were deployed across the city on Sunday as a precaution after the deadly shootings. Police continued to patrol the streets surrounding the mosque on Monday Police continued to search the perimeter around the mosque on Monday as the suspect awaited his first court appearance A police officer searches beneath a car outside the Quebec Islamic Cultural Center in the aftermath of the shooting A large police presence remained at the mosque on Sunday as investigators continued to work inside and around the city Two men were arrested on Sunday but police are yet to reveal a possible motive. Officers remained at the mosque on Monday Mourners began laying flowers at the scene of the attack on Monday as authorities worked to piece together how it unfolded As investigators continued to work at the mosque on Monday (above) police were led to a home in a residential street 10 minutes away by one of the suspects 'MAKE NO MISTAKE, THIS WAS A TERRORIST ATTACK' Prime Minister Justin Trudeau leads a minute's silence in the Ottawa House of Commons on Monday after the attack Prime Minister Justin Trudeau held a minute's silence for those killed in the attack at the House of Commons on Monday after an emotional speech. 'Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack,' he said, before issuing a heartfelt message to the country's Muslim community. 'Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. 'Last night's horrible crime against the Muslim community was an act of terror committed against Canada and against all Canadians. 'We will grieve with you. We will defend you. We will love you. And we will stand with you,' he said. On Sunday, Prime Minister Trudeau released a statement immediately after the attack where he deemed it an act of terror on Muslims. 'It was with tremendous shock, sadness and anger that I heard of this evenings tragic and fatal shooting at the Centre culturel islamique de Quebec located in the Ste-Foy neighbourhood of the city of Quebec. 'We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge. 'On behalf of all Canadians, Sophie and I offer our deepest condolences to the family and friends of all those who have died, and we wish a speedy recovery to those who have been injured. 'While authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, it is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. 'Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country. Canadian law enforcement agencies will protect the rights of all Canadians, and will make every effort to apprehend the perpetrators of this act and all acts of intolerance. 'Tonight, we grieve with the people of Ste-Foy and all Canadians.' Advertisement He confirmed one of the suspects had called police himself but refused to give any more details. 'The suspect dialed 911 and identified himself as being involved with the incident.' Prime Minister Trudeau earlier described the mass killing as a 'terrorist attack on Muslims'. 'We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge. While authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, it is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. 'Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. 'Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country. 'Canadian law enforcement agencies will protect the rights of all Canadians, and will make every effort to apprehend the perpetrators of this act and all acts of intolerance. 'Tonight, we grieve with the people of Ste-Foy and all Canadians.' Vigils were been planned to take place on Monday across the country as the first harrowing details of the shooting emerged. Survivors: Among those pictured leaving the mosque after the attack on Sunday evening were young boys People gathered on mounds of snow outside the mosque as police taped off the scene on Sunday night Armed police stayed at the scene overnight to patrol it as others worked inside the mosque. Security at mosques across the US was heightened in response to the slayings The mosque's vice president Mohamed Labidi choked back tears as he admitted security had been a 'major' concern for staff Archbishop of Quebec Cardinal Gerald LaCroix wept as he was embraced by Pope Francis on Monday at the Santa Marta Residence at the Vatican The flag at Peace Tower in Ottawa was lowered to half-mast on Monday in memory of the victims Quebec Prime Minister Philippe Couillard (right) issued a message to Muslim citizens on Monday in the wake of the attack, telling them at a press conference: 'We are with you, this is your home, we are all Quebecers' The mosque was attacked at around 8pm Sunday evening while around 50 people prayed inside Witnesses told how the killer burst into the mosque dressed in black waterproof jacket at around 8pm. The mosque's president Mohamed Yangui was left in total shock by the killings. 'Why is this happening here? This is barbaric,' he said. Worshiper Ali Hamadi said he left the mosque a few minutes before the shooting but that his friend, married father-of-three Abdelkrim Hassen, died in the attack. Mosque officials spoke of the tragedy on Monday at a press conference where they admitted being scared of such attacks in the past. 'It's a very, very big tragedy for us. We have a sadness we cannot express,' Vice President Mohamed Labidi said as he choked back tears. NYPD INCREASES PATROLS AROUND PLACES OF WORSHIP The New York Police Department is stepping up patrols at mosques and other places of worship in the city after six people were shot dead in a mosque in Quebec City, Canada. 'NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something,' New York City Mayor Bill Blasio said on Twitter. 'Our prayers are with the people of Quebec City as they deal with a terrible attack on a mosque. We must stand together,' Blasio said in another tweet. Earlier de Blasio sent a message directly to Muslims living in the city: 'To my fellow New Yorkers who are Muslim: New York City will protect you. The NYPD will protect you. We will fight all hatred and bias.' The department says it's monitoring the situation in Quebec City. Advertisement Mohamed Oudghiri normally attends prayers but missed Sunday's prayers. He told journalists: 'We are not safe here' A man holds a sign that reads 'la paix pas la guerre' or 'peace, not war' near a Quebec city mosque after the deadly shooting NYPD INCREASES PATROLS AROUND PLACES OF WORSHIP The New York Police Department is stepping up patrols at mosques and other places of worship in the city after six people were shot dead in a mosque in Quebec City, Canada. 'NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something,' New York City Mayor Bill Blasio said on Twitter. 'Our prayers are with the people of Quebec City as they deal with a terrible attack on a mosque. We must stand together,' Blasio said in another tweet. Earlier de Blasio sent a message directly to Muslims living in the city: 'To my fellow New Yorkers who are Muslim: New York City will protect you. The NYPD will protect you. We will fight all hatred and bias.' The department says it's monitoring the situation in Quebec City. Advertisement 'Security at our mosque was our major, major concern. But we were caught off guard,' he added. Police stood guard at the men's entrance to the mosque on Monday after putting up a perimeter the night before and there has been an increase in security at places of worship around the country. Other cities are upping security in light of recent attacks at Muslim places of worship. New York City mayor Bill de Blasio said on Twitter: 'The awful attack in Quebec is not an outlier. 'Today, a mosque in Texas was burned to the ground. We must stop those who seek to divide us.'NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something.' The Islamic Center of Victoria was ablaze at around 2am on Saturday. Local fire fighters are yet to reveal what started the fire. Quebec premier Philippe Couillard said there will be solidarity rallies across the region on Monday and says the province's people will all be together to express horror French President Francois Hollande on Monday condemned 'in the strongest possible terms' what he called an 'odious attack'. A pig's head was left outside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center in June. Police are investigating whether it is connected to the shooting 'It's the spirit of peace and openness of the people of Quebec that the terrorists wanted to hit,' added Hollande. German Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman condemned the 'despicable'. Steffen Seibert said the German leader was shocked by the shooting. Seibert said: 'If the killers intended to set people of different faiths against each other or to divide them, they must not and will not succeed in that. 'We stand in mourning beside the Muslim community in Quebec.' A pig's head was left at the mosque last year during the holy month of Ramadan in another heinous attack. Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them North African emigrants. Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of Quebec was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighboring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Yesterday, a Texas mosque was ravaged by a fire just hours after President Donald Trump signed an executive order restricting migration from seven predominantly Muslim countries. A clerk at a convenience store spotted smoke and flames billowing from the Islamic Center of Victoria at around 2am on Saturday. The fire department spent more than four hours battling the blaze. Tragic discovery: Bernard 'Butch' Gore, 71, had dementia and was without his medication. His body was found in a stairwell on Friday morning The son of the elderly man found dead in a stairwell at Sydney's Westfield Bondi Junction has paid tribute to his father as his family wait for answers on just how he wasn't found for three weeks. The body of Bernard 'Butch' Gore, 71, was found in a stairwell at the major shopping centre about 8.30am on Friday morning, devastating relatives who had spent weeks trying to find him. 'Our dad was not frail,' his son Mark Gore told Daily Mail Australia on Monday. 'He was a strong and resilient man.' Mr Gore said reports his father - a barber who still cut his friends' hair to this day - was 'confused' were not correct. Westfield is facing questions on how Mr Gore's body went undiscovered for such a long time - in a time where temperatures skyrocketed to the mid-40s. But the family said they are grieving and waiting for the results of the investigation before they pass judgment. 'We're just not there at the moment,' Mr Gore said. Known as 'Butch' to his mates, Mr Gore was originally from Tasmania and had been staying with his daughter at Ocean Street in Woollahra in the weeks before his disappearance. 'He was a strong and resilient man,' said Bernard Gore's son Mark (pictured) Police are seen outside the fire stairwell at Bondi Junction where Bernard 'Butch' Gore's body was discovered on Friday morning Police, emergency services and family had launched a mammoth effort to find Bernard 'Butch' Gore. His body was finally found on Friday morning He went missing carrying only $30 and his transport Opal card when he did not turn up to meet his family at the shopping centre on January 6. Mr Gore's family and police had pleaded for information leading to his safe return in recent weeks. 'My father would not want to bother anyone if he was lost, and I think it's unlikely he'd approach a stranger for help,' Mark said at a press conference on January 10. 'I hope someone will notice him alone and ask if he needed help; he'd probably say he was fine but people need to contact police if they think it is him.' Search parties had scoured nearby Centennial Park after reported sightings. He had successfully made the journey between home and the shopping centre several times before. The police rescue unit worked with local cops, officers on horseback and police helicopters to scour Centennial Park for the missing Mr Gore - but unfortunately he was not found Police officers swarmed the Westfield complex in Sydney's east on Friday after the shocking discovery in the fire stairwell Detectives (left, right) are seen here huddling outside the fire escape where Mr Gore's body was found on Friday morning Police blocked off the fire escape as shocked shoppers arrived at Westfield Bondi Junction early on Friday On Friday, the body was found in the fire escape near the level three access close to luxury stores such as Scotch and Soda, Chanel, Jimmy Choo and Leona Edmiston. A maintenance worker was the first to locate the body, reports said. The body is understood to have been there for a number of days and was decomposed. His death is not being treated as suspicious. In a statement on Friday afternoon, NSW Police said although the body had not formally been identified, investigators believed it to be Mr Gore. Police will investigate the death and prepare a report for the Coroner. A spokeswoman for Westfield's parent company, Scentre Group, offered their 'deepest condolences to the family of the man found today at Westfield Bondi Junction.' 'Investigations are still underway to determine exactly how these sad and tragic circumstances could have occurred, and Scentre Group will continue to work with police in their investigations,' she said. A NSW police spokeswoman said a crime scene was established about 8.30am. Police will investigate the death and compile a report for the Coroner Humbled and vulnerable after his affair with best friend Billy Brownless's wife was exposed, Garry Lyon spent most of 2016 away from the limelight. But it seems the footy star is now back and ready to face his demons head-on as he kicks off 2017 with a return to radio on SEN. During his first show it was revealed Lyon also sat down for a full interview with Mike Sheahan about how he has spent the past 12 months, including his battle with depression and return to public life. Scroll down for audio Garry Lyon returned to the spotlight on Monday morning as he took part in a radio broadcast for SEN, teasing a tell-all interview about his troubled 2016 In a preview of that interview, Lyon said dealing with depression had been 'humbling' because it requires you to 'it just strips all ego from you' In a preview of the interview, which is due to air in full after 8am on Tuesday, Lyon says: 'What I can tell you, it has been the most humbling process in my life. 'Because when you get to this stage in your life, when you lose control of your emotions, it just strips all ego from you, because you are in the hands, or your fall at the feet at whoever can help you. 'You have this situation where you can't control your emotional state. I've historically been a confident person, I've got a really healthy ego. 'Sometimes your self awareness isn't what it should be, because you can get carried away ... you ride your success without stopping to say, hang on, where am I at. 'If anything, I've never been more self aware then I have been right now, and hopefully, you know, I'll come back with a degree of humility that helps me recognise maybe in others, if they are struggling.' Asked about why he had chosen to do the interview, Lyon said he 'didn't regret it' and added that people will feel the need to talk about what happened to him Lyon (second right) was forced out of the public eye early in 2016 after it was revealed he had an affair with Nicky Brownless (second left), wife of fellow presenter and best mate Billy (left) Speaking about his decision to lay his struggles bare in an interview, he said: 'I wasn't sorry I did it [the interview]. 'I cant sit here and not expect some talk about what has happened in the past 12 months or so.' Lyon dropped all of his presenting duties in 2016 after his affair with Nicky Brownless was exposed in early February. The fallout caused a rift between Lyon and close friend and fellow presenter Billy, and ultimately led to the collapse of the latter's marriage. Lyon and Nicky are now reported to be in a loving relationship, while Billy has admitted his own fast-paced lifestyle meant he wasn't always the best husband. A young New Zealand man who filmed himself obstructing police from arresting his father in heated scenes has been slammed on social media. The footage, from the Waikato district, shows officers arriving to carrying out a warrant at the father's house for failing to attend a court appearance. The young man repeatedly hurls abuse and threatens the officers. But now the son is on the receiving end of an avalanche of abuse on Facebook, where commenters took him to task for wasting police resources. Tense footage shows police arriving to arrest a man before his son begins hurling abuse at them 'Hope he got arrested and charged for wasting your time. Everyone needs to back off the cops',' wrote one commenter. The man initially demands officers state their names and show warrants, telling them 'I fear for my life!' However when they arrested his father the man issues violent threats, telling police 'you're lucky we don't kill you,' and tussling with the officers. 'This guy is nuts! ...f*** off with your consent,' wrote another. The guy with a camera is embarrassing all kiwis. Makes the cops play by the law yet he is above it... what a joke'.' A New Zealand Police spokesperson told Daily Mail Australia they defended the actions of the officer in the footage. The man hurls death threats at the calm officers and tussles with them as they arrest his father The son has faced an avalanche of abuse on Facebook, where commenters took him to task for wasting police resources 'Police can meet with resistance at any time during their operational duties, and are trained to deal with and diffuse conflict when it arises on the job. 'The officers in this instance showed a calm and measured approach to dealing with this situation.' The spokesperson warned the public not to jump to conclusions about images and videos on social media of isolated incidents. Malcolm Turnbull has refused to comment on Donald Trump's controversial ban on Muslim-majority travel to the United States. President Trump has banned people from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen, from travelling to the U.S. for 90-days. This could also affect Australian dual nationals, or people who have travelled to any of the seven countries in recent years. Mr Turnbull could not be drawn to comment on the travel ban from Canberra on Monday, despite his frontbenchers appearing to support the U.S. President. Scroll down for video Malcolm Turnbull has refused to comment on Donald Trump's controversial ban on Muslim-majority travel to the United States (Mr Turnbull pictured at press conference on Monday) President Donald Trump is pictured holding up a signed Executive Order in the Oval Office of the White House 'It's not my job as Prime Minister of Australia to run a commentary on the domestic policies of other countries,' Mr Turnbull said. He said no Australian citizens had sought assistance from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade regarding the ban as yet. Mr Turnbull confirmed Donald Trump's decision to honour a deal with the US to resettle asylum seekers from Nauru and Manus Island. Following a 25-minute conversation with the new president, the prime minister said the pair discussed the arrangement struck under the previous Obama administration. 'It's not my job as Prime Minister of Australia to run a commentary on the domestic policies of other countries,' Mr Turnbull said Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, actress Nicole Kidman, and Ms Bishop's partner David Panton attend the 2017 G'Day Black Tie Gala in Hollywood on Saturday Demonstrators poured into JFK airport in New York on Saturday to protest Trump's order People chant and hold signs as they protest against the travel ban at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport arrivals gate in Dallas, Texas on Sunday 'I thank President Trump for his commitment to honour that existing agreement,' Mr Turnbull told reporters at the press conference. Mr Turnbull refused to provide further details about the agreement but said screening was a matter for US officials. Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said the process may take some time, as he warned people smugglers not to exploit the announcement as an opportunity to put people on boats. 'The government's resolve remains as strong as it's ever been,' he said. Deputy opposition leader Tanya Plibersek said the government needed to remove the 'shroud of secrecy' surrounding the deal. Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said the process to move refugees to the U.S. may take some time More than 1,000 people gathered at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport to protest Trump's order that restricts immigration on Saturday 'It has taken way too long for people on Manus Island and Nauru to be resettled,' she told reporters in Sydney. Ms Plibersek also accused the Prime Minister of being 'missing in action' on the issue of the U.S. travel ban. 'We don't know how this ban will affect Australian citizens or permanent residents who were born in one of these countries,' she told reporters on Monday. 'I think it's absolutely vital now that the Australian Government seek clarification about how this will affect Australian citizens.' Mr Turnbull's press conference comes after Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said she supported strong border policies. Ms Bishop attended the 2017 G'Day Black Tie Gala on Saturday in Los Angeles (she is pictured with John Travolta) Demonstrators gathered in San Francisco International Airport Saturday to protest against the ban on immigration on Saturday 'I'm confident that the Australian government and the U.S. government will continue to support each other in ensuring that we can implement our strong immigration and border protection policies,' Ms Bishop said in Los Angeles. 'The Australian government is working very closely with the administration and the US officials and we want to ensure that Australians continue to have access to the United States, as they have in the past, and people from the United States have access to Australia.' Treasurer Scott Morrison also said the U.S. President was merely fulfilling an election promise. 'They've had an election and the president has implemented what he said he would do,' he said on 2GB radio on Monday morning. A spokeswoman for Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says officials are in talks with US counterparts to get clarity on how the temporary ban on those from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen may affect dual nationals. Hundreds of people demonstrate outside Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Sunday A sea of protesters gathered outside of Terminal 4 of JFK after people from Muslim countries were detained at border control 'The Australian embassy in Washington is engaging with US officials on the potential implications of the suspension for Australian travellers, including dual nationals,' a spokeswoman told AAP in a statement. All travellers are being warned that rules could change at short notice. 'Travellers should contact the nearest embassy or consulate of the United States for the most current information,' the spokeswoman added. President Trump's executive order, signed on Friday, temporarily bans people from the seven countries from visiting the U.S. for 90 days. All refugees have been banned for 120 days, while Syrian refugees have been banned indefinitely. A couple's house was trashed when New Zealand police stormed in looking for a wanted man who was never there. Heavily-armed officers fired at least half a dozen teargas canisters into Greg Cummins' two-bedroom Tamatea home on Friday night after a three-hour stakeout. The canisters smashed windows and embedded in walls, burned carpet, and melted lino - forcing the couple to move into a motel indefinitely at public expense. A couple's house was trashed when New Zealand police stormed in looking for a wanted man who was never there Heavily-armed officers fired at least half a dozen teargas canisters into Greg Cummins' two-bedroom Tamatea home on Friday night after a three-hour stakeout Police were looking for serial offender Shawn Harding and got a tip he was hiding out at Mr Cummin's house, who he knew since they were teenagers. 'The police just made the biggest c**k-up, they've totally destroyed the house,' he told Hawke's Bay Today. The angry resident said he was relaxing with a beer after work when police showed up at about 5pm and pointed a gun at his wife when she opened the front door. When he stepped outside to investigate the noise, Mr Cummins was immediately handcuffed and dragged out to the street where other residents had been evacuated. Police were looking for serial violent offender Shawn Harding (pictured) and got a tip he was hiding out at Mr Cummin's house The canisters smashed windows and embedded in walls, burned carpet, and melted lino - forcing the couple to move into a motel indefinitely at public expense A hole in the wall from a teargas canister fired through a window He insisted he hadn't seen Harding in two weeks and told him not to come over if he was wanted by police, but officers didn't believe him. 'They told me that's not the way we do things, 99 per cent of the time we find the people under the bed,' he said. Acting Hawke's Bay area commander Inspector Andy Sloan would not say where their tip came from or comment on the tactics used in the raid. 'Police in matters such as this must take precautionary actions to ensure public safety,' he said, saying they used 'necessary steps' to confirm if Harding was there. Mr Cummins insisted he hadn't seen Harding in two weeks and told him not to come over if he was wanted by police, but officers didn't believe him Acting Hawke's Bay area commander Inspector Andy Sloan would not say where their tip came from or comment on the tactics used in the raid Harding, who Mr Cummins said had become 'institutionalised', is wanted for driving offences but has a long history of violent crime. He was jailed for 7.5 years in 2005 for, while on amphetamine, stabbing his ex-girlfriend so hard he broke the blade of the knife, and for ramming a car off the road and attacking it with an axe. The 40-year-old spent a week on the run before walking into a courtroom holding a bag of clothes and waiting to be arrested. A year from finishing his parole he robbed a chainsaw shop and had to finish his sentence plus another 3.5 years, before finally being released in 2014. The American Civil Liberties Union raised more than $24m this weekend, which is five times what it would raise in a single year. The non-profit, non-partisan organization found itself going head-to-head against Presidential Donald Trump, who on Friday signed an executive order barring nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. The donations from 356,306 people online averaged $68 per person. Scroll down for video A large sum: The American Civil Liberties Union received more than $24m following its legal battle with Donald Trump and his executive order banning immigrants from 7 countries this weekend The donations from 356,306 people online averaged $68 per person. Pictured: ACLU executive director Anthony Romero CNN commentator Brian Stelter tweeted that this sum was five times what the organization would raise in a single year. The union had, as of Saturday morning, also welcomed 150,000 new members, Yahoo reported. The group's membership has grown since November - when Trump was elected - by more than 100 percent, from 400,000 to more than 1m. ACLU's executive director Anthony Romero told the news site: 'People are fired up and want to be engaged. What we've seen is an unprecedented public reaction to the challenges of the Trump administration.' National political director Faiz Shakir added: 'I hope Trump enjoys losing. He's going to lose so much we're going to get sick and tired of his losing.' Anthony Romero said: 'People are fired up and want to be engaged. What we've seen is an unprecedented public reaction to the challenges of the Trump administration' Trump's order called 'Protection Of The Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into The United States,' prohibits entry to the United States to all nationals of seven Muslim-majority states: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 120 days. It also bans citizens from these countries from securing a visa for 90 days. A senior Homeland Security official told Reuters that roughly 375 travelers were immediately affected by the order. Out of the 375, 109 were in transit to the US and denied entry. Another 173 people were stopped by airlines from boarding an aircraft to the US. An additional 81 travelers with green cards or special immigrant visas received waivers. The stay issued Saturday evening by federal judge Ann Donnelly in Brooklyn blocks the situation pending a permanent ruling. The stay issued Saturday evening by federal judge Ann Donnelly in Brooklyn blocks the situation pending a permanent ruling. The ACLU lawyers who handled the case also filed a motion for class certification, which means other people affected by the order will be able to benefit from the stay as part of a class action lawsuit. The Trump administration will likely appeal the ruling and other stays ordered in states including Virginia and Massachusetts. Donnelly's order applied specifically to those immediately and directly affected by the order, i.e. those who had already been granted visas and are now seeing them taken away retroactively. But the ACLU is further arguing that Trump's entire order, which prioritizes Christian refugees, is unconstitutional under the First Amendment. It remains to be seen how the legal controversy will be resolved. WHAT IS THE EMERGENCY STAY? The emergency stay issued Saturday evening by a federal court is a temporary measure that preserves the status quo pending a permanent ruling. It means that none of the travelers currently held at airports across the nation can be deported back to their countries. That is because Judge Ann Donnelly ruled that doing so would cause the travelers irreparable harm. The stay does not, however, mean that the travelers have to be let into the United States. It is unclear what will happen to those detained. The stay is not a ruling on Donald Trump's executive order enforcing the immigration ban. Lawyers had filed a petition on behalf of two out of 12 refugees detained at JFK airport. The men, two Iraqi nationals, had valid visas. One of them had worked for the US government for years. ACLU attorneys had filed a petition on their behalf, but the stay is effective nationwide. The lawyers who handled the case have also filed for class certification, which means other people affected by the order will be able to benefit from the stay as part of a class action. Advertisement A viral photo which shows an enormous great white shark lurking in the water beneath a 10-year-old boy surfing a wave has divided the internet. Eden Hasson was catching the last of the light while surfing at Samurai Beach in NSW on Tuesday evening when his dad spotted the suspicious shape in the water. And while the youngster raced to shore and received international attention for his spectacular 'brush with death', many surfers online were less than convinced. Some even labelled the photo a 'hoax', pointing out that the shape in the water looked similar to another surfer diving beneath the wave with his board. Enormous great white shark or surfer diving under a wave? The internet has been divided over a photograph uploaded to social media on Tuesday Eden Hasson, 10, was surfing at Samurai Beach in NSW when his father Chris captured this amazing image from the shore A number of social media users claimed the photograph was a 'hoax' and 'publicity stunt' One woman pointed out that sharks go into a state of temporary paralysis when upside down 'This is too funny you got your time on TV for a hoax - it's so obvious to anyone who surfs that this is another surfer duck diving,' wrote one man. 'The more I look the more it looks like a surfer duck diving to get out of the way,' added another. 'It is another surfer duck diving a wave and not a shark. Granted it looks awful similar but the grey you can see breaking the surface really isn't in the right spot and you can make out his feet,' said another. Other users pointed out it was unlikely a great white shark of that size would have been floating upside down with its mouth facing the sky. What do YOU think? The young surfer said he first thought that what he surfed over was seaweed (pictured) Not convinced: A number of people took to Facebook to suggest that the 'shark' was in fact a surfer 'duck diving' out of the young boy's way But Eden's father, lifetime surfer Chris Hasson, firmly denied the claims (post pictured above) Most sharks typically experience tonic immobility - a natural state of paralysis - when they go upside down. But Eden's father, lifetime surfer Chris Hasson, firmly denied the claims and said that all four surfers in the water could confirm that the photo had not been doctored and was definitely a shark. 'It's legit as I took photo and there were only four guys out and I called them in straight away and showed them photo,' he wrote online. 'Haha (it's an) optical illusion. Sorry conspiracy theorists. The four guys out will validate. Definitely a shark, legit you trolls.' Eden had been out surfing at at Samurai Beach in NSW (pictured) with his friends He was standing on the rocks taking photographs of his son when he saw a dark shadow in the water. Mr Hasson, who is a Nelson Bay real estate agent with Real Estate Friendly, was snapping away when he zoomed in and caught the head of a three-metre great white shark just as Eden glided his board over it. 'Check it's mouth,' Mr Hasson told his friends via Facebook at the time the photo was taken. 'It's rolled over having a good look at his yummy yellow new wetsuit.' Mr Hasson said the extraordinary photograph came about as Eden rode the wave to the beach. He quickly zoomed in and was shocked at the image he saw. 'Eden was half way out and I called everyone in. I showed them the photo and everyone was in awe laughing,' Mr Hasson said, 'One of the surfers said just before the wave a large school of mullet arrived.' A young mother has revealed how her ex-partner tortured and killed their one-month-old baby because he 'couldn't handle her screaming'. Baby Paige was killed by her father, Michael John Humphreys, in September 2012, and he was sentenced to nine years behind bars on Friday. But for Paige's mum Sarah Mooney, now 26, the death of her beautiful baby girl was a 'life sentence' that has left her wondering what she could have done differently to save her child. Paige Humphreys died aged one-month after her father abused her 'for most of her life' because he 'couldn't handle her screaming' A Brisbane court found baby Paige had been 'tortured for most of her life', Ms Mooney said the first time she saw a mark on her daughter was when she was ten-days-old. She told the Gympie Times there was a lump behind her baby's left ear but she believed Humphreys when he told her their baby had rolled off a bed. When Ms Mooney suggested she get the bump looked at by doctors she was attacked. 'I tried everything I could to take her to the hospital, but I had someone holding me up against the wall by my throat - saying if I did he would be accused of bashing Paige and my two other children would be taken off me,' Ms Mooney said. The mother-of-three had given birth via C-section and was still recovering during this first attack. She said it was 'physically impossible' for her to get out of her violent relationship by then because Humphreys had control of her car, finances and mobile phone. She said she feared if she did anything he would hurt her other children. Michael John Humphreys, in September 2012, he has now been sentenced to nine years behind bars The attacks on baby Paige became more public over time first he would verbally abuse the weeks-old baby for crying then one day he hit her in front of Mooney. 'He could not physically handle her screaming,' she said. Ms Mooney started sleeping in another room, with Paige on her chest 'to protect her' but that wasn't enough. The day before Paige died her mother found a hand print on her back. The next morning when Ms Mooney woke her baby was dead. Six weeks later she found her baby had suffered broken vertebrae and ribs, a fractured skull and a bleeding spleen and pancreas prior to death. Brisbane Supreme Court Justice David Boddice handed down Humphreys' sentence labeling the attacks on her as 'systematic and persistent' abuse. 'It is inconceivable that one human being could do that to a baby of that age,' Justice Boddice said. Anthony Mundine has explained why he won't be standing for the national anthem during Friday night's grudge bout against Danny Green. The firebrand boxer says he's trying to educate people that Advance Australia Fair is a theme song for the white Australia policy which is unjust to indigenous Australians. 'I am a man that stands against wrong and I think that is a big wrong in our country. And I can't stand for something that I don't believe in,' Mundine told reporters in Adelaide on Monday. Anthony Mundine has explained why he won't be standing for the national anthem during Friday night's grudge bout against Danny Green The indigenous boxer said Advance Australia Fair was a theme song for the white Australia policy Danny Green shadow-boxes during a public workout ahead of the highly-anticipated clash '"Advance Australia Fair", if you speak to your historians and educated college professors, (it's) fair - as in white fair - not as in fair go,' he told SBS. 'That was the theme song for the white Australia policy, from 1901 to the early 1970s when Aboriginal people weren't even considered citizens.' The Indigenous boxer, and former rugby league star, also said Jessica Mauboy was chosen to sing the anthem in Adelaide on Friday 'because she is black'. He called on Mauboy to not go ahead with singing the anthem at the Friday match in Adelaide because 'it's not for our people'. 'They are just using her because she is black,' Mundine told Daily Telegraph. Mundine said he was not trying to divide Australians but his people are not 'young and free'. 'That was the theme song for the white Australia policy': Mundine says he's trying to educate people (Mundine is pictured in September last year at his Redfern gym) Mundine speaks to a crowd of reporters in Adelaide following his public workout on Monday 'They are just using her because she is black,' Mundine said of Jessica Mauboy (pictured singing carols at The Domain in December last year) Event organisers and Foxtel are now reportedly in talks to find a resolution and it's possible the anthem will be performed before opponents enter the ring. 'Who cares what Anthony Mundine is saying?' One Nation Senator Pauline Hanson told Sunrise. 'That is his opinion, but the fact is, we have teachers in schools who are telling kids, children, you don't have to stand for the national anthem. They're saying if you find it offensive, don't stand and leave the classroom. 'We are saying this in our classrooms. Why should we worry about what Anthony Mundine is saying? I am more concerned about what the kids are being taught in our classrooms.' In a press conference on Monday afternoon, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said he did not agree with Mundine. 'Our national anthem unites all Australians, I don't agree with him. 'From our First Australians, to the newest baby in the arms of a migrant mother.' Not the first time: In September, Mundine encouraged NRL and AFL players to boycott the anthem at the grand finals in a Facebook post At the time Mundine said the national anthem was written when 'blackfullas were considered fauna (animals)' Danny Green takes pictures with spectators at a public workout in Adelaide In September, Mundine encouraged NRL and AFL players to boycott the anthem at the grand finals. 'The anthem was written in late 1700s where blackfullas were considered fauna (animals). Advance Australia Fair as in white not fair as in fair go,' Mundine wrote on Facebook. 'All players aboriginal & non aboriginal should boycott the anthem & start changing Australia's ignorant mentality... lets move forward together yo.' Former league players Larry Corowa and Joe Williams joined in the call for players to boycott the anthem. Mr Turnbull criticised the boycott in September, and Today Show host Karl Stefanovic called it 'ridiculous'. Mundine and Green last competed in 2006, more than 10 years ago. Daily Mail Australia has contacted Foxtel, Danny Green and Jessica Mauboy teams for comment. An Iranian-born Australian engineer who has been working in the United States said Donald Trump's controversial new immigration ban has made her feel like a prisoner of the government. Shadi Sherafat travelled to Chicago two years ago on her Australian passport to work for a mechanical engineering company, but now says she is afraid to take a planned trip home to see friends next month because she might not be allowed to return. The 33-year-old dual national told Fairfax Media if she is stopped from re-entering the U.S. from Australia she will lose her job and will be homeless. Shadi Sherafat (pictured), an Iranian-Australian engineer who is working in Chicago, said she feels like a prisoner of the United States government Ms Sherafat is just one of thousands of Australians who may be effected by President Donald Trump's (pictured) controversial new immigration ban Ms Sherafat, who has a master's degree from Melbourne University, also worries she will be forced to leave the United States when her visa ends in April. She said the entire situation and Foreign Minister Julie Bishop's announcement Australia would stand by President Trump's executive order has left her feeling heartbroken. 'I feel like a prisoner of the US government.' 'When I saw Julie Bishop's response I was really shocked. This gives me no hope, zero hope. I did have a little bit of hope because I have an Australian passport. But now me, an Australian professional that doesn't practice any religion - I'm basically banned from leaving the country or returning to Australia,' Ms Sherafat told Farifax. Ms Sherafat said she has written to Joe Hockey, Australian ambassador to the U.S., but is considering leaving the country because she doesn't feel welcome. Massive protests have broken out throughout at airports throughout the United States since President Trump's executive order went into force Perth businessman Kim Greenock (pictured) said he witnessed an Australian academic being turned back at the border while in the processing queue at LAX It comes after an Australian academic was stopped from entering the U.S. because she was born in a country on President Trump's ban blacklist. That's according to a Perth businessman who witnessed the moment the woman was turned back at Los Angeles airport at the weekend. Kim Greenock told ABC Radio he overheard the academic protesting to border control workers: 'I was on a plane when this all happened'. 'She was an academic and she said she was travelling on business to a conference,' Mr Greenock recalled. The academic told customs officials she had lived in Australia for 17 years but the border officer said they could see she was from one of the banned countries. Protester Judy Lewis holds a sign at Los Angeles International airport - where an Australian dual national was apparently turned back at the weekend She protested 'I live in Australia, I've got a child' but was refused entry. When the woman continued to take issue with the officer, the academic was warned in strong terms. 'If you protest we will force you to leave and then you will have a problem,' she was told. 'So when the ban is lifted you may not be able to come to the United States again.' The Trump Administration has temporarily barred people from seven Muslim majority countries from visiting the U.S. The nations blacklisted in President Trump's executive order are Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Libya and Yemen. Demonstrators have swamped airports from California (above) to New York in protest of the so-called 'Muslim ban' - which largely affects residents of Muslim countries Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has asked Australian officials to ensure our nationals receive preferential treatment - like Canadian and British citizens Under the terms of Mr Trump's order, the U.S. has also shut its doors to refugees from around the world. Hundreds of U.S. workers with Green Cards - formal permission to live and work in the country - were detained at the weekend. However, White House officials have signalled Green Card residents will be allowed to pass through the border after massive protests broke out across the country. Late on Monday, Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop signalled she would ask the U.S. administration for Australian dual nationals to be exempt from the ban. Both the Canadian and British governments have received assurances their nationals will be excluded from the order. Ms Bishop told Fairfax Media: 'I have directed our officials in Washington DC to work with US officials to ensure any preferential treatment extended to any other country in relation to travel and entry to the United States is extended to Australia.' Mr Greenock was contacted for further comment. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop wants to negotiate an Australian exemption for dual nationals to Donald Trump's controversial travel freeze. Canadian and British citizens have already been exempted from the president's executive order, which bans holders of passports from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States for 90 days. Ms Bishop has directed Australian representatives in Washington, DC to seek the same 'preferential treatment extended to any other country,' the Age reported on Monday. Scroll down for video Foreign Minister Julie Bishop wants to negotiate an Australian exemption to Donald Trump 's controversial travel freeze The newly-elected US President made an executive order banning all citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States The news came shortly after Ms Bishop announced Australia would stand by the president's executive order - despite backlash from a number of countries in Europe and elsewhere. 'I'm confident that the Australian government and the U.S. government will continue to support each other in ensuring that we can implement our strong immigration and border protection policies,' Ms Bishop said earlier on Monday. Mr Trump's executive order also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days. The seven countries affected are Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Permanent US residents - known as green card holders - who are citizens of the seven countries will be allowed back into the US but will be subject to a secondary screening upon arrival, a Homeland Security official told CNN on Sunday. British and Canadian citizens were made exempt from the rules after inquiries by the governments of those countries, reported the UK's Independent newspaper and Canada's Star newspaper, respectively. Citizens of the UK who also hold a passport from one of the seven countries are allowed to travel to the US, except if they are flying in from their other country of citizenship, the Independent reported. 'The Australian government is working very closely with the administration and the US officials and we want to ensure that Australians continue to have access to the United States, as they have in the past, and people from the United States have access to Australia,' Ms Bishop said. Treasurer Scott Morrison also jumped to Mr Trump's defence, reasoning that the newly-elected president was simply fulfilling an election promise. 'They've had an election and the president has implemented what he said he would do,' he said on 2GB radio on Monday morning. A spokeswoman for Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says officials are in talks with US counterparts to get clarity on how the temporary ban citizens of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen may affect dual nationals. Treasurer Scott Morrison also jumped to Mr Trump's defence, reasoning that the newly-elected president was simply fulfilling an election promise Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is also believed to have secured a deal with Donald Trump and the United States to accept asylum seekers from Nauru (pictured) and Manus Island Widespread backlash: Governments from United Kingdom, Canada and large chunks of Europe voiced their protest (as did thousands of Americans - pictured is Terminal 4 of JFK airport after people were detained at border control) WHO EXACTLY IS BANNED FROM THE U.S? Any non-U.S. citizen from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen is now barred from entering the United States. That covers legal permanent residents - green card holders - and visa-holders from those seven countries who were out of the United States after Friday, when President Donald Trump signed an executive order with the temporary ban. They cannot return to the U.S. for 90 days. There's an exemption for immigrants and legal permanent residents whose entry is in the U.S. national interest, but it's unclear how that exemption will be applied. Visa and green card holders already in the U.S. will be allowed to stay. Source: Associated Press Advertisement 'The Australian embassy in Washington is engaging with US officials on the potential implications of the suspension for Australian travellers, including dual nationals,' a spokeswoman told AAP in a statement. All travellers are being warned that rules could change at short notice. 'Travellers should contact the nearest embassy or consulate of the United States for the most current information,' the spokeswoman added. Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is also believed to have secured a deal with Donald Trump and the United States to accept asylum seekers from Nauru and Manus Island - despite a vast majority coming from the banned countries. It's understood Mr Trump agreed to honour the agreement struck under the Obama administration during a 25-minute phone conversation with Mr Turnbull on Sunday. Mr Morrison told 2GB radio that the government had 'been able to secure the continuance of this arrangement under President Trump'. An emu has died in country Victoria after a police officer crash-tackled it to the ground and tried to 'arrest it'. The big bird was running on the Princes Highway at Newborough, east of Melbourne, on Saturday night when police received a call from drivers. The officer crash tackled the emu to the ground after it ran into oncoming traffic, Victoria Police said. An emu died in the Victorian town of Newborough after a police officer crash tackled it to the ground (stock image of an emu in the Queensland town of Longreach) He then handcuffed its legs to stop it kicking, with a vet on hand. 'Sadly the emu died due to what is believed to be stress from the incident,' a Victoria Police spokeswoman told Daily Mail Australia. La Trobe Valley locals had earlier struggled to round up the bird and police were unable to properly chase it in their car. The officer suffered cuts and bruises trying to apprehend the emu, which can't run backwards. Police were unable to provide an exact time. The emu was running into oncoming traffic in the La Trobe Valley town of Newborough (stock image of emu at Woomera in South Australia) Kenneth Fenske, 57, was the fifth suspect arrested in an alleged pedophile ring in which men dressed up as furry animals and assaulted a young boy A suspect in a fetish-themed child predator sex ring, in which men dressed up as furry animals and assaulted a young boy, was arrested on Friday. Kenneth Fenske, 57, was arrested in Quakertown, Pennsylvania, 45 miles north of Philadelphia. He was the fifth suspect apprehended in what police said was the years-long abuse of a young boy, who is now 14, at sex parties where men dressed as animals raped him. Fenske was charged with child rape, involuntary deviant sexual intercourse and unlawful contact with a minor, CBS Local reported. Other suspects arrested and charged in the abuse include Jeffrey Harvey, left, and David Barker, right Fenske's name at these furry parties was allegedly 'Lupine' and he dressed as a furry red fox. On 'three or four' occasions he stands accused of undressing a boy who was brought to the parties at the man's house dressed as Tony the Tiger, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The boy would play Xbox at Fenske's house and Fenske occasionally take the boy to his bedroom to abuse him, it is alleged. Since last summer, Jeffrey Harvey, David R. Parker, Craig Knox and Stephen Taylor have been arrested and charged for their alleged participation in the abuse of the boy. Knox would dress as a rottweiler and kept nine such dogs at his Virginia home and Taylor is accused additional bestiality-related crimes. Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro said: 'This child victim was repeatedly abused over a seven- or eight-year period by a group of criminals who cared only about their gratification.' Parker, Harvey and Knox are in custody while Fenske and Taylor posted bail and await trial. The investigation is ongoing and prosecutors believe the case may involve both more victims and more predators. An immigration official and celebrant wife married 16 Brisbane brides off to Indian men as part of a 'one-stop shop' for spousal visas, a court has heard. Chetan Mohanlal Mashru and Divya Krishne Gowda are on trial in Brisbane District Court after pleading not guilty to arranging marriages for visas. Mashru, who is representing himself in the trial, is also charged with delivering a false or misleading document and influencing a Commonwealth official. Immigration official Chetan Mohanlal Mashru and his celebrant wife Divya Krishne Gowda (pictured) are on trial in Brisbane for arranging marriages for visas Prosecutor Greg Lynham said in his opening statement on Monday the pair ran weddings out of their Oxley townhouse, south of Brisbane, in 2011 and 2012. But the unceremonious unions were 'nothing more than a ruse to obtain a spouse visa', Mr Lynham said. The court heard the men had to pay Mashru and Gowda for the ceremony and correct documents while the citizen brides were also paid for two years of marriage. The couples were wed on sight and told how to make it appear they were together by exchanging phone numbers and setting up a joint bank account, Mr Lynham said. Chetan Mohanlal Mashru leaving the Brisbane District Court on Monday where he is on trial for for allegedly arranging 16 fake marriages The court heard Divya Krishne Gowda (above) and her husband married 16 Brisbane brides off to Indian men as part of a 'one-stop shop' for spousal visas The court heard the men had to pay Mashru (pictured) and Gowda for the ceremony and correct documents while the citizen brides were also paid for two years of marriage Five of the grooms and 15 of the brides are due to testify at the trial. The court heard one of the weddings could not be completed because of an issue with the bride's birth certificate so Mashru and Gowda arranged for the man to marry a different Australian woman. The trial continues. Jeremy Kyle's ex-wife has revealed her shock after learning that the TV host is in a relationship with their former nanny. Kyle, 51, is currently dating Vicky Burton, a woman 16 years his junior, after the pair met when she looked after his children with ex Carla Germaine, 41. Former model Germaine claimed her and Miss Burton, 35, were 'best friends' and could not believe the news. Scroll down for video Jeremy Kyle (right) was pictured on a beach in Barbados in 2013 with his former nanny Vicky Burton (far left) and his ex-wife Carla Germaine (second left) Speaking from her home in Ascot, Berkshire, she told the Sun: 'I'm in shock she was my nanny for nine years, she looked after my babies. 'We were best friends. But I haven't heard anything from her. I don't know whether I suspected something was going on before.' Burton cared for the couple's children Alice, 12, Ava, 11, and Henry seven, and was photographed with Kyle, his ex-wife and two of their children on a family holiday in Barbados in 2013. However, she quit as the family's nanny nine months ago. Germaine explained that her TV-host ex had told her the couple had been together for the past two months. She said: 'What about our children? Why would he let it go public? I've got our three children to protect and this was their nanny. There are moral boundaries and integrity. 'My priority is my children.' Kyle, who has been hosting the Jeremy Kyle chat show for 13 seasons on ITV since 2005, announced that he and wife were splitting in 2015. Kyle and his former wife Carla were photographed together at the National Television Awards in 2015 News of their break-up came after Kyle made a frank admission about the couple's sex life during his self-titled show in June 2015, while interrogating a woman about whether she'd cheated on her partner. The presenter and his wife were married for 13 years but they 'grew apart' and it was reported that Carla was caught having an affair with England polo player James Carr, 25. The friend added that Miss Burton is 'loved by all the family' and that is 'no animosity' after Kyle informed his ex-wife about his new girlfriend. They said: 'He's been single for a long time and deserves a bit of happiness.' The 51-year-old rose to fame after publicly grilling Brits on ITV's The Jeremy Kyle Show which sees him discuss people's relationship dilemmas Kyle, who has been married twice, was diagnosed with testicular cancer in 2012 and publicly spoke about his troubles with gambling. He has four children, including a 26-year-old daughter from a previous marriage and three with Carla His first marriage to Kirsty Rowley ended in 1990 after a year together and the pair have a daughter called Harriet. MailOnline has contacted Kyle's agent for comment. Plenary Assembly of CCBI to Start in Bhopal from January 31 NEW DELHI, Jan. 30, 2017 / Christian Newswire / -- The Conference of Catholic Bishops of India (CCBI) is the Canonical National Episcopal Conference. It is the largest Bishops Conference in Asia and the fourth largest in the world. It consists of 132 dioceses and has 182 bishops. The 29th Plenary Assembly of the Conference of Catholic Bishops of India (CCBI) is scheduled to be held from 31st January to 8th February, 2017, at the Pastoral Centre, Ashaniketan Campus, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh. The Archdiocese of Bhopal under the leadership of its Metropolitan Archbishop Most Rev. Dr. Leo Cornelio S.V.D. is hosting the assembly. Eminence Oswald Cardinal Gracious, the president of CCBI and the Archbishop of Mumbai, briefed the proceedings, objectives, the background of the theme and outcome of the 29th plenary session of CCBI. Proceedings The Assembly will deliberate on the theme "Promoting the Joy of Love in Our Families". The chief resource person and the keynote speaker of the assembly is His Eminence Lorenzo Cardinal Baldisseri, Secretary General, Synod of Bishops who is well known for his knowledge of Indian as well as world situation of families and an expert on the document Amoris Laetitia (the apostolic exhortation of Pope Francis on families). He added "The 29th plenary session of CCBI aims at helping at families to face the challenges and difficulties of the family in India such as poverty, education, jobless and injustice etc. although there is no alarming situation as crisis. It aims at enabling the families to become better and holier. So the conference focuses on the spirituality of the families so that renewed families can transform church and society in turn. His Eminence said that, "We have a message for all the families of India as the family values are deteriorating on regular basis." Background His Eminence described the background of choosing the theme of the conference, "Promoting the joy of love in our Families". In the wake of two synods of the bishops in Rome on the family it was realised to revitalise the family apostolate in India to embody the spirit of the synod. A nationwide survey of the families was carried out by the Lawrence Pius Dorairaj, the President of family commission. The conference will study the outcome of the survey and will enlighten to formulate a pastoral plan suitable to Indian context. His eminence was happy to share the reason for selecting Bhopal the Destination for organizing 29th plenary session. He praised the enthusiasm and initiative of the Rev. Dr. Leo Cornelio, Archbishop of Bhopal. According to His eminence the conference will definitely strengthen the local church. And it provides varied experience of mission to all participants of CCBI. Expectations His eminence shared the expectations as follows: To bring about a Pastoral plan in accordance with the survey conducted. To actualise the message of Amoris Laetitia (the apostolic exhortation of Pope Francis on families) in Indian context. Salim Mehajer is being sued by his cleaner for $25,500 after the former Auburn deputy mayor's cheque allegedly bounced. Cleaner Anping Yan has filed a civil suit against the controversial property developer and Downtown Project Developments, who he claims have not paid him for 10 months of work at a western Sydney apartment complex , according to The Daily Telegraph. Mr Mehajer, 30, told a court on Monday he ended Mr Yan's cleaning contact in 2013 and claims Mr Yan was actually hired by his former company SM Property Development, which has been liquidated. Scroll down for video Cleaner Anping Yan claims Salim Mehajer (pictured) owes him $25,500 for 10 months of work at a western Sydney apartment complex after the former politician's cheque bounced Mr Yan (pictured) has filed a civil suit against the controversial property developer and Downtown Project Developments Mr Yan's attorney told the court Mr Mehajer had signed an affidavit in September stating he was the director of Downtown Project Developments, despite serving a three-year ban from managing any company. Mr Mehajer said it was a 'typographical error' and confirmed he was 'banned by ASIC from acting as a director,' according to the Daily Telegraph. Mr Yan said he was hired to clean the apartment complex in Lidcombe in 2011, but was not paid for his work between September 2013 and July 2014. The court heard Mr Mehajer signed an affidavit in September stating he was the director of Downtown Project Developments, despite serving a three-year ban from managing any company He claims Mr Mehajer gave him a cheque for $25,500 in late 2014 but it bounced when he tried to cash it. Mr Mehajer's lawyer Allan O'Connor told the court on Monday the 30-year-old had paid until September 2013 before ending his contract and hiring another cleaning company, according to The Age. There is no record of Mr Yan's termination, the court heard. The presiding magistrate will make her final ruling in April. Islamic State's chief executioner, who has beheaded more than 100 people, has been stabbed to death in an ambush in Iraq. Nicknamed Abu Sayyaf, he was dubbed one of the terror groups scariest decapitators and was paraded in their sick videos for his huge frame. He was also said to be leading ISIS in the Nineveh State, where he was killed by an unknown group who swarmed terrorist territory. Abu Sayyaf was paraded by ISIS for his enormous frame like The Bulldozer (pictured) Abu Sayyaf, translated to mean 'father of swordsmith', is also the name for an ISIS branch in the Philippines synonymous with beheadings and kidnappings. The executioner, who died in the al-Dasawa region in the western side of the city of Nineveh, was renowned for collecting the heads of his victims and dumping them in the same infamous hole in the region of al-Khasafa. Muhammad Yawar, an Iraqi journalist, told ARA News: 'Abu Sayyaf was one of the scariest executioners in Nineveh. He was known for his huge body and heavy arms. He was one of the renowned faces in the ISIS propaganda videos. An ISIS fighter pictured waving a gun and a flag in the air as he runs down the street in Syria 'Abu Sayyaf was a reflection of the brutality of this terrorist group.' There are varying reports of how he came to his death, with some news outlets stating he was shot by gunmen, but according to Iraqi News, security source told Alsumaria News: 'An unknown armed group killed on Sunday the Islamic State's most famous decapitator, the so-nicknamed Abu Sayyaf. 'The armed group ambushed him at al-Dawasa region, in the western side of the city, and stabbed him several times. 'He died immediately.' Nineveh is located on the outskirts of Mosul, where the operation continues to liberate its people from ISIS control. A defiant Theresa May has stood by the decision to issue an invitation to Donald Trump to make a state visit to Britain in the face of the outcry over his controversial travel ban. The Prime Minister, who became the first world leader to meet the new US president in the White House, faces demands from a petition signed by more than 1.4 million people to call off the visit. But appearing at a joint press conference in Dublin with Irish prime minister Enda Kenny, Mrs May was adamant it would go ahead. Prime Minister Theresa May, pictured at a press conference in Ireland, said the US and UK remain close allies and that President Trump's state visit invitation 'stands' 'The United States is a close ally of the United Kingdom. We work together across many areas of mutual interest and we have that special relationship between us,' she said. 'I have issued that invitation for a state visit for President Trump to the United Kingdom and that invitation stands.' It came after Boris Johnson tonight assured Donald Trump there is no chance of his state visit to the UK later this year being cancelled. He rejected calls by senior Tory politicians and a petition signed by more than 1.4million people demanding the President be uninvited in the wake of his travel ban on citizens from seven majority Muslim countries. The Foreign Secretary said President Trump was an 'elected head of state of our closest allies and said there was 'absolutely no reason why he should not be accorded a state visit and every reason why he should'. No10 said Theresa May is 'very happy' President Trump has accepted the Queen's invitation to visit, adding: 'We look forward to hosting the President later this year.' Boris Johnson, pictured in the Commons today, tonight assured Donald Trump there is no chance of his state visit to the UK later this year being cancelled But Mr Johnson did repeat his criticism of President Trump's 'highly controversial' travel ban and accepted it had caused 'unease' across the world. He also issued fresh travel guidance, insisting no British citizens will be affected by President Trump's immigration crackdown. But there was growing pressure on the Government over its relationship with President Trump. Protests against his ban are planned to take place in Edinburgh, Cardiff, Manchester, Newcastle, Leeds, Cambridge and Birmingham and in London demonstrators will protest outside Downing Street. Tory peer Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, the first female to attend Cabinet, became the latest high profile politicians to call for the state visit to be postponed until President Trump has lifted his controversial travel ban. And MPs must now debate calls for President Trump's state visit to be cancelled after the online petition easily passed the 100,000 target within hours of being set up. More than 1million people have signed a petition demanding President Trump's state visit to the UK is cancelled. Pictured, President Trump with an executive order in the Oval Office Theresa May, pictured left arriving for Brexit talks in Cardiff today, is under growing pressure to postpone Donald Trump's state visit to the UK. Baroness Warsi, right, the ex-Tory Cabinet minister, said Britain must not honour the US President by rolling out the red carpet for him The Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, pictured at the Despatch Box today, said President Trump was an 'elected head of state of our closest allies and said there was 'absolutely no reason why he should not be accorded a state visit and every reason why he should' It exceeded 1million names by 10am this morning - less than 36 hours after it was set up - and is the second most popular motion on the Government's online petition website. But a Downing Street source dismissed the petition, which claims his visit would embarrass the Queen, as 'a populist gesture'. And they blasted the suggestion that the President's state visit could be scrapped, saying it would 'undo everything' that Mrs May achieved during her visit to the White House on Friday. In angry exchanges in the Commons today MPs urged ministers to cancel President Trump's state visit. Veteran socialist Dennis Skinner said Britain must not walk 'hand-in-hand with another fascist Trump,' while his Labour colleague David Winnick branded President Trump a 'bigoted man' who 'under no circumstances should address Parliament' during his state visit. But Mr Johnson rejected calls to cancel the visit, telling MPs: 'We should bear in mind that he is the elected head of state of our closest and most important ally and there is absolutely no reason why he should not be accorded a state visit and every reason why he should.' The petition reached 1million signatures mark by 10am this morning - less than 36 hours after it was set up Veteran socialist Dennis Skinner, pictured in the Commons today, said Britain must not walk 'hand-in-hand with another fascist Trump' Labour colleague David Winnick, pictured standing up in the Commons today, branded President Trump a 'bigoted man' who 'under no circumstances should address Parliament' during his state visit There were warnings from London's Muslim Mayor Sadiq Khan that going ahead with President Trump's visit could increase the threat of terrorism in London. 'I fear it will be used to act as a recruiting sergeant for so called Isis and other like minded groups,' he wrote in the Evening Standard. Mr Khan said Londoners will not support 'rolling out the red carpet' for President Trump. Last night it was announced that the executive order, which prevents anyone entering the US from seven Muslim majority countries for 90 days, will not apply to British nationals holding dual nationality with one of the banned nations. WHO HAS TRUMP BANNED? President Trump's executive order prevents anyone entering the US from seven Muslim majority countries for 90 days. The Foreign Office secured clarification about what the travel ban means for the UK. Its guidance says: The ban does not apply to any British citizen, regardless of whether they were born in - or hold dual nationality with - the seven countries on Trump's travel ban. But the ban does apply to anyone who does not hold British citizenship and is from from one of the seven countries: Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Travellers to the US from anywhere other than one of those countries will experience no extra checks, regardless of nationality or place of birth. Dual nationals might have extra checks if they travel directly from one of the seven countries. Advertisement Today Downing Street insisted it was not a special deal for Britons but instead officials had sought clarification. A spokesman for the PM added that she 'disagrees with the restrictions'. President Trump's hardline immigration crackdown triggered protests across the US and today thousands of demonstrators will take to the streets in cities across Britain. Tory peer Baroness Warsi said President Trump must not be given the honour of a state visit. 'We have to question whether, in Britain, this is something that Britain should be doing for a man who has no respect for women, disdain for minorities, little value for LGBT communities, no compassion for the vulnerable and whose policies are rooted in divisive rhetoric,' she told the Today programme. 'Those who run and govern this country bowing down to a man who holds the views that he holds, values which are not the same as British values, I think is sending out a very wrong signal.' The peer said the Government must ensure that 'people in this country know that whatever crazy things the President of the United States may be doing, it is not what we believe and not what we support.' Baroness Warsi echoed Ms Davidson, who said a state visit 'could not possibly occur' while 'a cruel and divisive policy which discriminates against citizens of the host nation is in place'. Mr Khan, who became the first Muslim mayor of a Western capital city last year, wrote in the Evening Standard today: 'We must now rescind the offer of a full state visit for President Trump - until this ban is lifted. 'I don't believe the people of London will support rolling out the red carpet until this happens. Great friends must warn each other when they are making a mistake.' And former Labour leader Ed Miliband told the BBC: 'If ever Isis wanted a tool to radicalise people against the United States, I'm afraid that President Trump has sadly provided it. Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson, pictured, said a state visit 'could not possibly occur' while 'a cruel and divisive policy which discriminates against citizens of the host nation is in place' London's Muslim Mayor Sadiq Khan, pictured, also said President Trump should only be invited for a state visit once he lifts his 'shameful' travel ban The US President's shock executive order prevents anyone entering the US from seven Muslim majority countries for 90 days Speaking alongside President Trump at the White House on Friday, Prime Minister Theresa May revealed that he and the First Lady had accepted an invitation from the Queen to make a state visit to the UK later this year with full pomp and ceremony 'I don't believe the state visit can go ahead in these circumstances.' The petition calling for President Trump to be barred from given a state visit is now the second most popular since the government's online petition website was set up in 2010. But the call for action is still a long way off the largest Parliamentary petition in history when more than 4million people demanded a second referendum over EU membership last summer. Confirming that President Trump's state visit will go ahead later this year as planned, a Downing Street source told the BBC: 'The invitation has been issued and accepted. 'To scrap the visit would undo everything following Mrs May's visit. America is a huge and important ally we have to think long term.' Despite this, MPs will have to debate cancelling President Trump's trip because the enormous response to the petition meant it easily passed the 100,000 target needed to trigger a Commons debate. The enormous response easily passed the 100,000 target needed for MPs to consider holding a debate on the motion in the House of Commons, with more and more people flocking to sign it. As more and more people flocked to sign it, the petition rose at an average of more than 1,000 signatures per minute. Plans for a state visit for President Trump were only announced on Friday when Mrs May revealed he had accepted an invitation from the Queen. The high-profile visit was scheduled for later this year and was set to feature the usual full pomp and ceremony. But it had already hit a snag after it emerged the US President wants to avoid Prince Charles because of their dispute over global warming. EIGHT PREVIOUS STATE VISITS THAT ATTRACTED CONTROVERSY Tens of thousands of people came out to protest against George W Bush over the war in Iraq when the Queen hosted him in 2003. Pictured, the Queen and the President at Windsor Castle From protesters toppling an effigy of George W Bush to demos against China's human rights record, state visits to the UK have had their fair share of controversy. 1971 - Japan's Emperor Hirohito Emperor Hirohito, Japan's wartime head of state, made his first state visit to Britain in 1971. Former prisoners of war - angry at Japan's brutal militaristic past - protested by standing in silence as his carriage drove past. Some turned their back on the emperor and wore red gloves to symbolise war deaths while others whistled the popular Second World War march, Colonel Bogey. They called on Japan to offer them compensation and a full apology for their treatment during the war. 1978 Romania's Nicolae Ceausescu It was the first state visit by a Communist head of state to the UK and Romania was already well-known as one of the most corrupt and oppressive of the Soviet Union's Cold War satellite states. The Queen took drastic steps to avoid meeting Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu any more than necessary, according to royal author Robert Hardman. 'While walking her dogs in the Palace gardens, she spotted Ceausescu and his wife Elena heading in her direction. 'As the Queen told a lunch guest some years later, she decided the best course of action was to hide behind a bush rather than conduct polite conversation,' he wrote. 1998 Japan's Emperor Akihito Just like his father did in 1971, Akihito met obvious hostility on London's streets from British prisoners of war. Former PoWs symbolically turned their backs on him, while others jeered him. Addressing the state banquet, Akihito spoke of his 'deep sorrow and pain' over the suffering inflicted by his country during the war, but did not apologise for the treatment of prisoners in work camps. 2003 - Russia's Vladimir Putin Her Majesty invited Russian President Vladimir Putin for a state visit in June 2003 Mr Putin's historic trip was the first by a Russian head of state since Tsar Nicholas I in 1843. Amnesty International and other human rights groups used the visit to highlight ongoing reports of killings, rape and torture by Russian forces in Chechnya. 2003 - US president George W Bush President George Bush's state visit, while Tony Blair was prime minister, was highly controversial. Tens of thousands of people came out to protest against the American leader and the war in Iraq, amid unprecedented security for a state visit. Demonstrations throughout Mr Bush's stay were mostly peaceful, and peaked with the toppling of an effigy of Mr Bush in Trafalgar Square, which parodied scenes of the capture of Baghdad. Stop The War Coalition said some 200,000 joined the demonstration. One protester threw an egg at the presidential cavalcade, but missed. 2005 - Chinese president Hu Jintao Saudi Arabia's king Abdullah's state visit in 2007 revived controversy over his regime's abuse of human rights Noisy protests against Chinese rule in Tibet targeted Hu Jintao's state carriage procession. The Metropolitan Police was criticised for its hardline handling of the peaceful demonstrations, and admitted following a High Court case its officers acted unlawfully when they removed protesters' banners and flags. The Prince of Wales, a supporter of the Dalai Lama, had been accused of boycotting a Chinese state visit to the UK in 1999 by failing to attend the return banquet held for then-president Jiang Zemin. This time, during Hu Jintao's stay, Charles carefully side-stepped the issue by being out of the country on a tour of the US on the night of the official dinner. He did not meet Mr Hu on the remaining two days of his visit. 2007 - Saudi Arabia's king Abdullah The first state visit by a Saudi king to the UK for 20 years revived controversy over the regime's abuse of human rights and the government's halting of a Serious Fraud Office bribery inquiry into the al-Yamamah arms deal. Tensions surrounding the trip were heightened when the king insisted in an interview Britain was not doing enough to tackle terrorism. Around 100 human rights and anti-arms trade activists jeered and shouted 'shame on you' as the royal procession passed along The Mall in central London. 2015 - China's President Xi Jinping Protesters attempting to highlight human rights violations clashed with pro-China supporters during a procession welcoming Chinese president Xi to the UK. Scuffles broke out between the two groups after the police perimeter set up for protesters was ignored by both sides. But thousands of supporters also lined The Mall to welcome Xi Jinping with flags, T-shirts and hats - provided by the Chinese embassy. Advertisement The petition, backed by Mr Corbyn and Lib Dem leader Tim Farron, says the US President should no longer be invited to avoid embarrassing the Queen. The motion states: 'Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen. 'Donald Trump's well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. 'Therefore during the term of his presidency Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official State Visit.' Mr Corbyn said he is 'not happy with him coming here until that ban is lifted,' while Mr Farron said his visit would be 'placing the Queen in an impossible position of welcoming a man who is banning British citizens purely on grounds of their faith'. Within hours of being set up it attracted the necessary 100,000 for the motion to be considered for debate in the Commons. A heat map shows that most people who are signing the petition to cancel Mr Trump's state visit are in London or student towns. The darker the colour, the more people have signed it Most people signing the petition are in London or student towns, according to a heat map. Any petition that receives more than 100,000 signatures within six months must be considered for debate by MPs in Parliament. TRUMP'S TRAVEL BAN TRIGGERS TRAVEL CHAOS FOR BRITONS Hamaseh Tayari, pictured, a UK resident with an Iranian passport, was stranded in Costa Rica after being denied boarding a flight home to Glasgow because her flight was due to stop-over in New York British Airways and Virgin Atlantic are offering refunds for travellers affected by Donald Trump's travel ban. His executive order preventing anyone entering the US from seven Muslim majority countries for 90 days has triggered chaos at airports across the world as travellers were caught out in transit. Customers who have bought flights to the US will be given the choice of a refund or the chance to re-book. One woman affected was Hamaseh Tayari, a UK resident with an Iranian passport, who was stranded in Costa Rica after being denied boarding a flight home to Glasgow because her return flight was due to stop-over in New York. Ms Tayari was due to fly home to Glasgow via New York after holidaying in Costa Rica but her US transit visa was revoked as Mr Trump's immigration crackdown took effect immediately. She is now trying to work out an alternative route home but she said it is likely to cost her a month's salary to get home. 'This has really shocked me. We just discovered [what Trump did] at the airport when we went to check-in, Ms Tayari told the Guardian. 'I want people to know that this is not just happening to refugees. I am a graduate and I have a Phd. It has happened to a person who is working and who pays tax.' Advertisement Petitions that attract more than 10,000 in the time period requires a response from the Government. The petition eclipsed the target within a few hours and by 10am it had surpassed 1m signatures. It will now be up to the Commons Petition's Committee to decide whether a parliamentary debate on the matter would be appropriate, but its popularity is likely to lead to a debate in the Commons, which could be highly embarrassing for the US President. David Cameron introduced the e-petition initiative when he entered Downing Street in 2010 in a bid to boost democracy and transparency. London's Muslim Mayor Sadiq Khan also said President Trump should only be invited for a state visit once he lifts his 'shameful' travel ban. Tory MP James Cartlidge was one of few politicians to defend President Trump's travel ban, saying the bandwagon to stop his state visit 'just ensures a warmer bear hug for him in Moscow'. He was backed up by former Ukip leader Nigel Farage, who defended the immigration crackdown and even suggested Britain should follow the President's lead and introduce 'extreme vetting' of incomers. Mr Javid, the Business Secretary, responded directly at Mr Farage, tweeting: 'Farage is wrong to try and defend US immigration ban. These are not British values.' Announcing on Friday that the Queen had invited President Trump to make an official state visit to the UK, Mrs May said: 'In a further sign of the importance of that [special] relationship I have today been able to convey Her Majesty the Queen's hope that President Trump and the First Lady would pay a state visit to the United Kingdom later this year and I'm delighted that the President has accepted that invitation.' Meanwhile, thousands of demonstrators are planning to protest against the ban outside Downing Street and across the country today from 6pm. Protests are listed to take place in London, Edinburgh, Cardiff, Manchester, Newcastle, Leeds, Cambridge and Birmingham. A march organised by a coalition of groups, including Stand Up to Racism and the Muslim Council of Britain, is due to begin at the US embassy next Saturday, ending at Downing Street. Graham Guest, who started the petition in November, told the Press Association he feared Mr Trump would use the state visit and the accompanying photo opportunities with the Queen to bolster his image. The storm over Donald Trump's Muslim travel ban comes just two days after he and Theresa May were spotted holding hands at one point as they walked around the White House grounds It would be highly embarrassing for the US President, pictured with Mrs May on Friday, if MPs were given a debate on whether to cancel his state visit to the UK He said: 'A state visit legitimises his presidency and he will use the photo opportunities and being seen with the Queen to get re-elected. 'The wording in the petition is quite precise as I actually say that he should come here as the head of government to do government to government business. 'At the end of the day he is still the President and we've just got to live with that. But there's no reason why he should get all the pomp and publicity of a state visit.' Asked why he had launched the petition, Mr Guest, from Leeds, said: 'Anything to make his life more uncomfortable. 'I think a debate in Parliament to ban a state visit would be great as people will have had the chance to air their views on him. 'The petition is really just to make as much noise as possible and put the spotlight on him and what an awful person he is.' A No 10 spokesman said: 'An invitation was extended and has been accepted.' President Donald Trump has chosen a replacement for the late Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia, and he will announce a name tomorrow night. 'I have made my decision on who I will nominate for The United States Supreme Court. It will be announced live on Tuesday at 8:00 P.M. (W.H.),' the president wrote on Twitter. Trump originally said the announcement would come on Thursday. Word of a possible earlier announcement first came as the White House dealt with fallout from Trump's partial travel ban on Middle Eastern refugees. As a candidate, Trump often used surprise announcements to shift attention away from negative media coverage. Trump told small business leaders gathered at the White House on Monday morning that he had made 'a very big decision on the United States Supreme Court, that is going to be announced tomorrow night from the White House at 8 o'clock.' The president called his choice 'a person who is unbelievably highly respected, and I think you will be very impressed with this person.' President Donald Trump said Monday morning that he will introduce his Supreme Court nominee to the nation at 8:00 p.m. Tuesday The White House is defending itself against complaints about Friday's travel-ban executive order; candidate Trump often used surprise announcements to shift the national dialogue away from hot-button issues Trump chose 8:00 p.m. on Tuesday for his announcement, just an hour before CNN is scheduled to host a town hall-style broadcast with Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi meaning her big event will be drowned out by Trump's big reveal The White House offered a hint at who the president had picked on Monday afternoon. The president's spokesman told a reporter Trump is '100 percent sure he's the pick' - indicating that it would not be a woman. 'This individual is part of the list that he put out. He maintains exactly what he said he was going to do,' Spicer said, referring to a definitive list of 21 names Trump previously put out. Spicer claimed a moment later, after his questioner pointed out that he gave away the gender of the nominee in his answer, that he said 'individual,' even though he had, in fact used the phrase, 'he's the one.' In doing so, Spicer inadvertently confirmed that Trump was likely going to nominate one of three, white men rumored to be on his short list. It was not immediately clear why Trump bumped his Supreme Court announcement up. The timing incidentally carries an added benefit for Republicans. CNN is scheduled to host an hour-long town hall event with Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi at 9:00 p.m. Tuesday, an event that will now be drowned out by reactions to Trump's choice. Three federal appeals court judges are said to have emerged as leading candidates: Neil Gorsuch, Thomas Hardiman and William Pryor. The official says the president has also been considering Diane Sykes, one of his early favorites for the high court seat. NEXT SUPREME COURT JUSTICE? Neil Gorsuch of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals is said to be leading Trump's short list When Trump nominates his chosen justice, Senate Democrats and Republicans will immediately face intense political pressure, with liberals demanding that Democrats block the choice and the new president urging Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to blow up longstanding rules to secure confirmation. What happens depends in part on who Trump chooses. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York has said Democrats will oppose any nominee outside the mainstream. He will likely decide whether to try to block, or filibuster, based on the nominee's performance in confirmation hearings and feedback from his Democratic caucus, including the 10 senators who are up for re-election in states that Trump won last year. The advantages of trying a filibuster are clear make Republicans work to find the 60 votes needed to end it, including at least eight Democrats, and as a result, delay or block the nomination. Republicans hold a 52-48 majority. But there are also downsides. Democrats running for re-election next year in states Trump won in 2016 could face political consequences for their party's attempted obstruction. And if Republicans change the rules and eliminate the filibuster altogether, Democrats would have lost their most powerful weapon in future Supreme Court fights. The White House was preparing on Monday to go to battle. Spicer predicted that Senate Dems would try to ' slow walk' Trump's nominee and 'play political games,' like they did with his cabinet secretaries. 'He met with a bunch of Senate Democrats to talk about the qualities they want in a judge. And before they even heard who this individual is, you've got some of them saying "absolutely no." I mean, that just shows you that it's all about politics, it's not about qualification,' Spicer said. 'I think that's a pretty sad message.' He pointed out that Senate Democrats have their backs to the wall, given their performance in recent elections. 'The message came through loud and clear that the American people wanted decisive leadership. They're getting it.' When Trump nominates a justice, Senate Democrats and Republicans (including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, pictured) will come under immense pressure NEXT SUPREME COURT JUSTICE? William Pryor of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and Thomas Hardiman of the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals are also said to be on Trump's short list Republicans did not try to filibuster either of former President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominees. The only filibuster attempt in the past few decades was by Democrats against Justice Samuel Alito, nominated by former President George W. Bush. The effort failed and Alito was confirmed. If there's an attempted filibuster, Republicans would first try to woo eight Democrats to vote with them to overcome it. But those votes aren't a given. While there are several senators up for re-election in Republican-leaning states, some are loyal Democrats who rarely cross party lines. Gorsuch and Hardiman won broad Senate support when they were confirmed for their appeals court judgeships. Gorsuch was confirmed by voice vote in 2006; Hardiman 95-0 in 2007. Pryor, who backed a Texas law that made gay sex a crime, will face opposition. He was confirmed 53-45 in 2005. Conservative groups are ready. The Judicial Crisis Network has said it will spend $10 million to ensure Trump's pick is confirmed. 'We will force vulnerable senators up for re-election in 2018 like Joe Donnelly and Claire McCaskill to decide between keeping their Senate seats or following Chuck Schumer's liberal, obstructionist agenda,' said Carrie Severino, the chief counsel and policy director of the group. Donnelly of Indiana and McCaskill of Missouri are both Democrats who represent states that Trump won with more than 55 percent of the vote. Senate Liberals trying to block Trump's choice will be led by Chuck Schumer, whom Trump mocked Monday for crying during a press conference about his travel-ban measure 'ASK THE NEAREST HIPPIE': THE LEGACY OF JUSTICE SCALIA Scalia, who died in February, was nominated to the US Supreme Court in 1986 by President Ronald Reagan and was the longest-serving justice on the current Court, as well as its first Italian-American Justice. An advocate of an originalism interpretation of the Constitution, Scalia believed that its meaning was fixed at the time it was written and that it did not evolve and change with the times. It was the foundation for his staunch opposition to same-sex marriage and affirmative action, his controversial comments in court and colorful dissents often making as many headlines as the decision itself. 'Who ever thought that intimacy and spirituality (whatever that means) were freedoms?' he wrote in his dissent after same-sex marriage was legalized by the Supreme Court in June, a vote he called a 'threat to American democracy'. 'And if intimacy is, one would think Freedom of Intimacy is abridged rather than expanded by marriage. Ask the nearest hippie,' he wrote. In the same dissent, Scalia wrote that the Supreme Court had descended 'to the mystical aphorisms of the fortune cookie' and wrote that California didn't count as a 'genuine' Western state. Advertisement If Democrats decide to try to filibuster and McConnell can't get enough Democratic votes to overcome it, he'll have a major decision to make. Does he change the rules of the Senate and make it impossible to filibuster a Supreme Court nominee? A last resort, getting rid of the filibuster is dubbed 'the nuclear option.' Then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid changed the rules for lower-court judges in 2013 after Republicans had blocked many of President Barack Obama's nominations. McConnell, a devout Senate institutionalist, strongly criticized Reid for doing that and is seen as reluctant to make a similar move. Trump told Fox News' Sean Hannity on Thursday that he would encourage McConnell to go that route, however. Conservatives are already somewhat split on whether McConnell should 'go nuclear' if he can't find the votes. The Heritage Foundation warned of the consequences, suggesting that eliminating the filibuster for Supreme Court nominations could set a precedent for getting rid of the legislative filibuster, which has been used successfully by both parties, when in the minority, to block legislation. The Heritage memo pushed another strategy for getting around the filibuster called the 'two-speech rule.' The idea is to use Senate rules allowing senators only two speeches in a legislative day, which is different from a calendar day. By extending a legislative day over several days or weeks, Republicans could wait until all Democrats had given their two speeches and none were left to speak, allowing the Senate to move to a simple majority vote. That strategy would require a lot of time and effort, and Democrats would likely look for procedural ways to thwart it. Whatever happens, look for each side to bring up history. 'What we hope would be that our Democratic friends will treat President Trump's nominees in the same way that we treated Clinton and Obama,' McConnell said this week. Scalia died last February, and McConnell said within hours of his death that the next president, not Obama, should have the pick. Republicans didn't even hold hearings on Obama's nominee, Judge Merrick Garland, and the strategy paid off. Democrats will be mindful of McConnell's refusal to consider Garland when deciding how to treat Trump's nominee. A scandal-hit Sydney hospital has given ineffective hepatitis B vaccines to nearly 300 babies, it has emerged. Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital is urgently contacting 282 mothers after it discovered the shocking mix-up last week. The hospital, in south west Sydney, has already called back six infants to be given the correct vaccine, while scores more parents have been told their babies were given the wrong jab. Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital (pictured) has given ineffective hepatitis B vaccines to nearly 300 babies, it has emerged The ineffective hepatitis B vaccine was given to babies born at the hospital between November 29, 2016, and January 22 this year. The vaccine had been rendered useless after being stored at the wrong temperature. Dr Stephen Conaty, from South Western Sydney Local Health District, said the vaccines were kept in a fridge which was too cold. 'Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital is contacting mothers to advise them that their infant may have received an ineffective hepatitis B vaccine at birth, after a fridge that stored routine vaccines was found to have low temperature readings,' he said. The hospital came under fire last year after giving two babies (including Amelia Khan, above) nitrous oxide instead of oxygen 'Six infants have been recalled and offered an additional vaccination. 'We want to reassure all involved that receiving potentially less effective vaccine is not harmful, however some babies may not have received important early protection against hepatitis B. 'Hepatitis B vaccine is given to all babies in Australia at birth to protect them from hepatitis B infection in early life. Hepatitis B infection in babies is rare in Australia.' Concerned parents can call South Western Sydney Local Health District Public Health Unit on 1300 163 033. Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital came under fire last year after accidentally giving two babies nitrous oxide, otherwise known as 'laughing gas', instead of oxygen. A boy called John Ghanem died and a girl, Amelia Khan, was left having seizures and having to be fed through a tube following the error. A school has relaxed its dress code to allow pupils to wear slippers in the classroom - and parents love the idea. The decision came after a 10-year study showed children who learned with no shoes on were more likely to behave better and obtain good grades. Now Findern Primary School in Derby has adopted the approach and claims to have already noticed improvements. Among those to herald the idea was parent Sarah Robinson, 38, whose five-year-old-daughter Emelia goes to the school in slippers. Stacey Sharpe, 26, with her sons Owen, 7 (left) and Harrison, 5 (right) both wear their slippers in class From left: Pupils Toby Fern, Lacey Green, Jacob Reynoldson and Lois Toone show off their slippers She said: 'Everybody loves it, it makes the classes so much more relaxed. 'We have to leave for school a tiny bit earlier to make time for the children to change into their slippers. 'Emelia absolutely loves to wear them, it makes it much more comfortable to sit. 'The health of their feet is so important, and not having to wear shoes all day could really help.' Manjit Tomlin, 38, who has one daughter, India, five, who goes to the school, added: 'The kids can focus more because they're comfortable. 'I think the slippers have made lessons more relaxed, from what I've heard it's not been destructive at all. Sarah Robinson, 38, with her daughter Emelia, 5 (left) and Mangit Tomlin, 38, with daughter India, 5 (right) are both in favour of slippers at the school 'It's going to be good to see if other schools adopt it and how it works out in other areas.' The study by Bournemouth University found that removing shoes in the classroom created a calmer and quieter environment, even reducing bullying in some cases. They also found that children are more likely to get to school earlier, leave later and read more. As well as visiting schools in New Zealand and Australia for the project, researchers studied children's attainment at a school in west London. The system is also practised in the colder climes of Scandinavia, where children take their snow boots off before entering the classroom. Teacher Samantha Johnson joins in the fun at the school in Derby, which has made the change after research by Bournemouth University Stacey Sharpe, 26, a healthcare assistant, has two son, Owen, five, and Harrison, seven, who attend lessons in slippers. She said: 'It's a good idea. Harrison's been so excited about it that he's even bought them back home. 'When I heard about it I thought it would be a lot of effort for the teachers to help the kids to change into the slippers all the time, but it's worked out very well. 'The children all really love it. 'They're just something a bit different to other schools, it makes it a different for the kids. 'It stops the children from rushing out to play time too quickly, because they have to stop and change their shoes.' The study by Bournemouth University found that removing shoes in the classroom created a calmer and quieter environment, even reducing bullying in some cases Sharon Carr, 40, a community carer, has two sons Caden, eight, and Aiden, five, who attend the school. She said: 'It depends on whether it's what the kids want, isn't it? The children generally seem to like it which is the main thing. 'Caden doesn't wear them, he's one of the only ones in his class that doesn't. 'He never wears them at home either, so he wouldn't wear them in class. He just doesn't find them comfortable. 'I guess it's safer if he steps on sharp objects like scissors, though. Aiden wears them at home though and seems to enjoy wearing them at school.' Head teacher Emma Titchener said she had even brought a pair of her slippers into school, and was not against the idea of making slippers compulsary. She added: 'I was aware of the research previously and we had considered it and then one of our teachers tried it for a day and noticed quite a big difference. The research suggested that children in comfortable footwear were more likely to get to school earlier, leave later and read more 'So we thought we would trial it and so far it seems to have made a big difference. The children are really happy to do it. 'Even though everybody is well behaved it seems that the children feel more comfortable.'The idea wasn't a gimmick, there is serious educational reasons behind it. 'We are doing it because the children are more receptive to learning at a faster pace when they are comfortable. 'In our school the philosophy is that if it makes a difference to their outcomes and performance then it is worth doing. 'At the moment it isn't compulsory but from September it might become part of our uniform policy if the trial is successful.' She added that the 'vast majority' of pupils were now wearing slippers in school. Findern's relaxed approach to its dress code is a far cry from a Roman Catholic primary school in Manchester, which hit the headlines after banning hijabs She said: 'The pupils come in their shoes and get changed into their slippers first thing. 'Then at playtimes and lunchtime they get changed back into their shoes to go outside. 'The vast majority of the pupils are taking part. I have got a pair of my slippers in school and we are all trying it out. 'A vast majority of the staff are trying it to see if it results in an improvement for them as well. 'When it comes to changing anything in a school, changes are always met with a difference of opinion. 'This is no different but in terms of support it's been massively well supported. 'We've got 200 pupils and we've had queries about it from just two parents. 'I always think that as soon as parents realise there is a benefit to the children then they get on board.' Deputy head Michelle Hall said children were excited by the idea after it was pitched to them by teachers Findern's relaxed approach to its dress code is a far cry from a Roman Catholic primary school in Manchester, which hit the headlines after banning hijabs. St Clare's School in Handsworth caused outrage after it told parents of a four-year-old girl that she was not allowed to wear the item as the school banned headwear. Earlier this month, hundreds of teenage girls were turned away from the first day back at school for wearing skirts that were too short. Ebbsfleet Academy in Dartford, Kent, has a strict policy which states that girls can wear a navy A-line skirt 'of a suitable length for school, that is, no more than 5cm above the knee'. Around 200 pupils were said to have been turned away on the first day after the festive period. And late last year, a 'Gestapo' headteacher at a school in Margate, Kent, got into a week-long row with parents after refusing to allow scruffy pupils into class. Hartsdown Academy locked the gates and individually inspected pupils as they arrived, under the watchful eye of head teacher Matthew Tate. Girls from the Ebbsfleet Academy, wearing the short skirts that are at the centre of the controversy Arrested Development actress Alia Shawkat used an Arabic greeting as she took the stage at the SAG awards, in a pointed protest at Donald Trump's immigration ban. The 27-year-old, who was presenting the award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series, began by saying 'Salaam Alaikum!' The phrase translates to 'greetings', or 'peace be with you'. Arrested Development actress Alia Shawkat used an Arabic greeting as she took the stage at the SAG awards with Steven Yeun She continued by making a dig at Kellyanne Conway's 'alternative facts' comment, saying: 'Like many of our nominees here tonight, we represent people who have come from other cultures, and thats a real fact.' The Search Party star, whose father is from Iraq, had joined a protest at Los Angeles International airport on Saturday night, along with Ellen Page and Chloe Grace Moretz. She tweeted: 'LAX COME! We are growing every second NO TRUMP NO KKK NO FASCIST USA.' Shawkat was among a number of celebrities who spoke out about the President's controversial immigration ban on Sunday night. She continued by saying: 'Like many of our nominees here tonight, we represent people who have come from other cultures' Host Ashton Kutcher set the tone of the night as he kicked off the show, saying: 'Everyone at airports who belong in my America, you are a part of the fabric of who we arewe welcome you.' Actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus, whose father was an immigrant from France, also spoke out about the controversial policy, saying: 'The immigrant ban is a blemish and it's un-American. She added: 'We are grateful for them, we stand with them, and we will fight for them.' Stranger Things actor David Harbour also delivered a rousing speech as the drama won the best ensemble award at the SAGs. The Search Party star, whose father is from Iraq, had joined a protest at Los Angeles International airport on Saturday night, along with Ellen Page and Chloe Grace Moretz He said: I would just like to say that in light of all thats going on in the world today, its difficult to celebrate the already celebrated Stranger Things. Harbour continued: 'We are united in that we are all human beings and we are all together on this wonderful painful, horrible painful joyous exciting and mysterious ride that is being alive. 'We will as per Chief Jim Hopper punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the weak and the disenfranchised and the marginalized and we will do it all with soul with heart and with joy.' Meanwhile, Big Bang Theory star Simon Helberg arrived on the red carpet with a sign saying 'Refugees welcome', while his actress wife Jocelyn Towne had 'Let them in' written on her chest. A Bible miraculously emerged unscathed and opened on a telling passage after a tornado that was traveling at around 150mph ripped through the chapel in which it was placed. Staff at William Carey University in southern Mississippi were stunned when they found the holy book undamaged and in its original position despite the window next to it being smashed to pieces. They were given a further shock when they found it opened on Psalm 46 on the school's pulpit while inspecting damage the morning after the storm last weekend. Staff at William Carey University in southern Mississippi were shocked to find the Bible in a good condition and opened on a telling passage after the tornado The open page from Psalm read: 'God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.' Rick Wilemon, an adjunct art instructor at the private Christian college in the city of Hattiesburg, took some photos of the Bible as it was found in the otherwise-damaged Bass Chapel after the EF-3 tornado which causes winds of between 130mph to 166mph. EF0 is the weakest point on the Enhanced Fujita Scale used to measure tornado strength and EF5 is the strongest. 'No building was left untouched,' Wilemon told CNN. 'So many appear to be total losses.' Wilemon said the Bible's extraordinary survival has bolstered the spirits of the campus and in the wider area after the deadly storm claimed the lives of four people and destroyed a number of buildings in the area. 'It is remarkable that something so inspiring to our community is also inspiring to the nation,' Wilemon said. The tornado injured more than 20 in Forrest County, inclduing some minor on the college campus, the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency said. The cities of Hattiesburg and Petal were most damaged by the storm. Video courtesy of WHLT 22 The open page from Psalm read: 'God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble' Doctors and nurses in a gynaecology unit in Macedonia were fined after celebrating the Orthodox Christian New Year with cupcakes decorated to look like vaginas. Bosses at the hospital in Stip fined the medics 30 per cent of their month's salary and said their behaviour was disrespectful to patients. The scandal was discovered when an employee posted pictures of the party on social media. Doctors and nurses working in a gynaecology department in Macedonia were fined after they celebrated the Orthodox Christian New Year with cupcakes decorated to look like vaginas Hospital bosses in Stip, in central-eastern Macedonia, docked the medics 30 per cent of their salary after a member of staff posted pictures of the party on Facebook Employees were also caught drinking alcohol, which is banned in the hospital. The medical staff's Santa Claus hats were also said to be inappropriate. The staff member who posted the pictures wrote: 'We thank you for the beautiful and original muffins that were the mascot of our gynaecological and obstetric departments. 'In addition to a long day, we managed to gather and celebrate the Orthodox New Year.' The employees were also criticised for drinking alcohol, which is banned in the hosptial. The staff member wrote on Facebook: 'We thank you for the beautiful and original muffins that were the mascot of our gynaecological and obstetric departments' They were also criticised for wearing Santa hats to the party. The employee also said: 'In addition to a long day, we managed to gather and celebrate the Orthodox New Year' In the pictures which were posted on social media, doctors and nurses pose beside a table filled with food and drink The decision to fine the staff was made by the hospital's finance manager Elizabeta Paparova, along with a disciplinary committee. Mrs Paparova said: 'After the investigation, there was a recommendation to the director of the hospital that the doctors and the nurses seen on the pictures are to be fined.' The gynaecology department was rocked by scandal in November last year, when a pregnant woman, 26, and her baby died of toxic shock. Cigarettes and an ashtray were also spotted on the controversial Facebook post. This is not the first scandal that has hit the hospital. In November last year, a pregnant woman, 26, and her baby died of toxic shock A Melbourne schoolboy claims to be the first Australian denied a U.S. visa following President Donald Trump's controversial entry bans. Pouya Ghadirian, 15, was born in Australia but holds dual Iranian-Australian citizenship by descent. He said he was planning to go on 'space camp', a dream trip to the U.S. with his school, where he would visit Orlando in Florida, Washington, and the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Alabama. Melbourne schoolboy Pouya Ghadirian, 15, claims to be the first Australian denied a U.S. visa following President Donald Trump's controversial entry ban President Trump (pictured) has issued an executive order banning the US from taking in people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia His visa interview was set for Monday morning. But on arriving at the U.S. Consulate office in Melbourne with his dad, things soon turned sour. The consulate officers said the rules had changed. 'They were a bit shocked and they didn't know how to handle it. They said they had terrible news,' he says. 'They said it was the first time it had happened in an Australian embassy.' Pouya, who is beginning his Year 11 studies at Melbourne High School this week, says he and his dad reacted emotionally to the news. Pouya (pictured) said he was planning to go on 'space camp', a dream trip to the U.S. with his school but was told by the U.S. Consulate office in Melbourne on Monday the rules had changed 'I cried at the consulate and I don't normally,' he says. '[My dad] was upset as well because he was saying, 'look we've had no criminal record and we've done nothing wrong'. 'I have an Australian citizenship. I was born here. It doesn't make sense and it can't be right.' Mr Trump has issued an executive order banning the US from taking in people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia. The US Embassy has been contacted for comment. Franks Issues Statement Supporting POTUS' Rationale for Extreme Vetting WASHINGTON, Jan. 30, 2017 / Christian Newswire / -- Today President Trump issued a statement (below) regarding the Executive Order concerning extreme vetting of immigrants from countries with terrorism ties. Congressman Trent Franks (photo) made the following statement in response to the President's Executive Order and the ensuing hysteria from the Left: "I agree with the President's statement on the Executive Order on immigration. Once the implementation has been smoothed out, the Executive Order will ultimately ensure those who want to come to America, those who respect and share our values, will find a welcome refuge through "the golden door". Those tired, poor, and huddled masses, those homeless and tempest-tossed, who are willing to respect our Constitution and way of life, will be granted asylum and maybe even a new home. Those who wish to do us harm or who despise the values which make us great will no longer be naively welcomed with open arms." -------- THE WHITE HOUSE Office of the Press Secretary FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE January 29, 2017 President Donald J. Trump Statement Regarding Recent Executive Order Concerning Extreme Vetting "America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave. We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say. My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering." A 33-year-old woman has become the sixth victim of the sickening Melbourne car attack. She died in hospital just before 7.30pm on Monday, ten days after a car mowed down dozens of pedestrians on Bourke Street. Among the others to have died are 10-year-old Thalia Hakin, who was out walking with her mother and eight-year-old sister Maggie when all three were hit by the car. A 33-year-old woman has become the sixth victim of the sickening Melbourne car attack. Pictured, crowds at a memorial held for victims gather at Melbourne's Federation Square The woman died in hospital just before 7.30pm on Monday, police confirmed People pay tribute leaving flowers at a temporary memorial on Bourke Street Mall Maggie was left with a broken leg and she attended her sister's funeral last week with it still in plaster, while her mother was too badly injured to see her daughter laid to rest. Matthew Si, 33, Jess Mudie, 22, and a 25-year-old Japanese man also died during the frenzied rampage. Three-month-old Zachary Bryant was also killed and his two-year-old sister, Zara, was badly injured. Nine patients remain in hospital, with one said to be in a critical condition. Among the others to have died are 10-year-old Thalia Hakin Thalia's eight-year-old sister Maggie was left with a broken leg and she attended her sister's funeral last week Jess Mudie, 22, a consultant for insurance company Marsh & McLennan, was one on the victims Zara, one of the youngest victims of the tragedy has been released from hospital, four days after her brother was laid to rest. The two-year-old was discharged from the Royal Childrens Hospital on Friday afternoon. Her brother Zachary was farewelled last Tuesday at a private funeral. Zachary Bryant (right) was killed in the alleged attack. His two-year-old sister Zara ( left) was discharged from the Royal Childrens Hospital on Friday afternoon Matthew Si, 33, was also killed Their parents Matthew and Nawwar Bryant described Zachary was a 'beautiful, loving, happy and perfect little baby' in a statement released to Daily Mail Australia on Monday. Dimitrious 'Jimmy' Gargasoulas, 26, is accused of stabbing his brother Angelo before allegedly mowing down dozens of people in the sickening attack. Angelo Gargasoulas took to Facebook on Sunday to express his sympathy for the families of the deceased. Police have charged Melbourne resident Dimitrious Gargasoulas over the incident Police allege the vehicle was being driven by 26-year-old Dimitrious Gargasoulas 'To all the families of the victims involved in last Friday's tragedy, my heart goes out to you and for all those still fighting in hospital, my thoughts are with you and your recovery,' Angelo wrote. 'No one could've predicted what Jimmy did or that he'd do that, that morning. 'I'm fortunate enough to still have my life and the support I have received is unheard of. 'I thank everyone involved in making this an easier time for everyone else involved, and my family. The brother of the accused, Angelo, took to Facebook on Sunday to express his sympathy for the families of the deceased Crowds at a memorial held for victims of the Bourke Street Mall Attack at Federation Square 'As for me, I still got some recovery time to do, and it's all looking good. 'Still in disbelief, the realism of it all has yet to fully sink in, stay strong Melbourne!' Last week, the alleged driver was due to front Melbourne Magistrates Court, but claimed he was feeling 'unwell' when summoned to face five counts of murder. His defense lawyer told the court that his client was unable to appear after being released from hospital following surgery on a gunshot wound to his arm. A Syrian national who received a US reunification visa on Friday was stopped boarding a flight to Los Angeles hours after President Donald Trump signed his controversial executive order restricting travel. Nail Zaion turned up for his flight from Istanbul to Los Angeles on Sunday afternoon only to be told he would not be allowed to board the aircraft. Zaion was refused permission to board as a result of the chaos caused by Donald Trump's executive order restricting travel from seven Muslim majority countries. Scroll down for video Nial Zaion was refused permission to board a flight from Istanbul to Los Angeles yesterday The Syrian national had been granted a visa to travel to the United States on Friday Zaion was prevented from boarding his flight after Donald Trump signed an executive order restricting people from seven countries including Syria from the United States A clearly emotional Zaoin looked devastated when he learned he would not be able to see his family for the first time in two years. Zaion told ABC News: 'So I came here, I showed them my visa. I showed them everything. They told me, "We can't allow you to travel." I told them, "I will go on my own responsibility". He said, "No". 'So I don't know what to do right now.' Zaion has been left stranded at Istanbul airport while US officials try to interpret Trump's controversial measure, which has been defended by the White House despite massive protests across the country. White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said the changes were 'a small price to pay' to keep the nation safe, but it is unclear whether the order will accomplish that. It does not address home-grown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement. And the list of countries in Trump's order does not include Saudi Arabia, where most of the September 11 2001 hijackers were from. Secretary of State Reince Priebus said other countries could be added to the list. Trump spoke by phone on Sunday with leaders from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Neither country is among the seven specified in Trump's order. The president, meanwhile, defended his actions, insisting it was 'not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting'. 'This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe.' Mr Trump also said he had 'tremendous feeling' for the people fleeing the bloody civil war in Syria and vowed to 'find ways to help all those who are suffering'. The White House said later that King Salman of Saudi Arabia and Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates, had agreed to support safe zones for refugees, but offered no further details. The developments came a day after a federal judge in New York issued an emergency order temporarily barring the US from deporting people from the seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trump's 90-day travel ban. The court barred US border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the US with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. The Department of Homeland Security said the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. 'President Trump's executive orders remain in place - prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the US government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety,' the department said. Top congressional Republicans, meanwhile, were backing Mr Trump despite concerns from a handful of colleagues and condemnation from the Koch political network, which is among the most influential players in the conservative movement. Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell said he supported more stringent screening, but warned that Muslims were some of the country's 'best sources in the war against terror'. Republican senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, meanwhile, expressed fear that the order could 'become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism'. 'This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country,' they wrote. 'That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security.' Mr Trump hit back on Twitter, calling the pair 'sadly weak on immigration'. Advertisement A killer cold of -10C has been forecast for much of February - after the previous -5 snap caused an extra 1,000 deaths this month. After last week's freeze, the Met Office forecast mainly wet and windy conditions for the next two weeks, with milder conditions expected for much of the British Isles. But Government weathermen said the country is set for a fresh 'prolonged' chill in mid and late February. February has seen temperatures plunge to at least -8C - and as low as -18C - in each of the past five years, Met Office records show. Met Office forecaster Emma Salter said: 'It's a big change from cold to unsettled conditions into February. A westerly flow means wet and windy spells at times, with gales possible in the North and West. 'But it looks like it turning colder again in mid and late February. The wind direction is expected to shift to a colder direction, which is from the east or north, with high pressure building. Scroll down for video A killer cold of -10C has been forecast for much of February - after the previous -5 snap caused an extra 1,000 deaths this month. Pictured: Ice covered trees and hedge rows in Renfrewshire as freezing fog grips central Scotland After last week's freeze, the Met Office forecast mainly milder, wetter and windy conditions for two weeks, with milder yet wet conditions expected for much of the British Isles Two men take their dogs on a misty walk along a foggy seafront in Weymouth, Dorset as Britain prepares for milder weather this month 'Wintry conditions are possible again. People should keep an eye on the forecast.' Today's forecast suggests it will be mainly dry with sunny spells for much of the UK, with outbreaks of rain in the far West. Hundreds more cold weather deaths are feared in the February chill - after 1,023 more deaths than average were recorded in the week temperatures hit -5C this month. In the week ending January 13, the most recent week for which death figures from the Office of National Statistics are available, 13,715 deaths were reported in England and Wales, up from the week's average of 12,692. ONS figures show 20 per cent of winter deaths are people aged under 75, with 11 per cent under 65. The Department of Health said cold conditions worsen winter killers including flu, chest diseases, heart attacks, strokes and dementia. Public Health England said many cold weather deaths were preventable - blaming draughty houses' lack of insulation, inadequate heating and Brits failing to wrap up warm in chills. The beach in Weymouth, Dorset, was empty apart from a few pigeons this afternoon, with the weather not likely to improve going forward Today's forecast suggests it will be mainly dry with sunny spells for much of the UK, with outbreaks of rain in the far West Temperatures this morning saw a big contrast between different areas of the UK, with a 20-celsius swing between Plymouth with highs of 11C and Cairngorm in Scotland at -9C After last week's freeze, the Met Office forecast mainly milder, wetter and windy conditions in the UK for the next two weeks Department of Health chief medical officer Professor Dame Sally Davies, writing in the Cold Weather Plan for England, said: 'Cold-related deaths represent the biggest weather-related source of mortality. Winter sees a significant rise in deaths.' Dr Thomas Waite, of Public Health England's extreme events team, said: 'Thousands of people die because of their exposure to cold weather. It's really important we all do everything we can to ensure everyone stays well.' COLD SNAP LEADS TO HEALTH WARNING People in the UK have been warned to stay warm and looked out for vulnerable neighbours, friends and relatives as Britain prepares for yet another bitter snap. Dr Angie Bone, of the Extreme Events team at Public Health England said: 'As the cold weather is forecast to continue for several more days, people with long term health conditions, very young children and older people continue to be at risk of health problems from the cold. 'If you're at risk, you can still take action to reduce health problems. Keep your home heated to at least 18C, keep yourself warm by keeping active and wearing lots of thin layers of clothing instead of one thick layer, and don't delay in visiting the pharmacist for minor winter ailments. 'Also think if there's anyone you can help out who may be at risk - if we all do our bit we can all stay warm and well this winter.' Advertisement Temperatures this morning saw a big contrast between different areas of the UK, with a 20-celsius swing between Plymouth with highs of 11C and Cairngorm in Scotland at -9C. The coldest night of the year so far has been recorded in Scotland, with the UK seeing a temperature difference of more than 20 degrees between north and south. Braemar in Aberdeenshire saw temperatures dip to minus 10.1C, while the Isles of Scilly recorded 10.2C, the Met Office said. Met Office spokeswoman Emma Sharples said Braemar was a 'well-known cold spot' due to its location in the Scottish Highlands. 'It is a valley location, so you tend to get cold air drained down into the valley,' she said. The chilly spell did not beat the coldest night of the winter though - on Monday December 5 temperatures fell to minus 11C in Cromdale, Moray. Snow cover in Scotland and cold air in the north helped keep temperatures low, with overnight figures of minus 3C in Edinburgh, minus 2.8C in Carlisle and minus 1.6C in Durham. Meanwhile, temperatures hit 4.3C in Nottingham, 7.1C in Gravesend and 7.7C in Cardiff. The coldest night in January 2016 was minus 12.4C in Kinbrace, Scotland. A spokesman from MeteoGroup said the UK could see highs of 13C (55.4F) in the coming week, as the weather gets a lot milder. He said 'low pressure systems moving in from the Atlantic' would cause the change in temperature. Towards the weekend and into the second week of February, the weather will 'get quite unsettled', as wind and heavy rain sweeps across the UK. The coldest night of the year so far has been recorded in Scotland, with the UK seeing a temperature difference of more than 20 degrees between north and south The conditions, meanwhile, resulted in a series of accidents in the Highlands including a collision involving seven vehicles on the A9. Emergency services were called to the multiple accidents on Monday. The first happened at 9.20am on Drumossie Brae just south of Inverness, before a second happened at 9.30am at the junction to Carrbridge/A938. Seven vehicles were involved in the first accident including a Volvo coach with 18 passengers, a Ford Ranger, Ford Fiesta, Citroen C3, Volkswagen Passat, Mitsubishi Shogun and a Seat Ibiza. No-one was injured and police said the road reopened again at around 11.30am. The second accident at the Carrbridge junction involved a Volkswagen Crafter flatbed van and a lorry. A man in his fifties was airlifted to Raigmore Hospital in Inverness, but is not believed to be in a life-threatening condition. Sergeant Donnie MacKinnon of Police Scotland said: 'We believe a contributory factor in the collision on the A9 at Drumossie has been the presence of a low-lying sun, causing reduced visibility for drivers. 'It is fortunate no-one has sustained life-threatening injuries and that of course is the most important thing, but these collisions resulted in two separate closures of the main A9 arterial route which brought with it disruption for all road users. 'Whilst I would like to thank road users for their patience during the closures, it is also important to remind drivers of the importance of driving to the road conditions and adjusting their speed accordingly.' Several countries around the world are protesting at the executive order signed by President Donald Trump which suspends the entry into the US of all nationals from seven countries, all of which are overwhelmingly Muslim. Trump has denied it is a ban on Muslims and had insisted the nations on the list Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia Sudan, Syria and Yemen 'are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror'. But how are these countries linked to terror attacks in Europe? President Donald Trump holds up the executive order he signed on Friday, which bans individuals from seven mainly Muslim nations from entering the United States Mail Online has analysed all the terrorist attacks in Europe, including Turkey, since 9/11. No individuals from five of the countries on the list - Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen - had been linked to any terrorist attacks in Europe in the last 15 years, although some could be linked to Islamist bases and training camps in Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Raffaello Pantucci, a counter-terrorism expert at the Royal United Services Institute in London, told Mail Online: 'Most terrorist attacks in America are carried out by Americans. Demonstrators protest against President Trump's executive order at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. The ban has been seen as Islamophobic by many American Muslims 'This list contains countries like Iran and Sudan, which have long been accused by the US of state sponsorship of terrorism, but have not been involved as individuals. And why are Pakistan and Saudi Arabia not on this list? 'There is not a lot of logic behind this but it's a lot of politicking. 'He signs a shiny executive order, which makes life difficult for a few people, and makes the international community upset, but at the end of the day he doesn't get elected by the international community.' So how many individuals from each nation have been involved in terror attacks in Europe since 9/11? Syria - 3 (possibly 4) In 2007 Loa'i Mohammad Haj Bakr al-Saqa, a Syrian, was convicted of masterminding the November 2003 truck bombing of two synagogues in Istanbul, which killed 57 people. Several other Turkish men, with links to al-Qaeda, were also convicted. One of the men who carried out the Paris attacks in November 2015 was believed to be Syrian. Ahmad al-Mohammad, 25, blew himself up at the Stade de France stadium. A Syrian passport was found near his body, although the authorities said they believed it was fake. The Paris prosecutor's office said later his fingerprints matched those of a man who arrived on the Greek island of Leros in October, purporting to be a Syrian refugee. Another of the Stade France suicide bombers was identified as M al-Mahmod, who had also arrived in Leros among refugees. He may have come from Syria although his identity and nationality were never conclusively proved. In July 2016 Mohammad Daleel, 27, blew himself up outside a wine bar in Ansbach, Germany. Fifteen people were injured. Daleel was a refugee from Syria who had arrived in Germany in 2014 seeking asylum. From Syria with hate: In July last year Mohammad Daleel (pictured, left) blew himself up outside a wine bar. Fellow Syrian Loa'i Mohammad Haj Bakr al-Saqa (right) was convicted of masterminding a truck bombing in Istanbul in 2003 Iran - 0 But in 2012 a suicide bomber killed six Israeli tourists as they got off a coach in Burgas, Bulgaria. Earlier this year Australian citizen Meliad Farah, 32, and 25-year-old Canadian citizen Hassan el-Hajj Hassan were named as the bomber's accomplices. They are believed to have been agents of Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shia group with close ties to Iran. Libya - 0 But earlier this month US jets bombed an ISIS training camp near Sirte, Libya - the former home town of the late dictator Colonel Gaddafi - after intelligence linked it to Anis Amri, the Tunisian refugee who killed a lorry driver and 11 people at a Christmas market in Berlin last month. Iraq - 2 In December 2010 Taimour Abdulwahab al-Abdaly, an Iraqi-born Swedish national, blew himself up in a botched suicide bombing in the centre of Stockholm. Witnesses said al-Abdaly, who had come to Sweden as a child and later lived in Luton, England, 'shouted something in Arabic' before detonating the bomb. Several other bombs failed to go off and he was the only fatality in the attack. On September 17, 2015 Rafik Yousef, a 41-year-old Iraqi national, was shot and killed when he tried to stab a policeman in Berlin. Astonishingly he had been released from prison after plotting to kill the Iraqi prime minister during a visit to Germany in 2004. Before the madness: Taimour Abdulwahab al-Abdaly (second left) is pictured with his British wife, Mona Thwany and his in-laws at her graduation. He later blew himself up in the centre of the Swedish capital, Stockholm Somalia - 0 But on 5 December 2015 a Somalia-born man, Muhaydin Mire, stabbed three people during a high-profile attack on the London Underground at Leytonstone after shouting: 'This is for Syria, my Muslim brothers'. Mire and his family had arrived in London from Somalia when Mire was 12. He was jailed for life in August last year. Sudan - 0 But in November last year an ISIS commander, known as Abu Nassim, was arrested in Sudan. Abu Nassim, who was born Moez Fezzani, was deported from Italy in 2012 but was later convicted and jailed for five years and eight months in jail for recruiting terrorists in Milan. Abu Nassim is also wanted for his role in the massacre of 21 tourists at a museum in Tunis in 2015. Yemen - 0 But the Daily Telegraph reported in 2015 that Said Kouachi, one of two brothers who killed 12 people during an attack on the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris, had been to the Yemen in 2011 and may have met Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born preacher who specialised in radicalising Muslims in the West. Al-Awlaki was killed by an American drone strike a few months later. The vast majority of the terror attacks in Europe have come from home-grown terrorists, especially from France and Belgium. Terrorist attacks in Russia - of which there have been many - usually emanated from Chechnya or other rebellious and overwhelmingly Muslim parts of the North Caucasus. While in Turkey, which has seen an upsurge in attacks recently, the bombers have been mainly Turkish nationals, often from the Kurdish minority. Britain's two major terrorist attacks - the 7 July 2005 bomb attacks on buses and Tube trains in London and the horrific beheading of off-duty soldier Lee Rigby in May 2013 - were carried out by British-born extremists. In the case of Corporal Rigby, the killers were brought up as Christians and converted to Islam as adults. Donald Trump Jr. and his brother Eric could be set to join a project to bring pandas to Central Park Zoo. Billionaire John Catsimatidis revealed that he has spoken to the Trump Organization about funding a new panda pavilion at the New York attraction. He said that by backing the project the Trump brothers would follow in the footsteps of their father, who stepped in to save the Wollman Rink in Central Park in the 1980s. Donald Trump Jr. and his brother Eric could be set to join a project to bring pandas to New York's Central Park Zoo Catsimatidis told the New York Post: 'What Id say to Eric is, "Youd be doing for the panda project what your father did with the Wollman Rink." 'Maybe the Trump Organization will build it for half the price, the way Donald did the Wollman Rink for half the price.' President Trump saved the ice rink in the southern part of Central Park in 1986, by paying for renovation work that allowed for the attraction to re-open. Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney - who has been calling for pandas to brought to New York for years - and television host Yue-Sai Kan are among those leading the campaign to import two breedable pandas from China. Billionaire John Catsimatidis revealed he had spoken to the Trump Organization about the project to import two breedable pandas from China (file photo) A pair of pandas would cost $1million to lease from China, not counting the expensive cost of keeping the animals each year Kan held a fundraiser at her Manhattan home last week, while a Black & White Panda Ball is set to be held at the Waldorf Astoria next month to raise cash for the panda pavilion. A pair of pandas would cost $1million a year to lease from China, not counting the expensive cost of looking after the animals. Mayor Bill de Blasio expressed his support for the project last year, on the provision that the pandas would be privately funded. A senior officer who flashed a female colleague to goad her over her breast enlargement surgery repeated her apology to her bosses and former co-worker, saying she still feels 'very ashamed' by what happened. Her apology came after her bosses slammed the 'pointless' hearing that let her keep her 109,000-a-year job. Greater Manchester's Police and Crime Commissioner Tony Lloyd said the force had been put in a 'ludicrous' position and were forced to give Assistant Chief Constable Rebekah Sutcliffe a final warning instead of firing her. Ms Sutcliffe bared her breasts at Superintendent Sarah Jackson and said: 'You're judged by the size of your t*ts. I don't feel the need to pump myself full of silicone'. In the drunken rant in a hotel bar she also told her: 'Look at these, look at these, these are the breasts of someone who has had three children'. An independent disciplinary panel last year found her guilty of gross misconduct but still recommended she should not be sacked. Today the force's own panel sat and agreed she should have a final warning because they had 'no significant reason' to ignore their recommendation. Ms Sutcliffe said today she had apologised nine times to her victim - and said she was looking forward to getting back to work. Back in work: Greater Manchester Assistant Chief Constable Rebekah Sutcliffe (pictured today) has been given a final warning and not sacked despite being found guilty of gross misconduct Row: ACC Rebekah Sutcliffe, left, of Greater Manchester Police allegedly flashed colleague Supt Sarah Jackson, right, who says she was shamed for having breast enhancement surgery She said in a statement following the hearing: 'I would like to repeat the apology that I have already given to Sarah Jackson, to the Chief Constable and to my colleagues. I deeply regret what happened and the impact it has had upon those people. 'I continue to feel very ashamed that I behaved in this way. I would also like to apologise now to the public - for the unpleasant nature of the incident and for the fact that I have let them down. 'The responsibility for what happened is mine and mine alone. At the time of the incident, I was under significant personal and professional pressure. D-day: Assistant Chief Constable Rebekah Sutcliffe (pictured today) will not be sacked for flashing a colleague who had a boob job 'In this context I foolishly became drunk, and as a result behaved in a way that is entirely at odds with the way I conduct myself on a daily basis and with the person and senior leader that I want to be. 'I did not mean any of the things that I said and I am dismayed that I was so unkind and unfair. I hold Sarah Jackson in high esteem, and prior to this incident consistently supported her and many others over a number of years with professional development and progression. 'Since the incident, through the support of professional counselling and my family and friends, I have reflected carefully on what has happened and taken steps to ensure this never happens again. I am determined to continue on this path. 'I am passionately committed to the work of Greater Manchester Police and to public service. I have always sought to treat victims, the vulnerable, the wider public and my colleagues with care and respect and to promote this behaviour in others. 'I am very grateful that I have been given the opportunity to return to work. On my return, I will bring the very best of my abilities to serve policing and the public as well as I am able. What I did was wrong, and I apologise for it. I now look forward to getting back to serving the community I love' Ms Sutcliffe refused to take questions after the hearing but released the statement via Greater Manchester Police. She repeated her apologies to Ms Jackson, Chief Constable Ian Hopkins and her GMP colleagues. Greater Manchester's Police and Crime Commissioner Tony Lloyd said the force had been put in a 'ludicrous' position and forced to accept a decision 'made by others'. He and chief constable Ian Hopkins will now write to the Home Secretary Amber Rudd calling on her to reform the system so the force can have the first say. Reaction: Greater Manchester Police's Mayor and Police and Crime Commissioner Tony Lloyd (left) said the force had been put in a 'ludicrous' position - chief constable Ian Hopkins (right) has called for the disciplinary process for senior officers to be reformed Night out: Supt Jackson (centre) tweeted this photograph from the event designed to enhance the 'profile and perception' of female officers in May. Her friends, pictured, were not involved in the alleged incident He said: 'Whilst it may seem odd to many people that someone who is guilty of gross misconduct can keep their job, that was the decision of the independent panel and GMP is left with no real option but to follow it. 'Having a pointless second hearing has put GMP in a ludicrous position. Such hearings give the public the impression that GMP is culpable for a decision which was, in fact, made by others'. Chief Constable Ian Hopkins has said that the anomaly of second hearings for senior police officers needs to be scrapped. 'Boobgate' policewoman apologises again - but refuses any questions ACC Rebekah Sutcliffe has kept her job and released a statement today - but refused to take questions. She said in a statement: 'I would like to repeat the apology that I have already given to Sarah Jackson, to the Chief Constable and to my colleagues. I deeply regret what happened and the impact it has had upon those people. I continue to feel very ashamed that I behaved in this way. I would also like to apologise now to the public - for the unpleasant nature of the incident and for the fact that I have let them down. 'The responsibility for what happened is mine and mine alone. At the time of the incident, I was under significant personal and professional pressure. In this context I foolishly became drunk, and as a result behaved in a way that is entirely at odds with the way I conduct myself on a daily basis and with the person and senior leader that I want to be. 'I did not mean any of the things that I said and I am dismayed that I was so unkind and unfair. I hold Sarah Jackson in high esteem, and prior to this incident consistently supported her and many others over a number of years with professional development and progression. 'Since the incident, through the support of professional counselling and my family and friends, I have reflected carefully on what has happened and taken steps to ensure this never happens again. I am determined to continue on this path. 'I am passionately committed to the work of Greater Manchester Police and to public service. I have always sought to treat victims, the vulnerable, the wider public and my colleagues with care and respect and to promote this behaviour in others. 'I am very grateful that I have been given the opportunity to return to work. On my return, I will bring the very best of my abilities to serve policing and the public as well as I am able. What I did was wrong, and I apologise for it. I now look forward to getting back to serving the community I love' Advertisement He said: 'It has led to a situation nationally where gross misconduct findings do not always lead to dismissal. 'The two-phase process that only exists for chief officers has left us in a difficult situation and I am writing to the Home Office to call for the process to be standardised for all police officers'. In a less-than gushing statement about ACC Sutcliffe's future he said: 'ACC Sutcliffe has been given a chance to demonstrate that she is committed to serving the people of Greater Manchester. We will now work with her to consider how she best achieves this in support of Greater Manchester Police.' Her victim Sarah Jackson, who now works for a neighbouring force, said: 'I am pleased the matter has been resolved and I can now put the matter behind me. 'My focus is solely on my new role at Cumbria Constabulary and I am looking forward to working with my new colleagues and the people of Cumbria'. Her QC John Beggs today argued that she had apologised nine times for the incident and claimed: 'The public of Greater Manchester would think that she should be given a second chance'. He handed the panel more than 200 pages of testimonials with many officers speaking of Ms Sutcliffe as 'inspirational', 'visionary' and 'a strong leader'. He told the hearing in Manchester: 'My client did apologise as soon as humanly possible and did so repeatedly. She apologised on nine occasions. 'The behaviour that she exhibited that night were a product of alcohol and not of intellect. ACC Sutcliffe was prepared to make a very public apologise but took into consideration the third parties who did not wish her to do that. On this occasion she let herself down, her colleagues down and the force national down'. Last year a disciplinary panel consisting of chair Rachel Crasnow QC, Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Constabulary Sir Tom Winsor and independent member Alastair Cannon found her gross misconduct had taken Ms Sutcliffe to 'the very precipice of dismissal'. They recommended she should keep her job and Ian Pilling agreed. The senior officer is said to have had up to four glasses of wine over dinner at a 'women in policing' event before losing her temper with Supt Jackson over her breast enhancement surgery. Ms Sutcliffe told Superintendent Sarah Jackson that her 'credibility was zero' after she had a 'boob job' and berated her as a 'laughing stock' who would be judged professionally 'on the size of her t**s'. Ms Sutcliffe, 47, who was the most senior female Greater Manchester Police (GMP) officer at the time, verbally attacked her younger subordinate following a gala dinner at the national Senior Women In Policing Conference in May 2015. But a hearing was told she remains a 'role model' to women despite humiliating another senior officer over the size of her breasts. The haranguing in the early hours of May 6 at Manchester's Hilton Hotel concluded when Ms Sutcliffe told her colleague she was no longer going to support a further promotion for her. Assistant Chief Constable Rebekah Sutcliffe (pictured today) said she was 'ashamed' of her behaviour and said she had apologised nine times to her victim - and said she was looking forward to getting back to work. Ms Sutcliffe denied what she did amounted to gross misconduct but a panel found it did following a hearing in December. However the panel recommended that Ms Sutcliffe receive a final written warning rather than dismissal. The BBC's director of strategy and former Labour culture, media and sport secretary James Purnell wrote a letter in support of Ms Sutcliffe. He said it 'seems to me an important type of officer to retain in policing'. While not 'excusing or condoning' her reported behaviour, he added: 'The region's police force would be poorer without her and a force for good would be lost.' Ms Sutcliffe admitted misconduct in failing to treat Ms Jackson with respect or courtesy and that she abused her position and authority. She also acknowledged that her actions discredited the police service. Her counsel, John Beggs QC, had told panel chair Rachel Crasnow QC, Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Constabulary Sir Tom Winsor and independent member Alastair Cannon that the 'sheer quality and quantity' of the character references before them 'entitle you to come to a decision which is not career-ending'. Outburst: ACC Sutcliffe drank up to four glasses of wine and says she can't remember what happened He said many of the statements from senior and subordinate officers spoke of her as 'inspirational', 'visionary' and 'a strong leader'. One unnamed female detective chief inspector at GMP said she is 'a role model to many women in the organisation'. Sir Tom asked Mr Beggs: 'Has her capacity to be a role model for many women officers not been fatally undermined by having humiliated and insulted a fellow woman officer in relation to her body and performance?' Mr Beggs replied: 'No, it has not been fatally undermined unless you take the approach that once you make a mistake you are tainted. 'In this case the humiliation and upset caused has been acknowledged, admitted and sincerely and fully apologised for. 'Assistant Chief Constable Sutcliffe remains a role model - a role model who is not perfect, who has human frailties. 'Greater humility has been brought upon her. She will emerge as an even more impressive senior leader if you permit her to.' Another female detective chief inspector testified of her anger that senior male colleagues had behaved 'far more reprehensibly' than Ms Sutcliffe - who has served GMP for 23 years - and not faced sanction. Mr Beggs said Ms Sutcliffe's 'stupid mistake' of getting too drunk did not demand dismissal and she was someone who could continue to make an 'immensely positive contribution' to policing and service to the public. He went on: 'She is a woman, actually, of conspicuous personal kindness - to victims of crime, vulnerable people, subordinate colleagues. Someone who always goes the extra mile to help a colleague in personal and professional stress. 'She is a strong leader. She is an inspirational and visionary leader.' Supt Jackson, pictured left with friends and right in her uniform, said the abuse she suffered in front of her colleagues left her 'mortified, embarrassed and ashamed' References came from male and female officers across 'a diversity of rank', he said, and he noted that 'many hard-nosed senior detectives clearly regard her as one of the best, some say the best leader they have worked for'. Mr Beggs said: 'Both within and out of the (police) service, people who know very well what she has done and admitted nonetheless speak with confidence, and assert, that she has much left to give.' On Tuesday, the panel was told that former GMP chief constable Sir Peter Fahy had twice promoted Ms Sutcliffe and felt she had the potential to reach the highest rank. It is believed that Ms Sutcliffe is the most senior officer to face a public disciplinary hearing since they were introduced by the Government last year. Mr Beggs told the panel: 'This will not happen again. Despite the humiliation she can rebuild her career, not just for the benefit to her but for the people of Greater Manchester. 'She will do so chastened. She won't repeat the mistake, you can be certain of that.' ACC Sutcliffe, above, is said to have told Supt Jackson she was 'a laughing stock on the fourth floor' - where the force's senior command team is based in its Manchester headquarters He said that Sir Peter Fahy's suggestion that Ms Sutcliffe could be a chief constable in future 'now appears to be a forlorn hope but what she can continue to give is outstanding service'. 'It is not necessary to dismiss Rebekah Sutcliffe, censure is necessary. Most importantly, it is not in the public interest to dismiss her.' Ms Sutcliffe, who was earning 109,000 per year at the time of her suspension, would face a pension shortfall of more than 500,000 if sacked. It is the third investigation she has faced. Two years ago she was investigated for failing to declare her relationship with Detective Superintendent Paul Rumney, then in charge of the force's Professional Standards Branch, when she sat on a disciplinary panel. And in 2010 she was given 'suitable advice' by a senior officer after reportedly trying to gatecrash a Labour Party conference event. In May it emerged she is set to marry her former head of standards her third marriage to an officer in the same force. Prince Charles took his own towels to an official engagement so he didn't have to use hot-air hand dryers. During a royal visit to Leicestershire's Mountsorrel and Rothley Community Heritage Centre this month, Prince Charles avoided the toilet machines. Instead, freshly laundered towels were placed in a cubicle for his tour to the site. During a royal visit to Leicestershire's Mountsorrel and Rothley Community Heritage Centre last week, Prince Charles avoided the toilet machines More than 800 people turned up to see Charles as he arrived by steam train at the Mountsorrel and Rothley Community Heritage Centre Studies have found hand dryers can spread germs more than paper towels, as they blast bacteria into the air. A source close to the centre told The Sun: 'There was a real buzz about Prince Charles's visit and staff wanted it to be perfect. 'They were more than happy to make one of the toilets for his exclusive use only and for his own hand towels to be used.' Clarence House declined to comment. During the royal visit, Charles visited the most multicultural street in the country when he walked down the city's Narborough Road During his royal visit to Leicester, The Prince of Wales met a former Afghan child refugee who hitch-hiked across Europe to reach Britain and visited the most multicultural street in the country when he walked down the city's Narborough Road. He finished the day in the Leicestershire countryside, unveiling a plaque celebrating the work of volunteers who restored more than a mile of track at the Victorian Mountsorrel Railway. The news comes amid reports President Donald Trump wants to avoid the Prince of Wales because of their dispute over global warming. The President is understood to have made it clear he does not want talks with the Prince at Clarence House, a regular feature of state visits. Trump is said to fear a meeting will encourage environmentalists to stage protests against him. Reports of Trump's threatened boycott of the Prince come a week after the publication of a new book by the heir to the throne warning of the threat posed by climate change. The Prince is said to regard Trump's views on the issue as 'appalling' and is 'relaxed' about the prospect of not meeting him. A well-placed source said: 'If the opportunity arises, the Prince would discuss the issue with the President in a courteous, respectful and candid way. 'If the President does not want tea at Clarence House, that is a matter for him. It would be a pity because, as a non-politician, Charles is in a unique position to raise matters like this. Either way, he will play a full part in the State visit.' Instead of seeing Prince Charles, Trump wants tea or dinner plus a photocall with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge at Kensington Palace 'to get even with Obama' who was accorded the privilege last year. A mother has said her daughter and her classmates have become possessed because their school has desecrated graves to build an extension in Jamaica. Audrey Smith has called for the authorities to step in, claiming her 11-year-old daughter is possessed by a demon. She said Ginger Hill All-Age School in St Elizabeth dug up graves to accommodate a new building resulting in children kicking, screaming and fainting. Scroll down for video A girl kicking and screaming in a video shared online claiming to show the girls are possessed The girl is held by two women (left) as she kicks and screams before fainting (right) A mother clutches her daughter amid fears the school is possessed by demonic creatures Ms Smith, 47, told the Jamaican Weekend Star: 'I know that it is demon in my child because I go to church and I plea for demons out of people. 'I am not a fool.' A video claiming to show the demonic girls has been uploaded to YouTube under the caption 'Look what's happening to the students from Ginger Hill all age school in St Elizabeth'. Ms Smith said the strange behaviour began at the start of the month, and has sought medical help for her daughter, but she claims it was nothing doctors could help with. The claim she is possessed is backed up by the fact seven other schoolgirls began acting even more erratically on Wednesday, according to the worried mother. She said she was in a class when her daughter passed out and started to thrash about. Other people had to be brought in to hold her down, Ms Smith said, and the teachers stayed out of the classroom because they were afraid. The reason behind the alleged demonic behaviour according to the girl's mother is the disturbed graves. She told the Jamaican paper: 'I heard for a little part of the school they put up the other day, they knocked down the graves and built parts of the school on it. A 'possessed' schoolgirl from St Elizabeth 'When they were digging up the place them, they saw bones, so I don't know if the dead that were there got confused.' The incident has polarized opinions among people reacting the video online, with a man identifying as MC Dee writing: 'The whole island needs to turn to the Lord. 'I'm sure there are a set of devil worshipers out there. 'Pray to Jesus to heal the land because Jamaica is beautiful.' But many shared the views of Jen Rowe, who said: 'Take the children to hospital. 'Ignorance at its highest form here. 'Pure garbage about devil and demons. 'Children are suffering and all the parents doing is screaming and making noise.' Others hinted it could be an environmental issue. What do you do if you feel you've been wronged? Call the police of course and that is exactly what one woman did when she felt her drug dealer had ripped her off. The unnamed woman called the police in the Northern Territory after her drug dealer had asked for more money than the usual. The Northern Territory Police, Fire and Emergency Services posted the bizarre story to their Facebook on Monday and offered to help anyone else who felt their drug dealer was ripping them off. A Northern Territory woman has called the police to alert them that her drug dealer had asked for more money than what they usually charged her The woman said she had attempted to purchase marijuana but was annoyed when the price was more than what she usually paid for the drug. Police attempted to gain more information from the woman but she ended the phone call. 'Is your drug dealer ripping you off?, the post began. 'A call to police yesterday had to top the list of unusual. 'A woman called police to complain about the price of marijuana in her community, reporting that her local drug dealer had asked for more money than the usual. 'Completely offended, the woman demanded that police investigate this outrageous price hike. When asked for further details, the woman hung up. 'If you know a drug dealer who is ripping you off, give us a call, wed love to help.' The woman said she had attempted to purchase marijuana (pictured) but was annoyed when the price was more than what she usually paid for the drug. A terminally ill teen has fulfilled her dying wish of firing a Taser at a willing person weeks after she drew up a bucket list of things she would like to do before she passes away. Alyssa Elkins, 16, is suffering from leukemia and decided not to go through with a second round of treatment to spend more time with her family. And the young woman from Morgan County in Ohio decided that firing a taser at a police officer volunteer was one of the things she most wanted to do after doctors gave her between one to six months to live earlier this month. Alyssa Elkins receives instructions on how to fire the Taser from Sgt. Al Shaffer from the Newark Police Department The 16-year-old prepares to fire at Sgt. Doug Bline who is flanked by two assisting officers Newark Police Department, New York agreed to partake in the unique event after her family and friends contacted the force for filmed event. The first to volunteer out of six, Sgt. Doug Bline, was selected to receive the tasering and after some training, Alyssa, who donned a fitted Newark Police uniform shirt with her name on it, took aim and fired. Around 50 people were in the room to witness the girl, from a farm in the village of McConnelsville, shoot at the policeman who winced in pain and slowly fell to the ground, flanked by two other officers, after she pulled the trigger. Sgt. Al Shaffer asked those present to shout 'Taser! Taser! Taser!' with Alyssa firing on the third 'Taser.' Alyssa also took up the unexpected opportunity to fire at her uncle Barry, who is a State Highway Patrol trooper and gave her the inspiration to fire a Taser after she watched a video of him getting hit by one during his police training. The Taser makes impact and the officer winces in pain and Alyssa can barely look Bline falls to the ground. He said the pain he endured was worth it for Alyssa's happiness Connell asked if her uncle had done anything in the past that she might like to get back at him for to which she agreed, reported the Columbus Dispatch. 'It's painful, but given her situation, it's a no-brainer,' said Bline, the first officer to be shot. 'If I were her parent in this situation, I'd be happy to know that someone was willing to do this for her.' He also said it was an educational opportunity to show that Tasers 'are a very safe, effective way to subdue someone.' A photo from the Alyssa Elkins Support Page. A post from January 23 read: 'The results to Alyssa's biopsy shows that she has indeed relapsed and has leukemia. She has decided to refuse another transplant. As it has a much higher risk of relapse then even the first' Her bucket list also included petting a miniature pig which came along to the taser firing with her. Speaking on the day Alyssa said: 'God loves everybody and he's for us and not against us. He puts us through trials,' she said. 'In the end, I'm not really scared. If he takes me, I know where I'm going.' 'She'd never hurt anyone,' said her mother Tiffany Elkins. 'My other daughter wasn't even sure Alyssa could push the button, that she'd be too afraid to hurt somebody.' Nicola Sturgeon dramatically ramped up her threats to call a fresh Scottish independence vote today after clashing with Theresa May in Brexit talks. The First Minister warned 'time is running out' to hammer out a joint approach to the looming negotiations with the EU. After the discussions with the PM and other devolved leaders in Cardiff, Mrs Sturgeon gave the clearest indication yet of her timescales by saying the 'next few weeks' would be crucial. The Prime Minister used the sessions today to make clear that she will not be held hostage by Scotland - insisting Brexit will be driven from Westminster. The Prime Minister held talks with Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon and Welsh First minister Carwyn Jones and Northern Ireland's Arlene Foster in Cardiff today Mrs Sturgeon has demanded that Mrs May get the 'consent' of the Scottish Parliament before triggering Brexit, but last week judges at the Supreme Court dismissed the idea that she needed to. Ms Sturgeon said this afternoon she 'remained to be convinced' that her Government's proposals are being taken seriously. She added: 'I came here today determined to find some grounds for compromise, some way of trying to square the circle of the UK-wide vote to leave and the Scottish vote to remain, but I also came with a very direct message to the UK Government, that so far the compromise or the attempts at compromise have come only from the Scottish Government. 'There has been no willingness to meet in the middle on the part of the UK Government. 'In terms of me getting a sense of whether Scotland is going to be listened to at all, that period between now and triggering of Article 50 is absolutely crucial. 'The next few weeks are not going to resolve every issue of Brexit, but in terms of me being able to judge whether Scotland's voice is going to be heard at all in this process... the next few weeks are very important.' Asked if such a timescale could see her announce another vote on independence by March, she added: 'I'll do what needs to be done to protect Scotland's position. We are running out of time for this process. It can't go on indefinitely and it won't go on indefinitely. 'This is one of the last key opportunities for me to make clear to the Prime Minister that I have to see some movement on her part, and over the next few weeks she has got the opportunity to demonstrate whether that movement is going to be forthcoming.' Mrs May said last week's Supreme Court ruling on Brexit had put it 'beyond doubt' that the final decision rested with the UK Government. The PM is flying to Dublin later for Brexit talks with Irish counterpart Enda Kenny. Speaking before the JMC meeting today, Mrs May said: 'We will not agree on everything, but that doesn't mean we will shy away from the necessary conversations and I hope we will have further constructive discussions. 'We have also had the Supreme Court judgment which made clear beyond doubt that relations with the EU are a matter for the UK Government and UK Parliament. 'We should not forget that that means MPs representing every community in the UK will be fully involved in the passage of Article 50 through Parliament.' Miss Sturgeon wants Scotland to stay in the European single market even if the UK leaves, reflecting the majority Remain vote north of the border. The Prime Minister, pictured arriving at Cardiff City Hall this morning, will use talks with the leaders of the devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland today to make it clear that Brexit will be driven from London The leaders of the devolved administrations, including Sinn Fein leader Michelle O'Neill, left, and Wales First Minister Carwyn Jones, right, are expected to press the PM not to take the UK out of Europe's single market when they meet at Cardiff City Hall today She said the UK Government was showing 'no sign whatsoever' of taking Scotland's position 'remotely seriously'. Meanwhile it emerged today that the SNP is set to abandon one of its longest-held policies for Scottish independence - full membership of the EU. Party chiefs now want Scotland to follow a Norway-style approach where it would stay inside the single market but outside the EU, according to The Times. It comes after a poll revealed that more than a third of people who backed independence in the 2014 referendum want Scotland to remain outside the EU. SNP chiefs believe that ditching its pledge for Scotland to be in the Brussels club will help it keep those voters on board. Gordon Brown has accused the UK authorities of 'criminal negligence' for ignoring the alleged abuse of British children sent to abroad Thousands of British children, some as young as five, who were sent abroad to start a new life may have been sexually abused - and then moved as part of a cover up. Former Prime Minster Gordon Brown has accused the UK authorities of 'criminal negligence' for ignoring the alleged abuse of children who were relocated under the Child Migrants Programme from the 1920s to the 60s. Writing in the Mirror, he claimed new evidence suggests many children fell victim to sexual predators before they left the U.K and that the Home Office was warned they were at further risk abroad. Under the Child Migrants Programme, poverty-stricken youngsters were compulsorily deported to Australia, Canada and other parts of the Commonwealth until it was stopped in 1970. Most children were wrongly told that their parents had died and that they would enjoy a 'better life', while the parents thought the children had been adopted in Britain. Mr Brown apologised for Britain's 'disgraceful' role in sending more than 130,000 children to its former colonies in 2010, but now says his apology was 'incomplete'. He said: 'We now know that scores of children were themselves subject to abuse before they were deported to foreign countries. 'It is clear that at least in the mid-1950s, and probably from 1947, Governments did have evidence that abuse was happening and did nothing.' Mr Brown was citing evidence given to the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. He described the evidence as painting a picture of 'violence and rape'. Most children were wrongly told that their parents had died and that they would enjoy a 'better life', while the parents thought the children had been adopted in Britain, Pictured: British Orphans at Melrose House near Parramatta in 1953 British orphans are pictured at Melrose House, Australia in 1953. A new report alleges some child migrants were victims of sexual abuse before and after they were sent abroad One victim claimed they were just five years old when they were repeatedly raped in a children's home in the UK and then, after being sent to Australia as a child migrant, the sexual abuse started again. Mr Brown said the new evidence needed to be urgently addressed by Britain's Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse. It was set up in 2014 following the revaluation that Jimmy Savile had repeatedly sexually abused children for decades before his death and was partly modelled on the Australian inquiry. Two twins from Islington, London are pictured carrying their luggage to the boat train 'Rangitoto' in London in 1950. There is no suggestion that the boys pictured were abused Mr Brown also warned that a fund set up by campaigners at the Child Migrants Trust to help those sent abroad is due to run out of money 'by March'. At least 100 families have not received any aid. Mr Brown added: 'Some [families] are only now in the early stage of making contact with their UK relatives. Others have yet to come forward for help. 'It would be inhumane to deprive them of their last chance to meet their kith and kin.' A former young Australian of the year finalist faces more fraud charges following allegations she conned her own homeless charity out of more than $440,000. Jean Madden, 37, was charged back in July with one count of fraud for 'dishonestly causing detriment' to her Street Swags charity. She was on Monday charged with six more counts of fraud, one of falsifying a record and one count of attempted fraud. Madden, from Brisbane, continues to deny the charges. Former young Australian of the year finalist Jean Madden, 37, faces more fraud charges following allegations she conned her own homeless charity out of more than $440,000 Madden, 37, was charged back in July with one count of fraud for 'dishonestly causing detriment' to her Street Swags charity Madden, who is a former Queensland Australian of the year, was originally charged following allegations that she misappropriated $441,000 of charity funds. Her lawyer, Kris Jahnke, told the Brisbane Times that the new charges were related to the same case. 'It's important to remember my client denies any wrongdoing,' Mr Jahnke said. 'As I understand it, the new charges are intrinsically linked to the current offence before the court. It's disappointing that this didn't come to light six months ago.' Madden will appear in court to face the new charges on February 28, while she will face the original fraud charge on March 13. Madden was sacked from the Street Swags charity last year following allegations she gave her partner a half-a-million dollar contract and spent $170,000 of the charity's money. Madden, from Brisbane, was on Monday charged with six more counts of fraud, one of falsifying a record and one count of attempted fraud Madden continues to deny the charges At the time, she posted a five-minute video to the charity's website defending herself. 'To have misappropriated $441,000, which is what I'm being accused of, is physically impossible,' she said. Madden set up Street Swags, which provided homeless people with sleeping bags, back in 2010. She became Queensland Young Australian of the Year the same year and was a national finalist. Police have launched an investigation after seven dead dogs were found with broken necks and gunshot wounds to the head. The dogs were discovered along a rural road outside of Charlotte, North Carolina and had been dumped some time ago, according to the Union County Sheriff's Office. The sheriff's office also said the canines were hunting dogs and none of them had a microchip that could be used to trace them back to an owner. Five of the dogs lay on the ground. They were found some time after they had died Pawsitive Impact NC Dog Rescue, a North Carolina-based rescue group, described the discovery as a 'massacre' and posted gruesome photos of the dogs strewn across the leafy ground on its Facebook page. They said that they removed the bodies to be cremated and also posthumously named each of the dead dogs to give each some 'dignity.' The post read: ' Saturday morning we drove out to the location (Morgan Academy Rd) that we were given to find a very gruesome, heartbreaking scene. Seven dogs murdered! Shot in the head and their necks were broken. They were found by the side of a road near Charlotte, North Carolina Rescue Group Pawsitive packed the dogs in bin liners and took them to be cremated 'A report has been filed with the Union County Sheriff's Dept. and we are posting these pictures, however graphic they may be; in hopes that maybe someone might know something or recognize these dogs.' Pawsitive said before they took the dogs to be cremated the bodies were checked over at Ballantyne Veterinarian Clinic by vet Dr. Josh Humphrey who confirmed that they had suffered broken necks and bullet wounds. Labor leader Bill Shorten has sparked a potential diplomatic rift with Australia's closest defence ally by slamming Donald Trump's ban on travellers from Muslim nations. The opposition leader condemned the U.S. president's executive order temporarily barring travellers from seven predominantly Islamic countries, as protesters stormed airports across the U.S. 'Mr Trump's ban on refugees based upon their religion or country is appalling and ought to be ended as soon as possible,' he told his 167,000 Twitter followers on Monday. Labor leader Bill Shorten (pictured) says Donald Trump's migration ban is 'appalling' U.S. President Donald Trump (pictured) speaking with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on Sunday to confirm a refugee settlement deal Bill Shorten tweeted his critique of Donald Trump's migration ban as protesters continued to storm airports across the U.S. (O'Hare International Airport in Chicago pictured) Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Foreign Minister Julie Bishop have both declined to criticise the White House order banning travellers from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen from entering the United States for 90 days. Mr Shorten is urging the prime minister to criticise the president, who spoke by phone to Mr Turnbull on Sunday to honour a deal to settle refugees from Nauru and Manus Island in the U.S. 'I urge Malcolm Turnbull to reconsider what our nation's position ought to be and rethink what he should be saying on our behalf,' the Labor leader said. 'It's time for leadership.' Bill Shorten has demanded Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull (pictured) criticise President Trump's migration ban He risks creating a diplomatic rift with the U.S., Australia's closest ally in the Pacific, should he become prime minister during President Trump's four-year term, which runs until January 2021. In March, during the Republican primary campaign, the Labor leader said he hoped Mr Trump wasn't elected president. 'Donald Trump's views are just barking mad on some issues,' he told Darwin radio station Hot 100 FM. Former Labor leader Mark Latham during the 2004 federal election campaign in Brisbane. His previous comments about U.S. foreign policy became a political liability Mr Shorten's blunt critique of President Trump has echoes of 2003, when Labor frontbencher Mark Latham described supporters of George W. Bush's Iraq war as 'a conga line of s*** holes'. Mr Latham became Labor leader a few months later. His comments created diplomatic tensions with the 43rd U.S. president during the 2004 federal election in Australia, which Labor went on to lose in a landslide. Former U.S. president George W. Bush (pictured) was offended by Labor leader Mark Latham's comments Sick notes written by ISIS militants desperate to escape the front line have revealed jihadis are not turning up to fight because of headaches, sore feet and bad backs. As the terror group is flushed out of areas of Iraq, coalition forces have uncovered documents that belong to the Tarek ibn Ziad battalion that operates in Iraq. They show Arab and European terrorists in the Middle East are pleading to be discharged from duty so they can return to their home countries with the most feeble of injury claims. An ISIS fighter's sick note from the Tarek ibn Ziad battalion recovered by allied troops in Iraq An ISIS fighter wielding a weapon points at frightened hostages under the terror group's flag The documents revealed a number of excuses such as back pain, headaches and heel soreness Among the excuses for not fighting on the front line include stating cerebral pains, knee spasms, backaches and heel soreness, according to Iraqi News. Tarek ibn Ziad is understood to be a terror cell made up of mainly European fighters tasked with carrying out attacks in the Middle East. It was formed by a terrorist named Morrocan Abdelilah Himich, who goes by the named of Abu Suleyman al-Fransi, according to The Arab Weekly. He is understood to have played a part in the November 2015 Paris attacks. The terrorist group have come under huge pressure from US-led forces in Mosul, their self-appointed caliphate. The stronghold has been widely regarded as their Iraqi based since they seized power back in 2014, but their position is weakening. Iraqi and Kurdish troops in coalition with allied soldiers are advancing on the city, and have already killed 3,300 ISIS fighters since the offensive started in October. The pressure has resulted in jihadis turning their back on the group, and incidents of infighting have also been reported as a number of senior leaders have fallen. The most recent was that of ISIS' chief executioner nicknamed Abu Sayyaf, who was stabbed to death near the city on Sunday night. Abu Sayyaf was paraded by ISIS for his enormous frame like The Bulldozer (pictured) He was dubbed one of the terror groups scariest decapitators and was paraded in their sick videos for his huge frame. He was also said to be leading ISIS in the Nineveh State, where he was killed by an unknown group who swarmed terrorist territory. Abu Sayyaf, translated to mean 'father of swordsmith', is also the name for an ISIS branch in the Philippines synonymous with beheadings and kidnappings. The executioner, who died in the al-Dasawa region in the western side of the city of Nineveh, was renowned for collecting the heads of his victims and dumping them in the same infamous hole in the region of al-Khasafa. White nationalist Richard Spencer has asked why there are mosques in 'one of North America's most beautiful cities' following an attack in Quebec that left six dead. The alt-right leader also suggested that Muslims 'can go home' during an outburst on Twitter. His provocative comments came after gunmen opened fire on worshippers at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center on Sunday night. Scroll down for video White nationalist Richard Spencer has asked why there are mosques in 'one of North America's most beautiful cities' following the attack in Quebec that left six dead The alt-right leader launched into an outburst on Twitter after a gunman opened fire on worshippers at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center on Sunday night White university student Alexandre Bissonnette has been named as the sole suspect accused of killing six men at the mosque. Bissonnette, 27, was arrested alongside Moroccan-Canadian Mohamed el Khadir on Sunday night. On Monday afternoon, Surete du Quebec, the investigating police force, confirmed one of the men was no longer facing charges. A source later told Reuters police were looking at Bissonnette as a 'lone wolf'. Six men aged between 39 and 60 were killed at the mosque and five remain in a critical condition in intensive care at the city's Hopital de l'Enfant-Jesus after the killings on Sunday night. Twelve others had less serious injuries and another 39 escaped from the mosque unharmed. Following the attack, Spencer wrote on Twitter: 'Why are there mosques in Quebec City, one of North America's most beautiful cities?' He continued: 'It's almost as if French Canada has the same problem as France with Muslims', before adding 'refugees welcome, eh'. He claimed it was 'almost as if French Canada has the same problem as France with Muslims', before suggesting that Muslims 'can go home' Spencer claimed that there needs to be 'an effort across N. America and Europe to help Muslims reconnect w/ their roots and families', posting: 'Yes, Muhammad, you can go home again.' He also appeared to disagree with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's response to the attack, writing: 'Trudeau BTFO?!' Trudeau has described the mass killing as a 'terrorist attack on Muslims'. He wrote on Twitter: 'Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families.' Twitter users responded angrily to Spencer's tweets, with a pastor writing: 'More punches coming your way'. Spencer was punched in the face by a protester as he was giving a TV interview in Washington during anti-Trump demonstrations earlier this month. His provocative comments came after a gunman opened fire on worshippers in Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center on Sunday night Weetabix today became the latest company to blame Brexit as it warned it could be forced to hike prices. The popular cereal company said the weakening pound was increasing its production costs. As a result chief executive Giles Turrell said customers should expect the price of Weetabix to rise by a few per cent later this year. But despite the warnings, the firm announced it is investing 30million to boost production at its UK manufacturing sites in Northamptonshire. Weetabix today became the latest company to blame Brexit for hiking prices Weetabix buys its wheat from within 50 miles of its processing plants in Burton Latimer and Corbyn, but it is priced in dollars, meaning its costs have rocketed as it has had to pay more pounds to buy dollar-priced items. Mr Turrell told the BBC: 'The big thing thats impacted us really has been currency, so with the Brexit impact weve seen obviously a weakening sterling which means all our raw materials do cost us more. 'Our primary obligation is to try and absorb those costs internally and try to run the business more efficiently. At a final resort we would have to increase our prices. Well probably have to do that later on this year if we cant continue to offset internally because of the currency impact.' Asked how much Weetabix could rise by, Mr Turrell said: We havent declared that, we would want it to be in low single digits. Higher prices is something the UK must 'get used to,' the boss of Unilever said last week. His firm, which makes Marmite, Domestos and Persil, was embroiled in a furious row with Tesco and consumers in the autumn after blaming Brexit for increasing its prices. Demands: Weetabix's 30m investment will produce new varieties Unilever was embroiled in a row over the cost of Marmite after it blamed Brexit for hiking prices in October The overall level of inflation rose by 1.6 per cent last month, up from 1.2 per cent on the previous month. Weetabix, which is also behind the Alpen brands, said its increase in investment is a response to rising demand but it comes as it is reportedly being prepared for a sale by its Chinese owners, Bright Food. Its share of the cereals and drinks market increased from 15.3 per cent to 16.4 per cent over the past year and the investment will help it produce new varieties, a spokesman said. The company employs 1,100 people in the UK 800 in manufacturing and 1,800 globally. It said the investment would create jobs but declined to say how many. Several firms are believed to be interested in buying the 84-year-old business which could fetch at least 1.5bn including Americas Post Holdings and the UKs Associated British Foods. Freda Mudalige, 75, was duped by two cold callers claiming to be from an IT firm who conned her into making multiple purchases at the Asda store in Taunton, Somerset A daughter has slammed Asda after they sold her vulnerable mother 3,400 of iTunes vouchers which she passed on to scammers after they promised to build her a computer. Freda Mudalige, 75, was duped by two cold callers claiming to be from an IT firm who conned her into making multiple purchases at the Asda store in Taunton, Somerset. Despite having a 250 limit per transaction, supermarket staff allowed the pensioner to make repeated 250 transactions on two dates last month before she relayed the codes back to the conmen. The retired bookkeeper believed she was paying the callers to build her a computer, but her daughter Dilly Carter has questioned why staff at the supermarket didn't do more to prevent her from spending so much on the vouchers. Ms Carter claims Asda is partly to blame for allowing her mum to spend such large amounts of cash. However, the supermarket giant maintains that staff 'followed the correct processes'. The incident, which is being investigated by police, has prompted her to move the grandmother-of-one out of the home she owns in Bishops Lydeard, Somerset, and into her house 170 miles away in Hertfordshire. Ms Carter, 36, believes her mother may have lost as much as 10,000 to various scams over the years. The mother-of-one described the cold callers as two men with Asian accents posing as IT workers, who claimed to have offices in London, but refused to talk to her when she made contact. She said: 'It's heartbreaking. I'm heartbroken for her. I feel let down because she's living on her own. 'They claimed they were building her a computer and they needed her to pay the money but they could only do it with these iTunes vouchers. 'She was told by Asda you can only spend 250 as a maximum, but they can keep putting it through in several transactions to total the overall amount. 'She added them up all herself and took them to the till and bought them in a huge bundle. Ms Mudalige's daughter Dilly Carter (both pictured) blames Asda for letting the pensioner spend so much on the iTunes vouchers each time 'When they [the cold callers] ring and I answer, they hang up straight away. They know that's not an elderly voice 'They know my mum, they know her by her first name. They build a relationship don't they? They [the scammers] use the names Mr Peterson or James Anderson. 'Different voices, different names but they probably all work together. It's all a big con isn't it? They're just taking advantage of the elderly. 'They probably all work in circles and the same company. They probably get a few people that they think 'right it always works with her, let's call her and tell everyone else to call her'. 'The same thing is probably happening with other people in this area and others all over the country. 'Everything's cash - they made her get cash because it's not traceable. 'It makes me feel run-down and annoyed - beyond annoyed. I find it difficult to believe that would people would do that.' Ms Mudalige, who has bipolar, paid for the vouchers across numerous transactions on November 15 and December 28 last year, using cash withdrawn from an ATM in Taunton High Street. She had been receiving cold calls for several months and lost 500 in another scam last August. Ms Carter said: 'They're [Asda] a huge store, I can't understand how they can let it go as far as it's going. 'All these elderly people that live on their own and haven't got their family round them, you'd expect that big stores, post offices, places like that, would look after them. 'There's absolutely no way they would ever allow that to happen in my local post office. The con men scammed Ms Mudalige into splashing out on iTunes vouchers, under the promise they were going to build her a computer 'My problem is that I obviously know my mum is ill, but it is Asda's responsibility to look out for elderly customers. 'Anyone buying that amount [in vouchers], you'd think 'what the hell?'. There must be something that people can do to stop this. 'My mum told me the assistants went and got them because they didn't have enough on display. 'They said they didn't have enough on the shop floor. They're spread around the store so they got someone to go and get them for her. 'How can anyone with the slightest bit of sense not think 'maybe I should tell my manager'. 'I just think they should have some sort of moral obligation and that should never have happened. 'If my mother had stolen that amount in vouchers, they'd soon be on it. 'She's moving into my house which has got no room, so she's taking my baby's bedroom our living circumstances have to change as a result. 'I don't want anyone to take advantage of her ever again, and I can't stop that without moving in with her. 'It doesn't help with her illness because she's stressed. It has had a negative effect on all the family.' Avon and Somerset Police confirmed they were investigating the incident and had notified Action Fraud. Asda said it had conducted 'a full and thorough investigation' into the incident and found that its staff had 'followed the correct processes'. An Asda spokesman said: 'We have processes in place to help keep our customers safe from fraudsters and continually remind our colleagues to look out for the signs of these scams. 'We are in contact with Ms Mudalige and will do all we can to assist the police with their inquiries.' Mohamed Abrini, the 'man in the hat' bombing suspect caught on camera during the Brussels airport attack, has been charged in France over the November 2015 jihadist massacres in Paris, his lawyers said Monday. Belgium handed Abrini over to the French authorities on Monday for a day so that he could face charges related to the deaths of 130 people in the French capital. Abrini was captured in Brussels in April over his suspected involvement in the March 22 Brussels attacks and the Paris killings, both of which were claimed by the Islamic State group. A photo taken during a press conference to present a police search notice for the third suspect from the Brussels airport attack - understood to be 'man in the hat'Mohamed Abrini Belgium handed over Mohamed Abrini, believed to be the 'man in the hat' bomber at Brussels airport last year, to France for questioning about the 2015 Paris attacks, federal prosecutors said. Abrini was captured in Brussels in April over his suspected involvement in the March 22 Brussels attacks and the Paris killings, both of which were claimed by the Islamic State group. 'In the framework of the investigation related to the attacks in Paris on 13 November 2015, Mohamed Abrini was surrendered to the French judicial authorities for a period of one day,' the prosecutor's office said in a statement. Eric Van Der Sypt, a spokesman, said the decision is based on 'mutual agreements' between the two countries. 'It's not uncommon that suspects in different cases are surrendered for one day or a few days,' Van Der Sypt said. Mohamed Abrini (left), alleged to be the notorious 'Man in the Hat' (right) in Brussels Belgian investigators have said the Brussels airport and metro bombers who killed a total of 32 people were part of the same Brussels-based cell that orchestrated the November 2015 Paris attacks that left 130 dead. Abrini, believed to be the 'man in the hat' from images caught on security cameras, fled the airport without detonating his suitcase bomb after his accomplices Najim Laachraoui and Ibrahim El Bakraoui set off theirs, killing 16 people and themselves. Several sources close to the Belgian-led investigation have said the three bombers targeted passengers travelling to the United States and also Jewish and perhaps Russian targets at the airport. US sources said they are confident the airline check-in counters for flights to the United States, Israel and Russia were targeted. Abrini had a record as a long-time petty criminal who grew up in the troubled Molenbeek area of Brussels with Salah Abdeslam, the only survivor of the group that carried out the Paris attacks. Firefighters and policemen are gathered in the northern Paris suburb of Saint-Denis city centre in the aftermath of the November attacks thought to have involved Abrini Policemen and soldiers control Brussels airport's entrance in the wake of the attacks last year Nicknamed 'Brioche' after his days working in a bakery, Abrini is thought to have given up training as a welder at the age of 18 before eventually gravitating towards extremism. The Belgian of Moroccan origin was seen at a petrol station north of Paris two days before the November 13 attacks with prime suspect Abdeslam, who drove one of the vehicles used in the attacks. Belgian authorities have charged Abrini with 'participation in the activities of a terrorist group and terrorist murders' over the massacres in the French capital. Identified as a radical Islamist by Belgian investigators, Abrini is believed to have briefly visited Syria last year and his younger brother Suleiman, 20, died there. He was known to security services for belonging to the same cell as Abdelhamid Abaaoud, one of the organisers of the Paris attacks who opened fire on bars, restaurants and a concert hall before he died in a police shootout shortly afterwards. MSNBC's Joe Scarborough went on a tear Monday morning - blaming Trump's controversial so-called Muslim ban on his 32-year-old senior advisor Stephen Miller. Scarborough said he met with the president and many members of his team over the weekend, and said it was Miller who was the author of the executive order that is now causing chaos at airports across the country. The executive order bans all citizens from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen and Syria from entering the country. It has been widely criticized as being a 'Muslim ban' - something the White House denies. Scroll down for video MSNBC's Joe Scarborough (left) blamed the president senior advisor Stephen Miller (right) for this weekend's chaos following the Muslim ban "This weekend was a disgrace and it's all on your shoulders." @JoeNBC pic.twitter.com/OGYh6cPFif Dorsey Shaw (@dorseyshaw) January 30, 2017 Citizens from these countries that were traveling to the U.S. when President Trump signed the executive order on Friday have been held at airports across the country, as lawyers fight to get them released. Reports say that Miller and other White House political operatives developed the plan without consulting any other agencies - which caused the confusion about what to do about citizens arriving from these countries over the weekend. You've got a very young person in the White House on a power trip, thinking you can just write executive orders and tell all of your cabinet agencies to go to hell. Joe Scarborough 'I will just say this right here - and reporting will bear this out - you've got a very young person in the White House on a power trip, thinking you can just write executive orders and tell all of your cabinet agencies to go to hell. 'And Washington is in an uproar this morning - forget about what's happening in the street - because Stephen Miller decided he was going to do this without going through the regular inter agency process,' Scarbrough said Monday morning. Scarborough became so impassioned in his take down that his co-host, Mika Brzezinski, tried to quiet him repeatedly. 'Stephen Miller better learn very quickly that if you're going to have the president of the United States sign something, you may better check it out with other agencies. Miller defended the executive order in an appearance on CBS News Monday morning 'I know you're almost 33 [Mika: 'Now stop], but you may want to actually check it out with other agencies who have been doing this for a long time. 'You may want to check [Mika: Shh] with people who run other agencies too, ok? 'And by the time you're 35, maybe you'll know how Washington and the White House really works, if you're still around. I hope you're not. Because this weekend was a disgrace and it's all on your shoulders,' Scarbrough said. Scarborough took a hit at Miller age again later, saying 'whoever drafted this up wrote it like a seventh grader'. Scarborough continued to rail against Miller on Twitter after the show, writing: 'Those focusing on White House staff being critical of Miller are missing the bigger story. It is the foreign policy team he angered most.' He went on to link to a story about Miller, which said that white nationalist Richard Spencer was a 'mentor' to Miller. Miller defended the executive order in an appearance on CBS This Morning. 'Anytime you do something hugely successful, that challenges a failed orthodoxy, you're going to see protests. In fact, if nobody is disagreeing with what you are doing, then you're probably not doing anything that really matters in the scheme of things. 'But in terms of huge turmoil, we processed 325,000 travelers in the first 24 hours after the new restrictions were put into place and 109 were detained for additional security screening. By any measure, I would describe that as efficient, orderly and enormously successful. 'And really, on behalf of the White House, I would like to praise the hard work of the customs and border protection officers who implemented the order,' Miller said. Miller graduated from Duke University with a degree in political science in 2007. He wrote for the student newspaper during his four years there, and was known for defending the Duke lacrosse team during that sex scandal. He went on to work as the press secretary for Congressman Michele Bachmann and Congressman John Shadegg, before rising to the position of communications director for then Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions, now Trump's pick for attorney general. He worked with Sessions to defeat the Gang of Eight's proposed immigration bill - and started developing a new plan he described as 'nation-state populism'. Iraq has banned US citizens from travelling to the country in a tit-for-tat move following Donald Trump's extreme vetting executive order. Trump has suspended travel from seven Muslim majority countries including Iraq. However, in return, Iraqi politicians have now banned Americans from their country. Scroll down for video Iraq has banned US citizens from their country following Donald Trump's executive order Thousands of people have demonstrated outside airports in protest at Trump's travel ban Iraqi politicians Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun said the decision in parliament today is binding for the government. Both say the decision was passed by a majority votes in favor but couldn't offer specific numbers. No further details were available on the wording of the parliament decision. It was also not immediately clear who the ban will apply to - American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and other Americans doing business in Iraq. It was also not known if and how the Iraqi measure would affect cooperation in the fight against ISIS in Mosul. Trump's order includes a 90-day ban on travel to the US by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, and a 120-day suspension of the US refugee program. Iran's senior vice president Ishaq Jahangiri branded the executive order as 'illegal, inhumane and against human rights'. He said: 'We will definitely take stance against this illegal, inhumane and anti-human-rights activity in international bodies. 'And once again (we) will review and explore American human rights in international bodies in order to let the world to know what a system they are facing.' Pauline Hanson says Donald Trump's migration ban doesn't go far enough. The One Nation leader has weighed into the U.S. president's executive order banning citizens and refugees from seven predominantly Muslim nations. 'President Trump's protections against Islamic extremism are a good start but I would go further and include Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia,' she tweeted to her 19,800 followers on Monday. Scroll down for video One Nation leader Pauline Hanson says Donald Trump should add Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia to banned list Queensland senator Pauline Hanson tweeted her thoughts to her 19,800 followers Senator Hanson said President Trump also needed to target states with known links to Islamic extremism in a bid to reduce the threat of terror attacks. 'The people of America have elected Donald Trump because they wanted to regain control of their borders and protect themselves against the influence and threat of radical Islamic terrorism,' she said in a statement. Travellers from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya and Somalia and Yemen are already being banned from entering the United States for 90 days. But Afghanistan was excluded, even though it is home to Taliban militants. The list also fails to include Saudi Arabia, an oil-rich nation which been accused of having close ties with Islamic State, which the Kingdom denies. Fifteen of the 19 hijackers on the planes that crashed into New York's Twin Towers in September 2001 were from Saudi Arabia. Another two came from the United Arab Emirates with Egypt and Lebanon each contributing a hijacker but none of these nations are on President Trump's blacklist, even though the terrorist attack was in his home city. The public policy Cato Institute released analysis last year showing no American was killed on U.S. soil by citizens from the seven nations named in President Trump's order. U.S. President Donald Trump signs an executive order in the Oval Office as Vice President Mike Pence (far left) looks on Fifteen of the 19 hijackers on the planes that crashed into New York's World Trade Centre in September 2001 were from Saudi Arabia President Trump has been accused of excluding from his list countries with ties to his global hotel business empire. Like President Trump, Senator Hanson last year campaigned to ban Muslim migration. 'Our politicians can no longer sit by and ignore the fact that unless we do something like ban Islamic immigration, Australia will continue to face an ever increasing threat from radical Islamic terror,' she said. Senator Hanson received an invitation to President Trump's inauguration last week but she declined, with her New South Wales Senate colleague Brian Burston going in her place. Donald Trump hosted a screening of Finding Dory at the White House while thousands of people protested at airports following the imposition of a travel ban from seven Muslim-majority countries. The president spoke on the phone with Salman bin Abd-Aziz, king of Saudi Arabia and the crown prince of the United Arab Emirates, Mohammed bin Zayed before the movie. He then rang the acting president of South Korea Hwang Kyo Ahn. Deputy Secretary of Labor Chris Lu tweeted it was ironic that Trump had chosen Finding Dory as it is 'the story of a foreigner entering the US without authorization to reunite with her parents'. Donald Trump hosted a screening of Finding Dory, pictured, at the White House - a film about a blue tang fish who travels to America from Australia to reunite with her family Thousands of Americans have protested outside airports following the introduction of Trump's extreme vetting order which the president claims is not a ban on Muslims Protesters also gathered on Pennsylvania Avenue near the White House to express their rage Lu noticed the movie was due to begin at 3pm and has a 97-minute running time. The film's co-star Albert Brooks also drew attention to the film's plot. He tweeted: 'Odd that Trump is watching Finding Dory today, a movie about reuniting with family when he's preventing it in real life.' The movie also has a very strong ecological message. At 4.45pm, Trump was back on Twitter attacking former presidential candidates John McCain and Lindsey Graham claiming they are 'sadly weak on immigration'. Film co-star Albert Brooks said it was an odd choice of movie because of the film's plot Trump's press secretary Sean Spicer said the president returned to work after 60 seconds Moments after the movie finished, Trump attacked Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham on twitter describing the pair as 'sadly weak on immigration' In a follow-up tweet, Trump claimed the two senators 'should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III'. However, Trump's press secretary Sean Spicer denied his boss spent 90 minutes watching the movie and instead returned to work after greeting White House staff and their children at the family theater. He tweeted: 'Actually he spent 60 seconds welcoming & thanking spouses & children of WH staff then right back to work: up next 7pm call w South Korea.' He said they should concentrate on ISIS and defending US borders rather than starting WWIII Deputy Labour secretary Chris Lu noticed Trump's choice of film was quite ironic Boris Johnson has insisted no UK citizens will be affected by Donald Trump's controversial travel ban. The Foreign Secretary said he had received assurances from the US administration that the restrictions would make 'no difference' to Britons - even if they are dual nationals. Mr Johnson also repeated his belief that the temporary rules - denying entry to nationals from seven mainly Muslim countries - were 'divisive, discriminatory and wrong'. But he flatly dismissed furious demands to withdraw the invite for the US president to come for a state visit - saying there was 'absolutely no reason' why the event should go ahead. The statement to the House of Commons will provide some welcome clarity after a message on website of the US embassy in London this morning said dual nationals would be refused visas. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson told MPs today that no Britons will be affected by the US restrictions even if they have dual nationality Mr Johnson was addressing the House of Commons today amid widespread anger over the US restrictions imposed on seven mainly Muslim countries The developments followed two days of chaos day in which Olympic starMo Farah and Tory MP Nadhim Zahawi warned they could be among those prevented from seeing their families in America. Mr Johnson told MPs: Im able to provide the following clarification. The general principle is that all British passport holders remain welcome to travel to the US. We have received assurances from the US embassy that this executive order will make no difference to any British passport holder, irrespective of their country of birth or whether they hold another passport. He added: In any case, the executive order is a temporary measure intended to last for 90 days, until the US system has added new security precautions. 'This is of course a highly controversial policy which has caused unease and I repeat that this is not an approach that this Government would take. Mr Johnson hailed Mrs Mays highly successful visit to the White House on Friday and said maintaining a good working relationship with the US administration enabled the UK to stand up to President Trump when he oversteps the mark. Let me conclude by reminding the House of the vital importance of this countrys alliance with the United States - on defence, intelligence and security we work together more closely than any other two countries in the world, he said. That relationship is overwhelmingly to our benefit. The Prime Ministers highly successful visit to the White House last week, underlying the strength of that trans-Atlantic alliance. Donald Trump signed the executive order implementing the travel restrictions shortly after Theresa May left the White House last week Where we have differences with the United States we will not quail from expressing them, as I have done today. He added: We also repeat our resolve to work alongside the Trump administration in the mutual interest of both our countries. Sir Mo, who was born in Somalia, a country on the list, said the ban made him feel like an alien and later spoke of his relief at the climbdown. TRUMP'S TRAVEL BAN TRIGGERS TRAVEL CHAOS FOR BRITONS Hamaseh Tayari, pictured, a UK resident with an Iranian passport, was stranded in Costa Rica after being denied boarding a flight home to Glasgow because her flight was due to stop-over in New York British Airways and Virgin Atlantic are offering refunds for travellers affected by Donald Trump's travel ban. His executive order preventing anyone entering the US from seven Muslim majority countries for 90 days has triggered chaos at airports across the world as travellers were caught out in transit. Customers who have bought flights to the US will be given the choice of a refund or the chance to re-book. One woman affected was Hamaseh Tayari, a UK resident with an Iranian passport, who was stranded in Costa Rica after being denied boarding a flight home to Glasgow because her return flight was due to stop-over in New York. Ms Tayari was due to fly home to Glasgow via New York after holidaying in Costa Rica but her US transit visa was revoked as Mr Trump's immigration crackdown took effect immediately. She is now trying to work out an alternative route home but she said it is likely to cost her a month's salary to get home. 'This has really shocked me. We just discovered [what Trump did] at the airport when we went to check-in, Ms Tayari told the Guardian. 'I want people to know that this is not just happening to refugees. I am a graduate and I have a Phd. It has happened to a person who is working and who pays tax.' Advertisement Mrs May has been heavily criticised for her cautious response to Mr Trumps presidential decree. Amid growing uproar she ordered Mr Johnson and Home Secretary Amber Rudd to demand an exemption for 250,000 British citizens who have dual nationality with one of the seven countries. That clarification arrived late last night, and Mr Johnson said he had now carved out a special exemption for the UK. Mr Trumps decree applies to citizens from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen and will last for at least 90 days. A US State Department official initially said citizens from other countries holding dual nationality with the banned states would also be affected. The move was designed as a first step toward the Presidents controversial election pledge to ban all Muslims from entering the US in a bid to counter terrorism. Mr Trumps executive order, which was signed just hours after Mrs Mays visit to the White House last week, also imposed a total ban on refugees for 120 days, and an indefinite ban on those travelling from Syria. Mr Trump was unrepentant last night, saying on Twitter that the US needed extreme vetting to protect itself from terrorism and that he didnt want the US to end in a mess like Europe. Mrs May refused three times to condemn the ban during a press conference in the Turkish capital Ankara. Downing Street said this morning that the PM 'disagreed' with the restrictions and had acted to ensure the interests of UK nationals were secure. The Foreign Office confirmed the ban would not apply to dual British nationals shortly after 8pm last night. Canada also won an exemption for its citizens who hold dual nationality with the affected states. Mr Johnson held talks on the issue with Mr Trumps chief strategist Steve Bannon and son-in-law Jared Kushner. But a message on the US embassy website today states: 'Per US Presidential Executive Order signed on January 27, 2017, visa issuance to aliens from the countries of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen has been suspended effective immediately until further notification. 'If you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time. 'If you already have an appointment scheduled, please DO NOT ATTEND your appointment as we will not be able to proceed with your visa interview. 'Please note that certain travel for official governmental purposes, related to official business at or on behalf of designated international organizations, on behalf of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or by certain officials is not subject to this suspension.' Iranian-born physics student Naz Jahanshahi, from Manchester, was devastated to learn that she may have to cancel a trip to the US with her boyfriend Sir Mo is originally from Somalia, one of the countries on Donald Trump's list. There were fears that dual British nationals from the banned countries would not be able to enter the US The Foreign Office said travellers to the US from anywhere other than one of the seven countries involved would experience no extra checks regardless of nationality or place of birth. And it said that dual citizens from one of the seven countries travelling to the US from outside those countries would not be affected. They said, however, that dual nationals might have extra checks if they travelled directly from one of the seven countries. In a statement last night, the Foreign Office said: The US has reaffirmed strong commitment to the expeditious processing of all travellers from the United Kingdom. Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson, pictured, said a state visit 'could not possibly occur' while 'a cruel and divisive policy which discriminates against citizens of the host nation is in place' London's Muslim Mayor Sadiq Khan, pictured, also said President Trump should only be invited for a state visit once he lifts his 'shameful' travel ban Mr Johnson had said: We will protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals home and abroad. Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality. The Foreign Secretary was publicly criticised by his sister, the journalist Rachel Johnson, who told him on Twitter: We should protect the rights of everyone, not just UK nationals. Only those travelling directly from a banned country, for example a British-Libyan citizen travelling directly to the US from Libya, may be subjected to extra checks, the Foreign Office said. Mr Trump issued a statement insisting he had not imposed a Muslim ban. He said: My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. For most people coming face-to-face with a great white shark is the stuff of nightmares but one Chinese tourist has described encountering the predator as his 'life highlight'. Marshall Yu, 43, came within metres of a giant great white while diving in Victoria on Sunday. Mr Yu, an interior designer, was SCUBA diving off Mornington Peninsula when he captured the close encounter with the man eater. Scroll down for video A Chinese tourist has come face-to-face with a giant great white shark during a Scuba dive off the coast of Victoria on Sunday Mr Yu is currently visiting Australia from Shanghai. The footage taken on his underwater camera shows the huge creature swimming slowly away from Mr Yu. Mr Yu described the encounter as his 'favourite ever experience' whilst diving and even thought the shark was cute. 'I didn't see any aggression I made eye contact with it, (the shark) was pretty cute.' Mr Yu told 9news. Relatives searching for missing Jessica Runions (pictured) have found a man's body for the second time in two weeks Search teams looking for a missing Missouri woman have found a man's body for the second time in two weeks. The body was discovered by the relatives of Jessica Runions, 21, as they searched fields and undergrowth in south-east Kansas City. Police said the death is being treated as suspicious, but the victim has not yet been identified. The discovery comes after Runions' relatives found a man's decomposing body in a creek bed last week. He was later identified as a 21-year-old man from Raytown reported missing in November. His death is being investigated as a homicide. Relatives of Runions have been searching for her nearly every week since she went missing in early September, the Kansas City Star reports. Her father John said: 'Two bodies two weeks in a row? It's unbelievable. 'We're not going to stop looking until we find her. And if we find other people along the way, that's good. Families deserve closure.' Runions' burned vehicle was found near this remote overpass in Kansas City two days after she was last seen Runions was last seen leaving a gathering of friends in south Kansas City. Her burned vehicle was found two days later in a nearby wooded area. Kylr Yust has been charged with burning her vehicle, and a judge entered a not guilty plea on his behalf. Police said Yust was also questioned over the 2007 disappearance of an ex-girlfriend, Kara Kopetsky, who was 17 when she went missing. He has not been charged in either disappearance. Syria has refuted claims that President Bashar al-Assad has had a stroke and insists he is in 'excellent health'. The Lebanese newspaper, al-Mustaqbal, said 'reliable sources' had told them Assad, 51, had suffered a cerebral infarction and was being treated in a hospital in Damascus amid high security. Al-Arabiya said a Saudi newspaper, Okaz, had claimed Assad was suffering from a 'brain tumour' and was being treated by a Russian and Syrian medical team. President Assad (pictured) has not been seen in public for several weeks but the Syrian government said rumours about his health were 'hopes in the imagination of those who made them up' But Syria's state news agency SANA quoted the president's office in Damascus as saying rumours about his health were 'absolutely incorrect' and he was working as normal. Assad's office said the Syrian people had become 'immune against such lies' and made dark insinuations about who was behind the claims. Russian blogger Navsteva added: 'Saudi Arabias Al Arabiya spreading rumours Assad suffered a stroke, was shot by his Iranian bodyguard, and is dead.' Assad is pictured enjoying an after-dark feast with Syrian soldiers during Ramadan last year Saudi Arabia supported Sunni Muslim rebels when they first rose up in 2011 against Assad, who is from the Alawite minority and has close links with Shia Iran and Lebanese-based Hezbollah. Earlier in the month the Saudi-owned daily Asharq al-Awsat, based in London, claimed the Syrian leader's mental health was deteriorating because of the 'psychological pressures' of Syria's civil war. But SANA said the spreading of 'unfounded claims' coincided with a change in the balance of power in Syria, after the Assad regime recaptured Aleppo in November, and said the health rumours were 'hopes in the imagination of those who made them up'. A man serving two life sentences for masterminding a deadly Indianapolis house explosion for insurance money is now on trial for plotting the murder-for-hire of a key witness in the explosion case. Prosecutors say that while in jail awaiting trial for spearheading the explosion plot, Mark Leonard, 47, tried to hire a hit man to kill his friend Mark Duckworth. Leonard had revealed to Duckworth that he planned to reap $300,000 from a gas explosion in his girlfriend's house, and wanted to spend part of his expected windfall on a Ferrari, according to court testimony. When the explosion actually occurred, killing two neighbors and destroying dozens of homes, a shocked Duckworth called his father, a former Indianapolis police officer, telling him: 'Leonard don't have anything to lose now to kill me because I know too much,' according to testimony. Duckworth's fears may have been justified. Scroll down for video Convicted: Mark Leonard (left); his girlfriend, Monserrate Shirley; and his brother, Bob Leonard were all jailed in the fatal insurance scam plot. Now Leonard faces trial for hit man scheme Mark Duckworth (front) leaves the courthouse after testifying against his friend Mark Leonard in 2015. Leonard had tried to hire a hit man to stop the testimony, prosecutors say Leonard masterminded the gas explosion that killed two and destroyed multiple homes When Leonard learned that Duckworth planned to testify against him, prosecutors claim he asked a fellow jail inmate for help arranging a contract killing, reported the Indianapolis Star. Little did he know the inmate was actually a jailhouse informant, who was more than happy to help him find a 'hit man.' In recorded calls from jail, Leonard allegedly offered the supposed hired killer, 'Jay,' a $15,000 contract to kill Duckworth in a manner that appeared to be a suicide. There was a $5,000 bonus clause if 'Jay' could convince Duckworth to recant his prior statements to police before slaying the man, said prosecutors. In recordings played in court, Leonard can be heard giving 'Jay' descriptions of Duckworth's car, directions to his home, and advising the supposed assassin to sneak inside through the back door. 'Mr. Leonard believed he would be immediately released upon the death' of the witness, Marion County Prosecutor Terry Curry said when the charges were filed in 2013. But freedom was not in the cards for Leonard. 'Mr. Leonard believed he would be immediately released upon the death' of Duckworth, said Marion County prosecutor Terry Curry (pictured) The 2012 blast shattered windows and caved in walls of dozens of homes. Leonard had allegedly told Duckworth beforehand that he planned to buy a Ferrari with insurance money 'Jay' turned out to be special agent Jeremy Godsave of the Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearm Bureau. Saved from the assassination plot, Duckworth went on to testify that Leonard had hinted at his dark plans some time before the gas explosion. Duckworth testified that Leonard had talked about buying a Ferrari, WTHR reported. 'Where did you get the money to buy a Ferrari?' Duckworth asked. 'The tsunami winds blew out the fireplace and the house blew up' Leonard reportedly replied, adding that he planned to get $300,000 in insurance money soon. The prosecutor asked Duckworth if he and Leonard were friends. 'I thought we were,' he replied. The damning testimony helped convict Leonard in 2015 on murder, arson and other charges in the house explosion , which killed neighbors Dion and Jennifer Longworth. Four others were convicted in the case, including Leonard's girlfriend and his half-brother. Leonard received two life sentences without parole, plus 75 years, for plotting the explosion. A victim of modern slavery has spoken of his horrific experiences at the hands of a traveller gang who forced men to work for nothing, live in squalid conditions and beat them if they tried to escape. Mark Ovenden was one of those kept as a slave by five members of a family who lived a luxurious life at the expense of drug addicts and alcoholics. He was homeless when he was picked up on the streets of Bournemouth and being offered 'a job' at the Greenacres traveller site near Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire. Mark Ovenden (left) told of his time as a slave group run by gang leader William Connors He told how he was offered accommodation by the gang, who then bullied their workers in laying driveways for long hours in all weather. Speaking on Channel 4's The Modern British Slave Trade, Mr Ovenden said: 'It would have been about eight living in a horsebox, which had wooden bunks built into the side. 'You've seen pictures of the concentration camps, the long tunnel-like barracks and it was like that inside.' 'There was one outside cold water tap for the workers to use. Most of them hadn't showered for a couple of months at least. There was one outside toilet that didn't work.' He added: 'It was made very clear that if I was to go out, if I tried to leave, the consequences would be pretty grave. I'd seen them punch people, kick people and threaten people's lives.' Mr Ovenden was freed after two years with around 20 other men and his case led to William Connors and his traveller family being jailed. Surveillance footage taken by police shows Connors bullying one of his slave at the campsite Police told how some of the men they found at the site were missing teeth, while others had been sleeping in faeces in conditions compared to a Nazi concentration camp The Connors owned homes with hot tubs; a fleet of cars including a Rolls-Royce and a Mercedes saloon; enjoyed Caribbean cruises and holidays in Mexico and Dubai; and had 500,000 in the bank. But their fortune came from constructing driveways and patios using a workforce of vulnerable men kept in squalid conditions, paid a pittance, and living in fear of violence. The workers were given alcohol and cannabis but so little food they resorted to scavenging from dustbins for leftovers. Sian Turner, a police officer who worked on the case, told the documentary: 'You had these poor people, thin, in pitiful dress, people missing teeth with their heads down, broken men.' Workers were made to live in caravans and a horse box owned the Connors family, who had purchased several sites Victims said the conditions inside were like a prison camp, with beds on either side Footage from the documentary shows the state of some of the caravans they lived in Around 13,000 people are being held as slaves in modern Britain, working up to 115 hours a week with no pay according to the new documentary. Anti-trafficking campaigner Megan Stewart said slavery 'is organised crime on a scale the world hasn't seen before'. She said gangs are now targeting the homeless because it is cheaper than trafficking people in from abroad. She said: 'The more vulnerable they are, the more likely they are to be targeted. If you don't speak English, if you look like you are an alcoholic of a drug addict, that's the sort of person the traffickers are going to be looking for. People who won't be missed.' Harriet Wran's ex-boyfriend claims the couple were falling in love and planning on starting a life together when they were arrested for the murder of a small-time drug dealer. In his first public statement since being sentenced to 13 years in jail, Michael Lee told The Daily Telegraph his former lover 'abandoned' him in prison as she walked free after receiving a two-year sentence as part of a plea deal. Wran, 28, and Lee's love story fell apart when the couple who were on a six day drug bender - and an accomplice forced their way into Daniel McNulty's home in 2014 and stole $650 and a stash of drugs. Harriet Wran's (pictured) ex-boyfriend, Michael Lee, claims the couple were falling in love and planning on moving into an apartment together in Sydney's Surry Hills before they were arrested In his first public statement since being sentenced to 13 years in jail, the 37-year-old lifelong criminal (far right) said he cannot accept Wran's release from jail after only serving two years Lee then stabbed Mr McNulty to death. The 37-year-old lifelong criminal said he is sorry for what he has done and should serve his sentence but said he cannot accept Wran's release from jail after only a couple of years. 'There's one law for the rich and one for the poor,' Lee said, pointing to her connections as the daughter of a former Labor premier. 'I believe if she wasn't who she was she'd still be serving time,' he continued, claiming he 'saved her a**' by not testifying against her. 'I'm seen as the monster who ruined her life, but she's no angel. She already had a 4g-a-day ice addiction and was messed up when we met.' Wran, a recovering ice addict spent two years in jail for participating in a robbery that led to the death of a drug dealer. Lee, 37, was sentenced in September last year to at least 13 years and six months behind bars for stabbing Mr McNulty to death. The friend, Lloyd Edward Haines, 31, who knew Lee had a knife but did not anticipate it would be used, was jailed for at least 11 years. They both pleaded guilty in the NSW Supreme Court to murder and armed robbery with wounding of Mr McNulty's flatmate, Brett Fitzgerald. Wran, who is a former Sydney Church of England Grammar School pupil, served time for being an accessory after the fact of murder and robbery. There's one law for the rich and one for the poor,' Lee said, pointing to Wran's (pictured) connections as the daughter of a former Labor premier Wran, 28, and Lee's love story fell apart when the couple who were on a six days into a drug bender - and an accomplice forced their way into Daniel McNulty's (pictured) home in 2014 and stole $650 and a stash of drugs Lee said he believes Wran (pictured) would still be behind bars if she 'wasn't who she was' and he hadn't 'saved her ass' by not testifying against her Lee told the Daily Telegraph the system is stacked against people who do not have money unlike Wran's family (pictured are Harriet and her brother Hugo) Lee told the Daily Telegraph the system is stacked against people who do not have money unlike Wran's family. He claims Wran 'loved to play gangster'. The trio headed to Mr McNulty's home. After he stabbed Mr McNulty, Lee said Wran appeared stunned for a moment before she began scrounging the floor for drugs while telling him he 'really was bad'. Lee said the 28-year-old, who has a large tattoo of a dragon on her arm, likes 'bad Asian men'. Lee said he was Wran's first 'proper criminal boyfriend' and the pair bonded over drugs and books 'I was her first proper criminal boyfriend, I had done time before and she loved that about me, you could tell,' Lee told the Daily Telegraph of when the couple first met. Lee said Wran told him on multiple occasions she was falling in love with him and they planned on moving into an apartment in Sydney's Surry Hills. The pair bonded over their love of drugs, books and their parents' bad health, the 37-year-old said. During their relationship Lee claims they had 'wild sex' after smoking or injecting ice. A student has died from a suspected stroke while he was having sex with his girlfriend. The girl, identified only as Fu, said her 22-year-old boyfriend Huang was on top of her when they woke up at 5am and started making love. He lost collapsed halfway through and fell down with a large thud after suffering what is thought to be a stroke or a heart attack in Taiwan. A man understood to be Huang being carried through the hospital having passed out Fu said: 'Halfway through our lovemaking, he began to sweat and had difficulty breathing. 'He lost consciousness right there, and fell down on the bed with a loud thud. 'I called his name and touched him, but there was no reaction.' Horrified Fu, 20, called for an ambulance which raced Huang to hospital, but there was nothing doctors could do. Huang was a little overweight but had always been healthy, Fu told cops. His shattered parents said: 'How can he die like this? We want to know what happened.' They have asked police to probe the cause of death. But officers say they do not suspect foul play and believe Huang suffered a stroke or heart attack in Keelung, Taiwan. Huang was taken to Keelung Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, but doctors couldn't save him The city of Keelung in Taiwan where temperatures have dropped to an unusually cold 11C Shih Chi-chung, a senior doctor at the hospital Huang was taken to, said: 'When he arrived he had already stopped breathing and had no pulse. 'He was unconscious and his eyes rolled white.' Huang had recently recovered from a minor cold. And his death has prompted medics to suggest that the city's unusually cold temperature of 11 degrees Celsius could have played a part. Dr Shih, head of Keelung Chang Gung Memorial Hospital's emergency room, warned that people should avoid vigorous sex when it is cold - and warm up first with some exercises. Prosecutors are waiting the results of an autopsy. This is the shocking moment a father throws his baby to passersby as he stands on their sinking car in China. The footage was filmed in China's Hunan province and posted online on January 28. The family were saved by onlookers and taken to hospital for a check-up however no injuries were reported. Scary: Father was holding the baby and asked for onlookers' help to catch the toddler Onlookers successfully caught the toddler, the rest of the family managed to escape safely According to Apple Daily, the family of six, which included a toddler were on their way back home for the Chinese New Year and were about to cross the river in Changde City. The footage did not show how the car fell into the river, but it was not far from the car ferry and the pier. Family members can be seen climbing out of the car and climbing on top of it. The worried father asks bystanders on the shore to fetch his toddler. All other family members came out of the car and swam to the pier before the car sank As the car sank and shifted far away from the pier, the father threw his toddler to the onlookers. The toddler was saved and the rest of the members managed to escape. Shortly after the rescue, they were sent to the hospital for inspection. Web users have been commenting on the video. One user commented: 'I can feel the nerves when the onlookers caught the toddler in time.' While others shared their concern at what would have happened if the onlookers had not caught the child. Advertisement Incredible pieces of 200-year-old artwork which gave Britain its first look at life in South Africa are set to be sold at an auction for around 25,000. Natural history painter Samuel Daniell became one of the first to depict the African country while on an expedition there at the turn of the 19th century. His raw, almost photographic, paintings were shipped back to the UK to offer westerners a previously unseen window into South Africa. The stunning works, which were done before the dawn of photography, picture wild animals and native peoples against the rugged backdrop of the the country's Atlantic coast. Thirty of Daniell's best paintings were compiled into 'African Scenery and Animals', which was published in 1804. This first edition copy has been in private ownership in South Africa for the past century but is now being sold at Bonhams auctioneers for an estimated 25,000. Incredible pieces of 200-year-old artwork which gave Britain its first look at life in South Africa are set to be sold at an auction for around 25,000. Each painting was done on thick paper measuring 18ins by 25ins. Pictured is a painting of Bushmen Hottentots, armed for an expedition Natural history painter Samuel Daniell became one of the first to depict the African country while on an expedition there at the turn of the 19th century. Pictured is the New Theatre in Hottentot Square The pictures also provided valuable information to those involved with international trade and academics studying the country. Pictured are Korah Hottentots preparing to move, with a bull and a dog The volume comes with ten leaves of letterpress text, which have a description, written by Daniell, of each of the images. Pictured is a Quahkah - an extinct species of zebra The stunning works, which were done before the dawn of photography, picture wild animals and native peoples against the rugged backdrop of the the country's Atlantic coast. At the time of publication 'African Scenery and Animals' would have been very expensive and the preserve of the upper classes to store in their libraries A copy in poorer condition than this one was sold by Bonhams in 2005 for 15,000. The sale takes place tomorrow. Pictured is an artwork of the Sneeuwberg waterfall Matthew Haley, a specialist at Bonhams, said Daniell's work 'documented the country's people and animals. Pictured is a drawing of an African Rhino Natural history painter Samuel Daniell became one of the first to depict the African country while on an expedition there at the turn of the 19th century shared property and the US does, meaning Hejailan-Amon could lose out on millions of dollars claim to partial ownership of a $25m art collection from their Fifth Avenue home was dismissed by a Manhattan court A Manhattan socialite who said her husband hid away artwork worth $25million in a feuding divorce has lost her bid to partial ownership of the famous works. Tracey Hejailan-Amon claimed that her estranged husband Maurice Alain Amon moved the couple's art pieces into a storage unit before filing for divorce in Monaco, in order to avoid splitting it with her. A New York judge ruled against the socialite and sided with the Swiss businessman who maintained the art from the Fifth Avenue apartment was his property. Socialite Tracey Hejailan-Amon (left) claimed that her estranged husband Maurice Alain Amon (right) moved the couple's $25million art collection into a storage unit to keep from splitting it with her. A New York judge dismissed her partial ownership claims Among the artworks alleged to have been shifted are Nega Mushroom by Takashi Murakami (left) and Andy Warhols Self-Portrait (right) British artist Damien Hirst's Acridine is also part of the art collection, valued at $25million in total Hejailan-Amon claimed she collected between 17 and 20 pieces of art worth about $25million during her marriage to Amon. This included pieces by Andy Warhol, Damien Hirst and Jean-Michel Basquiat, which until recently hung on the walls of their Manhattan apartment, the New York Post reported. But according to her lawsuit, Amon's art consultants moved them into storage before he filed for divorce in Monaco - where there is no legal concept of shared property. According to the paper, her lawsuit stated: 'These illegal and unlawful removals of the works of art is and was a strategic predicate for the service of a divorce action by Amon.' The art was 'swiped' from their exclusive 834 Fifth Avenue apartment, home to Wendi Murdoch, the ex-wife of Rupert Murdoch, a Broadway producer and the co-owner of the New York Giants. The unit price of the ritzy pad that sits across from Central Park is $15,000,000 reported LLNYC. The art was 'swiped' from their exclusive $15,000,000 834 Fifth Avenue apartment (pictured), home to Wendi Murdoch, a Broadway producer and the co-owner of the New York Giants Last year Amon convinced a judge his second wife did live in Monaco, using photos of her massive closet as proof. Monaco doesn't recognize shared property meaning Amon would save millions in the divorce In another photo of the Monaco closet, an open sliding door reveals an entire collection of clothes hanging in summer colors of white, pink and blue Hejailan-Amon also lost her bid to move the divorce proceedings to New York, where she could walk away with a larger sum of money, the New York Post reported. The divorce is taking place in Monaco which doesn't recognize the concept of shared property, meaning Amon would save millions from his second wife. Last year Amon successfully convinced a judge in the small city-state that his wife of eight years did live in Monaco, handing over photos her massive closet with a shoe collection as proof. Amon's lawyer denied the 'hiding' accusations, saying his wife was 'fully aware' the art was going into storage One photo of the Monaco closet shows a collection of at least 80 pairs of shows, including stilettos, wedges and patent-leather pumps stacked on eight racks taking up an entire wall of the closet 'One need only look at the number of pairs of shoes in her closet to conclude she lives there,' Amons lawyer, Peter Bronstein, says in the filing. Hejailan's lawyer denies the claim that Monaco is his client's home. Hejailan-Amon risks having to return $70million worth of gifts her soon-to-be ex-husband gave her under Monaco's laws, the Post reported. The couple have no prenuptial agreement but she believes she has a 'substantial if not a 50/50 interest' in the art, it was claimed. The New York Daily News reported that a lawyer for Amon said the accusations were unfounded. 'Artmon Limited owns all the artwork described in the complaint and none of it is marital property. 'Ms Hejailan-Amon was fully aware of the artwork removal plans and her claims are without substance.' Google has donated $2 million to refugee causes and hopes its employees will match the gift in response to Donald Trump's travel ban. The internet search engine said it will give the funds to the American Civil Liberties Union, the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, the International Rescue Committee and the UNHCR. Google's CEO Sundar Pichai sent a memo to staff outlining the plan. Scroll down for video Google's CEO Sundar Pichai, pictured, has said the firm will donate $2 million to refugee causes in response to Trump's travel ban and hopes employees will match the gesture Almost 200 Google employees are affected by Trump's new travel ban according to the firm The company said almost 200 of its employees are affected by the ban. According to USA Today, Google's co-founder Sergey Brin took part in a protest against the ban at San Francisco International Airport. Pichai said: 'We're concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US.' Several major technology companies have criticized the travel ban. Tim Cook, CEO of Apple said: 'Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do.' Apple's founder Steve Jobs was the son of a Syrian immigrant. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings called the president's first week in office 'very sad', saying in a Facebook post that 'Trump's actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all. 'It is time to link arms together to protect American values of freedom and opportunity.' Trump's hardline executive order, signed Friday, suspends the arrival of refugees for at least 120 days, and for the next three months bars visas for travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. As resistance to the temporary immigration restrictions mount, a US federal judge on Saturday ordered authorities to stop deporting refugees and other travelers stuck at US airports. US District Judge Ann Donnelly's decision to issue a temporary stay - which stopped short of ruling on the constitutionality of Trump's order - came after dozens of people were detained at US airports following Trump's actions. Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella said: 'As an immigrant and as a CEO, I've both experienced and seen the positive impact that immigration has on our company, for the country, for the world.' Thousands of people have protested against Trump's travel ban outside airports across the US Trump was unapologetic following Friday's decision to block travellers from seven countries The company had warned Thursday that immigration restrictions could impact its ability to fill research and development positions. Globalization has been a boon for Silicon Valley, which employs a significant population of foreign engineers. Some 250,000 Muslims live in the San Francisco Bay Area, according to the Council on American-Islamic Relations. 'Internet companies in particular thrive in the US because the best and the brightest are able to create innovative products and services right here in America,' said Michael Beckerman, the head of a leading industry lobby group. Trump met last month with a handful of America's most powerful tech executives - a bid to mend fences with a largely pro-Democrat industry. Trump defended his controversial plan with a series of outraged tweets this morning Trump claimed only 109 people were detained for questioning at US apirports Trump claimed his plan, which has led to widespread demonstrations, is working No announcements were made following the summit, however. In the short term, many tech companies are offering legal assistance to staffers impacted by the executive order. A Facebook spokesperson said: 'We are assessing the impact on our workforce and determining how best to protect our people and their families from any adverse effects.' Chris Sacca, a major financial backer of the sector, vowed to donate $150,000 to the American Civil Liberties Union, an organization that has hit the executive order with legal challenges. Uber CEO Travis Kalanick vowed to raise the issue at a meeting next week of Trump's business advisory council. NBC is reportedly looking to become 'the next Fox News' after snapping up two of the network's biggest stars. Media insiders tell Page Six that NBC News Chairman Andrew Lack wants to try and make the Peacock Network more like the cable news leader, and claim that he is willing to make a few changes to achieve that goal. 'He believes hes building MSNBC and NBC into the next Fox [News],' said one source. That individual then added: 'It seems the network wants to take a more conservative tone.' Lack is said to have made the decision to start 'building' the network 'into the next Fox [News]' after managing to successfully sign Fox News alums Megyn Kelly and Greta Van Susteren earlier this month according to insiders. A rep for the network dismissed this report however, saying that the only thing Lack is interested in is 'more good journalism.' Scroll down for video Changes: NBC is reportedly hoping to build the network into the next Fox News after hiring Megyn Kelly (above in May with President Donald Trump) claim media insiders And another: Two days after hiring Kelly, NBC announced that Greta Van Susteren would be joining MSNBC after 14 years with Fox News (Van Susteren with Speaker of the House Paul Ryan last week above) Van Susteren is already on the air every weeknight at 6pm on MSNBC as host of For the Record, just four months after she resigned from Fox News after close to 15 years with the network. 'Fox has not felt like home to me for a few years and I took advantage of the clause in my contract which allows me to leave now,' wrote Van Susteren in a statement announcing her decision to leave the network. 'The clause had a time limitation, meaning I could not wait. I love my staff, I love my colleagues, and I love the crews. That is the hardest part of this decision as they are wonderful people.' Van Susteren has failed to match her Fox News ratings on her new MSNBC show thus far, but did still manage to pull in a respectable 822,000 viewers during her first week on air, including 172,000 in the key 25 - 54 demo. That was good enough for third place among cables news shows in her time slot that week, just behind The Situation Room on CNN (955,000 viewers) and Fox News Special Report with Bret Baier. Baier managed to finish out the week with over three times as many viewers as both shows, with 2.94million people tuning in. Van Susteren has also been successful in landing a number of high-profile guests in just the first few weeks of her show, including Senator John McCain and Speaker of the House Paul Ryan. Big names: Van Susteren is already on the air as host of For the Record on MSNBC, and had Senator John McCain (above) on he first show No truth: A rep for the network dismissed this report, saying that the only thing Lack (left in 2005) is interested in is 'more good journalism' (Former Fox News CEO Roger Ailes on right) Kelly meanwhile will be taking on a broad-reaching role at NBC when she starts work later this year. And for that role she is reportedly being paid $12-million-a-year, less than half of the $25million annual salary that Fox News had offered her to stay on as host of The Kelly File. It was revealed soon after NBC announced that Kelly would be joining their news team that it was Lack who had managed to seal the deal in landing the highly sought after Fox News host. The New York Times reported that he did this by using his first meeting with Kelly to 'discover what she was seeking,' and then came back with 'a deal that was tailored to her preferences.' Kelly is now set to host a weekday talk show and Sunday news magazine while also contributing to political and special event coverage at NBC when she starts in her new role later this year. Details of Kelly's shows have not been revealed yet by the network, but Page Six reported last week that Kelly would be getting her own time slot on Today in the show's third or fourth hour. The third hour is currently anchored by Al Roker and Tamron Hall, while the fourth hour has been hosted by Hoda Kotb and daytime stalwart Kathie Lee Gifford since its inception a decade ago. 'Everyone has been left in the dark and no one knows why theres such a disruption when shows are doing so well across the board,' said one insider. Another insider also chimed in, saying: 'People are pissed. The third hour was beating every syndicated show across the board. They were in over their head and bit off more than they can chew when they hired Megyn.' Fans of Hoda and Kathie Lee need not worry however, as a source reveals that they will be staying on the show when Kelly arrives, and moving to 9am if executives decide to give the former Fox News host their time slot. Roker meanwhile appears across the first three hours as it is, so his job would be safe. Rumors: Reports last week that Tamron Hall (above in October with NBC News President Deborah Turness) might be out of a job were dismissed by network sources Still there: A network source was also quick to dismiss an insider's claim on Monday that MSNBC national correspondent Joy Reid (above in June with Tom Brokaw), might be let go from the network. Fights: trump has not given NBC an interview since he was elected, and lashed out at Today on Twitter just before the inauguration (above) It was also reported that Hall would be leaving NBC next month, but a network source told DailyMail.com that is not the case. A network source was also quick to dismiss an insider's claim on Monday that MSNBC national correspondent Joy Reid, who also hosts the weekend talk show AM Joy, might be let go from the network. Lack spent a decade as president of NBC News and later head of NBC television before leaving in 2003 to take a job at Sony. He returned however in early 2015 shortly after the Brian Williams scandal and was responsible for naming Lester Holt as the new host of NBC Nightly News while also reworking the MSNBC weekday lineup. Under Lack there has been more of a focus on breaking and headline news on MSNBC during the week, and Williams was added as a host and breaking news anchor when he returned from his suspension by the network. He also made the decision to air a weekday version of Meet the Press on MSNBC called MTP Daily in addition to the hour-long weekend edition that had been airing on NBC for the past 70 years. Neither NBC or MSNBC has managed however to score an interview with President Donald Trump since he was sworn into office, with the billionaire businessman choosing to give his first sit down to ABC News' David Muir. Shortly before that interview, President Trump lashed out at NBC on Twitter following a report from MSNBC correspondent Ari Melber on Today, in which he said that some of the job creation the commander-in-chef was taking credit for had been in the works long before the election. 'Totally biased @NBCNews went out of its way to say that the big announcement from Ford, G.M., Lockheed & others that jobs are coming back. to the U.S., but had nothing to do with TRUMP, is more FAKE NEWS,' wrote President Trump. 'Ask top CEOs of those companies for real facts. Came back because of me!' He later added: 'No wonder the Today Show on biased @NBC is doing so badly compared to its glorious past. Little credibility!' Novo Nordisk is to create a diabetes research HQ in Oxford similar to their facility in Denmark (pictured) Danish drugs giant Novo Nordisk has delivered a vote of confidence in Britain by announcing it will invest 115million in a new diabetes research centre in Oxford. The company praised the UK's 'world-leading scientists' as it said the move - which will employ around 100 researchers - will go ahead. The firm admitted that it would prefer 'less uncertainty' over how Brexit will play out. But it is ready to 'navigate' potential issues as they arise. The news is another boost for Theresa May as she looks to forge a new future for the UK outside the EU. The centre will employ up to 100 researchers based in an Oxford University research centre, with total investment expected to be around 115 million over 10 years. World-renowned researcher in the fundamental biology of pancreatic islets, insulin action, diabetes and related conditions Professor James D Johnson has been appointed head of the facility. Mads Krogsgaard Thomsen, chief science officer and executive vice president of Novo Nordisk, said: 'This collaboration brings together some of the world's sharpest minds in the field of diabetes to seek new targets for therapeutic innovation. 'It combines Novo Nordisk's 90 years' experience in developing treatments for diabetes with the expertise of world-leading scientists from the University of Oxford. 'Our vision is that the unique combination of industrial and academic know-how will eventually lead to a new generation of treatments to improve the lives of people with Type 2 diabetes.' The news is a boost for Theresa May (pictured in Cardiff today) A spokesman for the company said: 'Right now, there are a lot of uncertainties when it comes to the consequences of Brexit. Obviously, less uncertainty would have been preferable. He added: 'The uncertainties of Brexit are unfortunate but do not challenge this next step of a long collaboration between Novo Nordisk and University of Oxford.' The company also said it would have to 'navigate' any potential issues as they emerge. Sir John Bell, Regius Professor of Medicine, University of Oxford, said the collaboration was an opportunity to mix competence at the campus with the company's groundbreaking research and results in diabetes. He added: 'This collaboration underlines the importance of shared research and cutting-edge science across boundaries. 'Employees at Novo Nordisk Research Centre Oxford and researchers at the University of Oxford will have the opportunity for daily interaction to share knowledge and insights that will potentially produce new medicines for people living with Type 2 diabetes and its complications.' 'Our vision is that the unique combination of industrial and academic know-how will eventually lead to a new generation of treatments to improve the lives of people with type 2 diabetes.' Project Fear is really milking it! Weetabix warns of 9% price hikes because of Brexit Weetabix today became the latest company to blame Brexit as it warned it could be forced to hike prices. The popular cereal company said the weakening pound was increasing its production costs. As a result chief executive Giles Turrell said customers should expect the price of Weetabix to rise by up to 9 per cent later this year. But despite the warnings, the firm announced it is investing 30million to boost production at its UK manufacturing sites in Northamptonshire. Demands: Weetabix's 30m investment will produce new varieties Weetabix buys its wheat from within 50 miles of its processing plants in Burton Latimer and Corbyn, but it is priced in dollars, meaning its costs have rocketed as it has had to pay more pounds to buy dollar-priced items. Mr Turrell told the BBC: 'The big thing thats impacted us really has been currency, so with the Brexit impact weve seen obviously a weakening sterling which means all our raw materials do cost us more. 'Our primary obligation is to try and absorb those costs internally and try to run the business more efficiently. At a final resort we would have to increase our prices. Well probably have to do that later on this year if we cant continue to offset internally because of the currency impact.' Asked how much Weetabix could rise by, Mr Turrell said: We havent declared that, we would want it to be in low single digits. A man has filmed himself unleashing a foul-mouthed rant at a group of police officers. The expletive-laden barrage of abuse, recorded in Sydney on January 24, was captured on camera by a man after he was challenged by the cops. A police officer is seen asking the man for his identification, but the man resists and begins swearing at them. A man has filmed himself unleashing a foul-mouthed rant at a group of police officers The officers show remarkable restraint as the man launches into a furious tirade. After insulting their mothers, he puts up his middle finger and calls the four officers 'dogs'. The cops continue to challenge the man and appear to be trying to calm him down, but he continues his abuse nonetheless. The officers eventually give up and get into an unmarked van, but still the man carries on insulting them. The expletive-laden barrage of abuse, believed to have been recorded in Sydney, was captured on camera by a man after he was challenged by the cops He even taunts them as they get inside of the vehicle, with one of the officers beeping their horn to get him to move off of the road as he circles the van. New South Wales Police said a 27-year-old man was issues with a criminal infringement notice after abusing officers. A spokesman said: 'At about 1.40pm on Tuesday 24 January 2017, police stopped and searched a 27-year-old man and his vehicle at Morehead Street, Waterloo. 'After this it is alleged he made a number of offensive comments to officers while recording them, before they left the location. 'That man has now been issued a criminal infringement notice for offensive language.' The New Mexico military facility where the first atom bomb test was conducted will host a rare open house on April Fools' Day. The Army's White Sands Missile Range is open to the public for two days a year. The next time it will open is in October. During the open house this spring, members of the public will be able to see the site where the atom bomb was tested more than 71 years ago. The Army will open the site where the atom bomb was tested on April 1 - but it's no April Fools' Day joke. Above, the test explosion on July 16, 1945 At 5:29am on July 16, 1945, the scientists behind the Manhattan Project tested the atom bomb for the first time at the site. The atom bomb was used for the first time a month later, on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. When the Japanese did not agree to a non-conditional surrender after the bombing, the Allies dropped another bomb on the city of Nagasaki - forcing the Japanese to finally surrender and end the war. Tourists will also get the chance to see the McDonald ranch house where the plutonium core of the bomb was assembled. The home has been restored to look the way it did during the war. The Army says that radiation levels are present, but low at the site. They compare the levels during a one-hour visit to about half the radiation one would get on a cross country flight - or about a year of watching TV. The White House says outcry over President Donald Trump's reorganization of the National Security Council is 'much ado about nothing.' Trump added Steve Bannon, his chief strategist, to the principles committee, and seemingly downgraded the director of national intelligence and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman, a characterization the White House says is 'utter nonsense.' They will only attend meetings when 'issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed,' a directive says. Press Secretary Sean Spicer argued Monday on MSNBC that the make-up of the committee is the same as it was in 2001, under the last Republican president, with the exception of Bannon. DNI was also substituted for CIA. The DNI position didn't exist back then. Bannon could have attended meetings regularly, anyway, Spicer contended, touting the announcement of his addition to the powerful panel as an example of the administration's 'transparency.' SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO The White House says outcry over President Donald Trump's reorganization of the National Security Council is 'much ado about nothing.' The president's chief political strategist, Steve Bannon,could have attended meetings even if he were not on the panel Press Secretary Sean Spicer argued Monday on MSNBC that the make up of the committee is the same as it was in 2001 under the last Republican president, with the exception of Bannon National security experts are uneasy with Trump's decision to put his chief political strategist on the panel, a controversial figure and former head of right-wing news site Breitbart. He's also a former Goldman Sachs banker. Susan Rice, national security adviser to Barack Obama, said Bannon's addition was 'stone cold crazy.' John McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, called it 'a radical departure from any National Security Council in history.' Trump added Steve Bannon, his chief strategist, to the principles committee, and downgraded the director of national intelligence and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Rice also said that the new administration had made the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and director of national intelligence 'afterthoughts in cabinet level principal meetings' and asked why the CIA director was cut out of the NSC. The White House said Monday afternoon that the CIA director was removed from the panel in 2005. Trump is amending the order to add Mike Pompeo, his CIA director back in, Spicer said, responding to Rice. Spicer brandished reporters on Monday for 'misreading' the order as saying that the DNI and Joint Chiefs chairman are being kept out of NSC meetings unless they are invited. 'They are always welcome to attend, 100 percent,' he said during his daily briefing. But if the threat doesn't involve the military, such as a discussion on the pandemic flu, 'it would be a waste of time to drive the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff over,' he said. 'If he wants to attend, he's part of the committee. He can come any time,' Spicer added. He held up a copies of the Bush-era order from 2001 and the one Trump signed over the weekend, with the relevant sections highlighted, and had copies loaded on two screens behind him to demonstrate that they were fundamentally the same as he lectured reporters during the afternoon briefing. Spicer said Sunday on ABC News that Mike Flynn, Trump's national security adviser and a former head of the defense intelligence agency under Obama, spearheaded the reorganization of the forum. The Trump spokesman said the purpose is to 'streamline the process for the president to make decisions on key, important intelligence matters.' He said the Republican administration moved to 'modernize the National Security Council so that it is less bureaucratic and more focused on providing the president with the intelligence he needs.' Spicer said that Bannon isn't just playing the role of domestic political adviser to the president - he's the chief geopolitical strategist, as well. Today, in an appearance on Morning Joe, he claimed that White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs and Obama Senior Advisor David Axelrod quietly attended NSC meetings in the previous administration. 'All we did frankly was become transparent and actually put down on paper who's actually going to attend,' he said. 'Axelrod went all the time, and they never actually codified it as part of their national security.' The White House official added: 'This is an example of transparency and making sure that we're not trying to hide who's gonna be attending these meetings.' David Ignatius, of the Washington Post, told Spicer that Alberto Gonzales, a former attorney general, has said that that Bush did not want Karl Rove, his chief political strategist, in the sensitive meetings. Spicer shot back that Bannon 'isn't playing Karl Rove's part.' Spicer blasted reporters on Monday for 'misreading' the order as saying that the DNI and Joint Chiefs chairman are being kept out of NSC meetings unless they are invited - holding up copies of the Bush era order and the Trump one to show that their similar 'Steve has an ext military background, extensive background on geopolitical affairs. And the assumption that he's playing the same role as Karl Rove is just not, not accurate,' Spicer said. Touting this White House's transparency again, Spicer claimed, 'The Obama administration, they had people going in and out of NSC meetings without people knowing unless they got caught wind of.' As far as the reported removal of the DNI and Joint Chiefs Chairman are concerned, Spicer said, 'They're both on.' 'This is much to do about nothing,' Spicer contended. 'This is literally the language in 2001.' The White House appears to be referring to NSC guidelines from the beginning of Bush's administration. That was before 9/11. The make-up of NSC was later changed. As Spicer stated, in 2005 it was amended to disinclude the CIA director. At his briefing later in the day, Spicer used Axelrod as an example again as he defended Bannon's inclusion, telling journalists that the political adviser is 'not going to be in every meeting.' 'Like Axlerod, he'll come in and out when needed. But I think we wanted to be upfront about it and make sure that that was stated so it wasn't a story when he did.' Axelrod, a CNN contributor, said Monday afternoon in an op-ed on the news networks website that it is 'simply not true' that he and Gibbs frequented the NSC forums. Spicer claimed that former White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs and Barack Obama Senior Advisor David Axelrod quietly attended NSC meetings in the previous administration. Axelrod says he and Gibbs were silent observers during deliberations, not participants, like Bannon The former White House official said he and Gibbs were silent observers during deliberations on the war against Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan. 'I was not a member of the committee. I did not speak or participate. I sat on the sidelines as a silent observer with Gibbs because we would be called upon to publicly discuss the president's decision on that critical matter and the process by which he arrived at it,' he stated. Furthermore, Axelrod stated, 'Our access also came with limits. We were barred from some of the most sensitive meetings on the Afghanistan-Pakistan policy review so as not to inhibit discussions. 'In elevating Bannon to sit with the Secretaries of Defense and State and other key national security figures on the NSC principals committee, President Trump has blazed new ground. Bannon will exercise authority no political adviser has had before. He will be a full participant, not an observer, in national security deliberations. The Obama aide said that Bannon has 'eclipsed' the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the DNI on the National Security Council in Trump's NSC structure. 'Steve Bannon is playing a role in national security and foreign policy for which there is no precedent.' A young woman who died in a mystery crash in a seaside car park has been named locally as Katie Atkinson. Onlookers ran to pull her from the wreckage but she received fatal injuries after her car smashed into a wall. Dorset Police have only released scant details so far but say she was at the wheel of a black Renault Clio. They want to hear from anyone who saw 'the manner of driving' of the car before the collision. A young woman who died in a mystery crash in a seaside car park has been named locally as Katie Atkinson Dorset Police have only released scant details so far but say Ms Atkinson was at the wheel of a black Renault Clio It smashed into a wall at the Alum Chine car park at Westbourne, close to Bournemouth's miles of golden sands. Emergency services were called at five minutes before 1am to the tragedy in the car park on Alumhurst Road. They say Ms Atkinson, from Salisbury, Wilts, suffered serious injuries and was taken to hospital where she later died. 'Her next of kin have been informed and the coroner notified' said a spokesman a short time ago. 'The road is currently closed to allow collision investigators to examine the scene.' Police added that it is not clear at this stage why she cannoned into the car park wall, apparently at high speed. Ms Atkinson, from Salisbury, Wilts, suffered serious injuries and was taken to hospital where she later died It's also not clear whether anyone else was in the car, and whether other vehicles were also involved. Inspector Derek McKerl, of Dorset Police, said: 'Sadly the driver was pronounced dead shortly after arriving at hospital. 'Her family are being supported by specially trained officers. 'I am appealing to anyone who witnessed the collision or the manner of driving of the Clio prior to the incident to contact police.' The car park gets packed with hundreds of tourists' cars every day in the peak holiday season. It is used by holidaymakers visiting Bournemouth's famous beach a short walk away. A truck driver who was charged a bus crash that killed four college softball player shot himself dead Friday, just weeks before he was due to stand trial. The Tarrant County medical examiner's office determined the cause of death for 55-year-old Russell Staley was suicide, according to the Dallas Morning News. KXII-TV reported that he died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Staley was driving an 18-wheeler when his truck struck the left side of a bus carrying the North Central Texas College softball team in September 2014. He was scheduled to stand trial on March 8 on four counts of first-degree manslaughter in the deaths of Brooke Deckard, 20, Jaiden Pelton, 19, Meagan Richardson, 19, and Katelynn Woodlee, 18, who were killed in the wreck. Scroll down for video Truck driver, Russell Staley (pictured), 55, who was charged with manslaughter in the September 2014 bus crash that killed four college softball players, took his own life on Friday Staley was driving an 18-wheeler when his truck struck the left side of a bus carrying the North Central Texas College softball team, killing the four players, including Meagan Richardson, 19, (left) and Brooke Deckard, 20, (right) The team (pictured) was returning to Gainesville, Texas, from a scrimmage in Bethany when the northbound semi crossed the median on Interstate 35 near Davis and struck the bus. Eleven other passengers and Staley were all hospitalized The team was returning to Gainesville, Texas, from a scrimmage in Bethany when the northbound semi crossed the median on Interstate 35 near Davis and struck the bus. Eleven other passengers and Staley were all hospitalized. In June 2015, Staley was charged with manslaughter, following a nine-month investigation of the collision by the Oklahoma Highway Patrol. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) released a report of their findings in November 2015. The agency found that the probable cause of the crash was a failure by Staley to control his vehicle 'due to incapacitation likely stemming from his use of synthetic cannabinoids'. 'As a result of the crash, four passengers on the bus were fully or partially ejected and died,' the report concluded. The NTSB found that the probable cause of the crash was a failure by Staley to control his vehicle 'due to incapacitation likely stemming from his use of synthetic cannabinoids'. Katelynn Woodlee, 18, (left) and was Jaiden Pelton, 20, (right) were among the four victims The report also determined the bus (pictured) lacked appropriate crash-worthiness standards, both of which contributed to the severity of the injuries Staley told police he was reaching for a cooler to get a soft drink when he felt the truck (pictured) drift, according to the NTSB report. A pipe found in the truck's cab tested positive for a synthetic cannabinoid known as K2 The report also determined the bus lacked appropriate crash-worthiness standards, both of which contributed to the severity of the injuries. 'He (Staley) said he was distracted by something in the cabin,' Oklahoma Highway Patrol Captain Ronnie Hampton, said a day after the crash. Staley told police he was reaching for a cooler to get a soft drink when he felt the truck drift, according to the NTSB report. A pipe found in the truck's cab tested positive for a synthetic cannabinoid known as K2. However, Staley's drug test results were inconclusive, the Morning News reported. The NTSB found that Staley's lack of attempt to take action was not a result of fatigue or reaching for the cooler, but 'due to incapacitation'. An attempt by campaigners to bring a High Court challenge against a third runway at Heathrow Airport has failed. A coalition of local councils, including Hillingdon, Richmond, Wandsworth and Windsor and Maidenhead, together with Greenpeace UK and a Hillingdon resident, claims that the Government's October 2016 decision to back plans for the runway is unlawful. It alleges there was a failure to consult before resiling from unequivocal promises that it would never be built and that the Government has failed to recognise the project's unlawful air quality impacts. An attempt by campaigners to bring a High Court challenge against a third runway at Heathrow Airport has failed. Pictured, an artist's impression showing how the airport could look with a third runway But lawyers for the Transport Secretary argued that the judicial review could not proceed - saying it should not be heard until after the consultation on the National Policy Statement (NPS) on aviation is published in 2017/18. On Monday in London, Mr Justice Cranston struck out the case on the basis that the court had no jurisdiction to hear the claim. James Maurici QC told the judge that there was a 'preliminary and insuperable obstacle' to the claim proceeding. The court had no jurisdiction to hear the matter because of the provision in the Planning Act 2008 which said that proceedings may only be brought in a six-week period that followed once the NPS was adopted, or if later, published. A coalition of local councils, including Hillingdon, Richmond, Wandsworth and Windsor and Maidenhead, together with Greenpeace UK and a Hillingdon resident, claims that the Government's October 2016 decision to back plans for the runway is unlawful 'That is not expected to happen until late 2017 at the earliest. Before that time this claim is precluded. This is a complete answer to the claim at this time.' The coalition said that the 2008 Act has no such time limitations and that, in any event, the decision was made before the Planning Act process started. The judge said that his decision followed from the language of the relevant section of the Act, the legislative purpose and the overall statutory context and history. 'Once the Secretary of State adopts and publishes an NPS the court will have jurisdiction to entertain the challenges the claimants advance. For the present this claim must be struck out.' Greenpeace UK executive director John Sauven said: 'Today's ruling was about the timing of our legal challenge, not its merit. It doesn't change the fact that ministers have no solution to the huge air and noise pollution problems caused by a third runway. By forging ahead with a flawed consultation ministers are just delaying an inevitable legal challenge, wasting more time, energy, and public money in the process. 'Expanding Heathrow will heap more misery on thousands of Londoners already breathing illegal levels of air pollution and make it impossible for the government to comply with air quality laws. The government should ditch this project as they have promised to do many times in the past.' Google has gotten political with its 'doodle' - choosing to pay tribute to Fred Korematsu, a famed Japanese-American who defied government orders to enter an internment camp during World War II. Korematsu, who would have celebrated his 98th birthday on Monday, was among the thousands who were to be rounded up under Franklin Roosevelt's executive order 9066 in the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbor. About 120,000 people - more than 60 percent of whom were American citizens - were packed up and sent to 10 different camps after FDR signed the order in February 1942. Google has dedicated its 'doodle' (pictured) on Monday to civil rights icon Fred Korematsu Korematsu (left, in a photo from the 1940s, and right, in 1996) is a famed Japanese-American who defied government orders to enter an internment camp during World War II But Korematsu - who was just 22 at the time and had tried to enlist in the US army two years earlier - refused to go quietly, and instead fled from his home in San Leandro, California to Oakland. He was eventually captured and charged with a felony, but the civil rights icon still refused to give up. Instead, he challenged the constitutionality of the executive order, and the case ultimately ended up in the Supreme Court in 1944. The court ruled against him 6-3 at the time, but the decision was overturned in 1988. During the original hearing, Justice Frank Murphy said: 'This exclusion of "all persons of Japanese ancestry, both alien and non-alien," from the Pacific Coast area on a plea of military necessity in the absence of martial law ought not to be approved. Such exclusion goes over "the very brink of constitutional power" and falls into the ugly abyss of racism. Korematsu challenged the constitutionality of FDR's 1942 executive order, and the case ultimately ended up in the Supreme Court in 1944. Pictured are his children, Karen and Ken Korematsu About 120,000 people - more than 60 percent of whom were American citizens - were packed up and sent to 10 different camps. Pictured is the Salinas Assembly Center in California - people were gathered here before being sent to the Manzanar internment camp 'I dissent, therefore, from this legalization of racism. Racial discrimination in any form and in any degree has no justifiable part whatever in our democratic way of life. 'It is unattractive in any setting but it is utterly revolting among a free people who have embraced the principles set forth in the Constitution of the United States. 'All residents of this nation are kin in some way by blood or culture to a foreign land. Yet they are primarily and necessarily a part of the new and distinct civilization of the United States.' Korematsu was awarded the President Medal of Freedom by Bill Clinton in 1998. He died in 2005, aged 86. The internment of Japanese-Americans is widely viewed as one of the darkest moments in US history. Pictured are families at a camp in California Japanese-Americans are seen arriving by train before being transferred to the Manzanar internment camp. A US soldier looks on At the time, Clinton said: 'In the long history of our country's constant search for justice, some names of ordinary citizens stand for millions of souls. Plessy, Brown, Parks. To that distinguished list, today we add the name of Fred Korematsu.' The internment of Japanese-Americans is widely viewed as one of the darkest moments in US history. Many drew parallels between what Korematsu fought against and the executive order on immigration signed by Donald Trump last week. Trump's order banned people from seven Muslim countries - Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen - from entering the US. President Franklin Roosevelt put the order into place in 1942. FDR is pictured signing the Declaration of War with Japan Korematsu was awarded the President Medal of Freedom by Bill Clinton in 1998. He died in 2005, aged 86 The president and his team have said the move is designed to protect America. Much of the rhetoric used about people needing to be loyal to the US is similar to what was seen in the 1940s to justify internment camps. 'We need men like him more than ever now,' April Brucker wrote. 'Good timing for the #GoogleDoodle,' Kaitlyn Freund said. 'Wise Choice Google. Thank you,' Joanne Boorsma tweeted. Donald Trump signs an executive order to impose tighter vetting of travelers entering the United States, at the Pentagon in Washington, on January 27 People have protested against Trump's executive order across the weekend. Pictured is a woman holding a sign at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport on Saturday 'Thank you @Google. We needed a reminder,' Michaela Ehimika said. 'Learn about today's #GoogleDoodle and why it's so important but to repeat history. #travelban,' another added. Internment camps were located in California, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, Colorado, and Arkansas. The last camp was not closed until March 1946 - six months after the war officially ended and after the US dropped two nuclear bombs on Japan. A man raises a sign in the air that reads, 'We are here to stay,' during protests against Trump's ban on Sunday in New York People gather in Copley Square to protest the muslim immigration ban enacted by President Trump on January 29 Four decades later, it was ruled that every person who survived being in the camps would receive restitution payments of $20,000. The move, which could be seen to be politically-motivated, comes as Google joined in a chorus of tech giants speaking out against Trump's ban. Google CEO Sundar Pichai told employees in the note that at least 187 Google workers could be affected by the order. It is not clear how many of those workers are currently traveling outside the US. 'We've always made our views on immigration known publicly and will continue to do so,' Pichai said in a memo. An activist holds a sign outside the White House to protest President Donald Trump's executive actions on immigration A man holds a young boy on his shoulders during protests against Trump's ban in Washington DC on Sunday In an official statement, Google said: 'We're concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US.' USA Today reports Google has also created a '$4million crisis fund' to provide donations to four groups: the American Civil Liberties Union, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee and UNHCR. The donations are funded by $2million from executives and up to $2million more from staff. Thousands of protesters took to the streets on Saturday and Sunday, while there were also demonstrations at airports across the country when it emerged people were being detained and even deported as a result of the travel ban. A handful of Sydney's most prestigious schools reportedly face multimillion-dollar lawsuits from hundreds of people for historic claims of having been sexually abused as children. Lawyer Jason Parkinson told the Daily Telegraph that top schools like Trinity Grammar, Knox Grammar and St Patrick's College, Goulburn, were among the schools facing a series of legal claims. He also claimed acclaimed schools such as Newington College and De La Salle colleges in Revesby Heights and Marrickville were among those facing huge lawsuits. A handful of Sydney's most prestigious schools reportedly face multimillion-dollar lawsuits from hundreds of people for historic claims of having been sexually abused as children. Pictured, Trinity Grammar School Mr Parkinson said the abuse took place on 'an outrageous scale' and said the deluge of lawsuits was similar to that seen when asbestos was found to be harmful. 'There has not been a common thread of criminality or negligence that has affected more Australians than child abuse and it is more egregious than asbestos because these institutions' reason for being was caring for children,' he said. He added that the 'cruellest thing' was the stark truth that parents had worked hard to send their children to the best fee-paying schools, only for them to suffer at the hands of those who were supposed to be caring for them. 'Mothers took second jobs to pay for the school fees to find out 30 years later that the teachers or the Catholic brothers were molesting their children and these families were paying for it. Now their children are paying for it,' Mr Parkinson said. Lawyer Jason Parkinson claimed that schools like Trinity Grammar, Knox Grammar (pictured) and St Patrick's College, Goulburn, were among the schools facing a series of the historic allegations The lawyer also claimed that private schools were more likely to cover up abuse as it is not mandatory for them to report it, whereas it is in state schools. Mr Parkinson, who says he has 1,500 sex abuse cases on his books, said many o the boys who were abused are now seeing psychologists and psychiatrists - costing 'a fortune' to the taxpayer. Police encourage any person who has been a victim of any kind of sexual violence, no matter how long ago the incident occurred, to contact police. Reports can be made at any police station. Millionaire property developer Ron Medich has appeared before a jury in Sydney on the first day of his murder trial. The 68-year-old businessman has pleaded not guilty to allegedly ordering the murder of his rival Michael McGurk on September 3, 2009. Medich's former business partner was shot dead outside his Cremorne home, on Sydney's lower North Shore, in front of his nine-year-old son at 6.25pm on that day as he carried a takeaway chicken out of his Mercedes-Benz. Crown prosecutor Gina O'Rourke, SC, told jurors in the New South Wales Supreme Court on Monday that Medich organised the murder because he was owed millions of dollars. Millionaire property developer Ron Medich has appeared before jurors in Sydney Sydney businessman Michael McGurk (pictured in 2006) was shot dead outside his Cremorne home in September 2009 in front of his nine-year-old son 'These disputes that involved millions of dollars were a significant motive for the accused to direct the murder of the deceased,' she said in a report by The Daily Telegraph. Medich has denied the allegations. The prosecution is also alleging that Medich asked a friend Fortunato 'Lucky' Gattellari to organise the murder and had given him an instruction at Leichhardt, in Sydney's inner west. 'I need to put an end to this. I need you to find someone to kill him for me,' the prosecutor told the jury. Police officers comb through Michael McGurk's Cremorne home on September 4, 2009 Ron Medich outside the New South Wales Supreme Court in Sydney in October 2016 Ms O'Rourke also told the court Medich and McGurk had been embroiled in a legal dispute about money. 'The accumulative effect of these disputes - the costs, the damage to his reputation and the embarrassment he felt about how he was treated by the accused led to the irretrievable breakdown of their relationship and a strong desire to have the deceased permanently removed from his life,' she told jurors. The court also heard Medich became frustrated at the delays in having McGurk killed. The order of service of service for murdered businessman Michael McGurk in September 2009 'What the f*** is going on? How long is it going to take - are you sure these guys know what they are doing?,' the prosecutor quoting him saying. Medich is also accused of ordering the intimidation of McGurk's widow Kimberley after her husband was killed. 'The f***ing bitch has got to get the message - I'm sick of it,' he allegedly said to Gattellari. The trial before Justice Geoffrey Bellew is expected to last for three months. White House advisor Kellyanne Conway blasted protesters who took to the streets and swarmed some of the nation's airports to counter President Donald Trump's new executive order on immigration mocking them standing against every phase of his ascent to the White House. 'He is basically saying to people, 'You protested my nomination, you protested my candidacy, you protested my election, you protested my inauguration, you protest the day after my inauguration, you're protesting the executive order, you're protesting how about this cooperation and collaboration, this quote bipartisan that we're always talking about?' Conway told ABC's 'Good Morning America' Monday. 'The only person doing that is President Trump,' Conway said. Donald Trump advisor Kellyanne Conway complained that protesters had complained at each phase of Donald Trump's ascent, and now are protesting his executive order Thousands of demonstrators descended on major airports including those in New York, Los Angeles and Dallas to protest the Trump's order, which imposed a 90-day stop to to new visas from seven countries with majority Muslim populations, stops all Syrian admissions indefinitely, and stops the U.S. from accepting refugees for 120 days, while imposing 'extreme vetting' of arriving passengers who had already done their paperwork. Among those joining the effort were Senate minority leader Charles Schumer, who made tearful remarks, and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren. 'Imagine if they had put all this enthusiasm, these tearful senators these senators with bull horns imagine if they had protested outside VA hospitals when our veterans were dying for care?' Conway asked. 'Imagine if they cared about the homeless they walk by every single day in New York and Washington where's the protest on that?' she continued. Conway appeared on 'Good Morning America' after protesters hit the streets again over the weekend The Delta Airlines computer outage stranded customers nationwide on Sunday Trump mocked New York Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, for tearing up on Sunday while he condemned the executive order President Donald Trump went on offense Monday morning against naysayers who question his Friday executive order temporarily banning incoming travelers from seven terrorism hotbeds Conway also hit back at Arizona Senator John McCain and South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham, both of whom blasted the new order in a statement. 'The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong - they are sadly weak on immigration,' Trump said. 'The two ... Senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III.' McCain and Graham, both Republicans, wrote: 'Our government has a responsibility to defend our borders, but we must do so in a way that makes us safer and upholds all that is decent and exceptional about our nation.' Trump wrote that 'there is nothing nice about searching for terrorists,' and defended his administration's decision to avoid telegraphing its intentions in advance 'It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trump's executive order was not properly vetted. We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defense, Justice, and Homeland Security,' they wrote. Conway added in her Monday appearance that she wants the senators to 'be there' for Trump. 'We have a lot to do and we want Republican senators, both of whom pursued the presidency themselves, we want them to be there for this president, to support him, especially when he is trying to keep our people safe,' she said. Trump partially blamed the protesters for causing airport delays, while mocking 'the tears Schumer. 'Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer,' Trump wrote on Twitter. This is the tense moment a brave onlooker plucks a large knife from the hands of an Australian pensioner after he set his house on fire in a domestic incident in Thailand. Edward Woodward, 65, set his furniture ablaze on Australia Day in Surat Thani, Southern Thailand, before wielding a large kitchen knife at emergency crews. Police and firemen were called to the property after Mr Woodward 'went beserk' following a family row involving his 40-year-old Thai wife, known as Juttamas. Australian pensioner Edward Woodward, 65, set his furniture ablaze on Australia Day in Thailand A brave onlooker was seen plucking a large knife from the hands of the 'stressed' Australian man As firefighters arrived he greeted them with a large kitchen knife at the gate but this was soon seized by a brave member of the public. As the blaze was extinguished local people battled to calm him down as they waited for police to attend the scene. After he was disarmed, Juttamas arrived at the house and she said that she had been with the Australian for five years. After her two sons from a previous relationship had moved in with her and Mr Woodward there had been frequent rows and that Mr Woodward had threatened to kill one of her sons. Police and firemen were called to the property after Mr Woodward went beserk following a family row His 40-year-old wife Juttamas told local media her husband was 'stressed', but was unsure what set him off As the blaze was extinguished local people battled to calm him down as they waited for police to attend the scene So fearing for her life and that of her sons she decided to leave with her children and fled to the sanctuary of her elder sister's house nearby. After she had left him Mr Woodward had set fire to a bed and a sofa in the garage. 'He must have been stressed,' said Juttamas, 'so he tried to burn down the house'. She was was unsure exactly what set him off. Police are currently investigating but it is unlikely that any legal action will be taken against the man. Rachel Adrian, a registered nurse from Missouri, is facing the likely prospect of having to deliver her baby this week without her Kurdish husband by her side after he was barred from entering the US under President Donald Trumps travel ban. Adrian, 29, and her husband of two years, Hoger Ameen, were looking forward to welcoming their son together later this week and starting to build their life as a family in her native Missouri. Then on Friday, their plans came to a screeching halt when Trump issued the controversial executive order, titled Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into the United States, imposing a 90-day on travel to the US by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, alongside a 120-day suspension of the US refugee program. Stranded in limbo: Iraqi Kurd Hoger Ameen and his pregnant wife, Rachel Adrian (pictured together, left), have found themselves separated by President Trump's travel ban just days before the 29-year-old Missouri nurse is due to give birth to the couple's son Message to the president: Adrian sent out a defiant tweet to President Trump, telling him his ban won't stop 'one little Iraqi Kurd,' meaning her unborn son, from entering the US Ameen, a Sunni Kurd working in the field of telecommunications in the Iraqi city Sulaymaniyah, had his visa paperwork in order, had undergone physical examinations and submitted tax forms as part of the application process, reported the Los Angeles Times. The 29-year-old husband and father-to-be went to his visa interview last June. The following month, his wife moved back to her hometown of Saint Joseph, Missouri, where the pair were hoping to spend the first couple of years of their son's life. Adrian's due day in this coming Thursday. She and Ameen have selected the Kurdish name Aland for their baby. Rachel Adrian relocated to Iraq five years ago to do relief work as a nurse. She and Ameen met in 2013 and got married the following year. A short time later, the newlyweds started the arduous and time-consuming process of applying for a spouse visa, which set them back about $2,000 in fees for various forms and medical exams. Ameen also had to find a sponsor in the US in order to be able to live and work here. Humanitarian: Rachel Adrian relocated to Iraq five years ago to do relief work as a nurse, and in 2014 she married Hoger Ameen, a telecommunications specialist The couple have spent a lot of time and money gathering forms, lining up medical exams and finding a sponsor for Ameen as part of the arduous visa application process On Saturday, their dream of reuniting in Missouri in time for Aland's birth came crashing down when an email showed up in Ameens inbox from the US Embassy in Baghdad notifying him of Trump's travel ban. Adrian said that if the president were to lift the order today, the visa approval process would still take at least two weeks, meaning that Ameen would certainly miss his son's birth. 'I have no idea when he'll get to meet his son,' she told the paper. 'And that's really sad.' In an email to the paper, Ameen said he, too, is heartbroken about having to miss the birth of his boy but he is trying to stay strong for his wife. 'I am afraid that when I do get to come my son wont know who I am,' he wrote. This is my first son and I feel sick that I wont get to hold him.' On Monday, Iraqi lawmakers retaliated against Trump's order by calling on the government to enact a reciprocal travel ban on Americans if the US president does not lift the travel ban. On Friday, Trump issued an executive order imposing a 90-day on travel to the US by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, alongside a 120-day suspension of the US refugee program If the measure is approved, it would mean that Rachel Adrian won't be able to travel to Iraq with her son to visit her husband. Trump's ban on all new visas for people in seven predominantly Muslim countries has sparked widespread protests in major airports across the US, including John F Kennedy International Airport in New York, Newark International Airport in New Jersey, LAX in Los Angeles and Dallas International Airport in Texas. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, among them New York Senator Charles Schumer, a Democrat, and Republicans Senators John McCain, of Arizona, and Lindsay Graham, of South Carolina, have publicly condemned the travel ban Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism, they said in a joint statement. Public outcry: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City Protesters are seen holding up signs condemning the Muslim travel ban at JFK Airport True to fashion, President Trump responded to the public outcry against his immigration policy by tweeting that 'there is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter out country.' As for Rachel Adrian, she had a message of her own for Trump, which she tweeted out Sunday: 'Sorry @realDonaldTrump there is one little Iraqi Kurd you can't stop from coming into this country.' The tweet directed at the new president of the United States was accompanied by a selfie of the expectant young mother smiling defiantly into the camera while keeping a protective hand on her baby bump. President Donald Trump claimed Monday that Lockheed Martin had knocked $600 million off the cost of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, a government contract he has sharply criticized for cost overruns. 'I appreciate Lockheed Martin for being so responsive,' Trump told reporters at the White House Monday. Speaking from the Oval Office, Trump added that the company was doing a great job on the program. Scroll down for video President Donald Trump today claimed that he was able to get $600 million off the price of the F-35 line of fighter jets 'I appreciate Lockheed Martin for being so responsive,' Trump told reporters at the White House Monday It was a change in tune from tweets he sent out in December, in which he criticized the pricey Lockheed jets and asked Boeing to 'price-out' a competitor. 'Based on the tremendous cost and cost overruns of the Lockheed Martin F-35, I have asked Boeing to price-out a comparable F-18 Super Hornet!' Trump tweeted. In after-hours trading after Trump had written the tweet, Lockheed's shares fell 2 percent and Boeing's rose 0.7 percent. However, the competitor the president-elect called for, the F-18 Super Hornet, lacks the stealth capabilities of the Lockheed planes, and are a significantly older model. 'They're two completely different aircraft from different generations,' Phillip Carter, a senior fellow at the Center for New American Security, told the Guardian. 'It's like comparing an old jeep to a Humvee.' The Lockheed planes were costing about $100 million each to build, with the total cost running at $400 billion. Earlier this month, however, CEO Marillyn Hewson said the company was 'very close to a deal' to lower the cost of the program. On Friday, Trump's new Defense Secretary James Mattis ordered a review of the program to 'determine opportunities to significantly reduce the cost.' Lockheed tweeted that the company 'welcomes the appropriate focus on affordability and capability.' 'We are confident such a thorough and objective analysis will show that only the F-35, with its advanced stealth and sensors, can meet the 21st century air superiority requirements of all of our military services,' the statement read. Charges have been dropped against Lloyd Klein, the fashion designer ex-boyfriend of 'Catwoman' Jocelyn Wildenstein, after the couple were involved in a domestic fracas at their home last month. Klein, 49, arrived at Manhattan Criminal Court on Monday morning in a chauffeur-driven BMW wearing custom-made Christian Dior and Louis Vuitton, accompanied by two bodyguards. He had been facing several charges including assault, robbery, grand larceny and criminal mischief for allegedly stealing an iPhone, a Swiss ID, a cell phone case and a credit card after a fight with Wildenstein, 71, at their sprawling, $13-million Manhattan home in December. He was also accused of hurling her to the ground. Scroll down for video Charges have been dropped against Lloyd Klein, the fashion designer ex of 'Catwoman' Jocelyn Wildenstein. Above, Klein, 49, pictured outside New York Criminal Court Klein had been facing several charges including assault, robbery, grand larceny and criminal mischief for allegedly stealing an iPhone, a Swiss ID, a cell phone case and a credit card after a fight with Wildenstein, 71 (above in court after 'slashing' Klein), at their $13-million home Wildenstein - instantly recognizable due to her feline features - was arrested on December 6 for 'clawing' Klein across the face and 'cutting him with scissors' Klein's hearing lasted under a minute on Monday and saw the judge dismiss all charges against him due to a lack of evidence. Wildenstein did not accompany Klein to court. Klein told DailyMail.com exclusively: 'First of all, the charges were unfounded. I'm not sure how this came out because none of this happened and I'm very happy everything is being dismissed.' His lawyer, Alex Spiro of Brafman & Associates, declined to comment. Klein pictured inside Manhattan Criminal Court on Monday morning Wildenstein, the so-called 'Bride of Wildenstein' due to her extensive plastic surgery, was arrested on December 6 for allegedly clawing Klein across the face, throwing hot wax over him and cutting him with scissors. During that incident, Klein was forced to bundle Wildenstein into a walk-in closet to bring the attack to a halt. Wildenstein called the police herself to say she was locked up against her will but officers took one look at her partner's bloodied face and chest and booked her on felony and misdemeanor assault charges. She is due in court on February 15. Klein, who lives between his homes in New York, LA and Miami, told DailyMail.com that he bears no ill-will against his former partner. 'It's very difficult after a long relationship with such a wonderful person,' the Canadian-born designer said. 'I want whoever is looking at Jocelyn Wildenstein to understand that she is a great person, an extremely interesting person. She's not only what people want to see. Beauty is extremely subjective. 'I'm a fashion designer, I come from a world where aesthetic and image is extremely important. Whatever people think about her is a little bit over the top. 'I think she is a wonderful person and she has impeccable taste in everything. Her face has always been a feline face. I saw picture of her when she was 17, it was the same eyes and the same cheekbones, the same face. Klein's (pictured in court with scars allegedly from Wildenstein) hearing lasted under a minute on Monday and saw the judge dismiss all charges against him due to a lack of evidence. Wildenstein did not accompany Klein to court The Canadian fashion designer arrived at criminal court on Monday morning in a chauffeur-driven BMW wearing Christian Dior and Louis Vuitton, accompanied by two bodyguards 'Because we tag her as a feline, she is tagged as someone wild. Her family name is well-attributed to her because she is wild but in a very good sense, in a very elegant way. 'She is a very elegant woman and extremely well-mannered.' Klein believes that the incident at their home was caused by Wildenstein being under a great deal of pressure in her personal life. He said: 'I think it was related to stress, to a family situation. Her daughter and son are extremely ungrateful to her but I don't want to get involved. The stress comes from [that] and it was just before the holidays.' Klein said that he did not blame Wildenstein for the charges brought against him. He added: 'I blame it on her children, Diane and Alec Jr. I blame it on her family situation. I don't blame it on her. This is a woman who is hurt. I don't think it's right to treat your mother that way. 'She is hurt and what happens when a person is hurt? The closest person to them is the one who also gets hurt.' Although the former couple are not in touch at present, Klein hopes they can soon be friends. Wildenstein put her $13 million New York condo for sale following the brawl. Pictured, Klein relaxing in the lavish apartment The condo takes up the entire 51st floor of Trump World Tower - and it is believed the 'Catwoman' spent millions on lavish renovations and an opulent art deco interior He said: 'We cannot speak to each other at the moment, we are not seeing each other or talking to each other but we are not at war. I think there are strong feelings and a great connection between us. I think it's important to learn lessons and realize that we are very important to each other.' For the time being, Klein is focusing on his fashion business and other opportunities. The designer, who recently battled cancer and is now in full remission, has previously designed clothes for Nicki Minaj, Pink, Miley Cyrus, Mary J. Blige and Joan Collins. 'My main concern right now is to get in my design studio in my fashion house and prepare the next collection,' he said. 'I'm writing a memoir which is going to come out very soon. There are also some propositions from Hollywood producers, so let's see what's going to happen.' Last month, police were called to the home of Klein and Wildenstein over a domestic incident. 'It was one hell of a cat fight but when all is said and done they should both emerge unscathed,' an insider told DailyMail.com at the time. Klein pictured leaving Manhattan Criminal Court on Monday morning 'Lloyd still thinks the world of Jocelyn and he has absolutely no desire to see her suffer any more than she already has.' Wildenstein was once touted as one of the wealthiest women in the U.S. after securing an estimated $2.5 million divorce payment and $100 million a year in maintenance. She divorced art dealer Alec Wildenstein in 1999. But in a recent interview with the filmmaker Daphne Barak, she claimed that the Wildenstein family trust fund made her monthly payments dried up, leaving her with no income. Wildenstein told Barak her last monthly instalment of $111,000 came in March 2015. 'I wasn't ready for it. How can I pay for dental care, doctors, the expenses of my homes or travelling? I have nothing to pay with,' she said. 'You know, it cannot be, that one day - all of the sudden - they stop the payments, just leaving me like that. They expected me to live only 20 years.' Wildenstein will appear in court next month accused of assault in the second-degree and inflicting injuries with a weapon. Klein is keen to put the matter behind them and has indicated he will not press charges against his former partner of 14 years. Klein says he bears 'no ill-will' towards his former partner and that she is a 'wonderful person' Wildenstein was once touted as one of the wealthiest women in the United States after securing an estimated $2.5 million divorce payment and $100 million a year in maintenance. She divorced art dealer Alec Wildenstein (pictured on right with his new wife) in 1999 A pervert lorry driver was caught by paedophile hunters trying to meet a 13-year-old girl for sex. Michael Billham, from Brunswick in Newcastle, made contact with who he thought was an underage schoolgirl over an online teen chat site last September. The 52-year-old HGV driver sent a series of sickeningly 'vulgar' messages detailing explicit sex acts then planned a meeting at Newcastle City centre. Michael Billham, from Brunswick in Newcastle, made contact with who he thought was an underage schoolgirl over an online teen chat site last September When he arrived to meet the youngster, who did not exist, he was confronted by Dark Justice, a group who trawl the internet to expose paedophiles, who had alerted the police. He told officers he had been 'so stupid'. Billham admitted attempting to meet a child following sexual grooming. At Newcastle Crown Court Judge Sarah Mallett sentenced him to 12 months imprisonment, suspended for two years, with rehabilitation requirements, sex offender programme, ten years on the sex offenders register and a five year sexual harm prevention order. The judge said the sentence was the way of 'best managing future risks' and told him: 'There was an attempt to commit an impossible offence but, of course, the potential for harm does not need stated. ' Judge Mallett said Billham, who lost his HGV driving job as a result of the conviction, has shown remorse and a willingness to address his offending. Judge Mallett said Billham, who lost his HGV driving job as a result of the conviction, has shown remorse and a willingness to address his offending. Prosecutor Mark Giuliani told the court Billham had sent a message to the teen profile on the site, which was for 13-19 year-olds, saying 'I would like to meet you' and stating his true age. Mr Giuliani added: 'The group responded with 'I am 13' and then there follows what can only be described as vulgar messages from the defendant to who he believed was a 13-year-old girl.' Billham was confronted on camera when he turned up at the Centre for life in Newcastle city centre on September 30 last year Billham was confronted on camera when he turned up at the Centre for life in Newcastle city centre on September 30 last year. Mr Giuliani said: 'There was an intention for penetrative activity.' Gavin Doig, defending, said no real child was involved and Billham, who lives with his parents, has never been in trouble before and is willing to work with the authorities who can help him. Gaby Stone (pictured) pocketed sponsorship and appearance fees from the Strictly Come Dancing star between 2014 and 2015 The former manager of Olympic gold medallist Greg Rutherford has admitted fleecing the long jumper out of more than 48,000 to fund his gambling addiction. Gaby Stone, 34, pocketed sponsorship and appearance fees from the Strictly Come Dancing star between 2014 and 2015. Stone was a director and company secretary of GSE Management and looked after Mr Rutherford's commercial opportunities, Blackfriars Crown Court heard. Max Hardy, prosecuting, said: 'Mr Stone was Mr Rutherford's manager for a number of years having been introduced to him in 2009. In return, Stone would receive 20 per cent of the earnings and 80 per cent would go to the track and field star, the court heard. 'In 2014, a time came when Mr Stone was receiving payments for some commercial activities but he was not making payment to Mr Rutherford for sums owed to him,' said Mr Hardy. The last payment made by Stone to the London 2012 champion was in September 2014 but he continued to rake in money until August 2015, the court heard. 'Prior to 2014 he accepts that he behaved recklessly in regards to contractual obligations but after October 2014 it became dishonest,' said Mr Hardy. He said there was 'no dispute' that Stone owed Mr Rutherford 63,403 but said there was a time when 'recklessness became dishonesty; therefore it was criminal conduct'. Sentencing was adjourned to allow Stone an opportunity to pay Mr Rutherford (pictured) back and for the total loss to be clarified 'It is in no dispute that Mr Stone had, for some time, a serious gambling problem,' said Mr Hardy. Dressed in a tie, dark grey jumper and black jeans, Stone spoke only to give his name and admit one charge of fraud. He was initially charged with swiping 63,000 but the prosecution accepted the lower figure of 48,488. Sentencing was adjourned to allow Stone an opportunity to pay Mr Rutherford back and for the total loss to be clarified. He plans on paying four fifths of the money back before he is sentenced, said Julia Flanagan, defending. Stone has a degree in sport sciences from Loughborough University and has also represented gymnastics champion Louis Smith and two-times gold medallist boxer Nicola Adams. Rutherford shot to fame after taking the gold at London 2012, and setting the British record for the long jump. He was unable to repeat the feat at the Rio de Janeiro games last year where he won bronze. Rutherford appeared in last year's Strictly Come Dancing, following the footsteps of Stone's other client Louis Smith. Adjourning the case Judge Jane Sullivan said: 'It is a serious matter, the starting point of an offence of this nature and the most likely outcome is immediate custody, it is only right you should know that.' Stone, of Marylebone, London, admitted fraud and was bailed ahead of sentence on March 6. It's now legal to smoke, gift, grow and possess up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana in Maine. On Monday, Maine residents saw the first tangible results of state voters' decision to legalize marijuana as possession and home growth of marijuana became legal. Voters narrowly passed the ballot question in November, and the waiting period between the vote and legalization has expired. Contentious aspects linger, including what rules should govern businesses that will sell marijuana, such as retail stores and social clubs. It's now legal to smoke, gift, grow and possess up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana in Maine. On Monday, Maine residents saw the first tangible results of state voters' decision to legalize marijuana as possession and home growth of marijuana became legal The Legislature has been hammering out those details, and they will take months to fully craft, meaning it will be months before marijuana businesses open in the state. 'It's huge. No longer will we be punishing adults for using a safer substance than alcohol,' said David Boyer, campaign manager for the ballot question. 'We're not making criminals out of thousands of Mainers who choose to use marijuana,' Boyer added. The marijuana legalization vote was close, passing by only about 4,000 votes, and opponents of the spread of marijuana have vowed to continue to push for restrictions in the state. Legalization also sparked a row between legislators and Republican Gov Paul LePage. On January 26, lawmakers unanimously approved legislation delaying the retail sale of marijuana until February 2018. But LePage at first declined to sign off on such a delay because of concerns he has about funding and oversight. He ended up signing it on January 27. LePage's signing of the bill also closed a loophole that could have allowed Mainers under 21 to possess pot. But details on how businesses will sell marijuana, are still being hammered out by legislature. On January 26, lawmakers unanimously approved legislation delaying the retail sale of marijuana until February 2018 Cities and towns have also considered moratoriums on the establishment of marijuana businesses, and some have already approved such temporary bans. Many local officials have said they don't want to get into the business of issuing marijuana licenses until the state rules are firmly in place. Scott Gagnon, chairman of Mainers Protecting Our Youth and Communities, has said that legalization will bring a 'huge cultural change for Maine' and that cities and towns are right to be cautious about whether they will allow sales within their borders. Massachusetts, California and Nevada also legalized recreational marijuana with a referendum last year. Footage has emerged showing the moment Mischa Barton began screaming about her mother and the end of the world, after she was allegedly given the drug GBH. The OC actress, 31, was filmed ranting incoherently while standing on the fence in her backyard in LA. Barton is seen suddenly crashing to the ground as she loses her footing and falls backwards. Mischa Barton (pictured) was taken to hospital for mental evaluation after neighbors found her 'screaming about end of the world and her mom being a witch' on Thursday The actress was voluntarily taken to hospital Thursday after neighbors found her screaming. Barton said Friday she was out of the hospital after an overnight stay and had found out through doctors that someone had given her GHB on Wednesday night, while she was celebrating her 31st birthday. GHB, which is often referred to as a date-rape drug, has been known to be slipped in alcoholic drinks, typically to incapacitate victims of rape or sexual assault. In the footage, Barton can be heard shouting about planet earth, before saying: 'Oh my God, it's over. I feel it. And it's angry.' She later says: 'We're dying, we're dying. I knew it, I knew it. I don't want anybody to know. Oh my god, it's terrifying.' The actress is also heard shouting: 'Oh my mother. I always knew it. Oh you f***** witch. I knew it. What a witch. I was right, I was right.' Towards the end of the footage, she shouts out 'Ziggy Stardust', the name of one her dogs. The actress said Friday she was out of the hospital after an overnight stay and had found out through doctors that someone had given her GHB on Wednesday night. Barton is pictured earlier this month Barton told People Friday that she went out with a group of friends on the evening of the 25th. 'While having drinks, I realized that something was not right as my behavior was becoming erratic and continued to intensify over the next several hours,' the actress aid. 'I voluntarily went to get professional help, and I was informed by their staff that I had been given GHB. After an overnight stay, I am home and doing well.' Barton thanked the staff at Los Angeles' Cedars-Sinai Medical Center for their care. The actress, who turned 31 just two days ago, tweeted: 'Thank you all for all the birthday messages Xoxo' 'This is a lesson to all young women out there, be aware of your surroundings,' she added. However, a source has now claimed to TMZ that Mischa was on a downward spiral for 'nearly a year' before checking into the hospital psych unit. The site alleges that Mischa's neighbours claim she 'frequently' has loud crying and screaming fits, disturbing the peace. Her next-door-neighbours are also reported to have complained about the star's loud parties and late night Netflix binges. It is not the first time Barton has blasted her mother Nuala. She famously sued her in 2015, accusing her of defrauding her by stealing her money Law enforcement sources told TMZ Thursday that Barton had been voluntarily taken to the hospital for a mental health check. Police and firefighters were called to the scene after being alerted about a jumper or possible overdose. Barton was wearing just a dress shirt and tie at the time. Not long afterwards the Brit, who turned 31 just two days ago, tweeted: 'Thank you all for all the birthday messages Xoxo'. The tweet seemed to have been deleted as of Thursday evening. It is not the first mental health episode Barton has been involved in. In July 2009, after seeking medical attention for a tooth infection, the actress was sectioned for two weeks under a '5150', a Californian law that allows a psychiatrist to involuntarily confine a person deemed to have a mental disorder that makes them a danger to themselves and others. Last year she accused her mom of purposely holding up the sale of the $7million Beverly Hills mansion they co-own She said at the time: 'If they feel you are depressed or a danger to yourself they can hold you on a 5150. I am terrified of needles and they wanted to pump me full of drugs and I said, 'No, absolutely not. I don't want to be here,' and got into a fight with the nurses, and that led to my 5150.' It is not the first time Barton has blasted her mother Nuala either. She famously sued her 2015, accusing her of defrauding her by stealing her money. Last year she accused her mom of purposely holding up the sale of the $7million Beverly Hills mansion they co-own. The 7,600-square-foot Tuscan-style villa, which boasts views of Catalina Island, was one of the focal points of the suit - with the actress claiming her mom gave herself co-ownership of the property without her knowledge or permission. She accused Nuala of taking out massive loans against the house behind her back - and turning the home into her 'personal ATM'. The 7,600-square-foot Tuscan-style villa, which boasts views of Catalina Island, was one of the focal points of the suit Barton even claimed she was then kicked out of the home by her parents who wouldn't let her back on the property. That case was dismissed back in February with the terms of the agreement stating Nuala would sell the home. Nuala had been her daughter's manager for years until the actress accused her mom of being a 'greedy stage mother posing as a talent manager'. Barton's lawsuit included claims that Nuala had lied about her salary for a film and didn't pay her the full amount. She also accused her mom of opening up a Mischa Barton fashion boutique in London and used the Sixth Sense actress's name to hawk a handbag line - yet Barton claimed she never saw a cent. Nuala called her daughter's allegations 'nonsense' and the case was dismissed in February last year. Both mother and daughter have had financial problems for years - so the impending sale of the home should bring much-needed relief to them both. In her bankruptcy papers, filed in February, Nuala said her assets totaled $3,747,500 but her liabilities totaled $5,583,412. She said her average monthly income totaled only $1,600 but her expenses were $27,618 - leaving her in the red over $26,000 every month. The biggest asset listed in her bankruptcy petition was the Bowmont Drive property. She said the current value of her portion was $3,747,500 with the total value being $7,495,000. The petition stated her liabilities as $4,264,567 on the mansion, including an unknown amount owed to Barton. Nuala spends $10,500 a month on the Beverly Hills home along with $12,200 in additional mortgage payments, $3,635 in real estate taxes and $600 in food & housekeeping supplies, according to the papers. Barton (pictured earlier this month) attempted a comeback on the most recent Dancing With The Stars - but was booted off after just three episodes Last year, the actress who has been trying to sell off the home for 6 years - listed it for sale at the price of $7.495 million. Barton also listed it back in 2010 for $8.6 million and even tried to rent it out for $35,000 a month but nobody bit. London-born Barton moved to the United States when she was five and began acting at age eight, appearing in hit movies Sixth Sense and Notting Hill before rocketing to fame in teen drama The OC. However her glittering career came crashing down as her partying began to get out of control. She was arrested for DUI in 2007, then two years later - following an intervention by her parents - she had a nervous breakdown and was held in psychiatric care after threatening to kill herself. In 2009 her house went into foreclosure after it was revealed she had failed to pay her mortgage for five months. The same month she was sued by producers of the movie Promoted, who claimed they paid her an advance but she never turned up for work. Barton was then sued by her landlord over unpaid rent on her $7,000 a month NYC apartment in 2010 before suing her own mother five years later for 'theft' and 'breach of contract'. Her legal troubles are believed to have left her homeless and broke. She attempted a comeback on the most recent Dancing With The Stars - but was booted off after just three episodes. Phil Shiner, a solicitor who worked for the now-defunct Public Interest Lawyers (PIL), sent the tribunal in central London a letter asking for the case to be adjourned A lawyer accused of hounding British troops for a decade was branded a coward last night after he refused to attend a disciplinary hearing due to 'stress'. Disgraced Phil Shiner said he was 'unable to cope' with the tribunal into allegations he drummed up claims against UK soldiers in the aftermath of the Iraq War. The hearing, into accusations that he paid an agent to cold-call potential 'victims' of Army abuse, continued in his absence after his request to delay proceedings was denied. Prosecutor Andrew Tabachnik, counsel to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA), accused him of 'manoeuvring' and said that Mr Shiner thought he was above the rules. He said: 'What is going on here is manoeuvring on his part. He is in a state of avoidance in relation to the proceedings. It is most unfortunate that having pursued allegations of a cover-up by the British Army that Professor Shiner has been caught engaging in his own cover-up.' Mr Tabachnik added: 'What is at the heart of Professor Shiner's professional misconduct is a view on his part that the ends justified the means, that his work in the human rights field was of such moment that he was able to disregard the rules that apply to his fellow solicitors.' Mr Shiner's now-collapsed firm, Public Interest Lawyers, brought the vast majority of 3,380 allegations of murder and wrongdoing by British soldiers to the Iraq Historical Allegations Team. Hundreds of soldiers, many suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental health problems, have been relentlessly pursued for more than a decade as a result. Not a single case has resulted in a prosecution. Mr Shiner is now charged with 24 counts of misconduct by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. His firm claimed British soldiers went on a killing and torture spree following a fierce battle in southern Iraq in 2004, known as the Battle of Danny Boy. But after five years of investigations, the Al-Sweady public inquiry which cost 25million concluded the allegations by Iraqis were based on 'deliberate lies, reckless speculation and ingrained hostility'. The Ministry of Defence later passed a dossier on Mr Shiner's company and Leigh Day, another human rights firm, to the solicitors' watchdog. In its first hearing in December, Mr Shiner admitted acting recklessly and without integrity as he pleaded guilty to nine charges and partly accepted a further nine. He admitted he would be struck off. He was due to attend his first hearing yesterday into the claims he denied, but days before it was due to start, a friend sent a letter saying 'he feels too unwell'. Mr Shiner, 59, whose firm pocketed 1.6million for its work on Iraqi claims, also said he did not have enough money to represent himself, the tribunal heard. Mr Tabachnik said Mr Shiner 'knew it would be stressful' and also pointed out that he had two houses and other assets. Chairman of the bench Nicola Lucking agreed, and ruled the tribunal should go ahead without Mr Shiner. Tormented soldiers who were hauled before the courts over false claims last night reacted with fury at his no-show. Jeremy Edgar, who was dragged before the Al-Sweady inquiry, said: 'I suffered at the time and I still suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety disorder. I still had to go to answer for the false claims brought by this man. He is a coward who in the very least should attend these hearings to answer for what he did. In 2004, Shiner represented Iraqi families seeking compensation over the deaths of loved ones allegedly killed by British soldiers 'I have not been allowed to put the experiences of my service behind me and had to relive them over a period of nearly seven years, living with the constant threat of having a knock at the door.' Former Sergeant Richard Catterall was cleared three times of any wrongdoing after he shot an Iraqi in self-defence. He was forced to give evidence, even though he suffered from PTSD and agoraphobia and it was feared he would kill himself. His daughter, Demi Catterall, said: 'Stress? Is [Mr Shiner] in that much stress he physically can't leave the house? Is he that stressed he has actively tried to commit suicide? Doubting himself thinking he's he worst person in the world? I highly doubt it ... he needs to face up to what he's done.' The tribunal heard how Mr Shiner got agent Mazin Younis 'on the hunt' to track down alleged victims of the Battle of Danny Boy. The agent cold-called potential clients, which is against the solicitors' code of conduct, the tribunal heard. It was also claimed Mr Shiner offered financial 'sweeteners' to a fixer to change evidence on how clients to go before the Al-Sweady inquiry had been found. The hearing continues. His slurs dogged my men for a decade A serving colonel who commanded British troops in Iraq gave a vivid account yesterday of how his men had been subjected to a 'demoralising decade' of baseless claims against them. Colonel James Coote OBE said the ordeal his soldiers endured while facing allegations of torture, mutilation and murder had tarnished the image of the legal profession. The married father of two, who has completed tours of Northern Ireland, Iraq and Afghanistan over his 20-year career, felt his personal integrity was 'attacked' by human rights lawyer Phil Shiner's team during a 25million, five-year inquiry. In a statement handed to Mr Shiner's disciplinary tribunal in London yesterday, Col Coote said false claims had damaged the morale of his soldiers and the Army's reputation. He said: 'The false allegations... levelled against the soldiers under my command were among the most serious brought against the British Army since the Second World War.' Col Coote, of the Princess of Wales's Royal Regiment, said they 'had a very serious effect on the morale of the soldiers involved and on the reputation of the British Army more widely'. In 2004, when the Battle of Danny Boy took place, he was a major in command of up to 120 men. The battle became the subject of the Al-Sweady inquiry after Iraqis represented by Mr Shiner and another firm falsely claimed civilians were tortured and murdered in its aftermath. During the battle in Majar al-Kabir, southern Iraq, Col Coote said soldiers defended themselves against an ambush by heavily armed militia known as the Mahdi Army. He described the incident as 'harrowing', adding: 'Several soldiers, particularly those involved in recovering bodies from the battlefield, were treated for psychological trauma.' The tribunal heard how rumours began to circulate locally that many of the Iraqis had been taken alive and then killed which was not true. Mr Shiner was alerted to the allegations and sent his agent, Mazin Younis, 'on the hunt' to find the claimants, it was said. Mr Shiner then secured legal aid to bring about a judicial review, which led to a five-year inquiry in which 222 military witnesses were made to give evidence. Col Coote said his perception of lawyers changed when he learned of the 'way in which British solicitors were pursuing and championing the false allegations of murder, mutilation and torture'. He added: 'I remember my sense of anger and dismay following the publication of these allegations.' He added that the claims 'resulted in an extremely stressful and demoralising decade for me and other soldiers', and said the process of the inquiry had been 'thoroughly unpleasant and demeaning and led to the return of some of the symptoms I had suffered on my return from Iraq'. Col Coote said: 'It took a toll on my family, who were upset that extremely serious and untrue allegations could be made against me and the soldiers I had commanded.' He told how he witnessed soldiers becoming 'visibly distressed' as a result of giving oral evidence and had been placed 'under very great emotional strain'. He pointed out that Sir Thayne Forbes, inquiry chairman, found British soldiers responded to the deadly ambush with 'exemplary courage, resolution and professionalism'. A school teacher who volunteers as a Scotland Yard special sergeant has been charged with nine counts of sexually assaulting a child under the age of 13. Craig Keane, 28, was charged with child sex offences last Thursday and appeared at Barkingside Magistrates Court on Friday. Keane teaches design and technology at The Sandon School in Chelmsford, Essex, but the charges do not relate to any students involved with the school. Craig Keane, 28, was charged with child sex offences last Thursday and appeared at Barkingside Magistrates Court on Friday. Until his suspension he teaches design and technology at The Sandon School in Chelmsford, Essex, pictured In a letter sent to parents head teacher Jo Wincott wrote: 'We have been informed by the Metropolitan Police that one of our teachers, Mr Craig Keane, has been formally charged with offences that fall under the area of child protection. 'I wanted to write to you personally and ensure that you found out this news directly rather than via the press or social media. 'The charges are not related to anything that has taken place at the school or involving students at The Sandon School.' Following his arrest, Mr Keane was suspended from his position at the school which then followed its safeguarding processes. Ms Wincott asked that any persons affected by the letter to contact the school, where members of staff are available to provide support. Mr Keane has also been suspended from his duties as a MSC officer, a voluntary and unpaid role. He has been bailed to attend Snaresbrook Crown Court on February 20. The investigation is being led by the Met's Sexual Offences Exploitation and Child Abuse Command. Police in North Carolina have arrested four women and charged them with painting anti-Trump graffiti. A number of businesses and one police car were painted January 21 in the town of Boone - the day after the President's inauguration. Police said the women were arrested late last week and charged with seven counts of misdemeanor graffiti and one count of damaging personal property. Several buildings, signs and a police car were vandalized in Boone with obscene messages Officers said several subjects painted 'Black Lives Matter,' anti-Trump and anti-police slogans on businesses and a police car The four women arrested were each given a $1,500 bond pending a court appearance on March 1 The women are 22-year-old Taryn Bledsoe, 22-year-old Julia Grainger, 22-year-old Elizabeth Prier, and 21-year-old Hannah Seay, all of Boone. Officers had said several people had painted 'Black Lives Matter,' anti-Trump and anti-police slogans, causing damage of about $10,000. Boone Police chief Dana Crawford said a tip from High Country Crime Stoppers led to the arrests. Videos and screenshots allegedly showing the suspects walking down King Street and buying spray paint were released to the public. Hannah Seay, 21 and Julia Grainger, 22 were arrested after police say they were responsible for vandalism across the downtown area in Boone, North Carolina Taryn Bledsoe, 22 and Elizabeth Prier, 22 were also arrested. All four women were charged with seven counts of misdemeanor graffiti violation and one count of misdemeanor damage to personal property WSOC reported that the vandalism included anti-Donald Trump messages. A Boone police car was spray-painted with the words 'Black Lives Matter' and an Earth Fare health food store was spray-painted with 'Neoliberalism!!!' 'We took this case very seriously. Our detectives worked very long hours each day of this investigation, even working through the night, at one point. 'These hours were spent locating evidence, conducting interviews and eventually gaining confessions from each of these individuals,' said Chris Hatton, lieutenant of the criminal investigations division of Boone Police. Tips from the public through High Country Crime Stoppers ultimately led to the incidents being solved. The women were caught on CCTV camera walking down King Street in the city The vandalism happened shortly before 4 a.m. January 21 in downtown Boone 'This is a fine example of the partnership High Country Crime Stoppers shares with the public and law enforcement to make our community better. The response to the Tsunami system videos was superb,' noted Crime Stoppers Watauga County Coordinator and Boone Police Sgt. Shane Robbins. 'The cost of cleaning or repainting a police vehicle is not coming from President Trump but Boone taxpayers,' Chief Dana Crawford said. It was not known if the women have attorneys. A 20-year-old Pennsylvania man pleaded guilty Monday to trying to help the Islamic State group and to tweeting out a list that identified and targeted people serving in the U.S. military. Jalil Ibn Ameer Aziz faces the potential of up to 25 years and a $500,000 fine after admitting to a charge of conspiring to provide material support to the Islamic State group and to transmitting a communication containing a threat, both felonies. Aziz, a natural born American arrested in Harrisburg in December 2015, used about 70 different Twitter accounts and an encrypted mobile messaging application to spread messages from the Islamic State group and to help people trying to travel to territory it controls, said federal counterterrorism prosecutor Robert Sander. Jalil Aziz, 20, pleaded guilty on Monday to conspiring to provide material support to the Islamic State In March 2015, Aziz published on Twitter a list of more than 100 American military personnel that included photos, rank and addresses, along with instructions to kill them, Sander told the judge. Aziz referred to it as an assassination list, Sander said. The message exhorted people to 'kill them in their own lands, behead them in their own homes, stab them to death as they walk their street.' Federal officials say the service members on the list were notified and appropriate security measures were taken. During a search in November 2015, authorities found five high-capacity magazines, a knife, a balaclava and other equipment in the home he shared in Harrisburg with his parents. Federal public defender Thomas Thornton said Aziz does not remember all of the messages he was accused of sending or retweeting. After the hearing, Thornton described his client as 'a young kid who was tweeting from his bedroom.' 'He's very sorry that he ever got himself involved in something like this,' Thornton said. Authorities have said Aziz also expressed on Twitter his interest in 'buying' a Yazidi woman upon his arrival in Islamic State group territory. 'I just want one girl 17 years old,' he tweeted, according to federal prosecutors. In a filing last week that argued the Yazidi posts were irrelevant and should not be evidence at trial, Thornton called the communications 'no more than the fantastical musings of an isolated and suppressed teenage boy.' Yazidis, whose heartland is in Iraq's remote Sijar region, have been targeted by Islamic State group militants for conversion and elimination, and Yazidi women have described being forced into sexual slavery. Alexa Curtin, the daughter of Real Housewives of Orange County star Lynne Curtin, has found herself embroiled in more legal trouble this week. Alexa's grandmother, Marilou Colee, 88, filed an 'elder abuse' restraining order against the 23-year-old, claiming that her granddaughter has spiraled out of control and broke into her California home in Mission Viejo. The particular type of legal order she is seeking is for persons 65 years or older who have been physically, emotionally or financially abused. Marilou chalks up the string of break-ins and erratic behavior to Alexa's traumatic sexual assault two years ago. Last year, Alexa filed a federal lawsuit against the Orange County Sheriffs Department, accusing a deputy of raping her when she was 21 during a traffic stop. Alexa's grandmother, Marilou Colee, 88, filed a restraining order against the 23-year-old, saying that her granddaughter has spiraled out of control and broke into her California home in Mission Viejo Marilou chalks up the string of break-ins and erratic behavior to Alexa's traumatic sexual assault. Pictured, the family together for mother's day last year; from left to right Raquel Curtin (Alexa's sister), Marilou Colee, Lynne Curtin and Alexa Curtin Plaintiff was violated, traumatized, emotionally drained, in shock, and fearing for her own safety. Specifically, Plaintiff feared that given the Deputys position, he would find her and harm her again,' the suit stated. The incident, Alexa's grandmother Marilou said, jolted her life off track and made her turn to illicit substances. Two months after filing the lawsuit, Alexa was charged with drug possession. 'She has been raped by an Orange County sheriff, and this poor girl, she can't get it out of her mind. She'd upset with all of this. It's an awful thing to happen to a woman,' Marilou told DailyMail.com. 'I love her so much, but she broke into my house. 'I can see who's at the door from the inside, and when I open it she just kind of comes in. She's stayed with me for a couple weeks before. After that she's threatened us, broken windows. 'She really frightened me. When we called the police they said I had to file a restraining order before they could do anything.' Marilou and her daughter Lynne, who lives with her, filed a probate case accusing Alexa of elder abuse last Tuesday at Orange County Court. 'You know, I'm 88 years old, and I went to court with my daughter and spent four hours filling out all these papers. Everything we said was the truth, but they thought we were lying. Marilou and her daughter Lynne, who lives with her, filed a probate case accusing Alexa (pictured left) of elder abuse last Tuesday at Orange County Court. Lynne starred on Real Housewives for two seasons before leaving after season 5, while Alexa made multiple guest appearances on the show '[Alexa] is sweet as can be, but she turned threatening, saying she hates my daughter. She's threatened to kill herself and asked Lynne things like "Why did you have me?" Marilou, seen here with daughter Lynne, said '[Alexa] is sweet as can be, but she turned threatening, saying she hates my daughter. She's threatened to kill herself and asked Lynne things like "Why did you have me?" 'She doesn't have any money, she doesn't have a car, she hasn't been doing anything. It's so sad, she'll be out in the rain, she's slept in the bushes.' Despite Alexa's attempt to get back on her feet, a brief stint in the adult film industry has marred her professional aspirations. Under the alias 'Jayden Taylors', Alexa did porn videos in 2014 to pay for plastic surgery. 'She's trying to get a job now but, you know, if you have anything in your history, they don't want to hire you. It's hard out there. Her father paid for her to go to rehab and I think she's off the drugs now,' Marilou said. Marilou hopes that Alexa will be able to make a life change and, by doing so, take an emotional burden off her family. 'My daughter is so upset over all of this. She's depressed, she's that upset. 'We have a lovely home. We've always been a perfect family, the girls have never done anything. But later in my life this is so hard. 'Alexa started drinking, she's not with her husband anymore; it all kinda broke her heart. I pray every night that she'll straighten out. She's fragile. There are so many possibilities for her, though: modeling, dancing, anything. 'We don't know where she is now. Some friend took her in and then she called Lynn and told her she was safe. There are some pictures on Facebook where she's wearing some nice clothes, so hopefully this will be it,' Marilou said. Lynne Curtin starred on Real Housewives for two seasons before leaving after season 5, while Alexa made multiple guest appearances on the show. Marilou is set to have a court hearing over the restraining order request next month. Alexa could not be reached for comment. Police and an animal protection team have raided a house in Ukraine where a man is alleged to have 'tortured, killed and eaten dogs for the past 15 years'. Three dogs including a stolen dachshund along with two puppies were saved from the ramshackle building close to the city of Mykolayiv. The owner is nicknamed 'The Skinner' and 'the slaughterer' by neighbours who say their protests have been ignored by the authorities for years. Authorities in Mykolayiv, Ukraine rescued these dogs from a man dubbed 'The Skinner' Officials found the remains of dozens of dogs strewn around the suspect's property The killer, who has not been named, skinned the dogs and used their meat as food 'People told us a man living in their apartment block was killing and eating dogs,' said a statement from the city's Animal Protection Centre. The raid came after an appalling smell of rotting corpses from the man's other home, a flat in the city. He was killing dogs at his nearby dacha, or country house, claimed neighbours who said he name was Dmitry. His picture has not been issued. He is said to be on the run. At his dacha, police found the remains of dogs and also cattle, skins and skulls of animals, and evidence of blood and 'what may be ritual killings', it was claimed. 'The grounds of Dmitry's dacha literally looked like a slaughter house,' said a source present when the police went in. Neighbours reported the smell of decaying flesh to the authorities in Mykolayiv Locals claimed the killer was involved in 'blood rituals' at his dacha with other people Authorities managed to save several dogs from almost-certain death at the dacha 'There was rubbish, plastic bags, skins of animals, skulls of cattle, and blood.' Police are believed to seeking a warrant to search his flat, and detain the suspect, who is believed to have fled. 'Even given the cold, smell of dead corpses and blood was very strong. 'People say that there were blood rituals held at his dacha. 'Dogs were killed - and there were people splashing in their blood.' Police in Ukraine are currently trying to track down the main suspect who has vanished Police recovered dozens of skins from several different types of animals and many bones This is the moment a group of firefighters rescued a man from an industrial cement mixer after he slipped into the machinery while cleaning it out. The man, who has not been named, was taken to hospital after 16 firefighters battled to free him from the cement mixer in Hamsteels Lane, Quebec, County Durham. He needed help to get out of the cement mixer and was taken in an ambulance to the University Hospital North Durham with an injured leg. This is the moment a group of firefighters rescued a man from an industrial cement mixer (pictured left) after he slipped into the machinery while cleaning it out The man, who has not been named, was taken to hospital after hurting his leg in the fall County Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue Service sent a fire crew from Consett, County Durham, to the incident at 11.47am this morning. They were assisted by Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service and the North East Ambulance Service (NEAS). A spokesman for County Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue Servicesaid: 'A man had been cleaning out the cement mixer and he slipped and fell on his own weight, on his leg. 'Because it was quite a small space, he needed assistance to get out. 'He was taken out by the fire service and went to University Hospital North Durham. 'He had an injury to his leg. There were 16 firefighters there all together. Seven from our side and nine from Tyne and Wear on their platform.' A spokesman for County Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue Servicesaid: 'A man had been cleaning out the cement mixer and he slipped and fell on his own weight, on his leg' A 25-year-old champion stand-up paddle surfer has been killed in a suspected drunken driver crash involving her boyfriend on Oahu, Hawaii, over the weekend. Television and radio personality Betty Banzai Depolito said that her friend and sea sister Sophia Tiare Bartlow died after the crash in Waialua Saturday night. Authorities said 35-year-old Sage Candelaria was speeding in a pickup truck when he lost control of the vehicle, crossed over the center line and struck a tree in the front yard of a residence. Scroll down for video Tragic end: Champion surfer Sophia Tiare Bartlow, 25 (left and right) was killed in a suspected DUI crash on Oahu, Saturday Smashed: Sage Candelaria was allegedly speeding in this white pickup truck when he lost control of the vehicle, crossed over the center line and struck a mango tree Pinned down: Bartlow was not wearing a seat belt and was ejected from the truck, which then rolled over on top of her It was just a huge rumble and we all ran out, said Joseph Calaustro, who told Hawaii News Now he was inside the home at the time of the crash. My dad, the neighbors, we all came running out. Police said Candelarias passenger, later identified as his girlfriend Sophia Bartlow, was ejected from the truck and rolled over by the vehicle. She was taken to a hospital in extremely critical condition and later succumbed to her injuries. Candelaria was hospitalized in serious condition and later arrested on suspicion of negligent homicide, DUI and driving without a license. Bartlow grew up in California and graduated from the University of Hawaii with a degree in anthropology, Depolito told Honolulu Star Advertiser. Bartlow, pictured here surfing, grew up in California and graduated from the University of Hawaii with a degree in anthropology Water athlete: Bartlow was ranked 12th in the 2015 Stand Up World Series women's ranking. In her rookie year, she won the 2014 US SUP surfing tour In her element: According to Bartlows website, the 25-year-old was a third-generation surfer High hopes: On her website, Bartlow put down 'Olympic gold' as one of her goals in life It's just devastating, Depolito said. Bartlow was always full of love and light. She made people smile. She was a very loving spirit. Bartlow was ranked 12th in the 2015 Stand Up World Series women's ranking, according to the Waterman League website. In her rookie year, she won the 2014 US SUP surfing tour. The accident that claimed Sophia Bartlows life took place at around 10.15pm on Saturday when police said Sage Candelaria lost control of his truck while speeding along Waialua Beach Road west of Haleiwa Road in the rain. The truck smashed into a mango tree and sent Sophia Tiare Bartlow flying out of the vehicle onto the roadway before landing on top of her. Joseph Calaustro, the neighbor, ran up to the mangled vehicle and came upon a harrowing scene. Describing the condition of the gravely injured surfer, he said: 'She was twisted and her leg was facing upwards a little and her back was facing downwards. He and other neighbors lifted the truck off of Bartlow. All the while, Calaustro said her boyfriend was in a state of panic but tried to reassure his dying girlfriend that she will be alright. Bartlow's mother is Jericho Poppler (pictured left, together, and right), a trailblazing world champion longboarder who founded the International Professional Surfers female surfing tour in 1976 Throwback Thursday: This side-by-side collage shows Bartlow on the left and her mother Jericho in her younger days on the right dressed in yellow bikinis Paramedics who responded to the scene said Bartlow was not wearing a seat belt at the time of the crash. According to Bartlows website, the 25-year-old was a third-generation surfer: her grandmother Bobbie was a junior Olympic diver, surfer and bodysurfer, and her mother, Jericho Poppler, is a trailblazing world champion longboarder who founded the International Professional Surfers female surfing tour in 1976. She has raised me on the ocean, inspiring a reverence and understanding for nature so great and profound, Ive yet to find the words that can describe it, Bartlow wrote about her mother, a cancer survivor and Surfers Hall of Famer, who is now in her 60s. Its an understatement to say that growing up within an aquatic culture has formed my worldview. Its an honor to follow in her footsteps; gratitude for simply being is what fuels my joy. Theresa May was booed by protesters calling her 'fascist' and 'racist' today for her lukewarm condemnation of Donald Trump's travel ban. The Prime Minister was heckled by noisy demonstrators as she arrived for a meeting with leaders of the devolved institutions in Cardiff. She walked into the city hall in the Welsh capital without responding to the shouting. Boris Johnson said tonight he had received assurances from the US administration that the restrictions would make 'no difference' to Britons - even if they are dual nationals. Theresa May was booed by protesters as she arrived for talks with leaders from the devolved institutions in Cardiff today Mr Johnson also repeated his belief that the temporary rules - denying entry to nationals from seven mainly Muslim countries - were 'divisive, discriminatory and wrong'. But he flatly dismissed furious demands to withdraw the invite for the US president to come for a state visit - saying there was 'absolutely no reason' why the event should go ahead. Mrs May has been heavily criticised for her cautious response to Mr Trumps presidential decree. Amid growing uproar she ordered Mr Johnson and Home Secretary Amber Rudd to demand an exemption for 250,000 British citizens who have dual nationality with one of the seven countries. Mr Trumps decree applies to citizens from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen and will last for at least 90 days. A US State Department official initially said citizens from other countries holding dual nationality with the banned states would also be affected. The move was designed as a first step toward the Presidents controversial election pledge to ban all Muslims from entering the US in a bid to counter terrorism. Mr Trumps executive order, which was signed just hours after Mrs Mays visit to the White House last week, also imposed a total ban on refugees for 120 days, and an indefinite ban on those travelling from Syria. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson told MPs today that no Britons will be affected by the US restrictions even if they have dual nationality Mr Johnson was addressing the House of Commons today amid widespread anger over the US restrictions imposed on seven mainly Muslim countries Mr Trump was unrepentant last night, saying on Twitter that the US needed extreme vetting to protect itself from terrorism and that he didnt want the US to end in a mess like Europe. Mrs May refused three times to condemn the ban during a press conference in the Turkish capital Ankara. Downing Street said this morning that the PM 'disagreed' with the restrictions and had acted to ensure the interests of UK nationals were secure. Protests against his ban are planned to take place in Edinburgh, Cardiff, Manchester, Newcastle, Leeds, Cambridge and Birmingham and in London demonstrators will protest outside Downing Street. A Gatwick Airport employee who was 'central' to a plot to smuggle vast quantities of cocaine into the UK, hidden inside British Airways jets, has had his 13-and-a-half-year sentence reduced by more than two years. Tomasz Babiak, 31, played a 'pivotal role' in the scheme to import drugs from Jamaica into Britain, concealed behind panels in BA aircraft. The daring scheme involved airport staff at the Caribbean end being 'recruited' to hide cocaine worth millions inside the jets whilst they were preparing them for take off and before passengers and other staff boarded. After the planes had landed, cleaners at Gatwick, who had been corrupted by the drug gang, were to remove the stash from behind the panels and use their employee status to get through customs. Former Gatwick Airport employee Tomasz Babiak, 31, played a 'pivotal role' in the scheme to import drugs from Jamaica into Britain, concealed behind panels in British Airway aircraft (file photo) Gatwick Airport staff member Babiak played a 'leading role' in the conspiracy and was caught with 9kg of 'import strength', 82 per cent pure, cocaine in December 2015. Babiak, of no fixed abode, was jailed for 13 and a half years at Kingston Crown Court in November last year, after pleading guilty to conspiracy to import cocaine. Now, however, that has been slashed to ten years and nine months by Lord Justice McCombe at London's Criminal Appeal Court. The judge, sitting with Ms Justice Russell and Judge Paul Batty QC, said Babiak was 'in breach of trust, being employed at Gatwick airport'. Babiak played a 'leading role' in the conspiracy at Gatwick Airport (pictured above) and was caught with 9kg of 'import strength', 82 per cent pure, cocaine in December 2015 (file photo) His claim to have been acting under duress had been rejected by the judge who jailed him. But Lord Justice McCombe said that, due to an error, Babiak had been given a longer sentence than the judge had intended. Cutting his jail term, he concluded: 'To that extent this appeal is allowed.' The court earlier heard that the gang had made two 'dummy runs' on BA flights and drugs were seized on two occasions. Melanie Johnson, 35, has been charged with assault and battery in Greenville County A fourth grade elementary school teacher was arrested on Saturday for allegedly biting a child at trampoline park in South Carolina. Melanie Johnson, 35, has been charged with assault and battery after turning herself in on Sunday to Greenville County police, WHNS reported. Authorities say the assault happened around 1.30pm on Saturday at the Sky Zone trampoline park. According to the investigative reports, the victim, an 11-year-old boy, was playing with one of his friends by keeping his hat away from him during a birthday party. Johnson allegedly grabbed the victim and shouted 'let go of his hat' while attacking him. Authorities say Johnson bit an 11-year-old boy at Sky Zone trampoline park (file above) on Saturday. The incident was reportedly sparked due to the boy playing with one of his friends by keeping his hat away from him She then allegedly bit the 11-year-old boy during the incident. The boy and his mother reported what happened at the party to the Greenville County Law Enforcement Center, where it's said the child had a visible mark on his wrist. Investigators also reviewed the surveillance video at Sky Zone and said that Johnson could be seen grabbing the 11-year-old and biting the boy on tape. Johnson works as a fourth grade teacher at Forest Acres Elementary School, according to their website. The Pickens County School District has placed her on administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation. It's unclear if Johnson knew the alleged victim or why she was at the trampoline park on Saturday. A Maryland deer that had been walking around with a plastic pretzel jug on its head for more than a week, was finally freed on Sunday by wildlife officials. The deer, who has been dubbed Jughead by residents of the Glenwood Park community in Bel Air, was freed by the Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) after they tranquilized him, according to the Baltimore Sun. Jughead was spotted around 5.30pm Sunday by officials, who used pliers to cut the plastic off of his head. Scroll down for video A Maryland deer (pictured) that had been walking around with a plastic pretzel jug on its hear for more than a week, was finally freed on Sunday by wildlife officials The deer, dubbed Jughead by residents of the Glenwood Park community in Bel Air, was freed by the Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) after they tranquilized him (pictured) Jughead, who had his head stuck in the plastic jug since January 19, was spotted around 5.30pm Sunday by officials. Once he was tranquilized, rescuers used pliers to cut the plastic jug and free the deer (pictured) DNR Wildlife and Heritage Service director Paul Peditto kept the community updated about the deer's condition. 'We have a dart in him. Not a perfect setup with darkness approaching but he's hit,' he wrote. Peditto let residents know that Jughead was 'immobilized but had good respiration'. Gregg Bortz, the public information officer for the DNR wrote in an email to the Baltimore Sun confirming Jughead had been freed. 'I can confirm that our Wildlife Response Team successfully freed the deer from the container, monitored him for more than an hour until he recovered from the tranquilizer, and released him into the wild with two new ear tags.' A resident in the area, Chris Beauchamp, told the Baltimore Sun that authorities had been searching for the buck all weekend. Beauchamp said the poor deer hadn't had anything to eat or drink in more than a week. Authorities were unable to get to the deer sooner because of heavy winds that prevented lightweight tranquilizer darts to be used, according to the Baltimore Sun. The community also helped in the search for Jughead by posting updates on social media about spotting the creature roaming around. Gregg Bortz, the public information officer for the DNR confirmed that Jughead (pictured) had been freed Authorities were unable to get to the deer sooner because of heavy winds that prevented lightweight tranquilizer darts to be used. The community also helped in the rescue of Jughead by posting updates on social media about spotting the creature roaming around The deputy leader of the Labour Party has been branded an 'utter moron' after referring to missing RAF Serviceman Corrie McKeague as a woman. Tom Watson MP was replying to a letter from a campaigner concerned not enough was being done to find Mr McKeagie, who has not been seen since September 24. But the response from Watson's office twice refers to 'her' disappearance. Incensed campaigners have branded Mr Watson as 'disgusting' for his insensitive and ill-informed reply. The deputy leader of the Labour Party Tom Watson (pictured) has been branded an 'utter moron' after referring to missing RAF Serviceman Corrie McKeague as a woman Mr McKeague (left), whose girlfriend April Oliver (right) found out she was pregnant two weeks after he went missing, was last seen at RAF Honington in September Tom Watson MP was replying to a letter from a campaigner concerned not enough was being done to find Corrie but in the letter he twice referred to 'her' A picture of Watson's response to a request for help was posted by Facebook user Tanya Knapper earlier this month and those who saw it slammed the MP Mr McKeague, 23, from Dunfermline, Fife, went missing on a night out in Bury St Edmonds, Suffolk. The RAF gunner has not been seen since. A picture of Watson's response to a request for help was posted by Facebook user Tanya Knapper earlier this month with the Labour MP's name and signature clearly visible on the back of the letter. The typed note, written on official parliamentary paper with the House of Commons logo at the top, starts by thanking Tanya for getting in touch. It then continues: 'Although Corrie McKeague is not one of my constituents, I share your concerns about her disappearance.' It continued: 'I note in your correspondence, though, that you believe extra funding is needed to aid the search for Corrie and are unhappy with the criminal investigation to date into her disappearance.' Tanya commented on her post: 'I did think no wonder they've not found him if they're looking for a woman. It was quite clear in my letter Corrie is a man too.' Corrie was last seen on a night out in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, on September 24. Here he is walking along Brentgovel Street at around 3.20am The RAF serviceman's girlfriend found out she was pregnant with his child just two weeks after he disappeared Outraged Facebook users were quick to react to Mr Watson's glaring error. Nonna Marzi wrote: 'So out of touch. 'Her'. My god I'm speechless.' Joanna Rickarby commented: 'That's disgusting. Fancy not even checking who they're speaking about.' Emma Cole wrote: 'Her? This person clearly knows nothing about the situation. Disgusting.' Kieron Riddy commented: 'What an utter moron.' Whilst Phyllis Ison added: 'And this from the people who are supposed to care about the people.' Tom Watson today apologised for the mistake, saying: 'I'm sorry for the drafting error in my letter to a constituent about such a sensitive case. 'I sincerely hope it doesn't cause more distress and that people understand it was a genuine mistake.' Corrie McKeague (left) trawled the internet for casual sex and opened a joint account on the partner-swapping club with his 21-year-old girlfriend April Oliver with a scantily clad woman used as the profile picture (right) Corrie is a senior Aircraftman at RAF Honington, which is ten miles north of Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk where he was last spotted on CCTV. He is the son of Nicola, from Dunfermline, and Martin McKeague from Cupar, and has two brothers; Darroch and Makeyan McKeague, who have all pleaded for his return publicly. His girlfriend, April Oliver, 21, discovered she was pregnant with his child two weeks after he went missing and yesterday revealed her 'unbearable pain' since the disappearance. Writing on her Instagram page, she said: 'I hurt every day. I cry every morning and night. I've never missed anyone so bad. The pain is unbearable. 'No one understands the pain or hurt of missing the person you love every second of the day and night.' Miss Oliver, a personal trainer, revealed last month that she is expecting his baby later this year. The graphic shows where Corrie McKeague had been on the night that he disappeared Last month, April Oliver (left) revealed she is pregnant. Her boyfriend (right) went missing in Bury St Edmunds last year She added: 'I don't care what has happened, I just want you home. You're my best friend and I need you. 'You promised you would never leave me. I love you Corrie please come back to me. Xxxx'. After his disappearance, it emerged that the two had a joint account on a swingers website used for partner swapping. Miss Oliver's plea came as it was revealed detectives hunting for Mr McKeague have so far spent more than 300,000 in their search to find him. Despite the enormous cost to the public purse, his family have also raised more than 50,000 to draft in private investigators to help with the search. Mr McKeague disappeared while out drinking in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, at 3.25am on September 24, 2016. CCTV footage showed him walk through the centre of the market town after going to a takeaway outlet. He then fell asleep in a doorway and a search of his phone picked up a signal 13 miles away at a nearby landfill site. His mother Nicola Urquhart (pictured), who is a police officer in Scotland, said the search in Suffolk has been insufficient His mother Nicola Urquhart, who is a police officer in Scotland, led her own unofficial search along with 100 volunteers, drones and dogs. Speaking yesterday, his mother said: 'I've never criticised any of the work that the police have done, I've been delighted with the efforts they've made. 'With myself, it's just looking for particular things that have been done in the enquiry that I've been asking for. They've clearly spent a massive amount. 'The police are doing everything that we are asking them to do.' April Oliver (pictured with Corrie McKeague) has revealed her 'unbearable pain' According to the Freedom on Information request, the 300,000 bill has been made up of staffing, overtime, travel and forensics. The sum has been split between Suffolk and Norfolk Constabularies. Ms Urquhart was critical of the police in December last year, claiming her faith in their ability to help find Corrie was 'utterly destroyed'. And last week, she admitted the chances of finding him alive are diminishing. A Suffolk Police spokeswoman said: 'As long as we still have lines of enquiry to follow, as we do now, this will remain an active and continuing investigation. 'Police still have work to carry out around a number of aspects of the investigation and we continue to treat finding Corrie as a priority for the constabulary.' Tom Watson became the standard bearer for the campaign to reveal the identities of Westminster MP's who had committed vile crimes against children. He made explosive allegations in the House of Commons in 2012 which claimed that there was evidence seized in the 1990s which would prove there was a 'widespred paedophile ring' at Westminster. The claims were subsequently discredited and Watson himself apologised. Anyone with information over Corrie's disappearance should call Suffolk police's incident room on 01473 782019. An Arizona man was convicted on Monday of charges that he provided support to Islamic State by helping a New York City college student travel to Syria, where he died fighting for the militant group. Ahmed Mohammed El Gammal, 44, was found guilty by a Manhattan federal jury on all four counts he faced, including that he provided material support to a foreign terrorist organization. Jurors in a note said they reached their verdict after what they called a 'difficult deliberation.' The verdict came on the third day of deliberations in the case, which centered in part on evidence collected from social media. Ahmed Mohammed el Gammal, 44, seen left and right, was found guilty on all four counts of recruiting a college student for providing and conspiring to provide material support to ISIS El Gammal made arrangements for Baruch student Samy El-Goarany travel to Syria in February 2015, and introducing him to people who helped him join ISIS 'Once again, we have shown that terrorists and terrorist enablers can be brought to justice fairly, openly, and swiftly in the crown jewel of our justice system -- civilian courts,' Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said in a statement. A lawyer for El Gammal had no comment. He faces a mandatory-minimum sentence of 10 years in prison and a maximum of 55 years. El Gammal is one of more than 100 people to face U.S. charges since 2014 in cases related to the Islamic State, which controls parts of Syria and Iraq and has claimed responsibility for bombings and shootings of civilians in other countries. Ahmed Mohammed el-Gammal helped student Samy el-Goarany, pictured, reach Syria where he trained with the Islamic State group before he was killed in November 2015 The case stemmed from El Gammal's interactions with Samy Mohammed El-Goarany, a 24-year-old student at Baruch College in Manhattan, who prosecutors said had become obsessed with Islamic State and wanted to fight with it. Prosecutors said El Gammal, an Egyptian-born Phoenix resident, was a supporter of Islamic State who had settled in America and, after befriending El-Goarany online, decided to guide the student toward his goal. In October 2014, El Gammal traveled to New York, met with El-Goarany and put him in touch with a friend in Istanbul who could help him travel to join Islamic State, prosecutors said. El-Goarany ultimately flew to Istanbul from New York in January 2015, and sometime after arrived in Syria, where he received religious and military training and died fighting with Islamic State, prosecutors said. El Gammal's lawyers denied that El Gammal knew about El-Goarany's plans, saying the student misled people into believing he was traveling to do humanitarian work. President Donald Trump is scheduled to announce his pick for the Supreme Court tomorrow night during primetime. Last week, the Republican president was reportedly down to three choices, all conservatives and all appointed to their current positions by President George W. Bush. Trump was originally going to name his pick Thursday, but the White House decided to move the announcement to Tuesday 'because he wanted to,' according to White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer. Scroll down for video Judge Neil Gorsuch has the most traditional resume for a Supreme Court pick, having graduated from Columbia and Harvard and clerked at the Supreme Court in his youth The frontrunner for the position looks to be Neil Gorsuch, a Colorado-based federal appeals court judge, who is just 49 years old. Gorsuch has a pure Ivy League background, having attended Columbia for undergrad and Harvard for law school. He also clerked at the Supreme Court, assisting Justices Byron White and Anthony M. Kennedy, before taking a job at a D.C. law firm. While he may share personal ties with Kennedy, Gorsuch's record is more similar to that of the late Justice Antonin Scalia, the man he would replace. Gorsuch, who has been sitting on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit since 2006, is a proponent of originalism, according to the Washington Post. In a speech he gave last spring, he said he had tried to follow Scalia's path. Judges, Gorsuch believed, should look to 'text, structure and history' to make decisions. Their job is 'not to decide cases based on their own moral convictions or the policy consequences they believe might serve society best,' he said. Eleventh Circuit Judge William Pryor has made the strongest public pronouncements against abortion, calling Roe v. Wade the 'worst abomination of constitutional law in our history' Unlike another top contender, Eleventh Circuit Judge William Pryor, Gorsuch hasn't ruled in an abortion case. He has sided with Hobby Lobby and Little Sisters of the Poor in opinions that are in line with the Supreme Court's conservative justices. The phrasing that he used in a ruling on behalf of those who challenged Obamacare's birth control mandate suggest he's pro-life, as he said businesses would be forced to 'underwrite payments for drugs or devices that can have the effect of destroying a fertilized human egg.' Pryor's view on the subject is more well defined. He called the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision, which legalized abortion nationally, the 'worst abomination of constitutional law in our history.' Choosing the Atlanta-based judge would shed the Ivy League mold of Supreme Court justices, as Pryor received his law degree from Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana. The 54-year-old was twice elected the attorney general of Alabama and defended the state's practice of handcuffing inmates to hitching posts in the sun if they refused to work on chain gangs, according to reporting from the Washington Post. In the historic gay rights case Lawrence v. Texas, Pryor filed an amicus brief in defense of Texas' sodomy laws arguing 'states should remain free to protect the moral standards of their communities through legislation that prohibits homosexual sodomy.' He's likely to have the hardest time getting through the Senate, as his confirmation for the 11th Circuit was a bumpy ride. Senate Democrats called the Bush appointee an 'extremist' and wouldn't vote for him, forcing Bush to do so over a Senate recess. It took another two years for a deal to be made between the two political parties to get Pryor on the bench. Judge Thomas Hardiman is on the short list for the Supreme Court, with his Third Circuit colleague, Judge Maryanne Trump Barry - the president's sister - encouraging this pick Thomas Hardiman, who serves on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, might be a better bet. When Bush appointed him to the position in 2003, the Senate vote was 95 to 0. Hardiman is getting a push from Judge Maryanne Trump Barry, the president's sister, who also serves on the Third Circuit. 'He's probably the most conservative judge that can get confirmed,' a source within the Trump administration, familiar with the SCOTUS deliberations, told the Washington Examiner. The Pittsburgh-based Hardiman has a compelling backstory. He was the first member of his family to go to college, growing up in Waltham, Massachusetts and coming from working class roots. He sometimes worked as a taxi driver to pay for degrees at Notre Dame and Georgetown University Law Center. He also speaks fluent Spanish and volunteered at the Ayuda immigration legal aid office in Washington, D.C. Hardiman's considered a good fit for Trump because he's come out strongly for the Second Amendment. He dissented when the 3rd Circuit heard a gun case in 2013, which said it was constitutional for the state to require individuals to demonstrate 'justifiable need,' before granting them a permit to carry a handgun in public. Hardiman said the law violated the Second Amendment and argued that the Second Amendment 'extends beyond the home,' the Washington Post said. President Obama waited a month after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia to name his pick for the Supreme Court: Merrick Garland, the chief judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Obama announced his pick on March 16, 2016, a day after the Florida primary, which Trump handily won. Believing that the party's fortunes could change and the GOP could win the White House come fall, Senate Republicans dragged their feet on the Garland nomination, forcing it to expire earlier this month, as the last session of Congress concluded. This now clears the way for a Trump nomination, though Democrats have hinted that they might play the same game. Sen. Jeff Merkley, a Democrat from Oregon, told Politico Monday that he planned to filibuster any SCOTUS pick that isn't Garland and he expected his Democratic colleagues to do the same. 'This is a stolen seat. This is the first time a Senate majority has stolen a seat,' Merkley said. 'We will use every lever in our power to stop this.' Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer indicated that he would fight 'tooth and nail' for any nominee that is outside the 'mainstream.' Trump's counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway took to Twitter today and shared the Politico article that featured Merkley's comments. 'Tells you all you need to know about the Democrats, 2017. Senate Dems will filibuster Trumps Supreme Court nominee,' Conway sniped. Spicer echoed Conway at today's press briefing. 'For a party preaching tolerance, it's interesting to see some Democrats already come out against this unnamed individual,' Spicer told reporters. Former President George H.W. Bush was released from Houston Methodist Hospital where he received treatment for pneumonia for more than two weeks. Bush, 92, was admitted to the hospital for experiencing breathing difficulties on January 14, and his treatment included a stay in intensive care, inserting a breathing tube and connecting him to a ventilator. The nation's 41st president is doing much better and son George W. Bush said he was 'thrilled' his father was 'home and well', after the elder Bush was released from the Houston hospital on Monday. George H.W. Bush was released from Houston Methodist Hospital on Monday following two weeks of care. The former president was admitted after experiencing breathing difficulties on January 14 The nation's 41st president's treatment included a stay in intensive care, a breathing tube and a ventilator, but now is doing much better and 'thankful for the prayers' sent his way Bush spokesman Jim McGrath said: 'He is thankful for the many prayers and kind messages he received during his stay, as well as the world-class care that both his doctors and nurses provided.' Former President George W. Bush told DailyMail.com through a spokesman on Monday that he was glad to see both of his parents released from the hospital. '43 is just thrilled that 41 is home and well,' the younger Bush's spokesman Freddy Ford said, referring to the two George Bushes by their numbers in the order of U.S. presidents. 'He's incredibly grateful to the doctors, nurses, professionals, and staff who have taken such great care of him,' Ford said. '43 spoke with his parents earlier today and said they sounded strong and happy.' Former President George W. Bush (right) told DailyMail.com through a spokesman on Monday that he was glad to see both of his parents released from the hospital The elder Bush was joined at the hospital by his 91-year-old wife, Barbara, who spent five days there for treatment of bronchitis until her release a week ago. The couple's 72-year marriage is the longest of any presidential couple in U.S. history and the former first lady was with her husband during much of his stay, including when she was hospitalized for her own treatment. They were 'essentially therapy for each other,' Dr. Clint Doerr, one of the physicians treating Bush, said last week. Prior to the news of Bush's hospitalization, he informed Donald Trump on January 10, he wouldn't be able to attend his inauguration ceremony. Former President George H.W. Bush used a bit of humor to excuse himself from attending Donald Trump's inauguration. He joked that attending the ceremony would put him 'six feet under' Bush and Trump are pictured above in 1988, when Bush was running for president He joked that sitting outside in January would likely put him and wife Barbra 'six feet under' and that they'd be 'stuck in Texas'. Just four days later he was taken to Houston Methodist Hospital, followed a few days later by Barbra as precaution after experiencing fatigue and coughing. During the news of Bush's hospitalization, several wished the two good health and a speedy recovery on social media. Among the well-wishers were President Trump, John McCain, Ellen DeGeneres and Bill Clinton. Trump tweeted to wish former president George H.W. Bush and his wife Barbara a speedy recovery and to thank them for their letter Ellen DeGeneres also tweeted she was 'sending love' to George and Barbara Bush Bill Clinton -the 42rd president - tweeted to wish George H.W. Bush - the 41st president - and his wife a speedy recovery Bush, who served as president from 1989 to 1993, has a form of Parkinson's disease and uses a motorized scooter or a wheelchair for mobility. He was hospitalized in 2015 in Maine after falling at his summer home and breaking a bone in his neck. He was also hospitalized in Houston the previous December for about a week for shortness of breath. He spent Christmas 2012 in intensive care for a bronchitis-related cough and other issues. Despite his loss of mobility, Bush celebrated his 90th birthday by making a tandem parachute jump in Kennebunkport, Maine. Last summer, Bush led a group of 40 wounded warriors on a fishing trip at the helm of his speedboat, three days after his 92nd birthday celebration. Advertisement Thousands of people have taken to the streets of UK cities today to protest against Donald Trump's immigration ban. Demonstrators were out in force in London, Glasgow, Newcastle, Manchester, Birmingham and Cardiff waving banners and placards in response to The President's executive order preventing citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries entering the US for 90 days. In London, thousands of activists gathered opposite the gates of Downing Street, turning Whitehall into a sea of posters and signs. Among the list of high-profile celebrities to appear were pop star Lily Allen and human rights activist Bianca Jagger, while outspoken Match of the Day presenter Gary Lineker was also spotted at the London event with sons Harry and George. Crowds of people dominated city centres all over the UK, with riot police brought in to keep order in London and ensure they did not boil over into violence. But despite the protests, Prime Minister Theresa May made clear President Trump's invitation for a state visit would not be revoked and reiterated her dedication to the 'special relationship' Thousands of demonstrators have taken to the streets of UK cities tonight to protest Donald Trump's immigration ban. Pictured are crowds in London with police struggling to convey traffic through the hordes of people Outspoken Match of the Day presenter Gary Lineker, left and right, was spotted at the protest alongside sons Harry, far left, and George, right Pop star Lily Allen, left, was also at the protest while shadow home secretary Diane Abbott, right, told the gathering crowds to 'reject Islamophobia' Bianca Jagger, human rights activist and former wife of Rolling Stones frontman Mick, was also at the protest tonight and joined demonstrators waving placards Gigantic crowds have gathered near Downing Street in London, taking aim at the President's controversial policy banning citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries entering the US for 90 days Politicians including shadow home secretary Dianne Abbott, shadow attorney general Shami Chakrabarti and former Labour leader Ed Miliband were also at the London march. Ms Abbott told the crowd she had come on behalf of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. She said: 'Donald Trump has been president for only a few days, and look at what he is doing. 'We need to resist the Islamophobia and scapegoating of Muslims, we have got to resist it whether it is in the United States or here in the UK.' Shadow attorney general Shami Chakrabarti told the crowd: 'It is in sadness and solidarity that we gather here this evening. 'I also hope, friends, that we stand here in solidarity with all the world's women who the President has insulted and all the desperate refugees that he would spurn.' Chants including 'Donald Trump has got to go' rippled up the swelling crowds on Whitehall, while others shouted 'no hate, no fear', and 'no ban, no wall'. Traffic ground to a halt as the protesters spilled into the road. MPs including former Labour leader Ed Miliband, Green Party leader Caroline Lucas and Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron also spoke at the event. Griff Tyson, 23, of west London, said he had to take a stand against Theresa May's 'complicit' reaction to Trump's Muslim ban. He said: 'It's emergency action to make a point - people won't take what he's doing. 'It might be democracy because he was voted in but people aren't having it. 'Theresa May has been complicit in his actions by refusing to condemn them, she's spineless. 'She just got home and did it through faux diplomatic channels. 'I'm here to show solidarity with the oppressed and suffering, and to be surrounded by like-minded people.' Some of the more surreal placards envisioned Donald Trump as King Kong kidnapping the Statue of Liberty, pictured Others compared the President to a bin of 'garbage' while another raised a poster which simply said 'SAD', pictured Former actress Miss Jagger was one of the high-profile protesters to address the crowds of thousands tonight Addressing the crowd, one Muslim refugee said: 'America is a beacon of democracy and peace, but Trump's action will tear the fabric of American society. 'We call on all peace-loving individuals to stand firm and oppose all racist and xenophobic action.' Metres away from the door of Number 10, chants of 'shame on May' began to echo throughout the crowd. Former England footballer Lineker praised the crowds after the event and wrote on Twitter: 'Well played London'. Allen also tweeted throughout the event and described the crowds as 'beautiful people'. Downing Street earlier stood firm on the decision to extend an invitation to Mr Trump, saying: 'We look forward to hosting the president later this year.' The SNP's Westminster leader Angus Robertson fired up the thousands of activists in London with a chant of 'no state visit'. He added: 'Friends, first they came for the Muslims, but we say something and we say no state visit for Donald Trump.' Left-wing activist Owen Jones, who helped organise the protest in London, said: 'Today we say with defiance, with determination, we will not stay silent.' Thousands of activists are also out in Newcastle, pictured, with similar protests taking place in large cities throughout the UK Crowds in London have turned the streets into a sea of signs, with many imploring Theresa May to stand up to the President while others pledge to welcome refugees to the UK Demonstrators of all ages have wrapped up warm to brave the cold and make their point heard tonight. Pictured are crowds of people gathered in Glasgow tonight The sheer size of the crowds has brought traffic to a halt across the country, with buses in London struggling to complete their routes, pictured Parents in Edinburgh, pictured, have come out with their children as families have urged the UK Government to 'resist Trump' Many have been creative with their signs, left and right, with some thinly veiled comparisons between the US President and the regime of Nazi Germany Muslim refugees in the UK have called for 'all peace-loving people to oppose all racist and xenophobic action'. Pictured are protesters in Edinburgh Some got very creative with their signs, mocking up pictures of Donald Trump draped in a loincloth made from an American flag, pictured But a defiant Theresa May has stood by the decision to issue an invitation to Donald Trump to make a state visit to Britain in the face of the outcry over his controversial travel ban. The Prime Minister, who became the first world leader to meet the new US president in the White House, faces demands from a petition signed by more than 1.4 million people to call off the visit. But appearing at a joint press conference in Dublin with Irish prime minister Enda Kenny, Mrs May was adamant it would go ahead. 'The United States is a close ally of the United Kingdom. We work together across many areas of mutual interest and we have that special relationship between us,' she said. Mounted police, pictured, have been called to the scene of the protests in London to keep order and ensure no violence Thousands more took the to the streets of Manchester, pictured, gathering outside the town hall to make their voices heard The protests, pictured, appear to have had little effect as the Foreign Office has confirmed it will not 'uninvite' the President This aerial shot captured hundreds of demonstrators gathered in Cambridge this evening to protest the ban Many protesters, such as this crowd in Newcastle, have come bearing banners and placards either slamming the President or calling for him to 'stop hate' 'I have issued that invitation for a state visit for President Trump to the United Kingdom and that invitation stands.' Graphic designer Sami Hayes, 23, said she joined the protest in solidarity with British Muslims, and to support minorities against whom she said Trump has discriminated. She said: 'I feel sick that anyone has the power to discriminate on the scale that he does. 'Refugees are human beings and they're not being treated like that because of where they're from. 'Even if Theresa May doesn't do anything, protests like this show Muslims in this country that we're not against them. 'People have been targeting Muslims when they shouldn't be scared in our country.' One of the predominant messages from protesters in London was to 'choose love' and 'teach tolerance' of other cultures More than 700 people have turned out in Birmingham's Victoria Square, pictured, after answering a call on Facebook to stage a protest Others have aligned themselves with one of the most famous symbols of freedom in the US - the Statue of Liberty, pictured The protests, pictured, come in the wake of a petition signed by more than 1.4million people demanding the President be 'uninvited' from a state visit Some of the demonstrators in London, pictured, have even taken to wearing stickers on their faces calling for people across the world to 'stand together against hate' Prime Minister Theresa May, pictured, has remained defiant against the protests and said the invite to President Trump would not be withdrawn Fellow protester Phillip White, 22, said: 'I think it's important when your family are Jewish, like mine, to recognise that refugees can still face persecution. 'People are still suffering and genocide didn't stop with the Holocaust. 'We can't be seen to appease his decision, even though it doesn't affect us directly. 'We approve if we don't fully oppose it. 'It's disgusting that we are sitting by and letting this happen.' More than 700 people in Birmingham answered a Facebook call to protest against the President. The city's Victoria Square filled with people voicing their opposition to Trump's order banning nationals of seven foreign countries entering the United States. Some demonstrators in London even pleaded with the Queen not to roll out the red carpet for Trump on his state visit Some in London clambered over each other and climbed onto poles and traffic lights to get a better look of the situation Metropolitan Police officers, pictured, kept a close eye on proceedings but the majority of demonstrators only seemed interested in peaceful protest A sea of people marched through the streets of Edinburgh carrying the banner 'Scotland against Trump', pictured Protestors also held signs aloft and cheered speakers as they joined a series of nationwide protests urging the Trump administration to drop the policy. The executive order prevents citizens from the majority Muslim nations Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from getting into the country. The Foreign Office released a statement yesterday saying U.K. nationals with dual citizenship would not be affected, but the US Embassy has not clarified the US government's position. Hasanian Jaffar, 29, who owns his own chain of independent optical stores, organised the Birmingham protest via Facebook. He said: 'I got the idea from a similar protest being organised in London. My family and I were extremely disturbed by everything that's going on and we were looking for something similar. 'When we saw there wasn't a protest, I set one up immediately so we could attend one. Others have drawn on a quote by civil rights leader Martin Luther King that 'injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere' Many demonstrators have turned out to oppose racism, with many claiming the President's policies can be described as such. Pictured are protesters in Whitehall One woman in London was pictured carrying a placard that refugees deserve 'jobs and homes not racism' A huge protest march also moved through the streets of Leeds tonight, pictured, with the crowds drifting back as far as the eye could see Many in Leeds carried posters mocking traditional US values, such as the country's reputation as the 'land of the free' 'It's amazing how fast it has grown in just 24 hours. I just needed to get it started and now people have flocked to it. 'We are adding our voices to an international chorus of protest. 'We are a really diverse city and what Trump has done flies straight in the face of our values. It just doesn't fit with us. 'We are not a city that turns people away. We need to stand up and show Trump, and our politicians, that we really care. 'His order is a clear restriction on a specific group of people without justification. 'The alternative would be to just let them get away with it, and we cannot do that.' In Scotland demonstrations began in the early evening. The largest protests were in Glasgow and Edinburgh where crowds swelled from around 5pm, and protests were also evident in Aberdeen and Dundee. The crowds in London gathered from around 6pm and soon dominated the streets of Westminster, pictured In Leeds, megaphone wielding protesters led the crowds in chants against the President, with 'Hey ho, Donald Trump has got to go' heard across the country More satirical signs took aim at Theresa May for 'appeasing' the President, who came in for criticism himself over his 'tiny hands' One artists even mocked up a picture of Theresa May as a snake alongside Donald Trump with a familiar-looking moustache, pictured Placards and banners were held aloft in Glasgow as a crowd of around 500 people chanted 'hope not fear, refugees are welcome here'. The protests were organised by a variety of groups including Stand up to Racism, and refugees whose countries had been singled out by Mr Trump. Demonstrations continued in George Square after a three-hour rally in Buchanan Street, Glasgow. In Edinburgh, large crowds marched from the North Bridge to the US Consulate in Regent Terrace. Hundreds also braved the rain and cold in the West Country to protest against President Trump's controversial ban. There were protests in Falmouth, Cornwall, Torquay, Plymouth, Exeter, Totnes and Ashburton in Devon. In Exeter one demonstrator said: 'Those who don't learn history are doomed to repeat it.' One of the Exeter organisers was 25 year old Exeter Uni student Malaka Mohammad whose family live in Gaza. She said it was 'vital' people stood up to Trump's bullying. She said: 'We want to stand up with Germany and Canada and other countries who are brave enough to speak out, unlike our Government and Theresa May who have chosen to be silent.' Much of Whitehall became a sea of signs bearing slogans including 'Dump Trump' and 'Sound the alarm', pictured The moment President Trump and Mrs May were spotted holding hands last week was also mocked on signs, pictured Meanwhile in Bristol, pictured, Mayor Marvin Rees, centre, led a protest against the ban with hundreds turning out to support it Huge crowds gathered along the waterfront in College Green, Bristol, outside the city's cathedral, pictured Rain showers in south Wales were not enough to put people in Cardiff off protesting, with the skies full of signs and umbrellas Three bodies were found dead in a quiet New Jersey neighborhood as police are still searching for clues in the triple murder mystery. Michael Davis, 45; Roshana Kenilson, 30; and Lance Frazier, 44, were all found dead inside an apartment in Maplewood, New Jersey, on Sunday. The Essex County police are investigating the deaths as homicides and the preliminary investigation suggests they sustained gunshot wounds. Michael Davis, 45,; Roshana Kenilson, 30,; and Lance Frazier, 44, were all found dead inside an apartment in Maplewood, New Jersey, on Sunday. The Essex County police are investigating the deaths as homicides and the preliminary investigation suggests they sustained gunshot wounds Although it is believed they suffered from gunshot wounds, the official cause and manner of death will be determined by a medical examiner, according to the Village Green New Jersey. They were found by the Maplewood Fire Department while performing a well-being check. Someone had placed a call about not being able to reach one of the apartment occupants, reported CBS News. Davis was the only resident of Maplewood and owned a convenience store. Kenilson was of Paterson, New Jersey, and Fraser was of Newark, New Jersey. The three bodies were found dead in a quiet New Jersey neighborhood (pictured) and police are still searching for clues in the triple murder mystery They were found by the Maplewood Fire Department while performing a well-being check at Van Ness Court (pictured). Someone had placed a call about not being able to reach one of the apartment occupants The victims' names were released on Monday after police notified their families. There is no known motive for the deaths and local police are still looking for answers. Police were questioning everyone on the street and have blocked off the road, even screening residents before letting them enter. The autopsies are being performed on Monday. Fight organisers have said they will not play the Australian national anthem early to please champion boxer Anthony Mundine, who has threatened to sit down during the song. The firebrand boxer, who will face off with Danny Green on Friday, said he is trying to educate people Advance Australia Fair is a theme song for the white Australia policy, which is unjust to indigenous Australians. Organiser Steve Crawley said he will continue to speak with Mundine's agent Khoder Nasser in the next few days, but 'can't see why' they won't have Jessica Mauboy perform while both fighters are in the ring. 'They way I figure it is that if you go to an NRL or AFL grand final, the athletes are on the field when the anthem is performed,' Mr Crawley told The Daily Telegraph. Scroll down for video Fight organisers have said they will not play the Australian national anthem early to please champion boxer Anthony Mundine (Mundine is pictured in September last year at his Redfern gym) Anthony Mundine has explained why he won't be standing for the national anthem during Friday night's grudge bout against Danny Green He said the choice to have Jessica Mauboy sing Advance Australia Fair was 'nothing to do with her being indigenous'. On Monday in Adelaide, Mundine said he was a man 'that stands against wrong' and believes the national anthem is a 'big wrong in our country'. ''Advance Australia Fair', if you speak to your historians and educated college professors, (it's) fair - as in white fair - not as in fair go,' he told SBS. 'That was the theme song for the white Australia policy, from 1901 to the early 1970s when Aboriginal people weren't even considered citizens.' The Indigenous boxer, and former rugby league star, also said Jessica Mauboy was chosen to sing the anthem in Adelaide on Friday 'because she is black'. He called on Mauboy to not go ahead with singing the anthem at the Friday match in Adelaide because 'it's not for our people'. 'They are just using her because she is black,' Mundine told Daily Telegraph. Mundine said he was not trying to divide Australians but his people are not 'young and free'. The indigenous boxer said Advance Australia Fair was a theme song for the white Australia policy Danny Green shadow-boxes during a public workout ahead of the highly-anticipated clash Mundine speaks to a crowd of reporters in Adelaide following his public workout on Monday 'Who cares what Anthony Mundine is saying?' One Nation Senator Pauline Hanson told Sunrise. 'That is his opinion, but the fact is, we have teachers in schools who are telling kids, children, you don't have to stand for the national anthem. They're saying if you find it offensive, don't stand and leave the classroom. 'We are saying this in our classrooms. Why should we worry about what Anthony Mundine is saying? I am more concerned about what the kids are being taught in our classrooms.' In a press conference on Monday afternoon, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said he did not agree with Mundine. 'Our national anthem unites all Australians, I don't agree with him. 'From our First Australians, to the newest baby in the arms of a migrant mother.' 'They are just using her because she is black,' Mundine said of Jessica Mauboy (pictured singing carols at The Domain in December last year) Not the first time: In September, Mundine encouraged NRL and AFL players to boycott the anthem at the grand finals in a Facebook post At the time Mundine said the national anthem was written when 'blackfullas were considered fauna (animals)' Danny Green takes pictures with spectators at a public workout in Adelaide In September, Mundine encouraged NRL and AFL players to boycott the anthem at the grand finals. 'The anthem was written in late 1700s where blackfullas were considered fauna (animals). Advance Australia Fair as in white not fair as in fair go,' Mundine wrote on Facebook. 'All players aboriginal & non aboriginal should boycott the anthem & start changing Australia's ignorant mentality... lets move forward together yo.' Former league players Larry Corowa and Joe Williams joined in the call for players to boycott the anthem. Mr Turnbull criticised the boycott in September, and Today Show host Karl Stefanovic called it 'ridiculous'. Mundine and Green last competed in 2006, more than 10 years ago. Daily Mail Australia has contacted Foxtel, Danny Green and Jessica Mauboy teams for comment. Ireland has backed Theresa May's goal of securing a 'friction-free' trading relationship with the European Union after Brexit. Taoiseach Enda Kenny said helping the UK Prime Minister agree a deal to keep UK-EU trade as close as possible would be an 'absolute priority' for Ireland ahead of Brexit negotiations. Setting out her strategy earlier this month, Mrs May strongly hinted that Britain could leave the European customs union (CU), stating she wanted 'frictionless' cross-border trade. Scroll down for video Prime Minister Theresa May (right) is greeted by Taoiseach Enda Kenny as she arrives at Government Buildings in Dublin Speaking after talks with the PM in Dublin, Mr Kenny echoed her language, suggesting he would support the strategy during divorce talks She added that she has an 'open mind' on whether it should be done through associate membership or a new agreement. Speaking after talks with the PM in Dublin, Mr Kenny echoed her language, suggesting he would support the strategy during divorce talks. Mr Kenny said: 'Our two governments are agreed that a close and friction-free economic and trading relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union, including Ireland, is in our very best interests.' 'And as the UK prepares for its formal notification under Article 50, we want to see that these deep trading ties between our two countries are recognised and facilitated. 'That will continue to be an absolute priority for my government, not just in our discussions with the British Government, but also with our EU partners as we prepare for the negotiation process on the EU side of the table.' Taoiseach Enda Kenny said helping the UK Prime Minister agree a deal to keep UK-EU trade as close as possible would be an 'absolute priority' for Ireland Donald Trump was today compared to Hitler and Mussolini by a famously outspoken Labour MP who called on the Government to ban the US leader from a state visit. Dennis Skinner said Britain should stand up to the new US President today, as thousands took to the streets all over Britain to protest over a planned state visit. The MP for Bolsover, known for his barbed remarks from the backbenches, also criticised Theresa May for being 'hand-in-hand' with a fascist. Donald Trump is a fascist like Hitler and his state visit to the UK should be cancelled, veteran Labour MP Dennis Skinner said today The comments come amid widespread protest to a state visit all over the country after he banned people born in certain nations from entering America But Prime Minister Theresa May, who visited Trump in Washington last week, has refused to rule out the state visit to Britain The comments come after the Prime Minister was seen cosying up to Trump during a visit to Washington last week, re-iterating Britain's commitment to its 'special relationship with the US'. But within hours of her leaving the country, Trump sparked worldwide outrage with a travel ban on refugees and citizens from several mainly Muslim countries. An emergency Commons debate was called on his planned state visit after a million people signed a petition calling for it to be cancelled in just 24 hours. And Mr Skinner joined growing calls to scrap plans to host Mr Trump, who he said is not fit for the honour of addressing Parliament in Westminster Hall as Nelson Mandela did in 2003. Speaking during an urgent Commons statement on the travel ban, Mr Skinner said: 'Will the Foreign Secretary (Boris Johnson) just for a moment try to recall, along with me, as I hid underneath the stairs when two fascist dictators, Mussolini and Hitler, were raining bombs on towns and cities in Britain. 'Now this Government are hand-in-hand with another fascist - Trump. His comments came after more than a million people signed a petition to ban the state visit in just 24 hours 'And what I say to him - do the decent thing and ban the visit. This man is not fit to walk in the footsteps of Nelson Mandela.' Mr Johnson dismissed the Hitler comparison and insisted it is in Britain's interests to work with the new president. He said: 'I hesitate to say it but your memory must be at fault if you think Mussolini rained bombs on this country. 'But I hear the comparison that he makes, I don't accept that comparison. 'I believe it's in our interests to work with our American friends and partners to show our disquiet where that is appropriate and to get the best deal for UK nationals and dual nationals.' Benjamin Netanyahu will visit the United States on February 15, the White House said Monday, making Israel's prime minister the second world leader to visit the White House since Donald Trump became president. British Prime Minister Theresa May got the red-carpet treatment and a joint press conference with Trump last week. 'Our relationship with the only democracy in the Middle East is crucial to the security of both our nations,' White House press secretary Sean Spicer told reporters. 'And the president looks forward to discussing continued strategic, technological, military and intelligence cooperation with the prime minister.' Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, shown today in Jerusalem, will head to the United States on February 15 to meet with President Donald Trump Trump has found in Netanyahu a key ally who shares his views on borer security and Middle Eastern politics The two men last met in September, at Trump's palatial New York City penthouse Trump invited the Israeli leader to the U.S. shortly after taking office. The two met in September, as Trump was still campaigning for the White House. Netanyahu is emerging as a key political ally of Trump, marking a change from the frosty relationship he had with the Obama White House. He recently agreed with Trump's longstanding plan to build a wall on America's southern border, noting his own nation's reliance on a similar wall where its territory meets Egypt's. Netanyahu also said Monday that he would push Trump to renew sanctions against Iran when he visits Washington, complaining that Iran had once more tested a ballistic missile. Israel's prime minister has been harshly critical of the deal that six world powers including the Obama administration struck with Iran, a pact that sought to curb the Islamic republic's nuclear program in return for an end to multi-nation economic and diplomatic sanctions. Iran is Israel's avowed enemy; Israel sees Tehran's weapons expansion as a threat to its very existence. During the U.S. election campaign, Trump called the pact a 'disaster' and 'the worst deal ever negotiated,' though he has also said it would be hard to overturn an agreement enshrined in a U.N. resolution. White House press secretary Sean Spicer announced the Netanyahu visit on Mondayu and then fended off hostile questions about Friday's Holocaust Remembrance Day proclamation that made no specific mention of Jews Trump's team defended his statement against complaints that it did not mention Jews saying it was an intentional move to avoid leaving out other Nazi victims In a statement on his personal Twitter account, around the same time the White House announced his Feb. 15 visit, Netanyahu said: 'Iran again launched a ballistic missile. This is a flagrant violation of a Security Council Resolution.' A U.S. official said on Monday that Iran had test-fired a medium-range ballistic missile on Sunday, which exploded after 630 miles. 'In my upcoming meeting with President Trump I intend to bring up the renewal of sanctions against Iran,' Netanyahu said. 'Iran's aggression cannot be left without a response.' On the heels of the White House's announcement, reporters pilloried Spicer over the administration's explanation for Friday's Holocaust Remembrance Day proclamation, which the White House released without including any reference to Jews. 'I think with respect to, you know, Israel and the Jewish people specifically, there's been no better friend than Donald Trump when it comes to protecting Israel,' the press secretary said. 'The president went out of his way to recognize the Holocaust and the suffering that went through it and the people that were affected by it, and the loss of life, and to make sure that America never forgets what so many people went through, whether they were Jews or gypsies, gays, disability, priests,' a progressively more flustered Spicer added. 'And I'm not I get it. But at the end of the day I don't think when you look at the state of Israel or the Jewish people themselves, I think there has been no better friend to Donald Trump especially after the last eight years, the tremendous respect he has shown Israel, the Jewish people. And to suggest anything otherwise is, frankly, a little bit disappointing.' Netanyahu's relationship with Barack Obama was frosty at some times, bitter at others, as the White House pursued a nuclear deal with Iran that Israel saw as an existential threat Netanyahu has warmed up to Trump to such a degree that the U.S. president made a TV commercial in support of one of his re-election bids Israel has built walls in Jerusalem and on its national borders, giving its people an understanding of Trump's view of U.S. border politics Spicer said Friday's statement 'was written with the help of an individual who's both Jewish and the descendants of Holocaust survivors.' He would not confirm that he was talking about Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law, who has been tasked with overseeing Middle East peace efforts and wrote a key campaign speech for Trump to deliver to a Jewish lobby group in Washington. 'Did I say that? No. I know what I said,' Spicer snapped at one reporter. 'I didn't say Jared's name. No, I'm not but I'm just saying, no, I'm not getting into who wrote it.' Trump, he said, 'has several members of the Jewish faith on his senior staff.' Spicer, true to his pattern in the White House thus far, turned the question on the questioner, blasting the press for taking issue with Friday's statement. 'The idea that you're nit-picking a statement that sought to remember this tragic event that occurred and the people who died in it is just ridiculous,' he jabbed. 'Where were the questions about the UN Security Council resolution that came forward,' Spicer scolded, referring to the Obama administration's final days, 'and the idea of this unprecedented step that the outgoing administration took as a massive slap in the face of Israel?' 'Where were the questions then?' Hillary Clinton running mate Sen. Tim Kaine said Sunday morning that the Trump White House is suffering from 'Holocaust denial' betrayed by its Holocaust Remembrance Day statement More than 11 million people died in Nazi genocides, including 6 million Jews but also millions of Polish gentiles, Roma gypsies, gays, Jehovahs Witnesses, blacks and communists Hillary Clinton's vice presidential running mate Sen. Tim Kaine said Sunday that Trump's proclamation for Holocaust Remembrance Day was an example of 'Holocaust denial.' White House spokeswoman Hope Hicks said Saturday that Trump meant to be 'inclusive' of other groups that suffered and perished under Adolf Hitler's regime. About 5 million non-Jews died in the Nazi purges, including 1 million Roma Gypsies, 2 million Polish gentiles, and countless gays, Catholic priests, blacks, communists, Jehovah's witnesses, trade unionists, and the physically and mentally disabled. Kaine, a Virginia Democrat, insisted on NBC's 'Meet the Press' program that it was 'not a coincidence' Trump's broad statement about the Nazi genocides came on the same day as his executive order limiting visas and immigration benefits to people from seven Muslim-majority countries. 'The final solution was about the slaughter of Jews. We have to remember this. This is what Holocaust denial is,' Kaine said. 'It's either to deny that it happened or many Holocaust deniers acknowledge, "Oh yeah people were killed. But it was a lot of innocent people. Jews weren't targeted".' Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks told CNN that the 'inclusive' White House was not slighting Jews but equally mourning non-Jewish Nazi victims White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said Sunday that he had 'no regrets' over the statement's language Trump's statement Friday said '[i]t is impossible to fully fathom the depravity and horror inflicted on innocent people by Nazi terror.' 'Yet, we know that in the darkest hours of humanity, light shines the brightest. As we remember those who died, we are deeply grateful to those who risked their lives to save the innocent.' 'In the name of the perished, I pledge to do everything in my power throughout my Presidency, and my life, to ensure that the forces of evil never again defeat the powers of good. Together, we will make love and tolerance prevalent throughout the world,' Trump's statement concluded. White House chief of staff Reince Priebus told NBC's 'Meet the Press' on Sunday that the administration wasn't 'white-washing anything' with the statement. 'I think you know that President Trump has dear family members that are Jewish. And there was no harm or ill-will or offense intended by any of that,' he said, adding that 'I don't regret the words.' 'I mean, everyone's suffering in the Holocaust including, obviously, all of the Jewish people affected; and the miserable genocide that occurred is something that we consider to be extraordinarily sad and something that can never be forgotten, and something that if we could wipe it off of the history books we could.' 'But we can't,' Priebus continued. 'And it's terrible. I mean, I don't know what more to tell you.' Iran carried out a test launch of a medium-range ballistic missile on Sunday which exploded after 630 miles, a US official said on Monday. The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the test launch was carried out from a site near Semnan, approximately 140 miles east of Tehran. The last time this type of missile was test launched was in July 2016. Iran defense minister Brigadier Gen Hossein Dehqan said in September that such missiles would be produced by the country. The Obama administration previously said that Iran's ballistic missile tests had not violated the nuclear agreement, but President Donald Trump has said he will stop Tehran's missile program. A medium-range ballistic missile was tested on Sunday in Iran and exploded after 630 miles, a US official said on Monday. The test was carried out from a site near Semnan, 140 miles east of Tehran. Pictured above is a file photo from a March 2015 ballistic missile test in IRan President Donald Trump has said he will stop Tehran's missile program, per the UN resolution agreement Under the UN resolution approving the nuclear deal that was made in 2015, Iran is 'called upon' to refrain from work on ballistic missiles designed to deliver nuclear weapons for up to eight years. Critics of the deal have said the language is ambiguous and does not make compliance obligatory, while Tehran says the missiles it has tested are not specifically designed to carry nuclear warheads. The deal was brokered by the United States, Russia, China, Britain, Germany and France. This month, Iranian lawmakers approved plans to increase military spending, including expanding the long-range missile programme. On Sunday, Trump spoke with King Salman of Saudi Arabia, and the two 'agreed on the importance of rigorously enforcing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran and of addressing Iran's destabilizing regional activities,' the White House said in a statement. Launching a ballistic missile could fall under 'destabilizing regional activities'. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday he planned to push Trump to renew sanctions against Iran during a visit to Washington next month. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday he planned to push Trump to renew sanctions against Iran during a visit to Washington next month Netanyahu has been harshly critical of the deal that six world powers including the United States under president Barack Obama struck with Iran to curb its nuclear programme in return for an end to multilateral sanctions. Iran is Israel's avowed enemy and Israel argues that the agreement fails to prevent Iranian weapons posing a threat to its very existence. 'I will meet President Trump in Washington soon, and among the issues I will address, is the need to renew the sanctions against Iran,' Netanyahu wrote on Facebook on Monday. 'Sanctions against the ballistic missiles, and other sanctions against the terror, and re addressing the failed agreement on its nuclear capabilities. 'I know that this bothers not only Israel, and not only the US but other countries in the region. Iran's aggression should not be ignored.' Iran sparked international outrage last March when it conducted two ballistic missile tests, one displaying the message, 'Israel must be wiped out' in Hebrew. A Melbourne schoolboy trying to visit the United States said consulate staff were 'very apologetic' when they rejected his visa under 'the President's orders'. Pouya Ghadirian, who was born in Australia and holds dual Iranian-Australian citizenship by descent, was planning to go on his dream trip to 'space camp' in Alabama. But just before his visa interview on Monday, the 15-year-old selective state school student was told his application had been rejected 'due to the new presidential proclamation'. 'As someone who was born in Australia and hasn't lived anywhere else but Melbourne, I didn't expect to not be let into the U.S,' Pouya told the Today Show on Tuesday. Scroll down for video Melbourne schoolboy Pouya Ghadirian, 15, claims to be the first Australian denied a U.S. visa following President Donald Trump's controversial entry ban Pouya Ghadirian, who was born in Australia and holds dual Iranian-Australian citizenship by descent, was planning to go on his dream trip to 'space camp' in Alabama 'I was quite upset actually'. Pouya said the Consulate office were very apologetic, but were unable to help him further. 'They said that it was the president's order and they had no control,' he said. The teenager, who attends Melbourne High School, said he hopes the Turnbull government can clear the ban as he fears those with sick relatives in the U.S. could be disallowed from visiting. 'I won't get into any politics and I'm not taking any sides. But I just think that this policy should be reviewed very fast within the next few days,' he said. Pouya was planning to go on 'space camp', a dream trip to the U.S. with his school, where he would visit Orlando in Florida, Washington, and the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Alabama. His visa interview was set for Monday morning. But on arriving at the U.S. Consulate office in Melbourne with his dad, things soon turned sour after the consulate officers said the rules had changed. 'They were a bit shocked and they didn't know how to handle it. They said they had terrible news,' he says. 'They said it was the first time it had happened in an Australian embassy.' Pouya, who is beginning his Year 11 studies at Melbourne High School this week, says he and his dad reacted emotionally to the news. 'I cried at the consulate and I don't normally,' he says. '[My dad] was upset as well because he was saying, 'look we've had no criminal record and we've done nothing wrong'. 'I have an Australian citizenship. I was born here. It doesn't make sense and it can't be right.' President Trump (pictured) has issued an executive order banning the US from taking in people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia The teenager told the Today Show (pictured) he hopes the Turnbull government can clear the ban as he fears those with sick relatives in the U.S. could be disallowed from visiting Pouya (pictured) said he was planning to go on 'space camp', a dream trip to the U.S. with his school but was told by the U.S. Consulate office in Melbourne on Monday the rules had changed Mr Trump has issued an executive order banning the US from taking in people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia. Despite the visa ban, a statement released by the Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop on Tuesday, said 'all Australian passport holders remain welcome to travel to the US. 'The White House has confirmed the US Executive Order of January 27 will not affect any Australian passport holder irrespective of their country of birth or whether they hold another passport,' the statement read. On Monday, Mr Turnbull refused to comment on Trump's controversial ban on Muslim-majority travel to the United States 'It's not my job as Prime Minister of Australia to run a commentary on the domestic policies of other countries,' Mr Turnbull said. But on Tuesday Mr Turnbull said he confirmed with White House that Australian passport holders, including dual nationals, can enter the United States. 'Australian passport holders will be able to travel to the United States in the same way they were able to prior to the executive order,' Mr Turnbull told Sky News. The US Embassy has been contacted for comment. On Tuesday Mr Turnbull said he confirmed with White House that Australian passport holders, including dual nationals, can enter the United States A toddler has been found wandering the streets at night, and has been unable to tell police his name. Investigators were called after residents found the three-year-old boy in their front yard about 10pm on Monday at Marina Drive in Melton, western Melbourne. The boy was reunited with his mother when she arrived at the police station on Tuesday morning. Investigators were called after residents found the three-year-old boy in their front yard about 10pm on Monday at Marina Drive (pictured) in Melton, western Melbourne The boy was found wearing a t-shirt with a toucan on the front with blue sleeves and a white back, white socks and a nappy. He had been unable to tell police his name or his parent's names. Police did a doorknock of the area but had been unable to track down the three-year-old boy's family. The boy was described as being of Caucasian appearance, with brown hair and brown eyes. Police described the boy as being softly spoken and happy. The boy was found wearing a t-shirt with a toucan (pictured) on the front with blue sleeves and a white back, white socks and a nappy Tracey Lynn Bautista faces up to 20 years in prison and up to $250,000 in her sentencing hearing April 29 after pleading guilty to trading child porn including a teen relative A 46-year-old woman from Texas has pleaded guilty to trading child pornography. Tracey Lynn Bautista from Houston could be jailed for up to 20 years and faces a $250,000 fine when she is sentenced in April. Baustista began trading child pornography with another man who had previously been arrested for on child porn charges. She then offered to get nude pictures of her 16-year-old relative, and then sent him the topless photos that revealed the teenager's breasts. The pictures were sent through a social media website called Kik messenger. According to the U.S. Attorney's Office, Bautista responded 'nice' and 'wow. good pic' to the photos the man sent her in return. Bautista was tracked by investigators from Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Homeland Security Investigations and the Montgomery County Precinct Constable's Office. Bautista faces a minimum of five and up to 20 years in federal prison as well as a possible $250,000 maximum when she appears in court on April 29. State Department employees harboring anger about President Donald Trump's travel ban are welcome to find a new place to work, the White House said Monday. The 100 signatories of a dissent memo that's circulating at State 'should either get with the program or they can go,' White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer declared. 'At some point if they have a big problem with the policies that he's instituting to keep the country safe, then that's up to them to question whether or not they want to stay or not,' Spicer told reporters during his daily briefing. Scroll down for video State Department employees harboring anger about President Donald Trump's travel ban are welcome to find a new place to work, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said Monday The cable, posted to web by the blog Lawfare, argues that Trump's executive order barring the State Department from issuing visas to citizens of Sudan, Iran, Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Libya will not achieve its stated purpose, to protect the country from terrorism. It further points out that countries such as Pakistan and Saudi Arabia are not included in the order, even though citizens of those countries have committed acts of terrorism in the United States in the past. The executive action will 'immediately' sour relations with the countries affected and 'much of the Muslim world, which sees the ban as religiously motivated,' the dissenters write. 'It will increase anti-American sentiment,' the draft memo argues, 'hostility towards the United States will grow.' The State Department has confirmed the existence of the dissent cable, snippets of which appeared today in the Wall Street Journal. 'This is an important process that the acting secretary, and the department as a whole, respect and value,' State Department spokesman Mark Toner said, according to the NYT. 'It allows State employees to express divergent policy views candidly and privately to senior leadership.' Dissent cables like the one that's making the rounds now are typically presented to the secretary of state. Trump's nominee, Rex Tillerson, has not yet been confirmed Senate. Barack Obama's policy toward Syria was the source of consternation among career foreign service officers was last summer. A group of 51 diplomats working in Washington and serving overseas urged the administration to intervene in the humanitarian crisis in Syria with military action. Kerry graciously called the memo that was sent to his desk 'an important statement.' 'I respect the process, very, very much. I will . . . have a chance to meet with people when I get back,' he said during a visit to Copenhagen. Trump's White House took a more abrasive approach to dissenters of the immigration order the president signed Friday afternoon. Protesters attend a demonstration against President Donald Trump's executive order, placing temporary bans on entrance to the U.S. for people from Iran, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan and Libya in Dulles international airport 'The president has a very clear vision. He's been clear on it since the campaign. He's been clear on it since taking office, that he's going to put the safety of this country first,' Spicer said during his briefing. 'He's going to implement things that are in the best interest of protecting this country prospectively, not reactively.' He brought up polling showing that more Americans agree with the travel ban, that prohibits Syrians from coming the country indefinitely, than not and proclaimed that 'the American people support what the president is doing.' They are 'pleased that this president is taking the steps necessary to protect this country,' he said. 'If somebody has a problem with that agenda, then they should ques then that does call into question whether or not they should continue in that post or not,' he said of State Department employees protesting the travel restrictions. The White House on Friday asked four career State Department officials, including Patrick Kennedy, undersecretary for management, to quit who were appointees of the previous president, allowing them to submit their resignation, in line with protocol. Toner, a hold-over from the Obama administration himself, said the political appointees were in 'limited term positions.' News reports initially said that diplomats were quitting in protest of Trump, but a State Department official told CNN those reports were wrong. 'These people are loyal to the secretary, the President and to the State Department. There is just not any attempt here to dis the President. People are not quitting and running away in disgust. This is the White House cleaning house.' A Sydney journalist and her employer Yahoo7 may now face a hefty penalty for publishing a story that resulted in a Melbourne murder jury being discharged. Prosecutors have called for Krystal Johnson and the Australian news website to be convicted and fined for contempt of court, The Age reported. Johnson last year bypassed sub-editors because they were too 'busy' to publish a news story about the trial of Mataio Aleluia on August 17, but the report contained material that had not been put to a Supreme Court jury. Prosecutors have called for Sydney reporter Krystal Johnson (pictured) and her employer, news website Yahoo7, to be convicted and fined for contempt of court Justice Lex Lasry ordered a retrial over worries that the accused man would not receive a fair trial. In November Johnson and Yahoo7 were found guilty of contempt of court for publishing details about a defendant that could prejudice a jury. Johnson included details she had lifted from an accurate report from an earlier court hearing. She had not been in court covering the case. Johnson (pictured) and Yahoo7 were found guilty of contempt of court for publishing details about a defendant that could prejudice a jury On Monday, given the seriousness of the contempt, the court heard prosecutors wanted Johnson and her employer Yahoo7 fined and convicted for the breaches. The article had broken 'the golden rule of journalism' and caused a murder trial to be aborted on its fourth day, Prosecutor Kerri Judd, QC said. Aleluia was later found guilty at a retrial of murdering his girlfriend, Brittany Harvie. Ms Judd said this in turn had caused Ms Harvie's family distress - Ms Harvie's mother gave evidence at the initial trial and had to do so again at the retrial. Prosecutor Kerri Judd, QC, called on Justice John Dixon to impose a 'modest' fine on Johnson (pictured) She called on Justice John Dixon to impose a 'modest' fine on Johnson, but a 'very significant penalty' on Yahoo7. The prosecutor said that Yahoo7 was a well-known news website and should have had 'the adequate systems and training in place to ensure this doesn't occur'. Justice Dixon reserved his decision on penalties. Senate Democrats are poised to use the filibuster against President Donald Trump's Supreme Court pick. Speaking to Politico, Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., said he will filibuster any pick that isn't Judge Merrick Garland, who President Obama named last March, but Republicans refused to vote on for 10 months. 'This is a stolen seat,' Merkley said. 'This is the first time a Senate majority has stolen a seat. We will use every level in our power to stop this.' Scroll down for video Sen. Jeff Merkley told Politico today that he would filibuster President Donald Trump's nominee for the Supreme Court. Trump will announce his pick tomorrow night Sixty votes would be needed in the Senate to override Merkley's filibuster, however Majority Leader Mitch McConnell could follow in the footsteps of Democratic Leader Harry Reid and change the Senate rules so a simple majority will do. Reid and the Democrats changed the rules in 2013 for other nominations, including judicial nomination, but not for the Supreme Court. McConnell hasn't said whether he would make the move, dubbed 'the nuclear option.' The new Democratic leader, Sen. Chuck Schumer indicated that he would fight 'tooth and nail' for any judicial nominee who is outside the 'mainstream.' 'If the nominee is not bipartisan and mainstream, we absolutely will keep the seat open,' Schumer said on CNN earlier this month. Trump has decided who he will appoint and plans to make the announcement tomorrow night during primetime. Court watchers believe it will be one of three conservative appeals court judges, who were all appointed to their current positions by the country's last Republican leader, former President George W. Bush. 'He's 100 percent sure he's the pick,' White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said teasing the choice today. 'This individual is part of the list that he put out.' There's the Ivy League-educated Neil Gorsuch, who once clerked for Justice Anthony Kennedy. He's also looking at the former attorney general of Alabama, William Pryor, who's gone on record condemning Roe v. Wade and gay rights. Sen. Jeff Merkley (right), standing alongside newly-elected Sen. Chris Van Hollen (left), appeared at a 'Fire Bannon' press conference shortly after Donald Trump's election Finally, Trump could select Pittsburgh-based judge Thomas Hardiman, who's strong on the Second Amendment. Members of Trump's inner circle, reacted negatively to the Democrats' filibuster chatter. Counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway tweeted out the Politico story twice. She pointed out that Democrats 'promise to block & obstruct before they meet & hear him/her,' she said of Trump's pick. 'Tells you all you need to know about the Democrats, 2017,' she said. 'Senate Dems will filibuster Trumps Supreme Court nominee.' Spicer also needled the Democrats during today's press briefing. 'For a party preaching tolerance, it's interesting to see some Democrats already come out against this unnamed individual,' Spicer told reporters. It's rare to filibuster a Supreme Court nominee, with it last attempted in 2006 when Bush appointed Justice Samuel Alito during the president's second term. While Democrats, including Merkley, point to the treatment of Garland, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell suggested that those across the aisle respect a first-term pick from a new president. 'Under Clinton, Ginsburg and Breyer, not filibuster, no filibuster. In other words, no one required us to get 60 votes,' McConnell said to reporters last week. 'Under Obama, Sotomayor and Kagan, no filibusters.' 'That's apples and apples. First term, new president, Supreme Court vacancy,' McConnell concluded. Grace Kelly's childhood home in Philadelphia will be turned into a museum. Her son, Prince Albert II of Monaco, told People that the home could open to the public by 2018 - or 'possibly earlier'. Prince Albert bought the home for $754,000 in the fall, after the previous owner died. The previous owner was a hoarder so the home will likely need a lot of work until it's ready for its new life as a museum. Scroll down for video Grace Kelly's childhood home in Philadelphia will be turned into a museum, her son has confirmed The actress-turned-royal's son Prince Albert II of Monaco (pictured) visited the home in October, after purchasing it for $754,000 Prince Albert is pictured touring the property with family in October However, since the home is located in a neighborhood, Prince Albert said that it likely won't act as a traditional museum, with normal hours. He said that while 'there will be different public events, it won't be exclusively a musem'. 'While it is a historical landmark, I don't think that a dedicated museum is the right avenue to take. There will though be any number of events which will facilitate public viewing'. He says his team is working to develop events that will attract visitors to the museum. The home will serve as an outpost for the Princess Grace Foundation and Monaco's Princess Grace Irish Library. It is the very home where Prince Rainier III of Monaco proposed to Kelly. The actress is pictured here showing her mother her new engagement ring while they sit in the family's living room Kelly left the home to pursue an acting career in 1950, going on to star in the likes of To Catch A Thief, Dial M For Murder, Rear Window and Country Girl before she retired and married Prince Rainier in 1956 (pictured on their wedding day) The Library is partnering with Villanova University to plan lectures, readings, concerts and kid's activities. Prince Albert flew out to the U.S. in October to visit the Kelly family residence, and said being there made him nostalgic for his youth. 'I hadnt seen the house in a good many summers and some of it is in relatively good shape, he said. 'The previous owner hadnt touched some parts in 40 years. Other parts need great work . . . I can still see the living room carpet. Its not there anymore but I remember the pattern. And the kitchen where we all had breakfast every morning.' 'Seeing it without furniture was odd,' he said. 'And, it seems a little small. Of course, when youre young everything seems bigger. But it seems a lot smaller than I remembered.' The home was where Prince Albert's father, Prince Rainier, proposed to his mother, then an actress in 1956. After accepting his proposal, Kelly's life changed forever, and she sailed to Monaco to help her husband lead his small European nation. The price of the East Falls estate (pictured here is the living room) was initially listed for $1million, but brought down to $850,000 in July. It dropped by antoerh $100,000 in August Realtor Patty Gernerd said the home soon received multiple offers and a bidding war brought the price up by $25,000 A grandson of Kelly's father said the royal family is securing the estate for the winter and were planning renovations Kelly spent her childhood in the home, which features six bedrooms (including the one pictured here) and four bathrooms The house remained in the family until 1974, when it was put on the market by Kelly's mother and sold to Marjorie Bamont The 4,000 sq ft house, built in the 1920s by Kelly's father John B Kelly Sr, was originally listed in July for a cool $1million before the price was brought down to $850,000. The price dropped again by another $100,000 in August but a competitive bidding war pushed the sale tag back up by $25,000. 'There were multiple offers on the property,' realtor Patty Gernerd told PhillyVoice . 'We started at a higher offer because we had no idea what the wow-factor would be.' 'The people who put in offers really wanted it because of a combination of the name and the architecture.' Kelly spent her childhood in the home, which features six bedrooms and four bathrooms. The house remained in the family until 1974, when Kelly's mother Margaret sold the estate to Thomas and Janet Lawnton, who then sold it six days later to Marjorie Bamont. Bamont (pictured here) lived at the home for more than 40 years. She pleaded no contest to animal cruelty in 2014 when 14 live cats - and one dead - were found inside the residence, which was discovered to be covered in feces and fleas Gernerd said that, despite its rocky recent history, the house has maintained its original shape through the years 'It's a solid-structured building with great bones in it,' she said. 'It was built correctly, and most of the originality is still there. The architecture of the time didn't get muted' Gernerd said the house still has its original windows and bricks, as well as the stunning archways and staircase The legacy of Kelly's childhood home has remained in her former neighborhood, which still recalls her family's famous parties for adults and carnivals for the community's children in their backyard (pictured) Bamont lived at the home for more than 40 years. She was charged with animal cruelty in 2013 when 14 live cats - and one dead - were found inside the residence. Philadelphia SPCA officers said the house was covered with cat feces and fleas. A live dog was also found inside the dwelling, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer . Bamont, who was believed to be suffering a mental health crisis at the time, eventually pleaded no contest after she was convicted of 14 counts of animal cruelty in 2014. She died two years later. The house was purchased after four months on the market. A grandson of Kelly's father said the royal family is securing the estate for the winter and were planning renovations. Kelly left the home to pursue an acting career in 1950, going on to star in the likes of To Catch A Thief, Dial M For Murder, Rear Window and Country Girl. She tragically died in a car crash in 1982, but the legacy of her childhood home has remained in her former neighborhood. The estate is seen as so important in Philadelphia's legacy that the city dedicated an official plaque in 2012 (pictured) Kelly's father John was a three-time Olympic gold medalist and a prominent bricklayer in Philadelphia who was almost elected to be the city's mayor. The family was known for throwing incredible parties and hosting carnivals for the children of the community. 'People still recollect seeing Grace wait for the bus and how sweet and kind she was,' Grenard said. 'The family was beloved by the neighborhood as a gregarious and magnanimous group of local dignitaries. Their nobility was a force that shaped the community.' Gernerd said that much like the family's legacy, the house has also maintained its original shape through the years. 'It's a solid-structured building with great bones in it,' she said. 'It was built correctly, and most of the originality is still there. The architecture of the time didn't get muted.' 'When people came to look at it, the integrity remained and you could feel the flavor when it was first built. That was the charm of the house overall.' Gernerd said the house still has its original windows and bricks, as well as the stunning archways and staircase. 'It really is a love story,' she said. Kenneth Ruch, 48, who police was driving drunk, was arrested after he struck and killed two sisters who were crossing the street. A Philadelphia man, who police said was driving drunk, was arrested after he struck and killed two sisters who were crossing the street. Kenneth Ruch, 48, was driving along Roosevelt Boulevard Saturday night when he sped up to beat a traffic light and hit 19-year-old Kimberly Phillips and her 10-year-old sister Loraya Braxton, according to Philly.com. He has been charged with two counts each of homicide by vehicle, homicide by vehicle while DUI and involuntary manslaughter. Police said the sisters were trying to cross Roosevelt Boulevard at Large Street around 11.42pm when the incident happened. As they were walking, Ruch, who was driving a 2011 Jeep Wrangler, saw the light change from green to yellow and sped up as he approached the intersection, according to Philly.com. He then swerved into the left lane and hit the sisters. The impact sent their bodies 150 to 200 feet, authorities told CBS Philadelphia. Phillips' leg was severed and she was pronounced dead at the scene at 11.49pm. Phillips' (left and right) leg was severed and she was pronounced dead at the scene at 11.49pm. Braxton was rushed to St Christophers Hospital where she was later pronounced dead Police said as the sisters were walking, Ruch, who was driving a 2011 Jeep Wrangler (pictured), saw the light change from green to yellow and sped up as he approached the intersection Braxton was rushed to St Christophers Hospital where she was later pronounced dead. Police said Ruch fled the scene but returned a short time later and was arrested. Ruch's wife, who was in the Jeep, was not charged, according to ABC 6. A Gofundme account set up by Phillips' aunt, Kareema Branch, says the young woman leaves behind two children, four-year old Hakim and three-year-old Tahjah. 'My niece was a beautiful 19 year old mother, who loved her family unconditionally. She died trying to say her little sister life, who died also. 'My sister Loretta needs all the help and support to bury her daughter and help to take care of her grandsons,' Branch wrote. Ruch then swerved into the left lane and hit the sisters. The impact sent their bodies 150 to 200 feet, authorities said. Pictured are shoes that the sisters were wearing NSW Australian of the Year Deng Adut is the latest high-profile figure to hit out at Donald Trump's immigration ban. Mr Adut, who came to Australia as a refugee at the age of 14, has slammed the executive order which prevents passport holders from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States for a period of 90 days. 'The hypocrisy is too much,' Mr Adut, who is now a Sydney-based criminal lawyer, told 9 News. Deng Adut delivering an Australia Day address in Sydney in late January 'The culture of punishing the innocent and weak countries has got to stop. 'There are home-grown threats in America that Trump should be focusing on, instead of the perceived threats of foreigners.' Mr Adut added America should now cease their military presence in places such as Iraq and Syria, as they are two of the countries on the ban list, alongside Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Mr Trump's executive order also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days. Deng Adut meeting five-year-old Canberra school boy Deng Akesh in late January Deng Adut shakes hands with PM Malcolm Turnbull at The Lodge in Canberra during a morning tea for Australian of the Year finalists Mr Adut has hit out at U.S. President Donald Trump (pictured) Mr Adut told his Facebook followers he initially 'wasn't planning to comment on Trump's Executive Order - after all, the injustice is plain for everyone to see' as he was in court, but court finished early. Mr Adut came to Australia as an illiterate 14-year-old refugee in 1998 without a word of English after being smuggled out of Sudan into Kenya. His transformation from a boy, trained to use an AK-47 machine gun, into a criminal lawyer in western Sydney inspired the nation and lead to his NSW Australian of the Year accolade. Only a year ago, he came to national prominence after delivering an Australia Day address in Sydney. Deng Adut in November 2016 when he was named the NSW Australian of the Year The University of Western Sydney, where he finished his law degree in 2010, was so impressed with his achievement it put together a video of his life, which has been viewed more than 2.6 million times. Mr Adut, who was born in the South Sudanese village of Malek in 1984 and now runs AC Law, taught himself how to read, write and speak English. He came to Australia after being smuggled out of South Sudan as a war-injured teenager by his brother John, who he had recently reunited with. His journey included spending 18 months in a Kenyan refugee camp. The Manhattan District Attorney's Office is looking into the decades-old suspicious death of a reporter who at the time was investigating the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Newspaper columnist and TV game show star Dorothy Kilgallen, 52, was found dead of an alleged drug overdose in her Manhattan townhouse on November 8, 1965 - just weeks before a trip she had planned to New Orleans to meet with a secret informant relating to an 18-month investigation she was conducting about Kennedy's assassination for a tell-all book. The circumstances surrounding Kilgallen's death is well documented in author Mark Shaw's new book, 'The Reporter Who Knew Too Much', which suggests she was killed to stop her relentless pursuit of a Mafia don that was connected to the former president and his killer, Lee Harvey Oswald. According to The New York Post, Joan Vollero, a spokeswoman for DA Cyrus Vance Jr., says that a staffer read Shaw's book and reviewed a letter from him that cites new leads, witnesses overlooked and medical evidence surrounding the decades old case. 'I'm hopeful DA investigators will probe any records available and interview witnesses still alive today who can shed light on what happened to this remarkable woman,' Shaw told The Post. 'Victims have rights whether their name is Dorothy Kilgallen or Dorothy Doe, and Kilgallen was denied justice in 1965. That's why I'm fighting for her.' Shaw added that since his book was published in December, he has received several emails from people who have read the book who also feel as though an official investigation into Kilgallen's death is needed. Newspaper columnist and TV game show star Dorothy Kilgallen (pictured left and right) was found dead on November 8, 1965 of an alleged drug overdose in her Manhattan townhouse Kilgallen (pictured far left) is best known for her role as a star panelist on CBS's TV game show What's My Line? A medical examiner at the time ruled her death accidental, caused by a combination of sleeping pills and alcohol, and the case was closed. But Shaw believes Kilgallen was the victim of foul play orchestrated by a mobster who feared her tell-all book would accuse him of being the mastermind behind Kennedy's assassination. 'Murder is murder whether it happened five days or 50 years ago,' Shaw told the New York Post in December at the time of the book release. 'Victims have rights, and Dorothy was denied hers because there was no investigation.' Through the discovery of more than 40 videotaped interviews with some of Kilgallen's closest friends and one of the last people to see her alive - Shaw contends her death is a murder mystery featuring suspects including Frank Sinatra, Mafia Don Carlos Marcello and a 'mystery man' who may have silenced her. In 1963, Kilgallen - best known for her role as a star panelist on CBS's TV game show What's My Line? - was devastated by Kennedy's November 22 assassination, according to Shaw. Kennedy, who Shaw had considered a friend and even visited in the White House, was fatally shot by Oswald as the then-U.S. president traveled through Dallas in a motorcade. After his death, Kilgallen launched her investigation and dismissed the notion that Oswald acted alone, gathering evidence, including notes and interviews. But after her death, the file of evidence was never found, with Shaw telling the Post that whoever silenced Kilgallen 'took that file and burned it.' Author Mark Shaw believes Kilgallen was the victim of foul play orchestrated by a mobster who feared her tell-all book would accuse him of orchestrating the assassinations of John F Kennedy (left) and Lee Harvey Oswald (right) Bystanders look on as Jacqueline Kennedy reaches over to help her husband who lies on the rear of a car after being struck by an assassin's bullet as his motorcade traveled through Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas in November 1963 Kilgallen died days before a trip to New Orleans where she was going to investigate Carlos Marcello (pictured) - who she had suspected of masterminding Kennedy's assassination According to Shaw, Kilgallen was under surveillance at the time of her death due to her writings about Fidel Castro as well as Kennedy's assassination. One of her hairdressers and close friend Charles Simpson said that Kilgallen had told him: 'If the wrong people knew what I know [about the JFK assassination], it would cost me my life.' Kilgallen had reportedly also found an enemy with then-FBI Director J Edgar Hoover due to her Voice of Broadway columns for the New York Journal-America, criticizing Hoover and his theory that Oswald acted alone. This caused Hoover to have a motive to silence Kilgallen, according to Shaw. Kilgallen later managed to be the only reporter to interview Jack Ruby, the Dallas bar owner who fatally shot Oswald at Dallas police headquarters. She later exposed Ruby's testimony to the Warren Commission before its official release, angering government officials. As she researched Kennedy's assassination, intended for a tell-all book for Random House, she set up a second trip to New Orleans. She was going to investigate Marcello - who she had suspected was the mastermind behind Kennedy's assassination. Prior to her trip, she told a friend she was going to meet a source who she did not know, but said they were going to give her information about the case. She also told her lawyer Mort Farber she was going to 'break the real story and have the biggest scoop of the century.' However her tell-all book was never published after she was found dead ust days before the intended trip. 'The killers won, because she was eliminated and erased from any historical record about the JFK assassination,' Shaw told the Post. When Kilgallen was found dead inside her Manhattan apartment, she was sitting up in a bed, dressed in only a blue bathrobe, and still had a floral hair accessory in her hair that she had worn the night before when she appeared on the TV game show. An empty sleeping-pill bottle and a drinking glass were found on the nightstand, but Shaw contends they were part of a 'staged' death scene. One of her hairdressers, Marc Sinclaire, noted that prior to her death Kilgallen had bought a gun and changed her will, adding she was 'scared for her life and family.' He also said Kilgallen's body was found in a bedroom she never slept in and that she was wearing bed clothes she never wore to bed. However, police at the time reportedly found nothing suspicious about the death, ruling out a suicide and homicide. An autopsy done at the time reportedly cited the cause of death as 'acute ethanol and barbiturate intoxication, circumstances undetermined.' Joe Tonahill, who was Jack Ruby's co-counsel, said Kilgallen did not show any signs of being an alcoholic or using drugs prior to her death. Kilgallen pictured center. Now, the Manhattan District Attorney's Office is looking into her suspicious death after Shaw contacted them about possible new evidence related to her death Never-before-released lab results from Kilgallen's autopsy obtained by Shaw revealed the presence of two other drugs in her system, tuinal and nembutal. Shaw said three years after Kilgallen's death, two toxicologists found the extra drugs in lab tests but did not alert authorities. Tests also revealed the glass found on the nightstand contained a powder residue, suggesting someone opened capsules and poured drugs into her drink, Shaw said. Shaw also discovered her autopsy was conducted in Brooklyn Medical Examiner's and not the Manhattan office even though she died in Manhattan. Mark Shaw (above) is the authoer of the book surrounding Kilgallen's death Dr Steven Goldner, who worked in the Brooklyn office, said that office was controlled by the mob and they 'deliberately sent her body to Brooklyn as part of the cover up,' according to the Post. The last person to see Kilgallen alive, Katherine Stone, said she saw the journalist with a 'mystery man' talking 'serious business' at the Regency Hotel in New York City. The mystery man was identified by Shaw as Ron Pataky, who was 12 years younger than her, who he believes Kilgallen had an affair with. Kilgallen was married to Richard Kollmar, who she went on to have children with. Shaw believes Pataky and Kilgallen's relationship fell apart when she started suspecting he was leaking her evidence about the assassination to her targets. Shaw contends that two poems written by Pataky 40 years after Kilgallen died suggest his involvement with the lines, 'Somebody who's dead could tell no tales,' and 'Make one of 'em poison' in a line about a bartender making drinks. Pataky told Shaw in December that he 'loved Dorothy dearly' and denied an affair or that he was at the Regency Hotel the night before her death, according to the Post. However, he did admit a close friendship with Kilgallen. Advertisement A suspected terrorist is accused of killing six Muslim men as they prayed at a Quebec mosque was reportedly a 'Trump supporter who liked Le Pen and mocked Syrian refugees online'. Alexandre Bissonnette is accused of slaughtering five Muslim men and injuring five others by opening fire on them during evening prayers at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center on Sunday. The 27-year-old 'loner' student was described by classmates as a pro-Trump loner who did not fit in well at Laval University where is studying anthropology and political sciences. But neighbors of the family home in the affluent Quebec suburb of Cap Rouge were stunned to learn Bissonnette, described as a 'typical boy-next-door', was being accused of the shooting. The suspected terrorist was arrested on Sunday night after phoning police himself from his Mitsubishi where investigators allegedly found two rifles and an AK-47. Bissonnette was charged with six counts of murder, five of attempted murder and is likely to have more charges brought against him, police said on Monday. He made a brief court appearance, wearing a white prisoner jump suit, shackled hands and feet, where he did not enter a plea. Originally police believed two gunmen had carried out the attack and took Moroccan-Canadian Mohamed el Khadir into custody. He is now being treated as a witness and no one is else is wanted in connection with the attack. Scroll down for video Alexandre Bissonnette was seen arriving at a Quebec City courthouse on Monday chared with six counts of first degree murder and five of attempted murder after allegedly opening fire on a mosque the night before (L-R) Azzedine Soufiane and Khaled Belkacemi were killed as they attended evening prayers at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center on Sunday night (L-R) Boubaker Thabti and Abdelkrim Hassen, a married father-of-three, also died in the horrific shooting The mosque's concierge Ibrahima Barry (left), 39, and his cousin Mamadou Tanou Barry, 42, (right) both of Guinea, were also killed 'The inquiry is ongoing to determine the motives,' said Royal Canadian Mounted Police Superintendent Martin Plante. Six men aged between 39 and 60 were killed at the mosque as they observed evening prayers at the mosque which said security had become a 'major' concern. Another five are in intensive care at Quebec City's Hopital de l'Enfant-Jesus after the shooting on Sunday night. Twelve others had less serious injuries and another 39 escaped from the mosque unharmed. Among the victims is father-of-two Boubaker Thabti, of Tunisian descent, halal butcher and father-of-three Azzedine Soufiane, who worked next door to fellow victim Khaled Belkacemi, an Algerian-Canadian professor. The professor, who was also married with children, worked at the same university where Bissonnette is enrolled. The mosque's concierge Ibrahima Barry, 39, and his cousin Mamadou Tanou Barry, 42, both of Guinea, were also killed, according to Associated Press. Abdelkrim Hassen, a married father-of-three who worked in IT for the government was also gunned down and killed, according to his friend Ali Hamadi who had also been at the mosque but left shortly before the shooting. Meanwhile, it has also emerged that a father-of-four is among those injured in the shooting rampage. Taxi driver Said El-Amari, 38, is said to be in a critical condition at the Enfant-Jesus hospital. His brother-in-law, Hassan Dardari, told Le Journal de Quebec: 'There are other operations to come. He is in a critical state.' At a press conference on Monday afternoon, officials from the Gendarmerie royale du Canada confirmed the suspect had been charged with six counts of murder. Searches are ongoing at the suspect's home and at the mosque, they said. It's likely he will have more charges, specifically under the terrorism act, brought against him. Bissonnette fled the scene in his Mitsubishi but called 911 himself later to turn himself in, local media reported. His car was spotted on the side of the road with a police vehicle behind it on Sunday night Bissonnette is a student at Laval University. A friend of Bissonnette's said he was pro-Trump and conservative but did not think he was capable of violence The 27-year-old was dressed in a white prison jumpsuit and sneakers and appeared to be handcuffed as he made his way inside the courthouse Alexandre Bissonnette's house in Quebec City, Canada, (pictured) was searched by police after the shooting Bissonnette, 27, and el Khadir were arrested on Sunday night after six men were shot dead at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center during evening prayers. El Khadir was picked up by police at the mosque but Bissonnette fled in his Mitsubishi and was arrested in nearby Ile d'Orleans around 20 minutes later after calling 911, Le Soleil reports. Police found two rifles and an AK-47 in the car. Court clerk Isabelle Ferland earlier identified the pair as the two men arrested in connection with the shooting. Police are not seeking anyone else in connection with the attack which was is being treated as an act of terror. A source later told Reuters police were looking at Bissonnette as a 'lone wolf'. The political sciences and anthropology student, who is from the affluent Quebec City suburb Cap-Rouge, will appear in court sometime on Monday or Tuesday. Bissonnette is suspected of carrying out the Quebec City mosque massacre alone Students described him to DailyMail.com as a pro-Trump loner but a timid man who didn't seem capable of committing an act of terror. 'Based on the conversations that I had with him during the American presidential campaign, it's true he is pro-Trump,' the student, who asked to remain anonymous, said. He added that he Bissonnette had 'never demonstrated' a violent side but that he didn't 'fit in' among peers. 'Yes, he was conservative in the political sense but despite the profound differences between us, he never showed or suggested that political violence or terrorism was something he was capable of. 'He didn't fit in well at university.' One Facebook group dedicated to welcoming refugees in the Quebec City area claimed that Bissonnette was well known in the area for his 'pro-Le Pen and anti-feminist positions at Laval University and on social networks,' wrote the Bienvenue aux refugie.es - Ville de Quebec Facebook group. He is said to have acted like a 'troll' and would attack women's rights. A Facebook page reportedly belonging to Bissonnette, which has since been taken down, revealed support for far right ideologies, including that of Marine Le Pen, the leader of France's National Front. For Le Pen and her supporters, 'massive migration,' notably from Muslim North Africa, is supplanting French civilization and is at the root of many France's modern woes. 'On est chez nous' ('We're in our land') is a mantra at the rallies of her party, the National Front. Her views have won the endorsement from white supremacists. Other 'likes' included Israeli Defense Forces, Donald Trump, and outspoken critics of Islam Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens. Yet neighbors paint a very different picture of the suspect, describing him as the 'perfect boy-next-door', who loved his family, sports and would always remember to say hello. Alain Dufour, a financier who retired last week, and has lived next door to Bissonnette's family home since the alleged shooter was a child, said: ' Alexandre is a very nice, friendly young man. He and his brother have been brought up very closely and carefully by his parents. They are all very close. 'Alexandre has never given anybody any trouble in this area and is the perfect boy next door. 'He is friendly and always says hello. I didn't know that their son had a gun and never imagined he could kill innocent people like that. 'My wife Huguette and I are very upset about those people who were killed. Very sad. ' Crime scene: Two people were initially arrested for the attack at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center on Sunday night. Police continued working at the mosque late into the night (above) A police officer stood guard at the men's entrance to the mosque, one of the largest in Quebec, late on Sunday night as forensic investigations continued Quebec City Police continued to work at the scene late into the night on Sunday as investigators questioned Bissonnette and Mohamed el Khadir His wife added: Alexandre has lived here all his life. He is very sweet. I remember him as a boy when he had a paddle car and would ride it outside his house. 'I can't believe he could have done something like that. I am in shock.' Police are speaking to Bissonnette's parents, his father Raymond - a retired government employee who he addressed as 'Papa' - and his mother Manon, but insisted they were not suspects in the case. A police officer at the Bissonnette house told DailyMail.com: ' We are just beginning the investigation and there a lot of questions. But in my experience of these cases the parents do not know anything before. 'And they are not suspects at all here. They are victims themselves.' Cadets Canada also revealed that Bissonnette was a member between 2002 and 2004, as they extended their 'deepest condolences to all those affected by this terrible tragedy.' The grandson of a decorated World War II veteran, Bissonnette had posted a photo of himself on his Facebook page as a boy dressed as an army cadet, a military leadership program for Canadian youths. Fellow students said Bissonnette didn't 'fit in well' at the university where he is studying political sciences and anthropology Laval University's rector said he would would assist authorities in any way he could but has not yet confirmed Bissonnette's enrollment. He was not known to police before Sunday night's atrocity. Police searched Bissonnette's home in Cap Rouge overnight. They were seen searching el Khadir's apartment which is less than a kilometer from the mosque on Monday, TVA reports. Witnesses told how the killer burst into the mosque dressed in black waterproof jacket at around 8pm. The mosque's president Mohamed Yangui was left in total shock by the killings. 'Why is this happening here? This is barbaric,' he said. Worshiper Ali Hamadi said he left the mosque a few minutes before the shooting but that his friend, married father-of-three Abdelkrim Hassen, died in the attack. Mosque officials spoke of the tragedy on Monday at a press conference where they admitted being scared of such attacks in the past. 'It's a very, very big tragedy for us. We have a sadness we cannot express,' Vice President Mohamed Labidi said as he choked back tears. The shooting came as protests erupted across the US in response to President Donald Trump's immigration ban against seven Muslim-majority countries which Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned earlier on Sunday. Prime Minister Trudeau gave an emotional speech at Ottawa's House of Commons on Monday, telling peers: 'Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack.' The parliament observed a minute's silence to honor the victims. The prime minister also issued a message of support to the country's Muslim community. 'Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack': Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau gave an emotional speech in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill on Monday Two thousand police officers were deployed across the city on Sunday as a precaution after the deadly shootings. Police continued to patrol the streets surrounding the mosque on Monday Police continued to search the perimeter around the mosque on Monday as the suspect awaited his first court appearance A police officer searches beneath a car outside the Quebec Islamic Cultural Center in the aftermath of the shooting A large police presence remained at the mosque on Sunday as investigators continued to work inside and around the city Two men were arrested on Sunday but police are yet to reveal a possible motive. Officers remained at the mosque on Monday Mourners began laying flowers at the scene of the attack on Monday as authorities worked to piece together how it unfolded As investigators continued to work at the mosque on Monday (above) police were led to a home in a residential street 10 minutes away by one of the suspects 'MAKE NO MISTAKE, THIS WAS A TERRORIST ATTACK' Prime Minister Justin Trudeau leads a minute's silence in the Ottawa House of Commons on Monday after the attack Prime Minister Justin Trudeau held a minute's silence for those killed in the attack at the House of Commons on Monday after an emotional speech. 'Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack,' he said, before issuing a heartfelt message to the country's Muslim community. 'Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. 'Last night's horrible crime against the Muslim community was an act of terror committed against Canada and against all Canadians. 'We will grieve with you. We will defend you. We will love you. And we will stand with you,' he said. On Sunday, Prime Minister Trudeau released a statement immediately after the attack where he deemed it an act of terror on Muslims. 'It was with tremendous shock, sadness and anger that I heard of this evening's tragic and fatal shooting at the Centre culturel islamique de Quebec located in the Ste-Foy neighbourhood of the city of Quebec. 'We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge. 'On behalf of all Canadians, Sophie and I offer our deepest condolences to the family and friends of all those who have died, and we wish a speedy recovery to those who have been injured. 'While authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, it is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. 'Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country. Canadian law enforcement agencies will protect the rights of all Canadians, and will make every effort to apprehend the perpetrators of this act and all acts of intolerance. 'Tonight, we grieve with the people of Ste-Foy and all Canadians.' Advertisement 'Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. 'Last night's horrible crime against the Muslim community was an act of terror committed against Canada and against all Canadians. 'We will grieve with you. We will defend you. We will love you. And we will stand with you,' he said. President Trump called Prime Minister Trudeau to offer his condolences on Monday afternoon. 'This is another senseless act of violence that cannot be tolerated. We condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms. 'It's a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant, and why the president is taking steps to be proactive instead of reactive when it comes to our nation's safety and security. 'We are of course praying for those injured in the attack, and are keeping in close contact with officials in Quebec and Canada,' White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said. Quebec Police have given no suggested motive for the killings but confirmed it was being treated as an act of terror. They are also looking in to whether a pig's head left outside the mosque last year is connected to the incident. People attend a vigil in Montreal on Monday, for the victims of Sunday's shooting at a Quebec City mosque Vigils and memorials were held all over Canada after the terrorist attack on Sunday (pictured people at a vigil at the Grand Parade in Halifax, Nova Scotia) People gather around the Centennial Flame on Parliament Hill during a vigil following a deadly shooting at a Quebec City mosque, in Ottawa, Ontario A woman places flowers for victims of a shooting Sunday at a mosque in Quebec City at Dalhousie University in Halifax on Monday In Montreal., people held up signs which read 'Unite against hate!' and 'Stop the criminalization of Islam!' 'We're still in the early stages of the investigation, we're still trying to determine all the facts associated with the incident and not interfere with the progress of the investigation so we're not going to discuss the specifics at this time,' Martin Plante of the Gendarmerie royale du Canada said at a press conference on Monday morning. Prime Minister Trudeau earlier described the mass killing as a 'terrorist attack on Muslims'. 'We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge. While authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, it is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. 'Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. 'Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country. 'Canadian law enforcement agencies will protect the rights of all Canadians, and will make every effort to apprehend the perpetrators of this act and all acts of intolerance. 'Tonight, we grieve with the people of Ste-Foy and all Canadians.' The Canadian prime minister attended a vigil along with thousands of people bundled in winter clothes in front of Notre-Dame-de-Foy Church, just around the corner from the mosque that was attacked. It was one of many vigils in Canada, and the Eiffel Tower in Paris was darkened in respect to the victims as was the CN Tower in Toronto. Vigils took place in cities across Canada today as people paid tribute to the six men who last their lives in the shooting. Belkacemi, 60, was a professor in the department of soil sciences and food engineering at Laval University, while his wife was also a professor at the university. He previously studied at the Polytechnic School of Algiers in Algeria before finishing his PhD at the University of Sherbrooke. His department's dean, Jean-Claude Dufour, said: 'His remarkable work will survive his sudden departure, which sadden us all deeply.' Survivors: Among those pictured leaving the mosque after the attack on Sunday evening were young boys People gathered on mounds of snow outside the mosque as police taped off the scene on Sunday night Armed police stayed at the scene overnight to patrol it as others worked inside the mosque. Security at mosques across the US was heightened in response to the slayings 'I want to express on behalf of the entire university community my profound sadness in announcing the death of Khaled Belkacemi, who was a victim of the attack at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center,' added rector Denis Briere said. 'I echo the comments of the head of the FSAA in honoring the kind and professional skills of our colleague. He was a passionate and engaged in the faculty's work. His remarkable body of work will outlive his unexpected death which has saddened us profoundly.' Soufiane, 57, owned the Epicerie-Boucherie Assalam butcher shop, was described as a 'very kind man' by one of his regulars. 'Last visit when I was there, he was playing with his daughter, his daughter was laughing,' Salah Abdullah told CTV News. 'When I heard that he has passed away, (that moment) really came to my mind.' The father-of-three was a leading member of the Muslim community in Quebec City and one of the first to move there and open a business - the store where most local Muslims would shop at every week. Ali Ouldache said Soufiane was the first Muslim he met after arriving from France in 2007. 'It (his store) was really my refuge and we became friends after that,' Ouldache said. 'He was a father to everyone, a brother to everyone - very tolerant, very respectful.' 'It's a tragedy the way he died.' Thabti, a pharmacist who moved to the area from Tunis, Tunisia in October 2011, was a family man who was not only dedicated to his wife and children, but also helping Syrian refugees settle into a new life in Canada, according to a friend. His son Mohamed described him as a 'very, very good guy' who 'helped everybody.' He also had a three-year-old daughter. Mamadou and Ibrahim Barry, were cousins from the same tiny village in Guinea. The Guinea government said in a statement: 'In this painful circumstance, the government of Guinea expresses its deepest sympathy and condolences to the Canadian government, the families of the disappeared, and the entire nation,' said a statement on the government's website. The mosque's vice president Mohamed Labidi choked back tears as he admitted security had been a 'major' concern for staff Archbishop of Quebec Cardinal Gerald LaCroix wept as he was embraced by Pope Francis on Monday at the Santa Marta Residence at the Vatican The flag at Peace Tower in Ottawa was lowered to half-mast on Monday in memory of the victims Quebec Prime Minister Philippe Couillard (right) issued a message to Muslim citizens on Monday in the wake of the attack, telling them at a press conference: 'We are with you, this is your home, we are all Quebecers' The mosque was attacked at around 8pm Sunday evening while around 50 people prayed inside 'Guinean representatives in Canada are actively engaged in meeting the families of our compatriots and expressing the support of the nation as a whole.' Father-of-two Mamadou Barry was a technician at Lucas Meyer Cosmetics, and lived in the same apartment building in Sainte-Foy as Ibrahima, a father-of-four, who worked at Quebec's health insurance board. Ibrahima, whose wife is believed to be in poor health, helped support his family both home and abroad. The pair were said to be very close, more like brothers than cousins, according to their friend Moussa Sangare. 'They were so kind. They worked and practiced their faith,' he said, adding that the community can't make sense of their deaths,' he told CP24. 'They were people who were well integrated in Quebec. They had good work, they took care of their kids and their family.' Sangare said he spent Saturday morning with the Barrys in the same mosque where the shooting occurred where they read the Qur'an with their children. The cousins leave behind their children. Hassen, which has also been spelled as Hassane, was born in Algeria, studied computer engineering, and had worked in Paris and Montreal before moving to Quebec City, according to MontralMuslims. 'He was a very peaceful, sensitive man. If he saw two people in a fistfight, he'd walk away,' his co-worker, Abderrezak Redouane said. Reuters is also reporting that Ahmed Youness, a 21-year-old student, was killed in the shooting although this report has not been verified. NYPD INCREASES PATROLS AROUND PLACES OF WORSHIP The New York Police Department is stepping up patrols at mosques and other places of worship in the city after six people were shot dead in a mosque in Quebec City, Canada. 'NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something,' New York City Mayor Bill Blasio said on Twitter. 'Our prayers are with the people of Quebec City as they deal with a terrible attack on a mosque. We must stand together,' Blasio said in another tweet. Earlier de Blasio sent a message directly to Muslims living in the city: 'To my fellow New Yorkers who are Muslim: New York City will protect you. The NYPD will protect you. We will fight all hatred and bias.' The department says it's monitoring the situation in Quebec City. Advertisement Mohamed Oudghiri normally attends prayers but missed Sunday's prayers. He told journalists: 'We are not safe here' A man holds a sign that reads 'la paix pas la guerre' or 'peace, not war' near a Quebec city mosque after the deadly shooting NYPD INCREASES PATROLS AROUND PLACES OF WORSHIP The New York Police Department is stepping up patrols at mosques and other places of worship in the city after six people were shot dead in a mosque in Quebec City, Canada. 'NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something,' New York City Mayor Bill Blasio said on Twitter. 'Our prayers are with the people of Quebec City as they deal with a terrible attack on a mosque. We must stand together,' Blasio said in another tweet. Earlier de Blasio sent a message directly to Muslims living in the city: 'To my fellow New Yorkers who are Muslim: New York City will protect you. The NYPD will protect you. We will fight all hatred and bias.' The department says it's monitoring the situation in Quebec City. Advertisement Police stood guard at the men's entrance to the mosque on Monday after putting up a perimeter the night before and there has been an increase in security at places of worship around the country. Other cities are upping security in light of recent attacks at Muslim places of worship. New York City mayor Bill de Blasio said on Twitter: 'The awful attack in Quebec is not an outlier. 'Today, a mosque in Texas was burned to the ground. We must stop those who seek to divide us.'NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something.' The Islamic Center of Victoria was ablaze at around 2am on Saturday. Local fire fighters are yet to reveal what started the fire. Quebec premier Philippe Couillard said there will be solidarity rallies across the region on Monday and says the province's people will all be together to express horror French President Francois Hollande on Monday condemned 'in the strongest possible terms' what he called an 'odious attack'. A pig's head was left outside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center in June. Police are investigating whether it is connected to the shooting 'It's the spirit of peace and openness of the people of Quebec that the terrorists wanted to hit,' added Hollande. German Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman condemned the 'despicable'. Steffen Seibert said the German leader was shocked by the shooting. Seibert said: 'If the killers intended to set people of different faiths against each other or to divide them, they must not and will not succeed in that. 'We stand in mourning beside the Muslim community in Quebec.' A pig's head was left at the mosque last year during the holy month of Ramadan in another heinous attack. Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them North African emigrants. Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of Quebec was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighboring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Yesterday, a Texas mosque was ravaged by a fire just hours after President Donald Trump signed an executive order restricting migration from seven predominantly Muslim countries. A clerk at a convenience store spotted smoke and flames billowing from the Islamic Center of Victoria at around 2am on Saturday. The fire department spent more than four hours battling the blaze. A GoFundMe account has already raised $100,000 Canadian dollars for the victims of the tragedy. After not being consulted during crafting of President Donald Trump's new immigration ban, Pentagon chiefs are drawing up a list of Iraqis who have assisted the United States who would be exempted from a 90-day seven-country ban. Those Iraqis who served the United States as drivers, interpreters, or in other roles would be exempted from the new ban, which went into effect as soon as it was issued Friday night. A list being drawn up by the Pentagon under newly-installed Secretary of Defense James Mattis could number thousands of people, the Los Angeles Times reported. Defense Secretary James Mattis (C) welcomes Jordan King Abdullah at the Pentagon in Washington, DC, U.S. January 30. Mattis reportedly was not consulted during the drafting of the executive order affecting seven Muslim-majority nations 'Even people that are doing seemingly benign things in support of us whether as a linguist, a driver, anything else they often do that at great personal risk,' Pentagon spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis told reporters Monday. The changes would take the form of guidance to be followed in the order's implementation, to avoid avoid the White House having to produce a new order following blowback on the issue. The list would include those who have 'demonstrated their commitment' to the U.S. Trump's order, which was put out without consultation with U.S. agencies or with key Republican committee chairman, some of whom have complained about it, did not provide an immediate carve-out for those who have aided the U.S. Some Iraqis and Afghan citizens have obtained special immigrant visas, under a program authorized by Congress, in recognition of their service. OPEN DOOR: The Pentagon under Defense Secretary James Mattis is drawing up a list of Iraqis to be eligible to come here because they assisted United States forces in Iraq President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Hall of Heroes at the Department of Defense Friday at the Pentagon. Trump signed two orders, one calling for the 'great rebuilding' of the nation's military, and another on 'extreme vetting' of visa seekers from terror-plagued countries Iraqi Hameed Khalid Darweesh appears with New York representative Nydia Velazquez at an Immigration ban protest in New York Protesters are surrounded by police officers and travelers as they pass through an exit of Terminal 4 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, Saturday, after earlier in the day two Iraqi refugees were detained while trying to enter the country 'I think we recognize that people who have served this country we should make sure that in those cases they're helped out. But that doesn't mean that we just give them a pass,' White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters Monday. 'The Obama administration, I think it was 2009 let two people through the Iraqi program in. Those people came to the United States and tried to plan an attack in Kentucky,' he noted. The administration clamped down on Iraqi admissions in 2011 while it ran names against federal databases, after an Iraqi man, Waad Ramadan Alwan, who had been granted asylum, was found to have have constructed roadside bombs in Iraq. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis greets Jordan's King Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein during an honor cordon at the Pentagon on Monday Two Iraqis, Hameed Khalid Darweesh and Haider Sameer Abdulkaleq Alshawi, were among those held at JFK airport in the hours after Trump's new order, later to be released Saturday night. Darweesh worked as an interpreter and came on a special immigrant visa granted on the day of Trump's inauguration. Alshawi got a visa to meet his wife and child, who got refugee status for association with the U.S. military. 'I think that we've gotta recognize that people who have helped this country, who have served this nation, may not be citizens at the time want to come here, then we need to appreciate the service that they've had,' Spicer continued. 'That doesn't mean that we don't let them in without a certain degree of vetting. And I think that's-that's what we're going to do to make sure again, that the onus is on us to make sure that we're protecting the American people and that people want to come into this country do so in a peaceful way.' Mattis, who was present when Trump signed the new order at the Pentagon Friday during a ceremony for his swearing-in, was not consulted or involved in its drafting, the New York Times reported. An official told the Washington Examiner Mattis was displeased with how the order was implemented. John Rowan, national president of Vietnam Veterans of America, said in a statement Monday: 'We strongly urge President Trump to consider the effects that this ban on Iraqi and Afghan interpreters will have on our long-term strategic goals, and to immediately create an exception for foreign nationals who have served alongside our men and women.' The action could benefit Iraqi military pilots who train in the U.S. to fly F-16 fighter jets. The training is part of the fight against ISIS, which the U.S. is trying to conduct with minimal U.S. forces on the ground. Iraqi forces, Syrian fighters, and Iraqi and Syrian Kurdish fighters are among those who are joining in the battles to liberate Mosul in Iraq and Raqqi in Syria from the grip of ISIS. An Indian taxi driver has been accused of molesting an Australian tourist when she sat in the front seat of the vehicle. The 20-year-old woman, who is studying in India, was on her way to see a friend after leaving her South Mumbai hostel in Colaba on the evening of January 20. She was travelling in the taxi when the driver allegedly groped her as she tried to fasten her seat belt, a senior police officer told ABC News. An Indian taxi driver has been accused of molesting an Australian tourist in Mumbai (stock image) She was travelling in the taxi when the driver allegedly groped her when she tried to fasten her seat belt, a senior police officer claimed (stock image) The police officer said the distressed woman only reported the alleged incident after she managed to photograph the driver when she saw him a few days later. After reporting the matter to police on January 26, the accused was taken into custody where he was charged with molestation. 'He is currently in police custody and we are going to file a charge-sheet soon with molestation charges,' the police officer told ABC. The young woman has been staying in the hostel after she moved to Mumbai about a year ago to pursue her studies, India Today reported. A Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade spokesperson told Daily Mail Australia they were 'aware about the reports an Australian woman involved in a molestation incident in India'. 'We stand ready to offer and provide all appropriate assistance, if requested, in accordance with the Consular Services Charter,' the spokesperson said. The White House said Monday it is studying details of an Iranian ballistic missile test. Press Secretary Sean Spicer said he did not know the 'exact nature' of the test and expected to have more information later. A defense official said the missile test ended with a 'failed' re-entry into the earth's atmosphere. The official had no other details, including the type of missile. Scroll down for video White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said today he did not know the nature of the missile test The official was not authorized to discuss the matter and spoke on condition of anonymity. Iran is the subject of a United Nations Security Council resolution prohibiting tests of ballistic missiles designed to deliver a nuclear warhead. As part of the 2015 nuclear deal, the U.N. ban was prolonged by eight years, although Iran has flaunted the restriction. State Department spokesman Mark Toner said the U.S. was looking into whether the ballistic missile test violates the U.S. Security Council resolution. 'When actions are taken that violate or are inconsistent with the resolution, we will act to hold Iran accountable and urge other countries to do so as well,' Toner said. Sen. Bob Corker, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, condemned Iran for the missile test. A medium-range ballistic missile was tested on Sunday in Iran and exploded after 630 miles, a US official said on Monday. The test was carried out from a site near Semnan, 140 miles east of Tehran. Pictured above is a file photo from a March 2015 ballistic missile test in Iran 'No longer will Iran be given a pass for its repeated ballistic missile violations, continued support of terrorism, human rights abuses and other hostile activities that threaten international peace and security,' Corker, a Republican from Tennessee, said in a written statement. Iranian-backed rebels in Yemen, meanwhile, claimed a successful missile strike against a warship in the Red Sea belonging to the Saudi-led coalition that is fighting alongside Yemen's internationally recognized government. Video footage shown on the rebels' al-Masirah television on Monday shows a warship being hit and a fire on board starting as a man not shown in the video shouts the rebels' trademark chant of 'Allahu akbar (God is greatest), death to America, death to Israel, a curse on the Jews and victory for Islam.' Advertisement With his rifle at the ready and a menacing stare, this is the unsettling depiction of what life in London could have looked like. Set in November 1941, the Germans have won the Battle of Britain in a new BBC television series which is due to air next month. The series, named after and based on the 1978 novel SS-GB by Len Deighton, focuses on Douglas Archer, a British detective attempting to solve a complex murder which gains the attention of the Nazi high command. Set in November 1941, the Germans have won the Battle of Britain in a new BBC television series which airs next month The series, named after and based on the 1978 novel SS-GB by Len Deighton, focuses on Douglas Archer, a British detective attempting to solve a complex murder Archer is a Scotland Yard detective working under the SS facing the dilemma of whether to effectively collaborate or join the resistance It was adapted for the silver screen by the writers behind James Bond films Skyfall and Spectre, Neal Purvis and Robert Wade. SS-GB is the BBC's latest offering in the wake of online successes from the likes of Amazon, which has received praise for its production of American author Philip K Dick's book The Man in the High Castle. Set in the 1960s, the hit alternative history series shows an America divided by the conquering Nazis and Japanese. Philip Sabin, professor of strategic studies at King's College London, said: 'It is hardly surprising that the Second World War has become such a focus it's the biggest war there has ever been... 'The most valuable aspect of these alternative histories is that they remind us that the real course of events was not fore-ordained, and get us thinking about how delicately balanced the outcome might have been, at least in some cases.' Barbara Barga, played by Kate Bodsworth, with Detective Superintendent Douglas Archer, Sam Riley, in the new show In this shot a Spitfire has landed in front of Buckingham Palace as part of the new television programme on if the Nazi has won the Battle of Britain and taken over SS-GB is the BBC's latest offering in the wake of online successes from the likes of Amazon, which has received praise for its production of The Man in the High Castle Mary Tyler Moore died of a heart attack brought on by pneumonia and diabetes, her death certificate reveals. The celebrated comedy actress, who revolutionized the role of women in television, died aged 80 in a Connecticut hospital on January 25. She was laid to rest in a private funeral service, attended by close family and friends, at Oak Lawn Cemetery in Fairfield on Sunday. The certificate, obtained by TMZ, reveals that her official cause was cardiopulmonary arrest brought on three prior conditions. The actress suffered from aspiration pneumonia, diabetes and hypoxia a lack of oxygen reaching the tissue which all contributed to her passing. Tragic: Television icon Mary Tyler Moore (left and right, with husband Dr Robert Levine) died aged 80 from a heart attack The family held a small funeral for the TV icon at the Oak Lawn Cemetery in Fairfield, as about 50 people attended the private memorial on Sunday. Moore's husband, Dr. Robert Levine is pictured above Moore had long suffered from a host of problems, including diabetes which she was diagnosed with at age 33. The acclaimed comedienne captured the hearts of millions of viewers in the 1960s sitcom The Dick Van Dyke Show and then The Mary Tyler Moore Show in the 1970s. Moore emerged on screen at a time when actresses were traditionally cast as housewives but with her fashionable trousers and Jackie Kennedy-style hair, she became heralded by Time Magazine as one of women who 'changed television' for ever. She went on to play the groundbreaking role of Mary Richards on The Mary Tyler Moore show from 1970 to 1977, where she portrayed a single career woman working in a Minneapolis TV newsroom determined to make a success of herself. It won 29 Emmys, a record that stood for a quarter century until Frasier broke it in 2002. The actress died in a Connecticut hospital in the company of friends and her third husband, Robert Levine, her publicist Mara Buxbaum announced, adding: 'Mary will be remembered as a fearless visionary who turned the world on with her smile.' Stars were quick to pay tribute, including veteran talk show host Larry King who tweeted: 'Mary Tyler Moore was a dear friend and a truly great person. A fighter. Rest in peace, MTM.' A procession of cars, including a black hearse carrying Moore's remains, entered the cemetery just before 11am off Bronson Road in Fairfield, Connecticut on Sunday (above) Photographs from her gravesite show the burial mound covered in roses and white orchids (above) after the funeral, as newly planted White Birch trees were planted nearby George Takei, who played Mr Sulu in Star Trek, called her a 'role model'. The funeral service for the television legend was private and the Oak Lawn Cemetery in Fairfield was closed to the public as local police officers blocked the entrance on Sunday, according to the Connecticut Post . A procession of cars, including a black hearse carrying Moore's remains, entered the cemetery just before 11am off Bronson Road. The small group of about 50 mourners entered a small white chapel for a brief service before her interment. Fairfield Police Lt. James Perez was on duty providing protection during the service and witnessed the funeral proceedings. He said 'it was a very quiet, small group', as he added that the only celebrity he recognized was Bernadette Peters, Moore's co-star in the 1990 film, The Last Best Year. 'There was a brief service,' Perez said. 'It's a beautiful site that she's at. It's nice what the family did. It was a nice little send off for her.' Moore's family purchased a 12-plot gravesite at Fairfield's Oak Lawn Cemetery for her resting place, TMZ reported. Her family reportedly spent roughly $200,000 on a huge granite five foot female angel statue that adorns her grave, which is surrounded by a small wall also made of the stone. After her services ended, the cemetery re-opened to the public early Sunday afternoon allowing dozens of people to come inside to pay tribute to Moore. Born in Brooklyn, New York, Moore moved to Los Angeles when she was eight years old and started her career in showbusiness as a dancer aged 17. The Emmy award-winning actress died surrounded by family members who quickly flocked to say their goodbyes at a Connecticut hospital. She is pictured left in 2008 and right in 1970 The actress, who is well known for her role on ' The Dick Van Dyke Show', had a long battle with diabetes after being diagnosed with disease at age 33. She is pictured above with Dick Van Dyke on the programme Moore, who had been married three times, also underwent brain surgery in 2011 to remove a benign brain tumor. She is pictured above in a scene from her show in 1970 Her first TV job came when she played an elf in a 1955 Hotpoint advert. That same year, the aspiring actress married 27-year-old Dick Meeker, a cranberry products salesman. For Moore, the marriage was a ticket out of an unhappy household where she had a devoutly Catholic father, an alcoholic mother and a neighbour who sexually abused her when she was young. In 1961 Moore's career began to take off as she landed the role of Laura Petrie, the suburban New York wife. How Mary Tyler Moore helped create the modern woman on TV Moore's first major TV role was on the classic sitcom 'The Dick Van Dyke Show,' in which she played the young homemaker wife of Van Dyke's character, comedy writer Rob Petrie, from 1961-66. With her unerring gift for comedy, Moore seemed perfectly fashioned to the smarter wit of the new, post-Eisenhower age. As Laura, she traded in the housedress of countless sitcom wives and clad her dancer's legs in Capri pants that were as fashionable as they were suited to a modern American woman. Laura was a dream wife and mother, but not perfect. Viewers identified with her flustered moments and her protracted, plaintive cry to her husband: 'Ohhhh, Robbbb!' But it was as Mary Richards, the plucky Minneapolis TV news producer on 'The Mary Tyler Moore Show' (1970-77), that Moore truly made her mark. At a time when women's liberation was catching on worldwide, her character brought to TV audiences an independent, 1970s career woman. Other than Marlo Thomas' 1960s sitcom character 'That Girl,' who at least had a steady boyfriend, there were few precedents. Mary Richards was comfortable being single in her 30s, and while she dated, she wasn't desperate to get married. She sparred affectionately with her gruff boss, Lou Grant, played by Ed Asner, and always addressed as 'Mr. Grant.' And millions agreed with the show's theme song that she could 'turn the world on with her smile.' The series ran seven seasons and won 29 Emmys, a record that stood for a quarter century until 'Frasier' broke it in 2002. 'Everything I did was by the seat of the pants. I reacted to every written situation the way I would have in real life,' Moore told The Associated Press in 1995. 'My life is inextricably intertwined with Mary Richards', and probably always will be.' Advertisement She was only 23, but the chemistry with Van Dyke made her millions of fans who loved their humorous portrayal of a married couple. After that show ended, in 1967 Moore played opposite Julie Andrews in the film musical Thoroughly Modern Millie. Then came the Mary Tyler Moore Show, which began in September 1970 and earned Moore five Emmy awards over its seven-year run. It was described as being 'revolutionary' in the way that women were portrayed on the small screen. Mary Richards was a single woman who was not divorced or widowed, but 'determined to make it on her own'. While onscreen she had found a way to play the happy housewife and mother, in real life she was stalked by tragedy and persistent health problems. The Tony Award-winning star was open about her fight against diabetes. She had several laser surgeries to help treat her deteriorating vision, and also had brain surgery in 2011 to remove a benign tumour. She outlived her only child, a son called Richard from her first marriage, who died aged 24 of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. After her early marriage to Meeker ended in 1961, she married NBC programmer Grant Tinker, but later said he was more a father figure than a husband. In 1978, the actress's 21-year-old sister died from an overdose of drugs and alcohol. In 1980 she earned rave reviews and a best actress Oscar nomination for Ordinary People, directed by Robert Redford, in which she played a cold mother coping with an unhappy family. Redford said the performance had allowed her to show her 'dark side'. In 1983 she married Robert Levine, a cardiologist 18 years her junior. Battling what she called 'a social drinking habit', she checked into a Betty Ford clinic in 1984. Despite the challenges, she threw her energies into supporting animal rights, and was a long-time vegetarian. In 1995 Moore revealed that cosmetic surgery helped her cope with life, saying: 'I like to think of (the surgery) as staying fit. And if it can keep my face up where it belongs, then I will go to a doctor and get his assistance.' She declared in 1997 that it was a 'great feeling' that her shows had been so revered, adding: 'I have no children now, but I know I touched lives in a very strong way, both comedically and aesthetically.' When she found herself unable to sleep, she would sometimes watch old episodes of her own shows, saying: 'They have a lesson, small ones and happy ones. They give you hope that there's a better future.' The legend broke into Hollywood first as a dancer and appeared in several commericals before she landed roles on TV. She is pictured above in 1953 for her sophomore year photo at Immaculate Heart High School in Los Angeles The film Hidden Figures is based on the life of three female African-American mathematicians working for NASA - Katherine Johnson, pictured, who is still living and married to her lover portrayed in the film, Corporal Jim Johnson The inspirational film Hidden Figures, which won a Screen Actors Guild Award last night, is based on the story of three female African-American mathematicians working for NASA during the turbulent civil rights era of the 1960s. In the film, the main character Katherine Johnson, played by Taraji P Henson, is enamored with a young army Lieutenant named Jim. Off the screen, the real life Katherine Johnson, now 98, and Corporal Jim Johnson, 91, eventually married, and are still alive to this day - residing in Hampton, Virginia where the film is set. Katherine Johnson, who received a medal of honor from President Obama in 2015, reportedly loved the movie and said the young women did a good job of representing her and her fellow computers, according to the LA Times. Off the screen, the real life Katherine Johnson, now aged 98, and Corporal Jim Johnson, aged 91, eventually married, and are still alive to this day - residing in Hampton, Virginia where the film is set Colonel Jim Johnson, Katherine's film love interest, was played by Mahershala Ali, who also won a SAGA last night for his performance in Moonlight. Mrs Johnson was a mathematician and physicist who worked to calculate the trajectories of spacecrafts, and was instrumental in the launches Project Mercury, Apollo 11, and the Space Shuttle Program. From her first marriage to James Goble in 1939, she had three daughters: Joylette, Katherine, and Constance. Goble passed away in 1956 from a brain tumor. In 1959, the year after the National Advisory Committee for Aeuronautics was renamed to NASA, she married Jim Johnson. Now in their nineties, they still live in Hampton, Virginia, where Katherine originally moved to join the Langley Research Center as a 'computer' in 1953. Katherine and Jim Johnson are pictured with their three daughters, Katherine, Joylette, and Constance Hidden Figures won the Screen Actors Guild award for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture. During her acceptance speech, Taraji P Henson said: 'This film is about unity,' 'The shoulders of the women that we stand on are three American heroes: Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan and Mary Jackson. Without them, we would not know how to reach the stars.' 'This story is about what happens when we put our difference aside and we come together as a human race,' she concluded. 'They are hidden figures no more!' Mrs Johnson's fellow computers were Dorothy Vaughan and Mary Jackson, played by Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monae, respectively. Mrs Johnson was a mathematician and physicist who worked to calculate the trajectories of spacecrafts, and was instrumental in the launches Project Mercury, Apollo 11, and the Space Shuttle Program Her fellow mathmeticians, Dorothy Vaughan, left, and Mary Jackson, right, were also depicted in the film Taraji P Henson as Katherine Johnson, left, Octavia Spencer as Mary Jackson, center, and Janelle Monae as Dorothy Vaughan, right Vaughan unfortunately passed away in 2008, and Mary Jackson died in 2005, both unable to see their legacy grace the big screen. Henson, however, had the opportunity to sit down with the inspiration for her role, and speak with her about her experiences working in the segregated South in a male dominated industry. She said she felt a significant amount of pressure honoring the influence of someone who was still living. Henson, center, had the opportunity to sit down with the inspiration for her role, and speak with her about her experiences working in the segregated South in a male dominated industry The actresses won a SAGA for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture, and Taraji P Henson said it was a 'film about unity' and 'what happens when we put our differences aside and come together as a human race' 'I owe her all my truth and all of me,' she told The Hollywood Reporter. The majority of the film was true to reality, though some characters were created to aid in the movie production of the story. Kevin Costner's character Al Harrison is one such instance, though NASA reported that he is loosely based on Robert C Gilruth, the architect of Manned Space Flight. Vivian Michael, played by Kirsten Dunst, was also fictional and created for the screenplay, but is intended to represent the oppositional forces of white women in the 1960s. A 12-year-old Yemeni girl, headed to Los Banos California, was told that she could not board the plane that would reunite her with her American family after four years apart. Eman Ali received her visa to come to the United States on Thursday, and was turned away Saturday as she attempted to board a plane in Djibouti. Djibouti is across the Gulf of Aden from Yemen, whre Eman was living with her grandparents for four years, waiting for her immigration papers to come together while the rest of her family was together in the United States. Pictured: Protesters of President Trump's travel ban at LAX. A 12-year-old Yemeni girl, headed to Los Banos California, was told that she could not board the plane that would reunite her with her American family after four years apart Her father, Ahmed Ali, flew to meet his daughter in Yemen and bring her home. He told the Mercury News: 'She asked me, "Why can't we go? Why only Yemeni? Why only Muslim?"' Ahmed Ali became a citizen of the United States in 2010 and manages a shopping center in the Central Valley town of Los Banos, where he lives with his family. Eman is just one of scores of people who were denied entrance to the United States over the weekend. 'It's really not fair,' Ali told the News from his hotel room in Djibouti, 'Not everyone is a terrorist.' Eman is just one of scores of people who were denied entrance to the United States over the weekend The father flew to Jordan early January to meet Eman. Together the two traveled to Djibouti for an interview with the US Embassy, where Eman was granted her visa. They booked a flight back to the United States on Saturday, but President Trump's ban went to effect Friday. Trump signed an executive order putting a 120-day hold on allowing refugees into the country, an indefinite ban on Syrian refugees, and a 90-day ban on citizens from Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. The family's San Francisco-based lawyer Katherine Lewis said 'It's very frustrating to say the least. I think the executive order is unconstitutional, immoral and unAmerican. A 12-year-old child is certainly no threat to the United States.' Demonstrations have taken over major airports and cities in the United States since the ban was put into place Ali said he and his daughter were checking their bags when she was told she would not be allowed to board the plane. Her suitcase was filled with gifts for her mother and two sisters. The family had to leave Eman in Yemen four years ago, as she was born there and not an American citizen. When they left her, they thought that it would take less time for her immigration papers to come through than it did. Lewis said: 'It's a hard choice for any parents to make - an impossible choice. It's a war zone.' Though they did not want to leave Eman, Lewis explained that they wanted to take their older daughter to safety, and did not anticipate that it would take four years for the family to be reunited. Eman's journey to Djibouti, across the war-torn country of Yemen, was incredibly dangerous. Ali cannot imagine sending her back, but does not know how she will get to the United States. He told the News: 'We don't have a place to go.' Demonstrations have taken over major airports and cities in the United States since the ban was put into place. Researchers have discovered traces of the earliest known prehistoric ancestor of human beings. In a finding which calls into question decades of research into human evolution, the creature called 'Saccaorhytus' has been revealed. A microscopic sea creature that lived 540 million years ago, it has sack-like features created by its elliptical body and large mouth. Bizarrely the species, which is new to science and was identified from microfossils found in China, showed no evidence of having an anus. The earliest known prehistoric ancestor of human beings is believed to have lived 540-million years ago. Pictured is an artist's impression of the creature called 'Saccaorhytus' SACCAORHYTUS: WHAT WE KNOW A microscopic sea creature that lived 540 million years ago, it has sack-like features created by its elliptical body and large mouth. The species which is new to science and was identified from microfossils found in China showed no evidence of having an anus. Saccorhytus was about a millimetre in size, and probably lived between grains of sand on the seabed. Its features were spectacularly preserved in the fossil record for 540 million years. Advertisement This means any waste material inside its body would have come back through the mouth. It is also believed the thin-skinned creature - discovered after a study of fossils found in China - moved along the ocean bed by 'wriggling'. The scientists who carried out the research, including some from the University of Cambridge, believe this creature is now the most primitive example of a so-called 'deuterostome'. This is a broad biological category that encompasses a number of sub-groups, including the vertebrates. If the conclusions of the study, published in the journal Nature, are correct, then Saccorhytus was the common ancestor of a huge range of species. This would mean it was the earliest step yet discovered on the evolutionary path that eventually led to humans, hundreds of millions of years later. 'We think that as an early deuterostome this may represent the primitive beginnings of a very diverse range of species, including ourselves,' said Simon Conway Morris, Professor of Evolutionary Palaeobiology at the University of Cambridge. The creature is now the most primitive example of a so-called 'deuterostome'. This is a broad biological category that encompasses a number of sub-groups, including the vertebrates 'To the naked eye, the fossils we studied look like tiny black grains, but under the microscope the level of detail is jaw-dropping. 'All deuterostomes had a common ancestor, and we think that is what we are looking at here.' Despite the findings, modern humans are, however, unlikely to perceive much by way of a family resemblance. The saccorhytus was about a millimetre in size, and probably lived between grains of sand on the seabed. Its features were spectacularly preserved in the fossil record The Saccorhytus microfossils were found in Shaanxi Province, in central China (shown on map), and pre-date all other known deuterostomes WHAT ARE DEUTEROSTOMES? Deuterostome is one of the major groups of the animal kingdom. The majority of deuterostomes are either chordates or echinoderms. Most early deuterostome groups are from about 510 to 520 million years ago, when they had already begun to diversify into not just the vertebrates, but the sea squirts, echinoderms, animals such as starfish and sea urchins, and hemichordates. This level of diversity has made it extremely difficult to work out what an earlier, common ancestor might have looked like. The Saccorhytus microfossils were found in Shaanxi Province, in central China, and pre-date all other known deuterostomes. Advertisement Saccorhytus was about a millimetre in size, and probably lived between grains of sand on the seabed. Its features were spectacularly preserved in the fossil record. The study was carried out by an international team of academics, including researchers from the University of Cambridge in the UK and Northwest University in Xi'an China, with support from other colleagues at institutions in China and Germany. 'Our team has notched up some important discoveries in the past, including the earliest fish and a remarkable variety of other early deuterostomes,' Degan Shu, from Northwest University, added. 'Saccorhytus now gives us remarkable insights into the very first stages of the evolution of a group that led to the fish, and ultimately, to us.' Most other early deuterostome groups are from about 510 to 520 million years ago, when they had already begun to diversify into not just the vertebrates, but the sea squirts, echinoderms, animals such as starfish and sea urchins, and hemichordates. This level of diversity has made it extremely difficult to work out what an earlier, common ancestor might have looked like. Most other early deuterostome groups are from about 510 to 520 million years ago, when they had already begun to diversify into not just the vertebrates, but the sea squirts, echinoderms, animals such as starfish and sea urchins (pictured) The Saccorhytus microfossils were found in Shaanxi Province, in central China, and pre-date all other known deuterostomes. By isolating the fossils from the surrounding rock, and then studying them both under an electron microscope and using a CT scan, the team were able to build up a picture of how Saccorhytus might have looked and lived. This revealed features and characteristics consistent with current assumptions about primitive deuterostomes. By isolating the fossils from the surrounding rock (pictured), and then studying them both under an electron microscope and using a CT scan, the team were able to build up a picture of how Saccorhytus might have looked and lived EVOLUTION OF MAN 55 million years ago - First primitive primates evolve 15 million years ago - Hominidae (great apes) evolve from the ancestors of the gibbon 8 million years ago - First gorillas evolve. Later, chimp and human lineages diverge 5.5 million years ago - Ardipithecus, early proto-human shares traits with chimps and gorillas 4 million years ago - Australopithecines appeared. They had brains no larger than a chimpanzee's 2.8 million years ago - LD 350-1 appeared and may be the first of the Homo family 2.7 million years ago - Paranthropus, lived in woods and had massive jaws for chewing 2.3 million years ago - Homo habalis first thought to have appeared in Africa 1.8 million years ago - Homo ergaster begins to appear in fossil record 1.6 million years ago - Hand axes become the first major technological innovation 800,000 years ago - Early humans control fire and create hearths. Brain size increases rapidly 400,000 years ago - Neanderthals first begin to appear and spread across Europe and Asia 200,000 years ago - Homo sapiens - modern humans - appear in Africa 40,0000 years ago - Modern humans reach Europe Advertisement 'We had to process enormous volumes of limestone about three tonnes to get to the fossils, but a steady stream of new finds allowed us to tackle some key questions: was this a very early echinoderm, or something even more primitive?' said Dr Jian Han, of Northwest University. 'The latter now seems to be the correct answer.' In the early Cambrian period - when most major groups of animals first appeared in the fossil record - the region would have been a shallow sea. Saccorhytus was so small it probably lived in between individual grains of sediment on the sea bed. Its body was bilaterally symmetrical a characteristic inherited by many of its descendants, including humans and was covered with a thin, relatively flexible skin. This suggests it had some sort of musculature, meaning it could have made contractile movements, and moved around by wriggling. Perhaps its most striking feature, however, was its rather primitive means of eating food and then dispensing with the resulting waste. Saccorhytus had a large mouth, relative to the rest of its body, and probably ate by engulfing food particles, or even other creatures. Small conical structures on the creature's body may have allowed the water it swallowed to escape, so were perhaps the evolutionary precursor of the gills seen in fish. But the researchers were unable to find any evidence the creature had an anus. 'If that was the case, then any waste material would simply have been taken out back through the mouth, which from our perspective sounds rather unappealing,' Conway Morris said. Scientists may soon be able to wipe out your most haunting memories using lasers. Researchers in Japan have found a way to manipulate neurons in the brains of mice to remove triggers for certain bad memories. These findings could work toward the development of new methods to reverse post-traumatic stress disorder, they claim. Scientists may soon be able to wipe out your most haunting memories using lasers. Researchers in Japan have found a way to manipulate neurons in the brains of mice to remove triggers for certain bad memories (stock image) Scientists at the University of Toyama wanted to see whether two independent memories can be linked and then decoupled. To do this, mice were trained to have two separate fear memories. First, Professor Kaoru Inokuchi taught mice to associate pain with taste. The mice were injected with nausea-inducing lithium chloride every time they licked a bottle filled with a saccharine solution. To create a second fear memory, mice were then trained to associate a tone with an electric shock, causing them to freeze whenever they heard it. These two unrelated memories where then linked. Whenever the mice tasted saccharine, researchers played the same tone, causing them to freeze. Eventually, whenever mice tasted the sugar solution, they automatically froze. The team then wanted to separate these memories using lasers. They used a technique called optogenetics that uses light to target and switch off specific neurons that were active during these memories, so that the memories were no longer linked. And it worked. When they tasted saccharine, the mice no longer froze. In separate research, Stony Brook University found a way to manipulate neurons in the brains of mice to strengthen or erase memories. In the 2004 film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, pictured, a couple undergoes a procedure to have their memories of each other erased When they played the tone, the mice stood still, showing that the memory was not erased completely but decoupled from each other. This is is important because it may be harmful to PTSD patients if breaking the link between a trigger and a painful event erases the original memories completely. 'In principle, we should be able to apply this approach to specifically dissociate a daily memory and also the traumatic event without affecting the individual memory,' says Inokuchi. 'The fact that you can parcel out these memories and manipulate them in a predictable fashion is remarkable,' Sumantra Chattarji, an expert on memory at the National Centre for Biological Sciences in Bangalore, India told New Scientist. 'This was impossible a few years ago.' Inokuchi believes some day in the future, a similar technique could help people decouple traumatic memories from memories of other events. Scientists generally believe that emotional memories are tied to the amygdala, though the mechanisms which control memory are still a mystery in many ways. In a separate study last year, researchers tested the underlying mechanism of memory using a fear-based model in mice. The team manipulated acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter in the brain that acts as a mechanism for signalling involved in memory. TRAINING YOUR BRAIN TO BANISH BAD MEMORIES Another study led by researchers from Dartmouth and Princeton has shown that people can intentionally forget past experiences by changing how they think about the context of those memories. The researchers showed participants images of outdoor scenes, such as forests, mountains and beaches, as they studied two lists of random words. The volunteers deliberately manipulated whether the participants were told to forget or remember the first list prior to studying the second list. Right after they were told to forget, the scans showed they 'flushed out' the scene-related activity from their brains. But when the participants were told to remember the studied list rather than forget it, this flushing out of scene-related thoughts didn't occur. The amount people flushed out scene-related thoughts predicted how many of the studied words they would later remember, which shows the process is effective at facilitating forgetting. To forget those negative thoughts coming back to haunt you, researchers suggest trying to push out the context of the memory. For example, if you associate a song with a break-up, listen to the song in a new environment. Try listening to it as you exercise at the gym, or add to a playlist you listen to before a night out. This way, your brain will associate with a positive feeling. If a memory of a scene from a horror film haunts you, watch the same scene during the daytime. Or watch it without sound but play a comedy clip over the top. Advertisement This neurotransmitter is delivered to the amygdala by cholinergic neurons, which reside in the base of the brain and have been thought to strengthen emotional memories when increased in the amygdala. To stimulate specific populations of cholinergic neurons, the researchers used light to control the cells in living tissue. 'Memories of emotionally charged experiences are particularly strong, whether positive or negative experiences, and the goal of our research is to determine the mechanisms underlying the strengthening of memory,' said Lorna Role, PhD, Professor and Chair of the Department of Neurobiology and Behaviour and Co-Director of the Neurosciences Institute at Stony Brook Medicine. The researchers found that when they increased acetylcholine release in the amygdala as a traumatic memory formed, this memory was enhanced, lasting more than twice as long as normal. Advertisement Spurred by technology advances and demand for alternatives in congested cities, the race is on to create the world's first commercially viable 'flying car.' Inventors have come up with some incredible designs over the years, although most aren't capable of driving on roads. But as engineers make inroads in their development, experts say they could be ready within a few years. Here are some of the top contenders. Scroll down for videos Airbus has been working on a fleet of air taxis with the hopes of relieving urban congestion and the firm has unveiled its first conceptual renderings. Called Vahana, this sleek self-flying aircraft seats one passenger under a canopy that retracts similar to a motorcycle helmet visor and is summoned like an Uber MEET VAHANA Project Vahana began last year and is one of the first projects at A, the advanced projects and partnerships outpost of Airbus Group in Silicon Valley. The first conceptual renders have been revealed showing a sleek self-flying aircraft with room for one passenger who sits under a canopy that retracts similar to a motorcycle helmet visor. Its also believed that the air taxis will take off and land vertically, as there are helicopter-like struts, and tilting wings each with four electric motors. The team at Vahana aims to have a full-sized prototype in the air by the end of 2017 and a model on the market for sale by 2020. Advertisement Vahana European aircraft manufacturer Airbus is working at its Silicon Valley research center on a driverless flying taxi that at first will have a pilot, but will later be autonomous. Called Vahana, this sleek self-flying aircraft seats one passenger under a canopy that retracts similar to a motorcycle helmet visor and the vehicle is designed to operate like a helicopter. The vertical takeoff-landing, all-electric aircraft is a cockpit mounted on a sled and flanked by propellers in front and back. Project Vahana began early last year and is one of the first projects at A, the advanced projects and partnerships outpost of Airbus Group in Silicon Valley. 'At Vahana, we are passionate about personal flight. The aircraft we're building doesn't need a runway, is self-piloted, and can automatically detect and avoid obstacles and other aircraft,' A chief executive Rodin Lyasoff wrote on the Vahana website. 'Designed to carry a single passenger or cargo, we're aiming to make it the first certified passenger aircraft without a pilot.' Airbus plans to test a prototype before the end of 2017, and to have the first Vahanas ready for production by 2020. The conceptual renders suggest that the air taxis will take off and land vertically, as there are helicopter-like struts, and tilting wings each with four electric motors Project Vahana began earlier last year and is one of the first projects at A, the advanced projects and partnerships outpost of Airbus Group in Silicon Valley. There is space for one passenger, who will sit under a canopy that retracts like a motorcycle helmet visor CORMORANT FIGURES Capacity: 2 patients Length: 20 ft 4 in (6.2 m) Width: 11 ft 6 in (3.5 m), 2.15 m without thrusters Height: 7 ft 7 in (2.3 m), 1.8 m without thrusters Advertisement Cormorant Israeli tech firm Urban Aeronautics originally designed its people-carrying drone as an 'air mule' for military use. Dubbed the Cormorant, this vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft is capable of carrying 1,000 pounds over 31 miles, allowing it to deliver supplies to war zones and carry wounded soldiers to safety. The craft is also designed to make 'split decisions' if issues should occur during a mission - it either continues its journey, retreats home or lands for further instructions from a human operator. Israeli tech firm Urban Aeronautics originally designed its people-carrying drone as an 'air mule' for military use. Dubbed the Cormorant, this vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aircraft is capable of carrying 1,000 pounds over 31 miles, allowing it to deliver supplies to war zones and carry wounded soldiers to safety The craft is also designed to make 'split decisions' if issues should occur during a mission - it either continues its journey, retreats home or lands for further instructions from a human operator A prototype has taken two years to complete, but its creators are hopeful that it will be able to reach places traditional helicopters can't in the near future. A test flight, which was carried out on November 3, was the first time the Cormorant took to the skies over uneven terrain while piloting itself. 'This flight paves the way forward for the immediate evolution of Cormorant from prototype to near-term production and ultimately commercialization of this groundbreaking technology - for broad applications and markets, said Urban Aeronautics founder Rafi Yoeli. THE LILIUM JET Steering - Easy to fly (Fully computer-assisted control system) Number of passengers - 2 Max. take-off weight - 600 kg Cruising velocity - 180 mph Max. velocity 250 mph Range - 300 miles Power - 435 hp Advertisement Lilium Jet German technology company Lilium Aviation is working on a two-seater aircraft that will take off vertically using 36 electric fan engines arrayed along its wings. The egg-shaped plane, called Lilium, has been heralded as high up as the European Space Agency (ESA), who highlight its environmental benefits as well as not needing to land at an airport. The aircraft will hover and climb until the fans are turned backward slowly. After that, it flies forward like a plane using electric jet engines. The company has been flight-testing small scale models. The aircraft will have an estimated cruising speed of up to 190 mph and a range of 190 miles. German technology company Lilium Aviation is working on a two-seater aircraft that will take off vertically using 36 electric fan engines arrayed along its wings. The egg-shaped plane, called Lilium, has been heralded as high up as the European Space Agency (ESA), who highlight its environmental benefits as well as not needing to land at an airport AEROMOBIL 3.0 SPECIFICATION Top speed: 124mph as a plane and 100mph as a car Take-off speed: 90mph Engine: Rotax 912 Wings: Collapsible Construction: steel framework and carbon coating Dimensions: The hybrid measures 6m long, 1.6m wide as a car and 8.2m wide as a plane Weight: 450kg Advertisement AeroMobil 3.0 The Slovakian company AeroMobil has developed a car with wings that unfold for flight. It uses regular gasoline and fits into standard parking spaces. It can also take off from airports or 'any grass strip or paved surface just a few hundred meters long,' according to the company's website. But the flying car ran into some trouble last year when it spectacularly crashed during its maiden flight with the inventor on board after witnesses said it went into a tailspin. Stefan Klein, the co-owner of tech company AeroMobil was taking the company's 3.0 prototype on a test flight in Slovakia. Onlookers said the craft appeared to be in trouble before going into a tailspin, forcing Klein to deploy a parachute around 900ft off the ground to help bring the car down as gently as possible. The Slovakian company AeroMobil has developed a car with wings that unfold for flight. It uses regular gasoline and fits into standard parking spaces. It can also take off from airports or 'any grass strip or paved surface just a few hundred meters long,' according to the company's website EHang 184 Chinese drone maker EHang has been flight-testing a person-carrying drone in Nevada. The vehicle is a cockpit with four arms equipped with a total of eight rotors. The company says the 184 is autonomous, so all the passenger has to do is enter in their destination in the smartphone app, sit back, and let the drone take over. Chinese drone maker EHang has been flight-testing a person-carrying drone in Nevada. The vehicle is a cockpit with four arms equipped with a total of eight rotors. The company says the 184 is autonomous, so all the passenger has to do is enter in their destination in the smartphone app, sit back, and let the drone take over There's no option to take control of the 184 remotely. The cockpit is empty, apart from a stand to place a smartphone or tablet and a cup holder. 'You know how it feels to sit in a Ferrari? This is 10 times better,' George Yan, co-founder of Ehang said in an interview with DailyMail.com. 'I think in all of us there is that little kid in all of us that says I want to fly,' said Yan. 'I dont want to get a pilot license after five or 10 hours of flying, I want to do it right away. Were making that dream happen.' A command station in China will be able to monitor and control the aircraft anywhere in the world, company officials say. S2 Joby Aviation has developed a two-seater aircraft that not only reaches speeds of 200 mph, but is also powered by lithium nickel cobalt manganese oxide batteries. 'If we can build an aircraft which is quiet, safe, and efficient, and you get door-to-door at five times the speed of ground transport, it will radically change life,' Joby Aviation CEO and founder JoeBen Bevirt told ReadWrite in an earlier interview. Joby Aviation has developed a two-seater aircraft that not only reaches speeds of 200 mph, but is also powered by lithium nickel cobalt manganese oxide batteries. Joby S2 may look like it was designed for James Bond, but this personal plane could change the future of travel 'It will have a transformative effect.' The aircraft has 16 electric propellers, 12 of them are designed for vertical take-off and landing (VTOL), which means no runway is needed. The 12 large propellers are designed to tilt forward, which provides the aircraft with balance and multirotor-styled vertical life for take-off and landing. Terrafugia TF-X Terrafugia, based in Woburn, Massachusetts, is working on a 'flying car' called the TF-X a car with folding arms and rotors for vertical takeoff and landing. The vehicle will have a cruising speed of 200 mph (322 km/h), along with a 500-mile (805 km) flight range. TF-X will have fold-out wings with twin electric motors attached to each end. These motors allow the TF-X to move from a vertical to a horizontal position, and will be powered by a 300 hp engine. Terrafugia, based in Woburn, Massachusetts, is working on a 'flying car' called the TF-X a car with folding arms and rotors for vertical takeoff and landing. The vehicle will have a cruising speed of 200 mph (322 km/h), along with a 500-mile (805 km) flight range. TF-X will have fold-out wings with twin electric motors attached to each end The planned four-person TF-X will be semi-autonmous and use computer-controlled so that passengers can simply type in a destination before taking off. TF-X vehicles will be capable of automatically avoiding other air traffic, bad weather, and restricted and tower-controlled airspace. The vehicle will be able to recharge its batteries either from its engine or by plugging in to electric car charging stations. Volocopter The Volocopter VC200 takes to the skies using its 18 gently humming rotors and electric propulsion. It is piloted one-handedly with a single joystick, which has shown to reduce the major reason behind fatal helicopter accidents: human error. The initial two-seat design uses battery packs, with a flight-time duration of only about 20 to 30 minutes. The Volocopter VC200 takes to the skies using its 18 gently humming rotors and electric propulsion. It is piloted one-handedly with a single joystick, which has shown to reduce the major reason behind fatal helicopter accidents: human error Its inventors say it will be the most environmentally-friendly helicopter ever created. They also claim it will be the world's safest because it is unlikely to crash if a rotor fails. In April last year, the German firm embarked on a new era in urban mobility with a manned flight in the world's first certified multicopter. With a passenger in tow, The Volocopter VC200 took to the skies for a three minute voyage using its 18 gently humming rotors and eco-friendly electric propulsion. Zee This Mountain View, California, aircraft developer bankrolled by Google co-founder Larry Page says on its webpage that it is working on a 'revolutionary new form of transportation' at the 'intersection of aerodynamics, advanced manufacturing and electric propulsion.' Company officials declined to provide details about Zee's projects. A patent from 2011 emerged last year showing its designs for a flying car, and Bloomberg reported it is pursuing a 'simpler, more conventional-looking design.' A patent from 2011 for the Zee aircraft emerged last year, and Bloomberg reported it is pursuing a 'simpler, more conventional-looking design' And in October, a new design was spotted by locals in the area. The attention grabbing plane has a high pitched, electric whine, they say. In the hopes of relieving building pressures in hospitals and care homes, researchers are developing 'culturally aware' robots. The emotional machines could help care for the elderly, assisting them in taking their medications and offering them companionship. Researchers have been awarded 2 million ($2.5 million) in funding to develop the bots over the next three years. Scroll down for video In the hopes of relieving building pressures in hospitals and care homes, researchers are developing 'culturally aware' robots. The machines could help care for the elderly, assisting them in taking their medications and offering them companionship (stock image) PEPPER THE ROBOT Pepper went on sale to consumers in Japan in June 2015 and then enterprise customers, who pay for the bot on a three-year rental basis worth around $16,000 (12,188.80), the following October. MasterCard announced in May last year it is teaming up with SoftBanks Robotics and Pizza Hut Asia to launch a new commerce app for the customer service bot. In June last year the robot was installed in two Belgian hospitals. It was also recently announced that Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance will be deploying 100 Pepper robots across 80 branches in Japan to help out on the sales floor by 2017. Advertisement The project will be led by teams from Middlesex University and the University of Bedfordshire. Professor Irena Papadopoulos, an expert in trans-cultural nursing at Middlesex University, told the BBC: 'As people live longer, health systems are put under increasing pressure. 'In the UK alone, 15,000 people are over 100 years of age and this figure will only increase. 'Assistive, intelligent robots for older people could relieve pressures in hospitals and care homes as well as improving care delivery at home and promoting independent living for the elderly. But it isn't just a matter of replacing all human support with robots. Professor Papadopoulos added: 'It is not a question of replacing human support but enhancing and complementing existing care.' The machines could help care for the elderly, assisting them in taking their medications and offering them companionship (stock image) She added: 'We are starting with care homes and with people who are semi-independent living in sheltered housing, but we do believe that in the future the robots would become acceptable for people to have in their own homes.' The three-year project will involve specialist researchers from all over the world and will expand the capabilities of the Pepper robot, which is made by Softbank Robotics. The three-year project will involve specialist researchers from all over the world and will expand the capabilities of the Pepper robot, which is made by Softbank Robotics Pepper has already been shown to be useful in a range of social scenarios. Last year, the droid landed a job in Pizza Hut locations in Asia, announced a partnership with Honda's robot Asimo and will soon start selling life insurance in Japan. The mystery of the true location of the legendary city of Atlantis, which is said to have been destroyed overnight, has captured our imagination for thousands of years. Now, the discovery of large stone anchors in the Strait of Gibraltar hints the powerful Bronze Age civilisation described by Plato may have existed. A new National Geographic documentary called Atlantis Rising charts an epic search for the lost city from Santorini, Greece to the islands of the Azores, comparing theories based on literature about the enigmatic civilisation. Scroll down for video A new documentary by James Cameron has been released to understand more about the mythical city of Atlantis, pictured here as an artist's impression. The documentary looks at archaeological examples of architecture in Santorini, Greece and the islands of the Azores THE DOCUMENTARY The programme explores multiple locations in its bid to unlock the mystery of Atlantis. For example, Plato wrote that ships sailed the Atlantic stopping at the Azores and experts touched on the recent discovery of pre-Roman structures on the remote islands that suggest ancient people sailed the vast ocean thousands of years before Columbus, in keeping with the famous tale of the lost city. The documentary also travels to Donana National Park in Southern Spain, which was the subject of a previous 'Finding Atlantis' documentary. The marsh used to be an open bay adjacent to the Pillar of Hercules the ancient name given to the Strait of Gibraltar - where the anchors were discovered, suggesting it could have one been the site of the lost city. The programme also includes author Georgeos Diaz-Montexano's idea that some Atlantian refugees fled inland to wat is now Campanario, southern Spain and rock carvings in the area seem to show a record of the epic tale and its drowned port. Pointing to one of the rock etchings, Mr Diaz-Montexano said: 'You can see around three inscribed boats here with about eight to 12 oars each.' Advertisement The origins of the myth of Atlantis lies solely with Greek philosopher Plato, who referred to the Bronze Age city in two of his dialogues, 'Temaeus' and the 'Critas', in the fourth century BC. In them, he says the Atlanteans mined gold and silver which they used to decorate temples and walls, while the capital of Atlantis was a port comprised of rings of land and sea. Plato suggested the civilisation was destroyed overnight when an earthquake and tsunami struck, destroying the city's important port which was buried beneath mud. Experts featured in the new documentary, produced by Titanic director James Cameron, draw on Plato's texts in a bid to reveal the lost city's location. Filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici told IBTimes UK: 'We went back to this source and used the way he describes Atlantis as a treasure map, comparing the city's features with existing places.' They did not expect to find a complete city, but set out to discover artefacts that had survived the ravages of time and may have been washed into the Atlantic by a mighty wave, thousands of years ago. The team of scientists and marine archaeologists used advanced navigation techniques and multi spectral imaging to uncover clues about the Lost City of Atlantis, which some scholars believe to be entirely fictional. However, Bill Lange, of Woods Hole Oceanic Institution said in the documentary: 'I have no doubt there are vast areas that were once inhabited by people that are now hundreds of feet underwater.' Professor Richard Freund, University of Hartford, added: 'Plato is writing in a very specific time period, so when he says Atlantis was located at the strait of Gibraltar - he called them the Pillars of Hercules at the time - every single mariner, every single Greek reader, knew exactly where he was talking about.' Clips of the documentary, which aired on 29 January, show marine archaeologists discovering a large stone anchor in what was the Pillars of Hercules. The programme explores multiple locations documented in history in its bid to unlock the mystery of Atlantis. Pictured is one of the researchers consulting a hand-drawn map marking possible locations The anchor, which measures 83cm across and has a hole in its centre, could be evidence of docks or breakwaters at the dive site. Professor Richard Freund of the University of Hartford, said in a clip: 'It's a really amazing find. 'This anchor you can get very excited about. 'This is a 3,000, 4,000-year old anchor that is massive for a very large boat, which shows us that ancient large boats were sailing into this area 4,000 years ago.' In fact, the team discovered six of these intriguing artefacts that could date back to the Bronze Age the largest ancient anchor hoard to be found in the Atlantic near the Strait of Gibraltar. Plato wrote that ships sailed the Atlantic stopping at the Azores (pictured). As part of the documentary, James Cameron takes a closer look at the recent discoveries relating to Atlantis made in this region 'Atlantis Rising' also divers explore the seas around Santorini and around the islands of the Azores, to compare a range of theories about the enigmatic civilisation 'These anchors could be 3,500 to 4,000 years old and establish a harbour in the Atlantic, where I didn't even dare dream to find anchors,' Mr Jacobovici told Indiewire. 'If we found six on a few dives, there must be thousands out there, confirming Plato's report of a port just past the Pillars of Hercules,' he said in the documentary. The programme explores multiple locations in its bid to unlock the mystery of Atlantis. For example, Plato wrote that ships sailed the Atlantic stopping at the Azores and experts touched on the recent discovery of pre-Roman structures on the remote islands that suggest ancient people sailed the vast ocean thousands of years before Columbus, in keeping with the famous tale of the lost city. The documentary also travels to Donana National Park in Southern Spain, which was the subject of a previous 'Finding Atlantis' documentary. The marsh used to be an open bay adjacent to the Pillar of Hercules the ancient name given to the Strait of Gibraltar - where the anchors were discovered, suggesting it could have one been the site of the lost city. The researchers did not expect to find a complete city, but set out to discover artefacts that had survived the ravages of time. Pictured is the Azure Window, a limestone natural arch on the Maltese island of Gozo, and one of the sites for exploration by the film makers The researchers explored a number of areas, including Santorini, Greece, the Donana National Park and Campanario in Spain, and the Azores islands, marked on this map The programme also includes author Georgeos Diaz-Montexano's idea that some Atlantian refugees fled inland to what is now Campanario, southern Spain and rock carvings in the area seem to show a record of the epic tale and its drowned port. Pointing to one of the rock etchings, Mr Diaz-Montexano said: 'You can see around three inscribed boats here with about eight to 12 oars each.' Experts used spectral imaging to take a closer look at the etchings, revealing a horse and boat which could be interpreted to be sinking beneath a wavy line depicting the sea, as well as concentric circles, which were a feature in Plato's description of the lost city. The team of scientists and marine archaeologists used advanced navigation techniques and multi spectral imaging (pictured) to uncover clues about the Lost City of Atlantis It has previously been suggested that the present day islands of Santorini or Malta may once have been Atlantis, but neither fits with Plato's description. Mr Jacobovici told IBTimes UK that while Santorini was destroyed overnight by a volcanic eruption and was home to an advanced Bronze Age civilisation, it is not on the Atlantic side of the strait of Gibraltar, as described by Plato. While the documentary is not able to pinpoint without doubt the site of the Lost City of Atlantis, it compares archaeological examples of concentric architecture, for example, with Plato's descriptions. This led the researchers to surmise they may have been a 'mother city' of Atlantis possibly in southern Spain but the advanced civilisation spread across the Mediterranean. 'Southern Spain may have been the centre of a civilisation which spread to Malta, Santorini or all the other places we have investigated,' Jacobovici said. However, artefacts uncovered on land and sea have yet to be examined in the lab to reveal their origins, meaning some scholars who believe the Lost City of Atlantis is an allegory constructed by Plato, may not be convinced. Atlantis Rising aired on 29 January on the National Geographic channel. SEA-GOING SUPERPOWER, OR WAS PLATO PLAYING POLITICS? Atlantis was first described by the Greek philosopher Plato more than 2,000 years ago. While many believe the story is a myth created by Plato to illustrate his theories about politics, others insist it is based on a real historical disaster. According to Plato's account, written around 360BC, Atlantis was a major sea power located in the Atlantic. It was larger than ancient Libya and Asia Minor (modern Turkey) put together, and was 'the way to the other islands, and from these you might pass to the whole of the opposite continent'. His account included detailed descriptions of the island - with mountains in the north and along the coast, and a plain in the south. Its kings were descended from Poseidon - the god of sea - but their divine lineage became diluted as they mixed with mortals. By around 9600BC the island had conquered much of Western Europe and Africa and enslaved its enemies. This date would make the city nearly as old as the end of the last Ice Age and pre-dates the earliest recorded city states, found in what is now Iraq, so seems rather unlikely. After a failed attempt to invade Athens, the entire island sank into the sea 'in a single day and night of misfortune' which may have involved a volcanic eruption. Over the centuries, scholars have attempted to locate the real Atlantis - believing the account was based on a real ancient superpower. One of the theories is that Plato was describing the Minoan civilisation on Crete and the neighbouring island of Santorini which was devastated by a massive volcanic eruption around 1600BC, but others believe the islands do not fit Platos description of Atlantis location. Some believe the Atlantis myth was inspired by the Black Sea floods of around 5,000BC - an event that may have also generated the flood stories which appeared in the Old Testament. Advertisement Researchers have discovered the 'tinder' area of the brain responsible for triggering attraction and causing us to notice the opposite sex. The researchers used deep brain imaging techniques in mice including optogenetics, which uses light to stimulate particular parts of the brain. The study traced the trigger of attraction to the hypothalamus, an evolutionarily ancient structure at the bottom-center of the brain that's responsible for controlling major bodily functions such as body temperature, hunger, thirst and sexual behavior. Scroll down for video Neurons in the medial preoptic brain area seen through a 2-photon microscope attached to a live mouse The researchers at the University of North Carolina (UNC) School of Medicine examined the medial preoptic area (mPOA) of the brain - a specific set of neurons inside the hypothalamus. Previous research found the mPOA was important for social and reproductive behaviour in all vertebrate species studied from fish to human. But until now it has been unclear whether this area drives social motivation through circuit connections with reward systems in the brain. To test how this brain area works in attraction, the researchers exposed female mice to male mouse urine. When female mice were exposed to the odor of male mouse urine, a large number of the neurons in the mPOA became excited into greater activity. The researchers also found that these neurons responded more strongly to male mouse urine when females had high circulating levels of estrogen or a combination of estrogen/progesterone, which surges before the mice become fertile. By contrast, the same neurons were not excited when the mice were exposed to the odor of female mouse urine or attractive odors like food. Dr Jenna McHenry, a postdoctoral research associate at UNC and first author of the research paper published in Nature Neuroscience, said: 'This suggests that certain neurons in the brain may be specialized to prefer social rewards over nonsocial rewards, and that the processing of social cues is sensitive to circulating hormones.' To visualize the neurons in the mouse's brain researchers used tiny tubular lenses connected from their microscope to a specific area of the mouse's brain Normal microscopy techniques only allow imaging of brain cells in awake mice for brain cells that are a fraction of a millimeter below the brain's surface. But the mPOA is several millimeters deep in the brain, so to visualize those neurons the researchers had to use a special microscopy technique. Dr Garret D Stuber, associate professor of psychiatry, cell biology & physiology at UNC and leader of the study said him and his team used tiny tubular lenses connected from their microscope to the mPOA of the mouse's brain. With a technique known as two-photon calcium imaging, the scientists were able to visualize the activity of mPOA neurons in awake female mice. To enhance the accuracy of the technique, the researchers used mice that had been genetically engineered so that only their mPOA neurons could be imaged. The researchers examined the medial preoptic area (mPOA) of the brain - a specific set of neurons inside the hypothalamus. Previous research found the mPOA was important for social and reproductive behavior in all vertebrate species studied from fish to human Dr Stuber said: 'With our setup, we could image the mice a couple of times a week and each time find the same cells that we previously recorded brain activity from.' The researchers also used optogenetics to demonstrate the effect of stimulating the mPOA area. Optogenetics (from Greek optos, meaning 'visible') uses light to control neurons which have been genetically sensitized to light. It involves introducing light-sensitive proteins into cells, which when activated, can affect the cell's activity. They found that stimulating the mPOA neurons with light triggered the release of the neurotransmitter dopamine from a part of the brain called the ventral tegmental area (VTA). Dopamine helps control the brain's reward and pleasure centers. The researchers used optogenetics to demonstrate the effect of stimulating the mPOA area using light. Both male and female mice whose mPOA neurons were stimulated this way showed a preference for moving closer to mice of the opposite sex Both male and female mice whose mPOA neurons were stimulated moved closer to mice of the opposite sex. Dr Stuber said: 'On the whole, the data suggest that these mPOA neurons help drive social attraction toward a potential mate.' Stuber's team plans to follow up by applying similar imaging and optogenetics methods to the workings of the VTA. The findings also have implications for anxiety, depression and related disorders, which can be triggered or worsened in some women by shifts in hormone levels. Dr McHenry said: 'While hormone-related changes in motivation are important for mating or maternal behaviour in female mice, some atypical hormonal changes in women appear to underlie reproductive mood disorders, such as postpartum depression.' Studying these hormone-sensitive circuits that control motivational states could lead to new drugs to target these mood disorders. Artificial intelligence (AI) can diagnose illnesses, fight parking tickets, and now, AI is being to find humans love. Dating app Hinge is currently testing a virtual assistant called 'Audrey' that will act as the user's wing woman it talks to their matches and sets up a date. The technology is currently in beta, but Hinge is said to offer the service for $99 a month in bid to 'say goodbye to matching, messaging and scheduling'. Scroll down for videos Dating app Hinge is currently testing a virtual assistant called 'Audrey' that will act as the user's wing woman it talks to their matches and sets up a date. The technology is currently in beta, but Hinge is said to offer the service for $99 a month HOW DOES IT WORK? Audrey was designed to chat with a users matches and setup a date between the two. Hinge members simply select the people they are interested in via the app. 'Audrey will reach out, introduce you, and schedule a date if the feeling is mutual.' And the technology will give users return 'data and feedback along the way to help you find that perfect match.' Audrey is not open to the public, but is taking request to get on the list once it is fully released. Advertisement The dating assistant was first spotted by Nathan McAlone with Business Insider, who also received an email from Hinge that shares how Audrey will work. Hinge members simply select the people they are interested in via the app. 'Audrey will reach out, introduce you, and schedule a date if the feeling is mutual.' And the technology will give users return 'data and feedback along the way to help you find that perfect match.' Audrey is not open to the public, but is taking request to get on the list once it is fully released. Humans are starting to rely on AI for a range of things, so it may not be a surprise that we are looking to them to help with matters of the heart. A separate Japanese technology company, NTT Resonant, is inventing a robot designed to dish out love advice. The system, called Oshi-el, can show sympathy, suggest a solution to your problem and add a comment of encouragement. 'Most chatbots today are only able to give you very short answers, and mainly just for factual questions,' Makoto Nakatsuji at NTT Resonant told New Scientist. 'Questions about love, especially in Japan, can often be a page long and complicated. Hinge members simply select the people they are interested in via the app. 'Audrey will reach out, introduce you, and schedule a date if the feeling is mutual'. And the technology will give users return 'data and feedback along the way to help you find that perfect match 'They include a lot of context like family or school, which makes it hard to generate long and satisfying answers.' The researchers taught Oshi-el using 190,000 questions and 770,000 answers from the company's own forum. It still sounds somewhat robotic, with responses like: 'I can see this is a difficult time for you. I understand your feelings.' Humans are starting to rely on AI for a range of things, so it may not be a surprise that we are looking to them to help with matters of the heart. A separate Japanese technology company, NTT Resonant, is inventing a robot designed to dish out love advice It is the first AI designed to answer non-factoid questions, the researchers say. In a new paper, the researchers outline the problem of existing AI when it comes to love advice. 'They can not understand the ambiguous use of words in the questions as word usage can strongly depend on the context, e.g. the word 'relationship' has quite different meanings in the categories of Love advice and other categories,' the authors said in the paper. 'As a result, the accuracies of their answer selections are not good enough.' Another problem is 'the current methods can only select from among the answers held by QA sites and can not generate new ones' they added. To give the robot some context, Oshi-el selects and combines sentences from a database, based on the words in the question. In a new paper, the researchers outline the problem of existing AI when it comes to love advice. They say current AI cannot understand the ambiguous use of words in the questions, as word usage can strongly depend on the context 'Our evaluation shows that our method achieves 20 per cent higher accuracy in answer construction than the method based on the current best answer selection method,' the authors wrote. The researchers hope to improve on the accuracy of the algorithm, but cannot get the funding. 'It's hard to get money for love,' Dr Nakatsuji said. 'If we develop it for travel, we will be able to monetise it through hotels or restaurants.' In most species, males evolve flashy, eye-catching traits to beat male competition and grab the attention of female mates, while females are drab and less conspicuous. But in some species females including lizards, crustaceans and primates, have evolved eye-catching features too - and they haven't evolved just to win mates. New research suggests that 'female beauty' may have arisen to help females compete for higher social status or protection from predators - an idea called the 'social selection hypothesis'. Scroll down for video Female striped plateau lizards from Arizona (pictured) develop orange patches on their throats when they're ready to mate. The male lizards prefer females with darker spots as it indicates they have better quality eggs In most animals, males are the showy sex. For example, peacocks have elaborate, large feathers with iridescent eyes that they use to attract females, while female peahens are drab. Male lions have manes which help them gain the attention of lionesses. But females in some species, including crustacean, insects, lizards, fish and primates, females have eye-catching traits. For example, the female blue crab (Callinectes sapidus) has red-tipped claws that can be likened to painted nails. The deep red tips of the females' claws are attractive to male blue crabs, who look for deeper red claws in females as opposed to lighter orange ones. Female striped plateau lizards from Arizona develop orange patches on their throats when they're ready to mate. The male lizards prefer females with darker spots as it indicates they have better quality eggs. The female blue crab (pictured) has red-tipped claws that can be likened to painted nails. The deep red tips of the females' claws are attractive to male blue crabs, who look for deeper red claws in females as opposed to lighter orange ones And female long-tailed dance flies have feathery hind legs which are held alongside the abdomen in flight to accentuate abdominal size and make males think their abdomens are full of eggs. Dr Courtney Fitzpatrick, a researcher at Duke University and the co-author of the study published in the journal Evolution, said that female beauty is often overlooked, while biologists have studied male embellishments for a long time. WHAT IS SOCIAL SELECTION? Sexual selection is when traits in one gender of a species evolve to help them attract mates to reproduce. For example, peacocks have elaborate, large feathers with iridescent eyes that they use to attract females, while female peahens are drab. But social selection is a different concept, and it may help explain why some females of a certain species have evolved eye-catching traits. Social selection theory, developed three decades ago by Mary Jane West-Eberhard, Darwin's sexual selection insights by demonstrating that social competition in a variety of contexts unrelated to mating will often favor the evolution of the types of ornaments, weapons and behaviors that are not associated with mating alone. Advertisement She said that more attractive males get more girls and father more offspring because of their good looks, but it's not clear why females would evolve eye-catching traits. The extra work involved in producing and raising offspring for females means they are less likely to benefit from scoring extra males sexual partners. Females generally look for quality over quantity, whereas males do the opposite. According to the researchers, most studies assume that flashy females use their looks to 'marry up' and get the attention of higher-quality males that are more likely to be better parent. To test this assumption, Dr Fitzpatrick and co-author Professor Maria Servedio, an evolutionary Biology professor at the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill, developed a mathematical model that predicts changes in the frequency of ornamented females in a population over time. Their model showed that some males are better mates and some are pickier. Physically attractive females in the model are sometimes able to attract superior males, producing more surviving young than less eye-catching females. When these attractive females have babies, they pass on their good looks to their daughters, who also have the same advantages in attracting higher quality males, and this cycle continues from generation to generation. Female long-tailed dance flies have feathery hind legs which are held alongside the abdomen in flight to accentuate abdominal size and make males think their abdomens are full of eggs. However, the researchers say that this effect was weaker than expected. Contrary to expectation, the model shows that winning the romantic interest of picky males is not enough to explain how attractive female features become widespread - even when better-looking females are more likely to land a good catch. The results of the model support other research suggesting that female beauty doesnt evolve just to win mates. Instead, traits such as the dance flys frilly legs or the blue crabs red-tipped claws may help their bearers compete for other resources, such as social status or protection from predators. The results are consistent with an idea called the 'social selection' hypothesis, first proposed three decades ago by theoretical biologist Mary Jane West-Eberhard of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. Dr Fitzpatrick said that just because males prefer some female traits over others, it doesnt necessarily mean they evolved those traits to attract males. First they heard the loud screams coming from a nearby sleep nest early one morning then at dawn, scientists at the Fongoli chimpanzee study site discovered a horrific scene. The gruesome remains of a West African chimpanzee named Foudouko were found still bleeding hours after his death, with evidence that he had been beaten, killed, and partially cannibalized by members of his own community. While chimpanzees are known to kill rivals from other tribes, intragroup murders such as this are extremely rare, with just nine cases on record to date. Researchers say the unusual ratio of adult males to females in this particular group may have given rise to the grisly encounter, as competition to reproduce intensified. Scroll down for video The gruesome remains of a West African chimpanzee named Foudouko were found still bleeding hours after his death, with evidence that he had been beaten, killed, and partially cannibalized by members of his own community THE VICTIM Foudouko once led the group as one of its alpha males, alongside a beta male named Mamadou, and was somewhat of a tyrant, according to Pruetz. After Mamadou was injured in 2007, causing him to separate from the group for weeks and subsequently return in a lower rank, Foudouko was ostracized for their continued alliance. Foudouko was eventually kicked out of the group, and lived alone for years. With low prospective for finding a mate, Foudouko rejoined the group, where Mamadou had climbed back up to beta status, and his brother David had become alpha. While they accepted him back, some members of the group still sometimes chased him off, according to New Scientist. The researchers say Foudouko was trying to rise back up to power, a foolish move. Advertisement In a paper published to the International Journal of Primatology, the researchers detail the attack which lasted even after Foudouko was dead. There were attacks by multiple chimpanzees on his dead body, most frequently by a young adult male and an older female,' the authors wrote. The latter also cannibalized the body. Stomach-churning footage of the aftermath shows the group biting and aggressively pulling at the body. Foudoukos body was found bleeding profusely from a bite to his right foot, with a large gash on his back, a ripped anus, cracked ribs, and finger wounds from the attackers teeth as they clamped down to stretch his arms and hold him down, according to New Scientist. The researchers suspect he died of internal injuries, or bled out from his wounded foot. And, they say he was beaten with rocks and sticks long after he died, as the chimpanzees continued on to break his limbs and even ate some of his flesh. It was striking, Jill Pruetz of Iowa State University, a National Geographic Society grantee who has been studying the group since 2001, told New Scientist. The female that cannibalized the body the most, shes the mother of the top two high-ranking males. Her sons were the only ones that really didnt attack the body aggressively. In a paper published to the International Journal of Primatology , the researchers detail the attack which lasted even after Foudouko was dead. There were attacks by multiple chimpanzees on his dead body, most frequently by a young adult male and an older female' In chimp communities, there are typically more adult females than males. But at this site, which is part of the Fongoli Savanna Chimpanzee Project in Senegal, the males outnumber their potential mates at roughly two to one. This, in large part, may be the result of human activity, as females are poached to provide infants for the pet trade, New Scientist reports. Foudouko once led the group as one of its alpha males, alongside a beta male named Mamadou, and was somewhat of a tyrant, according to Pruetz. After Mamadou was injured in 2007, causing him to separate from the group for weeks and subsequently return in a lower rank, Foudouko was ostracized for their continued alliance. Foudouko was eventually kicked out of the group, and lived alone for years. The researchers suspect he died of internal injuries, or bled out from his injured foot. And, they say he was beaten with rocks and sticks even long after he died, as the chimpanzees continued on to break his limbs and even ate some of his flesh With low prospective for finding a mate, Foudouko rejoined the group, where Mamadou had climbed back up to beta status, and his brother David had become alpha. While they accepted him back, some members of the group still sometimes chased him off, according to New Scientist. The researchers say Foudouko was trying to rise back up to power, a foolish move. It was incredibly hard to watch, Pruetz said of the gruesome incident, speaking to National Geographic. I was really disturbed for about three days [afterward], as if you had a falling-out with a friend. And, Foudouko's old comrade Mamadou was observed attempting to wake the dead chimp following the attack but the chimpanzee has since been exiled, too. They may be some of the youngest stars on the red carpet. But the cast of Stranger Things proved they're already style pros as they attended the SAG Awards in Los Angeles on Sunday afternoon. Millie Bobby Brown, 12, Finn Wolfhard, 14, Caleb McLaughlin, 15, Noah Schnapp, 12, and Gaten Matarazzo, 14, supported their hit sci-fi thriller as they arrived to the elite awards show. Scroll down for video Red carpet favourite! Millie Bobby Brown wore a beautiful custom-made Emporio Armani dress and Jennifer Behr headband to the SAG Awards in Los Angeles on Sunday Looking sharp! Finn Wolfhard, Caleb McLaughlin, Noah Schnapp, and Gaten Matarazzo supported their hit sci-fi thriller as they arrived to the elite awards show Millie hit a fashion high note in a custom made Emporio Armani dress, which she revealed to E! that Giorgio Armani had sketched the design himself. 'Giorgio Armani sketched it for me,' she said, to the surprise of her co-stars. The cast also revealed they had been trained on how to speak with the media. 'We've done maybe like two years of training on not to say anything,' Finn said. 'It's called media training', he added. Attention to detail: Millie hit a fashion high note in a custom made Emporio Armani dress, which she revealed to E! that Giorgio Armani had sketched the design himself Polished: Brown's dress featured a belted waistline and lace sleeves Asked who was the most likely to spoil the show, Caleb insisted, 'I'm the most hardest to break.' Winona Ryder looked edgy and incredible in a long black dress that flashed some cleavage. Rounding off the cast was Joe Keery and Natalia Dyer, who play each other's love interests on the show. Natalia dazzled in a fitted fiery red gown with pink hibiscuses on the neckline, while her co-star sharpened up in a black tuxedo. Look who's here! Winona Ryder looked edgy and incredible in a long black dress that flashed some cleavage By her side! Winona's beau Scott Mackinlay Hahn proudly posed beside his SAG nominated wife Wow: Rounding off the cast was Joe Keery and Natalia Dyer, who play each other's love interests on the show Joining the two was Shannon Purser, who plays bookish Barbara 'Barb' Holland. The actress put herself worlds apart from Barb as she dropped jaws in an ultra glamorous black dress with long tulle skirt. Also representing the cast of Stranger Things was actor Matthew Modine, who plays Dr. Martin Brenner. The height of glamour! Joining the two was Shannon Purser, who plays bookish Barbara 'Barb' Holland Co-stars! Natalia and Joe were joined by Stranger Things co-star Charlie Heaton Teamwork! The co-stars made some time for a snap on the red carpet Matthew, 57, was joined by his daughter Ruby Modine, 26, who looked the height of glamour in a glossy champagne off-the-shoulder gown. It's a big night for the cast of Stranger Things, who have been honoured with three nods in some very important categories. Winona Ryder, 45, is going up against Millie in the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series category. A family affair! Matthew Modine, 57, was joined by his daughter Ruby Modine, 26, who looked the height of glamour in a glossy champagne off-the-shoulder gown It's an honour! It's a big night for the cast of Stranger Things, who have been honoured with three nods in some very important categories The entire cast have also been nominated for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series - which they won. The ensemble includes Gaten Matarazzo, Fine Wolfhard, Natalie Dyer, David Harbour, Charlie Heaton, Matthew Modine, Joe Keery, and Caleb McLaughlin. Stranger Things is about a woman (played by Ryder) living in a small town in Indiana in 1983 who launches an investigation after her son goes missing. Congratulations: The entire cast have also been nominated for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series Picture perfect: Brown blew kisses towards the camera She's a star: Crowds parted for rising starlet Millie as she waved to crowds A series of extraordinary mysteries are stumbled upon which involve secret government experiments, supernatural forces, and a very unusual little girl. The Screen Actors Guild created its own awards ceremony in 1995. The gong handed out to winners is a statuette of a nude male figure brandishing both a mask of comedy and a mask of tragedy; it is called 'The Actor'. It is one of the only award shows where actors are honoured by their peers; the ceremony recognizes achievements in acting alone. Cameo appearance! The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt star Tituss Burgess stole some of the spotlight with his bright blue suit as he joined the boys for a group snap The first honours given out in SAG's inaugural ceremony included industry staples Tom Hanks (Forrest Gump) and Jodie Foster (Nell), for lead roles in films. However it wasn't until 1996 that the show began handing out an award for best ensemble, a category that is now seen as one of the most accurate predictors for the best picture award at the Oscars. The first ensemble to win the prize was Apollo 13, another film featuring Tom Hanks; however, this year the awards favorite was snubbed despite a critically acclaimed turn in Clint Eastwood's Sully. Head to head: Winona Ryder, 45, is going up against Millie in the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series category They're fans! John Legend and his wife Chrissy Teigen posed with the cast, an image which the singer captioned, 'Stranger Things happening backstage at the #SAGAwards!' Only one film since 1996 has gone on to win best picture at the Academy Awards without first being nominated in SAG's best ensemble category. Only Mel Gibson's Braveheart managed it 20 years ago. However, this is simply being nominated in the category. The statistics for those ensembles that win at the SAG awards is a bit different. Suits them! The stars showed off their dapper style that night Proud winners: The stars grinned from ear-to-ear as they showed off their latest awards They're all winners! The cast enthusiastically showed off their trophies for the Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series The Screen Actors Guild has handed out the ensemble award 21 times (SAG only began giving out ensemble awards in 1996), but of the films that were awarded the honour only 11 went on to land best picture at the Oscars (52%). Still, actors, the largest group in the Academy of Motion Pictures, hold considerable sway. (SAG, though, is much larger, with about 160,000 members, compared to about 1,200 actors in the academy.) Nominees are selected by separate movie and TV nominating panels, each comprised of more than 2,000 randomly selected SAG members. Sunday night marks the 23rd annual ceremony for the Screen Actor's Guild. Aww: Noah got a little emotional after the cast's big win as he embraced Millie backstage Practically family: Schnapp also shared a warm embrace with Winona, his on-screen mother A picture is worth a thousand words: The young stars checked out a snap of their victorious moment Big night: Millie celebrated with a hug from her co-star Finn Riveting: Stranger Things is about a woman living in a small town in Indiana in 1983 who launches an investigation after her son goes missing Russell Crowe and Terri Irwin have denied any romantic rumors with each other in the past. But it seems he is happy to publicly show his admiration for the 52-year-old mother of two. On January 23, national hugging day, the Wildlife Warrior shared a picture of herself and late husband Steve Irwin, wishing her followers a happy national hugging day. Scroll down for video 'You're amazing': Russell Crowe tweeted Terri Irwin praising her for keeping his legacy alive a decade on from his death The Hollywood actor, also 52, retweeted the blonde beauty saying: 'Terri... you have kept his [Steve Irwin's] love and ambitions relevant... you're amazing.' A source told New Idea: 'Russell is done hiding his love with Terri and wants to shout it from the rooftops.' They added that it was the Academy Award winner's way of praising Terri for keeping Steve's legacy alive a decade on from his death. Admiration: The Academy Award winning actor called Terri amazing for keeping her late husband's ambitions relevant Just friends: In the past a representative for Terri said the two were just good friends 'It was his way of telling the world he adores her.' 'Russell has so much respect for Steve, and the kids, so this post was all about being delicate as well as confirming his feelings for Terri,' the source added. In the past a representative for Terri revealed to Daily Mail Australia that the pair were just good friends. 'There is no romantic link at all between Terri and Russell. Once again, these reports are completely false,' they said. Wildlife warriors: The source said Russell has so much respect for Steve and her kids, 'this post was all about being delicate as well as confirming his feelings for Terri' A spokesperson from Australia Zoo told Daily Mail Australia: 'Terri and Russell are no romantic links at all and Russell still supports Australia zoo and Steve's legacy.' Daily Mail Australia has reached out to Russell Crowe's management for comment. In December there were rumours the pair were romantically involved and planning a wedding in 2018. 'Terri and Russell are not dating and are certainly not planning a wedding,' an Australian Zoo representative said. In the past Terri Irwin has been linked to Australian screen legend Paul Hogan. Her representative branded the claim as 'completely false', while Paul's management said they had 'never heard such a thing'. Last year, Karl Stefanovic made international headlines for pointing out the wardrobe double standards for men and women. And on the Today show on Monday, Karl's co-host Lisa Wilkinson called out the issue again, live on air. The 57-year-old journalist was speaking to co-star Richard Wilkins during a live cross, when he revealed he was wearing the exact same suit at the Screen Actors Guild Awards, which he wore at the G'Day USA event on Saturday. Scroll down for video 'We officially hate you!' On the Today show on Monday, Lisa Wilkinson called out the wardrobe double standards for men and women (seen L is Karl Stefanovic and R, Richard Wilkins) Speaking on behalf of herself and co-star Sylvia Jeffreys, she said they were shocked at how quick and easy it was for Richard to pack for his trip overseas, thanks to the outfit repeat. 'Youre now telling us that you can actually wear, as a bloke, the same outfit today, that you wore yesterday to a ceremony?' 'We officially hate you!,' she said, making Karl laugh. So nice he wore it twice! Richard Wilkins is seen here at the G'Day USA event in Los Angeles on Saturday, with Renee Bargh. He's wearing the same suit he wore during the live cross on Today Being honest! Richard, 62, said he and Karl always chose to stick to black and white at Hollywood events and they can get away with it (seen at the G'Day USA event at the weekend) Richard, 62, said he and Karl always chose to stick to black and white at Hollywood events and they can get away with it. 'Well as Karlos and I always say before these kind of events, we say "bro, what suit do you reckon you're going to wear, what colour suit do you think you might wear?," Richard said. Chiming in, Karl remarked sarcastically: 'Lets go with the black suit Dickie, what colour shirt do you think you should wear?' When Richard said they always choose classic white, Karl asked him about what colour tie he'd wear. It would be less fuss: Lisa - appearing in disbelief - added: 'In my next life, I'm coming back as a bloke' 'I reckon, let's break out loose this year, let's go with a black tie,' Richard said, admitting he made a fashion faux-pas wearing his suit with blue shoes. After making Karl and Lisa laugh, he admitted it only takes 'blokes' a short five minutes to pack. Lisa - appearing in disbelief - added: 'In my next life, I'm coming back as a bloke.' Karl previously wore a blue 'knock-off' Burberry suit on Today for a whole year, to prove a point over sexism and the wardrobe double standards between men and women. He particularly wanted to highlight the double standards women face in the TV industry. Making a point: Karl previously wore a blue 'knock-off' Burberry suit on Today for a whole year (seen), to prove a point over sexism and the wardrobe double standards between men and women After Karl revealed his everyday workwear - teaming his suit with a white shirt and different colour ties - he said he had not received one complaint about his repetitive attire. But he said Lisa regularly copped criticism about the way she looked. He said no one had even noticed his choice of attire, while women got the brunt of everything, from the colour they wore to thousands of tweets about something wrong they said. 'I'm judged on my interviews, my appalling sense of humour on how I do my job, basically. Whereas women are quite often judged on what they're wearing or how their hair is ... that's (what I wanted to test),' Karl told Fairfax Media at the time. His experiment also sparked a media frenzy worldwide, with interest coming from websites like the BBC and New York Post. The suit was later auctioned off for charity, with proceeds going to White Ribbon Australia. La La Land is nominated for 14 Oscars which includes the film's stars, Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling, both of whom are up for Best Actress and Best Actor, respectively. And while the movie is clearly a hit, news has emerged that Emma Watson and Miles Teller were 'originally tapped as leads in the movie,' and are now 'raising hell with their agents for not securing the roles for them,' according to the New York Post. However Watson and Teller - both repped by CAA - lost the roles for being 'too demanding,' a Hollywood insider said in the report. (DailyMail.com contacted spokespeople for both stars, but did not receive an immediate response.) Missed opportunity: Emma Watson and Miles Teller were 'originally tapped as leads' in La La Land, and are now 'raising hell with their agents for not securing the roles,' according to a new report by The New York Post One movie insider said, 'Teller was offered $4 million to star in La La Land, but he wanted $6 million.' According to the report, 'Watson was offered the lead female role, but she initially wouldnt commit.' 'Then she began making all these crazy demands, like rehearsals for the film must be done in London for a film called La La Land!' The insider added: 'They jumped through hoops to make it work with her, but she just didnt feel the film was right for her.' Teller didn't seem to agree with the reports, dubbing them 'alternative facts' in a tweet Some sources insist Watson stepped away to do Disneys live-action Beauty And The Beast film. The British actress Watson, who is best known for playing Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter films, reportedly began her negotiations when she was represented by rival agency WME, but signed with CAA in December. Teller and Watson are said to be furious they missed out on the role as the film has won a string of gongs and are expected to scoop a number of Academy Awards later this month. 'Now that its winning all the awards, theyre freaking out and looking for someone else to blame.' Huge hit: 'Now that its winning all the awards, Watson and Teller are freaking out and looking for someone else to blame.' La La Land is nominated for 14 Academy Awards Reps for Teller, Watson and CAA did not comment. However Teller didn't seem to agree with the reports, dubbing them 'alternative facts' in a tweet. Meanwhile, when producers finally cast Emma Stone, Ryan Gosling 'jumped at the chance to work with her again.' Both actors are nominated for Oscars for their role in the hit musical. When Stone received a nomination for Best Actress in a Leading Role for her performance in La La Land, she admitted it was 'beyond any of her wildest imaginings.' She said recently: 'What a morning. I am so grateful for this honor and I'm so happy to share this feeling with my La La Land family. The greatest part of life is connecting with people, and I love the deeply talented, kind and passionate people I was lucky enough to work with on this movie.' 'I'm also overjoyed that the movie has connected with audiences in the way it has, and that it's hopefully bringing a kick in their step to those who watch it. This is beyond any of our wildest imaginings and we can't wait to celebrate together.' They were college sweethearts and both have successful acting careers. And Sterling K Brown packed on a PDA with his wife, Ryan Michelle Bathe on the red carpet for the SAG Awards on Sunday. The 40-year-old actor planted a kiss on Ryan - also 40 - as he could barely take his eyes off her as she dazzled in a stunning Gemy Maalouf gown. Scroll down for video Close couple: Sterling K Brown packed on a PDA with his wife, Ryan Michelle Bathe on the red carpet for the SAG Awards on Sunday Sterling - who is nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series for his role as Randall Pearson in This Is Us - looked handsome in a well-cut tux. Ryan - who has a recurring role in the NBC drama series - epitomised classic Hollywood glamour in an asymmetric ivory gown with white lace overlay. No wonder Sterling couldn't keep his hands to himself, as she looked exceptionally beautiful with an elaborate updo drawing attention to her stunning features. Puckering up: The 40-year-old actor planted a kiss on Ryan - also 40 - as he could barely take his eyes off her as she dazzled in a stunning Gemy Maalouf gown The couple met at Stanford University and married in 2007. He is known for playing Christopher Darden in The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story, for which he won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited Series or Movie. It was announced earlier this month that he will be joining the upcoming Marvel superhero movie Black Panther. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the 40-year-old actor will play a character called NJobu, who is reportedly a figure from main character TChalla's past. Looking good: Sterling - who is nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series for his role as Randall Pearson in This Is Us - looked handsome in a well-cut tux Classic Hollywood glamour: Ryan - who has a recurring role in the NBC drama series - wore an asymmetric ivory gown with white lace overlay Pretty: No wonder Sterling couldn't keep his hands to himself, as she looked exceptionally beautiful with an elaborate updo drawing attention to her stunning features Happy together: The couple met at Stanford University and married in 2007 The Screen Actors Guild created its own awards ceremony in 1995. The gong handed out to winners is a statuette of a nude male figure brandishing both a mask of comedy and a mask of tragedy; it is called 'The Actor'. It is one of the only award shows where actors are honoured by their peers; the ceremony recognizes achievements in acting alone. The first honours given out in SAG's inaugural ceremony included industry staples Tom Hanks (Forrest Gump) and Jodie Foster (Nell), for lead roles in films. However it wasn't until 1996 that the show began handing out an award for best ensemble, a category that is now seen as one of the most accurate predictors for the best picture award at the Oscars. The first ensemble to win the prize was Apollo 13, another film featuring Tom Hanks; however, this year the awards favorite was snubbed despite a critically acclaimed turn in Clint Eastwood's Sully. Only one film since 1996 has gone on to win best picture at the Academy Awards without first being nominated in SAG's best ensemble category. Only Mel Gibson's Braveheart managed it 20 years ago. However, this is simply being nominated in the category. The statistics for those ensembles that win at the SAG awards is a bit different. The Screen Actors Guild has handed out the ensemble award 21 times (SAG only began giving out ensemble awards in 1996), but of the films that were awarded the honour only 11 went on to land best picture at the Oscars (52%). Still, actors, the largest group in the Academy of Motion Pictures, hold considerable sway. (SAG, though, is much larger, with about 160,000 members, compared to about 1,200 actors in the academy.) Nominees are selected by separate movie and TV nominating panels, each comprised of more than 2,000 randomly selected SAG members. Sunday night marks the 23rd annual ceremony for the Screen Actor's Guild. Advertisement The British have reigned supreme with SAG nominations, and ensured they turned out in force at the annual ceremony held at Los Angeles' Shrine Auditorium on Sunday. With a nomination for Best Actress, it was no wonder The Crown star Claire Foy looked in great spirits as she cuddled up to co-star Matt Smith in a black Ermenegildo Zegna suit at the ceremony, but she wasn't the only one to watch on the evening. Also tipped for SAG success were glamorous Game Of Thrones gal pals Sophie Turner and Maisie Williams, whilst Downton Abbey's Michelle Dockery ensured she wouldn't be overlooked in a gorgeous multicoloured gown. Scroll down for video Cosy co-stars: With a nomination for Best Actress, it was no wonder The Crown star Claire Foy looked in great spirits as she cuddled up to co-star Matt Smith at SAG Awards on Sunday, but she wasn't the only one to watch on the evening Claire looked phenomenal at the event, opting for an unique semi-sheer gown that hinted at her incredible figure whilst remaining demure. The garment featured an embellished pink collar and black tulle full skirt that was layered over a pink slip. She finished off the look by sweeping her golden locks into a chic chignon bun. Sizzling siren: Also tipped for SAG success were glamorous Game Of Thrones gal pals Sophie Turner and Maisie Williams, whilst Downton Abbey's Michelle Dockery ensured she wouldn't be overlooked in a gorgeous multicoloured gown Game Of Thrones stars Sophie and Maisie may be best friends off-screen and sisters on, but the pair opted for completely contrasting looks on the evening. Sophie oozed glamour in a scarlet gown that featured a risque thigh high split that flashed her enviably lean legs. Maisie, however, channelled old Hollywood, and was a vision of beauty in a floor length dusty pink gown that clung to her incredible frame whilst remaining demure. Fit for a Queen! Claire looked phenomenal at the event, opting for an unique semi-sheer gown that hinted at her incredible figure whilst remaining demure Dressed to impress: Matt looked incredibly dapper in a black Ermenegildo Zegna suit and black loafers Bright-eyed: Claire's large peepers dazzled as she posed for photographs Congratulations: Claire looked in fine spirits as she clutched her award Sheer joy: The star cut a cute figure in her decorative sheer dress Cute: Claire glanced over her shoulder and produced an innocent smile Her moment: Claire was thrilled as she took to the stage to accept her statuette Close display: John Lithgow place a friendly arm around Claire as they smiled for photos Michelle Dockery was another British star on the red carpet, and she will be hoping to scoop a SAG for Best Ensemble for her work in Downton Abbey. But whilst the fate of the BBC drama remains unknown, she ensured she'd be definitely receive praise for her outfit on the evening. Clad in a multicolored gown that sheathed her lithe figure, the 35-year-old actress was a vision of beauty as she posed for snaps. A Game Of Gowns: Sophie Turner turned heads with her glamorous crimson floor length dress which featured a risque thigh high split and offered a look at her enviably lean legs and towering silver heels Blonde bombshell: Sophie oozed glamour by wearing her golden tresses in loose waves, whilst her plump pout was painted a matching crimson hue to complement her glamorous gown Featuring a square neckline, the gown cinched in at her tiny waist before flaring out into a dazzling floor length skirt. Ensuring she wouldn't overpower her ensemble, her chestnut coloured locks were swept back in a bouffant style that allowed her flawless features to shine through. Complementing her bright gown, the star wore a slick of red lipstick on her plump pout and accessorised with gold earrings. Pretty in pink: Maisie Williams dazzled in a floor length dusty pink gown that skimmed over her stunning figure Pretty in pink: Game Of Throne's star Maisie Williams dazzled in a baby pink gown as she posed for pictures with fellow British actor Ben Barnes Michelle wasn't the only British star on the red carpet on the night, as rising star Millie Bobby Brown looked lovely in a scarlet gown. The Stranger Things Star, 12, donned a Grecian style dress with a lace sleeve as she headed into the event. Clearly having a great time, the talented pre-teen posed up a storm for the cameras. Gorgeous: Michelle Dockery ensured she'd be definitely receive praise for her outfit as she stormed the red carpet at the 2017 SAG Awards on Sunday All eyes on her: Clad in a multicolored gown that sheathed her lithe figure, the 35-year-old actress was a vision of beauty at the Shrine Auditorium on the evening Two's company: Michelle took to the stage with James Marsden on the evening Dazzling: Michelle commanded attention as she posed inside the theatre by the stage Having a giggle: Michelle had a laugh with her Downton co-star Laura Carmichael as she dazzled in a floral gown Floral fancy: Laura looked funky in a Nineties-inspired floral gown with a flattering pillar shape Celebs gathered at The Shrine Auditorium to toast another year in film and television at one of the few awards ceremonies where actors are judged by their peers. The annual show is often seen as the best predictor for the Oscars, with most categories falling right in step with the Academy Awards. The British are reigning supreme so far this awards season as a host of UK talent were nominated for top prizes. Nude ambition! Best Actress nominee Emily Blunt dazzled in a flesh coloured gown adorned with beads and sequins Cute couple: Emily was joined by her American husband John Krasinksi on the evening Here's looking at you: Emily and her beau stared at the crowds as they headed down the red carpet It's set to be a battle royale with regal dramas as The Crown, Downton Abbey and Game of Thrones all among the UK-made shows up for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series. The trio will go up against Netflix hit Stranger Things, for which English child actress Millie Bobby Brown is nominated, and controversial series Westworld. As well the Ensemble gong, The Crown bagged acting nominations for British actress Claire Foy and John Lithegow. GOT also bagged nods for Peter Dinklage for his turn as Tyrion Lannister and for Outstanding Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Television Series. Sizzling in stripes: Naomie Harris - nominated for her role in Moonlight - looked fantastic in a cream co-ord with scarlet stripes Sassy in sequins: Gwendoline Christie dazzled in a glittering black jumpsuit All eyes on her: The statuesque beauty commanded attention in her glittering sequinned jumpsuit and boots In the film stakes Emily Blunt and Hugh Grant represent the Brits flying the flag. Emily may have missed out on a Golden Globe nomination for Girl on a Train, however, the SAG board voted for her join the stars up for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role. She will compete with Amy Adams for Arrival, Natalie Portman for Jackie, Stone for La La Land, and Meryl Streep for Florence Foster Jenkins. Meryl's co-star Hugh Grant flies the flag for the UK in the Male Actor in a Supporting Role category alongside Dev Patel for Lion. The Brits face stiff competition from Mahershala Ali for Moonlight, Jeff Bridges for Hell or High Water and Lucas Hedges for Manchester By The Sea. Here come the Brits! Rising star Millie Bobby Brown looked lovely in a scarlet gown as she walked the red carpet Looking lovely: Millie wore a cute beaded hairband at the awards and wasn't afraid to strike a few poses on the carpet Loving life! Millie playfully stuck her tongue out for the cameras at the awards British raised Andrew Garfield lands a nod in the Best Male Actor countdown for his turn in Mel Gibson's Hacksaw Ridge alongside Casey Affleck for Manchester By The Sea, Gosling for La La Land, Viggo Mortensen for Captain Fantastic and Denzel Washington for Fences. Meanwhile, Naomie Harris will compete with Viola Davis (Fences) Nicole Kidman (Lion), Octavia Spencer (Hidden Figures) and Michelle Williams (Manchester By The Sea) for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role. While the SAG awards only honour categories in acting, the best ensemble award category often offers a hint as to what film will snag best picture at the Oscars. Glittering in gold: Thandie Newton dazzled in a gold sequinned gown that appeared to be Westworld inspired with its print Best of British: Dev Patel looked dapper in a fitted navy suit whilst Game Of Thrones star Nathalie Emmanuel dazzled in an off the shoulder beaded dress that cut just above the ankle Cute couple: : Anna Eberstein put on a leggy display in a black velvet mini dress with gold panels as she cuddled up to partner Hugh Grant - who is nominated for his role in Florence Foster Jenkins The Screen Actors Guild has handed out the ensemble award 21 times (SAG only began giving out ensemble awards in 1996), but of the films that were awarded the honour only 11 went on to land best picture at the Oscars (52%). Still, actors, the largest group in the Academy of Motion Pictures, hold considerable sway. (SAG, though, is much larger, with about 160,000 members, compared to about 1,200 actors in the academy.) Individual film SAG nominees have historically aligned about four-out-of-five with Oscar acting categories. Nominees are selected by separate movie and TV nominating panels, each comprised of more than 2,000 randomly selected SAG members. Emily Blunt and proud husband John Krasinski glowed on Sunday at the SAG Awards in Los Angeles. The 33-year-old actress looked stunning in a long nude gown with plunging neckline. Emily was nominated in the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role category for her work in The Girl On The Train. Scroll down for video Cute couple: John Krasinski escorted his wife Emily Blunt on Sunday to the Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles She was competing against Amy Adams, Natalie Portman, Emma Stone and Meryl Streep in the category. John, 37, looked dapper in a black suit with black skinny tie. The London native wrapped an arm around his waist as they arrived at the awards ceremony at the Shrine Auditorium. John earlier took to Instagram and posted a photo of the couple on the way to the awards show. Proud husband: John shared a snap on Instagram of the couple headed to the awards show Hollywood stars: Emily and her actor husband John have been married since 2010 Award nominee: Emily was nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role Tender moment: John leaned into his leading lady on the carpet 'So proud of this nominee! Brought to you by @jennstreicher @streicherhair @highheelprncess #SAGawards,' John wrote in the caption for his more than 560,000 followers. The couple recently sold their retreat in Ojai, California for $2.4 million. Emily wanted a gap year in London so their children Hazel, two, and six-month-old Violet could get accustomed to life in London. Lovely gown: The actress looked stunning in a long nude gown with intricate embroidery Good times: John laughed while escorting his wife to the awards ceremony The actress has been filming Gnomeo & Juliet: Sherlock Gnomes. Emily also will play Mary Poppins in a remake of the musical due out in 2018. John and Emily also will team up to voice characters for the animated film Animal Crackers. Fan favorite: The Devil Wears Prada star was competing against Amy Adams, Natalie Portman, Emma Stone and Meryl Streep Voice star: Emily has three animated projects in the works She just took a helicopter ride over Costa Rica, where she's on vacation with her boyfriend and family. But Kylie Jenner came back down to earth in time to share another sexy bikini selfie on Sunday. The 19-year-old reality television star flaunted her cleavage in a skimpy black two piece. Scroll down for video Working that cleavage: Kylie Jenner came back down to earth in time to share another sexy bikini selfie on Sunday The busty make-up entrepreneur was sure to make sure she showed as much of her chest as possible, holding the camera high with her other hand keeping her hair to one side. The youngest of the Kardashian-Jenner sisters showcased her slim waist and shapely hips in the strappy swimwear. She playfully pretended to peel off her bikini in a Snapchat shared by her half-sister Kourtney Kardashian. Sexy: She playfully pretended to peel off her bikini in a Snapchat shared by her sister Kourtney Stunning figure: She showcased her waist and flat tummy She has been generously sharing her skimpy outfits with social media followers since landing in the Central America country. On Saturday she shared a snap in a red and black Louis Vuitton triangle string bikini. And on Friday she marked the start of her trip by posing in her smalls on Snapchat. She flaunted her figure in a revealing grey underwear set in the mirror. Wild thing: Kourtney added animal filters and more clothing than her half-sister Undressed: She has been generously sharing her skimpy outfits with social media followers since landing in the Central America country Revealing: She flashed sideboob and a lot of flesh All in the angles: The star kept the camera high so she could give an eyeful of her cleavage Fringe benefits: Later Kylie wore a dress which barely contained her assets, in her own Snapchat feed Stunning: Kim Kardashian was looking relaxed in her own posts as she teamed sparkles with a baseball cap Nice view: The 19-year-old Lip Kit founder looked perfectly done up with flawless makeup as she went up in a chopper earlier on Saturday Revealing: Kylie Jenner shared her sexiest selfie yet, on Saturday, as she showcased her curves in a teeny string two-piece Sexy: Never knowingly un-logoed, the make-up entrepreneur looked very busty in the skimpy Louis Vuitton red and black bikini She's away with boyfriend Tyga and Tyga's son King Cairo, four, from his relationship with Blac Chyna. Blac now has a daughter with Kylie's half brother Rob Kardashian. Kylie and Tyga are on vacay with her momager Kris Jenner, sisters Kourtney and Kim and her children North and Saint in Costa Rica. Mirror selfie: On Friday she marked the start of her trip by posing in her smalls on Snapchat Cameras for the family's reality show Keeping Up With The Kardashians are following the group around, as they film the next season of the ever-popular show. On Saturday the reality TV family went on a new adventure that took them into the friendly skies. Kim, Khloe and Kourtney Kardashian as well as Kylie Jenner took to Snapchat to shares images from their helicopter ride in Costa Rica where the clan is vacationing. Zip lining: The family was also seen wearing helmets as they rode a bus. Khloe and Kourtney were in front with Kylie and Tyga behind them. In the last row was Kris Jenner and her beau Corey Gamble The family was also seen wearing helmets as they rode a bus, most likely heading zip-lining which is popular in the country. Khloe and Kourtney were in front with Kylie and Tyga behind them. They were joined by Kris Jenner - who didn't appear to be dressed for the adventure - and her beau Corey Gamble. All woman: The reality star is far past her teen years as she is not afraid to show her fans what she is made of on social media. Here she is on Instagram on Saturday Australia's Foreign Minister, Julie Bishop stepped out for the 2017 G'Day Black Tie Gala in Hollywood over the weekend. Mingling with A-list celebrities such as Nicole Kidman and John Travolta, the 60-year-old looked radiant and ageless as she donned a black sequin frock. Her toned arms and svelte physique was on full display as her gown clung to her slim frame. Scroll down for video Looking buff! Australia's Foreign Minister, Julie Bishop stepped out for the 2017 G'Day Black Tie Gala in Hollywood over the weekend The politician made a statement with flawless makeup, a pink lip and thick black lashes. She wore her short blonde locks out and paired her ensemble with a simple pair of pearl and diamond drop earrings. Julie could barely contain her excitement at meeting Nicole Kidman, beaming brightly as she gazed up at the statuesque beauty with adoration. Ladies' night! Nicole Kidman mingled with Julie Bishop at the 2017 G'Day Black Tie Gala in Hollywood over the weekend She was also spotted catching up with John Travolta as she posed at the media wall with the stellar actor. She later went onto to pose for a group photo with John and Nicole alongside honoree David Hill, Keith Urban and Julie's partner David Panton. Last month Julie cancelled her attendance at the Portsea Polo event. Excited? Julie could barely contain her excitement at meeting the actress, beaming brightly as she gazed up at the statuesque beauty with adoration Julie attended the event in 2016 with David - and billed taxpayers $2716. It was revealed raft of high-profile Australians had signed an open letter calling on Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to immediately establish a federal anti-corruption watchdog. The letter was signed by more than 40 signatories including former WA premier Geoff Gallop and Australian Council of Trade Unions president Ged Kearney, along with prosecutors, lawyers and academics. The signatories say the independent watchdog will help restore integrity, accountability and trust in the federal parliament and public service. 'The public is sick and tired of the lack of accountability revealed by repeated scandals involving federal politicians and others,' the letter says. Star studded cast: Julie was also spotted catching up with John Travolta as she posed at the media wall with the stellar actor Star studded: Honoree David Hill, musician Keith Urban, Australia's Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, Nicole Kidman, John Travolta and David Panton posed for a photo 'It's time to create an independent anti-corruption watchdog to investigate and expose corruption and serious misconduct at the federal level, including among federal parliamentarians.' It came after the former health minister resigned from the front bench on Friday following revelations she had bought property on the Gold Coast during a taxpayer-funded trip. Mr Turnbull has flagged a new independent authority will be established to monitor work expenses of federal politicians, a move supported by minor parties and crossbenchers, to make MPs' taxpayer-funded expenses more transparent. She's known for her seductive sense of style. But Sofia Vergara ditched the clinging fabrics for a girly new look at the SAG Awards on Sunday night - in what she dubbed her 'ballerina' dress. 'I feel like a ballerina, an old ballerina but a ballerina,' she joked of the tight strapless top with flared net skirt, which she teamed with towering Charlotte Olympia heels. Scroll down for video 'I'm a ballerina!' Sofia Vergara unveils girly new look at SAG Awards (but jokes big breasts mean she always looks like 'a hooker') Genetic inheritance: Sofia said that her large breasts meant she always looked like 'a hooker' Kicking up her heels! Sofia's new look was a big change for the actress Still, while she delighted in her change of style, Sofia was under no illusion that it made her look sweet and innocent. After being shown old footage of herself at the award's show - in which she said her large breasts meant she always looked 'like a hooker' - she insisted that hadn't changed. 'Sorry dad!' she laughed, blaming her paternal grandmother for her ample 32F cleavage. Prom time! 'I feel like a ballerina, an old ballerina but a ballerina,' she joked of the tight strapless top with flared net skirt Sofia, 44, attended the awards show in Los Angeles with her husband of one year, Joe Manganiello. The two gazed into one another's eyes as they posed on the red carpet, clearly besotted with one another. 'This is 44': Sofia posed with fellow 'immigrant' Thandie Newton at the SAGs Cuddling the co-stars: With her castmate Ed O'Neil Date night: She said of her marriage to Joe Manganiello, 'I still feel like a newlywed' And Sofia said of their marriage: 'I still feel like a newlywed.' But when E!'s Giuliana Rancic questioned Sofia on how their relationship worked, she insisted: 'I'm perfect. And he does nothing that bothers me.' Sofia's show Modern Family was nominated for a SAG Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series. Still newlyweds! Sofia, 44, attended the awards show in Los Angeles with her husband of one year, Joe Catching up: The actress bumped into her Modern Family co-star on the red carpet In 2015, American actress Lindsay Lohan hung up on Australia radio hosts Kyle and Jackie O during a phone interview. And on Monday, the Mean Girls star, 30, was back to her old tricks as she again pulled the plug on their chat live on air on KIIS FM. After being offended by a question about her different home bases around the world, Lindsay eventually hung up when being quizzed about the last time she cut their chat short. Scroll down for video 'She's done it again': Lindsay Lohan (seen in February last year) hung up on Kyle and Jackie O during a chat on KIIS FM on Monday, after doing it while being interviewed in 2015 'Oh she's done it again, she's done it again!,' Shockjock Kyle said after the line ended, to a giggling Jackie O. While Jackie tells Kyle to call the star back, he said he was reluctant to. 'No, forget it, I know what she's doing, she's doing it again...it's Lindsay, she doesn't get offended by s**t,' he said. Did they offend her? Seen are Australian radio stars Kyle Sandilands and Jackie O It happened after Lindsay talked about her bond with Oprah Winfrey and how much she adores her. Kyle made mention of Oprah's eight-part documentary series on Lindsay - where she was caught hanging up on Kyle and Jackie O in 2015, by passing her phone to her assistant to end the call. During Monday's chat, Kyle told Lindsay just before she hung up: 'I learned that when a celebrity hangs up on you during an interview, it can sometimes be on purpose...I don't know if you remember, but you were talking to us on that show,' Kyle started, before she hung up. Shortly before, Lindsay had also snapped at Jackie O after she asked if she owns houses in her bases of Dubai, New York and London. 'What kind of question is that?' Shortly before hanging up on Monday, Lindsay had also snapped at Jackie O after she asked if she owns houses in her bases of Dubai, New York and London 'What kind of question is that?,' Lindsay said. She carried on however, saying she doesn't own property in each location. After hanging up, it seems Lindsay was just pulling Kyle and Jackie O's leg. Laughing, Lindsay said: 'You guys set it up! Were great together.' 'We should have our own show in Dubai!,' she joked. Gotcha! After hanging up, it seems Lindsay was just pulling Kyle and Jackie O's leg In 2015, Lindsay cut short her chat with the pair after they made mention of American actor Tom Cruise. 'I remember reading a story and there were all these rumours going around about Tom Cruise and how, you know, the way he meets girls is his agent calls up someone in particular and sets up someone on a date,' Jackie said at the time. 'Does that ever happen to you, where someone calls your agent?' Lindsay's publicist then told the pair they had to 'wrap up' the chat. Not having it: In 2015, Lindsay cut short her chat with the pair after they made mention of American actor Tom Cruise (seen in London in November) The redhead - who is known for films including The Parent Trap and Freaky Friday - has recently made international headlines with reports stating she's converted to Islam. She's recently been spotted wearing headscarves and recently took a short social media hiatus and deleted all her Instagram images. Just two days ago however, she returned online and shared two shots of her meeting with with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. She also has on her Instagram bio, the Arabic quote 'alaikum salam,' which translated into English reads 'peace be unto you.' However she told Kyle and Jackie O on Monday that the quote has been on her profile for 'two years.' Her Downton Abbey castmates join her in a SAG nomination for best ensemble cast in the period drama series. And Michelle Dockery, 35, reunited with Laura Carmichael, 30, at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles on Sunday night. Truly shedding any hint of Lady Mary Talbot, the actress looked striking in her multicolored gown that sheathed her lithe figure. Scroll down for video All the colours of the rainbow: Michelle Dockery (left) reunited with her former Downton Abbey co-star Laura Carmichael (right) at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday The brunette was a vision of beauty as she posed for snaps in the floor-length striped number. Made up of panels of pink, peach, yellow and black, the square neckline gown cinched in at her tiny waist before flaring out into a dazzling floor length skirt. A slit in the dress allowed Michelle to showcase her toned pins; and the black strap heels she wore on her pedicured feet. Gorgeous: Michelle Dockery ensured she'd be definitely receive praise for her outfit as she stormed the red carpet at the 2017 SAG Awards on Sunday Lady Mary, is that you? There was absolutely nothing post-Edwardian about Michelle Dockery's gown as she sauntered up the red carpet ahead of the annual Hollywood ceremony Just a slither: A slit in the dress allowed Michelle to showcase her toned pins; and the black strap heels she wore on her manicured feet Brunette beauty: Ensuring she wouldn't overpower her ensemble, her chestnut coloured locks were swept back in a bouffant style that allowed her flawless features to shine through Her chestnut coloured locks were swept back in a bouffant style that allowed her flawless features to glow through. Complementing her bright gown, the star wore a slick of red lipstick on her plump pout and accessorised with gold earrings. Laura, too, looked incredible wearing a black spaghetti strap dress which had colourful flowers embroidered throughout. She wore her blonde locks in delicate curls as she posed for snaps and completed her look with a slick of ruby red lipstick. Blooming lovely: Laura looked perfectly confident as she posed solo on the red carpet Fancy seeing you here: The girls appeared thrilled when they caught up with one another at the event Colourful creations: The girls posed in their bright outfits with their arms around one another Fun: They appeared to be having a blast as they giggled the night away New pal: They posed for snaps with Modern Family star Eric Stonestreet (centre) Buddies: Laura and Michelle famously both starred together in Downton Abbey (left and centre) and may well be joining forces for the highly-anticipated movie The British are reigning supreme so far this awards season as a host of UK talent were nominated for top prizes. It's set to be a battle royale with regal dramas as The Crown, Downton Abbey and Game of Thrones all among the UK-made shows up for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series. The trio will go up against Netflix hit Stranger Things, for which English child actress Millie Bobby Brown is nominated, and controversial series Westworld. As well the Ensemble gong, The Crown bagged acting nominations for British actress Claire Foy and John Lithgow. A vision... Michelle looked stunning as she glided through the ceremony Hand it over! The British beauty dished out an award Holding on: She was in very good company as she strutted on stage with James Marsden GOT also bagged nods for Peter Dinklage for his turn as Tyrion Lannister and for Outstanding Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Television Series. In the film stakes Emily Blunt and Hugh Grant represent the Brits flying the flag. Emily may have missed out on a Golden Globe nomination for Girl on a Train, however, the SAG board voted for her join the stars up for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role. She will compete with Amy Adams for Arrival, Natalie Portman for Jackie, Stone for La La Land, and Meryl Streep for Florence Foster Jenkins. Meryl's co-star Hugh Grant flies the flag for the UK in the Male Actor in a Supporting Role category alongside Dev Patel for Lion. After shooting down claims that he once had a fling with Katie Price, Simon Cowell reportedly faced the embarrassment of public mockery on Sunday. Shortly after The Sun On Sunday's report broke, Simon's Britain's Got Talent co-star David Walliams shared the front page on Twitter, writing: 'I look forward to discussing this story in depth with @SimonCowell today on camera @BGT.' And, according to The Sun, he made good on his promise, mocking the media mogul in front of a live capacity audience at the London Palladium as they sat through auditions. Scroll down for video Mock: David Walliams, left, reportedly mocked Simon Cowell, right, in front of a live audience at the London Palladium on Sunday, over a report that he'd had a tryst with Katie Price Denied: While an ex-boyfriend of Katie Price claims the tryst happened a number of years ago, representatives for both stars vehemently denied the allegations The newspaper reports that when one hopeful told the judges that he would be performing a song about a mistake he made 10 years ago, David said to Simon: 'Was that the same mistake you made with Katie Price?' The Sun reports that Simon appeared shocked and shook his head 'disapprovingly' in reaction to the cheeky comedian's taunt. Ahead of Simon's appearance on the show, a representative for the star was forced to deny claims made by Katie Price's ex beau Leandro Penna that the glamour model had a liaison with him while she was dating the Argentinian. Cheeky! As the story broke, David announced his plans to taunt Simon at their planned Britain's Got Talent taping later that day Talent hunt: Simon was joined by David Walliams, Amanda Holden, Alesha Dixon and Ant & Dec at the London Palladium for the latest series of Britain's Got Talent on Sunday His own man: He employed his distinctive fashion taste for the high-profile occasion, wearing a white jumper with lengthy blue jeans and dark shoes When asked for comment on the claims, a spokesman for Simon said: 'These are very historic rumours, going back at least five years. 'For example, she came to his 50th birthday party in 2009 but thats it. Simon and Katie have long been friends - and nothing more.' Model Leandro, 31, alleged that Katie, 38, previously dismissed his accusations that she cheated on him after staying out all night at a 'business meeting' with the X Factor boss. Speaking to The Sun on Sunday, Leandro said he believed Simon had an affair with Katie after reading texts on her phone - before finally confronting her after she spent a night out with him. It's a dog's life: On Saturday, Simon wore the same outfit for the launch of the 2017 talent hunt, arriving at the same venue with his beloved pooches Squiddly and Diddly Winter warmers: The cute dogs wore pink and blue knitted coats Playful: Simon ducked and smiled as he made his way into the Palladium Untrue: Katie Price was forced to deny she bedded Simon after her fiance Leandro Penna confronted her over worries she was having an affair with music mogul The Argentinian model claims that he ended his brief engagement to the model in 2012 after she came home 'drunk' after a 'business meeting' with the SYCO boss. Following her evening out with Simon, Leandro confronted his fiancee about her suspected relationship with the music mogul - prompted by the discovery of earlier texts. 'I asked her if she'd f***ed Simon and she said, "No",' the TV presenter explained. A blazing argument reportedly followed the accusations with Katie quizzing Leandro on why he thought that, before he admitted that he'd discovered texts between them. The reason? The model, 31 (Left), alleges the glamour model was forced to deny his accusation's she cheated after staying out all night at a 'meeting' with the X Factor boss (Right) At odds: Leandro (seen with Katie in August 2012) said he believed Simon was bedding Katie after reading texts on her phone before confronting her after she spent a night out with him Addressing their split, Leandro said his belief that Katie had cheated on him with Simon forced him to end it. 'It's the reason I split up with her,' he told the newspaper, before claiming that the texts he found were proof enough after her meeting with the record boss. Alleging that their night together was premeditated, Leandro said: 'It was clear this was not just a business meeting,' adding that his fiancee was 'dolled up' in a provocative manner. 'I asked her if she'd f***ed Simon and she said, "No"': The model and TV presenter claims Katie denied the affair before he told her he'd discovered text messaged between the pair 'It's the reason I split up with her,' he told the newspaper, before adding that the texts he found were proof enough after her meeting with the record boss. 'These are very historic rumours, going back at least five years. Simon and Katie have long been friends - and nothing more': Simon's spokesperson told the MailOnline MailOnline has contacted representatives of both Katie and Leandro for comment. Katie first met the Argentinian hunk following the end of her marriage to second husband, Alex Reid. The couple met at The Oscars in 2011 before embarking on a rollercoaster year-long relationship, announcing their engagement in 2012 before splitting in October of that year. The second Mr. Price: Katie first met the Argentinian hunk following the end of her marriage to second husband, Alex Reid (pictured together in 2010) Back then: The couple met at The Oscars in 2011 before embarking on a rollercoaster year-long relationship, announcing their engagement in 2012 before splitting in October of that year At the time of their split Katie wrote on her official website: 'Leo and I have had a lovely fun time for a couple of years, we will always feel deep affection for each other, but sometimes relationships just run their course. 'Pressures of work on different continents, natural demands of family ties, and careers, have meant we have spent a huge amount of time apart even when we were in the same country. This meant it was difficult for the relationship to move forward. 'Accordingly we've mutually decided to call it a day, but we really wish each other nothing but the very best and will remain best of friends, whoever he eventually settles down with will be a very lucky girl.' He might be a 69-year-old member of the 'Strolling Bones' but Ronnie Wood has taken to late fatherhood with aplomb. The previously hard-living Rolling Stones guitarist is raising the most adorable twin daughters, as seen from this picture his theatre producer wife, Sally Humphreys, 39, shared with fans this weekend. 'Out and about with the Ronettes,' she wrote next to the picture of eight-month-old Gracie and Alice, who wore stylish patterned headwear to keep out the cold. 'The twins love their turbans.' The previously hard-living Rolling Stones guitarist is raising the most adorable twin daughters, as seen from this picture his theatre producer wife, Sally Humphreys, 39 Almost a year after giving her maiden speech, Michelle Mone, 45, is planning to grace the Lords with her presence again. 'Writing my first speech supporting apprenticeships,' the underwear seller known as Baroness Bra declared online at the weekend. 'Everyone deserves a chance in life.' Lady Mone of Mayfair, as she styled herself after being elevated to the peerage by David Cameron, rather undermined her hard-working credentials by posting the tweet from Dubai, that plutocrats' playground. Phil Collins' Lily reveals a tattooed back Some stars boast about their trophies during Hollywood awards season, but Lily Collins is keen to show off her tattoos. The 27-year-old daughter of pop star Phil Collins wore a back-baring green gown at the Producers Guild Awards over the weekend which displayed her two upper-back 'art works'. She has 'Love Always and Forever' inked between her shoulder blades and, below that, an image of a nude woman sitting on a lily pad, which she had done during a trip to South Korea last summer. She also has three other tattoos: on her wrist, her foot and her ribs. 'A beautiful keepsake from an incredibly memorable Korean adventure,' she has said of her lily pad tattoo. Couldn't she have just bought some postcards? The 27-year-old daughter of pop star Phil Collins wore a back-baring green gown at the Producers Guild Awards James Bond star Daniel Craig has been married to Oscar winner Rachel Weisz for more than five years, so let's hope he's learned how to pronounce her surname. 'In America, they say 'Weiss', 'Wise', 'Wooz', 'Waz',' wails the actress. 'I would still love to change the W to a V, so people say it right. I'm childish about it. I want Veisz!' Apple Tree Yard Rating: Suits Rating: BBC1's Apple Tree Yard staring Emily Watson and Mark Bonnar (pictured) is 'dismally slow', writes Christopher Stevens Apple Tree Yard (BBC1), the Sunday night thriller sold to us by the Beeb as a polished, sexy bite of crisp drama, turns out to be rotten at the core. Like a Golden Delicious blighted by damp and maggots, it had a promising waxy shine on the outside, but is now revealed as a dark, distasteful mess under the skin. Not since the crime series Broadchurch fell apart so disastrously has a TV blockbuster promised so much and delivered such dreadful sludge. Its dismally slow. Passages of tense inactivity in a drama can build suspense, but many scenes here were downright moribund characters said the same things over and over, sitting on park benches or walking very slowly. At one stage we were reduced to watching a printer churn out pages. It was the only thing on screen that didnt look terminally depressed. Apple Tree Yard's treatment of rape was irresponsible and could have done with someone with knowledge of trauma counselling or the law to advise on it But much worse was the shows treatment of rape. Thats a dangerous subject for a Sunday night as producers should know from the uproar provoked by Downton Abbey three years ago when ladys maid Anna was vilely assaulted. Before tackling this topic, the BBC ought to have been completely confident of its handling. Every aspect of the story and its potential impact should have been scrutinised. It failed utterly to do this. You have to wonder whether anyone with any knowledge of law or trauma counselling even looked at Apple Tree Yard before it was broadcast. Emily Watson plays Yvonne, a 50-something scientist and mother in a stagnating marriage, who embarks on an affair with a stranger (Ben Chaplin). In the final scene last week, she was beaten and raped at an office party by a colleague called George Selway (Steven Elder). Selway has guessed shes unfaithful to her husband as he saw her sending texts at the party. Were expected to believe that this is a compelling reason for Yvonne to keep the rape a secret and not report it to the police. She is supposed to be a highly respected, well-connected professional. She would surely expect the police to take her report very seriously. Instead, she hung around outside the station like a frightened teenager who darent tell anyone about her abusive boyfriend. Perhaps Yvonne was in shock, you might say. But a week later she was insisting that her rapist must never be prosecuted because that would besmirch her own legacy as a scientist. Her name would be dragged through the mud. What irresponsible nonsense for the BBC to peddle. Her identity as a rape victim would not be reported: thats a legal fact. Nor would her reputation be damaged by a sexual assault. To suggest she had no choice but to keep silent is shameful. The show should have been followed by a clear-cut declaration that viewers should dismiss every word they had just heard. The plot was rubbish in other ways. When her rapist started stalking her, Yvonne begged her secret agent boyfriend to sort him out. She was brave enough to eviscerate the hostess of a dinner party, in front of all her friends and guests, for being un-PC but when a weasel in specs leered at her, she had to barricade herself into her house. And when the boyfriend went round to sort out Selway, he parked right outside the perverts house. Surely theyre taught better than that in spy school? Suits, staring Megan Markle (left) and Patrick J Adams (right) is unashamedly trashy, it may look like Mad Men but it feels like Neighbours, says Christopher Steves Meanwhile in law school, royal girlfriend Meghan Markle was fretting about her legal exams, in Suits (Dave channel), and whether she would pass the character and fitness assessment. Prince Harry seems to think so. Harrys not watching for the clever dialogue or subtle characters, because that isnt Suits if its high quality legal drama you want, find a box-set of The Good Wife, which is ten times better. But who cares about quality? This show is unashamed trash, the sort of guilty pleasure to watch with a glass of gin or a tub of ice cream. Its not just Harry... the Queen Mum would probably have loved it too. Suits might look like Mad Men but it feels like Neighbours. When characters arent talking, they stand in profile and stare nobly into the middle distance. Grandeur, melodrama and soap ideal training for the Royal Family. They recently moved to Bali together. And at the weekend Megan Marx, 27, and girlfriend Tiffany Scanlon, 30, were spotted shopping for underwear at Victoria's Secret. The couple were seen packing on the PDA as they shopped for new panties at the store. Scroll down for video Saucing it up! At the weekend Megan Marx, 27, and girlfriend Tiffany Scanlon, 30, were spotted shopping for underwear at Victoria's Secret Looking good! Megan showcased her toned physique in a beige skirt and red crop top, while her lover Tiffany flaunted her lithe pins in white denim Daisy Dukes and a khaki T-shirt Megan showcased her toned physique in a gold and beige striped skirt and red crop top, while her lover Tiffany flaunted her lithe pins in white denim Daisy Dukes and a khaki green sport T-shirt. The girls decided to test a few perfumes, before heading to the underwear section, where they rummaged through various different coloured panties. Tiffany settled on a pair of nude undies which she inspected before getting her girlfriend's seal of approval. Heating things up: Later the blonde reality star found a hot pink pair which seemed to appeal to Megan Testing out: The girls decided to test a few perfumes, before heading to the underwear section, where they rummaged through various different coloured panties Later the blonde reality star found a hot pink pair which seemed to appeal to Megan. Tiffany was then seen heading with Megan to the counter with her credit card in hand along with her chosen panties. While they waited for the items to go through, the couple indulged in some serious affection and gazed longingly into each other's eyes. Getting the right pair: Tiffany rummaged around for the perfect pair Maybe these? Megan had a good look too Megan recently relocated to Bali to begin a new life with Tiffany, joining her afterwards whom she met on The Bachelor last year. Since going public with her relationship with fellow reality contestant Tiffany, Megan has had no qualms about talking about her sex life. Or how about these? Tiffany eyes up a sheer pair of undies Tiffany was then seen heading with Megan to the counter with her pink credit card in hand along with her chosen panties 'I was a good little Christian girl and look at me now,' the 27-year-old joked on Friday's KIIS 1065 Kyle and Jackie O Show, revealing that 'it's not the first time she's 'been with women.' When asked by radio co-host Kyle Sandilands as to whether her relationship with Tiffany is her first lesbian experience, she stated: 'No it's not.' 'I've been with women before [meeting Tiffany], so it's not the first time. I was a good little Christian girl and look at me now,' the blonde bombshell said with a laugh. Megan revealed that her parents who left the religion prior to when she did, are nothing but supportive of her romantic decisions. Not her first experience: When asked by radio co-host Kyle Sandilands as to whether her relationship with Tiffany is her first lesbian experience, she stated: 'No it's not' Going strong: Megan and Tiffany confirmed their romance at the Maxim Hot 100 party in Sydney last November 'My parents are very, very supportive and very happy for me. I'm a very lucky girl,' the Maxim cover girl gushed. Megan and Tiffany confirmed their romance at the Maxim Hot 100 party in Sydney last November. Speaking to Daily Mail Australia, Tiffany confessed that the pair fell in love during a holiday in Bali, Indonesia in June. 'While we were in the show, it was just a friendship. It probably wasn't until we were in Bali together that it was like ''Oh, this is more'',' said Tiffany. Island love: Speaking to Daily Mail Australia, Tiffany confessed that the pair fell in love during a holiday in Bali, Indonesia in June She's an awards show veteran. And Amy Adams had one of her biggest supporters on her arm as she attended the SAG Awards in Los Angeles on Sunday. The actress, 42, cosied up to her husband Darren Le Gallo, who she married in 2015 after over a decade together. Scroll down for video His leading lady! Amy Adams had one of her biggest supporters on her arm, her husband Darren Le Gallo, as she attended the SAG Awards in Los Angeles on Sunday Amy looked incredible as usual in a plunging black gown that clung to her physique. The actress brought some major glam to her otherwise sophisticated and chic dress with a silver choker necklace along with a pair of earrings and a bracelet. She wore her fiery red locks scraped across her head in a sophisticated hair style. Amy brought out her beautiful light blue eyes with ample amounts of mascara, and she touched up her complexion with pink blush and lipstick. Classically chic: Amy looked incredible as usual in a plunging black gown that clung to her physique Her husband, meanwhile, showed off his suave and sophisticated side in a black tuxedo with bow tie. Amy and Darren married in 2015 and the couple have six-year-old daughter Aviana Olea Le Gallo. Amy has been nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role for her role in Arrival - an award she lost out to La La Land star Emma Stone. Love story: The couple married in 2015 after over a decade together Preened to perfection! She wore her fiery red locks scraped across her head in a sophisticated hair style The actress has received glowing reviews for her role of Louise Banks, a linguist tasked by the military to interpret an alien language. Yet the star did not receive an Oscar nomination, and the snub 'disappointed' the film's director Denis Villeneuve. Denis, 49, was thrilled to find out he had been nominated for Best Director and that the movie had received seven more nods, including one for Best Picture, but was upset to see that Amy didn't make the cut. Huge achievement: Amy has been nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role for her role in Arrival He told People: 'It was so strange. When they announced, at one point we were like, I think, already five nominations or something like that, so we were like popping the champagne... 'When I saw that she was not [nominated], it was such a big disappointment, because she's the soul, she was my muse. I owe her everything for Arrival.' Denis admitted to having mixed emotions at learning he had been nominated as a result of Amy being left out from the line-up. Leading ladies! Adam cosied up to Meryl Steep, who has also been nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role for her role in Florence Foster Jenkins And producer Shawn Levy echoed his sentiment and praised Amy's 'sanguine graciousness' despite not receiving a nomination herself. He told the magazine: 'The first call I got that morning was from Amy. Her sanguine graciousness, her firm pride in what we did together as a filmmaking unit, was so elegant, and gracious, and strong. So I'm aspiring to that grace.' The film's cast and crew will find out the fate of the movie when the Academy Award winners are revealed at the ceremony in Los Angeles on February 26. Out of this world: The actress has received glowing reviews for her role of Louise Banks, a linguist tasked by the military to interpret an alien language She's the Hollywood child actress who recently worked with refugees in Turkey. And Lindsay Lohan, who debuted a bizarre accent in November when she spoke to reporters with an international twang, is holding onto her new speech pattern. The 30-year-old was interviewed by Kyle & Jackie O on KIIS FM on Monday, where she slipped in and out of her culturally confused delivery. Scroll down for video Global citizen: Lindsay Lohan, who debuted a bizarre accent in November when she spoke to reporters with an international twang, is holding onto her new speech pattern The American film star was at her outspoken best when asked by Jackie O about how she lives between three major cities. 'When you say you're based in Dubai, and also London and New York, do you own houses in all these locations or do you stay in hotels each time you visit?' In a feigned intercontinental tone, Lindsay retorted: 'What kind of question is that?' Direct: The American film star was at her outspoken best when asked by Jackie O about how she lives between three major cities 'A very intrusive one!' said Kyle, as he rushed to her aid. 'No, I don't own houses in these locations. Whenever I've spoken to you guys I've been very honest about my charity work, in Syria and in India,' she answered. 'It's smarter for me to be based in the UAE, because I found a lot of support with my company here,' she added. Cosmopolitan: The 30-year-old was interviewed by Kyle & Jackie O on KIIS FM on Monday, where she slipped in and out of her culturally confused delivery Kyle inquired about how she deleted her Instagram account earlier this month, which had read 'Alaikum salaam,' which means 'Peace be unto you' in Arabic. 'If you guys in Australia really cared about me, you would have noticed that was there for two years,' she said regarding the phrase being featured on her profile. Jackie then mentioned how there had been speculation she had converted to Islam. 'Life is speculative, you know that,' she mysteriously replied. Culturally fluid? Kyle inquired about how she deleted her Instagram account earlier this month, which had read 'Alaikum salaam,' which means 'Peace be unto you' in Arabic In a possible nod to her changed accent, Lindsay described how she drove to Amsterdam from Brussels, where she filmed her latest movie The Shadow Within, after suicide bombings took place at Brussels Airport in March last year. 'At the end of the day, that was a good learning experience,' she offered. 'Before you go, give us "God bless you" in Arabic,' Kyle requested of her. 'Inshallah,' she replied, which translated into English actually means 'God willing'. Claire Foy and John Lithgow were honoured by their contemporaries at Sunday night's Screen Actor's Guild Awards for their show-stopping turns in The Crown. Hot off her Golden Globe win for portraying the young Queen Elizabeth II, Claire scooped the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series in Los Angeles on Sunday. Foy, 32, was still flustered as she took hold of her statuette following the win by her American co-star John Lithgow, 71, for his portrayal of Prime Minister Winston Churchill in the drama created by Peter Morgan. Scroll down for video Congratulations! Claire Foy and John Lithgow were honoured by their contemporaries at Sunday night's Screen Actor's Guild Awards for their show-stopping turns in The Crown Lithgow was honoured with the Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series after losing out in the Best Supporting Actor Series, Limited Series or Television Film category at the Golden Globes. In her acceptance speech, Claire thanked her friend and co-star Matt Smith, who plays Prince Philip, telling him she loved him. 'Thank you for making this job a joy and making me laugh,' she told the audience. The pair had arrived together for the ceremony posing for photos on the red carpet. Best actress: Claire won for her leading role as Queen Elizabeth II Cheerleader-in-chief: Her co-star Matt Smith, who plays Prince Phillip, jumped to his feet with joy when her name was announced and was the first to congratulate her Co-stars: In her speech, Foy, 32, thanked Smith 'for making this job a joy and making me laugh' and telling him that she loved him Flying the flag: The British pair had arrived together for the ceremony at LA's Shrine Auditorium Fit for a Queen! Claire looked phenomenal at the event, opting for an unique semi-sheer gown that hinted at her incredible figure whilst remaining demure Double joy: American actor John Lithgow was honored with the SAG Award for his role as Prime Minister Winston Churchill in The Crown Her fan: He was spotted enjoying a joke with Foy during the televised event and backstage following his win he told reporters she was the main reason he had accepted the part While The Crown lost out to Netflix stable mate Stranger Things for the best ensemble in a TV series, Foy and Lithgow's wins were warmly greeted by their co-stars. The Shrek star acknowledged on stage that he would never have thought of casting himself as Churchill. He thanked the 'magnificent cast of about 50 wonderful English actors' saying 'these are the people who have delivered me up to this platform.' Sizzling sirens: British actresses Sophie Turner and Maisie Williams brought plenty of glamour to the red carpet, while Downton Abbey's Michelle Dockery ensured she wouldn't be overlooked in a gorgeous multicoloured gown Gorgeous: Michelle couldn't be missed as she stormed the runway Sizzling in stripes: Naomie Harris - nominated for her role in Moonlight - looked fantastic in a cream co-ord with scarlet stripes Here come the Brits! Rising star Millie Bobby Brown looked lovely in a scarlet gown as she walked the red carpet And backstage he gushed about Foy, saying she was the main reason he decided to accept the role. 'Claire was in the first sentence I heard about this project. I said 'yes' when I heard Claire. I have many actor friends in London who have worked with Claire and the word lovely keeps coming up,' the 71-year-old said. While she may have picked up some of the most prestigious awards in the film industry, Claire revealed before the ceremony the unusual place she likes to store her trophies. Speaking before the event, she said: 'In my toilet, not actually in my toilet but in my downstairs toilet. Nude ambition! Best Actress nominee Emily Blunt dazzled in a flesh coloured gown adorned with beads and sequins Floral fancy: Laura Carmichael looked funky in a Nineties-inspired floral gown with a flattering pillar shape 'You can't put it anywhere noticeable, because everyone would be like, 'Oh yeah, showing off".' The British reigned supreme with SAG nominations, and ensured they turned out in force at the annual ceremony. UK-made shows The Crown,Downton Abbey and Game of Thrones all battled it out for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series. The trio went up against Netflix hit Stranger Things, for which English child actress Millie Bobby Brown was nominated, and controversial series Westworld. GoT also bagged nods for Peter Dinklage for his turn as Tyrion Lannister and won the Outstanding Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Television Series category. Did President Obama try to start a war with Russia before January 20? The Obama administration and careerists within the intelligence community who are repulsed at the prospect of a President Trump someone who plans from the outset to hold people accountable were very busy laying political landmines for him ahead of his Jan. 20 inauguration. One of the biggest was laid by the president himself. Obama appears to have done all he could to either sabotage any chance Trump has at actually producing better relations with Russia, or make it so that one of the first things the billionaire-turned-politician will have to do is engage the U.S. military against Russian forces. As reported by Breitbart, Obama ordered U.S. forces to Poland, which borders Ukraine, to the southeast, and the Baltic nations of Belarus and Lithuania, to the east and northeast, respectively. These nations were once part of the Soviet Union and harbor sizable Russian populations. In addition, Poland butts up against the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, a city and region that still belongs to Mother Russia. Obama sent 3,000 U.S. troops to Poland, which admittedly welcomed the move, prompting Russia to respond by deploying sophisticated S-400 anti-aircraft missiles around the capital of Moscow. (RELATED: Keep up with all U.S. military actions and deployments at NationalSecurity.news) The UKs Daily Mail, quoting the Russian Defense Ministry, reported further: The SAM combat squads of the Moscow Region aerospace forces have put the new S-400 Triumph air defense missile system into service, and have gone on combat duty for the air defense of Moscow and the central industrial region of Russia. The main task of the anti-aircraft missile troops of the Russian Aerospace Forces is air defense and protecting vital state, military, industry and energy facilities, as well as the Armed Forces troops and transport communications, from aerospace attacks. Such troop deployments are not made spontaneously or in haste, short of a legitimate national security emergency (like the build-up of enemy forces on a border or an outright attack on U.S. forces). So two things are more likely: 1) Obama approved this troop movement months ago in anticipation of Hillary Clinton winning in November and continuing his policies of provoking Russia; or 2) He did so to antagonize Russia on his way out the door, leaving Trump holding the bag. Either way, its a problem that the Trump team will have to deal with almost immediately. Trump and appropriate incoming administration personnel have also been briefed already on what the Pentagon is doing, whats coming up and what has already been approved. Trump and his defense/national security team are probably already working on alternative plans for de-escalating tensions with Moscow not because Trumps a Vladimir Putin stooge like the insane Leftist Democratic Party claims, but because its the right thing to do. There is no reason to be pushing Russias buttons other than to antagonize Putin for some geopolitical reason that has nothing to do with hacking the U.S. election. The globalist cabal Obama belongs to obviously appears intent on starting something with Russia, when in fact the better play would be to improve relations with Moscow as a way to counter a rising China. (RELATED: What else will Obama do to provoke World War III? Find out at Collapse.news) Before exiting the White House, Obama appears to have done all he could to antagonize China, as well. As noted by Reuters, both China and Russia are objecting to the U.S. deployment of THAAD (Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense) missiles to South Korea, ostensibly as a means of countering North Korean ballistic missiles. Moscow and Beijing are aware that THAAD can also be used to counter their ICBMs in the region. What if Mexico allowed Russia to place troops south of our border? What if Cuba decided to do so? That would be no different than what Obama has just done in Poland, given the nations proximity to Kaliningrad, if nothing else. These actions threaten our interests, our security, Putins spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said. Especially as it concerns a third party building up its military presence near our borders. Its not even a European state. J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for Natural News and News Target, as well as editor of The National Sentinel. Sources: Breitbart.com TheEconomicCollapseBlog.com Reuters.com And the award for cutest couple goes to... Jerry O'Connell and his wife of ten years Rebecca Romijn certainly looked to be gunning for king and queen of the red carpet prom at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday night. The hot couple shared flirtatious looks with each other while posing up for photos at the annual event, where actors celebrate their peers. Scroll down for video Adorable: Jerry O'Connell and his wife of ten years Rebecca Romijn certainly looked to be gunning for king and queen of the red carpet prom at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday night Jerry, 42, looked absolutely besotted with his 44-year-old bombshell wife. However, the duo were not the only ones looking smitten on the carpet. William H. Macy and Felicity Huffman put on an adorable display, before Macy won Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series for Shameless. Cute: The hot couple shared flirtatious looks with each other while posing up for photos at the annual event, where actors celebrate their peers Still got it: William H. Macy and Felicity Huffman put on an adorable display, before Macy won Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series for Shameless Endurance: The happy couple are celebrating 20 years of marriage this year, a feat in divorce addled Hollywood The happy couple are celebrating 20 years of marriage this year, a feat in divorce addled Hollywood. While Modern Family's Ty Burrell and his wife Holly also put on a very loved up display. The Burrell's have been married for 17 years, tying the knot in 2000. Cuddled up: While Modern Family's Ty Burrell and his wife Holly also put on a very loved up display PDA: Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban certainly were vying for cutest couple as they nuzzled each other on the red carpet Of course, Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban certainly were vying for cutest couple as they nuzzled each other on the red carpet. The actress and country music star have been married for 11 years. The Screen Actors Guild created its own awards ceremony in 1995. The actress and country music star have been married for 11 years Smooch! Ariel Winter and Levi Meaden upped the PDA stakes quite a bit The gong handed out to winners is a statuette of a nude male figure brandishing both a mask of comedy and a mask of tragedy; it is called 'The Actor'. It is one of the only award shows where actors are honoured by their peers; the ceremony recognizes achievements in acting alone. Nominees are selected by separate movie and TV nominating panels, each comprised of more than 2,000 randomly selected SAG members. Sunday night marks the 23rd annual ceremony for the Screen Actor's Guild. They've made no attempt to discourage rumours of an off-screen romance. Stranger Things stars Charlie Heaton and Natalia Dyer, who enjoy more than a little tension onscreen, arrived to the Screen Actors Guild Awards together on Sunday night. The duo looked close as they posed up together, before the entire cast of the Netflix show won for TV Best Ensemble. Scroll down for video Not doing yourself any favors: Stranger Things stars Charlie Heaton and Natalia Dyer, who enjoy more than a little tension onscreen, arrived to the Screen Actors Guild Awards together on Sunday night The 20-year-old actress wore a skintight red dress with pink accents around her neckline. While 22-year-old Heaton opted for a classic tuxedo as she sported some dark shades. Just a couple weeks ago the English actor was seen with his arm around Natalia as they left LAX to shoot the second season of Stranger Things in Atlanta. Gorgeous: The 20-year-old actress wore a skintight red dress with pink accents around her neckline Just two days later he posted a snap to Instagram of his own feet wearing her high heels with the caption: '@nattyiceofficial Need my converse back!' The post certainly seemed to confirm what many fans were thinking, however the two have not officially made any comment on their relationship status. The Screen Actors Guild created its own awards ceremony in 1995. Love triangle: Joe Keery, who plays a love rival on the Netflix show, was third wheeling at the ceremony The gong handed out to winners is a statuette of a nude male figure brandishing both a mask of comedy and a mask of tragedy; it is called 'The Actor'. It is one of the only award shows where actors are honoured by their peers; the ceremony recognizes achievements in acting alone. Nominees are selected by separate movie and TV nominating panels, each comprised of more than 2,000 randomly selected SAG members. Sunday night marks the 23rd annual ceremony for the Screen Actor's Guild. She may only be 16 but already this actress is proving she is a fashion and social force to be reckoned with. Yara Shahidi showed she can compete with the best of them when it comes to red carpet fashion at the Screen Actors Guild Awards. The 16-year-old perfectly tread the fine line between age appropriate and sensationally stylish in Los Angeles, California, on Sunday. Scroll down for a full list of SAG Award winners Style star: Yara Shahidi showed she can compete with the best of them when it comes to red carpet fashion at the Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles, California, on Sunday The Black-ish star wore a Naeem Khan creation that brought some playful lines and colours to the red carpet. Yara's dress featured purple, green, blue, yellow and pink sequined stripes that ran horizontal across the sheer black organza skirt and in an arrow pattern on the dress' high neck top. Embracing the fun nature of her gown, the star made the most of the A-line skirt spinning around on the carpet every chance she got. And with each spin, the star's smile grew bigger. Designer duds: The Black-ish star wore a Naeem Khan creation that brought some playful lines and colours to the red carpet Perfect in pattern: Yara's dress featured purple, green, blue, yellow and pink sequined stripes that ran horizontal across the sheer black organza skirt and in an arrow pattern on the dress' high neck top Yara accessorized the statement making dress with a black woven Onna Ehrlich clutch and a Swarovski bangle. Making sure to not detract from the gown, Yara kept the rest of her look simple wearing her hair slicked back. Yara's fun look and big smile comes despite President Trump's immigration ban hitting home for the young star. Twirl it out: Embracing the fun nature of her gown, the star made the most of the A-line skirt spinning around on the carpet every chance she got Having her say: The 'proud Black Iranian' took to Instagram to speak about what the President's immigration ban means to her The executive order bars citizens of seven countries including Iran from entering the United States for the next 90 days, suspends the admission of all refugees for 120 days and bars Syrian refugees until further notice. Yara's mother is African-American and Native Choctaw while her father is Iranian American. On Saturday Yara took to Instagram to speak about what the ban means to her. Everyone's here: Yara's co-stars joined her on the red carpet including Anthony Anderson, who was nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series - won by William H. Macy The 16-year-old wrote: 'I am the result of love. More specifically, Black and Iranian love. Of Shia love, of Christian love, of American love... 'If my Baba was stuck at an airport because of a Muslim ban 39 years ago, he would have never fallen in love with my Mama. I would not exist and I wouldn't have had to amazing brothers. 'Xenophobia destroys the power of love and the power of our collective potential. It creates a false sense of security for some and an environment of fear for others. Immigrants don't threaten safety - stereotypical narratives that promote hate do.' Co-star cuties: Her on-screen siblings were also all there including 'twins' Marsai Martin and Miles Brown Stepping out: Their fellow co-star and 'brother' Marcus Scribner also made sure to be at the event rocking a colourful bow tie While Black-ish was nominated for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series - which was won by Orange Is The New Black - the show has addressed many serious social issues this season including police brutality towards men of colour. Yara's co-stars joined her on the red carpet including Anthony Anderson, who was nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series - won by William H. Macy. Her on-screen siblings were also all there including 'twins' Marsai Martin and Miles Brown. Say cheese: Miles, who is always very dapper, got a little red carpet help from his television mom Tracee Ellis Ross Thanks mom: Tracee made sure that the 11-year-old's tie was straight before they posed up for pictures together Their fellow co-star and 'brother' Marcus Scribner also made sure to be at the event rocking a colourful bow tie. Miles, who is always very dapper, got a little red carpet help from his television mom Tracee Ellis Ross. Tracee made sure that the 11-year-old's tie was straight before they posed up for pictures together. Added extras: Tracee wowed in a simple black silk dress by adding lots of statement jewellery Check these out: The 44-year-old wore large cocktail rings by Lydia Courteille, L'Dezen, and Yvel Jewelry and a pair ruby red earrings from Narcisa Pheres Tracee wowed in a simple black silk dress by adding lots of statement jewellery pieces. The 44-year-old wore large cocktail rings by Lydia Courteille, L'Dezen, and Yvel Jewelry and a pair ruby red earrings from Narcisa Pheres. While Yara did not address the immigration ban at the SAGs, many other artists used their platform to criticized the President's new mandate either during their speeches or on the carpet by carrying signs. Bella and Gigi Hadid joined a protest in New York against Trump's immigration ban on Sunday. The model sisters were seen hitting the city streets chanting 'No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here.' Bella, 20, held up a sign that read 'We are all Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, Atheists, Christians, Jews' as she marched down a blocked off Big Apple roadway. Certain key letters from each religious or non-religious denomination was highlighted to spell out: 'We are all humans'. Scroll down for video... Models Bella and Gigi Hadid joined in the protest against President Trump's immigration ban on the streets of New York City on Sunday Bella bundled up beneath a cozy cream colored knit turtle neck which cropped above her pants flashing her belly button and taut tummy. The model showed off her lean pins in a pair of skintight pinstripe jeans which flared at the knee and completely covered her footwear. The brunette beauty sported a pair of shades and pinned her raven colored tresses high on top of her head in a bun. Bella is seen holding up a sign that reads 'We are all humans' while Gigi joined in on the chanting with her fellow protesters While one of their protesting friends held up a sign that simply said 'resist' Gigi, 21, looked fashionable per usual in a cropped pair of jeans by Mother denim which featured a red stripe on the sides and perfectly matched her candy apple colored puffer jacket. The supermodel sisters are only a year apart in age and are very close. They were also joined by their mother Yolanda Hadid, who shared a snap from the march. Their decision to join the protest came after Bella missed the Women's March that followed Trump's inauguration, after her work commitments meant she was overseas. She was mocked for posting an image in support of the march - which instead was taken at the 1995 Million Man March. West coast: Back in Los Angeles, Johnny Depp's ex-wife Amber Heard was among those joining the protests at LAX airport. Making a point: Amber joined the protesters at the airport But there was no such mistake on Sunday, when Bella and her sisters were part of the crowd. Meanwhile Emily Ratajkowski posted a snap of her hand drawn sign, reading: 'Revolution has no borders'. Back in Los Angeles, Johnny Depp's ex-wife Amber Heard was among those joining the protests at LAX airport. Events were underway in New York, Chicago, Detroit, Miami, Los Angeles, Boston, Pittsburgh, and Washington DC in the early afternoon on Sunday. Many of the events were documented on social media with the hashtag, '#NoBanNoWall' - showing they were also protesting Trump's plan to build a wall on the border with Mexico. Events were underway in New York, Chicago, Detroit, Miami, Los Angeles, Boston, Pittsburgh, and Washington DC in the early afternoon The Manhattan event was organized by Make the Road New York - with demonstrators set to march from Battery Park to the Customs and Border Patrol offices Meanwhile, some of those held at New York City's John F Kennedy airport were seen celebrating as they left Terminal 4 following more than 30 hours of detention. However, Trump defended his sweeping order on immigration Sunday afternoon and and said he would find other ways to help those suffering from Syria's bloody civil war. The president said in a statement that 'America is a proud nation of immigrants' that'will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression,' but 'while protecting our own citizens and border'. They were also joined by their mother Yolanda Hadid, who shared a snap from the march While Emily Ratajkowski posted a snap of her hand drawn sign, reading: 'Revolution has no borders' He denied once again that his executive order, which bans visitors from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, seven predominantly Muslim countries, was a ban aimed at Muslim people. 'This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe,' he said. 'There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days.' Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly declared the entry of lawful permanent residents, also known as green card holders, to be of national interest on Sunday evening. 'In applying the provisions of the president's executive order, I hereby deem the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest,' he said in a statement. 'Accordingly, absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, lawful permanent resident status will be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determinations.' There were a number of protests scheduled across New York, with a huge crowd already seen gathered at Battery Park - which provided a clear view of the Statue of Liberty out in the water. The Manhattan event was organized by Make the Road New York - with demonstrators set to march from Battery Park to the Customs and Border Patrol offices. Hugh Sheridan has opened up about his relationship with House Husbands co-star Gary Sweet. The 31-year-old, who is a new addition to the cast for the show's fifth season, says he struggled to work alongside the two-time Logie award winner. But far from being as a result of an on-set feud, Hugh told New Idea in Monday's issue that it was because the 59-year-old kept him laughing all the way through filming. Scroll down for video Troublesome: Hugh Sheridan has opened up about his relationship with House Husbands co-star Gary Sweet He said: 'I can't work with Gary. My agent called and asked how it was going, and I told her I can't work with him. 'She thought [it was because] there was so much drama, but he's so funny and he makes me laugh!' Gary has starred in House Husbands since its debut on Channel Nine in 2012, playing one of the show's main characters, Lewis Crabb. Co-stars: The 31-year-old, who is a new addition to the cast for the show's fifth season, says he struggled to work alongside the two-time Logie award winner (pictured) Having a laugh: Far from being as a result of an on-set feud, Hugh told New Idea in Monday's issue that it was because the 59-year-old kept him laughing all the way through filming Hugh's character, music teacher Nick Gazeki, is dating Lewis' neighbour Rachel (Jane Allsop) which puts him on a collision course with Lewis in the upcoming season. And while things may be rocky between the two on screen, Hugh says the TV veteran has been inadvertently helping him become a better actor. He said: 'It would be my shot and he'd do this thing with his lip and I'd just lose it! I'm getting extremely good at controlling my laughing, which is good because I always steered away from comedy because I would laugh.' Noisy neighbour: Hugh's character, music teacher Nick Gazeki, is dating Lewis' neighbour Rachel (Jane Allsop) which puts him on a collision course with Lewis in the upcoming season Helping hand: And while things may be rocky between the two on screen, Hugh says the TV veteran has been inadvertently helping him become a better actor The former Packed To The Rafters star had professed himself 'pumped' to join the cast when news of his new role broke in March last year. Hugh, who has four Logie awards to his name, had turned his attentions to a music career before landing the role, forming the band California Crooners Club. House Husbands will return to screens when season five premieres on Channel Nine on 6 February. Porsha Williams had her anger management training tested to the limits on Sunday's episode of The Real Housewives Of Atlanta. The 35-year-old reality star went head-to-head with her nemesis Kenya Moore as the group embarked on a 'glamping' trip together. They didn't get past the city limits before things grew acrimonious. Glamping trip: Porsha Williams clashed with her nemesis Kenya Moore on Sunday's episode of The Real Housewives Of Atlanta on the way to a glamping trip Porsha accused the women of being 'condescending' towards her during their last meeting. 'I felt like I was being made fun of and provoked,' she said, noting that Kenya was the worst culprit. 'That's some bulls*** like everything else,' retorted Kenya, 46. 'Lord have mercy we can't even get outside the city limits without these girls bickering and fussing about absolutely nothing,' sighed camping trip organizer Phaedra Parks. Not buying it: Kenya refuted Porsha's claims that she was attacking her City limits: Phaedra Parks noted that the ladies started bickering before they reached the city limits 'You worry about Porsha. Don't worry about what Kenya is doing,' Kenya sniped to Porsha. 'Watch your mouth!' replied Porsha angrily. The show opened with Kenya shopping with Phaedra for glamping gear. Anger management: Porsha felt Kenya was being condescending about her anger management classes 'There is nothing glamorous about carrying a shovel around to hide your s***,' remarked Kenya. Marlo Hampton turned up for the trip in stilettos and a sheer, camouflage twinset. Phaedra was annoyed that the women had all brought friends. Glamour camping: The ladies embarked on a 'glamping' trip organized by Phaedra 'I don't recall telling everyone that they could invite la-di-da and everybody,' grumbled the 43-year-old. Things grew frosty in the bus and the women began to 'throw shade' at each other. 'Oh lord, I knew I should have stayed at home,' regretted Porsha. Feeling regret: Porsha immediately regretted going on the trip Phaedra earlier had said the women had been unfairly 'attacking' Porsha lately. 'You've got to be compassionate,' she advised Kenya. Meanwhile, Cynthia Bailey met Kenya's mercurial ex-boyfriend Matt Jordan to try and mediate. Candid conversation: Cynthia Bailey met with Kenya's mercurial ex-boyfriend Matt Jordan The personal trainer complained of a lack of 'respect and communication' from Kenya. 'We don't see eye to eye, we don't speak the same language and more recently I've been getting upset and breaking things,' Matt admitted. 'If she's the drama queen you are definitely the drama king,' said Cynthia, 48. Communication issues: Matt told Cynthia that he was having 'respect and communication' issues with Kenya Cyntha later received a visit at her brand new lake house from Kenya. Kenya was unsympathetic to Matt's complaints. 'I am sick and tired of people blaming their bad behavior on me, that is some crazy s***,' she yelled. Lake house: Kenya visited Cynthia at her new lake house Blame game: Cynthia told Kenya about Matt's complaints but she was not sympathetic Kenya also felt 'hurt' that Cynthia hadn't defended her enough to Matt. 'I am sick of not knowing where Cynthia's loyalties lie,' she huffed before storming away from their meeting. Kandi Burruss met with her best friend/assistant Carmon to plan an engagement party for their mutual friend Shamea. Stormed out: Kenya stormed out of her meeting with Cynthia Porsha decided not to attend because of her feud with Kandi. Shamea started crying because of her absence. She then grew annoyed that Porsha hadn't defended her when Phaedra had badmouthed her by insinuating that she'd 'f***ed everybody's husbands in Atlanta'. White party: Kandi Burruss threw a white party for Shamea to celebrate her upcoming wedding Getting emotional: Shamea started crying after learning that Porsha wasn't coming to the party Lost memos: Cynthia and Sheree Whitfield did not wear white to the party to Kandi's chagrin Counseling session: Porsha attended an anger management session and was told by her counselor that her 'friends' were provoking her 'If that was the case then I would have f***ed Apollo because he made many passes,' scoffed Shamea. Porsha later told Shamea that she avoided the party to bypass an 'ambush' from the 'Kandi Clique'. So Shamea warned her to 'be careful' of Phaedra. Be careful: Shamea warned Porsha to be careful of Phaedra 'She used to say you were stupidthat you had bricks for brains,' she recalled. The Real Housewives Of Atlanta continues next week on Bravo. A preview of the glamping trip showed the women talking about Kenya's relationship with her estranged mother and Kandi being asked if she's a lesbian. It is an issue clearly close to her heart. And Jocelyn Towne, niece of famed screenwriter Robert Towne, wore a message scrolled across her chest as she joined husband Big Bang Theory star Simon Helberg at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday night. The blonde had a simple message to deliver, 'Let them in', as her partner carried a sign reading 'refugees welcome' in response to President Trump's immigration ban. Scroll down for video Close to her heart: Jocelyn Towne, niece of famed screenwriter Robert Towne, wore a message scrolled across her chest as she joined husband Big Bang Theory star Simon Helberg at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday night The couple, who married in 2007 and share two children together, looked somber as they displayed their message to the red carpet photographers. Thirty six year old Helberg, who holds a black belt in karate, looked dapper in a velvet coat and purple trousers. While Jocelyn, 40, wore a white gown that showed plenty of chest and offered certainly enough room for her statement. The blonde had a simple message to deliver, 'Let them in', as her partner carried a sign reading 'refugees welcome' in response to President Trump's immigration ban The couple, who married in 2007 and share two children together, looked somber as they displayed their message to the red carpet photographers Their message comes just days after President Donald Trump's controversial executive order halting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Iraq. During the awards show, many actors took the opportunity on live TV to speak out against the policy. In what was likely the most powerful speech of the night, David Harbour took the stage with the rest of the 16-ensemble cast of the Netflix show Stranger Things and spoke about being united and standing up against bullies. Smart: Thirty six year old Helberg, who holds a black belt in karate, looked dapper in a velvet coat and purple trousers He said: I would just like to say that in light of all thats going on in the world today, its difficult to celebrate the already celebrated Stranger Things. 'This award from you, who take your craft seriously, and earnestly believe like me that great acting can change the world is a call to arms from our fellow craftsmen and women to go deeper and through our art to battle against fear, self-centeredness and exclusivity of our predominantly narcissistic culture; and through our craft to cultivate a more empathetic and understanding society by revealing infinite truths that serve as a forceful reminder to folks that when they feel broken and afraid and tired, they are not alone.' The 16-ensemble cast of the Netflix show Stranger Things took the stage to accept their award for the best Ensemble in a Drama Series Kutcher immediately followed his opening comments with a series of tweets, expanding on his opinion of the President's immigration ban 'We are united in that we are all human beings and we are all together on this wonderful painful, horrible, joyous, exciting and mysterious ride that is being alive. 'Now, as we act in the continuing narrative of Stranger Things, we 1983 Mid-Westerners will repel bullies, we will shelter freaks and outcasts - those who have no home - we will get past the lies; we will hunt monsters; and when we are at a loss amidst the hypocrisy and the casual violence of certain individuals and institutions we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the weak and the disenfranchised and the marginalized; and we will do it all with soul with heart and with joy.' Actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus, whose father was an immigrant from Nazi-dominated France, said: 'The immigrant ban is a blemish and it's un-American' Her little sister Kylie Jenner may be the pout guru of the family. But Khloe Kardashian proved she is just as adept at the arcane makeup arts as her budding mogul of a half sibling. The 32-year-old shared an Instagram snap of herself on Sunday from Cost Rica that proved she can pout with the best of them. She's got the magic touch: Khloe Kardashian shared an Instagram snap of herself on Sunday from Cost Rica that proved she can pout with the best of them In the selfie Khloe shows off her very plump lips and thick make up while wearing a yellow, cleavage baring, swimsuit. The reality star's hair falls in dyed blonde tangles over her chest as she smoulders for the camera. She captioned the image: 'Island Vibes'. Lip kit magic? The 32-year-old proved she is just as adept at the arcane makeup arts as her budding mogul of a half sibling Kylie Jenner In the selfie Khloe shows off her very plump lips and thick make up while wearing a yellow, cleavage baring, swimsuit Khloe in real life: The TV personality is a bit more thin lipped Sensei: Her little sister Kylie Jenner may be the pout guru of the family with her lip kit company Meanwhile, the Revenge Body host is on holiday with her family in Costa Rica. The vacation crew includes Kim, her two children, Kourtney and her children along with Scott Disick, Kylie, and their mother Kris and Corey Gamble. Kanye West appears to not have attended the trip. Meanwhile, the reality star recently took to her website to lay out some very common scenarios and how she deals with them. Mr K! Khloe tried out some fun features of the picture and video sharing app But before she delved into the specifics, she explained: 'I'm old-fashioned in a lot of ways! I don't think there's necessarily a right or wrong way when it comes to dating but I definitely have certain preferences.' One of her first topics was whether a prospective date should call or text her to gain her attention. Master Mason: The adorable boy also got a chance to see what he would look like with a mustache and some big chompers 'It depends,' she began, before continuing with a somewhat shocking revelation: 'I'm OK with being asked out over text message.' While that confession was surprising for the 'old-fashioned' Khloe, she quickly qualified it. 'Once we're into the relationship, we need to call each other and talk on the phone, though. I'm big on setting the tone with relationships.' Work ethic: Khloe still got in some training while on holiday Bettina 'Betty' Banks is far from just your average reality TV star, boasting a raunchy Instagram account full of steamy poses and half-naked photos. But on Sunday, a day before the new season premiere of My Kitchen Rules, the competition hopeful was seen beaming as she strolled the streets of Sydney with a black apron in hand. The 27-year-old influencer and blogger was dressed in a bright orange top, paired over a blush coloured mini-skirt for the outing. Beaming beauty! Bettina 'Betty' Banks was seen beaming as she strolled the streets of Sydney on Sunday with a black apron in hand, just one day before My Kitchen Rules premiered The sleeveless top showed off the tattoos down her arms and gave a glimpse of those near her chest. A hollow star could be seen on the beauty's foot as she strolled the street comfortably in black flip flops, while holding metallic heels with one hand and flashing the peace sign with the other. Her two tone locks were style in waves and the beauty appeared to be wearing remnants of make up, suggesting she had just finished a photoshoot related to the show. Betty and her partner on the show, best friend David Vu, made their debut on Monday night as guests at Damo and Caz's instant restaurant. Photoshoot? The beauty's two tone locks were style in waves and she appeared to be wearing remnants of make up, suggesting the reality TV starlet had just finished a photoshoot related to the show All smiles! Betty was seen smiling as she strolled the street comfortably in black flip flops, while holding metallic heels in one hand with the apron draped over the other But it's not long till it's their turn - with the New South Wales pair due to head to the kitchen on Tuesday night's show. There, Betty is set to show the skills she picked up while helping care for her ailing mother, who went mysteriously went blind when she was a child. In an interview with TV Week, both Betty her mother, Manisone, 48, reveal the struggles the tough cook went through when she was younger. 'When I was about seven or eight, she hurt herself and I went, "It's my turn to take care of you. I want you to teach me how to cook",' the brave girl told her mum. Flashing her tattoos: The sleeveless top showed off the tattoos down Betty's arms and gave a glimpse of those near her chest Betty, who has Laotian heritage, took over being the 'woman of the house' cooking for the family and caring for little her sister, who was only five at the time. She also did the cleaning and shopping, took her mum to doctor's appointments, did her mother's hair and make-up, and bathed her little sister. 'I think I grew up pretty fast,' Betty admits. Cooking for mum: Betty honed her skills caring for her family from age seven Up next! Betty and her MKR partner, BFF David Vu, will head into the kitchen on Tuesday night's episode Mainsone is immensely grateful for her loyal daughter, telling the publication: 'She's everything a mother would want in a daughter'. The duo are very close and Betty even has a tattoo of her mother's face on her forearm, in addition to a full sleeve of tats up her arm. Meanwhile, Betty told The Saturday Telegraph she is 'not worried' about TV audiences seeing her racy Instagram photos and admitted to having 'skeletons.' 'I think I grew up pretty fast': Betty showed her softer side as she spoke about looking after her ailing mother as a child Oh mama: The duo are very close and Betty even has a tattoo of her mother's face on her forearm, in addition to a full sleeve of tats up her arm Not your average reality TV star: The 27-year-old is far from just your average reality TV star, boasting a raunchy Instagram account full of steamy poses and half-naked photos 'Maybe I am a bit more raunchy... but its made me proud of and comfortable with my body. 'Theres nothing Im worried about and Im not ashamed of that.' 'There are few skeletons in my closet,' she said. Racy: Meanwhile, Betty told The Saturday Telegraph she is 'not worried' about TV audiences seeing her racy Instagram photos and admitted to having 'skeletons' The 'social media influencer' boldly hashtags her own name with every post and has 40,000 followers on the account. Posting under her full name Bettina Banks, the brunette beauty has numerous selfies posing in lacy lingerie and completely topless. Betty also shares bikini snaps from frequent holidays to Bali, flaunting her many tattoos in tiny swimwear. She has a lot of swimwear! Betty also shares bikini snaps from frequent holidays to Bali, flaunting her many tattoos in tiny swimwear Mischa Barton posted to her Instagram on Sunday for the first time since her hospitalization in Los Angeles on Thursday. The former star of The O.C. shared a photo of an odd-looking Buddha statue in a lotus position and with a peace symbol headdress. It's not clear what the statue was made of but it appeared to be a Serenity Buddha posed with crossed legs and hands in the lap. Back on social media: Mischa Barton shared a photo of an odd-looking Buddha statue in a lotus position and with a peace symbol headdress to her Instagram on Sunday Barton tagged the post 'Verdugo Mountains', a small mountain range outside of Los Angeles that's popular with hikers. The actress was taken to the hospital Thursday after neighbors found her screaming that her mother was a witch, TMZ reported. She was also rambling about the 'world shattering', and Ziggy Stardust - which is one of her dog's names. She said Friday she was out of the hospital after an overnight stay and had found out through doctors that someone had given her GHB on Wednesday night, while she was celebrating her 31st birthday. GHB, which is often referred to as a date-rape drug, has been known to be slipped in alcoholic drinks, typically to incapacitate victims of rape or sexual assault. Erratic: The O.C. star was taken to hospital for mental evaluation after neighbors found her 'screaming about end of the world and her mom being a witch' on Thursday, TMZ reported Drugged: On Friday Barton said she was out of the hospital after an overnight stay and had found out through doctors that someone had given her GHB on Wednesday night Not so happy birthday: Not long afterwards the Brit, who turned 31 just two days ago, tweeted: 'Thank you all for all the birthday messages Xoxo' Barton told People Friday that she went out with a group of friends on the evening of the 25th. 'While having drinks, I realized that something was not right as my behavior was becoming erratic and continued to intensify over the next several hours,' the actress aid. 'I voluntarily went to get professional help, and I was informed by their staff that I had been given GHB. After an overnight stay, I am home and doing well.' However, a source claimed to TMZ that Mischa was on a downward spiral for 'nearly a year' before checking into the hospital psych unit. Last year she accused her mom of purposely holding up the sale of the $7million Beverly Hills mansion they co-own. Estranged: It is not the first time Barton has blasted her mother Nuala either. She famously sued her in 2015, accusing her of defrauding her by stealing her money The 7,600-square-foot Tuscan-style villa, which boasts views of Catalina Island, was one of the focal points of the suit - with the actress claiming her mom gave herself co-ownership of the property without her knowledge or permission. She accused Nuala of taking out massive loans against the house behind her back - and turning the home into her 'personal ATM'. Barton even claimed she was then kicked out of the home by her parents who wouldn't let her back on the property. That case was dismissed back in February with the terms of the agreement stating Nuala would sell the home. Nuala had been her daughter's manager for years until the actress accused her mom of being a 'greedy stage mother posing as a talent manager'. Barton's lawsuit included claims that Nuala had lied about her salary for a film and didn't pay her the full amount. She's the former glamour model who now lives a reclusive farm lifestyle away from the spotlight. But chef Pete Evans' eccentric wife Nicola Robinson, 39, made a rare public appearance this week as she sat court-side at the Australian Open on Sunday. The nutrition enthusiast looked worlds away from her former runway queen self, having swapped her trademark bleach-blonde curls for a head of sleek brunette balayage hair. Scroll down for video Rare appearance: Pete Evans' eccentric wife Nicola Robinson, 39, made a rare public appearance this week as she sat court-side at the Australian Open on Sunday She managed to keep a low profile at the highly-publicised event, however, with the aide of a pair of over-sized sunglasses. Taking to Instagram on Sunday, Nicola shared her thoughts about her experiences in the grandstands, writing: 'I relish in the fact that I don't have to go out of our front gate too often, especially because I do my best version of 'me' on the farm, but this experience was well worth the journey! 'The combined energy of everyone was such a full on buzz... I will never forget it! #humble,' she continued. Evolving style: The nutrition enthusiast looked worlds away from her former runway queen self, having swapped her trademark bleach-blonde curls for a head of sleek brunette balayage hair It's the latest style overhaul from New Zealand-born Nicola, who once appeared in the pages of lads magazines such as Ralph and Playboy. Nicola, who also goes by the name of Nutrition Mermaid on Instagram, was a prominent Kiwi socialite back in the 90s and early 2000s. Back in 2007, Nicky admitted that she had drastically changed her body by undergoing three breast augmentations. Former glamour model: It's the latest style overhaul from New Zealand-born Nicola, who once appeared in the pages of lads magazines such as Ralph and Playboy Party-girl past: Nicola, who also goes by the name of Nutrition Mermaid on Instagram, was a prominent Kiwi socialite back in the 90s and early 2000s (pictured in 2004) She made the admission during an interview on reality show Nicky Watson - The Naked Truth, which was aired in New Zealand by TVNZ. Her drug-taking, failed marriage, threesomes, despair, depression and a suicide attempt were also openly discussed on the show. Last year, Pete Evans told Good Weekend that his wife 'deeply regrets' her famous implants, and is 'looking forward to having them removed in the near future.' Nip and tuck: Back in 2007, Nicky admitted that she had drastically changed her body by undergoing three breast augmentations (pictured in 2009) Not shy! She hasn't been shy to reveal her curves on the runway in the past, having strutted the catwalk in this scant ensemble in 2004 Brow game: Over the years, Nicola has undergone a style metamorphosis, including letting her full eyebrows grow out naturally and reducing the bleach used in her hair (pictured in 2007) Changing faces: Her face appears to have changed over time as well, with Nicola sporting a decidedly swollen pout and fuller cheekbones over the past few years (pictured in 2011) Over the years, Nicola has undergone a style metamorphosis, including letting her full eyebrows grow out naturally and reducing the bleach used in her hair. Her face appears to have changed over time as well, with Nicola sporting a decidedly swollen pout and fuller cheekbones over the past few years. Since finding love with 'Paleo Pete' in 2011, Nicola has reinvented herself as a free-spirited flower child dedicated to a natural lifestyle. She has also swapped her glitzy wardrobe for bohemian-inspired fashion and much simpler makeup choices. Rebirth: Since finding love with 'Paleo Pete' in 2011, Nicola has reinvented herself as a free-spirited flower child dedicated to a natural lifestyle Freckles and all! Nicola has also begun to reveal her naturally freckled complexion over the past few years It seems he felt like whipping some off of the back and sides. For 50 Shades Darker hunk Jamie Dornan looked far from his bondage-obsessed businessman he plays on screen as he wore a cropped haircut as he got ready to jet out of Los Angeles on Sunday. The erotic movie beefcake was almost unrecognisable as he padded around with his buzzcut and a bushy beard while he got ready to fly out to another destination, a situation he perhaps prefers. Brand spanking new look: 50 Shades Darker hunk Jamie Dornan showed off his new cropped haircut at an airport in Los Angeles on Sunday For the 34-year-old Northern Irishman has an army of female fans around the world due to his scene-stealing turns as clean cut sadomasochistic billionaire Christian in 2015's 50 Shades Of Grey. Indeed it seems unlikely his new look will win the same sort of approval with the ladies as his suave appearance in the cinematic adaptation of E. L. James' notoriously filthy novel. But he was not the only star of the film franchise that was spotted loitering at an airport on Sunday. For his leading lady Dakota Johnson, who plays naive student Anastasia Steele in the film, was seen arriving at New York's JFK Airport. Buzz off Christian: Jamie was almost unrecognisable from his turn as the bondage-obsessed billionaire thanks to his new do And off he goes: He was surely hoping no one would recognise him as he headed for his flight Good idea: His headphones will have come in useful if he decided to watch his film on the flight The 27-year-old looked in fine form indeed in a patrterned woolen jacket, black pullover, jeans and leather boots. Meanwhile a new clip released on Saturday from Fifty Shades Darker shows an extended date night for the characters. In the steamy clip, the two are out enjoying drinks at a fancy establishment when randy Christian cannot resist resorting to type and telling Anastasia what to do. This time, though, she's happy if not immediate to oblige as he tells her to remove her panties while sitting at the table in the middle of the restaurant, which is surely bad table etiquette Fifty states away: While Jamie was in LA his on-screen lover Dakota Johnson was jetting into New York Shady lady: She tried to slip under the radar by wearing sunglasses indoors Natural beauty: Her remarkably smooth forehead was prominent as she headed off Sophia Bush wore a hot pink strapless Marchesa gown to the Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles on Sunday night. The Chicago P.D. star had her hair in an updo with strands falling around her face so as to emphasize her bare shoulders and Jacob & Co. earrings. And she upped the ante by adding some dramatic pink eye shadow above and below her eyes that matched her frock. Stood out fromt he crowd: Sophia Bush wore a hot pink strapless Marchesa gown to the Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles on Sunday night The designer gown featured draped panels at the waist that were crunched together to create a dynamic silhouette. She added plain heeled brown sandals and carried a black studded clutch. Bush completed her look with pendant earrings. Stunner: The designer gown featured draped panels at the waist that were crunched together to create a dynamic silhouette and the actress added matching hot pink eye shadow The former One Tree Hill star was at the awards show as a presenter. She joined Common on stage to present the award for outstanding performance by a male actor in a drama series. The award went to veteran actor John Lithgow, who won for his portrayal of Winston Churchill in Netflix drama The Crown. It's been almost a year since he tied the knot with his glamorous wife. And it seems celebrity chef Pete Evans, 43, and former Playboy ambassador Nicola Robinson, 39, may be starting to get clucky. The My Kitchen Rules chef already has two daughters from a previous marriage, but recently told TV Week he and his new wife are open to having even more children. Scroll down for video Getting clucky? Celebrity chef Pete Evans, 43, and his wife Nicola Robinson, 39, are thinking about starting a family 'I'm a very happy man to share my life with such a beautiful woman,' Evens said. 'I'm not sure what the future holds - we'll see what happens.' Evans, a paleo-crusader, and Nicola, who calls herself the 'Nutrition Mermaid' on social media, are one of Australian cooking's leading couples. Babies: The My Kitchen Rules chef already has two daughters from a previous marriage, but recently said he and the former Playboy ambassador (pictured) are open to having children of their own The pair married in April last year and regularly take to Instagram to share glamorous photos of their natural and loved-up lifestyle. Describing herself as a 'moon-gazing farm girl' who wears an 'earth suit', Nicola introduced Pete to his beloved paleo eating regime around two years ago. The pair have since branded themselves as health experts, often taking to social media to dish out advice about nutrition and lifestyle choices. Despite being incredibly busy with his filming commitments for MKR and other work priorities, Evans said his work-life balance is a priority. Newlyweds: The pair married in April last year and regularly take to Instagram to share glamorous photos of their natural and loved-up lifestyle 'I'm a very happy man to share my life with such a beautiful woman': Evans regularly gushes about Robinson (pictured) Family first: Despite being busy with his MKR commitments and other work priorities, Evans said his work-life balance and children remained a priority In particular, spending time with his two daughters Chilli, 11, and Indii, 10. 'The older the kids get the more fun we have and the more proud of them I am, because they're becoming their unique selves,' Evans said. Although both girls are still at primary school, they're already showing an eagerness to follow in their father's footsteps in the kitchen. Recently Evans shared a photo to Instagram showing his two daughters helping to prepare 'crispy skin flathead with carrot, ginger and shallot and a ton of broccoli'. She has been keeping their romantic Los Angeles getaway intricately documented. And Georgia May Foote was once again determined to share the spoils of her new romance with her 500,000 Instagram followers as she posted an adorable selfie with her new beau George Alsford on Monday. The 25-year-old former Coronation Street beauty enjoyed a delicious cocktail in the snap, as she bragged of her 'fella' in the caption on the shot. Scroll down for video Loving life: Georgia May Foote was once again determined to share the spoils of her new romance with her 500,000 Instagram followers as she posted an adorable selfie with her new beau George Alsford on Monday Georgia is currently in the throes of romance with her hunky boyfriend, who is signed to Select Model Management - the same agency she is signed to. After jetting to Los Angeles on Friday, the stunning star has been littering her social media feeds with images of the mini break, which she deemed: 'The best four days ever'. As she sipped on a scrumptious looking cocktail, with George sipping on a beer, while she added the caption: 'My fella is the just (heart eye emoji). This has been the best 4 days ever. #LA #themr @georgealsford'. The brunette beauty also shared an arty shot in which she stood against street art depicting angel wings, with her back to. Fly away... The 25-year-old former Coronation Street beauty enjoyed a delicious cocktail in the snap, as she bragged of her 'fella' in the caption on the shot Loved-up lovely: Georgia is currently in the throes of romance with her hunky boyfriend, who is signed to Select Model Management - the same agency she is signed to She appeared overjoyed to spot that her burgundy trainers matched the colours on the wings, as she added the caption: 'When ur creps match ur wings... #la #aintcomingback #crepcheck'. Georgia's new romance comes hot on the heels from her split with her Strictly Come Dancing professional Giovanni Pernice, who she began dating shortly after her relationship with her Coronation Street co-star Sean Ward. As she moved on from her split from Giovanni in August, it was revealed that she had fallen hook, line and sinker for handsome George. Happier than ever: She appeared overjoyed to spot that her burgundy trainers matched the colours on the wings, as she added the caption: 'When ur creps match ur wings... #la #aintcomingback #crepcheck' Happiness is... George, who stands at 6ft 3in tall, is signed with Select Model Management, the same firm which represents Georgia George, who stands at 6ft 3in tall, no doubt caught her eye across their modelling agency. He has appeared in campaigns for Hugo Boss, Pepe Jeans and Russell & Bromley, among other top-flight brands, and frequently shows off his gym-honed torso on his Instagram account. Georgia announced her split from Giovanni on Twitter in August, making it clear that the decision came down to them and them alone. She's had a turbulent few months after finalising her divorce from ex-husband Johnny Depp. But Amber Heard looked in high spirits as she arrived at the LAX Airport in Los Angeles to catch a flight on Sunday morning. The actress, 30, looked the epitome of rock chick chic as she sported a Van Halen T-shirt and skintight jeans, sporting a huge grin as she headed to a waiting car. Scroll down for video Plenty to smile about: Amber Heard looked in high spirits as she arrived at the LAX Airport in Los Angeles to catch a flight on Sunday morning Clearly beating any signs of jet lag, the Zombieland star looked fresh and fabulous following her flight. Adding inches to her frame, the blonde strutted through the airport in leather ankle boots, artfully matched to her black sling bag. The Paranoia actress wore her golden tresses in an effortless bedhead manner, with strands perfectly framing the beauty's flawless face. Rock chick chic: The actress, 30, looked the epitome of rocker chic as she sported a Van Halen T-shirt and skintight jeans, sporting a huge grin as she headed to a waiting car Amber showed off her naturally striking looks, opting for little to no make-up for her flight. The star's lighthearted outing comes less than two weeks after Amber's divorce from Johnny Depp was finalised, winning custody of both the couple's dogs, along with nearly $7million, which she plans to donate to charity. The star has been seen in multiple locations over the past week, seemingly moving on quickly from her divorce from the actor, 53. The Rum Diary co-stars officially ended their 15-month marriage on January 15 after Amber accused Johnny of domestic abuse. No jet lag here: Clearly beating any signs of jet lag, the Zombieland star looked fresh and fabulous following her flight Work it: Adding inches to her frame, the blonde strutted through the airport in leather ankle boots, artfully matched to her black sling bag The Friday Night Lights star received a $6.8 million settlement that she has pledged to donate to two charities: Childrens Hospital of Los Angeles and the American Civil Liberties Union. The actress has been keeping herself busy since the messy divorce, throwing herself into work - beginning production for the hotly anticipated movies Aquaman and Justice League. Amber is also set to star as the protagonist, Nicola Six, in the Mathew Cullen's directed movie London Fields. The movie follows the story of a clairvoyant femme fatale Nicola Six, who has been living with a dark premonition of her impending death by murder. She begins a tangled love affair with three uniquely different men: one of whom she knows will be her murderer. In happier times? Amber's 15-month marriage to actor Johnny Depp, 53, officially ended earlier this month when the couple finalised their divorce (pictured January 2016) She plays Vespyr Cash in hit flick Captain Fantastic. And Annalise Basso certainly oozed star quality as she hit the red carpet in a burgundy floor-length gown at The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday. The 18-year-old actress was joined by her co-stars at the The Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, California. Scroll down for video Turning heads! Annalise Basso certainly oozed star quality as she hit the red carpet in a burgundy Bibhu Mohapatra gown at The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday Showcasing her porcelain shoulders in the Bardot cross-strap Bibhu Mohapatra gown, the piece was cinched in at the waist, making the most of her slender midriff. Featuring a semi-sheer chiffon overlayer, the gown fell elegantly to the floor, complimenting the red carpet as she posed. And putting on quite a show, the flame-haired actress threw the train in the air, making for a dramatic picture. With minimal make-up and a pair of statement drop earrings, she showcased her natural beauty as she posed alongside her cast. The whole cast! The 18-year-old actress was joined by her Captain Fantastic co-stars at the The Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, California Co-stars Samantha Isler and Nicholas Hamilton put on a cheery display as they posed for cameras. Nicholas, 15, looked dapper in a suit while Samantha, 18, was the epitome of understated elegance in an emerald green frock which made her bright blue peepers pop. Viggo Mortensen, who plays dad Ben Ash in the hit flick put on a suave appearance in a crisp suit as he posed alongside his on-screen daughter Shree Crooks, who plays young Zaja Cash. Showstopper! Showcasing her porcelain shoulders in the Bardot cross-strap dress, the piece was cinched in at the waist, making the most of her slender midriff And Trin Miller put on a busty display in a plunging white dress with polka dot detailing. Meanwhile George MacKay, who plays Bo Cash, looked quite the gentleman in his suit and bow tie. Taking to the stage later in the night, Viggo Mortensen and Kathryn Hahn coordinated in black cocktail chic ensembles, joining hands as they held a speech. The annual show is often seen as the best predictor for the Oscars, with most categories falling right in step with the Academy Awards. Oozing elegance: Co-stars Samantha Isler and Nicholas Hamilton put on a cheery display as they posed for cameras While the SAG awards only honour categories in acting, the best ensemble award category often offers a hint as to what film will snag best picture at the Oscars. The rising chorus for La La Land was suddenly missing a very conspicuous note on Sunday night. The 23rd annual Screen Actors Guild nominated the leads of Damien Chazelle's acclaimed musical, Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling. Teen stars! Nicholas Hamilton posed alongside Stranger Things star Millie Bobby Brown, 12, Bond: Viggo Mortensen, who plays dad Ben Ash in the flick put on a suave appearance in a crisp suit as he posed alongside on-screen daughter Shree Crooks, who plays young Zaja Cash But the perceived Oscar front-runner was notably absent in the SAGs' top category, best ensemble. La La Land has been marching toward best-picture winner at the Oscars, picking up a nomination in the coveted category, after breaking records at the Golden Globes. Granted, La La Land, largely focused on its leads, doesn't scream ensemble. But if it goes on to win best picture, it will be only the second to do so without a SAG ensemble nod in the category's history. Racy: Trin Miller put on a busty display in a plunging white dress with polka dot detailing Sweet: Teen star Nicholas and young Millie put on a glamorous display for the bash Only Mel Gibson's Braveheart managed it 20 years ago. However, this is simply being nominated in the category. The statistics for those ensembles that win at the SAG awards is a bit different. The Screen Actors Guild has handed out the ensemble award 21 times (SAG only began giving out ensemble awards in 1996), but of the films that were awarded the honour only 11 went on to land best picture at the Oscars (52%). Still, actors, the largest group in the Academy of Motion Pictures, hold considerable sway. (SAG, though, is much larger, with about 160,000 members, compared to about 1,200 actors in the academy.) As long as I got my suit and tie: George MacKay, who plays Bo Cash, looked quite the gentleman in his Emporio Armani suit and bow tie All black: Taking to the stage later in the night, Viggo Mortensen and Kathryn Hahn coordinated in black cocktail chic ensembles, joining hands as they held a speech The best ensemble nominees were Barry Jenkins' coming-of-age tale Moonlight, Kenneth Lonergan's Massachusetts family drama Manchester by the Sea, the rousing NASA drama Hidden Figures and, in a surprise, the Viggo Mortensen-led bohemian romp Captain Fantastic. Manchester by the Sea led all films with four nominations, including best actor for Casey Affleck and supporting nods for Michelle Williams and Lucas Hedges. In television, series newcomers The Crown, Westworld and Stranger Things all picked up three nominations each, alongside Emmys favorite The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story and Game of Thrones. Netlfix dominated with 17 total nominations, followed by HBO's 13. Following months of speculation, Channel Seven has confirmed The X Factor Australia has been axed for 2017. Angus Ross, head of programming at Seven, confirmed the news to The Daily Telegraph on Monday, saying: 'X Factor is not coming back. We have a number of slots to fill and over the next couple of months we'll be announcing a lot more.' The ratings-starved talent show had enjoyed eight seasons, having first aired in 2005 before returning for its second season in 2010 and continuing until 2016. Scroll down for video Axed: After months of speculation, Channel Seven has confirmed The X Factor Australia has been axed for 2017 Angus Ross told TV Tonight this week that the 'disappointing' ratings were to blame for the show's booting this year. 'Obviously the back half of the year wasn't as successful as the front half of the year for us. 'We walk away with Secret Daughter as a win from the back half, but there was a bit of disappointment with some of the other shows,' he said. Last year's season saw hosts Adam Lambert, Iggy Azalea, Guy Sebastian and Mel B take the helm as judges under a new format, named 'Next Gen'. New lineup: Last year's season saw hosts Adam Lambert, Iggy Azalea, Guy Sebastian and Mel B take the helm as judges Ratings nightmare: Just 665,000 people tuned in to watch Isaiah Firebrace (pictured) win in 2016 Nothing on Dami: That figure is a shadow of the 2 million plus winners who saw Dami Im (pictured) crowned victorious in 2013 Every episode of the formerly top-rating program failed to hit the generally accepted benchmark of 1 million viewers during it's most recent season. At one point, the show slumped to its worst-rated night in its 12-year history. Only 665,000 people tuned-in to watch Isaiah Firebrace win in 2016, a shadow of the 2 million plus viewers who saw Dami Im crowned the victor in 2013. Tension: Amid the falling ratings, the show's judges also made headlines last year after both Guy and Adam complained about Iggy's on-set antics Amid the falling ratings, the show's judges also made headlines last year after both Guy and Adam complained about Iggy's on-set antics. The divisive rapper was regularly seen feuding with Guy on the show, who at one point labeled her 'a bit of a weirdo.' Adam, who also found fame on the American version of Idol, has also previously branded her as a 'diva'. Weirdo': Guy was has been hardly sheltered about his thoughts about co-host Iggy Azalea, at one point calling the divisive rapper 'a bit of a weirdo' She has graced some of the world's most high-profile catwalks in exquisite couture creations. And Karlie Kloss proved she has picked up a sartorial trick or two from the fashion designers as she stepped out in Sydney on Monday. Cementing her fashion credentials, the 24-year-old supermodel flaunted her lean legs in a breezy red shirtdress. Scroll down for video Looking good! Karlie Kloss, 24, proved she has picked up a sartorial trick or two from the fashion designers as she stepped out in Sydney on Monday The Victoria's Secret model looked the height of summery chic in the flirty button-down number from her Karlie Kloss Collection for Express - which featured sweet cap sleeves and a racy front-split. Sweeping her brunette tresses into a sleek topknot, the statuesque stunner hid her striking features behind some classic Ray Ban Wayfarer shades. Injecting a dose of sports-luxe into her feminine look, Karlie added some cult white adidas Stan Smith trainers. Befitting her current stay in Sydney, Karlie recently revealed she believes herself to be an honorary Australian. Cheeky: Cementing her fashion credentials, the supermodel flaunted her lean legs in a breezy red shirtdress and adidas Stan Smith trainers Speaking to The Daily Telegraph this week, the New York-based beauty confessed: 'Long before I even came to Australia I feel like I was an honorary Aussie.' 'It's almost like there's an Australian family of sorts in New York. The first people I met there were Abbey Lee (Kershaw), Cat McNeil and Dion Lee.' She added: 'They represent your country very well and I've always had a fond place in my heart for Australia.' Taylor Swift's bestie was this month announced as the face of David Jones' autumn/winter 2017 campaign, and will walk the runway for the department store's collection launch. 'Nothing comes between me and my Calvins': The supermodel flaunted her toned abs in the cult underwear Smart! Once the Chicago native nailed the tricky code for herself, she realised it's potential to help women build businesses and started the Kode with Klossy scholarship She will strut her stuff alongside Australian models Bridget Malcolm, Jessica Gomes and Jesinta Campbell. Meanwhile, multi-talented Karlie has been spending her downtime launching a scholarship for women to learn computer coding. 'Initially my interest in coding was that it was this very mysterious secret language that all these engineers and founders of tech companies knew,' she told The Daily Telegraph. She's known for her unique and rather eccentric fashion sense. And Helena Bonham Carter proved style definitely runs in the family as she enjoyed a morning stroll with her mother, Elena Propper de Callejon, in New York on Sunday while taking some time out from shooting Ocean's Eight. The British actress, 50, enjoyed a low key girls' day out with her equally eccentrically dressed mum as the pair walked through the streets of Manhattan, before heading to the Blick Art Materials store. Scroll down for video Mum's the word! Helena Bonham Carter proved style definitely runs in the family as she enjoyed a morning stroll with her mother, Elena Propper de Callejon, in New York on Sunday Helena slipped on her favourite knee-grazing dolly coat, paired with leggings and quirky leather Oxford boots. Keeping the cool winter chill at bay, the Harry Potter actress placed a striking shaggy stole around her neck as she draped her tan satchel over her shoulder. In true Helena fashion, she brought her accessory A-game as she completed her kooky look with round-rimmed sunglasses and a red rose adorned on her hair. While sauntering arm-in-arm with her mother, the Alice in Wonderland star wore her signature curly locks in a quirky up-do with strands perfecting framing her stunning features. It's all relative: The British actress, 50, enjoyed a low key girls' day out with her equally eccentrically dressed mum as the pair walked through the streets of Manhattan Wrapped up: Helena slipped on her favourite knee-grazing dolly coat, paired with leggings and quirky leather Oxford boots Mrs Bonham Carter - a French-Spanish psychotherapist - showed off her equally fabulous fashion sense sporting an ankle-grazing emerald overcoat, worn over an aztec printed frock. Echoing her daughter's winter wardrobe, the matriarch donned a fur cossack hat with a matching black and grey scarf. The actress is currently in New York working on the hotly anticipated movie Ocean's Eight - which will feature a predominantly female cast, including Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett and Anne Hathaway. Helena is based in London, where she lives with her two children, son Billy, 13, and daughter Nell, nine. Flamboyant: Keeping the cool winter chill at bay, the Harry Potter actress placed a striking shaggy stole around her neck as she draped her tan satchel over her shoulder She shares her offspring with film-maker Tim Burton, from whom she split in 2014, though they're noted to enjoy an amicable relationship. Elena has been a regular red carpet fixture over Helena's 30-year career and remains one of Helena's favourite people. During an acceptance speech for the Best Supporting Actress BAFTA in 2011, Helena dedicated The Kings Speech accolade - for which she played the Queen Mother - to her own mother. She gushed: This is for all the best supporting wives the Queen Mother herself, and my mum. 'There is no doubt that if my father were alive, he would have given it to her. She was the best supporting wife you could ever have wished for. Seeing double: Mrs Bonham Carter - a French-Spanish psychotherapist - showed off her equally fabulous fashion sense sporting an ankle-grazing emerald overcoat They both play strong, independent women in HBO's hit epic Game of Thrones. But aesthetically, Gwendoline Christie, 38, and Maisie Williams, 19, couldn't be more different, with the former towering over her co-star at Sunday night's Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Expo Hall in LA. Famed for playing Brienne of Tarth, Gwendoline swapped her knight's armour for a glitzy black sequin dress. Scroll down for video Stark difference! Gwendoline Christie, 38, towered over her Game of Thrones co-star Maisie Wiliams, 19, at Sunday night's Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Expo Hall in LA She coordinated with an application of black nail polish, while a slick of rouge on her lips injected a splash of colour. The star wore a short blonde bob with a full fringe and applied a subtle touch of colour on her pale cheeks. At 5ft 1in, Maisie's head barely reached 6ft 3in Gwendoline's breast with the dramatic height difference impossible to ignore. Glamorous: Famed for playing Brienne of Tarth, Gwendoline swapped her knight's armour for a glitzy black sequin dress The petite actress looked glamorous in a pink satin dress, tied at the waist. She sported thick, dark eyebrows and a deep berry lipstick for dramatic, goth-tinged effect. Her shoulder-length brunette tresses were styled in bouncy curls and she accessorised with dangly earrings and a couple of silver rings. Reunited: They were joined by Liam Cunningham (GoT's Davos Seaworth) who looked smart in a navy suit with black lapel Maisie, who plays the determined Arya Stark in GoT, placed one arm around Gwendoline and the other on her hip. They were joined by Liam Cunningham (GoT's Davos Seaworth) who looked smart in a navy suit with black lapel. The pair looked in fine spirits despite Game of Thrones missing out on the Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series award to Stranger Things. Dramatic: Maisie sported thick, dark eyebrows and a deep berry lipstick for dramatic, goth-tinged effect Later in the night, the duo joined their co-stars in heading to the HBO after-party to lament their loss, yet also live it up as a group. Glamorous Maisie looked stunning still yet went for a more casual look as she slipped into some comfy trainers beneath her stunning silk gown. She was joined by co-star Nathalie Emmanuel, who looked phenomenal in a glimmering gown while keeping her make-up dewy and stunning. In training: Glamorous Maisie looked stunning still yet went for a more casual look as she slipped into some comfy trainers beneath her stunning silk gown A helping hand: Gwendoline looked phenomenal in the dazzling getup A graceful getaway: The jumpsuit was perfectly suited to her statuesque height Golden girl: She was joined by co-star Nathalie Emmanuel, who looked phenomenal in a glimmering gown while keeping her make-up dewy and stunning Fabulous from every angle... Nathalie, who soared to fame in Hollyoaks, certainly slotted into the glamour of the night Stylish: Alfie Allen, who plays Theon Greyjoy in the show, looked dapper in a tuxedo as he vacated the bash in style Alfie Allen, who plays Theon Greyjoy in the show, looked dapper in a tuxedo as he vacated the bash in style. More HBO stars appeared at the event, with Westworld star James Marsden going for a slick navy suit with an open necked white shirt. Sarah Paulson, who stars in American Horror Story, looked stylish in a pillar black gown with a white blazer over the top. Dashing: More HBO stars appeared at the event, with Westworld star James Marsden going for a slick navy suit with an open necked white shirt Monochrome madness: Sarah Paulson, who stars in American Horror Story, looked stylish in a pillar black gown with a white blazer over the top More stars: Westworld beauty Angela Sarafyan, who plays a prostitute in the sci-fi show, looked chic in a sheer gown with a paisley print Strutting her stuff: Sophie Turner proved just how versatile her fashion choices are as she transformed into an abs-flashing sweatshirt with jeans for the HBO after party held at celeb hot spot Catch LA in West Hollywood on Sunday night Who's that girl? The 20-year-old Game Of Thrones actress flashed her incredibly taut abs in the edgy ensemble, which was worlds away from her earlier look of a floor-sweeping red gown with a racy split Suited and booted: Clea DuVall went super low key in an androgynous suit She welcomed her first child into the world after a gruelling 48-hour labour at the beginning of the month. And Stephanie Davis has shared the first picture of her newborn baby, as well as revealing the little fellow's name. The 23-year-old Hollyoaks actress, whose pregnancy played out in the public eye after ex Jeremy McConnell denied he was the father, has named her son Caben-Albi George- the middle name a tribute to her late grandfather. Scroll down for video Welcome to the world! Stephanie Davis shared the first picture of her newborn baby on Monday, as well as revealing the little fellow's name Posing on the cover of Ok! Magazine, Stephanie looked every inch the beaming new mum as she posed in a simple nude vest and understated make-up, cradling the adorable little boy. Stay strong despite the circumstances, the actress admitted she's absolutely besotted with her 'perfect' little one, adding: 'I'll cope on my own. It makes me sad that I can't give Caben the happy family life that I have. And addressing Jeremy's denials over the little one, she added: 'My son is one hundred per cent Jeremy's baby. 'That's [paternity tests] in the process of being arranged, but any tests that happen will be dealt with privately.' 'I'll cope on my own- my son is one hundred per cent Jeremy's baby' : Stephanie, 23, has named her son son Caben-Albi George- the middle name a tribute to her late grandfather Stephanie explained her son's first name simply 'popped' into her head after a chance meeting with a stranger, sticking with her as she wanted something unusual. And in a previous column for the magazine, the soap star revealed she would be attributing her beloved grandfather, adding: 'It's not Albi but that will definitely be a middle name'. The brunette beauty gave birth to her son on January 13 at Liverpool Women's Hospital weighing in at 6lb 10oz following a 48-hour labour. Excited: The actress has admitted she can't wait to get started on the first chapter of the rest of her life with her son The brunette beauty uploaded a photo of her carrying her baby in his car seat two weeks ago, as they made their way out of the maternity suite at a hospital in Liverpool. She captioned the sweet snap: 'We did it little one... By far my favourite chapter yet... (sic),' followed by a red heart emoji. The actress has admitted she can't wait to get started on the first chapter of the rest of her life with her son, and has thrown herself into life as a new mother. Welcome! Stephanie had first announced the birth of her baby two weeks ago, with an image of her newborn's feet, gushing: 'The day my world became complete' Although mother and baby were said to be doing well, doctors at the time requested she stay in so that she could keep an eye on her and her brand new beautiful addition. Her representative said at the time: 'We can confirm our client Stephanie Davis today gave birth to a baby boy in Liverpool. Mother and baby are doing fine.' The actress didn't have the easiest of pregnancies as she was struck down with acute morning sickness in the first and second trimester. She then she experienced some bleeding, which she feared was a sign of her losing her baby, in the third trimester. 'If he is my son I will absolutely step up': Jeremy revealed he will do his best once he's confirmed as the father of the newborn (Pictured together February 2016) Sweet: The former Hollyoaks actress recently retweeted a picture posted by her best friend Jay Roberts, who she has chosen to be the tot's godfather However, doctors quickly established that her baby was fine and she had colitis. Stephanie then started experiencing Braxton Hicks - irregular practice contractions that can be felt around mid-pregnancy and increase in frequency and strength as the pregnancy progresses - and pressure at the bottom of her stomach last month. And things are set to get even more complicated for the actress as her ex-boyfriend Jeremy McConnell - who has denied he's the father of the baby - is determined to have a paternity test done as soon as possible in order to know if he's really the dad. He arrived home from his holiday in Thailand just days after Stephanie gave birth. The Irish model was spotted rushing around with his suitcase as he made his way out of Dublin Airport - after sources claim he is looking to take a paternity test to determine whether he is the father of the child 'as soon as possible'. A source told The Mirror: 'Yes, he is looking to arrange this ASAP, but this is time dependent on Steph.' 'That's [paternity tests] in the process of being arranged, but any tests that happen will be dealt with privately,' Stephanie revealed following the tot's birth Jeremy is still refusing to confirm he's the father of his estranged ex's baby boy - revealing he was 'delighted' for Steph after her lengthy labour but that he will only play the father role if it is confirmed for good. Addressing the news on Twitter shortly after news of the birth broke, he wrote: 'I am delighted that Steph has safely had the baby, of course if he is my son I will absolutely step up and do what I can to support him.' He further explained: 'Any timescale for that is in Steph's hands now. I did reach out to her some weeks ago but didn't hear back.' Stephanie had first announced the birth of her baby with an image of her newborn's feet, gushing: 'The day my world became complete. 'I've been overwhelmed & so in love with you. Words could never describe. Thank you for all your support!' She's well-known for her penchant for plastic surgery. But Skye Wheatley has denied she has surgically enhanced her posterior, despite frequently flaunting her voluptuous behind on Instagram. Speaking with The Project on Monday night, Skye stated: 'I've had my boobs, my nose and my lips [surgically altered]. Apparently I've had my butt done but that's a rumour, I can assure you'. Scroll down for video It's real! Reality star Skye Wheatley revealed to The Project on Monday night that she has not surgically enhanced her posterior, despite her penchant for plastic surgery The blonde bombshell famously underwent a botched boob job in Bangkok, having to undergo surgery again in Australia to fix her ample assets. Late last year, Skye went back under the knife to have a rhinoplasty and documented the journey for her fans via her YouTube account. Speaking of her plastic surgery, the 22-year-old told the show: 'I am happy with who I am, I just realised that I have imperfections and I just wanted to change them'. 'I am happy with who I am': Skye says that despite changes in her outward appearance she is still the same on the inside Skye's mother, Angela, also spoke with the news program, and revealed she was reluctant to let her daughter go under the knife. 'As a mother you don't want your child to change, and I think she's beautiful just the way she is but there's nothing I can do or say to stop her,' she admitted. Skye is known for sharing racy selfies on social media that show off her physique, and before her segment on The Project went to air she took to Instagram to share another sultry snap. Speaking out: Skye's mother Angela revealed that there was nothing she could do or so top dissuade her daughter from going under the knife but thinks she was perfect naturally The picture-perfect shot showed Skye laying seductively by a pool in a skimpy pink bikini. Skye addressed her social media presence in the interview, stating: 'I feel like there is a bit of pressure to be perfect on Instagram 'cause you look at all these models on Instagram and their life is perfect'. However, despite her outward changes, Skye told the show that she believes she is still the same person on the inside. 'I don't know how to be anyone else but myself,' she said. Total transformation! Skye Wheatley is virtually unrecognisable compared to her days on Big Brother in 2014 (right) 'Pressure to be perfect': Skye shared a sizzling snap before her segment went to air, although she told The Project there was pressure to appear perfect on Instagram Plump posterior: Skye frequently shows off her voluptuous behind on Instagram 'The best thing about my YouTube [account] is seeing all the support that I have from people that have watched me from Big Brother and that have come back to my YouTube and go "Oh, you're still the exact same girl, you may look a little bit different but you're the same girl inside",' she noted. Meanwhile, Skye is preparing for her upcoming trip to Bali, where she will not doubt continue to share saucy selfies on social media. It seems she may be travelling without her beau Cameron McCristal who shared a snap of Skye on Instagram on Monday with the hashtag: 'going to miss you'. The SAG Awards were praised on Sunday night after giving out seven out of 13 gongs to black actors and diverse casts. The celebration of equality mirrors the Oscars this year in which the diversity drought has come to an end with at least 10 black actors and filmmakers being nominated. During the SAGs, three African American stars won gongs, with the female-cast of Hidden Figures picked up Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. Scroll down for video Gongs: The SAG Awards have been praised as seven out of 13 top honours were given to black actors and diverse casts at the Shrine Auditorium on Sunday night (pictured Taraji P. Henson) Fab: Taraji spoke about equality as she picked up an award on behalf of the cast of Hidden Figures, a film with a predominant African American cast about women working for NASA When the Orange Is The New Black cast co-won their award for Outstanding Performance By An Ensemble in a Comedy Series, Taylor Schilling addressed the topic of diversity in her acceptance speech. She said: 'Mostly, wed like to say that we stand up here representing a diverse group of people. 'We know that its gonna be up to all of us and all of you to keep telling stories that show that what unites us is stronger than what divides us.' Superstar: Viola Davis picked up Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role for her role in Fences Iconic: Denzel Washington nabbed Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role for Fences Moreover, Taraji P. Henson spoke about equality as she picked up an award on behalf of the cast of Hidden Figures, a film with a predominant African American cast about women working for NASA. She said: 'This film is about unity. The shoulders of the women that we stand on are three American heroes: Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan and Mary Jackson. Without them, we would not know how to reach the stars. 'These women did not complain about the problems, the circumstances, the issues," she continued. "They focused on solutions. Therefore, these brave women helped put men into space. Star: When Orange Is The New Black co-won their award for Outstanding Performance By An Ensemble in a Comedy Series, Taylor Schilling addressed diversity in her speech She said: 'Mostly, wed like to say that we stand up here representing a diverse group of people. We know that its gonna be up to all of us and all of you to keep telling stories that show that what unites us is stronger than what divides us' 'This story is about what happens when we put our difference aside and we come together as a human race. They are hidden figures no more!' Moonlight star Mahershala Ali won Outstanding Supporting Actor, while Denzel Washington nabbed Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role. Viola Davis picked up Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role. Dapper gent: Moonlight star Mahershala Ali won Outstanding Supporting Actor for his role They sparked rumours of a split after their epic spat at the National Television Awards last week. But it looked as though Megan Mckenna and Pete Wicks may be back on again, after they were pictured dining together at TOWIE pal Gemma Collins' birthday in Tenerife. The brunette beauty, 24, and her tattooed on/ off beau, 28, were seen being grilled by co-star James Lock, who suddenly appeared keen to discover their relationship tips. Scroll down for video Not the last supper then? It looked as though Megan Mckenna and Pete Wicks reunited following their NTAs bust-up, as they were pictured dining together at Gemma Collins' birthday in Tenerife Stirring up the seemingly awkward atmosphere further, James posted a Snapchat from the dinner as he grilled the turbulent couple following their very public row. 'These two are like an old couple they don't talk.' he joked, adding: 'Megan! -What's your top tip for a great relationship?' As someone piped up in the background shouting 'habit!', James added: 'Come on girl, hit us with it. Before he concluded: 'You don't have one? What because of him?', admitting: 'What's my top tip? Don't have one.' Staying mum: The brunette beauty, 24, and her tattooed on/ off beau, 28, were seen being grilled by co-star James Locke, who suddenly appeared keen to discover their relationship tips 'These two are like an old couple they don't talk.' he joked, adding: 'Megan! -What's your top tip for a great relationship?' James asked Megan and Pete Megan and Pete kept tight-lipped during the exchange. Megan arrived on the Spanish Island on Saturday, ahead of Pete who was enjoying the end of a boozy weekend in Scotland, without his seemingly estranged girlfriend. Megan appeared to be enjoying her girls' night out on the island - having flown to Tenerife without Pete following their blazing row at the NTAs on Wednesday. The beauty was pictured sobbing hysterically and holding her head in her hands as she headed home from London's O2 Arena after their supposed fall out. Over it: Megan appeared confident and comfortable on the night out - having flown to Tenerife without Pete after she was seen leaving the NTAs crying, following a row with her man (above) The TOWIE star struggled to control her emotions as Pete snubbed her on his way out of the venue. The stony-faced hunk reportedly ignored her cries of 'Pete!', and instead strode past her and disappeared into the night. Megan had to be consoled by her companion, who attempted to reassure her before leading her home. She has since deleted her latest post about Pete and unfollowed the star on Instagram. After becoming teary-eyed on Wednesday, a seemingly troubled Megan endured a further meltdown on Twitter on Friday - at the hands of online trolls. The feisty Essex girl defiantly declared she was 'strong enough' to ignore the bullies, but pondered why some people believe it is OK to attack her because of her celebrity status. 'Why do people on Instagram think it's ok to cyber bully me just because I'm in the public eye?' she asked during the rant. She continued: 'Thank god I take no notice & im strong enough to see all that rubbish... but some people arnt [sic]. 'Surely this should be a crime to harass and cyber bully someone. In the public eye or not. Everyone's the same... [sic]' Rising above the drama however, she finished her tirade by adding: 'That's why I'm thankful for all my amazing fans who defend me without me even having to say anything!' Megan and Pete had only just been getting back on track, after they temporarily split when sexts he sent his former flame were leaked last Autumn. She previously denied she had undergone a boob job, insisting it was simply her 'time of the month'. And Kylie Jenner has once again sparked speculation she could have gone under the knife thanks to her latest glamorous night out during her holiday in Costa Rica. The 19-year-old Keeping Up With The Kardashians star put on a very busty display as she stepped out with her sister Kim in a shiny white dress - complete with a daring, plunging neckline. Scroll down for video Buxom: Kylie Jenner has once again sparked speculation she could have gone under the knife thanks to her latest glamorous night out in Costa Rica Fit to bust! The 19-year-old put on a very busty display as she stepped out with her sister Kim in a shiny white dress - complete with a daring, plunging neckline Raunchy: The teen also documented her look on social media - posting a saucy side view to her Snapchat to display her seemingly enhanced chest to fans Kylie's fringed number makes the most of her ample cleavage, sparking debate amongst her fans. The conversation has been taking place following her recent Instagram posts, with one person querying, 'Did her boobs just get bigger AGAIN'. One particular image sees the reality starlet looking rather buxom in a flesh-coloured bandeau top. Clear: Kylie's bust was left on full display as she stepped out for an evening with her sister Kim, sporting an equally glittering ensemble Revealing: The fringed jumpsuit cut into an incredibly low V at the front to reveal her clearly braless chest beneath Confused: Her bust became the subject of discussion among fans on her Instagram post of the outfit (above) Sparking debate: Kylie's recent posts highlight her curvier figure compared to her earlier posts (pictured in 2016) Before and after? The conversation has been taking place following her recent Instagram posts, with one person querying, 'Did her boobs just get bigger AGAIN' 'oooo Kylie how many times a week do you get your period again???', another asked, referencing her earlier defence. Another wrote: 'boob job, they don't grow overnight, just be straight out looks stupid when you try to hide the obvious. Last month, Kylie also caused a stir when she shared a new snap showing her eye-popping curves - leading to questions about the 'cost of her implants' and claims she has 'ruined her body'. Spot the difference? Kylie again sparked speculation that she has undergone a boob job last month Kylie has frequently come under fire for cosmetic enhancements - most famously when she persistently denied plumping her pout with fillers, before making a candid confession last year that she underwent the procedure at the tender age of 17. Yet again the reality starlet has faced intrigue - this time over her chest - yet in August she shot down the rumours in an impassioned rant on her website. She said: 'No, people I haven't gotten breast implants! Everyone is obsessed with that. Truth is, as I've gotten older, I've gained 15 pounds and my body has changed; I've definitely filled out.' Her latest Instagram post - which saw here were a skin tight body suit a Hat Attack denim cap - will potentially lead to another denial after the comments section was flooded with curious comments over her famous curves. What a difference... three years makes: Kylie has frequently come under fire for cosmetic enhancements - most famously when persistently denied plumping her pout with fillers, before making a candid confession last year that she underwent the procedure at the tender age of 17 (pictured in 2013) Eye-popper: Another shot posted on her Instagram shortly after showed off yet more of her new found curves Some of her 81.4million Instagram followers wrote: 'So how much did the boob job cost?... They get bigger by the minute!... Boob job so on fleeck... Nice implants... wtf are these boobs... showing off your new tits ... 'Did you get breast implants? Looks like it... Your boobs look so big in this pic!... Absolutely no respect for your body... go back and see how pretty u looked 3 yrs back!!! Dislike!... 'Honestly thought it was a joke at first I thought those where literal watermelons lol... You have ruined your body... just a push up bra plus shes on her period duhhhhhh... What size of silicone implants did you get kayle?... Curvy girl: Although her sensational curves remain the same her chest is subject to change Bikini babe: She makes no secret of her sexy figure - posting an array of sizzling shots online 'Admit it you got a boob job... Those boobs look bigger than ever... Admit that you have a boob job already... Those fakes are going to explode soon... 'The plastic family... boobs looked great before, now they look too big... okay she definitely got a boob job... her boobs just grow 6 sizes overnight... Showing off her new tatas... (sic)' Despite her denials, Mark Norfolk, the Clinical Director at Transform told MailOnline: Looking at the recent images of Kylie, it would appear that she has had a recent Breast Augmentation. 'Considering Kylies weight hasnt fluctuated hugely over the last year it is unusual that her breast size would increase so dramatically and in my professional opinion, I dont believe that this increase in size is down to hormones as she is claiming. 'Kylie also looks to be around a petite size 8 so her breasts dont seem naturally in proportion with her dress size. However, without seeing her in person, its hard to say for certain and as we are unable to see the outlines of Kylies breast there is a chance the increase in breast size could be down to a good bra.' The admission that she filled her lips aged 17 meant as a minor, a parent would have to sign off on them. Confused? Kylie's changing shape has baffled her Instagram followers and fans 'I have temporary lip fillers, it's just an insecurity of mine and it's what I wanted to do,' she revealed on her E! show last year. When she last shot down her boob job rumours, Kylie insisted that her curvier figure is all down to hormones, tweeting: 'TMI but it's that time of the month lol.' They're very much the embodiment of a modern family. And Gwyneth Paltrow, 44, and Chris Martin, 39, came together to support their daughter Apple, 12, at a school event in Santa Monica, California, on Sunday. The consciously uncoupled pair arrived separately to the event, with Gwyneth making a stylish entrance on a cream scooter. Scroll down for video Arriving in style: Gwyneth Paltrow, 44, and Chris Martin, 39, came together to support their daughter Apple at a school event in Santa Monica, California, on Sunday The mother-of-two's trendy black aviators were visible through the visor of her bright white helmet, and she wrapped up in a black coat. After she'd parked her vehicle, she removed her helmet to reveal her long blonde tresses and makeup free face. Chris was seen on foot, wearing a a chunky black scarf with a long sleeve white top rolled up to the elbows. Hands full: Chris was seen on foot, wearing a a chunky black scarf with a long sleeve white top rolled up to the elbows He coordinated with a pair of black trousers and a pair of white Adidas high-tops. The Coldplay frontman had his hands full with carrier bags and flowers, looking every inch the doting dad. Since their separation in 2014, the friendly exes have both been linked to other people. Blonde beauty: After she'd parked her vehicle, Gwyneth removed her helmet to reveal her long blonde tresses and makeup free face Professionally, Chris is set to hit the road with his band as they resume their A Head Full Of Dreams world tour at the end of March. While Gwyneth will be making her way back to television and film this year, with two projects already lined up, according to IMDB. In addition to these projects, the all-around health and wellness advocate also recently launched her own organic skin care line, branded under Goop, the lifestyle website that started as a weekly newsletter straight from Gwyneth's kitchen in Santa Monica. She has been hitting headlines for all the wrong reasons. Yet Megan McKenna ditched her love woes, after her blazing row with boyfriend Pete last week, as she headed to TOWIE filming in Tenerife with new girl Amber Turner on Monday. The 24-year-old reality veteran looked phenomenal in a skimpy bikini as she strutted on-set with her BFF, who is set to join the cast in the forthcoming series. Scroll down for video A shoulder to lean on: Megan McKenna ditched her love woes, after her blazing row with boyfriend Pete Wicks last week, as she headed to TOWIE filming in Tenerife with new girl Amber Turner on Monday Megan looked nothing short of sensational as she strutted her stuff into filming, as the cast vacated the bleak weather in their native Essex for the blissful climes of Tenerife. The Barking-born beauty was clearly prepped for her moment in the spotlight - slipping into the tiniest possible bikini for her turn in front of the cameras once again. Her brightly coloured two-piece featured an abstract pattern and a barely-there compilation of material - all the better for flaunting Megan's astonishing figure. Clearly proud of her assets, she turned to the back to flash a sizzling look over her shoulder to best show off her extremely perky posterior. Hello Miss McKenna! The 24-year-old reality veteran looked phenomenal in a skimpy bikini as she strutted on-set with her BFF, who is set to join the cast in the forthcoming series Hot times: Megan looked nothing short of sensational as she strutted her stuff into filming, as the cast vacated the bleak weather in their native Essex for the blissful climes of Tenerife Look at me! Clearly proud of her assets, she turned to the back to flash a sizzling look over her shoulder to best show off her extremely perky assets Legs eleven: The girls coordinated in their glamorous getups Despite boasting an incredibly taut stomach, Megan wrapped a black sarong around her waist, which perfectly tied in with her oversized black sunglasses. She lengthened her already extraordinary legs with the addition of staggering wooden heels in a nude colour. Injecting a designer touch into the look was her flashy Rolex watch, which was gifted to her by Pete - perhaps a sign all is not lost as she continued to wear the jewellery. Her volumunious tresses were styled into huge curls with an astonishing height on top while her make-up was generously applied - hinting she was certainly not planning any trips into the water for the day. Got it wrapped up: Despite boasting an incredibly taut stomach, Megan wrapped a black sarong around her waist, which perfectly tied in with her oversized black sunglasses Wow! Megan certainly made an impact as she strutted her stuff along the shores Bouncy blow-dry: Her volumunious tresses were styled into huge curls with an astonishing height on top while her make-up was generously applied - hinting she was certainly not planning any trips into the water for the day Out and a pout: The brunette stunner sizzled in her bold ensemble Amber meanwhile proved she is certainly set to cause a stir on the show as she slipped into her astonishing orange ensemble. Slotting in perfectly with the Essex girl glam, the blonde beauty wore a chic key-hole bikini with a dazzling diamante adornment under the bust. She too wrapped a sarong around her taut stomach while shielding her high-waisted bottoms, which featured a high hip strap detail. The flawless stunner seemed to have headed to the hairdresser with her pal, as they both boasted near identical blowdries - save for the contrasting blonde and brunette hues. Sizzling: Amber meanwhile proved she is certainly set to cause a stir on the show as she slipped into her astonishing orange ensemble Through the keyhole: Slotting in perfectly with the Essex girl glam, the blonde beauty wore a chic key-hole bikini with a dazzling diamante adornment under the bust Orange and the new black: She too wrapped a sarong around her taut stomach while shielding her high-waisted bottoms, which featured a high hip strap detail Feeling Selfie-ish: The girls flashed their coordinating initial phone cases as they snapped selfies Bouncy beauty: The flawless stunner seemed to have headed to the hairdresser with her pal, as they both boasted near identical blowdries - save for the contrasting blonde and brunette hues Flower power: Gemma Collins looked sensational in a flowing floral kaftan as she shot scenes at her hotel pool Megan and Pete sparked rumours of a split after their epic spat at the National Television Awards last Wednesday. But it looked as though the couple may be back on again, after they were pictured dining together at TOWIE pal Gemma Collins' birthday. The brunette beauty and her tattooed on/ off beau, 28, were seen being grilled by co-star James Locke, who suddenly appeared keen to discover their relationship tips. Not the last supper then? Megan and Pete sparked rumours of a split after their epic spat at the National Television Awards last week Here comes trouble! Pete was seen strolling through Tenerife airport as he jetted into the island on Sunday Boys' night out: The tattooed hunk hit the town as soon as he got to Tenerife, enjoying an evening out with pals (L-R) James Lock, Dan Edgar and Tommy Mallet Here come the boys! Pete, Dan and James were seen filming scenes at a swimming pool on Monday morning Hunks in trunks: Pete and James showcased their gym-honed physiques as they emerged from the pool dripping wet Stirring up the seemingly awkward atmosphere further, James posted a Snapchat from the dinner as he grilled the turbulent couple following their very public row. 'These two are like an old couple they don't talk.' he joked, adding: 'Megan! -What's your top tip for a great relationship?' As someone piped up in the background shouting 'habit!', James added: 'Come on girl, hit us with it. Before he concluded: 'You don't have one? What because of him?', admitting: 'What's my top tip? Don't have one.' Cheeky! The lads seemed to be play-fighing as they grappled in the shallows Fun in the sun: The trio seemed to be having a ball as they larked around Staying mum: The brunette beauty and her tattooed on/ off beau, 28, were seen being grilled by co-star James Locke, who suddenly appeared keen to discover their relationship tips 'These two are like an old couple they don't talk.' he joked, adding: 'Megan! -What's your top tip for a great relationship?' James asked Megan and Pete Megan and Pete kept tight-lipped during the exchange. She arrived on the Spanish Island on Saturday, ahead of Pete who was enjoying the end of a boozy weekend in Scotland, without his seemingly estranged girlfriend. Megan appeared to be enjoying her girls' night out on the island - having flown to Tenerife without Pete following their blazing row at the NTAs on Wednesday. The beauty was pictured sobbing hysterically and holding her head in her hands as she headed home from London's O2 Arena after their supposed fall out. Over it: Megan appeared confident and comfortable on the night out - having flown to Tenerife without Pete after she was seen leaving the NTAs crying, following a row with her man (above) The TOWIE star struggled to control her emotions as Pete snubbed her on his way out of the venue. The stony-faced hunk reportedly ignored her cries of 'Pete!', and instead strode past her and disappeared into the night. Megan had to be consoled by her companion, who attempted to reassure her before leading her home. She has since deleted her latest post about Pete and unfollowed the star on Instagram. After becoming teary-eyed on Wednesday, a seemingly troubled Megan endured a further meltdown on Twitter on Friday - at the hands of online trolls. The feisty Essex girl defiantly declared she was 'strong enough' to ignore the bullies, but pondered why some people believe it is OK to attack her because of her celebrity status. 'Why do people on Instagram think it's ok to cyber bully me just because I'm in the public eye?' she asked during the rant. She continued: 'Thank god I take no notice & im strong enough to see all that rubbish... but some people arnt [sic]. 'Surely this should be a crime to harass and cyber bully someone. In the public eye or not. Everyone's the same... [sic]' Rising above the drama however, she finished her tirade by adding: 'That's why I'm thankful for all my amazing fans who defend me without me even having to say anything!' Megan and Pete had only just been getting back on track, after they temporarily split when sexts he sent his former flame were leaked last Autumn. She made a surprise entrance in the South African jungle on I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! this week. And while Kate Fisher, 42, may have been a household name in the 90s, many viewers took to Twitter to reveal their confusion as to her identity during Monday night's episode. Kate, who now goes by the moniker T'ziporah Malka bat Israel, left fans scratching their heads when she appeared almost unrecognisable from her glamorous days as James Packer's fiance. Scroll down for video Is that you? While Kate Fisher, 42, may have been a household name in the 90s, many viewers took to Twitter to reveal their confusion as to her identity during Monday night's episode of I'm A Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here! 'Omg that is Kate Fischer???? Unrecognisable,' Tweeted one shocked fan during her debut episode. Another fan concurred, Tweeting: 'Oh I had to have a triple-take on Kate Fischer. What happened?', while adding hashtags such as: 'siren so long ago', 'wow' and 'time changes everything'. '90s bombshell Kate Fischer I did not recognise her wow!' [sic] a viewer Tweeted. New look: Kate, who now goes by the moniker T'ziporah Malka bat Israel, left fans scratching their heads when she appeared almost unrecognisable from her glamorous days as James Packer's fiance Shock: 'Omg that is Kate Fischer???? Unrecognisable' Tweeted one shocked fan during her debut episode Concurring: Another fan concurred, Tweeting: 'Oh I had to have a triple-take on Kate Fischer. What happened?' Former pinup: '90s bombshell Kate Fischer I did not recognise her wow!' [sic] a viewer Tweeted Other fans took to social media to comment on Kate's physical transformation over the years, with one Tweeting: 'My 16 year old self no longer has a crush on Kate Fischer'. Meanwhile, other viewers took to Twitter to sing charismatic Kate's praises, with one Tweeting: 'I can see @TziporahMalkah being a great team leader for this group.' Another Twitter user gushed: '@TziporahMalkah seriously so super smart and awesome! Glad to see you back'. Thanks for sharing! Other fans took to social media to comment on Kate's physical transformation over the years, with one Tweeting: 'My 16 year old self no longer has a crush on Kate Fischer' Leader: Meanwhile, other viewers took to Twitter to sing charismatic Kate's praises, with one Tweeting: 'I can see @TziporahMalkah being a great team leader for this group' Praise: Another Twitter user gushed: '@TziporahMalkah seriously so super smart and awesome! Glad to see you back' Throwback: Kate is widely remembered as the glamorous runway sensation who shared a high-profile relationship with billionaire James Packer Bombshell: She was known for her daring red carpet ensembles and busty displays (Pictured in 2006) Kate is widely remembered as the glamorous runway sensation who shared a high-profile relationship with billionaire James Packer. Nowadays, Kate lives a very low-key life in Melbourne while working in a hospital. Several years ago, she relocated to Los Angeles, where she converted to Judaism and changed her her name to Tziporah Malka bat Israel. New identity: Several years ago, she relocated to Los Angeles, where she converted to Judaism and changed her her name to Tziporah Malka bat Israel The media personality was recently spotted wearing just a bed sheet and simple slippers as she checked her mailbox outside her home in the Melbourne suburb of Toorak. 'I don't think she goes out much,' one neighbour told Woman's Day. 'I see the lights on but I don't see her for weeks at a time.' A friend of the star also told the publication, 'she's extremely private', and that 'she'd still like to fall in love and have a family of her own, but she's happy'. The highly-anticipated eighth season premiered on Monday night. But while the first episode of My Kitchen Rules focused on Tasmanian sweethearts Damo and Caz, a truffle farmer by the name of Henry Terry stole the show on social media. Dozens of viewers took to Twitter to swoon over handsome Henry, keen to know about the farmer who supplied crucial ingredients for their instant restaurant challenge. Scroll down for video Scene-stealer: During the premiere episode of My Kitchen Rules on Monday night, a handsome truffle farmer by the name of Henry Terry stole the show on social media, with many Twitter users swooning over his good looks Early in the show, as Damo and Caz went to collect ingredients for their meal, they were introduced to Henry, whose good looks didn't go unnoticed by Caz. 'He looks like a Calvin Klein Model,' the social worker said, as Salt N Pepa's hit 'Whatta Man' played in the background. Twitter soon erupted with many also remarking on good-looking Henry. Unexpected heartthrob: The premiere episode of My Kitchen Rules featured a brief appearance by Henry, who set social media alight Husband material: Good-looking Henry is the owner of a successful truffle business, making him the perfect catch 'Oh my god, moving to Tasmania to find Henry the truffle farmer,' one user wrote. 'Henry the truffle farmer will be making all the ladies go gaga over him,' another stated, accompanied by an animated GIF that showed a cartoon character's eyes exploding with love hearts. With Henry's appearance on the show quite brief, many users were left wanting more. A picture tells a thousand words: Many viewers across the country quickly fell in love with Henry Checking out the goods: Caz was inspecting Henry's truffles, but his good looks also caught her eye 'If they're having truffle issues can they bring that truffle farmer to 'help' preferably nude,' one fan requested. Another admirer tweeted to the hosts of Sunrise, asking if Henry could be interviewed on the breakfast program. And believing that he will now be permanently thrust into the spotlight, another added: 'I feel for this "Henry The Truffle Farmer". He is never going to get another moment of peace'. Impending fame: One Twitter user believed that Henry would now be subjected to large amounts of attention However, it appears that Henry is no stranger to the camera. As the owner of Tasmanian Truffles, the young entrepreneur has previously been featured on the Channel Ten lifestyle show, The Living Room. He was also appeared on a video for The University of Tasmania discussing his successful truffle venture. Meanwhile, plenty of fans took to social media to note the return of judge Manu Fieldel's purple velvet jacket. Another 'Jacket-gate'? Manu's purple velvet jacket caught the attention of many social media uses It's back! Manu has previously worn the seventies-inspired garment, and many keen viewers remembered his unusual outfit choice Flashback: Some users mercilessly mocked Manu's retro outfit choice Later in the program, Twitter turned its attention to Manu's unusual outfit choice as he arrived at Damo and Caz's house for dinner. The French-born chef resurrected an infamous purple velvet jacket that he had worn in previous seasons. 'THE JACKET LIVES', a viewer announced in capital letters, emphasising the garish garment's return to screens. Unique fashion choice: Manu chose the purple blazer to wear to the instant restaurant Summing it up: The premiere night of MKR was dominated by discussion around both handsome Henry and Manu's jacket Many MKR fans ridiculed the jacket, with one writing: 'My dad wore purple velvet at his wedding. 42 years ago. Just saying.' Others stated that in the seventies-inspired jacket, Manu reminded them of movie characters Willy Wonka and Austin Powers. Another posted a GIF that showed That 70s Show character Steven Hyde making a painful grimance. In the sitcom, Steven was known for his penchant for all things velvet. And while Damo and Caz scored well for their dishes, kicking off a competitive series of the show, one user summed up what many were thinking: 'The true stars of #MKR are Henry the Truffle Farmer and Manu's velour jacket'. The colour purple: The French-born chef raised eyebrows with his sartorial selection He was nominated for Outstanding Performance By A Male Actor in a Leading Role for his role in Hacksaw Ridge. But Andrew Garfield skipped Sunday's SAG Awards, leaving fans disappointed. Taking to Twitter in their droves, they complained: 'Where the heck is Andrew Garfield?'. Some speculated that he was home 'sick in bed'. But instead it seems the Hacksaw Ridge star had a better offer - and was actually in London. Sick? Andrew Garfield skipped Sunday's SAG Awards,despite being nominated for Hacksaw Ridge (pictured Jan 8) DailyMail.com can reveal that the actor was actually at The National Theatre with a group of friends watching Ruth Wilson in Hedda Gabler Andrew's interest in the stage is understandable, as he will appear in Tony Kushner's Angels in America at the highly respected theatre in May. Meanwhile back in LA his failure to attend the SAGS left fans confused. Missed: His no-show left some fans disappointed Where is he? These fans missed seeing Andrew at the event at the Shrine Auditorium Celebrity journalist Marc Malkin wrote on Twitter: 'I am sad. No Andrew Garfield tonight. He's home sicky in bed.' The trip to London also meant the 33-year-old actor wasn't on hand to cheer ex-girlfriend Emma Stone's win for LaLa Land. The couple dated from 2011, after meeting on The Amazing Spider-Man, but broke up last year. She won! The 33-year-old actor wasn't on hand to cheer ex-girlfriend Emma Stone's win for LaLa Land Relationship: The couple dated from 2011, after meeting on The Amazing Spider-Man, but broke up last year (pictured July 2014) And of course it meant there was no opportunity for Andrew to recreate the viral moment he kissed Ryan Reynolds when his ex's co-star Ryan Gosling beat Reynolds at the Golden Globes. The pair caused a sensation earlier this month when they planted a kiss on the lips after missing out on the Best Actor gong. Andrew missed out on a win at the SAGS, as the Actor was scooped by Denzel Washington for Fences. Close: The couple have remained on friendly terms and Andrew gave Emma a proud standing ovation at the Golden Globe Awards this month Sensational: It also meant there was no opportunity for Andrew to recreate the moment he kissed Ryan Reynolds when his ex's co-star Ryan Gosling beat Reynolds at the Golden Globes Although he was due to attend, his no-show meant that he avoided running into his ex-girlfriend, however both Andrew and Emma are nominated for Oscars next month. The couple have remained on friendly terms and Andrew gave Emma a proud standing ovation at the Golden Globe Awards this month. Not well: Jane Fonda had strep throat and didn't show up for the SAGs (pictured Oct 2016) Cup of ambition: Jane was unable to attend to co-present Lily Tomlin with a Lifetime Achievement Award, but Dolly Parton ably did the duty solo Jane Fonda also fell sick and was unable to attend to co-present Lily Tomlin with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Dolly Parton, 71, did the duties alone, after she explained to the Hollywood Reporter that the 79-year-old actress was ill with strep throat. Tomlin and Fonda also were both nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series for their work in Grace & Frankie. Also ill: Despite having her outfit ready-to-go, Sarah Hyland shared on Instagram that she wouldn't be attending, at the last minute Modern Family star Sarah Hyland also cited her health for skipping Sunday's SAGs. Despite having her outfit ready-to-go, she shared on Instagram that she wouldn't be attending, at the last minute. 'Sad to say I will not be attending the sag awards today for some health reasons. So I leave you all with an adorable picture from last years @sagawards. Ps. You know my dress was gonna be turnt too.' She's not one to put a foot wrong when it comes to showing off her idiosyncratic fashion sense. But on Sunday night Kim Kardashian appeared to head to a family dinner in Costa Rica with one shoe broken. Photographs appear to show the reality star missing a heel on one of her Gladiator-style heels as she walked to the restaurant in a shiny red mini dress. Scroll down for video Something missing? Kim Kardashian appeared to have broken one of her Gladiator-style heels as she headed to a family dinner in Coasta Rica on Sunday night Broken? Photographs appear to show that her right shoe was missing a heel but it may be an optical illusion Still, no-one likely noticed what was going on with Kim's shoes since she decided to step out bra-less in a sheer and shiny red mini dress. The 36-year-old showed no modesty in the slinky low-cut number that visibly revealed her large breasts. And she showed off plenty of leg too in the outfit that skimmed her thighs and folded itself around her generous derriere. Exposed: Still, no-one likely noticed what was going on with Kim's shoes since she decided to step out bra-less in a sheer and shiny red mini dress No support: The 36-year-old Keeping Up With The Kardashians star showed no modesty in the slinky low-cut number that visibly revealed her large breasts The Keeping Up With The Kardashian queen gave her look sporty edge with a blue velvet cap pulled down over her eyes. She sported the long, ironed raven locks, which has been her signature hairstyle since her robbery in Paris, but missing was the gold lip ring she's been wearing of late. Kim naturally made sure to keep a large cell phone close carrying it in one hand as she headed to the eatery. Eyes down: Kim, who was without husband Kanye West, gave her look sporty edge with a blue velvet cap pulled down over her eyes but wasn't wearing the gold lip ring she's favored of late Never off duty: The reality star Kim naturally made sure to keep a large cell phone close carrying it in one hand as she headed to the eatery with younger half-sister Kylie Jenner Inside the dinner party: Kim shared a Snapchat selfie from the feast Accompanying her older half-sister to the family get-together was Kylie Jenner, 19. The teen looked more ready for a red carpet that a quiet meal in a plunging white tiered gown. And she didn't show much more modesty than Kim as her barely-there outfit revealed almost all of her cleavage and mixed silky tassels with sheer panels throughout its length. Not so modest either: Kylie, 19, donned a barely-there outfit that revealed almost all of her cleavage and mixed silky tassels with sheer panels throughout its length Revealing number: Kylie pulled her raven locks back into a sleek ponytail and her makeup was flawless Kylie pulled her raven locks back into a sleek ponytail and her make-up was flawless. The ladies were followed by a security guard with a flashlight. The sisters have been on vacation in Costa Rica for several days with the Keeping Up With The Kardashian cameras following their every step. When fun and work collide: The sisters have been on vacation in Costa Rica for several days as the Keeping Up With The Kardashian cameras follow their every step Nice pose KJ: The girlfriend of Tyga looked up at the moon and stars in this image Looking fine: Kylie also to Snapchat to give a good look at her skimpy gown Kim was also seen in a nude bikini by a pool with sister Khloe. And the mother-of-two took daughter North West on a helicopter ride while she wore slippers. Also along for the sight-seeing trip was sister Kourtney with her kids Mason, Penelope and Reign. Even on-again love rat Scott Disick was there. But there have been no signs of Kanye during the vacation. He is thought to be working on new music after his November mental breakdown that caused him to get help at the UCLA Medical Center. She seemed genuinely surprised to land the Screen Actors Guild Award for actress for La La Land at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles on Sunday. But even more surprising - and completely adorable - was the reaction of Emma Stone's co-star Ryan Gosling when she gushed about him on stage. 'Ryan, you're the best. That's just the truth. No one can argue it,' she said as the laughing 36-year-old covered his face with his hand in embarrassment. Scroll down for video 'You're the best!' An embarrassed Ryan Gosling covered his smiling face as his La La Land co-star gushed about him on stage when she picked up SAG's best actress honour on Sunday Don't look at me! The actor seemed shy. Also at his table were John Legend and Chrissy Teigen The hunky star was seated at a table next to crooner John Legend and his wife, model Chrissy Teigen, as he watched his onscreen love interest pick up her statuette. Emma also went on to thank the musical's director Damien Chazelle. And the star had a shout out for the other actresses in the category, Meryl Streep, Natalie Portman, Amy Adams and Emily Blunt. Lost for words: The 28-year-old seemed genuinely surprised when she received SAG's best actress honour The beautiful 28-year-old and Ryan are old friends. They also worked together on Crazy Stupid Love and Gangster Squad. Ryan didn't get the SAG honour for best actor, losing out to Fences' Denzel Washington. Put your hands together: Ryan applauded Emma when her win was announced But he did win the Golden Globe for actor earlier this month. The film is nominated for a historic 14 Oscar nominations, tying the record held by All About Eve (1950) and Titanic (1997). The Academy Awards will take place in Los Angeles on February 26. Lara Worthington jetted into Sydney on Monday for a whirlwind trip for the first time since giving birth to her second son. But the model arrived alone, having left her children behind in her adopted home of New York City, presumably with their dad, Lara's hubby Sam Worthington. 'Lara is in Sydney for literally 72 hours for business meetings for her beauty brand The Base and meet with her Australian team,' a friend told The Daily Telegraph. Scroll down for video No babes: Lara Worthington jetted into Sydney on Monday for a whirlwind trip for the first time since giving birth to her second son 'Because it's a short trip she left her children at home,' the friend added. Lara has two boys, eldest son Rocket Zot, and a son who she hasn't yet publicly named, who was born in October. Lara (married name Worthington) arrived at Sydney Airport on Monday morning. The blonde beauty showed off her svelte post-pregnancy figure in a pair of black trousers teamed with a chic black and white check blazer. Alone: But the model arrived alone, having left her children behind in her adopted home of New York City, presumably with their dad, Lara's hubby Sam Worthington Solo: 'Because it's a short trip she left her children at home,' a friend reveals Baby love: Lara posted an image of Rocket on a swing recently to Instagram The 29-year-old was clearly happy to be home, beaming as she walked through Sydney airport's international terminal. The mother-of-two was glowing makeup free, and had her famous 'Bingle bob' out in a simple style. The Daily Telegraph reported over the weekend that Lara was jetting into her native Sydney on her first trip home in almost eight months. Doting:Lara, seen here with Rocket, jetted into her native Sydney on her first trip home in almost eight months House husband: Sam has presumably been left to mind the kids The publication claimed a source said the visit is to not only spend time with her relatives, including her Cronulla-based mother Sharon Bingle, but to also hold meetings for her tanning line, The Base. The blonde beauty is also said to be attending the David Jones fashion show on Wednesday. He's known for his role as John Paul McQueen on soap stalwart Hollyoaks. Yet, it appears actor James Sutton has let some of the on-screen drama trickle into his reality as he reportedly split from his fiancee Kit Williams and has moved on to a new love. According to The Sun, the Channel 4 star, 33, previously confirmed his engagement with the model in 2015 during a romantic trip to Barbados, but have allegedly split late last year. Scroll down for video Moving on: It appears actor James Sutton has let some of the drama on-screen trickle into his reality as he reportedly split from his fiancee Kit Williams and has moved on to a new love Rachael Collin The TV actor is said to now have found love again with brunette beauty Rachael Collin, having shared a number of snaps with the stunner on social media. Despite his new relationship going under the radar, James looked smitten with his new partner in an array of cosy Instagrams, including one of them looking playful by the seaside. James - who briefly appeared on Emmerdale - previously dated fellow soap stars Sammy Winward, Cath Tyldesley and Jessica Fox. MailOnline have contacted James' reps for comment. Finding love again: The TV actor is said to now have found love again with brunette beauty Rachael Collin, having shared a number of snaps with the stunner on social media Happy: Despite his new relationship going under the radar, James looked smitten with his new partner in an array of cosy Instagrams, including one of them looking playful by the seaside Aside from finding love once again, it was previously revealed he is set to quit Hollyoaks, having first appeared in the long-running soap in 2006. Playing the son of Myra McQueen, he previously quit the drama in 2008, before returning in December 2012. Now leaving the show for a second time, James will leave the soap in an heartbreaking storyline that will see the gay teacher drive off the edge of a cliff in his car. Saying goodbye: Aside from finding love once again, it was previously revealed he is set to quit Hollyoaks, having first appeared in the long-running soap in 2006 A TV source told The Sun: 'James is a soap legend and will be sorely missed by Hollyoaks cast, crew and viewers. Producers have given him a huge, dramatic exit so it's going to be the perfect way to see off almost a decade of John Paul on our screens. 'In gut-wrenching scenes filmed in north Wales before Christmas, John Paul will be shown driving off the edge of a cliff in his car. 'Show chiefs arent necessarily saying his exit is for good and they are leaving the door open. But for now this is the last people will see of John Paul for the foreseeable future.' AFL WAG Rebecca Judd gave her son Oscar a lesson on tasteful Instagram filter selection on Tuesday. But there's some things the 33-year-old would best leave in the hands of professionals. KIIS FM's newest host shared an adorable farewell snap with her cute five-year-old son before he set off for his big first day of school for the year. Scroll Down For Video First day! Bec Judd shared an adorable farewell snap with 5-year-old son Oscar before he set off for his big first day of school for the year. The charming black-and-white filtered snap pictured the wife of former AFL star Chris in a motherly embrace with her bubbly blonde son. Bec leaned her glowing face against Oscar's, her expression looking equal parts proud and nervous. Her son's expression appeared harder to pin down, accurately presenting the mix of emotions he must be feeling as he ventures into a new school year. He looked absolutely adorable in his knitted prep hat and button-up shirt. Nervous! The 33-year-old beauty leaned her glowing face against Oscar's in the snap her expression looking equal parts proud and nervous as she prepares to spend much more time apart now that the school holidays have wrapped-up Bec wore an off-the-shoulder white dress. 'And just like that, he's off...' She wrote in the caption. The comment encapsulates the common first-day-of-school realisation of just how fast kids seem to grow up. Married! Bec is married to former AFL star Chris Judd (L) and the couple share four children Last day! Last year, the personality shared an image of Oscar's Kindergarten graduation, his different uniform perhaps implying a change of schools for 2017 Last year, the personality shared an image of Oscar's Kindergarten graduation, his different uniform perhaps implying a change of schools for 2017. Bec thanked her son's teachers for being 'two of the nicest ladies you'll ever meet.' She shares three more kids with husband Chris, with next-oldest Billie, 2 still a few years off her school debut. The brunette beauty gave birth to twins Tom and Darcy last year. Who is affected by Trump's immigration order? Ambiguity reigned Sunday as to the finer details of Donald Trump's temporary ban on incoming refugees and travelers from seven Muslim countries, with questions remaining about how exactly the measures affect various populations. The order initially took many travelers by surprise, especially those already aboard airplanes en route to the United States as the president signed the measure into force on Friday afternoon. Administration officials reported that 109 people had been detained as they arrived in the United States on Saturday, of which "a couple dozen" individuals were still being held as of Sunday morning. Protesters hold signs up during a protest at San Francisco International Airport in California on January 29, 2017 Josh Edelson (AFP) The following is a list of the nationalities and groups of people affected by Trump's order, which is titled "Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States." - Refugees - The decree prohibits entry to all refugees, regardless of nationality, for 120 days. Beyond that time, the United States will admit a maximum of 50,000 refugee in 2017, more than halving the 110,000-person limit set by former president Barack Obama. The US refugee program was previously frozen for three months following the September 11 attack in 2001. - Syrians - All Syrians, refugee or otherwise, are forbidden from entering the United States until further notice. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the Syrian war has forced 4.8 million people to flee the country since 2011. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in December it had recorded the deaths of 312,001 people since the conflict began with anti-government protests in March 2011. - Iran, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan and Libya - No visas will be issued for 90 days to migrants or visitors from seven mainly Muslim countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. - Green card holders - The decree does not affect those who hold a US green card. Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly declared the entry of lawful permanent residents to be "in the national interest." However, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said that nationals from the seven countries named in the order should expect to be subject to increased border controls. - Visa holders - All visa holders coming from the seven specified countries are subject to the new order, with the exception of those who hold diplomatic visas or visas to international institutions such as NATO or the United Nations. Judges in at least four states have blocked part of the ban, ordering authorities to stop deporting refugees and other travelers stuck at US airports. - Binationals - The situation for individuals with dual nationality remains complex. US officials said Saturday that American citizens who also have a passport from one of the seven barred countries are not affected by the order. An exemption is also granted to dual nationals holding British and Canadian passports. Britain said its nationals would not be subject to additional checks unless they traveled directly to the US from one of the listed countries. But dual nationals who hold passports from one of the seven countries plus an additional foreign country will not be able to gain entrance. US, S. Korea to 'strengthen' defenses against N. Korea US President Donald Trump and South Korea's Acting President Hwang Kyo-Ahn vowed to "strengthen" their joint defense capabilities against the belligerent North, the White House said. "President Trump reiterated our ironclad commitment to defend the ROK, including through the provision of extended deterrence, using the full range of military capabilities," the White House said in a statement, using an acronym for the South's formal name. "The two leaders agreed to take steps to strengthen joint defense capabilities to defend against the North Korean threat." The agreement between Washington and Seoul to install the High Altitude Area Defense system has provoked anger in South Korea and China Ben Listerman (DoD/AFP/File) Pentagon chief James Mattis is due to travel to South Korea on Wednesday and Japan on Friday on his first trip as defense secretary. The trip comes amid worries in the two long-standing American allies about the direction of US policy in their region under President Donald Trump. During his campaign, Trump threatened to withdraw US forces from the two countries if they did not step up their financial support for their defense. But the White House insisted that the trip "reflects the close friendship between our two countries and demonstrates the importance of the US-ROK alliance." Seoul and Washington agreed last year to install the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in the South after a string of North Korean nuclear and missile tests -- prompting strong objections from China, which fears it will undermine its own ballistic capabilities. Earlier this month, Hwang warned that North Korea's nuclear and missile capabilities are accelerating at an "unprecedented" pace, as he called for the "swift" deployment of the anti-missile system. Within South Korea, voices opposing the THAAD installation have grown louder, with some opposition candidates pledging to scrap the agreement if they win a presidential election due this year. World leaders criticise Trump immigration move Several world leaders and governments have hit out at the immigration restrictions imposed by US President Donald Trump. Here are some of the top reactions: - BRITAIN - President Donald Trump's temporary immigration ban to the United States sparks international furor and days of protests Mandel Ngan (AFP/File) Downing Street said on Sunday Prime Minister Theresa May does "not agree" with the restrictions and would intervene if they affected British nationals. While US immigration is a matter for Washington, "we do not agree with this kind of approach and it is not one we will be taking," London said. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson tweeted Britain "will protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals home and abroad. Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality." - EUROPEAN UNION - European Union foreign policy supremo Federica Mogherini pledged the bloc would "continue to support, welcome and take care of those who flee from war". "We will continue to celebrate for every wall that is torn down and for every new bridge that is built up. We will keep working for peace and coexistence. This is our history, this is our identity, our work and our commitment," added Mogherini. - CANADA - Prime Minister Justin Trudeau did not directly criticise Trump but said on his official Twitter account: "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada." This tweet was followed by one showing him with a young refugee at a Canadian airport and another that used the hashtag #ACanadianIsACanadian, as his office confirmed Canadian passport holders including dual nationals were unaffected by the ban. - IRAN - Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif slammed Trump's move as "a clear insult to the Islamic world" and said it "will be recorded in history as a great gift to extremists and their supporters". Zarif said Trump's decision "only serves to provide a fertile ground for more terrorist recruitment by deepening the ruptures and fault-lines which have been exploited by extremist demagogues to swell their ranks". His ministry said earlier it would reciprocate with a ban on Americans entering the country, though it will not apply to those who already have a valid visa. - GERMANY - Angela Merkel's spokesman said the German chancellor "regrets the entry ban" and "is convinced that even in the necessarily resolute battle against terrorism, it is not justified to place people from a certain origin or belief under general suspicion". Berlin "will now examine the consequences" of the ban for German citizens with dual nationality affected by the decision, added the spokesman. - INDONESIA - Indonesia "deeply regrets" the move "because we believe it would affect the global fight against terrorism and the refugees management negatively," foreign ministry spokesman Arrmanatha Nasir told AFP. "It is wrong to link radicalism and terrorism with one particular religion," Nasir said. - FRANCE - French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said: "Welcoming refugees who are fleeing war is part of our duty." "We must... ensure that this happens in a fair, just way and with solidarity ... This decision can only cause us concern." - SWEDEN - Swedish Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Margot Wallstrom called the decision "deeply unfortunate". "This decision increases mistrust and tensions between people. Not since World War II have so many people fled war and conflict," she wrote. "It is the joint responsibility of all countries to help them, including the US." - SWITZERLAND - Trump's decision is "wrong", Swiss Foreign Affairs Minister Didier Burkhalter said. "We have always been opposed to discrimination against human beings on the basis of religion or nationality," he said. "In that sense, the US order clearly goes in the wrong direction." Burkhalter said the Swiss government would confer with American representatives to find out how the order would affect Swiss residents, especially dual nationals from countries affected. Burkhalter also invoked the Geneva Conventions, saying they "mean that all countries welcome people affected by war for humanitarian reasons". "It is therefore contrary to the Conventions to stop welcoming people coming from Syria," he added. - THE NETHERLANDS - Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said all refugees fleeing war and violence "deserve a safe haven, regardless of their ethnicity or religion". He added that while his government is conscious of the potential to abuse the refugee system, "we regret the US decision to ban the travel of people from seven Muslim countries and we reject it." However, Geert Wilders, a lawmaker from the far-right Freedom Party, tweeted Sunday: "Less Islam means more freedom" and "No more immigration from an Islamic country is exactly what we need. Also in The Netherlands, Islam and freedom are incompatible." - CZECH REPUBLIC - Going against the grain of global condemnation, a spokesman for Czech President Milos Zeman came out in favour of the ban. "US President Trump protects his country, he's concerned with the safety of his citizens. Exactly what EU elites do not do," Jiri Ovcacek said. - POLAND - Polish Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski also refused to condemn the ban, saying "it's the right of every sovereign state to determine its own immigration policy". "The scale of this phenomenon is so large that in many countries at the moment the immigration issue is a matter of government policy and should remain government policy," he told Polish private news channel Polsat News on Sunday. "No country currently has the obligation to welcome immigrants. Countries have the obligation -- in accordance with international conventions -- to welcome refugees, if they arrive," he added. International reaction to US president Donald Trump's travel restrictions on seven Muslim-majority countries Alain Bommenel (AFP) Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif blasted President Trump's ban as "a clear insult to the Islamic world" Kirill Kudryavtsev (AFP/File) Malaysia shipwreck search expanded, three men detained Rescuers Monday expanded their search for four Chinese tourists and a crewman whose boat sank in rough seas off Malaysia, as police detained the skipper, another crewman and the boat owner for suspected negligence. The owner had breached procedures, including overloading the boat, Sabah state Police Commissioner Ramli Din was quoted as saying by national news agency Bernama. "Police will also investigate whether negligence led to the deaths of the tourists," Ramli said. Twenty Chinese tourists have been rescued and sent to hospital after the boat they were on sank off Borneo STR (AFP) The sinking of the catamaran off Sabah on Borneo island on Saturday, the first day of the Lunar New Year holiday, sparked a major air and sea search. Twenty exhausted Chinese tourists survived hours in the water thanks to their life jackets and by clinging desperately to objects from the boat, but three other tourists died. The skipper and another crew member were earlier rescued off a nearby island. Initially, authorities said 28 Chinese tourists were on board the ill-fated vessel. But late Monday Malaysian officials said one Chinese had failed to show up for the trip. The search area has been further expanded from 1,500 to 2,400 nautical square miles, Awil Kamsari, a spokesman for the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, told AFP. Awil said the search was expected to continue through the night despite adverse weather. Malaysian navy chief Ahmad Kamarulzaman Ahmad Badaruddin told AFP that more assets have been deployed. Part of the search area falls in Brunei's waters and the sultanate's navy is assisting, he said. "It's not going to be easy as time is critical. The longer it takes, the lower the probability of finding them," Ahmad said, adding the sea was still very rough. "But we cannot lose hope and must continue." The search was postponed due to rough seas on Sunday night but resumed Monday morning. Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak said on his Facebook page he wanted a "thorough investigation" into the incident. China's foreign ministry also urged "a fair and objective investigation to find out the truth in the accident as soon as possible". The boat with 27 tourists and three crew aboard had left the Sabah state capital Kota Kinabalu for Pulau Mengalum, an island known for its pristine beaches and dive sites. The boat owner reported it missing on Saturday evening. The skipper said the boat had "broken" and sank after being hit by big waves. The traumatised and exhausted survivors were taken to Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Kota Kinabalu. A Malaysian official there told AFP they "looked shocked" and some "could not walk and looked very tired" as they were taken to hospital. He said they survived because of their life jackets and by clinging on to objects from the boat. Zambian women's day off for periods stokes debate A Zambian law that entitles women to take one day off work a month when they have their period is stirring increasingly fierce debate in a country reluctant to discuss sexual health. Discreetly called Mother's Day, the 2015 law -- unique in Africa -- enables women to be absent from work without notice or a doctor's note to help them cope with menstrual bleeding, pain and cramps. "It helps me to manage my physiological needs (and) I think it's very important that I always endorse it," Shupe Luchembe, 36, a civil servant in the capital Lusaka and mother of three, told AFP. Zambian woman Chiselwa kawanda explains her opposition to a law that allows women to take one day off work a month when they have their period DAWOOD SALIM (AFP) "As a woman, it goes without saying that every month I need a special day away from the office to manage myself properly." In Zambia, a southern African country of 15.5 million people, discussing sex and personal health is largely taboo and often surrounded by secrecy and misunderstanding. Many parents prefer not to explain how their children were conceived and born, instead saying they were "brought from the hospital." But two years ago, employment law was amended to grant all women -- and not just mothers, despite its title -- one day of menstrual leave each month after lobbying by campaigners. "Mother's Day is a very progressive law," said Madube Siyauya, of the Non-Governmental Organisations' Coordinating Council ( NGOCC), an umbrella body of Zambian action groups. "Some women have heavy flows, some of them have a lot of pain or vomiting. "So it's a very important day that allows women to attend to their biological needs and continue their work without being susceptible to discrimination." "Zambia is envied because of this law," added Sara Longwe, also of the NGOCC, one of those that pushed for the law. - 'It is abused' - But not everyone is a fan. While some Zambian women say the day off is widely abused, the law is also a popular subject for complaint among Zambian men. "I have never taken Mother's Day in my life," Laura Miti, 46, head of the Alliance for Community Action, told AFP. "I don't understand why others need it. It is abused. Whenever they have something they need to do, they would rather take the day off than taking leave. "My sense is that giving half the workforce 12 days (off) extra per year is unproductive. It can't be productive, especially if you are working in the corporate world." Chiselwa Kawanda, 33, a government employee in Lusaka, agrees, saying the law was misguided. "If I miss a day at work, it means I have to start all over the next day," she said, adding that, in any case: "You don't have periods for just one day." Zambia's approach is rare across the world, though Japan has had similar legislation since 1947 and Indonesia, Taiwan and South Korea have since followed suit. In Britain, Coexist, a small Bristol-based non-profit company, is experimenting with flexible hours for menstruating employees. - 'No evidence of low productivity' - Despite the criticisms, the Zambian government says it stands by the legislation, which has no age limits so also applies to women after the menopause. "Some women get sick, they are not able to concentrate on their work... so it was agreed that they can stay home without producing any certificate," Cecilia Mulindeti-Kamanga, of the labour ministry, told AFP. "Of course there has been some complaints here and there but women go at different times. There is no documentary evidence of low productivity." Some Zambian women also allege that employers, particularly in the private sector, put pressure on female workers to not take their Mother's Day. Others point out that the vast majority of Zambian women cook, clean, bring up children and care for the elderly at home or toil in the fields with little time off of any description. The government has also introduced other programmes to support women. This year it started providing free sanitary pads to schoolgirls in rural areas to reduce absenteeism. Women in Zambia face widespread discrimination in education, law and employment, and the rates of child marriage and death during childbirth are high, especially in underdeveloped rural areas where most people live. Trump agrees to refugee intake from Australia: Turnbull President Donald Trump will honour a deal struck under his predecessor to accept refugees from remote Pacific camps, Australia's prime minister said Monday amid immigration chaos in the United States. In November, Canberra negotiated a "one-off" deal with the outgoing Obama administration to settle an unspecified number of the 1,600 boatpeople Australia held in offshore processing centres in Nauru and Papua New Guinea. There were fears that Trump, who on Friday signed an executive order to suspend the arrival of refugees to the US for at least 120 days and bar entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries, would scupper the deal. US President Donald Trump speaks on the phone with Australia's Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, who said the White House will honour a deal struck under Trump's predecessor to accept refugees from remote Pacific camps MANDEL NGAN (AFP) Following a phone call between the leaders Sunday, Australia Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said the agreement would proceed. "We also discussed the resettlement arrangement of refugees from Nauru and Manus, which had been entered into with the previous administration, and I thank President Trump for his commitment to honour that existing agreement," Turnbull told reporters. He declined to provide further details on the deal, saying it was for US authorities vetting people on the islands. "So this is a matter that is entirely in the hands of United States government's agencies." Turnbull did not join in with international criticism of the Trump travel ban, saying he would not comment on the policies of sovereign nations. Amid confusion in the US, where immigration authorities have struggled to implement the ban, thousands have protested at several airports. Around 300 people were stopped or detained worldwide, while four federal judges moved to halt deportations. The US order suspends the arrival of Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. Canberra has come under fire from rights groups and the United Nations for its treatment of people seeking to arrive by boat, many from war-torn areas. The government puts such boatpeople in offshore detention camps and blocks their resettlement in Australia, even if found to be refugees. Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said such policies would continue. Thousands attend funeral of slain Myanmar Muslim lawyer Thousands of mourners gathered on Monday to bury a top Muslim lawyer and adviser to Aung San Suu Kyi who was gunned down outside Yangon airport in what the ruling party said was a political assassination. Ko Ni, a legal adviser to the National League for Democracy, was shot in the head on Sunday afternoon as he waited outside the airport while holding his grandson. His killing sent shockwaves through both Myanmar's already hard-pressed Muslim community and the ruling party in a country where political killings are rare. Mourners pay their respects at the coffin of murdered Muslim lawyer Ko Ni at his funeral in Yangon on January 30, 2017 Ye Aung THU (afp/AFP) Police have not said what prompted the murder, but Ko Ni, 63, was a prominent Muslim figure who spoke out against the increasingly vocal anti-Islamic sentiments of Buddhist hardliners and criticised the powerful military's grip on power. Distraught relatives were joined by senior NLD figures, imams, Buddhist monks and members of the public who crammed into a Muslim cemetery on the outskirts of Yangon on Monday afternoon. "This is a very cruel and ugly tragedy," Moe Zaw, a 37-year-old Muslim mourner told AFP. Both the NLD and Ko Ni's family suspect he was targeted because of his politics. "We strongly denounce the assassination of Ko Ni like this as it is a terrorist act against the NLD's policies," the NLD said in a statement, describing him as an "irreplacable" aide to Suu Kyi. She has yet to make a statement on the killing. A taxi driver who tried to stop the gunman was also killed. The attacker, named by police as 53-year-old Kyi Lin, was arrested at the scene. A harrowing photo circulating on social media showed what appeared to be the moment the gunman, standing behind Ko Ni as he held his grandson, took aim. His daughter Yin Nwe Khaing said she brought her young son to greet his grandfather at the airport, adding her father had made enemies because he had been a prominent Muslim voice. "As we are from a different religion there were many people who didn't like and hated it. I think that also could be a reason (for his murder)," she told DVB TV. - Anti-Muslim sentiment - Ko Ni had just returned from a government delegation visit to Indonesia where regional leaders were discussing sectarian tensions in Rakhine state. Myanmar's army has waged a crackdown on the mainly Muslim Rohingya community which has prompted tens of thousands of them to flee the area. Ko Ni had previously criticised religious laws pushed by Buddhist nationalists. Myanmar's border regions have simmered for decades with ethnic minority insurgencies but it is rare for prominent political figures to be murdered in Yangon -- the country's booming and largely safe commercial hub. However in recent years Myanmar has witnessed a surge of anti-Muslim sentiment, fanned by hardline Buddhist nationalists. Around five percent of Myanmar's population is Muslim. Suu Kyi has herself faced criticism for not fielding a single Muslim candidate during the 2015 elections, a move which analysts said was a sop to Buddhist hardliners. She has also faced international censure for her failure to criticise the crackdown on the Rohingya in Rakhine state. Since the launch of the crackdown in October at least 66,000 Rohingya have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh, alleging security forces are carrying out a campaign of rape, torture and mass killings. Suu Kyi and the military have denied allegations of abuse. Senior NLD leaders, including party patron Tin Oo, visited Ko Ni's family before the funeral. "Losing that kind of person is great loss for the country, for democratic forces and for us (the party)," Tin Oo told reporters, describing the killing as an "assassination". The International Crisis Group, a think-tank that has previously sounded the alarm over rising religious intolerance in Myanmar, said the killing "underlines the urgency of the Myanmar government and society coming together to condemn all forms of hate speech". Mourners carry the coffin of Ko Ni, a prominent Muslim lawyer who was murdered the previous day, in Yangon on January 30, 2017 Ye Aung THU (afp/AFP) Tin Tin Aye (right), the widow of murdered Muslim lawyer Ko Ni, is comforted by Tin Oo of the ruling National League for Democracy party in Yangon on January 30, 2017 Paing AUNG (AFP) Jihadist rule in Mosul sparked backlash against religion In recaptured areas of Mosul, the extreme interpretation of Islam that jihadists forced on the local population for more than two years has sparked a backlash against religious observance. After the Islamic State group seized the city in June 2014, it made prayers compulsory for people who were outside their homes, banned smoking, mandated beards for men and veils for women, smashed artefacts it said were idolatrous, publicly executed homosexuals and cut off the hands of thieves. The jihadists cast their efforts as enacting the true interpretation of Islam -- an assertion that most Muslims reject -- but for some people, rather than making them more religious as intended, IS extremism had the opposite effect. Imam Mohammed Ghanem was forbidden to conduct Friday prayers under Islamic State rule because he refused to pledge allegiance to the group Martyn AIM (AFP) The call to prayer sounds over a mosque's loudspeakers in a recaptured area of Mosul, but a butcher named Omar continues working -- something that would have been impossible under IS rule. "Mosul is an Islamic city and most young people used to pray," but IS was "forcing us... we had to go to the mosque against our will", he said. Before eastern Mosul was retaken from IS during the massive operation to recapture the northern city that was launched on October 17, shops had to close five times a day for prayers. "One day, the boy who works with me received 35 lashes because he hadn't been praying," Omar said. "Now, we are no longer obliged to close our stores... Whether we pray or not, the decision is ours." Imam Mohammed Ghanem, who was forbidden to conduct Friday prayers under IS rule because he refused to pledge allegiance to the group, said the jihadists sparked a backlash against religion. "Now some people hate the time of prayer because IS forced them" to pray, Ghanem said. - 'Too much pressure' - "They reject these rules because they associate them with IS, even if they are in fact true Islamic precepts," he said. "Put too much pressure on something and it will explode. This is what's happening now with the people: they want to live the way they want," he said. According to Ghanem, part of his work before IS seized Mosul was educating people about Islamic practices and correcting them if necessary. "Now, we say nothing because they reject religious authority. If we tell them they are doing something wrong, they tell us that we are from IS," he said. In another area of eastern Mosul, where rain is accumulating in craters left by the fighting, Imam Fares Adel said he too has changed the way he interacts with the faithful. "Now we are afraid to give advice to people because they feel uncomfortable with the religious clothing" worn by imams, said Adel. The imam said he understands those residents who "reject Islam", but thinks the situation will "gradually" return to normal. "The number of people is gradually increasing and they will all come back once of the footprint of IS has disappeared," said Adel. In Ghanem's mosque, latecomers have to pray outside. Around 40 worshippers kneel near fruit and vegetable stands to pray, while hundreds are squeezed inside the mosque. "The imam has a good mentality and he speaks well to us. More and more people are coming back" to the mosque, said 25-year-old resident Mohammed Ali. Now, without the threat of IS reprisals, "they come because they choose to". Iraqi men pray outside a mosque in Mosul's al-Masarif neighbourhood Martyn AIM (AFP) Congolese M23 fighters 'seek refuge in Rwanda' Thirty individuals claiming to be members of a Congolese militia group have sought refuge in neighbouring Rwanda, saying they were fleeing a Congo army offensive, the Rwandan government said Monday. The fighters were unarmed when they were apprehended after crossing the border near the Rubavu district on Sunday, Rwanda's defence ministry said. M23 is a mostly ethnic Tutsi rebel group that mutinied against the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2012, saying a peace accord signed in 2009 had not been respected by the government. The M23 is a mostly ethnic Tutsi rebel group that mutinied against the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2012 ISAAC KASAMANI (AFP) The militia was defeated the following year, and hundreds of fighters fled the country. The Congolese armed forces (FARDC) refused to comment on any offensive in the country's east, but a military source told AFP that two army helicopters crashed on Friday near Rutshuru, close to the Rwandan border, during an operation against M23 fighters. On Monday morning, a memorial ceremony was held in Goma, a city near the border with Rwanda, for an officer killed in one of the crashes, an AFP correspondent reported. A United Nations source said its MONUSCO peacekeeping mission did not participate in the offensive. Earlier this month, Uganda said that 40 M23 rebels that had been quartered at a military base since 2014 had disappeared, and that about 100 more had been caught trying to cross into DR Congo. Former Israeli chief rabbi convicted of graft A former Israeli chief rabbi, Yona Metzger, was found guilty Monday of taking bribes on multiple occasions, as well as fraud and obstructing justice, a court said. The Jerusalem district court convicted Metzger in a plea bargain, under which the ex-chief rabbi of the Ashkenazi branch of Judaism would be sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison and fined $1.3 million. The court, which accepted the plea bargain reached between Metzger and the prosecution, is not bound by the proposed sentence. Yona Metzger, pictured in Berlin in 2012, is a former Israeli chief rabbi KAY NIETFELD (DPA/AFP/File) Discussions on the sentence will commence on February 8. The former top rabbi had initially been charged with an array of felonies including taking bribes, fraud, money laundering and witness tampering. Metzger stepped down in July 2013 after 10 years in office. Chad's foreign minister Moussa Faki Mahamat named AU chief Chad's foreign minister Moussa Faki Mahamat was named Monday as the new AU Commission chairperson, beating four others to succeed South Africa's Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, diplomats told AFP. Several delegates leaving the election hall confirmed the win, while grinning Chadian delegates hugged each other in celebration. Former Burundian president Pierre Buyoya confirmed Faki's victory, telling AFP it came after a final round battle with Kenyan foreign minister Amina Mohamed. Moussa Faki Mahamat has been serving as Chad's foreign minister since 2008 The 56-year-old former prime minister has been at the forefront of the fight against Islamists in Nigeria, Mali and the Sahel and has promised "development and security" will be top of his agenda as chief of the continental bloc. He said he dreams of an Africa where the "sound of guns will be drowned out by cultural songs and rumbling factories" and pledged to streamline the bureaucratic AU during his four-year term in office. Member states elected him after seven rounds of voting, according to a statement from Kenya congratulating him on his victory. US return to torture would be 'catastrophic': UN expert The United Nations' top torture expert warned US President Donald Trump on Monday that endorsing waterboarding and other abuse as an interrogation technique would be illegal and have disastrous global consequences. Trump has repeatedly said he supports the use of torture in interrogations, although he has said he would defer to his Pentagon chief James Mattis, a torture opponent, for guidance on any new waterboarding push. His comments have nonetheless sparked alarm that he will try to reverse laws put in place by his predecessor Barack Obama outlawing the brutal interrogation techniques like waterboarding used by the CIA on suspects following the September 11, 2001 attacks. UN special rapporteur on torture Nils Melzer ADEM ALTAN (AFP/File) "If the new administration were to revive the use of torture, ... the consequences around the world would be catastrophic," Nils Melzer, the UN special rapporteur on torture, said in a statement. "Should Mr. Trump follow through on all of his pledges, more countries are likely to follow his lead and get back into the torture business," he warned, adding that this would be "an ultimate disgrace for all of humanity." Melzer said he was open to engage in "constructive dialogue" with Trump, but urged him not to reintroduce interrogation methods "that are more closely associated with barbarism than with civilisation." He pointed out that torture as an interrogation technique had repeatedly been shown to "produce false confessions and unreliable or misleading information." "Faced with the imminent threat of excruciating pain or anguish, victims simply will say anything - regardless of whether it is true - to make the pain stop and try to stay alive," he explained. Moreover, torture is neither legally nor morally acceptable, Melzer said. "If you are looking for military advantages in war, you can argue that chemical weapons 'work', or terrorism 'works' as well," he warned. One in four US children suffers 'chronic bullying': study Nearly one in four US children suffers from chronic bullying at school, a problem that may lead to poor academic performance and low confidence over time, researchers said Monday. The findings in the Journal of Educational Psychology are based on a study of 383 children who were followed from kindergarten through high school. "It's extremely disturbing how many children felt bullied at school," said lead author Gary Ladd, a psychology professor at Arizona State University, who described the work as the first long-term bullying study of its kind. Nearly one in four US children suffer from chronic bullying at school, researchers say Arif Ali (AFP/File) "For teachers and parents, it's important to know that victimization tends to decline as kids get older, but some children never stop suffering from bullying during their school years." The study began in Illinois, but since many families moved during its decade-long duration, the subjects were living in 24 different states by the time the research ended. Contrary to popular belief that bullying is prominent among older kids, researchers found that bullying was "more severe and frequent in elementary school and tended to taper off for most students as they got older," said the report. "However, 24 percent of the children in the study suffered chronic bullying throughout their school years, which was consistently related to lower academic achievement and less engagement in school." Researchers gave annual surveys to the children and asked the youths to describe their experiences with bullying and whether they had been hit, picked on or verbally abused by other kids. The study authors also analyzed teacher evaluations and standardized reading and math test scores. Children who were chronically bullied throughout their school years "had lower academic achievement, a greater dislike of school and less confidence in their academic abilities," said the study. Similar findings were seen in children who had experienced moderate bullying that increased as years went on, or about 18 percent of the group. Fewer academic problems were seen among those who suffered less bullying as time went on, about 26 percent of the group, suggesting that kids could recover if the victimization stopped. "Some kids are able to escape victimization, and it looks like their school engagement and achievement does tend to recover," Ladd said. "That's a very hopeful message." Boys were significantly more likely than girls to be chronically bullied. A total of 32 percent of kids said they had experienced little or no bullying. Ladd urged parents to take action if they see their children struggling and said all schools should have anti-bullying programs in place. "There has been a lot of consciousness raising and stories of children being bullied and committing suicide, and that has raised public concern," he said. Israel MPs debate bill legalising wildcat outposts Israel's parliament on Monday discussed the final adoption of a bill that would allow it to appropriate hundreds of hectares of Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank. A committee backed the bill but around 500 revisions will be voted on separately in a process starting Tuesday. Lawmakers will then vote on the bill in two further readings, with parliament expected to approve it. Israeli Prime Minister and Likud party leader Benjamin Netanyahu (C) is surrounded by bodyguards as he arrives for a meeting with party members at the Knesset, the Israeli parliament in Jerusalem, on January 30, 2017 MENAHEM KAHANA (AFP) The bill is backed by Israel's rightwing government but has alarmed the international community and supporters of an independent Palestinian state. The Palestine Liberation Organisation labelled the bill a "declaration of war", and called on the international community to intervene. The law would legalise at least 3,921 Jewish homes on the occupied West Bank built in contravention of Israeli law, according to the anti-settlement organisation Peace Now. It would be the first time Israel has applied its own civil law to land it recognises as Palestinian-owned in the West Bank, law professor Amichai Cohen told AFP. Around 2,000 Israelis, including many settlers, protested outside parliament Monday in support of the law, an AFP correspondent said. Israeli law distinguishes between settlements it considers legal and so-called "outposts", but the bill would legalise 54 of the latter, Peace Now said. The owners of the land would be compensated financially or with land elsewhere. The attorney general has told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the bill would be unconstitutional and could open up Israel to international criminal prosecutions. Addressing his Likud faction on Monday, Netanyahu insisted his coalition would advance the bill "this week." "This bill's purpose is to prevent recurring attempts to harass the Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria," he said, using the biblical term for the West Bank. Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman said his Yisrael Beitenu faction would support the bill, despite reports that the attorney general has said he would refuse to defend the law if it were challenged in court. "The chance that it will be struck down by the supreme court is 100 percent," Lieberman said. Opposition leader Isaac Herzog said that "all the legal advisors are opposed" to the bill which posed a "danger to Israel," both internally and internationally. International law considers all settlements in the West Bank, which Israel seized in the 1967 Middle East war, to be illegal, and they are seen as a major obstacle to peace between Israelis and Palestinians. - 'Significant success' - At Monday morning's protest, around 2,000 people marched to parliament, with teenagers holding signs condemning the demolition of any Jewish homes in the West Bank. "Israel the only country that destroys Jewish homes," one sign read. "If the regularisation bill passes that would be a very significant success for the Jewish people," David Goldenberg, a 29-year-old protester from Jerusalem, told AFP. "This is our land. We came here because of our history, because this is the land of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob." Many Israeli rightwingers see all of the West Bank as part of Israel and have called for it to be annexed. Following Donald Trump's inauguration as US president last week, Netanyahu has greenlighted thousands of new settlement homes in the West Bank and annexed East Jerusalem. Trump has indicated he will be far more supportive of Israeli settlement building than his predecessor Barack Obama, who criticised them throughout his time in office. At the protest, Yehudit Tayar, a spokeswoman for the Yesha council which represents settlers, denied the bill's passing was the result of Trump's election, although she admitted it may have sped up the process. "It doesn't start with Trump. It starts here in our nation -- the responsibility to protect our land and our people." The Trump administration declined to comment on Israel's announcement of 2,500 new settlement homes on January 20, breaking with Obama's policy of condemning such plans. The proposal being debated Monday was approved by parliament for the first time in early December. Netanyahu suggested at the time that the proposal be shelved until Trump took over, according to media reports. Jewish settlements in the West Bank AFP (AFP) African Union re-admits Morocco after 33-year absence The African Union decided Monday to allow Morocco back in the fold after a 33-year absence, despite stiff resistance from some member states over the status of Western Sahara. After an emotional and tense debate, member states decided by consensus to leave the question of the disputed territory of Western Sahara for another day, and resolve it with Morocco "back in the family." "From the moment that Morocco did not impose conditions ... we take their word for it and accept that Morocco be admitted to the African Union," said Mohamed Salem Ould Salek, foreign minister of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), which claims sovereignty over the entire territory of Western Sahara. African Heads of State pose for a group photo ahead of the start of the 28th African Union summit in Addis Ababa on January 30, 2017 Zacharias ABUBEKER (AFP) Morocco quit the then Organisation of African Unity (OAU) in 1984 after the bloc admitted the former Western Sahara as a separate member. Some had feared Morocco would demand the expulsion of the SADR as a precondition for its own return to the AU. Morocco maintains that the former Spanish colony under its control is an integral part of the kingdom, while the Polisario Front, which campaigns for the territory's independence, demands a referendum on self-determination. Salek said that having Morocco in the same room would allow the SADR to pressure them into fulfilling their obligations and allowing a referendum in accordance with a 1975 decision by the International Court of Justice. "Now (if) Morocco is blocking (it) will be questioned by the head of states: why are you afraid of a referendum? "Why don't you allow the Sahrawi to choose their future freely?" - Family solutions - Delegates attending the summit in the Ethiopian capital described an emotional and tense discussion, with heavyweights like Algeria and South Africa against the re-admission of Morocco. "Morocco is now a full member of the African Union. There was a very long debate but 39 of our 54 states approved the return of Morocco, even if the Western Sahara question remains," Senegalese President Macky Sall told journalists. "As we have said, if the family grows bigger, we can find solutions as a family," he added. Morocco has been angling to return to the AU for several years and King Mohammed VI formally announced his intention to do so in July last year. Since then he has criss-crossed the continent lobbying for support. Morocco is increasingly looking southwards to expand its economy and has realised it cannot drive an agenda on the continent without being in the AU, observers say. The membership of affluent Morocco -- the sixth biggest economy in Africa -- could be a boon for the African Union, which lost a key financier in late Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi and is working on ways to become financially independent. - Chad takes helm - The 28th African Union summit began with the swift election of Chadian Foreign Minister Moussa Faki Mahamat, 56, as the new chairperson of the AU Commission, beating four other candidates. Faki won in a final battle against his Kenyan counterpart Amina Mohamed after seven rounds of voting, the Kenyan government said in a statement. Faki, a former prime minister, has been at the forefront of the fight against Islamists in Nigeria, Mali and the Sahel and has promised "development and security" will be top of his agenda as chief of the 54-member continental bloc. Meanwhile Algerian diplomat Smail Chergui was re-elected to the key post of peace and security commissioner. Faki takes over from South Africa's Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma who is credited with advancing women's issues and moulding the ambitious Agenda 2063, but is seen to have dropped the ball on peace and security. - 'Turbulent times' - The choice of a new leader is crucial for the future of a bloc which is undergoing deep introspection on how to reform to become more relevant and better respond to crises on the continent. Tasked with leading the reforms, Rwanda's President Paul Kagame delivered a "biting" report to heads of state on Sunday, according to a statement from the Kenyan government. He criticised "chronic failure to see through African Union decisions (which) had resulted in a crisis of implementation and a perception that the AU was not relevant to Africans". Kagame also slammed "over-dependence on (donor) funding" which accounts from 70 percent of the AU budget, according to the Institute for Security Studies. The AU is also grappling with its relationship with US President Donald Trump's administration, sounding the alarm over an immigration ban affecting three African nations. "The very country (where) our people were taken as slaves... has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries," outgoing AU Commission chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told some 37 heads of state and leaders from across the continent. "It is clear that globally we are entering very turbulent times," she added. United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres gives a press conference on the sidelines of the 28th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the African Union summit in Addis Ababa on January 30, 2017 ZACHARIAS ABUBEKER (AFP) Pakistan cracks down on group linked to Mumbai attacks Pakistan has placed the chief suspect behind the 2008 Mumbai attacks under house arrest as it cracks down on the group linked to the carnage. Firebrand cleric Hafiz Saeed, who heads the Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) group and has a $10 million US bounty on his head, is to be placed under "preventative detention", according to the Interior Ministry order. Police took Saeed away from a mosque in Lahore late Monday and escorted him to his residence where they appear to be holding him under house arrest, an AFP journalist reported. Pakistani leader of the Jamaat-ud-Dawa organisation Hafiz Saeed (C) speaks to the press after being detained by police in Lahore, early on January 31, 2017 ARIF ALI (AFP) "My detention orders are unlawful and we will challenge them in the court," Saeed told reporters before he was led away by police. "These orders have come from Washington," he said. "Now more rallies and protests will be held on Kashmir issue," Saeed said, adding: "our movement will continue till Kashmir's independence." Pakistan and India both control part of Kashmir but claim the whole of the territory and have fought two of their three wars over it since independence from Britain in 1947. India blames Pakistan for sending militant groups to foment unrest in the part of Kashmir controlled by New Delhi. JuD, listed as a terror outfit by the United Nations, is considered by the US and India to be a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), the militant group blamed for the attack on India's financial capital. The horror of the Mumbai carnage played out on live television around the world as commandos battled the heavily armed gunmen, who arrived by sea on the evening of November 26, 2008. It took the authorities three days to regain full control of the city and New Delhi has long said there is evidence that "official agencies" in Pakistan were involved in plotting the attack. Islamabad denies the charge. But for years JuD operated freely across the country, popular for its charity works especially in the wake of natural disasters, and testing Islamabad's vow to tackle militancy. Despite the bounty against him Saeed led a high-profile public life, regularly delivering fiery anti-India speeches. - 'Obliged to take action' - The detention order surfaced hours after Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar hinted that a crackdown was imminent. He told reporters in Islamabad earlier Monday that, given the group had been under observation for years and was blacklisted internationally, Pakistan is "under obligation to take some action". "The situation will be clear on this by tomorrow," he said, without giving further details. The order from the interior ministry placed JuD and a foundation tied to it on a watch list, and also ordered the "preventative detention" of four other members in various cities in Punjab. India has long seethed at Pakistan's failure either to hand over or prosecute those accused of planning and organising the Mumbai attacks, while Pakistan has alleged that India failed to give it crucial evidence. Islamabad's decision in 2015 to release an alleged mastermind of the attacks, Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, was slammed as an "insult" by New Delhi. Pakistan has long been accused of playing a "double game" with militants by supporting groups it thinks it can use for its own strategic ends, particularly in disputed Kashmir. Elder Bush released from Texas hospital Former US president George H.W. Bush was released from the hospital on Monday after spending approximately two weeks recovering from pneumonia, including a stint in intensive care, his spokesman said. The 41st president, age 92, was taken to Houston Methodist Hospital on January 14 suffering from bacterial pneumonia. His 91-year-old wife Barbara, who had viral bronchitis, was also admitted to the same health facility but released just several days later. Former George H.W. Bush, who served as commander-in-chief from 1989 to 1993, is the oldest of the five living former US presidents BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI (AFP/File) "President George H.W. Bush was discharged today from Houston Methodist Hospital after being treated for pneumonia," Bush spokesman Jim McGrath said in a statement. During his stay the former president was intubated for 48 hours to aid with his breathing. Bush has Parkinson's disease, which has left him in a wheelchair, but doctors said it was not a major factor in this latest illness. His is a less-common version of Parkinson's that only affects the lower body. Advanced age was of greater concern. The former president and first lady received many messages of support, doctors said, including from a family that hand-delivered a get-well card which hung in the former president's hospital room. "He is thankful for the many prayers and kind messages he received during his stay, as well as the world-class care that both his doctors and nurses provided," McGrath said. Bush, who served as commander-in-chief from 1989 to 1993, is the oldest of the five living former US presidents. Netanyahu denounces Iran missile test ahead of Trump meeting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Iran on Monday of launching a ballistic missile in what he said constitutes a "flagrant violation" of a UN Security Council resolution. In a statement on his Facebook page, Netanyahu said he intended to "raise the renewal of sanctions against Iran in this context and in other contexts" in his upcoming meeting with US President Donald Trump. The White House said on Monday that Trump will host Netanyahu on February 15. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will visit the White House on February 15, 2017 MENAHEM KAHANA (AFP) Israel's archfoe Iran has carried out a number of missile tests in recent months, which the United States and European governments have said are a breach of its commitments under the 2015 nuclear deal. Western powers say the missiles are capable of carrying nuclear warheads and therefore go against the deal, while Iran says its missile programme is "non-negotiable". Israel had opposed the deal between Iran and major powers, which lifted a wide range of international sanctions in exchange for limits on Iran's nuclear programme. US state of Washington files suit against Trump travel ban The top prosecutor in the state of Washington filed a lawsuit on Monday challenging as illegal and unconstitutional President Donald Trump's travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries and demanding an immediate halt to its implementation. "No one is above the law -- not even the president," Attorney General Bob Ferguson told a news conference. "And in the courtroom, it is not the loudest voice that prevails. It's the Constitution." Ferguson's lawsuit -- the first of its kind -- targets Trump, Homeland Security and high-ranking administration officials. It calls for key provisions of the president's executive order on immigration to be declared illegal and unconstitutional. Washington State Governor Jay Inslee (D) speaks during a demonstration on January 29, 2017 in Seattle, Washington, against US President Donald Trump's executive order banning Muslims from certain countries STEPHEN BRASHEAR (GETTY/AFP/File) The complaint argues that the travel ban, which has been met with an uproar both in the United States and abroad, was separating and harming families "and undermining Washington's sovereign interest in remaining a welcoming place for immigrants and refugees." Several major companies in Washington state, including Amazon and Expedia, filed declarations alongside the lawsuit explaining the fallout of the executive order on their operations and employees. "Never has our system of checks and balances been more important," said Washington governor Jay Inslee, who joined Ferguson at the press conference. "Until Congress takes this administration to task for the obvious moral and legal injuries suffered by innocent, law-abiding people entering our country, it is up to states to protect and promote the rights of the people who reside in our borders." The suit urges the court to schedule a hearing on the matter within two weeks. On Saturday, a federal judge in New York blocked Trump's order as it pertained to certain individuals affected by the travel ban. 'Trump & Dump' program aims to profit off Trump tweets Techies have devised a program to execute quickfire stock trades to take advantage of President Donald Trump's Twitter habit of blackballing individual companies. And the president's tweets are saving puppies, since when the program earns money, the funds are donated to an animal welfare group. The "Trump & Dump" artificial intelligence program identifies Trump's market-moving tweets, assesses instantaneously whether the sentiment is positive or negative and then executes a speedy trade. The "Trump & Dump" artificial intelligence program identifies Trump's market-moving tweets, assesses instantaneously whether the sentiment is positive or negative and then executes a speedy trade SPENCER PLATT (GETTY/AFP/File) Ben Gaddis, president of Austin, Texas marketing and technology company T3, said the idea was sparked by watching Trump's actions during his transition, when twitter attacks of companies such as Boeing and Lockheed Martin sent the share prices tumbling. "Everyone is asking themselves how to deal with the unpredictability of Trump's tweets," Gaddis told AFP. T3's response was to develop a "bot," a piece of software that does automated tasks, to trade on the information. The company has so far been pleased with the results, which yielded "significant winnings" on two occasions and a "slight" loss on a third trade, Gaddis said. In early January, T3 scored a "huge" profit by betting Toyota's share price would fall after Trump lambasted the automaker for building cars in Mexico, it said in a short video on the T3 website. The time lag between the Trump tweet and T3 trade was only a second, according to a short video on the T3 website. T3, which has pictures of numerous dogs on its website and describes itself as having "dog friendly offices" is donating the earnings from the bot-directed trades to American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). Ole! Jon Rahm breaks through with thrilling back 9 at Torrey SAN DIEGO (AP) Jon Rahm of Spain added his name to the burgeoning list of young stars Sunday with his big game and big finish at Torrey Pines. Rahm made two eagles over the final six holes, the last one a 60-foot putt from the fringe on the 18th to win the Farmers Insurance Open. The 22-year-old Rahm started the final round three shots behind and made up ground in a hurry. He hit 4-iron to 18 feet and holed the eagle putt on the 13th, stuffed a wedge into 5 feet for birdie on the 17th and finished with another eagle that left him pumping both fists when the ball dropped in. He shot 30 on the back nine and closed with a 7-under 65. Jon Rahm, right, of Spain, reacts after making a putt for eagle on the 18th hole of the South Course during the final round of the Farmers Insurance Open golf tournament Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, at Torrey Pines Golf Course in San Diego. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull) The victory puts Rahm in the Masters. Jon Rahm, of Spain, reacts after making a putt for eagle on the 18th hole of the South Course during the final round of the Farmers Insurance Open golf tournament Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, at Torrey Pines Golf Course in San Diego. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull) Jon Rahm, of Spain, watches his tee shot on the second hole of the South Course during the final round of the Farmers Insurance Open golf tournament Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, at Torrey Pines Golf Course in San Diego. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull) Patrick Rodgers putts on the first hole of the South Course during the final round of the Farmers Insurance Open golf tournament Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, at Torrey Pines Golf Course in San Diego. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull) Patrick Rodgers watches his tee shot on the second hole of the South Course during the final round of the Farmers Insurance Open golf tournament Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, at Torrey Pines Golf Course in San Diego. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull) Brandt Snedeker hits his second shot on the first hole of the South Course during the final round of the Farmers Insurance Open golf tournament Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, at Torrey Pines Golf Course in San Diego. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull) Dozens of U.S. colleges are opposing President Donald Trump's sweeping travel ban that has left some students and professors stranded abroad. The presidents of several universities on have issued scathing attacks of Trump's executive order halting immigration from seven Muslim-majority nations. Many said it's already disrupting research and academics for their scholars, while some suggested they would defy the ban as far as legally possible. The Association of American Universities, which represents 62 schools, urged Trump to reverse the order and said it will only steer top scholars to countries that compete with the United States. Tamar Gendler, front left, Dean of Arts and Sciences at Yale, and Yale President Peter Solovey, front right, listen to speakers in front of Sterling Memorial Library at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut Protesters crowd into Bradley Airport in Connecticut to demonstrate against President Donald Trump executive action stopping people from many Muslim Countries from traveling to the US Mitch Daniels, the president of Purdue University and a former Republican governor of Indiana, called the order 'a bad idea, poorly implemented,' and called on Trump to revoke it. The ban, which blocks immigrants from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, has been put on hold after federal judges in New York, Massachusetts, Virginia and Washington state stepped in. But some students and scholars from those countries remain caught in legal limbo, stranded while traveling abroad or visiting home during the recent holiday break. Ata Anzali, an assistant professor of religion at Vermont's Middlebury College, has been living in his home country of Iran since last summer to conduct research. His family booked flights that would have brought them back to the U.S. just before noon Sunday, but Anzali changed his mind at the last minute. He said he canceled two flights because he feared his children might get snarled by the travel ban. Natalie Swarts of Philadelphia calls out protest chants as the crowd follows in cadence during a protest of President Donald Trump's travel ban at Philadelphia International Airport Stephanie Hartley-Bah and her son Jah'kier Hartley, seven, both of Bear, Delaware, listen during a protest at Philadelphia International 'I don't want my kids to go through this traumatic experience of being detained or deported,' Anzali told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from Iran. 'This is causing so much confusion, what are we supposed to do?' Yale University doctoral student Ali Abdi, who is from Iran, left the U.S. days before the order was signed to conduct research in Afghanistan. Now he doesn't know if he can return. 'I cannot go to Iran, my home country, because I've been a human rights activist over the past 10 years and I might face some sort of persecution,' he said. 'I'm in a situation where it seems I am neither welcome by the Iranian government or the American government.' A Stanford University student from Sudan who is a legal resident in the U.S. was detained for hours after arriving in New York on Friday but later allowed in. 'An unfortunate consequence of the new policy appears to be that students and scholars from designated countries are, for the moment, effectively detainees in this country,' Stanford President Marc Tessier-Lavigne and other leaders from the school wrote in a letter. Deandra Jefferson of Philadelphia speaks during a Black Lives Matter sit in during a protest of President Trump's travel ban People gather for a rally in New York's Battery Park in New York as they protest against Trump's executive order banning travel to the U.S. by citizens of several countries University of Massachusetts President Marty Meehan said several students and faculty members were traveling abroad when the order was signed, including two professors from Iran who were temporarily detained at Logan Airport in Boston even though they're permanent U.S. residents. 'This is not the country we promised to them when we invited them to study, teach and conduct research here,' Meehan wrote. Students and scholars from several other colleges also have been stuck, including from Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Clark Atlanta University. More than 17,000 students from the seven counties affected by the ban studied at American colleges last year, according to data from the State Department and the nonprofit Institute of International Education. More than 12,000 of those were from Iran. A sign reading 'Orange is the New Red' is displayed in a march in Philadelphia People gathered in New York's Foley Square on Sunday as they protested against President Donald Trump's executive order As spring break approaches, some international students were planning to visit home or take academic trips abroad. But now, many colleges are urging them to reconsider. Schools including Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and Tufts University in Boston guided students from nations under the ban to avoid all travel outside the U.S. Many are advising to students to determine whether it's safe to travel. On social media, some schools received praise Sunday for saying they would do everything in their power to protect immigrants on campus. The University of Michigan said its campus police don't ask about immigration status and don't partner with federal officials to enforce immigration laws. Duke University said it 'cannot and will not share confidential student records with law enforcement agencies local, state, or federal without a subpoena.' Prosecutors to appeal rapist's sentence to US Supreme Court COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) An Ohio prosecutor plans to appeal the rejection of a convicted rapist's 112-year prison sentence to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Mahoning (muh-HOH'-ning) County Prosecutor's Office wants the high court to take up the case of the 2008 sentence given to Brandon Moore for crimes committed when he was 15. Moore was tried as an adult and convicted by a jury in the 2001 armed kidnapping, robbery and gang rape of a 22-year-old Youngstown State University student. FILE - This undated file photo, provided by the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction shows Brandon Moore. An Ohio prosecutor plans to appeal the rejection of a convicted rapist's 112-year prison sentence to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Mahoning County Prosecutors Office wants the high court to take up the case of the 2008 sentence given to Moore for crimes committed when he was 15. (Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction via AP, File) The Ohio Supreme Court overturned the sentence in December, saying it constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. Prosecutors say the formal filing will come in March. Myanmar ruling party mourns assassination of Suu Kyi adviser YANGON, Myanmar (AP) Thousands of Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of a longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at a cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. Ko Ni, a prominent lawyer and member of Myanmar's Muslim minority, was shot in the head at close range as he walked out of the Yangon airport Sunday. The suspected shooter was apprehended while trying to escape. A statement issued late Monday by the office of President Htin Kyaw said that according to an initial interrogation, the shooting was intended "to threaten the country's stability." It said the authorities would step up security measures, and urged people not to be frightened and refrain from agitation involving race or religion. Myanmar Muslims pray as they bury the body of Ko Ni who was assassinated by a gunman on Sunday, during a funeral at a cemetery Monday, Jan. 30, 2017, in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of the longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at the cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw) The killing shocked many in Yangon because attacks on prominent people are rare, although security forces are notorious for brutal behavior in remote rural areas, especially when dealing with ethnic minorities. Ko Ni "is irreplaceable for both Aung San Suu Kyi and the party," Suu Kyi's ruling National League for Democracy party said in a statement. He was especially valued as an expert in constitutional law, looking for ways to sidestep provisions placed in the charter by an earlier military junta to retain power at the expense of elected governments. He was seen as a familiar and helpful figure by journalists and human rights workers who have found Suu Kyi's government almost as difficult to deal with as the military-backed regime it replaced. At the same time, Ko Ni was active in defending the rights of Muslims, who often face discrimination in Buddhist-majority Myanmar. Last year, he helped found the Myanmar Muslim Lawyers Association, which was criticized by ultra-nationalist Buddhists monks as well as by some of his political allies, who feared it encouraged sectarianism. Anti-Muslim sentiments have increased in the country in recent years following deadly intercommunal violence in the western state of Rakhine, home to many Muslims belonging to the Rohingya minority. As a Burmese Muslim, Ko Ni shared their religion but was better integrated into mainstream Myanmar society. The suspect was arrested after he also shot a taxi driver who tried to stop him from fleeing the airport, the Information Ministry said in a video posted on state-run MRTV. The driver died on the way to a hospital. Police seized two guns from the man, whom they identified as Kyi Linn of Mandalay. Authorities were searching for any possible accomplices. Speculation about the motive included political intimidation, anti-Muslim prejudice and a possible business dispute involving the victim's private law practice. Mandalay regional police chief Han Tun said at a news conference that the suspect is an ex-convict who had received a 27-year-sentence on three counts of stealing statues of Buddha. Reports in the Myanmar press said he was released in 2014 under an amnesty after serving 11 years. Members of Parliament, political activists and NLD party members were among those who gathered Monday for the funeral at a Muslim cemetery on Yangon's outskirts, said Tun Kyi, a prominent Muslim activist and a friend of Ko Ni. Many of the thousands of people who streamed to the cemetery wept openly. Security was tight, with police even using bomb detectors on the baskets of flowers sent by mourners. The overflowing crowd turned rowdy at times, jostling for space as the open pavilion, with a capacity for perhaps 500 people, was surrounded by at least 10 times that number of people. Those attending included U.S. Ambassador Scot Marciel, who called Ko Ni's death "a terrible loss." "Of course we are all shocked and really sad," he said. "I knew Ko Ni and his commitment to his country and democracy." There are important antecedents in Myanmar for political violence against influential leaders, including Suu Kyi and her father Gen. Aung San, who led the country to independence from Britain. Aung San was assassinated in 1947 along with six members of his provisional Cabinet, and some historians consider his lost leadership a reason for the country's unrest since then, because he could not oversee a power-sharing agreement he had made with ethnic minorities. Suu Kyi was the apparent target of an assassination attempt in 2003, when her motorcade was ambushed by a mob on a remote road in central Myanmar. Her driver maneuvered their car to escape, but other people in her entourage four by government accounts, more according to other sources were killed. The attack was generally thought to have been carried out by a faction of the military, although no one faced punishment. Ethnic minority leaders have also been targets, most notably the monarch of the Shan minority, Sao Shwe Thaik, who was also the first president of Myanmar in 1948-1952. He was arrested by the military when it staged a coup in 1962 and died in unclear circumstances in custody. His son was shot dead on the day of the coup, and another Shan noble disappeared after being arrested. Myanmar Muslims pray as they bury the body of Ko Ni who was assassinated by a gunman on Sunday, during a funeral at a cemetery Monday, Jan.30, 2017, in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of the longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at the cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw) Myanmar Muslims pray as they bury the body of Ko Ni who was assassinated by a gunman on Sunday, during a funeral at a cemetery Monday, Jan.30, 2017, in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of the longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at the cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw) Yin Ngwe Khine, left, daughter of Ko Ni who was assassinated by a gunman on Sunday, arrives to attend a funeral of her father at a cemetery Monday, Jan.30, 2017, in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of the longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at the cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw) Tin Tin Aye, second from right, mother of Ko Ni who was assassinated by a gunman on Sunday, cries as she attends a funeral at a cemetery Monday, Jan.30, 2017, in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of the longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at the cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw) People bury the body of Ko Ni who was assassinated by a gunman on Sunday, during a funeral at a cemetery Monday, Jan.30, 2017, in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of the longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at the cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw) A member of parliament wears a black ribbon on the traditional jacket in remembrance of Ko Ni, a prominent Muslim lawyer and a long standing legal advisor of the ruling party National League for Democracy, during a regular session of the union parliament in Naypyitaw, Myanmar, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. A gunman killed Ko Ni on Sunday, shooting the lawyer in the head at close range as he walked out of the Yangon airport, the government said. (AP Photo/Aung Shine Oo) People carry a coffin of the body of Ko Ni who was assassinated by a gunman on Sunday, during a funeral at a cemetery Monday, Jan.30, 2017, in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of the longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at the cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw) Myanmar Muslims stand on the balcony of a mosque during a funeral of Ko Ni who was assassinated by a gunman on Sunday, at a cemetery Monday, Jan. 30, 2017, in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of the longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at the cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw) People crowd as they try to bury the body of Ko Ni who was assassinated by a gunman on Sunday, during a funeral at a cemetery Monday, Jan.30, 2017, in Yangon, Myanmar. Myanmar politicians, activists and others shocked by the assassination of the longtime adviser to leader Aung San Suu Kyi gathered Monday at the cemetery for an emotional funeral ceremony, while police investigated the motive for the killing. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw) Military: First-known combat death since Trump sworn in WASHINGTON (AP) It's been described as the greatest burden any commander in chief must bear. Just days into his young presidency, a U.S. service member has died in military action authorized by Donald Trump. It's the first known combat death of a member of the U.S. military since Trump took the oath of office on Jan. 20 and underscores the gravity of the decisions he now makes. Three service members were also wounded Sunday during the firefight with militants from al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula's branch in Yemen. The raid left nearly 30 others dead, including an estimated 14 militants. A fourth U.S. service member was injured when a military aircraft assisting in the mission had a "hard landing" nearby, according to U.S. Central Command. FILE - In this Jan. 27, 2017 file photo, President Donald Trump gestures as he speaks during a news conference in the East Room of the White House, Friday, Jan. 27, 2017, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File) "Americans are saddened this morning with news that a life of a heroic service member has been taken in our fight against the evil of radical Islamic terrorism," Trump said in a statement. "My deepest thoughts and humblest prayers are with the family of this fallen service member," he said. The names of the casualties were not released. Planning for the clandestine counterterrorism raid began before President Barack Obama left office on Jan. 20, but Trump authorized the raid, according to a U.S. defense official, who was not authorized to discuss details beyond those announced by the Pentagon and so spoke on condition of anonymity. The U.S. has been striking al-Qaida in Yemen from the air for more than 15 years, mostly using drones. Sunday's surprise pre-dawn raid could signal a new escalation against extremist groups in the Arab world's poorest but strategically located country. The action provides an early window into how the new president will put his campaign rhetoric into action when it comes to foreign intervention. Trump had promised an "America first" approach and an end to the "era of nation building" if he won the White House. Many interpreted his language as isolationist and expected Trump to be more cautious about where the U.S. intervened. At the same time, Trump had broadcast a stronger posture on the world stage. He pledged to beef up the military and said he aimed to achieve "peace through strength." Sunday's raid was not the first time that the United States had conducted a counterterrorism raid on the ground in Yemen, but it was not the usual approach of striking from the air, the defense official said. The raid was planned as a clandestine operation and not intended to be made public, but the loss of a service member changed that, the official said, adding that no detainees were taken in the operation. An al-Qaida official and an online news service linked to the terror group said the raid left about 30 people dead, including women and children. Among the children killed was Anwaar, the 8-year-old daughter of Anwar al-Awlaki, a radical Yemeni-American cleric killed in a U.S. airstrike in Yemen in 2011, according to the girl's grandfather. Nasser al-Awlaki told The Associated Press that Anwaar was visiting her mother when the raid took place. She was shot in the neck and bled for two hours before she died, he said. In addition to killing the militants, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said U.S. forces "captured a whole host of information about future plots that's going to benefit this country and keep us safe." The president "extends his condolences," he said on ABC's "'This Week." ''But more importantly, he understands the fight that our servicemen and women conduct on a daily basis to keep this country safe." Just over a week ago, suspected U.S. drone strikes killed three other alleged al-Qaida operatives in Bayda in what was the first-such killings reported in the country since Trump assumed the U.S. presidency. Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, long seen by Washington as among the most dangerous branches of the global terror network, has exploited the chaos of Yemen's civil war, seizing territory in the south and east. The war began in 2014, when Shiite Houthi rebels and their allies swept down from the north and captured the capital, Sanaa. A Saudi-led military coalition has been helping government forces battle the rebels for nearly two years. ___ Malaysia searching for 5 after tour boat sinks; 3 detained KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) Malaysian authorities expanded the search for four Chinese tourists and a crew member still missing at sea Monday two days after their boat sank off Borneo island. Police detained the boat's owner and the surviving captain and crew member to assist the investigation. Three Chinese died but 22 people were rescued, most of them after huddling together in the rough waters, wearing life vests and forming human chains, finally being saved by fishermen after more than 10 hours adrift. Malaysia's Maritime Enforcement Agency said in a statement that the search area has been expanded by about four times to 1,500 square nautical miles of the South China Sea off Sabah state. It said Brunei has also deployed a plane to search in its waters. In this image made from video run by China's CCTV via AP Video, medical workers prepare to receive victims rescued from a boat sinking at the port in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. Malaysian authorities expanded the search Monday still missing two days after their boat sank off Borneo island. (CCTV via AP) Government minister Shahidan Kassim was reported by the national Bernama news agency as saying that the 20 Chinese tourists rescued were weak, shivering and sunburnt but had sustained no serious injuries. The survivors were brought ashore late Sunday and hospitalized. Shahidan said rescuers were running out of time as one of the survivors had told authorities that one of the missing had died. Their catamaran left Sabah's capital, Kota Kinabalu, Saturday morning to Pulau Mengalum, an island 60 kilometers (38 miles) west, and was reported missing about 12 hours later. Sabah police chief Ramli Din tweeted late Monday that 27 Chinese tourists were on the vessel, rather than 28 as disclosed earlier. It had three crew members. The captain and one crew member were rescued by another tourist boat Sunday afternoon, and fishermen found the 20 other survivors along with the three dead, two men and a woman, a few hours later. Authorities said the survivors had been adrift for 10 hours but didn't say when the boat sank or give other details. The police chief said the boat owner has been detained, along with the captain and surviving crew member, to assist the investigation. He didn't elaborate. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang in a statement Sunday expressed "profound condolences" to the affected families. Geng called on Malaysia to "continue to make all-out efforts in its search and rescue work," as well as to carry out an "impartial and objective" investigation into the accident. Malaysia's Sabah and Sarawak states share Borneo island with Brunei and Indonesia's Kalimantan province. Many Chinese travel abroad during the Lunar New Year holiday, which began Saturday. ___ Associated Press researcher Henry Hou in Beijing contributed to this report. A survivor of a sank boat is attended the Malaysia Marine Operation Force post in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia on Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. More than 20 people, mostly Chinese tourists, were rescued Sunday after their boat sank in strong wave.(AP Photo) Survivors of a sank boat receive medical assistance at the Malaysia Marine Operation Force post in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia on Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. More than 20 people, mostly Chinese tourists, were rescued Sunday after their boat sank in strong wave. (AP Photo) In this image made from video run by China's CCTV via AP Video, Chinese and Malaysian officials look at a search grid of the area a boat sunk, in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia. in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. Malaysian authorities expanded the search Monday still missing two days after their boat sank off Borneo island. (CCTV via AP) Brazilian executive returns home to arrest on graft charges RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) Police arrested an oil and mining mogul who was once Brazil's richest man on corruption charges on Monday, as a string of newly approved plea bargains threatened to draw more top politicians and executives into a massive graft probe. Eike Batista was taken into custody after landing in Rio de Janeiro on a flight from New York, four days after authorities found him missing from his Brazilian home. The prosecutor's office said in a statement that American police had been monitoring Batista over the weekend, right up until the moment the door to his flight closed and they confirmed he was on board. Batista, who is famous for having amassed and then lost a multibillion-dollar fortune, is accused of paying bribes to former Rio de Janeiro state Gov. Sergio Cabral, apparently to gain advantage in landing government contracts. BRAZIL OUT - NAO PUBLICAR NO BRASIL - Businessman Eike Batista disembarks from a vehicle as he arrives to the Ary Franco prison, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Monday, Jan 30, 2017. Police arrested Batista, a businessman who was once Brazil's richest man on corruption charges, as a string of plea bargains threatened to draw top politicians and executives into a massive graft probe. (Jose Lucena/Futura Press via AP) Images on television Monday showed the former tycoon, with his head shaved and clutching a pillow, leaving the jail he was taken to after his arrest. Fernando Martins, his lawyer, confirmed that Batista was being transferred to another jail to await trial. Martins also told The Associated Press that it was too early for Batista to consider a plea bargain and that his transfer was made "to preserve his physical integrity." Batista's arrest is part of an investigation into the laundering and hiding of about $100 million in foreign bank accounts. Prosecutors allege that nearly $80 million of that belonged to Cabral, who is facing several corruption charges and was jailed last year. Batista told Brazilian TV Globo that he was returning "to help clean things up." He declined to comment on the charges. Meanwhile, plea bargains in separate cases threaten to implicate other key business and political leaders in the biggest corruption probe in Brazil's history, an investigation that has already shaken the nation's power structure. Brazil's Chief-Justice Carmen Lucia on Monday validated 77 plea bargains with officials from the Odebrecht construction company, which was one of the main players in a kickback scheme centered on the state's Petrobras oil company. Lucia did not unseal the documents for the time being, delaying a blow to the country's political class in a single stroke. The public prosecutor's office will now review the deals and decide which allegations to investigate. Prosecutors say that inflated contracts at Petrobras and other state companies yielded more than $2 billion in bribes over a decade. That investigation has spawned dozens of others, like the one in Rio that implicated Batista, and revealed a level of corruption in Brazil that has shocked even the most cynical. It has ensnared dozens of politicians and executives, many of them implicated by information learned in plea bargains. One of the most anticipated deals accuses President Michel Temer of seeking and accepting illegal campaign financing. Temer denies wrongdoing. If the allegations are confirmed by Brazil' top electoral court, the president would be removed and Congress would pick a successor. ___ DiLorenzo reported from Sao Paulo. FILE- In this Nov. 18, 2014, file photo, former billionaire Eike Batista, a Brazilian tycoon once named No. 7 on Forbes' list of the world's richest people, attends a hearing at a federal criminal court in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Federal police on Thursday, Jan. 26, 2017, issued an arrest warrant for Batista for allegedly paying bribes to former Rio state Gov. Sergio Cabral to gain advantage in government contracts. Cabral is facing several corruption charges and was jailed in 2016. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana, File) 5 in custody over irregular property restitution in Poland WARSAW, Poland (AP) A former Warsaw town hall official, his parents and a lawyer are among five people taken into custody over irregularities in real estate restitution, Poland's chief prosecutor's office said Monday. An investigation into restitution decisions in Warsaw was ordered last year following media reports that, in violation of the law, city officials had given ownership of a valuable downtown plot of land to people unrelated to its original owners. The decision was part of a wide process of restitution of real estate that was seized under communism from its pre-World War II owners. The process has been long known to be breeding irregularities, with lawyers and businessmen specializing in acquiring rights to houses and plots and then selling them at huge profit. A valuable downtown plot of land is pictured in Warsaw, Poland, Monday, 30 Jan. 2017 at the center of a property restitution scandal. City officials, against the law, have given its ownership to people who have no link to its original owners, but who do huge business on acquiring and then reselling rights to real estate in Warsaw. Poland's top prosecutor's office says that a Warsaw lawyer and a former town hall official are among five people taken into custody over irregularities in real estate restitution. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski) Chief Prosecutor Zbigniew Ziobro's office said the five will be questioned as suspects. A separate state-run Central Anti-Corruption Office said the allegations include corruption. "In the past such perpetrators could sleep peacefully while ordinary people, illegally evicted from their homes, suffered," Ziobro's office quoted him as saying. "But now the prosecutors are taking steps to make them take the responsibility for their criminal actions." Poland is one of very few former communist countries that have no formal process for returning or compensating people for real estate seized, or "nationalized," under communism following World War II. A number of draft restitution laws were knocked down by politicians, who argued that Poland could not afford an across-the-board solution. As a result, highly valuable property has been returned to people who, in many cases, have no connection to it. The new owners often raise the rent, cut utilities and bully the tenants out of homes they lived in and took care of for decades. They then sell the refurbished apartments for hefty sums, making fortunes. A valuable downtown plot of land is pictured in Warsaw, Poland, Monday, 30 Jan. 2017 at the center of a property restitution scandal. City officials, against the law, have given its ownership to people who have no link to its original owners, but who do huge business on acquiring and then reselling rights to real estate in Warsaw. Poland's top prosecutor's office says that a Warsaw lawyer and a former town hall official are among five people taken into custody over irregularities in real estate restitution. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski) Israel police: January shooting in Haifa was 'terror' attack JERUSALEM (AP) Israeli police say an attack by an Arab resident in the port city of Haifa earlier this month was a "terror" attack. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld says the investigation shows the man shot two Jews in separate attacks on Jan. 3, killing one and wounding the other. Since 2015, Palestinian attackers have carried out numerous stabbings, shootings and assaults using cars, killing 41 Israelis and two visiting Americans. During the same time, Israeli forces have killed 235 Palestinians. Israel says most of them were attackers. Such attacks are unusual in Haifa, where Jews, Muslims and Christians coexist together. 10 Things to Know for Today - 30 January 2017 Your daily look at late-breaking news, upcoming events and the stories that will be talked about today: 1. SIX PEOPLE KILLED IN SHOOTING AT QUEBEC CITY MOSQUE Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau calls the attack during evening prayers an act of terrorism. Miss France Iris Mittenaere expounds on her answer during the question-and-answer portion of the Miss Universe 2016 competition Monday, Jan. 30, 2017, at the Mall of Asia in suburban Pasay city, south of Manila, Philippines. Mittenaere won the crown. (AP Photo/Bullit Marquez) 2. TRUMP BEGINS GOVERNING BY CHAOS An AP analysis details the numerous ways Trump could have avoided at least some of the havoc wreaked by his temporary halt to the U.S. refugee program. 3. SENATE TO FACE PRESSURE ONCE TRUMP NOMINATES SUPREME COURT JUSTICE Liberals will demand Democrats block the choice, while the new president is insisting Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blow up longstanding rules to secure confirmation. 4. WHAT CALIFORNIA HASN'T DONE TO CONFRONT CLIMATE CHANGE The state considered a world leader on global warming hasn't started tackling how to pay for all the expected damage, including moving expressways and public buildings as waters rise. 5. TOYOTA RELINQUISHES TITLE OF WORLD'S BIGGEST AUTOMAKER The company reports that it sold 10.175 million vehicles worldwide in 2016, fewer than Volkswagen's 10.31 million. 6. HOW FLYING CARS MIGHT BECOME REALITY Nearly a dozen companies around the globe are competing to be the first to develop a new kind of aircraft that will enable commuters to glide above crowded roadways. 7. TRUMP IMMIGRATION BAN TAKES THE SPOTLIGHT AT SAG AWARDS In speech after fiery speech at the Screen Actors Guild Awards, winners strike a defiant tone against Trump's sweeping measures. 8. HUGO CHAVEZ COMES BACK TO LIFE ON TELEVISION The life of the late leader who mesmerized Venezuela's impoverished masses before dying of cancer in 2013 is being dramatized in a Spanish-language TV series that Chavez's allies have angrily criticized. 9. MYANMAR MOURNS ASSASSINATION OF TOP SUU KYI ADVISER Ko Ni, a prominent member of Myanmar's Muslim minority, was shot in the head as he walked out of the Yangon airport, shocking many because attacks on prominent people are rare in Yangon. 10. WHO WON THE MISS UNIVERSE CROWN The title went to Iris Mittenaere, a 23-year-old dental student from France, in only the second Miss Universe win for a French woman in more than 60 years. People chant slogans at the Indianapolis International Airport, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, during a protest against President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily suspending all immigration for citizens of seven majority Muslim countries for 90 days. (Kelly Wilkinson/The Indianapolis Star via AP) Turkey re-opens embassy in Libyan capital ISTANBUL (AP) Turkey's foreign ministry says it is re-opening its embassy in the Libyan capital which had closed over security concerns in 2014. The foreign ministry said in a statement Monday the embassy in Tripoli was starting out with a "core staff" working under Ambassador Ahmet Aydin Dogan. The ambassador had been working out of Tunisia after the embassy closed. Turkey's consulate in Misrata never closed. Turkey has close ties with the North African country and provided vital support to the rebels who overthrew and killed Moammar Gadhafi in 2011. Libya has been wracked by fighting and other violence involving rival militias since the demise of its longtime leader. German consumer group files data suit against WhatsApp BERLIN (AP) A German consumer group says it has filed a lawsuit against WhatsApp over its data gathering and sharing practices. The Federation of German Consumer Organizations said Monday that it filed the suit at Berlin's state court. It argued that WhatsApp "collects and stores data in part illegally and passes them on to Facebook." Facebook acquired the global messaging service in 2014 and announced last summer that WhatsApp would begin sharing phone numbers of its users with the social network. That angered data protection advocates in Germany and elsewhere. WhatsApp said its "privacy policy and terms updates comply with applicable law." Puerto Rico approves law that calls for partial debt payment SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) Puerto Rico's governor has signed a fiscal emergency law that in part aims to pay some of the U.S. territory's nearly $70 billion public debt. Ricardo Rossello said a portion of the money left over after essential services are paid would go toward paying bondholders. The law also extends a debt moratorium until May 1 and gives Rossello the option to extend it for three more months if needed. Legislators approved the bill following several amendments, including requiring their approval before the governor can take out loans or issue new bonds. Head of German railway quits abruptly after 8 years BERLIN (AP) The head of Germany's national railway has resigned abruptly after nearly eight years at the helm of the government-owned company. Deutsche Bahn said that its board of directors on Monday approved CEO Ruediger Grube's request to step down with immediate effect. It didn't give reasons for Grube's move. German media reported that his resignation was triggered by an argument over details of a planned contract extension. FILE - In this Jan. 8, 2013 file photo Ruediger Grube, CEO of German railway operator Deutsche Bahn AG, smiles as he arrives for a closed-doors conference organized by German newspaper Die Welt in Berlin (AP Photo/Michael Sohn, file) Deutsche Bahn said that a decision on a successor will be made soon. In practice, that is a decision for Germany's governing parties. Iraqi lawmakers urge ban on Americans after Trump order BAGHDAD (AP) Iraqi lawmakers Monday called for banning Americans from entering the country after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order suspending immigration from Iraq and citizens of six other Muslim majority nations. The vote is not binding on the Iraqi government, but it still could strain relations between Baghdad and Washington amid the military operation to retake Mosul from the Islamic State group. The vote was described as "a recommendation," by deputy speaker of parliament, Sheik Humam Hamoudi, and called for the U.S. Congress to "pressure the American administration to reconsider that decision regarding Iraq." An Iraqi businessman Nazar al-Hamadani shows a phone picture of his Visa to United States during an interview with the Associated Press in Baghdad, Iraq, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. Iraqis say they are shocked and disappointed with President Donald Trump's order that bans citizens of Muslim-majority countries, including Iraq, from entering United States. (AP Photo/ Ali Abdul Hassan) The Foreign Ministry also spoke out against Trump's order, saying it "regrets such a decision" against a country that the U.S. considers "an ally and a strategic partner." "It is a surprise that Iraq is covered with this order because it is not among the countries that export terrorists or Takfiri ideology," the statement added, using an Arabic term that refers to Sunni extremists. "The Iraqi community inside the U.S. enjoys a good reputation and its members have not involved in any terrorist act." The ministry described Trump's decision as "wrong" and called for him to reconsider it. The 90-day travel ban affects citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The Pentagon is compiling a list of Iraqis who have supported U.S. and coalition personnel to help exempt them from Trump's ban, said Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman. The list will include those who have tangibly demonstrated their commitment to supporting U.S. forces, such as translators, drivers and Iraqi forces who may be training in the U.S., he said. Trump's ban and the Iraqi parliament decision came as Iraqi forces are more than three months into the fight to dislodge IS militants from Mosul. Iraqi forces control about half of Iraq's second-largest city. The Mosul operation is the largest in Iraq since 2003 and one in which Iraqis are more dependent than ever on U.S. support. American forces withdrew in 2011. The Pentagon says there are more than 5,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. Small numbers of U.S. forces have operated inside Mosul and from the air. The U.S.-led coalition said it has dropped more than 9,900 munitions in and around the city since the operation began in October. Iraqi forces are largely dependent on coalition airpower to retake and hold territory. Iraqi officers leading the Mosul battle say they doubt that politics will hurt the military effort against IS. Brig. Gen. Haider Fadhil said he believes U.S. support for Iraq will increase, since Trump has pledged to hasten the pace of the fight against the militants. The measure, a copy of which was obtained by AP, calls for a reciprocal measure "in the event the American side will not retreat from that order to maintain the state prestige and the dignity of the Iraqi people." That language suggests it would deny entry to Americans holding valid Iraqi visas. It also called for the U.S. Congress to pressure the Trump administration to reconsider its ban. The decision did not detail when it would be enacted or to whom specifically it would apply: U.S. military personnel, aid workers, oil companies or other Americans in Iraq. "Parliament absolutely lacks the authority to originate legislation of any kind regulating anything the executive branch does," said Kirk Sowell, a political and legal analyst focused on Iraq and publisher of the Inside Iraqi Politics newsletter. The prime minister's office said the government "is waiting to receive the decision officially and it will take care of it and follow up with the American administration to discuss what is needed to ensure the respect of agreement," according to government spokesman Saad al-Hadithi. Since taking office in 2014, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has struggled to balance his government's dependence on both the U.S. and Iran in the fight against IS. Iraq is reliant not only on coalition airstrikes that have helped its forces retake nearly all the territory IS once held, but also on U.S. financial aid. Earlier this month, Baghdad signed a $1 billion sovereign loan guarantee with the U.S. aimed at financially supporting Iraq during its economic crisis. Iraq continues to be dominated by powerful political blocs with close ties to Iran, another key ally. Al-Abadi's political opponents former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and influential Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr regularly highlight his close relationship with the U.S. in seeking to portray him as weak. The U.S. Embassy offered only a brief statement, saying "we have seen the reports of the parliament vote and are reviewing its details. We refer you to the government of Iraq for further clarification." Even if the government were to take up the parliament's call and implement the ban on Americans entering Iraq, it is not certain that the semi-autonomous northern Iraqi Kurdistan region which has equally strong tie with Washington would abide by it. The Kurdistan region has its own immigration policies and largely controls its own borders. FILE - In this Monday, Sept. 8, 2014 file photo, Iraqi lawmakers attend a session in Baghdad, Iraq. Iraqi lawmakers have called for a "reciprocity measure," banning Americans from entering the country after U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order banning Iraqis and citizens of six other majority-Muslim countries. The Iraqi vote was non-binding for the government, but is poised to strain Iraq's relations with the U.S. in the midst of the operation to retake Mosul from the Islamic State group. (AP Photo/ Karim Kadim, File) A volunteer paints over a mural that had been displayed by the Islamic State group, on the eastern side of Mosul, Iraq, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. Arabic reads, "Now the fighting begins." (AP Photo/Khalid Mohammed) 'Man in the hat' from Brussels attacks charged in France PARIS (AP) Mohamed Abrini, the 'man in the hat' who escaped from the Brussels airport just before a deadly suicide attack there has been charged in France over links to the Nov. 13 attacks in Paris. The Paris prosecutor's office confirmed that Abrini was charged Monday with belonging to a terrorist organization, complicity in explosives manufacturing and transportation, and other allegations linked to the Nov. 13, 2015, attacks that left 130 people dead in Paris. Abrini, a Belgian, is accused of a role in the Islamic State cell that also attacked Brussels on March 22. Surveillance cameras filmed him alongside two suicide bombers who later detonated their explosives in the Brussels airport. Kentucky man to serve life in prison for family killing CADIZ, Ky. (AP) A Kentucky man will spend life behind bars for orchestrating the killings of his parents, sister and an acquaintance. News outlets report Ryan Champion was sentenced Friday. Champion avoided the death penalty after pleading guilty in December to four counts of murder. He also pleaded guilty to a kidnapping charge. After the October 2014 slayings, Champion portrayed himself as the lone survivor of an attack on his family in western Kentucky. Champion said 22-year-old Vito Riservato had killed the family and he survived by killing Riservato. But prosecutors have said it was a murder-for-hire scheme with a twist that ended with Riservato's slaying. Suspected US drone kills 2 alleged al-Qaida Yemen fighters SANAA, Yemen (AP) Yemeni security and tribal officials say a suspected U.S. drone strike killed two al-Qaida militants on Monday, a day after a U.S. raid killed three senior leaders of the group. They say a missile strike in the central Shabwa province hit a car used by militants coming from Bayda province, where the U.S. raid took place. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to talk to reporters. Around 30 other Yemenis are believed to have died in the U.S. raid, including women and children. A U.S. soldier was killed and three others were wounded in the gunbattle, while another three U.S. soldiers were wounded in the "hard landing" of an MV-22 Osprey aircraft at a staging area in Yemen. A Pentagon spokesman said Monday that U.S. officials are assessing possible civilian casualties, including women and children, but emphasized a U.S. belief that there were "a lot of female combatants" at what he described as preset positions, indicating that they were legitimate targets in the firefight that ensued. Navy Capt. Jeff Davis said an unspecified number of the estimated 14 fighters killed in the raid were female combatants, and said reports of female civilian deaths should be taken "with a grain of salt." The U.S. has been waging an air war against al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula for well over a decade but has rarely engaged in ground combat in Yemen. The soldier killed in the raid was the first known U.S. combat death since President Donald Trump took office. __ Singapore teen submits US asylum claim in immigration court CHICAGO (AP) A Singapore teenager seeking to stay in the U.S. after his blog posts mocking his government twice landed him in jail made his first appearance Monday in a Chicago immigration court, where an attorney officially submitted his application for asylum. Amos Yee appeared via video and spoke little during the hearing. He's been detained at a northern Illinois jail since December, when immigration authorities took him into custody at O'Hare International Airport. His 246-page application includes statements of support from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, who urged U.S. officials to let him stay. They allege Yee has been harassed by the Singapore government for publicly expressing his views on religion and politics, and for criticizing the city-state's leaders, including late Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew. FILE - In this May, 12, 2015, file photo, Singapore teen blogger Amos Yee speaks to reporters while leaving the Subordinate Courts after being released on bail in Singapore. Yee, who is seeking seeking asylum after online posts mocking his government landed him jail, appeared in a Chicago immigration court Monday, Jan. 30, 2017, via video from an Illinois jail where he's been held since immigration authorities took him into custody at O'Hare International Airport in December 2016. Yee's attorneys submitted his asylum application Monday. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E, File) Yee, 18, was imprisoned in Singapore for six weeks in September on charges of hurting the religious feelings of Christians and Muslims, after breaching bail conditions following a monthlong sentence he served on the same charges. "Our theory is that he was persecuted in Singapore and that the prosecution against him was illegitimate because it was based on laws that were meant to restrict his freedom of expression," Yee's attorney Sandra Grossman said outside court. "If he returns to Singapore, he's likely to be convicted again for similar acts." Wearing an orange jumpsuit, Yee sat with hands folded in his lap, his once shoulder-length hair closely cropped. He briefly greeted and thanked the judge and said he didn't have anything to add to his attorney's comments. A federal government attorney said in court that Yee's criminal record in Singapore would be reviewed. Grossman said she intended to call witnesses at the next hearing. Judge Samuel Cole set a March 7 hearing, though he indicated he'd seek an earlier date. It was unclear if Yee will remain in custody as his case proceeds. Grossman said his release was at the discretion of the Department of Homeland Security, but President Donald Trump's recent immigration orders had fueled an air of uncertainty. Trump's executive order stopping immigration for citizens of seven predominantly-Muslim countries for 90 days created chaos over the weekend. Those with legal permission to live in the U.S., including refugees and green-card holders, were detained at airports. Some were sent back before a federal judge issued an emergency order temporarily barring deportations. Thousands protested from Seattle to New York. Grossman said those in the U.S. have legal protections. "He's lucky that he's already here," she said of Yee. "But he is affected by the general atmosphere that the administration is creating." Kathryn Mattingly, a spokeswoman for the Executive Office for Immigration Review, which oversees U.S. immigration courts, declined to comment. ___ Lifting Russia sanctions won't be beneficial to all DUBROVSKOYE, Russia (AP) Russian businessman Oleg Sirota is such a big fan of Donald Trump that he's built a snowman of the new U.S. president outside his factory. It's an irony then that he fears Trump could spell his business' ruin. Sirota is one of Russia's winners from international sanctions. A ban on Western food imports has made it possible for the former programmer to fulfil his dream of becoming a cheesemaker. In this photo taken on Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2017, Russian cheesemaker Oleg Sirota puts a bucket on top a snowman in Istra district, about 80 kilometers outside Moscow, Russia. Sirota is one of Russia's winners from international sanctions. Russian businessman Oleg Sirota is such a big fan of Donald Trump that he's built a "Trump" snowman outside his factory _ but he fears the new U.S. president will ruin his life's work. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin) Sirota has become something of a darling in Russian media with his patriotic gestures, notably his wheel of cheese that is inscribed with Russian President Vladimir Putin's name. Sirota insists it must be collected in person. Demand is so high that Sirota has a three-month waiting list for new customers and he plans to increase production 10 times over this year with new facilities and a hiring push provided the warm words between his two political heroes, Trump and Putin, don't bring about an end to sanctions. "I was backing Trump in my heart, but Hillary in my head," Sirota said. "If sanctions are canceled, this will all collapse." Sanctions have reduced foreign competition in some sectors of the Russian economy, helping entrepreneurs like Sirota to expand rapidly to plug the gap. Often heavily in debt, many will struggle without sanctions, and some are considering whether to go public with their protests. Sanctions were not mentioned directly during Trump's first phone call with Putin last Friday, though the Russian government said the two leaders discussed "restoring mutually beneficial trade and economic ties." The U.S. and the European Union slapped Russia with sanctions in 2014 when it annexed the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine and backed separatists in eastern Ukraine. The sanctions have focused on individuals close to Putin, as well as major companies in the energy, defense and banking sectors. Russia responded with bans on fresh food imports from the U.S., EU and other Western countries. Since then, food prices in Russia have risen sharply, but the agriculture and fisheries sectors have performed strongly against the backdrop of much-reduced competition. Sirota, who has borrowed large sums from banks and relatives, and taken government grants, predicts that the removal of a Russian ban on food imports would flood Russia with cheap milk imports, sweeping away fledgling businesses like his. "It's like sending a small boy out to box a world champion," he said. "We need five or six years of sanctions, minimum, to break through. This shield has been protecting us and we need it to keep doing so." Sirota sees himself as the proud heir to a Russian agricultural tradition devastated by war and revolution in the 20th century. He's strongly anti-globalization and backs Putin's signature foreign policy moves in Ukraine. Now he and other farmers are considering taking to the streets. "If there's serious talk of canceling the sanctions, we'll definitely appeal to Vladimir Putin for support. Maybe we'll even have protests in favor of keeping them because it's hugely detrimental for us," he said. If sanctions go, Sirota wants higher tariffs on imported products, asking "why can the Americans do it and we can't?" In recent weeks, Russian officials have made conflicting statements on whether their "counter-sanctions" will stay. Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev called on Russians to "shed the illusions" that sanctions against Russia would soon be lifted while Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov has said key government ministries should operate on the assumption that they will be. Without providing details, Putin has said Russia would support farmers while admitting Russia's membership of the World Trade Organization, which sets the rules for global trade in a way that no one country is discriminated against, could leave the domestic agriculture sector vulnerable. "For Putin, removing the sanctions, the Russian sanctions, would actually hurt several important constituencies within Russia," said analyst Dmitry Trenin, director of the Moscow Carnegie Center. "Maybe removing them too fast, too soon, is not what Putin would want." The Russian food ban mostly affects European countries and is unlikely to be scrapped before the removal of EU sanctions, which were last extended in December for a six-month period. "There is a very big chance that this was the last extension of the sanctions," said Hendrik Vos, a professor in international relations at Belgium's Ghent University, pointing to countries like Italy, Greece and Hungary which favor closer ties with Russia. "There are simply too many member states that also don't have an interest in extending sanctions." Potential winners of any dropping of sanctions would likely include Russia's oil and gas industry, which would find it easier to access foreign financing and expertise. Retailers could also benefit from extra competition among suppliers, while consumers would welcome lower food prices. Lorenzo Getti, an Italian who runs cafes and a restaurant consultancy in Moscow, has swapped Italian produce for products from Mexico or the unsanctioned mini-state of San Marino, as well as buying salami from Russian suppliers. "Unfortunately it is not the same level as the Italian ones and it will not be for some years," he said of Russian-sourced salami. In his cheese storeroom outside Moscow, Sirota muses on how the annexation of Crimea made his dreams come true, but reconciliation could kill them. "Crimea is in the heart of every Russian," he said, pointing to a cheese colored dark red with Crimean wine, "and without Crimea none of this would have happened." ___ Raf Casert in Brussels, Belgium, and Ekaterina Chernyaeva in Moscow contributed to this report. In this photo taken on Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2017, Russian cheesemaker Oleg Sirota, left, and his unidentified partner make cheese in Istra district, about 80 kilometers outside Moscow, Russia. Sirota is one of Russia's winners from international sanctions. Demand for cheese is so high that Sirota has a three-month waiting list for new customers and he plans to increase production 10 times over this year with new facilities and a hiring push. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin) In this photo taken on Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2017, Russian cheesemaker Oleg Sirota makes cheese iin Istra district, about 80 kilometers outside Moscow, Russia. Sirota is one of Russia's winners from international sanctions. Demand for cheese is so high that Sirota has a three-month waiting list for new customers and he plans to increase production 10 times over this year with new facilities and a hiring push. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin) In this photo taken on Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2017, Russian cheesemaker Oleg Sirota pets his cow in Istra district, about 80 kilometers outside Moscow, Russia. Sirota is one of Russia's winners from international sanctions. Demand for cheese is so high that Sirota has a three-month waiting list for new customers and he plans to increase production 10 times over this year with new facilities and a hiring push. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin) In this photo taken on Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2017, Russian cheesemaker Oleg Sirota stands at the entrance of his house in Istra district, about 80 kilometers outside Moscow, Russia. Sirota is one of Russia's winners from international sanctions. Demand for cheese is so high that Sirota has a three-month waiting list for new customers and he plans to increase production 10 times over this year with new facilities and a hiring push.(AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin) Mercer deputy who shot man with toy gun found not at fault PRINCETON, W.Va. (AP) Authorities have cleared of wrongdoing a West Virginia deputy who fatally shot a man wielding a toy pistol. The man who was killed, 69-year-old Dennis Stanley, was drunk and using other substances at the time of the September shooting, Mercer County prosecutor George Sitler told the Charleston Gazette-Mail (http://bit.ly/2kM6d1q). Deputy Adam Ballard shot and killed Stanley on Sept. 10 in the middle of West Virginia Route 71 in Montcalm. A resident had called 911 and reported Stanley was waving the pistol around and acting erratically. Officers didn't see Stanley waving the pistol, Sitler said, but knew he had a pistol in his pocket. "From a short distance away, it looked like a real gun in his pocket," he said. Ballard was wearing a body camera at the time of the shooting. The recording captured Ballard telling Stanley to put his hands in the air "more than a dozen times" before the fatal shot was fired, Sitler said. Ballard is still employed by the sheriff's department. He will not face criminal charges and police found he violated no internal policies. The investigation is complete, and Sitler said he has no plans to present the case to the grand jury. "Deputy Adam Ballard's actions were restrained, careful and professional," Sitler said. "I have personally commended him for his conduct, although the outcome was regrettable." An autopsy found that Stanley's blood alcohol content was .14. He also tested positive for cocaine and oxycodone and had what police believed was marijuana in his pocket. ___ EU negotiator: Trump, Putin, Islamic extremism threaten bloc LONDON (AP) U.S. President Donald Trump poses a serious threat to the continued existence to the European Union because he is working with far-right groups on the continent to engineer the bloc's disintegration, the EU's chief Brexit negotiator said Monday. Guy Verhofstadt, a former prime minister of Belgium and now a liberal member of the European Parliament, said the EU had "fewer friends than ever in the United States today." Trump and his political advisers had joined with European far-right movements in undermining the EU, he said in a speech at London think-tank Chatham House. Trump himself had spoken "very favorably of the fact that other countries will want to break away" from the 28-member bloc. The European Parliament's lead Brexit negotiator Guy Verhofstadt, the former Prime Minister of Belgium, speaks during a seated discussion after delivering a speech to Chatham House in London, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. Chatham House, the Royal Institute of International Affairs, is an independent policy institute based in London. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham) Under the "enormous political influence of his chief political adviser Steve Bannon, he has sent people to Berlin, to Paris to prepare the ground for similar referenda as Brexit" Verhofstadt said, referring to the 2016 British vote to leave the EU. Asked about what he referred to as Trump's "anti-Muslim" policy to ban refugees and citizens of selected Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S., Verhofstadt said Trump has been influenced by the European far-right, rather than the other way round. "We invented nationalism in the 19th Century in Europe but we apparently have forgotten what disaster, what atrocities that so-called national identity thinking and nationalism has created in Europe. The problem is not national identity itself, it's when national identity is based on ethnicity and not values, that the problems start in Europe. "Twenty million people have died because of nationalism in Europe. So putting your political thinking and the future organization of Europe on nationalist ideas is the most stupid thing that you can do. It's playing with fire, knowing what it has created in the past," he said. Verhofstadt said Trump is just one of three serious existential threats to the EU, alongside "radicalized political Islam" and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Putin, he said is trying to undermine the EU from inside with cyberattacks and financing anti-European far-right political parties including the Party for Freedom in the Netherlands and France's National Front. The European Parliament's lead Brexit negotiator Guy Verhofstadt, the former Prime Minister of Belgium, delivers a speech to Chatham House in London, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. Chatham House, the Royal Institute of International Affairs, is an independent policy institute based in London. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham) The European Parliament's lead Brexit negotiator Guy Verhofstadt, the former Prime Minister of Belgium, listens during a seated discussion after delivering a speech to Chatham House in London, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017. Chatham House, the Royal Institute of International Affairs, is an independent policy institute based in London. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham) French foreign minister, visiting Iran, defends nuclear deal PARIS (AP) France's foreign minister has arrived in Iran's capital for a two-day visit, defending the deal that world power reached with Tehran aimed at curbing Iranian nuclear activities and promising to keep France's doors open to Iranians. Jean-Marc Ayrault's comments in a statement Monday night appeared to be a veiled response to U.S. President Donald Trump's skepticism toward the Iran nuclear accord and his three-month ban on travelers from Iran and six other Muslim countries. While in Tehran, Ayrault will meet with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and his Iranian counterpart, Mohammad Javad Zarif, as well as other Iranian officials, according to the French Foreign Ministry. Dozens of executives from French companies are accompanying Ayrault to sign business deals with Iranian clients. It's the first visit by a foreign minister of a world power since the new U.S. administration took office. In a statement, Ayrault said the nuclear deal is "already bearing fruit" with economic deals and giving new impetus to Franco-Iranian exchanges between business people, students and tourists. "In the face of all the challenges our world is faced with, France refuses to turn in on itself, or to stigmatize. It is making the choice of international cooperation and multilateralism. Terrorism in particular has no nationality," he wrote. He also called on Iran to help fight violent Islamic extremism in the region. In 2015, Ayrault's predecessor, Laurent Fabius, visited Tehran following the nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, including the administration of U.S. President Barrack Obama. Iran agreed to cap its nuclear activities in return for the lifting of sanctions. Judge acquits 2 men of perjury in inmate's exoneration NEW ORLEANS (AP) Two men were acquitted Monday on perjury charges that were filed after they recanted their stories in a 1993 murder case resulting in the release of the convicted suspect. State District Judge Ben Willard in New Orleans, who heard arguments and testimony Friday, tersely pronounced Kevin Johnson and Hakim Shabazz not guilty in a morning proceeding that lasted a matter of seconds. He said the state had not met its burden of proof in the perjury case. Prosecutors had insisted the two should be punished for lying whether it was when they were teenagers two decades ago, or as adults two decades later. "This is a case that never should have been accepted in the first place," Johnson's attorney, Robert Hjortsberg, said outside the courthouse. "The timing of the acceptance of these charges was suspect in the sense that it looked vindictive. And I don't think anybody can deny that." Defense attorney and New Orleans City Council member Jason Williams, who has been at odds with District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro over funding issues and other matters, said the verdict was "as swift as it was righteous." Cannizzaro later issued a statement expressing disappointment with the verdict and saying there was no question Johnson and Shabazz committed perjury either in 1994 or when they changed their story in 2013. "What did the State fail to prove?" Cannizzaro said in his statement. Recantations by Johnson and Shabazz helped the organization known as The Innocence Project New Orleans win freedom for Jerome Morgan, who was convicted in 1994 and spent 20 years behind bars. The victim in the case, 16-year-old Clarence Landry, died when a gunman opened fire at a party in 1993. Morgan was 17-years-old when he was arrested. Defense stressed that the two men were teenagers when the shooting happened. They said the men were courageous to risk prosecution by recanting their stories. A perjury conviction could have resulted in anywhere from five to 40 years in prison. Prosecutors say their false statements had consequences whether they sent an innocent man to prison or enabled a killer to go free. Shabazz, Johnson and Morgan all were at a Sweet 16 party where a gunman opened fire in 1993. Shabazz and another person were wounded. Landry was killed. Morgan was convicted at trial the next year. He was freed in 2014 and charges were officially dropped in 2016. 178 Haitian migrants detained in waters near Turks & Caicos PROVIDENCIALES, Turks and Caicos Islands (AP) Authorities in the Turks & Caicos Islands say they have detained 178 Haitian migrants aboard two boats in waters near the British Caribbean territory. Police said one boat was detained before dawn on Monday and the other late Sunday along the southern coast of Providenciales island. Authorities said no drugs or weapons were found aboard the boats and that the migrants will be repatriated. Police detained the migrants nearly a week after another boat carrying 69 Haitians capsized near Providenciales. Officials say they found the bodies of 15 people and detained one person. An undetermined number made it to shore. Mexico says Israel leader should apologize for tweet MEXICO CITY (AP) Mexico's top diplomat said Monday Israel should apologize for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's weekend tweet supporting U.S. President Donald Trump's plan for a border wall. Netanyahu tweeted that Israel's wall along its border with Egypt had stemmed a swell of African migrants. In his words, "President Trump is right. I built a wall along Israel's southern border. It stopped all illegal immigration. Great success. Great idea." Luis Videgaray, Mexico's foreign relations secretary, told the Televisa network Monday that "an apology would be something appropriate." Most Mexicans resent Trump's proposed wall and see his calls for Mexico to pay for it as an insult. Videgaray said "we are waiting for a clarification and a rectification," and called the tweet "an insult." On Saturday, Mexico called in the Israeli ambassador to express its "profound disappointment, surprise and rejection" of the tweet. Netanyahu sought to clarify his weekend tweet, telling a meeting of his Likud Party that he made no reference to Mexico in his post and that the tweet was being blown out of proportion by the media. "Now they (media commentators) are saying, 'You harmed Mexico, you ruined the relationship with them.' Who even referred to Mexico? We had and will have a good relationship with them, even when we have real disagreements and not fabricated ones," he said, in remarks apparently made before Mexico's demand for an apology. Videgaray brushed off that explanation. The Latest: Senate panel delays vote on budget nominee WASHINGTON (AP) The Latest on developments in Congress (all times local): 6:30 p.m. The Senate Budget Committee has postponed a Wednesday morning vote on Donald Trump's pick to run the White House Budget Office. Attorney General-designate Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala. leaves his office on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2017, as the Senate Judiciary Committee prepares to advance his nomination. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite) A vote scheduled on the nomination of South Carolina Rep. Mick Mulvaney has been pushed back until Thursday. A panel spokesman says the delay is because other committees have rescheduled their meetings for Wednesday after delaying tactics by Democrats. Mulvaney is a hard-liner on the budget, favoring cuts to popular benefit programs like Medicare. Trump has so far declined to endorse such cuts. ___ 5 p.m. A spokeswoman for the U.S. Capitol Police says 47 people were arrested Tuesday as they demonstrated in a Senate office building. The spokeswoman, Eva Malecki, says the demonstrators were arrested on misdemeanor charges dealing with crowding and obstructing passage through a public building. The protesters were voicing concerns about the likely repeal of the law expanding health insurance coverage, the Affordable Care Act. A public relations firm in Washington says the protesters included health care workers and faith leaders. The protests culminated outside of Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch's office, where demonstrators blocked the hallway demanding to hear Hatch's plans to keep American families covered. ___ 2 p.m. The confirmation hearing for President Donald Trump's choice to head the Labor Department has again been postponed. A spokeswoman for the Senate panel that had been set to hold Andrew Puzder's hearing Feb. 7 said the fast food CEO's financial and other statements have not been filed to the panel. No new date for the session has been set. It's at least the third postponement for the head of CKE Restaurants, Inc. The company owns Hardee's and Carl's Jr. Union leaders and Democrats say Puzder is ill-suited to head the Cabinet agency that enforces protections for workers. Puzder is against much of their agenda, including a big hike in the minimum wage. Trump nominated Puzder on Dec. 9. __ 1:25 p.m. Democrats are using an obscure Senate rule to delay the committee vote on attorney general nominee Jeff Sessions. After Democratic senators on the Senate Judiciary Committee gave lengthy speeches opposing Sessions for several hours Tuesday, chairman Charles Grassley said the vote will be delayed until Wednesday. Sessions is expected to be approved by the panel. By giving lengthy speeches, Democrats are able to trigger a rule that doesn't allow committees to be in session for two hours past the start of the Senate day. That rule is generally waived. In their speeches, Democrats questioned whether the Alabama Republican could be independent of President Donald Trump as the nation's chief law enforcement officer. Sessions was one of Trump's first and strongest supporters. __ 1:20 p.m. A Senate panel has voted favorably for the nomination of former wrestling entertainment executive Linda McMahon to lead the Small Business Administration. The 18-1 vote from the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee moves McMahon's nomination to the full Senate for consideration. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., has cast the lone "no" vote. McMahon is the former chief executive of World Wrestling Entertainment. She ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate in Connecticut but has remained active in politics as a donor to Republican candidates and causes. The Small Business Administration helps people get training and financing to start or expand their company. McMahon says she'll make it a priority to review the agency's disaster assistance programs. McMahon has emphasized her business roots helping to getting the wrestling business up and running and eventually employing more than 800 people. __ 1:15 p.m. The Senate has confirmed Elaine Chao to serve as Transportation secretary in the Trump administration. The vote was 93-6 on Tuesday. Chao is an experienced Washington hand. She was labor secretary under President George W. Bush, and is the wife of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. McConnell voted present. Chao would be a lead actor in pursuing Trump's promise to invest $1 trillion to improve highways, rail service and other infrastructure projects. __ 12:05 p.m. A Senate committee has approved Republican donor and school choice advocate Betsy DeVos for education secretary, even as two GOP senators expressed some reservations. After a heated debate Tuesday morning, senators on the Health, Education, Pensions and Labor Committee have voted 12-11 along partisan lines to support DeVos' nomination, sending it to the full Senate for action. But two prominent Republicans on the committee, Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, are expressing their skepticism over DeVos. They say they are not yet sure whether they will vote for her on the Senate floor. Murkowski says DeVos has yet to prove that she deeply cares about America's struggling schools and its children. Murkowski says the nominee has not yet earned her full support. ___ 11:20 a.m. The AFL-CIO is urging the Senate to reject President Trump's pick for to lead the Labor Department. Federation President Richard L. Trumka said in a letter to senators Tuesday that Andrew Puzder's nomination "betrays the promise (Trump) made to put working people first." He added that Puzder's record as CEO of CKE Restaurants, Inc., could risk government protections on overtime and worker safety. He noted that Puzder is opposed to a big hike in the minimum wage and could "torpedo" pay rules on certain federal contracts. Puzder has said that "the right government policies can" produce more jobs and better wages. His confirmation hearing is expected Feb. 7. Democrats have widely panned Puzder's nomination in similar terms. But Republicans control the Senate and there's no sign Puzder's confirmation is imperiled. ___ 11:10 a.m. Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington state says she is disturbed that President Donald Trump has removed the energy secretary from a permanent positon on the National Security Council. Trump removed the energy chief as part of a shake-up that also ousted the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the director of national intelligence. Cantwell, the senior Democrat on the Senate energy panel, said the energy secretary has a key role in safeguarding the nation's nuclear stockpile. Former Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, a nuclear physicist, played a crucial role in developing the 2015 agreement aimed at preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon. Cantwell said "now is not the time to remove the energy secretary" from the national security post, noting that the Iran deal is "based so much on science." __ 11 a.m. Republican and Democratic senators are clashing over the nomination of charter school activist and wealthy Republican donor Betsy DeVos as education secretary. As the Senate Health, Education, Pensions and Labor Committee prepares to vote Tuesday on DeVos' nomination, Chairman Lamar Alexander is lamenting Democrats' fierce opposition to President Donald Trump's pick. He says he respects his colleagues and doesn't question their motives or votes but thinks "their concerns are misplaced." Sen. Patty Murray of Washington State, the top Democrat on the committee said it was clear that DeVos is "the wrong choice." Murray charged that DeVos has spent her family's wealth to push "extreme anti-student ideology" siphoning money away from public schools "toward taxpayer funded private school vouchers, with little accountability, for just a few." __ 10:44 a.m. Senate Finance Committee votes to confirm President Donald Trump's picks for health and Treasury secretary are being indefinitely postponed after Democrats boycotted the meeting. Democratic senators held an abruptly called briefing for reporters outside the hearing room. They said they were demanding more information about the two nominees, GOP Georgia Rep. Tom Price to be Health secretary and financier Steve Mnuchin to head the Treasury Department. The Democrats cited separate newspaper reports about Price's trading in a health company stock and Mnuchin's behavior involving foreclosures when he was a banker. Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch said he planned to reschedule the votes but did not say when. He said Democrats "ought to stop posturing and acting like idiots." __ 10:35 a.m. The top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee says she'll vote against President Donald Trump's nominee for attorney general, Sen. Jeff Sessions. Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California says she can't reconcile the independence required in the job "with the partisanship this nominee has exhibited." Sessions was one of Trump's earliest supporters. The Senate Judiciary Committee is meeting Tuesday to vote on the nomination. Feinstein also praised Sally Yates, the former acting attorney general who was fired by Trump Monday after she publicly questioned the constitutionality of his refugee and immigration ban. "That statement took a steel spine to stand up and say no," Feinstein said. "That is what an attorney general must be willing and able to do." Feinstein said she has "no confidence" Sessions would do that. __ 10:20 a.m. Attorney general nominee Jeff Sessions says he had no role in helping the White House draft an executive order on refugees and immigration. In responses to Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy about his involvement in writing executive orders, Sessions wrote: "None. Neither I, nor any of my current staff, had such a role." Leahy asked the question Jan. 25 in reference to orders involving immigration. Sessions returned the written answers Monday. The Judiciary panel is meeting to vote on Sessions' nomination. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley defended the Alabama senator, who has been one of President Donald Trump's strongest supporters. "It's not clear to me why it would be a problem even if he had been involved," Grassley said. __ 10 a.m. The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee has backed Montana Rep. Ryan Zinke for Interior secretary and former Texas Gov. Rick Perry for Energy secretary. President Donald Trump's nominees met little resistance in the panel Tuesday morning. The committee voted 16-6 for Zinke and 16-7 for Perry. The nominations now go to the full Senate. FILE - In this Jan. 17, 2017, file photo, Education Secretary-nominee Betsy DeVos testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington. Republicans are muscling more of President Donald Trumps Cabinet nominees to the cusp of Senate confirmation over Democratic objections, with committees poised to advance his picks to head agencies in the thick of partisan battles over health care, legal protections, education and the economy. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File) The Senate Judiciary Committee's ranking member Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif. speaks on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2017, during the committee's business meeting to discuss the nomination of Attorney General-designate, Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik) FILE - In this Nov. 19, 2016 file photo, President-elect Donald Trump walks Labor Secretary-designate Andy Puzder from Trump National Golf Club Bedminster clubhouse in Bedminster, N.J. Puzder was CEO of a fast food empire that is outsourcing jobs on his watch, a stark contrast with his boss' threats and tweeted slaps at companies that outsource jobs. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File) Morocco rejoins the African Union after 32 years ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AP) Western Sahara and African Union sources have told the Associated Press that Morocco has officially been admitted back in to the continental body after 32 years of isolation. The decision for Morocco to rejoin the AU came Monday at the African leaders summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. "Morocco has been admitted to join the AU with a view that it will become the 55th member of the continental body. That's made with the understanding that Western Sahara will remain a member of the AU," said Lamine Baali, ambassador of Western Sahara to Ethiopia and the African Union. "All the debates were focused on (the issue) that Morocco should respect the internationally recognized border of Western Sahara." An African Union source who followed the debate for Morocco to return to the continental body told the Associated Press that 39 countries supported Morocco's bid but nine countries voted against it. The nine "were countries in Southern Africa, except Swaziland," said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the press. "Most of the debate was related to the border (with Western Sahara). But the decision has finally been made for Morocco to rejoin the AU and become the 55th member. It is now adopted." Morocco left the pan-African bloc in 1984 after a majority of the member states recognized the disputed territory of Western Sahara as a member. It claims the territory in defiance of U.N. resolutions for a referendum on the independence. ___ Mexico earmarks $50 million to back migrants in US MEXICO CITY (AP) Mexico's president said Monday his country will spend about $50 million to hire lawyers for migrants in the United States facing deportation. The money will be channeled through Mexican consulates in the U.S. and also go to outreach programs to defend Mexicans' rights. President Enrique Pena Nieto said in a video message to the nation that he had spoken to U.S. President Donald Trump for an hour by phone Friday. He said they reached no agreements, but found space for further dialogue between their respective representatives. FILE - In this Jan. 23, 2017 file photo, Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto pause during a news conference at the Los Pinos presidential residence in Mexico City. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte) That would have been one day after Pena Nieto abruptly cancelled a planned visit to Washington this week. The clash was provoked by Trump's insistence that Mexico would pay for his proposed border wall perhaps through a tax on imports from Mexico. Pena Nieto said he emphasized to Trump that the relationship between the two countries must recognize Mexico's sovereignty, dignity and independence as well as their friendship and cooperation. "I will inform Mexicans of the advances," Pena Nieto said. Earlier Monday, Mexican Foreign Relations Secretary Luis Videgaray said the effort to bolster consular services in the U.S. "isn't about obstructing the enforcement of the law in the United States, or much less opposing law enforcement." "We are going to focus the money on one fundamental objective, which is the defense of the rights of Mexicans. This means legal advice, informational campaigns, the hiring of lawyers where it is necessary." Videgaray also said Mexico understands "it will be necessary to make some changes" to the North American Free Trade Agreement with the U.S. and Canada. U.S. President Donald Trump has pledged to re-negotiate NAFTA. But he said Mexico won't accept a return to protectionist policies such as import quotas or tariffs. He mentioned including things such as e-commerce, which didn't exist when NAFTA took effect in 1994. Videgaray did not specify what other changes Mexico would be open to, but did say the country wanted "integrated negotiations, where all topics will be discussed and the dialogue won't be limited to commercial aspects, for example, but also include issues like immigration and security." Along with renegotiating NAFTA, Trump has pledged to increase the deportations of people who are in the United States illegally, positions that have caused major frictions with Mexico. Videgaray said Mexico wants to diversify its trade. At present, about 80 percent of Mexico's exports go to the United States. He said Mexico wants to improve trade with Latin American countries, Japan and especially South Korea. Mexico also wants to negotiate free trade agreements with Brazil and Argentina and attract foreign investment from China, the foreign relations secretary said. Russell Simmons' RushCard company being sold to Green Dot NEW YORK (AP) RushCard, the prepaid debit card company founded by hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons, is being bought by rival Green Dot for $147 million. Green Dot said Monday it will buy UniRush, the parent company of RushCard as well as the Rapid! payroll debit card. Simmons started RushCard in 2003 as one of the first prepaid cards to focus on minority customers and charge lower-than-average fees. Prepaid debit cards are largely used by the "unbanked," or those who do not have a checking or savings account and largely rely on cash to pay their bills month to month. RushCard is perhaps best known for a software upgrade that went haywire in 2015, cutting off more than 400,000 customers from their funds for days and even weeks. People told of being unable to purchase necessities for their children, and customer service lines were tied up for weeks. Simmons apologized and took personal responsibility, and later used some of his personal fortune to cover customers' expenses. "This whole situation has been devastating for them, and we want to make sure they are made whole," Simmons told The Associated Press in 2015. Green Dot CEO Steve Streit said he and Simmons had on-and-off conversations about an acquisition going back years. Despite RushCard's 2015 problems, Streit said Green Dot is buying RushCard largely for the name recognition as well as its sizeable customer base of 750,000 people. Green Dot plans to retain the RushCard name and brand along with its other products. "Having his name associated with RushCard is a big reason why we are buying it," Streit said in an interview. As part of the transaction, Streit said Green Dot will not be liable for any settlements tied to the 2015 incident. This includes the investigation still ongoing by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. AP FACT CHECK: Trump claims on travel ban misleading, wrong WASHINGTON (AP) In the face of widespread criticism, President Donald Trump has staunchly defended his order temporarily banning refugees and nearly all citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries. But in a statement Sunday and tweets Monday, Trump misstated the facts multiple times. What Trump said and how it compares with the facts: ___ FILE - In this Jan. 23, 2017 file photo, President Donald Trump sits at his desk in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington. The legal fight over President Donald Trumps refugee ban is likely to turn on whether the president has the authority to control access to Americas borders and whether targeting people from a particular region in the world violates the Constitution. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File) TRUMP: In a Twitter message Monday, he said "Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage." THE FACTS: According to a federal law enforcement official briefed on the implementation of the order, nearly 400 green-card holders actually were delayed after arriving at U.S. airports after the travel ban was signed. As of Sunday afternoon, one legal permanent resident had been denied entry as a result of the order, according to the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the person wasn't allowed to discuss the matter publicly. Delta Airlines did report a computer problem that forced the cancellation of more than 150 flights on Sunday. The chaos and protests at airports around the country began before that happened and were related to the travel ban, not delayed or cancelled flights. ___ TRUMP: In a White House statement Sunday, he said "My policy is similar to what President (Barack) Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months." THE FACTS: That's not exactly what happened. According to State Department data, 9,388 Iraqi refugees were admitted to the United States during the 2011 budget year. The data also show that Iraqi refugees were admitted every month during the 2011 calendar year. The Obama administration did slow processing for Iraqi nationals seeking refuge in the U.S. under the government's Special Immigrant Visa program for translators and interpreters who worked with American troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. That happened after two Iraqi nationals were arrested on terrorism-related charges. But that year, 618 Iraqis were allowed to enter the U.S. with that special visa. Government data show that during the 2011 budget year, more than 7,800 Iraqis were allowed into the United States on non-immigrant visas, including tourists. ___ TRUMP: In the same statement, he said "The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror." THE FACTS: That is misleading. The Republican-led Congress in 2015 voted to require visas and additional security checks for foreign citizens who normally wouldn't need visas such as those from Britain if they had visited the seven countries: Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. This was included in a large spending bill passed overwhelmingly by Congress and signed by Obama. As the law was enacted, the Obama administration announced that journalists, aid workers and others who traveled to the listed countries for official work could apply for exemptions. There were no special U.S. travel restrictions on citizens of those seven countries. ___ TRUMP, also in Sunday's statement: "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order." THE FACTS: Trump is right that there are many majority-Muslim countries that have not been included in the travel ban. But he's also being misleading. The executive order signed Friday does not specifically say Muslims can't visit the U.S., but it does create a temporary total travel ban for citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries. It also indefinitely bans Syrians. Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani recently told Fox News that Trump had asked him to create a plan for a Muslim ban that would meet legal tests. Giuliani said he ultimately made recommendations that focused on security and what countries posed security threats. ___ TRUMP: The president also tweeted, "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the 'bad' would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad 'dudes' out there!" THE FACTS: The immigration system doesn't allow the kind of "rush" Trump is describing. There are 38 countries, mostly European, whose citizens can visit the U.S. without a visa. But they must be approved for travel in advance by supplying background information to the U.S. government. Any other foreigner looking to visit or move to America for school or work has to get in line for a visa and be subjected to a variety of background checks, including reviews by federal law enforcement and intelligence. Before Trump's executive order was signed, some people were eligible to skip an in-person interview if they met a variety of requirements. And the U.S. can always stop a foreigner from boarding a U.S.-bound flight or cancel a visa upon someone's arrival. A visa is not a guarantee that a foreigner will be allowed into the U.S. ___ Follow Alicia A. Caldwell on Twitter at www.twitter.com/acaldwellap A look at of 3 victims of Canada mosque shooting They were fathers, one was a businessman, one a university professor men gathered for evening prayers at a Quebec City mosque when it was attacked in a shooting that authorities call a terrorist act. Six people were killed and 19 others wounded in the Sunday night attack on the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre in the provincial capital. More than 50 people were inside when the shooting began. A day later, community members talked Monday about some of the men who died: The flag flies at half-mast on the Peace tower Monday Jan. 30, 2017 in Ottawa. It was announced Monday that the flag would fly at half-mast in memory of the victims of the Quebec City shooting.(Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press via AP) ___ Azzedine Soufiane, 57: a grocer and butcher with three children. Local imam Karim Elabed described Soufiane as an important member of the community and a longtime Quebec City resident who helped guide newcomers to the provincial capital. "Mr. Soufiane was someone who was well known in Quebec because he opened one of the first community businesses here," said Elabed, an imam at a mosque in nearby Levis, Quebec. "Myself, when I arrived here eight years ago, (his shop) was the first place I learned about and pretty much all of Quebec's Muslims did their groceries there." ___ Khaled Belkacemi, 60: a professor in the food science department at the Universite Laval. "Our university community is in mourning today," rector Denis Briere said in a statement. "We mourn the death of an esteemed member of the faculty and the university, a devoted and beloved man of his colleagues and students." Mohamed Labidi, vice president at the mosque where the attack occurred, said Belkacemi was a good friend. "He wouldn't have hurt anyone," Labidi said. "He was so kind and gentle. He had one child." Retired professor Hani Antoun described Belkacemi as a valued colleague and respected scientist. He said Belkacemi was married to another professor in the department and had three children. "He was a kind person, someone who was appreciated by everyone," Antoun said. "He was a renowned scientist who was very well known. It's an enormous loss." Faculty dean Jean-Claude Dufour said in a statement that Belkacemi was a, "cultivated, passionate man at the heart of the faculty." Belkacemi was well-loved by and devoted to his students and colleagues, the statement continued. "His impressive body of work will survive. ___ Abdelkrim Hassen, 41: an information technology worker for the government with a wife and three daughters. He was described by his friend Ali Hamadi, who said he left the mosque a few minutes before the shooting began. ___ Two of the victims, brothers Mamadou Tanou Barry, 42, and Ibrahim Barry, 39, were nationals of Guinea. In a statement on its website, that Africa nation's government said: "In this painful circumstance, the government of Guinea expresses its deepest sympathy and condolences to the Canadian government, the families of the disappeared, and the entire nation." ___ Aboubaker Thabti, 44, also died in the attack. US museum defines Holocaust after White House is criticized WASHINGTON (AP) Days after President Donald Trump issued a statement commemorating the Holocaust that did not mention the murder of Jews, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum has clarified how it defines the Holocaust. The museum issued a statement Monday that says, "The Holocaust was the systematic, state-sponsored murder of six million Jews by Nazi Germany and its collaborators." The statement adds that although others were killed by the Nazis, "the elimination of Jews was central to Nazi policy." The statement from Trump was issued Friday, which is International Holocaust Remembrance Day. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus (ryns PREE'-bus) said on Sunday that there were no regrets about the statement, arguing that the White House was "not whitewashing anything." The university student charged with killing six Muslim men during evening prayers at a mosque in Canada was known for far-right, nationalist views and his support of the French rightist party led by Marine Le Pen. Alexandre Bissonnette was charged with six counts of first-degree murder and five counts of attempted murder over the shooting rampage at a Quebec City mosque that Canadas prime minister called an act of terrorism against Muslims. Alexandre Bissonnette is escorted to a van. Bissonnette, a French Canadian student, made a brief court appearance and did not enter a plea over the attack staged during evening prayers on Sunday. Wearing a white prisoner jump suit, his hands and feet shackled, he stared down at the floor and fidgeted, but did not speak. The 27-year-old suspect, who has espoused support for Ms Le Pen and US president Donald Trump on his Facebook page, was known to those who monitor extremist groups in Quebec, said Francois Deschamps, an official with a refugee advocacy group. Marine Le Pen Its with pain and anger that we learn the identity of terrorist Alexandre Bissonnette, unfortunately known to many activists in Quebec for taking nationalist, pro-Le Pen and anti-feminist positions at Laval University and on social media, Mr Deschamps wrote on the Facebook page of the group, Bienvenues Aux Refugies, or Welcome To Refugees. An anthropology and political science major at Laval University in Quebec City, Bissonnette had also expressed support on his Facebook profile for Generation Nationale, a group whose manifesto includes the rejection of multiculturalism. Authorities said Bissonnette was unknown to police. The grandson of a decorated Second World War veteran, Bissonnette appears in a Facebook photo as a boy dressed as an army cadet, a military leadership programme for Canadian youths. But cadets are not members of the Canadian Armed Forces and do not receive military training. For Ms Le Pen and her supporters, massive migration, notably from Muslim North Africa, is supplanting French civilisation and is at the root of many Frances modern woes. On est chez nous (were in our land) is a mantra at the rallies of her party, the National Front. Her views have won the endorsement from white supremacists. More than 50 people were at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre when the shooting began, and witnesses described a scene of chaos as worshippers scrambled to find friends and loved ones. In addition to the six dead, 19 people were wounded - all men. Of the five victims who remained in hospital, two were in critical condition, authorities said. Canadians will not be broken by this violence. Our spirit & unity will only strengthen we will mourn, and we will heal, together. pic.twitter.com/TVdFrbuHpq Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 30, 2017 Canadas prime minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec premier Philippe Couillard both characterised the attack as a terrorist act, which came amid strong criticism around the world over Mr Trumps temporary travel ban for people from seven Muslim countries. Mr Trudeau said in Parliament the victims were targeted simply because of their religion. The White House has vigorously defended US president Donald Trumps immigration restrictions as protests spread throughout the country. Some Republicans in Congress publicly opposed the changes amid legal challenges to the order banning travellers from seven predominantly-Muslim countries, though top congressional Republicans remained largely behind the new president. In a background call with reporters, a senior administration official declared the orders implementation a massive success story, claiming it had been done seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism. Protesters assemble at John F Kennedy International Airport in New York (Craig Ruttle/AP) But there was confusion at airports around the world and on Sunday night the administration appeared to backtrack on how the order would apply to certain groups such as legal permanent US residents. Homeland security secretary John Kelly issued a statement saying citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent US green cards will be allowed to re-enter the US. Statement By Secretary John Kelly On The Entry Of Lawful Permanent Residents Into The United States https://t.co/Es1qivoR3J pic.twitter.com/hffMK2MOQC Homeland Security (@DHSgov) January 29, 2017 Officials had previously said they would be barred from returning. Mr Trumps order, which also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria, sparked widespread protests and denunciations from Democrats and a handful of Republicans. Many have accused the administration of rushing to implement the changes, resulting in panic and confusion at the nations airports. You have an extreme vetting proposal that didnt get the vetting it should have had, said Ohio Republican senator Rob Portman, who urged the new president to slow down and work with politicians on how best to tighten screening for foreigners who enter the United States. ICYMI, here is my interview with @jaketapper on the executive order & Russia sanctions: https://t.co/2w2hqInFDV #cnnsotu Rob Portman (@senrobportman) January 29, 2017 In my view, we ought to all take a deep breath and come up with something that makes sense for our national security and reflects the fact that Americas always been a welcoming home for refugees and immigrants, he said. Several Democrats in Congress said they would introduce legislation to stop the ban. Our gov't has responsibility to defend borders, but must do so in way that makes us safer & upholds all that's decent & exceptional about US John McCain (@SenJohnMcCain) January 29, 2017 Ultimately, I fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) January 29, 2017 During a round of Sunday interviews, Mr Trumps aides stressed that just a small portion of travellers had been affected by the order and emphasised its temporary nature. I cant imagine too many people out there watching this right now think its unreasonable to ask a few more questions from someone travelling in and out of Libya and Yemen before being let loose in the United States, chief of staff Reince Priebus, said. And thats all this is. As of Sunday afternoon, one legal permanent resident had been denied entry to the country as a result of the order, according to a federal law enforcement official. Kellyanne Conway (Matt Rourke/AP) White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said the changes were a small price to pay to keep the nation safe, but it is unclear whether the order will accomplish that. It does not address home-grown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement. And the list of countries in Mr Trumps order does not include Saudi Arabia, where most of the September 11 2001 hijackers were from. The president, meanwhile, defended his actions, insisting it was not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. New Marseille signing Dimitri Payet admits he needed to return to France after becoming unhappy at West Ham following one exceptional year with the club. Payet was presented by Marseille on Monday afternoon after completing a 25million move back to the Stade Velodrome on Sunday. The France international was initially a big hit for West Ham, scoring 12 goals in his first season after joining from Marseille in the summer of 2015, but he left the Premier League club under a cloud having not featured since refusing to play in a match against Crystal Palace on January 14. Dimitri Payet @dimpayet17: "I was no longer happy at @WestHamUtd, I had to come back home. I still have good memories of WH supporters". pic.twitter.com/BDCWRr5W7K Olympique de Marseille (@OM_English) January 30, 2017 West Ham co-chairman David Sullivan admitted he was disappointed with the behaviour of the 29-year-old who signed a long-term contract last year and would have preferred for him to remain at the club to be made an example of. However, Payet was allowed to leave London in the interests of squad unity and he has signed a four-and-a-half-year deal with Marseille. Speaking at his presentation, reported by the clubs Twitter account, Payet said: I was no longer happy at West Ham, I had to come back home. I still have fond memories of the West Ham supporters. Coming back to Marseille is a personal choice. I am very happy to come back here. Its a place I know well. I wanted to come back here and be part of this project. Payet joins a Marseille side that are sixth in Ligue 1 on 33 points, four adrift of fourth-placed Lyon but 13 away from Paris St Germain in third. Payet, who spent two seasons at Marseille before joining West Ham, added: The goal is to get into Europe. Getting into the top three is going to be difficult. Morning, bring back your Payet shirt to any of the club shops & you will get a new replacement for 25, full details on WHU web site today. https://t.co/i9BPrS6YG1 Lady Karren Brady (@karren_brady) January 30, 2017 Meanwhile, West Ham are offering to take Payet replica shirts back and replace them at a discounted rate of 25. Payet was named as the clubs player of the year for the 2015/16 campaign his only full season as a Hammer - and had proved an instant hit with the fan-base. Now vice-chairman Karren Brady has promised all those who have Payets name printed on this seasons shirt that they can exchange it for a blank one, at a cost. A man has been rescued after falling inside a cement mixer while cleaning it. Fire crews were called to the scene in Hamsteels Lane, Quebec, County Durham, after the worker fell into the mixer at around 11.45am on Monday. Photos released by the County Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue Service showed rescuers working on the vehicle, including the use of cutting equipment on the mixing drum. County Durham and Darlington Fire Service staff rescue a worker who fell inside a cement mixer while cleaning it Photos from the earlier rescue of the male in the cement mixer, now transported to University Hospital North Durham. pic.twitter.com/gonoHiJQcn County Durham & Darlington Fire & Rescue Service (@CDDFRS) January 30, 2017 A spokeswoman for the service said: It appears he slipped inside the mixer when he was cleaning it. Under his own weight, he fell on his leg and was not able to climb out. Tens of thousands of protesters have flooded city streets across the UK as outrage continues to rumble over Donald Trumps travel ban. Theresa May has come under renewed pressure to toughen her stance on the controversial tycoon after he closed US borders to a host of Muslim-majority nations. In London, one of the citys most recognisable streets was gridlocked as thousands of activists gathered opposite the gates of Downing Street. Whitehall already gridlocked by protesters well ahead of the advertised 6pm start time #MuslimBanprotest pic.twitter.com/OTCd0XPAI9 Jack Hardy (@JackHardy9) January 30, 2017 Similar protests took place in cities including Edinburgh, Cardiff, Manchester and Birmingham. Whitehall was turned into a sea of placards and traffic came to a standstill as the sprawling crowd spilled into the road. People demonstrate during the protest at Downing Street People demonstrate during the protest at Downing Street Chants including Donald Trump has got to go rippled up the street throughout the evening. Speakers from across the political spectrum addressed those gathered in London alongside campaigners and performers. Cheers and chants rippling down one of London's most recognisable streets as speakers address vast crowd at #TrumpProtest pic.twitter.com/QioFLIhh5D Jack Hardy (@JackHardy9) January 30, 2017 Shadow home secretary Diane Abbott told the crowd she had come on behalf of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. She said: Donald Trump has been president for only a few days and look at what he is doing. We need to resist the Islamophobia and scapegoating of Muslims, we have got to resist it whether it is in the United States or here in the UK. There were similar scenes up and down the country, with huge crowds in the shadow of landmarks such as Manchester Town Hall and Greys Monument in Newcastle. Thousands also packed the streets in Scotland, where the largest protests were in Glasgow and Edinburgh, with smaller events in Aberdeen and Dundee. Demonstrations continued in George Square, Glasgow, after a three-hour rally in Buchanan Street, while in Edinburgh, large crowds marched from the North Bridge to the US consulate in Regent Terrace. Demonstrators during a protest in Glasgow A woman dressed as the Statue of Liberty during a protest in Glasgow In Nottingham, hundreds of people congregated at Speakers Corner to protest. People held banners with a range of messages including Im Syrian Not A Terrorist and Trump: Make America Hate Again. The action comes after a petition calling for the US presidents UK state visit to be axed surged to more than 1.5 million signatures after his executive order. How the petition stood at 9.30pm on Monday Earlier on Monday, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson sought to restore calm by telling Parliament the ban would make no difference to British passport holders. Metres away from the door of Number 10, chants of shame on May echoed throughout the crowd. Downing Street has stood firm on the decision to extend an invitation to Mr Trump, saying: We look forward to hosting the president later this year. The SNPs Westminster leader Angus Robertson fired up the London activists with a chant of no state visit. Honoured to speak to tens of thousands of protesters on Whitehall against State Visit for President Donald Trump #MuslimBan pic.twitter.com/lemM77IGlG Angus Robertson (@AngusRobertson) January 30, 2017 He added: Friends, first they came for the Muslims, but we say something and we say no state visit for Donald Trump. Czech Republic - Factors To Watch on Jan 26 PRAGUE, Jan 26 (Reuters) - Here are news stories, press reports and events to watch which may affect Czech financial markets on Thursday. ALL TIMES GMT (Czech Republic: GMT + 1 hours) =========================ECONOMIC DATA========================== Real-time economic data releases.................... Summary of economic data and forecasts........... Recently released economic data.................. Previous stories on Czech data............. **For a schedule of corporate and economic events: http://emea1.apps.cp.thomsonreuters.com/Apps/CountryWeb/#/2E/events-overview ==========================NEWS================================== UNIPETROL: Czech downstream oil group Unipetrol's fourth-quarter net profit jumped to 4.17 billion crowns ($166.15 million) after the restart of shutdown units and the reversal of an impairment allowance, the company said in a presentation on Thursday. Story: Related stories: CENBANK'S REZABEK: The Czech central bank is not likely to exit its crown currency cap before the second quarter, outgoing board member Pavel Rezabek was quoted as saying on Thursday. Story: Related stories: REUTERS INTERVIEW-CENBANK'S TOMSIK: Investors betting on a jump in the Czech crown after the central bank scraps its cap on the currency this year may get burned as they are holding large long positions in shallow markets, central bank vice-governor Vladimir Tomsik said. Story: Related stories: DEFENCE: United Arab Emirates-based military vehicles maker NIMR Automotive is teaming up with Czech state defence equipment company VOP CZ to try to break into European markets in the coming years, the head of NIMR said in an interview. Story: Related stories: SONNEN: Venture capital-backed Sonnen, which makes solar batteries, will decide by the end of the year on whether to go public via a stock market listing or launch another funding round with investors, one of its managing directors said. Story: Related stories: CEE MARKETS: Poland's currency and stocks outperformed regional assets on Wednesday morning as the central bank said it could keep policy loose for as long as two years if needed to boost growth. Story: Related stories: ---------------------- MARKET SNAPSHOT ------------------------ Index/Crown Currency Latest Prev Pct change Pct change close on day in 2017 vs Euro 27.002 27.02 0.07 0.02 vs Dollar 25.125 25.142 0.07 2.04 Czech Equities 938.16 938.16 0.86 1.8 U.S. Equities 20,068.51 19,912.71 0.78 1.55 Pvs close or current levels vs prior domestic close at 1600 GMT ==========================PRESS DIGEST======================== ECONOMY: The Czech Banking Association estimates growth to accelerate to 2.6 percent in 2017, up from an expected 2.4 percent last year. Pravo, page 18 (Reuters has not verified the stories, nor does it vouch for their accuracy.) For real-time stock market index quotes click in brackets: Warsaw WIG20 Budapest BUX Prague PX For updates on CEE currencies TOP NEWS -- Emerging markets Prague Newsroom: +420 224 190 477 E-mail: prague.newsroom@thomsonreuters.com (Reporting by Prague Newsroom) Yemen says Trump's travel ban on Muslims supports extremists CAIRO, Jan 29 (Reuters) - Yemen believes that U.S. President Donald Trump's temporary ban on certain Muslims traveling to the United States supports extremists, a news agency run by the Saudi-allied government reported on Sunday. The impoverished and war-damaged country on the southern coast of the Arabian Peninsula is one of seven Muslim-majority countries whose citizens face a 90-day ban on entering the United States. Yemen's northern regions, including the capital Sanaa and the country's largest international airport, are controlled by the Iran-allied Houthi group while its internationally recognised government is based in the south and east. "We resent the U.S. ban ... such decisions support the stance of extremists and sow divisions," the SABA news agency quoted a source at the foreign ministry as saying. Trump to honour refugee swap deal with Australia By Aaron Bunch and Harry Pearl SYDNEY, Jan 30 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump has confirmed by telephone that his administration will honour a refugee resettlement deal with staunch ally Australia, Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said on Monday. The previous U.S administration had agreed to resettle a substantial number of the 1,200 asylum seekers, mainly from Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq, held in Australia's processing centres on remote Pacific islands in Papua New Guinea and Nauru. But Trump's executive order on Friday, suspending his nation's refugee program, had cast doubt on the future of the deal, whose details and timing have never been made public. "We discussed the importance of border security ... we also discussed the resettlement arrangement of refugees from Nauru and Manus, which had been entered into with the previous administration, and I thank President Trump for his commitment to honour that existing agreement," Turnbull said. The two leaders spoke by telephone on Sunday, Turnbull told reporters in Canberra, one of a number of conversations the new U.S. president held with world leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. U.S. Homeland Security officials have begun assessing the asylum seekers, although it was unclear when those found to be genuine refugees would be resettled. Under the deal, Australia will in return resettle refugees from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. Confirmation the deal would proceed came after Trump signed an executive order that put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily barred travellers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries, including Iran and Iraq. In Sydney, up to 150 far-right protesters rallied on Sunday, holding placards supporting Trump and demanding a ban on Muslim immigration to Australia. Turnbull did not comment on the Trump policy, saying, "It is not my job, as prime minister of Australia, to run a commentary on the domestic policies of other countries." No Australian dual citizens of the countries affected by the order had yet sought consular help to enter the U.S., Turnbull said. Australia's hardline immigration policy is a contentious issue that has drawn international condemnation from the United Nations and other rights groups, but which remains popular at home and has bipartisan political support. Once fringe, far-right political parties like Pauline Hanson's One Nation have gained wider backing, which sometimes spills over into calls for a ban on Muslim immigration. Australia, a staunch U.S. ally, has been on heightened alert for attacks by home-grown Islamist radicals since 2014 and authorities say they have thwarted a number of plots. Swiss vote on multinational tax perks in February referendum By John Revill ZURICH, Jan 30 (Reuters) - U.S. medical implant maker Zimmer Biomet's decision on a potential $40 million investment in its Swiss factory has been put on hold until the outcome of a referendum next month on tax reform. A long-standing tax break that has attracted thousands of companies to Switzerland is set to go and the issue for Zimmer and some 24,000 international firms is how the new regime will stack up against other low-tax jurisdictions. That's not immediately clear as Switzerland's 26 regions, or cantons, set their business taxes. Consultants KPMG reckon the average Swiss corporate rate will be about 14 percent after the reform, above Ireland's 12.5 percent, but lower in some cantons. (Graphic on tax rates: http://tmsnrt.rs/2kdi2Ow) Switzerland has been in the European Union's firing line for years because cantons have a special tax status for foreign companies that means some pay virtually no tax over an effective federal tax of 7.8 percent. The country agreed with Brussels in 2014 to abolish this status as it allows some foreign firms to pay far lower tax on overseas earnings, an attractive perk for multinationals looking to lower tax bills. Most Swiss recognise the country needs tax reform to avoid being blacklisted as a low-tax pariah, but the new measures proposed to help companies offset the loss of the special status breaks have created deep divisions. Companies will get tax breaks on research and development (R&D) in Switzerland, profits from patents developed there and deductions for excess company equity. In addition, many cantons say they will also reduce corporate tax rates for all companies to reduce the fiscal burden and dissuade multinationals from leaving. Zug, for example, taxes special status firms at 8 percent to 11 percent and ordinary companies at 14.6 percent. After the reforms, it plans to tax all companies at 12 percent. TOO GENEROUS The No campaign comes from a coalition including the Social Democrat Party, Greens, trade unions and church leaders, as well as some from right-leaning parties that back the proposals. They say the reforms overall will lead to lower tax revenue, and fear the public will bear the brunt through cuts in public services or higher personal taxes. The federal government has pledged to give cantons an extra 1.1 billion Swiss francs ($1.1 billion) to help cover expected budget shortfalls. But critics say the new tax breaks would punch a 3 billion franc hole in budgets. They estimate that in Zurich, citizens would face a 14 percent increase in income tax to cover an expected annual shortfall of 223 million francs. "No one is disputing that there is a need for reform, but with this proposal ordinary people are financing the big companies who are taking record dividends out of Switzerland," said Swiss lawmaker Jacqueline Badran. After parliament approved the measures last year, critics gathered the 50,000 signatures needed to trigger the Feb. 12 referendum, which can overturn the parliamentary vote. Those backing the government say the reforms strike a balance between abolishing the tax breaks criticised by Brussels and new measures that will keep Switzerland competitive. "We believe the tax legislation proposed is a good solution for Switzerland. We would basically see very little impact. Our tax rate would stay relatively stable. We're hoping for a positive outcome," said Joe Jimenez, chief executive officer of pharmaceutical giant Novartis. UNCERTAINTY Luigi Sorrentino, manager of Zimmer Biomet's Winterthur site, which is also its European headquarters, reckons the U.S. firm would be more likely to expand its hip and spine implant factory if the public backs the reform and ends the uncertainty. But if voters send the proposals back to the drawing board, other locations may become more attractive. "We have investment plans to install new products and transfer new business to this site but we are waiting to see what happens," said Sorrentino. "We have 30 sites around the world and we are competing with them for investment dollars." After the financial crisis the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) came up with an action plan to tackle so-called base erosion and profit shifting - where multinationals book profits in low-tax jurisdictions from revenue earned elsewhere. The OECD estimates $100 billion to $240 billion of tax is lost each year through such schemes. The EU has investigated tax structures used by Amazon and a Fiat subsidiary in Luxembourg, as well as Starbucks in the Netherlands and it ordered Ireland to recover $14 billion from Apple. In Switzerland, companies pay a cantonal tax on top of the federal tax. Overall, corporate rates range from 12 percent to 24 percent depending on the canton, with Lucerne the lowest and Geneva the highest. But for foreign firms with sizable overseas sales, the special status tax break for so-called holding, domiciliary or mixed companies means their tax rates range from just 7.8 percent to 12 percent. For some companies benefiting from special status, the reforms still look appealing. "We would love to have any benefits from increasing investment, or having investment in R&D. Switzerland is our HQ and most important R&D centre," said Bracken Darrell, chief executive of Logitech, which makes products such as computer mice and wireless switches controlling lighting. HIGH STAKES The stakes are high for Switzerland, already coming to terms with the end its long-cherished tradition of banking secrecy. If multinationals pull out, Switzerland's economy could suffer. The changes also come at a time U.S. President Donald Trump is considering slashing corporate taxes and Britain is making noises about cutting its rates when it leaves the EU. The government says special status firms employ 150,000 people and contribute half of federal corporate taxes. It argues that bringing taxes into line with international norms would make Switzerland more attractive, securing jobs and prosperity. According to research institute BAK Basel Economics, if 3,000 of the most mobile international companies - those with a headquarters, management or commodity trading business - were to leave, the fallout would be significant. It estimates Swiss gross domestic product would shrink by 5.6 percent in the short term and 175,000 jobs would go, and the long-term fallout would be more significant as global tax competition increases. Peter Uebelhart, head of tax at KPMG Switzerland, however, argues, that a tax system that complies with international standards would encourage firms to stay. Pollsters say the outcome of the referendum is too close to call and many voters say they are confused by the issues. "I don't really understand it, I don't think the politicians do either, I think hardly anyone does," said Daniel Schiesser, a language teacher from Zurich. "The supporters say hundreds of companies will leave, but that's pure guess work and ignores the other advantages of them being in Switzerland. The opponents say a counter proposal can be introduced in two years, but that's doubtful." In Zug, the vote is being watched very closely. The canton is home to 1,800 special status companies which contribute nearly a third of its tax revenue. "If the reforms are rejected nobody knows what will happen ... nobody has a plan B," said Heinz Taennler, Zug's finance director. "There is very real risk that some companies could leave Zug, which would be very damaging." ($1 = 0.9999 Swiss francs) Poland - Factors to Watch Jan 30 Following are news stories, press reports and events to watch that may affect Poland's financial markets on Monday. ALL TIMES GMT (Poland: GMT + 1 hour): STOCK EXCHANGE Belarusian refineries Mozyr and Naftan as well as the country's largest commercial bank Belarusbank are considering initial public offering (IPO) at the Warsaw Stock Exchange, the daily Rzeczpospolita reported, citing unnamed sources. AUTO MARKET Poland's January auto sales might reach 38,000, which represents a 20-percent jump in annual terms, Rzeczpospolita reported, citing industry monitor Samar. Car registration may reach 445,000 this year. SUNDAY TRADING BAN Proposed Sunday trading ban in Poland may results in retail sales falling 9.6 billion zlotys ($2.37 billion) a year and a loss of 36,000 jobs, Rzeczpospolita reported, citing estimates by PricewaterhouseCoopers. ENERGY FIRMS Polish largest energy firms, such as PKN Orlen PGNiG and Serinus Energy, want to increase their activities abroad, Rzeczpospolita reported. IDEA BANK Investment bankers are probing the market for potential investors for Idea Bank, controlled by Polish billionaire Leszek Czarnecki, the business daily Puls Biznesu reported, citing unnamed source. T-BONDS Romania - Factors to watch on Jan. 30 Here are news stories, press reports and events to watch which may affect Romanian financial markets on Monday. 2017 BUDGET Romania's government delayed approving public spending plans for this year for the second time in three days on Friday amid political infighting over the size of the budget for the country's intelligence agencies. DEBT ISSUANCE Romania's finance ministry may announce debt issuance plans for February. ANTI-CORRUPTION Tens of thousands of Romanians protested in Bucharest and other main cities on Sunday against government's plans to decriminalise certain offences and pardon convicts through emergency decrees that could hurt an anti-graft drive. * Justice Minister Florin Iordache has plans to out the emergency decrees up for public debate on Monday, before announcing how the government plans to proceed. CEE MARKETS The leu and Romanian government bonds eased on Friday ahead of a meeting of the country's government to approve a 2017 budget plan with ambitious wage and pension hikes and several tax cuts. For the long-term Romanian diary, click on For emerging markets economic events, click on For an index of all diaries, click on India cedes top coal importer spot back to China as growth trend stalls: Russell By Clyde Russell LAUNCESTON, Australia, Jan 30 (Reuters) - India has surrendered its status as the world's top importer of coal back to China, with its overseas purchases in 2016 falling to less than 200 million tonnes. The question now is whether lower Indian coal imports is the new reality, or if last year was just a blip. India's coal imports last year totalled 194.93 million tonnes, according to vessel-tracking and port data compiled by Thomson Reuters Supply Chain and Commodity Forecasts. This was 5.4 percent lower than the 206.6 million tonnes recorded for 2015, and also less than the 255.5 million tonnes imported by China last year, according to official customs data. It should be noted that despite the decline, India is still importing nearly four times as much as it did a decade ago, and almost double the amount from five years back. India's rapid growth in coal imports came amid strong economic growth and struggles by state miner Coal India to lift output to meet its ambitious targets. India's coal production has been rising, although Coal India may battle to reach a target of 575 million tonnes for the 2016/17 fiscal year that ends on March 31. Output for the April to December period was 378 million tonnes, a rate that if maintained for the final three months of the financial year would see production closer to 504 million tonnes. Nonetheless, India's Coal Secretary Susheel Kumar said on Jan. 6 that the miner is expected to raise its output to 660 million tonnes in the 2017/18 fiscal year, and to 1 billion tonnes by 2020. Those targets tend towards the optimistic, but even if Coal India doesn't hit them, the world's biggest coal miner is still likely to keep raising production by millions of tonnes a year. This alone puts a question mark over the continuing viability of coal imports into India, given that Coal India is a low-cost producer that has the backing of a government with the elimination of coal imports as a stated policy goal. For India's coal imports to reverse last year's slide, it is likely that two conditions have to be met. The first is that India's coal demand would have to rise faster than Coal India's output. This is possible but it's not a base case scenario. India is already starting to pull back from building more coal-fired power plants, and increasing pollution in the capital New Delhi is likely to see further pressure on the government to tackle the problem. India's pre-construction pipeline of coal-fired power generation dropped by 40 gigawatts (GW) last year, according to a Global Coal Plant Tracker run by non-government and anti-coal group CoalSwarm. Only China - battling its own pollution issues - cancelled more coal power projects, with 114 GW scrapped, CoalSwarm said. Still, the International Energy Agency said in a Dec. 12 report that it expects India's coal demand to rise by an annual average 5 percent by 2021. If this is case, and Coal India comes close to its output targets, it's likely India won't need to import much coal for power generation, although given the paucity of local reserves it will still have to buy coking coal overseas to make steel. CARMICHAEL MINE BLACK SWAN The second condition for India to reverse its slide in coal imports is that global coal prices would have to remain cheap so incoming shipments could compete with Coal India production. It's perhaps no surprise that India's coal imports fell for the first year in six in 2016, just as global coal price benchmarks had their first increase for five years. Benchmark Australian thermal coal prices at Newcastle Port rose 87 percent last year to $94.44 a tonne, although they had dropped to $84.17 by the end of last week. India buys the bulk of its coal imports from Indonesia, taking mostly low-rank grades that can be blended with higher-quality coal prior to burning. Indonesian coal prices also increased last year, with low-rank 4,200 kilocalorie per kilogram fuel jumping 70 percent to end 2016 at $53.46 a tonne. These sorts of price increases will cut the appeal of imported coal, meaning cargoes from top suppliers Indonesia, Australia and South Africa will have to compete on convenience and flexibility of delivery. Overall, it seems that the case for India importing coal is weakening, both on a demand and price basis. But, and it's a big but, the outlook for imports may change dramatically if Adani Enterprises goes ahead with the construction of its $16 billion Carmichael mine in Australia's Queensland state. Adani remains publicly committed to the controversial project, saying on Dec. 6 that it planned to start construction around the middle of this year on the mine, which is slated to produce as much as 60 million tonnes per annum. Adani plans to ship the mine's output to India to burn in its own power plants, arguing that the project therefore isn't exposed to global coal prices and has a guaranteed customer. The Adani mine, bitterly opposed by environmentalists in Australia, is the black swan for India's coal imports. With the mine, the imports can increase, without it, they are likely to continue to decline over time. Singapore says seized troop carriers arrive back home SINGAPORE, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Nine Singaporean armoured vehicles seized by Hong Kong in November as they were being shipped home from military exercises in Taiwan, arrived back in Singapore on Monday, Singapore said. Hong Kong's seizure of the armoured vehicles led to tension between China and Singapore, which has deepened its security relationship with the United States over the past year and remains concerned over China's assertive territorial stance in the South China Sea. After Hong Kong authorities seized the carriers, Beijing, which regained sovereignty over the former British colony on China's southeast coast in 1997, warned countries against maintaining military ties with Taiwan, which it views as a wayward province. "The nine Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) Terrex Infantry Carrier Vehicles (ICVs) and other equipment arrived in Singapore today," Singapore's ministry of defence said in a statement. Travel curbs show U.S. hatred of Muslims, say Islamist sympathisers -SITE DUBAI, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Entry curbs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump on travellers from seven Muslim-majority countries are proof of America's "hatred towards Muslims", sympathisers of Islamist militant groups said according to the U.S.-based SITE monitoring service. It said the "Scholars of Haq" channel asked on the messaging app Telegram whether Trump's policies meant he was currently the best "caller to Islam" - someone who attracts new believers. PRESS DIGEST - Bulgaria - Jan 30 SOFIA, Jan 30 (Reuters) - These are some of the main stories in Bulgarian newspapers on Monday. Reuters has not verified these stories and does not vouch for their accuracy. STANDART - Bulgarian President Rumen Radev will discuss with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg a major NATO military drill to take place in Bulgaria and Romania in the spring and bring troops from over 20 countries. Radev will visit NATO headquarters on Tuesday. TRUD - Bulgaria has closed 764 schools in the past 14 years and has opened only 12 new ones mainly due to the demographic crisis in the Balkan country, the education ministry said. Iraq asks Trump administration to ''reconsider'' travel ban BAGHDAD, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Iraq has asked the United States to reconsider a travel ban imposed on Iraqis, a foreign ministry statement said on Monday, adding that the U.S. decision was "wrong". "It is necessary that the new American administration reconsider this wrong decision," it said. Recalling their continuing cooperation in the war on Islamic State, the statement added: "We affirm Iraq's desire to strengthen the strategic partnership between the two countries." South Africa's Gordhan alleges campaign by Guptas against Treasury By Tiisetso Motsoeneng JOHANNESBURG, Jan 30 (Reuters) - South African Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said in court documents on Monday that a trio of Indian-born businessmen was waging an "organized campaign" against him and the Treasury, the latest salvo in a legal and financial battle that has unsettled investors. The Gupta brothers, who deny allegations that they wield excessive influence over President Jacob Zuma, had themselves accused Gordhan in a court filing 10 days ago of conducting a vendetta against them and trying to damage their business. The dispute is an unwelcome distraction for the finance minister, whose own relationship with Zuma has been tense, as he tries to persuade ratings agencies not to downgrade South Africa to 'junk' status in response to stuttering economic growth. Gordhan said in his affidavit that the Guptas' Jan. 20 court filing was part of a "systematic and highly organised campaign by the Gupta family and its associates against the National Treasury, myself and other targets." He denied having a vendetta against them. A statement from Oakbay Investments, the holding company for the Gupta family, said Gordhan's affidavit did not change the fact that its bank accounts remain closed. "Today's affidavit is a case of reverse victim syndrome," the firm's spokesman said. "We look forward to clearing our name in court." A previous filing by Gordhan last October had said that 6.8 billion rand ($500 million) in payments made by the three brothers, and companies they control and other individuals with the same surname, had been reported to authorities as suspicious since 2012. The Guptas, whose businesses range from mining to media, have said this statement was "riddled with factual and legal errors". Gordhan has asked a court for a declaratory judgment that he cannot interfere with decisions by South Africa's major banks to cut their ties with businesses owned by the Guptas. He has said they repeatedly asked him to intervene to have their accounts reopened. Between December 2015 and April 2016, FirstRand, Standard Bank, Nedbank and Barclays Africa all terminated the accounts of companies controlled by Oakbay Investments. Allegations that the Guptas wielded undue influence over Zuma were investigated last year by the Public Protector, a constitutionally mandated anti-corruption watchdog. It did not make conclusive findings but recommended that the president order a judicial inquiry to investigate the allegations, which has yet to happen. Zuma has said the Guptas are his friends, but denies anything improper about the relationship. Iraq asks Trump to "reconsider" travel ban BAGHDAD, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Iraq asked the United States on Monday to reconsider the travel ban on its citizens, taking a more diplomatic line than the Iraqi parliament which demanded the government retaliate. "It is necessary that the new American administration reconsider this wrong decision," the foreign ministry said in a statement ahead of a meeting between Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jafari and U.S. Ambassador Douglas Silliman to discuss the ban. "No Iraqi has been involved in terror attacks in the U.S.," Jafari told the ambassador, the minister's website said. The United States gives financial assistance to Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi's government and provides critical air and ground support to Iraqi troops fighting Islamic State militants who overran a third of Iraq in 2014. More than 5,000 U.S. troops are deployed in Iraq The foreign ministry statement said: "We affirm Iraq's desire to strengthen the strategic partnership between the two countries." President Donald Trump on Friday temporarily banned U.S. entry for people from seven Muslim-majority countries - Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen - and halted the admission of refugees. SOFTS- Arabica dips on Brazil weather, fading India import hopes hit sugar By Mariana Ionova LONDON, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Arabica coffee futures fell on Monday, extending last week's losses, while raw sugar prices slipped on fading expectations that India will start imports this quarter. March arabica coffee futures fell 1.45 cents, or 0.95 percent, to $1.509 per lb at 1224 GMT while March robusta coffee futures fell $3, or 0.13 percent, to $2,235 a tonne. Arabica rose to a two month-high last week on expectations of a smaller Brazilian crop, but then fell as favourable weather in key regions in the world's top producer of the coffee variety somewhat dampened the bullish mood. "Robusta has been starved for quite some time now, while for Arabica it's more the future outlook," said Michaela Kuhl, analyst at Commerzbank. Robusta supplies have tightened following poor crops in Brazil and Indonesia and a drop in production in Vietnam. Dealers increased their net long positions in arabica by 6,479 lots to 25,281 lots in the week to January 24, according to Commodity Futures Trading Commission data, suggesting speculators are still betting on reduced supply.. However, Kuhl noted the market is sceptical of the recent recovery in the Brazilian real, which touched its highest since October 2016 on Monday. "That probably has a dampening effect, even though the fundamental situation points to, if not quite scarcity, supply that will not be as abundant as it used to be." March raw sugar futures also fell 0.25 percent, 0.05 cent to 20.28 cents per lb, while March white sugar was down $0.70, or 0.13 percent, at $536.80. The market continued to monitor India, where rising sugar prices have fuelled speculation that it would have to lower import duties. However, dealers said the market is now expecting this to come later in the year, reducing tightness in the front month. Cocoa futures also dipped, with the March New York contract slipping $2, or 0.10 percent at $2,093 a tonne. Syrian government denies rumours Assad in poor health BEIRUT, Jan 30 (Reuters) - The Syrian government has denied rumours that President Bashar al-Assad is suffering from ill health, saying he was "carrying out his duties quite normally". Speculation swirled in recent days on social media and some Arab news websites saying Assad, 51, was in critical condition, citing rumours of stroke, or even that he had been shot. "The presidency denies all these reports. President Assad is in excellent health," his office said in a statement on Friday. "They (the reports) coincide with the changing circumstances in the field and politically," it said, without elaborating. Assad ally Russia and rebels backer Turkey hosted talks between the government and opposition in Kazakhstan last week, where they reaffirmed a shaky month-old ceasefire between the two sides ahead of a new round of planned peace negotiations in Geneva. Assad had said before the Astana talks he was ready to discuss "everything", including his own position within the framework of the Syrian constitution. His opponents have insisted throughout nearly six years of conflict that he must leave power under any peace deal. But in the 17th year of his presidency Assad holds the upper hand in the Syrian war, bolstered by allies Russia and Iran whose military involvement has turned the conflict to his advantage. The Syrian army and allied forces recaptured the Wadi Barada area near Damascus on Sunday, in another blow to rebels who have fought for years to unseat Assad. Wadi Barada's recapture came weeks after rebel groups were driven from areas they held for years in east Aleppo, their last major urban stronghold. Taking full control of Aleppo represented Assad's most important gain yet in a conflict that grew out of protests against his rule in 2011. Swathes of Syria remain outside his control, including the Islamic State-held eastern province of Deir al-Zor, large areas of the north held by Kurdish groups, and pockets of rebel-held territory in the west. Norway's Lutheran Church embraces same-sex marriage By Gwladys Fouche OSLO, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Norway's Lutheran Church voted on Monday in favour of new ceremonial language that will allow its pastors to conduct same-sex marriages, bringing it into line with several other mainstream Protestant denominations abroad. Last April the annual conference of the Church - to which nearly three quarters of Norwegians said in 2015 they belonged - backed the principle of same-sex marriages, but did not agree on a wording.. Monday's decision involved modifying the marriage text to make it gender-neutral, removing the words "bride" and "groom". The new liturgy will come into effect on Wednesday. In 2015 the French Protestant Church allowed gay marriage blessings, while the U.S. Presbyterian Church approved a change in the wording of its constitution to include same-sex marriage. "I hope that all Churches in the world can be inspired by this new liturgy," said Gard Sandaker-Nilsen, leader of the Open Public Church, a movement within the Lutheran Church that campaigned to change the rules. Norway became the second country in the world after Denmark to allow same-sex registered partnerships in 1993, and it has allowed civil same-sex marriage since 2009. Germany meets bankers in Frankfurt for Brexit talks By John O'Donnell FRANKFURT, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Germany's top regulators met about 50 envoys from foreign banks on Monday to explain how they could move business to Europe's biggest economy after Britain leaves the European Union, German financial watchdog Bafin said. Bafin, which has been approached by numerous banks in recent weeks, said it answered questions from the banks such as how to get a banking license in Germany as well as giving its views on risk management. One official said representatives of about 25 banks had attended. The meeting underscores a growing willingness to consider alternatives to London, after Prime Minister Theresa May said that Britain would leave the EU's single market, a move that would isolate the City of London from many European clients. Peter Lutz, a Bafin official in charge of bank oversight, said the authorities wanted to help banks considering a move to understand the rules in Germany and that it was happy to have further meetings. "Brexit is ... no reason for celebration," Lutz said. "But we have to be pragmatic." Executives, chiefly those in charge of regulatory issues, from banks including Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and Citigroup were to attend the meeting in Bafin's Frankfurt offices, people familiar with the matter have said. Those banks declined to comment. Many Germans are sceptical of the aggressive practices of largely U.S. and British investment banks. Nonetheless, the country's politicians are seeking to show a friendly face to banks in London searching for alternative locations in the European Union to continue selling in the bloc once Britain leaves. May has said her government will invoke Article 50 of the EU treaty, starting two years of negotiations to arrange Britain's departure, by the end of March. Frankfurt looks set to be one of the biggest winners from any exodus from London. Hubertus Vaeth, head of Frankfurt Main Finance, a group backed by local government to promote the city, has predicted that 10,000 jobs will move from London to Frankfurt over five years, with investment banks among the early movers. Germany's economic strength and the fact that Frankfurt is home to the European Central Bank makes it attractive for banks. Tesco's $4.6 bln takeover of Booker - what happens next? LONDON, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Britain's biggest supermarket Tesco last week agreed a 3.7 billion pound ($4.6 billion) cash and shares takeover of Booker, the country's largest wholesaler, that would increase its dominance of a 195 billion pound food market. The deal was welcomed by investors with Tesco and Booker's shares soaring 9 percent and 16 percent respectively. However, the transaction will face scrutiny from competition authorities as it will add to Tesco's more than 28 percent share of the overall UK grocery market and more specifically its influence in the convenience, confectionery and tobacco markets. Though Booker only owns a handful of stores, it has over 125,000 retail customers, supplying independent retailers who trade under its Premier, Family Shopper, Budgens and Londis brands. It is also Britain's largest cash and carry operator with over 200 branches. Below are details of the key steps of the regulatory process and the views of the major protagonists: COMPETITION AND MARKETS AUTHORITY Britain's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) will consider the deal. Analysts and investors said the complexity of Tesco and Booker's businesses meant unpicking the competition implications was a huge challenge to the CMA's processes and the outcome difficult to predict. They said a lot depended on how the CMA defines the markets the two companies operate in - whether it looks at the UK grocery market as one or splits it between mainstream supermarkets and smaller convenience stores. "How an earth is the CMA going to determine the competitive dynamics within and between districts where a (Tesco owned) One-Stop trades against a Premier and Londis?," asked Shore Capital analyst Clive Black. "What about where a Tesco superstore has a (smaller) Premier and Budgens close by or more parochial still, a Tesco Express and a Family Shopper." INITIAL ENGAGEMENT The deal was announced on Friday and the CMA will already be poring over the details of Tesco's proposal. "We'll engage with them over the next few days and weeks," said Tesco Chief Executive Dave Lewis. PHASE 1 INVESTIGATION After a short period the CMA will formally confirm the start of a Phase 1 investigation, inviting interested parties to comment. That will be the chance for competing retailers, wholesalers, foodservice providers and their respective supply chains to make their representations. After up to 40 working days the CMA could clear the deal, ask Tesco and Booker to offer "undertakings in lieu" or concessions to avoid a more detailed Phase 2 investigation, or refer the deal to a Phase 2 probe. PHASE 2 INVESTIGATION Analysts see referral to an in-depth Phase 2 investigation as inevitable. If that inquiry, which lasts up to 24 weeks, does not find a lessening of competition, the transaction will be cleared. If a lessening of competition is found, the CMA can either seek remedies or block the deal. TESCO'S VIEW Lewis said that as the deal was essentially a retailer and a wholesaler coming together it was not an acquisition of stores and therefore not detrimental to competition. "What we think will happen is by coming together ... independent retailers get a better deal here than perhaps they do on a standalone basis," he said. BOOKER'S VIEW Booker CEO Charles Wilson said the deal was "pro-competition", with benefits for consumers and customers who will see better choice, prices and service. "We've had good advice on this and that's why we think we've got a very compelling story to take them (the CMA) through," he said. INDEPENDENT RETAILERS' VIEW "Some retailers will welcome this, others will be concerned about competing with stores supplied through the merged Booker and Tesco business, and some will be uneasy at the prospect of working in partnership with one of their biggest historical competitors," said James Lowman, CEO of the Association of Convenience Stores. COMPLETION? Tesco and Booker said they do not expect the deal to become effective until late 2017 or early 2018. That's a big clue that they expect the deal to be referred to a Phase 2 probe. EU leaders push measures to stop African immigration from Libya By Gabriela Baczynska BRUSSELS, Jan 30 (Reuters) - European Union leaders meet in Malta on Friday to give their political backing to a series of new measures aimed at stemming the flow of migrants from the Libyan coast to Italy. The perilous Mediterranean crossing is now the main migrant route to Europe, after a EU-Turkish deal last year that has slashed the numbers arriving in Greece via Turkey. The EU, beset by disputes over the uncontrolled arrival of some 1.5 million refugees and migrants in the past two years, is determined to shut it down. Below are key elements of a draft declaration, seen by Reuters, to be made by the EU leaders in Malta. - "We are determined to take additional action to stem migratory flows along the Central Mediterranean route and break the business model of smugglers... We will step up our work with Libya as the main country of departure as well as with its North African and sub-Saharan neighbours. Our actions will be carried out in full respect for human rights and international law" and in conjunction with the U.N. refugee agency (UNHCR) and International Organization for Migration (IOM). - "In Libya, capacity building is key for the authorities to acquire control over the land and sea borders and to combat transit and smuggling activities... The EU will also step up cooperation with and assistance to Libyan regional and local communities." This section reflects the fact that the U.N.-backed government in Tripoli does not control the country, where state structures collapsed after the 2011 overthrow of veteran leader Muammar Gaddafi. Much of Libya is run by militias and tribes which play a role in the smuggling business, EU officials say. - Leaders would agree to provide and fund more training, equipment and support to the Libyan national coastguard, and seek to break smugglers' networks; they would also seek to ensure "adequate reception capacities and conditions in Libya for migrants". The EU hopes it could provide funding to the UNHCR and IOM to set up such sites. - The EU would attempt to step up voluntary returns by migrants, and tell them along their route across Africa about the perils of the journey, to discourage them from trying. - The EU would help police Libya's land borders by offering financing, training or equipment to help ensure fewer people get into Libya. It would also step up cooperation with neighbouring Egypt, Tunisia and Algeria. - The EU would look at the possibility of sending migrants back to Libya, and the potential barriers to this, while respecting international law. Arizona man convicted of helping college student join Islamic State NEW YORK, Jan 30 (Reuters) - An Arizona man was convicted on Monday of charges that he provided support to Islamic State by helping a New York City college student travel to Syria, where he died fighting for the militant group. Syrian government denies rumours Assad in poor health LONDON, Jan 30 (Reuters) - The Syrian government has denied rumours that President Bashar al-Assad is suffering from ill health, saying he was "carrying out his duties quite normally". Speculation swirled in recent days on social media and some Arab news websites saying Assad, 51, was in critical condition, citing rumours of stroke, or even that he had been shot. "The presidency denies all these reports. President Assad is in excellent health," his office said in a statement on Friday. "They (the reports) coincide with the changing circumstances in the field and politically," it said, without elaborating. The Ikhbariya news channel said on Monday that Assad had spoken by phone to Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, the first report from state media to detail Assad's activities since the health rumors emerged. Assad ally Russia and rebels backer Turkey hosted talks between the government and opposition in Kazakhstan last week, where they reaffirmed a shaky month-old ceasefire between the two sides ahead of a new round of planned peace negotiations in Geneva. Assad had said before the Astana talks he was ready to discuss "everything", including his own position within the framework of the Syrian constitution. His opponents have insisted throughout nearly six years of conflict that he must leave power under any peace deal. But in the 17th year of his presidency Assad holds the upper hand in the Syrian war, bolstered by allies Russia and Iran whose military involvement has turned the conflict to his advantage. The Syrian army and allied forces recaptured the Wadi Barada area near Damascus on Sunday, in another blow to rebels who have fought for years to unseat Assad. Wadi Barada's recapture came weeks after rebel groups were driven from areas they held for years in east Aleppo, their last major urban stronghold. Taking full control of Aleppo represented Assad's most important gain yet in a conflict that grew out of protests against his rule in 2011. Swathes of Syria remain outside his control, including the Islamic State-held eastern province of Deir al-Zor, large areas of the north held by Kurdish groups, and pockets of rebel-held territory in the west. France to hold London roadshow to lure finance jobs to Paris By Maya Nikolaeva, Jean-Baptiste Vey and Michel Rose PARIS, Jan 30 (Reuters) - French authorities will head to London next week for a roadshow to try to lure financial jobs to Paris which will show off the French capital's advantages versus Frankfurt as an alternative to Britain's financial centre. Valerie Pecresse, the head of the wider Paris region and Gerard Mestrallet, president of France's finance industry lobby Europlace, will next Monday meet executives from BlackRock, Bank of America Merrill Lynch and others to present a study by McKinsey, aimed at highlighting the attractions of Paris. In the run up to Britain's June vote on Brexit, leading financial firms said they would move jobs out of the country if there was a vote to leave but have set out few details since on how many will go or where to. "The battle narrows down to Paris and Frankfurt," a spokesman for Pecresse told Reuters. HSBC, Europe's biggest bank, has said it could move a part of its operations to Paris. HSBC already has a large subsidiary in Paris that holds most of the licences needed by an investment bank. "There will be others," one French minister, who declined to be named, told Reuters. Paris has a network of international law firms and asset managers and the city is also home to the European markets authority, ESMA and has its own financial supervisor, which looks after some of the largest banks in the eurozone, French officials say. "We have a very good supervisor and that's important for American banks," a source at the French finance ministry said. Also in Paris's favour is its status as Europe's only other "world city" alongside London, with some of the most-visited cultural attractions in the world and the headquarters of many multinational companies, French authorities say. Germany is also on a charm offensive to attract finance jobs from Britain. The country's senior regulators met about 50 envoys from foreign banks on Monday to explain how they could move business to Europe's biggest economy after Britain leaves the European Union, German financial watchdog Bafin said. Beyond the financial sector, Paris's allure has recently been boosted by an influx of investment in its tech sector, with Facebook choosing the French capital to open its first ever start-up incubator. But French officials have acknowledged France's strict labour laws can put off businesses. The finance ministry source said the French administration was working on ways to allow firms to lay off teams of 50 people or so more easily, but this could not be implemented before the presidential election this spring. Nordine Hachemi, chairman and chief executive of Kaufman & Broad, a France-based property developer and builder, is optimistic about Paris's attractions but expects any actual moves to take time. "We should be realistic, no-one is going to rush to settle in Paris," Hachemi told Reuters, adding that he saw no impact from Brexit on the property market with regards to companies considering relocation plans. "This will take time ... There is competition with other European cities, there is no impact at this stage," he said. Behind the scenes though, companies and employees are already making enquiries with French institutions about practical matters. Ecole Internationale Bilingue, one of Paris' most prestigious bilingual schools, told Reuters they received quite a lot of registration requests from British-based families who were concerned about the consequences of Brexit. Brazil No 1 instant coffee exporter turns down new orders By Marcelo Teixeira SAO PAULO, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Brazil's Cia Cacique de Cafe Soluvel SA, the country's number one exporter of instant coffee, is refraining from closing export deals for future delivery due to uncertainty over robusta coffee supplies, and fears it will lose market share to rivals in other countries. Cacique's export sales director Pedro Guimaraes Fernandes told Reuters on Monday that Brazil's robusta supply crisis is 'very serious' and that without an opening to imports soluble shipments will start to plunge soon. "By this time I should be closing deals for May shipment, but I'm not," said Fernandes. "I can not close a deal if I don't know if I will have raw material to produce," he said. Brazil is the world's largest producer and exporter of green coffee and also the number one shipper of instant coffee. While there are no problems with green coffee shipments, since the arabica crop was a record in 2016, the soluble coffee industry is suffering from a sharp reduction of robusta production due to two years of drought in the top robusta state Espirito Santo. Arabica coffees are usually used to produce ground roasted brands, while the robusta type is largely used for instant coffee. Brazil produced a record 42 million 60-kg bags arabica crop in 2016, but robusta output fell to 8 million bags, the smallest since 2004. "The current level of robusta stocks is derisive. It would hardly supply the industry for more than two months," said Fernandes, who also heads Brazil's soluble coffee association Abics. Brazil's government projected current robusta stocks at 2.14 million bags recently. Brazil does not allow coffee imports on the grounds that they could expose local coffee fields to diseases. Instant coffee makers are trying to convince the government of the necessity of importing robusta. Officials in Brasilia are still evaluating the issue, said the Agriculture Ministry on Monday. Fernandes says the instant coffee industry is also asking coffee producers, who historically oppose any opening to imports, to change their stance and consider a temporary importing window. He says that if the industry loses market share abroad it will be bad for producers as well, since that could reduce demand for their coffee in the future. Strike cuts French electricity production by nearly 4 GW PARIS, Jan 30 (Reuters) - A strike by electricity and gas sector workers in France has cut nuclear and hydro power production by nearly 4 gigawatt, French grid operator RTE and utility EDF said on Monday. RTE said on its website that unplanned outages due to the strike had cut output at eight of France's 58 nuclear reactors, while EDF said on its website that the strike had cut hydropower production by 656 megawatts. RTE said the eight reactors were expected to be back on full capacity by Tuesday evening. The Central Bank for the second time has granted additional time to the licensed commercial bank, Amana Bank PLC, to meet the interim minimum core capital, required to have been met by January 1, 2017, according to a filing to the Colombo Stock Exchange. The Central Bank has granted time till June 30, 2017, to raise Amana Banks minimum core capital up to Rs.7.5 billion. The bank is currently negotiating a stock deal to inject equity in a bid to meet the Rs.10 billion minimum capital by January 1, 2018. The original directive issued in December 2014 by the Central Bank required all licensed commercial banks to raise their minimum core capital from Rs.5.0 billion to Rs.10.0 billion by January 1, 2016. However, Amana Bank, along with a few other small and mid-sized commercial banks, requested a deferred time frame from the Central Bank to meet the capital requirement, for which the Monetary Board gave its approval. According to the capital augmentation plan agreed with the regulator, the bank was required to raise its minimum core capital to Rs.7.5 billion by January 1, 2017 and further up to Rs.10.0 billion by January 1, 2018. In an earlier disclosure filed in December, Amana Bank said it was in talks with prospective foreign parties to infuse equity capital to meet the regulatory minimum capital requirements. Yesterday the bank said it is having discussions with Islamic Corporation for the Development of the Private Sector (ICD), the fund manager of IB Growth Fund (Labuan) LLP (IBGF), with a view to seeking participation in a proposed issue of shares. For this purpose, the due diligence on the bank is to commence by the ICD, the bank said in the disclosure. Meanwhile, the budget 2017 proposed to double the minimum core capital level to Rs.20.0 billion with no timelines attached. But the new capital levels are expected to come into effect from January 1, 2018 onwards. However, the Central Bank is yet to issue a clear direction to the banks because the Finance Ministry cannot specify the minimum capital levels to banks. Meanwhile, the new BASEL III rules demand higher capital adequacy levels in comparison to the risk- weighted assets to ensure the bank operates with higher capital buffers to withstand shocks in times of stress similar to the times of the global financial crisis in 2008/9. While some of the liquidity and interim capital adequacy levels are already monitored by the regulator at present, the Central Bank is mostly likely to issue directives on BASEL III early this year, which will come into full force from 2019 onwards. According to banking sector sources, Amana Bank has already lined up to Rs.10.0 billion in equity capital and the current talks are for the balance requirement to meet the Rs.20.0 billion capital base. Bank Islam Malaysia Berhad, AB Bank in Bangladesh and Islamic Development Bank based in Saudi Arabia together account for a 38.5 percent stake in Amana Bank. For the nine months ended September 30, 2016, Amana Bank surpassed its Rs.100 million profit mark and posted a net profit of Rs.101.5 million or 8 cents a share, which is 16.3 percent less than a year ago. The Delimitation Committee Report will be gazetted within a month, Provincial and Local Government Minister Faizer Mustapha informed the Supreme Court today through his lawyer. He said this when a Fundamental Rights petition filed by Peoples Action for Free and Fair Elections (PAFFREL) was taken up for hearing this morning. The committee report was handed over to the minister on January 17. (KB) John Keells Hotels PLC recorded improved financial performance for the December quarter as its Sri Lankan city hotels and Maldivian resorts showed improved occupancy, the parent company John Keells Holdings said in an earnings release. The company made earnings of 27 cents a share or Rs.391 million, recording an increase of 7 percent from a year ago. The revenues rose by 8 percent year-on-year (YoY) to Rs.3.1 billion. The earnings for the nine-month period ended December 31, 2016, was 56 cents a share, down slightly from 58 cents a share. The revenues topped Rs.8.6 billion recording an increase of 6 percent YoY. John Keells Hotels operates 1,337 four and five-star rooms in 11 properties, both in Sri Lanka and Maldives under its Cinnamon brand. During most part of last year, its Maldivian resort sector was adversely affected by the low occupancy mainly due to slower tourist arrivals mainly from China and also due to the political tensions in the archipelago. However lately, Maldives tourism industry has been showing signs of bouncing back with Chinese arrivals also picking up. For November, total arrivals to the archipelago surged 16 percent YoY to 104, 572, its highest in 2016, bringing the total arrivals during the first 11 months to 1.17 million, up 4.6 percent YoY. John Keells Hotels appears to be a beneficiary of this positive trend as the companys Maldivian resort sector made an after-tax profit of Rs.228 million, up 5 percent YoY. The segment revenues also rose by 7 percent YoY to Rs.1.67 billion. Meanwhile, John Keells Hotels subsidiary, Tranquility (Pvt) Ltd, paid US$ 15 million to Yacht Tours Maldives (Pvt) Ltd and another US$ 1.5 million to the Ministry of Tourism of Republic of Maldives in December 2016 in order to extend head lease rights of Dhonveli Island from August 26, 2028, to April 16, 2045, a note to the interim financial said. Further, the company said they had contracted but not incurred Rs.4.0 million in capital commitments to its Kakaahura Hotel project in Maldives as of December 31, 2016. A further US $ 13.5 million on the same project has been approved but not yet contracted. Meanwhile, the companys Sri Lankan resorts segment showed increased performance as a result of improved occupancy coupled with operational efficiencies and resulting cost savings. The segments after-tax profit rose by 10 percent YoY to Rs.166.2 million on a revenue of Rs.1.45 million, which was up by 8 percent YoY. The company said it contracted but not incurred a sum of Rs.58 million as capital commitments for a hotel project in Nuwara Eliya. Another Rs. 3.718 billion has been approved for the project by the end of December 2016 but is yet to be contracted. As of December 31, 2016, John Keells Holdings held 80.32 percent stake in the company followed by a 5.39 percent stake by the Employees Provident Fund. WASHINGTON POST, 29th JANUARY, 2017- An ominous week-long standoff between the government and its rogue first vice president is choking traffic and dominating talk in the edgy Afghan capital. Police units have been stationed at strategic points near his fortified compound, and everyone is asking the same question: Are they going to arrest Abdurrashid Dostum? Six weeks ago Dostum, 62, a powerful ethnic Uzbek boss and former warlord with a history of alleged war crimes and personal abuses, was publicly accused of brutality and rape by a former governor and political rival, Ahmad Eschi, who charged that Dostum had held him captive in a rural stronghold and ordered him sodomized with a military rifle. Following is the full speech delivered by the new National Chamber of Commerce of Sri Lanka President Sujeeve Samaraweera at the 58th Annual General Meeting of the chamber held recently at The Kingsbury Hotel. I am honoured to be elected as the 32nd President of this prestigious chamber, the National Chamber of Commerce of Sri Lanka, and I assure with confidence and pride that I will take forward the good work done by my predecessors to take the chamber to greater heights. I am taking over the presidency of this chamber at a very critical period for the world economy as well as the Sri Lanka economy. Sri Lankas economy is going through a paradigm shift with the able leadership of President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremasinghe, whilst we anticipate a shift in the world economy with Donald Trump taking the presidency of the United States of America. As Sri Lanka aspires to become a higher middle-income country, it will need to adjust its development model and economic growth, which will likely require continued structural changes towards greater diversification and productivity increases. Although Sri Lanka has excelled in overcoming human development challenges, typical to a low-income country, its service delivery systems in education, health and other areas must now adjust to face new and changing demands typical of a middle-income country. To accommodate these increasing demands, the government needs to increase fiscal revenues in the medium term. The country is to transit to a more robust, competitive and globally integrated economy and create better-paying private-sector jobs. We need to distribute the benefits of the countrys growth to all citizens and increase female labour force participation through education. Boosting green growth, improving environmental management and mitigating natural disasters and the effect of climate change are also priorities. SME development Our chamber is very much involved in small and medium enterprise (SME) activities and carries out many programmes to assist the small and medium entrepreneurs to develop their businesses and skills and knowledge. SMEs play a significant part and contribution to most of the economies of the world. In Sri Lanka, the main driving force of the economy is considered to be SMEs. Approximately 70 percent of the enterprises in the country can be classified as SMEs and they provide approximately 45 percent of the employment in the country. It is noted that many SMEs do not use the latest technology and have limited access to finance, due to collaterals not being available. Further, SMEs are not directly connected to markets especially in the case of exports. The chamber proposes to develop the required skills in the SME sector but to provide services in the area of finding local and international markets for SME products, which is one of the critical success factors for the development of the sector. The National Chamber is working hand in hand with provincial and district chambers to address this situation. We launched the Western Province Entrepreneurship Awards for the first time in 2016 on an invitation by the National Enterprise Development Authority. We are making the path for SMEs to come to national level and compete in our flagship event of the chamber - National Business Excellence Awards - to conquer the business world. We urge the government to come forward and support the National Chamber in fulfilling this national task of promoting public-private partnership. Export development The National Chamber of Commerce of Si Lanka welcomes the decision of the European Union to grant the GSP Plus facility to Sri Lanka. We understand that it will take another three to four months for the necessary formalities. We believe it will have a positive impact on our exports to Europe, since our export pricing will become competitive and would generate more and more market opportunities. In return, the investment in the country also may go up by making a positive impact on employment generation and gross domestic product (GDP) and narrow the current account deficit. We are aware that Dr. Harsha De Silva is giving leadership to great business promotion activity called economic diplomacy, which is commended by the business community at large. We feel it can be further strengthened by educating our commercial officers operating in other countries. The National Chamber will wholeheartedly support this endeavour and we will forward our proposal to the deputy minister in the near future. It is vital to keep the cost of production as low as possible so that our products would be competitive in the international market specially competing with Asian countries such as Bangladesh, Vietnam and Myanmar, etc. It is a known fact that our utilities such as water and electricity are higher in price in the region. India, through its foreign trade policy is supporting the export-oriented manufacturing and services in an excessive magnitude and Malaysia is also doing the same to boost and encourage exports. We should look at these examples, analyse and should take constructive steps to improve our economy. Supporting the export industries by way of encouraging investments, offer them attractive terms to acquire the latest technology, encourage them to invest in patents and branding in overseas markets, ensuring internationally accepted quality infrastructure and quality certification systems within the country are vital for the development of the sector. Shortages of skilled labour The shortage of skilled labour continues to be a hindrance across many businesses in manufacturing and services in Sri Lanka. The National Chamber statistics demonstrate that there is a shortfall of 15 to 20 percent in all the industries. In the recent past, the government paid considerable attention to the matter and it is essential that the Sri Lankan government continues to focus on policies forming the much required skilled workface for the industries. So, it is vital for Sri Lanka to have policies aligned to increase skilled labour availability and to get these skilled labour employed on export-related industries is also paramount important. It is significant to understand that there should be a change of attitudes of young community to get into skilled jobs; social acceptance for these jobs is at a minimum level. The government, private sector and media in this country at large have a great national responsibility to make this transformation happen. Necessity for a national trade policy Ladies and gentlemen, since Sri Lanka is negotiating many preferential free trade agreements at the moment with larger and stronger economies, such as India, China and Singapore, the National Chamber is insisting the fact that it is an absolute necessity to have a national trade policy for Sri Lanka, which will govern and provide directions to any trade agreements to be signed by Sri Lanka with any other country. It is worth mentioning that India has a well-defined foreign trade policy, which is updated every five years, where the current policy statement is applicable to the period of 2015 to 2020. This document provides the framework agenda for exports and imports of India for the specified time period, keeping aligned with the vision of Made in India of the Indian government to support both manufacturing and services sectors. Necessity for anti-dumping, countervailing measures With the background of Sri Lanka entering into three free trade agreements with very strong economies in the near future, it is vital to implement anti-dumping regulations in Sri Lanka. In other words, a common mechanism to protect our domestic industries from unfair trade practices is an absolute necessity. Most of the emerging economies like India, Brazil and China are already practicing anti-dumping measures with the view of protecting their local industries. Over the past decade, China and India have rapidly increased their use of anti-dumping laws, the worlds most dominant form of trade protectionism, against their trading partners. Women and youth development Ladies and gentlemen, gender equality and women empowerment play a key role in the 2030 agenda for sustainable development. Positive signs are visible in the number of women in decent employment and taking further steps to narrow these gaps are considered vital. Many women continue to work as family workers and informal workers with limited access to social protection mechanisms. We also appreciate the government initiative of bringing 25 percent allocation for women participation in local government elections. The National Chamber firmly believes and is committed to support women engagement in business and entrepreneurship. In fact, the National Chamber had the first lady president of a chamber in Sri Lanka. The chamber is engaged in supporting women entrepreneurship development at national level as well as provincial and district level. It is our belief that women can seriously contribute to the economic development of this country much more than they contribute at present. We need to see more and more ladies in boardrooms in this country contributing to the business development. Youth entrepreneurship and leadership development are also much needed by our country at this juncture. We should train our younger generation to lead the businesses effectively. Creating the next level business leaders and allowing them to take practical, hands on experience in manufacturing, marketing, sales, financial aspects and entrepreneurship, will ensure the continuation of businesses in the long run. Private sectors role in anti-bribery, anti-corruption The governments decision to implement independent commissions is shedding transparency to the key activities of the government and Sri Lanka would be positively recognized by the international community. Ladies and gentlemen, corruption and bribery are problems for businesses in Sri Lanka. We, as the private sector, support this initiative and make sure that we adopt anti-bribery and corruption policies in our own organisations. It is good governance and discipline that can bring in fair trade practices, where finally everybody can enjoy his/her share of business. Ladies and gentlemen, with the said backdrop of facts, I would like to state that the chamber will be implementing a well-focused development programme during my tenure. Further, we will form a trade facilitation counter for business interaction between the local and international companies. This facility will pave the way for investment opportunities and joint ventures. We will have regular social interactions with our members for our members for networking purpose. We will continue to work on SMEs by facilitating their business interactions by creating a virtual market place at the chamber to create synergies. This will enable SMEs islandwide to interact with each other and with the corporate world on the business opportunities. We would like to take the National Chamber activities to an international level by collaborating with similar organisations worldwide and also by facilitating winners. Also, by facilitating the winners of the Business Excellence Awards to participate in internationally recognized award ceremonies. The National Chamber will continue to expand the work done on skills development and training space by creating a special training and education institute for professional and skilled level trainings for the business community. Creating a professional youth wing for booming future business leaders. Managing the chamber with the private sector model. Developing a way forward strategy up to 2020. Appointment of an advisory committee comprising of a senior economist and prominent entrepreneurs to guide our chamber activities of the future. Members support. Ladies and gentlemen, with the help of the two deputy presidents, honorary secretary, treasurer and the secretariat of the National Chamber, I will continue to serve the members, business community and country at large. Thomson Reuters Foundation: A new synthetic fertiliser could help farmers to save money, boost food production and reduce planet-warming emissions, scientists have found after trialling it on rice farms in Sri Lanka. By slowing down the release of nutrients the fertiliser will help farmers to increase crop yields using less chemicals, the scientists from Britain and Sri Lanka said. Chemical fertilisers such as the nitrogen-rich urea were key to the agricultural boom of the 1960s and 70s known as the Green Revolution but their cost remains relatively high for farmers in the developing world. Agricultural production must rise by about 60 percent to feed a growing global population, expected to reach 9 billion by 2050, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation(FAO). Urea, commonly used to grow rice, wheat and maize, dissolves quickly when in contact with water and part of its nutrients are washed away before crop roots can absorb them.As a consequence, more applications are needed, which can prove too expensive for farmers in poor regions, the scientists wrote in the scientific journal ACS Nano this week. Moreover, unabsorbed urea particles go on to form ammonia that pollutes waterways and eventually causes the release of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. The new fertiliser delays the dissolution of urea by binding it with a mineral to slow down the release of nutrients 12 times, the scientists said. The plant takes up more of the fertiliser and less is wasted, said Gehan Amaratunga of the University of Cambridge in Britain, co-author of the report. This goes a long way to reduce the environmental footprint of agriculture, he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by telephone on late Thursday. Initial trials using the new fertiliser on rice farms in Sri Lanka showed production grew up to 20 percent using almost half the amount of fertiliser, Amaratunga said. Amaratunga said he hoped the innovation could help usher in a new, more eco-friendly Green Revolution. It is a Green Revolution...as its more food and less environmental damage, he said. MOSCOW, (rt.com), 28 Jan, 2017 - Both sides expressed their readiness to make active joint efforts to stabilize and develop Russia-US cooperation on a constructive, equitable and mutually beneficial basis, as well as build up partner cooperation on a wide range of international issues, according to a Kremlin statement following their discussion. The White House said that the positive conversation was a significant start to improving the relationship between the United States and Russia that is in need of repair. Both President Trump and President Putin are hopeful that after todays call the two sides can move quickly to tackle terrorism and other important issues of mutual concern, the White House statement added. The two leaders also discussed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as well as Irans nuclear program me. Major aspects of the Ukrainian crisis have been also touched upon, the Kremlin announced. The leaders of Russia and the US have noted a need to restore economic ties to stimulate further development of the relationship between the nations. Putin and Trump also agreed to initiate a process to work out possible dates and venue of their personal meeting. At a time when Sri Lanka is looking at ways to preserve water and its natural resources, various multi-national stalwarts too are claiming territory. One such multi-national that made headlines in this way is the Coca-Cola Beverages Sri Lanka (Pvt) Ltd, which held discussions recently to request for an expansion project. Amidst closing down operations in India following protests over extensive extraction of ground water and thereby causing huge damage to the environment, Coca-Cola has had initial discussions with Finance Minister Ravi Karunayake to discuss the possibility of setting up a production factory in Sri Lanka and use ground water here to export some of its brands to India. During the past few years, the Coca-Cola Beverages Sri Lanka Ltd was subject to criticism on various grounds from careless handling of discharge to polluting the Kelani River. In an attempt to shed light on the concerns of this expansion, the Daily Mirror spoke to a few individuals of varied expertise, to consult their opinions regarding this project. The previous oil leakage was an accident CEA Chairman "The President himself has given us a mandate to continue any project that causes minimum or no damage to the environment." Speaking to the Daily Mirror, Central Environmental Authority (CEA) Chairman, Prof. Lal Mervin Dharmasiri said that Sri Lanka is a country that depends on foreign investments. Through mega-scale factories they provide job opportunities for the locals in addition to many other benefits. But if they keep considering the environmental hazards, nothing could be done. The President himself has given us a mandate to continue any project that causes minimum or no damage to the environment. The previous oil leakage caused by the Coca-Cola factory was an accident and the company even issued a notice stating that they would be shifting to another place to prevent such damage from occurring again. The Coca-Cola factory recently signed a MoU with the CEA and will be funding Rs. 1.5 million to establish online water monitoring stations. The purpose of this project is to monitor the quality of water and also continue their work without causing any damage to the environment. NWSDB cannot restrict abstraction of groundwater unless government requests G.m. - NWSBD "There are no such government regulations in Sri Lanka at the moment but once they establish their project there will be a committee where the water board too will be a member" In his comments GM of the National Water Supply and Drainage Board, G. A Kumararathne said that the NWSDB cannot restrict the abstraction of groundwater until the government requests them to restrict it. If they go for individual abstraction then they have to abide by certain limitations. Many people depend on groundwater and therefore if they start abstracting then there should be proper monitoring. There are no such government regulations in Sri Lanka at the moment but once they establish their project there will be a committee where the water board too will be a member. Here we will be commenting on the discharge, pollution and other negative consequences occurring from the project. CEA shouldnt encourage the initiatives of companies that could cause environmental damage - Director ECT "The respective authorities were simply silenced after the company agreed to pay Rs. 131 million in compensation for the NWSDB for contaminating the river water with oil." The Director of the Environment Conservation Trust, Sajeewa Chamikara said that the Rs. 150 million worth fund that the Coca Cola Company intends to provide for the environmental restoration of the Kelani River is nothing but an initiation to divert authorities from seeing the real picture of the environmental damage caused to the river by the Company. The Central Environment Authority is not concerned about the rate at which the Kelani River is being polluted owing to the waste released into the water by the Coca Cola Company. They have polluted the river before and will continue to do the same in future too. The CEA has failed to take heed of the environmental damage caused to Kelani River by the Coca Cola Company during the past and this situation would continue to remain the same in future too. According to him, the waste products of the company are generally stored in large tanks and are released in to the river mostly during the rainy season. When the oil contamination in Kelani River surfaced, the CEA failed to take any legal action against the company responsible for the environmental damage and water pollution. The respective authorities were simply silenced after the company agreed to pay Rs. 131 million in compensation for the NWSDB for contaminating the river water with oil. CEA did not press charges against the Coca Cola Company since it agreed to pay the compensation for the environmental damage it caused to Kelani River back in 2015. I think that our environment authorities should play a much responsible role and not encourage the initiatives of companies that could harm our environment he added. We are committed to ensuring the long term conservation of local water resources Coca-Cola "We are working jointly with local community based stakeholders in reducing the adverse and far-reaching impacts of CKD stricken areas in Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa" In a statement issued by the Coca-Cola Beverages Sri Lanka Limited, a senior official said that at a recently held meeting between senior leaders of the Coca-Cola system and the Minister of Finance, Coca-Cola reiterated its commitment to Sri Lanka. In the backdrop of a stable and investor-friendly economy, the company expressed interest in further enhancing its investments in the country. The investment will significantly contribute towards the increase in supply chain infrastructure, manufacturing capacity and human capital which would undoubtedly enable job creation, portfolio expansion and thereby provide greater refreshment and choice to all our consumers and customers in Sri Lanka. Our operating model is one that strives to create economic and social value across the chain and for the communities in which we operate. We are working jointly with local community based stakeholders in reducing the adverse and far-reaching impacts of CKD stricken areas in Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa . We are committed to working with partners from civil society and the government in ensuring the long term conservation of local water resources, primarily the Kelani River. A healthier community in harmony with a viable, sustainable and growing business is in the best interest of society and we are happy to play our part. Several attempts to contact Finance Minister Ravi Karunanayake and State Minister of International Trade Sujeewa Senasinghe failed. During the past few years, several data breaches have made global headlines. You may remember the Target Stores data breach in 2013 that put the credit card numbers and personal information of millions of people into the hands of cybercriminals. According to the court documents, about 42 million people had their credit or debit information stolen. Target subsequently agreed to pay US $ 10 million to settle a class-action lawsuit related to the companys data breach. Further, the court documents showed hacking victims could get as much as US $ 10,000 apiece. It cost Target over US $ 162 million in 2013 and 2014. In a more recent case last year, banks in India will either replace or ask users to change the security codes of as many as 3.2 million debit cards in whats emerging as one of the biggest ever breaches of financial data. The breach is said to have originated in malware introduced in a system, enabling fraudsters to access information allowing them to steal funds. According to industry reports, payment card data made up 48 percent of data breaches investigated in 2012 and was also the second largest volume of records affected and payment card data targeted in 61 percent of breaches investigated in 2013. Commonly targeted industries include retail (45 percent of breaches), food and beverage (24 percent of breaches), hospitality (9 percent of breaches), financial services (7 percent of breaches), non-profit (3 percent of breaches) around the world. Many of the high-profile data breaches reported as complicated or sophisticated, when in reality, most occur due to low-level, very basic security practices are overlooked. Credit card data breaches are becoming so frequent globally that related stories seem barely newsworthy unless they involve huge data leaks from major corporations. But, for those impacted, even a small breach can be significant. Besides the aggravation of having to deal with fraudulent transactions, fraudulently exhaust out credit limits that prevent legitimate cardholders from using their cards until charges are detected and reversed, denied payments when an issuer cancels a card due to a suspected breach and fails to quickly notify the cardholder and other payment issues, the stolen data can sometimes be used in various ways to commit non-credit-card-related identity theft. In a survey conducted in the US, it was found that two-thirds of adults would not return to a business after a data breach. With the growing security awareness amongst the public, they are less likely to patronize a business which has had a security breach and hence customer confidence can affect the profitability of a business. The customers trust the organisation with their card data when they make transactions. When a security breach occurs, both parties are affected. Should an organisation get breached, not only will they have to deal with the loss of data, but may also have to deal with fines and lawsuits from customers and other organisations. Data breaches cost organisations a lot in both money and customer confidence the cost of replacing credit cards, paying fines and paying compensations for what the customers have lost, investigation costs and audits. Between 1998 and 1999, Visa and MasterCard report credit card fraud losses totalling US $ 750 million, which is an insignificant amount with compared to hundreds of millions of dollars in transactions processed annually. With the growing consumer comfort with online purchasing, merchants rolled out e-commerce websites and connected their payment processing systems to the Internet. This encouraged fraudsters to capitalize on poorly protected systems from which the payments and card data can be stolen, making payment card fraud faster and easier than ever before. Security risks became increasingly high with the increased instances of card-not-present transactions. These information security incidents and financial losses gave credit card companies an intensive amount of work towards implementing a solution to the problem. PCI-DSS as a solution With the rise in payment card data breaches globally, the need for a sophisticated security programme aroused. In 2004, all the major credit card companies responded to this crisis by joining together to create a comprehensive security standard. Thus, the pioneer payment brands, namely, American Express, Discover Financial Services, JCB International, MasterCard and Visa Inc., formed the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council (PCISSC) in 2006. Five different security programmes: Visas Cardholder Information Security Programme, MasterCards Site Data Protection, American Express Data Security Operating Policy, Discovers Information Security and Compliance, JCBs Data Security Programme were similar in objective of creating an additional level of protection when the payment data is stored, processed or transmitted. The founding members of the PCISSC aligned and improved said the existing internal information security programmes to come up with a unified information security programme. In this light, the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS) was created along with some of the other supporting standards such as PA-DSS, PCI-PTS, P2PE, etc. The PCI-DSS helps protect the safety of payment card data. The PCISSC set the operational and technical requirements for organisations accepting or processing payment transactions and for software developers and manufacturers of applications and devices used in those transactions. The goal of the PCI-DSS is to protect cardholder data wherever it is processed, stored or transmitted. The security controls and processes required by the PCI-DSS are vital for protecting payment card data and have specific rules for different businesses, based on the type of the business (processing, storing and transmitting of payment card data), depending on the size of the organisation measured in the number of transactions. Compliance is essential Being compliant to the standard, can reduce these fines and also reduce the amount of lawsuits and liability an organisation may incur. One has to prove that they were compliant for the fines not to be as bad if you were not making the effort. Hence, compliance is a top priority for merchants and organisations that process electronic payments. The standard helps issuers, acquirers, retailers and third party service providers to improve card data security. The standard was created so organisations could re-evaluate how they were actually using and managing cardholder information. The PCI-DSS specifies 12 different requirements for compliance, organised into six different control objectives. 1.Build and maintain a secure network 2. Protect cardholder data 3.Maintain vulnerability management programme 4.Implement strong access control measures 5.Regularly monitor and test networks 6.Maintain information security policy The execution of PCI compliance creates secure, regularly-assessed environments and processes surrounding the handling of payment card data during its processing, storage and transmission. This includes the protection of cardholder data at not only the point of sale but during its storage and transmission in a cardholder environment. This includes both network access by external parties and internal access to system components in the cardholder environment. As the PCI DSS demands, the implementation of security standards for these environments and processes, complying with the PCI security standards helps ensuring the safety of cardholder data. Additionally, PCI compliance requires regular assessment, remediation and the process of compliance facilitates better internal security strategies and can help prevent future problems. Maintaining payment security is a serious business. The card data of the customer needs to be protected by the organisations and the organisations are responsible for keeping the customer card data safe as far as the card data stored, processed or transmitted by the organisation. While many organisations may not see the PCI-DSS as a necessary evil, it is important to both organisations and their customers that they follow the requirements. After all, organisations are handling valuable information about their customers and should the information get stolen, it has repercussions beyond just a simple theft. It is vital that every entity responsible for the security of cardholder data diligently follows PCI-DSS. Unlike any other prevailing security standard, the PCI-DSS requires 100 percent compliance with the standard if not penalties could be enforced by payment brands to the organisations who are in non-compliance with the standard. Following the PCI guidelines goes a long way to securing payment data. Doing so assures customers and vendors that financial information is protected to the highest standard against identity theft and fraudulent purchases. Situation in Sri Lanka In Sri Lanka, organisations have been paying attention to physical security in their businesses, but are they dedicating enough time and effort to protect the information digitally? The cybercriminal is not concerned about which part of the world youre in and is looking for the easy pickings. The standard is not only applicable to websites that accept and process credit cards but also that outsource the processing of credit cards to third parties, if they accept credit card payments over the phone or even in person. So there is still a lot of work to be done to make organisations become more aware of their responsibilities and obligations when accepting credit cards. And if we can enable our small merchants to make the right decisions by using the guidance that has been published, then that will protect and contribute toward protecting the small merchants as well. Until the PCI-DSS is adopted in Sri Lanka, the Sri Lankan organisations will struggle to comply with varying security standards in various international markets especially with regards to payments. This drive toward having a single standard for the payment industry should be everyones interest especially those who want the electronic payments landscape to grow within the country. The security benefits associated with maintaining PCI compliance are vital to the long-term success of all merchants who process card payments. This includes continual identification of threats and vulnerabilities that could potentially impact the organisation. Most organisations never fully recover from data breaches because the loss is greater than the data itself. Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) Magazine (Sujit Christy is a governance, risk and compliance professional and Director at Information Security Professional Associates (iSPA). He is the founding member and Secretary of the (ISC)2 Chennai Chapter and a board member of the (ISC)2 Colombo Chapter. He can be emailed at sujit@layers-7.com) REUTERS: Sri Lankas foreign direct investment (FDI) slumped 54 percent to reach an extremely low by any standard level last year, the government said as inconsistent tax and economic policies weighed on offshore investments. The FDI dived 54 percent to US $450 million in 2016 year-on-year, compared with US $970 million in the previous year, which International Trade Minister Malik Samarawickreme stated was extremely low by any standard. He said the state-run Board of Investment (BOI) should promote investment, and if necessary, regulations and rules need to be changed to attract investments as the current regulations have failed to bring in investors. Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe-led centre-right United National Party (UNP), which is in a coalition with President Maithripala Sirisenas centre-left Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) promised to revive the economy with major FDIs. Last year, the government faced a debt and balance-of-payments crisis, and it also had to change its tax policies announced in 2016 budget due to protests. It is a lot to do with policy inconsistency on some of the key criteria like taxes and land ownership, Shiran Fernando, an analyst at Colombo-based Frontier Research. Still we see some uncertainty in particular in the financial sector due to the proposals outlined in the budget for 2017 in November. The government also faced legal battles in raising the Value Added Tax (VAT) by 4 percent to 15 percent, resulting in a loss of Rs.100 billion (US $666.7 million) due to a six-month delay in the implementation of the new tax. The government agreed for a economic reform agenda with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a US $1.5 billion loan in June last year. That includes reducing budget deficit, allowing rupee flexibility, and reviving loss-making state-owned enterprises. The IMF in November said Sri Lankas macro-economic and financial conditions have begun to stabilize and the island nations performance under its US $1.5-billion loan programme was satisfactory. Amaya Wijesinghe, the winner of the SriLankan Airlines social media contest Go Gan with UL, received her fabulous prize of two return air tickets to SriLankans latest destination, Gan in the Maldives and a three-night holiday package at Canareef Resort Maldives. The Christmas themed contest ran in the month of December 2016. It successfully enhanced brand awareness for SriLankan and the number of fans on the official Facebook page of the airline from countries including India, the United Kingdom, Japan, Singapore and Dubai. SriLankan has an active and popular Facebook page with more than 500,000 fans from all over the world (URL:https://www.facebook.com/flysrilankan/). The SriLankan Facebook page constantly runs contests and activities to keep its fan base engaged with many giveaways and prizes along the way. SriLankan started operations to Gan in December 2016 and is currently the only international scheduled operator to the Maldivian island. A federal court has granted an emergency stay blocking the deportation of migrants detained at airports around the United States due to Donald Trumps immigration ban. The federal court for the Eastern District of New York issued the stay Saturday evening after only two of 12 refugees held at JFK airport were released, after 14 and 24 hours respectively. The ACLU had filed a petition on their behalf, but the stay is effective nationwide. Under the stay, none of the travellers held at airports across the nation can be sent back. However, the measure doesnt mean they have to be allowed into the country - leaving them in a grey area. Earlier on Saturday, Donald Trump defended his new immigration measures, which prompted outrage as migrants were barred from entering the United States, including families of refugees and Ivy League students. The president denied that his executive order, which bars refugees and citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the US, was a Muslim ban. He maintained that the ban was working very nicely while chaos broke out in airports as migrants were stopped and some non-American citizens realized they were now barred from the country where they were studying or had lived, perhaps for years. Trumps comments came as migrants around the country were detained in airports because they arrived just after the executive order was signed. A senior Homeland Security official told Reuters that roughly 375 travellers affected by the order. Out of the 375, 109 were in transit to the US and denied entry. Another 173 people were stopped by airlines from boarding an aircraft to the US. An additional 81 travellers with green cards or special immigrant visas received waivers. Its not a Muslim ban, but we are totally prepared, Trump told reporters in the Oval Office Saturday afternoon, according to The Hill. Its working out very nicely. You see it in the airports, you see it all over. Its working out very nicely and we are going to have a very, very strict ban and we are going to have extreme vetting, which we should have had in this country for many years. DAILY MAIL, 29th JANUARY, 2017 REUTERS, 29th JANUARY, 2017- Prime Minister Theresa May said Britain did not agree with U.S. President Donald Trumps curbs on immigration after coming under criticism from lawmakers in her own party for not condemning his executive order when initially questioned. On a visit to Turkey on Saturday, she was asked three times to comment on Trumps move to put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and to temporarily bar travellers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries, which he said would protect Americans from violent Islamists. May - who had flown to Turkey from the United States where she was the first foreign leader to meet the new U.S. president for talks she called successful - replied that Washington was responsible for its policy on refugees. But after the prime minister flew back to a political storm in London late on Saturday, coming under fire from within her own party, her spokesman said Britain disagreed with Trumps ban. CA, Inc., doing business as CA technologies, develops, markets, delivers, and licenses software products and services in the United States and internationally. It operates through three segments: Mainframe Solutions, Enterprise Solutions, and Services. The Mainframe Solutions segment offers solutions for the IBM z Systems platform, which runs various mission critical business applications. Its mainframe solutions enable customers enhance economics by increasing throughput and lowering cost per transaction; increasing business agility through DevOps tooling and processes; increasing reliability and availability of operations through machine intelligence and automation solutions; and protecting enterprise data with security and compliance. The Enterprise Solutions segment provides a range of software planning, development, and management tools for mobile, cloud, and distributed computing environments. It primarily provides customers secure application development, infrastructure management, automation, and identity-centric security solutions. The Services segment offers various services, such as consulting, implementation, application management, education, and support services to commercial and government customers for implementation and adoption of its software solutions. The company serves banks, insurance companies, other financial services providers, government agencies, information technology service providers, telecommunication providers, transportation companies, manufacturers, technology companies, retailers, educational organizations, and health care institutions. It sells its products through direct sales force, as well as through various partner channels comprising resellers, service providers, system integrators, managed service providers, and technology partners. The company was formerly known as Computer Associates International, Inc. and changed its name to CA, Inc. in 2006. CA, Inc. was founded in 1974 and is headquartered in New York, New York. Aetna Inc. operates as a health care benefits company in the United States. It operates through three segments: Health Care, Group Insurance, and Large Case Pensions. The Health Care segment offers medical, pharmacy benefit management service, dental, behavioral health, and vision plans on an insured and employer-funded basis. It also provides point-of-service, preferred provider organization, health maintenance organization, and indemnity benefit plans, as well as health savings accounts and consumer-directed health plans. In addition, this segment offers Medicare and Medicaid products and services, as well as other medical products, such as medical management and data analytics services, medical stop loss insurance, workers' compensation administrative services, and products that provide access to its provider networks in select geographies. The Group Insurance segment offers life insurance products, including group term life insurance, voluntary spouse and dependent term life insurance, group universal life insurance, and accidental death and dismemberment insurance; disability insurance products; and long-term care insurance products, which provide the benefits to cover the cost of care in private home settings, adult day care, assisted living, or nursing facilities. The Large Case Pensions segment manages various retirement products comprising pension and annuity products primarily for tax-qualified pension plans. The company provides its products and services to employer groups, individuals, college students, part-time and hourly workers, health plans, health care providers, governmental units, government-sponsored plans, labor groups, and expatriates. Aetna Inc. was founded in 1853 and is based in Hartford, Connecticut. The following companies are subsidiares of Novartis: 1 A Pharma GmbH, Abadia Retuerta S.A, Admune Therapeutics, Advanced Accelerator Applications, Advanced Accelerator Applications, Advanced Accelerator Applications International SA, Advanced Accelerator Applications S.A., Advanced Accelerator Applications S.r.l., Advanced Accelerator Applications USA Inc., Aeropharm GmbH, Alcon, Alcon Couvreur NV, Amblyotech, Amblyotech Inc., Arctos Medical, Arctos Medical AG, Australia Pty Ltd, Beijing Novartis Pharma Co. Ltd., BioMedical Research Co. Ltd., CELLforCURE, Cadent Therapeutics, Cadent Therapeutics Cambridge, Cellerys, Cellerys AG, CellforCure, Chiron Corporation, Ciba-Geigy Japan Limited, Co. Ltd, CoStim Pharmaceuticals, CoStim Pharmaceuticals Inc., Coalesce Product Development Limited, Corthera, Development Co. Ltd., EBEWE Pharma Ges.m.b.H Nfg. KG, Encore Vision, Endocyte, Endocyte Inc., Eon Labs Inc., Farmanova Saglik Hizmetleri Ltd, Fougera Pharmaceuticals, Fougera Pharmaceuticals Inc, Gyroscope Therapeutics, HEXAL AG, Hexal, IDB Holland BV, Iberica S.L.U., Ilaclari Sanayi ve Ticaret A.S, JSC Sandoz, Japat AG, Kedalion Therapeutics Inc., Lek Pharmaceuticals d.d., Lek S.A., Manufacturing Pte Ltd , Navigate BioPharma Services Inc, Neutec Pharma Limited, Novartis (Hellas) S.A.C.I., Novartis (Singapore) Pte Ltd, Novartis (Taiwan) Co. Ltd, Novartis (Thailand) Limited, Novartis Argentina S.A., Novartis Australia Pty Ltd, Novartis Austria GmbH, Novartis Biociencias S.A., Novartis Biosciences Peru S.A., Novartis Bioventures AG, Novartis Business Services GmbH, Novartis Capital Corporation, Novartis Chile S.A., Novartis Corporation, Novartis Corporation Sdn. Bhd., Novartis Deutschland GmbH, Novartis Ecuador S.A., Novartis Farma S.p.A., Novartis Farma Produtos Farmaceuticos S.A., Novartis Farmaceutica S.A, Novartis Farmaceutica S.A. de C.V., Novartis Finance Corporation, Novartis Finance S.A., Novartis Finance Services Ltd, Novartis Finland Oy Espoo, Novartis Gene Therapies, Novartis Gene Therapies EU Limited, Novartis Gene Therapies Inc., Novartis Grimsby Limited, Novartis Groupe France S.A., Novartis Healthcare A/S, Novartis Healthcare Philippines Inc., Novartis Healthcare Private Limited, Novartis Holding AG, Novartis Hungary Healthcare Limited Liability Company, Novartis India Limited, Novartis Inflammasome Research, Novartis Integrated Services Limited, Novartis International AG, Novartis International Pharmaceutical Investment AG, Novartis Investment Ltd, Novartis Investments S.a r.l., Novartis Ireland Limited, Novartis Israel Ltd, Novartis Korea Ltd., Novartis Middle East FZE, Novartis Netherlands B.V., Novartis Neva LLC, Novartis New Zealand Ltd, Novartis Norge AS, Novartis Ophthalmics AG, Novartis Optogenetics Research Inc., Novartis Overseas Investments AG, Novartis Pharma (Logistics) Inc., Novartis Pharma (Pakistan) Limited, Novartis Pharma AG, Novartis Pharma B.V. , Novartis Pharma GmbH, Novartis Pharma GmbH, Novartis Pharma K.K., Novartis Pharma LLC, Novartis Pharma Maroc SA, Novartis Pharma NV, Novartis Pharma Produktions GmbH, Novartis Pharma S.A.E., Novartis Pharma S.A.S., Novartis Pharma Schweiz AG, Novartis Pharma Schweizerhalle AG, Novartis Pharma Services AG, Novartis Pharma Services Romania S.R.L., Novartis Pharma Stein AG, Novartis Pharmaceuticals Canada Inc., Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation, Novartis Pharmaceuticals Limited, Novartis Pharmaceuticals UK Limited, Novartis Poland Sp. z o.o., Novartis Portugal S.G.P.S. Lda., Novartis Ringaskiddy Limited, Novartis Saglik Gida ve Tarim Urunleri Sanayi ve Ticaret A.S, Novartis Saudi Ltd., Novartis Securities Investment Ltd, Novartis Services Inc., Novartis Slovakia s.r.o., Novartis South Africa (Pty) Ltd, Novartis Sverige AB, Novartis UK Limited, Novartis US Foundation, Novartis Vaccines and Diagnostics Inc, Novartis Vietnam Company Limited, Novartis de Colombia S.A., Novartis de Venezuela S.A., Novartis s.r.o., Oriel Therapeutics Inc., PT. Novartis Indonesia, Protez Pharmaceuticals, Pte Ltd, Research Inc, Salutas Pharma GmbH, Sandoz A/S, Sandoz AG, Sandoz B.V., Sandoz Canada Inc., Sandoz Egypt Pharma S.A.E., Sandoz Farmaceutica S.A., Sandoz Farmaceutica Lda., Sandoz GmbH, Sandoz Hungary Limited Liability Company, Sandoz Ilac Sanayi ve Ticaret A.S., Sandoz Inc, Sandoz Industrial Products S.A, Sandoz International GmbH, Sandoz K.K., Sandoz Limited, Sandoz Manufacturing Inc., Sandoz NV, Sandoz Pharma K.K, Sandoz Pharmaceuticals AG, Sandoz Pharmaceuticals d.d., Sandoz Philippines Corporation, Sandoz Polska Sp. z o.o. , Sandoz Private Limited, Sandoz Pty Ltd, Sandoz S.A. de C.V, Sandoz S.A.S., Sandoz S.R.L., Sandoz S.p.A., Sandoz South Africa (Pty) Ltd, Sandoz Ukraine LLC, Sandoz d.o.o. farmaceutska industrija, Sandoz do Brasil Industria Farmaceutica Ltda, Sandoz s.r.o., Selexys Pharmaceuticals Corporation, Shanghai Novartis Trading Ltd., Societe par actions SANDOZ, Spinifex Pharmaceuticals, The Medicines Company, The Medicines Company, Triangle International Reinsurance Limited, Trinity River Insurance Co Ltd, Vedere Bio, Vedere Bio ll, Xiidra, Ziarco, and Ziarco Group Limited. Read More The following companies are subsidiares of Illinois Tool Works: A V Co 1 Limited, A V Co 2 Limited, A V Co 3 Limited, ACCU-LUBE Manufacturing GmbH - Schmiermittel und -gerate -, AIP/BI Holdings Inc., Accessories Marketing Holding Corp., Advanced Molding Company Inc., Allen France SAS, Alpine Engineered Products, Alpine Systems Corporation, Anaerobicos S.r.l., AppliChem GmbH, Avery Berkel France, Avery India Limited, Avery Malaysia Sdn Bhd, Avery Weigh Tronix, Avery Weigh-Tronix Finance Limited, Avery Weigh-Tronix International Limited, Avery Weigh-Tronix LLC, Avery Weigh-Tronix Limited, Avery Weigh-Tronix Properties Limited, Avery Weigh-Tronix Suzhou Weighing Technology Co. Ltd., Azon Limited, B.C. Immo, Beijing Miller Electric Manufacturing Co. Ltd., Berkel Ireland Limited, Berrington UK, Brapenta Eletronica Ltda., Brooks Instrument B.V., Brooks Instrument GmbH, Brooks Instrument KFT, Brooks Instrument Korea Ltd., Brooks Instrument LLC, Brooks Instrument Shanghai Co. Ltd, Buell Industries Inc., CCI Realty Company, CFC Europe GmbH, CS Australia Pty Limited, CS Mexico Holding Company S DE RL DE CV, Calvia Spolka z Ograniczona Odpowiedzialnosci, Capital Ventures Australasia S.a r.l, Capmax Logistica S.A. de C.V., Celeste Industries Corporation, Coeur, Coeur Asia Limited, Coeur Holding Company, Coeur Inc., Coeur Shanghai Medical Appliance Trading Co. Ltd, Compagnie Hobart, Compagnie de Materiel et d'Equipements Techniques-Comet, Constructions Isothermiques Bontami C.I.B., Crane Carrier Company, Denison Mayes Group Limited, Despatch Industries, Diagraph Corporation Sdn. Bhd, Diagraph ITW Mexico S. de R.L. De C.V., Diagraph Mexico S.A. DE C.V., Dongguan Ark-Les Electric Components Co. Ltd., Dongguan CK Branding Co. Ltd., Duo Fast de Espana S.A.U., Duo-Fast Korea Co. Ltd., Duo-Fast LLC, E.C.S. d.o.o., E2M Production B.V.., E2M Technologies B.V.., E2M Technologies Inc.., ECS Cable Protection Sp. Zoo, ELRO Grosskuchen GmbH, ELRO Holding AG, ELRO-WERKE AG, Elro Group, Eltex-Elektrostatik-Gesellschaft mit beschrankter Haftung, Envases Multipac S.A. de C.V., Eurotec Srl, Exhibit 21, FEG Investments L.L.C., Filtertek De Mexico Holding Inc., Filtertek De Mexico S.A. de C.V., Filtertek SAS, GC Financement SA, Gamko B.V., Gun Hwa Platech Taicang Co. Ltd., HOBART Gesellschaft mit beschrankter Haftung, Hartness International, Hobart Andina S.A.S., Hobart Belgium B.V., Hobart Brothers International Chile Limitada, Hobart Brothers LLC, Hobart Dayton Mexicana S. de R.L. de C.V., Hobart Food Equipment Co. Ltd., Hobart International Singapore Pte. Ltd., Hobart Japan K.K., Hobart Korea LLC, Hobart LLC, Hobart Nederland B.V., Hobart Sales & Service Inc., Hobart Scandinavia ApS, Hobart Techniek B.V., Horis, ILC Investments Holdings Inc., ITW AEP LLC, ITW AOC LLC, ITW Aircraft Investments Inc., ITW Ampang Industries Philippines Inc., ITW Appliance Components EOOD, ITW Appliance Components S.A. de C.V., ITW Appliance Components S.r.l.a, ITW Appliance Components d.o.o., ITW Australia Holdings Pty Ltd, ITW Australia Property Holdings Pty Ltd., ITW Australia Pty Ltd, ITW Automotive Components Chongqing Co. Ltd., ITW Automotive Components Langfang Co. Ltd., ITW Automotive Japan K.K., ITW Automotive Korea LLC, ITW Automotive Parts Shanghai Co. Ltd, ITW Automotive Products GmbH, ITW Automotive Products Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., ITW Bailly Comte, ITW Befestigungssysteme GmbH, ITW Belgium B.V., ITW Brazilian Nominee L.L.C., ITW Building Components Group Inc., ITW CER, ITW CP Distribution Center Holland BV, ITW CS UK Ltd., ITW Canada Inc., ITW Celeste Inc., ITW Chemical Products Ltda, ITW Chemical Products Scandinavia ApS, ITW China Investment Company Limited, ITW Colombia S.A.S., ITW Construction Products AB, ITW Construction Products AS, ITW Construction Products ApS, ITW Construction Products CZ s.r.o., ITW Construction Products Italy Srl, ITW Construction Products OU, ITW Construction Products OY, ITW Construction Products Shanghai Co. Ltd., ITW Construction Products Singapore Pte. Ltd., ITW Construction Services Manila Inc., ITW Contamination Control B.V., ITW Contamination Control Wujiang Co. Ltd., ITW Covid Security Group Inc., ITW DS Investments Inc., ITW DelFast do Brasil Ltda., ITW Denmark ApS, ITW Deutschland GmbH, ITW Diagraph GmbH, ITW Dynatec, ITW Dynatec Adhesive Equipment Suzhou Co. Ltd., ITW Dynatec GmbH, ITW Dynatec Kabushiki Kaisha, ITW EAE B.V., ITW EAE Mexico S de RL de CV, ITW EF&C France SAS, ITW EF&C Selb GmbH, ITW EU Holdings Ltd., ITW Electronic Business Asia Co. Limited, ITW Electronic Components/Products Shanghai Co. Ltd., ITW Electronics Suzhou Co. Ltd., ITW Epsilon Sarl, ITW Espana S.L., ITW European Finance Co. Ltd., ITW European Finance II Co. Ltd., ITW European Finance III Co. Ltd., ITW FEG Hong Kong Limited, ITW FEG do Brasil Industria e Comercio Ltda., ITW Fastener Products GmbH, ITW Fluids and Hygiene Solutions Ltda., ITW Food Equipment Group LLC, ITW GH LLC, ITW GSE ApS, ITW GSE Inc., ITW Gamma Sarl, ITW German Management LLC, ITW Global Investments Holdings LLC, ITW Global Investments Holdings Y Compania Sociedad en Comandita por Acciones, ITW Global Investments Inc., ITW Global Tire Repair Europe GmbH, ITW Global Tire Repair Inc., ITW Global Tire Repair Japan K.K., ITW Graphics Asia Limited, ITW Graphics Thailand Ltd., ITW Great Britain Investment & Licensing Holding Company, ITW Group France Luxembourg S.ar.l., ITW HLP Thailand Co. Ltd., ITW Holding Quimica B.C. S.L. Sole Shareholder Company, ITW Holdings Australia L.P., ITW Holdings I Limited, ITW Holdings II Limited, ITW Holdings III Limited, ITW Holdings IV Limited, ITW Holdings IX Limited, ITW Holdings Inc., ITW Holdings V Limited, ITW Holdings VI Limited, ITW Holdings VII Limited, ITW Holdings VIII Limited, ITW Holdings X Limited, ITW Holdings XI Limited, ITW ILC Holdings I Inc., ITW IPG Investments LLC, ITW Imaden Industria e Comercio Ltda., ITW India Private Limited, ITW International Holdings LLC, ITW Invest Holding GmbH, ITW Ireland Holdings Unlimited Company, ITW Ireland Unlimited Company, ITW Italy Holding Srl, ITW Japan Ltd., ITW Korea LLC, ITW LLC & Co. KG, ITW Limited, ITW Lys Fusion S.r.l., ITW Materials Technology Shanghai Co. Ltd., ITW Meritex Sdn. Bhd., ITW Metal Fasteners S.L., ITW Mexico Holding Company S. De R.L. de C.V., ITW Mexico Holdings LLC, ITW Morlock GmbH, ITW Mortgage Investments II Inc., ITW Mortgage Investments III Inc., ITW Mortgage Investments IV Inc., ITW Netherlands Administration BV, ITW Netherlands Beta B.V., ITW Netherlands Finance Alpha BV, ITW New Universal LLC, ITW New Zealand, ITW Ningbo Components & Fastenings Systems Co. Ltd., ITW Novadan Sp. Z.o.o., ITW PPF Brasil Adesivos Ltda., ITW Packaging Technology China Co. Ltd., ITW Participations S.a r.l., ITW Pension Funds Trustee Company, ITW Performance Polymers & Fluids Japan Co. Ltd., ITW Performance Polymers & Fluids Korea Limited, ITW Performance Polymers & Fluids OOO, ITW Performance Polymers ApS, ITW Performance Polymers Wujiang Co. Ltd., ITW Performance Polymers and Fluids Group FZE, ITW Peru S.A.C., ITW Poly Mex S. de R.L. de C.V., ITW Polymers Sealants North America Inc., ITW Pronovia s.r.o., ITW Pte. Ltd., ITW Qufu Automotive Cooling Systems Co. Ltd., ITW Real Estate Germany GmbH, ITW Residuals III L.L.C., ITW Residuals IV L.L.C., ITW Rivex, ITW SMPI, ITW SPG Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., ITW Simco-Ion Shenzhen Co. Ltd., ITW Slovakia s.r.o., ITW Spain Holdings S.L., ITW Specialty Film LLC, ITW Specialty Films France, ITW Specialty Materials Suzhou Co. Ltd., ITW Sverige AB, ITW Sweden Holding AB, ITW Test & Measurement Equipment Shanghai Co. Ltd, ITW Test & Measurement GmbH, ITW Test and Measurement Italia Srl, ITW Test and Measurement Services Industry and Trade Ltd., ITW Texwipe Philippines Inc., ITW Thermal Films Shanghai Co. Ltd., ITW UK, ITW UK Finance Beta Limited, ITW UK Finance Delta Limited, ITW UK Finance Gamma Limited, ITW UK Finance Limited, ITW UK Finance Zeta Ltd., ITW UK II Limited, ITW Universal II LLC, ITW Welding, ITW Welding AB, ITW Welding GmbH, ITW Welding Products B.V., ITW Welding Products Group FZE, ITW Welding Products Group S. DE R.L. De C.V., ITW Welding Products Italy Srl, ITW Welding Products Limited Liability Company, ITW Welding Produtos Para Solgdagem Ltda., ITW Welding Singapore Pte. Ltd., ITW de France, ITW do Brasil Industrial e Comercial Ltda., Illinois Tool Works Chile Limitada, Illinois Tool Works ITW Nederland B.V., Illinois Tool Works Inc., Impar Comercio E Representacoes Ltda., Industrie Plastic Elsasser GmbH, Inmobiliaria Cit. S.A. de C.F., Innova Temperlite Servicios S.A. de C.V., Innovacion y Transformacion Automotriz S.A. de C.V., Instron Brasil Equipamentos Cientificos Ltda., Instron Foreign Sales Corp. Limited, Instron France S.A.S., Instron GmbH, Instron Japan Company Ltd., Instron Korea LLC, Instron Shanghai Ltd., Instron Thailand Limited, International Leasing Company LLC, Isolenge - ITW Sistemas de Isolamento Termico Ltda., Itw Spraytec, KCPL Mauritius Holdings, Kester, Kleinmann GmbH, Krafft S.L., Loma Systems, Loma Systems BV, Loma Systems Canada Inc., Loma Systems sro, Lombard Pressings Limited, Lumex Inc., Lys Fusion Poland Sp. z.o.o., M&C Specialties Co., MAGNAFLUX GmbH, MEHB Holdings Limited, MGHG Property LLC, MTS 2 LLC., MTS 3 LLC., MTS China Holdings LLC, MTS Europe Holdings LLC, MTS Holdings France S.a.r.l., MTS Japan Ltd.., MTS Korea Inc.., MTS Systems China Co. Ltd., MTS Systems Corporation, MTS Systems Danmark ApS., MTS Systems Europe B.V., MTS Systems Finance C.V.., MTS Systems Germany GmbH, MTS Systems Holding B.V.., MTS Systems Hong Kong Incorporated, MTS Systems Limited, MTS Systems Norden Aktiebolag, MTS Systems S.r.l, MTS Systems., MTS Systems.., MTS Sytems Do Brazil, MTS Testing Solutions India Private Limited., MTS Testing Systems Canada Ltd., Manufacturing Avancee S.A., Meritex Technology Suzhou Co. Ltd., Meurer Verpackungssysteme GmbH, Miller Electric Mfg. LLC, Miller Insurance Ltd., NDT Holding LLC, NOVADAN APS, North Star Imaging Inc., Nova Chimica S.r.l., Orbitalum Tools GmbH, PENTA-91 OOO, PR. A. I. Srl, PT ITW Construction Products Indonesia, Pacific Concept Industries Limited Enping, Panreac Quimica S.L., Paslode Fasteners Shanghai Co. Ltd., Peerless Machinery Corp., Polyrey, Premark FEG L.L.C., Premark HII Holdings LLC, Premark International, Premark International LLC, Prolex Sociedad Anonima, QSA Global Inc., Quimica Industrial Mediterranea S.L., R&D Engineering A/S., R&D Prague s.r.o., R&D Steel ApS., R&D Test Systems A/S., R&D Tools and Structures A/S., RDGDK Engineering Private Limited, Ramset Fasteners Hong Kong Ltd., Rapid Cook LLC, Refrigeration France, S.E.E. Sistemas Industria E Comercio Ltda., ST Mexico Holdings LLC, Sealant Systems International Inc., Sentinel Asia Yuhan Hoesa, Shanghai ITW Plastic & Metal Co. Ltd, Simco Japan Inc., Simco Nederland B.V., Societe de Prospection et dInventions Techniques SPIT, Speedline Holdings I Inc., Speedline Holdings I LLC, Speedline Technologies GmbH, Speedline Technologies Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., Speedline Technologies Mexico Services S. de R.L. de C.V., Stokvis Celix Portugal Unipessoal LDA, Stokvis Danmark ApS, Stokvis Holdings S.A.R.L., Stokvis Promi s.r.o, Stokvis Prostick Tapes Private Limited, Stokvis Tapes B.V., Stokvis Tapes Benelux B.V., Stokvis Tapes Deutschland GmbH, Stokvis Tapes France, Stokvis Tapes Hong Kong Co. Limited, Stokvis Tapes Italia s.r.l., Stokvis Tapes Limited, Stokvis Tapes Limited Liability Company, Stokvis Tapes Norge AS, Stokvis Tapes Oy, Stokvis Tapes Polska Sp Z.O.O., Stokvis Tapes Shanghai Co. Ltd., Stokvis Tapes Sverige AB, Stokvis Tapes Taiwan Co. Ltd., Stokvis Tapes Tianjin Co. Ltd., Stolvis Holdings II S.A.R.L., Subsidiaries, Technopack Industria Comercio Consultoria e Representacoes Ltda., Teknek China Limited, Teknek Japan Limited, Teksaleco Ltd., The Miller Group Ltd, Thirode Grandes Cuisines Poligny, Tien Tai Electrode Co. Ltd., Tien Tai Electrode Kunshan Co. Ltd., Unichemicals Industria e Comercio Ltda., VR-Leasing Sarita GmbH & Co. Immobilien KG, VS European Holdco BV, Valeron Strength Films B.V., Veneta Decalcogomme S.r.l., Versachem Chile S.A., Vesta, Vesta Global Limited, Vesta Guangzhou Catering Equipment Co. Ltd, Viltronics Soltec, Vitronics Soltec B.V., Wachs Canada Ltd., Wachs Subsea LLC, Weigh-Tronix Canada ULC, Weigh-Tronix UK Limited, Wilsonart International Holdings LLC, Wynn Oil South Africa Pty Ltd., Wynn's Automotive France, Wynn's Belgium BVBA, Wynn's Italia Srl, Wynn's Mekuba India Pvt Ltd, and Zip-Pak International B.V.. Read More The following companies are subsidiares of Ingersoll Rand: 13125882 Canada Inc., 211 E. Russell Road LLC, 4458664 Canada Inc., ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES ASIA PTE. LTD., ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES BORROWER S.C.A., ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES INDIA PRIVATE LIMITED, ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES LLC, ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES MIDDLE EAST FZE, ACCUDYNE INDUSTRIES SERVICES LIMITED, ASTRUM IT GmbH, Accudyne Industries Acquisition S.A r.l, Accudyne Industries Canada Inc., Accudyne Industries S.A r.l., Air Dimensions, Air Dimensions Inc., Albin Pump SAS, BOC Edwards Global Low pressure Air business, CISA S.p.A., Cameron-Centrifugal Compression, Comercial Ingersoll-Rand (Chile) Limitada, Comingersoll-Comercio E Industria De Equipamentos S.A., CompAir, CompAir (Hankook) Korea Co. Ltd., CompAir Acquisition (No. 2) Ltd., CompAir Acquisition Ltd., CompAir BroomWade Ltd., CompAir Finance Ltd., CompAir GmbH, CompAir Holdings Limited, CompAir International Trading (Shanghai) Co Ltd, CompAir Korea Ltd, CompAir South Africa (SA) (Pty) Ltd., Consolidated Distribution Holdings Ltd., DV Systems Inc., Dosatron International SAS, Emco Wheaton Gmbh, Emco Wheaton USA Inc, Enza Air Proprietary Limited, FlexEnergy Holdings LLC, Frigoblock Grosskopf Gmbh, GD Aria Holdings Limited, GD Aria Holdings Limited, GD Aria Investments Limited, GD First (UK) Ltd, GD German Holdings GmbH, GD German Holdings I Gmbh, GD German Holdings II GmbH, GD German Investments GmbH, GD Global Holdings II Inc., GD Global Holdings Inc., GD Global Holdings UK II Ltd., GD Global Ventures I B.V., GD Global Ventures II B.V., GD Global Ventures III B.V., GD Industrial Products Malaysia SDN. BHD., GD Investment KY, GD UK Finance Ltd., GPS Industries, Gardner Denver (Thailand) Co. Ltd., Gardner Denver Austria GmbH, Gardner Denver Bad Neustadt Real Estate GmbH & Co KG, Gardner Denver Belgium NV, Gardner Denver Brasil Industria E Comercio de Maquinas Ltda., Gardner Denver CZ + SK sro, Gardner Denver Canada Corp (Canada), Gardner Denver Cyprus Investments II Limited, Gardner Denver Cyprus Investments Limited, Gardner Denver Deutschland GmbH, Gardner Denver Engineered Products India Private Limited, Gardner Denver FZE, Gardner Denver Finance II LLC, Gardner Denver Finance Inc & Co KG, Gardner Denver France SAS, Gardner Denver Group Svcs Ltd, Gardner Denver Holdings Limited, Gardner Denver Hong Kong Investments Limited, Gardner Denver Hong Kong Ltd, Gardner Denver Iberica SL, Gardner Denver Inc., Gardner Denver Industries Ltd., Gardner Denver Industries Pty Ltd., Gardner Denver International Inc., Gardner Denver International Ltd., Gardner Denver Investments Inc., Gardner Denver Italy Holdings S.r.L., Gardner Denver Japan Ltd., Gardner Denver Kirchhain Real Estate GmbH & Co KG, Gardner Denver Korea Ltd., Gardner Denver Ltd., Gardner Denver Machinery (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., Gardner Denver Nash Brasil Industria E Comercio De Bombas Ltda, Gardner Denver Nash LLC, Gardner Denver Nash Machinery Ltd., Gardner Denver Nederland BV, Gardner Denver Nederland Investments B.V., Gardner Denver Oy, Gardner Denver Polska Sp z.o.o., Gardner Denver Pte. Ltd., Gardner Denver S.r.l., Gardner Denver Schopfheim GmbH, Gardner Denver Schopfheim Real Estate GmbH & Co KG, Gardner Denver Schweiz AG, Gardner Denver Slovakia s.r.o., Gardner Denver Sweden AB, Gardner Denver Taiwan Ltd., Gardner Denver Thomas GmbH (f/k/a ILMVAC GmbH), Gardner Denver Thomas Inc., Gardner Denver Thomas Pneumatic Systems (Wuxi) Co. Ltd., Gardner Denver Thomas Real Estate GmbH & Co KG, Garo Dott. Ing. Roberto Gabbioneta S.r.l., Ghh-Rand Schraubenkompressoren Gmbh, HASKEL EUROPE LTD., HASKEL HOLDINGS UK LIMITED, HASKEL INTERNATIONAL LLC, Hamworthy Belliss & Morcom, Haskel France SAS, Haskel Sistemas de Fluidos Espana S.R.L., Hibon Inc., Highspeed Newco LLC, Hingerose Limited, ILMVAC (UK) Ltd., ILS Innovative Labor Systeme, ILS Inovative Laborsysteme GmbH, INGERSOLL RAND ITS JAPAN LTD., INGERSOLL-RAND (CHANG ZHOU) TOOLS CO. LTD., INGERSOLL-RAND (CHINA) INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT MANUFACTURING CO. LTD., INGERSOLL-RAND CHINA LLC, INGERSOLL-RAND COMERCIO E SERVICOS DE MAQUINAS E EQUIPAMENTOS INDUSTRIAIS LTDA., INGERSOLL-RAND DE PUERTO RICO INC., INGERSOLL-RAND INDUSTRIAL COMPANY B.V., INGERSOLL-RAND INDUSTRIAL SP. Z O.O., INGERSOLL-RAND INDUSTRIAL U.S. INC., INGERSOLL-RAND PHILIPPINES INC., INGERSOLL-RAND SPAIN S.A., INGERSOLL-RAND U.S. HOLDCO INC., IR HPS Holdco. 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Read More Hawaiian Electric Industries, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, engages in the electric utility, banking, and renewable/sustainable infrastructure investment businesses in the state of Hawaii. It operates in three segments: Electric Utility, Bank, and Other. The Electric Utility segment engages in the production, purchase, transmission, distribution, and sale of electricity in the islands of Oahu, Hawaii, Maui, Lanai, and Molokai. Its renewable energy sources and potential sources include wind, solar, photovoltaic, geothermal, wave, hydroelectric, municipal waste, and other biofuels. This segment serves suburban communities, resorts, the United States armed forces installations, and agricultural operations. The Bank segment operates a community bank that offers banking and other financial services to consumers and businesses, including savings and checking accounts; and loans comprising residential and commercial real estate, residential mortgage, construction and development, multifamily residential and commercial real estate, consumer, and commercial loans. This segment operates 42 branches, including 29 branches in Oahu, 6 branches in Maui, 4 branches in Hawaii, 2 branches in Kauai, and 1 branch in Molokai. The Other segment invests in non-regulated renewable energy and sustainable infrastructure in the State of Hawaii. Hawaiian Electric Industries Inc. was incorporated in 1891 and is headquartered in Honolulu, Hawaii. On Sunday, the White House appeared as if it was pulling back on one key part of the tough immigration order by the President, signaling that travelers attempting to enter the U.S. from the 7 countries banned by President Trump can enter if they are green card holders. Chief of Staff at the White House Reince Priebus announced that the permanent residents were exempt from the ban moving ahead, even though during the weekend other officials from the administration said the rule did not apply green card holders. Get Warning: Undefined variable $CompanyName in /home/acctdp/public_html/wp-content/themes/responsalambre/single.php on line 65 alerts: This apparent reversal arrives amidst a widespread controversy over the new order by Trump that temporarily stopped entry into the U.S. of all refugees and travelers from seven countries that are predominantly Muslim populated including Iran, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, Syria, Sudan and Yemen. Federal judges across the U.S. blocked sections of the executive actions by Trump since he implemented them on Friday. For the most part, the judges prevented deportations of certain travelers that ran into the implementation during the weekend. The changes over the weekend with regard to holders of green cards reflected confusion over the new order that also bars all refugees from Syria from entering the U.S. for an indefinite period. Lawyers of some of the affected immigrants have said that border officials appeared uncertain over how the new rules worked and even at times disagreed with each other about the travelers that were affected and those that were not. Making the situation more complicated was a statement made by Homeland Security that asserted its agents would be enforcing all of the orders by Trump while complying with the judicial orders. Since some of the judicial orders have blocked deportation that has left certain officers to attempt to determine which priorities must be honored. On Sunday, Senator Mitch McConnell the Senate Majority Leader said the U.S. should not be imposing what he called a religious test on those seeking entrance to the country, in part because doing so would upset key allies in the countrys fight against terror. McConnell gave praise to Trump for his ramping up of vetting of those trying to come into the U.S., but warned against the vetting signaling out just Muslims. Kellyanne Conway the senior counselor at the White House said on Sunday that the additional vetting was aimed at just promoting overall security and if a traveler is not considered dangerous they will likely be released. A small group of Albemarle County human resources and school division staffers gathered recently for a recruitment fair aimed at giving potential job candidates a chance to inquire about the school division. But this fair didnt have the traditional involve booths, information displays or other physical objects showcasing the division. The staffers didnt even leave the County Office Building. Instead, the group sat around a conference table with their laptops and answered questions via the internet as interested persons across the nation, and even the world, inquired about jobs in the county schools. Clare Keiser, an assistant director in the countys human resources department, said the purpose of taking part in the virtual recruitment fair set up through Education Week, a national news publication was to reach a broader audience of potential job candidates. This is the first time the Albemarle school division has done a job fair like this one. On the recruitment fairs starting page that day, only a handful of other public school divisions in Virginia participated, alongside numerous divisions from across the nation. Mitsuko Clemmons-Nazeer, recruitment and selection manager for the countys human resources department, said this kind of recruitment fair opens the opportunity for the school division to attract more global applicants. By doing this, it could eventually result in opening students and the schools up to ideas potentially different than their own. I think everyone brings perspective, and I think that global perspective allows an educator to come in and be open-minded to differentiating and working with a different type of learner, she said. The focus of the virtual recruitment fair was on special education, an area in the county school division thats considered hard to fill, Keiser said. Its a position that, because of the dynamics of the job, has a little bit of a higher turnover rate than some of the other types of teaching positions, she said. In addition, the county school division has seen an increase in students with disabilities or who require other special-education services. According to data provided by the division, there has been a 17.5 percent increase in special-education enrollment since the 2012-13 school year. Katy Compel, special-education coordinator for the division, said that when she looks for potential candidates to teach special education, shes looking for people who can paint a picture of what their work would look like in the classroom setting. And while there might be an obvious edge to being able to sell that vision or picture in-person, Compel said the virtual setting shows how they can communicate this idea in written form, not just verbally. It actually gives them a chance to think about it, too, instead of just being on the spot how would you paint that picture? she said. Although it was all done without face-to-face interaction, the format of the virtual recruitment fair didnt stray too much from a traditional one. Anyone interested in learning more about employment with Albemarle County schools would click on or in a sense, approach the link to connect with a county schools representative and chat, similar in format to most common messenger or chat settings. While chatting, that representative would be able to see a copy of that persons resume and any other documents they uploaded, and provide answers to their questions. Overall, Keiser said the virtual recruitment fair went well, and one of the benefits was that they were able to reach a wider audience than traditional site fairs offer. Typically, when we go to a site fair, its more of a homogenous group of people that were meeting, where this was a very diverse group of people, she said. But one downside is that the conversations can lack the personal interactions that often are had at in-person recruitment fairs. In Albemarle County schools, we put relationships as one of the most important things, if not the most important thing, that we build with our staff and our students, and so when you are not being able to have that depth of conversation, its hard to kind of make a judgment on that relationship piece, Keiser said. Keiser said they plan to participate in more virtual recruitment fairs this year. She said they will focus on recruiting potential candidates in science, technology, engineering and math or STEM positions in April, and will then conduct a general virtual fair in June. As far as whether the county schools will continue to use this online method of job recruitment in coming years, Keiser said theyll make that determination the same way they do with traditional fairs based on the number of viable applicants and candidates they get from it. I think well take a look at, did we get applicants from that, and not only did we get applicants, but did we get viable candidates that we would want teaching in Albemarle County schools? Keiser said. Thats a really important thing for us, and if we find that the answer to that is yes, then we will definitely participate. For a second-straight day, hundreds gathered in Charlottesville to protest President Donald Trumps 90-day U.S. travel ban on citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries. This time, demonstrators gathered at the University of Virginia, beginning with a rally in front of the Rotunda. Over the course of about 90 minutes, the protesters marched along the Lawn, then down McCormick Road before stopping in front of a section of the Berlin Wall an artifact donated to the university in 2014. Just before the crowd marched, several speakers rallied the protesters on the steps of the Rotunda. One of them, fourth-year student Javad Jarrahi, compared Trumps actions to U.S. authorities decision to turn away German Jewish refugees aboard the MS St. Louis in 1939. Look around you, Jarrahi said. History is repeating itself. The rally, dubbed the March for Muslim, Immigrant and International Students, was organized by the Minority Rights Coalition at UVa. It attracted a wide swath of community members that included Charlottesville City Councilor Wes Bellamy. Bellamy encouraged attendees to get involved in politics at the local and state levels, and to work to hinder the implementation of Trump policies in their communities. Persistence will be the key to affecting change, he said. We have to let them know were not going anywhere, Bellamy said. People who are elected respond when individuals such as yourselves let them know youre not going away. As students and community members protested outside, UVa President Teresa A. Sullivan issued a statement saying the university supports undocumented and refugee students. University officials are still working to understand how the orders might affect students, faculty and staff members, Sullivan said. The situation remains fluid with additional court orders in other states, and will continue to evolve in the coming days, she wrote. For now, the administration is reaching out to students from the seven affected countries Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen and advising them not to travel abroad. UVa leaders also have met with undocumented immigrant students protected by the Deferred Action by Childhood Arrivals process to offer their support, Sullivan said. She advised students with questions to reach out to the universitys international office. As we continue to work on these issues, please join us in expressing support to the members of UVas international community who are so essential to the vitality of our university, read Sullivans statement. Robert Kubinec a former U.S. State Department official who now lives in Charlottesville and volunteers helping refugees to get settled in the area said many of the refugees he knows are afraid to speak up. Kubinec worked in the departments visa office in Saudi Arabia for two years. He told the audience that the measure was unnecessary. Our refugee vetting system is the most sophisticated in the world, he said. It is not insecure, it is not unsafe. The protest was just one of many around the country that broke out following the executive order, which was signed late Friday. Trumps order suspends the issuance of visas and other immigration benefits to nationals of countries of particular concern, and calls for a review of the vetting process to make sure that individuals seeking these benefits do not pose security threats. The United States must be vigilant during the visa-issuance process to ensure that those approved for admission do not intend to harm Americans and that they have no ties to terrorism, reads the order. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security confirmed Sunday that the 90-day ban will affect green card holders, as well as people seeking new visas. There was some confusion Sunday over the way green card holders who are legal permanent residents would be affected. A spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security initially told the news agency Reuters that green card holders will be barred from re-entry; officials followed up by saying they would simply face more extensive vetting before re-entry. Either way, Kubinec said he has advised the refugees he works with to avoid going abroad. But this is difficult for some of them he said one man he is advising wants to leave the country for his wedding ceremony in two months. That kind of story isnt unusual, he said. We are effectively imprisoning people who have been vetted, Kubinec said after his speech, as the protesters began their march across Grounds. These are not people who snuck in they came in through legal means. Charlottesville Mayor Mike Signer has organized a news conference on Tuesday afternoon to show support for refugees and immigrants. According to a Facebook page dedicated to the event, Signer wants to declare Charlottesville Capital of the Resistance to the Trump administration. He will be joined by Khizr Khan, a Muslim American activist and father of UVa graduate and U.S. Army Humayun Khan, who was killed in Iraq in 2004. Various religious leaders from the area have been invited, as well. The trial for a man accusing Albemarle County police officers of unlawful search, false imprisonment and battery is being pushed back by eight months due to a life-threatening head injury the man sustained last month. According to a motion filed in December, Benjamin Burruss sustained the injury on Dec. 5 while at his home, only to be discovered that evening by his wife when she returned from work. As such, Burruss and his attorney have asked a judge to push the week-long trial scheduled for February back at least six months. Burruss, whose locality of residence could not be determined by press time, filed a civil lawsuit against five county officers in November 2015 over an encounter that took place two years earlier. The suit alleges that on Nov. 21, 2013, Burruss was staying at the Comfort Inn in Albemarle and preparing to head to Montana for a camping trip in order to relieve stress he had been encountering due to difficulties at his job and in his marriage. The same morning, Burrusss employer contacted county police, asking them to check on Burruss and informing them that he planned to go hunting and may have a firearm, although he had not made any statements indicating that he wanted to hurt himself or anyone else, the lawsuit states. Burruss was then confronted in the parking lot, but refused to speak with the officers once hed gotten into his truck, saying they would need a warrant and asking that he be left alone. Officers surrounded the vehicle, and for two hours, repeatedly asked Burruss to exit the vehicle and speak with them. During this time, officers contacted Burrusss wife and asked her to get an emergency custody order from a magistrate to take Burruss into custody, as he had recently changed his medications for depression. Burrusss wife related some of the difficulties her husband was dealing with and advised an officer that Burruss had not made any statements indicating that he was going to hurt himself or others. Nonetheless, Burrusss wife went to a magistrate, who ordered the emergency custody order authorizing the seizure of Burruss. The order recited that it was issued upon a sworn petition and facts from Burrusss wife, although no sworn petition is contained in the court records for the order, nor was one found following a Freedom of Information Act request seeking the records, according to the original complaint. A SWAT team was then called to extract Burruss from the truck. Officers then launched a flash grenade at his truck, smashed his driver-side window, dragged him out, searched his vehicle and arrested him. He was administered a psychiatric evaluation and put on a 72-hour mental health hold. Representatives for the county have argued that the officers have qualified immunity and acted in good faith during their interactions with Burruss, but attorney Michael Winget-Hernandez countered that the officers did not have probable cause to hold his client. He further argued that if the officers believed Burruss to be a danger to himself or others, they could have taken him into custody without requesting an emergency custody order. In April, a federal judge ordered that the case would move forward despite motions from the county to drop it. A trial date was set for February, but Burrusss attorney filed an unopposed motion in December asking for a delay. According to the motion, Burruss sustained a life-threatening head injury at his home on Dec. 5, and wasnt found until his wife returned home that evening. He was taken to the University of Virginia Medical Center and underwent brain surgery that night, during which a portion of his skull was removed. While his prognosis is satisfactory, Winget-Hernandez wrote that Burruss was not expected to be well enough to meaningfully assist with the preparation of the case per the then-current trial schedule. As such, they asked that the case be pushed off for a significant period so that Burruss could recuperate. A judge quickly approved the motion. Since the motion was granted, the court also has denied a request by the Region Ten Community Services Board to be excused from turning over Burrusss medical records in the case, thus compelling Region Ten to disclose those records subject to a protective order. A Lynchburg substance abuse treatment program known as Pathways Treatment Center also has been asked to disclose medical records in the case, and like Region Ten, asked the court to exclude them from the case; a judge will take that matter up Tuesday. Earlier this month, the trial was rescheduled for Oct. 2-5. The Rutherford Institute, an Albemarle County-based civil liberties organization, helped to bring the lawsuit. RICHMOND Chemical recipes used in fracking, the controversial method of extracting natural gas and oil by high-pressure ground injections, could be kept secret under legislation that passed the Virginia House of Delegates Monday. The House voted 59-37 in favor of legislation to exempt information about chemical concentrations from disclosure under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act as trade secrets of the companies seeking permits from the state Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy. Fracking, short for hydraulic fracturing, involves a combination of water, chemicals and sand shot into the ground to release energy resources from hard-to-reach deposits inaccessible by other drilling methods. Though not heavily used in Virginia, the procedure has stirred controversy and concerns about water contamination in other states, including Pennsylvania and North Dakota. The issue could be coming to Virginia within a few years. Companies have shown interest in the area known as the Taylorsville basin east of Fredericksburg, stirring concerns in Caroline and King George counties. Since 2010, Texas-based Shore Exploration & Production Corp. acquired 86,000 acres in the Middle Peninsula and Northern Neck areas. Del. Roxann L. Robinson, R-Chesterfield, the sponsor of House Bill 1678, said on the House floor last week that the legislation had become a "transparency bill" after it was amended to only cover information about chemical concentrations, not the chemicals themselves. "By protecting that actual recipe it will foster more efficient and more advancements in the fracking industry," Robinson said Friday during debate on the bill. Companies that want to protect their fracking recipes would have to invoke the public-records exemption and make a case why their information should be kept confidential. The state would have final say over whether the exemption applies. Some lawmakers argued that the chemical concentrations alone can hold information vital to public safety. Del. David L. Bulova, D-Fairfax, drew an analogy to a chemical used in swimming pools. "A little bit of chlorine in that water is great," Bulova said. "If you put in too much chlorine, that can be exceptionally dangerous." Bulova said he was concerned that Virginians who sense something amiss with their water could be blocked from investigating what might be in it. "What this is about is the family who might notice a change in the smell or taste of their water who then contacts the Virginia Department of Health," Bulova said. "This bill doesn't prevent our state agencies from talking to each other," Robinson replied. "If there's any kind of problem, they definitely can coordinate with each other." Robinson noted that she has a separate bill that explicitly authorizes the energy department to share information with other agencies and local officials in emergencies. Five Republicans - Dels. Les R. Adams, R-Pittsylvania, Peter F. Farrell, R-Henrico, Robert G. Marshall, R-Prince William, Brenda L. Pogge, R-James City, and David E. Yancey, R-Newport News - joined most of the chamber's Democrats in opposing the bill. Three other Republicans did not vote. Del. Kaye Kory, D-Fairfax, joined with the Republican majority in support of the bill. Similar legislation on fracking chemicals is pending in a Senate subcommittee. Before becoming law, the measure would have to pass both chambers and be signed by Gov. Terry McAuliffe. WASHINGTON Former president Barack Obama rejected the idea Monday that President Donald Trump had based his immigration executive order on a policy adopted by his own administration, and endorsed the protests that have been taking place across the country in response to the new restrictions. Trump has said that his move to ban the entry of migrants from seven Muslim-majority countries into the U.S., and to suspend temporarily the admission of refugees, was based in part by a decision in 2011 by then-President Obama to ban the admission of Iraqis to the U.S. after evidence surfaced that two Iraqis seeking resettlement had been linked to terrorist activity in their home country. Former Obama administration officials have denied that there was ever a halt to the awarding of visas to Iraqis, though the processing of these applications slowed after they were subject to more intense scrutiny. Obama, who has remained publicly silent about his successor since leaving office a week-and-a-half ago, pledged before leaving office to only speak about Trump's policy moves "where I think our core values may be at stake." On Monday his spokesman Kevin Lewis said in a statement, "With regard to comparisons to President Obama's foreign policy decisions, as we've heard before, the President fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion." Alluding to the widespread protests taking place in major airports and cities in response to the new immigration policy, Lewis said that Obama "is heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country." "In his final official speech as president, he spoke about the important role of citizen and how all Americans have a responsibility to be the guardians of our democracy - not just during an election but every day," Lewis said. "Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake." RICHMOND Efforts to take politics out of Virginia's electoral redistricting process and reform how felons regain the right to vote died a swift and silent death Monday morning as a House of Delegates subcommittee killed 25 proposed constitutional amendments with just a few votes. The three amendments would give the General Assembly power to overrule regulatory actions by the governor, let military spouses keep a property tax exemption even if they move to a new house and create a budgetary lock box to better safeguard state transportation funds. Republican leaders had limited the subcommittee to passing just three amendments from the docket to avoid overwhelming voters with potential ballot questions in 2018. That left out other major issues like redistricting, the restoration of felons' political rights, both topics that had some Republican support. All of the remaining amendments died on a single, 4-3 vote. Democrats on the seven-member constitutional subcommittee pushed unsuccessfully for individual votes, but Del. J. Randall Minchew, R-Loudoun, the subcommittee chairman, reminded colleagues of their earlier instructions from Del. Mark L. Cole, R-Spotsylvania, who chairs the House committee on elections. "A motion to report more than three would not be in harmony with that directive," Minchew said. The block of legislation included five rights restoration amendments and five aimed at nonpartisan redistricting reform. Del. Jason S. Miyares, R-Virginia Beach, voted against the motion to table the other amendments in bulk. In an interview, he said he saw some "pretty darn important issues" left on the agenda and said he supported the GOP-sponsored amendments on rights restoration and redistricting. "It's a little bit of a 'welcome to the NFL' moment I guess as a freshman," Miyares said. Under Virginia law, the General Assembly has to pass constitutional amendments in two consecutive sessions before the changes go to voters on the ballot. Republican-sponsored bills to automatically restore the political rights of nonviolent felons and prohibit political considerations in the drawing of electoral district maps both seemed to have some potential of passing this year. Some Republicans pitched compromise plans on felon voting after last year's lengthy battle with McAuliffe over his executive order that restored rights to more than 200,000 felons at once. The Supreme Court of Virginia later overruled by the Supreme Court of Virginia, but Del. Gregory D. Habeeb, R-Salem, pushed for an amendment that he said would loosen the constitutional disenfranchisement policy while scaling back the governor's near-total authority over rights restoration. Redistricting advocates made a concerted push for a redistricting amendment sponsored by Del. R. Steven Landes, R-Augusta, that simply states lines can't be drawn to help or hurt any party or incumbent politician. "There were a lot of good redistricting bills in there that people could've gotten behind," Brian Cannon, executive director of redistricting advocacy group One Virginia 2021, said after the meeting. "It's clear that there's a majority on this subcommittee that doesn't want to prohibit politicians from drawing political lines to benefit themselves." Del. Jackson H. Miller, R-Manassas, a member of the subcommittee, said the push for nonpartisan redistricting seems stronger in states with Republican-controlled legislatures. "The Republicans were able to take control of the legislature with the Democrats controlling redistricting," Miller said. "And it can work the other way around." The three amendments that passed will continue on to the full elections committee and the House floor. The proposal with perhaps the most sweeping impact would allow the General Assembly to review and nullify rules and regulations passed by the executive branch. Such a change could allow the legislature to undo some executive actions it doesn't like, such as McAuliffe's ban on guns in state buildings and the governor's push to roll back restrictive regulations on abortion clinics. The balance of power could change after this year, when voters will choose a new governor and the entire House of Delegates will stand for re-election. A similar amendment is advancing in the Senate. When it comes to policing for profit, no one is immune from temptation. Just ask Attorney General Mark Herring. The knock against the practice sometimes called civil asset forfeiture has been clear and simple for many years: Allowing law-enforcement agencies to confiscate peoples personal property without even filing criminal charges, let alone obtaining a conviction, violates the nations bedrock principles regarding justice. Whats more, allowing law-enforcement agencies to keep and spend the proceeds of such seizures gives them an overwhelming incentive to further abuse an already abusive system. This is not a new concern. Congress tried to address it more than 15 years ago, when it passed the Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform Act. The measure produced underwhelming results. Two years ago two former directors of the Justice Departments asset-forfeiture division urged Congress to kill the program entirely. Government self-interest corrupted a crime-fighting tool into an evil, they wrote in The Washington Post. As two people who were heavily involved in the creation of the asset forfeiture initiative at the Justice Department in the 1980s, we find it particularly painful to watch as the heavy hand of government goes amok. The program began with good intentions but now, having failed in both purpose and execution, it should be abolished. They offer good advice particularly for Virginia. Last year the House of Delegates passed a bill that would have required a criminal conviction before property could be confiscated. The Senate killed the measure. Legislators did slightly tighten the standard of proof, which is an improvement but only a modest one. Not many people can afford to challenge the confiscation of their property, especially when doing so would cost them more in legal fees and lost wages than the property is worth. Law-enforcement agencies sometimes defend asset forfeiture by arguing that it deprives criminals of their ill-gotten gains and strengthens law enforcement. But since criminal charges are rarely filed, thats circular reasoning: We took the property because the owner was a criminal, and we know he was a criminal because we took his property. But even existing reforms can be undermined, sometimes by the very people who are supposed to enforce them. Formal Justice Department policy prohibits paying for raises with funds gained through equitable sharing of property seizures carried out in joint federal-state operations. But somebody at Justice put together an informal PowerPoint presentation showing states how they could get around that rule. All a state has to do, the presentation explained, is to use funds from seizures on other expenses, such as operations and vehicle maintenance. That frees up money that can then be allocated for pay hikes. Virginia took in more than $100 million from a case against Abbot Laboratories. In this instance, the case was legit: The company pled guilty. But Herrings office then used some of the money just as the Justice presentation advised: to hike salaries. To be clear, salaries need hiking, badly. Some laywers in the AGs office make substantially less than lawyers working in local commonwealths attorney offices and far, far less than they could make in private practice. Thats not the issue. The issue is the way in which the Justice Department encouraged states to circumvent its own clear directive and the fact that Virginia did so. Think of the episode as one more data point in a case that needs no further proof. Its high time for Virginia to end asset forfeiture in any case that lacks a criminal conviction and to allocate the proceeds to charity, so that policing is no longer tainted by profit. Excerpted from the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Donald Trumps unlawful immigration order is hostile not only to immigrants and refugees but to the principles that have animated America since its Founding. And the pity is that it is completely unnecessary. It will achieve nothing good, while doing a great deal of harm. The order already has created chaos at points of embarkation and arrival around the world. It has upended countless lives of peaceful citizens and earned America global disdain. And for what? Suspending the entry of refugees does not make America any safer, because refugees already undergo an exhaustive vetting process that lasts from several months two years. Trumps repeated insistence that he wants extreme vetting calls to mind Churchills observation about nuclear weapons: Beyond a certain point youre just making the rubble bounce. Trumps order is doubly ineffective because it exempts countries such as Saudi Arabia, home to many of the 9/11 attackers, while singling out nations such as Libya and Syria. The number of Libyan and Syrian nationals convicted of trying to carry out terrorist attacks on the U.S. homeland during the past four decades is zero. During that time only 17 individuals from the other countries on Trumps list Iran, Iraq, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen were convicted of such charges, and the number of Americans they killed also is zero. Americans homegrown citizen terrorists have killed far more people. Several judges have intervened to stay the implementation of Trumps order. That is a good thing, because it plainly violates a 1965 law declaring that no person can be discriminated against in the issuance of an immigrant visa because of the persons race, sex, nationality, place of birth or place of residence. The issue no doubt will be litigated. In the meantime, blameless souls fleeing persecution are left in a purgatory of fear and doubt. All of this is bad enough. But the presidents order has produced a lamentable ripple effect as well. Republican and conservative leaders have said little against the order. Worse, even some of those who most opposed Trumps candidacy, such as National Review, the nations leading conservative weekly, are now defending Trump. They are doing so not out of any sense that he has done the right thing, but rather out of a knee-jerk response to criticism of the president from Democrats and liberals. If Nancy Pelosi says something is bad, then apparenty that something must be defended, even if it runs up against every tenet of small-government, pro-liberty doctrine. Others have gone even further. Corey Stewart, the proto-Trump running for governor in Virginia, made the outlandish statement that (Terry) McAuliffe and (Ralph) Northam would rather see a terrorist attack in Virginia than offend liberals. Remarks like that dispel any last shred of suspicion that Stewart might be responsible enough to hold public office. These reactions represent tribalist groupthink at its worst just like Trumps order itself does. The president is wading into a cesspool, and he is taking much of the country with him. Salem fatality on highway 60 Updated twice with additional details: Last 12:17pm There was a fatal automobile crash west of Salem on US 60 late last night, according to ... Get ready for streets of treats Today 3:30 to 5pm Downtown Marion Young seeks Crittenden Sheriff's post Click Image to Enlarge Don Young asks for your vote as Crittenden County Sheriff. Young has been a constable and worked with the sheriff'... Crittenden burn ban remains in effect Livingston County lifted its countywide burn ban early this week, but Crittenden Countys burn ban remains in effect. The state wildfire se... Via the Daily Trust: Lassa fever patient was not neglected Keffi FMC. Excerpt: The Chief Medical Director of the Federal Medical Center, Keffi in Nasarawa State, Dr. Joshua Ndom Gyan, said yesterday that the Lassa fever patient, who died at the facility on January 15, was not neglected. Addressing a press conference yesterday in Lafia, Dr Gyan said, The late Bala Lawal was referred to the facility by a doctor in Dalhatu Araf Specialist Hospital, Lafia. He was unconscious when he arrived the facility on January 11, 2017. His medical referral only showed that he had sepsis/tonsillitis. Unknown to us, the patient had been suspected to have Lassa Fever, and a sample had been sent for testing. On the second day, our doctors were told on phone that it was a confirmed case of Lassa fever. Even in this condition of shock, our team still attended to him, risking the infection, while scouting for the drugs and Personal Protective Equipment. The Federal Ministry of Health responded promptly to our call and provided the necessary items on January 13. A total of four doses of Ribavirin were administered to him before his death on 15 January 2017. We sympathize with the deceaseds family for the irreparable loss and consider their sharp reactions and claims that the patient was killed as part of the grieving process. I also urge the public to disregard the rumour making the rounds that Baba died as a result of negligence. The father of the deceased, Alhaji Muhammed Baba Lawal, earlier accused the medical personnel of negligence. He alleged that doctors at the center failed to attend to his son for three days. SAIL too is a state-owned firm and is a prime consumer of coking coal as well as a major customer of CIL's metallurgical coal. New Delhi: Worried over domestic coking coal price hike effected by state-owned CIL, the country's largest steel maker SAIL today said it is in negotiations with the miner on the issue as it is difficult for the company to absorb the increase. "We are under negotiations with them and working model will come out," Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) Chairman P K Singh told PTI on Coal India Ltd's recent hike in coking coal prices. CIL arm Bharat Coking Coal Ltd this month increased the prices of coking coal by about 20 per cent. Another subsidiary of the world's largest miner Central Coalfields Ltd has also increased price of metallurgical coal this month. "We are in dialogue with them (CIL). We have told (them) that at this stage it is difficult for us to absorb (the hike in coking coal price). They have agreed to form a committee," Singh said. The panel which will be constituted will have members from both the state-owned firms. SAIL too is a state-owned firm and is a prime consumer of coking coal as well as a major customer of CIL's metallurgical coal. "We have an MoU with Coal India. Once we are in that MoU that pact remains applicable for the entire financial year. MoU means we also have an assured offtake from Coal India and We take coking coal from them. We take domestic coking coal supply only from Coal India," Singh said. According to an official, the price of various grades of coking coal of CIL varies between Rs 2,400 and Rs 5,050 per tonne. Asserting that SAIL was unable to recover its cost of production, he said there was a lot of pressure on its operations. On possibility of price increase by the steel PSU, he said "it will depend on market situation". Of its total requirement, SAIL imports 86 per cent of metallurgical coal, while the rest is sourced indigenously. The steel PSU has existing captive coking coal production of nearly 0.5 million tonnes per annum. The global coking coal price which was at USD 80 per tonne in January last year rose to USD 283 per tonne in December, Indian Steel Association Secretary General Sanak Mishra said. However, in early January, global price of metallurgical coal came down to USD 193 per tonne, Mishra said. Tax department said said that the taxman has issued numerous summons under the Benami Transactions Act and is in the process of issuing more. New Delhi: Initiating a stringent action against black money holders post notes ban, the Income Tax department today said it has issued 87 notices and attached bank deposits worth crores in 42 cases nationwide under the newly enforced Benami Transactions Act which attracts a heavy penalty and rigorous jail term of a maximum 7 years. Post the demonetisation order of the government on November 8 last year, the department had carried out public advertisements and had warned people against depositing their unaccounted old currency in someone else's bank account saying such an act would attract criminal charges under the Benami Property Transactions Act, 1988, applicable on both movable and immovable property, that has been enforced from November 1, 2016. "After in-depth investigations, the I-T department has issued 87 notices under section 24 of the said Act (notice and attachment of property involved in benami transaction). A total of 42 properties, largely monies worth crores in bank accounts and an immovable property, of benamidars have been attached," officials said citing an analysis report, also accessed by PTI. The I-T department is the nodal department to enforce the said Act in the country. They said the taxman has issued numerous summons under the Benami Transactions Act and is in the process of issuing more. The decision, they said, to slap the stringent provisions of the Benami Transactions Act was taken after analyzing serious cases where the illegalities were blatant and suspect cash was deposited in either benami accounts or Jan Dhan or dormant accounts. The taxman had initiated a nationwide operation to identify suspect bank accounts where huge cash deposits have been made post November 8 when the government demonetised the Rs 500 and Rs 1000 currency notes. Officials said the Act empowers the taxman to confiscate and prosecute both the depositor and the person whose illegal money he or she has "adjusted" in their account. "Such an arrangement where a person deposits old currency of Rs 500 and Rs 1000 in the bank account of another person with an understanding that the account holder shall return his money in new currency, the transaction shall be regarded as benami transaction under the said Act. "The person who deposits old currency in the bank account shall be treated as beneficial owner and the person in whose bank account the old currency has been deposited shall be categorised under this law as a benamidar," a senior official had explained earlier. The Benami Act, the official had said, provides that the benamidar, the beneficial owner and any other person who abets or induces the Benami transaction, shall be punishable with rigorous imprisonment for a period ranging from 1-7 years. "The benami amount in the bank account deposited post demonetisation will be seized and confiscated and the accused will also be liable to fine which extends upto 25 per cent of the fair market value of the benami property," the official said. The Income Tax department has stepped up its action to check black money transactions, money laundering and tax evasion in the wake of the demonetisation and has issued hundreds of notices of enquiry to charitable and religious trusts to show their account balances and to those who have deposited huge cash in their bank accounts. The I-T department has detected undisclosed income of over Rs 5,343 crore and seized Rs 114 crore of new notes till now which were allegedly procured illegally in its nationwide operation against black money hoarders. New Delhi: India's health ministry is likely to see a substantial increase in funding, after it warned that its programmes were short of cash and sought more than $1.2 billion in additional money, according to government officials and documents seen by Reuters. The final numbers could change when Finance Minister Arun Jaitley presents the budget for fiscal 2017/18 on Wednesday. But one official familiar with the numbers said the health ministry is expected to get a $1.5 billion, or 27 percent, increase in funding to around $7 billion. The health and finance ministries did not respond to requests for comment. An increase in the budget allocation, if finalized, would signal an acknowledgment from Prime Minister Narendra Modi's administration that the country needs to ramp up spending on the sector. Successive administrations have faced criticism from public health advocates for spending only around 1 percent of India's gross domestic product on public health, less in percentage terms than countries like Afghanistan and Sierra Leone. More than a million Indian children die every year before reaching the age of five. Hundreds of millions of poor people rely on India's public health programmes which provide basic services like vaccinations, disease prevention and free drugs. Until May last year, Jagat Prakash Nadda, the union health minister, had publicly maintained that the sector had no funding issues but needed to get better at spending the money it had. Between 2005 and 2013, the ministry only once spent all of its allocated funds.But letters sent by his ministry to the finance ministry between June and January, not previously disclosed, show that Nadda has also come around to the view that his department needs a larger pot to meet its public health objectives. "These are the bare minimum requirements," Nadda wrote in a letter to Jaitley on Jan. 10, outlining his request for additional funds. "There are several other significant programmes experiencing paucity of financial resources." The government has been increasing allocation to the health sector after criticism over its social sector cuts in 2015. But pressures on the budget are rising. It must also step up spending on roads, railways and irrigation projects to stimulate growth while keeping the fiscal deficit in check. Repeated requests In his letter, Nadda wrote that he needed an extra $589 million to implement a programme to screen patients for cancer and other illnesses, while the HIV/AIDS treatment programme required an infusion of $74 million. Nadda also wrote that there was an "urgent requirement" of around $520 million for the current year's spending, the absence of which "will adversely impact key programmes like malaria, tuberculosis, polio and other vector borne disease". Nadda's letter followed requests from other health officials in the preceding months. In November, the health ministry's top bureaucrat, C. K. Mishra, wrote to the finance secretary saying he had been informed that his ministry would receive less funds than were promised during mid-year reviews. The lack of adequate funding, Mishra wrote, "will give a serious setback" to new initiatives and existing programmes. Health ministry officials also cited delays in getting funds to implement Modi's directive to upgrade dozens of district hospitals into medical colleges, in order to add new doctors. India has seven doctors for every 10,000 people, half the global average, according to the World Health Organization. It is not clear how the federal budget for 2017/18, or individual state budgets that supplement it, will split health spending across various programmes. The government official who has knowledge of the budget numbers said the increase in the health ministry budget would be sufficient for ongoing projects. "But given escalation costs, there is no space for new health innovations," the official said. According to Mr Kalsi, the Nexa showrooms and premium car launches have helped his company to attract a large number of customers, who were not traditional Maruti customers. Hyderabad: With the peoples lifestyle changing faster than ever before, car makers are being forced to update their models and brands to retain their appeal to the customers. The lifecycle of car models is getting shorter because of fast changing lifestyles of people. In the past, people used to drive one car for 15-20 years. But now people change cars every five years. This forces car companies to keep our models up-to-date and introduce new features. But we have to phase out existing brands before the customers themselves reject them, said R.S. Kalsi, executive director (marketing and sales) Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. Even now we get letters from our customers asking why did phase out Maruti 800 model, explained. In tune with the changing demograhics and lifestyles of customers, Indias largest car maker by sales has been trying reposition itself as the manufacturer of aspirational cars as against the affordable car maker. The car maker has recently launched an aspirational car model called Ignis for catering to the affluent customers. As part of this, the company had started a new line of dealerships called Nexa to sell its premium cars. The firm has launched its 200th Nexa showroom in Hyderabad on Monday. Nexa showrooms are for customers who need a higher level of customer satisfaction, he said. According to Mr Kalsi, the Nexa showrooms and premium car launches have helped his company to attract a large number of customers, who were not traditional Maruti customers. Around 51 per cent of the customers visiting the Nexa showrooms are not traditional Maruti customers. This speaks a lot about the success of the Nexa showrooms, Mr Kalsi explained. Mumbai: Farah Khan and Sania Mirza are going to grace the couch of Koffee With Karan next week, which means two things are going to dominate this upcoming episode: their adorable camaraderie and practical jokes. In the teaser, you can see a puzzled Karan Johar asking himself, Where is Sania Mirza in my life? I need to be Sania's friend. To which, the forthright Farah was quick to reply, But, he will become your friend only because you are world's number 1, I hope you know that. The team player that Sania is, she sided with Farah and asked Karan, Is that why you haven't called me on Koffee till now? I was waiting. As soon as you turned number 1, you got a call, came the response. If this convo cracks you up, wait until you here Sania answer her rapid fire questions. The World No. 1 was far from being diplomatic and was bold to say that she does not want any of the Bollywood actors to wear their shirts. It so happened that Karan asked Mirza as to who, among Bollywood actors, she feels needs to wear put his shirt back on. Nobody should wear shirts. Everybody should take them off. Farah was her usual candid self, from revealing that Karan had once bitched about everything- her guests to crockery- to saying that if her friends happen to date Ranveer Singh and Ranbir Kapoor, they should carry condoms. Oops! Watch the teaser here: Mumbai: Shahid Kapoor who took the audience and critics by storm with his mind-boggling performance in Udta Punjab won the most credible award of the year for it. The actor won the Filmfare Critic's Choice award for the best actor. Shahid has delivered solid performances in films like Udta Punjab, Haider, Kaminey to commercial movies like Jab We Met, R... Rajkumar, Kismat Konnection, Ishq Vishq among others. He is now only associating with great content and films that will completely showcase his acting skills. Shahid is one of the few actors of his generation who can completely transform and get under the skin of his characters, be it the drugged and delusional rockstar Tommy Singh in Udta Punjab, the dark and complex Haider Meer in Haider or Guddu and Charlie in Kaminey. Whether its growing his hair or going bald, covering up in tattoos or playing a drunk, despite never having a sip of alcohol in his life, Shahid is always up for a challenge and willing to transform his looks to make his character believable. Shahid, who proved his mettle in Kaminey, Haider and Udta Punjab will now essay the role of an Indian soldier fighting for the British during the Second World War, in a love story based against the backdrop of war in Vishal Bhardwaj's Rangoon. Shahid is currently working with two of the biggest actresses in the Hindi film industry- Deepika Padukone in Padmavati and Kangana Ranaut in Rangoon. Mumbai: Last week we put up a poll on Twitter asking our followers which movie among 'Dangal', 'Sultan' and 'Raees' according to them is the best. Almost four thousand people voted and the result might shock you. Even though 'Dangal' is the highest grossing Indian film earning close to 400 crore in the country, audiences chose 'Raees' as the best film with 49% votes. Salman Khans 'Sultan' came second with 36% votes and 'Dangal' with a shocking 15% votes. It is very unusual to see 'Raees', that was recently released, at the top of the poll as the best film, even as Salman's 'Sultan' has crossed 300 crore and Aamir Khan's 'Dangal' has broken all the box-office records, and the SRK starrer seems unlikely to match the collections of the other two films. What do you think could be the reason? Is it because SRK's movie recently released or is it his massive fan following? Directed by Rahul Dholakia, 'Raees' also star Mahira Khan and Nawazuddin Siddiqui in the lead roles. Denzel Washington and Emma Stone took home the Best Actor and Best Actress trophies for their performances in 'Fences' and 'La La Land' respectively. Mumbai: The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards (SAG Awards), recently held at Los Angeles, honoured this past year's most outstanding performances in both television and film. While Denzel Washington (Fences) and Emma Stone (La La Land) won in the Best Actors' category, Violas Davis (Fences) and Mahershala Ali (Moonlight) took home the Best Supporting Actor award. Here's the list of all the winners who won a 2017 SAG Award, as reported by E! Online: Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture: Hidden Figures Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series: Stranger Things Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role in a Motion Picture: Emma Stone, La La Land Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role in a Motion Picture: Denzel Washington, Fences Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series: Claire Foy, The Crown Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series: John Lithgow, The Crown Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series: Bryan Cranston, All the Way Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in Television Movie or Miniseries: Sarah Paulson, The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture: Mahershala Ali, Moonlight Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture: Viola Davis, Fences Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series: Orange Is the New Black Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series: William H. Macy, Shameless Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series: Julia Louis-Dreyfuss, Veep Outstanding Action Performance by a Stunt Ensemble: Hacksaw Ridge Outstanding Performance by a Stunt Ensemble: Game of Thrones 2017 SAG Life Achievement Award: Lily Tomlin Nivin Pauly is easily one of the most celebrated stars in Kollywood from the Malayalam film industry. His film, Premam ran for more than 200 days in Tamil Nadu, which is considered a rare feat even for a Tamil film. Now, the actor is presently gearing up for his next straight Tamil release, which is helmed by Gautham Ramachandran. Initially, it was speculated that this project had been titled, Santa Maria. Later, rumours were abuzz that Avargal was the chosen one, but now, the team has officially announced a title. Speaking to DC, director Gautham says, We have fixed Richie as the title and it is Nivins name in the film. We had considered a lot of options and producers Anand Kumar and Vinod Shornur felt that Richie would be perfect for the film. The title design and the first look poster will be unveiled in the coming week. Currently, the post-production work of Richie is underway. Since Nivin is dubbing for himself in Tamil for the first time, he is spending a lot of time getting the diction right. He has wrapped up 75 percent of his work and we are planning to release the film this summer, reveals the director. We had earlier reported that Richie is adapted from the famous Kannada film, Ulidavaru Kandanthe. The Tamil version will focus on two important characters played by Nivin and Natarajan Subramanian. When asked about the name of Nattys character in the film, Gautham remained tight-lipped and stated that it would be better to watch it on screen. Shraddha Srinath, Lakshmi Priyaa Chandramoul, Prakash Raj, Elango Kumaravel, GK Reddy and Naveen Kunjumon are part of the supporting cast. The phone booth is situated on a hill in the Japanese town of Otsuchi which was hit by an earthquake and a tsunami a few years ago. (Photo: Pixabay) For the faint hearted, this might come as a surprise but a town in Japan actually has a phone booth they use to talk to the dead. Otsuchi which was hit by an earthquake and tsunami in 2011 along with other cities in Japan has the phone booth on a hill for people to talk to their dead family members that they lost in the calamity. According to a report in Travel and Leisure, the phone booth which is just like any other is used by locals and tourists to talk their loved ones as and when they miss them. However, the phone is disconnected which means the person can talk into thin air to deal with their grief. The town was destroyed within 30 minutes had over 10 percent of its population killed in the calamity and had many grieving people. The phone booth was however installed by a man named Itaru Sasaki who couldnt get over the death of his cousin and found it hard to use a normal phone and so he built the phone booth to help him come to terms with the death. The eerie phone booth is situated on a grassy hill a few hours away from Tokyo. Mumbai: Like every other state in India, Andhra Pradesh too is pushing to surge forward on the path of progress by inviting investors to promote business in the state and it also came up with its own marketing campaign calling on entrepreneurs to make Andhra Pradesh their business again. Although the map of Andhra Pradesh now looks different ever since Telangana became a separate state, the logo designed for the Andhra Pradesh Investment Meet 2017 in Visakhapatnam turned out to be really awkward. Andhra Pradesh map It may have been made for attracting investors to AP, but the logo ended up looking like a penis and managed to grab the attention the of a netizen who posted the image of it on Reddit asking if the logo needs to be redesigned, and shock seemed to be the most common response. (Photo: Reddit) One user wrote, You have ruined it for me forever. I can never look back at the map now without seeing a dong, and for others the slogan make Andhra Pradesh your business again made it even more outrageous. People got creative and also shared alternate captions like, "Sow the seeds of your 'business' in this fertile nether region of India," and "sow the seeds to a prosperous future in Andhra Pradesh." New Delhi: A 20-year-old youth was allegedly stabbed to death at a barber shop over the usage of a comb in southeast Delhi's Badarpur area, police said on Sunday. A PCR call was received today at 1.30 pm saying that a man had been stabbed by a pair of scissors and he was critical, said a senior police officer. During inquiry, it was found that the accused brothers Raghubir Thakur (25), and Navami Thakur (30), had a scuffle with deceased Pawan in their shop over the usage of a comb. The matter aggravated and Raghubir caught Pawan by hairs and Navami stabbed him with a pair of scissors, police added. Pawan was rushed to the Apollo Hospital where doctors declared him brought dead. Both the accused have been detained and are being interrogated, police added. Mumbai: A three-month-old stray puppy died after it was flung from the terrace of a two-storied building in Chembur on January 24. A case has been filed by a dog-feeder from the neighbourhood against unidentified people. This is the second such incident in Mumbai in the past one week after a case was of dog killing registered in Goregaon recently. According to a report in DNA, the 45-year-old complainant first heard the puppy whining at around 5:30 pm on January 24. As the whining increased, another person from the building saw the dog being thrown from the terrace. However, the person who threw the dog was not visible. When the complainants sister emerged from the building, she found the dog limping for some time, before it died. The lady then got in touch with PETA who helped her lodge a case and the dogs body was sent for post-mortem. The report indicated that the death was not natural. According to police there are five suspects in the case with two eye-witnesses. There are no CCTV cameras in and around the spot of the incident. Still, we are certain we can nab the culprit, police was quoted saying. The four teenagers used to take their victim to a vehicle parked in their colony and sodmise him. (Representational image) Hyderabad: A 13-year-old boy was regularly sodomised and filmed by four teenagers from his neighbourhood at Jamal Colony in Old Malakpet for the last one-and-a-half months. Whenever the victim refused to go with them, his tormentors threatened to upload the videos and pictures on social media. When the victims father found out about the criminal harassment of his son, he lodged a complaint with the police. The teenagers aged between 15 and 16 years have been arrested. The Chaderghat police said the rape had been going on for more than one-and-a-half months. The four teenagers used to take their victim to a vehicle parked in their colony and sodmise him. A jeep used to be parked in the colony. When the area was deserted, the four accused used to call the victim inside the vehicle and rape him. They also used to take the boy to their homes when their family members were not there, said Inspector G. Sattaiah of the Chaderghat police. Boy gave in due to fear They also took photographs of what they were doing and threatened the young boy that they would send the pictures to others on WhatsApp and upload them on social media. The boy got scared and he used to go wherever they called him, another investigating officer said. The boy has been sent for medical examination and a case has been registered under IPC section 377 and under relevant sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO). New Delhi: Trying to down play Samajwadi Party (SP) patriarch Mulayam Yadav's shocking condemnation of the newly forged SP-Congress alliance, the grand old party came out in support of his son and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, asserting that the alliance was primarily formed owing to Akhilesh's leadership and not Mulayam's. "What he (Mulayam) said is entirely his personal opinion. We have formed a strategic alliance with their party and primarily with Akhilesh's leadership. If there happens to be an important leader who is not happy with the development it is their internal matter," Congress leader Sandeep Dikshit told ANI here. Further stating that the majority of voters and party members are with Akhilesh, Dikshit added that the alliance is panning out very well for everyone. Agreeing with Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi's recent statement calling Bharatiya Janata Party's politics more divisive and threatening than Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati's, he said the saffron party is responsible for pitting people against each other. "Whether it is a matter of Hindu-Muslim relations or amongst other communities, or the matter of branding their detractors as Anti - nationals, in all matters BJP has played this venomous game and pitted one against another. How they tore the country in the Ram Janm Bhoomi episode is a well known fact which need not be reiterated." In a press conference with Akhilesh Yadav yesterday, Rahul had said "BSP government might have committed mistakes. I personally respect Mayawatiji. I respect Kanshi Ram also and there can be no comparison between Mayawati and BJP." Earlier in the day, Mulayam ended up giving fodder to the opposition and shocking everyone by voicing his dissent to the newly forged alliance between Samajwadi Party and Congress. Mulayam expressed his displeasure over the pre-poll alliance and categorically stated that he is against it, adding that he would not campaign in the state. "I am against the alliance formed between the Samajwadi Party and the Congress. I will never acknowledge this alliance. The Congress was in power for so long, but it did not do anything for the development of the country. I will not campaign in this election," he said. Mulayam further blamed Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav for going against his wishes and jeopardising the chances of his own party members. YORK An Army veteran down on her luck got a special surprise Saturday. Several organizations and volunteers made it happen. People young and old moved furniture and boxes into a York home. Were unloading the stuff, taking it all upstairs, and then were kind of getting it situated, said Austin Siewert, sales manager at Military and Commercial Fasteners. Wholey Homes, as well as Military and Commercial Fasteners, filled up a moving truck. We did a drive at (the) office to get furniture and stuff like that to bring into the house, Austin said. When we all come together, we can create something really beautiful, I think (its) I really neat, said Anna Siewert, founder of Wholey Homes. The volunteers are working hard for a woman whos been through a lot. It started with my husband passing away. He had terminal cancer, retired U.S. Army Specialist Deborah Gilbert said. That caused Gilbert to lose her home and stay at the Bell Family Shelter. Im 61 years old, and Ive never been homeless in my life, so it was a shock to me, Gilbert said. It was something that I really had to wrap my head around. The YWCA of Greater Harrisburg helped Gilbert move into her home with her daughter and grandson a few weeks ago. Were basically focusing on the master bedroom and the living room, Anna said. Volunteers gave Gilbert a home makeover for their day of service. For this to happen and people to do it willingly and the generosity of their hearts, its touching, its hopeful, its encouraging, Gilbert said. Theres something everybody can do to help somebody else, Anna said. Gilbert said she never expected the big makeover and plans to pay it forward. The crowd grabbed the trophies tied to the horns of the galloping animal and some of them got minor injuries in the process. (Representational image) Nellore: Ignoring police warnings, a bull race/jallikattu was held at Ramireddypalle village in Chandragiri mandal in Chittoor district on Sunday. Though the event is usually held on the third day of the Sankranti festival known as Pasuvula Panduga (Cattle Festival), the residents of Ramireddy-palle decided to hold it a fortnight after Sankranti to attract more people to their village and also to give it a separate identity and more publicity. As expected, a large number of people from neighbouring villages and mandals made a beeline for the village. The race was flagged off by YSR Congress general secretary B. Karunakar Reddy, and Chandragiri MLA Ch-evireddy Bhaskar Reddy. Farmers painted the horns of the cattle, including bulls and cows, and fixed trophies to the horns before making them run through the narrow stre-ets of the village in the mi-dst of hundreds of people. The crowd grabbed the trophies tied to the horns of the galloping animal and some of them got minor injuries in the process. Locals carried the people who were able to seize the trophies on their shoulders, praising them for their valour. One of the organisers, Chandrasekhar Reddy, said there is no money in the trophies and people take the risk because they are treated as heroes by their associates if they can snatch the trophies. Pointing to the participation of all kinds of cattle in the event, he said it cannot be called jallikattu, which is confined to bulls. New Delhi: Government on Monday sought the dismissal of a batch of petitions on judicial reforms, including appointments of judges in High Courts and Supreme Court, saying there should not be parallel proceedings when the matter is being dealt in the administrative side. A bench comprising Chief Justice J S Khehar and Justice N V Ramana said the matters have come up before it for the first time and the court would consider them after one month. Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for the Centre, said the matters are being dealt at the administrative side and they should not be taken up on the judicial side. He said the Memorandum of Procedure for appointment of judges have not been finalised in the last six months. Rohatgi also said the government has been filing status reports as sought by the SC at different points of time. The apex court then deferred the hearing on several petitions on the issues for a month. On January 2, the apex court had questioned the Centre why judges and chief justices of high courts were not being transferred despite the recommendations of the collegium and asked it to file a status report on such pending transfers with detailed reasons. Former Chief Justice T S Thakur had asked the AG to return to the collegium for reconsideration instead of sitting over the recommendation, as it gave rise to "speculation and misgivings" due to continuance of judges in the same high courts despite being transferred. The apex court had on November 18 last year said it had not accepted the Centre's stand of rejecting the 43 names recommended by the Supreme Court Collegium for their appointment as judges of the various high courts and most of the names have been sent back for reconsideration. The Centre had told the court that it had cleared 34 names out of the 77 recommended by the collegium for appointment as judges in various high courts in the country. Rohatgi, on November 11, had told the court that the Centre had already sent the fresh draft of the Memorandum of Procedure for consideration of the collegium on August 3 last year, but so far no response has been received by the government. The apex court had earlier rapped the government for delay in appointments to higher judiciary despite recommendations by the collegium in this regard and said the entire institution cannot be brought to a grinding halt. Maintaining that the appointment process "cannot be stalled" due to non-finalisation of the MoP, the court had criticised the tardy progress in processing files pertaining to judges' appointment and even warned that it may summon the secretaries of the PMO and the Ministry of Law and Justice to ascertain the factual position. The Attorney General had said that non-finalisation of the MoP was one of the issues and assured the bench that more progress will be seen in the near future on the appointment of judges. The apex court had said it would not tolerate "logjam in judges' appointment" and would intervene to "fasten accountability as the justice delivery system is collapsing". The bench had said that if the government had reservation about any name, it could always come back to the collegium. Hyderabad: Common Governor of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana E S L Narasimhan would meet some Ministers and officials from both states to discuss pending issues following state bifurcation in 2014. The meeting is understood to have been convened on February 1. Telangana would like to raise the division of High Court and others during the meeting, while Andhra Pradesh wants division of certain institutions under the 9th and 10th Schedules of Andhra Pradesh Re-organisation Act. The division of several institutions and others has been pending since the bifurcation of undivided Andhra Pradesh in June, 2014. Several meetings held between the two sides to sort out the issues have not been known to be too successful. The Governor is understood to have had a meeting with Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu and his Telangana counterpart K Chandrasekhar Rao at Raj Bhavan when both of them attended the customary 'At Home' on Republic Day. There have been differences between the two states on sharing of power, water and others since the bifurcation came into effect. New Delhi: External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj has sought a report from the Indian Ambassador in the US on the arrest of a Baroda-based businessman at an airport in the American state of North Dakota. "I have asked for a report from Indian Ambassador in U.S. @IndianEmbassyUS," she tweeted in response to a tweet by the wife of the arrested Indian man. "Sushmaji, my husband Paraman Radhakrishnan is an honest man with a passion for energy conservation," the wife tweeted to the minister. 53-year-old Radhakrishnan was taken into custody at the Grand Forks International Airport by police for allegedly making a bomb threat at an airport as he told a travel agent that there was an explosive in his bag. He faces terrorism charges. Congress chief Sonia Gandhi's political secretary Ahmed Patel also sought Swaraj's intervention for the release of Radhakrishnan. Bengaluru: Three sensational murders in Karnataka; two in Bengaluru and one in Dharwad between November 2014 and October 2016 have foxed the police. Sources in the three investigating agencies, which are handling the three murder cases, have told this newspaper on condition of anonymity that they have found no strong leads which can help them detect the murders. Interestingly, all the three murders were alleged contract killings and executed by professional killers. There is no news on what happened to the investigation in the sensational murder of a highly decorated retired Air Force officer Parvez Khokhar, who was murdered on November 24, 2014 in his villa in a gated community in Hebbagodi police station limits. Khokhar, a former Air Commodore, was a highly decorated officer and served as the project director of Indias indigenous Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) and was the military attache in the Indian mission in Islamabad for four years. Even after his retirement in 2003, Khokhar had taken up sensitive assignments. It has been nearly two and half years after the 71-year-old retired officer was reportedly smothered to death on his bed, with his hands and limbs tied, the Bengaluru rural police have not been able to crack the case. They ruled out conspiracy theories and the other routine suspect motives like property/relationships dispute and rivalry. On August 30, 2015 Prof. M.M. Kalburgi (77) a rationalist and well known Kannada litterateur, was shot dead at his house by an assailant. He had fired two bullets from a 7.65 mm country-made pistol. The killer and his accomplice on a motorcycle till date remain unidentified despite the best and most concerted efforts made by the States premier investigating agency Criminal Investigation Department (CID). The sensational murder gained Karnataka the notoriety of being an intolerant State with the rationalists and voices of dissent being perceived as soft targets. Prof Kalburgis murder was the last of the trilogy of fatal attacks against rationalist thinkers in India between August 2013 and August 2015. With his murder the anger against organised attacks on rationalists gained national prominence. Before Prof Kalburgis murder, Prof. Narendra Dabholkar (69) was shot dead in Pune on August 20, 2013 by two unknown assailants, who pumped in four bullets from a 7.65 mm country made pistol on him. Later on February 16, 2015 CPI leader Govind Pansare (81) was fatally shot at in Kolhapur by two unknown bike borne assailants, who fired five bullets from two 7.65 mm country made pistols at him, when he was out on a morning walk with his wife. The most recent murder of an Andhra Pradesh based industrialist Parachuri Surendra Kumar (55) in Bengaluru on October 30, 2016 again by two bike borne assailants, is also reportedly headed the Khokhar and Kalburgi way with the police claiming that its a complex case with no leads so far. Surendra knew too many people and had reportedly collected service charges from many of them on assurance of getting them huge loans. But he reportedly did not keep the promise. There was also a property angle and the police questioned his former assistant Kapil Shashwat, who was lodged in Mathura jail in UP on the alleged property dispute he had with Surendra. The investigation did not yield any conclusive result. Surendra was not in touch with his parents for long. In the last couple of years he had visited them in Andhra Pradesh, but they also couldn't help the investigating officer with any leads. The motive behind Surendra's murder remains unclear till date," said an officer on condition of anonymity. No clarity on motive behind Khokhar and Surendra murders has the police chasing several theories and unknown assailants in the dark alley. In the case of Prof Kalburgi, while the motive was allegedly to silence his voice of reason, the killers here too remain unknown. BENGALURU: Our Constitution guarantees important fundamental rights, such as right to equality, freedom among others. Apart from these, some Western countries have embraced several more, and 'Right to be Forgotten' is one such which is in trend these days. In a rare case, the Karnataka High Court recently passed an order along similar lines to protect the dignity of a woman. The High Court, while passing an order on a criminal petition, directed its Registry to make sure that any internet search made in the public domain would not reflect the womans name. The court observed, This is in line with the trend in Western countries of 'right to be forgotten' in sensitive cases involving women in general and highly sensitive cases involving rape or affecting the modesty and reputation of the person concerned. The womans father had approached the court seeking directions to mask the womans name in an earlier order passed by the High Court. The petitioner had said that his daughter feared grave repercussions if her name was associated with her earlier case and it would affect her relationship with her husband and also her reputation in the society. Earlier, she had filed a complaint against a man stating that she was not married to him and the marriage certificate should be annulled. However, she later agreed to withdraw her case after both parties arrived at a compromise. Following the woman's undertaking, the High Court had quashed the case against the accused man. Later, the woman's father approached the High court praying to direct the High Court Registrar General to remove the name of his daughter in the digital records maintained by the High Court and that it should not be visible in any of the internet search engines, including Google and others. The woman was apprehensive that if anyone searched for her name on the internet, the result would throw up her name in the case and that would have a repercussion on the relationship with her husband and her reputation in the society. After hearing the plea, the High Court ordered, It should be the endeavour of the Registry to ensure that any internet search made in the public domain ought not to reflect the petitioner's daughter's name in the cause-title of the order or in the body of the order in the criminal petition. The court, however, made it clear that as far as the HC website is concerned, such a step need not be taken. If a certified copy of the order is applied for, the name of the petitioners daughter would certainly reflect in the copy of the order. Pro-Jallikattu protesters during a demonstration against the ban on the Jallikattu at Marina Beach in Chennai. (Photo: AP) Madurai: The Madras High Court bench today issued notice to the Tamil Nadu Home Secretary and the DGP on a PIL seeking a judicial probe into alleged excesses by the police while dispersing Jallikattu protesters at Alanganallur and other places in the district on January 23. Issuing the notice on a petition filed by one P Kanagavel, a division bench comprising Justices A Selvam and P Kalaiarasan here directed the State Home Secretary, the DGP, the Madurai City Police Commissioner and the District Superintendent of Police to file their counter affidavits before February 15. The petitioner alleged that the police had attacked those who were holding a peaceful protest in Alanganallur village and Tamukkam Grounds, Sellur and Periyar Bus terminus in the city in support of Jallikattu. He also claimed that several protesters were detained illegally. He prayed for a judicial inquiry into the police action against the demonstrators, besides seeking a direction to the state government to provide proper treatment to those injured. When the matter came up for hearing, the Additional Advocate General (AAG) opposed it, saying a case had been registered against the petitioner as well and hence the PIL was not filed in public interest. He also claimed that 10 buses and three police vehicles were damaged in the violence allegedly by the agitators. 48 people had been arrested and remanded in judicial custody, he added. The petitioner's counsel alleged that the police themselves had set fire to vehicles with a view to creating a violent atmosphere. On January 23, the police had used force to disperse the Jallikattu protesters at Alanganallur, famous for the bull-taming sport. A plea for a CBI probe had been made in the Madras High Court's principal seat, also alleging police excesses against the Jallikattu protesters in Chennai. Lucknow: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, who forged an alliance between the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Congress for the upcoming elections in the state, said on Monday that his father and SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav would campaign for the party. Speaking to NDTV, Akhilesh also said that he was confident that SP would win the elections alone, but an alliance with the Congress would "firm up the verdict". Akhilesh Yadav said Mulayam Singh Yadav's respect will increase if the freshly forged alliance forms the next government in the state. "If we win, it will be Mulayam Singh whose respect will increase the most," Akhilesh said while addressing a rally in Etah. He also used the occasion to train guns at the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), saying if Mayawati-led party comes to power then it will construct more elephants in the state. "If elephant's size increases then imagine what size elephant she will construct," said Akhilesh. Taking a jibe at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), he said that demonetisation adversely affected the state's economy. Voicing displeasure over the alliance between Samajwadi Party and Congress, SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav on Sunday said he would not campaign for it in the state assembly polls. "I am completely against the alliance. I will not campaign for it," Mulayam said on a day his son and Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi held their first joint press conference in Lucknow and held a road show displaying great bonhomie. Mulayam, who had rejected the possibility of an alliance for the assembly polls before being deposed as party president by Akhilesh, said, "Congress ruled the country for a long time and made it laggard. We always fought against Congress." "Samajwadi Party is capable of contesting elections alone. In the past, it fought alone and formed government with a majority. No occasion arose for effecting an alliance," he said. But Akhilesh said on Monday, I am sure Mulayam Singh Yadav will campaign for us. Panaji: Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) supremo Sharad Pawar has scotched rumours that his party was cosying up to BJP, saying it will never support the saffron party nor join hands with communal forces and compromise on secularism. "There are rumours being spread that NCP is growing close to BJP. This is absolutely false news. NCP will never support BJP," he said addressing a public meeting in Vasco last night where he was canvassing for his party candidate Jose Philipe D Souza. "We will never compromise on secularism. NCP will never be with the communal forces. Those who are favouring and spreading communalism, we will never be with them," said Pawar was recently honoured with the Padma Vibhushan, countrys second highest civilian award. With Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray calling off their two-decade-old alliance with the BJP, speculation was rife that it could look at NCP to fill the crucial gap ahead of civic polls in Mumbai and other places in Maharashtra. During the public meeting last night, Pawar slammed Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the demonetisation holding him responsible for generating unemployment in the unorganized sector and spelling doom on various sectors including the power loom industry. He accused PM of having taken the demonetisation decision to "misguide" and divert the attention of the people from his failure to bring back black money from abroad. "The PM overnight terminated a lot of currency and within a day, the entire country was standing in queues outside banks," he said. The former Union Minister also lambasted Manohar Parrikar for closing down mining industry in the state after he took over the reins in 2012 as the CM. "People who were dependent on the mining industry were forced to face a bleak future with one decision of Parrikar," he said. Pawar also accused then Congress-led central government for furthering the crisis in Goa's mining industry by allegedly revoking the environmental clearances granted to mining firms. New Delhi: Amidst chill in Indo-Pak ties, Pakistan has declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend South Asian Speakers' Summit to be held next month. "Pakistan and Myanmar which were among the countries in the South Asian nations invited to the Speakers' meet in Indore on February 18-19 have declined the invitation," official sources said. However, officials did not elaborate on the reasons given by Pakistan and merely noted that these two countries have written that they will not be able to attend the meet. The Summit, which is primarily an IPU initiative and not a SAARC activity, will be attended by Speakers of Parliament from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka among other countries, the sources said. Significantly, in 2015, India had boycotted a Commonwealth Parliamentary Union (CPU) meeting in Islamabad to protest against Pakistan's decision to not invite the Speaker of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. The discussions during the Speakers' Summit on achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will update the participants on implementation of the SDGs in their region and globally. Special emphasis will be laid on sharing experiences and increasing understanding about how parliaments in the region institutionalise the global goals, capture the synergies and build coherence at the policy level, IPU said on its website. HARRISBURG Millions of women around the globe marched the day after President Donald Trumps inauguration. And they spoke. State Rep. Carol Hill-Evans, D-York, hopes everyone was listening. Were here. Pay attention to us. We have needs. We have some things that are important to us. Dont discount us, said Hill-Evans, a brand new legislator in York. York County certainly does not discount its women. The last four newly elected state representatives Kristin Phillips-Hill, Kate Klunk, Hill-Evans and Dawn Keefer are women. We have a different perspective we bring, said Keefer, also newly elected. Its a unique voice, and we should have a proportionate number of women here. Women hold four of York Countys seven seats in the state House. Thats just fine with male counterpart Rep. Seth Grove. They understand the issues, Grove said of York Countys female four. They bring great perspectives from their personal lives, their businesses, their family, dealing with husbands, so theyre great. I enjoy working with all of them. Phillips-Hill said women more easily disagree without being disagreeable. Even though we take very different sides of an issue, we have a way of working in a civil manner to address those issues, she said. When asked what women bring to the equation, Hill-Evans had a rapid response. Common sense, she blurted almost before the question was completed. Then she laughed, Im sorry. I was too fast with that. She chuckled again. But women arent getting the last laugh yet. They hold just 40 of 203 House seats. And women were elected to just seven of 50 seats in the Senate. Pennsylvania has never elected a woman governor or U.S. senator. Commonwealth voters just rejected both Hillary Clinton and Katie McGinty. Some day, said Phillips-Hill of female-elected executives. And well make sure we put the right woman into those positions. Hill-Evans hopes that the success in York County breeds more success for women everywhere. When we see one or two or five that have succeeded, then it encourages others to do the same thing, she said. But she concedes that other women are not as supportive of her political aspirations. They say youve gotta be nuts, Hill-Evans said with a laugh. Bengaluru: Ending his 46 long years of association with the Congress, party veteran S.M. Krishna on Sunday said that the party is in a state of confusion whether it needs mass leaders or managers, but for now, it seems it is content with "managers". "With pain and anguish, I have decided to quit Congress," he said, but declined to spell out his next step, saying he still had to think about it. "The Congress suddenly discovered that I was past my age," said the 84-year-old. "Unfortunately, it is somebody else who makes up the mind. It is somebody else who decides. Hence, I felt for some time now that Congress does not need me." "The Congress today depends more on managers. They do not want time-tested leaders or time-tested workers like me. Hence I have taken the decision, however painful it has been, because today I am going away from a house which I was familiar with," he said. On his possible retirement from politics, he retorted saying that politicians and soldiers never retire, but only fade away. He made no secret of his unhappiness over the way he was made to step down as the external affairs minister in 2012 just days before a major cabinet revamp, saying he only wanted a 'graceful' exit. I strongly feel that there is a way of getting rid of a political leader. The Congress should learn the art of being graceful. They could have told me that we are thinking of some drastic step, he said. The press conference, which was scheduled to start at 11.30 am, was delayed by nearly an hour as sources said Mr Krishnas wife Prema was inconsolable. Speculation also did the rounds that the party high command was trying to intervene, but sources confirmed that none of the party top leaders called. He said Congress president Sonia Gandhi had given him special respect, but took veiled digs at the central leadership. On the respect shown by Mr Rahul Gandhi, he shot back, I will not speak about vice-president. I will speak about the president. He dismissed a question if he was an aspirant for the post of the country's Vice-President and whether he would meet BJP leaders, saying, Do you think I have gone crazy? Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi, along with Election Commissioners Achal Kumar Jyoti and Om Prakash Rawat, announcing poll schedule for five states during a press conference, in New Delhi. (Photo: PTI) New Delhi: The Election Commission (EC) and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) are on a collision course after the central bank rejected an EC request to increase the weekly cash-withdrawal limit for candidates contesting the upcoming Assembly elections in five states. The EC had urged the RBI to increase the withdrawal limit for candidates to Rs 2 lakh from the current Rs 24,000 per week imposed on everyone after the Centres demonetisation move. However, the RBI said the hike would not be possible at this stage. The EC then expressed its serious concern to RBI Governor Urjit Patel about the cursory manner in which the issue has been dealt with. As per law, candidates contesting polls in UP, Uttarakhand and Punjab can spend Rs 28 lakh each on their campaigns. Election Commission said that the RBI has not realised the gravity of the matter. It reminded the central bank that it is imperative that its directions are complied with during poll season. It is reiterated that it is the constitutional mandate of the ECI to conduct free and fair elections and to provide level playing field to all candidates," the letter read. In the letter, the Election Commission has desired that current limit on cash withdrawal for candidates for the forthcoming elections may be enhanced in order to ensure that they are able to defray election expenditure up to the statutory limits. The poll panel further requested the candidates to incur their election expenses by account payee cheque or RTGS/NEF'T for all exceeding Rs. 20,000 during the entire election process. Currently, ATM withdrawal limit stands at Rs 10,000 a day and bank withdrawal is capped at Rs 24,000 a week for savings accounts and Rs 1,00,000 a week for current accounts. New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday refused to grant regular and interim bail on medical grounds to self-styled godman Asaram in a sexual assault case registered in Rajasthan. The bench headed by Chief Justice S Khehar also rejected an interim bail plea on health grounds in another sexual offence case lodged in Gujarat. "The instant plea is devoid of merit and hence dismissed," the bench, also comprising Justice N V Ramana, said while dealing with the bail plea on health grounds. The bench also rejected the plea for regular bail, after taking note of attacks on crucial witnesses and the attempts of the accused to delay the trial by examining prosecution witnesses on several dates. On October 28 last year, the apex court had asked Rajasthan government to respond to the plea of Asaram, facing trial in rape cases, seeking modification of the court's order directing him to undergo treatment at AIIMS in Jodhpur. The Gujarat Government had earlier told the top court that the rape case registered against Asaram would very likely proceed in an expeditious manner, adding that the trial would be completed within six months, so bail should not be granted to him in the case. The apex court had on November 18 last year sought the response of the Centre and five states on a plea seeking a CBI probe into the alleged murder of children through black magic and attacks on ten witnesses in the Asaram rape cases. Asaram was arrested by Jodhpur Police on August 31, 2013 and has been in jail since then. Two Surat-based sisters had lodged separate complaints against Asaram and his son Narayan Sai, accusing them of rape and illegal confinement, among other charges. The elder sister, in her complaint against Asaram, had accused him of repeated sexual assaults between 2001 and 2006 when she was staying at his ashram near Ahmedabad. A teenage girl had accused him of sexual assault at his ashram in Manai village near Jodhpur. The girl, who belonged to Shahjahanpur in Uttar Pradesh, was a student living in the ashram. Kolkata: The Trinamool Congress (TMC), which has been vocal against demonetisation, decided not to attend the pre-budget all-party meet called by the Centre on Monday. Instead, the West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has directed all party MPs to attend a meeting at her Kalighat residence in Kolkata. Mamata had earlier questioned the February 1 date for the Union Budget. Ahead of the Budget Session, an all-party meeting will be held on Monday to seek the opposition's support for smooth conduct of proceedings in both the houses of Parliament. A similar meeting has been convened by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan. Mumbai: Bhoomata Brigade chief and gender rights activist Trupti Desai, who shot to fame for spearheading the agitation seeking parity to women over their restricted entry into places of worship, has now announced a new campaign for a liquor-free Maharashtra. "I am going to launch the state-wide campaign soon, and it will start from Pune. There are more men who consume liquor but the women suffer most because of it. Liquor consumption also increases domestic violence; Hence I am keen on setting up 'Taigiri' groups that would extend support to women suffering in such cases," Desai told on Monday. "If a district like Chandrapur can successfully implement a flat ban on liquor, why cant Maharashtra follow suit," Desai said. If Guardian ministers of each district initiate the process, liquor ban can be implemented in a few days, she felt. Desai alleged that the state government seems to be not concerned with key issues of liquor consumption and its impact on lives of people, especially women in this state. "After holding a couple of meetings with the members of the Brigade, I will soon launch the campaign," Desai said. "I am going to follow the path of Mahatma Gandhi during my agitation across the state. If the state fails to take appropriate steps, then I am going to intensify the agitation," Desai warned. Hyderabad: Shortage of serology kits required for testing for HIV, Hepatitis B, C and others are not available at Osmania General Hospital for a month, leading to major inconvenience for patients. The microbiology department is writing in the casesheet of parents that these kits are not available and testing cant be done. Patients have to go to private laboratories and get the test done. A senior doctor at the microbiology department said that they had been constantly asking the superintendent about the kids. Reminders had been sent to the Telangana Medical Services and Infrastructure Development Corporation but the supply has not been sufficient, he said. A 14-year-old was diagnosed with HIV/AIDS but his tests could not be carried at the OGH on Monday. Mr Mujtaba Askari, who is helping the patient, explained, We insisted that we will not take the patient to a private laboratory and the tests must be done at OGH. Only after that a kit was arranged and the test done. A majority of the patients go to private laboratories, said a senior doctor. Another doctor said the the OGH had run through its quota of serology kids in the first two quarters due to the high load of patients. The shortage is being felt this month as fewer kits were supplied and we are trying to maintain a stock for emergency patients. Superintendent Dr G.V. Murthy was not available for comment. Both the men involved in this story need no introduction. Mahatma Gandhi and Adolf Hitler are names that created history, in their own way and on the opposite ends of the moral spectrum. While Gandhi got his title Mahatma for his persistent conviction in non-violence; Hitler, on the other hand, was infamous for violent practices and had almost achieved genocide. But not many people know that Mahatma Gandhi had written to the Fuhrer twice. Addressing the German Dictator as dear friend, the Mahatma had asked Hitler to pursue peace and adopt non-violence. The first letter dated July 23, 1939 was brief as Gandhi requested Hitler to prevent a war from unfolding, also apologising in the same breath if he had erred in writing to the dictator. Interestingly, a month later, Hitler signed the iconic non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union. However, following this Germany violated the Munich agreement, triggering a sequence of events that led to World War II. Nevertheless, undeterred in his attempts, Gandhi wrote a second letter on December 24, 1940. It was a longer letter, in which Gandhi condemned British for their organised violence and also wrote that he would not want to end British rule with German aid. Assertive in his appeal for peace, Gandhi wrote, If not the British, some other power will certainly improve upon your method and beat you with your own weapon. You are leaving no legacy to your people of which they would feel proud. They cannot take pride in a recital of cruel deed, however skilfully planned. I, therefore, appeal to you in the name of humanity to stop the war. He also proposed an alternative approach, asking Hitler to accept the intervention of an impartial international tribunal of his choice. You know that not long ago I made an appeal to every Briton to accept my method of non-violent resistance. I did it because the British know me as a friend, though a rebel. I am a stranger to you and your people. I have not the courage to make you the appeal I made to every Briton; not that it would not apply to you with the same force as to the British. But my present proposal is much simple because much more practical and familiar, he wrote. Alappuzha: Giving an international push to the Keralas traditional recipes, Bibi Baskin, the Irish television and radio presenter, has written an article on them. In her piece in The Irish Times, Kerala cooking with Bibi Baskin, on Saturday she describes how she fell in love with them. It began 15 years ago when she made a visit here and was tempted to buying the Raheem Residency. She felt she wanted to explore its quintessential tastes besides her journalistic pursuits. On her way to that venture, she says, she had to overcome different challenges. Her search culminated in buying the restaurant near beach road in 2003. Later it was converted into a boutique heritage hotel, which is now a well-known beachside destination. She says Kerala recipes are more suited to the busy life of Westerners rather than the Indian housewife, who lovingly spends most of the day in the kitchen. She says it was great challenge preparing Kerala recipes because of difficulties in finding ingredients in Ireland. Pointing out that acquiring and understanding of the vast array of ingredients used in dishes was a daunting task, she says she had learned their names in Malayalam from locals. My cooking experience was similarly limited by circumstance when I bought the hotel in Alappuzha. I learnt it from my qualified chefs who didnt want the boss in the kitchen," she says. "And I took the baby steps in preparing Kerala food with the support of them. There were plenty of the most marvellous spicy flavour combinations that teased my palate and my imagination endlessly. It still continues for me today in Ireland, but without my teachers. And Im still stealing the garam masala." Ms Baskin chooses to share her favourite recipes: chickpea curry (kadala) and carrot or cabbage thoran. "They are like the bacon and cabbage in Ireland," she says. "The Malayalees serve these curries with puttu, or with the large-grained rice native to their own state, simply boiled. You can rarely find it in Ireland, and you need a puttu machine, like a kind of meat mincer, to make the rice rolls. So well keep it simple. You can get basmati rice in your local supermarket." Hyderabad: The Telangana state transport department expects the Centre to reduce the minimum educational qualification required for obtaining a driving licence for transport vehicles. Joint transport commissioner J. Pandurang Naik said an applicant seeking a licence to drive non-transport vehicles must be able to read and write. For the transport driving licence, the applicant must have a minimum qualification of Class VIII, he said. This rule is leading to many transport vehicle drivers not applying for licences, or operating vehicles with non-transport licences. Hyderabad has 404 private autorickshaws but 90,518 driving licences were issued for non-transport autorickshaws. This includes licences for 17,867 three-wheeler goods vehicles. For 94,423 autorickshaws, 48,163 driving licences were issued. Traffic DCP A.V. Ranganath said the police found that many drivers were driving transport autorickshaws with non-transport licences. Most drivers of cabs, medium and heavy goods vehicles operate vehicles with non-transport driving licence as they lack educational qualifications as per norms, he said. Following a series of reviews on the matter, then commissioner of transport department Sandeep Kumar Sultania had sent proposals to the Centre to ease the education qualification norm. An official from the transport department said that similar proposals were sent by other state governments and the Centre had considered the proposals last year. In the 22nd Motor Vehicle Amendments, the Union Cabinet committee approved our proposals and we are expecting the government will pass the Bill in the upcoming Budget Session of Parliament, the official said. The official said the Centre may impose a new condition that the applicant must have semi-literacy in reading, writing and digital aspects. The applicant should appear for computer based driving tests, he said. 8,000 caught without DLs Around 8,000 youngsters were caught driving without a drivers licence in just a year in Hyderabad. Police is now seek imprisonment for those driving without licence, apart from fines. RTA and police officials on Saturday decided to file chargesheets against owners who give vehicles to underage drivers or those without licence. With a chargesheet, the magistrate can imprison the vehicle owner for up to three months. The city police is also meeting a body of magistrates to ensure imprisonment for the vehicle owner in each cases. Senior officials said there was a provision for arrest and imprisonment of drivers and owners for driving a vehicle without licence under Sections 180 and 181 of Motor Vehicle Act, 1988. In serious cases, magistrates are sending offenders to prison. The new move is to ensure prison for owners who give their vehicles to unlicenced or minor drivers, said DCP, Traffic, A.V. Ranganath. Section 180 says whoever, being the owner or person in charge of a motor vehicle, causes or permits, any other person who does not have licence to drive the vehicle shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three months, or with fine which may extend to Rs 1,000, or with both. The police is holding coulselling sessions for the parents of underaged drivers, cautioning them about the consequences of letting their kids drive without a licence. Hyderabad: Armijeris subalbatus, a species of mosquito usually found in rural areas, is multiplying in the city. The entomology department of the GHMC estimates that the species now constitutes 15 per cent of the city's mosquito population. These mosquitoes are bigger, light brown in colour, live in bushes and in corners in houses and are active at night. They have been found to transmit filariasis in Punjab and Puducherry. Armijeris, also known as coquillett, breeds in septic tanks and the egg develops into a mosquito within eight to 10 days. The mosquitoes live for around 30 days and produce 1,000 eggs in their life span. Osmania University assistant professor in zoology C. Srinivasulu said the species was found to be disease carriers in Southeast Asia. It was found to transmit Japanese Encephalitis, filariasis and even malaria. The origin of the mosquitoes is in the forest; it breeds in small pools of water that turn foul. As villages encroached into the forests, the species adapted to villages and similarly in the case of the city. In urban habitats, they mostly breed in slums, open drains or septic tanks. Once they are established, they migrate across the city. Armijeris are disease bearing." GHMC chief entomologist V. Venkatesh said no case of filariasis has been reported in the city in recent times. But, he said, residents must participate in the drive to keep spaces mosquito-free. If we allow one mosquito, it will multiple into 1,000 mosquitoes within a month. The GHMC requests all residents to do away with all types of stagnant water, fresh or foul, and don't allow any breeding ground. Close septic tanks, report overflowing drains or manholes. In case of nuisance, they should report to the circle entomology department," Mr Venkatesh said. A moment of disconnect or cognitive dissonance, as he puts it led Mike Yankoski to conduct an unconventional experiment. Yankoski said he was attending a Christian college and doing well in his classes, but looking the other way when he saw people on the streets. Im saying one thing and doing the opposite, Yankoski said. Thats when Yankoski decided to take a semester off from college to explore what it meant to be homeless on the streets of six American cities. He persuaded a friend to join him on the journey, and started to research, plan and gather advice about becoming intentionally homeless. Yankoski realizes his planning put him a step ahead of the truly homeless. This was artificial. This was a decision, he said, noting there are hundreds of thousands of homeless people and most of them didnt have the luxury of choice. Yankoskis experiences over the five-month experiment became the basis for a book, Under the Overpass: A Journey of Faith on the Streets of America, and the foundation for his work on behalf of the homeless. That work brings him to Carlisle Feb. 18 as the featured guest speaker for Safe Harbours Night Without A Tux fundraiser. The event begins at 6 p.m. at the Carlisle Country Club and features a dinner, a silent auction and music by the group Jazz Me. The evening is a celebration of what we do and how we do it, and it supports what we do, said Scott Shewell, spokesman for Safe Harbour. Fundraising About 33 percent of the organizations overall operating budget comes from private fundraising, which includes grants and donations, Shewell said. This means Safe Harbour must raise approximately $252,000 through community donations, annual campaigns, events and grants from foundations. The gala is one of those key fundraising events. Im very honored and excited to stand alongside them, Yankoski said. This is not something that can be done alone. This is a community effort, a community-wide effort. One of the greatest lessons Yankoski learned on the streets of Washington, D.C., Denver, San Francisco, Portland, Phoenix and San Diego was that society has a willful ignorance about homelessness. Its easy to pretend these men and women are not there and our responsibility, he said. People need to become familiar with the complex reality faced by those on the street, and respond in complex ways, Yankoski said. There are simple, first responses reflecting basic human dignity that anyone can do. That includes looking people in the eye, asking them their name or offering to buy them a cup of coffee or a sandwich. Those responses, though, need to be coupled with deeper responses. For example, people can support organizations like Safe Harbour, volunteer for organizations focusing on homelessness or teach a class to improve the skills of someone who is homeless. Business owners can also hire homeless people. Once you get on the streets, its hard to get off the streets without some assistance or help, Yankoski said. Thats what makes an organization like Safe Harbour so strategic, Yankoski said. Shewell said Safe Harbour provides housing and support services for individuals and families to help them become independent by increasing their basic life skills. That includes life skills and employment training, among other programs. This mission runs counter to the misconception that organizations like Safe Harbour encourage people to remain in a homeless situation by helping them. On the contrary, Shewell said, the programs give people a place to breathe and to work through their next steps. One of the things we say is especially with our emergency shelter it gives them a place to break the cycle, he said. Tickets for the gala are $65 per person and are available online at safeharbour.org, by emailing Safe Harbour at info@safeharbour.org or by calling Safe Harbour at 717-249-2200. Former Finance Minister P Chidambaram with former PM Manmohan Singh speaks to media after release 'The REAL State of Economy Report- 2017' at AICC in New Delhi on Monday. (Photo: AP) New Delhi: BJP and Congress on Monday traded charges over "help" extended to Vijay Mallya in securing loans and fleeing the country, with the two parties hurling accusations at each other for coming to the aid of the beleaguered businessman. Ahead of the Budget Session beginning on Tuesday, BJP sought to corner Congress, alleging the "corrupt hands" which helped Mallya secure bank loans belonged to the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Finance Minister P Chidambaram. Singh and Chidambaram rejected the charge, while Congress targeted the Modi government over allowing the liquor baron to flee to foreign shores. BJP spokesman Sambit Patra quoted from purported letters written by Mallya to Singh seeking his intervention to bail out his struggling Kingfisher Airlines following which it got loans. Patra asked Congress President Sonia Gandhi and her deputy Rahul to explain at whose behest the defaulting company got loans. "The hands which pulled the strings to ensure that Mallya received loans are visible now. It belonged to Chidambaram and Singh. Did the hands of 10, Janpath also pull the string? Sonia and Rahul Gandhi should come out in public to say at whose behest the loans were sanctioned to Kingfisher Airline," he told a press conference. "It was after one such letter Mallya had written to Singh on November 14, 2011 that the Prime Minister told the media that 'we have to find ways to get Kingfisher out of trouble'," Patra claimed. Trashing the accusation, Singh and Chidambaram told the media that it was a routine thing for captains of industry to write letters to the government which were marked to appropriate authorities and that they did not violate any law. "I think what I have done was done with full satisfaction of mind that we were not doing anything which was against law of the land," Singh said, rubbishing the charges at a press conference jointly addressed by him and Chidambaram at Congress headquarters. Singh said all prime ministers and other ministers received representations from the industry. "In normal course, we pass on these to appropriate authorities. It was a normal, routine transaction and therefore the letter that is being talked about is nothing but an ordinary piece of letter which any government in my position would have dealt with," Singh said. Chidambaram, on his part, said hundreds of such representations received by the government were not dealt with by Ministers themselves. "No minister can deal with each one of these representations. They are marked down to departments and officers concerned, who will then take appropriate follow-up action," he said, adding there was "absolutely nothing wrong" if somebody sought some policy changes or wanted forbearance to be shown. "If letter to PMO is marked down to Principal Secretary to PM and Principal Secretary fowards it to department concerned, these are normal," he claimed. Dragging the top Congress leadership into the row, Patra alleged that Pulok Chatterjee, the then Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister, would "snatch" files from Singh to take them to 10 Janpath, Sonia Gandhi's residence. In another letter, he alleged, Mallya sought Singh's intervention to get funds from banks released immediately. In one of the letters, Mallya said he was very "relieved" and "pleased", apparently referring to developments in the interim, according to Patra. A top PMO official had spoken to ministries concerned following his letter to Singh and Mallya had mentioned it, he alleged. Patra cited another letter the liquor baron, who has been declared a proclaimed offender in the case by a court, allegedly wrote to Chidambaram in March 2013, seeking his intervention to get a No Objection Certificate from the SBI, which headed the consortium of banks which had given unrecovered loans to the airliner and its subsidiaries as his liquor company was in talks with Diageo for a deal. Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala posed a string of questions to BJP, asking the ruling party to explain who was responsible for allowing Mallya to escape at a time when the consortium of lenders had moved against him for recovery of over Rs 9,000 crore. "Was Vijay Mallya tipped off to run away from India by a high ranking official inside the Modi government?" he asked. Surjewala also claimed BJP supported and voted for Mallya to get him elected to Rajya Sabha in June 2010. He also wanted to know if it was true that the businessman was once the working president of Subramanian Swamy's Janata Party. Swamy is now in BJP and locked in a legal battle with top Congress leadership including Sonia and Rahul Gandhi in the National Herald case. "Why did Modi government permit Diageo plc, which now owns United Breweries, make payment of $ 40 Million as part of agreement dated 25.02.2016 as also receive this money in an offshore account? What has action has Modi government taken against Diageo plc and United Breweries?" he asked. Surjewala said, "Instead of levelling senseless allegations, BJP needs to come forward and answer questions." Chidambaram said the loans that are under investigation were given in 2009, when he was not the Finance Minister. "The letter does not concern Kingfisher, it concerns United Spirits limited, which was and is a thriving, flourishing profitable company. The letter does not talk about any loan, the letter talks about an NOC for a preferential allotment of shares. That is capital, equity, not loans," he said. "Why has Modi Government not sought deportation of Vijay Mallya from UK till today?" Surjewala asked. He said for all the talk of bringing back black money within 100 days of coming to power, the Modi government had allowed "a single defaulter with a default of over Rs 9000 crore to run away under the watch of the government." Mumbai: If political pandits are to be believed, Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, the blue-eyed boy of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, is eying a space in national politics. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is also gradually projecting the leader on the national scene, and recent indications suggest that Mr Fadnavis (aka Mr Clean Image) has a bright future in the power corridors of Delhi. Sensing his partys push, Mr Fadnavis has started working steadily on the ground. Recently, Mr Fadnavis was appointed Officer on Special Duty (OSD) in Delhi, and, though the work norms for this position has still not been finalised, sources told to The Asian Age that bridging relations across the political spectrum will be hidden work for him. Mr Fadnavis, however, denies harbouring any ambition to enter national politics. Speaking to The Asian Age on Sunday, he said, Prime Minister Modiji has been setting new benchmarks of responsive governance and transparency. All the BJP CMs are replicating that model in their states. We are fortunate to have the backing of Modiji as PM and Amitbhai Shah as party president. Now, the only pressure we face is to deliver, and we will achieve that. Mr Fadnavis inclusion in the group of CMs that deal with the ambitious digital payment programme of the Centre also indicates his growing stature. Chandrababu Naidu, Naveen Patnaik and Shivraj Singh Chauhan, the chief ministers of Andhra Pradesh, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh respectively, are other heavyweights in this group. The inclusion of the relatively junior Maharashtra CM, however, had raised many eyebrows. It may be mentioned here that Mr Fadnavis had recently evaded a question on harbouring prime ministerial ambitions at the Powai IITs Mood Indigo festival. The CM had said, The aspirations of those who wish to be PM never have been fulfilled. Take the example of Sharad Pawar or Mulayam Singh Yadav. So let me remain chief minister. Jammu: Shouting slogans against US President Donald Trump for suspension of all immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, CPI(M) MLA MY Tarigami today held protests in J&K Assembly and staged a walkout from the House. At the beginning of the session, he went into the well of the House for the first time while shouting slogans "down with racist Donald Trump" and "long live unity of people of the world" as he protested the visa ban order of Trump administration. He was protesting against Trump's decision to indefinitely suspend the re-settlement of Syrian refugees and ban people from seven Muslim countries from entering the United States. Later Tarigami staged a walkout from the House. Terming this decision of Trump as "cowardly and self-defeating", he told reporters that this is also "dangerous" for the peace in the world. "This decision is bound to polarise the world and endanger the lives of the innocents," he said. The CPI(M) leader said the order lacks logic and it is by all standards "un-civilised and blatantly unconstitutional". Tarigami appealed the people to join the millions world over in their protests against this "terrorist" order by Trump. Uttar Pradesh state Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav of SP, left and Congress party Vice-President Rahul Gandhi, address a joint press conference in the sidelines of their joint election campaign in Lucknow. (Photo: AP) Lucknow: Shia cleric Maulana Kable Jawwad, who is known for his bitter relations with Uttar Pradesh minister Azam Khan, on Monday appealed to Muslims not to vote for Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance in the upcoming assembly polls. "Congress always worked against the Muslims, while the ruling SP government did nothing for the community except betraying them. Now these parties are contesting polls in an alliance. I appeal to everyone, especially Muslims, not to vote for them in the election", he told a press conference organised by Sunni Ekta Front. When asked about the party he would support, Jawwad, who had recently met BSP leader Naseemuddin Siddiqui said, "Talks are on. I will decide about it in next three days." Coming down heavily on Akhilesh Yadav government, he alleged the present dispensation has "only given riots and by appealing in Supreme Court against Muslim youths, who were set free by the lower court, he (Akhilesh) has proved that he is "anti-Muslim". Jawwad, who is also a member All India Muslim Personal Law board (AIMPLB), has a good clout among the Shia community. He had, earlier, indulged in war of words with Khan over waqf properties issue. Amritsar: BJP national President Amit Shah on Monday asked the electorate to vote for the SAD-BJP combine in Punjab for the third time, stating that the alliance's victory was necessary for the security of the country. "The election in Punjab is an election for the security of the nation. Being a border-lying state, it is the responsibility of the electorate to choose a government which can ensure secure borders, communal harmony and peace. Punjab is the heart of India. If it is secure, the nation is secure," he said. Shah was addressing an election rally Amritsar in support of BJP candidates for the Punjab Assembly elections. Launching an offensive against Congress and AAP, he said Captain Amarinder Singh and Arvind Kejriwal were "daydreaming" of becoming the Chief Minister of Punjab. He said PPCC chief Amarinder Singh is referred to as "absent MP" as he never attended the Parliament nor visited Amritsar after being chosen as the MP from Amritsar. "Will you ever vote for a person who is an 'absent MP'? One who has been missing since becoming an MP? Well, even if he manages to become the CM, where will you go to find him? "He uses Captain in front of his name but he takes orders from Rahul Baba (Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi). India is moving towards a Congress-free nation and I appeal you people to bar the entry of Congress in Punjab too," he said. Similarly, he said, Kejriwal was dreaming of becoming the CM of every state he visits. "Some people are trying to do their best to defame Punjab. They are fooling people in order to seize power in Punjab. But I must say, the people know it all. The electorate of Delhi which voted for you (Kejriwal) is now looking for you with binoculars," the BJP chief said. "I ask the people of Punjab to call up your relatives in Delhi and get a reality check," he said. Holding that PM Modi-led Central government had ensured development of the state, Shah said, "PM Modi and Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley have a deep connection with Amritsar. Today, Amritsar has been declared a Heritage City and will soon become a Smart City." Thousands of crores have been sanctioned by the Central government for Amritsar and it is visible in the development that has taken place at Amritsar, he said. The senior BJP leader also had a word of praise for Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal. "There is nobody like CM Parkash Singh Badal. He is the epitome of sacrifice. He has dedicated his entire life for the betterment of Punjab. It hurts when people abuse him. Politics has hit a new low," he said. Shah added that ever since the Modi government came into power, no single allegation of corruption had been levelled against it. "We have taken strong decisions like demonetisation, surgical strikes, neem-coated urea etc. We have given Punjab a lot and will give more in time to come. People of Punjab need to be united and ensure that there is Akali-BJP government here. The state government then in collaboration with Centre government will ensure even faster development of Punjab," he said. New Delhi: BJP on Monday latched onto Mulayam Singh Yadav's disapproval of SP's alliance with Congress to hit out at the formation, saying it shows people and even Samajwadi Party workers are unhappy with the tie-up. Senior party leader and Union Minister Venkaiah Naidu termed the alliance as an attempt of two frustrated parties to give shelter to each other as he claimed that various surveys had projected Congress getting less than 10 seats in the 403-seat Assembly. The alliance underlined people's lack of faith in Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, prompting him to enter into an alliance with Congress even though SP had won a majority on its own in the last polls, he told reporters. "If the state government had done a good job, then what was need of an alliance when SP had got a majority on its own? It shows it has lost confidence. It has tied up with a party which destroyed the country with its corrupt rule rife with scams," he said. Akhilesh Yadav has given handle of his cycle (SP's symbol) to a hand (Congress' symbol) which destroyed the country, he alleged, asking people to consider it and vote for BJP which is fighting polls on developmental agenda. The SP government is remembered for lawlessness, corruption and attacks on dalits and women, he alleged, adding that Akhilesh may mislead people in Delhi with media advertisements but not those in Uttar Pradesh. "Mulayam Singh Yadav who founded the party is saying he will not campaign for the alliance. It shows even SP cadres are not happy," he said. Voicing displeasure over the alliance between Samajwadi Party and Congress, SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav on Sunday had said he would not campaign for it in the assembly polls. "I am completely against the alliance. I will not campaign for it," Mulayam said. In a word of praise for Bihar Chief Minister and former ally Nitish Kumar, Naidu said while he had been working to develop Bihar and take it out of 'BIMARU' states, UP remained backward and problems of electricity, roads, water, education and health remained. Asserting that people will vote for BJP, he said the poor saw Prime Minister Narendra Modi as their "messiah". New Delhi: Seeking cooperation of all parties in running Parliament during Budget session, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday said it is a 'mahapanchayat' which should function despite differences which may crop up during poll season. After the Winter Session was washed out due to protests over demonetisation, Modi reached out to the opposition on the eve of the Budget session at an all-party meeting in New Delhi called by the government that was attended by all major parties except Trinamool Congress, which has been unhappy over the note ban and arrest of its MPs in chit fund cases. The government, however, asserted that the Budget will be presented as scheduled, rejecting the opposition's allegations that it will impact the upcoming Assembly elections. Speaking to reporters, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar said that during the meeting Prime Minister Modi sought support of all parties and said "in election time, there can be some differences among us, but Parliament is mahapanchayat. It should function." Kumar said all parties responded positively and said that they want the House to function smoothly. Rejecting the opposition's allegation that government should not have advanced the session as early presentation of the Union Budget will impact the level playing field during upcoming State Assembly elections, the Minister said Supreme Court and Election Commission have already given their judgement on this. "The government's efforts will be that the budget should benefit all and takes the country forward," Kumar said. Earlier speaking to reporters, Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha and senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad said that government should not have advanced the Budget session. Azad also citied a similar situation in 2012 when the then UPA government had postponed the budget session due to state assembly elections. "We have asked the government that they should avoid any such announcement in the budget session which affects level playing field in the five State Assembly elections," Azad said. The Congress leader has also asked the government to call another all-party meeting before next part of budget session. Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia and CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury demanded that there should be discussion on demonetisation also during the first phase of session. "We have told the government that there should be discussion on demonetisation for two days as the people across India have suffered due to this irrational move of the government," Yechury told reporters. He also said that presentation of budget on February 1 is "non-scientific" as it will not take into consideration the statistical data of third quarter which comes only in mid-February. Despite his vainglorious nature and thin skin, US President Donald Trump could play a historical role in resolving the dead end in relations the West has reached with Russia. He has consistently rejected the caricature that Russias President Vladimir Putin has become in American eyes and treats his fellow President with respect as a person he can do business with. How far Mr Trump will go in befriending Mr Putin remains to be seen, but what is already clear is that he has broken the mould, even praising his Russian counterparts smartness. One of the trademarks of the Obama era was its obsession with bringing China on board by lauding Chinese President Xi Jinping, despite blatant human rights abuses, while condemning Mr Putin. China, of course, has economic clout and aspires to be a superpower. While Barack Obama hinted to the Atlantic magazine in a series of soul-bearing interviews that Ukraine was a core Russian interest while it was not Americas, he did not act on it. One of the problems flowing from the break-up of the Soviet Union was Washingtons resolve to humiliate Moscow and to hive off the adjoining state of Ukraine with a population of 50 million, with close ethnic, religious and family ties to Russia into the Western world. This was part of the Western philosophy of having won the Cold War and with the populist Russian leader Boris Yeltsin at the helm, decided to tilt the scales against Moscow. Ukraine was, indeed, divided by the western regions of the country being pro-West while the eastern parts, largely Russian-speaking, were pro-Russian. The crisis in Moscows relations with Kiev reached a climax with Russia annexing Crimea Nikita Khrushchev had once given to Ukraine, then a part of the Soviet Union. Russia also armed sympathisers in eastern Ukraine in areas declaring themselves self-governing. Mr Putin cannot restore the Soviet Union, but he is suggesting that hiving off Ukraine from its close ties with Russia, given the geopolitical scenario, is unnatural and should be reversed. The West had imposed economic sanctions against Moscow after it annexed Crimea and sponsored two Minsk agreements to keep it in line on eastern Ukraine. What Mr Trump is suggesting is that Mr Putin is a leader fighting for his countrys interests and need not be painted in lurid colours, the fashion in the United States. Indeed, during his recent hour-long telephone conversation with the Russian leader, Mr Trump touched on the themes of fighting the Islamic State and terrorists in Syria. Both sides, it would seem, are carefully calibrating their relations after Mr Putin was virtually blackballed by the West. Mr Putins interests are plain, to rehabilitate his country as a major power nothing hurt him as much as Mr Obamas description of his country as a regional power with a role to play in the wider world. He proved it by his military intervention in Syria tilting the scales in favour of President Bashar al-Assad and his moves in seeking new terms for peace. Unlike his predecessor, Mr Trump is demanding concessions from China in giving it a pass in world affairs, making Beijing see red. In geopolitical terms, it does not make sense to see Russia get closure to China because it is spurned by the West. Thus far, Mr Trumps vague suggestions of removing sanctions against Russia for other favour offered have met strong opposition from Republican leaders. The picture is further complicated by US intelligence agencies conclusion of Russian hacking of US sites to help Mr Trump win. The new US Presidents argument is that Russia can help in the fight against the Islamic State and can be of assistance in Syria. Judging by Mr Trumps temperament and often-erratic behaviour, it is difficult to gauge how far the opening to Mr Putin will take the two countries and the world. The West still swears by keeping Ukraine in the Western sphere of influence even as more leaders in Europe are coming out against maintaining economic sanctions against Moscow, with several aspirants for the French presidency pleading with Germanys Chancellor Angela Merkel to reconsider her hard line on sanctions. She was, of course, living in East Germany before the reunion of the two Germanies. The Cold War was supposedly over with the break-up of the Soviet Union, but a new kind of murky Cold War has taken its place, with a more assertive Russia provoking the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) to police European Union borders with members troops. Mr Trumps designation of Nato as obsolete has been replaced for the moment by his endorsement in his talks with Britains Prime Minister Theresa May. In any event, the US President does not set much store by the longevity of the European Union after Britains exit. Undoing the aberrations of the break-up of the Soviet Union is not on anyones agenda. Rather, the more limited task of evolving a reasonable compromise with Russia on Ukraines future is within the realm of possibility. The difficulty is that the myth of a valiant Ukraine fighting the bad boy (Russia) is so ingrained in the Western view and so enmeshed in the triumphalism of the West that it is difficult to separate reality from popular credo. Britain will suffer from its foolish decision to leave the European Union for a long time. It is indeed ironical that an outsider who beat the insider in the US presidential election should have so little respect for the European traditional warring parties coming together in what became the European Union. Perhaps the shock of Mr Trumps US presidency was necessary to get European leaders to refocus on what they have achieved, despite the new strains of nationalism gaining ground. Mr Trumps entry into the world scene might be akin to the proverbial bull in a china shop, but to the extent it has disrupted conventional wisdom on Russia in the West, it will be salutary. Russia is a country that cannot be ignored. Karachi: A conflict ends when the people at its centre look over the precipice and recognise that compromise is a life-or-death imperative, said John Lyndon of OneVoice Europe recently in the context of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. This reminded me of a recent conversation I had with a senior Indian security official. We were surrounded by diplomats, journalists and military officials gathered there to discuss the global security challenges in a friendly West Asian country. After an exchange of pleasantries, the official asked me where I was born in Pakistan. When I named the district, his face lit up and he said that it was his parents birthplace as well. His parents spoke the dialect of Multan and he and his siblings were fascinated by stories of pre-Partition days. To the amusement of the other guests, we struck a cultural chord and started talking about Pakistan-India conflicts and the acrimony and bitterness they had bred in the subcontinent. I wanted my Indian counterparts to listen to a voice from the past that spoke of the future the voice of Eqbal Ahmad who was born in a small village in Bihar in 1932 into a well-to-do family but chose to migrate to Pakistan at the time of independence. Described by an English magazine as a revolutionary and intellectual who was the Ibn Khaldun of modern times, he died of cancer on May 11, 1999, at the age of 67. According to Eqbal, history and geography bind India and Pakistan in perpetuity. Fear, hostility, conflict and war have made it a painful embrace. Nuclear weapons threaten to make it fatal. He was of the view that both Delhi and Islamabad perceive Kashmirs realities and interests as subservient to their own and often remarked bitterly that India and Pakistan were willing to fight to the last Kashmiri. The question he posed was: were both willing to find a Kashmiri solution for Kashmir? His answer was pragmatic. The first step was to comprehend the ambitions and fears of the three parties: India, Pakistan and the Kashmiris. Indias ambition is territorial; its aim, to exercise sovereignty over the Valley, Jammu and Ladakh. Its strategic concerns vis-a-vis China reinforce the territorial imperative. Pakistans ambition is also territorial. However, it is reinforced by a deeply held sense of injustice. As for the Kashmiri-speaking majority, their driving force was a well-founded sense of victimhood; a feeling rooted in history but greatly nourished by Delhis brutal repression and its security forces excesses. Kashmiris also view themselves as a divided and dispersed people, a perception that nourishes the yearning for reunification and independence. The Valley is a classic environment for nurturing nationalism, home of Kashmiriyat. India cannot suppress it. It must be accommodated, Eqbal pleaded. Eqbal felt that neither India nor Pakistan had tried the option of a negotiated settlement in earnest. First, it required the two adversaries to rethink their fixed positions and acknowledge that Kashmirs future is a matter of dispute between Pakistan, India, and the Kashmiri people; its settlement must involve and satisfy all three. Second, that no matter how forcefully it was promoted, a unilateral solution would not work. Third, that the benefits of a historic compromise are much greater than the profits or pride of territorial acquisition. The concrete proposal Eqbal envisaged was a step-by-step progression from autonomy, to open borders, to unification with divided sovereignty. Everyone would give up something so that everyone could gain something. The challenge of Pakistans Kashmir diplomacy is not only to pursue bilateral negotiations but to persuade international opinion and bring multiple pressures on the Indian government to opt in favour of a sane and lasting settlement. A meaningful change will require peace-loving citizens from Pakistan, India and Kashmir to become organised and demand a break from the burden of history. By arrangement with Dawn Donald Trumps executive order issued on Friday barring migrants from seven Muslim-majority countries and a ban on refugees has caused such chaos that the US was reeling for a couple of days until a federal judge issued an emergency stay which comes as a ray of hope to many. The class action lawsuit, brought by American Civil Liberties Union and other activists, promises more than a temporary halt to the madness even as it comes to the rescue in the nick of time for people detained in airports. The US had not been discriminating in immigration based on national origin for decades but the new President turned all that upside down in the name of national security. It is a moot point whether extreme border controls will bring the desired results in a nation that has been beset most recently by terror acts unleashed by citizens living for long in the US. In an increasingly interconnected world, the US needs the world as much as the world needs the US. And it is not just trade that links the global village the world is becoming. The new White House occupant doesnt seem to think so as seen in just his first few decisions in a week in office, which are potentially isolationist. The mayhem created in the wake of the Friday order saw people being stopped in the streets and asked about their nationality and their presence in the US, as it happened to the Indian-origin lady who has been living in the US for 30 years and who inspired Shah Rukh Khans Swades. The lot of green card holders who may have returned to the countries of their origin on holiday or work could face an uncertain return unless the stay order has come to the rescue of everyone who could be stopped by immigration authorities. The Indian-origin CEO of Google, Sundar Pichai, and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, heading two of the worlds most valuable companies, expressed their concerns over the bewildering changes in policy Mr Trump has brought about, which are in keeping with what he was promising to do in the US most divisive campaign ever for the right to lead the nation. The H-1B visa programme for highly skilled workers, which has helped the $50 billion Indian IT industry flourish in a symbiotic relationship with the best US companies like Microsoft, Google and Intel might be under threat too as modifications are in the pipeline. The immigration policy changes are so disruptive in their sweep that they threaten the profitability of US companies too. It is clear that the leader of the free world has been trapped in rightist populism, which could not only pose a threat to US businesses, but also when measured against the fundamental principles of humanitarianism. It appears the US perennial fight is expanding from a legitimate battle against Islamist terrorism to a fight against Islam itself. Ironically, the most stress now is being caused to people with a right to be in the US. Mr Trump declared that the world is a mess. Some introspection might reveal that he is the one who is making it worse. Dickinson College Interim President Neil Weissman Monday sent a statement to the campus community in Carlisle regarding President Donald Trumps travel ban on refugees from seven countries. Weissman said the current executive order affects few Dickinson students and employees, but he noted that the orders implications have been unsettling for some students on campus. First and foremost, we are reaching out to our international and exchange students, scholars and families to let them know we appreciate the value they bring to our campus community and to provide them with support during these times of uncertainty, Weissman said in the statement. More broadly, Dickinson reaffirms its commitment to global engagement and connection. Dickinson is committed to global education and to building an inclusive community, Weissman added. We remain firm in welcoming talented students and employees from across the globe and reject decisions based on religion or national origin. Also in Carlisle, the U.S. Army War College does not expect the ban to affect its military community, according to spokesman Thomas Zimmerman. Mulayam Singh Yadav, UPs most significant political player of the past three decades and founder of the Samajwadi Party that his chief minister son Akhilesh Yadav now presides over after prevailing over his father in a bitter in-house struggle, appears to have taken few lessons from life. He made belligerent noises against the Akhilesh faction until the Election Commission recently overlooked his claims and allotted the partys symbol to the son. This was in recognition of the fact that the latter appeared to have sway over nearly cent per cent of UPs ruling party. The changed situation should have persuaded any reasonable and experienced politician that the wind was not with him and a generational shift had occurred, a shift that favours a very different grammar of politics than the one practised by Mulayam and his cohorts that include younger brother Shivpal. But the senior Yadav has been slow to grasp this, in spite of his phenomenal political skills as well skills at political skulduggery. After Akhilesh and his alliance partner Rahul Gandhi, the Congress vice-president, held a roadshow in Lucknow on Sunday and a joint press conference marked by bonhomie, Mulayam lashed out at the newly-sealed SP-Congress alliance and said he would not campaign for it. It is not clear if Mulayam has grown senile early, or whether he is being manipulated by forces inimical to his CM son. Tongues have wagged over the years to suggest that his inner moves frequently give comfort to BJP, against which Akhilesh, in Congress company this time, is waging a ferocious battle. It is more than likely, and wily old Mulayam cannot but know it, that an important reason the CM may have sought an alliance with the Congress, a much smaller player in the state, is to neutralise any negative moves in the election season by the SP old guard of Mulayam and Shivpal, with wily Amar Singh crafting malignant moves in the background. When asked, Rahul spoke of the possibility of the SP-Congress linkage in UP extending to the Lok Sabha poll of 2019 though he did say this had not been discussed between the two sides. Thats fair enough. Everything would depend on the nature of the result of the Assembly poll. If the secular alliance, does not make it, it is entirely possible that part of the SP base moves to the BJP in case Mulayam cannot lead any more. It is also not unthinkable that if the alliance falls well short and BSP supremo Mayawati is in the lead but needs a leg-up, Congress may offer her a helping hand as hers too is a secular outfit. Much unspoken politics remains in the UP situation. Ever since the Samajwadi alliance with the Congress turned into reality, the Congress office has been besieged with strange requests. Almost every day, Samajwadis are trooping into the Congress office in Lucknow, demanding a symbol for them. When questioned, every aspirant claims that Akhilesh bhaiyya has asked them to get a symbol from the Congress, because the party does not have candidates. When asked whether they intended to join the Congress, the young wannabes happily say, Nahin nahin, we are in the Samajwadi Party but we will contest on the Congress symbol. Some senior SP leaders also insist that according to the secret arrangement it has been decided that about two-dozen SP leaders may be accommodated by the Congress. Congress leaders in the state are completely flummoxed over these reports but none of the top leaders in the party are willing to issue clarifications. The alliance is surely tied up in knots. Gadkari: An innovative minister Union minister Nitin Gadkari, who is given the credit for image makeover of BJP headquarters and for the long-awaited increment to the BJP staff during his tenure as party chief, found an admirer in the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. The Crown Prince, it was learnt, asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a jovial chat during the lunch hosted by the PM, that Mr Gadkari should implement some of his ideas in Abu Dhabi where he should come for at least a year. A smiling PM then looked at Mr Gadkari, who was sitting at the same table but at some distance from the two, and told him about Sheikh Mohammeds request. The art of feigning ignorance Madhya Pradesh agriculture development and farmers welfare minister Gauri Shankar Chaturbhuj Bisen has a unique way of ducking an unpleasant controversy by being forthright on his lack of understanding of the issue. And, it hardly matters to him if his government faces embarrassment for his undesirable openness. Almost a year after the Centre introduced Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) and after disbursement of Rs 4,416 crores to 20 lakh farmers in MP to compensate for their crop loss due to natural calamities in 2016, Mr Bisen was still wondering what exactly was the plan about. Opposition Congress has promptly grabbed the opportunity to question the state government that how a scheme was being implemented without understanding it. But, the wily minister, if his close aides are to be believed, has stirred a hornets nest certainly not without a reason. He has created a controversy to blunt a brewing storm being set off by growing resentment among the farmers, his supporters argued. Ignorance is bliss and feigning ignorance is diplomacy! Rita Bahuguna Joshi, 67, sent shockwaves when she quit the Congress to join the BJP in October in Uttar Pradesh. Daughter of former chief minister Hemvati Nandan Bahuguna, she is articulate and takes issues and opponents head-on. Her remarks against Mayawati after her house in Lucknow was burnt down by BSP supporters led to her being jailed. While campaigning in Lucknow Cantt this time as a BJP candidate she spoke to Amita Verma about the challenges before her. After spending decades in the Congress and a stint in the Samajwadi Party, how does it feel to be in the BJP now? The difference has not yet sunk in. Soon after I joined the BJP, the party got into the election mode and so did I. We are determined to oust corrupt regional parties from Uttar Pradesh and we are focusing on this. I have been given the opportunity to connect with the party workers through meetings. BJP workers, in a sense, are disciplined enough to follow decisions taken by the leaders. There is a great deal of resentment among BJP workers over tickets given to those who recently joined the party. How are you coping with this? There are some shortcomings in our campaign, but we will overcome them soon. If you take party workers into confidence, the initial resistance melts away. For the BJP workers, getting our government in place is more important and that is what we are all working towards. The resentment is natural when everyone aspires for a ticket, but this will die down in a few days. Besides, I was elected from the constituency in 2012 and have huge backing of my own workers, who left the Congress with me. This is also a big advantage for me. What are the issues you are focusing on? The state is obviously the main issue and the corruption during the SP and BSP governments is largely responsible for the plight of Uttar Pradesh. The leaders of regional parties have amassed wealth for themselves, promoted their families, but have conveniently forgotten the people who elected them to power. Is demonetisation a major issue in your constituency? Surprisingly, in the urban areas, demonetisation has had a positive impact. People do not deny having faced problems but they are now convinced that this will put a strong curb on black money. The people trust Prime Minister Narendra Modi and are aware that he is working selflessly for the country. You are pitted against Aparna Yadav (from the SP), younger daughter-in-law of Mulayam Singh Yadav. She has launched an aggressive campaign accusing you of not doing any work in the constituency. Her connectivity with the constituency is just a few months old and her only USP is that she belongs to the ruling family. She is not a politician, but a social worker. The Lucknow Cantt constituency has never elected a Samajwadi Party candidate. The Samajwadi Party, too, has never done any development for the area. As a legislator in the past five years, I have brought funds for water supply, Rs 400 crore to upgrade the sewage system and a 80-bed hospital. You have been in the SP and then the Congress. What is your take on the new alliance between these two parties? The fact that they have forged an alliance shows that they are doubtful of their own individual performances in the elections. The SP and the Congress have accepted that they are coming together to stop the BJP, which implies that they have already conceded defeat and are desperate about their own survival. The SP, which is a ruling party, has given up 105 seats to the Congress and need I say anything more about SPs self-confidence? The alliance, however, has turned the UP elections into a three-cornered contest. You were the only BJP leader who recently objected to Vinay Katiyars remarks on Priyanka Gandhi Vadra. I am very clear that derogatory remarks against anyone, particularly a lady, are totally unacceptable. In politics, we must maintain some decorum and dignity. Such sexist remarks should be condemned and one should rise above political lines on such issues. Therefore, I publicly criticised the remark. If you receive a phone call from someone who asks, Can you hear me?, then you must hang up immediately. Virginia police is urging the mass not to answer the question as it is most probably being recorded by scammers to gain authorised access to utility or credit card bills. According to a report published by CBS News, Virginia police are now warning folks in US about the new scheme. You say yes, it gets recorded and they say that you have agreed to something, said Susan Grant, director of Consumer Protection for the Consumer Federation of America. I know that people think its impolite to hang up, but its a good strategy. These phone scammers already have the receivers phone number, credit card numbers or cable bills as a result of data breach. They record the receivers answer and use it in future in response to when the victim disputes the charge. Officer Jo Ann Hughes with the Norfolk ( Va. ) Police Department told WTKR-TV often the scammer uses a familiar area code when calling. Click on Deccan Chronicle Technology and Science for the latest news and reviews. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter. According to HP, these batteries have the potential to overheat, posing a fire and burn hazard to customers. HP will also provide free replacement battery in each eligible case. HP has expanded its voluntary recall of batteries due to fire and burn hazards. The batteries were manufactured between March 2013 and October 2016 and were sold under the HP and Compaq brands. HP has recalled over 140 thousand batteries in US, Canada and Mexico. The batteries were used for the ProBook, HP ENVY, Compaq, Compaq Presario, and HP Pavilion. In June last year HP recalled around 41 thousand batteries, but this week the company extended its recall to additional 101 thousand batteries. According to HP, these batteries have the potential to overheat, posing a fire and burn hazard to customers. HP will also provide free replacement battery in each eligible case. The company has also initiated a process to assist with validation and ordering for customers with 10 or more potentially affected batteries. The affected batteries have the 6BZLU, 6CGFK, 6CGFQ, 6CZMB, 6DEMA, 6DEMH, 6DGAL, and 6EBVA prefixes in their bar codes. HP advises users with these batteries to either download HPs Battery Program Validation Utility that determines whether the particular battery may be faulty, or manually enter serial number and barcode of the battery into a special form on HPs website. Click on Deccan Chronicle Technology and Science for the latest news and reviews. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter. Around this time last year, Narendra Modi launched the Startup India, Standup India campaign. About 31 startups have been banned from on-campus recruiting by some of the most prestigious universities in India after reportedly cancelling thousands of job offers. According to a report by BBC, attractive salaries offered by these fastest growing startups made the job enticing for many individuals; however, instead of providing an enabling business environment, many failed to materialise. As a result, leading Indian universities have stood up to fight against the operational issues faced by many of their students with these startups. Around this time last year, Narendra Modi launched the Startup India, Standup India campaign. The campaign was launched with a slew of measures to enable entrepreneurship in the country. Twelve months down the line startups are still struggling to be profitable, which forces them to cut costs, laying off staff and halting hiring. Sachin Kumar, an IIT graduate, had hoped he had that his $20,000 per year job would be secured with the company, but unfortunately it did not materialise. This was the main reason he is not able to get another job elsewhere. In an interview to BBC, he mentioned that other companies refused to hire him because they didnt want to hire someone who was initially hired with another company. It was a struggle for me to find a next job, Kumar added. The BBC report continued stating most of the companies involved blamed changing priorities. Click on Deccan Chronicle Technology and Science for the latest news and reviews. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter. MIKA which stands for Multi-purpose Intuitive Knowledge Assistant is the first of its kind. Nokia recently announced the launch of the companys version of customised digital assistant called MIKA. However, this one is designed specifically for telecom operators. The Finnish tech-giant claims that MIKA is set to improve telecom operators efficiency by providing engineers faster access to critical information. MIKA which stands for Multi-purpose Intuitive Knowledge Assistant is the first of its kind. It saves time and frees the skilled workers to focus on other more important tasks by providing automated assistance. MIKA offers users with an extensive range of tools, documents, data sources along with a Nokia-specialised AVA knowledge library that gathers the best projects of the company together. This gives users access to recommendations based on similar issues seen in other networks. Nokia also introduced the Predictive Repair service that allows engineers to tap into its knowledge base remotely. According to Nokia, the service can predict hardware failures and recommend replacements up to 14 days in advance, with up to 95 per cent of accuracy. Click on Deccan Chronicle Technology and Science for the latest news and reviews. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter. Police survey the scene after a deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City, Canada. (Photo: AP) Quebec City, Canada: Six people were killed after gunmen opened fire in a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers, the mosque's president told reporters on Sunday. Earlier, a witness told Reuters that up to three gunmen fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center. Police put up a security perimeter around the mosque and declined to comment to reporters about the incident. "Why is this happening here? This is barbaric, said the mosque's president, Mohamed Yangui. In June 2016, a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the cultural center. Yangui, who was not inside the mosque when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. He did not know how many were injured, saying they had been taken to different hospitals across Quebec City. Incidents of Islamophobia increased in Quebec in recent years amid a political debate over banning the niqab, or Muslim face covering. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of Quebec was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighboring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Police survey the scene after deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City, Canada. (Photo: AP) Quebec City: Six people died and eight were injured after gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque, a shooting that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned on Monday as a "terrorist attack." Police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told journalists that two suspects were arrested following the attack that police were also treating as an act of terrorism. Trudeau said in a statement that "we condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge." "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, city and country." According to witnesses interviewed on local television, two masked gunmen entered the cultural center around 7:15 pm yesterday. The motive of the attack was not immediately clear. Police quickly set up in the mosque's vicinity. Coulombe said those killed were between ages 35 and 70. Police did not rule out the possibility of a third suspect who had fled the scene. "It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence," Trudeau said. "Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear." Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said in a series of Twitter posts that the government was "mobilized to ensure the security of the people of Quebec." "Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence," he wrote. "Solidarity with Quebec people of Muslim faith." Police stationed near the mosque told AFP that they had been preparing for this type of attack "because it's happening all over the world." "I don't understand why here -- it's a small mosque," said a man who was inside the center at the time of the attack. "It's not Montreal or Toronto." The mosque has already been the target of hate: a pig's head was left on the doorstep last June during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Other mosques in Canada have been targeted with racist graffiti in recent months. The attack comes as Canada has vowed to open its arms wide to Muslims and refugees after US President Donald Trump's controversial immigration ban Friday sparked travel chaos and outrage around the world. Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of Trump's order, the immigration ministry said Sunday. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. Trump has suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Journalists inside an auditorium of school attacked by Taliban, in Peshawar, Pakistan. (Photo:AP) Quebec City: Gunmen killed at least six people and injured eight more when they opened fire in a mosque in Quebec City, Canada on Sunday night. Here are some of the major attacks perpetrated by gunmen against civilians around the world over the last two years. Pakistan school raid December 16, 2014: Taliban insurgents storm an army-run school in Peshawar, killing 154 people, most of them children. Double Paris shootings January 7-8, 2015: Gunman Amedy Coulibaly, claiming allegiance to the Islamic State group, kills a policewoman in a Paris suburb before attacking a Jewish supermarket the next day, where he kills four more people. He is killed in a police assault. On January 7, the Al-Qaeda-linked Kouachi brothers kill 12 people at the headquarters of the Charlie Hebdo satirical weekly in Paris. Karachi bus slaughter May 13, 2015: Gunmen storm a bus in Karachi and kill 45 people who belong to the Shiite Ismaili minority. IS claims the attack, its first in majority Sunni Pakistan. Charleston church tragedy June 17, 2015: A white gunman kills nine people at an historic black church in Charleston, South Carolina. Tunisia beach attack June 26, 2015: Gunmen kill 38 people, including 30 British tourists, at a beach hotel in Sousse, a little more than three months after a similar attack at the Bardo museum in Tunis kills 22 people, including 21 foreign tourists. IS claims both attacks. Mali hotel siege November 20, 2015: Gunmen take guests and staff hostage at a luxury hotel in Mali's capital Bamako, in a siege that leaves at least 20 dead, including 14 foreigners. The attack is later claimed by AQIM, which says it was a joint operation with the Al-Murabitoun group. San Bernardino bloodbath December 2, 2015: Syed Farook and his Pakistani wife Tashfeen Malik open fire at a Christmas party in San Bernardino, California, killing 14 people. IS hails the attack, but does not claim direct responsibility. Ivory Coast assault March 13, 2016: At least 14 civilians and two special forces troops are killed when gunmen storm the Ivorian beach resort of Grand-Bassam. Al-Qaeda's North African affiliate, Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), claims responsibility. Orlando gay bar massacre June 12, 2016: A gunman claiming allegiance to the Islamic State group opens fire inside a gay bar in Orlando, Florida, killing 49 people in the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history. Munich mall rampage July 22, 2016: David Ali Sonboly -- who police say was obsessed with mass murderers including Norwegian right-wing fanatic Anders Behring Breivik -- shoots dead nine people at a Munich shopping mall before turning the gun on himself, having spent a year planning the attack. Istanbul nightclub terror January 1, 2017: Seventy-five minutes after party-goers ring in the New Year, a gunman opens fire in the Reina nightclub on the banks of the Bosphorus, killing 39 people and injuring at least 65. Quebec mosque terror January 29, 2017: Six people died and eight were injured after masked gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque, a shooting Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned as a "terrorist attack." A Harrisburg man pleaded guilty Monday to conspiracy to provide material support and resources to a terrorist organization, according to U.S. Middle District of Pennsylvania and FBIs Philadelphia Division. Jalil Ibn Ameer Aziz, 20, who is a U.S. citizen and resident of Harrisburg, had been charged Dec. 22, 2015, in an indictment with conspiring and attempting to provide support to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. A superseding indictment on May 18, 2016, added solicitation to commit a crime of violence and transmitting a communication containing a threat to injure. The court said Aziz, between July 2014 and Dec. 17, 2015, provided and attempted to provide personnel and services to ISIL, as well as solicited and endeavored to persuade others to kill and attempt to kill officers and employees of the United States. The indictment said Aziz knowingly tweeted the names, addresses, photographs and military branches of about 100 U.S. service members to followers and viewers of his Twitter account. The tweets also contained threats to injure them, stating kill them in their own lands, behead them in their own homes, stab them to death as they walk their street thinking they are safe. Aziz pledged his allegiance to ISIL and used at least 71 Twitter accounts to advocate violence or disseminate propaganda, the court said. It noted that he also used Twitter and other electronic communication services to assist those seeking to travel to and fight for ISIL, with him at least once acting as an intermediary between a person in Turkey and several well-known members of ISIL, the court said. A search of Azizs closet also found five loaded M4-style high-capacity magazines, a modified straight edge knife, a thumb drive, medication, flashlights, a toothbrush, sunflower seeds, a lighter, nail clippers, fingerless gloves, a pocket watch and a black balaclava. The security of the American people is the highest priority for our office and the Department of Justice, U.S. Attorney Bruce Brandler said in a news release. While we cannot eliminate terrorism completely, we can bring to justice those responsible for providing material support and resources to terrorist groups and for spreading hate and destruction in our communities and abroad. Thankfully, the defendants activities were disrupted by the FBI and the Joint Terrorism Task Force and justice will be served in this case. The case was investigated by the FBIs Joint Terrorism Task Force with assistance from the Harrisburg Bureau of Police. Washington: US President Donald Trump said he will announce his nomination to the Supreme Court on Tuesday, a pick likely to tilt the court to conservatives on crucial issues such as abortion and gun control. Trump's choice will fill a vacancy left by the sudden death last year of conservative justice Antonin Scalia, which left the court evenly divided between four conservative and four liberal justices. "I have made my decision on who I will nominate for The United States Supreme Court. It will be announced live on Tuesday at 8:00 P.M. (W.H.)," Trump said on his Twitter account. Abortion, gay marriage, gun control, the Supreme Court is the final arbiter of many of the most sensitive issues of American life and law. Its members, who must be confirmed by the Senate, are named to life terms so their influence is long lasting. Trump has said he wants a candidate who is against abortion and firmly backs Americans' right to own guns. Among those tipped as frontrunners for the post are Neil Gorsuch, a respected appellate court judge who is considered an ideological match to Scalia, and William Pryor, an Alabama appellate court judge considered an opponent of abortion rights. Trump had said he would announce his pick on Thursday, but has moved the date up amid a raging controversy and confusion over his order to temporarily bar travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. His Supreme Court pick is certain to set off another pitched battle with Democrats. Former president Barack Obama had named Merrick Garland, an appellate court judge, to fill Scalia's seat but Republicans used their control of the Senate to keep his nomination from being considered. Howard Schultz, the coffee retailers chairman and CEO, said in a letter to employees Sunday that the hiring would apply to stores worldwide and the effort would start in the United States where the focus would be on hiring immigrants who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel. (Representational Image) Washington: Starbucks says it will hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years, a response to President Donald Trumps indefinite suspension of Syrian refugees and temporary travel bans that apply to six other Muslim-majority nations. Howard Schultz, the coffee retailers chairman and CEO, said in a letter to employees Sunday that the hiring would apply to stores worldwide and the effort would start in the United States where the focus would be on hiring immigrants who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel. Schultz, a supporter of Hillary Clinton during the presidential run, took aim at other parts of a Trump agenda focused on immigration, repealing former President Barack Obamas health care law and restructuring trade with Mexico. The letter said that Starbucks would help support coffee growers in Mexico, provide health insurance to eligible workers if the health care law is repealed and back an Obama-era immigration program that allows young immigrants who were brought to the country as children to apply for a two-year reprieve from deportation and a work permit. The move reflects the increasing complexity that businesses face when dealing with the Trump administration. Trump has met with CEOs at Ford, General Motors and Boeing and asked them to create jobs in the United States, while touting each announcement about new factory jobs as a success even if those additions had been planned before his presidential victory. But not all corporate leaders have embraced Trump. Schultz added that Starbucks would aim to communicate with workers more frequently, saying Sunday, I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack. "President Trump's barbaric executive orders have thrown our nation's ports into turmoil and struck fear into the hearts of Muslims across the country," Ms Jayapal said. (Photo: AP) Washington: Indian-American Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal on Monday vowed to fight the "ill-conceived and unconstitutional" executive order by US President Donald Trump banning immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries. The remark from the Seattle Democratic Representative came after two immigrants held by Customs and Border Protection at the Seattle airport as a result of the order were released. "President Trump's barbaric executive orders have thrown our nation's ports into turmoil and struck fear into the hearts of Muslims across the country," Ms Jayapal said. "The release of the two immigrants held by CBP is a small victory in our fight against the president's inhumane policies," she said in a statement and thanked American Civil Liberties Union of Washington and Northwest Immigrants Rights Project for taking swift legal action for their release. "President Trump should know that this is not over. This is only the beginning of our resistance. We will fight his ill-conceived and unconstitutional executive orders until the very end," Ms Jayapal vowed. Jorge Baran, executive director of the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, joined Ms Jayapal in welcoming the release. "We're pleased to see the release of individuals held by CBP." "While our work is far from over, this victory proves that we are on the right side of the law. We appreciate our political and community leaders who took swift action and help make this release possible. We pledge to use every resource available to bring relief to individuals suffering as a result of these executive orders," Baron said. Mr Trump has caused outrage at home and abroad after he signed the executive order on Friday suspending refugee arrivals and barring visas for travellers from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for at least 90 days. The two individuals were released this morning at the airport. One of them is on his way to Las Vegas to a convention he was planning to attend. The other is with his family who were already here visiting other relatives. One of them is a Sudanese citizen who has lived in the UAE for more than twenty years and the other is a Yemeni citizen born in Saudi Arabia. They were both arriving on visitors visas. The suspect identified as Paraman Radhakishan, from India, was taken into custody at the Grand Forks International Airport. He faces terrorism charges. (Representational Image) Washington: A 53-year-old Indian has been taken into custody by police in the US state of North Dakota for allegedly making a bomb threat at an airport as he told a travel agent that there was an explosive in his bag. The suspect identified as Paraman Radhakishan, from India, was taken into custody at the Grand Forks International Airport. He faces terrorism charges. Police said Radhakishan was taken into custody after he told a travel agent at the Grand Forks International Airport around 5:14 AM yesterday that there was a bomb in his bag. As a precautionary measure, operations were suspended. The Grand Forks Regional Bomb Squad "evaluated the validity of the threat," a statement said. Airport operations were soon normalised. Radhakishan was on his way from Grand Forks -- the third largest city in North Dakota -- to Minneapolis. Radhakishnan's motive is still under investigation; however, police said it is possible he became upset with airport staff. Police said whatever the reason, any threat of this kind is taken seriously. People show signs at the Indianapolis International Airport during a protest against President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily suspending all immigration for citizens of seven majority Muslim countries for 90 days. (Photo: AP) Washington: Jihadist groups, including Islamic State sympathisers, have hailed the Trump administration's ban on travel to the US from seven Muslim- majority nations saying it would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists, according to a media report. Comments posted to pro-Islamic State social media accounts predicted that US President Donald Trump's executive order would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists, The Washington Post reported. One posting hailed Trump as "the best caller to Islam," while others predicted that Trump would soon launch a new war in the Middle East. "(Islamic State leader Abu Bakr) al-Baghdadi has theright to come out and inform Trump that banning Muslims from entering America is a 'blessed ban,'" a posting to a pro-Islamic State channel on Telegram, was quoted as saying. The writer compared the executive order to the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, which Islamic militant leaders at the time hailed as a "blessed invasion" that ignited anti- Western fervour across the Islamic world. Several postings suggested that Trump was fulfilling the predictions of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American born al-Qaeda leader and preacher who famously said that the "West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens," the report said. Awlaki was killed in a US drone strike in Yemen in 2011. Another posting on the Telegram channel "Abu Magrebi" said Trumps actions "clearly revealed the truth and harsh reality behind the American governments hatred toward Muslims." Leaders of the Islamic State have spoken frequently of their intention to drive a wedge between Western governments and their Muslim populations, and have welcomed outside help-- intentional or not -- in fulfilling that goal. In a 2015 essay in the Islamic State's English-language magazine Dabiq, the group said that its motivation for launching terrorist attacks in Europe was to provoke an anti-Muslim backlash that would force ambivalent Muslims to enlist with them. "Jihadists would have to argue to lengths that Obama, Bush, and others held anti-Islam agendas and hated the religion not just radical terrorists," said Rita Katz, founder of the SITE Intelligence Group, a private organisation that monitors jihadist websites. "Trump, however, makes that argument a lot easier for them to sell to their followers," Katz was quoted as saying. The reaction to the ban from Islamic State sympathisers came as current and former US officials also expressed concern that the temporary ban would undermine the global fight against violent Islamic militants. "The effect will probably in some areas give ISIS some more propaganda," Senator John McCain told CBS News. Trump last week issued a controversial executive order banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries --Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia. The trolling is part the continuing fallout over an executive order signed by Trump on Friday, halting travel to the US for citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries. (Photo: AP) Washington: Twitter users are trolling Trump Hotels over the US President Donald Trump's controversial 'Muslim ban', by responding to a tweet posted by the company in 2011. The trolling is part the continuing fallout over an executive order signed by Trump on Friday, halting travel to the US for citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries. Users are targeting the tweet sent by Trump Hotels which innocuously asked the public to share their favourite travel memory. The post read, "Tell us your favourite travel memory was it a picture, a souvenir, a sunset? We'd love to hear it!",the Sun reported. One Twitter user replied:"Dear @TrumpHotels-Unfortunately I didnt have that great of an experience at ur hotels! Oh wait? I wasn't allowed in! #NoBanNoWall? Another said: "@TrumpHotels my favorite memory was Marching past your hotel with over 500,000 friends to protest this administration!" A user added: "@TrumpHotels @nybooks I enjoyed travelling abroad at a time when I wasn't despised because of my evil president." "@TrumpHotels Went to Kos (Greece) in August 2015. Brought food and clothes to the refugees camping around the harbour. Lovely sunsets too," another user said. Trump signed an order on Friday imposing an indefinite travel ban on Syrian refugees and a temporary curb on people from six other countries - Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen and Somalia - from entering the US for at least 90 days. The move has invited criticism and outrage at home and from international leaders. The backlash to the order has dominated social media this weekend, with some Twitter users digging out a five-year-old tweet from Trump Hotels which innocuously asked the public to share their favourite travel memory, the RT reported. The tweet did gain some interest when originally posted, but has been flooded with replies in the wake of Saturday's airport detentions. Some people shared their fears over the current political climate, with one user posting an image he said showed his granted asylum status. Manila: Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Monday admitted widespread corruption in the police force that is waging his deadly war on drugs, but extended the crackdown until the last day of his term in 2022. Duterte announced plans to "cleanse" the police force, including suspending anti-drug units, after a series of scandals in which officers were caught committing murder, extortion and robbery while using the drug war as cover. "You policemen are the most corrupt. You are corrupt to the core. It's in your system," Duterte told reporters as he railed against the anti-drug officers who allegedly masterminded the murder of a South Korean businessman. Duterte said nearly 40 percent of the police force engaged in illegal activities. His comments came seven months after he took office and immediately made police the frontline troops in his plans to wipe out the illegal drug trade that he said was threatening to turn the Philippines into a narco state. Since then, police have reported shooting dead more than 2,500 people they have accused of being drug suspects, alleging on every occasion they had to open fire in self-defence. Human rights groups and relatives of some of the victims have alleged police frequently kill defenceless people, and often plant drugs and a gun on the bullet-riddled corpse. Nearly 4,000 other people have died in unexplained circumstances in the crackdown, according to official figures. Many of those victims have had signs placed on them labelling them drug traffickers or users. Extended war Duterte won the presidential elections largely on a law-and-order platform, headlined by a vow to eliminate the illegal drug trade in three to six months. He promised that 100,000 people would be killed and so many bodies would be dumped in Manila Bay that the fish would grow fat from feeding on them. Once in office Duterte extended the timeframe of the drug war until March of this year, but on Monday he said there would be no end while he was in power. "I will extend it to the last day of my term," Duterte said. "March no longer applies." In the Philippines, presidents are allowed to serve only a single term of six years. Following Duterte's comments at a press conference just after midnight, national police chief Ronald Dela Rosa announced that all the anti-drug units across the country had been deactivated. "No more anti-drug operations. We have to focus our efforts towards internal cleansing," Dela Rosa said. However Duterte emphasised repeatedly that the drug war would continue as long as he was in power, and he did not state that police would stop trying to eliminate drugs. Duterte also said the military and the Drug Enforcement Agency, which is under the president's office, would become more involved. A deadly mistake Critics seized on Duterte's admission that the police force was extremely corrupt and must be cleansed as proof he made a huge mistake that had cost thousands of lives. "We started out with a drug problem, and here we are with mass serial killings and kidnap-for-ransom groups that shamelessly operate from even within the police ranks," said Senator Leila de Lima, a former justice secretary. Duterte, a firebrand lawyer, repeatedly told police during the election campaign and after assuming the presidency that he would shield them from prosecution if they killed people as part of the crime war. He also told police at Dela Rosa's birthday party this month he would tolerate them engaging in illegal activities to earn "sideline" money, as long as that did not involve drugs. "Go into smuggling, just don't do drugs," Duterte said. Duterte said at the party he sympathised with the police for receiving such low salaries, and understood that they needed to get more income from other ways. "I mean I'm not saying that we have to do illegal things. What I'm saying is that until such time that we (the government) can give you more and somebody offers to help, take it," he said. Air France said in a statement it was informed on Saturday by the US govt of the new restrictions, and had no choice but to stop the passengers from boarding US-bound flights. (Photo: Representational Image) Paris: Air France has blocked 21 passengers from Muslim countries from travelling to the US because they would have been refused entry under President Donald Trump's new immigration ban. Air France said in a statement it was informed on Saturday by the US government of the new restrictions, and had no choice but to stop the passengers from boarding U.S.-bound flights. An airline spokeswoman said on Monday that the 21 people were taken back to their point of departure or otherwise taken care of. She would not provide the passengers' names, nationalities or other details. Other international airlines have done the same. The passengers were from seven Muslim-majority countries affected by the three-month immigration ban: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Abrini was captured in Brussels in April over his suspected involvement in the March 22 Brussels attacks and the Paris killings, both of which were claimed by the Islamic State group. (Photo: AP) Brussels: Belgium has handed over Mohamed Abrini, the "man in the hat" bomber at Brussels airport last year, to France for questioning about the 2015 Paris attacks, federal prosecutors said. Abrini was captured in Brussels in April over his suspected involvement in the March 22 Brussels attacks and the Paris killings, both of which were claimed by the Islamic State group. "In the framework of the investigation related to the attacks in Paris on 13 November 2015, Mohamed Abrini was surrendered to the French judicial authorities for a period of one day," the prosecutor's office said in a statement. Eric Van Der Sypt, a spokesman, told AFP that the decision is based on "mutual agreements" between the two countries. "It's not uncommon that suspects in different cases are surrendered for one day or a few days," Van Der Sypt said. Belgian investigators have said the Brussels airport and metro bombers who killed a total of 32 people were part of the same Brussels-based cell that orchestrated the November 2015 Paris attacks that left 130 dead. Abrini, dubbed the "man in the hat" from images caught on security cameras, fled the airport without detonating his suitcase bomb after his accomplices Najim Laachraoui and Ibrahim El Bakraoui set off theirs, killing 16 people and themselves. Several sources close to the Belgian-led investigation have told AFP that the three bombers targeted passengers travelling to the United States and also Jewish and perhaps Russian targets at the airport. "That understanding has held up with later investigations, including with Abrini's alleged confession," a US law enforcement source told AFP. US sources said they are confident the airline check-in counters for flights to the United States, Israel and Russia were targeted. Abrini had a record as a long-time petty criminal who grew up in the troubled Molenbeek area of Brussels with Salah Abdeslam, the only survivor of the group that carried out the Paris attacks. Brioche Nicknamed "Brioche" after his days working in a bakery, Abrini is thought to have given up training as a welder at the age of 18 before eventually gravitating towards extremism. The Belgian of Moroccan origin was seen at a petrol station north of Paris two days before the November 13 attacks with prime suspect Abdeslam, who drove one of the vehicles used in the attacks. Belgian authorities have charged Abrini with "participation in the activities of a terrorist group and terrorist murders" over the massacres in the French capital. Identified as a radical Islamist by Belgian investigators, Abrini is believed to have briefly visited Syria last year and his younger brother Suleiman, 20, died there. He was known to security services for belonging to the same cell as Abdelhamid Abaaoud, one of the organisers of the Paris attacks who opened fire on bars, restaurants and a concert hall before he died in a police shootout shortly afterwards. Moscow: A Russian man has celebrated the first telephonic conversation between President Vladimir Putin and his American Donald Trump by having their portraits tattooed on his teeth, according to media reports. The dental patient was having new porcelain crowns and veneers done at the surgery in Sochi, Russia- but he wanted something "extra special". Dentist Levchenko Lev then offered to engrave the man's initials, letters, or his own signature on his gnashers. But the patient stunned staff when he asked for portraits of Trump and Putin to mark their first phone call on Friday, days after the former was inaugurated as the 45th US President. Levchenko Lev, who runs Levchenko Lev Studio Dental, said they had to draft in a professional artist for the work which cost more than 2,000 pounds. He said: "During the discussion with the patient's unique capabilities in the manufacture of dental restorations, I offered to do the initials, letters, or my signature on their own work. "The patient was actively interested in whether you can make the image of Putin and Trump at the crowns. I called the artist to clarify whether it is possible to make such small figures clearly, and met with the artist," Lev was quoted as saying by UK-based Sun newspaper. The portraits of Putin and Trump were successfully tattooed on the patient's teeth, the report said. The engraving was done on ceramic. The artist first made the engraving with a fine brush, and then baked it in a dental oven and covered the material with a layer of dental transparent glaze. U.S. Rep. Scott Perry, who represents part of Cumberland County, defended President Donald Trump's executive order on immigration from Muslim-majority nations. In a statement issued Monday, Perry said the order is a necessary, temporary step aimed at improving the vetting process for immigrants from areas rife with jihadis. "The United States has the most generous refugee policies in the world and a culturally diverse, open country unlike any other. We want that proud tradition to continue. Yet ISIS continues to embed fighters within the refugee flows bound for Europe to carry out terrorist attacks and clearly encourages its followers to do the same in the United States. "There's no 'Muslim ban.' President Trump's executive order imposes a temporary, 90-day ban on people entering our country from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen countries rife with jihadist violence. Muslims and others from the more than 190 remaining countries in the world are unaffected. Even the Iraqi government says it understands the security reasons behind the President's decision. "The order aims to improve our vetting process by temporarily halting refugee admissions for 120 days. Top national security officials repeatedly warn that we don't have the necessary resources or information to fully vet refugees. "Former President Obama banned many refugees from Iraq in 2011. Former President Carter, during the Iranian hostage crisis, banned Iranians from entering the United States with very limited exceptions. Notably, the media was silent on both occasions. "Clearly, however, the administration must clarify its policies and remove any confusion with regard to Green Card holders. The primary duty of government is to keep the American people safe. We must take common sense steps to protect ourselves from those who take advantage of our generosity to commit acts of terrorism." Demonstrators at Philadelphia International Airport protest against the executive order that President Donald Trump signed clamping down on refugee admissions and temporarily restricting travellers from seven predominantly Muslim countries on January 29, 2017 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (Photo: AFP) Baghdad: A global backlash against US President Donald Trumps immigration curbs gathered strength on Sunday as several countries including long-standing American allies criticised the measures as discriminatory and divisive. Governments from London and Berlin to Jakarta and Tehran spoke out against Trumps order to put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily ban travellers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries. He said the move would help protect Americans from terrorism. In Germany which has taken in large numbers of people fleeing the Syrian civil war, Chancellor Angela Merkel said the global fight against terrorism was no excuse for the measures and does not justify putting people of a specific background or faith under general suspicion, her spokesman said. She expressed her concerns to Trump during a phone call and reminded him that the Geneva Conventions require the international community to take in war refugees on humanitarian grounds, the spokesman added. Merkels sentiments were echoed in Paris and London; Terrorism knows no nationality. Discrimination is no response, said French Foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, while his British counterpart Boris Johnson tweeted: Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality. Along with Syria, the US ban of at least 90 days affects travellers with passports from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, including those with dual nationality that includes one of those countries. Trump said his order, which indefinitely bans refugees from Syria, was not a Muslim ban, though he added he would seek to prioritise Christian refugees fleeing the country. Washingtons Arab allies, including the Gulf states and Egypt, were mostly silent. The government in Iraq, which is allied with Washington in the battle against ultra-hardline Islamist group Islamic State and hosts over 5,000 US troops, also did not comment on the executive order. But some members of the parliament said Iraq should retaliate with similar measures against the United States. Iran vows to respond In Baghdad, influential Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said American nationals should leave Iraq, in retaliation for the travel curbs. It would be arrogance for you to enter freely Iraq and other countries while barring to them the entrance to your country and therefore you should get your nationals out, he said on his website. There was no immediate reaction to the curbs from Islamic State, although in the past it has used U.S. monitoring of Muslim foreigners to stoke Muslim anger against Washington. The Tehran government vowed to respond in kind to the US ban on visitors from Iran, but on Sunday Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Twitter that Americans who already hold Iranian visas can enter the country. Unlike the US, our decision is not retroactive. All with valid Iranian visa will be gladly welcomed, Zarif said. Authorities in Sudan, which is also targeted by the ban, summoned the US charge daffaires in Khartoum. They said the order sent a negative message, coming two weeks after Washington announced it would ease economic sanctions on the country. Trumps executive order on Friday took effect immediately, wreaking havoc and confusion for would-be travellers with passports from the seven countries and plunging Americas immigration system into chaos. The Department of Homeland Security said about 375 travellers had been affected by the order, 109 of whom were in transit and were denied entry to the United States. Another 173 were stopped by airlines before boarding. Fuad Sharef, his wife and three children were among the first victims. They had waited two years for a visa to settle in the United States, selling their home and quitting jobs and schools in Iraq before setting off for a new life they saw as a reward for working with US organisations. They were prevented from boarding their connecting flight to New York from Cairo airport on Saturday, detained overnight and forced to board a flight back to northern Iraq. I am totally broken We were treated like drug dealers, escorted by deportation officers, Sharef told Reuters, likening Trumps decision to the dictatorship of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. I am broken, I am totally broken. A 32-year-old Syrian man, Nail Zain, was among dozens of people at Istanbuls Ataturk Airport prevented from flying to the United States on Sunday. He told Reuters he was supposed to fly to Los Angeles, but officials said his visa was cancelled. My wife and my son are in the United States. My son has American nationality. And we have been waiting for this moment for two years. Finally when I got the chance, they prevented me as a Syrian passport holder from travelling, he said. He was later taken out of the terminal by authorities. Trump, a businessman who successfully tapped into American fears about militant attacks during his campaign, had promised what he called extreme vetting of immigrants and refugees from areas the White House said the US Congress deemed high risk. He said on Saturday of his order, Its working out very nicely. You see it at the airports, you see it all over. The travel curbs, however, also drew criticism from several other countries around the globe. In Jakarta, Indonesian foreign minister Retno Marsudi said the Muslim-majority nation deeply regretted Trumps plans for extreme vetting of people from some Muslim countries. Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni said open society, plural identity, no discrimination were the pillars of Europe, while the Danish, Swedish and Norwegian governments also registered their opposition. Danish foreign minister Anders Samuelsen tweeted: The US decision not to allow entry of people from certain countries is NOT fair. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his country welcomed those fleeing war and persecution, even as Canadian airlines said they would turn back US-bound passengers to comply with an immigration ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries. To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada, he tweeted. Parliament called on the Iraqi government to respond in kind to the American decision in the event that the American side does not withdraw its decision. (Photo: AP) Baghdad: Iraqi lawmakers voted Monday to call on the government to enact a reciprocal travel ban on Americans if Washington does not withdraw its decision to bar Iraqis, officials said. The call is a response to President Donald Trump's executive order barring citizens of Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen from entering the US for at least 90 days, a move he billed as an effort to make America safe from "radical Islamic terrorists". Parliament called on the Iraqi government to "respond in kind to the American decision in the event that the American side does not withdraw its decision", a parliamentary official who was present for the vote told AFP. "Parliament voted by majority on calling on the Iraqi government and the foreign ministry to respond in kind," MP Hakim al-Zamili said. Sadiq al-Laban, another lawmaker, confirmed that "the vote was for a call on the government" to enact reciprocal measures. "We are against this stance from the new administration," Laban said, adding: "We hope that the American administration will rethink... this decision." Trump's decision led to the detention of incoming refugees at US airports, sparking protests, legal challenges and widespread condemnation from rights groups. The travel restrictions, which come on the heels of repeated assertions by Trump that the US should have stolen Iraq's oil before leaving in 2011, risk alienating the citizens and government of a country fighting against militants the president has cast as a major threat to America. President Donald Trump signs an executive order on extreme vetting during an event at the Pentagon in Washington. (Photo: AP) Aden: Yemen's government warned Monday that US President Donald Trump's order banning travellers from mainly Muslim countries would encourage global "extremism". "Yemen expresses its dissatisfaction after the order prohibiting, even for a limited time, the entry to the United States of people holding a Yemeni passport," a foreign ministry spokesman said. The Arabian Peninsula country was one of seven named by Trump in Friday's order whose nationals will be temporarily barred from travelling to the US. "Such a decision is likely to strengthen the position of extremists," the spokesman said, adding that "the only way to achieve victory in the fight against terrorism... is dialogue and not creating barriers." Yemen is gripped by a conflict that has killed more than 7,400 people since March 2015, when a Saudi-backed coalition began bombing raids on rebel forces who had seized control of capital Sanaa and northern and central parts of the impoverished nation. In this Jan. 10, 2017 photo, members of civil society hold a banner with pictures of missing rights activists, Waqas Goraya, Salman Haider, and Asim Saeed, during a demonstration to condemn the missing human rights activists, in Islamabad. (Photo: AP) Islamabad: Two Pakistani bloggers who vanished earlier this month have left the country fearing for their safety, relatives told AFP on Monday, following a virulent media campaign painting them as blasphemers. They were among five men who went missing from various cities in Pakistan. Four of the five who had stood against religious intolerance and criticised Pakistan's military have been freed, their families said. They would not comment on where the men had been held. Their disappearances triggered nationwide protests and raised concerns of government involvement claims denied by officials. Allegations on social media networks Facebook and Twitter and by right-wing TV hosts that the missing men were blasphemers has triggered a flood of threats despite denials from their worried families. The allegation can be fatal in deeply conservative Muslim Pakistan, where at least 17 people remain on death row for blasphemy. Liaqat Ali Goraya, the father of blogger Waqas Goraya, confirmed to AFP that his son was safe and had left the country. But his nephew Abdur Rahman Cheema, whose disappearance at the same time as his son was not reported to the media, was still missing. "Waqas has gone, we've sent him abroad," said his father, declining to comment on who had held him. Before he went missing, Goraya was based in The Netherlands and had returned to Pakistan for a family wedding. A source close to the family of blogger Asim Saeed confirmed he too had left the country. His father, Ghulam Haider Akbar, told AFP the family had received death threats purporting to come from the anti-Shiite Laskhar-e-Jhangvi group. "You who have blasphemed deserve death. You are out of Islam and should be ready for a painful punishment, which will be remembered by your generations to come," a text message said, according to Akbar. A relative of a third blogger, who asked to remain anonymous, said both he and his family had left their home town and were in hiding. "We are going to think about it for a few days and assess the situation. If it seems ok, we'll return, else we'll try to go abroad," the relative said. Zeeshan Haider said his brother, poet and activist Salman Haider, was "fine and safe". The whereabouts of the fifth man remain unknown. Rights groups have long criticised the colonial-era blasphemy legislation as a vehicle for personal vendettas as even unproven allegations can result in mob lynchings. A number of NGOs and observers say the online campaigns are to silence progressive voices and are carefully coordinated. Pakistan has had a history of enforced disappearances over the past decade, but this has mainly been confined to conflict zones near the Afghanistan border or to Balochistan province where separatists are battling for independence. Army said the injured soldier was shifted to the Combined Military Hospital in Peshawar where he succumbed to injuries. (Photo: Representational Image) Islamabad: At least one Pakistani soldier was killed when militants operating from Afghanistan targeted a border post in Khyber tribal district, the army said on Monday. Terrorist fired at the border post in Khyber district, critically injuring soldier Waqas. Army said the injured soldier was shifted to the Combined Military Hospital in Peshawar where he succumbed to injuries. "Terrorists are resorting to fire from across the border taking advantage of weak border control on Afghanistan side. There is a requirement to check terrorists' freedom of movement on Afghan side of the border," it said. The meet on February 1-2 to attend the Programming Committee will be the first meeting of the SAARC member states since the postponement of the 19th SAARC that was supposed to take place in Islamabad November last year, a Foreign Ministry official said. (Representational Image) Kathmandu: Senior officials of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) are scheduled to meet in Kathmandu this week for the first time since the summit was postponed last year to discuss various issues. The meet on February 1-2 to attend the Programming Committee will be the first meeting of the SAARC member states since the postponement of the 19th SAARC that was supposed to take place in Islamabad November last year, a Foreign Ministry official said. During the meeting, SAARC member states will discuss a number of issues, including the budget of the SAARC Secretariat and five regional centers of SAARC, according to Foreign Ministry sources. The matter relating to rescheduling the next SAARC summit will also come up during the meeting, to be attended by joint secretaries of the SAARC countries. Nepal, current chair of the SAARC, had decided to postpone the SAARC Summit until further notice after four nations Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh and India requested to postpone the summit in Islamabad scheduled for November 9 and 10 last year, following escalation of tension between India and Pakistan. India and three other countries had blamed Pakistan for not creating a conducive environment and not cooperating on combating cross-border terrorism in South Asia for holding the SAARC Summit, while Pakistan has rejected the charges. The decisions made by the programming committee will be forwarded to the Standing Committee for endorsement. SAARC is a regional body founded in 1985 in South Asia, comprising Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Everyone is familiar with this scenario: An app you once loved no longer brings the same joy. Its gotten buggy over time, or an update transformed it to the point it became unusable. Chances are you thought about calling it quits. But after years of sharing your personal data with this app, you probably gave up and stayed in this stale relationship. You put up with the productivity-killing bugs and odd design changes because moving to a new, potentially better app felt harder than sticking with the bad one. Take Evernote, the note-taking app. After nearly a decade attracting millions of users, the company last year severely restricted free use of its software while raising prices for its plans by as much as 40%. This month, Evernote also released a redesign for its mobile app, which users complained was bloated with unnecessary features that have made note taking too complex. Even so, people have stuck with Evernote partly because taking their notes elsewhere is hardly easy. We understand those kind of changes dont make everyone happy, said Greg Chiemingo, an Evernote spokesman. In fact, weve seen continued growth of paying customers over the last two years. People deserve better than this. Every day you stay with a bad app is time you could be spending with a superior product that will make life better. Here are my tips, based on interviews and personal experience, for a clean break. When to call it quits No app is perfect, but you have to draw the line somewhere. The problem is, you may be in such a rut that you cant recognise the warning signs. An obvious one is when an app stops working reliably in a way that affects your life. For instance, I called it quits on Apples Calendar app when I was planning a dinner with friends last month and the software sent a calendar invite in Greenwich Mean Time rather than Pacific Standard Time. As a result, one person thought we were meeting on Saturday instead of Friday and didnt show up. (It wasnt the first time this happened, either.) Brian Fitzpatrick, a former manager at Google who led a team that developed tools to help people move their data to and from Google, said he dumps an app when it has stopped improving. Its still functioning, but you dont see any changes in it for a very long time, he said. Its sort of a zombie app, I would call it at that point. Another sign that its time to move on is when you have nobody to talk to. Many popular apps for tasks like note taking, photo management and word processing are connected to social networks, or people you can share data with. If an apps audience is a ghost town like Yahoos photo-sharing app, Flickr, which sank in popularity after mobile photo-sharing services like Instagram emerged then its probably time to leave. Yahoo did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Flickr. Getting out The hardest part of breaking up with an app is moving your data. So as a rule of thumb, save a backup copy of your data so that you can export it into a new app. Then carefully search for a better app to suit your needs. As a safety measure before changing apps, you should always keep extra copies of your data somewhere, whether it be in the cloud with a service like Dropbox or on a physical hard drive. Some companies deliberately make exporting your data difficult because they want you to stick around. Its sort of like moving into an apartment and finding out at the end of the lease you cant take your furniture and your books with you, Fitzpatrick said. Evernote is a good example. It includes an Export notes feature, but it only lets you export notes into two formats that are compatible with just a few other note-taking apps. Microsofts note-taking app OneNote, along with Apples Notes app, can easily import Evernote records. But if your app of choice is something else, such as Google Keep, you will have to manually paste your notes in the new app. Flickr is also difficult to part ways with. Getting out your photos requires lots of manual labour: You have to download all the photos, which can take a significant amount of time if you have thousands of high-resolution images, and then upload them to a new photo service. When companies dont provide convenient tools to export your data, look elsewhere by doing a quick web search for solutions. There are plenty of people in the same boat as you, and chances are they have written scripts, or lightweight programmes, to automatically pull out your data for you. If there is no convenient way to export your data, sometimes it doesnt hurt to just take out what is most important to you. Perhaps you dont need five-year-old notes from Evernote anymore, so you could just manually paste your latest memos and get a fresh start with a different app. Finding a new app On the bright side, you can learn a lot from a tough breakup with an app which can be especially useful when looking for a replacement. The biggest lessons: Pick a tool that supports a wide array of formats instead of proprietary ones. And before you commit to a new app, make sure it is as easy to get out as it is to get in. Ditching Apples Calendar app was fairly easy. All my calendar data was already stored online and Apples app supports calendars from multiple online services including Google, Microsoft and Facebook. The key was finding an app that also supported those services but performed better. After testing several apps, I decided that Fantastical 2, a new app with a cleaner interface for getting a glance at calendar events, was the best one. Once Fantastical 2 was installed, I added my Google calendar accounts to load all my events into the app. Fitzpatrick recently decided to cut ties with Google Voice, the search giants calling and texting service, because it had remained unchanged for years. So he made backups of his call history, text messages and address books using Google Takeout, a web tool that he helped develop for easily downloading personal data stored on Google services. Then he switched to Signal, the encrypted messaging service, which has more modern features for messaging and phone calls, and disconnected his Google Voice. Google said it updated Google Voice on Monday with photo sharing and group messaging. But that was too late to keep people like Fitzpatrick. A lot of it comes down to: How interested are you in change? he said. Donald Trump's immigration ban targeting some Muslims and refugees entering the US does not apply to green cards holders, a top White House aide said today, amid ongoing confusion and anger over the controversial crackdown. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said that the temporary ban "doesn't include green card holders going forward," Priebus told NBC's "Meet the Press" program. He added however that anyone traveling back and forth from the countries in question -- including US citizens -- would be subjected to further screening. Priebus was asked about reports that Trump's executive order issued on Friday affected green card holders, contrary to recommendations from the Department of Homeland Security. A green card, a document issued by the Department of Homeland Security allowing a person born outside the country to reside and work in the United States, serves as proof that its holder is a permanent resident and often is a step en route to obtaining US citizenship. "We didn't overrule the Department of Homeland Security, as far as green card holders moving forward, it doesn't affect them," Priebus told NBC. Regarding the impact of Trump's executive order on US citizens, he added: "I would suspect that if you're an American citizen traveling back and forth to Libya you're likely to be subjected to further questioning when you come into an airport," he said. Priebus also suggested that the current ban -- affecting travelers from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen -- could be expanded eventually. "Perhaps other countries needed to be added to an executive order going forward - but in order to do this in a way that was expeditious, in a way that would pass muster quickly, we used the seven countries" already targeted. A federal judge late yesterday issued an emergency stay on parts of Trump's executive order, but the Department of Homeland Security and the White House today insisted that the order remains in force. The interim ban on annual buffalo race Kambala in Karnataka will remain for at least another two weeks as the High Court today decided to await the Supreme Court verdict on Jallikattu pending before it. "This honourable court will wait for the Supreme Court order on Jallikattu (bull taming sport) and accordingly decide on Kambala," Chief Justice Subhro Kamal Mukherjee heading a division bench said in his order. The case was then adjourned for two weeks. The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear all Jallikattu matters tomorrow after the Centre filed a plea seeking to withdraw the January 6 notification, so as to allow the bull-taming sport in Tamil Nadu. A bench headed by Justice Dipak Misra had allowed all the applications related to Jallikattu to be filed. A division bench of the Karnataka High Court headed by Chief Justice had in November last passed an interim order banning all Kambala races until the disposal of PIL filed by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). Reacting to the court order, Kambala Committee President Ashok Pai said they would soon decide on resuming massive protests across the state. "We may decide to resume our protests, beginning from tomorrow itself. The only hope before us is the state government. We hope it issues the ordinance paving the way for conducting Kambala," Pai said The interim order hit Kambala organisers who were not permitted to conduct the event held in Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts in the coastal region. Kambala committees had filed an interim application, seeking vacation of the stay spurred by the success of the Jallikattu stir in Tamil Nadu. Amid continuing protests against the ban, Karnataka Cabinet on January 28 had decided to amend the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act to pave the way for Kambala. The protesters are demanding an ordinance, as was done in the case of Jallikattu to permit holding of the folk sport. The annual sport, held from November to March, involves a pair of buffaloes tied to the plough and anchored by one person. They are made to run in parallel muddy tracks in a competition in which the fastest team wins. It is believed to be held to propitiate the Gods for a good harvest, besides being a recreational sport for farmers. PETA, on the other hand, has been arguing that the agitators in Karnataka have taken a leaf out of the pro-Jallikattu protesters' book and begun to falsely label PETA India as 'foreign' and were now calling for banning the organisation. Facing growing demand for holding Kambala, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has said an ordinance could be brought in, if necessary, to allow the event after seeking legal opinion. He had also asked the Centre to take a favourable stand on Kambala as it did on Jallikattu, where both Tamil Nadu and Central governments, after facing public pressure moved swiftly to facilitate the sport. By all means, build a wall on the border, but dont make Mexico pay for it. It was a great and by great I mean effective, not noble or heroic applause line from then-candidate Trump on the campaign trail. Audiences loved it, particularly the call-and-response. Trump: Whos going to pay for it? The crowd: MEXICO! But the campaign is over and so is fun time. If the wall is worth having, its worth paying for. On Thursday morning, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto abruptly cancelled his planned meeting with Donald Trump because the American president gave him no choice. Nieto was willing to go ahead with the meeting, despite the fact Trump had signed an executive order commencing work on a wall. But then in an interview Trump said that if Nieto wasnt willing to commit Mexico to paying for the wall, he shouldnt bother coming. What else could Nieto do? The Greek historian Thucydides argued that countries go to war for three reasons: honor, fear and interest. He put honor first, and yet that is probably the least appreciated aspect of foreign policy today. Historian Donald Kagan, in his essay Honor, Interest, Nation-State, recounts how since antiquity, nations have put honor ahead of interest. For the last 2,500 years, at least, states have usually conducted their affairs and have often gone to war for reasons that would not pass the test of vital national interests posed by modern students of politics. On countless occasions, he continues, states have acted to defend or foster a collection of beliefs and feelings that ran counter to their practical interests and have placed their security at risk, persisting in their course even when the costs were high and the danger was evident. Americans instinctively understand this when our own honor is at stake. The rallying cry during the Barbary Wars, Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute, has almost become part of the national creed. I am no fan of Karl Marx, but he was surely right when he observed that shame is a kind of anger turned in on itself. And if a whole nation were to feel ashamed it would be like a lion recoiling in order to spring. Both the first and second world wars cannot be properly understood without taking the role national honor plays in foreign affairs. Similarly, Vladimir Putins constant testing of the West only makes sense when you take into account the despots core conviction that the fall of the Soviet Union was a blow to Russian prestige and honor. Now, I dont think a war with Mexico is in the cards, even if the Trump administration were to figure out a way to get Mexico to foot the bill for a border wall. But forcing them to pay for it would be a punitive and gratuitous act of humiliation. Expecting a democratically elected president of a sovereign and allied nation to, in effect, grovel to the United States is the equivalent of asking him to drink poison. Across Mexico, the wall itself is despised as an insult. Thats too bad. And while I dont think we need some visible-from-space Great Wall of American Greatness stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific, America has every right to secure its borders in any way it sees fit. But asking Mexico to pay for it literally adds injury to insult. In economic terms theres little difference between asking them to pay for it and forcing them to build it themselves. No wonder virtually every sector of Mexican society sees the demand as an announcement of a humiliation, in the words of Mexican political analyst Jesus Silva-Herzog Marquez. The former head of the Mexican Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) described the demand as spitting in the face of Agustin Basave Benitez, the foreign minister who set up the presidential meeting. President Trump insists that he wants a good relationship with Mexico and that a wall would be a win-win for the two countries. Maybe. But Trumps win-win calculus is based upon an analysis of simple national interests. A wall would, Trump argues, curtail drug-trafficking and stop the flow of Central American immigrants through Mexico. Thats the case Trump wanted to make at his presidential meeting. And, again, he might be right. But nations dont just act on their interests; they act on their honor. And shouting Youll pay! is a surefire way of guaranteeing no one will hear anything else. Jonah Goldberg is an editor-at-large of National Review Online and a visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. You can email him at JonahsColumn@aol.com. A magistrate court here today adjourned the hearing in the RSS defamation case involving Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi till March 3 for recording of his plea. "The date granted for recording of his (Rahul's) plea (which is equivalent to framing of charges) is March 3," said Magistrate Tushar Vaze, adjourning the case. The case against Rahul was filed by a local RSS functionary Rajesh Kunte over the former's speech in Bhiwandi on March 6, 2014 in the run up to Lok Sabha polls. During the rally, Rahul had allegedly claimed, "The RSS people had killed Gandhi." Prior to the adjournment, Rahul's lawyer Ashok Mundergi and Narayan Iyer told the court that they have not received the copy of the entire newspaper (which published the news item on the Congress leader) but only the cuttings. Mundergi told the court that he will have to go through the entire documents and he will argue if needed, before the plea is recorded. He then, along with Iyer, moved an adjournment application. However, Nandu Phadke, advocate of the complainant in the case, urged the court that Rahul's plea may be recorded today but his request was turned down. Rahul arrived in the court here at around 12.30 PM amid tight security accompanied by senior Congress leaders Ashok Chavan and Sanjay Nirupam, besides party supporters. As the magistrate was dictating some order in another case, Rahul was made to wait till 1.30 PM before his case was called out. He was seen exchanging pleasantries and speaking with Kunte. Later, in a brief interaction with waiting mediapersons outside the court, Rahul said, "My fight is against the ideology which killed Gandhiji. I remember Gandhiji. My fight is against the ideology which removed his poster from Khadi (KVIC) posters. "Gandhiji is in the heart of every Indian. He was killed but his thought can't be erased," Rahul, who was heading for a rally in poll-bound state of Goa, said. At the last hearing in November, the Bhiwandi court had granted him bail in the case after former Union Minister Shivraj Patil stood as surety. When Mundargi had requested for a date and sought the court to exempt Rahul from personal appearance, owing to his political commitments, the complainant's lawyer had urged that Rahul may be treated as an "ordinary citizen" and adjourned the hearing till today. On September 1 last year, Rahul had preferred to face the trial as an accused in the defamation case, submitting before the Supreme Court that he stood by "every word" of his statement. The Congress Vice President had expressed his readiness to face the trial after the apex court refused to interfere with the proceedings pending against him before the trial court. He had then withdrawn the appeal filed by him against the Bombay High Court judgement refusing to quash the defamation case and summons issued to him by the trial court. The apex court also declined Rahul's plea that he be exempted from personal appearance before the Bhiwandi court which had taken cognisance of the complaint of the RSS functionary by summoning him as an accused in the case. US President Donald Trump's travel ban on citizens from mainly Muslim countries is illegal and "mean-spirited", the United Nations human rights chief Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein said today. Zeid, who rarely communicates on Twitter, said in a tweet that "discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law", adding that "the US ban is also mean-spirited and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism." Trump on Friday signed an executive order suspending the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely -- and barring citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The measures introduced a week after his inauguration were fiercely criticised over the weekend, although UN reactions were largely tepid. The UN bodies most directly engaged with migration -- the UN refugee agency and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) -- issued a statement on Saturday which made no mention of the executive order and stopped far short of condemning it. Instead, the agencies urged the US to "continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution." They also vowed "to engage actively and constructively with the US Government... to protect those who need it most". Researchers have found that three-quarters of primate species are in decline, and about 60% are now threatened with extinction. Hence, concrete steps are necessary to save them, reports Carl Zimmer. Our fellow primates are in trouble. In a study of unprecedented scope, a team of 31 primatologists has analysed every known species of primate to judge how they are faring. The news for mans closest animal relatives is not good. Three-quarters of primate species are in decline, the researchers found, and about 60% are now threatened with extinction. From gorillas to gibbons, primates are in significantly worse shape now than in recent decades because of the devastation from agriculture, hunting and mining. I think were going to get quite a number of extinctions within next 50 years if things go on the way they are, said Dr Anthony B Rylands, a senior research scientist at Conservation International, USA and a co-author of the new study, which was published in Science Advances. Taking stock of every primate species on Earth was a huge challenge, in part because scientists keep finding new ones. Since 2000, 85 new primate species have been identified, bringing the total to 505. Scientists are finding so many new primate species in part because the destruction of forests is making it easier to reach populations that were once remote. Another reason for the burst of discovery is that scientists have started investigating the DNA of primates, finding that some populations had unique mutations. The new research was not all bad news for primates. Some species are doing OK, said Dr Katherine C MacKinnon, an anthropologist at Saint Louis University, USA and a co-author of the study. The ones that are doing OK are the ones that arent super-specialists, the ones that are most flexible. But most species are not so flexible. Every species of ape is threatened (including gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, orangutans and 19 species of gibbons), while 87% of lemur species are. Other species that are critically endangered include the brown-headed spider monkey of Ecuador, the Niger Delta red colobus, and the crested macaque, an Indonesian species famous for having taken a selfie with a photographers camera. Pushing to the edge Its worse than we thought 10 years ago, Katherine said. She and her colleagues identified a number of human activities pushing primates to the edge, such as hunting. In West Africa, for example, there is a strong demand in local markets for primate meat. The forests are still standing, but theyve shot everything out of it, said Anthony. The incentives to kill primates are not only local, though. A lot of primate meat is making its way to China, along with body parts falsely believed to have healing powers. Primates are also threatened by the wholesale destruction of forests to make way for agriculture. In the Amazon, the jungle is being converted to cattle ranches and soybean fields, while in Madagascar, paddy fields are taking the place of lemur forests. Western countries are also helping push primates towards extinction. Palm oil can be found in everything from doughnuts to lipstick to biodiesel fuel. New palm oil plantations are completely replacing forests in Southeast Asia one of the most primate-diverse parts of the world. Even cellphones can add to the risks. In central Africa, miners go into rain forests to dig for an ore called coltan that ends up in phone circuits. Those miners hunt for their meals. They live on primates, said Anthony. Humans have already driven some primate species extinct, but it is hard to say exactly how many. Madagascar was once home to giant lemurs that could weigh as much as 350 pounds. While Western scientists never laid eyes on these remarkable creatures, the fossil record shows that 17 lemur species became extinct after humans arrived there 2,000 years ago. More recently, a monkey called Miss Waldrons red colobus has disappeared from its range in West Africa. It has not been spotted for over 25 years and is believed to be extinct. Some of the most endangered primate species are down to just a few dozen survivors. Their prospects are grim because many of them live in parts of the world where human populations are projected to grow the fastest. Halting the crisis The authors of the new study offer a number of reasons it is worth trying to halt the crisis. Recent research has shown that primates are extremely important to the ecosystems in which they live. As they feed on leaves and fruit, for example, they move pollen between trees. They pass seeds in their droppings, allowing plants to spread across a healthy range. People used to think of primates as icing on the cake, as not being vital for ecosystems, said Katherine. But now we know they are. Primates have also been invaluable for understanding ourselves. The first primates evolved roughly 80 million years ago, and then split into the living lineages over millions of years. By comparing our biology to those of other primates, we have learned about the evolution of our brains, our vision and our vulnerability to diseases. If those species become extinct, we will lose the opportunity to learn more. While the prospects are dire, Anthony said there were concrete steps that can be taken to help primates. You have to stop hunting them and give them a place to live, he said. That is easier said than done, he acknowledged, since the local communities where primates live are often struggling to feed their families. In some cases, it may be possible to take the pressure off primates by building fish farms as an alternate source of protein. In other cases, communities may be able to make more money over the long term from tourist operations in intact forests than from slash-and-burn agriculture. Anthony pointed to the golden lion tamarin as an example of how a primate species can be saved. It once lived in huge numbers in the Atlantic coastal forests of Brazil. After the forests were nearly wiped out to make way for sugar plantations and other forms of agriculture, the species nearly vanished. In 1983, the US National Zoo led an international effort to bring them back. Monkeys were bred in captivity, forests were conserved and hunting was banned. Today, the species has a small but stable population of some 3,500 individuals in the wild. There are cases where you can bring them back from the brink, said Anthony. But the immensity of the destruction of tropical forests makes it very difficult. Growing up in India, Manu Prakash entertained himself with a bottle cap that spun around on two strings that he tugged with his fingers. As a physical biologist at Stanford University in California, he is now transforming that simple toy, called a whirligig, into a cheap tool to help diagnose diseases such as malaria. Manu started this project, the results of which were published in Nature Biomedical Engineering on January 10, 2017, after a research trip to Uganda in 2013. While visiting health care clinics, he noticed that most lacked a working centrifuge or the electricity to power one and could not separate blood samples to perform basic disease diagnostics. One clinic used its broken centrifuge as a doorstop, says Manu, a 2016 MacArthur genius grant winner who has also invented a foldable paper microscope. When we got back from Africa, we asked ourselves, Can we do centrifugation with no electricity, using only human power? Other researchers have come up with low-tech, inexpensive centrifuges that used salad spinners and egg beaters, but these devices could manage only about 1,200 rotations per minute and took too long to process samples, says Manu. Hoping to do better, his team went on a shopping spree to a toy store, collecting spinning gizmos and filming them with a high-speed camera. Yo-yos spun too slowly (and required training to use). But whirligigs were both easy to operate and reached speeds of 10,000 rpm, comparable to a commercial centrifuge. Delighted by the whirligigs performance, the researchers began exploring the mathematics underlying it in the hope of making improvements. Video footage revealed that the toys strings not only twist around each other as they wind and unwind, but also form coils similar to structures found in DNA. Solving the equations that describe the forces behind that coiling revealed the specifications for an ideal whirligig from the size of its disc to the thickness of its strings capable of spinning a million times per minute. Human hands cannot spin the toy fast enough to hit that theoretical limit. But a new design made in the lab achieved 125,000 rpm submitted to Guinness World Records last year as the fastest device to rotate with human power. Hiding in plain sight What makes this really special is that it takes something simple and reveals something superbly useful hiding just under our noses, says Tadashi Tokieda, an applied mathematician at the University of Cambridge. After optimising the whirligig, Manu and his team then mounted plastic tubes for holding blood samples onto their paper device. Their final prototype, dubbed the paperfuge, can reach 20,000 rpm, separating plasma from blood in 1.5 minutes, and malaria parasites in 15 minutes. Whether health care workers will be willing to spend that much time powering the paperfuge either in a health care facility or out in the field remains to be seen. Manu has partnered with the health care nonprofit PIVOT in Boston for a clinical trial in Madagascar, which will assess not only how easy the device is to use, but also its durability and reliability compared with commercial centrifuges. We dont know yet if the paperfuge will work, says Matt Bonds, PIVOT co-founder and an economist at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It would take a lot of evidence to convince people to abandon modern centrifuges, but having available as an alternative could open up a world of new possibilities. Nitin Rakesh, the newly appointed Chief Executive Officer of mid-tier IT services provider Mphasis, has said the company will focus on continuity of business and geographic expansion. In an interaction with DH, Rakesh said the company has its solid footing in banking and financial service vertical. There is continuity of a lot of things that involves business, and that will really be the focus, especially on accelerating within that continuity, he said. Rakesh replaces CEO Ganesh Ayyar after becoming the Additional Director on the Board at Mphasis with effect from January 29. Besides focusing on the platforms already established, Rakesh said the company will expand its presence in other geographies. We are currently running a majority of our business in the United States and looking at expanding our base to Europe. There is a lot of opportunities in the continental Europe. With our new product offering, Mphasis can do better in these geographies, he said. Mphasis, acquired by private equity giant Blackstone from HP Enterprise for over $1 billion last year, is looking at the former CEO and President of Syntel to expand its business. Rakesh said the company will avail its intellectual property, automation and cognitive solution to take the company to next level. Amidst chill in Indo-Pak ties, Pakistan has declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend South Asian Speakers' Summit to be held next month. "Pakistan and Myanmar which were among the countries in the South Asian nations invited to the Speakers' meet in Indore on February 18-19 have declined the invitation," official sources in New Delhi said. India had invited the Speaker of the National Assembly of Pakistan, Sardar Auaz Sadiq, for the regional summit. In Islamabad, a senior official said Sadiq would not be able to participate in the summit due to crucial national engagements. The official told PTI that the schedule of the summit clashes with an important session of the National Assembly, the lower house of parliament. "The Speaker would be needed to chair the crucial session and we have already conveyed this to India," the official said. The Summit, which is primarily an IPU initiative and not a SAARC activity, will be attended by Speakers of Parliament from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka among other countries, the sources said. Significantly, in 2015, India had boycotted a Commonwealth Parliamentary Union (CPU) meeting in Islamabad to protest against Pakistan's decision to not invite the Speaker of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. The discussions during the Speakers' Summit on achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will update the participants on implementation of the SDGs in their region and globally. Special emphasis will be laid on sharing experiences and increasing understanding about how parliaments in the region institutionalise the global goals, capture the synergies and build coherence at the policy level, IPU said on its website. Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has said that officials should give priority to providing rations to the poor after which they should weed out bogus ration cards. He made these observations on Monday in Bengaluru while reviewing drought relief work across Karnataka. He wanted officials to take up relief work on war footing utilising state funds instead of waiting for funds from the Centre. Deputy commissioners and chief executive officers of zilla panchayats are in Bengaluru to attend the two-day review meeting. He said nearly 1.08 lakh families are benefiting from the Anna Bhagya scheme. The food and civil supplies department is trying to remove bogus claimants and this is a welcome move. But the priority should be to identify the needy, he emphasised. Siddaramaiah said the unit system adopted for distributing rations has deprived people of sufficient rations. Many government schemes are not being properly implemented in certain districts. Taking bribes alone is not corruption. Even delay in execution of work amounts to corruption, he added. Pointing out that Karnataka was witnessing one of its worst droughts in the last 46 years, Siddaramaiah said the state government had sought Rs 4,702 crore from the Centre for drought relief works. The Centre sanctioned Rs 1,782 crore to the state but not a single paisa has been released till date. The Centre has been falsely blaming the state that grants released previously have not been utilised, Siddaramaiah said. Siddaramaiah said officials should clarify the factual position. Why are you silent? he asked officials. The review meeting will continue on Tuesday. Ninety-year-old Indira, arguably the oldest tusker in Karnataka, died at the Sakrebailu elephant camp near here early on Monday morning. Indira was brought to Sakrebailu in 1968 along with two other elephants, Balarama and Bhaskar. The elephants had been captured during the Khedda operation at Kakanakote near Mysuru. While Balarama and Bhaskar were later sent to Mysuru and Kerala, respectively, Indira was retained at Sakrebailu, said Shivashankar, Deputy Conservator of Forests, Wildlife, Shivamogga division. The average lifespan of an elephant is 70 but Indira lived an exceptionally longer life, veterinarian Vinay told DH. It remained healthy for many years. Its health slumped when it lost an eye about 10 years ago, which made its search for food difficult. A few weeks ago, it lost another eye. This greatly inconvenienced the elephant and it stopped taking food, Vinay said. Indira had delivered a male calf in 1978 and a female one in 1983. They were named Lakshmeesha and Usha, respectively. Lakshmeesha was handed over to Udupi Mutt while Usha was sent to the Kerala forest, he added. Indira was cremated in the camp after the post-mortem. With its death, the number of elephants at Sakrebailu has reduced to 22, a source in the Forest department said. The High Court of Karnataka has ordered that emergent notices be issued to the state government, the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGUHS) and the Public Works Department on a petition against the gazette notification to shift the varsitys campus from Bengaluru to Ramanagaram. The petition, filed by students and faculty at the RGUHS, argues that the government erred in its decision to relocate the university without assessing the difficulties that the employees, faculty and students would face. Not only that, the government disregarded the fact that the university utilises its own funds to provide the best infrastructure for students and employees, and that the government has not funded any of the activities of the university. The university will function out of the deputy commissioners office in Ramanagaram till it gets a permanent campus. The petitioners said it would be a burden on the university if it has to spend on the infrastructure in a temporary building and then spend on a permanent campus on the assumption that the acquired land would be free from litigation. The petitioners told the court they are concerned about the difficulties that would arise from the relocation of the universitys campus, and sought stay on the notification. Plea against KMVT Act. The High Court of Karnataka on Monday ordered that notices be issued to the state government and the Transport Department on a PIL challenging the definition of cost of vehicle in the Karnataka Motor Vehicles Taxation Act, 1957. The nonprofit, Dove Drive Without Borders Foundation, has challenged several sections and sub-sections of the Act, which permit Karnataka to levy higher tax on new cars than other states. The NGO pointed out that to increase the tax, Karnataka has indirectly altered other tax components, based on which tax under the Act is calculated, without actually amending the said law. It has demanded that the quantum of tax to be imposed under the Act be calculated on the basis of the cost of the motor vehicle (price of the motor vehicle excluding all other tax components), and urged the court to declare the sections and sub-sections of the Act unconstitutional. A division bench of Chief Justice S K Mukherjee and Justice R B Budihal ordered the notices and adjourned the hearing. Take a breath, America. People are only freaking out because our new president is a Republican. Today, most Americans agree Ronald Reagan was one of our greatest, most effective presidents.Back in the 1980s, the press ran editorials and quoted experts in news stories explaining why Reagan was sure to nuke the world. Genesis had a hit song and video, Land of Confusion, expressing and exploiting these same fears. Instead, Reagan won the cold war and down came the Berlin wall. Genesis broke up, Phil Collins went on to a financially rewarding solo career and songwriter Mike Rutherford went on to write arguably some of the best songs of his life. (Yeah, even though I disagree with their politics, you cant deny Mikes lyrical and musical brilliance or Phils technical skills in developing a repetitive build to crescendo.) America went on to job growth and economic expansion. On January 20th, the Huffington Post filled their post-inauguration home page with a giant black font that filled the screen, shrieking, Trump Gets Nuclear Codes! Time for a Genesis comeback? Also predictable, which I did because I only make easy predictions, left-wingers are going nuts in the streets, on social media and in many other public places. The party that demanded Trump accept the outcome of the election refuses to accept the outcome themselves, smashing windows, burning cars, assaulting police and marching in the street wearing costumes representing female genitalia. Oddly, these costumes were featured in parades along with protesters demanding the U.S. become gender neutral. Thousands didnt get the memo. An older woman was escorted from a plane this week because she was berating people who voted for Trump, asking the Baltimore travelers if they were there to protest or celebrate.One of her verbal victims replied that he was in town to celebrate democracy. She, too, was troubled that his vote might have put the nuclear codes in the hands of a Republican. Complaining that the presumed Trump voter sitting in his assigned seat next to her was in my space, police came and asked her to leave. Passengers applauded her removal from the plane. She seemed genuinely surprised that she, the accoster, was escorted out instead of the man who destroyed her world by voting for the candidate she sincerely fears. During the presidency of George W. Bush, wealthy liberals created a nationwide radio syndication they called, Air America. It was a propaganda machine, though they failed to draw enough listeners to keep it afloat. They did, however, manage to draw the attention of the Secret Service by engaging in Assassination Chic. The star host of these segments was Randi Rhodes, who created radio skits with gunshot sound effects and crude comments directed at President Bush. Recently, a Kentucky burlesque dancer who also worked for an insurance company thought it would be meaningful to request someone assassinate President Trump. She lost both jobs, her talent agency representation and any possibility of an award for best use of Twitter. A writer for Saturday Night Live, Katie Rich, thought it would be fun to bully Trumps 10 year-old son, Barron, as a potential serial killer. Rightfully and quite unexpectedly, SNL suspended Katie. Good to know its still outre for liberals to target a Presidents child. Still, there is more violence from the left than has ever been performed by the Tea Party. This is to be expected.Fear is rampant, funded and fueled by a number of left-wing organizations, over fifty of them funded by billionaire George Soros, per research by liberal feminist Asra Q. Nomani at the New York Times. You can also expect to read experts predicting when Trump will nuke some feared country. How do I know? Flashback to Bush 43, when ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern toured the country, predicting exactly which month(s) Bush would nuke Iran. He was a liberal star, baby. Perhaps some are still fearfully waiting for his predictions to come true. Rick Jensen, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate, is Delawares award-winning conservative talk show host on WDEL. Email him at rick@wdel.com. Transport authorities on Monday gave app-based cab aggregators Ola and Uber three days to shut down ride-sharing but said they could resume the service after getting permission from the state government. Transport Commissioner M K Aiyappa said Ola Share and uberPOOL, which involve picking up individual passengers from different locations and dropping them at the destination of their choice, violated the Motor Vehicles Act. These operators work with contract carriage permit, which means they cannot pick up passengers from different locations. They agreed that the share service was illegal and sought three days to stop it, he added. The official, however, said that under 66.3J of the transport rules, a change could be made in the permit if it was in public interest. We are not against the cab share service. If it is in the interest of people, let the companies approach us with a request. We will forward their case to the state government which will take a decision, he said. When it was brought to his notice that the share service involves security issues, Aiyappa said the cab aggregators should first get permit for the feature and that the issue of security would be taken up later. Transport Minister Ramalinga Reddy, however, told DH that the companies needed to prove that their service benefited the people. It is the governments job to serve the people. If there is any provision in law (allowing permission for stage carriage), we will consider their request, he said. The minister said the app-based cab aggregators followed the rule only when it was forced on them. They have run the share service illegally for all these days. Now, they are being forced to approach us. Why cant they take permit before starting such a service, he said. Ola and Uber drivers have said the cab sharing service lacked safety guidelines. In case an individual assaults a woman passenger or robs a fellow rider, drivers will be held responsible. Why should we suffer for the mistake of a passenger, asked Tanveer Pasha, leader of a drivers union. When asked why the Transport Department had allowed the share services for months, the commissioner said they didnt have any complaints or information in that regard. Now, we have given three days. After that, we will crack down on cabs offering share services without permit, he said. Nearly 2,000 police personnel were promoted at a ranking ceremony hosted by the Bengaluru city police at Palace Grounds on Monday. Home Minister G Parameshwara awarded head constable badges to police constables who were promoted and single stars on head constables who were promoted as assistant sub-inspectors. In all, 1,888 police personnel from the city police constabulary were promoted, 152 of them women. A majority of them were from the City Armed Reserve and the others from law and order and traffic. The home minister congratulated the constables, some of who were promoted after 20 years of service. He also said up to 1,000 police personnel will be promoted next month. The rank of a constable is equivalent to that of a second division assistant in the revenue department. But after 15-20 years of service, an SDA would get promoted as deputy tahsildar, whereas a constable remains a constable. I took this up with the chief minister who readily understood the issue and asked me to resolve it, Parameshwara said. The minister also proposed several schemes for the welfare of policemen including revision of salaries on a par with the pay commission by setting up a committee. The minister also promised a Police Bhavan and a Police University in Bengaluru. We are working on making loans easily accessible to policemen as nobody offers them loans. We will talk to nationalised banks for home and vehicle loans for policemen and education loans for their children, said Parameshwara. The home minister also felicitated DG&IGP Om Prakash who will retire on Tuesday. I feel proud that I will retire as an officer and not as a constable, said D N Hanumantharayappa, who was promoted as ASI, attached to the City Armed Reserve. Hanumantharayappa had served as a police constable for 27 years and head constable for seven years. Our batch is lucky as a few of us got promoted after nine years of service compared to our seniors who worked for 24 years for their first promotion, said Nandeesh P of Subramanyapura police station, who got promoted as head constable. The state government will attempt to create education complexes on a pilot basis in the coming academic year, said primary and secondary education minister Tanveer Sait. We will start one Urdu school in each taluk, with support from the minorities department, and one Kannada medium school. The schools will be in two stages of Class 1 to 8 and 9 to 12, Sait said, speaking to DH. Cluster-level surveys for the implementation of the pilot have been undertaken and training of teachers has begun, he said. Existing infrastructure will be used for the purpose. He was participating in a workshop and convention on education organised by Karnataka State High School Assistant Masters Association on Monday. The government had received a report which suggests the present divisions such as lower primary school, higher primary school, high school and higher secondary, be consolidated. An education complex which houses classes 1 to 12 is the need of the hour and this practice exists elsewhere in the education sector. It may help to ensure retention of students and minimise dropouts. To test it out, we are undertaking this pilot project, he said. The government wants to run the schools on the model of Adarsha Vidyalaya - schools set up under the centrally sponsored scheme Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan (RMSA). Several primary school teachers were concerned about their seniority being affected by such a move but I have promised them that this will not be affected, he said. Further, he added that the No Detention Policy will be rolled back to Class 5 starting from the next academic year. Sait said that in urban areas, as far as possible, it will be ensured that students do not write the exams in their own school. Students will be allotted exam centres different from their schools to ensure that the exams are conducted fairly. In rural areas, it has been planned to consolidate two to three villages or one hobli and have one exam centre. Since rural students may find it difficult to travel, we will make some changes to the plan, he said. The girl was found dead late on Sunday on the ninth floor of the Infosys facility in Phase II of the Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park at Hinjewadi on the outskirts of Pune city. The victim hailed from Kozhikode district of Kerala and worked as a system engineer with Infosys. The Pune police swung into action and arrested Saikia, hailing from Assam. The police said Infosys officials told them that Rasila had the day off on Sunday, but had come to work on a project and was in touch with colleagues at the companys Bengaluru office. But when her supervisor could not get through to her over phone late on Sunday, someone in the Hinjewadi office was asked to check on her. However, she was found strangulated to death with a computer cable. The suspect was identified on the basis of CCTV footage. Police teams were sent out to several locations following which he was trapped. We have arrested the suspect, Deputy Commissioner of Police Ganesh Shinde said. The police scanned the CCTV footage and saw Rasila entering the room at 3.05 pm and coming out for a break around 5 pm. Later, Saikia followed her in the office, though he was not authorised to enter that area. This led to suspicion of the guards involvement. A day after a software engineer was strangulated to death at her workstation on the Infosys campus in Pune, a security guard who was on the run was arrested from Mumbai. Twenty-three-year-old Rasila Raju O P had objected to Bhaben Saikia (26), a security guard, staring at her and threatened to complain to his superiors. The man killed her in a fit of rage. Samajwadi Party (SP) patron Mulayam Singh Yadav is said to have asked his loyalists to file nomination papers against the Congress in 105 seats. Mulayams son, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, had left those seats for his ally to contest in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections. Mulayams frustration is not limited to his failure to stop the SP from having a truck with the Congress, but many of his loyalists in the party were sidelined by Akhilesh after an intense family feud. Mulayams latest move means that the Congress will have to face rebel SP candidates in the remaining five phases, since nominations for the first two beginning February 11 is closed. Mulayams threat comes a day after he expressed his unhappiness on the SP-Congress coalition. Mulayam had also said that he will not campaign for them and had lamented that many of his loyalists future was spoilt due to the alliance. Akhilesh, who has been giving restrained reactions on his fathers comment since the dispute between the two played out in the open, courteously rejected Mulayams stand on the new alliance to check the resurgent BJP in the state. He expressed confidence over the chances of his father joining the campaign and said that if the coalition wins, Mulayams respect will go up by many notches. If we win, it will be Mulayam Singh whose respect will increase the most, Akhilesh said while addressing a rally in Etah. With the Trump administration mounting pressure, Pakistani authorities tonight put Mumbai attack mastermind and Jammat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed and four others under detention under an Anti-Terrorism Act. Saeed was at Masjid-e-Qudsia Chauburji in Lahore when police descended there to implement the order of detention issued by Punjab Province's Interior Ministry yesterday in pursuance to a directive from the Federal Interior Ministry on January 27, JuD activists and Pakistani media said. He "is at Masjid-e-Qudsia Chauburji and a heavy contingent of police has surrounded the JuD headquarters," JuD official Ahmed Nadeem, who was present at the premises of the outfit, told PTI by phone. "The commanding police officer told us that he has with him the house arrest order of the JuD chief issued by the Punjab Home Department," Nadeem said. "We are going to shift Hafiz Saeed from Masjid Al-Qudsia Chauburji to his Jauhar Town residence to place him under house arrest on the order of the government," a senior police officer told PTI. Saeed's residence has been declared sub-jail, he said. National flags were hoisted at the JuD offices in Lahore, instead of party flags, on the directives of provincial home department, local media reports said. The provincial authorities have also started to remove the banners of JuD from the roads of Lahore, the reports said. Nadeem said the Pakistani government had been under pressure from the United States to take action against Saeed or face sanctions. "This government has buckled under the pressure," he said. Three days back, Punjab's Ministry of Interior had included names of Saeed and four others -- Abdullah Ubaid, Zafar Iqbal, Abdur Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Niaz -- in the Watch List as per UNSC 1267 Sanctions and ordered their preventive detention. Ubaid, Iqbal, Abid and Niaz were also also taken into preventive custody, Pakistani media reported. Punjab government's action comes amidst pressure on Pakistan from the Trump administration that it must take action against JuD and Saeed to avoid sanctions. JuD is the front for the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror outfit which is responsible for numerous terror attacks in India, including the Mumbai terror strike of November 26,2008, which was masterminded by Saeed. In a notification issued on January 27, Pakistan's Interior Ministry had said "...on the basis of report sent by Ministry of Foreign Affairs ..., the Federal government, having reasons to believe, that Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) organisation is engaged in certain activities which could be prejudicial to peace and security and in violation of Pakistan's obligations to the United Nations Security Council Resolution No 1267." It directed the Punjab government to put the organisation on the Watch List. In a similar order, the Federal government directed putting Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF) on the Watch List for a period of 6 months, which is extendable. Citing these directives from the Federal governent, Punjab's Ministry of Interior had issued an order yesterday, in which it "placed Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF) and Jamaat-Ud-Dawa (JUD) on the Watch List and have listed these organizations in the Second Schedule of the ATA 1997 (as amended)". Under this section of ATA, the government has the power to arrest and detain suspected persons. "Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, Abdullah Ubaid, Zafar Iqbal, Abdur Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Niaz are reportedly active members of the aforementioned organizations within the meaning of Section 11EEE(1) of the ATA 1997 (as amended). As such, they must be placed under preventive detention," the order said. The notification asked the Home Secretary to "kindly direct the concerned agencies to move and take necessary action" as the matter "is most urgent". Earlier during the day, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said the PML-N government was taking steps to "fulfil our obligations" with regard to JuD. The organisation [JuD] has been under observation since 2010-11. Since it has also been listed by the UN Security Council [Sanctions Committee], we are bound to take some steps. We are taking those steps to fulfill our obligations, he told reporters after inaugurating a passport office in Islamabad. JuD has already been declared as a foreign terrorist organisation by the United States in June 2014. Saeed also carries a reward of USD 10 million announced by the US for his role in terror activities. A few hours before his detention, Saeed said he does not care if his organisation faces any "curbs" for raising voice for "oppressed Kashmiris". "I don't care if the government places some curbs on us on the pressure of the United States and India. India is putting pressure on Pakistan through the US to take action against us," Saeed said while talking to a group of senior journalists here at a local hotel this afternoon. He warned the Nawaz Sharif government that the JuD would move court if any curbs were placed on it. Saeed said the JuD would hold a march from Lahore to Islamabad and Karachi to Islamabad to put pressure on the government to raise the issue of Kashmir at international fora. The High Court on Monday refused to vacate a stay on the buffalo racing sport of Kambala. A division bench comprising Chief Justice SK Mukherjee and Justice R B Budihal said, No Kambala. The District Kambala Committee and others had appealed against the stay. The court will hear the case again in two weeks. The organisers cited the Karnataka Cabinets decision to amend the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act of 1960 to list Kambala and bullock cart racing as traditional sports. The petitioners also contended Tamil Nadus ordinance in favour of the bull-taming sport of Jallikattu had received the Centres approval. The bench, however, observed the Jallikattu ordinance was coming up for hearing on Tuesday at the Supreme Court. We would not like to hear a matter similar to that, it said. Justice Mukherjee said the buffalo was not a performing animal, and the stay could not be vacated. People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) India, in a public interest petition, had sought quashing of a notification dated December 17, 2015, allowing the coastal Karnataka sport under certain conditions. The Karnataka governments department of animal husbandry and fisheries had issued the notification. The Animal Welfare Board of India (AWBI) had recorded 65 complaints of non-cognisable offence. Yet, the authorities had filed just one FIR in connection with three Kambala events between December 2014 and January 2015, the petitioners had submitted to the court. All three events, PETA contended, had displayed gross cruelty towards the animals and violated several laws, besides an apex court order. In the wake of the success of the agitation for Jallikattu, people in Udupi and Dakshina Kannada districts have stepped up their demand for the restoration of Kambala. The Reserve Bank of India has decided to remove cash withdrawal limits for current accounts, cash credit accounts and overdraft accounts from February 1. The apex bank, however, retained the weekly withdrawal limit from savings account at Rs 24,000. On a review of the pace of remonetisation, it has been decided to partially restore status quo ante on limits placed on cash withdrawals from current accounts/ cash credit accounts/ overdraft accounts with immediate effect, the RBI said. Limits placed on cash withdrawals from ATMs stand withdrawn from February 1, 2017. However, banks may, at their discretion, have their own operating limits as was the case before November 8, 2016, the RBI added.The RBI also said that it is considering hiking withdrawal limit for savings account holders. The limits on savings bank accounts will continue for the present and are under consideration for withdrawal in the near future, the RBI said. Savings account holders were allowed to withdraw Rs 2,500 per day per card from November 8. The limit was raised to Rs 4,500 on December 30 and then to Rs 10,000 on January 16, 2017. Ahead of the presentation of the Union Budget, the Congress on Monday painted a grim picture of the economy, questioning the sense of optimism sought to be presented by the Centre. Former prime minister Manmohan Singh released a 78-page document titled The Real State of the Economy 2017 which claimed that the economy was not in a good shape. The IMF has projected that the growth rate of India this current fiscal year will not be 7.6% but 6.6%. Several other agencies have made similar projections, he said, adding that the economy not being in good shape was obvious. Former finance minister P Chidambaram questioned the Modi government on loss of jobs and investments, in his partys view, being reduced to a trickle. They are hiding behind the dazzle of an important number the GDP. But people are not dazzled by numbers, Chidambaram said. Congress member M V Rajeev Gowda, who put together the RSE report, said Prime Minister Narendra Modi had promised creation of two crore jobs every year, but in reality only 1.5 lakh jobs were created in 2016. The Congress claimed that new investment proposals have reduced to a trickle post-demonetisation and the quarter ending December 2016 saw only 404 such projects. The number of new projects had dropped to below 500 for the first time in a decade during the previous quarter (September 2016). The fall to close to just over 400 projects is a very sharp fall to a new low, the RSE document said. Gowda, who heads the AICC Research and Coordination Commitee, said even Modi's pet initiative 'Start-up India' has come a cropper as many start-up companies have closed shop. Chidambaram said the document released by the Congress was closer to the truth than what the Modi government would claim in the Economic Survey that is set to be presented to Parliament on Tuesday. The Economic Survey to be presented in Parliament may feature a chapter on universal basic income this year. Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian has promised to float the idea to let the government think over it. Universal basic income is a form of social security where the State transfers a sum of money to poor citizens to supplement their income to reach a certain threshold. In the Indian context, it may mean people below the poverty line. Recently Subramanian had said that his effort would be to add a new chapter in the Economic Survey of 2017. He had also argued that the scheme can be tried on a pilot basis in the most disadvantaged regions of the country. More recently even the Niti Aayog has come in favour of UBI. Its CEO Amitabh Kant has said that the government could try UBI in the form of interest-free loans to the poor. He has argued that UBI will be important in the context of disruption being caused in the job market through automation. But he also added that the government needed to do an in-depth analysis before launching such a scheme. A government official said that at this stage it would only be an idea to be discussed and debated since the country already has some social security programmes for the poor. Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, the world's largest public works programme, is one such programme which provides work and wages for 100 days in a year. It will be difficult for the government to replace such programmes and bring in UBI, he said but did not rule out a cost-benefit analysis at this stage. Among the critics of UBI is former finance minister P Chidambaram who said, UBI is not a novel idea. Countries that have a comprehensive social security scheme provide a cash payment as well as food coupons to persons entitled to receive social security benefits (the poor, unemployed, disabled, aged). In India, there is no comprehensive social security scheme. We have the MGNREGA scheme that bears a similarity to UBI. Recently, Switzerland turned down the idea of UBI by an overwhelming majority due to its financial implications. CET : ; Area residents may have noticed a new kind of traffic coming from Route OO in the last month. A group of mostly former Kentuckians belonging to the Mennonite faith are in the process of establishing a community of families between Fredericktown and Farmington, giving area leaders, business owners and community members the opportunity to extend a warm welcome to the Mennonites as they travel the area in their horse-drawn buggies. David Mazelin, one of the Mennonites who has moved to the area, said many of those coming to the area have traveled from Scottsville, Kentucky. We moved here from Kentucky, most of us, Mazelin said. Theres a few families that are coming from western Missouri. Mazelin said they chose the area because of its relative proximity to the communities in western Missouri and Scottsville, Kentucky. We have a group that we work with in western Missouri, and were getting full there in Scottsville so we decided to check in between the two settlements and this is what we found, Mazelin said. Mazelin said the Mennonites have found the area to be similar to the one they left in Kentucky, except there seems to be more wind. Making the transition even easier, Maslan said the people of St. Francois and Madison Counties have been very welcoming so far. Currently, there are four families who have made the move to the area, but Mazelin said there will eventually be 20 to 25 families living on the 900 acres the group purchased just off Route OO. Its going to take a few years, Mazelin said. Theres going to be eight families coming in this winter. What land isnt used for housing will be used to raise produce, much of which will be available for local sale. Well put up a stand down here by the road, Mazelin said. And we might sell some other things, too. The group is currently working on constructing houses and preparing for the arrival of other families. Fredericktown City Administrator Doug Friend said he was approached by some members of the Mennonite group and asked about the possibility of accommodations being made in the way of parking locations for their horse-drawn buggies. The city is currently considering locations to install hitching posts for that purpose. Madison County installed a hitching post in a gravel parking lot north of the county courthouse near the sheriffs department. Local businesses have also made efforts to accommodate the Mennonites. According to Friend, Gifford Lumber Company has put a hitching post up on their property and other businesses have expressed a desire to do the same. Everyone that I talked to indicated they thought that was a good idea, Friend said. I would think if they do any amount of trade there, then they would accommodate them. Mazelin said the traffic in Farmington causes some difficulty in comparison to travelling in Fredericktown, but the group is doing business in both towns. While there are many variations within the larger Mennonite faith, the core beliefs are largely similar to those at the center of most modern protestant denominations, with a stronger emphasis on rejecting worldliness. For DESIGN SCENE Magazine January/February Issue Artist MAGNUS GJOEN sits down for an exclusive interview with our editor KATARINA DJORIC to talk about his fashion background, working with Vivienne Westwood (among other) and his creative process. GET YOUR COPY IN PRINT $24.90 AND DIGITAL $3.90 What made you switch from fashion design to art? I guess you can say Im an accidental artist. While working in fashion 5 years ago I moved into a new flat in London and started searching for art to hang on my walls. In the end I decided to do it myself and the rest has snowballed from there to me quitting my job 2 years later. I initially started doing ltd. ed. prints, which over the years have become more elaborate and with special finishes like gold leaf and diamond dust. As the demand for originals has increased, a lot of my time is now spent making these for specific shows and clients. How does your fashion background influence your art? Ive always thought Art is more important for fashion, although its impossible not to bring fashion into art. You are of course bombarded with images daily and these are stored in the subconscious while youre creating. You do bring a business element into the picture after having worked in fashion. I do often ask myself would people want this on their wall?. Sometimes you have to follow your instinct, but I dont believe in making art for yourself. Your art is mostly a reinterpretation of old concepts into contemporary climate. Do you have a feeling that everything is seen before and all we left is some sort of reinterpretation? My work is a lot of the time about rediscovery and taking things from the past and renewing it for the contemporary market. To breathe a bit of fresh air into dusty old paintings forgotten in the far corners of a museum or in its basement. Its also about presenting an object in a new light to the viewer who has innately been told that a specific object is negative. Beauty can also be found in a small piece of engineering like a gun. I dont think all that is left is reinterpretation, but I want people to engage in a different way with an old artwork. What kind of impact do you want to make with your art? What is the message? Art is about expanding the mind and exploring things and presenting it to the viewer as you want it. Its about capturing a memory or moment of whoever is looking at a piece and nudging their emotions; taking them back to that feeling, place or time. Tell me about your experience working as a graphic designer for Vivienne Westwood? One takes a wealth of experience as well as knowledge of how to, or in some cases not to do things. Every brand has their own way of doing things. Every brand Ive worked with has given me something which is part of my own process now. How does your path from an idea to final artwork look like? It usually starts with a trip to Italy. Now that I live full time back in London, I go to Italy for a few months in the summer exploring. Visiting every nook and cranny and churches on hill-tops for inspiration. Not only Italy of course, but I accumulate a wealth of inspiration from exhibitions and museums I go to and when I get back to London theyre all printed out into a huge mood-board. From there starts the creation and inspiration to make new pieces. From subject matter to finish. I use quite a lot of time doing digital mock-ups. Even if the final piece is a 3D object or painting I need to see it work on screen before it is made. In the case of the older paintings I use, they are often in need of digital restoration where you want to keep something as original as possible, however still remove water damage and scratches. It can take from 3 weeks to 3 years to finish a piece. Sometimes the best thing is to let something lay until you find the correct inspiration on how to finish it and execute that. What does your workspace look like? I would say everything has its place but is neither messy nor tidy. there is definitely no paint splatter on the floors. Who are your favorite artists? Living, I would say Robert Indiana and Im a big fan of Polly Morgan and her taxidermy art. Its provoking and intelligent. Michael Craig-Martin and his Pop Art everyday objects is another one which is simple and colourful, but nonetheless impactful. And favorite fashion designers? Comme des Garcons, Miuccia Prada and a bit of Jil Sander. Do you have any ambitions to work in fashion again? Maybe a collaboration? I loved working in fashion, but alas that part of my life is over. Most of my friends still work in fashion so I get my fashion fix from them. I get approached by people to do apparel collaborations from time to time but I have yet to find the right one. Do you draw inspiration from other art forms such as film or music? If anything furniture design and patterns. And are there any albums or films you would recommend? Im one of those people who will listen to most things from Beyonce to Hole and film wise I do like my Sci-Fi. Do you view the disposable aspect of social media as positive or negative in regards to your artwork? I would view it as positive. Art in the end of the day you can hang on your wall and keep, but also look at on a screen. If you really like something you want to live with it and hence have it on your wall. What is next for you? How would you like to see your work evolve in the future? I have a few collaborations which I have just finished and will embark on a few more after Christmas. I will hopefully be doing some new sculptures in the new year as well. For more of Gjoens work visit www.magnusgjoenart.com. GET YOUR COPY IN PRINT $24.90 AND DIGITAL $3.90 THIS Bollywood Actress Has Replaced Katrina Kaif As The Brand Ambassador For A Popular Brand! The WhiteSpace Alliance (WSA), a global industry organisation enabling sharing of underutilised spectrum, is working with the Government of India to bring cost-effective broadband services to its citizens. In a recent series of meetings with telecommunications regulatory and Ministry officials, WSA leadership promoted the use of available TV band channels (white spaces) to provide widespread broadband connectivity to support the nations Digital India initiative. WSA believes these unused TV Band channels can serve as fixed wireless access spectrum for middle- and last-mile connectivity to villages as well as many small and medium enterprises. This infrastructure could also support a wide range of e-Payment, e-Governance and e-Services applications. We had highly productive meetings with key members of the Indian Government, said Dr. Apurva N. Mody, Chairman of WhiteSpace Alliance. Utilising TV band spectrum can help make a digitally-empowered India a reality. Technical standards are in place, products are available and similar policy frameworks have already been implemented in other countries. With appropriate policies in place, the vision of Digital India can move forward rapidly, and even traditional wireless operators can have a play. Under the nations current program, BharatNet, Indias National Fibre Optic Network, is expected to provide a high speed backbone network to a central point within a cluster of villages known as Gram Panchayats. While last mile connectivity within individual villages could be supported by a variety of access methods such as Wi-Fi and/or LTE, the mechanisms to deploy cost-effective middle-mile connectivity between these network levels have not yet been specified. The powerful propagation characteristics of TV band spectrum make white space solutions ideal for providing such middle mile connectivity to rural and remote areas. Wired infrastructure is not cost effective to deploy in these situations, and vegetation makes line-of-sight wireless solutions unreliable. In addition, white space devices are easy to install, require relatively little power, and are reliable in difficult environmental conditions, minimizing ongoing implementation costs. "White space technologies overcome many cost barriers associated with large scale broadband deployments, said Hemant Mallapur, founder of WSA member Saankhya Labs. Better propagation means that signals travel longer distances, antennas can be deployed at rooftop height instead of on large towers, and network configurations dont require line-of-sight. Adoption of white space solutions continues to accelerate across many emerging markets. The Philippines have formally issued regulations, and deployments have begun. Regulations and field trials are also underway in Colombia, Indonesia, Malawi, Botswana and South Africa. White spaces have been recognised by both the International Telecommunications Union and the United Nations Commission on Science and Technology for Development as an important mechanism to bridge the global digital divide. Diabetes leads to more deaths in the US than was previously believed, according to new research. Scientists have suggested that diabetes is the third-leading cause of death in the US and accounts for 12 per cent of mortalities. Previous research reported that diabetes accounted for just four per cent of deaths in the US. While the findings are indeed concerning, there is no reason why people with diabetes cant go on to live long, healthy lives by keeping good control of their blood sugar levels, eating healthily and getting regular exercise. The research was based upon health records of people on the National Health Interview Survey and the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. The team looked at health trends and mortality rates in the population. They found that complications from diabetes can mask a single reason for a fatality, resulting in diabetes not being listed as the underlying cause of death as frequently as it should be. Diabetes is currently listed as the seventh most common reason for death by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), but the researchers are calling for changes to be made at a national level to counteract the growing effect diabetes is having in the US. In the case of diabetes, the burden is potentially obscured because of underreporting, said co-lead author Samuel Presto, a professor of sociology in the School of Arts and Sciences. Our work aims to reveal that diabetes is a much more important cause than is appreciated. The researchers added that their findings reinforce the need for robust population-level interventions aimed at diabetes prevention and care. The findings appear online in the PLOS ONE journal. District 117 Missouri Rep. Mike Henderson took a tour Friday of MCII, Inc., a sheltered workshop located in Farmington's Industrial Park to learn more about the business that provides employment opportunities for workers certified as eligible by the Missouri Division of Vocational Rehabilitation. The business, which is certified to operate as a sheltered workshop by the Missouri Department of Education, provides skilled subcontract labor for business and industry. It encompasses a 40,000 square foot facility built in 2004. Leading Henderson's tour was MCII General Manager Ginger Williams who was accompanied by Gil Kennon and Dale Wright, both longtime members of the workshop's board of directors. Henderson, R-Bonne Terre, strolled throughout the entire MCII facility, stopping at various work centers scattered throughout the building where employees were performing tasks that ranged from manufacturing parts to preparing finished products for shipping. Williams would explain the various tasks and stopped every once in a while to engage in conversation with a worker, giving the freshman legislator to ask questions and interact with the employees. "Our facility is state of the art with an enclosed inspection room that meets industry lighting standards and an up to date furniture refinishing department," Williams said. "We also have a separate warehouse area which includes five truck bays and ground level loading/unloading. Everyone at MCII is proud of their work and all of our workers several of which have worked at MCII for decades has a strong work ethic." Tasks performed by workers at the sheltered workshop include shrink wrapping, packaging, assembly, reassembly, inspecting, sorting, fulfillment, collating, labeling, drilling, bulk mailing and furniture refinishing. At the completion of the tour, Henderson sat down with Williams, Kennon and Wright in the lounge area to discuss what he'd observed. "I thought it was awesome I guess is the best way to describe it," he said. "I can't imagine how it could be that anybody who could come through here and not support something like this. They do so much for these young adults who need someone to help them." Responding to Henderson, Williams said, "I really, really appreciate you taking time to visit us today and to walk through and see everything. I believe that everyone should spend one day in a sheltered workshop. It would change your outlook on life." Noting that state Sen. Gary Romine was supposed to take part in the tour, as well, Henderson explained that he was taking part in a hearing at the capitol in Jefferson City and was unable to make it. "He was looking forward to it," Henderson said. "Gary has visited here before, but he was really wanting to be here today." Williams said that Romine has been very supportive of MCII, as had 116th District Rep. Kevin Engler, R-Farmington, and former 117th District representative Linda Black. "Well, I'd like to be a person who can help you, too, with anything you need," Henderson said. "I believe wholeheartedly in this project." U.S. President Donald J Trump has been shaking the very principles of the United States constitution since he took his presidential oath. Trumps tyrannical administration seems to be churning out executive orders without the slightest concern for real-world humanitarian, as well as economical implications, so much so that with this latest immigration ban from 7 Muslim dominant countries, he has struck the very backbone of the American economy - The Silicon Valley. Trouble is brewing in the valley thanks to President Trump and his ban on Muslim immigrants from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. As per a report from JPMorgan Chase, the Silicon Valley ranks Third globally in GDP per capita. According to the National Foundation for American Policy, more than half of all Silicon Valley startups valued over a billion dollars were founded by immigrants. The technology hub is also the region responsible for leading Americas economic recovery, as per Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. Silicon Valleys strength, which they have to keep building on, is that they attract so many people with advanced skills, advanced education, engineering skills at the PhD and doctoral level, said report co-author Tom Gray. They are very good at that. But if they start losing that, then they might have trouble. And, Trouble is brewing in the valley thanks to President Trump and his ban on Muslim immigrants from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. With tech companies like Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Netflix, etc relying heavily on high-skilled migrant engineers and professionals, a dark cloud seems to be looming over the valley, which has come out to condemn the executive order banning immigrants. Heres how some of the worlds biggest tech giants reacted to the ban, as it came into effect on Friday. Ban would affect at least 187 Googlers - Sundar Pichai Google Amongst the first tech companies to react to the ban, Googles immigrant CEO, Sundar Pichai, told employees that the ban would affect at least 187 Googlers. The company advised its employees from other countries to cancel any travel plans in the near future. We're concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US, Google said in an official statement. The company also created a crisis fund for pro-immigration organisations. Accorning to an exclusive report by CNBC, Google created a "$2 million crisis fund that can be matched with up to $2 million in donations from employees, totaling $4 million, for four organizations: the American Civil Liberties Union, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee and UNHCR." Steve Jobs was the son of a Syrian immigrant Apple Apple also has a lot to lose thanks to Trumps immigration ban. The ban, which is a big slap on Apples face considering Steve Jobs was the son of a Syrian immigrant, instigated a company-wide response from CEO Tim Cook. In an internal company memo obtained by The Associated Press, Jobs told employees It is not a policy we support. "We have reached out to the White House to explain the negative effect on our coworkers and our company," he added. Cook also went on to say that "Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do." These actions will make America less safe - Reed Hastings Netflix Netflix CEO, Reed Hastings, did not mince words in his reaction to Trumps immigration ban. The CEO took to Facebook and said, "Trump's actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all." He went on to add, These actions will make America less safe (through hatred and loss of allies) rather than more safe." Tesla Elon Musk, an immigrant from South Africa and founder of Tesla, SpaceX tweeted saying, "many people negatively affected by this policy are strong supporters of the US" and they do not "deserve to be rejected." Not allowing countries or refugees into America is not right, and we must stand with those who are affected - Airbnb Airbnb Local housing startup, Airbnb, decided to help immigrants who were stuck overseas due to the ban. The company offered to arrange for free-of-cost housing to those hit by the ban. CEO, Brian Chesky Tweeted on Sunday saying, Airbnb is providing free housing to refugees and anyone not allowed in the US. Stayed tuned for more, contact me if urgent need for housing. The company also released a statement saying, "Not allowing countries or refugees into America is not right, and we must stand with those who are affected, Airbnb is providing free housing to refugees and anyone else who needs it in the event they are denied the ability to board a US-bound flight and are not in your city/country of residence. We have 3 million homes, so we can definitely find people a place to stay." Lyft Ride hailing service Lyft announced a donation of $1 million to the American Civil Liberties Union, which won a class action lawsuit against Trumps immigration ban, in which a federal judge granted a temporary stay on Trumps immigration ban. Microsoft The Redmond-based tech giant, Microsoft, reached out to its employees offering legal advice and assistance to those affected by the ban. Microsoft President, Chief Legal Officer, Brad Smith, said that the company was aware of 76 employees who are citizens of the banned countries, and hold a U.S. temporary work visa. Uber Uber has also announced a $3 million grant in legal defence funds for drivers affected by the Trump Ban. After a #Delete Uber campaign flaired out in New York city, CEO Travis Kalanick announced the grand and called the ban "unjust." Today we need your help supporting drivers who may be impacted by the President's unjust immigration ban, he added. This is the largest crisis fund ever created by Google. According to an exclusive report by CNBC, Mountain View based tech giant Google, has created its largest ever crisis fund in support of immigration. As per the report, Google has made a $2 million fund, which will be matched by an additional $2 million from employee contributions, totalling $4 million, for pro-immigration organisations such as, American Civil Liberties Union, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee and UNHCR. Google CEO, Sundar Pichai floated the campaign in an internal company memo and the same was confirmed by a Google Spokeswoman late on Sunday. The campaign comes after Pichai objected to the recent ban on immigration from 7 predominantly Muslim countries. Amongst the first tech companies to react to the ban, Googles immigrant CEO, told employees that the ban would affect at least 187 Googlers. The company advised its employees from other countries to cancel any travel plans in the near future. We're concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US, Google said in an official statement. Google is not the only tech company to announce financial aid in favour of immigrants. Cab aggregators Uber and Lyft also announced donations of $3 million and $1 million respectively, for pro-immigrant causes. The tech industry is set to be one of the biggest potential losers due to Trump's immigration ban. You can read all about the reactions of various tech stalwarts on the Trump immigration ban in the link given below. See Also: Google, Apple, Tesla, Netflix: This is how tech companies reacted to Trump's immigration ban Google has been working to disable and ban bad, harmful ads from the web for a while now. In 2016, the Mountain View tech giant took some stern steps to block click to trick ads, which try and target a users private information, putting personal online safety at risk. In 2016, Googles systems detected and disabled a total of 112 million ads for trick to click, 6X more than in 2015. Last year, Google also introduced a policy to ban payday loan ads from the internet, and disabled more than 5 million such ads from the internet starting July 2016. In India, Google, in collaboration with Microsoft and Yahoo, pledged to ban ads on sex determination. Google also reached out to Bloomberg and said that it has taken action to prevent searches and have its advertising comply with local laws. Now, showcasing its efforts towards ridding the internet of bad ads, Google has released its Better Ads Report for 2016. A free and open web is a vital resource for people and businesses around the world. And ads play a key role in ensuring you have access to accurate, quality information online. But bad ads can ruin the online experience for everyone. They promote illegal products and unrealistic offers. They can trick people into sharing personal information and infect devices with harmful software. Ultimately, bad ads pose a threat to users, Googles partners, and the sustainability of the open web itself, the company noted in a recent blogpost. According to the blogpost, the company deploys a strict set of rules and policies to discover and get rid of ads that are designed to mislead consumers. we have a team of engineers, policy experts, product managers and others who are waging a daily fight against bad actors, said the company. Quoting an alarming figure in its report, Google said that it took down 1.7 billion bad ads in 2016, more than double of what they did in 2015. The company also noted that if it took 1 second to take down one of such ads, it would take over 50 years to ban these many ads, but its technology works faster. In addition, Google took down more than 68 million ads for healthcare violations in 2016, 17 million ads for illegal gambling, 80 million bad ads for deceiving, misleading and shocking users, 23,000 self-clicking ads that randomly direct users to the Play store, and 7 million bad ads for intentionally attempting to trick Googles detection systems. This just goes to show how online ads can be very deceptive and can compromise a users safety on the internet. In 2016, Google found new types of scammers that are designed to trick its systems by pretending to be news stories, instead of ads. Googles calling these ads tabloid cloakers and the company reported that it suspended more than 1300 accounts due to tabloid cloaking. In December 2016 alone, Google took down 22 cloakers that were responsible for ads seen by more than 20 million online users in a single week! Publishers and website owners use our AdSense platform to make money by running ads on their sites and content, so we have strict policies in place to keep Google's content and search networks safe and clean for our advertisers, users and publishers. When a publisher violates our policies, we may stop showing ads on their site, or even terminate their account, notes the company. Chinese wooden furniture manufacturer Jiasen International Holdings is to de-list from AIM and float in the NEX Exchange Growth Market, subject to shareholder approval. The Quanzhou-based company said on Monday that it will seek to cancel its shares trading on AIM and admit them to trade on the NEX Exchange Growth Market, a market for early stage companies. The furniture designer, which sells products under the Fuyou brand, is to send a notice on shareholders for a meeting. The cancellation can only ahead with 75% or more of votes cast by shareholders. Shares in Jiasen International Holdings were down 25% to 3.75p at 1201 GMT. LGO Energy is disappointed on learning the Spanish government has not approved the extension of its concession in the country and the oil and gas firm is looking to reapply. The AIM-listed company maintained that the pending the extension decision, and along with present oil prices, it would have a minimal impact on its finances as LGO Energy focusses its operations in Trinidad. The La Lora concession, which has a carried value of 7m and is owned by the the company's subsidiary, Compania Petrolifera de Sedano (CPS), was not granted an extension by the Spanish government and will close on Tuesday at midnight. Executive chairman Neil Ritson said: "Naturally we are disappointed with the decision and it will inevitably cause some hardship to our employees and their communities in the Burgos area, where Ayoluengo has been a significant source of employment for the last 50 years. We will be working with the Spanish authorities to seek a new concession as soon as possible." The company said that the decision appeared to have been made on purely legal, and not technical or commercial, grounds and despite the advice that LGO received from lawyers in the country on the strength of the legal case. It also said that the Spanish Ministry of Industry, Energy and Tourism has indicated that it will offer the Ayoluengo field to CPS for a new concession as soon as possible. LGO will make a new application for a 30-year concession on the same overall technical basis as the extension and believes that its experience at the field and its technical and commercial knowledge puts it in a competitive position. CPS is in the final stages of a process to temporarily suspend all field operations and to complete the sale of all oil stocks from the Ayoluengo field by the end of the concession. Employment contracts for CPS's 17 staff will also be suspended for up to one year. The company said that it has actively sought an extension to the concession over the past four years and has carried out legal, technical and commercial evaluation work that was submitted to the Ministry in August 2015 in support of a formal request for a 20-year extension. Shares in LGO Energy Were down 8.69% to 0.113p at 1257 GMT. Aggrekos shares fell on Monday after Deutsche Bank cut its recommendation on the stock to hold from buy and lowered the target price to 1,000p from 1,050p. The supplier of temporary power generation equipment is expected to see trading profit return to growth in 2018 after a 40% decline across 2012 to 2016. Deutsche reiterated that it believes earnings will reach an inflection point in the next 12 to 18 months. At a 12-month forward price-earnings ratio of 16.5x, however, we believe much of this is now priced in. As such, we find it increasingly hard to argue with conviction that there is an incremental catalyst that is not priced in on a 12 month view. Hold. Deutsche predicts an average trading profit drop of 4% per year for fiscal years 2016 to 2017, followed by growth of 5% per year for 2018 to 2020. The bank believes a return to earnings growth in 2018 will be supportive of current valuation for longer. It also sees potential to grow dividends and make additional cash returns from 2018. Ahead of Aggrekos full year results on 7 March, Deutsche has forecast adjusted pre-tax profit of 221m, slightly below the consensus of 222m and managements guidance of 225m. We expect the following discussion points to be in focus: 1) expectations for the Argentina standby contracts after they expire in February/March; 2) comments on the current trading environment, Power Solutions pipeline and 2017 consensus pre-tax profit which sits at 220m (Deutsche Bank forecast at 225m); 3) 2017 capital expenditure outlook (Deutsche Bank at 291m). On 16 January, Aggreko confirmed the Government of Argentina extended its fixed site contracts, equivalent to 174 mega watts (MW), until 31 December 2017. The FTSE 250 company said the original contracts amounted to 180MW, and initially had various expiry dates. Aggreko also confirmed that 56MW of the 270MW standby contracts was off-hired in 2016, leaving the balance at 214MW. We make minimal changes to earnings per share forecasts as we update our model for recent contract wins and updated Argentina assumptions post the 16 January update, Deutsche said. The bank has pencilled in EPS of 62.44p for 2016, up 0.4% from the previous estimate. It also upgraded its EPS forecast for 2017 by 1.3% to 63.33p and downgraded 2018 EPS by 1.6% to 67.75p. Risks include: the shape of Argentina profit drag, the macroeconomic environment, competition and pricing pressures, bad debts, equipment seizure and foreign exchange movements, Deutsche concluded. Shares fell 3.49% to 1,002p at 0913 GMT. Proactis chief executive designate Tim Sykes, his chairman and one other director have together bought 175,000 of shares in the spend-control software company, as the company continues its search for a full-time CEO. Chief financial officer Sykes, whose appointment as CEO designate was announced just before Christmas alongside the resignation of CEO Rod Jones, shelled out 25,000. Chairman Rod Potts spent 100,000 before costs and non-executive Alan Aubrey 50,000, with all three buying at a price of 154p. Jones stepped down after 14 years at the company, having grown the company from a small start-up. He will work his 12-month notice period and, during this period, Sykes will be the CEO designate while the company searches for a new CFO. Top Director Buys Proactis Holdings (PHD) Director name: Potts,Rodney Amount purchased: 64,935 @ 154.00p Value: 99,999.90 Tungsten Corporation (TUNG) Director name: Benello,David Amount purchased: 145,000 @ 67.25p Value: 97,510.76 Proactis Holdings (PHD) Director name: Aubrey,Alan John Amount purchased: 32,467 @ 154.00p Value: 49,999.18 Griffin Mining Ltd. (GFM) Director name: Usdan ,Adam Amount purchased: 50,000 @ 51.90p Value: 25,950.00 Proactis Holdings (PHD) Director name: Sykes,Timothy J Amount purchased: 16,234 @ 154.00p Value: 25,000.36 Chaarat Gold Holdings Ltd. (di) (CGH) Director name: Andersson,Martin Amount purchased: 50,000 @ 11.45p Value: 5,726.20 Chaarat Gold Holdings Ltd. (di) (CGH) Director name: Andersson,Martin Amount purchased: 50,000 @ 11.25p Value: 5,625.00 Bank Of Cyprus Holdings Public Limited Company (BOCH) Director name: Spanos,Michael Amount purchased: 61 @ A 3.22 Value: 197.80 Maintel Holdings (MAI) Director name: Stevens,Kevin Amount purchased: 15 @ 1,013.00p Value: 151.95 Top Director Sells Proactis Holdings (PHD) Director name: Jones,Rodney D Amount sold: 405,844 @ 154.00p Value: 624,999.74 Chemring Group (CHG) Director name: Ellard,Sarah Amount sold: 6,428 @ 195.45p Value: 12,563.53 Shares in US airlines were near the bottom of the pile again at the start of the week, following the new president's executive order, signed on 27 January, temporarily suspending the refugee admissions programme, imposing a temporary ban on refugees travelling from Syria specifically and on the entry of so-called 'aliens' from seven countries. The temporary suspension of the refugee admissions program would extend for 120-days after which time it would be reinstated for those countries which were deemed to meet the possible additional procedures necessary to ensure national security, according to a text of the executive order supplied by the White House to the New York Times. The same would apply to Syria. Another 90-day temporary ban on the entry into the country of so-called 'aliens' was also be put in place. Multiple reports over the weekend following the executive order indicated there was confusion regarding whether the bans would extend to those who had already been issued visas but were travelling from one of the countries listed by the Department of Homeland Security (two days later, on Sunday, it transpired it would not). US official said 109 travelers had been detained at various US airports, with some of those having later been allowed to enter the country. Commenting over the weekend, John McCain, one of two US Senators for Arizona, said: "Our government has a responsibility to defend our borders, but we must do so in a way that makes us safer and upholds all that is decent and exceptional about our nation. "It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trumps executive order was not properly vetted. We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defense, Justice, and Homeland Security. [...]." As of 1506 GMT, a sub-index of Airline stocks was down by 2.96%, with stock in Delta Air Lines off by 3.22% and American Air Lines retreating 5.32%. From an investment perspective, some analysts mused aloud on Monday whether the weekend's events were an indication of what might lie ahead. "Concerns [have risen] that the US may become a much less predictable place to do business. "For all the early optimism about the so called Trump trade it would appear that for some the rose tinted glasses may well be starting to fall away as they digest this new entirely predictable turn of events," said Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets UK. For his part, Michael Every, Head of FMR Asia Pacific at Rabobank, said: "For markets, the most important thing to glean from this latest barrage of Trump news is not just that, as Bloomberg states, Confusion Grips Airports as Courts Limit Trump Travel Curbs, nor that the new administration seem either accidently or deliberately chaotic, which is usually a negative for sentiment. Even arguments for and against the executive order itself are secondary. "The real underlying issue must surely be if the markets belief - and continued pricing for - a politically liberal, economically neoliberal global economy regardless of who is in office is still appropriate." A petition to stop President Donald Trump coming to Britain for a state visit has gained more than 1m signatures after he made an executive order to temporarily ban people from seven majority Muslim countries and Syrian refugees from entering the US. The petition has more than exceeded the 100,000 signatures needed for Parliament to consider a debate. Protests in response to his potential visit are planned to take place in London, Manchester, Bristol, Brighton, Liverpool, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Cardiff and Swansea at around 1800 GMT. Prime Minister Theresa May proposed the state visit when she met Trump in Washington on Friday, where they discussed Nato and a potential trade deal once Britain leaves the European Union. However, May came under fire when she did not condemn Trumps immigration measures at a press conference in Turkey. Downing Street later issued a statement saying that the government does not agree with Trump and it is not a policy that Britain will be taking. On Friday, Trump made an executive order for extreme vetting for people coming from Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Iran, Libya and Somalia for 90 days and refugees from countries from other than Syria to not enter the country for 120 days, in order to keep terrorists out, but the move has been met with criticism from figures in the Republican and Democrat parties and world leaders with protests at airports across the US. A federal judge on Saturday decided to partially block the order. On Sunday, foreign secretary Boris Johnson said that British citizens with dual nationality from any of the seven countries listed will be able to go to the US. But on Monday, the US embassy in London contradicted Johnson as it said that any national, or dual national from the seven countries should not apply for a visa appointment or go to one previously planned. any "national, or dual national", of the seven countries, should "not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time" and if you have a scheduled appointment to not attend as it would not be able to proceed with the visa interview. Figures from all parties have voiced their concerns for a state visit by Trump. Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the opposition, told ITV that it would be wrong for Trump to come to Britain while the ban was still in place. "I think he has to be challenged on this. I am not happy with him coming here until that ban is lifted, quite honestly. Tim Farron, the leader of the Liberal Democrats said: Any visit by President Trump to Britain should be on hold until his disgraceful ban comes to an end. Otherwise, Theresa May would be placing the Queen in an impossible position of welcoming a man who is banning British citizens purely on grounds of their faith." This was echoed by Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, who told Sky News: "I am quite clear, this ban is cruel, this ban is shameful, while this ban is in place we should not be rolling out the red carpet for President Trump." Ruth Davidson, leader of the Scottish Conservatives, said that a state visit by Trump could not possibly occur in the best traditions of the enterprise while a cruel and divisive policy which discriminates against citizens of the host nation is in place. Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister of Scotland, tweeted that it would be wrong for it to go ahead while the ban is still in place. If Parliament does debate the petition, it would not be the first time that Trump will be discussed. In January last year a petition gained more than 570,000 signatures for MPs to debate banning the then presidential candidate from entering Britain. MPs decided not to ban him but labelled him a fool and a "wazzock. Markets in Asia finished lower on Monday, after a wild political weekend in the US as President Trumps hugely controversial immigration policy put serious pressure on the greenback. In Japan, the Nikkei 225 was down 0.51% at 19,368.85, with fresh domestic data showing Japan retail sales rose 0.6% in December compared to the prior year. That disappointed investors, who were hoping for an increase of around 1.3%. The yen was stronger on the greenback, and was last ahead 0.37% at JPY 114.67 per $1. Technology firm Toshiba was down 3.69% after reports emerged that a number of trust banks were preparing to file lawsuits against the company over financial mismanagement. Local media also claimed chairman Shigenori Shiga, as well as president of Toshibas beleaguered Westinghouse nuclear development subsidiary Daniel Roderick, were both set to resign. The Bank of Japan began its two-day policy meeting for January on Monday, with local markets expecting to stand pat on policy amid fears it was looking to tone down its unprecedented stimulus programme. Markets in China, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan remained closed for public holidays on Monday. A number of countries were openly criticising Trumps executive order placing a flat ban on citizens of seven primarily Muslim countries from entering the US. Reports were numerous over the weekend of US residents and dual citizens of other countries being refused entry to the US because of their nationalities. Attorneys-General from 15 states and the District of Columbia openly promised to battle what they called an unconstitutional order, although Trump defended the move on Sunday night, denying it was about religion. Whether the markets start to price in a stronger Trump risk premium is yet to be seen, but the S&P 500 rallying 1% last week in the face of various protectionist measures suggest this premium is not yet in the market, noted IG chief market strategist Chris Weston. Oil prices were mixed, with Brent crude last flat at $55.52 per barrel and West Texas Intermediate adding 0.3% to $53.33. In Australia, the S&P.ASX 200 was down 0.92% at 5,661.52, with broad losses across almost all subindexes - gold was the exception, as it climbed 1.2%. Gold specialist Newcrest Mining saw its shares rise 1.27% after it released solid production results for the December quarter, showing it was on track to meet guidance. Alacer Gold was also up, improving 2.58%, while Evolution Mining added 1.42%. Regional insurance group QBE Insurance was 0.15% firmer after it emerged it had been approached by Allianz over a possible takeover. Details were scarce, with no acquisition price yet proposed. In New Zealand, the S&P/NZX 50 fell 0.7% to 7,085.56, led lower by broadband infrastructure owner Chorus, which lost 3.7%. The down under dollars were both weaker, with the Aussie last off 0.1% at AUD 1.3258 to the greenback and the Kiwi slipping 0.15% to NZD 1.38 per $1. European stocks were in the red on Monday, as investors assessed President Donald Trumps curb on refugees and his travel ban on arrivals from predominantly Muslim countries entering the US. The benchmark Stoxx Europe 600 finished down 1.05% to 362.55, Frances CAC 40 fell 1.14% to 4,784.64 and Germanys DAX was 1.12% lower to 11,681.89. By sectors, the Stoxx 600's gauge of Oil&Gas shares surrendered 2.14%, Basic Resources erased 2.26% and Banks were down 1.67%. Milan's FTSE Mibtel fared worst among the region's main equity benchmarks, retreating 2.95% to 18,759.40, while Athens's ASE index gave back 3.5% amid the continuing stand-off between the country and its creditors. Meanwhile, West Texas Intermediate crude was down 0.93% to $52.68 a barrel and Brent crude was lower by 0.43% to $55.28. On Friday, Trump put a 120-day hold on allowing refugees into the country, an indefinite ban on any refugees from Syria and a 90-day ban on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The ban also applies to anyone with dual nationality including any of those countries. A petition in the UK gathered more than 1.0m signatures to stop a state visit for Trump, with protests planned in several cities across the country in response to his immigration ban. Mike van Dulken, head of research at Accendo Markets, said: Major equity indices are negative, as investors react to the implementation of yet another controversial executive order from the new resident of the White House. Trump's travel ban adds to the Mexican wall and his attempt to curb immigration and pursue a pro-America, anti-globalisation, anti-terror mandate. He's sticking to his pledges, adding to concerns that he goes all in and pins chunky import tariffs on China (and elsewhere?) to encourage Americans to buy domestic. A dollar sell-off has reversed leaving sterling and the euro where they were late Friday. Elsewhere, in France leftwing rebel Benoit Hamon beat centrist former Prime Minster Manuel Valls in the second round of Socialist partys primary on Sunday. Recent polls suggest, however, that no Socialist candidate will make it to the second round in the French presidential race, with either centrist Emmanuel Macron or centre-right Francois Fillon likely to do battle with Front Nationals Marine Le Pen. Data showed that Eurozone business and consumer confidence continued its resurgence in January, but analysts are wary that the momentum could be hampered by uncertain outcomes from upcoming elections in the Netherlands, France, Germany and possibly Italy. The European Commissions Economic Sentiment Indicator rose to 108.2 from 107.8 in December, which was the highest level since March 2011. This was more than the 107.9 expected. On the corporate front, FTSE 100 telecoms group Vodafone was up 1.34% after confirming that it is in talks over merging its Indian business with Idea Cellular, which is part of the Aditya Birla Group. Engineer WS Atkins was 6.0% higher following a report in The Times that it has been approached by US firm CH2M for a possible $4bn merger. Randgold Resources gained 0.84% after saying it was confident of topping production guidance of 670,000 oz of gold for 2016 from its Loulo-Gounkoto mining complex in Mali, with another record quarter at the end of the year. Lloyds Banking Group was also down 1.46% after the UK government cut its stake in the bank to just under 5%, or 3.57bn shares, as it looks to take the bank private again in the next few months. This is down from 4.24bn shares previously. European stocks were in the red on Monday, as investors assessed President Donald Trumps curb on refugees and his travel ban on arrivals from predominantly Muslim countries entering the US. At midday, the benchmark Stoxx Europe 600 was down 0.72% to 363.73, Frances CAC 40 fell 0.87% to 4,798.02 while Germanys DAX was 0.72% lower to 11,728.69. Meanwhile, West Texas Intermediate crude was down 0.26% to $53.31 a barrel and Brent crude was flat at $55.51. On Friday, Trump put a 120-day hold on allowing refugees into the country, an indefinite ban on any refugees from Syria and a 90-day ban on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The ban also applies to anyone with dual nationality including any of those countries. A petition in the UK gathered more than 1m signatures to stop a state visit for Trump, with protests planned in several cities across the country in response to his immigration ban. Mike van Dulken, head of research at Accendo Markets, said: Major equity indices are negative, as investors react to the implementation of yet another controversial executive order from the new resident of the White House. Trump's travel ban adds to the Mexican wall and his attempt to curb immigration and pursue a pro-America, anti-globalisation, anti-terror mandate. He's sticking to his pledges, adding to concerns that he goes all in and pins chunky import tariffs on China (and elsewhere?) to encourage Americans to buy domestic. A dollar sell-off has reversed leaving sterling and the euro where they were late Friday. Elsewhere, in France leftwing rebel Benoit Hamon beat centrist former Prime Minster Manuel Valls in the second round of Socialist partys primary on Sunday. Recent polls suggest, however, that no Socialist candidate will make it to the second round in the French presidential race, with either centrist Emmanuel Macron or centre-right Francois Fillon likely to do battle with Front Nationals Marine Le Pen. Data showed that eurozone business and consumer confidence continued its resurgence in January, but analysts are wary that the momentum could be hampered by uncertain outcomes from upcoming elections in the Netherlands, France, Germany and possibly Italy. The European Commissions Economic Sentiment Indicator rose to 108.2 from 107.8 in December, which was the highest level since March 2011. This was more than the 107.9 expected. Energy and basic-resource shares were the worst performers as crude and copper prices retreated, with the Stoxx 600 sub-indexes for the sectors down 1.2% and 1.4%, respectively. On the corporate front, FTSE 100 telecoms group Vodafone up 2.61% after confirming that it is in talks over merging its Indian business with Idea Cellular, which is part of the Aditya Birla Group. Engineer WS Atkins was 5% higher following a report in The Times that it has been approached by US firm CH2M for a possible $4bn merger. Randgold Resources fell 0.76% despite saying it was confident of topping production guidance of 670,000 oz of gold for 2016 from its Loulo-Gounkoto mining complex in Mali, with another record quarter at the end of the year. Lloyds Banking Group was also down 0.59% after the UK government cut its stake in the bank to just under 5%, or 3.57bn shares, as it looks to take the bank private again in the next few months. This is down from 4.24bn shares previously. European equity markets lost ground in early trade as investors digested US President Donald Trumps curb on refugees and his travel ban on arrivals from predominantly Muslim countries, although there were a few bright spots in terms of deal news. At 0850 GMT, the benchmark Stoxx Europe 600 and Frances CAC 40 were down 0.6%, while Germanys DAX was 0.5% lower. Meanwhile, West Texas Intermediate was down 0.2% to $53.08 a barrel and Brent crude was off 0.5% at $55.26. On Friday, Trump put a 120-day hold on allowing refugees into the country, an indefinite ban on any refugees from Syria and a 90-day ban on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The ban also applies to anyone with dual nationality including any of those countries. Rebecca OKeeffe, head of investment at stockbroker Interactive Investor, said: European markets are lower this morning as President Trump's immigration ban reverberates across the globe. Thus far, the market has been keen only to concentrate on the positives of the Trump administration and ignore the potential negatives, but the global reaction to the immigration ban has finally seen investors sit up and take notice. "The risk premium associated with the new administration is not insignificant and this is the first sign that markets may have potentially overlooked some of the risks associated with the presidency since the November vote. Energy and basic-resource shares were the worst performers as crude and copper prices retreated, with the Stoxx 600 sub-indexes for the sectors down 1.2% and 1.4%, respectively. On the corporate front, FTSE 100 telecoms group Vodafone was in the black after confirming it is in talks over merging its Indian business with Idea Cellular, which is part of the Aditya Birla Group. Engineer WS Atkins was a higher riser following a report in The Times that it has been approached by US company CH2M for a possible $4bn merger. Randgold Resources fell despite saying it was confident of topping production guidance of 670,000 oz of gold for 2016 from its Loulo-Gounkoto mining complex in Mali, with another record quarter at the end of the year. Lloyds Banking Group was also in the red after the UK government cut its stake in the bank to just under 5%, or 3.57bn shares, as it looks to take the bank private again in the next few months. This is down from 4.24bn shares previously. London stocks fell in early trade, taking their cue from an uninspiring Asian session as investors digested US President Donald Trumps curb on refugees and his travel ban on arrivals from Muslim countries. At 0830 GMT, the FTSE 100 was down 0.6% to 7,142.37. On Friday, Trump put a 120-day hold on allowing refugees into the country, an indefinite ban on any refugees from Syria and a 90-day ban on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The ban also applies to anyone with dual nationality including any of those countries. Spreadexs Connor Campbell said: Pretty much everything slipped into the red this morning, the markets reacting to the fresh bout of instability brought on by Donald Trump over the weekend. Though the Trump rally may have lifted the markets to their current peaks, the global outrage that has greeted the Presidents first week in office, the most recent instance being the well-placed disgust at his Muslim travel ban, is now beginning suppress investors appetites especially since, as mentioned, the indices are trading so high. To be fair to the fake-tanned commander in chief, the weeks cluttered economic calendar is likely also contributing to the negative start. Wednesday sees the first Trump-era Fed meeting, something that is expected to tee up a March rate-hike, while Thursday brings with it a Bank of England get-together. All this before Friday completes a trifecta of heavy-hitters with the latest US non-farm jobs report. Thats going to be a lot for the markets to process in the back end of the week, explaining why things might be a bit jittery this morning. In corporate news, FTSE 100 telecoms group Vodafone was in the black after confirming it is in talks over merging its Indian business with Idea Cellular, which is part of the Aditya Birla Group. Engineer WS Atkins was a higher riser following a report in The Times that it has been approached by US company CH2M for a possible $4bn merger. On the downside, Randgold Resources fell despite saying it was confident of topping production guidance of 670,000 oz of gold for 2016 from its Loulo-Gounkoto mining complex in Mali, with another record quarter at the end of the year. Lloyds Banking Group was also in the red after the UK government cut its stake in the bank to just under 5%, or 3.57bn shares, as it looks to take the bank private again in the next few months. This is down from 4.24bn shares previously. There are no major UK data releases due, but in the US, personal consumption expenditure is at 1330 GMT, while pending home sales figures are at 1500 GMT. Market Movers FTSE 100 (UKX) 7,142.37 -0.59% FTSE 250 (MCX) 18,125.17 -0.36% techMARK (TASX) 3,234.77 0.06% FTSE 100 - Risers Vodafone Group (VOD) 198.80p 2.82% DCC (DCC) 6,280.00p 1.45% ITV (ITV) 207.40p 1.32% United Utilities Group (UU.) 904.00p 0.50% BAE Systems (BA.) 593.50p 0.17% Shire Plc (SHP) 4,394.00p 0.11% Worldpay Group (WPG) 282.30p 0.11% TUI AG Reg Shs (DI) (TUI) 1,161.00p 0.09% BT Group (BT.A) 303.05p 0.08% London Stock Exchange Group (LSE) 3,101.00p 0.03% FTSE 100 - Fallers Old Mutual (OML) 207.60p -2.63% Mediclinic International (MDC) 791.50p -2.34% Diageo (DGE) 2,207.00p -1.65% Tesco (TSCO) 203.15p -1.65% Mondi (MNDI) 1,744.00p -1.64% Anglo American (AAL) 1,347.50p -1.57% Aviva (AV.) 478.10p -1.52% easyJet (EZJ) 960.00p -1.44% Barclays (BARC) 227.30p -1.43% Marks & Spencer Group (MKS) 339.40p -1.34% FTSE 250 - Risers Atkins (WS) (ATK) 1,473.00p 5.21% Dignity (DTY) 2,497.00p 2.59% Redefine International (RDI) 40.21p 2.34% P2P Global Investments (P2P) 815.00p 2.13% Hastings Group Holdings (HSTG) 229.00p 1.69% Electrocomponents (ECM) 491.80p 1.65% Synthomer (SYNT) 441.60p 1.56% Barr (A.G.) (BAG) 509.00p 1.39% Brewin Dolphin Holdings (BRW) 314.44p 1.30% Ferrexpo (FXPO) 144.80p 1.12% FTSE 250 - Fallers Aggreko (AGK) 1,019.00p -3.78% Allied Minds (ALM) 381.70p -3.02% Drax Group (DRX) 372.60p -2.44% PZ Cussons (PZC) 296.60p -2.43% Meggitt (MGGT) 419.60p -2.28% Investec (INVP) 563.50p -2.00% Tullow Oil (TLW) 295.40p -1.53% Aberdeen Asset Management (ADN) 267.00p -1.51% Petra Diamonds Ltd.(DI) (PDL) 146.40p -1.48% Thomas Cook Group (TCG) 85.50p -1.44% Two former HBOS bankers are among six people who have been found guilty of bribery and fraud. Lynden Scourfield, a former manager with HBOS - which was rescued by Lloyds Banking Group during the financial crisis - pleaded guilty to six counts, including corruption. Mark Dobson, who was also a manager at HBOS, was convicted on counts including bribery, fraud and money laundering at Southwark Crown Court. David Mills, Michael Bancroft, Alison Mills, and John Cartwright were also convicted. Another defendant, Jonathan Cohen, was acquitted of charges. Scourfield accepted bribes from businessmen Bancroft and Mills to get small business customers of HBOS to use consultancy firm Quayside Corporate Services. Quayside, a turnaround consultancy offering business experience and expertise to small businesses, is run by Mills and his wife Alison. The bribes included sex parties, exotic foreign holidays, cash in brown envelopes and other favours between 2003 and 2007. Prosecutors said 28m in cash fees went through the accounts of Mills, his wife and their associated companies. "What Scourfield gave Mills in addition to fees was the opportunity to take control of the various businesses and, in some cases, to acquire ownership of them. Mills and his associates used the bank's customers and the banks's money dishonestly to enrich themselves," prosecutor Brian O'Neill QC told the court. HBOS said the estimated cost of Scourfield's lending activity in early 2007 was more than 300m. Since then, there have been further losses, including the impact on business customers. Sources told the BBC the total value of the fraud may be closer to 1bn. The UK government has cut its stake in Lloyds Banking Group to just under 5%, or 3.57bn shares, as it looks to take the bank private again in the next few months. UK Financial Investments Limited, the government vehicle set up to control taxpayers stakes in the banks that were bailed out during the financial crisis, previously held 4.24bn shares in Lloyds. Back in May last year, the government said it planned a retail sale of its 9.2% shareholding, fully returning the shares to the private sector between 2016 and 2017. But in October, Chancellor Philip Hammond announced the government would only make shares available to institutions rather than retail investors. He said at the time that returning Lloyds to the private sector and recovering all of the cash the taxpayer injected into the bank during the 2008 crisis was a priority for the government. Vodafone has confirmed it is in talks over merging its struggling Indian business with Idea Cellular, which is part of the Aditya Birla Group. The FTSE 100 telecoms group made the announcement on Monday, following recent speculation in the media about a combination of Vodafone India and Idea amid fierce price competition in the country. Vodafone had been planning to float Vodafone India on the Mumbai stock exchange. On Monday it said all-share merger of Vodafone India, excluding the UK company's 42% stake in Indus Towers, was under discussion with Aditya Birla Group, which would see it issue of new shares in Idea to Vodafone and would result in Vodafone deconsolidating Vodafone India. It stressed that there was no certainty that any transaction will be agreed, nor as to the terms or timing of any transaction. The Indian mobile market has broken out in a price war since September with the launch of newcomer Jio, founded by billionaire Mukesh Ambani, and the country has become a trouble-spot for Vodafone, with losses there severely hurting the rest of the group as shown by the 5bn write-down on the business in November. Reports in recent weeks suggested Vodafone was looking a possible tie-up with either Idea, Jio or Aircel, which is run by Ambani's brother Anil. Having been hovering near December's two-year low, shares in Vodafone rose almost 3% to 198.8p by 0845 GMT on Monday, topped the FTSE. It seems Vodafone is taking the Indian tiger by the scruff of the neck, said analyst Neil Wilson at ETX Capital, noting that November's whopping write-down from increased competition in India was down to a 14% drop in data prices, caused by free promotional offers from Reliance Jio as it shakes up the market by offering almost free data. "Indeed a vicious price war in India means the group could post its first operating loss in ten years in 2017. The Idea tie-up looks like a way to limit the casualties on either side. A merger could help the combined group maintain higher prices and take on the likes of Reliance Jio. Something had to be done and this merger might be the way to strengthen Vodafones hand in the Indian price war. Last week, in downgrading its rating on Vodafone, Bank of America Merrill Lynch said a mooted Indian merger with Idea "could provide scale" to offset price pressure from Jio, but analysts did not envisage any move in the short term. But they added M&A activity in India would only offer "some respite" as Vodafone's troubles required larger structural change. Telecommunications and pharma issues found a bid as stocks in the Materials space lost ground amid risk-off trading in the wake of the past weekend's events which saw a significant amount of confusion in the US, and to an extent in many other countries, over the scope of the temporary travel bans imposed by the US administration on travelers and refugees from several mainly Muslim countries. Pacing gains among the former, Vodafone confirmed it was in talks over merging its struggling Indian business with that of its rival Idea Cellular, which is part of the Aditya Birla Group. In parallel, BT Group found a small bid as analysts at Barclays reiterated their overweight stance on the fixed line operator, albeit while marking down their target price from 525p to 475p. "Even though Enterprise weakness has exceeded cost cutting potential this year and next, we do see further cost cutting potential (>1bn over 2 years) likely to offset any potential further weakness or strategic capex increases," Barclays said. Weighing on bulk metals miners, as of 1640 GMT March 2017 copper futures on COMEX were down 1.52% to $2.6485/oz.. Shares in the oil patch meanwhile were getting hammered following news, after the close of trading on Friday, that the number of onshore US oil rigs jumped by 15 over the latest week to reach 566, to well above the 498 in place at the end of the same week one year ago. The above data, from US oilfield services provider Baker Hughes, sent front month West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures down by 0.32% to $55.34 a barrel. For its part, shares in Tesco led grocers lower, as they surrendered part of the previous session's advance. Speculation was mounting that the competition regulator would intervene in the Booker acquisition. With the acquisition of the small convenience stores such as Budgens, Premier and Londis, there are fears the grocery giant could exert undue influence within the convenience store market to the detriment of independent store owners, CMC Markets Michael Hewson said. Top performing sectors so far today Mobile Telecommunications 4,393.82 +1.31% Pharmaceuticals & Biotechnology 12,951.93 +0.24% Media 7,731.72 +0.15% Fixed Line Telecommunications 3,481.29 +0.06% Alternative Energy 0.00 0.00% Bottom performing sectors so far today Industrial Metals & Mining 2,264.42 -3.51% Food & Drug Retailers 3,081.01 -2.36% Oil & Gas Producers 8,037.54 -2.28% Oil Equipment, Services & Distribution 15,954.23 -2.22% Mining 16,539.24 -1.92% Subscriber content preview By KRISTEN DE GROOT Associated Press The 911 calls started pouring in just after noon in the tiny western Pennsylvania town of Brookville: The electrical meter is on fire. The house siding is burning. My power strip is smoking. The computer is fried. The carpeting is singed. Our light bulb exploded. A power company says a failed power line component was to blame for an electrical surge Jan. 20 in Brookville, population 4,000. When it was over, 500 to 1,000 residents were affected, said Tracy Zents, the director of Jefferson County's Department of Emergency Services. . . . AGC of America CEO looks at Trumps impact on contractors AP Photo/Christian Torres [enlarge] Workers are building a taller fence at the Mexico-U.S. border separating the towns of Anapra, Mexico, and Sunland Park, New Mexico. Most of President Trumps border wall would be built in Texas. AGC of America CEO Steve Sandherr was in Bellevue Friday to kick off the local chapters annual meeting, and he talked about what contractors can expect from President Donald Trumps administration. The DJC spoke with Sandherr about this, and his answers are here edited for style and length. Q: What do AGC members think about Trump? A: President Trump broke all the conventional rules in getting elected: raised little money; had little organization/staff; and had broad policy objectives (tax reform, infrastructure, immigration) without any details. However, many of his appointments are the type we would have expected from a conservative GOP president. These picks demonstrate he is looking to get things done and they have calmed the nervous D.C. establishment. We also know that he is not to be underestimated and that he is full of surprises. Candidate Trump talked about a 10-year plan with $10 trillion in new spending. The President and GOP leadership in both the House and Senate are in agreement that we need to enact corporate tax reform to make U.S. firms more competitive in international markets. Sandherr There may also be an opportunity to achieve immigration reform. Past attempts to pass reform in both the Bush and Obama administrations fell short, to some degree because immigration hardliners did not believe the proposals adequately addressed border security. No one can argue that Trump will be lax on border security and that is where the opportunity may lie. If Congress enacts a strong border security bill, it may be possible to get earned legal status for people who work in our industry without proper credentials. The new administration presents a great opportunity to identify bad policies and regulations, and to withdraw them or amend them. There is a mechanism known as the Congressional Review Act that empowers Congress to effectively veto rules that are implemented at the end of an administration. We are working with congressional leadership to roll back some of these actions with this tool. We are also hopeful that President Trump will reverse the position the Obama administration took on regulations that have been challenged in federal court and are subject to appeal. Q: What are some regulations the AGC wants to abolish? A: We have actually identified a significant number of federal regulations that we would like to see the new Trump administration eliminate or alter. Here is a link to the comprehensive list: http://tinyurl.com/AGC-MakeFedResponsible. In particular, we would like to see the new administration embrace a new approach to silica regulations that actually deliver significant health and safety improvements. Unfortunately, the prior administration put in place a measure that, by setting unrealistic targets, will do little to help protect workers. We would also like to see the new administration repeal the executive order and regulations relating to the Obama administrations blacklisting rule, which opens the door to having federal officials punish contractors for their political leanings instead of for their actual performance record. Q: Are there enough workers to build Trumps infrastructure plan? A: We have been working with the Trump administration to make a strong case that any new infrastructure program should also be paired with new workforce development measures to ensure that we have enough qualified workers to keep pace with demand. That plan at http://tinyurl.com/AGC-RebuildWorkforce calls for boosting funding for career and technical education programs, making Pell grants eligible for technical training, and making it easier to set up construction training programs. More important, by giving construction a starring role in rebuilding our economy, the Trump administration could help highlight that construction offers a high-paying career that more folks should consider. Q: Could some sectors be hurt by Trump? A: The one construction sector that could potentially be at risk with the new administration is hospital construction. Given the uncertainties facing federal health care policy over the coming months as Congress and President Trump work to replace the Affordable Care Act, it is safe to assume that many hospitals and other health care providers will put planned projects on hold, at least until the issue is resolved in Washington, D.C. Q: How does Seattles construction market look? A: Seattle is among the most robust construction markets in the country at this point. Construction employment throughout Washington state, and in the Seattle area in particular, is growing at a faster rate than in the rest of the country. This is part of a broader trend where many coastal cities have experienced faster rates of growth than other parts of the country. The Seattle area has also benefited from growing demand from firms like Boeing, Amazon, Microsoft and Costco for new factories and facilities. In addition, a number of local infrastructure projects, including work to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct with a tunnel, is boosting demand for construction services in the metro area. In short, it is good to work in construction in the Seattle area. Other Stories: Denmark's Novo Nordisk to invest 115 mn in new research centre at Oxford Denmark's Novo Nordisk plans to invest 115 million over 10 years in a new science research centre in Oxford. The new centre, which would work on new ways of treating type 2 diabetes, would have 100 academics and scientists. The decision to invest in the UK was described by David Gauke, chief secretary to the treasury, as "a vote of confidence in the UK's position as a world-leader in science and research". According to Novo Nordisk, it was attracted by Oxford's history of "excellence". Novo Nordisk's chief science officer and executive vice-president Mads Thomsen told BBC that the UK's decision to leave the EU made the firm pause before taking a very long view. "Obviously we think the Brexit decision was unfortunate. That being said, Oxford University has been around for 800 years so the academic excellence and our company's ability to turn that into medicines hasn't really changed," he said. While the disease research and molecular biology would be conducted in Oxford, any new drugs or treatments would be developed and manufactured in Denmark. Although Oxford University would get some reward for any success, Thomsen said that bulk of any commercial gains would go to the Danish company. According to John Bell, a professor of medicine at Oxford, the new set-up, which would allow for daily interactions between academic and industrial scientists, underlined the importance of sharing research and cutting-edge science across sectors. Though Novo Nordisk would press ahead with its investment, Brexit looked likely to see one important pharmaceutical body leave the UK. The European Medicines Agency, which had been based in London since 1995, and which had been responsible for the scientific evaluation, supervision and safety monitoring of medicines developed by pharmaceutical companies for use in the EU would likely leave the UK. After Trump ban, Starbucks to hire 10,000 refugees globally Starbucks plans to hire 10,000 refugees worldwide over the next five years in response to President Donald Trump 's travel ban, the head of the US coffee-chain company said on Sunday. "I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise," Starbucks chairman and chief executive Howard Schultz said in a letter to employees posted on the company's website. "We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question." Schultz, a Democratic Party supporter, said that Starbucks had been in contact with employees affected by the new Republican president's executive order signed Friday. The decree suspends the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The CEO said the refugees it hires would be fleeing war, persecution and discrimination in the 75 countries where the company operates. "And we will start this effort here in the US by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support," he said. Schultz also defended Mexico, which Trump has said will have to pay for a wall along its long and porous border with the United States to deter immigrants, perhaps by the US imposing a 20 per cent tariff on Mexican imports. "Building bridges, not walls, with Mexico," he wrote, voicing support for the country that has provided Starbucks with coffee for three decades and where nearly 600 Starbucks coffee shops employ 7,000 people. President Donald Trump has signed an executive order to suspend admission of all refugees for 120 days while a new system is put in place to tighten vetting for those from predominantly Muslim countries and give preference to religious minorities. Trump said that the goal is to screen out "radical Islamic terrorists" and that priority for admission would be given to Christians. "We don't want them here," Trump said on Friday of terrorists in a signing ceremony at the Pentagon. "We only want to admit those into our country who will support our country and love deeply our people." In an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network earlier Friday, Trump was asked whether he would prioritize persecuted Christians in the Middle East for admission as refugees, and he replied, "Yes." "They've been horribly treated," he said. "Do you know if you were a Christian in Syria it was impossible, at least very tough, to get into the United States? If you were a Muslim you could come in, but if you were a Christian it was almost impossible. And the reason that was so unfair - everybody was persecuted, in all fairness - but they were chopping off the heads of everybody, but more so the Christians. And I thought it was very, very unfair. So we are going to help them." Since the beginning of the Syrian civil war and the rise of Islamic State, many more Muslims than Christians have been killed or displaced because of the violence. A 2015 Washington Post poll found that 78 per cent of Americans favoured equal consideration for refugees regardless of religion. The order was called "Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States" and contained a temporary entry ban that would affect citizens of seven countries - Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Somalia. The order calls for a halt to the flow of refugees from Syria until further notice and suspends all refugee admissions for 120 days until more analysis can determine which countries harbour the greatest threat. The annual intake of refugees for fiscal 2017 would also fall to 50,000 from more than 100,000 authorized now, according to the order. The order also included a new policy that states and localities should have a say in determining whether refugees can resettle there. It calls for the secretary of homeland security to propose a way to make their involvement routine. Governors and mayors, mostly Republicans, have objected to refugees, once they are admitted to the country, being resettled in their jurisdictions, often in small and medium-size cities where the cost of living is lower than it is in big coastal cities. Earlier drafts of the order called for the creation of safe zones to protect civilians in Syria - a feature that could require committing thousands of ground troops. But in the final order, there was no mention of such zones. The downsizing of the refugee programme, which had grown under former President Barack Obama's administration, fulfils Trump's campaign pledge to start the "extreme vetting" of immigrants and refugees, even though the United States already conducts the most rigorous and drawn-out screening process in the world. Never easy for Syrians Syrians are subject to special attention because Islamic State controls significant amounts of territory in their country. An estimated 11 million Syrians have fled their homes since the outbreak of fighting in 2011, with almost five million registered as refugees and more than six million internally displaced. US vetting has changed significantly since the refugee programme was suspended for several months after the attacks of 11 September 2001. After applicants register with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, that agency refers some of the most vulnerable to the United States. They include single mothers and their children, victims of violence and people with severe medical conditions requiring sophisticated treatment. Last year, the UNHCR referred more than 34,000 applicants, up from 16,000 in 2015 and 10,000 the year before that. Syrians being considered for resettlement in the United States pass through a complex, multi-tiered background investigation. It involves biometric and database screening, personal interviews to look for inconsistencies in their stories, and security screenings by the National Counterterrorism Center, the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security and the State Department. The process typically takes nine months to two years to complete. In the fiscal year that ended in October, the United States admitted 12,500 Syrian refugees. An additional 3,500 were admitted for resettlement in the last three months of 2016. The overwhelming majority were women and children. Now, with Trump's executive order, the flow grinds to an immediate halt. People who have sold their belongings in preparation for an imminent departure may not be allowed to board their flights to the United States. It was not immediately clear what would happen to those refugees already in the air when the order was signed. Some refugees were finding their appointments with DHS officials cancelled even before the order came into force, said Linda Hartke, head of the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service. Unaccompanied refugee minors living in camps, helped by the group, now cannot fly to the United States to live with foster families, she said. Refugee advocates slammed the order as cruel, while proponents of tighter immigration controls said it would protect Americans from radical Islamists who might try to sneak into the United States as refugees and launch an attack. "The ban on refugees will severely cripple the US refugee programme, leaving thousands who face life-threatening danger without humanitarian protection," said Greg Chen, director of advocacy for the American Immigration Lawyers Association. "This policy does not make us safer. It shows weakness and withdraws our nation from the position as global leader when so many refugees urgently need protection." The International Rescue Committee called suspending refugee resettlement a "harmful and hasty" decision that would affect thousands of innocent people - mostly women and children - awaiting resettlement to the United States. "America has the strongest, most successful resettlement programme in the world," said David Miliband, head of the IRC. "Certified by successive administrations, the US resettlement programme makes it harder to get to the United States as a refugee than any other route." The UNHCR has warned for several years that the world is undergoing a refugee and migration crisis of epic proportions, comparable only to the period after World War II. Some analysts caution that the decision to suspend refugee admissions to a country that defines itself as a nation of immigrants could lead other governments to follow suit and undermine US credibility. Canada will offer temporary residency to any traveller stranded by US President Donald Trump's order temporarily barring people from seven Muslim-majority countries, a senior official said. While local and federal Canadian MPs condemned Donald Trump's ban, the Justin Trudeau government has refrained from directly criticising Donald Trump's immigration policies. Canadian immigration minister Ahmed Hussen told a news conference that he did not know how many people might be eligible, but said only a small number of passengers trying to fly to the United States from Canada had been denied boarding. Trump's executive order has brought uncertainty to immigrants around the world, including people visiting their home countries, on whether they would be allowed to return to the United States. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if they need it, as we have done so in the past," Hussen said. Since the United States accounts for 75 per cent of all Canadian exports, Ottawa preferred to remain silent on the Trump order and instead opted to stress that Canada is open to refugees. The Canadian Council for Refugees called on the Justin Trudeau government to pull out of its so-called Safe Third Country agreement with the United States, under which Canada returns asylum seekers crossing the US border. Most politicians in Canada have already condemned Trump's ban. On Sunday, the opposition New Democrats called for an emergency debate in the federal parliament. Earlier in the day, more than 200 Canadian technology company founders, executives and investors called on Ottawa to immediately give temporary residency to those displaced by Trump's order. "Canadian tech companies understand the power of inclusion and diversity of thought, and that talent and skill know no borders," the letter said. Canada is eager to attract skilled tech workers from abroad while also retaining employees and students who are often lured away by global companies. More than 300,000 Canadians work in California's Silicon Valley. Protestors oppose Trump's Keystone revival, hold march in Buffalo Buffalo in New York state yesterday witnessed a protest march against the Dakota Access pipeline. The protestors marched in solidarity with the hundreds of people at Standing Rock in North Dakota. The local protest follows president Donald Trump's recent orders to press ahead on the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines. According to protestors, the projects would harm the environment and possible pollute drinking water. The protestors carried signs and chanted slogans like ''water is life'' and ''you can't drink oil, keep it in the soil'' and according to the group, although the pipeline was several states away, the issue still resonated in Boston. The orders that president Trump signed clear the way for renegotiating pipeline deals and ordering materials for the pipelines that would be made in the US. According to Trump and other proponents, the pipelines would create jobs and cut reliance on foreign energy, even as, demonstrators remained firm and continued the fight to protect US' water. On 21 January, thousands marched through downtown Colorado Springs calling for equality, fairness and human rights a day after Trump's inauguration. The rally yesterday focused on Trump's reversing former president Barack Obama's rejection of the proposed 1,179-mile pipeline in November 2015 (See: President Obama rejects Keystone XL pipeline proposal). According various Native American tribes and activists, the project would pollute drinking water and sacred Native American cultural sites. Ryan Barry, who organised the protest, said he wanted to raise awareness about a movement toward sustainable energy, not fossil fuel. He added civic organisation, Unite Colorado Springs, had been standing with the people of Standing Rock Indian Reservation in North and South Dakota since September, adding that they were determined to protest Trump's executive actions as long as he was president. I dreamt and talked about it for years and finally at 67 years of age, I grabbed my bag, caught the bus to the airport, boarded a plane and landed in Biarritz in the South of France on my first step on the Camino de Santiago. I arrived in beautiful sunshine and the first people I met were Ann and Sean Meehan from Donegal Town and an Aussie called John. All were heading my way so we shared a taxi to St Jean Pied de Port. Warning; If you are going to do the Camino, dont take a taxi to St Jean, its over 100 and the train costs 7.50. Bus and train services are easy to access. The first stop was the Camino Office where you can find out everything you need to know. I knew very little before I arrived and made the silly mistake of taking a case with wheels. The streets are cobbled and steep, not ideal for pulling a case along. Most people carry their belongings in rucksacks on the climb but I had mine sent on from Alberque (hostel) to Alberque costing 5 - 7 each time but well worth it. Rooms available Knowing so little about the Camino I booked into a B&B the first night which was outside St Jean. I wouldnt advise this, there are lots of hostels which cost from 5 to 10 per night, you may not be able to book online but there are usually rooms available. I was lucky with the B&B, as the owner collected me in St Jean and delivered me back the next morning at 7am. Otherwise I would have had to walk 3k. I was warned before I left to begin the walk early so I would be finished each day before the sun got too hot. When I got out of that car on the first morning I looked at the hill in front of me and thought; What have you let yourself in for, you daft auld biddy? It rose steeply in front of me and didnt look as though it was going to level off at any time soon. Okay, I thought One foot in front of the other. That became my mantra for the next five days. As I came to the first rest stop, a little cafe, Ann and Sean Meehan were there and we had coffee together and then it was on to the next rest stop, in the middle of nowhere. We climbed 1,400m that first day to Roncesvalles which is 25k from St Jean by road, thats not allowing for the altitude of the mountain. That evening my MiFit said 44,861 steps. Over the next five days we travelled 150km which is nearer 200km when you calculate in the altitude. Each afternoon I prayed for the hostel to come into sight and many times vowed I would never do it again, but the next morning I was up with a smile and ready to go with very few aches or pains and not a blister in sight. We left each morning in the dark, most of us with flashlights on our heads, the atmosphere was lovely, everyone with great attitudes. Wonderful people I met some wonderful people along the way, from all corners of the world; Korea, Japan, Denmark, Australia, New Zealand, the US, France, Germany etc. I spent time walking and chatting with a young woman, Jackie, from Korea, who had spent time in Bundoran learning to surf, another woman, Angelica, from Guatemala, Miok, a pharmacist from South Korea, really interesting people. I had dinner the first evening with five others; a French couple, an English man, a Polish man and a Korean man. Most people spoke some English. All really nice people but nobody could beat the Irish for the craic. When you arrived at the rest spots you usually got a shout, Hey Ann, ham and eggs on the menu, or something similar, and they usually kept a seat for you. Two guys from Keady, Armagh, were mines of information about the Camino. One of them had already walked the Camino a few times. Hilarious company! They were also very au fait with Ballyshannon and Creevy, where they spend free time when not working or walking the Camino. Tough journey It was a tough journey but so enjoyable, despite sore feet. Im not religious but theres definitely something spiritual about it. I dont know what it is, maybe its the battle with yourself to complete the journey or the euphoria when the strain and pain ends each day, as someone suggested. All I know is Im going back and hope to do the full 1000km in the next few years. A new Donegal-based research project focusing on the wellbeing of cancer survivors is to be launched this week. Funded by the Irish Cancer Society with support from Relay for Life Donegal, new research into issues around cancer survivorship to be carried out by researchers based in Letterkenny University Hospital. Dr Janice Richmond, advanced nurse practitioner in the oncology department at Letterkenny University Hospital, and Dr Jane Walsh, director of the health research group in NUI Galway and Co-Director of the Health and Wellbeing Cluster in the Whitaker Institute, will play a lead role in carrying out research into ways in which cancer patients who have gone through treatment can feel better, both physically and psychologically. Dr Richmond will speak at the launch about why her research is important when it comes to providing healthier, happier lives for cancer survivors. Dr Robert OConnor, head of research in the Irish Cancer Society, will speak about the types of research which the society supports, covering how we can better prevent, detect, treat and survive cancer. Robert OConnor, chair of Relay For Life Donegal, will discuss how the local community are making a real impact when it comes to supporting the work of the Irish Cancer Society. Dothans business community appears ready to embrace a state gas tax increase for road and bridge repair, a state lottery and state money for new prisons, according to instant polls conducted Monday during a Dothan Area Chamber of Commerce meeting held to hear from state legislators. According to instant polls conducted from those in attendance at the chambers Eggs and Issues annual meeting, 81 percent of those responding would support a six-cent per gallon gas tax increase to be spent on repairing roads and bridges. Eight percent of those responding said they would support an increase of less than six cents. Six percent said they would support an increase of more than six cents per gallon, while five percent said they would not support any increase. A series of meetings around Alabama were held last year to push a six cents per gallon increase in the state gas tax for road and bridge repair, but the measure failed to gain traction. A similar measure could be introduced in the upcoming legislative session. Meanwhile, the Association of County Commissions of Alabama is backing a three cents per gallon increase to fund a $1.2 billion bond issue to be used to resurface rural county roads. About 150 people attended Mondays chamber meeting, held at the Wiregrass Rehabilitation Center. More than half of those in attendance responded to a series of questions asked during the meeting. The poll is not scientific and reflects only a small portion of Dothan's business community. Reponses are below: Q: How optimistic are you that 2017 will be a good year economically for your business and for the business community as a whole? Very Optimistic: 49 percent Moderately Optimistic: 43 percent Somewhat Optimistic: 8 percent Not at all optimistic: 0 percent Q: Do you support the state of Alabama building new prisons to reduce overcrowding and avoid federal intervention in the prison system? Yes: 69 percent No: 31 percent Q: Do you support the Alabama Legislature passing a referendum to allow the citizens of Alabama to vote on a state lottery? Yes: 67 percent No: 14 percent Depends on the Details: 19 percent. Q: If a lottery were enacted in Alabama, how do you believe the money should be spent? To the General Fund: 12 percent To the Education Fund: 41 percent Split Between Both: 47 percent Q: Who will be the next Governor of Alabama? Bradley Byrne, U.S. Representative: 39 percent Young Boozer, State Treasurer: 16 percent Roy Moore, former Supreme Court Chief Justice: 10 percent Twinkle Cavanaugh, Public Service Commissioner: 7 percent Kay Ivey, Lt. Governor: 7 percent Tommy Battle, Mayor of Huntsville: 6 percent John Merrill, Secretary of State: 4 percent Sandy Stimpson, Mayor of Mobile: 4 percent Del Marsh, State Senator: 3 percent Martha Roby, U.S. Representative: 3 percent As Houston County Commission chairman, Robert Crowder focused on changing the commissions image. It was more than a board that looked after the countys roads, current chairman Mark Culver said. Crowder helped make it a governing body on equal footing with other organizations. Culver said both he and Crowder were elected to the commission in 1986, Culver as a commissioner and Crowder as chairman. Although its membership changed, Culver said Crowder was able to keep the commission pointed in the right direction. Crowder died at his home in Taylor under hospice care on Friday. He was 67. Culver was appointed chairman in 1997 when Crowder left the commission to become executive director of the Southern Alabama Regional Council on Aging. Vickie Murphy, who served as Crowders secretary at SARCOA for almost 20 years, described him as a giving man who planned things through. Our program grew tremendously because of Robert Crowders vision, Murphy said. Under his watch the program evolved and moved from downtown Dothan to a new facility on Brannon Stand Road. Murphy said Crowder was a strong advocate for seniors in the seven counties SARCOA serves and changed the direction of aging programs in Alabama. He made contributions to programs across the state and nation through various boards on which he served, including the National Association of Area Agencies on Aging and the Southeastern Association of Area Agencies on Aging. Crowder believed that it was important to understand the aging environment at the regional and national level in order to advance SARCOAs mission. Culver said Crowder helped start the senior center in Taylor when he was mayor and was active in working with and helping seniors when he became commission chairman and later the head of SARCOA. It wasnt just a job to him, Culver said. He did it because he loved them and he had a great reputation around the state for being a leader for senior rights. Murphy said Crowder was diagnosed with cancer in 2015 and retired from SARCOA on Aug. 31, 2016. Crowders father served in the military and he moved around the country with his family while growing up. They settled in the Dothan area and Crowder graduated from Dothan High School and Auburn University. After terms as mayor and county commission chairman, he worked with SARCOA to support causes for seniors. According to information from SARCOA: Crowder fought to secure Tobacco Settlement money for Alabamas elderly via the Frail Elderly and Disabled Medicaid Waiver program. He was instrumental in promoting legislation to establish and fund the Senior Citizens Trust Fund to ensure sufficient funds for the needs of the ever-increasing senior population. He helped to re-establish the Alabama Association of Area Agencies on Aging. Crowder served on the Governors Long-Term Care Task Force and served as past President of the Alabama Gerontological Society (AGS). He was inducted into the Senior Citizens Hall of Fame in 2009. Locally, senior centers in Barbour, Coffee, Covington, Dale, Geneva, Henry and Houston counties have exercise equipment, computers and Internet access due to Crowders vision and persistence. Crowder was instrumental in securing additional local funding for the senior centers and achieved a funded grant for the Enhanced In-Home Service program, which provided homebound participants with additional food via the Brown Bag program and also provided additional transportation for medical appointments. Through his leadership, the Hungry to Help Program was established giving sponsors the vehicle through which to provide nutritious meals to an elderly neighbor, a senior friend, or a disabled loved one. Because of Crowders vision the Wiregrass Senior Resource Center was established. Crowder worked directly with numerous senior citizen groups, service delivery agencies, city and county political entities and numerous other resource groups to meet the needs of seniors. The SARCOA staff grew from 10 employees to 70 during Crowders tenure. The family will receive friends at Ward-Wilson Funeral Home from 5-7 p.m. Sunday. The funeral will be 2 p.m. Monday at Tabernacle United Methodist Church in Taylor. Burial will follow in Memory Hill Cemetery. In February 2016, Brett Kaplan a veteran of the corporate world flew the coop to become CFO of online home services marketplace Oneflare. Founded just five years earlier by serial entrepreneurs Marcus Lim and Adam Dong, the fast-growing Sydney tech start-up provided the enterprising South African with relief from an itch big business hadnt scratched. The former PwC, Investec and Onsite Rental Group employee spoke to Dynamic Business about the rationale behind his career change and what corporate types have to gain from joining the start-up ecosystem. Dynamic Business: What led you to trade in a corporate career for a job with a start-up? Kaplan: In January 2015, My wife and I took an extended 12-month honeymoon to travel the world. During what I like to call our adult gap year, we spent six months in India, working for an Australia-based social business. The team was small with a mix of young Aussies and local Indians, all trying to raise the standard of English education on the outskirts of Bangalore. There was a technology aspect to the business in that staff were developing software for tablets to assist facilitators who didnt have formal teaching qualifications. My role was to help the team professionalise, drawing on my corporate background. Working with a team of young, passionate people young team who were eager to learn and try new things was an uplifting experience. It was also thrilling being part of a group that could quickly shape the business and pivot on short notice. During my time in India, I witnessed a huge improvement in the management of the business and revelled in its success when it won a coveted technology grant from Atlassian. The experience stayed with me during the rest of our travels and when we returned to Australia I decided to search for a similar role with a small business with big ambitions, possibly in the tech space, that could benefit from my corporate development experience. Dynamic Business: What was the appeal of working with Oneflare at the executive level? Kaplan: It was obvious the business model had massive potential. Other online marketplaces have had huge success in Australia and local services is another potential one of those. Oneflare had been experiencing rapid growth and the trajectory was (and still is) looking good. In 2015, it generated over $450m worth of jobs and attracted over 1.3 million unique visitors monthly we expect the 2016 figures to be significantly higher. The team are really switched on and passionate about solving the local services challenge. Dynamic Business: How did you appeal to the senior management of the business? Kaplan: By showing them that: 1) I was a guy they would get on with as well as work with; 2) I had seen and worked through similar organisational growth challenges that they seemed to be facing; and 3) I was prepared to do everything from basic transactional work to high level strategic and financial planning. Dynamic Business: How have your start-up and corporate experiences differed? Kaplan: There are many subtle and then not-so-subtle differences Like any tech start-up, shoes are considered optional, theres a high frequency staff drinks and dress-ups, and dogs wander around the officeand chase balls around the office and chew the odd cable around the office. Yes, there was some cultural adjustment but ultimately the transition from corporate to start-up life was quite easy for me. Id already had a taste of start-up culture in India and I tend to approach everything in life with an open-mind. Above all, OneFlare is driven by a great company culture its a hugely enjoyable work environment. The greatest point of difference between corporate and start-up culture and the greatest attraction for me has been the ability to shape the business with incredible freedom and speed plus the opportunity to work with a team of managers who possess real entrepreneurial flair. I was amazed in one of my first management meetings how we were talking about potentially changing the entire revenue model, which would be rolled out in three months. Dynamic Business: How has the company evolved since you came onboard? Kaplan: Since joining in February 2016, the growth of the business in terms of user volume, financials and headcount has been incredibly rapid (compared to what I was used to in the corporate world). For instance, when I joined OneFlare there were 50 employees whereas now we have 75. We also attracted a $15 million investment from Domain Group, who acquired a 35% stake in the company in May 2016. Its interesting to think that it wasnt that long ago that team members were refilling the water cooler with an outside hose in order to keep the bank account in credit. The growth weve enjoyed has been accompanied by a lot of change, both in terms of the way our teams work and in the way the leadership team steers the ship. That said, the culture has largely remained the same, particularly the ability to think and move quickly with bold ambition, always learning from our mistakes. If anything, theres a greater level of excitement and passion from the team due to the fact that the stakes are now higher and the opportunities more real. The challenge will be to retain that culture as we continue to grow. Weve had many a heated debate about the best way to tackle this challenge and its these debates that have brought out some really smart solutions. Dynamic Business: why should corporate workers consider joining a start-up? Kaplan: Freedom The freedom you experience in playing an active role in shaping and growing the business. The freedom and pace at a startup is thrilling, making each and every day at work an adventure. Also, your past experience in corporate will benefit you greatly at a startup. In the corporate world you see what works for large companies, and what doesnt, which you can then apply to the startup to help it grow and be more successful. See also: Before getting hitched, solidify your business: Oneflares CEO on securing the right investors Are you planning on rebranding your SME this year? Or maybe youre just looking to give your website a a facelift. Either way, the ever-changing landscape of domain names is rich with opportunities to boost business. Are you keeping up with the latest trends? If not, here are three you should know about. 1. New gTLDs ICANN (thats the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) is the organisation responsible for keeping the Internet from turning into the Wild West in terms of domain name registrations and extensions. ICANN is the governing body that allows new generic top level domains (gTLDs) from being registered, and recently there has been a surge in the number of approved domain extensions. Until a few years ago, stepping outside the box in terms of gTLDs meant choosing .net or .biz instead of .com. Now, gTLDs like .photography or .nyc are available, among hundreds of other generic top level domains for multiple industries. This means you have a brand-new opportunity to get creative with your domain name. Which of the new gTLDs of the world will be your top choice? Before you get too excited about all of your options, be sure to consider existing gTLDs. The process for registering a brand-new domain extension with ICANN is not only time-consuming, but also expensive. Unless you have an extra 200 grand on hand and a handful of lawyers to handle the paperwork, its best to stick with options that other companies have already registered. Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to find out which extensions to consider for your website. Start with a domain name generator like Nominus, for example. 2. Dropping Vowels English in particular is a language full of silent vowels and letters. Who needs them anyway? One trend appearing in company names, product names and domain names alike is the dropping of vowels. Toggle becomes Toggl, for example. Its also popular to spell a word phonetically for a new twist. Would you buy Tiger boxes or Tyga boxes? The latter is far mare eye catching and sparks curiosity. A word of caution, however: when you start playing around with dropped letters or clever spelling, be sure to run plenty of tests with your potential audience in order to make sure the changes make sense. If many people mispronounce or misunderstand the word, it is time to go back to the drawing board. 3. Shorter Extensions Although long gTLDs like .photography or .business are now available for purchase, shorter domain extensions are actually trending. And for good reason: advertising space is precious, and shorter domains are more economical. Think about the cost of business cards, flyers or good old fashioned newspaper classified ads. In many instances, youll be charged per letter. A long gTLD could cause your advertising bill to skyrocket. On the other hand, think about how easily your digital marketing team will be able to design side bar banners or smaller advertising slots with a long domain name. Ideally, the entire URL will fit onto the same line. But if your viewers need a magnifying glass to make out the name of your website, your branding efforts will be moot. Opt for shorter gTLDs that are just two or three letters long, and try to keep the overall domain name on the short side as well. Bonus Trend: Investing in Domain Names Investing in domain names is becoming more popular and trendy each year. With a little up-front investment, selling popular domain names for a larger price down the road can be an excellent way to earn passive income. However, as with all investments, there is some risk. You might never be able to resell a domain name. But if you keep a close eye on trends in business and popular culture, you might be able to predict which domain names will be sought after in the near future. Still, the popularity of new gTLDs might dissolve this form of domain name investing. With so many other options to choose from, it would be easy to buy the same domain name under a different extension, like .city. However, .com continues to be the most recognizable and default option for domain extensions, so companies may still pay big bucks to purchase a .com version from you. About the Author: Whilst President Trumps dumping of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a blow to the Australian government, the move wasnt unexpected and media reports suggest the focus could now shift to including China as a centerpiece to a post-TPP multilateral trade bloc. Whilst this perhaps makes sense from a trade perspective after all, China accounts for 26% of Australias total imports and exports (2015/16) the political challenge will be to ensure Australia does not become the meat in the sandwich in any potential US / China trade war. Trade Minister Steven Ciobo said the government was willing to work with the other 10 participating countries (Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru, New Zealand, Singapore and Vietnam) to find a way forward for the TPP, and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has suggested China could replace the USA in the TPP. Minister Ciobo also said Indonesia had expressed interest in involvement in the TPP and that a reformulated agreement (without the US) would create enhanced market opportunities into markets like Canada and Mexico. It also, of course, would reduce the cost of compliance, and thats really important for Australian small to medium enterprises, who want lower barriers to trade, he said. From a market perspective, President Trumps move to withdraw from the TPP so far appears to have had limited impact, with the Australian stock market and Australian Dollar showing minimal direct reaction. But what has been the opportunity cost for Australian SMEs? For Australian goods exporters, the TPP would have eliminated more than 9% of tariffs in the TPP region. In terms of industry sectors, Agriculture would have been the big winner with commodities such as beef, sugar, rice and dairy all receiving preferential access through new quotas and tariff reductions. Sugar producers in particular would be frustrated with the POTUS as they were being promised new access to the US market for the first time in 20 years. Trump would also be on the nose for our cheese makers who were expected to benefit from the cutting of tariffs to Japan and increased access to the States. Service exporters were also set to benefit from the agreement with a promise to liberalise key barriers and provide more transparent and predictable operating conditions in TPP countries. With the end of the mining boom, the TPP could have been just the shot in the arm companies servicing this industry needed. Vietnam had promised to open its mining investment regime and level the playing field for foreign suppliers to its growing mining, oil and gas sectors. Large state owned enterprises were also to be held to account ensuring Australian goods and services providers could compete fairly for contracts. But not everyone is unhappy with the demise of the TPP. The Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) clause has raised alarm bells in some quarters as it was seen as an overly powerful vehicle to advocate on behalf of corporations seeking compensation for future losses resulting from legislative change or court decisions in foreign countries. There were also concerns that the TPP would keep cheap generic drugs locked out of Australia for longer, although Prime Minister Turnbull had quashed this suggestion on many occasions. So, while Trumps executive order trigger finger may have cost SMEs in terms of potential access, it appears that the greater threat in the short term may be regional stability and becoming collateral damage in any trade war. See also: What does Trumps victory mean for trade?, Will the US withdrawal from the TP affect us? About the author Ian Smith is the CEO of CargoHound, an online marketplace for international freight that enables importers and exporters to source competitive freight pricing from community rated service providers. Since launch in July 2015, the Sydney-based company has signed up over 1050 importers and exporters and received aggregate freight quotes totalling more than A$5.5 million. 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Ireland United States Minor Outlying Islands United States of America 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 They have a belief in Chinese that the way you celebrate the first day of the lunar year determines how you will spend the rest of the year. With this in mind I accepted and invitation to celebrate the Chinese New Year at JinJiang Inn in Ortigas. After all, the place is just 10 minute walk away from my place. I wore red because black and white is a no-no color for celebrations. Red is believed to be a lucky color to wear specially during celebrations. Plus thiss dress was a gift by Feng Shui Master Marites Allen to me. It has auspicious symbol printed all over it signifying windfall of good fortune ! Two cute red and green lions was waiting by the entrance of JinJiang Inn. Some of the foreign guest of the hotel enjoyed the appearance of the lions and took video and photos. Yes, I also took videos and photos because they are cute and its lucky to have them dance in front of you. After the dance, they served a Chinese New Year feast lunch at Five Spice. Its a Chinese restarant concessionaire of JinJiang Inn in Ortigas. They served their signature Five Spice dish, the traditional Kikiam they actually serve in China! Five Spice is a small restaurant situated at the lower ground floor of the hotel. It can house up to 50 guest max approximately JinJiang Inn is part of the Hotel 101 management under Hotel Asia hotel chains and because JinJiang is their hotel brand that is originally Chinese they choose to hold their Chinese New Year Celebrations in here. Im looking forward to experience staying in their hotels. JinJiang Inn Ortigas is popular for business guests as it is in the heart of Ortigas Center along San Miguel Ave corner Lourdes Drive. They have 90 rooms and 5 suites but no swimming pool though. Its mostly for business . They also have JinJiang Inn in Makati with 50 rooms and 9 suites, InJap Tower in Iloilo with 194 rooms and Hotel 101 Manila in front of SM Mall of Asia with 518 rooms and a pool! Meanwhile, heres what my Fortune Cookie said: Stay gorgeous eveyrone! The confirmation vote for Donald Trumps nominee for Secretary of Education, Michigan billionaire Betsy DeVos, is scheduled for this Tuesday, so we can expect to see a final flurry of informationand misinformation, as it may beover the next 48 hours in an all-out attempt to secure her the position. And its a good bet that one of the individuals behind this wave of propaganda will be Ed Patru, the self-appointed head, andas sleuthed out recently by Mercedes Schneiderprobably the only member, of Friends of Betsy DeVos. I searched for any formally organized group calling itself Friends of Betsy DeVos, and I found no record. In fact, the only hits I did find always seem to be some quote by Ed Patru, spokesman for Friends of Betsy DeVos. There is just Ed Patru. According to his Linkedin bio, Ed Patru is a PR guy who is currently VP of Media Affairs for a Washington, DC-based, PR firm, DCI Group. So, perhaps not surprisingly, theres really no such thing as a group called Friends of Betsy DeVos theres just Ed Patru, trotting out supportive quotes and press releases touting Ms. DeVos as the next coming of John Dewey and Mother Teresa Patru argued that DeVos does not push for school choice in the thousands of school districts across the country where public schools are doing a great job. Rather, her focus has always been on the hundreds of thousands of poor kids who, by no fault of their own, are forced to attend public schools that arent working. and There isnt a serious person in America who looks at Betsys nearly 30-year record of investing her time, energy and fortune in bringing educational equity to communities of color and concludes that her motivation for doing this is racism, Patru declared. It doesnt even make sense. Its absurd and preposterous on its face. and Patru pointed out the broad base of support she has earned among African Americans, urban Democrats, Latinos, and other minorities because of her work in promoting educational equality. However, Ed Patru is a very good friend to have if youre a spectacularly unqualified, bumbling candidate for a high-level executive position overseeing a government agency that is responsible for a profession you know absolutely nothing about. So what brought Ed and Betsy together? How did a West Michigan multi-level marketer find a high-powered Washington-insider political spin doctor to prop up her campaign? And what experiences has Mr. Patru had that qualify him for this unenvious task? Ed Patru currently works as VP of Media Affairs for a Washington, DC-based, PR firm, DCI Group. What does DCI Group do? DCIs founders cut their teeth working for the tobacco industry in the 1990s, and one of the groups managing partners, Tom Synhorst, was a field coordinator for the RJ Reynolds tobacco company. The work of a field coordinator for RJR included keeping track of state and local smoking bans and cigarette tax initiatives; monitoring workplace smoking bans; meeting with company sales representatives; developing and supporting smokers rights groups, including setting up meetings, circulating petitions, and providing materials; contacting school districts concerning RJRs youth program; placing people in public meetings and meetings with legislators to support the tobacco industrys position; getting letters to the editor printed in local and regional newspapers; and creating alliances with organizations with similar concerns, such as anti-tax groups. In one internal memo, field representatives were instructed: Xerox like crazy. When a favorable letter to the editor is printed, getting people to copy the letters and send them to their elected officials with a note saying (essentially) This is what I think, too, is key. [Letters to the editor] now become a two-step process: Step One is getting them published. Step Two is circulating them as widely as possible. According to a study published February 8, 2013 in the journal Tobacco Control, Rather than being a purely grassroots movement that spontaneously developed in 2009, the Tea Party has developed over time, in part through decades of work by the tobacco industry and other corporate interests. The DCI Group was behind this effort through their consultation services to Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks, both of whom have worked to oppose smoke-free laws across the United States since at least 2006. DCI Group also has ties to the American Legislative Exchange Council, a corporate bill mill that provides draft templates of proposed legislation that ethically-challenged congressional representatives can use to advance bills that ALEC wants passed, but that the reps werent quite clever enough to write themselves. Another client of DCI Group was the nation of Azerbaijan, which the US Department of State notes is one of the most important spots in the world for oil exploration and development but rates the countrys human rights record as poor, especially with respect to freedom of assembly, freedom of expression, the administration of justice, and the respect of property rights. For the low, low price of only $20,000 per month, DCI agreed to provide strategic PR, media outreach and establishment of relationships with U.S. think tanks. DCIs goal here was to develop relationships between Azerbaijan and American think tanks because these organizations are vital contributors to the formulation of U.S. policy and serve as validators of official policy positions. Human Rights Watch has condemned the Azerbaijaini government for its treatment of imprisoned journalists, human rights defenders, and political opposition activists after police forces attacked anti-corruption protesters in the capital city of Baku in October 2012. So, it seems that Mr. Patrus work with Betsy DeVos would not be the first time that a DCI employee has worked with an ethically and morally challenged client to help advance policies harmful to American citizens. Another special skill of the DCI Group is its expertise in developing fake grassroots organizations. These astroturf groups give the perception that ordinary citizens have joined forces to support a particular cause, and present an insidious challenge to transparency in governance and public policy work by obfuscating the intentions behind movements, and creating the impression that things are not quite as they seem. In other words, lying. A prime example of this tactic was the DCI-backed front group, Stop Too Big To Fail, aimed at killing Wall Street reform. Stop Too Big To Fail is an astroturf operation funded by corporate interests to give the appearance of grassroots opposition to reform. The group posed as a liberal grassroots organization and launched a $1.6 million ad campaign asking viewers to tell their senators, vote against this phony financial reform. Support real reform, stop too big to fail. Stop Too Big To Fail has also launched diaries on netroots sites like Daily Kos and FireDogLake and posted columns on Huffington Post. The group even went as far as to dupe Simon Johnson, a former chief economist at the IMF, now at MIT, into participating in a media conference call purportedly on the topic of breaking up large banks. To his dismay, they later displayed a photo of Johnson, who is a prominent advocate of breaking up the big banks, on their webpage. This was not the first time DCI has helped large corporations to create a phony consumers group. DCI has manufactured grassroots campaigns for the tobacco industry in fake smokers rights groups and has managed public relations for the Coalition to Protect Patients Rights, an anti-health reform group. DCI operatives have also: Worked on stealth campaigns to undermine mortgage reform legislation in 2008 Represented the military junta in Burma in 2002, drafting press releases critical of the Bush administration Worked behind the scenes for Microsoft as they were embroiled in an anti-trust suit in the 1990s, to sway public opinion and the opinion of state and federal officials Lobbied on behalf of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), one of the countrys largest and most influential trade associations, in order to generate positive PR for the controversial Medicare Act of 2003. DCI paid thousands of dollars to health care consultants to plant positive stories in the press, tilting the battle in favor of the law Contributed to the birth of a new industry in Washington: journo-lobbyingan innovation driven primarily by the influence industry. Lobbying firms that once specialized in gaining person-to-person access to key decision-makers have branched out. The new game is to dominate the entire intellectual environment in which officials make policy decisions, which means funding everything from think tanks to issue ads to phony grassroots pressure groups. But the institution that most affects the intellectual atmosphere in Washington, the media, has also proven the hardest for K Street to influenceuntil now. To review, Mr. Patru and his colleagues at DCI Group have worked with radical dictatorships across the world to destabilize entire nations and economies; have deliberately lied to and dangerously misled the public with respect to tobacco use, the mortgage crisis, and big pharma; and have been on the ground floor during the birth of two of the most destructive movements in US politicsastroturf groups, and journo-lobbying, both of which have contributed to the American publics distrust of one of our most venerable institutions, the pressand each other. That Ms. DeVos would turn to a public relations lobbyist and operative like Ed Patru, an employee of a firm with a long track record of unethical business relationships, tampering in the affairs of sovereign nations, and flat-out dirty tricks, should tell us everything we need to know about her true goals and motivations in pursuing the position of Secretary of Education For Betsy, its not about the kids. Its not about learning. Its not even about choice. Its all about the money. And the power. Our schools are not businesses. And Betsy DeVos has no business being Secretary of Education. 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Inducted into the Philadelphia Public Relations Hall of Fame, for many years he served as a Lecturer in Corporate Communication at Penn State University. A former President of the Philadelphia Public Relations Association (PPRA) he has lectured at Rowan University, Temple University, The College of New Jersey and Arcadia University. He has conducted workshops on public relations for thousands of participants throughout the nation and has taught countless others the art of public speaking. He has also advised numerous lawyers, judges, public officials and political candidates. Cirucci is a prolific writer and his op-ed pieces have appeared in the Philadelphia Daily News, Philadelphia Inquirer, Courier-Post and other publications. A native of Camden NJ, Cirucci is a former President of the Philadelphia chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators. Cirucci served as Associate Executive Director of the Philadelphia Bar Association for nearly 30 years. He served as Chair of Penn State University's Professional Advisory Board for the Corporate Communication major at Penn State Abington and on the Pennsylvania Bar Association's Judicial Selection Commission. He received his MA degree from Rowan University and his BA from Villanova University. He has been named a Distinguished Alumnus of Rowan's public relations program and received the E. A. "Wally" Richter Leadership Award, the highest honor from the National Association of Bar Executives' Communications Section. He has also been honored by numerous other local, state and national groups. Cirucci's passions include politics, the popular culture, books and authors, art, communication, music, theatre, movies, dining and travel. In his hometown of Camden, Cirucci taught fifth grade at the Ulysses Wiggins Elementary School named for the founder of the Camden NAACP. There he was one of the first teachers in the country to teach African-American history to inner city students. He later served as editor of a local weekly newspaper, as Assistant to the Township Manager of Cherry Hill Township and as Associate Director of Communications at the New Jersey State Bar Association. He's Dan Cirucci, the founder and editor-in chief of the Dan Cirucci Blog, Matt Rooney's sidekick on Save Jersey's videocasts and one of the most widely honored public relations professionals in his field. He's also been a public relations consultant to numerous organizations and individuals and hosted The Advocates on RVN-TV. Macetas autofertilizantes?. Un equipo del Laboratorio de Materiales Polimericos y Biosorbentes de la Universidad Federal de Sao Carlos (UFSCar), en el estado de Sao... California could become the first state to require Monsanto to label its glyphosate-based herbicide, Roundup, as a possible carcinogen following Fresno County Superior Court Judge Kristi Kapetans tentative ruling on Friday. Monsantos best-selling Roundup herbicide. Flickr The tentative ruling regards the agrochemical giants Jan. 2016 lawsuit against Californias Environmental Protection Agencys Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA). In Sept. 2015, the OEHHA issued plans to list glyphosate as a possible cancer threat under the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986, commonly known as Proposition 65. The OEHHA made the decision following the France-based International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) findings that glyphosate is probably carcinogenic to humans (Group 2A) in March 2015. In its lawsuit, Monsanto claimed that the listing was unconstitutional because the OEHHA delegated law-making authority to an unelected and non-transparent foreign body that is not under the oversight or control of any federal or state government entity. However, California lawyers argued in its motion to dismiss the lawsuit that the IARCs scientific determinations are the gold standard in carcinogen identification. According to the Associated Press, Judge Kapetan will issue a formal decision soon. OEHHA spokesman Sam Delson told the AP that state regulators are waiting for the judges formal decision before moving forward with the warning labels. Once a chemical is listed a as probable carcinogens, the manufacturer has a year before it must attach the label, Delson added. Monsanto attorney Trenton Norris argued that consumers would stop buying Roundup after seeing the labels and cause immediate financial consequences for the company. It will absolutely be used in ways that will harm Monsanto, he said. The company plans to challenge the ruling and insists on the safety of glyphosate, which is the most widely applied agricultural chemical in the world. Glyphosate is sprayed onto Roundup Ready crops that are genetically modified to resist applications of the spray. The agencys flawed and baseless proposal to list glyphosate under Proposition 65 not only contradicts Californias own scientific assessment, but it also violates the California and U.S. constitutions, said Samuel Murphey, a Monsanto spokesman. Monsanto will continue to challenge this unfounded proposed ruling on the basis of science and the law. On the same day of the hearing, environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and the law firm of Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman held a press conference outside of the Fresno courthouse in support of the OEHHA. This listing is not going to put them out of business. Its just going to warn people before they use their product that this product might cause cancer, and you better limit your use to protect yourself and to protect your families, Kennedy said at the press conference. Its called a precautionary principal. Who wouldnt want to know that? Why does this company not want these farm workers to know that this chemical may endanger them and may endanger their families, Kennedy continued. Why did [Monsanto] hire these great lawyers to come here to shut California up and to stop California from protecting these people? https://twitter.com/RobertKennedyJr/status/825128422502457344 Arturo S. Rodriguez, president of the United Farm Workers of America as well as several of Baum Hedlunds and Kennedys California Roundup cancer clients also spoke a the press conference. My husband Jack was very conscious of the dangers of chemicals and his misfortune was taking Monsantos word that Roundup was safe, said Teri McCall, who believes that a warning label would have saved her husband Jacks life. Teri McCall claims Roundup caused her husband of 40-years to develop terminal cancer after he used the herbicide on his 20-acre fruit and vegetable farm for more than 30 years. I dont want to see any more unsuspecting people die from cancer because they didnt know of the danger to their health from exposure to Roundup, she added. Glyphosate in Roundup needs to be on the list of Prop 65 chemicals that are dangerous to our health so that people can make informed decisions for themselves about the risks they are willing to take. I dont believe my husband would have been willing to take that risk. [facebook https://facebook.com/BaumHedlund/videos/10155015260708385/ expand=1] Dr. Nathan Donley, senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity and a former cancer researcher, praised the judges tentative ruling. Californias wise decision to require labeling of the controversial pesticide Roundup to clearly state that it may cause cancer is based on the worlds most reliable, transparent and science-based assessment of its active ingredient, glyphosate, he said in a statement provided to EcoWatch. We are pleased that the court is upholding consumers right to make well-informed, fact-based choices about the known risks of a product before purchasing it and support California in its commitment to protecting people and the environment from dangerous toxins. https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/status/708426106488135682 The Fresno judges tentative ruling was not the only blow to Monsanto in court. The companys years-long efforts to introduce commercial GMO (genetically modified) corn was blocked by a Mexican court last week. According to Reuters, the court upheld a late 2013 ruling that temporarily halted even pilot plots of GMO corn following a legal challenge over its effects on the environment. As Reuters explained, Critics say genetically modified corn plantings will contaminate age-old native varieties and that toxins designed to protect the GMO grain against pests may be linked to elevated insect mortality. Guess what was found in Pennsylvanias Department of Environmental Protections (DEP) filing cabinets after gas operators drilled 10,027 fracking wells over the last 12 years? Only 9,442 citizen-reported fracking complaints. And 44 percent of those are drinking water-related. Pennsylvanias DEP finally released the complaints to Public Herald, an investigative journalism nonprofit. Theres much to learn from Pennsylvanias now-public 9,442 fracking complaints as legislators decide to frack or not to frack in Western Maryland. As fracking took off in 2008, so did the number of citizens lodging water, air and land fracking complaints with the DEP. A year ago, we reported that Pennsylvanias drinking water contamination due to fracking appeared to be much higher than previously reported. To date, Pennsylvanias Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) reports only 284 positive water contaminations for the 10,027 fracking wells drilled. That three percent figure seems pretty low. What hasnt set right with many is that Pennsylvanias official water contamination rate is starkly different than what citizens report on-the-ground. Thousands of news stories, YouTube videos and social media posts report an entirely different story of serious fracking water issues, rampant air pollution, land destruction and negative health issues. In rural communities, many homes rely on private water wells, not municipally-supplied water. The new natural gas drilling process called fracking drills through surface water aquifers to access natural gas found miles underground in shale rock basins. The Now-Public 9,442 Pennsylvania Fracking Complaints Reveal: 1. The volume of citizen complaints is alarming, shocking even. For every fracking well drilled, one homeowner, business or gas operator called in an issue. 2. Water well complaints make up 44 percent of DEP complaints. The DEP is the911 dispatch center for citizen oil and gas issues. Ninety-six percent of these water complaints were dismissed. The current number of water complaints is higher as the DEP put methane migration and other water issues under different complaint categories; those cases are additional to the 4,108 reported so far. 3. Water contamination is indeed widespread and systemic: Total complaints and water complaints are scattered throughout Pennsylvanias fracking fields and arent concentrated in one area. A tally of the fracking wells drilled, total and water-related fracking complaints by EPA region in Pennsylvania. Public Herald and DEP 4. Complaint ratios worsen over time: As fracking grew in Pennsylvania, gas operators should have reduced the negative impacts to land, air and water over time. This data suggests that as fracking continues, complaint ratios increase. Because this citizen-complaint data was never studied year-over-year, the opportunities to develop best practices, share learning, conduct scientific studies and possibly reduce future harm were eliminated. Sadly, Pennsylvania DEP and Gov. Wolf were touting that fracking is safer by reporting lower violations. DEP failed to ever report the real volume of citizen complaints. As older conventional drilling was replaced by fracking in 2010, complaints-to-wells drilled grew at an increasing rate. Fracking is different and worse than conventional drilling. Source: Public Herald / Pennsylvania DEP Why Was This Complaint Data Never Made Public? Public Herald is reporting a series of articles analyzing the DEPs 12-year suppression of citizen fracking complaint data. This newly-discovered complaint data calls into question the U.S. Environmental Protection Agencys (EPA) fracking water study. After the EPAs original fracking is safe preliminary conclusion, the final report said there could be water issues in certain situations. Did the EPA ever see these 9,442 citizen complaints? Adding to this mess, several thousand complaint records are missing. Over three years, Public Herald scanned 6,981 paper complaints before the DEP emailed the nonprofit 9,442 complaints. What happened to the almost 3,000 complaint records? This data would have been invaluable to scientist, health professionals, citizens and communities to know, study, plan and adapt. How many people got sick even though authorities knew water wells were getting contaminated? Dr. Stolz explains, Suppressed information from Pennsylvania regulators makes it very difficult to know the truth about these incidents, he said. What Happened to the 3,824 Citizens Who Called In and Their Water Complaint Was Dismissed? The DEP determined that 96 percent of the fracking water complaints were not caused by nearby gas operations. Were they bogus calls? Youre telling me that there are thousands of people in Pennsylvania that want to fool the DEP? I cant accept that, said Dr. John F. Stolz to Public Herald. Dr. Stolz is a Professor of Biology at Duquesne University and through his Center for Environmental Research and Education has been providing free water tests for citizens who claim water damage. Friends of the Harmeds Dana Dolney delivers weekly water to a Pennsylvania homeowner whose well was claimed to be ruined by fracking. Theres no financial restitution or government support available for fracking damage. Homeowners either work with the offending gas company, sue or rely on charity. What Will the Future Look Like? If there is a minimum level of inherent damage involved with fracking, as the data suggests, what will fracking look like with 20,000 fracking wells in a region? What will happen to Western Marylands tourism and rural landscape? My answer. Actual West Virginia commode after nearby fracking trashed private well water. Plaintiff lost their lawsuit even though plaintiff had a taped phone call confession that frackers had ruined water. Reposted with permission from our media associate Baltimore Fishbowl. By Owen Agnew Rod Read, an engineer and stay-at-home dad, lives on the remote Isle of Lewis in Scotland. For the past seven years, hes been designing a kite that he thinks could revolutionize wind power. His prototype, a series of spinning rainbow-colored rings, stands out against the gray Scottish sky. On a good day, the kite generates more than 450 watts. Its just a small model, but Read thinks the technology could be scaled up to the utility level. His model still needs more testing, but kites have a number of advantages over traditional turbines and several companies are developing kite-based generating systems. Traditional wind turbines require a lot of concrete and steel, which makes them heavy and expensive to build. Kites are much lighter and cheaper. They can reach powerful winds at high altitudes that are inaccessible to fixed turbines. The challenge is getting all that power back down to the ground. Reads solution is a series of spinning kites, which transfer their motion downwards via a rotating column of tensioned tethers. He links his small-model kite to the drive train of his electric bicycle, which he stakes down to the thick Hebridean turf. With his kite spinning above him, he can charge the bikes battery. His kite model looks flimsy, but it uses tension to its advantage, much like a suspension bridge. Read grew up on the Isle of Lewis and said that island life lends itself to making and tinkering. Everyones got their own ideas of self-reliance and self-sustainability, he explained. Youve got to be a bit of a jack of all trades to survive on an island. Read imagines a big future for his invention. Hes created computer models of large arrays of connected kites, all generating power in unison. A network of kites, Read said, is safer and stronger than a single kite. If one kite fails, it is held aloft by the others. Read has published several of his designs on his website for anyone to use. More testing is needed to show the design can be scaled up, and Read is raising funds to help a PhD student at the nearby Strathclyde University test the design. There are other kite-driven turbine designs in various stages of development around the world, including the Google-funded Makani Power in California. Scottish Kite Power Systems is building the UKs first kite-driven power station this year. Whether kite power takes off on the utility level remains yet to be seen. For Read, his next goal is to build a kite large enough to charge his electric car. Reposted with permission from our media associate Nexus Media. More than 100 food and agriculture organizations, representing more than 10 million people across the food system, sent a letter to Capitol Hill Monday urging senators to oppose the confirmation of fast food CEO Andrew Puzder as secretary of labor. This clarion call from the nations farmers, food-system workers and public health advocates, led by Corporate Accountability International, Food Chain Workers Alliance, Friends of the Earth and Real Food Media, comes on the heels of growing opposition and controversy surrounding Donald Trumps pick to head the Department of Labor. https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/status/825767173020909568 A recent Capital & Main investigation found that under Puzders watch as CEO, CKE Restaurants faced more federal employment discrimination lawsuits than any other major fast food chain. The corporation violated workers rights, including wage theft and failed to provide employees with overtime pay. Andrew Puzder is dangerous for working families and bad for our food system, said Jose Oliva, co-director of Food Chain Workers Alliance. The country needs a labor secretary who will protect working families, not corporate interests. Puzders track record as CEO of CKE Restaurants proves that he should be kept as far away from Washington as possible. The letter calls the nomination of Andrew Puzder a betrayal of the presidents promise to improve the lives of working people and urges senators to reject Puzders nomination. It expresses grave concern with the conflicts of interest between Puzders tenure at CKE Restaurants and the responsibilities of a labor secretary, including the fact that: Puzders company has faced numerous Department of Labor violations for failing to pay the minimum wage or overtime. Sixty percent of inspections at Carls Jr. and Hardees restaurants found labor law violations. Puzder has opposed both raising the minimum wage and enforcing overtime rules and mandatory sick leave. Putting an outspoken critic of worker protections and a living wage in charge of the Department of Labor is straight out of an Orwellian nightmare, said Kari Hamerschlag, deputy director of food and technology at Friends of the Earth. The Senate must reject the nomination of Puzder if it cares at all about the basic rights of working people. Since Puzders nomination, advocacy groups have documented numerous workers rights violations under the watch of the former fast food CEO. For instance, research released by the Restaurant Opportunities Centers (ROC) United reveals a long history of labor violations at CKE Restaurants during Puzders tenure. Surveys from hundreds of CKE employees reveal that women working at CKE reported more than 1.5 times the rate of sexual harassment as reported for the industry overall. The choice of Andrew Puzder for secretary of labor is a dangerous one for this countrys working families, said Sriram Madhusoodanan, Value Meal campaign director at Corporate Accountability International. If President Trump truly wants to drain the swamp, why is he nominating people like Puzder, who have played an outsized role creating the swamp in the first place? In January, Carls Jr. and Hardees workers joined the Fight for $15 in opposing Puzders nomination, taking part in actions in more than two dozen cities. Widespread opposition and questions surrounding Puzders companys labor practices have prompted Congress to postpone the nomination hearing until February. Across the country, millions of people are demanding real change when it comes to our food system and the people who work in it, said Anna Lappe, founder of Real Food Media. Our Department of Labor must reflect those peoplenot corporate bottom lines. It is unacceptable to nominate someone who has such a callous attitude to the struggles of working families to head the labor department. The organizations signed onto the letter represent a broad cross-section of the food and labor movement, uniting groups like the Union of Concerned Scientists, Earthjustice, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers and the Workers Center of Central New York, among many others. The unprecedented nature of this coalition underscores the unique threat Puzder faces to people advocating for environmental protection, workers rights and healthy food. Puzders senate confirmation hearing begins Feb. 7, 2017. (Reuters/Andrew Winning)Richard Dawkins is one of the most prominent writers looked up to by atheists from around the world. One of the country's largest atheist organizations filed a lawsuit against a West Virginia school district for holding an optional Bible course, saying the program violates the First Amendment rights of students. The Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) sued the Mercer County Schools for implementing its "Bible in the Schools" class, an optional course that has been available since 1939. The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia, Bluefield Division, was done on behalf of a student's parent who was bringing up her child as an atheist. The lawsuit said that the Bible course promotes one religion and violates the personal consciences of students who do not share or practice the Christian faith. "Forcing Jane Doe to choose between putting her child in a Bible study class or subjecting her child to the risk of ostracism by opting out of the program violates the rights of conscience of Jane and Jamie Doe and therefore their First Amendment rights," the lawsuit read. The First Amendment prohibits Congress from filing laws that promote one religion over others and restricting a person from practicing his religion. Meanwhile, the spokesperson for the school declined to give a statement, as they are still reviewing the details of the lawsuit, according to a report from The Christian Post. In 1939, the "Bible in Schools" started as a single course in Blue Field High School, which was eventually controlled by the Mercer County Board of Education in 1986. The FFRF came out with a press release enumerating the points of contention in their lawsuit. The group called the Bible course an "equivalent of sectarian Sunday school instruction." They pointed out "Lesson 2" of the Bible course, which they say is promoting Creationism, wherein humans and dinosaurs were said to have co-existed. Another is "Lesson 6," which encourages students to obey the 10 Commandments. The Pew Research Center came out with a Religious Landscape Study in 2014, which indicated that the number of American adults identifying themselves as atheists had doubled in recent years, rising to 3.1 percent in 2014 from 1.6 percent in 2007. The same study showed that about 32 percent of atheist respondents "look primarily to science for guidance on questions of right and wrong. (Photo: LWF / M. Renau)A Syrian family living in an unfinished building in Al Mafraq. Many refugees have to trade their food vouchers to pay the rent in early 2016. Pope Francis offered his greetings to participants at the 2017 March for Life in Washington, D.C., assuring them of his prayers and blessing at an event at which U.S. Vice President Mike Pence was speaking. But the Catholic Church was keeping its powder dry on the migrant and refugee issue that followed later that day. In a papal telegram from Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Pope thanked the marchers for their witness to life and it was hardly surprising due to the Catholic stance on the sanctity of life from the moment of conception. Pence spoke at the March for Life this year on Jan. 27, marking the first time that a current vice president has attended the event. Hardly sounding like the right hand man to President Donald J. Trump, Pence told the crowds that the pro-life movement is winning, urging them to fight for life with compassion and love. Pence urged pro-lifers to win over hearts with gentleness and compassion at the 2017 March for Life an event supported by many Catholics and evangelical Christians. "So I urge you to press on," Pence told the audience gathered on the National Mall for the rally, imploring them "as it is written, let your gentleness be evident to all." "Let this movement be known for love, not anger," he said according to Catholic News Agency, "let it be known for compassion, not confrontation." "Society can be judged by how we care for the most vulnerable," he said, pointing to the aged, infirm, disabled, and unborn as examples. "We've come to a historic moment in the cause of life," he added, and "we must meet this moment with respect and compassion for every American." "Life is winning in America," he said, "and today is a celebration of that progress, the progress that we've made in that cause." The pro-life movement can win the hearts and minds of young people "if our hearts first break for young mothers and their unborn children, and if we each of us do all we can to meet them where they are with generosity, not judgment," said Pence. Other speakers at this year's rally and march, included, Kellyanne Conway, senior counselor to Trump; Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York; Baltimore Ravens tight end Benjamin Watson; and former Planned Parenthood director Abby Johnson. The Catholic support for the Trump camp on the issue of the right to life did not, however, guarantee support in every policy of the new U.S. president. Already in 2016, while the U.S. presidential campaign was in full swing Pope Francis had said, "It's hypocrisy to call yourself a Christian and chase away a refugee or someone seeking help, someone who is hungry or thirsty, toss out someone who is in need of my help. "If I say I am Christian, but do these things, I'm a hypocrite." The message read to the Washington rally, however, quoted a passage from Francis' apostolic exhortation, Amoris Laetitia: "So great is the value of a human life, and so inalienable the right to life of an innocent child growing in the mother's womb, that no alleged right...can justify a decision to terminate that life." "His Holiness is profoundly grateful for this impressive testimony to the sacredness of every human life," said the Pope's message. Pope Francis, "trusts that this event, in which so many American citizens speak out on behalf of the most defenseless of our brothers and sisters, will contribute to a mobilization of consciences in defense of the right to life and effective measures to ensure its adequate legal protection," said the message. But two days later Catholic leaders in the United States reacted with anger to President Trump's newly signed executive order that bars Syrian refugees from entering the country and halts resettlement programs for up to four months and are urging him to reconsider the policy. "This weekend proved to be a dark moment in U.S. history," Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago said in a Jan. 29 statement said America Magazine. "The executive order to turn away refugees and to close our nation to those, particularly Muslims, fleeing violence, oppression and persecution is contrary to both Catholic and American values." INTERNATIONAL HOLOCAUST REMEMBERANCE DAY Signed by Trump on the afternoon of Jan. 27, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the executive order stops all refugee resettlement for four months. It bars refugees from Syria from entering the United States indefinitely. Further, residents of seven predominantly Muslim nations cannot enter the United States for 90 days. By the following night, several federal judges temporarily blocked parts of the order so that travelers being detained in U.S. airports by border patrol agents could enter the country. On the morning of Jan. 30, the Trump administration suggested that the order was being amended so that greencard holders (permanent residents) would be allowed to reenter the United States. In an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) that aired this weekend, Trump suggested that Christian refugees would be given priority over people of other faiths, including Muslims. Of course, he was soon tweeting that sentiment from his personal account on Jan. 29. But many Christian leaders, including Catholics, rejected the notion that Christians undergoing persecution should be given priority over others being persecuted for their faith, such as Muslims suffering from violence at the hands of other Muslims. "We are told this is not the 'Muslim ban' that had been proposed during the presidential campaign, but these actions focus on Muslim-majority countries." Cupich said. "They make an exception for Christians and non-Muslim minorities, but not for Muslims refugees fleeing for their lives." He noted, "The world is watching as we abandon our commitments to American values." The New York-based World Evangelical Alliance, many of whose members hold similar views to Catholics opposing abortion and supporting the sanctity to life, reacted to Trump's decree by issuing a statement titled: "Call to Welcome Refugees." "We wholeheartedly affirm the clear teaching of the Holy Bible that the people of God are called by God to 'love' and 'welcome' the foreigner and stranger (Leviticus 19:33,34 and Matthew 25:34-36)," said the WEA statement. "We therefore call upon the worldwide body of Christ to reflect the heart of God and to actively love and welcome refugees. "We call upon Christian leaders and pastors to deepen their biblical understanding of forced displacement and to intentionally minister in ways intended to create space in the hearts and minds of others for refugees. "We call upon Christians everywhere to pursue a biblically informed perspective of forced displacement and to actively seek the welfare of refugees. "Recognizing that the global refugee crisis is putting great pressure on governments, we call upon Christians to pray for wisdom for government leaders involved in refugee-related policy-making," said WEA. A blog about life under, and resisting, a dictatorship For many principals and school leaders, learning how to grapple with some of the most vexing issues in schools only happens once they are on the job. And often, that can feel like too little, too late. For example, fostering an equitable environment in schools where the students are overwhelmingly black and Latino and the teachers are mostly white is a major challenge that many modern principals must confront, but not a skill set that has typically been cultivated in traditional preparation programs. That explains why specialized, or niche principal-training programs have been popping up across the country in recent years. They are part of a growing effort to close the gap between what principals learn in traditional degree-earning programs and the skills they find they actually need on the job. Such niche training initiatives range widely in their focussome emphasize equity issues, others focus on developing business skills. But their goals are the same: to train more-effective school leaders and increase the academic success of students. Those types of programs are in response to the sense that the field, by and large ...[is] not adequately preparing principals, said Ellen Goldring, a professor in Vanderbilt Universitys Peabody College of Education and Human Development. Similar to the differences between what a degree in economics offers and that of a Master of Business Administration, many traditional education degree-earning programs deal more in theory than in practice, Goldring said. Becoming Specialists A range of niche principal-training programs have emerged, some of them created by universities, others developed by alternative programs that might work closely with school districts, charter school networks, universities or state departments of education. Among the areas of specialized focus: social emotional learning, the science of improvement, and the early elementary grades. Specialized training or microcredentialing for principals is still a relatively new idea, so there hasnt been much research done on the effectiveness of such programs, which can be both separate from certificate earning programs, or folded into them. The NYC Leadership Academy is one such example. It has built its aspiring principals program around training principals on how to foster equitable environments in their schools at a time when students are becoming more diverse, teachers and principals remain largely white, and schools have become increasingly segregated. The reaction that were getting is that principals are struggling to address issues of equity in their schools, and theyre asking for help, said Irma Zardoya, the president and chief executive officer of the NYC Leadership Academy. Exposing Inequities The program places a heavy emphasis on teaching principals how to leverage data to identify equity issues in their schools. Although a principal may feel that there arent large gaps in academic achievement among student groups in their school, the data may expose a different story, said Zardoya. When school leaders look at the data and see that their students of color are maybe not doing well, then the questions come up and are raised: Why is this happening? What can we do to address it? Is it an issue of the way we teach? Is it an issue of expectations? she said. That approach hit home with Brandon Cardet-Hernandez, an alumnus of the program who is now principal of the Bronx Academy of Letters in the South Bronx of New York City. All of the schools students are black or Latino, and 90 percent of them qualify to receive free lunches, a common measure of poverty. But the schools data around discipline showed some troublesome disparities, Cardet-Hernandez said, in particular for African-American boys who were struggling in math. Seeing how certain students were being punished for wrongdoing prompted Cardet-Hernandez to embrace restorative justicewhen students take charge of resolving conflicts and repairing the harm caused by one another by coming together to talk through problems and air grievances. We have taken on a huge push for restorative justice, he said. This starts happening when you break down the data: What is happening to our students, our students of color, and how are we disciplining, and are we disciplining fairly? As part of the schools restorative justice approach, Cardet-Hernandez created something he calls a pass room, where students are sent instead of being suspended. In the pass room, they may talk with a therapist, do art, or even yogasomething the students themselves proposed. The aspiring principals program, which started in New York City but has been adopted by school districts in several other states, also uses simulations and role playing to help train prospective principals on how to deal with the day-to-day issues that may arise, such as how to manage and interact with parents and students from different backgrounds. In one particular exercise, participants in the program are interrupted during a simulated workday by an actor playing an irate parent, sometimes one who doesnt speak English. The interaction is videotaped, which the NYCLA staff reviews and discusses later with the aspiring principal. Participants continue working as teachers, teacher leaders, or assistant principals while going through the aspiring leaders program. They are required to identify an issue or challenge that they want to tackle in their current school, and develop a plan to address it. This kind of practical, hands-on training in equity issues is essential to closing persistent achievement gaps between racial groups, said Zardoya. Filling Knowledge Gaps Not only are principals being required to oversee more-diverse student populations, theres also a shift in many school districts to give principals more autonomy over the schools they run. In those situations, principals may find they need more of the kind of business and leadership skills taught in an MBA program. Thats the knowledge gap the Woodrow Wilson MBA Fellowship in Educational Leadership, which launched three years ago, is attempting to close. The program was developed by Princeton University, but it is run by three participating universities in Indiana and two in New Mexico. The impetus for creating the MBA educational fellowship came from a 2005 report by Arthur Levine, the former president of Teachers College, Columbia University, and the current head of the Woodrow Wilson Foundation. Levine has been one of the most prominent critics of how school leaders and teachers are prepared for their professions. His report noted that while universities often use such programs as cash cows, many enrollees use them simply to get a boost in pay in their current positions. The programs themselves had low standards for admission and graduation, while doing little to prepare principals for the actual demands of the job, the report said. In the Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, participants study many of the subjects they would in an MBA program, with an emphasis on how these topics relate to running a school, such as team building, talent recruitment, budgeting, and even marketing, said LeAnn Buntrock, the fellowships program director. Marketing is becoming increasingly important, she said. There are charter schools, and private schools, and people need to be able to define who they are and what they do, and why their school is a good option for kids. Although principals arent looking to increase profits at a school, there are many similarities between running a successful business and running a successful school, such as understanding everything from finance to building a high-performing team. The education context is different, there are special challenges, but at the end of the day, good leadership is good leadership, Buntrock said. Early-Childhood Focus Meanwhile, as cities and states have started to invest more in early-childhood education and prekindergarten programs, there is now a parallel drive to better prepare principals to lead elementary schools. The University of Washington offers a special certificate in its executive leadership program that is aimed at principals who lead schools serving the early grades, particularly pre-K through 3rd grade. Its participants can opt to earn credits toward a masters degree. The program is teaching principals skills to make them better at leading schools with the youngest students. Among the areas these would-be school leaders focus on is how to effectively partner with the local preschools and Head Start programs to ensure they are preparing students for kindergarten, how best to engage the families of young children, and how to be strong instructional leaders for prekindergarten through 3rd grade teachers. It also trains participants on how to properly assess teachers and students in the early gradesa process thats far more fluid and observation-based than it is in the later grades, said Kristie Kauerz, an assistant professor of P-3 policy and leadership at the University of Washington. Those early grades are a critical time for both student development and state accountability measures, said Kauerz, who also runs the P-3 executive leadership certificate program. The standards-based environment in the K-12 world is putting so many pressures on principals around closing the achievement gap and reading by 3rd grade, she said. If principals understand that those gaps appear by toddlerhood and they are addressed long before 3rd grade, it helps alleviate some of the standards pressures that principals are feeling. Supporting young students and their teachers requires a set of skills beyond what is taught in most traditional education programs, Krauez said, and programs like hers are one way to fill the gaps, albeit even if its a little ad-hoc. Higher ed is really hard and slow to change, she said. Going to all the principal-training programs and telling them they are wrong wont get us very far. So, how do we engage principals at scale in things that are not yet mandated? But to Goldring, the Vanderbilt professor, specialized training gives school leaders the opportunity to personalize the education they get from a traditional degree-earning program. If Im in a system where I have no budgeting responsibilities, it would make no sense for me to focus on that particular microcredentialing, she said. But maybe Im in a diverse school system, and I want to focus on that as part of my preparationI like that idea of having that flexibility to match needs to the context of the leader. Privacy Overview This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful. Todo lo que necesitas saber para comenzar tu dia Suscribirse implica aceptar los terminos y condiciones President Donald Trump's order to restrict people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States sparked confusion and anger on Saturday after immigrants and refugees were kept off flights and left stranded in airports. In his most sweeping decision since taking office a week ago, Trump, a Republican, put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily barred travelers from Syria and six other countries. Civil rights and faith groups, activists and Democratic politicians were furious and vowed to fight the order. Capping a day of confusion and chaos and protests in several airports across the country, a federal judge in Brooklyn, New York, granted a temporary reprieve. The American Civil Liberties Union successfully argued for a temporary stay that allowed detained travelers to stay in the United States. Supporters outside the Brooklyn courtroom and at protests at airports in Dallas, Chicago, New York and elsewhere cheered the decision, but a bigger fight lay ahead. The court action does not reverse Trump's order, which was criticized by some of America's closest allies. Trump, a businessman who successfully tapped into American fears about terror attacks during his campaign, had promised what he called "extreme vetting" of immigrants and refugees from areas the White House said the U.S. Congress deemed to be high risk. He told reporters in the White House's Oval Office on Saturday that his order was "not a Muslim ban" and said the measures were long overdue. "It's working out very nicely. You see it at the airports, you see it all over," Trump said. Along with Syria, the ban affects travelers with passports from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The Department of Homeland Security said about 375 travelers had been affected by the order, 109 of whom were in transit and were denied entry to the United States. Another 173 were stopped by airlines before boarding. The order "affects a minor portion of international travelers," the department said in a statement, saying the measures "inconvenienced" less than 1 percent of travelers. The new rules blindsided people in transit and families waiting for them, and caused havoc for businesses with employees holding passports from the targeted nations and colleges with international students. Public to put questions to Ministers The Manx public will be able to put questions to two of the Island's Ministers later today. Economic Development Minister Laurence Skelly and Policy and Reform Minister Chris Thomas will speak at the Positive Action Group's public meeting. The pair will be talking about the Council of Minister's recently published Programme for Government. The meeting gets underway at the Manx Legion Club in Douglas from 7.30pm. You have to give it to Meghan Markle. She is a potential source of great speculation for everyone who likes to know about royal lives and lifestyles. To begin with, Suits co-star Patrick J. Adams, who plays the role of her on-screen fiance in the bigtime USA network show kissed the future princess. And during a Reddit AMA, one fan asked him: "What's it like making out on-screen with the potential future princess of England?" The Canadian-born actor said something brief, but said it very neatly, according to Time. He replied: "The same as it was before she was potentially a future princess of England." Now that did open a can of worms. Immense speculations have been roused about whether both Meghan and Prince Harry are marrying - but haven't announced it yet. What about Patrick? Is she close to the star too? Would she have told him that she was going to become a princess? It does seem so. Meghan has been working with Suits for a long time now. Years, in fact. She once called the group her work family. So if she is becoming the future princess, wouldn't she spill the beans to the Suits family first? Meanwhile, the 35-year-old Markle is familiarising herself with London and living at Harry's Nottingham cottage home at Kensington Palace. The couple is said to be "chilling" and "enjoying lazy days together," according to Us Magazine. "I can see them engaged by the spring," says a Harry pal. "He's head over heels!" Media speculations about the couple has been high. Her co-stars are opening up to the press, but she has kept a lot under wraps. Many rumors say that she is just trying to lie low until she gets an official proposal from Prince Harry. A report in December said Meghan "supposedly bailed" on an interview with The Today Show. At the last minute, she missed talking about Suits. Some 'insiders' are clear that it was because she did not want anyone to riddle her about her romance with Prince Harry. Still, Meghan is geared up to answer a lot of questions about her personal life. Especially as she is promoting this season of Suits. Finally, the Suits family has to be prepared that if she does decide to marry Prince Harry, she would have to leave Suits for a more suitable calling. A queenly one, by all standards. And that stirs a royal soup. YouTube/Inside Edition During the last quarter of 2016, Nokia created a buzz as reports circulated that the Finland-based tech giant is set to unveil a new line of Nokia Android phones in 2017. Nokia's move is considered to be one big major image overhaul as it embraces the software of most of the competitive smartphone brands in the market. Techies and former Nokia fans and users were excited to see what Nokia Android phones 2017 have to offer. It can be remembered that Nokia once dominated the mobile handset scene but was eventually dragged down when Apple and Samsung rose to fame. PC Advisor reports that Nokia has finally revealed its very first Android phone, the Nokia 6. As of writing, the Nokia 6 is only available in China, which has raised some questions as to why the Finnish tech company decided to launch the Nokia Android phones 2017 in a different country. "The decision by HMD to launch its first Android smartphone into China is a reflection of the desire to meet the real world needs of consumers in different markets around the world," the company said in a press release. The new set of Nokia Android phones 2017 are products of Nokia's collaboration with HMD Global. Together, they are expected to take the tech and gadget world by storm with the newest line of Nokia Android phones 2017. According to PC Advisor, the Nokia 6 was publicly made available for purchase on Jan. 19. However, the pre-registration has reportedly reached over one million in China resulting to the first ever Nokia Android phone 2017 to be sold out in just one minute. For international customers who are interested to get their hands on Nokia 6, it is exclusively available in China as of writing. However, more Nokia Android phones 2017 units are expected to be unveiled during the MWC 2017 in Feb. as announced on the official Facebook page of Nokia. Trumps 45 percent tariff By Dr. Peter Morici President Trumps proposed 45 percent tariff on Chinese imports could leverage significant changes in trade with the Middle Kingdom, but to succeed he must address Beijing more realistically than past presidents. Since Richard Nixons historic trip, U.S. policy has been premised on the notion that offering China wider access to American markets and cooperation in other areas would encourage it to evolve into a western-style market economy with more democratic institutions. A prosperous and more liberal Chinese society would provide a buoyant market for U.S. exports and become more sympathetic toward American security arrangements in the Western Pacific. That simply has not happened. China limits imports with high tariffs and discriminatory regulations, subsidizes exports with an inexpensive currency and generous credit through state controlled banks, bullies foreign investors, pirates western intellectual property and much more to gain advantages in trade. Unapologetically, Beijing has pronounced it is creating a socialist-market economy but it all smacks of good old-fashioned mercantilism. Chinas exports to the United States exceed imports 3 to 1, and that costs Americans millions of jobs China is becoming decidedly less democratic indeed Orwellian. Beijing is rolling out a system that monitors the minutia of citizens activities from internet sites visited to jaywalking citations to assign social credit ratings that will determine access to jobs, credit and their childrens school admissions. It is using the wealth generated by huge trade surpluses to build a sophisticated navy and air force to bully neighbors and assert sovereignty over neutral waters in the South China Sea, and establish an Asian Infrastructure Development Bank to assert soft power in the region. Chinas economic success, financial largesse and President Obamas failure to challenge Chinese military assertiveness have encouraged strategically important Malaysia and the Philippines to tilt toward China. Confronted by Chinese practices that victimize U.S. businesses, both the Bush and Obama administrations have responded by pushing China to adopt market-oriented reforms, but this has proved folly. For example, faced with a chronically undervalued yuan, U.S. diplomats encouraged China to make its currency more freely convertible dollar yuan conversions are regulated in China. What they neglected was that Beijings monetary and industrial policies such as pumping liquidity into state-owned banks and restrictions on foreign investment can be tweaked to drive down the value of the yuan too. Imposing a tariff may persuade China to abstain from some forms of currency manipulation or lift certain restrictions on U.S. investment, but it wont radically alter the disposition of Chinese leaders. They harbor deep suspicions of open markets and unbridled civil liberties and bristle at the notion that the United States should enforce security in the Western Pacific. China can offer some face-saving concessions to American negotiators, and then implement other more opaque policies that subsidize exports, limit imports and harm American workers. Alternatively, it can harass U.S. companies with large investments in China, like GM and Wal-Mart, to whip up political pressure in Washington against Mr. Trumps assertive policies. Or ratchet up military tensions in the South China Sea, and force Americans to ask whether the trade deficit really is worth risking a war. The Trump administration certainly cant mount any kind of economic pressure that would put China on the path to becoming a western market economy, a democratic society or regionally less aggressive. The best it can do is to force a deal to manage bilateral trade explicitly to ensure a balance between bilateral exports and imports. That is a very different approach than facilitating market forces and letting the chips fall where they may, which has been the orientation of U.S trade agreements since World War II. Accomplishing equity between the two economies based on complementarity and mutual advantage would be particularly complex as Chinese industry increasingly moves away from labor intensive industries, as wages rise, into more sophisticated technology intensive activities. To secure interests in the region, the United States must be prepared to devote the naval and other military resources necessary to meet Chinas provocative actions in the South China Sea and elsewhere. Otherwise, Asian neighbors by necessity will pivot toward Beijing and be more inclined toward its prescriptions favoring state directed capitalism and autocratic governance. These will prove expensive and difficult, but prosperity and leadership are never cheap or easy. Peter Morici is an economist and business professor at the University of Maryland, and a national columnist. Home Gods Trump card By Michael Moriarty Ever since Donald Trump announced his candidacy for the Presidency of the United States?! My wife, Irene, and I have been seriously arguing, continuously for the first and only time in our 12 year love affair! She, like most women in the world, doesnt trust Donald Trump. Despite the fact that I, following my only encounter with Donald Trump, found him to be one of the rudest and most contempt-filled men Id ever met, Im now certain that God sent Donald Trump to us! Why? To even begin to do what Donald Trump must do? That demands an unending impatience! An urgency that is, at times, even more distasteful than rudeness!! For over twenty years I have watched the Bush/Clinton/Bush/Obama leadership of America take the greatest nation in the history of the human race unrelentingly into the crapper. It is not, as Trump himself describes it, a swamp that Trump must pull America out of. It is a bipartisan creation I can only call a cesspool! The previous leadership Ive mentioned has begun to successfully turn the United States of America into Mexico. Either that or into one of the shamelessly beleaguered and venomously reptile swamps of South America. And why? One main reason and one main reason only! And that is? The bipartisan American commitment to hand the future of the entire human race over to this insane lust for The New World Order! An obligatory tyranny devoid of the Declaration of Independence, the United States Constitution and the American Bill of Rights. A megalomaniacal pipe dream to be shoved by the United Nations right up our conglomerate behinds. God help us! And He has!! He sent Donald Trump! And Trumps message? Grow the **** up!! Or, to echo the sentiment felt when Ronald Reagan arrived to send the same message: Fathers home! Yes! The adults have returned to Washington, D. C.! We have an American adult in the White House! An adult in every sense of the word!! American maturity has returned to the United States!! No! cry the women and their male counterparts. TRUMPS A BIG SELFISH BABY! HES THE UGLIEST OF UGLY AMERICANS! Lets take a look-back at the book that gave us, for the first time, the self-loathing label of The Ugly American! Created by both William Lederer and Eugene Burdick, published in 1958, The Ugly American has indelibly left any American occupation of foreign lands with a loudly proclaimed self-loathing label. One that liberates and allows any definition of the word ugly. Neo-Fascist and Neo-Nazi are two synonyms for Ugly that come immediately to mind. Two, soon-to-be highly acclaimed authors, as Wikipedia reports, were disillusioned with the style and substance of Americas diplomatic efforts in Southeast Asia. Both served in the Navy. Burdick during World War II. Lederer as special assistant to the commander-in-chief of US forces in the Pacific and Asian theater. What American behavior in occupied lands inspired these two naval veterans to label our image abroad as The Ugly American? In 1958 we were in the Cold War. In the realities of war, cold or otherwise, neither side can be self-conscious about its image to their mortal enemy. If it does, it has no hope of winning the war they are engaged in, cold or otherwise. Any salesman of or for a United Nations New World Order is the mortal enemy of our America of the Declaration of Independence, our Constitution and our Bill of Rights! If you want to burn those documents and the American Flag?! Or even if you just want to ignore them?! You these days particularly - are an enemy of the United States. The entire meaning of America, her very soul is in those sacred writings! The Communists, during the Cold War, were more than certain that stories of Americas behavior in war, cold or otherwise, would turn much of the American population against its own troops and military leadership. They also knew that warriors against Communist propaganda, men like Joseph McCarthy, particularly in a Cold War, could be easily portrayed in the American mainstream press as paranoid war-mongers. Basically the essence of that book, The Ugly American is that American forces abroad are behaving with the crude insensitivity of would-be Donald Trumps. Meanwhile, and most ironically, the Communists had the multi-lingual, intensely sophisticated savoir-faire and cultured appearance of, guess who? Melania Trump! It should be no mystery then that Mrs. Trumps birthplace was Communist Yugoslavia. And she married an Ugly American? Apparently so! Couldnt she have stayed in Eastern Europe and found herself a wealthy and powerful Communist? Of course she could have! Freedom called to Melania Knaves in the same way it is calling to billions of other human beings on this Earth!! They are begging and cheating and lying their way into the United States to get a piece of the American Pie!!!! Who could assure Melania of her greatest freedom in the Free World? The most visibly and successfully free man in America: Donald Trump! You gotta problem with that?! Then what are you doing in America?! Oh, we and a lot of our celebrity friends are leaving America because of Donald Trump! Well, I, Michael Moriarty, left America because of the Clintons and their Attorney General, Janet Reno! I now have dual citizenship: American and Canadian. The only recent fact that has me tempted to return to the United States?! That Ugly American, President Donald Trump! The smooth, Ivy League, Harvard and Yale likes of the Bushes, the Clintons and Barack Hussein Obama?!?! Traitors! Every **** one of them! They are citizens, not of the United States but of their deluded daydreams about The New World Order! The Bushes too? you ask The Bushes and their Secret Society, Skull and Bones, are the worst of the lot! Check this smoothly treasonous announcement by Papa Bush! Here is John F. Kennedy testifying to a conspiracy, the conspirators of which, I am certain, had President Kennedy assassinated! From the very speech I have linked you to, it is obvious that President Kennedy knew very well and by name whom he was referring to in this speech about secret societies. Thank God JFK was not the only one to know the Truth. President Trump knows all about the secret society of conspirators that killed Kennedy! Should The Donald Himself escape some immediate assassination and live to a second term, President Trump is, for the sake of his own survival, obliged to drain the swamp of John F. Kennedys true assassins. If anything opened up America to the American cesspool that fills the swamp, the virtual hell that America surrendered to when she didnt pursue the real assassins of John F. Kennedy?!?! If you can murder a President of the United States and get away with it?!?! IS THERE ANYTHING SUCH TRAITORS THINK THEY CANNOT DO?!?! And they have done it! Their evil made the likes of Barack Hussein Obama and his mentor, George Soros, inevitable! Over twenty years of cold-bloodedly homicidal corruption has owned the United States. President Donald Trump knows that more profoundly than anyone on this Earth. He, more than any national leader since John F. Kennedy himself, is risking his life every second of every day as President of the United States. And much of female America and its male, New World Order counterparts, feel free to treat President Trump as the ugliest of ugly Americans. Nothing is more beautiful, more breath-taking, more gorgeous than The Truth! Ugly as the Truth may seem upon a first encounter with it?! Truth is the very well-spring of God Himself! God, therefore, the Judeo-Christian Almighty, Jehovah, has rolled into the White House with Donald Trump! However, I get it! You might have a problem with my faith in Donald Trump! But thats your problem! Not mine!! Michael Moriarty is a Golden Globe and Emmy Award-winning actor who starred in the landmark television series Law and Order from 1990 to 1994. His recent film and TV credits include The Yellow Wallpaper, 12 Hours to Live, Santa Baby and Deadly Skies. Contact Michael at rainbowfamily2008@yahoo.com. He can be found on Twitter at https://twitter.com/@MGMoriarty. Home President Trump starts in overdrive and should continue By Daniel M. Ryan They were apt vociferously to demand "reform" as if it were some concrete substance, like cake, which could be handed out at will, in tangible masses, if only the demand were urgent enough. These parlor reformers made up for inefficiency in action by zeal in criticising; and they delighted in criticising the men who really were doing the things which they said ought to be done, but which they lacked the sinewy power to do. They often upheld ideals which were not merely impossible but highly undesirable, and thereby played into the hands of the very politicians to whom they professed to be most hostile. Moreover, if they believed their own interests, individually or as a class, were jeoparded, they were apt to show no higher standards than did the men they usually denounced. - Theodore Roosevelt President Donald Trump is not someone who sees a regular-sized mandate as a reason to move cautiously! His first week in office has seen him announce or undertake a yuge number of policies, as documented by this very long list from The Hill. The same mags Jordan Fabian and Jonathan Easley wrote, Surprise! Trump doing what he said he would?. Hes already issued executive orders to get the Wall started; to kickstart the repeal of Obamacare; to withdraw from the TPP; to suspend visas temporarily from the seven trouble nations Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen; to call for a national investigation into voter fraud; to "[block] foreign aid for international organizations that provide abortions"; to implement a hiring freeze for non-military employees of the federal government; to expand the definition of illegals which constitute high-priority criminal deportees; and of course, to pursue defunding sanctuary cities. Thats a lot of action, especially for one week. Already. President Trump has taken steps to implement the bulk of his promises. As Mssrs. Fabian and Eastly point out, President Trump has been unusually consistent and is following through hard. Hes not only starting off in overdrive, hes also redlining. Just last Saturday, he filled in a widely-noticed gap in his promise-keeping by signing a five-year lobbying ban for administration officials. Whats left of the promise gap is closing, quickly. And this high-energy redlining is beginning to spill over. As reported by Kimberly L. Strassel in the Wall Street Journal, the Republican Congress is learning that a formerly obscure Act - the Congressional Review Act (CRA) can be used to eliminate a lot of Obama-Adminstration regulations: "It turns out that the first line of the CRA requires any federal agency promulgating a rule to submit a report on it to the House and Senate. The 60-day clock starts either when the rule is published or when Congress receives the reportwhichever comes later." So any agency report not received by Congress means the clock has not started ticking. This seems to be the case for a lot of controversial regulations issued when the Republicans had their House majority. The Pubbies might choke and throw away the chance to reverse the more egregious reversible regs, but the fact that theyre showing real interest means that the world has changed. President Trumps high-energy style is energizing others, however incompletely. And in the corporate world, we see headline after headline about some biggie announcing a new factory here, new jobs there, and so on along the tracks. Granted, many of the spokepeople have said that they have announced plans that were in the works anyway. Obama supporters will claim that theyre just taking advantage of an already-turned-around economy. But the optics profoundly favour President Trump, just as the bottoming of the stock market in March 2009 favoured Obama. As W. James Antle III pointed out, Trumps burst of energy has the potential to make his popularity ratings shoot up. Union leaders have raved over President Trump's views on trade as well as his approval of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines. In essence, Trump is carving out a part of the Democrat Party that has been very loyal to them over the decades. Once this filters through to the approval ratings, his oft-commented-on approval ratings will climb. This climb will accelerate once economic growth picks up more. In the interim, Trump has little to fear from a prog counterattack. As more than one Trump-watcher has pointed out, his ostensibly frenetic activity might well be a deliberate strategy to keep the Trump-haters off balance. The American Thinkers Brian C. Joondeph theorizes that President Trumps highly-public squabbles are in essence a distraction strategy. Comparing it to Muhammad Alis rope-a-dope, he opines that President Trump is wearing the liberal media down by encouraging them to waste energy on ephemera while he gets his agenda pushed through. In other words, hes playing them. Scott Adams has a related but different take: Trumps hyper-fast actions make for a scattershot environment that result in the progs being overwhelmed by the number of things to get angry about. In his words, Trumps high-energy burst has them succumbing to ?Outrage Dilution". David Brooks for one, seems to have been thrown off his cams by it. Yes, theres been a lot of winning. But should this spate of winning put us on our guard? Is President Trump going too far too fast, leaving a flank open for a counterattack that the Dems very publicly want to make? Is he pushing so hard that his Administration will be struck by gale-force blowback? In the humble opinion of your humble scribe, the answer is no.? Strangely but significantly, the apparently widespread opposition to President Trump is not as strong as it seems. With one significant exception, which I will discuss near the end, the progs plans for resistance range from echo-chambery to flaky. The Progressive Routed? Theres quite a bit of evidence that they are. You need only watch Fox News latest Star at Nine, Tucker Carson, to see it. Hes developed a very popular shtick which consists of inviting on a prog and turning him or her into a LOLcow without so much as a yell. All he does is give them enough rope to hang themselves as he asks questions that less sheltered progs would have been able to answer. His shtick only works because his opponents live in echo chambers. Its not hard to find other evidence of prog haplessness. Case in point: "Liberals Fleeing to Canada Fail to Meet Immigration Standards". This...not-quite-intrepid display is not what you would call an effective advertisement for their organizational ability. Remember the MSM to-do about fake news? That one didnt last long, did it? All they got for their trouble was a merry band of MSM critics latching onto a new beat: landing on fake news passed along by MSMers themselves. The latest of many examples: "After Decrying Fake News, Journalists Are Still Binging On Fake News". Such as, the fake news which claimed that President Trump had the White House bust of Martin Luther Kind removed. He hadnt. Over in California, which is now kooky in a Progressive way, we see another attempt at not-so-great resistance: "Celebrities Call For Total Hollywood Strike Until Trump Resigns". You can hear the retort all through the Heartland: Do it! And take all the tee-vee people with you.? But the above is not the keystone of kook. That, uh, noteworthy spot belongs to CalExit. As a sign of haplessness, note well: "Plan for California to secede from United States picking up steam". And adding to the brew of kookery, California Threatens To Cut Off Funds To Washington! With this number, were in the zone of peak flakery. Yad think that the Civil War would have served as a rather instructive warning sign. But no, because were in the Realm of the Echo Chamber. The progs behind Calexit, if theyve thought about the issue at all, have figured that they must be exempt because theyre not evil slavers. If you know anything about the Civil War beyond the Fun Fact level, youll remember that there was, er, another issue at play. It didnt even occur to those folks that a lot of Red-State military boys would leap on the opportunity to fight for the Union this time round. To the winner goeth the Reconstruction, which includeth whatever Reconstruction Amendments are deemeth to be fitting. Even the dangerous-at-street-level protests, which also include violence, are about as frightening as a Halloween mask. The SJW and antifa types who act as the muscle for those, arguably show signs of mental illness. The same year that the first SJW crazies fed the Youtube cottage industry that ridicules them, Macleans magazine published an expose of the growing problem of mental illness amongst college-student high achievers.. The extent to which those antifas are motivated by mental illness is the extent to which they are not a political threat. Mentally ill people make poor tacticians. And even if they're not, they do lack the ability to pick their battles wisely. A Fed-Ex driver became a folk hero simply by saving a couple of American flags from being burnt by a group of those protesters. Even in Portlandia, the cops are treating them as outright rioters and getting cheered for doing so. Its hard not to miss the fact that the folks who take down the antifas are being feted as heroes. The self-appointed avatars of the people are discovering that people-for-real increasingly see them as disruptive and criminal. Thats not the tilt needed to win a guerrilla war, surely. I believe I mentioned questionable tactical judgment... Overall, theres a pattern of the anti-Trump resistance? floundering around as if it were routed. Thats because, in a very real way, it has. Despite Donald Trump winning a modest mandate instead of a landslide, the progs are acting as if he had won a Roosevelt-sized blowout. Why? Because they have a very definite weak point, the flipside of their institutional strength: they are profoundly dependant upon the government. Even the ones who are not materially dependant upon the government are psychologically dependant. This is their weak point, and its showing. Like the courtiers of old, they are only powerful and strong when they or their allies control the government. When the government is controlled by their opponents, they flail around or become impotent. Not Entirely... But, they still have tactics that work most notably, using the courts. Blanketed by all the above tomfoolery is an announcement that should serve as a red-flag warning: "Dems Wont Rule Out Endangered Species Act Suits To Block Trumps Wall". Unlike the above flailing, this tactic has a proven track record of working. Lawsuits of this sort have throttled progress ever since Tennessee Valley Authority v. Hillway back in 1978. They did block the Fence, and its a sure bet that theyll be used to try to block the Wall. Another successful use of the courts, as reported by The Hill: "Federal judge blocks Trump immigration order: report". So yes, there are real risks to the Trump Train getting derailed. But the ones that work all fall into the well-known tactic of lawfare. Theres nothing new about this tactic. As consistent with their odd habit of seeing the Current Year as a reprise of 1965, the progs even when they have tricks that work seem to have frittered away their ability to come up with new tricks. Given that dissoluteness, theres no reason for President Trump to take his foot off the accelerator. Petal-to-the-metal will keep the Win Train rolling. There are times for caution, but these times are not. In fact: boldness and the street-level pushback against protesters hold out the promise of finally getting enough resolute support for lawsuit reform that will diminish lawsuit abuse. At the very least, Joe Hardhat is not going to be happy when he sees infrastructure jobs being thwarted by politically-motivated lawsuits. Daniel M. Ryan, as Nxtblg, is shepherding the independently-run Open Audi Initiative Prediction Market Shadowing Project. He has stubbornly assumed all the responsibility and blame for the workings and outcome of the project. Quanah Parkers house joins Geronimos teepee By Michael R. Shannon Its not every day you can lean on the dining room table that once belonged to the Comanches last war chief, Quanah Parker, and wonder if your feet are going to crash through the floorboards. The table that once hosted Teddy Roosevelt and Geronimo is now surrounded by a house thats collapsing due to lack of funds and lack of will power. Somehow a nation that puts a minor figure like Sacajawea on its coinage cant coordinate the rescue of a house that personifies a man who successfully lead his people through the transition to civilization. Quanah Parker was the foremost warrior of his time, the real Lord of the Plains. Parker was a cruel, ruthless raider who recognized the Comanche way was ending. Instead of living out his life as a despondent ward of the Great White Father, Parker became a businessman, hobknobbed with the famous and represented his tribe in Washington. The house symbolizes the transition. Cattlemen driving herds north needed grass and water, both of which Parker had in abundance. They asked what he would need from them in return for grazing rights. Parker said build him a house just like the one the commandant of Ft. Sill lived in only bigger. And thus Star House was born. Parker lived in it until his death in 1911. His last direct descent to occupy the house was Linda Parker Birdsong. In 1957 the Army decided to take her land and use it for a firing range. Birdsong was promised the house would be moved, but in typical Pentagon fashion Star House was dumped in a field and the contractors abandoned it without reinstalling the stoves or providing a connection to running water. Although it was uninhabitable, it wasnt neglected. Birdsong sold the home to the uncle of the present owner, Wayne Gipson, and it served as an amusement park tourist attraction. In 1985 the park was forced to close by skyrocketing insurance rates another gift to America from trial lawyers and the revenue dried up. Keeping a twostory, eightbedroom house in good repair proved too expensive for Gipson, who lives on the proceeds of a small restaurant and trading post. Now the house is on the verge of disintegration. The roof is gone from much of the rear and the second story is so unstable and dangerous, I didnt risk trying to see it for myself. In 2015 a reporter from the New York Times came to visit and he was optimistic that a May flood, which ruined most of the rugs and wallpaper, might have a sliver lining. I think the best thing that could have happened is the flood, said Chenoa Barhydt, a Comanche Nation official. This will start a conversation about saving it. It was a short conversation. The house dried out and the promises dried up. Gipson said although the Comanche nation promised extensive help, nothing materialized. And there the situation stood until a grant paid for an architectural assessment report. Just stabilizing Star House will cost $200,000. Restoring will run over a million. After the report Comanche Nation officials promised to spring for pocket change and register a savethestarhouse.org website to take donations. But digging the change out of the sofa must have been a bigger challenge than expected because the website is dead. Lets put this in perspective. The most recent figures (from 2006!) show the Comanche nation made a $35,000,000 profit from their four Oklahoma casinos and, with one exception, for the next ten years revenue has increased. Yet the nation is passing the hat among outsiders to raise money to save the last home of its greatest war chief. Part of the problem is Gipson, a nonComanche. The nation wants him to give up control of Star House, evidently out of the goodness of his heart. The other is foundations and government wont donate to an individual for a restoration project of this type. Someone will have to establish a 501(c)3 taxexempt charity to accept donations, a project beyond Gipsons means, but well within that of the Comanches. Gipson may not be the easiest person to deal with, but hes obviously not viewing Star House as a profit center. If he had, Gipson wouldve been selling Parkers furniture piecemeal over the years to collectors. The feds spent $199 million building the Museum of the American Indian; the Comanches make millions in profits off their casinos each year and Gipson made $8.00 in sales the day I visited. The Comanches, Oklahoma and/or the feds must to come up with a solution that includes Gipson and saves the house. Now. Otherwise Star House is going the way of Geronimos teepee. Michael R. Shannon is a public relations and advertising consultant with corporate, government and political experience around the globe. He is a dynamic and entertaining keynote speaker. He can be reached at mandate.mmpr (at) gmail.com. He is also the author of Conservative Christian's Guidebook for Living in Secular Times (Now with added humor!). Home The past, present, and future of Quebec (Part Five) By Mark Wegierski The Quebecois nurse a great number of grievances against what has ironically been dubbed "TROC" ("the rest of Canada"). (Troc apparently means rump in French.) The term has an interesting significance giving the impression that Quebec wants to see itself as both the most quintessentially important part of Canada as well as separate from Canada. It also points to the unwillingness of TROC to call itself English Canada or English-speaking Canada. Indeed, the term English Canada is frequently rendered in quotation marks in many of the more recent Canadian English-language political works, as it would today be considered presumptuous to assert the existence of such an entity, considering the supercharged multiculturalism that especially characterizes such major megalopolises as current-day Toronto and Vancouver. As in the case of most so-called recognized minority groups today, the Quebecois have amplified in their collective memory, a long catalogue of wrongs that were committed against them by the anglais. However, the Quebecois cannot just be seen as a recognized minority they have a huge area of land to which they could be considered native they are a nation and, were they to separate, they would form a territorial nation-state. For the Quebecois nationalist today, everything bad begins with the battle of the Plains of Abraham, and the resultant Conquest -- the conquest of French Quebec by the British in 1759. This primal wound has haunted French-English relations in Canada. However, the French of an earlier Quebec seemed to be better able to reconcile themselves to their fate. The British had ironically been relatively tolerant to the institutions of Ancien Quebec, especially in regard to the Roman Catholic Church which was allowed to continue to flourish something that was virtually unheard of in most British realms. Some may remember that phrase from an American Revolutionary ditty if Gallic Papists have the right, to worship their own way, what hope then, for the freedoms, of poor Americay. George IIIs toleration of Roman Catholicism in Quebec was read in as an article of indictment against him in the Thirteen Colonies. In the nineteenth century, the British constitutional monarchy was not seen as alien to Quebec, as it has latterly become perceived. From the 1960s forward, as modern, progressive-minded nationalists, the Quebecois have had to find a way to repudiate much of their earlier, Catholic-centred, rurally-focused history, and to simultaneously blame what is today seen as this unfortunate backwardness exclusively on the English. The artifact which fulfills this function is the idea of the so-called "roi negre" (which could be politely translated as local chieftain). It is assumed that first the prelates of the Church, and then such figures as Duplessis (a long-serving Premier of Quebec in the 1930s to 1950s, called "le Chef", somewhat similar in style to America's Huey Long), were actually tools of the English in maintaining social control over Quebec. The English were not interested in improving Quebec society, so long as they had a "local chieftain" they could rely on to enforce order among the locals about whom the English couldnt care less. The English did dominate commerce and industry in Quebec up to the 1950s, largely confining French-Canadians to the rustic, but it is not often considered that many at that time might have preferred such a life. One of the great focal events of Quebec, for the Quebecois nationalists, is the 1837 Rebellion of the Patriotes, led by Louis-Joseph Papineau, which was brutally suppressed by the British. Although the Rebellion actually had comparatively little support at the time, across a Church-bound Quebec, it is seen as a harbinger of secular nationalism. The execution of Louis Riel, the leader of the half-French/half-Indian Metis in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, is seen as another atrocity. The fact that Riel had decades earlier executed an English-Canadian in rather gruesome circumstances which made it difficult for Canadian Prime Minister John A. Macdonald to show clemency -- is rarely mentioned. Salt was also rubbed into the wounds when French-language schooling in Manitoba was done away with, and failed to be enacted in other provinces with French minorities. The execution was certainly a baneful event, which turned Quebec away from the once-powerful Bleus/Conservative Party in the federal election of 1896. Relying on a solid bloc of seats from Quebec, and a minority of seats from English Canada, the Liberals have almost always formed the government of Canada in the Twentieth Century. While Quebec remained a very conservative society until the so-called "Quiet Revolution" of the 1960s, it generally voted Liberal federally. This trend was continued with its support of the chameleon-like Pierre Elliott Trudeau, first elected in 1968. English-Canadians believed that Trudeau would "put Quebec in its place", while French-Canadians voted for him because he was seen as a "native son". The idea of Trudeaus toughness against the Quebec separatists was reinforced by his declaration of martial law in Quebec in October 1970, against a small, extremist separatist faction, that had kidnapped (and later murdered) the Quebec Minister of Labour, as well as kidnapped a British trade official. Trudeau enacted the policy of coast-to-coast bilingualism (French and English) in Canada, which was said to be the price of keeping Quebec in Canada. Ironically, the Quebecois nationalists cared little for bilingualism, and moved to make their province unilingually French. Trudeau's individual rights, multiculturalism, and aboriginal rights policies came to be seen as diluting and undermining the now undisputed place of French-Canadians as one of the "two founding peoples" of Canada. The 1980 Quebec referendum on "sovereignty-association" failed by a ratio of 60 to 40. In 1982, Trudeau "patriated" the Canadian Constitution, including within it the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, within the Constitution Act, 1982. The Parti Quebecois provincial government, led by Rene Levesque, which had just lost the referendum, refused to accept this. The so-called "patriation", and the maneuvers of Trudeau and the other Premiers concerning its initial announcement to the public, are often seen as an anti-Quebec conspiracy, sometimes described in Quebec, rather too flamboyantly, as "the Night of the Long Knives". In an attempt to have Quebec accede to the new Canadian Constitution, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney negotiated the Meech Lake Accord in 1987. A strange kind of fury seized English Canada, especially in opposition to the legal recognition of Quebec as a distinct society, an obvious historical and social reality, but a blow to absolute individual rights, as well as to the notion that so-called group rights are normally afforded only to visible minorities (a term of official usage), as well as to Aboriginal peoples in Canada. The Accord failed in 1990, when it was rejected by the recalcitrant legislatures of two smaller English-Canadian provinces. In 1992, the Charlottetown Agreements were cobbled together by Mulroney and the ten provincial Premiers. They were in many ways similar to the Accord. They were put to a countrywide referendum. The Quebecois nationalists opposed them because they did not offer enough to Quebec, whereas TROC opposed them because they offered too much. The Agreements were solidly defeated across the country. Written in 1840, Lord Durham's famous Report had accurately warned that the future of Canada might consist of "two nations warring in the bosom of a single state". To be continued. Mark Wegierski is a Canadian writer and historical researcher. Home Russia seeks another Mediterranean naval base in Libya By Lt. Col. (ret.) Michael Segall In recent months, Russia has been ramping up its involvement in the Libyan sociopolitical crisis, which has been ongoing since the removal of its ruler, Muammar Qaddafi. Russia has been strengthening its ties with Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, who heads the LNA (the Libyan National Army), one of the many military militias operating in Libya, and opposes the countrys official government. Haftar has also visited Moscow twice over the past half-year and met with the foreign and defense ministers in an effort to obtain weaponry. Russia views Haftar as a main means to deepen its involvement and influence in Libya, which it regards as a springboard for establishing its military naval presence in the Mediterranean Basin and gaining a foothold in North Africa. Haftar is a survivor of Qaddafis regime, and for a time he worked (from Virginia) to oust him with the help of the CIA. Haftar also has longstanding ties with Moscow going back to the early 1970s. After Qaddafis fall, he returned to Libya and became active mainly in its eastern region (Tobruk, Benghazi). He opposes the GNA (the Government of National Accord) headed by Fayez Mustafa al-Sarraj, which is supported by the United Nations and the European countries and is based in Tripoli. Haftar recently called to set up a unity government without dictates meaning by the United Nations and the European countries. Haftar is supported by the alternative government and the House of Representatives (HoR) in Tobruk, which is recognized by the West. Haftars LNA militia actually constitutes the main active military force and one of the best organized in Libya. Several of Haftars people and members of the HoR have also warned recently in Russian Arabic news outlets that they favor Haftar and that they aim to liberate and unify Tripoli. Haftar also controls Libyas main oil ports, which he took over in September 2016 when he wrested them from the Petroleum Facilities Guard, which is loyal to the GNA. Russia Seeks another Naval Base in the Mediterranean Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar (right) on board the Russian aircraft carrier on January 11, 2017 A significant sign of the thaw was the unusual visit by Haftar to the aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov on January 11, 2016, when it was off the coast of Tobruk on its way back to Severomorsk. The aircraft carrier operated in the Mediterranean as part of Russias active involvement in the Syrian crisis. With this move, Russia showed which side it supports in the Libyan crisis and made clear that Haftar must be awarded a prominent post (defense minister, for example) in any future settlement. It also signaled that Russia intends to expand its naval presence in the Mediterranean, beyond its Tartus base in Syria, in the direction of North Africa and the Libyan ports of Benghazi and Tobruk. It also aims to play an active role in the reshaping of the Middle East in the aftermath of the Arab Spring, particularly in areas undergoing crises. While he was on the aircraft carrier, Haftar conversed in a videoconference with senior Russian officials, including Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu from the situation room. The topics were the terror organizations in the Middle East, the supply of billions of dollars worth of weaponry (warplanes, tanks, advanced surface-to-air missile systems), as well as the reorganization of the Libyan army and the renovation of Russian-produced weapons. This was despite the weapons embargo on Libya, which prohibits providing weapons to groups operating there with the exception of the GNA. During the Qaddafi era, Russia was Libyas main weapons supplier, and since the revolution, the weapons have made their way to the terror organizations operating in North Africa including AQIM and the Islamic State. Moscow views Haftar as a main power factor whom Russia can cultivate while also mocking the European countries, which gambled on the wrong horse (the al-Sarraj government) while publicly expressing support for the feeble GNA, which controls almost nothing outside of Tripoli. At the same time, the Europeans too mainly Britain, France, and Italy are putting out feelers behind the scenes, seeking to open channels of communication with Haftar and his eastern political support base. In this regard, Aquila Saleh, head of the HoR, and a number HoR members held a meeting with the British ambassador to Libya, Peter Millet, in Tobruk (January 17). Saleh claims Millet realizes the failure of GNA. Millet tweeted that he had discussed with head of the HoR possibilities to find a solution to the current political freeze. In recent months, Haftar has been waging fierce battles against Islamic elements in Benghazi. He is considered the nemesis of the Islamic organizations in Libya, including some that support the GNA. From Moscows standpoint, Haftars struggle against the Islamic organizations (terror organizations) offers a foothold for promoting him in the domestic Libyan arena. Moscow has also called upon Martin Kobler, special representative of the UN secretary-general and head of the United Nations Support Mission in Libya, to help Haftar obtain a key post in a future Libyan government (defense minister) while emphasizing that the current GNA government is ineffective. It should be noted that it was the forces loyal to the GNA that spearheaded the destruction of the Islamic States last stronghold in the city of Sirte on the Mediterranean coast with help from Misrata-based militias, some of which are drawn from Islamic militias) after months of struggle and U.S. aerial assistance through AFRICOM forces. The Syrian Model Russia is prepared to give Haftars army military and logistical aid in bases in eastern Libya as part of his struggle against the Islamic terror organizations. The terminology Russia uses in Libya is largely borrowed from the Syrian discourse: Bashar Assads struggle against the Islamic terror organizations that have taken over Syria. Similarly, Russia maintains that Libya is waging a local struggle that affects the regional arena (the Syrian crisis affects Turkey, Jordan, and Lebanon; the Libyan imbroglio affects Tunisia, Algeria, Egypt, and Chad) and threatens particularly because of the Islamic and international terror organizations to destabilize it. In both the Syrian and Libyan cases, there is a need to curb the stream of refugees arriving in Europe. Egypt, too, has an interest in weakening the radical Islamic elements active in Libya, and it supports the Russian move. Russia may try to promote a settlement in Libya and serve as a mediator between the head of the GNA government, al-Sarraj, and Haftar by holding talks in Egypt. It would thereby further improve its relations with Cairo, which still has not completely recovered from the Obama doctrine in the Middle East. In Libya, as in Syria, Russia preferred to throw its weight behind the military strongman, who controls the countrys oil ports, in lieu of the weak, UN and Western supported GNA. Although Russias backing for Haftar does not necessarily herald a quick solution to the Libyan crisis, Moscow expects that it will generate an internal dynamic in Libya that will benefit him, especially since Western support for the GNA is hesitant. Indeed, behind the scenes, some of the Western countries are aiding Haftar in his war against the Islamic elements. Europe, in particular, has an interest in rapidly resolving the Libyan crisis, even if Russia and its client Haftar are to gain a prominent place in the equation. Refugees are streaming from Libyas shores to Europe and particularly Italy, which recently stepped up its involvement in Libya and provided patrol boats and humanitarian aid to the GNA, while also reopening its embassy in mid-January 2017. Pawns and the Superpower Russia appears to be setting up its pawns in the Middle East as part of its overall strategy of regaining its superpower status. As President Trump takes office, Moscow wants to test his policy. Another theater where Russia is likely to act is Yemen, which also is in a severe crisis with no solution on the horizon. It was reported in the past that Russia was demonstrating an interest in the crisis. It may try to resolve it in the future with the help of Iran, which supports the Houthis and the backers of deposed president Ali Abdullah Saleh. Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states have been trying to oust the Houthis from the capital city, Sanaa, and other strongholds along the Red Sea coast. Russias recent mediation conference between the Fatah and Hamas terrorist movements, titled Reestablishing the Unity of the Palestinian People, also indicates Moscow will to be more involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict. The Russian brokered a deal to form a national unity government ahead of elections after three days of reconciliation talks in Moscow. Fatah and Hamas delegates also met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and asked him to advise incoming American President Donald Trump against carrying out his campaign pledge to move the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. At present, the Libyan crisis is not at the center of the international agenda (unlike the energies that France and the international community have been investing in the Arab-Israeli conflict). It appears, however, that settling the crisis in Libya will become a major issue in the superpower struggle in the Middle East and North Africa, and possibly also in forming the new balance of power between Putins Russia and the United States and Europe. These powers want to redivide and reshape the Middle East after its disintegration during the Obama years. IDF Lt.-Col. (ret.) Michael (Mickey) Segall, an expert on strategic issues with a focus on Iran, terrorism, and the Middle East, is a senior analyst at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and at Alcyon Risk Advisors. Home Sleazy legal tactics used to go after former Utah Attorney General By Rachel Alexander With all the attention brought recently to the politically motivated prosecutions of the DOJ, culminating in the high-profile Supreme Court exoneration of former Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell, you would think prosecutors would start backing off on dishonest witch hunts against prominent Republicans. But theyre not in Salt Lake City. Similar to red states like Arizona and Texas, Utahs legal system is predominantly controlled by the left. Since they cant get any traction in elections statewide, Democrats abuse the legal process to destroy elected Republican officials. Its always the same, tired old, vague ethics laws that are used: bribery, public corruption, etc. Its not hard to find some transaction a politician participated in and find an angle where the elected official allegedly benefited. Negotiate a contract with the electric company to save the city money? The Republican official must have a relative whose large house will benefit from that electric company. Award a contract to a more efficient technology company? The Republican official must know one of the the thousands of employees who work at the company, so its a quid pro quo. Hire one of the savviest names in business to clean up an area of government? The innovator must have given the Republican official a Christmas gift in the past if they knew each other, so its clearly bribery. And when the beleaguered official fights back in court? Obstruction of justice. And so on and so on. Since the prosecution has virtually unlimited government resources, and public officials are usually forced to provide their own defense, it is extremely difficult to beat these inquisitions. Other prominent Republicans often desert them, afraid of being found guilty by association. Former Utah Attorney General John Swallow is facing 12 felonies and one misdemeanor for bribery, accepting gifts and obstruction of justice. Swallows four-week trial begins on February 7. He has pled not guilty. Mark Shurtleff, the attorney general who preceded him, was also arrested on corruption charges arising out of the same circumstances, but prosecutors later dropped them. Marc Sessions Jenson, a wealthy businessman, ran afoul of the law in the 2000s for swindling millions from investors. Shurtleff was responsible for the investigation, conviction and sentencing of Jenson" in the 2000s. After being sent to prison and failing to pay $4 million in restitution, he accused the two attorneys general of wrongdoing with his case despite the fact it was the judge who wanted the restitution penalty and prison, then locked him up for not paying the money not the two attorneys general. Jenson accused Swallow and Shurtleff of accepting lavish gifts from him in exchange for helping him navigate his legal troubles from inside the office. However, unless the gift was given in anticipation of a quid pro quo, it is not unethical to accept gifts from an acquaintance. In response to Jensons accusations against Shurtleff and Swallow, Shurtleff warned, " He has sworn revenge. I suggest you consider carefully whether to believe a desperate, convicted fraudster." Jenson also accused Shurtleffs friend Tim Lawson of accepting bribe money from him to in order to influence Shurtleff. Lawson responded, "Jenson is in prison because he is a pathological liar, because he lied to the people he stole money from." In a second accusation, indicted businessman Jeremy Johnson accused Swallow of instructing him to contribute money to former Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.), in order to persuade the senator to have the FTC drop its investigation into his businesses. Swallow acknowledges Johnson approached him in 2010 because the businessman thought he was being unjustly targeted by the FTC. Swallow agreed to help direct him to find lobbyists which is not unethical to deal with his FTC troubles. Emails show that Swallow set Johnson up with RMR Consulting to work on influencing Reid. Swallow maintains that he did not go further than that. "I told Jeremy I could not and would not intervene with the FTC on his behalf, given my position with the state [attorney general]," Swallow said. He said Johnson also asked him to approach the U.S. Attorney on his behalf, and again Swallow refused. As a wealthy philanthropist, Johnson provided generous contributions to Shurtloffs campaign for Attorney General and supported various initiatives and charities which the office was involved with. Shurtloff helped set up meetings between Johnson and top elected officials no crime. But how innocent was Johnson? Its reported, The Federal Trade Commission says Mr. Johnson was the mastermind behind one of the largest and most intricate online marketing frauds ever perpetrated in the United States. When the FTC failed to stop its investigation into Johnsons companies, Johnson started demanding back the money he had paid to RMR Consulting. He admitted he did not know if any of the money he paid in the deal actually reached anyone connected to Reid. Johnson was arrested for mail fraud and continued to pressure Swallow. He arranged a meeting with Swallow where he secretly videotaped and recorded him. Yet he was unable to incriminate him. Throughout the meeting, Swallow consistently states his role must be limited to assisting with obtaining lobbyists, "I'd like to have it legally through lobbyists," he says. It appears that the only evidence of Swallow telling Johnson to bribe Reid is Johnsons testimony. But as weve learned from previous wrongful prosecution cases like that of former Congressman Rick Renzi, key witnesses can be lured by the prosecution to change their testimony with thousands of dollars of reward money dangled in front of them. This is illegal if not divulged to the defense and jurors. Or perhaps Johnson received an assurance that time would be shaved off his sentence should he implicate powerful Republican officials. What this comes down to is Swallow was targeted because he was an activist conservative. He sued the Obama administration in an attempt to overturn Obamacare and to demand the return of federally controlled lands in Utah back to the state. He received an A+ rating from the NRA and was endorsed by the organization when he ran for attorney general. As a state legislator, he sponsored the largest tax cut in Utahs history and was named Taxpayer Advocate of the Year by the Utah Taxpayers Association. When the DOJ announced it was investigating Swallow, the Utah Democratic Party Chairman gleefully issued a statement praising the development. Swallow appears to have an ethical background, there doesnt seem to be an unethical bone in his body. Even more telling, in Swallows case, the DOJ actually did the right thing and decided in 2013 not to file public corruption charges against him, nor against Shurtloff. Yet local prosecutors disregarded this exoneration and brought their own charges. They asked the judge to conceal the exculpatory fact from jurors that DOJ prosecutors had declined to prosecute Swallow and incredibly the judge agreed. They also got the judge to withhold the fact that state prosecutors dropped all charges against Shurtleff. Assistant Salt Lake County district attorney Chou Chou Collins bizarrely claimed that it was irrelevant and would confuse the jury. In another over-the-top move, prosecutors arrested their own witness earlier this month, a former deputy attorney general, after he told them he wouldnt be able to testify against his ex-boss because he had a conflict with the trial date. But instead of working with him to find a mutually agreeable date, prosecutors arrested him while he was in town for his mothers funeral. Perhaps he didnt want to testify against an innocent man and they knew it. Earlier this month Swallow requested that the judge recuse herself due to bias. He cited her refusal to hold evidentiary hearings on defense motions, unwillingness to protect against a breach of attorney-client emails and illegal treatment of a witness. So who is really crooked here, businessmen in prison who have not much more evidence against those accused than verbal stories, or an attorney general who merely inherited the doings of his predecessor a predecessor who has been completely exonerated? This has all of the elements of a typical witch hunt by the left against conservatives hopefully they wont get away with it this time around. Rachel Alexander and her brother Andrew are co-Editors of Intellectual Conservative. She has been published in the American Spectator, Townhall.com, Fox News, NewsMax, Accuracy in Media, The Americano, ParcBench, and other publications. Home The Womens March and the real Deplorables By Selwyn Duke In a recent viral Facebook post, a conservative woman found it necessary to point out that she wasnt a disgrace to women for not supporting the Womens March on Washington. Of course not. Saying otherwise is a bit like having called a soldier a disgrace to soldiers for not having supported the My Lai Massacre. One DC marcher held a placard stating, I am more than my v****a. This was clear: She was also a mouth and a sign. British journalist Katie Hopkins, who attended the event, cited the above message and pointed out that possession of such an anatomical feature is a matter of biology, not a political argument and that the marchers had no political arguments. Theirs was a collective tantrum. Madonna spoke at the rally, dropped f-bombs, led the throng in chanting "I'M NOT YOUR B****!" and then, quite ironically, complained that Good didnt win in the election. Hopkins quipped that she didnt even know Good was a candidate. If he was, though, Madonna should have told us whether Donald Trump is the Bad or the Ugly. Then wed better know what to expect the next four years. But Madonna, dont preach; youre in trouble deep. Its not just that the Secret Service is now investigating her for saying at the march that she thought about "blowing up the White House." Its that shes blowing up her own life and helped blow up our culture. After peddling sexuality to make money and demonstrating a pathological unwillingness to constrain herself, Madonna has (as a parent must) tried to constrain her children. Unsurprisingly, however, son Rocco Ritchie rebelled against the immaterial girl and now lives with his father. The 58-year-old pop tart has also become the Peter Pan Syndrome personified and is clearly unhappy, as 2016 on-stage meltdowns evidenced. Is this woman, whose own ship is listing badly, one to advise on the ship of state? Madonna, take the log out of your own eye before worrying about the speck in Donald Trumps. Actress Ashley Judd spoke at the rally as well (and as badly). Perhaps now too dependent on having others write her material, she recited a poem disgorged by a 19-year-old Dunkin Donuts worker which included the line, I feel Hitler in these streets, a mustache traded for a toupee. What profundity! Move over, Whitman and Yeats youve just been dunked on. In the same vein, there were march messages such as "This p***y bites and she slays," P***y power itll grab ya, B*****s get stuff done (finally, some specificity!), Ovaries before brovaries, My p***y bites, Utereses before duderuses (so obsessed with sexual body parts but cant spell them?), and Trump is a big p***y. They forgot to say he smells and has cooties. These were, mind you, among 150 slogans provided for protesters to choose from because, well, no one could ascend to such heights of intellectualism all by himself. Additionally, many marchers wore pink p***y hats, which, Yahoo.com stated, would Unite Millions at Womens Marches Around the World. If men held a rally and wore doggy hats with phallic symbolism, would they be called brave or boorish, be exalted as protesters or excoriated as pigs? The march was pointless, classless and brainless, but not harmless. One common theme was anger at certain crass comments Trump made in the past. To combat this, the marchs leaders and their lemmings decided to be crude, lewd and even more crass in the present. Its much like trying to correct your childs cursing by cursing him out. A famous sentiment used to justify such behavior, and one written on a protesters sign, stated, "Well behaved women seldom make history. This is like complaining that well behaved children seldom make a mess, for empowered ill-behaved people often do make history and make a mess of it. Contrary to this was the father of our nation, George Washington. He defeated his times greatest power and won our nations independence, all while being a pillar of civility. Not only is he known for helping popularize 110 Rules of Civility & Decent Behavior, but in 1776 he issued general orders to the Continental Army condemning the practice of profane cursing, writing that every man of characterdetests and despises it. Seeking rights without character is like seeking health without nourishment. Washington himself observed, "Human rights can only be assured among a virtuous people while fellow founder Samuel Adams warned that public liberty will not long survive the total extinction of morals." The DC vixens-cum-vice peddlers should take note. Fortunately, there are millions more women making history by, every day, molding the next generation to be well behaved and to not mistake boorishness for bravery and sexual snake oil for sophistication. Contact Selwyn Duke, follow him on Twitter or log on to SelwynDuke.com. Home I like the approach that is being taken to quote the president verbatim: President Donald Trump signed an executive order Monday morning requiring that for every new federal regulation implemented, two must be rescinded. This will be the biggest such act that our country has ever seen, Trump declared moments before signing it inside the Oval Office. There will be regulation, there will be control, but it will be a normalized control where you can open your business and expand your business very easily. And that's what our country has been all about. The executive order signing, which fills a campaign pledge, comes after the president held a listening session with small-business leaders. If you have a regulation you want, number one, were not gonna approve it because its already been approved probably in 17 different forms, Trump said. But if we do, the only way you have a chance is we have to knock out two regulations for every new regulation. So if theres a new regulation, they have to knock out two. The White House has yet to release text of the executive order, but the president added that it goes far beyond that. Were cutting regulations massively for small business and for large business, he said. But they're different. But for small business, and thats what this is about today. Check Point researchers recently found mobile ransomware embedded in an app called EnergyRescue, which was available from the official Google Play store. The malware, called Charger, steals contact info and SMS messages from infected devices, and requests admin permissions. If those permissions are granted, the ransomware locks the device and demands 0.2 Bitcoins (approximately $180) in payment with the warning, You need to pay for us, otherwise we will sell portion of your personal information on black market every 30 minutes. Similar to other malware seen in the past, Charger checks the local settings of the device and does not run its malicious logic if the device is located in Ukraine, Russia or Belarus, the researchers write. This is likely done to keep the developers from being prosecuted in their own countries or being extradited beween countries. To make it harder to detect, the researchers noted, the malware used the following techniques: It encodes strings into binary arrays, making it harder to inspect them. It loads code from encrypted resources dynamically, which most detection engines cannot penetrate and inspect. The dynamically-loaded code is also flooded with meaningless commands that mask the actual commands passing through. It checks whether it is being run in an emulator before it starts its malicious activity. PC malware first introduced this technique which is becoming a trend in mobile malware having been adopted by several malware families including Dendroid. The researchers disclosed their findings to the Android Security Team, which removed the infected app and updated its defenses to detect the Charger malware. Tripwire security researcher Craig Young told eSecurity Planet by email that with 2.2 million apps in the Google Play store, its all but inevitable that some bad apples will get through. Users can still trust the Google Play Store, but need to keep in mind a few tips to stay safe, he said. First of all, you should never ever grant administrator permission to any application without absolute trust for why it is needed. Also, starting with the 2015 release of Android 6, applications started requesting permission at run time rather than install, so it is very apparent when an app tries to steal contacts or other personal data. Unfortunately, only a little over 30 percent of Android devices are running this version or newer, due to many low-end phones being neglected by vendors with respect to providing updates, Young added. This is why its important to buy Android devices from vendors which made commitments to keeping the product up to date for a specified amount of time. A recent Ponemon Institute survey of 593 IT and IT security practitioners, sponsored by Arxan and IBM Security, found that while 60 percent of respondents acknowledged having experienced a security incident due to an insecure mobile app, 44 percent are taking no steps to prevent such attacks. For IoT apps, the situation is even worse respondents said IoT apps are harder to secure (84 percent) than mobile apps (69 percent), and 55 percent of respondents said theres a lack of quality assurance and testing procedures for IoT apps. Just 30 percent of respondents said their organization allocates sufficient budget to protect mobile apps and IoT devices. Mobile and IoT applications continue to be released at a rapid pace to meet user demand, IBM Security global executive security advisor Diana Kelley said in a statement. If security isnt designed into these apps there could be significant negative impacts. Organizations are at risk and cybercriminals know where the soft spots are. Raising awareness of application security in the enterprise is a critically important first step toward a more secure future for businesses and consumers. On January 20th, 2017, Donald Trump officially became the 45th President of the United States of America. A lot of people in Russia, including those in power (government officials, members of parliament, etc.) express hope that he will change the U.S. policy towards Moscow, widely considered as anti-Russian. The main question is: are these hopes justified? Answering this question I must say that we are certainly deluding ourselves that relations with our country were the central plank of Mr.Trumps entire campaign, and that Russia is always at the forefront of the Presidents mind. Assessing his personality we must take into consideration two factors. Firstly, he is a pragmatist, albeit outwardly eccentric and fond of punchy soundbites (by the way, those soundbites do not necessarily translate into actual policy). Secondly he is definitely not Santa Clause, and even if he had a sack full of gifts, those are clearly not meant for Russia. Nevertheless, I must say that Donald Trump is the lesser of the two evils. Had Hilary Clinton won, the situation would have taken an entirely predictable downward trajectory. The two countries would have continued to sever their remaining bilateral ties. All the existing problems in their relations i.e. Ukraine, Syria, cyber security, human rights etc. would still be there, and new ones would surely emerge with the passage of time. There are many issues where Russia and the United States could and should focus their efforts to reduce the ongoing confrontation. I will mention only three of them which to my mind are of utmost importance for the worlds security. First, we should aim to work together against international terrorism, first of all against Islamic State. We should stop arguing about which parties in Syria should be regarded as terrorists. Trump has both the opportunity and the need to rise above the nonsensical bickering initiated by his predecessor, define the goals that America shares with Russia, designate common targets and start striking those targets together. After all, international terrorism is the enemy at the gate for both of our countries. It is in our shared interests to strike that enemy down which is entirely possible if Russia and the United States pool their resources. Second, we should restart our strategic stability dialogue. In this regard, Dr Alexey Arbatov offers an accurate assessment of the current U.S.-Russia dynamic. As he observes, after a quarter century pause, Russia and the United States are again on the verge of a massive and multichannel cycle of the arms race. [1]. He quotes an observation by Professor Robert Legvold that both countries in modernizing all three legs of their nuclear triads, have reopened a potential competition between offensive and defensive systems and introduced new destabilizing technologies, such as conventionally armed strategic missiles capable of striking the other sides nuclear weapons, thus blurring the firebreak between conventional and nuclear warfare. [2] As Dr Arbatov adds Besides the political split over Ukraine and disagreements over ballistic missile defenses and conventional global hypersonic systems The clash of positions over the conflicts in Ukraine and Syria and the divergence of views over ballistic missile defense and conventional hypersonic systems, the two states are now deeply divided in their fundamental views on the role of nuclear weapons, assessments of strategic balance, and perceptions of possible causes of war. These contradictions and their origins should be understood by both powers. Russia and the United States should make an effort to forge a common, up-to-date understanding of strategic stability and enhance it by arms control provisions and through regular military and civilian contacts. [3] He continues Weapon systems that threaten the survivability of each others strategic forces, and command, control, communications, and intelligence assets imply a first strike strategy and provoke pre-emption. While undertaking phased reduction of nuclear forces, both sides should reach agreements to alleviate mutual concerns about prompt and slow counterforce systems, even if those are designed against other opponents. Expanding defensive systems to reduce each sides vulnerability to rogue states should only be based on US Russian agreements. Systems and concepts blurring the line between nuclear and conventional operations are inherently destabilizing and should be subjected to limitations and confidence-building measures. There must be a mutual understanding that any use of nuclear weapons, however limited, is escalatory and should be excluded from bilateral strategic relations. [4] Third, Russia and the United States should do their utmost to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons. A solid foundation for efforts in this area already exists, namely the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Almost fifty years have passed since its coming into force. Many milestones have come and gone since 1968, but the NPT is still alive and bearing fruit (suffice to recall the recent diplomatic taming of the Iranian nuclear program). Nevertheless, a new Cold War between Russia and the West could lead to cracks appearing on the treatys foundation. Nuclear proliferation is equally dangerous for both of our countries. Trump and Putin should pool their efforts to keep the NPT afloat. **** [1] See Dr Alexey Arbatovs article in Arms Control Today from September 2016. Page 24. Dr Arbatov is the head of the Center for International Security at the Russian Academy of Sciences Institute of World Economy and International Relations and head of the Nonproliferation Program at Carnegie Endowment for International Peaces Moscow Center. [2] Ibid and Robert Legvold, Return to Cold War (Cambridge, UK: Polity, 2016), p.132. [3] Arbatov Ibid [4] Ibid. The opinions articulated above represent the views of the author(s), and do not necessarily reflect the position of the European Leadership Network or any of its members. The ELNs aim is to encourage debates that will help develop Europes capacity to address the pressing foreign, defence, and security challenges of our time. On Tuesday afternoon, investors watched over UK Parliament talks over the activation of Article 50. It was also indicated that the Brexit white paper would be published on Thursday. Pound Sterling continued to slide on Tuesday morning, slumping in the region of 1.7065 against the NZ dollar. With Parliament preparing to debate the governments Article 50 bill concerns over the prospect of a hard Brexit weighed on investor sentiment once again, despite the large number of amendments that have been tabled by MPs. At the time of writing this update, the British Pound to New Zealand Dollar exchange rate trended in the region of 1.7198, having slipped below the key level of 1.72 as Sterling weakened in the afternoon. Concerns in UK markets that Scotland First Minister Nicola Sturgeon may push for a second Scottish independence referendum if Scotlands position on the EU was not respected weakened GBP. Traders were also concerned about pressure on UK Prime Minister May to either side with the EU or the US on Trumps controversial Muslim ban. Pound to New Zealand Dollar Exchange Rate Worsens on Rising Fears of UK-EU Battle of Interests The current week has started off poorly for the GBP NZD exchange rate, which has remained negative on account of a lack of direct UK economic data. Also reducing demand for the Pound has been comments from Italian Deputy Foreign Minister Mario Giro, who predicted that the City of London financial sector may come under threat from European Union nations in the future. Issuing an alarming forecast on the matter, Giro stated that; This will be an economic war. Lets say an economic cold war, and we (Italy) are not in favour of it. While Giro was primarily warning that the UK could face troubles from the EU during the Brexit process in the financial context, he also offered optimism, stating that; We have to negotiate with patience, calm, we have to be honest to each other, and also we have to use fair play. The process has not started. We have two years. Pound Gains Predicted if UK PM Keeps an Open Mind to Devolved Nation Proposals Today While no UK economic news is expected out today, the Pound could still appreciate against the New Zealand Dollar depending on the outcome of todays meeting between Theresa May and devolved nation leaders. Although May is expected to deny any attempts for devolved nations to secure a veto on the Article 50 bill, her response to plans to keep Scotland and Wales in the EU single market after Brexit is not yet known. Assuming that the PM shuts down any attempts to remain part of the UK but also part of the EU single market, demand for the Pound may drop further still due to the rising threat of a reactionary second independence referendum by Scotland. New Zealand Dollar Pound Trading Strengthened by Reduction in National Trade Deficit The New Zealand Dollar has managed to climb against the Pound during trading today, thanks to Sundays late trade balance figures for December. While the figure did not return to the surplus range, the shift from -746m to -41m still represented a significant deficit reduction for the nation and supported the New Zealand Dollar. The viability of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) without the US is still a matter for debate, but at the present time at least, the New Zealand Dollar is up against the Pound due to no significant deterioration of talks among investors. New Zealand Dollar Weekly Forecast: Tourist Stats and Jobs Data on the Table The next New Zealand data out this week will come tonight, when the annual visitor arrivals figure for December is due. This previously posted an 11% rise. The only other major NZ news this week will come on Tuesday night, when the Q4 employment change and unemployment rate stats are due. GBP NZD Data Releases 30/01/2017 21:45 NZD Visitor Arrivals (YoY) DEC 31/01/2017 00:05 GBP GfK Consumer Confidence JAN 21:45 NZD Employment Change (QoQ) Q4 21:45 NZD Unemployment Rate Q4 Expats, particularly those with dual citizenship, have been thrown into confusion after the new American President Donald Trump announced a ban on people with certain passports entering the country and refugees from certain countries.Over the weekend valid visa holders and legal residents with green cards have been prevented from entering the United States after Trump signed an executive order banning those with passports from seven mainly Muslim countries for 90 days. It also emerged that those with dual citizenship of these countries, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, might also be affected, although the situation regarding people with dual passports is still unclear. The status of those born in these countries who now have citizenship of a non-banned state was also unclear.The situation could affect tens of thousands of doctors, students, researchers, engineers and IT specialists employed by global companies in the US and at universities and hospitals as well as top companies in Silicon Valley.Some Governments, such as the UK, have obtained clarification that its citizens, even if born in one of the banned countries, will be allowed entry but others have not. One high profile example was British Olympic gold medal athlete Sir Mo Farah who was born in Somalia. He is currently training in Ethiopia but his wife and children live in the US and he voiced concerns about being able to get back into the country where his family lives.On Monday the Department of Homeland Security confirmed the order would not be varied. 'The Presidents Executive Orders remain in place. Prohibited travel will remain prohibited and the US Government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety. No foreign national in a foreign land, without ties to the United States, has any unfettered right to demand entry into the United States or to demand immigration benefits in the United States,' it said in a statement.There is currently confusion at US airports and ports. People arriving back from holiday and expats visiting family abroad face questioning and some have been detained, others have not been allowed to board planes bound for the US.Airlines are totally confused with some adopting more strict interpretations of the order than others. One couple on holiday in South America who live in the UK were not allowed to board their flight to Glasgow because there were transiting through New York. They were left stranded without money for another flight that did not go via the US but have now raised enough money to get home. Australian airline Qantas, however, has offered travellers caught up in the US ban full refunds.In the US, expats, even those with green cards, are being advised not to leave if they think they could be affected by the new rules as they risk being separated from their families. Immigration lawyers and employers suggest that hundreds of thousands of green card holders could be affected.While courts in New York and Virginia have ordered stays on the deportation of people with valid visas for the US, this only affects those already caught up in the confusion and not those who have yet to travel.Firms with expat employees are also trying to clarify the situation. Google, for example, which employs nearly 200 foreigners who could be affected has consulted lawyers. Universities, top medical hospitals and high tech companies also employ a large number of expats from the banned countries, many of whom could be either stranded abroad or unable to return to their families in the US. Hi, I am currently living in the UAE, and trying to move to canada. Could anyone please help me with the following: My kids are currently in Grade 3 & 5. They will move to Grades 4&6 the next academic year. I had checked the rankings of the schools from the Fraser institute websites. I would like to know if we could choose schools based on the ranking. Os is it based on the locality that we might stay in? When I see a rating of 6 how good is that school? Does Burlington have some sort of a community housing. Is it easy to get a place on rent quickly and how expensive is it? When there are snowfalls how long does is last to get back to normal life. How do kids with frequent bronchial infections find life there? Do they fall sick very often? How well could children cope up with the change? I know there are quite a few questions. I hope someone could help me out with these i have a doubt... pls help me anyone... i am planning to take viagra tablet or delay spray into india on my vacation on coming may. its legal in dubai airport or indian airport? You should probably ask a close neighbor what their situation regarding phone and Internet lines. It may not be necessary to pay a separate phone line IF (and only if) the current line (even if inactive) is "degroupe"- but to test that out, you'll need either the old phone number for the place, or at least the phone number of a neighbor that you can put into the little tester function on one of the Internet provider websites. Or, you can get a French mobile phone service and use your smart phone as an Internet "hot spot" - depending on your Internet needs. (Though you will need to check - perhaps with a neighbor - about mobile coverage in the area.) Cheers, Bev Hi all. i would like to ask how much on average a new kitchen would cost. in a roughly 4mx6m kitchen. How much would the cupboards and granite top cost including labor. but also excluding the stove. We are interested in a property but then the kitchen i'm not happy with it so i want to weigh the options of redoing the kitchen . Just a rough estimate . Apologies its not immigration related. Thanks . This is (almost) my last column. It marks 40 years of deadlines, 36 in national syndication. Thats over 5,000 columns and more than 3.5 million words. Its the equivalent of 44 books, or six tomes the size of War and Peace. It has been a wonderful run, and I couldnt have done it without you. That was a literal statement, not a sentimental one. It was your gift of trust, your letting me be your itinerant learner and observer that made the last 40 years possible. Ive received many reader letters about the column. Some tell how youve achieved a secure retirement by following this column. One letter spoke for two generations, of columns passed from father to son. It doesnt get any better than that. Other letters urge me to keep on writing. But 40 years is a long time. Ive begun to develop a 700-word mind, an ability to deal with anything as long as it is not shorter than, or longer than, the traditional length of a newspaper column. Im also acutely aware that every hour spent doing one thing I love, writing, is an hour that Ive lost to do other things I love. And, at 76, I may not be able to do them if I wait too long. My wife and I were in Puerto Vallarta earlier this month; in February, well be at the annual meeting of the Philosophical Society of Texas; in March, Ill be sailing with my brothers. And Ill be driving my personal retirement vehicle a recently purchased 2004 Porsche Boxster. Ill be sharing it, and working on it, with my son, Ollie, maybe doing a few things to make it faster on the draw. And Ill continue the more difficult project of personal restoration by walking still more. Will I come back to writing? I think so. But for now, Im looking forward to living life without deadlines. One obvious project is a portfolio cookbook for Couch Potato investors. Another is an exploration of what I call the menu of life and death about choices we make, individually and nationally, about life itself and how long it lasts. One of the wonderful things about writing a newspaper column is that you are exposed to the cornucopia of human ability and talent. I wish I could name all the people Ive written about and drawn from in the last 40 years, but it would take volumes, not 700 words. I have others to thank as well: editors. Ive been blessed with editors who focused on what we could do to deliver a better read. Weve re-paragraphed, expunged word echoes, made shorter sentences and excised obscure references. They have hidden my crippling failure to master the possessive. And they have scattered hyphens where they were needed when this scribbler remained oblivious. More Information Note to readers Scott Burns, whose column has appeared in the San Antonio Express-News for at least three decades, has decided to retire. His last column, Two Menus for Social Security, will appear Sunday. See More Collapse I owe a particular debt to Miss Ozgood, my 11th-grade English teacher. I wanted to be an engineer and an astronaut, but she started the fire. She asked her students to write sentences instead of diagramming them, and I did. Voter Guide: What to know for the midterm election Your guide to the Texas and San Antonio races and candidates on the Nov. 8 ballot. I have a parting gift for you, almost ready. It has nothing to do with investments. It has everything to do with living in the world. Ive called it Still at Large, a collection of columns that I wrote by leaving my computer, office and comfort zone. Theyre the columns I wrote while riding a motorcycle along the Texas-Mexico border, sailing in Belize and visiting other spots around the world, but mostly in our great country. Send me an email with Still at Large in the subject line, and Ill send you the PDF file as soon as it is done. Finally, you can always reach me at sburnscolumn@yahoo. com. Just remember, I may not answer immediately because Im out there, still at large. Heres a relatively safe policy prediction: we will get major federal corporate tax reform in the next year. Heres a sneak preview of the changes, especially the ones I like. Normally Id recommend ignoring policy wonk papers published many months ago back in the midst of a presidential campaign. However, with a House, Senate, and executive branch unified under the same party, much of this stuff in Paul Ryans June 2016 proposal known as A Better Way (aka the Blueprint) will likely become law. Before you decide to just turn the page and ignore tax reforms to focus on the sick Twitter burns, all the fake news and alternative facts, let me just stake the claim that tax law is the hidden architecture of our world. This, right here, is the stuff that really matters. Mikes Second Immutable Law of Taxation states that if you want to know what a societys real values are, follow its tax laws. (Ill remind you of Mike First Immutable Law a little later on.) According to Ryans A Better Way, the goals of corporate tax reform are: 1. Spur additional capital investment in the U.S. 2. Discourage corporate indebtedness 3. Reduce corporate double-taxation of profits 4. Bring U.S. tax rates in line with international tax rates 5. Simplify the cost of tax compliance with the IRS 6. Improve the IRS customer-service orientation and 7. Reduce the stockpile of overseas corporate profits held by U.S. companies. All of these sound like reasonable goals to me. To spur business investments, the Ryan Blueprint recommends allowing businesses to deduct the full cost of purchasing tangible and intangible assets the year they are purchased. Previously, when a business invested in a thing like, I dont know, lets say a new tractor the cost of the tractor would be depreciated, or spread out, over many years. The effect is to give businesses an additional tool for reducing current tax bills. That seems like it probably would help spur more business investment. To further help businesses, and to bring U.S. taxes in line with international rates, the Blueprint proposes a drop from a top (C-Corp) corporate tax rate of 35 percent to a far more modest 20 percent flat rate, and a drop to 25 percent for sole proprietorships and partnerships, which make up most small businesses. Before you angrily shout Corporate give-away! let me make the case for this one. The justification for this drop has many parts. First, the average corporate tax rate of developed countries is 24.8 percent, far below the U.S., which has the highest top corporate tax rate among our peer group countries. Ironically, the US also collects proportionately less corporate taxes than peer group countries. So, we have high tax rates, but low tax collection a bad combo. Now, our current top corporate tax rate of 35 percent compared with the average of roughly 25 percent elsewhere probably overstates the differences. Thats because corporations in other countries may pay fees and licenses and other taxes that U.S. corporations do not, and also because large U.S. corporations are skilled at tax avoidance strategies. We should expect that skilled tax avoidance because of Mikes First Immutable Law of Taxation, which states that every tax action causes an opposite tax-avoidance reaction. Understanding that immutable law, we should favor tax rates that cause the least amount of tax avoidance behaviors. A main justification for the corporate tax rate drop is to bring us in line with international tax norms. Why should we care about that? First, because in an interconnected world, U.S. corporations operate at a competitive disadvantage under their higher tax rate. Voter Guide: What to know for the midterm election Your guide to the Texas and San Antonio races and candidates on the Nov. 8 ballot. Second, U.S. multinational companies have figured out that they can avoid being taxed on overseas profits at our more punitive 35 percent rate by one of two methods. The first method is that some corporations leave their money earned overseas in a kind of international tax limbo. The result is an estimated $2 trillion in untaxed U.S. corporate earnings held overseas. Large corporations have been waiting for tax rates to drop, as now seems imminent, or for a kind of one-time corporate tax amnesty to incentivize them to bring their profits onshore. This all seems much more likely to happen with upcoming tax reform, and will also give a one-time boost to the U.S. Treasury. Other companies have decided to merge with or be bought by foreign corporations in order to avoid U.S. tax rates, in whats called a tax inversion. Burger King famously did this with Canadian-based firm coffee chain Tim Hortons. Minnesota-based medical device giant Medtronics was bought by Ireland-based Covidien, a smaller medical device company that allowed the U.S. company to relocate to a lower-tax country. From my perspective, you really cant blame the leaders of corporations for doing either of these things when faced with a massive corporate tax rate difference. In order to be responsive to shareholders, top executives have to seek legal ways to minimize their taxes. All of which is to say, bringing top U.S. corporate tax rates closer to international norms seems like an important and overdue reform. To discourage corporations from taking on debt, the Blueprint proposes eliminating the tax deduction for paying interest on debt. The household analogy here would be the popular mortgage interest tax deduction, which somewhat encourages homeowners to take on larger mortgages than they might otherwise take on, which is also something I kind of hate. The idea in the corporate world is that by eliminating deductions for debt interest payments, corporations will be nudged into taking on less debt. In addition, the Blueprint argues, this elimination, paired with the upfront deduction for capital investments described above, encourages current investment, but not through excessive borrowing. Finally, the Blueprint proposes modernizing and streamlining the IRS. This seems like one of those things thats easier said than done, but by all means, lets try to make this happen as well. I have plenty of mean things to say about other aspects of the tax reform Blueprint, but Ill save that for a future post. Michael Taylor is a former Goldman Sachs bond salesman and writes the Bankers- Anonymous.com finance blog. michael@michaelthesmartmoney.com @Michael_Taylor Here is a look at public meetings scheduled in the coming week: Monday The Philomath City Council will hold a goal-setting session at 6:30 p.m. at City Hall, 980 Applegate St. Tuesday The task force working on the City Council goal of a climate action plan meets at 5 p.m. at the Madison Avenue Meeting Room, 500 S.W. Madison Ave. The task force, which received council approval of its draft plan Dec. 12, will look at next steps and a strategy for developing its implementation plan. Councilor Charlyn Ellis will host a meeting for Ward 5 residents at 7 p.m. at the Chintimini Senior and Community Center, 2601 N.W. Tyler Ave. Wednesday The Corvallis Community Involvement and Diversity Advisory Board meets at 5 p.m. at the Madison room. The board will discuss criteria for the neighborhood empowerment grants it will be awarding. The Corvallis Planning Commission meets at 7 p.m. at the downtown fire station, 400 N.W. Harrison Blvd. No public hearings are scheduled. Commissioners will discuss their annual work plan and the mixed-use employment zone. The Corvallis-Benton County Library Advisory Board meets at 7:30 p.m. at the library, 645 N.W. Monroe Ave. Friday The Corvallis Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Board meets at 7 a.m. at the Madison room. Feb. 4 Ward 7 Councilor Bill Glassmire will team up with newcomer Hyatt Lytle of Ward 3 for the 10 a.m. to noon government comment corner at the library. The League of Women Voters of Corvallis will host a legislative town hall from 10 to 11:30 a.m. at the library. State Sen. Sara Gelser and Reps. Dan Rayfield, Andy Olson and Mike Nearman have been invited to participate in a discussion of the 2017 legislative session. WASHINGTON Congressional Republicans are moving to undo a key element of the Obama administrations effort to reduce the oil and gas industrys effect on greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. Legislation is being readied in the House to overturn an executive order from last year cutting the amount of methane a particularly potent greenhouse gas that is vented and flared from drilling sites on federal and tribal lands. The bill, along with another piece of legislation overturning an order protecting streams and wildlife around coal mines, is set to be introduced today. These are abusive, last-minute regulations that are grossly inconsistent with congressional intent, Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, said in a conference call Friday. They will impose a real and unnecessary cost on American people and communities. After last weeks Republican retreat in Philadelphia headlined by President Donald Trump, party leaders were gearing up to roll back federal regulation at large. And with Trumps public skepticism that climate change constitutes the global crisis that scientists maintain, greenhouse gas emission rules are expected to be near the top of the list. Most immediately, Republicans plan to revive a little-used law signed by former President Bill Clinton in the 1990s that gave Congress the authority to overturn any regulation within 60 days of publication a measure designed to keep presidential administrations from tacking on regulations on their way out of the White House. Known as the Congressional Review Act, it has only been used once in the past two decades. But now Republicans want to use it to tackle rules on everything from overtime pay to climate change. Environmentalists are already stepping up campaigns to block the legislation in the Senate, where Republicans maintain a thin 52-48 majority. The math is hard, but its not settled, said Chase Huntley, a senior government relations director at the Wilderness Society, a conservation group. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that methane is 25 times more powerful than carbon dioxide in terms of its warming effect on the atmosphere. While emitted by everything from landfills to cattle, the highest proportion 33 percent comes from oil and gas systems. Last year, the Bureau of Land Management said it was time to update its decades-old drilling rules, arguing that it was for the good of the planet and would slow the waste of a valuable public resource in methane the principal component of natural gas. But for drillers, either burning methane or allowing it to escape is a part of doing business. Getting pipelines built to remote drilling locations requires investment and approval from government agencies. And with natural gas selling at historic lows, the incentive to capture that gas is reduced. Nevertheless, with global pressure to address climate change building, some companies have increased efforts to seek out methane leaks and reduce emissions. Since 1990, overall methane emissions have come down 6 percent, according to EPA. Oil and gas industry groups such as the Western Energy Alliance have long fought methane regulations, arguing that they add billions of dollars in cost, raising energy prices while reducing oil field jobs. But the oil lobby faces opposition from a small but burgeoning industry that sells sensors and provides manned inspection teams armed with infrared goggles to root out leaks on drilling sites. In Colorado, which has some of the strictest methane emissions rules in the country, Houston-based Rebellion Photonics has made a business selling automated gas-detection systems. CEO Allison Sawyer said the rush to fix leaks has led to rising demand for maintenance staff in the oil fields. Voter Guide: What to know for the midterm election Your guide to the Texas and San Antonio races and candidates on the Nov. 8 ballot. Its worked really well in Colorado, she said. Theyre high-paying, blue-collar jobs that can never be exported. Sawyer and others in her industry are working with environmentalists to press their case to Congress. But they will have to flip some Republicans, with Bishop expressing confidence Friday that he has the votes in the House and the Senate to get his legislation passed. The Bureau of Land Managements venting and flaring rule is one in a series of methane emissions rules ordered by the Obama administration. Bishop said he planned to address two similar methane rules adopted by the EPA but had not yet decided how. A rule relating to emissions from new wells is too old to be addressed by the Congressional Review Act. Overturning it would likely require an executive order from Trump. The other rule, for existing wells, is still in development at the agency and is not expected to be completed by incoming EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. Were a little ahead of how many of those I want to do administratively and how many I want to do legislatively, Bishop said. The method Im going to use in the future is not quite clear. James.osborne@chron.com Twitter.com/osborneja This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate A sensor installed at the edge of remote oil well site in Karnes County could help solve one of the trickiest environmental problems of the oil patch methane gas leaks. A program to create the first smoke alarm for methane, a nontoxic flammable gas, moved out of the laboratory two weeks ago and into the Eagle Ford Shale in South Texas for testing. Norwegian energy company Statoil installed technology that uses a laser to detect when the colorless, odorless methane is escaping from equipment. Its part of the Methane Detectors Challenge, an unusual partnership between environmentalists, independent researchers, startup companies, and large oil and gas companies. The idea is to create an affordable 24-hour monitoring device that would send an alert when methane spikes. Methane, the key component of natural gas, is a potent greenhouse gas that traps more heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. While natural gas is touted as a cleaner-burning alternative to coal or crude oil, there are concerns about leaks from equipment at well sites, pipelines and processing plants. Besides the environmental benefits and despite uncertainty over the future of environmental regulations in the oil field under a Republican administration the technology is an important innovation for an industry that loses an estimated $2 billion in the U.S. from escaped gas and $30 billion worldwide. It also would make the oil field safer for workers, said Desikan Sundararajan, senior researcher in Statoils shale oil and gas team. What does a leak at a well site really mean? Sundararajan asked. You have a piece of equipment thats not working the way its supposed to work. Although the laser technology that Statoil is installing is accurate enough to pinpoint small leaks, Shane Siebenaler of San Antonios Southwest Research Institute, said thats not the point. This isnt about finding every little leak, Siebenaler said. If you can find these large, super emitting sites, there are many, many environmental benefits. Theres an incentive for everyone to find these. The institute has tested equipment, analyzed data and acted as a neutral third party in the partnership. Research from the University of Texas and the Environmental Defense Fund in 2015 found that things such as equipment leaks or open hatches on tanks acted as superemitters in the oil field but could be prevented or fixed easily with frequent monitoring. A study published last year and led by chemists at the University of Texas at Arlington showed that the level of air pollution at shale oil and gas facilities in South Texas Eagle Ford Shale oil field could be high but when it was, it was most often caused by malfunctioning equipment. Aileen Nowlan, manager of the Methane Detectors Challenge with the Environmental Defense Fund, said a small number of leaks are responsible for the lions share of oil field emissions. While many oil companies send employees to check for leaks a few times a year, theres no round-the-clock monitoring that could quickly alert companies to a problem. The kind of equipment used is also a hurdle. Infrared cameras can see leaks, but that equipment costs $65,000 to $100,000 per camera useful for periodic checks, but unaffordable to install in oil fields with thousands of wells. Its not OK if you get out there six months later and youve been pouring out methane and volatile organic compounds the whole time, Nowlan said. With remote monitoring, Youre sending your team to where theres actually a problem. The rest of their time can be spent on more productive things instead of working on a calendar. Detecting methane leaks has different benefits for everyone involved: safety and economics for companies and climate for environmental groups. The Environmental Defense Fund wants affordable detection equipment so it would be widely adopted by oil and gas companies. Fixing leaks would help the environment, not only reducing methane but also preventing other compounds from escaping, such as benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylenes volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, which can harm the nervous system or cause cancer in high concentrations. Siebenaler said workers coming and going from sites shouldnt be exposed to gas leaks and that a remote and accurate monitor could reduce the amount of drive time for workers tasked with checking equipment. Going around with a camera is expensive and time-consuming, One of the largest types of accidents in oil and gas is vehicle accidents, Siebenaler said. You have people who spend all day driving to these remote sites. This would monitor all the time. The partnership was launched when the Environmental Defense Fund gathered oil and gas producers together and in 2014 put out a call for entrepreneurs to come forward with technology that might work to detect methane. Southwest Research Institute put the technology through rounds of testing, with researchers and oil and gas companies providing feedback to the startup companies on ways to improve software and hardware or on problems to solve. The collaboration helped overcome some common research problems in oil and gas. Large companies conduct plenty of research but dont often want to share information with competitors. Developers outside the industry may have good technology and ideas, but no access to oil and gas sites for testing. Siebenaler said the equipment was tested in the lab and outdoors in realistic settings rain, heat, wind and cold. But the field will provide the true test. It also has to work in unpleasant environments oppressive heat and humidity in the Texas summer or several feet of snow piling up in the North Dakota winter. This was part of the challenge, said Dirk Richter, founder of Colorado-based Quanta3, the company with the laser sensor chosen by Statoil for its pilot program. You prove your technology can operate in the harshest of conditions. Its not pretty out there. Having a delicate instrument doesnt help. It has to survive. Richter isnt an oil and gas guy; he did his doctoral thesis on building laser spectrometers for atmospheric research and has expertise in things such as measuring emissions from active volcanoes. I knew the technology and components that were out there and had an idea of how to make a very cost-efficient design that could tend to this problem, Richter said. The laser technology works like a bloodhound almost, Richter said. Variable factors such as wind direction are taken into account. They can sniff out where a leak actually happens, he said. Statoils Sundararajan said the company liked Quanta3s ability to pinpoint the source and intensity of the leaks. Voter Guide: What to know for the midterm election Your guide to the Texas and San Antonio races and candidates on the Nov. 8 ballot. The goal of the research project is to develop a system that costs a few thousand dollars a price that might allow companies to widely install the equipment. So far, the technology costs multiples of that since its a pilot, but Sundararajan said the price would come down if it goes into production. Statoil already considers the technology a success. We believe the only way to bring the cost down is to do more pilots and help these companies goes into industrialization, Sundararajan said. Statoil also has a goal of becoming the most carbon-efficient oil and gas producer, he said. The installation in Karnes County took about three hours, including unloading the equipment from a truck and mounting solar panels and batteries to power it. All the while, oil kept pumping. Thats the beauty of it, Sundararajan said. We didnt have to shut down our well pad at all because its completely noninvasive. Its like a perimeter sensor on the corner of the pad. If all goes well, Statoil will move the pilot equipment from the Eagle Ford to the Bakken formation in North Dakota to test it there. The Quantum3 equipment would need to stay in the Bakken for a longer period, though, to capture enough extreme winter weather to know how the laser works in that environment. Other oil and gas companies are participating in the challenge and moving closer to field testing. California utility provider Pacific Gas & Electric, a recent addition to the Methane Detectors Challenge, also recently announced that it would test a device from the San-Francisco-based startup Acutect in real-world conditions. jhiller@express-news.net Twitter: @Jennifer_Hiller This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Texas manufacturers continue to see improving business conditions after Donald Trump assumed his role as president, according to a new survey. The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey took responses from 115 manufacturers from Jan. 17 - 25 and saw a double-digit increase in the shipments index, which measures the amount of manufactured products shipped to customers. Many of the measures either increased or decreased by small margins from December to January. The employment index increased 9.5 points and bounced back into positive territory a month after falling 7.4 points. The production index the measure of a companys output fell slightly by 2.9 points to 11.9, remaining in positive territory. One machinery manufacturer, however, complained about Trumps proposal to scrap the North American Free Trade Agreement with Mexico and Canada. Theres some uncertainty around potential impacts related to NAFTA and other policy changes from the Trump administration, said one respondent, noting that the company has a facility in Mexico. Several large chain customers are asking for backup plans should there be any supply chain disruption, the executive said in comments made before the White House unveiled its proposal to levy a 20 percent tariff on goods imported from Mexico. The Trump Administrations import tax declaration came after the Dallas Fed survey was taken, so its unclear what impact it may have on manufacturing confidence. The Dallas Fed specifically asked respondents about the percentage of their revenue came from exports in the past year. Twenty-four percent of respondents said 10 or more percent of their revenue came from exports, while 31 percent said none of their revenue was from exports. Voter Guide: What to know for the midterm election Your guide to the Texas and San Antonio races and candidates on the Nov. 8 ballot. The index for company outlooks for the next six months increased slightly to 48.8, with 54.6 percent of respondents reporting better outlooks and only 5.8 percent saying their outlook worsened. In the comments section of the report, many manufacturers from primary and fabricated metals to computer and electronic product manufacturing noted potential upticks from the Trump presidency. rdruzin@express-news.net @druz_journo The San Antonio Independent School District is working to hire 250 experienced teachers this spring with proven track records of improving student achievement as part of an effort to have fewer students repeat grades. Some of the new master teachers, as the district calls them, will mentor resident interns at Ogden Elementary as part of a partnership with the Relay Graduate School of Education. Others will work in accelerated classrooms all over SAISD with students who would otherwise be retained, getting them back on track by moving them up two grade levels within two years. Its not uncommon for SAISD to retain up to 20 percent of students in the primary grades, Superintendent Pedro Martinez said. By contrast, an average of 3 percent of students statewide in grades kindergarten through 12 were held back in the 2014-2015 school year, according to the Texas Education Agency. We have some of the highest retention rates Ive ever seen, Martinez said. Thats why I have 16-year-olds in middle school, and so it hasnt worked for us. Social promotion is not the alternative either. The accelerated classrooms could contain students from multiple grade levels grouped according to their ability, Martinez said. Within the classrooms, the master teachers will provide individualized help to struggling students. The master teachers will work with their students beyond the length of a regular school day for 75 minutes a day, four days a week, Martinez said. They will also run monthlong summer programs that are more comprehensive than the districts programs for students who failed state standardized tests, Martinez said. In return, they will receive stipends of $15,000 in addition to their salaries on the district pay scale, and SAISD will raise their base salaries to match what they would make in higher-paying districts, Martinez said. The additional money is coming from a federal grant and the revenue generated by the tax increase voters ratified in November, Martinez said. SAISD has not been able to keep enough teachers with the experience to succeed with struggling students in the impoverished district, Martinez said. Many teachers leave SAISD for Northside or North East ISDs, because they live closer to those schools and the working conditions are less stressful, with more middle-class children and modern facilities, Martinez said. We have been the employer of the newbies, and as soon as they get experience and they build a track record, they leave us, Martinez said. That doesnt work for us. We have the children that are, I would argue, the most in need in the county. SAISD is recruiting master teachers from all across the state, but will also seek to elevate current district teachers to the new position, said Toni Thompson, associate superintendent for human resources. The district will be looking at past performance evaluations and student assessment data to determine whether candidates can prove at least three years of successful teaching and significantly impacting student achievement, Thompson said. SAISD will look at results from each candidates students on the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness, or other tests if the candidate was not teaching a STAAR-tested grade. To avoid hiring candidates who have only taught high-performing students, the district will look at rates of test score growth, Thompson said. Candidates will also have to show experience facilitating or leading teams and go through a demo lesson. Were looking for talent, Martinez said. Were willing to pay for it. They do have to work more for us and were driving that talent toward our communitys children. Thats our basic strategy. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate VICTORIA One day after fire destroyed this citys exquisite gold-domed mosque, hundreds of people of many faiths came to pray, grieve and show support, even as federal agents picked through the charred rubble. Love Thy Neighbor, read one poster. We Will Rebuild With Love, read another. While some folks came from as far away as Dallas, Fort Worth and San Antonio for the morning service, most were local residents. It was wonderful and amazing. Today, I feel we are one big family in Victoria. We are not alone, Imam Osama Hassan, speaking hours later, said of the outpouring of support. RELATED: Texas mosque destroyed in early-morning blaze; cause unknown And after the speeches and prayers ended, some in the crowd lingered. People were giving us hugs, with tears in their eyes, telling us how sad they were, and trying to give us donations, he said. The early-morning fire came a week after a burglary at the mosque and a day after President Donald Trump imposed travel restrictions on seven Muslim countries. And although some were quick to assume it was the work of an arsonist, investigators called in to assist the local fire marshal have offered no clues as to their theories or findings. We are praying it will prove to be an accident, and not something else. We reject the hate, Hassan said. And while few people in Victoria are jumping to conclusions, given the national political climate, some are bracing themselves for the dreadful possibility that it was a hate crime. Im kind of stoic about it. It will be what it will be. We dont have a history of that here, but everyone has a weird Uncle Harold, said City Councilman Tom Halepaska, 67, who owns a bakery. As a community, weve always been very open, including with the Muslim religion. We just want to live in peace, he added. Mayor Paul Polasek echoed those sentiments. The word that describes it for all of us is sad. It was a beautiful place of worship. Im ready to get a new one built and go forward, he said. We just need to be very supportive, and make sure people get good facts and good information, Polasek added. Abe Ajrami, a member of the Islamic Center, was among those who delivered a message of unity and appreciation at the Sunday morning service, held outside the ruined mosque. The first few hours, we were alone, watching the fire. But when people started hearing the news, the response was phenomenal, he said, reliving Saturday morning. The support from the community and nationally has been wonderful. We have a GoFund account, and over $600,000 has been raised in the last 30 hours, Ajrami said. As of Monday morning a total of $869,167 had been raised. In the meantime, worshippers are meeting for daily prayers in a vacant doctors office. If all goes well, construction on a new mosque will begin soon, Hassan said. Hours after the Sunday service ended and the crowd had dispersed, motorists were pulling in one after another to gaze quietly at the burned mosque. Im speechless. I didnt expect it to be completely destroyed, said Amin Mohd, 63, who had driven from Houston. I feel grief. I feel sorry for these ignorant people out there. I think its causing fear, he added. Nearby, Toby and Meagan Montez and their seven children who had just attended Mass were having an important family meeting in their parked car. We were talking about what it means to love thy neighbor and that its important for everyone to be able to worship in peace, even if they believe differently than us. It doesnt matter, said Meagan Montez, 36. Im heartbroken for them. You dont want people to live in fear, she said of the local Muslim congregation. Im also heartbroken for the people who think this is the way to handle things. They are apparently afraid of the Islamic community here, who are outstanding citizens, she added. jmaccormack@express-news.net This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate AUSTIN Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick basked in cheers from school choice advocates at the Texas Capitol on a bright day last week, giving the crowd what it wanted in ways that highlighted their sharply differing styles. Abbott painted the issue in broad strokes as a matter of civil rights. He didnt delve into the details of broadening school choice, instead pointing out that Patrick and others are working on legislation that hell sign if it reaches his desk. Patrick unhesitatingly spelled out the specifics of what hes pushing: allowing people to take their tax dollars to go to a school of their choice and citing the mechanisms by which that could be accomplished. He also brought the battle to House Speaker Joe Straus, R-San Antonio, who wasnt at the rally and whose chamber in the past has turned aside the idea of using public dollars to support private school tuition. The House rankled Patrick by not voting on a Senate-passed school choice bill in the past legislative session in 2015. I say, give us a vote up or down on school choice in this 85th legislative session, Patrick said, raising his voice with tear-down-this-wall enthusiasm. Abbott will be in the spotlight again Tuesday, when his State of the State address to the Legislature will give him the opportunity to declare what matters most and signal that he means business in his second legislative session as governor. Many expect Abbott to prioritize familiar issues including school choice; a push for a convention of states to rein in the federal government through constitutional changes; a fix for the troubled system of protecting abused and neglected children; and his drive against so-called sanctuary cities, including his desire for a bill allowing the removal of local officials. If Abbott chooses, it will be a chance for him to alter the perception that the balance of power between the two top spots has shifted since the departure of Texas longest-serving governor, Rick Perry. Before Perry, the conventional wisdom was that the lieutenant governor was the Capitols most powerful figure, a statewide officeholder who presided over the Senate and controlled the destiny of legislation there. Perry changed that balance, using the force of his swaggering personality, long legislative experience, powerful connections and unhesitating use of the limited powers of his office to assert dominance over the prone-to-negotiate lieutenant governor with whom he served, David Dewhurst. With the ascension of Abbott and Patrick, the optics have changed. Abbotts background as a judge and attorney general gives him a more cautious approach. He is eager to weigh the implications of each topic, picking issues to highlight after strategic consideration and taking bold positions on a handful. The governor has been noncommittal on a proposal championed by Patrick that would restrict the restrooms that transgender people can use in government buildings and schools. Passage of such a bill would be fraught with economic risk, with Straus among those voicing concerns that it would dampen business and drive away events such as the NCAA Final Four scheduled next year in San Antonio. Patricks push for the bathroom bill is emblematic of his charge-ahead style. He has made no secret of his desire to drive the legislative agenda with a detailed list of priorities. He has fully used his offices power and worked to expand it by presiding over a rule change that further eroded the power of Senate Democrats in the GOP-majority Legislature. Use of veto pen Those on the legislative battle lines, however, point out that Abbotts lower-key style doesnt mean he can be taken lightly. The veto pen is no less powerful in his hands, and Abbott has illustrated that in a way that is significant while presenting a contrast to Perry. Perry, after his first legislative session, in 2001, vetoed a record 79 bills in a single day, bringing his rookie total to 82 in a spree dubbed the Fathers Day Massacre. Abbott, by contrast, stretched his authority to veto money from the state budget in a way that drew opposition but was ultimately validated by the attorney generals office. Lawmakers starting-point budgets this year are drafted in a way that make it easier for him to veto spending, said budget expert Eva DeLuna Castro of the Center for Public Policy Priorities. The Texas budget has always been a legislative process, she said. This is a big change. Sen. Juan Hinojosa, a McAllen Democrat who is vice chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, called Abbott more of a force to be reckoned with than Gov. Perry. He said Abbotts office communicates well with lawmakers about changes he wants in legislation Hes got a different style, a different personality, but do not underestimate his authority or power in his approach to governing, Hinojosa said The budget is the key function of government. ... And he has quietly moved to assert dominance over the state budget. Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, said Abbott is readily available to talk about legislation although she hadnt spoken to him as of early last week about the proposed Texas Privacy Act affecting bathrooms, of which she is the author. He likes to let the legislative process move along until there is time for the governor to enter into the picture. I remember last session, I kept saying, Governor, we really need you to weigh in on this process. And he would smile at me and say, In due time, said Kolkhorst, adding that governors get more involved as the session nears its end. Protecting his right flank But Rep. Lyle Larson, R-San Antonio, said Abbott has not demonstrated the strength in leadership that I think a lot of us were expecting. I think hes been concerned about his right flank. There has been speculation that Patrick could challenge Abbott in the Republican primary, although Patrick has repeatedly denied it and endorsed Abbott for re-election ahead of the session. Perry, by contrast, took a position and then regardless of the political consequences, he went after it, right or wrong, said Larson, who sometimes skirmished with Perry. Larson also said Perry had the back of lawmakers who supported his initiatives. He has said Abbott didnt help some GOP lawmakers who asked for his aid in their primaries after their support for his prekindergarten initiative sparked tea party opposition. Hopefully, in his second session, hell be protective of the people that are pushing his initiatives in both the House and the Senate, Larson said. If Abbott again seeks help passing initiatives and he doesnt give those assurances, Larson said, Im not certain how many people are just going to turn their backs and walk away. Rep. Dennis Bonnen, an Angleton Republican who is a top member of Straus team, praised Abbott, saying he is doing an exceptional job of setting the agenda on the issues that are a priority to him, and allowing the legislative bodies to have the room to set their own agenda as they desire. Governors are there to set a direction, Bonnen said. They arent there to dictate all legislative matters. It can backfire on them if they do so. Sen. Jose Menendez, D-San Antonio, said hes looking for the leaders to put the states interests first, noting that Texas has a long and storied history of big characters in public office The lieutenant governor, the governor and the speaker, and the rest of us, we all represent all Texans regardless of what primary politics they choose to participate in, Menendez said, expressing hope that Abbott in his State of the State speech will focus on continued investment in children, including child protective services and an expansion of prekindergarten Longtime lobbyist and consultant Bill Miller said each top official plays from a distinct strength. Patrick is bold and has the Senate behind him; Straus is a strong leader with a very collegial style; and Abbott is content to weigh in on his terms: You can be as bold and quick as you want. And Ill evaluate it on my clock, Miller said. Miller predicted that Abbotts speech will be a little more important than normal. I think the governor will make some declarations and some calls to action that will show some real boldness. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Crowds swarmed the steps of San Fernando Cathedral and downtowns Main Plaza on Sunday, as more than 300 people attended a student-sponsored rally to protest President Donald Trumps executive order and actions that ban immigrants from Muslim countries from entering the U.S. They encircled people who spoke out about the presidents actions and several other issues including Muslim rights, Black Lives Matter and the proposed wall along the Texas-Mexico border. As they raised signs and cheered, a priest from the cathedral walked through the crowd and told them they were welcome to come inside and pray as chants of defiance echoed across the plaza. What do we do, a speaker shouted. The crowd yelled in response: Stand up and fight back! Move San Antonio Executive Director H. Drew Calloway said the rally was a response to concerns that students at local college campuses had voiced the past week about being anxious over four years of a Trump administration. Calloway said the group put out a post Saturday night on a Facebook page titled San Antonio Students Speak Out: A Rally for Our Friends. However, Calloway said they needed to mobilize quickly and thought, How can we tell them they are powerful and were here to stand with them? This is what came out of it. Student leader Rebecca Conejo from the University of Texas at San Antonio told the crowd that America is a nation born from resistance and they have an obligation to protect and fight for their families and friends. When I see a man tell the Muslim world our golden doors are shut, I see hate and I see fear and Ive had enough, said Conejo, 21. Ive had enough of people telling us our voices dont matter. May Mzayek held a sign that read, In Syria I couldnt protest anything, as a proud Syrian-American I am protesting against discrimination. She said she was protesting not just for herself, but also on behalf of her parents and the sister she accompanied to America 16 years ago. Im very proud to represent them, Mzayek said. It means everything to me. Mzayek, 26, became a U.S. citizen in August 2015. Mark Barrera, 64, learned about the protest Sunday morning from his daughter. He attended because he was upset with family and friends who back Trump. Im very disappointed with friends and family who gave tacit support, he said. Tacit support is consent. Many refugees who have resettled in San Antonio live in District 8, represented by Councilman Ron Nirenberg. He said America is a country of immigrants and called the recent executive order a mistake. It is wrong to arbitrarily exclude people who have already been approved to travel to this country and, in some instances, have lived here legally for years, he said. We are a better country than that, and, as Americans all across the country are showing, we wont stand for bigotry or discrimination. After an announcement from organizers about an earlier protest at San Antonio International Airport, some headed there, where small groups met Saturday night and Sunday morning. Saturday night, the 10 residents felt it was their obligation to show the refugees a warm welcome and show of support as they arrived. A San Antonio police officer told the group of women and children that they didnt have a permit to protest and faced getting arrested if they didnt leave. Say it loud, say it clear, refugees are welcome here, was among the rhyming slogans chanted by the group that had grown to 27 after the rally at the airport. Tonya Hope, public relations manager, said the airport is sensitive to those desiring to express their opinions as long as they adhere to the citys ordinance regarding protests and/or demonstrations. The policy for permit requests is two days prior to the event, Hope said. We respect the publics right to have demonstrations and have this process to allow for those events. All demonstrations must remain peaceful and not disrupt the safety of passengers and guests. Amy Kastely, a lawyer and professor of law at St. Marys University, said the way the ordinance is written and being enforced could be unconstitutional, adding that people have a right to protest within a reasonable distance of the customs area, where refugees are being detained. They have to provide some space thats close enough to be visible to the international area, and they havent done anything like that, Kastely said. vtdavis@express-news.net cquinn@express-news.net San Antonio is not a sanctuary city, not by official policy of City Council or Bexar County Commissioners Court. Local law enforcement agencies cooperate with immigration authorities, especially with regard to violent criminals. But they dont instruct or require officers to ask people to show me your papers. That egregious law-enforcement tool, infamously championed by an Arizona law known as SB 1070, triggered civil rights litigation and a Supreme Court ruling that eventually pulled most of its teeth. Yet the confluence of chaos that is the Trump White House and the steady steam of anti-immigrant executive orders coming out of it plans to threaten federal funding to cities if police dont bend enough, dont become more demonstrably restrictive. Not only are more deportations in the balance, but so are family separations and racial profiling cases; and cities that would be no safer for all the effort. Trumps orders are worrying U.S. mayors, including our own, spurring a review of what could be at stake. A city summary shows San Antonio expects to receive $153 million in federal and state grants in fiscal year 2017, most of it for health services. The sum includes 608 grant funded positions in health, aviation, transportation, education and law enforcement programs. The city receives $1.8 million from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security; $919,654 from the Department of Justice; and $1.1 million from the Office of the Governors Criminal Justice Division. Thirteen of the 21 granting agencies are federal. If the White House decides to punish cities that may not be self-declared-sanctuary cities but behave in sanctuary-like ways, people and programs could be hurt. The Texas Republican-led statehouse has fallen in line with Trump in Senate Bill 4, similar to Arizonas show me your papers law. San Antonio Police Chief William McManus opposes it, and chiefs across the country have assailed similar measures. At a forum last week at the University of Texas at San Antonio, state Rep. Diego Bernal called the flurry of posturing, policies and legislative proposals in Austin and Washington what they really are distractions. Theyre busy work, dangerous busy work, that feed xenophobes and keep Washington and Austin from working on real problems with real solutions that improve lives. Think affordable healthcare, affordable health insurance and affordable housing. Think fairer wages, especially for the least among us, and better schools, lower college tuition, cleaner air and water. Think laws that encourage, not discourage, voter participation and turnout. The list is endless. Requiring officers to ask immigration questions doesnt rate as a solution to a problem. Neither is building a border wall, which may be the biggest distraction of all, while costing untold billions. Oh, and it wont work. How much San Antonio will stand up to bullies will remain to be seen. But Trump and the Texas statehouse wont change how San Antonio practices compassion. While its nowhere near being post-racial as one speaker put it at the forum last week, making him particularly unaware of life in San Antonio many champion compassion. Faith communities, nonprofit agencies, charitable groups, social justice activists and many governmental officials will continue that work. A few years ago, the peaceCENTER spearheaded a project to recognize San Antonio as a world-class compassionate city, one in which all its sectors recognize the importance and value of compassion in the life of a city and by doing so create an ethos of compassion and a safety net for its most vulnerable citizens. That movement includes DreamWeek, Dignity San Antonio, the Catholic Worker House, Dialogue Institute and the local chapter of the Council of American Islamic Relations. Theyll continue to practice compassion, as will the vast majority of houses of worship and nonprofit agencies that provide meals, teach people to read or help the elderly. At their core, theyre ministries of compassion. Many more will continue to follow the sacred texts that teach us to welcome the stranger, not ask him for his papers. The old parish of Mission Concepcion is a good example of living compassion. It has adopted a Syrian refugee family that just arrived to San Antonio. In the next year, it will assist it with rent, food and adjusting to life. The parish just wrapped up a year of adopting a family from the Congo. The experience taught them to count their own blessings, especially when members of that family said its first year here was the most peaceful theyve ever experienced. SB4 and the tone set by Trumps executive orders wont create safer neighborhoods or help police departments do better jobs. Theyre more likely to wreak havoc on peace, on compassion and on justice. Lets not go that route. eayala@express-news.net Twitter: @ElaineAyala AUSTIN A Republican governor trying to oust a locally elected Democrat has a familiar ring to it, but this time it's not Rick Perry being accused of pressuring a district attorney to resign after a messy drunken driving incident. It's Greg Abbott proclaiming that he'll remove a sheriff if she doesnt toe the line on immigration, apparently through a proposal he hopes will be written into law as part of a crackdown on so-called sanctuary cities. Since GOP leaders in Texas have made a crusade of pushing back against what they consider federal overreach, some consider it unseemly for them to reach down and try to oust someone put in place by local voters. But Abbott appears no more worried about that than Perry was before him. After Travis County Sheriff Sally Hernandez said she only would honor federal immigration detainers asking her to hold suspects if they were booked for certain serious crimes, Abbott called it outrageous. She really is trying to create a sanctuary city here in the state of Texas, Abbott said on Fox & Friends. Abbott said he not only would cut off grants funneled through his office to any sanctuary city a term that is fluidly defined but that he is working on laws to impose penalties and remove from office any office holder who promotes sanctuary cities. If Hernandez doesnt change her tune in response to the funding cutoff, he said, We will remove her from office. Hernandez said shes following all state and federal laws, upholding constitutional due-process rights and helping keep her community safer by ensuring people can report crimes without fear of deportation. I respect the job of our state leaders, but I will not allow fear and misinformation to be my guiding principles as a leader sworn to protect this community, she said. The voters, who elected state leaders and me, expect and deserve a collaborative effort to come up with solutions to this very complex issue. Besides Hernandez, Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez has tangled with Abbott over the issue of immigration detainers. The position of the Sheriffs Association of Texas is that immigration detainers should be honored. Though Abbotts latest battle, like Perrys before him, centers on Democratically inclined Travis County, there are differences. Perry was indicted after he vetoed state funding for the public integrity unit that was overseen by Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg. Perry said she had lost the publics confidence after a messy drunken-driving incident, but she refused to step down. The abuse-of-power case against Perry ultimately was dismissed. Abbott, a former attorney general and judge, is more prudently going the lets-write-a-law route to target officials who dont comply with immigration detainers, calling it a matter of safety and security. But there already are ways to remove locally elected officials, either at the ballot box or if there is misconduct, by a court proceeding. In a system in which the populace elects government officials, the proper method of removal is through the electoral process, and not by allowing one elected official to substitute his or her judgment for that of the voters who elected another official, said Professor Geary Reamey of St. Mary's University School of Law. Reamey pointed out that those responsible for enforcing laws use discretion in a variety of ways, and no one would suggest that they should be removed for failing to issue a citation to every speeder, or even for deciding to recommend a lower level punishment for a criminal defendant than could be imposed under law. Impeachment, he said, has never been intended to be vehicle for a continuing plebiscite on the popularity of elected officials or their actions. Abbotts action also comes after a federal court in Illinois last year found that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainers go beyond the governments ability to arrest someone without a warrant. Reamey said no official could be required by law to detain someone upon a mere request from a federal immigration agency if there is not probable cause or at least reasonable suspicion to believe the detainee has committed a crime. Detaining a person on a mere hold request, he said, could subject officers and the agency to civil and criminal liability for violating the U.S. Constitution. pfikac@express-news.net Twitter: @pfikac WASHINGTON As candidates two years ago, the Republican governors of Kentucky and Arkansas swore they would do away with "Obamacare" if elected. But a funny thing happened between the campaign trail and the governor's mansion: Reality set in. After promising to uproot Kentucky's Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act, Republican Gov. Matt Bevin simply renamed his Democratic predecessor's health care plan for low-income adults and proposed changes designed to help people find jobs and get off the rolls. In Arkansas, Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson changed the name of the Medicaid expansion program and proposed adding small premiums for people with incomes above the federal poverty line, $11,880 for an individual. As Congress prepares to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, 14 other states with GOP governors that opted to expand Medicaid under the law may face the same reality Bevin and Hutchinson did: Taking health insurance away from hundreds of thousands of people is a complicated and risky proposition. Medicaid spending for all states was about $532 billion in 2015, with about 63 percent funded by the federal government and the rest by states. In expanding Medicaid under the ACA, Republicans in expansion states chose economics over politics, even though it meant cooperating with a law that nearly all conservatives abhor. That calculus won't change with the transition in Washington, according to Matt Salo, who heads the National Association of Medicaid Directors. "Not only do you have to consider the ramifications of denying health coverage to hundreds of thousands of constituents, but you have to face down insurance companies, hospitals and other titans of the health care industry, for whom this means disrupted business models and reduced revenue streams," Salo said. Whatever their political affiliation, people will blame the incumbent governor if they or a loved one loses health care coverage, said Stephen Voss, a political scientist at the University of Kentucky. People will die and word will get out. "It's a failure of the political process that people don't always make the connections between broad-brush political rhetoric and their own welfare," Voss said. "Republicans wanted to send a signal that they're resisting Obamacare. But they didn't want negative stories to start rolling in about what happened to people who lost their health coverage." Preserve and add In upcoming legislative sessions, many GOP-dominated states are likely to preserve expansion while adding so-called personal responsibility policies that have been proposed in Kentucky and adopted in Arkansas and five other states. Those policies include monthly premiums, copays and work requirements for low-income beneficiaries. Critics say such steps could erode enrollment. But Bevin and Hutchinson insist that if people are able to leave the Medicaid rolls because they become healthier and their incomes rise, everyone wins. "Instead of Medicaid as the be-all and end-all for who knows how long, it's a transition to something better," said Doug Hogan, a spokesman for Kentucky's health and family services agency. Republicans in Congress want to replace many of the interconnected provisions of the federal health care law, including the so-called individual mandate requiring everyone to sign up for health coverage and the subsidized insurance marketplace where nearly 13 million people with incomes too high to qualify for Medicaid purchased coverage last year. But for states, repeal of the Medicaid expansion provisions would have the biggest effect on state budgets and the health and welfare of their residents, according to Jesse Cross-Call, a policy analyst with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal research group that collects and analyzes state health care data. President Donald Trump's pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, Georgia Rep. Tom Price, has proposed an Affordable Care Act replacement that would do away with the Medicaid expansion. House Speaker Paul Ryan and other Republicans in Congress support dispersing federal Medicaid money through "block grants" to the states. Trump's own health care reform agenda includes converting Medicaid to a block grant. Under a block grant, each state would get a fixed amount of money and would have broad discretion over how to spend it, instead of receiving a stream of federal dollars based on the actual costs of its health care program. Entitlement end Medicaid would cease to be an entitlement, in which everyone who qualifies is guaranteed coverage. Instead, the federal government and states could cap spending and restrict coverage, regardless of whether more people fell into qualifying income brackets during a recession, for example. The Trump administration hasn't revealed any details, but "it's pretty clear that the outcome will involve some degree of cuts in federal money to the states, particularly if a block grant is adopted," said Len Nichols, who heads the Center for Health Policy Research and Ethics at George Mason University and was a health care adviser to President Bill Clinton. "That's where you're going to have the pushback from governors over the math." In all, Medicaid covers about 73 million people. As a national average, the low-income health plan represents more than a quarter of state budgets. Under the 2010 ACA, which took effect in 2014, states can expand their low-income health plans to adults with incomes up to 138 percent of the federal poverty line ($16,394 for an individual), using primarily federal money. From 2014 through 2016, the federal government paid all of the costs to cover newly eligible adults in the states that accepted the option. Starting this year, the federal share dips to 95 percent of the roughly $53 billion annual price tag for the states that have expanded, and if the provision is left unchanged, the federal share would decline to 94 percent in 2018, 93 percent in 2019 and 90 percent in 2020 and beyond. Enrollment update So far, more than 11 million adults have enrolled in expanded Medicaid programs in the 31 states and the District of Columbia where the option was adopted. Of those, 4.5 million live in states with Republican governors. No new states are expected to sign up for Medicaid expansion this year _ at least not until the administration announces its replacement plan. North Carolina's newly elected Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper earlier this month asked the federal government to approve his Medicaid expansion plan in the waning days of the Obama administration. But the state's Republican-led Legislature secured a federal court order barring the administration from considering his request. Congress and the Trump administration could repeal major portions of the Affordable Care Act, but keep the Medicaid expansion provisions. In that case, the new administration could give states broader leeway to shape their expansion programs than the Obama administration has, said Robin Rudowitz, associate director with the Kaiser Family Foundation, which tracks Medicaid policy. "On certain issues, the Obama administration drew a line in the sand," Rudowitz said. For example, it opposed state requests to limit enrollment to adults at or below the federal poverty level. Under the Obama administration, Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Montana and New Hampshire received federal approval to expand their low-income health care programs for adults under different rules than traditional Medicaid. Arkansas, with its so-called private option, was the first state to receive federal approval for an alternative expansion plan in 2013. Instead of enrolling newly eligible adults in its traditional Medicaid plan, which serves primarily children, pregnant women and the elderly and disabled, the plan for low-income adults substituted private insurance for traditional Medicaid. A bipartisan collaboration between former Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe and the state's Republican-dominated Legislature, the plan has managed to come in under budgeted costs while covering far more people than originally projected, said Amy Webb, a spokeswoman for the state's human services agency. After it was approved, Iowa and New Hampshire proposed similar plans. Hutchinson proposed further modifications to the plan last year and dubbed it Arkansas Works. As of this month, it now includes small premiums for people with incomes above the federal poverty level and a requirement that those who work must accept employer-sponsored insurance, with Medicaid paying the employee portion of the bill. If the Medicaid expansion remains intact, Kentucky could be the first state to get approval for an alternative plan under the Trump administration. With enough latitude, even holdouts such as Florida, Texas and Virginia might be persuaded to accept federal money to cover low-income adults. A long time ago, San Antonio teens knew of a place far away known as the Death Loop. For many of us growing up in neighborhoods inside Loop 410 back in the early 80s, Loop 1604 was far, far away. And, for adventurous teens with drivers licenses, a car, enough cash to fill up the gas tank, a box filled with Rush, Ronnie James Dio or Van Halen cassettes or Duran Duran, Pet Shop Boys and The Cure and a desire to go to the Exxon at the end of the world, it made for good cruising. There, driving along the dark reaches of the urban area surrounded by sleeping construction equipment and livestock, teens could drive with the windows down and the volume way up, talking about what we did that day and about high school and what we were going to do once we left the confines of 1604 to make our mark in the world. Eventually, we grew up. Some of us moved to megacities with bedroom communities that felt bigger than San Antonio; others went to college towns with scenic views and green spaces a half-hour away from the nearest strip mall. We went away to bigger places and brought back bigger ideas. Our friends came to visit our unique city and decided to stay. Some of us stayed and found that we didnt have to leave home to visit a theme park or shop high-end retail. As job opportunities grew, so did the city, and soon, we were the weekend destination for South Texas. A lot of those guests came back and stayed. And so, even though it never left, the loop grew. It got wider. It got bigger, with better lights. As the construction equipment increased and the livestock decreased, it went from being Way Out in The Sticks to The Quickest Way Home. It became a safer thoroughfare and lost that distant, deathly mystique. And it got so crowded, especially along the chunk between Bandera Road and I-35, that it lost its end-of-the-world appeal. Nobodys called it the Death Loop in years. Last week, San Antonio Express-News Staff Writer Bruce Selcraig reported that the Metropolitan Planning Organization recommends the busiest part of Loop 1604 be turned into a toll road, but changes wouldnt come around for about a decade. And the estimated price for a one-way cruise? Four bucks and change. Back in the 80s, that could buy you a couple of Puffin Billys Rail Rider Specials. But were not back in the 80s. San Antonio has grown, especially in the North Central corridor along U.S. 281 where it meets the now-mighty Loop 1604. In the past few years, shiny new ramps have taken us soaring past stoplights at the junction. Things are faster, smoother, nicer. Thing is, were not done growing. San Antonio will continue to grow, and if youve been stuck on that entrance ramp just beyond the Legacy Shopping Center, you might think that it cant get any worse. Be assured that it can and, if nothing is done, it will. Tolls hurt. Paying to get from point A to point B hurts everybody, and it especially hurts minimum-wage workers who will have to factor an extra transportation expense into already tight budgets. But as much as San Antonians complain about growth-area gridlock, the area just keeps growing. You cant turn back the clock, and you cant stop the growth. mariaanglin@yahoo.com MOUNT HOPE, Ohio Most farmers have a mental image of what the perfect pasture should look like, but very few pastures, in reality, are anywhere close to perfect. So said Jim Gerrish, a grazing expert who spoke to farmers Jan. 26-27, during the North Central Ohio Grazing Conference For Dairy, held at the Mt. Hope Event Center. Gerrish, who works as an independent grazing consultant, has studied pastures across the U.S. and overseas. He spent two decades in forage research and outreach at the University of Missouri. But he estimates only 5 percent of the pastures hes seen are truly excellent. Dense growth One of the biggest indicators of a good pasture, he said, is the density of growth. The grass should be so thick that you can feel it dragging at your feet as you walk, he said. In an excellent pasture, we expect to see 90 percent of the soil covered by green, growing, living plants, he said. Good pastures should also be high in energy, adequate in protein and mineral rich. He said the biggest problem with pasture management is usually grazing the grass too short, which hurts its chance at recovery, and the overall yield. When pastures are over-grazed, every bite becomes smaller and smaller, and as the bite becomes smaller, that means less and less energy going into the animal, he said. Gerrish said farmers also need to have good biodiversity in their pastures, keeping in mind that diversity above ground leads to greater diversity below ground. All of these things lead to greater soil health, which leads to better use of photosynthesis and energy production. Pattern of life He also reminded farmers that they need to be patient, explaining that the first role of grass is to feed itself. First, grass feeds the grass, then grass feeds the soil, and after that, grass can feed the livestock, he said. About 950 people attended the opening day of this years conference, a new record. Leon Hershberger, a farmer and grazing supplier from western Michigan, said graziers need to be doing soil samples, and paying closer attention to the trace minerals. He said pre-manufactured fertilizers may be ideal for maintenance, but if a particular nutrient needs built up more than the others, the soil will likely need a more specialized fertilizer. An excellent pasture is defined by many things. Here are a few of the characteristics you should try to promote. Pasture density. Your pasture should be covered in growth, with very little bare ground. In an excellent pasture, at least 90 percent of the ground should be covered in growth. Pasture biodiversity. You should focus on a diverse mix of growth, and which adds diversity above and below ground. Excellent pastures should be high in energy, adequate in protein and rich in minerals. Conduct soil and forage tests to determine your levels. Allow plenty of time for your pasture to recover, and avoid the temptation to graze too short. Short growth results in less growth, and less feed for your cattle. Understand and respect the growth cycle. The pasture needs moisture and light to grow, and it needs time. The grass has to feed itself first, then the soil, and then it can feed your livestock. To learn more about the dairy grazing conference visit https://smallfarminstitute.com. Hershberger said farmers also need to plan their pastures in a way that has the animals out in the pasture as much as possible, versus congregating at the barn, or barnyard. The more they can drop their nutrients onto the pasture, the more efficient and better for the soil, he said. Market shift He said he sees a bright future for organic products and pasture-raised products. Big food companies are losing market share, because they have relied on packaged and processed foods. The trend, according to Hershberger, and Fortune Magazine, is more shoppers shopping along the perimeter of stores where they can find fresh, whole foods. This trend cost big food companies $4 billion in 2014, the magazine reported. Big companies are losing market share and they are scrambling to try to keep it, Hershberger said. He said people are not eating any less, but their preference for whole foods is causing companies to search for ways to adapt out of necessity. Next generation In a talk about farmland succession, Sugarcreek-area farmer and accountant Emery Miller said todays land market brings a lot of opportunity and challenge. On the one hand, farmers are retiring every day, and according to the National Young Farmers Coalition, about 573 million acres of farmland will need a new farmer over the next 25 years. Miller said that breaks down to about 22.9 million acres changing hands each year, or more than 152,000 farms of 150 acres. He encouraged farmers to seize the opportunity, but reminded them to be fiscally responsible. Hope springs eternal, but hope will not pay your bills, he said. So weve got to take a realistic look at this. There are many ways farmers can save when transferring their farms, such as setting it up through a trust or limited liability corporation, and keeping good records, so they can save as much on taxes as possible. Land prices Miller said the financial aspect is a big part of buying a farm today, but he said there are religious and moral reasons for keeping a farm going, as well. He said it concerns him the way Amish have drifted away from farming, and into industry and business. He said the change has also caused a shift in values, and hes concerned of what will happen if the Amish become too far removed from the land. We have become an industrialized people with a minority of us trying to maintain an agrarian mindset, he said. But with good planning and record keeping, Miller said farmers can still buy at todays prices and make a go of it. We can still do it, because people are doing it and theyre having fun doing it, he said. "It's a very specific way of coating the seed. It's got a big drum on it and the seed spins with centripetal force one way while another part spins the other way which creates an atomising effect, so what it does is coat every seed individually as it's going," he said. "Yes, the sprinkler does get blocked occasionally, we've also had to replace the packing (at the base of the pivot tower where the pipe enters) annually and every five to six months get into the (bigger) pit with the tractor and bucket to clean it out. "This past year was very cold and the crops were affected not only by frost but many low minimum temperatures around 2 or 3C during the flowering time - that seemed to be what was affecting the yield in both of those trials," he said. Oct. 16, 1924 Jan. 25, 2017 Marvin LaVerne Rowley was born Oct. 16, 1924 in Portland; he died Jan. 25, 2017 at the age of 92. His parents, Jesse and Agnes Rowley, moved their family to Tualatin in 1928. Marvin attended Tualatin Grade School and Sherwood High School, graduating in 1942. He entered the Army on Feb. 22, 1943 and served in the Cavalry and the 41st Infantry in the Philippines in World War II. Sgt. Rowley was discharged in March 1946. Marvin married Marian Parker in Portland on Jan. 20, 1946. They moved to Corvallis in July 1946 where he attended Oregon State College in the School of Forestry. While attending college he built his house, and added two daughters to the family. As a senior he was awarded the Kelly Axe award as the senior who contributed the most to the school. He graduated with a bachelors of science degree in Forest Engineering in June 1950. He then worked for Umpqua Plywood Corporation in Myrtle Creek, where his son was born. In 1954, Marvin moved his family to Philomath where he and his brother-in-law started a logging company, Rowley and Parker Tree Farm Service. The company did contract logging in the Northwest, mostly for Oregon State University. In 1956, he purchased a 100-acre tree farm southwest of Philomath, where he grew Christmas trees, actively logged (until 2013!), and experimented with various crops over the years. A foster daughter joined the family for five years, and another daughter was born. In 1958, he received his Oregon Professional Forest Engineering and Professional Land Surveyors licenses. In 1973, he sold his interest in the logging company and accepted the position of Manager of the OSU McDonald Forest. This position included the opportunity to visit other forest operations in the United States, Europe, and South America. He retired on Dec. 3, 1986. In 1955, Marvin committed his life to the Lord and served in many capacities in his church, Philomath First United Brethren, even preaching when needed. He was involved in Corvallis Christian Business Men, Child Evangelism, and went on many mission trips. He served on the Philomath City Park Board, City Water Commission, and during the 1960s on the Philomath School Board. For many years he taught at Outdoor School for Philomath School District, and assisted with PHS Forestry classes and competitions. He was a member of the Corvallis Chamber of Commerce Natural Resource Committee for over 20 years. Marvin became a widower in May 2006. Then on Nov. 24, 2007 he married a long-time family friend, June Pitts. The combined families blended well with having known each other since 1950. Marvin was a member of the Society of American Foresters since 1950, and was elected a Fellow in 2009. He was a charter member of the Benton County Small Woodlands Association, and served as the Lincoln, Benton, and Linn county representative of the American Tree Farm Certification Committee. Marvin received the Tree Farmer of the Year a few times, and he spent many hours judging other tree farms for that award until his health declined about a year ago. In 2015, he was honored by the OSU Forestry Department with having a McDonald Forest road named for him the road to McCulloch Peak. Among his personal accomplishments were teaching, guiding, encouraging, and loving his 4 children and their families; inviting many to live with the family over the years relatives, a foster daughter, a missionary's teenager, and hosting many missionary guests and exchange students; and hosting meals for his OSU Forestry students and continuing involvement in their lives. Marvin is survived by his wife June Rowley of Albany; daughter Linda (Ralph) Conner of Philomath; daughter Joan Richter of Yelm, Washington; son Allen (Cora) Rowley of Corvallis; daughter Ronda (Mark) Reid of Mt. Lake Terrace, Washington; brother Dean (Ann) Rowley of Beaverton; sister Roberta Carson of Sutherlin; nine grandchildren; and 22 great-grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his wife Marian, two brothers, two sisters, and one granddaughter. A celebration of life will be held at 1 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 4, at the OSU Forestry Club Cabin at Peavy Arboretum on McDonald Forest in Corvallis. Donations can be made in his honor to Philomath Community Church for the Mission Fund or the Building Fund, P.O. Box 1567, Philomath, OR 97370. Please leave your memories and condolences for the family at www.mchenryfuneralhome.com. UPDATED: As of about 10 p.m. Monday, Dominion Energy had restored power to about 3,000 homes and businesses that lost electricity at about 8 p.m. due to an equipment issue, according to the Do Pitts: Before voting, take a look at your sample ballot in Cumberland County and NC The Red Cross is warning of a humanitarian crisis in British NHS hospitals following the death of an elderly woman who spent 35 hours on a trolley in A&E. The woman, who has not been identified, was rushed to Worcestershire Royal Hospital this week, but she could not be taken onto a ward because there were no beds. Her condition deteriorated and she had a heart attack, dying in a hospital cubicle. Meanwhile, a second patient, who had to stay in the waiting room at the same hospital, died when he suffered an aneurysm. There are now claims that the hospital is in meltdown. Nurses are understood to have been in tears becaue they feel so helpless about the situation, and patients are believed to have been on trolleys three deep in hospital corridors because of a severe lack of beds. Crisis Medics say the dire situation at Worcestershire is the same as that being faced at casualty units across Britain. The Red Cross has revealed that it has been called upon to give help to hospitals and paramedics, saying that the picture was so bad it was a humanitarian crisis. Startling data show the extent of the problems facing the NHS in the week leading up to January 1. During that week, casualty units were so full they had to close their doors to ambulances 42 times. Meanwhile, nearly a quarter of patients waited at least four hours to be seen, when that is meant to be the maximum waiting time in A&E. The statistics also show that 1,000 beds were closed every day in a bid to prevent the spread of norovirus. Ministers are now set to hold emergency talks with MPs and health chiefs in Worcestershire. However, this winters crisis is being blamed on pressures on social care funding, meaning that elderly patients are remaining in hospital longer rather than being released to be cared for in the community. This so-called bed blocking then results in there being no space for new patients. In the prior post, we talked about reasonable goal setting that can turn into perverse incentives, leading to compliance and reputational disasters like Wells Fargo. In this post, we look at whether companies can contain the excesses of their incentive programs with controls. Controls that work well always come at a cost. A robust compliance and control environment might mean that a business unit gets poorer results now, in exchange for longer-term gains. The conflict between short-term results and long-term goals can pit management against compliance personnel in a struggle for whose voice is the loudest. That tension doesnt go away. We have seen a number of cases of corporate misconduct where controls were ignored or overridden, which can be more dangerous than no controls at all. Thats compliance without consequences. Controls that arent taken seriously or are distorted to fit short-term business objectives can lead to channel stuffing, holding back orders, or not writing down bad debt or a depreciated asset. Supervisors (who also depend on incentive plans) are sometimes aware of the practices but dont stop them. Its not surprising, then, to see middle management playing the odds of not getting caught or thinking that a managerial wink and nod should be OK because its so common. But when controls are ignored to achieve a temporary improvement of financial results, it erodes the ethical tone inside the organization and compliance is discarded. Further, any financial benefit to the company is short-lived. Channel stuffing in one quarter merely robs from sales numbers in subsequent quarters. Another unintended consequence of a bad incentive system is the squeezing of margins. Channel stuffing, for example, can result in unnecessary warehouse fees (if the customer is not ready to take possession) and discounting to clear inventories. In short, disregarding controls leads to bad (and sometimes illegal) behavior, hiding behind good performance. Its a scenario that cant last long. As Warren Buffet once noted, Only when the tide goes out do you discover whos been swimming naked. In the next post, well look at how steep incentive plans produced some of the worst corporate scandals of the decade. And how companies can avoid those problems going forward. ____ Richard Bistrong is a contributing editor of the FCPA Blog and CEO of Front-Line Anti-Bribery LLC. In 2010 he pleaded guilty to a conspiracy to violate the FCPA and served fourteen-and-a-half months at a U.S. federal prison camp. He now consults, writes and speaks about compliance issues. In 2015 he was named one of Ethispheres 100 Most Influential in Business Ethics. He can be contacted by email here and on twitter @richardbistrong. Marc Hodak is Partner at Farient Advisors, an independent executive compensation and performance advisory firm. He has taught corporate governance as a professor at NYUs Stern School and as visiting lecturer at the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland. He can be contacted here. This post was adapted from an article that appeared in Compliance Week Is It Time For An Incentive Mine-Sweep? by the same authors. The ethics & compliance community already knows were going to hear lots of chatter in coming months about easing the burden of compliance with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Well probably see a new attitude at the Justice Department, shifting away from prosecuting organizations in favor of prosecuting individuals. We may see changes in the size of monetary penalties, or the use of deferred-prosecution agreements. All that is fine; it comes with the territory of new political leadership. But what should set compliance officers on fire is the inevitable new round of talk about how overseas bribery isnt a crime worth prosecuting at all. This is on my mind thanks to a recent column in the legal blog Above the Law, Is Trump the End of FCPA Enforcement? The author, a white-collar defense lawyer, speculated about the need for all this attention to corporate bribery and FCPA enforcement. The killer paragraph was this: If GE wants to bribe folks in Poland, why is that our problem and not Polands? Why should we care about corruption in Poland if Poland doesnt? Indeed, if a Polish company can bribe but an American country cant, doesnt that put us at an unfair disadvantage? At the very least, why should U.S. taxpayers fund cleaning up Polands government? In fairness to the author, I cant quite tell from his column whether he truly believes those words. But many other people now in political ascendancy in the Trump Administration do believe those words. They see overseas bribery as somebody elses problem, nothing that law enforcement or the corporate compliance community should bother with here. Thats the sort of sentiment that should make ethics & compliance officers blood boil. So lets take a deep breath and start dismantling these asinine ideas one at a time. First, try visiting Poland and asking the Polish people whether they dont care about corruption. I have asked that question, of people in India, China, Nepal, Bolivia, Tanzania, and other countries Ive visited that are impoverished by corruption. They never dont care about corruption. They struggle with it all the time, every day. People with the above attitude seem to believe that corrupt societies can collectively wave a magic wand, and suddenly start behaving properly. Thats not how the world works. Thats not how our country worked, which spent most of its history mired in poverty and political corruption. Some parts of our country still do. Escaping from poverty and corruption is long, painstaking, frustrating work, with setbacks all the time, over many years. I cant understand how some people fail to grasp that point. Anyone who has been poor knows it. They know that the tentacles of circumstance can pin you down over and over, in one way or another. Second, U.S. taxpayers arent cleaning up Polands government. They are cleaning up U.S. businesses, or overseas businesses that rely on our capital markets for liquidity and investment dollars. If corruption in Poland (or some other developing country) then starves for lack of illegal payments, that is a public good for everyone, regardless of where they live. Third, the idea that corruption in Poland is Polands problem where do people think that desperate and miserable people in impoverished countries will go? To the unemployment line or job retraining center? They will come to the West, legally or not. They will join extremist organizations that will offer them the false promise of a better life by hating someone else and blowing that person up. That other person will be us. Walls dont deter the desperate. Security lines dont deter the desperate. Extreme vetting doesnt deter the desperate. Prosperity deters the desperate. And if they cant achieve that on their own, there is no smarter investment than for people in prosperous nations to help them. Fourth, where should the disregard for corruption end? We could play out the above paragraph to its logical conclusion: If companies wants to murder business competitors in Poland, why is that our problem and not Polands? Thats not a facetious exercise. In Russia, for example, this is what corrupt organizations do. So why not allow U.S. companies to do the same? Whats the difference between one offense and another in the quest for profit? If its OK to win business illegally, why create a distinction about the type of crime involved? Nobody would say that murder in the name of profit is acceptable. Neither is bribery. But its an easier crime to commit, so it requires more discipline to prevent and police. And thats the naked logic, herecompliance with anti-bribery statutes is hard work, which we dont like to do, and the harm affects some distant, vague third party, so why cant we say its not worth the bother? This is the attitude that emerges when you conflate FCPA compliance, which is hard, with FCPA enforcement, which is good. Yes, the two are deeply interlaced. And compliance itself is a frustrating task more frustrating than it needs to be, for an abuse that often doesnt happen at your specific organization. So you end up reaching the conclusion that anti-corruption enforcement is a fools errand. It isnt. I often say that anyone who wants to complain about zealous anti-bribery laws should go live in an impoverished country for a year first. Then see whether you still dont care about the corrosive effect of corruption. If we want to believe that America is a city on a hill, and a beacon of solace for more desperate parts of the world, this is the price. This is what we have to do, to believe in that idea. We have to believe we should do better simply because we can do better, even if doing better is a pain in the ass. Lyndon Johnson once said, What convinces people is conviction. Believe the argument youre advancing. If you dont youre as good as dead. Johnson was right. Yes, compliance with the FCPA can be a challenging technical exercise. We should work to ease and improve the burden. But fundamentally, the FCPA is a good law that helps make this world better. I believe most ethics & compliance officers feel the same way. (If you dont, you should find a new line of work.) And anytime you hear someone else dismiss the menace of overseas bribery, feel free to print out this column and staple it to his forehead. He deserves it. ___ Matt Kelly is the founder of Radical Compliance, which provides consulting and commentary on corporate compliance, audit, governance, and risk management. He was the long time editor and publisher of Compliance Week until he stepped down at the end of 2015. He writes and speaks frequently on corporate compliance, audit, and governance, and now works with various private clients to understand the those fields and to develop go-to-market strategies or provide other assistance in reaching audiences of compliance professionals. He can be contacted here. A version of this post first appeared on the Radical Compliance blog and is published here with permission. On Friday, President Donald J. Trump issued an executive order regarding immigration and the banning of refugees into the United States. This order affects our international community here at Ferris State University and compromises the opportunities for study abroad, international travel, and the employment and enrollment of faculty, staff and students from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Our international students, faculty and staff are feeling a strong sense of uncertainty over their futures here and the lives they have built for themselves and their families. At Ferris State University, we fully welcome and embrace our international community. Our founders, Woodbridge and Helen Ferris, welcomed international students on our campus in the early 1900s. We will continue to be a university where we welcome and value global diversity. Provost Paul Blake will host a meeting this week in coordination with the Office of International Education and the Diversity and Inclusion Office to visit with international students, faculty and staff. Together we will address concerns and provide support as we continue to learn more about how this executive order will affect those working and studying here at Ferris State University. Our core values remain at the heart of this institution and its commitment to opportunity, diversity and equality for all. Together we will work through this period of uncertainty and provide the support and assistance our international students, faculty and staff need during this challenging time. ; David Eisler President, Ferris State University The Asia Apparel Expo is a professional sourcing marketplace for European companies to meet with apparel manufacturers and suppliers from eight Asian countries that will take place in Berlin from February 14-16. Over 300 companies from Hong Kong, China, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Taiwan and Vietnam are expected to exhibit at the show. The trade fair is organised by Hong Kong based Kenfair Exhibition Limited and managed by Comasia Limited. It is the largest tradeshow in Europe where clothing professionals can meet with Asian factories that offer production of apparel products for men, women and children as well as fabrics and textiles, and trimmings and accessories, and that are ready to meet European customers demands for finished garments, contract manufacturing and private label development. Asia is the worlds number one destination for apparel manufacturing and Asia Apparel Expo connects world-class Asian clothing manufacturers and fabric suppliers, providing low cost, high quality and stable product supply, to European brands, said the organiser in a press release. The Asia Apparel Expo is a professional sourcing marketplace for European companies to meet with apparel manufacturers and suppliers from eight Asian countries that will take place in Berlin from February 14-16. Over 300 companies from Hong Kong, China, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Taiwan and Vietnam are expected to exhibit at the show.# The sixth edition of the three-day expo is supported by Export Promotion Bureau of Bangladesh, China Council for the Promotional of International Trade (CCPIT) Shanghai Pudong Sub-Council, CCPIT Jiangsu, CCPIT Zhejiang and Bureau of Commerce of Qingdao of China, and The Indian Silk Export Promotion Council and Federation of Indian Export Organisations of India. Europe imports about half of the worlds total clothing production and Asia is the major apparel supplier, producing more than 32 per cent of the worlds clothing exports. China is the leading world producer and supplier of clothing and has thrived under a government policy geared towards developing a clothing and textiles industry open to the world. Asian countries have developed highly competent, competitive and skilled manufacturing bases with continuous improvements in quality, on-time delivery, customer service, ethical and environmentally-friendly employment practices and working conditions. Six Asian countries (China, Indonesia, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India) account for 80 per cent of Asias apparel exports to Europe, Americas and Japan. Asia Apparel Expo is open to sourcing professionals and brand manufacturers, trading companies, wholesalers, multiple retailers, chain stores, department stores, agents, designers, private label and buying offices. (KD) Fibre2Fashion News Desk India The Central Institute for Cotton Research (CICR) of the Indian government has received approval for three varieties of indigenous Bt seeds that are suitable for the northern states of the country. The institute will also seek approval for additional seeds meant for the southern and central states of India from Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR). CICR plans to make 11 Bt cotton seeds available by the next cotton sowing season, according to a leading daily. Farmers will not be required to buy cotton seeds as they can be derived from the crops, considering that all the seeds contain the resistant gene. The Bt cotton crops will also have a shorter duration and will be ready to harvest by November as they have a gestation period of 160 to 170 days. The Central Institute for Cotton Research (CICR) of the Indian government has received approval for three varieties of indigenous Bt seeds that are suitable for the northern states of the country. The institute will also seek approval for additional seeds meant for the southern and central states of India from Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR).# The institute has developed 20 Bt cotton varieties instead of hybrids using Mon531 and expects 11 of them to be available by the next season, said Dr Keshav Kranthi, director of CICR. They are engineered to build up immunity against the pest bollworm. Kranthi said that the CICR Bt cotton crops will be ready for harvest before the pink bollworm strikes. The new seeds are equivalent to Monsantos Bollgard that was launched back in 2002. (KD) Fibre2Fashion News Desk India The 64National Garment Fair (NGF) that is currently underway in Mumbai, has exhibitors showcasing a wide range of mens wear, womens wear, kids wear, ethnic wear, intimate wear, sportswear and more from their Spring/Summer 2017 collections. Over 12,000 retailers from across India are expected to visit the fair that has over 260 stalls. Despite demonetisation, the 64th NGF has over 260 Stalls showcasing over 300 Brands under one roof. It is estimated that nearly 12,000 Retailers will visit the fair across two days, said Rahul Mehta, president of Clothing Manufacturers Association of India (CMAI), the organiser of the show. The total size of Indian apparel industry is estimated to be around Rs 2,50,000 crore for the domestic market. Out of this, organised market is Rs 74,250 crore (30 per cent) whereas unorganised market is Rs 1,75,750 crore (70 per cent). The 64th National Garment Fair (NGF) that is currently underway in Mumbai, has exhibitors showcasing a wide range of men's wear, women's wear, kids' wear, ethnic wear, intimate wear, sportswear and more from their Spring/Summer 2017 collections. Over 12,000 retailers from across India are expected to visit the fair that has over 260 stalls.# The Indian domestic apparel industrys size is estimated to double within next 7 years. In the year 2015-16, Indias garment export was $16.80 billion. It is expected to reach $20 billion during the current fiscal, added Mehta. CMAI is one of the lead implementing agencies under Component II of the Integrated Skill Development Scheme (ISID) of the ministry of textiles to impart training to 35,000 trainees by March 31, 2017. It has already trained 32,145 trainees and placed 25,336 trainees in the industry, said the association in a press release. CMAI has also succeeded in persuading the Government of India to remove readymade garments, sold in loose form, from the rules of Packaged Commodities Act. This will go a long way in increasing the ease of doing business in the apparel industry. (KD) Fibre2Fashion News Desk India Shima Seiki, leading computerised knitting machine manufacturer, is set to exhibit at the Premiere Vision show in Paris, to be held from February 7 to 9, 2017, in hall 6, stand 6J40-6K4. It will partake in the Knitwear Solutions category for the flatbed knit sector as sole machine technologist, following its successful participation in past editions.Recent consumer trends such as increased online shopping activity have changed supply chain requirements, with growing demand for mass customisation and short turnaround. The combination of pioneering Wholegarment knitting technology that allows a garment to be produced in its entirety without the need for linking or sewing afterward, along with the SDS-ONE APEX3 3D design system offers an ideal manufacturing model to support such trends. Shima Seiki, leading computerised knitting machine manufacturer, is set to exhibit at the Premiere Vision show in Paris, to be held from February 7 to 9, 2017, in hall 6, stand 6J40-6K4. It will partake in the Knitwear Solutions category for the flatbed knit sector as sole machine technologist, following its successful participation in past editions. # Demonstrating the latest in Wholegarment knitting technology will be the flagship MACH2XS machine that features the companys original SlideNeedle on 4 needle beds and patented spring-loaded full-time sinker system. Capable of Wholegarment knitting in all-needles, MACH2XS offers great flexibility for knitting beautiful and sophisticated, high-quality Wholegarment products with a seemingly endless variety of knit patterns at very high speed and efficiency, all while minimising dependence upon labour-intensive sewing and linking.Wholegarment knitting forms a synergy with the aforementioned SDS-ONE APEX3 that provides revolutionary game-changing flexibility in the knit supply chain. Ultra-realistic simulation capability on APEX3 allows virtual sampling to minimise the impact that the sample-making process has on current manufacturing in terms of time and cost. APEX3 also supports design and simulation in a variety of other industries such as circular knitting, weaving, pile weaving, and printing.To further enhance the capabilities of APEX3, Shima Seikis new web-based fashion service staf (Shima trend archive and forecast) will also be demonstrated. Staf is dedicated to empowering its members with the means to search and download from a rich stock of information as well as tools to organise that information to aid in fashion planning, design and presentation. Staf features an information archive of fashion and colour trends covering the past 50 years, as well as a massive collection of fashion-related content, covering materials, flat sketches, design patterns and collection photos. All this information can be neatly organised on a virtual concept board that can be shared across various devices, improving on planning efficiency significantly. (GK) Fibre2Fashion News Desk India Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has said that countries are queuing up to sign trade deals once Britain leaves the EU and single market. In Tuesdays speech, Prime Minister Theresa May said Britain would withdraw from the single market, and warned the EU not to take punitive measures against Britain. European Commission President Jean Claude Juncker, said that Brexit negotiations would be carried out according to the rules and they yield good results. I welcome the clarifications given by Mrs May, but I said to her last night that a speech will not launch the negotiations. Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Boris Johnson stated that Britain would no longer have our trade policy run by the EU commission. That means crucially that we will be able to do new free trade deals with countries around the world. They are already queuing up. Under EU rules, we are not formally allowed to negotiate these new treaties until we leave. But there is nothing to say that ideas cannot be pencilled in. EU Leaders Reactions to Mays Speech Other EU leaders have taken varied and different lines on Theresa Mays speech. Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said, We want a fair deal for the United Kingdom, but that deal necessarily needs to be inferior to membership. Thinking it can be otherwise would indicate a detachment from reality. The Czech Republics Secretary of State for EU Affairs, Tomas Prouza, said it was important a deal would make sense for both sides. In her speech, May outlined that measures to punish Britain could be met with a cut in corporation taxes make Britain more competitive with the EU. She implied that if negotiations were not satisfactory, Britain would walk away. She said, No deal for Britain is better than a bad deal for Britain. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said turning Britain into a low corporation tax haven was an odd way of approaching a constructive relationship with a whole continent. Our Presidency will keep the interests of all nations including those that are low-lying and vulnerable at the forefront of our negotiations. We are also focused on turning the words and commitments of the Paris Agreement into measurable actions on the part of all nations, and are calling for transparent systems of accountability and practical outcomes to ensure the agreement is a success, he said. Fiji will serve as the President of the COP 23 negotiations to be held in Bonn, Germany from 6-17 November 2017, making history as the first-ever small island state to hold the Presidency. Fiji has outlined its leadership priorities ahead of its Presidency of COP 23 the UN negotiations on climate change on day one of a three-day meeting (30 Jan. 1 Feb.) between Fijian Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama and a delegation from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) led by its Executive Secretary, Ms. Patricia Espinosa.The meeting also included Attorney-General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, Minister for Agriculture and National Disaster Management Inia Seruiratu who is Fijis designated Climate Action Champion and the Permanent Secretaries for the Office of the Prime Minister, Foreign Affairs, Civil Service, Environment, and Economy.At the meeting, Fiji updated the UNFCCC on its preparatory work to meet the duties and responsibilities leading up the COP Presidency and its agenda for the upcoming negotiations.Prime Minister Bainimarama identified climate adaptation finance, effective monitoring of adherence through the rulebook to the Paris Agreement and the objectives of the Climate Action Agenda as key issue areas for the Fijian presidency.Prime Minister Bainimarama also pointed to the need for greater engagement from the private sector, NGOs and civil society in support of Fijis global effort to boost access to climate finance and reduce climate risks to developing economies. Abhinaya Chakravarthy Kichcha Sudeep's next movie Hebbuli will release worldwide on February 23. The makers SRV Productions and Umapathy Films plan to release the movie on their own with the help of Mysore Talkies. There were reports of the film releasing for Christmas and Republic Day but all these reports turned out to be false. Also the trailer was supposed to be out for the Republic Day, but it will release on February 5. Producer Umapathy confirmed on twitter about the release date - "HERE IS TH GOOD NEWS FOR ALL KICHCHA FANS, HEBBULI RELEASES ON FEBRUARY 23rd !!!!". With this tweet, release date has been officially confirmed. Umapathy also responded to a fan's tweet about the trailer and replied - "May be on Feb 5th" So we can expect the trailer of this much awaited film to be out by the next weekend. The team is currently busy with the post-production work which is simultaneously happening in Bangalore and Chennai. Director Krishna is overseeing the post-production work which is expected to be completed by a week or so. The makers intend to send the film for censor formalities in the second week of February. They are confident of getting the first print out by then. This plan allows the producers to release the film on February 23, as announced. The film has been shot in the various locations of Bangalore, Mysore and Goa. The team has shot few sequences in Kashmir in tough circumstances and this is said to have come out very well. Karunakaran is the director of photography and Arjun Janya has composed the music. Sreenivasan, who has gifted some fine works to the Malayalam film industry as a writer, is all set to pen a script for an upcoming film, after a brief break. Interestingly, the actor's new script is for a debutant director. The film, which has been titled as Paviyettante Mudhurachooral will de directed by Sreekrishnan. Sreenivasan will be penning the dialogues for the movie, as well. The actor-writer himself will be playing the lead role in this film, which is expected to bring back the vintage Sreenivasan. Lena essays the female lead role in this film and will be paired opposite Sreenivasan. They will be seen as a married couple, who belongs to different religions. Sreenivasan will essay a character named as Pavithran, whereas Lena will appear as Annie, who is a teacher. They both will also be seen together in the upcoming film Honey Bee 2. It is after a break of two years that Sreenivasan is donning the role of a writer. His previous work was the 2014 film Nagaravaridhi Naduvil Njan, which hit the theatres in 2014. Now, there are also reports doing the rounds that the actor-writer will be penning a script for Sathyan Anthikkad film, which will feature Mohanlal in the lead role. BEIJING (dpa-AFX) - Japan will on Monday release December figures for retail sales, highlighting a quiet day for Asia-Pacific economic activity. Retail sales are expected to fall 0.5 percent on month and rise 1.7 percent on year after adding 0.2 percent on month and 1.7 percent on year in November. Large retailer sales are called lower by 1.0 percent on year after dipping 0.3 percent in the previous month. Thailand will see December figures for its current account balance; in November, the current account surplus was $3.19 billion. Finally, many of the regional markets are shuttered for the Lunar New Year, including South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, China and Hong Kong. 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. SANTA CLARA, CA--(Marketwired - January 30, 2017) - Kandou Bus has announced that it will demonstrate its Chord' signaling link technology at the DesignCon 2017 Conference and speak in an Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF) panel. Kandou, in collaboration with Keysight, will demonstrate its Glasswing PHY on the show floor and describe the next generation Glasswing. In the OIF panel presentation in the technical conference, Kandou will describe why its innovative coding-based link technology should be the industry's next choice for in-package, high-rate interconnect. "Chord signaling reduces the gap to the Shannon capacity for a given channel," said Amin Shokrollahi, CEO and Founder of Kandou Bus. "Our implementation of this new form of signalling allows system designers and chip architects to increase bandwidth and save power in multi-chip module solutions." In-Package Interconect PHY Supports New Chip Architectures The core of Kandou's innovative technology is a novel signaling method called Chord signaling in which correlated signals are sent across more than two correlated wires. Bandwidth can be increased by a factor of 2-4X and power can be reduced by 50 percent or more, all with NRZ-like signal integrity. The Glasswing PHY allows system chips that are too large to yield well to be divided into smaller, higher yielding pieces and connected on a multi-chip module with low power consumption. Long reach SerDes PHYs and the logic circuits that surround them are good candidates to be put onto a separate tile chip. This also allows a SerDes tile chip to have a separate development path over time as compared to the system chips that connect to it. DesignCon Details Kandou will be in booth 218 on the show floor at DesignCon 2017 at the Santa Clara, Convention Center, which is open February 1 st and 2 nd from 11-6 on each day. In Track 8 on Tuesday afternoon from 4:45 - 6:00 PM, Kandou VP of Product Management Brian Holden will participate in the OIF panel "CEI-112G: The Next Wave of Electrical Interfaces." His panel presentation is entitled "The CEI-112G in MCM Project." The complete DesignCon technical program can be found at http://www.designcon.com About Kandou Bus S.A. Bandwidth and power challenges for next-generation links are being addressed by the industry's leading standards organizations such as OIF, IEEE and JEDEC. Kandou advocates for industry standards, contributing its technology and support via membership and board positions within these organizations. Headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland and founded in 2011, Kandou Bus is an innovative interface technology company specializing in the the invention, design, license and implementation of unmatched chip-to-chip link solutions. Kandou's Chord' signaling technology lowers power consumption and improves overall performance of semiconductors, unlocking new capabilities in electronic devices and systems. http://www.kandou.com. About the OIF The OIF facilitates the development and deployment of interoperable networking solutions and services. Members collaborate to drive Implementation Agreements (IAs) and interoperability demonstrations to accelerate and maximize market adoption of advanced internetworking technologies. OIF work applies to optical and electrical interconnects, optical component and network processing technologies, and to network control and operations including software defined networks and network function virtualization. The OIF actively supports and extends the work of national and international standards bodies. Launched in 1998, the OIF is the only industry group uniting representatives from across the spectrum of networking, including many of the world's leading service providers, system vendors, component manufacturers, software and testing vendors. Information on the OIF can be found at http://www.oiforum.com. Chord signaling is a trademark of Kandou Bus. All other trademarks or registered trademarks are properties of their respective owners. Kandou Press Contact: Jeff McGuire VP Business Development 303-903-9244 jeff@kandou.com OIF Press Contact: Deborah Porchivina PAPR for the OIF Email: Deborah@papr.com Mobile: 415-272-0943 WINNEMUCCA, NEVADA -- (Marketwired) -- 01/30/17 -- Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. (NYSE MKT: PZG) ("Paramount") today announced that the first results from its current drill program at its Grassy Mountain Project are exceeding expectations in terms of grade and rock quality for mining purposes. The results to date are confirming the high-grade core of the deposit which is surrounded by a larger envelope of lower grade gold mineralization. Paramount's plan is to construct an underground mine to exploit the high-grade core. The current 29-hole drill program is part of an ongoing Pre-Feasibility Study ("PFS") required to raise resources to proven and probable reserves and complete the mine permitting process. As reported in November 2016, Paramount began a drill program using one reverse circulation rig and two core rigs. The program was designed in conjunction with PFS consultants Mine Development Associates ("MDA"), Golder Associates ("Golder") and AUSENCO to: -- Better define the high-grade core for underground mining and potentially expand its size and grade; -- Acquire material for PFS-level metallurgical testing to design the recovery process including studies to better define the crushing equipment and milling circuits necessary to optimize gold recoveries; -- Obtain geotechnical data on rock quality for underground mine design and mining methodology. For resource confirmation and metallurgical drilling, the reverse circulation rig is being used to drill the upper portion of the holes while the two core rigs are being used to complete the lower portions of the holes in the targeted high-grade core. For geotechnical data, core rigs are being used for the entire hole employing a triple tube technique to preserve the in situ characteristics of the rock. Paramount believes that triple tube drilling and logging at the drill site provide a more accurate assessment of rock competence encountered in actual underground mining compared to the previous methodology of manipulating and transporting drill core prior to logging, which can generate additional fracturing. Results for the first four holes completed to their targeted depths are as follows (see the map below for drill hole locations): ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- From To Width Width(1) Au Ag Hole-ID Type (ft.) (ft.) (ft.) (m) (g/T) (g/T) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- GM16-02 RC 130 400 270 82.4 0.60 3.2 Core 450 525 75 23.0 1.69 9.85 Core 545 685 140 43.0 47.51(2) 12.68 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- GM16-03 Core 85 415 330 100.7 0.53 2.0 Core 455 785 330 100.7 2.17 5.0 Including 500 672 172 52.5 3.35 7.5 Including 500 545 45 13.7 3.41 7.1 Including 605 633 28 8.5 5.96 8.7 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- GM16-04 Core 130 681 551 167.9 1.12 5.1 Including 520 601 81 24.7 2.48 7.3 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- GM16-14 Core 367 750 383 116.8 2.20 9.1 Including 546 579 33 10.1 7.51 18.0 Including 613 679 66 20.1 3.56 9.2 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- (1) These holes were oriented to intersect the target at true thickness. (2) Intercept includes 5 ft. (1.5m) @ 1090 Au g/T RC= Reverse Circulation sample; core= core samples Average grades are calculated using uncapped lab assays The following table provides the objective and observations for each of the reported holes: ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ID Total Total depth depth Purpose (ft.) (m) Specific objective Observations ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- GM16-02 Intercept of 140 ft. Test continuity and (43 m.) grading 47.5 g true width of high Au/T (uncapped) grade zone confirms high grade interpreted in the core with grade and resource model to be thickness substantially 90 ft. (28 m.) exceeding resource thick, in a zone model. Several samples with limited with over 100 g Au/T Resource 742 226 previous drilling (see fig 2) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- GM16-03 Metallurgical drill hole to acquire several rock types and grade distribution for Intersected zones and Metallurgic recovery grades as predicted by & Resource 785 239 optimization resource model. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- GM16-04 Demonstrates rock quality is better than anticipated in PEA which has favorable implications for mining Geotechnical hole to costs. Grades and evaluate rock thicknesses as Geotech & quality & infill predicted in resource Resource 745 227 drilling model. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- GM16-14 Confirmed limit of high Geotechnical hole to grade towards a less evaluate rock mineralized area. A 10 quality & infill m thick zone of 7.5 g drilling to limit Au/T and a 20 m zone of high grade zone 3.5 g Au/T were as Geotech & between two previous predicted by resource Resource 750 229 drill holes. model. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paramount CEO Glen van Treek commented: "The results from the first four holes confirm our expectation of a possible improvement in the resource. We expect that the infill drilling will continue to find smaller but very high grade zones that can add meaningful ounces to the overall resource. Previous resource estimates may not have captured the impact of these very high grade occurrences. Further drill results are needed to come to a firm conclusion but we are excited by the assays we have received to date which lead us to believe that incremental improvements in quantity and overall grade may be achievable." Paramount has paused the drilling due to current weather conditions at the site and expects to resume its drill program in February. NI 43-101 Disclosure Exploration activities at Grassy Mountain are being conducted by Calico Resources USA Corp. personnel under the supervision of Michael McGinnis (CPG 10914), Project Manager and a Qualified Person under National Instrument 43-101, who has reviewed and approved this release. An ongoing quality control/quality assurance protocol is being employed for the program including blank, duplicate and reference standards in every batch of assays. About Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. Paramount Gold Nevada is a U.S. based precious metals exploration company. Paramount has a high ratio of ounces of gold in mineral inventory to shares outstanding, providing its shareholders with exceptional leverage to the gold price. For our mineral inventory, click here. Paramount holds a 100% working interest in the Grassy Mountain Gold Project which consists of approximately 9,300 acres located on private and BLM land in Malheur County, Oregon. The Grassy Mountain project contains a gold-silver deposit (100% located on private land) for which a Preliminary Economic Assessment ("PEA") has been prepared and key permitting milestones accomplished. For the PEA, click here. Additionally, Paramount owns a 100% interest in the Sleeper Gold Project located in Northern Nevada. The Sleeper Gold Project, which includes the former producing Sleeper mine, totals 2,322 unpatented mining claims (approximately 60 square miles or 15,500 hectares). Paramount's strategy is to create shareholder value through exploring and developing its mineral properties and to realize this value for its shareholders in three ways: by selling its assets to established producers; entering into joint ventures with producers for construction and operation; or constructing and operating mines for its own account. Cautionary Note to U.S. Investors Concerning Estimates of Indicated and Inferred Resources This news release uses the terms "measured and indicated resources" and "inferred resources". We advise U.S. investors that while these terms are defined in, and permitted by, Canadian regulations, these terms are not defined terms under SEC Industry Guide 7 and not normally permitted to be used in reports and registration statements filed with the SEC. "Inferred resources" have a great amount of uncertainty as to their existence, and great uncertainty as to their economic and legal feasibility. It cannot be assumed that all or any part of an inferred mineral resource will ever be upgraded to a higher category. Under Canadian rules, estimates of inferred mineral resources may not form the basis of a feasibility study or prefeasibility studies, except in rare cases. The SEC normally only permits issuers to report mineralization that does not constitute SEC Industry Guide 7 compliant "reserves", as in-place tonnage and grade without reference to unit measures. U.S. investors are cautioned not to assume that any part or all of mineral deposits in this category will ever be converted into reserves. U.S. investors are cautioned not to assume that any part or all of an inferred resource exists or is economically or legally minable. Safe Harbor for Forward-Looking Statements This release and related documents may include "forward-looking statements" and "forward-looking information" (collectively, "forward-looking statements") pursuant to applicable United States and Canadian securities laws. Forward-looking statements are based on the reasonable assumptions, estimates, analyses and opinions of management made in light of its experience and its perception of trends, current conditions and expected developments, as well as other factors that management believes to be relevant and reasonable in the circumstances at the date that such statements are made, but which may prove to be incorrect. Management believes that the assumptions and expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are reasonable. Assumptions have been made regarding, among other things: the completion of a PFS; the quantity and grade of resources included in resource estimates; the accuracy and achievability of projections included in PEAs; Paramount's ability to carry on exploration and development activities, including construction; the timely receipt of required approvals; the price of silver, gold and other metals; prices for key mining supplies, including labor costs and consumables, remaining consistent with current expectations; work meeting expectations and being consistent with estimates and plant, equipment and processes operating as anticipated. Paramount's future expectations, beliefs, goals, plans or prospects constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the United States Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and other applicable securities laws. Words such as "believes," "plans," "anticipates," "expects," "estimates" and similar expressions should also be considered to be forward-looking statements. There are a number of important factors that could cause actual results or events to differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to: uncertainties involving interpretation of drilling results, environmental matters, lack of ability to obtain required permitting, equipment breakdown or disruptions, and the other factors described in Paramount's disclosures as filed with the SEC and the Ontario Securities Commission. Except as required by applicable law, Paramount disclaims any intention or obligation to update any forward-looking statements as a result of developments occurring after the date of this document. To view Figure 1 - Drill hole Location Map, please visit the following link: http://media3.marketwire.com/docs/1084250_Figure_1.pdf To view Figure 2 - Section containing GM16-02, please visit the following link: http://media3.marketwire.com/docs/1084250_Figure_2.pdf Contacts: Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. Glen Van Treek President, CEO and Director 866-481-2233 Paramount Gold Nevada Corp. Christos Theodossiou Director of Corporate Communications 866-481-2233 TORONTO, ONTARIO -- (Marketwired) -- 01/30/17 -- Canadian Silver Hunter Inc. ("CSH" or the "Company") (TSX VENTURE: AGH.H) is pleased to announce that it has entered into a binding option agreement (the "Option Agreement") with Cobalt Projects International Corp. ("Cobalt"), whereby Cobalt may earn up to a 100% interest in the South Lorrain Project, the Company's flagship mineral exploration property (the "Property"). The highlights of the Option Agreement are as follows: -- The Option Agreement is comprised of three separate options which permit Cobalt to earn a fifty percent (50%) interest (the "First Option"), an additional one percent (1%) interest (the "Second Option"), and an additional forty-nine percent (49%) interest (the "Third Option") in and to the Property. -- Cobalt may exercise the First Option by paying an aggregate amount of $850,000 and incurring total cumulative expenditures of $1,750,000 on the Property over a period of three (3) years from the effective date of the Option Agreement. -- Subject to the receipt of TSXV approval, Cobalt may exercise the Second Option by paying an aggregate amount of $200,000 within sixty (60) days of having exercised the First Option and by producing a report in compliance with the standards of National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects on or before the fourth (4th) anniversary of the effective date of the Option Agreement. -- Subject to the First Option and Second Option having been exercised, Cobalt may exercise the Third Option by paying an aggregate of $750,000 and incurring expenditures of $1,250,000 on or before the fifth (5th) anniversary of the effective date of the Option Agreement. -- If at any time Cobalt exercises the First Option or Second Option but does not elect to earn a further interest in and to the Property, then CSH and Cobalt shall form a joint venture for the development and mining of any commercially exploitable ore body on the Property. -- Once the conditions of exercise of the First Option, Second Option and Third Option have been satisfied, Cobalt will own a 100% interest in the Property and shall grant a 2% net smelter return royalty to CSH with a right of Cobalt to purchase one-half of the royalty for $1.0 million at any time in the first 10 years. About Canadian Silver Hunter Inc. CSH is a Canadian exploration company focused on the exploration of silver-cobalt deposits on its flagship South Lorrain Project (formerly the Keeley Frontier Project). The South Lorrain Project is located within the historic South Lorrain Silver Camp, which along with the historic Cobalt and Gowganda silver camps is part of a world class cobalt-silver district in the Abitibi Greenstone Belt between Temagami and Kirkland Lake, in northeastern Ontario. CAUTIONARY STATEMENT: Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. This release includes certain "forward-looking statements". These statements are based on information currently available to the Company and the Company provides no assurance that actual results will meet management's expectations. Forward-looking statements include, or may be based upon, estimates, forecasts and statements as to management's expectations with respect to, among other things, the timing of the Company's exploration, development and business plans, strategic acquisitions, the focus of the Company in the future, progress in and success of development of the Company's mineral properties, and the Company's performance, business prospects and opportunities. Forward-looking statements may be identified by such terms as "believes", "anticipates", "expects", "estimates", "may", "could", "would", "will", or "plan". Since forward-looking statements are based on assumptions and address future events and conditions, by their very nature they involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Actual results relating to, among other things, outcomes of acquisitions or other corporate transactions, exploration or development on the Company's mineral properties, and the Company's financial condition and prospects, could differ materially from those currently anticipated in such statements for many reasons such as: changes in general economic conditions and conditions in the financial markets; changes in demand and prices for minerals; litigation, legislative, environmental and other judicial, regulatory, political and competitive developments; operational difficulties encountered in connection with the activities of the Company; and other matters discussed in this release. This list is not exhaustive of the factors that may affect any of the Company's forward-looking statements. These and other factors should be considered carefully, and readers should not place undue reliance on the Company's forward-looking statements. The Company does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements that may be made from time to time by the Company or on its behalf, except in accordance with applicable securities laws. Contacts: Canadian Silver Hunter Inc. Jeffrey Hunter President and CEO (647) 348-6966 info@cshi.ca www.canadiansilverhunter.ca WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Uber has come under heavy criticism for its decision to suspend surge pricing for its trips at New York's John F. Kennedy Airport, the site of protests in response to President Donald Trump's executive order banning immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries. Uber's NYC Twitter account informed riders on Saturday night, 'Surge pricing has been turned off at JFK Airport. This may result in longer wait times. Please be patient.' However, angry customers accused the ride-hailing service of trying to profit from a temporary work stoppage by taxi drivers, which had been called by the New York Taxi Workers Alliance. The cab driver advocacy group, representing many immigrants, said it would suspend services to and from JFK airport for one hour in respect and solidarity with immigrants. Uber's decision to turn off surge pricing met with an angry and furious response from customers, with people viewing the company as capitalizing on the situation. Thousands of Uber customers deleted their app in protest and posted the evidence to social media using the hashtag deleteUber. Uber later said it was sorry for the confusion about its earlier tweet and added that it was not meant to break up any strike. 'We wanted people to know they could use Uber to get to and from JFK at normal prices, especially last night,' a spokesman for Uber said. Uber also said it would support drivers who may be impacted by President Trump's 'wrong and unjust immigration ban.' In a blog post, Uber CEO Travis Kalanick said his company will provide 24/7 legal support for drivers trying to get back into the country and also compensate these drivers for their lost earnings. Further, Uber urged the government to reinstate the right of U.S. residents, irrespective of their country of origin, to travel. The company will create a $3 million legal defense fund to help drivers with immigration and translation services. Kalanick, who is on President Trump's economic advisory group, said he will raise the issue of the travel ban on Friday when he goes to Washington for President Trump's first business advisory group meeting. Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX Kostenloser Wertpapierhandel auf Smartbroker.de New, dedicated facility to serve Axalta's customers from Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland and Iceland Axalta Coating Systems (NYSE: AXTA), a leading global manufacturer of liquid and powder coatings, officially opened its new, ultra-modern Axalta Refinish Academy Nordic earlier this month. The move underscores Axalta's strong commitment to providing high-quality, innovative products and services to its customers in the global refinishing industry. This Smart News Release features multimedia. View the full release here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130005677/en/ The next-generation Axalta Refinish Academy Nordic opened in January 2017 (Photo: Axalta) The facility, which is located in Sisjon, 20 minutes south of Gothenburg, Sweden, houses not only the latest generation training center for Axalta's three global refinish brands Cromax, Spies Hecker and Standox but also the new offices for the Nordic refinish management organization and the Swedish refinish sales organization. "The Axalta Refinish Academy Nordic is well-placed to benefit from Axalta's 150 years of experience and expertise," said Gilles Navez, Marketing Strategy Director for Axalta in Europe, Middle East and Africa. "It is designed to be a welcoming facility where refinishers from Nordic countries can enhance their skills using the latest products and equipment in a modern environment. Everything has been developed to ensure that the refinishers who train here not only receive the best possible course experience and return to their body shops with self-confidence and skills, but also learn how to work as efficiently as possible." The Axalta Refinish Academy Nordic has been specially designed for maximum energy savings and to meet future environmental requirements. Participants visiting the Academy for training courses will discover three training rooms for effective learning and team building, two cutting edge spray booths, and three mixing rooms, one for each of the three refinish brands. The Academy also boasts a comfortable lounge area, decorated with true Scandinavian flair, where course delegates can relax or talk with colleagues. For more information about Axalta, please visit axalta.com. About Axalta Coating Systems Axalta is a leading global company focused solely on coatings and providing customers with innovative, colorful, beautiful and sustainable solutions. From light OEM vehicles, commercial vehicles and refinish applications to electric motors, buildings and pipelines, our coatings are designed to prevent corrosion, increase productivity and enable the materials we coat to last longer. With 150 years of experience in the coatings industry, the approximately 12,800 people of Axalta continue to find ways to better serve our more than 100,000 customers in 130 countries every day with the finest coatings, application systems and technology. For more information visit axalta.com and follow us @Axalta on Twitter and on LinkedIn. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130005677/en/ Contacts: DA Public Relations Ltd Chantal Bachelier-Moore +44 207 692 4964 chantal@dapr.com WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - A California woman has filed a class action lawsuit against the makers of Hatchimals, the hottest toy during the holiday season, after the Hatchimal toy she purchased for her daughter never hatched. Jodie Hejduk of Bakersfield, California has been listed as the primary plaintiff in the lawsuit, but several other customers have also joined the lawsuit against Spin Master, the Canadian toy company that makes Hatchimals. The lawsuit alleges that Spin Master engaged in a 'bait-and-switch' marketing scheme, which means to falsely advertise goods with the intention of substituting it with inferior goods. 'Unfortunately, this Christmas season, millions of children and families across the globe were sourly disappointed with coal in their stockings, in the form of a bait-and-switch marketing scheme perpetrated by Spin Master, the manufacturers of this Christmas season's 'it' gift, Hatchimals,' the lawsuit alleges. A Hatchimal is a toy that consist of a large, spotted plastic egg containing a robotic animal, and is supposed to hatch after a specific set of instructions are followed. The toys, for children aged 5 and above, come in five different 'species' - Pengualas, Draggles, Burtles, Owlicorns, and Bearakeet. According to Spin Master's website, the hatching process can take 25 to 40 minutes, as each Hatchimal is 'unique and hatching times will vary.' The lawsuit claims that in January 2017, the plaintiff bought a Hatchimal from Wal-Mart in California for about $50 as a birthday present for her daughter. The woman and her daughter followed the instructions included in the package, but the Hatchimal failed to hatch and the toy remains unhatched in its egg. Several angry parents also later took to social media to complain after many of the toys failed to 'hatch' on Christmas morning. In response to the lawsuit, Christopher Harrs, Spin Master's executive vice president and general counsel, said the company took 'extraordinary and proactive steps to respond to consumer questions regarding Hatchimals' during the holiday period. 'The allegations from the class action lawyer are simply inaccurate and not based on actual facts,' Harrs added. Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX Kostenloser Wertpapierhandel auf Smartbroker.de ARLINGTON, Virginia and PARIS, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Bloomberg BNA and Baker McKenzie today announced that their fifth annual Global Transfer Pricing Conference, in association with the Tax Management Education Institute, will be held March 27-28 in Paris. The conference takes place at The Westin Paris - Vendome and event information and registration is available at https://www.bna.com/2017-global-transfer-pricing-paris/. The event brings together top government officials from key OECD and non OECD countries, along with leading transfer pricing experts from the business community who will wrestle with the topics creating the most uncertainty for multinational companies. "Transfer Pricing has never come under such scrutiny," said Bloomberg BNA Transfer Pricing Report Managing Editor Molly Moses. "Every business is keen to hear the latest on the European Union tax probes of various high-profile companies, the recent OECD guidance on both profit splits and permanent establishments, and the differences in how countries are analyzing the 'value chain.'" "Transfer pricing risks has become the biggest concern for the corporate tax function. They can be huge monetary-wise and have impact beyond tax, for instance on the corporate image," Caroline Silberztein, Chair of Baker McKenzie Global Transfer Pricing practice added. "This year's Global Transfer Pricing Conference will offer insights and practical considerations on the biggest transfer pricing risks and challenges faced across Europe and globally, including the new transfer pricing documentation paradigm, the increased use of profit split, and the positions asserted by emerging economies." Keynote addresses will be delivered by Pascal Saint-Amans, Director of the OECD's Centre for Tax Policy and Administration, and Gert-Jan Koopman, Deputy Director-General for State Aid at the European Commission. Other confirmed speakers include: Brian Jenn ,Attorney Advisor, Office of International Tax Counsel, U.S. Department of Treasury ,Attorney Advisor, Office of International Tax Counsel, U.S. Department of Treasury Edouard Marcus , Deputy Director, Ministry of Finance, France , Deputy Director, Ministry of Finance, Michael McDonald , Financial Economist, Office of Tax Analysis, U.S. Department of Treasury , Financial Economist, Office of Tax Analysis, U.S. Department of Treasury William Morris , Chairman of the OECD Business Advisory Group and Senior Tax Counsel and Global Tax Policy Director , Chairman of the OECD Business Advisory Group and Senior Tax Counsel and Global Tax Policy Director Timothy Power , HMRC Treasury (Policy) , HMRC Treasury (Policy) Stig Sollund , Chair of the U.N. Transfer Pricing Subcommittee , Chair of the U.N. Transfer Pricing Subcommittee Robert Stack , Former Deputy Assistant Secretary (International Tax Affairs), U.S. Department of Treasury , Former Deputy Assistant Secretary (International Tax Affairs), U.S. Department of Treasury Catherine Turk , Senior Director, Global Tax Planning, Johnson & Johnson Senior Director, Global Tax Planning, Johnson & Johnson Jefferson VanderWolk , Head of Tax Treaty, Transfer Pricing and Financial Transactions Division, OECD About Bloomberg BNA Bloomberg BNA, a wholly owned subsidiary of Bloomberg, is a leading source of legal, regulatory, and business information for professionals. Its network of more than 2,500 reporters, correspondents, and leading practitioners delivers expert analysis, news, practice tools, and guidance - the information that matters most to professionals. Bloomberg BNA's authoritative coverage spans a full range of legal practice areas, including tax & accounting, labor & employment, intellectual property, banking & securities, employee benefits, health care, privacy & data security, human resources, and environment, health & safety. (www.bna.com) About Baker McKenzie Baker McKenzie helps clients overcome the challenges of competing in the global economy. We solve complex legal problems across borders and practice areas. Our unique culture, developed over 65 years, enables our 13,000 people to understand local markets and navigate multiple jurisdictions, working together as trusted colleagues and friends to instill confidence in our clients. Our Global Transfer Pricing practice includes over 200 lawyers and economists who deliver innovative and commercially pragmatic advice and assistance in design, implementation and defense across markets. (www.bakermckenzie.com) About Tax Management Educational Institute Tax Management Educational Institute (TMEI) is an independent educational organization founded by Tax Management, Inc., a subsidiary of The Bureau of National Affairs, Inc. TMEI is devoted solely to the conduct of responsible, professional seminars and conferences of the highest quality dedicated to issues of tax policy and practice, and to the funding of related scholarly endeavors. EDMONTON, ALBERTA -- (Marketwired) -- 01/30/17 -- Alberta-based Edo Japan (Edo) was busy feeding more than just hungry customers during the final months of 2016. As part of its 'Edo a Little, Help a Lot' holiday giving campaign, Edo restaurants across the country raised $64,311.79 for local food banks to help feed those in need. The Edmonton Food Bank will receive $13,186.67 of Edo's overall food bank contribution. This year marks the seventh consecutive year of Edo's partnerships with Canada's food banks through its 'Edo a Little, Help a Lot' holiday giving campaign in an effort to give back to the local communities where they operate. "Edo is proud to continue its strong partnership with local food banks across Canada as we wanted to carry the tradition of our holiday giving campaign into the 2016 holiday season," said Dave Minnett, President and CEO, Edo Japan. "We are thankful to our supportive franchisees and loyal customers who helped us make the holidays brighter for Canadian families in need." Since the inception of its partnership with Canadian food banks in 2010, Edo has raised more than $363,000 for local food banks in the communities where it operates. Edo introduced Double Up Day this year on December 10, 2016 at all locations nationwide. With every spring roll purchased, Edo donated 50 cents to local food banks, doubling its traditional holiday season donation of 25 cents. In addition to the money raised during its holiday campaign, Edo supports local food banks year-round with donations collected during dry runs for the openings of new stores. For more information about Edo Japan and the 'Edo a Little, Help a Lot' holiday giving campaign, please visit http://www.edojapan.com. About Edo Japan Established in 1979 in Calgary, Alberta, Edo Japan was designed to bring the freshness of hot Japanese Teppan-style cooking to suburban shopping centres and food courts across Canada. Offering the highest quality, freshly prepared food in the quick service restaurant industry, Edo Japan has quickly become a popular alternative with more than 115 locations across Canada, serving more than eight million meals annually. For more information please visit www.edojapan.com. @edo_japan https://www.facebook.com/edojapan http://www.youtube.com/user/edojapaninc Contacts: For media inquiries, please contact: Erica Morgan Brookline Public Relations 403.538.5641 ext. 106 emorgan@brooklinepr.com TORONTO, ONTARIO -- (Marketwired) -- 01/30/17 -- Nutritional High International Inc. (the "Company" or "Nutritional High") (CSE: EAT)(OTCQB: SPLIF)(FRANKFURT: 2NU) is pleased to announce that it has entered into an agreement to acquire (the "Acquisition") the technology and intellectual property rights to an innovative product to be referred to as the "Dab Stick". The Dab Stick is a dispenser for viscous liquid substances, capable of carrying approximately 1/2 gram of cannabis oil extract designed with the retail consumer and adult use user in mind. The oil vessel is capable of dispensing oil in very small metered doses, which ensures consistency between each dose of oil dispensed and providing desired consumer experience. While there have been similar products introduced in the California market (and have been subsequently discontinued), Dab Stick uses a revolutionary patent pending process which solves technical failings of such past discontinued products. The Dab Stick allows the user to select an exact amount of oil to dispense, which provides a controlled and consistent flow in a multitude of operating conditions. The product is also designed with a view to being able to easily integrate empty vessels into filling equipment. The chief advantage of using Dab Stick, versus other commercially available methods of dispensing concentrate products is the ability to control pressure inside the vessel to avoid leakage and product spoilage. A provisional patent application has been filed with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (the "USPTO") for the Dab Stick and the vendors of the technology has completed a conceptual design and prototype of the Dab Stick. Together with the Vendor, Nutritional High is currently in the process of locating a suitable manufacturer to supply the product to Nutritional High's facilities in the United States. Jim Frazier, CEO of Nutritional High commented- "The acquisition of the Dab Stick intellectual property is another step in our efforts to introduce transformative products to the marijuana oils and edibles industry. Along with the internal development of consumer-appealing brands such as FLI and Jimi Hendrix product line Nutritional High will take an increasingly leading role the consumer market. We have other innovative concepts in the pipeline that we will introduce as we continue building our product portfolio. We are still in the first inning of cannabis consumer market development, and only the companies which put the consumer first will be able to strive in the long term." Billy Morrison, Director and Officer of Nutritional High and Dab Stick co-inventor commented as follows - "We're pleased to announce the roll-out of this innovative product, which we believe to have potential to become the new standard of cannabis concentrate consumption. We also would like to highlight the importance of the patent application with the USPTO and future patent applications which are planned, which will help solidify Nutritional High's foothold in the consumer market." Acquisition Terms As a part of the Acquisition, the vendors (the "Vendors") have agreed to assign to Nutritional High the Dab Stick technology and the intellectual property ("Assigned IP") and all rights thereto, and the Vendors will assist with developing improvements. As consideration (the "Consideration") for the Acquisition, the Company has agreed to issue to the Vendors common shares in the capital of the Company (the "Consideration Shares") upon reaching the following milestones: a. upon confirmation, to the Purchaser's satisfaction that the Dab Stick product satisfactorily functions for its intended purpose, Nutritional High shall issue an aggregate of 434,783 Consideration Shares at a deemed price of $0.23 per share; b. upon the commercial sale at fair market value of the first 100 Dab Stick products, an aggregate of C$100,000 worth of Consideration Shares (based on the closing price of the Nutritional High common shares at the time of issuance); c. upon the commercial sale at fair market value of the next 500 Dab Stick products, an aggregate of C$100,000 worth of Consideration Shares (based on the closing price of the Nutritional High common shares at the time of issuance); and d. upon the grant of a patent by the USPTO, an aggregate of C$200,000 worth of Purchaser Shares (based on the closing price of the Nutritional High common shares at the time of issuance). If Nutritional High decides to abandon the application, Nutritional High must provide the Vendors with four months notice of its decision, and shall assign, for no additional consideration, the patent application to the Vendors upon the written request of the Vendors, or issue C$200,000 worth of Consideration Shares. The Company has also granted the Vendors the exclusive right to market the Dab Stick for non-cannabis or cannabis derivative related pharmaceutical use, in exchange for a 5% royalty on gross revenue. The Vendors include 4 inventors, amongst which is Billy Morrison, a director and an officer of the Company. As a non-arm's length party, Mr. Morrison has abstained in approval of the Acquisition. About Nutritional High International Inc. Nutritional High is focused on developing, manufacturing and distributing products and nationally recognized brands in the hemp and marijuana-infused products industries, including edibles and oil extracts for nutritional, medical and adult use. The Company works exclusively through licensed facilities in jurisdictions where such activity is permitted and regulated by state law. For updates on the Company's activities and highlights of the Company's press releases and other media coverage, please follow Nutritional High on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Google+ or visit www.nutritionalhigh.com. NEITHER THE CANADIAN SECURITIES EXCHANGE NOR OTC MARKETS GROUP INC., NOR THEIR REGULATIONS SERVICES PROVIDERS HAVE REVIEWED OR ACCEPT RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS RELEASE. This news release may contain forward-looking statements and information based on current expectations. These statements should not be read as guarantees of future performance or results. Such statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from those implied by such statements. Such statements include submission of the relevant documentation within the required timeframe and to the satisfaction of the relevant regulators, completing the acquisition of the applicable real estate and raising sufficient financing to complete the Company's business strategy. There is no certainty that any of these events will occur. Although such statements are based on management's reasonable assumptions, there can be no assurance that such assumptions will prove to be correct. We assume no responsibility to update or revise them to reflect new events or circumstances. Company's securities have not been registered under the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "U.S. Securities Act"), or applicable state securities laws, and may not be offered or sold to, or for the account or benefit of, persons in the United States or "U.S. Persons", as such term is defined in Regulation S under the U.S. Securities Act, absent registration or an applicable exemption from such registration requirements. 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 the United States or any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful. Additionally, there are known and unknown risk factors which could cause the Company's actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking information contained herein. All forward-looking information herein is qualified in its entirety by this cautionary statement, and the Company disclaims any obligation to revise or update any such forward-looking information or to publicly announce the result of any revisions to any of the forward-looking information contained herein to reflect future results, events or developments, except as required by law. Contacts: Nutritional High International Inc. David Posner Chairman of the Board 647-985-6727 dposner@nutritionalhigh.com Boom Capital Markets Inc. Steven Low (647) 620-5101 steve@boomcapitalmarkets.com www.boomcapitalmarkets.com VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA -- (Marketwired) -- 01/30/17 -- Viscount Mining Corp. (TSX VENTURE: VML) (OTCQB: VLMGF) ("Viscount" or "the Company"), is pleased to announces the results of its Annual General Meeting of Shareholders (the "AGM") held on January 27, 2017 in Vancouver. The motions approved by Viscount's shareholders included the following: -- Approval of the number of directors at six; -- Election of all six nominees to serve until the next annual meeting of shareholders of the Company, or until their successors are elected or appointed. Directors James MacKenzie (President & CEO), Kaare Foy (Chairman), Andrew Gertler, William MacDonald and Honourable Grant Devine were re-elected; -- Mark J. Abrams, BSc. MSc. was newly appointed to the Board of Directors of the Company; -- Approval of the Company's stock option plan; and; -- Re-appointment of Davidson & Company LLP, Chartered Accountants as the Company's external auditor. Mr. Abrams has more than 30 years of domestic and international mineral exploration experience. Most recently, he was responsible for exploration and acquisitions in the United States for Golden Predator Corp., prior to which he worked for 12 years for Agnico-Eagle (USA) Ltd., where he led his exploration team to a gold discovery in northeastern Nevada. Mr. Abrams has designed, initiated and conducted advanced project evaluations and acquisitions in the in United States, Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, Chile, Argentina, Canada, China and Indonesia, including the acquisition of and first exploration work on the Donlin Creek project in Alaska for Placer Dome. He conducted exploration work over 18 years for Placer Dome within the Cortez joint venture and Bald Mountain mine properties. He was responsible for acquiring the lands now occupied by portion of the Pipeline mine and was involved in the early exploration work on the deposit. Mr. Abrams is experienced in creating and managing programs and budgets ranging from $100,000 to $15,000,000, and holds a BSc. in Geology and MSc. in Geology from Eastern Washington University. Kaare Foy, Viscount Chairman stated: "Mr. Abrams has been serving on the Company's Advisory Board since July of 2015 and we look forward to his greater involvement in the growth and leadership of Viscount as it moves forward with its projects." The Board and Management of Viscount are deeply saddened to announce the passing of one of its earliest directors, Matthew J. Hughes, a friend and former member of the Board from 2014 - 2017. Mr. Hughes died on January 27, 2017, at the age of 56. "Matt was a respected geologist working in the exploration, development and mining industry for more than 25 years," said Jim MacKenzie, Viscount's CEO. "He served on the boards of numerous private and public companies. His wealth of knowledge, networking and expertise has made an invaluable contribution to the Company. Everyone at Viscount extends heartfelt condolences to his family during this difficult time. Matt will be greatly missed by his many friends and family." About Viscount Mining (TSX VENTURE: VML) (OTCQB: VLMGF) Viscount Mining is an exploration company with a portfolio of gold and silver properties in the Western United States, including Cherry Creek in Nevada and Silver Cliff in Colorado. Cherry Creek is comprised of more than 9,000 acres, all 100% owned, and includes more than 20 past producing mines. Viscount has entered into an exploration earn-in agreement with Sumitomo Corporation covering the Cherry Creek property. Sumitomo can earn in up to a 75% interest in the property by producing a feasibility study and by spending in addition a minimum of US$10,000,000 in exploration and development expenses by the eighth anniversary of the earn-in agreement. Silver Cliff in Colorado is comprised of 96 lode claims, covering much of the historical past-producing mineral districts of Silver Cliff and Rosita Hills. For additional information regarding the above noted property and other corporate information, please visit the Company's website at www.viscountmining.com ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS Jim MacKenzie, President, CEO and Director 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. Forward-Looking Statements This news release contains certain statements that may be deemed "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 Viscount Mining Corp. 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 forward looking statements. Forward looking statements are based on the beliefs, estimates and opinions of Viscount Mining Corp. management on the date the statements are made. Except as required by law, Viscount Mining Corp. undertakes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements in the event that management's beliefs, estimates or opinions, or other factors, should change. Contacts: Viscount Investor Relations 604-960-0535 info@viscountmining.com VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA -- (Marketwired) -- 01/30/17 -- Graphite One Resources Inc. (TSX VENTURE: GPH)(OTCQX: GPHOF) ("Graphite One", "GPH" or the "Company") presents the post-tax financial results from its Preliminary Economic Assessment ("PEA") that the Company announced on January 25, 2017 for the development of its 100%-owned Graphite One integrated, manufacturing project (the "Project"). At the request of IIROC the Company is clarifying the following disclosure from its news release disseminated on January 25, 2017. The PEA projects a Net Present Value ("NPV") for the Project on a pre-tax basis of US$1,037 million using a 10% discount rate, with an Internal Rate of Return ("IRR") of 27%. On a post-tax basis, the NPV is projected at US$616 million using a 10% discount rate, with an Internal Rate of Return ("IRR") of 22%. Annual production of CSG and other graphite specialty materials is projected at 55,350 metric tonnes when full production is reached in Year 6. A minimum of 40 years of indicated and inferred resources grading 7% Cg (graphite) have been identified in the target exploitation zone to sustain full scale operations, notwithstanding additional potential resources immediately outside the target zone or the broader Graphite Creek property. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Summary of the Project's Pre-Tax Financial Results (US$ Million) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- NPVof Net Cash Flowat 10% Discount Rate $ 1,037 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- IRR 27% ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Payback Period in Production Year 4 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Summary of the Project's Post-Tax Financial Results (US$ Million) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- NPV of Net Cash Flow at 10% Discount Rate $ 616 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- IRR 22% ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Payback Period in Production Year 4 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Project is conceived as a vertically integrated manufacturer of high grade Coated Spherical Graphite ("CSG") with mining and processing facilities near Nome, Alaska and advanced material processing done at a dedicated graphite product manufacturing facility. Washington State is a potential site for the product manufacturing facility due to its established maritime links with Alaska, the availability of low-cost power, developed industrial sites and proximity to markets. The PEA was prepared by the independent engineering firm, TRU Group Inc. of Toronto, Ontario, under Canadian Securities Administrators' National Instrument 43-101 - Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects ("NI 43-101"). The post-tax analysis assumes the Project is based on 100% equity financing and its ownership and locations make US federal and Alaska and Washington state taxes applicable. As the Project advances and the graphite mining, processing and manufacturing plans are optimized, the Company will commission an accounting, legal and tax study to determine the optimal corporate structure and economics. The financial analysis used a 10% discount rate for the NPV and IRR analysis in the PEA and considers it the appropriate rate that reflects the measure of risk at this stage of the Project. In an effort to provide comparative results with others in the industry with similar stage projects, the Company also presented a NPV and IRR using an 8% discount rate in the press release of January 25th, 2017. The Company emphasizes that the 10% rate be used in evaluating the PEA. QUALIFIED PERSONS The independent qualified persons responsible for preparing the Graphite One PEA are R. James Robinson, P.Geo., Ioannis (John) Roumeliotis, Ing., and Maureen Paterson, P. Eng. of TRU Group Inc. They have reviewed and approved the contents of this press release. David R. Hembree, C. P. Geo., the General Manager of Operations for Graphite One Alaska Inc., is the company's designated qualified person for this press release within the meaning of NI 43-101 and has reviewed and validated that the information contained in the release is consistent with that provided by the independent qualified persons responsible for the PEA. About TRU Group TRU Group Inc are engineers, managers, planners and integrators focused on technology intensive industry. The firm has a long standing strong capability in battery materials from resource through to end-products and have completed numerous assignments for several clients. More information is available on the TRU Group website www.trugroup.com. About Graphite One Resources Inc. GRAPHITE ONE RESOURCES INC. (TSX VENTURE: GPH)(OTCQX: GPHOF) continues to develop its Graphite One Project (the "Project"), whereby the Company could potentially become the dominant American producer of high grade Coated Spherical Graphite ("CSG") that is integrated with a domestic graphite resource. The Project is proposed as a vertically integrated enterprise to mine, process and manufacture high grade CSG primarily for the lithium-ion electric vehicle battery market. Graphite mineralization mined from the Company's Graphite Creek Property would be processed into concentrate at a graphite processing plant. The processing plant would be located on the Graphite Creek Property situated on the Seward Peninsula about 60 kilometers north of Nome, Alaska. CSG and other value-added graphite products, would be manufactured from the concentrate at the Company's proposed graphite product manufacturing facility, the location of which is the subject of further study and analysis. The Graphite Creek Property contains America's largest known large flake graphite deposit. Resources identified to date include 10.32 million tonnes of indicated resources grading 7.2 percent graphitic carbon ("Cg") and 71.24 million tonnes of inferred resources at 7.0 percent Cg identified, using a 6% Cg mining cut-off grade. Work on the Graphite Creek Property is progressing through the evaluation phase with environmental baseline sampling programs and engineering studies in progress. Mineral beneficiation testing, mine, infrastructure and processing plant design work, and a resource development drilling program are expected to be undertaken in the months ahead. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS "Anthony Huston" (signed) For more information on Graphite One Resources Inc. please visit the Company's website, www.GraphiteOneResources.com. CAUTIONARY STATEMENT Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. This release includes certain statements that are deemed to be forward-looking statements. All statements in this release, other than statements that are clearly historical in nature, are forward-looking statements. Generally, forward-looking information can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "proposes", "expects", or "is expected", "scheduled", "estimates", "projects", "intends", "assumes", "believes", "indicates" or variations of such words and phrases that state that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might" or "will be taken", "occur" or "be achieved". Forward-looking information in this release includes, but is not limited to, statements regarding resource estimates and potential mineralization, the interpretation and actual results of current exploration activities, changes in project parameters as plans continue to be refined, the actual ability to produce spherical graphite, ultimate further and final results of additional test-work, estimated capital and sustaining costs and the availability of equipment, labour and resources required, the anticipated applications of graphite in high-tech, clean tech, energy storage and national security applications and all other anticipated applications, international demand and ability to transport and enter into such markets, the results of the TRU Group's study being accurate regarding the characteristics of the Graphite Creek mineralization, exploration drilling, exploitation activities and events or developments that the Company expects, the sustainability and ultimate environmental effects of spherical graphite, future joint ventures and partnerships, future prices of graphite, possible variations in grade or recovery rates, are all 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 the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in forward-looking statements include: (i) volatile stock price, (ii) the results of the product development test work may not be indicative of the advancement of the project as anticipated, or at all, (iii) market prices, (iv) exploitation and exploration successes, (v) continuity of mineralization, (vi) uncertainties related to the ability to obtain necessary permits, licenses and title and delays due to third party opposition, (vii) changes in government policies regarding mining and natural resource exploration and exploitation, (viii) competition faced in securing experienced personnel, access to adequate infrastructure to support mining, processing, development and exploration activities and continued availability of capital and financing, and (ix) general economic, market or business conditions. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on this forward-looking information, which is given as of the date it is expressed in this press release, and the Company undertakes no obligation to update publicly or revise any forward-looking information, except as required by applicable securities laws. For more information on the Company, investors should review the Company's continuous disclosure filings that are available at www.sedar.com. Estimates of mineralization and other technical information included or referenced in this press release have been prepared in accordance with NI 43-101. The definitions of proven and probable reserves used in NI 43-101 differ from the definitions in SEC Industry Guide 7. Under SEC Industry Guide 7 standards, a "final" or "bankable" feasibility study is required to report reserves, the three-year historical average price is used in any reserve or cash flow analysis to designate reserves and the primary environmental analysis or report must be filed with the appropriate governmental authority. As a result, the reserves reported by the Company in accordance with NI 43-101 may not qualify as "reserves" under SEC standards. In addition, the terms "mineral resource", "measured mineral resource", "indicated mineral resource" and "inferred mineral resource" are defined in and required to be disclosed by NI 43-101; however, these terms are not defined terms under SEC Industry Guide 7 and normally are not permitted to be used in reports and registration statements filed with the SEC. Mineral resources that are not mineral reserves do not have demonstrated economic viability. Investors are cautioned not to assume that any part or all of the mineral deposits in these categories will ever be converted into reserves. "inferred mineral resources" have a great amount of uncertainty as to their existence, and great uncertainty as to their economic and legal feasibility. It cannot be assumed that all or any part of an inferred mineral resource will ever be upgraded to a higher category. Under Canadian securities laws, estimates of inferred mineral resources may not form the basis of feasibility or pre-feasibility studies, except in rare cases. Additionally, disclosure of "contained graphite (Cg) tonnes" in a resource is permitted disclosure under Canadian securities laws; however, the SEC normally only permits issuers to report mineralization that does not constitute "reserves" by SEC standards as in place tonnage and grade without reference to unit measurements. Accordingly, information contained or referenced in this press release containing descriptions of the Company's mineral deposits may not be comparable to similar information made public by U.S. companies subject to the reporting and disclosure requirements of United States federal securities laws and the rules and regulations thereunder. Contacts: Graphite One Resources Inc. Anthony Huston CEO, President & Director (604) 697-2862 AnthonyH@GraphiteOneResources.com www.GraphiteOneResources.com Investor Relations Contact 1-604-684-6730 GPH@kincommunications.com VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA -- (Marketwired) -- 01/30/17 -- The British Columbia Securities Commission (BCSC) has paid a B.C. investor $20,000 that she lost as a result of misconduct by Keith Henry Alexander. In a settlement agreement with the BCSC, Alexander admitted he breached the Securities Act when he distributed a security to an investor without a prospectus and without being registered to trade. He agreed to market prohibitions and, pursuant to an order under section 161(1)(g) of the Securities Act, paid the BCSC $20,000 that he had obtained as a result of his contraventions. Under the Securities Act, the BCSC must make money that it receives under a section 161(1)(g) order available to investors. The investor in this case submitted her claim to the BCSC and the BCSC paid her $20,000. For more information on how the BCSC returns fund to investors, visit: - 'Returning Funds to Investors' under the Enforcement Tab on the Commission website - Section 15.1 of the Securities Act - Part 3 of the Securities Regulation About the British Columbia Securities Commission (www.bcsc.bc.ca) The British Columbia Securities Commission is the independent provincial government agency responsible for regulating capital markets in British Columbia through the administration of the Securities Act. Our mission is to protect and promote the public interest by fostering: -- A securities market that is fair and warrants public confidence -- A dynamic and competitive securities industry that provides investment opportunities and access to capital Learn how to protect yourself and become a more informed investor at www.investright.org Contacts: Media Contact: Alison Walker 604-899-6713 Public inquiries: 604-899-6854 or 1-800-373-6393 (toll free) inquiries@bcsc.bc.ca Vietnam's textile and apparel industry has long been one of the most important contributors to the country's export-oriented economy. Despite undergoing rapid transformations and facing different challenges in the sector, Vietnam still holds its position as one of the leading textile and apparel suppliers in the global market. Details about Vietnam's textile and apparel exports, silk production and cotton production are some of this week's featured stories on BizVibe. BizVibe is the world's smartest B2B marketplace and allows users to connect with over seven million companies around the globe. BizVibe is the world's smartest B2B marketplace and allows users to connect with over seven million companies around the globe. This Smart News Release features multimedia. View the full release here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130006019/en/ Market opportunities in Vietnam's textile and apparel industry. (Graphic: Business Wire) Vietnam textile and apparel exports to experience 7% growth in 2017 Vietnam's total export value of textiles and apparel reached USD 27.2 billion in 2015, an increase of 9.43% from the previous year, making the country one of the top five textile and apparel exporters in the world, according to the USDA. In 2017, Vietnam's textile and apparel exports have been projected to grow from 5% to 7%, due to the development of technology, the growing number of skilled workers, and newly issued preferential policies from the government. Despite suffering from lack of raw textile material, the momentum of Vietnam's textile and apparel export is expected to be bigger over the next few years, mainly driven by its low production cost and the beneficiaries of joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Connect with fabrics and textiles companies in Vietnam listed on BizVibe Vietnam's silk production is in recovery Vietnam produced about 450 metric tonnes of silk in 2015, making it the sixth largest silk producing country in the world. This figure has been considered as a great achievement since silk production was almost entirely abandoned by many silk producers in Vietnam between 2004 and 2014 due to an inability to compete with Chinese silk. A more promising future is expected for Vietnam's silk production as policies from government, such as land tax exemption and mulberry subsidy, have been issued, and new innovations and technologies have been applied to increase the silk production. Connect with over 1,500 silk materials companies listed on BizVibe Vietnam's cotton product export rises, despite the decreasing cotton production Cotton production in Vietnam has suffered a decline in recent years, mainly due to high production costs, lack of government support, and the shrinking cotton planted area. However, with the increasing demand for cotton yarns in the global market, especially China, the export of Vietnam's yarn (cotton and other) rose 12% in 2015, totalling 961,777 tons. While Vietnam's cotton production may be falling, the country still holds its position in the global market. Although, it relies heavily on imports of raw cotton to sustain its production, but current prices and trade agreements mean that the future still looks bright for Vietnam's textile and apparel industry. Connect with nearly 35,000 textiles companies listed on BizVibe In addition to these segments, BizVibe is also home to 50,000+ apparel and textile companies across 200+ countries, covering all sectors. The BizVibe platform allows you to discover high quality leads and make meaningful connections in real time. Claim your company profile for free and let the business come to you. About BizVibe BizVibe is home to over seven million company profiles across 700+ industries. The single minded focus of BizVibe's platform is to make networking easier. Over the years, we've searched far and wide to figure out how businesses connect and enable trade. That first interaction is usually fraught with the uncertainty of finding a potential partner vs. a potential nightmare. With this in mind, we've designed a robust set of tools to help companies generate leads, shortlist prospects, network with businesses from around the world and trade seamlessly. BizVibe is headquartered in Toronto, and has offices in London, Bangalore and Beijing. For more information on the BizVibe network, please contact us. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130006019/en/ Contacts: BizVibe Media Marketing Executive Jesse Maida media@bizvibe.com www.bizvibe.com TORONTO, ONTARIO and SMITHS FALLS, ONTARIO -- (Marketwired) -- 01/30/17 -- Mettrum Health Corp. ("Mettrum") (TSX VENTURE: MT) and Canopy Growth Corporation (TSX: CGC) ("Canopy Growth", and together with Mettrum, the "Companies") are pleased to announce that the Ontario Superior Court of Justice has issued a final order approving the proposed acquisition by Canopy Growth of all of the issued and outstanding common shares of Mettrum by way of a plan of arrangement (the "Arrangement"), as previously announced by the Companies on December 1, 2016. Completion of the Arrangement remains conditional on certain closing conditions customary for transactions of this nature pursuant to the terms of the definitive arrangement agreement dated November 30, 2016, as amended. Subject to the satisfaction or waiver of all such closing conditions, it is anticipated that the Arrangement will be completed after the markets have closed on January 31, 2017. The Arrangement, if completed, will result in the creation of a world-leading diversified cannabis company with six licensed facilities and a licensed production footprint of approximately 665,000 sq. ft. with significant acreage for expansion. Following completion of the Arrangement, Mettrum will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Canopy Growth, trading of Mettrum's common shares on the TSX Venture Exchange will be halted after closing on January 31 and Mettrum's common shares will be delisted from the TSX Venture Exchange in the normal course shortly thereafter. About Mettrum Health Corp. Mettrum Health Corp. is a Tier 1 Industry Issuer listed on TSX Venture Exchange. With three licenses to produce and sell medical cannabis under the Access to Cannabis for Medical Purposes Regulations, Mettrum Health Corp. is a leading producer and vendor of medical cannabis. In addition, through its wholly-owned subsidiary Mettrum Hempworks, Mettrum also is a licensed producer and distribution of industrial cannabis (hemp) products, including Mettrum's functional food line, Mettrum Originals, under the Industrial Hemp Regulations (Canada) issued pursuant to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act (Canada). For more information, visit www.mettrum.com. About Canopy Growth Corporation Canopy Growth is a world-leading diversified cannabis company, offering diverse brands and curated cannabis strain varieties in dried and oil extract forms. Through its wholly-owned subsidiaries, Tweed, Tweed Farms, and Bedrocan Canada, Canopy Growth operates three state-of-the-art production facilities with over half a million square feet of indoor and greenhouse production capacity. Canopy Growth has established partnerships with leading sector names in Canada and abroad. For more information, visit www.canopygrowth.com. 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. Forward-looking statements are generally identifiable by use of the words "expect", "anticipate", "continue", "estimate", "objective", "ongoing", "may", "will", "project", "should", "believe", "plans", "intends" or the negative of these words or other variations on these words or comparable terminology and include statements with respect to all regulatory approvals and the completion of the Arrangement. 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. Mettrum and Canopy Growth 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. None of the TSX Venture Exchange, TSX Exchange nor their Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in their respective policies) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Contacts: Mettrum Health Corp. Ali Mahdavi Director, Investor Relations 416.962.3300 amahdavi@mettrum.com Media Contact Argyle Public Relations Alison George 416-968-7311 x230 Canopy Growth Corporation Tyler Burns Investor Relations 1-885-558-9333 ext. 122 tyler.burns@canopygrowth.com Canopy Growth Corporation Media Contact Jordan Sinclair Director of Communications 1-885-558-9333 ext. 309 jordan@tweed.com Washington D.C.--(Newsfile Corp. - January 30, 2017) - The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced that Wenchi Hu, an Associate Director in the Division of Trading and Markets, will leave the agency in early February. Ms. Hu has headed the division's Office of Clearance and Settlement Supervision since August 2015, after serving three months as its Acting Associate Director. The office oversees registered clearing agencies including those that are designated systemically important in the equity, options, government and mortgage-backed securities, and security-based swaps markets. It routinely coordinates with the Federal Reserve Board, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and regulators outside the U.S. to enhance supervision of clearing agencies. "Wenchi has been a tremendous source of expertise on clearance and settlement matters and played a critical role with respect to the Commission's clearing agency supervision program. During her time at the Commission, she made invaluable contributions to the review of numerous clearing agency initiatives that have had a significant impact on the national clearance and settlement system and the financial markets." said Heather Seidel, Acting Director of the Division of Trading and Markets. During her tenure, Ms. Hu has overseen more than 150 clearing agency initiatives, including National Securities Clearing Corp.'s Accelerated Trade Guaranty, Fixed Income Clearing Corp.'s permanent adoption of its GCF repo pilot program and suspension of the GCF repo interbank program, and ICE Clear Credit's default management, recovery, and wind-down rule change. She also oversaw LCH SA's application for registration as a security-based swap clearing agency, the first by a non-U.S. clearing house. Ms. Hu said, "It has been a great honor to serve at the Commission. I have been privileged to work with extremely talented and dedicated staff members and contribute to the Commission's important work on clearing agency oversight." Ms. Hu joined the SEC in November 2011 as a senior special counsel in the Office of Compliance, Inspections and Examinations and later moved to the Office of Derivatives Policy in the Division of Trading and Markets. She was named Assistant Director in the division's Office of Clearance and Settlement Supervision in June 2013. Ms. Hu is a graduate of the University of California-Berkeley School of Law (Order of the Coif) and holds master's degrees from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Harvard Law School. Before joining the SEC she worked as managing director and senior counsel at Rabobank Nederland in New York and was an associate at Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton LLP. Applications to study at De Montfort University (DMU) from the European Union (EU) have increased by almost a third this year, bucking a national decline in numbers. Last week, the House of Commons heard that across UK universities, applications from EU students had fallen by 7.43%, following the UKs vote for Brexit. But after campaigning across Europe this summer to show how welcoming it is to students from across the world, DMU has seen a rise of 29% in numbers of EU students applying to study. Polish students in particular have responded to DMU, with more than three times as many applications from the country as the year before. Professor Dominic Shellard, Vice-Chancellor of DMU, said the rise showed the importance of taking positive action in response to policy. He said: The moment the referendum result became clear we knew we needed to speak out, to reassure our students and staff that no matter what happened, we would remain welcoming to all. Since then we have carried this message overseas, to cities across the EU, meeting young people and showing them the power and potential of an international education. It is satisfying and motivating to see that these efforts have made a difference. RELATED NEWS DMU launches #LoveInternational campaign to show global support DMU takes 1,087 students to New York for biggest #DMUglobal trip yet See some of the reasons students are choosing DMU In the immediate wake of the decision to leave the EU, DMU launched its #LoveInternational campaign. The initiative both celebrates and reassures international staff and students living and working at universities across the country, and takes this message out overseas. During the summer of 2016, DMU held a series of events in European capitals, celebrating its EU students and staff, as well as its global outlook. The first of these events, helping to reassure potential students and staff that it is business as usual for the university, took place in Nicosia, Cyprus. Events then followed in Warsaw, Poland, the Swedish capital Stockholm, Vilnius, Lithuania and in the German capital Berlin. DMU teamed up with the British Governments GREAT Britain campaign to deliver these events. The university also offers all its students the opportunity to enjoy #DMUglobal, an award-winning programme offering international trips to enhance their studies. Earlier this month DMU undertook the biggest #DMUglobal trip yet, taking 1,087 students and staff to New York City. The visit involved students on many different courses, offering each a tailored experience which illuminated the topics and skills they had covered in the classroom. Fashion students went behind the scenes at the world's premier lingerie designers, Victoria's Secret, while Media Production students visited NBC. Earnix, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based provider of predictive analytics solutions for the financial services industry, completed a $13.5m financing round. Backers included Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP), Vintage Investment Partners and Israel Growth Partners (IGP). In conjunction with the funding, Reuven Ben Menachem, founder and former CEO of Fundtech, a global provider of software to the financial services industry, has been elected as Chairman. In addition, Haim Shani, co-founder and general partner of IGP, has also been appointed as a Director. The company intends to use the funds to accelerate geographic expansion, penetration into the banking vertical, and investment in new products. Led by CEO David Schapiro and founder Sammy Krikler, Earnix provides financial services companies with integrated customer analytics software that combines predictive modeling and optimization with real-time connectivity to core operational systems to improve product, pricing and marketing decisions, while ensuring alignment with changing market dynamics. FinSMEs 30/01/2017 Frontrow Energy Technology Group, a Scottish developer of energy service companies, raised 13m in equity funding. Business Growth Fund committed 10m for a minority stake in the company alongside a 3m investment coming from Frontrows founders. In conjunction with the funding, Mike Sibson, an investor in BGFs Aberdeen office, will join the board of Frontrow. The company intends to use the funds to expand its resources and infrastructure, and to develop young technology companies in the regions energy industry. Formed in 2013 by chairman Graeme Coutts, and led by CEO Stuart Ferguson, Frontrow has acquired, established and grown a group of oil and gas, and energy service companies, including: Well-Sense, a downhole technology business with an innovative and low cost way of collecting data from oil wells; Well-Centric, a provider of wellhead servicing operations offshore; and Interventek, a subsea technology business with a shear and seal valve designed to reduce the cost of subsea well interventions while improving safety and reliability. The companies are based in the same incubator facility in Dyce, Aberdeenshire. The team also includes non-executive director Colin Smith and executive director Frank Summers. FinSMEs 30/01/2017 I fear this budget. I fear that Finance Minister Arun Jaitley might announce an idea that I have liked and advocated: The idea of a Universal Basic Income. I fear it because Jaitley may use this label to justify something quite the opposite. In the process, he might ruin a good idea. Straws in the wind indicate that he might try something to this effect. Demonetisation was part of a grand political design of Garibi Hatao, version 2.0. The idea was to give a nicely wrapped gift to all the poor and engineer an enduring realignment of poor voters towards Modi. Now that most of currency is back in the banks, there is no money to buy that gift. Plan A has failed. The PM is desperately working out Plan B. The Budget speech would be the last occasion before pains of demonetisation begin to weigh too heavily. It may also be an opportune moment to influence the outcome of Punjab and UP elections, now that the Election Commission has agreed to be a mute spectator to this unusual timing of the Union Budget. There is both pressure and temptation to announce something big, radical and populist. Some economists close to the government are hinting that this big measure could be Universal Basic Income. Universal Basic Income is a very simple idea: Every citizen receives a fixed amount of income from the government on a regular basis. There are many versions of this idea but some features are common to most of the versions. One, its coverage is universal and includes every citizen without any distinction. Two, it is unconditional. Three, the income so transferred is enough to cover basic needs. Four, the transfer is in cash, not in kind. Its not a woolly-headed mega dole scheme that it might seem initially. Some of the best economists advocate it because they find it a smart method for ensuring social welfare. An assured income supplement is the surest way to protect the most vulnerable sections of our society. We have a very large proportion of poor and notoriously unreliable ways of distinguishing the poor from the not-so-poor. Hence it is best to offer benefits to everyone, including the few who do not deserve it. This can help cut down on many of the very inefficient and corrupt subsidies being offered to the poor. Direct cash transfer has the benefit of cutting down on bureaucracy and infrastructure. Small experiments suggest that poor families dont blow away additional cash. They use it more wisely that the government would on their behalf. The trillion rupee question is: Can our government afford it? If the Basic Income is kept at Rs 1,000 per person per month, we are talking about an annual expenditure of Rs 15 lakh crore, about three-fourths of the Union Budget last year. Clearly this is unaffordable, even if we bring down the amount by one-half, unless we make some fundamental changes to our revenue generation and expenditure pattern. To this end, many economists have suggested some of these steps. One, increase tax revenue by widening the tax net, not by increasing the tax rate. Demonetisation provides a good opportunity to do so, now that all the money is in the banking system. Two, introduce wealth tax like many other countries and end the income tax exemption given to agriculture for income beyond, let us say, Rs 1 crore. Three, cut down on avoidable government expenditure on defence import. Four, do away with many of the tax-breaks and concessions extended to rich corporates. Five, wind up or prune some of the most leaky and corrupt welfare schemes and replace them with direct cash transfer. Economists have calculated that all these measures could yield a surplus of 9 percent to 12 percent of the state GDP, enough to fund this scheme. But it wont happen overnight. A lot of preparation must go into the making of a scheme like this one. Why do I fear its announcement in the coming budget? I fear that what we would get is not Universal Basic Income, but a parody. From the signals that one can pick up, what the government is thinking about is neither universal nor basic income. This government does not have either the patience to prepare for this scheme or the political will to gather resources required for this. There are no signs of an appetite to cut down on the tax-breaks and subsidies enjoyed by the corporates and the well-to-do. So, it might go for limiting this scheme to the 'poor'. The trouble is that there is no way of identifying the poor that escapes whims of the patwari or the sarpanch. The whole point of universal income is to avoid this trap. Since the government may not have the resources to give money that covers basic needs, it may offer a minuscule transfer that does not pull the extremely poor out of the trap of poverty. I fear something worse. This small cash transfer to a small proportion of the 'poor' may be used as a justification to dismantle many of the ongoing welfare programmes like the Public Distribution System for foodgrains and the MNREGA. Now, both these programmes suffer from leakage and corruption and need serious reform. But at this stage we are not in a position to replace these programmes with cash transfer. The results of some of the experiments have not been encouraging. If these programmes are diluted without adequate and assured cash transfer, then it will be a double whammy for the poor, already suffering from the consequences of demonetisation. If this is the version of Universal Basic Income that Jaitley has in mind, then God save us from this scheme. What, then, should the Finance Minister focus on? First of all, this should be the budget for compensating the poor farmers, daily wage earners, petty traders who have taken a real hit due to demonetisation. Second, the government should come up with a long-term measure to address agrarian distress. The farmers desperately need a scheme for assured returns to their labour. Three, some of the basic welfare measures like maternity benefits and old age pension are waiting universalisation and effective implementation. Four, there is an urgent need to pump in more resources into education, health and irrigation. I would prefer these announcements over Universal Basic Income becoming another jumla. The author is a psephologist, socio-political analyst and National President of Swaraj India For full coverage of Union Budget 2017 click here. Indias power sector has long been riddled with the poor financial health of the power distribution companies (Discoms) despite repeated bailouts from the Central government, the first of which was attempted in 2001. The Ujwal Discom Assurance Yojana (Uday) approved by the Union Cabinet in November 2015 aimed to permanently resolve the financial issues of these companies. While Uday does appear to be a robust attempt by the government to revive their fortunes by making state governments more responsible, it is still early days to evaluate the one-year-old scheme, which has shown mixed results till date. Woes of Discoms Discoms have long been starved of essential outlays which has not been the case for generation and transmission utilities. The focus of the power sector has been on adding to the generation capacity and meeting rising electricity demand. However, the distribution infrastructure at the consumer end has often been neglected. This has left Discoms ill-equipped to cater to the composite mix of consumers they are obligated to serve. Discoms have to deal with multiple challenges: Supplying electricity to a large number of connections with low individual loads, multiple tariff classes with cross-subsidies, power theft and planning for fluctuating. Revenue loss can be attributed to accumulation of regulatory assets, arrears in operational costs, arrears in payments to generation and transmission utilities, interest burdens, etc. State governments in India also often subsidise electricity tariffs for agricultural and domestic consumers. Delay in disbursement of state subsidies, promised to domestic and agricultural consumers, has added to the financial strain on Discoms. As a result, their debt has burgeoned despite attempted bailouts. As per the governments 2015 estimates, the accumulated debt of all Discoms reached Rs 4.3 lakh crore. While operational and financial inefficiencies are recognised as the root cause, exact nature of the problem varies across different states and across different Discoms. Attempted reforms Uday aims at improving operational and financial efficiency of state Discoms. It does not promise any grants but voluntarily asks the states to take-over 75 percent of the debt of the respective Discoms. The scheme appears to build on previous financial restructuring schemes (financial restructuring scheme, 2012 and Distribution Management Responsibility Bill, 2013) and on aligning its targets with other ongoing programs in the power sector. Under Uday, states issue non-statutory liquid ratio (SLR) bonds and state development loan bonds, in the market or directly to the respective banks or financial institutions holding the Discom debt to the appropriate extent. The scheme requires a tripartite agreement between Discoms, the state government and the ministry of power (MoP). So far 21 states have signed MoUs. Jharkhand is the first state to sign under Uday and it cleared historic dues of the state Discom amounting to Rs 5,553 crore. Since then, Jharkhands state Discom has accumulated fresh dues of Rs 1,330 crore. On the other hand, the Haryana state Discom, Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (DHBVN), for the first time ever since its inception recorded a profit of Rs.78 crores, in the first half of financial year 2016-17. Both the Discoms signed for Uday within three months gap, Jharkhand in January 2016 and Haryana in March 2016. It would be short-sighted to attribute either of the states results to the efficacy of Uday scheme. The Uday scheme has to be seen from a long-term perspective. The power ministry, in its memorandum of Uday scheme, announced a plan for states to absorb future losses in a graded manner: 5 percent of the previous years losses in 2017-18, 10 percent in 2018-19, 25 percent in 2019-20, and 50 percent in 2020-21. This indicates that the scheme has allocated financial restructuring of Discoms, anticipating the timelines for improvement in Discoms performance. Further, to improve the operational efficiency of Discoms, Uday has identified parameters, based on which ranking of states is undertaken. These parameters call for better metering, consumer indexing, augmentation of networks, quarterly tariff revisions, etc. Participating states may get priority funding through concurrent schemes on power sector development. Are Discoms entirely to blame? Despite a history of inefficient operations, the distribution segment has struggled due to a lack of investments, high costs of power procurement, delay in payments from government and under-performing power plants. About 80 percent of the costs of supply of Discoms, in aggregate, is for bulk power purchases. Revenue realisation from sale of power barely touches 80 percent of the overall cost of supply. Discoms rely on their Annual Revenue Requirement (ARR) filings, submitted to the state regulators, for any cash surpluses, to invest in additional infrastructure. Given high costs of supply, regulators come under tremendous pressure to minimise increases in ARR, by denying mandated returns to Discoms. The generation and transmission utilities, on the other hand, get high regulated returns. The central public sector generation utilities enjoy heavy post-tax profits, while, in the same sector Discoms are bailed out by various schemes from the government. (The writer is a researcher at the Council on Energy, Environment and Water an independent not-for-profit policy research organisation based in New Delhi. He can be reached at kapardhi.bharadwaj@ceew.in) Farmers body Jai Kisan Andolan, a movement of Swaraj Abhiyan, in association with various farmers organisations and unions has sought a complete overhaul of policy framework related to agriculture and all segments of rural primary production. In a first-of-such-kind effort in the country, Jai Kisan Andolan, led by Yogendra Yadav, will present an alternative budget called Krishi Budget on 1 Februarythe Union Budget Day-from a public platform called Kisan Sansad at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi. This budget would take up issues like agricultural policy, farmers income, minimum support price, and measures to mitigate the effects of demonetisation. Yadav has urged the Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to address agriculture in a holistic and composite manner as it touches all sectors of rural economy; recognise agriculture and all segments of rural primary production, and ensure that the quality of food consumed by citizens meets the highest standards of safety and health. Agriculture policy is whimsical, as exemplified by the decision to import pulses at Rs 60 to Rs 90 per kg, while offering minimum support price (MSP) of Rs 50 per kg to Indian farmers. Finally, demonetisation has had the greatest impact on farmers there was severe cash crunch to purchase inputs for winter planting, prices of produce reached rock-bottom levels and unsold perishable crops had to be thrown away in a country that suffers food shortage, Yadav, president of newly formed political party Swaraj India said. The GDP growth in agriculture is in free fall in the last three years of NDA government. Going by the last two budgets and the string of anti-farmer legislations and policies of this government, farmers movements have held that this is the most farmer unfriendly government of Independent India. This government has been paying only lip service to remedy the acute distress of farmers by announcing fanciful schemes like universal crop insurance as a remedy for crop loss due to natural calamity and doubling of income of farmers. We expect the FM to have a fresh thinking and complete overhaul of policy framework, added Yadav, co-founder member Jai Kisan Andolan. What Krishi Budget wants from FM? Raising farm income and income guarantee to farmers: In Budget 2017-18, the government should spell out a mechanism for doubling the nominal income of farmers and all primary producers in the rural sector in three years. Enact a Farmers Income Guarantee Act to tackle long-term agricultural crisis. There should be budgetary allocations made in 2017-18 to set up a permanent and statutory National Farmers Income Commission for income assessment of farm households and implementing the income guaranteeand a full-fledged income security mechanism from 2018-19. Remunerative and Universal Price Yield Assurance (RUPYA): The Income Guarantee Act should spell out the mechanism for ensuring and achieving income guarantee for all farmers. Such a mechanism should have-- the prices should be remunerative, its benefits should be available to all farmers, it must cover farmers against all forms of crop loss and price deficiency. Compensation for losses from demonetisation: Demonetisation has severely impacted Kharif marketing and Rabi sowing and cultivation. The farmers suffered multiple trauma: harvested crop were piling up with the traders unable to pay in cash, farmers were hard pressed to pay for inputs and wages of agricultural workers. Potato, Tomato, vegetable growers suffered from sharp fall in price, forcing many of them to dump their crop. This state-induced calamity is something the government must compensate the farmers for. Increase in allocation for agriculture sector: In real terms, the allocation to Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare (DACFW) in 2016-17 was only Rs 20,984 crores (after taking into account the shift in budget heads), which was lower than the allocations of 2013-14 and 2014-15. To adequately address all fundamental and structural issues relating to agriculture and all segments of rural primary production, there has to be substantial increase in allocation for agriculture, especially to implement the proposed income guarantee scheme. Allocations to agriculture have to be treated with the same alacrity and respect as allocations to defense, since food sovereignty and security are as important as security of our borders from external invasion. Overhaul of Disaster Relief System and creation of National Disaster Mitigation Fund: Farmers reeling from two consecutive years of drought got very little timely support from the Government, despite orders of the Supreme Court for a slew of relief measures and several long-term reforms. A serious overhaul of the disaster relief system is urgently required, including the institutional machinery between Finance, Home and Agriculture Ministries. Meanwhile, outlays for disaster relief to farmers need to be increased to respond promptly to extreme weather events. Higher allocation for irrigation with special focus on rainfed areas: In 2016, the Finance Minister had made grand and unsubstantiated claims about allocation of Rs 80,000 crore for irrigation. It turned out that much of this was non-budgetary support. Only Rs 12,000 crore was allocated to Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchai Yojana (PMKSY), which combined several existing irrigation schemes. There should be a clear prioritization for minor irrigation projects and watershed development, with the aim of providing protective irrigation to irrigated dry crops in rainfed areas. The rainfed areas which constitute 60% of the cultivated area are most distress-prone. Watershed investments need full attention and cannot be scaled down in any way. Tenant farmers access to credit and credit guarantee fund: Ensuring that tenant farmers or lessee farmers get access to bank loans on high priority, Bhoomiheen Kisan Credit Scheme and NITI Ayog report highlighting the need to support lessee farmers, there should be a Credit Guarantee Fund to increase the bankers' confidence in lending to non-land owning licensed cultivators, both as individual farmers and in joint liability groups. Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs): FPOs should be the focus of a really meaningful Startup India mission. All the incentives being provided under Startup India mission should be extended to FPOs, including tax exemptions, provision of capital and infrastructure. Though agricultural income of farmers is exempt from income tax, the income of FPOs is taxable at 30% from the very first year this is a major disincentive for farmers to come together to establish collective business entities. Government should provide investments into working capital, decentralized storage infrastructure, processing and value addition facilities for farmer collectives, for more direct and branded marketing by producer collectives etc. Besides, Jai Kisan Andolans budget wish list include implementation of recommendations of Ramesh Chand Committee report on MSP fixing formulae should be implemented; market intervention scheme for perishables and products not covered under price support schemes; MSP should be effectively implemented for pulses and oilseeds, operationalizing the new MSP concept articulated in Economic Survey 2016-17 and implementation of universal crop insurance and use of public distribution system to procure pulses and millets for poor consumers. (This is an updated version of an earlier story published on 28 January) Pressure is mounting on top Congress leaders including former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and former finance minister P Chidambaram to respond to the charges that UPA government went out of the way to push public sector banks extend both fund and non-fund support to Vijay Mallyas now grounded airline Kingfisher that owes Rs 9,000 crore to some 17-banks. In a press conference on Monday, the BJP basically repeated the findings of a CNN-News18 expose (read here) that cited correspondence between Vijay Mallya and the UPA top brass to bail out the failing airline. Letter shows Manmohan Singh expressed support for Mallya; Orders were given by PMO to concerned ministries. The corrupt hands that helped Vijay Mallya in getting loans belonged to Manmohan Singh and Chidambaram (Sic), the BJP alleged in the presser today (Monday). Responding to these charges, former civil aviation minister, Vayalar Ravi told CNN-News 18 that he can't remember what I did but any minister in my position would do what I have done. With the BJP taking up the issue claiming evidence, political pressure will mount on the UPA leadership to come clean on the matter. As noted in an earlier column, the fact is Kingfisher Airlines, which never made profit in eight years of its existence, continued to enjoy the support of banks even when a crisis was brewing inside. Banks continued to offer fresh assistance despite seeing the writing on the wall. This would not have been possible without some sort of political backing to the billionaire and silent missives to banks to influence the business decision. But, this is something that warrants deeper investigations. Last week, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had arrested few former bankers including former IDBI Bank chairman, Yogesh Aggarwal, four other ex-officials of the bank including ex-Deputy Managing Director B K Batra and former Kingfisher CFO, A Raghunathan. "It was first exposure to the bank. There was no need for the bank to take the exposure outside the consortium when already other loans were getting stressed," the PTI quoted a senior CBI official involved in the probe. Clearly, the investigators have acted too late in the Kingfisher case. That too only after the media took up the issue in a major way after the liquor-baron (who offered personal guarantee to this loan) left the country on 2 March last year. The industrialist is currently believed to be in the UK. The Narendra-Modi government has made several attempts to bring Mallya back by cancelling his passport and pushing for deportation but didnt find success yet. Despite this, and multiple court summons, the liquor King hasnt yet returned to the country. Even now, banks are currently struggling to recover money by selling Kingfisher assets. Much as the role of the bankers needs to be probed in the context of the violations of lending norms and corruption, the likely involvement of the political dispensation during the whole episode (Kingfisher loan was first termed as NPA in early 2012) too needs to be probed, especially in the context of reports that the UPA-government, particularly the PMO and the ministry of finance favored Mallya and Kingfisher Airlines. Only a thorough independent investigation will reveal whether the charges are true. Its almost a year since Mallya left the country. Since then, the liquor baron has been highly defiant and has defended his case saying he is being a victim of the media trial and unfair treatment by the government and investigators. In an April, 2016 interview to Financial Times (read here), Mallya said by taking my passport or arresting me, they are not getting any money. The billionaire has also contested the Rs 9,000 crore figure. In the hindsight, Mallya has smartly used the legal system to his advantage to delay the loan recovery including forcing Kolkata-based United Bank of India to reverse its decision (to tag Mallya as wilful defaulter) getting a favourable court verdict on technical ground. Remember, the court ruled in favour of Mallya citing that instead of having three members, the grievance redressal committee of the bank had four members. There are not too many parallels to the Mallya-Kingfisher case in Indias banking sector history. This is one of the first cases, where banks, government and judiciary have acted together to chase one individual who have guaranteed a Rs 9,000 crore loan. For that same reason, bringing Mallya and Kingfisher before the law is extremely critical to send out a strong signal to the other large defaulters, especially wilful defaulters. Not just bankers, the role of politicians in the Kingfisher episode needs to be probed thoroughly. If the UPA-government, the PMO and FM, went out of the way to help Mallya, they have a lot of explaining to do. In the midst of fresh threats over his film Padmavati from the Hindu Sena, filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali brokered a fragile peace agreement with the Rajput Sabha. Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Padmavati in fresh trouble; Hindu Sena protests, after Karni Sena row The Rajput Sabha is the umbrella organisation under which the Karni Sena members of which group were responsible for assaulting Bhansali and damaging the sets of his film in Jaipur is included. Bhansali, through his production house, promised to clarify any concerns the Rajput Sabha may have had. Accordingly, a printed statement was issued to the Rajput Sabha members giving them the assurances they required. The Rajput Sabha had put forward three demands: 1. That no scenes of an intimate nature would be depicted between the characters of Rani Padmavati and Alauddin Khilji. 2. That no historical facts would be distorted. 3. That the Rajput Sabha would be shown the film before it was released in theatres. Sanjay Leela Bhansali productions said they would meet these requirements, and their official statement read: "As discussed with you (Shree Rajput Sabha), this is to specifically clarify that there is no romantic dream sequence or any objectionable/romantic scene between Rani Padmavati and Alauddin Khilji. We have been carefully researching and making the film. We are confident that Mewar will be proud of the film made on their revered queen. We do not want to hurt any sentiments and would appreciate if the social organisations and local people support us in making this film and making their queen revered by the world. Request you to please ensure that moving forward there is no action against our production, crew and cast in lieu of the said issue from members of your association and other Rajput associations. We look forward to your cooperation." However, a section of the Karni Sena was not happy with the agreement reached between Bhansali and the Rajput Sabha, and have demanded that the film's title be changed, and the name 'Padmavati' be dropped. Sanjay Leela Bhansali Productions CEO Shobha Sant said that changing the film's name was not in her purview. However, she assured that there was no 'dream sequence' between Khilji and Padmavati, further adding, "We have been doing things in the right manner". Iris Mittenaere, a 23-year-old dental student from France, won the Miss Universe crown on Monday in Manila, the Philippines, where it was held this year. However, Miss India, the 22-year-old Bengaluru-based Roshmitha Harimurthy failed it to make it to the top-13. It's been over 17 years since an Indian contestant was crowned at this pageant. Sushmita Sen (1994) and Lara Dutta (2000) are the only two winners of the Miss Universe crown from India so far. When chica be my side #missuniverse A photo posted by Roshmitha Harimurthy (@roshmitaa) on Jan 21, 2017 at 8:12am PST Miss France Iris Mittenaere was crowned by the outgoing winner Miss Philippines, Pia Wurtzbach, amid much applause. In the final round, the three finalists were asked by the judges panel to talk about how they learned from the one big failure in their lives. "I've failed several times in my life," Mittenaere said. "(But) when you fail, you have to be elevated and you have to try again and keep going ... I have failed before but for me this is the great first opportunity." Miss Haiti, Raquel Pelissier, a 25-year-old survivor of the devastating 2010 earthquake that destroyed her hometown, was named first runner up while Miss Colombia, 23-year-old, Andrea Tovar, was second runner up. Meanwhile, the presence of Sushmita Sen on the Miss Universe judges' panel garnered a lot of attention. Sen said she was happy to be back in Manila, where she had been crowned Miss Universe more than two decades ago. When she was asked what she would be looking for in the Miss Universe contestants, Sen replied: "Elegance". With inputs from agencies Their romance has long been the stuff of every Telugu cinema fan's dreams, and now actors Naga Chaitanya and Samantha Ruth Prabhu have made it official. Chaitanya and Samantha whose fans popularly refer to them by the diminutive 'ChaiSam' were engaged in a small, private ceremony in Hyderabad on Sunday. The engagement was only attended by a few family members and very close friends of the couple. Confirming the news, Chaitanya's father the star Akkineni Nagarjuna took to Twitter to announce the news. "Can't express my happiness in words. It's official now," Nagarjuna tweeted. Nagarjuna also shared a family picture featuring the entire Akkineni clan, including his other soon-to-be daughter-in-law Shriya Bhupal, who will marry his younger son Akhil. Akhil Akkineni also tweeted out his wishes for his brother and his finacee: My brother and my new sister ! I'm the happiest thammudu in the world. Love you guys ! https://t.co/ONfOMLOseG https://t.co/UHRNsv9wSf Akhil Akkineni (@AkhilAkkineni8) January 29, 2017 For the engagement ceremony, Samantha wore a specially designed sari by Kresha Bajaj, while Chaitanya opted for a natty suit. While the couple hasn't announced a wedding date yet, sources close to their families said they were looking to tie the knot in 2018. Chaitanya had previously been quoted as saying: The marriage may happen in the latter part of 2017. We havent fixed a wedding date. My younger brother Akhil is getting married first. That about dashes fans' hopes for a joint wedding celebration for both the Akkineni brothers. Here are photos from the engagement ceremony: Chaitanya and Samantha first met on the sets of Gautham Vasudev Menon's Telugu romantic-drama Ye Maaya Chesave, and went on to work together in films such as Autonagar Surya and Manam. They're pegged to play the leads in an upcoming Telugu adaptation of 2 States. With IANS inputs The fringe goes berserk again and as usual the entire debate around the core issue veers the wrong way. Whether Rani Padmavati was real or fictional is not the central matter here; neither is whether director Sanjay Leela Bhansali took creative liberties with Malik Mohammad Jaisi's account of the Rajput queen written in the 16th century. The fact that Bhansali, the citizen of a free country, was roughed up by members of the Karni Sena, a fringe group claiming to be representing the Rajput community, for making a film of his choice is what should be bothering all. After Karni Sena damaged the sets of the film Padmavati and forced the director to abandon shoot and go back to Mumbai, the Hindu Sena has jumped in, alleging distortion of history by Bhansali. Some of its members allegedly issued death threat to the latter - the organisation has now dissociated itself from the threat - besides warning him against continuing shooting of the film in Mumbai. The Shiv Sena has come up with its two bit saying there should be no character assassination of any Hindu king or queen. If the senas come together there's no way the film is going to have a smooth release. Last heard, Bhansali has clarified to the Karni Sena that there are no objectionable scenes in his movie and agreed to a pre-release screening of the movie for its leaders. Translated in simple words, it means the director has capitulated to pressure and the veto on his film remains with the group. The right questions in this context would be: who allows these people to trample on the freedom of others with such impunity? Where is the state? Why do these outfits - they are often referred to as the fringe but are as mainstream as it can get given the capacity they enjoy to disturb the normal - have a free run everywhere? It needs no overstating that their activity is a travesty of the idea of rights and freedom given to every Indian by the Constitution. This is grand idea is exactly what the state and its instrumentalities are expected to protect and save from vulgarization. Democracies won't simple work without the state standing guarantee for the freedom of people. Curiously, while all our anger is directed against groups such as Karni Sena or Maharashtra Navriman Sena or several such outfit known by different names, the inadequacy of the state to intervene gets under noticed. It is quite evident by now that state after state are happy to cede space to vigilante groups. In Maharashtra, the government sought to play mediator between MNS and producer Karan Johar during the Ae Dil Hai Mushkil controversy. In the present case, the Rajasthan government has not intervened strongly in favour of Bhansali, virtually leaving him helpless. Other states react in the same way when such outfits chose to assert themselves over individuals. The police refuse to act. Courts are an option but with the governments deciding to play safe, help from them won't amount to much. Political parties have long stopped taking an unambiguous position in such matters. They usually take the populist position, fearing a backlash if they take a firm position this ay or that. They fear that there would be a political price to pay. Now, who do people like Bhansali or Karan Johar fall back on? Nobody really. If the film fraternity it applies to all in the intellectual and creative community as well were united and had some way to arm-twist governments it would help. It is the same way the fringe groups exert pressure on the latter - if you act against us, forget our votes next time. Does this mean that the state is losing its moral authority? When it fails to safeguard the rights of individuals then it certainly is. If the current state of affairs continues we would soon have gangs of goons making lives of citizens miserable. Is there a solution to it? If there's one it is not visible. The country needs to introspect. Oscar season is looking more and more like one very well-dressed protest against President Donald Trump. In speech after fiery speech at Sunday night's Screen Actors Guild Awards, winners struck a defiant tone against Trump's sweeping immigration ban. Their words varied from tender personal reflections to full-throated battle cries, but they were nearly uniform in channeling the nationwide demonstrations sparked by Trump's halting of immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim nations. The SAG Awards culminated with the evening's top honour, best movie ensemble, going to the cast of Hidden Figures, an uplifting drama about African-American mathematicians who aided NASA's 1960s space race, starring Taraji P Henson, Janelle Monae and Octavia Spencer. Henson concluded the show the same way its first presenter, Ashton Kutcher, began it: with the kind of pointed politics that have traditionally been more an aberration than a constant at Hollywood award shows. "This story is about unity," said Henson, who stars alongside Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monae in Hidden Figures. ''This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race. We win. Love wins. Every time." It was a surprise win for Hidden Figures. With the Oscar front-runner La La Land (which took the Producers Guild Awards' top honour on Saturday) not nominated in the category, most expected a contest between Moonlight or Manchester by the Sea. Such a result could now mean Hidden Figures is the strongest challenger to the La La Land dominance, or, perhaps, that none of the three films will be able to muster enough to topple the song-and-dance juggernaut. Yet if Damien Chazelle's musical is to go on to win best picture, it will be just the second film to do so without a SAG ensemble nod in the category's history. Only Mel Gibson's Braveheart managed it in 1996. But such Oscar handicapping usually the prime drama at the SAG Awards largely took a backseat to politics on Sunday. (That is, with the possible exception of Denzel Washington's surprise win over Casey Affleck.) Whichever film ultimately triumphs at the Oscars, it seems assured of being dwarfed by the growing off-screen clamour. The immigration ban has already altered the Academy Awards. On Sunday, the revered Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi, whose A Salesman is nominated for best foreign language film, said he would boycott the Oscars, even if he was allowed to travel for them. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who added another honor for her performance on the political satire Veep, said she was the daughter of an immigrant who fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France. "Because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes," said Louis-Dreyfus. "And this immigrant ban is a blemish and it is un-American." Perhaps the most moving speech came from Mahershala Ali, who won best supporting actor for his acclaimed performance in Barry Jenkins' coming-of-age portrait, Moonlight. Ali said the film, about a shy, gay Miami boy's hard life, held lessons of acceptance. "We see what happens when you persecute people," Ali said. "The fold into themselves." Ali said his own relationship with his mother exemplified tolerance. The son of a Protestant minister, Ali converted to Islam 17 years ago. "We put things to the side," Ali said of their differences. "I'm able to see her. She's able to see me. We love each other. The love has grown. That stuff is minutia. It's not that important." Ali was among the several Oscar favorites who cemented their front-runner status, including best-actress winner Emma Stone for La La Land and best-supporting actress winner Viola Davis for Fences. But best actor went to Davis's co-star (and director) Washington for his performance in the August Wilson adaptation. Most expected the award to go to Affleck, apparently including Washington himself. "I'm a God-fearing man," he said, still shaking his head as he reached the podium. "I'm supposed to have faith, but I didn't have faith." The most blistering speech was by David Harbour, who led the cast of Netflix's Stranger Things another big surprise winner on stage to accept best ensemble in a TV drama series. "We will hunt monsters," Harbour vowed in lengthy remarks that drew a standing ovation. The hit Netflix series Orange Is the New Black won best ensemble in a comedy series for the third straight year. "We stand up here representing a diverse group of people, representing generations of families who have sought a better life here from places like Nigeria, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Ireland," said star Taylor Schilling, while a cast member added "Brooklyn!" ''And we know that it's going to be up to us and all you, probably, to keep telling stories that show what unites us is stronger than the forces that divide us." Lily Tomlin was the lifetime achievement honoree on Sunday. The 77-year-old actress gave a warm, rollicking speech that dispensed both drinking advice and regret over wasting "a lot of time being ambitious about the wrong things." "Did you hear? The Doomsday Clock has been moved up to two and a half minutes before midnight," said Tomlin. "And this award, it came just in the nick of time." Here's a complete list of winners at Sunday's 23rd annual Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles: MOVIES Actor: Denzel Washington, Fences Actress: Emma Stone, La La Land Supporting actor: Mahershala Ali, Moonlight Supporting actress: Viola Davis, Fences Cast: Hidden Figures Stunt ensemble: Hacksaw Ridge TELEVISION Actor in a comedy series: William H Macy, Shameless Actress in a comedy series: Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Veep Comedy series cast: Orange is the New Black Actor in a movie or miniseries: Bryan Cranston, All the Way Actress in a movie or miniseries: Sarah Paulson, The People v OJ Simpson: American Crime Story Drama series cast: Stranger Things Actor in a drama series: John Lithgow, The Crown Actress in a drama series: Claire Foy, The Crown Stunt ensemble: Game of Thrones LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT Lily Tomlin Given our contemporary political culture, it is perhaps too much to expect the Indian political class to come out with a full-throated condemnation of the violent attack on film director Sanjay Leela Bhansali. Yet, illusions and hopes have a way of persisting, even when they fly in the face of reality. One wonders why our top political leaders, many of them currently engaged in energetic poll campaigns, could not have done their bit in expressing solidarity with Bhansali. One wonders why, as they addressed large groups of the electorate in different parts of the country, the leaders did not warn the people of the dangers of promoting cultural totalitarianism. It is only logical to wonder whether such silence is wilful and expedient on the part of politicians. Whether such chronic behaviour is prompted by tactical poll considerations, where politicians do not want to counter such regressive sentiments of regional chauvinism. Last Friday, activists of Karni Sena (a Rajput organisation) entered the Jaigarh Fort and assaulted Bhansali, slapping him around, tearing his shirt. The assaulters alleged that Bhansalis film Padmavati, which he was shooting in Rajasthan at that time, presents a distorted picture. The director, according to them, has portrayed the Rajput queen Padmavati as being in love with the powerful medieval century Khilji dynasty ruler, Alauddin Khilji. In the aftermath of the violent incident, Bhansali packed up and quit the site where he was shooting. He has now even clarified that his film Padmavati does not contain any dream sequence or objectionable scene between Padmavati and Alauddin Khilj. That the director is compelled to furnish explanations about his forthcoming film to a gang of lumpens with little or no idea of history or cinema, shows how dangerous and farcical the situation has become. We clarify that there is no dream sequence or any objectionable scene between Rani Padmavati and Allauddin Khilji. We have been carefully researching and making the film ... The attack on the shoot and crew was uncalled for and was extremely damaging to the image of the beautiful city of Jaipur, the directors statement reads. Lets be clear. The question whether Bhansalis film does or does not have so-called objectionable scenes of intimacy between Padmavati and Alauddin is an irrelevant one. Cinema grants its filmmakers the creative and artistic licence to play around with the script and history. Documentaries might be mandated to represent characters or events as they were or as they happened although even this is no longer strictly true. Even if Bhansali included content in his film which certain sections of people find offensive, he is well within his rights to do so. What has made this sort of cultural dictatorship all too normal in this country is the lack of active intervention by politicians in such situations whenever fiats are issued and enforced by mobs against artistes. If Rajasthans Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government has been less than audible in voicing its condemnation over the assault, politicians from either side of the aisle have hardly made themselves heard any louder. This pattern of silence or muted criticism is what has made the Indian political class complicit with the mobs, in enforcing and promoting the rising cultural censorship across the country. Unfortunately, political parties are always most vociferous when it comes to issues of appointment of heads of cultural institutions. And that seems to be the only issue in the realm of culture that provokes politicians to intervene in a decisive manner. By now India has a deeply entrenched culture where ruling political parties of the day appoint their loyalists to top educational and cultural institutions, regardless of the suitability for the job. And the opposition parties, on their part, do what they do best launch fierce attacks on the appointees. Recall in this context last years vociferous opposition to the BJP appointee, Pahlaj Nihalini, as the chairperson of the Central Board of Film Certification. But the very same parties on both sides of the divide, either look away, or mumble a whispered reproach to groups regularly holding artistes to ransom. Sadly, political parties dont seem to be aware of the threat that these escalating incidents have come to pose to Indias creative industries and personalities. They simply dont care about the attrition of artistic freedom, and the culture of fear that has come to stay. Sanjay Leela Bhansali's historical epic Padmavati has found itself in the midst of a fresh controversy after another outfit the Hindu Sena protested against its depiction of 'distorted history'. A member of the group reportedly also issued a death threat 'to Bollywood' for standing up in support of Bhansali and his film, after the Karni Sena which claims to represents the interests of the Rajput community damaged his sets in Jaipur and roughed up the famed auteur. If they shoot for Padmavati in Mumbai, we will go break the set in Mumbai too. And if Bollywood unites, we will not leave them too. This is a Hindu nation and we wont let people demean our culture, the Hindu Sena member was quoted as saying in media reports. The Hindu Sena has dissociated itself from the threats issued by its member(s) and said action would be taken against those found to be guilty. At the same time, the group has also asked for a written explanation from Sanjay Leela Bhansali regarding the story of his film. Meanwhile, the Shiv Sena said that the decision of the Central Board of Film Certification would be final, but the filmmaker would need to accountable as well for any 'objectionable portrayal'. Spokesperson Manisha Kayande was quoted by ANI as saying: The movie is still being made and the Censor Board needs to be alert. And if there is character distortion of any gallant Hindu kings and queens, then definitely it is objectionable. Agreed that the Censor Board certificate is the final word but he directors and story writers also need to do their part, she said. Previously the Patidar Sena had protested against perceived historical 'inaccuracies' in Padmavati. A report in Ahmedabad Mirror, dated 20 September, has quoted Hardik Patel, the president of the PNS as saying that they wouldn't allow Bhansali to shoot or screen his film in Rajasthan and Gujarat, unless he assured them that Rani Padmini's portrayal would be historically accurate. The attack on Bhansali by the Karni Sena on Friday, 27 January 2017, drew widespread censure from the Hindi film industry. Karan Johar, Anurag Kashyap and Sonam Kapoor were among those who immediately expressed their support for Bhansali. Padmavati actors Deepika Padukone and Ranveer Singh also took to social media to assure their followers that there was no distortion of historical facts in the film. Bihar's deputy chief minister Tejashwi Yadav also condemned the attacks on Bhansali and Padmavati and said the team were welcome to shoot in their state. Padmavati was first staged as an opera in Paris by Sanjay Leela Bhansali in 2008. This is its big screen adaptation. Bhansali's previous film Bajirao Mastani too was embroiled in protests over historical accuracy. By Nate Raymond | NEW YORK NEW YORK A former analyst at Michael Dell's New York-based investment fund was convicted of insider trading on Monday, just a week after he was arrested for refusing to come to court to face trial.John Afriyie, 29, was found guilty by a federal jury in Manhattan of securities fraud and wire fraud for misusing secret information about a deal that MSD Capital, named for the Dell Inc founder, was considering financing. Jurors immediately began hearing additional evidence to decide whether Afriyie should forfeit about $2.6 million, money that prosecutors said he made through insider trading and re-investing his over $1.5 million in illegal profits.Lawyers for Afriyie were not immediately available to comment.The trial was the latest to spill out of a wave of insider trading cases by Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara's office, which has secured 85 individuals' convictions since 2009. Prosecutors said that in early 2016, Afriyie learned about Apollo Global Management LLC's (APO.N) planned $7 billion deal to buy security company ADT Corp after the private equity firm approached MSD about providing financing.After MSD employees were emailed about a restriction imposed on trading in ADT stock, Afriyie accessed a shared folder on MSD's network server to learn about Apollo's pending deal, prosecutors said.He then bought ADT call options for $24,254 through a brokerage account in his mother's name, enabling him to earn more than $1.5 million when the deal was announced, prosecutors said. Afriyie denied wrongdoing. Defense attorney Ezra Spilke told jurors on Monday that the purported ADT inside information had become stale due to new developments and his trades amounted to betting. "These are lottery tickets," Spilke said in his closing argument.The trial began a day later than planned, after Afriyie on Jan. 23 refused to come to court, prompting the U.S. Marshals Service to arrest him at a hotel in East Windsor, New Jersey. Spilke called Afriyie's absence a "misguided attempt to fire his counsel," but U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer determined Afriyie had given "willfully untrue" reasons for not attending court. The judge revoked Afriyie's bail as a result of his absence. Defense lawyers soon after asked Engelmayer for a psychiatric evaluation of Afriyie, saying in a court filing that Afriyie had been showing an "absence of rational thinking." Engelmayer denied the request.The case is U.S. v. Afriyie, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 16-cr-337. (Reporting by Nate Raymond in New York; Editing by Phil Berlowitz) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. By Maya Nikolaeva, Jean-Baptiste Vey and Michel Rose | PARIS PARIS French authorities will head to London next week for a roadshow to try to lure financial jobs to Paris which will show off the French capital's advantages versus Frankfurt as an alternative to Britain's financial centre.Valerie Pecresse, the head of the wider Paris region and Gerard Mestrallet, president of France's finance industry lobby Europlace, will next Monday meet executives from BlackRock, Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BAC.N) and others to present a study by McKinsey, aimed at highlighting the attractions of Paris.In the run up to Britain's June vote on Brexit, leading financial firms said they would move jobs out of the country if there was a vote to leave but have set out few details since on how many will go or where to."The battle narrows down to Paris and Frankfurt," a spokesman for Pecresse told Reuters.HSBC (HSBA.L), Europe's biggest bank, has said it could move a part of its operations to Paris. HSBC already has a large subsidiary in Paris that holds most of the licences needed by an investment bank."There will be others," one French minister, who declined to be named, told Reuters.Paris has a network of international law firms and asset managers and the city is also home to the European markets authority, ESMA and has its own financial supervisor, which looks after some of the largest banks in the eurozone, French officials say. "We have a very good supervisor and that's important for American banks," a source at the French finance ministry said. Also in Paris's favour is its status as Europe's only other "world city" alongside London, with some of the most-visited cultural attractions in the world and the headquarters of many multinational companies, French authorities say. Germany is also on a charm offensive to attract finance jobs from Britain. The country's senior regulators met about 50 envoys from foreign banks on Monday to explain how they could move business to Europe's biggest economy after Britain leaves the European Union, German financial watchdog Bafin said.Beyond the financial sector, Paris's allure has recently been boosted by an influx of investment in its tech sector, with Facebook (FB.O) choosing the French capital to open its first ever start-up incubator. But French officials have acknowledged France's strict labour laws can put off businesses. The finance ministry source said the French administration was working on ways to allow firms to lay off teams of 50 people or so more easily, but this could not be implemented before the presidential election this spring.Nordine Hachemi, chairman and chief executive of Kaufman & Broad, a France-based property developer and builder, is optimistic about Paris's attractions but expects any actual moves to take time. "We should be realistic, no-one is going to rush to settle in Paris," Hachemi told Reuters, adding that he saw no impact from Brexit on the property market with regards to companies considering relocation plans."This will take time ... There is competition with other European cities, there is no impact at this stage," he said.Behind the scenes though, companies and employees are already making enquiries with French institutions about practical matters.Ecole Internationale Bilingue, one of Paris' most prestigious bilingual schools, told Reuters they received quite a lot of registration requests from British-based families who were concerned about the consequences of Brexit. (Reporting by Maya Nikolaeva, Jean-Baptiste Vey and Michel Rose; Additional reporting by Emmanuel Jarry, Julien Ponthus and Matthieu Protard. Editing by Jane Merriman) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. By Arwa Gaballa, Eric Knecht and Michael Georgy | CAIRO/ERBIL, Iraq CAIRO/ERBIL, Iraq Fuad Sharef and his family waited two years for a visa to settle in the United States, selling their home and quitting jobs and schools in Iraq before setting off on Saturday for a new life they saw as a reward for working with U.S. organisations. But Sharef, his wife and three children were prevented from boarding their connecting flight to New York from Cairo airport on Saturday. They were sudden victims of U.S. President Donald Trump's new travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries.Their passports confiscated, the distraught family was detained overnight at Cairo airport and forced to board a flight back to the northern Iraqi city of Erbil on Sunday morning."We were treated like drug dealers, escorted by deportation officers," Sharef told Reuters by telephone from Cairo airport. "I feel very guilty towards my wife and kids. I feel like I'm the reason behind their dismay." In the most sweeping use of his presidential powers since taking office a week ago, Trump signed an order on Friday suspending the entry of people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for at least 90 days. He said this would help safeguard the United States from terrorists. The travel curbs took effect immediately, wreaking havoc and confusion for would-be travellers with passports from the seven countries. Sharef and his family were among the first victims.Sharef and his family arrived at Erbil International Airport looking demoralised, wondering how Trump could sign a document that shattered their dreams in an instant, even though their papers were in order.He likened Trump's decision to the dictatorship of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein."I believe it is a terrible error in the U.S., terrible error in the history of the United States. I thought America is an institution and democracy," said Sharef. "I see (it is) like autocracy, someone signs and effective immediately what does this mean? It is just like Saddam Hussein's decisions. Yeah without going back to the Congress, I dont understand." Sharef said he was employed by a pharmaceutical company before leaving Iraq, but had worked on projects funded by U.S. organisations such as USAID in the years following the 2003 U.S.-led invasion and occupation of Iraq. The family applied for a U.S. visa in September 2014 as security conditions in Iraq deteriorated, with Islamic State insurgents seizing swathes of the country and carrying out mass killings. Sharef's work with the United States made him particularly vulnerable to attack by militants who view him as a traitor. "I am broken, I am totally broken, I don't understand how he rewards those people who helped him. I don't understand this. When we worked with them, we put our lives, my life, my family's life, in jeopardy," said Sharef."And we were easy target every day for terrorist groups. Everyone who works with Americans is regarded as an infidel."AFTER RISKING THEIR LIVES Sharef applied to emigrate via a programme known as Special Immigrant Visa, which was created by U.S. lawmakers to help the tens of thousands of Iraqis who risked their lives helping Americans after the 2003 invasion. At least 7,000 Iraqis, many of them interpreters for the U.S. military, have settled in the United States under SIV auspices since 2008, while some 500 more are being processed, State Department figures show. Another 58,000 Iraqis have been awaiting interviews under the Direct Access Program for U.S.-affiliated Iraqis, according to the International Refugee Assistance Project.Sharef's friend Mona Fetouh said she had worked with him on a USAID-funded local governance and civil society project in 2004. Fetouh, a U.S. resident, said she gave Sharef a recommendation for his SIV application.Originally due to fly on Feb. 1, the family decided to travel earlier after news leaked of Trump's plan to issue new immigration restrictions. But they were too late."My plan was to go to Nashville, Tennessee. I have friends there. I have arranged with them and they are preparing house and finding house for me, jobs," said Sharef. "A lot of dreams, yeah...Financially this journey cost me 5000 dollars and all went down the drain."Sharef, father of two girls and a boy, said the family was still in shock and did not know what steps to take next. They would be staying temporarily with Sharef's brother in Erbil. "I don't know. Maybe I will send an email to the American embassy in Baghdad asking for an explanation," he said. Asked if he feared for his life returning to Iraq, he said:"Maybe it's less dangerous in light of the relative regression of Islamic State influence in Mosul, but during my years of work, my life and the lives of my family were constantly in danger and I'm now at risk of being at threat at any moment. There are no guarantees."An Iraqi army offensive has been gradually dislodging Islamic State from the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.One of Sharef's biggest challenges is explaining the situation to his children."My little daughter every day keeps asking me when we are going to America and I tried to explain to her that there is a suspension one month and she was calculating days," he said."Okay at that date the suspension will finish and the day after we go, yes dad?" (Writing by Lin Noueihed; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Stephen Powell) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. By Saad Sayeed | ISLAMABAD ISLAMABAD Two more missing Pakistani activists have reappeared after vanishing earlier this month, their families told Reuters on Monday, but relatives were unable to shed any light on who had been holding the men or why.Waqas Goraya and Ahmed Raza Naseer, who went missing from the eastern city of Lahore and from southern Punjab province, respectively, returned on Saturday, but their families waited to get them to safe places before informing the media. They were among five well known activists who went missing within days of one another in Pakistan earlier this month, only one of whom remains unaccounted for.All five had contributed to blogs or were involved in social work critical of human rights violations or the influence of the military, leading to speculation they may have been arrested - although the government has repeatedly denied police were holding the men.The military and other state agencies have declined to make any official comment. In their absence, the five were accused on social media and some mainstream television programs of blasphemy against Islam, a highly charged allegation in Pakistan that could put their lives at risk from hardline religious groups. Two of the families confirmed receiving death threats from a known Islamist militant group but asked Reuters not to publish details. The whereabouts of the fifth activist, Samar Abbas, are still unknown, his brother Ghazanfar Abbas told Reuters.Two other missing activists, writer and professor Salman Haider and blogger Aasim Saeed, also returned on Saturday. Naseer's brother Tahir said that his brother was in good health and had not spoken about who had been holding him since his disappearance on Jan. 7. "He did say that he was questioned for two days and that he had to hand over all his data, from bank details to email information," said Tahir Naseer.Waqas Goraya's wife, Mescha, said she had not yet met with her husband but confirmed speaking with him on the phone and added that he was "at a safe house" whose location "cannot be disclosed to anyone for security reasons". She said she had not asked where he had been, and did not plan to "unless he talks by himself". Goraya was visiting Pakistan from the Netherlands with his wife and son when he went missing on Jan. 4. On Sunday, activist Saeed's father told Reuters that his son had been detained by "state agencies" while visiting Pakistan from Singapore, but did not specify which one. (Reporting by Saad Sayeed; Editing by Mark Trevelyan) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. On Saturday, two policemen died after their vehicle ran into a state transport bus after a head-on collision with a bike in Mysuru, Karnataka. The News Minute reported that more than the accident, the behaviour of the bystanders was more shocking, for they gathered around the crash-site to click pictures instead of helping the policeman who was still alive at the time. The accident happened in Alanahalli on the the Mysuru-T Narasipura road on Saturday morning. The two cops 32-year-old Lakshman, the driver of the jeep and 38-year-old inspector Mahesh Kumar were on their way to Suttur for security arrangements for a yatra. Lakshman died on the spot, whereas Mahesh died due to excessive bleeding while stuck in the jeep for half an hour, when the Mysuru SP and his team reached the spot of the accident. We arrived at the spot some 25 minutes after the accident, and took Mahesh Kumar to a nearby private hospital. He succumbed to his injuries within minutes, the Mysuru SP told The News Minute. Every time I miss an opportunity to put some form of cruelty right, I feel enormously guilty almost as If I had been responsible for it myself. I have always found people in Karnataka extremely vicious in their attitude towards animals. All their festivals involve some form of animal torture and killing from the Ashvamedha Yagna of Mysore, where live horses were thrown into the fire (until Diana Ratnagar stopped it, I think) to the Makar Sankranti or harvest festival. Kadaballi is a village on the Bangalore-Mangalore national highway in the Nagamangala taluka of Mandya. Its deity is Kaveti Ranganatha. This deity is to be worshipped with live foxes on the day after the harvest festival of Makara Sankranti. The hunting of foxes begins the day before Sankranti and takes three days. Nets, that are blessed by the temple, are used to hunt them in the valleys of the Kadaballi region, Kadehalligudda Valley spreading out to Hassan district. The hunters split into two groups. The first group beats drums and blows horns to drive the foxes from their hideaways. The other group waits with nets outside the holes. Scared by the noise, the foxes rush out and are captured. The more that are caught, the luckier the village. Usually, five to ten foxes are trapped. Sometimes, the foxes are killed while being captured and are buried on the spot, which becomes a "sacred" place. These are the lucky ones. The captured foxes are brought back, with their mouths and legs tied, and kept in a pen behind the temple. About 30,000 people congregate for the "festivities", the liquor flows, firecrackers are exploded. At 10 pm, the trussed foxes, already half-dead with fright, are dragged out. Their ears are pierced with gold rings and they are stuffed onto a decorated chariot and taken in a noisy procession of drums, cymbals and dance to the temple. There, the animals are garlanded, water is sprinkled on them. Firecrackers are tied to their tails and lit. Their legs are untied and they run into the night with their tails on fire. Most die of their wounds. Dhanaganahalli in Mysore Taluka also has "fox-worship". Here, they are even more brutal. The foxes have their mouths sewn shut with ordinary needle and thread (think of that happening to your mouth). With blood dripping from their mouths, the defenceless animals are presented to the deity. After that, their lower right ears are cut off and stray dogs, who have been captured days in advance and kept hungry, are let loose on the tied animals. Mauled, bleeding, dying, the foxes are let loose. Ask the villagers why they do this and they answer that they regard the fox as an incarnation of God. I can now understand why Jesus Christ was crucified! If that is what they do to their gods "in the interests of the prosperity of the village", what would they do to demons? Better not to ask. A local paper gave a large photograph of the ceremony. It shows a tiny red fox, its tongue sticking out of its tied mouth while the surrounding urchins push and pull at it with ropes. The Indian fox (Vulpes bengalensis) is found in southern India. It is a self-reliant and solitary animal that eats food ranging from berries, plant material and offal, to small birds and rodents. Food, that is not immediately needed by the animal, is buried. It has silvery red, thick, long fur, a bushy tail and upright ears. It makes no great demands from its environment, living in rabbit dens which it enlarges, or digging its own holes. Sometimes, it even shares its den with other animals, wild cats, rabbits, even owls. Apparently, a peace treaty is in operation. It does not wander too far from its den and so villagers, who keep a sharp lookout for these holes throughout the year, have an easy time capturing it. Fox calls range from a soft whimpering, or purring, sound between mother and child, a howl which is an abandonment or loneliness call, to a loud yapping when threatened. The belief that a fox raids villages for its chickens or piglets is greatly exaggerated. In fact, the fox is so timid that, were it to venture near a human habitation, it usually takes one aggressive rooster to drive it off. As it is, young foxes have a very high mortality rate. The female bears three to five young, but most die before they become independent. If the mother is killed, the father takes over the rearing. In fact, as soon as the young are born, the father starts bringing food for the mother to the den. He takes his family for a "walkabout" when they become old enough to see the world. The family unit is a loving, caring one. The ability of the fox to elude its hunters is extremely limited. They can be hunted year after year at the same sites. It can be easily attracted by imitating its call and it comes readily, throwing caution to the winds. It does not understand even the rudiments of disguise. It will often fail to jump into an available hole till its hunters are gone. It will not run into water to disguise its scent while even deer do that. It is simply a shy and anxious creature that lives as best as it can on whatever is available. The Indian fox is small and lacks the strong odour of other foxes. It even makes a good pet. This is the animal that villagers in Karnataka deify and then mutilate and kill. This must not happen next year. Please write to the Animal Welfare Board of India in Chennai to take anticipatory action by informing the police. Write to the environment minister of Karnataka and tell him to use the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act to arrest a few of the villagers, so that this evil is wiped out. Even write letters to the Deccan Herald, or any other paper in Bangalore, so that you can make this issue important. The lives of the few remaining foxes depend on you and me. To join the animal welfare movement, contact gandhim@nic.in, www.peopleforanimalsindia.org. Mumbai: Bhoomata Brigade chief and gender rights activist Trupti Desai, who shot to fame for spearheading the agitation seeking parity to women over their restricted entry into places of worship, has now announced to launch a new campaign for a liquor-free Maharashtra. "I am going to launch the statewide campaign soon, and it will start from Pune. There are more men who consume liquor but its the women suffer most because of it. Liquor consumption also increases domestic violence; Hence I am keen on setting up 'Taigiri' groups that would extend support to women suffering in such cases," Desai told PTI on Monday. "If a district like Chandrapur can successfully implement a flat ban on liquor, why not entire Maharashtra state follow suit," Desai said. If Guardian ministers of each district initiate the process, liquor ban can be implemented in a few days, she felt. Desai alleged that the state government seems to be not concerned with key issues of liquor consumption and its impact on lives of people, especially women in this state. "After holding a couple of meetings with the members of the Brigade, I will soon launch the campaign," Desai said. "I am going to follow the path of Mahatma Gandhi during my agitation across the state. If the state fails to take appropriate steps, then I am going to intensify the agitation," Desai warned. Chandigarh: The members of Jat community in Haryana on Monday continued their agitation in 18 districts of the state seeking reservation in government jobs and other demands. Amid elaborate security arrangements, the Jats held dharnas at several locations, which remained peaceful, officials said. "The dharnas remained peaceful in 18 districts," All India Jat Aarakshan Sangharsh Samiti (AIJASS) president Yashpal Malik told PTI over phone, adding from 3 February the Jats will hold dharnas in Delhi in support of those agitating in Haryana. "On February 3, we will begin with a dharna at Narela and then on the following days dharnas will be held in 11 districts of Delhi every day," he said. The call for the fresh stir has been given by some Jat outfits, especially those owing allegiance to AIJASS. Since Sunday, the members of Jat community have been staging peaceful dharnas at Ramayan village near Hisar-Bhiwani railway track, Jolilath village on Sonipat-Gohana road, Jassia village on Rohtak highway, Rasalwala Chowk in Jhajjar, Umrakheri village near Panipat-Shamli road, Bala village near Assandh road in Karnal and at some other places. From Monday, the agitation will begin in a couple of more districts, Malik said. Internet services have been suspended in the vicinity of dharna sites to check spread of rumours. Authorities have imposed prohibitory orders under Section 144 of CrPC in some areas of the sensitive districts, banning gathering of five or more people. Paramilitary forces are out in sensitive areas while heavy police force has been deployed to maintain strict vigil. The central forces have conducted flag marches in some sensitive areas, officials said. During a similar stir a year ago, there were 30 deaths and widespread destruction of property. This time, Haryana has been put on maximum alert, officials said. All the Deputy Commissioners and Superintendents of Police have been directed to ensure that highways and railway tracks are not obstructed and no damage is caused to property, they said. The state government has warned agitators against taking law in their hands. "People can protest peacefully, but if anyone takes law in one's hands, then strict action will be taken," a senior official said in Chandigarh. Rapid Action Force has been deployed at Munak canal in Sonipat district to ensure uninterrupted water supply to the national capital. The agitators had damaged the canal during last year's stir. Meanwhile, in Hisar, the dharna by Jats near Ramayan village was addressed by various leaders of the community on the second day of the agitation amid elaborate security arrangements. Ram Bhagat Malik, spokesperson of AIJASS claimed that the dharna would continue in a peaceful manner. While addressing a gathering, the leaders said those Jat or Khap leaders "who betrayed the community by siding with the government this time also, will have to face the consequences. The community will teach them a lesson. They have been trying to weaken the agitation". Notably, Rohtak and some of its neighbouring districts, including Sonipat and Jhajjar had been worst-hit by the violence which broke out during last year's Jat stir. Apart from the quota demand, the agitators are demanding release of arrested Jat youths from jails, withdrawal of cases registered during last year's agitation and grant of government jobs to the kin of youths killed and those injured during last years stir. Kerala has always been a land of violent student strikes, particularly by the Students Federation of India (SFI), the students wing of the CPM; but when it comes to a landmark uprising against a non-government law college thats currently rocking the capital city, they seemed to have conveniently embraced moderatism. While all the student unions of the Congress, the CPI, the BJP and the MSF (of the Muslim League) are in it together, the SFI seems to be overtly worried about the possible hurt the agitation could cause the management of the institution than the grievances of the future of the students. The reason is obvious and simple its parent CPM is in power and it owes so much to the the institution in question the Kerala Law Academy which incidentally is a hot potato for other political parties too. Ironically, although the Law Academy is patronised by almost all political parties because a large number of their leaders and nominees have studied there, the CPM and the SFI are clearly going out of their way to help the institution. On Saturday, when the Kerala University Syndicate, which may be compared to a state Cabinet in terms of its decision making powers on university matters, met to decide on the complaints of the students, the nominees of the CPM sabotaged the latters main demand of the removal of the principal of the college and glossed over other the complaints, including return of a vast tract of government land. The students have been on a warpath for 20 days now and have been unrelenting in their primary demand that the principal should step down. Their charges against her are serious and include intimidation, malpractice, victimisation, favouritism, caste-based discrimination, abuse of authority, and unlawful misdemeanour. In the eyes of the agitating students, the academy bespeaks a place thats a law unto itself. A committee of the syndicate in fact undertook an investigation and endorsed the complaints of the students, but when it came to real action, the CPM/SFI strategically dragged their feet. Instead of taking drastic action as demanded by the students, they soft-pedalled the issue and got away with a minor spank for the principal. They didnt want to accede to the students demands and just debarred her from exam duties for five years. In effect, this would mean nothing because the principal could continue and even do everything she has been allegedly doing, by proxy. And the students didnt accept the decision and are continuing with their strike a curious case of self-proclaimed revolutionary Marxists siding with the management than the protesters, and the latter thumbing their nose at them. Whats stranger than the decision is the reasoning by the CPM. According to them, the university doesnt have the authority to remove the principal and any more drastic decision by them would have been challenged by the college-management in a court of law. This argument had never been heard in Kerala in which a student body is speaking for a management under the cover of law or a student body is limiting its decisions for fear of possible legal retaliation. When one looks back at the violent strikes that the SFI took out against even milder forms of privatisation in education or steps by college managements to augment their educational portfolios in the state, their latest position is bizarre. In the mid-eighties, when an extremely reputed private eye hospital, the only one of its kind then in the state, thought of starting a masters course, the party went on a rampage. The decision was rolled back. Later, when there were was a move of permitting nine polytechniques and one ayurveda college in the private sector, a violent SFI went to the streets again. Ultimately the decision had to shelved. In 1986, they unleashed one of the most violent street protests against a proposed pre-degree board, which incidentally was implemented by the CPM-led government in another form later. Similarly, the SFI unrelentingly fought against a vice-chancellor of the Kerala University and even against a cooperative medical college, which the CPM finally took control of. Exactly a year ago, an SFI leader slapped and knocked down former diplomat TP Sreenivasan for his support to collaboration with overseas educational institutions. The protest in question is historic not just because students have come together against a 50-year old politically influential institution, but because it represented peoples swelling frustration and anger against the devastation caused by privatisation of education in the state. In fact, what led to the protest in Thiruvananthapuram was a continuation of agitation by students against a private engineering college in Trichur district in northern Kerala a few weeks ago following the alleged suicide of a student. The protest spread to other places and finally propelled the Law Academy students as well. By suggesting something that would be convenient to the management of the Law Academy, the CPM is trying to avoid bigger questions concerning the institution, which incidentally typifies the double-standards of the party and could even expose its complicity. The reason suggested by the CPM/SFI for its inability to do anything more is that the college is private. While asserting that the college is private, the party is not only lying, but is also admitting that the monster of private education in the state had been originally unleashed by them because the institution was established during the second term of the CPM-led government of EMS Naboodthirippadu that had even allotted a huge plot of land in the heart of the city. Did EMS allow the establishment of a private college and even gave government land when privatisation of education was ideologically sacrilegious? In fact the CPM/SFI is now twisting the truth to suit their decision and to help the management because it was impossible to set up a private college in Kerala in the 1960s and it was established as a society a public institution in which both the government and eminent citizens were stakeholders. The Law Academy prospectus clearly states this that it was established as a society in 1966. The then government was both politically and legally right to allow such an institution because the purpose was noble. In fact, many institutions in the state and elsewhere in India had been established as societies and had gone on to become national icons without diluting its public character. However, in the case of the Law Academy which was established as a society with government participation and patronage cunningly started calling itself private at some stage and begun behaving like one. There is no record when this transition happened and whether its even legally possible. The academy literature calls itself private now. Doesnt the Kerala government, which gave precious land to it because it was a public institution and it had a stake, have a problem? Wouldnt the registrar of societies know? Interestingly, even if the CPM doesnt have a problem, its veteran leader and former chief minister VS Achuthanandan finds it odd and wants the government to take it back. Another strange charge against the institution is that it doesnt have appropriate affiliation to the University of Kerala because it doesnt have any records on the same or the academy hasnt produced any papers to counter the charge. A lawyer, who went to court against the academy in the 1980s insist that there is no affiliation, but the academy is yet to clarify. Unless the academy makes the papers of affiliation public, the charges would stick. The strike against the Law Academy in fact has a larger context its the test of the peoples tolerance to the ills of privatisation of education. Its really ironical that the party that brought the revolutionary Kerala Education Bill in 1957 to contain privatisation of education, is today siding with a management that is inimical to the interests of the students. What the party and its proxies effectively hide behind its ideological pomposity is that its as responsible to the present rot as the Congress and its allies are. The decline of Keralas famous model of public funded education began in 1991, when the Congress-led UDF was in power, and in response, the CPM unleashed an agitation in which five of its workers were killed; but when the party itself came back to power in 1996, it rolled out a Plus Two liberalisation drive. When the Congress (UDF) returned in 2001, it further liberalised the education sector. The subsequent CPM government in 2006 did nothing to stop it. The Congress-led UDF started it and the CPM-led LDF nurtured it quite generously. In fact, had the CPM applied the breaks, the damage could have been limited because between 2001, when the UDF started the mayhem, and 2006, the number of engineering colleges in the state (now, there are 160 engineering colleges for 14 districts at a whopping average of 11-12 colleges per district) was still under 50. But instead of stemming the rot, the CPM-led government under VS Achuthanandan, allowed about 30 more colleges and when the UDF came back under Oommen Chandys leadership, it added another 30-odd. Today, many of the CPM leaders have no qualms in sending their children to such self-financing colleges. The privatisation of higher education has been so perverse that half the engineering seats in the state have no takers and many colleges have only single-digit pass percentages. Incidentally, Kerala is one of the highest consumers of education loans in India there cannot be a better indicator of private sector providing poor quality education and trapping families in debt-trap. According to the all India survey of the Ministry of Human Resources (2013), out of the 654 colleges in the state, 498 are private. If the capital expenditure on education was 5.7 percent in the eighth plan period, by the 11th plan, it fell to 2.1 percent. Other than providing salaries, the government is practically doing nothing. The prestigious government colleges and schools of the past have become dens of political lumpen and goons. And by being in government alternatively with the Congress, the CPM is equally responsible although it conveniently pontificates every now and then. Even while being dubious in his stand on the Law Academy, the Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan is waxing eloquent about how privatisation has ruined education. Interestingly, the Marxists have a strange history that many dont know in the state in the 1940s, when CP Ramaswamy Iyer wanted to nationalise primary school education, the communists (then undivided) opposed it for whatever reasons. Today, by siding with the Law Academy management, they are showing their instinct again, notwithstanding the fact that SFI is also notionally on strike. Along with the charges of the students, the government should also investigate these two critical questions about the Law Academy: How did a society established with state government participation become private and where is its accreditation? Otherwise, the state will be complicit in gross illegality. At 12.30 pm, people start gathering for namaaz at a mosque in Unnati nagar of Hadapsar area in Pune. An awkward silence follows the moment Mohsin Shaikh's name is mentioned. "We want to forget the incident," the residents say before leaving. Mohsin Shaikh, an IT professional, was attacked and murdered by a mob on 2 June, 2014 in the violence that had erupted in the area due to a controversial post on social media. The three accused in this case Vijay Gambhire, Ganesh alias Ranjeet Shankar Yadav and Ajay Lalge were granted bail by the high court in the second week of January this year. According to the order, half-an-hour before the incident, Hindu Rashtra Sena chief Dhananjay Desai had held a meeting in Hadapsar. He delivered a speech at the meeting which allegedly instigated the violence. Accused had no other motive such as personal enmity against the deceased. The fault of the deceased was only that he belonged to another religion. They were provoked in the name of religion, observed Justice Mrudula Bhatkar. "Was it Mohsin's fault that he was born in a Muslim family?" asks his grieving father Mohammed Sadiq Shaikh. "Mohsins death came at a huge cost. The family is trying to recover from it. My family had to face financial difficulties. The government had promised a job for my younger son. After following it for two and a half years, they said he cannot get a job as Mohsin was not a government employee. Mohsin had pursued masters in computer administration and he used to bring home Rs 40,000 to Rs 50,000 per month. How are we expected to survive?" he asks. Amin Shaikh, an eyewitness and a victim, was shocked after the court's decision. On the day of the incident, he was returning from his village when he was attacked by a mob. He ran inside a nearby shop and locked himself inside. He survived with a few injuries. Some memories dont fade away. I lost everything I had after the incident," says Amin. I had seen them killing Mohsin. People came to know that I am an eyewitness in the case. I was working as a scrap dealer and had to travel to various places every day. But I had to shut down my business because after this incident people refused to do business with me. Workers in my shop left out of fear. And I couldnt manage everything on my own. I was sitting idle at home for almost one and a half years. But I have a big family, so I started driving an autorickshaw. But I make it a point to come back home by 8 pm every day. I was scared that even though the accused were in jail, their friends would come to the nearby area. The court has now granted them bail. I am still trying to come to terms with it. What if something happens to me?" he asks. The riots had spread to parts of western Maharashtra too. On the night of Mohsin's murder, shops in Kolhapur were vandalised. Jiya Sajan, owner of Hollywood Shoes in Kolhapur, was shocked when he heard of the bail. Though I financially recovered, I was not able to recover emotionally. The way people looked at me has changed," he says. Activists and lawyers have decided to challenge the decision in court. A Pune-based legal group Advocacy Association has filed an application before the Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court, seeking to quash the bail order. It was an atrocious mention of religion of the victim. The justification given while granting bail to the accused was unwarranted. It has sent a very wrong message. This order shows the need to have strict law against mass violence. The court seems to have taken into consideration the rights of the accused but failed in recognising the victim's perspective, said Asim Sarode, a Pune-based lawyer and a human rights activist. I fear this decision will send a wrong message. Someone gets killed because of religion and the court says there was no personal enmity. With due respect to the court, I want to ask arent these two statements contradictory? I am really disturbed after reading the court order. Former judges and legal experts should now discuss the decision on a public forum, said veteran socialist leader Baba Adhav. Mohsins family has written to the Chief Minister of Maharashtra seeking appointment of senior advocate Ujjwal Nikam in this case. They are looking at legal options and are planning to move the Supreme Court. The hearing for Dhananjay Desai's bail plea is expected on 1 February. The family is now waiting for the government to take cognizance and decide on their application before the hearing. Chants of death to the dictator grow louder as Iran protests intensify The protests in Iran that were sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini have now entered the 42nd day. The demonstrations are more powerful than ever and so is the crackdown by Iranian authorities. Thousands of mourners defied heightened security measures as they made their way to Aminis burial site in Prime Minister Narendra Modi and many other political leaders on Monday paid tribute to Mahatma Gandhi, the Father of the Nation, on his 69th death anniversary. - ...Tributes to beloved Bapu on his Punya Tithi. Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) January 30, 2017 Leaders cutting across party lines also tweeted their tribute on the death anniversary of Gandhiji, which is also celebrated as Martyr's day across India. #MahatmaGandhi ji showed us the ethical way, how India can progress in the right direction by following the virtues of truth and morality. Ashok Gehlot (@ashokgehlot51) January 30, 2017 Remembering the person, whose life meant a new chapter of thought for the whole world, Mahatma Gandhi, on his Punya Tithi. pic.twitter.com/X19Io9vSc8 Dr Kumar Vishvas (@DrKumarVishwas) January 30, 2017 On his death anniversary, let us remember #MahatmaGandhi's inspiring words "Be the Change you wish to see in the world." N Chandrababu Naidu (@ncbn) January 30, 2017 We remember the great Mahatma today on #MartyrsDay and pledge to imbibe upon us the great values of Love, Humanity, Truth and Non Violence. pic.twitter.com/QDfTLw4q7F Dr. Harsh Vardhan (@drharshvardhan) January 30, 2017 Remembering our beloved Bapu #MahatmaGandhi on his Punyatithi Suresh Prabhu (@sureshpprabhu) January 30, 2017 On this day in 1948, Mohan Das Karamchand Gandhi was assassinated by Nathuram Godse, a Hindu nationalist, who fired three bullets into his chest during a prayer meeting at the Birla House in New Delhi. Gandhi is admired across the world for his nonviolent philosophy of passive resistance. He was known to his many followers as the Mahatma. Since the brouhaha around Sanjay Leela Bhansali's latest film is rooted in history, let us look at the history of the men showing their jauhar (courage) against an unarmed man, trying ostensibly to protect the honor of Rani Padmini. Let us start with a story that is real, not the imagination of some medieval Sufi poet. Once upon a time, not so long ago, there was a great Rajput leader of Rajasthan. His name was Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, the man who went on to become India's vice-president. One day, while he was travelling, hundreds of Rajput men surrounded Shekhawat at a railway station with swords, threatening to attack him. The reason: Shekhawat had refused to endorse the demand of Rajputs for glorifying Roop Kanwar, a young woman burnt on the funeral pyre of her husband in a village called Deorala in 1987. Faced with a bloodthirsty crowd, Shekhawat did not resort to flight. He stood up to them and refused to endorse Roop Kanwar's burning. "My father died when I was a child. If my mother too had burnt herself, who would have brought me up. I condemn the practise of sati," Shekhawat roared. This story needs recounting for two reasons. One, it says a lot about the mindset of the Rajputs of Rajasthan, a clan that not so long ago wanted a woman who had been drugged, chained and burnt alive in the name of tradition hailed as a Devi, a goddess. And two, Rajput Karni Sena, the group that is now standing up for Rani Padmini's honour has deep historical connections with the organisation that wanted to endorse sati as a legitimate practise in 20th century India. So much for women's rights, their honour. Lokendra Kalvi, the burly Rajput from western Rajasthan leading the anti-Bhansali campaign is son and political heir of Kalyan Singh, the man who led the agitation for glorification of sati, deification of Roop Kanwar. And the Rajput Sabha, which is jumping around today to protect the dignity of Padmini, was at the forefront of the campaign to justify the feudal, barbaric practise. In fact, the history of Rajput organisations in Rajasthan is full of contradictions when it comes to women's rights. In August 1997, when Diya Kumari, daughter of the former royal family of Jaipur, granddaughter of the late Maharani Gayatri Devi, married Narendra Singh, a cashier at the Jaipur palace, the Rajputs threw a fit. The Rajput Mahasabha, led by the same hot-heads who want Bhansali punished, held state-wide protests, condemned the former royals family for allowing their only child to marry against the community's wishes and even threatened to excommunicate the family and revoke all its titles. Amidst the din, the royal family had to discreetly get the couple married in Delhi. A few years later, Kalvi and his supporters formed a Samajik Nyay Manch for seeking reservation for upper castes. And how did they run their campaign for social justice? By holding violent protests at meetings addressed by Vasundhara Raje, the then (and current) chief minister of Rajasthan. Rajput hoodlums led by Kalvi attacked Raje at several places, disrupted her meetings and rallies and generally made life miserable for the first women chief minister of the state. It is amusing to see the Rajputs now stand up for the honour of Padmini, whose very existence is caught on the border that separates fact from fiction: a woman who was perhaps sent to her funeral pyre with hundreds of others in an allegory dreamt up by Malik Mohammad Jayasi. Imagine the same Rajputs who justified sati, threatened to excommunicate a woman for marrying with the blessings of her family but against the wishes of the community and harassed a woman chief minister, attacking a director who wants to spin a narrative from the love story of the king of Chittorgarh, and the princess of Sri Lanka, who were brought together by a parrot! Fancy all of them getting enraged because they believe Bhansali may have been dreaming of filming a dream sequence that shows the queen of Padmini dancing with Alauddin Khilji. The problem in this case is the same that plagues every community and religion that looks at myths and legends through the blinkers of faith. Some beliefs, myths and dogmas get ingrained so deep that it becomes impossible to separate fact from fiction, rhetoric from rationale. Call it the 'Mandir Wahin Banayenge' syndrome. I called up Dr Omendra Ratnu, a Jaipur-based surgeon who is leading the campaign against Bhansali's film to spell out why the Rajputs were against the film. His arguments: "Padmini is our mother, our goddess... Padmini committed jauhar to ensure no mlechha gets to touch her body. If somebody shows dishonour to her, he should be punished in an open square. It doesn't matter if her existence, the tale of her valour, were documented or not... Many Hindu documents were set on fire in Nalanda. Ours is an oral tradition. For us Rajputs, all Hindus, it is a matter of faith, our pride and honour. Kissi film maker ne apni maa ka doodh piya hai to Jesus aur Allah ke existence pe sawal utha kar dikhae (can some film maker dare question the existence of Christ and Allah)?. Okay, let Bhansali show us the script." Obviously, Bhansali is up against much more than just a rational, calm debate on a 14th century narrative written three hundred years later that means many things to many Rajputs. In this war of rhetoric, where might is considered right, there could be just one winner. Politicising the film, turning it into an emotive issue serves the interests of Rajputs. Once the dominant community in the state, it has now been pushed to the political margins by the more politically savvy and astute Jats and Meenas. Rajput leaders like Kalvi are desperate to regain their prominence and show their political heft, if not for the community's future, their own good. So, often they pounce on issues that could unite the community, even if it is a movement steeped in obscurantism, medievalism and barbarity for justifying sati or annulling a young woman's wedding because it didn't get their sanction. There is, of course, no dearth of real issues the ones that affect the lives of Rajasthani women, especially Rajput that need the community's attention and outrage. The Rajputs need to do a lot within the community to empower women, especially those who decide to live on in spite of daunting challenges. For years, Rajputs of Rajasthan blatantly ignored the rights of women. Widow remarriage was considered a taboo in the community for years, even when it had social sanction in many agrarian communities. It was outlawed by the community. Those who defied the diktat were excommunicated, turned into pariahs. It got the community's muted sanction just a few years ago. Most of the Rajput women still leave in purdah. At social events and weddings, there are separate quarters for them. It is a practise that has survived modernity. Literacy levels are among the lowest in India, especially in rural Rajasthan. Other social indices like reproductive span, number of girl children in schools, infant mortality rate, sex ratio, age at marriage point to a state where women lead a life of misery. In 1997, when Rajputs wanted to excommunicate the Jaipur royals, Brigadier Bhawani Singh, the titular head of the Kachchawah clan that established the dynasty, told the hotheads to "pay attention to Rajput poverty, lack of education, instead of railing like obscurantists". Had they been alive, the former royal 'Bubbles' Singh and the late VP Shekhawat, the man who was hailed as Rajasthan's only Singh, would have been amused by this latest surge of concern among the community's leaders for the pride and honour of women. Who knows, even Roop Kanwar may be bemused! Confessions first, I am not a historian. I have no degree in history. I also hate to go on on historical issues as they are rarely about facts always about inferences and ideologies. The trouble with all the narratives out there in newspapers and online magazines is they are derived from ideologies. The silliest one I have read is from Scroll that questions not just Padmavati but goes on to question the identity of Rajputs. Questioning the identity of any caste or tribe is easy after all even a fool can ask a question. Generally, journalism is about seeking answers to questions, and not just asking them. It becomes especially dangerous in todays time to question identities as egos are fragile, social media gives fire to fragility and can ignite violent riots. History is about facts from sources that are respected or trusted by historians. Al Tabari, the famous Mughal historian, said: 'Let the sources speak for themselves'. A statement that applies to journalists, although, unfortunately, today's writers and 'journalists' even when writing about history do not want to let the sources speak. To quote Al Tabari, Let him who studies this book of ours know that in everything I say about the subjects which I have decided to recount there, I rely only on what I transmit from explicitly identified reports (akhbar) and from accounts (athar) which I ascribe by name to their transmitters. I do not achieve understanding through rational proofs nor do I make discoveries by intuition (fakr al-nufus), save to a very limited degree. For knowledge about the men of the past and current news about men of the present cannot be obtained by one who has not himself witnessed these men or whose lifetime does not reach back to theirs. [In the latter situation knowledge can be obtained] by the statements of reporters and transmitters, not by rational deduction of intuitive inference. Al Tabari wrote the seminal text History of the Prophet and Kings or as the Persian title said, Tarikh al-Rusul wal-Muluk. Al Tabari is important not just because of his reference to the way history should be written but also because he recorded both the Mughal and Rajputs. I will come to reference of the Rajput identity in a bit; first, let me address the sources of Al ul din Khalji's military campaign. Amir Khusraus Khazain al-Futuh is the only contemporary account of Ala al Din Khaljis campaigns that exists today. Two British historians Elliot and Dowson made the first partial English translation in their multi-volume work, The History of India as Told by its Own Historians, published between 1867 and 1877. Muhammad Habib published a translation in 1931 under the title The Campaigns of Alaud-Din Khilji being the Khazainul Futuh (Treasures of Victory), followed by Mohammad Wahid Mirzas complete translation of the Khazain al-Futuh in 1975. Now these are all academic texts that have become the source of what we know of history during this period. Amir Khusraus text is the original source for all these texts. Khusrau wrote about military campaigns and was a court poet, hence more panegyric in his recantations rather than being historically accurate. Which is why there might be no reference of Rani Padmavati by Khusrau, but as Al Tarabi said, only those who were there can confirm it. Now to the question of the Rajput identity. There are three words here: rajaputra, rauta, and thakur that have been used over the last 1,500 years or more as a connotation of Rajput identity. Most historians have confused these words and some dispute the synonymous nature of these words with the word Rajput. Most western historians base their study of the Rajput identity on two texts during the Mughal period: the Rajput social and warrior identity was first expressed in two 15th century texts, Nayacandra Suris Hammira Mahakavya and Padmanabhas Kanhadade Prabandh. But remember the word Rajput in a social and warrior identity was expressed in these two 15th century texts before rajaputra, rauta, and thakur was used. The wise ideologists of todays time would like us to believe that the identity therefore did not exist before 15th century: this is their inference and their interpretation. One of the worst things that any historian can do with sources is to interpret it and present it as a fact. Another reason both these texts are not believed to be the definitive ones with respect to Rajput identity is because of the narrative. In the Hammira Mahakavya, for example, a Mongol Muslim by the name of Mahimasahi not only becomes a Rajput, but he competes with Hammira as the texts protagonist. The Kanhadade Prabandh similarly contains a lengthy episode at the end of the text in which Firuza, the daughter of the Delhi Sultan Ala al-Din Khalji, recognises her previous existence as a Hindu married to Kanhad Des brother and commits sati. They are written from a Mughal point of view and try to create the Mughal identity as a paragon of Rajput virtues. Now please go read these original sources and make up your own mind instead of believing the drivel that is being served to you. If you cant read then please dont pretend to know about history or historical fact and show your ignorance. Self-styled godman Asaram Bapu's quest for bail is set to continue as the Supreme Court on Monday dismissed his plea on medical grounds, stating that his instant plea is devoid of merit. The apex court also dismissed Asaram's regular bail plea in sexual assault case lodged in Rajasthan while noting that it can't overlook the fact that the trial was unnecessarily prolonged after attacks on prosecution witnesses. Asaram's bail saga in the Supreme Court began in October 2016, when it had rejected his interim bail plea on health grounds and asked him to get his treatment done in Rajasthan under judicial custody itself. A bench of Justices AK Sikri and NV Ramana had said if Asaram wanted to undergo treatment, he could get the diagnosis done at Aiims, Jodhpur or at Rajasthan Ayurvedic Hospital while staying in judicial custody. The apex court's direction had come after Asaram said he wanted to undergo ayurvedic treatment in Delhi for which he needed one month's interim bail. However, on 3 October, a medical board of the Aiims had told the apex court that Asaram's health was stable. Last year, on 11 August, the apex court had denied interim bail to Asaram in a rape case and directed Aiims to set up a medical board to ascertain his health condition before taking up his regular bail plea. On 9 August, two days prior to the apex court judgement, the high court had rejected his bail application in the rape case. This had been the ninth regular bail application of Asaram to be rejected. An interim bail plea had also been rejected by the high court in July last year. Asaram was arrested by Jodhpur Police on 31 August, 2013 and has been in jail since then. A teenage girl had accused him of sexual assault at his ashram in Manai village near Jodhpur. The girl, who belonged to Shahjahanpur in Uttar Pradesh, was a student living in the ashram. With inputs from PTI A new exhibition of Manish Pushkale's work, titled The Painter of Light, is being held at the Akar Prakar Art Advisory in Delhi from 31 January to 25 February, 2017. The exhibition was previously hosted by the Musee de Guethary, France, under the Festival of India in France, 2016 in collaboration with the ICCR, the Embassy of India in France and Akar Prakar. Manish Pushkale, the artist, was born in 1973 in Bhopal. His Masters degree was in Geology, from MVM College, Bhopal. With no formal training in art, Pushkale evolved a language of abstraction which carries his own imprint. Pushkale's early training as a geologist is echoed in the organic texturality of his works. The meticulous choice of colours used to layer his works and his method of applying and wiping off paint tangibly invokes complex meditations on asceticism-worldliness, renunciation-sensuality, presence-absence, death-rebirth and so on. While his works are a play of formal dichotomies like those of light-shade, mark-erasure, form-formlessness, restraint-excess, control-indulgence, now have matured to a level that confronts and assimilates all these oppositions to achieve a state of refined harmony. The legendary artist SH Raza had said of Pushkale's work: "Manish has attained substantially in a very short span of time; he has evolved a new kind of visual grammar. He is constantly harnessed to a sense of penance and meditation. A number of his painting series in which the characterisation and sensitivity demonstrated towards pictorial interludes are completely varied, have appeared. It is my opinion that he is now moving ahead from whatever he has done till now. He is moving ahead as if there is no end in sight. This is a search, an exploration that he himself has to be alive, has to take forward. It is very possible that this search will take him to a white canvas. And once again something will emerge from that white canvas... He sees in a way that even the camera doesn't. This is imagination, the vision of the soul. Let us see what forms and shapes of his creation will be discovered ahead." Ashok Vajpeyi also had high praise for Pushkale's vision and work. "Each significant artist has a vision of life, art and reality. It need not be a vision which is predetermined; significance demands dynamic change, new transformations and accretions. An artist without a vision could be of no interest. But an artist with fixed vision could hardly be expected to produce significant art," Vajpeyi had said. "Even at the risk of some simplification, one could say that Manish has a vision where art is a continuum of discovery; that the act of discovering in art is an interminable act." Taking a dig on Bahujan Samaj Party's chief Mayawati's weight, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, in a rather tasteless comment, said that Mayawati was like her party's symbol (elephant) "both require a lot of space." Addressing the media on Sunday during a SP-Congress joint conference, when a journalist asked the chief minister about alliance with BSP, Akhilesh said, "How could we have given space to her (Mayawati)? She takes so much space, even her party symbol is that of an elephant." Jagah kaise de dete unhe?Kitni jagah leti hain vo, unka toh chunav chinh hathi hai: Akhilesh Yadav on if BSP would've been part of alliance pic.twitter.com/90YbtMW5Nu ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) January 29, 2017 When Akhilesh was reminded that he used to refer to Mayawati as "buaji" (aunt), the SP leader said, "Now I am not saying that any longer. You have not heard it from me now." However, while Akhilesh was dismissive about the BSP chief, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi expressed his appreciation for Mayawati, saying he "personally respected" her even though her government made some mistakes while ruling Uttar Pradesh. "BSP ran government and had committed mistakes but the respect is intact. There is a lot of difference between BJP and BSP. BJP's ideology is harmful to the country but Mayawati's ideology is not. Do not compare Maywatiji with RSS". To a question on Congress' earlier foray with BSP in the 1996 assembly polls after which its number of seats decreased, Gandhi said, "History is not static and keeps changing and saying that alliance in 1996 with BSP was wrong and so it will be wrong this (alliance with SP) time too... situation is different now and it is right strategically for the state, the country as well as for Samajwadis." Rahul and Akhilesh addressed a joint press conference on Sunday followed by a road show across state capital Lucknow. The Samajwadi Party and the Congress have joined hands to fight the forthcoming Assembly polls in UP. While, Samajwadi Paarty would fight 298 seats, rest will be contested by the Congress. With inputs from PTI In his first election rally this year, in Lucknow, a humongous gathering at the local Ramabai Ambedkar Maidan, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had raised a clarion call against voting based on caste, religion and community calculations and urged the electorate to rise above it and usher in "real development" in Uttar Pradesh. "People of the state have already seen politics of caste and family... For once, rise above caste, class and vote only for development in the elections and see whether Uttar Pradesh changes or not, said the prime minister on 2 January. Is Modi out of sync with his own party? Last Saturday, the BJP released its manifesto for Uttar Pradesh. On Sunday, party president Amit Shah gave an exclusive, candid, exhaustive interview to Network 18 editor-in-chief Rahul Joshi. There emerges a distinct impression, judging from the manifesto promises and Shah's comments during the tete-a-tete that the BJP feels the need to lace its development agenda with a generous but covert dose of polarisation. That would point to a lack of confidence in 'development' as the sole change agent a pronounced sway from Modi's stress on vikaas, health, sanitation, and corruption and poverty eradication as areas of focus. Of course, there are many promises on vikaas, but Shah's formula seems to be a combination of thematic Hindutva tropes, polarisation pressure points and under-the-hood rhetoric that plays on the communal fault lines without being too in-your-face. He raises the issue of slaughterhouses, migration of Hindus but places these in the context of economic well-being and failure of the state's law and order machinery to claim plausible deniability. On a blunt question about whether the BJP is indulging in soft Hindutva, Shah says it would be wrong to see the party's move to raise these complex social issues as 'attempts at polarisation'. The mechanised abattoirs, he says, are robbing the farmers of their livelihood. "Please don't look at the ban on slaughterhouses from that point of view. In all of Uttar Pradesh whether western Uttar Pradesh, Awadh, Rohailkhand or Purvanchal, you will see that due to slaughterhouses, cows that give milk are finished. If there is a drought or flood, farmers fall back on cows for sustenance. The state has unlimited potential for milk production. I come from Gujarat where the availability of water is much less than in Uttar Pradesh. But dairies have record production there. In Uttar Pradesh, we want to prevent cattle-smuggling and slaughter. Today, even FIRs are not registered in Uttar Pradesh in such cases. We have planned to set up dairies so that farmers will get good prices. This will also help them add value, and improve livelihoods," he said. So to the manifesto promises of an "East, West, North and South Corridor" that would connect "every village to tehsil office by bus" and the "improvement of medical facilities", free laptops, one GB of internet data, waiving farm loans and meeting the pending payments of Uttar Pradesh's sugarcane farmers "in 120 days", Shah also felt the need to spell out the BJP's Ram Mandir agenda, an issue that was almost an afterthought during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. "We have a very clear stand on Ram Mandir, that we will explore ways of building a temple within the constitutional framework. This can be done in two ways: Either through dialogue or through a court order," he said during the interview. He was equally forthcoming on the Network 18 editor-in-chief's question regarding triple talaq, saying, "We believe that the Constitution mandates every woman should get her rights, and that includes Muslim women. Triple talaq curtails the rights of Muslim women." If voted to power, the BJP, he had promised during the release of the manifesto, "will seek the opinion of Muslim women in Uttar Pradesh on the issue and on the basis of that opinion, will then approach the Supreme Court." Modi had made no mention of the Ram Mandir issue during his speech. This apparent dichotomy could be the result of the BJP's belief that it could benefit from a 'reverse polarisation' due to the coming together of the Samajwadi Party and Congress, both of whom have rather openly courted the Muslim votes. The consolidation of secular votes euphemism for Muslims forms the fulcrum of the Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance, an issue Firstpost has highlighted in a recent column. The worry in the BJP is that there has been a disillusionment in the Jat belt in western Uttar Pradesh and the party cannot afford to antagonise the residents of that area if it hopes to come to power. The 'reverse polarisation' will only work if anger against the BJP is subsumed within the greater anger against polarisation engineered by the Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance. There have been reports already of BJP MLA Sangeet Som screening footage from a documentary on the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots that killed 50 and resulted in the uprooting of 50,000 people. According to The Times of India, Som was among three BJP lawmakers booked recently for violating the model code of conduct. The two others are Muzaffarnagar MLA Kapil Dev Agarwal and Shamli representative Suresh Rana, also an accused in the 2013 riots. In a video that gained currency on social media ever since Sunday, Suresh Rana, BJP MLA from Thana Bhawan who has earned a ticket in the upcoming Uttar Pradesh elections, has been found saying that "curfew will be imposed in Kairana, Deoband and Moradabad if he wins the polls". Rana, according to the The Indian Express, has been named in cases related to the Muzaffarnagar riots. Interestingly, while acknowledging that "there should be no communal agenda in polls", Shah proposed that there is a lot of anger at "appeasement politics" and some BJP lawmakers are merely articulating that resentment. "There's anger among the general public. People are reflecting the public mood against the politics of appeasement and vote banks. If someone speaks up against the politics of appeasement and vote banks, he is only articulating the public mood. But I agree there should be no communal agenda in polls. If we appeal to end mechanised slaughterhouses, then it cannot be called communal. We are doing it for the farmers. A task force against the exodus in western Uttar Pradesh cant be termed communal, it is a constitutional right of the people. In the state, people have stopped sending their daughters to colleges because the girls get harassed. We have promised that the BJP will form an Anti-Romeo Squad to save these girls. This is not communal. It is the right of every girl to study in her own city or village. That is why it would not be correct to paint everything as communal," he said in the interview. Overall, the BJP seems to be acknowledging that the political narratives of demonetisation and development won't be enough for a 2014 encore. That doesn't speak too highly of its prospects. Notwithstanding the Saffron colour and the slogan of Hindutva, the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Shiv Sena were never on the same page. Even that colour and the Hindutva had different connotations. And yet, both the parties were together for over 25 years, and who knows, the marriage could survive even longer, despite the violent split now. They have separated (actually, for the second time in three years), but are not divorced as yet. The divorce depends on many other factors that have nothing to do with the colour of the flag they uphold or the ideology of Hindutva that they claim brought them together. Both parties are cautious and also self-conscious of the fact that divided they fall and united they fight with each other more fiercely than with the Opposition. So the question for them is whether to fall and force a mid-tern poll in the state or wait till the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) election results are out on 23 February. Only after the comparative seat positions are clear will they decide whether or not to come together in a "live-in" relationship, with a "forget, but don't forgive" attitude. The Sena and the BJP marriage was always on the brink. The existential political reality that prevailed in the mid-1980s had first brought them together. After the collapse of the Janata Party in 1979, the Jan Sangh was forced out of the anti-Congress coalition and Indira Gandhi staged a stunning comeback in 1980. The frustration loomed large across the Opposition spectrum. This was the backdrop for the formation of the BJP. The use of "Janata" appeared to be a pretence that the party carried the legacy of Jaiprakash Narayan movement and the term "Bharatiya" was used to signify that it would carry forward the politics of "Bharatiya Jan Sangh". But it was a lonely corner. Even the identity politics of the "Marathi manoos" had lost its sheen to the reemergence of the Congress under Indira. The year 1984 was even worse. The Rajiv Gandhi-led Congress won a historic 414 seats in the Lok Sabha and the BJP could win only two. Even Atal Bihari Vajpayee had lost to Madhavrao Scindia in Gwalior. No other party was keen on an alliance with the BJP. The Shiv Sena, under the leadership of Bal Thackeray, sensed a political opportunity in that adversity. Pramod Mahajan, another Maharashtrian, and Thackeray discussed their parties' mutual loneliness and the idea of Hindutva, they felt, could be used as a common plank. But ironically, the BJP had adopted the ideology of Gandhian Socialism, partly as a tribute to the Gandhian leader, Narayan, and partly as a constitutional propriety. Neither the RSS believed in this fig leaf, nor the Shiv Sena. But the realisation that if they did not come to some understanding, their political existence was at stake never mind, coming to power brought them together. And in the 1989 Look Sabha election, they allied to benefit mutually from exploiting the Bofors and Ayodhya campaigns. Rajiv had committed a faux pas in 1986 by reversing the Shah Bano judgment of the Supreme Court through Parliament. It was seen as a bizarre surrender to 'Mullah-Maulvi' blackmail. Despite this saffron treaty, the BJP and the Sena could not agree on supporting the VP Singh government in 1989. Thackeray was a strident critic of Singh, and the BJP had supported his government from outside. But the politics of Hindutva had become particularly vocal and violent since the Ayodhya movement forcefully started in 1987. The Sena saw the mood and strategically decided to transcend the politics of the Marathi manoos and tackle the politics of militant Hindutva. That, at once, united them with the radical Hindu elements in the BJP. LK Advani and Mahajan represented that line while Vajpayee played the centrist-moderate role. (It must not be forgotten that Vajpayee never joined, nor endorsed, the Rath Yatra, launched by the VHP-BJP, with Advani in the chariot, a year later in 1990). However, it is necessary to take into account the "class" divide that separates the two Hindu parties. The Sangh Parivar is rooted essentially in the urban, upper caste, middle class with white collar jobs. The Shiv Sena, on the other hand was born on the streets, with neo-unemployed lumpen and disgruntled Marathi working class. Loose parallels can be drawn here with Donald Trump's social base and White America's frustrations. Not only violent language, but street violence came naturally to the Shiv Sainiks. The Sangh Parivar could not publicly support that sort of politics. But it soon realised that its "safe and sophisticated" politics would get muscle power by aligning with the Sena. The Sangh thought of itself as cerebral strategists and the Shiv Sena as muscle power. Thackeray was always aware and angry with the "hypocritical" BJP leadership that "looked down" upon his followers. He often ridiculed Sangh politics of keeping away from the ruckus. The Sena had organised the textile workers, following the collapse of communist trade unions. The BJP had no base in that class. Its core support came from white collar employees and the trading community. There was this undeclared "class war" within the saffron alliance. Even in the present break-up, one can clearly see this "class tension". But how far will the split go? If the BJP wins more seats than the Sena in Mumbai, there will be pressure within the Sena to "forget" the electoral battle and come together to save "Hindus". If, on the hand, the Sena wins more seats, then it will be a victory of the Marathi manoos rather than Hindutva. One can only hazard a prediction that nobody will get majority on their own. In that hung scenario, the saffronites will come together. However, nearly three weeks later, if the BJP suffers a setback in Uttar Pradesh and Punjab, then the Sena will become emboldened with the backdrop of more seats in the corporation. It can then withdraw support to the state government and force a mid-term poll. The skullduggery of the NCP led by Sharad Pawar to support the government from outside cannot keep the government afloat for long. The NCP's social base is the Maratha community, which is already in the mood of uprising. Pawar's party cannot support a Brahmin chief minister for even six months. Modi may have tried to woo Pawar by honouring him with Padma Vibhushan, mainly to neutralise his party's hostility towards Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. But the tectonic movements in society cannot be tackled by clever moves like this. One thing is for certain, the Sena-BJP split, if taken to its logical conclusion of withdrawing from state and Central governments, will have far reaching consequences on the politics of the next three years and even beyond. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday expressed hope that the Budget Session of Parliament will see peaceful debates despite political differences. Modi made the appeal at an all-party meeting in Delhi, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar told reporters. He said all parties agreed that debate should take place. "The Prime Minister said that differences may arise between parties but democracy should win and there should be debate in Parliament," the minister said. PM Modi in the all party meet said that this is 'Mahapanchayat' and that the Govt wants discussion to happen: Ananth Kumar,Union Min pic.twitter.com/klxPhEYTuB ANI (@ANI_news) January 30, 2017 "All parties, especially those in the opposition, said they wanted debate and both houses should function," the minister added. All parties,particularly oppn,were of the view that the budget session should function, discussion should take place: Ananth Kumar,Union Min pic.twitter.com/2g6qfZOH43 ANI (@ANI_news) January 30, 2017 Asked about the Opposition's demand to postpone the Budget, the minister said: "This is the nation's Budget, for the benefit of the nation. The Supreme Court has given its verdict." Trinamool to skip Parliament on Budget Day The Trinamool Congress hardened its stance against the Central government by announcing that its members will not attend Parliament on Wednesday when the 2017-18 Budget will be presented. Still angry over the arrest of its MPs Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Tapas Pal by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in connection with the Rose Valley Group chit fund scam, the party said it would also not attend the all-party meeting, that took place on Monday. "Trinamool MPs will not be present in Parliament on the first two days of the Budget session in protest against demonetisation, which was implemented without taking Parliament into confidence, and restrictions on withdrawal limits from bank accounts which are still in force," a statement from the party office said. Opposition questions timing of Budget Opposition parties raised their differences with the government over tabling the Union Budget on 1 February, because the economic data for the third quarter won't be factored in. Sitaram Yechury, leader of CPM said, "Dislocating manner in which budget session is being called. Also it is not scientific to present budget on 1 February." He added, "We told the Govt it would have been better to have the budget postponed like it was done in 2012, but its their prerogative." We told the Govt it would have been better to have the budget postponed like it was done in 2012, but its their prerogative: Sitaram Yechury pic.twitter.com/BpK7WvbEWh ANI (@ANI_news) January 30, 2017 The Budget Session of Parliament starts on Tuesday, while the Union Budget will be presented on Wednesday. With inputs from IANS The inherent tension between development and environmental damage, between income and loss of heritage, has been a far more salient issue in Goas elections than elsewhere in the country. General outrage over the frenetic craze for the mining and export of iron ore played a great role in sweeping the Congress out of office in the previous round of Assembly election in 2012. The mining issue became symbolic of widespread corruption that had appeared to have a free-run under a series of Congress chief ministers. Voting for a new Assembly is due on 4 February. Corruption continues to linger as an issue this time, but with far less intensity than in 2012. But the impact on the environment of developmental projects still elicits an angry response among some citizens. One issue that has focused public attention is that the government passed an order in November 2015 to classify coconut palms as grass apparently to allow a proposed beer factory to cut 10,000 coconut palms on the factory site near Amadi village. Rahul Mhambre, treasurer of the Aam Aadmi Partys Goa unit says there is a 'huge revolt' over the issue. That is an exaggeration, but certainly some voters express disgust. The more general feeling is that the incumbent BJP government failed to go after the corrupt. Indeed, two former Congress ministers against whom Manohar Parrikar filed corruption cases when he was the chief minister (in the first half of the current five-year term) are now contesting on BJP tickets. Mhambre correctly points out that Parrikar gained hugely from the mining scam five years ago, but that people are not satisfied with what he did once he came to power. Indeed, as things stand, Parrikar appears to command little following on the ground in Goa. BJP president Amit Shahs statement that Parrikar would continue to control the Goa unit of the party, whether from Delhi or from Panaji, has only deepened fissures in the state unit rather than energise voters. Already, other party leaders, including Francis D'Souza, who was the deputy chief minister when Parrikar was chief minister (2012 to to late 2014), were already miffed. Ironically, they and most observers viewed the appointment of Laxmikant Parsekar as an instrument for Parrikars remote control. That even Parsekar is now chary of acknowledging Parrikar became evident in an interview he gave Firstpost right after Shahs statement. Mining scam Meanwhile, mining has begun again in a small way after the Supreme Court had completely banned it in late 2012. However, common people have become aware and watchful now that they have seen the benefits of the ban, according to Claude Alvares, the prime mover of the petition that brought about that ban. Also, he says, several truck owners sold their vehicles after the ban and that has led to an increase in transportation costs now. Activist academic Prajal Sakhardande points out that silting caused by mining went into food and affected fields, rivers, lakes and towns. He says Goa was a far more lush green place before mining began in 1947 mainly for Japans post-war reconstruction. He says it became 'loot' during the 1990s, more so since around the turn of the millennium and that had a terrible environmental impact. T Victor, the president of the Mining Engineers Association of India, explains that this stemmed from 'unmeasurable demand' for iron ore in China, mainly to build infrastructure for the Beijing Olympics in 2008. So, says Victor, instead of the 30 million tons that Goa has a capacity to produce, output went up to as much as 55 million tons from 2005 to 2010. "Even mud was sold," he says. Plus, in the style of the Wild West, operators started stealing for example, waylaying a truck in a forest, replacing half the ore with mud and adding mud to the stolen half to put on their own truck. Under changed rules following the 1991 liberalisation, anyone could export ore. Since many voters suspect that much of the mining industry was controlled benami by politicians, the system of law and order was a casualty of what most observers refer to as 'the loot.' The problem, according to Victor, was that regulators were the government rather than autonomous bodies. Generally speaking, Goas voters continue to be cynical about politicians, especially about whether they care about Goas precious environmental heritage. Goa-based Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) could emerge as kingmakers in the scattered scenario of the ongoing election for a new Goa Assembly. Polling is due next Saturday. Neither of these two parties is likely to win many seats. However, if either of them emerges as even the fourth-largest group in the new house but with four or five MLAs the party could become the key to government-formation. In fact, at least the MGP has already projected a chief ministerial candidate. Twin factors work in favour of these two parties. One, many Goans expect no party to get a majority. Two, the three parties the BJP, the Congress, and the Aam Aadmi Party that could potentially emerge with larger numbers of seats cannot join each other in a coalition. Their antagonism at the national level runs too deep to allow that. Both parties depend on the strength of particular candidates rather than their respective party agendas. Indeed, few know what the NCPs agenda is any more. But some of its candidates have a strong base. Some MGP candidates too have long-established networks of support in their constituencies. The ironic fact is that both might even end up allying with larger parties that would appear to be ideologically opposed. The MGP was a part of the current BJP-led coalition, and has adopted Hindutva-oriented stances. However, it left the coalition a month before the election, and there have in some phases been signals that it might ally with the Congress. The MGP also appears to be close to the Goa Suraksha Manch, which former RSS strongman Subhash Velingkar formed in October after differences with the BJP led to a rupture with both the party and the RSS. On the other hand, there have been signals that, despite its origins as a party meant to uphold Congress values, the NCP could go with the BJP. The Aam Aadmi Partys chief ministerial nominee makes no bones about it: 'NCP is a BJP plant, he says. The Padma Vibhushan award to party supremo Sharad Pawar have encouraged NCP activists in Goa to think such an alliance is likely. Within the state, the NCP has become associated with former Congress chief minister Churchill Alemao. His reputation took a beating while he was in power, and even more so when he fielded three other members of his family during the last election. People in the area got together to ensure that all four were defeated. Fractured scenario Of course, all these calculations are based on the presumption that the fractured nature of public reactions to the various parties campaigns most of which have in any case been pretty low-key. Those calculations could go wrong, however, if the very large number of candidates in the fray end up pushing the same party to victory in more constituencies than most observers currently expect. After all, the BJP emerged with 21 of the Assemblys 40 seats last time, with just four percent more votes than the Congress, which won only 9 seats. As things stand, the BJP could possibly slip through to a majority despite a distinct lack of public enthusiasm. For, although people are largely dissatisfied, the anti-incumbency sentiment is nowhere near as intense as it was against the Congress in 2012 mainly over the issue of corruption. The other possibility, upon which AAP backers bank, is that a large number of 'silent voters are willing to try out the party as an alternative to the two major parties, both of which have disappointed. To be sure, the very few people in Goa who appear to be positively excited about any of the parties (rather than candidates) in the fray appear to be AAP backers. There is another factor in these elections, though one that could queer the pitch for the MGP and the NCP: A number of relatively new local parties have emerged parties such as Goa Forward. They represent Goan identity more than any of the other parties, including the MGP. For although the MGP was the original party of Goa, it is jaded compared with the newer parties. More important, it has always stood for a Marathi identity as the 'Maharashtrawadi' part of its name suggests. In fact, the MGP, which had won the first elections after Goa became a part of India, lost its vigour after a 1967 referendum on whether Goa should become a part of Maharashtra was defeated. Many Goans celebrated the golden jubilee of that year since 16 January, the date on which the vote took place in '67. Cultural and academic events were organised around the anniversary, and even a new song composed. So, if the MGP or the NCP win enough seats to dictate terms for a coalition, it will owe to the popularity of particular candidates. After serving 35 years in the Indian Army, Brigadier (retd) Syed Ahmad Ali joined the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) as its pro-vice chancellor in 2012 and seems to have conveniently forgotten the secular ethos that are integral to the military life. The title "Syed" in his name means that Brigadier Ali traces his lineage to the family of Prophet Muhammad. Also, the Syeds, being an upper caste, do not marry lower caste Muslims, barring exceptions. The AMU website declares proudly that Brigadier Ali belongs to a "distinguished family of zamindars" or landlords, one of the only two classes of Muslims, the other being Islamic clerics, responsible for the continuing Muslim backwardness. Speaking at a seminar on The Inclusion of Article 341 in the Indian Constitution and the Muslim Reservation, Brigadier Ali stressed the need for reservation to Muslims, forgetting in the process that our political leaders delivered a secular constitution at a time India was going through religious bloodshed. The seminar was organised at the AMU campus where Brigadier Ali was the chief guest. According to the Urdu daily Roznama Sahafat of 28 January, Brigadier Ali stated: "Muslims are extremely backward in the field of education for which it is necessary to give them reservation in educational institutions." About 1,000 years of Muslim rule in India should have propelled Muslims to great heights in the fields of education and sciences and taken this nation to majestic glories. But Muslim emperors spent time building mosques, palaces and tombs rather than inventing buses, railways and the telegraph. It's unfortunate that the only diagnosis the pro-vice chancellor of this leading Muslim educational institution offers is not innovation and invention but reservation. What is also worrying is that during a 35-year military career, Brigadier Ali did not learn anything about merit and the need for a questioning mind, scientific temper and liberal outlook as necessary for the progress of Muslims. These were the basic reasons Sir Syed established the Aligarh Muslim University and launched the Urdu magazine Tahzibul Akhlaq with the singular purpose to inculcate scientific temper among Muslim students. It does not appear that Brigadier Ali has learnt anything from Sir Syed. The Article 341 of the Indian Constitution is known by its two sub-clauses which state: (1) "The President may with respect to any State or Union territory, and where it is a State after consultation with the Governor thereof, by public notification, specify the castes, races or tribes or parts of or groups within castes, races or tribes which shall for the purposes of this Constitution be deemed to be Scheduled Castes in relation to that State or Union territory, as the case may be." (2) "Parliament may by law include in or exclude from the list of Scheduled Castes specified in a notification issued under clause (1) any caste, race or tribe or part of or group within any caste, race or tribe, but save as aforesaid a notification issued under the said clause shall not be varied by any subsequent notification." Nowhere do these clauses indicate that religion can be a criterion for reservation. However, it seems the seminar was organised in order to call for the removal of Article 341 from the constitution. This was no small seminar. It was organised at the Kennedy Hall, which is the largest auditorium on the AMU campus. Mahmood Pracha, a senior advocate at the Supreme Court, was invited to speak at the seminar. According to the Roznama Sahafat report, Mahmood Pracha argued: "Reservation can be given even on the basis of religion." It is astounding that calls will be made in the 21st century from the campus of AMU for the use of religion in public policy, providing the necessary ingredient for another partition of India. For Indian youths who do not know history, it was from the campus of Aligarh Muslim University that the Pakistan Movement originated, leading to the Partition of India on religious basis in 1947. It does not automatically follow that the AMU's founder Sir Syed also wanted the Islamic state of Pakistan. It appears that the birth of Pakistan Movement at the AMU campus came about as an unintended consequence of Sir Syed's educational movement. In his capacity as the pro-vice chancellor, it should have come as a natural instinct to Brigadier Ali to recognise the historical parallel and discourage any argument based on religion. Instead, Brigadier Ali endorsed and advocated that religion be the basis for reservation in educational institutions. Such Islam-based advocacy will create its own logical next step: a new cycle of partition. It will be sad if it comes from the AMU. In recent years, Islamists in India have sought to forge unity with Dalits to advance their Islamist cause. Speaking on the occasion, Mahmood Pracha went on to describe the Article 341 as a threat to the Muslim-Dalit unity, a deep longing of Indian Islamists. Pracha stated: "[The lack of] discussion of religion in Article 341 of the constitution is a suppression of the rights of Dalits and Muslims which should be removed." According to the report, Dr Muhib ul Haq, a teacher at the department of sociology of AMU, also spoke on the occasion. He also took the line of argument Pracha advanced, stating: "Great injustice was done to Dalits and Muslims by not giving reservation and by banning religion from Article 341." Nazar Abbas, another AMU teacher, also argued that reservation should be granted to Muslims in order to eradicate their "social and educational" backwardness. If Islam could not eradicate "social" backwardness of Muslims, I am left wondering how reservation can do it. It seems the lone voice to speak of all human beings, not just Muslims, was a young research scholar Muhammad Rizwan who argued: "The nation cannot progress until the backwardness of all sections of the country is removed." Notwithstanding Muhammad Rizwan's exception, it is clear that seminars like these will birth another Pakistan movement on the AMU campus in near-future and for which Brigadier Ali and his like-minded colleagues should alone be held accountable. The year 2017 marks the 200th birth centenary of Sir Syed (1817-1898). I suggest that the AMU leadership hold the next big seminar on the following question: Is the AMU campus leading, once again, a campaign for another partition of India? On Monday, the All India Trinamool Congress (TMC) released a statement saying that they will not be present in Parliament for the first two days of Budget session. Citing their protest against demonetisation as the reason, TMC leaders Derek O'Brien, Kalyan Banerjee, Saugata Roy, Sukhendu Sekhar Roy and Dinesh Trivedi issued the statement. The party also cited protest over the arrest of its two MPs by the CBI in connection with the chit fund scam. The statement read, "In the ensuing session, Trinamool will, among other issues, raise the issue of the illegal arrest of its Lok Sabha leader and another MP which is a clear case of political vendetta by the ruling party at the Centre by misusing the CBI and abusing the power." All India Trinamool Congress releases statement,says will not be present in parliament for first two days of #BudgetSession pic.twitter.com/PfqONNC88R ANI (@ANI_news) January 30, 2017 The TMC will also not attend the all-party meeting convened by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan on Monday evening ahead of the Budget session of Parliament beginning Tuesday. "Trinamool will not attend Parliament on 1 February because of Saraswati Puja which is a big day in Bengal," party leader and MP Derek O'Brien told PTI earlier. He said that on Saraswati Puja, there is a custom of keeping away from work and not even touching the tools. "Saraswati Puja is beyond a religious festival. It is a socio-cultural festival of Bengal," he added. Budget will be presented by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday. About not attending all-party meeting, he said this was because Trinamool supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had called a meeting of party MPs for today "10 days back". Asked whether the party was "boycotting" these proceedings or just skipping, he replied, "It is open for your interpretation". The TMC has been angry over the arrest of its two MPs Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Tapas Pal by CBI in connection with the Rose Valley Group chit fund scam. With inputs from PTI Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti on Monday labelled the people including members of her alliance partner BJP anti-nationals for trying to abrogate special status enjoyed by the state under the Indian Constitution by using the judiciary and creating an atmosphere of insecurity. If we injured the spirit of Article 370, there wont be bigger anti-national work than this. Those people, who are trying to do that, are the biggest anti-nationals and we shall fight them, Mehbooba said, while speaking in Jammu and Kashmir Assembly on Monday. Mehbooba said she was aware of some people trying to use the judiciary to harm Article 370 of the Indian Constitution, thereby creating an atmosphere of insecurity in the state and vitiate the atmosphere. I know there have been attempts made to use the judiciary to try to play with the spirit of Article 370, but they, who are doing it, dont know they are harming India and its interests, she added. On Saturday, former Chief Minister Omar Abdullah had warned Mehbooba in the legislative assembly that BJP was planning to use judiciary for bulldozing states special position guaranteed under Article 370. Those, who among us, think BJP has given up the issue of Article 370 are mistaken as they have realised that it cant undo Article 370 through legislature but will do it through judicial means, conceding that it could not use legislature to do so, Omar Abdullah had said. Mehbooba on Monday said that the moment someone tries to abrogate this uniqueness of Jammu and Kashmir, it will have an adverse impact in the valley and will encourage people who want to settle people of one colour and one religion in the Valley. This Muslim majority state should send a message to the world and answer Donald Trumps Muslim ban by welcoming Kashmiri Pandits to Valley. Kashmir cannot be allowed to become another Syria or Afghanistan, she added. Many right-wing NGOs and think tanks have sought legal intervention to abrogate article 370. This has triggered a furious debate over identity politics in the state and is also seen as one of the reasons being the 2016 unrest. Earlier this month, the state government had to challenge a PIL filed in the Delhi High Court by Advocate Surjeet Singh arguing that the amendment made to Article 368 of constitution shall be made applicable to the state of J&K. But the court prima facie observed that Delhi HC has no jurisdiction to it, to which the counsel for other side responded that judges of the High Court take oath under constitution of J&K. The high court had recently challenged provisions of Article 370, while hearing a PIL, which challenged the Constitution Order 1954 that adds a proviso to Article 368 of the Indian Constitution. The proviso to Article 368 (power of Parliament to amend the Constitution and procedure thereof) says no such amendment shall have effect in relation to the Jammu and Kashmir unless applied by order of the President under clause (1) of Article 370". Article 370 grants special autonomous status to the State of Jammu and Kashmir which makes it clear that any law, including Constitution amendments, will not be applicable to the State unless applied by an order of the President under this article. Former Chief Minister Omar has also alleged that it was not the Agenda of Alliance document of ruling PDP-BJP coalition government, but National Security Advisor Ajit Dovals doctrine which is being implemented in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. The state is run by Mufti (Mohammad Sayeed) Doctrine. I dont know any Doval Doctrine or Dulat Doctrine, but if any doctrine helps us to implement Mufti Doctrine, I will welcome that," Mehbooba said. By Tommy Wilkes | NEW DELHI NEW DELHI Two of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's main political opponents opened their joint campaign on Sunday to win a crucial election in Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state, which heads to the polls next month.Home to 200 million people and India's most important region politically, Uttar Pradesh will help shape Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) chances of winning a second term in national elections in 2019.The chief minister of Uttar Pradesh and president of the Samajwadi Party, Akhilesh Yadav, and the vice-president of the Congress party, Rahul Gandhi, smiled and hugged for the cameras in a show of personal and political unity."We are going to fight united and we are going to defeat the BJP," Gandhi, 46, told reporters in the state capital, Lucknow, before the two headed off for their first campaign roadshow.In Uttar Pradesh, a poor and agrarian state, people tend to vote along social and religious lines. With no one community dominant, political parties struggle to win unless they can convince more than one social group to back them. The alliance brings together two parties that have previously won a large share of Muslim voters. Muslims account for 19 percent of Uttar Pradesh's population. Another party in the state, led by politician Mayawati, is also wooing their vote.BJP minister Mahesh Sharma said the Congress and Samajwadi party tie-up was a "desperate and opportunistic alliance". Modi has invested huge political capital in winning Uttar Pradesh, holding a series of rallies and trumpeting the benefits of his controversial decision to abolish high-denomination banknotes in November.Congress, run by the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty that has ruled India for most of its existence, has watched its voter base shrink in recent years. The alliance offers it a chance for a limited comeback.Akhilesh Yadav, 43, is a relatively popular leader and regarded as the modern face of his party after he triumphed in a bruising battle with his father for control of their party. Voting in Uttar Pradesh begins on Feb. 11. The election is set to be the world's largest democratic exercise this year. Four other Indian states also head to the polls, with results due on March 11. (Editing by Larry King) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. By Mehreen Zahra-Malik and Mubashar Bukhari | ISLAMABAD/LAHORE ISLAMABAD/LAHORE Pakistan on Monday ordered Hafiz Saeed, accused by the United States and India of masterminding the 2008 attacks on the Indian financial capital Mumbai that killed 166 people, to be placed under house arrest.The move came after years of pressure and could ease recently escalating tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours. Saeed's continued freedom has long infuriated Islamabad's arch-foe India.The United States has offered $10 million for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Saeed, who heads the Muslim charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD). Washington says JuD is a front for the Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT). "A large police team arrived (at JuD headquarters) and told us that Hafiz Saeed would be placed under house arrest," Nadeem Awan, a spokesman for the group based in the eastern city of Lahore, told Reuters.An Interior Ministry source confirmed Saeed and the other men "are under house arrest" and on the exit control list, meaning they could not leave the country. India's foreign ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment.It was unclear why Pakistan decided to act now. A senior Pakistani defence ministry official said Islamabad had not heard anything from the new administration of U.S. President Donald Trump but had been feeling U.S. pressure on the issue."Trump is taking hard decisions against Muslim countries, there is open talk of actions against Pakistan also. So yes, this was a consideration," said the official.Other government officials have said recently that a broader diplomatic campaign - pushed by India - to isolate Pakistan over its failure to go after some Islamist groups has taken a toll, even involving pressure from longtime ally China. RAMPAGE IN MUMBAI The Mumbai attacks in 2008 brought Pakistan and India to the brink of war after 10 gunmen killed commuters, foreigners and some of India's wealthy elite in a rampage that included attacks on two luxury hotels, a Jewish centre and a train station.India accused Pakistan of sponsoring the attack through LeT, which Saeed founded in the 1990s. Pakistan has denied any state involvement and Saeed - who has distanced himself from LeT - has said repeatedly he was not responsible.Saeed was put under house arrest after the Mumbai attack but was released about six month later in June 2009. Awan said Islamabad had been under pressure from the United States to take action against Saeed or face sanctions. "This government has buckled under the pressure," he said.The Punjab provincial government said Saeed and four other men were in "protective custody" because they violated a U.N. Security Council resolution passed after the Mumbai attacks.Interior Ministry documents seen by Reuters named Saeed and four other men as members of JuD and Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FiF), a charity wing of JuD headed by Saeed.One document said the government believed FiF was "acting in a manner that may be concerned in terrorism". PROSECUTIONS RARE Previous Pakistani announcements of action against anti-India militant groups have rarely led to serious punishments for them.Western countries have for decades accused Pakistan of harbouring Islamist militant groups and using them as proxies against bigger neighbour India, with whom it has fought three wars since independence. Islamabad denies having such a policy.In recent months, Saeed has been holding regular press conferences about the security crackdown in Indian-controlled Kashmir, trying to highlight alleged civil rights violations against the mainly Muslim population there.He told Reuters last month that he had no fear of arrest despite the appointment of a new army chief and a new head of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) spy agency.Successive Pakistani governments have vowed to crack down against militant groups but lack of action against Saeed has often been seized on by India as proof that Islamabad was dragging its feet on tackling banned outfits. (Writing by Drazen Jorgic; Editing by Tom Heneghan) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. As the Assembly elections draw closer, the Congress has launched a mega offensive against the Badals with Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu campaigning in Bathinda on Monday. The election to this Assembly seat remains the most keenly watched ever since three-time former BJP MP from Amritsar seat Navjot Singh Sidhu jumped into the fray as a Congress candidate, claiming that his mission is to "save Punjab" and oust the ruling Badals who "looted" the state. 53-year-old Sidhu's entry has overshadowed other contestants who are in the race for this seat, including Rajesh Kumar Honey (41), the district president of BJP and a councillor of the party. Honey first won the municipal corporation election in 2007 and then again in 2012. Among the 15 candidates, including five Independents, who in the fray, Sarabjot Singh is contesting from AAP, Tarsem Singh from BSP and Baldev Singh from CPI. Amritsar East, which was carved out of Amritsar North in 2012, has 1,52,413 voters, including 81,240 men and 71,173 women. Like most other candidates fighting from other segments of holy city Amritsar which is in the grip of severe cold conditions these days, Sidhu enthrals the public with his one-liners and 'Sidhuisms'. Making his debut in Congress, Sidhu in his characteristic boisterous manner sends out his war cry against the ruling Badals in his poll rallies, which he holds not just in Amritsar-East, but all across Amritsar parliamentary segment, saying "Bhaag, Badal Bhaag, kursi khali kar (run Badal, run. Leave the chair)". Sidhu is fighting from the Amritsar East seat which was earlier held by his wife Navjot Kaur, who had switched over from BJP and joined Congress a few weeks ahead of him. Navjot Kaur had defeated Simarpreet Kaur, an Independent candidate, by a margin of over 7,000 votes in the last elections. Mandeep Manna was a ticket aspirant from Congress this time but the seat was given to Sidhu after he joined the party. While Navjot Kaur is currently doing most of the campaigning in Amritsar East seat, Sidhu is devoting more time in various assembly segments of Amritsar, nine of which constitute the Amritsar Lok Sabha seat, bypolls for which will be held simultaneously along with Assembly polls on 4 February. Rajinder Mohan Singh Chhina, Sidhu's archrival from his erstwhile party BJP, is contesting the Amritsar Lok Sabha seat this time. Having shifted base from Patiala to Amritsar to fight his first election in 2004, over the years Amritsar has remained his stronghold. Sidhu had remained the BJP MP from Amritsar LS constituency, winning the seat in 2004, 2007 (by-election) and 2009. He was also a Rajya Sabha MP for a brief period. With inputs from agencies By Allison Lampert and Anna Mehler Paperny | QUEBEC CITY/TORONTO QUEBEC CITY/TORONTO Police were investigating a single suspect in a shooting at a Quebec City mosque that killed six people, with a second person who was arrested now considered a witness, authorities said on Monday.The suspect in the attack on Sunday evening prayers was Alexandre Bissonnette, a French-Canadian university student, according to a source familiar with the matter. The man now considered a witness was of Moroccan descent although his nationality was not immediately known, the source said. He was named by media as Mohamed Khadir or Mohammed Belkhadir by media.Police declined to give details of those arrested or possible motives for the shooting at the mosque, the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec.Authorities initially said they had arrested two suspects, but in a Twitter message, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said that "following the investigation, the second individual is now considered as a witness."Police said on Monday morning they were confident no other suspects were involved in the attack."They consider this a lone wolf situation," the source said.Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told the House of Commons in Ottawa: "Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack," adding a personal message to Canada's one million Muslims: "Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. Last night's horrible crime against the Muslim community was an act of terror committed against Canada and against all Canadians. We will grieve with you. We will defend you. We will love you. And we will stand with you."Somber parliamentarians observed a moment of silence. Trudeau will visit Quebec City later on Monday, a spokesman said. The attack was out of character for Quebec City, a city of just over 500,000 which reported just two murders in all of 2015. Mass shootings are rare in Canada, where gun control laws are stricter than in the United States. In addition to the six killed, five people were critically injured and 12 were treated for minor injuries, a spokeswoman for the Quebec City University Hospital said.U.S. President Donald Trump called Trudeau to express his condolences "and offered to provide any assistance as needed," said Trudeau spokesman Cameron Ahmad. He gave no further details about of the call.Over the weekend, Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, his response to an executive order by Trump on Friday to halt the U.S. refugee program and to temporarily bar citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States.Trump's action, which the president said was "not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe," was widely condemned in the United States and abroad as targeting Muslims. FATHER OF FOUR KILLED A father of four, the owner of a halal butcher near the mosque, was among those killed, said Pamela Sakinah El-hayet, a friend of one of the people at the mosque.The mosque concierge was killed, as was Ahmed Youness, a 21-year-old student, El-hayet told Reuters. One of El-hayets friends, Youness roommate, was in the mosque at the time of the shooting. He was unharmed, she said, but in total shock.Ali Assafiri, a student at Universite Laval, said he had been running late for the evening prayers at the mosque, near the university in the Quebec City area. When he arrived, the mosque had been transformed by police into a crime scene. "Everyone was in shock," Assafiri said by phone. "It was chaos."Universite Laval is the oldest French-language university in North America, with 42,500 students.Vigils were planned for Montreal and Quebec City, the provincial capital, as well as in Edmonton. There was an outpouring of support for the mosque on social media.Citizens for Public Justice, a group of Canadian Christians, churches and other religious congregations, expressed their solidarity with the Muslim community of Quebec City."Last night's shooting, targeting people of faith during their worship and prayer, is a deplorable attack on all Canadians and our most deeply-held values," the group's executive director, Joe Gunn, said. While the motive for the shooting was not known, incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years.The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies.Pope Francis offered his condolences to Cardinal Gerald Cyprien LaCroix, Archbishop of Quebec, who was visiting Rome on Monday. (Additional reporting by Kevin Dougherty in Quebec City,; Alastair Sharp and Anna Mehler Paperny in Toronto; David Ljunggren in Ottawa; Writing by Andrea Hopkins, Frances Kerry, Grant McCool; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and Alan Crosby) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. The decision of SM Krishna, former Karnataka chief minister and India's external affairs minister, to leave the Congress party has surprised many of its party leaders particularly since he was "too old" for any assignment. In many ways, his decision expresses the frustration of the old guard which appears worried that the national party is being reduced to a regional outfit far from being a national party. Krishna's decision has puzzled the closest of his associates, supporters and adversaries. More so, the timing of his decision. In his words, he felt slighted when he was told a couple of years ago that he was not being re-nominated to the Rajya Sabha. To him, a more graceful way would have been if Congress president Sonia Gandhi had told him it was time for someone else to take his place. Some take decisions like a flash light. I am a tubelight, was his reply to a question at the news conference when asked why he took so long to leave the party that he considered his home for 46 years. The efforts of Central leaders like AK Antony and Ghulam Nabi Azad to convince him to reverse his decision to quit the party, obviously failed, since Krishna went ahead to address the media and make a succinct political point. That the party needs only managers and not time-tested leaders. The younger leaders in the Congress, some of whom only spoke on condition of anonymity, have disagreed with Krishna. They believe that Krishna had held the best of positions in the party and in government all through his career. One of them even said that there was no other position that the party could offer him. But, some of the senior leaders privately admit that Krishna was expressing an opinion that many of them have felt in the party for some time now. Said one leader, who did not want to identified: What he said was absolutely correct. There are ways and means of managing the current situation in Karnataka as well as elsewhere. It is not exactly positions that the older leaders are looking for. In modern parlance it can well be described as consultants who work pro bono. What it means, in simple terms, is something that chief minister Siddaramaiah could have done to enhance the party's image. For instance, said another leader: It is well known that Siddaramaiah is more focused on the rural sector than the urban sector. He could have very well asked Krishna to head the vision group for Bengaluru and told a couple of his ministers to work along with him. Krishna's work would have enhanced the image of the party among the people in Bengaluru because he has a good image in the state capital. More importantly, it could have also helped solve some of the city's major problems that have hurt the image of Siddaramaiahs government. Said Prof Sandeep Shastri, Pro-Vice Chancellor, Jain University, and well known political analyst: The state has lost out on an opportunity to have somebody who just wanted to be given the status of an elder statesman in the party. What he has done is clearly out of a sense of hurt that the party does not want to give credence to a leader of some stature, a leader with some support in urban areas. Prof Harish Ramaswamy of the political science department of Dharwad University said: His departure from the Congress will hurt the party because he represents the clean image of the party. He was also the symbol of development in the Congress party given his record of making Bengaluru as the IT capital of India (during his tenure as chief minister between 1999-2004). Symbolically, it will hurt the image of the Congress in Karnataka. With elections just a year away, the exit of a senior leader like Krishna is very unfortunate. This is the time for the Congress party to get all the important leaders of the party together, get them to pull up their sleeves to face the elections, said H Hanumanthappa, former MP and senior leader of the party. Not A Vote Puller But A Leader Krishna leaving the party may not lead to a major swing in votes. Krishna hails from the Old Mysuru region where the dominant community is the upper caste group of Vokkaligas. It is well-known that he is never considered a leader of the Vokkaliga community like another octogenarian and leader of the Janata Dal (S) HD Deve Gowda. But, with his departure from the party, there is some amount of loss of stature for the Congress in this region and, at this point of time, everyone will agree that the party requires it most. The Congress also has no alternate Vokkaliga face. It will certainly help the Janata Dal," said Prof Muzaffar Assadi, former head of the department of political science, Mysore University. Party leaders privately admit that Krishna may not have contributed much in arresting the growth of the JDS in the region. But, his departure will give a big handle for former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda to exploit the situation by pointing out how leaders from the Vokkaliga community are treated in a national party like the Congress. The Old Mysuru region is crucial for the Congress for several reasons. After the recent passing away of Mahadev Prasad, who was a minister and a close associate of Siddaramaiah, the Congress party does not have a single candidate belonging to the other major caste group of Lingayats in about a dozen constituencies. And, another associate of Siddaramaiah and an important Dalit leader, Srinivasa Prasad, has already joined the BJP. It means that the Congress has no major face among the Lingayats, the Vokkaligas and, to some extent, among the Dalits as well. That leaves the party wholly dependent on the support of the OBCs that Siddaramaiah's camp claims remains intact as in 2013 assembly elections. Facing A United BJP The challenge to the Congress also comes from the decision of the BJP president, Amit Shah, to back KS Eshwarappa's move to make a breakthrough in the OBC vote that the Congress has claimed control over. It means that the BJP will be making an all-out effort to break the backbone of the Congress among the OBCs and will not be wholly dependent upon the vote of the upper caste group to which BS Yeddyurappa, its state unit president and former chief minister, belongs. In other words, every kind of a vote, whether on the lines of the caste axis or otherwise, is important to the Congress. And, in the current era, image management is bound to play as much a critical role for the Congress as for any other party. "He (Krishna) commands respect among the middle and educated classes. This is the section which will be influenced by his decision. The perception that decent people have no place in politics will be further strengthened. The approach of this section of voters will also affect the morale of the party worker. To that extent, it is a loss to the party," said BL Shankar, an associate of Krishna and a former chairman of the legislative council. It is, perhaps, in this context that the BJP's former party president and union minister, Sadananda Gowda, went on record to state that his party would heartily welcome Krishna if he intended to join. Explains Prof Assadi: In the BJP, LK Advani has practically retired and has been marginalised. The BJP leadership may not require him all the time but in the hour of need, his services can be utilised in some way or the other. If Advani resigns like Krishna has, the party stands to lose that image among that section of voters which has voted for it because of Advani. Krishna was an asset that had to be retained by the party for the future. Prof Shastri puts it most succinctly: The present leadership of the Congress doesnt understand the importance of ego massage. Taking the adage 'honesty is the best policy' to an all new level, an Independent candidate from Agra South, Gopal Chaudhary, has said that his only agenda for fighting the Assembly election is to make money. Chaudhary, who is all set to fight the election on 11 February made these surprisingly shocking remarks when he was asked about his poll agenda. #WATCH: Independent candidate Agra South Gopal Chaudhary says 'my only reason for coming into politics is money, I'll fool people" pic.twitter.com/sYfPIdhiYC ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) January 27, 2017 In the video, which has now gone viral across social media, Chaudhary is heard saying, "Mera chunaav mein koi mudda nahin, bas ek personal mudda hainmujhe paisa kamaana hai, invest karna hai and saari suvidhaye khari karna hain (I have no agenda. I only have a personal agendaI want to make money and invest it). When asked why he wants to loot the public, the candidate claimed that corruption is rampant in politics, while taking the example of ruling Samajwadi Party MLAs to bolster his claim to indulge in corruption. "Kyunki rajneeti mey aise hi ho raha hai. Rajneeti mey jo aata hai, paise kamata hai, ghar basaata hai. Samajwadi party ke log dekhiye, sab MP hai, vidahyak hai, Mein bhi kama raha hoon pise, paise kamane aaya hoon (Anyone who enters politics, earns money. You can see Samajwadi leaders doing so. Even I want to do so," Chaudhary said. When asked how he will make money, he showed his apparent inexperience and said that he will get guidance from government officers to learn the tricks of the trade. Chaudhary also added that once he wins the election, he will naturally learn how to earn money. "Jo vikaas karya ke liye paisa aata hai, usme 25 percent to hai hi. Aur kai tarah se kaam hote hai jo mujhe kuch log batayenge. Mujhe abhi utni knowledge nahi hai. Jeetne ke baad mujhe apne aap knowledge aa jayegi. Adhikari mujhe kahenge paise kamane ke liye," the aspiring MLA claimed. When asked how he would win the election, he took a jibe at the prime minister and alleged,Itni badi Hindustan mein, sawa so crore janata ko bewakoof bana kar koi banda PM ban jaata hai, toh uss mein koi kaabiliyat toh hogi. Waise hi mai bhi bewakoof banaunga (If Narendra Modi can fool 125 crore people and become the prime minister, he surely has some ability to dupe people. In the same way, I will also dupe people)." The Dalit-plus-Muslim votebank is easily the most winnable formula in Uttar Pradesh. Together, these two groups form well over 40 percent of the population in the state. In a state where Samajwadi Party could sweep the polls with less than 30 percent vote share in the last Assembly election, a Dalit-Muslim votebank is the simplest route to power. Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati has the single biggest block majority of Dalits behind her. If Muslim electorate gets enthusiastic towards BSP, Dalit-plus-Muslim votebank could be a unbeatable. This is simple arithmetic. And, Mayawati is surely aware of it. Yet, it remains a mystery why the BSP never goes aggressively for the Muslim votes. It is commonly said that Muslims go with the party that is most likely to defeat BJP. If thats true then why don't we see Muslims voting enthusiastically for a BSP? SP gets lions share of the Muslim votes but BSP is far behind. There are several reasons for that but first a recent example when BSP had the opportunity to grab Muslim votes and she missed it. After the Muzaffarnagar riots, or for that matter the murder of Mohammad Akhlaq in Dadri, has turned the popular mood in the state against SP. How can an astute politician like Mayawati be unaware of this minority anger? There were other grievances too, apart of the anti-incumbency factor against SP, yet the BSP failed to tap this feeling of discontent among Muslims. Failure to take stand on Muslim issues The feeling among Muslims that Mayawati does not care much for the Muslims, gained strength when Muslim youths were routinely picked up from Azamgarh and other towns of Uttar Pradesh during BSP regime. Azamgarh was branded as hub of terror during her tenure as the chief minister. Muslims hoped BSP leadership would take a strong stand against it or at least speak out over the indiscriminate arrests something that could have boosted the morale of Muslims. But this didnt happen. Muslims felt that there pain wasnt understood by the BSP. And the trust deficit between Muslims and the BSP kept growing. While SPs core Yadav vote is much less than BSPs Dalit vote, SP managed to create the image that it was a party that looked after interests of Muslims and thus emerged the Muslim-Yadav combination. Muslims do vote for BSP, often as second choice, but the Dalit-plus-Muslim combination that would have been invincible, could never emerge in Uttar Pradesh. No serious effort to reach out to Muslims After the SP formed the government in 2012, there was little effort on part of BSP leadership to reach out to Muslims. Many Muslims complained that the BSP doesnt even seem to acknowledge that we had supported the party election after election, but just expects our vote. In the wake of riots, Muslims were in need for someone who would stand by their side. Perhaps, the expectation was that BSP leaders would visit homes of victims of communal riots and those who suffered at the hands of cow vigilantes. There was bound to be a feeling of dejection. It was the time one started hearing more and more about Mayawati being soft on BJP and about BSP chiefs purported statement in the past that put blame on Muslims for partys loss. We have had examples of 'secular' parties allying with BJP, but BSP joining hands with the saffron party is something that we have heard more often. However, the fact remains that the BSP has never had a serious outreach strategy towards the Muslims neither in terms of launching new schemes for artisans (that could have helped the community), nor major developmental projects in Muslim dominated cities or towns. No symbolism: Rare to find Muslim icons on BSPs banners, hoardings During BSP events, conventions and political campaigns, it is rare to see any Muslim personalitys photograph along Dalit icons of yore. The banners and posters are seldom in Urdu. Symbolic representation goes a long way in bringing a community with the party. But the BSP doesnt seem to think about it. Even promises are not such that would make Muslims rush towards the party. When new districts were carved during BSP rule, none of them was named after any Muslim icon of the past. Major schemes or projects werent named after Muslims freedom fighters (unlike Dalit heroes). No one except Nasimuddin: BSPs sole Muslim face During her tenure, Muslims too rued that it was difficult to get to meet her. The party doesnt have strong Muslim leaders either. The Muslim face of BSP is Nasimuddin Siddiqui. But Siddiqui doesnt have influence among Muslims. Besides, Mayawatis lack of connect with Muslim social, religious leaders sent wrong signals to the Muslims. Akbar Ahmad Dumpy and Ilyas Azmis protest in Parliament after Batla House encounter and police parading Muslims wearing keffiyeh, was a moment when Muslims felt the party was strongly raising their voice. However, reports suggested that both of them were ticked off for their protest. They were out of favour in the party soon. A feeling gained ground among Muslims that strong Muslim leaders were unwelcome in BSP (though it is a charge against other parties too). Mayawati was chief minister briefly in her earlier two stintsaround four months in 1995 and six months in 1997. In 2002, she was chief minister and remained in the chair for more than a year. Along with a committed Dalit vote, she needed just a chunk of another major social group, to form government on her own. But it was only in 2007 that when there was an apparent wave against SP government that her party could win an absolute majority and she was chief minister for five years. Field Muslim candidate BSPs sole strategy to get Muslim support BSP has been in the fray since the decade of eighties. In the aftermath of Babri mosque demolition, Muslims were angry with Congress and were looking for alternatives. There were two strong alternatives that emerged in UP: Mulayam Singh Yadavs SP and Kanshi Rams BSP. But Mulayam Singh Yadav cleverly positioned himself as custodian of Muslim interests. The BSP didnt go all out to get Muslim vote. Yet, it kept getting some Muslim vote. The sole plan has been to field Muslim candidate and get the communitys votes. It remains the partys sole Muslim plan till date. But is that any plan, at all! Roping in Muslim leaders like Mukhtar Ansari just before polls may fetch her votes. With 97 Muslim candidates in the fray, BSP will definitely get Muslim vote in many constituencies. Even otherwise no one write off the party. But the real question is that shouldnt BSP have tried to be the first choice for the Muslim voter in UP, when the field was open for it for years? Perhaps, no one except Mayawati can answer it. Dehradun: Uttarakhand Congress on Monday accussed Prime Minister Narendra Modi of violating the model code of conduct, which is in place in the five poll-bound states, by the broadcast of his monthly 'Mann ki Baat' programme. "There was no need for the Prime Minister to broadcast his 'Mann ki Baat' programme in view of the upcoming polls in the five states," state Congress spokesperson RP Raturi said. "Through this broadcast, Modi attempted to entice the youth which is against decorum," Raturi alleged. Terming the broadcast as "abuse of power" the spokesperson said, "Mann ki Baat should not have been aired in the five poll-bound states." Ottawa: Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of US President Donald Trump's travel ban, the immigration ministry has said. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. Hussen did not indicate how many people could be concerned by this measure, but he said that as of early Sunday afternoon, the Canadian authorities were unaware of anyone stranded in the country by the US order. Trump on Friday suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Hussen, who is of Somali origin, said the Trump administration had assured Ottawa that Canadians holding dual nationality with those countries would not be affected by the US ban. He said that people from those seven countries who have a valid Canadian permanent residency card can still enter the United States. However, under the US order, the ban will apply to people from the targeted countries who are passing through Canada. More than 35,000 Canadians with dual citizenship have citizenship with one of the seven countries, he added. Hussen also stressed that Canada would continue to pursue an immigration policy based on compassion while at the same time protecting the security of its citizens. On Saturday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcomed immigrants to Canada, striking a sharp contrast with Trump's sweeping executive order restricting immigration the previous day. "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada," Trudeau posted on Twitter. According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one out of five people in the country are foreign-born. Canada has welcomed more than 39,670 Syrian refugees between November 2015 and the beginning of this January, according to government figures. Washington: A senior Democratic lawmaker has said she will introduce two bills in the US Senate seeking to immediately rescind President Donald Trump's "discriminatory" executive order imposing a travel ban on people from seven Muslim-majority nations and to ensure additional Congressional oversight on his authority. Senator Dianne Feinstein, Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said she will introduce the bills in response to Trump's discriminatory executive order barring immigrants from Muslim-majority countries and suspending the US refugee programme. Feinstein's first bill would seek to rescind the executive order. The second would call for amending the Immigration and Nationality Act to ensure additional Congressional oversight on the president's authority to bar classes of people from entering the United States. As per the bill, the US president would be required to provide 30 days' notice to the Congress, rationale for taking such an action and an analysis of the potential effects, including social, economic and demographic. The president would also be required to respond to members' questions about the proposed rationale to bar classes of immigrants. "The president's blatantly discriminatory executive order should be rescinded immediately. The consequences of this order will be far-reaching and were obviously not carefully considered. People all around the world will be affected, including Americans," Feinstein said. Feinstein said there is no legitimate national security reason to ban refugees the vast majority of whom are women and children who have experienced the worst of humanity. In a dear colleague letter, Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said Trump's "unconstitutional" executive order betrays everything the Statue of Liberty and the US stand for. "The president's action is not only unconstitutional but immoral. As Pope Francis said, 'It's hypocrisy to call yourself a Christian and chase away a refugee or someone seeking help,'" she said. "We have been moved and inspired by the scenes of Americans, including Members of our Caucus, rallying to airports across the nation to demand justice for the men, women and children detained and/or deported under the president's order," she said. Democratic National Committee interim chair Donna said Trump's Muslim ban is illegal, a pretext for religious discrimination and it only makes America less safe. "Experts agree that this policy is a gift to radical terrorist recruiters everywhere experts like former CIA Director and four-star General David Petraeus, who said a Muslim ban was 'totally counterproductive,' Trump's own current Secretary of Homeland Security Retired Marine General John Kelly, and his predecessor, Republican former Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge, who said a Muslim ban would 'feed into the ISIS narrative'," she said. New York: The US border officials are checking the Facebook profiles of immigrants before allowing them into the country, a media report said. The move came in the wake of US President Donald Trump's executive order to temporarily bar US entry to refugees and citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations. The US officials are reportedly checking the Facebook pages of immigrants for their political views, The Independent reported on Sunday. A Houston-based lawyer Mana Yegani was quoted as saying that several green card holders, who have the right to live and work in the US, were detained by border agents at American airports hours after Trump's executive order came into force. According to the American Immigration Lawyers Association (Alia), border agents were checking the social media accounts of those detained and were interrogating them about their political beliefs before allowing them into the US. "I and my fellow lawyers had worked through the night fielding calls from people with legitimate visa being detained before entering the US or ordered back on flights to the Muslim-majority countries on the list," said Yegani, who works with the Alia. "The ban has affected travellers with passports from seven Muslim majority countries and also green card holders who are granted authorisation to live and work in the US," a spokeswoman from Department of Homeland Security said. The ban on Saturday created chaos and outrage around the world, while numerous travellers found their access to the US territory blocked and protests were staged at several US airports. "In one alleged incident a Sudanese PhD student at Stanford University in California, who has lived in the US for 22 years, was held for five hours in New York and in another a dual Iranian-Canadian citizen was not allowed to board a flight in Ottawa," the report noted. "These are people that are coming in legally. They have jobs here and they have vehicles here. Just because Trump signed something at 6 pm yesterday (on Friday), things are coming to a crashing halt. It's scary," Yegani said. The executive order bans immigration from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen under measures to "keep radical Islamic terrorists out". "I am establishing new vetting measures to keep radical Islamic terrorists out of the US," Trump said on Friday during the signing at the Pentagon after the swearing-in of Defence Secretary James Mattis, CNN reported. Donald Trump faced mass protests and global outrage Sunday over his controversial ban on travellers from seven Muslim countries, facing the first real test of his nine-day administration. The ban was criticised by allies, sparked confusion over its implementation and galvanised Democrats looking for a lightning rod to beat Trump. There was growing unease among Republican lawmakers as well. Four federal judges moved to halt deportations, around 300 people were stopped or detained worldwide and US civil rights lawyers warned the battle could head to the Supreme Court. Thousands of noisy demonstrators poured into the country's major airports for the second day in a row to show support for immigrants and refugees impacted by Trump's contentious travel restrictions. Lawyers accompanied by interpreters set up shop in airports and fought for the release of those detained on arrival many of them were in mid-air when Trump signed the decree. The decree suspends the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. At least 109 people were held upon arrival to the United States despite holding valid visas. It was unclear how many were still detained late Sunday. Top Trump aides downplayed the number as "a couple of dozen" as Canada said it would offer temporary residence to those stranded in the country by the ban. Under fire from all quarters, Trump issued an official White House statement to deny it was a Muslim ban and blast the media for its coverage. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe," he said. The decision that falls short of his 2015 promise on the campaign trail to ban all Muslims from coming to the United States ignited the biggest controversy since he took office. Trump then took to Twitter to blast Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, fellow Republicans who criticised the ban. He called them "wrong," "weak on immigration" and "looking to start World War III." The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong - they are sadly weak on immigration. The two... Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 ...Senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 Thousands protest The real estate tycoon, who has never previously held elected office, sees himself making good on a key but highly controversial campaign promise to subject travellers from Muslim-majority countries to "extreme vetting" which he declared would make America safe from "radical Islamic terrorists." The detention of travellers at US airports left families divided: a father was unable to reach his son's wedding, and a grandmother unable to meet her grandchildren. Iran called the ban a "gift to extremists." Six Syrians were turned away from Philadelphia International Airport and sent back to Lebanon, a Beirut airport official said. In New York, police estimated that 10,000 people gathered in protest at Battery Park across the river from the Statue of Liberty America's famed beacon of freedom and immigration. "Refugees are welcome here!" demonstrators shouted, some holding up signs recalling the Holocaust that read "Never Again." Trump signed the decree on Holocaust Memorial Day. "It should send a chill down the spine of every American," the city's Democrat mayor Bill de Blasio said as the crowd chanted "impeach" in reference to Trump. Thousands more protested outside the White House. Galvanised Democrats Protestors also gathered at Washington's Dulles Airport and airports in Los Angeles, Orlando and Sacramento. Hundreds demonstrated in Boston, with activists scheduling other rallies in Atlanta, Denver, Kansas City and Seattle. While Trump cited the 11 September, 2001 attacks in explaining his move, none of the 9/11 hijackers' home countries Egypt, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were included in the measure. All of those countries are key US allies. Uncertainty reigned over the ban's implementation, with some green card holders from the targeted countries saying they had been turned back or prevented from boarding flights to the US. But the Trump administration officially clarified late Sunday that the permanent residents would be exempt from the ban. The order affected dual nationals, but not Canadian or US dual passport holders. Britain one of the several countries seeking clarification from Washington said its nationals would not be subject to additional checks unless they travelled directly from one of the listed countries. Trump will also honour a deal struck under his predecessor to accept refugees from remote Pacific camps, Australia's prime minister said amid the chaos. In November, Canberra negotiated a "one-off" deal with the outgoing Obama administration to settle an unspecified number of the 1,600 boatpeople Australia held in offshore processing centres in Nauru and Papua New Guinea. In addition to scathing criticism from abroad from Tehran to Cairo to major European countries Democratic and Republican lawmakers at home also hit out against the move seen by many as religious discrimination at the border. Sixteen attorneys general from mostly Democrat-run states vowed to fight the order as unconstitutional. Trump appeared to justify his order by writing on Twitter that Christians in the Middle East had been "executed in large numbers." "We cannot allow this horror to continue!" he tweeted to his nearly 23 million followers, making no mention of Muslims who have been killed in greater numbers. Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 Oscar-winning Iranian director Asghar Farhadi and the subjects of The White Helmets, an Oscar-nominated documentary, announced they would now not attend next month's Academy Awards. Meanwhile, several world leaders and governments hit out at the immigration restrictions imposed by Trump. Britain Downing Street said on Sunday Prime Minister Theresa May does "not agree" with the restrictions and would intervene if they affected British nationals. While US immigration is a matter for Washington, "we do not agree with this kind of approach and it is not one we will be taking," London said. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson tweeted Britain "will protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals home and abroad. Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality." We will protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals home and abroad. Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) January 29, 2017 European Union European Union foreign policy supremo Federica Mogherini pledged the bloc would "continue to support, welcome and take care of those who flee from war". "We will continue to celebrate for every wall that is torn down and for every new bridge that is built up. We will keep working for peace and coexistence. This is our history, this is our identity, our work and our commitment," added Mogherini. Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau did not directly criticise Trump but said on his official Twitter account: "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada." To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 28, 2017 This tweet was followed by one showing him with a young refugee at a Canadian airport and another that used the hashtag #ACanadianIsACanadian, as his office confirmed Canadian passport holders including dual nationals were unaffected by the ban. Iran Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif slammed Trump's move as "a clear insult to the Islamic world" and said it "will be recorded in history as a great gift to extremists and their supporters". Zarif said Trump's decision "only serves to provide a fertile ground for more terrorist recruitment by deepening the ruptures and fault-lines which have been exploited by extremist demagogues to swell their ranks". His ministry said earlier it would reciprocate with a ban on Americans entering the country, though it will not apply to those who already have a valid visa. Germany Angela Merkel's spokesman said the German chancellor "regrets the entry ban" and "is convinced that even in the necessarily resolute battle against terrorism, it is not justified to place people from a certain origin or belief under general suspicion". Berlin "will now examine the consequences" of the ban for German citizens with dual nationality affected by the decision, added the spokesman. Indonesia Indonesia "deeply regrets" the move "because we believe it would affect the global fight against terrorism and the refugees management negatively," foreign ministry spokesman Arrmanatha Nasir told AFP. "It is wrong to link radicalism and terrorism with one particular religion," Nasir said. France French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said: "Welcoming refugees who are fleeing war is part of our duty." "We must... ensure that this happens in a fair, just way and with solidarity ... This decision can only cause us concern." Sweden Swedish foreign minister and deputy prime minister Margot Wallstrom called the decision "deeply unfortunate". "This decision increases mistrust and tensions between people. Not since World War II have so many people fled war and conflict," she wrote. "It is the joint responsibility of all countries to help them, including the US." Switzerland Trump's decision is "wrong", Swiss foreign affairs minister Didier Burkhalter said. "We have always been opposed to discrimination against human beings on the basis of religion or nationality," he said. "In that sense, the US order clearly goes in the wrong direction." Burkhalter said the Swiss government would confer with American representatives to find out how the order would affect Swiss residents, especially dual nationals from countries affected. Burkhalter also invoked the Geneva Conventions, saying they "mean that all countries welcome people affected by war for humanitarian reasons". "It is, therefore contrary to the Conventions to stop welcoming people coming from Syria," he added. The Netherlands Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte said all refugees fleeing war and violence "deserve a safe haven, regardless of their ethnicity or religion". He added that while his government is conscious of the potential to abuse the refugee system, "we regret the US decision to ban the travel of people from seven Muslim countries and we reject it." However, Geert Wilders, a lawmaker from the far-right Freedom Party, tweeted Sunday: "Less Islam means more freedom" and "No more immigration from an Islamic country is exactly what we need. Also in The Netherlands, Islam and freedom are incompatible." That said, a couple of countries did come out in favour of Trump's ban. Czech Republic Going against the grain of global condemnation, a spokesman for Czech President Milos Zeman came out in favour of the ban. "Trump protects his country, he's concerned with the safety of his citizens. Exactly what EU elites do not do," Jiri Ovcacek said. Poland Polish foreign minister Witold Waszczykowski also refused to condemn the ban, saying "it's the right of every sovereign state to determine its own immigration policy". "The scale of this phenomenon is so large that in many countries at the moment the immigration issue is a matter of government policy and should remain government policy," he told Polish private news channel Polsat News on Sunday. "No country currently has the obligation to welcome immigrants. Countries have the obligation in accordance with international conventions to welcome refugees, if they arrive," he added. With inputs from AFP By John Irish | TEHRAN TEHRAN France vowed on Monday to act as defender of Iran's nuclear deal, which U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to tear up, but said it was imperative Tehran abide strictly by the conditions of the accord.Arriving in the Iranian capital for a two-day visit, French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said it was in the "common interest" that the 2015 accord under which Tehran agreed to curb its nuclear programme in return for lifted sanctions was obeyed.During the U.S. election race Trump had branded it "the worst deal ever negotiated", telling voters he would either rip it up or seek a better agreement."I'm coming as the defender of the accord, but to be vigilant and explain that they (the Iranians) must be irreproachable," Jean-Marc Ayrault told reporters after landing in Tehran. "We harbour real concerns about the U.S. administration's attitude towards this agreement," he said. The deal was brokered by the United States, Russia, China, Britain, Germany and France. Paris took one of the hardest lines against Tehran in the negotiations, but has been quick to restore trade ties.Major French corporations including planemaker Airbus, oil major Total and automobile manufacturers Peugeot and Renault have all signed deals.Ayrault said that while Tehran had "largely" kept to the terms of the deal, it had pushed the spirit of the accord over the past year by carrying out several ballistic missile tests. "We want this agreement to be respected. It is in the common interest of the international community that it is," Ayrault said.The foreign minister is due to meet Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and the powerful Secretary of Supreme National Security Council, Ali Shamkhani. The visit, which includes an economic conference where some contracts may be concluded, will provide an opportunity for talks on Syria. Paris is a vociferous opponent of Iran's backing of Syria's leader, Bashar al-Assad."We will discuss our disagreements, notably on Syria. "We had hoped Iran would be less aggressive in the region," Ayrault said, referring to the period since the nuclear deal.On Sunday, Trump spoke by telephone with Saudi Arabia's King Salman, a close U.S.-ally in the Middle East. A White House statement said the two leaders agreed on the need to address "Iran's destabilizing regional activities." (Editing by Ingrid Melander and Richard Lough) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. New York: Global coffee giant Starbucks has said it will hire 10,000 refugees over next five years as it vowed to not "stand silent" in the face of US President Donald Trump's order to ban people from seven Muslim-majority nations and assured it will continue to nurture the human spirit. "I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise. We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question," Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz said in a message in the wake of Trump's order that has upended lives in the US as well as across the globe. Schultz said the company will take specific actions to ensure people around the world that it will "neither stand by, nor stand silent as the uncertainty around the new Administration's actions grows with each passing day." The Starbucks chief announced that the company has had a long history of hiring young people looking for opportunities and a pathway to a new life around the world. "This is why we are doubling down on this commitment by working with our equity market employees as well as joint venture and licensed market partners in a concerted effort to welcome and seek opportunities for those fleeing war, violence, persecution and discrimination," he said. Schultz said Starbucks is developing plans to hire 10,000 refugees over five years in the 75 countries around the world where it does business, including India. "And we will start this effort here in the US by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support," he said. Starbucks will also strengthen its business in the "critically important market" Mexico, which has been a target of Trump's policies. Schultz said the company has been open for business in Mexico since 2002, and have since opened almost 600 stores in 60 cities across the country, which together employ over 7,000 Mexican partners. "We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same," he said. He also outlined Starbucks' plans to ensure healthcare coverage to its employees in the wake of Trump's plans to scrap Obamacare. "We are in business to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time whether that neighborhood is in a Red State or a Blue State; a Christian country or a Muslim country; a divided nation or a united nation. That will not change. You have my word on that," Schultz said. Trump's executive order, which imposed a minimum 90-day ban on immigrants and refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries (Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen; refugees from Syria have been barred indefinitely), has sparked an outpouring of criticism. By Bozorgmehr Sharafedin | DUBAI DUBAI The new U.S. immigration curbs have cast uncertainty over the futures of thousands of Iranian students in the United States, with many losing hope of being able to finish their studies or find a job in the country. President Donald Trump's executive order bans travellers from seven Muslim-majority countries including Iran for three months, and there is little certainty of what will happen after that.Many of the students have spent their families' life savings to pay for an American higher education, which they hope will be a ticket to a well-paid job in the West or Iran. Now they fear if they leave the country, they will not be allowed back in. They also do not know what status they will have after the three months are up, and whether they will be allowed to study, live or work in the United States. Amin Amouhadi, 32, studies at the University of Georgia. His girlfriend, who is also Iranian, is about to finish her PhD in Canada."We were planning to get married in a month and move in together but the current ban and its possible consequences have put the future of all our plans in jeopardy," he told Reuters."I might quit my PhD program, (and) try to find a university in Canada to apply for. I can't think of any other plan."The United States is the most popular destination for Iranians studying abroad, despite decades of hostility between the two countries. The trend goes right to the top; Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's cabinet boasts more U.S. doctorates than did the cabinet of Trump's predecessor Barack Obama. About 8,700 Iranian students were at U.S. universities in 2014, a fifth of the estimated 50,000 Iranians studying abroad, according to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.More than 3,000 Iranian students have received PhDs from American universities in the past three years, over 7,000 U.S. academics including 40 Nobel Laureates said in a petition against the order signed by Trump on Friday. They said the ban could lead to the departure of many talented individuals. 'INHUMANE ORDER' Mohammadreza Jalaeipour, a post-doctorate student at Harvard University, has cancelled a study visit to Oxford University in Britain because he was afraid he would not be able to return.The 34-year-old said he was not hopeful of extending his studies in another American university or receiving a visa for a job in the United States."This discriminatory and inhumane order is targeted to harm Iranian society. It shows that the U.S. government is dishonest when it says they have no problem with the Iranian people and they are only against the Iranian government," he said.Medical students could be among the hardest hit. Roozbeh Esfandiari is an Iranian who studied medicine in the United States before gaining a job as a researcher at Harris County psychiatric center in Houston. He said U.S. medicine school qualifications could not be easily transferred to other countries, so it would be a major blow for Iranian graduates if they were unable to work in the United States after several years of study. "This news (Trump's order) is a headache for Iranian doctors applying for residency," he said.The Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates said on its website that it was aware of the executive order and was evaluating the potential impact on international medical students and graduates. ANXIETY, DEPRESSION Even before Trump's order, the road to American higher education has always been a tough one for Iranians. Since there is no U.S. embassy in Iran, students must travel to embassies or consulates in other countries to apply, which can cost them thousands of dollars.Student visas can take many months to secure. Because of security concerns, Iranians can face background stiff checks.Zahra Razavi, a computer science student at the University of Rochester, said her husband had applied for a U.S. visa several times under the Obama administration, with no success. The Trump order has crushed their lingering hopes of living together in the United States, she added."This disaster has caused depression and deep anxiety in me. It's impossible to continue this way. I have no choice but to say goodbye to my dreams and quit my studies."Shirin Sajadi, an Iranian psychotherapist in Boston, wants to help shell-shocked students from her homeland by offering them free psychotherapy sessions. "There's a sense of facing crisis and the need to make sense of the chaos surrounding us," she told Reuters. "Many immigrants have come to this country when they had nothing but hope for a better life. They've worked hard, played by the rules and hoped to succeed. But now that hope is gone." (Editing by William Maclean and Pravin Char) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. WASHINGTON Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will meet with President Donald Trump on Feb. 15 for talks covering a range of security issues, the White House said on Monday."Our relationship with the only democracy in the Middle East is crucial to the security of both our nations, and the president looks forward to discussing continued strategic, technological, military and intelligence cooperation with the prime minister," White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters as he announced the visit. (Reporting by Steve Holland; Writing by Tim Ahmann; Editing by Chris Reese) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. New York: Protests against President Donald Trump's travel ban on people from seven predominantly Muslim nations continued for the second day, with thousands of demonstrators gathering at airports and outside the White House in solidarity with those hit by the controversial move. Protesters gathered outside the White House and raised slogans like 'This is what America looks like!', 'The people united, will never be divided' and 'No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here,' as they waved the American flag and held placards, opposing Trump's order to block any visitors for 90 days from seven designated countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Similar protests were held across the nation and at airports, where confusion continued to prevail over the order after a New York judge's order temporarily halting removal of individuals detained in the country. People gathered at Battery Park in Lower Manhattan, within sight of the Statue of Liberty, Boston's Copley Square as well as popular spots across San Francisco demonstrating and extending their support and solidarity with refugees and those impacted by the ban. Hundreds of protesters had gathered at the Dulles International Airport, while at the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, scores of Muslims pulled out their prayer rugs and knelt, and at least 50 people were taken into police custody. Mohammad Abdulhadi said he was blown away that hardly any of those protesting appeared to be Muslim. "I think the most beautiful thing about the entire evening was it wasn't predominantly Muslim," he told WFAA-TV. "There were Mexicans, priests, rabbis, men, women, everybody." It was the second consecutive weekend that protests were held across the country against the Donald Trump administration. Last weekend, just a day after Trump was sworn-in as President, millions of women and men had joined the 'Women's March' across the nation against Trump's policies on a host of issues. Maryam Kanna, a 24-year-old Iraqi-American who lives in Arlington, Virginia, told WTOP News that the executive order was "totally alienating." Kanna said she worries about her uncle, a British citizen, and her cousins in Canada, who may no longer be able to enter the US. A woman who identified herself as Sonia from Sterling, Virginia., said she doesn't recognise what she sees in the United States right now. "My dad's a green card holder, and granted, the country he's from is not on the ban list, but it really could easily be," she said. "This is not the America I was raised in." By Allison Lampert | QUEBEC CITY QUEBEC CITY Two suspects were under arrest after a shooting at a Quebec City mosque on Sunday evening killed six people and wounded eight, police said on Monday, and a source said one was French-Canadian and the other was of Moroccan heritage.At least one of the suspects in the attack by two gunmen was a student at nearby Universite Laval, the source said.One suspect was identified as Alexandre Bissonnette, a French-Canadian, the other as Mohamed Khadir, who is of Moroccan heritage although his nationality was not immediately known, according to the source.Police declined to give details of the suspects' identities or possible motives for the attack during evening prayers at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec.Legal procedures are now underway and we cannot make any comment on the identity of the suspects, Royal Canadian Mounted Police national security superintendent Martin Plante told a news conference. He added the suspects, both men, were not previously known to police.One suspect was arrested at the mosque, where police were called at about 8 p.m. local time, and the other turned himself about an hour later, Quebec City Police Inspector Denis Turcotte said.Police said they were confident there were no other suspects involved in the attack.Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau earlier called the shooting "a terrorist attack on Muslims." The shooting came over the weekend that Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, after U.S. President Donald Trump halted the U.S. refugee program and temporarily barred citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States on national security grounds.Trump's action was widely condemned in the United States and abroad as targeting Muslims.FATHER OF FOUR AMONG THOSE KILLED Five people were critically injured in the mosque attack and remained in intensive care, three of them in life-threatening condition, a spokeswoman for the Quebec City University Hospital said on Monday. Another 12 people were treated for minor injuries, she said.A father of four, the owner of a halal butcher near the mosque, was among those killed, said Pamela Sakinah El-hayet, a friend of one of the people at the mosque.The mosque concierge was killed, as was Ahmed Youness, a 21-year-old student, El-hayet told Reuters. One of El-hayets friends, Youness roommate, was in the mosque at the time of the shooting. He was unharmed, she said, but in total shock.Ali Assafiri, a student at Universite Laval, said he had been running late for the evening prayers at the mosque, near the university in the Quebec City area. When he arrived, the mosque had been transformed by police into a crime scene. "Everyone was in shock," Assafiri said by phone. "It was chaos."Universite Laval is the oldest French-language university in North America, with 42,500 students.There was an outpouring of support for the mosque on social media, and vigils were planned for Montreal and Quebec City, the provincial capital, as well as Edmonton later on Monday.While the motive for the shooting was not known, incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies.Pope Francis offered his condolences to Cardinal Gerald Cyprien LaCroix, Archbishop of Quebec, who was visiting Rome on Monday. Francis said he was praying for the victims of the attack. "The pope underlined how important it is in these moments that everyone remains united in prayer, Christians and Muslims," the Vatican said in a statement. (Additional reporting by Kevin Dougherty in Quebec City and Alastair Sharp and Anna Mehler Paperny in Toronto; Writing by Andrea Hopkins, Alastair Sharp and Frances Kerry; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. Washington: There is a possibility in the future of including Pakistan in the list of countries from where immigration has been banned, a top White House official indicated on Sunday, acknowledging for the first time that Pakistan was under consideration to be put in that category. "The reason we chose those seven countries was, those were the seven countries that both the Congress and the Obama administration identified as being the seven countries that were most identifiable with dangerous terrorism taking place in their country," White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, told CBS News. Trump has issued a controversial executive order banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia. "Now, you can point to other countries that have similar problems, like Pakistan and others. Perhaps we need to take it further. But for now, immediate steps, pulling the Band-Aid off, is to do further vetting for people traveling in and out of those countries," Priebus said. This is for the first time that the Trump Administration has publicly acknowledged about considering putting Pakistan into that list. Currently as per the executive order, visitors from countries like Pakistan and Afghanistan are subject to extreme vetting. Priebus said the executive orders were signed after a lot of planning. "We're not going to advertise to the world that we're going to put a stop or at least a further vetting on travel in and out of our country from these seven places," he said. "Some people have suggested, that, well, maybe we should have given everyone a three-day warning. But that would just mean that a terrorist would just move up their travel plans by three days. Identifying too many people in these countries and giving them a heads-up in these countries would only potentially flag the executive order for bad order," Priebus said. "The President has a call with leadership in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and other countries around world. And I'm sure this topic may come up," he said. Priebus asserted that Americans have to be protected first. "These are countries that harbour and train terrorists. These are countries that we want to know who is coming and going in and out of to prevent calamities from happening in this country," he said. "We're not willing to be wrong on this subject. President Trump is not willing to take chances on this subject. He was elected president in many respects because people knew that he was going to be tough on immigration from countries that harbour terrorists," Priebus said. "I can't imagine too many people out there watching this right now think it's unreasonable to ask a few more questions from someone traveling in and out of Libya and Yemen before being let loose in the United States. And that's all this is," he said. By Allison Lampert and Anna Mehler Paperny | QUEBEC CITY/TORONTO QUEBEC CITY/TORONTO Police were investigating a single suspect in a shooting at a Quebec City mosque that killed six people, with a second person who was arrested now considered a witness, authorities said on Monday.The sole suspect in the attack on Sunday evening prayers was Alexandre Bissonnette, a French-Canadian university student, according to a source familiar with the matter. The man now considered a witness was of Moroccan descent although his nationality was not immediately known, the source said. He was named by media as Mohamed Khadir or Mohammed Belkhadir by media.Police declined to give details of those arrested or possible motives for the shooting at the mosque, the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec.Authorities initially said they had arrested two suspects, but in a Twitter message, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said that "following the investigation, the second individual is now considered as a witness."Police said on Monday morning they were confident no other suspects were involved in the attack."They consider this a lone wolf situation," the source said. In addition to the six killed, five people were critically injured and 12 were treated for minor injuries, a spokeswoman for the Quebec City University Hospital said.Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau earlier called the shooting "a terrorist attack on Muslims." He was heading to Quebec City later on Monday, a spokesman said. U.S. President Donald Trump called Trudeau to express his condolences "and offered to provide any assistance as needed," said Trudeau spokesman Cameron Ahmad. He gave no further details about of the call.The shooting came over a weekend when Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, speaking in response to Trump's order to halt the U.S. refugee program and to temporarily bar citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States.Trump's action, which the president said was aimed at protecting Americans from the threat of attacks by militant Islamists, was widely condemned in the United States and abroad as targeting Muslims.FATHER OF FOUR AMONG THOSE KILLED A father of four, the owner of a halal butcher near the mosque, was among those killed, said Pamela Sakinah El-hayet, a friend of one of the people at the mosque.The mosque concierge was killed, as was Ahmed Youness, a 21-year-old student, El-hayet told Reuters. One of El-hayets friends, Youness roommate, was in the mosque at the time of the shooting. He was unharmed, she said, but in total shock.Ali Assafiri, a student at Universite Laval, said he had been running late for the evening prayers at the mosque, near the university in the Quebec City area. When he arrived, the mosque had been transformed by police into a crime scene."Everyone was in shock," Assafiri said by phone. "It was chaos."Universite Laval is the oldest French-language university in North America, with 42,500 students. Vigils were planned for Montreal and Quebec City, the provincial capital, as well as in Edmonton later on Monday. There was an outpouring of support for the mosque on social media.Citizens for Public Justice, a group of Canadian Christians, churches and other religious congregations, expressed their solidarity with the Muslim community of Quebec City."Last night's shooting, targeting people of faith during their worship and prayer, is a deplorable attack on all Canadians and our most deeply-held values," the group's executive director, Joe Gunn, said. While the motive for the shooting was not known, incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years.The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies.Pope Francis offered his condolences to Cardinal Gerald Cyprien LaCroix, Archbishop of Quebec, who was visiting Rome on Monday. "The pope underlined how important it is in these moments that everyone remains united in prayer, Christians and Muslims," the Vatican said in a statement. (Additional reporting by Kevin Dougherty in Quebec City,; Alastair Sharp and Anna Mehler Paperny in Toronto; David Ljunggren in Ottawa; Writing by Andrea Hopkins and Frances Kerry; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and Alan Crosby) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. By Allison Lampert and Anna Mehler Paperny | QUEBEC CITY/TORONTO QUEBEC CITY/TORONTO A French-Canadian university student was the sole suspect in a shooting at a Quebec City mosque and was charged with the premeditated murder of six people, Canadian authorities said on Monday, in what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called "a terrorist attack."Court documents identified the gunman in the attack on Sunday evening prayers as Alexandre Bissonnette. He was also charged with five counts of attempted murder, according to court papers.Among the six men killed were a butcher, a university professor, a pharmacist and an accountant, according to police and Canadian media.Police declined to discuss possible motives for the shooting at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec. "They consider this a lone wolf situation," a Canadian source familiar with the situation said.In Washington, U.S. government security experts were leaning to the view that the gunman most likely was motivated by hatred for Muslims, a U.S. government source familiar with official reporting said.A man of Moroccan descent who had also been arrested was now considered a witness, although his nationality was not immediately known, the Canadian source said.Trudeau, who has made a point of welcoming refugees and immigrants from Muslim-majority countries, told parliament in Ottawa: "Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack."He added a personal message to Canada's 1 million Muslims: "Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. Last night's horrible crime against the Muslim community was an act of terror committed against Canada and against all Canadians. We will grieve with you. We will defend you. We will love you. And we will stand with you." Somber parliamentarians observed a moment of silence. Trudeau was scheduled to visit Quebec City later on Monday.The attack was out of character for Quebec City, a city of just over 500,000 which reported just two murders in all of 2015. Mass shootings are rare in Canada, where gun control laws are stricter than in the United States. In addition to the six killed, five people were critically injured and 12 were treated for minor injuries, a spokeswoman for the Quebec City University Hospital said.Federal Safety Minister Ralph Goodale told reporters in Ottawa there was no change to "the national terrorism threat level" from medium because "there is no information known to the government of Canada that would lead to a change at this time."U.S. President Donald Trump called Trudeau to express his condolences "and offered to provide any assistance as needed," said Trudeau spokesman Cameron Ahmad. Over the weekend, Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, his response to an executive order by Trump on Friday to halt the U.S. refugee program and to temporarily bar citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States.Trump's action, which the president said was "not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe," was widely condemned in the United States and abroad as targeting Muslims.On Monday, White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters that the Quebec shooting was "a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant, and why the president is taking steps to be proactive, rather than reactive, when it comes to our nation's safety and security."FATHER OF FOUR KILLED A father of four, the owner of a halal butcher near the mosque, was among those killed, said Pamela Sakinah El-hayet, a friend of one of the people at the mosque.The mosque concierge was killed, as was Ahmed Youness, a 21-year-old student, El-hayet told Reuters. One of El-hayets friends, Youness roommate, was in the mosque at the time of the shooting. He was unharmed, she said, but in total shock.Ali Assafiri, a student at Universite Laval, said he had been running late for the evening prayers at the mosque, near the university in the Quebec City area. When he arrived, the mosque had been transformed by police into a crime scene."Everyone was in shock," Assafiri said by phone. "It was chaos."Universite Laval is the oldest French-language university in North America, with 42,500 students.Vigils were planned for Montreal and Quebec City, the provincial capital, as well as in Edmonton. There was an outpouring of support for the mosque on social media."Last night's shooting, targeting people of faith during their worship and prayer, is a deplorable attack on all Canadians and our most deeply-held values," said Joe Gunn, executive director of Citizens for Public Justice, a group of Canadian Christians, churches and other religious congregations.Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became an issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. (Additional reporting by Kevin Dougherty in Quebec City,; Alastair Sharp and Anna Mehler Paperny in Toronto; David Ljunggren in Ottawa; Mark Hosenball in Washington; Writing by Andrea Hopkins, Frances Kerry, Grant McCool; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and Alan Crosby) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. By Julia Edwards Ainsley | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON President Donald Trump on Monday brushed off outcry at home and abroad over an immigration ban on refugees and people from seven predominantly Muslim countries, a move that caused chaos at U.S. airports over the weekend.The leader of the Democrats in the U.S. Senate, Chuck Schumer, said he would bring legislation to the chamber on Monday evening seeking to end the ban.An executive order issued by Trump on Friday banned immigration from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen, and temporarily halted the entry of refugees.Chaos broke out at as border and customs officials struggled to put the directive into practice amid loud protests at major U.S. airports. The president's critics have said his action unfairly singled out Muslims, violated U.S. law and the Constitution, and defiled America's historic reputation as hospitable to immigrants. In a pair of Twitter posts early on Monday, Trump appeared to blame the airport confusion on protesters as well as Schumer, who had teared up over the weekend while discussing the ban, and even a computer system failure at Delta Airlines late Sunday."Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage ... protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!" he wrote.Schumer said 11 Republican lawmakers had already spoken out against the immigration order and called for action. "We should repeal this, and then we should sit down in a careful, thoughtful way to figure out ways we need to tighten up things against terrorism," the New York Democrat told NBC News. He said he would also urge a delay in the vote in the Senate on Tillerson and likely other Cabinet-level nominees but the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said there was no plan to delay the vote. GREEN CARDS The Trump administration on Sunday loosened a restriction on legal permanent residents of the United States, also known as green card holders, from the seven countries. Administration officials had said on Saturday green card holders from those countries were included in the executive action and were required to undergo additional screening before re-entering the country. Late on Sunday, the Department of Homeland Security said they would be admitted, subject to additional security checks if needed.Senior Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway said the green card guidelines were not altered but needed clarification. "It wasn't a rollback," she told CNBC. On Monday, a senior U.S. official said all green card holders detained and questioned at ports of entry in the wake of the order were ultimately admitted to the United States on Sunday night. None were turned over to immigration authorities for detention, said the official, who asked not to be named. Trump rejected criticism that the order amounted to a Muslim ban, saying more than 40 majority Muslim countries were not affected. But condemnation poured in from abroad, including from traditional allies of the United States like Germany.Protests erupted around the country, lawsuits were filed and a federal judge blocked deportation of those detained under the order, which drew criticism from immigration and human rights activists, Democratic lawmakers and leading Republicans.Senator Bob Corker, the Republican chairman of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a Trump supporter, said the president's order had been poorly implemented, particularly for green card holders."The administration should immediately make appropriate revisions, and it is my hope that following a thorough review and implementation of security enhancements that many of these programs will be improved and reinstated," Corker said. (Reporting by Doina Chiacu and Susan Heavey; Writing by Alistair Bell; Editing by Bernadette Baum) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. SANAA Houthi militants attacked a Saudi warship with three boats off the western coast of Yemen on Monday, causing an explosion that killed two crew members and injured three others, Saudi state news agency SPA reported."A Saudi frigate on patrol west of Hodeidah port came under attack from three suicide boats belonging to the Houthi militias," the Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen said in a statement on SPA.One of the boats collided with the rear of the vessel, causing an explosion and a fire that killed two crew members, the statement said, without specifying their nationality.Three others were injured and in a stable condition. The fire was put out by crew.The Iran-allied Houthi group that controls Yemen's capital claimed responsibility for the attack, the third carried out on ships off the coast of Yemen in the last six months. "The Saudi warship was involved in aggression against western coastal cities and Yemeni fishermen," a military official was quoted as saying by the Saba Yemeni news agency, run by the dominant Houthi movement. Earlier on Monday, a building in southern Saudi Arabia used by United Nations staff to monitor ceasefire violations in Yemen was damaged by cross-border rocket fire. The Saudi-led coalition said the attack on the ship was a serious development that "would impact international navigation and the flow of humanitarian assistance to the port for Yemeni citizens." In October, a U.S. Navy guided missile destroyer was targeted in a failed missile attack from Yemen.Former President Barack Obama launched cruise missile strikes on coastal radar sites in response in Washington's first direct military action against suspected Houthi-controlled targets in Yemen's conflict.In another incident in October, a Saudi-led force rescued passengers from a vessel being used by the United Arab Emirates military that was attacked by Houthi fighters in a strategic Red Sea shipping lane, the Bab al-Mandab strait. More than 3.4 million barrels of oil passed through the 20 km (12 mile)-wide Bab al-Mandab each day in 2013, the U.S. Energy Information Administration says.Saudi Arabia and its Gulf Arab allies have carried out thousands of bombing raids in Yemen since March 2015 in a campaign to try to restore the ousted internationally recognised government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. (Reporting by Mohammed Ghobari and Ali Abdelaty; Writing by Tom Finn; Editing by Tom Heneghan) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. Beirut: Mixed messages from Washington have left Syrian Christians confused about the effect of US restrictions on refugees and travelers from several Muslim-majority countries, with some seeing hope fading away. US President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Friday that put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily barred travellers from Syria and six other countries. The order also seeks to prioritise refugees fleeing religious persecution, a move Trump separately said was aimed at helping Christians in Syria to leave. But hopes were dashed for at least one Syrian Christian Orthodox family, who were turned away at Philadelphia international airport and had to return to Lebanon. Christians in Damascus, where Syria's conflict is still felt as fighting rages through much of the country, said pledges to prioritise minorities made little difference to them. "Getting US visas has been the dream of all citizens in developing countries, no matter their religion," said Youssef Touma, 34, attending a church service in Damascus on Sunday."Syrians of all faiths were used to queuing at the US embassy's gates (to try to get visas). But it was almost impossible to get them, and has been harder since the war started. "What I heard is that there will be exceptions for Christians from the ban, but not the easing of Christians' travel - so that means there are still the same difficulties getting a visa," Touma said. Norma, a 30-year-old IT worker at the same church who declined to give her surname, said travel to the United States was a distant and impracticable dream."I don't know or have anyone in the U.S. If there was someone I knew, an aunt or uncle, then I'd think about going myself, of course. And it would be better to undertake a safe journey to America instead of a risky one by boat to get to Germany," she said. Syrians in neighbouring countries like Lebanon and Turkey have said they will primarily seek refuge in Europe, where some countries like Germany have taken in hundreds of thousands of refugees. Many have made dangerous crossings by boat from Turkey.Christians wishing to leave Syria said the US preference for religious minorities could play into the hands of Islamist extremists. At the very least, it would have no real impact."I think (Islamist) extremists here would love for us to leave, to be rid of us," said Damascus resident Joseph Memari, reached by phone. Trump wrote on his Twitter account on Sunday: "Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue!" Touma said statements made no difference. "Minorities are always targeted by extremists and Trump's statements will not increase or decrease that," he said."They have been targeted since before Trump became president. The Christians of Maaloula (near Damascus) left the country before Trump was even considering the presidency."Christians of the Damascus countryside, like Harasta and Douma, were forced to leave their homes five years ago," he said. By Dan Levine Pressure on U.S. President Donald Trump grew on Monday over his order banning travel from seven Muslim-majority nations, as the state of Washington announced a legal challenge and former President Barack Obama took a swipe at his successor.The leader of the Democrats in the U.S. Senate, Chuck Schumer, said he would bring legislation on Monday evening seeking to end the ban, although his effort stood little chance of being passed by the Republican-led CongressBritish Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson joined a chorus of concern expressed by U.S. allies, ranging from Iraq to Germany, at Trump's executive order to forbid entry into America by refugees and people from some predominantly Muslim countries. Washington will be the first state to take on the executive order, announcing an effort to sue in federal court. "It is an insult and a danger to all of the people of the state of Washington, of all faiths," Governor Jay Inslee, a Democrat, told reporters. He said it was important for the Trump administration to face lawsuits from the state itself, and not just cases filed by people who have been impacted by the order.Technology companies Amazon.com Inc (AMZN.O) and Expedia Inc (EXPE.O), both of which are based in Washington state's Seattle area, will support the suit, state Attorney General Bob Ferguson said. Another Washington state company, Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O), said it has been cooperating with the attorney general's office to provide information about the order's impact "in order to be supportive." Republican Trump's directive on Friday put a 120-day hold on allowing refugees into the country, an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria and a 90-day bar on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The president argues that his action will protect America from terror attacks but critics complain that it unfairly singles out Muslims, violates U.S. law and the Constitution, and defiles America's historic reputation as a welcoming place for immigrants. Chaos broke out over the weekend as border and customs officials struggled to put the order into practice amid loud protests at major U.S. airports. Federal judges blocked deportation of those detained under the order.Several other state attorneys general, including those from California and New York, have said they are considering whether to file their own lawsuits.U.S. stocks suffered their biggest drop of 2017 as investors took the curb on immigration as a reminder that not all the new president's policies would be market-friendly. OBAMA CRITICISM White House spokesman Sean Spicer said Trump's move was popular with Americans.The majority of Americans agree with the president. They recognise that the steps that hes taken were to keep the country safe, Spicer said, citing unnamed polls.Referring to protests, Trump's predecessor Obama said through a spokesman that he is heartened by the political activism he sees across the country and disagrees with discrimination against people based on their religion. Kevin Lewis, a spokesman for Obama, said the Democrat who left office 10 days ago "fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion." He did not mention Trump by name. It is rare for former presidents to criticise their successor's policies so soon after leaving the White House. On Twitter, Trump appeared to blame the airport confusion on protesters as well as on Schumer, who teared up over the weekend while discussing the ban, and even a computer system failure at Delta Air Lines Inc (DAL.N) late on Sunday."Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage ... protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!" he tweeted. Schumer, a New York Democrat, urged repealing the order. "We should repeal this, and then we should sit down in a careful, thoughtful way to figure out ways we need to tighten up things against terrorism," he told NBC News, noting that some Republican lawmakers also had spoken out against Trump's action. But even if the Republican leadership in the Senate allowed a vote on Monday to repeal the order as Schumer wants, the Democrats would need all of their members plus at least three Republicans to back him for the measure to pass. And a proposed repeal of the ban would face even stronger resistance in the House if it passed the Senate.ALLIES WORRIED Trump rejected criticism that the order amounted to a Muslim ban, saying more than 40 Muslim-majority countries were not affected. But abroad, concern mounted."This is, of course, a highly controversial policy, which has caused unease and, I repeat, this is not an approach that this government would take," Britain's Johnson told parliament.Britain, which is trying to maintain its so-called special relationship with the United States, is potentially one of Trump's strongest allies abroad. Prime Minister Theresa May last week became the first foreign leader to visit him as president.Tens of thousands of protesters gathered in London and other British cities on Monday to demonstrate against the ban. People, some holding placards reading "No to Racism, No to Trump" and "Dump Trump," staged a protest outside May's Downing Street residence. The Iraqi parliament voted to ask the government to retaliate against the United States, putting at risk cooperation in the fight against Islamic State. A government official in Baghdad said Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari plans to meet the U.S. ambassador on Monday or Tuesday to express dismay at Trump's decision.U.S. State Department officials circulated a draft memo dissenting from Trump's executive order. "The end result of this ban will not be a drop in terror attacks in the United States; rather it will be a drop in international good will towards Americans and a threat towards our economy," said the memo drafted under the State Department's "dissent channel," which lets officials disagree with policy.Separately, U.S. officials said the department received multiple cables from U.S. embassies over the weekend reporting foreign dissatisfaction at the order. (Additional reporting by Doina Chiacu, Arshad Mohammed, Susan Heavey, Mark Hosenball and Patricia Zengerle in Washington and; Sharon Bernstein in California; Writing by Alistair Bell; Editing by Bernadette Baum and Bill Rigby) This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed. Transcription 1 Andean Countries and the USA: how much can be expected from FTAs? Jose Duran, Carlos de Miguel and Andres Schuschny Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean United Nations Outline The aim of this presentation is to contribute to the assessment of trade, macroeconomic and welfare impacts of the simultaneous FTA among Colombia, Ecuador and Peru within the United States of America CGE Modeling and Model Outline Andean countries: Trade history & policy trends U.S. Andean Trade Preferences (ATPA & ATPDEA) Scenarios description and simulation outcomes Concluding remarks 2 CGE Models and simulations A set of behavioral equations of the economic agents which defines the supply and demand functions from their initial endowments and their budget constraints. A set of conservation or market clearing equations: Good production - consumption, Imports (i,r,s) Exports (i,s,r), Zero profits conditions, Expenditures Revenues equilibria, Saving Investment equilibria, Global Transport Sector Equilibrium 1. Which model? 2. Which closure? 3. Which data? CGE Simulation 4. Which shocks? 5. Which numeric Method? 6. Which outcomes check? GTAP Model Closed economy diagram + Taxes collected by the Regional Household 3 GTAP Model Open economy full diagram + Global Transport Sector GTAP:Production process Armington structure (instrumental assumption): The imports are differentiated by their origin. There s no perfect substitution. 4 Model s closure Consist on the characterization of the exogenous and endogenous variables (in our model with 24 regions x 31 products there are endogenous y exogenous) Standard GE Closure: Walras Law: full markets equilibria, zero profits, budget constraints fulfilled Saving Investment closure: Fix investment returns (short run setting) Endogenous capital accumulation closure: to simulate a steady-like state Capital stock varies as saving demand rate The Global Database Content of the GTAP database: Trade stats: UN COMTRADE, by product (origin and destination at cif and fob prices), Transport margins: (CIF/FOB), Protection Data: tariffs to M, subsidies to X, production subsidies, etc: OECD, WB, Macroeconomic Stats: C, I, G, X, M Domestic/Sectoral Stats: Input/Output matrices Information is harmonized by different techniques 5 Andean Countries and the USA: how much can be expected from FTAs? Colombia-Ecuador-Peru: Population = 87.2 million (15.5 % of LAC population) GDP = 238,000 million USD (10 % of LAC GDP) GDP per capital = 6740 USD (PPP) 6 Andean: Trade history & policy trends In 1969, Andean countries signed the Cartagena Pact. Trade liberalization among Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia and Venezuela started in 1992 and become effective in Peru is partially integrated. Between the mid-1980 and the end of the 90s, the Andean Community reduced its average external tariff as it will be showed in the next slide. Intra-bloc trade was growing 13.5% between and exports to USA was growing 12 % between ANDEAN COMMUNITY: Change of maximum import mean tariffs rates (1980s 1990 & 2004) Peru Colombia Ecuador Bolivia Venezuela Andean Community (incl. Ven.) 1980s 1990 around 2004 Source: Authors calculation based on official figures. 7 U.S. Andean Trade Preferences (i) The ATPA (Andean Trade Preference Act, ) have granted tariff preferences over 5600 products to induce drug-crop cultivation and production substitution. The ATPDEA (Andean Trade Promotion and Drug Eradication Act, ) extend the duty-free treatment to other 700 (more than 6300 products). Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia and Peru were the beneficiaries Since 2002, ATPDEA increased exports further more. The ATPDEA will finalize next December, 31th. Millon dollars U.S. Andean Trade Preferences (ii) U.S. ATPA AND ATPDEA TOTAL IMPORTS FROM ANDEAN COUNTRIES, (Million dollars) Bolivia Peru Ecuador Colombia ATPA (1991) ATPDEA (2002) Source: Authors calculation based on USIT trade on-line database. 8 U.S. Andean Trade Preferences (iii) Countries U.S. IMPORTS FOR CONSUMPTION UNDER ATPA AND ATPDEA BY SOURCES IN ANDEAN SUBREGION, 2001 AND 2005 (Percentages) Main exported products under ATPDEA by country ATPDEA Share in total export by each country Country contribution in total ATPDEA exports Bolivia Colombia Ecuador Peru 4 countries Gold jewelry, Gold necklaces, sweaters, pullovers, sweatshirts, shirts, knitted or crocheted, of cotton (95%) Petroleum oils an oils from bituminous mineral, roses, fresh cut, naphtha s, textiles and apparels (96%) Petroleum oils an oils from bituminous mineral, roses, fresh cut, cut flowers, naphtha s (98%) Cathodes of refined cooper, men s or boy s shirts, T-shirts, singles, asparagus (91%) 41.1% 50.5% 77.3% 43.5% 56.2% 53.7% 5% 64.2% 43.9% 53.0% 3.3% 43.1% 13.1% 4% 100% % 41.8% 35.7% 21.0% 100% Source: Authors calculation on the basis of USITC trade basis on-line. Andean - U.S. Trade Patterns (i) USA is the main trading partner of all members of the Andean Community (AC): 4% of Andean s exports went to the USA (% of U.S. total imports). Exports to USA grew 12% per year (in average) between (17.5% during 2005) % of its imports came from the USA (63% represents capital and intermediate goods). Colombia Ecuador Peru Venezuela ANDEAN COMMUNITY, CONTRIBUTION TO EXPORTS GROWTH RATE BY COUNTRY DESTINATION (2005) (percentages) Andean Community Bolivia LAC United States European Union Japan Asia Other countries World = 35.3 = 24.6 = 26.6 = 18.7 = 36.7 = 43.0 Source: Authors calculation based on official figures. 9 ANDEAN ATPA COUNTRIES: TRADE WITHIN THE UNITED STATES, (Millions of dollars) Colombia Ecuador Trade balance Exports Imports Peru Andean - U.S. Trade Patterns (ii) Trade balance Exports Imports Trade balance Exports Imports Bolivia Trade balance Exports Imports Source: Authors calculation on the basis of COMTRADE databases and national sources. Andean - U.S. Trade Patterns (iii) In terms of composition, trade patterns show product complementarities. However, intra-bloc exports are also intensive in manufactures. So granting tariffs preferences to the USA may establish competition a within intra-bloc trade. 100% 80% 60% 40% 20% TRADE PATTERNS OF THE ANDEAN EXPORTS TO USA AND U.S. EXPORTS TO THE ANDEAN COMMUNITY ( ) (Percentages of total exports) 0% COL ECU PER USA BOL VEN Primary Products Natural Resource basis Low technology High technology Intermediate technology Source: Authors calculation on the basis of COMTRADE United Nations databases. 10 Motivations of the negotiations 1. Limited size of the regional market (10% of total exports). 2. Weakness of the Andean trade integration. E.g.: Venezuela have left the community. 3. FTAA (Free Trade Area of the Americas) negotiations stalled. 4. Skepticism in WTO Doha negotiations, which has generated a wave of PTA and FTA worldwide. In the LAC region there are more than 65 agreements. From 2001 to 2006, at least 12 new extra-regional FTA were signed. 5. The need to establish stable trading patterns after the ATPDEA completion (december 31th, 2006). Negotiations were launched May 18 th, 2004 in Cartagena (Colombia). Twelve negotiations rounds. Peru finalized negotiations in November, 2005, Colombia in March, Ecuador have prorogued them. Bolivia participated as observer. Items Regional Aggregation Production Sectors Market structure Demand Trade Primary Factors Saving - Investment Main features of the simulated framework (GTAP model) Description 24 Countries and/or Regions (from 57) All regions produce 31 goods using 5 primary factors and intermediate goods (from 92) All sectors face a perfectly competitive markets structure. GTAP as usual. Derived from the Regional Household (C, G, S) utility function. Factors and Intermediate demands are derived from the standard GTAP framework based on CES functions. Exports are differentiated by destination. Imports by origin (Armington Structure) Land, Skilled and Unskilled Labor, Capital and Natural Resources. Full employment. Savings are fully invested. Fix investment shares among countries. Additionally, a steady-like state framework with capital accumulation based on Francois (1996), were implemented. 11 Benchmark Equilibrium Simulation The GTAP baseline year (2001) does not provide a good basis since the economic environment and the protection data have largely changed between 2001 and the LAC FTAs implementation timeline. We have established a new Benchmark Equilibrium based on the end of 2004, validated in Schuschny, Duran & de Miguel, (2006) GTAP 6.1 Partially upgrade data (2001) AlterTax simulation FTA and PTA among LAC countries up to December 2001 GTAP 2001 ECLAC Baseline Standard CGE closure simulation FTA and PTA among LAC countries between (December December 2004) GTAP 2004 ECLAC Benchmark Standard CGE closure simulation Simulated scenarios: 1. AC3USA Full 2. AC3USA Excl. Sens. Outcomes of this presentation 3. No ATPDEA/No FTA Systematic Sensitivity Analysis GTAP 2004 ECLAC Benchmark is used as reference and to calculate net effects AC3-USA Full Liberalization 1 Simulated scenarios No FTA / No ATPDEA 3 AC3-USA Excluding Sensibles 2 Further simulations including capital accumulation effects Andean sensible products: Rice, wheat, Cereal Grains, Oil seeds, Vegetable oils and fats, Sugar, Other crops, Daily and milk products, Food products, Fishing, Textiles, Apparel, Leather products, Motor parts. USA sensible products: Sugar 12 Main Macroeconomic results (Percentage changes with respect to baseline 2004) GDP Exports Imports AC5 Bolivia Colombia Ecuador Peru Venezuela EE.UU. AC5 Bolivia Colombia Ecuador Peru Venezuela EE.UU. AC5 Bolivia Colombia Ecuador Peru Venezuela EE.UU. AC3 USA Full Liberalization AC3 USA Excluding Sensibles No FTA/No ATPDEA Bolivia Colombia Ecuador Peru Venezuela Bolivia Colombia Ecuador Peru Venezuela Origin Andean Community United States Andean Community United States Intra-bloc and USA trade Destination Bolivia Colombia Ecuador Peru Intra-subregional trade under No FTA / No ATPDEA scenario -2.3 Venezuela Intra-AC Intra-subregional trade under AC3-Full liberalization scenario USA Rest of the world World Source: Authors based on GTAP 6.1 simulations 13 Sectoral impacts on total output Under the FTAs: Agricultural products (specially wheat, fibers, forestry and oleaginous seeds) and Heavy manufactures (machinery and equipment lead the effects) are negatively affected. Light manufactures vary depending the category (from positive in the case of sugar or apparel to negative, meat products, vegetable oils and fast). The exclusion of sensible products reduce the negative effects as well as distribute the positive ones along sectors, specially in the case of light manufactures. No FTA / No ATPDEA redirect the negative impacts on light manufactures (especially textiles, apparels and leather products). Meanwhile, oil, mining and metals sectors improve. Sectoral decomposition of change in total output AC3-USA Excluding sensibles AC3-USA Full liberalization No ATPDEA / No FTA AC-USA Full liberalization AC-USA Excluding sensibles COLOMBIA Agricultural Products Petroleum and mining Light manufactures Heavy manufactures Services Total Production ECUADOR Agricultural Products Petroleum and mining Light manufactures Heavy manufactures Services - Total Production - - PERU Agricultural Products Petroleum and mining 3.6 Light manufactures Heavy manufactures Services Total Production Source: Authors based on GTAP 6.1 simulations 14 Effects on total output (Ecuador) Total Output Andean Community 3 - USA No FTAs / No ATPDEA Main winner sectors Sugar, Food products Fishing Sugar Machinery and equipment, auto parts, metal products negligible Main losers sectors Other manufactures, metals, oil-seeds Other manufactures, chemicals, textile Apparel, Textile, Leather products Apparels Source: Authors based on GTAP 6.1 simulations The table shows the three main products (GTAP aggregation) in each category Sectoral impacts on exports FTAs have positive impacts on trade in all FTAs scenarios and for all sectoral groups, especially, light manufactures, sugar, transport equipment, wheat, milk and apparel. The exclusion of sensible products balance the results along sectors. No FTA / No ATPDEA provokes a fall of AC exports, mostly in light manufactures (textiles 20% and apparel 40% down). 15 Sectoral decomposition of change in exports AC3-USA Full liberalization AC3-USA Excluding sensibles No ATPDEA / No FTA AC-USA Full liberalization AC-USA-Excluding sensibles COLOMBIA Agricultural Products Petroleum and mining Light manufactures Heavy manufactures Services Total Exports ECUADOR Agricultural Products 0.5 Petroleum and mining Light manufactures Heavy manufactures Services Total Exports PERU Agricultural Products Petroleum and mining Light manufactures Heavy manufactures Services 4.1 Total Exports Source: Authors based on GTAP 6.1 simulations Effects on total exports (Ecuador) Total Exports Andean Community 3 - USA No FTAs / No ATPDEA Main winner sectors Sugar, Wheat Dairy products Sugar Food products Fruits and vegetables Transport equipment, Dairy products Other manufactures Combustibles, Food products, Fruits and vegetables Main losers sectors Cereal grains Meat products, Oil seeds Meat products textile, Chemical Apparels, Textile, rice Apparel Textiles Source: Authors based on GTAP 6.1 simulations The table shows the three main products (GTAP aggregation) in each category 16 Sectoral impacts on imports FTAs increase of agricultural products imports (wheat), light manufactures (meat, apparel and textile) and heavy manufactures (machinery and equipment and other manufactures) and chemical, plastic and rubber products. Imports of machinery and equipment, considered as capital goods, can boost future economic growth (by means of capital accumulation). The exclusion of sensible products reduce the raise of most agricultural imports and some light manufactures. No FTA / No ATPDEA implies a fall of Andeans imports connected with the fall down of trade. The paper explicitly gives details of sectoral impacts on trade between AC and USA. Sectoral decomposition of change in imports COLOMBIA Agricultural Products Petroleum and mining Light manufactures Heavy manufactures Services Total Imports ECUADOR Agricultural Products Petroleum and mining Light manufactures Heavy manufactures Services Total Imports PERU Agricultural Products Petroleum and mining Light manufactures Heavy manufactures Services Total Imports AC3-USA-excluding sensibles AC3-USA-Full liberalization No ATPDEA / No FTA AC-USA-Full liberalization AC-USA-excluding sensibles Source: Authors based on GTAP 6.1 simulations 17 Effects on total imports (Ecuador) Total Imports Andean Community 3 - USA No FTAs / No ATPDEA Main winner sectors Meat products Apparel Dairy products Machinary and equipment, Other manufactures, Chemical Fishing, Wheat, Metal products negligible Main losers sectors Metal products rice Metal products Apparels, Textile, rice Chemical Other manufactures ATPDEA makes the difference Source: Authors based on GTAP 6.1 simulations Welfare effects Are measured by the Equivalent Variation. Since the benchmark scenario (2004) includes several trade liberalization processes undertaken in the LAC region, it s necessary to filter the net effects for a accurately estimation. Welfare estimations were complemented with a SSA of the AC3-USA scenario to attain the robustness on results. Empirical evidence shows that static impacts of FTAs turn out to be quite tiny in terms of GDP. 18 NET NOMINAL WELFARE EFFECTS OF ALL THE SIMULATED SCENARIOS (in million 2001 dollar with regard to the 2004 baseline scenario) Countries LAC Andean Community Bolivia Colombia Ecuador Peru Venezuela MERCOSUR Chile United States World Baseline 2004 (Includes ATPDEA) AC3 USA Full liberalization Excluding sensibles No FTA / No ATPDEA Note: The net effect is the difference between each considered scenario and the 2004 baseline benchmark Source: Authors, based on GTAP 6.1 simulations Concluding remarks 3 different CGE simulated scenario were implemented to analyze the FTAs impacts of the 3 Andeans with the USA. Results suggest that FTAs would be beneficial to improve Terms of Trade of all subscribers. The FTAs divert trade from the intra-bloc Andean market towards the USA marketplace and from those other no signers. The exclusion of sensible products improves the outcomes. The FTAs seems to be clearly beneficial for Peru and USA. That s not so for Colombia and Ecuador (see SSA) In general, the case of unsuccessful negotiations and ATPDEA completion could be the worst solution. It is important to consider the long run (dynamic-investment) effects. 19 Thank you for your attention Andres Schuschny Carlos de Miguel Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean United Nations REGIONAL AGGREGATION USED IN THE SIMULATIONS No. Codex Countries Groups 1 Bol Bolivia 2 Col Colombia Andean 3 Ecu Ecuador Community 4 Per Peru 5 Ven Venezuela 6 Arg Argentina 7 Bra Brazil MERCOSUR 8 Uru Uruguay 9 Mex Mexico 10 USA United States of America 11 Canada Canada NAFTA 12 Chil Chile 13 Central America and the CyC Caribbean Other LAC countries 14 Rlac Rest of Latin America 15 UE15 European Union a 16 PECOS New European Union Members b EU Reuro Rest of Europe 18 China China 19 Japon Japan 20 India India Asian countries 21 Corea korea 22 Rasia Rest of Asia 23 Sudafrica South Africa 24 ROW Rest of the World ROW Source: Authors based on GTAP 6.1 Database a Include: Germany, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, The Netherlands and United Kingdom. b Include: Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia. 20 No Codex Arroz Trigo Ocereales FrutasVeg Semilloil AceiteVeg Azucar FibrasVeg Ocultivos BeyTa Ganaderia Carne Lacteos Oaliment Pesca Forestal Textil Confeccion CueroCalz Madera Mineria Combustibles Dpetrol Quimica Metal ProdMetal MaquiEqui Autop Etransp Omanu Servicios Description mvh (Motor vehicles and parts) otn (Transport equipment nec) COMMODITY AGGREGATION USED IN THE SIMULATIONS pdr (Paddy rice), pcr (Processed rice) wht (Wheat) gro (Cereal grains nec) v_f (Vegetables, fruit, nuts) osd (Oil seeds) vol (Vegetable oils and fats) c_b (Sugar cane, sugar beet), sgr (Sugar) pfb (Plant-based fibers), wol (Wool, silk-worm cocoons) ocr (Crops nec) b_t (Beverages and tobacco products) ctl (Cattle,sheep,goats,horses), oap (Animal products nec) cmt (Meat: cattle,sheep,goats,horse), omt (Meat products nec) rmk (Raw milk), mil (Dairy products) ofd (Food products nec) fsh (Fishing) frs (Forestry) tex (Textiles) wap (Wearing apparel) lea (Leather products) lum (Wood products) omn (Minerals nec), nmm (Mineral products nec) coa (Coal), oil (Oil), gas (Gas) p_c (Petroleum, coal products) crp (Chemical,rubber,plastic prods) i_s (Ferrous metals), nfm (Metals nec) fmp (Metal products) ome (Machinery and equipment nec) ele (Electronic equipment), omf (Manufactures nec), ppp (Paper products, publishing) ely (Electricity), gdt (Gas manufacture, distribution), wtr (Water), cns (Construction), trd (Trade), otp (Transport nec), wtp (Sea transport), atp (Air transport), cmn (Communication), ofi (Financial services nec), isr (Insurance), obs (Business services nec), ros (Recreation and other services), osg (PubAdmin/Defence/Health/Educat), dwe (Dwellings) Sectoral Groups Agricultural Products Light Manufactures Petroleum and Mining Heavy Manufactures Services PTAs included in the GTAP 2001 ECLAC Baseline No. Agreement Signed in Implementation date 1 Chile - Canada 5-Dec-96 5-Jul-97 2 Chile - MERCOSUR Chile - Bolivia Jul-93 4 Chille - Ecuador Jan-94 5 Chile Peru Jul-98 6 Chile - Venezuela Jul-93 7 Chile - Mexico 1991 y Aug-99 8 Chile - Central American Common Market (CACM) 18-Oct-99 9 Chile - Colombia Jan MERCOSUR (Arg+Bra+Uru+Par) Andean Community (Bol+Col+Ecu+Per+Ven) a CACM (CRI + ElS + Hon + Gua + Nic) Mexico - Colombia - Venezuela (G-3) Jan Mexico-Union Europea Jun Mexico-EFTA (idem Mex-UE) Jun Mexico - Guatemala - El Salvador Honduras 29-Jun Mar Mexico Nicaragua 18-Dec-97 1-Jul Mexico - Costa Rica 5-Apr-94 1-Jan Mexico Bolivia 1-Jan Mexico Uruguay 1994 ECA LAIA framework 21 a Mexico Israel 10-Apr-00 1-Jun a Mexico Panama 22-Apr Mexico - USA CANADA Jan-94 Source: Authors based on Kuwayama, Duran and Silva (2005), Saez (2005) and Vela Sosa (2004). 21 PTAs included in the GTAP 2004 ECLAC Benchmark No. Agreement Signed in Implementation date 1 Chile United States of America 06-Jul Jan-04 2 Chile European Union 18-Nov Feb-03 3 Chile EFTA 26-Jul Dec-04 4 Chile Republic of Korea Apr-04 5 Mexico Uruguay (FTA) 1994 y Nov-03 6 United States of America - Australia Apr-05 7 ATPDEA USA Preferences to AC 06-Aug Aug-02 8 EU15 to EU May-04 Source: Authors based on Kuwayama, Duran and Silva (2005) ), Saez (2005), USITC (2005), and Vela Sosa (2004). Note that the effects of the ATPDEA are included in this benchmark scenario. It allows us to capture the gains in the market access due to FTA. GTAP Simulations: Correction from 2001 to 2004 Shock tms(trad_comm,"usa","chil") = target% 2 from file tms.shk; Shock tms(nochil_sen,"chil","usa") = target% from file tms.shk; Shock tms(trad_comm,"ue15","chil") = target% 9 from file tms.shk; Shock tms(nochil_sen,"chil","ue15") = target% from file tms.shk; Shock tms(trad_comm,"reuro","chil") = target% 3 from file tms.shk; Shock tms(nochil_sen,"chil","reuro") = target% from file tms.shk; Shock tms(nochil_sen,"chil","corea") = target% from file tms.shk; Shock tms(trad_comm,"corea","chil") = target% from file tms.shk; Shock tms(trad_comm,"mex","pecos") = target% 3.28 from file tms.shk; Shock tms(trad_comm,"pecos","mex") = target% 6 from file tms.shk; Shock tms(trad_comm,"pecos","chil") = target% 8 from file tms.shk; Shock tms(trad_comm,"chil","pecos") = target% from file tms.shk; Shock tms(trad_comm,"mex","japon") = target% from file tms.shk; Shock tms(trad_comm,"japon","mex") = target% 55 from file tms.shk;! Preferencias del acuerdo ATPDA Shock tms(atpda_pref,"usa","bol") = target% 0 from file tms.shk; Shock tms(atpda_pref,"usa","ecu") = target% 0 from file tms.shk; Shock tms(atpda_pref,"usa","col") = target% 0 from file tms.shk; Shock tms(atpda_pref,"usa","per") = target% 0 from file tms.shk; ) Chile United States (2003) Chile European Union (2002) y Rest of Europe (2003) ) Chile Korea (2003) ) Mexico - PECOS (2004) ) Chile - PECOS (2004) ) Mexico Japan (2004) Products granted by the ATPDEA (Andean Countries) ATPDEA Preferences are included to ex - ante FTA filtering Benchmark Scenario B2004GE The tech world has slammed US President Donald Trumps order of banning immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries -Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the U.S. CEOs of major tech companies have criticized and reacted to this latest move. Google CEO Sundar Pichai sent out a memo to its employees urging anyone with a visa or green card from one of the banned countries to cancel any travel plans. He said the company is concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US. [HTML1] Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg also expressed his concerns about the impact of the immigration order. He stated that his great grandparents came from Germany, Austria and Poland, and his wife Priscillas parents were refugees from China and Vietnam. Apple CEO Tim Cook wrote in a memo to employees, I share your concerns. It is not a policy we support. We have reached out to the White House to explain the negative effect on our coworkers and our company. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said in a LinkedIn post that the company shares the concerns of the orders impact on its employees who are from the seven listed countries and have been in the US lawfully. Microsoft also said that it is working with its employees to provide legal advice and assistance. [HTML2] Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey also condemned the immigration order, saying the humanitarian and economic impact of the ban is real and upsetting. Netflix CEO Reed Hasting shared via a Facebook post, Trumps actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all. Worse, these actions will make America less safe (through hatred and loss of allies) rather than more safe. [HTML3] Tesla Motors and SpaceX founder CEO Elon Musk also tweeted his concerns regarding the immigration order. Uber CEO Travis Kalanick, Airbnb c0-founder also criticized the latest move by US President Donald Trump. [Update] Executives of Canadian smartphone maker BlackBerry and Periscope have also shared their views on this order. BlackBeryy CEO John Chen wrote in a post, Many technology companies, both in the U.S. and in Canada, were founded by immigrants. At BlackBerry, more than half of the executive team and many of our employees including myself are immigrants, so we see firsthand every day the value and benefits of legal immigration. While there is a need to protect citizens, we must also preserve our strength in diversity. Periscope team wrote in a blog post, Periscope is built, maintained, and operated by people from many faiths and countries. Without immigrants and refugees, Periscope would not exist.For this reason, we are updating the Periscope loading screen to make a simple true statement: Proudly made in America by immigrants. KYOCERA in partnership with Japanese operator KDDI has introduced rafre, which is its second generation of its washable smartphone. The successor of DIGNO rafre that was introduced back in 2015 as the worlds first hand-soap-washable smartphone has resistance against foaming body soap in addition to foaming hand soap. Like its predecessor, the new rafre features resistance to hot water and a touchscreen that be can be used even when the users hands are wet or when wearing gloves. It is also It is designed to meet MIL-STD-810G military specifications. It also comes with a cooking app, which allows users to scroll through recipes, set timers and answer calls through hand gestures without having to touch the display. It has 4G LTE connectivity with VoLTE support. Check out the complete specifications below. KYOCERA rafre KYV40 specifications 5-inch (1280 x 720 pixels) TFT LCD display with Dragontrail X protection 1.4 GHz octa-core Snapdragon 430 processor with Adreno 505 GPU 2GB RAM, 16GB internal memory, expandable memory up to 200GB with microSD Android 7.0 (Nougat) 13MP rear camera with LED Flash 2MP front-facing camera Shockproof (MIL-STD-810G), Waterproof (IPX5 / IPX8) and Dustproof (IP5X) Dimensions: 71 142 10.4mm ; Weight: 158g 4G VoLTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 ac, Bluetooth 4.2, GPS 3,000mAh battery The KYOCERA rafre comes in Pale Pink, Clear White and Light Blue colors and will be available from March 2017 in Japan and is available for order from KDDI for 43,200 yen (US$ 376 / Rs. 25,660 approx.). Source Transcription 1 Peru Fulbright-Hays Seminar 2008 Galina Tchourilova 2 Geography of Peru Peru, in western South America, extends for nearly 1500 miles along the Pacific Ocean. Five-sixths the size of Alaska Peru is divided by the Andes Mountains into three sharply differentiated zones: western coastal plain (costa( costa), high and rugged Andes in the center (sierra), eastern lowland jungle of Amazon Basin (selva( selva) 3 Peru (496,200 square miles) has perhaps greater diversity than any other country in the world. The Andes run north to south through the country and are the second highest mountain range in the world. The eastern slopes of the Andes are skirted by rainforest, the beginning of the Amazon basin. Peru has 83 different ecological zones. Peru has the world s s driest desert and the richest rainforest on the face of the earth. Topography 4 Climate Peru s s climate has two seasons wet and dry but the weather varies greatly depending on the geographical region. The desert coast is very arid. During summer (January to March), the sky is clear, and the weather is hot and sticky. During the rest of the year a grey coastal mist covers the sun. Every few years this area is hit by El Nino, which produces floods in the coastal areas and sometimes the highlands. The temperature in the Andes can reach the freezing point during the night, but will go up to 80 degrees F during the day. During the summer it stays very dry. The climate in the tropical forest is strictly divided on dry and rainy seasons, but generally stays hot and humid. 5 Statistics National name: Republica del Peru President: Alan Garcia (2006) Population (2008 est.): 29,180,899 Capital and the largest city: Lima, 8,180,000 (metro area) Languages: Spanish, Quechua (both official); Aymara; many minor Amazonian languages Religion: Roman Catholic 81% Arable land: 3% Natural resources: copper, silver, gold, petroleum, timber, fish, iron ore, coal, phosphate, potash, hydropower, natural gas. Agriculture: coffee, cotton, sugarcane, rice, potatoes, corn, plantains, grapes, oranges, coca, poultry, beef, dairy products, fish. 6 Population Peru has approximately 29 million inhabitants. Due to its great size, Peru has a low population density, but the rugged character of its land tends to concentrate populations in small areas and cities. About 52 percent of Peruvians are Indians of varying descent. Mestizos,, those of European and Indian blood, comprise about 32 percent of the population. Whites, mostly of Spanish descent, and others make up about 12 percent of the population. 7 Before the Incas Before the Incas Peru had other great cultures including the Chavin, Nasca, Huari, Moche,, and Chimu.. The first great civilization in the cycle can be traced back to 1300 B.C. Chavin metallurgy, soldering, and temperature control methods were advanced for their time. They also had a knowledge of textiles that allowed them to revolutionize cloth production. The Chavin established a trade network and developed agriculture by 850 B.C. and lasted to 25 B.C. The Chavin peoples, much like all Andean groups, had no system of writing. They learned how to tame llamas. /43/Estela.jpg/180px-Estela.jpg ae15gold2~p1_200.jpg 8 The Moche culture has left impressive archaeological sites and some of the most outstanding pottery. The most important people, the priests and warriors, lived closest to the large ceremonial pyramids and other temples. They were surrounded by a middle class of artisans and then, in descending order: farmers and fishermen, servants, and slaves. The priests and warriors were both honored and obeyed. They are the people frequently shown in ceramics, which depict them being carried in litters and wearing fine jewelry. As there was no written language, most of what we know about the Moche comes from their pottery. The ceramics show us that the Moche had well-developed weaving techniques but, unfortunately, most of their textiles have been destroyed. 9 Pictures from the excavation site at the Temple of the Moon (Moche( Moche) 10 The next important period, the Chimu,, lasted from about 1000 A.D. to 1470 A.D. The Chimu built a capital at Chan Chan, north of Trujillo. Chan Chan is the largest pre- Columbian city in Peru, covering about 28 sq km, and is estimated to have housed about 50,000 people. It is as an urban society that the Chimu are best remembered. Their huge capital contained approximately 10,000 dwellings. Buildings were decorated with friezes, the designs molded into the mud walls, and the more important areas were layered with precious metals. There were huge walk-in wells, canals, workshops and temples. The Chimu were exceptionally fine goldsmiths. The royal dead were buried in mounds with a wealth of funerary offerings. 11 One of the most famous and distinctive features of the Nazca culture (approximately A.D ) is the polychrome pottery, buff or red and painted in three to eight colors. The Nazca lines, the large "geoglyphs or drawings on the earth's surface, make no sense on the ground. One can recognize the features only from the air. /nazca_pottery.jpg There are several kinds of figures, such as fish, birds, monkeys, a whale, spiders and plants. These lines spread on the ground more than 800 miles, some of them extend 12 miles long. Since these lines are on a flat surface and its climate is extremely dry, nearly all geoglyphs remain completely intact. 3x.jpg 12 The Inca Empire was quite shortlived. It lasted just shy of 100 years, from ca.1438 A.D., when the Inca ruler Pachacuti and his army began conquering lands surrounding the Inca heartland of Cuzco, until the coming of the Spaniards in The Inca brought under their control the area of present-day Peru, Bolivia, northern Argentina, Chile, and Ecuador. The Inca built the most extensive road system at the time, which covered approximately 22,500 km (14,000 mi) and provided access to over three million square km of territory. 13 The Incas gave their empire the name, Land of the Four Quarters or the Tahuantinsuyu Empire. It stretched north to south some 2,500 miles along the Andean range from Colombia to Chile and reached west to east from the dry coastal Atacama desert to the Amazon rain forest. The Incas ruled the Andean Cordillera, second in height and harshness to the Himalayas. Daily life was spent at altitudes up to 15,000 feet and ritual life extended up to 22,057 feet to Llullaillaco in Chile, the highest Inca sacrificial site known today. Mountain roads and sacrificial platforms were built, which means a great amount of time was spent hauling loads of soil and rocks up to inhospitable heights. This ability of the sandal-clad Inca to thrive at extremely high elevations continues to perplex scientists today. At the height of its existence the Inca Empire was the largest nation on Earth and remains the largest native state to have existed in the Western hemisphere. 14 A Chakana (or Inca Cross) is an Andean symbol. It is the three-stepped cross representing the southern cross and symbolizing the three tiers of Inca life (the lower world, this world, and the higher world). The three levels also represent the snake, puma, and condor. Many buildings, temples, and religious sanctuaries are scattered with the chakana symbol. The hole in its centre denotes Cusco,, which is termed "the navel of the Inca empire" and also represents the circle of life. Its twelve external corners are believed to mark the twelve months of the year, while the four arms of the cross represent North, South, East and West. ChakanaCross.jpg 15 Inca religion The six major gods of the Inca represent the moon, sun, earth, thunder, lightning and the sea. Heaven was depicted by the condor, the underworld by the anaconda, and the brother who resided on earth was the puma. The Incas worshipped the Earth goddess Pachamama and the sun god, the Inti. The Inca lord of Tahuantinsuyo was held to be sacred and to be the descendant of the sun god. The legend of the origin of the Incas tells how the sun god sent his children Manco Capac and Mama Ocllo (and in another version the four Ayar brothers and their wives) to found Cusco,, the sacred city and capital of the Inca empire. Inti Raymi,, the feast of the sun was the biggest, most important festivity in Inca times. The Inti Raymi celebration continues today It is still performed every year in September on the winter solstice of the Southern hemisphere. 2E/96gNdCkyRX0/CIMG1082.JPG?imgmax=512 16 Pachamama celebrations today During the month of August many people honor the Mother Earth with offerings. They burn incense, sprinkle yellow confetti around to bless their houses and businesses, and perform special ceremonies. 17 The architecture of the Inca cities still amazes and puzzles most scientists. Trapezoidal shape of doors and windows is one of the signature style of the Incas. Inca developed a technique of wall building that was well- suited to an earthquake prone area. Instead of repeated rows of bricks or rectangular stones, they interlock the stones in the different levels of the wall. The blocks of stones weigh several tons and they are fit together so tightly that not even a razor blade can fit through them. 18 The Incas used irrigation and terracing to expand agriculture into the highland areas. They developed drainage systems and canals to diversify their crop resources. Potatoes, tomatoes, cotton, peanuts and coca were among the many crops grown by the Inca. Llamas were used for meat and transportation. There was more than enough resources available for everyone. Increased subsistence levels led to a growth in the Inca population. 19 The inhabitants of the Andean region developed more than half of the agricultural products that the world eats today. Among these are more than 20 varieties of corn; 300 varieties of potato; as well as one or more varieties of squash, beans, peppers, peanuts, cassava, and quinoa, which is made into a cereal. By far the most important of these was the potato. The Incas planted the potato, which is able to withstand heavy frosts, as high as 15,000 ft. At these heights the Incas could use the freezing night temperatures and the heat of the day to alternately freeze and dry the potatoes until all the moisture had been removed. These potatoes can be stored for a long time. 20 Lake Titicaca the the world's highest lake navigable to large vessels, lying at 12,500 feet above sea level in the Andes Mountains, astride the border between Peru and Bolivia. Titicaca is the second largest lake of South America. The lake averages between 460 and 600 feet in depth, but the bottom tilts sharply toward the Bolivian shore, reaching its greatest recorded depth of 920 feet. Surface temperatures average 56 F. In Inca mythology, Manco Capac and Mama 0cllo, children of the Sun, emerged from the depths of Lake Titicaca to found their empire. With snow-capped mountains along its shores, this great blue lake is one of the Andes' most enchanting places. Lake Titicaca 21 Uros floating islands The remnants of an ancient people, the Uros,, still live on floating mats of dried totora (a reed that grows in the marshy shallows). From the totora,, the Uros make their houses and the famed boats fashioned of bundles of dried reeds lashed together with a stylized puma head as decoration. Tourism and handicrafts are important sources of the income for the local people. 22 Taquile is an island in Lake Titicaca 45 km offshore from the city of Puno. About 1,700 people live on the island. This is an indigenous community which continues to live within the traditions of the 14th century, according to the principles of Inca life. Here, the three golden rules of the Empire of the Sun have been kept: Ama suwa, Ama quella, Ama llulla (do not steal, don't be idle, and do not lie). The economy is based on fishing, terraced farming potato cultivation, and income from 40,000 tourists who visit each year. Taquilenos are known for their fine handwoven textiles and clothing. Everyone on the island children, women, and men spin and weave. 23 The ruins of Machu Picchu, rediscovered in 1911 by Yale archaeologist Hiram Bingham, are one of the most beautiful and enigmatic ancient sites in the world. The Inca turned the site into a small (5 square miles) but extraordinary city. Invisible from below and completely self- contained, surrounded by agricultural terraces sufficient to feed the population, and watered by natural springs, it had been utilized by the Inca as a secret ceremonial city. Two thousand feet above the Urubamba river it has palaces, baths, temples, storage rooms and some 150 houses. These structures, carved from the gray granite of the mountain top are wonders of both architectural and aesthetic genius. The skeletal remains of ten females to one male had led to the assumption that the site may have been a sanctuary for the training of priestesses. Machu Picchu 24 One of Machu Picchu's primary functions was that of astronomical observatory. The Intihuatana stone ( Hitching Post of the Sun ) has been shown to be a precise indicator of the date of the two equinoxes and other significant celestial periods. At midday on March 21 and September 21, the sun stands almost directly above the pillar, creating no shadow at all. At this precise moment the sun "sits with all his might upon the pillar" and is for a moment "tied" to the rock. At these periods, the Incas held ceremonies at the stone in which they "tied the sun" to halt its northward movement in the sky. Shamanic legends say that when sensitive persons touch their foreheads to the stone, the Intihuatana opens one's vision to the spirit world. 25 Quipu Since the Incas had no system of writing, they kept records by means of a quipu a a series of short, knotted strings hung at intervals from a long top string. By varying the colors and kinds of knots used, and the spacing of the strings and knots, the Incas could record populations, troops, and tribute, as well as information about their legends and achievements. The quipu was a complex memory aid rather than a literal record, and only a trained quipucamayo,, or memory expert, could create or interpret it. An oral comment accompanied each quipu and allowed the quipucamayo to make sense of its meaning. Following the Spanish conquest and the introduction of records written in Spanish, the Incas lost the ability to read quipus. Modern scholars still have not deciphered the codes used in the creation of quipus. q=tbn:kz6mvls2bjazzm: colat/pe/econcusco/quipu2.jpg 26 Inca mummies Inca mummies consist of two types, mummies of the rulers and mummies of the sacrificed ones. Most of the mummies of the rulers were kept in Cuzco.. None of them have been found, as they were ruined during the Spanish conquest of Peru. The mummies of sacrificed ones were found in Peru, Chile, and Argentina. Sacrificed children were mummified by the freezing temperature and the dry, windy mountain air, so they were natural mummies. A typical example was Juanita, the Ice Maiden. The recent discoveries also provided scientists with important information on the Incas traditions and lifestyle through artifacts found with the mummies. ages/cmmump24.gif 27 The hairless dog is native to Central and South America. Archaeological evidence shows that the breed existed in the New World for more than 3,500 years. Most likely, their early forerunners originated as spontaneous hairless mutations of indigenous New World dogs. Hairlessness may have offered a survival advantage in tropical regions. Their value in ancient Indian cultures is evidenced by their frequent appearance in the art and artifacts produced by the Colima,, Aztec, and Toltec civilizations in Mexico. Xolos were considered sacred dogs by the Aztecs because they believed the dogs were needed by their masters souls to help them safely through the underworld. 28 The Beginning of the End With the arrival from Spain in 1532 of Francisco Pizarro the Inca empire was seriously threatened for the first time. Duped into meeting with the conquistadors in a "peaceful" gathering, an Inca emperor, Atahualpa, was kidnapped and held for ransom. After paying over $50 million in gold and silver by today's standards, Atahualpa, who was promised to be set free, was strangled by the Spaniards who then marched straight for Cusco and its riches. How did Pizarro and his small army of mercenaries, totaling less than 400, conquer what was becoming the world's largest civilization? Much of the "conquest" was accomplished without battles or warfare re as the initial contact Europeans made in the New World resulted in rampant disease, in particular, smallpox. Lacking immunity, the Inca were e reduced by two-thirds. thirds. Spanish also cleverly used the results of the recent civil war to their advantage, creating alliances with groups of Indians who were unhappy with current Inca rule. Spanish culture, religion, and language replaced Inca life and only o a few traces of Inca ways remain in the native culture today. 29 The last Inca Condorcanqui (Tupac Amaru II) inherited the caciqueship of Tungasuca governing on behalf of the Spanish governor. He sympathized with the plight of the native people and petitioned the Spanish government to improve conditions in the textile mills, the mines, and the villages. Unsuccessful, he adopted his great- grandfather's Incan name, a more native style of dress, and organized a rebellion, seizing and executing governor Antonio de Arriaga of Tinta in Tupac Amaru II's rebellion was one of many indigenous Peruvian uprisings in the last fifty years of Bourbon control. It was suppressed after the Battle of Sangarara,, and he was soon captured. He was sentenced to witness the execution of his wife, his eldest son, and many of his supporters. He was sentenced to be tortured and put to death by dismemberment. pacamaru2.jpg 30 When the horses failed to accomplish this execution, he was later drawn and quartered on the main plaza in Cusco, in the same place his greatgrandfather who lead his revolt against Spaniards had been beheaded. When the revolt continued, the Spaniards executed the remainder of his family, except his 12-year-old son Fernando, who was imprisoned in Spain for the rest of his life. It is not known if any members of the Inca royal family survived this final purge. At the same time, Incan clothing and cultural traditions, and selfidentification as "Inca" were outlawed, along with other measures to convert the population to Spanish culture and government until Peru's independence as a republic. Monument to Tupac Amaru in Cusco. AAQU/vzvoWsK3I4o/IMG_0167+tupac+amaru+plaza.JPG 31 Cusco,, the ancient capital of the Incas 32 Colonial architecture (Cusco, Lima, Arequipa) 33 Lima, the capital 34 Colegio Fe y Alegria,, Lima 35 Colegio Seminario San Carlos y San Marcelo, Trujillo 36 Traditional dances 37 Peruvian music Pre-Colombian Andean music used wind and percussion instruments. The most representative wind instruments are siku (Quechua) or zamponas as (Spanish). It is a set of panpipes with 2 rows of bamboo canes, seven in one and 6 in the other. Usually one player leads and the other follows. While symbolically this demonstrates reciprocity within the community, practically it enables players to play for a long time without getting too "high" from dizziness caused by over- breathing. The string instruments (charango,, harps, violin) are based on instruments introduced by the Spanish. 38 Peruvian jungle (Madre de Dios River) In the rain forest one might see caimans, giant otters, anacondas, brown agouti, and a great variety of birds, frogs, and butterflies es 39 Market in Cusco 40 And some unusual things 41 Strange food Coca tea (Mate de Coca) This drink is used now as an antidote for altitude sickness. It is made from the coca leaf which has been used by the Peruvians for thousands of years to boost their energy levels and dull their senses against cold, hunger, and exhaustion. The Incas considered coca leaves a sacred object and used them as an offering to the god Inti. The leaves were also used by fortune tellers, and the native doctors. Following the Spanish conquest, the Catholic Church decreed the eradication of coca plantings because they believed that the plant had satanic powers. On the other hand the production of coca leaves increased at the same time because they were given to the Indians so that they would work harder and longer in the mines and on the plantations. Inca cola Chicha fermented corn drink Cuy roasted guinea pig, local delicacy 42 Good food Peruvian food is a mixture of Japanese, Chinese, African, Spanish, Italian traditions, and Andean ingredients. It's a fusion, but a very balanced fusion made over the last few hundred years. The famous dishes are: ceviche (marinated raw fish), trout prepared in a variety of ways, chicharon (pork), alpaca, palta (stuffed avocado), and many other delicious Creole recipes. 43 History of Peru in murals (overview) 44 45 46 47 48 Peru = beautiful places 49 And beautiful faces 50 Bibliography empi.htm inamerica/south/cultures/inca.html Peru, Lonely Planet Publications Pty Ltd, 2000, Australia Peru, Editorial Everest, S. A., 2003, Spain All images, unless otherwise noted, are property of Galina Tchourilova 51 Questions. 1. Where is Peru located? 2. Into what three distinctive geographical parts Peru is divided? 3. What mountain range goes through the center of the country? 4. What is the capital of Peru? 5. What are the official languages of Peru? 6. What cultures preceded the Inca civilization? 7. For how long did the Inca Empire exist? 8. What was the capital of the Incas? 9. What is the signature style of the Inca architecture? 10. What are the main gods of the Inca religion? 11. What does Pachamama represent? 12. What were the main crops during the Inca Empire? 13. What was the purpose of Machu Picchu? 14. What is a quipu? 15. What do you know about Inca mummies? 16. What is special about the Uros and Taquile communities on Lake Titicaca? 17. What Spanish conquistador started the conquest of Peru? 18. What was Atahualpa s s ransom? 19. Who was the last Inca and why he is called that? 20. How were coca leaves used before and after the conquest? Captain Sully Sullenberger says President Trumps temporary ban on citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries entering the U.S. could potentially put Americans safety at risk. This makes us less, not more safe, Sullenberger, who is now a CEO of Safety Reliability Methods, Inc., a safety consulting firm, tells FOX Business. Additionally, the Miracle on the Hudson pilot says the way the ban was implemented has created chaos. Protests broke out at some airports across the country on Saturday and Sunday in reaction to news of the new immigration policy. On Sunday, the White House released a press release to clarify details. More on this... White House Fires Back Amid Claims it Told EPA to Erase Climate Change We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days, the statement said. On Monday, President Trump again defended his executive order, tweeting that only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage. Trump also said that his order was not a ban on Muslims, but instead was about targeting terror and keeping our country safe. The executive order titled "Protecting the Nation from Terrorist Entry into the United States, states that immigrant and nonimmigrant aliens from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen are barred from entering the U.S. for the next 90 days. It is especially unfair to those, such as translators in Iraq, who have helped the U.S. This discourages other individuals and countries from helping us in the future, Sullenberger says. The Air Line Pilots Association, International released a statement on Monday, urging pilots from banned countries that hold green cards to avoid flying internationally for now. We recommend that green card holders from the above countries not accept assignments outside the U.S. until the government has confirmed that they will be permitted to return to the U.S. without challenge. As of this moment, statements from the U.S. government have not provided assurance on this point, ALPA said in a statement. A sightseer got caught in high seas off the coast of northern California on the morning of January 26 and had to be rescued by the U.S. Coast Guardfrom his truck. The unidentified man had driven his Nissan pickup onto a jetty guarding the entrance to Humboldt Bay, just outside the city of Eureka. The area was under a National Weather Service advisory due to a swell that was creating surf heights of up to 27 feet and spectacular breakers, which were apparently what drew him to the popular vantage point. Local photographer Tyler Whiteside was there for the same reason and captured the incident on video, which shows waves crashing over the jetty and swamping the truck as the driver continues further out into the ocean. A ditch in the road finally proves to be impassable, but before he can make his way back to land, the waves begin slamming the truck against the wall running along the side of the path. Despite the danger, the driver exits the vehicle to assess the situation, then reenters, only to be bashed against the wall again. Fortunately for him, it all went down just a half-mile from the local U.S. Coast Guard station, which received an emergency call about the potential tragedy unfolding and sent a boat and helicopter to the rescue. The man was then airlifted off of the jetty and escaped without injury, according to the U.S. Coast Guard. The truck was left behind and recovered later in the day when the treacherous conditions subsided. Although the non-amphibious vehicle reportedly had Arkansas license plates, a U.S Coast Guard spokesman tells Fox News that the driver was from California. He will not be charged for the cost of the rescue since he was in legitimate distress and not intentionally perpetrating a hoax. Steve Harveys mishap at last years Miss Universe pageant, in which he mistakenly announced Miss Colombia as the winner, is far from forgotten in the South American country -- but it is forgiven. During the Sunday night ceremony, the new Miss Colombia Andrea Tovar had a spicy exchange with Harvey on stage. "I want you to marry my son," he told her, gushing at her beauty. And then: "I wanna just ask this for myself, how do people in Colombia feel about Steve Harvey?" "You want the truth?" she quipped. "No, just lie to me," he jokingly responded. They hated you a little, but I love you and I forgive you. To err is human," said gracefully Tovar, who ended up in the third place. A 23-year-old dental student from France, Iris Mittenaere, won the Miss Universe crown and Miss Haiti Raquel Pelissier, a 25-year-old survivor of the devastating 2010 earthquake that destroyed her hometown, was named first runner up. Harvey returned to host the 2017 beauty competition a year after his colossal gaffe. "Yes, it's been a long year and if I learned anything is that if you make a mistake, you keep on going," he said in his opening monologue. But the jokes about it returned toward the end of the evening. Just as Harvey was about to announce the winner, Miss Universe 2015 Pia Wurtzbach handed him a thick pair of reading glasses. Thank you, Pia, Harvey said as the crowd laughed. A year late, but thank you. Along with Colombia and the Philippines, the other finalists included Kenya, Indonesia, Mexico, Peru, Panama, Canada, Brazil, France, Haiti, Thailand and Miss USA Deshauna Barber. As President Donald Trump works to limit immigration and build a Mexican border wall to keep foreigners from entering the U.S. illegally, more than 150 restaurants in America are taking a stand. In cities throughout the country, including New York, Minneapolis, Detroit, Boston, Oakland, Chicago and Ann Arbor, Mich., restaurants are declaring themselves to be part of a grassroots Sanctuary Restaurants Movement. Sanctuary restaurants agree to anti-discrimination policies, put up signs on windows that pronounce their sanctuary status and receive know-your-rights training, such as webinars on how to ask federal immigration agents for proper paperwork if there's an attempted raid. Some will also offer a text line for customers or employees to report any incidents of harassment. The restaurants generally advocate a zero tolerance policy for sexism, racism, and xenophobia and believe there is a place at the table for all. PIZZA HUT WAITRESS SAYS SHE'S NO LONGER HOMELESS AFTER GENEROUS TIP When reached via email, Andrew Tarlow, owner of Diner restaurant in Brooklyn, send the following statement to Fox News: As a restaurant group, Tarlow wrote, were working together to increase our cultural competency and strengthen our self-awareness and bonds, deepening our capacity to serve our guests by understanding how we all experience the world, sometimes in similar and sometimes in very different ways, and working to make the world more hospitable to all." On Wednesday, Trump signed executive orders aimed at jumpstarting construction of a wall on the southern U.S.-Mexican border and punishing cities that declare themselves sanctuaries for immigrants. Organizers of the movement say the restaurant industry, given its heavy reliance on immigrant labor, is more vulnerable than others. Every day more restaurants and diners are signing up with a clear commitment to be together and stand up to the policies were now seeing coming from the administration, said Matt Nelson, executive director of Presente.org, a partner with the Sanctuary Restaurant Movement. Despite growing support, not everyone is on board with the movement. The National Restaurant Association, which represents roughly 500,000 businesses, is pushing for a complete immigration overhaul, including an updated verification system that confirms employees' eligibility to work in the country legally. Association Senior Vice President Steve Danon told the Associated Press that the organization "is looking forward to working with the Trump administration" on ways to make verification "easier and more cost-efficient. Approximately 12 million people work in the U.S. restaurant industry, according to Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC), a partner organization that helped found the Sanctuary Restaurant Movement. Immigrants comprise up to 70 percent of the restaurant workers in big cities like New York and Chicago, and an estimated 1.3 million restaurant workers in the country are here illegally. Amid numerous reports of restaurateurs routinely underpaying undocumented workers, some question if owners or employers who join the Sanctuary Restaurants Movement are adhering to fair payment practices, and agree to pay undocumented workers the same as legal workers. First off, all owners are asked to become part of Restaurants Advancing Industry Standards in Employment (RAISE), Nelson says. RAISE is an advocacy organization committed to improving wages and labor practices in the industry, and one of the first partners of the movement. I cant speak for all employers, but employers [in the SRM] would pay by position and by experience. Everyone would be paid according to scale. Employers arent supposed to legally discriminate based on legal status, Nelson adds. FOR THE LATEST FOOD FEATURES FOLLOW FOX LIFESTYLE ON FACEBOOK Penny Baldado, owner of Cafe Gabriela in Oakland, California told Fox News that as an undocumented immigrant from the Philippines, the first work she had when she came to the U.S. was in the restaurant industry. "I experienced the injustices as a queer and undocumented Filipina. How I run my business is informed by my experiences. Its important for me and my co-workers and community to feel safe against racism, sexism, and xenophobia, she said, explaining her decision to add her cafe to the movement about two weeks ago. Even without a President Trump, Ive created a safe space in the cafe because Ive lived through these systems of oppression. For Santuary restaurateurs, it's not just about publicly taking a stand against Trump's proposed policies, it's about putting those ideas into action by allowing members to connect, provide legal resources to concerned owners and help employees in the event of a raid or unlawful request of information of workers. Every place this administration tries to intervene, and everywhere policies which are intended to strike fear and hate in people and create a culture of chaos, Sanctuary Movement will fight the cultural battles. Our resistance is literally baked into our food, Nelson said. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Transcription 1 Page 1 of 5 Our Client Company Reg. No.: Address to be advised Date: Monday, June 17, 2013 Invoice No: Professional services rendered Notes Year 1 US$ Year 2 US$ Thailand Company formation fee 1. 5,575 0 Thai Government registration costs 2. 1, Assistance opening a local corporate bank account 3. 2,350 0 Estimate annual tax and accounting fee ,300 VAT registration fee Total funds transfer required to complete your engagement 6. 9,925 2,550 Note: this invoice needs to be tailored for each Client. The above services and fees represent the average requirements of our Clients. 2 Page 2 of 5 Notes to invoice above 1. Healy Consultants fees to efficiently and effectively project manage our Clients engagement i) without our Client travelling and ii) our Client sending one courier to us. All engagement fees are agreed and paid up front. Consequently, there are no hidden fees or surprises or ambushes throughout the engagement. All engagement deadlines are agreed up front in the form of a detailed project plan, mapping out deliverables by week throughout the engagement term; Every second day during the engagement, we our Client a detailed status update. Our Client is immediately informed of engagement problems together with the solution. Your dedicated engagement manager is reachable by phone, skype, live chat and and will communicate in your preferred language; Healy Consultants never gives up until we complete the engagement, regardless of the complexities or obstacles presented by banks and Governments; These costs include a) annual Thai government fees and b) company secretary fees for 12 months. Healy Consultants will act as your Thailand company secretary, and our annual responsibilities include a) Preparation and filing of Annual Return; b) Securely maintain company records; d) Prepare the Annual meeting documents for signature; e) Filing of notice of change of registered office and business address; preparation of minutes. 2. Estimate of Government fees includes company i) stamp/seal, ii) MOA iii) Capital registration fee, iv) Government application fee, v) fee for publishing newspaper announcement and vi) VAT registration. All Government costs will be supported with original invoices and receipts; 3. Healy Consultants will be pleased to open a corporate bank account. It is a time consuming task, Healy Consultants will shelter our Client from the administrative challenges. There is a 50% probability the banks will request a bank signatory to travel for a one hour bank interview. Healy Consultants will try its best to negotiate with the bank for a travel exemption. As you can appreciate, it is a difficult task to obtain bank account approval through a newly formed company, when shareholders and directors and bank signatories reside overseas. There will be a fee discount of US$500 if you have to travel; 4. These accounting and tax fees are an estimate of Healy Consultants fees to efficiently and effectively discharge your annual company accounting, auditing and tax obligations. Following receipt of a set of draft accounting numbers from your company, Healy Consultants will more accurately advise accounting and tax fees; 3 Page 3 of 5 5. This fee is for Healy Consultants to register our Client s firm with VAT. The VAT registration process takes around 4 weeks, depending on the efficiency of the Revenue Department. 6. To assist our Clients minimize Forex costs, we offer the payment in SG$, Euro, Pound or US$. Kindly let me know in which currency your Firm prefers settling our fees and I will send an updated invoice, thank you. 7. All fees quoted in this invoice correspond to fees quoted on Healy consultant s business website. Please review this invoice carefully to identify errors. During the rush of a business day, it is possible Healy Consultants inadvertently made fee calculation errors, typing errors or omitted services or omitted historic fee payments from Clients. In the unfortunate event you identify invoice errors, please revert to me directly re the same. I apologize in advance if I or my staff made invoice errors; 8. A Thai company can be 100% foreign owned using the US-Thai Amity Treaty of 1966 if there is a majority of US citizen directors and majority shares are owned by US citizens. Healy Consultants fee for Amity Treaty registration is US$1900. Healy Consultants annual fee to supply a nominee silent USA citizen is US$8,750; 9. In accordance with Thailand Companies Act, the minimum share capital of a Thailand company is USD65,000. After registration of the company, 25% of the investment capital is require to be paid up by the shareholders; 10. According to Thai company law, three promoters and shareholders are required for each Thailand LLC company. If our Client requires nominee services, Healy Consultants fee for corporate nominee director or corporate shareholder amounts to US$1,800 per annum. Our fee for a nonresident individual nominee director or individual shareholder amounts to US$3,600 per annum. Our fee for a country resident director or resident shareholder amounts to US$6,600 per annum. When appointing a nominee Healy Consultants collects a refundable deposit of US$ 1,100 per nominee; 11. In accordance with the Section 1097 of the Thai Civil and Commercial Code, a Thai LLC is required to have a minimum of three shareholders. Thai citizens are required to hold 51% of the shares. Healy Consultants will be happy to provide nominee Thai shareholders and a nominee Thai director for your Thailand LLC. The fee per Thai nominee director and per nominee shareholder is $1,950 per annum. To ensure your assets are fully protected, the nominee will not be a bank signatory nor will he have an active role in daily corporate activities; 4 Page 4 of Before company incorporation is complete, the Thai government must review and approve a lease agreement for office premises and obtain the building registration number ( tabiehn bahn ). Some of our Clients request Healy Consultants to provide temporary shared office space for 6 months until our Client finds their preferred business address. If your Firm requires this service from Healy Consultants, our monthly fee amounts to US$1,250. Alternatively, some of our Clients request Healy Consultants to locate permanent office premises and our one-time fee for this service is US$4,950; 13. If required, Healy Consultants will be pleased to assist your firm obtain business visa approvals. Our fee is US$4,950 per person and includes preparation of a quality visa application and submitting to the correct Government immigration officers. The Government enjoys ultimate power of approval of visa applications. Consequently, guaranteed success is outside of Healy Consultants control. What is inside our control is the preparation and submission of a high quality immigration visa application that maximizes the likelihood of visa approval. To date, we enjoy a 100% approval record; 14. The fees quoted in this invoice are an average of the fees of a typical Thailand engagement. Government fees and procedures vary by industry and by company. Healy Consultants can only provide a tailored fee quotation after agreeing our Client s specific corporate structure and strategy. If during the engagement, Healy Consultants finds that company incorporation and corporate bank account opening is more complex than anticipated, requiring a larger investment of time than standard cases, Healy Consultants reserves the right to request additional fees; 15. Healy Consultants will only incorporate your company after 75% of due diligence documentation is received by . Healy Consultants will only open a corporate bank account after 100% of Client due diligence documentation is received by courier; 16. As stipulated on our business website and in section 3 of our engagement letter, Healy Consultants will only commence the engagement following i) settlement of our fees and ii) completion and signing of our legal engagement letter; 17. To efficiently and effectively complete your engagement in a timely manner, we recommend your Firm transfers these funds to Healy Consultants corporate bank account. Thereafter, our Incorporation and Banking Team will aggressively advance your engagement, providing your firm daily feedback as to engagement status. Healy Consultants corporate bank account details are outlined in the attached Adobe file, thank you. I would be grateful if you us the bank transfer advice slip to enable my Accounting Department to accurately and timely identify bank receipts: 5 Page 5 of 5 Thank you for your business and we look forward to working closely with you over the coming weeks as we engineer your Thailand LLC. Best regards Aidan Healy Aidan Healy Managing Director Healy Consultants Tel: Address: Skype: Fax: (+852) (direct) BB Building, Suite th Floor, 54 Asoke Road Sukhumvit Soi 21, Bangkok healyconsultants (+65) (direct) Confidentiality Notice This transmission and accompanying files contain confidential information intended for a specific individual and purpose. This transmission is private and confidential. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying or distribution or the taking of any action based on the contents of this information is strictly prohibited. Please contact the sender if you have received this mail and you are not the intended recipient. Document and Attachments This document was prepared through Microsoft Word 2003 and attached documents were created through Microsoft Word 2003 and Adobe Acrobat 7.0. If you are unable to accurately and completely read this document and open the attachments, kindly advise us and we will gladly resend the information to you in a different format. The bond between a Utah boy with severe epilepsy and his service dog, Dopey, are tugging at heart strings across the nation. PEOPLE reported that the pair have been inseparable since 2013, when the 4-year-old golden retriever began assisting 12-year-old Britton Voss, of Clearfield, who is developmentally delayed. Dopey, who is often found lying calmly by Brittons side, is trained to tip off the boys teacher or parents, fetch his medicine or even call 911 when he senses Britton will seize, Deseret News reported. That he can predict Brittons seizures hours in advance has caught scientists attention and shocked Brittons teacher, Melissa Lovell, at Sunset Junior High, the news website reported. Deseret News reported that about two months ago, Dopey began nudging, panting and licking Lovells pregnant belly to alert her that something was wrong. One hour later, Britton began seizing. "I looked at (my lead aide), and we just both looked at each other like 'That is unbelievable, Lovell told Deseret News. In Lovells functional skills class, Dopey also acts as a seizure alert dog for Brittons classmates. Hes a member of our team, Lovell told PEOPLE. His presence has calmed some of my students down when they simply look at him. I have one student who loves to talk about Dopeys chocolate chip eyes. He and the other kids see him as another student an extension of Britton. This is not just a dog. Dopeys an angel. A prominent association representing medical professionals in Great Britain has asked its staff not to use the term expectant mother to avoid offending transgender and intersex patients, leading some critics to slam the organization for being too politically correct. The guidelines, published late last year by the British Medical Association (BMA) in a 14-page booklet titled A Guide To Effective Communication: Inclusive Language In The Workplace, asks them to instead use the term pregnant people. Gender inequality is reflected in traditional ideas about the roles of women and men, a pamphlet explaining the guidelines reads, according to Metro.co.uk. Though they have shifted over time, the assumptions and stereotypes that underpin those ideas are often deeply-rooted. A large majority of people that have been pregnant or have given birth identify as women, the pamphlet continues. We can include intersex men and transmen who may get pregnant by saying pregnant people instead of expectant mothers. The Sun reported that the group released the guidelines to celebrate diversity. Among other stipulations, the guidelines also advise against using the term Christian name, as not every family is Christian, and the term family name in lieu of last name, as well as the avoidance of masculine noun-derived terms like mankind and manpower, Metro.co.uk reported. The elderly should be avoided in favor of "older people," and "accessible lifts" used instead of "disabled lifts," the guidelines state, and people who are "biologically male or female" instead should be referred to as "assigned male or female," the news website reported. The Sun reported that the guidelines have been released on the heels of news that revealed Britains first pregnant man, 20-year-old Hayden Cross, of Gloucester, was putting hormone therapy on hold to conceive. Cross was reportedly born a woman but is now legally a man. He is pregnant with donor sperm, the Sun reported. The BMA has noted that it did not intend for the guidelines to apply to its nearly 156,000 doctor members, who interact directly with patients during their care. This is a guide for BMA staff and representatives aimed at promoting an inclusive workplace at the BMA, the BMA said, according to the Sun. It is not workplace guidance for doctors, which is clear from the fact it does not refer to patients. While some people on Twitter have applauded the associations decision, arguing that it promotes inclusivity, others have suggested the guidelines are overly sensitive. European prices for some off-patent cancer drugs have risen by more than 100 percent in the past five years, with two cases of hikes exceeding 1,000 percent, according to data presented at a medical conference on Saturday. Similar price rises for old drugs have sparked outrage in the United States, where former hedge fund manager Martin Shkreli was pilloried in 2015 for increasing the cost of an anti-parasitic medicine by more than 5,000 percent. The new analysis by British academics suggests Europe is not immune to such unexplained cost increases, although absolute prices typically remain a lot lower than in the United States. "It seems to be happening quite frequently across Europe," said Andrew Hill of the University of Liverpool, who presented the data with a colleague from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine at the European Cancer Congress in Amsterdam. "Prices aren't as high as in the U.S. but these are generic drugs and, as such, they should be available at close to the cost of production." Hill's analysis showed the British list price of busulfan, an old drug for leukaemia, had increased by 1,227 percent between 2011 and 2016, while one generic version of tamoxifen, used for breast cancer, rose by 1,079 percent. There were also massive increases for some cancer treatments in other European countries, including Italy, where Aspen Pharmacare was fined 5 million euros ($5.3 million) last year after hiking the price of a chemotherapy drug by 1,540 percent. Aspen is appealing the decision. Industry critics argue some companies take over supply of certain generic drugs and then raise prices progressively to maximize profits. The generics industry says this is a skewed picture, since in some cases prices need to rise from unrealistically low levels to keep production viable, especially when companies are supplying only a small number of patients. South Africa-based Aspen said that while the percentage increases appeared large, they were "from a very low and unsustainable price base, having not been increased over decades". Warwick Smith, director general of the British Generic Manufacturers Association, said in many cases competitive tendering systems imposed by European healthcare systems also resulted in very substantial discounts from the prices cited. "In the case of generic medicines used in hospitals, it is important to distinguish between the actual price paid and the much higher list prices often quoted," he said. The issue is gaining increased attention from authorities in several European countries, with Britain last month fining Pfizer a record 84.2 million pounds ($106 million) for its role in ramping up the cost of an old epilepsy drug by as much as 2,600 percent. Pfizer is appealing. The British government is also introducing new legislation designed to secure better value for money for the National Health Service from its spend on medicines. The European Consumer Organisation BEUC, meanwhile, wrote to European Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager in October asking her investigate potential cases of unfair generic drug prices across the European Union. Are people who spend time naked in the company of others happier than those who don't? Scientists are reporting in the Journal of Happiness Studies that so-called "naturists" seem to be, though why remains unclear. "Naturists have been saying this for some time," the lead researcher from the University of London in New Cross tells the Richmond and Twickenham Times. Still, he adds, "Little to no empirical research has investigated whether naturist activity actually makes us happieror, just as importantly, why it makes us happier." The team first surveyed more than 800 people and concluded that people who hang out naked with others outside of their immediate family said they are happier and feel better about their bodies than people who keep their clothes on, reports Men's Health. The scientists then talked to people before and after a nudist event, and found that the longer and more frequently people are naked, the higher they rate all these markers of happiness. One participant suggests that seeing other "not perfect" bodies does wonders for one's own self esteem, though researchers still need to sort out exactly why people feel happier after baring all. But if going nude isn't for you, the New York Times reports that the mere act of standing up and moving your body does wonders, too. (Public nudity too much for you? Here are 6 reasons why you should sleep naked.) This article originally appeared on Newser: Feeling Blue? Scientists Suggest Spending Time Nude People who can nod off in any situation may consider a move to Japan, where public napping, so long as one follows certain rules of etiquette, is basically seen as virtuous. So reports the New York Times, which calls such napping a "subtle sign of diligence." The word for this type of nap, "inemuri," means "sleeping while present," says Brigitte Steger of Cambridge, and it sends a message to those nearbybe it in a work meeting or on the subwaythat said napper has worked to exhaustion. It is generally more common and accepted among older, white-collar workers, but it's a tricky concept in a nation that also sees a strong work ethic as virtuous. "On a certain level, inemuri is not considered sleep at all," Steger wrote for the BBC last year. "Not only is it seen as being different from night-time sleep in bed, it is also viewed differently from taking an afternoon nap or power nap." But there are rules: It's fine, even common, to indulge in a crowded subway car or elsewhere in publiclow crime rates helpprovided you don't take up too much space; another expert calls stretching out "violating spatial norms." Women, meanwhile, are frowned upon if they look immodest while asleep. In short, in a nation where people often sleep less than six hours a night, then work long hours, inemuri has become what Steger calls "an informal feature of Japanese social life" that is not just accepted but somewhat necessary. (The flip side of this "karoshi," which is literally killing people.) This article originally appeared on Newser: Japan's Antidote to Overwork: 'Inemuri' Naps A Pennsylvania nanny took her caregiving one step further when she donated part of her liver to her 16-month-old charge. Kiersten Miles, 22, had only known the Rosko family for three weeks when she first learned baby Talia had a serious disease that could be fatal without a liver transplant, WTXF reported. Talias diagnosis was not disclosed. She was 9 months old when I started watching her. Shes so helpless. She cant tell anyone whats wrong with her. She cant spread the word and ask for help," Miles, a college student, told the news station. Miles quickly volunteered and the family and their medical team made sure she understood that this was a serious surgery that would disqualify her from donating again, even if she had a child in a similar situation. It's such a small sacrifice when you compare it to saving a life. Some of her doctors said she possibly wouldnt have made it past 2 years old. All I had to do was be in the hospital for a week and a 5-inch scar. I dont know, it just seemed like such a small sacrifice to me," Miles told WTXF. The transplant was done in about 14 hours and Miles and Talia are both doing well. In its hysteria-driven coverage of President Trumps immigration order, the mainstream media forgot to mention this: most of the country supports it. A recent Quinnipiac poll indicated that 48 percent of the nation approves of "suspending immigration from terror prone regions, even if it means turning away refugees," while 42 percent oppose such a measure. In contrast, Americans did not agree with Obamas decision to open the door to more Syrian refugees; at the end of 2015, a Quinnipiac poll revealed that 51 percent of the country stood against the move, while only 43 percent supported it. There is the problem for Democrats -- even as they rant and rave over Donald Trumps assault on the progressive values of the elite establishment, consumer confidence has soared to 12-year highs. How can that be? Heres the key, which the mainstream media has ignored for eight years: President Obama was personally popular, but his policies were not. Conversely, President Trump personally scores low approval ratings, but he is pushing an agenda that has the support of most Americans. Chuck Schumer has vowed to fight Trump tooth and nail and has made good on that threat by slow-walking confirmation of the presidents cabinet appointees. The Senate Minority Leaders opposition is knee-jerk payback for years of GOP obstructionism. The problem for Mr. Schumer is this: the GOP resisted Obamas policies because the majority of the country didnt like them. Thats why Republicans gained ground over the past eight years, earning decisive off-year election victories. Voters in 2010 and 2014 elected representatives who would oppose President Obamas initiatives, giving the GOP control of the House and then the Senate. If Democrats were caught off guard by this turn of events, they can blame their pals in the media, who were so enamored of President Obama that they failed to honestly assess the mood of the country. Approval for ObamaCare never rose above 50 percent. Obamas 2014 executive amnesty for people in the country illegally was similarly unpopular, with an NBC poll showing that 48 percent disapproved of his approach, and only 38 percent supported it. Meanwhile, some 57 percent of the country disapproved of the nuclear deal with Iran, while only 30 percent were in favor of it. Republicans were right to resist these and other wrong-headed Obama policies. The situation is now reversed. Ironically, Trump enters office with high negative ratings, but people like what hes doing. Polling shows most Americans favor walking away from the TPP and stopping the Syrian refugee program. They have always backed the Keystone XL Pipeline. If Democrats now become the Party of No, as the GOP was derisively called, in a childish retaliatory spat, they will further alienate the broad majority of Americans who are frustrated with stagnant earnings and low growth. Democrats are already in trouble, having lost more than 1,000 congressional and state legislative seats and governorships a staggering total -- during Obamas tenure. They will only compound their vanishing act if they fight the Trump agenda. Americans have short attention spans, so it is worth reminding all those teary-eyed Obama fans pining for four more years, that their champion was not as successful as his recent approval ratings might suggest. It was only at the beginning and in the final months of his tenure that his popularity rose much over 50 percent. Over his eight years Obamas average approval rating was 47.9 percent, beating out only Truman, Ford, and Carter, and falling below all others, including G.W. Bush and Richard Nixon. The reasons for Obamas mediocre ratings? Jobs and security. Obama never made job creation his number one priority. He never placed the safety of Americans above his globalist progressive agenda. That is why the country elected Donald Trump. His priorities are clear: putting Americans back to work and defeating radical Islamic terrorism. His initial moves target those objectives. Approving the Keystone XL was a slam-dunk. In 2015 when Obama decided against the pipeline, a CNN/ORC poll showed that 57 percent of the country wanted it built; only 28 percent opposed it. What about the TPP? Rasmussen reports that 56 percent of the country favors walking away from the multination trade deal, while 27 percent disagrees. How about cutting the size of the federal government? According to Rasmussen, voters agree by a two-to-one margin. More than half applaud Trumps prioritizing America First and 73 percent think its more important to protect American manufacturing jobs that keep prices low. While Americans may back most of the Trump agenda, few will applaud the seemingly disorganized way the recent immigration order was rolled out. The country elected CEO Trump in part because they wanted successful implementation of Populist Trump policies. Some missteps are to be expected. Many of Trumps cabinet picks are political neophytes like himself; mistakes will be made and there will be a learning curve. But, the White House needs to recognize how snafus can undermine Trumps agenda, and make sure program details are buttoned down in advance of their announcement. Bottom line: The country needs Trump to succeed. Editor's note: The following column originally appeared in The Hill newspaper and on TheHill.com. The Trump cabinet is the first in thirty years President Reagan through President Obama without a single Latino. "This is a disaster and setback for the country," Arturo Vargas, the executive director of the National Association of Latino Elected And Appointed Officials (NALEO) told the Associated Press last week. "The next time a president convenes his Cabinet there will be no Latino perspective." This is not about being politically correct. The absence of Latinos at the White House comes as President Trump is already at odds with the nations largest minority group, and especially with people from Mexico. Last week, he signed an executive order calling for the construction of a border wall with Mexico. That led the president of Mexico to cancel a trip to the White House. Also last week, Trump ordered a crackdown on so-called sanctuary cities where local agencies do not question people about their immigration status and police do not report all criminals lacking immigration papers to federal immigration authorities. Most of the undocumented immigrants in the sanctuary cities targeted by the president are Latinos. At a meeting with congressional leaders and in a later ABC News interview, Trump falsely claimed that millions of illegal immigrants, the majority of whom are Latinos, voted in the election, thus causing him to lose the popular vote. Trumps anger at Latinos comes after a campaign where he stirred white resentment towards Americas southern neighbor with his call to build the wall. He often asked fans at rallies to name the country that was going to pay for it. The loud response? Mexico. He also slandered federal judge Gonazlo Curiel an American born in Indiana to Mexican parents as a Mexican who could not be impartial in the Trump University fraud case because of his ethnic background. That attack was so vulgar that even Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) labeled it the textbook definition of a racist comment. In his first week in the White House, Trump poured fuel on his antagonistic relationship with Latinos. Many Hispanic GOP stalwarts including some who served Republican presidents have distanced themselves from Trump over his anti-Mexican attitude. President George W. Bushs Commerce Secretary, Carlos Gutierrez, even endorsed Hillary Clinton. Gutierrez told NPR last year that Trumps comments about Curiel shattered the whole idea that we don't judge people on the basis of where they come from or where their parents came from and said Trump was guilty of bigotry and bullying. Linda Chavez, the highest-ranking woman in Ronald Reagans administration and a Bush Cabinet nominee, declared herself anti-Trump and called him a disaster and a vile human being because of his anti-immigrant comments. Meanwhile, in the 115th Congress there is an all-time record high number of Hispanic senators and congressman 38 in total including the first Latina elected to the Senate, Catherine Cortez Masto, a Nevada Democrat. However, none of these leaders hold positions in the upper echelons of the partys leadership. Xavier Becerra of California, the former chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, was the top ranking Latino in Congress last year. He stepped down to become Californias Attorney General. Of the top four leadership posts in both chambers for both parties, none is held by Hispanics. The only Latino in any congressional leadership post is Rep. Linda Sanchez (D-Calif.), who was recently named as the Vice Chairwoman of the House Democratic Caucus. State and local representation for Latinos is not much better. There are only three Hispanic governors in the United States, all of whom are Republican, while most Latinos are Democrats. As I wrote in this column in August, there was vocal disappointment in the Latino political establishment that Hillary Clinton did not choose a Hispanic as her running mate. She tapped Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), a white man who speaks fluent Spanish, and passed over popular Latino Democrats like Becerra, former Labor Secretary Tom Perez and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro. And in the current race to lead the Democratic National Committee, there is no urgent rallying around Perez, the lone Latino in the race. It is actually harder to explain the absence of Latinos among Democratic leaders than it is to explain the dearth in the Trump camp. According to exit polls, Democrat Hillary Clinton won 66 percent of the Latino vote last November. At the moment, however, it is the absence of Latino voices in the White House that is painful and striking. The mainstream media, liberals and Hollywood are pitching a super-sized hissy fit over President Trumps decision to protect the fruited plain from blood-thirsty jihadists. They seem to think we are under some sort of moral obligation to allow refugees to flood into the country without vetting and pray that nobody gets blown up. I write about this very issue in my new book, The Deplorables Guide to Making America Great Again. Click here for a free subscription to Todds newsletter: a must-read for Conservatives! I watched in utter amazement this weekend as hordes of agitators swarmed airports across the country causing all sorts of mayhem. CNN called the protests spontaneous which is quite remarkable considering a number of protesters were waving professionally-made banners and posters. Muslims at DFW International Airport turned a baggage claim area into a makeshift mosque kneeling on prayer rugs and chanting, Allah. And there was nary a peep from TSA or airport officials. But heaven help the poor fellow who tries to go through a TSA check point with a bottle of Head & Shoulders in his carry-on luggage. Click here for Todds new book the most deplorable book in modern American history. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo lashed out at the president saying New Yorkers have no tolerance for intolerance. New York City Mayor and Communist sympathizer Bill de Blasio said the ban was chilling to anyone in America who cares about religious liberty. These are the same guys who tried to shut down a Chick-fil-A franchise and told gun-toting, Bible-clingers they were not welcome in the Empire State. So spare us your righteous indignation. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel said he plans on hosting illegal aliens in his home and urged citizens to do the same. Thats a mighty thoughtful gesture, but it might be safer for the refugees to eat a slice of deep dish pizza in Syria rather than the Windy Citys South Side. The mainstream media feared the president was going overboard to protect Christians from radical Islamists, Newsbusters reported. CNNs Carol Costello, seemed genuinely troubled that his underlying goal was to make this country aggressively Christian. Failed talk show host Piers Morgan addressed the issue in a bizarre column titled, More Americans were killed last year by toddlers with guns than by Muslim terrorists, Mr. President where is the executive order to stop THAT? This executive order is not making America great, Morgan wrote in the Daily Mail. Its making America hate. Mr. Morgan is British. It is grotesquely unfair because it punishes many decent, law-abiding people who have every right to be in the country, he added. Piers Morgan is the poster child for extreme vetting. Hollywood is even worse marginalizing Christianity while embracing Islam. The people who play make believe for a living went out of their way to denounce President Trump during the Screen Actors Guild awards Sunday. We have to speak up, actress Emma Stone said. Staying silent only helps the oppressor, not the victim. Right now I hope that people seeing things that are being done that are unconstitutional and inhumane would say something. Here's a thought -- next year -- hold the SAG awards in downtown Tehran. I hear the Ayatollahs are big Rosie O'Donnell fans. When it comes to gathering and reporting the news, it is hard to beat the uncommon sense of legendary journalist Peter Kihss. I wrote several months ago that, as a young reporter, I learned from him that there are no such things as stupid questions to politicians, only stupid answers. Now another Kihss gem applies, this time to the early media coverage of President Trump. More than three decades ago, Kihss and I were talking in the old newsroom of the New York Times when, after a frustrating day of seeing his story mangled by editors, he looked at me and said: Always remember, the job of the editor is to separate the wheat from the chaff and publish the chaff in the newspaper. I laughed, he didnt, but his warning seemed especially prescient after Trumps first Monday in the Oval Office. The new president delivered tons of wheat while most of the media was obsessed with the chaff. The adage that actions speak louder than words is freely ignored when it comes to Trump. As part of their double standard, the ink-stained mob and broadcast confederates prefer to watch what he says instead of what he does. To continue reading Michael Goodwin's column from the New York Post, click here. I am a retired newspaperman. I am 69 and live in Poca, WV, with my wife of 45 years, Lou Ann. We grew up in Cleveland. Three kids. Grandfather. More on who I am is here. Report all errors to DonSurber@GMail.com Remember this name: Ben Rhodes. Ill get back to Ben in a moment. He is the centerpiece to Obamas final vicious attack on Israel. Im a Jew who loves and supports America, Israel and President Donald Trump. So, lets talk about Fake News. Obama-lovers, liberals and the mainstream media (I know, I repeat myself) are desperately trying to paint President Donald Trump as some kind of racist, white extremist and anti-Semite. How absurd. How ironic. They are doing this on purpose. They are covering up for their own blatant racism, anti-Semitism and hatred for Israel. They purposefully attack Trump to cover-up the facts about the damage Obama did to Israel. The mainstream media never said a word about Obama's anti-Semitism or blatant attacks on Israel. Obama made many shocking, damaging attacks on Israel. The list is so long it would take me an entire book to list them all. But its what Obama did in his last few days as presidentthe very last official acts of his careerthat are most shocking. Obama allowed the United Nations and their anti-Semite representatives to condemn Israel for the first time in United States history Worse, Israel reports they have ironclad proof that President Obama actually orchestrated and lobbied for the passage of the U.N. condemnation. Worse yet, in Obamas final HOUR in office he released $221 million of U.S. taxpayer money to the Palestinian Authority. Keep in the mind this money was frozen by Congressional leaders. It was so important to send American taxpayer money to Israels enemies, that President Obama made it his last official act in office. But all of that pales in comparison to the Ben Rhodes story. Heres the story no one in the U.S. media has mentioned. Just three days before his final day in office, Obama named Ben Rhodes to the Holocaust Memorial Council -- the most sacred Jewish commission in all of America. The Holocaust Memorial Council oversees the National Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. Who is Ben Rhodes? He happens to be Obamas point man behind the scenes for the Iran deal and U.N. resolution condemning Israel. Rhodes sold the merits of both deals in the media. He was Obamas chief rainmaker, messenger and salesman for the two most damaging and insulting deals towards Israel and the Jewish people in United States history. And to make matters worse, Rhodes was caught bragging about misrepresenting the Iran deal to the American people in order to sell the Iran deal. In other words, Ben Rhodes is the Jonathan Gruber of Israel haters. Gruber was Obamas architect of ObamaCare who bragged on video that he lied and misrepresented the merits of Obamacare to sell it to the dumb America people. Rhodes bragged out loud to New York Times Magazine the exact same thing. He is proud of lying, misrepresenting and manipulating to pass a treaty that could lead to the nuclear annihilation of Israel. That would be called a second Holocaust. And Obama appointed that man to the Holocaust Memorial Council to oversee the National Holocaust Memorial Museum. This final act by Obama is so disgusting it was a lead story in "The Times of Israel" newspaper last week. The Israeli people are shocked, dismayed, disgusted and insulted. THINK ABOUT IT: Obama gave the man who sold the Iran deal, that could lead to a second Holocaust of the Jewish people, a 5-year term on the Holocaust Memorial Council. This is tantamount to a president of the United States naming a white extremist to the Board of the NAACP. Former President Obama was the worst president in history in his treatment toward Israel. And the Ben Rhodes move was his final insult to Israel and the Jewish people. But I have news for the Trump administration. All members of the Holocaust Memorial Council serve at the pleasure of the president of the United States. Its never been done before, but a president can demand that a member of the Holocaust Memorial Council step down. Donald Trump has never been shy about doing things that have never been done before. Mr. President, its time to take a stand and make history. As an American Jew and supporter of Israel, I call on all Americans, but especially Jewish Americans, to demand President Trump ask Ben Rhodes to step down from the Holocaust Memorial Council immediately. Rhodes has been on that Board for two weeks. That's two weeks too long. I have great confidence President Donald J. Trump will always support, celebrate and stand with Israel and the Jewish people. Lets start with Ben Rhodes' removal. His appointment to the Holocaust Memorial Council is a disgrace to America, Israel and the Jewish people. If you are trying to understand what all the hoopla regarding President Trumps so-called refugee ban is aboutand what the Democrats overall strategy is in dealing with Trump--youd better go watch "The Sting." That 1973 classic directed by George Roy Hill is about two grifters or con men played by Robert Redford and Paul Newman who assemble a mob of accomplices and fellow cons to convince a rich sucker or mark to bet half a million dollars in a horse race he thinks is fixed. In fact the racing parlor (in con man lingo the store, which looks like a legitimate business but is in fact a complete sham) where he places the bet is a phony set-up, and Redford and Newman get away with his money scot free. This is exactly what the Democratic Party has done for decades. The grifters in this case are Democrat leaders like Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer. The store is the mainstream media from NY Times to NBC and CNN and the mob are the rent-a-crowd demonstrators who turn up to make a fuss in front the stores cameras, whether its in the Womens March last weekend or at the San Francisco Airport this weekend. Who are the marks? Theyre gullible Republicans whom the Democrat grifters and the media con into believing the American public wants them to stand behind a Democratic initiative in a show of bipartisanship, or to oppose a Republican one on the grounds thats its too extreme. The promised score is popularity among moderates and independents, as well as mention in the New York Times as a principled conservative or maverick for breaking with their partywhen in fact its the Democrats who actually win and the Republican mark who loses with his own base thanks to the sting. Thats what happening with the media hysteria over Trumps Muslim ban(in fact its a temporary ban that effects exactly seven countries, ones on which the Obama administration already placed travel limits as countries of concern) and its what going to erupt when Trump announces his Supreme Court pick on Tuesday night. Its a well-worn con by this time. Democrats used it to convince GOP moderates we were losing the Vietnam War and that Americans wanted us to pull out (in fact poll after poll showed the public supported the war until the very end). Theyve used it to claim the public wants stricter gun control laws, and opposes any federal spending cuts or government shutdown. More recently theyve used it to convince GOP marks that if they were going to win over Hispanics they have to support amnesty for illegal immigrants; and that waterboarding is tantamount to torture. But their biggest score was in 1974 when the Democrat/media con game was able to peel off enough Republicans to impeach Richard Nixon and force him to resigna score they later tried and failed with Ronald Reagan over Iran-Contra, but now hope to see repeated with President Trump. In addition, they know some GOP marks keep coming back for more, even when theyve been taken. Theres John McCain, for example, whom they stung in the 2008 presidential race, but is still willing to act as maverick on issues like waterboarding and Trumps relations with Vladimir Putin. There was Marco Rubio on comprehensive immigration reform, until he wised up and saw that Chuck Schumer and others were just playing him as a sucker. Because Republicans slowly are wising up, just as the public has. They are realizing what CNN and the New York Times present as the burning issues of our timepolice violence against blacks or the hacked election a couple weeks ago or this weekends Muslim ban--are really all part of the sting. Thats going to make the Democrat grifters job harder this time. It will also make it easier to blow the whistle on the scammers, as Trump advisor Steve Bannon did when he branded the mainstream media the opposition partyalthough the oppositions phony store would be more accurate. In the movie "The Sting" one of the grifters says about the mark, Hes not as tough as he looks. The other replies sheepishly, Neither are we. Neither are the Democrats, once you catch on to their big con. China has placed military forces on heightened alert in the northeastern part of the country as tensions mount on the Korean peninsula following recent threats by Pyongyang to attack, U.S. officials said. Reports from the region reveal the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) recently increased its military posture in response to the heightened tensions, specifically North Korea's declaration of a "state of war" and threats to conduct missile attacks against the United States and South Korea. According to the officials, the PLA has stepped up military mobilization in the border region with North Korea since mid-March, including troop movements and warplane activity. China's navy also conducted live-firing naval drills by warships in the Yellow Sea that were set to end Monday near the Korean peninsula, in apparent support of North Korea, which was angered by ongoing U.S.-South Korean military drills that are set to continue throughout April. North Korea, meanwhile, is mobilizing missile forces, including road-mobile short- and medium-range missiles, according to officials familiar with satellite imagery of missile bases. More On This... Click for more from The Washington Free Beacon. Missouri's lieutenant governor demanded answers Tuesday morning after violence exploded overnight in Ferguson, Mo. following a grand jury decision not to indict a police officer who shot and killed an unarmed black teenager in August. Appearing on Fox News Channel's "America's Newsroom," Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder took aim at Missouri's chief executive: "If you are going to have the National Guard deployed and a state of emergency declared and then hold them back, I say the governor owes the people of Missouri a lot of explanations." Hours before the grand jury decision was announced, Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon appealed for calm and pledged authorities were "focused on making sure the necessary resources are at hand to protect lives, protect property and protect free speech." "It is not enough to stand at a press conference and mouth some lines that were prepared," Kinder said. "You have to actually act." On Monday, November 17, Nixon signed an executive order activating the Missouri National Guard to "support law enforcement during any period of unrest that might occur following the grand jury's decision concerning the investigation into the death of Michael Brown." But those guardsmen were noticeable absent as rioters burned and looted as many as 25 buildings and vandalized police cars in Ferguson. "We see the National Guard rolling in this morning... where were they last night? The law-abiding citizens and business owners and taxpayers of Ferguson and the St. Louis region have a right to ask this governor to answer some questions," Kinder said. "Why were they not in there at the first sign of an overturned police car or a smashed police car window with a show of force that would have stopped this?" Kinder had a question of his own for Gov. Nixon: "Is the reason that the National Guard was not in there because the Obama administration and the Holder Justice Department leaned on you to keep them out? I cannot imagine any other reason why the governor who mobilized the National Guard would not have them in there to stop this." Former CIA Director Michael Hayden on Wednesday defended the agencys post-9/11 interrogation methods, following the release of a Senate report that slammed their tactics as "brutal" and ineffective. These interrogations gave us kind of a Home Depot-like storage of information on Al Qaeda on which we relied, Hayden told Fox News. We are still relying on it today. Hayden was one of the top-ranking intelligence officials in the federal government for a decade. He first served as director of the National Security Agency, before taking over at the CIA in 2006 during the George W. Bush administration, under which the interrogation programs began. Hayden sharply disagreed with the conclusions in the roughly 500-page Senate Intelligence Committee report that techniques such as waterboarding were not effective in gathering intelligence. The report -- a summary of a much larger, classified report -- was released by Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein, despite warnings from Republicans and some inside the Obama administration that it could lead to reprisals against Americans. Hayden on Wednesday said the interrogation or debriefing of roughly 100 detainees resulted in 8,000 pages of intelligence reports, or about 50 percent of what U.S. intelligence officials know about Al Qaeda. We got an awful lot of information, said Hayden. The argument they make was that we got zero intelligence that was not otherwise available from this program. Hayden also argued the Democrat-led report lacks the context that Americans were gripped with fear about a possible follow-up to the 9/11 terror attacks. Since weve made them feel safe again, they start complaining that we did too much, said Hayden, who also questions the accuracy of the report. No one involved with the program can even imagine how they got to this conclusion. Hayden and other former directors and deputy directors also penned an op-ed on Wednesday in The Wall Street Journal calling the "one-sided study" a "partisan attack." They also disputed claims that the takedown of Usama bin Laden was not aided by information gleaned from the program. CIA officials have said the program provided the "bedrock" understanding of the Al Qaeda network that it is still being drawn on today. One former CIA officer told Fox News, for instance, that once accused Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's will was broken, he generated more than 2,000 intelligence reports. But the Senate report, a summary of a still-classified 6,000 page study, concludes the interrogation techniques were "brutal and far worse" than the CIA represented to lawmakers. It details an array of harsh methods including sleep deprivation for up to 180 hours. The report called CIA management of the program "deeply flawed" and said the spy agency gave "inaccurate" information about it to Congress and the White House. Feinstein, D-Calif., the head of the intelligence panel who ordered the release of the report, said Tuesday on the Senate floor that the CIA techniques in some cases amounted to "torture." Fox News' Catherine Herridge and Chad Pergram and The Associated Press contributed to this report. The Obama administration announced Friday changes to U.S.-Cuba policy that would step up joint medical and scientific work, commerce and people-to-people exchanges between the two nations. The new regulations, which are to take effect on Monday and are issued by the U.S. departments of Commerce and Treasury, will pave the way for importing Cuban pharmaceuticals and for Americans to deal more directly with the new crop of Cubans who are running their own business ventures. One of the key changes in the new presidential directive noted prominently in initial social media posts and news reports after the administrations announcement calls for eliminating the $100 limit on the value of Cuban rum and cigars that American travelers can bring back from the island. In a conference call with reporters, senior administration officials, speaking on background, indicated that the next president would be unwise to undo changes the Obama administration began taking almost two years ago that they say already has made noticeable improvements in the lives of ordinary Cubans on the island. The Cuban people continue to be at the center of everything were doing, said a senior administration official. Expanding our license allow items to be sold directly to Cubans. Weve seen concrete benefits for Cubans on the island. "We've increased the space for this type of travel, people to people exchange, commercial opportunities in ways that are already having a positive impact on the lives of Americans and Cubans," the official said. "Turning back the clock on that policy would only take away those opportunities." Two Cuban-American members of Congress, who both sit on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, promptly denounced the further thaw in relations between Cuba and the Obama administration. Cuban-American congressional lawmakers, like most critics of the administrations decision to restore diplomatic relations with Cuba in 2014, have denounced the change in U.S.-Cuba policy as unfairly benefiting the communist regime, which is said to continue to oppress dissenters. Sen. Marco Rubio, Florida Republican, said in a statement: "After two years of President Obama's Cuba policy, the Castro regime has made out like bandits and received numerous concessions from the U.S. without lifting a finger to return the fugitives it is harboring from American justice, pay Americans for their stolen property, or allow the Cuban people to exercise their God-given freedoms. New Jersey Democrat Sen. Robert Menendez, said in a statement that the new changes violate two U.S. laws regarding Cuba. Todays regulatory economic changes from the White House not only benefit state-owned Cuban businesses and bolster the coffers of the Castro regime, but mark a profound shift away from our own commitment to the rule of law and the processes of democracy as we have always known them, Menendez said. The new regulations simply and blatantly violate both the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992 and the Cuban Liberty and the Libertad Act of 1996, the senator said, which codified the embargo against Cuba. While the Administration may not like the embargo or agree with it, it remains the law of the land, Menendez added. At the end of the day, it is outrageous that our own government would seek to break the law and blatantly acknowledge its intent to do so. White House officials said the embargo, which dates back more than 50 years, has failed to spark democratic reforms in Cuba. Asked by reporters in a conference call whether the changes would benefit mainly the Cuban government, officials said they would have direct and positive benefits for the Cuban people, even as it involved the Cuban state. Along with the changes on cigars and rum, the administration is also lifting limits on cargo ship travel between the U.S. and Cuba and easing U.S. and Cuban researchers' ability to conduct joint medical research. Proponents of lifting the embargo praised the new changes. "Cuba's healthcare system has achieved renown for its world-class doctors and medical breakthroughs, said James Williams, president of Engage Cuba, a group that helps U.S. and Cuba groups connect. There's no telling what could be accomplished from a thriving partnership between Cuba and the United States, the world's most advanced medical market. Includes reporting by The Associated Press. President Donald Trump could announce his nomination for the Supreme Court as early as Monday, a White House official told the Associated Press. Word of the possible announcement came as the administration grappled with the fallout of Trump's executive order halting the United States' refugee program and suspending visas for citizens of seven predominently Muslim countries. As a candidate, Trump often used surprise announcements to shift attention away from negative coverage. DOWN TO TWO: A LOOK AT WHO PRESIDENT TRUMP MIGHT TAP FOR THE SUPREME COURT Trump himself had tweeted that he would make his selection public on Thursday. On Friday, sources close to the selection process told Fox News that the president had narrowed his shorlist down to two federal appeals court judges: Neil Gorsuch of the Tenth Circuit and Thomas Hardiman of the Third Circuit. The sources told Fox News that Trump has privately kept one person in mind for some time. The president has met with at least three candidates to replace the late Antonin Scalia, whose seat on the high court has been vacant since his death this past February. "I have made my decision pretty much in my mind, yes," Trump told Fox News' Sean Hannity in a cable exclusive interview this past Thursday. "That's subject to change at the last moment, but I think this will be a great choice." The Associated Press contributed to this report. President Trumps order to suspend the countrys refugee program and temporarily ban immigration from seven mostly-Muslim nations erupted Sunday into a full-scale political battle -- with Trump and top aides defending the move amid nationwide protests and congressional Democrats vowing a relentless Capitol Hill fight to undo the order. America is a proud nation of immigrants, and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression. But we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border, Trump said Sunday afternoon. This is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as president I will find ways to help all those who are suffering. Trump issued the statement as hundreds of protesters marched in Washington and in other cities across the country to protest the president's self-described extreme vetting -- which resulted this weekend in dozens of foreign visitors and some legal permanent U.S. residents being detained at domestic airports. Earlier in the day, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., staged a press conference with some immigrant children and adults impacted by the bans and vowed to fight them on Capitol Hill with every fiber of my being. Sen. Diane Feinstein, D-Calif., said that she would introduce two bills Monday. One of the bills would rescind Trump's order, while the other would give Congress greater oversight of the president's immigration authority. And California Democratic Rep. Lou Correa said the executive orders on illegal immigration directly challenge the right to due process under the Constitution and that hell introduce legislation to fund legal aid to those who are targeted. Congressional Democrats led by Schumer, who said hes already appealed to Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, will have a difficult task getting any kind of measure through the Republican-control Congress that would reverse the executive order. I doubt many Arkansans or Americans more broadly object to taking a harder look at foreigners coming into our country from war-torn nations with known terror networks. I think theyre wondering why we dont do that already, said Arkansas GOP Sen. Tom Cotton, who as an Army officer served combat tours in Afghanistan and Iraq. However, Trump is facing opposition for some congressional Republicans, including Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, of Florida, and Barbara Comstock, of Virginia, along with Sens. Ben Sasse, of Nebraska, Lindsey Graham, of South Carolina, and John McCain, of Arizona. "It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trump's executive order was not properly vetted, Graham and McCain said in a joint statement. "Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. Trump, a Republican, tweeted in response that the statement was wrong and that the senators were sadly weak on immigration. The executive order Trump issued Friday imposes a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program and a 90-day ban on travel to the United States by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. On Saturday afternoon -- as reports surfaced about foreign visitors being detained at New Yorks Kennedy airport and elsewhere -- Trump said his plan to prevent Islamic terrorists and others for attacking the United States was working out very nicely. But by Saturday evening, a federal judge in Brooklyn issued a temporary halt on the part of the executive order that allows the Trump administration to deport people from the largely-Muslim countries. Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world - a horrible mess!, Trump tweeted Sunday morning. Meanwhile, Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the president, told Fox News Sunday: These are countries that have a history of training, harboring, exporting terrorists. And White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus argued that as many as 80 percent of Americans agree with the policy change, while dismissing media reports about chaotic scenes Saturday at U.S. airports. I do not think there was any chaos, he told NBCs Meet the Press, while predicting more people will be detained and offering no apologies. Priebus also seemed to suggest that foreign arrivals who have so-called green cards that allows them to permanently live and work in the United States will not be subject to the additional screenings. As far as green-card holders going forward, it doesnt affect them, he told NBC. Kelly said later that allowed green card holders into the country was "in the national interest of the country. And Tennessee GOP Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also said Trump's order had been "poorly implemented, especially with respect to green card holders." Trump, Conway and Priebus argued Sunday that the seven countries were in fact identified by President Obama in 2015 and pointed out that roughly 40 other such nations included Afghanistan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia were not part of the travel ban. Trump is also facing opposition from attorneys general in 15 states and the District of Columbia, who issued a statement Sunday condemning his order as unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful. The American Civil Liberties Union received millions in donations over weekend amid the backlash over President Trumps executive order to suspend the countrys refugee program and temporarily ban immigration from seven-mostly Muslim nations. Since Saturday morning, the ACLU said it had received more than 350,000 donations totaling $24 million. Executive Director Anthony Romero said the organization usually receives about $4 million per year. "It's really clear that this is a different type of moment," Romero told USA Today. "People want to know what they can do. They want to be deployed as protagonists in this fight. It's not a spectator sport." A federal judge in New York blocked part of Trumps order Saturday, giving an emergency stay to those who were being held at airports nationwide over the immigration ban in response to the ACLU lawsuit. According to the organization, nearly 140,000 people signed up for their email list since Saturday. Pop star Sia and Rosie ODonnell both contributed $100,000. Ride-sharing service Lyft agreed to donate $1 million as well. Trump and top aides doubled down on the order Sunday, despite nationwide protests and congressional Democrats vowing a relentless Capitol Hill fight to undo the order. America is a proud nation of immigrants, and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression. But we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border, Trump said Sunday afternoon. This is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as president I will find ways to help all those who are suffering. Trump issued the statement as hundreds of protesters marched in Washington and in other cities across the country to protest the president's self-described extreme vetting -- which resulted this weekend in dozens of foreign visitors and some legal permanent U.S. residents being detained at domestic airports. The executive order Trump issued Friday imposes a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program and a 90-day ban on travel to the United States by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. On Saturday afternoon -- as reports surfaced about foreign visitors being detained at New Yorks Kennedy airport and elsewhere -- Trump said his plan to prevent Islamic terrorists and others for attacking the United States was working out very nicely. Along with Democratic lawmakers, and some Republican lawmakers, Romero told USA Today that Trump has to understand governing is different than running for office. He added that Trump is walking down a dangerous path. A group of six bipartisan congressmen have asked President Donald Trump to exempt Iraqi military aides and interpreters who served with U.S. troops from his "extreme vetting" executive order. "These allies risked their own lives, as well as the well-being of their families, to advance Americas security interests," the letter read in part. "We encourage you to make special consideration in the review process for these individuals, who are certain to face threats to their own lives as part of the broader pause in refugee and immigrant admissions." The executive order, which Trump signed Friday, suspends the issuing of visas to citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries, including Iraq, for 90 days. Earlier Monday, Pentagon spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis told reporters that the Defense Department would submit names of Iraqis that have aided U.S. forces in action against Al Qaeda and ISIS. Davis did not say whether Defense Secretary James Mattis was consulted before Trump signed it. He added that the Pentagon was still "assessing" any impact the executive order would have on U.S. service members. The letter was signed by Republican Reps. Duncan Hunter of California, Adam Kinzinger of Illinois and Steve Stivers of Ohio. Three Democrats also signed the letter: Rep. Earl Blumenauer of Pennsylvania, Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts and Rep. Peter Welch of Vermont. Hunter, Kinzinger, Stivers and Moulton all served on active duty in Iraq. DWT, you've no doubt run across someone calling herself "Hone." She was a friend of mine in college and she sent me a letter-- to poste restante (I think in Kabul) which came to me months after the The last time I drank a Coke (or Pepsi) I was barely 20; it was in 1970. There was no social media then (aside from postcards) and international telephone calls were way too expensive for someone like me. So, while I was making my way by land across the world I depended on letters from home for news. If you read the comments here at, you've no doubt run across someone calling herself "Hone." She was a friend of mine in college and she sent me a letter-- to poste restante (I think in Kabul) which came to me months after the massacre at Kent State . Although she doesn't remember it today, her letter included a call to arms: American students would topple Coca Coca and Pepsi, two iconic American brands, as a response to the murders of the peaceful protestors. Foolishly I had been depending on Coke for hydration because the water was so dangerous to drink in countries like Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India in those days. The U.S. consulates in Iran and Afghanistan would warn American travelers to boil water for several minutes, let it cool down and then boil it again before drinking it. So it was a great sacrifice for me to give up consuming soft drinks. But I did and never touched one again. Yesterday I deleted my Uber app and I'll never get in another Uber. It'll be taxis and Lyft for me from now on. OK, how about a few words from Pope Francis? This is what he told a group of Catholic and Lutheran pilgrims yesterday: "[T]he sickness or, you can say the sin, that Jesus condemns most is hypocrisy... You cannot be a Christian without living like a Christian. You cannot be a Christian without practicing the Beatitudes. You cannot be a Christian without doing what Jesus teaches us in Matthew 25," a reference to Christs injunction to help the needy by such works of mercy as feeding the hungry, clothing the naked and welcoming the stranger. Its hypocrisy to call yourself a Christian and chase away a refugee or someone seeking help, someone who is hungry or thirsty, toss out someone who is in need of my help. If I say I am Christian, but do these things, Im a hypocrite. Randian fake-Christian Paul Ryan, who can be eliminated, politically, in 2018 , is still pissing off God by swearing that Trump's executive order is not a Muslim ban. He's lying. And most of the Republicans in Congress are right there with him. The relatively new congressman from Staten Island, Dan Donovan said the same thing a;most all the GOP members are saying, namely that "President Trump's decision is in America's best interest." Even the Republicans criticizing Trump-- so far Senators Susan Collins (ME), Jeff Flake (AZ), Lindsey Graham (SC), Lamar Alexander (TN) and Ben Sasse (NE) plus House members Mike Coffman (CO), Carlos Curbelo (FL), Elise Stefanik (NY), Will Hurd (TX), Mike Fitzpatrick (PA), Charlie Dent (PA), Justin Amash (MI), Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL) and Barbara Comstock (Va), all from blue-leaning or swing districts-- are bing very circumspect. Barbara Comstock, for example, one of the most electorally vulnerable Republicans in Congress, issued a tepid statement saying, "As I consistently have said, I don't believe it is constitutional to ban people from our country on the basis pf religion. However, I do support-- and the House of Representatives has supported on a bipartisan basis-- increased vetting based on national security concerns. The presidents executive order yesterday went beyond the increased vetting actions that Congress has supported on a bipartisan basis and inexplicably applied to Green Card holders, people who are legally within our country who have followed the rules. Green Card holders go through a detailed legal process and are vetted. They are required to register with the selective service-- many serve in the military. They pay taxes. I find it hard to believe that green card holders-- legal permanent residents-- were intended to be included in this Executive Order. This should be addressed and corrected expeditiously." was addressed expeditiously, thought not corrected. When Department of Homeland Security officials asked the White House for a clarification, the neo-Nazi who Trump has put in charge of this whole mess, psychopathic right-wing blogger Steve Bannon, said Itaddressed expeditiously, thought not corrected. When Department of Homeland Security officials asked the White House for a clarification, the neo-Nazi who Trump has put in charge of this whole mess, psychopathic right-wing blogger Steve Bannon, said Green Card holders were very much meant to be included . No comment on that report from Ryan or Comstock or any of the other Republicanos enabling Trump and Bannon. The only Republican who seems sincere and principled in his opposition to Trump's unconstitutional mayhem is Justin Amash, noting Trump's executive order "overreaches and undermines our constitutional system... The president's denial of entry to lawful permanent residents of the United States (green card holders) is particularly troubling. Green card holders live in the United States as our neighbors and serve in our Armed Forces. They deserve better... Ultimately, the executive order appears to be more about politics than safety. If the concern is radicalism and terrorism, then what about Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and others? Finally, we can't effectively fight homegrown Islamic radicalism by perpetuating the 'us vs. them' mindset that terrorists use to recruit. We must ensure that the United States remains dedicated to the Constitution, the Rule of Law, and liberty." Politically, Democrats better follow the lead of resisters like Ted Lieu and Jerry Nadler and let their own base know they are fighting-- and for real-- and not let the story become a false narrative about a few"brave Republicans" standing unto Trump. But what Comstock and other Republicans are talking about when they refer to "bipartisan support" is the 289-137 approval of an ugly, bigoted anti-refugee bill by Texas' Michael McCaul. 47 Democrats-- mostly from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party-- joined forces with 242 Republicans to pass it. 135 Democrats and just 2 Republicans voted against it-- and one of the Republicans, Iowa extremist Steve King, voted NO because he didn't feel the bill was draconian enough. Over the weekend into today many of the 47 Democrats who voted with the Republicans are trying desperately to distance themselves from their own votes. Take right-wing Blue Dog Jim Cooper, who represents (badly) a safe blue seat in Nashville. Yesterday he was trying to hide his bigotry with a tweet. Steve Israel, one of the leaders of the move to get Democrats to vote with the GOP against refugees, was practically rending his clothing today in sympathy for the immigrants. Here's a list of the worst of the traitors who are still in Congress: Pete Aguilar (New Dem-CA) Ami Bera (New Dem-CA) Sanford Bishop (Blue Dog-GA) Julia Brownley (worthless coward-CA) Cheri Bustos (Blue Dog-IL) Gerry Connolly (New Dem-VA) Jim Cooper (Blue Dog-TN) Jim Costa (Blue Dog-CA) Henry Cuellar (Blue Dog-TX) John Delaney (New Dem-MD) Tulsi Gabbard (LOL-HI) Jim Himes (New Dem-CT) Steve Israel (Blue Dog-NY) Ron Kind (New Dem-WI) Ann Kuster (New Dem-NH) Dan Lipinski (Blue Dog-IL) Sean Patrick Maloney (New Dem-NY) Donald Norcross (Corrupt-NJ) Scott Peters (New Dem-CA) Collin Peterson (Blue Dog-MN) Kathleen Rice (New Dem-NY) Tim Ryan (Would-be Leader-OH) Kurt Schrader (Blue Dog-OR) David Scott (Blue Dog-GA) Terri Sewell (New Dem-AL) Kyrsten Sinema (Blue Dog-AZ) Filemon Vela (Blue Dog-TX) There's only one group that has been working consistently to drive Blue Dogs and New Dems out of Congress for over a decade-- Blue America. No one else has dared. Want to help? You can here Since Mike decided to delete this tweet over the weekend, we decided to decorate it for him Perhaps its not so shocking that a man who confesses to getting about four hours of sleep per night is churning out executive orders and presidential memoranda at a furious pace. But a comparison between Trump's first full week on the job and the agenda of several of his predecessors underscores just how quickly his administration has moved. President Trumps Week One schedule, counting Inauguration Day and the ensuing seven days, covered a grand total of six executive orders and eight memoranda. This included: efforts to begin dismantling ObamaCare; withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership; freezing federal hiring and new government regulations; targeting sanctuary cities; beefing up border security; starting extreme vetting; ordering the construction of a southern border wall; restricting money to international organizations that perform abortions; and reviving the Keystone and Dakota Access pipelines. As Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, described it last week, the pace has been "dizzying." TRUMP'S EXECUTIVE ACTIONS The president's order Friday suspending the U.S. refugee program and taking other sweeping immigration measures has been the most controversial by far. But the actions nevertheless show Trump doing what he said he was going to do on the campaign trail -- and quickly. Its classic President Donald Trump style, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway told Fox News' Justice with Judge Jeanine on Saturday. Its exactly who hes been in business, as a candidate, as president-elect and now president. Hes all about action and impact. For good measure, Trump also met with British Prime Minister Theresa May, called several world leaders, openly feuded with media organizations and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, and sent out 69 tweets (not counting retweets) 49 from his personal account and 20 from Trumps newly acquired @POTUS. Trumps early pace of executive actions is similar to that of President Obama, who signed five executive orders and, according to one tally, nine memoranda in his first week. Trump's actions, however, were more sweeping than Obama's. And a review shows that Presidents George W. Bush and Clinton worked at a slower pace than either Obama or Trump in their opening days. Bushs only action was a restoration of the Mexico City Policy, which stops U.S. money from funding international groups that promote or perform abortions (which Trump also restored last week after it was revived under Obama). Otherwise, Bushs efforts mostly were focused on stopping Clintons final deeds. He ordered a halt to the publication of new regulations and also issued instructions to slow the implementation of Clintons final executive orders. Clintons early acts were focused on social policy, particularly abortion. He took steps to make RU-486 an abortion drug accessible, reversed a Department of Defense ban on abortion, issued an executive order to overturn a gag rule on doctors informing patients about abortion options and lifted a moratorium on federal funding of fetal tissue transplantation research. Clinton also moved to proclaim a National Day of Fellowship and Hope and issued two executive orders: one making sure that senior employees signed ethics pledges and another establishing a National Economic Council. Obama, after a successful campaign built on the concept of change, tried to swiftly turn concept into reality. Obama issued executive orders from the start suspending all ongoing proceedings at Guantanamo Bay and requiring the Army Field Manual be used as a guide to terror interrogations. The order banned torture, after Obama during the campaign was highly critical of the practice of waterboarding. Obama also enacted a pay freeze for senior White House staff who made more than $100,000, suspended pending federal regulations proposed by the Bush administration and made senior staff sign ethics rules regarding lobbying. On the environmental front, he ordered higher fuel efficiency standards and allowed states to raise emissions standards. Fox News' Chad Pergram contributed to this report. Former President George H.W. Bush has been released from a Texas hospital after being treated for pneumonia. The former presidents office issued a brief statement saying Bush was released Monday from Houston Methodist Hospital. He is thankful for the many prayers and kind messages he received during his stay, as well as the world-class care that both his doctors and nurses provided, the statement said. Bush was experiencing breathing difficulties when he was admitted Jan. 14. During his treatment, which included a stay in intensive care, doctors inserted a breathing tube and connected him to a ventilator. The nation's 41st president was joined at the hospital by his 91-year-old wife, former first lady Barbara Bush, who spent five days there for treatment of bronchitis until her release a week ago. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Top House Democrats have demanded an emergency meeting with Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly to get clarification over President Donald Trumps immigration restrictions, which have been a source of controversy since they were put into action late last week. Democrats on the judiciary, homeland security and foreign affairs oversight committees wrote a joint letter to Kelly to discuss the implementation and guidance concerning the Executive Order." John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, Bennie Thompson, D-Mass., ranking member of the Homeland Security Committee, Eliot Engle, D-N.Y., ranking member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, and Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., the top Democrat on the Judiciarys immigration panel, all signed off on the letter to Kelly. The lawmakers hope to get a meeting with Kelly by Wednesday or sooner. The lawmaker said the order has already led to panic and chaos and they pin the blame on the lack of clarity and guidance provided after Trump signed the order. We look forward to meeting with you in short order so that we can have an open and candid discussion about how the Trump administration arrived at this chaotic place, what you understand the meaning of the Executive Order to be, and what guidance you have offered to your employees and other stakeholders. Democrats, as well as a small number of Republicans have lashed out against Trumps order since it was signed Friday. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. "You have an extreme vetting proposal that didn't get the vetting it should have had," said Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, who urged the new president to "slow down" and work with lawmakers on how best to tighten screening for foreigners who enter the United States. "In my view, we ought to all take a deep breath and come up with something that makes sense for our national security" and reflects the fact that "America's always been a welcoming home for refugees and immigrants," he said. Kelly issued a statement Sunday saying that, absent information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a "dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination." That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent U.S. residency "green cards" will not be barred from re-entering the U.S., as officials had previously said. Earlier in the day, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., staged a press conference with some immigrant children and adults impacted by the bans and vowed to fight them on Capitol Hill with every fiber of my being. Sen. Diane Feinstein, D-Calif., said that she would introduce two bills Monday. One of the bills would rescind Trump's order, while the other would give Congress greater oversight of the president's immigration authority. The executive order Trump issued Friday imposes a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program and a 90-day ban on travel to the United States by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. But by Saturday evening, a federal judge in Brooklyn issued a temporary halt on the part of the executive order that allows the Trump administration to deport people from the largely-Muslim countries. Fox News' Chad Pergram and the Associated Press contributed to this report President Donald Trump will welcome Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the United States next month. White House press secretary Sean Spicer said Monday that Netanyahu will visit on February 15. He said Trump looks forward to "discussing continued strategic, technological, military and intelligence cooperation." Trump has signaled strong support for Israel. Netanyahu on Sunday said that the American embassy in Israel should be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, endorsing one of Trump's campaign promises. Conservative patriarch Charles Koch and his vast network is vowing to oppose President Donald Trump if and when he deviates from their dedication to "free and open societies." This weekend alone, Koch raised concerns about whether the Republican president will adopt an "authoritarian" governing style. Koch's chief lieutenants condemned the nascent administration's plans to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in infrastructure projects. And the Koch network's many donors lashed out at Trump's push to block immigration from several Muslim-majority countries. "It doesn't do any good for us to be positioned as hating whole classes of people," said Erick Brimen, who, like the other 550 or so donors who gathered at a luxury California hotel this weekend, will pay at least $100,000 this year to fund Charles and David Koch's nationwide network of policy and political organizations. "What has made America great always is that this has been a place that has welcomed the best and the brightest," said Brimen, a Venezuelan native who became a U.S. citizen last year and now manages a private equity firm. "The message needs to be very loud and clear that we continue to be such a place no matter where you come from." The sentiment was in line with a formal statement released Sunday by the Koch network, which said Trump's "travel ban is the wrong approach and will likely be counterproductive." The pointed criticism comes as the conservatives who help fund what may be the nation's most powerful conservative network grapple with mixed feelings about the new administration. The Kochs refused to support Trump's candidacy last fall, but they now see a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to influence the White House and the Republican-controlled Congress. Many who attended this weekend's Koch donor conference reported anxious optimism about the extraordinary opportunity for conservatives. They highlighted strong ties between the Koch network and the Trump administration. And even before it is announced, Koch's team is preparing to devote its tremendous resources to defend Trump's pick for the Supreme Court. Yet there are also deep concerns about a new president with no long-term commitment to conservative priorities like free trade, free markets and small government. "Our suspicion is we're going to get three parts good and one part bad," said Chris Wright, a Colorado-based energy entrepreneur. "We're worried about the one part bad." And over and over again this weekend, Koch's lieutenants insisted they were willing and able to take on the Trump administration and any members of Congress who stand in their way. Without naming Trump, Koch network co-chair Brian Hooks noted that Republicans opposed President Barack Obama's stimulus and would should do the same if the new president follows through on his pledge to support a massive infrastructure package. Others promised to fight what they called "crony capitalism" in the new administration, reminding conservatives they fought Obama's support for private companies like Solyndra and should do the same when Trump picks winners and losers in private business. Hooks and others also repeatedly raised pointed objections to Republican plans to adopt a "border adjustment" tax or new tariffs. "We're going to have the courage to oppose bad policies...regardless of who proposes them," Hooks declared. Koch himself raised a broader concern about the new administration's use of executive authority. The billionaire industrialist did not mention Trump by name as he warned that the nation is facing a moment of "tremendous danger." He said the nation could "go the authoritarian route ... or we can move toward a free and open society. So this is our opportunity." Despite the obvious tension between the Koch network and Trump administration, Koch leaders say they're confident about their ability to shape the direction of the Trump administration's policies from the inside. There is perhaps no bigger Koch ally than Vice President Mike Pence, whose staff and ideology has been in close alignment with the Kochs for years. Koch spoke directly with the vice president on the phone days before his inauguration as Pence considered hiring a Koch communications staffer, Stephen Ford, to serve as his chief speechwriter. Ford was soon hired, along with former Koch chief Marc Short, who now serves as the White House legislative director. "The reason we're optimistic ... is really Mike Pence," said Doug Deason, a prominent Trump supporter and major Koch donor. "If you think Cheney had power in Bush White House, just watch and see what happens with Mike Pence." Meanwhile, Koch donor Fred Klipsch, of Indiana, suggested the tension between Trump and Koch is exaggerated. "These are two strong-willed individuals and they've had their disagreements," Klipsch said. "On the other hand, when it comes time to get to work, I think they're all working in the same direction." Not all Muslim-Americans reject President Trump's executive order restricting travel from seven troubled, Muslim-majority nations. Amid widespread protests and a federal lawsuit filed by the Council for American-Islamic Relations, a handful of Muslim activists say the president was right to order the sudden imposition of strict and targeted travel regulations. Its not a ban on Islam, or any religion, Raheel Raza, a Pakistani-born Muslim human rights activist, told Fox News. There is so much hysteria surrounding this order that its unfortunately barring reason and logic. Trump is not politically correct at all. (If he wanted to) he would say outright that it was a Muslim ban. Raza has come out in support of the 120-day suspension of the refugee program and a 90-day moratorium on travel to the U.S. from citizens of seven terror hot spots, including Iraq, Syria, Somalia and Sudan. She said every country has a right to secure its borders, and that the temporary order is needed while Washington works on a better solution to combat extremism. Im not a fan of [Trumps] terminology but hes bringing a necessary conversation to the table, she said. They may not like talking about these issues, but you dont have to like Trump to have this discussion. But lets not lose sight of the fact that the reason they are refugees is because radical Islamists, and horrible foreign governments, are killing them. Others in the Muslim community have come out in favor of the travel ban, as well. In the cold war, we vetted against communism, for communist theory and ideology, Dr. Zuhudi Jasser, founder and president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, said during an interview on Fox News' Americas Newsroom. That was part of the immigration process. I hope we begin to engage reformist Muslims. We need to stop with identity politics. There is nothing more pro-Muslim than vetting jihadists, Jasser added. The executive order was signed Friday and took immediate effect, and affects travel to the United States by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The order also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria. "Such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism at a critical time," the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the world's largest body of Islamic nations, said in a statement "The OIC calls upon the United States government to reconsider this blanket decision and maintain its moral obligation to provide leadership and hope at a time of great uncertainty and unrest in the world." Trump has vigorously defended the order, saying it "is about terror and keeping our country safe" and not "a Muslim ban." Thousands of people spent the past weekend protesting the order at many of the nations airports, including New Yorks JFK, Chicagos OHare and LAX in Los Angeles. On Monday, CAIR announced it filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of over 20 individuals that challenges the constitutionality of Trumps executive order. The vulgar animosity that accounts for the existence of Executive Order entitled Protecting the Nation from Terrorist Attacks by Foreign Nationals, issued the same day of this action, is plain to see, and the absence of the words Islam or Muslim does nothing to obscure it, reads a line from the lawsuit that was filed in the Eastern District Court of Virginia. As of Monday, protests have continued at airports around the nation. To the people protesting you feel for these people, thats great. So do I, Raza said. But where were you a month ago, three months ago, a year ago? Protesters are yelling in the streets over a few hundred refugees detained but they were not shouting in the streets when half a million Syrians were being butchered? President Trump spoke with Saudi Arabian King Salman Sunday, and discussed the possible formation of safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as a new effort to fight terrorism in the Middle East. In the conversation, according to a readout released by the White House, the pair agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of radical Islamic terrorism and also on securing peace in the region, particularly in the Yemen and Syrian crises. The White House said the King also agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, something Trump called for repeatedly during his presidential campaign. The President requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts, the readout said. They also discussed Trump leading a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism which would also help build a new economic and social future in the region. Trump signed an executive order Friday suspending refugee admissions and immigration from seven terror-prone countries including Syria and Yemen. Critics of Trumps executive action have noted that Saudi Arabia where many 9/11 terrorists were from wasnt included on the list of countries subject to restrictions. However, the administration has noted that the list was actually drawn up by the Obama administration. President Trump launched into a fiery defense of his controversial refugee and immigration restrictions Monday, blaming protesters and Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumers fake tears for difficulties at U.S. airports, and urging his opponents to study the world! Trump signed an executive order Friday that imposed a 120-day suspension of the refugee program and a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. from citizens of seven terror hot spots, including Iraq, Syria, Somalia and Sudan. The order sparked chaos at the nations airports as customs agents struggled to interpret the order, and outraged civil rights groups and Democratic lawmakers -- some of whom attended protests at the nations airports where some travelers had been detained. Schumer, D-N.Y., who has pledged to fight the order with every fiber of my being tweeted Saturday, that there are tears running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty tonight. There are tears running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty tonight. pic.twitter.com/X6q40dMCsN Chuck Schumer (@SenSchumer) January 27, 2017 On Sunday, Schumer struggled to hold back tears at a press conference as he called the order "mean-spirited and un-American." Trump responded Monday morning, by saying that only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained. He blamed the chaos at airports on a Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,..... Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 Trump was referring to a Delta systems outage Sunday night that led to a number of delays. However the chaos began Saturday, and so most of the chaos was not related to the outage. After promising again to Make America Safe Again he reminded his Twitter followers that there is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter out country and urging them to study the world!" He later doubled down on his criticism of Schumer, telling reporters after a White House meeting with small business owners that he thought "there's about a 5 percent chance [the tears were] real." "I noticed Chuck Schumer yesterday with fake tears," Trump said. "Im going to ask him who is his acting coach." Trump aide Stephen Miller also defended the move Monday morning, saying on Fox & Friends that the list of countries was from a list drawn up by the Obama administration, and that the move was a preventive measure to stop terror attacks like those seen in Europe. "Our task in this new administration is to prevent what happened in parts of France and Belgium and Germany from happening in the United States," Miller said. "Where you have large pockets of radicalization that extend through generations and that become a long-term security problem." Responding to criticism that the order had been dropped on agencies with little-to-no warning, both Miller and Trump said that a window would have allowed potential terrorists to come in before it closed. The Trump administration was forced to make a number of clarifications on the status of permanent legal residents or green card holders, while a federal judge issued a stay on deportations late Saturday. President Trumps executive order Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States stirred immediate controversy after it was signed Friday. Here is what you need to know about the executive order: What does President Trumps executive order do? The purpose of the executive order is detecting individuals with terrorist ties and stopping them from entering the United States for 90 days if they come from any of seven countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The order suspends those granted refugee status for 120 days while the Trump administration reviews and reworks immigration screening procedures. The order also states that refugees who are already in the process of being vetted may be admitted to the United States, but only after undergoing the revised screening processes. The Seven Countries Although the order is being characterized as a "Muslim ban," which Trump discussed during his campaign, it is worth noting that President Trump did not cherry-pick these seven countries. The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror, Trump said in a statement on Sunday. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion -- this is about terror and keeping our country safe, noting that there are at least 40 countries that are predominantly Muslim that are not affected by the order. It is deeply irresponsible to characterize this Executive Order as a Muslim ban -- it is not, Chairman of House Homeland Security Committee Michael McCaul, R-Texas, told Fox News. The order puts a pause on refugee admissions and temporarily halts immigration from seven countries, each of which was already designated by the Obama administration as an area of terror concern. The seven countries were originally flagged by the Obama administration for the Visa Waiver Program Improvement and Terrorist Travel Prevention Act of 2015, which restricted access to U.S. Customs and Border Protections Visa Waiver Program for citizens of Iran, Iraq, Sudan and Syria. In 2016, the Department of Homeland Security under the Obama administration added three additional countries, which are reflected in President Trumps executive order: Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The executive order asks for streamlined communications and information from departments of State and Homeland Security, along with the intelligence community, about the listed countries to ensure those who seek entry into the U.S. are not a security or public safety threat. The countries have 60 days to start giving the information to the United States and, if they dont, those seeking entry will be prohibited from entering the United States. Green Card and Visa holders affected? On Saturday, the Department of Homeland Security said that President Trumps order did apply to green card holders traveling to the United States from those seven countries. The White House confirmed this position Saturday night, and said that green card holders would be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. The American Civil Liberties Union and federal courts in Brooklyn, Boston and Virginia blocked the government from enforcing the executive order against visa and green-card holders. The next day, on NBCs "Meet the Press," White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus changed the stance. As far as green card holders, moving forward, it doesnt affect them, Priebus said. If youre an American citizen traveling back and forth to Libya, you are likely to be subjected to further questioning when you come into an airport. He also noted that customs and border patrol agents have discretionary authority when they suspect someone is up to no good when they travel back and forth to countries listed in the order. What is the global reaction? The Iranian foreign ministry and the Iraqi parliament have approved reciprocity measures -- meaning U.S. citizens cannot enter the countries until the ban is lifted. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid bin Raad Zeid al-Hussein, took to Twitter on Monday morning saying that discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law, and calling President Trumps action mean-spirited. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Britains Prime Minister Theresa May and French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, among others, expressed their disagreement and concern. But President Trump received support from Czech President Milos Zeman. A spokesperson for Zeman said U.S. President Trump protects his country. Hes concerned with the safety of his citizens. Exactly what EU elites do not do. What happens next? Senate Democrats are expected to roll out legislation Monday evening in an effort to repeal Trump's order. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., will introduce two bills. The first would rescind the executive order, and the second would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to ensure additional congressional oversight of the presidents authority to bar classes of people from entering the United States, according to Feinsteins office. Painting more than 200 million people with the same broad brush is contrary to the principles on which this nation was founded and will not make us any safer, Feinstein said in a statement. This World Politics in a Time of Populist Nationalism (WPTPN) guest post is written by Moonhawk Kim, who was an assistant professor of political science at the University of Colorado Boulder from 2007 to 2016. His research focused on the politics of international trade institutions. This post first appeared on his blog To Be Analyzed. Ruggies (1982) embedded liberalism provided the framework for understanding the nature of the domestic social contract underlying the post-World War II international economic arrangement for the last three-and-a-half decades. As an alternate to the disembedded liberalism (Polanyi 1944) model of the gold standard era, this model described and prescribed the importance of domestic political economic stability over maintenance of the liberal international economic order. In the decades since Ruggies article, the potential threat to the stability of embedded liberalism scholars anticipated was a return to disembedded liberalism, the model of hyperglobalization at the cost of domestic political economic stability. One way to interpret the triumph of Donald Trump is that the long-standing social bargain within the U.S. underlying Pax Americanaand thus the whole post-war international orderhas unraveled. The bargain is moving toward hyper-priotization of domestic political economy over a liberal international economy. This interpretation is consistent with the broad observation about the characteristics of voters who voted for Trump (losers from globalization, broadly defined to include those that confront a high level of economic uncertainty if not low income) and Trumps nationalistic economic policies, now taking the first step in the form of withdrawing from the Trans Pacific Partnership. Two interrelated components are necessary for maintaining a stable domestic-international bargain. One, the international benefits of a liberal world economythe gains from tradehas to be domestically distributed. Economists have always recognized that the gains are at the aggregate level. Those who gain from economic globalization (winners) need to compensate those who are hurt from it (losers) and mitigate the latters cost of adjusting to the new economic reality. Two, the domestic population needs to intuitively and/or rationally understand the nature of the domestic-international bargain and continually support to reinforce and sustain the international arrangement. I have some ideas on why these two components unraveled over time: A Paradox of Stability: When an international order worksworks really well, as it did in the post-war erait becomes taken for granted. People and states simply come to think this is how it is and fail to realize the institutions and the effort underlying it. Thats actually the indication of the most institutionalized institutions, at least according to sociologists. However, when the taken-for-grantedness leads to desires for dismantling the institution in question, it becomes a problem. (This is akin to the vaccination issueOh, I dont have to vaccinate against pertussis, because pertussis is not a problem anymore!A related aspect of this is that people/leaders also come to disregard the strategic interaction underlying the stability of the existing order. Other countries have been keeping their trade open because the U.S. has been. If the U.S. becomes more protectionist, other countries will not keep their trade open. The U.S. doesnt just import; it also exports. Disjuncture from the Historical Moment: Much of the post-war international order was shaped by the experience states endured during the interwar years, in particular the Great Depression. As the length of time between the historical moment and the current period increases, the lessons fadepeople/leaders who experienced it die and new ones never learn it. (What about the Great Recession? See #1 above.) Disembedded Liberalism: #1 and #2 led to an increasing emphasis on the liberal economic order over domestic political economic stability. The gap in real income growth in the U.S. over the last four decades is the best evidence of this. Certainly not all wealth resulted from a liberal international economy alonetechnological progress played an important rolebut the gains were not distributed in ways to ensure long-term domestic stability. Complexity of Globalization: I use the term globalization as a shorthand for lowering of costs of transportation and communication, thereby increasing the density of interaction among people. These changes are mainly facilitated by technological innovations that lower the costs. As a result of this, the global system becomes more complex in two ways.First, causal chains in large-scale outcomes become harder to trace. When causation has to be inferred rather than perceived, people reject both the process of inference (science) and the assertions of causality. This opens up the possibility of phenomena like alternative facts to arise. Second, differences across individuals, groups, and countrieswhich have always existedbecome revealed and more likely to generate conflicts. Simultaneous with this increased exposure to diversity, the same technology that increases that exposure facilitates individuals and groups to communicate and organize with those that are likeminded (e.g., cable news channels). In short, globalization strengthens intra-group cohesion while increasing inter-group conflicts. So what happens now? The next four years will be an interesting test of Keohanes (1984) thesis that international institutions can in fact successfully persist and maintain order after hegemonic decline. Of course, with the current regime in the U.S., we are witnessing less of a decline and more of a willful rejection in alleged service of domestic political economic priorities. The absurdly misinformed protectionist policies by the administration will certainly end up causing a great deal of economic harm to the very groups it is claiming to be helping. The Duck of Minervas WPTPN group is still seeking guest contributions. If you are interested in writing a post and have research expertise in international relations, international political economy, foreign policy, comparative politics, or cognate fields please see this post for more information. An Iron Age tomb brimming with treasures fashioned out of gold, bronze and amber was recently uncovered after lying undisturbed by the Danube River for nearly 2,600 years, archaeologists report. The glitzy hoard adorned and surrounded the skeleton of a woman who likely died between the age of 30 and 40, and it suggests that she was an elite member of the Celtic society that buried her in ancient southern Germany at a hill fort called Heuneburg in 583 B.C., the researchers said. Moreover, the presence of a petrified sea urchin and ammonite (a type of extinct mollusk) in the grave are intriguing, and suggest that the woman "was a kind of priestess," said the study's lead researcher Dirk Krausse, the archaeologist for the German state of Baden-Wurttemberg. [See Photos of Treasures Uncovered in the Elite Woman's Grave] Multiple graves around the woman's burial chamber had been looted over the years, with some looters digging tunnels from tomb to tomb, facilitating the plundering process, Krausse said. The newfound grave is "extraordinary," as it's the "first richly furnished central grave from that period the first half of the sixth century in Heuneburg which was not looted in antiquity," Krausse told Live Science. Immense excavation People have known about Heuneburg, a prehistoric hill fort near the Danube River, for centuries. The Celtic city-state was likely founded in the sixth century B.C., and it's thought that even the famous Greek Philosopher Herodotus (circa 484 B.C to 425 B.C.) mentioned it while writing about the history of the Danube River, Krausse said. However, it wasn't until 1950 that researchers began modern excavations of the site, which sits just north of the Alps. But those digs didn't uncover everything. In 2005, archaeologist Siegfried Kurz, who died in 2014, found a golden brooch brooch in a plowed field. Kurz later led a small-scale excavation of the grave, which was located in an area known as the Bettelbuhl necropolis. The grave contained a young child, likely a girl between the age of 2 and 4, who was burried next to a larger grave that had a burial chamber made out of timber, the researchers said. Concerned that another plow, or other agricultural activity, would harm the larger grave, the researchers excavated the entire 88-ton (80 tonnes) section which they dubbed Keltenblock in 2010. A crane carried Keltenblock to the laboratories at the archaeological state office of Baden-Wurttemberg. Golden treasures The large grave held myriad treasures: intricate jewelry made of amber, gold and bronze; piles of furs and textiles; an ornament made out of boars' horns and bronze jingle bells that would have adorned a horse's chest; carved boxwood objects; bracelets carved from black stone; and a belt made of bronze and leather . The jewelry and the belt covered the 5-foot-3-inch tall skeleton of the elite woman. On the opposite side of the chamber, researchers found the skeleton of what was likely a woman, measuring just 5 feet 1 inch tall. The woman, whose remains were buried with just a few pieces of bronze jewelry, may have been a servant, Krausse said. [In Photos: Ancient Tomb of a Celtic Prince Uncovered] At the feet of the second individual sat a 1.3-foot-long bronze sheet decorated with circles. A computed tomography (CT) scan of the sheet showed the remains of an iron horse bit, which gave researchers the idea that the sheet may have been a chanfron (also spelled chamfron) a piece of metal that covers a horse's forehead. If the bronze sheet is a chanfron, it's the first one on record to be found in Heuneburg and only the second known from this period north of the Alps, the researchers said. Given that the grave has both the chanfron and the ornament made from boars' tusks that would have covered a horse's chest, it's likely that the elite woman had a strong connection with horses, Krausse said. Waterlogged wood The floor of the chamber was lined with oak and silver fir planks. By dating the wood and examining its tree rings, the researchers determined that the trees were felled in the fall of 583 B.C. This date firmly places the grave with the Hallstatt culture a name that has been given to the people who lived in central Europe during that time, the researchers said. It's rare for timber to survive 2,600 years, but the grave's contents persisted because the Danube River routinely flooded, and clay in the soil around the grave helped keep the water inside the burial site. Just like the ocean can preserve a wooden shipwreck, the water from the Danube preserved the timbers and most of the grave's organic contents, with the exception of the textiles and furs (which were in bad shape) and some of the grave's iron and bronze objects, the researchers said. However, the surviving objects are especially revealing. The elite woman's jewelry is similar to the jewelry that was worn by a young girl whose remains were discovered in 2005, and whose grave was just about 6.5 feet away from the elite woman's grave. The similarity in their jewelry suggests that the girl and the woman were buried during the same time period, the researchers said. [In Photos: Boneyard of Iron Age Warriors] Moreover, the style of the elite woman's jewelry and chanfron matches that seen in cultures south of the Alps, including Italy, Greece, Cyprus and Sicily, Krausse said. Other excavations suggest that the gold filigree was made at Heuneburg, showing that artisans there were influenced by styles in cultures south of the Alps, Krausse said. "By knowing this new grave, we see the context between the region south of the Alps and this city at the Danube River," Krausse said. "They were much closer, there was much more traffic and interrelations between these areas than we thought before." The findings were published in the February issue of the journal Antiquity . Editor's Note: This article has been updated to correct the record on who discovered the 2005 grave of the young girl. A team led by archaeologist Siegfried Kurz, who died in 2014, found the brooch in a plowed field and later led a small-scale excavation of the grave. Previously, the story incorrectly said that the farmer who plowed the field discovered the brooch. This story was updated Jan. 27 at 12:50 p.m. EST. Original article on Live Science. Thousands of scientists including 40 Nobel laureates have added their names to a statement powerfully denouncing President Trumps executive order restricting entry to the United States for people from seven nations. Calling the order discriminatory, and detrimental to the national interests of the United States, the petition explains that not only does the immigration move unfairly target people from Muslim-majority nations, it also harms American science. The statement also points out that the order places an "undue burden" on the members of the scientific community who are from one of the countries targeted by the executive order. The people whose status in the United States would be reconsidered under this [executive order] are our students, friends, colleagues, and members of our communities, it reads. As of Monday morning, the petition which in addition to denouncing Trumps move, also ask him to reconsider the order had more than 12,000 supporters, according to its website, notoimmigrationban.com. The unethical and discriminatory treatment of law-abiding, hard-working, and well-integrated immigrants fundamentally contravenes the founding principles of the United States, it adds. Science relies on collaboration and open communication between researchers. And of the millions of scientists who live in the United States, 18 percent of them were immigrants, as of 2013, according to a report from the National Science Foundation. While a majority of those immigrants became naturalized citizens, according to the report, 15 percent held temporary visas and 22 percent were permanent residents. Trumps order initially was interpreted to include permanent residents, or green card holders. The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) also responded to the move, warning that it could hurt the United States place in the world as a scientific leader. Scientific progress depends on openness, transparency, and the free flow of ideas," the CEO of AAAS, Rush Holt, said in a statement. The United States has always attracted and benefited from international scientific talent because of these principles. The January 27, 2017 White House executive order on visas and immigration will discourage many of the best and brightest international students, scholars, and scientists from studying and working in the United States, or attending academic and scientific conferences, he added. An article on Science magazines website also points out that researchers from Iran are particularly vulnerable, given than many scientists originally from that country study in the United States. One Iranian postdoctoral researcher told that publication: How can I stay in the United States and start my lab, thinking every moment, panicking, that I cant go back home if something happens to my family? There are thousands of people like me. SpaceX has run several competitions aimed at pushing forward the ambitious Hyperloop project, with the latest one wrapping up on Sunday. Although a couple of companies are working on developing the track technology for the ultra-fast transportation system, it's engineering students from around the world who've been busy designing the pods that passengers could one day ride in. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, the man who dreamed up the Hyperloop concept back in 2013, has been using the contests to encourage students to develop the capsules, which, if the system ever goes into operation, will carry people inside a near-vacuum environment at speeds of up to 760 mph. At that rate, a journey between LA and San Francisco would take a mere half hour. Showdown Taking place just outside SpaceX's headquarters in Hawthorne, California, and judged by SpaceX engineers, the 30 teams in the latest competition spent the last week putting their pods through a range of tests in the hope of securing a run on the test track. Three finalists were selected, with each one given the chance to send their half-size prototype along the enclosed mile-long track on Sunday. The Delft Hyperloop team from Delft University in the Netherlands triumphed after gaining the highest overall score with its super-sleek carbon-fiber pod (above) incorporating a specially designed brake and stabilization system. The Technical University from Munich in Germany picked up the award for the fastest design, though speeds are currently way down on those expected with the final Hyperloop system. Among U.S. entrants, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) finished third overall. MIT had already caught the attention of judges last year when it won the Best Overall Design Award during an early phase of the contest, while Delft University had previously collected the Pod Innovation Award. SpaceX said that based on the "high-quality submissions and overwhelming enthusiasm surrounding the competition," it's planning a second installment of the contest -- Hyperloop Pod Competition II -- for later this year. Focusing solely on speed, the summer showdown will be open to all-new student teams with pods designed for the test track, as well as to existing teams with tried and tested pods. Addressing the participating teams on Sunday, Musk said the event was designed primarily to "encourage innovation in transport technology, to get people excited about new forms of transport to really get people to innovate and to think about doing things in a way that's not just a repeat of the past, but to explore the boundaries of physics and see what's possible." Silicon Valley heavyweights Apple, Google and Microsoft are among a host of tech companies blasting Presidents Trumps controversial refugee and immigration restrictions. Trump signed an executive order Friday that imposed a 120-day suspension of the refugee program and a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. from citizens of seven countries, including Iraq, Syria, Somalia and Sudan. The order sparked chaotic scenes at U.S. airports as customs agents struggled to interpret the policy and outraged civil rights groups launched protests. In a memo sent to Apple employees Saturday the iPhone makers CEO, Tim Cook, voiced his concern about the executive order. WHY DID APPLE JUST FILE A VAPORIZER PATENT? I've heard from many of you who are deeply concerned about the executive order issued yesterday restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. I share your concerns. It is not a policy we support, he wrote, in the memo, which was obtained by MacRumors. Cook added that some Apple employees have been affected by the immigration order. Apple will do everything we can to support them, he wrote, adding that the Cupertino, Calif.-based firm has reached out to the White House to explain the negative effect on our coworkers and our company. The Apple CEO was one of a number of U.S. tech leaders that met with Trump last month. Cook is also a member of Trumps Strategic and Policy Forum, which also includes Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk and Uber CEO Travis Kalanick. Apple believes deeply in the importance of immigration -- both to our company and to our nation's future, Cook wrote in his memo. Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do. FACEBOOK UPDATES ITS TROUBLED TRENDING FEED WITH MORE INFO, LESS PERSONALIZATION Apple co-founder and tech icon Steve Jobs was the son of a Syrian immigrant to America. Google CEO Sundar Pichai slammed Trumps move in a memo to employees Friday. "Its painful to see the personal cost of this executive order on our colleagues," he wrote, in the memo, which was obtained by Bloomberg. "Weve always made our view on immigration issues known publicly and will continue to do so." More than 100 Google staff are affected by the executive order, according to Pichais memo. Google co-founder Sergey Brin attended a protest against the immigration move at San Francisco International Airport, according to media reports. TWO EMPLOYEES ARE SUING MICROSOFT, ALLEGING THEIR JOBS GAVE THEM PTSD Were concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the United States, Google said, in a statement sent to Fox News. We'll continue to make our views on these issues known to leaders in Washington and elsewhere." The search giant has also created a crisis fund that could raise up to $4 million for four immigrant rights organizations. Google confirmed a USA Today report that it is funding an initial $2 million for the fund that can be matched with up to $2 million in donations from employees. The money will go toward the American Civil Liberties Union, the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, the International Rescue Committee and the U.N. Refugee Agency. Company executives are also donating separately to the effort. One of the strongest condemnations of Trumps move came from Netflix CEO Reed Hastings. Trump's actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all, he wrote, in a Facebook post Saturday. Worse, these actions will make America less safe (through hatred and loss of allies) rather than more safe. IS PRESIDENT TRUMP STILL USING HIS OLD ANDROID PHONE? Other tech heavyweights also weighed in on the events unfolding at the nations airports. As an immigrant and as a CEO, Ive both experienced and seen the positive impact that immigration has on our company, for the country, and for the world. We will continue to advocate on this important topic, wrote Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in a LinkedIn post Saturday. Nadella also posted a memo from Microsoft President and Chief Legal Officer Brad Smith that described the companys belief in a strong and balanced high-skilled immigration system. Like many of you, I'm concerned about the impact of the recent executive orders signed by President Trump, wrote Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in a post on the social network Friday. We need to keep this country safe, but we should do that by focusing on people who actually pose a threat. GOOGLE ENTERING CUBA IS 'TROJAN HORSE' THAT COULD REINFORCE REGIME, RESIDENTS SAY Uber has also been dragged into the immigration furor amid allegations that it attempted to exploit a taxi protest against the ban at New Yorks JFK Airport on Saturday by turning off surge pricing. Uber NYC tweeted that surge pricing had been turned off at JFK airport Saturday. Surge pricing has been turned off at #JFK Airport. This may result in longer wait times. Please be patient. Uber NYC (@Uber_NYC) January 29, 2017 The hashtag #DeleteUber was soon trending on Twitter. In a subsequent tweet Uber NYC said that its earlier tweet was not meant to break the strike and linked to Uber CEO Travis Kalanicks Friday Facebook post opposing the travel ban and explaining how affected Uber employees will be compensated. Last tweet not meant to break strike. Our CEOs statement opposing travel ban and compensating those impacted: https://t.co/joWvPvux9J Uber NYC (@Uber_NYC) January 29, 2017 In a Facebook post Sunday Kalanick explained that Uber is creating a $3 million legal defense fund to help drivers with immigration and translation services amid what he described as the President's unjust immigration ban. Rival Lyft has voiced its concern about Trumps immigration move, announcing on Sunday that it is donating $1 million over the next four years to the ACLU. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Airports around the country say operations have mostly resumed to normal after a series of protests erupted in response to President Donald Trumps executive order blocking visitors from seven predominantly Muslim nations. According to Skift, U.S. carriers did not receive advance notice of the order or information from the government on how to address passport and visa holders from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemeneven those who are lawful U.S. citizens. Despite the immigration confusion, several airport officials confirmed to Fox News Monday that most protests have disbanded and fliers should proceed with travel as booked. Airports Despite the dramatic protests that made headlines over the weekend, many airport officials say there were few, if any, reports of travel delays and, by Monday morning activity at arrival and departure terminals was proceeding without incident throughout the country. PROTESTORS JAM THE PHONE LINES AT TRUMP'S MAR-A-LAGO RESORT San Francisco International Airport spokesman Doug Yakel said that as of Monday, there were no reports of passengers missing flights, all security checkpoints were open and there are no delayed flights. At Philadelphia International Airport (PHL), congested lanes brought traffic to a halt on the airport ramps, reportedly causing a few people to miss flights on Sunday. By Monday, however, Mary Flannery, PHLs marketing and public affairs manager, told Fox News that there were no demonstrations being held and airport operations had resumed without incident. Atlantas Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport also advised travelers to take precaution and allow extra time. The airport set up two locationsthe domestic and international terminalsto accommodate the protest crowds and media outlets. Due to todays protest, there will be 2 locations to accommodate the demonstrators in #ATL Airport Domestic and International Terminals. pic.twitter.com/OGTOkf5yJw Atlanta Airport (@ATLairport) January 29, 2017 In the New York City-metro area, people flying out of or into Newark Liberty International Airport or John F. Kennedy were advised to contact their individual carrier over the weekend and noted that traffic was higher than usual. On Monday Port Authority's Cheryl Ann Albiez told Fox News that today, its pretty quiet at most airports. She noted that protesters over the weekend were very calm and aside from one arrest, all demonstrators listened to law enforcement officials when asked to make way for travelers. When asked if the Port Authority was advising fliers to allow extra time, Albiez said, We always say that. It is New York City, so you never know but so far its been fine today. Airlines On Saturday, airlines released official statements regarding Trumps order. Many are offering affected customers the chance to rebook travel, will waive change fees or permit refunds. Effective immediately and until further notice, due to an executive order, the U.S. Department of State has revoked immigrant and non-immigrant visas for travelers to the United States from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, United Airlines alerted fliers Saturday noting that anyone affected should contact the airline directly to make other arrangements. British Airways is offering affected customers a refund for their travel to the U.S. and will give passengers the option of rebooking flights. FOR THE LATEST TRAVEL FEATURES FOLLOW FOX LIFESTYLE ON FACEBOOK Emirates, which was forced to quickly change pilot and flight attendant rosters on U.S.-bound routes following Trumps order, issued the following statement, A very small number of our passengers traveling were affected by the new U.S. immigration entry requirements implemented by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection today. According to Reuters, a spokesman for Abu Dhabis Etihad Airways said the airline had taken steps to ensure there will be no issues for flights departing over the coming weeks, and does not expect major travel disruptions this week. Delta Air Lines said it was in the process of contacting customers affected by the travel restriction for rebooking and, where necessary, to issue refunds. However, the airline found itself dealing with a major IT outage that caused the cancelation of 170 flights Sunday. The problem forced agents to check in passengers manually and left some planes stranded on the tarmac for hours. On Monday, the Atlanta-based carrier reported that while its essential information systems had been restored late Sunday, operations were still getting back to normal and cancelled 110 flights. Los Angeles International Airport will be getting new fingerprint and iris scanners for passengers who want to speed through security lines. The Los Angeles Times reported Saturday that biometric screening company Clear will install kiosks by the end of March in Los Angeles and at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport and Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. FOR THE LATEST TRAVEL FEATURES FOLLOW FOX LIFESTYLE ON FACEBOOK The company's kiosks can confirm a traveler's identification in seconds. Passengers must pay an annual $179 fee to enroll and use the system. Clear Chief Administrative Officer David Cohen says travelers who use the kiosks can head more quickly to the Transportation Security Administration's screening. The company already operates in airports in San Francisco, Washington and New York. The skeletal remains of a missing Fort Campbell soldier were found in Tennessee, authorities said Wednesday. Susan Niland, a spokeswoman for the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, said in a statement that the remains found on Interstate 24 in Robertson County were identified as missing Pfc. Shadow McClaine. "I held onto hope that they were just holding her somewhere," - mother of soldier #ShadowMcClaine whose body was found after 145 days @FOX40 pic.twitter.com/9zKSnretAA Nicole Comstock (@ComstockNEWS) January 26, 2017 McClaine was a member of the 101st Airborne Division at the Army post on the Kentucky-Tennessee line. She was reported missing in September and her abandoned car was found in Nashville. Jamal Williams-McCray and Charles Robinson, two fellow Fort Campbell soldiers, were charged with murder, kidnapping and conspiracy in McClaines disappearance in November. McClaines mother told the Leaf-Chronicle in November that her daughter and Williams-McCray had been divorced for more than a year. Williams-McCray was arrested on Oct. 6 on out of county warrants and was being held in the Montgomery County Jail. McClaine failed to report back for duty as an air traffic control tower operator at Fort Campbell after Labor Day, the Army said. Her car was found several days later. McClaine joined the Army in 2011 and served stints in Afghanistan and South Korea, her mother said. She was preparing to leave the military on Oct. 11, and looking forward to returning to civilian life, with plans to return to California and go to school to build on her interest in photography. The Associated Press contributed to this report. next Image 1 of 3 prev next Image 2 of 3 prev Image 3 of 3 Dozens of U.S. colleges are opposing President Donald Trump's sweeping travel ban, which has left some students and professors stranded abroad. The Association of American Universities urged Trump on Sunday to reverse his executive order halting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, saying it will only steer top scholars to countries that compete with the United States. Presidents from other schools issued scathing attacks of the move. Many students and scholars from countries affected by the ban have been caught in legal limbo while traveling abroad. Iranian Yale University doctoral student Ali Abdi left the U.S. days before the order was signed to conduct research in Afghanistan. Now he doesn't know if he can return. Other schools with students or faculty who were stranded include MIT, Harvard and Clark Atlanta University. next Image 1 of 3 prev next Image 2 of 3 prev Image 3 of 3 Delta Air Lines, recovering from a weekend technology outage, cancelled more flights Monday but said that the issue has been resolved. By early Monday, 110 flights had been canceled and the airline said more may follow. Delta canceled about 170 flights Sunday night after the outage prevented some departures. President Donald Trump blamed Delta for weekend problems at many airports, where large protests were held to oppose his executive order that temporarily banned travel to the U.S. by refugees and citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries. Federal judges blocked part of the order. Trump tweeted early Monday morning that only 109 people were detained for questioning under the order, out of 325,000 coming to the U.S. "Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage," he tweeted. Delta officials did not immediately comment on the president's tweet. Just two weeks ago, Delta CEO Ed Bastian was celebrating the new Trump administration, saying that he was "very excited" about the possibility that the new administration might invest in upgrading airport facilities, reduce taxes and cut regulations. Bastian also expressed hope that Trump might give a new airing to complaints by Delta, American Airlines and United Airlines that Middle Eastern competitors receive unfair government subsidies. Bastian apologized Sunday evening on the company's website to customers affected by the "frustrating situation." Delta offered to let passengers booked on flights Monday to delay travel plans for a few days without incurring the usual fee $200 for domestic flights for changing a ticket. The airline also declined to carry unaccompanied minors until midday while it recovered from the outage. In August, Delta suffered a computer breakdown after a power outage in its operations center. The airline canceled more than 2,000 flights over three days and said the outage cost it $100 million. ___ Josh Boak reported from Washington. David Koenig can be reached at http://twitter.com/airlinewriter An ESPN anchor who vented about missing her flight because of airport immigration protesters is drawing criticism from people who say she is being insensitive. Sage Steele posted a photo of protesters speaking out against President Donald Trump's order to temporarily suspend immigration from seven Muslim majority nations at Los Angeles International Airport on Instagram on Sunday night. In the caption, she noted that she and other passengers had to drag luggage nearly 2 miles to get to the airport, but still missed their flights. She writes that she loves seeing people exercise their right to protest, but was saddened "to see the joy on their faces knowing that they were successful in disrupting so many people's travel plans." Steele defended her post to critics on Twitter. ESPN didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. Google has created a crisis fund that could raise up to $4 million for four immigrant rights organizations. Google has confirmed a USA Today report that it is funding an initial $2 million for the fund that can be matched with up to $2 million in donations from employees. The money will go toward the American Civil Liberties Union, the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, the International Rescue Committee and the U.N. Human Rights Commission. Company executives are also donating separately to the effort. Google says in a statement that it's concerned about the impact President Donald Trump's order to temporarily suspend immigration from seven Muslim majority nations will have on the company's employees and their families. Two men were acquitted Monday on perjury charges that were filed after they recanted their stories in a 1993 murder case resulting in the release of the convicted suspect. State District Judge Ben Willard in New Orleans, who heard arguments and testimony Friday, tersely pronounced Kevin Johnson and Hakim Shabazz not guilty in a morning proceeding that lasted a matter of seconds. He said the state had not met its burden of proof in the perjury case. Prosecutors had insisted the two should be punished for lying whether it was when they were teenagers two decades ago, or as adults two decades later. "This is a case that never should have been accepted in the first place," Johnson's attorney, Robert Hjortsberg, said outside the courthouse. "The timing of the acceptance of these charges was suspect in the sense that it looked vindictive. And I don't think anybody can deny that." The District Attorney's Office did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment. Recantations by Johnson and Shabazz helped the organization known as The Innocence Project New Orleans win freedom for Jerome Morgan, who was convicted in 1994 and spent 20 years behind bars. The victim in the case, 16-year-old Clarence Landry, died when a gunman opened fire at a party in 1993. Morgan was 17-years-old when he was arrested. Defense stressed that the two men were teenagers when the shooting happened. They said the men were courageous to risk prosecution by recanting their stories. A perjury conviction could have resulted in anywhere from five to 40 years in prison. Prosecutors say their false statements had consequences whether they sent an innocent man to prison or enabled a killer to go free. Shabazz, Johnson and Morgan all were at a Sweet 16 party where a gunman opened fire in 1993. Shabazz and another person were wounded. Landry was killed. Morgan was convicted at trial the next year. He was freed in 2014 and charges were officially dropped in 2016. Willard heard testimony and arguments Friday in the perjury case, the result of a 2015 indictment. The Latest on Senate consideration of President Donald Trump's Cabinet nominees (all times local): 6:02 p.m. President Donald Trump's nomination of Rex Tillerson for secretary of state has cleared a hurdle in the Senate. The 56-43 vote on Monday puts Tillerson's bid to be the nation's chief diplomat on track for confirmation later this week. The vote also sets the stage for a lengthy debate over the president's order banning travel from specific Muslim-majority countries. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York pressed unsuccessfully for a delay in the vote until Tillerson answered for Trump's travel ban order. The order bars individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. for 90 days. Trump has said the move is aimed at protecting the nation against extremists. ___ 1:05 p.m. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York says he will vote against eight of President Donald Trump's Cabinet nominees. Schumer said he'll oppose education secretary nominee Betsy DeVos (dih-VAHS'), secretary of state nominee Rex Tillerson, attorney general nominee Jeff Sessions, health and human services nominee Tom Price, treasury secretary nominee Steve Mnuchin (mih-NOO'-chin), labor secretary nominee Andy Puzder, Environmental Protection Agency nominee Scott Pruitt and budget director nominee Mick Mulvaney. Schumer called the picks "billionaires and bankers" and asked whether the country wants to be "one that helps the middle class and those struggling to get there or one that further rigs the system in favor of the special interests?" The Senate will hold a test vote on Tillerson's nomination Monday, and committees will vote on several other nominations this week. ___ 11:20 a.m. A procedural vote in the Senate on Donald Trump's secretary of state nominee sets up an extended debate over the president's executive order barring refugees for at least four months and the direction of U.S. policy toward Russia. Rex Tillerson needs the backing of 51 senators Monday evening to put his nomination on track for confirmation later this week in the Republican-led chamber. Although many Democrats oppose Tillerson, they'll need at least several Republicans to join them to derail the nomination. That appears unlikely even after two of the Senate's leading GOP voices on national security criticized Trump for failing to consult with key federal agencies before issuing the travel ban. Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina have tepidly endorsed Tillerson, Exxon Mobil's former CEO. next Image 1 of 3 prev next Image 2 of 3 prev Image 3 of 3 The Latest on President Donald Trump (all times local): 7:35 a.m. President Donald Trump says that "big problems" were created at airports by a Delta Airlines computer outage, "protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer." The president tweeted early Monday that only 109 out of 325,000 people "were detained and held for questioning" following his executive order to bar individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries. A Delta systems outage Sunday night led to departure delays and cancellations of at least 150 Delta flights. Protesters packed many of the country's major airports over the weekend protesting the executive order. Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer tweeted Friday that "Tears are running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty" over the ban. Trump also tweeted on Monday, "there is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country." A man serving two life sentences in a deadly Indianapolis house explosion faces trial on a murder-for-hire charge. Prosecutors say 47-year-old Mark Leonard tried to hire a hit man to kill a key witness in the house explosion case while he was in jail. The Indianapolis Star reports (http://indy.st/2kh67BT ) that Leonard's trial on a conspiracy to commit murder charge begins Monday. Prosecutors say Leonard spearheaded the plot to destroy his then-girlfriend's house with a natural gas explosion to claim insurance money. The November 2012 explosion killed a couple who lived next door and damaged dozens of homes. Leonard was convicted in 2015 of murder, arson and other charges. He received two life sentences without parole, plus 75 years. Four other people, including Leonard's half brother, were also convicted. ___ Information from: The Indianapolis Star, http://www.indystar.com The Manhattan District Attorneys office is looking into the mysterious death 51 years ago of newspaper writer and Whats My Line? star Dorothy Kilgallen, who was investigating the JFK assassination, The Post has learned. The stunning development comes after a new book, The Reporter who Knew Too Much, suggests Kilgallen was murdered to shut down her relentless pursuit of a Mafia don linked to JFK and Lee Harvey Oswald. Joan Vollero, a spokeswoman for DA Cyrus Vance Jr., confirmed that a staffer has read the book, and reviewed a letter from author Mark Shaw citing new leads, medical evidence, and witnesses overlooked when Kilgallen, 52, died suddenly on Nov. 8, 1965 at the peak of her career. Im hopeful DA investigators will probe any records available and interview witnesses still alive today who can shed light on what happened to this remarkable woman, Shaw told The Post, which featured his findings last month. Victims have rights whether their name is Dorothy Kilgallen or Dorothy Doe, and Kilgallen was denied justice in 1965. Thats why Im fighting for her. Shaw said he has received dozens of e-mails from readers demanding an official investigation. One called her a patriot who should be revered for risking her life to solve the JFK assassination. Click for more from The New York Post. The NYPD said in a statement late Sunday that it was increasing patrols at mosques and other houses of worships after six people were gunned down at an Islamic center in Canada. "NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something," New York City Mayor Bill Blasio said in a tweet. The NYPD added that Critical Response Command personnel have been assigned to extended tour coverage at certain mosque locations. Two gunmen were arrested in the shooting at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre. Quebec provincial police spokeswoman said Monday that some of the wounded were gravely injured. Police said at least eight were wounded in the shooting. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau characterized the shooting as a terrorist attack. We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge," Trudeau said in a statement. "It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country," he said. "Canadian law enforcement agencies will protect the rights of all Canadians, and will make every effort to apprehend the perpetrators of this act and all acts of intolerance." Authorities were still investigating the shooting. The Associated Press contributed to this report. An off-duty Los Angeles Police Department officer shot and wounded two people who reportedly tried burglarizing his home early Monday. The two suspects and the officer were rushed to the hospital, Fox 11 reported. The shooting unfolded around 1 a.m. in Downey, southeast of LA. TEEN ZAPS COP WITH STUN GUN TO FULFILL BUCKET-LIST WISH The officer confronted the burglary suspects who then "assaulted" him -- so he fired his weapon, LAPD Capt. Andy Neiman told KABC. Neither the officer nor the suspects were immediately named. The officer was hurt, but wasn't shot, Neiman said. Downey Police detectives were performing a criminal investigation, while LAPD officials conducted an administrative probe. Downey is a city of about 110,000 people 15 miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles. Click for more from Fox 11. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Greenville police said a 35-year Pickens County elementary school was arrested after biting an 11-year-old boy at a Greenville trampoline park on Saturday. Police said the assault happened at Sky Zone on Laurens Road around 1:30 p.m. Saturday. Per the investigative reports, the victim was at Sky Zone for a birthday party and was playing with one of friends by keeping his hat away from him. Melanie Johnson is accused of then grabbing the victim and biting him. The victim said the woman shouted let go of his hat while attacking him. Police said the victim and his mother reported the assault at the Greenville County Law Enforcement Center on Sunday. The victim did have a visible mark on his wrist. Police reviewed surveillance footage and said Johnson could be seen grabbing and biting the child as described. Warrants were signed charging Johnson with assault and battery. Police said she turned herself in on Sunday. Click for more from FOXCarolina.com. Two weeks after child welfare workers removed four children from a woman's suburban Pittsburgh home in June for alleged neglect, they discovered an even bigger problem: The woman has two other children who are missing, and haven't been seen alive for more than a decade. Since the summer, police investigators have cast a wide net for twins Ivon and Inisha, who would be about 18 now. A county detective has testified he believes the children are dead but can't prove it. A cadaver-sniffing dog came up empty during a search of another Pittsburgh area house in December. Patricia Fowler was arrested in August on charges of concealing the whereabouts of her twins after police investigated following the removal of four of her other children. Fowler has claimed the children are safe and living out of state, but no information she's provided to police has panned out, authorities said. She's been free on bail. As police try to solve the mystery, they have filed additional charges against Fowler, 47, accusing her of illegally collecting more than $50,000 in state food stamps, public assistance and medical benefits for the twins. As of Friday, she had not yet surrendered on the new counts, which include theft. A criminal complaint filed Wednesday said she had been collecting benefits for the twins since June 2011, and continued doing so through the end of August weeks after police charged her with concealing the twins' whereabouts. Her public defender would not comment, citing an office policy to not commenting on pending investigations. Fowler has changed her story several times regarding the whereabouts of Ivon and Inisha. She's told police the two children are living with friends or relatives in North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, only to have the names and addresses she's provided not check out, or have relatives tell police they've never heard of the twins. Police said one out-of-state address provided by Fowler turned out to be a vacant storefront, and one Georgia city she named didn't exist. At one point, Fowler even told police she sold the children years ago for $2,000 each to a woman she didn't know in a deal brokered by a man she met in a bar. She reversed course and told police that was a lie. Police have unsuccessfully checked with the National Center of Missing and Exploited Children, which in September released age-progressed images showing what the twins may look like now. Other databases in various states provide no evidence that the twins ever attended school. "In my professional opinion, I believe they've met their demise," lead Allegheny County detective Michael Kuma testified at Fowler's preliminary hearing on the concealment charges in October. The detective said this week he can't comment on the ongoing investigation. Fowler's son, Datwon, 19, remains jailed on charges he conspired with his mother to hide his twin siblings from authorities. Datwon texted police at his mother's behest back in August, pretending to be Ivon and saying that he and Inisha were safe and sound and living out of state, police said. But GPS tracked the phone to the home Datwon shares with his mother, and he confessed to the ruse. Datwon's attorney, Richard McCague, said he believes the new charges are an effort to put Fowler behind bars like her son. "They don't have a complaint about child abuse and they don't have a body indicating someone has died. They believe these children are dead but they can't prove it," McCague said. "Under those circumstances, what else can they charge mom with?" From time to time, the United States identifies certain individuals as crucial to the operation of terrorist organizations. Often these individuals are top leaders, or they help finance terrorist organizations. These are frequently people who have committed, or are deemed to pose a significant risk of committing, acts of terrorism. When such individuals are identified, the U.S. government places that person's name on the Specially Designated Nationals List, their assets within U.S. reach are immediately blocked, and they are effectively locked out of the global financial system. As a result, no U.S. citizen or company may conduct business with designated individuals. In this way, the United States deters participation in terrorism and disrupts financial support networks for terrorists and terrorist organizations. Such are the cases of Ali Damush and Mustafa Mughniyeh. Both men, top leaders of the Lebanon-based Hizballah terrorist organization, have recently been named by the United States Department of State as Specially Designated Global Terrorists under Executive Order 13224. Ali Damush is head of Hizballahs Foreign Relations Department, an organization that engages in covert terrorist operations around the world on behalf of Hizballah and includes recruiting operatives and gathering intelligence. Mustafa Mughniyeh is a Hizballah commander who once led Hizballahs operations in the Golan Heights and helped organize the groups terrorist infrastructure. He is the nephew of former Hizballah military commander Mustafa Badreddine and the son of Imad Mughniyeh, the former chief of Hizballah military and terrorist operations. The imposition of sanctions by the United States against terrorists like Damush and Mughniyeh notifies the American public and the international community that Ali Damush and Mustafa Mughniyeh are actively engaged in terrorism. Such designations of terrorist individuals and groups expose and isolate organizations and individuals, and assist or complement the law enforcement actions of U.S. agencies as well as those of other governments. The Senate is pressing ahead on President Donald Trump's nominee for secretary of State, with a procedural vote likely to trigger an extended debate over the president's executive order banning travel from specific Muslim-majority countries and U.S. policy toward Russia. Rex Tillerson, Trump's pick to be the nation's chief diplomat, needs the backing of just 51 senators on Monday evening to put his nomination on track for confirmation later this week in the Republican-led chamber. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., wants a delay in the vote until Tillerson answers for Trump's travel ban order, a postponement that's unlikely with Republicans in the majority. Trump's order bars individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries for 90 days. Trump has repeatedly said that the move is aimed at protecting the nation against extremists looking to attack Americans and American interests. But recent domestic acts of deadly extremist violence have been carried out either by U.S. citizens or by individuals whose families weren't from the nations singled out. Although many Democrats including Schumer will oppose Tillerson, they'll need at least several Republicans to join them to derail the nomination. That appeared unlikely, even after two of the Senate's leading GOP voices on national security voiced concern over Trump's desire for a better relationship with Moscow. Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina also criticized Trump's travel ban order and for failing to consult with key federal agencies, including the departments of Justice and Homeland Security. "We fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism," McCain and Graham said. That elicited an angry tweet from Trump, who called the two GOP senators "weak on immigration" and accused the two of "looking to start World War III." Whether Trump intends to lift U.S. sanctions against Russia will likely be a central theme in the Senate debate over Tillerson's nomination. The president last week was noncommittal, telling reporters at a news conference, "We'll see what happens. As far as the sanctions, very early to be talking about that." But Democrats have doubted Tillerson's willingness to be tough with Russia. Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, said his responses to questions about sanctions against Moscow sounded more like answers a corporate executive would give instead of a prospective secretary of state. McCain, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, and Sen. Rob Portman, a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, last week warned the White House about easing any punishments on Moscow and vowed to turn the sanctions into law. U.S. intelligence officials have concluded that Moscow meddled in the 2016 election to help Trump become president. Obama in late December ordered sanctions on Russian spy agencies, closed two Russian compounds and expelled 35 diplomats the U.S. said were really spies. The new penalties add to existing U.S. sanctions over Russia's actions in Ukraine, which have damaged Russia's economy but had only limited impact on Putin's behavior. In 2014, Russia annexed Crimea in Ukraine, drawing widespread condemnation in Europe and the United States and a raft of penalties. Relations are also tense over Putin's backing of Syrian President Bashar Assad and allegations of Russian meddling in the U.S. elections. Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said last week he would support Tillerson. Manchin, who faces re-election in 2018 in a state that backed Trump heavily in the presidential election, said the former Exxon Mobil CEO's business career "will bring a unique perspective to the State Department." ___ Follow Richard Lardner on Twitter: http://twitter.com/rplardner On a March morning nearly five years ago, a 15-year-old California high school cheerleader vanished as she walked from her home in Santa Clara County to her school bus stop. Sierra LaMar's body has never been found, but authorities charged a 21-year-old man with her murder and kidnapping, allegations that could sentence him to death if he's convicted in a trial set to begin this week. LaMar's disappearance sparked a massive search by air and land for the girl who came to be known as "Everyones Daughter" on T-shirts and posters. A sophomore at Sobrato High School, LaMar was last seen around 6 a.m. March 16, 2012, when she left her Morgan Hill home for the bus stop. A day later, authorities found the teen's cellphone and her handbag -- with her clothes neatly folded inside -- along the side of the road near her home. The condition of the phone indicated it had likely been tossed from a vehicle. Antolin Garcia-Torres, a high school dropout, was arrested in May 2012 and charged with murder and attempting to kidnap three other women in 2009. Prosecutors said they had strong physical evidence linking him to LaMar -- including traces of her DNA found in the trunk of his car. "We believe we have probable cause that he committed the kidnapping and murder of Sierra LaMar," County Sheriff Laurie Smith announced following the arrest of Garcia-Torres, who has pleaded not guilty. District Attorney Jeff Rosen is seeking the death penalty -- despite no body being recovered -- and prosecutors must argue their case without an autopsy or murder weapon. Defense attorneys, meanwhile, are expected to argue that LaMar may still be alive, Fox affiliate KTVU-TV reported. If prosecutors fail to get a conviction, Garcia-Torres cannot be tried again even if new evidence is recovered in the case, according to the San Jose Mercury News. The murder trial is set to begin Monday with the selection of alternate jurors and opening statements. The son of a Southern California fire chief was found at the bottom of a lake Sunday after he was reported missing when he failed to return to a cabin, police said. Dawson Hartwig, the son of San Bernardino County Fire Chief Mark Hartwig, was found by a sheriffs dive team at around 1:10 a.m. in Lake Arrowhead. According to KTLA-TV, Hartwig, 20, left a rented cabin Friday night and told friends he was going out for a walk. When he didnt return by the next morning, friends alerted the Twin Peaks Sheriff Station. More than 70 San Bernardino Sheriffs deputies and volunteers scoured the area over the weekend. He was found in 30 feet of water near the Yacht Club. "The Sheriff's Dive Team sends our deepest condolences to the Hartwig family," Lt. Bryan Lane said Sunday. "Fire and Sheriff are one big family and we all feel your loss." Officials said Hartwig left his phone behind. Officials havent released any other details. Click for more from KTLA-TV. The Navy SEAL killed in a raid targeting senior Al Qaeda leaders in Yemen was identified Monday as Chief Petty Officer William "Ryan" Owens. "Ryan gave his full measure for our nation, and in performing his duty, he upheld the noblest standard of military service. The United States would not long exist were it not for the selfless commitment of such warriors," Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said in a statement. At least three other U.S. service members were injured in the raid. In addition, three service members were hurt in a crash-landing of an MV-22 Osprey sent in to evacuate the wounded, the Pentagon revealed on Monday. IRAN TESTS BALLISTIC MISSILE IN DEFIANCE OF UNITED NATIONS RESOLUTION, OFFICIALS SAY "A lot of female combatants" were part of the resistance the SEALs encountered on the target, Pentagon spokesman Capt. Jeff David told reporters. "Some of the enemy killed in action were female." Davis said the women took what he called pre-arranged fighting positions when they came under attack by the Navy SEAL assault force. HIT SQUAD REPORTEDLY KILLS ISIS MADMAN WHO BEHEADED HUNDREDS The Pentagon was "still assessing" reports of civilian casualties in the Yemen operation, Davis said. He would not confirm whether any children were killed as well. The raid on Al Qaeda headquarters was the first counterterrorism offensive under President Trump aimed at gathering intelligence about the militant group, a U.S. official told Fox News. It was also first combat death under the new administration. A total of 14 fighters from Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula were killed in the assault, and U.S. service members captured "information that will likely provide insight into the planning of future terror plots," according to the military. A U.S. official told Fox News planing for the operation began before Trump assumed office, but had not been given the green light. Fox News' Lucas Tomlinson contributed to this report. A man has been charged with stabbing his mother to death during a confrontation inside her western Pennsylvania home. Police say 27-year-old Dean Craven stabbed his 57-year-old mother, Lauri, multiple times Sunday morning. Authorities declared her dead at her Neshannock Township home, about 45 miles north of Pittsburgh. Craven stayed at the home until police arrived. He was arrested without incident. Police haven't released a suspected motive or details, other than that it happened during an altercation. Dean Craven faces charges including homicide and aggravated assault. He remains jailed without bond and court documents do not list an attorney. next Image 1 of 3 prev next Image 2 of 3 prev Image 3 of 3 The first joint training exercises in Poland for U.S. troops and their Polish counterparts are underway. A U.S. armored brigade of 3,500 troops from Fort Carson, Colorado deployed this year to Zagan, southwestern Poland, as a deterrence force on NATO's eastern flank. Exercises that started Monday at the Zagan Military Training Area involved land troops from the U.S. and Polish armies, tanks and armored vehicles. Poland's President Andrzej Duda and the U.S. ambassador to Poland, Paul Jones, observed the training. They stressed that the U.S. troops' presence was strengthening the region's security and also bilateral ties. Duda said: "God bless Poland, God bless America, God bless American soldiers." The force comes as reassurance to nations in the region that are nervous about Russia's growing military activity. A pregnant Sudanese woman who married a Christian man was sentenced to death Thursday after she refused to recant her Christian faith, her lawyer said. Meriam Ibrahim, whose father was Muslim but mother was an Orthodox Christian from Ethiopia, was convicted of "apostasy" on Sunday and given four days to repent and escape death, lawyer Al-Shareef Ali al-Shareef Mohammed said. The 26 year old, who is eight months pregnant, was sentenced after that grace period expired, Mohammed said. Amnesty International immediately condemned the sentence, calling it "abhorrent." Mohammed called the conviction rushed and legally flawed since the judge refused to hear key defense witnesses and ignored constitutional provisions on freedom of worship and equality among citizens. Ibrahim and Wani married in a formal church ceremony in 2011 and have a son, 18-month-old Martin, who is with her in jail. The couple runs a farm south of Khartoum. Sudan's penal code criminalizes the conversion of Muslims into other religions, which is punishable by death. As in many Muslim nations, Muslim women in Sudan are prohibited from marrying non-Muslims, though Muslim men can marry outside their faith. By law, children must follow their father's religion. Sudan introduced Islamic Shariah laws in the early 1980s under the rule of autocrat Jaafar Nimeiri, a move that contributed to the resumption of an insurgency in the mostly animist and Christian south of Sudan. An earlier round of civil war lasted 17 years and ended in 1972. The south seceded in 2011 to become the world's newest nation, South Sudan. Sudanese President Omar Bashir, an Islamist who seized power in a 1989 military coup, says his country will implement Islam more strictly now that the non-Muslim south is gone. A number of Sudanese have been convicted of apostasy in recent years, but they all escaped execution by recanting their new faith. Religious thinker and politician Mahmoud Mohammed Taha, a critic of Nimeiri and his interpretation of Shariah, was sentenced to death after his conviction of apostasy. He was executed in 1985 at the age of 76. Mohammed said he intends to appeal Ibrahim's conviction. "The judge has exceeded his mandate when he ruled that Meriam's marriage was void because her husband was out of her faith," Mohammed told The Associated Press. "He was thinking more of Islamic Shariah laws than of the country's laws and its constitution." He said Ibrahim's Muslim father left her mother when she was a child and her mother raised her as a Christian. The court in the capital, Khartoum, also ordered that Ibrahim be given 100 lashes for having what it considers sexual relations with her husband, Daniel Wani, a Christian from southern Sudan who has U.S. citizenship, according to the lawyer and judicial officials who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations. Wani was acquitted of a charge of harboring an apostate, according to another defense lawyer, Eman Abdul-Rahim. Wani fled to the United States as a child to escape the civil war in southern Sudan but later returned, she said. Amnesty called the sentence a "flagrant breach of international human rights law." "The fact that a woman could be sentenced to death for her religious choice, and to flogging for being married to a man of an allegedly different religion, is abhorrent and should never be even considered," Amnesty said in a statement, quoting its Sudan researcher, Manar Idriss. Ibrahim's case first came to the attention of authorities in August, when members of her father's family complained that she was born a Muslim but married a Christian man. They claimed that her birth name was "Afdal" and that she changed it to Meriam. Mohammed said the document produced by relatives to show she was given a Muslim name at birth was a fake. Ibrahim refused to answer Judge Abbas Khalifa when he called her "Afdal" during Thursday's hearing. Meriam is a common name for Muslims and Christians alike. "I was never a Muslim. I was raised a Christian from the start," she said. Authorities first charged her with having illegitimate sex last year but she remained free pending trial. She was charged with apostasy and jailed in February after she declared in court that Christianity was the only religion she knew. An American missionary who was murdered in his home week was well liked, according to members of a church in Haiti, who called on police to find his killer. George Knoop, 77, was stabbed multiple times Tuesday in the Delmas section of Haiti's capital. Friends and police said Knoop, who is from Chicago, was alone at the time and apparently knew his assailant. Detectives have taken two statements, but no arrests have been made in the case. The motive for Knoop's murder is still not known, said John Munsell, chairman of the board for the Quisqueya Chapel in Haiti where Knoop worked. "In terms of us here at the chapel, we are not aware of any conflicts he had with people," Munsell said. "He was well liked." After he was stabbed, Knoop called a security guard who worked at the church and cried for help. Munsell said Knoop may have called the guard because it was the first number he could reach in his cellphone. Church members then went to Knoop's home, a two-minute drive away, and he was found on the floor. Police later recovered the knife. A computer was apparently stolen during the attack but it does not appear robbery was the motive. Knoop was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead at 5:09 p.m. "We're definitely wanting this person to be found and brought to justice," said Munsell. The Quisqueya Chapel is a non-denominational and evangelical church. Knoop also mentored young men and led Bible study groups. "He worked with guys, take them under his wing and follow up with them. `How's it going?' That kind of stuff," Munsell said. Knoop came to Haiti for the first time in 2010 in the aftermath of the earthquake. He became an elder with the Quisqueya Chapel and a worked as a volunteer for U.S.-based Missionary Flights International. He was divorced and didn't have any children, Munsell said. The church has planned a memorial service on Wednesday afternoon. The Associated Press contributed to this report. A French Ministry of Defense official tells Fox News that the Air Algerie jet carrying 116 people that vanished from radar shortly after takeoff late Wednesday night has crashed in Mali, and that two French fighter jets have located the wreckage. Air navigation services lost track of the Swiftair MD-83 roughly 50 minutes after takeoff from Ougadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso, at 9:55 p.m. ET Wednesday, the official Algerian news agency said. France's foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, told The Associated Press that the flight "probably crashed." The French Ministry of Defense official told Fox News that the plane went down near the Malian city of Gao, a city essentially under the control of the Malian government, though it has seen lingering separatist violence. The list of passengers includes 51 French, 27 Burkina Faso nationals, eight Lebanese, six Algerians, five Canadians, four Germans, two Luxemburg nationals, one Swiss, one Belgium, one Egyptian, one Ukrainian, one Nigerian, one Cameroonian and one Malian, Burkina Faso Transport Minister Jean Bertin Ouedraogo said. The six crew members are Spanish, according to the Spanish pilots' union. More On This... Swiftair, a private Spanish airline, said the plane departed Burkina Faso for Algiers at 9:17 p.m. ET Wednesday, but had not arrived at the scheduled time of 1:10 a.m. ET Thursday. Swiftair said it was unable to make contact with the plane. "In keeping with procedures, Air Algerie has launched its emergency plan," the APS news agency quoted the airline as saying. Burkina Faso authorities also set up a crisis unit in Ouagadougou airport to update families of people on board the plane, Reuters reports. The flight path of the plane from Ouagadougou, the capital of the west African nation of Burkina Faso, to Algiers wasn't immediately clear. Ougadougou is in a nearly straight line south of Algiers, passing over Mali where unrest continues in the north. The plane sent its last message around 9:30 p.m. ET, asking Niger air control to change its route because of heavy rains in the area, Ouedraogo said. A source also told Sky News that the plane asked to divert its path to avoid another aircraft. Algerian Prime Minister Abdelmalek Sellal said on Algerian state television that 10 minutes before disappearing, the pilots were in contact with air traffic controllers in Gao. Last week, an armed Islamist group formed by Al Qaeda commander Mokhtar Belmokhtar reportedly claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing that killed a French soldier in northern Mali. In a video posted on the Internet, a spokesman for the group Al-Mourabitoun, identifying himself as Abu Assem Al-Muhajir, said the attack north of Gao, was "a response to French claims that they had annihilated the Mujahideen (Islamic fighters)". Al-Mourabitoun was formed last year from the fusion of two Islamist groups operating in northern Mali: the Mulathameen brigade, led by the one-eyed Belmokhtar who is thought to have masterminded an attack on an Algerian gas plant last year in which nearly 40 hostages were killed, and the Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa (MUJWA), Reuters reports. A senior French official told The Associated Press that it seems unlikely that these fighters had the kind of weaponry that could shoot down a plane. The official, not authorized to speak publicly, said on condition of anonymity that they primarily have shoulder-fired weapons -- not enough to hit a passenger plane flying at cruising altitude. Swiftair took ownership of the plane on Oct. 24, 2012, after it spent nearly 10 months unused in storage, according to Flightglobal's Ascend Online Fleets, which sells and tracks information about aircraft. It has more than 37,800 hours of flight time and has made more than 32,100 takeoffs and landings. The plane has had several owners over the years, including Avianca and Austral Lineas Aereas. The MD-83 is part of a series of jets built since the early 1980s by McDonnell Douglas, a U.S. plane maker now owned by Boeing Co. The MD-80s are single-aisle planes that were a workhorse of the airline industry for short and medium-range flights for nearly two decades. As jet fuel prices spiked in recent years, airlines have rapidly being replacing the jets with newer, fuel-efficient models such as Boeing 737s and Airbus A320s. There are 496 other MD-80s being flown by airlines around the world, according to Ascend "We're aware of reports on Air Algerie Flight AH5017," Boeing spokesman Wilson Chow said. "Our team is gathering more information." The Associated Press contributed to this report. The United States governments continuing support for Syrian rebels to counter the threat of Islamic State terrorists in the region is just the latest attempt by the Central Intelligence Agency to arm and train insurgencies across the globe a practice that has generally failed to provide positive results for all involved, astill-classified internal CIA review uncovered by the New York Times revealed. The CIAs counterinsurgency efforts throughout Latin America particularly in Fidel Castros Cuba and Sandinista Nicaragua are prime examples of the issues entailed in the U.S. policy to arm rebels hostile to anti-American governments, the report indicates. Each country and each situation has its own story but there is always a lot of strife when it comes to arming rebel groups, Larry Birns, the director of the Washington D.C.-based Council on Hemispheric Affairs told Fox News Latino. While the C.I.A. review, presented to President Barack Obama in the White House Situation Room earlier this year, did highlight some of the agencys victories in the counterinsurgency field its 1947 arming of Greek soldiers to put down a communist insurgency and the successful work to arm the mujahedeen rebels during the Soviets war in Afghanistan in the 1980s it mainly focused on the failures of the tactics of arming rebel groups. Along with pointing that some mujahedeen fighters eventually formed the base of al-Qaeda, the review noted the arming of Nicaraguas Contra fighter to overthrow the left-wing Sandinista government and counter the USSR's influence in the 1980s was a major blunder. This was common place, Birns said of the U.S.s proxy wars against the Soviet Union. And it was always cast in the light of the Cold War. The administration of President Ronald Reagan authorized the CIA in the early 1980s to arm Contras rebels to fight the Sandinista government of Daniel Ortega. While the conflict left about 30,000 people dead it failed to result in a regime change until Ortega was voted out of office in 1990 in favor of pro-American candidate Violeta Chamorro. Ortega was re-elected in 2007 and remains in office today. The unfavorable byproduct of arming the rebels in Nicaragua turned out to be the Iran-Contra affair, in which it was revealed that the government had secretly sold weapons to Iran and funneled the proceeds to the Contras in defiance of a congressional law leading to harsh criticism against the Reagan administration and the conviction of several administration members. Before Nicaragua, the United States was heavily involved in covert action in Cuba, including most-famously the failed By of Pigs invasion. The 1961 invasion of Cuba by a counter-revolutionary military, trained and funded by the CIA, was meant to overthrow the government of Fidel Castro. Launched from the shores of Guatemala site of one of the CIAs first successful counterinsurgency operations the Bay of Pigs invasion was a disaster as Castros troops almost immediately surrounded the rebels and after three days killed or captured the U.S.-trained troops. The Bay of Pigs turned into one of the biggest embarrassments for the administration of President John F. Kennedy and heightened Cubas shift toward an alliance with the Soviet Union leading directly to the Cuban Missile Crisis a little over a year later. Im concerned that reliance on the Free Syrian Army may become a modern-day Bay of Pigs and that our guns, armored vehicles and missiles may once again fall into the hands of extremist groups who turn them against us and our allies, Rep. Jared Huffman of California wrote in an editorial for the Press Democrat newspaper. The fight against the Islamic State and against Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad have only raised more concerns within Washington that by arming the Syrian opposition forces that U.S. could soon face a situation like that in Nicaragua or worse Afghanistan, where weapons end up in the hands of groups hostile to the U.S. It is already known that an increasing number of Syrian fighters opposed to Assad are siding with the Islamic State or the al-Qaeda-aligned Nusra Front. Government officials believe it will be months of spade work before the military had determined how to structure the program and how to recruit and vet the rebels, Rear Adm. John Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, told the New York Times last week. In response to North Koreas atrocious human rights record, the United States has placed additional sanctions on North Korean officials and entities. As a result of these actions, any property or interest in property of those designated by Office of Foreign Asset Control, or OFAC, within U.S. jurisdiction is frozen. In particular, OFAC designated Kim Won Hong, the Minister of State Security. The Ministry of State Security, or MMS, engages in beatings, forced starvation, sexual assault, forced abortions, and infanticide in the countrys network of political prison camps. Kim Won Hong plays a role directing these abuses. Kim Il-Nam is the Chief of the South Hamgyong Province branch of the MSS and is involved in the management of the Yodok political prison camp located within this province. Kim Yo Jong is the Vice Director of the Workers Party of Korea Propaganda and Agitation Department. It is North Koreas primary agency responsible for both newspaper and broadcast censorship. Choe Hwi is also a Vice Director of the PAD, and he has reportedly been responsible for maintaining ideological purity and managing the general censorship functions of the PAD. Min Byong Chol reportedly known as the angel of death for his record of political inspections and purges is a member of the Workers Party of Koreas Organization and Guidance Department. Jo Yong-Won is the Vice Director of the Organization and Guidance Department and a member of the Workers Party of Korea Central Committee which helps implement North Koreas censorship policies. Kang Pil-Hun is the Director of the General Political Bureau of the Ministry of Peoples Security. This ministry operates a network of police stations, interrogation and detention centers, and labor camps throughout North Korea and uses interrogations to degrade, intimidate, and torture their citizens. OFAC also identified the State Planning Commission and Ministry of Labor as agencies, instrumentalities, or controlled entities of the government of North Korea. The Ministry of Labor assigns laborers to specific sectors, including the mining sector, in accordance with the State Planning Commissions labor allocation plans. The entities work together to implement an economic system that relies on forced labor. These latest sanctions expose individuals associated with serious human rights abuses and censorship and underscore the U.S. governments commitment to promoting accountability for such abuses in North Korea. next Image 1 of 3 prev next Image 2 of 3 prev Image 3 of 3 With the Mediterranean Sea becoming too treacherous and other routes blocked by barbed-wire fences, would-be migrants are taking a new route into the Europe Union: through Hungary. Coming from as far away as Afghanistan and Syria and as near as Kosovo and Albania, thousands of migrants a week are crossing into Hungary and requesting asylum, turning the country into an EU transit hot spot. The surging number of immigrants has encouraged far-right and anti-Islam movements across Western Europe. It is also causing strains in remote places like Asotthalom, a Hungarian village near the border with Serbia, where a trickle of migrants three years ago has turned into a flood. The situation this year "has become practically unbearable," said village mayor Laszlo Toroczkai. This summer he formed a team of rangers who spend most of their time picking up migrants, who are taken to a police station in the city of Szeged where most apply for asylum in Hungary. Then just as migrants entering the EU from Italy do they continue on to Germany, Sweden or elsewhere in Western Europe where they hope to make new lives or join relatives who have already made it. "A lot of people come and they want to be caught," said Kitty McKinsey, spokeswoman for the UNHCR Regional Representation in Central Europe. "They file for asylum and they go to what are called open reception centers and then a lot of them do frankly disappear into Western Europe." Lt. Col. Gabor Eberhardt, chief of the border police in Szeged, said this year proceedings were launched against more than 26,000 people of 61 nationalities for illegal border crossings in his territory. That compares to 34 in 2004, the year Hungary joined the EU. Hungary has seen 35,000 asylum requests so far this year compared to 18,900 in 2013 and the flow of migrants has soared in the last few months. There were 683 asylum requests in March but 9,125 in November and a projected 12,500 in December. About half of these asylum requests were migrants from Kosovo, south of Hungary's border with Serbia. "I have left since I want to find my feet in life," said Albana Shabani, 22, who fled Kosovo with her husband. Both unemployed, they felt they had no prospects of finding jobs in Kosovo, one of the poorest countries in Europe. They traveled by bus to Subotica in northern Serbia. Then, guided by the GPS of their mobile phone, they made a three-hour trek into Hungary and were caught by the rangers in Asotthalom. Like many other Kosovars, they are headed to Germany, one of Europe's strongest economies. Some Kosovo migrants were even born there or lived there already as war refugees but were deported after 2010 when Kosovo was considered safe enough for their return. The second-largest asylum group to Hungary this year was 7,400 people from Afghanistan, followed by 6,600 from war-torn Syria. On a visit this week to the border, Associated Press reporters saw many groups of migrants. One man who identified himself only as a Palestinian from Syria said in broken English that he had left Damascus in August and walked most of the way. An Afghan boy who looked no older than 12 was getting his foot bandaged at the Szeged police station. According to refugee officials, migrants heading to Hungary often use smuggling rings to travel across Turkey and up through the Balkans. Once they make it into Hungary, which belongs to the EU's free travel area known as Schengen, they face borderless travel across most of the 28-member bloc. Frontex, the EU's border agency, says the Western Balkan route into Hungary has grown more attractive after Greek authorities greatly increased their vigilance at the Evros land crossing with Turkey two years ago. Bulgaria this year also installed a 20-mile (33-kilometer) barbed-wire fence on its border with Turkey, bringing down the number of illegal crossings. The Western Balkan route "has gained importance, particularly as people are aware of the dangers they are facing in crossing the Mediterranean," said Marta Pardavi of the Hungarian Helsinki Committee, which provides free legal assistance to asylum seekers. The UNHCR estimates over 3,400 migrants have died this year trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea, as a rising tide of migrants encourages smugglers to use even more unseaworthy boats and lawlessness in Libya allows human trafficking to flourish. Faced with such an overwhelming increase, the Szeged border police have been getting help from rangers and volunteers, who detain the migrants until they are transferred to a makeshift holding center. There, the migrants, who rarely carry identification, are fingerprinted, given a medical checkup and treatment if needed, fed and housed. Those who request asylum about 95 percent of them, Eberhardt said are sent to the migration office, which later decides their fate. Locals complain about the trash the migrants leave behind toothbrushes, wet clothes, tattered shoes and the fires they set in the surrounding forests while waiting overnight to be picked up by smugglers. Of the 18,900 asylum requests in 2013 made to Hungary, over 11,000 were abandoned, supporting the notion that most migrants are moving on to other destinations. "A lot of people want to go to join their families in Western Europe, but a lot of people would stay in Hungary if there were better prospects to integrate .... if they could get jobs," McKinsey said, urging the government to better help those who want to begin a new life in the country. That is not likely to happen. Prime Minister Viktor Orban has said he was against "liberal migration policies." Marta Pardavi of the Hungarian Helsinki Committee said refugee programs like those run by her group are very dependent on EU funds and get little money from Hungary. Orban's government, she says, is deliberately working "not to have a country that offers anything that would be attractive to illegal migrants or asylum seekers." Out on the border, Asotthalom ranger Vince Szalma expects a large number of migrants to arrive just in time for Christmas. He said Kosovo migrants told him "their whole village of 2,500-3,000 people is on the move" toward Hungary. ___ Vanessa Gera in Warsaw contributed to this report. next Image 1 of 3 prev next Image 2 of 3 prev Image 3 of 3 Morocco's government has suspended the opening of the country's first Ikea store, in a last-minute decision reportedly linked to diplomatic tensions around the Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara. The company spent months building the sprawling store next to Casablanca and it was slated to open Tuesday. But the Interior Ministry issued a statement Tuesday morning saying the store lacks the necessary "certificate of conformity." A website known for close ties to the Moroccan royal palace, Le 360, reported that the decision was linked to Swedish support for the Western Saharan independence movement. The report said the government held an "emergency meeting" Monday about Ikea's status in Morocco. Ikea, founded in Sweden but now Dutch-based, would not immediately comment on the suspended opening. Cities struggling with deep-seated violence look at Medellin, Colombia as a beacon of hope and an example of what can be done it shows them what true renaissance looks like. In the 80s and 90s, many tourists traveling in the country skipped the Andean city, terrorized as it was by notorious drug lord Pablo Escobar and the ruthless cartel he named after his home city, the infamous Cartel de Medellin. The fear started to dissipate slowly after the so-called King of Cocaine was finally gunned down in 1993, and now Colombias second city is notorious for a very different reason: its astounding transformation into a modern, vibrant and safe metropolis. Just last week Medellin was awarded the prestigious Lee Kuan Yew World City Prize 2016 by the Urban Redevelopment Authority and the Center for Liveable Cities. And three years ago, Citi and the Marketing Services Department of the Wall Street Journal crowned Medellin the Innovative City of the Year beating out fellow finalists New York City and Tel Aviv. After the 2013 designation, tourists started to flood Medellin in record numbers today it is the fastest growing tourism destination in the country outside the capital, according to Colombias Tourism Ministry. Last year alone, nearly 430,000 Americans visited Colombia, a 27 percent increase from the previous year. Experts and local officials say the advances in the City of Eternal Spring were accomplished by targeting social spending, a modern transport system and partnerships between the private and public sector. A city is not safer when there is a bigger police force, but when there are spaces of cohabitation, said Jorge Melguizo, former Secretary of Citizen Culture in Medellin, home to roughly 3.5 million people. Cohabitation is constructed through social, educational and cultural projects, added Melguizo, who has held multiple positions focused on urban development within the city government. Those projects, Meguizo said, focused on Medellins poorest neighborhoods known as comunas to maximize the impact. In these areas, a slew of non-governmental organization laid the roots for transformation and became the backbone of Medellins social fabric, as they consistently push marginalized groups to demand a better quality of life. One of those NGOs is Corporacion Cultural Nuestra Gente, which has been offering arts programs in Medellins Comuna 2 for more than 20 years. You cant talk of Medellins transformation without special consideration of the people in the barrios of Medellin, said Jorge Blandon, founder of Nuestra Gente. The transformation was born in these areas, in the discussions in these communities. But transforming a city also requires capital, and in this case it was provided in large part by the public utility company Empresas Publicas de Medellin (EPM). At least 30 percent of the companys profits go to the local governments social programs. EPM has a business model that allows it to compete with private companies, said the companys former CEO, Federico Restrepo, but that also lets it assume functions to resolve social problems in a way that benefits the company. Restrepo cited a 2009 project as an example of how EPM has been a key contributor to Medellins urban and social development. That year, the company took on a project to bring electricity to comunas, an endeavor that would not seem profitable for a private company but raised the quality of life in the city and prevented the potentially negative impacts of urban migration. The unique relationship with EPM has enabled Medellins local government to take on bigger infrastructure projects, such as the praised overground Metro system that includes cable cars one of the most prominent physical markers of the citys transformation. It has also made possible navigating safely through previously cut-off and stigmatized comunas. While the physical renovations have not solved the citys struggles with issues like street crime and inequality, the homicide rate in Medellin has dropped by 70 percent in the past four years. But beyond cosmetics and crime rates, Melguizo said that the entire perception of the city has seen a notable shift among its inhabitants. The change has been cultural, more than physical, he said. Mexican immigration authorities said Saturday they have been hit by a surge of almost 5,000 Haitian, African and Asian migrants entering by the southern border in just a few days. Recent experience suggests the 4,749 migrants entering through Mexico's Tapachula immigration center on the Guatemalan border will soon try to reach the California border, with many expected to apply for asylum. Mexico's National Immigration Institute said the migrants entered the country between Sept. 21 and 23. It did not break them down according to country of origin, but recent trends suggest the majority are likely from Haiti. That would mark a huge increase over the number seen so far this year. The institute said a total of 7,800 Haitian migrants entered Mexico through Guatemala between Jan. 1 and Sept. 21, as well as 1,701 migrants from Africa and 3,753 from various Asian. The institute said that none of these Haitian, African or Asian migrants have requested permission to stay in Mexico. "Up to this moment, the institute has not received any requests from these foreigners for refuge, asylum or regularization, because they have expressed that their desire is to reach the United States." The migrants cannot be sent back to their home countries, so Mexico gives them 20-day temporary visas so they can cross the country and get to the U.S. It said the Africans came mainly from the Congo, Ghana, Guinea, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia, Sudan and Nigeria. However, this week the U.S. government said it was widening efforts to deport Haitians in response to the wave of thousands of immigrants from the Caribbean nation who have overwhelmed California border crossings with Mexico in recent months. Mexico said that in Baja California alone, about 1,230 Haitian, African and Asian migrants are waiting for asylum in the United States, in many cases at border crossing gates or bridges. The institute said Mexico was trying to provide the asylum seekers with food and water while they waited for a U.S. response. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Sarah Saldana testified in Congress that other governments told her on a recent trip to Central America that 40,000 Haitians were on their way and called it an "emergency situation" on California's border. A government move lifted special protections that shielded Haitians from deportation after their nation's 2010 earthquake. The change may dramatically affect Haitians who have been showing up at U.S. border crossings in California, claiming they lived in Brazil for several years, left for economic reasons, and traveled through Central America and Mexico. Homeland Security officials say about 5,000 Haitians have been stopped at San Diego's San Ysidro port of entry since October, compared to only 339 for the 2015 fiscal year. Large numbers have also turned themselves in to U.S. inspectors in Calexico, California, 120 miles east of San Diego. The influx is so heavy that inspectors at San Ysidro, the nation's busiest border crossing, are turning back Haitians with appointments to come at a later date, leaving hundreds waiting in Tijuana, Mexico. Many stay at one of the Mexican border city's five migrant shelters that volunteered in May to help. The Rev. Pat Murphy, director of Casa del Migrante in Tijuana, said 90 percent of the people who have come to his shelter in the last six weeks are Haitians who moved to Brazil after the 2010 earthquake. Like us on Facebook Follow us on Twitter & Instagram On the sandy beaches of Ipanema and Copacabana in Rio de Janeiro, where tourists come to play and hawkers of sarongs and coconut water set up their stalls, the summer heat of December and January also brings with it a threat that most visitors arent familiar with: Arrastoes. Thats the term roughly translating as trawlers used for when a group of young kids, usually from slums in the city, go out together running through the beach and grabbing bags, smart phones whatever they can get their hands on as they scamper past and attacking people. Often the arrastaoes take place in the late afternoon, when many sunbathers are leaving the beach and heading toward bus and subway stations. Although the main objective is to carry out robberies, the victims usually end up suffering from other types of violence, such as assaults and intimidation. Retired psychologist Silvia Moreira was the victim of three just last summer: one on the beach, on the street and one in her car. After each, she had to be hospitalized. "It was because of an arrastao that I hit [another] car and was hospitalized for 40 days," she told Fox News Latino. "In the other, the assailants had knives and cut my arm. It is a collective fear they work as a group to create a lot of fear and make people vulnerable. My daughter was beaten by a boy when she refused to give up her purse on the beach last week". A local police officer who works around Ipanema and Leblon beaches and asked not to be identified, said that, when arrastaoes happen, they are uncontrolable. "They come in big groups," he said. "Police officers try to avoid it, but once it happens, there are always victims. We run after them, but because they are minors, there is not a lot we can do. People aren't just robbed they are also hurt and scared." In October, about 92 people, including 78 minors and 2 children, were arrested after they allegedly robbed shops and assaulted pedestrians on Nossa Senhora de Copacabana, the main commercial avenue in the tourist district. Gabriela Souza, who was on Nossa Senhora that day, said that the overwhelming feeling is one of "despair." "They came running between the cars and the sidewalks, Souza told FNL. They knocked down pedestrians and tried to enter the stores. Everyone had to act fast to close their shops." Arrastoes are a Rio phenomenon that began as far back as the early 1990s, but their frequency and size has increased dramatically in recent years. According to the Institute of Public Security, during the summer, the number of such incidents can reach two a day and involve more than 20 young people in each. During the week, the likeliest settings are on streets and buses. On weekends, it mostly happens on the beach. Most of the people arrested for these attacks are poor teenagers and kids from the favelas, and efforts to combat this type of crime, critics say, tend to add to the divide between rich and poor and contribute to racism. Brazilian sociologist Ignacio Canto says the problem is a complicated one. "Many victims are workers from the less affluent classes, residents of the suburbs, he pointed out. Earlier this year, police were searching young people who bused to the beach from the poorest neighborhoods of the city. A number of "militias" also were reported to have cropped up, composed of middle-class people, who intimidated random kids. Cariocas as residents of Rio are known take pride in some of the citys public spaces, such as its beaches, being democratic, with the poorest having as much access as the wealthiest. But that is something of a lie, says historian and lawyer Rafael Soares. "These are groups of young people, teenagers, occupying a space where they do not entirely belong, Soares told FNL. There is a view of the beach as a democratic space, but it is not." The arrastoes add to a level of fear over crime in the city. In August, even with thousands of extra police officers and soldiers patrolling the city during the Olympic Games, 386 murders took place in Rio, a 17.5 percent increase over the same month in 2015. Monica Figueiredo, a retiree, doesnt have the best expectations for the coming summer. "Cases of theft are very common. You cannot leave anything out or exposed, she told FNL. I avoid the beach, especially on weekends." The lone suspect accused of opening fire at a Quebec City mosque was formally charged with six counts of first-degree murder on Monday evening, one day after the massacre that killed six men. The suspect was identified as 27-year-old Alexandre Bissonnette, a student at the nearby Laval University, the CBC reported. Bissonnette also was charged with five counts of attempted murder. A second man, Mohamed el Khadir, was initially identified as an additional suspect by Quebec officials. Reuters and the French language newspaper La Presse reported earlier that one of the suspects was of Moroccan origin, a report that was picked up by Fox News and other news outlets. But police later announced there was only one suspect in the attack, and Khadir was identified as a witness. NAVY SEAL KILLED, 3 INJURED IN RAID ON AL QAEDA IN YEMEN Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the massacre at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre, calling it a terrorist attack on Muslims. The attack unfolded in the men's section of the mosque on Sunday night. Trudeau said in Parliament the victims were targeted simply because of their religion and spoke to directly to the more than 1 million Muslims that live in Canada, saying, "We are with you." ISRAEL POLICE: JANUARY SHOOTING IN HAIFA WAS 'TERROR' ATTACK Five people were in critical condition and at least 12 others suffered minor injuries, University of Quebec Hospital Centre spokeswoman Genevieve Dupuis said Monday. The dead ranged in age from age 35 to 65. A possible motive was unclear. Police said they did not believe there were other suspects. One gunman was armed with an AK-47, the Le Soleil newspaper reported. The bullets hit people that were praying. People who were praying lost their lives. A bullet passed right over my head, a witness who asked to remain anonymous told Radio Canada. President Trump expressed his condolences to Trudeau and the Canadian people and offered to provide any assistance needed, according to the prime minister's office. The gunfire started at the Islamic center at around 8 p.m., Le Journal de Quebec reported. More than 50 people were attending prayer service at the time of the shooting. The center's president Mohamed Yangui said the shooters reloaded at least three times. Police ramped up security at mosques across the country after the massacre. An unidentified man looking for his friends, who were regular attendees of evening prayers, told Le Journal de Quebec, "I've tried to reach them, but I cannot. It's terrible." The French-speaking province of Quebec has been embroiled in a lengthy debate about race and religious accommodation. The previous separatist government of the province called for a ban on ostentatious religious symbols such as the hijab in public institutions. The CBC reported that someone left a pig's head on the mosque's doorstep this past June, during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Islam's holy book, the Koran, forbids them from consuming pork. "We were told that it was an isolated act, but today we have deaths," Yangui told reporters. "It is minutes and hours of terror and anguish." In the U.S., the NYPD said in a statement that officers have been told to give special attention to mosques in the area. Police said they were monitoring the situation in Quebec. Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said the Eiffel Tower would go dark at midnight to honor the victims. Fox News' Samuel Chamberlain, Ryan Gaydos and The Associated Press contributed to this report. Toyota has relinquished the title of the world's biggest automaker, reporting Monday that it sold 10.175 million vehicles worldwide in 2016, fewer than Volkswagen's 10.31 million. General Motors reports its tally next week. If GM's number falls short, it will be the first time the German automaker has become No. 1. It's a milestone achievement despite the taint to VW's reputation from a huge scandal over cheating on emissions tests. Booming China sales helped offset that damage. Japanese automaker Toyota Motor Corp. has had that auto crown for the past four years, although it fell behind General Motors in 2011, when production was hit by a quake and tsunami in northeastern Japan. Detroit-based GM was the top-selling automaker for more than seven decades until Toyota surpassed it in 2008. Eike Batista, once Brazil's richest man and most flamboyant national booster, was detained by federal police on Monday on allegations of bribing a former governor, putting an end to his brief stint as an international fugitive. Batista, a brash entrepreneur whose meteoric rise and fall made him the poster boy of Brazil's decade-long boom before the global commodities crash, flew overnight from New York to Rio de Janeiro, where police had raided his luxury home on Thursday. The 60-year-old businessman, who has sold or forfeited his stakes in the energy, mining and logistics empire known as EBX Group, was once married to a Carnival queen and is the son of a former chief executive officer of mining company Vale SA. BRAZIL'S 'CAR WASH' PROSECUTOR SAYS CORRUPTION PROBE TO GROW Five years ago, he had a net worth exceeding $30 billion and was considered one of the world's 10 richest people. On Monday, he had his hair implants shaved off before he was locked in a shared cell in Rio's notorious Bangu prison, authorities said. "I am returning to answer to the courts, as is my duty," Batista told the Globo television network at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport. "It's time for me to clear this up." In May, Batista showed up at the southern Brazil offices of federal prosecutors, who are leading a huge probe into political kickbacks made by scores of major companies in return for lucrative contracts from state-run oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA. Batista told prosecutors at the time that former Finance Minister Guido Mantega had requested, and he had made, a contribution of 5 million reais ($1.60 million) to cover debts from the successful 2010 presidential campaign of former president Dilma Rousseff, who was impeached last year for breaking budget rules. BRAZIL JUDGE DIES IN CRASH AHEAD OF CORRUPTION PROBE RULING Mantega was charged with corruption in September, due in large part to Batista's testimony, prosecutors said. Both Mantega and Rousseff deny wrongdoing. The sweeping corruption investigation, which now covers several state-run companies, has jailed prestigious CEOs and major political figures, convicted more than 80 people and confirmed some $2 billion in bribes paid over several years. New testimony from plea bargains approved on Monday is expected to implicate more than 100 sitting politicians. "I think federal prosecutors are cleaning up Brazil in a fantastic manner," Batista told Globo TV. "The Brazil that is being born now will be different." He added that he never intended to flee and was in New York on business. Batista declined to answer a reporter's question about whether he considered himself guilty or innocent. Batista's lawyer, Fernando Martins, told reporters outside a prison where the businessmen initially was taken that he had not yet spoken with his client but that he was worried about his safety. Inmates with a college degree, which Batista lacks, are usually separated from the rest of the population in Brazil's crowded prison system, where a series of violent riots have erupted this year. A former wildcat gold miner, Batista attracted ravenous demand for shares in his mining and energy ventures, which were forced into bankruptcy court as oil and mineral prices crashed. Police accuse Batista of paying $16 million to former Rio Governor Sergio Cabral in exchange for support of the businessman's many Rio-based endeavors. He has not yet been formally charged. Cabral, who resigned from office in 2014, has been jailed since last year in connection with other corruption charges. His lawyers have denied he committed any crimes. The oil companies OGX Petroleo e Gas SA and Oleo e Gas Participacoes SA and mining company MMX, which were founded by Batista, said on Monday that he no longer held administrative roles, and his arrest would have no impact on them. A suspect in the Brussels airport attack dubbed the "man in the hat" has been handed over to France to be questioned about the Paris atrocities. SUSPECT IN QUEBEC MOSQUE TERROR ATTACK WAS OF MOROCCAN ORIGIN, REPORT SHOWS Mohamed Abrini was detained in Brussels in April last year over his suspected involvement in the March 2016 attacks and the Paris killings, which the Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for. Belgium's prosecutor's office said in a statement: "In the framework of the investigation related to the attacks in Paris on 13 November 2015, Mohamed Abrini was surrendered to the French judicial authorities for a period of one day." NAVY SEAL KILLED, 3 INJURED IN RAID ON AL QAEDA IN YEMEN Eric Van Der Sypt, a spokesman, said the decision was based on "mutual agreements" between the two countries. He said: "It's not uncommon that suspects in different cases are surrendered for one day or a few days." Belgian investigators have said the airport and metro bombers, who killed 32 people, were part of the same Brussels-based cell that plotted the November 2015 Paris attacks. Some 130 people were killed in the Paris attacks. Abrini, who was dubbed the "man in the hat" in CCTV images, fled from the airport without apparently detonating a suitcase bomb after accomplices Najim Laachraoui and Ibrahim El Bakraoui set off theirs, killing 16 people and themselves. Sources close to the Belgian-led investigation have said the three bombers targeted passengers travelling to the United States, as well as Jewish people and perhaps Russians at the airport. U.S. sources said they are confident the airline check-in counters for flights to the United States, Israel and Russia were targeted. Abrini had a record as a petty criminal who grew up in the deprived Molenbeek area of Brussels with Salah Abdeslam, the only survivor of the group that carried out the Paris attacks. He was nicknamed "Brioche" after his days working in a bakery and is thought to have given up training as a welder at the age of 18 before he became radicalized. Click for more from Sky News. To ring in the New Year, U.S. Ambassador Scot Marciel welcomed partners from the Myanmar and United States agricultural sectors to his home in Yangon on January 12th to recognize the achievements attained through bilateral engagements between the two countries. More than 50 representatives from the Myanmar government and business sector attended the event, including Dr. Tin Htut, Permanent Secretary, Kyaw Swe Lin, Deputy Director General Kyin Kyin Win, and Deputy Director from the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Irrigation, Aung Min Thyke. The Director from Ministry of Commerce and some of the largest Myanmar grain importers and bakeries, Myanmar Coffee Association, as well as delegates from the U.S. Wheat Associates and Winrock International were also present. Sales of packaged goods in Myanmar, many produced with wheat ingredients from the United States, have grown from an estimated $184 million in 2011 to more than $272 million in 2016. Similarly, U.S. wheat exports to Myanmar rose to nearly $4 million in 2016. Furthermore, Myanmar coffee exports to the United States and Europe were 54 metric tons in 2016. The coffee association plans to increase these exports to 80 metric tons in 2017. Facilitated by the people-to-people approach of USAIDs Farmer to Farmer program and Value Chains for Rural Development activity, in collaboration with Winrock International, Myanmar became a player in the U.S. market in 2016, and is now on the map as an emerging coffee growing region. The achievements attained in the agricultural sector demonstrate that collaboration and continued engagement benefit both countries. Through deepening Myanmar-U.S. commercial relationships, we see the Myanmar milling and baking sectors expanding due in part to the use of high quality products such as U.S. wheat, said Ambassador Marciel. Through these partnerships, we not only see more cafes and bakeries that consumers can enjoy in Myanmar, but also more companies producing more value-added products and giving consumers more options at retail stores. In addition, USAIDs work with smallholder coffee farmers and agribusinesses has strengthened their operations enabling them to export Myanmar coffee to the rest of the world. As these trends continue to grow, itll have a positive impact on the economy, creating more jobs and generating more income for everyone. Just 10 days ago, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nietos approval rating hit a record low: 12 percent, according to a survey by Mexico City-based newspaper Reforma. Dogged by protests and nationwide looting over the governments 20-percent increase in gas prices, the deeply unpopular leader may end up thanking President Donald Trump for prompting offended Mexicans to rally behind their leader. From billionaire business magnate Carlos Slim to political opponents, there has been a groundswell of support for Pena Nieto, who has cut a lonely figure in months of bruising encounters with Trump. PENA NIETO REITERATES MEXICO WILL NOT PAY FOR TRUMP'S BORDER WALL "We have to support the president of Mexico, so he can defend the country's interests," said Slim, the world's fourth-richest man, during a rare conference press called last week. "I would be very interested in seeing this unity last." Even the government's most prominent critic, leftist presidential hopeful Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, has called on Mexicans to support Pena Nieto. In addition to the gas prices uproar, rising crime, a sluggish economy and a series of corruption scandals in his party had sent the president's popularity reeling in the past few months. Then came the mini-showdown with Trump. "Under a national crisis people rally around a leader. Now he's got to keep leading, that's important," said Peter Schechter, senior vice president for strategic Initiatives at the Atlantic Council. "There has to be perception he continues to lead." Former presidential spokesman Ruben Aguilar saId the popularity bounce for Pena Nieto may be short-lived. "There is a certain feeling of unity around the president," Aguilar said. "But it is very possible that this sentiment could evaporate." Reuters and the The Associated Press contributed to this report. A Danish court has extended the detention of the daughter of the former confidante of South Korea's president. Special prosecutor David Schmidt Hvelplund told The Associated Press on Monday that Chung Yoo-ra will remain in detention until Feb. 22. The court is awaiting additional information before deciding whether to meet a South Korean extradition request as part of a corruption investigation. Chung was arrested in Aalborg, northern Denmark, on Jan. 1 on an international arrest warrant. She is the daughter of jailed Choi Soon-sil, who is suspected of bribery and receiving favors from companies in return for manipulating government affairs. South Korean President Park Geun-hye was impeached last month over the scandal and the Constitutional Court is reviewing whether to formally end her rule. next Image 1 of 3 prev next Image 2 of 3 prev Image 3 of 3 The Syrian military says the evacuation of rebels and their families from the Barada Valley as part of an agreement to surrender the capital region's primary water source has been completed. The military says via the Telegram messaging system that 1,142 fighters and 760 members of their families have been evacuated from the region northwest of the capital Damascus. They were taken in buses to the rebel-held northwestern province of Idlib. The evacuation marks the end of a nearly six-week-long standoff between rebels and pro-government forces that led to severe water cuts to some 5 million people around Damascus. It said more people are to be evacuated from the nearby village of Harira but it has been delayed because the roads are closed with snow. A German consumer group says it has filed a lawsuit against WhatsApp over its data gathering and sharing practices. The Federal of German Consumer Organizations said Monday that it filed the suit at Berlin's state court. It argued that WhatsApp "collects and stores data in part illegally and passes them on to Facebook." Facebook acquired the global messaging service in 2014 and announced last summer that WhatsApp would begin sharing phone numbers of its users with the social network. That angered data protection advocates in Germany and elsewhere. WhatsApp said its "privacy policy and terms updates comply with applicable law." It says the use of European WhatsApp user data for products and advertising purposes on Facebook has been "temporarily paused" to allow for discussions with officials. Iran-backed Houthi rebels attacked a Saudi warship in the Red Sea Monday, killing two sailors and wounding three others, a U.S. official confirmed to Fox News. The Saudi frigate, Al Madinah, was conducting routine operations in the southern Red Sea when the attack occurred. THREE SERVICE MEMBERS HURT IN OSPREY CRASH AFTER DEADLY YEMEN TERROR RAID It is unknown if the ship was hit by a missile or by suicide attack after being rammed by a small boat, officials told Fox News. The U.S. military was monitoring the situation. The Saudi frigate was able to continue her transit despite the damage, according to the official. ISLAMIC BODY CALLS TRAVEL BAN A 'GRAVE CONCERN' The attack came one day after President Trump spoke to Saudi Arabias King Salman. Iran launched a ballistic missile Sunday in defiance of a U.N. resolution that ordered the Islamic Republic to stop such tests, U.S. officials revealed to Fox News. In October, U.S. Navy warships came under missile attack by Iran-backed Houthi rebels in the same area of the southern Red Sea just north of the Bab al Mandab Strait. For the first time in history, a U.S. destroyer successfully shot down incoming enemy missiles using SM-2 missiles in the October attack. Days later Tomahawk cruise missile launched from the USS Nitze destroyed the Houthi radar installations responsible for firing on the U.S. warships. Iran conducted its first ballistic missile test under Donald Trump's presidency, in yet another apparent violation of a United Nations resolution, U.S. officials told Fox News on Monday. The launch occurred Sunday at a well-known test site outside Semnan, about 140 miles east of Tehran, Fox News was first to learn. TRUMP DEFENDS ORDER FOR VISA CRACKDOWN, REFUGEE HALT: 'WE CAN'T TAKE CHANCES' The Khorramshahr medium-range ballistic missile flew 600 miles before exploding, in a failed test of a reentry vehicle, officials said. Iran defense minister Brigadier Gen. Hossein Dehqan said in September that Iran would start production of the missile. U.N. resolution 2231 -- put in place days after the Iran nuclear deal was signed -- calls on the Islamic Republic not to conduct such tests. However, this is at least Iran's second such test since July. The resolution bars Iran from conducting ballistic missile tests for eight years and went into effect July 20, 2015. ISLAMIC BODY CALLS TRAVEL RESTRICTIONS A 'GRAVE CONCERN' Iran is "called upon not to undertake any activity related to ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons, including launches using such ballistic missile technology," according to the text of the resolution. The landmark nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, however, does not include provisions preventing Iran from conducting ballistic missile tests, and Iran claims the tests are legitimate because they are not designed to carry a nuclear warhead. President Trump on Sunday spoke with King Salman of Saudi Arabia, a conversation in which the two "agreed on the importance of rigorously enforcing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran and of addressing Irans destabilizing regional activities," the White House said in a statement. A ballistic missile launch could potentially fall under "destabilizing regional activities." The launch also came a day before Jordans King Abdullah arrived in Washington for meetings with Vice President Pence and Defense Secretary Mattis. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would address the Iran issue with Trump when the two leaders meet on Feb. 15. "I will meet President Trump in Washington soon, and among the issues I will address, is the need to renew the sanctions against Iran," Netanyahu wrote on Facebook on Monday. "Sanctions against the ballistic missiles, and other sanctions against the terror, and re addressing the failed agreement on its nuclear capabilities. "I know that this bothers not only Israel, and not only the US but other countries in the region. Iran's aggression should not be ignored." The U.S. intelligence community was able to identify Sunday's launch due to its robust satellite network. The overhead system can detect the heat signature of missile launches and explosions from bombs being dropped around the world. Last March, Iran sparked international condemnation when it test-fired two ballistic missiles, one emblazoned with the phrase Israel must be wiped out in Hebrew. U.S. Army Gen. Joseph Votel told lawmakers last March the United States should continue to "expose" Iran for the role that the rogue nation plays in the region, including its support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, responsible for dropping barrel bombs on his own people. Dehqan said in September that Iran would beef up its defense capabilities by "manufacturing three fundamental products in the area of missile [development] by the end of the year." "Iran's missile tests are an unacceptable act of aggression-something we have seen occur time and again for the last 18 months," Ambassador Mark D. Wallace, CEO of the non-profit United Against Nuclear Iran, responded. Fox News' Rich Edson contributed to this report. After Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi announced that eastern Mosul was cleared of ISIS fighters, the Iraqi Special Operations Forces staged a victory parade in front of Mosul University. They cheered in the precise place where ISIS had celebrated its conquest of Iraq's second largest city in 2014. Battle-hardened commandos of the legendary Golden Division drove armored Humvees festooned with the Iraqi national flag and plastic flowers. Riding atop the gun-laden vehicles, they displayed captured ISIS black flags upside down while blasting horns and playing a recording of the division's theme song. SLIDESHOW: IRAQIS CELEBRATE AFTER E. MOSUL IS FREED FROM ISIS' GRIP According to a special forces officer, the demonstration was mounted to reassure the tens of thousands of civilians who had remained inside their houses in eastern Mosul during the months-long, door-by-door battle that it is now safe to walk the streets. Hundreds of men and a smattering of women and children cheered as a construction crane raised a huge Iraqi flag on top of a hill within sight of nearby ISIS fighters across the Tigris River. The Iraqi-led forces encircling western Mosul are preparing to launch a final offensive against ISIS fighters barricaded in the luxury houses they seized for use as headquarters, prisons, kitchens, barracks and slaughterhouses. Many of the opulent homes are located on defensible high ground, affording them clear sight lines for ISIS snipers to target the Iraqi forward units, especially the Golden Division spearhead. The houses are laced with IEDs, explosive booby traps hidden in toys, cars, flower pots and corpses. IRAQ DECLARES EASTERN MOSUL 'FULLY LIBERATED' FROM ISIS When the Iraqi commandos cross the Tigris, suicide bombers will propel bomb-loaded cars at them from side streets; small, spying drones will drop cleverly rigged hand grenades from a few hundred feet up. In advance of the final offensive, coalition air strikes are bombing suspected ISIS houses and weapons depots, trying to kill jihadists and destroy their battlements. More than 500,000 civilians are trapped in western Mosul, which is held hostage by ISIS. Golden Division soldiers are known for risking their own lives to pull civilians out of harm's way, but some ordinary people will lose their homes, their livelihoods, their limbs and even their lives in the chaos of battle. The hope is that Iraqis will retake western Mosul and, as in the east, people will emerge to start up life anew, selling meat, vegetables, gasoline, hot chai and fresh water while sweeping away the rubble and washing away the blood. Al Abadi told the Associated Press that he does not know how long it will take to free the western side of the city. I can't tell now, he told AP, but we are capable of doing so and we will do so." next Image 1 of 3 prev next Image 2 of 3 prev Image 3 of 3 Italian government and church officials have welcomed 41 Syrian refugees at Rome's airport, saying they wanted to show solidarity at a time when the U.S. is sending refugees away and building walls to keep them out. The Syrian children were given balloons as they arrived, and a colorful sign reading "Welcome to Italy" greeted the latest group of refugees to be resettled in the country via an agreement between the government and a Catholic-Protestant collaboration. Italy's deputy foreign minister, Mario Giro, greeted the Syrians and insisted on the obligation to welcome those fleeing war. He said walls, as proposed by the Trump administration, have been shown not to work. What works, he said, is the organized acceptance and distribution of refugees, coupled with economic accords with countries of origin. The spokesman for Vladimir Putin says a meeting between the Russian president and U.S. President Donald Trump is in the works. Trump and Putin had a much-anticipated hour-long discussion on Saturday, the first since Trump assumed office last week. Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Monday lauded the phone call as a "good, constructive conversation" but dismissed suggestions of Trump and Putin may have reached deals in that phone call. Peskov said Kremlin and White House staff have been instructed to prepare a meeting between the two leaders and added that the leaders could reach practical agreements only after they see each other. Speaking earlier in Moscow, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said the conversation showed that Russia and American interests "overlap in a number of areas" including fighting terrorism. Western Sahara and African Union sources have told the Associated Press that Morocco has officially been admitted back in to the continental body after 32 years of isolation. The decision for Morocco to rejoin the AU came Monday at the African leaders summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. "Morocco has been admitted to join the AU with a view that it will become the 55th member of the continental body. That's made with the understanding that Western Sahara will remain a member of the AU," said Lamine Baali, ambassador of Western Sahara to Ethiopia and the African Union. "All the debates were focused on (the issue) that Morocco should respect the internationally recognized border of Western Sahara." An African Union source who followed the debate for Morocco to return to the continental body told the Associated Press that 39 countries supported Morocco's bid but nine countries voted against it. The nine "were countries in Southern Africa, except Swaziland," said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the press. "Most of the debate was related to the border (with Western Sahara). But the decision has finally been made for Morocco to rejoin the AU and become the 55th member. It is now adopted." Morocco left the pan-African bloc in 1979 after a majority of the member states recognized the disputed territory of Western Sahara as a member. It claims the territory in defiance of U.N. resolutions for a referendum on the independence. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that the American embassy in Israel should be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, injecting himself once again into a charged campaign trail promise of U.S. President Donald Trump. NETANYAHU BACKS TRUMP'S MEXICO WALL, TOUTS SIMILAR ONE ON EGYPT BORDER AS 'GREAT IDEA' Netanyahu's comments at his weekly Cabinet meeting appeared aimed at countering reports that Israel was concerned about the fallout of such a move, which is vehemently opposed by the Palestinians and has sparked fears of a renewed outbreak of violence. It comes a day after Netanyahu unilaterally endorsed Trump's call to build a wall along the Mexican border, saying the Israeli model along its border with Egypt has proven successful "I would like to clarify unequivocally that our view has always been, and continues to be, that the United States' embassy should be here in Jerusalem," Netanyahu said. "Jerusalem is the capital of Israel and it is appropriate that not only the American embassy will be here but that all embassies will move here and I believe that in due course most will come here, to Jerusalem." NETANYAHU QUESTIONED FOR 3RD TIME ON CORRUPTION ALLEGATIONS Currently, nearly all foreign embassies are located in the coastal city of Tel Aviv because their countries have refrained from recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital until its status is resolved in future peace talks. Israel has long called for the embassies to be relocated but hasn't pushed hard for it given the widespread international opposition. But Trump's rise has emboldened Israel's nationalists. His campaign platform made no mention of a Palestinian state, a cornerstone of two decades of international diplomacy in the region, and he has signaled that he will be far more tolerant of Israeli settlement construction than his predecessors. Both his designated ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, now a top aide and Mideast envoy, have deep ties to the settler movement. Friedman and Kushner's family foundation have both been generous contributors to the Beit El settlement, and a delegation of settler representatives was invited to Trump's inauguration. The Palestinians want the West Bank and east Jerusalem -- areas captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war -- for their hoped-for state. Former President Barack Obama, like the rest of the international community, considered the building of settlements an obstacle to peace and frequently criticized their construction. But Trump did not comment when Israel announced a major housing drive last week. At the Cabinet meeting, Netanyahu also said his government planned to introduce a bill to legalize dozens of West Bank settlement outposts later this week. There are about 100 outposts across the West Bank that Israel considers illegal but tolerates and often allows to flourish. The bill is being pushed by the pro-settler Jewish Home party, which has threatened to quit Netanyahu's coalition if it doesn't go through. The bill was cited as one of the reasons the Obama administration allowed a United Nations Security Council resolution to pass that challenged the legality of the settlements. U.S. officials said that after previously vetoing anti-Israel resolutions, they felt compelled to abstain because of continued Israeli settlement construction and efforts to retroactively legalize dozens of them in exchange for compensation for the original Palestinian landowners. Also Sunday, Israeli troops killed an 18-year-old Palestinian and wounded five others after they came under attack in a refugee camp in the northern West Bank city of Jenin, Israeli and Palestinian officials said. Palestinian police said a group hurled rocks at the Israeli troops, who responded with fire and fatally shot Mohammed Khalefeh. The Israeli military confirmed the account, saying that its forces were attacked with pipe bombs before they responded. Israeli forces routinely carry out arrest raids in the West Bank against wanted Palestinian militants. Since 2015, Palestinian attackers have carried out numerous stabbings, shootings and vehicular assaults that killed 40 Israelis and two visiting Americans. Israeli forces killed 235 Palestinians in the same period, most identified by Israel as attackers. Palestinians and rights groups have accused Israel of using excessive force in some of the confrontations. Israel says the violence is fueled by a Palestinian campaign of incitement compounded on social media sites that glorify and encourage attacks. Palestinians say it stems from frustration over decades of Israeli rule in territory they claim for a state. An American man with dementia allegedly was flown to Britain and dumped in a parking lot by his own family, according to U.S. court documents. Roger Curry, 76, was mysteriously discovered outside the bus station in Hereford in November 2015 after being abandoned by his wife Mary and son Kevin, investigators said. SC TEACHER BIT CHILD AT TRAMPOLINE PARK, FACES ASSAULT CHARGES, POLICE SAY The case baffled cops after Curry was found in the picturesque hamlet with two men. One was younger and also had an American accent and the second was a local man who answered a police appeal for information. UK LAWMAKERS LOOK INTO FAKE NEWS' 'THREAT TO DEMOCRACY' But as soon as the paramedics stopped the younger American disappeared fueling suspicions that he was a relative who was trying to abandon the man. Curry was cared for at a nursing home in Britain for eight months before being flown back to Los Angeles. Police spent months trying to work out who he was, despite contacting local care homes, hospitals and even international embassies. According to tonights BBC Panorama investigation, court papers filed in LA state: In late 2015 Mr Curry was taken surreptitiously to England by his wife Mary Curry and his son Kevin Curry and abandoned there. Curry appeared to have been cared for and was found wearing new clothes. He lived in a care home run by Herefordshire Council for months but was identified after a viewer responded to a police appeal on BBC Midlands last March. Debbie Cocker found an old picture from a 1958 yearbook for Edmonds High School in Washington State which appeared to show Curry in his younger days, as reported in the Daily Mail. Roger Curry was then tracked down by investigators to a a burnt-out house following a fire at his home in 2014 in an affluent suburb of Los Angeles. Neighbours identified the mystery man as Curry, a former nurse married with two children. Son Kevin told Panorama that he had nothing to do with the abandonment of his dad in England. Click for more from The Sun. Iran's official IRNA news agency is reporting that France's foreign minister has arrived in Tehran for a two-day visit. The Monday report said Jean-Marc Ayrault will meet Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and his Iranian counterpart, Mohammad Javad Zarif, as well as other Iranian officials. Dozens of executives from French companies are accompanying Ayrault to sign business deals with Iranian clients. This is the first visit by a foreign minister of a world power since the new U.S. administration took office. In 2015, Laurent Fabius Ayrault's predecessor visited Tehran following a landmark nuclear deal between Iran and world powers. The deal capped Iran's nuclear activities in return for the lifting of sanctions. Many officials from European countries have visited Iran since the deal went into effect last year. An Austrian newspaper reports that the owner of the house where Adolf Hitler was born is going to high court to challenge the government's right to take possession of the property. The challenge is in response to last month's parliamentary approval of a government bill to expropriate the house after she refused to sell it. The daily Kurier, in a report for its Tuesday edition, says owner Gerlinde Pommer has asked Austria's Constitutional Court to rule against the government move. Hitler was born in 1889 in the house in Braunau am Inn, a town on the German border. Officials want to remodel the property's facade to eliminate its draw as a shrine for admirers of the Nazi dictator and to offer it to an agency that runs workshops for disabled people. Romania's president has urged the government to scrap a proposal to pardon thousands of prisoners, a move which has led to massive anti-government protests. President Klaus Iohannis spoke after tens of thousands of people marched through Romania's capital and other cities on Sunday to protest the initiative, which critics say could reverse anti-corruption efforts. Premier Sorin Grindeanu has requested an emergency ordinance allowing the government to pardon prisoners to ease prison overcrowding. Iohannis posted a message on Facebook Monday, urging the government to drop the initiative, saying "the voice of the people can no longer be ignored." Critics say the proposal could benefit party allies convicted of corruption. Romania's top prosecutor has criticized the plan. A military court in Suriname has ordered the president to resume his long-stalled murder trial in the killing of political opponents under his dictatorship in 1982. The court ruled Monday that President Desi Bouterse breached his legal authority last year when he ordered a halt to the proceedings. Bouterse and 25 co-defendants are accused of rounding up 15 prominent opponents and executing them inside a colonial fortress in the capital of the South American country. Bouterse was elected president in a parliamentary vote in 2010 and re-elected in 2015. He accepted responsibility for the killings but says he was not present during the executions. Witnesses dispute that claim. Prosecutors are expected to disclose the sentence they are seeking when the trial resumes Feb. 9. Turkey's foreign ministry says it is re-opening its embassy in the Libyan capital which had closed over security concerns in 2014. The foreign ministry said in a statement Monday the embassy in Tripoli was starting out with a "core staff" working under Ambassador Ahmet Aydin Dogan. The ambassador had been working out of Tunisia after the embassy closed. Turkey's consulate in Misrata never closed. Turkey has close ties with the North African country and provided vital support to the rebels who overthrew and killed Moammar Gadhafi in 2011. Libya has been wracked by fighting and other violence involving rival militias since the demise of its longtime leader. The foreign ministry said in its statement that re-opening the embassy would allow Turkey to support reconciliation and reconstruction efforts in Libya. next Image 1 of 3 prev next Image 2 of 3 prev Image 3 of 3 A group of Turkish servicemen seeking asylum in Greece have appeared before an Athens court to contest their continued detention despite the rejection of Turkey's request for their extradition. The pilots and flight engineers fled to Greece in a military helicopter a day after the failed July 15 military coup in Turkey. Greece's Supreme Court ruled last week that the eight men wouldn't get a fair trial in Turkey, and that their lives might be in danger there. The decision prompted anger from Turkey. The Supreme Court ordered their release from police custody, but police later extended their detention order on national security grounds for three months, pending examination of their asylum bids. The men appealed that decision in an administrative court Monday. A ruling is expected within days. A British parliamentary committee is launching an inquiry into the spreading "fake news" phenomenon. UK COURT RULING THREATENS TO DELAY BREXIT; GOVERNMENT VOWS TO STAY ON TRACK The Culture, Media and Sport Committee probe begins Monday. It will study "the widespread dissemination, through social media and the Internet" of phony news stories. Committee chairman Damian Collins says the trend is a "threat to democracy" that undermines public confidence in the media. BAHRAIN POLICE OFFICER KILLED IN ATTACK CLAIMED BY SHIITE MILITANTS He called on major tech companies to do more to prevent the spread of fake news on their platforms. "Just as major tech companies have accepted they have a social responsibility to combat piracy online and the illegal sharing of content, they also need to help address the spreading of fake news on social media platforms," he said. Concerns about bogus stories have risen since the U.S. presidential election, during which fake news stories garnered wide attention. Some derogatory stories making false claims about Hillary Clinton may have damaged her candidacy in its final weeks. The committee plans to study the dividing line between legitimate commentary and propaganda and to gauge the impact false stories have on public understanding of the world. It will also study whether computer-generated algorithms could be used to remove fake news stories from news feeds. CaliBurger Announces New Canadian Partnership VANCOUVER, BC - (Marketwired - January 30, 2017) - CaliBurger announced today that it has entered into an agreement with K Franchise Systems (CaliBurger's existing partner for British Columbia, Washington state and Oregon) to develop the rest of Canada. The first restaurant will likely open later this year. Reyaz A. Kassamali, President and CEO of KFS, stated: "After our hugely successful opening in downtown Vancouver last year, we are very excited to extend our partnership with CaliBurger to cover the rest of Canada. We see a lot of potential for this cutting-edge burger concept in the Canadian market, in particular in major metropolitan markets. In fact, our first order of business will be to relocate the existing CaliBurger in Waterloo, Ontario to a more central location in Toronto, which we expect to open a little later this year." Kassamali further commented that they are currently in talks with potential franchisees in other major cities across Canada. About CaliBurger Founded in Santa Monica, California, CaliBurger is a 21st-century revival of the classic California burger joint by featuring California-style burgers with an interactive in-store technology experience. The menu consists of fresh (never frozen!), made-to-order premium quality burgers, chicken sandwiches, fresh hand-cut fries, all at an accessible price point in today's market. Most CaliBurgers are fully licensed, so also have handspun milkshakes, which can be ordered virgin, spiked with bourbon, rum or Bailey's, and/or with a shot of Stumptown Nitro Cold Brew coffee on tap. Local craft beers are also available on tap. CaliBurger visitors can play a selection of video games like Minecraft and Fun Wall's #Blitz or GemJump against other guests on a large, interactive video wall. The restaurants also integrate other technological features into the dining experience, such as wireless, in-table charging stations, or advance ordering from a smartphone app or the web, which allow guests to skip the line. CaliBurger currently has restaurants in Asia, the Middle East, Europe and North America. CaliBurger ranked #1 on Bloomberg Global's Top Five restaurants in Hong Kong for its "rocking burgers" and was Huffington Post's top burger concept to watch in 2014. For more information, please visit www.caliburgerfranchise.ca SOURCE CaliBurger Contact: Reyaz A. Kassamali CaliBurger Canada Reyaz@CaliBurger.ca ### Comments: Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus. Disqus Captain D's Accelerates Growth in Florida and Seeks Candidates to Open Restaurants Fast casual seafood franchise plans aggressive expansion and exhibits at Tampa Franchise Expo NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Jan. 30, 2017 // PRNewswire // - Captain D's, the leading fast casual seafood restaurant, announced today plans for continued development in Florida, targeting Tampa, St. Petersburg, Sarasota and Bradenton to expand its presence through franchise growth. Mark Levis, senior director of franchise development, will be at the Tampa Franchise Expo on Feb. 18 and 19 to meet with qualified prospective franchisees. Captain D's currently has 30 restaurants located throughout the state, opening three locations in North Florida last year and signing a multi-unit develop agreement to bring additional locations to Orlando. Captain D's aggressive growth plans for Florida are part of the brand's overall franchise development plans for this year. This expansion is further driving Captain D's ongoing success, achieving its fourth successive year of record high system-wide AUV in 2016. Captain D's also saw a fourth-quarter system-wide same-store sales increase of 1.3 percent and a 2.3 percent system-wide same-store sales increase for the entire fiscal year, marking the company's 21st consecutive quarter and sixth consecutive year of positive growth. "Captain D's experienced tremendous growth last year and as we ride that momentum in 2017, we've made Florida a priority market for franchise expansion," said Michael Arrowsmith, chief development officer of Captain D's. "With existing restaurants in the area consistently performing well, we're eager to catapult our presence even more in the region, and encourage qualified and experienced franchise candidates interested in joining a nationally recognized brand with a proven record of success to visit us during the upcoming Tampa Franchise Expo." Those interested in developing Captain D's restaurants in Tampa, St. Petersburg, Sarasota and Bradenton are encouraged to contact Mark Levis, senior director of franchise development at (615) 603-8373 or (615) 231-2006 to discuss opportunities. Levis will be at booth 301 at the Tampa Franchise Expo on Saturday, Feb. 18 and Sunday, Feb. 19 from 10:00 a.m. 4:00 p.m. at the Tampa Convention Center, located at 333 S. Franklin Street. Captain D's success in 2016 was further driven by its seafood expertise and product innovation, with the introduction of new menu items including Nashville Hot Fish, Home-Style Flounder, Coconut Shrimp and Salmon Cakes. Coupled with its menu diversification and expanded array of offerings, Captain D's credits its new restaurant beach design with contributing to the brand's compounding success. To date, nearly 60 percent of all restaurants have been reimaged to the brand's new vibrant, coastal design, with another 50 locations to be remodeled by the end of this year. With these efforts, Captain D's has remained true to what it does best serving high-quality seafood with warm hospitality at an affordable price in a welcoming atmosphere. With 518 restaurants in 21 states, Captain D's is the fast-casual seafood leader and number one seafood franchise in America ranked by average unit volume. The company is currently seeking single- and multi-unit operators to join in the brand's rapid expansion. For more information about franchise opportunities, visit http://www.captaindsfranchising.com or call 877-635-6502. About Captain D's Headquartered in Nashville, Tenn., Captain D's has 518 restaurants in 21 states, plus military bases around the world. Captain D's is the nation's leading fast casual seafood restaurant and was named the #1 seafood chain in the QSR 50, ranked by AUV. Founded in 1969, Captain D's has been offering its customers high-quality seafood at reasonable prices in a welcoming atmosphere for more than 47 years. Captain D's serves a wide variety of seafood that includes freshly prepared entrees and the company's signature hand-battered fish, which is cooked to order. The restaurants also offer premium-quality, grilled items such as shrimp, and surf and turf, as well as hushpuppies, desserts and freshly brewed, Southern-style sweet tea, a Captain D's favorite. For more information, please visit www.captainds.com. SOURCE Captain D's Contact: Samantha Russo Fish Consulting 954-893-9150 srusso@fish-consulting.com ### Comments: Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus. Disqus Steven M. Fassberg, the Founder of The Original Brooklyn Water Bagel Co. Creates the Worlds First Banini Union between panini and bagel to hit stores with introductory Banini Bundle offer w/ drink & side. January 30, 2017 // Franchising.com // Who: The Original Brooklyn Water Bagel Co. (Brooklyn Water Bagel), founded by legendary Brooklynite Steven M. Fassberg, has created the worlds first Banini. This union of a bagel and a panini will be available to order at participating locations nationwide. To commemorate this menu expansion, Brooklyn Water Bagel has created the Banini Bundle for a limited time introductory offer. Brooklyn Water Bagel is a leader in the fast casual industry specializing in breakfast and lunch deli creations honoring an authentic Brooklyn-style menu and using a proprietary 14-step water filtration process to produce authentic Brooklyn bagels, specialty baked goods and artisan-roasted coffee products via Brooklynized water. What: Brooklyn Water Bagel has combined its famous Brooklynized bagels with the pressed perfection of a traditional panini sandwich to bring you the worlds first-ever Banini. Each made-to-order sandwich is served in Brooklyn Water Bagels official Banini Box and features their signature house-roasted meats or deli salads pressed between a crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside Banini, with five options to choose from: Chicken/Turkey BLT fresh-roasted chicken or turkey, crisp bacon, lettuce, tomato fresh-roasted chicken or turkey, crisp bacon, lettuce, tomato Chicken Bacon Avocado fresh-roasted chicken, fresh avocado, baby spinach, crisp bacon, tomato, lemon aioli fresh-roasted chicken, fresh avocado, baby spinach, crisp bacon, tomato, lemon aioli Monte Cristo fresh-roasted turkey, ham, melted Swiss cheese, thousand island dressing fresh-roasted turkey, ham, melted Swiss cheese, thousand island dressing Tuna Melt fresh albacore tuna salad, melted American cheese, tomato fresh albacore tuna salad, melted American cheese, tomato Turkey Avocado turkey, fresh avocado, baby spinach, tomato, lemon aioli I crafted the worlds first Banini a union between a hot fresh pressed panini and bagel with the goal of creating a cutting-edge proprietary lunch menu item that would incorporate the consistency of our beloved bagel in a non-traditional format, says Brooklyn Water Bagel founder Steven M. Fassberg. The new Banini is a mouthwatering gourmet sandwich available in assorted varieties with the signature flavor and crunch of our Brooklynized bagels. There really is nothing comparable to this unique sandwich. To herald the arrival of this revolutionary sandwich, Brooklyn Water Bagel presents the Banini Bundle, an introductory offer including your choice of a Banini, a side and a 24oz. soda (prices vary by location). When/Where: Discover the Banini and grab a bundle after 11 a.m. at participating Brooklyn Water Bagel locations nationwide. To find a Brooklyn Water Bagel near you, visit www.brooklynwaterbagel.com/locations. About Brooklyn Water Bagel Since its establishment in 2008 by Co-Chairman and Founder Steven M. Fassberg, The Original Brooklyn Water Bagel Co. has seen remarkable growth and success. A proprietary 14-step water filtration process replicates the water flowing from the Catskill Mountains into Brooklyn to Brooklynize it in every store location nationwide. The proprietary water is used to make all of The Brooklyn Water Bagels baked goods and beverages. The Florida-based brand currently operates 24 restaurant locations in 6 states: Florida, North Carolina, Maryland, California, Georgia and Massachusetts. In addition to featuring authentic Brooklyn-style bagels, The Original Brooklyn Water Bagel menu includes egg sandwiches, deli sandwiches, omelets and muffins along with a variety of farm-sourced and artisan-roasted coffee blends. SOURCE The Original Brooklyn Water Bagel Co. Contacts: Michelle Soudry The Gab Group msoudry@thegabgroup.com 561-750-3500 Kellie Gannon The Gab Group kellie@thegabgroup.com 561-750-3500 ### Comments: Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus. Disqus A 21-year-old Woodbridge woman was arrested Sunday and accused in a stabbing in Spotsylvania County that left a man seriously injured, police said. Alicia Antonia Hatch was charged with malicious wounding. She was placed in the Rappahannock Regional Jail Sunday night under no bond. The victim, a 25-year-old Woodbridge man, was rushed to Mary Washington Hospital Sunday afternoon with life-threatening injuries. Sheriff's Capt. Jeff Pearce said the incident took place about 2 p.m. in the parking lot of a day care center at 12008 Old Salem Church Road near Plank Road. Pearce said Hatch and the victim are acquaintances and had come to Spotsylvania for unknown reasons. They got into an argument and pulled into the day care parking lot to continue it, Pearce said. At some point, the man was stabbed in the chest. Pearce said the incident had nothing to do with the day care, which according to its website was not open Sunday. Deputies responding to a 911 call found the victim injured in the parking lot and had him rushed to the hospital. Hatch was apprehended a short time later a few blocks away and was taken into custody for questioning by detectives. She was initially labeled a person of interest, but became a suspect by the end of the evening. It was not clear Sunday what the argument was about or whether anyone witnessed the stabbing. Detectives are still investigating the incident. The Fredericksburg region should expect icy roads as snow and rain are expected to fall tonight and Monday morning. Though the amount of snow in Fredericksburg is only expected to be between a half-inch to an inch overnight, below freezing temperatures could produce hazardous driving conditions on Monday. Virginia Department of Transportation said in a news release that there will be crews treating Fredericksburg-area roads with sand, salt and treatment chemicals in the evening to reduce icing. However, [crews] will not use anti-icing solutions ahead of the storm, since it will start with rain first. Plowing will begin once one to two inches of snow have accumulated, according to the release. VDOT encourages people in the Fredericksburg, Northern Neck or Middle Peninsula area to avoid the roads when icy. Slick sidewalks and driveways can also indicate dangerous conditions on roads. For more information on road conditions or any potential closings, visit 511virginia.org. Emily Hollingsworth DONALD TRUMP has promised to refashion trade policy and the world trading environment in ways that will improve the lives of all Americans. Economists since the time of Adam Smith have understood the value of economic specialization and trade in generating widespread prosperity. Around the world, countries that trade the least have the lowest standards of living. By contrast, those that have embraced trade have advanced rapidly from agrarian subsistence to industrial abundance. The importance of trade to national well-being is certainly well understood in the context of foreign and defense policy, too. Sanctions restricting investments and trade are a weapon of choice against recalcitrant regimes such as North Korea. Surely we shouldnt turn such a weapon on ourselves. Trade policy should turn on a fundamental question regarding economic freedom: Do Americans get to decide for themselves what products to buy and sell, or should government act as an intermediary, directing purchases to favored suppliers, no matter the cost? For those who believe in limited government, the answer is obvious: Individuals should be free to choose. Unfortunately, our trading environment today is far from free. Government intrudes in a variety of ways: tariffs, quotas, regulatory standards and more. Free-trade agreements may reduce some of these constraints, but they often leave others in place, or even make them worse. President Trump clearly has heard the cries of Americans fed up with the whole process. Many in Washington have denounced the presidents decision to abandon the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiated by his predecessor. The agreement would undoubtedly have created legitimate new commercial opportunities for some American producers and importers, and its a shame to lose them. But the deal also included sweetheart provisions that would hinder competition. Thats a problem. A better, more transparent negotiating process would have reduced the opportunity for such special dealing. Others quite understandably worry that the U.S. will lose influence in the Pacific region if we dont participate in the agreement. But in the final analysis, U.S. influence comes from the ideals we profess, the strength of our economy and our military. The benefits we derive from our existing trade and strategic relationships are not going to vanish because the TPP did not become U.S. law. NAFTA is a more substantial agreement and a more significant concern. An established arrangement, its provisions are now embedded in the fabric of everyday investment, production and consumption decisions in the U.S., Canada and Mexico. Casual overthrow of NAFTA rules could have devastating costs for millions of Americans. Thats not to say that NAFTA shouldnt be renegotiated. Improvement is possible in many areas. Energy, for example, was deemed too difficult an issue to handle in the 1990s. It might now be ripe for inclusion in an updated NAFTA. It will be vital, however, to handle NAFTA renegotiation with care and concern for the interests of all Americans. Like any economic intervention by, NAFTA is prone to regulatory capture, that is, the exercise of undue influence by those who can afford the best lobbyists or who are able to dominate the political discourse. The Trump administration will have to stand strong against corporate calls for special privileges that appear in the guise of protectionism. A good test is whether the protection requested is aimed at a foreign market-corrupting practice or whether it instead is a competition-suppressing response to the decisions of fellow Americans seeking the best products at the best prices. Unfortunately, American consumers, who speak loudly in the marketplace, have very little representation among the D.C. power elite. The Trump administration has indicated that, prior to reopening negotiations, it will fully research the economic implications of withdrawing from NAFTA, with attention devoted to its potential effects on manufacturing and service-sector workers, the middle class, and foreign direct investment. Thats a great place to start. The Trump administrations determination to reexamine our trade pacts presents a rare opportunity to expand Americans freedom to trade. The current system, though better than it once was, is rife with cronyism and special deals for the well-connected. The rest of us pay the price for that. Its time we got a better deal. Terry Miller directs The Heritage Foundations Center for Free Markets and Regulatory Reform. WORLD WAR II was over; it was January 1946. China, however, was another story. The civil war between the Communists and Nationalists was starting again, and everywhere seemed dangerous. But on one cold night, the USS Sumnerthat quirky little hydrographic survey vessel on which my dad servedwas tied up to a dock in Shanghai. The Sumner was providing food relief and an American presence. For security reasons, the crew was restricted to the ship and the immediate area of the dock. One machine gun was always manned. But after midnight, the winter cold had taken hold and the docks were quiet. The only light came from the ship. My father, Roger T. Kerr, was on the bridge with the officer of the deck. My dad did double duty as a quartermaster and a hydrographic survey technician. Sometime after midnight, a crewman passed the word that sailors had seen a little Chinese girl hiding in the shadows of a warehouse. The bridge crew focused their binoculars on where the sailor was pointing. They saw a small child wearing sandals and a frayed dress. She was almost certainly yet another of Shanghais many orphans. My dad, never shy about offering his opinion, to officers or anyone else, said, She wont survive the night like that. Weve got to bring her aboard. A lieutenant j.g. named Joe Gorman, who was officer of the deck, readily agreed. The captain, who was up late working, heard the shouting, came on the bridge and said they couldnt do it. Besides, this could be some kind of ploy. He wasnt a bad guy, but it was his ship, things were tense, and he was cautious. One sailor left the ship and started to approach the little girl. Everyone was quiet. Would she run? The sailor had served in China before the war and knew a little Chinese. What happened next was a little dance. Hed say something. She would edge closer and then as he moved a little closer, shed step back. Apparently, she had learned to be afraid of everyone. After about 15 minutes, they were face-to-face and the sailor was sitting cross-legged. He shouted for someone to get him a coat for the girl. On the bridge, the captain nodded and it was quickly dispatched. Once again, the captain was told she would never survive the night if she stayed out there. The captain didnt say anything. He knew what he had to do, but he couldnt sanction it. He simply said, Mr. Gorman, I would like to talk to you in my quarters. Then, in a loud voice, Mr. Gorman and I will be conferring for 10 minutes. All at once, there were no officers on the bridge. And it was pretty obvious what they were supposed to do. Two more sailors left the ship to help bring the little girl aboard, and the ships corpsman was standing by. She was dangerously cold, dehydrated and hungry. It was a noble act. They had saved her from the cold of a dark Shanghai night, but what do you do with a 3-year-old Chinese girl on a Navy ship? Like so many things in the Navy, you improvise. For the next six weeks, she and the Navy got along fine. The sailors loved her, taught her some English, and introduced her to a world of kindness, good food and even homemade clothes. Sailors are good with a needle and thread. But as kind and thoughtful as they were, they were at sea aboard a U.S. naval vessel with a child who needed proper care. The captain, who referred to himself as a good Catholic boy from Boston, contacted a Catholic orphanage in Hong Kong. It agreed to accept the child, and the captain made sure a stop in Hong Kong was added to the ships itinerary. Few ships operated as independently as the Sumner. The transfer was made. The crew knew it was the right thing to do, but they missed her. It is a sweet story. Sadly, most of the crew members have passed on. But its my hope that there is a lady living in Hong Kong, say about 73 or 74 years old, with children and grandchildren of her own, who has a faint recollection of being aboard a Navy ship of wonderful sailors who took care of her so many years ago. That prospect, however dim the memory she may have, warms my heart. David S. Kerr, a Stafford County resident, has worked on Capitol Hill and for federal agencies. He is an instructor in the political science department at Virginia Commonwealth University. LETs take a walk. We all know what that means. I am inviting you to go out with me, on foot, and the arriving anywhere is entirely secondary to the walking. It makes every bit as much sense to take a walk to the store as it does to take a walk around the block, right back to where we started. Pope Francis is a big fan of walking. He said, When you are walking, anything can happen. Its catching on, too. One of the most famous walks in the world, the Camino de Santiago in northwestern Spain, attracts more pilgrims than ever, and the 500-mile trek has existed for more than a thousand years. I was there a few years agomy wifes family is from Galiciaand marveled at the mishmash of humanity ambling to the end point, the Cathedral of St. James. Walking is an attention-getter. If your boss says, Come to my office, you sense something formal or instructive is about to be relayed. If, instead, the boss comes up to you and says, Walk with me, you might detect an imminent moment of intimacy, revelation, even vulnerability. A walk is an empty thing. We fill it as we go. That squirrel crossing our path, grabbing an acorn and scurrying up a nearby tree, could not have been planned. You simply encounter it, feel it, perhaps try to figure out a meaning for it. Even walks with purpose have this quality of emptiness, a waiting container that will be filled by whatever stands in the path. A friend who attended a political march and rally was rocked, not by the affirmation of her reason for being there, but by the overwhelming encounters with so many different people and passions. A walk is also about the future. You may glance side to side, at your companion maybe, and you might even look back for a second, but your eyes are forced forward. Your orientation is toward where you are going, not where you are. In the Boy Scouts, I sometimes took night hikes in which my only illumination was a measly flashlight trained on the ground directly in front of me. Its all you need, Mr. McCusker would say, correctly. Walking is a deceleration of life. I slow down to a walk; I dont speed up to a walk. That means I am choosing to invest precious time and effort in the trip. It can be momentous. If I am walking the 10 miles to work instead of driving, I am doing something astonishing. If I commit to the 470-mile Camino across Spain or a portion of the 2,200-mile Appalachian Trail, I am likely making a life-altering investment. Walking is a shedding. Ask any college student about the care it takes to strut around campus all day, making sure that backpack is not too cumbersome. When you walk, you ask, seriously and not frivolously, Do I really need to take this with me? Its no wonder that many religions make walking sacred. The Hajj. The Kumano Kodo. The Camino de Santiago, the Stations of the Cross. One of the most revered speeches of our history, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.s I Have a Dream speech, took place after a walk. When we humans want to memorialize a cause or an event, as often as not we do it by walkingfrom the Thanksgiving Day parade to the Walk to Defeat ALS. Ultimately, walking is a gift. To fully realize this, imagine a doctor saying youll never walk again, or helping a loved one rehab from a knee replacement, or witnessing a childs first step. So, lets take a walk, you and me. Youll meet your future, squirrels and all. Youll be fascinated, bored, excited, confused, exhausted, exhilarated and, finally, at rest. Anything can happen. Like life, for instance. Orlando R. Barone is a writer from Doylestown, Pa. He wrote this for The Philadelphia Inquirer. Email him at orby114@aol.com. IN the give-and-take that comes with homeownership, both the buyer and lender haveor at least, should havea strong incentive to make sure the transaction works out and does not end in default and foreclosure. This mutual trust is vital to any real-estate transaction. Anyone who has ever purchased a home knows the paperwork involved. Stacks of contracts, each with its own series of sign heres and initial theres. One of the clauses in one of the paragraphs in one of the sections of one of those forms is a passage that requires the bank that holds the mortgage to place a public notice in the local newspaper before it evicts you for falling behind on your payments. This is an important safeguard for homeowners. State Senate Majority Leader Thomas K. Tommy Norment, RJames City, is trying to take it away. Again. He is sponsoring Senate Bill 1368, which would remove that requirement from the lenders and instead only call upon them to let homeowners know that they can check on foreclosure notices filed at the courthouse or posted online. He proposed very similar legislation last year. It went down on a 1720 vote when two of his fellow Republicans voted against it and two others were temporarily off the Senate floor when the votes were taken. Now it is up before the Senate again, and it needs to go down again. Understand as you read this that The Daily Press, The Free LanceStar and other Virginia newspapers have a financial stake here. When these required notices of pending foreclosure appear in print, they are paid ads. Newspapers profit from them. But that has nothing to do with our opposition to Sen. Norments bill. Our opposition is about protecting homeowners as much as possible from surprise foreclosures. Published notices help ensure that the legal process is followed. Those who support Sen. Norments bill argue that it is cheaper to forgo paid advertisements and instead put the word out by social media and other digital channels. This is true, but it is also less efficient. Cheaper does not always mean better. Though this may be hard for some folks to accept, there are plenty of American citizens who dont own computers, or who are not online every day or who only waderather than surfthe internet. It would be ludicrous to suggest to these people that it is their responsibility to find the online notices alerting them to a pending foreclosure on their property. In many cases, these people get their information from the newspaper old-school print edition. If critical information must be conveyed, with a reasonable likelihood of reaching them, that paid legal notice is as good a bet as any. It needs to remain in the contract, in the agreement between buyer, seller and lender. In a standard loan contract, it is the lenders responsibilityfinancial and otherwiseto take these steps, including the newspaper ad. It is part of the agreement by which the lender does everything reasonably possible to let the borrower or homeowner know before foreclosure puts someone on the street. A homeowner about to have the rug pulled out from underalong with the walls, the ceilings, the doors, and windowsshould receive every possible notice. Allowing the other parties to ignore their contractual obligations? Putting the onus on that homeowner to check the courthouse and negotiate municipal and court websites? This is not acceptable, even if it does save a few bucks. Sen. Norments legislation fits into a larger pattern that should be disturbing to Virginia residents. Our commonwealth requires just three days notice before foreclosure, far shorter than most states. And Virginia does not require a judges order to evict. In the broader picture, keep in mind that our legislature has an extremely weak record when it comes to keeping the public informedeven the most fundamental tenets of the state Freedom of Information Act sometimes require protracted legal action. Take it from us. We know. The standard contract for the purchase of a home is a long and complicated document with specific requirements spelled out for all parties. If the homeowners fail to comply with their end of the deal, they face the consequences. The lenders, by the same logic, should have to live up to their end. Including the language that requires paid public notices in the local newspaper before resorting to foreclosure. This clause is in the contract for your protection. The prospect of your elected officials stripping that protection away should set off some warning bells. The (Newport News) Daily Press Affordable education key to a strong economy Higher education can be an economic engine that helps diversify and grow Virginias economy, but only if its affordable. Im a staunch supporter of school choice, and I believe that all education options, whether that is a two-year community college, four-year college or university, or a trade school, should be available and affordable to all Virginians. We cannot let the fear of debt stop people from continuing their education. Workplace readiness is incredibly important, and for many, that starts with some sort of higher education. More than two-thirds of Virginia voters reject the notion that our four-year public colleges and universities are affordable, and support holding the line on future tuition increases. Voters name higher education as a concern and understand that for many, an affordable education has always been the ticket to a better and brighter future. In Virginia, the cost of tuition has skyrocketed by 74 percent over the last 10 years. If the average Virginian wants to send a child to college, they had better be prepared to spend almost 25 percent of a years gross earnings on tuition and fees. Unfortunately, for every $1 reduction in state funding for public college and universities, tuition goes up by $2. The rise in what a degree costs threatens Virginias economy and future, and that is just unacceptable. As leaders in our communities, we must encourage our youth to continue their education path no matter which route they choose to take. Campaign season is well underway in Virginia, and there are stark differences on many issues. There should be no difference about how to make education an affordable opportunity. Virginians want solutions, and its up to the General Assembly to deliver. You can count on me to deliver. Sen. Bryce Reeves Spotsylvania I, as a lifelong resident of Virginia, am appalled by the decision of our governor to not attend the inauguration of Donald J. Trump. Nothing exemplifies the division in our country more than the actions of the Democrats during this important process. Bedalovs teams approach aims to take advantage of a unique aspect of female biology, known as X inactivation. Women and all female mammals have two copies of the X chromosome, but one of these chromosomes is tightly bundled and almost completely shut off in every cell, effectively muting nearly all of its approximately 2,000 genes. X inactivation is somewhat mysterious, but researchers know that the choice to silence a given X chromosome happens early in embryonic development, and that choice appears to be random. About half of a female embryos cells silence their maternal X chromosome; the other half switch off dads X. Once that X is silenced, it stays off as cells continue to grow and divide as the embryo grows, each new cell keeps the same chromosome silenced as its ancestor did. This phenomenon is responsible for a variety of natural occurrences, from calico coloration in cats (the genes coding for black or orange fur reside on the X chromosome) to the fact that identical female twins are often less identical than their male counterparts. (Even though identical female twins carry identical DNA instructions in all their cells, X inactivation means female twins sometimes use their genetic code differently from their sisters.) And X inactivation also underlies certain sex-linked disorders like Rett syndrome the disease-causing gene, MECP2, is carried on the X chromosome. Even though, on average, half of a girls neurons will produce the healthy version of the MeCP2 protein, the loss of the protein due to the mutation in the other half of neurons is enough to trigger the syndrome. The research team is working toward a therapy that would reawaken the inactive X, the silenced X chromosome in every cell, thus potentially reversing the syndrome by spurring the activity of the normal version of the gene in formerly diseased cells. The 30 genes that Bedalov and his team found do just that in adult mouse cells. Its not implausible to believe that the developmental syndrome could be reversed, said Bedalov, who is also an oncologist and transplant physician at Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, Fred Hutchs clinical care partner. Ten years ago, a mouse study from researchers at the University of Edinburgh made waves in the Rett syndrome community because it suggested that the diseases symptoms could be overcome by restoring normal levels of the healthy version of the MECP2 gene. Girls with Rett syndrome dont produce enough of the MeCP2 protein in many of their neurons, which leads to developmental delays ranging from mild to severe. The landmark 2007 study showed that restoring levels of MeCP2 in a mouse model of Rett syndrome could reverse these symptoms even in adult animals, showing that the mutations effects may not do permanent damage to the brain. Although a promising first step, the approach that team used to target MeCP2 in mice is not possible to do in humans. We just have to find a way to wake it up Now, Bedalov and his colleagues at Fred Hutch, Harvard Medical School and the University of Pennsylvania have identified a class of genes that could be new therapeutic targets for the disease in humans. The researchers found that when these genes activity is blocked, the normal copy of MECP2 is partially reactivated along with other genes on the inactive X in adult mouse cells in the lab. Although there are U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs that target some of the 30 genes uncovered in their study, Bedalov cautioned that even an early-stage clinical trial for their approach is a long way off. First, the researchers want to confirm that reactivating the X chromosome works in a female mouse model of Rett syndrome. Theyre currently in the process of developing this animal model. Because the genes theyve found dont fully reactivate the silent X chromosome, its not clear whether blocking their activity will be enough to reverse the syndrome. Next, they will test some of those drugs, which include a class of targeted cancer drugs known as PI3K inhibitors, in the mouse model. Because the research teams approach leads to the reactivation of the entire chromosome, it could also apply to other, similar disorders, as several other genes on the X chromosome have been linked to developmental disorders in girls. Researchers used to think that reawakening the entire silent X chromosome could be disastrous, Bedalov said. Studies in animal models showed that embryos unable to silence one of their X chromosomes die well before birth. But his lab has seen early hints that partially lifting X-chromosome silencing in adult mouse brains appears to not harm the animals. The research project was initiated and funded by the Rett Syndrome Research Trust, or RSRT, an organization launched by Monica Coenraads, whose daughter, Chelsea, has Rett syndrome. When Chelsea was first diagnosed in 1998, a genetic test for the disease hadnt yet been developed. Chelsea, who is now 20, has a long list of symptoms she lives with, Coenraads said, but shes so much more than the laundry list of symptoms. Even though Chelsea is wheelchair-bound, doesnt speak or use her hands, she loves being around people and has an amazing smile, her mother said. She deals with so much and yet she does it with grace and courage, said Coenraads, the executive director of RSRT. We cant wait for the day to have something that improves her life. Coenraads led a different foundation that helped fund the 2007 study showing that the disease could be reversed in animals. Scientists working on Rett syndrome many of them partnering with RSRT are pursuing multiple different avenues to overcoming the deficit of MECP2, Coenraads said. Reactivating the naturally occurring, inactive form of the gene has a certain logical appeal, she said. The concept that there is a healthy copy of this gene in every cell, we dont have to deliver it, its already there, we just have to find a way to wake it up its a very attractive approach, Coenraads said. Free Freightnet Membership List your company in the Freightnet directory. It's Free, it's Easy and your company can be displayed in front of potential freight buyers within 24 hours. One split-second decision made on a dairy farm in Devon during a particularly wet August day in 2012 has changed the lives of 1,600 people in North Central Kenya. When Richard Gibson from Nether Woodburn Farm, near Tiverton, opened the letter beginning Dear farmer inviting him to take part in a BBC TV series, he nearly tossed it in the bin. But after another wet day on the farm and some encouragement from his wife, Heather, he re-read it and completed the online application. Several forms, psychiatric and screen tests later, and while sat on the scraper tractor, Richard received a phone call confirming that he had been chosen to take part in a programme called The toughest place to be a farmer. Apart from the clues he could gather from the packing list and the injections required, Richard had no idea where he was going and what he would be doing. I had to have a yellow fever injection, so I knew it was South America or Africa, but Africas a big place, he says. The Samburu community Richard spent 15 days living with the Samburu people in a village called Mpagas. The villagers built him a hut and, though they dont have beds themselves, made him a bed to protect him from the scorpions and snakes on the floor. He was accompanied by a producer, an assistant producer and a cameraman. However, he spent a lot of time with just his host, fellow farmer Lemeragichen, and with the villagers, who are related to the better-known Maasai tribe. During the fortnight spent in Kenya, Richard fully immersed himself in their way of life, although he did decline the offer of the circumcision ritual required to make you a warrior. One of the tasks he had to complete was fetching the water with his hosts wife. They had to walk 40 minutes in blistering heat to fill up four five-litre cans with water from a 10 foot well and carry them home again. The thing I got out of it was that they might die in a months time, but we have a lot to be jealous of, Richard says. They were really warm and genuinely kind to me, and they didnt have to be. See also: Farmers reveal what its like to be featured on TV Farming in Mpagas The Samburu people used to be nomadic, but have created more permanent settlements over the years. They are pastoralists, farming cattle and goats for their own consumption and to sell. The animals spend most of the day roaming grazing often dead grass and leaves, as Richard recalls but must be bought into an enclosure at night because of the threat of predators. Calves and kids are kept inside a hut most of the day and are released to feed from their mothers at set times. When the youngstock is feeding, the farmers will milk the other teat. They would be getting about a pint a cow a day very different yields from those Richard gets from his 120 cows at home. They sometimes kill and eat a goat, but eat little meat really, existing mainly on maize meal, milk and blood. I couldnt survive on what they ate, its nothing. I lost about a stone in two weeks, Richard says. On his trip, Richard went to one of the local towns to meet a herdsman who had lost all his cattle because of drought and had to leave the land to find jobs such as cracking stones to make concrete for the road. I just rush around like a slave doing any jobs I can to get money for my family, the tribesman told Richard. I used to be a proud man, but I am nothing here. Farming in Devon has its challenges. But finding water is not one of them Richard Gibson It was clear when the programme was screened that this story moved father of two Richard. And it was one of the moments that led to the charity Aid for Samburu being born. Farming in Devon has its challenges, says Richard. But finding water is not one of them. It was clear they had a huge, huge water problem, Richard adds. And he decided upon returning home that he would set about raising money to change that. Aid for Samburu Reunited with Heather on British soil, Richard got the ball rolling on his mission. The couple started ringing around charities to ask if they would be able to drill a borehole if they raised the money for it. Its far too remote was a common response and so the Gibsons decided they would have to get going on their own. The TV programme Richard featured in was due to air in March 2013. The couple knew that might be their best bit of publicity, because Richard told the camera he planned to go home and fundraise. With that deadline looming, Heather began tackling the world of memorandums, constitutions, trustees and gift aid tax codes in order to set up an official charity and JustGiving page and was successful in doing so just a week before the show aired on BBC Two. Were just farmers and we didnt know anything about all this, says Heather. One thing I have learnt is that if you dont know what youre doing, just hold your hands up and seek as much advice as you can, she adds. Aid For Samburu was founded with a committee of locals and friends, with the key aim to help fellow farmers in a less favourable part of the world. The charity has raised money both through donations and pledges, as well as a lot of fundraising. Heather and Richard have organised numerous clay shoots, dinner dances and quizzes, as well as travelling widely giving talks. Its a good job I like cooking, says Heather. We have also been lucky to receive some big backing from an investment company who saw the BBC programme. Its incredible how generous people are. One of the things people like about us is that we have no overheads, no running costs apart from a website so 98p of every pound goes to the Samburu people. The water project Once the fundraising got going, step one was to sort out a plan of action for getting a water source to Richards host community. After lots of research and deliberation on the best way to provide water, Heather and Richard found The Milgis Trust, a charity in northern Kenya, who would help with a borehole project. The Milgis Trust is a conservation charity run by a Kenyan lady called Helen Douglas-Dufresne, who had implemented successful water projects previously, understood the Kenyan way of working and the Samburu people and was keen on the project because it would also hold huge benefits for wildlife as well as the people and livestock. Installing a water system held more complications than Richard and Heather could ever have imagined from the access issues to the elephants who might destroy it in search of their own water. Finding the right spot to drill was another huge task. To do so, they employed a hydrogeologist who identified an area where he believed there was an ancient underwater river. And although they knew the spot, they didnt know if the water would be drinkable or full of salt. And then they had to get a drilling rig there. In November 2015, the borehole was drilled. Sure enough, they hit an underground river and the water was beautiful. One borehole, a solar-powered pump, 11km of trenched pipework and two 10,000-litre tanks later, three villages Mpagas, Mpang and Marti-Dorop have a plentiful water supply. Needless to say, the villagers are incredibly grateful as it has changed their lives completely as well as those of the livestock and local wildlife. We are told they are suffering a nasty drought at the moment, but our community has at least got water, Heather says. The borehole and solar panels are within a security compound that is always manned by two water custodians. The panels themselves need cleaning twice a day because, being on the equator, they must lie horizontally and so get very dusty. The system is also manned by scouts in the area and there is a mobile mechanic on hand for any issues. One problem that had to be fixed was a water tank that had been trashed by baboons in search of a drink. A new wall should prevent repeat vandalism. All in, the project has cost 76,000. This covers all the planning and preparation work, transport and implementation as well as maintaining the system and looking after its security for five years. The villages have formed a committee who will hopefully take it over after this time. Long-term sustainability is key, says Heather. Aid For Samburu still has 9,000 to raise to cover the trenching fees for the water pipes and maintenance the devaluing of the pound has, of course, hindered them paying off the project costs. The future We thought we might draw a line under it once the water project was complete, says Heather. In fact, they are now already working on new projects that the villagers asked for help with. One of these initiatives is a veterinary programme, firstly focusing on the rabies problem in their dogs. Dogs are in this strange void because the people need them to protect the village and their livestock from hyenas, for example but the people dont want to be too close to the dogs in case they have rabies, Richard explains. The plan is to look at a vaccination and identification programme, possibly involving microchipping. Were coming at it from a farming point of view because thats what we know, adds Heather. I want to help them look at the quality of their cattle as well as the quantity, says Richard, who has seen how the water availability had increased milk yields by June 2016. Another of the issues the men and women of the village have raised is birth control, so Aid for Samburu and the Milgis Trust have begun work on helping the community with family planning. Richard says: You have to do what they want, not just what you think is best. I initially published this post in my personal blog GameMakers.com. Check it out to learn more mobile gaming design techniques, analysis, and industry opinions. Context: Every mobile gaming company has their own system for describing different types of mobile games. In other words, a mobile gaming taxonomy or classification system. Unfortunately, no industry standard exists. Further, I've been very unhappy with the current taxonomies developed by the various research firms out there. As a good friend of mine stated recently to me: When you have Clash of Clans and Game of War in the same classification category, something is definitely wrong. To help promote a shared understanding within our industry I'm proposing an "open-source taxonomy" based upon my own understanding of the market. I'd be happy for other companies or research firms to adopt this standard if possible. Further, I'd love to hear feedback and debate how to improve upon the proposed mobile gaming taxonomy below. Classification Approach: To build the taxonomy, I relied on 3 primary principles: Gameplay Focus: Focus differentiation of categories based on gameplay instead of systems or other metrics Top-Down High-Level Categories: Build high-level categories top-down using an easy to understand classification approach Bottom-Up Sub-Categories: Build sub-categories/genres using a bottom-up approach based on the actual types of games we find in the marketplace Gameplay Focus: At a high-level, I wanted to distinguish categories based on an overriding characteristic. The two characteristics that seemed to make the most sense were either: 1. Gameplay or 2. Systems. I chose to focus on gameplay because we often see similar systems (e.g., Gacha, guild, etc.) mixed in very different kinds of games. However, to the player, I believe they would consider games more different based on the core gameplay itself rather than based on the, for example, monetization system used. Taking a more specific example: Summoner's War and Puzzle and Dragon both use Gacha Fusion system design mechanics for character progression but the better classification against those two games would be the core gameplay (Turn based battle vs. Match-3). Top-Down High-Level: I picked high-level categories that seemed to make the most logical sense and those I thought easy to understand. I also eliminated some categories I didn't feel appropriate for mobile or felt dated (e.g., Arcade category vs. Action). Finally, I also picked categories which I believe will be up and coming such as the Party category and Racing. Bottom-Up Sub-Categories: In my view, the sub-categories need to be rooted in what actually exists in the market. The audience has already decided what types of games they like with the money they spent. Hence, we develop a sub-categorization focused on making sense of what kinds of products were actually generating revenue. Further, from a developer perspective, studios will find higher granularity of sub-categories more insightful and actionable. As a specific example, for Shooting and RPG categories you'll see a much higher level of granularity than from typical research firms out there. I believe developers want to know, for example, the relative success if building a Shooting type game between FPS, TPS, and cover-based shooter games. As another example, we know Match based games are a huge category, but it's more useful to distinguish between the various types of Match such as match-3, match blast, line matching, or otherwise. Proposed Mobile Gaming Taxonomy: So here below is the proposed mobile gaming taxonomy: You can scroll the spreadsheet above horizontally. Let me know what you think! Ameri-Tool Industries officials believe that obtaining ISO certification an international manufacturing and quality control standard will help the Albany company snare new contracts with aerospace, defense and medical industries and other sectors of the economy. If we wanted to do business with Boeing, for example, youd have to be ISO certified, said Todd Piller, a Lebanon resident who is in the process of taking over ownership of the company. Having the certification will give us the possibility to go after many more quotes. Theres a lot of health care items that have to be ISO. Its just a huge opportunity for us, he added. Steve Edwards, who currently owns the company with Burl Smith, said that ISO certification is the wave of the future. If we dont get on board soon, there will be less and less opportunities, Edwards said. Piller said he will use a $50,000 grant from the city of Albany to obtain ISO certification and new contracts could result in the hiring of as many as 50 new workers. The injection mold plastics manufacturing company, located at 2420 Three Lakes Road S.E., currently has about 25 employees. The grant was awarded by the Albany City Council in mid-January after Ameri-Tool considered moving to Redmond, which was offering financial incentives to lure the company to town. Per terms of the grant, Ameri-Tool must stay in Albany for the next 10 years. Im very pleased that the council members supported this unanimously. It gives me great faith in this city and how they want to keep manufacturing here, Edwards said. Edwards and Smith, who are looking to retire, said they expect the ownership transfer to be finalized sometime between three months from now and the end of 2017. Smith said that it was important for the duo to ensure the future of Ameri-Tool, and the livelihood of long-term workers. Todd has some experience in the industry and the desire to build the company, Smith said. Piller has worked in plastics for 25 years and was the general manager of Nypro when that company was based in Corvallis. Ive worked with many, many large Fortune 500 companies, he said. Ameri-Tool has been in business for 36 years. The company started in Corvallis, but moved to Albany in the mid-1980s after being offered property tax incentives, Edwards said. At its peak in the 1990s, Ameri-Tool had roughly 75 workers. Edwards said the North American Free Trade Agreement resulted in many customers going to Mexico or China, and the company had to restructure as a result. Among Ameri-Tools major current products are parts for defibrillators. Those require ISO certification, but Ameri-Tool has been making them so long that the company is grandfathered in. Our quality control system today follows the same principles, but we are not certified, Piller said. Ameri-Tool also makes parts for metal detectors and for consumer electronics, Edwards said. Our products can be seen pretty much worldwide, Edwards said. We probably arent that well-known in Albany, because we dont really sell anything locally. Endocrinology adds nurse practitioner Deborah Marchino, a family nurse practitioner, has joined Samaritan Endocrinology. Marchino, who has worked for Samaritan Health Services for 11 years, has a special interest in endocrinology. In her new role, she will see patients with types 1 and 2 diabetes, assisting them with insulin pumps and continuous blood glucose monitors. Additionally, she will see patients with thyroid disease and other endocrine issues. Most recently, Marchino worked at Samaritan Internal Medicine. Previously, she was a nurse for nine years at Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center, caring for patients in the hospitals progressive care unit. Marchino earned a bachelors degree at Oregon Health & Science University and a masters degree at Gonzaga University. She can be reached at 541-768-7900. Broker joins Coldwell Banker Broker Lyle Hatch now is working at Coldwell Banker Valley Brokers in Corvallis. Hatch moved to the Willamette Valley four years ago. He is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran and has spent decades in the contracting trades. He can be reached at 541-224-3785 or LHatch@valleybrokers.com. Starker Forests appears in calendar Starker Forests, a fifth-generation family company that manages nearly 90,000 acres of forest in Corvallis, is featured for February in the 2017 SAIF calendar. The theme of this years calendar, which has been distributed to more than 50,000 policyholders, agents and other stakeholders statewide, is Good Things Grow in Oregon, to celebrate the more than 300,000 Oregonians who work in jobs supported directly or indirectly by agriculture. Further information about Starker Forests is available at SAIF.com/WOW. OSU professor garners award Oregon State University mathematics professor Tevian Dray recently received the 2017 Deborah and Franklin Tepper Haimo Award for Distinguished College or University Teaching of Mathematics from the Mathematical Association of America. The award honors college or university teachers who have been recognized as successful and influential beyond their own institutions. Dray was honored for the award at the 2017 Joint Mathematics Meetings, held Jan. 4 through 7 in Atlanta. He is the first winner from Oregon State since the awards inception nearly 25 years ago. Joining the College of Science faculty in 1988, Dray is a teacher who aims to foster curiosity and excitement in his interactive classroom. He uses both alternative and nontraditional teaching methods as needed to empower students to discover for themselves the beauty and depth hidden in mathematics. His success is mirrored by his students assessments: More than 50 percent of his numerical evaluations over the past decade have been at least 5.8 on a 6.0 scale, and students consistently comment that he inspires them to be active learners and removes barriers through open discussions. Dixon reappointed to youth council Recently retired Benton County Commissioner Jay Dixon has been reappointed to the board of the Oregon Youth Development Council. Dixons term lasts till 2020. He will serve as the councils vice-chair. The YDC is part of the Oregon Department of Educations Youth Development Division. The council is responsible for developing and implementing policies that re-engage youths from the ages of 16 to 24 who are not in school or working, and to engage youth ages 6 to 15 who may be on the trajectory to become disengaged from school and future workforce opportunities. Dixons history of serving Oregons children and families began in 1999 when he was elected to the Corvallis School District Board and chaired the first successful local option school levy campaign in Oregon, Corvallis Kids Count! One of the biggest question marks surrounding the 2017 legislative session is this one: Will proposals to try to rein in the costs of the state's Public Employees Retirement System finally get a full and fair hearing this year? Democratic legislators and Gov. Kate Brown have been less than enthusiastic about that task over the last few years, especially in the wake of a 2015 state Supreme Court ruling that tossed out many of the significant reforms legislators approved in 2013. In the wake of that ruling, the line we heard from legislators was that there was little that could be done to fix the PERS problems or certainly nothing that would put a significant dent in the huge imbalance between the fund's assets and its obligations, currently estimated at about $22 billion. And they added, even if a magic bullet existed to fix our PERS issues, it certainly wouldn't withstand another legal challenge. So, while local governments and school districts gird for an initial set of premium increases that will cost an estimated $800 million for the two budget years beginning in July (and even larger increases in the budget cycles to come), the Legislature has shrugged off even modest attempts at reform. The picture may be changing a bit for the 2017 session. Republicans (and even some Democrats) have been floating suggestions for PERS reform and have gotten legal advice that some of those suggestions could withstand a legal challenge. Republicans have introduced two bills this session, Senate Bills 559 and 560, that they say would trim some PERS costs. The bills would: Redirect employees' required 6 percent retirement contributions to support the pension fund; those contributions currently go into a supplemental investment account that belongs to the employee. Cap a members' final average salary used in the calculation of their benefits at $100,000. Change the calculation of final average salary so it is the average of five years of wages instead of three. These changes would not solve all of the PERS issues facing Oregon. And it's a matter of debate as to how much of a difference they'd make financially and whether they're legal. But this is a debate that we can no longer afford to ignore, and that means giving legislative committees a fair shot at examining these bills and other PERS proposals that may surface this session. Besides, Republicans have a bargaining chip to use this session: The state's $1.8 billion budget shortfall (partially created by rising PERS costs) means that legislators will be looking for additional revenue. But Democrats will need votes from Republicans to raise taxes. Republicans have said they'll come to the table to talk revenue, but not until progress is made on PERS reform. And since this is a longer session, scheduled to run into July, that means legislators will have time to consider a variety of PERS proposals, in contrast to the shorter legislative sessions held in even-numbered years. Mike McLane, the House Republican leader, took note of that last week during a meeting with Oregon journalists: "Now is the appropriate time to have big policy discussions," he said. McLane meant the comment as a not-so-veiled jab at the big-deal policy issues that Democrats pushed through in the 2016 short session. Jab aside, though, he has a point: This session should offer ample opportunity to take a careful and detailed look at what sort of PERS changes could make a dent in the system's costs, honor the commitments we've made to state workers and withstand inevitable legal challenges. That may be a hard trifecta to hit, but the difficulty of the task doesn't let legislators off the hook. (mm) Dumplings. Eggplant with garlic sauce. Tofu skin salad. Mongolian beef. Grandmother style braised pork. Meat balls. Egg tarts. Jasmine tea. All of this was on the menu for the estimated 700 to 800 people who attended the annual China Night at Oregon State University Sunday, an event that also included performances and traditional celebrations for the Lunar New Year. Yipeng Song, co-president of the Chinese Association of OSU, said the organization has put on the event for at least a decade to coincide with the most important festival of the year in China. We are having this event to give people a feeling of home, and also there are a lot of people interested in Chinese culture, and this gives them a chance to experience it, he said. Song, a third-year student in computer science, said in addition to having OSU students perform at the event, they had student groups from other universities and groups from the Corvallis perform. He said he was happy with the turnout at the event and hoped people attending got a chance to learn about Chinese culture. According to Song, to make the event happen they involved around 50 volunteers. Shuang Lin, a senior in business and treasurer of the Chinese Association, ran the kitchen at the event. She said the students begin planning three months in advance for the event, and they work with OSU kitchen staff to make sure the menu is acceptable and to order much of their food through the university. They also specialty ordered some ingredients before spending most of Saturday and Sunday cooking. Lin said many Americans havent had much experience with authentic Chinese food, since Chinese restaurants in the United States are serving an Americanized version of Chinese food. We want to let everyone try some real Chinese food, she said. Lin said its a lot of work to prepare the food, but its gratifying to see all the people who attended. She said she hopes the event helps improve the relationship between China and America. This kind of event helps everyone understand Chinese culture, she said. Lin added she thinks western culture influences eastern culture more than vice versa, but she hopes events like this change that some, because there are Chinese values she believes would be good for western nations, such a deep devotion to one's parents. Donald Trump promises to repeal and replace Obamacare and has said that replacement and repeal should be simultaneous. Let's hope he insists on simultaneity. Repeal would be delayed since there is no Republican consensus on a replacement. But delay is preferable to the mess caused by a mere repeal. Obamacare insured millions of additional people. And some parts are very popular, especially its ban on denying insurance to people with pre-existing conditions. But insurance markets would be destroyed if this ban is retained but the most unpopular part of Obamacare, mandatory purchase of insurance, is not also retained. The obvious way to escape from this dilemma is to enact a single-payer system an improved Medicare-For-All financed by general taxes. Nobody would have to buy insurance, but everyone would be insured. People would not have to choose between incomprehensible policies with different coverage and doctor networks. Patients would no longer churn between different types of insurance, each with its own network, as incomes change. People would no longer have to document their finances in order to qualify for subsidies. Medical providers would no longer need huge staffs now costing about $80,000 per year for every doctor to bill dozens of insurance companies. Readers familiar with TV's Doc Martin may remember that this irascible English doctor has only one employee. Conservatives bemoan duplicated government programs and administrative bloat. But we now have separate government agencies for insuring poor people, retirees, veterans, and native Americans. We also have private bloat: back-room staffing at medical providers and huge staffs insurance companies use to figure out reasons for not covering people. This presents an opportunity for Donald Trump, a world-class opportunist. Imagine him explaining to his supporters, often not economically advantaged, why a system covering medical bills with only nominal co-payments, no deductibles, and no out-of-network doctors would be strongly in their interest. Or explaining to black Americans how an improved Medicare For All would do more for minorities than any other conceivable government program. If Trump were to propose Medicare-For-All, Democrats in Congress would support him, and so would many of the voters, Republicans and independents, who supported him. Medicare-For-All would not require establishment of a new bureaucracy, since Medicare is already a going concern. Indeed, it would allow elimination of the organizations now covering the poor, veterans, and native Americans. Trump, knowing how to get national attention, will be uniquely able to explain why inevitable criticism of his proposal by the medical-pharmaceutical-insurance complex is self-interested and misleading. He can explain why taxes necessary to pay for Medicare For All will cost average (and especially below-average) Americans less than they are already paying, directly and indirectly, for medical care. Although most congressional Republicans have opposed single-payer, if Trump convinces public opinion many Republican congressmen would have to vote for it. If single-payer failed to pass, Trump could urge voters to unseat those who opposed it in 2018. It took red-baiter Richard Nixon to restore U.S. relations with China. Can a Republican president bring us Medicare For All? A recent story in the news was about a Chinese nuclear submarine being spotted in Google Earth imagery showing it docked in port at Karachi, Pakistan. The image in question was from May, 2016: Submarine in Karachi, May 2016. Since then, a new image from October 2016 has been added to Google Earth: Another submarine in Karachi, October 2016. But the submarine in the October image appears smaller, so is probably a Pakistan owned submarine. We can see two Pakistani submarines in a later October image in a different part of the port: Pakistani submarines in Karachi, October 2016. This makes us wonder whether or not it would be worthwhile for countries around the world to build roofs over their military ports to hide the movements of their submarines given the current easy access to satellite imagery. We also wonder to what extent militaries around the world use Google Earth imagery to monitor other nations, or do they rely on their own sources. Our guess is that in this case, Indian intelligence services were well aware of the submarines visit long before it appeared in a Google Earth image. Tanker Explosion In November 2016, not far from the Karachi port, also in Pakistan, at the Gadani shipbreaking yard, an oil tanker that was being dismantled there exploded, killing at least six people and injuring over two hundred. Digital Globe captured an image of the location soon after as part of their FirstLook program The oil tanker that exploded. To find the above locations in Google Earth download this KML file. World Conference Centre Bonn : Row with architects delays roof canopy Bonn A 1.4 million euro roof canopy to be built as rain protection in front of the new convention hall at the WCCB is being delayed by an architect dispute. The city is hoping for a temporary solution. Teilen Teilen Weiterleiten Weiterleiten Tweeten Tweeten Weiterleiten Weiterleiten Drucken Michael Kleine-Hartlage is slowly growing impatient. The managing director of Bonn Conference Centre Management GmbH (Bonn CC) has been waiting for a long time for the planned approximately 1000 square metre roof canopy to be built in front of the new convention hall at the World Conference Centre Bonn (WCCB) at a cost of around 1.4 million euros. He says the roof canopy is very important to the smooth running of the WCCB. It will shelter visitors to conventions and conferences from rain and snow while waiting outside the building for their accreditation during busy periods. The proprietary rights to the planning and construction of a roof canopy at the WCCB belong to Ruth Berktold and Marion Wicher, architects at the Munich based Yes architecture. They won the tender for the WCCB including the hotel at the end of 2004 and are also supposed to design the roof canopy. The city of Bonn approached the two proprietary rights owners some time ago. However, up to now we have been unable to reach a solution to the questions of proprietary rights because the architects cannot agree with each other, said city spokeswoman Monika Horig when questioned by the General Anzeiger. It is currently unclear whether permanent roofing can be built at the WCCB. Monika Horig said mobile or temporary solutions could be used for large events and the city was in contact with Bonn CC about this. One of the architects, Ruth Berktold, would only tell the General Anzeiger: I am still waiting today for city of Bonn to contact me. The comment was met with astonishment by the city of Bonn. Time is running out for Kleine-Hartlage. We hope an appropriate solution will have been found at the latest by the start of the World Climate Conference, he said. The conference is due to take place in Bonn this November and Bonn CC is expecting around 20,000 participants from all over the world. Although they will not all come at once, many will have to stand outside during busy periods. Kleine-Hartlage is therefore drawing up temporary solutions so that no-one will get wet feet. They can be put up and taken down as needed and will not need the permission of the proprietary rights holders. Page Not Found Well that's embarassing. It looks like the page you're looking for has been moved or is no longer available. Article Protecting the worlds oceans an important goal of Germanys climate diplomacy The worlds oceans are vital to our survival. They regulate the global climate and are a source of food and income for billions of people. Only a very small part of the seas enjoys legal protection, however. Our diplomats are working in New York right now to change this state of affairs. New technology lets you control smartwatch using breath and skin Features oi -Samden Sherpa Whoosh lets users reject or answer calls by shushing or blowing at the device. With advances in connectivity and computing, smartwatches have redefined the way we access data and produce information. While the smartwatch phenomenon first began in 2015, today the trend is in full swing. Moreover, it looks like 2017 is going to be a big year for smartwatches as many companies are bound to release improved versions of their devices. Also with the proliferation of technology who knows we could see smartwatches with some added and enhanced features that would leave us awestruck. That being said, Researchers at Georgia Institute of Technology in the US have in fact created Whoosh, a technique that allows a person to control the smartwatch by blowing, exhaling, shushing, sipping or puffing on the screen. Basically, you can now take calls by simply blowing at your smartwatch. OnePlus 3T gets new FreedomOS ROM which lets you uninstall Google and System apps Sounds amazing right! So if you are wondering how does this work then, the research report reveals that the smartwatch uses its microphone and machine learning to identify the breath patterns of each acoustic event, and then assigns an action to each. For example, a wearer can shush the watch to ignore a call or blow on it twice to accept. The watch can also be locked or unlocked using a correct combination of short or long breaths. In addition, you can do more. While voice recognition may sometimes produce incorrect words when dictating a text message, blowing quickly on the watch can also erase words, while blowing on it longer will send the text message when ready. The technique also works with smartphones. A user can transfer content from the smartwatch to a smartphone simply by sipping it off the watch and puffing it on the phone. The technology could have the potential for people with disabilities, researchers said. This is only one of the recent innovations in the smartwatch domain. In fact, another new interaction technique WatchOut has also been developed and instead of the controlling your smartwatch with your breath, this technique uses taps and scrolling gestures on the case and watchband, outside the watch screen. So users can control the actions in the smartwatch by making use of the smartwatch's gyroscope and accelerometer sensors. SEE ALSO: LG's upcoming Android Wear smartwatch images leaked "Other techniques that improve control of smartwatches have included 3D gestures above the screen, bigger screens or adding an extra armband," said Cheng Zhang, a Ph.D. student at Georgia Tech. "We wanted to show it could be done with existing technology already common on today's devices," said Zhang. The study conducted by Zhang and the others further show that scrolling on rubber watchbands was more accurate than leather bands due to the different friction of the materials. They have also created an app that can create eight touchpoints on the device's bezel. Rather than scrolling through a long list of apps, the user simply hits one of eight spots on the case to launch Facebook, for example "We have created a technique that allows the user to tap the watch to accept or deny phone calls. Hitting the right side answers the call; the left side ignores it," he said. And things just don't end there. The researchers have developed feature known as TapSkin and this allows users to tap on the back of their hand to input numbers 0-9 or commands. The technique uses the watch's microphone and inertial sensors to detect a total of 11 different tapping locations on a person's skin around the watch. You can read the research paper HERE. Best Mobiles in India Facebook, To stay updated with latest technology news & gadget reviews, follow GizBot on Twitter YouTube and also subscribe to our notification. Allow Notifications How to book an Uber ride with Google Maps Tips Tricks oi -Abhinaya Prabhu Book Uber from Google Maps. A couple of weeks back, Google rolled out an update to its location and navigation service - Google Maps. This update added the redesigned ride services section to the app. The ride services were already a part of Google Maps, but until this update, Google Maps would just offer the ride estimate for Ola and Uber cab hailing services and to complete the process of booking the ride, users had to use the respective apps. With the most recent Google Maps update, users can book either an Uber ride without opening the app of the cab hailing service. However, this is not the case with Ola. Users who want to book an Ola ride still have to open the Ola app to complete the booking process. The advantage of the integration of Uber service in Google Maps is that users need not even install the Uber app on their smartphone. It just requires users to sign in to the Uber account to book a ride directly from Google Maps. Google unveils SD card support, Wi-Fi only mode for Maps If you want to book an Uber ride within the Google Maps app, you can take a look at the steps that we have listed out below. Once again, we make it clear that you need to have an account with Uber to avail this service. Step 1 Open Google Maps and enter the destination on the search bar. Turn on the location service so that the app fetches your current location. At the bottom right, you can see a car icon that will show the direction, tap on this icon. Also Read: Google Maps beta shows parking availability to select users Step 2 Along with the current location and destination, you can see four tabs - navigation by car, public transit, walk, and ride services. Tap on the ride services tab. Step 3 On tapping on ride services, you can see both Ola and Uber services. On tapping on Uber, you will get options such as UberPOOL, UberGO, Uber X, and Uber XL. The options come along with the estimated fare as well. Apart from these, you can also get to know how quickly the car can arrive at your current location. Also Read: Google Maps updated: New features to checkout Step 4 Below each option, there is a request icon that you need to click to book a ride. Tap on request and Google Maps will ask for the details such as the login credentials of your Uber account. Once you key in the details, the estimated fare will be shown along with the different payment modes. Confirm the details and tap on 'book'. That's it! Your booking is complete and you will get the ride details including the name of the driver, vehicle type and its registration number. There are options to call the driver and to cancel the ride as well. The interesting thing is that Google is also providing a discount of Rs. 50 on the final fare of the ride on booking an Uber from the Google Maps app. Best Mobiles in India Nokia and Orange Group join hands to make 5G a reality News oi -Samden Sherpa Nokia and Orange have partnered up to develop the future 5G mobile networks. Nokia is now joining hands with Orange Group, a global leader in corporate telecommunication services, to develop 5G services that will allow industries and consumers to take better advantage of the new network. Nokia says that with the development of the 5G services, operators would be able to deliver dramatic improvements in data speeds, network latency, and agility, as well as they would get the ability to enable new capabilities such as network slicing. Nokia adds that with 5G capabilities, "it would even further allow operators to support a growing number of customers and potentially billions of connected IoT devices with a consistent quality of service, laying the foundation for smarter cities, connected vehicles, smart factories and offices, remote healthcare and many other connected industries." Nokia unveils digital assistant for telecom operators Setting a vision for greater things, Nokia and Orange under this new collaboration aims to drive the definition and development of the new services with a focus on making the transition from 4G to 5G network connectivity in the most efficient way in terms of power, operations, and cost effectiveness, and with the highest level of quality and reliability. Furthermore, it has been confirmed that both the companies will build on existing joint innovation programs, as well as work with other partners, to develop, trial and introduce solutions that will make 5G a commercial reality and drive the digital transformation of vertical industries. Also, Nokia has mentioned that the companies will open up the laboratories to work with their respective innovation partners, including local enterprises, vertical application providers, and local start-ups, to accelerate the ecosystem that will be created around 5G. Commentating on the new partnership, Alain Maloberti, Senior Vice President, Orange Labs Networks at Orange said, "In line with the Orange Essentials 2020 strategy, Orange places innovation at the heart of its drive to deliver an unmatched customer experience. Working with Nokia, we are preparing the evolution of our networks from 4G to 5G, with multiple services on a single infrastructure to deliver a quality tailored for each service requirement. Our new services will enhance people's lives and accelerate the digitization of vertical industries." Nokia's plan for MWC 2017: Everything you should know Similarly, Marc Rouanne, chief innovation and operating officer at Nokia, expressed, "With our breadth of Radio, IP and Optics technologies, and the expertise of Bell Labs, Nokia is proud to be assisting Orange in the introduction of 5G and the application of the Future X Network paradigm. Through this collaboration, we will test 5G applications for different industry segments and measure the benefits of extremely short latency and very high speeds. We are also delighted to be applying our world-class R&D expertise in Paris and Lannion in this project." Source Best Mobiles in India Facebook, To stay updated with latest technology news & gadget reviews, follow GizBot on Twitter YouTube and also subscribe to our notification. Allow Notifications Nokia unveils digital assistant for telecom operators News oi -GizBot Bureau Nokia has created a digital assistant "MIKA" that will improve telecom operators' efficiency by providing engineers faster access to critical information. Finnish telecommunications giant Nokia has created a customised digital assistant "MIKA" that will improve telecom operators' efficiency by providing engineers faster access to critical information. MIKA that stands for 'Multi-purpose Intuitive Knowledge Assistant' -- is the first digital assistant trained specifically for the telecom industry, designed to provide automated assistance that saves time and frees highly skilled workers to focus on critical tasks. "MIKA taps into the power of the Nokia AVA platform to provide quick and accurate answers, avoiding time wasted on fruitless searches. It is customised to support the specific needs of telecoms, and can deliver recommendations based on experience from networks around the world," said Igor Leprince, Head of Global Services at Nokia, in a statement. SEE ALSO: Nokia's plan for MWC 2017: Everything you should know MIKA combines augmented intelligence with automated learning to provide access to an extensive range of tools, documents and data sources. These include the Nokia AVA knowledge library, a repository of best practices gathered from Nokia projects around the world. Using the knowledge library MIKA can provide recommendations based on similar issues seen in other networks. MIKA is available via a web interface and mobile agent so that engineers can tap into its knowledge base, wherever they are. In addition to launching MIKA, Nokia introduces 'Predictive Repair', a service that will enable operators to reduce costs and improve network quality by moving away from break-fix approaches to hardware maintenance. "The care service can predict hardware failures and recommend replacements up to 14 days in advance, with up to 95 per cent accuracy," the company said. IANS Click Here for New Smartphones Best Online Deals Best Mobiles in India Facebook, To stay updated with latest technology news & gadget reviews, follow GizBot on Twitter YouTube and also subscribe to our notification. Allow Notifications Reliance Jio Happy New Year offer terminates TRAI regulations: Vodafone to Delhi High Court News oi -Chakri Kudikala Vodafone India accuses blatant violation of TRAI regulations. Vodafone India, today approached to Delhi High Court saying that the TRAI has failed to stop the 'blatant violation' of its tariff orders by Reliance Jio and saying that permitting Jio to continue its free 4G services. This matter has been taken up by Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva saying that if the court passes this order, it will affect the new telecom company. A voice made by Vodafone India became Reliance Jio as a respective party. Also Read: Meizu Pro 7 leaked in a presentation slide; to boast of 4K display, and titanium body Vodafone has claimed that the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has also failed to implement Department of Telecommunications' (DoT) circulars which lay down that all tariffs must be compliant of inter-connection usage charges (IUC), non-discriminatory and non-predatory. Vodafone India said that the 'promotional offer was and continues to be in blatant violation of cardinal regulatory principles as IUC charges being the floor for the retail tariffs.' To recall, Vodafone India, back in 2002 signed an agreement to TRAI saying that none of the free 4G offers should exceed 90 days of the time limit. 'The free offerings were illegal and also violates the 90 days' upper limit fixed for any promotional offer (with) 90 days expiring on September 18, 2016 (even if counted from June 21, 2016) and in any event on December 3, 2016. The respondent (TRAI) ignored petitioner's representations and efficiently deal with the same' petitioned Vodafone India to Delhi Court. Also Read: Idea Cellular announced suite of digital apps - Idea Music Lounge, Movie Club, & Game Spark The India' second largest telecom network, Vodafone has further said that due to TRAI's "arbitrary, irregular action/inaction," RJIO, "in the garb" of 'test service' or preview offer, amassed millions of subscribers by offering them free services during the so- called trial period. Vodafone is making this move after Bharti Airtel and Idea Cellular approached TDSAT against the same issue, but Reliance Jio still is unmoved regarding these claims from the rivals. Also, it is said that TRAI will be making a final move on February 1 regarding the Airtel's and Idea's claims. Written with inputs from PTI Best Mobiles in India Facebook, To stay updated with latest technology news & gadget reviews, follow GizBot on Twitter YouTube and also subscribe to our notification. Allow Notifications IMF Says Returning Refugees 'Aggravating' Afghan Government's Capacity RFE/RL January 28, 2017 The International Monetary Fund (IMF) says Afghanistan is experiencing a "large influx" of returning refugees that is severely testing the country's ability to absorb so many displaced people. In a report issued this week, the IMF said more than 700,000 refugees returned to Afghanistan last year, mainly from Pakistan, but also from Iran, Europe, and elsewhere. "This is seriously aggravating the government's capacity to absorb refugees in an already difficult environment of high unemployment and internally displaced people after decades of conflict," it said. The organization urged the country to strengthen internal coordination and planning and said the international community needs to play a role in providing financing and humanitarian support to avert a crisis. The IMF said that many of those coming from Pakistan are not coming "voluntarily." It said analysts estimate that up to 2.5 million more will return over the next 18 months, representing almost 10 percent of the Afghan population. Decades of war and instability have driven millions of Afghans from their homes and out of the country. Millions of refugees returned to Afghanistan after the U.S.-led invasion of 2001 drove the Taliban from power, but security has deteriorated since 2014, when most NATO combat forces had withdrawn from the country. The security situation now remains difficult in many areas of the country, with militant groups like the so-called Islamic State (IS) battling Afghan government forces and remaining U.S.-led forces. "Many of the Afghans who lived abroad for decades are returning to a country facing conflict, insecurity, and widespread poverty," the IMF said. "Given the difficult economic climate, prospects for returnees are generally poor," it added. 'While there are also wealthier returnees, a typical returning refugee has a high risk of falling into poverty." Source: http://www.rferl.org/a/imf-afghanistan-refugees- displaced-person-return/28265160.html Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Military Strikes Hit ISIL Terrorists in Syria, Iraq From a Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve News Release SOUTHWEST ASIA, Jan. 29, 2017 U.S. and coalition military forces continued to attack Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant terrorists in Syria and Iraq yesterday, Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve officials reported today. Officials reported details of yesterday's strikes, noting that assessments of results are based on initial reports. Strikes in Syria Attack, bomber, fighter and remotely piloted aircraft conducted 15 strikes consisting of 24 engagements in Syria: -- Near Abu Kamal, two strikes destroyed an oil truck and two oil wellheads. -- Near Bab, a strike destroyed an ISIL headquarters building and a bunker. -- Near Raqqah, Twelve strikes engaged three ISIL tactical units; destroyed seven bridges, an ISIL headquarters building and a fighting position; damaged a supply route. Strikes in Iraq Attack and fighter aircraft conducted two strikes consisting of five engagements in Iraq, coordinated with and in support of the Iraqi government: -- Near Mosul, two strikes destroyed an ISIL anti-air artillery system, a fighting position and two barges; suppressed two mortar teams; damaged three supply routes. Task force officials define a strike as one or more kinetic events that occur in roughly the same geographic location to produce a single, sometimes cumulative, effect. Therefore, officials explained, a single aircraft delivering a single weapon against a lone ISIL vehicle is one strike, but so is multiple aircraft delivering dozens of weapons against buildings, vehicles and weapon systems in a compound, for example, having the cumulative effect of making those targets harder or impossible for ISIL to use. Accordingly, officials said, they do not report the number or type of aircraft employed in a strike, the number of munitions dropped in each strike, or the number of individual munition impact points against a target. Ground-based artillery fired in counterfire or in fire support to maneuver roles is not classified as a strike. Part of Operation Inherent Resolve The strikes were conducted as part of Operation Inherent Resolve, the operation to eliminate the ISIL terrorist group and the threat it poses to Iraq, Syria, the region and the wider international community. The destruction of targets in Syria and Iraq further limits ISIL's ability to project terror and conduct operations, officials said. Coalition nations that have conducted strikes in Syria include the United States, Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Denmark, France, Jordan, the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and the United Kingdom. Coalition nations that have conducted strikes in Iraq include Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Jordan, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address U.S., German leaders reaffirm importance of NATO People's Daily Online (Xinhua) 13:35, January 29, 2017 U.S. President Donald Trump and German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Saturday agreed on the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's (NATO) fundamental importance to the broader transatlantic relationship. In a telephone conversation, the two leaders also reaffirmed the military bloc's role in ensuring the peace and stability of the North Atlantic community, the White House said in a statement. "In this vein, the leaders recognized that NATO must be capable of confronting 21st century threats and that our common defense requires appropriate investment in military capabilities to ensure all allies are contributing their fair share to our collective security," said the statement. In a recent interview, Trump said NATO was "obsolete because it was not taking care of terror," and he complained that various members of the bloc were not paying their dues, which was "very unfair to the United States." At a joint press conference with Trump in Washington on Friday, British Prime Minister Theresa May said the U.S. president had confirmed that he is "100 percent" behind NATO. During Saturday's phone conversation, Trump and Merkel also affirmed the importance of close German-American cooperation to the security and prosperity of the two countries and expressed their desire to strengthen bilateral relations in the coming years. In addition, the two leaders agreed on the need to strengthen cooperation in the fight against terrorism and violent extremism and to work to stabilize conflict areas in the Middle East and North Africa. Trump accepted Merkel's invitation to attend the Group of 20 (G20)Summit in Hamburg, Germany, in July, and said he looks forward to receiving the chancellor in Washington soon, according to the statement. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Duterte: US endangering regional security by storing arms in Philippines Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 11:55PM Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has accused Washington of constructing permanent arms depots in his country, in a move which he said will disrupt regional security. "They're unloading arms in the Philippines now ... I'm serving notice to the armed forces of the United States. Do not do it, I will not allow it," said Duterte on Sunday during a televised press conference. He noted that the US is currently bringing arms into three provinces in the Philippines, which he stressed was in violation of a defense agreement between the two countries. "Provisions of the Visiting Forces (Agreement), there shall be no permanent facilities. A depot is by any other name a depot. It's a permanent structure to house arms," he said. "I do not even know if there is a nuclear tip (missile) now, that they are unloading," he added. Duterte, who has on multiple occasions voiced his disdain for the presence of US forces in his country, made the remarks after the Pentagon gave the go ahead for the construction of warehouses, barracks and runways on Philippine soil in accordance with an Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) between both countries. Philippine president went on to note that if such facilities were built, he would mull a review of pacts between the two countries "and maybe ultimately abrogate, since it is an executive order." He added that the US was endearing stability in the region, especially in the Philippines, over its problems with China. "The missiles of China are pointed at the American expeditions," he said in reference to US naval patrols in the South China Sea. "A depot would serve as a supply line," Duterte added. China claims almost all of the strategic South China Sea, through which $6.5 trillion in shipping trade passes annually. The sea is also claimed in part by Taiwan, Brunei, Vietnam, Malaysia, and the Philippines. While some of those rival claimants, such as the Philippines, have been handling their differences with China smoothly, the US stands accused of needlessly heightening tensions in a region it does not belong to. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Saudi airstrikes on Yemen may amount to war crime: UN report Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 6:56PM The United Nations says Saudi Arabia's deadly airstrikes against Yemen "may amount to war crimes," strongly urging Riyadh's allies in the campaign, including the US, Britain and France, to respect international humanitarian law. An annual report prepared by UN experts, who monitor sanctions and the conflict in the war-torn Yemen, investigated 10 Saudi-led coalition strikes from March to October last year that claimed the lives of at least 292 civilians, including about 100 women and children. "In eight of the 10 investigations, the panel found no evidence that the airstrikes had targeted legitimate military objectives," the experts said in the 63-page report, which was presented to the UN Security Council on January 27. The report, as was quoted by Reuters on Saturday, further said that the panel reached a firm conclusion that the Saudi-led coalition had not met the "international humanitarian law requirements of proportionality and precautions in attack" for all the 10 investigated airstrikes. According to the UN experts, the member states of the so-called Saudi-led coalition are Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco and Sudan. The panel added that the "violations associated with the conduct of the air campaign are sufficiently widespread to reflect a broader policy of attrition against civilian infrastructure." Saudi Arabia has been engaged in the deadly campaign against Yemen since March 2015 in an attempt to bring back to power Yemen's former President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, a staunch ally of Riyadh, and undermine the popular Houthi Ansarullah movement. The UN report further said forces loyal to Hadi, including officials and security forces, committed "widespread and systematic violations of international humanitarian law, international human rights law and human rights norms" against the Yemeni people during the abovementioned period. The Saudi war has so far claimed the lives of at least 11,400 Yemenis, and taken a heavy toll on Yemen's facilities and infrastructure, destroying many hospitals, schools, and factories. The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) said recently that the military aggression against Yemen had killed nearly 1,400 Yemeni kids, injuring hundreds more. Rights groups have described the United States and the United Kingdom as complicit in the bloodletting given their provision of deadly weapons to the Saudi regime during the bombardment campaign. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address US commando killed, 3 hurt in surprise assault on central Yemen Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 6:39PM The US military says one service member has lost his life and three others sustained injuries after special forces carried out an attack against a purported position of al-Qaeda militants in the central Yemeni province of Bayda. The Central Command said in a statement on Sunday that 14 al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) militants were killed in the dawn assault near Yakla village in the Rada'a district of the province, located about 210 kilometers southeast of the capital, Sana'a. The statement added that the US forces had gained access to "information that will likely provide insight into the planning of future terror plots." The Central Command further noted that a fourth service member was injured in a "hard landing" in a nearby location. The aircraft was "intentionally destroyed" after it was unable to fly afterward. This is while medics at the scene said 30 people, including 10 women and three children, were killed as Apache combat helicopters struck the area from the air before commandos were dropped in for the raid. "The operation began at dawn when a drone bombed the home of Abdulraoof al-Dhahab and then helicopters flew up and discharged paratroopers at his house and killed everyone inside," one local resident said on condition of anonymity. He added, "Next, the gunmen opened fire at the US soldiers who left the area, and the helicopters bombed the gunmen and a number of homes and led to a large number of casualties." According to some reports, a total of 57 people, including civilians, were killed in the assault. Meanwhile, an unnamed US military official said the surprise dawn raid in Yemen had been authorized by President Donald Trump. AQAP has taken advantage of the chaos and breakdown of security in Yemen to tighten its grip on the southern and southeastern parts of the Arab country. The US carries out drone attacks in Yemen and several other countries, claiming to be targeting al-Qaeda elements; but, local sources say civilians have been the main victims of the attacks. American intelligence officials recently said as many as 117 civilians had been killed in at least 526 drone strikes conducted during former US President Barack Obama's term in office. The attacks had been carried out in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Libya and elsewhere. The drone strikes in Yemen continue alongside the Saudi military aggression against the impoverished conflict-ridden country. According to the United Nations humanitarian coordinator for Yemen, Jamie McGoldrick, the Yemeni conflict has claimed the lives of 10,000 people and left 40,000 others wounded. McGoldrick told reporters in Sana'a on January 16 that the figure is based on lists of victims gathered by health facilities and the actual number might be higher. The Saudi war on Yemen, which local sources say has killed at least 11,400 people, was launched in an attempt to bring back the former government to power. The Saudi war has also taken a heavy toll on the country's facilities and infrastructure, destroying many hospitals, schools and factories. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Boko Haram terrorists kill seven in northeastern Nigeria Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 4:31PM Militants believed to be from the Boko Haram Takfiri terrorist group have attacked a convoy of motorists along a highway in northeastern Nigeria, killing at least seven people and injuring several others. Witnesses said on Sunday that the militants ambushed the military-escorted motorists along recently-secured Maiduguri-Biu highway in Borno state the previous day. Nigerian soldiers are said to be among the injured. Dauda Pambe, a local resident who was among the travelers guarded by soldiers, said many passengers ducked in their vehicles to avoid being hit by bullets. "We were somewhere between Bulabulin and Dogonwaya villages when the Boko Haram gunmen opened fire on the vehicles ahead of us in the convoy," said Pambe. "The first vehicle was hit on the tire and the driver could not proceed so the passengers alighted and fled into the bush. The second vehicle was a pickup van carrying many passengers, and many of them could not escape." The militant-infested highway, which was recaptured last year by the military, has been one of the most dangerous routes in northeastern Nigeria for several years because of militant attacks. The military now escorts motorists moving in convoy along the road. The latest incident came three days after Boko Haram gunmen stormed a military base in Borno. Boko Haram terrorists have killed more than 20,000 people and forced more than 2.7 million others to flee since 2009. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address US commandoes attack Yemen's Bayda, kill 57: Reports Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 8:19AM US forces have carried out a series of ground and air raids against a village in the Yemeni province of Bayda, killing a total of 57 people, among them civilians. US paratroopers parachuted in Bayda's Qifah district and raided the Yakla village there, with some 30 aircraft such as Apache helicopters and drones taking part in the operations. Saudi media said 16 civilians, among them women and children, lost their lives in the US assault. Reports said the rest of those killed were militants with the al-Qaeda terror group, including three of its ringleaders. "The operation began at dawn when a drone bombed the home of [al-Qaeda ringleader] Abdulraoof al-Dhahab and then helicopters flew up and unloaded paratroopers at his house and killed everyone inside," an unnamed local told AFP. The Lebanese al-Mayadeen television channel reported that a US soldier was also killed during clashes with militants. Two years ago, US troopers conducted a similar operation in Yemen's Hadhramaut Province to allegedly save an American reporter who was held captive by al-Qaeda. However, the operation was unsuccessful and left the correspondent dead. Separately on Sunday, Saudi fighter jets mistakenly bombarded positions held by Riyadh's own mercenaries in Bayda Province. Arabic-language al-Masirah television network quoted an informed military source as saying that the Saudi warplanes had also targeted homes in Bayda's al-Quraishyah and Sharyah neighborhoods. Similar Saudi air raids were also carried out in the districts Harad and Nasim in Hajjah Province as well as the Sirwah neighborhood of Ma'rib Province. The Saudi jets further targeted al-Amri district of Ta'izz Province with cluster bombs. Elsewhere, in Shabwah Province, a large number of Saudi mercenaries were killed and injured in the Yemeni army's rocket attacks. Additionally, 50 Saudi mercenaries, among them foreign nationals, were killed and injured in clashes with the Yemeni army forces in the port city of Mokha and Dhubab district, both situated in Ta'izz Province. Three rocket attacks also hit downtown Zanzibar in Abyan Province. The Riyadh regime has been incessantly pounding Yemen since March 2015 in a bid to reinstall the country's ex-government and crush the Houthi Ansarullah movement. The Houthis and the Yemeni army have been defending Yemen against the Saudi offensive for almost two years. The military aggression has claimed the lives of over 11,400 Yemenis, including women and children, according to the latest tally by a Yemeni monitoring group. One US soldier killed, three injured in Yemen raid Later on Sunday, US military announced that one US soldier had died and three were injured in the Yemen raid. "We are deeply saddened by the loss of one of our elite service members," said General Joseph Votel, commander of US Central Command in Tampa, Florida, AFP reported. The American military officials added that the name of the deceased soldier would be withheld until relatives have been notified. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Trump orders military chiefs to devise plan in 30 days to defeat Daesh Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 3:34AM US President Donald Trump has signed yet another executive order directing the military's Joint Chiefs of Staff to devise a plan within 30 days to destroy the Daesh (ISIL) terrorist group. Trump signed the military directive on Saturday, along with two other executive orders, including one imposing restrictions on highly lucrative lobbying for foreign governments by administration officials. In remarks following the order to military commanders, Trump said, "I think it's going to be very successful. That's big stuff." The move was apparently aimed to signal that the new US president was serious about delivering on his campaign pledge to tackle "global terrorism" more aggressively than his Democratic predecessor, former President Barack Obama, whom he has accused of establishing the notorious terror group that has taken over large swathes of territory in Iraq and Syria and engaged in exporting their oil reserves. This is while both Trump and his defense secretary, retired Marine General James Mattis, have expressed a desire to expedite an end to the battle against ISIL. US military advisers and air power have reportedly been engaged in helping Iraqi forces in recapturing the city of Mosul. In Syria, the US is struggling to recruit enough local militants to facilitate its own plan to recapture ISIL stronghold of Raqqah, in continued efforts to undermine the authority of the Syrian government. Even before Saturday's order, US military authorities had been at work developing a series of potential actions for Mattis and Trump's entire national security team to consider, according to The Washington Post, which added that the plans include possible deployment of additional advisers to Iraq and Syria. Changes to the existing campaign are expected to be modest adjustments to the existing strategy rather than any radical departure. How far the new measures go "would depend upon the political risk that the president is willing to take when we do certain things that could exacerbate things with Russia or Turkey." The proposals will seek to make sure that commanders in the field "have the wherewithal and the leeway to do what they have to do to successfully prosecute the campaign," the report added, citing a US defense official speaking on condition of anonymity. Deployment of more combat power, however, may come with serious drawbacks, including risking additional American lives and adding to the already significant cost of military operations overseas. The daily further added that Trump also signed an executive order restructuring the National Security Council "and streamlining procedures in a way that the White House believes would be more adaptive to modern threats." It also quoted Trump as saying that the change would bring "a lot of efficiency and, I think, a lot of additional safety," adding: "People have talked about doing this for a long time." However, it was not immediately clear on Saturday what impact Trump's executive order halting entry of migrants and legal US residents from Iraq and other Muslim-majority nations would have on Washington's partnership with the Iraqi government in the battle against ISIL. Iraqi lawmakers have urged the country's Foreign Ministry to explain how the measure will affect Iraq. Daesh terrorists, who were initially trained by the CIA in Jordan in 2012 to destabilize the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, now control large parts of Syria and Iraq. They have been engaged in crimes against humanity in the areas under their control. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address U.S. Says 14 Militants, One American Killed In Yemen Al-Qaeda Raid January 29, 2017 U.S. officials said 14 militants were killed, along with one U.S. service member, in a commando raid on an Al-Qaeda stronghold in Yemen. The American death in the January 28 raid is the first known U.S. combat death since President Donald Trump took office last week. Few details about the incident were released. An unnamed military official told Reuters that the U.S. special forces raid was authorized by Trump and was aimed at gathering intelligence about Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. The official said American forces did not seize any militants or take any prisoners off-site. The Pentagon said 14 Al-Qaeda members were killed. Earlier reports quoted unidentified Yemeni security officials as saying several helicopters took part in the operation in Bayda Province. AFP reported a provincial official as saying as many as 41 militants and 16 civilians were killed. A civil war began in Yemen in 2011 that pits Shi'ite Huthi rebels against Al-Qaeda fighters and the Saudi-backed Yemeni government of Abd-Rabbu Mansur Hadi, which was forced out of the capital in 2015 to the southern city of Aden. Saudi Arabia leads a 10-country coalition fighting the Huthi rebels and Al-Qaeda militants. The United States announced that it would assist with intelligence and logistics with Saudi Arabia and Egypt. It has previously carried out several drone strikes in the country. Based on reporting by AP, AFP, and Reuters Source: http://www.rferl.org/a/us-launches- raid-al-qaeda-yemen/28266073.html Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Trump Reshuffles National Security Council To Include Controversial Adviser RFE/RL January 29, 2017 U.S. President Donald Trump has reshuffled his National Security Council, ordering the inclusion of his controversial chief strategist in the key policy-making body. In addition to Stephen Bannon's appointment, the White House also said it was changing the attendance of the council's so-called Principals Committee, the cabinet-level interagency forum that deals with national security policy issues. Both moves, announced January 28, raised eyebrows among national security experts and former government officials. https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/01/28/presidential-memorandum-organization-national-security-council-and Bannon has become a lightning rod for criticism in the new Trump administration. Before joining Trump's team last year, he ran a news website known as Breitbart, which regularly published xenophobic and occasionally racially-tinged articles. The National Security Council (NSC) is the main executive agency group advising the president on national security and foreign affairs. Under previous administrations, the director of national intelligence, known as the DNI, attended all meetings of the NSC's Principals Committee. Also attending was the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the highest-ranking military official in the U.S. government. But the reshuffling announced January 28 instead said the DNI and the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman would "attend where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed." "The security threats facing the United States in the 21st century transcend international boundaries," the order said. "Accordingly, the United States Government's decision-making structures and processes to address these challenges must remain equally adaptive and transformative." Senator John McCain (Republican-Arizona), who has increasingly become a vocal critic of some Trump policies, told CBS television January 29 that he was worried about Bannon's presence on the NSC. He called it "the most radical departure from any National Security Council in history." In an unrelated order also released January 28, Trump ordered a lifetime ban on administration officials lobbying for foreign governments and a five-year ban for domestic lobbying. With reporting by NBC, CBS, and The Guardian Source: http://www.rferl.org/a/trump-reshuffles- nsc-include-bannon/28266116.html Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Merkel, Trump Discuss 'Fundamental Importance' Of NATO During Call January 29, 2017 German Chancellor Angela Merkel and U.S. President Donald Trump stressed the importance of the NATO alliance to global security during their first call since Trump's inauguration. The leaders "agreed on the NATO alliance's fundamental importance to the broader transatlantic relationship and its role in ensuring the peace and stability of our North Atlantic community," according to a White House statement on January 28. "In this vein, the leaders recognized that NATO must be capable of confronting 21st century threats and that our common defense requires appropriate investment in military capabilities to ensure all allies are contributing their fair share to our collective security." Trump has worried some European allies after criticizing NATO, at one point calling it "obsolete" because it had not done enough to fight terrorism and saying that many members were not pulling their weight financially. The two also discussed the "need to strengthen already robust cooperation in the fight against terrorism and violent extremism, and to work to stabilize conflict areas in the Middle East and North Africa." A joint statement said that Russia and Ukraine were also discussed, without giving details. A spokesman for Merkel said Trump had accepted the chancellor's invitation to attend the G20 meeting in Hamburg in July. Based on reporting by AP, Reuters, and The Washington Times Source: http://www.rferl.org/a/merkel-trump-discuss -natio-importance/28266044.html Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address The Reasons Behind The Turkmen-Tajik Tiff Bruce Pannier January 29, 2017 A recent spat between Turkmenistan and Tajikistan is probably the lamest dispute between two Central Asian countries I can remember, though I think I know the real cause of the problem. Tajikistan is talking about constructing a new railway line that would connect the country to Russia via Uzbekistan. Some poorly considered language was used in the statement about this project and that was seized upon by Turkmenistan's Foreign Ministry, which fired off an equally ill-advised statement rebuking Tajikistan. And while Tajikistan might technically have started this row, I get the feeling nerves are becoming frayed in Ashgabat these days over more important matters than a new railway line from Tajikistan to Russia. In a January 24 statement, the deputy head of Tajikistan's state railway company, Usmon Kalandarov, mentioned the proposed new railway line that "bypasses Turkmenistan." On January 25, the Turkmen Foreign Ministry released a statement calling Kalandarov's comments "unethical" and "unfriendly." The Turkmen Foreign Ministry expressed bewilderment (they do that a lot in their statements, makes me wonder) and reminded that "Turkmenistan has initiated a number of specific projects that involve Tajikistan and are aimed at further expanding cooperation between the two countries in the transport and communication spheres." The Foreign Ministry added: "This statement by one of the leaders of the Tajik railways does not contribute to the practical efforts to achieve the above mentioned objectives." Assuredly not, but a quick look at the map shows there would be no reason for a railway from Tajikistan through Uzbekistan and on to Russia to ever pass through Turkmenistan. The line would have to be extended much farther west to incorporate Turkmenistan. So the project itself doesn't seem to be the problem. It seems more to be that a Tajik state official publicly mentioned Turkmenistan being left out of the project. That is what has irritated the Turkmen government and spurred a response from the Foreign Ministry. International rights organizations mention Turkmenistan critically all the time, but governments do not. For most of its 25 years as an independent country, Turkmenistan's isolationism, couched as a state policy of "positive neutrality," has kept the country out of international arguments, conflicts, and alliances. The name "Turkmenistan" just doesn't come up too much when top officials in other countries make policy statements. But that has changed lately. At the start of January, Iranian officials launched a verbal attack on Turkmenistan after Ashgabat shut off (Turkmen authorities say "limited") gas supplies to Iran over an unpaid debt. The National Iranian Gas Company issued statements indicating Turkmenistan was violating their contract and threatened to take Turkmenistan to arbitration, which finally prompted the Turkmen Foreign Ministry to issue two separate responses in a 24-hour-period to defend Turkmenistan's position that Iran was in the wrong. One year ago, Turkmen authorities were issuing similar statements after Russia's Gazprom tore up gas agreements with Turkmenistan and refused to import any more Turkmen gas citing, very publicly, Ashgabat's "intractable" position in negotiating prices. And before that, there were Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbaev's comments in mid-October 2015, right after a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, that the security situation along Turkmenistan's border with Afghanistan was troubling. The Turkmen Foreign Ministry released a statement that same day that read, "The Turkmen side expresses its extreme bewilderment (eds: what did I tell you?) and concern at this statement by the Kazakh side which is irrelevant to the situation on the state border of Turkmenistan." The statement went on to recommend Nazarbaev and others receive their information from more credible sources in the future, ignoring the fact that the Afghan government and media were acknowledging there was fighting in northwest Afghanistan near the border with Turkmenistan. Russia's Federal Security Service and the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization, which does not include Turkmenistan, have also expressed concerns similar to Nazarbaev's since October 2015. Turkmen-Tajik relations probably won't be affected much by this recent tiff. There was a meeting of the Turkmen-Tajik intergovernmental commission on trade-economic and scientific-technical cooperation in Ashgabat on January 26-27. And the Turkmen Foreign Ministry was correct in pointing out it "has initiated a number of specific projects that involve Tajikistan" that are aimed at furthering cooperation between the two countries. Turkmenistan has offered to supply Tajikistan with electricity and oil but so far this has been impossible due to Uzbekistan's refusal to allow these exports through its territory. That is the reason Turkmenistan and Tajikistan agreed to build the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Tajikistan (TAT) railway line that finally made it from Turkmenistan into Afghanistan at the end of 2016. Turkmen authorities might now wonder if Tajikistan could lose interest in TAT should the new railway project from Tajikistan through Uzbekistan advance. Of course, now that Uzbekistan has a new president, Shavkat Mirziyaev, who has vowed to improve ties with Central Asian neighbors, new opportunities for cooperation between Turkmenistan and Tajikistan could open up and TAT could soon become TUT (Turkmenistan-Uzbekistan-Tajikistan), a shorter and much more secure route. Turkmenistan's diplomatic problems are coming at the same time economic problems are hammering Turkmenistan. The latest blow is the January 27 reports from Pakistani media that the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline will be delayed by one year due to problems with financing (Qishloq Ovozi says even that is overly optimistic). Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov has been promising for several years that TAPI would start operations by 2019 and Turkmenistan would have a new export route for 33 billion cubic meters (bcm) of its gas annually. Turkmenistan needs TAPI after losing Russia, and probably Iran soon as customers, two countries that 10 years ago combined for nearly 50 bcm of Turkmen gas sales. So the Turkmen Foreign Ministry's terse statement to Tajikistan might have been ill advised but it is to some extent understandable. Almost nothing seems to be going right for Turkmenistan lately. With material from RFE/RL's Turkmen Service, known locally as Azatlyk, and Tajik Service, known locally as Ozodi Source: http://www.rferl.org/a/reasons-behind- turkmen-tajik-tiff/28266240.html Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Many Civilians Among the Dead After US Raid in Yemen Sputnik News 23:27 29.01.2017(updated 04:43 30.01.2017) A US military raid in Yemen January 29 resulted in the deaths of one US commando, more than a dozen militants and perhaps dozens of civilians, among them women and children. The death of the US soldier marks the first combat death of the administration of US President Donald Trump, and its first operation against al-Qaeda in Yemen, Reuters reports. US Central Command reports that one of its soldiers died, three were injured in a firefight and 14 al-Qaeda militants, the targets of the southern Yemen raid, were killed. One other solider was injured when his aircraft had a "hard landing" and was subsequently intentionally destroyed. Yemeni security and tribal officials identified three senior Al Qaeda leaders slain in the surprise early morning raid, Military.com reports: Abdulraouf al-Dhahab, Sultan al-Dhahab and Seif al-Nims. An Al Qaeda member, speaking to AP, called the raid a "massacre," and Reuters cites local medics saying 30 people were killed, among them 10 women and three children. One of the children was eight-year old Anwar al-Awlaki, the daughter of preacher Anwar al-Awlaki, believed the US to be a high-level al-Qaeda recruiter and killed in a US drone strike in 2011. "She was hit with a bullet in her neck and suffered for two hours. Why kill children? This is the new administration it's very sad, a big crime," her grandfather, Nasser al-Awlaki, told Reuters. Local residents say the raid began with a drone strike on al-Dhabhab's house, followed by Apache helicopters that unloaded paratroopers into the area. Tribal officials said the soldiers were looking for al-Qaeda leader Qassim al-Rimi, and that they took at least two captured individuals with them. Five al-Qaeda operatives were killed by US airstrikes earlier in January, according to US Central Command. Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has used the havoc wreaked by Yemen's year's long civil war, aided by Saudi Arabia and armed by the US, to seize territory in the country's south and east. American forces had not conducted any special operations in Yemen since December 2014, just before war broke out, Reuters notes, though Barack Obama's administration bombarded it with drone strikes. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Manila Eager to Sign Military Agreement With Moscow, Eyes Russian Weapons Sputnik News 21:19 29.01.2017(updated 21:33 29.01.2017) The Philippines' military is looking forward to signing a memorandum of understanding with Moscow to allow regular contacts with its Russian counterparts, Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said. Manila is also pursuing through Russian weapons offerings, and is considering purchasing specialized sniper rifles, UAVs and maybe even submarines. Speaking at a press conference on Thursday, Philippines' Secretary of Defense Delfin Lorenzana confirmed that he would be joining President Rodrigo Duterte for his official visit to Moscow in April or May. He noted that he looks forward to signing a Memorandum of Understanding with his Russian counterpart during the visit that would allow for regular exchanges to take place between the two countries' militaries. "I will accompany the President there. We hope to sign an MOU a military-to-military agreement with the Russians, that would allow visitation of troops and perhaps ships coming here," the Secretary said. "They could observe our exercises. We could also observe their exercises there," he added. The agreement may also allow for the exchange of students in Russian and Filipino officer schools, according to the official. "Maybe later on we could also go into joint exercises; but that will be in the future," Lorenzana noted. "It's not part of the MOU that will be signed," and would require separate treaties, the Secretary of Defense clarified. Lorenzana added that Russia has offered Manila a variety of different weapons systems, including "ships, submarines, aircraft, and helicopters." "We will look into that because we should buy in accordance with our modernization planWe will buy smart, will buy quality items and which will suit the needs of people on the ground," the defense official stressed, pointing to Manila's modest efforts to modernize the military. As far as the subs go, the Philippine government's news bureau has indicated that the Department of National Defense is "determining whether these specialized ships are essential for the modernization needs of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and whether the country can afford to acquire and maintain such an expensive weapons platform." "Do we need submarines? Let's find out. It depends on the needs of the country," Lorenzana added. According to the official, the military is also "interested in [Russian-made] specialized rifles, like sniper riflesWe are also thinking of buying we'll find out if they have good quality UAVs or drones. We might be able to consider those." Earlier, President Duterte expressed an interest in Russian assault rifles, hailing them to be 'among the best in the world'. Earlier this month, Russia's Admiral Tributs anti-submarine destroyer arrived in the Philippines along with the Boris Butoma tanker ship for a four-day goodwill visit. During the port call, President Duterte was invited aboard the Admiral Tributs, shaking hands with Rear Admiral Eduard Mikhailov of the Russian Navy and welcoming Russia as an "ally," adding that the Russian Navy is free to visit the country's ports "anytime." During the visit, Russian Ambassador to the Philippines Igor Khovaev said that Manila had shown an interest in diversifying its alliances, with Russia "ready to become a new reliable partner and a close friend of the Philippines." "It's not a choice between these partners and those ones. Diversification means preserving and keeping old traditional partners and getting new ones," Khovaev emphasized. "We are ready to supply small arms and light weapons, airplanes, helicopters, submarines and many, many other weapons," Khovaev noted, adding that Russia was serious about negotiating on the sale of modern "sophisticated weapons," including diesel submarines. In a visit to Moscow last month, Philippine Foreign Minister Perfecto Yasay told Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov that Manila intends to build up its defense and security cooperation with Russia. Russian officials have since indicated that terrorism and anti-piracy efforts may be an important area of cooperation between the two countries. Manila has been fighting a counter-insurgency campaign against Ansar Al-Khilafah Philippines (AKP), a militant group which has pledged its allegiance to Daesh (ISIL/ISIS). Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Afghan Forces Kill 49 Militants in Seven Counter-Terrorism Operations Sputnik News 18:46 29.01.2017 49 armed militants were killed in seven operations in different provinces of Afghanistan, according to the Interior Minister. MOSCOW (Sputnik) At least 49 militants were eliminated in seven counter-terrorism operations across Afghanistan, conducted by the Afghan National Defense and Security forces, the Interior Minister said Sunday. "The operations were conducted in Helmand, Nangarhar, Kandahar, Farah, Jowzjan, Herat and Faryab provinces, as a result 49 armed militants were killed, six wounded and five others were arrested by Afghan National Defense and Security Forces," the ministry said in a statement. The weapons, including three rocket launchers, two PK machine guns and six AK-47 rifles, were also confiscated during the operations, the ministry added. Currently the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces are conducting joint operations across the country, aimed at combating terrorism. Afghanistan is experiencing political, social and security instability, in particular, due to the activity of Taliban, a militant group formed in the 1990s, seeking to establish Sharia law in the country. The crisis in the country prompted the emergence of local cells of other extremist organizations such as the Daesh. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Terror 'Remains a Real Challenge' in Afghanistan, But Trump May Send New Troops Sputnik News 18:09 29.01.2017(updated 18:14 29.01.2017) US President Donald Trump is considering sending more troops to Afghanistan, according to the Wall Street Journal. The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump is considering sending additional US servicemen to Afghanistan. The WSJ quoted an Afghan official as saying that in a December phone call, then-President-elect Donald Trump reportedly told Afghan President Ashraf Ghani that he would consider the possibility of delivering more US troops to Afghanistan in the future. "President-elect Donald J.Trump said he would certainly continue to support Afghanistan security forces and will consider a proposal for more troops after an assessment," the official said. Commenting on the matter, political analyst Bashir Bizhan told Sputnik Iran that "although no one belittles the US role as a great economic power, Washington should maintain its reputation by delivering on its previous obligations," something that Bizhan said "unfortunately is not happening." "The threat of terrorism still remains a real challenge for the Afghan people," he pointed out. "It is obvious that those Western forces that are still in place in Afghanistan are pursuing their own goals, and they are not going to care about the welfare of the Afghan people," according to Bizhan. "There was no review of this policy following the withdrawal of the main contingent [of Western forces] from Afghanistan. The people's perception of the credibility of the US and European military has plummeted in all provinces," he added. He was echoed by Kabul University Professor Matiullah Kharuti, who told Sputnik Iran that the 8,400 US soldiers and 6,400 NATO troops who currently remain in Afghanistan are engaged in implementing their own tasks there. "Under the guise of holding an anti-terrorist campaign in Afghanistan, Americans haven't neglected to deal with more important matters, namely, drug cultivation in the country," Kharuti sarcastically said. He added that Barack Obama's policy in Afghanistan failed and that nothing positive has been done for the national economy. "But from Washington's point of view, its own strategy on Afghanistan both a short-term and long-term one is being steadily put into practice," he concluded. Meanwhile, the UK Ministry of Defense said that Britain increased the number of servicemen in Afghanistan by 50, bringing the total number of the personnel committed to the operation to 500. UK Armed Forces Minister Mike Penning said that the United Kingdom, alongside with its NATO allies, was committed to the long-term development of the Afghan security and defense forces in order "to ensure Afghanistan is not a safe haven for terrorists," as quoted in the statement. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Polish Chief of General Staff Resigns Amid Rift With 'Unstable' Defense Minister Sputnik News 13:32 29.01.2017(updated 13:49 29.01.2017) Polish Armed Forces' Chief of General Staff Mieczyslaw Gocul has tendered his resignation, effective at the end of the month. The move fuels rumors of a quarrel taking place inside the Polish Armed Forces between career officers and unpopular Defense Minister Antoni Macierewicz. The General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces announced Gocul's intent to resign on Friday, publishing his official letter of resignation on their website. "My service in the position of Chief of the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces is nearing its end. On January 31, 2017 I will finish my professional military service and say goodbye to the uniform," Gocul, 53, wrote in the letter. A career military man, Gocul served in the military for 34 years, beginning his career in 1983. In May 2013, he was nominated and then appointed to the position of Chief of the General Staff. In his letter of resignation, the officer alludes to changes in the global security environment, and to "difficulties in predicting the course of events." Somewhat cryptically, Gocul ends the letter with an expression of gratitude to the veterans of the service, "to all the institutions, organizations and individuals who express their constant concern about the fate of our country. For your support and understanding I express my gratitude to the military families." Poland's PAP news agency said that it was not immediately clear who would replace Gocul. Polish President Andrzej Duda announced that he would be taking steps to reorganize the leadership of the military late last year. The most recent reforms were carried out in 2014, when command of the military was divided into three sections: the General Staff, the General Command and the Operational Command of the Armed Forces. Gocul's resignation is not the first major change. Last month, Lieutenant General Miroslav Rozanski resigned amid pressure to do so by Defense Minister Antoni Macierewicz. Polish media have speculated that the resignation of the high-ranking officers may be connected to their dissatisfaction with the direction Macierewicz is taking defense policy, although Warsaw has been tight-lipped about the reasons for the shakeup. Recent opinion polling has placed Macierewicz among the least popular politicians in Poland. In Russia, the defense minister is known for being among the most rabidly anti-Russian Polish officials. Last year, he announced that Poland would soon be doubling the size of its army in response to the "threat from Russia." Two weeks ago, commenting on the deployment of thousands of US troops to Poland, Macierewicz declared that the post-WWII order established at Yalta was "over," leading to concerns from European observers that Warsaw may be looking to regain some of its lost territories in Ukraine, Belarus, or Lithuania. Last year, the outspoken official even accused Russia of inventing Islamic terrorism, and claimed that Russia deliberately downed the Polish presidential plane which crashed in Smolensk in 2010, killing President Lech Kaczynski and other high-ranking officials. Last May, a group of high-ranking officials called on Macierewicz to step down, including for his comments about the 2010 plane crash and for entertaining the idea of a Jewish conspiracy for global domination. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Trump Reaffirms US Commitment to NATO in Conversation With Hollande Sputnik News 06:42 29.01.2017 US President Donald Trump reaffirmed the commitment of the United States to NATO in a phone talk with his French counterpart Francois Hollande and voiced the desire to enhance US-French security cooperation, the White House said in a statement. MOSCOW (Sputnik) Earlier in the day, Trump held a number of phone conversations with world leaders, including Hollande, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe among others. "The leaders discussed our military and defense cooperation both bilaterally and through NATO. President Trump reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to NATO and noted the importance of all NATO Allies sharing the burden on defense spending," the statement said on Saturday. The statement added that in the phone conversation Trump also voiced his desire to strengthen security cooperation, including in the sphere of counterterrorism. According to the statement, the two presidents also appreciated the efforts made by both Washington and Paris to fight against the Islamic State terrorist group, which is outlawed in many countries, including the United States and Russia. During the presidential race Trump repeatedly said that Washington should decrease the support of other NATO member states and protect only those members of the alliance, who "fulfill their obligations" to the United States. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Trump, Saudi King Agree to Back Safe Zones in Syria and Yemen By Mary Alice Salinas January 29, 2017 The White House says President Donald Trump and Saudi King Salman bin Abd al-Aziz Al Saud have agreed to back safe zones in Syria and Yemen. The two spoke by telephone Sunday, reaffirming the longstanding relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia. A White House statement said Trump asked for the king's support for safe zones, and that the king agreed. They also said they will support what the White House called "other ideas" to help refugees driven from their homes because of war, and the "importance of rigorously enforcing" the nuclear deal with Iran, which Trump has fiercely criticized as a bad deal. Trump spent the last two days reaching out by telephone to a number of world leaders. He also was to talk Sunday with the crown prince of the United Arab Emirates, Mohammed bin Zayed, and acting South Korean President Hwang Kyo-Ahn. He spoke Saturday to Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. In a much anticipated call, Trump also spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin, agreeing to cooperate in defeating Islamic State and work for peace in Syria and throughout the world. The White House said the hour-long call was "positive," and that it was "a significant start to improving the relationship" between Washington and Moscow, which has been badly strained in recent months, primarily over allegations that Russia interfered in the November presidential election. Neither side mentioned U.S.-imposed sanctions on Russia, or the possibility they could be eased. A Kremlin statement said Putin and Trump "thoroughly discussed" international issues, "including the fight against terrorism, the situation in the Middle East, the Arab-Israeli conflict, the sphere of strategic stability and nonproliferation, the situation around the Iranian nuclear program and the Korean Peninsula." The talks also "touched upon ... the main aspects of the crisis in Ukraine," Moscow's statement said, adding: "It was agreed to establish a partnership on all these and other areas." NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address British Official 'Deeply Concerned' by Somalia Drought By Harun Maruf January 29, 2017 The British secretary for International Development says she is "deeply concerned" at the worsening drought situation in Somalia. At the end of a visit to Mogadishu Saturday, Priti Patel said the drought is affecting millions of people and Britain plans to step up providing support to Somalia. "Millions of people in Somalia are currently living in desperate conditions as drought threatens lives and instability, which is why the UK is stepping up support to save lives and provide basic food, clean water and nutrition," she said in a statement. "Building a secure, stable and prosperous Somalia is a top priority for the UK and while great progress has been made, significant challenges remain," the statement said. Millions of dollars in aid Patel announced that London will provide several million dollars in support for the people affected by the drought. She said the money will be delivered through three U.N. agencies: the World Food Program, U.N. Children's Fund and the Food and Agricultural Organization. Several days ago, the international community appealed for $864 million to help 3.9 million Somalis who needed urgent life-saving assistance, a statement said. Delayed and insufficient rainfalls have been blamed for the drought. The Somali government warned against possible famine in parts of the country unless urgent humanitarian deliveries are made to the regions in the northeast, central Somalia, southwest and Somaliland. Worst drought in 25 years The government said this is the worst drought in 25 years. The drought has affected nomadic communities and farmers, according to the government. She said Britain will host a conference for Somalia in May attended by members of the international community to offer future support for Somalia. In Mogadishu, Patel met interim head of state Mohamed Osman Jawari. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Army soldiers, allied forces destroy Saudi warship in western Yemen Iran Press TV Mon Jan 30, 2017 6:50PM Yemeni army forces, backed by fighters from allied Popular Committees, have targeted and destroyed a Saudi military vessel in a missile attack off the coast of the country's western province of Hudaydah. An unnamed Yemeni military source told Arabic-language al-Masirah television network on Monday that Yemeni forces fired a guided missile at al-Madinah warship in waters near the port city of Hudaydah, located 150 kilometers southwest of the capital Sana'a. The source added that the vessel had 176 soldiers and officers in addition to a combat helicopter onboard at the time. The warship had reportedly mounted missile attacks against Yemen's western coasts, cities and fishermen. On January 21, the Yemeni Coast Guard warned enemies' battleships against using the strategic Bab el-Mandeb Strait, which connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden, to bomb civilian targets, emphasizing that such a practice poses grave threats to international maritime navigation in the area. In October 2016, Yemeni forces and Popular Committees fighters destroyed an Emirati HSV-2 Swift hybrid catamaran off the shores of the Red Sea port city of Mukha, situated 346 kilometers south of the capital. Yemeni army forces had destroyed a Saudi warship in a missile attack in the southwestern coast of Yemen, in the Bab el-Mandeb in October 2015. The development came only days after Yemeni forces managed to destroy another Saudi vessel in the area, with reports saying that the sunken ship had repeatedly fired rockets on residential areas in Ta'izz Province. Yemeni snipers shoot dead five Saudi troopers Meanwhile, Yemeni army soldiers and allied forces fatally shot five Saudi troops in the kingdom's southwestern border region of Jizan. They killed two Saudi troops in the al-Moanaq base of the region, located 969 kilometers south of the capital, Riyadh, on Monday evening. Army troops and Popular Committees fighters had earlier launched attacks on al-Khashal and al-Karas outposts in the same Saudi region, killing three Saudi soldiers there. Separately, tens of Saudi-sponsored militiamen loyal to the resigned Yemeni president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, were killed and wounded in al-Wazi'iyah district as Yemeni forces thwarted their offensive. Several armored vehicles belonging to the militiamen were also destroyed during the heavy fighting. According to the United Nations humanitarian coordinator for Yemen, Jamie McGoldrick, the Yemeni conflict has claimed the lives of 10,000 people and left 40,000 others wounded. McGoldrick told reporters in Sana'a on January 16 that the figure is based on lists of victims gathered by health facilities and the actual number might be higher. The Saudi war on Yemen, which local sources say has killed at least 11,400 people, was launched in an attempt to bring back the former government to power. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Jordan's King Abdullah To Visit U.S.; Trump Meeting Uncertain RFE/RL January 30, 2017 Jordan's King Abdullah will travel to Washington on January 30 to meet with U.S. officials, although it remains uncertain if he will hold talks with President Donald Trump. Officials said Abdullah is scheduled to meet with Vice President Mike Pence on January 30 for a breakfast meeting at his Naval Observatory residence in Washington. The king will also meet congressional leaders, senators, and senior officials, including Defense Secretary James Mattis, according to officials and diplomats. One official said a meeting would likely be arranged with Trump, but there has been no formal confirmation. The fight against Islamic State (IS) militants and Russia's role in the Middle East are likely to be on the agenda, Jordanian officials said. "The king will seek a stepped-up campaign against [Islamic State] extremists and secure extra resources to help ensure the militants would not be allowed to move towards our borders," the Reuters news agency quoted one official as saying on condition of anonymity. Pro-Western Jordan has taken part in a U.S.-led air campaign against IS militants in Iraq and Syria, and it has experienced deadly IS attacks on its territory. Abdullah has a close personal relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin and went to Moscow last week, signaling Russia's growing role in the Middle East. "Without Russia, we will not be able to find solutions to not only the Syrian problem but other regional problems in the Middle East," Abdullah told reporters in Moscow, adding that he and Putin shared "the same vision of bringing stability to our region." Two officials told Reuters that the king was pleased that the new administration would focus on security, as opposed to the Obama administration's emphasis on political reforms, which was seen by many in Jordan as interference. The king, who turned 55 on January 29, will be the first Arab leader to meet with the new administration. He comes as the Trump administration's immigration clampdown, including a ban on visitors from seven Muslim-majority countries, has caused an uproar in the United States and abroad. Jordan isn't among the countries affected by Trump's immigration order. With reporting by Reuters and AP Source: http://www.rferl.org/a/jordan-king -abdullah-visit-washington -pence-trump/28266907.html Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address White House Says Saudis Agree On Need For Syria, Yemen Safe Zones RFE/RL January 30, 2017 The White House says President Donald Trump and Saudi Arabia's King Salman voiced support for the idea of safe zones in Syria and Yemen in an hour-long phone call. During his campaign, Trump had repeatedly called for Gulf states to pay for establishing safe zones to protect Syrian refugees. He has suggested that he sees their establishment as a way of reducing what he calls a threat of terrorism stemming from refugees and others arriving in the United States from some Muslim countries. "The president requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said in a statement after the January 29 call. Since 2011, Syria has been engulfed in a civil war that has killed more than 300,000 people. In Yemen, at least 10,000 have been killed in a war between Shi'ite Huthi rebels and a Saudi-backed coalition supporting the Sunni-led government, the UN said recently. The official Saudi Press Agency did not mention safe zones in its report on the call. It said the two had affirmed the "depth and durability of the strategic relationship" between the United States and Saudi Arabia. The White House said the leaders agreed on the importance of bolstering efforts in the fight against Islamic State (IS) militants. The Reuters news agency reported that a senior Saudi source familiar with the call did not say if they discussed Trump's executive orders to put a hold on allowing refugees into the United States and to temporarily ban travelers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries. Saudi Arabia is not among the seven countries on the list. Iran's 'Destabilizing' Activities The White House said the two also agreed on the need to address "Iran's destabilizing regional activities." Trump has spoken out sharply against Iranian policies, and predominantly Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shi'ite-led Iran are major rivals in the Middle East. The White House statement said the two also discussed what it said was an invitation from the king for Trump "to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future, economically and socially," for Saudi Arabia and the region. Trump also spoke with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad bin Zayed al-Nahyan. The White House said Trump also discussed safe zones and that "the crown prince agreed to support this initiative." With reporting by Reuters and AP Source: http://www.rferl.org/a/saudi-arabia -trump-yemen-syria-iran- safe-zones/28266830.html Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Heavy Shelling by Pakistan Causing Avalanches in Kashmir - Indian Army Chief Sputnik News 20:49 30.01.2017 Both countries have been engaged in heavy shelling with mortars on the border for the last one year. Both armies have lost dozens of soldiers in close firing at the Line of Control, the de-facto border between India and Pakistan. New Delhi (Sputnik) The death toll from avalanches in the Himalayan region of Kashmir has risen to 20 over the last week after five more Indian soldiers succumbed to their injuries on Monday. All these five soldiers were rescued from heavy snow in the Machhil sector on Saturday. "The five Army soldiers, who had been trapped under the snow in Machhil sector on January 28 and subsequently rescued after grueling daylong mission, were today evacuated to Srinagar, despite persistent poor weather conditions, for specialist medical care. Unfortunately, all five brave hearts have succumbed to their injuries," reads a release sent by Indian Army's Northern Command. The army said that the mortal remains of 14 soldiers who died in an avalanche near the Line of Control (LoC) in the Gurez sector of north Kashmir last week were also brought to Srinagar so that they could be sent to home for their last rites. Earlier on Sunday, Indian Army Chief General Bipin Rawat blamed Pakistan firing for the recent avalanches in Kahsmir. "Ceasefire violations and the use of heavy weapons by Pakistani troops are leading to the loosening of soil, thus creating the danger of a landslide. Global warming is also leading to cracks in glaciers," Gen. Rawat told reporters after paying homage to Major Amit Sagar, who lost his life in an avalanche on January 25, at Sonmarg. Meanwhile, Authorities in Kashmir issued a fresh medium danger avalanche warning for the next 24-hours in upper Kashmir close to the border with Pakistan. "A medium danger avalanche warning valid for next 24-hours from January 30 to January 31, 2017 (1700 Indian Standard Time) exists for avalanche prone slopes in Kupwara, Bandipora, Baramulla, Ganderbal, Kulgam, Budgam, Anantnag and Kargil districts." Earlier on Wednesday, six civilians and an Indian army officer were killed when they were buried in two separate avalanches. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Presidential Memorandum Organization of the National Security Council and the Homeland Security Council The White House Office of the Press Secretary For Immediate Release January 28, 2017 January 28, 2017 MEMORANDUM FOR THE VICE PRESIDENT THE SECRETARY OF STATE THE SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE THE ATTORNEY GENERAL THE SECRETARY OF AGRICULTURE THE SECRETARY OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES THE SECRETARY OF TRANSPORTATION THE SECRETARY OF COMMERCE THE SECRETARY OF ENERGY THE SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY THE ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT AND CHIEF OF STAFF THE ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT AND CHIEF STRATEGIST THE DIRECTOR OF THE OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET THE REPRESENTATIVE OF THE UNITED STATES TO THE UNITED NATIONS THE UNITED STATES TRADE REPRESENTATIVE THE CHAIR OF THE COUNCIL OF ECONOMIC ADVISERS THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD OF GOVERNORS OF THE FEDERAL RESERVE SYSTEM THE DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE THE DIRECTOR OF THE CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY THE CHAIRMAN OF THE JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF THE ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT FOR NATIONAL SECURITY AFFAIRS THE ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT FOR HOMELAND SECURITY AND COUNTERTERRORISM THE ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT FOR ECONOMIC POLICY THE ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT FOR TRADE AND MANUFACTURING POLICY THE ASSISTANT TO THE PRESIDENT FOR INTRAGOVERNMENTAL AND TECHNOLOGY INITIATIVES THE Deputy Assistant to the President and National Security Advisor to the Vice President THE COUNSEL TO THE PRESIDENT THE ADMINISTRATOR OF THE UNITED STATES AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT THE ADMINISTRATOR OF THE NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION THE CHAIRMAN OF THE NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION THE DIRECTOR OF THE FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION THE DIRECTOR OF THE OFFICE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY POLICY THE DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL DRUG CONTROL POLICY THE CHAIRMAN OF THE PRESIDENT'S INTELLIGENCE ADVISORY BOARD THE ADMINISTRATOR OF THE FEDERAL EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AGENCY THE ARCHIVIST OF THE UNITED STATES Organization of the National Security Council and the Homeland Security Council As President, my highest priority is to ensure the safety and security of the American people. In order to advise and assist me in executing this solemn responsibility, as well as to protect and advance the national interests of the United States at home and abroad, I hereby direct that my system for national security policy development and decision-making shall be organized as follows: The National Security Council, the Homeland Security Council, and Supporting Staff The National Security Act of 1947, as amended, established the National Security Council (NSC) to advise the President with respect to the integration of domestic, foreign, and military policies relating to the national security. There is also a Homeland Security Council (HSC) -- established through Executive Order 13228 of October 8, 2001, and subsequently codified in the Homeland Security Act of 2002 -- that has the purpose of advising the President on matters pertaining to homeland security. Each Council is also responsible for the effective coordination of the security-related activities and functions of the executive departments and agencies. The security threats facing the United States in the 21st century transcend international boundaries. Accordingly, the United States Government's decision-making structures and processes to address these challenges must remain equally adaptive and transformative. Both Councils are statutory bodies that the President will continue to chair. Invitations to participate in specific Council meetings shall be extended to those heads of executive departments and agencies, and other senior officials, who are needed to address the issue or issues under consideration. When the President is absent from a meeting of either Council, the Vice President may preside at the President's direction. The Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (National Security Advisor) and the Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism (Homeland Security Advisor) shall be responsible, as appropriate and at the President's direction, for determining the agenda for the NSC or HSC, respectively, ensuring that the necessary papers are prepared, and recording Council actions and Presidential decisions in a timely manner. When international economic issues are on the agenda of the NSC, the National Security Advisor and the Assistant to the President for Economic Policy shall perform these tasks in concert. The NSC and HSC shall have as their regular attendees (both statutory and non-statutory) the President, the Vice President, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of Defense, the Attorney General, the Secretary of Energy, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the National Security Advisor, the Homeland Security Advisor, and the Representative of the United States to the United Nations. When international economic issues are on the agenda of the NSC, the NSC's regular attendees will include the Secretary of Commerce, the United States Trade Representative, and the Assistant to the President for Economic Policy. The Director of National Intelligence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as statutory advisers to the NSC, shall also attend NSC meetings. The Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff, the Assistant to the President and Chief Strategist, the Counsel to the President, the Deputy Counsel to the President for National Security Affairs, and the Director of the Office of Management and Budget are invited as attendees to any NSC meeting. In addition to the NSC and HSC, there is also a single NSC staff within the Executive Office of the President that serves both the NSC and HSC. The staff is composed of regional, issue-focused, and functional directorates and headed by a single civilian Executive Secretary, pursuant to 50 U.S.C. 3021, who is also the Chief of Staff. All policy and staff activity decisions will be transmitted to the Executive Secretary for appropriate distribution and awareness. The purpose of the NSC staff is to advise me, the National Security Advisor, the Homeland Security Advisor, the NSC members, the HSC members, and others in the White House; to facilitate the implementation of Administration policy; and to help coordinate the national-security-related activities of the executive departments and agencies. A. The Principals Committee The Principals Committee (PC) shall continue to serve as the Cabinet-level senior interagency forum for considering policy issues that affect the national security interests of the United States. The PC shall be convened and chaired by the National Security Advisor or the Homeland Security Advisor, as appropriate, in consultation with the appropriate attendees of the PC. The Chair shall determine the agenda in consultation with the appropriate committee members, and the Executive Secretary shall ensure that necessary papers are prepared and that conclusions and decisions are communicated in a timely manner. Invitations to participate in or attend a specific PC shall be extended at the discretion of the National Security Advisor and the Homeland Security Advisor, and may include those Cabinet-level heads of executive departments and agencies, and other senior officials, who are needed to address the issue under consideration. The PC shall have as its regular attendees the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of Defense, the Attorney General, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff, the Assistant to the President and Chief Strategist, the National Security Advisor, and the Homeland Security Advisor. The Director of National Intelligence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff shall attend where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed. The Counsel to the President, the Deputy Counsel to the President for National Security Affairs, and the Director of the Office of Management and Budget may attend all PC meetings. The Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor (Deputy National Security Advisor), the Deputy Assistant to the President and National Security Advisor to the Vice President, and the Executive Secretary (who shall serve as the Executive Secretary of the PC) shall attend all of the meetings of the PC, and the Representative of the United States to the United Nations and the Assistant to the President for Intragovernmental and Technology Initiatives may attend as appropriate. When international economic issues are on the agenda of the PC, the Committee's regular attendees will include the Secretary of Commerce, the United States Trade Representative, and the Assistant to the President for Economic Policy (who shall serve as Chair for agenda items that principally pertain to international economics).\ A. The Deputies Committee The Deputies Committee (DC) shall continue to serve as the senior sub-Cabinet interagency forum for consideration of, and where appropriate, decision-making on, policy issues that affect the national security interests of the United States. The DC shall be convened and chaired by the Deputy National Security Advisor or the Deputy Assistant to the President and Deputy Homeland Security Advisor (Deputy Homeland Security Advisor), as appropriate. The Chair shall determine the agenda in consultation with the regular DC members, and the Executive Secretary shall ensure that necessary papers are prepared and that conclusions and decisions are communicated in a timely manner. Invitations to participate in or attend a specific DC meeting shall be extended by the Chair to those at the Deputy or Under Secretary level of executive departments and agencies, and to other senior officials, who are needed to address the issue under consideration. The DC shall have as its regular members the Deputy Secretary of State, the Deputy Secretary of the Treasury, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, the Deputy Attorney General, the Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security, the Deputy Director of the Office of Management and Budget, the Deputy Director of National Intelligence, the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Deputy Assistant to the President and National Security Advisor to the Vice President, the Deputy National Security Advisor, the Deputy Homeland Security Advisor, and the Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development. The Executive Secretary shall attend the DC meetings. The Deputy Counsel to the President for National Security Affairs may attend all DC meetings. The relevant Deputy Assistant to the President for the specific regional and functional issue under consideration shall also be invited to attend. Likewise, when and where appropriate, the Deputy Assistant to the President for Strategic Planning, the Deputy Assistant to the President for Strategic Communication, the Deputy Assistant to the President for International Economic Affairs, the Deputy Assistant to the President for Transnational Issues, and the Deputy Representative of the United States to the United Nations, shall also be invited to attend. Other senior officials shall be invited where appropriate. The DC shall review and monitor the work of the interagency national security process, including the interagency groups established pursuant to section D below. The DC shall help to ensure that issues brought before the NSC, HSC, and PC have been properly analyzed and prepared for decision. The DC shall also focus significant attention on monitoring the implementation of policies and decisions and shall conduct periodic reviews of the Administration's major national security and foreign policy initiatives. The DC is responsible for establishing Policy Coordination Committees (PCCs) and for providing objectives and clear guidance. A. Policy Coordination Committees Management of the development and implementation of national security policies by multiple executive departments and agencies typically shall be accomplished by the PCCs, with participation primarily occurring at the Assistant Secretary level. As the main day-to-day fora for interagency coordination of national security policies, the PCCs shall provide policy analysis for consideration by the more senior committees of the national security system and ensure timely responses to the President's decisions. Regional and issue-related PCCs shall be established at the direction of the DC. Members of the NSC staff (or National Economic Council staff, as appropriate) will chair the PCCs; the DC, at its discretion, may add co-chairs to any PCC. The PCCs shall review and coordinate the implementation of Presidential decisions in their respective policy areas. The Chair of each PCC, in consultation with the Executive Secretary, shall invite representatives of other executive departments and agencies to attend meetings of the PCC where appropriate. The Chair of each PCC, with the agreement of the Executive Secretary, may establish subordinate working groups to assist that PCC in the performance of its duties. An early meeting of the DC will be devoted to establishing the PCCs, determining their memberships, and providing them with mandates and strict guidance. Until the DC has established otherwise, the existing system of Interagency Policy Committees shall continue. A. General The President and the Vice President may attend any and all meetings of any entity established by or under this memorandum. This document is part of a series of National Security Presidential Memoranda that shall replace both Presidential Policy Directives and Presidential Study Directives as the instrument for communicating relevant Presidential decisions. This memorandum shall supersede all other existing Presidential guidance on the organization or support of the NSC and the HSC. With regard to its application to economic matters, this document shall be interpreted in concert with any Executive Order governing the National Economic Council and with Presidential Memoranda signed hereafter that implement either this memorandum or that Executive Order. The Secretary of Defense is hereby authorized and directed to publish this memorandum in the Federal Register. DONALD J. TRUMP # # # NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Iran, Iraq, Yemen censure US president's travel ban on Muslims Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 9:59AM US President Donald Trump's controversial Muslim ban has been met with criticism from Iran, Iraq and Yemen, whose nationals have been targeted by the restrictive measure. On Sunday, Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani slammed the US for imposing a travel ban against Iranians and nationals from six other Muslim states and said harboring concerns about terror threats from the Islamic Republic's nationals "sounds more like a joke." Ali Larijani said everyone knows Iran has, over the past years, invariably confronted terrorists, making it a trendsetter, subsequently joined by fellow nations in the region. "Making mention of Iran here under the pretext of concerns about terrorist acts sounds more like a joke," the top parliamentarian emphasized. Trump's measure reveals the "violent and racist attitude" of the US, which is hidden behind the mask of democracy and advocacy for human rights. On Friday, the US leader signed an executive order, suspending entry into the US for travelers from seven Muslim countries, namely Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Larijani further said such a move shows the Americans are "even afraid of their own shadow," adding, "A country, which boasts security power, would not take such decisions out of presentiment, anxiety, and phobia." The Islamic Republic, he said, is a safe and self-reliant country. Unlike the US, Iran works to pave the way for social interactions among nations, and supports peaceful coexistence among all nationalities with their different ideologies on the basis of Islamic principles, the top parliamentarian stated. In a statement issued on Saturday, Iran's Foreign Ministry slammed Trump's executive order as "insulting," vowing that Tehran would respond to the move in kind. Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif also said such a restrictive measure against Muslims "is the greatest gift to terrorists and their supporters." Observers have warned that the US commander-in-chief has set up the moratoria in an Islamophobic and racially-charged move to substantively reduce the flow of Muslims into the country. Also on Sunday, Yemen's Houthi Ansarullah movement also lashed out at Trump's decision and called for the ban to be reversed. The Sana'a-based movement is running the conflict-torn country's affairs amid the absence of a government and a deadly Saudi war. "All attempts to classify Yemen and its citizens as a probable source for terrorism and extremism are illegal and illegitimate," said the movement in a statement, according to Yemen's Saba Net news agency. Cited by Reuters, two unnamed Iraqi parliamentarians, meanwhile, said Baghdad was to argue with the US that the travel curbs could affect cooperation against the Takfiri Daesh terror group. Hashd al-Sha'abi, the Shia-majority Iraqi volunteer force, which is aiding the military in its fight against the terrorists, also called on the Iraqi government to react to the ban by preventing US nationals from entering Iraq and expelling those who are already in the country. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Khan Wants Trump to Extend US Travel Ban to Pakistan By Ayaz Gul January 29, 2017 Pakistan's leading opposition politician, Imran Khan, is urging President Donald Trump to ban Pakistanis from entering the United States, after he suspended immigration from seven Muslim majority countries. The controversial U.S. ban currently applies to Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Addressing a rally in the central Pakistani town of Sahiwal on Sunday, Khan denounced the ban as anti-Muslim and praised Iran for its retaliatory action of banning Americans from entering the Islamic Republic. "I want to tell all my fellow Pakistanis today, I pray that Donald Trump really bans visas for us." Khan said, suggesting that such a move could help prevent brain drain from Pakistan. He went on to urge educated and skilled Pakistani youth to abandon U.S. travel plans in search of a better economic future, and to focus instead on building Pakistan. "And then if America tells us they are stopping visas for us we will also, like Iran, tell them we are going to stop visas for Americans," Khan vowed. Khan's Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf party is the third major political force in the national parliament, and rules the country's northwestern Khyber-Pakhtunkhaw province. Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's government has not yet commented about Trump's ban on Muslim countries. Officials in Islamabad are hoping for improvement in their usually uneasy relations with Washington under the Trump presidency. Pakistan's alleged support for anti-Afghanistan and anti-India Islamist militant groups sheltering on its soil has been a major irritant in tensions with Washington. On Sunday, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus hinted that Pakistan could be included in the list of countries from which immigration has been banned. "You can point to other countries that have similar problems like Pakistan and others -- perhaps we need to take it further." Priebus told CBS News. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Middle East, Europe Anger Mounts over Trump Travel Ban By Jamie Dettmer January 29, 2017 An Iraqi parliamentary committee asked the country's government Sunday to "reciprocate" against the controversial U.S. immigration curbs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump on citizens from seven Muslim countries. The Iraqi government has so far not commented publicly on President Trump's executive order barring residents of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen from entering the U.S. for 90 days. The Trump executive order places also an indefinite ban on admission of Syrian refugees and a 120-day ban on all other refugees entering the U.S. But officials in Baghdad say they will lobby the U.S. administration to overturn the curbs. or at least soften the executive order's impact on Iraqis. And they plan to warn the White House that the temporary immigration ban risks undermining cooperation in the war on the Islamic State terror group. Governments in other Arab countries have been muted also in their public responses to the ban, opting to lobby Washington strongly behind the scenes. United Arab Emirates and Saudi leaders will talk by phone Sunday with President Trump, and according to an official in Dubai, who spoke to VOA on the condition of anonymity, will caution the U.S. president not to add either emirate to the list of states included in the travel ban. White House officials on Saturday warned other countries could be added to the seven states already listed in the executive order, "Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into the United States." Four U.S. federal judges have imposed stays on the travel ban, which applies to refugees and visa holders - including U.S. permanent residents - born in any of the seven countries listed in the executive order. The judges issued rulings in quick succession blunting the effect of the order as rights lawyers called the ban's constitutionality into question. Iran on Saturday announced it will bar all U.S. citizens from entering the Islamic republic in retaliation for the curbs on citizens from its country. In a statement, Iran's Foreign Ministry dubbed Trump's order "an obvious insult to the Islamic world." The statement described the travel ban "a big gift to extremists and their supporters." Tehran further cautioned that the U.S. ban would not make America safer. The ministry also said its retaliatory measures would remain in place until the U.S. restrictions were lifted. White House officials say the ban on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen is part of an effort to stop terrorists from entering the U.S. And President Trump and his aides say those who opposed the executive order are overreacting. "It's not a Muslim ban," the president told reporters in the Oval Office. "We were totally prepared. It's working out very nicely. You see it at the airports, you see it all over. It's working out very nicely." That isn't the view of European leaders. While Arab governments have opted so far for a quieter lobbying approach on the travel ban, Trump's executive order has sparked a wave of outrage not only across the Middle East but in Europe, where national leaders denounced the ban. On Saturday, French President Francois Hollande said defending democracy "requires observing fundamental principles," among them welcoming refugees. "And when he [Trump] refuses the arrival of refugees, while Europe has done its duty, we have to respond," the French leader said in a statement issued by his office. Luxembourg warned Trump immigration curbs risk bolstering "hatred towards the West." And the country's foreign minister, Jean Asselborn condemned the move saying, "The decision is bad for Europe, because it's going to strengthen even further the mistrust and hatred towards the West in the heart of the Muslim world." "The American president is dividing the Muslim world into good and evil with this," Asselborn told the German newspaper Tagesspiegel. The French and German foreign ministers, meanwhile, voiced their "concern" after talks in Paris. "Welcoming refugees who are fleeing war is part of our duty," France's Jean-Marc Ayrault said after a meeting with his new German counterpart, Sigmar Gabriel. "This decision can only cause us concern. But there are a lot of other issues that are causing us concern," Ayrault said, with Gabriel at his side. German Chancellor Angela Merkel criticized Trump's immigration curbs. She said it is "not justified to put people from a specific background or faith under general suspicion" in order to combat the terrorism of the few. A spokesman for Merkel said, "The Chancellor regrets the U.S. government's entry ban against refugees and citizens of certain countries. She is convinced that even the necessary, resolute fight against terrorism doesn't justify putting people of a particular origin or particular faith under general suspicion." Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May, who met Trump in Washington Friday, was careful while visiting Turkey the day after to refrain from criticizing the curbs. But on Sunday she shifted position issuing a midnight statement saying she does not agree with the policy. The British leader said she would appeal to the U.S., if the ban impacted British citizens who hold dual citizenship with any of the listed countries. "We do not agree with this kind of approach and it is not one we will be taking," she said in a statement issued by Downing Street. Her statement came after an Iraqi-born British lawmaker from May's Conservative party revealed he had received confirmation he would not be allowed to enter the U.S. The leaders of Britain's main opposition parties are now calling for the withdrawal of an invitation extended to President Trump by May to visit Britain. In Mosul, where Iraqi forces are battling militants in a bid to oust the Islamic State terror group from its last major urban stronghold in Iraq, soldiers expressed anger at the ban, saying it could prevent them from visiting relatives in the United States. "It's not fair, it's not right. I should have the right to visit my family,"Assem Ayad, a 23-year-old soldier deployed in Mosul who has three cousins living in Texas, told AFP news agency. "This decision was made because there are terrorist groups in Iraq. But there are also innocent people" including those who are fighting against militants, added Ayad. Another Iraqi soldier, Haider Hassan, told AFP he has a cousin living in the United States who he wants to visit. Referring to U.S. military personnel deployed in Iraq, Hassan asked: "Why would they ban us from coming to America when they are in my country and have bases here?" NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address US Judge Temporarily Blocks Part of Trump Order on Immigration By VOA News January 29, 2017 A federal court has intervened after U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order limiting immigration to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries led to widespread confusion as refugees, green-card holders, students and workers were detained at American airports or barred from boarding international flights to the U.S. Late Saturday, U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly in New York had issued an emergency order that temporarily barred the deportation of people who had been detained after landing at U.S. airports with valid visas. The order also barred the detention of anyone with an approved refugee application. Donnelly said in her order "There is imminent danger that, absent the stay of removal, there will be substantial and irreparable injury to refugees, visa-holders, and other individuals from nations" who are subject to the president's order. Similar court actions have followed in other jurisdictions, including Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington State. A Homeland Security statement issued early Sunday said it will "comply with judicial orders," but went on to say it will also "implement the president's Executive Order to ensure that those entering the United Stated do not pose a threat to our country or the American people." Reports from federal authorities indicated at least 170 people had been detained since Trump signed his order at the White House on Friday. Trump responds Trump brushed off comments that his order could be seen as an anti-Muslim measure, and said the "very strict" crackdown he had ordered was working out "very, very nicely." The new immigration rules target people from seven nations all where a large majority of the population is Muslim judged as possible threats to the United States. At airports in New York, Washington, San Francisco and other cities, however, large crowds of protesters were gathering. Lawyers, many of them from the American Civil Liberties Union, also came to airports to offer counsel to airport detainees or any other U.S.-bound travelers stranded abroad. Fearful family members of those unable to enter the country were thrown into confusion by the new rules and what they said was a lack of information about how they were being enforced. Thousands of people at the New York airport chanted their support for refugees, and for "love, not hate," and held signs condemning the president's policy. Democrat Hillary Clinton, who lost to Trump in the November election and rarely commented since, tweeted "I stand with the people gathered across the country tonight defending our values and our Constitution. This is not who we are." As he signed his executive order Friday night, Trump said: "We're going to have a very, very strict ban and we're going to have extreme vetting [of would-be immigrants], which we should have had in this country for many years." By "extreme vetting," Trump was referring to his plan to carefully and intensively investigate Muslims and other people deemed to be possible threats to the United States before they are allowed to enter the country. "Slamming shut the doors to the United States of America, which has rigorously vetted refugees for years, is an attack on the basic accepted notion that people should be able to flee for their lives," said Jason Cone, the executive director of the U.S. branch of Doctors Without Borders. "Refugees are mothers and fathers and children who want what we all want: a safe place to live their lives, free from war and persecution." Retno Marsudi, the foreign minister of Indonesia, which has the world's largest Muslim population, but was not included in the nations whose citizens face restrictions for entering the U.S., told Reuters in a social media message that "We have deep regrets about the policy." .Lawmakers speak on both sides U.S. lawmakers are speaking out both for and against the immigration restrictions. House Speaker Paul Ryan, a Republican like Trump, defended the ban in a statement delivered by an aide Friday, even as his opponents circulated posts on social-media highlighting a strong statement Ryan made six months ago denouncing discrimination against Muslims. "This is not a religious test, and it is not a ban on people of any religion," Ryan's spokeswoman AshLee Strong said. Senator Ben Sasse, a Republican from Nebraska, said Trump was properly focused on protecting U.S. borders, but he added that the decree, as written, was "too broad." Republican Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona said Trump is right to be concerned about national security, "but it's unacceptable when even legal permanent residents are being detained or turned away...." Lena F. Masri, the national litigation director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations said of Trump's order: "This is an order that is based on bigotry, not reality." John Cohen, a former Homeland Security official, said the president's ban did not address the country's "primary terrorism-related threat," people already in the U.S. who are inspired to radicalism by what they see on the internet. House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul praised Trump's order. McCaul said in a statement "with the stroke of a pen," Trump had done "more to shut down terrorist pathways into this country than the last administration did in eight years." The Washington Post reported Saturday that calls and emails to more than a dozen other top Republican lawmakers, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, went unanswered in the first day of the ban's implementation. But some Republicans spoke out against the new policy. Other lawmakers speak out Congressman Charlie Dent, a Republican from Pennsylvania, counts a sizable Syrian population among his constituents in the metropolitan area of Allentown. He told The Washington Post of six people from the same family, owners of a home in Pennsylvania and all carrying valid visas, who were stopped at Philadelphia International Airport after arriving in the country on a Qatar Airways flight. "This is ridiculous," Dent said. "I guess I understand what his [Trump's] intention is, but unfortunately the order appears to have been rushed through without full consideration." "This family was sent [back to the Middle East] despite having all their paperwork in order," Dent added. "It's unacceptable, and I urge the administration to halt enforcement of this order until a more thoughtful and deliberate policy can be reinstated." "Shame. Shame. Shame," said Republican Senator Brian Schwartz of Hawaii in a tweet. "I feel sick." Senator Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat from California, told a reporter the ban is "an unbelievable action. It's one thing to see that an individual is properly vetted. It's an entirely different matter to say that because someone comes from a particular country or is a member of a particular faith that he or she has no access to this country." Other travelers have been thwarted in their attempts to enter the country as well, adding fuel to the protests at airports from coast to coast. The Los Angeles Times reported Saturday that most of the detainees there were from Iraq or Iran. A 25-year-old medical student from Iraq studying in the U.S. told VOA's Michael O'Sullivan at the Los Angeles airport she was joining the protest there because of the pain her "brothers and sisters" are feeling while "stuck at the gate at the airport." She also said her plans to visit her family in Iraq now cannot happen, and they will not be allowed to visit her. No access to those detained Federal officials have not been allowing family members or lawyers any contact with detainees, so details are sketchy. One immigration attorney, Jordan Cunnings, told the Los Angeles newspaper one of the detainees was a young Iranian mother who has held a U.S. green card, or legal work permit, for five years and is schedule to take her oath of citizenship in two weeks. Cunnings said the woman is traveling with her 11-month-old baby, who is an American citizen. "People don't have phone access or communication access to the people waiting for them, or their attorneys," Cunnings said. Cunnings also told the paper that without information, legal aid workers are scanning the crowds for people who might be looking for someone who has not shown up. "We're literally walking around asking people, 'Are you waiting for someone who has been detained?'" he said. Somali refugees Somali refugees who have been waiting years for resettlement in the United States told VOA's Somali service their flights to the United States were canceled by the order. "We come from Dadaab [refugee camp] and have been in the U.N. complex in Nairobi [Kenya] for days, for the preparation of our flights to the U.S. on January 31," Farah Mahad Bille told VOA Saturday. "We are told this morning that we are going back to Dadaab because of the U.S. president's order. It's an absolutely devastating loss of hope to us." Farhan Sulub, a Somali-American father who lived in the United States for 10 years, told VOA his wife was stopped at Dulles International Airport, outside the nation's capital, although Sulub's children were allowed to enter the country. "The immigration officers in the airport called me as I was waiting for my wife and children," he said. "They told me that my wife is not allowed to enter the U.S. because of her Somali nationality, but my children can go with me if I needed." UN urges US to reconsider The United Nations refugee agency and the International Organization for Immigrants have joined the growing numbers of advocacy groups criticizing U.S. actions. "The needs of refugees and migrants worldwide have never been greater, and the U.S. resettlement program is one of the most important in the world," according to a joint statement by the two groups. Since the previous U.S. policy of welcoming refugees has enriched both the lives of the refugees and their new American societies, the two groups urged U.S. officials to reconsider the new policy. "Resettlement places provided by every country are vital," the international refugee-aid groups said, adding they are hopeful "that the U.S. will continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution." VOA's Somalia Service contributed to this report. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address UNHCR: Refugees Pose No Threat to US National Security By Lisa Schlein January 29, 2017 The U.N. refugee agency says Syrian and other refugees pose no national security threat to the United States. The UNHCR, other U.N. agencies and human rights advocates are urging the United States to reconsider its ban on immigration. The U.N. refugee agency says there is no merit to a claim by U.S. President Donald Trump that Syrian refugees threaten national security and should be banned from entering the United States. On Friday, President Trump signed an executive order denying entry of citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries into the United States for 90 days. The new policy also calls for the suspension of all refugee resettlement to the U.S. for 120 days and an indefinite ban on Syrian refugees from entering the country. UNHCR spokeswoman Vannina Maestracci rejected assertions that Syrian refugees are terrorists. She said refugees are victims of terrorists and those proposed for resettlement are among the most vulnerable people on Earth. They include women and children, people with disabilities and serious medical needs. She told VOA that refugees undergo a very rigorous screening process before they are admitted to the U.S. for resettlement. "I think it is fair to say that refugees coming into the United States to be resettled are some of the most vetted individuals entering the United States," said the spokeswoman. In a recent interview with U.S. media, President Trump said the U.S. has taken in "tens of thousands of people" without knowing anything about them, adding that they were not vetted. The president is calling for "extreme vetting" of immigrants coming to the U.S. Maestracci said the UNHCR carefully screens all refugees proposed for resettlement in the United States and more than 30 other countries. She said the U.S. decides which refugees it will accept; a process that can take two years. "There are many, many layers to it within the U.S. system," she said. "I think eight federal government agencies are involved. There are six different security data base, five separate background checks all done by the U.S." The Office of Refugee Resettlement reports 14,333 Syrian refugees have been resettled in the U.S. since 2012. This number pales in comparison to other countries, such as Turkey, which currently hosts nearly three million Syrian refugees. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Trump: Immigration Order, Not About Religion, but About Keeping Country Safe By VOA News January 29, 2017 U.S. Homeland Security chief John Kelly says he believes admitting lawful permanent residents into the United States is in the country's national interest, and does not go against the provisions of President Donald Trump's executive order on refugees and immigration. Kelly's statement late Sunday clarifies some of the confusion surrounding Trump's executive order limiting immigration. It basically halts immigration for 90 days from seven Muslim majority countries he says have spawned terrorists. Trump defended his order against the global outcry, saying it is not about religion but about "terror and keeping our country safe." "America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border," he said in a statement from the White House on Sunday. The president noted that former President Barack Obama had identified the seven countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen - as sources of terror. He pointed out that more than 40 Muslim majority countries are not affected by his order, and he took a characteristic swipe at the media for calling his order a ban on Muslims. Trump's executive order issued Friday will be in effect for 90 days, but has led to widespread confusion. Refugees, green card holders, students and workers have been detained at American airports or barred from boarding international flights to the United States. A senior administration official told reporters late Sunday that the president's executive order was written by the top Republican immigration experts on Capitol Hill, and that the legal significance of how it will be carried out was carefully considered. But U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly in New York issued an emergency order Saturday temporarily barring the deportation of people with valid visas being detained at U.S. airports. The order also bars the detention of anyone with an approved refugee application. The judge wrote "there is imminent danger that, absent the stay of removal, there will be substantial and irreparable injury to refugees, visa-holders, and other individuals from nations" who are subject to the president's order. The Homeland Security Department says it will comply with judicial orders, but stressed it will continue to enforce all of the president's executive orders. But reports from federal authorities indicated at least 170 people had been detained at U.S. airports since Trump signed his order Friday. Two senior Republican senators criticized Trump's order Sunday. "It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trump's executive order was not properly vetted. We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defense, Justice and Homeland Security, Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham said. "Such a hasty process risks harmful results. People affected by order Twenty-eight-year-old Iranian national Neda Daemi, a 16-year legal U.S. resident, was released after being detained for 10 hours Saturday. Daemi spoke with two lawyers and added she was not asked to sign any papers. She explained she had flown to Los Angeles from Tehran, Iran, where she was visiting family members. Somali refugee Binto Siyad Aden and her children were released late Saturday after they were detained in Virginia. They had arrived on a family reunion visa from Kenya. Aden's husband, Farhan Sulub Anshur, a U.S. citizen from Minnesota, said he believes his wife and two children were released after a court intervened. "You can't image our joy and feelings now. They have been released and we are here together at a hotel near the airport, " Anshur said. He told reporters his wife was subjected to harsh treatment from law enforcement while in detention at the airport. "They harassed her and threatened her with handcuffs and arrest; they forced her to sign a form stating that her and her children will be deported, but she refused to sign for the kids and told them their father is an American citizen," he said. A Seattle judge issued an emergency stay of removal from the U.S. for two people, and another judge in Virginia banned the deportation of green card holders for seven days and ordered immigration officials to allow detainees access to lawyers. Other congressional reaction Trump's allies on Capitol Hill are treading carefully amid the controversy following his order. Republican Senator Mitch McConnell said the president has a lot of latitude to try to secure the country. "We need to be careful as we do this. I think we need to be careful we do not have religious tests in this country," McConnell said. Republican Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona said Trump is right to be concerned about national security, "but it's unacceptable when even legal permanent residents are being detained or turned away ..." Democrats, however, believe Trump is doing more harm and playing into the hands of the enemy. "What Trump is doing is harming our national security. It will incite attacks against us. ISIS (Islamic State) is already using this ban as propaganda," U.S. Representative Seth Moulton said. Kenneth Schwartz, Mohamad Olad contributed to this report. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Trump Issues Statement Defending Travel Bans Sputnik News 00:53 30.01.2017(updated 04:43 30.01.2017) Calling America a "proud nation of immigrants," US President Donald Trump defended the immigration restrictions he ordered January 27 and said he would continue "protect our own citizens and border." "America has always been the land of the free and the home of the brave. We will keep it free and safe, as the media knows but refuses to say," Trump began his statement, taking aim at his favorite target, the US media. He said while the country would continue to show "compassion to those fleeing oppression," it must do so while protecting itself, and that within 90 days, visas would begin being issued for "all countries." The new president equated his ban on accepting Syrian refugees, his four-month suspension of taking refugees from any country, and his ban on admitting nationals of seven Muslim countries to what former President Barack Obama did in 2011, when for six months he stopped issuing visas for refugees from Iraq. Trump also noted that the seven nations his ban affects Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen were identified by the Obama administration as "sources of terror." "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," Trump said. "This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order." "We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days," he said. Trump also said he had "tremendous feeling" for those caught up in the "horrific humanitarian crisis" in Syria, but that his first priority is to American citizens. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address As Protests Rage, Trump Says Travel Bans 'Working Out Very Nicely' Sputnik News 05:14 29.01.2017(updated 13:22 29.01.2017) US President Donald Trump says the country's new travel bans are "working out very nicely" despite lawsuits, protests and chaos at airports. Asked about the controversial executive orders banning many Muslims from entering the United States signed yesterday, Trump seemed sanguine. "It's not a Muslim ban," the president began, before going on to say "we were totally prepared, it's working out very nicely, you see at the airports, you see it all over we're going to have a very, very strict ban and we're going to have extreme vetting, which we should have had in this country for many years." The remarks came during a photo opportunity in the Oval Office January 28. The new executive orders suspend the United States' program to accept Syrian refugees and puts a 90 day ban on admitting nationals from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, even those who have valid US visas or who already live in the United States as legal aliens with green cards. Christians and members of minority religious groups in those countries are to be given priority consideration for entrance, a stipulation leading many to call the orders, indeed, a "Muslim ban." The restrictions potentially cover more than 130 million citizens of those countries. "We don't want them here," Trump said as he signed the orders January 27. "We want to ensure that we are not admitting into our country the very threats our soldiers are fighting overseas. We only want to admit those into our country who will support our country and love deeply our people." Meanwhile, thousands of people are protesting at airports across the US, New York City's taxi drivers have staged a strike in solidarity, Iran is considering retaliatory measures and the ACLU has filed a lawsuit on behalf of two detained refugees that names Trump personally as well as the US Department of Homeland Security and US Customs and Border Protection. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Washington and Seoul Maintain Different Approaches to Showdown With North Korea Sputnik News 18:07 30.01.2017(updated 18:12 30.01.2017) A recent White House press release didn't confirm that a consensus had been reached between the US and South Korean Presidents on Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) during their telephone conversation on January 30, according to Sputnik Korea. On January 30, US President Donald Trump held a phone conversation with his South Korean counterpart Hwang Kyo-ahn, during which he allegedly expressed understanding and support for Seoul's efforts to install elements of the US Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in South Korea, according to a press release issued by Seoul. "Acting South Korean President Hwang briefed US President Trump on Seoul's stance regarding the installation of the US THAAD system in South Korea. Trump expressed an active understanding and called for a further boost in bilateral cooperation, which will be discussed during US Defense Secretary Mattis' upcoming visit to South Korea," the press release said. However, the text of the White House's press release indicated that the THAAD issue was not discussed during the two leaders' telephone conversation, according to Sputnik Korea. "President Trump reiterated our ironclad commitment to defending the ROK [South Korea], including through the provision of extended deterrence, using the full range of our military capabilities," the press release, in particular, said. The South Korean Prime Minister's press service, for its part, never mentioned the phrase "extended deterrence" but referred to an abstract "powerful response [to North Korea's actions] based on the US-South Korean cooperation." Sputnik Korea's special correspondent tried to find out the reasons for this discrepancy, but calls to the press releases of both countries remained unanswered. It is worth noting that "extended deterrence" in terms of a military strategy means that in the event of a nuclear attack on the allied countries, such as the United States, South Korea, Japan and others, an array of weapons will be used, including intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM), ballistic missile submarines (SLBM) and strategic bombers. After the publication by the US of the Nuclear Posture Review in 2002, the missile defense (MD) and precision strikes system became part of the extended deterrence apart from the three above-mentioned strategic measures. The concept of "extended deterrence" also means "the possibility of pre-emptive nuclear strike" and includes measures such as interception, notification, detection and removal of contamination characteristics. Meanwhile, former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said that South Korean government is right to follow the THAAD deployment plan. "Given the reality, where the Korean Peninsula is in a state resembling war, the authorities' actions [on deploying THAAD] are reasonable," Ban said, as quoted by Yonhap news agency. China and Russia have repeatedly showed their objection to the deployment of THAAD, arguing that their real aim was to deter the strategic weapon systems not only in the Korean peninsula's North, but primarily in China's hinterlands and Russia's Far East regions. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Iranians not need Trump to allow them in IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency Tehran, Jan 29, IRNA -- Head of the Expediency Council Center for Strategic Research, Ali-Akbar Velayati, said on Sunday that Iranians have always led a dignified life and they have no need for Trump or any other person from the US to allow them in or not. He made the remarks at the end of a meeting with the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, Tadamichi Yamamoto on Sunday in reaction to the US president's travel ban on seven Muslim countries' nationals. The Iranians' honor is that they do not need to be accepted by irregular people like Trump, he said, noting that they also need not draw Trump's attention to be able to receive visa or not. The senior official also noted that Iranians visit countries, which respect them and no doubt the move would be detrimental to the US' future and it would face worse problems than ever. Asked about the statement of the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, that Aqsa Mosque destroyed by the Romans is a sacred site for the Jews, he hoped that the secretary general had not said such a thing and if so, it is not true and logical. "Aqsa Mosque belongs to Muslims and the entire land of Palestine belongs to the Palestinians that has been occupied by the Zionists," he said, hoping that the land would be liberated a day. Responding to a question about French foreign minister's visit to Tehran, Velayati said if he wants to work for his country's nation and foreign policy, he should enter into constructive talks with Iran as the first power of the region. If the French want to pursue the diplomacy of complying with the Americans, they will have no room in the region, he said, noting that if France wishes to attend the region, it should adopt independency in its foreign policy and avoid obeying the Americans. He also hoped that French foreign minister's trip to Tehran would be in line with its nation and government's wishes, as they always tried to separate their interests from those of the US. Yamamoto also told reporters that he held deep and clear talks with Velayati on Afghanistan. He also appreciated Iran for its support for the Afghan National Unity Government. 8072**1420 NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Deputy FM hails injection of UF6 into IR8 centrifuges IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency Tehran, Jan 29, IRNA -- Deputy Foreign Minister for Legal and International Affairs, Abbas Araqchi, on Sunday praised injection of Uranium hexafluoride (UF6) into IR8 centrifuges as a turning point in Iranian scientists' Research and Development (R&D) activities. Araqchi made the remarks in a message released in his Instagram account on Sunday. "Bravo, IR6 and IR8 are symbols of indigenous scientific and technological progress and also national pride and glory." Araqchi urged paying attention to importance of the prideful step. The IR8 is an advanced centrifuge machine, at least 24 times more powerful than the IR1, the official added. He called IR8 centrifuge machine a turning point in R&D of Iran's enrichment program. The IR6 and IR8, both of which are under test of injection of the UF6, will determine the future of Iran's enrichment industry, Araqchi added. The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) declared on Saturday the initiation of R&D for the advanced generation of the IR8 centrifuges using the UF6 gas. At this phase, injection of the UF6 gas to the advanced generation of the IR8 centrifuges is underway, the statement said. Public Relations department of the AEOI said in its statement that the IR8 centrifuges are one of the most sophisticated centrifuges, designed and manufactured by the Iranian scientists who have successfully carried out its mechanical trials with success in the past three years. 9191**1420 NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address French president underlines necessity to respect JCPOA IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency Tehran, Jan 29, IRNA -- French President Francois Hollande during a phone conversation with US President Donald Trump underlined necessity to respect the Joint Comprehensive Plan Of Action reached between Iran and G5+1(US, UK, France, Russia, China plus Germany). According to the dispatches, Hollande discussed Syria crisis in his phone call with Trump on Saturday and said that resolution of Syria crisis is only possible in the framework of UN. French president warned his new US counterpart against adopting a protectionist stance and called on him to respect the principle of accepting refugees. Hollande stressed the 'economic and political consequences of a protectionist approach." Trump on Friday signed an executive order suspending the US refugee resettlement program for 120 days. Hollande also insisted on 'the importance for the planet of the implementation of the Paris convention on global warming'. Trump has announced plans to undo climate policies and promote domestic energy development as part of his 'America First' agenda. 9191**1771 NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Zarif reacts to Trump's racist order ISNA - Iranian Students' News Agency Sun / 29 January 2017 / 11:46 Tehran (ISNA) Iranian foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on his official Twitter account criticized the U.S. president Donald Trump' travel ban. Zarif in a series of posts on his Twitter wrote: *Muslim ban shows baseless of U.S. claims of friendship with the Iranian people while only having issues with the Government. *Muslim ban will be recorded in history as a great gift to extremists and their supporters. *While respecting Americans and differentiating between them and hostile U.S. policies, Iran will take reciprocal measures to protect citizens. *Unlike the US, our decision is not retroactive. All with valid Iranian visa will be gladly welcomed. Trump signed an executive order restricting migration from Muslim-majority countries. Under the order nationals of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen are prohibited from entering the U.S. for at least the next 90 days. End Item NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Top Iraqi cleric wants Americans out over Trump's ban on Muslims Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 2:11PM Prominent Iraqi cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr, has censured US President Donald Trump over his executive order to ban entry into the US of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries, calling for the expulsion of American nationals from the Arab country in retaliation. "It would be arrogance for you to enter freely Iraq and other countries while barring them the entrance to your country ... and therefore you should get your nationals out," Sadr said in a statement published on his website on Sunday. Iraqi parl. says govt. must reciprocate US travel ban Meanwhile, Iraqi parliament's foreign affairs committee has decried the measure as "unfair," and asked the Iraqi government to "reciprocate" the travel curbs imposed on Iraqis. "We ask the Iraqi government to reciprocate ... the decision taken by the US administration," the committee said in a statement, adding, "Iraq is in the frontline of the war of terrorism ... and it is unfair that the Iraqis are treated in this way." "We clearly demanded that the Iraqi government deal reciprocally in all issues... with the United States of America," Hassan Shwairid, the deputy head of the committee, told AFP. On January 27, Trump signed a sweeping executive order to make good on his promised Muslim Ban. The new Republican president's order imposes a 90-day ban on the entry of citizens of Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Somalia, blocks refugees from Syria indefinitely, and suspends all refugee admissions for 120 days. Iraq's popular forces want Americans out In a related development, the pro-government Popular Mobilization Forces, commonly known by the Arabic word Hashd al-Sha'abi, also urged Iraqi authorities to bar the entrance of Americans into the country. "After the decision of the American president to prohibit the entry of Iraqi citizens to the United States of America, we demand Americans be prevented from entering Iraq, and the removal of those of them who are present," Hashd al-Sha'abi said in a statement. The statement did not clarify whether the demand applies to the US military personnel already deployed to Iraq or not. Thousands of American troops are currently in Iraq as part of the so-called US-led coalition against Daesh Takfiri terrorist group. Hashd al-Sha'abi fighters joined forces with Iraqi army soldiers and Kurdish Peshmerga forces in a major operation on October 17, 2016 to retake the strategic northern city of Mosul from Daesh extremists. The pro-government fighters also played a major role in the liberation of Tikrit, located 140 kilometers northwest of the capital, Baghdad, as well as Fallujah city in the western province of al-Anbar among many areas in Iraq. The reactions to Trump's Muslim ban come amid reports that the Iraqi government plans to lobby the US administration to mitigate the impact of restrictions on Iraqi travelers and preserve cooperation in the anti-Daesh campaign. On Saturday, protests broke out at major US airports, including Dallas, Chicago, Boston, Los Angeles and New York, after border agents began detaining refugees and immigrants arriving in the country. Families anxiously waited to learn the fate of their loved ones at terminals, while protesters chanted "Let them in" and "This is What America Looks Like." The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) also filed a lawsuit, challenging Trump's executive order on behalf of two Iraqis who were detained at New York's John F. Kennedy airport on Friday. ACLU lawyers successfully argued for a temporary stay, allowing the detained travelers to stay in the country. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Russia ready to help Iraq fight Daesh: Lavrov Iran Press TV Mon Jan 30, 2017 6:25PM Russia has expressed readiness to provide the Iraqi government with assistance in the country's fight against the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov made the announcement on Monday, saying that Moscow would help Iraq's anti-terror fight only "with Baghdad's consent." "In broader terms, we should not forget that ISIL (Daesh) is operating not only in Syria, but also in Iraq," Lavrov said in a meeting with his Eritrean counterpart Osman Saleh. "I do not rule out that, if the Iraqi authorities show interest, we will be able to provide additional support to them, at least in terms of intelligence data, but in other forms as well," he added. Iraqi army soldiers, supported by fighters from pro-government Popular Mobilization Units, commonly known by the Arabic word Hashd al-Sha'abi, and Kurdish Peshmerga forces, are currently engaged in joint operations to purge key areas in the country of the Takfiri terrorist group. Daesh still maintains firm control over the western quarter of Mosul, the terror group's last urban stronghold in the country. Moscow launched its campaign against Daesh and other terror outfits in Iraq's neighbor, Syria, at the request of the Damascus government in September 2015. Its air raids have helped Syrian forces advance against foreign-backed terrorists wreaking havoc in the Middle Eastern state since 2011. This is while the US-led coalition has also been conducting airstrikes against what are claimed to be positions of Daesh terrorists inside Syria since September 2014 without any authorization from Damascus or a UN mandate. The coalition has repeatedly been accused of targeting and killing civilians. It has also been largely incapable of fulfilling its declared aim of destroying Daesh. The UN special envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, estimates that over 400,000 people have so far been killed in the conflict. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Prominent Muslim lawyer gunned down in Myanmar Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 3:27PM A prominent Muslim lawyer and adviser to Myanmar's ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party has been assassinated along with a taxi driver outside the country's busiest airport. Ko Ni was shot dead as he got into a taxi in front of the main terminal of Yangon International Airport at 5:00 pm (1030 GMT) on Sunday after returning from a government-led trip to Indonesia, his assistant, San Naing, said. "They shot my boss. He is dead. I am beside his body and there's blood on the floor," Naing told Reuters by phone. Zaw Htay, a spokesman at the presidential office, said the prominent lawyer died "on the spot." The unidentified lone assassin also killed a taxi driver and injured two other people. Police have arrested a suspect but there are no reports on the potential motives behind the assassination so far. Ko Ni was an expert in constitutional law and advised the NLD on legal affairs. He was a rare voice advocating religious tolerance and pluralism. The UN's special rapporteur for Myanmar, Yanghee Lee, expressed her outrage over Ko Ni's murder and said she had met the top lawyer during her last trip to the country earlier in January which also included a visit to western Rakhine state. "My deepest and most sincere condolences to the family of Ko Ni the most prominent and respected Muslim lawyer of Myanmar," she said on her Twitter account. She also called on Myanmar's government to "get to the bottom" of his killing. The daylight shooting comes amid Myanmar government's heightened crackdown against Rohingya Muslims. Myanmar's military intensified its crackdown in Rakhine state after an attack on the country's border guards on October 9, 2016 left nine police officers dead, which the government blamed on the Rohingya. There are reports that at least 400 people have been killed, more than 2,500 houses, mosques, and religious schools destroyed, and three villages completely wiped out during the military crackdown. Myanmar's government has also blocked humanitarian and media access to Rakhine which is home to about 1.1 million Rohingya. Rohingya Muslims have been subjected to executions, rape, and arson attacks since October, according to refugees and rights groups. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Putin, Trump express willingness to cooperate: Kremlin People's Daily Online (Xinhua) 09:06, January 29, 2017 Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump agreed to stabilize and deepen bilateral cooperation during a phone conversation on Saturday, the Kremlin said. "The two sides expressed willingness to work actively together to stabilize and develop Russian-American cooperation on a constructive basis, as equals, and to mutual benefit," the Kremlin said in a statement issued after their first phone conversation since Trump's inauguration last week. Putin and Trump highlighted the priority of joint efforts in the fight against the main threat of international terrorism during the call, which was widely scrutinized to see if there will be a thaw in the soured relations during the Obama administration. "The Presidents called for establishing a real coordination of U.S. and Russian actions to defeat the Islamic State and other terrorist groups in Syria," the statement read. They also stressed the importance of restoring mutually beneficial trade and economic ties between business communities of the two countries, which could further boost development of bilateral relations. Russian and American people see each other positively, said the two leaders, who agreed to maintain regular personal contacts. Both sides are working to set possible date and venue for a Putin-Trump meeting. The presidents discussed and agreed to cooperate in the fight against terrorism, the situation in the Middle East, the Arab-Israeli conflict, the Iranian nuclear program, the Korean Peninsula issue and the Ukrainian crisis. "The conversation took place in a positive and businesslike manner," said the Kremlin statement. Russian ties with the United States and other NATO members experienced a record low during the Obama administration, mainly due to the Crimea issue, the Ukrainian crisis and the hacking accusations. In the last weeks of Obama's presidency, the United States expelled Russian diplomats and expanded economic sanctions. Putin was among the first leaders of major powers to send congratulations to Trump after the result of the U.S. presidential election was announced in November. During a call in mid-November, Putin and the then U.S. president-elect agreed that the current ties between Russian and the United States "could not get worse" and vowed to help "stimulate a return to pragmatic, mutually beneficial cooperation." NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Reading The Readouts: A Closer Look At The Trump-Putin Phone Call Steve Gutterman January 29, 2017 For Americans and Russians looking for clues about how relations will shape up under U.S. President Donald Trump, the Kremlin and White House readouts of his first postinauguration phone call with Vladimir Putin had something for everyone -- and not quite enough for anyone. Beyond the upbeat talk of mending badly strained ties and cooperating against terrorism, the two statements left plenty of questions about exactly what the two presidents discussed in the January 28 call and what, if anything, they agreed on in any detail. RFE/RL takes a closer look at what the readouts said -- and left unsaid -- about four key issues. Sanctions If you're skeptical about speculation that Trump is about to ease or lift sanctions imposed on Russia by former President Barack Obama's administration, you've got plenty of grounds for it: Neither the Kremlin statement nor the much shorter White House readout, issued a few hours later, made any reference to sanctions. Furthermore, officials on both sides said the sanctions -- imposed over Russia's seizure of Crimea in 2014, support for separatists in eastern Ukraine, and alleged interference on Trump's behalf in the U.S. election -- were not discussed in the call, which came a day after Trump said it was "very early" to be talking about lifting them. But those who think Trump may be closer than he suggests to easing sanctions found support for their suspicions in the Kremlin statement, which said the presidents stressed the importance of "restoring mutually beneficial trade and economic ties" between their countries. Some observers in both Russia and the West interpreted that as a hint that at least some of the punitive measures will go on the chopping block to clear the way for commerce. And what of the insistence in Washington and Moscow that Trump and Putin didn't discuss the sanctions at all? Well, the argument goes, at this point it is in neither president's interest to move too quickly, at least in public. For Trump, he is under pressure from both U.S. political parties and key European allies to keep sanctions in place. For Putin, it's because Russia has made a show of saying that it can endure any hardship and is not pleading for the punishments to be lifted. Ukraine In Kyiv, Trump's election has prompted fears that the United States could sacrifice support for Ukraine for better relations with Russia. That would make the country even more vulnerable to influence and interference from Moscow, which has also backed separatists in a war against government forces that has killed more than 9,750 people. Those concerns were hardly soothed by the Kremlin readout of the call, which said that the two agreed to "establish partner-like cooperation" on international issues including what it called "the crisis" in Ukraine. For some observers, that read like a suggestion that Ukraine's fate would be in the hands of a newly forged partnership between Moscow and Washington. Fanning such fears may have been the Kremlin's intent. But it could also be an overinterpretation; the wording might mean little more than that Trump and Putin agreed that their countries should interact constructively on a range of global issues -- the anodyne stuff of past statements, at least during warmer times in the relationship. Anyone who hoped Trump's team would shed more light on the subject was disappointed: There was no mention of Ukraine in the White House statement. Syria And Terrorism Putin has long accused the United States of double-standards on terrorism. The Obama administration said Moscow used the fight against the extremist group Islamic State as a pretext for a Syrian air campaign aimed mainly at backing President Bashar al-Assad. Remarks by Russian officials suggest that the election of Trump, who has repeatedly expressed hop that the two countries can get together and "knock the hell out of" Islamic State, has raised the Kremlin's hopes that closer cooperation against terrorism -- and with it, perhaps, closer positions on issues ranging from Ukraine to human rights -- is imminent. Both readouts support that idea, making clear that fighting Islamic State and terrorism was the main topic and a top priority. The White House statement, in fact, mentioned no other specific issue aside from bilateral relations, while the Kremlin readout listed several others including Ukraine, the Middle East, the Korean Peninsula, and nuclear proliferation. But the Kremlin statement, which was substantially longer than the White House readout, seemed to hint at more specific cooperation -- particularly in Syria, where the two countries have conducted separate bombing campaigns. "The presidents called for the establishment of real coordination of Russian and American actions with the aim of crushing [IS] and other terrorist organizations in Syria," it said. The White House statement did not go quite that far, saying that topics addressed during the hour-long call ranged "from mutual cooperation in defeating [IS] to efforts in working together to achieve more peace throughout the world, including Syria." It concluded by saying that both presidents "are hopeful that after today's call the two sides can move quickly to tackle terrorism and other important issues of mutual concern." Face-To-Face A phone call is one thing, but face-to-face talks would be likely to send a stronger signal that ties are on the mend. Meeting in person sooner rather than later is arguably of particular importance to Putin, who may be eager for the optics of a superpower summit. After initial talk of a meeting soon after Trump's inauguration, Russian officials have sought to manage expectations recently by saying it could take months to arrange. Still, the Kremlin statement seemed to suggest that the president could get together soon, saying that they agreed to order subordinates to come up with a potential time and place for a personal meeting. The White House statement made no mention of a personal meeting. Source: http://www.rferl.org/a/closer-look-at-trump- putin-phone-call/28266254.html Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Russia: No 'Moralizing' In Putin-Trump Phone Call RFE/RL January 30, 2017 Russia's foreign minister is suggesting that U.S. President Donald Trump did not raise the issue of human rights with Russian President Vladimir Putin during their telephone conversation on January 28. In the past, Russian officials have often bristled at what they claim have been Western attempts to teach the Russian government how it should treat its citizens and how it should behave on the international stage. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that the first conversation between the two presidents since Trump's inauguration on January 20 was marked by "mutual respect" and a desire "to speak without moralizing, focusing on the national interests of each country." Trump has indicated he will seek improvements in Russian-U.S. relations, which are badly strained over Moscow's interference in Ukraine and alleged meddling in the U.S. election. Russia has blamed the tension on the previous U.S. administration. Trump and Putin have called for closer cooperation against terrorism and the extremist group Islamic State, and statements from the Kremlin and the White House indicated that was a main topic of discussion during the call. Lavrov said that Russia is ready "at any moment" for talks with the United States on counterterrorism efforts. Also on January 30, Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it is possible the two presidents will hold talks in person sometime before a summit of the Group of 20 (G20) nations in July. The Kremlin said after the phone call that Trump and Putin had ordered subordinates to discuss the date and place for a face-to-face meeting. With reporting by dpa, Reuters, TASS, and Interfax Source: http://www.rferl.org/a/russia-putin-trump-call -no-moralizing-lavrov/28267758.html Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address At Least 2 Policemen, 3 Militants Killed During Operation in Russia's Chechnya Sputnik News 02:45 30.01.2017(updated 03:23 30.01.2017) At least two law enforcement officers and three militants have been killed during a police operation in Russian Chechen Republic. MOSCOW (Sputnik) At least two law enforcement officers and three militants have been killed during the police operation in the city of Shali located in Russia's Chechen Republic, Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said Monday. "[The militants] opened fire and threw a grenade after the proposal to show their documents Due to the received wounds Sgt. 1st Class Ali Muslimkhanov and a serviceman of the Patrol-Guard Service of the Police Islam Yakhadzhiev died. Also two local residents were injured. The immediately taken actions allowed to kill three militants," Kadyrov said. He added that the group was controlled from the Syrian territory by a recruiter of the Islamic State jihadist group, outlawed in Russia. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Syrian army forces recapture strategic Wadi Barada valley from militants Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 4:31PM Syrian government forces, backed by fighters from allied popular defense groups, have established full control over all towns and villages in the strategic Wadi Barada area on the outskirts of the capital, Damascus, after dozens of foreign-sponsored Takfiri militants left the region and fled toward the militant-held northwestern city of Idlib. The Syrian army, in a statement read out by military spokesman Brigadier General Ali Mayhoub and broadcast live on television on Sunday, announced that units of armed forces and their allies have accomplished "their mission in returning security and stability to Basemeh, Ain al-Khadhra, Dayr al-Mogharen, Ayn al-Fijah, Dayr Ghanon, Kafr Zait, al-Hussainiah, Kafr al-Awamid, Berhelia, Afreh, and Souq Wadi Barada." Mayhoub then put the total expanse of liberated areas at 400 square kilometers, noting that the Syrian army has agreed to the evacuation of hundreds of militants from those areas as part of a reconciliation agreement between armed opposition groups and the government. The high-ranking Syrian military figure underlined that Wadi Barada will be purged of Takfiri militants within the next two days. The announcement came a day after Syrian government forces and their allies entered the water pumping station in Wadi Barada for the first time in four years. Around 5.5 million people in Damascus and its suburbs have been scrambling for clean water ever since Syrian army soldiers and fighters from popular defense groups launched a major offensive on December 22, 2016 to recapture Wadi Barada. The operation began after terrorists refused to surrender and leave the mountainous area near the Lebanese border. The Takfiri militants had earlier contaminated Damascus's drinking water supply with diesel. The water authority had to cut the supply to Damascus and resort to using water reserves after extremists polluted the Ayn al-Fijah spring in the valley. The Barada River and Ayn al-Fijah spring reportedly supply 70 percent of the water for Damascus and its environs. Although people in some neighborhoods can get up to two hours of water every three or four days, many people have to buy water from unregulated vendors, with no guarantee of quality and at more than twice the regular price. According to the UN, 15 million people across Syria are in need of help to access water and households spend nearly a quarter of their income on water. UNICEF has provided generators to pump water and is delivering 15,000 liters of fuel daily to supply up to 3.5 million people with 200,000 cubic meters drinking water per day. Over the past almost six years, Syria has been fighting foreign-sponsored militancy. UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura estimated in August last year that more than 400,000 people had been killed in the Syrian crisis until then. The UN has stopped its official casualty count in Syria, citing its inability to verify the figures it receives from various sources. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Water is Life: Syrian Army Liberates Vital Wadi Barada Area Near Damascus Sputnik News 17:19 29.01.2017(updated 21:23 29.01.2017) The government troops have completely liberated the Wadi Barada area near Damascus thus securing the main water source for the capital. MOSCOW (Sputnik) The Syrian army has fully liberated the Wadi Barada area near the Syrian capital of Damascus, where the main water source is located, from militants, the Army Command said in a statement Sunday. "Syrian government army units have completed the mission on restoring security and stability in the villages and towns in Wadi Barada in the western suburbs of Damascus after series of successful military operations," the statement said, as quoted by the SANA news agency. According to the military, their actions made it possible to sign ceasefire agreements in some of the villages, thus, letting civilians and militants leave the area without clashes. Earlier in the day, a similar agreement was reportedly signed in the village of Ein Al Fejeh, where the main water source is located. Over 6 million residents of Damascus were left without water after militants cut Damascus of water supply. The repair brigades have already arrived in the area to restore the water connection. Since 2011, Syria has been engulfed in a civil war, with government forces fighting against numerous opposition and terrorist groups, including al-Nusra Front and Daesh, banned in a range of countries, including Russia. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Turkey detains pro-Kurdish party spokesman amid post-coup purge Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 10:50AM Turkish police have arrested the spokesman of the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) as part of the government's crackdown on the pro-Kurdish opposition party launched following last year's failed military coup. An unidentified Turkish security source said Ayhan Bilgen, who also serves as the MP for the city of Kars, was taken into custody at Ankara Esenboga Airport on Sunday and would be taken to southeastern Diyarbakir Province, Turkey's Anadolu news agency reported. Bilgen was detained for his failure to give testimony in an alleged terror probe underway by Diyarbakir prosecutor's office, the source added. Huda Kaya and Meral Danis Bestas, two other HDP lawmakers, were arrested on Saturday as part of the same investigation and released under judicial supervision. The crackdown on opposition is part of measures taken under a state of emergency declared following the abortive military putsch on July 15, 2016, blamed on the movement led by US-based opposition cleric, Fethullah Gulen. In November 2016, 13 HDP lawmakers were detained on charges of links to Kurdish militants. They have all denied having any ties with the Kurdistan Workers' Party, also known as the PKK. Currently, 10 of those arrested, including HDP co-leaders Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag still remain in custody awaiting trial. Earlier this month, Diyarbakir prosecutors demanded a jail term of between 43 and 142 years for Demirtas and a prison sentence of between 30 and 83 years for the Yuksekdag. Turkey has banned the PKK as a terrorist organization. The militant group has been calling for an autonomous Kurdish region since 1984. A shaky ceasefire between Ankara and the PKK that had stood since 2013 was declared null and void by the militants in 2015 in the wake of a Turkish aerial campaign against the group. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Britain, Turkey sign 100 million warplane deal Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 12:13AM British Prime Minister Theresa May has signed a 100 million warplane deal with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in hopes that the UK will emerge as Turkey's principal military partner. The jet fighter agreement, signed on Saturday, will see the UK's largest military contractor BAE Systems collaborate with Turkish companies to build a custom-made Turkish warplane, the TF-X, British daily The Guardian reported, underlining that the UK hopes the deal would spark "a longstanding relationship, and open the door to becoming Turkey's main defense provider." "It marks the start of a new and deeper trading relationship with Turkey and will potentially secure British and Turkish jobs and prosperity for decades to come," said May, who had earlier laid a wreath at the mausoleum of former Turkish leader Kemal Ataturk. "This agreement underlines once again that Britain is a great, global trading nation and that we are open for business," added the British prime minister, who aims to demonstrate that the UK can strike lucrative trade deals as it prepares to exit the European Union. "We would expect this to unlock further deals," said a Downing Street spokeswoman as quoted in the report, which noted that besides the warplane deal, May and Erdogan further discussed security cooperation and counter-terrorism, and agreed to form "a joint working group" to begin talks about a bilateral trade deal that could be signed after Brexit. The development came immediately following May's official visit to Washington, where she held talks with US President Donald Trump. According to the report, May signed the military deal with Turkey despite growing concerns regarding Erdogan's human rights record "and the increasingly authoritarian tone of his government, which has locked up thousands of political dissidents and protesters." The spokeswoman insisted that the issues of human rights and trade were distinct saying, "I think those are separate issues; Turkey is an important NATO partner, so our cooperation on both security and defense is in line with that." "The prime minister's approach is quite clear; she thinks it is important and in the UK's interests to engage with Turkey," she further stated. Asked about the massive crackdown following the attempted coup against Erdogan's leadership last year, May's spokeswoman said, "We have expressed strong support for Turkey's democracy and institutions following the coup, but have also been very clear that we urge Turkey's response to be proportionate and in line with international human rights obligations." Speaking beside Erdogan in his lavish presidential office, May said, "I'm proud that the UK stood with you on July 15 last year in defense of democracy and now it is important that Turkey sustains that democracy by maintaining the rule of law and upholding its international human rights obligations as the government has undertaken to do." May's remarks on human rights comes despite her total expression of support for Persian Gulf dictatorships such as Saudi Arabia and Bahrain as Britain presses ahead with more weapon sales to both regimes, which are notorious for their grave human rights records in their cruel repression of domestic dissent. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Greece Refuses to Extradite 50 Turkish Citizens Accused of Terrorism Sputnik News 17:35 29.01.2017 Athens refused to extradite 50 Turkish citizens that are accused in Turkey of being members of terrorist organization, according to local media reports. MOSCOW (Sputnik) Greece refused to extradite 50 Turkish citizens that are accused in Turkey of being members of organizations recognized as terrorist, local media reported on Sunday. A total of 24 people are said to be members of the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), eight of the so-called Fethullah Terrorist Organization (FETO), six of the Revolutionary Left (DEV-SOL), one of the Lebanon-based Hezbollah, one of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and others of other groups, the Yeni Safak media outlet reported. On Thursday, the Greek Supreme Court ruled against the extradition of eight soldiers, who had flown to Greece by helicopter on July 16 after a thwarted coup in Turkey and asked for political asylum, saying that a fair trial cannot be expected in Turkey. According to the court ruling, the Turkish servicemen have permission to travel freely within the Greek borders. A day later, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said that, following the Greek Supreme Court's decision, Ankara might withdraw from the bilateral treaty with Greece on readmission of undocumented migrants. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Turkey Kills 20 Daesh Terrorists During Aerial Bombardment in Northern Syria Sputnik News 10:34 30.01.2017(updated 11:16 30.01.2017) According to the Turkish General Staff, 20 Daesh jihadist group members were killed in northern Syria as a result of airstrikes conducted by the Turkish Air Forces over the past 24 hours. MOSCOW (Sputnik) As a result of airstrikes conducted by the Turkish Air Forces, 20 Daesh jihadist group members were killed in northern Syria over the past 24 hours, media reported Monday, citing a statement issued by the Turkish General Staff. "Turkish Air Forces destroyed 20 buildings used by Daesh terrorists as hideouts, as well as one arsenal and two defensive positions in the Syrian towns of Al Bab, Tadif and Bzagah In over 24 hours, 20 Daesh terrorists have been eliminated," the General Staff was quoted as saying by the news outlet Haberturk. In August 2016, Turkey launched Operation Euphrates Shield against the internationally-condemned terrorist organization Daesh (ISIL/ISIS). Turkish forces, along with Syrian opposition forces, occupied the city of Jarabulus in northern Syria and are currently carrying out an offensive against a strategic city of Al Bab. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Clashes in east Ukraine kill 3 soldiers, 1 pro-Russian Iran Press TV Sun Jan 29, 2017 2:58PM Fresh clashes in eastern Ukraine have killed three government forces and one from the pro-Russia militants' camp in what has been described as the bloodiest escalation of conflict in weeks in the war-torn region. Ukraine military spokesman Oleksandr Motuzyanyk said Sunday that three Ukrainian forces were killed in clashes that erupted following an offensive by pro-Russians to capture the city of Avdiivka. "Today, the enemy attempted to seize the Avdiivka industrial zone," said Motuzyanyk, adding that another soldier was wounded in the battle for the control of the city which has seen some fierce clashes on its outskirts over the last weeks. Avdiivka lies close to Donetsk, the de facto capital of pro-Russia forces in eastern Ukraine. Sources in Donetsk said one militant was killed and another wounded in the confrontation near Avdiivka. Eastern Ukraine has been gripped with around 33 months of devastating violence which has claimed the lives of more than 10,000 people. The conflict has badly impacted relations between Russia and the West as the Western governments support Kiev's claims regarding Moscow's alleged intervention in the east. Russia has denied allegations of supporting the militants; however, it insists that it would intervene if Kiev intensifies its suppression of ethnic Russian population living in the territory. The renewed violence on the outskirts of Avdiivka came despite a ceasefire announced in December. According to the deal, the warring sides are supposed to avoid using heavy weaponry. Reports on Sunday said, however, that the firefight involved artillery and large-caliber mortars. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Anxious Ukraine Risks Escalation In 'Creeping Offensive' Christopher Miller January 30, 2017 NOVOLUHANSKE, Ukraine -- The way Ukrainian commander Vyacheslav "Eagle-Owl" Vlasenko described it, his troops snuck into this rustic town of 4,000 people in broad daylight and took it -- and a valuable pig farm -- without firing a shot. Concealed in trucks that looked like those used by the pig farm, the troops' advance into Nuvoluhanske -- which had been part of the gray zone, a ravaged no-man's land between the warring sides -- took their Russia-backed separatist foes by surprise. "We used civilian trucks and a sort of maskirovka," Vlasenko, clad in fatigues, told RFE/RL at the command-and-control center of the Ukrainian Army's 46th battalion in nearby Zaitseve on January 23. It was a reference to a deception tactic widely credited to Russian military planners and employed by the Kremlin when it seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014. "It was 1 p.m." Vlasenko said. "They figured out what had happened at 8:45 p.m. and began firing artillery, striking near our defensive positions on the east side of the pig farm." Mounting Discontent Frustrated by the stalemate in this 33-month war of attrition, concerned that Western support is waning, and sensing that U.S. President Donald Trump could cut Kyiv out of any peace negotiations as he tries to improve fraught relations with Moscow, Ukrainian forces anxious to show their newfound strength have gone on what many here are calling a "creeping offensive." Observers say the Ukrainians appear to be trying to create new facts on the ground, while officials and commanders insist they are fighting to stop the flow of contraband into separatist-controlled territories and fending off attempts by separatist groups that call themselves the Donetsk and Luhansk "people's republics" to seize more territory. Whatever the case, since mid-December Ukraine's armed forces have edged farther into parts of the gray zone in or near the war-worn cities of Avdiivka, Debaltseve, Dokuchaievsk, Horlivka, and Mariupol, shrinking the space between them and the separatist fighters. In doing so, the pro-Kyiv troops have sparked bloody clashes with their enemy, which has reportedly made advances of its own -- or tried to -- in recent weeks. The Ukrainian military reported that 17 of its soldiers were killed in the December battles. At least 16 more have been killed in fighting this month, including seven on January 29-30. There are no reliable figures for the separatist side. In all, Europe's only active war has claimed the lives of more than 9,750 people and displaced some 1.7 million more since it began in April 2014, according to the United Nations. And all signs point to the conflict getting worse before it gets better. Fears Of Escalation Stalker, the nom de guerre of a commanding officer who declined to give his full name, showed RFE/RL through the 46th battalion's labyrinth of freshly dug trenches that keep the soldiers safe from artillery shells and sheltered from the biting winter. Within the stuffy confines of a bunker housing weapons, ammunition, rations, and half a dozen men and at least one woman, soldiers warmed themselves by a field stove, checked social media on their smartphones, and prepared borsch during a rare lull in fighting. They were the lucky ones. Three of their fellow troops had been wounded and evacuated since taking up the position, Stalker said. All that divides the two sides here is 350 meters and a cemetery smack in the middle of a snow-covered field -- a dark symbol that is not lost on the fighters. Soon, from a road over the hill came a convoy of European monitors who had been critical of the advances. They were there to inspect the new Novoluhanske positions. "The direct result of forward moves is escalation in tension, which often turns to violence," Alexander Hug, the principal deputy chief monitor of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe's Special Monitoring Mission (OSCE SMM) to Ukraine, had told RFE/RL prior to his visit. Hug said the soldiers had recently become more brazen. For much of the conflict, they have played a game of hide-and-seek with the OSCE, concealing their weapons from the international monitors' scrutinizing eyes. But, Hug said, they now position large-caliber artillery, including towed howitzers, main battle tanks, and multiple-launch rocket systems banned under the Minsk deal "in the open with impunity." Caught In The Cross Fire As the two sides push closer to each other, they risk not only their own lives but those of civilians. On January 27, Hug reported five civilians had been killed this month alone as a result of the clashes. He said 19 were killed in all of 2016, a year in which the OSCE recorded more than 300,000 cease-fire violations. At an elementary school in Novoluhanske a few hundred meters from the 46th battalion's new trenches, teacher Lyudmila Alekseyevna told RFE/RL while watching her fourth-graders slide down an icy mound that townspeople feel like "death is knocking on our doors." "We are ready for peace to return to us," she said, adding that she did not know why the military had come to Novoluhanske. Combating Lawlessness Pavlo Zhebrivskyy, the governor of the Donetsk region, told RFE/RL at his office in Kramatorsk that the Novoluhanske move to where there had been no police presence was necessary to stop smuggling. With supplies limited in the conflict zone, a lucrative black market has flourished. Kyiv estimates traffickers make millions sneaking coal, fuel, food, and more across the front line. In the past week, nationalist activists have blocked "indefinitely" a railway line they claim is used to trade illegal contraband with the separatists. "There was no law enforcement to stop criminal activity, [including] the illegal smuggling of Ukrainian goods...of pig meat," said commander Vlasenko. Novoluhanske's pig farm houses some 93,000 swine and produces up to 20 tons of meat per day, much of which soldiers claimed and journalists reported had been trafficked into separatist-controlled territory. Zhebrivskyy said that "98 percent of smuggling" around Novoluhanske ceased after the 46th battalion's arrival. Bumpy Road To Peace Hug said battlefield advances by both sides make implementing the 2015 peace deal, known as the Minsk agreement, "more difficult." Ukrainian authorities insist their moves do not endanger the peace process and are not in violation of the Minsk deal because they did not cross in separatist-controlled territory. "According to the Minsk agreement, there is a clear delineation of the contact line, and there were absolutely no violations by Ukraine in terms of the contact line, but there have been significant violations on the other side's part," Ukrainian Defense Minister Stepan Poltorak told RFE/RL in Kyiv on January 21. Put more simply, Stalker said, "It's our Ukrainian land. How can it ever be a violation?" Russians In Waiting There is also a haunting prospect of Ukraine's creeping offensive: the risk of provoking a military response from Russia, as Kyiv and Western officials say previous advances did. Ukraine suffered two devastating defeats -- in Ilovaisk in August 2014 and in Debaltseve in February 2015 -- that left hundreds of troops dead after Russia-backed forces encircled them and pounded their positions with heavy artillery. The battle changed the Ukrainians' calculus and gave the separatist side the clear upper hand. Poltorak noted that Russia has since constructed several military bases and camps close to Ukraine's border, which allows Russia to deploy thousands of its troops "within a matter of hours." Moreover, he claimed, 5,000 regular soldiers of the Russian armed forces are already on separatist-held territory, along with 40,000 Russian nationals fighting in separatist militias. In addition to personnel, Poltorak said, Russia has deployed to eastern Ukraine "more than 600 main battle tanks, more than 1,300 armored vehicles, more than 700 pieces of artillery, and more than 450 multiple-launch rocket systems." Russia denies sponsoring the separatists or deploying its forces to Ukrainian territory, despite overwhelming evidence of both. New Strength? Ukraine's army appears to feel emboldened almost three years after the start of the fighting, having undergone a crash course in warfare and modernized its military -- bold enough for some to say the occupied areas of eastern Ukraine could be "liberated" by the end of 2017. After increasing its defense budget to about $6 billion, Ukraine created a standing army of 250,000 soldiers -- up from only 5,000 to 6,000 combat-ready troops in April 2014, Poltorak said. That makes it among the largest armies in Europe. Meanwhile, its state arms maker has pumped out new military materiel, including an unmanned fighting vehicle, and it hopes to manufacture a new main battle tank to rival one made by Russia. Last month, Ukraine tested a new "high-precision" missile for Smerch multiple-launch rocket systems that has a range of 60 kilometers. Peace Through Power While leaders in Kyiv and Moscow say publicly the only way to solve the current conflict is through political means, neither has shown a willingness to do so, Hug said. Asked about the Ukrainian military's recent advances and weapons testing, Poltorak said a political solution is "only possible if Ukraine will have a powerful army." Otherwise, he said, its adversaries won't take it seriously. Back in Novoluhanske, the 46th battalion's Vlasenko boasted that if politicians couldn't bring an end to the war, his soldiers could recapture the occupied territories by force "and be at the border with Russia in around six months." But he added a caveat: "It would cost many civilian lives." Source: http://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-russia- creeping-offensive-escalation -fighting/28268104.html Copyright (c) 2017. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address On Valentines Day 2013, astronomers around the world watched on as the 2012 DA14 asteroid, an object discovered by Spanish scientists, passed Earth at a safe distance of 27,680 kilometers. But that same night, another object around 20 meters in diameter closed in on our planet, unnoticed by anyone. Several hours later it became a spectacular ball of fire in the skies over Russia. Impact point of the Chelyabinsk meteorite in Russia in 2013. Getty The meteorite exploded around 30 kilometers above ground and the shockwave injured hundreds, providing a stark warning of the threat posed to Earth by such objects. We have to learn to deflect asteroids before its too late Josep Maria Trigo, researcher Now, a team of European scientists headed by Spanish investigators has been the first to analyze a fragment of the meteorite which scattered thousands of pieces of debris over the frozen plains of Chelyabinsk, west of the Ural Mountains. The team studied the mechanical properties of the minerals forming the Chelyabinsk meteorite, looking at hardness, elasticity and fracture toughness, or the amount of stress an object with a crack, or other existing flaws, can tolerate. The results, which have been accepted for publication in the prestigious Astrophysical Journal, could play a key role in designing future space missions aimed at deflecting more dangerous meteorites and stopping them crashing into Earth, the researchers said in a press conference. Meteorites of between 30 and 50 meters like the one that flattened several square kilometers of Russian forest in the so-called Tunguska event of 1908 happen on a timescale of centuries or thousands of years, but we can experience an impact like Chelyabinsk at any moment, and we dont know when, said study co-author Josep Maria Trigo, an investigator with the Barcelona-based Institute of Space Sciences (IEEE-CSIC). Trigo acknowledged that when an asteroid remains undetected, as in the case of the Chelyabinsk meteorite, or if it is only detected a matter of days or hours beforehand, there is not much that people can do. But if the object is detected with a margin of months or years, it could be diverted by launching a so-called kinetic projectile, or a projectile that doesnt contain a charge. For such a strategy to work, it is important to have as much information as possible about the composition of the object and where exactly to strike it. Meteorites like Chelyabinsk have their origins in asteroids that have been travelling through the Solar System for long periods of time and have suffered collisions that have changed their consistency and composition. Studies like the one carried out by Spanish investigators could serve to identify which zones have suffered the least impacts, and to ensure that [after the impact from the projectile] the meteorite heads in the opposite direction, Trigo said. Josep Maria Trigo holds up the fragment of meteorite analyzed by the team. EFE The European Space Agency (ESA) had planned to work with NASA on a joint Asteroid Impact Mission (AIM), but the ESA pulled its funding for the project, leaving work stalled. NASA now plans to continue alone with its part of the project, which involves launching an impact device against an asteroid. But Trigo said the European side of the project was not over and that various European countries want AIM to make a comeback. We have to learn to deflect asteroids before its too late, he said. English version by George Mills. Argentina was born as a land open to immigrants coming from all corners of the planet. The 1853 Constitution made it quite clear in its preamble, where it explained its own main goal: To secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves, to our posterity, and to all men of the world who wish to dwell on Argentinean soil. Federal police in Buenos Aires. Telam archivo Even today, Argentina remains one of the most open countries in the world, and South Americas biggest recipient of foreigners. The laws help: free universal education and healthcare, and open-border policies. But even Argentina is starting to change. In an election year, and with fear of a lack of public safety gripping society, the Mauricio Macri administration has found a culprit: foreigners. The executive has promised more checks at the borders and on airplanes to ensure that individuals with a criminal record are not allowed into the country. It is also pledging to speed up the deportation of criminals. Citizens from Peru and Paraguay are coming here and they end up killing one another over control of the drug trade Security Minister Patricia Bullrich The government insists that it is not trying to stigmatize immigrants, or to blame them for all crimes. It notes that last year, with Macri already in office, 215,000 people became naturalized citizens. And Argentina is going to accept Syrian refugees at a time when many other countries are turning them away. We are not like Donald Trump, we have the opposite idea, Argentina is an open country, said Macris deputy, Gabriela Michetti. But several organizations and opposition groups are raising the alarm. Argentinas foreign population is 4.5%, and foreign inmates serving time represent 6% of the prison population. The figures do not look alarming. Yet the government is providing another set of data that focuses on federal penitentiaries, and points to foreigners as being responsible for the most serious crimes, particularly drug trafficking. President Mauricio Macri has pledged to fight citizen insecurity, his constituencys main concern. EFE The foreign national population in the custody of the Federal Penitentiary Service has grown over the last years to reach 21.35% of the total prison population in 2016. In crimes linked to drugs, 33% of the people in the custody of the Federal Penitentiary Service are foreigners. The political message is very clear. Citizens from Peru and Paraguay are coming here and they end up killing one another over control of the drug trade. Many Paraguayans, Bolivians and Peruvians are involved, either providing the capital or as drug mules, as drivers or as part of a chain, said Security Minister Patricia Bullrich. Her words have triggered protests from several of those countries. And yet the perpetrators of the last crimes to shock society were all born in Argentina. This kind of reaction is nothing new. Past leaders have frequently resorted to the immigration theory to explain away crime rates. In October 2014, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner also stated that foreigners who are caught committing a crime will be deported, and not allowed to come back for the next 15 years. Where do Argentineans come from? They are descended from boats Nothing came of it. Then as now, political pledges to toughen up the law are always well received by a skittish population, but the real effects are typically very limited. Experts insist that a lack of security has much deeper causes that have to do with poverty and inequality. And the culture of immigration is engraved in every name and every family history here. Where do Argentineans come from? goes one popular joke in Buenos Aires. They are descended from boats. Even President Macri is the son of an Italian national who arrived in Buenos Aires at the age of 18 and built an empire from the ground up. But Argentina is going through difficult times, and many citizens are taking the easy way out: blame the immigrants. Society is in a state of permanent alert, particularly in the suburbs of large cities such as Buenos Aires, Rosario or Cordoba. Five television channels broadcasting news 24/7 provide detailed information about the most shocking crimes, ranging from theft to murder: a 15-year-old who killed a 14-year-old, a pregnant 15-year-old shot by two teens. Ever since the 2001 crisis, Argentina has slowly become more similar to its neighbors. While homicide rates are still low at six for every 100,000 inhabitants (compared with 84 in Honduras, 53 in Venezuela and 31 in Colombia), people compare themselves not to other countries, but to Argentina 20 years ago. And the sense of fear is extending. The middle and upper classes have reacted by hiring security guards or moving to closed communities Only six years ago, it was possible to go out on the lane to sip mate. Now this is pure hell, says Micaela, 22, speaking in La Tablada, the most dangerous area of Rosario. The scariest part is that this is a relatively new trend. The middle and upper classes have reacted by hiring security guards or moving to closed communities surrounded by barbed wire and electric fencing. All visitors get their vehicles searched, including the trunk. And workers bags are inspected to make sure that they have not stolen anything during their shift. The poor, who live in neighborhoods where the worst crimes take place, react desperately by stocking up on weapons. And the urban middle class, which is Macris natural voter pool, is demanding action now. When the president periodically visits a neighborhood and starts ringing doorbells a method invented by his Ecuadorean guru Jaime Duran Barba the locals speak almost exclusively about the lack of security. The real facts are heightened by a sense of general fears over public safety fueled by media outlets that have made this issue their number-one priority. Each new crime has a multiplying effect. Macri, just like the Kirchners before him, has increased the number of police officers on patrol. But that was not enough. He fought against corruption. But that was not enough, either. And so, with a new election looming, the president has turned to his last-resort solution: the outside enemy. The campaign is certain to be long and complicated. English version by Susana Urra. "Exploration Drilling and Resource Expansion Program Update" VANCOUVER, Jan. 30, 2017 /CNW/ - Northern Vertex Mining Corp. (TSX.V:NEE) (the Company") is pleased to report holes WW-16 and WW-17, which comprised nine inch diameter holes drilled as water wells, intercepted gold and silver mineralization 130 feet below the established Moss Mine gold-silver open-pit resource. The intercept in WW-16 calculates as 1.178 g/t gold plus 24.152 g/t silver (1.58 g/t gold Eqv.*) over 115 ft (645-760 ft), which converts to a true width of 39.3 ft (12.0 meters) at 70 degree dip of the Moss vein. The mineralization was in the hangingwall slightly above the main Moss vein. In an effort to test the Moss Structure at depth, Management made the decision to drill water well holes 16 & 17 using Reverse Circulation drilling rather than conventional well drilling techniques, with minimal extra costs, to ensure that representative samples could be collected in accordance with industry exploration (NI 43-101) standards. Highlights Include: Drill hole WW-16 - intercepted 115 ft (39.3 ft true width) @ 1.178 g/t gold plus 24.152 g/t silver.; 1.58 g/t gold Eqv. * Drill hole WW-17 - intercepted 25 ft @ 0.6596 g/t gold plus 1.59 g/t silver.; 0.686 g/t gold Eqv.* (not in Moss vein) *Gold Eqv. values estimated at gold:silver ratio of 60 based on metal prices of US$1200/oz gold and US$20.00/oz silver. Metallurgical recoveries are assumed at 100%. Five Drill Holes Completed in 3,000 Meter HQ Program In addition to WW holes 16 & 17, the Company has now completed five drill holes of a multi-phase 3,000 meter HQ drill program designed to test four priority gold-silver targets (see news release dated Dec 19, 2016). Assay results from the program will be reported once received and compiled. Kenneth Berry, President and CEO, stated: "We are very pleased with progress from our 3,000 meter drill campaign, which is running simultaneously with the Company's ongoing Moss Mine construction and development program. The interception in reverse circulation water well hole 16 that intercepted the Moss gold-silver structure at depth is a highly significant development that demonstrates the Moss gold-silver mineralization extends below depths previously recognized. This multi-phase core drilling program is intended to demonstrate the potential for discovery of new zones of gold and silver, which would help us achieve our goal of sharply increasing resources and potential future production without significant incremental costs." Reverse Circulation WW Drill Holes 16 & 17 Well WW-16 intersected 115 feet (35 meters) averaging 1.178 g/t gold, 24.152 g/t silver at an oblique angle (~20o) to the Moss vein. The true intercept is about 39.3 feet (12 meters). The mineralization occurs at 645-760 feet down hole in strong quartz-calcite stockwork veining immediately above the main Moss vein. Two duplicate samples from the mineralized zone had unusually high variance (1.407 vs 3.215 g/t gold in a split taken at the drill; 0.599 vs 2.027 g/t gold in a split taken at the prep lab). The variance in the splits is attributed to a nugget effect from fairly coarse gold, which is not common at Moss, but does occur locally. Well WW-17 had only weak to moderate stockwork quartz-calcite veining, most of it in the upper half of the hole (47-50 feet, 513-621 feet) and one deeper interval (887-902 feet). The best gold encountered was 25 feet (7.6 meters) grading 0.6596 g/t gold, 1.59 g/t silver at 530-555 feet. The well boring crossed the Canyon fault and did not intersect the Moss vein. Fault zones were hit at 589-632 feet and 662-670 feet. A rubbly fault zone was encountered at 1227-1238 feet. This is likely the Canyon fault, which may have faulted off the main Moss vein so that it was never intersected. The key assay results can be found by accessing this link: (Full Table of Results). QA/QC Samples of drill cuttings were collected by the drilling crew using a wet rotary splitter to ensure a representative sample of each five-foot interval. Field notes were recorded for each sample documenting what was sampled and how the sample was taken. Samples were collected in bags with a sample tag inserted and delivered to a secure location prior to shipment by bonded courier to Inspectorate America Corp., a commercial laboratory in Sparks, Nevada. The Inspectorate lab is an ISO 9001:2008 qualified assay lab that uses and makes available internal assaying controls. At the lab, rock samples are dried, crushed and pulverized to 85% passing through a 200 mesh sieve. The pulps are assayed for gold using a 30 g split, Fire Assay (FA) and Atomic Absorption (AA) finish. Pulps were further analyzed using a 15 gram split using 32 elements ICP. Silver assays used the ICP data. Overlimit assays for both gold and silver (10 gpt for gold and 100 gpt for silver) were rerun using a gravimetric procedure. Rejects and pulps are stored at the lab for future reference. Qualified Person: The foregoing technical information contained in this news release has been prepared in accordance with the Canadian regulatory requirements set out in National Instrument 43-101 (Standards for Disclosure for Minerals Projects) and reviewed on behalf the Company by Robert Cuffney, P.Geo, and a Qualified Person. About Northern Vertex Northern Vertex Mining Corp. is an exploration and mining company focused on the reactivation of its 100% owned Moss Mine Gold/Silver Project located in NW Arizona, USA. The Company's management comprises an experienced technical and operations team with a strong background in all aspects of acquisition, exploration, development, production and financing of mining projects worldwide. The Company is focused on working effectively and respectfully with our stakeholders in the vicinity of the historical Moss Mine and enhancing the capacity of the local communities in the area. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF NORTHERN VERTEX "Kenneth Berry " President & CEO 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. Forward-Looking Statements: This news release contains statements about our future business and planned activities. These are "forward-looking" because we have used what we know and expect today to make a statement about the future. Forward-looking statements including but are not limited to comments regarding the timing and content of upcoming work and analyses. Forward-looking statements usually include words such as may, intend, plan, expect, anticipate, believe or other similar words. We believe the expectations reflected in these forward-looking statements are reasonable. However, actual events and results could be substantially different because of the risks and uncertainties associated with our business or events that happen after the date of this news release. You should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. As a general policy, we do not update forward-looking statements except as required by securities laws and regulations. Cautionary Note to US Investors: This news release may contain information about adjacent properties on which we have no right to explore or mine. We advise U.S. investors that the SEC's mining guidelines strictly prohibit information of this type in documents filed with the SEC. U.S. investors are cautioned that mineral deposits on adjacent properties are not indicative of mineral deposits on our properties. This news release may contain forward-looking statements including but not limited to comments regarding the timing and content of upcoming work programs, geological interpretations, receipt of property titles, potential mineral recovery processes, etc. Forward-looking statements address future events and conditions and therefore involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from those currently anticipated in such statements. This press release uses the terms "Measured", "Indicated", and "Inferred" resources. United States investors are advised that while such terms are recognized and required by Canadian regulations, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission does not recognize them. "Inferred Mineral Resources" have a great amount of uncertainty as to their existence, and as to their economic and legal feasibility. It cannot be assumed that all or any part of an Inferred Mineral Resource will ever be upgraded to a higher category. Under Canadian rules, estimates of Inferred Mineral Resources may not form the basis of feasibility or other economic studies. United States investors are cautioned not to assume that all or any part of Measured or Indicated Mineral Resources will ever be converted into Mineral Reserves. United States investors are also cautioned not to assume that all or any part of a Mineral Resource is economically or legally mineable. SOURCE Northern Vertex Mining Corp. Two areas identified for drilling VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA--(Marketwired - Jan 30, 2017) - Alianza Minerals Ltd. (TSX VENTURE:ANZ) ("Alianza" or the "Company") reports results of fieldwork at the Horsethief sediment-hosted gold project, one of three properties in eastern Nevada where Alianza is actively exploring. Mapping, prospecting and sampling at Horsethief identified multiple areas of favourable alteration, structure and stratigraphy. This program also confirmed the presence of anomalous gold and pathfinder element geochemistry in both jasperoid and carbonate rocks with 10 of 68 samples returning more than 0.10 gram/tonne ("g/t") gold with a high of 1.22 g/t gold. These results, in combination with historic structural and stratigraphic data, will be used in prioritizing drill targets for the next phase of exploration. "The Horsethief area isn't typically considered prospective for sediment-hosted gold ("SHG") deposits, however, a considerable amount of exploration has recently recognized potential SHG prospects outside of the Carlin and Cortez trends," noted Jason Weber, P.Geo., President and CEO of Alianza, "Horsethief clearly shows potential for SHG mineralization. Modelling of previous drill and geophysical data with our recent field observations, we will be able to select high priority targets for drill testing." Horsethief Exploration Results The 2016 program focussed on gaining an understanding of the property stratigraphy and potential structural controls for mineralization. It was successful in identifying multiple new occurrences of jasperoid alteration in limestone and dolostone rocks considered to be Upper Cambrian age Dunderburg Formation. Sampling of both the jasperoids and carbonate rocks returned gold values ranging from below detection to 1.22 g/t gold and 11 of 68 rock samples collected returned gold values more than 0.10 g/t gold. A further 10 samples were considered anomalous in gold. Two primary target areas have emerged, both characterized by jasperoid alteration, anomalous gold and pathfinder element (silver ("Ag"), arsenic ("As"), mercury ("Hg"), molybdenum ("Mo"), antimony ("Sb")) geochemistry and complex structural setting. The North Horsethief target is dominated by a 900 by 150 metre jasperoid breccia occurrence at the contact of the Cambrian carbonate stratigraphy with Tertiary age volcanic tuffs that surround the property. Strongly anomalous gold geochemistry and coincident pathfinder element geochemistry in rocks and soils are associated with north-south, northeast and east-west oriented faulting. The highest rock sample reported from the property (sampled by a previous operator - 21.94 g/t gold) is located in this area. Immediately east of the main jasperoid body, vuggy fluorite and barite were noted in a smaller outcrop of jasperoid located on an east-west fault. The second area, Horsethief South, lies approximately one kilometre southeast of Horsethief North. This area hosts jasperoid alteration coincident with east-west and lesser north-south and northeast oriented structures. Gold values are subdued as compared to the northern target, but pathfinder geochemical anomalies are strong for As, Hg, Sb and Mo in soils. A strong Induced Polarization ("IP") geophysical anomaly exists at this target, persisting to depth to the limits of the survey (approximately 250 metres). The Horsethief property is located in Lincoln County, Nevada, approximately 20 km northeast of Pioche. Work by prior operators included mapping and sampling hematite-rich jasperoid breccia outcrops followed by shallow drilling. Historic drilling, generally 100 metres or less in depth, returned multiple intervals of gold mineralization including 13.7 metres averaging 1.2 g/t gold and 39.6 metres averaging 0.79 g/t gold with four holes terminating in mineralization. Gold mineralization was hosted in both silty limestone and jasperoid. Maps and photos from the Horsethief property can be found on the Company's website at http://alianzaminerals.com/project/horsethief/. Alianza contracted Big Rock Exploration LLC of Minneapolis, Minnesota to complete the 2016 field program. Bureau Veritas Minerals of Sparks, Nevada performed the analytical work using Ultra Trace (ICP-AES/MS) 53 element analysis (AQ252-EXT) using a 30-gram sample. Anomalous gold samples were then selected for Fire Assay - AAS analysis (FA430) to check and refine gold values further. Additionally, 10% of all samples will be sent to ALS for QA/QC check analysis. About Alianza Minerals Ltd. Alianza increases the chances of success in mineral exploration by using the "Prospect Generator" business model, focussing on gold and copper exploration in Latin America, Nevada and Yukon Territory. The Company has 28.3 million shares issued and outstanding, and is listed on the TSX Venture Exchange (TSX VENTURE:ANZ). Mr. Jason Weber, BSc, P.Geo., Alianza's President and CEO is a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101. Mr. Weber supervised the preparation of the technical information contained in this release. To learn more visit: www.alianzaminerals.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 RELEASE. STATEMENTS IN THIS NEWS RELEASE, OTHER THAN PURELY HISTORICAL INFORMATION, INCLUDING STATEMENTS RELATING TO THE COMPANY'S FUTURE PLANS AND OBJECTIVES OR EXPECTED RESULTS, MAY INCLUDE FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS. FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS ARE BASED ON NUMEROUS ASSUMPTIONS AND ARE SUBJECT TO ALL OF THE RISKS AND UNCERTAINTIES INHERENT IN RESOURCE EXPLORATION AND DEVELOPMENT. AS A RESULT, ACTUAL RESULTS MAY VARY MATERIALLY FROM THOSE DESCRIBED IN THE FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS. Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - January 30, 2017) - Icon Exploration Inc. (NEX: IEX.H) ("Icon" or "the Company") is pleased to provide an update and overview of the Company's goals and growth plans for 2017. Icon's Board and Management continues to rigorously investigate various opportunities in several industries and has decided to focus on the mining sector to take advantage of low cost acquisition opportunities. Both metal prices and investor interest in mining has fluctuated significantly during 2016. Despite the market fluctuations, Icon expects that several new projects will emerge as potential acquisition candidates. Over the next quarter Management expects to shortlist its proposed top mining acquisition opportunities for Icon and establish what it believes will be the optimal structure to complete such acquisitions (whether by option agreement, asset acquisition, joint venture or share purchase of any entity which holds the mining assets). Along with the mining acquisitions the Company will prudently explore funding partners to secure the assets and will draw on geological talent to complement the acquisitions and the Company. Rob Fia CEO & Director: "We are excited to position Icon to capitalize on what looks to be a bull market in precious and base metals and hope to acquire an extensive mining property portfolio diversified across various commodities while actively funding the Company. We would like to thank our partners and shareholders for their patience and support and look forward to the potential to make a transformative mining acquisition during 2017." The Company will provide shareholders with updates on these opportunities when material information becomes available. Icon Exploration Inc. Rob Fia, CEO & Director For further information: Email: rfia@kingsdalecapital.com Tel: 416-867-2353 Fax: 416-867-4566 Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release. Forward-looking information Certain statements in this news release constitute "forward-looking" statements. These statements relate to future events or the Company's future performance and include potential mining acquisitions as described in the news release. All such statements involve substantial known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results to vary from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. In addition to other risks, the Company's potential mining acquisitions may prove to be unsuccessful and the Company may be unable to complete any potential mining acquisition. Further, the Company may not complete any potential mining acquisition on the schedule it expects to complete as described in this news release or attract capital in the future to finance the Company. Forward-looking statements involve significant risks and uncertainties, they should not be read as guarantees of future performance or results, and they will not necessarily be accurate indications of whether or not such results will be achieved. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated due to a number of factors and risks. Although the forward-looking statements contained in this news release are based upon what management of the Company believes are reasonable assumptions on the date of this news release, the Company cannot assure investors that actual results will be consistent with these forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are made as of the date hereof and 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 under applicable securities regulations. NOT FOR DISSEMINATION OR DISTRIBUTION IN THE UNITED STATES Ameriabank: At the Vanguard of Armenia's Banking Sector STATEMENT OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY OF THE REPUBLIC OF ARTSAKH SUBSCRIBERS OF UCOMS ALL TIME BEST OFFER TO ENJOY ADDITIONAL BENEFITS Armenia-Azerbaijan: EU sets up monitoring capacity along the international borders PACE co-rapporteurs on Armenia concerned by reports of alleged war crimes or inhuman treatment perpetrated by Azerbaijans armed forces There is still 35% gender pay gap: Sona Ghazaryan Global Finance Names Ameriabank the Safest Bank in Armenia Mikayel and Karen Vardanyans provided 136 million AMD support for the overhaul of the Myasnikyan statue, which was in unsafe state of disrepair Believe me, as a representative of a country which uses the Schengen system very often, it is quite important. Vardanyan I really look forward to having answers from the Azerbaijani side for these alleged gross human rights violations: Secretary General I call on Armenian and Azerbaijani parliamentarians to use this Assembly as an agora of opportunities President Tiny Kox UCOMS SPECIAL OFFER OF THE UNLIMITED INTERNET IS NOW TERMLESS There is no place for the death penalty in a State that respects human rights: PACE General Rapporteur EU and CoE call on two Member States that have not yet acceded to this Protocol Armenia and Azerbaijan to do so without delay An urgent debate requested on "The military hostilities between Armenia and Azerbaijan". UCOM AND PES-PES CONTINUE COOPERATION WITHIN THE FRAMEWORK OF EDUCATIONAL PROJECT Google Ad The statement of the meeting between Prime Minister Pashinyan, President Aliyev, President Macron and President Michel of October 6, 2022 Largest Corporate Bond Program at the Securities Market of Armenia Completed Successfully The statement of the Defender on the video of the execution of Armenian PoWs by the Azerbaijani armed forces LEVEL UP ONLY FOR STUDENTS: UCOM OFFERS X2 AND X3 MORE INTERNET STATEMENT BY SECRETARY ANTONY J. BLINKEN This criminal act is another proof that the Armenophobia policy. Tatoyan Nikol Pashinyan, Nancy Pelosi discuss a number of issues related to the Armenian-American agenda and regional developments Delegation by Nancy Pelosi Accompanied by Alen Simonyan Visits Tsitsernakaberd Memorial Complex Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi Arrives in Yerevan Armenian Revytech, global technology leader SAP and financial services software specialist SAP Fioneer sign a cooperation agreement With 120 million drams donated by Mikael Vardanyan, the defenders of the homeland will be treated in a new building OSCE Chairman-in-Office and OSCE Secretary General call for immediate cessation of hostilities along Armenia-Azerbaijan border Statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Artsakh Ameriabank: At the Vanguard of Armenia's Banking Sector STATEMENT OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY OF THE REPUBLIC OF ARTSAKH SUBSCRIBERS OF UCOMS ALL TIME BEST OFFER TO ENJOY ADDITIONAL BENEFITS Armenia-Azerbaijan: EU sets up monitoring capacity along the international borders Google Ad PACE co-rapporteurs on Armenia concerned by reports of alleged war crimes or inhuman treatment perpetrated by Azerbaijans armed forces There is still 35% gender pay gap: Sona Ghazaryan Global Finance Names Ameriabank the Safest Bank in Armenia Mikayel and Karen Vardanyans provided 136 million AMD support for the overhaul of the Myasnikyan statue, which was in unsafe state of disrepair Believe me, as a representative of a country which uses the Schengen system very often, it is quite important. Vardanyan I really look forward to having answers from the Azerbaijani side for these alleged gross human rights violations: Secretary General I call on Armenian and Azerbaijani parliamentarians to use this Assembly as an agora of opportunities President Tiny Kox UCOMS SPECIAL OFFER OF THE UNLIMITED INTERNET IS NOW TERMLESS There is no place for the death penalty in a State that respects human rights: PACE General Rapporteur EU and CoE call on two Member States that have not yet acceded to this Protocol Armenia and Azerbaijan to do so without delay An urgent debate requested on "The military hostilities between Armenia and Azerbaijan". UCOM AND PES-PES CONTINUE COOPERATION WITHIN THE FRAMEWORK OF EDUCATIONAL PROJECT Google Ad The statement of the meeting between Prime Minister Pashinyan, President Aliyev, President Macron and President Michel of October 6, 2022 Largest Corporate Bond Program at the Securities Market of Armenia Completed Successfully The statement of the Defender on the video of the execution of Armenian PoWs by the Azerbaijani armed forces LEVEL UP ONLY FOR STUDENTS: UCOM OFFERS X2 AND X3 MORE INTERNET STATEMENT BY SECRETARY ANTONY J. BLINKEN This criminal act is another proof that the Armenophobia policy. Tatoyan Nikol Pashinyan, Nancy Pelosi discuss a number of issues related to the Armenian-American agenda and regional developments Delegation by Nancy Pelosi Accompanied by Alen Simonyan Visits Tsitsernakaberd Memorial Complex Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi Arrives in Yerevan Armenian Revytech, global technology leader SAP and financial services software specialist SAP Fioneer sign a cooperation agreement With 120 million drams donated by Mikael Vardanyan, the defenders of the homeland will be treated in a new building OSCE Chairman-in-Office and OSCE Secretary General call for immediate cessation of hostilities along Armenia-Azerbaijan border Statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Artsakh Could the 2018 race for governor come down to former health care executive versus former health care executive?Jay Gonzalez, a Democrat who left his job as former president and CEO of CeltiCare Health and New Hampshire Healthy Families in December, on Monday launched his campaign for governor of Massachusetts.If Gonzalez clears the Democratic primary, he'll face Republican Gov. Charlie Baker, who is widely expected to run for re-election. Baker is the former president of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care and Gov. William Weld's top budget aide, and he could face his own primary challenge from his party's more conservative wing.Baker is halfway through the four-year term he started in 2015, and Democrats, who already dominate Beacon Hill, from the Legislature to most constitutional offices, are already eyeing a showdown next year. A federal judge Friday blocked Texas from requiring that fetal remains to be buried or cremated.U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks said the new rule placed burdens on access to abortion that "substantially outweigh the benefits."In issuing a preliminary injunction that indefinitely prohibits Texas from enforcing the rule, Sparks said the new standards were vague, inviting interpretations that would allow state health officials "to exercise arbitrary, and potentially discriminatory, enforcement on an issue connected to abortion and therefore sensitive and hotly contested."Worse, Sparks wrote in his order, state officials admitted that the new policy has no health benefits and replaced a tissue-disposal regulation that causes no health problems. While Texas leaders said the change was needed to "promote respect for life and protect the dignity of the unborn," the rule may be pretext for restricting abortion access, the judge said.State Attorney General Ken Paxton said he would appeal the preliminary injunction granted by Sparks."Texas has chosen to dignify the life of the unborn by requiring the humane disposition of fetal remains," Paxton said. "These rules would simply prevent health care facilities from disposing of the remains of the unborn in sewers or landfills. Today's ruling, however, reaffirms that the abortion lobby has grown so extreme that it will reject any and every regulation no matter how sensible."Abortion providers sued to overturn the rule _ which requires health facilities to ensure that fetal tissue is buried or cremated, with the ashes buried or appropriately scattered _ saying the change was intended to restrict access to abortion, not to promote public health as state officials originally claimed.Lawyers for Texas argued that the regulation was intended to ensure that fetal remains, whether from an abortion or miscarriage, are treated with dignity in ways that won't substantially increase costs or impose a burden on women.Sparks had blocked the rule from taking effect as intended on Dec. 18 and scheduled a two-day hearing in early this month, after which he extended his order blocking enforcement until Friday to allow time to research and write his opinion.Under the rule, fetal tissue could no longer be incinerated and deposited in a landfill _ the method most commonly used by Texas abortion providers. Nor could the tissue be disinfected and placed in a landfill, or ground up and released into a sanitary sewer system, as previously allowed.Instead, each health facility was required to ensure that fetal tissue was properly buried and cremated. The rule did not apply to miscarriages at home or to early-term, drug-induced abortions that typically take place at home.During the two-day hearing, abortion providers testified that the rule could put clinics in danger of forced closing because there are a limited number of vendors available to comply with the burial or cremation mandate, and they feared that protests by anti-abortion activists could discourage vendors from doing business with abortion clinics.Abortion providers also said the rule was vague, placing them at risk of violations that could lead to a crackdown by state regulators, and imposed an unjustified burden on women seeking treatment for miscarriages or ectopic pregnancies.Lawyers for Attorney General Ken Paxton argued that the rule would not burden women because it imposes additional requirements solely on hospitals and clinics.They also said concerns about increased costs were overblown, noting that Texas Catholic bishops have offered to bury fetal remains, without charge, in Catholic cemeteries across the state, and that a funeral home operator was negotiating contracts with Houston-area hospital groups to pick up and cremate up to 25 fetuses at a time for a combined $350, or about $14 a fetus. With protesters' chants echoing through arrival halls and beyond, confusion prevailed Sunday at airports across the United States amid seemingly contradictory signals from the Trump administration over a hotly contested executive order blocking U.S. entry to refugees and nationals of seven Muslim-majority nations.Advocacy groups and administration officials remained locked on an apparent collision course over the order, which since its signing on Friday has led to the detention of more than 100 people landing at airports across the country with valid entry documents.About twice as many others were denied permission to board flights to the United States, according to lawyers representing a consortium of groups that won a temporary nationwide stay Saturday night against the deportation of anyone who had arrived with a valid visa.Groups including the American Civil Liberties Union said they would ultimately press to have Trump's order overturned as unconstitutional. In the meantime, the emergency stay issued by a federal judge in Brooklyn represented an "absolute baseline" prohibiting the removal of any of those who were halted upon arrival, said Lee Gelernt, the deputy director of the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project.But it remained essentially the luck of the draw in terms of who was halted upon arrival, who was released after questioning, and who had access to legal counsel if detained, the lawyers said."There's no method to this madness," said Becca Heller, director of the International Refugee Assistance Project, another of the groups that filed the legal challenge in New York and spoke to journalists in a conference call.For some, the directive's second full day brought a reprise of anxiety and heartbreak from the day before. Hind Mohamed traveled to Kennedy Airport from New Jersey with her family, hoping to greet her mother, a green card holder traveling from Sudan who had been due to arrive Saturday. But her initial flight was delayed; then she was rerouted to Saudi Arabia.Her mother's flight from Riyadh had been on the ground an hour, but there was no immediate sign of her. "I'm just nervous," Mohamed said, teary-eyed.Her 16-year-old son, Awab Hassan, kept a close eye out for his grandmother; he offered a teen's unvarnished take on the executive order, saying it lumped together terrorists and innocent people."That's not justice -- to see this country devolve, I'm not proud of that," he said. "Where's the feeling of taking people in, sharing the American Dream? Instead of shoving them back into a life of insecurity?"Even as a trickle of freed detainees gathered pace, the vigils were nerve-racking. In a haze of cigarette smoke, two Iranian friends paced a curb outside a terminal at Kennedy airport. One of them, a green card holder from Iran, had just heard that his wife, also a permanent resident, would face up to five more hours of questioning after returning from a family visit. Inside, a Turkish woman waited for her brother, worried about his rudimentary English. A Sudanese man tried to console distraught family members by phone.In some cases, customs and border officials were taking it upon themselves to ignore judges' rulings, lawyers and some local officials asserted. International airports at San Francisco and Washington Dulles were reported to be denying access to the lawyers who thronged to offer pro bono services.Los Angeles City Atty. Mike Feuer spent the early hours of Sunday at Los Angeles International Airport, but said he was repeatedly denied access to detainees and was unable to get an official count of those who had been halted on entry. One woman approached him, he said, to express fears for her elderly father, who was detained and suffered from Parkinson's disease."It is those kinds of real stories that are at stake because of this outrageous action" by the Trump administration, he said. "It is time not only for officials in my position, but all Americans, should find this a breathtaking violation of rights."Among immigration activists, exchanges pinged about where best to take one's chances. At Chicago, there was said to be greater leniency in releasing those initially detained, and in Boston, where a judge's order appeared to guarantee landing rights to anyone with a valid visa during the coming week, legal observers were watching for a potential spike in arrivals.As anguish mounted among families uncertain of loved ones' fate, the Trump administration insisted enforcement of the president's directive would be unaffected by a flurry of court rulings temporarily forbidding deportation of those who arrived with valid visas."Prohibited travel will remain prohibited," the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement, adding that the government retains the right to revoke visas on national-security grounds. The directive blocked all refugee arrivals for 120 days -- refugees from Syria are blocked indefinitely -- and suspended entry by people holding passports from Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Iran, Iraq, Yemen and Libya.But a key Trump aide, Reince Priebus, appeared to walk back a major element of the order, which initially halted the usual automatic U.S. entry normally given to heavily vetted permanent U.S. residents -- so-called green-card holders -- from the seven affected countries."As far as green card holders, moving forward, it doesn't affect them," Priebus, the White House chief of staff, said on NBC's "Meet the Press." It was not clear whether he was referring to green card holders being permitted to remain in the country, and re-enter following travel if they passed additional security screening.A day after House Speaker Paul Ryan was one of relatively few Republicans to voice an active defense, two Senate GOP heavyweights -- Arizona's John McCain and South Carolina's Lindsey Graham -- weighed in with a strongly worded joint statement warning against a "self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism.""It is clear from the confusion at airports across our nation that President Trump's executive order was not properly vetted," the statement said, in a pointed reference to Trump's repeated contention that despite a rigorous existing security process, arrivals until now have not been properly "vetted.""Our government has a responsibility to defend our borders, but we must do so in a way that makes us safer and upholds all that is decent and exceptional about our nation," they said.Via Twitter, the President delivered an angry and somewhat puzzling riposte to the two senators, calling them "sadly weak on immigration." He added that McCain and Graham "should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War II."Trump had earlier weighed in with a Sunday morning tweet saying the U.S. needs "strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW." The president also decried what he called a "horrible mess" regarding immigration in other parts of the world, including Europe.Congressional Democrats, who had opposed the order from the start, ratcheted up the pressure, saying they planned to introduce legislation to overturn it. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, who tearfully recalled a forbear's Ellis Island arrival, called the directive "mean-spirited" and "un-American."European leaders, for their part, have expressed shock and dismay over Trump's directive, and some U.S. allies were taken aback by the blocked entry of their own nationals with dual passports from one of the affected countries in the presidential order. British news reports said Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson had received White House assurances that the restrictions would only apply to dual-national British passport holders who were traveling from one of the countries on the list.Immigration advocates and the Trump administration offered dramatically clashing narratives as to the first full day's rollout of the executive directive. The Department of Homeland Security said fewer than 1% of international arriving travelers on Saturday had been "inconvenienced" by the president's directive.Lawyers countered that some enforcement went far beyond national security considerations, citing the blocked entry of a 2-year-old U.S. citizen with parents who held green cards; an Iranian Fulbright scholar who was forced onto a flight home before it was turned around on the tarmac; and an active-duty U.S. military officer whose arriving elderly mother was detained."A lot of people are being handcuffed, and people who don't speak English well are being coerced into taking voluntary departure," said lawyer Heller.Legal opposition to the directive expanded beyond the court system. Attorneys general from the District of Columbia and 15 states, including California, denounced the executive order as unconstitutional, declaring that no one should be targeted because of national origin or faith.But some travel sagas ended in joy and relief.Stella Ava of Cleveland, a Syrian-born green card holder, was visiting relatives in Turkey when the executive order took effect.She feared being prevented from boarding her flight or detained upon arrival at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, but told her waiting husband she had sailed through border controls after a few perfunctory-seeming questions."Thank God," she said, and tightly hugged her children. "I was so worried." Proposed legislation Governor Andrew Cuomo said his office will provide legal counsel for immigrants detained in New York airports and announced a hotline for families unsure if loved ones are detained.Officials believe six people were detained as of Sunday afternoon, after an executive order Saturday from President Donald Trump barred all refugees from entering the United States for four months.Additionally, the order halted refugees from Syria, in an effort to keep out "radical Islamic terrorists," according to an AP report.In a live press conference Sunday, Cuomo said attorneys from his office and the Port Authority are available for counsel, to ensure the legal rights of detainees are protected.He said the ban on immigrants goes against "the essence of who we are," as New Yorkers."As a New Yorker, I am an immigrant.....As a New Yorker, I am a Muslim. As a New Yorker, I am Jewish. As a New Yorker, I am black. I am gay....As New Yorkers, we are one community. The New York community is composed of all of the above," Cuomo said, responding to President Trump's executive order.Officials said they hope all of the detainees will be released by the end of Sunday.The following hotline was established for families who haven't heard from family members expected to arrive at an airport Saturday: 1-888-769-7243State officials announced proposed legislation Sunday in response to an alleged hate crime at Kennedy airport last week when a female airline employee was attacked.Rabeeya Khan was sitting in her office in the lounge at Kennedy Airport on Jan. 25 when she was attacked by a passenger who mocked her religion and invoked the name of Donald Trump, officials said, according to a report from the New York Daily News."F--k Islam, f--k ISIS," Robin Rhodes said, as he got on his knees and bowed in mock prayer after kicking a worker at Terminal 2's Delta Sky Lounge Wednesday night, according to authorities.Cuomo said he is working with the Assembly and Senate to adopt what they hope to be the Transportation Worker Protection Act, which would make an attack on an airline worker a federal offense-- subject to a maximum of seven years in prison."We have zero tolerance for any attack against an employee who works in the New York City transit system," said Alphonso David, counsel to the governor.The press conference was held amid protests at JFK Airport, Battery Park and in cities nationwide.Trump's order immediately suspended a program that last year resettled in the U.S. roughly 85,000 people displaced by war, political oppression, hunger and religious prejudice. Trump indefinitely blocked those fleeing Syria, where a civil war has raged, and imposed a 90-day ban on all immigration to the U.S. from seven Muslim majority nations, citing terrorism concerns.Trump said the halt in the refugee program was necessary to give agencies time to develop a stricter screening system, according to an AP report.The U.S. may admit refugees on a case-by-case basis during the freeze, and the government will continue to process requests from people claiming religious persecution, "provided that the religion of the individual is a minority religion in the individual's country."Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue!-- Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017The Council on American-Islamic Relations said it would challenge the constitutionality of the executive order. Description GIS - 30 January, 2017: Mauritius and Senegal signed on 27th January 2017 in Port Louis, an Accord de Developpement Conjoint and a Term Sheet defining the agreed modalities and conditions for the development of the first Special Economic Zone (SEZ) Project in Senegal. Mauritius and Senegal signed on 27January 2017 in Port Louis, an and a Term Sheet The signatories were the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance and Economic Development, Mr Pravind Kumar Jugnauth, and representatives of the Ministry of Finance of Senegal. In this context, Senegal has agreed to allocate a plot of land of a total area of 53 Hectares in the City of Diamniadio for the project. The project involves the management of a newly built industrial and business facilities of a total space area of more than 33,000 square metres on a 13-Hectares site, and the development of an Industrial Park on 40 Hectares of land. In a statement, Prime Minister Jugnauth expressed satisfaction towards the materialisation of the project which he said is in line with the philosophy of reinforcing further the intra-African relationship. According to him, the project which is a first SEZ set up in Senegal will open up new economic space for Mauritian businessmen and investors on the African continent. The Prime Minister further highlighted that the project will also strengthen Mauritian presence on the African continent and open up new prospects for Mauritian businessmen and investors to conduct business in Senegal, a country that is experiencing significant economic growth under the current President Macky Sall. Special Economic Zone project The project will be implemented through a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV), which has already been incorporated in Senegal. The Mauritius Africa Fund (MAF) holds 51% of SPV's own funds and the Government of Senegal 49% through its two agencies namely, the Sovereign Investment Fund for Strategic Investments SA (FONSIS) and the Agency for the Development and Promotion of Industrial Sites (APROSI). The MAF, with the help of the local private sector, will use Mauritian expertise towards the implementation of the SEZ project. By mobilizing both local and foreign investments and financing, they will contribute USD 9.7 million to SPV's capital for development in the Special Economic Zone. FONSIS and APROSI will contribute 49% that is approximately USD 4.9 million and 40 hectares of prime industrial land in the SPV. Description GIS - 30 January, 2017: The Minister of Tourism, Mr A.K. Gayan, had a meeting with the various stakeholders of the tourism industry on 27 January 2017 in Port-Louis. At the fore of discussions was the safety and security of tourists. The partners of the tourism sector present at the meeting shared their views with the Tourism Minister concerning this issue. The Minister of Tourism, Mr A.K. Gayan, had a meeting with the various stakeholders of the tourism industry on 27 January 2017 in Port-Louis. At the fore of discussions was the safety and security of tourists. The partners of the tourism sector present at the meeting shared their views with the Tourism Minister concerning this issue. Minister Gayan appealed to the stakeholders to ensure that Mauritius is a safe destination and that each citizen should collaborate to uphold the image of the country as a secure preferred destination for tourists. He stressed that the safety and security of tourists must be a priority as the tourism sector is a major pillar of the economy. The Tourism Minister highlighted that the safety and security of tourists should not just be inland but also when they are at sea practicing nautical activities. He underscored that this meeting will be followed by others with the actors of the tourism industry and that he is determined to work together with all those concerned to find solutions together. It is to be recalled that for the year 2016, tourist arrivals reached 1,275,227 as compared to 1,151,252 during the year 2015. Growth had been registered in arrivals from Germany, Italy, France, United Kingdom, India, South Africa and Reunion Island. Day of elections will be changed, if all the forces support that decision (video) The NA Republican Party of Armenia (HHK) faction lawmaker Artak Davtyan thinks that all the political forces, which have passed long way and are convinced of their capabilities, will participate in the parliamentary elections separately, and the picture is completely different in connection with the newly established political forces, Those powers, which are newly established, balancing their capabilities form alliances. Political force Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK), which underwent shocks two years ago, has decided to participate in the elections with an alliance, Artak Davtyan told journalists. The speaker states that the struggle for votes will be intense, We all will benefit from all these electoral processes, if the elections proceed flawlessly. In reply to the question whether Artak Davtyan can see himself in the future Parliament, the lawmaker answered that there are two necessary conditions for that, his and his partys desire, but the citizens vote will be decisive. According to Artak Davtyan these parliamentary elections will differ from the previous ones for a single obvious reason that the Constitution has been changed and we are shifting to a parliamentary system, All the presented political forces will be winners in the future parliament. As for changing the date of the elections, the lawmaker noted that it will happen, if all the forces support that decision. Alain Prost says cheaper tickets should be new F1 owner Liberty Media's first priority. Asked what he would do if he had just taken over, the F1 legend told the Italian newspaper La Repubblica: "Lower prices to get into the circuits. "At the moment it makes no sense. Because with empty grandstands, everything dies. "I agree with Ross Brawn that we need a project of 4-5 years, with targeted structural reforms in several areas: technical, regulations, communication," Prost added. (GMM) The F1 world is poised to discover 'deposed' supremo Bernie Ecclestone's next move. The sport's long-time but now former chief executive has denied reports he is planning a breakaway series, but some commentators are refusing to believe the 86-year-old Briton will simply fade into the night. "Why should a man, who has always been the same for 86 years, suddenly say 'I'll just go away with this comical new title'? "Sorry, but this is not Bernie," said former F1 driver Christian Danner, now a pundit for German television. "I would not be surprised if something happens in the background and suddenly the whole situation looks completely different," he told Germany's motorsport-magazin.com. The 'comical' title given to Ecclestone by Liberty Media is Chairman Emeritas', but some think Liberty would have been wiser to ensure his role is more hands-on. "Of course it would be an advantage for Liberty and all of us if we could keep using the expertise of Ecclestone," Toto Wolff, the Mercedes team boss, told Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung newspaper. "But it is a tightrope to walk if you want that but also want to emancipate from Ecclestone," he added. F1 legend Alain Prost told the Italian newspaper La Repubblica that the Ecclestone era had to end eventually. "Everything has an end," he said. "Bernie is 86 years old. It is natural, and even right, that sooner or later his era is over. "The good news is that I understand that the new owners have a clear idea of what to do and are experts in communication and the show," Prost added. (GMM) Toto Wolff has indicated he is definitely heading towards a new contract with Mercedes. The Austrian heads Mercedes' entire motor sport programme, and is the team boss at the title-winning F1 team and also a shareholder. But his contract with the German marque is set to end this year. Wolff, 45, told Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung that he is likely to ink a new deal. "Working with the board is smooth, there are a lot of people that I learn from every day, which makes me really enjoy my work. "So you can expect me to keep doing that for a while," he added. (GMM) US grand prix organisers say they would welcome more American races. F1's new owners, the US media group Liberty Media, are keen to expand the calendar to up to 25 races, with potential events in US cities like Los Angeles, Las Vegas or New York. Bobby Epstein, boss of the only US race at present in Austin, Texas, said he would welcome that. "In the long run, it will bring more attention to the sport and our race," he told the Austin American Statesman newspaper. "One of the drawbacks of F1 in America is most races start at 7am or even earlier. If you add a race in our time zone, it will grow the fan base, and that's good for all of us," he added. However, Epstein expressed concern that the new US races would likely take place on street circuits. "Street races tend to be very boring," he said. "There's not much opportunity to overtake. A fan can't watch many turns." (GMM) Nico Hulkenberg has tried the 2017-spec regulations in the Renault simulator -- and he says the new cars will be "brutally fast". To address criticism the cars had become too slow, F1 has dramatically changed the aerodynamic and tyre rules for the new season. "The new car feels brutally fast," German Hulkenberg, who has switched from Force India, told Auto Motor und Sport. Referring to the Barcelona layout he tested in the simulator, he reported: "Corners 3 and 9 are absolutely flat." But Hulkenberg worries that, with the faster cars and shorter braking distances will come more difficulty in overtaking. "In Monte Carlo you won't be able to pass," he said. "You will just drive in the middle of the track with your wide car, and that's it." Hulkenberg said he has been training hard for the physically more demanding cars, reporting: "I'd say I've been doing 20 to 30 per cent more. "I can promise everyone that for us in the car, it will be really hard again." (GMM) Almost 100% of Armenian agricultural production is saturated with heavy metals (video) As of now Amulsar gold mine exploitation is impossible, Seyran Minasyan, Senior Researcher at the Institute of Physics, Civil Voice NGO expert, told in the interview with A1+, There are drawbacks in all the official documents in part of effect of the mine exploitation on the environment. We have carried out research and we should say that the basins, which are in the territory of mine exploitation, are endangered. The agricultural zones of Vayk and Sisian are also in that territory, but the chemical effect on plants and wild vegetation isnt examined and presented. According to the expert, the abovementioned problems relate to any mining industry, but particularly in Amulsar case the situation is more catastrophic, Amulsar is directly connected with Jermuk mineral waters, which are priceless. The absence of effects of mining industry isnt proved scientifically. As long as there is no grounded, scientific evidence, the exploitation of the mine should be forbidden. The same relates to Sevan drainage basin- Kechut and Spandaryan reservoirs, though there is a conclusion that there is no connection between the mine and the reservoirs, he said. In connection with Amulsar gold mine exploitation, today Civil Voice NGO has organized a discussion, inviting representatives of environmental organizations. Environmentalist Karine Danielyan noted that on Saturday they met with the Minister of Health Levon Altunyan, which listened to their concerns. We had a surprisingly positive meeting. The Minister said that he will support us and agrees with us, she said. According to the words of Mrs Danielyan, the Government is working on various development projects, which contradict each other. Today 400 mines operate in Armenia, 30 out of which are mines containing metals, it cuts off the basis of Armenia- both that of nature and economy. The development routes chosen by the Government contradict each other. We say that we develop tourism, clear agriculture- ecotourism, and at the same time we cover the country with 21 tailings. The studies show that almost 100 % of our agricultural production is saturated with this or that heavy metal. Last Friday, President Trump signed an executive order suspending immigrant and nonimmigrant entry into the US from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen for 90 days, with the potential for adding further countries of origin to the list of proscribed. Ride-sharing companies Uber and Lyft, both of which have drivers affected by the order, responded quickly with actions to stand against the order and to support their respective driver communities. Uber CEO and co-founder Travis Kalanick noted in an email sent to Uber employees that Uber drivers who are citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria or Yemen and live in the US but have left the country, will not be able to return for 90 days. Uber will: Provide 24/7 legal support for drivers who are trying to get back into the country. Have lawyers and immigration experts will be on call 24/7 to help. Compensate drivers for their lost earnings. This will help them support their families and put food on the table while they are banned from the US. Urge the government to reinstate the right of US residents to travelwhatever their country of originimmediately. Create a $3 million legal defense fund to help drivers with immigration and translation services. Lyft co-founders John Zimmer and Logan Green said that the order is antithetical to both Lyfts and our nations core values. Lyft is donating $1 million over the next four years to the ACLU. Serviceman is accused of murder, but there are no fingerprints on the weapon (video) Serviceman Davit Dumikyan is not the murderer; he has become a victim of unlawfulness, claims the legal representative of the aggrieved party. Davit, who has been in custody for already 9 months, is accused of murder of fellow servicemen Suren Aramyan and Grigor Avetisyan on April 6, 2016. Ruben Martirosyan says: Dumikyan rejected self-confession testimony and informed that he was forced to give that testimony and the people, who made him do that, were military police officials, in particular, tall colonel. According to Ruben Martirosyan, Davit Dumikyan is accused of the murder in the case, when it hasnt been proved that he had fired from the weapon. There arent Dumikyans fingerprints on Dumikyans weapon. Are there any on their weapons? There isnt any fingerprint on any weapon and it is typical of unlawful investigation, which is usual in Armenia. According to human rights activist, the investigator tried to lead the case in another direction, defending the real criminals. If there were 18 weapons in the military post, those weapons should have been sent to ballistic expertise. But one of the weapons was hidden by the investigator. If the investigator doesnt carry out any examination over this important issue, it means that the very investigator or the investigative body eliminated the fingerprints. The human rights activist states that it has become usual that soldiery crimes arent revealed. All those bodies, Prosecutors Office, the RA Investigative Committee, the RA Military Police, Courts, which are supposed to reveal crimes and by that prevent future crimes, act against their title, work against the law. And in this case, he says, in case of fair investigation the investigators shouldnt have missed an important episode. Another serviceman and Captain also took part in the bloody incident. They had had problems with each other before going to the military post. A month before the incident the serviceman had beaten the Captain, for which he was sent to penal military unit. New research led by the University of Leicester in the UK has made a novel breakthrough in understanding how solidification cracking occurs during the welding of steel, an important engineering alloy. In an open-access paper in the journal Scientific Reports , the team proposes that solidification cracks grow by linking micro-porosities in the meshing zone in the solidifying weld pool. This is the first time that researchers have observed solidification cracking in steel and sheds new light on why the alloy may crack during the process. The team used synchrotron X-ray beamline at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) to observe the crack formation at the real time. Welding is the most economical and effective way to join metals permanently and it is a vital component of our manufacturing economy. It is estimated that more than 50% of global domestic and engineering products contain welded joints. In Europe, the welding industry has traditionally supported a diverse set of companies across the shipbuilding, pipeline, automotive, aerospace, defence and construction sectors. Solidification/hot cracking is the most common failure mode during metal processing, such as welding, casting and metal additive manufacturing (metal 3D printing). Professor Hong Dong from the University of Leicester Department of Engineering The study is part of the teams international EU FP7 project Mintweld, working with eleven partner originations from 7 EU countries. The research was funded by an EPSRC industrial CASE project with Tata Steel UK and was also supported by the European Commission as a part of the FP7 programme, Modelling of Interface Evolution in Advanced Welding (MintWeld); Contract No. NMP3-SL-2009-229108. Resources When you're in the middle of a political storm, the best thing to do is to ... ... whip up another one. That's why President Trump will move up his announcement of a Supreme Court pick. So many storms are swirling around Trump that it's hardly possible to focus on all of them. It is very disappointing to learn that two refugee families scheduled to arrive in Charlotte this week have been turned away. We have decades of experience in settling thousands of families fleeing persecution in their native country. These people have made a rich contribution to the life and culture of Western North Carolina. I join with my brother bishops in the effort to work Vigorously to ensure that refugees are humanely welcomed without sacrificing our Security or our core values as Americans. As Catholics we respond to the Biblical Call to welcome the stranger, it is an act of love and hope. (I've updated this post once below.) This new and sudden and unexpected travel ban issued Friday night by the White House has had a big impact right where you think it might: on American universities. Not only do U.S. colleges have faculty and students from every country in the world, they also have students and professors who are traveling overseas. Some of those folks who have ties to the seven majority-Muslim countries subject to this new travel ban are now stuck, either in a weird legal limbo (the first group) or unable to get home (the second group). It's not an insignificant number. According to the Association of Public & Land-Grant Universities, U.S. universities had 17,000 students from the seven counties studying here in 2015-16. (The seven counties: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.) If those students studied at just one university, you'd have something roughly the size of UNCG. The Chronicle has rounded up some of the major developments here and here. Inside Higher Ed has a roundup of university condemnations. Not surprisingly, higher ed leaders arent happy with a move that promises to have long-lasting (and negative) implications on how they recruit students, professors and researchers. North Carolina folks are worried, too. Here's a roundup of reactions: UNCG says it doesnt have any specific details on any impacted individuals to share at this time. Heres an official university statement as well as Chancellor Frank Gilliams message to students and employees. Our commitment to the values of equality, inclusion, and diversity remains as strong as ever, Gilliam wrote. These individuals and their families have our support, and their welfare is of utmost concern. N.C. A&T spent the weekend at the advice of the UNC system office counseling students and employees from the affected nations not to leave the country. (A&T does have folks affected by the ban, but it didn't provide details, like numbers or countries of origin.) "The past 72 hours have been troubling for many and particularly unsettling for individuals directly affected by the executive order," Chancellor Harold Martin wrote in a statement. "Over the history of our university, challenging times have consistently inspired the best in the A&T family, and I have no doubt that they will during this time as well." Elon University has students traveling abroad this month as part of its month-long winter term. President Leo Lambert says no one from Elon is stranded. Also, Lambert and other N.C. university leaders had already scheduled a trip to D.C. on Tuesday to talk to the states congressional delegation. You can bet immigration will come up. UNC-Chapel Hill has one person (unclear if its a student, professor or someone else) affected by the travel ban, according to this Chapelboro.com story, but the university isn't saying much about it. (UNC-CH confirmed this to me but didn't give any details "for privacy reasons.") UNC-CH has somewhere around 3,000 international students, scholars and employees from 100 different countries, and Chancellor Carol Folt says she's been hearing from many who are confused, frightened and unsure of what to do." According to the Charlotte Observer, presidents at several public and private N.C. universities are warning their students, faculty and staff from the seven countries not to leave the U.S. Here are the statements from presidents and chancellors at Duke, Davidson and N.C. State. An NCSU spokesman tells me that the university has 169 people (mostly grad students, but a few undergrads, post-docs and support staff) who might be affected by the travel ban. None are traveling overseas. A Wake Forest spokeswoman said the university has offered "support and guidance" to the one student on campus from an affected country. The university doesn't currently sponsor anyone faculty or staff from any of the seven countries. Here's the message from Wake's president. At Guilford College, meanwhile, the travel ban did not affect the Every Campus A Refuge program. The family of 11 that the college is hosting this semester arrived Tuesday. The family will be on campus until May, program founder and director Diya Abdo said. "They're doing great," Abdo, an English professor, told me this morning. "This family was very lucky." The family is not from one of the seven countries included in the travel ban, Abdo said. The family had been vetted and processed long before the ban took effect. This is the fourth group of refugees that Guilford has hosted. Since the spring 2016 semester, the college has hosted two families from Syria and a man from Uganda. Another Every Campus a Refuge chapter might not be so lucky. Abdo said Northampton Community College in Pennsylvania is scheduled to take in a refugee family this week, but Abdo said the travel ban makes it uncertain if this will happen. Update: 3:30 p.m.: I update the post with more information from N.C. A&T and Wake Forest University and corrected some typos. Update, 6:15 p.m.: Here's more from the N&O. It rehashes a lot of stuff I mentioned above and saw elsewhere, but it includes an interesting interview via email with a Duke professor who's originally from Iran and is now in Germany on a fellowship. Said the professor: He (the president) is building Wall around U.S. and American values. Want to make sure you see these blog posts? Like me on Facebook, and follow me on Twitter. Have something to say? Email me at john.newsom@greensboro.com. Chris White, vice president of preconstruction services at Frank L. Blum, will serve as the chair for the 2017 March for Babies event in Guilford County. The March of Dimes will hold a breakfast event to kick off the March for Babies fundraising campaign from 7:30 to 9 a.m. Thursday at the O.Henry Hotel in Greensboro. Attendees must confirm attendance send an email to jsouthern@marchofdimes.org. The March for Babies event is April 29 at UNC-Greensboros Kaplan Commons Lawn. The most urgent infant health problem in the U.S. today is premature birth. It is the number one killer of babies worldwide. North Carolina has one of the highest premature birth rates in the country with more than 11,000 babies born too soon each year. For information, visit marchofdimes.org. *** The Piedmont Triad Chapter of JDRF will hold the 2017 Hope for a Cure Gala on Feb. 25 at the Benton Convention Center, 301 W. 5th St. in Winston-Salem. The event honors Carl Armato, CEO of Novant Health, who was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes when he was 18 months old. Gala chairs are Wendy and Brad Calloway. The event highlights include a reception and silent auction at 5:30 p.m. and a dinner, program and live auction at 7:30 p.m. For information, call (336) 373-1768 or visit https://jdrf-triad.ejoinme.org/2017HopeGala. *** Heartstrings will offer a Pregnancy and Infant Loss Support Group for African American mothers beginning Wednesday. This group will meet for six-session from 10 to 11:30 a.m. Wednesdays. Groups will be led by Heartstrings African American facilitators at Novant Health Todays Woman OB/GYN in Winston-Salem. Childcare and transportation are available. The group is open to African American mothers who have experienced the death of a baby from conception to one year of age. Participants will meet other mothers who have experienced pregnancy and infant loss. Registration is required; call (336) 491-3875 or email tyj@heartstringssupport.org. *** Finding Your New Normal, an eight-week program for cancer survivors who have completed treatment, will begin Feb. 6. The class will be offered from 6 to 8 p.m. Mondays at the Cone Health Cancer Center at Wesley Long Hospital, Classroom 2-022, 501 N. Elam Ave. in Greensboro. The free series is based on a model of wellness and addresses such issues as emotional well-being, nutrition, exercise, spiritual wellness and self-care. Exercise classes are also an important component of the program. For information or to register, call Brenda Epperson at (336) 832-0688 or email fynn@conehealth.com. *** The Guilford County Stroke Support Group meeting will be from 3 to 4 p.m. Feb. 9 at the Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital, Department 4 West, Rehabilitation Center Dayroom, 1200 N. Elm St. in Greensboro. This support group is for stroke survivors, family members and friends. For information, call Katie Pittman at (336) 832-4000. *** The Adult Center for Enrichment will offer Mental Health Wellness for Family Caregivers from 10:15 a.m. to noon Feb. 14 at First Baptist Church, Room 108-C, 1000 W. Friendly Ave. in Greensboro. Many family caregivers experience high levels of stress, depression, anxiety and other mental health effects. ACE has partnered with the Mental Health Association in Greensboro to promote mental health awareness for caregivers and loved ones. Coping strategies while caregiving will be discussed, as well. To register, contact Jodi Kolada at (336) 274-3559 or education@well-spring.org. Or visit www.ACEcare.org/registration. Caregiver education sessions are offered at no charge, with contributions gratefully accepted. Let Kolada know by Feb. 7 if care for a loved one is needed during this time as prior arrangements are required. *** Free cervical cancer screenings for women ages 21 and older who are sexually active or have been sexually active, and have not had a Pap test within the last three years will be offered from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Feb. 13 at the Cone Health Cancer Center at Wesley Long Hospital, 501 N. Elam Ave. in Greensboro and from 6:15 to 7:45 p.m. Feb. 27 at the Cone Health Cancer Center at Annie Penn Hospital, 618 S. Main St. in Reidsville. The free screenings are for women who do not have insurance or cannot afford to visit their regular physicians. Registration is required; call (336) 832-8000. A national initiative to reduce the number of people with mental illness in jails will start accepting participants next month. The Stepping Up Process to End Recidivism, or SUPER, will open its registration Feb. 6 for its pilot womens program. SUPER is a pilot project that focuses on women who are incarcerated in the Forsyth County Detention Center. SUPER will provide screening, discharge and transition planning, and support to women who have mental health or substance use disorders. Forsyth County adopted the initiatives resolution in April 2015. The goals of SUPER are to link participants to identified resources, successfully graduate participants one year post-release, and reduce the likelihood of participants returning to the criminal justice system. Stepping Up received $82,500 from the Kate B. Reynolds Charitable Trust. The county requested $75,000 but received an additional $7,500. The grant will be paid over 24 months. In November, the initiative received a $36,363 grant from the Winston-Salem Foundation in addition to $50,000 approved in the countys 2017s budget. Funds will be used to hire a program manager and a part-time peer support position, according to county documents. Amber Humble was hired to head the program. The effort is part of the national Stepping Up Initiative, which aims to raise awareness of factors that contribute to the over-representation of people with mental illnesses in jails, and to develop practices and strategies to reduce the numbers. The national initiative is led by the National Association of Counties, the Council of State Governments Justice Center and the American Psychiatric Association Foundation. Hundreds of counties across the country, including 25 in North Carolina, have passed resolutions to support the initiative. Locally, Commissioner Gloria Whisenhunt and Assistant County Manager Ronda Tatum headed up the initiative. The program will start by identifying women in jail who would like to participate in the program, Whisenhunt said. A survey of the jails female inmates found that the majority are white, single and unemployed. Many have chronic mental illness issues, substance abuse problems, have been previously victimized and have past experiences with hospitalization or rehab. The project will focus on women with co-occurring mental illness and substance-abuse issues. Whisenhunt said the decision was made to start with the female inmates because the groups relatively small size no more than 100 at any one time makes it more manageable. According to Stepping Up, an estimated 2 million adults with serious mental illnesses are jailed each year in the United States. I was walking on the streets of Shanghai, China, in 1986 when an American couple asked me for directions. Because I spoke good English, we chatted for a while and exchanged business cards. I was working for the Shanghai municipal government, and the American man I met, Tom LaRose from Greensboro, was to change my life forever. Tom, who died last December after a bout with lung cancer, was a friendly, generous person. He graduated from Guilford College and eventually joined his fathers business, S. LaRose, Inc., a watch and jewelry shop on Commerce Street. About a month after our meeting in Shanghai, LaRose wrote to me, asking what I wanted to do in life. I said I wanted to come to America and get a masters degree in applied mathematics. LaRose sent me admissions materials from Duke, UNC-Chapel Hill, and N.C. State, but I chose a program at Western Michigan University. I passed their test in English as a foreign language, and they invited me to apply, provided I had $5,000 for expenses. I was downcast when I next wrote to Tom. I told him there was no way I could pursue my dream of graduate school because I had no money. He immediately wired $5,000 to Western Michigan University in my name. I came to America and worked hard to repay him. When I paid him back with interest, Tom told me he had no intention of charging interest on his investment in my life. He also commended me and praised my parents. With a masters degree in computer science in hand, I was hired by IBM in New York state, where I worked for two-and-a-half years. I met Tom for the second time in Times Square, and he convinced me to visit Greensboro at his expense to see if I was interested in working to help him update his companys systems. I liked Greensboro and worked for S. LaRose Inc. from 1993 to 2006. I went to Washington, D.C., to do contract work for the government and now work for Accenture Federal Services in Chantilly, Va. I discovered only after Toms death that he had been ill. Clara LaRose told me that Tom learned his generosity from his father, who also helped college students. I celebrate my mentors life and praise him for his generosity, friendship and ability to trust a Chinese man on the street who had a vision of a different life. Quisheng John Xu, Greensboro I have lived through the terms of 14 presidents, Hoover through Obama. Of the 14, none came close to the negative reception that the Republicans gave President Obama. Immediately after the election, they vowed to do everything to make him fail and to be a one-term president. When Obama became president, the country was on the brink of the worst depression since 1929 (I was alive then, picking cotton for 50 cents per 100 pounds), and unemployment was the highest in years. For his accomplishments, I hope readers will read Leonard Pitts Jr.s recent article in the N&R (Jan. 16) and Julien McCarthys letter of Jan. 21. Many of the people who voted for President Trump were people whom I feared, especially when I was growing up on the farm in South Carolina: the KKK, White Citizens Council, Skinheads, Aryan Nation, Nazis and many others who acted alone. Now that Trump is the president, I pray that he will do the right thing. I love this country. When I returned from Europe after World War II, I kissed the ground. I said then and I say now, God bless America and God bless my favorite president, Barack H. Obama. Firpo L. Hurley Greensboro Taking to the streets This is going to be a way of life. President Donald Trumps actions will spark reactions. And Greensboro may be in the thick of it. The local womens march drew 3,000 or more participants Jan. 21. A rally supporting immigrants and refugees Thursday counted about 500 people. Greensboro and High Point are welcoming to immigrants and refugees. Newcomers want to find better lives, work, raise families and see their children get an education and have a chance to achieve the American Dream. They dont often speak out, but when their hopes are threatened, they and their supporters should step forward and feel safe doing so. They are not criminals and terrorists and dont deserve to be treated as if they are. We can expect more of these demonstrations in the weeks and months ahead. As one example, Marches for Science are being organized around the country, with a target date of April 22. With all our colleges and universities here, we look forward to seeing biologists, chemists and other nerdy scientists take to the streets to defend evidence-based public policies. Answering the call For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in. Matthew 25:35 Seeing the cupboards in its food pantry about to run bare last week, Greensboro Urban Ministry reached out to its community with an urgent call for help. And its community stepped up. As of this writing, the nonprofit had received the equivalent of more than 41,000 pounds of food in cash and donations. In addition, a number of businesses, civic groups and places of worship chipped in with food drives of their own. Thats the good news. The bad news is that the need was so acute. GUM staff members estimate that the local demand for food assistance has risen by 20 percent. This means that, even with the heartening response to the current crisis, the need wont be going away. You can help by supporting the food drives or donating directly (Mondays through Fridays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturdays from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. ) at the Urban Ministrys main location at 305 W. Gate City Blvd. or online at www.greensborourbanministry.org. Good report on the Dan Thanks to N.C. State researchers, landowners along the Dan River downstream from Eden can relax. Our results showed no impacts of the Eden coal ash release on trace-element contents of soils or crops during the course of our two-year study, a team from the universitys crop and soil sciences department said in a report. The spill from a Duke Energy coal ash storage pond in 2014 caused plenty of worry, especially to farmers who irrigate their fields and water their livestock from the Dan. Will Strader, the Cooperative Extension Service officer for Rockingham County, thought it was critical to find out if there was a detrimental impact. Then N.C. State stepped in. The teams conclusions come as a welcome relief to everyone. A better way An overflow crowd tuned out Thursday night for a forum on redistricting in North Carolina at UNC-Greensboro. The focus of the session, sponsored by the League of Women Voters, was gerrymandering, by which self-interested politicians choose their voters instead of the other way around. A bipartisan panel of former state Supreme Court and appellate court judges discussed district maps they drew last summer, without taking politics into consideration. The bottom line: Redistricting can be done fairly and logically and without political favor. We hope the forum helps fuel public demand for a better way and gives momentum to ongoing efforts in the General Assembly, by Republicans and Democrats, to create a nonpartisan redistricting process in North Carolina (which most voters support). As former Justice Rhoda Billings, a Republican, said: Its really not all that hard if youre not trying to gerrymander. MAYODAN An Eden-based construction company has been awarded a contract to replace 3,424 feet of the water main along Fourth Avenue. The Mayodan Town Council unanimously approved the lowest bidder, Shiloh Utilities Inc., at a special meeting on Jan. 24. The meeting came after an informal bid opening on Jan. 19. The bid of $261,505 was the lowest of five bids submitted to the town. Yates Construction, based in Stokesdale, placed the highest bid of $385,074. The new 6-inch water main will run from Washington Street to the dead end beyond Van Buren Street. The project includes the reconnection of all existing service and the abandonment of the old water line. Engineering plans were submitted last December by Bill Lester of LKC Engineering, PLLC in Aberdeen. Funding for the project will come from the towns water and sewer balance. The water-sewer budget for the 2016-17 fiscal year is set at $2,107,700. We have discussed the project with the low bidder and they have confirmed their bid to be adequate to complete the work, said Lester in a summary memo to Mayodan Town Manager Michael Brandt sent on Jan. 20. The low bid is within the original construction estimate and we feel is an adequate price for the scope of work. Public Works Director Rick Pegram told the board on Monday that through a phone conversation with Shiloh Utilities, they anticipate starting the construction process in approximately three weeks. The company will have 10 consecutive calendar days to start the project once receiving a notice to proceed. In total, theyll have 120 consecutive calendar days to complete the project, unless the period for completion is extended by additional contract documents. Shiloh Utilities began operations in 1986 and is owned by Keith and Lisa Duncan. The company specializes in water and sewer line installation across the state of North Carolina. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate GREENWICH Leaders in the field of Catholic education looking to consolidate Catholic schools around the region are drawing on some of the lessons learned when consolidation was carried out in Greenwich. The Bridgeport Dioceses 16-month study of under-enrolled and financially struggling Catholic elementary schools is coming to a conclusion, and while it wont have any impact on Greenwich, it is looking at Greenwich as something of a model. The Greenwich Catholic School model has been successful, and it might be used in other areas, said diocesan spokesman Brian Wallace. The kindergarten-through-eighth-grade Greenwich Catholic School on North Street was founded in 1970, and was hailed as the first regional Catholic school system in the U.S., according to school administrators. The school consolidated seven separate operations educating students in the community. It was a lengthy and contentious process at the time, according to media and historical accounts, but it has been hailed as a successful merger. The Greenwich Catholic School opened the year after the closure of St. Rochs School in 1969. It also consolidated existing programs at St. Marys, St. Catherine, Sacred Heart and St. Pauls schools. Final consolidation took place in 1979. The Greenwich Catholic School has a full enrollment of 477 students. Greenwich Catholic School is thriving, said Wallace. Most of the changes in the region are expected to impact schools in Danbury and neighboring Brookfield. Bishop Frank Caggiano said recently that changes were in store. Some of these demographic and financial challenges transcend the ability of one school to overcome them, so a number of these schools have to look to work together, the bishop said. Caggiano could decide as soon as February about diocesan schools in the Danbury area, as well as in Stamford and the Shelton-Monroe area. Changes could include consolidating schools into a single academy with multiple campuses, following models in Greenwich, Norwalk and Bridgeport. Catholic elementary school enrollment in Fairfield County has dropped from 7,770 students in 2009 to 6,400 students in 2016, according to the diocese. The declining enrollment is a function of competition from public schools, the cost of Catholic school tuition and a decrease in young families participating in parish life and its taking its toll on diocesan finances. It has cost the diocese $21 million to cover school budget deficits since it took over the management of parochial schools in 2000. But the diocese has more in mind than saving money. However we reshuffle the cards, we are still planning on educating the same number of students, said diocese spokesman Brian Wallace. And the systems and resources we put in place will put us in a position to grow. He said the aim was to make Catholic education accessible, affordable and nearby. Caggiano said, My goal is to get back to full enrollment in all our schools. We have about 3,000 empty seats. Catholic high schools run by the diocese are doing well, but elementary schools are under-enrolled. The dioceses five high schools in Fairfield County are up by 75 students since 2009. With Staff Reporter Rob Ryser Albacore, salmon, and snapper sushi. Photo: Melissa Hom The first time I attempted to secure an evening table at the new Flatiron outpost of the famous L.A. sushi destination Sugarfish (or a spot at the small, eight-seat bar, or even a seat on one of the backless couches in the dim, perpetually overrun waiting alcove), the friendly gatekeepers at the front of the dark, narrow room said the wait would be at least two hours. When I returned at lunchtime on a snowy weekday during the holiday rush, the two hours had barely budged at all to an hour and a half. Which is how I found myself, many weeks later, after several more false starts, finally sitting down at the packed little bar at four oclock on a gray winter afternoon. Everyone was on their phones, including the gentleman next to me, who was talking loudly to someone in Portuguese. A little farther down, a woman worked two phones and looked up eagerly when her teatime fix of yellowtail and albacore arrived. I am soooooo addicted! she said to her server in tones of giddy delight. Were all so addicted! he cried. The legend of Sugarfishs founder, Kazunori Nozawa, and his legions of addicted admirers precedes him to New York, of course. Back in the 80s and 90s, he was one of the originators, with chefs like Masa Takayama, of L.A.s ascetic omakase school. Like Jiros famously anonymous establishment inside a random subway station in Tokyo, these stern practitioners operated, for the most part, out of modest little bolt-holes in random strip malls. They frowned on the more ornamental aspects of the Americanized sushi experience (dragon rolls, gouts of soy sauce on everything, actual menus, etc.) and used only the finest ingredients, which they doled out fresh every day to their devoted, high-paying clientele in rigid little set-course omakase bites. Over time, acolytes of this chaste omakase experience spread the gospel to influential non-sushi chefs, like David Chang, who helped launch a generation of effete, boutique tasting rooms across the land. Sugarfish. Photo: Jemma Hinkly/New York Magazine Nozawas original boutique operation was in Studio City, but as prices soared and fish disappeared from the seas, he looked for ways to democratize his purist vision and bring it to the masses. The answer, with the help of a savvy restaurateur named Jerry Greenberg, was Sugarfish, which began with one small restaurant in Marina del Rey and has turned, in a few short years, into a multi-outlet, L.A.-sushi version of Danny Meyers Shake Shack. Like Meyer, Nozawa and his partners took a complicated dining process and pared it down to its addictive essence. Instead of the usual parade of confusing, esoteric, ridiculously priced delicacies, they offered a few durably popular, quality favorites (yellowtail, salmon, tuna, shrimp, scallops). The lordly sushi master was replaced by a crew of diligent kitchen serfs in the back who wore Sugarfish-logo caps and turned out the chefs famous omakase options with a practiced, short-order efficiency. Like at one of those gimmicky sushi-conveyer-belt operations, these dishes are served by twos, on little white plates, with a minimum of fuss or frills, and they cost roughly half what youd expect to pay for your fix of yellowtail or high-grade tuna belly at one of the grander sushi joints around town. The first thing to pop up before me at the bar, after ritual servings of ginger and wasabi and a slightly weathered-looking helping of organic edamame, was some palatable, though obviously prerefrigerated tuna sashimi sprinkled with scallions and a little too much ponzu sauce, and the yellowtail, cut in Nozawas trademark plump, square slices. The rice under the fish was loose and vinegary and faintly warm, and although the fish wasnt of the highest quality, it was cool and fresh enough, and the combination of the different soft textures made for a nice bite. This mingling of freshness and texture, with a spritzing of palate-tingling acid, is one of sushis essential (and, yes, addictive) pleasures, and Nozawa and his team do an admirable job navigating a middle path between the cheap (often fake) deli sushi experience and the increasingly absurdly priced realm of the high-roller omakase. But like a house band running endlessly through the same set of songs, they tend to hit the same numbingly agreeable notes again and again. Most of the components of the iconic $51 Nozawa Trust Me omakase, which I gobbled in 15 hectic minutes, between manically checking my own phone and calling for more ginger were notable for their uniform, almost marshmallow texture, which in many cases masked any semblance of real flavor. The sesame-speckled salmon was remarkable for its pleasing appearance, and like the yellowtail and the precut toro sushi, the albacore had an admirably smooth texture, although once you worked through the garnish of scallions and the buzzy dose of ponzu, it tasted of nothing at all. Its possible to stray from these stolid omakase options at Sugarfish, but in sushi, as in life, you generally get what you pay for. When I returned on another afternoon (after a three-hour wait) with a sushi-aristocrat friend who remembered being glowered at by a cranky Nozawa back at the original restaurant in Studio City, we sampled some pale, weirdly desalinated salmon eggs and several bites of what the aristocrat classified as grade C tuna belly. All the items on the meager specials when available section of the menu were gone, except for some Santa Barbara uni, which had the consistency of watery, artisanal toothpaste. The pearly sweet shrimp was the best of these slim a la carte options, we both agreed, along with one or two of Nozawas famous hand rolls, which now have their own restaurant in L.A. Order them rolled, and not sliced in pieces, however, to avoid the softness of the rice and your chopped toro (or scallops, or cooked lobster) blending on the plate into what the aristocrat described as a gentle mush. Sweet shrimp. Photo: Melissa Hom Yellowtail. Photo: Melissa Hom Large scallops. Photo: Melissa Hom Omakase. Photo: Melissa Hom Rating: 1 star Sugarfish 33 E. 20th St., nr. Broadway; 347-705-8100; sugarfishsushi.com Ideal Meal: The Nozawa Trust Me set-course menu, with sweet shrimp, large scallops, and a cucumber hand roll on the side. Note: Late lunch is by far the easiest time to get a seat, although the best option of all is carryout, which should be up and running in a few weeks. Open: Lunch and dinner daily. Prices: Set menu, $27 to $51; a la carte, $5.25 to $16. Scratchpad: One star for the clean, uncluttered conception and another for the prices. Minus a star for the dining experience, the ridiculous wait, and the middling range and quality of the fish. *A version of this article appears in the February 6, 2017, issue of New York Magazine. The Super Bowl is this Sunday. Maybe youre actually interested in whos playing. Maybe youre just hosting a party for the wings, or need to bring a snack to curry favor with your host. Whatever the case, you can do better much better than just Fritos or, uh, bottled bleu cheese dressing. There are just too many great meats, chips, and other snacks out there not to. Here, 12 snacks that will make your Super Bowl party better: 4505 Meats Chicharrones $10 $10 Chicharrones are the chips of the pork world. Get yours from San Franciscos 4505 Meats, which peddles its kettle-cooked fried pork rinds in flavors like chili and salt and smokehouse barbecue. This four pack will mean theres plenty for everyone. $10 at Amazon Buy $10 at Amazon Buy Gracious Gourmet Artichoke-Parmesan Tapenade $12 $12 Chances are artichoke dip is a staple of your Super Bowl routine, and by now you might be looking for something new. Keep the theme going with this tapenade made with artichoke and enhanced by salty, nutty Parmesan. $12 at Mouth Buy Bespoke Crackers Garlic & Thyme Crackers $8 $8 No offense to perfectly good Carrs, but these are no plain old crackers. Theyre crunchy and fragrant with garlic and thyme, a nice way to amp up the flavor of the creamy cheese youre also getting. $8 at Mouth Buy Ends Meat Bresaola $120 $120 Having a big party? Go for gold and get an entire bresaola, the Italian dry-cured eye round of beef aged with salt and pepper for six months, from one of Brooklyns premiere meat makers. (Ends Meat ships this via priority mail, which takes one to three business days, so dont wait.) $120 at Ends Meat Buy Roni-Sue Chocolates Chocolate-Coffee Caramel Corn $11 $11 Balance out all that fat and meat with something sweet, like Roni-Sues popcorn made with candied espresso beans and single-origin Belizian dark chocolate. $11 at Mouth Buy If you buy something through our links, New York may earn an affiliate commission. The World's second largest cellphone networks operator, Vodafone, is in talks to merge its Indian business with local rival Idea Cellular. The information is confirmed by both companies but no specifics like deal worth have been disclosed. According to analysts the merger would result in a group with around 375 million subscribers and 36% market share. By joining forces with Idea Cellular in India Vodafone would become much more competitive against Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio Infocomm, a new carrier backed by India's richest businessman Mukesh Ambani. Jio's aggressive deals with free calls and low-cost data pushed Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea to slash their prices and settle for lower profits. Vodafone entered the Indian market in 2007 and has had a bumpy ride ever since, thanks to price wars and a legal battle over a $2 billion tax claim. Source | Via These are the best offers from our affiliate partners. We may get a commission from qualifying sales. The inauguration of Donald Trump as president of the US unlocked as many meme ideas as there are protests against his actions. But might be the weirdest we have seen - Russian company Caviar sells two 32GB iPhone 7 units with gold-plated backs and embossed faces of the Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. The backs also include the coat of arms of the country and the first two lines of the national anthem. The iPhones come in a wooden box and there are plans to sell them in a globe-shaped box. We have arranged a personal tete-a-tete meeting of leaders for integration of their forces, commented brand representatives. The price is RUB 399,000 or about $6,650 but you can get them separately for RUB 199,000 ($3,313) each. Caviar does not stop there - it offers patriotic golden docking stations for said iPhones. Well, Winnie the Pooh said "The more, the better" and looks like the company is sticking by that when talking about gold. Thanks for the tip, Vsevolod Podprugin! Source Gotee Records' HOLLYN announced this week that she will be releasing her debut LP album, One-Way Conversations, next month on February 10. This album is the follow-up to her acclaimed self-titled EP that produced the No. 1 single "Alone (feat. TRU)" and the Top 5 single "Nothin' On You." The upcoming release already touts a No. 1 radio single with the track "Love with Your Life." The pre-order for One-Way Conversations is live now, click here to preorder digitally as well as preorder the CD on her site iamhollyn.com. Fans can also get a first taste of the album with the lead single, "Can't Live Without," click here. Watch the album preview trailer below for a glimpse of One-Way Conversations by Hollyn. This 20-year-old Ohio native has had a whirlwind start since the release of her debut EP. She began her career with a rigorous 40-plus date nationwide tour, followed by a handful of shows overseas supporting her mentor, producer and Gotee Records' label head TobyMac. She spent last summer on her first-ever solo run on the West Coast while working and processing the direction for her debut LP. In the fall she was nominated for the GMA Dove Award New Artist of the Year category and had her award show performance debut. She was also named Air1's No. 1 Artist of the Year for 2016. "I've had to grow up a ton-quickly," Hollyn recollects. "One season, I'm a typical teenager living at home; the next, I'm moving to Nashville, managing my own business and spending weeks at a time on a tour bus; all the while trying to figure out if music is truly what God's called me into." And it is that personal reflecting that has led Hollyn to a deeply personal and one-of-a-kind debut full-length album. With co-writers/producers Bryan Fowler, Dave Lubben, Wit & 42 North, Cole Walowac of Capital Kings and Toby McKeehan helping bring her thoughts to life, these ten songs culminate into an earnest snapshot of Hollyn being herself: a young woman working out life with God, relationships, artistry, and career. From the first track and lead radio single "Can't Live Without"-born out of that momentous trip to California, Hollyn wastes no time getting real. "The album needed to start with most important thing to me: An honest confession of the loneliness I feel when I'm not in constant relationship with God or anyone else I care about," Hollyn says. "I often wonder if I'm even getting across to anyone; struggling to communicate what's going on in my heart. Conversations don't seem to go anywhere - hence the album title - and there's distance. Prayers seem to hit the ceiling. I can't survive long at all with that distance." Hollyn will be on one of this year's top tours - the TobyMac Hits Deep Tour - beginning next month on February 9 and running through April 9 including top markets like Houston, Dallas, Nashville, New York City, Chicago and Philadelphia. Check out the complete list of dates below. 2017 TobyMac Hits Deep Tour Dates 2/9 - Southaven, MS at Landers Center 2/10 - Lafayette, LA at Cajundome 2/11 - Beaumont, TX at Ford Center 2/12 - Cedar Park, TX at Cedar Park Center 2/14 - Pensacola, FL at Pensacola Bay Center 2/16 - Jacksonville, FL at Veterans Memorial Arena 2/17 - Estero, FL at Germain Arena 2/18 - Sunrise, FL at BB&T Center 2/19 - Tallahassee, FL at Donald L Tucker Center 2/23 - North Little Rock, AR at Verizon Arena 2/24 - Grand Prairie, TX at Verizon Wireless Theatre 2/25 - Grand Prairie, TX at Verizon Wireless Theatre 2/26 - Jackson, MS at Mississippi Coliseum 3/2 - Chattanooga, TN at UTC McKenzie Arena 3/3 - Nashville, TN at Bridgestone Arena 3/4 - Louisville, KY at Freedom Hall 3/5 - Auburn Hills, MI at The Palace 3/9 - Duluth, GA at Infinite Energy Arena 3/10 - Dayton, OH at Wright State University Nutter Center 3/11 - Rochester, NY at Blue Cross Arena 3/16 - Albany, NY at Times Union Center 3/17 - Norfolk, VA at Ted Constant Convocation Center 3/18 - New York, NY at The Theater at MSG 3/30 - Hoffman Estates, IL at Sears Centre Arena 3/31 - Pittsburgh, PA at Petersen Events Center 4/1 - Philadelphia, PA at Liacouras Center 4/2 - Hartford, CT at XL Center 4/4 - Greenville, SC at Bon Secours Welles Arena 4/6 - Toledo, OH at Huntington Center 4/7 - Cleveland, OH at Wolstein Center 4/8 - Charleston, WV at Charleston Civic Center 4/9 - Indianapolis, IN at Bankers Life Fieldhouse ABOUT HOLLYN: Hailing from Ohio, raised in the church and on the music greats from Lecrae to Southern Gospel, this American Idol alum has been working the past two years on her national debut. Hollyn has a style all her own. Listeners were introduced to this vibrant young lady on TobyMac's songs "Lights Shine Bright" and "Backseat Driver," which she is also a co-writer. Hollyn's music has combined for 42 million streams on Spotify, Pandora and YouTube since the release of her self-titled debut in 2015. Her first radio single made radio chart history with 95 percent of the Hot AC/CHR panel adding the single out of the box and spent nine weeks at No. 1. Hollyn has two No. 1 Hot AC/CHR singles plus a No. 1 as a featuring artist on TobyMac's "Backseat Driver." Tags : hollyn hollyn news hollyn new album hollyn one-way conversations American businessman and academic Bill George once said: No matter how effective your strategy, your vision, or your communication, you will fail to achieve the desired result for your organisation if you cannot inspire trust.Georges sentiments have been backed up recently by business consultant Sue Bingham in an article for the Harvard Business Review Bingham argued that high performing workplaces are best defined by the high level of trust between managers and employees.She cited a survey conducted by PwC with global CEOs that found that across industries, 55% of CEOs were concerned about the lack of trust within their organisations.Meanwhile, a survey done by the World Economic Forum revealed that less than 50% of employees trust the companies they work for, meaning employers have to be more cognizant of ways to build trusting relationships with their employees.When trust goes down (in a relationship, on a team, in an organisation, or with a partner or customer), speed goes down and cost goes up. The inverse is equally true: When trust goes up, cost goes down, and speed goes up, she said, quoting from Stephen M.R. Coveys The Speed of Trust.Bingham said there are four ways to address trust issues in the workplace that usually stem from traditional environments where the focus can sometimes be on rule enforcement.Use smart hiring practices by asking behaviour-based questions such as asking for a time when the candidate put a co-workers interests above their own, she said. This technique will help you gauge a candidates level of honesty and accountability ensuring that you are creating a culture where workers can depend on one another.She also stressed the importance of background checks and references to uncover falsities about their length of stay at their previous employment and past salaries.Dont let your cynicism cloud your judgment, she said. Managers who make negative assumptions about their employees tend to micromanage, withhold information, and create unnecessary rules and policies causing even the best hires to lose their passion.Show positivity by giving employees challenging assignments with the clear and confident belief that your expectations will be met.Most traditional HR departments recommend treating employees equally to mitigate risk, said Bingham, but this strips people of their individuality and unique abilities to contribute.A better approach is to have adult discussions that seek to determine the cause of a problem and to expect employees to identify and act on their own solutions. This counselling-style approach is quicker, more respectful, and provides significantly better results, she said.Take a cue from companies with high performing employees and create a zero tolerance policy for deceit within your organisation, she said. Make it clear that any employee, regardless of rank, can lose their job if theyre found to be dishonest about their work, she added.Related stories: (HedgeCo.NET) The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced that Citigroup Global Markets has agreed to pay $18.3 million to settle charges that it overbilled investment advisory clients and misplaced client contracts. The SECs order finds that at least 60,000 advisory clients were overcharged approximately $18 million in unauthorized fees because Citigroup failed to confirm the accuracy of billing rates entered into its computer systems in comparison to fee rates outlined in client contracts, billing histories, and other documents. Citigroup also improperly collected fees during time periods when clients suspended their accounts. The billing errors occurred during a 15-year period, and the affected clients have since been reimbursed. Advisory clients have every expectation that the fees charged by their financial adviser reflect the negotiated rate. Citigroup failed to take the necessary precautions to ensure clients were billed in a manner consistent with their advisory agreements, said Andrew M. Calamari, Director of the SECs New York Regional Office. The SECs order further finds that Citigroup cannot locate approximately 83,000 advisory contracts for accounts opened from 1990 to 2012. Without those missing advisory contracts, Citigroup could not properly validate whether the fee rates negotiated by clients when accounts were opened were the same advisory fee rates being billed to clients over the years. It is estimated that Citigroup received approximately $3.2 million in excess fees from advisory clients whose contracts were lost. Its a fundamental responsibility of a financial adviser to preserve key account documents such as advisory contracts. Citigroup failed to safeguard its client contracts, which seriously impeded its ability to determine the proper amount of fees the firm was authorized to charge, said Sanjay Wadhwa, Senior Associate Director of the SECs New York office. Citigroup consented to the SECs cease-and-desist order and agreed to undertakings related to its fee-billing and books-and-records practices. The firm is censured and must pay $3.2 million in disgorgement of the excess fees collected due to the missing contracts plus $800,000 in interest and a $14.3 million penalty. The proposal, it says, would benefit the unemployed. The General Unemployment Fund (YTK) has voiced its support for a proposal to transfer the responsibilities of the Employment and Economic Development Offices (TE Offices) to unemployment funds and the Social Insurance Institution of Finland (Kela). The Finnish Government has decided to transfer the responsibilities of TE Offices to the counties to be established as part of the regional government reform as of early 2019. The Ministry of Employment and the Economy revealed last week that its task force has proposed that responsibilities related to the implementation of the unemployment security and job alternation leave systems be transferred to the agencies disbursing unemployment benefits as of early 2018. The task force also confirmed that both TE Offices and the Centres for Economic Development, Transport and the Environment (ELY Centres) would be abolished. The counties, meanwhile, would be made responsible for organising some of the employment services currently provided by TE Offices. This is a truly significant societal change, Auli Hanninen, the chairperson of YTK, comments in a press release. The task force's proposal would, if carried out, clarify the unemployment security system of Finland. This is excellent news from the customers' standpoint as they would only have to deal with a single decision-making agency, he explains. The proposal would also consolidate the position of unemployment funds as guarantors of income security by making them responsible for determining independently whether or not applicants meet the eligibility criteria for earnings-related allowance, views Hanninen. YTK is, with its 380,000 members, the largest unemployment fund in Finland. Aleksi Teivainen HT Photo: Vesa Moilanen Lehtikuva Source: Uusi Suomi The manufacturing plant is first and foremost a national project, Lintila underscored while appearing on YLE's Ykkosaamu on Saturday. Mika Lintila (Centre), the Minister of Economic Affairs, has rubbished allegations that he is only promoting the interests of Vaasa, his electoral district, in preparing a bid to convince Tesla Motors to construct a manufacturing plant in Finland. We're definitely looking for the best solution for Finland, one that would allow Finland to receive this extremely big investment, he said according to Pohjalainen. Finland, he estimated, should approach the electric automotive manufacturer with a proposal containing a single possible proposal for the manufacturing plant as it seeks to fend off rival bids from, for example, Germany, Portugal and the Netherlands. The Ministry of Employment and the Economy, however, is intent on proposing several alternative sites to Tesla Motors. Finland has started exploring which municipalities would be interested. Vaasa was really the first, and the preparations there are well under way. Eight other [municipalities] then voiced their interest, meaning that we have nine different municipalities that are interested, said Lintila. That's why we conducted a preliminary assessment. Lintila reminded that Germany has identified Munich, Portugal Lisbon and the Netherlands Rotterdam as a possible site for the coveted manufacturing plant. I'd consider it odd if Finland entered the race and announced that we have these and these municipalities available. You have to go with a single-location strategy, he argued. Tesla Motors completed its first lithium-ion battery plant in Nevada, the United States, in 2016. The newly-completed plant, also known as the Gigafactory, is to commence the production of batteries by the end of the year and is expected to have an annual battery production capacity of 35 gigawatt-hours. The innovative automotive maker has since announced its plan to construct a plant for producing both batteries and complete vehicles in Europe. Aleksi Teivainen HT Photo: Heikki Saukkomaa Lehtikuva Source: Uusi Suomi A drink-driver who drove a car recklessly on to a bonfire at Halloween had binged while he was on a "rare night out", a court heard. Father-of-one Aaron Harrington (20) was over the alcohol limit when gardai stopped him as he left the bonfire. He was banned from driving for two years when he appeared before Dublin District Court charged over the incident in the north of the city. Harrington, of Coultry Drive, Ballymun, pleaded guilty to dangerous, drunk and un- insured driving. The incident happened at Shangan Road, also in Ballymun, last October 31. Sgt Niall Murphy said the accused drove from the Ballymun Road on to a bonfire at 11.25pm. He got out and gardai saw him leave, Sgt Murphy continued. Harrington was stopped, arrested and taken to Ballymun Garda Station where he tested over the alcohol limit, with a reading of 54mcg of alcohol per 100ml of breath. He failed to produce any driving documents. Convictions The court heard the accused had a number of previous convictions for public order and other offences. Harrington had left school after his Junior Certificate, was unemployed, living at home and was caring for his child, his lawyer said. He had not come to adverse garda attention in recent years. The accused had "no issues with drugs or alcohol" but had been binge-drinking on the night in question. "It was a rare night out for him," his lawyer said. Harrington was very apologetic and regretted what happ-ened, his lawyer said. He asked Judge Cormac Dunne not to impose an additional driving ban on him for the no-insurance charge. Judge Dunne said he had to do this, but explained that the bans would run for the same period. He disqualified Harrington from driving for two years on the drink-driving charge, with concurrent one-year bans on the dangerous driving and no insurance charges. He was also fined 50, given two months to pay it and lesser related charges were taken into consideration. Harrington did not address the court during the brief hearing. The widow of John Hurt has said it will be a "strange world" without the veteran actor following his death at the age of 77. Anwen Hurt said the Oscar- nominated star died at his home in Norfolk on Wednesday after a battle with pancreatic cancer. She called the award-winning actor the "most gentlemanly of gentlemen", as it was revealed that he spent the last years of his life working on a number of films. Hurt will return to screens as Ralph, a successful screenwriter who is facing terminal illness, in That Good Night, which takes its name from the poem by Dylan Thomas Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night. He had completed filming the role, described as "poignant" by producers, months before his death as he continued to work at a prodigious rate. Sadness In a statement, Mrs Hurt said: "It is with deep sadness that I have to confirm that my husband, John Vincent Hurt, died on Wednesday, January 25, 2017 at home in Norfolk. "John was the most sublime of actors and the most gentlemanly of gentlemen with the greatest of hearts and the most generosity of spirit. "He touched all our lives with joy and magic and it will be a strange world without him." As well as working on That Good Night, Hurt was also starring in the Jackie Kennedy biopic, Jackie, thriller Damascus Cover and the upcoming biopic of boxer Lenny McLean, My Name Is Lenny. Jackie co-star Natalie Portman said she was "so extremely sad" to hear of Hurt's death. "I was lucky enough to make two films with him, both of which were taken to the next level because of his performances," she said. "He was the most talented actor, and also a deeply good and funny and poetic and smart and warm human being. "I send my love to his family at this terrible time, and join his fans in watching his films that we are lucky enough to have for ever." Hurt was also filming Darkest Hour, in which he starred as Neville Chamberlain opposite Gary Oldman's Winston Churchill. Hurt recently pulled out of a production of John Osborne's play The Entertainer on medical advice as he recovered from an intestinal complaint. He had been due to play Billy Rice in the Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company production, directed by Rob Ashford. A spokesman for the producers of That Good Night expressed their "sincere condolences" and said they felt privileged to have worked with the actor. "John delivers a masterful and touching performance of this flawed character as he attempts to be reconciled to his son and, secretly, to ensure he is not a burden to his wife as he goes 'into that good night'," the spokesman said. He added that Hurt's role in the film "was extremely poignant but one that he was very proud of and keen to take on and complete despite his own personal battles with illness". Beloved The actor was nominated for two Academy Awards, for The Elephant Man and Midnight Express, and won four Baftas, including a lifetime achievement accolade in 2012 in recognition of his outstanding contribution to British cinema. Harry Potter author JK Rowling tweeted of Hurt, who played wand-maker Mr Ollivander in the film adaptations of her books: "So very sad to hear that the immensely talented and deeply beloved John Hurt has died. My thoughts are with his family and friends." Childline founder and president Esther Rantzen said Hurt, who was a fundraiser for the children's charity, had achieved an "extraordinary career". "He will be a great loss to the children in this country," she said. The capital's first supervised injection centre has moved another step closer. Drugs Minister Catherine Byrne is expected to introduce legislation to allow for the inner city facility in the coming weeks. "This is all about people and looking after the most vulnerable in our society," said Ms Byrne, amid speculation that the first centre could be unveiled in her Dublin South- Central constituency. Merchants Quay Ireland has expressed interest in piloting the first centre at its premises in the south inner city. Problem The homeless and drugs support service has been providing a needle exchange for three decades, with 2,500 individuals using it last year alone. "It tends to get labelled as 'not solving the drug problem'. Of course it's not going to solve the problem, but it's tackling a particular cohort," said Merchants Quay chief executive Tony Geoghegan. A first injection centre mooted for Dublin's inner city "can only be a positive thing", said Social Democrat councillor Gary Gannon. He said it was "time for the council to be pragmatic and brave in its decision-making and this is a welcome step". "In all, the examples across the world where the facilities have been provided, there has not been one death," he said. "What we have done up to now clearly hasn't worked. "Nobody wants to see people shooting up in the laneways, and this will provide a much safer environment. I can't understand how it has taken this long, so I'm in favour." Supervised injection centres were originally proposed last year by former drugs minister Aodhan O'Riordain. The Department of Health said there would be an "evidence-based approach" to decide which site would be best suited, where they would take into account factors including drug-related deaths, overdoses and drug-related litter. In December 2015, the Cabinet approved the drafting of legislation that would enable licences to be issued for the establishment of such facilities. Last week, Fine Gael TDs were given a presentation on the benefits of an injection centre from Tony Duffin, director of the Ana Liffey Drug Project. Americans at Chicago OHare Airport protest against the Muslim ban imposed by Donald Trump There have been calls for Taoiseach Enda Kenny to cancel the traditional St Patrick's Day visit to the White House in the wake of Donald Trump's so-called Muslim ban. Labour Party leader Brendan Howlin said Mr Kenny should be "working to make sure that these policies are not enforced on Irish soil". "President Trump does not share our values," he said. "Indeed, he is openly hostile to them. He and his team have made clear that he is unwilling to hear or even listen to discordant voices. "In that context, the only thing a visit by the Taoiseach to the White House could achieve would be to present Ireland as a supine supporter of Trumpism." Meanwhile, Children's Minister Katherine Zappone said the trip should be kept under "review". She said the Government should not wait until March 17 to make its views known on Mr Trump's controversial executive order. It bans people from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the US. They are Syria Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Britons with dual citizenship were later made exempt from Donald Trump's controversial travel ban, the Foreign Office has confirmed. But UK dual citizens travelling to the United States directly from one of the banned countries will face extra checks. Even Irish passport holders who have dual nationality in one of those countries will be refused entry. Ms Zappone wants a review of long-standing US pre-clearance arrangements at Dublin and Shannon airports that enable US immigration officers to vet passengers before they board a plane from Ireland . "If we do that now - review the arrangements - it will be sending a message," she said. Ms Zappone, who is a native of Seattle, said the Cabinet should be prepared to tell the American government that US officials can no longer operate on Irish soil if people are being discriminated against. Constitution "I think the Irish people would be in favour of that, and cert- ainly the Irish-Americans would be favour of that as well," she said. Ms Zappone said Ireland needs to determine whether the Constitution and the international treaties it has signed up to prohibit Trump's policies of discrimination. Foreign Affairs Minister Charlie Flanagan is due to travel to Washington for a series of meetings at which he will raise Mr Trump's stance on immigration. "Irish people are concerned at the dramatic changes in the United States of America," said Mr Flanagan. "I look forward to visiting Washington next Tuesday. I will be engaging with particular reference to immigration and Irish immigration. "I believe we all have obligations to the international community and, in particular, to the Geneva Convention. "I think it's important in these circumstances that we fully observe the letter of the Geneva Convention." Asked about the situations at Dublin and Shannon airports, Mr Flanagan said it was a matter for the US administration and the Department of Transport. A spokesperson for Transport Minister Shane Ross declined to comment, but his Independent Alliance colleague Kevin 'Boxer' Moran has backed the idea of a legal review. "We have a moral duty to speak out. I find events that are unfolding in America over the last 24 hours to be deeply disturbing, a view shared by our EU partners," said Mr Moran. "It is my view that there should be no facilitation of such orders." Draconian Fianna Fail's foreign affairs spokesman Darragh O'Brien said the Taoiseach should take-up the annual invitation to the White House because "not talking to people serves no purpose". "The restrictions the new administration has put in place seem to be quiet draconian," he said. "The Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Taoiseach must use the opportunity to raise the concerns not just of our own citizens, but those of any open, democratic country." Social Protection Minister Leo Varadkar said the White House trip should go ahead, but "it can't just be about smiles and shamrocks". Health Minister Simon Harris described the US policy as "deeply troubling, upsetting, unjust and discriminatory". The raided bungalow in Sallins, Co Kildare, sealed off by armed officers The Kinahan drugs cartel is cracking under increased pressure from gardai and making costly mistakes. A third major blow was dealt to the bungling gangsters after gardai seized 3m worth of drugs and an assault rifle during a massive raid. Detectives are working on the theory that the stash was hidden in a Co Kildare house because the arrogant criminals believed it was a safe location after it was raided by officers last week. The detached dormer bungalow in a quiet cul-de-sac on the Sallins Bridge estate was the focus of garda attention last Tuesday, the same day as a major guns find in a business park unit in Rathcoole. Four people were arrested as a result of that find and three have since been charged with gun possession. Targeting The raids are part of an ongoing operation targeting the Kinahan cartel, which is embroiled in a bloody feud with the Hutch family, based in the north inner city. The house in Sallins was raided again on Saturday night when an AK-47 rifle, 30kg of cocaine and heroin and a number of rounds of ammunition for different firearms were discovered. "This house had been under surveillance for a long time and maybe this gang thought that because it was raided last week the gardai would be finished with it," a senior source told the Herald. "But the surveillance did not end there and there was activity at the house since so it was raided again and the drugs and gun and ammunition were found." Gardai believe that using the same house, knowing it was raided only days before, shows how desperate the gang has become in moving and hiding their weapons, cash and drugs. "They're under huge pressure and this is evidenced by panicky behaviour as they try to find out where gardai are getting their success from," said the source. The property in Sallins has been rented for five years. Neighbours said the occupants kept to themselves but always drove expensive cars that were changed often. "There was never any trouble. We're all shocked, to be honest," said one local resident. Gardai said officers from the Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau supported by the Special Crime Task Force seized a firearm along with large quantities of suspected controlled drugs during the operation. An assault rifle similar, ammunition for a number of guns and around 3m worth of suspected heroin and cocaine were recovered. The drugs were in one-kilo blocks, and it is believed there was 20kg of cocaine and 30kg of heroin. The latest seizures represent the third major setback for the cartel in recent weeks. On January 20, gardai seized cannabis worth an estimated 37m at Dublin Port - more than the value of cannabis seized in the previous two years. It was concealed in steel boxes declared as tractor parts and is believed to have been paid for by a number of gangs who clubbed together. Paranoid The seizure of such a massive haul of drugs is thought to have led gangland criminals on a paranoid hunt for a mole within their ranks. This belief that there is a rat in the camp has led to fears of further gangland attacks. The second blow came with the Rathcoole raid and follow- up searches of houses. Gardai had been monitoring the lock-up at the Greenogue Business Park for some time in the belief there were guns or drugs within it, but they were forced to bust it last Tuesday when they spotted an increase in activity leading them to believe a massive hit was being planned. Their fears were confirmed when 15 weapons were seized, some of which were loaded. Follow-up searches resulted in tens of thousands of euro being seized in houses. Some was in the form of cash but more was found in bank accounts that have now been frozen. The Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) will now be able to examine the flow into and out of these accounts to build up a wider picture of the cartel's financial dealings. It is hoped this will provide a bigger and clearer picture of its operations nationally and internationally and lead to more arrests. The Sallins property remained sealed off yesterday and guarded by members of the Armed Support Unit. Garda technicians carried out a forensic examination of the property and a number of items of evidence were removed from the house for further analysis. No arrests have been made and inquiries continue. Neighbours said they were shocked to learn that the raid could be connected to the ongoing murderous Kinahan and Hutch feud. "It's hard enough to get your head around the fact that there's a gun and drugs and bullets in that house, but what if someone wanted to target whoever brought them here, in a quiet cul-de-sac full of children?" said one young mother. Innocent "I know it's a cliche you read all the time that the places where these things happen are quiet neighbourhoods, but this is just that, a quiet street. "We have heard and seen before how completely innocent people have been killed in this feud. "The last thing you would want to think about is what would happen if there was a gun battle in the street or innocent people being targeted by mistake because of a car that might have been parked outside their house." An elderly woman who lives alone has warned of rogue builders who tried to scam her out of 2,000 after pulling tiles off the roof of her Dublin home. The woman, who asked to be known only as Kathleen and is in her 70s, explained the sequence of events that turned an inconvenience into a frightening extortion at her Mount Merrion home. "I was coming back from the local park two weeks ago when I saw a workman coming out of my drive," she said. "The next day he called back and I didn't open the door. However, he called back again on the Friday and I was curious to know what he wanted, so I opened the door. "He told me I had a hole in my roof and gave me a flyer. I wasn't aware of a hole, but when I looked I could see it. But now I wonder did he cause it in the first place. "I tried ringing a few places but they said they couldn't come out, and my son took up the flyer and rang the number. The man told him it would be 100 to fix it and my son agreed. He feels a bit guilty now but it wasn't his fault," Kathleen added. Frightened "Then three men arrived and went up on the roof, and things suddenly turned. I was very frightened. They started pulling tiles off the roof and one of them told me I had a big problem and it would cost 2,000 to fix. "I was vary scared and I panicked, so I rang a friend of mine who works in property and told her what was happening. She came straight around with a builder she knows, and they told the three workers to leave immediately. "Thankfully, no money changed hands and my son got somebody else locally to come and help. "I have reported this to gardai and they are investigating it. I've heard other stories of vulnerable people paying between 5,000 and 20,000 to these scammers." Tom Fahey, of the Mount Merrion Residents' Association, said it was important to get the word out about these scammers. "If you need work done on your house, always engage a reputable contractor and get a quote in writing before you agree to have any work done," he said. Local independent councillor Deirdre Donnelly said: "The scammers seem to target people who are living on their own. This goes beyond the financial hardship suffered by the victims. The psychological trauma afterwards can be a lot worse." An investigation is underway after a man exposed himself to a young woman at a popular west Dublin park. The horrifying incident took place at Willsbrook Park at approximately 7.45pm last Thursday. Locals in Lucan have now been warned to be on high alert, with reports of similar incidents taking place in the park recently. The woman said she saw a man commit the lewd act as she walked by the park's main gate. The man fled into the darkness of the park when she screamed. The repulsed woman took to social media to describe the encounter. Dismay "This isn't the first time this has happened to me. The exact same thing happened last year when I was coming home from work, only that time he was standing on the footbridge in the park fondling and I had no choice but to walk past him," she said. "This is a year on and nothing has been done about it. I live right beside the park and have to walk by it on my way home from work every day and genuinely don't feel safe." According to reports, the man in question is in his late 20s or 30s. He is described as 5ft 9in or 10in tall and was wearing dark blue jeans and a dark coloured zip-up jacket. Other locals have also taken to Facebook to post warnings about the flasher and to express their dismay at the incident. Last year, Lucan Sarsfields GAA Club sent a warning note to parents following an incident where a man exposed himself to two club members in the park. In 2014, two teenage girls on their way home from school reported that a man had flashed in the same location. Lucan Councillor William Lavelle told the Herald that this incident is "disgusting but not surprising". "I know there have been many concerns over the years in relation to individuals exposing themselves in Willsbrook Park. "It's questionable whether it's the one individual or different people over a space of time. A lot of people are just disgusted at this latest incident, but they are not surprised due to the previous occurrences. Lighting "There is no doubt that the park's trees need to be cut back, which I've been pushing for quite a while. The park is also very underlit, but the council have come up with proposals to install public lighting there as part of a pedestrian improvement plan." A garda spokesperson said they "are investigating an incident of indecent exposure that occurred late Thursday evening". Fines for indecent exposure of up to 500 can be imposed under the Public Order Act, which provides for "offensive conduct in public". The offence can also be dealt with under Section 18 of the Criminal Law Act, with fines of up to 634.97 or up to six months in prison. Anyone who has any information on the offence is asked to contact Lucan Garda Station on 01-6667300. Washington County football: Wildcats, Warriors open playoffs with victories Williamsport and Boonsboro will play in the second round of the Class 2A-1A West playoffs after victories Friday night. North Carolinas top two Democrat officials added their voices Sunday to those elected officials opposing President Trumps immigration executive order. Trumps executive order bars citizens of seven Muslim nations Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the United States. Trump said Saturday that while the order is not a Muslim ban ... it is working out nicely. It was not clear Sunday from White House officials whether the ban still includes re-entry into the United States of individuals for those countries who have obtained green-card residence status. Gov. Roy Cooper said the order will make our homeland and our troops serving overseas less safe. Our vetting process has to be tough and thorough, but we should not impose a religious test to enter the country. Its especially troubling that individuals who risked their lives to protect our troops and served alongside them are now being turned away. There are news reports of Muslims who have served or assisted the U.S. military in the Middle East being among those individuals detained or not allowed to travel to the U.S. We can secure the safety of our country without separating families, hurting our businesses and turning away good people who need our help, Cooper said. Josh Stein, who began Jan. 1 his first term as state attorney general, said in a statement Sunday that the order puts the country at greater risk because it undermines the United States with our allies in the Middle East whose help we need to fight ISIS. Trumps action signals to the world that America sees all Muslims as terrorists. In the process, he actually strengthens the hands of ISIS, making it easier for them to recruit new terrorists. Stein, however, has not signed onto a statement issued Sunday by 16 of the nations 22 Democratic attorneys general in which they condemn the executive order as unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful. Those attorneys general said they are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that (the order) has created. Imam Khalid Griggs of Community Mosque of Winston-Salem, a leading voice in the Triad Muslim community, could not be reached for comment Sunday. Griggs posted on his Facebook account Friday that Trump, whom he refers to as 45 the 45th U.S. president has done more to acerbate religious, racial, and ethnic tensions in the country than years of anti-immigrant, racist, Islamophobic rhetoric by groups, such as the Ku Klux Klan, hundreds of nativists, extremists, border vigilantes and Islamophobes. Griggs said the mosque plans to conduct soon an informational session with Helen Parsonage, an immigration lawyer with the law firm of Elliot Morgan Parsonage. The session will focus on what Griggs called safeguarding oneself in this intensified anti-immigrant environment. Cooper and Stein made their comments after Charlotte-Mecklenburg police said six individuals were arrested Saturday during protests at Charlotte Douglas International Airport. Airports nationwide have become focal points of protests, particularly those where either refugees or individuals from those seven countries have been detained. Police said about 50 protesters formed two groups at the airport, with the first group protesting Trumps immigration order and the second community-related issues. Those arrested face charges that include trespassing and resist, obstruct and delay, The Associated Press reported. The News & Observer reported that about 1,300 individuals held a similar protest Sunday afternoon at Raleigh-Durham International Airport. Raleigh police said they were not aware of any arrests during the 2-hour event. Police at Piedmont Triad International Airport said Sunday there has been no protests at the facility. U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., issued a tweet Sunday in which he said America has always been a home for refugees fleeing persecution and seeking freedom, and it should continue to be. Tillis cited as an example of his support for refugee initiatives his work with the Afghan special immigrant Visa program, which allows Afghans who have supported U.S. efforts in the country to apply for refugee status here. Tillis spokesman Daniel Keylin said Tillis was specifically referring to an amendment he cosponsored affecting Afghans. He did not comment when asked if there was a similar effort for similar individuals in Iraq and other countries. As we offer safety to refugees, we must also be mindful of the sad reality that radical Islamic terrorists are actively attempting to infiltrate programs to enter Western nations, Tillis wrote. Tillis said he will seek clarity of the Trump administrations stance on green card holders and their re-entry into the U.S. U.S. Rep. Alma Adams, D-12th, called Trumps immigration executive order mean spirited and inhumane. She made similar remarks to Cooper and Stein that she does not believe the order will make the country safer. U.S. Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., and U.S. Reps. Ted Budd, R-6th, and Virginia Foxx, R-5th, have not made official comment on the immigration executive order. Jibril Hough, a spokesman for the Islamic Center of Charlotte, was quoted by The Charlotte Observer on Sunday as saying Trumps order feeds into the politics of fear, making our country more divided and tarnishes our image across the world. Its a McCarthy-type situation I call a Trumpism. Parsonage posted on her Facebook account Sunday that immigration lawyers around the country are now recommending that immigrants (especially those who are out of status or have no status) carry with them at all times physical documentary proof of continuous physical presence in the U.S. for the prior two years. That will help protect them against being subject to expedited removal, which she defined as an immediate order without any further hearing, review or opportunity to apply to stay in the United States unless the person expresses a fear of persecution, in which case he or she is afforded a credible fear interview to determine whether he or she may apply for asylum. Parsonage said individuals subject to expedited removal generally are not informed of their right to counsel. Likewise, they are not provided a sufficient opportunity to contact counsel to help them challenge the charges against them or present evidence that is not with them at the time of apprehension. This domain has expired. If you owned this domain, contact your domain registration service provider for further assistance. If you need help identifying your provider, visit https://www.tucowsdomains.com/ If Indian IT companies are known for something other than innovation and big profits, it is this beautiful and sprawling campuses. Adorned with imperial palms, exotic fountains and designer landscaping, these are sybaritic edifices to Indias economic rise. They are also a beacon of hope for the countrys young and talented. Yet, the beauty of these campuses can hardly hide an ugly truth. From Infosys to Tata Consultancy Services, many of these companies have struggled to guard the safety of workers, a concern brought back into focus by the alleged murder of a 25-year-old woman at an IT park in Pune on Sunday. Rasila Raju OP, who was found dead with a computer cable around her neck on the ninth floor of Infosys facility in Pune, is the latest in a growing list of IT workers kidnapped, molested, raped or killed on campus. Often, a company security guard or a driver is accused of these crimes. Read: Infosys techie murdered on Pune campus, security guard arrested About half of Indias 3.7 million people employed with the IT and outsourcing industry are women. Many work overnight shifts to be on the same time zone as their foreign clients. To be sure, many companies have tightened the vetting of drivers and security guards. They have also made new rules such as not allowing women to travel alone with drivers or setting up security patrols to monitor cabs. But changes such as screening drivers and guards have not kept pace with the number of outsourcing employees. Industry lobby, Nasscom, framed a code of conduct listing some of these steps to ensure the safety of staff while they commute to work or are in office itself. These guidelines came into force after a horrific rape of an employee of Hewlett Packard in Bangalore in 2005. She was returning home after a late shift. So how should companies secure their workers? The demographic diversity of Indias IT industry only amplifies the challenge of guarding the security of its workforce. Naturally, then, campus security be it of companies or colleges must build on cultural, procedural, legal, and above all, preventive measures. In the developed world, campuses have their own police. The Cambridge University Constabulary guards the famed centre of learning in Britain. In the United States too many colleges are secured by a separate police force. In India, where the police are burdened and resources stretched, a dedicated campus force would have to be paid for by companies. A more plausible solution is an appropriate blending of police and contract security with clearly delineated responsibility-and-command structures. Read: Pune Infosys techie murder: IT workers stunned, question outsourced security Blending physical security with technology helps overcome the shortcoming of depending on one or the other. Most campuses have a three-tier technology-based security structure with close circuit PTZ cameras, boom-barriers, X-ray bag scanners, flap-barriers and swipe cards. But what many companies dont have are campus security patrols on foot or vehicles, quick reaction teams to work closely with the local police or a campus-wide notification system for all staff, a whistle alert scheme or an anti-rape programme for employees and support staff. At Infosys facility in Pune, where Rasila was found dead, blue-and-grey spaceship-like structures add to the brilliance and appeal of the campus architecture. But for about its 35,000 employees, most of them young, these must now be a rude reminder that designer offices serve no purpose unless the people who work in them feel safe. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON A BJP candidate once accused of inciting communal riots has vowed to clamp curfew in three Muslim-majority towns of Uttar Pradesh should the party be voted to power, in remarks that could invite the Election Commissions wrath for potentially violating poll guidelines. Suresh Rana, who is contesting the assembly polls from Thana Bhawan in Hmali district, said on Sunday curfew will be imposed in Kairana, Deoband, Moradabad if he and the party are elected in the polls starting next month. If I win, curfew will be imposed in Kairana, Deoband and Moradabad, Rana is heard saying in a video clip released by news agency ANI. The MLA added his defeat will be celebrated in Deoband and Moradabad. His comments were greeted with loud cheer from the crowd. He, however, backtracked on Monday, saying his comments were taken out of context. Read | UP election: Politics over Muzaffarnagar riot victims leaves Kairana polarised The BJP has been highlighting what it claims is mass exodus of Hindus from several areas of Shamli due to alleged extortion and threat by Muslim goons. Last year, the BJP had released the report of a fact-finding team to Kairana and demanded a CBI probe into criminal gangs hounding out Hindus from the predominantly Muslim township in western Uttar Pradesh, around 100 km from Delhi. Deoband in neighbouring Shaharanpur district is famous for its Muslim seminary Darul Uloom, seen by the Hindu right-wing as a breeding ground of radical Islam. Moradabad, both a district and headquarter town, also has a large Muslim population. Western Uttar Pradesh is one of the most communally sensitive areas in the countrys most populous state and had seen largescale riots in 2013 in Muzaffarnagar. The violence had left more than 60 people dead and displaced thousands. Rana came up with a clarification, saying if his party comes to power then the state will see the exit of goons. Due to the fear of hooligans, extortion, the people migrated from western Uttar Pradesh. There is no village or town where migration did not take place due to these reasons. So, I meant to say that if the BJP comes to power in UP then these goons, extortionists will migrate and not the innocents, ANI quoted Rana as saying. The BJP is trying to regain power in the state after 19 years. Campaigning in the border district of Amritsar on Monday, BJP president Amit Shah sought votes for the SAD-BJP alliance in the interest of national security and communal harmony in Punjab. He also declared chief minister Parkash Singh Badal the epitome of sacrifice: He has dedicated his entire life for the betterment of Punjab. It hurts when people abuse him. Politics has hit a new low. On the lines of what Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said in his Punjab election rallies, Shah, who was addressing a rally in support of BJP and SAD assembly candidates and also BJPs Lok Sabha bypoll candidate, Rajinder Mohan Singh Chhina, said, The election in Punjab is an election for the security of the nation. Punjab is the heart of India. If it is secure, the nation is secure. He declared that it is the SAD-BJP alliance a symbol of Sikh-Hindu unity that has ensured brotherhood and communal harmony in the state. It is very important to carry on with that, he told the gathering. The candidates who stood with him on stage, besides bypoll nominee Rajinder Mohan Singh Chhina, included BJPs Anil Joshi, Rakesh Gill, Rajesh Honey, and Tarun Chugh, and SADs Gurpartap Tikka. On the AAP and Arvind Kejriwal, the BJP supremo said, Some people are trying to do their best to defame Punjab. They are fooling people in order to seize power in Punjab. But I must say, the people know it all. The electorate of Delhi which voted for you (AAP) is now looking for you with binoculars in their hands. Arvind Kejriwal wants to be the CM of Gujarat, Punjab, Goa, of every state he visits. He termed state Congress president Capt Amarinder Singh as an absent MP from Amritsar, Even if he manages to become the CM, where will people go to find him? He prefixes Captain to his name but takes orders from Rahul baba (Rahul Gandhi, Congress vice-president) . He credited the Modi-led central government with development in the state, and also mentioned that Modi and Union finance minister Arun Jaitley (who lost here against Amarinder in the 2014 LS polls) have a deep connection with Amritsar. In Ludhiana, Shah said Punjab will benefit with the BJP in power at the Centre and the Akalis being an important ally in the state. Akalis are not alone as the government at the Centre belongs to Narendra Modi. If you want peace in the state, then neither the Congress nor the AAP can bring peace in the state; only the SAD-BJP alliance can, he said. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) has decided to divert its resources from Punjab and Uttar Pradesh to focus on the other three poll-bound states: Manipur, Uttarakhand and Goa. The move could hurt the BJPs electoral prospects in the two bigger and politically crucial states, which among the five voting for a new government this February and March. With a committed cadre at the grassroots, the Sangh plays a vital role in mobilising public opinion in favour of the BJP and deploys its vast machinery to help the party on the day of polling. The official line, however, is that the RSS does not get involved in elections. The RSS, the BJPs ideological fount, is not happy with the way the party is attempting social engineering in UP on caste lines, sources said. The Sangh long-held belief is that caste divisions are a hindrance to larger Hindu unity. The BJP has returned to the Hindutva agenda, but its core poll strategy revolved around caste equations with aggressive wooing of non-Yadav other backward classes and non-Jatav Dalits in UP. Caste was the main criterion in the selection of party candidates and this does not have the Sanghs sanction. In Punjab, the RSS has strong issues with the BJPs coalition partner, the Shiromani Akali Dal. These factors prompted the RSS to opt for a passive role in UP and Punjab. It would rather focus on Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur. The cadre in these states (UP and Punjab) will do its bit, but there is no intensive planning. Besides, the BJP has a strong cadre base in these states and so, it should not be a problem for the party to mobilise votes, an RSS functionary said, seeking to play down its decision not to be pro-active in UP and Punjab. The organisation wants the party to coalesce the Hindu vote, instead of following the caste-based politics of the Samajawadi Party and the BSP. The RSSs attempts to woo Sikhs in Punjab through its outfit, Rashtriya Sikh Sangat, have not gone down well with the Akalis, who see the move as an attempt to overshadow the Sikh identity by including them in the Hindu fold. The Sangh was not happy with the drug problem in Punjab; it also has concerns about growing presence of Christian missionaries in the state, particularly along the border. Another area of contention is the periodic threat of the Khalistan-movement reviving, an RSS functionary from the Punjab unit said. In Uttarakhand , the seat of a large number of Hindu pilgrimage sites, the focus is on consolidation of the community against the growing presence of missionaries. The states proximity to China is another reason why the Sangh is keen on aiding the BJP in the hill state. In Goa, the cadre have been asked to redouble efforts to keep the debutant Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Congress out and ensure there is no mixed signal to Hindu voters after senior Sangh leader Subhash Velingkar broke away to float his own party. Velingkar has accused the BJP-RSS of appeasing the former Portuguese colonys English-speaking population. As was done for Assam and Kerala, the Sanghs dyed-in-the-wool cadre has been progressively paving the way for the BJPs ascendance in Manipur. The Sangh and the BJP are working together to stop Congress chief minister Ibobi Singh getting a fourth term in Manipur. Considered the architects of the Assam win, BJP general secretary Ram Madhav and election strategist Rajat Sethi have been anchoring the poll process in the northeastern state with Sangh functionaries. With limited grassroots presence in Manipur, the Sangh is counting on the Hindu vote, making overtures towards the majority Meiteis who control 40 seats in the Valley, without ruffling sentiments of the hill tribes having 20 seats. When the party began campaigning in Assam, no one thought it could pose a challenge to the Congress, but the Sangh cadre had been preparing the ground and the results were for all to see, a source said. In the three states, the Sangh is overseeing work at every booth and the cadre had been instructed to downplay caste fractures. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Addressing a gathering in favour of party candidate Parkash Singh Bhatti at Balluana on Sunday, Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president Sukhbir Singh Badal said the sacrilege crimes took place after the entry of Aam Aadmi Party into the state. The Punjab government has solved around 30 cases of sacrilege and only the Behbal Kalan incident remains unsolved, he said. "Prime Minister Narendra Modi has announced to get the sacrilege incidents probed by the CBI, Sukhbir said. He condemned AAP convener Arvind Kejriwal for his night stay at the house of a former militant on Saturday in Moga. "We have been able to achieve peace and communal harmony after much difficultly. But it seems Kejriwal is bent on destroying that for political gains, he said. Also read | Punjab polls: PM Modi assures CBI probe into sacrilege incidents He said this was not the first time that Kejriwal was courting radical elements. Earlier he had held a breakfast meeting with RP Singh of the Akhand Kirtani Jatha, which is a frontal organisation of the Babbar Khalsa International (BKI), he said. The Congress had done the biggest sacrilege by sending tanks and artillery into the Darbar Sahab, Sukhbir said. "Congress is also responsible for the massacre of innocent Sikhs in Delhi. The AAP was no less as its government bulldozed the historic piao at Gurdwara Sisganj. AAP also disrespected Guru Granth Sahab by comparing its election manifesto with the holy book". He said Akali Dal had always delivered on all its promises from free power to atta-dal and shagun schemes. "Now we have promised to waive loans of all small farmers besides promising a 100 bonus on both wheat and paddy, he said. Sukhbir also addressed rallies for BJP's nominee Arun Narang at Abohar and Akali candidate Joginder Singh Jindu from Ferozepur Rural. Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav on Monday asked party workers to contest all the 403 seats in Uttar Pradesh, hardening his stand a day after announcing his decision not to campaign for the SP-Congress combine. The 77-year-old leader, ousted as the party chief by his son and UP chief minister Akhilesh, is unhappy with the SPs decision to join hands with the Congress, once a bitter rival, for the assembly poll. The alliance (with the Congress) does not serve the interests of the SP. Go out and file your nominations from the seats that have been allocated to the Congress, Mulayam told a group of workers who had assembled at his New Delhi residence. He was still trying to persuade Akhilesh to exit the alliance, the three-time UP chief minister said, adding the Congress would gain from the arrangement at SPs expense. This is the reason I have decided not to campaign for the alliance, he said. The SP, he said, had grown because Muslim voters, once loyal to the Congress, had reposed faith in Samajwadi Party. With an opening now been provided, the Congress has an opportunity to regain the trust of the minority voters. This will harm the long term prospects of the SP and will destroy it eventually, Mulayam warned. His comments are unlikely to dent the alliances prospects, as most of the workers and leaders have already shifted loyalties to Akhilesh, who pushed for the tie-up. Moreover, the process of filing election papers for the first two of the seven phases of voting is over. The Congress is to contest 105 seats in the state, 43 of which go to the polls in the first and second phases. The Samajwadi Party will contest 298 seats. Polling opens on February 11. As their pet issue of a Ram temple is caught in a legal rigmarole, the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) is marketing a heady mix of soft Hindutva and development to the people of Uttar Pradesh. While releasing the manifesto for the assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, BJPs national president Amit Shah had proudly highlighted nine key issues that included everything for everybody--except the now forgotten promise of a Ram temple in Ayodhya. Instead, finding prime position were the two inflammable issues of the Kairana exodus and cow slaughter that instantly trigger communal polarisation, especially in western part of the state that witnessed the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots. Without wasting time the party high command also deployed its most polarising figure, Mahanth Yogi Adityanath, whose influence area happens to be Gorakhpur in east of the state. He will be addressing many meetings in an already polarised west UP. Read | Amit Shah releases BJP manifesto in UP, promises Ram temple, free internet data The new issues have taken centre-stage relegating the most exploited, yet emotive, issue of Ayodhya to page number 20 of the 24-page manifesto. Here too, the party stuck to the resolution of the knotty issue within the constitutional framework, instead of its earlier commitment of finding a legal solution if negotiations between Hindus and Muslims failed. This was a cut-and-paste job from the partys 2014 manifesto, and is a line the BJP has adopted since the countrywide frenzy subsided in mid-1990s. Interestingly, the BJPs vision document before the 2004 general election was much more categorical on the temple issue. It read: The BJP remains committed to its stand that the judiciarys verdict in this matter should be accepted by all. However, we believe that dialogue, and a negotiated settlement in an atmosphere of mutual trust and goodwill, are the best way of achieving this goal. Read | Ram temple row: Apex body of Hindu saints says BJP-VHP no longer trustworthy The two central governments led by socialist leader Chandra Shekhar and Atal Bihari Vajpayee had initiated a dialogue to find a solution to the contentious issue that scarred the Hindu-Muslim relationship in India. The Narendra Modi government, however, has not moved an inch in that direction. The sants associated with the movement are awaiting an appointment with the prime minister ever since he came to power. As for the legal remedy, the case is pending since 1949. The BJP has buried the issue as it lost its mass appeal after the loss of the disputed shrine on December 6, 1992. The BJP citadel also collapsed along with the shrine as people realised it was an empty promise, a mere election stunt. During elections, it can best ignite communal tensions but not necessarily deliver votes. The BJPs revival in 2014 was possible primarily because of Modi, in whom people saw both development and Hindutva. There are valid reasons besides the proven fact that no issue can be perennially milked in elections. Read | UP election: Ram temple issue will always be alive, says BJPs Vinay Katiyar The sangh parivar has not carried out any public mobilisation campaign, the backbone of the temple movement, to revive the issue. Some half-hearted yatras were organised till mid 2000, but they too lost their steam. Now even the much-touted customary celebration on December 6 hardly attracts any public participation as the construction of a Ram temple remains a distant dream for the devout. The VHP-BJP leadership that had spearheaded the temple movement is either dead or sidelined Ramchand Paramhans, Ashok Singhal, Lal Krishna Advani, MM Joshi, Kalyan Singh and Vinay Katiyar among others. Read | 24 years since Babri demolition, Ram mandir hardly an agenda for UP polls And while the VHP continues to intermittently play the Ram dhun, most of the BJP leaders have moved away from Ayodhya, unlike in the 1980s when they had come to the streets, walking shoulder-to-shoulder with the sants. The cadre have picked up new slogans like Bharat Mata ki Jai and Bhagwan Gautam Budh ki Jai while dropping the catchphrase Jai Sri Ram from their public discourse. Now newer divisive issues like love jihad and cow slaughter pay more political dividends. Read | UP Election: BJP chief brings back Ram Mandir issue in polarised west UP This is also because of the sangh parivars efforts to consolidate the Hindu vote-bank by bringing in the lower castes to its fold. Temples in the countryside are symbolic of untouchability even though Dalits form bulk of the pilgrims to temple towns. Moreover, the issue is now history for a generation born after 1992. The temple does not excite them any more unless their emotions are whipped up. Or else the Centres surrender on Jallikattu, a bull taming sport in Tamil Nadu in the south, would have kicked off murmurs among the hardliners. The government brought in a law to circumvent the Supreme Court order. Read | Will Mayawatis Mukhtar gamble get her Muslim vote? The question, however is, can the temple still kick off an emotional storm like Jallikattu did? Or it is merely a matter of faith for both the public and the politicians. For the BJP, the Ram temple exists. Only it has to be made magnificent. Bhopal: Umang Singhar, Congress MLA from Dhar districts Gandhwani assembly segment on Monday alleged that police gang raped four tribal women belonging to Bhil tribe in two villages of his constituency on January 25 and ransacked properties of many villagers during a raid conducted to catch some criminals. Singhar, who addressed a press conference here, had also brought four tribal women along with him. Speaking to reporters, the four tribal women alleged that on the morning of the January 25, police entered their houses and raped them. Another five tribal women who had also come to Bhopal with the MLA, also alleged that they were harassed by the police. A Bhil tribal woman told media persons that a cop entered her house on the morning of January 25, snatched her baby and threw it away. Phir usney mere saath galat kaam kiya. (Then he raped me), she said. Singhar said there were 25 to 30 criminal elements in the two villages-Butiya and Holibadya-in his assembly segment. Around 6 am on January 25, nearly 150 plus strong police force raided the village to catch the criminals. They hurled tear gas shells on the villagers, ransacked their properties, broke utensils in the houses, mixed pesticide with the grains and raped four Bhil tribal women and misbehaved with other womenfolk in the village. Some of the cops were drunk, he alleged. Singhar said the police also seized 10 bikes and two tractors of the villagers, claiming they had been stolen. We have the documents to show that these bikes and tractors were those of the villagers and not stolen at all, he said. Singhar said just because there were some criminal elements in the village, the police had no right to punish the whole village and rape women. On the same day, we approached the local police to file an FIR against the police, but they didnt do so. We took the women for a medical checkup to the Dhar district hospital, where doctors refused to form a panel for a medical examination. Somehow I managed to get them examined by a lady doctor, he said. Singhar said finally on Sunday the police registered a case of gang rape against unknown persons in the incident. Our demand is that a case be filed against the accused cops, a high level judicial probe be ordered be ordered into the incident, collector and SP of the district be immediately transferred and villagers be compensated for ransacking of their properties, he said. What police has to say? When contacted, Birendra Kumar Singh, superintendent of police (SP) Dhar rubbished the allegations. The fact is that Butiya village is home to habitual criminals and they had warrants against 143 criminals in the village. We raided the village on January 25 and seized some bikes and two tractors on the suspicion they had been stolen. Whenever police raids this village, they attack the police. So they are levelling these serious charges to exert pressure on police so that we dont enter their village in future, he said. On why police lodged a case against unknown persons for the alleged gang rape of four tribal women, Singh said as the women themselves lodged the complaint and it was of a serious nature, they registered the case. I have constituted a probe team headed by a Dy SP, which will investigate this incident, he said Bollywoods ultimate diva, Sridevi, is still a style icon, and so is her daughter Jhanvi Kapoor. The 53-year-old actor, still counted among the most beautiful women in the industry, posted a picture of hers with Jhanvi on her Twitter timeline on Sunday, and it became an instant rage among her fans. Sridevis second innings began in Bollywood with 2013 film English Vinglish, and she is in the news since then, mostly for her style statements. And now, Jhanvi appears to be following her mothers advice and footsteps in terms of fashion. Daughter of producer Boney Kapoor, Jhanvi is likely to make her Bollywood debut soon, but no project has been announced yet. Kalki Koechlin is busy shooting for her next project with her good friend, Konkona Sen Sharma. After sharing the screen with the latter in Ek Thi Daayan (ETD; 2013), and being directed by Konkona in her directorial debut, A Death in the Gunj, Kalki says she admires the actor-director and her talent. Speaking about her relationship with Konkona, the Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara (2011) actor says, I have a bit of a crush on her son Haroon. He is so cute. Konkona and I have a growing relationship. We first acted together in ETD and later, she directed me in her film, and now we will work in a film together as co-actors again. We have a good relationship. We hang out socially once in a while. She is someone who is very precise while working on her characters, acting and direction. I find that inspiring. A poster of Ek Thi Daayan. Kalki admits that her style of working is different from that of most people and includes preparation as well spontaneity. She says, I like to prepare well and work on my diction and pronunciation. I feel that it is important to improvise on the spot, as once you get to the location, things might not be as you imagined them. Many times, you have to change the way you thought you were going to do a scene. It is important to be very prepared yet be ready to improvise. Kalki and Konkona have worked together in three projects. Kalki has a few films scheduled for release this year, but the National Film Award winner (Special jury award) also excited about her upcoming web series. Its about the Goan mafia. Its a complex story about all the different people involved in the mafia. I play a Portuguese-Goan DJ. I have to learn Portuguese, as I will speak the language and also have a Portuguese accent. It is fun to learn a new language, but its scary and difficult too. Kalki is busy for the next couple of months, but she is happy to be able to do a variety of roles. I am getting enough work to choose from. That is a happy place to be in, she says. Kalki is busy shooting a web series currently. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON In November last year, Brunchs cover story for the wedding special issue, Love Lehengas, had designer Kresha Bajaj describing her work with brides-to-be on their dream wedding lehengas. The Mumbai-based designer had become a social media sensation after she shared pictures of her own wedding lehenga the white and gold ensemble included special moments and milestones from her love story, through intricate, embroidered designs on each kali. The jumping dolphins on the hem symbolised the moment she first met her husband, at a protest rally for dolphin culling; the clinking of champagne glasses, the proposal in Maldives; while the palace, the time they recced their wedding venue in Udaipur. While sharing the stories of other clients she was working with, Bajaj had been hush-hush about a love story sari she was designing for a celebritys engagement, as she wanted to keep the news under wraps. Turns out, the sari was for Samantha Prabhu, a leading name in the Telugu and Tamil film industries. The actress got engaged to Naga Chaitanya, actor Akkineni Nagarjunas son, yesterday at a private ceremony in Hyderabad. From HT Brunchs story on November 27 Prabhu shared a sneak-peek of her sari on her Instagram today the picture shows the actress flashing her engagement ring with fiance Chaitanya in the background, and the moment recreated through gold embroidery on her sari. He put a ring on it #myengagementsaree #mystory #mywholelife #thankyoukoecsh #cantgetbetter A photo posted by Samantha Ruth Prabhu (@samantharuthprabhuoffl) on Jan 29, 2017 at 9:42pm PST From the pages of my story .. to you with love A video posted by Samantha Ruth Prabhu (@samantharuthprabhuoffl) on Jan 25, 2017 at 7:22pm PST Prabhu had also put up a video of the work-in-progress sari a few days ago, with Alicia Keys and Jay Zs Empire State of Mind playing in the background. In the Brunch interview, Bajaj had mentioned that New York was special to the couple and she was going to recreate their story through iconic elements like Times Square. We changed the design a bit from what was originally planned. Im going to share all the behind-the-scenes details soon, says Bajaj. Read more: Naga Chaitanya and Samantha Ruth Prabhu are engaged. See pictures Follow us on twitter.com/HTBrunch Connect with us on facebook.com/hindustantimesbrunch SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Global coffee giant Starbucks has said it will hire 10,000 refugees over next five years as it vowed to not stand silent in the face of US President Donald Trumps order to ban people from seven Muslim-majority nations and assured it will continue to nurture the human spirit. I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise. We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question, Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz said in a message in the wake of Trumps order that has upended lives in the US as well as across the globe. Schultz said the company will take specific actions to ensure people around the world that it will neither stand by, nor stand silent as the uncertainty around the new Administrations actions grows with each passing day. The Starbucks Chief announced that the company has had a long history of hiring young people looking for opportunities and a pathway to a new life around the world. This is why we are doubling down on this commitment by working with our equity market employees as well as joint venture and licensed market partners in a concerted effort to welcome and seek opportunities for those fleeing war, violence, persecution and discrimination, he said. Schultz said Starbucks is developing plans to hire 10,000 refugees over five years in the 75 countries around the world where it does business, including India. And we will start this effort here in the US by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support, he said. Starbucks will also strengthen its business in the critically important market Mexico, which has been a target of Trumps policies. Schultz said the company has been open for business in Mexico since 2002, and have since opened almost 600 stores in 60 cities across the country, which together employ over 7,000 Mexican partners. We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same, he said. He also outlined Starbucks plans to ensure healthcare coverage to its employees in the wake of Trumps plans to scrap Obamacare. We are in business to inspire and nurture the human spirit, one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time; whether that neighborhood is in a Red State or a Blue State; a Christian country or a Muslim country; a divided nation or a united nation. That will not change. You have my word on that, Schultz said. Trumps executive order, which imposed a minimum 90-day ban on immigrants and refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries (Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen; refugees from Syria have been barred indefinitely), has sparked an outpouring of criticism. Limits on ATM withdrawals will further be eased from February 1 and curbs on branch withdrawals from current, cash credit and overdraft accounts would be lifted with immediate effect, the Reserve Bank of India said on Monday. People will now be able to withdraw from ATMs Rs 24,000 from their savings accounts in one go, the second time in two weeks that the central bank has relaxed ATM limits while keeping the Rs 24,000 a week ceiling unchanged. The RBI had on January 16 raised the limit to Rs 10,000 per day from Rs 4,500. The decision to withdraw the weekly cap will be taken at an appropriate time the situation (of cash supply) is far better today, a source in the banking sector told HT on condition of anonymity. The restrictions were put in place after the government withdrew Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 banknotes in a surprise move, triggering a cash crunch. HT wrote on January 27 that the limit for single ATM transaction could be raised from Rs 10,000 to Rs 24,000 with the easing of cash supply. On a review of the pace of remonetisation, it has been decided to partially restore status quo ante, the RBI said in its notification. It, however, said banks would have the flexibility to fix withdrawal limits, as was the case before the demonetisation exercise was announced on November 8. Around Rs 12,000 crore was being provided for countrys 220,000 ATMs compared to around Rs 13,000 crore before November 8, sources said. The government has been saying the amount of currency in circulation would remain lower that what it was before November 8 even after remonetisation is completed, a move aimed at encouraging people to go cashless and adopt digital payment methods. Vodafone Plc, the British telecom company has confirmed ongoing talks of merger with Aditya Birla Group-owned telecom operator Idea Cellular, to cushion itself against a price war with Reliance Jio. The merger would make the joint entity the largest telecom operator of the country, with 43% revenue market share in 2018-19, according to Hong Kong-based brokerage firm CLSA. Airtel will have 33%, and Reliance Jio will occupy 13% share. Vodafone confirms that it is in discussions with the Aditya Birla Group about an all share merger of Vodafone India (excluding Vodafones 42% stake in Indus Towers) and Idea, Vodafone said in a statement. According to sources, Vodafone will hold a sizeable share in the merged entity, and both Vodafone and Idea will have representatives on the board of the company. Idea, in its statement to the Bombay Stock Exchange, said the company constantly evaluates various opportunities to enhance shareholder value, and is in preliminary talks to evaluate these opportunities. The fundamental premise of preliminary discussion is based on equal rights between Aditya Birla Group and Vodafone in the combined entity, it said in the statement. Last financial year, 2015-16, the combined revenue share of Idea and Vodafone was 42%, while Airtels was 31.4%. Together, Idea and Vodafone had 416.8 million subscribers, 70% more than Airtels 245.4 million. Vodafone said the merger would change the shareholding structure of the Indian company. Any merger would be effected through the issue of new shares in Ideato Vodafone and would result in Vodafone deconsolidating Vodafone India, Vodafone said in a statement. Vodafones indication of the merger made the Indian telecom index rally 9.5%. Ideas socks gained 29%. In 2015-16, the combined revenue of Idea and Vodafone was Rs 81,052 crore while Airtel reported Rs 60,687 crore. Together Idea and Vodafone will have more fire-power against Reliance Jios competitive moves that has already started a price war, said Sanchit Vir Gogia, co-founder and chief analyst of Greyhound Research. However, a former telecom regulator said that the merger would require clearance from the Competition Commission of India. The merged entity will also have the highest spectrum holding of all telecom operators in the country, which will make it better placed to offer better data services. Idea has a larger pre-paid customer base and has a strong foothold in the Indian hinterland. Vodafone has high APRU (average revenue per user), many post-paid, customers. In Davos, during the World Economic Forum, Sunil Mittal, chairman of Bharti Enterprise, which owns Airtel, told financial news company, Its a perfect match. If you look at it, the match is not bad. But you know I cant sit on the minds of Vittorio (Colao) or Kumar (Mangalam Birla). The strength and weaknesses match very well. Rural-urban, structured portfolio...makes for a good business case and I would support it. After the merger, the telecom industry will be left with three big playersAirtel, Vodafone-Idea, and Reliance Jio. Others like Reliance Communications is in talks with Airtel, Norwegian telecom operator Telenor is in talks with Aircel and MTS has already merged with Reliance Communications. Mittal has also confirmed that Airtel is in talks with Telenor. But I think it is in the interest of India, to give a good exit to companies like Telenor rather than wasting all the efforts. So I would say, we look at everything, but I think they are talking to many people, not just us. So I dont know what the outcome would be. The CLSA report, published in January, added that the merger is the best bet for Vodafone, and that both the companies complement each others operational skills. Vodafone has been attempting to list its local business for a few years. Idea is a listed entity, and gives Vodafone an opportunity to list its business without going through the process of an IPO. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Vodafone on Monday confirmed that it is in talks to merge its Indian operations with rival Idea Cellular in an all-share deal that could help both the groups counter the fierce competition in the market. In a short statement, Vodafone said it was in talks with Ideas parent conglomerate Aditya Birla Group. It said any merger would involve Idea issuing new shares to Vodafone and would result in Vodafone deconsolidating Vodafone India. But Vodafone did not provide any details of the timing of the transaction, adding that, There is no certainty that any transaction will be agreed.... The merger would exclude Vodafones 42% stake in Indus Towers. The confirmation from Vodafone led to a 29% surge in shares of Idea Cellular. Speculation has been rife for days about a merger between Vodafone and Idea Cellular to survive the stiff competition after the launch of Reliance Jio. The telecom industry in India is already reduced to a four players game -- Reliance Jio being the new one, and Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea as the incumbents. Marginal players such as Reliance Communications, Aircel and Telenor are already looking at probable consolidation. Mukesh Ambani is out to conquer his competitors. Reliance Jio, Ambanis telecom venture is up against incumbent rivals such as Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular. He wants to change the way India uses the internet, by offering high-speed internet services at ultra low cost. For that, he has already invested Rs 1,71,000 crore (almost $25 billion) into the telecom venture to build Indias first fourth-generation (4G) only telecom infrastructure to provide high-speed internet. On Monday, he announced that Rel Jio will raise another Rs 30,000 crore through a right issue, which the company will use to lay additional optical fibre cable (OFC) and expand existing network. Amulya Patnaik was appointed the new commissioner of Delhi Police on Monday. Patnaik, a 1985 batch IPS officer of AGMUT cadre, will succeed Alok Kumar Verma. Patnaik, known for his investigating skills, is currently the Special Commissioner of Police (Vigilance). Among some prominent cases that Patnaik handled are the parcel bomb case, the sensational Sarita Vihar kidnapping and the busting of the notorious Asghar gang. Patnaik is also known for deftly handling law and order situations. He led the police action when a mob had turned violent at an anti Dunkel rally in 1994. In 1995, Patnaik launched Pratidhi, a Delhi Police programme to provide counselling and other assistance to victims of sexual abuse. He has also been credited with planning and managing the security of the lone train journey undertaken by then prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2003. During his tenure in Delhi Police, Patnaik handled central, east and south districts and focused on crime prevention and forging partnership with the people to reduce incidents of crime. Patnaik was also instrumental in launching the anti-obscene call helpline and the anti-stalking cell. He also headed Crime Branch and south-eastern range. Apart from responsibilities in Delhi Police, Patnaik has also served as SSP (law and order) Puducherry and DGP of Mizoram. Patnaik is a recipient of the Presidents Police Medal for distinguished service and police medal for meritorious service. For the second consecutive year, outer Delhis Prashant Vihar has figured in the list of most unsafe places in the city with maximum number of snatching cases and vehicle thefts across Delhi, according to police annual crime data In 2016, 237 cases of motorcyclists snatching cell phones and wallets from pedestrians were reported at the Prashant Vihar police station, almost 57 more cases than the Hari Nagar police station in west Delhi, which records the second highest number of snatching cases in the city. Read: A woman raped every 4 hours, 21 cars stolen every day in 2016: Delhi Police data Since more than half of the FIRs registered at Prashant Vihar police station are related to snatching, most of the officers here are busy investigating cases where snatchers, with or without a bike, have fled with bags and cell-phones of passersby. Out of the 35 FIRs registered at the police station this year (till January 24), 18 were related to snatching. Covering around an area of 5 to 6 square kilometres, bikers wearing helmets strike at will, with police unable to stop the spree of such crimes. Barring one case, all were reported in Sectors 9, 13 and 14. Sources said, the control room receives at least two snatching calls, but not everybody bothers to file an FIR. Monika Arora, who owns a boutique, has been a victim of these biker gangs twice in the last seven months. On January 7, she had stepped out of the rickshaw and dropped her daughter, when two bikers snatched her wallet and fled. Last May, it happened in front of the North East Mall. Police did not register a case then. Last week, bikers again snatched my bag. This time, police have registered an FIR. Every day, we hear about somebodys phone getting snatched, she said. On January 8, 39-year-old Rajiv Sindu was jogging with his friends and had reached the gate of his friends apartment in Sector 13 at around 7.10am when four bikers held him at gunpoint and robbed him of his jewellery. Sindhu and his friends have stopped stepping out for morning walks after the incident. Read: In 2 years, Delhi cops cracked just 8% vehicle thefts, 15% burglaries I still cannot believe that in Delhi, people get robbed on the main road in front of everyone. Those men had two pistols. One of them asked the other person to shoot and rob me because I had a diamond ring. I thought these robberies only happen in the hinterlands. I gave the number of the bikes but the police has not been able to arrest anyone till date. ROADS BLOCKED Over the last few months, the local MLA Vijender Gupta along with all the RWAs in Prashant Vihar met the area DCP (Rohini) MN Tiwari twice over the rising snatching and motor vehicle theft cases. Gupta said they have asked for a third meeting with the DCP. The police and the RWAs have blocked roads, some even permanently, to ensure bikers do not have multiple escape routes. The roads here are wide and have multiple entry-exit points. Some roads were blocked permanently by the police and the RWAs to prevent the snatchings. Police also set up pickets outside the gates at night, but the measures have not had the desired effect, said Gupta. Tiwari was not available for comment. A senior police officer, who did not wish to be named, said, Prashant Vihar is a case study because of its wide roads and multiple intersections. It is easier for bikers to escape the area, after every crime. In the past, we found that bikers from places as far as Swaroop Nagar and parts of north Delhi come here to commit the crimes. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Ruling out the role of Krishan Pehalwans men in the murder of jailed gangster Manjeet Mahals father, the Delhi Police on Monday said it was the gang led by brothers, Jyoti alias Baba and Kapil Sangwan, who gunned down the 74-year-old man on Sunday. Investigators have identified one person from the rival gang who was involved in the assault that left Mahals father, Shri Kishan, dead on Sunday morning. But no arrests were made at the time of filing this report. Four to five men in a Scorpio car had arrived outside Kishans home in Najafgarhs Mitraon village and fired 15-20 rounds at Kishan just as he was about to step into his house after buying vegetables. Having received bullet injuries in his head and chest, Kishan died on the spot. Read: Delhi gang war: Reprisal in the air as gangsters father shot dead Since Mahals house is well secured with at least half a dozen CCTVs at the main gate, the entire incident was captured on camera. However, police in their probe found that a motorcycles registration number plate had been fixed on the car to conceal the identity of the killers. But the CCTV footage and polices ground investigation led to the identification of the gang behind the assault that threatens to revive bloody gang wars in the region. First on the polices radar was Krishan Pehalwan, a gangster who was elected as an MCD councillor and is also the brother of slain ex-MLA Bharat Singh. Since Mahal was the alleged mastermind of Singhs murder two years ago, police suspected Pehalwans men carried out a revenge attack. But Pehalwan denied the allegations and said he had no enmity with Mahals father. The probe too did not find his involvement. The police then focused their attention on the role of the Jyoti-Kapil gang as the two groups were involved in a bitter rivalry that began in December, 2015. It all started with Mahal and his associate, Nafe Singh alias Mantri, gunning down Jyotis brother-in-law, Sunil who was also known in the area as doctor. The Jyoti-Kapil gang had struck the very same night, killing Mantris father and wounding his mother and wife. Read: Delhi gang war: Police to provide security to kin of jailed criminals in Najafgarh Over the next few months, the Jyoti-Kapil gang allegedly gunned down two more people associated with Mahal. One was a driver and the other was a friend. But the revenge killings have continued with the murder of Mahals father, said Dependra Pathak, special commissioner of police. Several teams have been constituted to identify and nab the suspects. Six people were detained and dozens questioned until Monday, but no arrests were made. We are zeroing in on the suspects and should be able to arrest the assailants soon, the officer added. To prevent a backlash after the murder of jailed gangster Manjeet Mahals father in Najafgarh on Sunday, the Delhi Police will carry out a review to assess the threat to relatives of all major criminals in the area who are currently behind the bars. The police will then arrange for security in their villages to ensure they are not targeted by rival gangs, a senior police officer told HT. The two main villages where the security of those on target will be assessed are Mitraon and Dichaon Kalan which have been the centre stage of gang wars over the last two decades. Six suspects have been detained by the police in connection with the case, however there has been no breakthrough so far. We will meet the family members of these jailed gangsters to find out who all are under threat, said the officer. Security has already been heightened in the two villages. Police patrolling had been increased and additional barricades have been set up. Mahals 74-year-old father Shri Kishan was gunned down on Sunday morning. Mahal is currently lodged in Tihar Jail on charges of murdering former MLA Bharat Singh two years ago. The police are also speaking to the village elders to request them to keep the criminal elements in check. They will also ask the jail authorities to increase the security for the gangsters behind bars as they could be easy targets in prison. Till Sunday night the police were also probing the role of Bharat Singhs brother and gangster-turned-politician, Krishan Pehalwan. However, they have now said that it was unlikely that his men carried out the killing. The focus is now on a gang led by Kapil Sangwan and Suraj Bhan who have had a long-standing rivalry with Mahal. The tension in their rivalry was heightened in December 2015 when Mahal and his associate, Nafe Singh alias Mantri, allegedly gunned down Sangwans friend Sunil aka Doctor. Sangwans gang had retaliated the same night by killing Mantris father but the cycle of revenge did not end there. Over the next few months, the gang allegedly killed Mantris driver and a friend. With Mahals father being killed on Sunday, the toll on Mahals side has already climbed up to four. With the help of CCTV footage of the latest murder, the police have zeroed in on the persons involved in the attack, but they were yet to arrest anyone till Monday afternoon. We are close to cracking the case, said another senior police officer. Main players: Manjeet Mahal: He has been in the crime world for over two decades and was arrested last month for the murder of former MLA Bharat Singh. He is currently lodged in jail. He is in rivalry with several gangs, main among them being led by Krishan Pehalwan and Kapil Sangwan-Suraj Bhan. He has been in the crime world for over two decades and was arrested last month for the murder of former MLA Bharat Singh. He is currently lodged in jail. He is in rivalry with several gangs, main among them being led by Krishan Pehalwan and Kapil Sangwan-Suraj Bhan. Kapil Sangwan: He sees Manjeet Mahal as the main roadblock in his rise as the top gang leader in Najafgarh area. His interests include extortion and land grabbing. He is currently in jail after being arrested from Jaipur early last year. He sees Manjeet Mahal as the main roadblock in his rise as the top gang leader in Najafgarh area. His interests include extortion and land grabbing. He is currently in jail after being arrested from Jaipur early last year. Nafe Singh alias Mantri: He is the right hand of Manjeet Mahal gang. His father was gunned down in December 2015 in retaliation to the murder of a member of the Kapil Sangwan gang by him. He is on the run. He is the right hand of Manjeet Mahal gang. His father was gunned down in December 2015 in retaliation to the murder of a member of the Kapil Sangwan gang by him. He is on the run. At least six suspects have been detained on the suspicion of killing gangster Manjeet Mahals father in Najafgarh on Sunday even as police said they have already questioned over 100 persons in this connection. However, almost 24 hours after the daylight murder of 74-year-old Shri Kishan, the police are yet to make a breakthrough in the incident that threatens to revive violence in the area. Over the last two decades, Najafgarh has witnessed dozens of murders in gang wars. Kishan was shot outside his house in Najafgarhs Mitraon village by four to five men in a Scorpio on Sunday morning. Mahal is currently in Tihar Jail after his arrest last December. Following the incident, the police have also decided to review the security threat to family members of major criminals of the area who are currently in jail. The suspects detained so far are either Krishan Pehalwans men or belong to the Kapil Sangwan-Suraj Bhan gang, both long-time rivals of Manjeet Mahal. Pehalwans role is being probed as the murder of his brother and former MLA Bharat Singh was allegedly masterminded by Manjeet Mahal two years ago. Since Manjeet Mahals gang is seemingly weak because of his recent arrest, the Pehalwan gang may have seen it as an opportunity for revenge, said a senior police officer explaining how Pehalwan was a suspect. However, speaking to HT, Pehalwan had denied the role of his men in the incident and claimed that Mahals father was not his enemy and he did not consider him as one. The Kapil Sangwan-Suraj Bhan gang is also under the police radar as Mahal and his associates had allegedly killed Bhans friend, Sunil aka Doctor, around a year ago. That time, their main target was Bhan, but he had escaped, police had said. Though Bhan and his men had immediately struck back, killing the father of Mahals friend, Mantri, police believe the revenge was not over yet. The police are also probing the role of smaller emerging gangs in the incident. Since Mahal and many prominent gangsters in the area have been arrested in the recent months, striking against Mahals family could be their attempt to further dent his hold in the area, said the officer. It is afternoon. Mandeep Singh Randhawa has just arrived at his office, flanked by two junior officers. Around a dozen men and women wait patiently in a room next to his cabin. A few certificates of merit adorn the walls. Please give me a few minutes, Randhwa, deputy commissioner of police (Central Delhi), tells the visitors and moves straight to his seat and reaches out for the desktop. As he moves the mouse, the monitor, which is on the sleep mode, comes alive with a colourful geospatial map of the area under his control. He zooms in on a micro-scale section of the area, which has crime hots pots marked in red. Randhawa applies a few filters on the new crime-mapping software, and examines the calls made to the police control room about street crimes such as snatching, robbery and vehicle thefts in his territorial district. Pausing for a few moments, he reaches for his wireless handset and connects all ACPs and SHOs of his district one by one. Deploy two bike patrolling teams on either side of Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg in the press area. There were two snatching and robbery calls between 7 pm and 1 pm last night from the stretch. I dont want a rerun of the crimes tonight, he sternly tells the SHO of the IP Estate police station over the wireless set before scrolling through the application again. The DCP has identified the crime hot spot and possibility of any repeat of the crime in the area through a new software called CMAPS (Crime Mapping Analytics and Predictive System). The web-based software accesses real-time data from Delhi Polices Dial 100 helpline and, using ISROs satellite imageries, spatially locates the calls and visualises them as cluster maps to identify crime hot spots. The softwares statistical models and algorithms help the police understand where the next crime is likely to occur. This concept called predictive policing marks a paradigm shift in policing in the national Capital spread across 1,483 square kilometers and divided into 13 police districts, each headed by a DCP. Police get over 27,000 calls on Dial 100 every day on an average. We are not predicting the future, what we are predicting is where and when a crime is likely to happen based on scientific and objective analysis of data. And this will determine where our next observations are going to be, says Sanjay Beniwal, special commissioner of police (operations) sitting in his ninth-floor office at the police headquarters, which gives a panoramic view of the city. In a mega city, we believe a lot of crimes are predictable and can be curbed, he says. CMAPS, which updates the data every three minutes, replaces Delhi Polices mechanical crime mapping which involves manually gathering data at an interval of 15 days. The new software, Beniwal explains, allows the information generated though Dial100 to be plotted on the geospatial map of Delhi, enabling the police to pinpoint exact locations and spatial distribution of the crime. We can study the pattern of calls coming from a particular location. Suppose if there are too many robbery calls coming from a location which has a bar nearby, we can match those calls with past crimes in the area and understand if that bar is in any way responsible for these robberies, and whether another crime is likely to occur there, he says. Many cities such as Los Angeles and Kent in the US, and Berlin in Germany are using predictive policing techniques to prevent crime. In fact, the idea of crime forecasting took shape in 1931 when two Chicago criminologists, Clifford R Shaw and Henry D McKay, conducted a research, exploring the persistence of juvenile crime in some neighbourhoods of the city. They came up with the social disorganisation theory, which states that location matters when it comes to predicting illegal activity. DCP MS Randhawa coordinates police deployment in the Capital on the basis of Crime Mapping Analytics and Predictive System from his office in New Delhi. (Arun Sharma/HT PHOTO) That is when scientists began experimenting with data technologies, including statistical and geospatial analysis, to determine prevalence of crime. The researchers have been using everything from basic regression analysis to cutting-edge mathematical models to predict when and where the next crime is likely to occur. But until recently, the limits of computing power and storage prevented them from using large data sets. What softwares such as CMAPS have done is allow larger data collection, and process it in a much more sophisticated mathematical way a significant improvement over just manual hotspot mapping, which Delhi Police have been doing so far. But statistical model-based predictive policing has raised concerns in the West that it might create prejudices against particular communities or areas and how much power should be accorded to computer algorithms. Any statistical model can be flawed, but we hope it will be too dynamic to hold any area guilty of a crime for long, says Beniwal. The web-based software will soon be available on mobile and even a beat constable will have maps showing locations where crime is likely to occur, says an officer. It is all about using science to curb crime, says Beniwal. WHAT IS PREDICTIVE POLICING Predictive policing is the application of data analytical techniques to identify likely targets for police intervention and prevent crimes by making statistical predictions. A crime forecasting software involves statistical models and algorithms How it works 1 Predective policing starts with collecting large amounts of data on past crime and co-relating them with present crimes. CMAPS, Delhi polices crime mapping and predictive software is integrated with Delhi Polices new software and allows the information getting generated though Dial100 to be plotted on geo- spatial map of Delhi 2 Analyze Data: Software looks for patterns and correlations in past crime data 3 Predictive Maps: Algorithm predicts where and when a crime is likely to happen in future 4 Increased surveillance: Based on the possibility of the crime, police add or redeploys resources during certain period to prevent crime One of Delhis oldest watch showrooms, Gangoly Brothers, located in Connaught Place was burgled on Friday night. The incident happened despite heavy deployment of police in Lutyens Delhi for Republic Day and the Beating Retreat. The burglars have not been identified yet. Over 600 high-end watches of popular international brands such as Rolex, Rado Seiko, Guess, Omega, Victorinox, Longines, Fossil, with price ranging between Rs5,000 and Rs7 lakh, were stolen from the shop. The stolen watches included costly timepieces that belonged to the showroom owner and his son. Some were antique watches that the customers had left at the shop for repairs. The total loss was estimated over Rs1.35 crore Located close to Regal Building at the outer circle, Gangoly Brothers has been selling watches even before India became independent. Read: Delhi under ground-to-air high security cover for Republic Daycelebrations Even three days after the crime, the Delhi Police remained clueless about the identities of the burglars. Senior police officials suspect that the burglary was the handiwork of a professional gang and watch experts, as the thieves made away with only branded and costly timepieces. They said that almost all low cost watches and even the shopowners laptop were left untouched by the burglars, suggesting a thorough reconnaissance of the shop was done before the final execution. The owner of Gangoly Brothers, a watch shop in Connaught Place, shows an empty box after a burglary at the showroom. (Saumya Khandelwal/HT Photo) Interestingly, the only CCTV camera installed at the showroom was switched off when the store was closed around 8 pm on Friday after the days business. The shop owner has told police that switching off the camera every night was a route affair, which they had been doing to prevent short-circuits. The electric wiring at the shop is very old so we have to take precautions, said Dinesh Barodia, the owner of Gangoly Brothers. BK Singh, deputy commissioner of police (New Delhi), said an FIR has been registered under sections 457 (house-trespass or house-breaking by night in order to commit offence) and 380 (theft in dwelling house) of IPC at the Connaught Place police station. Teams have been formed to probe the case. We are trying to get CCTV footage from nearby shops and ATM booths and will examine them for clues, said the DCP. Read:In 2 years, Delhi cops cracked just 8% vehicle thefts, 15% burglaries Barodia told HT that the crime came to notice around 8 am on Saturday after security guard Naresh Bahadur telephoned him and informed that somebody had broken the shutter using iron rods. Bahadur told me that both the locks on the shutter were intact. I along with my son Mayank Barodia rushed to the shop and called the police after seeing the partially broken shutter, said Barodia adding the shop was opened in the presence of the police. The owner of Gangoly Brothers shows the empty showcase after a burglary at the showroom. (Saumya Khandelwal/HT Photo) Everything inside the shop was left upside down and over 600 watches and around R2 lakh in cash were missing. Watches that cost less than Rs5,000 were left untouched, said Mayank, questioning the alertness of the city police. The crime occurred barely 300 metres away from the Connaught Place police station and that too when maximum deployment of police was on the streets for national events, he said. Talking about the legacy of their business, Barodia said, post Independence, Gangoly Brothers became the first watchmakers to first President of the Republic of India, Dr Rajendra Prasad, who himself had given them the appointment letter. We became partners of Gangoly Brothers in 1980 and eventually took over as the shop owner in 1984. The Delhi high court on Monday asked the city government if geographical mapping of the number of schools in a given area was done before directing private schools to admit kids in nursery on the basis of neighbourhood criteria. Justice Manmohan asked, Did you (Delhi governments education department) conduct a survey mapping of the number of schools in a locality before coming out with this (neighbourhood norm) order? By this (neighbourhood) formula, you have entirely taken away the right of private schools here, the court said, noting that unless you do not give them autonomy to frame their own rules, they will not come up with more investment. The court said instead of taking away the autonomy of the private schools, public schools should be improved so that the parents only opt for these in the future. Full coverage of nursery admissions The courts oral observations came during hearing of pleas challenging the governments recent order to private unaided schools to admit children in nursery using the neighbourhood norm. Defending the governments decision, Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Sanjay Jain, appearing for the Directorate of Education (DoE), said they are taking initiatives to improve their schools. The parents, whose kids are to be admitted in nursery this year, had submitted before the court that the AAP governments order has curtailed their fundamental rights. Two groups representing private unaided schools in the Capital also challenged the new rules which have been made applicable from this academic year. Read: Smugglers get innovative again: 2 women held at Delhi airport with 1kg gold as white wire Even as police intensified security in different parts of Faridabad and Palwal districts as Jat agitation continued for the second day on Monday, the leaders of the stir remained determined that they will continue peaceful protest till their youth languishing in jails are released. The dharna staged by Jat community in Deeg village under Ballabgarh sub-division in Faridabad and another protest held in Jat dharamshala in Palwal township continued on Monday, though there were fewer members as participants. The agitation will continue till our demands are met, said Ram Kishen Malik, general secretary of Jat Aarakshan Akhil Bharat Sangarsh Samiti. A large number of our youth are languishing in jails. We want all of them released. We want cases against the community members registered during the earlier agitation to be withdrawn immediately, said Malik, adding that compensation be given to those who suffered injuries during the last agitation and jobs for kin of those who lost lives. Read: Haryana: Jat protest attracts bigger crowd on day 2, mobile operation suspended in Jhajjar Meanwhile, Faridabad commissioner of police Dr Hanif Qureshi said that police officials were sent to Jat-dominated areas in the district and it was made clear to them that the administration is duty bound to strictly implement instructions of the High Court and Supreme Court. We have made all arrangements to deal with the situation in case a violent situation arises. Our cops have been put on alert and we will not allow any body to take law in their hands, Qureshi said. The officers are ensuring that no objectionable audio, video or any other material that could disrupt peace are telecast through cable TV or circulated through social media like Twitter, Facebook and Whatsapp. During the previous Jat agitation, police had registered cases against the perpetrators of violence on National Highway 2. Sector 55 police had registered cases against over 300 people for resorting to vandalism and blocking Mathura road. Similarly, Palwal police had registered three FIRs and Sadar Police station alone had registered FIRs against over 750 people for blocking the highway at Prithla area and at Mitrol. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON A disturbing CCTV footage of a Delhi mother punching and kicking her child surfaced last month. The one reported last week showed another mother flinging her son down the stairs. Police say that the women did not share a happy relationship with their in-laws and both incidents were preceded by family fights. From postpartum psychosis to the Freudian defence of displacement, a range of theories was offered to explain why these mothers did what they did. But could their actions have been averted at any stage? Therapeutic intervention, psychologists say, could have helped. But neither the women nor their families felt it was necessary. Read: Delhi baby beaters: Why mothers are turning angry, violent Anxiety, stress and grief are common life experiences. It is their unnatural intensity that becomes a cause for concern. However, even the most hypochondriac among us wont acknowledge having mental distress because sharing it could cause social embarrassment. So in most cases, medical help is sought only for serious mental conditions such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. But even milder forms of mental disorder depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress, etc. make a case for treatment. In 2008, NGO Manas interviewed 2,381 individuals in Delhi and found 180 of them suffered from psychiatric morbidity or a mental condition that leads to both physical and psychological deterioration. But only 5% of the afflicted sought professional help. Almost every tenth person admitted to anxiety, palpitations, long depressive spells, severe mood swings and loss of sleep and appetite. While the educated, working women shared their concerns with their doctors, the housewives did not enjoy this privilege. The husband decided if one was to be taken to a doctor or not. While some women found a sounding board in their grown up children, many who showed signs of mental disorder were sent to her parents homes. Those who never sought medical help suffered from a mix of prejudice, ignorance and fear. Some approached tantriks, astrologers or religious gurus. While at least 12% of those suffering from psychiatric morbidity took to heavy smoking or mood-elevating drugs, another 9% drank to feel better. Some of the younger respondents admitted to going shopping to release stress but most of them continued to feel angry, withdrawn, alienated and untrusting. Nearly a decade after the study, things do not look any brighter. If suicide rate is any measure to judge mental health conditions, Delhi is on the edge. In 2014, the capital accounted for nearly 10% of the total suicides recorded in 53 Indian cities. In absolute numbers, Delhi (1,847) was next only to Chennai (2,214) and Bengaluru (1,906). Read: Delhi Metro to monitor edgy commuters, unusual behaviour to curb suicides Today, Delhis lifeline has become its biggest suicide magnet. Between January and November last year, 33 people jumped on the Metro rail tracks to kill themselves and 12 did not survive. It is estimated that, for each suicide, there are likely to have been more than 20 attempts. While suicide is an extreme manifestation of depressive behaviour, Delhi residents demonstrate their mental stress in many other ways. Instances of road rage, for example, have become routine. Therapists call it the Intermittent Explosive Disorder, characterised by an extreme expression of anger. The preventive mechanism remains weak. Few Delhi hospitals offer decent psychiatric treatment. The atmosphere at most of these facilities is not different from the stereotypical pagalkhana. There is a serious shortage of trained psychiatrists, support groups and toll-free help lines. Experts say it does not require huge medical paraphernalia to treat mental illnesses. Liaison psychiatry or placing mental-health specialists in hospitals to work alongside doctors could help treating some disorders. The Centre for Mental Health found that one such initiative in Birmingham, UK, reduced the length of hospital stays and the number of readmissions, saving four times its running costs, The Economist reported in August 2014. In another report, it was pointed out how France, where every third citizen was taking psychiatric drugs in the 1990s, reversed the trend by using short-talking therapy to break self-destructive patterns of thought and replace them with something positive. Read: Kofi Annan lauds AAPs Mohalla Clinics project, suggests reforms Getting applauded for its Mohalla or neighbourhood clinics initiative by none other than former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, the Delhi government could expand its primary care to include mental health. After all, what good is physical health if the mind is unclear and the spirit, broken. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The murder of 25-year-old software engineer, K Rasila Raju, in her office in Pune, has left women employees in the Capital feeling unsafe. We need more support so that we can work without being worried, says Tarab Ishrat, 30, who often works late night and travels from Greater Noida to her home in Okhla. For Parinita Samanta, 25, a hotel manager, the news has come as a shock. Its demotivating to read about such an incident. We as young professionals spend a lot of time in office and its one place where we feel safe. Some feel that the office timing for women ought to be changed. Till a month back I was one of the only two women on the late night shift. I felt uncomfortable and asked for my work shift to be changed. Thank God I did, because after this incident my parents would not have let me work late nights, says Suruchi Juneja*, 28, who works in an MNC in Noida. *Name changed on request SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Customs officials have arrested two women passengers at the Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA) for allegedly trying to smuggle in gold weighing around 1kg worth Rs 27 lakhs. The metal was concealed in the form of wire with white coating. The arrested women are from Panipat and were returning from Bangkok on Sunday. They were intercepted by custom officials after they crossed the green channel. The gold wires were concealed in their bags. While keeping surveillance on the passengers coming from Bangkok, two women passengers, both Indian passport holders, were intercepted after the green channel. On search of their baggage, pieces of gold wire coated white weighing 1,008 gms and valued at Rs 27.30 lakh were recovered, an official said. He said it was being probed whether they were a part of any organised racket or just carriers. Earlier this month, a passenger was caught by the customs officials at Delhi airport for allegedly carrying gold foils pasted on a carton. Gold weighing 700 gm worth up to Rs18.5 lakh was recovered. According to the official, smugglers are trying every trick to smuggle gold to Delhi as the customs department has increased vigil. We have come across cases in which gold was stitched into a brassiere, stuffed in the rod of baby walker, and tied on thigh guards and waist, he said. Customs had seized 6.6 kg gold from the Delhi airport in 2012-13, which increased to 384 kg in 2013-14. During 2014-15, the officials seized 574 kg gold and in 2016, over 220 kg gold worth 60 crore was confiscated. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON In 1995, when governor Moti Lal Vora hurriedly invited BSP leader Mayawati to form her first government with outside support from the BJP, Mulayam Singh Yadav had said in an informal conversation, The Congress has committed a blunder. Theyve lost Dalit votes forever. He was spot on. Once the Dalits found their own chief minister, they never looked back at the upper caste-driven Congress. Today when his rebel son is changing the political course in the state by allying with the Congress, Mulayam is seemingly disturbed. One, he always held the view that the alliance will strengthen the Congress which has been in the wilderness for 27 years. Second, there is no surety that after elections that Congress will not ditch the SP if the numbers favour the BSP in government formation. Congress vice president Rahul Gandhis praise of Mayawati and Kanshi Ram has not gone down well with the SP cadre who are sceptical about their partners intentions. Second, Mulayam doesnt agree with the division of Muslim vote theory as he is supremely confident about his ability to garner their votes. He had told a confidant now contesting elections on a BSP ticket, Muslims will vote for SP because of me and not alliance with the Congress. Despite the compatibility of vote bases, he prefers post-poll arrangements. However, what he does not realise is that the political discourse in the state has changed ever since Narendra Modi became Prime Minister. In their desperation to stop BJPs victory in UP, the Muslims will dump any party or leader. Read:History repeating itself? Mulayam followed Lohia, Akhilesh his father However caught in a time warp, Mulayam minced no words in condemning the alliance on the day the two scions Akhilesh Yadav and Rahul Gandhi -- launched a roadshow to move the alliance from the headlines to the field. He himself has hobnobbed with the Congress in the past - in 2004 to share power at the Centre and in 2009 for an alliance with the Congress. His close associate Amar Singh was the messenger, while he as chief minister remained ensconced in Lucknow. His criticism, thus, is on expected lines. It was his damaging statement appealing the cadre to speak against the alliance that has come as a surprise as at stake is not only his sons political career but that of the party he had founded in 1992. His statement, even if given under some external pressure or to diffuse the rising rebellion, will only help his two arch political rivals the BJP and the BSP. His vote bank, now inherited by his son, will split two ways. While a section of disillusioned Yadavs will move to the BJP, the Muslims will find undependable BSP stronger. Read: Party belongs to me, people by my side: SP chief Mulayam Maybe the young leadership of both the SP and the Congress are experimenting with what many describe as short-sighted politics that may or may not help them win the polls, but can throw a spanner in the works at a time when a resurgent BJP is trying to capture UP and strategist Mayawati is exploiting the SP family feud. Whichever way things go, his recent statements do not reflect the political wisdom that Mulayam is famous for. The most tangible element of the growing strategic convergence between India and the United States over the past two decades has been in the realm of defence. The George W. Bush administration began the process by lifting dual-use technology sanctions against India. While the sanctions were imposed over nuclear concerns, they had the additional effect of keeping India from acquiring almost any high-end US defence technology as well. President Barack Obama saw slow progress, largely because of the American allergies that afflicted the second Manmohan Singh government. But an ambitious Defence Technology and Trade Initiative was started and has since laid out over a half-dozen specific defence production projects that the two countries and more importantly their individual defence firms can work on together. The idea was to not only produce, in time, tangible Indo-US joint weapons systems but to also cut paths for such projects through the bureaucratic thickets of the respective defence ministries. The DTTI has had limited success, but continues to expand its remit. The new Donald Trump administration has yet to say anything concrete about the Indo-US defence relationship. There are reasons to be positive. The new president has spoken of India in only positive terms, something that has not characterised his language on most parts of the world. The outgoing Obama administration sought to institutionalise what had been accomplished with India in terms of defence cooperation with an amendment to the National Defence Authorisation Act 2017. The amendment fortunately received strong bipartisan support and is unlikely to be a source of contention with the Trump administration. This was largely confirmed by the testimony of the new Pentagon Chief, General Jim Mattis, who spoke of the DTTI has having helped the Indo-US defence relationship grow to the benefit of both countries. The future of the defence relationship now rests on the Trump administration moving forward in two areas. One is to reassure the Indian side that the USs strategic commitment to the rise of India, laid out by the Bush administration, remains embedded in Washingtons new decision-making circle. That original commitment is the bedrock of the Indo-US defence relationship. Without it, India will not trust the US enough to buy Made in America major weapons platforms and the US will not feel comfortable with giving India cutting-edge technology or weapons systems. Two is the willingness of the Trump administration to allow co-development and co-production of weapons with India. President Trump has laid out an economic policy manifesto that emphasises safeguarding domestic manufacturing and raising trade and investment barriers. The question is whether this will also apply to working with India on developing weapons. The coming months will show whether the new US president is strategic enough to accept that some degree of concession on the economic front is needed to uphold American influence in the world. India will expect continuity in its defence relationship under Trump and hopefully that is what the administration will also accept. Young chefs from all across the world are warming up to showcase their culinary finesse, with the return of the International Young Chef Olympiad. Touted to be worlds biggest culinary competition for student chefs, the Olympiad in its third edition will host teams from 45 countries. Organised by the International Institute of Hotel Management (IIHM) and Incredible India, the annual culinary extravaganza will witness students from some of the best hospitality institutions competing against each other in four tough rounds. The top 10 contestants from the first three rounds will showcase their innovative skills in the final battle for the winners trophy and a cash prize of $ 10,000. The participants have been divided into two teams - Team A and Team B and participants from each team are given 90 minutes to prepare certain number of portions of their dish. In the first round, which was held here on 29th and 30th January, competitors prepared four portions of a classical chicken dish according to the recipe provided to them. Their culinary skills were also tested with preparation of two omelets appropriate for a fine dining a-la-carte breakfast. For the second round, Team A will be travelling to Bangalore while Team B will go to Pune where they will showcase their creativity by preparing four Main Course portions of a vegetarian dish appropriate for a Bistro restaurant. The challenge lies in the mandatory use of a mystery ingredient that will be announced right before the round begins. Each year the panel of judges consists of most distinguished faces from the culinary world. We have three sets of judges available for each round, who will mark the contestants on the technical and production element while scoring them on presentation, taste, flavour, and culinary knowledge, says the organiser of the event. David Foskett, a London-based professor and author of the book Practical Cookery and Theory of Catering will be the chairman of the jury. The panel of judges include renowned Chef Sanjeev Kapoor as the Principal mentor. Logan Guleff, the 14-year-old winner of MasterChef Junior US 2014 is also in India for the event, and will be the official mascot for the competition. The final round which will be held in Kolkata, will be a two-hour long challenge that will test the chefs creativity, innovation, skills and professional good practice. Four portions of four individual Tapas dishes will be prepared as a selection of appetizers along with four portions of a fish dish as a main course. The Final round of the Olympiad will be held on February 2. Military intelligence, open secret, Microsoft Works, seriously funny. Now, you can add another item to the list of improbable combinations: rigorous statistical analysis and Miss Universe pageants. To wit: In being crowned Miss Universe today, Frances Iris Mittenaere became the 9th-oldest woman to ever win the competition, at 24 years, seven days. Her relatively advanced age fits a 65-year trend: Miss Universe winners have gradually gotten older since the competitions inaugural pageant in 1952, when Finlands Armi Kuusela claimed the crown at the age of 17 years, 312 days. Kuusela was just a few weeks older than the youngest ever winner: Perus Gladys Zender, who won in 1957 when she was just 17 years, 284 days old. Neither of the Indian Miss Universes were old enough to buy a legal drink in Delhi when they took the crown. Lara Dutta, who won in 2000, was 22 years, 26 days old when she won, while 1994s winner, Sushmita Sen, was 18 years, 184 days old. That India has produced two Miss Universes is a significant accomplishment only 15 other countries have sent forth multiple Miss Universes into the universe. Mittenaeres victory earned France a place in the multiple Miss Universe club; the countrys only previous winner was Christiane Martel, who won the second Miss Universe pageant in 1953. Perhaps it is unsurprising that the United States, a country whose current president owned the Miss Universe pageant for nearly two decades and in which beauty pageants have been the subject of major motion pictures and at least one disturbing reality television program, has produced eight Miss Universes. (Actually, if you include winners from Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States of America, there have been 13 American Miss Universes. However, Miss Universes record keepers count Puerto Rico as its own country.) Still, with the worlds third-largest population, we might expect the United States to produce more Miss Universes than smaller nations. Indeed, the U.S. has produced just fewer than a quarter of a Miss Universe per crore of its present-day population. Meanwhile, the award for most efficient Miss Universe producer goes to the Caribbean island nation of Trinidad and Tobago: two winners from a current population of just over 1.3 million, or about 14.7 Miss Universes per crore people. Incidentally, India, with its massive population of more than 1.3 billion people, has produced just less than .02 Miss Universes per crore people, the lowest rate among the 34 countries whose citizens have earned the crown. And now we come to the most important question of all: In which country do you have the best chance of meeting a Miss Universe? If, say, you were to roam randomly across the Japanese countryside, how likely would you be to stumble upon a Miss Universe? To guess the rough answer, well divide the number of Miss Universe winners from each country (excluding those who have died) by the countrys area (including lakes, reservoirs and rivers, for Miss Universes are known to enjoy swimsuits). After all that maths, we find that Puerto Rico has the highest population density of Miss Universes, with 54.92 living winners per lakh square kilometres. The runner up is, again, the lovely Trinidad and Tobago, with 39, and in third is Lebanon, with 9.57 Miss Universes per lakh square kilometres. In winning the crown for France today, Mittenaere doubled your chances of having a chance meeting with a French Miss Universe: there are now .37 Miss Universes per lakh square kilometres in France. If you do take that trip to Japan, you may have to roam for a very long time before you meet Riyo Mori, who won in 2007, or Akiko Kojima, 1959s Miss Universe. With an area of 377,835 square kilometres, Japan has just .54 Miss Universes per lakh square kilometres. Follow @htlifeandstyle for more. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (MCG) wrote to the Haryana Urban Development Authority on Monday to transfer funds as per the terms and condition of the sector transfer agreed in March 2016. Since the urban authority has failed to transfer the funds even 10 months after the agreement, MCG commissioner V Umashankar wrote to the Huda for reconciliation of the total amount the urban authority owes the corporation and to expedite the process. I have also spoken to the Huda administrator in this regard. I have said that the reconciliation exercise must be completed at the earliest and accordingly, funds be transferred to the corporation, Umashankar said. Sources said the Huda is yet to compile the revenue details for sharing the same with the MCG according to the agreement. The agreement stated that the Huda extension fee, transfer fee and other recoveries related to plots would be shared, with 75% of the revenue going to the MCG and 25% to the Huda. It has been noticed that no exercise for reconciliation of the amount to be paid by the Huda to the corporation consequent to the transfer of developed sectors has been undertaken and no amount has been remitted by it till date. As a first step in giving effect to the order of transfer of developed sectors, a standing mechanism for monthly reconciliation of the amount due to the corporation from the Huda needs to be constituted, the MCG commissioner said. Huda administrator Yashpal Yadav said he will get the process expedited. I had a meeting with the MCG commissioner in this regard and have directed my staff accordingly to expedite the detail, Yadav said. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Delhi-NCR will flag off a vintage car rally on February 17 with a view to display the rich cultural diversity and heritage of Haryana. The event will see the roll-out a long line of gems of the Indian automobile industry and from the stables of some globally renowned auto-makers that have been lost to the flashy hot wheels of this day. The rally will coincide with the Swarn Jayanti celebrations in Haryana . The three-day event will be flagged off from Red Fort, Delhi. More than 100 cars from various parts of the world will be showcased at the rally. As many as 14 vintage cars from Gurgaon will feature in the event as well. The viewers will also get to witness Benz Patent-Motorwagen, which was designed in 1886 and runs on a single cylinder. This car will be the oldest of the fleet to be showcased at the Gurgaon rally, the organiser said. Speaking to mediapersons at 21 Gun Salute Restaurant, Sector 29, Leisure Valley, on Monday, the organisers of the event will enter its seventh edition this year. The cars will zoom across the Noida racing ground during the three-day event. Madan Mohan, vintage-car collector and managing director of 21 Gun Salute Restaurant, said the event aims to provide historical evidence of the evolution of the global auto industry down the ages. Each car that is to be showcased has its own history and will bring out its own story on the evolution of the automobile industry, Mohan said. Elaborating on the plan for the next years edition, he said, Chandigarh will host the event next year and the vintage cars will travel through the rural parts of the state covering most of the villages. We are planning to showcase tractors designed in the 17th century in the rally next year to promote the agricultural sector. Mohan, who has a fleet of 300 vintage cars, 75 jeeps and more than 200 bikes, said the event is themed around Haryana this year and viewers will get to witness folk dance and songs of the state. He also said the city will soon get a vintage vehicle museum. We are working on a plan to showcase my collection of vintage cars to the citys auto enthusiasts. As many as 22 judges from across the world will review the event and performers from different parts of the country will showcase our cultural heritage to a global audience. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The cast of Hidden Figures rocketed to the Screen Actors Guild top award at a fiery, protest-laden ceremony that was dominated by defiance over President Trumps sweeping immigration ban. An uplifting drama about African-American mathematicians who aided NASAs 1960s space race, Hidden Figures was the surprise best-ensemble winner Sunday night at Los Angeles Shrine Auditorium. With the Oscar front-runner La La Land not nominated in the category, most expected a contest between Moonlight or Manchester by the Sea. This story is about unity, said Taraji P Henson, who stars alongside Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monae in Hidden Figures. This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race. We win. Love wins. Every time. Octavia Spencer, Taraji P. Henson, Janelle Monae and Kirsten Dunst (L to R) pose with the awards they won for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture for their work in Hidden Figures backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (REUTERS) From the first remarks by presenter Ashton Kutcher, the ceremony was peppered with speeches that argued passionately for inclusion. In a very well dressed version of the demonstrations sparked nationwide over the weekend, most award winners spoke in some way - either through personal anecdote or a call to arms - against Trumps halting of immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim nations. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who added another honour for her performance on the political satire Veep, said she was the daughter of an immigrant who fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France. Because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes, said Louis-Dreyfus. And this immigrant ban is a blemish and it is un-American. Perhaps the most moving speech came from Mahershala Ali, who won best supporting actor for his acclaimed performance in Barry Jenkins coming-of-age portrait, Moonlight. Ali said he saw lessons for today in Moonlight, in which he plays a character who makes a difference in a shy, gay Miami boys hard life. We see what happens when you persecute people, Ali said. The fold into themselves. Ali said his relationship with his mother exemplified tolerance. The son of an ordained minister, Ali converted to Islam 17 years ago. We put things to the side, Ali said of their differences. Im able to see her. Shes able to see me. We love each other. The love has grown. That stuff is minutia. Its not that important. Ali was among the several Oscar favourites who cemented their front-runner status, including best-actress winner Emma Stone for La La Land and best-supporting actress winner Viola Davis for Fences. But best actor went to Daviss co-star (and director) Denzel Washington for his performance in the August Wilson adaptation. Most expected the award to go to Casey Affleck, apparently including Washington, himself. Denzel Washington accepts his award for Male Actor in a Leading Role during the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (REUTERS) Im a God-fearing man, he said, still shaking his head as he reached the podium. Im supposed to have faith, but I didnt have faith. The most blistering speech was by David Harbour, who led the cast of Netflixs Stranger Things - another big surprise winner - on stage to accept best ensemble in a TV drama series. We will hunt monsters, Harbour vowed in lengthy remarks that drew a standing ovation. The hit Netflix series Orange Is the New Black won best ensemble in a comedy series for the third straight year. We stand up here representing a diverse group of people, representing generations of families who have sought a better life here from places like Nigeria, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Columbia, Ireland, said star Taylor Schilling, while a cast member added Brooklyn! And we know that its going to be up to us and all you, probably, to keep telling stories that show what unites us is stronger than the forces that divide us. A pair of veteran actors took other TV honours: John Lithgow for best actor in a drama series (The Crown) and Bryan Cranston for his Lyndon Johnson portrayal in the HBO movie All the Way. Sarah Paulson (The People v. OJ Simpson) and Claire Foy (The Crown) also took home awards. La La Land may have tied an Oscar record with 14 nominations, set a Golden Globes record with seven wins and won the top prize at Saturdays Producers Guild Awards, but it wasnt competing for the top Screen Actors Guild award. That means if Damien Chazelles musical is to go on to win best picture, it will be just the second film to do so without a SAG ensemble nod in the categorys history. Only Mel Gibsons Braveheart managed it in 1996. Actors, the largest group in the motion picture academy, hold considerable sway. SAG, though, is much larger, with about 160,000 members, compared to about 1,200 actors in the academy. Lily Tomlin accepts the Life Achievement Award during the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (Reuters) Lily Tomlin was the lifetime achievement honoree Sunday. The 77-year-old actor gave a warm, rollicking speech that dispensed both drinking advice and regret over wasting a lot of time being ambitious about the wrong things. Did you hear? The Doomsday Clock has been moved up to two and a half minutes before midnight, said Tomlin. And this award, it came just in the nick of time. Follow @htshowbiz for more In speech after fiery speech at Sunday nights Screen Actors Guild Awards, winners struck a defiant tone against Trumps sweeping immigration ban. Their words varied from tender personal reflections to full-throated battle cries, but they were nearly uniform in channelling the nationwide demonstrations sparked by Trumps halting of immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim nations. Speaking on the red carpet, Lion star Dev Patel who was nominated for best supporting actor - said: I just flew in from India a day ago. When I heard the news it was utterly devastating. The first thing that came into my head was the children who arrive on these shores with hope in their hearts. Its horrible. Its divisive. I hope something changes and something can be done because it really is terrible. Actor Dev Patel greets actress Thandie Newton as they arrive at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (REUTERS) The SAG Awards culminated with the evenings top honour, best movie ensemble, going to the cast of Hidden Figures, an uplifting drama about African-American mathematicians who aided NASAs 1960s space race, starring Taraji P Henson, Janelle Monae and Octavia Spencer. Henson concluded the show the same way its first presenter, Ashton Kutcher, began it: with the kind of pointed politics that have traditionally been more an aberration than a constant at Hollywood award shows. "We stand here as proud actors." - @TherealTaraji on behalf of the cast of @HiddenFigures pic.twitter.com/7oL24Vpo5V SAG Awards (@SAGawards) January 30, 2017 This story is about unity, said Henson, who stars alongside Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monae in Hidden Figures. This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race. We win. Love wins. Every time. It was a surprise win for Hidden Figures. With the Oscar front-runner La La Land (which took the Producers Guild Awards top honour on Saturday) not nominated in the category, most expected a contest between Moonlight or Manchester by the Sea. Such a result could now mean Hidden Figures is the strongest challenger to the La La Land dominance, or, perhaps, that none of the three films will be able to muster enough to topple the song-and-dance juggernaut. Yet if Damien Chazelles musical is to go on to win best picture, it will be just the second film to do so without a SAG ensemble nod in the categorys history. Only Mel Gibsons Braveheart managed it in 1996. But such Oscar handicapping - usually the prime drama at the SAG Awards - largely took a backseat to politics on Sunday. (That is, with the possible exception of Denzel Washingtons surprise win over Casey Affleck.) Whichever film ultimately triumphs at the Oscars, it seems assured of being dwarfed by the growing off-screen clamour. The immigration ban has already altered the Academy Awards. On Sunday, the revered Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi, whose A Salesman is nominated for best foreign language film, said he would boycott the Oscars, even if he was allowed to travel for them. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who added another honour for her performance on the political satire Veep, said she was the daughter of an immigrant who fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France. Because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes, said Louis-Dreyfus. And this immigrant ban is a blemish and it is un-American. Perhaps the most moving speech came from Mahershala Ali, who won best supporting actor for his acclaimed performance in Barry Jenkins coming-of-age portrait, Moonlight. Ali said the film, about a shy, gay Miami boys hard life, held lessons of acceptance. We see what happens when you persecute people, Ali said. The fold into themselves. Ali said his own relationship with his mother exemplified tolerance. The son of a Protestant minister, Ali converted to Islam 17 years ago. We put things to the side, Ali said of their differences. Im able to see her. Shes able to see me. We love each other. The love has grown. That stuff is minutia. Its not that important. Ali was among the several Oscar favourites who cemented their front-runner status, including best-actress winner Emma Stone for La La Land and best-supporting actress winner Viola Davis for Fences. But best actor went to Daviss co-star (and director) Washington for his performance in the August Wilson adaptation. Most expected the award to go to Affleck, apparently including Washington himself. Im a God-fearing man, he said, still shaking his head as he reached the podium. Im supposed to have faith, but I didnt have faith. The most blistering speech was by David Harbour, who led the cast of Netflixs Stranger Things - another big surprise winner - on stage to accept best ensemble in a TV drama series. We will hunt monsters, Harbour vowed in lengthy remarks that drew a standing ovation. The hit Netflix series Orange Is the New Black won best ensemble in a comedy series for the third straight year. We stand up here representing a diverse group of people, representing generations of families who have sought a better life here from places like Nigeria, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Ireland, said star Taylor Schilling, while a cast member added Brooklyn! And we know that its going to be up to us and all you, probably, to keep telling stories that show what unites us is stronger than the forces that divide us. Lily Tomlin was the lifetime achievement honoree Sunday. The 77-year-old actor gave a warm, rollicking speech that dispensed both drinking advice and regret over wasting a lot of time being ambitious about the wrong things. Did you hear? The Doomsday Clock has been moved up to two and a half minutes before midnight, said Tomlin. And this award, it came just in the nick of time. Follow @htshowbiz for more Over 200 people were killed in unrests in 2008, 2010 and 2016 in Kashmir, the government told Jammu and Kashmir legislative assembly on Monday. Chief minister Mehbooba Mufti, in a written reply, told the House that 76 civilians and two police personnel were killed in law and order disturbances in the Valley last year. In 2010, 101 persons were killed and 4,288 others, including security forces, were injured, she said. Mehbooba said 46 persons were killed and 1,265 others, including security forces, were injured in 2008. In 2016, as many as 8,587 persons were arrested, out of which 8,473 have been released till January 21, the chief minister said. In addition, 522 persons were booked under the J-K Public Safety Act (PSA), and 265 persons among 1,978 booked in the recent unrest were still under detention as on January 21, she said. Mehbooba said as many as 133 buildings, including police stations and schools, were damaged or set ablaze during the law and order disturbances in the Valley last year and 213 persons were arrested in this connection She said 2,655 cases have been registered in various police stations across Kashmir since July 8 last year. National security advisor Ajit Doval will hold talks with Russian officials in Moscow on Monday on counter-terrorism and security issues against a background of a thaw in ties between Russia and the United States that could redefine the relationship between the two countries. Doval will meet Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev, a confidant of President Vladmir Putin. The visit is seen as part of Indian efforts to gauge the possible realignments on key security and foreign policy issues as national capitals try to figure out the priorities of the Trump administration. In New York last month, Doval had met his American counterpart Michael Flynn before he formally took charge under the Trump administration. Flynn, like Doval, is an intelligence expert. During his meetings with the Russians, Doval is expected to focus on anti-terrorism issues such as the fight against Islamic State and situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Russia has remained our trusted partner and high-level interactions help two sides exchange notes on all major developments including the evolving regional security architecture, an Indian official said. For Indian officials, a realignment of Russia-US ties is welcome as it would wean Moscow away from the deeper strategic embrace of China. Those who believe in a possible realignment are going by the right optics set in motion by both Moscow and Washington. The positive call was a significant start to improving the relationship between the United States and Russia that is in need of repair, a White House statement said after the phone conversation between Trump and Putin. Though it would sound unreasonable to expect Trump would trample over ties with China that hinges on huge economic interest, India hopes better Russia-US ties would bring more balance to issues that Beijing aggressively pushes in the region. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Suspected Maoists hacked an employee of a construction firm at Belkhori village under Chakai police station of Naxal-affected Jamui district, 160 kms south-east of Patna, late on Sunday evening. The deceased, whose head was severed, has been identified as Sanjay Pandey, a munshi (accountant) with Raj Kumar Constructions. He was a resident of Barahiya in Lakhisarai district of Bihar. The local firm was engaged in the construction of rural road from Harni to Chetuwa villages, a stretch of 7 kms (approx.), under Pojha panchayat of Chakai block . Jamui police claimed to have recovered Maoist literature from the scene of the crime. One such leaflet said those executing government plans with the help of police, and without obtaining Maoist permission, would meet similar fate. The recovery of pamphlet points to the CPI (Maoists) owning up the killing, the police said. Inspector general of police, Bhagalpur zone, Sushil M Khopde said the crime site was close to Giridih district in neighbouring Jharkhand state. We are looking into the involvement of local Maoists in the incident. The police are conducting raids to nab the culprits, he said. Locals attributed the killing to levy demanded by the Maoists. However, Jamui superintendent of police Jayant Kant said, We are trying to ascertain if the firm had received any levy demand in the past. The matter was reported to the police on Monday morning. READ: Two construction firm employees killed in Bihars Saran district Earlier, on January 12 this year, two employees of a road construction company were shot dead by unidentified assailants in Derni police station area of Saran district, around 80 km north-west of Patna. The employees belonged to Shrishti Development Private Limited, engaged in road construction from Derni to Dighwara villages, a 12 km (approx.) stretch. Coming to the aid of a 74-year-old widow, who was harassed by her son and daughter-in-law, a Delhi court has asked the couple to vacate her house, saying there is rampant abuse and misuse of the domestic violence and dowry laws to silence and arm-twist the aging parents. Life is not a ladder but a wheel which takes a full circle.... The courts of law cannot permit the elderly to be abandoned financially as well as emotionally at an age when they need their own most, additional district judge Kamini Lau said in her judgement, adding the judiciary would step in to stop inappropriate and illegal conduct of children against aged parents. We forget that if we do not care for our parents at the age they require us, our kids would not care for us, the judge said. The court held that Shanti Devi, an elderly woman residing in Central Delhi, was entitled to possession of two properties and directed her son and daughter-in-law to vacate the house and peacefully hand it over to her. It also directed the couple to pay damages of Rs 5,000 per month to Devi from the time of filing of suit in October 2015, till the date of handing over the property to her. The court observed that Devi was a frail woman who was made to rush to the court in the twilight years of her life due to the harassment meted out to her by her son and daughter-in-law. This senior citizen has been facing trauma, harassment and humiliation in the hands of her own son and his wife. She has made numerous complaints to the police and reported the their harassment, the judge noted, adding that the couple was doing it to usurp the property. This is not the story of Shanti Devi alone but thousands of senior citizens which we hear almost every day, it said. The court declared null and void the sale agreement of the property, Will and power of attorney as produced by Devis son Ramakant and his wife Poonam and restrained them from selling the house to anyone. Read | Cases filed by senior citizens get priority Respecting our parents and elders and caring for them is an integral part of our rich Indian culture and tradition. Of late, there is a rampant abuse and misuse of the domestic violence and dowry laws only to silence and arm-twist the aging parents. Life is not a ladder but a wheel and takes a full circle. As the wheels of time turns, men wear many names and faces and no one wants to realise the great pattern the wheel weaves, the court observed. The Election Commission (EC) has directed the Congress to conclude its organisational elections by June, rejecting the grand old partys plea for a one-year extension. The poll panel conveyed its decision in a letter to the Congress general secretary in-charge of organisation,. Janardan Dwivedi. The main opposition party said it was yet to receive the ECs communique, but maintained it will have no problem in holding the internal polls at a mutually agreed date. We will talk to them (EC) and complete our organisational polls on a mutually agreed date, Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala said. Party sources said the organisational polls were likely to be held anytime after the results of the assembly polls are announced on March 11. The Congress had written to the EC on December 16 last year, seeking time till December 31, 2017 to hold its organisational elections in view of the upcoming assembly elections in five states. That was the second time the party had sought an extension of the cut-off date. Earlier, in September 2015, the party had urged the EC to extend the deadline till 31 December 2016. As per rules, all registered political parties have to hold their internal elections annually. The commission has asked the 131-year-old party to submit a complete list of office-bearers, members of committees, etc elected at such elections latest by July 15, 2017. Congress president Sonia Gandhi, 70, holds the record of being the party chief for 18 consecutive years after taking over from Sitaram Kesri in 1998. When the Congress Working Committee (CWC), the partys highest decision-making body, in its last meeting on November 7, 2016 sought an extension of Sonias term till December 2017, it did not necessarily mean that party vice-president Rahul Gandhi will have to wait another year to take over the reins of the party. In fact, as many as 32 CWC members had in that meeting urged 46-year-old Rahul, to assume the top post. But a Congress functionary said the timing of the change of guard has to be decided by Sonia and Rahul. He further explained that the CWC resolution on Sonias extension was a technical requirement that will have no bearing on Rahuls elevation. Senior leaders also refer to the party constitution to suggest that the change of guard could take place any time. The Congress constitution gives special power to the CWC to take any decision, including the appointment of party chief, with the condition that the move has to be ratified by the All India Congress Committee (AICC) within six months. It was on March 14, 1998 that the CWC exercised this provision to appoint Sonia as the Congress president in place of Kesri. The AICC then ratified the move on April 6, 1998. The day two of the Jat agitation seeking reservation in central jobs and cancellation of cases against youths arrested during the last years violent stir saw more supporters pouring in at Jassia village on the Rohtak-Panipat highway. Taking the protests to the next level, the Jat group on Monday sought political support from Jat leaders in the government and opposition parties, although slamming ministers in the BJP because of whom they have been labelled anti-social. The All India Jat Aarakshan Sangharsh Samiti (AIJASS), which is leading the stir, has written letters to former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Rohtak MP Deepender Hooda, Union minister Birender Singh, BJP zila parishad chairman Balraj Kundu and Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) leader Abhay Chautala. Its time they must also give support to their community, said Raj Singh Hooda, Rohtak district president of the AIJASS. Rapid Action Force deployed 200 metres from the protest site to prevent any untoward situation. (Manoj Dhaka/HT Photo) The Congress and INLD have already announced their support to the agitation and demands of the community. Last year, during the second round of Jat agitation in June, Congress and INLD leaders had reached the dharna sites and attacked the government for violence in February. The crowds at Jassia are expected to grow further on Wednesday, when the Jat group has announced to celebrate Chhotu Ram Jayanti. AIJASS national president Yashpal Malik is also expected to attend the function. Though facing sedition, police sources say he will not be arrested because the government does not want to add fuel to the protests. Meanwhile, one of the protesters on hunger strike in Rohtaks Sunariya jail on Monday got ill and had to be hospitalised. TWO KHAPS OFFER SUPPORT IN HISAR After getting a place to stage their dharna near the railway crossing at Ramayan village of Hisar, Jats, under the aegis of All India Jat Aarakshan Sangharsh Samiti (AIJASS), arranged tents, mattresses and food here on Monday. Jats from a score of neighbouring villages reached the site to join the dharna. The protesters claimed support of two khap leaders as well. Balwant Singh Arya, a member of the Sarva Khap Panchayat, Choubisi Meham, and Rajmal Kajal from Kajal khap today reached the dharna sight to support our stir. The khap leaders assured us they are with us and are ready to send men and women to join our cause whenever needed, said AIJASS spokesperson Rambhagat Malik. AIJASS district president, Hisar, Krishan Kirmara said: No one from the local administration has come forward to hold talks with us so far. We plan to begin hunger strike. Protests are also going on at designated places in Sirsa and Fatehabad districts. JATS DEFYING ORDERS IN KAITHAL, PANIPAT Defying ban on unlawful assembly in Panipat and Kaithal districts, Jats continued their protest for the second day. In Kaithal, they are protesting at Deoban village even as the administration has asked them to move to Jakholi village. In Panipat too, Jats have defied orders and are protesting at Ugrakheri village. CALLING FACILITY RESUMES IN JHAJJAR Addressing inconvenience caused to the public, the Jhajjar district administration on Monday ordered to resume calling facilities on mobile networks, though the ban on internet services continued. The administration had on Sunday imposed complete ban on mobile operations. The interim ban on annual buffalo race Kambala in Karnataka will remain for at least another two weeks as the High Court on Monday decided to await the Supreme Court verdict on Jallikattu pending before it. This honourable court will wait for the Supreme Court order on Jallikattu (bull taming sport) and accordingly decide on Kambala, chief justice Subhro Kamal Mukherjee heading a division bench said in his order. The case was then adjourned for two weeks. The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear all Jallikattu matters on Tuesday after the Centre filed a plea seeking to withdraw the January 6 notification, so as to allow the bull-taming sport in Tamil Nadu. A bench headed by Justice Dipak Misra had allowed all the applications related to Jallikattu to be filed. A division bench of the Karnataka high court headed by chief justice had in November last passed an interim order banning all Kambala races until the disposal of PIL filed by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). Reacting to the court order, Kambala Committee president Ashok Pai said they would soon decide on resuming massive protests across the state. We may decide to resume our protests, beginning from tomorrow itself. The only hope before us is the state government. We hope it issues the ordinance paving the way for conducting Kambala, Pai said. The interim order hit Kambala organisers who were not permitted to conduct the event held in Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts in the coastal region. Kambala committees had filed an interim application, seeking vacation of the stay spurred by the success of the Jallikattu stir in Tamil Nadu. Amid continuing protests against the ban, Karnataka Cabinet on January 28 had decided to amend the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act to pave the way for Kambala. The protesters are demanding an ordinance, as was done in the case of Jallikattu to permit holding of the folk sport. The annual sport, held from November to March, involves a pair of buffaloes tied to the plough and anchored by one person. They are made to run in parallel muddy tracks in a competition in which the fastest team wins. It is believed to be held to propitiate the Gods for a good harvest, besides being a recreational sport for farmers. PETA, on the other hand, has been arguing that the agitators in Karnataka have taken a leaf out of the pro-Jallikattu protesters book and begun to falsely label PETA India as foreign and were now calling for banning the organisation. Facing growing demand for holding Kambala, chief minister Siddaramaiah has said an ordinance could be brought in, if necessary, to allow the event after seeking legal opinion. He had also asked the Centre to take a favourable stand on Kambala as it did on Jallikattu, where both Tamil Nadu and Central governments, after facing public pressure moved swiftly to facilitate the sport. A 35-year-old neurologist has been arrested by Hyderabad Police for allegedly making and selling chocolates laced with marijuana on social media for the last two years, officials said on Monday. A special operations team of Rachakonda Police arrested Mohd Sujath Ali Khan from Bahadoorpura area in the Old City after raiding his house on January 27. He was making chocolates mixed with marijuana and selling them to his customers online through his Instagram account, special operations team inspector K Narsing Rao told Hindustan Times. Since he would be easily caught if he sold chocolates in the open market, Sujath Ali opened pages on Instagram in the name of Weedibles.hyd and Weedibles.India and started marketing them. Within no time, several clients came in contact with him over the phone, Rao said. Khan completed his MBBS degree from Deccan Medical College, run by the Dar-us-Salam Educational Trust headed by Hyderabad MP and MIM president Asaduddin Owaisi, with specialisation in neurology. After completing his degree, he worked in government-run Nizams Institute of Medical Sciences as a research coordinator till 2014. He later started working as a consultant in local gyms and came in contact with youth who were addicted to drugs. Police said Khan then hit upon the idea of making quick bucks by peddling drugs and that he learnt to make the chocolates after watching videos. He used to procure marijuana from peddlers, converted it into a fine powder and mixed it with chocolate powder to make the toffees. The colourfully-packed chocolates attracted the net-savvy youth and within no time, he was flooded with calls. He ran a brisk business of supplying chocolates to customers from various parts of the country. Premium handcrafted Nutella/chocolate based edibles infused with purified concentrated extracts; custom made to individual requirement.. the ads on Instagram said. Depending on the concentration of marijuana, he named his chocolates as X, XX, XXX, 4X, 5X and 6X. The price ranged from Rs 500 to Rs 1,800 per box of 10 chocolates, depending on whether it was X or 6 X. The customers, mostly youth including women, used to contact him from not only Hyderabad but also from Kolkata, Bengaluru, Chennai, Pune and Vellore, the inspector said. On an average, he used to make Rs 40,000 to Rs 60,000 a month through online sales. The supply of stocks was through parcels and couriers and payments were made through online banking, the inspector said. Khan was aware of the effects of marijuana and he knew that he would get repeated calls from the same customers. He did not go in for procuring dangerous narcotics like cocaine, which is costlier. Otherwise, his business would have run into crores of rupees, he added. Marijuana is classified as a schedule 1 drug in the Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances in India Act 1985. Its sale, consumption, production and transportation is illegal in the country. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Nagpur bench of Bombay high court on Sunday directed that two Chhattisgarh tribal women who were allegedly raped by Gadchiroli police personnel, and then abducted from a lawyers office on Saturday night, be kept in state-run home till Monday. During a special sitting on Sunday morning, a division bench of the court directed Nagpur police to produce the women before it on Monday. The bench comprising Justice Bhushan Dharmadhikari and Justice Swapna Joshi also restrained the Maharashtra police from contacting the women in any manner. The lawyer of both the women, Nihalsingh Rathod, had moved a writ of habeas corpus alleging that the women and activists with them were illegally and forcibly abducted from his office by police personnel in plain clothes on Saturday night. On the intervening night of January 20 and 21, Gadchiroli police had detained the two women when they were walking in the forest. The women aged 35 years old and 23 years old are from a Chhattisgarh village in Narayanpur district adjoining Gadchiroli. Both reportedly came to Gadchiroli to visit their relatives. Police suspected them to be Maoists or their sympathisers and claimed they were detained during the night as a precautionary measure. However, the next day Sainu Gota, an activist from Gadchiroli, claimed that after being freed, the women had alleged that the police had sexually assaulted them. Gadchiroli police, however, rejected the charges as baseless. Police said the women were produced before a magistrate and they denied the activists claims. When Gota, his wife Sheela, and the two women came to Nagpur to meet lawyer Rathod on Saturday, the Gadchiroli police along with Nagpur police arrested them. The police also registered a case against Gota and his wife on charges of filing a false complaint. Gadchiroli police alleged that the activists cooked up a false case and both women were in their illegal custody. Nearly 4,000 medical students in 32 new private colleges might find their institutes disqualified as these have failed to pass standard checks. These are among 34 colleges approved by a Supreme Court-appointed oversight committee in May 2016, but debarred by the countrys medical education regulator for failing to meet required standards. Second Chance A government source said the health ministry was examining the latest MCI report and has heard the heads of institutions that have failed the inspection. It may ask for another inspection for colleges having minor deficiencies. The ministry will send its remarks soon to the top court-appointed committee. The committee, headed by retired judge RM Lodha, had overruled the Medical Council of Indias (MCI) decision with the condition that if these colleges fail another inspection, they cannot admit students for two years. Subsequently these colleges admitted their first batch 3,957 students last summer. These students had cleared the national eligibility cum entrance test (NEET). Rules stipulate that these students studying for their bachelors of medicine (MBBS) should be shifted to other medical colleges if their institutes get disqualified. But experts feel such an effort will be challenging. You cant stretch facilities to accommodate so many students in other approved colleges. This will hamper studies of the students, said KK Aggarwal, national president of the Indian Medical Association. If the oversight committee accepts the MCI report, it will have to address the concerns of students admitted to these colleges. The MCI and the oversight committee didnt respond to requests for comments. Trouble began for the students after the MCI conducted another round of inspection in those 34 colleges in November and December. Only two colleges Maheshwara Medical College in Andhra Pradeshs Chitkul, and Amaltas Institute of Medical Sciences at Dewas in Madhya Pradesh met the regulators benchmark. In most of the institutes, the MCI found shortage of faculty and resident doctors, locked intensive care units (ICU) and emergency wards, and vacant general wards. Some of the colleges forged documents to show adequate faculty or lined up fake patients for MCI inspectors. A Hindustan Times investigation had found similar shortfalls. Empty ICUs, no faculty, locked operation theatres, and under-construction departments and buildings awaiting students in many of the institutes approved by the oversight committee. Meanwhile, Sudhir Giri, chairman of Venkateswara University that has failed to meet the MCI standard, said: The MCI is biased and adamant on barring us for vested reasons. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Eminent historian Prof Irfan Habib said Padmavati was a character in the book Padmawat written by Malik Mohammad Jaisi in Bhaktikal, which has no connection with history at all. Jaisi had penned it (the book) during Akbars reign around 1550 AD, wherein he had mentioned Alauddin Khilji. But Khilji existed from 1296 to 1316, he said. Read: Sanjay Leela Bhansali slapped on Padmavati sets: Bollywood tweets in shock Filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali cancelled the shooting of his film Padmavati after a fringe group vandalised the movies set in Jaipur on Friday, accusing the filmmaker of distorting history about queen Padmavati and Khilji. Before any serial or film, the producer always gives a disclaimer announcing that the story bears no resemblance with anyone living or dead and in that way he tampers with history, Habib said. King of Mewar Raja Ratan Singh fell in love with princess of Lanka Padmawati and he took her to Mewar after marrying her. After a battle, Alauddin Khilji captured Raja Ratan Singh and kept him in Delhi. But Padmawati got Ratan Singh released by her tact. Later, Raja Ratan Singh died in a battle in his old age. After that, Khilji fell in love with Padmavati and embarked upon getting her but before he could reach Mewar, Padmawati committed suicide, said Habib on Queen Padmavatis story. Read: We wont forget our history and neither will we let anyone else forget: Karni Sena on Padmavati Commenting on the need to de-link works of fiction from history, Habib said, There are stories in every country, but they cannot be accepted as part of history. England has a story of Robinhood, but it was never treated as history. But in our country, myths and stories are given a status of history. Defending the movie, actor Deepika Padukone, who plays the role of Padmavati in Bansalis film, said: I am sure that we have not tampered with history. We are bringing the story of a brave woman on the silver screen. Terming the assault on the sets of Sanjay Leela Bhansalis film Padmavati as shocking, production house Viacom18 Motion Pictures said it stands by their director and the film. Also read: Bhansali attack: Sushant Singh Rajput drops surname on Twitter to support Padmavati We stand by him (Bhansali) and our film which is a celebration of the Rani... We dont wish to hurt the sentiments of any person or community, Ajit Andhare, Viacom18 Motion Pictures, COO, said in a statement. Rajput groups piled more pressure on filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali over his latest production Padmavati, demanding on Monday that the title be purged and film screened before a team of Rajasthan historians ahead of its release. The film, starring Deepika Padukone as queen Padmavati, ran into trouble after members of a little-known outfit, Karni Sena, stopped its shooting at Jaigarh Fort in Jaipur on Friday, vandalised sets and manhandled director Bhansali. The group alleged distortion of facts, saying the Bollywood filmmaker, known for his extravagant productions such as Devdaas, was showing the Rajput queen in a poor light by weaving a romance with her arch-enemy Muslim king Alauddin Khilji. Bhansalis representative said a letter has been sent to the Rajput groups, clarifying that there is no romantic dream sequence or any objectionable scene between Padmavati and Khilji, played by Ranveer Singh in the movie. According to historians, Padmavati was a character in Padmawat, a book written by Malik Mohammad Jaisi around 1550, and it has no connection with history at all. The protests reignited a debate over growing intolerance in the country as Bollywood celebrities and social media railed against the assault on the films crew. The Karni Sena and another group, the Rajput Sabha, called a joint press conference on Monday to clarify that the misunderstanding over the alleged distortion of historical facts had been sorted out. But halfway through the conference, the Senas state president Mahipal Singh Makrana demanded that the films name be changed. We cannot give any assurance (to allow shooting of the movie) as long as this demand is not fulfilled, he said. The groups founder, Lokendra Singh Kalvi, rejected the demand. We did request the makers to consider changing the title. They cited the instance of Jodha Akbar in which the name remained but some changes were made in the script. We are satisfied with their explanation, Kalvi told Hindustan Times. For its part, the Rajput Sabha, the apex body of Rajasthans dominant community, asked the filmmaker to constitute a screening committee of historians from the state along with a judge of the Rajasthan high court to review the movie before its release. These demands kept the controversy afire, with no clear sign when shooting can resume. Jat leaders in Bharatpur burnt effigies of Bhansali and Prime Minister Narendra Modi and demanded banning of the movie stating that no distortion of history would be tolerated. Politicians are either silent or divided over the controversy. The BJP parliamentarian for Barmer, Col Sonaram Choudhary, condemned the attack on Bhansali, saying such incidents send a wrong signal abroad about the country. Bhansali has earlier directed an opera version of Padmavati, his rendition of a 1923 ballet written by Albert Roussel. It received a standing ovation at the Theatre du Chatelet in Paris in March 2008. .Read| Padmavati a fictional character with no connection to history, says historian SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Amidst chill in Indo-Pak ties, Pakistan has declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend South Asian Speakers Summit to be held next month. Pakistan and Myanmar which were among the countries in the South Asian nations invited to the Speakers meet in Indore on February 18-19 have declined the invitation, official sources said. However, officials did not elaborate on the reasons given by Pakistan and merely noted that these two countries have written that they will not be able to attend the meet. The Summit, which is primarily an IPU initiative and not a Saarc activity, will be attended by Speakers of Parliament from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka among other countries, the sources said. Significantly, in 2015, India had boycotted a Commonwealth Parliamentary Union (CPU) meeting in Islamabad to protest against Pakistans decision to not invite the Speaker of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. The discussions during the speakers summit on achieving sustainable development goals (SDGs) will update the participants on implementation of the SDGs in their region and globally. Special emphasis will be laid on sharing experiences and increasing understanding about how parliaments in the region institutionalise the global goals, capture the synergies and build coherence at the policy level, IPU said on its website. Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar has expressed serious concern over reports that schoolchildren were being engaged in illegal vending of alcohol by liquor mafia. He called upon rural women to extend their cooperation in checking the menace for effective implementation of total prohibition in the state. It is arguably for the first time that Kumar has made such a reference, hinting at bootlegging in Bihar, after the liquor ban on April 5 last year. Addressing a gathering at Suggi-Amas village in Gaya district as part of his Nishchay Yatra to assess implementation of his seven resolves, Kumar on Sunday said the liquor mafia were adopting various methods to transport the banned brew from neighbouring states after total prohibition was imposed in Bihar. We all have to remain cautious. Women should be more watchful and extend cooperation in identifying unscrupulous elements engaged in bootlegging, Kumar said. You (women) should join hands with me to choke the supply links. We cannot progress until we make Bihar a complete dry state, said the CM, adding that officials found to be involved in any nexus with the liquor mafia would be severely punished. A few days ago, Kumar had hit out at opposition parties for questioning the efficacy of prohibition law. He had reasoned that repealing laws could not be a solution if certain cases of heinous crime or bootlegging take place. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Prime Minister Narendra Modi, President Pranab Mukherjee and vice-president M Hamid Ansari on Monday paid tribute to Mahatma Gandhi on his 69th death anniversary. - ...Tributes to beloved Bapu on his Punya Tithi. Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) January 30, 2017 On this day in 1948, Mohan Das Karamchand Gandhi was assassinated by Nathuram Godse, a Hindu nationalist, who fired three bullets into his chest during a prayer meeting at the Birla House here. Read: The idea of Gandhi is universal and immortal Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi also paid tribute to the Father of the Nation and pledged to fight against those who seek to destroy. On Bapus martyrdom day my pledge to fight always against those who seek to destroy what he so carefully sought to build and protect an India of love, compassion and harmony, Rahul Gandhi said in his tweet. Also read: Rajghat gets a facelift: Bapu quotes can be read on entrances Mahatma Gandhi is admired widely for his non-violent philosophy and passive resistance. Rajghat will showcase a new look on Monday as it has got a facelift after 15 years. For the first time, a 157 word brief profile of Gandhi and a 131 word description of his Samadhi will be put on display, both in Hindi and English, at all the three gates of Rajghat. The murder of an Infosys engineer at the companys Pune facility has sent shockwaves across the IT sector with many questioning whether security employees hired for software parks are vetted before appointment. A 25-year-old woman identified as Rasila Raju OP was found strangled with a computer cable on the floor of a conference room at her workplace in the Hinjewadi IT Park near Pune late on Sunday evening. Within hours, the police arrested a security guard from Mumbai in connection with the crime, sending alarm bells ringing across the IT sector. Infosys officials who requested for anonymity as they were not authorised to speak to the media told HT that security had been outsourced to another firm, which was responsible for carrying out verification of staff prior to recruitment. Estimates suggest more than 300 IT companied located in and around Pune employ around 400,000 people with firms such as Infosys employing around 30,000 people. In most cases, IT companies have outsourced security as well as transport service. On some occasions, staff of the security agencies or cab services were found involved in crime despite background check, said Sunil Pailwan, who was previously associated with Hinjewadi Industries Association. Over the past two decades, top software firms have set up many parks, mini cities and campuses in several cities and thousands of employees live and work in these facilities. But despite promises of tough security and round-the clock surveillance, reports of crime from these campuses have been mounting in recent years. In the past, cab drivers working for private contractors were found involved in serious offences in Pune. In December 2015, a 25-year-old woman, working at the canteen inside the Pune Infosys campus, was allegedly raped by two male housekeeping staff colleagues. In 2009, another Pune-based software professional Nayana Pujari was raped and murdered by her cab driver and his friend while she was returning home. Jyotikumari Choudhary, a 22-two-year-old employee of a Wipro call center based in Punes IT hub Hinjewadi, was raped and her head smashed with stones by the firms cab driver and his friend in 2007. On August 7, 2008, a 22-year-old call center executive at IBM Daksh was gangraped. The police have not yet been able to crack the case. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Rasila Raju OP, the 23-year-old Infosys techie who was allegedly murdered by a security guard, had complained about his advances to the company but no action was taken against him, her maternal uncle said on Monday. Rasila, who hailed from Kozhikode district of Kerala, was strangled with a computer cable allegedly by the guard, Bhaben Saikia, after she chided him for staring at her. Her body was found in a conference room on the 9th floor of the Infosys building in Phase II of Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park at Pune on Sunday evening. We will file a complaint for a detailed inquiry into Rasilas death. Earlier, while making calls here, she had mentioned about the same security guard making advances towards her. Though she had complained to the company officials no action had been taken, her maternal uncle Manoj said on Monday. The alleged murder of the 23-year-old systems engineer has come as a shock to her family which was making arrangements for her marriage. A pall of gloom descended on the village of Kizhakkal Kadavu in the district as the news of the death trickled in. It is a rude shock for us. Rasila had made a call to her stepmother about 2.30pm yesterday (Saturday) and was speaking casually, Manoj said. Saikia, a security guard from Terrier Security Services deployed at the campus, has been remanded in police custody till February 4 after police nabbed him at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus in Mumbai. Rasila had visited her native village only two months back. Her father Raju, who is working as a home guard with Kunnamangalam police station, left for Pune along with some relatives on Monday morning following an intimation from her office on Sunday night that Rasila had a medical emergency. Her relatives enquired with their contacts at Pune and got to know what had happened to Rasila. Her mother had died two years back due to cancer. Rasilas brother Rijeesh is working abroad. Over the past two years rival political parties have joined hands, in some cases successfully, to take on the BJP in assembly elections in different states. The tie-ups may have underlined the urgency and the desperation in the Opposition camp, but they also have the potential to grow into a national alliance against Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the 2019 general elections. On Sunday, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi and Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav kept the doors open for such pacts. Its possible, they said when asked about a SP-Congress alliance in 2019. Ironically, days before the two parties firmed up an alliance for the assembly polls, Gandhi, for the first time, spoke about 2019 general elections at a party meet. Aachche din that Modi promised will come once Congress voted to power, he said, hinting at the next Lok Sabha polls. In 2015, the Congress chose ride piggyback on the JD(U)-RJD alliance in Bihar when arch rivals Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad joined hands to fight the BJP in Bihar. Last year, it was content as the junior partner to the Left in the West Bengal assembly polls, indicating that it may no longer have a superiority complex when negotiating with potential allies in places where the party is weak. Gandhi was also quick to make course-corrections: after the poor results of the Left-Congress combination in the Bengal polls, he was ready to do business with Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee who swept the polls. Gandhi and Banerjee even addressed a joint press conference in Delhi last month along with six other parties even though some other Opposition parties stayed. A good result in the UP elections for the SP and the Congress would only bolster chances for another UPA-style grand alliance involving these two parties along with the likes of the JD(U), RJD, Trinamool and the National Conference. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Struggling for political space, the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) has knocked on the doors of the Shiv Sena for a tactical adjustment in the upcoming civic polls in Maharashtra, but any truck between the two is unlikely to fructify with the latter showing little interest in it. Terming it a political move, MNS sources said, efforts are being made to cosy up with Sena, which is gearing up to battle it out with the BJP after deciding against a pre-poll pact. But, the Sena has shown no serious interest in the MNS proposal. We are fully ready for the polls. Unfortunately, we have to battle the BJP. Uddhav ji has made it clear that he will not seek anybodys support or alliance. If anybody wants to support us, we will consider it sympathetically. However, seat-sharing or any tactical understanding is ruled out, Sena sources said. MNS sources, however, indicated that the party has not given up all hopes. Fuelling speculations of a covert understanding in the form of seat adjustment between the two parties, MNSs former legislator Bala Nandgoankar had gone to the Shiv Sena chiefs residence. Though he could not meet Uddhav, he handed over a letter containing the partys proposal. Sena sources said the party chief has virtually spurned the overtures from the MNS. The MNS, an offshoot of the Shiv Sena which had bagged 111 seats in urban civic bodies in 2012, is now finding itself alone. According to political observers, the MNS is suffering from some sort of trust deficit and credibility crisis, a perception its leaders and functionaries refuse to share. Five years ago, the MNS, riding on Rajs charisma and anti-north Indian immigrant agenda, had bagged 28 seats in Mumbai corporation, seven in Thane, 29 in Pune, four in Pimpri-Chinchwad, two in Nagpur and one in Akola. In Nashik, it cornered 40 seats and stormed to power, and got its candidate elected as mayor with the NCPs support. Raj had supported the Sena in the mayoral election in Mumbai and expected the gesture to be reciprocated in Nashik. But his estranged cousin Uddhav did not yield. Party insiders say majority of the 111 corporators as well as former MLAs have switched sides either to the Sena or BJP. Always ready to volunteer their services for the country, residents of this town, located at a walking distance from the Indo-Pak international border, have one grudge -- this assembly constituency of poll-bound Punjab deserves more facilities. The residents recall how they had prepared themselves to volunteer just in case the country needed their services after tensions escalated between India and Pakistan following Indian Armys surgical strike across LoC in Jammu & Kashmir last year. After the Army conducted the surgical strike, orders were issued for evacuation of villages within 10-km area along the border with Pakistan in Punjab. However, despite several villages in Attari constituency being just 1 or 2 km from the border, people stayed put here. Everyone here decided that in case of war or any worst thing happening, we will move forward (towards Pakistan) along with our forces, but not retreat, 61-year-old Surjit Singh told PTI. Another resident, Harjinder Singh, a carpenter, said, After the surgical strike, the residents here put up a brave front. Nobody left their homes. Everyone said we are the brave people of the Majha region of Punjab and if one has to die, let it be here and all said in one voice that they will move forward and not leave their homes. Perhaps the Attari residents draw inspiration from Sardar Sham Singh Attariwala, who was a general in the army of Maharaja Ranjit Singh and famous for his last stand at the Anglo-Sikh battle of Sabraon. A villager shows bullet marks fired from Pakistan during heavy shelling from Pakistan side at the international border at Pargwal sector in Akhnoor. (Nitin Kanotra /HT File Photo) There is a memorial dedicated to him which is located right in the main bazaar area of Attari. Two Howitzer guns have been placed in the memorial ground and these were dedicated by former Indian Army chief, General Bikram Singh, on February 10, 2014 to commemorate the 168th martyrdom day of General Sham Singh Attariwala. However, residents here lament that many villages in Attari constituency, which is next to the border with Pakistan; still continue to be in a bad shape. They claim there is hardly anything in the name of facilities including proper health and education facilities. Residents say that unsafe bridges over the defence drain create fear and four months back an accident involving a school bus killed seven students. Both Surjit Singh and another resident Jagtar Singh said Attari residents should get facilities it deserves. There is a small hospital here, but without any facility. There is a small hospital here, but without any facility. Doctors are not available. We have to rush to Amritsar, which is about 25 km from here, for even small things. Sewerage problem also remains unresolved. There are not much employment avenues for the youth, Jagtar said. He said border areas should be given good financial package so that entire belt gets developed and youth are gainfully employed. Attari is a reserved constituency, having a voter strength of over 1,71,586, from where senior Shiromani Akali Dal leader and Punjab Minister Gulzar Singh Ranike (59) is seeking re-election and among 10 other candidates, he faces Congress Tarsem Singh DC (67), AAPs Jaswinder Singh Jahangir (39), BSPs Sukhwantjit Kaur (51) and CPI Gurdeep Singh (55). SAD candidate from Attari, Gulzar Singh Ranike, along with party leaders and supporters before filing nomination papers at Amritsar. (Sameer Sehgal/HT photo) Harjinder Singh, Sakatar Singh, who is an arhitya (commission agent) and fruit seller Wasim, also claim that this constituency is reeling under the impact of demonetisation. The situation here has still not improved. Residents still have to wait for a long time in queues to withdraw money. I have to make payment to farmers, but I am unable to pay them. This is causing hardship to farmers, but we are helpless, said Sakatar Singh. Baba Jasbir Singh (60), a resident of Atalgarh village, located barely 1 km from the Indo-Pak Attari/Wagah border, talked about the problems faced by the farmers in cultivating their land situated across the barbed wire fence. One member in a family is issued ID card and only he is allowed to go to take care of the land and the crops. There is fixed time from 10 a.m. till 5 p.m. when one can go across the barbed wire fence. Suppose we return with trolley filled with crops or other stuff, it has to be emptied and got checked. So, there are practical difficulties which we face in taking care of our own land, Jasbir said. Notably, in 2012, Ranike had defeated Congress rival Tarsem Singh DC by 4,983 votes and in 2007 Rattan Singh of Congress by 19,083 votes. Ranike exuded confidence about his victory, saying people will vote for the SAD-BJP alliance, which has undertaken development, not just here, but across the state. People know Congress is a sinking ship and it has nothing new to offer. AAP has no base here, he said. Tarsem Singh DC claimed people want to show the door to the Akalis, who have looted Punjab. He also talked about Congress commitment to weed out the drug menace. AAPs Jahangir claimed people are desperately looking for a change this time and his party is on a strong footing. People want to elect a clean and honest government this time, he said. An RSS leader was on Monday attacked and injured allegedly by CPI-M activists at Kankol in Payanoor in Kannur district, police said. He has been admitted to a hospital here and his condition is stated to be serious, they said. RSS alleged that a group of CPI-M workers attacked Ajit with iron rods when a meeting of the saffron organisation was in progress late in the evening. The district has been witnessing a spat of clashes between CPI-M and RSS-BJP workers after the May 16 Assembly polls which saw the CPI-M-led LDF government coming to power in the state. In another incident, a 64-year-old Congress worker was attacked and injured allegedly by RSS-BJP workers at Panoor in the district. The injured, M Sukumaran, a former school teacher, has been admitted to Thalassery Indira Gandhi Cooperative hospital, police said. He was attacked while he was opening his shop in the morning. Meanwhile, in the southern part of the state, a flag and flagpost of CPI-M was damaged allegedly by RSS-BJP workers at Paravoor in Kollam district. On January 18, a 53-year-old BJP worker was stabbed to death at Andaloor in Dharmadam, the constituency of chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan. Six CPI(M)workers have been arrested in this connection. On Friday last, 10 people, belonging to BJP-RSS, were taken into custody here in connection with the hurling of a bomb near the venue of a public meeting of CPI(M) state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan, police said. Police arrested a security guard on Monday in connection with the murder of a 25-year-old Infosys engineer, who was found strangled with a computer cable at her workplace a day before. Police teams picked up Bhaben Saikia -- a 26-year-old native from Assam working as a watchman at the Pune Infosys campus -- from Mumbai early on Monday. He is currently being brought to Pune, senior police inspector Arun Waikar told HT. Read: Dealing with rape and murder on Indias IT campuses The victim, Rasila Raju OP, was found dead late on Sunday evening on the ninth floor of Infosys facility in phase II of the Hinjewadi IT park near Pune. Saikia worked with a private security firm and was deputed at Infosys six months ago, police said. A background check at the time of appointment had shown no previous record of crime. We are deeply saddened & shocked by the tragedy at Pune DC. Our hearts go out to our colleagues family in this time of grief, the tech giant tweeted on Monday. (2/2) We are working with the authorities to provide all necessary support. Infosys (@Infosys) January 30, 2017 Police said they were working on some crucial leads and were confident of cracking the case after scanning through CCTV footage. The police said Infosys officials told them Rasila had the day off on Sunday, but had come in to work on a project and was in touch with colleagues at the companys Bengaluru office. But when her supervisor in Bangalore could not get through to her over phone late on Sunday, someone in the Hinjewadi office was asked to check on her. When her colleagues came to her workstation, they found her lying on the floor with a computer wire around her neck, said assistant police commissioner, Vaishali Jadhav. The techie was hit hard on the face before being strangled, said another official. Police said the post-mortem had been postponed on the request of victims family, who hailed from Kerala and were on their way to Pune. We will carry out post mortem once Rasilas family reaches here, said another official attached with Hinjewadi police station. According to senior police officials, Rasila had come to office at around 3pm. Around 10pm, we received call from Infosys about her body lying on the floor near her work station, said Jadhav. This is the second murder of a woman techie in Pune in the last two months. In December, Antara Das, 23-year-old techie from Kolkata working with Capgemini near Pune, was stabbed to death while returning from work late in the evening. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON A key amendment in the law could soon result in summons being serviced in civil matters through email, cutting through layers of red tape and delays, top sources in the ministry of law and justice said. Currently, a summons is served in accordance with the rules under Order V of the Civil Procedure Code (CPC) of 1908 that governs the functioning of civil courts in India and therefore, a majority of the cases. The procedures do not include email as a means of servicing and still rely on archaic methods such as personal service through a court official. A committee in the ministry is likely to finalise changes to the CPC on Monday and subsequently prepare a draft amendment bill for Parliament to pass. Right now there is a lot of scope for improvement in the way summons are serviced. Service through email is now a necessary reform we need. We need to speed up the process because delays result in cases dragging for years, a senior official on the committee told Hindustan Times. It has been decided to do away with the rules that are now archaic. The ministry brought out a report last year that pinned the average life of a case in India at around 13 years. Service of summons to respondents in civil suits considered among the top causes of judicial delay is traditionally done through court officials called process servers and is restricted to the person being summoned or an immediate family member of the respondent. Receipt of summons is necessary for the process to be completed. One of the key proposals being studied by the ministry that will come up for discussion is doing away with the process servers. In many cases, respondents influence these officials and show themselves as not present to receive the summons. Summons to a respondent residing in the jurisdiction of another high court has to be then routed through the high courts, causing even more delay, the official explained. Lawyers say evading summons remains one of the leading ways of prolonging litigation. Though frequent adjournments would be the leading cause for delays, it would be good if email can be used as a proven way of servicing summons. It would speed up the entire process, senior advocate Jayanth Bhushan said. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Agartala branch of state-run Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) has introduced assembly session (prayer) from Monday where all its staffs, including the high-rank officers, sing national anthem before joining their work. The move came months after the Supreme Court ordered that all cinema halls must play the national anthem before a film is screened. Though BSNLs training centres in Madhya Pradeshs Jabalpur and Ghaziabad in Uttar Pradesh have been singing the national anthem for nearly a decade now, the office in Agartala is the first to introduce this system in the state, said Tripura BSNL chief accounts officer Ashim Bhattacharya. All the employees from Group D to general manager met at the conference hall at 10am and sang the national anthem. The decision was taken during a meeting of the managing committee a few days ago. We found that the corporate sectors follow this system. As per decision, all the employees of the office would meet daily at the conference room to attend the prayer session, said Bhattacharya. Primarily, we began with the national anthem and we may include another prayer song Itna Shakti Hame Dena Data. We expect it would make work culture better and increase understanding among all sections of employees, the official said. This Republic Day, Tripura rolled out its tableau featuring Hojagiri, a Reang tribal dance, to depict the vibrancy of its culture, but thousands of kilometres away in the northeastern state the younger generation of the tribe can barely identify the national anthem. A team from the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) in New Delhi was recently taken by surprise when none of the 4,000 children, aged up to 10 years, at temporary shelters for Reang refugees in Tripuras Kanchanpur were able to identify the national anthem. The children were also unable to sing Jana Gana Mana even after being prompted. More than 35,000 Reang tribespeople, who moved from Mizoram to Tripura in October 1997 after atrocities were committed against them allegedly by Mizos, have been living in makeshift camps in Kanchanpur sub-division, 170 km from state capital Agartala, for the past two decades. Tripura rolled out its tableau featuring Hojagiri, a Reang tribal dance, on Republic Day to depict the vibrancy of its culture on January 26. (Mohd Zakir/HT PHOTO) While a political solution to their problems is in not in sight, the refugees regularly battle for even basic documents such as birth and caste certificates. A deputy director of the state education department and other officials, who had accompanied us, tried their best to make the children sing at least two lines of the national anthem but all their efforts were unsuccessful, NCPCR member Priyank Kanoongo told Hindustan Times. The team, including Kanoongo and Yashwant Jain, visited the camps between January 11 and 14 and inspected the Non-Residential Special Training Centres (NRSTCs) for Reang refugees at Naisingh Para, Asha Para, Heza Chera and other nearby areas. They were surprised to find these centres had never celebrated Republic Day or Independence Day since they were established more than a decade ago. Sixteen NRSTCs, run under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, are meant for child labourers and displaced children, aged between six and 14 years, who have never been to school or have dropped out for more than six months. There are 16 Non-Residential Special Training Centres, run under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, in Tripuras Kanchanpur sub-division for 4,000 Reang refugee children. (NCPCR) The standard of education is really poor...The contractual teachers who teach the children are only teaching them Bru or Reang languages, Kanoongo said. For the first time this year, the Tripura government organised Republic Day functions at the NRSTCs after being pulled up, said Kanoongo. The commission recommended that the Mizoram government should depute at least 60 officers, including teachers, at the NRSTCs to meet children to understand their problems. The central government disburses crores of rupees every year to these centres, where only a total of 50 to 60 contractual teachers are posted. Shunned by both the Tripura and Mizoram governments, students graduating from the centres have scant scope for further studies in the absence of better facilities and caste certificates. The condition of the Reang refugees is really bad. Only recently the Tripura government has started identifying the refugees. So far it has identified 500 refugees for repatriation, said Purushottam Roy Barman, a senior advocate and chairman of the Agartala-based NGO Tripura Human Rights Organisation. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON In a clear message to ally BJP, Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Mehbooba Mufti on Monday said anybody weakening Article 370, which grants special status to the state, will be doing the biggest anti-national act even as she contended that a conspiracy is being hatched against our culture and state in this regard. She also attacked those opposing setting up of colonies for Kashmiri Pandits in the valley, saying that by doing so, they do not want in their heart of hearts the displaced people to return. Speaking in the Legislative Assembly, she underlined that Pandits cannot go back to live in their original villages and other places in Kashmir in the prevailing security situation when even political workers and MLAs and MLCs are seeking a protective set-up. On Article 370, Mehbooba, who is running a coalition government with BJP, said there are some forces within this country who think that by scrapping Article 370, the issue of Kashmir will be resolved and everything will be alright. BJPs stated position is that Article 370 should be scrapped for total integration of J&K with India. There is a conspiracy being hatched against our culture and state. Those who speak against Article 370, they dont know that the Article 370, which is our special status, is in our character because of which we have dismissed the two ideological (narrative of two-nation theory) and also religion, and have shaken hands with India, Mehbooba said. Respecting concerns expressed by National Conference leader and former Chief Minister Omar Abdullah that some people are trying to weaken Article 370 through the judiciary, she said, If they hurt its soul by raking up Article 370, Section 35-A repeatedly etc, I feel that there will be no big anti-national act anything than this. Vowing to oppose any move to erode Article 370, she said, There will be no bigger anti-national thing than this because when you weaken this uniqueness of Kashmir through judiciary, then those forces in Kashmir Valley, who want to put an end to the composite culture in Kashmir Valley and want to have people from one community (Muslims) only, with one attire and one way of life, you will only make them successful. Then there will be no meeting ground for mainstream politicians, the chief minister said. She asserted that her endeavour will be to ensure that such things do not happen in which our uniqueness of the Jammu and Kashmir -- uniqueness because of a status and a special position -- does not get diluted. Side by side, she said, we need to work together to save the composite culture for which Article 370 protects it. The PDP leader said, If they hit those roots which is the basis of our composite culture, civilization and Kashmiriyat and brotherhood of Hindu, Muslim and Sikhs, which Gandhi ji also had seen in Kashmir, I feel that there will be no big anti-national act anything than this. She added, These are the same forces, which we have seen here also, who think by destroying the composite culture in Kashmir and make it a one religion-based state (Muslim state), particularly valley. The Centre on Monday told the Delhi high court it has been decided to grant a three-month provisional visa extension to a Yemeni student who is claiming refugee status and seeking that he be not deported to his country as his life is under threat there. The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and the Foreigner Regional Registration Office (FRRO) said the student was released from a detention centre at Lampur in Narela here on January 27 and his provisional visa would be extended for three months to facilitate his stay for seeking admission in a PhD programme of Delhi University. MHA and FRRO said that if he gets admission he shall be granted regular visa extension. However, if he fails to get into the PhD programme of the varsity, he would be asked to exit the country. The submissions were made in an affidavit placed before Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva who listed the matter for further hearing on March 20. In its affidavit, filed through central government standing counsel Rajesh Gogna, the government has said the Yemeni student was kept in the detention centre to restrict his movements till arrangements were made for deporting him as there was every likelihood that the petitioner might go underground. The government has claimed that he was doing various courses from here to prolong his stay in India as he did not want to return to his country. It also contended that the request of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for granting him long- term visa cannot be considered as 35 Yemeni nationals arrived in India after January 2015 when the crisis in Yemen erupted and 26 out of them have already left. So contention of the petitioner does not hold true, it said. The petitioner, in his plea filed through advocate Gunjan Singh, has contended that he is a Sunni Arab and his community has been targeted by Houthi rebels and other non-state actors such as al-Qaeda and the government there. According to his plea, he had a valid visa till October 31, 2016 and under the garb of extending it, he was kept at the detention centre at Lampur Sewa Sadan here. The Yemeni student had arrived in India in 2013 for studies and has done a post-graduate course in commerce from Pune University, the petition said and added that he has been given refugee status by UNHCR and should not be deported. Thousands of people hit the streets in Nadbai town of Bharatpur district and laid siege to the police station on Monday, demanding a probe into the death of a minor girl after she was abducted and gang-raped. Protesters under the banner of Nadbai Sangharsh Samiti forced shops and schools to shut down, and handed over a memorandum to officials demanding an inquiry by the Central Investigation Bureau (CBI). The minor girl was abducted, gang-raped and murdered, but police mentioned it as a suicide after she was raped. Police arrested only three accused and are trying to save others involved in gang rape and murder, said Prashant Upadhayay, Nadbai block Congress president. Sangharsh Samiti president Jagdish Mahndiratta said, Our protest will continue till we get justice for a daughter of the town. All shops, schools, and educational institutions will remain closed. Mohan Singh, 40, of Chimni village under Kumher police station befriended the Class 12 girl over the phone one and a half months ago. He assured her of marriage, falsely claiming that he was a bachelor and an employee of the police department. She could know that the man was lying when her phone call was attended by his wife on January 26. After the girl confronted him, Mohan decided to call her to a secluded place, police said. He sent his friend Sonu Pujari, 22, of Kabai village in Nadbai to bring her on a motorcycle. He waited for her with his another friend Gajendra Singh, 20, of Belara village. The three took the girl to an agriculture field, raped her and shot video clips in a mobile phone, police said. The 16-year-old girl requested Mohan to delete the clips, but he refused, and left her at Khangri railway crossing in Nadbai on January 26 night; she committed suicide by jumping before a train the next morning, police said. Police found the girls body at the crossing on Agra-Jaipur railway line. The girls father Vijay Sain had approached police after she didnt return after she left home saying that she was going to market to purchase a notebook. Additional superintendent of police Bharatlal Meena and Nadbai sub-divisional magistrate Rajesh Goyal met the protesters and assured them of a probe into the incident. Women and school students participated in the protest. Protesting locals handed over a memorandum for a CBI inquiry. The memorandum has been forwarded to senior officials, Goyal said. The land agitation at Bhangar reached the heart of Kolkata on Monday when a few thousand people, comprising farmers from the area as well as leaders and members of Left Opposition parties took part in a procession organised by CPI-ML Red Star, the Naxalite group behind the movement. The procession - which started from College Square and ended at Esplanade - was led by, among others, Sukur Ali Khan, father of Mafizul Ali Khan, the wage labourer who was shot dead, on January 17. I want my sons death to be probed by the CBI. I know that a powerful Trinamool leader planned all the violence, said Khan who filed a petition before the Calcutta High Court last week. I have refused to accept the compensation the state government offered. They cannot silence me by offering money, said the landless labourer. It was apparent that the CPI(M) sniffed an opportunity in the ongoing movement against state governments move to acquire 16 acres of farmland in Bhangar to recover some of its lost ground in rural West Bengal ahead of panchayat polls. Though none of the top CPI(M) leaders were seen in the rally, many CPI(M) supporters were present. It was learnt that some members of the Association for Protection of Democratic Rights (APDR) had earlier objected to the presence of CPI(M) in the programme, forcing leaders of the party to stay away. In what is seen as a throwback to the land movement stoked by the Trinamool Congress in Nandigram and Singur to dethrone the Left Front government in 2011, the farmers protest in the South 24 Parganas district, many CPI (M) leaders feel, could provide the Left Front a major issue against the TMC in the 2018 rural elections. Interestingly, this comes at a time when constant bickering between two powerful TMC leaders- former MLA Arabul Islam and his successor and former CPI(M) land reforms minister Abdur Rezzak Mollah- in the Muslim-dominated agrarian belt is further adding to the woes of the ruling dispensation. Although members of the CPI-ML Red Star are organising farmers against the land acquisition, a section of CPI-M leaders of the district and young party members close to Jadavpur MLA Sujan Chakraborty had been monitoring the developments long before it hit the headlines. Immediately after two youths were shot dead, the Bhangar Samhati Mancha was formed with help from Red Star members some of whom are former students of Jadavpur University (JU), said a CPI(M) leader from Jadavpur. The objective of the Mancha is to keep the issue alive, he added. CPI(M) and Naxalite leaders close to Red Star members trenched at Bhangar said the proposed Power Grid Corporation project on 13.44 acres involves setting up of towers and hi-tension transmission cables. This, they said, would not only cause inconveniences to farmers but affect real estate value of the land on which some big projects have already been planned. Farmers, who had sold land in much cheaper rate for the projects, now want market rate for their plots. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON While Bengal is still simmering in the land agitation at Bhangar on the fringes of Kolkata, a new chapter of protest was inaugurated in Bolpur of Birbhum district in south Bengal with villagers agitating against a proposed university that will be set up on a 20-acre plot of land. On Monday more than 100 villagers descended on the plot of land -- nabout 20 acre -- and smashed an under-construction boundary wall. They also set tyres of fire and placed them along the boundary. Villagers armed with iron rods and sticks broke a temporary shed where the construction workers were staying and chased them away. Speaking at a teachers conference in Kolkata on January 7, chief minister Mamata Banerjee announced that her government will set up the university close to Tagores Visva Bharati. We will build this Biswa Bangla university for which land has been identified. Work will commence soon, she said. On January 14 the chief minister surveyed the plot and the district administration was preparing for construction activity from early March. A road block in Bhangar on the fringes of Kolkata that erupted in agitation by villagers protesting against a power grid project. (HT Photo) The area is politically dominated by Trinamool Congress and its formidable district president Anubrata Mondal. Incidentally, various Left parties have called a rally in Kolkata on Monday to protest against the Bhangar power grid project and in support of the agitators. In 2001 the land was acquired by the Left Front government through West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation for setting up industry. The 20-acre plot is a part of a 300-acre stretch where a IT hardware park and a theme city are also coming up. The land owners received compensation too. On Monday, the angry villagers chiefly consisted of sharecroppers who were not paid any compensation. While they numbered around 60, some locals also joined in pushing the number above 100. When the government took the land, they told us it was for industry. It will give jobs to some local youths which will not be possible if a university comes up, said Sheikh Yusuf of Kashipur village. His uncles land was acquired by the government. Sudhir Kumar Nilkanth, police super of Birbhum, A team has rushed there led by the subdivisional police officer. We have posted a team there. Some Naxals and local CPI(M) supporters have misled the villagers, said Anubrata Mondal. The agitators were demanding that the land was taken for industry and they wanted only industrial units there. Birbhum, principally known for Tagores Santiniketan and Visva-Bharati university, is one of the backward districts of the state where agriculture is the chief economic activity. A couple of years ago, the district witnessed frequent clashes between BJP and Trinamool supporters. Shia cleric Maulana Kalbe Jawad has appealed to Muslims not to vote for the Samajwadi Party (SP)-Congress alliance in the UP assembly election. Jawad said other clerics and he were in talks with other political parties and will soon announce whom the Muslims should vote for. He appealed to all voters of the state to exercise their franchise during the polls. Jawad alleged that the Congress always harmed the cause of Muslims and did hardly anything for the community when it was in power at the centre for 50-60 years. The Samajwadi Party also cheated us and hardly did anything for Muslims in the last five years in UP. They promised to give (job) reservation to Muslims but did nothing, he said at a press conference at Sibtainabad Imambada in Hazratganj area here on Monday. Since ideologically Akhilesh Yadav is with Rahul Gandhi, there is no doubt in my mind that the alliance will not prove beneficial for the Muslims. Hence, I make an appeal to one and all not to vote for this alliance, he said. Maulana said instead of giving reservation, the Samajwadi Party gave land to construct burial ground for Muslims. Many other Shia and Sunni religious leaders were present in the press conference. Jawad also said Muslims suffered due to the numerous riots, including major ones, that had rocked the state. Be it the Muzaffarnagar riots or the Akhlaq episode, Muslims were left homeless. Instead of constructing their houses, the Samajwadi Party spent crores of rupees on the Saifai Mahotsav where women danced. This money could have been used for constructing houses for riot victims, he said. He claimed that the Samajwadi Party cheated Muslims and Yadavs. I have records to prove that the Samajwadi Party (SP) gave jobs only to Yadavs of Etawah and Mainpuri, he said. When asked if the clerics will appeal to Muslims to vote for BJP or BSP, he said, The ulema are in touch with different political parties. We will announce whom to vote for in a day or two. He said after Rahul Gandhi and Akhilesh Yadavs joint press conference and road show on Sunday, SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav said in an interview that he was not happy with the alliance. A father knows his son better, Jawad said. Jawad said chief minister Akhilesh Yadav had cheated the people of the state as most of the development projects that he announced were incomplete. I have myself seen that nearly 125 km work on the Agra Expressway is incomplete. A lot of work is left in Metro rail project, he said. Asked if the educated voters of today will follow his appeal, he laughed and said only time will tell. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Former bandit Malkhan Singh, the symbol of terror in the Chambal ravines of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh in the 1970s, may campaign for Ajit Singhs Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) in the assembly polls. Ajit Singh formally inducted the 72-year-old former dacoit into the party three days ago appointing him as a member of the party national executive albeit in a hush-hush manner, party sources confirmed. Though RLD leaders including Ajit Singh were not available for comment, Malkhan Singh confirmed that he had joined the RLD and would campaign for the party that has been pushed to the margins. I joined the RLD recently and will now certainly campaign for the party candidates with all the might at select places for the UP assembly polls if I am asked to, he told HT over phone from Gwalior where he currently stays. He, however, said he was not going to contest election for now. This is the first time that the dreaded ex-bandit will canvass for any political party in UP. He had earlier campaigned for the Congress and the BJP in Madhya Pradesh but never officially joined either of these two parties. I campaigned for the Congress and the BJP in MP but both the parties let me down, adding Now, I am with Ajit Singh and will do my bit to strengthen the party. Read | Ajit Singhs RLD mulls over an informal tie-up with BJP Asked why he has joined hands with Ajit Singh after campaigning for BJP and praising Modi in 2014, he said he was a free bird and could support any party he wished. When ministers, MPs and MLAs can change loyalties, why cant I? he asked. He said the Congress-SP alliance was an opportunistic one and would not work. Though Akhilesh Yadav is a nice person, a party like the Congress that ruled the country for so many years should have not entered into an alliance with the SP. This will demoralize the Congress workers, said he. Malkhan Singh who loves being called Dadda, ruled the Chambal ravines in MP and UP for nearly 15 years striking terror in the heart of the people in the two states. He surrendered before then MP chief minister, Arjun Singh in 1982. Sources said Malkhan Singh who belongs to the Lodh caste and took to guns due to caste war may influence Lodh voters especially in Bundelkhand districts sharing border with MP, if he is roped in for canvassing. With his attractive personality, a 6ft Malkhan Singh was seen drawing a good crowed when he campaigned for BJPs Narendra Tomar in Lok Sabha polls in 2014, said an RLD leader. Malkhan Singhs induction into the RLD is being seen as a part of Ajit Singhs aggressive strategy to save his party from political oblivion after it was left in the lurch by prospective alliance partners. On Sunday, Ajit Singh released the 10th list of party candidates with 25 names. The RLD has now announced a total of 225 candidates for the 403-seat Assembly. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Renowned sand sculptor Sudarsan Pattnaik appealed to the youth to vote in large numbers in the UP assembly polls through some amazing creations of some students at the Sangam on Sunday. Pattnaik was on his maiden visit to the city on the invitation of district administration for creating voter awareness through his unique art. He and DM Sanjay Kumar supervised the Namame Gange sand art competition. The artist also gave some useful tips to students who tried their hands at sand creations. Hundreds of onlookers gathered near these sculptures and also appreciated the work done by students and Pattnaik. I was surprised to see the beautiful sand sculptures made by around 60 students. Through the sand art, I want to give message to people to vote in large numbers in UP elections. Voting is a national duty and every voter should participate in the electoral process, said Pattnaik, while talking to Hindustan Times. The other thing that has left me surprised is the mega arrangement at the Magh Mela. I have been to many countries but nothing could match the breathtaking beauty of Sangam, Magh Mela and sea gulls. Even as thousands of people are residing in Magh Mela, the mela area is so clean and beautiful. It is rarely seen elsewhere, he added. Pattnaik said they were on the way to creating another world record by creating the worlds largest sand castle in Odisha. District magistrate Sanjay Kumar said they had launched a month-long voter awareness drive. The 2008 Malegaon blast accused, Lt Colonel Shrikant Purohit claimed before the Bombay High Court on Monday that there existed little evidence against him and that he was being falsely incriminated in the case. Purohit went on to recount before the court how he had killed many terrorists while in service, and prevented an infiltration bid, thus, attempting to establish that he was a patriot who had risked his own security for the nation and hence, could not have taken part in any terrorist activity himself. Purohits counsel advocate Shrikant Shivade read out from his service record telling the court that while in service, Purohit had killed three terrorists...risking his own life and safety.. that he displayed courage in the face of hostile fire.. The submissions came while the court was hearing a plea filed by Purohit seeking bail in the case. During the previous hearing, Purohit had argued that the Maharashtra Anti-terrorism Squad (ATS) had fabricated evidence in the case to incriminate him, and that, such injudiciousness on part of the ATS was a substantive ground for him to seek bail. He has claimed in his plea that he has been in detention for eight years and that his bail plea has consistently been denied by a special court since 2010. He has also urged the court to consider that in its supplementary chargesheet filed before the special court last year, the NIA had dropped the stringent charge of MCOCA against all accused in the case including him. He has argued that while the NIA has now suggested that Purohit and the others who are still facing trial in the case, be tried under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) that still remains valid, the provisions of UAPA that has rather stringent conditions on bail should not be applied to his case retrospectively. HC is likely to continue the hearing on Purohits plea on Wednesday. Also read: 2008 Malegaon blast accused tells HC that ATS implicated him City activists have threatened to file a criminal case against chief minister Devendra Fadnavis and MSRDC minister Eknath Shinde for allegedly favouring the toll operator on the Mumbai-Pune Expressway while it fleeces motorists. According to the activists, the toll operator has already recovered the estimated revenue two-and-a-half-years before their contract ends. They have threatened to file the case against the CM if the government fails to revoke the toll contract on the expressway. The toll operator IRB had secured the rights to collect the toll on the 94-km expressway till March 31, 2019 after making an upfront payment Rs918 crore in 2004. As per the contract, the expected toll revenue till 2018-19 was Rs2,869 crore. But as per the figures provided by the contractor, they (IRB) have crossed that figure in October 2016. Between 2004 and December 2016, the toll operator has collected Rs 2,923 crore, toll activist Sanjay Shirodkar claimed. RTI activist Vivek Velankar said that he had informed Fadnavis office about the excess recovery of the toll. I have mailed the required documents to the CM on November 26 and have been following up, but so far there has been no action, he said. Here Shirodkar added, If the government does not revoke the contract within 15 days, we will file a complaint with the Anti-Corruption Bureau against the CM, MSRDC minister and the responsible officials under the Prevention of Corruption Act and conspiracy-abetment. He added, We can even take this matter to court, if required. IRB, however, claimed that the toll collection on the Expressway is being done as per the concession agreement. IRB has shared all relevant factual information with the respective authorities in state government from time to time, a spokesperson from IRB Infrastructure Developers Ltd said. Meanwhile, MSRDC officials said that there has been no excess recovery. Kiran Kurundkar, joint managing director, MSRDC said, The toll collection is in line with the concession agreement. There is no clause to terminate the contract if the contractor reaches the target before its estimated time. A senior official said, The contractor took the risk of borrowing money considering it was Indias first expressway and quoted a price after due diligence to bag the contract. Now, whatever the contractor earns after meeting the target is their profit. Also read: 2 drunk men killed while crossing Mumbai-Pune e-way near Panvel SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) has now cracked the whip on Thadomal Shahani Engineering College (TSEC) in Bandra, asking them to transfer all its students to nearby colleges, after the institute failed to obtain an occupancy certificate for the top two floors of one of its buildings. The move came months after it forced two engineering colleges in Sion and Nerul to shift some students to other institutes. The AICTE directed the state's Directorate of Technical Education (DTE) to transfer all students, who were admitted to the Bandra institute in the current academic year. In June, the Bombay High Court (HC) had directed the college to furnish the occupancy certificate within four months. Gopakumaran Thampi, principal, TSEC, said that the college had finished the formalities of getting the certificate. "We expect the certificate shortly, but the AICTE in its over-enthusiasm, asked us to shift the students. We will consult our lawyers and seek an intervention from the Supreme Court or HC," he adds. Earlier, in October, the AICTE had ordered the transfer of over 30 freshers from SIES Graduate School of Technology at Nerul to other institutes, after the college failed to meet the conditions laid down by the HC. A month before that, around 400 students from Padmabhushan Vasantdada Patil Pratishthan's (PVPP) College of Engineering at Sion were moved to other colleges following a Supreme Court decision to put a conditional stay on an HC order that allowed the college to conduct admissions for the academic year. The AICTE has taken a tough stand against the state's engineering colleges that didn't fulfil norms. PVPP and TSEC are among the seven colleges in the state that were barred from admitting any student this academic year. Several other colleges, including SIES, had their intake reduced by the technical education body. When the colleges moved HC, it allowed them to admit the students, albeit with some time-bound conditions. Earlier this month, activists belonging to the Citizen Forum for Sanctity in Educational System, a Thane-based non-government organisation, had written to the AICTE, seeking action against TSEC, as the college had failed to meet teh HC's condition in the stipulated time. The college maintained that the apex body's actions against them were part of a "witch hunt" that was being conducted on behalf of some education activists. "It appears that these activists are being harboured by some rival institutes. The AICTE has targeted us when there are much worse institutes in the city," said an official from TSEC. READ MORE Campus cocktail: Traditional courses score in city colleges SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON A small-time trader of tailoring materials in Nalasopara has alleged that banks have refused to let him deposit a sum of Rs19,000 in coins of Rs10. Khalil Ali Shaikh owns a shop in Santosh Bhuvan, Nalasopara, and earns his living mostly in coins and loose change. Last week, he visited two banks- the Bank of Maharashtra (Waliv, Vasai branch) and Union Bank of India(Fatherwadi branch, Vasai) where he holds accounts, and requested the tellers to accept his deposit in coins of Rs10. None of the banks accepted my coins, and told me to come the next day. When I visited the banks again, they told me that have no time to count so many coins, said Shaikh. Since the past week I have kept the money in my shop, but fear for its safety, as the coins can be robbed easily, said Shaikh. When contacted, Naresh Gaikwad, manager of the Union Bank of India, said, It takes time to count the 1,900 coins, and Shaikh usually came when the banking hours were about to close. We have told him to come on January 30, when the bank reopens early for the week. We will then try to deposit the coins in his account or get it exchanged, said Gaikwad. We do not have the machinery or staff to detect whether the coins are genuine or fake, and it takes time to physically count and examine each and every coin at the counter, when there are huge lines of customers on a working day, he added. Also read: RBI rejects ECs plea for raising cash-withdrawal limit for election candidates Member of Parliament and senior NCP leader Supriya Sule on Monday blamed the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for corruption in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC). I think the BJP is equally responsible for the corruption in the BMC in all these years. They were partners in crime. Why doesnt BJP talk about corruption in the last 22 years, Sule said while talking about BJPs split with Shiv Sena and the formers allegations against its ally over corruption. Sule during a candid chat at the HT office also questioned BJP for saying that all only the Sena is causing corruption and not them and termed the split a move about high-morality politics. I dont believe in this theory. If my municipal corporator will make money, I will be equally responsible for that. You cant say that I am sorry, I am clean but my guy is corrupt and I am looking the other way. I dont take this extra high morality ways to escape from the responsibility, Sule said taking on BJP. Sule and Mumbai NCP chief Sachin Ahir interacted with the Hindustan Times journalists ahead of the Mumbai civic polls. In the run up to the Mumbai civic elections, Sena and BJP are locked in a bitter tussle and have been blaming each other over allegations of corruption in the civic body. This election is not only about bickering between some people and calling goons to each other. I am really concerned about the kind of governance they are going to give us. We really need an alternative. They are only calling each other corrupt. What should I do as a citizen.? After getting shocked and disappointed, who do I turn to? We, the Congress and the NCP, had never called each other corrupt and criminals, Sule said. Also read Corruption in BMC? What about dirt in PM Modis pet Swachh Bharat mission, Sena asks BJP Shiv Sena MP blames Devendra Fadnavis for all scams in Mumbai civic body SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Last week, when Taher Fakhruddin, the son of Khuzaima Qutbuddin, the claimant to the spiritual leadership of the Dawoodi Bohras, was crowned the 54th Dai, or head, of the sect, in Thane, his supporters published data from their online forum to argue that the breakaway group was collecting followers. The group said 11 million people had visited the website in one year and more than 500,000 were unique visitors. The numbers, they said, suggested that there were tens of thousands of Bohras who were their discreet supporters. The numbers, they claimed, were substantial as the Dawoodi Bohras, a mercantile community, has around one million members worldwide. The claim has been dismissed by the representatives of Mufaddal Saiffudin who succeeded his father, Syedna Mohammed Burhanuddin, who died in January 2014, as the 53rd head of the larger faction. Qutbuddin, Burhanuddins half-brother, had filed a suit in Bombay high court challenging his nephews appointment to the seat. When Qutbuddin died in March 2016, the court dispute had reached the trial stage. He had appeared in court and answered more than 600 questions on the dispute. There are only one million Dawoodi Bohras; are they saying that half of them are their supporters? asked a spokesperson from the community. We are not concerned with what they do, as we have no connection with them. Since their separation, the fledging group has created an interim headquarters in Thane and 50 centres across the world. Calling themselves Qutbuddin Bohras, they have their mosque, burial ground and a residential colony in Thane. Though their numbers are minuscule the group said that this is because people are afraid to declare their loyalty openly a former judge, a prominent business family and a top lawyer are rumoured to have joined the group. The dispute over succession, about which there were rumours even when Burhanuddin was alive, became a public dispute after his death. Though the Syednas preside over the community as hereditary though not always leaders, they call themselves the representatives of Imams the line of successors to Islams prophet who went into seclusion after disputing claims over the title. The community has a history of splits. Dawoodi Bohras are part of the Shia sect that broke away from the Sunnis after a dispute over the successor to Islams prophet. A book that formed part of the Ethnographic Survey, Central Provinces, documented five splits. Other experts have said there have been more. The Qutbuddins are an addition to breakaway groups likes Jafferias, Sulaimani and Mahdibagwalla Bohras. Protests against the powerful clergy in the 1960s and 1970s created a group who call themselves Reformist Bohras, who do not acknowledge a religious leader and manage their spiritual affairs through an elected trust. Fakhruddins followers have said that the crowning of the new leader will have no bearing on the case, which will go on. My father was the second-in-command for 50 years (the tenure of Burhanuddin), said Abdeali Qutbuddin, Fakhruddins brother. The new group has they have liberal views on issues such as female genital mutilation called female circumcision by supporters which is practised by the group. When groups of Bohra women started a campaign to get the practice banned, the head of the main sect said that the custom was compulsory; the breakaway group said that girls can chose to undergo the practice when they became adults. The Qutbuddins, however, said that they believe in following the tradition. We believe there is a Syedna who is the head of the community. Reformists have an issue with that, said Abdeali. We believe in following tradition, and tradition has room for liberty, transparency everything the reformists have been asking for. Saifuddin Insaf, a member of the reformist section and an Islamic scholar did not think that the new group was liberal in its outlook. The coronation itself is anti-Islamic. They are projecting themselves as liberal to attract followers. Read Bohra leader urging female genital mutilation is huge disappointment for India campaign Will breakaway Bohra groups liberal views on FGM win followers? Bohra diaspora responds to anti-FGM campaign SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Mumbai Congress released on Monday a chargesheet about the 20-year Shiv Sena-Bhartiya Janata Party rule in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation. The so-called chargesheet claims the allies had failed on all fronts, from water supply to roads, health, waste management and education. Former union minister and Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, who released the chargesheet said he has seen Mumbai deteriorating. The Congress has been targeting the Sena, BJP and their rule in the civic body over scams. The party demanded a third-party audit on scams. It claimed that while an audit of 25% of the budget was mandatory, the BMC did not conduct one from 2007 to 2010. The party said the BMC was facing corruption charges in desilting work and dumping ground management, and spent Rs1 lakh crore without any audit. The documents also claim citizens were forced to bear additional costs for water, owing to leakage of 30% in the supply system. It said roads were riddled with potholes when BMC spent Rs28,000 crore in a decade. Tharoor asked voters to give the Congress a chance, after electing Sena-BJP four times before. I have lived here during my childhood. Over the years, it has deteriorated on various fronts such as infrastructure and lack of amenities, Tharoor said. Mumbai Congress chief Sanjay Nirupam claimed the BJP said it would also release a chargesheet. The BJP s chargesheet will be against the Sena for their rule in the BMC. It is such irony that the BJP is targeting its ally, after sharing power with it in the civic body for years. Read: Saffron allies split may bring Congress, NCP closer BJP equally responsible for corruption in Mumbai civic body: Supriya Sule Shiv Sena hits BJP with its own no transparency claim A Bhiwandi court on Monday adjourned the proceedings of a case against Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi for allegedly defaming the defaming the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) over the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi to March 3 when charges will likely be framed. Rahul Gandhis lawyer said they have not received certain significant documents in the case. The complainants have not given us complete documents such as the entire newspapers. We were instead given only cuttings of articles. We want the entire newspapers that the complainant has submitted in court as we want to know about the page, the dates on which the alleged speech articles have appeared on, said Narayan Iyer, his counsel. However, Iyer had asked court to adjourn the case to March 10 but the court refused. The court proceedings coincided with Mahatma Gandhis 69th death anniversary. Before the start of the court proceedings, Rahul Gandhi interacted with his team of lawyers Ashok Mundargi and Narayan Iyer. Our battle is against the ideology which killed Mahatma Gandhi and which is removing him even from the posters, said Rahul Gandhi while speaking to the media. He further added that Mahatma Gandhi is in the hearts of Indians and he cannot be removed. Complainant Rajesh Kunte, an RSS worker, said in the court that Congress leader had defamed the Hindu right-wing organisation by blaming it for the murder of the Father of the Nation. Mahatma Gandhi was shot dead by a Hindu nationalist, Nathuram Godse, on January 30, 1948 in the then Bombay. In November last year, the magistrates court had granted bail to Rahul Gandhi in the case but asked him to attend proceedings on January 30. The Bombay high court turned down the Congress leaders plea to quash the criminal defamation case but had exempted him from personal appearance. He then moved Supreme Court with a special leave petition for permission to challenge the HC dismissal of his plea but later withdrew the plea, expressing readiness to face trial. Read more RSS, BJP hit out at Rahul over defamation case; Cong says he wont apologise Rahul defamation case: RSS says Cong think tank intellectually bankrupt SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON A day after chief minister Devendra Fadnavis attacked the Shiv Sena, calling it a party of extortionists, Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray said the former is becoming a chief minister of goons. Thackeray trained his guns on the BJP, accusing them of spoiling the name of Maharashtra and warrior king Chhatrapati Shivaji. He also ridiculed the BJPs attempt to compare Fadnavis with Lord Krishna, for his role during alliance talks between the two parties. No one becomes Prime Minister by giving a speech from the Red Fort. Similarly, no one becomes Lord Krishna by claiming to be him, said Thackeray, in reference to Mumbai BJP chief Ashish Shelars comments that the Sena chief was Duryodhana and Fadnavis was Lord Krishna, at a rally on Saturday. In a stinging response to Thackerays decision to walk away from the alliance, Fadnavis on Saturday called the Sena a party of extortionists whose dominance over Mumbai for the past 25 years was a huge loss to Mumbai. The CM blamed the saffron alliance split on the Senas refusal to agree to a transparency agenda. The stage has been set for a war between both parties to win power over the countrys richest civic body. After snapping ties, the parties have been targeting each other over various issues including corruption, development. Meanwhile, the BJP criticised Thackeray for his response, saying he could not digest criticism. The chief ministers speech on transparency was appreciated by all citizens, but rivals could not digest this fact, said BJP spokesperson Madhav Bhandari. Also read How the polite, shy Uddhav Thackeray made the Shiv Sena roar Five hard-hitting statements from Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackerays speech against BJP on Jan 26 In a major reprieve for Lawyers Collective the NGO run by former additional solicitor general Indira Jaising the Bombay high court issued an interim order on Monday, restraining the charity commissioner from attaching the organisations assets and accounts. Justice MS Sonak observed that while the Foreign Contributions Regulations Act (FCRA) gave the Union government power to regulate or even prevent associations from accepting foreign funds, it did not permit the government to stifle the very functioning of individuals or associations. The court directed that the domestic and non-FCRA bank accounts of the organisation be de-freezed on the condition that the NGO file quarterly reports detailing the use of these funds. In November last year, the Union ministry of home affairs (MHA) had permanently cancelled the organisations FCRA registration, alleging the misuse of foreign funds. The ministry had directed that the NGOs bank accounts be frozen and its assets attached. The MHA had issued similar orders for Greenpeace India, and activist Teesta Setalvads NGOs Sabrang Trust and Citizens for Justice and Peace. Jaising, her spouse and senior advocate Anand Grover one of the trustees of Lawyers Collective had accused the Union government of political vendetta at the time. Jaising claimed that she was being targeted as she had fought cases against Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Amit Shah. Lawyers Collective approached the Bombay high court through senior advocates Aspi Chinoy and Jamshed Mistry, arguing that the MHA order that draws upon sections 22 and 15 of the FCRA was erroneous and that the sections had been misinterpreted. Advocate Chinoy argued that FCRA provisions permitted the disposal of assets only with regard to defunct organisations. He added that Lawyers Collective was an existing entity that conducted extensive legal research in the fields of health and social justice. He said the organisation had come to a standstill as the MHA had prohibited it from accessing its own domestic accounts. Additional solicitor general Anil Singh argued on behalf of the Union government, saying the MHAs cancellation order was valid as the trustees of Lawyers Collective had diverted the NGOs money towards personal gains. He said the NGO had also illegally transferred money to Hungary and Malaysia, a part of which had been received in non-designated accounts. He said the NGO had failed to provide details regarding how it spent this money. Justice Sonak observed that some of the allegations levelled by MHA were quite vague. He added that since the appeal would be taken up for a final hearing to decide upon the legality of the MHAs decision, it would not be appropriate for the NGOs functioning to be halted in the meantime. Read Indira Jaisings NGO Lawyers Collective suspended for 6 months Govt cancels foreign funding licence of Indira Jaisings NGO SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Bombay high court pulled up the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation for shifting the responsibility of allotting a plot for a cemetery in Bandra and Khar to the state government A division bench of chief justice Dr Manjula Chellur and justice GS Kulkarni was hearing a petition filed by Furqan Qureshi in April last year. Qureshis petition said there was no cemetery for the Sunni Muslim community in Bandra and Khar, forcing people to use the one at Juhu, Santacruz or Bandra (East) all of which were far for residents of Bandra (West) and Khar (West). Through his lawyer, Ashraf Shaikh, the petitioner asked that land be allotted in the area. When the petition first came for hearing, the civic body and the state government brushed off the responsibility, and began shifting the burden on the other. The corporations affidavit indicates that they are shifting the responsibility of allotting a place for the kabrastan (cemetery) for the community in question to the government. The government pleader said the municipality has to find a place. We fail to understand the stand of both the state and the corporation, which are meant for the welfare of the public, but keep shifting responsibility to each other, the court observed after the first hearing on December 22 last year. The court asked the corporation to file an affidavit on the status of the allotment of land. On January 20, the corporation told the court no place had been allotted for a cemetery. We are unable to accept the corporations statement that they have not earmarked anything in the special planning area block A for the cemetery, the court said. The court asked the BMC to file a fresh affidavit in two weeks. Read HC asks if state has a policy to address shortage of burial space in Mumbai How a Mumbai cemetery tour turned into a debate on religion and menstrual rules To save trees, 3 Mumbai crematoriums to stop using wood SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi reiterated in Bhiwandi on Monday that he and his partys fight was against the ideology that killed Mahatma Gandhi. He also criticised Bharatiya Janata Party-led Union government for swapping Gandhis picture on the Khadi calendar with that of Prime Minister Narendra Modis. While speaking to the media after the adjournment of his case in Bhiwandi court, Gandhi said, My fight is against an ideology which killed Mahatma Gandhi and also the one that swapped his picture. Gandhi, did not address the party workers, like he did during his November visit to the court. During his last visit, which was days after the note ban announced by the Modi government, he had also stopped at bank at Santacruz in Mumbai and interacted with people standing in queues. The Congress vice-president, while quoting Mahatma Gandhis ideology of standing straight in favour of independence, said he was fighting against the people (the Modi government ) who want to impose an autocratic rule that suppresses the common man. He also had appealed to party leaders and workers to be ready for the fight against the government. Rahul Gandhi has been sued by a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh worker over his comments at a rally in 2014-elections blaming RSS for Mahatma Gandhis assassination. Also read Court adjourns hearing in RSS defamation case against Rahul Gandhi till March 3 Rahul defamation case: RSS says Cong think tank intellectually bankrupt The Bombay high court on Monday dismissed a petition raising concerns over the razing of 33 hectares of Aarey Colonys green cover situated in a no development zone (NDZ) to construct a Metro car shed. The division bench of chief justice Manjula Chellur and justice Girish Kulkarni fined the petitioner, Zoru Bathena, Rs 50,000, observing that he intended to make the petition a platform to seek information under the Right to Information (RTI) Act. The 41-year-old activist had asked the high court to direct the urban development department to give him information about the proposal to revise the citys development plan (DP). He stated that the proposal includes a plan to razing part of Aarey Colony to construct a car shed for the Metro 3 line, which runs between SEEPZ, Andheri and Colaba. He had also sought information as to why the car shed could not be constructed at an alternative site at Kanjurmarg. He sought an interim order preventing the department from proceeding with the proposed modification to the DP. He stated that according to a notice published on January 4, objections and suggestions can be made to the DP. Bathenas counsel said that he applied for information under the RTI Act and found out that more than 5,000 trees would be cut to construct the car shed. However, he was provided with incomplete data and thus could not file any objections to the DP, though he intended to do so. She added that the hearing on objections and suggestions to the DP would become a mere formality if the public was not given complete information about the proposed modification. However, the judges were unimpressed. They noted that the RTI Act has provisions enabling people to appeal if they do not receive complete information. The petitioner apparently wanted to cut short the procedure prescribed by the RTI Act, said the bench. It asked him to deposit the fine with the Maharashtra State Legal Services Authority within two weeks. Read 5,012 trees will make way for Metro-3 project in Mumbai Aarey Colony metro depot:Officials and activists spar on twitter Metro III car shed: The beginning of the end of Aarey in Mumbai? Days after the Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) split and went on tirades against each other, a tactical tie-up between the Shiv Sena and the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) seems to be in the offing. The MNS aims to prevent the BJP from gaining an upper hand in the civic polls by not fielding candidates against the Shiv Senas sitting corporators in the contentious Dadar-Mahim belt. MNS leader Bala Nandgoankar went to Matoshree the residence of Sena president Uddhav Thackeray on Sunday, to convey party chief Raj Thackerays desire to form a tactical tie-up for the BMC polls. As Uddhav refused to meet Nandgaonkar, the leader spoke to senior Shiv Sena members such as Anil Parab and Anil Desai, as well as Uddhavs personal assistant Milind Narvekar. Nandgaonkar told them Raj sought an informal alliance in a bid to avoid a division of Marathi votes. In turn, Raj asked the Shiv Sena not to field candidates in wards where the MNS has sitting corporators. The Shiv Sena leaders assured Nandgaonkar that they would talk to Uddhav and then get back to him. A section of the Shiv Sena, led by former chief minister Manohar Joshi, said an alliance was necessary. They contended that winning margins are thin and thus the party should avail of help from every quarter to counter the aggressive BJP. Another faction of Shiv Sena leaders is against an alliance with the MNS, fearing that it will give a boost to the rival party. We have already finalised the names of candidates for a majority of seats. The MNS is currently extremely weak and it wields influence in areas where we are strong. If we yield a few seats to them, there will be a rebellion in our strongholds, said a Shiv Sena leader who did not wish to be identified. Shiv Sena leaders said Raj was attempting to put pressure on the BJP and keep his allies close at the same time. Raj wants the BJP to come to his aid. However, unlike the Congress, the BJP does not yield much to Raj, he said. By broaching the topic of a tie-up, the MNS is also eyeing the Shiv Senas support for the Nashik municipal corporation elections. BJP may declare its first list by Tuesday On Sunday, senior BJP leaders including chief minister Devendra Fadnavis discussed the names of candidates and chalked out strategies to be adopted to tackle its former ally, the Shiv Sena, and other political parties. Party sources confirmed that they may release a list of candidates by Tuesday. Candidates in wards under its three parliamentary constituencies have been finalised, while candidates for the other seats will be finalised by Monday. We have decided on 120 candidates comprising three parliamentary constituencies Mumbai north central, Mumbai north and Mumbai north east. We have called for a meeting on Monday to decide candidates for Mumbai south, Mumbai south central and Mumbai north west, said a senior party functionary, who did not wish to be identified. Read Mumbai civic polls mirror Raj Thackerays declining clout Raj Thackeray to go it alone in civic polls Upping the ante against its ally Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Shiv Sena on Monday said chief minister Devendra Fadnavis will be sent home if he continued to level charges against it in the run up to the local body polls. The remarks from the bickering ally came after Fadnavis hit out at it at a BJP rally here on Saturday, close on the heels of the Sena deciding against a pre-poll pact with the senior partner for civic polls in Mumbai and other cities across the state. Read: Fadnavis: Shiv Sena is a party of extortionists They (BJP leaders) have been talking about building a Ram Temple for the last 28 years and duping people in the name of Uniform Civil Code. Now, they intend to give Mumbai into the hands of rich people.... if the CM continues to level low grade charges against the Shiv Sena, for time being it has left him only with a sore throat but tomorrow he will be sent home, the Sena said in an editorial in party mouthpiece Saamana. The allusion was to Fadnaviss sore throat while he made the hard hitting speech against the Sena. Read: Mumbai civic polls: Allies no more, Shiv Sena, BJP ready for Maha war The Sena said the work done by the party in the metropolis is the mantra for its victory and that it does not need goons and extortionists to win elections. In states like UP and Goa, Fadnaviss party has opened a special window to induct goons and criminals. In Maharashtra, they have wide-opened doors to induct such people. Show a certificate that you are a rapist, murderer, corrupt and gain entry into the party. This is the package being offered by them, the Sena charged. The split between the Shiv Sena and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the absence of alliance between the Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) have made the fight for the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) multi-cornered. What this means is many candidates may win with narrow margins, making it all the more important for you to cast your vote. In the 2012 BMC elections, the winning margin was less than 500 votes for 35-odd seats, while the number of such winning seats in 2007 was just 28. This time, the division of votes could make winning tougher for the candidates and political parties, according to political analysts. For the first time in the past more than two decades, all major political parties are contesting the elections for the countrys richest civic body separately. The ruling parties in the civic body have snapped ties, as old as 22 years, over disagreement on the number of seats to be shared. Similarly, the Congress and NCP, too, are contesting on their own, after having teamed up in the 2012 elections. Moreover, Asaddudin Owaisi-led All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM), Samajwadi Party and Maharashtra Navnirman Sena are fielding sizable candidates. Each vote will count for candidates. Mumbai has not seen such a competition in the recent history of BMC polls. It will be a neck-and-neck fight and winning margin will be narrow, political analyst Pratap Asbe told HT. The Sena has a stronghold in the Marathi heartland and the BJPs support used to help the saffron alliance bring in votes from non-Marathi communities such as Gujaratis and north Indians. With this combination, they dominated the BMC for about two decades. But this time, the BJP will try to make inroads in the strong bastion of Sena along with non-Marathi votes. A closer look at the 2012 BMC results shows of the 35 seats, the Congress won 11, while the Sena stood second by winning seven seats. The Congress got the second position on 13 seats. In the 2012 polls, both the Congress and the NCP contested the BMC elections together and won 65 seats (Congress-52 and NCP-13) of the total 227 seats. But now they will contest against each other and the AIMIM is likely to eat into Congress traditional minority votes. Similarly, Marathi votes are likely to be mainly divided among the Shiv Sena, MNS and BJP. The multi-cornered fight will result in narrow margin victories, as municipal wards are smaller compared to Assembly constituencies. Votes of each ward may be split into four to five candidates and in some cases, even among six candidates depending on the profiles of the wards. This will definitely make it a close contest, said Prakash Bal, political analyst. Read In battle for BMC, spotlight on Marathi manoos Can smaller parties sway major players voters? Mumbai civic polls: Shiv Sena calls BJP wild bull, rules out future tie-up with BJP SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi is likely to appear before a court in Maharashtras Bhiwandi for allegedly defaming the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) over the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi. The magistrates court is likely to frame charges against Gandhi in the case filed by an RSS worker who said Congress leader had defamed the Hindu right-wing organisation by blaming it for the killing of the Father of the Nation. Mahatma Gandhi was shot dead by a Hindu nationalist, Nathuram Godse, on January 30, 1948 in then Bombay. In November last year, the magistrates court had granted bail to Rahul Gandhi in the case but asked him to attend proceedings on January 30. The Bombay high court turned down the Congress leaders plea to quash the criminal defamation case but had exempted him from personal appearance. He then moved Supreme Court with a special leave petition for permission to challenge the HC dismissal of his plea but later withdrew the plea, expressing readiness to face trial. Meanwhile, the RSS on Monday accused the Gandhi family for creating disharmony and disintegrity in the country. RSS leader Rakesh Sinha said Rahul Gandhi has poor understanding of history and he makes remarks on politics and ideology according to his poor understanding. RSS is a reality, its force is creating unity and integrity in this country and it is their (Rahul Gandhis) family which has created disharmony and disintegrity in this country and has created a gap between rich and poor. It is their policy and their politics, he said. He expressed his readiness to face the trial after the top court refused to interfere with the criminal proceedings pending against him before the trial court. (With agency inputs) SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Shiv Sena has ruled out any alliance with the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS). Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray indicated he was not keen on any rapprochement with estranged cousin Raj Thackeray. A day after MNS leader Bala Nandgaonkar went to Matoshree (Uddhavs residence) seeking an alliance, the Sena chief said: I have not received any proposal. Anyway, the Sena is all prepared to go solo and we will win across Maharashtra. Uddhav did not entertain phone calls made by Raj seeking an alliance, Nandgaonkar said. The MNS leader, on Sunday, was not granted an audience by Uddhav and hence he had to be content meeting Sena leaders like Anil Desai, to whom he proposed an informal alliance. The aim, Nandgaonkar said, was to avoid division of Maharashtrian votes, thus preventing the BJP from gaining an upper hand. The proposal would include the MNS not fielding any candidates in constituencies where the Sena was strong and in return, the Sena would not field any candidates that had sitting MNS corporators. In case of the contentious Dadar-Mahim belt, there would be friendly fights and the strongest would win. Nandgaonkar now has assailed the Sena for its rebuff and said he had indeed submitted the proposal to the Sena. There was an overwhelming sentiment that the two parties should come together for the sake of Maharashtra. We had imposed no conditions and would have agreed to any seats left by the Sena. This would have immensely benefitted the Sena, said Nandgaonkar. He appealed to the Sena to reconsider its decision, saying there was still enough time. A similar situation arose during the 2014 assembly elections, when the BJP broke ties with the Sena. At that time, the Sena did take initiative, making Raj believe an alliance proposal was in the offing. However, Uddhav cut all communication, thus angering Raj. Currently, the MNS is in a bad shape, hit by both large-scale defections, the cash crunch as well as low morale among the workers. With the BJP launching an all-out attack on the Sena, Raj hoped to capitalise on it and woo the Sena. Read more: Shiv Sena hits BJP with its own no transparency claim SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The murder of Infosys engineer Rasila Raju OP at the companys Pune facility on Sunday has put the focus on security specifically the vetting of guards at tech companies. Following the incident, the police have called a meeting of IT companies, and the security and transport agencies they hire, with a view to beefing up security measures. Rasila, 25, from Kerala, was found murdered at her workstation on the ninth floor of Infosyss office at Hinjewadi IT Park near Pune late on Sunday evening. Within hours, the police apprehended security guard Bhaben Saikia, 26. Originally from Assam, Saikia was on his way there when he was arrested at CST in Mumbai. Police officials said while there were guidelines in place for IT companies and other agencies follow when recruiting staff, incidents such as these showed that more precaution was required. Very soon we will be meeting delegates from IT companies, security agencies and transport services to ensure that they follow our guidelines, said Vaishali Jadhav, assistant commissioner of police, Pune. The police said Saikia was an employee of Terrier Security Agency and deputed at Infosys, Pune, around six months ago. Before offering him a job, the security agency had done his character verification, which showed he had no criminal record, said deputy police commissioner Ganesh Shinde. To prevent incidents like this, agencies have to carry out additional checks for fool-proof vetting, he added. Women employees at Infosys who asked not to be named as they were not authorised to speak to the media told HT that while they had never worried for their safety on campus, even at night, the murder on Sunday night changed things. I often stay on campus when working on a project late at night. However, [the murder] has raised doubts and next time I will avoid being on campus alone, said a woman who has been with Infosys for three years. Another woman employee said, Many of us work on Sundays, when there fewer people on campus. We rely on security guards for our safety so this incident has shocked us. Most IT companies outsource their security to other firms, which are responsible for vetting their guards. On some occasions, security staff or drivers have been found to have been involved in crimes as they were not vetted properly, said Sunil Pailwan, previously associated with Hinjewadi Industries Association. Infosys maintained that it had followed all the guidelines while outsourcing its security to another firm. It is mandatory for our vendors to carry out background checks of their employees. For this employee (Saikia) too our vendor had done a background check. As far as Infosys is concerned, we ensure that the background checks are done regularly, said Sarah Gideon, corporate communications head, Infosys. According to estimates, more than 300 IT companies in and around Pune employ around four lakh people. Also read: Infosys techie murdered on Pune campus, security guard arrested SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Maharashtra government has implored schools to observe a token day in February to spread the importance of the Marathi language but education activists said that the state is turning a blind eye to the 250 Marathi-medium schools in the state that are on the verge of shutting down because of recent policies. School owners said that they will move the Bombay high court (HC) against the states school education department, which has refused to grant approvals to private Marathi-medium schools, which had sent proposals under the master plan finalised by the Congress government in 2012. The master plan was prepared in 2008 by mapping areas in need of new schools in rural areas. This was done amidst concerns on the acute shortage of Marathi-medium schools in areas that border other states, due to which students had to take admission in schools instructing in the neighbouring states language. The cabinet had taken a decision to grant permits to Marathi-medium schools in such regions. Owners said that the BJP-led government had put the master plan on hold. When we approach the officials to follow up on the status of these schools, we are told that the master plan has been scrapped and that the government is working on a new plan, said Deepak Pawar, convenor, Marathi Abhyas Kendra, which works towards the development of the language. Since the Right to Education Act, 2009 stipulates that schools cannot run without approvals, the department is pushing them to shut down. Bowing to the pressure, few have already started pulling down shutters; their students have been forced to transfer to other language schools. With no aid or approval from the government, the schools dont have the means to continue running, said Pawar. Teachers and principals are spending money from their own pockets to keep some of them afloat. In contrast, English-medium schools are getting speedy approvals, the owners alleged. There are several English schools flouting the RTE norms but the department is not cracking down on them, said Girish Samant, a school owner. Before moving court, the owners will appeal to the government for the last time this month. We have a meeting with Vinod Tawde, the education minister, and chief minister Devendra Fadnavis in Pune in the coming month, said Rajesh Pradhan, another school owner. If their pleas fall on deaf ears, the schools will launch a state-wide agitation and file a public interest litigation in the court, he added. Despite repeated calls and texts, Tawde and principal secretary Nanda Kumar refused to comment, citing the code-of-conduct, which is effective for the upcoming elections. But a senior education official said, We are working on different parameters to set up Marathi schools, they will be released once ready. READ MORE Maharashtra Education department wants schools to mark Feb 27 as Marathi Day SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Lalbaug flyover develops crack, was shut for sometime Following cracks on the expansion joints on the Lalbaug flyover (towards Byculla) on Monday morning, vehicular traffic had to be stopped on both, the north and south-bound sides, for sometime and it was later opened for light motor vehicle (LMV). Read Two senior aviation security officials in Mumbai fight over transfer before tribunal A worrying feud between two senior officials responsible for aviation security in India has come to light. The spat between Mumbais aviation security chief and the head of the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) began after the former was transferred to Imphal and involved a war of words too.Read Court adjourns hearing in RSS defamation case against Rahul Gandhi till March 3 A Bhiwandi court on Monday adjourned the proceedings of a case against Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi for allegedly defaming the defaming the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) over the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi to March 3 when charges will likely be framed. Read BJP equally responsible for corruption in Mumbai civic body: Supriya Sule Member of Parliament and senior NCP leader Supriya Sule on Monday blamed the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for corruption in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC). Read Trupti Desai to now fight for a liquor-free Maharashtra Bhoomata Brigade chief and gender rights activist Trupti Desai, who shot to fame for spearheading the agitation seeking parity to women over their restricted entry into places of worship, has now announced to launch a new campaign for a liquor-free Maharashtra. Read Bhoomata Brigade chief and gender rights activist Trupti Desai, who shot to fame for spearheading the agitation seeking parity to women over their restricted entry into places of worship, has now announced to launch a new campaign for a liquor-free Maharashtra. I am going to launch the statewide campaign soon, and it will start from Pune. There are more men who consume liquor but its the women who suffer most because of it. Liquor consumption also increases domestic violence; Hence I am keen on setting up Taigiri groups that would extend support to women suffering in such cases, Desai told PTI on Monday. If a district like Chandrapur can successfully implement a flat ban on liquor, why not entire Maharashtra state follow suit, Desai said. If Guardian ministers of each district initiate the process, liquor ban can be implemented in a few days, she felt. Desai alleged that the state government seems to be not concerned with key issues of liquor consumption and its impact on lives of people, especially women in this state. After holding a couple of meetings with the members of the Brigade, I will soon launch the campaign, Desai said. I am going to follow the path of Mahatma Gandhi during my agitation across the state. If the state fails to take appropriate steps, then I am going to intensify the agitation, Desai warned. Also read Trupti Desai: The voice for womens entry in Maharashtras temples Not just Jallikattu: Trouble brews when culture clashes with the law A worrying feud between two senior officials responsible for aviation security in India has come to light. The spat between Mumbais aviation security chief and the head of the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) began after the former was transferred to Imphal and involved a war of words too. The matter has come up after BS Tiwary, the deputy director with BCAS in Mumbai, challenged the transfer order citing life threat owing to militancy in Imphal and also accused BCAS chief Rajesh Chandra Kumar of criminal intimidation. According to transcripts of a conversation that preceded the move, Kumar allegedly threatened to send Tiwary to an ultimate place. The transcripts were part of Tiwaris reply to the Central Administrative Tribunal, where he has challenged the order. Both Kumar and Tiwary did not wish to comment on the matter as it was still pending with the tribunal. The transcripts indicated that the differences stemmed over giving security clearance to a Goa-based ground handling company. Such companies provide ground support such as moving baggage, loading food, cleaning the cabin etc. Tiwary was trying to seek security clearance for firm after the BCAS headquarters had turned it away, the transcripts read. Sources said the BCAS head office has sent at least two warnings to Tiwary over 2015-16 over similar differences. At the same time some airlines and ground handling companies has praised him to the moon. On January 18, an Air India staffer asked the BCAS to file an FIR against some AI cabin crew who allegedly hid their police records during a background check mandatory for airport access passes. The list included Tiwarys name for allegedly aiding them. But the airlines chairman and managing director, Ashok Lohani, appreciated him four days earlier over the implementation of a recent ministry rule stopping outsourced labour in ground handling companies. The transition was made a reality due to positive, professional and praiseworthy support by BS Tiwary, read the note. Also read Three Malaysia-bound planes in Mumbai searched following alert over bomb threat SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Anti-corruption Bureau (ACB), Thane, filed a case against 10 people at Nalasopara police station for forging documents to illegally construct 12 flats. The case was field on Monday. Shiva Reddy, a town planning officer of Vasai-Virar Municipal Corporation (VVMC), was caught red-handed by the ACB for offering Rs25 lakh to Dhananjay Gawde, Shiv Sena corporator from Nalasopara. Reddy has been accused offering Gawde Rs1 crore, of which Rs25 lakh was the first instalment, from a few developers. Reddy was arrested following Gawdes complaint. Meanwhile, ACB officers said seven more cases of graft were being probed simultaneously and FIRs could be registered against the accused for using forged documents. As per the FIR filed by the ACB, a building was constructed in Nalasopara (West) in 2009 in which approval to build 12 additional flats was procured using forged documents. An official said the seven cases were screened after Reddys arrest and FIR was field after they found discrepancies. Those named in the FIR are: Ramesh Tukaram Gharat, junior engineer ,VVMC, Mary Tuscano and Smita Bhoir, assistant municipal commissioners, Raju Masle, VVMC clerk, developers Mahendra Chaudhary, Dhananjay Raut, Kiran Deshmukh, architects Sham Kashid and Ajay Wadekar and Nilesh Deshmukh, Nalasopara corporator from Bahujan Vikas Aghadi. Tuscano husband was also arrested on charges of cheating and forgery a couple of months ago, but was released on bail. Also read: Maha additional director-general to look into corruption in Mumbai traffic police Three days after an Audi Q7 killed four persons after ramming into an autorickshaw near Hindon canal in Ghaziabad, the police have failed to salvage vital forensic evidence from the SUV that was seized after the incident. Officials have also failed to track the driver or other occupants of the car who fled. The police have also failed to track down the car owner Dr Manish Rawat who the police claim is a doctor at Safdarjung Hospital in Delhi. Officials said that he was staying at a rented flat in Olive County highrise in Vasundhara and was not meeting the police despite repeated attempts. The doctor is yet to provide his version that can inform us about the occupants of the car. He is the person who can tell us about the person who was driving the car. This is raising suspicion that he was present in the car during the incident. Some people had told us that there were two people in the car and they fled the spot, Anil Kumar Yadav, circle officer (Indirapuram), said. Also, there is no eye-witness to the incident. The police are also yet to trace mobile phones that were operational in the area, to track the movements of the doctor. We are trying to track the doctors mobile call details and will ascertain his locations around the time of the incident. It is also possible that he may be using more than one mobile phone. His mobile phone is switched off and we have not been able to contact him, he said. However, officials admitted that fingerprints inside the car were lost as many people had entered the vehicle for a search. We had also conducted a search at the Sarita Vihar residence of the doctor but came to know that he had already vacated the house and was staying in Olive County highrise, Yadav said. In the incident, Vishal Singh, an engineer, his cousin Yajuvendra, his family friend Rinku Yadav, a techie with HCL and auto driver Sanjeev Kumar were killed. The three victims are from Kanpur while Kumar is from Etah. We are yet to come out of the trauma and know nothing about the police investigation and their proceedings in the case. It will take us some time to gather ourselves and divert our attention to the case, Raghvendra, Yajuvendras brother, said. Kumars widow, who is pregnant, has returned to Etah. Her family said that she will not return to Khoda Colony. There is no point in her going back to Ghaziabad where she lost her husband. She is seven months pregnant and is still in shock. Here, we have people to look after her. We want the police to arrest the persons responsible, said Sudish Kumar, Sanjeevs cousin. The car and the auto were seized and brought to Indirapuram police station. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Mayawatis social engineering is resonating in the rural areas of Noida. Known for her formula for bringing together Dalit as well as Brahmin voters together to ensure victory, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) has fielded a Brahmin again for the Noida assembly constituency. The Dalits, Brahmins and Gujjars in Noida villages say they will vote for the BSP. While the Dalits find the BSP a natural choice, the Brahmins have extended support as the party candidate is a Brahmin. The Gujjars say that like the previous assembly elections, they will vote for the BSP this time as well. Whether the assurances by the voters prior to the polls will consolidate BSPs vote to translate into the victory of its candidate Ravi Kant Mishra is a moot question. With a large number of voters from the three communities in the Noida assembly seat, BSP is in the reckoning. It came second after the BJP in 2012 assembly polls. In 2012 assembly elections in Noida, BJPs Mahesh Kumar Sharma (77, 319 votes) won the seat, followed by BSPs Om Dutt Sharma (49,643 votes). Samajwadi Partys Sunil Choudhary (42,071 votes) came third. As per election commission data, there are nearly 5.10 lakh votes in Noida assembly constituency. Of these, nearly 1.25 lakh voters live in urban villages of Noida. (The election commission will release the final revised voter list soon.) Manish Sharma, former pradhan of Nagla Charandas village opposite sector 81, said the village with over 1,500 houses has nearly one third of population of each community and all of them are going to vote for the BSP. There are nearly 33% Brahmins, 33% Gujjars and the remaining 33% are Dalits, with another 100 voters from the Muslim community. All the communities have decided to vote for the BSP, he said. When asked why they wanted to vote for the BSP, Sharma said,Behenji has done a lot development in Noida. The law and order was good during her regime. The SP ended the Gram Pradhan system, which was very important for the development of villages. We are sure that she will revive the system. Echoing similar views, Rajender, former Pradhan of Bhuda village, said,Like 2012 assembly election, the Gujjars are going to vote for the BSP in the upcoming polls. We voted for the BJP in 2014 Lok Sabha polls. But in assembly polls, our vote will go to the BSP as she has done a lot for Noida. As for the development in Bhuda and Nagla Charandas, a reinforced-concrete-cement (RCC) road connecting the two villages was laid during Mayawatis tenure. Behenji has not done much development in our area. But we will still vote for her in the elections. We want her to be the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh the fifth time, said Rajesh Kumar, a Jatav. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The past three months have been incredibly hectic for Sachin Gurjar. The 26-year-old has put in long hours campaigning for his elder brother Manveer Gurjar on social media and on the streets of the national capital region. Sachin isnt the only one. Manveers entire family and friends pulled out all stops to ensure his victory in the current season of Bigg Boss, tirelessly going from door to door and posting minute-by-minute updates on dedicated social media pages. Their core team consists of five people -- hardware businessman Sachin, his elder brothers, Shekhar and Azad, friend Mithun Singh Rana and Manveers fan from Agra Vansh Thakur. The Noida-based men like to call themselves manveer-ians and they have been running pages on Facebook, twitter and Instagram, gathering support base for Manveer. We have over 35,000 likes on Facebook, 40,000 followers on Twitter and a similar number on Instagram. It was difficult in the beginning as Manveer had an extremely humble background. But slowly, we started noticing support for him across the country. It was then on November 2 that we decided to run a sustained campaign on social media, says Sachin. Villagers of Aghapur celebrating Manveer Gurjars Bigg Boss success. (Sunil Ghosh/HT Photo) But the campaign was not just limited to social media. We distributed pamphlets in Noida, pasted posters on autos and put up hoardings in market places. We wanted to ensure that people of Noida identify their representative, says Shekhar. Slowly, the campaign spread from Noida to other places in the NCR such as Faridabad, Gurgaon, Greater Noida and then to towns in the western UP belt such as Saharanpur, Meerut and other states, including Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh. Manveer Gurjars campaign was not just limited to social media. The team put up hoardings in Delhi-NCR and also distributed pamphlets to gain public support. (Sunil Ghosh/HT Photo) People started sending us videos in support of Manveer. They were struck by his natural charm. We received a call from Vansh from Agra who is a diehard fan of Manveer. He says that he finds his voice in Manveers. Such was the support of the people, says Sachin. Today, the manveer-iaans receive mails and messages from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and even African countries such as Tanzania. We started our campaign focussing on the Gurjar community and Noida residents but slowly we realised that Manveers simplicity has hit the right note with people across countries. We received messages from Pakistan where people said that they can totally relate with him, says Sachin. Manveer is expected to return to his village on Tuesday morning, where he will be given a grand welcome by the residents of Aghapur. And Manveer-ians have already started the preparations for the much-awaited event. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction is an international treaty that establishes procedures that provide for the prompt return of children wrongfully retained or removed from their habitual residence. Although the minister for women and children, Maneka Gandhi, took a decision not to have India sign the treaty for good reasons, there is now some reported rethinking. It would be disastrous for many reasons for India to sing the Convention. The Convention deals with what has come to be known as international child abduction. The Law Commission of India has recently addressed the issue, and the first and most important point made by the Commission is that the word abduction when used by a parent is misplaced as no parent can abduct her own child. The Commission recommends the passing of a domestic law and the signing of the Convention. The recommendation is surprising since the report itself notes that it is mainly women who are compelled to return to a foreign country to fight lonely battles for custody with no support. Read: When parents turn abductors of their own children, its more than a simple custody battle Although the discussion whether or not to sign the Convention is taking place in gender-neutral terms, the fact is that as the Commission itself notes, 68% of the taking parents were mothers; 85% of these respondent mothers were primary caregivers of their children and 54% had gone home to a country in which they held citizenship. So the first point to note is that this is a gendered issue, which concerns women who live in what has come to be known as NRI marriages. Often a male Indian migrant who is a green card holder comes to India to marry an Indian woman, not a green card holder, who he takes back on a dependent visa. They settle for example in the US and have children. Trouble erupts between them, the matter is taken to a US court and decisions in relation to child custody are made there, or perhaps ex-party decisions when she has had to leave the country with her children. It is here the Hague Convention will enter the picture and require that if there was a court order in a foreign jurisdiction, and woman has returned to her country of origin with the child, her husband can apply to an executive authority for the return of the child based only on an order of a freight court which could be an ex-parti order or if the husband is entitled to custody under a foreign law. Read: India to reconsider stand on international child abduction by a parent The mother, will be a child abductor and an application can be made to the authority in India for the return of the child to the place of: habitual residence, that is the US or any other reciprocal country who has signed the convention. I have seen cases without number where women fleeing a violent marriage have returned to India with the children, with no desire to return or any chance of going back for want of a green card. To compel such a child to return to the foreign country, who would obviously go with her mother, would be compounding the original problem. It is argued that the mother can go to the foreign court and convince that court that she should be allowed to take the child back. To deny a woman to apply in a foreign court for a variation of a custody order in favour of the husband means returning to a foreign land with no support structure in place, with no independent right to reside in that country and would virtually mean a separation between mother and child. Often such litigation is carried only by husbands with a view to compel a woman to give up her claims to alimony and any separation settlement. It is a known fact that when faced with such a choice, custody of children or alimony, women choose to exit a bad marriage with custody of the children with no alimony. It is in this context that the issue whether or not to sign the Hague Convention must be seen. The solution lies in a reverse law on protection of children found in the jurisdiction of the Indian courts. Our courts exercise parens patriae jurisdiction over children, in other words they are the ultimate guardians of children in their jurisdiction. When faced with a claim from a father who says that the child has been removed from his custody in the face of a court order granting him custody, the court must decide whether it is in the best interest of the child to be sent back to a foreign land. Indian law does not automatically recognise foreign judgments. Now by signing the Hague Convention, we will be compelled to recognise a foreign judgment regardless of the justness of the decision on custody under Indian law or whether was delivered ex-parte. We have moved from the father being the sole guardian of the child to joint guardianship, we must now recognise that there is a rational way of resolving the problems of children when a cross-country marriage breaks. It is not my suggestion that the father must have no contact with the children; there are ways in which the non-custodial parent can develop a genuine caring relationship with the child, through access orders, and through sharing vacations, provided there is trust between the separated or divorces spouses. It is here that the law must focus its attention rather than on its authoritarian and coercive role in punishing mothers who flee bad marriages. Indira Jaising is a senior advocate, Supreme Court The views expressed are personal In 2011, Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief Mamata Banerjee swept out the 34-year-old Left government in West Bengal, riding on a land agitation wave. It was ironic, for the Left owed its rise in Bengal to a movement for land rights and the most prominent political achievement of the CPI(M)-led Left Front government was also the land reforms programme. Over the past two weeks, Bengal has been rocked again by a land agitation -- villagers at Bhangar in South 24 Parganas are objecting to a Power Grid Corporation of Indias (PGCI) project for more efficient distribution of electricity. This development conceals two ironies. One, the agitators are directing their ire against the Mamata Banerjee government though not pinning it on her as an individual. Two, the project is being executed by a PSU and does not carry any vestiges of private profit that once was a rallying point against the Nano project in Singur of the then Opposition (TMC). But perhaps more significant, the opposition to the project signifies a failure for the model that the state government was experimenting with. While the government under Left chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee went for acquisition, Ms Banerjee never let an opportunity slip to announce that her government will not acquire a square inch of land if the villagers object. In 2013-14, the PGCI began purchasing land from locals some of whom were not ready to part with their fertile land. When the PSU failed, supporters of local TMC leader Arabul Islam entered the scene and forced the villagers to sell their land. Read: Bhangar Naxalite outfit leader surfaces in Delhi, but mystery continues But in 2015, Arabul Islam fell from grace and his rival factions gained importance in the area. The eclipse of the strongman encouraged the villagers to raise their voice and when none of the established Opposition parties came forward, a little-known Naxalite faction that swears by parliamentary democracy stepped in. Ms Banerjee who rose to the peak of her four-decade old political career with a resounding victory in the assembly polls could not perhaps imagine in her wildest nightmares that a cluster of villages could prevent her party leaders and the police from entering for more than a week. Read: Bhangar children guard villages after sundown, cant attend school Incidentally, the area voted for the ruling party in all the elections -- Lok Sabha (2014), Assembly (2016) and panchayat (2013). The challenge before the Bengal chief minister is to restore the faith of the villagers in her party and government. There is another trust she has to earn -- that of the investors who are still wary of the governments land policies. It is only a small coincidence that Bhangar erupted just before a two-day investor summit in Kolkata. When an unwritten truth confronts us in an extraordinary moment, it leaves us awestruck. Oh I knew this! Why didnt I realise this till today, we think. I had a similar experience many years ago at Ugandas Lake Victoria. We had reached there from Kampala. On the way, someone had told us that Mahatma Gandhis ashes were immersed here. I was captivated. In those days, Lake Victoria hadnt yet become a tourist attraction. If the lake was a human being, people would have been left mesmerised by its natural beauty. A little eddy was forming noiselessly at the place where the Nile emerges from the lakes womb. I imagined that the Mahatmas ashes would have dissolved into a similar whirl. At that moment I realised for the first time how deeply people from my generation who have grown up listening to all sorts of lofty statements for and against Gandhi are connected to the Mahatma. Read: Ghasera, where Mahatma Gandhis legacy lives on, waits for India Even Gopal Godses flawed logic made us revere the Mahatma even more. Nathuram Godses younger brother was an accused in Gandhis assassination. After completing his prison term, he went around the country justifying why they had carried out Gandhs vadh (murder). During this time he offered some laughable examples. At one time he claimed they had killed the Mahatma the way Krishna had slayed Jarasangh. I replied by asking him whether he put himself in the same category as Lord Krishna? How does it matter, he argued, our feelings were similar. At Lake Victoria I had discovered a connection with the Mahatma along with a growing feeling of sadness. During my conversation with Gopal Godse, the sentiment was turning into a seething anger, but there were people in Agra who had hosted him. They listened to him with a lot of respect. On that day I realised Gandhis biggest strength are his detractors. The more they resist him, the more his ideas will keep inspiring people. It has happened with every great man. That is why, when the Father of the Nations picture was missing from the All India Khadi Gram Udyog calendar this year, I wasnt upset. Power attracts sycophancy and that is how sycophants damage the image of politicians in power. The prime ministers office didnt just offer a clarification, but also tightened the screws, but the Opposition had sensed an opportunity by then. One result of this illogical debate over Gandhi was that the Mahatmas magic was again before the world in all its glory. According to Google News statistics, the number of people searching for the Mahatma grew by 50% in India and 62% worldwide in this period. Clearly, those in this generation who were not familiar with him got to know the Mahatma. This inquisitive quality in the younger generation is its biggest elixir. Read: Mahatma Gandhis granddaughter Tara receives top French honour I am fortunate that I have visited Gandhi memorials in various corners of the globe. Surprisingly, even after so many years, how does the Mahatma manage to elicit such a mix of curiosity and respect, that too in alien lands? In October 1997, when I met Nelson Mandela face to face along with former Prime Minister IK Gujral, at the residence of South African president Mahlamba Ndlopfu, I wanted to ask him the same question, but could not get an opportunity. Later, the secret of Gandhis popularity was revealed while speaking with anti-apartheid activist Ahmed Kathrada. Kathrada told him that when Mandela was imprisoned at Robben Island, he had many charges of violent crimes against him. The prison was the South African equivalent of our Kala Pani (Cellular Jail). It was a tried and tested method of white colonialists. They confined people to such uninhabited islands. Mandela realised this tactic. He told his colleagues they would protest against the white regime staying within prison regulations. Mandela was imprisoned there for 28 years, but pursuing his unique policy, he evolved from a person to an idea. It is the only instance in the history of humanity that a man could lead a freedom movement for so long from within the prison. And when he was released, he saved his country by adopting the policy of forgive and forget. According to Kathrada, Mandela had learnt this lesson from the Mahatma. Perhaps, Kathrada said this as a mark of respect to his guests, but not just Mandela, four other Nobel laureates of the 20th century Martin Luther King Jr, the Dalai Lama, Aung San Suu Kyi and Adolfo Perez Esquivel have admitted that Gandhis philosophy influenced them. If we take out these evolved human beings from the last century, well be left with nothing more than two World Wars and injuries from innumerable other wars. Gandhi and his ideological disciples have played a big role in keeping the earth worth living for human beings. Today is January 30. Do you remember this was the day Nathuram Godse pumped bullets into the Mahatmas body. But could he kill Gandhi? He certainly couldnt. Gandhi is alive in the minds of innumerable admirers and will continue to live there. Shashi Shekhar is editor in chief, Hindustan As a cartoon recently noted, the most disturbing news about Donald Trump is that President Trump and candidate Trump are proving to be largely co-terminous. Mr Trump is single-mindedly trying to ensure that he fulfils the electoral promises he made to his white working-class voting base, however illogical or illiberal they may be. It helps if there is an uproar against the policies as this hides the symbolic nature of many of them. The temporary 90-day ban on travellers and 120-day ban on refugees from seven countries, all of them Muslim majority, fits into this pattern of executive behaviour. Read: Donald Trumps immigration ban excludes Muslim countries where he does business With the visa bans, the Trump administration, having run into legal barriers regarding such policies as allowing the use of torture, is becoming more nuanced in how it crafts executive orders. Strictly speaking, the travel visa ban is only being imposed on countries that have refused to cooperate with the US homeland securitys vetting procedures on visa applicants. Five of the countries are in civil war and incapable of cooperating. Two of them, Iran and Sudan, have refused to provide information on their own citizens as a matter of principle. There is no doubt that Mr Trump deliberately sought out a set of legal parameters that would affect only Muslim countries, but that is not evident going by the language of the executive order. Read: How US President Donald Trumps worldview affects India The more trenchant criticism of the visa ban is that it does not really address any terrorism concerns. Most of the countries in civil war are on the highly restricted visa lists of most countries, including India. But the primary external threats faced by the US originate from places like Pakistan and enter the country via the internet. However, it is not clear that security is at all the reason that Trump issued his order. Not unlike his vague order on a border wall with Mexico, his primary purpose seems to be to generate criticism from those who did not vote for him so that he looks good to those who did. Neither the wall nor visa ban addresses the fundamental contradiction between open borders and tight security that every government faces. Read: Will Donald Trump listen to Ashley Tellis advice on India and China Mr Trumps actions should help trigger a debate on immigration in general. The US, like most democracies, has allowed a widening gap between its immigration laws, which are generally strict, and actual practice on the ground, which are realistically more lax. This provides legitimacy to anti-immigrant sentiments, which can argue they represent the rule of law. The Trump administration should over time move away from the symbolic towards the meaningful on this issue. Going by his first few weeks in office that may be some time coming --- if ever. Former Congress leader and deputy speaker of the Punjab Vidhan Sabha Bir Devinder Singh on Monday announced to extend support to AAP candidate Dr Balbir Singh here, who is pitted against Captain Amarinder Singh . The Congress is full of corrupt leaders and everyone is feeling suffocated.The AAP is only the hope left for Punjab to provide a clean government, thus I have extended support to the AAP, said Bir Devinder. In April Bir Devinder Singh was sacked from the Congress, for his article against Captain Amarinder Singh. Bir Devinder wants Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) convener and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal to take a vow that he would hand over the investigation of corruption cases against Capt Amarinder Singh to the CBI, apart from reopening disproportionate assets cases against Badal family, in case the AAP forms the next government in Punjab.People of Punjab are watching with disparagement the clandestine understanding between the two major players, the feudals of Badal and the Royals of Patiala to protect each other in the mega corruption they both indulged in during their respective regimes. Kejriwal must handover the cases registered against Badal and Amarinder to CBI, irrespective of cancellation reports filed by the vigilance bureau, he said in a statement. AJSU Party, a regional party based out of Jharkhand has become the first political party in the country that has announced 33 % reservation for women in the partys affairs that includes tickets for the assembly and parliamentary polls. Party president and ex deputy chief minister Sudesh Mahato made the ambitious announcement at the partys women convention held at Dimna Lake in Jamshedpur on Sunday. Mahato said there have been enough debates in the upper and lower houses of the parliament to secure womens share in politics, but no party took the lead and set a benchmark. AJSU Party has shown resolve and fulfilled the commitment it had made to its women cadres. The path has been laid. Other parties should now show the same resolve instead of cheating the fairer sex by making tall and hollow promises to them, AJSU chief said The Womens Reservation Bill which sought 33% reservation for women in the lower house and legislative assemblies was first introduced in the Lok Sabha by the Deve Gowda government on September 12, 1996. The Bill was aborted later. The Rajya Sabha passed the bill on March 9 2010. However, the Lok Sabha never voted on the bill. Mahato said the party didnt feel the need to wait for a law to give women their due share. The partys women convention also passed a 21-point agenda aimed at overall welfare and development of women. Prominent among them is the demand for alcohol ban in the state in line with Gujarat and Bihar and an all women police station in every block. Significantly, the party leaders yet again unanimously denounced any amendment in the Chotanagpur Tenancy (CNT) and Santhal Pargana Tenancy (SPT) Acts. AJSU is an alliance partner in the BJP-ruled state. One of its legislators, Chandraprakash Choudhary is a minister in the Raghubar Das government. However, their bonhomie turned sour after the government bought the amendment bill and passed it in the assembly through voice vote. You cannot think of ushering development by annoying majority population of the state, Mahato said. He said in 2010 as Panchayati Raj minister he had secured 50% reservation for women in the Panchayat elections and it went on to become history. The party also demanded reservation in government jobs for women who have contributed in sports. It vowed to identify and felicitate revolutionary women in Jharkhand. Special law for protection of women, modern residential colony for women displaced in eviction drives also found mention in the partys resolution. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) on Monday took suo motu cognizance of a Hindustan Times report highlighting how school authorities forced a pregnant class 6 student to take abortion pills and issued notice to the state government. The Commission has observed that the contents of the news report are not only shocking but painful. The rights of the victim girl to life, dignity and medical care have been violated due to the negligent and irrational act of the school authorities, says the NHRC notice, which was issued to the chief secretary of Jharkhand. The commission has sought a detailed report within four weeks from the chief secretary explaining the steps taken for relief, medical care and proper counselling of the victim girl. The report published on January 29 with a headline School forces pregnant class-6 student to take abortion pills exposes negligence of school authorities on girls safety. It highlighted that officials of the state-run Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya (KGBV) in Jharkhands Garhwa district reportedly endangered a pregnant Class 6 students life by forcing her to take abortion pills. Since the medicine was given without consulting a doctor and the girls condition worsened and she had to be rushed to the Garhwa Sadar Hospital. Doctors carried out a proper abortion to save the girls life. The issue also rocked the Jharkhand assembly on Monday with leader of opposition, Hemant Soren calling the incident a failure of the state machinery. Soren said the entire issue should be probed thoroughly as it smacks of a racket involving education officials. Answering him, chief Minister Raghubar Das said that no sooner the news was brought to his notice, he immediately ordered a probe. Actor Samantha Ruth Prabhu, who had six film releases in 2016, is most likely to team up with Ram Charan in his next yet-untitled Telugu outing. She is yet to officially sign on the dotted line, a source said. Its true that the makers have approached her and shes extremely excited about the project. But she hasnt yet officially signed it. As she has two more projects in her kitty, shes figuring out how she can allot dates, said a source from the film. To be directed by Sukumar, the film is tipped to be a rural romantic drama. Anupama Parameswaran achieved stardom with her Malayalam film, Premam. Originally, Anupama Parameswaran was considered for the role. It was believed she was replaced because she demanded high remuneration. The makers rubbished the reports. This is to clarify that while it is true Anupama is not part of Sukumar-Ram Charan project, it is not correct that on account of high remuneration demanded by her... Such reports are totally false, read a statement. The film will be produced by Mythri Movie Makers and it is slated to go on the floors from next month. Follow @htshowbiz for more ott:10:ht-entertainment_listing-desktop The family of Manveer Gurjar cant stop smiling. It was a special moment for them and the entire village of Aghapur near Noida when late on Sunday night, Manveer was declared as the winner of the 10th season of Bigg Boss. His younger brother Sachin Gurjar is busy coordinating with people from television media who thronged the house. Every reporter is welcomed with loud cheers of Manveer bhai zindabad from his friends and cousins. We have been campaigning since November, encouraging villagers and residents of Noida to support our Manveer. It is only because of the love he has received from people across India and other countries that he won the event, says Sachin. We had an intuition from the past three-four days that Manveer bhai is going to win the show. As soon as Salman bhai announced the winner, the entire village erupted in joy, says Amit Sharma, a friend of Manveer. The residents of Aghapur claim they have not slept since Sunday night. We have been campaigning since November and it was a big moment for us when bhai was announced as the winner. He proved to the world that a person with humility and simplicity can achieve anything in the world, said Neeraj Gurjar, Manveers cousin. Aghapur, a Gurjar community dominated village, has been in limelight for the past two months. Manveer Gurjar enjoyed the support of not just his community, Gurjar, but also people from other castes and communities as well. (Colors) It is a matter of pride that somebody from our community has brought laurels. But it is not just the Gurjar community that supported Manveer, but people of all caste and community because of Manveers natural charm, claims Sachin. Manveers friends claim that they have been glued to the television since he stepped in the Bigg Boss house 115 days ago. Every night, my entire family used to watch Bigg Boss because of Manveer bhai. Aghapur is such a small village and earlier nobody knew about it. Today, people are asking every other person about Manveers Agahpur, says Neeraj. Manveer will be returning to Aghapur on Tuesday morning with his parents and till then, its a moment to cherish for his brothers and people of Aghapur. Follow @htshowbiz for more SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Frequent fireworks are expected in the Budget session of Parliament with the Opposition set to raise the pitch against the governments demonetisation move and an early budget. The battle lines were clear on Monday, 24 hours before the Presidents speech to the joint sitting of both Houses to mark the beginning of the session. Two key parties TMC and BJPs ally Shiv Sena didnt attend the all-party meeting in the morning, signalling a hardening of stand against the government. The Sena, which is separately fighting the civic body polls in Mumbai, gave the consultative meeting a miss while the TMC is miffed over demonetisation. The first part of the session, with just eight working days, will end on February 9. Congress chief whip in Lok Sabha, Jyotiraditya Scindia, said that advancing the budget to February 1 was undemocratic, pointing out that the UPA government in 2012 had postponed the budget till elections. CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury alleged that the governments financial calculations will hide the impact of demonetisation . They will only have data till the second quarter of the year, the figures of the third quarter will not be there. Demonetisation has had such adverse impact on the economy. Its effect will not be taken into account because the figures will not be available, he said. Finance minister Arun Jaitley defended Centres decision and pointed out that six months ago, the cabinet had decided to advance the budget process. Sources said that the Opposition may bring privilege motion, citing RBI governor Urjit Patels submission to a House panel that the government asked the RBI to go ahead with demonetisation. Prime Minister Modi, who attended the meeting briefly, urged the parties to participate in a debate. The PM called Parliament a Maha Panchayat and said that differences may arise between parties but democracy should win, parliamentary affairs minister, Ananth Kumar, said. The session assumes significance as it will take place parallel to the assembly elections in five states, including Uttar Pradesh where stakes are high for the BJP after it suffered a string of losses in assembly tests. Read| Budget 2017: Whats in store on the personal tax front? SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Six people were killed and eight others injured when two gunmen opened fire in a mosque in Quebec City of eastern Canada on Sunday evening, with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemning the shooting as a terrorist attack on Muslims. More than 50 people were at the Islamic Cultural Centre of Quebec when the shooting erupted. The dead ranged in age from 35 to 70. Five people are in critical condition and 12 others sustained minor injuries, a University of Quebec Hospital Centre spokeswoman said. One suspect was arrested at the scene and the second suspect called police from his car, saying he was armed but wanted to surrender. He was arrested in nearby Ile dOrleans and a cache of AK-47s and handguns was found in his vehicle, a black Mitsubishi. One of the attackers was said to be of Moroccan origin, according to a report that was not confirmed by police. Both suspects were reportedly students at the Universite Laval. An eyewitness quoted in media reports said the attackers spoke with a Quebec accent and shouted Allah-u-Akbar before firing. Police did not release names of the suspects or give a motive. The police force of the city, which is the capital of Quebec province, said the situation was under control, the places are secure and the occupants were evacuated and that an investigation is ongoing. In a statement, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said, We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge. He added: While authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, it is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. He also tweeted: Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families. Please read my statement on tonights terrorist attack in Quebec City: https://t.co/58NRcOAUmB Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 30, 2017 The victims were reportedly all men praying on the main floor of the mosque even as women gathered on an upper floor and children played in the basement. Nearly 40 persons escaped the shooting. The attack occurred at around 8 pm, soon after a few dozen congregants at the mosque in Sainte-Foy neighbourhood had completed evening prayers. The provinces premier (the equivalent of chief minister), Philippe Couillard, said that Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence. The Islamic centre had been the target of a hate crime last summer during the holy month of Ramzan, when a pigs head had been placed outside its door. Police have not ruled out the possibility of a third person being involved in the attack. Anti-terrorism protocols were established and a wide perimeter around the mosque was secured by police. According to the French-language La Presse, the Police Management Structure Against Terrorism (TPCMS) had been activated while the Surete de Quebec is placing a command center at the scene and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) will lead the investigation with its Integrated National Security Team. The shootings came hours after Canadas Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcomed immigrants to Canada, striking a sharp contrast with Trumps sweeping executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim country. We are not safe here, said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque but not on Sunday. Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now very worried and thinking of moving back to Morocco. People leave a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City on January 29, 2017. (Reuters) Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the vast majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of the province was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighbouring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Trump suspended the arrival of refugees to the United States for at least 120 days, with those from Syria barred indefinitely. He also blocked entry of people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for the next three months. According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one out of five people in the country are foreign-born. Canada has welcomed more than 39,670 Syrian refugees between November 2015 and the beginning of this January, according to government figures. (With inputs from agencies) SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Emirates airline has changed its pilot and attendant rosters on flights to the United States following the US travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries, highlighting the challenges facing airlines trying to deal with the new rules. The worlds largest long-haul carrier, which flies daily to 11 US cities, has made the necessary adjustments to our crewing, to comply with the latest requirements, an Emirates spokeswoman said. She added that US flights continue to operate on schedule. President Donald Trump on Friday suspended the entry of people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days and all refugee admissions, from all countries, for 120 days. The decision caught airlines off guard, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA). I cannot think of anything comparable. This brings a mix of administrative confusion, impact and uncertainty for many travellers as well as practical operational headaches and complexities for airlines in planning their flight programmes, independent aviation consultant John Strickland told Reuters. The ban applies to pilots and flight attendants from the seven countries, even though all flight crew who are not US citizens already need a special visa to enter the country. Nicoley Baublies, from the German cabin crew union UFO, said the move was very unusual and meant uncertainty for airlines in terms of planning. Lufthansa has always ensured it has very diverse crews, with staff of different nationalities and that means that we are for the first time in decades having to look at where people come from, he said. Japan Airlines on Monday said it had begun screening passengers from the countries affected by Trumps travel ban before their departure for the United States. (Reuters photo) A spokesman for Lufthansa said it was too early to comment on the effects of the order but that airlines and passengers were required to follow the new rules. Another Emirates spokeswoman said the impact of the ban on operations will be minimal. The airline employs over 23,000 flight attendants and about 4,000 pilots from around the world, including the United States, Europe and the Middle East. A spokesman for Etihad Airways of Abu Dhabi said the airline had taken steps to ensure there will be no issues for flights departing over the coming weeks. Read: Global backlash grows against Trumps immigration order Japan Airlines (JAL) on Monday said it had begun screening passengers from the countries affected by Trumps travel ban before their departure for the United States. JAL officials will contact the US customs and border protection agency to confirm whether passengers will be allowed entry, a spokesman for Japans second-biggest carrier said. It is unclear if the ban applies to dual nationals - those who hold one passport from a country on the list and another from a non-US country which is not. Etihad on its website said dual citizens could travel to the US using their non-banned passport. The International Air Transport Association has told its members that the ban does not apply to dual nationals if they have a passport not on the list, according to an email. Read: Green card holders exempted as US tempers part of Trump Muslim ban amid protests US homeland security secretary John Kelly said in a statement that people from the seven countries who hold so-called green cards as lawful permanent US residents would not be blocked from returning to the United States from overseas, as some had been following the directive. EFFECT ON TRAVEL DEMAND? On Sunday, IATA sent another email to member airlines asking for examples of Green Card holders being denied boarding. It also said it was seeking more information from authorities in Washington. Baublies said the uncertainty over the rules was not helping. Trump reacts in 140 characters, we dont know what it means - for people with the wrong entries in their passports or with dual nationality or married to someone from one of the countries affected, are they allowed to travel? There are also concerns the restrictions could dampen travel demand. Ultimately this could feed through to the role airlines play in the global economy in supporting business and tourism due to as yet unquantifiable impacts on demand & cost, Strickland said. Baublies said airlines were usually among the first affected by global crises. We hope it doesnt mean that seats are left empty because people dont know where they can travel with which passport. Demonstrators at Philadelphia International Airport protest against President Donald Trump's executive order banning Muslim immigration. (AFP photo) Dubai-based Emirates and Etihad Airways are both owned by the governments of the United Arab Emirates, a US ally and a Muslim-majority country. Both carriers said they will continue to comply with the new rules on US immigration but where possible will offer to refund or rebook affected passengers. Emirates and Etihad have also said that passengers were affected by the ban over the weekend but their flight crews had not been impacted. Qatar Airways declined to comment on the impact of the ban on flight operations, although on Saturday it issued a statement on its website that passengers will need a green card or a diplomatic visa to enter the US. Emirates and Etihad issued similar statements. As the world watches with growing concern and protests and lawsuits mount in the United States, the Donald Trump administration is defending the travel ban on refugees and some Muslims. It has insisted the ban is not about religion, but about keeping out terrorists - or bad dudes as the president called them on Monday. Protests have been reported from all around the country, mostly outside airports, as the White Houses travel restrictions on all refugees and citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries ordered by Trump last Friday, which are being called the Muslim ban, have come under increased scrutiny from courts and opposition from civil rights bodies and political rivals. Federal judges in four states are considering lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the executive order and will hear arguments for striking it down this week. The Council for American-Islamic Relations, a leading body representing American Muslims, is scheduled to move a fresh case on Monday. Democrats in the US Congress are planning legislative action, also on Monday, to override Trumps executive order, which was called mean-spirited and un-American by Charles Schumer, the top Democrat in the Senate, at a news briefing. Even Republicans have come out in opposition. Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham said in a joint statement the order was not properly vetted and was issued without adequate consultation and may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security. Reportedly totally unprepared for the intensity of the opposition, Trump and his aides are pushing back in a series of television interviews, appearances on morning shows and, in the case of the president, on Twitter, his megaphone of choice. If the ban were announced with a one-week notice, the bad would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad dudes out there! Trump tweeted, seeking to address criticism that not enough preparation had gone into it. The confusion at airports here and abroad was blamed on the secrecy that surrounded the order. The customs and border protection officials and others tasked with enforcing the order had not seen it until after it was signed despite the fact that members of the presidents aides, especially those on the transition team, had been working on it for a long time. When asked by lawyers of two Iraqi refugees detained at JFK Airport on Friday about who they should contact for redressal, airport officials reportedly told them, Call Mr Trump. The president and his aides have also pushed back on number of people affected by the order. Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning, Trump tweeted, adding, Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage. But Trump is keenly aware he is dealing with a crisis that is not going too well for him and his short time in office, as talk has already started that he could be facing a potential defeat. The American Civil Liberties Union, which helped free the Iraqi refugees with a lawsuit, is already taunting him, using a line from his campaign: Hes going to lose so much were going to get sick and tired of his losing. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting, Trump said in a statement on Sunday. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. He argued that the temporary ban affects only seven countries. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. And he invoked his predecessor, saying his policy was similar to what President Barack Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. Even the seven countries chosen for the ban were those identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. An influential committee of the UK House of Commons on Monday launched an inquiry into the growing phenomenon of fake news, calling it a threat to democracy that undermined confidence in the media. The Culture, Media and Sport Committee said that over the past few years, there were rising concerns about the trend to distrust traditional sources of news, such as newspapers and broadcasters, and instead to turn to the internet and social media despite the fact that the source of stories was often unclear and it was not known whether these reports were accurate. The fear that this might lead the public being fed propaganda and untruths has been increased by the suggestions that electors in the 2016 US presidential election were subjected to possibly unprecedented amounts of 'fake news', and concerns that this may have had a significant impact on democratic processes, the panel said. Launching the inquiry, Damian Collins, chair of the committee, said: Just as major tech companies have accepted they have a social responsibility to combat piracy online and the illegal sharing of content, they also need to help address the spreading of fake news on social media platforms. .@CommonsCMS have today launched an inquiry into #FakeNews see the details and how to submit evidence here https://t.co/GOa03yJ9dr Damian Collins (@DamianCollins) January 30, 2017 Collins said consumers should be given new tools to help them assess the origin and likely veracity of news reports they read online. The committee will be investigating these issues, as well as looking into the sources of fake news, what motivates people to spread it, and how it has been used around elections and other important political debates," he added. The committee said it was looking at ways to respond to the phenomenon, focusing in particular on the following questions: * What is fake news? Where does biased but legitimate commentary shade into propaganda and lies? * What impact fake news has on public understanding of the world, and on the public response to traditional journalism? If all views are equally valid, does objectivity and balance lose all value? * Is there any difference in the way people of different ages, social backgrounds and genders use and respond to fake news? * Have changes in the selling and placing of advertising encouraged the growth of fake news, for example by making it profitable to use fake news to attract more hits to websites, and thus more income from advertisers? * What responsibilities do search engines and social media platforms have, particularly those which are accessible to young people? Is it viable to use computer-generated algorithms to root out fake news from genuine reporting? * How can people be educated to assess and use different sources of news? * Are there differences between the UK and other countries in the degree to which people accept fake news, given Britains tradition of public service broadcasting and newspaper readership? * How have other governments responded to fake news? SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Six people were killed after gunmen opened fire in a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers, the mosques president told reporters on Sunday. A witness told Reuters that up to three gunmen fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre. Why is this happening here? This is barbaric, said the mosques president, Mohamed Yangui. Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families. Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 30, 2017 Quebec police on the scene said there had been fatalities and that two people had been arrested. There are many victims ... there are deaths, a Quebec police spokesman told reporters. A witness said a heavily armed police tactical squad was seen entering the mosque. Police spokesman Etienne Doyon declined to say whether there was still a gunman inside the mosque. Police later tweeted: The situation is under control. Yangui, who was not inside the mosque when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. He did not know how many were injured, saying they had been taken to different hospitals across Quebec City. The shootings came hours after Canadas Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcomed immigrants to Canada, striking a sharp contrast with Trumps sweeping executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim country. Justin Trudeau condemned Quebec City shooting as a terrorist attack after gunmen opened fire at a mosque there, killing at least five. We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge, Trudeau said. Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, city and country. To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 28, 2017 Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them North African emigrants. In June 2016, a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the cultural centre. We are not safe here, said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque but not on Sunday. Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now very worried and thinking of moving back to Morocco. Canadian Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said in a tweet that he was profoundly saddened by the loss of life and wounded. Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the vast majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of the province was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighbouring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Zebida Bendjeddou, who left the mosque earlier on Sunday evening, said the centre had received threats. In June, theyd put a pigs head in front of the mosque. But we thought: Oh, theyre isolated events. We didnt take it seriously. But tonight, those isolated events, they take on a different scope, she said. Bendjeddou said she had not yet confirmed the names of those killed, but added: Theyre people we know, for sure. People we knew since they were little kids. Trump suspended the arrival of refugees to the United States for at least 120 days, with those from Syria barred indefinitely. He also blocked entry of people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for the next three months. According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one out of five people in the country are foreign-born. Canada has welcomed more than 39,670 Syrian refugees between November 2015 and the beginning of this January, according to government figures. The shooting at a Quebec mosque during Sunday night prays which reportedly killed five people was a terrorist attack on Muslims, said Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge, Trudeau said in a statement. Five people were killed after gunmen opened fire in a Quebec City mosque, the mosques president told reporters on Sunday. A witness told Reuters that up to three gunmen fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre. Why is this happening here? This is barbaric, said the mosques president, Mohamed Yangui. Quebec police said there were many victims and deaths, but did not confirm the death toll. They said two people had been arrested, but there were no immediate details on the suspects. A witness said a heavily armed police tactical squad was seen entering the three-storey mosque. Police declined to say whether there was a gunman inside the mosque at the time. Police tweeted later that the situation was under control and that the mosque had been secured and occupants evacuated. Yangui, who was not inside the mosque when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. He did not know how many were injured, saying they had been taken to different hospitals across Quebec City. Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families. Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 30, 2017 The shooting came on the weekend that Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, after U.S. President Donald Trump suspended the U.S. refugee program and temporarily barred citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations from entering the United States on national security grounds. New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said police were providing additional protection for mosques in that city following the Quebec shooting. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something, he tweeted. Canadas federal Liberal legislator Greg Fergus tweeted: This is an act of terrorism -- the result of years of demonizing Muslims. Words matter and hateful speeches have consequences! NOT SAFE HERE Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them North African emigrants. In June 2016, a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the cultural centre. We are not safe here, said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque in the middle-class, residential area, but not on Sunday. Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now very worried and thinking of moving back to Morocco. Mass shootings are rare in Canada, which has stricter gun laws than the United States, and news of the shooting sent a shockwave through mosques and community centers throughout the mostly French-language province. Its a sad day for all Quebecers and Canadians to see a terrorist attack happen in peaceful Quebec City, said Mohamed Yacoub, co-chairman of an Islamic community center in a Montreal suburb. I hope its an isolated incident. Read | PM Justin Trudeau says Canada will take refugees Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the vast majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of the province was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighboring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Zebida Bendjeddou, who left the mosque earlier on Sunday evening, said the centre had received threats. In June, theyd put a pigs head in front of the mosque. But we thought: Oh, theyre isolated events. We didnt take it seriously. But tonight, those isolated events, they take on a different scope, she said. Bendjeddou said she had not yet confirmed the names of those killed, but added: Theyre people we know, for sure. People we knew since they were little kids. President Donald Trump on Monday denied his immigration order was to blame for the chaos at nation airports over the weekend, instead pointing to computer glitches, protesters and even the tears of Senator Schumer. There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter the country, Trump wrote in a series of early morning tweets. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world! Trump enters his second week in office amid a global backlash to his policies. European Union officials denounced US policy as a dangerous embrace of isolationism and inequality, while the international aid group Doctors Without Borders accused Trump of keeping people trapped in war zones, directly endangering their lives. In Iraq, two lawmakers there said the Iraqi parliament has approved a reciprocity measure restricting the entry of Americans into Iraq. Meanwhile, its unclear how Trumps order would make the nation safer. The order does not address homegrown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. And the list of countries in Trumps order doesnt include Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. The president tweeted early Monday that only 109 out of 325,000 people were detained and held for questioning following his executive order to bar individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer, he added. Trump was referring to a Delta systems outage Sunday night that led to departure delays and cancellations of at least 150 Delta flights. However, the chaos started Saturday as protesters packed some of the countrys major airports to demonstrate against the executive order. Democratic senator Chuck Schumer tweeted Friday that Tears are running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty over the ban. Trump has defended his order by saying its not a Muslim ban. Protesters rally in front of John F Kennedy International Airport in New York. (AP Photo) In a background call with reporters Sunday, a senior administration official declared the orders implementation a massive success story, claiming it had been done seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism. Yet there appeared to be widespread confusion among authorities tasked with carrying out the order and how it would be applied to certain groups, like US legal permanent residents. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday saying that, absent information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination. That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent U.S. residency green cards will not be barred from re-entering the U.S., as officials had previously said. It remains unclear what kind of additional screening they will now face. You have an extreme vetting proposal that didnt get the vetting it should have had, said Ohio Sen. Rob Portman, who urged the new president to slow down and work with lawmakers on how best to tighten screening for foreigners who enter the United States. Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F Kennedy International Airport. (AFP Photo) In my view, we ought to all take a deep breath and come up with something that makes sense for our national security and reflects the fact that Americas always been a welcoming home for refugees and immigrants, he said. White House press secretary Sean Spicer on Monday morning defended the closed-mouth discussions that preceded Fridays announcement, saying that I think there are some people who might not like the way it was done, but they were all consulted in the process. Interviewed on MSNBCs Morning Joe, Spicer said officials put the safety of the American people first and said officials didnt want to telegraph what they were going to do. He acknowledged the secret way we had to roll this out and said that it was because of security reasons. A federal judge in New York has issued an emergency order temporarily barring the US from deporting people from the seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trumps 90-day travel ban. The order barred US border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. The Department of Homeland Security said Sunday the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. US President Donald Trumps travel ban on citizens from mainly Muslim countries is illegal and mean-spirited, the United Nations human rights chief Zeid bin Raad Zeid al-Hussein said on Monday. Zeid, who rarely communicates on Twitter, said in a tweet that discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law, adding that the US ban is also mean-spirited and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism. Trump on Friday signed an executive order suspending the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely -- and barring citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The measures introduced a week after his inauguration were fiercely criticised over the weekend, although UN reactions were largely tepid. The UN bodies most directly engaged with migration -- the UN refugee agency and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) -- issued a statement on Saturday which made no mention of the executive order and stopped far short of condemning it. Instead, the agencies urged the US to continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution. They also vowed to engage actively and constructively with the US Government... to protect those who need it most. Read| Jihadist groups hail Trumps travel ban as victory: Report A global backlash against US President Donald Trumps immigration curbs gathered strength on Sunday as several countries including long-standing American allies criticised the measures as discriminatory and divisive. Governments from London and Berlin to Jakarta and Tehran spoke out against Trumps order to put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily ban travellers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries. He said the move would help protect Americans from terrorism. In Germany - which has taken in large numbers of people fleeing the Syrian civil war - Chancellor Angela Merkel said the global fight against terrorism was no excuse for the measures and does not justify putting people of a specific background or faith under general suspicion, her spokesman said. She expressed her concerns to Trump during a phone call and reminded him that the Geneva Conventions require the international community to take in war refugees on humanitarian grounds, the spokesman added. Read | Trump orders tough controls, extreme vetting of refugees from 7 Muslim nations Merkels sentiments were echoed in Paris and London; Terrorism knows no nationality. Discrimination is no response, said French Foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, while his British counterpart Boris Johnson tweeted: Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality. Along with Syria, the US ban of at least 90 days affects travellers with passports from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, including those with dual nationality that includes one of those countries. Trump said his order, which indefinitely bans refugees from Syria, was not a Muslim ban, though he added he would seek to prioritise Christian refugees fleeing the country. Washingtons Arab allies, including the Gulf states and Egypt, were mostly silent. The government in Iraq, which is allied with Washington in the battle against ultra-hardline Islamist group Islamic State and hosts over 5,000 US troops, also did not comment on the executive order. But some members of the parliament said Iraq should retaliate with similar measures against the United States. Demonstrators at Philadelphia International Airport protest against the executive order that President Donald Trump signed clamping down on refugee admissions and temporarily restricting travellers from seven predominantly Muslim countries on January 29, 2017 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (AFP Photo) IRAN VOWS TO RESPOND In Baghdad, influential Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said American nationals should leave Iraq, in retaliation for the travel curbs. It would be arrogance for you to enter freely Iraq and other countries while barring to them the entrance to your country ... and therefore you should get your nationals out, he said on his website. There was no immediate reaction to the curbs from Islamic State, although in the past it has used U.S. monitoring of Muslim foreigners to stoke Muslim anger against Washington. The Tehran government vowed to respond in kind to the US ban on visitors from Iran, but on Sunday Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Twitter that Americans who already hold Iranian visas can enter the country. Unlike the US, our decision is not retroactive. All with valid Iranian visa will be gladly welcomed, Zarif said. Authorities in Sudan, which is also targeted by the ban, summoned the US charge daffaires in Khartoum. They said the order sent a negative message, coming two weeks after Washington announced it would ease economic sanctions on the country. Trumps executive order on Friday took effect immediately, wreaking havoc and confusion for would-be travellers with passports from the seven countries and plunging Americas immigration system into chaos. Read | Iran says will respond in kind to Trumps insulting ban The Department of Homeland Security said about 375 travellers had been affected by the order, 109 of whom were in transit and were denied entry to the United States. Another 173 were stopped by airlines before boarding. Fuad Sharef, his wife and three children were among the first victims. They had waited two years for a visa to settle in the United States, selling their home and quitting jobs and schools in Iraq before setting off for a new life they saw as a reward for working with US organisations. They were prevented from boarding their connecting flight to New York from Cairo airport on Saturday, detained overnight and forced to board a flight back to northern Iraq. I AM TOTALLY BROKEN We were treated like drug dealers, escorted by deportation officers, Sharef told Reuters, likening Trumps decision to the dictatorship of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. I am broken, I am totally broken. A 32-year-old Syrian man, Nail Zain, was among dozens of people at Istanbuls Ataturk Airport prevented from flying to the United States on Sunday. He told Reuters he was supposed to fly to Los Angeles, but officials said his visa was cancelled. My wife and my son are in the United States. My son has American nationality. And we have been waiting for this moment for two years. Finally when I got the chance, they prevented me as a Syrian passport holder from travelling, he said. He was later taken out of the terminal by authorities. Trump, a businessman who successfully tapped into American fears about militant attacks during his campaign, had promised what he called extreme vetting of immigrants and refugees from areas the White House said the US Congress deemed high risk. He said on Saturday of his order: Its working out very nicely. You see it at the airports, you see it all over. The travel curbs, however, also drew criticism from several other countries around the globe. In Jakarta, Indonesian foreign minister Retno Marsudi said the Muslim-majority nation deeply regretted Trumps plans for extreme vetting of people from some Muslim countries. Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni said open society, plural identity, no discrimination were the pillars of Europe, while the Danish, Swedish and Norwegian governments also registered their opposition. Danish foreign minister Anders Samuelsen tweeted: The US decision not to allow entry of people from certain countries is NOT fair. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his country welcomed those fleeing war and persecution, even as Canadian airlines said they would turn back US-bound passengers to comply with an immigration ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries. To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada, he tweeted. Read | In response to Trumps Muslim ban, Starbucks to hire 10,000 refugees over next 5 years Google CEO Sundar Pichai has created a $4 million crisis fund to help four organisations working to help people hit by US President Donald Trumps executive order banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. The fund has a corpus of $2 million that can be matched with up to $2 million in donations from employees, totalling $4 million, USA Today reported. It is intended to benefit the American Civil Liberties Union, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee and UNHCR, which are helping immigrants. Read: How US President Donald Trumps worldview affects India The campaign was disclosed in a memo sent by Pichai and confirmed by a Google spokeswoman late on Sunday. This is Googles largest crisis campaign ever and company executives are also giving money individually to the cause, the report said. The grant came a day after Pichai strongly objected to Trumps controversial immigration ban and company co-founder Sergey Brin joined a protest at San Francisco international airport. Executives at Apple, Microsoft, Netflix, Uber, Airbnb and Tesla Motors have already criticised the ban, which was temporarily stalled by a federal judge in New York on Saturday. Trumps order could disrupt the businesses of major tech companies, which rely heavily on foreign-born workers. In a staff memo, Pichai said the move affects at least 187 of the search giants staff. Read: Global backlash grows against Donald Trumps immigration order Were concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US, Google said in a statement. Well continue to make our views on these issues known to leaders in Washington and elsewhere. Trumps order suspended the entry of all refugees to the US for 120 days, indefinitely halted the admission of refugees from Syria and also barred the entry of immigrants from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen for three months. Tech and other companies have taken actions to help people hit by the ban. Starbucks said it will hire 10,000 refugees over five years around the world and Airbnb said it will find free, temporary places for refugees to stay in. Starbucks says it will hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years, a response to President Donald Trumps indefinite suspension of Syrian refugees and temporary travel bans that apply to six other Muslim-majority nations. Howard Schultz, the coffee retailers chairman and CEO, said in a letter to employees Sunday that the hiring would apply to stores worldwide and the effort would start in the United States where the focus would be on hiring immigrants who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel. Read | Googles Sundar Pichai slams Trumps Muslim ban, recalls employees back to US Schultz, a supporter of Hillary Clinton during the presidential run, took aim at other parts of a Trump agenda focused on immigration, repealing former President Barack Obamas health care law and restructuring trade with Mexico. The letter said that Starbucks would help support coffee growers in Mexico, provide health insurance to eligible workers if the health care law is repealed and back an Obama-era immigration program that allows young immigrants who were brought to the country as children to apply for a two-year reprieve from deportation and a work permit. The move reflects the increasing complexity that businesses face when dealing with the Trump administration. Trump has met with CEOs at Ford, General Motors and Boeing and asked them to create jobs in the United States, while touting each announcement about new factory jobs as a success even if those additions had been planned before his presidential victory. But not all corporate leaders have embraced Trump. Schultz added that Starbucks would aim to communicate with workers more frequently, saying Sunday, I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack. Read | Donald Trumps immigration ban excludes Muslim countries where he does business Harriet Harman, who held ministerial positions in the Tony Blair and Gordon Brown governments and senior positions in the Labour Party, has alleged that while studying at the University of York in the 1970s, her Indian professor offered her a better grade if she slept with him. Harman, 66, made the allegation in her memoir, A Womans Work, due to be published this week. It is billed as the story of women's progressive politics over the past 30 years told by someone at the forefront of the movement. The professor was Chennai-born TV Satyamurthy, who studied at Benares Hindu University and taught in several countries before settling in Britain, where he taught for 30 years at the University of York. He died in 1998 aged 68. Asked why she did not report him at the time, Harman told BBC television on Sunday: "I thought nobody would listen, that he would deny it and that they would take his side. He was in a position of authority. A man in a position of authority that can actually shape your future life can abuse their power for sex." Harman, who said she was repulsed by the professor, turned down Satyamurthys advances and managed to get the higher grade in her BA in politics in 1972. She joined the Labour Party and held several frontline positions, including its acting leader and leader of the opposition. However, the professors ex-wife, Carole Satyamurthy, 77, told the Daily Mail: "That's horrible. I find this very hard to believe. The story sounds very dubious to me. He was very brilliant and full of jokes, but very respectful of women. I'm sure he wouldn't have done that." But Harman said: "The idea that I would invent it - why would I? I've said it happened now, having not said anything about it before, because I think we need to look at how we make sure those people who are put in that position, feel able to complain, and those who do that, are held to account." Satyamurthy was considered a brilliant academic and a 1998 obituary described him as a larger-than-life personality whose great abilities as a scholar and teacher were eclipsed by his skill as a facilitator and co-ordinator of inter-disciplinary studies in the social and human sciences. The obituary in The Independent said: He was the originator, sustainer and editor of the landmark series Social Change and Political Discourse in India (1994-96) which refocussed understanding of the political cultural of the subcontinent. Yet this concentration on the study of India came late in his life, was by no means exclusive even then, and it followed much journeying, both physical and intellectual. York university's registrar, David Duncan, said the institution strongly condemned all forms of sexual harassment: "The allegations made by Ms Harman are extremely concerning. Behaviour of the sort described by Ms Harman would constitute gross misconduct and would lead to dismissal." SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Iraqi lawmakers on Monday voted to call on the government to enact a reciprocal travel ban on Americans if Washington does not withdraw its decision to bar Iraqis, officials said. The call is a response to President Donald Trumps executive order barring citizens of Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen from entering the US for at least 90 days, a move he billed as an effort to make America safe from radical Islamic terrorists. Parliament called on the Iraqi government to respond in kind to the American decision in the event that the American side does not withdraw its decision, a parliamentary official who was present for the vote told AFP. Parliament voted by majority on calling on the Iraqi government and the foreign ministry to respond in kind, MP Hakim al-Zamili said. Sadiq al-Laban, another lawmaker, confirmed that the vote was for a call on the government to enact reciprocal measures. We are against this stance from the new administration, Laban said, adding: We hope that the American administration will rethink... this decision. Trumps decision led to the detention of incoming refugees at US airports, sparking protests, legal challenges and widespread condemnation from rights groups. The travel restrictions, which come on the heels of repeated assertions by Trump that the US should have stolen Iraqs oil before leaving in 2011, risk alienating the citizens and government of a country fighting against militants the president has cast as a major threat to America. Entry curbs imposed by US President Donald Trump on travellers from seven Muslim-majority countries are proof of Americas hatred towards Muslims, sympathisers of Islamist militant groups said according to the US-based SITE monitoring service. It said the Scholars of Haq channel asked on the messaging app Telegram whether Trumps policies meant he was currently the best caller to Islam -- someone who attracts new believers. Of the first 48 users to respond, 34 (or 71 per cent) answered that he (Trump) was, according to SITE. Jihadists Call Trumps Travel Ban Proof of Americas "Hatred towards Muslims" https://t.co/2Mxc7ee7Aq SITE Intel Group (@siteintelgroup) January 29, 2017 One respondent was quoted as saying: What Trump has done has clearly revealed the truth, and harsh reality behind the American governments hatred towards Muslims. Jihadist groups, including Islamic State sympathisers, have hailed the Trump administrations ban on travel to the US from seven Muslim-majority nations saying it would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists, according to a media report. Comments posted to pro-Islamic State social media accounts predicted that US President Donald Trumps executive order would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists, The Washington Post reported. One posting hailed Trump as the best caller to Islam, while others predicted that Trump would soon launch a new war in the Middle East. (Islamic State leader Abu Bakr) al-Baghdadi has the right to come out and inform Trump that banning Muslims from entering America is a blessed ban, a posting to a pro- Islamic State channel on Telegram, was quoted as saying. The writer compared the executive order to the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, which Islamic militant leaders at the time hailed as a blessed invasion that ignited anti- Western fervour across the Islamic world. Several postings suggested that Trump was fulfilling the predictions of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American born al-Qaeda leader and preacher who famously said that the West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens, the report said. Awlaki was killed in a US drone strike in Yemen in 2011. Another posting on the Telegram channel Abu Magrebi said Trumps actions clearly revealed the truth and harsh reality behind the American governments hatred toward Muslims. Leaders of the Islamic State have spoken frequently of their intention to drive a wedge between Western governments and their Muslim populations, and have welcomed outside help -- intentional or not -- in fulfilling that goal. In a 2015 essay in the Islamic States English-language magazine Dabiq, the group said that its motivation for launching terrorist attacks in Europe was to provoke an anti- Muslim backlash that would force ambivalent Muslims to enlist with them. Jihadists would have to argue to lengths that Obama, Bush, and others held anti-Islam agendas and hated the religion, not just radical terrorists, said Rita Katz, founder of the SITE Intelligence Group, a private organisation that monitors jihadist websites. Trump, however, makes that argument a lot easier for them to sell to their followers, Katz was quoted as saying. The reaction to the ban from Islamic State sympathisers came as current and former US officials also expressed concern that the temporary ban would undermine the global fight against violent Islamic militants. The effect will probably in some areas give ISIS some more propaganda, Senator John McCain told CBS News. Trump last week issued a controversial executive order banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia. Six people were killed and eight others injured, including five in a critical condition, when two gunmen opened fire in a mosque in Quebec City of eastern Canada on Sunday evening, with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau denouncing the shooting as a terrorist attack on Muslims. One suspect was arrested at the scene and the second surrendered to police. While the suspects were not identified by the police at a press conference on Monday morning, Radio-Canada reported their sources named the two persons arrested as Alexandre Bissonnette and Mohamed Khadir. As the day progressed, reports indicated that Bissonnette was the sole suspect while Khadir had called the police. Both were also reportedly students at the Universite Laval, though the University has not confirmed that detail. Both are apparently in their late 20s or early 30s. While Khadir was detained by police in the vicinity of the mosque, Bissonnette escaped in a vehicle and was captured following a chase. However, later the Surete de Quebec, the provincial police, stated that only one of the individuals arrested was considered a suspect. The other person in custody is reportedly a witness.. Khadir was arrested in the vicinity of the Islamic Cultural Center of Quebec, while Bissonnette escaped in a vehicle and was detained later in nearby Ile dOrleans and weapons were found in his vehicle, a black Mitsubishi. The victims too were not identified though they were all male, aged between 35 and 60 and of North African and African origin. In a statement, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said, We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge. He added: While authorities are still investigating and details continue to be confirmed, it is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. Please read my statement on tonights terrorist attack in Quebec City: https://t.co/58NRcOAUmB Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 30, 2017 Trudeau was scheduled to visit Quebec City along with Opposition leaders after making a statement at the Canadian House of Commons on Monday afternoon. Meanwhile, United States President Donald Trump called Trudeau to express his condolences over the tragedy. Police in the city, which is the capital of Quebec province, said the situation was under control, the places are secure and the occupants were evacuated and that an investigation is ongoing. Trudeau was in the Canadian capital, Ottawa, on Monday morning and cancelled a scheduled event as he was regularly briefed by his national security team on developments related to the attack. The two masked gunmen burst into the mosque in Sainte-Foy neighbourhood as evening prayers were ending and opened fire. The victims were men praying on the main floor of the mosque even as women and children had gathered on an upper floor. Nearly 40 people escaped the shooting. Islamic Cultural Center had been the target of a hate crime last summer during the holy month of Ramzan, when a pigs head was placed outside its door. Security at mosques in Quebec and other Canadian provinces and cities such as Toronto was heightened after the attack. Vigils in memory of the victims have been planned across the country. The provinces premier (the equivalent of chief minister), Philippe Couillard, said that Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence. Anti-terrorism protocols were established and, according to the French-language La Presse, the Police Management Structure Against Terrorism (TPCMS) had been activated. The Surete de Quebec placed a command center at the scene and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) will lead the investigation. The shootings came hours after Trudeau welcomed immigrants to Canada, striking a sharp contrast with US President Donald Trumps sweeping executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim countries. Trump suspended the arrival of refugees to the US for at least 120 days, with those from Syria barred indefinitely. He also blocked entry of people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for the next three months. Canadian Muslims React Canadian Muslim groups were stunned by the attack on the mosque in Quebec City. In a joint statement, the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM) and AMAL-Quebec expressed outrage at the attack. NCCMs executive director Ihsaan Gardee said they were horrified by this despicable act of violence. He added, This act of wanton murder must be punished to the fullest extent of the law. The Council also sought an increase in patrols and security around mosques and Islamic centers in the country. AMAL-Quebecs president, Haroun Bouazzi, said, Quebec Muslims are frightened right now. We are urgently waiting for answers as to how and why such a tragedy could occur. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON Pakistani authorities on Monday issued orders for Lashkar-e-Taiba founder Hafiz Saeed to be placed in preventive detention, sources in Islamabad said hours after reports of fresh US pressure for action against the man accused of masterminding the Mumbai attacks. Details regarding the order were not immediately available. A report on the website of The News daily said Saeed had been put under house arrest at Jamia Masjid Al Qadsia at Chowburji in Lahore, where the Jamaat-ud-Dawah has its headquarters. The sources also said action had been taken against four other operatives of the JuD, which continued to be on the Pakistani interior ministrys watch list and had not been banned. JuD spokesperson Yahya Mujahid told Reuters that police arrived at the groups headquarters with orders to place Saeed under house arrest. These steps are being taken to please India, Mujahid said. Earlier in the day, interior minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said during an interaction with reporters in Islamabad that the government was mulling action against the JuD, which is led by Saeed, in line with sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council. He said authorities were currently assessing the situation before taking a decision. Soon after, JuD activists held a protest at the Press Club of Islamabad to oppose any possible ban on the group. The News daily had reported on Monday that the US had threatened Pakistan with sanctions if it did not ban the JuD, which has already been declared a front for the LeT by American authorities and the UN Security Council. Consultations are going on whether to declare JuD as defunct or not. However, the final decision will be taken after consultations between the civilians and military authorities, an unnamed senior official was quoted as saying. During a meeting with Pakistani envoy Jalil Abbbas Jilani on January 11, a US assistant secretary of state raised the issue of the Asia Pacific Group on Money Launderings latest report raising objections regarding the activities and the financing of the JuD, the report said. The 41-member APG includes the Financial Action Task Force, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and the Egmont Group of Financial Intelligence Units. Jilani informed the Foreign Office about the development, saying Pakistan had to respond to the APG and the US authorities by January 31. This is not the first time Saeed has been placed under house arrest. Soon after the 2008 Mumbai attacks that killed 166 people, Pakistani authorities cracked down on the JuD and detained Saeed. Within six months, he was freed on the orders of the orders of the Lahore high court. The JuD also resumed its activities after forming another front organisation, the Falah-e-Insaniyat Foundation. North Korea is likely to launch an intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM), South Korean military officials said on Monday. There are no signs of an imminent test firing of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) by North Korea. But we are closely monitoring any new military activities in the country as it could launch an IRBM at any time if leader Kim Jong-un gives the order, a defence ministry said. This year, North Korea has said that it was ready to fire off an ICBM, Yonhap News Agency reported. In his New Years Day address, Kim said that the country has entered the final stage of preparations to test-fire an ICBM, an apparent threat that the communist state is close to developing a nuclear-tipped missile capable of striking the continental US. Last week, Seoul and Washington picked up indications that the North has placed two ICBMs on mobile launchers, an indication that the test could come earlier than expected. Pyongyang test-fired a total of eight IRBM between April and October last year, with only one flying any distance. A petition on the British parliaments website seeking to prevent US President Donald Trump from making a state visit here garnered over 1 million signatories by Monday morning, reflecting growing resentment in the country over his recent immigration-related orders. The petition had a few hundred signatories until Trump signed executive orders restricting the countrys refugee programme and banning citizens of seven countries. The orders affect British citizens with dual nationalities with one of the seven countries. Downing Street rejected calls to cancel Trumps visit later this year, saying that the invitation had been issued and accepted during last weeks visit of Prime Minister Theresa May to the US. The opposition Labour called the rejection an appeasement of the US. The Foreign Office on Sunday night issued a statement after talks with US counterparts, seeking to reassure British nationals that they would not be subjected to extreme vetting. However, some Britons with dual nationalities reported facing problems. Launched by Graham Guest, a solicitor from Leeds, the petition says: Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen. Donald Trump's well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore during the term of his presidency Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official State Visit, it adds. Under the rules, a petition that attracts over 1 million signatures is considered for debate in parliament. Foreign secretary Boris Johnson was expected to be questioned in the House of Commons on Monday afternoon on travel problems faced by Britons. There were also calls on the government to hold an emergency debate. Conservative MP Nadhim Zahawi, who was born in Baghdad, and the former Labour leader Ed Miliband said they were calling jointly for an emergency debate on Trumps ban on Monday. SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON The Madhesi Morcha said on Monday it will organise protests in Nepals southern Terai region next week to pressure the government of Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda to amend the Constitution before holding polls to local bodies. The increasingly impatient Madhesi Morcha said protests will be organised in district headquarters on February 5. Madhesi parties are also demanding the implementation of a three-point agreement signed on August 3, the day Prachanda took over as premier with the backing of the Morcha. A nearly two-hour-long meeting between Prachanda, the Nepali Congress and the Madhesi Morcha on Monday did not result in a breakthrough, and Madhesi leaders flatly rejected the idea of holding elections before their demands are met. During the meeting, Prachanda proposed the constitutional amendments and the elections should be taken up simultaneously. But Madhesi leaders said there could not be any forward movement till the statute is amended. The parties agreed to hold another meeting aimed at forging consensus on the two contentious issues. The Madhesis, who are mostly of Indian origin, had protested against the promulgation of the new Constitution for almost six months in 2015, when 59 people were killed and scores injured. Prachanda has so far failed to deliver on his promise to the Madhesi Morcha about announcing polls to local government bodies and amending the Constitution. Though he has been in power for almost six months, Prachanda has been unable to amend the statute to address the demands of Madhes-based parties related to demarcation of federal boundaries, language, citizenship and making the Constitution more broad based. Announcing elections to the local bodies is a constitutionally mandated task but the agitating Madhes-based parties have said they will not allow polls to be held before the Constitution is amended. CPN-Maoist Centre leader Narayan Kaji Shrestha said efforts would be made to finalise the two issues after holding consultations among the parties by Wednesday. . Senior officials of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (Saarc) are scheduled to meet in Kathmandu this week for the first time since the summit was postponed last year to discuss various issues. The meet on February 1-2 to attend the Programming Committee will be the first meeting of the Saarc member states since the postponement of the 19th Saarc that was supposed to take place in Islamabad November last year, a foreign ministry official said. During the meeting, Saarc member states will discuss a number of issues, including the budget of the Saarc Secretariat and five regional centres of Saarc, according to foreign ministry sources. The matter relating to rescheduling the next Saarc summit will also come up during the meeting, to be attended by joint secretaries of the Saarc countries. Nepal, current chair of the Saarc, had decided to postpone the Saarc Summit until further notice after four nations Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh and India requested to postpone the summit in Islamabad scheduled for November 9 and 10 last year, following escalation of tension between India and Pakistan. India and three other countries had blamed Pakistan for not creating a conducive environment and not cooperating on combating cross-border terrorism in South Asia for holding the Saarc Summit, while Pakistan has rejected the charges. Read | Pakistan hopes to host Saarc Summit soon, says India violated spirit of charter The decisions made by the programming committee will be forwarded to the Standing Committee for endorsement. Saarcis a regional body founded in 1985 in South Asia, comprising Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Read | 2016 was a bad year for Indo-Pak ties. What lies ahead? US President Donald Trumps executive order barring all refugees and citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States for 90 days took effect on Friday leading to detentions and entry-denials at airports in the country and around the world. We dont want them here, said Trump, referring to the immigrants. We want to ensure that we are not admitting into our country the very threats our soldiers are fighting overseas. The countries affected by what is being called a Muslim Ban are Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Syria, Yemen, Somalia and Libya, all Muslim-majority countries. The new rules blindsided people in transit and families waiting for them, and caused havoc for businesses with employees holding passports from the targeted nations and colleges with international students. Passengers were detained, kept in custody and allegedly tortured at the airport. However, all this while America once again showed how it values justice and equality, proving that Trump doesnt need to Make America Great Again; the nation is already great. Immediately after the order, thousands of Americans flooded the streets and airports to protest against the order. Here are eight things which happened after Trumps immigration ban that will restore your faith in humanity: 1. US veterans back comrades After hearing about the detention of Iraqi interpreter Hameed Khalid Darweesh at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, US veterans stepped in to offer help and support. Darweesh, who holds a special immigrant visa granted for over a decade of faithful service as a military translator in Iraq, was one of the 12 people detained at the airport. He had boarded the flight with his family, after repeated threats. He was set free after the American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit on his behalf. 2. Airbnb offers free housing In the midst of chaos caused by President Donald Trumps executive order, which stranded refugees, students and green card holders in American airports, Airbnb, an online marketplace and homestay network enabling people to list or rent short-term lodging in residential propertiesis is offering housing to those affected. 3. New York taxis workers alliance joins the protest The Alliance announced halted pickups at JFK from 6 pm to 7 pm on Sunday to protest reports of at least a dozen people who have been detained in the airport due to the immigration ban executive order signed by President Trump yesterday. The Facebook page of the alliance said, Our 19,000-member-strong union stands firmly opposed to Donald Trumps Muslim ban. As an organisation whose membership is largely Muslim, a workforce thats almost universally immigrant, and a working-class movement that is rooted in the defense of the oppressed, we say no to this inhumane and unconstitutional ban. 4. Tech industry expresses solidarity As the controversy unfolded, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, Google, Microsoft, Netflix and others issued a raft of mostly internal statements (shared to social media) expressing concern for their employees, affirmations of American values, and travel advice. In a staff email, Google CEO Sundar Pichai said that the ban will create barriers in bringing talent to the US. 5. Starbucks says it will hire 10,000 refugees Starbucks announced that it will hire 10,000 refugees in the next five years, a direct response to Trumps ban. Howard Schultz, the coffee retailers chairman and CEO, said in a letter to employees Sunday that the hiring would apply to stores worldwide and the effort would start in the United States where the focus would be on hiring immigrants who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel. 6. Crowd forms protective ring around praying Muslims A crowd of people gathered around Muslims offering namaz at the airport, shielding them from harassment or heckling. Just beautiful | Muslims pray at Denver airport while protesters provide protection from harassment. #NoMuslimBan pic.twitter.com/i6my9tTAdg Sayed M. Modarresi (@SayedModarresi) January 29, 2017 7. Christian and Jewish clergy come forward Clergy members of different stripes strongly denounced Trumps order, calling it discriminatory. In a demonstration of solidarity, four churches and a synagogue offered the use of their own houses of worship for the displaced members of a mosque that was gutted by fire in Victoria, Texas, hours after Trumps Muslim ban order. 8. Celebrities, politicians voice protests on social media Messages of support and solidarity flew in thick and fast from different quarters. Former US Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, went to the extent of saying she would register as a Muslim in solidarity. I was raised Catholic, became Episcopalian & found out later my family was Jewish. I stand ready to register as Muslim in #solidarity. Madeleine Albright (@madeleine) January 25, 2017 Dallass Democratic mayor, Mike Rawlings, apologized on behalf of the citizens of Dallas to the dozens detained at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport. From the bottom of my heart, I apologize to those detained this weekend and their families. All 9 ppl detained yesterday now released. pic.twitter.com/kPdzk2DCiF Mayor Mike Rawlings (@Mike_Rawlings) January 29, 2017 Celebrities such as Miley Cyrus, Rihanna and Kim Kardashian West also tweeted in support. Disgusted! The news is devastating! America is being ruined right before our eyes! What an immoral pig you have to be to implement such BS!! Rihanna (@rihanna) January 29, 2017 Authors twitter handle is @rizviuzair SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON US President Donald Trumps temporary travel ban is the first step in an immigration overhaul to spare the country from the type of high-profile attacks that have recently rocked Belgium, France and Germany, a senior administration official said Sunday. The ban, criticised by allies at home and abroad, suspends the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. While the temporary ban is in place, the Trump administration is devising a new immigration policy that the new president sees as making good on his campaign promise to subject travellers from Muslim-majority countries to extreme vetting and make America safe from radical Islamic terrorists. Situations that exist today in parts of France, in parts of Germany, in Belgium, etc., are not situations we want replicated inside the United States -- the kind of large and permanent domestic terrorist threat, multidimensional and multigenerational -- and become sort of a permanent feature of American life, the administration official said. Thats why the administration will try and develop new screening standards for those seeking permanent admission to the US. The Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for most of the large-scale attacks on major European cities over the past two years. Aides to US President Donald Trump on Sunday called the implementation of a temporary travel ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries a massive success story despite criticism from some top Republicans, protests and disarray at airports. A senior administration official said the executive orders signed by Trump on Friday, which bar the admission of Syrian refugees and suspends travel to the United States from Syria, Iraq, Iran and four other countries on national security grounds, were being fully enforced by relevant agencies. Read: US tempers part of Trump immigration ban amid big protests, criticism Nothing has changed, said the official, briefing reporters on condition of anonymity as rallies against the move erupted across the United States. US judges in at least five states blocked federal authorities from enforcing the order. Lawyers representing people covered by the order said some authorities were unwilling to follow the court rulings. The administration official rejected criticism of the way Trumps plan had been implemented, saying: So it really is a massive success story in terms of implementation on every single level. Read: The world is a horrible mess: Trump defends executive orders on immigration Senator Bob Corker, the Republican chairman of the US senate foreign relations committee, however, said the application of the order was poorly implemented, particularly for green card holders, who have lawful permanent residence status. White House defends strategists clout on national security The White House on Sunday said the addition of President Donald Trumps chief strategist, Steve Bannon, to regular meetings on national security was essential to the commander in chiefs decision-making process. Trump took steps on Saturday to begin restructuring the White House National Security Council, adding the senior adviser to the principals committee, which includes the secretaries of state and defense. At the same time, Trump said his director of national intelligence and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff will attend only when issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed. Bannon served in the Navy before attending Harvard Business School, working at Goldman Sachs, starting his own media-focused boutique investment banking firm and later heading the ultraconservative outlet Breitbart News, which has been condemned for featuring racist, sexist and anti-Semitic content. Also read: An unguided missile: US national security handover to Trump has been bumpy He is a former naval officer. Hes got a tremendous understanding of the world and the geopolitical landscape that we have now, White House press secretary Sean Spicer said. White House press secretary Sean Spicer speaks during a daily briefing at the White House in Washington. (AP photo) Spicer said having the chief strategist for the president in those meetings who has a significant military background to help make guide what the presidents final analysis is going to be is crucial. But to Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, the Democratic vice presidential nominee, the NSC sadly has some really questionable people on it, he said, citing Bannon among them. President Donald Trump and Saudi King Salman want to rigorously enforce the Iran nuclear deal, the White House said Sunday, despite the US leaders long opposition to the agreement. The pair, in a phone conversation, also spoke of the need to address Irans destabilizing regional activities, fight the spread of radical Islamic terrorism and establish safe zones in war-ravaged Syria and Yemen, the White House statement read. No further details were provided about those plans. Trump opposed the nuclear agreement signed by Israels arch-foe Iran and world powers, including the United States, in 2015 and has said he wants to undo it. Some of his key nominees have adopted an openly anti-Iran stance, including secretary of state candidate Rex Tillerson, who is seeking a complete revision of the accord. Israeli President Netanyahu said last month that there were many ways of undoing the Iran nuclear deal and that he would discuss that with Trump. But before he left office, former president Barack Obama warned against rowing back the pact, emphasizing its significant and concrete results. The deal places curbs on Tehrans nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions. Tehran is a major foe of both Washington and Ryad. The Sunni majority Saudi kingdom is engaged in a power struggle with the Shiite country for dominance in the region. Trump and King Salman agreed on the importance of rigorously enforcing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran and of addressing Irans destabilizing regional activities, the White House said. Trump also spoke by telephone with the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, committing to further strengthen cooperation on fighting radical Islamic terrorism, the White House said. It said the pair also discussed establishing safe zones for refugees displaced by conflict in the region, and the crown prince agreed to support this initiative. President Donald Trump said on Monday his administration had been able to cut some $600 million from the latest US deal to buy about 90 F-35 Joint Strike Fighters, the Lockheed Martin aircraft the president has criticised for cost overruns. Trump, speaking to reporters at the White House, said Lockheed Martin had been responsive to his concerns about the high cost of the stealthy, high-tech warplane. We cut approximately $600 million off the F-35 fighter, and that only amounts to 90 planes out of close to 3,000 planes, Trump said, attributing that figure to Lockheed chief executive Marillyn Hewson. Negotiations for the 10th batch of F-35 aircraft - about 90 planes - have been under way, with a deal expected by the end of the month. The contract was expected to be around $9 billion, with the price per plane falling below $100 million. Trump said he became involved in the discussions over the cost of the aircraft about a month ago when he was still president-elect because the negotiations were not progressing. They were having a lot of difficulty. There was no movement. And I was able to get $600 million approximately off those planes. So I think that was a great achievement, Trump said, suggesting the savings would be even larger as more planes are bought and as the administration looks at other contracts. We will be savings billions and billions and billions of dollars on contracts, Trump said. The United States is expected to spend some $391 billion over 15 years to buy about 2,443 F-35 aircraft, which are being built in different versions for the Air Force, Navy and Marines. The price of the F-35 has typically been dropping with each new batch as Lockheed and the US government ramp up production of the aircraft, which helps to lower overall costs. While Trump and other US officials have criticized the F-35 program for delays, cost overruns and high aircraft costs, the program has been stabilising in recent years and the costs have been coming down. There were great delays, about seven years of delays, tremendous cost overruns, Trump told reporters. Weve ended all of that and weve got that program really, really now in good shape, so Im very proud of that. A senior Italian official warned that the UK and the European Union are heading into an economic cold war over Brexit that could wreak havoc on the west and weaken the continent. Mario Giro, Italys deputy foreign minister, said while many countries in the EU had said the UKs vote to leave the EU represented a loss to the union, there were more hardliners in the EU against the UK than it appeared. When we are among the 27 [countries within the EU, not including the UK], the hardliners are more numerous than it appears. I cannot quote a country in particular at the moment. We will see it at the beginning of the negotiation, Giro said in an interview with the Guardian. Read: Disgraceful: Theresa May govt introduces Brexit bill, sparks row He added: We are hearing more and more that there are people economic interests who are thinking they can inherit some economic position, thinking that they can take away from the UK some of the position of the City of London. Not Italy, of course, because we are not in that position. And this will be an economic war. Lets say an economic cold war, and we are not in favour of it. The statement followed remarks this month by the British prime minister Theresa May in which she said the UK was prepared for a hard Brexit if she could not negotiate a reasonable agreement with the EU over Britains departure. She said attempts by other EU countries to wreak vengeance on the UK would be an act of calamitous self-harm because the UK in turn would be prepared to radically cut taxes to attract businesses. Italian officials have always said their top priority in Brexit negotiations would be to guarantee the rights of hundreds of thousands of Italians who lived in the UK. Giro suggested that a coming battle of interests which he described as a competition between economic interests, not necessarily individual states could have terrible consequences. This will be a disgrace. To enter into a new era of hard competition on big money questions involving companies, this is very bad for the western world. We dont need these kinds of tensions at this time of a geopolitical Jurassic Park, he said, meaning that it was a world where every interest was out for itself. Read: After Trump talks, May eyes stronger post-Brexit trading ties with Turkey Giro declined to name specific concerns or the economic interests he was referring to but said the financial world is repositioning itself. We have to negotiate with patience, calm, we have to be honest to each other, and also we have to use fair play, he said. Because if we dont do it like this, if we act from the belly, with revenge, with sentiments, we will all be in trouble. While Italy was disappointed to see the UK exit the EU in this manner our idea was a soft Brexit, a negotiated one Giro also said he hoped Mays remarks this week represented just one speech. The process has not started. We have two years, he said. For Giro, Brexit is just one of a multitude of issues that shows a world coming apart at the seams. The old tools principles and multilateralism do not function any more, he said. Everything is broken and everyone is trying to save himself. His first concerns included Libya and Turkey, where he said any increase in instability threatened to drag us into it, into the confusion of the Middle East. We need Turkey to defend itself from this contagion [spreading from Syria]. We have to help Ankara, showing strong solidarity, he said. Even though Italys former prime minister Matteo Renzi, whose centre-left Democratic party still controls the Italian government, clearly favoured Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump in the US election, Giro said Italys view of America was essentially unchanged. Italy has always had good relations with America and will no matter what president the US has, he said. We will work with the new administration as we did with previous ones. He knows that Italy is very much in favour of strengthening the European Union, and not to dissolve it. That is something that everyone knows. Turkey on Monday opened the biggest trial yet over the failed July 2016 coup aimed at ousting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, trying 270 suspects including, in absentia, the alleged mastermind Fethullah Gulen. The suspects, 152 of whom are in pre-trial detention, include ex high-ranking military officials like former Aegean Army Command Chief of Staff Major General Memduh Hakbilen, the state news agency Anadolu reported. Also going on trial was ex-NATO Land Commander Chief of Staff Major General Salih Sevil. The number one suspect is US-based Islamic preacher Gulen, who is charged with ordering the failed July 15 coup, an accusation he strongly denies. Ankara also accuses the movement Gulen leads of being a terror organisation although the group insists it is a peaceful organisation promoting moderate Islam. Those on trial in the western city of Izmir face multiple charges including being a member of the armed terror group. Turkey has repeatedly asked the United States to extradite Gulen, who has been living in self-imposed exile there since 1999. The previous administration of Barack Obama had insisted that a possibly slow legal process should take its course but Ankara is hoping for a more eager response to its extradition request from new President Donald Trump. Gulen previously went on trial in absentia in January last year over corruption allegations that hit Erdogan in 2013. The Turkish justice ministry also sent new evidence to Washington for Gulens return including the indictment for the Izmir case, Anadolu reported on Monday. The indictment includes witness statements alleging that Gulen was to be presented with the plans for the coup by Adil Oksuz for his approval, the agency added. Turkish officials have said that theology lecturer Oksuz was the so-called imam of the plot and in charge of coordinating between Gulen and the army. Oksuz was detained in the aftermath of the coup but then released and is now on the run. Izmir: main plotting hub Other charges against the suspects include seeking to prevent parliament performing its duty as well as attempting to remove the constitutional order, the agency said. The suspects face life imprisonment if convicted in a trial expected to take two months, the Hurriyet newspaper reported. It said Izmir was believed to be one of the main plotting hubs of the coup with the Aegean city used as a logistical base. Memduh was apparently to be declared Izmirs martial law commander by the putschists, Anadolu reported at the time. Turkish officers are escorted by Greek special police forces as they leave the Greek Supreme Court in Athens on January 23 after a hearing concerning a possible extradition of the officers over July's failed coup in Turkey. (AFP File) A special courtroom was built to accommodate the size of the trial and security was tight. Intensive security measures included a drone above the courthouse, bomb-sniffing dogs and commando units. Previous trials have opened in Istanbul and smaller cases in other provinces in what is expected to be the largest legal process in the countrys history. Some 43,000 people are under arrest ahead of trial in a large-scale crackdown within a state of emergency declared after the coup which remains in place. On Monday, 10 more soldiers were arrested in connection with the Gulen movement, Anadolu reported. In December, 29 police officers went on trial in Istanbul accused of failing to defend Erdogan while 62 rebel soldiers are being tried over claims they attempted to take over Istanbuls Sabiha Gokcen Airport on the night of July 15. President Donald Trumps administration on Sunday tempered a key element of his move to ban entry of refugees and people from seven Muslim-majority countries in the face of mounting criticism even from some prominent Republicans and protests that drew tens of thousands in major American cities. Trump signed the directive on Friday, but the policy appeared to be evolving on the fly. Democrats and a growing number of Republicans assailed the move and foreign leaders condemned it amid court challenges and tumult at US airports. The presidents critics have said his action unfairly singled out Muslims, violated US law and the US Constitution and defiled Americas historic reputation as hospitable to immigrants. In a fresh defense of the action on Sunday, Trump said his directive was not about religion but keeping America safe. Trump has presented the policy as a way to protect the country from the threat of Islamist militants. US Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly said in a statement that people from the seven countries who hold so-called green cards as lawful permanent US residents would not be blocked from returning to the United States from overseas, as some had been following the directive. In his statement, Kelly said: I hereby deem the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest. Outside the White House, where some viewing stands from Trumps January 20 inaugural parade still stood, several thousand protesters denounced him, carrying signs such as Deport Trump and Fear is a terrible thing for a nations soul. Protests also were staged in cities and airports in New York, Los Angeles, Boston, Houston, Dallas and elsewhere. Demonstrators at Philadelphia International Airport protest against the executive order that President Donald Trump signed clamping down on refugee admissions and temporarily restricting travellers from seven predominantly Muslim countries on January 29 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (AFP) The Republican president on Friday put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the country, an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria and a three-month bar on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Border and customs officials struggled to put Trumps directive into practice. Confusion persisted over details of implementation, in particular for the people who hold green cards. Read l Canada: 5 killed and many injured in Quebec mosque shooting Senator Bob Corker, the Republican chairman of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a Trump supporter, said the presidents order had been poorly implemented, particularly for green card holders. The administration should immediately make appropriate revisions, and it is my hope that following a thorough review and implementation of security enhancements that many of these programs will be improved and reinstated, Corker said. Trump defended his action. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting, Trump said in a statement on Sunday. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. He added: We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. The department on Saturday said Trumps action did apply to people with green cards who were returning to the United States from the seven nations. A White House official said later on Saturday that green card holders who had left the United States and wanted to return would have to visit a U.S. embassy or consulate to undergo additional screening. Read | Donald Trumps Muslim ban takes effect but faces lawsuits around the world White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus went on the Sunday morning news programs to say those people would not be blocked. As far as green card holders moving forward, it doesnt affect them, Priebus said on the NBC program Meet the Press. Priebus added that these green card holders would be subjected to more questioning by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents when they try to re-enter the United States until a better program is put in place over the next several months. In an apparent indication that Kellys instructions were being implemented, some green card holders arriving in the United States said they had no trouble clearing customs. Mahdi Tajsarvi, an engineer who lives in Virginia, said he and his wife, Arezoo Hosseini, both Iranian citizens with US green cards, were asked a few routine questions by authorities at Dulles International Airport outside Washington on Sunday evening and let through within a few minutes. More nations may be added Priebus also said Customs and Border Patrol agents would have discretionary authority when they encountered someone arriving who they suspect is up to no good from certain nations. Asked why Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Egypt were not included on Trumps list, Priebus said that perhaps other countries needed to be added to an executive order going forward. US judges in at least five states blocked federal authorities from enforcing Trumps directive, but lawyers representing people covered by the order said some authorities were unwilling on Sunday to follow the judges rulings. Read l Facebook CEO Zuckerberg criticises Trump on immigration policy US Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, prominent Republican foreign policy voices, said in a joint statement Trumps order may do more to help recruit terrorists than improve U.S. security. Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism, they said, adding the United States should not stop green card holders from returning to the country they call home. This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country, the added. Trump blasted the two senators in a Twitter statement, calling them sadly weak on immigration. In a another Twitter message earlier on Sunday, Trump said the United States needed strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue! added Trump, who successfully tapped in Americans fear of attacks during his election campaign. Trumps tweet did not mention that many more Muslims have been killed in the bloody Syrian civil war and other violence in the targeted countries. Condemnation of Trumps action poured in from abroad, including from traditional allies of the United States. In Germany, which has taken in large numbers of people fleeing the Syrian civil war, Chancellor Angela Merkel said the global fight against terrorism was no excuse for the measures and does not justify putting people of a specific background or faith under general suspicion, her spokesman said on Sunday. Canada will offer temporary residency to people stranded in the country as a result of Trumps executive order on immigration, Canadian Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said. Briefing reporters at the White House on condition of anonymity, a U.S. administration official rejected criticism of the way Trumps plan had been carried out, saying: So it really is a massive success story in terms of implementation on every single level. Chuck Schumer, the top Democrat in the Republican-led US Senate, had a different view, calling Trumps administration incompetent. One hand doesnt know what the other is doing, Schumer said. I think banning refugees, banning immigrants, banning religions like Islam or any other religion, is un-American, said Will Turner, 42, draped in a U.S. flag among a crowd of several thousand people in front of the White House chanting: No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here. An official of the conservative billionaire industrialist Koch brothers political network of donors criticized Trumps immigration order at the donors winter gathering in Indian Wells, California. Our country has benefited tremendously from a history of welcoming people from all cultures and backgrounds. This is a hallmark of free and open societies, Brian Hooks said in a statement. Civil rights and some religious groups, activists and Democratic politicians have promised to fight Trumps order and Schumer said his party would introduce legislation to overturn it. Republicans control both the House of Representatives and the Senate. Priebus said that of 325,000 people who arrived from foreign countries on Saturday, 109 people were detained for further questioning, and most of them were moved out, with just a couple dozen more that remain detained. It wasnt chaos, he said. Judges in California, Massachusetts, Virginia and Washington state, each home to international airports, issued their rulings after a similar order was issued on Saturday night by U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly in New Yorks Brooklyn borough in a case involving two Iraqis caught by the order as they flew into the country. Attorneys general from California, New York, 13 other states and Washington, DC, condemned and pledged to fight what they called Trumps dangerous and unconstitutional order. Freedoms Just Another Word I was surprised when I saw the cover of your December 2014 issue. Robert E. Lee may still have many admirers, but as far as I know, he was a traitor to his country and should have been hanged after the Civil War. Jorge M. Robert Orlando & Ocoee, Fla. How in Gods name could a magazine claiming to be about American history put a picture of Robert E. Lee on the cover under the heading Freedom Fighter? Why didnt you include Benedict Arnold? Robert T. Cornwell Wichita, Kan. Enough Washington, Lincoln, Lee, etc. How about stories on Harvey Firestone, tire innovator; Philip Mazzei, Italian physician, horticulturist, friend of Tomas Jefferson and supporter of the American Revolution; or Charles R. Chickering, dean of stamp design at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing? Raymond Amoroso Brick, N.J. Four More Years I really enjoyed Second-Term Blues (Weve Been Here Before, December 2014). I would love to see this be a continuing series through the rest of Obamas second term, recounting different presidents and their lackluster or trouble-laden second terms (or third or fourth, as is the case for FDR). Sarah Jowett via Facebook Death-Defying Facts The First Senate Write-In Winner in the December 2014 issue was marred by two errors. First, it is incorrect to say that Strom Turmond remained in the Senate until his death in 2003. He declined to seek another term in 2002 and left the Senate in January 2003, almost six months before his death. Second, Mel Carnahan was the governor of Missouri who was running for a Senate seatnot a U.S. senator when he was killed shortly before the 2000 election. Dan Harrison Briarclif Manor, N.Y. Politically Incorrect Ron Soodalters article about the first Thanksgiving Proclamation by the new federal government told a fascinating story and illuminated important political and constitutional issues of the time (For All the Great and Various Favors, December 2014). There is just one minor but glaring error that caught my attentiona reference to James Madison as an Antifederalist. The father of the Constitution and a co-author of The Federalist Papers was, in 1789, surely not an opponent of the new government. He subsequently opposed the Federalist Party because he broke with Alexander Hamilton over specific policies, but this should not be confused with the antifederalism of states rights defenders who opposed the Constitution itself. Ron Miller Woodstock, Vt. Antifederalist was mistakenly inserted by the editors. Madison worked valiantly to ratify the Constitution, but he was opposed to a strong central government. As a congressman during George Washingtons presidency, Madison led a vocal anti-administration faction of like-minded pols. Sarah Josepha Hale is barely accorded a mention in your article about American Thanksgiving. Hales 17-year campaign of writing letters to every president and governor, persistent editorials in Godeys Ladys Book (1860 circulation 150,000) and years of follow-up articles and receipts published in Godeys made our Thanksgiving Day look, taste and feel as it does today. Is there a little gender bias here? I expect better of you, American History. Joanne L. Hjort Seattle, Wash. No disrespect to Hale, who was a significant editorial force for more than 40 years, but our story was meant to shed light on the surprising political origins of a holiday that most Americans consider apolitical. Seeing Is Believing I love the new iPad version of American History and was so happy to see the app in the iTunes store. This is by far the best history magazine, now even better. It is a joy to read on the iPad and laid out beautifully. I hope to see more interactive features and videos in future issues. This is what truly brings history to life. David Pucci Folsom, Calif. Originally published in the February 2015 issue of American History. To subscribe, click here. Six people have been reportedly shot dead at a mosque in Quebec City on Sunday night, as the attack took place at the city's Islamic Cultural Center the incident is being investigated by the police as an act of terrorism. As witnesses stated that three people carried out the attack the fatal shooting had also left eight civilians injured. The shot out took place during the evening prayers, two arrests were made later on by the police and they believe that the third suspect could still be on the run as per The Guardian. The Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said they condemn the terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of refuge and worship. One suspect was reported to be carrying an AK- 47 assault rifle and one was 27 years old. The two gunmen were wearing black and they opened fire randomly into dozens of worshipers, including families present at the mosque. Following the attack the Canadian province's premier, Philippe Couillard said that he would ask the National Assembly to fly the Quebec flag at half staff as per CNN. The police later on declared the situation was under control and the site was secure, the occupants of the mosque were evacuated safely. With further investigation, police are not ruling out the existence of accomplices. The might be other suspects involved in the shooting but it will need some time to figure it out. Five of the victims that are injured are currently receiving treatment at the University Hospital in Quebec. The hospital spokesperson Richard Fournier said other victims are in different hospitals throughout the city. Two vigils will take place in Quebec City and Montreal, this is not the first time the cultural center has been targeted. Last year a pig's head was wrapped and sent to the center and a magazine consisting of a pig on its cover saying "Bonne Appetit." @ 2022 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. Dr. Daryl Van Tongeren of the Hope College psychology faculty has been named a Rising Star in research by the Association for Psychological Science, a recognition most often bestowed on scholars at institutions with graduate-level programs. This was a complete surprise, and a delight, said Van Tongeren, an assistant professor of psychology who has taught at Hope since 2012. The Rising Star designation recognizes outstanding scientists in the earliest stages of their research career post-Ph.D. whose innovative work has already advanced the field and signals great potential for their continued contributions. Van Tongeren and this years other honorees have been recognized on the organizations website and will be highlighted in the February issue of the associations magazine, the Observer. This years list includes 95 researchers from across the United States and around the world, with Van Tongeren one of only two honorees from liberal arts colleges. That Van Tongeren is among those honored this year doesnt surprise Dr. Scott Vander Stoep, who is dean for the social sciences and a professor of psychology at Hope. It was immediately clear to us that Daryl was going to be a prodigious scholar. He has experienced unparalleled success as a grant writer and in his research output, Vander Stoep said. He publishes dozens of articles in refereed journals each year and, most importantly for Hope, he engages our students in much of his research. I've also observed Daryl teach several times and he is as good of a teacher as he is a scholar. And he makes all of these professional contributions with humility and with gratitude for working at a college that allows him to connect his Christian faith with his work life. Van Tongerens research focuses on the social motivation for meaning and its relation to virtues and morality. Specifically, he and his students adopt a social-cognitive approach to study meaning in life, religion and virtues, such as forgiveness and humility. For example, one of his current studies, part of a multi-institutional project, is seeking to understand how natural disasters shape what survivors believe, while another recently focused on the role that the desire for meaning plays in the tension between scientific and religious belief. Im really intrigued by big questions and psychological sciences ability to answer some of the biggest and most pressing questions that people face, Van Tongeren said. In my mind, when people wrestle with the meaning of life, the role of religion and how to treat each other well, those seem like some of the most pressing issues that we face. Van Tongeren has published more than 100 journal articles and academic book chapters. He has received multiple grants for his research from the John Templeton Foundation as well as from the college. In addition, Hope named him a Towsley Research Scholar in 2015 and he received the colleges Social Sciences Young Investigators Award in 2014. He regularly involves students as collaborative researchers in his work, both part-time during the school year and full-time during the summer. Several Hope students are co-authors on his publications, and students he mentored in research have received a regional award for excellence from the Midwestern Chapter of Psi Chi The International Honor Society in Psychology two years in a row. Prior to coming to Hope, Van Tongeren was a post-doctoral fellow at Virginia Commonwealth University for a year. He completed his undergraduate degree at Colorado Christian University in 2004, his masters degree at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs in 2006 and his doctorate at Virginia Commonwealth University in 2011. The Association for Psychological Science (previously the American Psychological Society) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the advancement of scientific psychology and its representation at the national and international level. Founded in 1988, the association has more than 26,000 members and includes the leading psychological scientists and academics, clinicians, researchers, teachers and administrators. More information about the association is available here. The list of this years Rising Stars is available at psychologicalscience.org. Hope College will feature the address Rx: Prescription for Latin America by Jason Beaubien, global health and development correspondent on the science desk of National Public Radio, on Monday, Feb. 6, at 1 p.m. in Winants Auditorium of Graves Hall through the Great Decisions Global Discussion Series of the World Affairs Council of Western Michigan. The public is invited. Admission is free. The councils Great Decisions Global Discussion Series highlights the most critical global topics facing Americans for the year as chosen by the Foreign Policy Association in New York City. The council brings experts to West Michigan to discuss the topics, with presentations at Hope in the afternoon and at Aquinas College in the evening. Beaubien, who will also be speaking in the Performing Arts Center at Aquinas in the evening, reports on a range of health issues across the world. Hes covered mass circumcision drives in Kenya, abortion in El Salvador, poisonous gold mines in Nigeria, drug-resistant malaria in Myanmar and tuberculosis in Tajikistan. He was part of a team of reporters at NPR that won a Peabody Award in 2015 for their extensive coverage of the West Africa Ebola outbreak. His current beat also examines development issues including why Niger has the highest birth rate in the world, can private schools serve some of the poorest kids on the planet and the links between obesity and economic growth. Prior to becoming the Global Health and Development Correspondent in 2012, Beaubien spent four years based in Mexico City covering Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean. In that role, he filed stories on politics in Cuba, the 2010 Haitian earthquake, the FMLN victory in El Salvador, the world's richest man and Mexico's brutal drug war. For his first multi-part series as the Mexico City correspondent, Beaubien drove the length of the U.S./Mexico border making a point to touch his toes in both oceans. The stories chronicled the economic, social and political changes along the violent frontier. In 2002, Beaubien joined NPR after volunteering to cover a coup attempt in the Ivory Coast. Over the next four years, he worked as a foreign correspondent in sub-Saharan Africa, visiting 27 countries on the continent. His reporting ranged from poverty on the world's poorest continent, the HIV in the epicenter of the epidemic, and the all-night a cappella contests in South Africa, to Afro-pop stars in Nigeria and a trial of white mercenaries in Equatorial Guinea. During this time, he covered the famines and wars of Africa, as well as the inspiring preachers and Nobel laureates. Beaubien was one of the first journalists to report on the huge exodus of people out of Sudan's Darfur region into Chad, as villagers fled some of the initial attacks by the Janjawid. He reported extensively on the steady deterioration of Zimbabwe and still has a collection of worthless Zimbabwean currency. In 2006, Beaubien was awarded a Knight-Wallace fellowship at the University of Michigan to study the relationship between the developed and the developing world. Beaubien grew up in Maine, started his radio career as an intern at NPR Member Station KQED in San Francisco and worked at WBUR in Boston before joining NPR. Hope is an educational partner of the World Affairs Council of Western Michigan, which is dedicated to educating people in western Michigan about other countries and cultures of the world, as well as providing a forum for discussion of critical foreign policy issues. In existence since 1949, the World Affairs Council of Western Michigan is a non-partisan, non-advocacy educational non-profit organization. With 60 member companies and almost 3,000 members, it is considered one of the best councils in the national network of 100 World Affairs Councils.he councils Great Decisions Global Discussion Series will feature a total of eight addresses on Mondays between February 6 and April 3, with additional topics including nuclear proliferation, and the complexity of U.S.-Saudi and U.S.-China relations. Six of the events will take place at Hope, and all eight will take place at Aquinas College. There is a $10 admission charge for the events at Aquinas. More information about the presentations at Hope is available here. More information and about the Great Decisions Global Discussion Series as a whole is also available. Graves Hall is located at 263 College Ave., between 10th and 12th streets. The Aquinas College Performing Arts Center is located at 1703 Robinson Rd. SE in Grand Rapids. Photo credit: Doby Photography Visit expo > BMP Whole Blood Analyzer: GEM Premier ChemSTAT Gold Supplier Applied Biosystems QuantStudio 7 Pro Dx Real-Time PCR System New FD150 Lyophilizer New FOB BSD920/BSD650 One Step Fecal Occult Blood Test Leading consultants from the Royal Brompton & Harefield Hospitals, one of the largest centers for the diagnosis and management of patients with ICC in the UK, performed groundbreaking surgery on the UK pavilion at Arab Health 2017 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.Each year, the Arab Health Congress, the largest healthcare exhibition in the Middle East, attracts a high level of UK clinicians, clinics and healthcare technology companies. At the four-day event held from January 30 to February 2, 2017, at the Dubai International Convention & Exhibition Centre, over 150 leading healthcare businesses, renowned hospital groups and esteemed clinicians from world-leading clinics were amongst the UK delegation traveling to the Middle East to showcase the very best of British healthcare. The Association of British Healthcare Industries, the industry association for the medical technology sector in the UK, organizes the UK Pavilion to highlight how British developments are transforming the lives of patients and clinicians across the globe.The technically demanding cardiac surgery performed at the UK Pavilion at the Arab Health 2017 provides hope to regional sufferers of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, which is the most common of all inherited cardiac conditions (ICC) and is associated with a higher risk of sudden death in the young. Due to its complex nature, clinical experience with these conditions is limited to a few centers around world, and the surgery carried out by world-leading specialists in heart and lung conditions on the UKs state-of-the-art operating theatre located on the UK Pavilion is expected to lead to better practice for this complex condition across the globe.Other demonstrations that took place on the UKs operating theatre included shoulder arthroscopies, knee reconstructions and laparoscopic rectal surgeries performed by healthcare providers BMI Healthcare, and HCA International.Paul Benton, International Director at the ABHI said, We are delighted to be performing such pioneering surgery at this years Arab Health Congress. Our surgical stage celebrates collaborations between healthcare providers, clinicians and healthcare technology companies and allows visitors to watch Britains best surgeons in action. It is also equipped with advanced UK technologies and is a flagship to the many pioneering MedTech innovations that are being showcased on the UK pavilion. Donald Trumps immigration ban, which affects 7 majority-Muslim countries, has inspired protests across the United States over the last 48 hours. A protest in Dayton, Ohio today featured a special guest speaker in Dave Chapelle, the celebrated comedian who converted to Islam in 1998. Chapelle made a short speech, which much like his unforgettable SNL monologue, was as funny as it was powerful. Donald Trump, wherever you are, I am begging you. Stop ruining my Sunday. It is freezing out here, he joked, before taking a more serious turn. We are all here because what you are doing does not seem right. As a matter of fact, it sucks. I support refugees, I support immigrants, and I love my friends and neighbors. Thank you. Watch footage of Chapelles speech below. Chappelle is one of many celebrities who have voiced disapproval for Trumps ban, including Rihanna, who wrote on Twitter, Disgusted! The news is devastating! America is being ruined right before our eyes! What an immoral pig you have to be to implement such BS!! Dave Chappelle Migos recently linked up with Joe La Puma at Flight Clubs Los Angeles location for an episode of sneaker shopping in which they discussed getting into a fight over the Candy Cane Air Jordan XIV, camping out for sneakers and the incredible run that Adidas has been on as of late. Migos also touched on some of their least favorite Air Jordans of all-time which includes the Air Jordan 22, aka when MJ lost the sauce, as well as why they love to wear Pharrells Adidas NMDs while performing on stage. Of course, the guys also briefly spoke about their sneaker plug, Benjamin Kickz, who is seemingly supplying the entire rap game with the most sought after sneakers nowadays. At the end of the day, Migos collectively racked up close to $3,000 on a handful of Js. Check out their trip to Flight Club LA below. Widely considered one of the best guitarists in the world for his two-handed playing style and integration of percussive techniques, Preston Reed will be bringing his unique style to The Grand Social this February. After a whirlwind year performing in China, USA, Canada and Europe, Preston Reed returns to Dublin for another intimate show in The Grand Social. Blues, rock, metal, funk, jazz and classical styles are distilled into a breath-taking musical and visual experience - a border-hopping musical language that tells stories without words. Recognised internationally as one of the greatest guitarists in the world, and as a ground-breaking innovator, Reed revolutionised the way the acoustic guitar is played. Advertisement The Manchester indie rockers will headline at Belsonic in Belfast and Malahide Castle in Dublin this June. The 1975 will return to these shores having thrilled the crowd at Electric Picnic back in September. They will be supporting the release of their clunkily-titled sophomore album I Like It When You Sleep, For You Are So Beautiful Yet So Unaware Of It, which was critically lauded in 2016. Tickets for the Malahide Castle gig are 49.50 and go on sale this Friday, February 3. Tickets for Belsonic also go on sale this Friday. // D U B L I N & B E L F A S T - T I C K E T S O N S A L E F R I D A Y // L O V E https://t.co/SuBdXeiVJV pic.twitter.com/y5E7YUShZJ The 1975 (@the1975) January 30, 2017 This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate NEW YORK - With the start of tax season, stress levels are rising at many small businesses. Even owners who are organized, keep good books and stay in touch with their accountants can find compiling returns to be a painful process. One reason is that tax laws change often, says Rosamaria Bravo, a certified public accountant with the firm MBAF in Miami. One of this year's big differences: Partnership returns must be filed by March 15, a month earlier than in the past. And companies known as C corporations have a filing deadline of mid-April, after having a March due date in past years. "It's very hard to stay on top of all the information," Bravo says. "The average business owner is more worried about their day-to-day operations." Here's a look at some lessons small business owners learned: Using software wisely When Christina Divigard started an advertising agency, she bought accounting software and began keeping the company's books herself. When tax season arrived, she discovered that out of inexperience, she'd incorrectly entered some information and misclassified some types of deductions. It took two weeks to get her books in order. "If I had to do it all over again, I would have put more effort and budget behind setting up systems properly from the get-go," says Divigard, managing director of New York-based Valvespring. Divigard subsequently hired a bookkeeper to help set up accounts and understand how to input income and expenses. She also learned more about the need to put expenses into different accounting categories - for example, meals during a business trip are different from meals to entertain customers under the tax law. Having a system that is correctly set up has reduced the chance of errors, and even if Divigard has to do repair work, "now it takes me a day rather than two weeks." Keeping up with the changes Complying with tax law revisions can be hard even with a bookkeeper and accountant, Barbara Karpf has learned. As of this year, businesses must file W-2 forms and 1099 forms with the IRS by Jan. 31. While companies were previously required to give those forms to workers by the end of January, they didn't have to get them to the government until the end of February. The government can charge a penalty if it gets the forms late. That created extra pressure for Karpf. Her home decor company, DecoratorsBest, moved offices in New York right after Black Friday and Cyber Monday, two of its busiest sales days. After she hired movers and a painter for the new space, she realized she needed to get information like Social Security numbers and addresses from eight people. Well into January she was still getting all the information together so 1099 forms for freelancers and other contract workers could get to the government, as well as the workers, on time. "It's more work in a shorter period of time," Karpf says. When an owner is running a business day by day and also trying to do long-term strategic planning, details like tax-deductible expenses can get lost in the shuffle, creating a headache later. Deborah Sweeney has learned to look at her books monthly to be sure expenses like charitable donations and the costs of employee meetings are entered properly. "That way, we don't have to scramble at the end of the year," says Sweeney, owner of MyCorporation.com, a Calabasas, California-based company that helps businesses incorporate online. Sweeney recalls errors of past years, such as not taking a deduction for a service contract on a printer. She has also learned to take her questions to her accountant to be sure she's not missing some of the finer points of rules about deductions. For example: "How do we categorize new furniture - do we write it off or depreciate it? What amount of an owner's health care costs is deductible?" Finding the best help Diane Hamilton, though, has struggled to find an accountant who's a good fit for her company, which makes computer and phone apps. She has worked with large accounting firms in the Richmond, Virginia, area where her Binary Formations business is located. But the bills climbed as she called with questions. "You look at how much they charge and the amount of revenue you bring in, and it isn't working," she says. When Hamilton switched to a much smaller accounting firm, she found herself doing as much work as when she tried to handle her taxes herself. She's still hoping to find the right tax professional for her company. Patent infringement cases filed in East Texas federal courts fell for the first time in three years in 2016 as legislation aimed at curbing the explosion of such lawsuits begins to have an impact, and as court rulings make it harder for patent holders to win. Since federal judges in East Texas adopted the "rocket docket" a decade ago to push cases to trial faster, the jurisdiction has become a favorite of patent lawyers, who filed cases there in increasing numbers as they found expertise among the judges, certainty about the process, and often friendly juries, legal specialists said. Between 2010 and 2015, the number of patent cases filed in East Texas increased by nearly five times, from 529 to a record 2,487, with 43 percent of all U.S. patent suits filed in East Texas, according to data compiled by Androvett Legal Media, a Texas company that provides communications services to law firms. But patent case filings in East Texas federal courts - in Marshall, Tyler, Texarkana and Beaumont - dropped sharply last year, falling by one-third to 1,685. The district's share of U.S. patent case fell to 37 percent. More Information 'Rocket docket' Patent infringement filings in Eastern District of Texas: 2010529 filings 2011570 filings 20121,117 filings 20131,319 filings 20141,234 filings 20152,487 filings 20161,685 filings Source: Federal court records and Androvett Legal Media See More Collapse Statewide, patent infringement lawsuits also fell for the first time in three years. Corporations and individuals filed 1,810 patent lawsuits in 2016, down nearly 900 from the year before, according to Androvett Research. Patent lawsuits filed in the Southern District, which includes Houston and Galveston fell to 36 from 39 in 2015. Legal specialists attributed the declines to efforts in Congress to thwart so-called patent trolls, who buy patents for the sole purpose of suing deep-pocketed corporations with the hope they will settle quickly, rather than to develop new products. Business groups have long blamed patent trolls for the surge in lawsuits; the number of cases filed nationally jumped by 65 percent between 2010 and 2015, climbed from 3,500 to nearly 6,000, before falling last year to about 4,500. The declines follow the enactment of the American Invests Act, which Congress passed in 2012. The law requires patent holders suing multiple defendants to file each claim as a separate lawsuit, instead of one consolidated complaint, making it more difficult and costly to sue. Samsung ruling In addition, several decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court have gone against patent holders, including one last year that significantly limited the damages that Samsung would have to pay for infringing on Apple's cellphone design patents. "The drop in patent filings is not surprising given the general perception that the deck has become stacked against patent owners, and especially against patent owners with limited resources," said Michael Heim, a Houston intellectual property lawyer and managing director of the firm Heim Payne & Chorus. Awaiting a decision Corporate defendants are also hoping that the Supreme Court's decision to hear arguments this spring in a case involving food product companies TC Heartland and Kraft Foods could provide new hurdles for patent holders. At issue is whether patent holders can shop for friendly venues to file suits, or must file in the jurisdictions where companies are headquartered; if the Supreme Court rules against venue shopping, it would likely mean fewer cases filed in East Texas, legal specialists said. "As the law stands now, plaintiffs can file in East Texas without concerns that venue is improper," said Gary Sorden, a Dallas attorney who specializes in patent law. "However, if the Supreme Court mandates that a patent case must be filed where a defendant has a principal place of business, then cases in East Texas will substantially decrease as most of the defendants do not have a principal place of business in Eastern District." For a longer version of this article, please visit TexasLawbook.net. PORTLAND, Texas - Dewey Magee has a "Keep Christ in Christmas" bumper sticker on his Chevy pickup. His wife, Victoria, wears a Rush Limbaugh T-shirt. They're more focused on raising chickens than fighting climate change. But the Magees, who have lived in this small city north of Corpus Christi for nearly 45 years, have become accidental activists, helping to lead the fight against a $10 billion petrochemical plant that would be built a half-mile from their home by Exxon Mobil Corp. and the Saudi Basic Industries Corp., or SABIC. Looking out a window toward the site, a 1,400-acre stretch of cotton fields, he worries about noise, pollution and the long-term health effects on his community, particularly his 10-year-old grandson who lives next door and struggles with asthma. "They're dangling the money, but it just seems like the devil looking you in the eye and whispering about millions of dollars," Magee said. "I get that we need jobs and to feed our families, but we need to protect them first." The Magees are part of a fierce opposition to a petrochemical complex that has promised thousands of construction jobs, hundreds of permanent positions and millions in tax revenues - a rare case in a state that is typically eager to accept new development, particularly by the energy industry. The Corpus Christi area has long been a center of refining and petrochemicals, with plants packed along a 10-mile stretch of tanks, tall stacks and flares known as "Refinery Row." More Information Tale of two cities Both Portland and Gregory would butt up against the edge of the proposed Exxon-SABIC plant, but the two communities are very different despite a shared high school and junior high. Portland is much larger, wealthier and majority white, while Gregory is a tiny city with more than 90 percent of its citizens having Hispanic heritage. PopulationMedian household income Portland16,116$66,662 Gregory1,992$28,830 (2015 U.S. Census data) See More Collapse But opponents here say a massive new petrochemical plant would represent a tipping point. Residents not only voice fears of environmental degradation and health impacts but also of a fundamental change in the character of this quiet bedroom community of fewer than 20,000. The largest proposed petrochemical project in Texas would be built from scratch and would include the world's biggest ethane cracker, which turns a component of natural gas into ethylene, the primary building block of most plastics, as well as other plastics manufacturing operations. The companies say the site will include green spaces and half-mile buffer around the plant, which could begin operations as soon as 2021. "We want to come in as a good neighbor," said Robert Tully, Exxon's project executive for the joint venture. "We want people to say, 'They really did try to blend in with the community and didn't just stick a plant there.'" Residents of Portland say their way of life is already under pressure from industries encroaching from the east and the port city of Ingleside. They worry the Exxon-SABIC plant, which would be built just outside the city limits to the north and west, could represent the beginning of a new industrial corridor along Highway 181 that would rival or exceed "Refinery Row," an area plagued by higher rates of cancer, asthma and birth defects, according to a 2016 report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Pastor Mark Miller of Portland's Oak Ridge Baptist Church - located about a mile from the potential Exxon site - said his community has reached a crossroads. "This place will change and it will not be the same - not just from this plant, but others that follow," said Miller, who has not taken sides in the debate. "People moved here because it's a smaller community, not Corpus Christi. It's changing around them and that's difficult. They'll either adapt or find another smaller place to live." Rapidly evolving Portland and Gregory, the other city abutting the proposed site of the plant, were first settled in the late 1800s and developed as Corpus Christi bedroom communities. The area's first industries were developed in the 1950s, when Reynolds Metals built a factory east of the cities. The plant was shuttered last year under the ownership of Sherwin Alumina, which filed for bankruptcy. Michael and Jenny Mauldin moved to the outskirts of Portland more than 20 years ago, with plans to retire there. But now, they find themselves three-tenths of a mile from the proposed chemical plant. If the plant is built, they said, they'll try to move, but doubt they'll find a buyer. "We moved out here for big sky, quiet nights. You could still see the stars, and that's already going away," Jenny Mauldin said. "Portland will be Exxon's garbage can." Exxon and SABIC, which is owned by the Saudi Arabian government, announced in July they would form a joint venture to build a Gulf Coast petrochemical plant to take advantage of Texas cheap and ample natural gas produced from the shale boom. After considering three other sites - one in Texas, two in Louisiana - they came to favor Gregory-Portland in San Patricio County because of its access to natural gas pipelines, as well as the proximity to ports, railways, highways and housing. While huge, the project is still less than half the size of Exxon's nearly 100-year-old Baytown campus east of Houston that's grown over the decades, including an expansion slated for completion later this year. The focus now rests on the seven-person Gregory-Portland Independent School Board, which could decide as soon as February whether to grant the project a property tax break at the site. While the school board can't reject the plant, the tax incentive could go a long way toward Exxon and SABIC deciding to move forward. Exxon says the tax breaks are important but not necessarily critical. Residents began getting riled up this summer over the loud humming emanating from a new iron plant built just east of Portland by the Austrian company Voestalpine. Just as these concerns about industrial encroachment were growing, Exxon and SABIC announced San Patricio County as a finalist for the petrochemical plant. In another instance of bad timing, Exxon and SABIC disclosed that San Patricio County was their preferred site at the end of last year, not long after, Corpus Christi suffered a water contamination crisis blamed on activity near Valero Energy's refinery and asphalt terminal. "The timing maybe couldn't have been worse," said Tully, of Exxon. Tully said he understands people's fears about a plant near their homes, but added that the companies would be sensitive to their concerns and the surrounding area. Exxon and SABIC have promised a "clean, safe and responsible complex" with new technology that would dramatically reduce emissions. "We understand there's going to be some opposition no matter where we go," Tully said. Like a good neighbor Part of what's kept Exxon and SABIC from making a final decision are the $460 million in property tax breaks they're seeking from the school district, as well as from the San Patricio County Commissioners Court. The commissioners are waiting on the school board, but County Judge Terry Simpson is a strong advocate of the project. Any energy project carries potential peril, Simpson said, but the potential jobs and tax revenues outweigh the risks. Exxon and SABIC in late December and January launched a media blitz with mailers, phone calls, focus groups, online advertising, T-shirts and other promotions. The mailers promise a generation of jobs and a thriving local economy with 11,000 temporary construction jobs and about 600 permanent positions. The aerial project renderings focus on the green spaces, water fountains and buffer zones, while placing the chemical and plastics plant facilities in the background. Those have hardly softened opponents, who formed the group, "Portland Citizens United," which has aggressively lobbied local officials. Exxon and SABIC were caught off guard when the Portland City Council, which has no jurisdiction since the project is beyond city borders, last month passed a non-binding resolution opposing the project, encouraging the companies to build elsewhere. The fight intensified earlier this month at a school board meeting to discuss the tax abatement. No decisions were made, but at least 40 protestors showed up with red "Portland Citizens United" shirts, air pollution masks and signs like "Health over Wealth." Business groups backing the project, including the San Patricio Economic Development Corp. and United Corpus Christi Chamber of Commerce, handed out green "United for Growth" T-shirts to supporters. Those supporters include Jessica Ortiz, of Gregory. "We need to bring some jobs to the area," said Ortiz, a dispatcher for a trucking company. "When the oil fields slowed down, so did a lot of the work." The tax abatements Exxon and SABIC are part of a state program designed to help Texas better compete with other states for businesses and jobs. Critics call it a corporate giveaway that would otherwise fund education. Exxon officials are admittedly nervous the school board could reject the tax breaks. But they're adamant that won't make or break the project. "The school board decision is an important one for us, but it is not the only factor," Tully said. "We could still build here." And that's what concerned Magee, as he looked at the undeveloped site from the window of his home. "I'm doing a lot of praying and a lot of cussing," Magee said, "and then I'm going to the pastor to say I'm sorry about the cussing." The information in this column is intended to provide a general understanding of the law, not as legal advice. Readers with legal problems, including those whose questions are addressed here, should consult attorneys for advice on their particular circumstances. Q: I have will-drafting software from 1999. My wife and I don't have wills. We have just the normal stuff: house, cars and bank accounts. Will this program work for making our wills, and then what do we do with the wills after they're signed? Do we need a lawyer? A: The laws have certainly changed over the past 18 years, but not so significantly that your old software program is clearly out of date. It would be better if you were to purchase the 2017 version of the software so that your documents would contain the newest possible language. (Plus, there's the strong possibility that your old software will not run on your computer's newer operating system.) Of course, it would be even better if you hired a lawyer to prepare the documents for you. There are several reasons why. First, you might be able to structure your estate to avoid probate. Second, you don't want to mess things up by writing the wills incorrectly, which can happen even if your software is not out of date. Third, you probably need other documents along with the wills, such as powers of attorney, medical powers, HIPAA releases and directives to physicians. If your software contains those forms, they will definitely be out of date, as they have all changed since then. Once you have signed wills and the other estate-planning forms, whether you write them yourself or you hire a lawyer to prepare them for you, they should be kept in a safe place. For some, that means a safe-deposit box. For others, it means a safe at home or some other place where the documents will be protected. Q: My wife and I own our home as joint tenants with rights of survivorship. Recently, I signed a Transfer on Death Deed stating the house belongs to my wife upon my death. The deed was notarized and witnessed and put in our safe-deposit box. Should I have recorded this document? A: The ownership of a home by two people as joint tenants with rights of survivorship is very rare in Texas. The vast majority of homes are owned as tenants in common. You should start by checking to see what your deed says. If you do, in fact, own the home with rights of survivorship, then there was no need to sign the Transfer on Death Deed, as the home is already passing to the surviving owner. If you own the home as tenants in common, the Transfer on Death Deed would be a good idea, but your wife should have signed one as well (or joined with you in the deed you signed). Regardless, a Transfer on Death Deed must be recorded, otherwise it has no effect. Super Bowl week is going to be a crazy time for Houston restaurants. But in addition to being busy, next week will also probably be a poignant time for chef Richard Knight at Hunky Dory. The former Feast chef who joined the Treadsack restaurant group as the executive chef of Hunky Dory when it opened in October 2015 is leaving after Super Bowl. His last day will be Feb. 5. "I've had a wonderful experience putting together this restaurant from the Kipper Club dinners, charity dinners, and loads of other fun stuff along the way," Knight said in a statement released Friday afternoon. "It's been great, but it's time for me to move on." Treadsack owner Chris Cusack said Knight is parting on good terms to pursue other opportunities that include a project with his wife, Carrie Jean Knight. "It's sad when things change," he said, "But I'm happy for Richard and Carrie." Knight's departure, which has been in the works for several weeks, leaves the inevitable question of who will lead Hunky Dory. That job falls to chef Graham Laborde, executive chef of Bernadine's, the restaurant attached to Hunky Dory at 1801 N. Shepherd. Laborde will become culinary director of both restaurants, according to Cusack. He added that both restaurants will remain open as separate concepts under the same roof. Bernadine's will continue its Gulf Coast/southern route while Hunky Dory will remain an inventive British pub-inspired eatery and bar. "I'm excited to take on the challenge of running two strong kitchens here in the Heights," Laborde said in a statement. "Richard has left some big shoes to fill, but he has a great team and a fantastic menu. We'll do our best to make him proud." Laborde's Bernadine's came in at No. 9 in Alison Cook's list of Houston's Top 100 restaurants for 2016. Hunky Dory was Treadsack's first major culinary venture after 2011's Down House. Knight, who made a name at the nose-to-tail Feast, wowed Houston foodies with his creative, often lavish take on British pub food including his much-talked-about Cake Stand Pork Chops (a slew of grilled pork chops stacked on a cake stand and dripping with schmaltz) and his Silver Salver, a showy presentation tray groaning with cheese, hare pie, chicken liver mousse, piccalilli, and gentleman's relish. Friday's news of Knight's departure and Labord's promotion comes at a curious time for the Treadsack group. In December, Foreign Correspondents restaurant closed the day after its chefs, the husband-and-wife team of PJ and Apple Stoops, left the business they opened with Treadsack in October 2015. According to a report by the Chronicle's restaurant critic Alison Cook, the 144-seat restaurant serving Northern Thai food found it difficult to attract a steady customer base. Aside from Houston Restaurant Weeks, "we had never really made money," Stoops said. Immediately after Foreign Correspondents closing, Treadsack announced that Canard, its boutique bar next door (they shared the same strip mall address at 4721 N. Main), was shuttering. Canard, which had opened only in March 2016, closed at the end of the year. Treadsack's reputation took a hit when the Houston Press reported in January that the Texas Comptroller's Office was threatening to seize Treadsack's cash for back taxes and that the IRS hit the business with $1.1 million in liens. According to reporter Craig Malisow, the company's financial problems were probably a result of the brisk expansion Treadsack undertook in 2015 when it opened Hunky Dory in October 2015 and Bernadine's 'n December 2015 followed by Canard in March 2016. "Based on internal memos obtained by the Press, the expansion appears to have caused delays in paying state and federal taxes as well as bonds leading to frozen accounts and employees' dealing with bounced paychecks and canceled health care benefits," according to the Houston Press article. Cusack did not address specific allegations. When asked if the article hurt business at the company's other brands (Down House, D&T Drive Inn, Hunky Dory, Bernadine's, Johnny's Gold Brick, and Sugar & Rice magazine), Cusack said no. "Not at all. In fact, there's been a groundswell of support from people who know our commitment to the neighborhood and know our business," he said. President Donald Trump first pitched a ban on Muslims more than a year ago, proposing it in the wake of the terrorist attack in San Bernardino, California, in December 2015. He revived the idea after the Orlando club massacre last summer. And when Trump announced Friday that he was suspending travel from seven Muslim-majority countries, his order mentioned the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks three times. No one involved in those attacks was born in the countries Trump's order included. Even as Trump's aides tried to defend the ban amid its chaotic rollout over the weekend, they continued pointing to some of those attacks, including some carried out by people born in the United States. The list of countries the ban affects also did not include countries where people behind several other attacks in recent years - along with high-profile plots that were not carried out - were born. Trump's ban, which also temporarily halted refugee resettlement and sent shock waves around the globe, followed through on a campaign pledge he said is necessary to keep the country safe. In his order signed Friday, Trump noted that "numerous foreign-born individuals have been convicted or implicated in terrorism-related crimes since September 11, 2001." Yet the list of countries included in the ban - Syria, Iran, Iraq, Yemen, Sudan, Somalia and Libya - leaves out countries tied to extremist attackers or plots. Somalia, birthplace of Abdul Razak Ali Artan, the college student who drove his car into a crowd and then stabbed and slashed people in a spree that injured 11 at Ohio State University in November, is included. (The Islamic State, an extremist group also known as ISIS or ISIL, claimed Artan was acting as its "soldier" in the attack, which happened just weeks after Trump's election. Trump visited with the victims.) Pakistan - birthplace of Faisal Shahzad, the attempted Times Square bomber, and Najibullah Zazi, a man who plotted to bomb New York's subway system - is not included. Nor is Kuwait, birthplace of Mohammad Youssef Abdulazeez, the gunman who killed four Marines in Chattanooga, Tennessee. "The ban is less about national security and more about advancing a worldview based on religious and racial exclusion," J.M. Berger, a fellow with the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism at The Hague and co-author of "ISIS: The State of Terror," wrote in an email Sunday. "It's not likely to make us safer, and it is far more likely to help our real enemies, ISIS and al-Qaeda. We don't do ourselves any favors when we make their talking points into reality." In a joint statement Sunday, Sens. Lindsey O. Graham, R-S.C., and John McCain, R-Ariz. -- two leading defense hawks - echoed Berger's points, saying they fear Trump's order "risks harmful results" and could help terrorists with recruitment. "Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism," McCain and Graham said. They added: "This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country." Trump and his aides have used very specific examples in arguing for the ban. White House aides defending the action on Sunday morning talk shows sought to tie it to some of the most high-profile attacks in recent years, even though none involved people born in countries subject to the ban. Kellyanne Conway, a senior adviser to Trump, went on "Fox News Sunday" and cited Sept. 11, the Boston Marathon bombing and the mass shooting attacks in San Bernardino and Orlando. Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, also pointed to San Bernardino and Boston in describing people who "had gone out to a country and then come back" while appearing on ABC's "This Week." In a briefing with reporters Sunday night, a senior administration official who asked not to be identified used some of the same examples. None of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from countries on the ban list. Most were from Saudi Arabia, which is one of multiple Muslim-majority countries where Trump has business interests and declined to ban travel. (The other hijackers were from Egypt, Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates.) Nor did the home countries of the Boston Marathon bombers - Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, brothers born in Russia and Kyrgyzstan - turn up on the list. Dzhokhar, the younger brother, who was sentenced to death for the bombing, was a naturalized U.S. citizen. Their parents were not refugees as has been reported; they instead came to the United States on travel visas and applied for political asylum. The two deadliest recent attacks in the United States that precipitated Trump's public call for a ban both involved people born in the United States. The Orlando gunman, Omar Mateen, was born in New York, the son of an immigrant from Afghanistan, a country not on the banned list. Syed Rizwan Farook, who carried out the attack in San Bernardino with his wife, Tashfeen Malik, was born in Illinois and, according to the FBI, had been radicalized and plotting attacks years before he met her. Malik came to the country on a fiance visa, and she was born in Pakistan and later moved to Saudi Arabia, two countries not covered by the ban. Since 2001, every deadly jihadist attack inside the United States was carried out by a U.S. citizen or legal resident, according to data collected by New America, a Washington-based nonprofit group. New America tracked nearly 400 cases involving people charged with jihadist terrorism or a related crime. In nearly half of these cases, people involved were born in the United States, while nearly a third involved naturalized citizens or permanent residents. "Far from being foreign infiltrators, the large majority of jihadist terrorists in the United States have been American citizens or legal residents," the group notes in a report on its findings. It adds: "In addition about a quarter of the extremists are converts, further confirming that the challenge cannot be reduced to one of immigration." This tally focuses on acts believed to be jihadist terrorism and does not include cases that might meet the hazy definition of domestic terrorism, including the church massacre in Charleston, South Carolina, the Planned Parenthood shooting in Colorado Springs, or the 2014 rampage in Santa Barbara, California. Trump's immigration order also significantly reduces the number of refugees who can come to the United States. Despite Trump's assertions that members of the Islamic State could hide among the refugees, refugees have not prominently been among those who carried out attacks in the United States. Refugees from the seven countries included in Trump's ban weren't responsible for any attacks in the U.S. between 1975 and 2015, according to a report published by the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank. That report looked at 154 people it identified as foreign-born terrorists who carried out attacks during that span. Out of that number, Cato found that 20 were refugees, and the only three who successfully carried out fatal attacks were Cubans admitted before the Refugee Act of 1980. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Firefighters are battling a blaze Monday at a warehouse along Interstate 10 in east Houston. The one-alarm fire broke out about 12:50 p.m. at 1000 block of the inbound East Freeway near Waco Street, according to the Houston Fire Department. No information, including about possible injuries, was available. Smoke could be seen billowing into the sky near the freeway. More details will be reported as the story develops. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Luis Ruiz, an immigration attorney with his own practice, set up shop early Sunday at Bush Intercontinental Airport. He'd seen news of attorneys around the country flocking to airports to help people detained under the terms of the executive order President Donald Trump issued Friday, and he figured duty called. So he arrived at IAH around 9 a.m., the first attorney of what would become a sizable legal operation, and set off searching for clients to counsel pro bono. "It's been escalating," he said Sunday night. "People just started showing up." By the evening, they ran an impromptu law office at the tables of a Starbucks amid deafening chants of hundreds of protesters in the arrivals area of the international terminal. More than 30 Houston lawyers specializing in immigration, personal injury, consumer protection, environment, civil law and more, pecked away on keyboards and interviewed family members of those who'd been detained inside the terminal. Spontaneous assembly Vanessa Winton, a labor and insurance attorney, logged on to Facebook on Sunday morning during service at the Lily Grove Missionary Baptist Church, when she saw a post from a lawyer friend about a gathering at the airport. "It was something I had to do," she said, and she arrived around 10:30 a.m. Chris Carron, an environmental lawyer with an energy company, was texting with other lawyer friends about the spontaneous assemblies at American airports. "I knew there would be people here," he said. So he came. Edgar Saldivar, senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Texas, was among the first wave who stayed at the Starbucks until 2 a.m. Sunday. "I came over here as soon as I could and other attorneys started arriving on their own," he said. Geoffrey Hoffman, director of the immigration clinic at the University of Houston Law Center, was notified of a particular case of an Iraqi man with a U.S. green card who would arrive at IAH and faced possible detention. He came, and when he saw the growing gaggle of law people, he sent notification to the Houston Immigration Legal Service Collaborative, a local law group. That group emailed its list, and the message was quickly reposted on several local Facebook groups for lawyers, including one called Lawyers for Good Government, which was made as a reaction to the Trump administration. A Google document posted to that group allowed local lawyers to sign up for shifts, said Emily Bivona, a tax lawyer volunteering Sunday at IAH. Katie Ray, a personal injury attorney at the Davis Law Group, saw notification on Facebook and set off. Because she didn't have immigration experience, she brought a printer and fax machine as her contribution. 'Our duty' The lawyers gathered at Starbucks fanned out in search of waiting worried people who might be relatives of those detained. They offered their services and helped put them in touch with U.S. Customs and Border Protection for answers on the status of their loved ones. In isolated cases, lawyers said they were willing to electronically file an emergency habeas petition to a federal court to ask a judge to immediately stop a detention. Aside from that, however, they acknowledged they have few effective options. "The problem is there is no right to counsel. We don't have ability to access potential clients," Hoffman said. Passersby stopped and offered help or asked if they could bring anything. By evening, the lawyers were stuffed and still had 12 boxes of Pizza Hut leftover from their donated lunch. They were also given free Starbucks cards by a donor. The effectiveness of their work seemed uncertain. They acknowledged they would need further signs from the administration before they could figure out how to respond. But until then, said Saldivar with the ACLU, the attorneys would do whatever they could to defend the Constitution. "We were called here to our duty," he said. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate NEW YORK - President Donald Trump's immigration order sowed more chaos and outrage across the country Sunday, with travelers getting detained at airports, panicked families searching for relatives and protesters marching against the sweeping measure that was blocked by several federal courts. Attorneys struggled to determine how many people had been affected so far by the rules, which Trump said Saturday were "working out very nicely." Hundreds of chanting anti-Trump protesters swarmed George Bush Intercontinental Airport on Sunday, packing Terminal E to capacity until police barred entry to non-ticket holders. Dozens of pro-bono lawyers set up camp at a nearby Starbucks to help passengers who had gotten detained. "There's a lot of fear in the community," said Arsalan Safiuallah, an attorney with the Council on American-Islamic Relations who attended the IAH protest. "I'm upset because I don't think this is constitutional." Yehiya Aljuboory, a 29-year-old Iraqi man detained en route to Houston after traveling abroad, was held at IAH for nearly four hours Sunday. "Is it a crime to travel to visit your family?" asked his worried friend, 28-year-old Mohammed Jalil. "Only because he is Muslim." Earlier in the day, roughly 1,000 people gathered in downtown, just steps away from Super Bowl festivities, to make their voices heard. The divisive order resonated deeply in Houston, where more than 20 percent of people were foreign-born in 2013, according to nonpartisan think tank the Migration Policy Institute. "I don't think I've ever seen the city as galvanized as this," said Houston resident Bev Caplan, 39, who protested at Discovery Green. 'In crisis mode' Advocates for travelers say the chaos is likely to continue. The executive director of the National Immigration Law Center, Marielena Hincapie, said "this is just the beginning." "We're really in a crisis mode, a constitutional crisis mode in our country, and we're going to need everyone," she said. "This is definitely one of those all-hands-on-deck moments." On Sunday talk shows, White House officials defended Trump's actions. "I can't imagine too many people out there watching this right now think it's unreasonable to ask a few more questions from someone traveling in and out of Libya and Yemen before being let loose in the United States," White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said. By Sunday evening, officials said nearly all of those who had been detained were free or soon would be, but the status of some travelers was unclear. The released included nine people held at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings' office said. U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Houston, vowed Sunday to introduce legislation repealing Trump's executive order, to hold hearings on homeland security and the vetting process and to defund agencies implementing actions such as those mandated by Trump's order as the government reviews the system. Jackson Lee called the executive order "thoughtless" and "non-deliberative" and said it had caused confusion among local customs officials. "I'm unused to an idea of associating one faith with hate," Jackson Lee said. "Who knows who is next on the list?" Jackson Lee worried the order would hurt the country's intelligence-gathering abilities by sowing distrust, she said, noting that the order directed the Department of Homeland Security to more broadly review who is let into the country. Demonstrations first erupted Saturday, a day after Trump signed the order banning travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen. The president also suspended the U.S. refugee program for four months. The ACLU sued on behalf of two immigrants, including Haider Alshawi, who was reunited with his wife and son in Houston on Sunday. U.S. District Judge Ann M. Donnelly issued an emergency order Saturday barring the U.S. from summarily deporting people who arrived with valid visas or an approved refugee application, saying it would likely violate their legal rights. But confusion remained about who could stay and who will be kept out. Federal courts in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state took similar action. A more decisive ruling on the legality of the Trump action by Donnelly will probably take at least several weeks. Opponents and government attorneys will get a chance to lay out their arguments in filings and possibly in oral arguments in court, said Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Immigrants' Rights Project. Activists said their goal was to have Trump's order overturned entirely. Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich, known for usually tempering his public comments, did not hold back in a statement Sunday about Trump's measures: "Their design and implementation have been rushed, chaotic, cruel and oblivious to the realities" of security. They had, he added, ushered in "a dark moment in U.S. history." How many affected? An official with the Department of Homeland Security who briefed reporters by phone on Saturday said 109 people who were in transit on airplanes had been denied entry and 173 had not been allowed to get on their planes overseas. No green-card holders were turned away from entering the U.S. as of Saturday, the official said, though several spent hours in detention before being allowed in. Before Trump signed the order, more than 67,000 refugees had been approved by the federal government to enter the U.S., said Jen Smyers, refugee policy director for Church World Service. More than 6,400 had already been booked on flights, including 15 families that had been expected over the next few weeks. Houston Chronicle staff writers Lindsay Ellis, Keri Blakinger, Sebastian Herrera and Mihir Zaveri contributed to this report. Facing growing criticism for failing to mention Jews in a statement marking the Holocaust, the Trump administration on Sunday doubled down on the controversial decision. In a statement on Friday, President Donald Trump broke with the bipartisan practice of past presidents by failing to include any mention of the anti-Semitic views that fueled the Holocaust and left 6 million Jews and millions of others dead. "I don't regret the words," said White House chief of staff Reince Priebus when asked to defend the statement on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday. "Everyone's suffering (in) the Holocaust including obviously all of the Jewish people affected and miserable genocide that occurs - it's something that we consider to be extraordinarily sad," Priebus added. Trump's 117-word statement was issued on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which marks the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp, Trump remembered "the victims, survivors, heroes of the Holocaust" without specifically mentioning the attempted extermination of Jewish people. Conservative commentator John Podhoretz slammed the White House's defense of its actions in a column on Saturday, noting that Nazi ideology rested on the aim of exterminating Jewish people from the face of earth. "The Nazis killed an astonishing number of people in monstrous ways and targeted certain groups - Gypsies, the mentally challenged, and open homosexuals, among others," Podhoretz wrote. "But the Final Solution was aimed solely at the Jews. The Holocaust was about the Jews. "There is no 'proud' way to offer a remembrance of the Holocaust that does not reflect that simple, awful, world-historical fact," he added. "To universalize it to 'all those who suffered' is to scrub the Holocaust of its meaning." In fact, the United Nations created the International Holocaust Remembrance Day in 2005 in part to combat a growing wave of anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial worldwide. Priebus noted that Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, who is also a senior aide in the White House, is Jewish. Trump's daughter Ivanka converted to judaism before the two married. "You know that President Trump has dear family members that are Jewish and there was no harm or ill will or offense intended by any of that," Priebus added.any of that," Priebus added. AUSTIN -- After a week of reacting to Washington headlines, Texas lawmakers will turn the focus back to the Lone State. On Tuesday, Gov. Greg Abbott will set the tone for the rest of the session by delivering his State of the State address to both houses of the Texas Legislature. In the speech, Abbott will detail for the first time his priorities for the session and will list which ones he wants to get expedited attention. Look for sanctuary cities, child-protection system reforms, school choice and school finance to make the priority list, among others. You can watch the action in the House Chamber live online. Those sanctuaries On Thursday, the Senate State Affairs Committee will hold a hearing on Senate Bill 4, a measure that would outlaw sanctuary cities -- ever-the-more important with the ongoing faceoff between Gov. Greg Abbott and Travis County Sheriff Sally Hernandez over whether she can ignore some federal immigration detainers. Abbott has said if she doesn't rescind the policy, he'll cut off state grant funding for county programs. President Trump last week weighed in by saying he wants a ban on so-called sanctuary cities and said he will cut off federal funds if they refuse. Here's the agenda and you can watch the committee discussions about this controversial bill live online. Foster care again On Monday, a House working group will brief reporters on the status of proposed reforms to the state's troubled Child Protective Services, a hot topic for months since it was revealed that hundreds of abused and neglected children were not being seen by case workers for weeks after being reported. Fixing this broken system, which faces the likelihood of federal court supervision by a judge who already has declared the status quo unconstitutional, promises to be a big-ticket item that lawmakers will have to address in a lean-budget year. Ethics for everyone On Wednesday, the Senate State Affairs Committee will hold a hearing on Senate Bill 14, the session's key ethics-reform measure by state Sen. Van Taylor, R-Plano. This is one area where the public is always interested in finding out whether their local lawmakers are squeaky clean, and you can bet all 181 lawmakers will be watching this bill closely to make sure it doesn't make their lives tougher. Watch the hearing online with this agenda. School choice Though nothing has been officially announced, some insiders say they expect the details of a school-choice bill -- one that will allow parents more choice in where their kids attend classes -- will be made public this week. It's one of Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick's top priorities to pass this session, although Democrats and some rural-district Republicans have issues with the plan they contend could punish public schools. No matter when the details are announced, look for this issue to make waves under the Pink Dome. Budget, budget, budget The Senate Finance Committee will continue its work every day this week on Senate Bill 1, the first draft of the upper chamber's new budget. Various agencies' spending will be coming up for review each day. Check the agenda to see what agency is up for discussion each day, or watch the hearings here. Chamber work The House and Senate will meet for at least a couple of days this week, but are not expected to do much of anything meaningful in chamber action aside from resolutions. Committee hearings will quickly gin up to start reviewing bills and taking testimony. Every-day meetings of the full legislative chambers won't start until later this spring. AUSTIN -- A Dallas appeals court on Monday halted payments to three private Houston attorneys who are prosecuting Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on criminal fraud charges, a move that could impact the case if it stays in effect. The 5th Court of Appeals, ruling in a taxpayer lawsuit challenging the payments by Collin County, said it would review additional information in the case in coming weeks before deciding whether to let the decision stand. The five-member Collin County Commissioners Court, made up of Republicans, had been slated to decide whether to approve the prosecutor's latest bill of $205,000 for the past year. Under state law, the county has to pay for the prosecution because Collin County District Attorney Greg Willis withdrew from the case because he is a friend of Paxton. Paxton, a Republican, is from Collin County. Paxton faces fraud charges stemming from transactions before he became attorney general two years ago. He was indicted in August 2015. An attorney for the special prosecutors, David Feldman, said the attorneys planned to continue preparing their case despite the temporary court decision. Paxton is scheduled to go to trial on May 1. The three special prosecutors are Houston attorneys Kent Schaffer, Brian Wice and Nicole DeBorde. Real estate developer Jeffory Blackard, who filed the lawsuit seeking to halt their special prosecutors' pay, has insisted in court filings that they are being paid in excess of a cap the county places on some attorneys' fees. District Judge George Gallagher, who approved hiring the prosecutors, said state law gives him discretion to break the cap. The three special prosecutors have submitted bills totaling $510,726 since the case began in 2015, records show. Blackard's case is also being paid for by the taxpayers of Collin Country, and so far has cost more than $106,000, officials confirmed Monday. Holders of eurobonds of nationalized PrivatBank (Dnipro), following the example of U.S. Cargill, demand to recompense their investment in the bank's securities. The letter, a copy of which has been sent to Interfax-Ukraine, was sent by the advisor of the noteholders' committee Dechert LLP law firm (Britain) to PrivatBank Board Chairman Oleksandr Shlapak, Governor of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) Valeriya Gontareva and Head of the Individuals Deposit Guarantee Fund Kostiantyn Vorushylin on January 27, 2017. The law firm paid attention to the unequal attitude of the bank to liabilities to notehoolders and liabilities to Cargill that were also converted into the bank's shareholder capital during its nationalization. The noteholders believe that the bank and Ukrainian authorities admitted that the liabilities to Cargill converted into the bank's shareholder capital were unlawful and were repaid. Legislation does not have grounds for interpreting liabilities to Cargill and liabilitites to the noteholders in a different way, the law firm said. The firm believes that the bank and Ukrainian authorities are to admit the implementation of liabilities to the noteholders meeting the conditions of the securities issue. Violation of these liabilities allows the noteholders to demand compensation of their investment in court, including in Ukriane, Dechert said. The law firm said that the noteholders on December 20, 2016 and January 10, 2017 asked for explanations from the bank regarding the forced capitalization of the debt on the securities. The response has not been sent. Dechert said that neither the firm nor its clients are persons affiliated with the bank. The press service of PrivatBank told Interfax-Ukraine that the transactions to capitalize the bank's liabilities were conducted by the Deposit Guarantee Fund and NBU. They confirmed that they are ready to protect their position. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate AUSTIN -- Disability advocates on Monday threatened to sue the Texas Education Agency unless the state permanently ends its special education enrollment benchmark within the next month. The advocates said immediate action was necessary because of the "devastating harm" caused by the benchmark. The state already has suspended and pledged to eventually eliminate the decade-old benchmark, which punished school districts for giving special education services to more than 8.5 percent of students. But the state has angered advocates by not saying when it will permanently end the policy. "The time for action to protect and support Texas's children with disabilities is now," the advocates from the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities and Disability Rights Texas wrote in a letter to the Texas Education Agency and Commissioner Mike Morath. Asked to comment on the letter, agency spokesman Gene Acuna said that officials were already working to eliminate the 8.5 percent metric. Changes to the policy should be proposed in the spring, he said. "As always, we continue to seek input from stakeholders during this process," Acuna said. The Texas Education Agency has denied that any child has been harmed by the benchmark The threat adds a new dimension to the debate over the benchmark, which already is a topic in the state Legislature and the subject of an investigation by the U.S. Department of Education. Legal action also could open the door to an effort to obtain compensation for the tens of thousands of students with disabilities who have been denied services due to the benchmark. Federal law requires schools to serve all eligible students with disabilities. The four-page letter cited a 2016 Houston Chronicle investigation that revealed the policy and the damage it caused. The Chronicle found that officials arbitrarily chose the 8.5 percent target while facing a $1.1 billion state budget cut and did not consult lawmakers, the federal government or any research. Nationwide, about 13 percent of students receive some type of special education services such as tutoring, counseling or therapy -- a percentage that has not significantly changed for years. In Texas, after the benchmark took effect, the percentage dropped from near the national average down to exactly 8.5 percent. That is the lowest rate in the United States, by far. More than 100 current and former school employees admitted to the Chronicle that they delayed or denied services to students with disabilities due to the benchmark. "The children and families of Texas deserve, need, and are legally entitled to better," the advocates wrote in their letter. The letter also outlined the group's legal theory. First, the advocates said, the benchmark was inappropriate because states are allowed to monitor school districts "only as necessary to ensure compliance with federal law." Moreover, they argued, the benchmark actively violated the law "because it directs, incentivizes, and has caused school districts to deny enrollment in special education programs to eligible students." The advocates said they would not file the lawsuit if Morath and the agency counter-sign their letter and initiate the process of permanently ending the benchmark within 30 days. "We genuinely hope and believe such a lawsuit is unnecessary given our joint interest in making sure the children with disabilities of Texas get the support and services they are legally entitled to receive," the advocates wrote. AUSTIN - In recent days, deep inside the dimly-lit clubs and white-cloth restaurants up and down Congress Avenue where much of Texas' real political deal-making takes place, the consensus was clear: This legislative session is a test of wills - Senate versus House, with Gov. Greg Abbott playing the role of occasional referee. "(Lt. Gov. Dan) Patrick is king in the Senate, probably the strongest since Bob Bullock, and he has the support of tea party Republicans that control the party," one lobbyist postulated at the Austin Club, an ornate 1876 opera house where lobbyists and lawmakers have dined, drunk and cut deals for decades. "(House Speaker Joe) Straus is just as strong in the House, and he sees his role as stopping the bad stuff from the Senate." A dozen other lobbyists at the table, and sitting nearby, nodded in approval. What about Abbott, now starting his second legislative session? "He's going to end up being the big adult in this process, the person who will decide what's best for Texas," said another. While there have been suggestions recently that Abbott, as the state's top leader, should be more vocal about where he stands, his closest aides and confidantes say that is not his style, that the former Texas Supreme Court justice tends to be more cautious in a way that, so far, has kept him out of political trouble. Come Tuesday, when Abbott gives his State of the State address where he will outline his priorities for the legislative session, the governor is expected to send his first clear signal of what measures he wants to be passed. And then he likely will step back and let lawmakers do their work, becoming more vocal in the late spring when the final versions of key bills come up for debate. While the details of his speech remain a closely guarded secret, insiders say that a ban on sanctuary cities will be on his list - likely as an emergency item to ensure its swift passage into law - along with reforming Texas' troubled foster-care system, school choice, ethics and education finance reform. "He is very consistent and deliberative in his leadership style," said Mark Miner, an Austin consultant who worked in communications posts for former Gov. Rick Perry and former Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst. "He's focused on the result, not the parade and grandstanding that goes on before you get to a result." Patrick's role For his part, Patrick, a former Houston radio talk-show host, has made no secret of his desire to pass 25 top bills, the most controversial of which is the so-called "Texas Privacy Act" bill that would limit bathroom access to a person's gender at birth. The Senate, controlled by like-minded conservatives, is expected to pass the measure to the House, where Straus has promised a cool reception. Despite his urging last week for the governor to clearly state his position on the measure, Abbott has stuck with waiting until he sees a final version of the bill before deciding. It is that bill that lobbyists and insiders are watching most closely as they look to who's in control of the session's agenda. "Patrick on the cover of Texas Monthly in a sort of imperial pose, is a pretty good description of the role he is playing in Texas politics right now," said Cal Jillson, a political scientist at Southern Methodist University who has watched Lone Star politics for decades. "Patrick clearly wants to be the most visible of the Big Three. Straus is managing the House to get what he thinks is best for Texas, and is not worried about visibility. "And Abbott is taking a lower profile, as he did last session, waiting until the issues come to him - and then calculating whether to agree or resist signing them. He measures very carefully what he does." Austin consultant Luis Saenz, who worked in high-level positions for both Abbott and Perry, said the current governor's low-key style stems from his background. "Perry came out of the (legislative) process where the leadership approach is different, and Abbott came from the judiciary where you make decisions after hearing the arguments on both sides," he said. Measured approach Democrats and a few moderate Republicans in the House, however, say they wish Abbott would be more involved against some controversial bills being pushed in the Senate that they hope the House will kill. They believe Abbott's more measured approach could tone down some of the harsh details that the far right is seeking. "He is methodical and careful and deliberative, which is all good, but up to this point I think he has been quieter than he was last session - or at least it seems that way," Senate Democratic Caucus Chairman Jose Rodriguez. D-El Paso, said. "I hope the governor will come out with a strong message (Tuesday) that can give a measured approach to some of these issues. Patrick is using his bully pulpit and power of personal persuasion, and his talk-show experience, to generate public interest in the issues he wants to pass." Abbott's methods for developing consensus include a weekly breakfast with Patrick and Straus, a long-time tradition during legislative sessions. He also made extensive use of private meetings at the Governor's Mansion last session to discuss bills and strategy with lawmakers, aimed at getting his priorities approved. Those meetings went mostly unnoticed, by design, to allow him to get his wishes known without the fanfare of press conferences or public discussions. This year, aides revealed that he plans to increase the number of private meetings to become more actively involved earlier in the session. For his part, Patrick has been clear that he intends to push the Senate to pass each of his top 25 priorities, which include a property tax cut and school finance reform. "In all our deliberations, maintaining our conservative principles and protecting Texas values will be our top priority," Patrick has pledged. A test of wills In the House, Straus has made it clear that his chamber intends to take a different track, carefully reviewing and addressing the challenges that face Texas and looking for solutions. Included are investing in the state's mental health system, fixing the "broken" school finance system and reforming Texas' embattled child-welfare system. "We will have moments of levity and tension and unity. We will disagree on some legislation and agree on much more," Straus told House members when he was reelected speaker earlier this month. In the end, Abbott will get the final say whatever bills the Legislature sends him. "This session is starting out to be a test of wills between the Senate and the House, with Greg Abbott performing a role of referee," said Mark Jones, head of political science at Rice University and a longtime observer of Texas politics. "I think he's going to signal strongly what he wants on a number of issues, but not until he needs to. Why take the political heat in opposing some of the bad bills the Senate wants, and risk alienating the Republican base, when Straus is willing to do that on his own?" WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily prohibiting entry into the United States for migrants from seven mostly Muslim countries and refugees from around the world fueled confusion, angst and a wave of protests across the country Sunday. Even as administration officials tried to clarify the reach of Trump's action - "This is not a Muslim ban," the president said in a statement - the exact limits of its scope and legal questions over its constitutionality remained unresolved. So did the question of whether the administration would comply with orders from federal judges to temporarily halt the travel ban. Trump issued a statement late Sunday afternoon that offered little clarity, even as he defended his executive order as necessary to protect the United States from terrorism. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," Trump said in the statement. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order." The president reiterated that the country would resume issuing visas to all countries "once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days." Still, barely 48 hours after Trump issued his order, confusion reigned over its reach and its implementation. Even as the president and other top advisers defended the ban, some Trump officials appeared on Sunday to walk back one of the most controversial elements of the action: its impact on green-card holders, who are permanent legal residents of the United States. "As far as green-card holders going forward, it doesn't affect them," Trump's chief of staff, Reince Priebus, said on NBC News' "Meet the Press," contradicting what government officials had said only a day earlier. 'Case-by-case basis' In a separate statement, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly was less definitive, suggesting that green-card holders' status would help them gain entry to the country but that they nonetheless would be subject to a "case-by-case" review. Meanwhile, Kelly's department indicated separately Sunday that it would continue to implement Trump's directive, even as it said it "will comply with judicial orders" issued by federal judges over the weekend, blocking enforcement of the ban to varying degrees. "Prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety," the agency said in a statement. "No foreign national in a foreign land, without ties to the United States, has any unfettered right to demand entry into the United States or to demand immigration benefits in the United States." Trump's virtually unprecedented executive action applies to migrants and U.S. legal residents from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Libya and Yemen, and to refugees from around the world. People subject to the ban include dual nationals born in one of the seven countries who also hold passports from U.S. allies such as the United Kingdom. As the legal questions surrounding the order remained unanswered Sunday, the uncertainty and resentment unleashed by the executive order he signed two days earlier showed few signs of waning. At Dulles International Airport, lawyers seeking to represent people who had been detained failed to get information from Customs and Border Protection officials despite repeated attempts. Even three Democratic members of Congress - Reps. Gerald Connolly and Don Beyer of Virginia and Jamie Raskin of Maryland - ran into similar roadblocks. Connolly pressed an airport police officer to get a Customs and Border Protection official to meet with the lawmakers to tell them how many people were detained and to see whether they had been able to communicate with their attorneys. "Are people being detained?" Connolly asked the officer. "How can you enforce the law if you're not enforcing a judge's order?" Connolly soon was on the phone with a CBP congressional affairs official. He and the other members pressed for information on possible detainees, including those traveling on a flight from Turkey. No one on site from the agency would meet with them. "That is unacceptable. It is our understanding you are detaining people," Connolly said. "Our understanding is you have not followed that (court) order." Capitol Hill criticism The president's far-reaching action triggered a wave of criticism from Democrats on Capitol Hill, who plan to assemble Monday on the steps of the Supreme Court in a show of solidarity with legal attempts to block Trump's travel ban. In addition, at least one House member said he plans to introduce legislation to overturn Trump's action by forcing him to comply with the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, which banned discrimination against immigrants on the basis of national origin. Trump also encountered growing opposition Sunday from lawmakers in his own party. "You have an extreme vetting proposal that didn't get the vetting it should have," Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, said Sunday on CNN's "State of the Union," even as he stopped short of opposing the order outright. Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Lindsey O. Graham, R-S.C., also spoke out against the action, saying in a joint statement that the government has a responsibility to defend its borders but must uphold "all that is decent and exceptional about our nation." "It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trump's executive order was not properly vetted," they said, adding, "Such a hasty process risks harmful results." Where else could Lady Liberty be but in New York Harbor, gateway to a vibrant nation of exiles and refugees? She has held high her beacon of light, hope and new beginnings since 1886. And now, her light has been extinguished, the ideals engraved on her pedestal defaced into mockingly ironic graffiti. With one cruel and ill-conceived executive order, this nation has entered a disorienting dusk. How long the torch of liberty remains dark depends on the strength and fierce commitment of liberty-loving Americans everywhere. With every legal, nonviolent means available, this nation must resist a president in thrall to a man who, until invited into the White House, presided over a noxious website that traffics in white supremacy, anti-semitism, bizarre conspiracy theories and fake news. It's apparently Stephen K. Bannon's cowardly nativist notions that the president was implementing when he temporarily banned people from seven predominantly Muslim nations from entering the country and indefinitely suspended the resettlement of refugees from Syria, the world's most pressing humanitarian crisis. Trump's order also threatens legal permanent residents. We can point the accusatory finger at the president's in-house ideologue - just named a full member of the National Security Council - and yet the buck stops with Trump. His cruel and intemperate campaign language has become, with shocking immediacy, cruel and intemperate action. His order, craven and xenophobic, irrational and counter-productive, is an affront to American values. It was sickening over the weekend to hear Texas Congressman Roger Williams, as well as numerous Trump sycophants, defending this travesty. Listening to Williams, a mild-mannered former car dealer from Weatherford, we could imagine him in decades past rationalizing our internment of Japanese Americans or calmly explaining why we couldn't take in Jews from Nazi Germany. Might be terrorists, you know. The words of various apologists for the president's unconstitutional order brought to mind John Kasich's presidential campaign ad from way back in November 2015. The ad paraphrased the haunting words of the late German pastor and concentration-camp survivor Martin Niemoller, who warned that by ignoring threats against others, there would be "nobody left to speak for me." Not to be alarmist, but that warning is beginning to look prescient, particularly in America's most diverse city, a city that long has welcomed refugees and immigrants, that recognizes and celebrates their contribution to this community. We must resist. In the courts, in the streets, through phone calls and emails to our elected representatives, we must speak out on behalf of sacred American values. We must stand tall against this move by the president. As tall as that majestic lady who lifts her lamp "beside the golden door." The federal government's just released 2016 annual financial report should be required reading not only for our new president and other administration officials, but for members of Congress as well. It is where their dreams will meet reality. The message in this year's report is clear and compelling - current trends are not sustainable. The federal government's 274-page report is similar to public corporations' 10-K reports - financial statements that they are required to submit to the Securities and Exchange Commission. But unlike the reports of corporations, the government's annual report also includes projections of revenues, expenses and federal obligations for the next 75 years. These projections are based on current law and policies. They are not predictions. They are intended to warn of the need for changes now. According to the report, the government's ratio of debt to gross domestic product, or GDP, a key measure of fiscal health, will probably increase from 77 percent today to 252 percent by 2091. Nearly all economists agree that a ratio that large would ruin our economy. Changing that trajectory, however, will be painful. The main culprit is interest. Outstanding federal debt is now more than $14.2 trillion, and last year the government paid $273 billion in interest. Even if the government is able to bring down spending for other than interest, outlays for interest will increase at an accelerating rate. That's because interest, like other expenses, causes the overall deficit to increase. The only way to break this vicious circle is for the government to run sustained "primary surpluses" - that is, forcing revenues to exceed noninterest spending. That is far easier said than done. Few politicians are willing to raise taxes, and the opportunities to significantly decrease spending are far fewer than might be apparent. As the annual report makes clear, of last year's $4.4 trillion in spending, 81 percent is, in essence, nondiscretionary. This includes outlays for defense, entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare, veterans benefits and interest. There is room to eke out savings by cutting the budgets of the multitude of federal departments and agencies. Such cuts may make for boastful presidential Twitter feeds and congressional letters to constituents, but they will have only minimal fiscal impact. Other Trump campaign promises would only advance, rather than delay, the coming day of fiscal reckoning. His across-the-board tax cuts has been estimated to reduce revenues by almost $6 trillion over a 10-year period. He has promised to strengthen the military at a cost of what some analysts say will be at least $800 billion. He has pledged to spend at least $1 trillion on infrastructure during the next 10 years. All this won't put the government on sound financial footing, but it's not impossible to get back on solid ground. It also doesn't mean that all spending must be reduced or that no taxes should be cut. As implied by the ratio of GDP to debt, the best way to manage the debt over the long term is to increase the GDP. That would require investments in programs that grow the economy. For example, those in basic education and job retraining, those that stimulate invention and discovery, and those that promote a healthy population. It would involve funding infrastructure projects, such as highways and airports that will facilitate commerce - but not bridges to nowhere. And it would mean carefully targeted tax cuts to low-income earners who are more likely to spend 100 percent of the cuts, and credits for investments in specified types of research and development, worker retraining and capital spending that will fuel both consumer demand and investment, as opposed to across-the-board rate reductions that result in increased debt without commensurate long-term benefits. Fiscal profligacy must be acknowledged and understood if it is to be alleviated. That is why this year's financial report is a must-read for our president, other administrative officials, members of Congress and anyone else interested in federal fiscal policy. Granof is the Ernst & Young Distinguished Centennial Professor in Accounting at the University of Texas at Austin. One of the responsibilities of the Missouri Senate is to confirm the gubernatorial appointments made when there is a transition in power or a vacancy in a department position. With the change in leadership we have been tasked with several new appointments to head state departments and Im encouraged by the governors picks for these positions. Since the election of our new governor Ive been impressed with the cabinet he has put together so far. Im encouraged by our new leadership and our governors ability to attract the highest caliber talent to Missouri. After meeting with some of these appointees, Ive learned they are here because they truly believe in the governors mission for our state and want to be an important part of it. Its no secret that some of our state agencies have gone through some turbulent times over the past few years. The Department of Corrections alone has had to pay out $8 million to settle lawsuits. This is unacceptable. Our departments must adhere to the highest standards moving forward. Further, the Department of Natural Resources has been sitting on permits for five years without approval and holding on to applications for reasons unknown to the Legislature. The purchase of property in the 33rd Senate District and the quiet, last-minute purchases of parks before the previous governors departure raise questions about leadership and the management of that department. We need good strong leaders to head our state departments and Im excited about the well qualified individuals the governor has given us to consider. Ive had the privilege of meeting with the acting directors of Agriculture, Chris Chinn; Office of Administration, Sarah Steelman; Corrections, Anne Precythe; Natural Resources, Carol Comer; and, Director of Public Safety, Charles (Drew) Juden. Chris Chinn is a fifth-generation Missouri farmer and brings a wealth of experience to the Department of Agriculture. Chinn recognizes the importance of agriculture to the state of Missouri and she will fight for our farmers and ranchers. She knows that family farms are key to the states future, and she knows the hardships and challenges that farmers face each day. I look forward to confirming her appointment. Sarah Steelman also brings a wealth of knowledge to her position at the Office of Administration. Steelman holds a Masters of Arts in economics from the University of Missouri and has worked as an adjunct professor of economics at Lincoln University. A former state treasurer and state senator, Steelman brings high-level expertise to the office responsible for budgeting, hiring and purchasing within state government. I am confident she will lead the department in the best direction for the state of Missouri. Anne Precythe has been chosen to lead the Department of Corrections. Precythe comes to us from North Carolina where she served as director of community corrections. Under Precythe, North Carolina lowered its incarceration rate through parole reform and she has promised to end the corruption that was previously dominating the Missouri Department of Corrections. I have high hopes for Precythe and believe that our correctional institutions will be in good hands once she is formally confirmed. Carol Comer has been tapped to lead the Department of Natural Resources. Comer has an extensive background as an environmental lawyer and previously served as commissioner of the Indiana Department of Natural Resources. Under her leadership Indiana was able to make it easier for businesses to get permits and the state saw improved air quality and protection of wildlife and natural resources. And all of this took place while the state saw job growth. I look forward to seeing our natural resources flourish under her leadership. Rounding out the nominations is the acting Director of Public Safety, Drew Juden. Juden comes to the department after serving as director of the Sikeston Department of Public Safety for 15 years. Juden began his time with the department in 1978 and also served on the board of directors for the SEMO Major Case Squad and the SEMO Drug Task Force. He was named President of the Missouri Police Chiefs Association in December of 2014. Public safety is vitally important and Im encouraged by the leadership shown by Juden in the past and what he will bring to the department. Confirmation hearings for these department heads will be taking place over the next few weeks and I encourage you to attend a hearing if you are able. Mike Cunningham is a Republican member of the Missouri State Senate, representing District 33. Contact him at 573-751-1882 or www.senate.mo.gov/cunningham A second animal shelter in Texas County is closing. One day after The Animal Shelter of Texas County announced its closure due to financial shortfalls, Dianas Grove Dog Rescue in Cabool followed suit with a press release Thursday afternoon announcing it was dissolving. The release said the groups board members have resigned and are working to relocate more than160 dogs at the shelter and nearly 50 dogs in foster care in St. Louis. Through Jan. 31, when the organizations license will be allowed to expire, dogs can be adopted privately. Several licensed rescues, shelters and no-kill shelters have committed to and are coordinating taking in the dogs that do not find homes by Feb. 1. Dozens of long-standing and new volunteers, board members and professionals, primarily from St. Louis, have worked tirelessly over the last few months to improve Dianas Grove. Our focus was working toward a sustainable organization that would eventually represent universal best practices for rural animal rescue, said Amanda Sheffield, former board president for Dianas Grove. Within the last two days, new information has come to my attention by a credible third party. This information paired with the ongoing challenges, has made it clear that the board could no longer support continuing forward. The announcement to close came days after the Chesterfield Mall in St. Louis canceled the opening of an adoption center to be run by the Cabool-based animal shelter after customers threatened to boycott the shopping center. According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Dianas Grove Dog Rescue was slated to occupy 6,600 square feet of space at the mall in west St. Louis County for an adoption center opening Saturday. The relationship formed with the mall after about 150 people donated more than $9,000 to Dianas Grove through an online GoFundMe account. In December, the animal rescue sent more than half of its 300 dogs to the Human Society of Missouri. Financial strain was cited. A Petco store in St. Louis and PetSmart severed partnerships with the shelter last year after some customers complained about sick dogs. Dianas Grove was cited many times Missouri Department of Agriculture Division of Animal Health for inappropriate living conditions for the dogs. A November 2015 report described multiple previous warnings to fix rusted enclosures, repair badly worn floors and walls that no longer stopped moisture and make sure dogs were not exposed to broken and jagged metal. That report also identified several new problems, and recommended that the facilitys inventory be reduced. The report was one of more than 10 issued to the organization between 2014 and 2016, according to Kim Kaven, who detailed the alleged violations on the website of her foundation DogMerchants.com. This is why so many people from within the St. Louis animal-welfare community contacted the Chesterfield Mall and threatened a boycott, Kaven said. And those calls resulted in (the) announcement that the mall changed its mind and will not go forward with the group restarting its adoption events in St. Louis. Sheffield said the focus of those involved with Dianas Grove is to secure the well being and future of the dogs at the shelter. Through Jan. 31, dogs and puppies will be available for adoption at www.takeafriendhome.org. Applications can be completed through the website. Adoption fees will be reduced to $100 for dogs and $150 for puppies younger than 16 weeks. The fees cover outstanding vet bills, transfer expenses and dog care, as well as staff wages and operating costs during the closure, Sheffield said. Many staff at the shelter will be greatly affected by losing their jobs Sheffield said. Those staff have been given two weeks notice and will assist through the transition. She said the loss of Dianas Grove and The Animal Shelter of Texas County in consecutive days is discouraging. Thousands of dogs in southern Missouri now have very few bridges to forever homes, she said. Many volunteers and professionals remain passionate and committed to helping the dogs in this high-need, underserved area. The mission to serve the dogs in Texas County does not end with the closing of Dianas Grove. We dont yet know where the path will lead, but we know that we cant turn our backs on these dogs. Adoptable dogs can be viewed at www.takeafriendhome.org and will be shared on facebook.com/dgdogrescue. The adoption application is available at www.takeafriendhome.org/application.html. Individuals interested in adoption can email Dogs@TakeAFriendHome.org. 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. Subscribing to our services is a three step process. First you have to create an account and then you have to pick if you want to subscribe to digital and or print. Some people only want to be a digital subscriber to get access online and others want to also receive the print edition. If you are already a print subscriber and want online access, it is free, you simply have to create an online account and then attach your print subscription account number to the online account you create. The State Fiscal Service and the State Treasury Service should unblock additional electronic VAT accounts of farmers. The request is outlined in a letter of agrarian associations sent to Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman and posted on the website of the Ukrainian Agribusiness Club (UCAB). "Due to the unlawful blocking of the additional electronic VAT accounts of farming companies in January 2017 and their unblocking only for one day January 13, 2017, many farmers failed to send funds to the additional electronic VAT accounts," the associations said. UCAB said that farmers had to send the funds to replenish the limit under a formula to register tax invoices before January 15, 2017 directly to their usual accounts of taxpayers in the electronic VAT administration system. This resulted in a non-distribution of the sum between the budget and taxpayers and the taxpayers did not receive the sums to their special accounts at banks. Agrarian associations asked the prime minister to order the State Fiscal Service and the State Treasury Service to urgently unblock the additional electronic VAT accounts of farmers allowing them to send funds to their accounts only for the sums declared in tax reports and ensuring their distribution in line with Ukrainian law both in part of paying VAT to the budget and in part of returning the funds to special accounts of farmers. The UCAB, Ukrainian Agrarian Council, Agrarian Union, Ukrtsukor, Ukrainian Agrarian Confederation, Union of Poultry Farmers and the Association of Pig Breeders signed the letter. Last Spring, a woman in Baltimore was shot as she walked to the bus stop after finishing her shift as a janitor at MedStar Franklin Square Medical Center. She was soon rushed right back into the emergency department where she worked as her coworkers attempted to stabilize her. This shooting wasnt random. The gunman was her ex-boyfriend, and he had been threatening and harassing her. Although the issue gets less attention than mass shootings, domestic violence often seeps into the workplace. A couple years before the MedStar occurrence, another hospital in the Baltimore area, St. Joes Medical Center, faced a similar incident when an employee was killed by an ex-partner. These reflect an all-too-common cycle: First, domestic violence starts at home. Then, when a woman tries to escape the relationship, the abusive partner begins showing up at her workplace and takes to stalking. When that fails to satisfy the impulses of power and control driving the abuse, horrific violence comes next. Unfortunately, we dont hear about these stories until its too late. Stalking is inextricably linked to domestic violence, and a staggering 7.5 million people or one in six women are stalked in the United States each year. Sixty-one percent of female victims are stalked by a current or former intimate partner, and 81 percent had been previously abused by that partner. Further, one study s... Temporary Ban from Seven Nations President Trump signed an executive order on Friday, January 27th, 2017, that suspends the admission into the U.S. of people from certain countries for 90 days. This three-month ban applies to citizens of the following countries: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. To Check Immigration and Mobility Themed Edition Click Here It is important to note that citizens of those seven countries who hold U.S. visas or U.S. green cards are included in this temporary ban. Anyone traveling abroad when the executive order was signed is now unable to enter the country for at least three months. Individuals who are nationals of the countries mentioned above who are currently in the United States should not depart the United States. A federal judge issued a stay of deportation on Saturday (January 28, 2016) for those detained in the US but it is unclear how those who are traveling will be impacted. Employers are analyzing their workforce to determine who could be impacted by this ban. Companies like Google are calling for all of their impacted employees to return to the US immediately. Employers and employees should contact their global mobility departments and immigration partners immediately for advice and counsel. Here is a PDF of the executive order. Other Refugee and Immigration Changes Trump ordered a four-month suspension of Americas broader refugee program. The U.S. will stop issui... Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and German Chancellor Angela Merkel plan to discuss cooperation between the two countries in the area of energy. "I hope that solidarity with regard to energy and cooperation between Ukraine and Germany in the energy sector will strengthen. We will try to find joint approaches both regarding Nord Stream 2 and OPAL," Poroshenko told reporters ahead of the talks with Merkel in Berlin on Monday. He expressed confidence that "this partnership is promising today". Poroshenko also spoke in favor of giving a new impetus to a number of Ukrainian-German economic and investment projects. "We are waiting for German investors to take part in the privatization processes unfolding in Ukraine this year," he said. Poroshenko also invited Merkel to travel to Ukraine on an official visit, at her convenience. Dispelling the myths and getting employees on board According to a 2015 study, more than two-thirds of American adults currently own a smartphone. And the majority of them spend at least three hours and eight minutes each day using mobile apps. With this in mind, it's no wonder mobile time tracking apps are taking the business world by storm and with them, GPS tracking in the workplace. For business owners, the benefits are clear. GPS tracking boosts employee accountability and eliminates common time theft issues like buddy punching. But for employees, the benefits might not be so obvious. In fact, a recent GPS survey conducted by TSheets found that 6 percent of employees who had no previous experience with GPS tracking said they would quit if GPS tracking was required at work. Another 38 percent said they would feel negatively about being tracked on the job. On the other hand, employees who were familiar with GPS tracking in the workplace, or had been tracked before, responded in favor of the technology. Only 5 percent of these employees felt negatively about being tracked at work, while more than half claimed to have had a positive experience. In short, employees who are unfamiliar with GPS can be expected to react with fear and anger, while employees who are in the know are more likely to respond positively. Knowing that, communication is everything when it comes to helping your employees understand the benefits and necess... A study by STR and Tourism Economics indicates that the United Kingdoms tourism and hospitality sectors have benefited from an increase in arrivals from North America, brought on by the devaluation of the British pound following the June EU Referendum. A study by STR and Tourism Economics indicates that the United Kingdoms tourism and hospitality sectors have benefited from an increase in arrivals from North America, brought on by the devaluation of the British pound following the June EU Referendum. Inbound Tourism According to the International Passenger Survey (IPS) conducted by the Office for National Statistics, U.K. arrivals from North America were up 6.8% between July and October 2016 when compared with the same period in 2015. From January to June, the pre-Brexit vote period, arrivals from North America increased at a more modest rate (+0.5%) compared with first six months of 2015. Meanwhile, arrivals from Europe have dropped off slightly following the referendum, down 0.1% between July and October 2016. Overall during the first 10 months of 2016, international arrivals to the U.K. were up 1.7% to 31.4 million. October 2016 year-to-date figures also show that holiday arrivals to the U.K. were down 3.7% overall. But between July and October, this rate of decline slowed somewhat to 2.9%. Meanwhile, business trips to the U.K. still showed growth in 2016, but slowed from 4.3% between January and June to 1.8% between July and October. While weve seen a recent slowdown in business travel to the U.K., its important to put it in perspective that 2015 was a standout year for business arrivals, up 7.1% compared with 2014, said David Goodger, Director for Tourism Economics in Europe. What remains to be seen is how holiday travel will be impacted in summer 2017. As the referendum vote occurred towards the end of June, when many already had July or August vacations planned, well see how a favorable exchange rate for holiday visitors from North America will play out this coming summer. Impact on Hotels For U.K. hotels, performance growth has been mixed between London and Regional U.K. (U.K. excluding London). In 2016, hotels in Regional UK recorded a 3.1% increase in revenue per available room (RevPAR), driven solely by an increase in average daily rate (ADR) as occupancy remained flat. London, on the other hand, recorded a 0.9% decline in RevPAR, brought on by flat ADR coupled with a 0.9% drop in occupancy. STR analysts attribute the decline to an increase in supply and a slow start to the year. Hotel Forecast The most recent market forecast report from STR and Tourism Economics projects that hotels in London will be affected by shifts in demand throughout 2017, which will likely bring down both occupancy and ADR growth throughout the year. On the other hand, hotels in Regional U.K. are expected to post RevPAR growth within the range of 2% to 6% from month to month throughout 2017. While the capital has faced challenges in 2016, we have certainly not seen a slowdown in development, said Robin Rossmann, STRs international managing director. London currently has more than 15,000 hotel rooms under construction or planned for development, which is more than all countries in Europe except Germany and Russia. This supply growth will put downward pressure on occupancy levels, but recent signs are showing the weak Sterling may help to grow arrivals sufficiently to offset this. For Regional U.K. hotels, an increase in staycations should boost performance, as outbound travel has become more expensive for U.K. residents given the current exchange rate. STR provides clients from multiple market sectors with premium, global data benchmarking, analytics and marketplace insights. Founded in 1985, STR maintains a presence in 10 countries around the world with a corporate North American headquarters in Hendersonville, Tennessee, and an international headquarters in London, England. For more information, please visit str.com. Daily News Delivery Join your colleagues and stay up to date on the latest all industry news and trends. Subscribe 2022 Hospitality Trends Six people were killed and eight others injured when attackers opened fire in a Quebec City mosque, shortly after Sunday evening prayers. We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge," said Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in a statement. Advertisement A joint terrorism task force that includes provincial police, the RCMP and Montreal police has been deployed. Two men in custody have been identified as the gunmen, according to media reports on Monday. A witness told Radio-Canada that he saw two men wearing black ski masks enter the Islamic Cultural Centre around 7:45 pm ET. One yelled something to do with "Allah" in a strong Quebecois accent," he recalled. He said he wasnt sure what kind of weapons the suspects had, because his attention shifted to people who were suddenly hurt. Advertisement "As soon as I saw the person that was near me fall ... we all threw ourselves on the ground, he said. Six people who were standing and praying, they died." The victims, all men, are between 39 and about 60, RCMP national security Supt. Martin Plante told reporters at a press conference Monday morning. Plante said police apprehended one of the suspects at the scene around 7:55 p.m., while another suspect called 911 around 8:10 p.m. and identified himself. He was arrested about an hour later near Ile-d'Orleans, just east of Quebec City's downtown core. At the Monday press conference, police declined to provide any identifying details about the suspects beyond the fact that they are both male and are in their late 20s or early 30s. Advertisement They also would not talk about the type of firearms used in the slayings. No other suspects, police believe On Sunday evening, Christine Coulombe, spokeswoman for the provincial police force, said 39 other people in the centre at the time of the shooting were not hurt. "Nothing right now makes us believe that there would be other suspects related to this event. However, you'll understand that we're not taking any chances, so we are making the necessary verifications to ensure that there are none," Couloumbe said. Mohamed Yangui, the mosque's president, told TVA that there are usually 60 to 100 people at the mosque on Sunday nights. Live video posted to the centre's Facebook page showed the immediate response by emergency crews in the Sainte-Foy neighbourhood. Advertisement One of the people behind the camera can be heard saying in Arabic: "He's escaped. He was on his feet, he's escaped." Another man begins naming people who were inside the mosque, but is told to stop in order to avoid worrying anyone who is watching the live video. "This is the result of Trump," says a bystander in Arabic. U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Friday that banned citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries from travelling to the U.S. for 120 days, and blocked the entry of Syrian refugees to the country. The ban is part of fulfilling a Trump promise during his presidential campaign that was filled with anti-Muslim rhetoric. The office of Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said no motive has been confirmed. Last year, a gift-wrapped pig's head was left outside the same cultural centre, accompanied by a card reading "Bon Appetit." Advertisement In 2014, the mosque was also the target of vandalism and hate mail. In a press conference in the early hours of Monday, Premier Philippe Couillard said Quebec, like so many places in the world hit by terrorism, would face it with courage. He mentioned public gatherings later Monday across the province would allow people to express their horror but also their solidarity, and highlighted a message to Muslim Quebecers. "We are with you. You are in your home. You are welcome in your home. We are all Quebecers," Couillard said. "We must together continue to build a society that is open, welcoming and pacifist." Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume was visibly shaken at the news conference. "No human should have to pay with their life for their race, their colour, their sexual orientation, of their religious beliefs," he told reporters. "I want to express my disgust against this villainous act. I want to tell the members of the Muslim community, those who are our neighbours, our co-citizens, that they can count on our support, our solidarity, but mostly I want to tell them that we love them." Advertisement "We are with you. You are in your home.'' Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard The mosque issued a Facebook statement early Monday after confirmation of the six dead. "All our thoughts are with the children who have to be told their father has died,'' said the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec. "May Allah give them patience and strength.'' Some mosques in Canada were reportedly tightening security, while police in New York City were also on heightened patrol around places of worship after the Quebec attack. Terrorist threat level 'medium' Last year, a federal report found that the terrorist threat level was "medium," meaning that a "violent act of terrorism could occur in Canada." It found: "The principal terrorist threat to Canada remains that posed by violent extremists who could be inspired to carry out an attack in Canada. Violent extremist ideologies espoused by terrorist groups like Daesh and al-Qaida continue to appeal to certain individuals in Canada." When he released the report, Goodale said it was his duty to inform Canadians about the threats. Advertisement "Homegrown terrorists" were behind two unrelated attacks in 2014 on Canadian soldiers. Warrant officer Patrice Vincent died of his injuries after being rammed by a vehicle in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Que. and Cpl. Nathan Cirillo was shot to death on Parliament Hill. The Ottawa shooter, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, was reportedly admired by a fellow Canadian named Aaron Driver who was killed during a police operation last August. Authorities believed that Driver, 24, planned to use a bomb to carry out a suicide bombing mission in a public area. With files from Mohamed Omar, Althia Raj, and The Canadian Press Also on HuffPost The suspect arrested in connection with a deadly shooting inside a Quebec City mosque has been identified as 27-year-old Alexandre Bissonnette. He made a brief court appearance Monday where he was arraigned on six counts of first-degree murder and five charges of attempted murder. Wearing a white jumpsuit and in handcuffs, the tired-looking accused stared at his feet and fidgeted during the hearing. Advertisement Police offered no information on what they believe motivated Sunday's shooting, which Prime Minister Trudeau has denounced as a terrorist act. Bissonnette is the only suspect at this point in the investigation, provincial police said Monday. Bissonnettes now-deactivated Facebooks account previously indicated hes a student at Universite Laval a status yet to be confirmed by school officials. According to La Presse, Bissonnette and his twin brother were bullied in high school. The outlet reports they participated in the Royal Canadian Army Cadets program. Advertisement I wrote him off as a xenophobe On Facebook, Bissonnette would often clash with people over politics. To Vincent Boissoneault, a childhood friend, the idea of Bissonnette committing an act of violence never crossed his mind. I can tell you he was certainly no Muslim convert, Vincent Boissoneault told The Globe and Mail. I wrote him off as a xenophobe. I didn't even think of him as totally racist, but he was enthralled by a borderline racist nationalist movement. The pair would debate when Bissonnette wrote anti-immigration comments and whenever he vocalized support for Donald Trump and French far-right politician Marine Le Pen. ... he was enthralled by a borderline racist nationalist movement. Bissonnette carved a reputation on a French-language web group called Bienvenue au refugies (translated as "Welcome Refugees"). Francois Deschamps, who moderates the group, said Bissonnette was known to make incendiary comments. He described the accused as unfortunately known to many activists in Quebec for taking nationalist, pro-Le Pen and anti-feminist positions at Laval University and on social media. Advertisement Offline, Bissonnette worked for Hema-Quebec, a non-profit group responsible for managing the provinces blood supply. In a statement about Bissonnette, Hema-Quebec said its primary mission is one of being devoted to the gift of life. News of the arrest of one of their own sent a shockwave throughout the organization, it said. Witness respects police actions Earlier, several media outlets identified two men who were arrested following Sunday's attack as Bissonnette and Mohamed Belkhadir. Belkhadir was released from police custody Monday after investigators changed his status from suspect to witness. Advertisement He explained to La Presse he was a helping a friend outside the mosque after the shooting when the sight of someone with a weapon made him flee. That someone turned out to be a police officer. But his choice to run caught the attention of officers in the area who gave chase to someone they presumed to be fleeing the scene. Belkhadir said he understands and respects police for their actions. For them, someone who flees is a suspect, he said in French. 911 call and arrest The shooting erupted at the Islamic Cultural Centre in the citys Sainte-Foy neighbourhood as Sunday evening prayers were ending. Six people were killed and 19 were injured. After the attack, a suspect called 911 to indicate he wanted to work with authorities, and waited for officers, said police in a news conference on Monday. Advertisement He was armed and spoke to us about his acts, said Insp. Denis Turcotte. He seemed to want to co-operate....The suspect said he was waiting for the police to arrive. The six victims are between the ages of 35 and 60. The 19 wounded in the attack are all men. Of those injured, two remain in critical condition in hospital. Among the dead include fathers, a grocer, and an Universite Laval professor. Bissonnette is previously unknown to authorities, police said. Threat is under control Mosques in the city are under increased security following the deadly incident. Let us unite against violence, Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said on Sunday. He swiftly called the deadly shooting a terrorist attack. Advertisement Prime Minister Justin Trudeau reached out to Canadian Muslims in a House of Commons speech on Monday: Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. He urged his colleagues to rally and step up in their roles as elected officials in this time of grief. At times like these, our communities need our leadership. It is in these moments we must show ourselves worthy of the honour of sitting in this place for them, Trudeau said. Vigils were planned in Quebec City, Montreal, and Halifax. With files from The Canadian Press and Ryan Maloney CLARIFICATION: An earlier version of this story cited early reports identifying one of the men arrested by police to be Mohamed Khadir. His name is Mohamed Belkhadir and Quebec provincial police said he is considered a witness. Advertisement Also on HuffPost To say that Ashton Kutcher is not happy about U.S. President Donald Trumps immigrant and refugee ban is an understatement. On Sunday, The Ranch star took to Twitter to voice his personal outrage over the matter, explaining that his wife, Mila Kunis, was a refugee who emigrated from Russia to the United States in the '90s. Advertisement My wife came to this country on a refugee visa in the middle of the Cold War! he wrote. My blood is boiling right now! My wife came to this country on a refugee visa in the middle of the Cold War! My blood is boiling right now! ashton kutcher (@aplusk) January 29, 2017 He also voiced his growing concerns for the country, saying: We have never been a nation built on fear. Compassion that is the root ethic of America. Our differences are fundamental 2R sustainability. We have never been a nation built on fear. Compassion that is the root ethic of America. Our differences are fundamental 2R sustainability. ashton kutcher (@aplusk) January 29, 2017 Advertisement Kutchers wife was born in Chernivtsi, Ukraine, but grew up in communist Russia. In 1991, at the age of seven, she moved to Los Angeles with her parents and older brother. My parents both had amazing jobs, and I was very lucky, Kunis told The Telegraph in 2011. We were not poor when we lived in Russia, whereas most people were very unfortunate. My parents thought that my brother and I would have no future there, though, so we moved to the United States. Trumps refugee ban hit Kutcher so personally that he even opened the 2017 Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday night with another powerful statement in protest: Good evening fellow SAG-AFTRA members and everyone at home, and everyone in airports that belong in my America, he began. You are a part of the fabric of who we are, and we love you and we welcome you. Advertisement Trump signed an executive order on Friday to ban immigrants from seven predominately Muslim countries: Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Syria. Syrian refugees, specifically, are banned indefinitely from resettling in the U.S., while refugees and immigrants from the seven countries are banned from entering the U.S. for 90 days. Kutcher wasnt alone in protesting the ban at the SAG Awards. Kerry Washington, for instance, wore a safety pin on her arm to show solidarity with refugees and immigrants. We will not stop fighting for our safety & the safety of our fellow citizens and human beings, she wrote on Instagram. Kerry Washington at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles, California. And Simon Helberg, of The Big Bang Theory, carried a sign on the red carpet reading Refugees Welcome, while his wife, Jocelyn Towne, had the words LET THEM IN painted on her chest. Advertisement Simon Helberg and wife Jocelyn Towne at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles, California. Also on HuffPost It's common for parents to use baby monitors to keep an eye on their little ones, but researchers are now saying some of these devices don't have any medical benefits. Modern "wearable" baby monitors are used to not only capture video of tots, but also measure babies' vital signs, including oxygen levels and heart rates. It also allows parents to track this information on their smartphones. Advertisement However, a review carried out by the Journal of the American Medical Association says there is no evidence that these "smart" monitors are accurate, and worse still, the devices may lead to false alarms about babies' health and safety, when in fact there may be nothing wrong with the child. "There is no evidence that [baby monitors] help kids and there's some evidence of potential harm," said Dr. Christopher Bonafide, the lead author on the review, who also noted that the devices create undue stress for parents, leading to unnecessary hospital visits and tests. "I worry about the unnecessary care and even potential harm to babies that can be associated with alarms from these devices," Bonafide noted. "There's not a role for these devices in the care of healthy infants." Advertisement According to Live Science via Yahoo, researchers examined the features of five baby monitors that have been introduced over the past two years: MonBaby, Baby Vida, Owlet, Snuza Pico and Sproutling. These monitors came with smartphone apps. They encountered a problem wherein the monitors would sound an alarm when the baby was actually fine. "An upset, crying one-month-old baby could have a heart rate that exceeds 180 beats per minute, which would cause a heart rate alarm on the Baby Vida monitor using its predetermined heart rate alarm settings," said Bonafide, who noted that this heart-rate level is not concerning in that type of situation. However, "a concerned parent might be compelled to seek care from a physician for reassurance, potentially leading to an EKG, chest X-ray, blood test, and admission for monitoring," he said. "That baby would be subjected to unnecessary discomfort, radiation and exposure to sick, contagious kids in waiting rooms," he told Live Science. "The parents might miss work, feel anxious, and then be stuck with a significant hospital bill." Advertisement Researchers also looked at the devices' manufacturing information online and found that although their websites didn't claim that their products could diagnose, treat or prevent disease, they did find an advertisement for Owlet that mentioned sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) and suggested their device could notify parents that something is wrong with their baby. Bonafide told Live Science that parents should be cautious as, "there is absolutely no evidence that using a vital sign monitor at home can prevent SIDS, and there is potential for harm if parents choose to use them," adding there is no evidence the monitors can accurately measure a baby's health. "Parents are wondering about these monitors because they care about and love their babies, and they want to do everything they can to keep them healthy," Bonafide said. "Monitor companies have capitalized on that to some degree, promising 'peace of mind' and offering to alert parents if something is wrong with babys health." Also on HuffPost 23 Life Hacks For New Parents See Gallery A shooting attack at a Quebec City mosque is unfortunately not the first of its kind in Canada. Sunday's violence left six people dead and eight others injured. One suspect is in custody, and police are probing the motive behind what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a "terrorist attack." Advertisement Below is a list of some of the worst mass shootings that have unfolded in the country. (Note: This is a list of shootings, where the murder weapon was a gun, and does not include other mass killings, such as the Air India bombing. ) Leonard Hogue murder-suicide (1965) On April 21, 1965, former Vancouver police officer Leonard Hogue, shot his wife in the head while she slept, which woke up his six children. He then moved through his house to kill each of the kids before eventually turning the gun on himself. After his death, police reports said Hogue was a suspect in two robberies, both of which netted him huge quantities of useless currency. Shell Lake massacre (1967) In 1967, 21-year-old Victor Hoffman shot and killed nine members of the Peterson family on their farm. Known as Canada's worst random mass murder, the victims were James and Evelyn Peterson and seven of their children, who ranged in age from 2 to 17. Phyllis Peterson, 4, was the only survivor. Advertisement Hoffman had been released from a mental hospital just three weeks before the attack. After his arrest, he was returned to a mental institution, where he was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. Ecole Polytechnique (1989) Also known as the Montreal Massacre, the violence at Ecole Polytechnique was Canada's deadliest mass shooting in recent history. In a planned attack, Marc Lepine entered the school and killed 14 women in 20 minutes before shooting himself. He claimed he was "fighting feminism," and his suicide note claimed feminists had ruined his life. Concordia University shooting spree (1992) In 1992, engineering professor Valery Fabrikant killed four of his colleagues after a pattern of tension and aggression towards fellow teaching staff at Concordia University. He was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. Vernon B.C. killings (1996) In April 1996, Mark Chahal shot his estranged wife and eight of her relatives at his former home in B.C., before going to a nearby motel and killing himself. Advertisement His wife, Rajwar Gakhal, had previously told the RCMP she felt threatened by her husband, but police admitted at the time of the attack that nothing was done to investigate her complaint. Cruse family murders (2002) In June 2002, 30-year-old American Peter Kiss forced his way into a Grimsby, Ont. home, where he shot his ex-girlfriend Shannon Cruse, her daughter, and her parents, before killing himself. Mayerthorpe RCMP killings (2005) In 2005, James Roszko shot and killed four RCMP officers who part of a seizure of stolen property on his farm near Mayerthorpe, Alta. After a shootout with other officers, Roszko turned the gun on himself and was pronounced dead at the scene. in It was the worst multiple-officer killing in Canadian history. Roszko had been operating a marijuana grow-op, and was under investigation for property crimes. Dawson College shooting (2006) In 2006, Kimveer Gill began shooting outside the entrance to Dawson College, and moved inside to the main floor atrium. One person died at the scene, and 19 others were hurt. Eight of them suffered serious injuries. Advertisement Gill was shot in the arm by police, and then shot himself in the head. A suicide note was later found on his body. Shedden massacre (2006) Eight people connected to the Bandidos motorcycle gang were found dead in a field north of Shedden, Ont. after an internal power struggle. Six gang members were convicted of first-degree murder for the killings. Claresholm highway killings (2011) Ten days before Christmas 2011, Derek Jensen killed three people at the side of an Alberta highway before killing himself. Jensen was reportedly angry with his ex-girlfriend, Tabitha Stepple, who was with her friend and two other men in the car. Stepple and the two men died, but Stepple's friend survived. Advertisement Story continues after gallery Alberta Tragedy See Gallery Moncton RCMP shooting (2014) In June 2014, Justin Bourque shot and killed three Moncton RCMP officers and wounded two others. He was captured after a manhunt and shootout with Mounties, and convicted of first-degree murder and attempted murder. Bourque received the maximum sentence for his crimes three concurrent life sentences and will be eligible for parole after 75 years in prison. Edmonton mass killings (2014) In December 2014, Phu Lam shot and killed eight people before committing suicide. He was reportedly angry upon finding out the eight-year-old boy he and his wife were raising was not his biological son. Lam shot the boy, his wife, and six members of her family, including her three-year-old niece. Lam was later found dead in his ex-wife's restaurant. Advertisement Documents show he had money troubles, and was on stress leave from work at the time of the attack. Story continues after gallery Edmonton Mass Murder, December 2014 See Gallery La Loche shooting (2016) On Jan. 22, 2016, a 17-year-old boy shot and killed two teenage brothers at a house in northern Saskatchewan. The teen then went to the local school, where he shot and killed two teachers and wounded seven others. His friends described the teen as the black sheep of his family and a victim of bullying at school. Also on HuffPost U.S. Gilead will not send financial claims against Ukraine after signing amicable agreement on Sovaldi medicine U.S. pharmaceutical manufacturer Gilead Sciences Inc., the manufacturer of the medicine to treat Hepatitis C would not send any financial claims against Ukraine after signing an amicable agreement regarding Sovaldi medicine, the company has told Interfax-Ukraine. Gilead said that innovative Sovaldi medicine with sofosbuvir actual substance was registered by Ukraine's Health Ministry in October 2015. "According to Ukrainian legislation, the registration gives exclusive rights to supply of the medicines containing sofosbuvir to Gilead during five years. In November 2015, the Health Ministry registered generic containing sofosbuvir without a permit of the company. Thus, the five-year rights of Gilead to the exclusivity of the medicine guaranteed by Ukrainian law were violated," the company said. The U.S. company said that Gilead was trying to solve the dispute in court and under a procedure outlined in the investment protection agreement signed by Ukraine and the United States. "The details of the negotiations and the conditions of the agreement between Gilead and Ukraine are confidential," the company said. The company expressed hope that the amicable agreement will be signed soon and its rights in Ukraine will be restored. "After implementing the conditions of the agreement Gilead would not send any financial claims," the company said. In addition, the company said that in July 2016 Gilead included Ukraine into the Global Access Program Chronic Hepatitis C Treatments. The company offers discounts to countries with low and medium incomes. "Under the program Ukraine will receive access to innovative Gilead medicines made for Hepatitis C treatments at the lowest prices in the world. The special price under Ukrainian public procurement programs is $250 per package of Sovaldi," the company said. A prominent NDP MP says a horrific shooting attack on a Quebec City mosque is a wake-up call for Canadians patting themselves on the back amid rising intolerance. Charlie Angus, who is mulling a run for his party's leadership, made the remark in a Facebook post Sunday that also called out the new U.S. president. Advertisement Donald Trumps carnival of hate doesnt stop at the border, Angus wrote in the wake of news that six people were killed and at least 12 others were injured during evening prayers. Angus urged followers to come together and defend their Muslim neighbours from the misinformation campaigns of the haters. We need to build community at this time, Angus wrote. We need to let our neighbours know that we have their back. Advertisement I am stunned to hear the news of the shootings and multiple deaths at a mosque in Quebec. Although there are few details... Posted by Charlie J. Angus on Sunday, 29 January 2017 Angus also took to Twitter Monday to note that as Canadians grieve victims of the shooting, Trump is welcoming rightwing extremist Steve Bannon, his chief strategist, to the National Security Council. As we mourn Muslim victims of hatecrime @realDonaldTrump appoints rightwing extremist Bannon to NSC.Canada can't be silent on his actions Charlie Angus NDP (@CharlieAngusNDP) January 30, 2017 Bannon was chairman of Breitbart News, an ultra-conservative website beloved by members of the so-called alt-right movement and white nationalists. Canada cant be silent on his actions, Angus said of Trump. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau released a statement Sunday calling the shooting a terrorist attack against Muslims in a place of worship and refuge. Advertisement Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear, Trudeau said in his release. Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country. Trump also called Trudeau Monday to offer condolences. NDP pushes for emergency debate New Democrats are also pushing for an emergency debate Monday on Trumps wildly controversial immigration policies. Trump sparked outrage by signing an executive order that temporarily bans visitors from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya. In response, Trudeau tweeted that Canada would continue to welcome those fleeing persecution and terror. To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 28, 2017 Advertisement On Sunday, Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen held a press conference to clarify the impact of the travel ban on Canadians. Hussen told reporters that the White House has given assurances that dual citizens with Canadian passports and permanent residents will still be able to cross the U.S. border. But Jenny Kwan, the NDP immigration critic, wants a broader discussion of how the federal government plans to respond on behalf of those targeted by the policy. "A ban against individuals based upon race, religion, or country of birth, implemented by our closest neighbour, cannot be tolerated, Kwan wrote in a letter to House Speaker Geoff Regan, requesting the debate. A number of NDP MPs have publicly criticized Trump since his election victory in November. NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair has called the U.S. president a fascist and has urged Trudeau to forcefully stand up to his counterpart. Advertisement Trudeau has long resisted calls to criticize Trump by name, saying instead that Canadians expect him to forge a strong working relationship with Trump. Trudeau and Trump are expected to meet within a month to discuss the North American Free Trade Agreement. In the wake of Trumps win, Angus rose in the House to say the U.S. election had cast a dark shadow across North America. Trump ran a campaign built around hate, blame, misogyny, and xenophobia, Angus said at the time. He also noted Canadians are not immune to such views, pointing to attacks against mosques and synagogues. Angus expressed optimism that, despite attacks against mosques and synagogues, Canadians will rise above the politics of paranoia and fear. Advertisement It is about standing up. It is about speaking out, he said. It is about telling our neighbours that we have their backs, because the politics of community will beat the politics of fear any day. With files from The Canadian Press Also on HuffPost On Saturday, the boy, who is a U.S. citizen from Maryland, was travelling from Iran to Washington, D.C. with a family member to meet his mother, who is Iranian, WILX 10 reports. Unfortunately, the five-year-old was held in custody by airport authorities for several hours before he was finally reunited with her. Advertisement In the emotional reunion, the mom and other relatives are seen giving the boy hugs and kisses. The mother is also heard singing Happy Birthday to him. Trumps executive order temporarily bans immigrants from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Syria. As a result, a number of immigrants and refugees were detained at airports over the weekend following the orders signing on Friday. However, the five-year-olds detainment, in particular, struck a nerve with the public. On Facebook, U.S. Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland revealed that he had given airport authorities advance notice that the boy would be arriving, yet the child was still detained. Advertisement Shame on you, Donald Trump, Van Hollen wrote in his impassioned post. And thank goodness for the federal judge who upheld the rule of law and temporarily blocked the implementation of Trumps removal order. We must remain vigilant and fight back. Many agreed with Van Hollen's stance and shared their outrage on Twitter. Hi Trump supporters. Here's your big, scary terrorist. A 5 year old boy, detained for hours, desperately waiting for his Mom. Shame on you. https://t.co/o7TXB9yOLB Enid-Raye Adams (@enidrayeadams) January 29, 2017 Despicable that a 5 YEAR OLD was detained for HOURS away from his mother. America, we are better than this. https://t.co/6GxLJs9YL5 Leela Daou (@leeladaou) January 29, 2017 This is nothing short of horrific. A 5-year-old child. Detained. https://t.co/Ahs8Z3RrB0 Caroline O. (@RVAwonk) January 29, 2017 Advertisement Were a country that welcomes immigrants and refugees, not terrorizes them. #nomuslimbanhttps://t.co/R2I1QqHSXZ Jill Smokler (@smoklerjill) January 29, 2017 In addition to this, protests were held at Dulles Airport, as well as at airports nationwide over the weekend. Also on HuffPost The 2017 Screen Actors Guild Awards took place on Sunday night, just days after President Donald Trump issued an executive order barring citizens from seven primarily Muslim countries from entering the United States. And, as expected, Hollywood had something to say about it. Among the first to speak out was "Veep" star Julia Louis-Dreyfus who took home the first award of the night for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series. It was her second time claiming the title for her role in "Veep" and fifth time receiving the award overall. Advertisement Julia Louis-Dreyfus has slam-dunked her speech targeting Trump: This Ban is Un-American. #SAGawardspic.twitter.com/iqGdYoX3wH Aaron Vallely (@Vallmeister) January 30, 2017 Whether the Russians did or did not hack the voting of tonights SAG Awards, I look out on the million or probably even million and a half people in this room and I say this award is legitimate and I won, she began, referencing Trump's presidential win and inauguration before declaring: Im the winner. The winner is me. Landslide. Dreyfus then took her speech down a more serious path telling the audience: I want you all to know that I am the daughter of an immigrant. My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France and I am an American patriot. And I love this country. And because I love this country I am horrified by its blemishes. And this immigrant ban is a blemish and un-American. Dreyfus' father died last September, just days before the actress took home her seventh Emmy award. At the time, Dreyfus also poked fun at Trump's political plans stating: Id also like to take this opportunity to personally apologize for the current political climate. I think that 'Veep' has torn down the wall between comedy and politics. Our show started out as a political satire but it feels now like sobering documentary. So I certainly do promise to rebuild that wall and make Mexico pay for it. Advertisement Also on HuffPost LAMEQUE, N.B. Troops went door-to-door Monday, helping northeastern New Brunswick recover from a devastating ice storm that has been linked to two deaths and almost three dozen hospitalizations from carbon monoxide poisoning. The soldiers cleaned debris from streets, went door-to-door to check on residents, and delivered needed items as the region recovers from a storm that has now prompted a delay in the provincial budget. Advertisement "They are making some significant gains in very difficult conditions ... But we understand there are people going through a tough time," Premier Brian Gallant told a briefing Monday. The budget scheduled for Tuesday is now delayed until Feb. 7. Early in the day, dark green military vehicles from Canadian Forces Base Gagetown crossed a bridge onto Lameque island, where soldiers set up a base in a school and then fanned out to ice-coated communities where power crews are still attempting to restore electricity lost in Wednesday's storm. The #CAF is sending approximately 200 personnel to support the emergency response to the ice storm in #NewBrunswickhttps://t.co/NlBfSvCgQnpic.twitter.com/dOQzwhXwaz Canadian Forces (@CanadianForces) January 29, 2017 Major Turmel Chiasson said the units have trained extensively for disaster scenarios, but for many of the younger soldiers it's their first real-life experience responding to an ice storm. Advertisement "(They're) very eager ... they train a lot and they don't do it for real, and this gets them involved in the community,'' he said. "For myself, I'm from here, the area, so yes, very excited to be here and helping friends and family.'' "A lot of friends were able to get on social media, and I was able to see the damage from the storms, so I was well in the know. Especially my mother, with no electricity for awhile, living in one of the worst areas.'' Gallant said the number of people without electricity has fallen from 150,000 last Wednesday, to less than 20,000 by noon Monday, and it was expected that with 380 repair crews on the ground that the majority of customers will have power restored by the end of the day. Advertisement "There are some families that will have a few days without power,'' Gallant said. Meanwhile, hospitals continued to assist people who succumbed to carbon monoxide fumes as some residents resorted to generators or barbecues to supply power and heat. As of Sunday evening, 33 people had been treated for exposure to the gas. Pigeon Hill resident Cynthia Gionet posted a video to Facebook last Thursday, showing hundreds of electrical poles downed on the island of Lameque. Images captured by The Canadian Press show a similar scene in other parts of the province. N.B. Power told CBC News that between 350 and 400 power poles in the province need restoring, after many broke in half under the weight of the ice. Advertisement In the small community of St. Leolin on the Acadian Peninsula, Mayor Mathieu Chayer said the community of about 700 people has its power back, but is grieving the loss of an elderly resident. He said many people in the town knew 74-year-old Lorraine Clement, who RCMP said passed away on Thursday as a generator was in her garage. Investigators have said an autopsy has yet to be carried out in her death, or in the death of a 62-year-old man who investigators say died at his home in Petite Riviere de l'ile on Lameque Island as a generator was running. Chayer said the incidents leave a lasting impact on the small, close-knit Acadian towns, which haven't seen an ice storm this severe for decades. Advertisement "Everybody's feeling sorrow about it ... She has family in the town,'' he said. The mayor said an emergency shelter was open in his town on Wednesday, hours after the storm hit, and that volunteer firefighters went door-to-door in an effort to check on older residents. "We can't have 100 per cent control of the community,'' he said. Chayer, a paramedic, said the deaths and hospitalizations have alerted residents in the region to the risks of running generators in enclosed spaces. "Everybody's feeling sorrow about it ... She has family in the town." "I don't think most of the people before this realized how deadly carbon monoxide is and how quickly it can kill somebody,'' he said. During his news conference, Gallant said he heard from doctors that many of the poisoning victims were operating generators in garages with the door open, not realizing that doesn't provide sufficient ventilation. "People will put things that emit carbon monoxide in garages thinking that if they open the door everything will be OK, but there is still the potential based on air flows of the emissions still going into their homes,'' said the premier. Advertisement More images from the ice storm: New Brunswick Ice Storm 2017 See Gallery UPDATE - Jan. 31, 2017: Provincial police are now treating the attack as an act of terrorism. RCMP told CBC News that Alexandre Bissonnette could face terrorism-related charges, pending its investigation. While Sunday's shooting at a Quebec City mosque was condemned by the prime minister as a "terrorist attack," police are still working to confirm a motive. Advertisement Six people are dead and 19 injured after gunfire erupted at the Islamic Cultural Centre as evening prayers were ending. One suspect is in custody, while another man who was arrested is now considered a witness. The last time terrorism-related acts caused such casualties on this scale was the era of the Front de liberation du Quebec, an extremist separatist group. It carried out dozens of attacks from 1963 to 1970, resulting in eight deaths, including Quebec deputy premier and cabinet minister Pierre Laporte. Advertisement The FLQ's founders were inspired by other revolutionary movements in the world at the time. The group followed a Marxist-Leninist philosophy and believed in overthrowing the Quebec government as well as rebelling against English imperialism. Its activities culminated in the October Crisis of 1970, when Laporte and British trade commissioner James Cross were kidnapped. The hostage-takings led Pierre Trudeau's government to invoke the War Measures Act, which allowed it to limit civil liberties. Many people consider the 1989 mass shooting at Montreal's Ecole Polytechnique as a terrorist attack. Marc Lepine killed 14 women in an anti-feminist rampage. It falls into a grey area because until after 9/11, there was no criminal definition of terrorism in Canada. Advertisement The worst terrorist attack in Canadian history happened in Irish airspace when a bomb exploded on an Air India passenger jet in 1985. In total, 329 people 268 of them Canadian citizens were killed when the airliner crashed into the Atlantic Ocean. The flight originated in Vancouver, where Sikh militants planted a bomb. Three people died in 1984 after a bomb exploded in a locker in Montreal's main train station. Thomas Bernard Brigham, an American war veteran, was convicted of planting it. More recently, two Canadian Forces members were killed in separate, unrelated terrorist attacks in 2014. On Oct. 20 that year, Warrant Officer Patrice Vincent died after Martin Couture-Rouleau rammed him with his car in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Que. Another soldier was injured. Police later shot and killed the suspect. Advertisement Two days later, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau shot and killed Cpl. Nathan Cirillo while the soldier was on sentry duty at the the National War Memorial in Ottawa. The gunman then stormed into the Parliament building before being killed by authorities. There have also other attempts to commit terrorist acts in Canada, including an al-Qaeda-inspired plot in 2006 to attack several targets in Toronto and southern Ontario. Eighteen people were arrested in connection with that plot. Last summer, terrorist sympathizer Aaron Driver was fatally shot by RCMP in Ontario after he made a video suggesting he planned to detonate a homemade bomb in an urban centre during rush hour. In 1966, a bomb exploded in a washroom on Parliament Hill, killing the would-be bomber, Paul Chartier, according to CBC News. Chartier had planned to throw the bomb on the House of Commons floor. Advertisement Also on HuffPost The deadly attacks at a Quebec City mosque Sunday evening drew some trolling from American white nationalist leader Richard Spencer. Six people were killed and eight others injured after a shooting at a Quebec City mosque, shortly after Sunday evening prayers. Advertisement Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the deadly shooting as "senseless violence." Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear, the prime minister said in a statement. Spencer, the U.S.-based white nationalist movement punched during President Donald Trumps inauguration in a viral video, sent a tweet aimed at Trudeau. Advertisement The leader of the racist movement, then mentioned Trudeau in a tweet, and in another, added "eh". Spencer tried to compare Canada with France, saying It's almost as if French Canada has the same problem as France with Muslims. It's almost as if French Canada has the same problem as France with Muslims. #QuebecCity Richard Spencer (@RichardBSpencer) January 30, 2017 Spencer is the head of the National Policy Institute, a white nationalist research and educational foundation. Hes also credited with coming up with the term alt right in an attempt to rebrand white nationalism, presumably to make it sound less like an extremist, racist hate movement. On Sunday evening, the shooting happened at the Islamic Cultural Centre in Quebec City. The victims are between 35 and about 60, according to provincial police. One man is in custody. Advertisement Thirty-nine other people in the centre at the time of the shooting were not hurt. Also on HuffPost The Ukrainian trade mission will go to Israel on March 6 through March 8, 2017, Ukrainian Agricultural Policy and Food Minister Taras Kutoviy has said. "It is planned to hold B2B meetings, visits industrial facilities, meet retailers and take part in networking events. Israeli partners show special interest towards Ukrainian sugar, flour and products made of it, vegetable oil, dairy products, vegetables, fruit, beverages and sweets," he wrote on his Facebook page. According to the report, Deputy Agricultural Policy and Food Minister for European Integration Olha Trofymtseva and Deputy Economic Development and Trade Minister, Trade Representative of Ukraine Natalia Mykolska will head the mission. As reported, on January 24 through January 26, the fourth round of free trade area (FTA) talks between Ukraine and Israel were held. The Economic Development and Trade Ministry reported the sides made some progress in approving the text of the agreement and in the tariff negotiations. Awards season is just getting started in Hollywood, and it looks like many celebs aren't backing down when it comes to sharing their raw thoughts on the current political situation in the U.S. Advertisement The 46-year-old began her speech by showing gratitude to the real life women the cast portrayed mathematicians Katherine Johnson, Mary Jackson and Dorothy Vaughan by speaking on the importance of their legacies, which was met with striking applause. "The shoulders of the women we stand on are three American heroes," she said. "Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson. Without them, we would not know how to reach the stars." "These women did not complain about the problems, their circumstances, the issues we know what was going on in that era," she continued. "They focused on solutions. Therefore, these brave women helped put men into space." Advertisement On Friday, U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order which banned refugees and immigrants from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia from entering the country. Henson, who has been known to hold nothing back when it comes to speaking her mind, has been vocal on social media about her resistance to Trump's new policy. So it came as no surprise that she concluded her speech by sending out a clear message about what the world needs most right now: love. "This story is of unity, this story is what happens when we put our differences aside, and we come together as a human race. We win, love wins, every time." Her impassioned words left both her costars and audiences everywhere in tears. Watch her full speech below: But Henson wasn't alone when it came to speaking candidly about the Trump administration at the show. "Stranger Things" actor David Harbour also made a very bold statement of resistance on stage, as he and the cast of the show accepted the award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series. Advertisement .@DavidKHarbour just gave the passionate, heartful speech we all need #SAGAwards BIG BOYS IN HOLLYWOOD STEPPING IT UP! pic.twitter.com/Oy0lSVS7iD RogelioGarcia Lawyer (@LawyerRogelio) January 30, 2017 "We will shelter freaks and outcasts those who have no homes," he exclaimed. "We will get past the lies, we will hunt monsters. And when we are lost amidst the hypocrisy and the casual violence of certain individuals and institutions we will, as per chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the meek, and the disenfranchised, and the marginalized, and we will do it all with soul, with heart and with joy." Spot. On. Also on HuffPost Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the more than one million Canadian Muslims coming to grips with a bloody terrorist attack at a Quebec City mosque must know they are loved and not alone in their pain. Thirty-six million hearts are breaking with yours, Trudeau said in the House of Commons Monday, a day after six people were gunned down at the Centre culturel islamique de Quebec mosque. At least 12 others were injured in the massacre. Advertisement Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. Trudeau reiterated that the attack on innocents praying peacefully was a clear act of terror, meant only to sow discord and hatred. Instead, the prime minister said, Canadians will heal together. We will grieve with you, we will defend you, we will love you and we will stand with you, Trudeau said directly to those who profess the Muslim faith. The prime minister also called on his colleagues to be the best version of themselves in the midst of such sadness. Advertisement At times like these, our communities need our leadership, he said. It is in these moments we must show ourselves worthy of the honour of sitting in this place for them. Those sentiments were echoed by all party leaders who preached a message of unity. Interim Conservative Leader Rona Ambrose told the House the terrorist attack strikes at the heart of a cherished Canadian freedom to worship without fear. It is also a sad reminder, she said, that Canada is not immune to such violence. An attack on a place of worship, Ambrose said, negates the principles on which Canada was founded. Ambrose said all leaders stand together to remember the victims. We have our differences but I know that no member of this House in any caucus would wish anything like this on anyone and under the banner of Canadian citizenship, we shall stand together, she said. 'Were in desperate need of love and solidarity' NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair also delivered a direct message to our Muslim brothers and sisters, many of whom are now feeling unsafe in their place of worship. Advertisement We mourn with you. We pray with you. And we promise we will stand united and fight against the forces of hatred, bigotry and Islamophobia, Mulcair said. And against those who peddle the politics of fear and division. Interim Bloc Quebecois Leader Rheal Fortin said that six people were assassinated because of their faith. Fortin spoke of an unhealthy climate of mistrust and intolerance. Were in desperate need of love and solidarity, he said. Finally, Green Party Leader Elizabeth May suggested the attack was almost incomprehensible in a place like Canada. She also called on Canadians to reject intolerance and hatred. "We will never let there be daylight between a Christian, a Jew, a Sikh, an atheist and a Muslim in this country.." Green Party Leader Elizabeth May Today we are all Muslims, May said. We stand with you and we will never let there be daylight between a Christian, a Jew, a Sikh, an atheist and a Muslim in this country. Advertisement We are Canadians and we stand together in love. Trudeau has invited his fellow leaders to travel with him to Quebec City later Monday to attend a vigil for the victims. Also on HuffPost Saturday night, Sia pledged $100,000 to match gifts to the ACLU to help overturn the Trump administration's de facto ban on travellers coming from several Muslim-majority countries. Within hours, people had tweeted donation receipts including Rosie O'Donnell and Judd Apatow. It wasn't just Sia. Other people, famous and ordinary alike, also issued gift challenges starting at $500. This is a new use of a backroom fundraising strategy for a greater purpose. Advertisement In a post-election article, Dr. Krishan Mehta predicted that people were going to use giving as a way to express a political point of view. It is not surprising that Planned Parenthood, which has been a regular subject of attack, received 40 times their usual number of gifts between the election the end of the year according to the Guardian. This giving doesn't just include Planned Parenthood. There is a new website called Rage Donate that allows people to make gifts to causes that are the most common targets of the new president's plans. Involvement in major causes is proving to be more than just making a gift. In today's connected world, people are also working as volunteers and activists in movements that are springing up quickly. Research by Stats Canada has consistently shown that there is a clear connection among giving, volunteering and participating. Advertisement This was on vivid display this weekend. The protests against the Muslim ban were huge. Regular people and stars gave money in support of the effort to overturn the Muslim ban. Lawyers volunteered in airports to free detained people. Protesters participated in sit-ins at the airports. While all this was going on, lawyers for the ACLU, a civil liberties non-profit, challenged Trump's executive order in court. This successful combination of donations, volunteering, activism and legal action could prove to be a potent combination in the days and months to come. This is not the first time that we have seen a rise in popular support for an emotional cause. The Ice Bucket Challenge was a remarkable instance of a successful viral donation campaign. And the recent Bell Let's Talk campaign was a great use of social media for good. Many causes have successfully used hashtag campaigns to raise awareness. These efforts do have a call to action to involve the broad public. But what is different this time is the broad range, size, speed and international scope of this effort. Advertisement Sia is Australian. Many Canadians gave online to the ACLU. The unexpected effect of globalization is citizens feel empowered to act and comment on the actions of another country. In an era of tremendous social media reach, this is an important turning point. Many Canadians have watched with concern U.S. events. Canada has responded very differently to many of the issues that Trump highlights -- most particularly in Canada's very different actions on immigration and refugees. The events of this weekend show that citizen activism now takes many forms. For many this will take the form of a donation to an activist non-profit. Through giving to key causes, Canadians can comment on U.S. politics Follow HuffPost Canada Blogs on Facebook Also on HuffPost: Canadians, feeling helpless about what's going on in the US? Here are some ways you can help #resist from the Great North -- and ensure our own country stays free, too: ENGAGE YOUR MP Let your Member of Parliament know you want Canada to take a stand against the policies being instated in the US. Ask what is being done to welcome refugees here, and insist the law disallowing US asylum seekers be repealed. VACATION WISELY Canadians spend billions of dollars each year travelling to the US. Plan your next vacation within Canada (it's big and beautiful and there's no way you've seen all of it!) or consider visiting another country that has taken a public stand against the current US administration's rhetoric. Sadly, while doing so will hurt those working in US tourism, choosing not to invest money in a country's economy is often one of the only ways foreigners can effectively show dissatisfaction. VOTE WITH YOUR WALLET Canada loves cross-border deals. Approximately 20 million overnight shopping trips to the US are taken by Canadians yearly. But voting with our wallets sends one of the most powerful messages we can to a government: until it is legal for citizens of all countries to enter the US, Canadians will not be entering it - even for a bargain. PUSH FOR ELECTORAL REFORM If we want to avoid the same fate in Canada of an ultra-conservative, racist and anti-LGBTQ government, the best thing we can do is push for electoral reform. Make our Liberal government keep its promise to revamp our unbalanced voting system BEFORE the next election. SUPPORT OUR MEDIA OUTLETS The state of our media is dire. It's eroding at a rapid rate and with it, our democracy. The media keeps government honest by being granted full access and having the resources to fact-check official statements. It must never be restricted, nor attacked by leaders and policy makers. Let the government know a strong, unbiased media base is crucial to our democracy, and ask what plans they have to ensure its survival. JOIN A PROTEST Let our American friends know they're not alone. Organize and demonstrate -- peacefully. Complacency is what allows regimes to gain power and remain powerful. But the power is always with the people if those people are loud enough and supported by others around the world. We've got you, America. STAY VOCAL Remain informed, remain a voice -- while taking breaks for self-care, of course. Be careful where you get your news from and fact-check regularly. But for the love of humanity, use. your. voice. We CAN make a difference. #NoBanNoWall Last year, during the week of the U.S. presidential election, in an opinion piece published here at Huffington Post, I criticized Canada's immigration system. I denounced the lack of resources being dedicated to reducing the backlog of spousal immigrant applications and the egregious wait times that foreign spouses of Canadian citizens had to suffer. At the time then, the backlog kept spouses apart for more than 24 months and created enormous pressure on the emotional health and stability of families. As a foreign immigrant married to a Canadian citizen, I felt that waiting two years to process a spousal visa was way too long and completely outrageous. Advertisement In my opinion piece, I declared that Canada's immigration backlog was as harmful and "ridiculous as building a wall between two countries". At the time, like many people and almost all the pollsters in the world, I underestimated Trump's chance of winning the election. And I didn't believe that even if he won that he would actually have the tenacity to go through with trying to build such a monstrous wall between the U.S. and Mexico. But I was incredibly wrong. And now look how the times have changed in just three short months. With only a week in office, Trump has signed his name to two separate executive orders that will severely affect the lives of immigrants and refugees. In Canada, after I and many other applicants spoke out about the backlog in Canada's immigration system, the federal government promised to devote more resources and to improve the process for spouses. They vowed to cut the wait time and backlog for spousal immigration applications by more than half, from a tortuous 24 months down to a more manageable 12 months. They also promised to expand the annual quota for spousal immigrants in 2017 and they issued a new simplified application kit. Canada's immigration minister at the time, John McCallum, said that "We have listened to Canadians.....Bringing families together makes for a stronger Canada. Canadians who marry someone from abroad shouldn't have to wait for years to have them immigrate or be left with uncertainty in terms of their ability to stay." Advertisement Meanwhile, in stark contrast to what has been taking place in Canada, the Trump administration has moved quickly since taking office to enact xenophobic, racist and anti-immigrant policies. With only a week in office, Trump has signed his name to two separate executive orders that will severely affect the lives of immigrants and refugees. The first order he signed calls for a wall to be built on the U.S. border with Mexico. In the second executive order also issued this week, Trump indefinitely suspended admissions for Syrian refugees and halted the issuing of visas to the nationals of six other mainly Muslim countries, including Iran, Iraq, Yemen and Libya, for three months. The consequences of Trump's executive orders are beyond symbolic. His wall, and the idea to pay for it with a 20 per cent import tax on Mexican goods, will have a real economic cost associated with it. And it will be a cost born by the American consumer, as well as Mexican businesses. And rather than keeping immigration at bay, the damage to the Mexican economy could lead to an increase in the number of migrants looking to leave an impoverished situation. Additionally, his executive order halting refugees, particularly from Muslim-majority countries, violate fundamental human rights and completely go against the sense of moral human decency. Refugees are the most vulnerable class of people who have gone through great lengths to flee from persecution, discrimination, armed conflicts and war. Advertisement What happened to the America that welcomed the "tired, the poor, and the huddled masses yearning to breathe free"? Contrary to what Trump thinks, his executive orders barring refugees and erecting a wall between our southern neighbour do not protect American interests. In fact, these will be costly in terms of economic and security terms. His policies will likely foment even greater hatred of the United States abroad. As one of the wealthiest countries in the world, the United States has a responsibility to help refugees. But it is a responsibility that it no longer takes seriously. With nationalist fervor, Trump yells that he wants to place "America First" and make "America Great Again." But he forgets the values that this great nation was built upon. What happened to the America that welcomed the "tired, the poor, and the huddled masses yearning to breathe free"? While the United States is quickly shutting itself down and becoming more insular, Canada remains open to immigrants. Over the past year, Canada has been extremely welcoming of Syrian refugees. And following Trump's recent move, Canada's Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, issued a statement on Twitter restating his country's commitment to welcoming refugees. Advertisement So I urge the Canadian government and the recently appointed Minister of Immigration, Ahmed Hussen, who is himself a former refugee, to continue to open its doors to more asylum-seekers following the deplorable actions by U.S. President Trump to restrict them. Because the Trump administration's anti-immigrant policies will now make Canada an even more attractive destination for migrants and refugees. Canada is a beacon of stability and a defender of human rights. It's a place where immigrants are valued and refugees are provided sanctuary. The United States could learn a lesson or two from its neighbour to the north, rather than focusing on the bogeyman on its southern border. Follow HuffPost Canada Blogs on Facebook I was married to a liar for 25 years. At a very personal level, I have first-hand knowledge of the devastation lying creates in people's lives. I know that liars can be clever, charming, smug, and thoroughly convincing. Scott Peck, in People Of The Lie, which The Wall Street Journal called a ground breaking book, described lying as a human evil. Liars are: "Utterly dedicated to preserving their self-image of perfection...They are acutely sensitive to social norms and what others might think of them....While they seem to lack any motivation to be good, they intensely desire to appear good. Their 'goodness' is all on a level of pretense. It is, in effect, a lie," according to Peck. Advertisement It is a book that deserves to be revisited at this time in our new world order where lying is an everyday occurrence. Such is the shock that lying has become the new truth, media outlets had to scramble for appropriate language in their reporting. The next challenge was to find a way to approach the liars and their lies at the same time keeping their incredulity in check. Liars all have very similar traits. First of all they have an agenda. There is a reason for their lying. In my case it was to hide a very big secret. Or it can be delusions of grandeur and power. It may simply be to play a game to find out how far they can push the other side of truth. There is always a motivating factor. Contrary to popular lore, really good liars do not shift their gaze or get fidgety in the midst of a lie. They build their base carefully. Try the crowd on for size. If they get away with one lie, then they branch out. One lie begets another and another, a bit like Pinocchio's nose. Advertisement Denial is not just a river in Egypt, it is another cornerstone of the liar. Deny. One particularly favourite line I heard when my marriage broke up was " I have no knowledge of that." A clever way to dodge honesty. Curiously enough I have since heard many people use that line in television interviews. Constantly shift the landscape is another tactic. Never let the spotlight shine too brightly on one area. Change the discussion focus, metaphorically go out for a smoke if conversations start going in the wrong direction. Contrary to popular lore, really good liars do not shift their gaze or get fidgety in the midst of a lie. Science has proven that these liars build separate brain wave patterns for the lying side of their life. Hence their ability to lie so believably. In that sense it is a truth, their truth or their alternative fact. A liar has a very astute understanding of the personal target or people in their audience. Tell them what they want to hear is an effective marketing tool and is also in the liar's arsenal. If a particular lie gets a very positive response and the crowd roars with approval, they quickly up the ante. Often these lies get more outlandish with each roar of the crowd and the liar lets the adulation wash over them. Advertisement All the while the liar portrays sincerity. The 'awe shucks' approach is another tactic. I am just like you they will say. The person is drawn into this 'you and me against the world' line. Here's someone that really understands and cares about me the crowd hopes. It's a dance, an act with a sinister goal of power and control. A good liar is a good manipulator. If they need to shift the focus they do. They readily identify when the time is right to throw a curve into the works. If one topic is creating too much heat, throw out something truly outlandish to catch the top headline and shift the focus. What do you lose along with truth when there is a liar in your in life? Trust, one of the basic tenets of any relationship. Once discovered, liars call into question everything they say and do. Remember the story of Peter and The Wolf. Eventually the town's people stopped listening. Ultimately the truth will out and we must contribute to that truth at every opportunity. What else do we lose with a liar in our life? The liar leaves a trail of disequilibrium which ultimately results in chaos. It is that unease, dis-ease that allows the liar to keep lying. Petulant, child-like, always upending the next topic. Sucking all the oxygen out of the air. Liars are constantly chasing their own fame and glory. It is their ultimate destination. A destination achieved at any cost where we hear the telephones are beautiful-elegant even. The world is in uncharted territory today. The media noted that we have always had a plethora of tinpot despots. As we've seen, the odd Rasputin sidekick is thrown in for good measure. It was easier to rail against regimes on another shore. Advertisement Giving attention to the liar fulfills their evil objective. Ultimately the truth will out and we must contribute to that truth at every opportunity. Meanwhile, in these uncertain times, we can take some comfort listening to Willie, "Living in the Promised Land." Follow HuffPost Canada Blogs on Facebook Also on HuffPost: Increasing economic inequality is shaking our global foundation. The world's richest one per cent own 99 per cent of our planet's wealth. The widening gap between the rich and the poor is contributing to global unrest, political instability, conflict and migratory crises. But most importantly, this gap continues to erode the well-being and dignity of the world's poorest and most vulnerable people. When unrest and conflict happen in the global community, Canada feels the tremors and the impact. The refugee crisis in Syria gives us a glaring example. As Canadians we care. But compassion is just the starting point. Concrete actions are what we need, both in the interest of developing countries and Canada's own -- for an economy that works for the middle class, for a healthier and safer environment for our families and the generations to come. To do so, Canada is playing a significant role globally in promoting greater equality. I am proud to say that we are refocusing our international assistance on the poorest and most vulnerable, and particularly on women and girls. Our new policy, which our government will outline in greater detail soon, responds to a clear mandate from Prime Minister Trudeau to "help reduce poverty and inequality in the world," promote inclusion and the respect for human rights. Advertisement Focusing on the right to education for girls is just one way we are working toward greater equality. This is more than just talk. It's about doing things differently -- putting human dignity and those who experience the worst forms of marginalization, especially women and girls, at the center of everything we do. Our government envisions a human-centred economy that works equally for everyone and empowers women and girls to take greater control of their lives for the benefit of all. In Afghanistan, for example, we are working with partners to implement the Community Based Education Enrichment Program. Through this initiative, families in some of the most vulnerable communities in Afghanistan are now sending their daughters to school, because they have access to safe, quality basic education. Focusing on the right to education for girls is just one way we are working toward greater equality. Our work focused on climate change is another. The poor are the most vulnerable to the devastation and setbacks caused by erratic weather. They lack the resources to rebuild or survive when disasters like drought or flooding hit. Through Canada's investments we are helping developing countries adapt and promote more inclusive green economic growth initiatives. For example, Canada's support is helping a company in Haiti make energy-efficient cookstoves that produce less greenhouse gas emissions. More than 60,000 cookstoves have been sold creating much needed jobs for Haitians, increasing air quality in households and protecting health of thousands of families. Advertisement Canada also supports international efforts that promote innovative thinking and ensure that technology is used to reduce poverty and inequality. Nowhere is this more evident than in our government's support for expanding access to mobile phone technology. This is a particularly powerful tool for women to access information, exercise decision-making power, do their banking, and access credit to start and operate new businesses. Governments alone cannot bring about global economic and social change. Private companies can indeed become partners in development and agents for social change and inclusion. There are great opportunities to develop policies and encourage international efforts to align private sector incentives with public goals, including development objectives. Just over a year ago I was pleased to participate in the launch of the Convergence investment platform. With support from the Canadian government, Convergence is the first and only platform that helps public and private investors find and connect with each other to invest in emerging markets. A great deal of legwork has been done in the global fight against inequality. In September 2015, Canada and other members of the United Nations committed to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The Agenda calls upon all countries and their citizens to work together to end poverty, to protect the planet and to promote peace and prosperity for everyone by 2030. The collective challenge is to turn these goals into actions and results. Together, we can build a better world -- one where there is greater economic and social equality -- a world where everyone can prosper and where women and girls are empowered to reach their full potential. Advertisement The Honourable Marie-Claude Bibeau is Canada's Minister of International Development and La Francophonie. Follow HuffPost Canada Blogs on Facebook On December 29, 2013, Egyptian security forces arrested award-winning journalist Mohamed Fahmy in a dramatic raid on Cairo's Marriott Hotel and imprisoned him on charges of being a terrorist, fabricating false news, and undermining state security. The opening of his recently-released memoir, "The Marriott Cell," below, introduces readers to a compelling true story of injustice, political intrigue and one man's inspiring fight for freedom. The night I am incarcerated, as I stand shivering and exposed, surrounded by half a dozen prison guards, I cannot fathom what losing my freedom might mean. Understanding will come later, stealthily, like the cold that creeps into my body from the concrete floor beneath my bare feet. Advertisement I am in a dingy foyer clad in only my undershorts and a thin, long-sleeved undershirt. Pain lances through my right shoulder, broken two weeks before my arrest and now cradled in a black canvas sling. I brace it against my chest as a prison guard approaches and tosses a set of white, pajama-like garments at me. He gestures for me to put them on and I step awkwardly into the bottoms using only my good arm to pull them up to my waist. "Take off the sling," he orders. "It's broken," I say, but his face remains impassive. I reach into the pocket of my jeans, which lie discarded on a nearby wooden bench and fish out a half-full pack of cigarettes. I hold it out to him, and he slides it into the pocket of his uniform. I am struggling to pull on the top when I see my colleague Baher Mohamed escorted into the foyer. Our eyes make quick contact. Then I watch him suffer the same humiliation, stripping to his underwear as the guards look on. Advertisement This is how I enter Scorpion, Egypt's notorious maximum-security prison. A guard hands me two rough grey blankets and orders me to wait for the prison doctor. I drop onto the wooden bench, my shoulder throbbing. The doctor, when he shows up, is wearing a training suit and slippers, and strides aggressively towards me. "Why are you wearing a sweater under the prison shirt?" His tone is sharp. "Take it off and give it to the guard." The guard to whom I've given my cigarettes kicks me in the shin. "Get up when you're spoken to!" "Sir," I speak directly to the doctor, "my shoulder is broken." "Fine," he says, relenting unexpectedly, as if already bored with our conversation, "keep the extra shirt." "May I keep these?" I ask, opening my left hand to show him the container of painkillers I have been clutching since my arrest 24 hours ago. He takes them from me, checks them over briefly, then hands them back without a word. He looks at Baher with an indifferent eye, and then turns to the guards. "Send them in." Advertisement This is how I enter Scorpion, Egypt's notorious maximum-security prison. Reserved for terrorists, criminals and high-level political prisoners, Scorpion is one of seven blocks that make up the vast Tora Prison complex, a sprawling, foreboding and heavily fortified conglomeration of drab, desert-coloured buildings surrounded by seven-metre-high, barbed-wire-topped walls and watch towers, and located twenty kilometres south of Cairo. Little is known about Scorpion, but it is nicknamed "the Cemetery," and some of the region's most dangerous figures are incarcerated here. The bearded face of Mohamed al-Zawahiri, the younger brother of the United States' "most wanted man," Ayman al-Zawahiri, the al-Qaeda leader who succeeded Osama bin Laden, floats into my mind. I had interviewed Mohamed al-Zawahiri eighteen months ago for CNN, following his release after ten years in this same prison where he had been tortured and confined in solitary. Mohamed, who was a member of the violent Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ) organization in the '90s, a group that formally merged with al-Qaeda in 2001, had insisted he was targeted mainly because of his brother Ayman. He had been accused of participating in the assassination of President Sadat and acquitted, but eighteen years later the CIA apprehended him in the United Arab Emirates and extradited him under the United States' extraordinary rendition program. Returned to Egypt, he was sentenced to death this time on charges of plotting to overthrow the state. The door slams shut behind me and I hear the sound of the key turning the lock. It had taken me weeks to land the interview with al-Zawahiri-- the first one he granted to foreign media after his brief release following President Hosni Mubarak's resignation. He would soon after be rearrested by the interim government and thrown back behind bars on new charges of "forming a terrorist cell" linked to al- Qaeda and plotting attacks against targets in Egypt. "Is al-Zawahiri inside?" I ask my guard. "Yes," he answers sarcastically, "he and his friends are all waiting for you in this seven-star hotel." Advertisement An entourage of guards march Baher and me through a maze of decrepit concrete hallways and metal gates. There is a stale, fetid smell that intensifies as the guards lead us deeper into the prison. Two mangy, underfed cats appear in one corridor and follow us. After five minutes we arrive in what the guards announce is the terrorist wing. Its dim passageway, littered with broken chairs and other discarded furniture, is lined with solid, gunmetal-green doors. The guards stop in front of a door marked with the number "7" in heavy black paint. One swings it open and I walk into a solitary confinement cell. The door slams shut behind me and I hear the sound of the key turning the lock. I am imprisoned. This is all a big mistake, I tell myself. I will be out in the morning when my family and the network create an uproar. Excerpted from The Marriott Cell by Mohamed Fahmy with Carol Shaben. Copyright 2016 Mohamed Fahmy. Published by Random House Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited. Reproduced by arrangement with the Publisher. All rights reserved. Follow HuffPost Canada Blogs on Facebook We drove for 12 hours along American highways through New York, Pennsylvania, Washington and Virginia, and at every gas station and rest stop met groups of women who were all headed to the same place: the Women's March on Washington. People flocked from across states and provinces to join the march by bus, train, car, metro and plane. Flights were filled with women headed to the march, and airlines illuminated the cabins in pink to mark the occasion. No two journeys looked the same. Everyone had their own reason for being there. Led by women, the peaceful march is believed to have been the largest demonstration in U.S. history, drawing between three and four million Americans to city streets across the country. Here in Canada, tens of thousands of citizens came out to support their American neighbours, and to advocate for the local issues that matter most to them and their communities. Canadians marched in 29 demonstrations in cities and towns across the country. The small Nova Scotia village of Sandy Cove drew international attention with their march of 15 people. My own mother and two-year old daughter went on a symbolic march of two people in our rural Ontario village. Advertisement My two-year old daughter marching with her grandmother in our neighbourhood. (Photo: Irene Whittaker-Cumming) Hundreds of sister marches took place around the world in at least 60 countries, with women standing in solidarity on every continent -- including Antarctica. Women across India marched to demand safety for women in public spaces. Women in Georgia spoke out about domestic violence, securing equal pay for equal work and political representation. In Kenya, women demanded reproductive rights, and an end to sexual harassment, assault, female genital mutilation, and the trafficking of women and children. No matter where they were, these marches were peaceful and inclusive. They were not about speaking out with one voice, but rather many distinct voices rising up together. As we walked towards the National Mall, we went from a street with 10 people to a street with a hundred people, and you could feel the anticipation build. Then, suddenly, we were on a street with hundreds of thousands of people. I had full-body chills and started to tear up, for what would be the first of many times throughout the day. Advertisement From my perspective, amidst an endless crowd on Independence Avenue, this was one of the most inclusive moments of civil action in history, representing a wide array of perspectives and issues. While not perfect -- and worthy of critique and ongoing discourse -- the march highlighted that women's rights are human rights. It showed that "women's issues" are the issues facing everyone: violence, poverty, racism, workers' rights, civil rights, disability rights, environmental justice and others. The official Unity Principles developed by the experienced, diverse organizing committee laid a foundation of inclusivity, and emphasized that people's various identities, lived experiences and social barriers can interconnect in different ways, depending on who they are and where they live. Marchers were unified by a shared commitment to fight for justice and equality. (Photo: Irene Whittaker-Cumming) Soon we couldn't walk any further. The crowd was thick with people united in their commitment to equality and justice. Speakers and performers spoke passionately to their lived experiences and the issues they knew best: Senator Tammy Duckworth spoke about accessibility, Sophie Cruz about immigrant rights, Michael Moore about political engagement, Gloria Steinem about sexual and reproductive rights, and Angela Davis about racism and the hetero-patriarchy. After the speeches, we marched. We marched through the streets of the U.S. capital, shutting down the city with our massive protest, as across the continent and the world, millions of other women, men and children did the same. Our presence was impossible to ignore, and showed what was possible as we begin a new sort of movement. Advertisement A movement with women at the helm. A movement with no leader, instead motivated by a unifying commitment to the fight for justice and equality. A movement where everyone is encouraged to take action on a diversity of issues that matter to them, their neighbours and the most marginalized among us. Countless signs declared "Women's Rights are Human Rights." (Photo: Irene Whittaker-Cumming) For me, that issue is girls' equality. I feel privileged to have taken part in this glorious, high-visibility moment that fuels the grueling, exciting and essential daily work of advancing girls' equality that I am a part of at Plan International Canada. I feel privileged to have been reminded so beautifully that the many movements for progress are interconnected. So, what now? This moment of solidarity must motivate us to stand together with groups outside of our own when our collective rights are threatened, be that in our own communities or around the world. Advertisement We must show up for women and girls around the world in the same way we showed up for women on that day. We must rally the courage to raise our voices every day to create a resounding call for equality that cannot be ignored. And when times are tough, we must remember this day, and let ourselves be reinvigorated by the energy of millions of marchers worldwide. Irene Whittaker-Cumming is a Senior Manager of Communications at Plan International Canada. Follow HuffPost Canada Blogs on Facebook Also on HuffPost: Aequo law firm advised Portigon AG (Dusseldorf, Germany), UniCredit Bank Czech Republic and Slovakia, a.s. (Prague, the Czech Republic) and other lenders on the restructuring of the multi-million loan facilities granted to the major Ukrainian automotive industry company, the firm has said on its website. Aequo advised the lenders on potential enforcement procedures, in Ukraine and abroad, negotiated the revised repayment terms, drafted the restructuring documentation as well as controlled fulfillment of conditions precedent to the restructuring transaction. Upon completion of the transaction Aequo issued a legal opinion in favor of the lenders. "This was a complex and challenging restructuring, involving multiple parties from both sides and long-lasting negotiations," Partner and head of Banking & Finance Yulia Kyrpa said. Allen & Overy advised on all aspects arising out of English, German and Czech Republic law elements of the restructuring. Aequo did not disclose the name of the company. According to Interfax-Ukraine's information, the company is an official manufacturer of Skoda cars in Ukraine Eurocar. As reported, in 2009, Germany's WestLB AG bank (now Portigon AG) organized a loan of EUR 52.4 million ($74.5 million) for the period of 12 year to Eurocar to implement a new stage of the project to produce cars of Volkswagen Group in Ukraine. The funds were raised to buy equipment for painting and welding lines being created on the basis of CJSC Eurocar (Solomonovo, Zakarpattia region). The lines were built in 2009 and by the end of 2010 the company intended to start manufacturing cars. However, the Ukrainian car market dropped a lot. The company froze the launch of the full-scale production. The 2017 SAGs had me feeling all of the feelings. Seriously. I am very confused right now. It is difficult to put my thoughts into words, but I will still try. On Sunday, we were called to make sh*t happen and use our skills to help those in need. We were asked on several occasions to unite, and not be afraid. I am Canadian and I felt all kinds of things -- how do American viewers feel? The Screen Actors Guild Awards are meant to honour actors, however the actors were honouring those affected by President Trump's latest executive order to keep those from Muslim-dominant countries out of the U.S. Not even a minute into the show, and a comment was already made. Ashton Kutcher started off the show by welcoming "actors, people at home, and everyone in airports that belong in [his] America." The crowd responded with loud cheers of support -- a reaction that remained consistent throughout the night. Advertisement Julia Louis-Dreyfus went up to accept the award for Outstanding Performance By An Actress in a Comedy Series, mentioning in her speech how she is the daughter of an immigrant. Her father had escaped Nazi-France. The words that stuck with me the most were as follows: "This immigrant ban is a blemish and un-American." Then, William H. Macy took hardware home for his performance in the series Shameless. He didn't miss a chance to mention Trump, thanking him for making his character seem normal. The most touching moment of the night would have to be when Mahershala Ali (Moonlight) won Best Supporting Actor. He was choked up as he spoke about the ban as a Muslim --f a moment everyone in the Twitterverse was hoping would occur. It made things very clear. Mahershala thanked his mom and his support system, as well as reflecting on his film and its similarities to today's reality. Advertisement You would think it would end there, but nope... It gets better! Bryan Cranston said, "I think 35 would put his arm around 45 and wish him success earnestly" when thinking about what LBJ would say to Donald Trump. Lifetime Achievement Award recipient Lily Tomlin is known for being an activist for many causes -- she asked, "What sign should I make for the next march?" The SAG-AFTRA president paraphrased the late Alan Thickman noting that performers are responsible for change. Ending it was a speech that will probably never be forgotten -- or at least be talked about until the Oscars. The Stranger Things Cast won Best Ensemble In A Drama Series and David Harbour did not disappoint. If you should take just one thing from his long powerful speech, it's that "we are all human beings." Advertisement The cast of Stranger Things accepts their award for Ensemble in a Drama Series during the 23rd Screen In non-political SAGs news, there were a few shockers that had me overjoyed about waiting to make my Oscars picks. Denzel Washington beat Casey Affleck out for Best Actor; Emma Stone won Best Actress; and Hidden Figures won the Best Ensemble Cast. It's safe to say that the SAGs left viewers with a lot to soak in. We'll all be thinking about every life decision we've made up until this moment and how we can positively shape our future. Speaking of positively shaping our future (I almost forgot about this), Sarah Paulson asked that you donate any spare money to ACLU (American Civil Rights Union -- recently temporarily stopped Trump's ban). I think I did a pretty decent job at summing up the show. If I missed anything, feel free to comment below or tweet me @MissSaverinaS. The countdown is on until the Oscars -- I will see you then. Follow HuffPost Canada Blogs on Facebook While details are still unfolding on the Quebec City mosque attack Sunday night, there is little question that the shooters were motivated by hate for Muslims. As such, Quebec and Canadian political leaders should take a long hard look at how their statements and actions may exacerbate such hate. Quebec Muslims rightly see the Quebec City mosque killings as just the latest escalation in a trend of growing harassment against Canada's Muslims. "The Muslim community in Quebec is suffering from a flood of hate attacks, [...] and now the attacks are escalating and bringing [...] the death of innocent people," lamented Samer Majzoub, president of the Canadian Muslim Forum. Advertisement It is the demagogues of our time who may be particularly to blame. There is no question that Islam worldwide has a problem of radical extremist violence. Fittingly, mainstream Muslim leaders -- in Canada and elsewhere -- have consistently condemned such violence. And while Canadian political leaders are also right to condemn Muslim extremist violence in Europe and elsewhere, they must be careful not to say things that inflame latent prejudice against Canada's Muslim community. It may be months before we learn the twisted motives of the killers in the mosque attack, but it is certainly not unreasonable to suppose that U.S. President Donald Trump's de facto Muslim travel ban might have played a role in encouraging the attack. Because whether they are Trump or anyone else, the statements and actions of our political leaders can easily legitimize unacceptable attitudes or behaviour in society. It is the demagogues of our time who may be particularly to blame. MP Kellie Leitch is one apt example that comes to mind. In 2015, Leitch was the front-woman for the Harper government's "barbaric practices tip line," which falsely but implicitly suggested that Canadian Muslims maintain practices which are already illegal under Canadian law, like forced marriages and honour killings. Now as a Conservative leadership candidate, Lietch has upped the ante in her anti-Muslim rhetoric by calling for the screening of "immigrants, refugees and visitors" for "anti-Canadian values." Advertisement Leitch was part of a Harper government which stoked anti-Muslim sentiment for years. For example, Harper consistently played off the danger of extremist Islamic terror, stating in 2011 that "Islamicism" was the biggest threat facing Canada. As one critic put it at the time, "Harper never loses a chance to invoke the spectre of Islamist terrorism." One high-visibility manifestation of Harper's anti-Muslim bias was his decision to block Muslim refugees from receiving asylum in Canada. Another was his attempt to prevent Muslim women from wearing the niqab during citizenship ceremonies -- a case which he lost, but which dragged publicly through the courts for months. After seeing Harper repeatedly lose this case in the courts, one commentator authored a piece, "Call the niqab issue what it is -- a shameless play for the bigot vote." In Quebec, the Parti Quebecois government of Pauline Marois proposed an infamous law in 2013 known as the "Charter of Values" which had a deep anti-Muslim focus. This bill, proposing the banning of many religious symbols -- such as the hijab -- in the public service, severely exacerbated anti-Muslim currents in the province. Quebecers experienced deja vu this past fall when conservative Quebec politician Francois Legault resurrected some of the very same issues relating to Muslim dress. Advertisement Gestures and words on the part of our politicians do matter. Many of Canada's Muslims have fled to Canada as witnesses of violence, oppression and terrorism themselves. It is therefore ironic that they are now targeted by conservative politicians in Canada somehow as a "source" of extremism. In fact, given their first-hand experience with oppression and violence, they are often the most ardent defenders of the liberties that many Canadians take for granted. Indeed, Majzoub concludes his statement on the attack by stating, "This massacre does not represent the values Quebecers and Canadians, [like those] of peace, equality and freedom of belief." Gestures and words on the part of our politicians do matter. We may never know what drove the attackers to murder six people praying in their Quebec City mosque this past weekend. However, we can be certain that fear-mongering language from our politicians can only be dangerous and counter-productive to a healthy and unified Canadian society. Follow HuffPost Canada Blogs on Facebook Also on HuffPost: Dear Justin, Tom and a Conservative player to be named later: Up here in the clouds above Canuckistan and Trumpland, jetting south on a plane, we cannot help but think of you. A few days ago, you see, my wife Lisa and daughter Emma travelled to Washington, D.C. with several hundred other Canadian women to protest the day-old Trump regime. More than a million people showed up, mainly women. Their principal focus was women's rights, but other issues came up, too. Advertisement In Toronto, where I marched with more than 60,000 people, it was much the same. There was a truly joyous, family friendly atmosphere to it all, and it felt wonderful to be there. The NDP and various union leaders tried to seize control of the day's events at the start, but we didn't let them. (More on that shortly.) Where are our leaders? In both cities -- and at Women's March events that took place around the world, involving millions -- one question could be heard, over and over: Where are our leaders? In Canada, the strategy of the Liberal and Conservative parties seems to be identical. That is, be very, very small. Be almost invisible. And, in that way, Donald Trump -- the Unpresident -- will not notice us, and he will hopefully leave us alone. Now, sure, a couple Conservative Party leadership candidates are aping Trump, and saying awful things about refugees and immigrants and people who do not look/sound/pray like them. But, overwhelmingly, most decent Liberal and Conservative politicians are appalled by Trump. They are disgusted and shocked. In private, they will certainly tell you that. Advertisement But in public? They say, and have said, precisely nothing. They are invisible. People are starting to notice. At a sold-out Mosaic Institute forum in Toronto I moderated a few days ago -- called "Canada In A Trump World" -- that was the very first question, in fact. An elegant, well-dressed older gentleman stood up and said: "Where is our prime minister? Condemning Kellie Leitch is easy. Why isn't he condemning the terrible things Trump says and does?" Many heads nodded. Mine did. The political answer to that question, of course, is trade, security, blah blah blah. We're a mouse, he's an elephant, etc. etc. Diplomacy, yadda yadda. That sort of thing. The Conservatives are no better. The moral answer, however, is this: "You're right. He's going to do exactly what he's promised to do -- eviscerate trade deals, put up walls, gut NATO, implement a Muslim registry -- and we will strongly object. We think he's wrong. And we intend to say so, in a united front, to his face. If there's one thing strong men understand, it's strength." Advertisement That hasn't been said, however. Not even close. What's happened, instead, is the government's most-senior advisers have hurried down to D.C., and then leaked to the Globe and Mail what a swell guy Steve Bannon is. You know, Steve Bannon -- the guy who isn't opposed to keeping blacks from voting and who, according to sworn court documents, doesn't want to let his kids go to school with Jews. What's happened, instead, are leaks of chatty, convivial phone calls between our feminist prime minister and the Unpresident. About how chummy they are. With Trump, a "man" who brags about sexually assaulting women and is facing multiple legal actions for sexual assault. The Conservatives are no better. I don't know of a single smart Conservative -- and yes, Virginia, they exist -- who isn't thoroughly disgusted by the racist, sexist, fascistic Groper-in-Chief. But will any of them speak up and call him what he is, which is a menace to global stability? A creep? A pig? Not a chance. Not on your life. The NDP, naturally, can be expected to claim the moral high ground. They have zero prospect of attaining power anytime soon, so they will denounce the Unpresident at every opportunity. Advertisement Fine. Good. But if the Dippers do what they did in Toronto at the outset of the sister Women's March -- that is, to treat opposition to Trump like it's an exclusive socialist club, and to refuse to build alliances with similarly horrified Grits and Tories -- well, then Trump will win. Because the only way to defeat this piece of filth is with the aforementioned united front. Divided, we will never succeed. If the Bernie Sanders experiment taught us anything, it's that. From four miles up, as we squint down at Canada and the formerly Unites States of America, what strikes us is this: the all-encompassing political silence. The people are mobilizing like never before, and the people are motivated. But our political classes? They're someone else, pretending to be ostriches. Remember that old maxim, politicos? Because it is so, so true in 2017. Silence in the face of injustice -- and hate, and cruelty -- is complicity. Sincerely, Us. Follow HuffPost Canada Blogs on Facebook Also on HuffPost: The five things you need to know on Monday, January 30 1) TRUMPED UP CHARGE You can bet your house that John Bercow will mention the historic victory of his hero Roger Federer in the Commons today. What is just as certain is that Trumps travel ban will get an airing, either through a statement from Boris Johnson or an urgent question forced on him by Labour. Advertisement The Foreign Secretary is basking in some favourable headlines this morning, most which suggest he single-handedly won an exemption to save Brits like Sir Mo Farah and Nadhim Zahawi from the Presidential executive order on refugees and foreign nationals. But as I pointed out last night in my long read on the PMs US and Turkey trip, Canadas Justin Trudeau got exactly the same clarification a full 15 hours before the UK announced it. May certainly looked flat-footed on the Trump refugee order. Those of us who heckled her in Ankara on Saturday were simply frustrated that she didnt want to comment at all on the American move. The PM changed tack at midnight, two and a half hours after she landed in the UK. But Labour may want to ask why, with Washington still awake, No.10 didnt seek clarification straight away on the impact on Britons. And even with different time zones, it was surprising it took so long on Sunday to extract the commitment delivered to Trudeau hours beforehand. For me, the bigger story is the rise of ex-Breitbart website chief Steve Bannon. Now Trumps chief strategist, it was obvious watching him up close on Friday just how much he is the real power behind the Presidents golden throne. Bannon is said to have drafted most of the executive orders of the past week. But the shock news in the States yesterday was his elevation to the National Security Council. Bannons new permanent role on the NSC was announced at the same time as Trump decided to relegate the highest-ranking military and intelligence chiefs to a mere invite-only status. Demoting the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff is truly extraordinary and the #StopPresidentBannon hashtag last night was a joke with a real bite. Senator John McCain, who told me in Philadelphia on Thursday how impressed he was with Theresa May, has been swift to denounce the NSC changes. Advertisement McCain is rapidly becoming the real opposition to Trump until the Democrats regroup (though note that Elizabeth Warren, a possible outside pick for 2020, was on the barricades yesterday). Trump took to Twitter to denounce both McCain and fellow Republican Lindsey Graham for their criticism of his travel ban. They are sadly weak on immigration, the President said. And never forget that in Middle America they're watching Fox News's favourable reports on the ban - featuring Muslims who support it. Less comfortable for Trump are rumours that his chief of staff, Reince Priebus, is exasperated by the Bannon-led ham-fistedness of the top team. And Senator Bob Corker, chairman of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, has urged the White House to immediately revise the travel ban, because it was poorly implemented and confusing. Corker met the PM in the US on her trip, and along with Paul Ryan is a key part of Mays twin-track influence strategy: working on Congress as much as White House figures like Jared Kushner. Over here, the big demo outside No.10 tonight will feature Ed Miliband, Lily Allen, and others. Will Jeremy Corbyn turn up? As for Trumps State Visit, Downing St is determined it will go ahead. But the Government has no control over whether Westminster Hall will be used for a joint address to both Houses of Parliament: thats upto Parliament itself. Which is why Sarah Wollastons move to ban the President from such an honour is more potentially damaging than the online petition calling for the whole visit to be cancelled. Those of us on the May trip certainly werent short of stories. Read here details of the Trump-hand-holding (and how he asked a waiter to keep his menu card of their lunch together). Read here my in-depth report on the US-leg of her tour, plus my sketch of THAT joint press conference. 2) MISSION IMPOSSIBLE While some of us were travelling with the PM, back home Jeremy Corbyn's party management problems over the Article 50 bill sparked into life. The resignation of his Shadow Welsh Secretary, the well-liked Jo Stevens, was a blow and could be the first of several by pro-Remain MPs who just cant stomach the idea of backing the Governments Brexit plan. I will vote for my city, my country and my party - and vote against the governments bill, Stevens said this weekend. Advertisement On Peston on Sunday, the Labour leader himself made clear that a three-line whip would be imposed. Its obviously impossible to carry on being in the shadow cabinet if you actually vote against a decision made after a very frank and very long discussion of the shadow cabinet earlier this week, he said. In his very Jezza-like way, that wasnt a threat that he would fire such ministers, but the implications were clear. Nevertheless, Tom Watson suggested Brexit rebels could be recalled top posts within a month. Its a big call now for Shadow Business Secretary Clive Lewis and Shadow Environment Secretary Rachael Maskell, who could both quit in coming days. Many Labour MPs admit privately that a three-line whip is the only option to avoid Labour leave voters in key constituencies being targeted by the Tories and UKIP. Corbyn supporters point out that Stevens, like Tulip Siddiq (who also quit the frontbench), will see their constituencies abolished by 2020 - just like Jamie Reed and Tristram Hunt. With the electoral trapdoor ready to open for them, its no wonder those with little to lose are perhaps the most outspoken/decisive. Lets see if others join them. As for the White Paper, the Sunday Telegraph reported Tory MPs threatening to rebel unless one is published in the next fortnight. Ive said before that No.10 has played the White Paper game to its advantage, holding off and then delivering concessions that are in fact mere crumbs of comfort for its critics. Publishing the White Paper, even though it will merely summarise the PMs speech, in coming days, could be another one. Will MPs be bought off so cheaply? 3) EMMANUEL TOO Theres been a lot of blather in recent months that centrist politics are dead, that the new populism of the hard Right and radical Left gets the downside of globalisation in a way that Third Way Blairites and Cameroons simply failed to. Justin Trudeaus rise is one counterpoint that, of course. But could France also be set to get its own moderate champion? Advertisement Emmanuel Macron, former economy minister in the socialist government, has been the dark horse for some time in the Presidential election. The 39-year old charismatic contender, running under his new En Marche! party, is now the man to watch. Macrons tilt at the Elysee was hugely boosted after Benoit Hamon last night trounced former PM Manuel Valls in the socialist primary. Hamon, dubbed Frances Jeremy Corbyn, has views (he wants a universal basic income, a tax on robots) that have deeply split socialist voters. A Kantar-Sofres-One Point poll yesterday put Macron on 21%, just one point behind conservative candidate Francois Fillon, whose ratings have plunged over allegations he paid his British wife for fake job. Marine Le Pen is on 25%, so its very much game on. And in recent days, Macron has been highly critical of Theresa Mays Trump love-in. He said on Friday that the UK was becoming a vassal state, meaning it is becoming the junior partner of the United States. And he said France and the EU had to be stronger to counter the USs retreat from free trade and global leadership. The unpredictable choices, the outbursts and the inward-looking United States of Trump no longer guarantees Europes security. BECAUSE YOUVE READ THIS FAR Everyone needs a bit of cheering up. So watch this wonderful video of a 4-yr-old and her dad singing Youve Got a Friend In Me. 4) THE OTHER JEREMY Sir Jeremy Heywood has been the Cabinet Secretary for five years and has played a key role in trying to ensure Theresa May and her new team understand the big, big difference between being Home Secretary and being Prime Minister. He rarely gives interviews, but today has one with Civil Service World, which is effectively Whitehalls in-house magazine. Advertisement He is pretty cool on the suggestion of extra cash to deal with the dual challenge of delivering Brexit and the Tory 2015 manifesto. Yet he stresses that the workload will not slim down, because the PM is very keen to deliver on Camerons election promises, and defends the decision to create the Brexit department and the new Department for International Trade. Heywood reveals that hes 80-90% of the way there in recruiting the extra senior civil servants needed for Brexit. But just two-thirds of the way through recruiting the 2,000 extra roles overall. But what struck me most were his lines on May: The prime minister has a very distinct way of working he says. She has regular collective discussions with ministers, and spends quite a lot of time on the four Cabinet committees on national security, trade, industrial strategy, and social reform. We have genuinely good discussions which really shape thinking and policy. So thats probably the most distinctive difference, he says. Any Cameroon reading that may wince. Also, May herself has a very big work appetite, preferring detailed papers that present all the options. Ah how silkily Sir Humphrey moves from one PM to another. Not a chillaxed Angry Bird in sight 5) YOURE FAKE NEWS Donald Trump famously used US Buzzfeeds release of unverified claims against him as proof that Fake News now comes from the media, not the wild fringes. Today MPs are to call on Google and Facebook to create tools to help readers and viewers identify counterfeit stories. The Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee has launched an inquiry after the number of untrue claims soared online. But with Facebook effectively the main distribution network for the media these days, the big challenge now is for Zuckerberg and co to work out just how much damage they want to do to their own brand. Fakebook is not a nice new moniker for a business that wants to attract ad dollars. Advertisement The CMS Committee says: Just as major tech companies have accepted they have a social responsibility to combat piracy online and the illegal sharing of content, they also need to help address the spreading of fake news on social media platforms. Consumers should also be given new tools to help them assess the origin and likely veracity of news stories they read online. At the moment, the only real tool is to read a media organisation you trust. SUNDAY SHOW ROUND-UP Speaking of whichheres our catch-up service for those of you who prefer a lie-in - or just a life - on Sunday mornings. All the political programmes best bits in one quick read, complete with clips, are in our summary HERE. Finally - many thanks to Owen Bennett and Ned Simons for supplying your WaughZone late last week. If youre reading this on the web, sign-up HERE to get the WaughZone delivered to your inbox. A few months ago, Railway Children was invited by the producers behind the Hollywood film Lion to be its charity partner for the #LionHeart Campaign. The campaign's aim is to raise awareness and funds for non-profit organisations in India helping children like Saroo, the star of the film, who live in poverty on the streets away from their families. Not surprisingly, we were thrilled to be asked to join up with such a high profile film and star studded cast that included Dev Patel and Nicole Kidman, who has already donated $10,000 to the cause. Producers and distributors of Lion have also pledged to match funds raised. Railway Children is a grassroots organisation that has been working to deliver positive change for over 20 years and the support from this campaign has been a welcome boost to our fight for vulnerable children who live alone at risk, suffering abuse and exploitation on the streets of India. Advertisement The film tells the true story of five-year-old Saroo Brierley, who gets lost on a train which takes him thousands of miles across India, away from his home and family. Saroo's story is not unique - there are over 11 million children living on the streets of India, with more than 80,000 going missing each year. There's a seamless connection between the story of Saroo and the reality of what we do every day at Railway Children, making the campaign a valuable opportunity to raise awareness and offer everyone who goes to see the film a tangible response to the problems they see on screen. In India, we provide food, shelter, safety and support. We work at major railway stations where our outreach workers find vulnerable children before an abuser can. We try to reunite children with their families and if that's not possible, we find them a long-term solution like placement in care homes. Above all, Railway Children makes sure things change so children never have to go back to the streets. A spokesperson for Lion recently said they were extremely proud to have brought Saroo's story to life for audiences around the world, but they didn't want the journey to end there, hoping that the power of this film would help bring about real impact in the lives of those Indian children who, like young Saroo, need assistance. Advertisement And that is the real world challenge we so often face as a charity. The spontaneous public support for the #LionHeart campaign has exceeded expectations. But after Lion has its final showing and Hollywood has moved onto its next big film, our task will be to translate this wonderful, albeit short-term, 'splash' into a key catalyst for positive, long-term change. Which is why it matters so much each time a cinemagoer is galvanized into action after seeing a film like Lion, as it brings us a little closer to the 250,000 street children we hope to reach in India over the next 10 years. The real world is not prone to Hollywood endings, but this would without doubt be a giant step in the right direction. Leon Neal via Getty Images This blog is an unedited transcript of a speech delivered by Clive Lewis at a demonstration against Donald Trump in Westminster, Monday 30 January Seeing you all here today makes me so proud to be a citizen of the world and makes me proud to be British. Advertisement That's because when we listen to the better angels of our nature we are an outward-looking, tolerant and inclusive country that I am proud to call home. Proud that everyone here today and millions more around our country reject the narrow, inward-looking destructive nationalism that Trump and Nuttall and Le Pen represent. Proud of a country that was one of the original signatories to the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. A declaration born out of the toxic ashes of xenophobia and intolerance. Let us remind ourselves and wrap ourselves in the words of Article One of that declaration: "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood and sisterhood." Advertisement Nowhere in there does it say Muslims are to be excluded. Nowhere in there does it say that torture is acceptable under any circumstances. Nowhere does it say Donald Trump has the right to undermine our human rights. Because an attack on one, be they Muslim, Mexican or gay, is an attack on all of us. So, Theresa May, listen up! We the British people are telling you stop with the appeasement. Stop indulging a racist, torture-supporting, woman-hating, crypto fascist. Stop him from coming to this country until he lifts the ban on Muslims. That's because the EU referendum result did not give you a mandate to sell out on our British values. Did not give you permission to sell our NHS to Donald Trump and his corporate cronies. Did not give you permission to rip us away from our brothers and sisters in Europe and into the arms of Trump's America. My final plea is this. It's a plea to all the decent people of Stoke. Its clear the Tories have pulled back in Stoke to give Paul Nuttall of Ukip a clear run at Labour. In Richmond, progressive voters kicked out Zac Goldsmith - a man who conducted an outrageous racist mayoral campaign. They collectively kicked him out. Advertisement Now I urge the progressive voters of Stoke to support the Labour candidate and stop the politics of Trump from coming to Westminster. My 95-year-old grandma had a saying: 'Cup of tea and a biscuit; finished.' It was ironic, really, given that for nine decades, Susi Linton only ever drank black coffee, but we all knew what she meant: get it over and done with and get out of there. She applied it to coffee mornings and catch-ups she could do without but, in honesty, it was a sign of impatience and shattered nerves - the daily reminder of her refugee roots. Advertisement My grandmother fled Nazi Germany, for Britain, in 1939; an 18-year-old, penniless, parentless, alone. The decision, by the British government, to take in young foreign females on domestic help permits in the months before war broke out was the difference between her living and dying. It was the difference between the rich tapestry that she sewed over the next 80 years of her life - having children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and getting in and out of functions as quickly as she could - and a perilous end that met six million others. It was precisely this time last year, as I held her warm, crinkled hand in her hospital bed, that I first wrote this piece. With the refugee crisis enveloping the global news, I found myself soaking in her own remarkable life story, mapped across her face, for a final time. The decision by Donald Trump - signed, by some sad irony, on Holocaust Memorial Day - to ban immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries makes now the right time to publish it; a story of humanity in times of despair to counter the deplorable lack of it spilling from the ink of the president's executive order. Imagine if my grandma - then Susi Braun, a young jewess from Berlin, Germany - had not been given that lifeline. Advertisement As she sat in her hospital bed, taking sips of water and nibbling on a favourite homemade butter biscuit which reminded her of her mother's baking, I reflected on the way she viewed Britain for taking her in. 'Britain saved my life,' she would proudly tell anyone who asked. My grandmother, like the thousands fleeing war today, had her most basic human rights stripped from her and witnessed men she knew killed in the street. She wasn't permitted to study and her father, a respected civil servant, was no longer allowed to work. Their small family of three was confined to a flat above an old age home to long for the continental life they loved and to watch as the neighbourhood where she enjoyed a happy, carefree childhood was razed to the ground outside. When her papers arrived from the Home Office, in London, she took one of the last trains out of Germany. Her parents said they would follow but they, along with her boyfriend (the man she thought she would marry), all perished in the Holocaust - their fate unconfirmed until war ended - while she went from door to door at night begging for money to guarantee their safety. That image never escapes me. She took a job as a nursery nurse and married here - Ken, a survivor of the Dachau concentration camp who went on to fight in the British Army - and they had one son, my dad, John. When my dad married my mum, my grandma finally got back what she had left behind: family. Ken had already passed away, from cancer. Advertisement For Susi Linton, the biggest joys of her magnificently long life were found in roots; a sense of belonging and family are the things that fired her spirit, even in her very last hours, because she knew better than most how quickly they could be snatched away. My brother and I giggle with fondness at the things she took pride in: being mentioned in a community newsletter or sent a Christmas card by the bank (she was Jewish, she didn't even celebrate it!) Or when people asked after her at luncheon groups or strangers made a fuss over her. And her two little great grandsons - nothing in life illuminated her eyes like them. In the same way that her parents could never have imagined the upheaval and fear that awaited their daughter, she could never have imagined, as she left Berlin, that these were milestones she would live to see. The hope that she was extended by strangers - by another country - in 1939 is the hope on which she lived her whole life. It is the hope which allowed her to see through the horror of war and loss that remained in her mind's eye for all those years. The hope that those being taken out of immigration queues in the USA will now be denied. As my grandma and I recounted memories together in her hospital bed, I cannot forget her taking a bite of the buttery biscuit of her childhood and asking me: 'Why do people have to suffer before they die?' She passed away a day later. It only takes a short walk around Glasgow to see that homelessness is a serious issue in the city. While a 38 Degrees online petition to open the doors of empty buildings to homeless people is a good start, it is a drop in the ocean compared to what is really needed. Estimating the scale of the problem is difficult: while government statistics suggest that around 400 slept rough in 2014, Glasgow Homeless Network puts it closer to 800. Regardless, the problem is undeniably becoming harder to ignore. The number of rough sleepers in Scotland has no doubt come down since its twenty-year peak in 2010, but demand for emergency accommodation is still high, and emergency accommodation charities such as Glasgow City Mission are increasingly being forced to turn people away due to being filled to capacity. The initiative to turn abandoned buildings into homeless shelters has gained traction recently in Glasgow, which at the time of writing has 22,224 signatures. Part of the support is undoubtedly a consequence of the homeless man in Birmingham who froze to death at the beginning of December. This and the campaign's success in Manchester, another UK city with a large homeless population; and the bitterly cold temperatures we have experienced. Advertisement Superficially, the idea of opening up empty buildings for homeless people is excellent and could be a good preventative measure against something similar happening in Glasgow. The reality, inevitably, is far more complex - getting people indoors is not a solution nor an appropriate preventative method to homelessness. The first issue if this were to go ahead and Glasgow City Council opened doors to the homeless is that they would have to be continually held to account over their performance; it would be imperative that they did not then step back and claim victory while not offering continuous care. According to a report by the Glasgow Homelessness Association, 40% people living on the streets need support with their mental health, while 28% needed help with alcohol and just over a quarter required help with drug abuse. Opening the doors is just one side of a multitude of issues regarding the problem of homelessness. If they were to go ahead with the campaign's plans then it could not stop there; food and drink would have to be supplied, staff would have to be hired, both in administrative and support roles, buildings would have to meet health and safety standards, free sanitary products would have to be distributed, health checks given, work done to help find people a permanent place to stay and a job, the list goes on. It's not so much a question of simply opening up empty buildings, it's a question of giving more funding and support to homeless charities and pressuring the government to introduce new initiatives and measures that really change people's situations. More hostels, more care workers, more compassion and less people worrying where they can stay night to night. Ultimately, it's morally repugnant that buildings should be sitting empty while people freeze on the streets. The campaign should not only call for empty buildings to be opened up but to be converted into homeless shelters, with a staff and a long-term support base. Advertisement Post-truth politics are in full effect at the Department for Education. In response to the growing clamour surrounding the biggest cuts to school funding in a generation, Ministers keep trotting out the same line; that they are spending more on education than ever before. In response to the growing backlash against the proposed new funding formula, they continuously repeat that there must be winners and losers if historical unfairness in funding is to be remedied. This is a way of manipulating the debate over school funding that fits in with the government's wider post-truth narrative that we don't have any money left and that in these financially difficult times, they are the moral arbiters of fairness. They seek to frame the debate by appealing to the financial insecurity being felt amongst the wider population and by constantly restating facts which are irrelevant to the argument. Advertisement Perhaps their most blatant alternative truth is their denial that there is any problem with school funding at all. Don't they know that us parents are using the schools and can see what is happening with our own eyes? Don't they know that we leave our children in the care of head teachers each day because we trust them and so, when they speak, we listen? The quality of the government's reasoning in the school funding debate is so poor that I would expect my 10 year old daughter to fail her forthcoming SATs exams should she display such an inability to engage with the arguments before her. Of course they are spending more than ever before, the costs are the highest they've ever been, as are the pupil numbers. But the relevant fact is per pupil funding, which is in decline - a point that even Jonathan Slater, Permanent Secretary at the DFE conceded when grilled by the Public Accounts Committee last week. It also isn't a necessary truth that there must be winners and losers in the funding of our schools. That is what the government would like us to believe, but it is a situation being created by an administration that simply has no desire to invest in our children's education. All schools can and should be funded adequately for their particular circumstances and those who lobbied for a new formula (which we support) did so not on the basis that other schools were overfunded, but that theirs were underfunded. They sought to increase their funding, not decrease the funding of others. Advertisement At a time when there is chronic underfunding across the board, it serves this administration very well to set school communities against each other over the scraps. The new funding formula will solve nothing, when schools across England are facing cuts amounting to 3bn pounds by 2020. The Fair Funding For All Schools campaign was co-founded by a coalition of parents from West Sussex, Wokingham and London. We are bringing together parents from the best funded areas and the worst funded areas to defeat the government's alternative truths on education spending. Almost 300 parents attended our launch event in our local primary school hall last month and there was an upbeat feeling in the room as we realised the power we had as an organised and collective group of parents who refuse to take this lying down and are getting mobilised to do something about it. We have been inundated with messages of support from parents, teachers and governors from across the country. All of whom had something to say about how cuts were hampering their schools and all of them voiced enthusiasm at the prospect of a parent-led campaign fighting back. Our campaign intention is simple: to defeat, delay or disrupt the cuts to our schools. At a minimum we want to see the government ensure that no school in the country loses funding as a direct result of the new National Funding Formula. London Councils say it would cost 335m a year to achieve. That is less than 1 per cent of the annual schools budget. It is also less than the amount of money that has just been handed back to the Treasury following the Academisation u-turn. Advertisement But we also want to see investment in our schools. We want per-pupil funding to be protected in real-terms over the life of this parliament. We want funding that allows schools to deal with the additional costs placed on them, without losing staff, without increasing class sizes, without cutting subjects and activities, without reducing support services and without calling on parents to fund core budgets. We are one of the richest countries in the world, we can and must invest in a decent education for all our children and invest in our future. All parents want the same thing; fair funding for their schools. That will not be achieved simply by reallocating money from a pot that simply isn't big enough. As any parent knows, if the pie on your table isn't big enough to feed your family, you'll still go hungry whichever way you slice it up. Whatever plans you have for tonight, I suggest you cancel them and instead go to see Denial at the cinema. It tells the story of how one of the leading Holocaust-deniers, David Irving, was exposed as deliberately falsifying history. The film is doubly timely: first, because its release coincides with Holocaust Memorial Day. The lessons of 'Never Again' should be totally obvious by now, yet, as the post-Brexit bigotry against minorities showed, discrimination and prejudice still thrive, even in our own backyard. Advertisement Second, because of the new "post-truth era", in which facts are ignored and instead the reality one would prefer to have is substituted without any objective basis. There have always been those on the extreme right-wing fringes who denied that the Holocaust happened, but the differences with Irving was that he was an established historian, who had a long record of writing about the Second World War. His views were published widely, claiming that Hitler never planned to kill the Jews, no Jews died in the gas chambers, places such as Auschwitz were not death camps, and that the story of the six million was made up. This was despite the fact that the Holocaust is one of the best documented genocides in the world - with evidence not just from the victims who survived, not just from local people around at the time, but also from the perpetrators themselves. Advertisement Even in high profile trials, mass murderers such as Adolf Eichmann, never denied the facts, just tried to avoid responsibility and that they were "following orders", a minor cog in the killing machine. Yet Irving still insisted it didn't happen and he became the acceptable face of revisionist history. There was a serious danger that while he may not persuade everyone, he would make Holocaust denial a respectable option. In a book on the Holocaust, the American Jewish academic, Deborah Lipstadt, mentioned in passing that Irving was a Holocaust denier who falsified history. It was just one sentence in a very long book, but Irving picked it up and decided to sue Lipstadt, and the film Denial is the account of the courtroom drama of what happened in 2000. Some people tried to persuade Lipstadt to settle out of court, lest the publicity that Irving received helped promote his views and gained him more supporters. It begs the question: do you oppose obnoxious people best by ignoring them and denying them the "oxygen of publicity"...or is that too docile and it is far better to expose lies lest they take hold? Advertisement Lipstadt decided that standing-by was not an option when not only were six million deaths being dismissed, but Irving's assertions were so flimsy. As one expert witness put it: "If David Irving were to say good morning to me, I'd look out of the window to see if the sun was shining or not". At the end of the case, the judge exonerated Lipstadt from the charge of libel, and declared that: Irving "distorts the evidence", that his arguments were based on the "misrepresentation, misconstruction and omission of the documentary evidence", "that he "perverted" the meaning of documents, and that his conclusions were "wholly untenable". It was a landmark judgement - objective proof in the British High Court - that Holocaust denial is not a valid opinion, but a falsification of truth. The problem is that while it is easy to disregard Irving as a buffoon, when Donald Trump can be President of the United States, can make outrageous claims that most others know are untrue, can issue offensive statements about minorities and yet still get a large popular vote, it means we can never relax, whether defending the memory of the Holocaust or standing up for civilised values. The International Court of Justice (ICJ), the primary judicial branch of the United Nations seated in The Hague, the Netherlands, will start hearings in March 2017 on Ukraine's claim against Russia pertaining to the alleged breach of two conventions, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin said. "In March, the UN World Court will start hearing the claim we have filed against Russia because of its systematic violations of the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination," he said on the Inter channel on Sunday evening. Ukraine filed the claim with the International Court of Justice on June 16 in order to hold Russia liable for violation of the two conventions. Shutterstock One week ago today, the Be Real Campaign for body confidence, founded by YMCA and Dove, launched its Somebody Like Me research looking into body image anxiety among young people. As you would expect, the main focus in the media was on the headline figures and eye-catching statistics such as the fact that 52% of 11 to 16 year olds told us they "regularly worried about how they look". However, as it is often said, behind every statistic is a real person and, within our extensive fieldwork for Somebody Like Me, we spoke to young people across the country in detail about their body image anxieties. These individual conversations reveal the heart-breaking extent to which body image anxiety affects young people. Their words were candid, brutally honest and, at times, quite upsetting to hear. Advertisement I wanted to share with you some of the words of the young people who took part. They spoke about the pressures from society, school, celebrities, the media and their families. Alongside dealing with the challenges of just growing up, one area which was mentioned frequently was the sheer relentless of the body image pressures they faced: "It is everywhere. It's something that I think about every day, all the time, what I'm looking like, you know, how I'm dressing and how other people perceive me," - Isabelle "I think with the added pressure of school work and trying to get good grades and everything. It's just like another thing and probably effects people more at our age because it's an added stress on top of everything else." - Clara These thoughts were echoed throughout our discussions and young people also spoke about the need to not just present themselves in real life as 'perfect' but for their social media and online self to be seen this way, too. The lengths that young people would go to were highlighted by Josh who said: "I Photoshop every one of my profile pictures, I kid you not. I get rid of my spots, I get rid of my double chin. It genuinely takes me 25 minutes to make a profile picture." Advertisement However, looking perfect online is not enough without recognition from peers. Young people spoke of the need to have 'likes' on their photos and the pressures of not receiving enough. "If you don't get so many 'likes', you'll take them off. Like I do that all the time. If I don't get 30 'likes' I'll take it off straight away," - Paris And the necessity to look popular has even stretched as far as young people actually buying 'likes': "I buy likes; I buy 100 likes so I don't feel bad about myself," - David Where the pressure to look perfect comes from is diverse a theme which I have covered previously and that again came up during the discussions was around the relationship between 'banter', bullying and body confidence. "No matter if it is a joke, you are still knocking someone down in some way. That does have a knock on effect on them, even if they don't mean it to and they know it's a joke. Subconsciously it can just eat away at your brain. You think they wouldn't have said if it wasn't true," - Nathan Advertisement While presenting the challenging image reality they have to traverse, young people were confident in what solutions they felt were necessary: "You need to teach people that they are okay. You need to teach people that perfection isn't real. Instead of teaching kids that you should be this thin, you should eat like this, and if you are not like this you will be unhappy," - Charlotte. The team who put this research together were in many cases surprised by the impact that body image anxiety was having on young people. Many of us who left school even just 10 years ago were amazed at how different and intrusive the pressures were that young people were under in school and adamant that action was so desperately needed. Getty Last Tuesday, as expected, the Supreme Court upheld the High Court's November ruling on the triggering of Article 50 - confirming that only Parliament, not Ministers using the Royal Prerogative, can initiate the start of the UK's exit from the EU. The Government had no other option than to comply with the ruling. Last Thursday, it duly published the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill, the passage of which will give the Prime Minister discretion to send the Article 50 notification. Advertisement Before specific amendments to the Bill can be debated and voted upon during the Bill's Committee Stage, MPs face a vote on Wednesday on the principle of the Bill, namely whether Parliament gives its consent for the Government to start the formal EU exit process. For MPs like me, who campaigned hard for a 'Remain' vote last year, who still believe that continued membership of the EU would be in Britain's national interest, and who are frustrated and saddened by the outcome of the referendum, the vote on Wednesday presents an agonising choice. Since late June last year, I've been receiving a steady stream of emails from constituents about the triggering of Article 50. The majority have been from remain voters, but a significant minority have been from those who voted leave. Leave voters urge me to respect the overall referendum result and to commit to vote for Article 50 unconditionally; remain voters to treat the overall referendum result as a glorified national opinion poll, but to treat the local breakdown of that result as an instruction that must be followed. In an age of online democracy, a growing number of constituents expect their views not only to be respected and listened to but also acted upon. I acknowledge that. And yet, as unfashionable as it may be, MPs are still representatives, not delegates. It is our duty to exercise our judgement on behalf of our constituents and, on that basis, to vote for what we believe to be the right decision in any given situation - even when that decision risks condemnation or being at odds with significant numbers of those we represent. Advertisement We are also accountable and must be prepared to set out the reasoning behind any decision we take. As a Labour MP representing a constituency that voted two-to-one to remain, I feel a particular responsibility to set out in detail why I think voting to block the triggering of Article 50 is mistaken, and why I therefore do not intend to vote against the principle of the Bill on Wednesday. As I have made clear repeatedly and consistently since 23 June last year - before I agreed to become a Shadow Brexit Minister and long before the Labour whip on Wednesday's vote had been decided - I accept the referendum result and believe that it created a democratic imperative for the UK to leave the EU. Parliament passed The European Union Referendum Act by a staggering 544-53 votes. The referendum authorised by that vote was the largest exercise of direct democracy in our country's history. More than 33 million votes were cast. It was a lengthy, wide-ranging campaign that culminated in high public turnout and a close but clear outcome. Many have argued that the referendum was not legally binding. That may well be the case, but the arguments are not just legal - they are deeply political, and the notion that the referendum was merely a consultation carried out to inform Parliament sadly holds no water. Voters were told that the result would be honoured and the vast majority expect it to be so. As an activist, I campaigned tirelessly for a 'remain' vote in my constituency, not because I was seeking advice from my electorate as to whether it was a good idea for the UK to remain in the EU or not, but because I knew full well that the result, whichever way it went, would be implemented. Advertisement I did not want the UK to leave the EU and I still lament the outcome of the referendum. But as a democrat, I cannot see how I can reconcile my belief that the result must be accepted, with a vote against the Bill on Wednesday that would seek to frustrate the process of putting it into effect. The Supreme Court was right to make clear that Parliament should exert democratic control over the Brexit process, but it would be a mistake to view their ruling as an opportunity for 650 men and women to re-run the referendum. In any case, parliamentary arithmetic means that the Bill will pass its Second Reading by a large majority. That would be the case even if every MP were mandated to vote as their constituencies did in the referendum. But even if the parliamentary arithmetic was such that defeating the Bill was a realistic possibility, I am not convinced it would be the right course of action. To seek to nullify the referendum result by parliamentary means risks, in my view, creating further social division, fuelling the rise of the far-right, adding to the alienation already felt by a significant section of the electorate and perhaps even sparking civil unrest in some parts of the country. As such, I respectfully disagree with those who maintain that, whatever the potential negative social and political implications, MPs should seek to overturn the result. It is also worth considering what would happen if the Bill were voted down on Wednesday. Far from securing our place in the EU or chastening the hardline Brexiteers, it would almost certainly trigger a snap general election fought solely on the issue of Brexit that in all likelihood would return a Conservative Government with an increased majority to enact any form of departure they wish - an outcome I think the present Commons makeup gives us a reasonable chance of avoiding. Determining not to vote against the triggering of Article 50 out of hand does not mean I am reconciled to giving the Government a blank cheque. My immediate focus as a member of the Shadow Brexit team is on amending the Bill in order to significantly increase Parliament's grip on the Brexit process. Advertisement The series of amendments to the Bill that we have tabled seek to ensure that: 1. There is a meaningful vote in Parliament on the final exit settlement - to be held before the Government refers the deal to the European Council and Parliament. 2. A number of key principles are established that the Government must seek to negotiate during the process, including securing barrier-free access to the single market and protecting workers' rights. 3. The legal status of EU citizens in the UK is resolved before negotiations begin. 4. There is robust and regular Parliamentary scrutiny throughout the Brexit negotiations by requiring the Secretary of State to report to Parliament at least every two months on the progress being made in negotiations. 5. That the Government be required to consult regularly with the devolved administrations in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland throughout Brexit negotiations. 6. That the Government be required to publish impact assessments conducted since the referendum with regard to any new proposed trading relationship with the EU. Advertisement I know that a significant number of constituents, while supporting efforts to amend the Bill, nevertheless believe I should vote against the principle of it on Wednesday in order to register a symbolic objection to the very fact that Brexit is happening. While I understand the strength of feeling that underpins such calls, it is my firm belief that it would ultimately undermine efforts to secure those amendments and I therefore fail to see how it would ultimately benefit my constituents. The real battle we now face is over the form that Brexit will take and against a vision of a post-Brexit Britain devised by the hard right of the Tory party. That is where the focus and energy of internationalists and pro-Europeans must now be. The referendum result created a democratic imperative for the UK to leave the EU but it signified no mandate for the terms upon which we exit. Theresa May's Lancaster House speech was written up as a clarion call for the hardest of EU departures, and I share the concerns of colleagues that there are fundamental flaws, inconsistencies and gaps in the approach that the Government have set out to date. But the eventual deal will not be decided unilaterally by the Prime Minister on the basis of her 12 objectives. May's approach will be tempered by the reality of the lengthy and difficult negotiations to come and there will inevitably be compromises along the way. Of course Parliament must have the opportunity to shape the final deal, but the argument that the referendum result should be ignored because an acceptable outcome cannot be guaranteed is an argument for having voted against The European Union Referendum Act, not for ignoring the result of a democratic exercise that Parliament sanctioned by an overwhelming majority. Rather than seeking to obstruct the EU exit process in its entirety, it is the job of the Opposition to robustly scrutinise and challenge the Government throughout the negotiation process. That means fighting for the maintenance of barrier-free access to the single market, for all the rights - workers, environmental and human - we currently enjoy, for a close and collaborative relationship with our European partners, and against the misguided prospect of turning Britain into a deregulated offshore tax haven. That is what I'll be fighting for over the coming weeks and months. Throughout, the interests of the 32,806 who voted remain in Greenwich and Woolwich as well as the 15,809 who voted leave will be in the forefront of my mind. Advertisement Matthew Pennycook is the Labour MP for Greenwich and Woolwich This year we are celebrating 10 years since Apple released its revolutionary new phone - the iPhone. Combining "an iPod, a phone and an internet communicator", Steve Jobs promised to turn the mobile world on its head, and 10 years later, it's fair to say that promise has come true. Although not the first smartphone, Apple changed people's perceptions of what a mobile could be used for, and is largely responsible for the dependency culture that has since developed. With over six iPhones being sold across the world every second, the easy-to-use interface and connected Apple products have turned it into a cult product- once you've switched to an iPhone, there is no going back. But was this phone always on track to be the must have smart phone? Some felt that Apple's latest release would barely make a dent on the mobile market, with Bloomberg arguing that it would only appeal to the "gadget freaks" and stating that Nokia had nothing to worry about. Others felt that the 'one phone fits all' concept was ridiculous, with Marketwatch boldly stating that Apple would need to roll out numerous variations or risk the iPhone immediately becoming passe. Leaders in the mobile world, unsurprisingly, also wrote off the launch of this new phone, with Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer, declaring there was 'no chance' the iPhone would get a significant share of the market. Yet, even back in 2007, there were the wide-eyed Apple fanatics who embraced the ground-breaking technology. New York Magazine questioned whether Steve Jobs had peaked with his creation and the SF Gate predicted that the "iPhone could mark a tipping point, encouraging the masses to look at their cell phone as more than a cell phone and prompting profound changes in everything from privacy to citizen journalism." Advertisement Since then, Apple has gone from strength to strength, but its position as number one has been challenged by the growth of the android operations system. Within a few short months, companies such as Microsoft and LG released their own version of the smartphone and the battle between Samsung and Apple took over the smartphone world. Despite recent setbacks with the Samsung Note explosion, the success of the Galaxy S7 is still prominent, with the May 2016 Kanter World Panel revealing that the Galaxy S7 accounted for 16 percent of smartphone sales worldwide. With the latest release from Apple witnessing a new shift in the realm of smartphones, the debate as to who is one top is stronger than ever. Some believe that despite the updates, Apple is still behind in terms of technological prowess, but you cannot ignore that Apple has won over the hearts and minds of its users and still can come out on top. Other innovations are vital for Apple if they're going to continue top in the face of high pressure from their rivals. Currently, the iPhone is responsible for two-thirds of Apple's revenue but this isn't sustainable due to global market saturation. So what is next for the smartphone? Back in 2008, when smartphones were still in their infancy, Nokia released a video of the Morph Concept, which explored the possibilities of nanotechnologies in communication devices, and while it might seem dated now, their predictions of a watch that can also act as a phone, wasn't too far off the mark. There has been a noticeable shift towards wearable technology and it wouldn't be a leap to suggest that this is also the case for the mobile world. People are increasingly looking for a compact device that can control everything and carry out the basic functions of a phone. Apple has once again shown it is ahead of the crowd through the launch of the Apple Watch, which as seen it placed as the number one smartwatch vendors, with a 40% market share. Advertisement Most people only know two things about George III. He lost us America and he went mad, although those with a degree in Advanced King George Studies might have heard that he wasn't actually mad, but suffering from a metabolic disorder called porphyria. A new BBC documentary, showcasing the Georgian Papers Programme, an academic partnership between Royal Archives and King's College London, made possible by personal permission of the Queen herself, challenges all this. I shall stick to psychiatry, and leave "how we lost America" to others, except to say that there may be some Americans currently wondering if King George wasn't such a bad leader after all. Advertisement Making retrospective psychiatric diagnoses of historical figures is fraught with difficulty. There usually aren't medical notes, and even if there are, the meaning of the words used have usually changed over time. The disorders themselves may also have changed - psychiatric disorders are not set in stone, but complex amalgams of biology, society and culture. If these change, so can the disorder itself. However, one advantage of being a monarch is that there is plenty of material to study, especially as now we can read the letters he wrote whilst ill and when well. Even then, caution is needed. The illness of a King was a delicate matter - one of his doctors resorted to hiding the unpalatable truth behind Latin even in his private diary, writing that "Rex noster insanit" - Our King is mad. The most likely diagnosis is that he was suffering episodes of mania, a severe version of what we now label "bipolar disorder". The over excitement, pressure of speech, sexual disinhibition, excessive disorganised activity, sleep problems and so on are characteristic. Contemporary students are taught to look out for grandiose delusions - such as believing one is, or is related to royalty, as another feature of mania. This doesn't work so well when the patient is a genuine King, but the records give plenty of other evidence of delusional thinking common in mania. But what about the porphyria? Everyone who has seen "The Madness of George III", with the King so brilliantly played on stage and screen by Nigel Hawthorne, will remember that the film concludes by informing the audience that the King wasn't mad at all, but had a rare metabolic disorder that only looked like madness. The script suggests that the pompous doctors, played as comic turns, overlooked this, and it was only his servants who noted that the King's urine returned to its normal colour as his mind returned - a classic sign of an episode of porphyria. Advertisement It was two psychiatrists, the mother and son team of Ida MacAlpine and Richard Hunter, who first proposed this diagnosis in 1968. True, there were symptoms that might have suggested porphyria, a genetic disorder which has been found in some members of the Royal Houses of Europe. But later critics highlighted serious mistakes and inconsistencies in the sources, and that mania was more likely. The question resurfaced ten years ago in the Lancet. Scientists analysed a lock of the King's hair, hoping this would prove that he had genetic evidence of porphyria, but this remained unresolved because they couldn't extract any DNA. So why did the theory of porphyria gain such traction over the years? MacAlpine and Hunter were disillusioned. They were fed up with psycho analysis, and instead believed that most mental disorders were caused by either known (such as porphyria) or as yet unknown organic physical conditions. Diagnosing an organic metabolic disorder in one of the most famous "madmen" in history would be a wake up call to modern psychiatry, and also remove the stigma or taint of mental illness from the Royal Family. Are there any lessons here for modern psychiatry? MacAlpine and Hunter's wish to remove the stigma associated with mental illness remains a noble cause. But instead of directly combating that stigma, their preferred method was to say that he wasn't really mad at all, but had an organic and hence legitimate disorder. They were probably mistaken in their preferred diagnosis, but that misses the point. It is wrong to go looking into the urine, even if Royal, solely to prove that this is a real disorder, as opposed to unreal mental illness. There is nothing wrong with devoting one's career, as many of my colleagues do, to using neuroscience to better understand bipolar disorder, and to develop better treatments. And I am pleased to say things have moved on since poor King George was over dosed with emetic tartar whose only result was that when a lock of his hair was analysed in 2005 it contained seriously toxic levels of arsenic, the chief constituent of the "medication". But we do not need good science to know that bipolar disorder is a real and serious illness, which, irrespective of the results of the research, cannot be abolished with the stroke of a pen as MacAlpine and Hunter tried. Now let's fast forward to King George's descendants to see how much times have changed. On Wednesday I hosted a private dinner at the Royal College of Psychiatrists attended by Prince Harry on how we can improve the mental health of our current serving and ex serving personnel. These things are off record, but I can say that his passion and commitment to making things better was extraordinary, and impressed even the old lags like me around the table. The Heads Together campaign which the younger Royals lead is directly challenging the old assumptions that there is a hierarchy of illness, in which physical illness is placed above mental illness. King George would have approved. Advertisement Professor Sir Simon Wessely, Regius Chair of Psychiatry, King's College London and President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists We live in a society where racial discrimination occurs routinely, but often subliminally. The discreet element of racism allows it to maintain its grip on society without people being able to fully appreciate its impact on the lives of many. Racism is not only demonstrated through hate crimes and openly racist remarks. However, it is possible to downplay the racism that takes place in other scenarios due to the laws that are supposed to safeguard people from discrimination. In the professional sphere, there appears, at face-value, to be sufficient legislation to successfully prevent any regular instances of racial discrimination. However, it is not enough to simply have anti-discrimination laws - it is also necessary to find a way to effectively implement them. Nicola Thorp has recently drawn attention to the barrier that many black women face due to the fact that their hair is considered to be unprofessional in its natural state. She has raised awareness of yet another unnecessary rule incorporated into society that allows other people to maintain a control over women's bodies. I indirectly encountered an example of this superficial sexism recently when my sister worked a shift at the Shangri-La Hotel in The Shard in London, and was asked to wear red lipstick. I was baffled by this, wondering how this silly requirement was necessary to make her look more professional. This sexist element to the professional sphere, however, should not undermine the racial undertone of the separate problem that Thorp addressed. There is a notable difference between appearing smart and professional for a job and having to go through a painful, lengthy and costly process so that black women will acquire 'white woman' hair. This not only serves as a barrier against black women, making it harder for them to find employment, but it additionally contributes to the idea of white women being more beautiful. It is such an immature concept that it is bewildering that this form of routine discrimination is actually still happening in British society, though beneath the surface. Advertisement This idea, that black women should be expected to imitate the natural hair of white women to be considered more professional-looking is bizarre and completely nonsensical. What is the logical reasoning behind this? Dress requirements make sense, unless of course women are expected to forcibly wear skirts and heels in a job that does not require them - a notable example of this would be stewardesses in numerous prestigious airlines. However, one might have great difficulty in trying to form a rational explanation for why black women apparently don't look professional unless they drastically alter their appearance. By making the effort to address her observations of a black woman being declined for a job on the grounds of her hair, Nicola Thorp highlighted the need for all women to stand up for each other when they indirectly come across oppression. This factor was brought up at the Women's March, the day after the US Presidential inauguration, in which women and some men came together to protest against the threat that Trump's new position poses against women's rights, as well as his casual and consistent demeaning of women. The biggest criticism of this march was that while white women were willing to come together for their own cause, as of yet a 'Black Lives Matter' march and a march supporting Muslim people's rights has yet to be planned on such a scale. One of the highlights of the live feed of the march in Washington, broadcast on Buzzfeed, was being able to hear black women speaking on behalf of multiple oppressed identities, and Muslim women who typically have a distinct lack of a platform to speak from. Advertisement Victoria Jones - PA Images via Getty Images This blog is an unedited transcript of a speech delivered by Baroness Chakrabarti at a demonstration against Donald Trump in Westminster, Monday 30 January Friends, My name is Shami Chakrabarti. I am a human rights lawyer and campaigner and I am Labour's Shadow Attorney General. Advertisement It is in sadness and solidarity that we come together this evening. Solidarity with so many innocent people from seven predominantly Muslim countries that the new US President has chosen to single out for discrimination, stigma and abuse. They include, amongst others Hameed Darwesh an Iraqi interpreter who served the US after the invasion of his homeland and is credited with helping to keep many US soldiers alive. After release by a Federal Court Judge on Saturday, Mr Darwesh remarked: "This is the soul of America. This is what pushed me to leave my country and come here." We also stand in solidarity with so many brave and humane Americans, including members of the ACLU. My friend Anthony Romero is it's director. This is what he said of the Trump Executive Order: "This effort is not just unconstitutional and unamerican and wrong-headed, we think it's also something that will go down in history as one of the worst moments for American Foreign policy." But I also hope we stand together for all the world's women who the President has insulted and all the desperate refugees that he would spurn. So let me leave you with the words of a great American woman, whose 1883 poem The New Colossus adorns that great symbol of the USA that is the Statue of Liberty: Advertisement Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame, With conquering limbs astride from land to land; Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles, From her beacon-hand Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command The air-bridged harbour that twin cities frame. "Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp! cries she With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp behind the golden door! For many American Muslims, emotions are haywire, the mood and morale are irregularly irregular because America under Trump is anybody's worst nightmare. "They'll probably freeze the accounts of Muslim organizations and go after individuals in positions of Muslim leadership". She did not sound paranoid, my Physician friend was reminding me of what happened after 9/11. Guantanamo remains an open wound from 9/11. We can't afford to be naive, our conversation further inferred. What are your plans? We'll have to weather this storm we both decided. "There is no going back to anywhere," said the single mother of three adult children. 'America is home' is not a cliche; this I read clearly from her face. "Many of us are already on surveillance" I shared in another conversation with another friend. There will no longer be a need to hide under the infamous "random selection" at airport security. I probably went through airport security 30 times in the past year and whenever I would return to the US, the CBP officer would have a characteristic look on his face as he looked at me and compared it with something he was reading on the screen in front of him Then some questions would follow. On my most recent return, I inquired about that look. The CBP officer who attended to me basically told me that as a Muslim, "...this was to be expected." We both laughed it off albeit very awkwardly. Advertisement "I don't think I want to send my child to the US {for school} anymore". A relative's son was counting the days until he comes to the US to be with his cousins and now after the elections, his father expresses deep uncertainty about the future of Muslims in America. He is holding off that decision. The prestigious academic institutions of the United States seem no longer appealing. "Did you notice that we {Muslim} went through the {Kubbler Ross} stages of grief", another friend had commented, referring to the community's shared "coming to reality" with the election results. We were seated at a gathering of Muslims in Southern California days after the election, trying to process together what is to come. First we were in denial about the results much like the rest of America then we angrily lashed out at those seemingly closeted bigots who voted for him. Then the articles went out in waves, "Not all Trump supporters are racists" perhaps we can renegotiate the why and how, this seemingly impending doom became reality. The next stage is depression, a stage we are slowly getting out of as more and more voices are telling us to use the democratic process to triumph against what democracy has brought upon us. We shall overcome! Or maybe not? When the President of the United States and his cabinet members can be so open in expressing their bigotry against Muslims, it leaves little to imagination for what the coming days could bring for over 3 million Muslims living in the United States. With the announcement of each cabinet member's agenda, we are somehow brought back to the stage of Denial; can Micheal Flyn really be the National Security advisor? He has called Islam "a political ideology masking as a religion", he has compared it to a "malignant cancer". And then there is Steve Bannon. Steve Bannon!!! And then there are suggestions to intern Muslims, in America, in 2017. Advertisement "I remain unapologetically Muslim American" she says, with palpable conviction, Brooklyn Accent in tow. Linda Sarsour, the American Muslim of the year speaks to an audience of hundreds of thousands at the Women's March in Washington and hundreds of millions more virtually, as the recordings of the matches were played all over the world. The next day, a vicious smear campaign threatens the integrity of her work, worse her person. #IMarchWithLinda rises successfully to her rescue. Dear President Trump and members of the United States Senate and House of Representatives, I strongly oppose the executive order banning refugees from war zones and immigrants and visitors from largely Muslim countries. As an American Jew, I want to share some of my family history. My grandfather Solomon had two brothers, Avram and David. They were Jews from a small village, Burshtyn or an even smaller nearby village that's name is lost, in Galicia, part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Records are confusing but we think he arrived in the United States in 1909. Avram, the oldest of the brothers, was already here. My grandmother Fanny joined Solomon in 1913, just before the outbreak of World War I. My father, Mandel, was born in the United States in 1920, the third of their four children. In 1921 the United States passed a quota law sharply restricting immigration from Eastern and Southern Europe. Technically the quota was by region, but a major purpose was to keep out Jews who many in Congress considered incapable of assimilation. The restrictions were tightened in 1924 further cutting off Jewish immigration to this country. Advertisement Unable to immigrate to the United States, David and his wife moved to Berlin in Germany where they had two sons, my father's first cousins, and eventually prospered in the garment trade. Toward the end of the 1930s, with Adolf Hitler and the Nazis in power in Germany, David and his wife decided they had to leave Germany. Unable to get permission to come to the United States because of the quota system and the refusal of this country to accept refugees, they eventually escaped to Palestine which was a British mandate. The family struggled in Palestine and decided that they had to make another attempt to join David's brothers in the United States. Somehow they made it to Marseilles, France where David could secure only one entry permit. They decided his wife and two children would return to Burshtyn, now part of Poland, and stay with David's father, my great-grandfather, until David could arrange for them to join him in the United States. In September 1941 Nazi Germany invaded Poland from the west and the Soviet Army invaded from the east. My father's aunt, cousins, and grandfather, along with the other Burshtyners, were trapped in the Soviet zone but remained safe. However in June 1941 Germany declared war on the Soviet Union and in August took control over Jewish regions in Galicia. At this point the family in the United States lost contact with family in Poland. The rest of the story is more general history. The Nazi occupiers ordered Polish Jews to relocate into ghettos and wear Star-of-David armbands. In December 1941 Germans confiscated fur coats from Jews. In March 1942 the Gestapo allies in the Ukrainian militia started rounding up Jews and shooting them. Thousands died. In October 1942 the Jews of Burshytn were driven into a ghetto in the larger town of Rohatyn, about ten miles north. We assume our family was part of that forced migration. In December 1942 all Jews in the local hospital, about two hundred, along with over a thousand other Jews were sent to the Belzec concentration camp where they died in the gas chamber. We do not know if family members were among this group. In June 1943 the last Jews left in Rohatyn were forced to dig their own graves and then shot to death. Advertisement In the United States, families knew their relatives were dead, but the extent of the European Holocaust was so great, and with a war going on, it was impossible to learn any details. After the war that region of Poland became part of the Ukraine and records were unavailable. American survivors placed an obelisk in honor of their dead in the Burshtyner Society plot in a cemetery in Queens, New York. When talking of the European Holocaust, American Jews swear to "Never Forget." The Trump administration has either forgotten or is choosing to ignore the consequences of United States actions during that period and is pursuing a similar immigration and refugee policy. This is inhumane and unacceptable. I pledge to do all in my power to help reverse this Trumpian human tragedy. Consequences for President Donald Trump's rhetoric differ substantively from those of Candidate Trump as such may affect his personal culpability over potential crimes under international law and now that he is Commander in Chief. Incitement may be enough to create criminal culpability. However, being in the chain of command, at the very top of it, President Trump assumes responsibility for not only setting the criteria for US military and operatives to act consistent with US and international law but also to prosecute those who in their official actions may violate, particularly if the crimes may take on the character of systematic violations. Trump has already confirmed his preference for torture after assuming the Presidency and he has expressed his intention to kill innocent family members of terror suspects while candidate. In order for any conviction to occur there would have to be a court identified willing to entertain investigation and prosecution as well as sufficient evidence of the alleged crime, unlawful killing or other "grave violations of international humanitarian law" being committed during President Trump's tenure. Would Any Court Entertain Potential Prosecution?Venues such as the International Criminal Court could appear remote, for now. However, national courts including US courts could also enforce criminal and/or civil provisions of such international law, particularly to degree such have been adopted as part of such country's laws, as they have been in large part in western democracies and even the US. Sovereign immunity may preclude prosecution specifically while in office. However, other avenues may be particularly suitable to this political leader, those that seek both civil and criminal liability in view of the fact that Donald Trump remains owner of a self-proclaimed global business empire. Judgments against such could be secured in national courts in random states but also the United States. The Presidency may not protect Donald Trump from claimants as it did not then-US Commander in Chief Bill Clinton when accused of sexual misdeeds. Finally, violations of international humanitarian law as adopted in US law may be the basis for impeachment proceedings particularly if these violate America's national interests. Advertisement The US is not currently party to the International Criminal Court, along with a rather curious club that includes Russia, China, Pakistan, India, Iran, Israel and Saudi Arabia. The ICC in its codes and practice has been most influenced and dominated by western democracies, particularly America's European allies. Some previous US Administrations though have worked to deflect potential jurisdiction in the case of US citizens, weakening America's efforts to instill the rule of law around the globe including when US interests are directly at stake. Some current African despots have now also sought to free themselves of potential investigation and prosecution, after they engaged in behavior potentially culpable under international law. By the actions of the UN Security Council, (where the US, Russia and China hold permanent veto wielding seats), potential indictment could be extended as well as delayed to states/nationals regardless of venue or citizenship. Even sovereign immunity may not be a bar as Sudan's sitting President was indicted by the ICC, (although there has been a more than conspicuous failure by Sudan or other neighboring states to detain the indicted.) Nonetheless, because UN Security Council measures may be needed, it is unimaginable that leaders in China or Russia or current US representatives would allow for ICC action to proceed on Trump, at least not as long Trump is in authority or a like minded and potentially similarly culpable Putin. (See: "Might Putin Face International Criminal Court by Annexing Crimea?") Still, while neither Trump or Putin appear likely to stand as defendants before the ICC, nonetheless the development of international criminal law is ever more relevant to national law and courts as encompassed by the Rome Statute, (to which I was signatory and Vice-Chair of preparatory negotiating committee.) An Evolving Jurisprudence that is Defining National Laws and Courts as well: The ICC was not intended to be a court of primary jurisdiction and continues to preside as tribunal of complementary jurisdiction that would only act if national courts are unwilling or unable to intercede. The ICC though through interaction of western democracies and civil society. (also anchored mainly in the US and Europe), continues to further the standards and consensus. This includes everything from war crimes to the more recently defined "crime of aggression" to crimes against humanity, which could be prosecuted for actions taken by a country's political leadership against its own citizens/people, as may be the case of Sudan or the Assad regime in Syria. Advertisement Reaching the Assets of the Culpable:The more realistic investigation and prosecution to Trump may come from national courts, within western democracies or the US. Plaintiffs as well as prosecutors could seek remedy to Trump in ways generally not a realistic option before. Trump has assets all around the globe which could be part of any reward for relief. During my tenure as the Ambassador of Bosnia & Herzegovina to the UN, Foreign Minister and Agent before the International Criminal Court, we worked with independent legal counsel and advocates who sought relief on behalf of a religiously diverse group of claimants who had been sexually assaulted by the forces under the command of General Ratko Mladic and self-styled President of Republika Srpska, Radovan Karadzic. Substantial and overwhelming evidence was presented and judgments were obtained for monetary damages, including in US Courts. However, there were no apparent assets against which such judgments could be executed. Trump, to the contrary, has projected his assets and presence as a global empire, and he has not divested since assuming office. Body of Evidence of Intent toward Systematic Abuses? Deterrence is an objective, even as the Trump Administration responds to challenges with even more audacious assertions of "alternative facts." The "Mexico Wall" or "Muslim Ban" that President Trump is seeking to impose perhaps to pose challenges as to how to confront. However, they do add to the body of evidence of discrimination and possible persecution on basis of identity, religious, ethnic, sexual orientation or otherwise. History teaches that such fear mongering rhetoric more frequently leads to wars and military adventurism rather than the purported goal of isolationism. The slogans employed by Trump, as "America First" have direct roots with those pre-WW II sympathizing/acquiescing to the Nazis. If some would argue that this is disconnected from recent history or coincidental or that President Trump is unaware, (even as his father has been reported to belong to this pre-WW II "America First" society), then perhaps we should focus on his sought alliance with Vladimir Putin. While Putin may be effectively shielded from ICC prosecution, nonetheless, his Kremlin has been directly linked to violations in the invasion of Georgia and Ukraine and the annexation of Crimea. In Syria, Putin's military has been accused by independent investigators as well as US and European officials of war crimes. (There is also credible evidence of "crimes against humanity" committed by Putin and/or his allies within Russia's borders.) Abdicating to Putin's Agenda & Adopting Putin's Crimes: By aligning US policy in Syria publicly with that of Putin's Russia, is there a lack of strategic as well as ethical wisdom? The often asked question is whether this is a recruiting, strategic gift to ISIS as well as abdication to Assad, Teheran and Putin. (Read: "Putin Drops the Bombs & Deals the Cards in Syria & Ukraine.) However, from a legal perspective, does this constitute an embrace of the Russian military's previous alleged crimes? Further, is it evidence that the US plans to adopt the same tactics, violations through joint operations with Putin's military or even by America's soldiers acting on their own? This places US military personnel in a very compromised situation, legally, strategically and in the trust/working relationship with local allies, (who now may also be offended, upended or otherwise confused by "Muslim Bans" or Trump's other statements including admiration for Putin). Advertisement Past rhetoric to prosecute previous US political leaders for violations of international law has largely been without consequence, as well as some would argue adequate evidence. Under the Trump Presidency this risk would appear to be substantially shifting, including for those unwittingly or otherwise acting on potential Trump directives. Trump's own words would reveal intent as well as action, where ambiguity or silence may have been a more clever precedent. What happens if the new US Secretary of Defense General Mattis resigns, (as President Trump has proclaimed him as the check on his inclination to employ torture)? Still, the chance of Trump ending up behind bars appears remote to say the least, but impeachment may be a more likely consequence of possible violations as ever more developed international humanitarian law also becomes part of US standards. And, unlike previous US Commanders in Chief, President Trump could be hurt in an unprecedented manner, where perhaps he is most sensitive, in his personal wealth which he has sought to perpetuate and expand while in the White House. @MuhamedSacirbey Whether rejoicing or mourning, millions of Americans awoke on January 21st feeling suddenly at the threshold of a new and uncertain era. However, in public safety-net emergency departments across the nation - like Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, where we work - the service of healing continued seamlessly, paying no heed to the national drama that has unfolded for the past several months. That day and into the night, there were simple moments that typify and define our work. Picking up an elderly homeless woman's shoes. Using a translator phone to ensure a Somali teenager had the right insulin dose. Jumping into action when medics arrive with a young cyclist struck on his way to work. It was comforting to lose oneself in the tide of humanity, the true cross-section of society that streams through our doors 365 days a year. Though healthcare is undergoing unprecedented evolution, our fundamental mission to serve remains steadfast. At the entrance to Harborview, there is a banner that states, in seven languages, "Harborview welcomes and respects ALL." Regardless of our political identities, physicians choose to rise above politics to carry out the principles of service that underlie our profession every day. Advertisement However, we now find ourselves at a crossroads in US healthcare and politics that threatens those that rely on us most for their wellbeing. The desire to remain apolitical in our duties must not silence our collective responsibility to protect our patients. Although the new administration has viewpoints on healthcare that substantially differ from those which preceded it, the one thing that most everyone can agree on is that there is plenty of room for improvement. However, we must speak firmly and act swiftly against reactionary changes that reflect political posturing without thoughtful policy to back them up. President Trump's day one mandate to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA) without offering a carefully formulated plan for revision or replacement endangers our patients. It also threatens the principles of fair and accessible healthcare for all Americans - regardless of party lines. In Washington State alone, over 500,000 people have obtained insurance through the ACA, and the uninsured rate has dropped by 54% since 2010. Nationwide, there are over 20 million newly insured, mostly working-class citizens and those afflicted by pre-existing conditions over which they have no control. In the ER - often the last resort for those that are uninsured - we experience alongside our patients the tragedies that befall people without access to health care; they are heartbreaking for us to witness, let alone for our patients to live. Physicians, nurses, and other healthcare providers have important, on-the-ground perspectives that must shape these debates. We can accomplish this by advocating for a principle-based approach to improving US healthcare. The core tenants that must guide healthcare reform are simple and bipartisan, outlined in the Triple Aim of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI): improve access to healthcare, improve the quality of care, and decrease overall costs. Utilizing thoughtful observation, rigorous research and careful data analysis to solve complex problems is the hallmark of modern medicine, and we must take on the enormous task of reforming healthcare policy with this approach at the forefront. Advertisement Congressional Republicans can still put forth a rational replacement that does not abandon the millions of Americans who currently depend on the ACA for health care access. If our newly elected leaders can communicate concrete ideas for how to improve access, increase quality, and decrease costs, the healthcare community should engage with them in a collective effort to make our system better. Until then, we must constantly remind ourselves that the eyes we look into on a daily basis at our hospital are not merely a backdrop. The easy thing to say is, "This is not my role," and to bury our heads in the daily tasks at hand. Our mission and principles are clear - but there is much work to be done. For us to simply hope for the best and stand by as mute stakeholders is an abrogation of our duties as healthcare workers, healers, and Americans. Anna E. Condino, MD, MPH Andrew G. Lim, MD, MS Paul W. Charlton, MD, MA Sabiha K. Barot, MD, PhD Five Ukrainian servicemen were killed and 13 were injured in 56 attacks on army positions in the combat zone in eastern Ukraine over the past day, the Anti-Terrorist operation (ATO) staff said in a report. In the Mariupol sector, 20 shells were fired from BM-21 Grad rocket launchers on Ukrainian army positions near Talakivka, the staff said on Facebook on Monday morning. Vodiane came under attack of a Grad P rocket launcher, 122mm artillery, mortars of various calibers, grenade launchers and small arms, it said. According to the staff, the hostiles fired 122 mm artillery on Lybidynske, mortars on Krasnohorivka, and grenade launchers and small arms on Hnutove, Pavlopil, Shyrokyne and Krasnohorivka, and engaged armored personnel carriers and infantry combat vehicles in Shyrokyne. Two onslaughts were mounted near Avdiyivka in the Donetsk sector but the hostiles "suffered casualties and had to retreat," it said. Mortars of various calibers were fired on Verkhniotoretske, Avdiyivka, Opytne, Luhanske, Zaitseve and Kamyanka on Sunday. "Tanks shelled Novhorodske and Pisky," it said. The militants fired mortars and grenade launchers on Novo-Oleksandrivka, Troyitske, Popasna and Novozvanivka in the Luhansk sector, it said. Image: Flag of Kazakhstan. Stock Photo. Kazakhstan has given up trying to use the U.S. court system to identify those who obtained and published a number of Kazakh officials' embarrassing emails. The outcome in Kazakhstan's nasty campaign was a victory for journalists and dissidents who have made a conscious decision to live overseas to avoid imprisonment in their despotic homelands. But their freedom-of-expression triumph came at a high price. Kazakhstan waged the U.S.-court campaign to try to learn the identities of journalists from the opposition website Respublika, and the journalists' sources. The cost of fighting the legal cases and the prospect of so many people being outed -- and punished -- prompted Respublika to stop publishing. Advertisement Kazakhstan went to court in the United States because the servers that Respublika used to disseminate its reports were located in the States. One reason it chose Stateside servers was Kazakhstan would have shut down the servers it used back home. Another reason was that Kazakh intelligence and police officials could have combed through the servers in the homeland to trace the identities of Respublika journalists and sources. Despite Respublika's shutdown, this case is important because it sends a message that despotic regimes will have a difficult time silencing opposition journalists and dissidents living in, or publishing from, democracies abroad. This is good news for those in the former Soviet Union, including my homeland Armenia, who want reliable information instead of lies and propaganda. Kazakh officials were apoplectic when Respublika began reporting in 2014 about juicy government emails the website had obtained. Advertisement The assumption was that someone hacked the material, although proof still has yet to surface. It also could have been the work of an insider who copied the emails. Aware that the servers Respublika used to disseminate the email stories were in the United States, the Kazakh government hired high-priced American lawyers to try to force the server company and Facebook to hand over information that could identify the Respublika journalists and sources. Federal courts in New York, where the Respublika server was located, and in California, where the suit against Facebook was filed, denied Kazakhstan the information it wanted to trace the identities. The lawyers used a law designed to protect Americans from hacking -- the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act -- to try to obtain the identities. Their effort amounted to "a two-year campaign of harassment, censorship and retaliation" against Respublika, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a non-profit organization whose goal is protecting individuals' computer freedoms. Advertisement The foundation joined Respublika in fighting Kazakhstan's demands that U.S. courts force the server company to say who contracted for Respublika's service. It also joined Respublika in opposing Kazakhstan's effort to force Facebook to disclose who was posting on, and editing, Respublika's Facebook page. That information would have led to Kazakhstan imprisoning anyone in the homeland connected with Respublika's reporting on the emails and trying to retaliate against Kazakhs abroad who were involved. Those familiar with America's First Amendment weren't surprised when the U.S. courts rejected Kazakhstan's efforts to identify the Respublika journalists. The First Amendment protects the public's ability to speak out and write about what's on their minds-- one of America's most cherished freedoms. Freedom of expression is so sacrosanct in the United States that courts have long declared that journalists have a right to publish any information they obtain, even if the source who provided the information got it illegally. Advertisement Forcing a server company or Facebook to give Kazakhstan information that would have helped the Kazakh government identify opposition journalists would have had a chilling on the journalists' work, and thus fly in the face of the First Amendment, New York and California courts ruled. If Kazakhstan had been able to learn the journalists' identities, it also could have learned who gave the journalists the emails. It would have gone after all of them, of course, but it would have reserved its most vicious retaliation for the source. The source's fear of being discovered may be one reason why Respulika decided to stop publishing in September of 2016 after being a thorn in the Kazakh government's side for 16 years. An irony in the American court decisions was that while the First Amendment protects journalists who publish information that sources obtain illegally, it does not protect the sources from being prosecuted. If Kazakhstan had been able to identify the source of the emails, and the source happened to be living in the States, the source could have faced criminal charges there. In the end, Kazakhstan's legal campaign was a double-edged sword. Because the campaign failed to identify the Respublika journalists and the source of the government emails, all were spared Kazakh prison terms. Advertisement But the legal campaign brought Respublika to a breaking point that years of government harassment and intimidation at home had failed to achieve: the decision to stop publishing. That's really a shame. Governments across the entire former Soviet Union have used every dirty trick imaginable to silence opposition news outlets. When Kazakhstan shuttered Respublika's print edition and sent its publisher packing to Poland in 2012, the organization remained the country's lone opposition voice by publishing online. Now it's gone -- and the big losers will be the Kazakh people, who from now will get only side of the story. The government side. SAN FRANCISCO, CA -- The night Donald Trump won the 2016 election, his 2020 re-election campaign began. His 2.8 million vote loss in the popular vote overshadowed his razor thin electoral win. He beat his opponent in Michigan by 10,704 votes, Wisconsin, by 22,748 votes, and Pennsylvania by 44,292 votes. With those 77.744 votes, he secured victory. He knows his margin of error in 2020 could also be precariously thin. On election night 2016, Donald Trump was prepared for defeat. The pollsters and media had lowered his expectations. But to lose re-election, that would be a humiliation. Almost as humbling as the multi-billion dollar losses from his three Atlantic City casino projects. Advertisement The dread of that experience foreshadows his fear of losing in 2020. Trump has acknowledged that massive debt sank his casino projects. Massive debt may be the price to carry out his most ambitious projects. The Race Begins In the first 100 hours in office, through executive orders, he has taken the first steps on every major promise he made during the 2016 campaign, including withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal; authorizing the building of a U.S.-Mexico border wall; disallowing federal grant money to sanctuary cities; hiring 5,000 more Border Patrol agents; reviving the Keystone XL pipeline and Dakota Access pipelines; banning federal funds to international groups that perform abortions or lobby to legalize or promote abortion; imposing a hiring freeze for some federal government workers; and easing the regulatory burdens of ObamaCare. The results have been positive for the president after a week of executive orders. The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll shows that 59% of Likely U.S. Voters approve of President Trump's job performance. Forty-one percent (41%) disapprove. But, it's been only a week since he was inaugurated. While he has issued executive orders, the heavy lifting for these initiatives will take months, likely years. Trump knows there will be economic disruption. Dozens of major trade agreements need to be re-negotiated. Unemployment may actually rise as more workers re-enter the work force. Exports may initially decline. Obamacare's replacement could leave millions without healthcare, especially with a weakened insurance coverage mandate. Advertisement Which raises Trump's obsession with voter fraud. The 2020 Campaign In the 2020 campaign, Trump again will face an adversarial media, which will attempt to discredit any accomplishments over the next four years. The left will be mobilized. The same swing states will likely decide the election - namely, the 46 electoral votes of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Billionaire George Soros and other liberal donors, as in 2016, will likely fund PACs to mobilize Latinos and other immigrants. Inducing an additional 77,744 voters to vote Democrat in the three key states is not as formidable as preventing undocumented entrants from voting. In California, for example, an estimated 800,000 undocumented residents have received driver's licenses, according to California Department of Motor Vehicles. Starting this year, the state will automatically register most licensed California drivers to vote. Trump's voter fraud rants targeted the 2016 popular vote, but are intended to neutralize the impact of voting irregularities in 2020. And this leads to a prediction. Trump may surprise everyone by pivoting to the left on immigration. Once the wall is essentially complete, and illegal entry along the Southern Border has declined noticeably, Trump will initiate limited immigration reform - most likely starting with children born of parents in America illegally. Advertisement This frontal attack will defuse efforts to mobilize the immigrant vote. Donald Trump's ban on global refugees and Muslim inhabitants of seven nations is not just excruciatingly bad policy. It is an affront to one of the core ideals of both Judaism and Christianity, as well as anybody else who thinks of the Bible as a source of important moral guidance, because the open-armed welcome of strangers is central to biblical traditions. In fact, hospitality to the vulnerable makes ancient Israel stand out in stark relief from its neighbors. Unless you were part of the vanishingly small elite class, the ancient Near East was a brutal place to live. Resources were scarce and excess food and water were almost nonexistent. Local communities were wary of any wandering foreigners. They posed a threat to everyone's livelihood: if we give them food, will we have enough for ourselves? What if they get greedy and take all we have? These questions are understandable when almost everyone was living on the brink of starvation. As a result, ancient Near Eastern peoples such as the Canaanites extended hospitality to foreign dignitaries, but they shunned visitors who might not be able to give something in return - like those fleeing oppression. In this respect, ancient Israel is an oddity among their neighbors: they insist, again and again, that their God, Yahweh, demands that the entire community welcome strangers. Their stories repeat this theme (see Genesis 18 and Ruth 1-4), and their legal codes, found in the Torah, make the requirement to offer hospitality to the stranger binding. Advertisement In the book of Exodus, just after Yahweh gives the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai, this command becomes part of the covenant: "You shall not wrong or oppress an alien, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt" (Exodus 22:21). The Hebrew word here translated alien, "ger," refers to someone on a journey -- in other words, this isn't about people with immigrant grandparents or long-settled individuals. In the book of Leviticus, the Israelites are commanded to provide food for all those who are needy: "You shall not strip your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the alien" (Leviticus 19:10). Moreover, Israelites are supposed to treat foreigners exactly as they treat one of their kin, or even how they treat themselves: "The alien who resides with you shall be to you as the citizen among you; you shall love the alien as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt" (Leviticus 19:34). The Israelites are also commanded to give full legal protections to foreign visitors: "You shall have one law for the alien and for the citizen" (Leviticus 24:22), and "You shall not deprive a resident alien or an orphan of justice" (Deuteronomy 24:17). Why would Yahweh want the Israelites to welcome, nourish and protect vulnerable strangers who wander into their communities? There are two reasons. First, Israel is composed of vulnerable, oppressed people whom Yahweh chose to help. Abraham, Sarah and Hagar were all foreigners in the land of Canaan. One recitation of Israelite history that worshipers are instructed to recite begins with "A wandering Aramean was my ancestor; he went down into Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in number" (Deuteronomy 26:5). In case the irony is not clear enough: "Arameans" is an ancient word for Syrians. So, Israel starts as a group of Syrian refugees oppressed by a foreign superpower. Yet these terrible circumstances are precisely why Yahweh heard the cry of the Hebrew slaves and came to rescue them (Exodus 3:7; Deuteronomy 26:6): that is, Yahweh is particularly sensitive to the cry of the vulnerable when they are threatened (Exodus 22:21-23). Advertisement And this is the second reason why Yahweh wants Israel to welcome the stranger: because "I am Yahweh" (Leviticus 19:34). Yahweh is different than the other gods of the ancient Near East: for starters, Yahweh lives in the Sinai wilderness, far removed from the luxurious centers of power in the Nile valley and along the Euphrates river (Exodus 3:1). Yahweh is opposed to the oppressive, hierarchical and self-serving theologies of the ancient Near East. Instead of choosing a strong nation to dominate the world by force, Yahweh chooses to work with a ragtag group of recently freed slaves to bring blessing to all the nations o the world (Genesis 12:1-3; Exodus 19:6). Yahweh has always listened more intently to the cries of the downtrodden, of which the alien is a repeated example. As a result, Yahweh demands that everyone follow suit and lend a hand -- particularly those who were once wanderers themselves, or who are descended from wanderers, but who are, by the grace of God, now in a safe place. This attitude of radical hospitality to the vulnerable is utterly bizarre in its cultural setting. Among several law codes from the ancient Near East that survive today (Hammurabi's code is merely one of them), none say anything at all about welcoming, protecting or loving strangers. Except, that is, the law codes found in the Bible. The New Testament is very similar: welcoming the vulnerable is welcoming Jesus himself. Not only is Jesus a descendent of a foreign refugee (Mathew 1:5), he himself was a refugee in Egypt (Matthew 2:13-23). If the point isn't clear enough, Matthew 25:37-40 hammers it home: God is present especially in the vulnerable, including the needy stranger, and when you refuse them, you are refusing Jesus himself (see also Hebrews 13:2). Advertisement By Amy Kumar From the day you are born, the world may seem like it is pitted against you and I will fight so hard for that not to be true. I wish for you to look up to the sky and see endless possibilities with no one to hinder you. When you are in preschool, they will ask you what you want to be when you grow up and do not hesitate to say what it is. There is no such thing as a "man's" job and do not let anyone fool you otherwise. When you start kindergarten, a little boy may call you names and pull on your hair. But, do not ever mistake that for love. Love is not nasty names and bruises. Do not let them say it is. Advertisement When you enter grade school, you may realize you are not like the other girls and they may call you names. Don't fear, you're only a caterpillar now and one day I promise you will become better than any butterfly they could ever be. At the same time, I hope you do not grow up to pick on that little girl with the speech impediment, or the little one with "weird" clothes. If you girls do not have each other's back, then who else will? Middle school will be hard. It is a time of ugly in between's and a transition into a different world full of puberty and emotions. It will also be the first time you realize that your gender will affect your actions and the way people treat you. I want you to try to keep your head up high and find love in yourself. In high school, you will battle between academics and acceptance. Do not let the latter win. They will learn to love you no matter who you are and in the end, your intelligence matters more. People are cruel, but try to find the good in everyone. No one likes a bitter soul. Advertisement You're an adult now. Your innocence shattered. Sadly, you will be used to the catcalls of disgusting men. The fear you feel when you walk down an empty dark road will soon become your reality. Your fingers will grip your friend's arm at a party as you fear for your safety. You will be let down by that boy who will only care for your body. You will find out that many value beauty over brains. You will feel your appearance be held up over your head with standards that are utterly unreachable. You will be compared to the models and actresses with unattainable goals. You will hate the girl that is perfect but sympathize with her for she may be going through the same things you are. You will find yourself hating every inch of your body but I hope that on that day you will come and find me. I hope that you do not leave your goals for any man and I hope you rise above it all. You will be amazing. *** Amy Kumar is a pre-med student at Baylor University and also a Certified Medical Assistant who lives in the Washington D.C area. She hopes to inspire south Asian women to live up to their dreams and advocate for their rights, whether it may be, loving their skin color or fighting for equality. She stands right with them. She also loves to dance both Bollywood and classical Indian forms and enjoys baking and watching Netflix.You can follow her on Instagram at haroldand_kumar C. M. Rubin's Global Education Report This month in The Global Search for Education, William Gaudelli, George Rupp and Dana Mortenson shared their perspectives on how to build more inclusive communities across political, economic and cultural divides, and on the lessons we all learned from recent world events. "The vote in the U.K. in favor of Brexit, the rejection by referendum of the peace agreement in Colombia, and the 2016 U.S. election all illustrate the power of democratic processes to register forcefully how the prevailing wisdom of a social order may not be in touch with substantial segments of the population," said Rupp. Gaudelli noted that globalization has "contributed to these differences" and when "amplified by a media-space that spreads vitriol across a multitude of echo-chambers, difference is exacerbated." Solutions lie in nurturing an economy "befitting our time" added Gaudelli, "one that grows in the rustbelt and throughout the many regions 'left behind' around new, green technologies, nano manufacturing for healthcare, and micro-finance for local resilience." Dana Mortenson focused on strategies to promote inclusive learning environments and encouraged educators to find "meaningful ways for students to express their identity and learn about their classmates' identities." A safe space to foster "storytelling and personal narrative" helps students "express who they are, what has shaped their worldview, and what matters to them." In 2015, the Duchess of Abercorn, Founder of the Pushkin Trust, visited America to share Pushkin ideologies and practice at the Creative Oklahoma conference in Oklahoma City, which is where we met. Sacha is the greatgreatgreat granddaughter of the famous Russian poet, Alexander Pushkin, and this month in The Global Search for Education, we discussed among other things how to help students find their 'voice'. The Duchess noted that finding one's voice begins with "recognizing that we have a story to tell." In her 30 years of experience with children involved in the Pushkin Trust, "the great maxim, "Unto thine own self be true," is perhaps what is needed now above all else - to be a whole human being is the challenge of our time." Advertisement In September 1994, Jerome Bruner, the famed psychologist, professor and education visionary, visited Reggio Emilia, a city in the Emilia-Romagna region of northern Italy. The President of Reggio Children at that time had written to Professor Bruner, inviting him to visit the city's schools. From that year onwards until 2012, Professor Bruner visited Reggio for one month of each year to study the city's schools and enjoy its rich culture. According to Carla Rinaldi, the current President of Reggio Children and Director of the Loris Malaguzzi International Center in Reggio Emilia, these schools and the local culture were "among his dearest research subjects." In my interview with Carla Rinaldi this month, she spoke about the philosophy of education in Reggio Emilia which emphasizes putting "great trust in the child (and in the human being), in his potential and possibilities; the idea that he is holder of a culture, the culture of childhood." Our thanks once again to all our amazing teachers, millennials, other contributors and supporters around the world. We look forward to your contributions in 2017. When it comes to the world of children there is always more work to be done. (Photos are courtesy of CMRubinWorld) C. M. Rubin Join me and globally renowned thought leaders including Sir Michael Barber (UK), Dr. Michael Block (U.S.), Dr. Leon Botstein (U.S.), Professor Clay Christensen (U.S.), Dr. Linda Darling-Hammond (U.S.), Dr. MadhavChavan (India), Professor Michael Fullan (Canada), Professor Howard Gardner (U.S.), Professor Andy Hargreaves (U.S.), Professor Yvonne Hellman (The Netherlands), Professor Kristin Helstad (Norway), Jean Hendrickson (U.S.), Professor Rose Hipkins (New Zealand), Professor Cornelia Hoogland (Canada), Honourable Jeff Johnson (Canada), Mme. Chantal Kaufmann (Belgium), Dr. EijaKauppinen (Finland), State Secretary TapioKosunen (Finland), Professor Dominique Lafontaine (Belgium), Professor Hugh Lauder (UK), Lord Ken Macdonald (UK), Professor Geoff Masters (Australia), Professor Barry McGaw (Australia), Shiv Nadar (India), Professor R. Natarajan (India), Dr. Pak Tee Ng (Singapore), Dr. Denise Pope (US), Sridhar Rajagopalan (India), Dr. Diane Ravitch (U.S.), Richard Wilson Riley (U.S.), Sir Ken Robinson (UK), Professor Pasi Sahlberg (Finland), Professor Manabu Sato (Japan), Andreas Schleicher (PISA, OECD), Dr. Anthony Seldon (UK), Dr. David Shaffer (U.S.), Dr. Kirsten Sivesind (Norway), Chancellor Stephen Spahn (U.S.), Yves Theze (LyceeFrancais U.S.), Professor Charles Ungerleider (Canada), Professor Tony Wagner (U.S.), Sir David Watson (UK), Professor Dylan Wiliam (UK), Dr. Mark Wormald (UK), Professor Theo Wubbels (The Netherlands), Professor Michael Young (UK), and Professor Minxuan Zhang (China) as they explore the big picture education questions that all nations face today. The Global Search for Education Community Page Advertisement Proudly I marched with the resistance in the City of Brotherly Love to protest the rule of Donald Trump. I refuse to refer to him as President when he has taken the role of fascist dictator with his own profiteering in mind. He owned a stake in the Dakota Access Pipeline which he ruled in favor of the pillaging of sacred lands and the potential destruction of water quality and wildlife. How long will it be before he lifts sanctions on Russia? Russia's hacking needs to be investigated fully to determine if Putin helped put Trump in power and has compromising secrets with which he is blackmailing Trump. Carl Bernstein is adamant about this. Of course, with former Exxon executive Tillerson as Secretary of State, Russia will be set up to drill in areas currently denied by sanctions . Where will these oil profits go? Where will oil profits go from potential drilling the Dakota Access Pipeline? Advertisement While Trump has said he has turned his businesses over to his sons, where is this documentation and his proof that he isn't guilty of the Emoluments Clause? Where are his tax returns? Is he truly a billionaire? A millionaire? Or just how leveraged is he to Russia and other countries?. Is being President a shell game for Trump to convert America's assets and relationships into profit for him alone.? Carl Bernstein said on CNN, "Trump lies. Let's call falsehoods lies. Republicans are worried about Trump's pathology and his delusional aspects. Trump has power to make changes and he's doing this with Russia. We are on the verge of perhaps upending World Order of the last sixty years." Trumps orders terminating the Affordable Care Act, and threatening the privatization of Medicare, Medicaid and SS are decisions of life and death. Advertisement Pence rails, "Life is winning," No, the life of the mother is being compromised for an unborn fetus. So life is losing at the hands of Republicans. We, women, we have been here and done this before. America IS great today. Obama helped to make it so, not the Republicans. Protect America's greatness by resisting Trump, his cabinet of plutocrats and his Supreme Court nominations who will support the dismantling of Roe v Wade, and his contempt for immigrants who make our nation great. Senator Schumer has said, "Lady liberty is crying." Her torch is about to be extinguished by the tyranny of a plutocracy trying to make a buck off of our wonderful country and by pretending God is behind misogynist Trump when his motivation is greed. Trump promised he would drain Washington's swamp, but has turned it into a cesspool of plutocrats he has chosen for his cabinet. And so in Philadelphia to greet Trump and his fellow Republicans, I carried a sign, "Mr. Trump, You can't grab my pussy and pipeline and profit from it." One of my favorite charities is Nowzad Dogs, which started off reuniting soldiers with the dogs they befriended while on tour in Afghanistan, and has now expanded to offer veterinary care to working animals in that war-torn country. I currently serve as the official ambassador for Nowzad Dogs in the United States. Ten years ago this February, Royal Marine Sergeant Pen Farthing rescued a dog named Nowzad, who had been used in dog fights in Afghanistan. Nowzad was smuggled across Afghanistan to begin the long journey to Pen's home in England. At that time he had no idea that the bond he had formed with this stray dog would be the catalyst for the start of the first animal welfare charity in Afghanistan. Pen Farthing and Nowzad Pen knew that other soldiers would want to bring the dogs and cats that they had adopted while fighting in Afghanistan back home with them, and so he founded Nowzad Dogs. Today, Nowzad Dogs has enabled 1,000 soldiers to bring their dog or cat back to their home countries when they finished their tour of duty. Advertisement The Nowzad Clinic was created in Kabul to provide a place for the animals to stay before departing for the United States, England, Canada, Spain and other countries. This clinic now provides vaccines and health care for donkeys, cows, sheep, goats and chickens. And of course, dogs like Mac - found curled up on the side of the road with crushed back legs- receive exemplary care. Mac is now enjoying a full life with his specially made wheel chair. The clinic employs the first-ever Afghan women to become fully trained veterinarians. More than 90 Afghan veterinary students attended practical hands-on training at the Nowzad clinic last year alone. It is the first clinic and animal shelter in Kabul and actually helps people as well because it stops the spread of rabies. The Nowzad Clinic is known for its animal welfare education, and this charity employs 20 Afghan nationals, who are as passionate about bringing animal welfare to Afghanistan as Pen and his team are. All of this has been achieved with minimal funding. Pen ensures every single cent donated is used to care for the animals. In 2014, Pen was named CNN Hero for his work with Nowzad Dogs. But despite this great honor, he still desperately needs funding to continue his work. Advertisement Cathy Kangas with a Nowzad Dog I have supported Nowzad since its inception when I first read Pen's book, "One Dog at a Time," about his work in Afghanistan. It is an uplifting, positive story about how a Royal Marine took care of a docked-eared Afghan fighting dog in between patrols and attacks by the Taliban, and soon embarked on a global effort to help dogs, soldiers and the animals of Kabul. Pen has shown that one person can have an amazing impact, bringing good to an environment written off by many. Nowzad is demonstrating what can be achieved when people from all walks of life and cultures cast differences aside and work toward a common goal. I would like to ask you to show Pen Farthing your support by pledging whatever you can afford to help him and the amazing team of Afghan nationals who care daily for the animals to continue the vital work they are doing. Pro-life activists gather outside the Supreme Court for the National March for Life rally in Washington, DC, U.S. January 27, 2017. REUTERS/Aaron P. Bernstein President Donald Trump signed an executive order blocking foreign aid or federal funding for international nongovernmental organizations that provide or "promote" abortions. "The president, it's no secret, has made it very clear that he's a pro-life president," White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told reporters. Advertisement If there was any question about whether he's pro-life, Trump said on Wednesday that he wanted to reinstate waterboarding and other forms of torture. Nothing says you're pro-life like tilting someone's head back and pouring water into their mouth or nose until they cannot breathe, causing their lungs to collapse and filling their sinuses and trachea with water so that they think they're drowning. Trump and other Republicans may be opposed to abortion but this does not mean they're pro-life; it just means they're opposed to abortion. On Jan. 13, Steve King, an Iowa congressman, introduced a bill that would ban abortions once a heartbeat is detected in the fetus. Advertisement "My legislation will require all physicians, before conducting an abortion, to detect the heartbeat of the unborn child," his statement said. "If a heartbeat is detected, the baby is protected." It's admirable to care about the heartbeat of an unborn child. But if you were really pro-life, you also would care about the heartbeat of the living. If you believe that life begins at conception and ends at birth -- as so many right-wing Republicans appear to do -- you're not pro-life, you're anti-living. It's time we redefine what we mean by pro-life. Take the following quiz. (Or better yet send this to your congressman, senators, governor, state legislators, and other elected officials who claim to be pro-life). Do you oppose capital punishment? Do you oppose torture? Do you support hate crime laws? Do you support the Violence Against Women Act? Do you support allowing women, children, and elderly to come to the United States from war-torn countries? Advertisement Do you oppose assault weapons? Do you support more extensive benefits to veterans of the armed services? Do you support universal health care? Do you support affordable housing? Should we release prison convicts who have been exonerated of their crime by DNA tests? Do you support unemployment benefits? Do you support racial and gender equality? Do you support equal justice for all? Do you support care for the mentally ill? Do you support the National Endowment for the Arts? Do you support regulating the safety of our food and drinking water? Do you support the Family and Medical Leave act? Do you support that we act with greater urgency to counter the dangers of global warming? Do you support stricter regulations on the banking industry? Do you support a living wage? Do you support the Environment Protection Agency, which protects the health of Americans by enforcing environmental standards? Do you oppose corporations who release toxins into the air that annually sicken or kill hundreds of thousands of people in this country, including a disproportionate number of children and the elderly? The current national political controversy over Immigration is a direct result of the failure of both Republican and Democratic party leadership to deal forthrightly with a decade smoldering problem. The consequences of this failure are reflected in the efforts of President Trump to address this problem by a series of Executive Orders. Democrats and Republicans in Congress for decades just kicked the can down the road, hoping somehow, someday, a solution would be found, even if "not on their watch." Meanwhile, millions of American were trying to understand and adjust to the changing debate about illegal immigration. Principally opportunists' Democratic leaders in Congress reframed the definition of the problem from "illegal immigration" to "undocumented" persons entitled to special protection in "sanctuary cities." Advertisement However, millions of those same concerned Americans, still regarded "undocumented" persons to be illegal immigrants, whom they believed, rightly or wrongly, were in some ways responsible for their loss of jobs, rising crime, and drug trafficking occurring in their communities. Add to this, incendiary series of acts of terror, that occurred in several States across our nation, directly or indirectly tied or attributed to "Muslim extremists" living or who recently entered our country. The candidacy of Donald Trump to become POTUS directly tapped into this growing fear and frustration and enabled him to be successfully elected. During his campaign, he told us exactly what he planned to do if elected. So, one of the first Executive Orders during his first week was to impose a 90-day freeze or ban on immigration from certain designated countries he believes have been most associated with acts or potential acts of terror within or against our country. In an editorial in this past Saturday's New York Times, The Times noted that: "Since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, no one has been killed in the United States in a terrorist attack by anyone who emigrated from or whose parents emigrated from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen, the seven countries targeted in the order's 120-day visa ban, according to Charles Kurzman, a sociology professor at the University of North Carolina." The report continued: "There was a random quality to the list of countries: It excluded Saudi Arabia and Egypt, where the founders of Al Qaeda and many other jihadist groups have originated. Also excluded are Pakistan and Afghanistan, where persistent extremism and decades of war have produced militants who have occasionally reached the United States. Notably, perhaps, the list avoided Muslim countries where Mr. Trump has major business ventures." Advertisement President Trump's flawed Executive Order does not address the fundamentals of the illegal immigration issue recited above. Court challenges will eventually go to our United States Supreme Court. Trump appointees to the Court are more likely than not to sustain his actions. The only force capable of potentially restraining the President and his appointees to the Court is massive nationwide protest demonstrations,24.7 that say to the President, Congress and the Court: "NO, NO, NO! NOT ON OUR WATCH! NOT IN OUR LIFETIME!!" "IF THERE IS NO FAIR, COMPASSIONATE, AND JUST RESOLUTION OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION, THERE WILL BE NO PEACE!" In December 2016, businessman and former Trump foreign policy advisor Carter Page presented a lecture in Moscow at the state-run news agency Rossiya Segodnya, where he blamed America for "arrogant foreign policies" towards Russia and talked about "restoration" of the U.S.-Russia relationship under President Donald Trump. Page used the occasion to gleefully share news about Rex Tillerson's nomination as the new secretary of state with the Russians, hours before the president-elect himself had announced the news in the United States. Carter Page was in Russia because, as he told the audience in Moscow, "There is a high level of interest amongst US as well as European companies to get back to the Russian market. This interest cuts across a diverse array of sectors," according to Russian government-controlled news website Sputnik International. "The hostile efforts to punish Rosneft (Russia's big state owned oil company) and their senior management team through Western sanctions have primarily hurt Western companies, rather than their intended target," Page said. Advertisement The U.S and E.U. applied sanctions against Russia in 2014 after Russia's military interference and eventual annexation of Crimea. Ultimately, the sanctions did impact Russia's economy. By 2016, Russia had recorded its steepest decline in gross domestic product since 2009, with slumping oil prices following as the international sanctions took a toll according to a report from the Guardian. Consumers were hit hardest, and 2.3 million Russians fell into poverty during the first nine months of 2015. Page, who founded a company called Global Energy Capital as well as former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort and Republican operative Roger Stone are now all under investigation by American law enforcement and intelligence officials. By January 19, the New York Times had reported that U.S. officials had intercepted communications and financial transactions as part of a broad investigation into possible links between Russian officials and associates of President-elect Donald J. Trump. Throughout his campaign and during his first days as President Donald Trump has advocated for a more schmoozy approach to Russia, telling reporters last month that thawing out the relationship with Vladmir Putin could be a "good thing." I wanted to better understand why current or past members of the Trump team would seek to chummy up to the Russian Federation in the first place. After all, we now know that intermediaries connected to the Russian government essentially hacked U.S. democracy and waged an aggressive campaign to influence the 2016 presidential election in Trump's favor. Why would the United States realign its interests with the likes of Vladimir Putin's government, a major nuclear power that continues to pose a menacing threat to Eastern Europe and the integrity of NATO, all the while aiding and abetting war crimes in of parts of Syria. Advertisement "Renegotiation is normal, but it has almost always had a purpose. How would Trump's proposed realignment advance the American national interest is the bigger question. The move would obviously help multinational oil companies and investment firms, such as ExxonMobil and Global Energy Capital -- that seems obvious," said Ryan M. Irwin, Assistant Professor of History at the University of Albany. But Irwin says it is worrisome that President Trump surrounded himself with the likes of (former campaign chairman) Paul Manafort, (former policy advisor) Carter Page, and national security advisor Michael Flynn. Irwin tosses secretary of state nominee Rex Tillerson into the mix as well. "These are people who've been paid to pursue other countries' national interests in Washington," said Irwin. The New York Times reported last August that "handwritten ledgers showed $12.7 million in undisclosed cash payments designated for Paul Manafort from former Ukraine leader Victor Yanukovych's pro-Russian political party from 2007 to 2012. The evidence came from Ukraine's newly-formed National Anti-Corruption Bureau. That same month, the Associated Press reported that Manafort helped a pro-Russian governing party in Ukraine secretly route at least $2.2 million in payments to two prominent Washington lobbying firms in 2012, and did so in a way that effectively obscured the foreign political party's efforts to influence U.S. policy. Rex Tillerson has been friendly with Vladmir Putin and Russia for years. The Wall Street Journal reported on December 6, 2016 that in 2011, ExxonMobil began a $500 BILLION partnership with Rosneft. Two years later, Putin presented Tillerson with the Order of Friendship, one of Russia's highest civilian honors. Tillerson opposed American sanctions of Russia, calling them ineffective. Bloomberg wrote in September 2014 that "the costliest well in the ExxonMobil history had struck oil a mile beneath the icy seas off the Siberian coast. It was what the industry likes to call an elephant--as much as a billion barrels, then worth about $97 billion." But the sanctions essentially halted the ExxonMobil project. In a January 2017 essay called "The Price of Appeasing Russian Adventurism," Andreas Umland, a senior research fellow at the Institute for Euro-Atlantic Cooperation in Kyiv, writes that U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and some of those advising him specifically on Russia, like Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, and Carter Page, hope that U.S. tolerance of Russian freedom of movement in the former Soviet space--in particular, in Ukraine--would make the Kremlin more cooperative in other fields, such as the fight against Islamist terrorism, and in other regions, such as Syria or the Arctic. Advertisement But Umland wonders if the new president and incoming administration fully understand what's at stake. He writes that a move by Washington to appease Moscow would be another crack in the splintering international nuclear nonproliferation regime. Acquiescence to Russia's territorial gains in Ukraine would further undermine the already-shattered 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), one of the world's most important multilateral agreements. Umland told me in an email there may be good reasons for the West to appease Russian imperialism in the former Soviet space because of other more salient interests of the US with regard to Russia: the joint fight against Islamist terrorism, energy cooperation, Syria, the Arctic, etc. "But apart from the open question whether appeasement will moderate Russia, there is also the question of the costs of such appeasement - if it works - for the other post-Soviet countries and the international non-proliferation regime. In 10, 20 or 30 years, people may come to the conclusion that undermining the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty (NPT) for current gains in US-Russian relations was too high a price to pay," said Umland. But, throughout his presidential campaign, Donald Trump made fighting ISIS and Islamic terrorism a hallmark of his campaign. In July 2016, he told supporters that he would weigh an alliance with Russia against Islamic State militants. Both Moscow and Washington are deeply concerned about the so-called "spillover" effects of the Syrian civil war, according to Evan Boucher, a foreign policy researcher and political science professor at the University of North Dakota. Advertisement Boucher says that between ISIS' Western and Chechen foreign fighters in Iraq and Syria, officials in the United States and Russia are troubled by the possibility of these fighters expanding the scope of violent operations against Western and Russian allies. He adds that both Russia petroleum companies as well as those in the United States seek higher oil prices. A more amenable White House to lifting sanctions on Russia might be able to work with Putin to help coordinate a rally in global crude oil prices, given signals from OPEC about a similar concern, he says. "The question for Congress is simple. When U.S. interests diverge from Russian interests, how will President Trump handle this? If Trump were forced to choose between an improved relationship with Russia and NATO's security interests, which would he choose? What are the red lines for Russian adventurism?" Boucher wonders. He says it is not surprising that Russia interfered in the U.S. presidential election. As we've heard before, Vladimir Putin perceived Hillary Clinton of having interfered in Russia's election 2011 by calling the Russian election "rigged." "Russia's robust disinformation online propaganda machine is extremely robust and well-documented by various journalists. This apparatus is widely agreed to have influenced the U.S. election by spreading misinformation about Hillary Clinton and, in general, muddying perceptions of truth and fiction throughout the election in which all information became a subjective," Boucher says. Advertisement The anxiety in Russia-adjacent states is inversely proportional to the confidence those states feel around NATO's robustness in follow through on its North Atlantic treaty, Article 5 obligations, Boucher adds. "This provision effectively states that any attack against one NATO member is considered to be an attack against all members, but leaves the response mandates relatively open to interpretation." There's little doubt, over the past few years, tension between the United States and Russia have risen to a boil. "Stepping back from that level of tension would be welcome, especially at a time when the U.S. faces many international challenges--from the Middle East to the Korean peninsula to the South China Sea," said Russell Bova, professor of political science at Dickinson College. Bova, who has written extensively about Russian politics, says Mr. Putin specifically wants an end to the existing sanctions; recognition of Russian sovereignty in Crimea; neutralization of Ukraine; removal of NATO forces from Eastern Europe, and recognition of Russian primacy in the post-Soviet space. "I suspect that part of Trump's strategy is to improve Russia relations in order to be better positioned to confront what is arguably the greater long-term challenge posed by China," said Bova, who teaches classes in international relations and comparative politics both at Dickinson and the U.S. Army War College. Advertisement But Edward Goldberg, author of "The Joint Ventured Nation: Why America Needs A New Foreign Policy" argues that China does not pose the sort of threat we see in Russia. "China is much too invested in the system, too economically intertwined with the world to radically shake up the existing order. The Chinese government's mandate is based on prosperity, and among other factors, it needs global stability to maintain that prosperity," said Goldberg. The United States should not relax existing sanctions on Russia, said Goldberg, who teaches international political economy at New York University Center for Global Affairs. "The reason for the sanctions is that Russia, against all post World War II norms, broke a treaty that it signed and directly violated the territorial integrity of its neighbor," said Goldberg. He says Putin, by placating the new Trump administration, which campaigned on a confrontational relationship with China, could be in a position to play the American card against his economic giant to the east. "But for America, this is a fool's game.There is no economic or political advantage for America to disassociate itself from China, to allow itself to be manipulated by the economically and politically weak Russia," said Goldberg. That said, one wonders what questions should be asked of incoming cabinet members and perhaps posed to the president as the potentially warmer tie with Russia comes to fruition. Advertisement Marcel H. Van Herpen is a security expert specializing in Russia, Eastern Europe, and the post-Soviet states. He is the author of three books on Putin's Russia. Van Herpen says Congress should be asking the new president and his cabinet appointees question such as "Don't you think that accepting the Russian annexation of the Crimea in exchange for an eventual 'cooperation' in the fight with ISIS will have an reverse effect? Will it not be interpreted by the Kremlin as a weakness of the United States and invite more Russian aggression - not only in Ukraine, but also in the Baltic states? "Recent remarks by the president elect, that NATO is "obsolete" have already weakened NATO and undermined the credibility of Article 5. These remarks have been welcomed by the Kremlin and seen as a weakening of the American commitment and American resolve," said Van Herpen. Improved relations with Russia are not inherently worrisome; what matters is the conditions under which such improved relations occur according to some experts. In fact, there are a number of worrisome conditions that could arise if the United States does pursue a more friendly relationship with Russia. University of Puget Sound Professor Seth Weinberger specializes in US international relations and is the author of Restoring the Balance: War Powers in an Age of Terror. Weinberger says that for a long time, Russia has long been upset about the extension of NATO onto its western border and seeks increased control over the foreign and sometimes domestic politics of those countries. Advertisement "By achieving improved relations, Russia could induce the U.S. to lessen, in perception or in reality, its commitment to NATO and the defense of those countries, which would then have little option but to comport their behavior to Russian preferences," said Weinberger. Examples of this include President Trump's calling NATO "obsolete" and questioning whether the U.S. would live up to its mutual defense commitments. Weinberger says if countries like Estonia doubt the iron-clad nature of NATO's security guarantee, they will have to move to accommodate Russia. He says the U.S. already finds itself increasingly unable to affect the political situation in Syria; if Russian and Iranian influence continues to increase in the region, one consequence of an improved U.S.-Russian dynamic could be the continued weakening of the U.S. role in the Middle East. "In my opinion, Russia seeks to return to great power status. I believe China seeks global economic power and regional military dominance. Russia, however, seeks to involve itself globally. This is to a large degree a response to Russian domestic weakness and structural problems in its economy and political structures," said Weinberger. He points to the annexation of Crimea and the covert invasion of Ukraine as examples of Russia using its foreign policy adventures to distract its domestic population from their ills and to create what's known as a 'rally-round-the-flag' effect. Advertisement "Russia has little interest in or ability to develop a sophisticated market and trade-based economy. Thus, there are few overlapping issues of mutual interest, like the U.S. has with China as a result of the economic interdependence between the two," said Weinberger. The operational situation in the Anti-Terrorist operation (ATO) area in Donbas remains complicated, at the same time the Ukrainian troops managed to seize a strategically significant outpost during the battle in the Avdiyivka industrial zone area, Ukrainian Defense Minister Stepan Poltorak said during the talks with injured servicemen at the Lviv military hospital. "Today there is a serious aggravation in the Avdiyivka area: in the morning the terrorist groups started the shelling, then, two groups of the hostiles comprising 25-30 people each launched assault actions on our positions. On one of the positions this attack was stopped by the Armed Forces servicemen, on the second one our servicemen went into the offensive and seized an important outpost, which has strategic significance. Our servicemen, unfortunately, sustained some losses. The situation in the ATO area is thorny, but controllable," the ministry press service quoted Poltorak as saying. The artillery preparation fire and assault actions by the hostiles near the Avdiyivka industrial zone (Donetsk region) killed three Ukrainian servicemen and injured a serviceman, Ukrainian Defense Ministry spokesman Oleksandr Motuzianyk said earlier on Sunday. Every new presidential administration offers a fresh opportunity to rethink the purpose, value and budget of the National Endowment for the Arts, the federal government's arts funding agency since its establishment in 1965. In 2016, Congress allotted the NEA $147,949,000, below its 1992 high of $175,954,680 but better than the $97,627,600 appropriation in 2000 when what were then called the "culture wars" was at its height and the agency was punished by conservative legislators for its direct and indirect support of more edgy art forms. President Ronald Reagan vowed to "abolish" the NEA but didn't and, since its days as a punching bag for the right wing, it largely has been forgotten. The agency's stated goals are "supporting excellence in the arts, both new and established; bringing the arts to all Americans; and providing leadership in arts education." More money for the agency would be good to help those efforts, and I especially would like to see much more done to make the arts a greater part of public school education: More opportunities to learn a musical instrument, the reintroduction of art and music appreciation classes, more required arts classes on the curriculum, theater and dance performances in the schools. We live at a time when symphony orchestras, opera companies, dance and theater troupes around the country are struggling financially due to diminishing attendance, the result of an aging audience. Shut down permanently over the past 15 years are the Florida Philharmonic, San Jose Symphony, Tulsa Philharmonic, Colorado Springs Symphony and the San Antonio Symphony, while bankruptcies have afflicted the New York City Opera and the symphony orchestras of Baltimore, Columbus, Detroit, Honolulu, Indianapolis, Miami, Milwaukee, New Mexico, Philadelphia and Syracuse. I'm certain some have been overlooked. Orchestral music, older and more contemporary, is not on the radar of young people who only hear what their pop, country, rap, rock or alt music networks are promoting. According to a 2010 survey conducted by the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics of elementary and secondary schools around the country, 91 percent offer music instruction and 84 percent provide visual art classes, with drama and dance far less frequently available. Those percentages do not seem so bad, but what one finds upon closer inspection is that generally there is one music instructor and one visual arts instructor in a given school, regardless of size, doing all the teaching, which results in the choral class or the art class available just once a week. Seventy percent of the surveyed secondary schools required only one credit in some music or art class for graduation, which means that students take their once-a-week chorus in ninth grade and then they are done with the arts. More congressionally appropriated money for the National Endowment for the Arts could be used to pay conservatory students to perform and give talks at public schools. Aren't we tired to see tributes to Misty Copeland as the first Black prima ballerina? We should be encouraging more students to try dance than just to praise the one. We could send dancers, musicians, actors and writers into schools, using federal dollars to pay for in-school and after-school programs. If we want cultural institutions to survive and not just rely on grandparents and the richest donors on the planet, we need to make the arts a priority for the young during the years we have their attention in our public schools. As much as any one-time project grant that the National Endowment for the Arts makes to some nonprofit organization, this focus on arts education will help ensure that the totality of the arts survive and prosper. The U.S. once created military alliances to advance its own security. Today Washington treats them like social organizations, which every nation should be invited to join, irrespective of qualification. So it is with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's vote to admit Montenegro, a quaint but geopolitically irrelevant Balkan state, into NATO. If the measure is approved by the full Senate, Americans will have yet another essentially useless defense dependent, this one a corrupt, long-time one-party gangster state. Quite a model for future alliance expansion. NATO was established to shield war-ravaged Western Europe from the Soviet menace after the end of World War II. However, Dwight Eisenhower warned against turning the alliance into a welfare program, with the Europeans forever dependent on U.S. defense subsidies. Alas, his successors didn't listen and today a continent with a larger population and economy than America skimps on its own military while expecting Americans to come to its aid whenever the slightest problem arises. Advertisement It was bad enough that Washington felt the need to protect larger, wealthier European nations. But after the collapse of the Soviet Union NATO acted like a gentleman's club which every civilized European state wanted to join. Thus entered former Warsaw Pact nations and Soviet republics, extending the alliance up to Russia's borders. That included the Baltic States, essentially irrelevant to the security of the rest of the continent and almost indefensible, at least at reasonable cost, as the U.S. and other Europeans finally have come to recognize. More recent proposals to bring in Georgia and Ukraine suggested that Washington had gone slightly mad. The two prospective members would offer nothing to America's defense but would bring along potential conflicts with nuclear-armed Russia. Both would be security black holes, almost all obligation and no benefit. (Small military contingents offered for misguided U.S. interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq are no recompense for confronting a nuclear-armed power in its neighborhood over interests it considers to be vital.) What now? While tossing out members mistakenly inducted, like the Baltics, would be difficult, Washington should at least stop adding members who add nothing to America's security. But the alliance, whose bureaucratic interest is to ever expand, even to the detriment of its members' actual security, has invited Montenegro to join. It is a postage stamp country with about enough people for one U.S. congressional district. Montenegro deserves its own novel, like the fictional Duchy of Grand Fenwick in The Mouse that Roared. But Podgorica shouldn't be part of NATO. Advertisement Montenegro's advocates attempted to rush its inclusion through the lame duck session, but were blocked by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kty) and others. Now, like horror villain Freddy Krueger, it's back. Again, the Senate's usual hawks are attempting to wave the duchy lookalike through while Donald Trump's attention is elsewhere. After all, there is a chance that he will decide to put America's security ahead of that of Montenegro and kill the move. What is the case for adding Podgorica to America's lengthy defense dole? Rather hilariously, the Heritage Foundation headlined a recent study "Support for Montenegro's Accession to NATO Would Send a Message of Strength." Yes, it would be tragic if the U.S. and entire European continent had to face the Russian hordes without Montenegro at their side. The duchy, er, country has 2080 men under arms. To transport them are eight, count them, eight armored personnel carriers, and seven operational helicopters. But NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg discerned that "Montenegro has some military capabilities which are important also to NATO." Apparently all those years of declining European defense spending finally had an effect, leaving the other Europeans dependent on Podgorica! Seriously, if the West's survival depends on Montenegro's inclusion in NATO, we should all be heading for the bunkers. And any capabilities which the country develops are likely to be paid for by American taxpayers with funds to upgrade the Montenegrin legions. If America and Montenegro step forth to conquer the world, it will be in a fantasy movie, not a reality show. If rebuffed by NATO, it has been argued, Grand Fenwick, er, Montenegro might offer Russia a naval base on the Adriatic. Such an inconstant partner would be a dubious treaty ally. Exactly what the inferior Russian navy would do with such a base is not evident. And such a facility, surrounded by NATO members and on waters dominated by NATO members, would be even less defensible than the Baltics. Advertisement If not useful for military purposes, is there any other reason to bring Podgorica into NATO? Last year Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Michael R. Carpenter testified that Montenegro shared the alliance's "values of democracy, individual liberty, and the rule of law." It was a unintentionally comedic performance. Whatever Podgorica's virtues, reflecting the best of the West is not one. For instance, last year the group Freedom House rated Montenegro as only "partly free" in political rights and civil liberties. And the trend was down. Civil liberties took a particular hit "due to restrictions on the freedom of peaceful assembly." There also were concerns "about the independence of the judiciary and the public broadcaster, as well as numerous failures to effectively prosecute past attacks against media workers." Moreover, Freedom House cited "indirect censorship." Corruption is a major problem, yet "NGOs that investigate corruption or criticize the government face pressure." In its 2015/2016 report, Amnesty International stated: "Threats and attacks against independent media and journalists continued: few perpetrators were brought to justice. Police used excessive force during mass protests organized by opposition parties." There was unlawful surveillance of critical NGOs. Finally, the State Department put out a 42-page report last year assessing Montenegro's human rights practices. While plenty of nations are worse, Podgorica is hardly a winner in the democracy sweepstakes. State noted "voting irregularities and a state-party confluence that undermined popular confidence." Corruption was pervasive, "characterized by impunity, political favoritism, nepotism, and selective prosecution of political and societal opponents." The situation confronting journalists was deteriorating. "There were also governmental and quasi-official attacks on leaders of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in government-controlled media." Minorities suffered "discrimination and societal violence." Finally, noted State: "Other human rights problems included impunity for war crimes, mistreatment by law enforcement officers of persons in their custody, overcrowded and dilapidated prisons and pretrial detention facilities, violations of the right to peaceful assembly," and more. Advertisement Alas, Montenegro has gained the reputation of a "mafia state." Analyst James Nadeau reported that the long-serving Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic, who stepped down after the last election but remains influential, had a "long history of corrupt and criminal activity." Some uncharitable observers called him "Mr. Ten Percent." On his way out of the Oval Office President Barack Obama argued that Podgorica's inclusion would "demonstrate to other countries in the Balkans and beyond that NATO's door remains open." But that frankly is a stupid message inconsistent with U.S. security. The Balkans is irrelevant to U.S. security and only indirectly relevant to the protection of Europe. European peoples worry far more about migrants streaming through the Balkans than recent hatreds reigniting. And the Balkan wars always were more about tragedy than security. Since America should not take on Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Serbia as defense dependents, there is no reason to send the message that the membership door is open. Instead, Washington should declare that Europe's cheap ride is over and the U.S. no longer will add nations to NATO like most people accumulate Facebook friends. However attractive Montenegro might be to filmmakers--it provided the setting for the James Bond reboot Casino Royale--Podgorica should be told to concentrate on fixing its domestic affairs and preparing for European Union membership. Most likely the Obama administration used Montenegro to strike at Moscow. Carpenter argued: "Montenegro's NATO membership will be a powerful rebuke to Russia's malign influence in the Western Balkans and demonstrate that no country has a veto over NATO's decision to admit new members." Actually, adding Montenegro is a losing hand for the West. The action is laughable on military grounds and would not enhance U.S. or NATO capabilities. Russia's armed services certainly would not be bothered. Advertisement But the proposed move demonstrated hostility toward Moscow that has been noticed by the Kremlin. That won't make America safer. Indeed, it is positively foolish for Washington to seemingly validate the security concerns of a power which allied officials claim threatens to harm America and Europe. Janai Nelson, Associate Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., argued Veasey v. Abbott, the pending challenge to Texas's voter ID law, before the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals en banc. Amid inauguration events and march preparations on January 20th, a federal court quietly issued an important decision that cannot and should not go unnoticed. In an opinion authored by conservative Supreme Court shortlister Judge William Pryor, the three-judge court ruled that Alabama engaged in racial gerrymandering when drawing twelve of its legislative districts. Judge Pryor is just one of dozens of federal judges around the country who have ruled that states or municipalities have diluted, disenfranchised, or otherwise devised illegal, unconstitutional schemes to deny minorities their rightful electoral power. Just weeks before the Alabama decision, George W. Bush appointee Judge Lee Rosenthal issued a decision finding that Pasadena, Texas implemented a voting plan for city council seats that ensured that "Latino voters do not have the same right to vote as their Anglo neighbors." Advertisement These rulings are both disturbing reminders that discrimination in voting is alive and well and heartening evidence of the role our courts serve as an impartial bulwark of our democracy. That role is not reserved for the courts alone, however. It is also the responsibility of the Department of Justice. In a climate where unfounded allegations of voter fraud or vote-rigging go unchallenged, the country cannot afford to let stand laws enacted on such falsehoods, many of which are palpably intended to disenfranchise ripening political power by historically marginalized racial and ethnic minority groups. Thus, DOJ's conviction to its mission "to ensure fair and impartial administration of justice for all Americans" is critical to its continued legitimacy. However, in another quiet decision that Friday, a magistrate judge delayed at the DOJ's request a long-calendared hearing on whether Texas's stringent voter ID law was enacted with the intent to discriminate against black and Latino voters. DOJ's requests for and receipt of continuances on a range of issues and cases, including hearings on the Baltimore policing consent decree and the challenge to Texas' outlier voter ID law, have set off alarm bells. It may be too soon for such fatalism, however. Once new teams get up to speed, they then must stay the course in pursuit of justice, a course charted by clear records, thoughtful judicial opinions, and the Department's own findings. This is especially true in the case of SB 14, Texas' hyper-restrictive voter ID law. Four courts, including the deeply conservative en banc Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, found that the law has a discriminatory effect on minority voters. A federal trial court also found in 147-page opinion that the law was passed with unlawful intent to discriminate based on race. The Fifth Circuit asked the district court to revisit its holding in accordance with new legal guidance on how to find intent. It was this long-awaited hearing, scheduled for this week, that DOJ successfully postponed. On February 28th, when the court is now set to hear this matter, the facts and the evidence will be unchanged. The voluminous record showing the radical procedures Texas took to pass the law and the deliberate choices it made in selecting forms of photo ID that blacks and Latinos were less likely to possess will be the same as it was on Friday. The powerful and well-substantiated arguments that the DOJ made in its briefs establishing Texas's discriminatory intent will be as resonant as ever. And, the threat to our democracy posed by suborning the Constitution to voter suppression will continue to be pressing. Advertisement Colorado State Rep. Polly Lawrence (R-Roxborough Park) has set an example for lawmakers everywhere, from Trump on down, by removing a fake-news item from her Facebook page. On Wednesday, I left a phone message for Lawrence, alerting her that back in Nov. she'd posted fake news with the headline, "WHOA! Hillary Caught On Hot Mic Trashing Beyonce' with RACIAL SLURS! Looks like Hillary may have just lost one of her biggest endorsements." The day after I called her, Lawrence removed the fake news. The fakeness of the Lawrence's post was never in doubt from the moment she posted it. The website called "The Resistance: The Last Line Of Defense," which published the Beyonce' fake news, has a disclaimer, which reads: Advertisement DISCLAIMER: The Resistance may include information from sources that may or may not be reliable and facts that don't necessarily exist. All articles should be considered satirical and any and all quotes attributed to actual people complete and total baloney. What's more, Snopes determined on Nov. 5, the day before Lawrence posted the item, that the Beyonce' item was false. Still, Lawrence posted the fake news with the comment, "If this is true, it fits in with the accusation that the Democrats only work with the African-American community when they need votes." But you know what's great? Lawrence accepted criticism and removed the fake news. Why? Because fake news causes cancer in civic discourse. That was diagnosed and then proven in the last election. Advertisement At least I think that's why Lawrence removed it. She didn't return my call, which is too bad because I would have heaped even more praise on her. In my phone message, in which I thanked Lawrence for removing the fake news, I asked her if she'd sign the Fake News Pledge, which is a promise 1) not to post fake news, defined as false information "packaged to look like news," and 2) to post a correction and explanation on Facebook if fake news is accidentally posted. The Pledge's arbiters of fake news are Snopes, Politifact, Factcheck.org, or a respected news outlet. If Pledge signers disagree with the specified arbiters, they do not have to remove anything from Facebook. But they are obliged to explain why they disagree with the fact checkers. Lawrence did not respond to my request that she sign the Fake News Pledge, and she still has at least one fake-news meme on her site, with a misquote of Obama, which I'll ask her about later. Lawrence is the second Colorado state lawmaker to remove fake news from their Facebook pages, since last year when I posted an investigation showing that five legislators had spread a total of eight fake news items on Facebook. After she became aware of her fake news post, then State Rep. Kit Roupe (R-Colorado Springs), removed it, telling me, "If it was false, and it came to my attention that it was false, then of course I would [remove it]." (Roupe also didn't respond to my request to sign the Fake News Pledge, and she has since left office.) Advertisement The three other lawmakers cited in the BigMedia.org investigation have refused to delete fake news. Rep. Gordon Klingenschmitt (R-Colorado Springs) refused to believe that Scalia was not, without a doubt, assassinated by the Clintons. And State Sen. Tim Neville (R-Littleton) refused to remove two items deemed false by fact checkers from his Facebook page. State Sen. Laura Woods (R-Arvada), who's left office as well, did not respond to my requests that she remove fake news from her Facebook page. Sir -- Twice now you have publicly referred to your alt-right constituency as 'hobbits'. In December you told the Daily Mail that your following of 'hobbits' should continue to keep you and Trump honest after you take power. More recently, in your epic blowup at the New York Times, you referred to your candidate's rise to victory as a revolt of 'working-class hobbits.' I'm assuming that in your referencing of that fair and humble folk you are attempting to paint a picture of simple, rural people who like good-tilled earth, are slow to anger, but when called upon are a force to be reckoned with. Presumably you've actually read the Lord of the Rings -- though from my experience, those who share your political affiliations aren't overly fond of books, except, perhaps, when throwing them on bonfires, or waving them in front of frenzied television crowds as examples of intellectual elitism. Advertisement But if you have read it, then you know where the real analogy lies. No, I'm not going to compare you to the Dark Lord Sauron. That would be insulting to that formidable Maiar, who -- though evil to the core -- was the holder of some actual power worth speaking of. Rather, may I direct your attention to chapter 18 of Return of the King -- The Scouring of the Shire. When Sam and Frodo return from their epic quest to Mordor -- which they are only able to accomplish through humility, love, and reliance upon one another -- they find that their beloved Shire has been taken over by xenophobic thugs. A huge wall has been put up to unnecessarily keep foreigners out, and childish shire-dwellers who have no experience or knowledge of the world have formed vigilante bands, guarding the realm against a trumped up 'enemy' who doesn't actually exist. The defining characteristics of this new, scoured, Shire -- it is an unfriendly place for foreigners, it is built upon lies told by a worm-tongued henchman, it is run by people with no experience, it is surrounded by a big and utterly unnecessary wall, and it is an environmental wasteland. As Tolkien said -- "trees had been wantonly felled, the old mill had been replaced by a great brick building straddling the stream, which it fouled with a steaming and stinking outflow." In Sam's words -- it was worse than Mordor. Sound familiar? Stinking outflow? Worse than Mordor? So if in labeling your constituency hobbits you really intend to say that they have been duped into following Grima Wormtongue into a dystopian thug state, then perhaps you have a point. If you're trying to paint your hobbits as the 'good guys...' Not so much, Mr. Bannon. Not so much. Advertisement Such analogies would not have sat well with J.R.R. Tolkien, who loved most and despised few, and the few he despised were mostly Nazis. Perhaps you know, that in 1938, before the outbreak of the great war, the German publisher of the Hobbit requested that Tolkien provide evidence of his Aryan heritage, so that they could ascertain if he had any Jewish blood. Here is a part of his response -- "Thank you for your letter. I regret that I am not clear as to what you intend by arisch [Aryan]. I am not of Aryan extraction: that is Indo-Iranian; as far as I am aware none of my ancestors spoke Hindustani, Persian, Gypsy, or any related dialects. But if I am to understand that you are enquiring whether I am of Jewish origin, I can only reply that I regret that I appear to have no ancestors of that gifted people. My great-great-grandfather came to England in the eighteenth century from Germany: the main part of my descent is therefore purely English, and I am an English subject - which should be sufficient. I have been accustomed, nonetheless, to regard my German name with pride, and continued to do so throughout the period of the late regrettable war, in which I served in the English army. I cannot, however, forbear to comment that if impertinent and irrelevant inquiries of this sort are to become the rule in matters of literature, then the time is not far distant when a German name will no longer be a source of pride. Tolkien certainly would have made no bones about correcting your misplaced fantasy novel analogies, your misplaced emphasis on national heritage as indicator of criminal intent, and your history, which -- as is all too common among fascist movements-- imagines an illusory white homeland that needs to be 'made great again.' Advertisement There's only one problem -- the great white America of which you speak doesn't exist and never did. And if history is any indicator, the pipe dream you're selling has an extremely rapid expiration date. Namarie, Two years after a federal lawsuit dealt the NYPD a legal blow to its wanton stopping and frisking of Black and Latino residents, it seems the country's largest police department still can't adhere to the law. Last week, New York City settled a lawsuit that challenged the NYPD criminal summonsing patterns over the course of years. Ultimately, $75 million could be paid to an untold number of plaintiffs. From 2007 to 2015, covering both the Michael Bloomberg and Bill de Blasio regimes, at least 900,000 criminal summonses were dismissed by judges because they didn't clear basic legal hurdles. Cops, for example, would dish out "disorderly conduct" summonses without bothering to jot down how what exactly was disorderly about the conduct of person they gave the summons to. Disorderly conduct summonses are often the catch-all infractions cops give out in poor Black and Latino neighborhoods. So many are clearly so baseless and arbitrary that judges have no choice but to toss them. Advertisement The beauty of Stinson v City of New York is that it highlights a side of policing that doesn't perhaps have the ugly optics of an arrest (with the handcuffs and sometimes accompanying brutality) but is no less punitive as it crushes people under financial fines, court dates and can potentially saddle them with warrants. Unlike stop and frisk encounters, where most walked away, summonsing binds you to the criminal justice system via a pink sheet of paper. Not everyone can fight summonses. Even less have the opportunity to file lawsuits on their own. The Stinson settlement may help. Part of the agreement is that efforts are made to find people who may eligible to receive compensation. With nearly a million shit summonses, chances are thousands of New Yorkers have been victims. So what fueled the summons frenzy? A big part of the problem was quality of life policing. In fact, some have called this the Broken Windows lawsuit. Since not every cop might enjoy ticketing a homeless person or handing a $100 fine to a poor person who jumped a turnstile, the mass summonsing was likely pushed through a widely-acknowledged quota system, which police officials continues to deny exist--despite countless stories to the contrary from retired and current cops. According to police mouthpiece J. Peter Donald, the NYPD has never used a quota system. That's been the company line for years, from Ray Kelly to Bill Bratton and current NYPD head honcho Jimmy O'Neill. Kelly likely even hid emails in a Hillary Clinton-esque move to keep lawyers from finding evidence of quotas, which are very much illegal. Advertisement Baseless, racist and quota-driven criminal summonsing should also make everyone take pause on the hair-brained scheme of some city council members, like Rory Lancman of Queens, to 'reform' Broken Windows policing by politely encouraging the NYPD to hand out more civil summonses for quality-of-life infractions instead. If police officers, ostensibly working under quotas, are the ones doing the summonsing, the result will be baseless, racist and quota driven civil summonses, which often mean higher fines and which are harder to fight in court (meaning a Stinson-like challenge probably could never happen). The worse part of the whole summons escapade is probably the de Blasio administration's reaction. The city's top lawyer, Zachary Carter, claims the Stinson settlement is indicative of "remarkable progress" by the police department. In other words, for Carter, city taxpayers having to shell out millions to settle shoddy, racist police work is not a moment to reflect or revise policy, but rather to pat themselves on the back. Today, the Earth got a little hotter, and a little more crowded. And the chances of Donald Trump's family and fortune surviving climate change are small, dwindling daily and irreversibly. Saving BUB, Beautiful Unique Biodiversity, as in these pygmy elephants in Borneo, is another reason to preserve carbon storing forests. Source Rainforest Rescue These elephants are already threatened by ivory poachers, but a planned road will greatly help poachers to invade their habitat. You can sign here to urge the plan is stopped! Advertisement Forests: the cheapest way to store carbon What Consumers of Palm Oil Never See is what their consumption drives: deforestation and extinction. Source SOB - IAR Indonesia, RAN OO UK Bank Financing Tied To Deforestation, Rights Violations For Palm Oil In Indonesia Greenpeace has published evidence of illegal deforestation and violations of local communities by companies receiving $16+ billion in loans and credit from the British bank HSBC. OO 'Out Of Control' Wildfires Damage Protected Forests In Northern Peru - fueled by agriculture and drought, the fires burned around 5,000+ acres during late 2016. When we harm forests, we harm ourselves. HOT NEWS OO 2016 Officially Declared Hottest Year On Record - the third year in a row to do so, and a marker of global warming. Advertisement OO Earth Sets A Temperature Record For The Third Straight Year - Surface temperatures are heading toward levels that many scientists believe will threaten both the natural world and human civilization. OO Global Warming Never 'Paused' And Could Soon Accelerate warns NASA scientist. We were looking in the wrong place for the extra heat, which went into the oceans, not the air. Just goes to show that oceans matter, too, when measuring the progress of global warming. As the extra heat starts going mostly into the air again, expect an acceleration in the effects of global warming on climate. * * MELTDOWN Nothing Like Drama To Emphasize Reality - from the "Day After Tomorrow" 2004 movie, a fictional depiction of the 2002 breakup of the Larsen B shelf in 2002. Once again, the Larsen shelf is in the process of shedding a tremendous amount of ice. Advertisement OO Larsen Ice Crack Continues To Open Up readying to calve a giant iceberg in the Antarctic. Nature Imitates Fiction: Similar to "Day After Tomorrow" Shot above, this is a REAL drone shot of a developing crack in the Brunt ice shelf that threatens the British Antarctic station. Screencapture of Jan 17, 2017 video at climatecrocks.com OO UK's Antarctica Research Base To Relocate As 'Precautionary Measure' amid concerns it could fall into a growing giant ice chasm. OO Argentine Scientists In Antarctica Tally Toll Of Climate Change as a nearby glacier thunderously sheds ice into the ocean daily on King George Island in Antarctica, changing the ecosystem around it. Every Minute, The Sea Rises As Our Future Drowns Credit Ferdi Rizkiyanto at www.behance.net OO Some Sea Level Rise Already Unstoppable; Cutting Carbon Emissions Will Stop Even More - due to the enduring effects of CO2, the global heating driving sea level rise will continue even after we cut emissions, making it ever more urgent that we cut emissions as much and fast as possible. OO Ancient Warm Period Hints At Bigger-Than-Expected Sea Level Rise up to 18 feet over many centuries even if governments cap global warming around current levels, scientists said. Advertisement * * WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW @@ Climate Change 101: Why Care? What You Need to Know - Bill Nye tells it all in five minutes amid graphic, dynamic, engaging, compelling imagery. Check it Out! STAND UP FOR THE ARCTIC - Urge your senator here to prevent drilling for oil in the Arctic, which is already heating far faster than elsewhere due to the burning of fossil fuels. * * TIME TO STAND UP FOR A DECENT CLIMATE Shedding Icy Tears as humanity fails to muster the will needed to stop the unfolding climate catastrophe. Source slightlywarped.com OO It's Time To Stand Up For The Climate--And For Civilization says Bill McKibben. Takeaways: 19th century scientists predicted how climate change could - and would - occur; 20th century scientists documented developing climate change. 20th and 21st diplomats built international bridges to tackle climate change. These foundations of civilization - science, diplomacy and civility - were hard won, but could fade fast. Trump could slow the pace of progress in tackling climate change, Enough to ensure far more disastrous climate change than we might prevent. How Fast We Act on Climate Change Will Determine How Many Children Will Die From It now and in the future. Related Headline: OO Bill Moyers: The Climate Threat Posed By Right-Wing Populism's Rising Tide - nationalist populist movements are skeptical about cooperative bodies, like the EU and the UN, which are essential for international progress on climate change. But... OO America Isn't That Divided On The Environment - Studies show there is no political divide on: Conserving water during droughts; Conserving electricity; For farmers, mitigating climate change by better soil management. Meh montage OO As Trump Takes Power, Americans' Concern Over Climate Change Hits Record Levels - with a clear majority backing action to tackle climate change. OO Trump Doesn't Represent American Views On Climate Change polls show, an issue that many experts consider to be one of the greatest threats of our time. OO Americans Are Aware Of, And Want Action On, Climate Change poll shows. OO Trump Supporters Don't Like His Climate Policies - Recent polls indicate that most Republicans support: participation in international climate agreements, like the Paris accord; taxing and regulating carbon emissions. getting more of US energy from clean renewable energy, and less from fossil fuels. Why did they vote for Trump? Many were convinced Hillary was worse, climate wasn't a high priority, and they didn't take many of his policy proposals seriously. (Current events must be jolting many of those Trumpers now.) Advertisement WHAT WE CAN DO OO The Anti-Trump Opposition Began At The Women's March: Here's How To Grow It - unite many factions around themes of broad agreement, one of which is climate change. OO Support Science-Informed Leadership And Candidates Running For Office * * TRUMP TRUMPED BY CLIMATE CHANGE Donald Trump's Children Likely Face Climate Apocalypse in their lifetimes; the likely crash of civilization that follows will crash their fortune and survival chances for their kids - and all of ours. Unless, of course, Trump acts to cut emissions, hugely. Source heavy.com OO Trump Aides' List Of First Days' Changes On Energy include: Not weighing climate change when approving pipelines, allowing new drilling for oil, gas, or other major actions; Ignoring the social cost of carbon emissions; Removing the State Department's ability to grant permission for cross border pipelines. The above changes run counter to Trump saying "Protecting clean air and clean water, conserving our natural habitats, and preserving our natural reserves and resources will remain a high priority." Surprised? OO Trump's Regulatory Freeze Halts Obama Rules To Promote Greater Energy Efficiency Madagascar Drought Means Starving Children Credit Nicholas Kristof at the New York Times OO How Climate Denying Trump Is Killing Children - By refusing to tackle it he allows the US to fuel the world with climate changing pollution that spells death for many children from increasingly extreme weather, such as the grisly drought in Madagascar, leaving a trail of dead children and desperate survivors. Advertisement OO Trump The Destroyer Arrives - His cabinet picks collectively will lead an effort to undermine the legacy of Mr. Obama on the environment, health care, immigration, civil rights and education - with no ideas on how to replace them. Daily Climate Editor Laura Pyle notes: "We have by far the highest I.Q.," Trump said, "of any cabinet ever assembled." MEH: Perhaps he meant IQ as in Inauspicious Quacks. OO Trump Tweeted The Wrong Ivanka. She Gave Him Climate Advice. Credit David Horsey at the Los Angeles Times, modified OO The Real Climate Hoax: Trump Cabinet Nominees Cast Doubt On Climate Change even if they don't flat out deny it or its cause, while the overwhelming scientific consensus shows their doubt to be unreasonable and misleading. OO New Studies Show Rex Tillerson Is Wrong About Climate Risks - While he accepted climate change exists, the Secretary of State nominee nevertheless proceeded to downplay its risks. OO Trump Nominees Pruitt And Perry Continue To Play Down Climate Change Credit David Horsey at the Los Angeles Times EPA Nominee Scott Pruitt: Doesn't know that abolishing each statute it administers would spark a debate in Congress; that abolishing each statute it administers would spark a debate in Congress; Could be an EPA wrecking ball , given that his career has grew from suing the EPA , given that his career has grew from suing the EPA Pruitt's EPA may loosen California's car pollution rules and in other states, too, ultimately worsening US air pollution. Was grilled on his conflicting fossil fuel industry ties . . Didn't tackle Oklahoma's fracking earthquake epidemic, critics charge. Department Of Interior Nominee Ryan Zinke: promotes coal , ignores clean renewable energy,and the need to act on climate change. , ignores clean renewable energy,and the need to act on climate change. pledges to undo federal regulations over federal lands while protecting them. Do you smell hypocrisy? OO Rick Perry Pledges Support For DOE Research, Renewables As Trump Plans Drastic Agency Cuts OO Trump's Education Nominee Betsy Devos Favors Policies That Dilute Science Education favoring diverting taxpayer dollars towards allowing enabling parents to use private schools where there is no accountability for the quality and accuracy of the science taught there. @@ A Message to Trump from Climate Scientists - lets hope Mike Pence is watching this, since this is probably beyond Trump's attention span... more importantly, Americans in general should see this. Advertisement OO Trump Ignores Climate At Our Peril OO Climate Change A Growing Challenge For A New President -Even As He Denies It Prove You're Not A Loser, Trump! OO Donald Trump Sees The Future In Coal. China Sees The Future In Renewables. Who's Making The Safer Bet? OO America Is Losing The Energy Innovation Race. Trump Can Help Win It - and create 1000s of new jobs, if he's smart enough to recognize the opportunity. * * TRUMP DENIES PUBLIC ACCESS TO EPA, OTHER FEDERAL AGENCIES OO Democratic Senators Launch Salvo At Trump's Blocking Of Information in a letter to him and made public here. OO Information Lockdown Hits Trump's Federal Agencies, Closed To Public -- AND Congress in many cases. OO Office That Protects Whistleblowers Fires Warning Shot Across Trump's Bow: Whistleblowers Rights Ride Above Trump's Silencing Advertisement "Under the anti-gag provision, agencies cannot impose nondisclosure agreements and policies that fail to include required language that informs employees that their statutory right to blow the whistle supersedes the terms and conditions of the nondisclosure agreement or policy," the OSC press release said. @@ Erosion - Donald Trump Climate Denial Vs Reality Music Video, by Rapper Baba Brinkman. In the absence of federal information, this might become a more significant way to inform the public. Hit it, Baba! OO Trump's War On EPA Regulations Will Kill Jobs And A Lot Of People - Clean air and water standards create jobs, spur innovation, and save lives. OO EPA Scientific Studies Must Be Vetted By Administration Before Release OO EPA Scientists' Work May Face 'Case By Case' Review By Trump Team official says. OO Trump WH Website Fabricates Benefits Of No Health Regulations On First Day Takeaways: The White House website said eliminating power plant climate rules, and other environmental rules would "greatly help American workers, increasing wages by more than30 billion over the next 7 years." (Less than20 per person yearly, even if true.) Its source was a flawed discredited 2015 economic study supported by the fossil fuel industry; it did not include the costs of pollution, especially on health, nor the world market trend away from fossil fuels. The website distorted the findings of even this flawed study. Welcome to Trump's Dark Fantasy World! OO All References To Climate Change Deleted From The White House Website RESISTING TRUMP'S BLOCK OF VITAL SCIENCE Scientists Are Starting To Stand Up for Science Source Facebook OO Scientists Are Planning The Next Big Washington March * * CLIMATE LEADERSHIP OO President Obama Transfers $500 Million To Green Climate Fund in attempt to protect Paris deal. This leaves the US owing $2 billion; Donald Trump is expected to stop further payments. * * CLUELESS LEADERSHIP Wisconsin Chooses to Mislead Public on climate change ignoring on its state websites the overwhelming consensus that it is caused by burning fossil fuels. OO Wisconsin: State Agencies Wipe Human-Caused Climate Change From Websites; Scientists Object saying "Rapid changes in climate are threatening public health, safety, and natural resources. Failing to accurately inform the public about these threats and the opportunities to reduce them, violates the trust we place in our public institutions." Advertisement * * GOOD CLEAN NEWS OO China's War On Coal Continues -- It Just Canceled 104 New Coal Plants - these halted projects are equal in size to one-third of the US coal fleet. It's potentially a very, very big deal for efforts to fight climate change. OO Toyota, Shell Among Giants Betting Nearly $11 Billion On Hydrogen As A Clean Fuel with plans to invest a combined 10 billion euros in hydrogen-related products within five years. OO Saudi Arabia To Launch $30-50 Billion Renewable Energy Program Soon says its energy minister. The Sun Grinds the Grain at this solar powered mill in Zambia. Source news.trust.org OO Africa: Zambia Tries New Way To Beat Drought - Solar Grain Mills hoping to hold down the cost of milling grain, and hold the line on food prices. OO Norway: Oslo Temporarily Bans Diesel Cars To Combat Pollution despite angering some motorists after they were urged to buy diesel cars a few years ago. * * SOCIAL REPERCUSSIONS Credit H. Raab at Flickr OO Climate Change Will Hurt Crops More Than It Helps Them study suggests, reaffirming an earlier study's idea that high temperatures could seriously harm the production of some of the world's most important food crops, including corn, soybeans and wheat. Advertisement Together, these 3 crops account for about a third of total cropland used on Earth. The implications of these studies are catastrophic for the world's food supply. OO Big Unfinished Business For Trump: Averting Serious Southwest Water Shortages - Outgoing Interior Secretary Sally Jewell laid out a game plan this; whether Trumps uses it is unknown. OO Indigenous Canadians Face A Crisis As Climate Change Eats Away Island Home - ask not for whom the bell tolls... * * GOOD IDEAS @@ Limit Trump's TV Viewing, Aides Try - to keep him from tweeting explosive and insane ideas he gets from watching TV, notes Seth Meyers truthfully in this recent "Late Night" segment. OO Even Conservatives Question Trump's Fitness: Maybe Trump Isn't 'Lying' OO Psychological 'Vaccine' Could Help Immunize Public Against 'Fake News' On Climate Change - by showing the errors and illogic imbedded in the climate myths that climate deniers create, when communicating with the public on climate change. Related Headline: OO A Fake News Vaccine? Climate Change Misinformation Can Be Fought With 'Inoculation' scientists say. Advertisement OO Social Will Needed, If Technology Is To Stave Off Climate Change - without the societal will to decarbonize, even the best technologies won't be enough. OO Evaluating The Social Cost Of Carbon Is Crucial To Tackling Carbon Pollution new ways to do so are evolving to keep up with the best available science. * * NATURAL REPERCUSSIONS OO Tibetan Tree Rings Trace Climate Change To 1870s when the Industrial Revolution revved up carbon emissions worldwide. The new study shows that before the 1870s, the temperature difference between summer and winter was widening. After the 1870s, this difference started to decrease, a trend that holds to the present day: as temperatures rise overall, winters become warmer faster than summers, closing the temperature gap between the two seasons. Trying to Rid Itself of Killing Ticks, A Moose Rubs Itself Smooth Source New Hampshire Fish and Game Department Advertisement OO Ticks, Thriving In Warm Weather, Take A Ghastly Toll On New England Moose - Researchers say droves of winter ticks, which flourish when fall is warm and the winter comes late, are killing moose calves. They have "wasted away." * * SPEAKING OUT A Bonnie Green Prince Charles Credit Richard Stonehouse at Getty Images OO UK's Green Prince Charles To Challenge Trump On Climate Change during the climate change denier's scheduled UK visit - unless, of course, Charles can avoid Trump altogether and let his princely sons meet Trump instead. OO Bernie Sanders To Scott Pruitt: 'Why Is The Climate Changing?' - Pruitt noted that humans may contribute to climate change "in some manner," and Sanders insisted that the science says a great deal more than that. OO Al Gore's Inconvenient Sequel To Open Sundance Festival in an acutely political year. Viewing Climate Change From Decades of Winters in the Colorado Rockies, Billy Barr amassed a unique, massive and valuable record of climate data. OO Billy Barr: The Hermit Who Inadvertently Shaped Climate-Change Science - Moving to the Rocky Mountains Biological Lab four decades ago, he started recording winter climate data that forms a unique, long term record of climate change in the Rocky Mountains. [FD: I know him personally, and he truly is an amazing person.] Advertisement * * FOSSIL FUEL FOLLIES OO The Great Lakes: Fossil Fuel Time Bomb Ticking In Largest US Freshwater Supply - Two 63-year-old pipes lie exposed at the bottom of the current-whipped Straits of Mackinac, "the worst possible place" for a spill in all the Lakes. OO Taxpayer Subsidized Coal Mining On Federal Land Under Review - one of the only places where, because of taxpayer subsidies in the form of cheap leases, coal can compete with natural gas. OO Land Rush For Oil In US Permian Basin: Exxon Mobil Is The Latest Player acquiring a major parcel in West Texas and New Mexico -- more climate-changing fuel we should not use. Disappearing Views - and People as air pollution takes its toll on both. Source AFP at www.scmp.com OO China, Japan, Vietnam: Air Pollution Map Reveals Countries At Risk Of 'Airpocalypse. - A study from Greenpeace International and Harvard University has discovered coal-fired power plants built in these countries are slowly killing people and creating an "airpocalypse." OO Southeast Asia's Coal Boom Could Cause 70,000 Deaths Yearly By 2030 report says. Conversely, about 50,000 lives could be saved yearly by 2030 if no new coal-fired power plants are built in Southeast Asia, South Korea, Japan or Taiwan, a new study finds. Advertisement OO China: Illegal Oil Refineries Produce High-Risk Fuel, Dump Acid Sludge To Make Toxic Lakes - A recent drug crackdown exposed evidence that many illegal oil refineries still operate in China These refineries sell home-processed diesel and oil to trucks and create safety hazards. Chairman Mao Would Have A Fit - all these bicycles for hire, discarded in a pile by people who were finished with them, but chose not to return them. Source Imaginechina/Rex/Shutterstock OO Chinese Choose Polluting Cars Over Clean Bicycles - Where is Chinese enforcement when it really counts? OO How Airlines Can Fly Around New Carbon Rules and a flying boom means a boom in airline pollution. OO Canada's Trudeau Is Under Fire For His Not So Green Record having approved two oil pipelines and a major gas facility. Advertisement * * FIXING CLIMATE CHANGE @@ A Simple And Smart Way To Fix Climate Change given by Dan Miller in 2014 at a Ted talk suggests a way to profit as we tackle climate change, by finally charging those who sell and use fossil fuels - and distributing the revenues back to all of us. The strategy is sure to speed transition to clean renewable energy. What's not to like? Check it out! If we do not live sustainably, Our children will die inhumanely. @@ The Cost of Unintended Pregnancy: Too Young Teen childbearing cost US taxpayers $9+ Billion in 2010 And the costs of raising a child usually ensures decades, if not a life, of poverty for its mother. - US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Advertisement WHAT YOU CAN DO Help prevent unintended pregnancies in your community: publicize where women can access affordable contraception. They can go here to find locations: And there are many more actions you can do, right here. * * * SOLAR KEEPS DANCING OO Republican Political Donors Install Nearly As Much Solar As Democratic Donors - political party affiliation doesn't matter. OO Despite Headwinds, Big Capital Continues To Flow Into Solar Projects, Processes And Startups - A billion-dollar roundup of some of the bigger and more interesting solar deals so far this year. OO Mapping Tool Identifies Michigan's Upper Peninsula Brownfield Sites For Solar Development identifying nearly 80 brownfield sites in the Upper Peninsula that could host the development of more than 750 megawatts of solar. Check it out here, right now! * * * WHY WE SHOULD ACT NOW: RISING RISKS Daily Climate Change: Global Map of Unusual Temperatures, Jan 30, 2017 Source cci-reanalyzer.org How unusual has the weather been? No one event is "caused" by climate change, but global warming, which is predicted to increase unusual, extreme weather, is having a daily effect on weather, worldwide. Advertisement Looking above at recent temperature anomalies, much of the US, Canada, and the waters surrounding them are experiencing warmer than normal temperatures: the eastern Pacific warm spot continues and, despite recent precipitation, so does the drought in most of California. Much of the areas surrounding the North Pole are experiencing much warmer than normal temperatures - not good news for our Arctic thermal shield of ice. Hotter than usual temperatures continue to dominate human habitats. * * * There is, of course, much more news on the consequences and solutions to climate change. To get it, check out this annotated resource list I've compiled, "Climate Change News Resources," at Wordpress.com here. For more information on the science of climate change, its consequences and solutions you can view my annotated list of online information resources here. To help you understand just what science does and does NOT do, check this out! What's Your Mormonism? I recently listened to a podcast on A Thoughtful Faith where the host Gina Colvin invited Peter Bleakley on to talk about his view of Mormonism. While I disagree with some of his ideas of the best parts of Mormonism and about whether or not the original theology of Mormonism is rich enough and coherent enough to sustain inquisitive modern questers, I love his idea that we can reject parts of the religion pressed on us by others while holding fast to the parts that we grew up with or have gained in the years since childhood that seem true and bright in goodness to us. Here are some of the ideas I sometimes hear either preached directly or indirectly about Mormonism which I reject: 1.God loves us only if we are worthy of being loved. His love is not unconditional. 2.We cannot disagree with prophets and apostles of the church and still remain in God's good graces. 3.What we wear is more important than what we say or do. In fact, what we wear prescribes what we say and do and forces others to act in ways that they have no control over, so we are guilty of double sinning. Advertisement 4.What we drink or eat or show the world outwardly matters more than how we treat our fellow humans. It is better to be a good example of righteousness and to protect our own purity than to risk what might happen if we stepped outside of our own protective spaces. 5.There are some sins that Christ did not atone for and that we will have to suffer for ourselves. 6.Children can be separated eternally from parents they love and who love them dearly by choosing a different path than Mormonism. 7.God makes us suffer because it is the only way to improve us to His level. 8.Expressing anger and hurt makes others uncomfortable and therefore is not what God wants us to do. We must repress any negative emotions because it looks bad. 9.We must show our loyalty to the church first and foremost, and never speak any criticism of any leaders, past or present. Advertisement 10.Wealthy members have proven they are following God's will by their worldly success and therefore deserve to be elevated in the church hierarchy. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates voiced support for President Donald Trump's idea to establish safe zones in Syria, which comes as no surprise given it would boost Sunni extremists who want to topple President Bashar Assad's secular regime. The White House, for its part, wants to bottle up refugees inside Syria to prevent Muslim blockade runners from reaching U.S. shores. However, instituting safe zones would require a costly military intervention and risks empowering the very jihadist forces Trump has vowed to defeat. On Sunday, Saudi Arabian King Salman and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad in separate phone calls with Trump agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen to help refugees "displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said in a press release. The conversations come in the wake of a White House executive order banning immigrants from seven Muslim countries, the original draft of which directed the Defense Department to begin devising blueprints for Syrian safe zones. Last week, Trump told ABC News that he would "absolutely do safe zones in Syria," echoing sentiments he expressed on the campaign trail. Advertisement Yet the final version of said executive order excluded the safe zone provision, probably to the chagrin of Al Qaeda in Syria and like-minded militants. But now it appears Trump only suspended the decision, perhaps calculating that he better get buy-in from stakeholders in the region before embarking on the initiative. Consequences not too difficult to foresee inimical to U.S. national security interests far outweigh any conceivable benefits of instituting in Syria a single so-called safe zone, a euphemism for a no-fly zone - itself a de facto declaration of war. The Pentagon estimates it would require 30,000 boots on the ground and cost $1 billion per month to implement. Moreover, a no-fly zone, which entails establishing air supremacy over the safe areas, risks sparking a direct confrontation with Syrian and Russian forces operating in the region. Safe zones also tend to attract jihadists who can target swarms of enclosed refugees, akin to shooting fish in a barrel. In fact, these types of arrangements, studies have shown, often become terrorist breeding grounds, as Joshua Hampson from the Niskanen Center think tank argued, especially if the camps are not adequately supported or are poorly run. Because of squalid conditions and lack of economic prospects, safe zone residents are often susceptible to radicalization and upon returning home "may carry the seeds of the next generation of terrorists." They could also serve as willing recruits for extremist groups to join the jihad against the Assad regime. Advertisement Trump would ironically adopt the exact same no-fly zone policy Hillary Clinton was rightly ridiculed for during one of their debates, and would align himself with liberal humanitarian interventionists who want to save Syrian civilians by bombing them. It also runs counter to candidate Trump's vows to oppose U.S. military adventurism, such as the oft-cited intervention to topple Gaddafi, which drove Libya into a destabilizing tailspin and afforded the Islamic State the chance to gain a foothold in the country. Trump appealed to many voters for eschewing such unnecessary excursions while Clinton was framed as the imperialist nation-building candidate, as some observers have noted. "Whatever Trump voters thought they were getting by supporting him, I'm reasonably sure sending tens of thousands of Americans to occupy parts of Syria for years to come wasn't it," Daniel Larsen wrote in the American Conservative. Trump, however, will have to resist the neocons among his advisors and the Sunni extremist government in Ankara which would love nothing more than to use safe zones to pave the road for effecting regime change in Damascus. One can expect Turkey to welcome Trump's proposal with open arms. Former national security advisor for former President Bill Clinton, Gwenyth Todd, warned this author that Trump could fall into the same trap as his predecessor. "Trump will face the same risk of treachery from his inner circle as Obama did," Todd said in an interview shortly after the November presidential election. "Trump does not know whom he can trust on foreign policy and who among his growing entourage is on the payroll of expansionist regional leaders like Turkish President [Recep Tayyip] Erdogan." Advertisement The answer to addressing the root cause of the refugee crisis requires a radical departure from Washington orthodoxy, a paradigm shift many hoped Trump would embrace along with his pragmatic-minded Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who perhaps still has time to influence White House strategy. Tillerson might be able to rein in Trump, who seems obsessed with setting a record for fulfilling campaign promises within his first couple weeks in office. Betsy DeVos testifies before the Senate Health, Education and Labor Committee confirmation hearing to be next Secretary of Education on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., January 17, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas If confirmed as President Donald Trumps Education Secretary, Betsy DeVos path to the Cabinet would represent a chilling civics lesson for the students whose educations she will shape in her new role. At DeVos confirmation hearing, Sen. Bernie Sanders posed the question, Do you think, if you were not a multi-billionaire, if your family has not made hundreds of millions of dollars of contributions to the Republican Party, that you would be sitting here today? Advertisement DeVos road to power has been paved by her family fortune, invested as both carrot and stick as she has driven relentlessly to shape education policy to her personal views. Opponents of her nomination have raised strong concerns about the controversial education policies she advocates that would shift public resources away from public schools and warn that she would weaken federal policies that protect vulnerable students from bias. With little experience in the field, her sole qualification seems to be years of buying the policies and politics that serve her best. The Senators who are considering her nomination have received nearly $1 million in campaign contributions from the DeVos family, which may give the appearance that high-ranking government positions can be bought by and sold to the highest bidder not the lesson our students should be learning. Most major donors wont admit what their money buys, but DeVos is not like most donors. She brags about it. In 1997, when the DeVoses were the largest source of soft money contributions for Republicans according to Betsy DeVos, she wrote in a Roll Call op-ed, I have decided, however, to stop taking offense at the suggestion that we are buying influence. Now, I simply concede the point... We expect a return on our investment. Advertisement Shes an heir to two enormous, Michigan-based family fortunes, one derived from her fathers auto parts business and the other through her spouse, Dick DeVos, whose father was a co-founder of the Amway multi-level marketing firm. Together, she and her family are worth more than $5 billion and have spent hundreds of millions of dollars to influence policy-making, spending generously on both lobbying and elections. At the heart of her civic philosophy is a prime principle: if you cant win playing by the rules, use your money to change them or ignore them. DeVos has been working behind the scenes to give donors like her more influence in our politics by effectively removing regulation of campaign money. The strategy she funded led to a series of damaging Supreme Court decisions including the landmark Citizen United ruling, which made billionaires like DeVos far more important in American politics. From Michigan, where DeVos served three terms as the GOPs state party chair, DeVos worked to rig the rules in her favor another way by pouring money into races across the country to win Republican control of state legislatures at the time when new district lines were being drawn for state and federal offices. The success of the gerrymandering project DeVos funded allowed politicians and donors like DeVos to pick their voters instead of voters picking their politicians. In Michigan, the effort empowered the DeVos clan and the lawmakers they funded. Emboldened by their elevated status, they immediately passed right to work legislation that gutted the power of their biggest political opponent in Michigan, organized labor. In addition to making direct campaign contributions, shes organized and backed political non-profits to reward and punish state candidates across the country, based on how well their education positions aligned with hers. In Louisiana, for example, where privatization of public schools has been a live wire issue, DeVos and her organizations have invested more than $1.6 million in recent state elections. In Ohio, her groups spent $870,000 in state elections a decade ago despite a formal warning that they were breaking state laws. They were fined a total of $5.2 million. Years later the fines remain unpaid. Advertisement The hearings at the International Court of Justice in the Hague ( Netherlands) into the Ukraine's motion to bring Russia to justice for acts of terrorism and discrimination in the course of its illegal aggression against Ukraine will begin in March 2017, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Pavlo Klimkin has said. "The hearings will begin at the International Court of Justice in March on our motion, which we filed against Russia, because it consistently violates the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination," he said on the Inter TV channel on Sunday night. As reported, on January 16, 2017 Ukraine filed a lawsuit with the International Court of Justice against the Russian Federation in order to bring it to justice for the acts of terrorism and discrimination in the course of its illegal aggression against Ukraine. The lawsuit was filed under the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism and the International Convention on Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. When Rachel Maddow finished a 26-minute monologue that spanned two segments on her MSNBC program last Thursday night, her grave tones indicated that she thought she'd just delivered a whale of a story. But actually it was more like minnow -- and a specious one at that. Convoluted and labored, Maddow's narrative tried to make major hay out of a report from Moscow that a high-ranking Russian intelligence official had been dragged out of a meeting, arrested and charged with treason. Weirdly, Maddow kept presenting that barebones story as verification that Russia's President Vladimir Putin had directly ordered the hacking and release of Democratic campaign emails in order to get Donald Trump elected president. It was a free-associating performance worthy of Glenn Beck at a whiteboard. Maddow swirled together an array of facts, possible facts, dubious assertions and pure speculation to arrive at conclusions that were based on little more than her zeal to portray Trump as a tool of the Kremlin. Even when sober, Joe McCarthy never did it better. We might dismiss her performance as just another bit of stagecraft on "MSDNC," but Maddow was in sync with widespread fear-mongering by pundits and Democratic Party loyalists who think they're picking some low-hanging fruit to throw at Trump. But what they're doing is poisonous -- and extremely dangerous. The standard memes demanding hostility toward Putin virtually never address some crucial questions. Such as: What are the plausible results of escalating a new Cold War? Is it wise to push the U.S. government into evermore assertive brinkmanship with Russia? Wouldn't the degree of success in that endeavor increase the degree of danger that the antagonisms will spiral into a military confrontation and, from there, into a nuclear holocaust? Such questions don't seem to bother the likes of Maddow, who has largely built her TV career on mocking, impugning and denouncing Republicans. Fair enough, except when it isn't -- and when it latches onto a Democratic party line of attack: no matter how bogus the reasoning or how dire the potential consequences for humans and all other life on this planet. Sliding through a kind of time warp, Maddow's performance on the night of January 26 was akin to what the most extreme Republicans have reveled in doing to incumbent Democrats in past decades -- baiting them as accomplices of the Kremlin and warning against actual detente between the two countries. To be clear: Donald Trump has already shown himself to be a horrendous president in countless ways that matter, from his Cabinet appointments to his numerous corrosive statements to his executive orders on subjects ranging from family planning for women overseas to immigration at home. Why spin into agenda-driven conjecture and illogic when there are so many empirical reasons to directly challenge Trump? But for countless U.S. reporters and pundits as well as Democrats in Congress, the temptation to attack Trump as a servant of Putin is irresistible. The thrill of marching down Pennsylvania Avenue last Saturday with 500,000 other people for basic human rights for women spurred my memory of the first march for women's lives I ever attended. In 1989, I was a 21-year-old college student marching at a time when protestors were physically blockading women's health care clinics. Then, as now, I felt that we could change the world with the energy of the crowd. What I now realize decades later is that change doesn't just come with marching, but with acting. And the need to act is urgent. Though individuals no longer blockade health center doors (but women seeking access to reproductive health services often face harassment), politicians here in Wisconsin, at the national level and in state legislatures around the country pass law after law that has the same effect -- to deny women access to life-saving health care. In the next several weeks, Paul Ryan will attempt to push through his bill to deny Medicaid patients the ability to seek birth control, cervical and breast cancer screenings and testing and treatment for STDs from Planned Parenthood. No abortion services are provided with public funds. Ryan's measure will not only deny 6,000 individuals from his own district access to Planned Parenthood, but 50,000 patients throughout our state. Advertisement The Republican talking point is that other providers will step in. But we need look no further than our own state to know that this is a lie. When Governor Scott Walker in his first budget denied all state funds to Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin (PPWI), five rural health care clinics in Shawano, Johnson Creek, Chippewa Falls, Fond du Lac and Beaver Dam closed, impacting thousands of Wisconsin women and men. No other provider stepped in to provide the critical health services no longer available in these communities. A recent Guardian article entitled "Healthcare without Planned Parenthood: Wisconsin and Texas point to dark future," details the devastating consequences, including spikes in sexually transmitted diseases, increased pregnancy rates, and a void in the availability of these health care services. The only option now for these counties is to refer women to Planned Parenthoods in other counties. The question is how long these Planned Parenthood providers will be around if Paul Ryan and Scott Walker have their way. The reality is that PPWI is one of the few charity health care providers to underserved people. Over 54% of PPWI's health centers are in health professional shortage areas, which are rural or medically underserved areas. In 73% of the counties that PPWI serves, there is no provider who has the capacity to absorb PPWI's patients. And PPWI loses money on every single Medicaid patient they serve, a result few providers can, or are willing to, absorb. PPWI's mission is not profit, but to serve patients. This week, my Democratic colleagues and I sent letters to both Paul Ryan and Scott Walker calling on them to cease their efforts to deny public funds to Planned Parenthood. These politicians shouldn't be jeopardizing the life and health of Wisconsin men and women to score political points. Without a massive public backlash against their efforts, that will be the result. And women and families will suffer. Advertisement NEW YORK, NY - DECEMBER 6: Steve Mnuchin, President-elect Donald Trump's nominee for treasury secretary, arrives at Trump Tower, December 6, 2016 in New York City. Trump and his transition team are in the process of filling cabinet and other high level positions for the new administration. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images) There's compelling evidence to show that Steve Mnuchin, Donald Trump's pick for Secretary of the Treasury, lied to the Senate in both written and verbal testimony. Senate Republicans seem to be taking these offenses in stride. None of the GOP's "independents" and "mavericks" have indicated that they will oppose his nomination. If they don't speak up, these Republicans are placing partisan politics over the rule of law and the integrity of their own institution. Advertisement False Witness Mnuchin received a written question from Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) about the practice of 'robo-signing' at OneWest, the mortgage firm he ran as CEO. 'Robo-signing' is a form of perjury that occurs when a bank's employees submit foreclosure documents without reviewing them for accuracy, but falsely state that they have performed those reviews. In this way, banks can quickly foreclose on large numbers of homeowners without going through the processes required by law. Mnuchin replied, "OneWest Bank did not 'robo-sign' documents ..." Note that Mnuchin didn't equivocate, or use qualifying statements like "to the best of my knowledge" or "as far as I can recall." He flatly stated that OneWest never engaged in the practice. But an investigation by the Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch found that OneWest "frequently used robo-signers." David Dayen noted that a 2011 consent order from the Office of Thrift Supervision included extensive evidence of OneWest's robo-signing activity, and that an employee of OneWest admitted to robo-signing documents in a 2009 deposition. Advertisement That wasn't Mnuchin's only 'misstatement.' He also failed to report more than $100 million in assets when he submitted his initial financial disclosure form, and did not disclose that he is the director of an investment fund headquartered in the Cayman Islands. (It turns out that Mnuchin is registered to vote in two different states, California and New York. Neither is within commuting distance of the Cayman Islands.) The nominee also neglected to mention that he plays a management role in seven other investment funds. Mnuchin called the mistakes "an oversight," adding: "I think as you all can appreciate, filling out these government forms is quite complicated." Sen. Robert Menendez replied, "It doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand the words 'list all positions.'" Advise and Submit The applicable statute on Congressional testimony says that "whoever, in any matter within the jurisdiction of the executive, legislative, or judicial branch of the government of the United States, knowingly and willfully" falsifies or conceals information has committed a crime punishable by fine or imprisonment. Sen. Susan Collins waxed eloquent about the Senate's responsibility last year, when a Democratic president was slated to appoint a Supreme Court nominee. "Our role in the Senate is to evaluate the nominee's temperament, intellect, experience, integrity and respect for the Constitution and the rule of law," Collins wrote. Advertisement Maine's other Republican Senator, Olympia Snowe, also said that one of the factors she uses to assess an Obama Supreme Court nominee was "respect for the rule of law." Will either of these senators apply the same standard - "respect for the rule of law" - to Trump's Treasury nominee? Then there's Sen. Lindsey Graham. Graham served as a military lawyer for six and a half years as an officer in the US Air Force JAG Corps, eventually rising to the rank of colonel. He had the common sense to say, "ISIL loves Donald Trump because he is giving them an opportunity to bring people their way." Graham's been burning up Twitter lately with scathing anti-Trump tweets like this one: "Ultimately, I fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism." Will "respect for the rule of law" lead attorney Graham to vote "no" on Mnuchin? What about the Senate's much-vaunted Republican "maverick," John McCain? Or Alaska Senator Linda Murkowski, a Republican who won as a write-in candidate and once defied her party while saying, "Politics be damned"? Advertisement Somebody? Anybody? The Silent Majority If any Republican Senators are disturbed by Mnuchin's behavior, they seem to laying pretty low. After Mnuchin testified, in fact, most reports suggested that Republicans were happy with his testimony. We've heard a lot over the years about "good Republicans" who "reach across the aisle," who respect the legislative process and place patriotism above politics. Where are they now? Have the "good Republicans" become so partisan that they're no longer willing to speak up against dishonesty, apparent lawbreaking, or contempt toward the Senate itself? So far they've been silent about Steve Mnuchin. Before August 2009, town hall meetings hosted by members of Congress were pretty routine affairs. But, after that summer, the very mention of a town hall meeting sent shivers through their spines of those elected to represent you. Indivisible, a guidebook for action, explains why -- and why it matters to the mass movement to resist Trump and his agenda. We have boiled it down to just a few minutes in this short video introduction to whet your appetite. As the Indivisible guide says so clearly, much of what it takes to succeed comes down to showing up. Members of Congress care about their constituents -- their employers, as it were. Sure, they care about money too. But there is little that frightens a politician more than activated angry constituents because they know that those constituents will vote, and may well organize against them. In 2009, a fairly small but extremely vocal group of these constituents who were concerned about the move to enact what later become the Affordable Care Act popped up at town hall meetings. They were angry. They interrupted representatives and senators as they were trying to speak. Suddenly, these traditionally dull, often sparsely attended meetings became great television. It began to look like a movement. Representatives and senators who may well have supported some elements of health care reform began to run scared. The rest, a they say, is history -- the history of the Tea Party and one we can learn from. Advertisement The most important lesson we must learn is that we need to act locally, that we all have a role to play and that role is exercising our own constituent power. Donald Trump's agenda doesn't depend on Donald Trump. It depends on your Members of Congress rubber-stamping it. The good news from our stand point is that politicians wake up every morning thinking about reelection. Make your voice heard locally and they will listen -- or they will find new jobs. This is true of course for politicians who oppose what you believe. It will weaken the resolve of Trump's lackeys in Congress. But it is also important to talk to those who should or do share your values. All of our elected officials must know that we expect them to stand strong, to stand together, and to treat an attack on one like an attack on all. For children living in warzones, a 'normal childhood' does not exist. Journeys to school, the safety of home, and even friends and family, slowly disappear and are replaced with explosions, violence and insecurity. Witnessing deaths and living in constant danger is the harsh reality of everyday life. For these children, the struggle for survival worsens each day as the perpetrators of war search for even more brutal weapons to kill and destroy. On top of the relentless violence, in countries such as Syria the most basic means of survival -- water -- has become a weapon of war. As a result of violence, the flow of water from the Wadi Barada and Fijeh Springs in Damascus, which supply 70 per cent of water to the city was interrupted. As a result, an estimated 5.5 million Syrians in Damascus and rural Damascus, which include immensely vulnerable children and their families, are living without access to running water -- marking the end of a devastating year and a bleak start to 2017. On 27 December 2016 in east Aleppo City in the Syrian Arab Republic, a boy collects water from UNICEF-supported a water point in Shakoor neighbourhood.Photo credit: UNICEF/UN046879/Al-Issa Advertisement The destruction of water sources is not new in Syria. There have been 30 deliberate water cuts in 2016 -- in Aleppo, Damascus, Hama, Raqqa and Dara. Pumps were destroyed and water sources contaminated in clear violation of human rights. For many children, the lack of water supply locally means they are forced to walk for hours in search of it, which puts them at a real risk of exploitation, violence and even death. In 2015, 11 children were killed when collecting water for their families. In addition to physical dangers along the way, collecting water from unregulated sources becomes all the more tragic for children because, if the bullets don't kill them, the water might. Untreated or contaminated water exposes children to Faecal Transmitted Infections (FTIs) which cause life-threatening diseases like diarrhoea. The water shortage in Damascus underlines a growing and multi-faceted problem in conflict. In Syria, there are 13.5 million people in need of safe water, around 6 million of whom are children. In some areas only 15 per cent of people have access to safe water and there is an estimated 50 per cent reduction in water availability across the country, forcing families to spend up to 25 per cent of their income on water. We need to address water access concerns. Solving Syria's water crisis is a crucial part of the humanitarian response and can lay the foundation for rebuilding the war-torn country. We must ask ourselves what the future holds for the people of Syria considering the continuing drought and the need to replace a dated water system. At the very core of UNICEF's work in humanitarian emergencies is the provision of equitable access to water, sanitation and hygiene to some of the most vulnerable and excluded communities. No child should have to live a day without access to water, hygiene and sanitation and water should never be used as a weapon of war -- when it is, civilians and children suffer the most. Advertisement UNICEF is in Syria providing solutions to the water crisis and helping ensure that children's access to water is not dangerous. Working with partners, we deliver water to homes to prevent children having to risk their lives in search for it; we rehabilitate and maintain water-pumping stations and generators, and we provide fuel for generators to supply millions of people with drinking water. The late Antonin Scalia was almost universally regarded as a brilliant jurist who not only wrote more beautifully than any Supreme Court justice since Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. but also transformed the nature of constitutional interpretation itself. President Trump stated during the election campaign that he would "appoint judges very much in the mold of Justice Scalia." It is also Scalia's seat that the president will be nominating someone to fill on Thursday. The current cacophony about which judge on the president's short list is the most "Scalia-esque" is therefore understandable. But it is misguided. I mean no disrespect to Justice Scalia--his Supreme Court opinions are the most fun for law professors to teach because he wrote so well--but the justice the president should be using as a model when selecting Scalia's replacement is Clarence Thomas. Why? For two primary reasons. First, because no justice in the history of the Court has understood the connection between our nation's two founding documents, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States, better than Justice Thomas. He has been reading, writing, and speaking about the subject since his days as chairman of the EEOC during the Reagan Administration. Although opponents of Thomas's nomination to the Court a quarter of a century ago, such as Harvard's Laurence Tribe, tried to use Thomas's commitment to the principles of the Declaration against him, they were foolish to do so. After all, Thomas Jefferson penned the Declaration in 1776 as "an expression of the American mind," Abraham Lincoln invoked the Declaration in the 1850s and '60s to help end slavery, and Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have a Dream" speech in 1963 was sown from the Declaration's promise that every person in America would one day live in a nation "where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." Advertisement Justice Thomas shares this vision of the American regime. For example, he reminded the faculty and students of James Madison University in Virginia that Madison, the chief architect of the Constitution, based the Constitution on "universal principles, [which] we find ... most succinctly and, indeed, elegantly stated by Madison's close friend, Thomas Jefferson, in our Declaration of Independence." Thomas went on in his speech to describe how the Constitution secures the rights promised to all Americans by the Declaration. President Trump would be well served by reading Justice Thomas's James Madison Day Lecture. He also should read Thomas's Lincoln Day address to the Claremont Institute. That speech, in my judgment, is the most significant speech about the Declaration since Rev. King's "I Have a Dream." There, Thomas urges the American people "to be ever vigilant in reminding us--me and everyone else who has the privilege of serving our nation through public office--of the principles of our Founding and how they apply to the controversies of our time." The second reason that President Trump should use Justice Thomas as a model when selecting Scalia's replacement is less jurisprudential than the first, but at the present moment in American politics--arguably the meanest and the most uncivil in our history--it is probably more important. Justice Scalia, for all his skill as a literary stylist, sometimes crossed the line with his impassioned rhetoric. And as we all know, the presidential election campaign that led to Donald Trump's victory was frequently caustic, to put it mildly, and the opening days of the new Administration have not deviated from that path. Thomas, in contrast, has an unparalleled reputation on the Court for being kind to everyone, no matter what their station in life. He mentors young persons. He visits people in the hospital. He lingers after speeches and events until everyone who wants to meet him, ask him a question, or take a photograph with him has had a chance to do so. He knows the names of everyone who works at the Court and he cares about them and their families. And when you interact with him one on one, as I have been fortunate enough to do on a couple of occasions, he wants to talk about you, not about himself. Advertisement America is more sharply divided than it has been in my lifetime, and it is not just a political divide. It is an ideological one, and it has led to an almost compulsive distrust. Few on either side show respect for those with whom they disagree or even listen to their opponents and try to understand their positions. The result is an exceptional level of animosity not just in the houses of Congress but in homes across America. Where does the church fit into this picture? One only has to ask the question to discover that the ideological fault line runs through the church too. Depending on which side of the line they find themselves, Christians are accusing their brothers and sisters on the other side of racism, xenophobia and greed or of biblical unfaithfulness, theological dishonesty and infidelity with an ungodly culture. Evangelicals sided overwhelmingly with the Republicans in the last election, and the mainline churches cried foul. They sided with the Democrats, so much so that Professor Will Willimon (once a United Methodist bishop) could call his beloved Methodist Church "the Democratic party on her knees." Which should we choose? Should the church side with Republicans or Democrats, with the right or with the left? Advertisement Neither. It is not the church's job to side with political parties. Her allegiance belongs to the kingdom of God. I hasten to add this does not mean that Christians should drop out of political engagement. Rather it means that Christians should use the political parties insofar as they promote justice and people's wellbeing. They should use the parties, not be used by them. The church must not allow itself and its gospel to be coopted. The church's position is roughly equivalent to the Free French (aka "The Resistance") during the Second World War. Their goal was to see a democratically-elected government, free of Nazi interference, established in their homeland. The church longs to see the kingdom of God established on earth. People who join the church are not joining a religious club or a theological society. They're joining The Resistance. They are ordinary men and women who know that things are not the way they are supposed to be in the world and, more importantly, in themselves. They are willing to change and to be change agents, and yet they are not committed to change; they are committed to their King. They have sworn allegiance to his kingdom. The people who belong to Christ - who have faith in him - are his operatives in hostile territory. Their job is not to set up a kingdom - the king will do that. Neither are they tasked with subduing the people around them. They force no one to follow their ways. Advertisement The job of a Resistance member is simple: always keep communication lines with headquarters open and, when a communication is received, follow orders. They gather regularly to send communications to headquarters, to be encouraged and to receive instructions. But when they leave their gatherings they do not leave the Resistance. Instead, they go into their schools, into their places of work, into public settings and private homes and work for the Resistance; that is, they obey their leader. They make car parts and study history and teach elementary kids and drive trucks and wait tables; they do the kinds of things they've always done - that everyone else does - but unlike everyone else, they are always awaiting instructions from their leader. Their work for God's kingdom will have political ramifications, sometimes very large ones, but they are not working for political solutions. They're working for their king. They may at once be more conservative than the traditionalists and more radical than the progressives, but not because they subscribe to an ideology but because they obey a king. They refuse to allow their political party affiliation to overshadow their primary identity as God's people. As someone who has children with two Irish grandparents and two Croatian grandparents, I understand the opportunity that immigration provides. And as the daughter of two people who emigrated from Ireland, I am very thankful for the country that welcomed my parents with open arms. I grew up hearing stories about the Irish famine and all the poor, destitute, hungry people who traveled across the ocean on boats to a new land. Not knowing what to expect. But finding an open door upon arrival. I know that the ancestors of John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan travelled to the United States from Ireland during the famine, as did the father of Henry Ford. And we all know what their descendants offered their country of birth. Advertisement As orders are signed and people march, I hope the principles I teach my children prevail. Kindness, acceptance and understanding. I hope we continue to evolve in a global world full of diversity. Where we can all grow by learning something new from a person who might seem different than us, but who usually wants exactly the same things we do. Peace, freedom and opportunity. As former First Lady Michelle Obama once said, "We are a nation founded as a rebuke to tyranny. A nation of revolutionaries who refused sovereign reign from afar. Hear me -- we're a nation that says give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. A nation built on our differences, guided by the belief that we're all created equal." With the phrase "climate change" disappearing from U.S. federal government websites and increased talk of regulatory overreach, it is obvious that protecting the environment will continue to be a fault line in American political ideology. While there are plenty of examples of environmental regulations being administered with rigidity and inflexibility, there are far more examples of accommodation and a process that provides plenty of time for businesses and localities to comply with environmental standards. The typical pace of regulation implementation in America is measured in decades, not days. For example, the hazardous waste regulations required in the 1976 Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, and the 1984 amendments to that bill, were not finalized until the 1990s. The Federal Water Pollution Control Act was enacted in 1972 and here in Manhattan we were still dumping raw sewage into the Hudson River until the North River wastewater treatment plant opened in 1984. Developing, issuing and implementing environmental regulations is a long process of give and take. Climate activists may call for immediate reductions in carbon emissions, but I don't see anyone unplugging their smart phones. The transition to renewable energy will take time. The gradual and incremental approach to environmental protection has worked. America's air and water are cleaner today than they were in the 1970s and our population and economy have grown substantially since then. If there really was a trade-off between environmental protection and economic growth, the progress we've made since the 1980s could not have happened. The idea that American environmental regulation ignores practical concerns and the views of business interests is complete nonsense. But the idea that enforceable national standards are not needed is foolish and dangerous. America's air and water are relatively clean because business has been convinced to take regulations seriously and develop and pay for the installation of the best available pollution control technology. If you doubt this is true go to Delhi or Beijing and try to take a deep breath. Their air quality provides a graphic example of the impact of unenforced environmental standards. Advertisement Nevertheless, a liberal-conservative divide has developed in American environmental policy. This is most clearly seen in climate change, where the discussion has degenerated into an argument between climate believers and climate deniers. Facts are not values; one does not need to believe in facts. We don't believe in gravity, we experience it. But climate policy has taken on a weird spiritual dimension. We don't see the same quasi-religious discussion around air and water pollution. I guess that's because the facts of polluted air and water are local and can often be seen and smelled. Climate change is a more gradual and global phenomenon and human induced change is taking place alongside of natural climate change. The planet is getting warmer, but some "believe" it has nothing to do with people and their machines, that perhaps it's all natural. It takes scientific literacy and often model-based analysis to understand climate change. The complexity of climate change and the aggressive lobbying of the fossil fuel business has worked to discredit the largely settled science of human-induced climate change. We have seen this anti-science push before, in the decades-long battle over the health effects of tobacco. The tobacco industry spent many years and many dollars fighting scientific reality, but, of course, the health effects of cigarettes proved inescapable. Climate impacts are also real, becoming apparent and will also eventually need to be acknowledged. In an interesting article about climate and agriculture in the American Midwest, Hiroko Tabuchi of the New York Times reports on the growth of climate and environmental awareness among Midwestern farmers. As Tabuchi reports: Advertisement "Doug Palen, a fourth-generation grain farmer on Kansas' wind-swept plains, is in the business of understanding the climate. Since 2012, he has choked through the harshest drought to hit the Great Plains in a century, punctuated by freakish snowstorms and suffocating gales of dust. His planting season starts earlier in the spring and pushes deeper into winter. To adapt, he has embraced an environmentally conscious way of farming that guards against soil erosion and conserves precious water...he is a climate change realist. Just don't expect him to utter the words "climate change." ...Here in north-central Kansas, America's breadbasket and conservative heartland, the economic realities of agriculture make climate change a critical business issue. At the same time, politics and social pressure make frank discussion complicated....So while climate change is part of daily conversation, it gets disguised as something else." Tabuchi also notes that renewable energy is not discussed as a way to mitigate climate change, but as an inexpensive form of locally generated power. This is an indication that the path to a renewable resource-based economy and to climate change mitigation and adaptation will not be the direct cause and effect path preferred by many climate scientists and environmental activists. Instead we will see the meandering incremental and pragmatic approach typical of America's policy response to other issues. Two steps forward and one step back seems to be the American Way. We are seeing it in health care; we've seen it on other environmental issues; we see it in issues of racial and gender equity. The political center gets redefined by social, economic and physical realities. Business doesn't like being told what to do, and we seem to have an aversion to regulation, but support for clean air, clean water and productive soil is widespread and ultimately prevails against ideological bias. In the strange political environment of the Trump era, I worry that this delicate balance between business and environment will be upset if business stops believing that regulations will be enforced. It is the settled law of the land that greenhouse gases are air pollutants that must be regulated under the Clean Air Act. The Supreme Court has already made that decision. The EPA under George W. Bush was slow to promulgate greenhouse gas regulations and the Obama administration didn't get around to it until their second term. The current rule is being reviewed by the courts, and even if it is thrown out, the Trump EPA will be required to issue another rule. Advertisement The American legal process, with few exceptions, moves slowly and deliberately. As we learned this past weekend with its partial stay of the Trump Administration's immigration executive order, the courts are better at stopping the abuse of power than at requiring action. Once a greenhouse gas regulation is in place, the long process of negotiating reductions can finally begin. Getting power plants to reduce greenhouse gas emissions will often require a difficult and delicate process. Gradual compliance schedules will be used to ensure that power supplies are not interrupted. Local stakeholders will be consulted; some will sue to be sure their voice is heard. That is how the process works. Initially, a Trump EPA may have difficulty meeting its responsibilities to issue and enforce regulations. EPA's resources will be reduced, and political support will be lacking. Talented people will give up and leave the federal government. We saw this during the first two years of Ronald Reagan's presidency. I am counting on the reality of a lethal environment to stimulate a non-ideological, broad based response to anti-environmental policy. The question in 2017 will be: Has environmental policy become so ideological, that like the crowd size at the inaugural, our rulers make up their own facts? If they do, progress will slow down, although I still doubt that the fundamental rules of American environmental protection will be abandoned. I believe that in a federal system, state and local governments will hear directly from their constituents and have the resources and power to respond to community needs. States will also sue the federal government to compel federal action. When the Soviet army liberated the Auschwitz death camp on 27 January 1945, among the prisoners left behind were a number of young twins. The surviving children and many more who had died were the subject of disturbing human experiments by Josef Mengele, a physician known as the "Angel of Death". About 3,000 twins were selected from an estimated 1.3 million people who arrived at Auschwitz for Mengele's deadly "scientific" experiments. Only about 200 of them survived. Mengele is significant for understanding the complicity of science with the mass atrocities of the 20th century. The elegant young doctor defied the stereotypical image of the Nazi brute. He was no crazy drunken beast with a whip. This was an ambitious researcher of human genetics, holding doctorates in anthropology and medicine. Advertisement Mengele worked in Auschwitz from May 1943. The death camp presented him with a "perfect" laboratory. It provided an unlimited supply of human specimens to study genetics, and he wouldn't get into trouble if they died following lethal injections and other gruesome experiments. Mengele was well-connected. In 1942 his former doctoral supervisor, Otmar von Verschuer, a scientist conducting genetics research with a particular interest in twins, had become the director of the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institute for Anthropology, Human Heredity and Eugenics (KWI-A) in Berlin. Under Verschuer the KWI-A played a key role as an institution of science in the implementation of Nazi racist ideology and policy during the holocaust. Mengele also spent time as a researcher at the KWI-A. The KWI-A's story connects the Nazi atrocities of the 1940s with the colonial origins of racial science. Nazis and colonial 'racial science' The institute's first director in 1927 was the well-known physical anthropologist Eugen Fischer. Fischer was a prolific researcher who had earned his scientific merits in genetics and racial science in the then German colony of German South West Africa (today's Namibia). Advertisement His 1908 field study, published in 1913, focused on the effects of racial mixing ("miscegenation"), applying the genetic theory of Gregor Mendel. Fischer examined 310 children of the "Basters" of Rehoboth, a community of "mixed-race" people living to the South of Windhoek in Namibia. The Rehobother offspring of Nama women and white men were observed and subjected to physical measurements. Based on these "scientific" methods, Fischer classified the mixed-race population. His verdict that African blood imparted impurity resulted in the prohibition of mixed-race marriages in all German colonies by 1912. In Namibia interracial marriage was already prohibited in 1905. German colonialism ended after World War I. This, however, was not the end of racial science. Incubated in the colonial laboratories of southern Africa, it was brought back and applied in "civilised" central Europe. Fischer first followed up his "bastard studies" in the 1920s and early 1930s with the "Rhineland bastards", children born to German mothers and fathers from the French African colonies. Few black Germans perished during the Nazi era. But, many were forcibly sterilised. The story of the KWI-A demonstrates how several significant dimensions connect 20th century racial science, colonialism and genocide. Advertisement Race, politics and economics of science Firstly, the concept of "race" as a classification of humans according to supposed genetic givens links science, colonial rule, and the Nazi mass murders. The similarities in the ways physical anthropologists and colonial officials classified Africans at the beginning of the 20th century, and the Nazis' classification of the Jews are obvious. Like Africans in the German colonies, Jews were regarded as alien and threats to the purity of German 'blood', who had to be excluded from the body of the German "Volk" (people). Fischer only joined the Nazi party in 1940. But he made antisemitic utterances earlier. His private correspondence provides evidence that he regarded the "Jewish question" as a "question of race" The social construction of the category "race" to classify humans was a prerequisite of the Nazi mass murders. In the 1930s, the KWI-A was centrally involved in the application of race-based laws to exclude Jews from the German "Volk". Stellenbosch University anthropologist Steven Robins has shown this in his book, "Letters of Stone", which tells his family's story from Nazi Germany to South Africa. Secondly, however, the KWI-A demonstrates the pitfalls of typical, unbridled ambition in scientists. This is disturbing indeed. Fischer did not so much become involved in the Nazi racial policy because he was a vicious racist, but because of the politics and economics of research. Advertisement In exchange for their scientific services for the Nazi regime, Fischer and his Institute received official recognition. Most importantly, the scientists obtained privileged access to very generous state funding. Thirdly, the KWI-A and its scientists provide chilling illustrations of some significant writings on the colonial origins of the dehumanisation and objectification of racially and the "eugenically undesirable". The philosopher Hannah Arendt, herself a holocaust refugee from Germany, explained in 1951 that European imperialism played a crucial role in the development of Nazi totalitarianism and associated genocides. Belgians and Rwanda The Nazi genocides have gone down in history as unique. They were organised with German industrial precision during the infamous Wannsee-Konferenz of 19 January 1942. The connection of science, racial policy and genocide, however, has a strong international dimension. Rwanda is a horrid example. In central Africa, the Belgians drew on craniology specifically, the "scientific" study of the shape and size of the skulls of different human "races". With additional differences in height and skin tone, the colonial administration fixed earlier social stratification between Tutsi, Hutu and Twa - all identified as Banyarwanda - into racial categories. From 1933 onwards, those were included in Rwandan ID cards. In the years before Rwandan independence, finally granted in 1962, the colonial ideology of Tutsi racial superiority was turned around by politicians who created a Hutu racial philosophy. In 1994 hundreds of thousands Rwandans were murdered because their ID cards identified them as Tutsi. Others died because their physical appearance corresponded with the racial stereotype. Advertisement The dark underbelly of Western modernity In 1955 the writer from Martinique, Aime Cesaire made a radical statement on the colonial origins of the holocaust. He wrote that in the 1940s the Nazis applied to Europe colonialist procedures which until then had been reserved exclusively for the Arabs of Algeria, the coolies of India, and the niggers of Africa. These were important observations during the decade of African struggles to end colonialism. Sixty years later, the recurrent connections of science and genocide still demonstrate the dark underbelly of Western modernity in Africa, Europe, and the global world. Ukrainian citizen Mykola Karpiuk, convicted in Russia, whose whereabouts had been unknown since December 5, 2016, is hold prisoner in Vladimir Central. He has no complaints about conditions of his detention and set his mind on fighting, his lawyer said in the air of TV channel. "Consul Hennadiy Breskalenko met with him. Now Karpiuk is under quarantine in a fairly good, almost normal state. He set his mind on fighting. He has all the necessary things. He has nothing to complain about," Karpiuk's Russian lawyer Ilya Novikov said in the air of 112.Ukraine TV channel on Saturday. Novikov plans to visit his defendant the next week. According to the lawyer, there is no information at the moment about the location and status of the Ukrainian cititzen Stanyslav Klykh, who was taken to Chelyabinsk on January 7. "We do not know about his state - both physical and mental. He had health problems," he said. The protection plans to file three more complaints to various instances. As earlier reported, the Supreme Court of Russia's Chechnya region on May 26, 2016 sentenced Karpiuk and Klykh to 22.5 and 20 years in prison, respectively, for allegedly taking part in fighting with Russian army forces during the first Chechnya war during the early 2000s. Both men deny the charges. Karpiuk was due to serve the first ten years of his sentence in prison, and the prison term of Klykh was set at nine years. After that both convicts will be transferred to a maximum-security penitentiary. The Russian Supreme Court upheld the sentence on October 26. Karpiuk and Klykh were sentenced for participating in the hostilities against federal forces with the UNA-UNSO organization during the first Chechen campaign. A multi-ethnic group of college age students are sitting in a row in a lecture hall and are listening to their professor. People protest Donald Trump's travel ban from Muslim majority countries at Los Angeles International Airport. Patrick T. Fallon/Reuters President Donald Trump has signed an executive order preventing nationals of Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Yemen, Libya and Somalia from entering the U.S. Syrian refugees are indefinitely banned, and other refugees are banned for 120 days. It's not clear what comes next. Advertisement During his campaign, Trump also stated his intention to remove all 11 million "illegal immigrants" from the country. The nation is waiting to see what will happen to them. In migration studies, there is a general lamentation about the eroding of the "politics of compassion" and the development of what Hannah Arendt and Rony Brauman called "politics of pity" that has replaced compassion, empathy and justice. Compassion takes place when the person suffering is in front of the person who is not; pity occurs at a distance. Humanism and cosmopolitanism allow the politics of compassion to occur. Otherwise, only the politics of pity emerge. As Paul Farmer pointed out: " The road from unstable emotions to hard entitlements -- rights -- is one we must travel if we are to transform human values into meaningful and effective programs that serve precisely those who need our empathy and solidarity most. Advertisement " This exercise is not related to any culture, be it Islamic or Western. Some countries belonging to the former culture have received Syrian refugees (Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan) and others have not (the Gulf countries). Some Western countries, such as Germany and Sweden took in Syrian refugees; others did not. Donald Trump, by signing this executive order, has radically redefined the politics of migration in the United States. He has indicated that his perception of geography is binary, dividing the world into Muslim-lands and non-Muslim-lands - in the very same manner that some radical Islamists do. Jacques Derrida has argued that hospitality is always tinted with hostility and fear. Sociologists often argue that xenophobia and racism are generated by the presence of the "other", which migrants and refugees are often characterised as. I am alarmed by the surge of new populism in U.S.A. and Europe, which is tearing apart the universal right to asylum. The only way to counter this trend is via free debate in the public sphere. Migrants and refugees do not have to be strangers. This is where civil society and the press could step in, given the chance. Advertisement Let us take the example of a group called the Center for Political Beauty in Germany. In 2015, the center held a large-scale "burial of refugee bodies" on the lawn of the Reichstag in Berlin, complete with shovels, dirt mounds, and small white crosses. This group produces its own accounts of the Syrian refugees crisis, challenging dominant narratives in which state ofcials and journalists are the primary subjects who can speak the truth. Anthropologists and Syrian refugees have begun ethnographic experiments using words and music, socialising weekly in a neighbourhood cafe, and providing courses in the some departments of anthropology in Germany, as well as activism to encourage the admission of Syrian refugees. But even in countries that accept large numbers of refugees, incivility can grow. In Germany, the anti-Islam party PEGIDA was founded in Dresden in 2014. They have since launched various marches in Europe against Muslim migrants. Advertisement As I write these lines, it seems that we researchers who provide knowledge about racism and migration have failed in our mission. As educators, we should promote critical thinking. Our knowledge does not trickle down to other people on its own. We cannot control what Donald Trump does or does not do. But, in addition to our conversations with our peers in academic outlets, we can renew our discourse and spend time with our diverse communities. As researchers, we can foster public knowledge through mass media. We can also listen to other people's fears. In the face of xenophobia, it's the least we can do. I was in Africa when President Obama ran in 2008. From the outside, we were the "Bush America" and loathed by international human rights experts. I endured their constant criticism until my sense of patriotism was gone. And then a black man came to the foreground, won, and revived our global respect with grace and intelligence. He led by example, not political force. And he gradually and methodically changed the world for LGBT people. If we look at before and after, the contrast is stark. But in the middle, LGBT people broke into mainstream acceptance, as discrimination became stigmatized, and LGBT liberation became the next great civil rights movement. Advertisement Leading this quest, Obama maneuvered the U.S. military into ending DADT with brilliant finesse, and actually attached the Matthew Shepard Act, a federal hate crimes law, to a military funding bill! He turned the Department of Justice into an equality machine churning out historic legal arguments for our equality under the Constitution. He appointed lesbians to the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission (EEOC) and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, both of which have led the fight for justice. The Civil Rights Commission issued groundbreaking analysis on the harm LGBT people endure under discrimination, including suicide, building the basis for Congressional protection. And the EEOC launched the fight that "sex" includes "gender identity" under the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The President also took the side of transgender school children, which the republicans then played as a religious rebellion in 2016. And all of this is now headed to the Supreme Court. I repeat: our protection under the Civil Rights Act is headed to the SCOTUS. Could we actually win and be protected federally? If so, this will be his legacy. Internationally, the United States made LGBT equality a core aspect of our diplomacy and foreign policy. I feel I should retype that sentence, because just writing it sends a chill through me. This is a huge deal. If in 2008, as I lived in fear as a gay man at the United Nations in Ethiopia, you had told me that the U.S. would soon be leading this campaign, I would have never believed it. But President Obama and Hillary Clinton did exactly that and it changed the international debate over LGBT people from a religious-entitlement to hate, into one of LGBT human rights under international law. Advertisement Of course, the president had to be prodded steadily, because he had many priorities and political challenges. And he had to be pushed into marriage equality. But he was the first sitting president to do it. And while doing so, he put our movement squarely in the context of "who you love" - coining our struggle as one of "love" - which is really the highest place of honor possible in this insane debate about our dignity. His Department of Education tackled safe-schools and bullying. The Department of Housing protected us in public housing. The Department of Health in hospitals. And he outlawed by Executive Order discrimination by federal contractors. Each step extending the protections of the Civil Rights Act in areas of housing, education, and employment. He was effectively granting us the protection of the law methodically and systematically. Like a law professor, he engineered equality in fact, until it was granted in law. The brilliance of this can not be overstated. All the while most people never knew. President Obama and I shared a term of office. These were my eight years of in-the-trenches activism for LGBT equality. And I too am stepping down from that role. But it was a good run at an historic time. Going into it I believed that President Obama would be our great liberator, and often felt disappointed that it wasn't bigger and faster. But I fought the impulse to blame Obama because of what the republicans did to him. No criticism of Obama is fair against that treason. Advertisement Nowadays, a quick internet search can tell employers all they need to know about you. But depending on what they find on your blog or social media profiles, this could be good -- or it could be very bad. So what can you be sure to include that would blow them away and set you up for career success? A. Ways You've Given Back Our company is passionate about giving back, promoting equality and making a difference. So, we want to see how you give back in innovative and meaningful ways. How have you volunteered? Did you rescue your pet instead of buy one? Did you ever write about ways people can make a difference or share stories of people who have overcome serious obstacles in their lives? - Beth Doane, Main & Rose A. A Personal Touch If your blog is purely about marketing yourself and promoting your skill sets, many will likely roll their eyes and move on. Don't be afraid to get personal when blogging. You don't necessarily have to go so far as to discuss your dating life, but revealing things like hobbies and interests shows that you have unique talents and abilities and will allow you to stand out from the herd. - Elle Kaplan, LexION Capital Advertisement A. A Visual Resume Page One of the best hires I've ever made was because of a visual resume page. After submitting an application, he instructed me to visit his website, where I found a visual representation of the work he'd done for every position he held over the past 10 years. He also included links to his reviews, mentions and even a video. I've since hired three people with similar pages. - John Rampton, Due A. Your Own Story Storytelling resonates. Tell a story about a unique experience that can help you stand out. If you did something like start a side business or a club, tell us about it and let us know how you did it -- tactically. - Ryan Shank, PhoneWagon A. Videos As a potential hire, you need to take every step possible to stand out, and posting videos is a great way to draw attention to yourself. Having a vlog highlights your personality, which is something that all employers look for. If you are outgoing and bubbly, put it out there. It could be the difference between getting tossed and being called in for an interview. - Jonathan Long, Market Domination Media A. New Ideas and a Willingness to Embrace Change I gravitate towards people who have new ideas and aren't afraid to explore them. I also look for individuals who embrace change because I know they'll be able to keep up with my goals and objectives. When a new technology or strategy surfaces that I think will help my business, I don't want to have to talk my team members into adopting it. I want people who are ready to roll with the change. - Nicole Munoz, Start Ranking Now Advertisement A. Your Accomplishments Use your blog to showcase something you've built and are proud of. It can be a website, an event you organized, an artistic endeavor, or anything else you took the initiative to do. Provide real insight on how you went about it and overcame any challenges you faced. - Hongwei Liu, mappedin A. A Love for Connecting With People When looking at a prospective employee's blog, I always like to see that they reach out to and connect with lots of other people. I like to see them creating conversations and engaging in current events and discussions. I also like to see them include other people and build on the things they say. - Matt Doyle, Excel Builders A. Your Skill Set It depends on the job, but what I want to see is competency in your role. If you're a designer, I'd like to see a portfolio showcasing your best work. If you're a strategist, I'd like to see case studies demonstrating an ability to develop effective strategies for moving a company forward. If you're an account manager, I'd like to see compelling articles on customer service and project management. - Brian Lischer, Ignyte A. Consistency Staying on top of your game and writing content on a consistent basis lets a future employer see two things: that you're constantly learning and that you're dedicated. These two combined traits can be hard to find. If you can demonstrate them both in a blog, you'll definitely stand out from the rest. - Volkan Okay Yazici, Stonexchange A. An Audience The most important thing you can have as a blogger is an audience. If you can demonstrate that you have a following, an employer will view you as a very valuable asset to their company. It can allow the business to expand its audience reach, leading to increased visibility and perhaps even more customers. - Patrick Barnhill, Specialist ID, Inc. Advertisement A. An Occasional Break in Professionalism It may sound counterintuitive, but if you're posting the same content most of your peers are, or using the same professional tone, you'll find yourself blending in with a fugue of individual voices that all sound the same. Instead of blending in, break the professional facade every once in a while and allow your personality to show through; we like to hire interesting people. - Blair Thomas, First American Merchant Kansas Athletics Board of Directors addresses NCAA case and more What did Travis Goff have to say about the NCAA case concerning Kansas mens basketball team. That takeaway, and more, here: Activists from the National Corps party, which was created in October 2016 on the initiative of members of the organization Azov Civil Corps, veterans of the Ukrainian National Guard Azov regiment, deployed pickets in Kyiv on Monday morning near the central offices of the subsidiaries of the Russian banks PIB, Sberbank, BM-Bank and the office of Alfa-Bank. The protesters placed posters on the banks' windows calling on citizens of Ukraine to withdraw their money from them. They demand the closure of Ukrainian banks associated with Russia and the arrest of Ukrainian National Bank Governor Valeriya Gontareva. They are not preventing the banks' staff and clients from going in and out of the buildings. Police officers are on site. They are not interfering in the situation. After last weeks speculation that it was interested in acquiring Generali , insurance heavyweight Allianz is now reportedly setting its sights on another international rival: Australias QBE On Sunday night, German newspaper Handelsblatt reported that Allianz CEO Oliver Bate met with QBE boss John Neal before Christmas and suggested an offer of AU$15 a share, which would value the Australian insurer at AU$20 billion (US$15 billion).Citing unnamed sources, the report said the two insurance giants had friendly talks, but there were no concrete negotiations about a potential deal yet. Reuters also cited an insider who said that Allianz made an informal approach to QBE.The Australian insurer, however, was quick to shoot down the reports. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, QBE said in a statement that it was not in discussions with any potential buyers.While it is QBEs policy not to comment on rumour or media speculation, QBE confirms that it is not in discussions with Allianz or any other potential buyer, the insurer said.Allianz, which operates in the UK like QBE, has yet to comment. Earlier this month, Bate told German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung that the company would look for big companies in the US and Europe, focusing on businesses in property insurance, credit insurance and investment management.Only a big takeover would help us. Buying smaller companies does not make sense for us, Reuters quoted Bate as saying.Bate said Allianz would have to look at affordable companies with clean balance sheet that also appear to be a good match for the German insurer. Global brokerage giant Jardine Lloyd Thompson Group (JLT) has acquired a 50.1% stake in US broker Construction Risk Partners (CRP) for US$50 million.Highly regarded in the industry, CRP is a construction risk and surety specialty insurance broker that serves many of North Americas largest contractors. Following the latest deal, the CRP management team will remain with the business, which will trade as a JLT Group company.Under the terms of the transaction, JLT will be allowed to increase its shareholding to 100% over time. The acquisition of CRP is seen to add scale, specialist construction capability and market presence for the London-headquartered brokers US operations.Meanwhile, CRP will have access to JLTs global resources to support its continued expansion across the US and introduce JLTs wider specialist insurance products to its clients.Our partnership with Construction Risk Partners puts us in a strong position in one of the worlds most attractive construction growth markets, said JLT Group CEO Dominic Burke.This important partnership further strengthens our global capabilities and will provide a significant complement to our growing US specialty business, which we launched in 2014, he added. Amid a tumultuous political climate and a backdrop of global instability, organisations that operate abroad face a nexus of threats and challenges.More companies are recognizing they cant ignore political violence and other political risks, Sergio Sanchez, chief marketing officer at Clements Worldwide which provides coverage to individuals and companies operating abroad told Insurance Business.Political risk insurance can provide protection from decisions made by host countries that could adversely affect business operations, including legislative, Sanchez explained, pointing out that political risk differs from political violence which refers to civil unrest and disobedience, strikes, riots, etc.In many countries, even developed ones, elections in particular are driving some of these activities, and so all types of companies need to be aware, Sanchez said.It is not just a challenge for humanitarian aid organizations working in Syria or Yemen. Construction, manufacturing, and IT companies are also worried about political risk.With a complex set of risks to navigate, and a variety of coverage options, its important that brokers have enough understanding of the market to provide guidance to their clients, Sanchez explained.Companies still require education so while some brokers try to enter the market they must demonstrate experience and knowledge in order to gain both client and underwriter trust.If a broker without much experience in this market tries to place coverage for a high-risk market, the underwriter may be reluctant believing that the broker is not educating or providing access to training that would lower future risk and possible claims.When it comes to pricing, there is a lot of variation in the market for both evacuation products and kidnap & random (K&R).There is still considerable excess capacity in the K&R market, so prices remain relatively low, Sanchez said though there are exceptions.Companies looking to insure just a handful of people in a particularly risky market, and those in particularly high-risk industries such as military contractors, will likely find prices higher, according to Sanchez.Organizations looking to spread the risk across a larger employee base, in multiple countries with multiple types of positions will find prices very reasonable, he said.Clements, which sources products on the open market as a broker and also provides its own solutions underwritten by Lloyds of London, recently launched an emergency evacuation product with salary continuation, an extension of its K&R solution which the firm says is unique in the market. The dean of the Berkshires delegation, Rep. William 'Smitty' Pignatelli, D-Lenox, introduces Sen. Adam Hinds. Pignatelli said his library had been his first classroom and teacher outside his home. Berkshire Delegation Supports State Library Funding Berkshire Athenaeum patron Andrew Neiner tells attendees at the breakfast about the 3D printer he uses at the library. STOCKBRIDGE, Mass. At Friday morning's Berkshire Library Legislative Breakfast, the theme was state aid and its impact on local libraries. But state Rep. Tricia Farley-Bouvier, D-Pittsfield, put a national spin on things. "Fake news," Farley-Bouvier said. "I believe it's one of the core things we need to make a correction on as a society. "I'm counting on libraries to be at the forefront of teaching the rest of us how to spot fake news and how to get real information." What's true, library advocates say, is that diminishing state funding is putting local libraries at risk. "It's shocking the way funding to public libraries has gone down and down and down," said Lynn Coakley, the president of the Western Massachusetts Library Advocates. "In North Adams, from 2007 to 2016, there was a 26 percent cut in state aid. In Pittsfield, there was a 17 percent cut. Here in Stockbridge, there was a 41 percent cut. "Think about all the things that could be done if that line was fully funded." Four members of Berkshire County's state legislative delegation attended the 19th annual breakfast, held this year at the Stockbridge Library. As usual, Farley-Bouvier, Rep. Gailanne Cariddi, D-North Adams, Rep. William "Smitty" Pignatelli, D-Lenox, and the delegation's newest member, Sen. Adam Hinds, D-Pittsfield, said they are big fans of libraries and would do what they can to maintain and hopefully increase state funding in the fiscal 2018 budget. But the library trustees, Friends group members and staffers who attended the event were reminded that courting the local delegation is not enough. "Help your fellow trustees, staff and Friends realize that your local legislator is only the first step in the process," Massachusetts Library Commissioner Jan Resnick said. Resnick encouraged Berkshire County residents to direct their appeals not only to their own elected officials but also to the leadership of the relevant committees and the legislature itself on Beacon Hill. State Rep. Tricia Farley-Bouvier said libraries are critical for research and the fight against 'fake news.' "It doesn't take much time to write a handwritten note or make a phone call," Resnick said. "Although we don't grab the headlines like the opioid crisis or state budget shortfalls, we are crucial to our state's prosperity and success." The executive director of the Massachusetts Library System, which annually delivers 6.4 million items in the commonwealth's interlibrary loan system, said his non-profit has been hit hard by declining revenue and rising costs, chiefly in the form of an increased minimum wage. Rep. Gailanne Cariddi told library advocates to use personal notes and phone calls, not 'canned emails' to reach legislators. The Board of Library Commissioners is seeking $28.8 million in state funds in FY18 with the biggest chunk, $10.1 million, coming in state aid to local libraries. In FY17, all state funding for libraries totaled $25.2 million. Even if the commissioners get the full ask, libraries would represent just .06 percent of the state budget. "We would love to be 1 percenters," Resnick joked. The Berkshire County legislators were united Friday in their concern for the libraries' cause. "The Lenox Library was my first classroom and first teacher outside my own home," Pignatelli said. Hinds echoed that sentiment. "It's those educational experiences outside the classroom and outside the home that are so critical," Hinds said. "Why would we put them at risk?" Letter: Closing Plunkett School Short-Sighted To the Editor: The impending closure of one of the two elementary schools in the Adams-Cheshire Regional School District is an unfortunate yet necessary step to strengthen the district both educationally and financially. The problems plaguing this region have been well documented in many forums: declining and aging population, declining enrollment, stagnant revenue, 10-15 percent rise in health-care costs every year. These, among many other economic factors have hit not just here but small towns across America hard. Both C.T. Plunkett in Adams and Cheshire Elementary School have served thousands upon thousands of kids. Closing either of these schools will be difficult and perhaps even traumatizing to former and especially current students. One thing that won't change is the focus of the staff on producing well-educated, prepared, well-rounded kids ready for the next level. Of that I am sure. At the beginning of the process I was public in my belief that whatever option is the best educationally for the students I would support. That raised a crooked eyebrow among some Adams residents when I made my opinion known. As the decision nears I have no doubt that Plunkett is the best option not only educationally but socially as well. It's highly concerning to me that the closure of Plunkett would pull dozens of jobs from downtown Adams. This would have a measurable effect on our businesses that have supported Plunkett for so long. It would also result in another empty school building in Adams. It also leaves the larger of the two towns, and the majority financier, in Adams-Cheshire Regional School District with no physical presence. But what concerns me most is the dilapidated condition of Cheshire and its inability to provide a consistent environment for learning. In 2014 a study was commissioned by ACRSD in the form of a Statement Of Interest sent to the Massachusetts School Building Authority. It basically asks the MSBA their opinion of the condition of Cheshire. The resulting report is deeply alarming. Some highlights include the following statements directly from the report: The school is in need of renovation and some replacement of facility systems such as roof, windows, and heating and ventilation systems. The school also needs demolition of obsolete buildings and additions of new modern buildings. The facility does not have access to town sewer and has its own septic system on site. The roof is in poor condition and requires constant repair and maintenance. The roofing system here certainly needs to be replaced. West wing windows, other than the cafeteria, have deteriorated wood frames and replacement is the only option. Jeffrey Snoonian Snoonian is chairman of the Adams Board of Selectmen. The opinion he has stated is entirely his own and not that of the Board of Selectmen. Five Ukrainian troops were killed and another 14 were wounded in the Anti-Terrorist operation (ATO) zone in Donbas in the past 24 hours, an overwhelming majority of the casualties happened in the fighting in Avdiyivka, Ukrainian Defense Ministry official Oleksandr Motuzianyk said. "According to tentative information, five Ukrainian troops were killed and 14 were wounded an injured in action in the past 24 hours. The Ukrainian troops incurred almost all the losses in the heavy fighting in Avdiyivka," he told a briefing in Kyiv on Monday. We work towards an equitable, gender-just, self-reliant and sustainable fisheries, particularly in the small-scale, artisanal sector We work towards an equitable, gender-just, self-reliant and sustainable fisheries, particularly in the small-scale, artisanal sector We work towards an equitable, gender-just, self-reliant and sustainable fisheries, particularly in the small-scale, artisanal sector We work towards an equitable, gender-just, self-reliant and sustainable fisheries, particularly in the small-scale, artisanal sector Council of the European Union at the level of Foreign Ministers plans to assess progress in the implementation of the reforms program in Ukraine over the past year at its meeting in Brussels on February 6, the press service of the Council said on Monday. "Ministers [of foreign affairs] will hold a debate on how to increase the impact of EU support. They will in particular assess EU support to the implementation of the Minsk agreements," a provisional agenda for this meeting says published on the website of the Council. The Council, chaired by the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Federica Mogherini, will discuss the political situation in Libya, one year after the formation of the Government of National Accord. It is expected that ministers for foreign affairs may also discuss how to work with Libya to address irregular migration along the Central Mediterranean route, on the basis of the joint communication 'Migration on the Central Mediterranean route: managing flows, saving lives,' which was presented on 25 January 2017, and follow up on the meeting of EU Heads of State and Government in Malta on 3 February 2017. The Council will also discuss the situation in Egypt and the way forward in EU-Egypt relations. Ministers may also address more specifically migration, counter-terrorism and Egypt's role in the region. The Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine (PGO) has extended until March 28, 2017 a special pre-trial investigation against former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, lawyer of the fugitive president Vitaliy Serdiuk has said. "The investigation authorities notified the defense that the investigation had been extended until March 28, 2017," he said on the air of 112.ua on Friday night. The lawyer also said the adjusted notification of suspicion, which was not accepted by Yanukovych's lawyer on Friday, has to be handed over in the territory of the Russian Federation. "Russia told the PGO that its request for legal assistance is under execution. The defense by all possible means is trying to speed up the execution of the request. Once the notification of suspicion is delivered, we'll sign it," Serdiuk said. Earlier, on January 27 prosecutor of the Chief Military Prosecutor's Office Ruslan Kravchenko said the PGO would pass the adjusted suspicion of treason to the defense of ex-president Viktor Yanukovych. Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko said the Prosecutor General's Office plans to complete the pre-trial investigation into criminal proceedings on the treason of Yanukovych in February 2017. This Isnt Our Last Love Letter Dear Don Don, Way back in 92 I walked into the room and knew Never felt this way before I shook your hand while gazing into your eyes And the feeling grew As I took a seat I knew A love that would have my heart Forever I knew Way back in 92 They say love at first sight doesnt always last or isnt true We were the exception to that rule Our love had no where to hide A spark set fire As if this is how the universe started I never doubted our love or what we could do Together we grew Forming a bond everlasting That became our glue My euphoria was YOU Im eternally grateful for the love and life we shared For how fortunate we were : to have and to hold through sickness and in health Til death do us part Until we are together again This isnt our last love letter I love you with all my heart and soul Yours forever, Deirdre (Mrs. Hank Snow) Im fortunate to have fallen in love with, marry and make a life with the sharpest, coolest, funniest, most rare, bad ass, tender loving, loyal man on the planet, my husband Don Imus. A True American Hero I dont know why it has been so hard for me to write about my dear friend Don Imus. I certainly know what he meant to me, my family, my charity, my hospital and the millions of fans that listened and loved him for so many years. I keep reading all the beautiful condolences that people are writing about how much a part of their lives were effected by listening to him over the years. But what most people dont talk enough about is what he did for all of us. In every sense of the word, he was an American Hero. His work with children with so many different illnesses and his dedication to their future was unmatched by anyone I have ever known or heard about. Besides raising over $100,000,000 for so many causes, he took care of young people for over 20 years in a state where he could not breathe. Along with his incredible wife Deirdre, he created a world where children were not defined by their disease. That was a miracle! He was a miracle. I will miss him ever day for the rest of my life. I was blessed to be a part of his and Deirdes life. No one will ever do what he did. I love you Don Imus - A TRUE AMERICAN HERO David Jurist IMUS IN THE MORNING FIRST DAY BACK! Denmark will begin implementing the "anti-corruption initiatives of the EU in Ukraine" from February 1, Foreign Minister of Denmark Anders Samuelsen has said. On February 1, Denmark will officially head the EU anti-corruption program in Ukraine. With a budget of 120 million Danish krones, we will be helping the Ukrainian government in its fight against corruption in the next three years, the article by the Danish foreign minister says, posted on the official page of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine on Facebook. He also noted that Denmark will maintain a high level of support for reforms in Ukraine in the energy sector, good governance, decentralization and freedom of the media. Together with the European Union we must to do what we can both politically and economically - to support the reform process in Ukraine and the path to growth and prosperity. We need to support economic development and help create a more effective framework for the private sector in Ukraine, the diplomat said. As reported, on November 24, Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze and EU Commissioner for European Neighborhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations Johannes Hahn signed the Agreement on funding the Anti-Corruption Initiative of the EU in Ukraine. The overall budget for the implementation of the initiative amounts to EUR 16.34 million. The EU contributes EUR 15 million and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark co-finances with EUR 1.34 million. The EU funds will be sent to enhance the capacities of public authorities responsible for fight against corruption National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine, Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutors Office, National Agency on Corruption Prevention, National Agency for Tracing, Recovery and Management of Crime Assets and ensuring the integrity of employees of other institutions of justice. Anti-corruption initiative of the EU in Ukraine also aims to improve parliamentary oversight over the process of reforms and capacity of the Verkhovna Rada to analyze and improve the strategic and regulatory framework, including through the establishment of an international advisory board of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on preventing and combating corruption. The initiative will involve civil society and the media in the implementation of anti-corruption measures, particularly through the promotion of "investigative journalism", and will cooperate with the relevant local authorities in the framework of the pilot project "Clean City" in order to demonstrate the positive changes that can bring an effective fight against corruption, the press service said. Meeting these goals will enable creation in Ukraine of a single center supporting institutions which activities are aimed at combating corruption. Sign up to our free IndyArts newsletter for all the latest entertainment news and reviews Sign up to our free IndyArts newsletter Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the IndyArts email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The longlist for the Wellcome Book Prize has been announced, celebrating exceptional works of fiction and non-fiction that have breached the worlds of health and medicine. Consisting of 12 books, seven of which are non-fiction and five fiction, the list was selected by a judging panel chaired by celebrated Scottish crime writer Val McDermid, alongside Simon Baron-Cohen, Gemma Cairney, Tim Lewens, and Di Speirs. This is the first time a longlist for the 30,000 prize has been introduced, expanding the prize's ability to honour a greater diversity of work: including the first posthumously published title in Paul Kalanithi's memoir When Breath Becomes Air, the first translated text in Maylis de Kerangal and Jessica Moore's Mend the Living, as well as the first Australian, French, and Israeli contenders. Recommended LGBT storylines make it onto Waterstones Prize youth fiction shortlist Val McDermid commented on behalf of the panel, "The challenge of judging the Wellcome Book Prize is that we have all had to read outside our own areas of expertise. That makes demands both of the judges and of the books. This longlist is evidence of the breadth, humanity, and creativity at work in the submissions for the prize, and we commend each of these twelve books for your reading pleasure." You can read the full longlist below. - How to Survive a Plague (Picador) by David France (USA) non-fiction - Homo Deus (Harvill Secker, Penguin Random House) by Yuval Noah Harari (Israel) non-fiction - When Breath Becomes Air (The Bodley Head, Penguin Random House) by Paul Kalanithi (USA) non-fiction - Mend the Living (MacLehose Press) by Maylis de Kerangal (France) trans. Jessica Moore fiction - The Golden Age (Europa Editions) by Joan London (Australia) fiction - Cure (Canongate Books) by Jo Marchant (UK) non-fiction - The Tidal Zone (Granta Books) by Sarah Moss (UK) fiction - The Gene (The Bodley Head, Penguin Random House) by Siddhartha Mukherjee (USA) non-fiction - The Essex Serpent (Serpent's Tail, Profile Books) by Sarah Perry (UK) fiction - A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) by Adam Rutherford (UK) non-fiction - Miss Jane (Picador) by Brad Watson (USA) fiction - I Contain Multitudes (The Bodley Head, Penguin Random House) by Ed Yong (UK) non-fiction The shortlist for the prize will be announced at a press conference on Tuesday 14 March at the London Book Fair. The winner will be announced at an evening ceremony on Monday 24 April at Wellcome Collection. Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse Loughrey Get our The Life Cinematic email for free Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the The Life Cinematic email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Throughout her life, Carrie Fisher proved time and time again how delightfully funny she was, whether while promoting films with her dog or making statements like: "I tell my younger friends that no matter how I go, I want it reported that I drowned in moonlight, strangled by my own bra. Even in death, the world has been humoured by the Star Wars actor, most notably after her ashes were placed in an urn shaped like a Prozac pill. Thanks to ABC News, an old podcast has begun circulating online in which Fisher reveals exactly how she wants her Oscars ceremony tribute video to play out. Rather than just a montage of clips of past performances, Fisher told Rebel Force Radio that she wants Star Wars co-star Harrison Ford to sing Melancholy Wookie, a song that seemingly did not exist beforehand. Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher Show all 9 1 /9 Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher American actor and singer Debbie Reynolds smiles and holds her infant daughter, Carrie Fisher Getty Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher American actress Debbie Reynolds with her daughter Carrie Fisher Getty Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher Actress Debbie Reynolds, poses with her children Carrie Fisher and Todd Fisher Getty Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher arrive at the premiere of 'Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith' Getty Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher Actress Carrie Fisher and her mother, actress Debbie Reynolds Getty Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher Actress Debbie Reynolds accepts the Life Achievement Award from her daughter, actress Carrie Fisher onstage at the 21st Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, California. Getty Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher Actresses Carrie Fisher, Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award recipient Debbie Reynolds, and Billie Lourd pose in the press room during the 21st Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, California Getty Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher A candle is seen on the star for Debbie Reynolds on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Hollywood, California Getty Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher A view of a temporary star made by fans in tribute to actress Carrie Fisher on Hollywood Walk of Fame in Hollywood, California Getty I saw him on Oscar night at some party. And I asked him you know how they have the reel on all the people who how died? I asked him if he would be in my death reel, and if he would sing. It's just something I want. Because they did that thing with John Hughes, they brought out all these actors who worked with him. So I just figured they'll bring out, depending on, of course, when it happens, there's a lot of people they can bring out. He's going to sing Melancholy Wookie. Whether Ford will sing is anyones guess. The Oscars ceremony takes place 26 February. Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse Loughrey Get our The Life Cinematic email for free Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the The Life Cinematic email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Kal Penn has surpassed his target of $250,000 for Syrian refugees, after beginning a fundraising page for Syrian refugees, and raised over half a million dollars instead. The actor, who starred in Harold and Kumar and was later appointed as a public engagement advisor to Barack Obama, started the campaign after tweeting a picture of a vile comment that had been posted on his Instagram account. Penn, who was born to Indian parents in New Jersey, shared the image with the fundraising page link which he created under the name: "Donating to Syrian refugees in the name of the dude who said I don't belong in America. "We are better than the hateful people who tell us we don't belong in our own country, that American can't be a beacon of freedom and hope for refugees from around the world," he wrote on the page. Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Show all 20 1 /20 Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-1 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-2 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-3 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-4 SAN FRANCISCO, CA - JANUARY 28: Demonstrators hold signs during a rally against a ban on Muslim immigration at San Francisco International Airport on January 28, 2017 in San Francisco, California. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday that suspends entry of all refugees for 120 days, indefinitely suspends the entries of all Syrian refugees, as well as barring entries from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering for 90 days. Stephen Lam/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-5 A crowd of protesters gathers outside of the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse as a judge hears a challenge against President Donald Trump's executive ban on immigration from several Muslim countries, on January 28, 2017 in Brooklyn. The judge issued an emergency stay on part of Trump's executive order, ruling that sending refugees stopped at U.S. airports back to their countries would be harmful. Yana Paskova/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-6 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-7 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-8 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-9 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-10 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-11 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-12 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-13 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-14 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-15 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-16 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-17 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-18 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-19 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-20 Passengers wait in line to check in at the American Airlines terminal at JFK International Airport August 10, 2006 in the Queens borough of New York City. British authorities arrested 21 people and halted a anallegedly terrorist plot to use liquid explosives concealed in carry-on luggage to blow up airliners traveling between Britain and the U.S. Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff said that the plot appeared to be directed at U.S. carriers flying out of Heathrow. such as United Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines. Stephen Chernin/Getty "We will turn their bigotry, along with the President's, into love." What began as a simple statement against racism quickly went viral on social media, and people began to donate - both in their own names and on behalf of Steven Bannon, Melania Trump, Kellyanne Conway and the US President himself. Donald Trump announces a ban on refugees and all visitors from Muslim-majority countries 30 minutes after the page was set up, $5,000 had already been raised, and he increased his goal to $50,000, and later to a target of $250,000 within 24 hours. He posted a thank you on the page which read: "Beautiful people - You just raised more than a quarter of a million dollars for refugees in less than 24 hours! "This is such a testament to how proud we are of our beautiful country and how fired up we are to #resist our new president's dangerous policies with solidarity and love. Thank you! The donor page remains open, so keep it up!" Supporters have taken the message to heart. At the time of writing the fundraising page had received $503,815 in donations. Penn posted more information about how to help refugees here. Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse Loughrey Get our The Life Cinematic email for free Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the The Life Cinematic email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Actor Kal Penn has turned a nasty comment about his origins into an inspiring cause as he raised more than $160,000 in a few hours for Syrian refugees. The Harold and Kumar star who went on to become an associate director in the White House Office of Public Engagement, tweeted a picture of a vile comment on his Instagram account which read: You dont belong in this country you f***ing joke. But Penn, who was born to Indian parents in the state of New Jersey, tweeted the picture with a link to a fundraising page, he created under the name donating to Syrian refugees in the name of the dude who said I dont belong in America. We are better than the hateful people who tell us we don't belong in our own country, that America can't be a beacon of freedom and hope for refugees from around the world. We will turn their bigotry, along with the President's, into love, he wrote on the crowdfunding page. His post went viral on social media and only half an hour after the page was created, $5,000 (4,000) had already been donated. Within a few hours, he smashed his $25,000 (20,000) target. This is some serious love! Lets keep going, he tweeted. He increased his goal to $50,000 (40,000) and less than a day after creating the page, he has raised $167,090 (133,000) and counting. Now Mr Penn is hoping to hit $250,000 (200,000) within 24hours. Donald Trump announces a ban on refugees and all visitors from Muslim-majority countries The money will be donated to the International Rescue Committee, which supports refugees around the world. Look how big your hearts are. Lets go huge! he tweeted. Some of the donors came with inventive names to support the cause, including: Kumar Fights Racial Profiling, #Saynotobigotry, All We Need Is Love and Born In The USA. TV writer Marc Guggenheim and his wife Tara Butters donated $500 to the cause. Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse Loughrey Get our The Life Cinematic email for free Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the The Life Cinematic email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Individual stories of those locked out of the US by Donald Trump's Muslim ban are flooding in, with this year's Academy Awards ceremony certainly not excluded from its effects. It has already been confirmed that both Asghar Farhadi, whose film The Salesman is nominated in the Foreign Language category, and Hala Kamil, the subject of Watani: My Homeland which is nominated in the Documentary (Short Subject) category, will be unable to attend the ceremony due to the ban. Now, it's emerged that two individuals involved with The White Helmets, also nominated in the Documentary (Short Subject) category, will also be prevented from attending the Oscars (via Indiewire): Raed Saleh, who heads the Syrian volunteer organisation, and cinematographer Khaled Khateeb. In response, the film's producer Joanna Natasegara has released a statement: "We have always said that if we were to be nominated, we would bring Raed Saleh, the head of the White Helmets, who has spoken many times in D.C., and Khaled Khateeb, the young cinematographer who risked his life over and over again, as our guests. Theyve been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize these people are the bravest humanitarians on the planet, and the idea that they could not be able to come with us and enjoy that success is just abhorrent." Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Show all 20 1 /20 Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-1 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-2 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-3 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-4 SAN FRANCISCO, CA - JANUARY 28: Demonstrators hold signs during a rally against a ban on Muslim immigration at San Francisco International Airport on January 28, 2017 in San Francisco, California. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday that suspends entry of all refugees for 120 days, indefinitely suspends the entries of all Syrian refugees, as well as barring entries from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering for 90 days. Stephen Lam/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-5 A crowd of protesters gathers outside of the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse as a judge hears a challenge against President Donald Trump's executive ban on immigration from several Muslim countries, on January 28, 2017 in Brooklyn. The judge issued an emergency stay on part of Trump's executive order, ruling that sending refugees stopped at U.S. airports back to their countries would be harmful. Yana Paskova/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-6 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-7 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-8 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-9 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-10 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-11 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-12 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-13 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-14 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-15 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-16 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-17 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-18 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-19 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-20 Passengers wait in line to check in at the American Airlines terminal at JFK International Airport August 10, 2006 in the Queens borough of New York City. British authorities arrested 21 people and halted a anallegedly terrorist plot to use liquid explosives concealed in carry-on luggage to blow up airliners traveling between Britain and the U.S. Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff said that the plot appeared to be directed at U.S. carriers flying out of Heathrow. such as United Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines. Stephen Chernin/Getty Watani: My Homeland director Marcel Mettelsiefen also released a statement on the ban: "This travel ban from President Trump is another devastating blow to refugees who have already suffered so much. As Trump seeks to demonise refugees and Muslim people in general, films such as Watani: My Homeland, which tell the human story of refugees become ever more important. We must reconnect with the common humanity of the refugee experience and we must all remember that the founding story of America is dependent upon people who have fled war, hunger and poverty in search of a better life." The White Helmets documents the daily operations of a group of volunteer rescue workers of the Syrian Civil Defense, better known as the White Helmets. Iranian mother reunited with 5-year-old son after he was detained at Dulles Airport Trump has ordered a four-month ban on all refugees from entering the country as well as enacting an indefinite ban on all those who hail from Syria. For 90 days, visas will not be issued to nationals from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Sign up to Roisin OConnors free weekly newsletter Now Hear This for the inside track on all things music Get our Now Hear This email for free Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Roisin OConnors email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Artist Mykki Blanco has released a tour diary that includes a moment where a shop assistant tries to stop him from trying on dresses. Footage show the 'Loner' rapper confront the woman in Berlin, whom he refers to as a "nasty checkout chick", after she is heard telling him to stop "playing in the dresses". "I bought one here last year," Blanco responds, visibly angry. "You don't know what you're talking about - stop talking to me." The assistant attempts to defend herself by saying "I'm working here" to which Blanco immediately snaps: "And I'm shopping here." "She thought she could talk to me that way because I am a gay man in drag," Blanco says in the video. Deadhype, which filmed the documentary, responded to a comment which doubted the events in the video on Dazed Digital. "Mykki was trying on items and actually ending up buying the dress, we can confirm the woman was completely rude and obnoxious," a spokesperson said. "We stopped filming because we were all shocked that this was really happening in 2016, in a city like Berlin." The diary documents the origin of the character and performer 'Mykki Blanco' and includes footage from his tour, and the Facebook video from his personal social media account which led to his debut rap song '5th Element'. According to Blanco, everything started from the iconic feud between Lil Kim and Nicki Minaj, where they fought over being Queens of hip hop. "Lil Kim had Kimmy Blanco and then Nicki was Nicki and I'm Michael, so I was like 'Mykki'," he explained. Head of Ukraine's Prosecutor General's Office (PGO) Yuriy Lutsenko has said the first to fire in the tragedy, in which five law-enforcement officers were killed, in Kniazhychi (Kyiv region) was an employee of the State Guard Service, who let off a warning shot. "We see in this video that the first to fire was a State Guard Service employee, who was located behind the stone wall facing the scene of the shooting," Lutsenko said during a 1plus1 TV Channel show aired on Sunday. According to Lutsenko, the State Guard Service employee fired in the air. A gun battle ensued between employees of Ukrainian law-enforcement agencies. Lutsenko said there is a possibility that the house in Kniazhychi, which robbers were trying to vandalize, may have been raided for a second time State Guard Service employees may have removed an elite auto from the premises. As earlier reported, during the special operation of the National Police of Ukraine and the Immediate Reaction Force KORD to detain vandals in Kniazhychi during the morning of December 4, a firefight broke out between members of different police units. Lutsenko said PGO investigators are looking into the actions of police commanders, who are suspected of dereliction of duty leading to especially serious consequences. He said actions taken by police SWAT officers at the scene were inappropriate. Interior Minister of Ukraine Arsen Avakov said eight policemen were fired as a result of the incident and 12 more disciplined. Sign up to our free IndyArts newsletter for all the latest entertainment news and reviews Sign up to our free IndyArts newsletter Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the IndyArts email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Donald Trump acted so swiftly on closing US borders to refugees and people from seven Muslim-majority countries that his new Secretary of Homeland Security, John F. Kelly, found out about it from broadcast news. Flying back to Washington from Miami, Kelly was given his first briefing on Trumps plan, which would ultimately lead to pandemonium and protests at US airports. The New York Times reports: 'Halfway into the briefing, someone on the call looked up at a television in his office. The president is signing the executive order that were discussing, the official said, stunned.' Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Show all 20 1 /20 Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-1 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-2 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-3 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-4 SAN FRANCISCO, CA - JANUARY 28: Demonstrators hold signs during a rally against a ban on Muslim immigration at San Francisco International Airport on January 28, 2017 in San Francisco, California. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday that suspends entry of all refugees for 120 days, indefinitely suspends the entries of all Syrian refugees, as well as barring entries from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering for 90 days. Stephen Lam/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-5 A crowd of protesters gathers outside of the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse as a judge hears a challenge against President Donald Trump's executive ban on immigration from several Muslim countries, on January 28, 2017 in Brooklyn. The judge issued an emergency stay on part of Trump's executive order, ruling that sending refugees stopped at U.S. airports back to their countries would be harmful. Yana Paskova/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-6 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-7 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-8 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-9 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-10 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-11 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-12 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-13 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-14 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-15 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-16 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-17 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-18 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-19 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-20 Passengers wait in line to check in at the American Airlines terminal at JFK International Airport August 10, 2006 in the Queens borough of New York City. British authorities arrested 21 people and halted a anallegedly terrorist plot to use liquid explosives concealed in carry-on luggage to blow up airliners traveling between Britain and the U.S. Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff said that the plot appeared to be directed at U.S. carriers flying out of Heathrow. such as United Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines. Stephen Chernin/Getty Trumps administration has thus far not only been playing out on TV but directly informing it. Last week, we found out that the president is still finding time to watch television in the White House when he gets bored and that many of his tweets appear to be ripped straight from Fox News. While thousands of Americans protested President Trumps blacklist against seven majority Muslim countries for a second day on Sunday, and hundreds of travelers were detained for attempting to legally enter the country, Trump sat down to watch Finding Dory with staff and family members. Sign up to the Independent Climate email for the latest advice on saving the planet Get our free Climate email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Independent Climate email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Delays in the publication of the governments key strategy to fight climate change are deeply concerning, a leading MP has said. The Independent revealed that the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, which is responsible for climate change after Theresa May abolished the dedicated department, has dropped a target date of the end of March to publish the Emissions Reduction Plan. The report was supposed to come out last year but there are concerns that civil servants are too busy working on the UKs departure from the European Union to give the plan the attention it needs. Activist lawyers at ClientEarth argue the government has been in breach of legal requirements to come up with a way to cut emissions for years and failing to hit the March deadline could prompt it to take the government to court. Iain Wright MP, Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, told The Independent that Climate Change Minister Nick Hurd had only this month told the committee the plan would be published in March. We very much hope that the government remains committed to this deadline, he said. Any further delays would be deeply concerning given the need to give investors, businesses and households certainty around how the government intends to meet its future carbon budget commitments. We recognise that delivering against our climate change commitments will involve some tough choices, especially as future changes will need to have a more direct impact on tackling carbon emissions of our businesses and households. But the prime minister needs to show she is serious about taking decisions for the long-term and not shying away from the difficult issues. 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Show all 10 1 /10 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A group of emperor penguins face a crack in the sea ice, near McMurdo Station, Antarctica Kira Morris 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Floods destroyed eight bridges and ruined crops such as wheat, maize and peas in the Karimabad valley in northern Pakistan, a mountainous region with many glaciers. In many parts of the world, glaciers have been in retreat, creating dangerously large lakes that can cause devastating flooding when the banks break. Climate change can also increase rainfall in some areas, while bringing drought to others. Hira Ali 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Smoke filled with the carbon that is driving climate change drifts across a field in Colombia. Sandra Rondon 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Amid a flood in Islampur, Jamalpur, Bangladesh, a woman on a raft searches for somewhere dry to take shelter. Bangladesh is one of the most vulnerable places in the world to sea level rise, which is expected to make tens of millions of people homeless by 2050. Probal Rashid 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Sindh province in Pakistan has experienced a grim mix of two consequences of climate change. Because of climate change either we have floods or not enough water to irrigate our crop and feed our animals, says the photographer. Picture clearly indicates that the extreme drought makes wide cracks in clay. Crops are very difficult to grow. Rizwan Dharejo 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Hanna Petursdottir examines a cave inside the Svinafellsjokull glacier in Iceland, which she said had been growing rapidly. Since 2000, the size of glaciers on Iceland has reduced by 12 per cent. Tom Schifanella 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A river once flowed along the depression in the dry earth of this part of Bangladesh, but it has disappeared amid rising temperatures. Abrar Hossain 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A shepherd moves his herd as he looks for green pasture near the village of Sirohi in Rajasthan, northern India. The region has been badly affected by heatwaves and drought, making local people nervous about further predicted increases in temperature. Riddhima Singh Bhati 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A factory in China is shrouded by a haze of air pollution. The World Health Organisation has warned such pollution, much of which is from the fossil fuels that cause climate change, is a public health emergency. Leung Ka Wa 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Water levels in reservoirs, like this one in Gers, France, have been getting perilously low in areas across the world affected by drought, forcing authorities to introduce water restrictions. Mahtuf Ikhsan The repeated delays to the Emissions Reduction Plan risk giving the impression that the governments policy cannot keep pace with its rhetoric, Mr Wright added. Delivering against our climate change targets has had cross-government support since the Climate Change Act was passed in 2008, he said. We have to begin to wonder what government has been doing since 2015 to ensure the UK continues to deliver on its legally binding carbon reduction commitments if it continues to delay publication. Sign up to our free weekly newsletter for insider tips and product reviews from our shopping experts Sign up for our free IndyBest email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the IndyBest email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} It can feel like a bit of a risk to buy your intimates online, because lets be honest, size is relative when it comes to bras and knickers. Those who bought before the internet age might not be convinced that an online store can do the same as a proper shop assistant, but with the variety of sizes, styles and shapes now available, they might just change their tune. Some retailers even offer shopping aids such as tips and tricks videos for choosing the right bra size, and online advisors to chat to in case you have any questions. The wide variety on these sites means that you can easily find exactly what youre looking for. Online giants like Figleaves could keep you busy for hours browsing its hundreds of options. Many retailers also offer free returns and exchanges as an added bonus. Even shops that have been in the lingerie business for years, like Ann Summers, are in the online business, so youll still be able to buy your old favourites. Read more: Something you wont find in-house, however, is the handy online review system. Youll feel more confident buying your intimates after reading what others have to say about them. After all, theres nothing worse than having knickers that are too tight or a bra that rubs you raw. Though it may feel strange to order your negligees on the internet, these shops have made it better than ever by offering a huge selection. Since its inception in 1994, Agent Provocateur has become an iconic and globally recognised brand. A go-to for luxury lovers, its product range encompasses everything from everyday underwear to more premium lingerie in sizes from 32B-36E. It might not be the most affordable, but here youre paying for quality craftsmanship and inimitable designs. We also love the wish list feature that allows you to send someone a list of products you desire. Visit Agentprovocateur.com now An oldie but a goodie, Ann Summers has been at the top of its game since 1972 and after more than 40 years has built a lingerie empire. Known primarily as an erotic retailer, Ann Summers stocks a playful range of undies, but theres much more to it than suspender belts and baby dolls. The brand also offers up ultra-comfortable everyday essentials and soft bras in an impressive array of sizes, from 30A-44H. Visit Annsummers.com now Already an online shopping mecca, Asos stocks hundreds of lingerie options for every budget, starting from a fiver and going up to over 150. You can narrow your search options by style, size, colour, price and brand and with free delivery and returns, youve got nothing to lose. Our favourites include Stella McCartney and Mimi Holliday, but Asoss own brand is pretty neat too. Visit Asos.com now With a modern, fashion-forward approach to lingerie, Bluebella has quickly become a popular choice for women on the hunt for high-quality undies at an affordable price. The site sells bras, knickers, basques and body bows, and even has a dedicated section for products suited to sizes DD-G. Visit Bluebella.com now Boux Avenue has quickly become a high street favourite with 28 stores in the UK alone, but its online service is just as impressive. Here you will find everything from everyday essentials to something a little sexier. Think shapewear, basques, matching sets and bra accessories; the retailer really does have it all. Whats more, everything is available in sizes 28-38, A-G cups and sizes 6-18. We also love the fact that each and every order comes gift wrapped in the brands signature black, white and pink boxes, complete with lace-print tissue paper and a handful of scented rose petals. Visit Bouxavenue.com now Brastop is a lingerie site tailored specifically towards larger busts, with bra sizes starting at 28D and going up to 46K. It stocks brands such as Panache, Curvy Kate and Kris Line, as well as a huge range of lingerie, hosiery and swimwear. The site has a great "fitting guide" section with tips and videos on how to choose the right bra size and shape. You can also chat online with an advisor if you need help choosing, and returns are free. Visit Brastop.com now Founded by two women who struggled to find bras to fit them, Bravissimo is the go-to destination for women with larger breasts. As well as bras which are available in sizes 28D-40L the website also sells swimwear, nightwear and sportswear. It also has a number of fitting guides for bras, sports bras and new mums. Visit Bravissimo.com now From bras and knickers to shapewear, basques and bridal lingerie, high street department store Debenhams really does have something for everyone. With so much on offer you can choose to search the website by brand, range, fit, style or price to find just what youre looking for. Bras are available in sizes 28A-48G. Visit Debenhams.com now Recently moved to be part of the Simply Be catalogue, if youve got a bit of time to spare browsing through thousands of options, online lingerie-giant Figleaves is worth a visit. With every size, style and shape of lingerie imaginable available, its a good thing the site has a detailed search function. You can whittle down your options by type (babydoll, basque, suspenders and holdups...), style (bralette, plunge, strapless), size, colour, brand and price. Visit Simplybe.co.uk now When it comes to shopping for underwear on the high street M&S is right up there with the very best luxury retailers. From own-brand cotton styles that you can rely on day-to-day, to lacy lingerie collections designed by supermodel Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, its entire range is bursting with wearable pieces in sizes 28-46K. Visit Marksandspencer.com now Established in the 1930s, Rigby & Peller has been providing support for the royal bosom since 1982, as it was once the official corsetiere to the queen. Theres no doubt this is the site to visit for luxury rather than your basic T-shirt bra, but it does have some more affordable options. With a range of bestselling brands available online, the selection offers a huge array of colourways to choose from. Visit Rigbyandpeller.com now When it comes to department stores, Selfridges reigns supreme for lingerie online. Stocking over 20 brands, ranging from the more affordable Calvin Klein to the iconic Agent Provocateur, as well as handy lingerie accessories like strap solutions and shoulder cushions, youd be hard pushed to leave with an empty basket. Visit Selfridges.com now This brand might not be the most inclusive when it comes to sizes, but if it's simple, affordable and super-stylish undies youre after, its website is well worth a browse. Offering a chic selection of bralettes, knickers, pyjamas and bras available in sizes 30A-36D Topshop is a great option for on-trend undies. Visit Asos.com now When it comes to basic undies, Intimissimi is always a reliable destination for affordable and stylish options. There are the sturdy and supportive push-up bras (from 25), the intricate lace bralettes (39) and the colourful balconette styles, (from 25). For the comfort creatures, look for the cotton push-up bras and matching undies. If youre after something a little more special, Intimissimi also offers an extensive range of corsets that are sophisticated and flattering and do not veer into tacky territory. Visit Intimissimi.com now Youve probably seen this Los Angeles-based brands strappy designs all over Instagram. They are quite unlike any other lingerie labels offering, mostly thanks to their complex and intricate fastenings and bright, fluorescent colours. For Love and Lemons treats its underwear like art, with every set delivering on detail and quality. The price tags are high (youll struggle to find a set for under 100), but with items as unique and playful as these, theyre worth every penny. Visit Forloveandlemons.com This British-based brand is fast becoming a go-to for those who like to take care choosing their lingerie and feel empowered wearing it. Why? Because Fruity Bootys designs are crafted to flatter womens bodies regardless of their dress size. Models of all shapes and sizes promote the colourful sets on Instagram and it also offers adorable bardot bra-style tops for those who want extra coverage but still want to feel like theyre wearing matching lingerie. Price-wise, its fairly reasonable and the pieces are well made so they will last you a while. Just be sure not to put them in the washing machine these pieces are delicate. Visit Fruitbooty.co.uk If youre feeling uninspired by the offering from high street lingerie brands, Glamorous Amorous is the place to go for something more niche, as it stocks 25 small and up-and-coming designers. Every brand page features an interview with the designer so you can get a feel for the concept behind the label. Our favourite bit is the "secret service" subscription, which lets you choose a style of lingerie, size and price range and have surprises delivered to you throughout the year. Visit Glamarousamarous.com now You'll find top brands like DKNY, Hanky Panky, Mimi Holliday and quintessentially British Ultimo at reduced prices via Lingerie Outlet Store. It offers a vast plus-size section, which is, unfortunately, lacking on some other sites. You'll also find a swimwear section, so you can buy bras and bikinis in one go. Visit Lingerieoutletstore.co.uk now Love Stories is a favoured brand among the fashion influencer type and not just because Instagrammer Lucy Williams has collaborated with it. These Insta-friendly lingerie sets are girlish without being kitsch. Yes, there is a lot of pinks, purples and frills, but the cuts are sharp and the coverage is full, meaning wearing them makes you feel secure and tucked in where it matters. The prices are mid-range bras average at around 40 while pants are roughly 35 but these products will remain coveted in your underwear drawer for some time, not just in terms of quality but also in style. Visit Lovestoriesintimates.com now (Rachel Manns Weddings) We reckon Luva Huva is the best online lingerie brand for the ethically conscious. lingerie is made from sustainable materials, including organic bamboo, soy and hemp fabrics, and recycled scraps, and is handmade in the UK. The pieces are comfortable, soft and feminine and there is a great range of nightwear and loungewear on offer too. Visit Luvahuva.co.uk now Starting out life as a tiny Southern German corset factory back in 1886, Triumph has grown to become one of the worlds leading manufacturers of lingerie and underwear. Available in over 120 countries, it sells everything from underwear and lingerie to sleepwear and swimwear. Visit Triumph.com now A brand thats been around for near on 65 years, youre in safe hands with Wolford. Synonymous with sophistication and comfort, it offers beautifully crafted underwear thats designed with serious technical know-how. Available in sizes 32A to 38E, Wolford not only sells bras and panties but also shapewear, bodysuits, beachwear and hosiery. Visit Wolfordshop.co.uk now If youre a vintage lover then this is the one for you. Whether youre taking your first steps into the world of retro undies or youre fully-fledged glamour queen, What Katie Did has something for everyone. Stocking bullet bras and negligees, you can easily recreate the silver screen allure of the Forties and Fifties with this brands extensive range of vintage-style lingerie and hosiery. It even has a dedicated section for corsets and a handy guide on how to find the right one for you. Celeb fans include the likes of Madonna, Katy Perry, Lady Gaga and Lana Del Rey. Visit Whatkatiedid.com now This lingerie label is doing things a bit differently by offering shoppers monthly drops of lingerie via a subscription model. One new set of lingerie every month might sound indulgent perhaps it is but theres something undeniably thrilling about having the stress of buying new underwear taken away from you, particularly when the underwear you receive is carefully chosen according to your size and preferences. There are the deep blue velvet bralettes and multi-strap thongs, mesh black sets and playful seasonal drops think a "honey bunny bralette for Easter. Prices vary depending on which subscription you choose: at 33.50 a month the queen box will get you a luxurious set of undies; while the empress box for 74.48 a month will give you a full lingerie set, complete with a mesh kimono and, erm, handcuffs. Visit Empressmimi.com now Voucher codes For discounts on lingerie, fashion and more, try the links below: Looking for more inspo? Browse our round-up of the best online clothing stores and brands For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Donald Trump has removed the judiciary from the Government on the White House website. Until now, and in every mainstream account of the politics of the US, the Government is made up of three branches. Those are made up of the executive, represented by the President; the legislative, made up of the Senate and House of Representatives; and the Judiciary. But the White House website now leaves out all mention of that latter branch. As of shortly after the inauguration, it mentions only the executive and legislative branches, both of which are controlled by the Republicans. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters The discovery came soon after judges dealt a blow to Donald Trump's "Muslim ban", a decision that put the White House in conflict with the judicial branch. Now the page that used to describe the judiciary's role in the governing of the US only reads: "Thank you for your interest in this subject". Otherwise, the page on the US Government is unchanged, suggesting that the removal was done on purpose. The change appears to have been made as part of a sweeping set of alterations and deletions made by Donald Trump as he entered the White House. Soon after the inauguration, for instance, it emerged that he had removed all mention of climate change or global warming, civil rights and protections for LGBT people, among others. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Google is celebrating the life of a pioneering civil rights activist who fought against the exclusion of people based on their race. Fred Korematsu was 22 years old when more than 115,000 Japanese-American people sent into incarceration because of a controversial Executive Order number 9066 that was signed in 1942 by Franklin D Roosevelt. It was an Executive Order that also introduced the travel ban on Muslim people from seven countries, and went into effect over the weekend. But rather than voluntarily be moved to an internment camp, Mr Korematsu went into hiding. That led to him being arrested in 1942 and convicted, after which he and his family were sent to the Central Utah War Relocation Center until the war was over. Rudy Giuliani explains how he helped Trump put together 'Muslim ban' legally That was despite the best efforts of organisations like the American Civil Liberties Union, which fought to take the case to the Supreme Court and then lost. The ACLU has been active in fighting against the new Executive Order, signed by Mr Trump, which meant that many people from various countries were held indefinitely in US airports. The illegality and the wrongness of the executive order were eventually recognised by the US, which ended it in 1976. Mr Korematsu had his conviction overturned in 1983. Five years later, Ronald Reagan introduced the The Civil Liberties Act of 1988, and as he did so he cited "racial prejudice, wartime hysteria and a lack of political leadership" for the internments. A post on the Fred Korematsu Institute makes clear the parallels between what happened during the war and what is happening today. "Some people think that the incarceration of Japanese Americans in concentration camps during World War II happened a long long time ago, and since the verdict in the Korematsu case was vacated, everything is okay now, and this could never happen again," the post reads. Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Show all 20 1 /20 Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-1 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-2 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-3 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-4 SAN FRANCISCO, CA - JANUARY 28: Demonstrators hold signs during a rally against a ban on Muslim immigration at San Francisco International Airport on January 28, 2017 in San Francisco, California. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday that suspends entry of all refugees for 120 days, indefinitely suspends the entries of all Syrian refugees, as well as barring entries from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering for 90 days. Stephen Lam/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-5 A crowd of protesters gathers outside of the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse as a judge hears a challenge against President Donald Trump's executive ban on immigration from several Muslim countries, on January 28, 2017 in Brooklyn. The judge issued an emergency stay on part of Trump's executive order, ruling that sending refugees stopped at U.S. airports back to their countries would be harmful. Yana Paskova/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-6 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-7 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-8 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-9 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-10 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-11 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-12 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-13 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-14 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-15 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-16 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-17 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-18 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-19 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-20 Passengers wait in line to check in at the American Airlines terminal at JFK International Airport August 10, 2006 in the Queens borough of New York City. British authorities arrested 21 people and halted a anallegedly terrorist plot to use liquid explosives concealed in carry-on luggage to blow up airliners traveling between Britain and the U.S. Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff said that the plot appeared to be directed at U.S. carriers flying out of Heathrow. such as United Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines. Stephen Chernin/Getty "However, after the events of 9/11, there has been an escalation of hate crimes and racial profilingby 1,600 percentall around the country targeting Muslim and Arab Americans, and those perceived to be Muslim and Arab Americans (like Sikh Americans, for whom 2 out of 3 children who wear patak or turbans are bullied in schools)." The post, written by activist Frances Kai-Hwa Wang, goes on to describe the kind of hate crimes and discrimination that have happened to those people. Both Google and the post draw attention to a famous quotation from Mr Karamatsu: If you have the feeling that something is wrong, dont be afraid to speak up. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} A campaign to #DeleteUber is leading people to delete the taxi app across the world. The criticism is coming in response to Donald Trump's so-called Muslim ban. It is being attacked on two fronts: by people who claim that it exploited a taxi protest against the ban, and by people who are worried about CEO Travis Kalanick's relationship with Mr Trump. Mr Kalanick defended his participation on Trump's panel in his Saturday Facebook post, saying he joined Mr Trump's advisory board out of the "belief that by speaking up and engaging we can make a difference." Mr Kalanick has also said that he would "urge the government to reinstate the right of U.S. residents to travel whatever their country of origin immediately". Still, many people are posting under the hashtag #DeleteUber in protest at the app. But just deleting the app isn't enough. If users really want to delete Uber then they have to delete themselves from the app, too which is slightly more complicated. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters That's done by heading to a special page on the Uber website, which can be found here. Click on "Sign In To Get Help" and log in using your email address or phone number and password. The app will the let you click to submit, and give you the option to enter anything specific you want to share with the company. Recommended Petition to cancel Trump state visit on course for 1m signatures Once it's deleted, there are more alternatives that can be used in the US than elsewhere, such as in the UK. In the US, for instance, rival taxi app Lyft has said that it will donate $1 million over the next four years to the American Civil Liberties Union. That was the organisation that successfully requested an emergency order approved by a federal judge Saturday that temporarily bars the U.S. from deporting people from the countries subject to Mr Trump's travel ban. A smaller app called Juno is only available in New York. It offers cheaper rides and claims to treat drivers better than Uber. In the UK, options include Gett, an app that lets people call up more traditional taxis. That offers free rides to users when they sign up. Sign up to our free Brexit and beyond email for the latest headlines on what Brexit is meaning for the UK Sign up to our Brexit email for the latest insight Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Brexit and beyond email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The investment of 115m in a new research centre in Britain by Danish drugs group Novo Nordisk was hailed as a vote of confidence in the UK's position as a world-leader in science and research by David Gauke, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury. I was ever so slightly surprised that he didnt say Britain is open for business as well. That seems to have become the stock reaction to this sort of announcement. Well, variety is the spice of life, I suppose. Yes, it is good news, coming as it does after similar post-Brexit vote investment announcements by Novos domestic UK peers AstraZeneca and GlaxoSmithKline. The Governments identification of pharmaceuticals as a key industry, which went hand in hand with a rather generous tax cut for drugs developed and patented here, appears to be paying off. But heres the thing: all these investments were headed our way before the EU referendum (see my above point about the tax cut). Its a relief that they have still landed in spite of it, and will therefore still create lots of economically welcome highly skilled, well paid jobs, plus lots of ancillary roles too. Its just that now, instead of adding to the economy, making it bigger, and helping the spread of prosperity, theyll simply serve to replace jobs that are going away. The most obviously comparable roles are those at the European Medicines Agency, which conducts scientific evaluation, supervision and safety monitoring of medicines developed by pharmaceutical companies for use in the EU. It employs 900 people in Canary Wharf including, among their number, a lot of highly skilled well paid people who are likely to see their jobs exported, along with all the support staff that go with them. Theyre all going to have to start looking for accommodation on the continent if they want to stay with the body. And, if theyre British, theyre going to have to start thinking about things like visas too. We have also started to see the export of still more highly skilled, well paid jobs from the City of London as banks and other financial institutions react to the Governments mad insistence on a hard Brexit. Plus all the ancilliary jobs that go with them. That hard Brexit will deny financial companies the passporting rights that facilitate their selling services across the continent. So they're shipping out to protect their businesses. When ministers hail the post-Brexit success of the UK economy, it is also worth remembering that we are unlikely to hear about the jobs that might have been created alongside the ones Novo Nordisk is creating but now wont be because of Brexit. Companies like to announce where they are putting money, and jobs. They dont tend to make a big fanfare about where they are not putting money and jobs. So we don't really know what this country has lost. Experts sometimes try and make estimates, but as Michael Gove infamously said during the EU Referendum campaign, Britain doesnt much like experts. Far easier to believe in alternative facts and the magic Brexit jobs fairy, hey. Business news: In pictures Show all 13 1 /13 Business news: In pictures Business news: In pictures Flybe collapses Airline Flybe has collapsed. All future flights on the Exeter-based airline have been cancelled leaving more than 2,300 staff facing an uncertain future, and wrecking the travel plans of hundreds of thousands of passengers. The chief executive, Mark Anderson, said: Europes largest independent regional airline has been unable to overcome significant funding challenges to its business. AFP via Getty Business news: In pictures Future product placement will be 'tailored to individual viewers' Marketing executives say that product placement in films and televison shows on streaming services such as Netflix may be tailored to individuals in future. For instance, if data shows that a viewer is a fan of pepsi, a billboard in the background of a shot would host an advert for pepsi, while for a viewer known to have different tastes it could be for Coca-Cola Paramount Business news: In pictures Corbyn wishes Amazon a happy birthday In a card sent to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos on the company's 25th birthday, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn writes: "You owe the British people millions in taxes that pay for the public services that we all rely on. Please pay your fair share" Business news: In pictures No deal, no tariffs The government has announced that it would slash almost all tariffs in the event of a no-deal Brexit. Notable exceptions include cars and meat, which will see tariffs in place to protect British farmers Getty Business news: In pictures Fingerprint payment NatWest is trialling a new bank card that will allow people to touch their hand to the card when paying rather than typing in a PIN number. The card will work by recognising the user's fingerprint NatWest/PA Wire Business news: In pictures Mahabis bust High-end slipper retailer Mahabis has gone into administration. 2 Jan 2019 Mahabis Business news: In pictures Costa Cola Coca-Cola has paid 3.9bn for Costa Coffee. A cafe chain is a new venture for the global soft drinks giant PA Business news: In pictures RIP Payday Loans A funeral procession for payday loans was held in London on September 2. The future of pay day lenders is in doubt after Wonga, Britain's biggest, went into administration on August 30 PA Business news: In pictures Musk irks investors and directors Elon Musk has concluded that Tesla will remain public. Investors and company directors were angry at Musk for tweeting unexpectedly that he was considering taking Tesla private and share prices had taken a tumble in the following weeks Getty Business news: In pictures Jaguar warning Iconic British car maker Jaguar Land Rover warned on July 5, 2018 that a "bad" Brexit deal could jeopardise planned investment of more than $100 billion, upping corporate pressure as the government heads into crucial talks AFP/Getty Business news: In pictures Spotif-IPO Spotify traded publically for the first time on the New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday. However, the company isn't issuing shares, but rather, shares held by Spotify's private investors will be sold AFP/Getty Business news: In pictures French blue passports The deadline to award a contract to make blue British passports after Brexit has been extended by two weeks following a request by bidder De La Rue. The move comes after anger at the announcement British passports would be produced by Franco-Dutch firm Gemalto when De La Rues contract ends in July. The British firm said Gemalto was chosen only because it undercut the competition, but the UK company also admitted that it was not the cheapest choice in the tendering process. Business news: In pictures Beast from the east economic impact The Beast from the East wiped 4m off of Flybes revenues due to flight cancellations, airport closures and delays, according to the budget airlines estimates. Flybe said it cancelled 994 flights in the three months to 31 March, compared to 372 in the same period last year. Novo Nordisks investment is good news. But it pays to treat to the brouhaha accompanying its announcement, and the tub thumping from ministers like Mr Gauke, with a degree of scepticism. Beyond the civil servants needed to handle negotiations, Breixt hasn't created any jobs, and when it comes to employment, the UK would have been better off in the EU. The economy has held up well to date, but damage from the loss of the jobs that aren't being created here, and from the loss of the jobs that are being exported back to Europe, will be felt eventually. Sign up to our free Brexit and beyond email for the latest headlines on what Brexit is meaning for the UK Sign up to our Brexit email for the latest insight Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Brexit and beyond email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The boss of Goldman Sachs told Prime Minister Theresa May that a hard Brexit would help European cities such as Frankfurt and Paris compete for Londons position as the continents dominant financial centre. Lloyd Blankfein talked tough and said there was no reason why European financial centres cant set up as effective rivals, the Financial Times reported, citing sources briefed on a private meeting at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January. Mr Blankfein reportedly expressed bemusement over how Ms May treats finance like any other industry, despite its outsized contribution to the UK economy and to tax revenues. Recommended Goldman Sachs considers moving half its London jobs because of Brexit Goldman was one of the biggest donors to the Remain campaign in the run-up to the June 2016 referendum. It employs about 6,000 staff in the UK, its main European operation. Speaking separately during the WEF, Mr Blankfein told Bloomberg Television that New York is already a bit of a gainer from Brexit, and that his firm has slowed down its planned policy of moving operations to London because of the vote. Operating our business to maximise our global potential -- we were trying to get as much into the UK as we could, Mr Blankfein said. Its too early to say what businesses might move, he said. I dont think we will need two years to make whatever adjustments we make, so were watching. The Prime Ministers meeting with Mr Blankfein and other senior bank bosses came just two days after her landmark speech confirming that the UK would leave the EU single market and suggesting that it would also leave the customs union. Brexit Concerns Show all 26 1 /26 Brexit Concerns Brexit Concerns Brexit will put British patients at 'back of the queue' for new drugs Brexit will put British patients at the back of the queue for vital new drugs, the Government has been warned forcing them to wait up to two years longer A medicines regulator has raised the alarm over a likely decision to pull out of the European Medicines Agency (EMA), as well as the EU itself. ealth Secretary Jeremy Hunt dropped the bombshell , when he said he expected the UK would quit the EMA because it is subject to rulings by the European Court of Justice. Getty Images Brexit Concerns London to lose status as 'gateway to Europe' for banks One of Germanys top banking regulators has warned that London could lose its status as gateway to Europe for the banking sector after Britain quits the European trading bloc. Andreas Dombret, who is an executive board member for the BundesbankGermanys central banktold a private meeting of German businesses and banks earlier this week in Frankfurt that even if banking rules were equivalent between the UK and the rest of the EU, that was still miles away from [Britain having] access to the single market, the BBC reports. Jason Hawkes Brexit Concerns Exodus The number of financial sector professionals in Britain and continental Europe looking for jobs in Ireland rocketed in the months after the UK voted to leave the European Union Shutterstock Brexit Concerns Brexit is making FTSE 100 executives richer Pay packages of many FTSE 100 chief executive officers are partly tied to how well share prices are doing rather than the CEOs performance -- and some stocks are soaring. ritish equities got a boost since the June vote because the likes of Rio Tinto, Smiths Group and WPP generate most sales abroad and earn a fortune when they convert these revenues back into the weakened pound. Sterlings fall also made UK stocks more affordable for overseas investors. Rex Brexit Concerns Theresa May: UK to leave single market Theresa May has said the UK "cannot possibly" remain within the European single market, as staying in it would mean "not leaving the EU at all". Getty Brexit Concerns Lead campaigner Gina Miller and her team outside the High Court Getty Brexit Concerns Raymond McCord holds up his newly issued Irish passport alongside his British passport outside the High Court in Belfast following a judges dismissal of the UK's first legal challenges to Brexit PA wire Brexit Concerns SDLP leader Colum Eastwood leaving the High Court in Belfast following a judges dismissal of the UK's first legal challenges to Brexit PA wire Brexit Concerns Migrants with luggage walk past a graffiti on a wall as they leave the 'Jungle' migrant camp, as part of a major three-day operation planned to clear the camp in Calais Getty Brexit Concerns Migrants leave messages on their tents in the Jungle migrant camp Getty Brexit Concerns The Adventist Development and Relief Agency (Adra) which distributes approximately 700 meals daily in the northern Paris camp states that it is noticing a spike in new migrant arrivals this week, potentially linked the the Calais 'jungle' camp closure - with around 1000 meals distributed today EPA Brexit Concerns Migrant workers pick apples at Stocks Farm in Suckley, Britain Reuters Brexit Concerns Many farmers across the country are voicing concerns that Brexit could be a dangerous step into the unknown for the farming industry Getty Brexit Concerns Bank of England governor Mark Carney who said the long-term outlook for the UK economy is positive, but growth was slowing in the wake of the Brexit vote PA Brexit Concerns The Dow Jones industrial average closed down over 600 points on the news with markets around the globe pluninging Getty Brexit Concerns Immigration officers deal with each member of the public seeking entry into the United Kingdom but on average, 10 a day are refused entry at this London airport and between 2008 and 2009, 33,100 people were detained at the airport for mainly passport irregularities Getty Brexit Concerns A number of global investment giants have threatened to move their European operations out of London if Brexit proves to have a negative impact on their businesses Getty Brexit Concerns Following the possibility of a Brexit the UK would be released from its renewable energy targets under the EU Renewable Energy Directive and from EU state aid restrictions, potentially giving the government more freedom both in the design and phasing out of renewable energy support regimes Getty Brexit Concerns A woman looking at a chart showing the drop in the pound (Sterling) against the US Dollar in London after Britain voted to leave the EU Getty Brexit Concerns Young protesters outside the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, to protest against the United Kingdom's decision to leave the EU following the referendum Getty Brexit Concerns Applications from Northern Ireland citizens for Irish Passports has soared to a record high after the UK Voted in favour of Leaving the EU Getty Brexit Concerns NFU Vice President Minette Batters with Secretary of State, Andrea Leadsome at the National Farmers Union (NFU) took machinery, produce, farmers and staff to Westminster to encourage Members of Parliament to back British farming, post Brexit Getty Brexit Concerns The latest reports released by the UK Cabinet Office warn that expats would lose a range of specific rights to live, to work and to access pensions, healthcare and public services. The same reports added that UK citizens abroad would not be able to assume that these rights will be guaranteed in the future Getty Brexit Concerns A British resident living in Spain asks questions during an informative Brexit talk by the "Brexpats in Spain" group, about Spanish legal issues to become Spanish citizens, at the town hall in Benalmadena, Spain Reuters Brexit Concerns The collapse of Great Britain appears to have been greatly exaggerated given the late summer crowds visiting city museums, hotels, and other important tourist attractions Getty Brexit Concerns The U.K. should maintain European Union regulations covering everything from working hours to chemicals until after the government sets out its plans for Brexit, said British manufacturers anxious to avoid a policy vacuum and safeguard access to their biggest export market Getty Several senior banking executives spoke openly in Davos about their plans to move thousands of jobs out of the UK to other European cities. HSBC chief executive Stuart Gulliver said trading operations that generate about 20 per cent of revenue for its investment bank in London may move to Paris. JP Morgan boss Jamie Dimon told Bloomberg it looked like more jobs than hed hoped for would be affected, while the president of UBS investment bank, Andrea Orcel, said he would definitely have to move jobs from London. Sign up to our free Brexit and beyond email for the latest headlines on what Brexit is meaning for the UK Sign up to our Brexit email for the latest insight Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Brexit and beyond email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Danish pharmaceutical giant Novo Nordisk is to invest about 115m over 10 years in a new research centre in Oxford, in a move described by the government as a vote of confidence in post-Brexit Britain. About 100 scientists will work at the centre, investigating new approaches to treating type-2 diabetes. Recommended The company helping foreigners leave Britain because of Brexit David Gauke, chief secretary to the Treasury, said that the move was a vote of confidence in the UKs position as a world leader in science and research, according to the BBC. Novo Nordisks executive vice-president and chief science officer Mads Thomsen said Britains vote to leave the EU was unfortunate but should not affect the collaboration between Oxford and the company. Obviously we think the Brexit decision was unfortunate. That being said, Oxford University has been around for 800 years so the academic excellence and our company's ability to turn that into medicines hasn't really changed, Mr Thomsen told the BBC. John Bell, a medicine professor at Oxford, said the new set-up, which will allow for daily interactions between academic and industrial scientists, underlined the importance of sharing research and cutting-edge science across sectors. The UKs decision to leave the EU has raised concerns in the science sector over a potential gap in funding and sparked concerns amongst drugmakers over future regulation. The European Medicines Agency, a body based in London and responsible for the scientific evaluation and safety monitoring of medicines, warned it is likely to leave after Brexit. Mr Thomsen told the BBC: We are very happy with the way the European Medicines Agency has worked and everybody is disappointed that it is likely it will have to leave the UK. We hope as many of the current 900 staff as possible will follow it to its new home in the EU as it is in everyones interest that there is as little disruption as possible for the journey of new medicines to patients. Brexit Concerns Show all 26 1 /26 Brexit Concerns Brexit Concerns Brexit will put British patients at 'back of the queue' for new drugs Brexit will put British patients at the back of the queue for vital new drugs, the Government has been warned forcing them to wait up to two years longer A medicines regulator has raised the alarm over a likely decision to pull out of the European Medicines Agency (EMA), as well as the EU itself. ealth Secretary Jeremy Hunt dropped the bombshell , when he said he expected the UK would quit the EMA because it is subject to rulings by the European Court of Justice. Getty Images Brexit Concerns London to lose status as 'gateway to Europe' for banks One of Germanys top banking regulators has warned that London could lose its status as gateway to Europe for the banking sector after Britain quits the European trading bloc. Andreas Dombret, who is an executive board member for the BundesbankGermanys central banktold a private meeting of German businesses and banks earlier this week in Frankfurt that even if banking rules were equivalent between the UK and the rest of the EU, that was still miles away from [Britain having] access to the single market, the BBC reports. Jason Hawkes Brexit Concerns Exodus The number of financial sector professionals in Britain and continental Europe looking for jobs in Ireland rocketed in the months after the UK voted to leave the European Union Shutterstock Brexit Concerns Brexit is making FTSE 100 executives richer Pay packages of many FTSE 100 chief executive officers are partly tied to how well share prices are doing rather than the CEOs performance -- and some stocks are soaring. ritish equities got a boost since the June vote because the likes of Rio Tinto, Smiths Group and WPP generate most sales abroad and earn a fortune when they convert these revenues back into the weakened pound. Sterlings fall also made UK stocks more affordable for overseas investors. Rex Brexit Concerns Theresa May: UK to leave single market Theresa May has said the UK "cannot possibly" remain within the European single market, as staying in it would mean "not leaving the EU at all". Getty Brexit Concerns Lead campaigner Gina Miller and her team outside the High Court Getty Brexit Concerns Raymond McCord holds up his newly issued Irish passport alongside his British passport outside the High Court in Belfast following a judges dismissal of the UK's first legal challenges to Brexit PA wire Brexit Concerns SDLP leader Colum Eastwood leaving the High Court in Belfast following a judges dismissal of the UK's first legal challenges to Brexit PA wire Brexit Concerns Migrants with luggage walk past a graffiti on a wall as they leave the 'Jungle' migrant camp, as part of a major three-day operation planned to clear the camp in Calais Getty Brexit Concerns Migrants leave messages on their tents in the Jungle migrant camp Getty Brexit Concerns The Adventist Development and Relief Agency (Adra) which distributes approximately 700 meals daily in the northern Paris camp states that it is noticing a spike in new migrant arrivals this week, potentially linked the the Calais 'jungle' camp closure - with around 1000 meals distributed today EPA Brexit Concerns Migrant workers pick apples at Stocks Farm in Suckley, Britain Reuters Brexit Concerns Many farmers across the country are voicing concerns that Brexit could be a dangerous step into the unknown for the farming industry Getty Brexit Concerns Bank of England governor Mark Carney who said the long-term outlook for the UK economy is positive, but growth was slowing in the wake of the Brexit vote PA Brexit Concerns The Dow Jones industrial average closed down over 600 points on the news with markets around the globe pluninging Getty Brexit Concerns Immigration officers deal with each member of the public seeking entry into the United Kingdom but on average, 10 a day are refused entry at this London airport and between 2008 and 2009, 33,100 people were detained at the airport for mainly passport irregularities Getty Brexit Concerns A number of global investment giants have threatened to move their European operations out of London if Brexit proves to have a negative impact on their businesses Getty Brexit Concerns Following the possibility of a Brexit the UK would be released from its renewable energy targets under the EU Renewable Energy Directive and from EU state aid restrictions, potentially giving the government more freedom both in the design and phasing out of renewable energy support regimes Getty Brexit Concerns A woman looking at a chart showing the drop in the pound (Sterling) against the US Dollar in London after Britain voted to leave the EU Getty Brexit Concerns Young protesters outside the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, to protest against the United Kingdom's decision to leave the EU following the referendum Getty Brexit Concerns Applications from Northern Ireland citizens for Irish Passports has soared to a record high after the UK Voted in favour of Leaving the EU Getty Brexit Concerns NFU Vice President Minette Batters with Secretary of State, Andrea Leadsome at the National Farmers Union (NFU) took machinery, produce, farmers and staff to Westminster to encourage Members of Parliament to back British farming, post Brexit Getty Brexit Concerns The latest reports released by the UK Cabinet Office warn that expats would lose a range of specific rights to live, to work and to access pensions, healthcare and public services. The same reports added that UK citizens abroad would not be able to assume that these rights will be guaranteed in the future Getty Brexit Concerns A British resident living in Spain asks questions during an informative Brexit talk by the "Brexpats in Spain" group, about Spanish legal issues to become Spanish citizens, at the town hall in Benalmadena, Spain Reuters Brexit Concerns The collapse of Great Britain appears to have been greatly exaggerated given the late summer crowds visiting city museums, hotels, and other important tourist attractions Getty Brexit Concerns The U.K. should maintain European Union regulations covering everything from working hours to chemicals until after the government sets out its plans for Brexit, said British manufacturers anxious to avoid a policy vacuum and safeguard access to their biggest export market Getty Despite fears that Britain could lose its appeal as a centre for research and manufacturing, Britains two biggest drugmakers are still committed to new investments. AstraZeneca is finishing a $500m (399m) headquarters and research centre in Cambridge, while GlaxoSmithKline pledged $360m (287m) to expand manufacturing in the United Kingdom in July, just five weeks after the Brexit vote. Additional reporting by Reuters Sign up to our free Brexit and beyond email for the latest headlines on what Brexit is meaning for the UK Sign up to our Brexit email for the latest insight Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Brexit and beyond email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} First it was Marmite, then PG tips and Freddo bars and now the chief executive of Weetabix has warned that the price of one of the nations favourite breakfast cereals might rise in 2017, on account of the slumping pound. Speaking to the BBC on Monday, Giles Turrell, the chief executive of Weetabix said prices are likely to go up this year by low-single digits in percentage terms. The Independent has contacted Weetabix for further comment. A string of companies in the UK have already attempted to offset sterling weakness by passing on the additional cost to consumers. Last year, Unilever clashed with Tesco over the price of products including Marmite prompting the later to raise prices. Wheat, one of the main ingredients in Weetabix, is a global commodity, which means it is priced in dollars and that its cost in pounds has therefore jumped over the past seven months. British companies are now bracing for further pressure in the months ahead as the start of Brexit negotiations threatens to drag the pound down further. Premier foods, the maker of Mr Kipling cakes and Bisto gravy, earlier this month said it was in talks with some of its biggest retail customers about cranking up prices as a result of the twin pressures of the tumbling pound and rising commodity prices. High street chain Next also warned shoppers they could face price rises of up to 5 per cent in 2017 due to the falling pound, with cost pressures likely hitting annual profits by up to 14 per cent. Brexit Concerns Show all 26 1 /26 Brexit Concerns Brexit Concerns Brexit will put British patients at 'back of the queue' for new drugs Brexit will put British patients at the back of the queue for vital new drugs, the Government has been warned forcing them to wait up to two years longer A medicines regulator has raised the alarm over a likely decision to pull out of the European Medicines Agency (EMA), as well as the EU itself. ealth Secretary Jeremy Hunt dropped the bombshell , when he said he expected the UK would quit the EMA because it is subject to rulings by the European Court of Justice. Getty Images Brexit Concerns London to lose status as 'gateway to Europe' for banks One of Germanys top banking regulators has warned that London could lose its status as gateway to Europe for the banking sector after Britain quits the European trading bloc. Andreas Dombret, who is an executive board member for the BundesbankGermanys central banktold a private meeting of German businesses and banks earlier this week in Frankfurt that even if banking rules were equivalent between the UK and the rest of the EU, that was still miles away from [Britain having] access to the single market, the BBC reports. Jason Hawkes Brexit Concerns Exodus The number of financial sector professionals in Britain and continental Europe looking for jobs in Ireland rocketed in the months after the UK voted to leave the European Union Shutterstock Brexit Concerns Brexit is making FTSE 100 executives richer Pay packages of many FTSE 100 chief executive officers are partly tied to how well share prices are doing rather than the CEOs performance -- and some stocks are soaring. ritish equities got a boost since the June vote because the likes of Rio Tinto, Smiths Group and WPP generate most sales abroad and earn a fortune when they convert these revenues back into the weakened pound. Sterlings fall also made UK stocks more affordable for overseas investors. Rex Brexit Concerns Theresa May: UK to leave single market Theresa May has said the UK "cannot possibly" remain within the European single market, as staying in it would mean "not leaving the EU at all". Getty Brexit Concerns Lead campaigner Gina Miller and her team outside the High Court Getty Brexit Concerns Raymond McCord holds up his newly issued Irish passport alongside his British passport outside the High Court in Belfast following a judges dismissal of the UK's first legal challenges to Brexit PA wire Brexit Concerns SDLP leader Colum Eastwood leaving the High Court in Belfast following a judges dismissal of the UK's first legal challenges to Brexit PA wire Brexit Concerns Migrants with luggage walk past a graffiti on a wall as they leave the 'Jungle' migrant camp, as part of a major three-day operation planned to clear the camp in Calais Getty Brexit Concerns Migrants leave messages on their tents in the Jungle migrant camp Getty Brexit Concerns The Adventist Development and Relief Agency (Adra) which distributes approximately 700 meals daily in the northern Paris camp states that it is noticing a spike in new migrant arrivals this week, potentially linked the the Calais 'jungle' camp closure - with around 1000 meals distributed today EPA Brexit Concerns Migrant workers pick apples at Stocks Farm in Suckley, Britain Reuters Brexit Concerns Many farmers across the country are voicing concerns that Brexit could be a dangerous step into the unknown for the farming industry Getty Brexit Concerns Bank of England governor Mark Carney who said the long-term outlook for the UK economy is positive, but growth was slowing in the wake of the Brexit vote PA Brexit Concerns The Dow Jones industrial average closed down over 600 points on the news with markets around the globe pluninging Getty Brexit Concerns Immigration officers deal with each member of the public seeking entry into the United Kingdom but on average, 10 a day are refused entry at this London airport and between 2008 and 2009, 33,100 people were detained at the airport for mainly passport irregularities Getty Brexit Concerns A number of global investment giants have threatened to move their European operations out of London if Brexit proves to have a negative impact on their businesses Getty Brexit Concerns Following the possibility of a Brexit the UK would be released from its renewable energy targets under the EU Renewable Energy Directive and from EU state aid restrictions, potentially giving the government more freedom both in the design and phasing out of renewable energy support regimes Getty Brexit Concerns A woman looking at a chart showing the drop in the pound (Sterling) against the US Dollar in London after Britain voted to leave the EU Getty Brexit Concerns Young protesters outside the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, to protest against the United Kingdom's decision to leave the EU following the referendum Getty Brexit Concerns Applications from Northern Ireland citizens for Irish Passports has soared to a record high after the UK Voted in favour of Leaving the EU Getty Brexit Concerns NFU Vice President Minette Batters with Secretary of State, Andrea Leadsome at the National Farmers Union (NFU) took machinery, produce, farmers and staff to Westminster to encourage Members of Parliament to back British farming, post Brexit Getty Brexit Concerns The latest reports released by the UK Cabinet Office warn that expats would lose a range of specific rights to live, to work and to access pensions, healthcare and public services. The same reports added that UK citizens abroad would not be able to assume that these rights will be guaranteed in the future Getty Brexit Concerns A British resident living in Spain asks questions during an informative Brexit talk by the "Brexpats in Spain" group, about Spanish legal issues to become Spanish citizens, at the town hall in Benalmadena, Spain Reuters Brexit Concerns The collapse of Great Britain appears to have been greatly exaggerated given the late summer crowds visiting city museums, hotels, and other important tourist attractions Getty Brexit Concerns The U.K. should maintain European Union regulations covering everything from working hours to chemicals until after the government sets out its plans for Brexit, said British manufacturers anxious to avoid a policy vacuum and safeguard access to their biggest export market Getty The pound is currently down about 10 per cent against the euro since the EU referendum in June, and is 17 per cent weaker against the US dollar. On Monday, Weetabix also announced a 30m capital investment programme across its UK manufacturing sites in Burton Latimer and Corby. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has expressed her concern over the surge in hostilities in Ukraine's east and the new losses among Ukrainian servicemen. "We have learned that there is no ceasefire [in the anti-terrorist operation zone] and that soldiers are dying and the situation is the cause for concern," she said at a joint briefing with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko in Berlin on Monday. Poroshenko said, for his part, that the Russian side did not react to any addresses from Ukraine and from the OSCE regarding the artillery shellings of Ukrainian servicemen in Donbas. Five Ukrainian troops were killed and 12 injured in Donbas on January 29 and two servicemen were killed and another five injured in the early hours of January 30, he said. "They were either injured or killed due to fire from artillery, artillery systems that were installed by Russian militants in residential areas of Donetsk and Yasynuvata in order to prevent Ukrainian soldiers from opening fire in return," he said. "We immediately applied to the OSCE, immediately reported [it]. I emphasize it: the Russian side declined to react to both the inquiries of our side and enquiries from the OSCE," Poroshenko said. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The chief executive of Goldman Sachs has become one of the first Wall Street executives to speak out against President Donald Trumps immigration ban, saying that the policy has the potential to disrupt business at the bellwether bank. In a voicemail sent to Goldman Sachs employees on Sunday night, Lloyd Blankfein said the firm will work to minimise the effect of the policy on its staff and their families and that it does not support the policy. If the order were to become or remain effective, I recognise that there is potential for disruption to the firm, and especially to some of our people and their families, Mr Blankfein said as reported by CNBC. He quoted from Goldman Sachs business principles: For us to be successful, our men and women must reflect the diversity of the communities and cultures in which we operate. That means we must attract, retain and motivate people from many backgrounds and perspectives. Being diverse is not optional; it is what we must be. He said now was the time to reflect on those words and the principles that underline them. JP Morgan has also condemned Mr Trumps travel ban. In a memo to staff, seen by the BBC, the investment bank operating committee said: "We want every one of you to know of our unwavering commitment to the dedicated people working here at JPMorgan Chase." It added: "With more than 140,000 employees in the United States alone, we are grateful for the hard work and sacrifices made to keep our country safe. At the same time, we understand that our country, economy and wellbeing are strengthened by the rich diversity of the world around us, where we are dedicated to serving customers and communities in more than 100 countries every day. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters On Friday, Mr Trump issued an executive order on temporarily stopping citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US. The countries affected are Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Major tech companies such as Google, Microsoft and Airbnb voiced concerns about the travel restrictions over the weekend. However, many US top executives have so far remained silent underscoring the sensitivities around opposing policies that could provoke a backlash from the White House. Earlier this month, Gary Cohn, the former chief operating officer and president of Goldman Sachs, took up the role of director of the National Economic Council in the Trump administration. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Google has set up a $4m (3.2m) crisis fund to help employees and other people affected by President Donald Trumps new immigration policy. Mr Trump, on Friday, signed an executive order for extreme vetting that halted the USs refugee programme and restricted citizens from a number of Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States for at least 90 days. The countries affected are Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. Recommended Airbnb offers free housing to anyone affected by Trump travel ban In response, Google has pledged $2m (1.6m) of its own money matched by $2m to be made up in donations from its employees, according to a report by USA Today. The crisis fund is reported to be the largest sum of money ever awarded by the search giant to a humanitarian cause. It will be distributed amongst four bodies: the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC), International Rescue Committee (IRC) and the UN Refugee Agency (UNHR). SAG Awards get political as actors turn on Trump Were concerned about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US, Google said in a statement to USA Today. Well continue to make our views on these issues known to leaders in Washington and elsewhere. News of Googles campaign follows statements against the controversial ban by company chief executive Sundar Pichai and the participation of its co-founder Sergey Brin in a protest at San Francisco International Airport over the weekend. Mr Pichai criticised the executive order in an email to staff saying the US ban on foreign national from seven countries affects at least 187 Google employees. Other tech companies took concrete action to support employees and people affected by Mr Trumps new policy. Airbnb has offered free accommodation to people left stranded by Mr Trumps travel ban. Microsoft sent a letter to its employees offering legal assistance to those affected, while Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive of Facebook,on Friday said that he was concerned about the impact of the recent executive orders signed by President Trump. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Separately, Uber over the weekend said it will create a $3m (2.4m) legal defence fund to help drivers on its platform with immigration issues. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Greece must agree an austerity deal with creditors within the next three weeks or it faces being plunged back into another major debt crisis, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned in a leaked report, adding that the country will need further substantial relief from EU nations. The Greek government is believed to have reached an impasse with negotiators over claims it can attain a budget surplus of 3.5 per cent after its third multi-billion euro bailout programme since 2009 runs out next year. In a report leaked to Reuters on Monday, the IMF said prime minister Alexis Tsipras and his coalition government could lead Greece into explosive long-term debt for the next decade if negotiations are not satisfactorily concluded by 20 February, when eurozone finance ministers are next due to meet. It added that Greek debt could explode to 275 per cent of GDP by 2060. The most recent meeting with creditors ended in a stalemate with Mr Tsipras saying he was not willing to take on further harsh cuts proposed by eurozone ministers, which he described as absurd. Greece cannot grow out of its debt problem, the IMF said in the leaked report, according to Reuters. Greece requires substantial debt relief from its European partners to restore debt sustainability. Major elections in Europes wealthiest nations, starting in the spring, could cause further unrest in Greece and make it even more difficult to negotiate successfully. Should Greece fall back into severe economic and political unrest in the coming months, the prospect of the troubled country losing its membership of the European Union - dubbed Grexit - could become a very real possibility once more. It is critical that a compromise is found, Aristides Hatzis, law and economics professor at the University of Athens, told the Guardian. If these negotiations are not wrapped up by February 20, we could be looking at potentially disastrous political turmoil, which would bring back the scenario of Grexit with a vengeance. A swathe of austerity cuts across all aspects of infrastructure in Greece has left 53 per cent of residents believing EU membership is not right for their country, according to a poll by Alco. Meanwhile support for Mr Tsipras government continues to plummet and fresh elections may be called. On Monday, Greek bond yields soared amid rising concerns that the country will struggle to repay creditors. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Always thought that you were more likely to hop on a bicycle in Amsterdam than hail one of Londons iconic black cabs? That may be about to change. The owner of the company that makes Londons characteristic taxis has unveiled major expansion plans, including a push into mainland Europe. Recommended Black cabs are going to go electric Speaking to Reuters for an interview published on Monday, Chris Gubbey, the chief executive of the London Taxi Company, said that his firm is pushing ahead with investment plans despite political jitter around Brexit, and that the company aims to increase output ten-fold by the turn of the decade. As a result, Londons black cabs could start hitting the streets of mainland Europe as early as next year, he said, though they might not necessarily be black in colour. LTC dates back to 1899. In 2012, Chinese automaker Geely, which also owns Volvo Cars, agreed to buy it. Its recently been exploring the possibility of electrifying its fleet and last year secured $400m through a green bond sale to finance the development of the TX5, a hybrid battery-powered version of the classic black cab. Reuters reported that executives from the company had already visited cities including Oslo, Amsterdam, Paris and Berlin, staking out markets, but Mr Gubbey declined to comment on which city would be the first overseas destination for the launch of the iconic cab. Asked by Reuters about the challenges of Brexit, Mr Gubbey said that the UK vote to quit the European Union had not triggered any investment changes, but that it had raised concerns about the future. Business news: In pictures Show all 13 1 /13 Business news: In pictures Business news: In pictures Flybe collapses Airline Flybe has collapsed. All future flights on the Exeter-based airline have been cancelled leaving more than 2,300 staff facing an uncertain future, and wrecking the travel plans of hundreds of thousands of passengers. The chief executive, Mark Anderson, said: Europes largest independent regional airline has been unable to overcome significant funding challenges to its business. AFP via Getty Business news: In pictures Future product placement will be 'tailored to individual viewers' Marketing executives say that product placement in films and televison shows on streaming services such as Netflix may be tailored to individuals in future. For instance, if data shows that a viewer is a fan of pepsi, a billboard in the background of a shot would host an advert for pepsi, while for a viewer known to have different tastes it could be for Coca-Cola Paramount Business news: In pictures Corbyn wishes Amazon a happy birthday In a card sent to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos on the company's 25th birthday, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn writes: "You owe the British people millions in taxes that pay for the public services that we all rely on. Please pay your fair share" Business news: In pictures No deal, no tariffs The government has announced that it would slash almost all tariffs in the event of a no-deal Brexit. Notable exceptions include cars and meat, which will see tariffs in place to protect British farmers Getty Business news: In pictures Fingerprint payment NatWest is trialling a new bank card that will allow people to touch their hand to the card when paying rather than typing in a PIN number. The card will work by recognising the user's fingerprint NatWest/PA Wire Business news: In pictures Mahabis bust High-end slipper retailer Mahabis has gone into administration. 2 Jan 2019 Mahabis Business news: In pictures Costa Cola Coca-Cola has paid 3.9bn for Costa Coffee. A cafe chain is a new venture for the global soft drinks giant PA Business news: In pictures RIP Payday Loans A funeral procession for payday loans was held in London on September 2. The future of pay day lenders is in doubt after Wonga, Britain's biggest, went into administration on August 30 PA Business news: In pictures Musk irks investors and directors Elon Musk has concluded that Tesla will remain public. Investors and company directors were angry at Musk for tweeting unexpectedly that he was considering taking Tesla private and share prices had taken a tumble in the following weeks Getty Business news: In pictures Jaguar warning Iconic British car maker Jaguar Land Rover warned on July 5, 2018 that a "bad" Brexit deal could jeopardise planned investment of more than $100 billion, upping corporate pressure as the government heads into crucial talks AFP/Getty Business news: In pictures Spotif-IPO Spotify traded publically for the first time on the New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday. However, the company isn't issuing shares, but rather, shares held by Spotify's private investors will be sold AFP/Getty Business news: In pictures French blue passports The deadline to award a contract to make blue British passports after Brexit has been extended by two weeks following a request by bidder De La Rue. The move comes after anger at the announcement British passports would be produced by Franco-Dutch firm Gemalto when De La Rues contract ends in July. The British firm said Gemalto was chosen only because it undercut the competition, but the UK company also admitted that it was not the cheapest choice in the tendering process. Business news: In pictures Beast from the east economic impact The Beast from the East wiped 4m off of Flybes revenues due to flight cancellations, airport closures and delays, according to the budget airlines estimates. Flybe said it cancelled 994 flights in the three months to 31 March, compared to 372 in the same period last year. Last week data from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders showed that the number of cars built in the UK hit a 17-year high in 2016 and that more cars are being exported from Britain than ever before. The trade body also warned, however, that a failure to establish proper trade deals after Brexit could damage the industry beyond repair. Sign up to our free Brexit and beyond email for the latest headlines on what Brexit is meaning for the UK Sign up to our Brexit email for the latest insight Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Brexit and beyond email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} US President Donald Trump is a threat to the European Union, the European Parliament's chief Brexit negotiator has said. Guy Verhofstadt made the comment at a speech in London on Monday afternoon, warning that the union was facing a three-pronged attack from outside forces. Two of the forces were Russia's Vladimir Putin and radical Islamism, he said, which were trying to undermine the EU project. But he added: I have just come back from US and my view is that we have a third front that is undermining the EU ... and that is Donald Trump. Mr Verhofstadt, a who is a Belgian liberal MEP, warned that nationalism was no way to run Europe and that it would lead to disaster. Twenty million people have died because of nationalism in Europe, he told his audience at Chatham House. There is not one family living on the continent and certainly not in Britain who has no grandfather, grandmother, who was not a victim of these stupidities, these atrocities at the end of the 19th and the whole 20th century. Putting your future organisation of Europe on nationalist ideas is the most stupid thing you can do. Its playing with fire knowing what it has created in the past. Brexit Concerns Show all 26 1 /26 Brexit Concerns Brexit Concerns Brexit will put British patients at 'back of the queue' for new drugs Brexit will put British patients at the back of the queue for vital new drugs, the Government has been warned forcing them to wait up to two years longer A medicines regulator has raised the alarm over a likely decision to pull out of the European Medicines Agency (EMA), as well as the EU itself. ealth Secretary Jeremy Hunt dropped the bombshell , when he said he expected the UK would quit the EMA because it is subject to rulings by the European Court of Justice. Getty Images Brexit Concerns London to lose status as 'gateway to Europe' for banks One of Germanys top banking regulators has warned that London could lose its status as gateway to Europe for the banking sector after Britain quits the European trading bloc. Andreas Dombret, who is an executive board member for the BundesbankGermanys central banktold a private meeting of German businesses and banks earlier this week in Frankfurt that even if banking rules were equivalent between the UK and the rest of the EU, that was still miles away from [Britain having] access to the single market, the BBC reports. Jason Hawkes Brexit Concerns Exodus The number of financial sector professionals in Britain and continental Europe looking for jobs in Ireland rocketed in the months after the UK voted to leave the European Union Shutterstock Brexit Concerns Brexit is making FTSE 100 executives richer Pay packages of many FTSE 100 chief executive officers are partly tied to how well share prices are doing rather than the CEOs performance -- and some stocks are soaring. ritish equities got a boost since the June vote because the likes of Rio Tinto, Smiths Group and WPP generate most sales abroad and earn a fortune when they convert these revenues back into the weakened pound. Sterlings fall also made UK stocks more affordable for overseas investors. Rex Brexit Concerns Theresa May: UK to leave single market Theresa May has said the UK "cannot possibly" remain within the European single market, as staying in it would mean "not leaving the EU at all". Getty Brexit Concerns Lead campaigner Gina Miller and her team outside the High Court Getty Brexit Concerns Raymond McCord holds up his newly issued Irish passport alongside his British passport outside the High Court in Belfast following a judges dismissal of the UK's first legal challenges to Brexit PA wire Brexit Concerns SDLP leader Colum Eastwood leaving the High Court in Belfast following a judges dismissal of the UK's first legal challenges to Brexit PA wire Brexit Concerns Migrants with luggage walk past a graffiti on a wall as they leave the 'Jungle' migrant camp, as part of a major three-day operation planned to clear the camp in Calais Getty Brexit Concerns Migrants leave messages on their tents in the Jungle migrant camp Getty Brexit Concerns The Adventist Development and Relief Agency (Adra) which distributes approximately 700 meals daily in the northern Paris camp states that it is noticing a spike in new migrant arrivals this week, potentially linked the the Calais 'jungle' camp closure - with around 1000 meals distributed today EPA Brexit Concerns Migrant workers pick apples at Stocks Farm in Suckley, Britain Reuters Brexit Concerns Many farmers across the country are voicing concerns that Brexit could be a dangerous step into the unknown for the farming industry Getty Brexit Concerns Bank of England governor Mark Carney who said the long-term outlook for the UK economy is positive, but growth was slowing in the wake of the Brexit vote PA Brexit Concerns The Dow Jones industrial average closed down over 600 points on the news with markets around the globe pluninging Getty Brexit Concerns Immigration officers deal with each member of the public seeking entry into the United Kingdom but on average, 10 a day are refused entry at this London airport and between 2008 and 2009, 33,100 people were detained at the airport for mainly passport irregularities Getty Brexit Concerns A number of global investment giants have threatened to move their European operations out of London if Brexit proves to have a negative impact on their businesses Getty Brexit Concerns Following the possibility of a Brexit the UK would be released from its renewable energy targets under the EU Renewable Energy Directive and from EU state aid restrictions, potentially giving the government more freedom both in the design and phasing out of renewable energy support regimes Getty Brexit Concerns A woman looking at a chart showing the drop in the pound (Sterling) against the US Dollar in London after Britain voted to leave the EU Getty Brexit Concerns Young protesters outside the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, to protest against the United Kingdom's decision to leave the EU following the referendum Getty Brexit Concerns Applications from Northern Ireland citizens for Irish Passports has soared to a record high after the UK Voted in favour of Leaving the EU Getty Brexit Concerns NFU Vice President Minette Batters with Secretary of State, Andrea Leadsome at the National Farmers Union (NFU) took machinery, produce, farmers and staff to Westminster to encourage Members of Parliament to back British farming, post Brexit Getty Brexit Concerns The latest reports released by the UK Cabinet Office warn that expats would lose a range of specific rights to live, to work and to access pensions, healthcare and public services. The same reports added that UK citizens abroad would not be able to assume that these rights will be guaranteed in the future Getty Brexit Concerns A British resident living in Spain asks questions during an informative Brexit talk by the "Brexpats in Spain" group, about Spanish legal issues to become Spanish citizens, at the town hall in Benalmadena, Spain Reuters Brexit Concerns The collapse of Great Britain appears to have been greatly exaggerated given the late summer crowds visiting city museums, hotels, and other important tourist attractions Getty Brexit Concerns The U.K. should maintain European Union regulations covering everything from working hours to chemicals until after the government sets out its plans for Brexit, said British manufacturers anxious to avoid a policy vacuum and safeguard access to their biggest export market Getty He further suggested that nationalism was in danger of making a comeback on both sides of the Atlantic. The senior MEP was speaking just ahead of the French presidential election in which the Front National candidate is expected to do well. Mr Verhofstadt, a former Belgian PM, represents the Parliament in negotiations over Brexit; separate negotiations are responsible for the views of the EUs other pillars, the Commission and the Council. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} A transgender woman has been blocked from seeing her five children after a family court ruled it was not compatible with her ex-wifes ultra-orthodox Jewish background. The landmark ruling, seen by The Independent, was issued by Justice Peter Jackson at the family court in Manchester. It has been handed down after 12 months of the transgender woman asking for access to her five children. At the centre of the fight between two parents were claims that the transgender parent, who is living as a woman, should not be allowed direct access to her children after leaving the ultra-orthodox Jewish community. This is because, barristers acting for the mother argued, it would lead to her children being ostracised by their ultra-orthodox community and unable to live normal lives due to their association with a transgender parent. However, Orthodox Jewish rabbis acting for the parent argued that Judaism did not believe transgender individuals should be punished in this way. Despite that, Justice Jackson concluded that the risk that these children and their mother would be rejected by their community if the children were to have face-to-face contact with their father was too great to allow direct contact. Weighing up the profound consequences for the childrens welfare of ordering or not ordering direct contact with their father, I have reached the unwelcome conclusion that the likelihood of the children and their mother being marginalised or excluded by the ultra-orthodox community is so real, and the consequences so great, that this one factor, despite its many disadvantages, must prevail over the many advantages of contact. I therefore conclude with real regret, knowing the pain that it must cause, that the fathers application for direct contact must be refused. He added: "I reject the bald proposition that seeing the father would be too much for the children. Children are goodhearted and adaptable and, given sensitive support, I am sure that these children could adapt considerably to the changes in their father. The truth is that for the children to see their father would be too much for the adults." The parent is instead allowed to indirectly contact her children four times a year via letters on festivals and on their birthdays. The parent had claimed she was subject to domestic abuse by her ex-wife but that had been denied. Richy Thompson, campaigns manager at the British Humanist Association told The Independent the decision was extremely sad given the progress made towards equal rights for transgender people. At a time when society is progressing towards having much more inclusive attitudes towards trans people and their fundamental rights, it is extremely sad that a religious community can hold such discriminatory attitudes, and threaten to ostracise children over a parents gender identity, that we might even end up with a family court judge entertaining a ruling like this one, he said. The case highlighted the difficulties faced by religious communities like ultra-orthodox Jewish Charedis if they encounter modern influences. Charedi communities adhere to a strict 19th-century interpretation of Judaism and contact with the secular world can be taboo. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Saudi Arabia has criticised Norway's human rights record, accusing the country of failing to protect its Muslim citizens and not doing enough to counter criticism of the prophet Mohammed. The gulf state called for all criticism of religion and of prophet Mohammed to be made illegal in Norway. It also expressed concern at increasing cases of domestic violence, rape crimes and inequality in riches and noted a continuation of hate crimes against Muslims in the country. The Scandinavian nation came under scrutiny during the United Nations' Universal Periodic Review, in which 14 States are scheduled to have their human rights records examined. Russia meanwhile called for Norway to clamp down on expressions of religious intolerance and and criticised the countrys child welfare system. They also recommended that Norway improve its correctional facilities for those applying for asylum status. Norwegian Foreign Minister Brge Brende was in Geneva to hear the concerns from 91 other countries. He told Norway's NTB newswire prior to the hearing: It is a paradox that countries which do not support fundamental human rights have influence on the council, but that is the United Nations, reported The Local. Human Rights Watch last report noted that in 2012 Saudi Arabia "stepped up arrests and trials of peaceful dissidents, and responded with force to demonstrations by citizens." It continued "Authorities continue to suppress or fail to protect the rights of 9 million Saudi women and girls and 9 million foreign workers. As in past years, thousands of people have received unfair trials or been subject to arbitrary detention. The year has seen trials against half-a-dozen human rights defenders and several others for their peaceful expression or assembly demanding political and human rights reforms." Get the free Morning Headlines email for news from our reporters across the world Sign up to our free Morning Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Morning Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} A petition calling on the UK Government to cancel Donald Trumps planned state visit reached one million signatures amid growing outrage over an immigration ban implemented in the US. The President signed an executive order on Friday limiting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, suspending refugee resettlement for 120 days and barring Syrian refugees indefinitely from entering the country. The order provoked a furious public outcry around the world, with protesters taking to the streets in outrage over what many called a Muslim ban. In the UK, a record number of people have signed the petition, with signatures reaching more then 1,370,000 at the time of writing. A heat map attached to the petition showed UK residents in large cities and university towns were more likely to have signed. Heat map shows parts of UK that do not want to see US President welcomed with a state visit (Screenshot) London, Brighton, Exeter, Liverpool, Manchester and Birmingham, among others, all saw a high concentrate of residents voice their concerns. However, no notable north/south divide was visible in the coloured map, with darker saturation representing a higher proportion of votes. Any petition that receives more than 100,000 signatures within six months must be considered for debate by MPs in Parliament. Petitions that attract more than 10,000 in the time period requires a response from the Government. The Muslim ban petition eclipsed the target within a few hours, surpassing 280,000 signatures by 3pm on the day of launch. However, Downing Street reiterated its stance had not changed on the Presidents forthcoming trip. An invitation has been extended and accepted, a Number 10 spokesman said. Get the free Morning Headlines email for news from our reporters across the world Sign up to our free Morning Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Morning Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Thousands of people have joined marches across Britain in protest at US President Donald Trump's travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries. MPs are also holding an emergency debate on Mr Trump's hastily implemented executive order. In London, Whitehall was turned into a sea of placards as thousands gathered opposite the gates of Downing Street. High-profile speakers such as former Labour leader Ed Miliband and pop star Lily Allen are expected to address the demonstration, organised by author and Guardian columnist Owen Jones. Thousands of demonstrators gathered outside Downing Street to protest against the US President (Getty) Shadow attorney general Shami Chakrabarti told the crowd: "It is in sadness and solidarity that we gather here this evening. "I also hope, friends, that we stand here in solidarity with all the world's women who the president has insulted and all the desperate refugees that he would spurn." Mr Jones said: "Today we say with defiance, with determination, we will not stay silent." Similar protests were planned in cities across the UK, including Edinburgh, Cardiff, Leeds, Manchester and Birmingham. Anti-Trump protesters also took to the streets in central Leeds (PA) The action follows a petition calling for the US President's UK state visit to be cancelled surged to more than a million signatures after his executive order. Earlier on Monday, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson sought to restore calm by telling Parliament the ban would make "no difference" to British passport holders. Chants, including "Donald Trump has got to go" and "shame on May" rippled up the swelling crowds on Whitehall. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Earlier, Downing Street stood firm on the decision to extend an invitation to Mr Trump, saying: "We look forward to hosting the president later this year." The SNP's Westminster leader Angus Robertson fired up the thousands of activists in London with a chant of "no state visit". He added: "Friends, first they came for the Muslims, but we say something and we say no state visit for Donald Trump." Shadow home secretary Diane Abbott told the crowd she had come on behalf of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. She said: "Donald Trump has been president for only a few days, and look at what he is doing. "We need to resist the Islamophobia and scapegoating of Muslims, we have got to resist it whether it is in the United States or here in the UK." Hundreds marched to the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh as part of the nationwide protests (Getty) In Scotland, demonstrations began in the early evening. The largest protests were in Glasgow and Edinburgh, where crowds swelled from around 5pm, and protests were also held in Aberdeen and Dundee. Placards and banners were held aloft in Glasgow as a crowd of around 500 people chanted "hope not fear, refugees are welcome here". The protests were organised by a variety of groups, including Stand up to Racism, and refugees whose countries had been singled out by Mr Trump. In Edinburgh, large crowds marched from the North Bridge to the US Consulate in Regent Terrace. Get the free Morning Headlines email for news from our reporters across the world Sign up to our free Morning Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Morning Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Thousands of protesters are expected to gather in front of Downing Street on Monday evening to protest Donald Trumps immigration ban. The executive order has sparked global outcry after the US President blocked immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries and suspended refugee settlement in the country. Refugees, green card and visa holders were blocked from boarding US-bound flights or detained in arrivals over the weekend, causing protesters from across America to descend on international travel terminals in outrage. And as unrest reaches fever-pitch in the US, anger is spilling over across the pond. A petition calling on Theresa May to axe Mr Trumps planned state visit to the UK reached one million signatures on Monday. Tonight's emergency demo is expected to attract thousands to protest UK complicity in the measure. Heres everything you need to know: When is it? According to the event page, the protest will be held on 30 January 2017 from 6-8pm GMT. Where is it? The precise location is 10 Downing Street, SW1A 2AA, London, however with more than 20,000 expected to attend, it will likely spill out into surrounding areas. How do I get there? The closest tube station, roughly eight minutes walk away, is Westminster - served by the Circle, District and Jubilee lines. Charing Cross, served by the Northern and Bakerloo lines, is 10 minutes away on foot. Who will be speaking? Speakers are expected to include: Baroness Shami Chakrabarti, Ed Miliband MP, Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, Caroline Lucas MP, Wail Qasim (Black Lives Matter), Tim Farron MP, Mhairi Black MP, Lily Allen, Clive Lewis MP and Bianca Jagger. A number of humanitarian groups will also be in attendance and several charity heads are expected to address the crowds. Why should I attend? Many were outraged at the UK Governments slow response to condemn the Muslim ban, after leaders in Canada, France and Germany all spoke out against the measure. The event titled: An Emergency demo against Trump's #MuslimBan and UK complicity, gives Britons an opportunity to stand in solidarity with American protestors. Theresa May has decided to ally herself with Donald Trump's bigoted, misogynistic government. She has refused to speak out against Donald Trump's #MuslimBan, event organisers wrote. Ms May has betrayed her own people. That doesn't mean we have to. Let's stand in solidarity with those targeted by Donald Trump's hateful government, including the people of this country, outside Downing Street and all over Britain. How else can I show support? Humanitarian groups started to act as soon as the order was implemented, and many still require urgent funding to continue challenging the measures in court. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is asking for donations to fund further legal battles. You can donate here. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko called for retaining anti-Russian sanctions as a motivation for positive progress in the Normandy Four negotiations and Moscow's implementation of the Minsk Agreements. "We are confident that resolute and unified actions are needed today. Resolute actions [are needed] in order to motivate the Russian side to sit down at the negotiation table, motivate [it] to implement the Minsk Agreements fully, first and foremost, in the security component. [...] In case they aren't implemented, we support maintaining and, if necessary, increasing the sanctions pressure on Russia," the Ukrainian president told reporters prior to negotiations with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin on Monday. Sign up to the Inside Politics email for your free daily briefing on the biggest stories in UK politics Get our free Inside Politics email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Inside Politics email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} An ex-Cabinet minister has accused the Government of bowing down to Donald Trump, demanding that Theresa May consider cancelling his state visit. Baroness Warsi said ministers had to decide whether it is right for the UK to bestow the highest honour it can on a US President who holds such controversial views. She urged ministers to refer to Mr Trumps immigration policy as a Muslim ban, arguing there could be no doubt that is what it is. It follows calls from Labour, the Liberal Democrats and other Tories to cancel the trip, not to mention an official petition that has soared past one million signatures. Baroness Warsi said: Those who run and govern this country bowing down to a man who holds the views that he holds, values which are not the same as British values, I think is sending out a very wrong signal. Speaking to BBC Radio 4s Today programme she went on: [State visits] are an honour of the highest order that a country can bestow on a visiting dignitary, its lots of pomp and ceremony, banquets and gifts and welcome and flattering speeches and all at the cost of the British tax payer. We have to question whether in Britain, this is something Britain should be doing for a man who has no respect for women, disdain for minorities, little value for LGBT communities, no compassion clearly for the vulnerable and whose policies are rooted in divisive rhetoric. But Downing Street was resisting pressure to withdraw the invitation given to Mr Trump by the Prime Minister at the weekend, when she became the first foreign leader to meet the new President. Theresa May congratulates Donald Trump on 'stunning election victory' A spokeswoman said the Governments position is that an invitation has been extended and accepted. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, London Mayor Sadiq Khan, the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative leader in Scotland, Ruth Davidson, have all called for the visit to be cancelled. Meanwhile a petition set up a matter of days ago has now exceeded one million signatures, having past the 10,000 mark requiring a government response, and the 100,000 mark meaning it must be considered for a debate in Parliament. It comes after Boris Johnson confirmed that Mr Trumps plan to temporarily ban travellers coming into the US from a group of predominantly Muslim countries Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen would only affect people who are dual citizens of the UK and a listed country, going directly to the US from the listed country. But the uproar over the ban, which Ms May at first refused to condemn, and then under pressure issued a statement saying she does not agree with it, continued regardless. Ms May had sidestepped questioning over whether she agreed with Mr Trumps policy just hours after being pictured holding hands with the President at the White House, where she praised his stunning election victory. Baroness Warsi added: What was worrying and what is worrying now, is the silence that were getting from government and its important that government come out and say this is a Muslim ban, which they condemn. Sign up to the Inside Politics email for your free daily briefing on the biggest stories in UK politics Get our free Inside Politics email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Inside Politics email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Boris Johnson has attacked those trying to "demonise" Donald Trump's administration over his travel ban. The Foreign Secretary hit out at Labour MPs who had condemned the President's ban on immigrants travelling to the US from Muslim-majority countries in what has widely been branded a "Muslim ban". Mr Trump has also said the US will not take any Syrian refugees for a period of 120 days. Speaking to MPs, Mr Johnson said the ban will not affect British passport holders as he branded discrimination on grounds of nationality "divisive and wrong". The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters The Foreign Secretary told MPs that Britons "remain welcome to travel to the US" and the country's embassy in London had confirmed President Trump's executive order would make "no difference" to British passport holders. Mr Johnson said: "The general principle is that all British passport holders remain welcome to travel to the US. "We have received assurances from the US embassy that this executive order will make no difference to any British passport holder, irrespective of their country of birth or whether they hold another passport." He added: "This is not our policy, nor is it a measure that this Government would consider. I have already made clear our anxiety about measures that discriminate on grounds of nationality in ways that are divisive and wrong." Labour backbencher Mike Gapes could be heard to shout "show some backbone" and "where's your spine?" as Mr Johnson updated MPs about Mr Trump's immigration policy. Dennis Skinner calls on Boris Johnson to ban Trump's visit The Foreign Secretary acknowledged the US policy was "highly controversial" but stressed the "vital importance" of the transatlantic alliance to the UK. However he was strongly criticised by opposition MPs for failing to take a tougher line with the new administration. Shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry said: "When it comes to human rights, when it comes to women's rights, when it comes to torture and the treatment of minorities, President Trump is already descending down a very dangerous slope. "When that happens we need a prime minister who is prepared to tell him to stop, not one who simply proffers her hand and silently helps him along." Veteran leftwinger Dennis Skinner compared the US President with Hitler and Mussolini, accusing the Government of being "hand in hand with another fascist - Trump". Mr Johnson said such comparisons between the elected leader of the US and the "tyrants of the 1930s" were "inappropriate". Sign up to our free Brexit and beyond email for the latest headlines on what Brexit is meaning for the UK Sign up to our Brexit email for the latest insight Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Brexit and beyond email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Labour MPs are to try to force a vote giving Parliament the right to decide whether Britain should stay in the EU single market and are demanding Theresa May delays triggering Article 50 until such a poll is held. In an amendment tabled to the Withdrawal from the European Bill, 10 Labour backbenchers, including a number of former shadow cabinet ministers, demand the Prime Minister holds off on formally beginning Brexit negotiations until Parliament has determined whether the UK should also seek to withdraw from the European Economic Area the official name for the single market. Ms May has previously said she plans to take UK out of the single market, arguing that staying in would mean not leaving the EU at all. The amendment was tabled by Wes Streeting, the MP for Ilford North and a member of the Treasury Select Committee, and backed by senior Labour MPs including Chuka Umunna, the former shadow Business Secretary, Heidi Alexander, who was previously shadow Health Secretary, and Maria Eagle, who has held several posts in Jeremy Corbyns top team. It seeks to force a vote on membership of the single market that would be held separately to the vote, forced upon the Government by last weeks Supreme Court ruling, on whether Theresa May should trigger Article 50. The amendment states: The Prime Minister may not give the notification at section (1) until such time as Parliament has determined whether the UK should also seek to withdraw from the European Economic Area in accordance with Article 127 of the EEA. Should the Government decide to reject the amendment, it could lead to further accusations that ministers are undermining the role of Parliament in determining how Brexit proceeds. Downing Street wants MPs and peers to pass the Bill as swiftly as possible and without conditions being added that would bind the Prime Ministers hands in negotiations with the EU. After tabling the amendment, Mr Streeting told The Independent: Throughout the referendum campaign prominent members of the Leave campaign gave assurances that leaving the EU would not mean leaving the single market. The Conservative manifesto committed to keeping us in the single market. In the absence of a mandate to quit the single market, the Government must now allow Parliament to decide our future trading relationship with the EU. I am firmly of the view that membership of a single market of half a billion customers represents the best possible trading relationship with our nearest neighbours, a better deal than we would get from other nations and certainly more preferable than lengthy trade negotiations with the EU that could take up to a decade. Jobs and livelihoods are riding on this. Supreme Court Brexit Challenge Show all 13 1 /13 Supreme Court Brexit Challenge Supreme Court Brexit Challenge People wait to enter the public gallery outside the Supreme Court ahead of the challenge against a court ruling that Theresa May's government requires parliamentary approval to start the process of leaving the European Union, in Parliament Square, central London Reuters Supreme Court Brexit Challenge Gina Miller, co-founder of investment fund SCM Private arrives at the Supreme court in London on the first day of a four-day hearing Getty Supreme Court Brexit Challenge A man waves the EU flag in front of the Supreme Court Getty Supreme Court Brexit Challenge Satirical artist Kaya Mar poses with two of his paintings in front of the Supreme Court Getty Supreme Court Brexit Challenge Pro-Europe protestors dressed as Supreme Court Justices stand outside the Supreme Court ahead of the first day of a hearing into whether Parliament's consent is required before the Brexit process can begin. The eleven Supreme Court Justices will hear the government's appeal, following the High Court's recent decision that only Parliament can trigger Article 50 Getty Supreme Court Brexit Challenge The eleven Supreme Court Justices will hear the government's appeal, following the High Court's recent decision that only Parliament can trigger Article 50 Getty Supreme Court Brexit Challenge Businesswoman Gina Miller arrives at the Supreme Court ahead of the first day of a hearing into whether Parliament's consent is required before the Brexit process can begin Getty Supreme Court Brexit Challenge Attorney General Jeremy Wright arrives at the Supreme Court in London EPA Supreme Court Brexit Challenge Protesters outside the Supreme Court in London, where the Government is appealing against a ruling that the Prime Minister must seek MPs' approval to trigger the process of taking Britain out of the European Union PA wire Supreme Court Brexit Challenge A protesters wearing a judge's wigs and robes stands outside the Supreme Court ahead of the challenge against a court ruling that Theresa May's government requires parliamentary approval to start the process of leaving the European Union, in Parliament Square, central London Reuters Supreme Court Brexit Challenge A protester holds up a placard outside the Supreme Court ahead of the challenge against a court ruling that Theresa May's government requires parliamentary approval to start the process of leaving the European Union, in Parliament Square, central London Reuters Supreme Court Brexit Challenge Pro-Europe protestors dressed as Supreme Court Justices stand outside the Supreme Court Getty Supreme Court Brexit Challenge A man waiting to enter the public gallery waves a European Union flag outside the Supreme Court ahead of the challenge against a court ruling that Theresa May's government requires parliamentary approval to start the process of leaving the European Union, in Parliament Square, central London Reuters Theresa May has previously argued the UK cannot possibly remain in the EU. In a speech earlier this month she said: I want to be clear: what I am proposing cannot mean membership of the single market. It would, to all intents and purposes, mean not leaving the EU at all. That is why both sides in the referendum campaign made it clear that a vote to leave the EU would be a vote to leave the single market. The issue is set to be raised by MPs as Parliament begins debating the Governments Brexit bill this week. In other amendments, tabled in the name of Jeremy Corbyn, Labour is demanding Parliament is given regular updates on Brexit negotiations and that the UKs devolved assemblies are also consulted. The party has also said it will seek to ensure the UK gets tariff-free access to the single market, with shadow ministers having suggested the party could withdraw its support for the bill if these conditions are not met. Another group of Labour backbenchers, led by former leadership contender Owen Smith, is also demanding the vote on Article 50 is delayed until ministers have published a full White Paper laying out their plan for negotiations. Sign up to the Inside Politics email for your free daily briefing on the biggest stories in UK politics Get our free Inside Politics email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Inside Politics email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The US embassy has appeared to contradict the Governments claim that British citizens will be mostly exempt from Donald Trumps travel ban on Muslim majority countries. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said on Sunday night that he had received assurances from the US that the Muslim ban would only apply to UK dual nationals travelling from the listed countries to the US. However a statement issued by the US embassy in London on Monday morning marked as an urgent notice said that no visas would be issued to any dual nationals of the countries listed under the Muslim ban. Thousands sign Trump petition - should the President come to the UK? The page - which appeared to have been taken down on Monday afternoon - said the embassy would not even see dual nationals of the countries listed by Mr Trump for interviews to arrange a visa to travel to America. Per U.S. Presidential Executive Order signed on January 27, 2017, visa issuance to aliens from the countries of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen has been suspended effective immediately until further notification, the US embassys statement said. If you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time. If you already have an appointment scheduled, please DO NOT ATTEND your appointment as we will not be able to proceed with your visa interview. A spokesperson for the Prime Minister told a briefing of journalists on Monday morning that he had not seen the notice, could not comment on it, and that he was confident the criteria stated by the Foreign Secretary would stand. Boris Johnson said yesterday the travel ban only affected British duals travelling from the listed countries to the US (Getty Images) The Foreign Office says Mr Johnson's statement was based on an explanation he was given by the White House. But a UK Government spokesman insisted the FCO guidance "was cleared by the top team in the White House and they are in charge". A Government source said that after seeing the US Embassy guidance, Mr Johnson "sought clarity from the White House and was informed that the FCO statement was correct". The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters The Government faced significant criticism after British citizens including an Iraq-born Tory MP and Olympian Mo Farah said they believed they were banned from the US under Donald Trump's policy. Theresa May initially refused to condemn the policy when questioned by reporters late last week, with Downing Street eventually issuing a tepid criticism in the early hours of the morning. May refuses to condemn Muslim ban Demonstrators are expected to descent on Downing Street tonight in protest of the Government's approach to the exclusion of British citizens. An official petition calling for Donald Trump's state visit to be cancelled hit a million signatures is record time. Sign up to the Inside Politics email for your free daily briefing on the biggest stories in UK politics Get our free Inside Politics email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Inside Politics email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Theresa May has said she was very happy to extend an invitation to Donald Trump to visit the UK on a state visit, despite growing backlash. The Prime Minister has faced strong opposition to her decision to invite the US President visit Britain, amid growing criticism of his ban on refugees entering the country. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has suggested Ms May should refuse to allow Mr Trump to enter the UK until he ceases the travel ban for refugees. However, Ms May has responded to the criticism, saying she was very happy to extend the invitation to Mr Trump and expressed no regret or desire to rescind it. Number 10 said the Prime Minister extended the invitation on behalf of the Queen and we look forward to hosting the President later this year. More than a million people have signed a petition to parliament asking MPs to stop the state visit. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters A protest organised outside Downing St in opposition to Trumps travel ban is expected to draw thousands of people. Activists and opposition groups have also said they are beginning to plan a large march or protest to coincide with Mr Trump's state visit. The date of the visit has not yet been announced but it is expected to occur later this year. Official state visits usually include a state banquet and a reception with Queen Elizabeth II. Mr Trump signed an executive order stopping refugees from entering the US as well as immigrants from seven countries, which have a majority Muslim population. Critics have expressed concern that the ban is Islamophobic and unfairly targets Muslim people. However, the White House has said it is necessary to reduce terrorism and increase safety for US citizens. Sign up to the Inside Politics email for your free daily briefing on the biggest stories in UK politics Get our free Inside Politics email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Inside Politics email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Boris Johnson defended Donald Trump as the UKs friend and partner as the row over the US travel ban from majority-Muslim countries deepened and Theresa May faced accusations that she was tipped off in advance about its introduction. Amid angry scenes in the Commons, the Foreign Secretary said it was wrong to demonise Mr Trump for introducing the controversial ban, which has prompted widespread protests and condemnation from other world leaders. Mr Johnson also refused to answer when asked three times if the US President told the Prime Minister that it was due to be introduced when they met last Friday, and whether she had made any criticism. Mr Johnson ducked the question on each occasion, insisting he would not reveal the content of the confidential conversations in the White House. He also refused to say whether Britain had raised any concerns before last weekend, given that Mr Trump had promised a travel ban on Muslims before he was elected. While Mr Johnson told the House that he found the notion of discrimination based on nationality divisive and wrong, MPs from all parties lined up to criticise him and the Prime Minister for failing to speak out more strongly against the ban as other world leaders have. Veteran Labour MP Dennis Skinner compared Donald Trump to the fascism of Hitler and Mussolini, while another Labour MP, Mike Gapes, branded the Prime Minister Theresa the Appeaser. Another warned local schoolchildren had been refused permission to travel to the US. But Mr Johnson replied: I think we have got the balance just about right. Its very, very difficult. We have had to be clear with our American friends and partners but we have also had to ensure important protections for duals and for UK citizens. He criticised Labour MPs for pointlessly demonising the Trump administration, saying that their approach would put the rights of British passport-holders in danger. On another occasion, Mr Johnson tried to reassure MPs by saying of Mr Trump: His bark is worse than his bite. He insisted the planned state visit would go ahead as planned this summer, although a proposal for the President to speak to Parliament may be scrapped. He said: To the best of my knowledge, both Nicolae Ceausescu and Robert Mugabe have been entertained by Her Majesty the Queen, and I think most members of the House would concede that it is our duty and the right thing to do to put in preparations now for receiving our friend, our partner, and the leader of the oldest, great democracy and the most important ally we have. The Commons clashes came as demonstrators started to gather nearby in Downing Street and after the petition demanding the state visit be cancelled soared close to 1.5 million signatures. Earlier in the day, the Prime Minister rejected any calls to suspend the state visit, saying she was very happy to extend an invitation to the President and had no plans to rescind it. Worldwide protests followed Mr Trumps signing of an executive order, which halted the US refugee programme for 120 days and indefinitely banned all Syrian refugees. It suspended the entry of all nationals from seven majority-Muslim countries Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Syria on national security grounds, the White House said. The claim by Channel 4 News that Ms May was told some sort of travel ban was coming is hugely damaging, after her initial refusal to criticise the announcement on Saturday. But, asked if it was correct, Mr Johnson told MPs: I dont comment on confidential conversations between the Prime Minister and the US President. As soon as we had a full understanding of the measures that they have brought in, we decided to intercede to get the protections that we needed. The Foreign Secretary also rejected some MPs comparisons to Hitler, saying: I do find it distasteful to make comparisons between the elected leader of a great democracy and 1930s tyrants. Earlier, Mr Johnson attempted to clear up confusion about the status of dual nationals by insisting the travel ban would not affect any British passport-holder. The US embassy in London had confirmed the executive order would make no difference despite posting advice suggesting otherwise. This advice was later withdrawn. The Foreign Secretary said: We have received assurances from the US embassy that this executive order will make no difference to any British passport-holder, irrespective of their country of birth or whether they hold another passport." He added: This is not our policy, nor is it a measure that this Government would consider. I have already made clear our anxiety about measures that discriminate on grounds of nationality in ways that are divisive and wrong. However, Mr Johnson said British dual nationals had been granted an exemption despite No 10 stating all dual nationals, from any country, would not be affected. It appeared that only Canada, Australia and New Zealand traditional Americas closest allies for information-sharing had been given the same exemption. Jeremy Corbyn stepped up his efforts to get the state visit invitation withdrawn, vowing to oppose all those who fan the flames of fear at home and abroad. In a letter to Ms May, the Labour leader wrote: Donald Trump should not be welcomed on a state visit to this country while he continues to propagate his anti-women, anti-Muslim and anti-Mexican policies. His invite should be withdrawn until the executive orders are gone and every element of them repealed. History judges us by the actions we take in opposing oppression. Sign up to the Inside Politics email for your free daily briefing on the biggest stories in UK politics Get our free Inside Politics email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Inside Politics email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Conservative MPs have turned on the Government over plans to close their local jobcentres to save money. The Department for Work and Pensions was accused of using Google Maps to pick jobcentres to shut down by MPs angry at the plans, which were announced last week. Unemployed people will be forced to travel further to sign on after the Department for Work and Pensions announced plans to close 78 local Jobcentres across the country. Recommended Unemployed forced to travel further as DWP to close 78 Jobcentres The Government claims it needs fewer offices to cover the whole country because people tend to submit their claims for benefits online. However, unemployed claimants are still required to attend Jobcentres at least every two weeks, with the Government having trialled weekly sign-ons and even more intensive daily sign-ons. Calder Valleys Conservative MP Craig Whittaker said the plan was a disaster. To relocate our jobcentre uphill and downdale out of the constituency will be a disaster to those longterm unemployed that rely on it for job advice and training, told the minister. Can my honourable friend assure me that those that have put forward these proposals have indeed visited places like the Calder Valley to understand the demographics and the geography or have they just sat in their offices in Whitehall using Google Maps? Tory DWP minister Caroline Nokes replied: This is not an exercise using Google Maps this is an exercise that we have engaged in over a number of months to use the best of our DWP estate. Other Conservative MPs hit out at the proposals. Jame Berry, MP for Rossindale and Darwen said the Government appeared to be in La La Land. Its all very well to talk about jobcentres in London but in rural Lancashire my constituents in Edgeworth will have to travel over an hour to get to Blackburn if we close the Darwen jobcentre, he warned. They are supremely hardworking and supremely successful and anyone who thinks you can get from Edgeworth to Darwen in 23 minuets is living in La La Land. Conservative MP Philip Davies called for the minister to look again at the plans and said his jobcentre in Shipley had an excellent local rapport with the Salvation Army who are situated right next door. Labour and SNP MPs also criticised the policy. Labour MP Luciana Berger said all three of the jobcentres that were open in her constituency in 2010 will have closed if the plans go ahead. DWP minister Caroline Nokes defended the closures (House of Commons) In 2010 I had three jobcentres in my constituency. Old Swan was closed by her department at the start of 2010 and now she wants to close the other two in Edge Hill and Wavertree, she said. My constituency has the 39th highest unemployment level in our country. Why does she want to make it harder for the 2,950 people who want to access support and who will have to pay 8.80 in order to do so? Labours shadow work and pensions minister Margaret Greenwood said disabled people would be hit by the increased travel time. The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned Show all 16 1 /16 The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "One case where the claimants wife went into premature labour and had to go to hospital. This caused the claimant to miss an appointment. No leeway given" The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "Its Christmas Day and you dont fill in your job search evidence form to show that youve looked for all the new jobs that are advertised on Christmas Day. You are sanctioned. Merry Christmas" The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "You apply for three jobs one week and three jobs the following Sunday and Monday. Because the job centre week starts on a Tuesday it treats this as applying for six jobs in one week and none the following week. You are sanctioned for 13 weeks for failing to apply for three jobs each week" The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "A London man missed his Jobcentre appointments for two weeks because he was in hospital after being hit by a car. He was sanctioned" 2011 Getty Images The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "Youve been unemployed for seven months and are forced onto a workfare scheme in a shop miles away, but cant afford to travel. You offer to work in a nearer branch but are refused and get sanctioned for not attending your placement" 2013 Getty Images The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "You are a mum of two, and are five minutes late for your job centre appointment. You show the advisor the clock on your phone, which is running late. You are sanctioned for a month" The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "A man with heart problems who was on Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) had a heart attack during a work capability assessment. He was then sanctioned for failing to complete the assessment" Rex The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "A man who had gotten a job that was scheduled to begin in two weeks time was sanctioned for not looking for work as he waited for the role to start" The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "Army veteran Stephen Taylor, 60, whose Jobseekers Allowance (JSA) was stopped after he sold poppies in memory of fallen soldiers" 2014 Getty Images The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "A man had to miss his regular appointment at the job centre to attend his fathers funeral. He was sanctioned even though he told DWP staff in advance" 2014 Getty Images The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "Ceri Padley, 26, had her benefits sanctioned after she missed an appointment at the jobcentre - because she was at a job interview" Jason Doiy Photography The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "A man got sanctioned for missing his slot to sign on - as he was attending a work programme interview. He was then sanctioned as he could not afford to travel for his job search" 2012 Getty Images The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "Mother-of-three Angie Godwin, 27, said her benefits were sanctioned after she applied for a role job centre staff said was beyond her" The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "Sofya Harrison was sanctioned for attending a job interview and moving her signing-on to another day" The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "Michael, 54, had his benefits sanctioned for four months for failing to undertake a weeks work experience at a charity shop. The charity shop had told him they didnt want him there" Getty The most ridiculous reasons people had their benefits sanctioned "Terry Eaton, 58, was sanctioned because he didnt have the bus fare he needed to attend an appointment with the job centre" Getty Images Accessibility is a major issue for many disabled people. The Government said it plans to halve the disability employment cap in this parliament how do the closures fit with that aim? she said. We are particularly concerned about the impact on women, children, and people with disabilities. Will the Government publish an assessment of the impact of this policy on equality issues? Will the Government delay its plan to reduce its estate until it has a clear idea of the impact of Universal Credit? These plans are simply not through and will have a damaging impact on the way that employment is provided. The DWP says the jobcentres are underoccupied and that moving them will save money. Sign up to the Inside Politics email for your free daily briefing on the biggest stories in UK politics Get our free Inside Politics email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Inside Politics email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} A petition calling on a state visit by Donald Trump to be cancelled in the wake of his controversial immigration ban has passed a million signatures. Citing Mr Trumps well documented misogyny and vulgarity, the petition states that Mr Trump should be allowed into the country, but not invited to meet the Queen. It comes as the Government confirmed Britons with dual citizenship flying from the UK would be exempt from the controversial ban, which targets immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries in a frantic bid to prevent a broad backlash against the policy from damaging her government. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson sought the clarification in anxious calls to senior figures in Mr Trump's team, highlighting the political problems the ban was causing Theresa May's administration. However, on Monday the US Embassy in London appeared to contradict the Governments claim that British citizens will be mostly exempt. The Prime Minister had finally told Mr Johnson and Home Secretary Amber Rudd to make representations to their US counterparts, after she initially refused to condemn the ban sparking an angry backlash from her own MPs and others. Theresa May's early reluctance to criticise the ban came after she was the first foreign leader to visit Mr Trump at the White House, where the pair were pictured holding hands and the President delighted Ms May by expressing a desire to sign a quick post-Brexit trade deal with the UK. The Government has so far refused to bow to calls for Mr Trump's es as a petition calling on the Government to scrap Mr Trump's planned state visit to the UK passed a million signatures. "An invitation has been extended and accepted," a Number 10 spokesman said, stressing the position had not changed. Ministers face being hauled into the Commons later amid continued concerns about the impact on Britons, as well as the way the Government has responded. And the Government is facing cross-party calls for an emergency debate. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, Lib Dem leader Tim Farron and SNP foreign affairs spokesman Alex Salmond have all called for the trip to be cancelled. The clarification to Mr Trumps plan to temporarily ban travellers coming into the US from a group of predominantly Muslim countries Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen confirms that the only people affected will be dual citizens of the UK and a listed country, going directly to the US from the listed country. But it is unclear if the move by ministers will be enough to quell anger over the ban, much of which was targeted at its discriminatory nature rather than the effect on Britons alone. Ms May finally issued a statement saying she does not agree with the policy and ordered her ministers to contact senior figures in Mr Trumps team. Downing Street sources said the aim was to make representations, with the goal of protecting the rights of British nationals, adding that it showed how seriously Ms May was taking the issue and that she was absolutely determined to respond to fears about the ban. Theresa May congratulates Donald Trump on 'stunning election victory' Calls were said to have been made to both the State Department and Department of Homeland Security. However, another Government source told The Independent Mr Johnson and his team were additionally in contact with Trumps top adviser Steve Bannon and his son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner. A Foreign Office statement eventually said: "The only dual nationals who might have extra checks are those coming from one of the seven countries themselves for example a UK-Libya dual national coming from Libya to the US. "The US has reaffirmed its strong commitment to the expeditious processing of all travellers from the United Kingdom." Mr Johnson had already taken to Twitter to say: We will protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals home and abroad. Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality. Donald Trump announces a ban on refugees and all visitors from Muslim-majority countries Communities Secretary Sajid Javid also tweeted to say that the US immigration ban was not British values. But the moves did not stop Labour trying to have Mr Johnson summoned to Parliament to account for the furore on Monday. The Independent understands that shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry will table an urgent question on Monday morning, although it must first be accepted by the Speaker of the House. Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn has also called for Mr Trumps state visit to be postponed until the Muslim-country ban is lifted. The Governments action comes after Ms May repeatedly refused to comment on Mr Trumps policy at a press conference in Turkey on Saturday, leading to accusations that she is putting good relations with Mr Trump and the hopes of a post-Brexit trade deal ahead of human rights. In the wake of the press conference, Tory MP Sarah Wollaston said the President should not be allowed to address either House of Parliament on his pending state visit as a result of the policy. She was backed by other Tories including Heidi Allen and ex-foreign minister Alistair Burt. Another of Ms Mays Tory MPs, Iraqi-born Nadhim Zahawi, spoke of his sadness that he might now be banned from the States, where his children are studying. Ruth Davidson, the leader of the Conservatives in Scotland, joined calls to cancel Mr Trumps planned state visit until he repeals the ban. Lib Dem leader Tim Farron said his visit would be placing the Queen in an impossible position of welcoming a man who is banning British citizens purely on grounds of their faith. Londons Muslim Mayor Sadiq Khan said Mr Trump should only be invited for a state visit when he lifts his shameful travel ban. Mo Farah could be prevented from returning to the US (Getty) Meanwhile, British Olympic gold medallist Sir Mo Farah, who lives and trains in Portland, Oregon, also attacked the ban, calling it deeply troubling. The Somali-born runner argued that the Presidents executive order had made him feel like an alien. In a statement on his Facebook page, Sir Mo wrote: On 1 January this year, Her Majesty The Queen made me a Knight of the Realm. On 27 January, President Donald Trump seems to have made me an alien. Former Ukip leader Nigel Farage was alone in defending the immigration crackdown, and even suggested Britain should follow suit and introduce extreme vetting of incomers. Sign up to our free Brexit and beyond email for the latest headlines on what Brexit is meaning for the UK Sign up to our Brexit email for the latest insight Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Brexit and beyond email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Nicola Sturgeon has given Theresa May a two-month deadline to compromise over Brexit hinting she will call a second independence vote otherwise. The SNP First Minister delivered what appeared to be an ultimatum after little progress was made during face-to-face talks between the pair. Ms Sturgeon said she had seen no evidence that her proposals including for Scotland to stay in the EU single market were being taken seriously. And she warned it was absolutely crucial that Scots saw some movement before the Article 50 exit clause is triggered, towards the end of March. Nicola Sturgeon insists she is not bluffing about second Scottish independence referendum Speaking in Cardiff, Ms Sturgeon said: So far the compromise, or the attempts at compromise, have come only from the Scottish government. There has been no willingness to meet in the middle on the part of the UK Government. In terms of me getting a sense of whether Scotland is going to be listened to at all, that period between now and triggering of Article 50 is absolutely crucial. Ms Sturgeon was then asked directly if her demand for compromise by March could end in her announcing a second independence referendum. She replied: Ill do what needs to be done to protect Scotlands position. We are running out of time for this process. It cant go on indefinitely and it wont go on indefinitely. This is one of the last key opportunities for me to make clear to the Prime Minister that I have to see some movement on her part and, over the next few weeks, she has got the opportunity to demonstrate whether that movement is going to be forthcoming. The SNP is holding a spring conference towards the end of March, which could be a platform for Ms Sturgeon to make a referendum announcement. However, it would be an enormous gamble by the SNP leader, given that recent polls have suggested declining support in Scotland for breaking up the UK. Brexit Concerns Show all 26 1 /26 Brexit Concerns Brexit Concerns Brexit will put British patients at 'back of the queue' for new drugs Brexit will put British patients at the back of the queue for vital new drugs, the Government has been warned forcing them to wait up to two years longer A medicines regulator has raised the alarm over a likely decision to pull out of the European Medicines Agency (EMA), as well as the EU itself. ealth Secretary Jeremy Hunt dropped the bombshell , when he said he expected the UK would quit the EMA because it is subject to rulings by the European Court of Justice. Getty Images Brexit Concerns London to lose status as 'gateway to Europe' for banks One of Germanys top banking regulators has warned that London could lose its status as gateway to Europe for the banking sector after Britain quits the European trading bloc. Andreas Dombret, who is an executive board member for the BundesbankGermanys central banktold a private meeting of German businesses and banks earlier this week in Frankfurt that even if banking rules were equivalent between the UK and the rest of the EU, that was still miles away from [Britain having] access to the single market, the BBC reports. Jason Hawkes Brexit Concerns Exodus The number of financial sector professionals in Britain and continental Europe looking for jobs in Ireland rocketed in the months after the UK voted to leave the European Union Shutterstock Brexit Concerns Brexit is making FTSE 100 executives richer Pay packages of many FTSE 100 chief executive officers are partly tied to how well share prices are doing rather than the CEOs performance -- and some stocks are soaring. ritish equities got a boost since the June vote because the likes of Rio Tinto, Smiths Group and WPP generate most sales abroad and earn a fortune when they convert these revenues back into the weakened pound. Sterlings fall also made UK stocks more affordable for overseas investors. Rex Brexit Concerns Theresa May: UK to leave single market Theresa May has said the UK "cannot possibly" remain within the European single market, as staying in it would mean "not leaving the EU at all". Getty Brexit Concerns Lead campaigner Gina Miller and her team outside the High Court Getty Brexit Concerns Raymond McCord holds up his newly issued Irish passport alongside his British passport outside the High Court in Belfast following a judges dismissal of the UK's first legal challenges to Brexit PA wire Brexit Concerns SDLP leader Colum Eastwood leaving the High Court in Belfast following a judges dismissal of the UK's first legal challenges to Brexit PA wire Brexit Concerns Migrants with luggage walk past a graffiti on a wall as they leave the 'Jungle' migrant camp, as part of a major three-day operation planned to clear the camp in Calais Getty Brexit Concerns Migrants leave messages on their tents in the Jungle migrant camp Getty Brexit Concerns The Adventist Development and Relief Agency (Adra) which distributes approximately 700 meals daily in the northern Paris camp states that it is noticing a spike in new migrant arrivals this week, potentially linked the the Calais 'jungle' camp closure - with around 1000 meals distributed today EPA Brexit Concerns Migrant workers pick apples at Stocks Farm in Suckley, Britain Reuters Brexit Concerns Many farmers across the country are voicing concerns that Brexit could be a dangerous step into the unknown for the farming industry Getty Brexit Concerns Bank of England governor Mark Carney who said the long-term outlook for the UK economy is positive, but growth was slowing in the wake of the Brexit vote PA Brexit Concerns The Dow Jones industrial average closed down over 600 points on the news with markets around the globe pluninging Getty Brexit Concerns Immigration officers deal with each member of the public seeking entry into the United Kingdom but on average, 10 a day are refused entry at this London airport and between 2008 and 2009, 33,100 people were detained at the airport for mainly passport irregularities Getty Brexit Concerns A number of global investment giants have threatened to move their European operations out of London if Brexit proves to have a negative impact on their businesses Getty Brexit Concerns Following the possibility of a Brexit the UK would be released from its renewable energy targets under the EU Renewable Energy Directive and from EU state aid restrictions, potentially giving the government more freedom both in the design and phasing out of renewable energy support regimes Getty Brexit Concerns A woman looking at a chart showing the drop in the pound (Sterling) against the US Dollar in London after Britain voted to leave the EU Getty Brexit Concerns Young protesters outside the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, to protest against the United Kingdom's decision to leave the EU following the referendum Getty Brexit Concerns Applications from Northern Ireland citizens for Irish Passports has soared to a record high after the UK Voted in favour of Leaving the EU Getty Brexit Concerns NFU Vice President Minette Batters with Secretary of State, Andrea Leadsome at the National Farmers Union (NFU) took machinery, produce, farmers and staff to Westminster to encourage Members of Parliament to back British farming, post Brexit Getty Brexit Concerns The latest reports released by the UK Cabinet Office warn that expats would lose a range of specific rights to live, to work and to access pensions, healthcare and public services. The same reports added that UK citizens abroad would not be able to assume that these rights will be guaranteed in the future Getty Brexit Concerns A British resident living in Spain asks questions during an informative Brexit talk by the "Brexpats in Spain" group, about Spanish legal issues to become Spanish citizens, at the town hall in Benalmadena, Spain Reuters Brexit Concerns The collapse of Great Britain appears to have been greatly exaggerated given the late summer crowds visiting city museums, hotels, and other important tourist attractions Getty Brexit Concerns The U.K. should maintain European Union regulations covering everything from working hours to chemicals until after the government sets out its plans for Brexit, said British manufacturers anxious to avoid a policy vacuum and safeguard access to their biggest export market Getty Ms Sturgeon spoke after a meeting of the Joint Ministerial Committee (JMC), which brings together the Prime Minister and the leaders of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Before the meeting, Ms May made clear the devolved administrations will not be given a decisive role in the UK's divorce from the EU. However, Carwyn Jones, the first minister of Wales who has also spoken out against a hard Brexit gave a more upbeat verdict, saying the talks had been useful. He said: There is a lot of work to do. We want to play a full part in the process. Its all about jobs at the end of the day, making sure we protect jobs and our economy. We do now need more meat on the bones as far as what the UK government proposes to do as we leave the EU. Article 50 has to be triggered to my mind. The people of Wales voted to leave the EU. Im not going to stand in the way of that. Its what happens afterwards thats important. Sign up to the Inside Politics email for your free daily briefing on the biggest stories in UK politics Get our free Inside Politics email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Inside Politics email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} You can tell when the Foreign Secretary is in serious mode as he switches from joker to hypocrite. To mention the fact that Trumps Muslim travel ban was signed on Holocaust Memorial Day, as many angry MPs from every party did on Monday afternoon, was apparently to trivialise the holocaust. When Mike Gapes, Labour MP for Ilford South, mentioned Theresa the Appeaser, Boris Johnson briskly told him it was, distasteful to make comparisons between the elected leader of a great democracy and 1930s tyrants. It certainly is. And he would know, it being not yet two weeks since he himself compared the elected leader of France to a Nazi guard handing out punishment beatings in a World War Two movie and just over six months since he had said the EU itself was pursuing a similar goal to Hitler. Weve seen this tactic before. When, at party conference, Sky News accosted him with a 350m cheque for the NHS and asked him if he might sign it, he walked off telling them they were doing a pointless stunt. This from a chap, who a couple of months earlier, had donned a protective face mask to take an angle grinder to the number 350,000,000 laid out in sheets of rolled steel, then three days later, on an industrial estate somewhere in the Midlands, smelted an aluminium cheque of the same amount. In his defence, the Foreign Secretary was in a near impossible position. Called to the house ostensibly to condemn the US Presidents visa ban for citizens of seven Islamic countries (its not actually a ban, the Foreign Secretary made clear, and the above quotation marks reflect merely what Trump himself called it), he also had to preserve the strategic alliance, and honour Trumps right to a state visit to Britain, which is expected to happen soon. With customary tact, Johnson reminded the house that the Queen has previously hosted Nicolai Ceausescu and Robert Mugabe, so could probably cope with Donald Trump. How hell have loved that. Time and again, members rose to attack Trump, Johnson telling them exhaust their wells of outrage, and reminding them it was not a UK policy. Yvette Cooper told him to For the sake of history have the guts to speak out. He did not do so. It would not be in the UKs interests. It was all to confirm the painfully, unignorably obvious. Whatever becomes of the last, best hope of earth, it will still be Britains only hope. All other options have been extinguished. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said that in his meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel he will discuss preparation of a roadmap to implement the Minsk Agreements. "Today we will discuss the roadmap for implementation of the Minsk Agreements," he told journalists before talks with Merkel in Berlin on Monday. The leaders of Ukraine, Germany, France and Russia (Normandy format) agreed to draw up the document at their previous summit, Poroshenko said. "I want to thank our German and French colleagues for their firm and principled position, for supporting Ukraine's position and to express hope that we will be able to find sufficient argument for Russia to finally return to the negotiating table and to finally start implementing the Minsk Agreements," he said. He stressed once again that he sees no alternative to the Minsk Agreements. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The head of the African Union has criticised Donald Trumps ban on immigration from some Muslim-majority countries, saying it presents one of the greatest challenges for the continent. As representatives of the AUs 53 member states met in Addis Ababa for a two-day summit, the chief of its commission said the bloc was entering very turbulent times after the US Presidents election. The very country to which many of our people were taken as slaves during the transatlantic slave trade has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries, said Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma. Donald Trump announces a ban on refugees and all visitors from Muslim-majority countries What do we do about this? Indeed, this is one of the greatest challenges to our unity and solidarity. Mr Trumps executive order prevented people with passports from three African nations Libya, Somalia and Sudan from travelling to the US. It also blocked visas for citizens from four Middle Eastern countries Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Iran. The President has also suspended all US refugee programmes for 120 days, and ended the flow of Syrian refugees to America indefinitely. Also speaking in Ethiopia, the UN Secretary General commended African countries for opening their borders to refugees and people fleeing violence while other parts of the world, including the developed West, close boundaries and build walls. Antonio Guterres, attending his first AU summit as the UN chief, said: "African nations are among the world's largest and most generous hosts of refugees. "African borders remain open for those in need of protection when so many borders are being closed, even in the most developed countries in the world." Mr Guterres didn't make a direct reference to the recent executive orders signed by Mr Trump, which also included a commitment to build a wall along the Mexican border, but his comment drew enthusiastic applause from hundreds of African leaders, officials and dignitaries who attended the opening of the summit, the Associated Press reported. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has received more than $24 million (19 million) in donations this weekend. The non-profit organisation, whose purpose is to defend people's individual rights and liberties, usually receives $4 million (3.2 million) a year in online donations. The huge increase comes as the ACLU, alongside some of its allies, challenged sections of Donald Trumps travel ban policy in court. More than 350,000 people donated over the weekend and many celebrities encouraged their fans to get in. Pop icon Sia and comedian Rosie ODonnell said they would both match donations up to $100,000. ACLU plan to use the donations to increase staffing and mount more legal challenges and Anthony Romero, the executive director of the organisation, said Mr Trump was engaging in xenophobia. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters "Our nation is a nation of immigrants. We have welcomed refugees to our shores, Mr Romero said on CNN. Refugees in particular are among the most vulnerable individuals, and the idea that we would try to shut them out because of the fearmongering, the xenophobia that President Trump has now engaged in, we find very troubling." The ACLU has also gained 150,000 to 200,000 new members in the last few days. It had 400,000 when Mr Trump was elected in November, Mr Romero said. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has said the company is working on more legal options to challenge US President Donald Trump's travel ban on several Muslim-majority countries. Mr Bezos said "this executive order is one we do not support" and said the company plans to fight the order. He also said Amazon has reached out to congressional leaders to explore legislative options and has prepared a declaration of support for the Washington state attorney general suing Mr Trump. Protests across American airports in response to Trump's immigration ban In an email to employees, he said: "We're a nation of immigrants whose diverse backgrounds, ideas, and points of view have helped us build and invent as a nation for over 240 years. "No nation is better at harnessing the energies and talents of immigrants. It's a distinctive competitive advantage for our country one we should not weaken." He added: "To our employees in the US and around the world who may be directly affected by this order, I want you to know that the full extent of Amazon's resources are behind you." The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Declarations of support from Expedia and Washington will also be filed with the lawsuit, which was declared by Attorney General Bob Ferguson on Monday. His complaint claims that Mr Trump's actions are separating Washington families, harming thousands of state residents, damaging the state economy, hurting Washington-based companies "and undermining Washington's sovereign interest in remaining a welcoming place for immigrants and refugees." Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} People have raised over $800,000 (638,000) in the space of a day for a Muslim community in Texas to help rebuild their mosque after the building was destroyed by a fire on Saturday. The blaze was discovered at the Islamic Centre of Victoria at around 2:00am on Saturday by a clerk at a convenience store, who called the fire department. It took around four hours to extinguish the fire and no injuries were reported. The mosque in Victoria was discovered on fire just hours after President Donald Trump announced a travel ban against citizens from seven Muslim majority countries and a 120-day halt to the USs refugee program. Recommended Canada mosque shooting leaves six dead after gunmen open fire A fundraising campaign to help rebuild the mosque was set up on Sunday, and has almost hit its $850,000 (680,000) goal. Nearly 18,000 people have helped to raise over $826,000 in the space of a day. Omar Rachid, who created the GoFundMe campaign, wrote: Our hearts are filled with gratitude for the tremendous support weve received. The outpouring of love, kind words, hugs, helping hands and the financial contributions are examples of the true American spirit. Authorities have not yet determined the cause of the fire, and Victoria fire marshals office has opened an investigation into the incident. Shahid Hashmi, president of the Islamic Centre, told the Associated Press that the congregations Imam was awake in the early hours of the morning and checked the mosques online surveillance. He found no alarm active and that the doors to the mosque were unlocked. ACLU immigrants' rights attorney Lee Gelernt: Federal judge has issued a stay on Trump's Muslim ban The Imam drove to the mosque as the building had been broken into a week previously, resulting in the theft of electronic items, and he felt concerned. By that time, fire engineers were already there pouring water on the fire, Mr Hashmi said. Speaking to Al Jazeera, Mr Hashmi said he hoped the act had not been a hate crime, but said the outpouring of support and donations had been incredible. We are very grateful, he said. The mosque has been targeted prior to the burglary reported last week. In 2013, a man admitted painting H8, computer shorthand for hate, on the outside of the building, the Victoria Advocate reported. Additional reporting by Associated Press Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Six people have reportedly been killed after gunmen opened fire in a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers The mosque's president told reporters that the deaths had occurred after several gunmen apparently opened fire on up to 40 people. Witnesses told Reuters the attack was carried on on the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre, where in the aftermath police put up a security perimeter around the mosque and declined to comment about the incident. Why is this happening here? This is barbaric, said the mosque's president, Mohamed Yangui. In June 2016, a pig's head was left on the doorstep of the cultural centre, said the news agency. Quebec police confirmed the Sunday evening shooting at the mosque in a tweet, and police on the scene said there had been fatalities. Police said that suspects had been detained. There are many victims ... there are deaths, a Quebec police spokesman told reporters. Mr Yangui, who was not inside the mosque when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. He did not know how many were injured, saying they had been taken to different hospitals across Quebec City. Like France, the Canadian province of Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them North African emigrants. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 national Canadian election, especially in Quebec, where the vast majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of Quebec was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighbouring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. The attack came the day that after Canada said it would offer temporary residency permits to travellers who become stranded here by US President Donald Trumps order banning people from seven Muslim-majority nations. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Six people were killed and eight were injured in a shooting at a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers. Authorities reported two arrests in what Canada's prime minister called an act of terrorism. Quebec provincial police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe said early Monday that some of the wounded were gravely injured. She said the deceased were approximately 35 to 70 years of age. Thirty-nine people were unharmed. More than 50 were at the mosque at the time of the attack. One suspect was arrested at the scene and another nearby in d'Orleans, Quebec. Police did not release their names. Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre President Mohamed Yangui said the shooting in the provincial capital happened in the men's section of the mosque. He said he wasn't at the centre when the attack occurred, but he got some details from people on the scene. We are sad for the families, he said. Both Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard characterised the attack as a terrorist act, which came amid heightened tensions worldwide over US President Donald Trump's travel ban on certain Muslim countries. We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge, Trudeau said in a statement. It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country, he said. Canadian law enforcement agencies will protect the rights of all Canadians, and will make every effort to apprehend the perpetrators of this act and all acts of intolerance. Quebec City police spokesman Constable Pierre Poirier said two suspects were arrested. Police said the mosque had been evacuated and things were under control. Trudeau said on Twitter that he spoke to Quebec's premier and was being briefed by officials. The prime minister said the government had offered any & all assistance needed. Trudeau had earlier reacted to Trump's visa ban for people from certain Muslim-majority countries by tweeting Saturday: To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength (hash)WelcomeToCanada. Trudeau also posted a picture of him greeting a Syrian child at Toronto's airport in late 2015. Trudeau oversaw the arrival of more than 39,000 Syrian refugees soon after he was elected. Couillard termed the Sunday mosque attack as barbaric violence and expressed solidarity with the victims' families. The mayor of Gatineau, Quebec, near Canada's capital of Ottawa, said there would be increased police presence at mosques around his city following the attack. The New York Police Department said it was stepping up patrols at mosques and other hours of worships in its city. The NYPD issued a statement Sunday night saying Critical Response Command personnel had been assigned to extended tour coverage at certain mosques. NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something, New York City Mayor Bill Blasio said on Twitter. Our prayers tonight are with the people of Quebec City as they deal with a terrible attack on a mosque. We must stand together, Blasio said in another tweet. Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said on Twitter Sunday that he was deeply saddened by the loss of life. His office said no motive had been confirmed. In the summer of 2016 a pig's head was left on the doorstep of the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre. The incident occurred in the middle of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. Practising Muslims do not eat pork. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Francois Deschamps, an organiser of a refugee-support group in Quebec City, said the motive remains unknown, but right-wing groups are very organised in Quebec City and distribute fliers at the university and plaster stickers around town. Deschamps said he has personally received death threats after starting a refugee support group on Facebook and people have posted his address online. I'm not very surprised about the event, Deschamps said. Canada is generally very welcoming toward immigrants and all religions, but it's less so in the French-speaking province of Quebec. AP Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Chelsea Clinton has joined mounting protests in New York City against Donald Trumps immigration ban. The former First Daughter, who is the only child of Hillary and Bill Clinton, shared a series of photos from the demonstration in Battery Park on Sunday afternoon. Thousands of people gathered at the park in lower Manhattan which is in sight of the Statue of Liberty to denounce the Presidents "Muslim ban". Across the US, protests were held at over 40 locations protesting the billionaire property developers controversial executive order. Chelsea posted a photo of a protester holding a sign which read Love Trumps hate - the emotional plea made by her mother Hillary Clinton just hours before she went to the polls in November. She also shared a picture of a placard which read get used to this picture Don. Yes. We will keep standing up for a country that matches our values and ideals for all, the 36-year-old said on Twitter. The former Democrat presidential candidate also expressed her support for the protests which swept across the US at the weekend. I stand with the people gathered across the country tonight defending our values & our Constitution. This is not who we are, Ms Clinton wrote on Twitter. Last week, Mr Trump signed an executive order which suspended the entire US refugee admissions system for 120 days and halted the Syrian refugee programme indefinitely. It also banned entry for people from seven majority-Muslim countries: Syria, Iran, Yemen, Iraq, Sudan, Libya and Somalia for 90 days. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Mr Trump said he would prioritise Christian refugees over those of other religions. Despite this, in a statement on Sunday, the President insisted the executive order was not a "Muslim ban" of the kind he pushed for on the campaign trail. The ban has unleashed chaos and outrage across the world, with people blocked from boarding US-bound flights and detained in American airports. Chelsea recently came to the defence of the President's 10-year-old son, Barron Trump, who was subject to a barrage of memes mocking his facial expressions and accusing him of looking bored on inauguration day. "Barron Trump deserves the chance every child does-to be a kid. Standing up for every kid also means opposing @POTUS policies that hurt kids," she wrote on Twitter. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Christian leaders have denounced Donald Trumpss immigration ban, calling on people of all faith to oppose the policy and stand with Muslims affected by it. The ban, signed by President Trump as an executive order, stops immigration from seven majority Muslim countries. It also stops refugees from entering for the next four months. The move has been criticised amid fears it unfairly targets Muslim people, however the White House has insisted the policy will protect against Islamic extremism and terrorism. The policy has provoked outcry both in the US and around the world, with demonstrations and protests planned outside airports and legislatures. Mr Trump announced his plan during an interview with a Christian television network, alleging that the his predecessors administration had unfairly let in Muslim refugees while turning away Christian refugees. Bishop Joe S. Vasquez, chairman of the committee on migration for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops told The New York Times he would not be supporting the policy. He said: We believe in assisting all, regardless of their religious beliefs. Jen Smyers, the director of policy and advocacy for the immigration and refugee program of Church World Service, echoed his concerns, calling Friday a shameful day in the history of the United States. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Rev. Scott Arbeiter, the president of World Relief, the humanitarian arm of National Association of Evangelicals which has helped resettle thousands of Muslim refugees, revealed the group have been collecting signatures from evangelical Christians who oppose the ban. He told the New York Times: We have no evidence that would support a belief that the Obama administration was discriminating against Christian populations. He added that group would resist: any measure that would discriminate against the most vulnerable people in the world based on ethnicity, country of origin, religion, gender or gender identity. Our commitment is to serve vulnerable people without regard to those factors, or any others. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} A senior member of Donald Trumps now-defunct transition team has called for the US Endangered Species Act to be drastically watered down, claiming it doesnt actually protect wildlife. Myron Ebell, who led a team tasked by the Republican billionaire with drafting an action plan to overhaul the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), said the legislation was being used as a political weapon and many of its policies should be scrapped. Campaigners say the 1973 act, brought in primarily to save the bald eagle from extinction, has helped prevent hundreds of species from dying out. They include American crocodiles, black-footed ferrets and whooping cranes. Critically endangered species Show all 10 1 /10 Critically endangered species Critically endangered species Yangtze Finless Porpoise There are as few as 1,000 of this highly intelligent dolphin from the Chinese river of Yangtze. Wikmedia Critically endangered species Cross River Gorilla There are around 200-300 left in the wild. Wikmedia Critically endangered species The Amur Leopard There are only around 30 left, exclusively in the Russian Far East. Wikmedia Critically endangered species Black Rhino Improving numbers, but with fewer than 5,000 left in central Africa, it is critically endangered. Wikmedia Critically endangered species Hawskbill Sea Turtle Mostly threatened by wildlife trade; their shells highly valued. Wikmedia Critically endangered species Javan Rhino The most threatened rhino species - there are as few as 35 in Ujung Kulon National Park in Java, Indonesia. Wikmedia Critically endangered species Leatherback Turtle Having lost many of its habitable beaches, and impacted by fishing operations, this seaturtle is considered by WWF to be 'critically endangered'. Wikmedia Critically endangered species South China Tiger It is believed to be 'functionally extinct', with none of the species left in the wild. Wikmedia Critically endangered species Sumatran Elephant There are between 2,400 - 2,800 of this elephant native to Borneo and Sumatra. Wikmedia Critically endangered species Sumatran Orangutan There are an est. 7,300 but the gradual deforestation of their Sumatran habitat may threaten further. Wikmedia Bald eagle numbers have also now recovered and the bird of prey has been removed from the list. But Republicans, who control the Congress, have threatened to roll back the act, and Mr Ebells comments will compound fears that the US President could act swiftly to repeal the law. Speaking in London on Monday, Mr Ebell said: "The endangered species act doesn't do much for protecting endangered wildlife, but it does a huge amount to control private property land use, and it is enforced very selectively, so that some landowners are not affected but people with exactly the same habitat, their use is limited or eliminated. "It is a political weapon and I am very interested in reforming, and I don't know if we will see that any time in the next decade, but I hope so." Myron Ebell (AP) While Mr Ebell has never met the President, he was appointed to a senior post in his transition team last year and served under Mr Trump until his inauguration on 20 January. Reforms could include making it more difficult to add new species such as the Pacific walrus and North American wolverine - to the list. Collette Adkins, a lawyer and biologist at the Minneapolis Center for Biological Diversity, who helped put the grey wolf on the endangered list, said: Wolves have made great progress toward recovery - that's because the Endangered Species Act works. But when those federal protections were removed, the states showed they were dead set on killing their wolves. And that they can't be trusted with wolf management," she told MPR News. Jamie Rappaport Clark, president of the Defenders of Wildlife group and a former Fish and Wildlife Service director under Bill Clintons administration, is also an advocate of the environmental legislation. He told the Washington Post: The political line-up is as unfavourable to the Endangered Species Act as I can remember. Any species that gets in the way of a congressional initiative or some kind of development will be clearly at risk. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The White House has defended a series of reforms to the US National Security Council, made in an executive order by Donald Trump, which will dramatically reduce the influence of military experts. The changes have been called stone cold crazy by Susan Rice, who served for the last four years as Barack Obamas National Security Adviser, and drew criticism from senior Republicans including Senator John McCain. Mr Trumps order dictated that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) would no longer routinely be required to attend top-level meetings of the NSC, the primary cabinet forum for the consideration of matters of national security. Instead, the President has given Steve Bannon, his Chief Strategist, a place on the council. Mr Bannon is the former publisher of the right wing website Breitbart News, an avowed nationalist who described his site as a platform for the white supremacist Alt-Right. Ms Rice retweeted a Trump critic who said Mr Trump loves and trusts the military so much he just kicked them out of the National Security Council and put in a Nazi in their place. Providing her own commentary, she added: This is stone cold crazy. After a week of crazy. Who needs military advice or intell to make policy on ISIL (Isis), Syria, Afghanistan, DPRK (North Korea)? She suggested Mr Trump was reducing the importance of the NSC by allowing Vice-President Mike Pence to chair some meetings, something which never happened under Obama. And she said the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the DNI were being treated as after-thoughts in the [NSC] cabinet level principals meetings adding: And where is CIA?? Cut out of everything? Mr Trumps executive order states that the top two military chiefs would only attend meetings where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed. According to CNN, intelligence chief James Clapper was always included in NSC principals meetings during the Obama administration. Senator McCain said he approved of the national security team Mr Trump had assembled, with the key exception of Mr Bannon. I am worried about the NSC, who are the members of it and who are the permanent members of it. The appointment of Mr Bannon is something which is a radical departure from any NSC in history," he told CBSs Face the Nation. It's of concern, this quote reorganisation. White House chief of staff Reince Priebus played down the changes on NBC News Meet the Press, saying the Joint Chiefs chairman and DNI could attend the NSC anytime that they want to be included. Sean Spicer, Mr Trumps spokesman, told ABC News the reforms were designed to streamline the process for the President to make decisions in key important intelligence matters. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters He praised General Mike Flynn, who will run the NSC as Mr Trumps National Security Adviser, as leader who probably understands the reforms that are needed better than anybody else. General Flynn was head of the Defense Intelligence Agency until 2014, when he was asked to step down by senior intelligence leaders. And he defended the appointment of Mr Bannon, describing him as a former naval officer, [who has] a tremendous understanding of the geopolitical landscape that we have now. Part of this is analysis, it is not just about intelligence, he said. Having key decision makers and the Chief Strategist for the President of the United State, to come in on what the strategy is going forward, is crucial. Former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych said he is ready to cooperate with Ukrainian investigators and convinced that no obstacles currently exist for appropriate investigatory and procedural actions to be taken with his participation in Russia. "At any time you like, you may personally arrive at the place of my residence, which you know, to receive my testimony, serve documents as may be necessary, and proceed with other procedural actions," Yanukovych said in a motion that his lawyer Vitali Serdyuk is expected to submit to the Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office on Monday. "In this case, I plead that you consider that I desire to cooperate with investigators and tell them about all actual circumstances of the case for the purpose of a comprehensive and unbiased investigation," Yanukovych said. The Aver Lex lawyer association highlighted the fact that Yanukovych has not yet been served the documents sent earlier by the Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office to Russia. This is because the judicial assistance request sent regarding service of the suspicion notice on Yanukovych is still waiting to be accommodated by competent Russia authorities, it said. "As soon as it is served, all appropriate procedural actions may be performed as usual or upon arrival by investigators in person at his place of residence," the lawyers said. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} A five-year-old child was reportedly detained for several hours at an airport before he was reunited with his mother following President Donald Trumps executive order on "extreme vetting". The boy was apparently held by authorities after arriving from Iran with another family at Dulles International Airport in Virginia, only 25 miles from Washington D.C. Footage from Washington channel ABC7 shows an emotional woman, reported to be the childs mother, embracing her son after she was forced to wait anxiously for him to be released by immigration control. The woman is then filmed singing happy birthday in English to the child as she hugs and kisses him. The woman declined to speak to reporters after the incident and the family's immigration status is not known. The incident comes amid furious backlash in the US and around the world following Mr Trumps order which temporarily bars entrance to the US for citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries, including Iran, as well as indefinitely banning all refugees. The order also introduces a blanket ban of all Syrian refugees until sufficient changes have been made to the US refugee program, without giving further details. The order states that once refugee admissions resume, fewer will be allowed in. The 2017 cap was set at 50,000 people, compared to 85,000 allowed by President Barack Obama in 2016. Demonstrators gathered at many US airports, including Dulles, to show their support for refugees and others coming from the banned countries, which are all predominantly Muslim. They held refugees welcome signs and chanted slogans in support of those being detained on arrival by authorities. A federal judge temporarily halted part of the order, but the majority of it remains in place, with protests taking place at airports around the country. The move has been denounced by civil rights groups, including the UNs refugee agency (UNHCR) and the International Organisation for Migration who said: The needs of refugees and migrants worldwide has never been greater and the US resettlement program is one of the most important in the world. The longstanding US policy of welcoming refugees has created a win-win situation: it has saved the lives of some of the most vulnerable people in the world who have in turn enriched and strengthened their new societies." Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The global outrage unleashed by Donald Trumps immigration ban has hit closer to home than the President might have bargained for. The preschool attended by his grandchild has come out and publicly condemned his Muslim ban. Last week, Mr Trump signed an executive order suspending the entire US refugee admissions system for 120 days, halting the Syrian refugee programme indefinitely, and banning entry for people from seven majority-Muslim countries. Adas Israel Congregation, a Conservative synagogue in Northwest Washington where Mr Trumps grandchild Joseph Kushner attends preschool, released a statement on Sunday night rebuking the Presidents controversial immigration ban. Donald Trump announces a ban on refugees and all visitors from Muslim-majority countries Joseph is the three-year-old son of the Presidents daughter, Ivanka Trump, and her husband Jared Kushner, a property developer who is a senior advisor to Mr Trump. According to CNN, the child attends preschool at Adas Israel. The leadership and clergy of Adas Israel Congregation stands with the entire Conservative movement and other local organisations such as the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington in advocating for the rights of immigrants," the synagogue said in a statement on Facebook and in an email sent to synagogue members. "And rejecting the targeting of individuals based on religion, and calling on the US government to reject policy proposals that would halt, limit, or curtail refugee resettlement in the US or prioritise certain refugees over others." The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Adas Israel, which is the largest Conservative synagogue in Washington, threw its backing behind a longer statement from the Conservative Jewish community against the immigration ban. Throughout our history, we often were the stranger in a strange land and were persecuted and attacked simply for being the other, the longer statement reads. Our religious tradition repeatedly forbids us from oppressing the stranger". The ban sparked chaos across the world, with people blocked from boarding US-bound flights and detained in American airports. Ivanka and Kushner recently moved to the affluent neighbourhood of Kalorama in Washington DC. The couple started dating in 2005 but reportedly broke up briefly in 2008 because Kushner's parents hoped he would marry a Jewish woman. However, the pair got back together and married in 2009, with Ivanka converting to Orthodox Judaism before the wedding. Permission was given for the couple's safety, according to lawyer and Israeli Republican Marc Zell (Getty) Kushner was brought up in the Modern Orthodox tradition, a type of Judaism that integrates strict observance of religious law with the secular, modern world. They have brought up all three of their children as practising Jews. Much of the Jewish community are antagonistic to Mr Trumps presidency. Across America, just 24 per cent of Jews voted for Trump and many leading Jews and Jewish organisations have frequently voiced their worries about Mr Trumps policies and the problem of anti-Semitism among some of his supporters. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} A BBC journalist has said he was detained for two hours and subjected to invasive checks at the US border by officials imposing Donald Trump's travel ban. British citizen Ali Hamedani, who was born in Iran, said he was forced to hand over his phone and its password so it could be scoured for his political views. The BBC World Service reporter's social media accounts were probed despite him having travelled to Chicago's O'Hare airport from London Heathrow while holding a British passport. The Foreign Office has since said it was told by the US that extra checks would be performed on UK citizens only if they were dual nationals travelling from one of seven counties, which are predominantly Muslim. Mr Hamedani told BBC Radio 5 Live's Stephen Nolan: So they took away my phone and they started searching and I saw the guy searching my Twitter account. They were looking to find about any kind of political views, whether I'm supporting anybody any kind of extremist idea or not. They also asked me questions about whether I have been trained by the military, if I had been trained in military bases in Iran or when was the last time I was back home in Iran. It wasn't pleasant at all. To be honest with you, I was arrested back home in Iran in 2009 because I was working for the BBC and I felt the same this time. Mr Hamedani, who landed at around 4.40pm UK time on Sunday and has rescinded his Iranian passport, said he was met by protesters after making it through security. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters He said: "The very touching moment was when I came out of the whole thing, when I came out into the arrival hall, I have met more than 50 people, most of them American ... and they hugged me and they welcomed me and they were trying to say 'this is not the real America, we are the real American people'." His ordeal came ahead of the Foreign Office saying that Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson had been told by the US President's team that Britons with dual nationalities would not be barred from entry. Mr Johnson was also told that heightened scrutiny for dual citizens would only apply to individuals travelling directly to the US from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. PA Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} US Customs and Border Protection agents are ignoring a federal judges stay on President Trumps immigration blacklist against seven majority Muslim countries and deporting people legally traveling to the states, according to attorneys representing those detained at airports across the country. Rogue customs and Border Patrol agents continue to try to get people onto planes, Becca Heller, director of the International Refugee Assistance Project, told reporters on Sunday, according to the Guardian. A lot of people have been handcuffed, a lot of people who dont speak English are being coerced into taking involuntary departures. President Trump issued his executive order Friday, implementing a 90 day ban for citizens in Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. It also suspended all refugees from entering the country for 120 days while Syrian refugees are barred indefinitely. Nonetheless, federal judges in New York, Massachusetts, Virginia, and Washington pushed back. The judicial branch responded by ordering those enforcing the ban to completely halt the removal or deportation of travelers who are otherwise legally authorized to enter the country. The American Civil Liberties Union estimated that between 100 and 200 travelers are currently detained at airports across the country. Melissa Keaney, a staff attorney with the National Immigration Law Center, told VICE that nearly a dozen people are detained at Los Angeles International Airport. And nearly a dozen travelers are reportedly detained at JFK International Airport in New York. Recommended White House reverses travel ban on green card holders The orders merely maintained the status quo of immigration law, still, civil liberties groups celebrated the victory amidst massive protests which broke out across the country. The courts can serve as a bulwark against these excesses, Anthony D Romero, the executive director of the ACLU, told the New York Times. Litigation is going to be a key tool for either undoing these policies or slowing them down. The ongoing legal battle comes as the Department of Homeland Security said it will comply with judicial orders; faithfully enforce our immigration laws, and implement the presidents Executive Orders to ensure that those entering the United States do not pose a threat to our country or the American people. The Department of Homeland Security promised to comply with the federal court orders while hinting that little had actually changed. The presidents executive orders remain in place prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the US government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety, the statement said. Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Show all 20 1 /20 Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-1 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-2 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-3 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-4 SAN FRANCISCO, CA - JANUARY 28: Demonstrators hold signs during a rally against a ban on Muslim immigration at San Francisco International Airport on January 28, 2017 in San Francisco, California. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday that suspends entry of all refugees for 120 days, indefinitely suspends the entries of all Syrian refugees, as well as barring entries from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering for 90 days. Stephen Lam/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-5 A crowd of protesters gathers outside of the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse as a judge hears a challenge against President Donald Trump's executive ban on immigration from several Muslim countries, on January 28, 2017 in Brooklyn. The judge issued an emergency stay on part of Trump's executive order, ruling that sending refugees stopped at U.S. airports back to their countries would be harmful. Yana Paskova/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-6 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-7 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-8 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-9 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-10 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-11 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-12 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-13 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-14 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-15 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-16 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-17 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-18 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-19 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-20 Passengers wait in line to check in at the American Airlines terminal at JFK International Airport August 10, 2006 in the Queens borough of New York City. British authorities arrested 21 people and halted a anallegedly terrorist plot to use liquid explosives concealed in carry-on luggage to blow up airliners traveling between Britain and the U.S. Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff said that the plot appeared to be directed at U.S. carriers flying out of Heathrow. such as United Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines. Stephen Chernin/Getty No foreign national in a foreign land, without ties to the United States, has any unfettered right to demand entry into the United States or to demand immigration benefits in the United States. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman along with 15 other state attorneys condemned President Trumps executive order, calling it unconstitutional and un-American. As the chief legal officers for over 130 million Americans and foreign residents of our states, we condemn President Trumps unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful Executive Order, the statement said. Religious liberty has been, and always will be, a bedrock principle of our country and no president can change that truth. The joint-statement added, We are confident that the Executive Order will ultimately be struck down by the courts. In the meantime, we are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation it has created. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Donald Trump has blamed a Delta computer outage and "the tears of Senator Schumer" for problems at airports after a ban on Muslims travelling to the US went into place. Claiming that only a few people were hit by the issues, and that "all is going well with very few problems", the new President appeared to dismiss the huge protests that had greeted the signing of the Executive Order. "Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage, protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!" he wrote in a series of tweets. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters "There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country," a follow-up message read. "This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world!" The "big problems at airports" appears to be a reference to the disruption caused in the wake of the ban, as people were unexpectedly detained and lawyers worked to help have them freed. Those were then followed by huge protests, which saw thousands of people assemble at airports including JFK in New York, where taxis and other public transport were shut down by protests. Mr Trump's reference to the "tears of" Chuck Schumer is apparently a reference to the US Senator's campaign to fight against Mr Trump's travel ban. The Senate minority leader has denounced the order and has vowed to support protestors against it. He had tweeted on Friday night that "tears are running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty" because of the ban. Delta Airlines' computer systems were hit by an outage on Saturday night that led to delays and the cancellation of at least 150 flights. Donald Trump's travel ban which bans anyone from a list of seven countries, as well as anyone who is a dual national has been opposed by major organisations including the United Nations. Organisations including Doctors Without Borders have argued that it will put lives in danger, and experts have said that the ban will actually make the US less safe. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Donald Trumps executive order limiting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries and suspending refugee settlement has sparked confusion and anger across America. Refugees, green card and visa holders have been blocked from boarding US-bound flights or detained in arrivals. Protesters swarmed international travel terminals and took to the streets denouncing the measures, which have suspended refugee resettlement for 120 days, barred Syrian refugees indefinitely and banned entry of nationals from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen for 90 days. As unrest grows in the US, public outrage is spilling over across the pond. A petition calling on Theresa May to axe Mr Trumps planned state visit to the UK reached one million signatures over the weekend. Many in Europe are taking to social media to ask how they can help fight the measures, which many have labelled a thinly veiled "Muslim ban." Humanitarian groups have started to act as soon as the order was implemented, and many still require urgent funding to continue challenging the measures in court. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) gained an early victory as federal judges in New York and Virginia ordered stays on the deportations for people with valid visas. We have no doubt that the motivation behind the executive order was discriminatory. This was a Muslim ban wrapped in a paper-thin national security rationale, ACLU executive director Anthony Romero said in a statement. Following the court ruling, donations started pouring in to the ACLU, who said it received more than $24.1 million (19m) from supporters over the weekend - the Union receives around $4 million (3.2m) in a normal year. The group plans to increase its staffing with the increased funds. The Union is now calling for more Guardians of Liberty to help fund future action to protect peoples constitutional rights. President Trump's war on equality is already taking a terrible human toll. Help us protect the rights of refugees and immigrants and everyone across America, the organisation wrote on its website. "With your help, we will continue to take action when Trump or his administration run roughshod over ethical norms or trample on peoples constitutional rights." You can donate to the ACLU here. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Almost half of US voters are in support of an immigration policy like the one President Donald Trump has implemented, reports have suggested. A move by the new President to ban refugees from entering the US sparked global outrage on Friday and was condemned by judges as unconstitutional and unlawful. But in a poll surveying 899 voters nationwide, researchers from the University of Quinnipiac found 48 per cent were in support of suspending immigration from terror prone regions, even if it means turning away refugees. Mr Trumps new policy, referred to as a Muslim ban, puts a 120-day hold on allowing refugees to enter the US, an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria and a 90-day ban on citizens from Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. According to the survey, 53 per cent of voters said they were in support of requiring immigrants from Muslim countries to register with the federal government. The study also asked questions regarding the Presidents proposals on climate change, and repealing the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), with a margin of error of +/- 3.3 percentage points. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Given four possible options for legislation on abortion in the US, 28 per cent of voters agreed it should be legal in all cases, a third (34 per cent) said it should be legal in most cases, and 11 per cent said abortion should be completely illegal. Tim Malloy, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll said: The Trump send them back to where they came from rallying cry may have stirred the crowds and tipped the vote his way, but Americans are not inclined to simply show immigrants the door. Responding to the ban, more than one million people in the UK have signed a petition calling on the British government to cancel Mr Trumps planned state visit . Citing Mr Trumps well documented misogyny and vulgarity, the petition calls for Mr Trump to be allowed into the country, but not invited to meet the Queen. Downing Street has already stressed its position had not changed regarding the trip, however. An invitation has been extended and accepted, a Number 10 spokesman said. Update: An earlier version of this article said that between 42-48 per cent of those surveyed were in support of suspending immigration from terror prone regions, even if it means turning away refugees. The actual figure was 48 per cent. 2/5/17 Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Rudy Giuliani, the former Mayor of New York, has said President Donald Trump wanted a Muslim ban and instructed him to put together a commission to show him the right way to do it legally. In an interview with Fox News, Mr Giuliani, currently the White House cyber security advisor, said the commission focused on danger imposed by the countries implicated in the executive order, not religion, which he called perfectly legal, perfectly sensible. Mr Trump signed an executive order on Friday night that stopped Americas entire refugee programme for 120 days and banned refugees from Syria indefinitely. The "travel ban" has suspended the entry of travellers to the US from seven Muslim majority countries; Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen, for 90 days. On Sunday, following a weekend of protests and condemnation from lawyers across the US, Mr Trump he issued a statement that denied the action amounted to a Muslim ban. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order, Mr Trump said in the statement. He claimed America is a proud nation of immigrants and stated the country will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. Mr Trumps comments fly in the face of Mr Giuliani however, who said the president had called the action a Muslim ban when it was first revealed. Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Show all 20 1 /20 Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-1 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-2 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-3 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-4 SAN FRANCISCO, CA - JANUARY 28: Demonstrators hold signs during a rally against a ban on Muslim immigration at San Francisco International Airport on January 28, 2017 in San Francisco, California. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday that suspends entry of all refugees for 120 days, indefinitely suspends the entries of all Syrian refugees, as well as barring entries from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering for 90 days. Stephen Lam/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-5 A crowd of protesters gathers outside of the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse as a judge hears a challenge against President Donald Trump's executive ban on immigration from several Muslim countries, on January 28, 2017 in Brooklyn. The judge issued an emergency stay on part of Trump's executive order, ruling that sending refugees stopped at U.S. airports back to their countries would be harmful. Yana Paskova/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-6 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-7 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-8 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-9 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-10 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-11 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-12 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-13 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-14 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-15 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-16 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-17 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-18 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-19 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-20 Passengers wait in line to check in at the American Airlines terminal at JFK International Airport August 10, 2006 in the Queens borough of New York City. British authorities arrested 21 people and halted a anallegedly terrorist plot to use liquid explosives concealed in carry-on luggage to blow up airliners traveling between Britain and the U.S. Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff said that the plot appeared to be directed at U.S. carriers flying out of Heathrow. such as United Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines. Stephen Chernin/Getty Speaking to former judge Jeanine Ferris Pirro on Fox News, in an interview which was reportedly aired on Saturday night, Mr Giuliani said: Ill tell you the whole history. When [Mr Trump] first announced it he said Muslim ban. He called me up, he said, put a commission together, show me the right way to do it legally. I put a commission together with judge [Michael] Mukasey, with congressman [Mike] McCaul, Pete King, whole group of other very expert lawyers on this and what we did was we focused on - instead of religion - danger. The areas of the world that create danger for us, which is a factual basis, not a religious basis. Perfectly legal. Perfectly sensible. And thats what the ban is based on. Its not based on religion, its based on places where there are substantial evidence that people are sending terrorists into our country, he said. Protests erupted at airports across America over the weekend as travellers were detained inside. Outside JFK airport people chanted Let them in while New York taxi drivers called a temporary strike in solidarity with those affected by the ban. A federal judge in New York on Saturday night issued an emergency stay to temporarily halt the the deportation of people who had arrived in the country with valid visas or on an approved refugee application. On Sunday morning the Trump administration U-turned on part of the executive order and claimed that US residents with green cards from the seven countries would not be affected by the ban. Several judges have called the executive order unconstitutional. Over the weekend, Attorneys General from 16 US states condemned the Presidents order and the chaotic situation it had created. They said: Religious liberty has been, and always will be, a bedrock principle of our country and no president can change that truth, they said. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Attorneys General from 16 US states have condemned Donald Trump's executive order banning citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries travelling to the US. The White House has remained defiant over the travel ban, which prevents people from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Libya, Syria and Yemen travelling to the US, despite several judges ruling it is "unconstitutional and unlawful". One federal judge has ordered a temporary stay on the order, which was reportedly not reviewed by Department of Justice lawyers before it was signed, allowing people with green cards and visas into the country. In a joint statement, the officials from California, New York, Pennsylvania, Washington, Massachusetts, Hawaii, Virginia, Vermont, Oregon, Connecticut, New Mexico, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Illinois and the District of Columbia condemned the "chaotic situation" the order had created. They said: Religious liberty has been, and always will be, a bedrock principle of our country and no president can change that truth. The executive order bans all immigration from the seven countries for 90 days as well as suspending the entire US refugee programme for 120 days and forbidding the immigration of Syrian refugees indefinitely. The Department of Homeland Security initially said the ban would also apply to people who have dual citizenship with a third country but UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has secured an exemption for British passport holders. The move came after Prime Minister Theresa May was heavily criticised for refusing to condemn the ban which was signed immediately after he visit to the White House where she invited Mr Trump to the UK for a state visit later this year. Protesters against the Trump executive order banning people from certain Muslin-majority countries (Getty) (Stephanie Keith/Getty) Ms May later clarified that she did not support the policy but stopped short of condemning it. She also did not respond to calls from her own backbenchers to cancel the state visit in light of his policy. Scottish Conservative Leader, Ruth Davidson, said: "State visits are designed for both the host, and the head of state who is being hosted, to celebrate and entrench the friendships and shared values between their respective countries". "A state visit from the current President of the United States could not possibly occur in the best traditions of the entreprise while a cruel and divisive policy which discriminates against citizens of the host nation is in place". Another Tory, Stratford-upon-Avon MP Nadhim Zahawi, said the ban applied to him as he had been born in Iraq so he could not visit his children in the US though he will now be permitted under Mr Johnson's exemption. Protests erupt outside JFK Airport after President Trump's immigration ban Large protests against the executive order are currently taking place across the US with a planned demonstration planned in the UK for Monday evening. Thousands are marching from Battery Park to the federal Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) offices in Manhattan and made more have protested outside several airports across the country demanding the release of the detained refugees and visa holders. A lawyer working with the American Immigration Lawyers Association which was one of several organisations to file the lawsuit against the order, Mana Yegani, said they were prepare non compliance motions against the CBP. Top congressional Republicans, meanwhile, were backing Mr Trump despite concerns about the targets of the order. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he supports more stringent screening mechanisms, though he cautioned that Muslims are some of the country's "best sources in the war against terror". "I think it's a good idea to tighten the vetting process But I also think it's important to remember that some of our best sources in the war against radical Islamic terrorism are Muslims, both in this country and overseas," he said. He also stressed the need "to be careful as we do this", and said it would be up to the courts to decide "whether or not this has gone too far". The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Mr Trump billed his sweeping executive order as a necessary step to stop "radical Islamic terrorists" from coming to the US but it is unclear the measures would prevent attacks on American soil. The directive did not address homegrown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. And the list of countries in Mr Trump's order does not include Saudi Arabia, where most of the 9/11 hijackers were from. Mr Priebus, who is Mr Trump's chief of staff, said the ban could be expanded to more countries in the future. Read the full statement below: As the chief legal officers for over 130 million Americans and foreign residents of our states, we condemn President Trumps unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful Executive Order and will work together to ensure the federal government obeys the Constitution, respects our history as a nation of immigrants, and does not unlawfully target anyone because of their national origin or faith. Religious liberty has been, and always will be, a bedrock principle of our country, and no president can change that truth. Yesterday, multiple federal courts ordered a stay of the Administrations dangerous Executive Order. We applaud those decisions and will use all of the tools of our offices to fight this unconstitutional order and preserve our nations national security and core values. We are confident that the Executive Order will ultimately be struck down by the courts. In the meantime, we are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} As the furore surrounding President Donald Trumps travel ban continues, the White House reportedly hopes to start collecting social media data from foreign visitors as part of new extreme vetting measures. US news channel CNN reported that travellers could even be asked to hand over their mobile phone contacts, in a move which could be seen as an attack on civil liberties. White House policy director Stephen Miller told the broadcaster the policy is in the very early stages of discussion and it is not known how it would work in practice. Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Show all 20 1 /20 Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-1 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-2 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-3 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-4 SAN FRANCISCO, CA - JANUARY 28: Demonstrators hold signs during a rally against a ban on Muslim immigration at San Francisco International Airport on January 28, 2017 in San Francisco, California. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday that suspends entry of all refugees for 120 days, indefinitely suspends the entries of all Syrian refugees, as well as barring entries from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering for 90 days. Stephen Lam/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-5 A crowd of protesters gathers outside of the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse as a judge hears a challenge against President Donald Trump's executive ban on immigration from several Muslim countries, on January 28, 2017 in Brooklyn. The judge issued an emergency stay on part of Trump's executive order, ruling that sending refugees stopped at U.S. airports back to their countries would be harmful. Yana Paskova/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-6 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-7 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-8 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-9 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-10 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-11 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-12 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-13 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-14 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-15 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-16 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-17 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-18 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-19 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-20 Passengers wait in line to check in at the American Airlines terminal at JFK International Airport August 10, 2006 in the Queens borough of New York City. British authorities arrested 21 people and halted a anallegedly terrorist plot to use liquid explosives concealed in carry-on luggage to blow up airliners traveling between Britain and the U.S. Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff said that the plot appeared to be directed at U.S. carriers flying out of Heathrow. such as United Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines. Stephen Chernin/Getty But an anonymous source told CNN that in future if visitors refuse to hand over their account details and contacts, they could be refused entry. The source claimed the Trump administration had raised concerns that terrorist Tashfeen Malik posted messages calling for a Jihad before he and his wife carried out an attack in San Bernardino, California in which 14 people were shot dead and 22 others seriously injured. Malik was a Pakistani born permanent resident of the US and he and his American-born wife reportedly became radicalised jihadists partly through their online activities. But FBI director James Comey said there is no evidence that Maliks postings would have raised the alarm because they were made under a pseudonym and with strict privacy settings. Mr Trumps press secretary Sean Spicer has not confirmed whether social media vetting is being considered by immigration, but the US government already asks some foreign travellers to hand over details of their Facebook and Twitter accounts on a voluntary basis. Those who enter the country under the visa waiver scheme are presented with an optional request to enter details of their online accounts, including Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. This policy was implemented by the Obama administration, in the face of fierce resistance from the social media giants who argued the policy threatened freedom of expression and posed security and safety risks. An immigration lawyer has claimed US border agents are checking the Facebook accounts of some green card holders as part of Mr Trumps so-called Muslim ban which temporarily bars citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering. The American Immigration Lawyers Association (ALIA) told The Independent there were anecdotal reports that some of those being detained at airports were having their social media accounts checked and being interrogated about their political beliefs. Online security vetting has been used increasingly over the past few years, but civil rights lawyers have raised concerns that it violates the first amendment of the US constitution the right to freedom of expression. Militants are conducting shellings of the positions of the Ukrainian Armed Forces using proscribed weapons near the city of Avdiyivka, Donetsk region, Ukrainian Defense Minister Stepan Poltorak said. "Last night the situation was a lot calmer, but the active phase began this morning. The enemy is conducting shellings from proscribed weapons, in particular, tanks and artillery," Poltorak said on Monday. He said that an "assault operation" of militants lasted the entire day. The minister also said that the Ukrainian servicemen have seized a stronghold of militants. The Ukrainian Defense Ministry said earlier that five servicemen were killed and another 14 injured in the anti-terrorist operation zone in the past 24 hours, and the overwhelming majority of losses occurred during hostilities in Avdiyivka. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Charles Koch first likened candidate Donald Trump's plan to ban Muslim immigrants to something Adolf Hitler would have done in Nazi Germany. The billionaire industrialist and his chief lieutenants offered a more delicate response this weekend when asked about President Trump's plan to block immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. They described Trump's plan as the wrong approach that violated its dedication to free and open societies. The criticism comes as the Koch network, among the most powerful conservative groups in the nation, works to strike a delicate balance in the early days of the new administration. The Kochs refused to support Trump's candidacy last fall, but they now see a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to influence the White House and the Republican-controlled Congress. Donald Trump announces a ban on refugees and all visitors from Muslim-majority countries Their optimism is fuelled by strong relationships inside the administration, despite their vow to oppose Trump's policies if they deviate from the Koch brothers' conservative priorities. Trump critics were easy to find at the California desert resort this weekend, where attendance at a semi-annual conference was limited to the 550 people who donate at least $100,000 each year to the various conservative political and policy groups backed by Charles and David Koch. The critics included Charles Koch himself, although the conservative patriarch did not mention Trump by name Sunday as he warned that the nation is facing a moment of tremendous danger. He said the nation could go the authoritarian route ... or we can move toward a free and open society. So this is our opportunity. Still, the Koch network says it's confident about its ability to shape the direction of the Trump administration's policies from the inside. Rudy Giuliani explains how he helped Trump put together 'Muslim ban' legally Many former network staffers that are in the White House now remain good friends of ours. So we're in constant contact with them, said Koch spokesman James Davis. Conversations have been open and continue to be. There is perhaps no bigger Koch ally than Vice President Mike Pence, whose staff and ideology has been in close alignment with the Kochs for years. Charles Koch spoke directly with the vice president on the phone days before his inauguration as Pence considered hiring a Koch communications staffer, Stephen Ford, to serve as his chief speechwriter. Ford was soon hired, along with former Koch chief Marc Short, who now serves as the White House legislative director. The reason we're optimistic... is really Mike Pence, said Doug Deason, a prominent Trump supporter and major Koch donor. If you think Cheney had power in Bush White House, just watch and see what happens with Mike Pence. Several reporters, including one from The Associated Press, were invited to attend the weekend conference. As a condition of attending, photographers were not allowed and reporters were not permitted to identify any donors without their permission. Koch and his powerful allies insist they will challenge Trump when his policies don't align with their conservative vision. The network plans to spend between $300 million and $400 million over the next two years to shape policy and politics, much of it devoted to its nationwide grassroots network. While there has been much talk of Trump allies creating an outside group to help promote his agenda, the Koch network's capacity to communicate directly with voters on the ground in key states has no political rival. The Koch's secret sauce, Holden says, is the accountability play. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters We're principled. And if we can't get comfortable with the policies that are in place, then we're not going to support them. But if we can we will support them, regardless of who's in office, he said. Like Trump, the Kochs favour efforts to cut government regulation and replace the federal health-care system. They do not share the president's plans for a massive infrastructure spending or his crackdown on immigrants from Muslim-majority countries. The travel ban is the wrong approach and will likely be counterproductive, network co-chair Brian Hooks said Sunday. Our country has benefited tremendously from a history of welcoming people from all cultures and backgrounds, he said. This is a hallmark of free and open societies. AP Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Donald Trumps ban on travel to the US from some Muslim-majority countries has been denounced by the UN's rights chief as mean-spirited and illegal under international human rights law. Zeid Ra'ad al Hussein said: Discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law. The US ban is also mean-spirited, and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism. Mr Trumps executive order, which also suspended all US refugee programmes for 120 days, would endanger lives, the medical aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres said. The Paris-based advocacy group said Mr Trumps order will effectively keep people trapped in war zones, directly endangering their lives. MSF, also known as Doctors Without Borders, called the refugee ban an inhumane act against people fleeing war zones. Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Show all 20 1 /20 Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-1 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-2 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-3 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-4 SAN FRANCISCO, CA - JANUARY 28: Demonstrators hold signs during a rally against a ban on Muslim immigration at San Francisco International Airport on January 28, 2017 in San Francisco, California. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday that suspends entry of all refugees for 120 days, indefinitely suspends the entries of all Syrian refugees, as well as barring entries from seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering for 90 days. Stephen Lam/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-5 A crowd of protesters gathers outside of the Brooklyn Federal Courthouse as a judge hears a challenge against President Donald Trump's executive ban on immigration from several Muslim countries, on January 28, 2017 in Brooklyn. The judge issued an emergency stay on part of Trump's executive order, ruling that sending refugees stopped at U.S. airports back to their countries would be harmful. Yana Paskova/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-6 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-7 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-8 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the new immigration ban issued by President Donald Trump at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-9 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-10 Getty Images Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-11 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-12 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-13 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-14 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-15 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-16 Protestors rally during a demonstration against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump signed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-17 NEW YORK, NY - JANUARY 28: Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-18 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-19 Protestors rally during a protest against the Muslim immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport on January 28, 2017 in New York City. President Trump singed the controversial executive order that halted refugees and residents from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. Stephanie Keith/Getty Protestors rally at JFK Airport against Muslim immigration ban jfk-protest-muslim-ban-20 Passengers wait in line to check in at the American Airlines terminal at JFK International Airport August 10, 2006 in the Queens borough of New York City. British authorities arrested 21 people and halted a anallegedly terrorist plot to use liquid explosives concealed in carry-on luggage to blow up airliners traveling between Britain and the U.S. Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff said that the plot appeared to be directed at U.S. carriers flying out of Heathrow. such as United Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines. Stephen Chernin/Getty It called on the US government to lift the order, end the exclusion from specific countries, and to restart the resettlement of refugees. The EU vowed not to discriminate against refugees based on nationality, race or religion and said it will never choose isolation and inequality, in an implicit reference to Americas actions. EU Commission spokesman Margaritis Schinas said that the 28-nation bloc was carefully studying the US travel ban to see how much it will impact EU citizens. Trump's state visit: Top five UK parliamentary petitions Mr Schinas also quoted from a Sunday interview of Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, in which he said: We have to make choices about the world we want to live in. We must choose between isolationism, inequality and national egotism on the one hand. And openness, social equality and strength through solidarity on the other. In an interview with Germany's Die Welt, Mr Juncker said that it is by standing for opening, social equality and solidarity that Europe can credibly act on the world stage to find common forward-looking solutions. And the world's largest body of Islamic nations told The Associated Press that it has grave concern over the travel ban. The 57-nation Organisation of Islamic Cooperation issued a statement on Monday warning that such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism. It called on the US to reconsider this blanket statement and maintain its moral obligation to provide leadership and hope at a time of great uncertainty and unrest in the world. The 90-day ban, imposed on Friday, affects travel to the US by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. All are members of the OIC. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} A former climate change adviser to Donald Trump has said the US President will pull America out of the landmark Paris agreement and an executive order on the issue could come within days. Myron Ebell, who took charge of Mr Trumps Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) transition team, said the President was determined to undo policies pushed by Barack Obama to restrict greenhouse gas emissions. He said the US would "clearly change its course on climate policy" under the new administration and claimed Mr Trump was "pretty clear that the problem or the crisis has been overblown and overstated". I expect Donald Trump to be very assiduous in keeping his promises, despite all of the flack he is going to get from his opponents, he told a briefing in London. Myron Ebell (AP) He could do it by executive order tomorrow, or he could wait and do it as part of a larger package. There are multiple ways and I have no idea of the timing. Mr Ebell, a long-standing climate sceptic, was employed by the Trump team last September to review the EPA and worked for the Republican billionaire until his inauguration on 20 January. Mr Trump, who has previously called climate change a hoax invented by the Chinese, promised a raft of policies during his campaign including to undo Obamas climate action plan and defund UN climate change work. Sir David Attenborough hopes Donald Trump keeps US in Paris Agreement The Paris agreement, successor to the Kyoto Protocols, aims to "stabilise greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system". In November, two weeks after his election victory, Mr Trump said he had an "open mind" on the climate deal, which was drafted at the end of 2015 and signed on the 22 April 2016. The agreement has 194 signatories, including the US. Mr Ebell, who has criticised the "alarmist agenda" of the climate change lobby, said any efforts by Mr Trump's new Secretary of State to keep the US in the Paris deal would be futile. Rex Tillerson, a former ExxonMobil chief executive, acknowledged the existence of climate change during his recent Senate hearing. Secretary of State-designate Rex Tillerson testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington DC at his confirmation hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee (AP) Asked about the Paris deal, he said: "I think its 190 countries have signed on. Were better served by being at that table than by leaving that table. However, speaking on Monday afternoon at an event hosted by the Global Warming Policy Foundation, which itself is accused of denying the damaging impact of climate change, Mr Ebell responded: "His [Mr Trump's] mandate is pretty clear, and he knows who he got it from. If Rex Tillerson disagrees with the President, who is going to win that debate? "Well I don't know but the President was elected and Rex Tillerson was appointed by the President, so I would guess that the President would be the odds-on favourite to win any disagreement over climate policy." Mr Ebell's assertion appears to contradict Mr Trump's approach to other policy areas - specifically torture - where the President has said the final say will be given to his cabinet picks, notably the secretary of defence James Mattis. The treaty commits all the countries of the world, for the first time ever, to cut their carbon emissions (Corbis) Asked last year about the link between humans and climate change, Mr Trump said there was some connectivity. Some, something. It depends on how much. The New York property tycoon has also said he would look very closely at whether to remain a signatory of the Paris agreement. Friends of the Earths director of campaigns, Simon Rayner, said pulling the US out of the Paris climate treaty "would be an act of utter contempt from Donald Trump towards the international community. Climate change is one of the biggest challenges the whole planet faces and one the U.S must play its fair share in tackling. The warning lights are flashing: Theresa May must urgently stand up to Donald Trump and an environment and political agenda that is already causing huge harm. Mr Ebell admitted he had not met Mr Trump and said he was appointed last August by a former member of his inner circle, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. The self-described "enemy of climate change alarmism", who disputes the negative impact of carbon dioxide on the environment, added: "There hasn't been much warming for the last 20 years, or statistically no warming for the last 20 years, but it is going to happen because we keep pumping more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Show all 10 1 /10 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A group of emperor penguins face a crack in the sea ice, near McMurdo Station, Antarctica Kira Morris 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Floods destroyed eight bridges and ruined crops such as wheat, maize and peas in the Karimabad valley in northern Pakistan, a mountainous region with many glaciers. In many parts of the world, glaciers have been in retreat, creating dangerously large lakes that can cause devastating flooding when the banks break. Climate change can also increase rainfall in some areas, while bringing drought to others. Hira Ali 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Smoke filled with the carbon that is driving climate change drifts across a field in Colombia. Sandra Rondon 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Amid a flood in Islampur, Jamalpur, Bangladesh, a woman on a raft searches for somewhere dry to take shelter. Bangladesh is one of the most vulnerable places in the world to sea level rise, which is expected to make tens of millions of people homeless by 2050. Probal Rashid 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Sindh province in Pakistan has experienced a grim mix of two consequences of climate change. Because of climate change either we have floods or not enough water to irrigate our crop and feed our animals, says the photographer. Picture clearly indicates that the extreme drought makes wide cracks in clay. Crops are very difficult to grow. Rizwan Dharejo 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Hanna Petursdottir examines a cave inside the Svinafellsjokull glacier in Iceland, which she said had been growing rapidly. Since 2000, the size of glaciers on Iceland has reduced by 12 per cent. Tom Schifanella 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A river once flowed along the depression in the dry earth of this part of Bangladesh, but it has disappeared amid rising temperatures. Abrar Hossain 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A shepherd moves his herd as he looks for green pasture near the village of Sirohi in Rajasthan, northern India. The region has been badly affected by heatwaves and drought, making local people nervous about further predicted increases in temperature. Riddhima Singh Bhati 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A factory in China is shrouded by a haze of air pollution. The World Health Organisation has warned such pollution, much of which is from the fossil fuels that cause climate change, is a public health emergency. Leung Ka Wa 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Water levels in reservoirs, like this one in Gers, France, have been getting perilously low in areas across the world affected by drought, forcing authorities to introduce water restrictions. Mahtuf Ikhsan "Since 1996, that is the year before the Kyoto Protocol was negotiated, over 30 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions since the era of fossil fuels began in around 1750 have been emitted. Now, if we were going to have some warming, it should have started. "The fact is that the sensitivity to carbon dioxide, the sensitivity to the climate, has been vastly exaggerated. "In all of this discussion of the impacts of global warming, the benefits of higher carbon dioxide levels and of warming...are completely minimised by the alarmist community." Jonathan Bartley, co-leader of the UK Green Party, said a US withdrawal would be a bitter blow to the fight to save our planet, but added: The momentum we have gathered is unstoppable, and the Paris Agreement will continue in strength with or without Donald Trump. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} President Trumps elevation of his chief political strategist to a major role in national security policy, and a White House order banning refugees from certain Muslim-majority countries from US entry, appeared to come together as cause and effect over the weekend. Stephen K Bannon whose nationalist convictions and hardline oppositional view of globalism have long guided Trump was directly involved in shaping the immigration mandate, according to several people familiar with the drafting who requested anonymity because they were not authorised to speak publicly. The order, which has ignited sweeping domestic and international backlash, came without the formal input of Trumps National Security Council, the committee of top national security aides designed to ensure the President examines all policy issues from different perspectives. In Trumps case, the NSC has not yet been fully formed. Key department heads, including the secretary of state, have either not been confirmed or had little chance to be briefed by those under them. But even as the mechanism for full consultation with defence, diplomatic, intelligence and other national security chiefs remains incomplete, Bannons policy influence was established late Saturday in a presidential directive that gave him something no previous president has bestowed on a political adviser: a formal seat at the NSC table. The same directive appeared to downgrade the status of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the director of national intelligence the Presidents senior intelligence and military advisers under statute by limiting their attendance to some meetings. Former President Barack Obamas national security adviser, Susan E Rice, called the measure stone cold crazy in a tweet on Sunday. Former Obama defence secretary and CIA director Robert M Gates, who said he was unconcerned about Bannons role, told ABCs This Week that pushing [the DNI and Joint Chiefs chairman] out of the National Security Council meetings, except when their specific issues are at stake, is a big mistake. Every president finds their judgement useful, whether they like it or not, Gates added. A senior NSC official said Sunday that negative interpretations of both measures misunderstood both the intention and the effect of a directive whose overall aim was to make policy formation more inclusive and more efficient. Some offices such as cyber have been expanded, while others have been collapsed. Obamas separate directorates on Europe and Russia have now been combined, the official said. While Obama was criticised for the size of his NSC staff, and Congress enacted legislation to shrink the number of bodies, Rice cut it by about 17 percent in recent years to fewer than 180 policy positions. Trumps is unlikely to be much smaller, the official said, and numbers were a secondary consideration. All positions on the White House payroll have now been filled, and those detailed from other agencies usually appointed for two-year secondments will eventually rotate out. Outside the White House, reaction to the new NSC organisational directive was less positive, with some saying that the immigration directive suffered from jumping ahead of the normal policy process, allowing it and other orders to be composed by political operatives such as Bannon and Stephen Miller, the White House senior adviser for policy, who is a Bannon ally and a former aide to Senator Jeff Sessions, Trumps populist and conservative nominee for attorney general. Senior Trump officials offered differing public explanations for the Bannon appointment. Asked what the strategist contributed to NSC discussions, White House press secretary Sean Spicer told This Week that Bannon is a former naval officer. Hes got a tremendous understanding of the world and the geopolitical landscape that we have now. Asked if Bannon was giving advice on national security matters, Spicer said he was contributing analysis. Its about the intelligence that comes in and the analysis that comes out of that, he said. Having key decision-makers, and the chief strategist for the United States for the President to come in and talk about what the strategy is going forward is crucial. Bannon has no job experience in foreign policy. After serving in the Navy for seven years in the late 1970s and early 1980s, his eclectic career took him to Goldman Sachs, to consulting to documentary filmmaking and then to the running of Breitbart News, a far-right website known for peddling conspiracy theories. From his perch as chief of Breitbart News, which produced a satellite radio show, Bannon cemented his role as a champion of the alt-right, an anti-globalism movement that has attracted support from white supremacists and helped power Trumps populist White House victory. Trump sees Bannon as a generational peer who shares his anti-establishment instincts and confrontational style. According to several people familiar with their relationship, Bannon has cultivated a rapport with Trump over security issues in recent months, and impressed Trump with his grasp of policy in talks they have held together with top intelligence and military officials. The new President relies on Bannon to ensure that his campaign promises and nationalist worldview are being followed and are shaping national security strategy. Trumps approval of Bannons new role is seen inside the White House as the formalisation of a dynamic that has already been at work for weeks, these people said. For many outside the White House, the optics of Bannons NSC appointment were bad, regardless of the motivation or the substance of his participation. In previous administrations, political advisers have been banned from national security discussions or at least not publicly acknowledged. George W Bush barred his political strategist, Karl Rove, from NSC meetings, according to Josh Bolten, Bushs chief of staff. The President told Karl Rove, You may never come to a National Security Council meeting, Bolten said at a conference on the NSC and politics last fall. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters It wasnt because he didnt respect Karls advice or didnt value his input, Bolten said. But the President also knew that the signal he wanted to send to the rest of his administration, the signal he wanted to send to the public, and the signal he especially wanted to send to the military is that the decisions Im making that involve life and death for the people in uniform will not be tainted by any political decisions. While Obama did not include political strategist David Axelrod in his own NSC organisational directive, Axelrod frequently showed up at the meetings particularly those having to do with strategy in Afghanistan and Iraq to the consternation of Gates and others. It is true that the Obama administration did it, said Peter Feaver, a political-science professor at Duke University who served on the Bush NSC staff. Its also true that we Republicans, myself included, sharply criticised them for doing it, precisely on the grounds that you are feeding the image that politics drove the decision. Washington Post Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Dozens of US diplomats around the world outraged over Donald Trumps travel ban have voiced their opposition to the President in a rare letter of protest. A draft of the letter, a so-called Dissent Channel Memo, has been circulating among officials. They are concerned that Mr Trumps executive order banning travel to the US for people from seven Muslim-majority countries, is not only contrary to American values, but will hamper counter-terrorism efforts. This ban ... will not achieve its stated aim to protect the American people from terrorist attacks by foreign nationals admitted to the United States, says the draft, obtained by Lawfareblog.com. Rather, it said the order will expand anti-American sentiment and immediately sour relations with key allies, particularly many of the countries whose citizens are now affected. The US State Departments dissent channel is a means for State Department employees to confidentially express policy disagreement. It was created in 1971 as a response to concerns within the department over the governments handling of the Vietnam War. Earlier this month, four senior officials at the department quit their jobs, rather than serving under Mr Trump. Mr Trumps executive order, which also suspended the countrys entire refugee programme for four months, has been marked by widespread protests across the nation, focussing on the airports where dozens of people were detained over the weekend and questioned. The countries affected were Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Iran, Libya and Sudan. Protests across American airports in response to Trump's immigration ban The governments of those largely Muslim countries see the White House move as an attack on Islam. By alienating such allies, the US government will lose access to valuable intelligence and counter-terrorism resources, the draft said. It also said that Mr Trumps knee-jerk executive order was based on misguided notions about terrorism in the United States. Despite the orders focus on them, a vanishingly small number of terror attacks on US soil have been committed by foreign nationals who recently entered the US on an immigrant or non-immigrant visa, it says. Rather, the overwhelmingly majority of attacks have been committed by native-born or naturalised US citizens individuals who have been living in the US for decades, if not since birth. It adds: In the isolated incidents of foreign nationals entering the US on a visa to commit acts of terror, the nationals have come from a range of countries, (such as Pakistan or Saudi Arabia), which are not covered by the order. On Sunday, as law enforcement agencies were still scrambling to figure out how to implement the executive order and as protests broke out in cities across the country, the White House defended its action, saying the move was necessary to ensure that the people that were letting into our country are coming here with peaceful purposes and not to do us harm. The safety of the American citizens, the safety of our country has got to be paramount, White House spokesman Sean Spicer told ABC News. Asked what message the executive order sends to Muslims worldwide, Mr Spicer said: What it sends is that well protect our country and people. The dissent channel is supposed to be a final resort for diplomats to voice their concern. In 1995 then-Secretary of State Warren Christopher warned State Department officials: Because the dissent channel is not a routine channel and its messages are handled at the highest levels of the department, authors should ensure not only that their views are well grounded and well argued but that other channels are not available to them. Last year, more than 50 diplomats filed a dissent memo with the Obama administration, expressing concern over US policy in Syria and calling for military strikes against the Syrian regime. The Independent has been unable to verify the contents of the draft letter. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Emirates airline is reportedly changing its pilots and cabin crews on flights to the United States following Donald Trump's executive order banning travel from several Muslim-majority countries. The Dubai-based carrier, which has 11 flights to US cities each day, made "the necessary adjustments to our crewing, to comply with the latest requirements," an Emirates spokeswoman told Reuters on Sunday The President's executive order temporarily suspended refugees and immigrants travelling from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the US. Reuters reports the ban also applies to pilots and flight attendants from those seven countries, even though all flight crew who are not US citizens already need a special visa to enter the country. Protests across American airports in response to Trump's immigration ban The impact of the ban on operations would be minimal, another spokeswoman told the agency, as Emirates employs over 23,000 flight attendants and around 4,000 pilots from around the world. Abu Dhabi's Etihad Airways told Reuters the airline had "taken steps to ensure there will be no issues for flights departing over the coming weeks" while Germany's Lufthansa confirmed airlines and passengers were required to follow the new rules. Separately, Etihad said a number of its passengers had been affected by the new US immigration policies. The carrier said it is offering affected passengers refunds or flight changes where possible. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters On Monday, global airlines association IATA, which represents 265 airlines, said the order was issued without prior coordination or warning, causing confusion among travellers and its own members, who are now at the forefront of implementing the rules. "It also placed additional burdens on airlines to comply with unclear requirements, to bear implementation costs and to face potential penalties for non-compliance," it said in a statement, calling for more clarity and more notice in the future. Mr Trump defended the abrupt order on Twitter. "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the 'bad' would rush into our country during that week," he said. "A lot of bad 'dudes' out there!" Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The animosity between Hollywood and Donald Trump is pretty mutual. As you would imagine, the President does not feel warmly to a community where he is one of the most universally hated figures and the target of incalculable award show wisecracks. James Cameron has become the latest Hollywood figure to condemn the President. The filmmaker, who has directed everything from The Titanic to Avatar, said he was very concerned about Mr Trumps attitude to climate change. Cameron suggested a Trump presidency was ultimately pushing us towards the tipping point of climate change. More broadly, the 62-year-old said the world had turned upside-down since Mr Trumps election and expressed his concern about the rhetoric being espoused by the White House. Its basically the upside-down world right now, and the kind of dialogue coming out of these guys sounds like George Orwell, he told the Daily Beast. Alternate facts? Theres no such thing as an alternate fact! These people are insane, Cameron added, referencing a now infamous phrase used by Mr Trumps adviser Kellyanne Conway after she was asked to explain why press secretary Sean Spicer made a statement to reporters peppered with inaccuracies. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters The acclaimed director, whose activism centres on climate and sustainability, said he was worried about the state of the environment under a Trump presidency. Years ago, we sort of spotted the iceberg ahead of us and we called out the order to turn, and weve been slowly, slowly, slowly trying to turn this big-ass ship to not hit the iceberg, and then Trump grabbed the tiller and just plunged it right back at the center of the iceberg, he said. So am I worried? Of course. Im like anyone of good conscience and reasonable intelligence. I think were the biggest freakin idiot civilisation in history right now, and theyll probably be talking about us 4,000 years from now scratching their heads - like they talk about Atlantis. Who are those guys? What did they do to piss off the gods so much that theyre buried under a hundred feet of mud right now? Cameron said he was concerned about the appointment of Scott Pruitt to the head of the Environmental Protection Agency. Recommended How a climate denier became head of Environmental Protection Agency He nominated a guy to run the EPA [Scott Pruitt] who has eight lawsuits against the EPA, and refuses to recuse himself from those lawsuits! claimed Cameron. Mr Pruitt, who is the Attorney General of the oil and gas-intensive state of Oklahoma, is a climate change sceptic. He has said the debate on climate change is far from settled and joined a coalition of state attorney generals in suing the agencys Clean Power Plan - the key Obama-era policy brought in to try and reduce US greenhouse gas emissions from the oil and gas sector. On Tuesday, Mr Trump signed an executive order to advance the construction of the $3.8bn (3bn) Dakota Access Pipeline. Last November the US Army Corps of Engineers denied the permit to build the 1,100-mile pipeline. Protesters fear the pipeline could damage drinking water and desecrate sacred grounds. Mr Trump, who has dismissed climate change as a Chinese hoax, has appointed known climate science deniers to key positions in his administration. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Kellyanne Conway, a leading spokesperson for President Donald Trump, launched a tirade against the media in an appearance on Fox News Sunday in which she called for commentators to be fired for covering Trump poorly. In a rant that has since gone viral, Ms Conway bemoaned the fact that not one silly political analyst and pundit who talked smack all day long about Donald Trump has been let go, in a continuation of the hostile relations between Mr Trumps administration and major media organisations. The appearance followed comments from the Presidents chief strategist and former editor of right-wing news site Breitbart.com, Stephen Bannon, in which he called the media the opposition party which should keep its mouth shut. Ms Conway has been the most frequent spokesperson representing Mr Trumps views on talk shows, and continued to lead the coordinated attack on the media, which has come from Mr Trump personally, along with Mr Bannon and Press Secretary Sean Spicer. Upon confrontation with host Chris Wallace on what is usually a sympathetic network to Mr Trumps administration, Ms Conway argued that if the mainstream media were a thriving private-sector business that actually turned a profit, 20% of the people would be gone. If youre part of Team Trump, you walk around with these gaping, seeping wounds every single day, said Ms Conway, referring to a perception in the Trump team that they are being attacked unfairly by media organisations. I believe in a full and free press. Im here every Sunday morning. I havent slept-in in months. Mr Wallace garnered praise on social media for not interrupting what was developing into a full-blooded rant from Ms Conway, and merely thanked her at the end of the monologue for her appearance on the show. Ms Conway was recently the subject of an SNL parody routine in which she appears on a talk show. Actress Kate McKinnon plays the president's advisor and sings a musical number in the style of Roxie Hart from the musical Chicago. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Los Angeles police officers will refuse to help enforce Donald Trumps plans to deport millions of illegal immigrants, the city's police chief has said. Charlie Beck, who has led the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) since 2009 and worked for the force for 40 years, said enforcing such measures came at the expensive of public safety and was not the job of police officers. Los Angeles, the second biggest city in the US, is home to an estimated 500,000 undocumented migrants. Donald Trump sacks acting attorney general over immigration ban Recommended Trump deletes the judiciary from the Government on White House website Mr Beck told the LA Times: We couldnt deport 500,000 people if we wanted to, and if we did, it would be at the expense of public safety. If the LAPD was forced to get involved in immigration enforcement, its all wed do, he added. The police chief was re-iterating a promise, made last year, to help protect the LA's immigrant communities. That is not our job, nor will I make it our job, he said in November on the issue of the LAPDs role in enforcing Mr Trumps deportation pledge. Speaking this weekend, as Mr Trumps wide-ranging Executive Order on immigration triggered a barrage of opposition from across the globe, Mr Beck said fears of deportation will make immigrants less likely to co-operate with police working on criminal investigations. "In the mid-1990s, when the state cracked down [on] illegal immigration, all we did was drive people underground, he said. When you create a shadow population that fears any interaction [with law enforcement officials], then you create a whole population of victims, because they become prey for human predators who extort them or abuse them because they know they wont contact the police." The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters A better way of tackling illegal immigration would be to help boost the Mexican economy, he suggested, saying: We have a very rich country with a lot of opportunity that is immediately adjacent to a poorer country with less opportunity, Mr Trump is facing a wave of opposition to his immigration policies after his ban on immigrants from seven Muslim countries triggered an angry backlash. Attorney generals in 16 US states declared the measures unconstitutional, while a federal judge ordered the ban should be lifted. A number of Republican senators also condemned the policy. As well as the immigration ban, the measures signed into law by the US President last week also included plans to strengthen the Border Patrol, build a wall along the US-Mexico border and publish a weekly list of crimes committed by immigrants in the US. Mr Beck's comments follow those made by leaders of several so-called sanctuary cities that have pledged to offer safe haven for immigrants and not co-operate with government agencies trying to deport undocumented migrants. The Democrat mayors of Chicago, Seattle, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco and a number of other cities have all said they will not help with deportations. Mr Trump responded by instructing that such cities be starved of federal funding a measure some commentators have claimed is illegal Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Malala Yousafzai has said she is heartbroken about Donald Trumps refugee ban and urged the President to scrap the executive order. Last week, Mr Trump signed an order suspending the entire US refugee admissions system for 120 days, halting the Syrian refugee programme indefinitely, and banning entry for people from seven majority-Muslim countries such as Syria, Iran, Yemen, Iraq, Sudan, Libya and Somalia for 90 days. The billionaire property developer said he would prioritise Christian refugees over those of other religions. The Pakistani activist and Nobel Peace laureate condemned the President for discriminating against those fleeing war-torn countries. "I am heartbroken that today President Trump is closing the door on children, mothers and fathers fleeing violence and war," the 19-year-old said in a statement released via The Malala Fund. "I am heartbroken that America is turning its back on a proud history of welcoming refugees and immigrants - the people who helped build your country, ready to work hard in exchange for a fair chance at a new life." The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters I am heartbroken that Syrian refugee children, who have suffered through six years of war by no fault of their own, are singled-out for discrimination. Yousafzai, who was shot in the head by the Taliban in an attempt to stop her campaigning for girls education in 2012, referred to a friend named Zaynab, who escaped wars in Somalia, Yemen and Egypt before turning 17. She explained that Zaynab received a visa to go to the US two years ago, where she learned English, graduated from secondary school and is now studying to be a human rights lawyer at university. Zaynab was separated from her little sister when she fled unrest in Egypt, Yousafzai, who has become a globally renowned campaigner for girls' education and children's rights, said. "Today her hope of being reunited with her precious sister dims. In this time of uncertainty and unrest around the world, I ask President Trump not to turn his back on the worlds most defenseless children and families. Mr Trumps ban on refugees entering the US has unleashed chaos and outrage across the world. Protests have swept across American airports and US lawyers have declared the Presidents actions unconstitutional. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} An unidentified intruder managed to bluff her way in to the Republican retreat where Theresa May spoke, and possibly covertly recorded audio of private meetings. President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence travelled with the Prime Minister to the closed door gathering in Philadelphia last week. Investigators are now examining how the woman, who posed as the wife of an unnamed Republican politician, was able to gain access. It is believed she passed through the rigorous security procedures and possibly used fake credentials, raising security concerns. Theresa May in America: The PM's first speech in 90 seconds The breach was announced by Mark Strand, head of the non-profit Congressional Institute which organised the retreat. In an email to attendees obtained by The Associated Press, Mr Strand said the woman misrepresented herself on multiple occasions to retreat organisers as the spouse of an elected official. He added: "The Congressional Institute is continuing to investigate this breach in order to fully understand how it happened and to ensure it does not happen again." The revelation came as organisers scrambled to find out how audio from inside the retreat was leaked to various news outlets. On the audio, GOP politicians can heard airing concerns about the practical difficulties and political risks of repealing and replacing President Barack Obama's health care law, also known as Obamacare. In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Show all 32 1 /32 In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump London An image of President Donald Trump is seen on a placard during the Women's March in London, England Getty In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Sydney A view of the skywriting word reading 'Trump' as thousands rally in support of equal rights in Sydney, New South Wales EPA In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Rome People shout and hold signs during a rally against US newly sworn-in President Donald Trump in Rome Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump London A protester holds a placard during the Women's March in London, England Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Marseille A placard ready 'Pussy grabs back' is attached to the handle bar of a bike during a 'Women's March' organized by Feminist and human rights groups in solidarity with women marching in Washington and around the world for their rights and against the reactionary politics of the newly sworn-in US President Donald Trump, at the Old Port (Vieux Port) of Marseille, southern France Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Bangkok A young Thai girl holds a "women's rights are human rights" sign at Roadhouse BBQ restaurant where many of the Bangkok Womens March participants gathered in Bangkok, Thailand Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Bangkok A Thai woman takes a photo of a "hate is not great" sign at the women's solidarity gathering in Bangkok, Thailand Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Bangkok American expats and travellers gather with the international community in Bangkok at the Roadhouse BBQ restaurant to stand in solidarity in Bangkok, Thailand Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump London Protetesters gather outside The US Embassy in Grosvenor Square ahead of the Women's March in London, England Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Marseille Women's March at the Old Port (Vieux Port) of Marseille, southern France Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Marseille Protestors hold placards reading 'My body my choice, my vote my voice' during a 'Women's March' organized by Feminist and human rights groups in solidarity with women marching in Washington and around the world for their rights and against the reactionary politics of the newly sworn-in US President Donald Trump, at the Old Port (Vieux Port) of Marseille, southern France Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Rome A person holds a sign during a rally against US newly sworn-in President Donald Trump in Rome Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Kolkata Activist Sarah Annay Williamson holds a placard and shouts slogan during the Women's March rally in Kolkata, India AP In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Kolkata Activists participate in the Women's March rally in Kolkata, India AP In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump London A Women's March placards are rested on a bench outside the US Embassy in Grosvenor Square ahead of the Women's March in London, England Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump London A women carries her placard ahead of the Women's March in London, England Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Manila Women protesters shout slogans while displaying placards during a rally in solidarity against the inauguration of President Donald Trump, in suburban Quezon city, northeast of Manila, Philippines AP In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Berlin Protesters attend a 'Berlin Women's March on Washington' demonstration in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany AP In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Berlin Protesters attend a 'Berlin Women's March on Washington' demonstration in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany AP In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Berlin Protesters attend a 'Berlin Women's March on Washington' demonstration in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany AP In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Melbourne Protesters take part in the Melbourne rally to protest against the Trump Inauguration in Melbourne, Australia Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Macau Protesters take part in the Women's March rally in Macau Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Melbourne Womens march on Melbourne protestors marching during a rally where rights groups marched in solidarity with Americans to speak out against misogyny, bigotry and hatred Rex In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Macau Protesters hold placards as they take part at the Women's March rally in Macau Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Macau Protesters hold placards as they take part at the Women's March rally in Macau, Macau. The Women's March originated in Washington DC but soon spread to be a global march calling on all concerned citizens to stand up for equality, diversity and inclusion and for women's rights to be recognised around the world as human rights Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Manila A mother carries her son as they join a rally in solidarity against the inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States in suburban Quezon city northeast of Manila, Philippines AP In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Sydney An infant is held up at a demonstration against new U.S. President Donald Trump in Sydney, Australia Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Sydney A woman attends a demonstration against new U.S. President Donald Trump in Sydney, Australia Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Sydney A woman expresses her Anti-Trump views in Sydney, Australia Getty Images In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump Sydeney Protesters demonstrate against new U.S. President Donald Trump in Sydney, Australia. The marches in Australia were organised to show solidarity with those marching on Washington DC and around the world in defense of women's rights and human rights Getty In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump London Protesters march from The US Embassy in Grosvenor Square towards Trafalgar Square during the Women's March in London, England Getty In pictures: Women of the world march against Trump London Protesters carrying banners take part in the Women's March on London, as they stand in Trafalgar Square, in central London Reuters A question-and-answer session with Mr Pence was also recorded. It was not immediately clear if the intruder was present for the session with Mr Trump, who spoke before the Vice President but did not engage in a private discussion with politicians. Chair of the conference, Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers, said: Leaks from internal member discussions are unacceptable." Additional reporting by AP Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} A 27-year-old man has been charged with six counts of murder after a shooting at a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers in an attack Canadas Prime Minister called a terrorist attack on Muslims. Alexandre Bissonnette, a French-Canadian political science and anthropology student, appeared at a Quebec City court on Monday, he also faces five counts of attempted murder. More than 50 people were at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre when the shooting erupted on Sunday night. Alexandre Bissonnette has been charged with six counts of murder (Reuters) Along with the six killed, five people were in a critical condition and 12 others suffered minor injuries, University of Quebec Hospital Centre spokeswoman Genevieve Dupuis said on Monday. The age of those killed ranged from 35 to 65. Earlier, police said they had arrested two men, including one who called 911 to say he was armed but ready to give himself up, but later said just one remains a suspect. Authorities later clarified that the other man, Mohamed el Khadir was just a witness. Police said they did not believe there were other suspects but were investigating. They did not give a possible motive for the attack. Francois Deschamps, an official with an advocacy group, Welcome to Refugees, said the suspect was known to those who monitor extremist groups in Quebec and that the suspect was known for his far-right views. A Quebec police officer stands guard after the shooting (EPA) The president of the Cultural Centre told reporters the shooting occurred in the mens section of the mosque. Mohamed Yangui said he wasnt at the centre during the attack, but got some details from people on the scene. Why is this happening here? This is barbaric, he said. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau denounced the attack as a terrorist attack on Muslims, which came a day after Canada said it would offer temporary residency permits to those stranded by President Donald Trumps travel ban on several Muslim countries. We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge, Mr Trudeau said in a statement. It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country, he added. Mr Trudeau will make a statement in parliament before travelling to Quebec City, his office said. World news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 World news in pictures World news in pictures 30 September 2020 Pope Francis prays with priests at the end of a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 29 September 2020 A girl's silhouette is seen from behind a fabric in a tent along a beach by Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 September 2020 A Chinese woman takes a photo of herself in front of a flower display dedicated to frontline health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Beijing, China. China will celebrate national day marking the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1st Getty World news in pictures 27 September 2020 The Glass Mountain Inn burns as the Glass Fire moves through the area in St. Helena, California. The fast moving Glass fire has burned over 1,000 acres and has destroyed homes Getty World news in pictures 26 September 2020 A villager along with a child offers prayers next to a carcass of a wild elephant that officials say was electrocuted in Rani Reserve Forest on the outskirts of Guwahati, India AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 September 2020 The casket of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is seen in Statuary Hall in the US Capitol to lie in state in Washington, DC AFP via Getty World news in pictures 24 September 2020 An anti-government protester holds up an image of a pro-democracy commemorative plaque at a rally outside Thailand's parliament in Bangkok, as activists gathered to demand a new constitution AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 September 2020 A whale stranded on a beach in Macquarie Harbour on the rugged west coast of Tasmania, as hundreds of pilot whales have died in a mass stranding in southern Australia despite efforts to save them, with rescuers racing to free a few dozen survivors The Mercury/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 22 September 2020 State civil employee candidates wearing face masks and shields take a test in Surabaya AFP via Getty World news in pictures 21 September 2020 A man sweeps at the Taj Mahal monument on the day of its reopening after being closed for more than six months due to the coronavirus pandemic AP World news in pictures 20 September 2020 A deer looks for food in a burnt area, caused by the Bobcat fire, in Pearblossom, California EPA World news in pictures 19 September 2020 Anti-government protesters hold their mobile phones aloft as they take part in a pro-democracy rally in Bangkok. Tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters massed close to Thailand's royal palace, in a huge rally calling for PM Prayut Chan-O-Cha to step down and demanding reforms to the monarchy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 September 2020 Supporters of Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr maintain social distancing as they attend Friday prayers after the coronavirus disease restrictions were eased, in Kufa mosque, near Najaf, Iraq Reuters World news in pictures 17 September 2020 A protester climbs on The Triumph of the Republic at 'the Place de la Nation' as thousands of protesters take part in a demonstration during a national day strike called by labor unions asking for better salary and against jobs cut in Paris, France EPA World news in pictures 16 September 2020 A fire raging near the Lazzaretto of Ancona in Italy. The huge blaze broke out overnight at the port of Ancona. Firefighters have brought the fire under control but they expected to keep working through the day EPA World news in pictures 15 September 2020 Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny posing for a selfie with his family at Berlin's Charite hospital. In an Instagram post he said he could now breathe independently following his suspected poisoning last month Alexei Navalny/Instagram/AFP World news in pictures 14 September 2020 Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, former Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba and former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida celebrate after Suga was elected as new head of the ruling party at the Liberal Democratic Party's leadership election in Tokyo Reuters World news in pictures 13 September 2020 A man stands behind a burning barricade during the fifth straight day of protests against police brutality in Bogota AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 September 2020 Police officers block and detain protesters during an opposition rally to protest the official presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus. Daily protests calling for the authoritarian president's resignation are now in their second month AP World news in pictures 11 September 2020 Members of 'Omnium Cultural' celebrate the 20th 'Festa per la llibertat' ('Fiesta for the freedom') to mark the Day of Catalonia in Barcelona. Omnion Cultural fights for the independence of Catalonia EPA World news in pictures 10 September 2020 The Moria refugee camp, two days after Greece's biggest migrant camp, was destroyed by fire. Thousands of asylum seekers on the island of Lesbos are now homeless AFP via Getty World news in pictures 9 September 2020 Pope Francis takes off his face mask as he arrives by car to hold a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 8 September 2020 A home is engulfed in flames during the "Creek Fire" in the Tollhouse area of California AFP via Getty World news in pictures 7 September 2020 A couple take photos along a sea wall of the waves brought by Typhoon Haishen in the eastern port city of Sokcho AFP via Getty World news in pictures 6 September 2020 Novak Djokovic and a tournament official tends to a linesperson who was struck with a ball by Djokovic during his match against Pablo Carreno Busta at the US Open USA Today Sports/Reuters World news in pictures 5 September 2020 Protesters confront police at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, Australia, during an anti-lockdown rally AFP via Getty World news in pictures 4 September 2020 A woman looks on from a rooftop as rescue workers dig through the rubble of a damaged building in Beirut. A search began for possible survivors after a scanner detected a pulse one month after the mega-blast at the adjacent port AFP via Getty World news in pictures 3 September 2020 A full moon next to the Virgen del Panecillo statue in Quito, Ecuador EPA World news in pictures 2 September 2020 A Palestinian woman reacts as Israeli forces demolish her animal shed near Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank Reuters World news in pictures 1 September 2020 Students protest against presidential elections results in Minsk TUT.BY/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 31 August 2020 The pack rides during the 3rd stage of the Tour de France between Nice and Sisteron AFP via Getty World news in pictures 30 August 2020 Law enforcement officers block a street during a rally of opposition supporters protesting against presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus Reuters World news in pictures 29 August 2020 A woman holding a placard reading "Stop Censorship - Yes to the Freedom of Expression" shouts in a megaphone during a protest against the mandatory wearing of face masks in Paris. Masks, which were already compulsory on public transport, in enclosed public spaces, and outdoors in Paris in certain high-congestion areas around tourist sites, were made mandatory outdoors citywide on August 28 to fight the rising coronavirus infections AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 August 2020 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe bows to the national flag at the start of a press conference at the prime minister official residence in Tokyo. Abe announced he will resign over health problems, in a bombshell development that kicks off a leadership contest in the world's third-largest economy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 27 August 2020 Residents take cover behind a tree trunk from rubber bullets fired by South African Police Service (SAPS) in Eldorado Park, near Johannesburg, during a protest by community members after a 16-year old boy was reported dead AFP via Getty World news in pictures 26 August 2020 People scatter rose petals on a statue of Mother Teresa marking her 110th birth anniversary in Ahmedabad AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 August 2020 An aerial view shows beach-goers standing on salt formations in the Dead Sea near Ein Bokeq, Israel Reuters World news in pictures 24 August 2020 Health workers use a fingertip pulse oximeter and check the body temperature of a fisherwoman inside the Dharavi slum during a door-to-door Covid-19 coronavirus screening in Mumbai AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 August 2020 People carry an idol of the Hindu god Ganesh, the deity of prosperity, to immerse it off the coast of the Arabian sea during the Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Mumbai, India Reuters World news in pictures 22 August 2020 Firefighters watch as flames from the LNU Lightning Complex fires approach a home in Napa County, California AP World news in pictures 21 August 2020 Members of the Israeli security forces arrest a Palestinian demonstrator during a rally to protest against Israel's plan to annex parts of the occupied West Bank AFP via Getty World news in pictures 20 August 2020 A man pushes his bicycle through a deserted road after prohibitory orders were imposed by district officials for a week to contain the spread of the Covid-19 in Kathmandu AFP via Getty World news in pictures 19 August 2020 A car burns while parked at a residence in Vacaville, California. Dozens of fires are burning out of control throughout Northern California as fire resources are spread thin AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 August 2020 Students use their mobile phones as flashlights at an anti-government rally at Mahidol University in Nakhon Pathom. Thailand has seen near-daily protests in recent weeks by students demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha AFP via Getty World news in pictures 17 August 2020 Members of the Kayapo tribe block the BR163 highway during a protest outside Novo Progresso in Para state, Brazil. Indigenous protesters blocked a major transamazonian highway to protest against the lack of governmental support during the COVID-19 novel coronavirus pandemic and illegal deforestation in and around their territories AFP via Getty World news in pictures 16 August 2020 Lightning forks over the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge as a storm passes over Oakland AP World news in pictures 15 August 2020 Belarus opposition supporters gather near the Pushkinskaya metro station where Alexander Taraikovsky, a 34-year-old protester died on August 10, during their protest rally in central Minsk AFP via Getty World news in pictures 14 August 2020 AlphaTauri's driver Daniil Kvyat takes part in the second practice session at the Circuit de Catalunya in Montmelo near Barcelona ahead of the Spanish F1 Grand Prix AFP via Getty World news in pictures 13 August 2020 Soldiers of the Brazilian Armed Forces during a disinfection of the Christ The Redeemer statue at the Corcovado mountain prior to the opening of the touristic attraction in Rio AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 August 2020 Young elephant bulls tussle playfully on World Elephant Day at the Amboseli National Park in Kenya AFP via Getty Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume said: No person should have to pay with their life, for their race, their colour, their sexual orientation or their religious beliefs. President Trump called Mr Trudeau to express his condolences about the mosque attack. The Canadian Prime Ministers office said Mr Trump expressed his condolences to Mr Trudeau and the Canadian people and offered to provide any assistance needed. The mayor of Paris said the lights of the Eiffel Tower will be switched off at midnight to honour the victims of the attack. French President Francois Hollande condemned the odious attack on the mosque and offered support for Canadas leaders. Mr Hollande, whose country has suffered a string of Islamic extremist attacks, said in a statement: It was the Quebecois spirit of peace and openness that the terrorists wanted to harm. While Canada is generally very welcoming towards immigrants and those from different religions, the French-speaking province of Quebec has struggled to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population. The face-covering, or niqab, became a large issue in 2015, where the vast majority of the provinces population supported a ban on ostentatious religious symbols. In June 2016, a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the Islamic Cultural Centre in the middle of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn until sunset. Practising Muslims do not eat pork. Additional reporting by agencies Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Republican lawmakers are worried about the consequences of repealing the Affordable Care Act and leaving 20 million people in the United States without health insurance, according to leaked audio from a party retreat. Politicians can reportedly be heard saying they are concerned about the potential political fallout if their policy to replace former President Barack Obamas health law is not adequate. The recording, is believed to have been made at a private Republican Party gathering by a woman who sneaked into the conference impersonating a lawmakers wife. The security breach is believed to have occurred on the same day President Donald Trump and vice President Mike Pence attended the event. Wed better be sure that were prepared to live with the market weve created, said Tom McClintock, a representative for California, according to the Washington Post . Thats going to be called Trumpcare. Republicans will own that lock, stock and barrel, and well be judged in the election less than two years away. Mr Pence, who is pushing to repeal Obamacare, said last week the party is "very close" to having developed a replacement policy. But members of his party seemed far less confident. Tom MacArthur, a New Jersey representative, allegedly said he was worried that Republican plans could strip health insurance from many of the 20 million people who gained coverage through the Affordable Care Act, including through the expansion of Medicaid. Were telling those people that were not going to pull the rug out from under them, and if we do this too fast, we are in fact going to pull the rug out from under them, Mr MacArthur is reported to have said. The intruder is believed to have been in the same room as Mr Pence at the conference, as there is also audio of a question and answer session with the vice President, which raises serious security concerns. It is not clear if she was present for the session with Mr Trump, who spoke before Mr Pence but did not engage in a private discussion with lawmakers. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Mr Trump admitted last week he had considered turning health care into a political game by waiting two years to dismantle Obamacare, by which time he said it would be destroying people's lives and "the Dems" would be begging him to do something. He has repeatedly described the 2010 law as a disaster, saying it is too expensive and eliminates insurance provider competition at the state level. Instead, he said he decided to "ease the burden" of the act with his first executive order, issued within hours of being sworn. The order seeks to minimise the unwarranted economic and regulatory burdens of the act. Sign up to our Evening Headlines email for your daily guide to the latest news Sign up to our free US Evening Headlines email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Evening Headlines email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Donald Trumps hotels have not had the most favourable coverage in the last week. Not only did the Presidents flagship 263-room luxury Washington DC hotel lose $1.1 million in its first two months according to a letter from Democratic politicians, it has been branded one of the worst in its class by a luxury travel brand. To make matters worse, Trump Hotels are now being mocked on social media. An old tweet by Trump Hotels asking people to share their favourite travel memory has been subject to a barrage of criticism about the Presidents immigration ban. The Presidents Muslim ban has sparked global chaos, with people blocked from boarding US-bound flights and detained in American airports. Last week, Mr Trump signed an executive order suspending the entire US refugee admissions system for 120 days, halting the Syrian refugee programme indefinitely, and banning entry for people from seven majority-Muslim countries. Tell us your favourite travel memory - was it a picture, a souvenir, a sunset? We'd love to hear it! Trump Hotels asked on Twitter back in 2011. Before long, the old tweet went viral, receiving a total of 6,800 replies. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters "@TrumpHotels hearing about my grandfather's perilous trip to America by boat as a child alone. I wonder if he would be let in today?" replied Noah Scalin. My ancestors came by boat from Ireland. Donald Trump would have said OK because they were white. Shame on his bigotry today, said Katy Muldoon. "Mine is my mother's story of fleeing Nazi Germany by train for Brussels where she lived in hiding until she could escape to US as a refugee," asked Susan Kandel. Prior to his inauguration, Mr Trump handed control of his international real estate development, property management and licensing company to his sons Donald Jr and Eric Trump. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} President Rodrigo Duterte has suspended his violent war on drugs, to allow police units in the Philippines time to root out corruption within their own ranks. Police chief Ronald dela Rosa confirmed his officers would no longer focus on arresting and charging suspected drug traffickers and consumers, and said specialised anti-drug units would be dissolved within days. More than 7,000 people have been killed in the campaign since Mr Duterte assumed power in June last year, many of them without proper trial, prompting outrage from Western nations and human rights groups. The furore led to a slump in relations between the US, the EU and the Philippines, culminating in Mr Duterte ordering US military forces to leave the country in October. A South Korean businessman, Jee Ick-joo, was kidnapped and killed by drug squad officers last October under the pretence of a drug raid, and the ongoing inquiry forced the president to admit the Filipino national police force was corrupt to the core. He estimated that 40 per cent of the force were currently involved in illicit dealings. We will cleanse our ranks, Mr dela Rosa told reporters in Manila. Then maybe after that, we can resume our war on drugs. To all the rogue cops: beware! We no longer have a war on drugs. We now have a war on scallywags. He added that the campaign would be suspended for a minimum of one month while corrupt officers were investigated. The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte Show all 9 1 /9 The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte On killing drug addicts These sons of whores are destroying our children. I warn you, dont go into that, even if youre a policeman, because I will really kill you. If you know of any addicts, go ahead and kill them yourself as getting their parents to do it would be too painful The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte Message to China I will go there on my own with a Jet Ski, bringing along with me a [Phillipino] flag and a pole, and once I disembark, I will plant the flag on the runway and tell the Chinese authorities, Kill me AP The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte Christmas message to law-breakers If you do not want to stop, and just continue committing crimes, then this would be your last Merry Christmas AP The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte On sex life I was separated from my wife. Im not impotent. What am I supposed to do? Let this hang forever? When I take Viagra, it stands up AFP/Getty Images The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte On the drugs trade None of my children are into illegal drugs. But my order is, even if it is a member of my family, kill him'" AP The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte Insulting the Pope We were affected by the traffic. It took us five hours. I asked why, they said it was closed. I asked who is coming. They answered, the pope. I wanted to call him: Pope, son of a wh**e, go home. Do not visit us again AFP/Getty Images The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte Joke about rape I saw her face and I thought, 'What a pity... they raped her, they all lined up. I was mad she was raped but she was so beautiful. I thought, the mayor should have been first AFP/Getty The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte Insulting Barack Obama "Mr Obama should be respectful and refrain from throwing questions at me about the killings, or son of a bitch, I will swear at you in that forum" REUTERS The most controversial quotes from Rodrigo Duterte On Abu Sayyaf Islamic militants "If I have to face them, you know I can eat humans. I will really open up your body. Just give me vinegar and salt, and I will eat you. If you annoy me to the fullest... I will eat you alive. Raw" EPA Mr Duterte initially said his war on drugs would last until December last year; in September, this threshold was extended to March. However over the weekend the president told reporters: March no longer applies...I will extend it to the last day of my term, in 2022. At the start of January, Mr Duterte vowed to confront, and if necessary kill, any local officials who are involved in the countrys illegal drug trade. The outspoken leader compiled a so-called narco-list containing an estimated 5,000 to 10,000 names of mayors, governors, police officers and other public officials, and claimed he would begin to act on it. Meanwhile Human Rights Watch said it believed the suspension was no more than a publicity stunt, and called on Mr Duterte to end his deadly campaign for good. The organisation has been a vocal critic of the president since he came to power last year. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Angela Merkel seemingly had to explain the Geneva refugee convention to Donald Trump during a phone call. Mr Trump has signed an executive order to ban immigration from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen for 120 days and the German Chancellor said she regrets the move. The German Government also said it would examine the effect the ban would have on its citizens with dual citizenship and present the case to Mr Trumps team. The chancellor regrets the US governments entry ban against refugees and the citizens of certain countries, Ms Merkels spokesman Steffen Seibert said in a statement. She is convinced that the necessary, decisive battle against terrorism does not justify a general suspicion against people of a certain origin or a certain religion. The Geneva refugee convention requires the international community to take in war refugees on humanitarian grounds. All signatory states are obligated to do. The German government explained this policy in their call yesterday, he added. Mr Seibert also said that Ms Merkel "is convinced that even the necessary, resolute fight against terrorism doesn't justify putting people of a particular origin or particular faith under general suspicion," German news agency DPA reported. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters A summary of the 45-minute phone call between the two world leaders was issued to the press but did not mention the travel ban. There was however an emphasis on the importance of Nato and the intention to further deepen the already excellent bilateral relations in the coming years. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Mohamed Abrini, who is suspected of being involved in the bombing at Brussels airport last year, has been charged in France over the Paris attacks in 2015, according to his lawyers. Mr Abrini was handed over to French authorities for one day of questioning about the Paris attacks that left 130 dead, Belgian federal prosecutors said earlier in a statement. He was captured in Brussels in April over his suspected involvement in the 22 March Brussels attacks on the airport and on the metro which killed a total of 32 people, and the Paris killings, both of which were claimed by Isis. World news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 World news in pictures World news in pictures 30 September 2020 Pope Francis prays with priests at the end of a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 29 September 2020 A girl's silhouette is seen from behind a fabric in a tent along a beach by Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 September 2020 A Chinese woman takes a photo of herself in front of a flower display dedicated to frontline health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Beijing, China. China will celebrate national day marking the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1st Getty World news in pictures 27 September 2020 The Glass Mountain Inn burns as the Glass Fire moves through the area in St. Helena, California. The fast moving Glass fire has burned over 1,000 acres and has destroyed homes Getty World news in pictures 26 September 2020 A villager along with a child offers prayers next to a carcass of a wild elephant that officials say was electrocuted in Rani Reserve Forest on the outskirts of Guwahati, India AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 September 2020 The casket of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is seen in Statuary Hall in the US Capitol to lie in state in Washington, DC AFP via Getty World news in pictures 24 September 2020 An anti-government protester holds up an image of a pro-democracy commemorative plaque at a rally outside Thailand's parliament in Bangkok, as activists gathered to demand a new constitution AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 September 2020 A whale stranded on a beach in Macquarie Harbour on the rugged west coast of Tasmania, as hundreds of pilot whales have died in a mass stranding in southern Australia despite efforts to save them, with rescuers racing to free a few dozen survivors The Mercury/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 22 September 2020 State civil employee candidates wearing face masks and shields take a test in Surabaya AFP via Getty World news in pictures 21 September 2020 A man sweeps at the Taj Mahal monument on the day of its reopening after being closed for more than six months due to the coronavirus pandemic AP World news in pictures 20 September 2020 A deer looks for food in a burnt area, caused by the Bobcat fire, in Pearblossom, California EPA World news in pictures 19 September 2020 Anti-government protesters hold their mobile phones aloft as they take part in a pro-democracy rally in Bangkok. Tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters massed close to Thailand's royal palace, in a huge rally calling for PM Prayut Chan-O-Cha to step down and demanding reforms to the monarchy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 September 2020 Supporters of Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr maintain social distancing as they attend Friday prayers after the coronavirus disease restrictions were eased, in Kufa mosque, near Najaf, Iraq Reuters World news in pictures 17 September 2020 A protester climbs on The Triumph of the Republic at 'the Place de la Nation' as thousands of protesters take part in a demonstration during a national day strike called by labor unions asking for better salary and against jobs cut in Paris, France EPA World news in pictures 16 September 2020 A fire raging near the Lazzaretto of Ancona in Italy. The huge blaze broke out overnight at the port of Ancona. Firefighters have brought the fire under control but they expected to keep working through the day EPA World news in pictures 15 September 2020 Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny posing for a selfie with his family at Berlin's Charite hospital. In an Instagram post he said he could now breathe independently following his suspected poisoning last month Alexei Navalny/Instagram/AFP World news in pictures 14 September 2020 Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, former Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba and former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida celebrate after Suga was elected as new head of the ruling party at the Liberal Democratic Party's leadership election in Tokyo Reuters World news in pictures 13 September 2020 A man stands behind a burning barricade during the fifth straight day of protests against police brutality in Bogota AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 September 2020 Police officers block and detain protesters during an opposition rally to protest the official presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus. Daily protests calling for the authoritarian president's resignation are now in their second month AP World news in pictures 11 September 2020 Members of 'Omnium Cultural' celebrate the 20th 'Festa per la llibertat' ('Fiesta for the freedom') to mark the Day of Catalonia in Barcelona. Omnion Cultural fights for the independence of Catalonia EPA World news in pictures 10 September 2020 The Moria refugee camp, two days after Greece's biggest migrant camp, was destroyed by fire. Thousands of asylum seekers on the island of Lesbos are now homeless AFP via Getty World news in pictures 9 September 2020 Pope Francis takes off his face mask as he arrives by car to hold a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 8 September 2020 A home is engulfed in flames during the "Creek Fire" in the Tollhouse area of California AFP via Getty World news in pictures 7 September 2020 A couple take photos along a sea wall of the waves brought by Typhoon Haishen in the eastern port city of Sokcho AFP via Getty World news in pictures 6 September 2020 Novak Djokovic and a tournament official tends to a linesperson who was struck with a ball by Djokovic during his match against Pablo Carreno Busta at the US Open USA Today Sports/Reuters World news in pictures 5 September 2020 Protesters confront police at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, Australia, during an anti-lockdown rally AFP via Getty World news in pictures 4 September 2020 A woman looks on from a rooftop as rescue workers dig through the rubble of a damaged building in Beirut. A search began for possible survivors after a scanner detected a pulse one month after the mega-blast at the adjacent port AFP via Getty World news in pictures 3 September 2020 A full moon next to the Virgen del Panecillo statue in Quito, Ecuador EPA World news in pictures 2 September 2020 A Palestinian woman reacts as Israeli forces demolish her animal shed near Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank Reuters World news in pictures 1 September 2020 Students protest against presidential elections results in Minsk TUT.BY/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 31 August 2020 The pack rides during the 3rd stage of the Tour de France between Nice and Sisteron AFP via Getty World news in pictures 30 August 2020 Law enforcement officers block a street during a rally of opposition supporters protesting against presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus Reuters World news in pictures 29 August 2020 A woman holding a placard reading "Stop Censorship - Yes to the Freedom of Expression" shouts in a megaphone during a protest against the mandatory wearing of face masks in Paris. Masks, which were already compulsory on public transport, in enclosed public spaces, and outdoors in Paris in certain high-congestion areas around tourist sites, were made mandatory outdoors citywide on August 28 to fight the rising coronavirus infections AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 August 2020 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe bows to the national flag at the start of a press conference at the prime minister official residence in Tokyo. Abe announced he will resign over health problems, in a bombshell development that kicks off a leadership contest in the world's third-largest economy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 27 August 2020 Residents take cover behind a tree trunk from rubber bullets fired by South African Police Service (SAPS) in Eldorado Park, near Johannesburg, during a protest by community members after a 16-year old boy was reported dead AFP via Getty World news in pictures 26 August 2020 People scatter rose petals on a statue of Mother Teresa marking her 110th birth anniversary in Ahmedabad AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 August 2020 An aerial view shows beach-goers standing on salt formations in the Dead Sea near Ein Bokeq, Israel Reuters World news in pictures 24 August 2020 Health workers use a fingertip pulse oximeter and check the body temperature of a fisherwoman inside the Dharavi slum during a door-to-door Covid-19 coronavirus screening in Mumbai AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 August 2020 People carry an idol of the Hindu god Ganesh, the deity of prosperity, to immerse it off the coast of the Arabian sea during the Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Mumbai, India Reuters World news in pictures 22 August 2020 Firefighters watch as flames from the LNU Lightning Complex fires approach a home in Napa County, California AP World news in pictures 21 August 2020 Members of the Israeli security forces arrest a Palestinian demonstrator during a rally to protest against Israel's plan to annex parts of the occupied West Bank AFP via Getty World news in pictures 20 August 2020 A man pushes his bicycle through a deserted road after prohibitory orders were imposed by district officials for a week to contain the spread of the Covid-19 in Kathmandu AFP via Getty World news in pictures 19 August 2020 A car burns while parked at a residence in Vacaville, California. Dozens of fires are burning out of control throughout Northern California as fire resources are spread thin AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 August 2020 Students use their mobile phones as flashlights at an anti-government rally at Mahidol University in Nakhon Pathom. Thailand has seen near-daily protests in recent weeks by students demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha AFP via Getty World news in pictures 17 August 2020 Members of the Kayapo tribe block the BR163 highway during a protest outside Novo Progresso in Para state, Brazil. Indigenous protesters blocked a major transamazonian highway to protest against the lack of governmental support during the COVID-19 novel coronavirus pandemic and illegal deforestation in and around their territories AFP via Getty World news in pictures 16 August 2020 Lightning forks over the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge as a storm passes over Oakland AP World news in pictures 15 August 2020 Belarus opposition supporters gather near the Pushkinskaya metro station where Alexander Taraikovsky, a 34-year-old protester died on August 10, during their protest rally in central Minsk AFP via Getty World news in pictures 14 August 2020 AlphaTauri's driver Daniil Kvyat takes part in the second practice session at the Circuit de Catalunya in Montmelo near Barcelona ahead of the Spanish F1 Grand Prix AFP via Getty World news in pictures 13 August 2020 Soldiers of the Brazilian Armed Forces during a disinfection of the Christ The Redeemer statue at the Corcovado mountain prior to the opening of the touristic attraction in Rio AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 August 2020 Young elephant bulls tussle playfully on World Elephant Day at the Amboseli National Park in Kenya AFP via Getty In the framework of the investigation related to the attacks in Paris on 13 November 2015, Mohamed Abrini was surrendered to the French judicial authorities for a period of one day, the Belgian prosecutors office said in a statement. Mr Abrini, dubbed the man in the hat from CCTV images, is accused of fleeing the airport without detonating his suitcase bomb after his alleged accomplices Najim Laachraoui and Ibrahim El Bakraoui set off theirs, killing 16 people and themselves. Mr Abrini grew up in the Molenbeek area of Brussels with Salah Abdeslam, the only survivor of the group that carried out the Paris attacks. The Belgian of Moroccan origin was seen at a petrol station north of Paris two days before the 13 November 2015 attacks in Paris, with prime suspect Mr Abdeslam, who drove one of the vehicles used in the attacks. Belgian authorities have charged Mr Abrini with participation in the activities of a terrorist group and terrorist murders over the massacres in the French capital. Identified as a radical Islamist by Belgian investigators, Mr Abrini is believed to have briefly visited Syria last year and his younger brother Suleiman, 20, died there. He was known to security services for belonging to the same cell as Abdelhamid Abaaoud, one of the organisers of the Paris attacks who opened fire on bars, restaurants and a concert hall before he died in a police shootout shortly afterwards. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Austria is planning to ban Islamic full-face veils in courts, schools and other public places. The prohibition will apply to the niqab and burqa, the full-face or face-and-body coverings worn by some Muslim women. It comes as part of a package of reforms drawn up by the country's governing coalition to counter the rise of the far-right Freedom Party, which has topped opinion polls for months. Angela Merkel calls for burqa ban 'wherever legally possible' in Germany "We believe in an open society that is also based on open communication. Full-body veils in public spaces stand against that and will therefore be prohibited," the agreement said. The country's coalition also agreed to prohibit police officers, judges, magistrates and public prosecutors from wearing head scarves in the interest of appearing "ideologically and religiously neutral" while serving the state. The countries with anti-women laws Show all 5 1 /5 The countries with anti-women laws The countries with anti-women laws The countries with anti-women laws The countries with anti-women laws The countries with anti-women laws The countries with anti-women laws The French parliament passed an act more than six years ago that made France the first European Union country to ban the niqab and burqa in public places. Belgium and some parts of Switzerland followed France's lead and similar bans have been considered in other European countries. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The city of Venice will pay for the funeral of a migrant who drowned in the citys Grand Canal, after reports emerged he was heckled with racist slurs by tourists and onlookers in the moments before his death. Police have opened a formal investigation into the death after footage was shared of Pateh Sabally, who reportedly jumped from a bridge in a suspected suicide, being told: Go on, go back home, and let him die, as he struggled in the waterway. The 22-year-old Gambian man was honoured at a memorial conducted by a local priest and costs of his funeral will be covered by city authorities, according to the Local Italy. The money will come from Venice mayor Luigi Brugnaro's personal cost of living allowance in "a gesture of respect from Venice towards Pateh Sabally and his shattered dreams," he said. He added: "The death of this young man has saddened all of us, and we feel pity towards those who, faced with the adversities of life, no longer find the strength to react to desperation," added Mr Brugnaro. We can't continue to nurture the hopes of half the world of coming to Italy. Everyone needs to realize it is impossible for our country to continue managing such a large-scale phenomenon in the way it has done so far. "We need to understand the future implications of this; above all the tragedies and suffering of [migrants and refugees]. Mr Sabally reportedly arrived in Sicily by boat from Gambia, but his application for asylum was denied. At least three life rings were thrown into the water near him, but he did not appear to reach for them, and his body was later found by divers in the canal. "He is stupid. He wants to die," one person is heard shouting in the video. I dont want to blame anyone but maybe something more could have been done to save him, said Dino Basso, the local head of the Italian association of lifeguards. World news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 World news in pictures World news in pictures 30 September 2020 Pope Francis prays with priests at the end of a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 29 September 2020 A girl's silhouette is seen from behind a fabric in a tent along a beach by Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 September 2020 A Chinese woman takes a photo of herself in front of a flower display dedicated to frontline health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Beijing, China. China will celebrate national day marking the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1st Getty World news in pictures 27 September 2020 The Glass Mountain Inn burns as the Glass Fire moves through the area in St. Helena, California. The fast moving Glass fire has burned over 1,000 acres and has destroyed homes Getty World news in pictures 26 September 2020 A villager along with a child offers prayers next to a carcass of a wild elephant that officials say was electrocuted in Rani Reserve Forest on the outskirts of Guwahati, India AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 September 2020 The casket of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is seen in Statuary Hall in the US Capitol to lie in state in Washington, DC AFP via Getty World news in pictures 24 September 2020 An anti-government protester holds up an image of a pro-democracy commemorative plaque at a rally outside Thailand's parliament in Bangkok, as activists gathered to demand a new constitution AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 September 2020 A whale stranded on a beach in Macquarie Harbour on the rugged west coast of Tasmania, as hundreds of pilot whales have died in a mass stranding in southern Australia despite efforts to save them, with rescuers racing to free a few dozen survivors The Mercury/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 22 September 2020 State civil employee candidates wearing face masks and shields take a test in Surabaya AFP via Getty World news in pictures 21 September 2020 A man sweeps at the Taj Mahal monument on the day of its reopening after being closed for more than six months due to the coronavirus pandemic AP World news in pictures 20 September 2020 A deer looks for food in a burnt area, caused by the Bobcat fire, in Pearblossom, California EPA World news in pictures 19 September 2020 Anti-government protesters hold their mobile phones aloft as they take part in a pro-democracy rally in Bangkok. Tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters massed close to Thailand's royal palace, in a huge rally calling for PM Prayut Chan-O-Cha to step down and demanding reforms to the monarchy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 September 2020 Supporters of Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr maintain social distancing as they attend Friday prayers after the coronavirus disease restrictions were eased, in Kufa mosque, near Najaf, Iraq Reuters World news in pictures 17 September 2020 A protester climbs on The Triumph of the Republic at 'the Place de la Nation' as thousands of protesters take part in a demonstration during a national day strike called by labor unions asking for better salary and against jobs cut in Paris, France EPA World news in pictures 16 September 2020 A fire raging near the Lazzaretto of Ancona in Italy. The huge blaze broke out overnight at the port of Ancona. Firefighters have brought the fire under control but they expected to keep working through the day EPA World news in pictures 15 September 2020 Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny posing for a selfie with his family at Berlin's Charite hospital. In an Instagram post he said he could now breathe independently following his suspected poisoning last month Alexei Navalny/Instagram/AFP World news in pictures 14 September 2020 Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, former Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba and former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida celebrate after Suga was elected as new head of the ruling party at the Liberal Democratic Party's leadership election in Tokyo Reuters World news in pictures 13 September 2020 A man stands behind a burning barricade during the fifth straight day of protests against police brutality in Bogota AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 September 2020 Police officers block and detain protesters during an opposition rally to protest the official presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus. Daily protests calling for the authoritarian president's resignation are now in their second month AP World news in pictures 11 September 2020 Members of 'Omnium Cultural' celebrate the 20th 'Festa per la llibertat' ('Fiesta for the freedom') to mark the Day of Catalonia in Barcelona. Omnion Cultural fights for the independence of Catalonia EPA World news in pictures 10 September 2020 The Moria refugee camp, two days after Greece's biggest migrant camp, was destroyed by fire. Thousands of asylum seekers on the island of Lesbos are now homeless AFP via Getty World news in pictures 9 September 2020 Pope Francis takes off his face mask as he arrives by car to hold a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 8 September 2020 A home is engulfed in flames during the "Creek Fire" in the Tollhouse area of California AFP via Getty World news in pictures 7 September 2020 A couple take photos along a sea wall of the waves brought by Typhoon Haishen in the eastern port city of Sokcho AFP via Getty World news in pictures 6 September 2020 Novak Djokovic and a tournament official tends to a linesperson who was struck with a ball by Djokovic during his match against Pablo Carreno Busta at the US Open USA Today Sports/Reuters World news in pictures 5 September 2020 Protesters confront police at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, Australia, during an anti-lockdown rally AFP via Getty World news in pictures 4 September 2020 A woman looks on from a rooftop as rescue workers dig through the rubble of a damaged building in Beirut. A search began for possible survivors after a scanner detected a pulse one month after the mega-blast at the adjacent port AFP via Getty World news in pictures 3 September 2020 A full moon next to the Virgen del Panecillo statue in Quito, Ecuador EPA World news in pictures 2 September 2020 A Palestinian woman reacts as Israeli forces demolish her animal shed near Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank Reuters World news in pictures 1 September 2020 Students protest against presidential elections results in Minsk TUT.BY/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 31 August 2020 The pack rides during the 3rd stage of the Tour de France between Nice and Sisteron AFP via Getty World news in pictures 30 August 2020 Law enforcement officers block a street during a rally of opposition supporters protesting against presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus Reuters World news in pictures 29 August 2020 A woman holding a placard reading "Stop Censorship - Yes to the Freedom of Expression" shouts in a megaphone during a protest against the mandatory wearing of face masks in Paris. Masks, which were already compulsory on public transport, in enclosed public spaces, and outdoors in Paris in certain high-congestion areas around tourist sites, were made mandatory outdoors citywide on August 28 to fight the rising coronavirus infections AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 August 2020 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe bows to the national flag at the start of a press conference at the prime minister official residence in Tokyo. Abe announced he will resign over health problems, in a bombshell development that kicks off a leadership contest in the world's third-largest economy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 27 August 2020 Residents take cover behind a tree trunk from rubber bullets fired by South African Police Service (SAPS) in Eldorado Park, near Johannesburg, during a protest by community members after a 16-year old boy was reported dead AFP via Getty World news in pictures 26 August 2020 People scatter rose petals on a statue of Mother Teresa marking her 110th birth anniversary in Ahmedabad AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 August 2020 An aerial view shows beach-goers standing on salt formations in the Dead Sea near Ein Bokeq, Israel Reuters World news in pictures 24 August 2020 Health workers use a fingertip pulse oximeter and check the body temperature of a fisherwoman inside the Dharavi slum during a door-to-door Covid-19 coronavirus screening in Mumbai AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 August 2020 People carry an idol of the Hindu god Ganesh, the deity of prosperity, to immerse it off the coast of the Arabian sea during the Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Mumbai, India Reuters World news in pictures 22 August 2020 Firefighters watch as flames from the LNU Lightning Complex fires approach a home in Napa County, California AP World news in pictures 21 August 2020 Members of the Israeli security forces arrest a Palestinian demonstrator during a rally to protest against Israel's plan to annex parts of the occupied West Bank AFP via Getty World news in pictures 20 August 2020 A man pushes his bicycle through a deserted road after prohibitory orders were imposed by district officials for a week to contain the spread of the Covid-19 in Kathmandu AFP via Getty World news in pictures 19 August 2020 A car burns while parked at a residence in Vacaville, California. Dozens of fires are burning out of control throughout Northern California as fire resources are spread thin AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 August 2020 Students use their mobile phones as flashlights at an anti-government rally at Mahidol University in Nakhon Pathom. Thailand has seen near-daily protests in recent weeks by students demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha AFP via Getty World news in pictures 17 August 2020 Members of the Kayapo tribe block the BR163 highway during a protest outside Novo Progresso in Para state, Brazil. Indigenous protesters blocked a major transamazonian highway to protest against the lack of governmental support during the COVID-19 novel coronavirus pandemic and illegal deforestation in and around their territories AFP via Getty World news in pictures 16 August 2020 Lightning forks over the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge as a storm passes over Oakland AP World news in pictures 15 August 2020 Belarus opposition supporters gather near the Pushkinskaya metro station where Alexander Taraikovsky, a 34-year-old protester died on August 10, during their protest rally in central Minsk AFP via Getty World news in pictures 14 August 2020 AlphaTauri's driver Daniil Kvyat takes part in the second practice session at the Circuit de Catalunya in Montmelo near Barcelona ahead of the Spanish F1 Grand Prix AFP via Getty World news in pictures 13 August 2020 Soldiers of the Brazilian Armed Forces during a disinfection of the Christ The Redeemer statue at the Corcovado mountain prior to the opening of the touristic attraction in Rio AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 August 2020 Young elephant bulls tussle playfully on World Elephant Day at the Amboseli National Park in Kenya AFP via Getty More than 181,000 migrants arrived in Italy by boat in 2016, most of them from sub-Saharan Africa, an increase of almost 18 per cent compared with 2015. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} US President Donald Trump and Saudi Arabias King Salman have come to conclusions on future strategies in the wars in both Syria and Yemen as well as how to deal with Iran, the White House has said. King Salman spoke with the new US president in a phone call on Sunday in which he agreed that Mr Trumps proposed safe zone plan for Syria was the best way forward in the six-year-long conflict. The countries were agreed on the need to address Irans destabilising regional activities, the White House said. A Saudi write up of the call said that both countries share views about Iranian policies in the region, or what Riyadh believes are attempts from arch-enemy Iran to step up its involvement in Arab affairs. The two also agreed in the hour-long conversation that fighting Isis must be a priority for both countries, and needed closer counter-terrorism and military co-operation. Neither source mentioned whether Mr Trumps travel ban for citizens of seven Muslim countries was discussed. Donald Trump ordered the Pentagon and Department of Defence to come up with a plan in the next three months on how to set up safe zones in Syria last week. President Trumps predecessor Barack Obama resisted Republican calls to set up safe zones on the grounds that such a move which could involve ground troops and extra US aircraft if a no fly zone is created would draw the country deeper into Syrias complex civil war. An increased US military presence in the country could also cause clashes with Russian forces, which operate in the country at the request of ally Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban Show all 11 1 /11 Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Spencer Platt/Getty Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Spencer Platt/Getty Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Spencer Platt/Getty Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Spencer Platt/Getty Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Spencer Platt/Getty Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Getty Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Spencer Platt/Getty Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Spencer Platt/Getty Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Spencer Platt/Getty Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Spencer Platt/Getty Activists protest Donald Trump's proposed Muslim ban People listen to speakers at a demonstration against racism and conservative presidential candidate Donald Trump's recent remarks concerning Muslims on December 10, 2015 in New York City. Dozens or demonstrators and activists converged at Columbus Circle to denounce the politics of Trump and the treatment of Muslim refugees both in America and Europe. Spencer Platt/Getty Speaking to reporters last week, a Kremlin spokesperson urged caution on the part of the US, adding that Russia had not yet been consulted on any safe zone plans. On Monday, Syria's state news agency said that any attempt to establish safe zones in the country without coordination with Damascus would be a violation of Syria's sovereignty. On the campaign trail last year, Mr Trump had said that he would get the Gulf states to pay to establish safe zones in Syria for refugees, as they have money like hardly anyone else has. King Salman also gave his support to the creation of safe zones in Yemen, where a Saudi-led Arab coalition is currently bombing Houthi rebels at the request of the exiled Yemeni government. Yemen's prime minister accuses UK of war crimes The almost two-year-old campaign has been criticised for causing heavy civilian casualties. The Saudi Press Agency, in its readout of the call, made no specific mention of safe zones. It said the two leaders had affirmed the depth and durability of the strategic relationship between the two countries. Also on Sunday, the US carried out its first military operation authorised by Mr Trump in central Yemen. The US commando raid on an al-Qaeda site killed one US soldier and injured three others. The US said that 14 militants were killed, but did not confirm reports from medics on the ground that 30 people, including 10 women and children, had died. Reuters contributed to this report Five people were killed after a shooting in Canada's Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center on Sunday, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) reported. The CBC quoted Quebec City Police as saying that more people are feared wounded when gunmen fired on dozens of people in the center around 8 p.m. local time (0100 GMT Monday). A man from the center told the CBC that at least five people were killed, but that information has not been confirmed by police. Witnesses said two suspects have been arrested and the police has cordoned off the center. Canadian Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale tweeted Sunday night that he is deeply saddened by the loss of life. His office says no motive has been confirmed. Premier of Quebec Province Philippe Couillard tweeted that the province is mobilizing to assure the safety of Quebec City residents. He added that "Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence" and offered solidarity with the families of the victims and wounded. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The eight-year-old daughter of a radical preacher was among a large group of civilians reportedly killed during a US dawn raid in Yemen, the first military operation overseen by Donald Trump. Around 30 people, including 10 women and children, are thought to have been killed by American military personnel in the rural Yakla district of al-Bayda in the south of the country, according to medical staff. Nora Al-Awlaki, the daughter of lecturer and al-Qaeda sympathiser Anwar al-Awlaki who was killed in an airstrike in 2011, was one of those who lost their lives, her grandfather Nasser said. Why kill children? This is the new [US] administration - its very sad, a big crime, Nasser Al-Awlaki said. [Nora] was hit with a bullet in her neck and suffered for two hours. The Pentagon did not refer to any civilian casualties in its statement. The US military meanwhile confirmed 14 al-Qaeda fighters had been killed in the raid, and a further two in a drone strike on central Yemen later in the day. An American commando was killed in retaliation, and three others injured. World news in pictures Show all 50 1 /50 World news in pictures World news in pictures 30 September 2020 Pope Francis prays with priests at the end of a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 29 September 2020 A girl's silhouette is seen from behind a fabric in a tent along a beach by Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 September 2020 A Chinese woman takes a photo of herself in front of a flower display dedicated to frontline health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Beijing, China. China will celebrate national day marking the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1st Getty World news in pictures 27 September 2020 The Glass Mountain Inn burns as the Glass Fire moves through the area in St. Helena, California. The fast moving Glass fire has burned over 1,000 acres and has destroyed homes Getty World news in pictures 26 September 2020 A villager along with a child offers prayers next to a carcass of a wild elephant that officials say was electrocuted in Rani Reserve Forest on the outskirts of Guwahati, India AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 September 2020 The casket of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is seen in Statuary Hall in the US Capitol to lie in state in Washington, DC AFP via Getty World news in pictures 24 September 2020 An anti-government protester holds up an image of a pro-democracy commemorative plaque at a rally outside Thailand's parliament in Bangkok, as activists gathered to demand a new constitution AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 September 2020 A whale stranded on a beach in Macquarie Harbour on the rugged west coast of Tasmania, as hundreds of pilot whales have died in a mass stranding in southern Australia despite efforts to save them, with rescuers racing to free a few dozen survivors The Mercury/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 22 September 2020 State civil employee candidates wearing face masks and shields take a test in Surabaya AFP via Getty World news in pictures 21 September 2020 A man sweeps at the Taj Mahal monument on the day of its reopening after being closed for more than six months due to the coronavirus pandemic AP World news in pictures 20 September 2020 A deer looks for food in a burnt area, caused by the Bobcat fire, in Pearblossom, California EPA World news in pictures 19 September 2020 Anti-government protesters hold their mobile phones aloft as they take part in a pro-democracy rally in Bangkok. Tens of thousands of pro-democracy protesters massed close to Thailand's royal palace, in a huge rally calling for PM Prayut Chan-O-Cha to step down and demanding reforms to the monarchy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 September 2020 Supporters of Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr maintain social distancing as they attend Friday prayers after the coronavirus disease restrictions were eased, in Kufa mosque, near Najaf, Iraq Reuters World news in pictures 17 September 2020 A protester climbs on The Triumph of the Republic at 'the Place de la Nation' as thousands of protesters take part in a demonstration during a national day strike called by labor unions asking for better salary and against jobs cut in Paris, France EPA World news in pictures 16 September 2020 A fire raging near the Lazzaretto of Ancona in Italy. The huge blaze broke out overnight at the port of Ancona. Firefighters have brought the fire under control but they expected to keep working through the day EPA World news in pictures 15 September 2020 Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny posing for a selfie with his family at Berlin's Charite hospital. In an Instagram post he said he could now breathe independently following his suspected poisoning last month Alexei Navalny/Instagram/AFP World news in pictures 14 September 2020 Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, former Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba and former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida celebrate after Suga was elected as new head of the ruling party at the Liberal Democratic Party's leadership election in Tokyo Reuters World news in pictures 13 September 2020 A man stands behind a burning barricade during the fifth straight day of protests against police brutality in Bogota AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 September 2020 Police officers block and detain protesters during an opposition rally to protest the official presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus. Daily protests calling for the authoritarian president's resignation are now in their second month AP World news in pictures 11 September 2020 Members of 'Omnium Cultural' celebrate the 20th 'Festa per la llibertat' ('Fiesta for the freedom') to mark the Day of Catalonia in Barcelona. Omnion Cultural fights for the independence of Catalonia EPA World news in pictures 10 September 2020 The Moria refugee camp, two days after Greece's biggest migrant camp, was destroyed by fire. Thousands of asylum seekers on the island of Lesbos are now homeless AFP via Getty World news in pictures 9 September 2020 Pope Francis takes off his face mask as he arrives by car to hold a limited public audience at the San Damaso courtyard in The Vatican AFP via Getty World news in pictures 8 September 2020 A home is engulfed in flames during the "Creek Fire" in the Tollhouse area of California AFP via Getty World news in pictures 7 September 2020 A couple take photos along a sea wall of the waves brought by Typhoon Haishen in the eastern port city of Sokcho AFP via Getty World news in pictures 6 September 2020 Novak Djokovic and a tournament official tends to a linesperson who was struck with a ball by Djokovic during his match against Pablo Carreno Busta at the US Open USA Today Sports/Reuters World news in pictures 5 September 2020 Protesters confront police at the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, Australia, during an anti-lockdown rally AFP via Getty World news in pictures 4 September 2020 A woman looks on from a rooftop as rescue workers dig through the rubble of a damaged building in Beirut. A search began for possible survivors after a scanner detected a pulse one month after the mega-blast at the adjacent port AFP via Getty World news in pictures 3 September 2020 A full moon next to the Virgen del Panecillo statue in Quito, Ecuador EPA World news in pictures 2 September 2020 A Palestinian woman reacts as Israeli forces demolish her animal shed near Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank Reuters World news in pictures 1 September 2020 Students protest against presidential elections results in Minsk TUT.BY/AFP via Getty World news in pictures 31 August 2020 The pack rides during the 3rd stage of the Tour de France between Nice and Sisteron AFP via Getty World news in pictures 30 August 2020 Law enforcement officers block a street during a rally of opposition supporters protesting against presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus Reuters World news in pictures 29 August 2020 A woman holding a placard reading "Stop Censorship - Yes to the Freedom of Expression" shouts in a megaphone during a protest against the mandatory wearing of face masks in Paris. Masks, which were already compulsory on public transport, in enclosed public spaces, and outdoors in Paris in certain high-congestion areas around tourist sites, were made mandatory outdoors citywide on August 28 to fight the rising coronavirus infections AFP via Getty World news in pictures 28 August 2020 Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe bows to the national flag at the start of a press conference at the prime minister official residence in Tokyo. Abe announced he will resign over health problems, in a bombshell development that kicks off a leadership contest in the world's third-largest economy AFP via Getty World news in pictures 27 August 2020 Residents take cover behind a tree trunk from rubber bullets fired by South African Police Service (SAPS) in Eldorado Park, near Johannesburg, during a protest by community members after a 16-year old boy was reported dead AFP via Getty World news in pictures 26 August 2020 People scatter rose petals on a statue of Mother Teresa marking her 110th birth anniversary in Ahmedabad AFP via Getty World news in pictures 25 August 2020 An aerial view shows beach-goers standing on salt formations in the Dead Sea near Ein Bokeq, Israel Reuters World news in pictures 24 August 2020 Health workers use a fingertip pulse oximeter and check the body temperature of a fisherwoman inside the Dharavi slum during a door-to-door Covid-19 coronavirus screening in Mumbai AFP via Getty World news in pictures 23 August 2020 People carry an idol of the Hindu god Ganesh, the deity of prosperity, to immerse it off the coast of the Arabian sea during the Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Mumbai, India Reuters World news in pictures 22 August 2020 Firefighters watch as flames from the LNU Lightning Complex fires approach a home in Napa County, California AP World news in pictures 21 August 2020 Members of the Israeli security forces arrest a Palestinian demonstrator during a rally to protest against Israel's plan to annex parts of the occupied West Bank AFP via Getty World news in pictures 20 August 2020 A man pushes his bicycle through a deserted road after prohibitory orders were imposed by district officials for a week to contain the spread of the Covid-19 in Kathmandu AFP via Getty World news in pictures 19 August 2020 A car burns while parked at a residence in Vacaville, California. Dozens of fires are burning out of control throughout Northern California as fire resources are spread thin AFP via Getty World news in pictures 18 August 2020 Students use their mobile phones as flashlights at an anti-government rally at Mahidol University in Nakhon Pathom. Thailand has seen near-daily protests in recent weeks by students demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha AFP via Getty World news in pictures 17 August 2020 Members of the Kayapo tribe block the BR163 highway during a protest outside Novo Progresso in Para state, Brazil. Indigenous protesters blocked a major transamazonian highway to protest against the lack of governmental support during the COVID-19 novel coronavirus pandemic and illegal deforestation in and around their territories AFP via Getty World news in pictures 16 August 2020 Lightning forks over the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge as a storm passes over Oakland AP World news in pictures 15 August 2020 Belarus opposition supporters gather near the Pushkinskaya metro station where Alexander Taraikovsky, a 34-year-old protester died on August 10, during their protest rally in central Minsk AFP via Getty World news in pictures 14 August 2020 AlphaTauri's driver Daniil Kvyat takes part in the second practice session at the Circuit de Catalunya in Montmelo near Barcelona ahead of the Spanish F1 Grand Prix AFP via Getty World news in pictures 13 August 2020 Soldiers of the Brazilian Armed Forces during a disinfection of the Christ The Redeemer statue at the Corcovado mountain prior to the opening of the touristic attraction in Rio AFP via Getty World news in pictures 12 August 2020 Young elephant bulls tussle playfully on World Elephant Day at the Amboseli National Park in Kenya AFP via Getty "The operation began at dawn when a drone bombed the home of Abdulraoof al-Dhahab and then helicopters flew up and unloaded paratroopers at his house and killed everyone inside," said one anonymous resident, in an account of the incident corroborated by Yemeni security staff. "Next, the gunmen opened fire at the U.S. soldiers who left the area, and the helicopters bombed the gunmen and a number of homes and led to a large number of casualties." In a statement, Mr Trump said he was saddened to hear of the death of the US commando, who was taken in our fight against the evil of radical Islamic terrorism. Numerous raids on Yemeni targets were carried out throughout the tenure of his predecessor Barack Obama. In mid-January, the United Nations' humanitarian aid official in Yemen said the civilian death toll in the nearly two-year conflict had reached 10,000. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} An Iraqi parliamentary panel has asked the Baghdad government to reciprocate US President Donald Trumps Muslim ban with travel restrictions aimed at American citizens. We ask the Iraqi government to reciprocate to the decision taken by the U.S administration, the foreign affairs committee said in a statement on Sunday. Iraq is in the frontline of the war of terrorism... and it is unfair that the Iraqis are treated in this way. The call was made after the panel met to discuss the fallout from the far-reaching new executive order on immigration signed into law by Mr Trump on Friday. Among other things, the order temporarily suspends the US refugee resettlement programme, and bars even valid visa-holding citizens of seven Muslim countries, including Iraq, from entering the country. Several parts of the legislation have already been struck down by federal judges amid outrage worldwide and protests at all of the US major airports over the weekend. Iraqs Popular Mobilisation Forces, a government-allied Shia militia group coalition formed to fight Isis, was also critical of the US policy, calling for a ban on issuing visas to Americans visiting the country and for those already in Iraq to be expelled. Bill de Blasio: Trump's travel ban is "unamerican" Government spokesperson Saad al-Hadithi was more cautious in conveying Baghdads criticism, saying that Iraq understood the US security needs but that the special relationship between the US and Iraq should be taken into consideration. Iraqis hoped the new legislation would not affect the efforts of strengthening and developing the bilateral relations, he said. Two parliament members speaking on background told Reuters that they planned to lobby the US to reverse the decision. Iraqi refugees and immigrants who settle in the US are already subject to extensive vetting and background checks. Many worked alongside the US army and government agencies during the US invasion of 2003 - 2011. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Iraq's parliament has voted to take "reciprocal measures" in reaction to the new US travel ban on citizens from several predominantly Muslim countries. The majority vote - which is binding - means parliament will ask the government to retaliate by implementing visa restrictions on Americans visiting Iraq, a parliamentary official said on Monday. It is not immediately clear whether the vote will impact American civilians and military already living and working in Iraq, as well as those who seek to enter. No details were offered by parliamentary spokespeople. It is also not understood how the measures will affect cooperation in the ongoing battle against Isis. Around 5,000 US troops are currently deployed in the country to assist Iraqi forces in the fight against the jihadi militants. The vote follows Sunday's recommendation from the Baghdad's government's foreign affairs committee to take action. Iraq is in the frontline of the war of terrorism... and it is unfair that the Iraqis are treated in this way, the committee said in a statement. Iraq is among the seven countries affected by the executive order on immigration signed into law by US President Donald Trump on Friday. Among other measures, the new legislation temporarily suspends the US refugee resettlement programme, and bars even valid visa-holding citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Sudan and Yemen from entering the country for 90 days. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has not yet reacted to the ban. Rudy Giuliani explains how he helped Trump put together 'Muslim ban' legally Several parts of the legislation have already been struck down by federal judges amid worldwide protests and outrage at all of the US major airports over the weekend. Baghdad officials are due to meet with the US ambassador on Monday or Tuesday to convey their "dismay" at the ban, Reuters reported. Two members of parliament - speaking on background - said that Iraq planned to lobby against the decision. Iraqi refugees and immigrants who settle in the US are already subject to extensive vetting and background checks. Many worked alongside the US army and government agencies during the US invasion of 2003 - 2011. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Al Qaeda, Isis and other jihadi groups are thrilled with US President Donald Trumps executive order on immigration targeting Muslim countries, describing it as proof that the US is at war with Islam. The new legislation signed by Mr Trump on Friday temporarily suspends the US refugee programme and bans citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries (Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen) from entering the country on the grounds of national security. Isis-friendly channels on the Telegram messaging service described the ban as blessed, echoing how the US 2003 invasion of Iraq was called a blessed invasion for reinvigorating anti-US sentiment in the region. One user greeted the news of the Muslim ban as the best caller to Islam, hoping it will draw Muslim Americans to their cause. Several posts suggested that the prediction of Anwar al-Awlaki a US-born al Qaeda leader killed in Yemen in 2011 that the West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens was coming true. Confusion reigned at border control over the weekend over whether green card holders and those with legal work or study visas should be sent back from the US or allowed to re-enter if currently overseas. [The ban] plays into this clash of civilisations idea, which is something that global jihadis need as fuel, to claim Americans are against them, that the West is against them, Dr Renad Mansour, a fellow from the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Chatham House, told The Independent. Trump is seen to be validating what they already claimed was happening. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters The new administration's decision to implement the restrictions was met with outrage internationally and sparked protests at major US airports, where lawyers and translators flocked to help those affected. Although several parts of the order have already been struck down by federal judges, and more reviews are on the way, an unknown number of people holding valid visas were turned away from US-bound flights or detained upon arrival over the weekend. Politicians and other officials have expressed concern that the hastily implemented legislation will fuel jihadi narratives and help inspire new recruits. The effect will probably in some areas give Isis some more propaganda, Republican Senator John McCain told CBS on Sunday. Javad Zarif, the foreign minister of Iran, one of the countries affected, tweeted that the travel ban will be recorded in history as a great gift to extremists and their supporters. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} It is not yet known how many people around the world will be affected by US President Donald Trumps executive order banning even legal residents of seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the United States. While citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Sudan and Yemen are temporarily barred from US soil, the legislation also suspends the USs refugee resettlement programme for 120 days and cuts the number to be accepted each year from 50,000 to 25,000. Several parts of what was deemed the ill thought out order have already been struck down by federal judges amid outrage worldwide and protests and confusion at all of the USs major airports over the weekend. Perhaps most cruelly it hits Syrians people who have suffered unthinkable losses the hardest. The processing of refugees fleeing six years of bloody civil war has been halted indefinitely. The last few days have been so frustrating. I havent slept at all, said 23-year-old Alaa Alsabeh, from Hama in central Syria. Alaa, who is currently studying in northern Cyprus, had been due to start a masters programme in Engineering at Wayne State University in Michigan later this year. But the US Embassy emailed to say that his visa interview had been cancelled, and would not be rescheduled. I have some plans but Im not sure what Im going to do. I missed my chance to go to Germany or Canada when I accepted the offer from [Wayne State], he said. Alaa managed to leave for Beirut over the border 18 months ago with the hopes of going on to postgraduate study to make his family proud. "It is frustrating his hard work has come to nothing thanks to American politics, he said. This order is nothing to do with Syrians or me, Im just a student. The protests show that the politicians dont represent the people over there. Donald Trump announces a ban on refugees and all visitors from Muslim-majority countries Thousands more people like Alaa thought to be waiting on the lengthy asylum process or already in the air when the order was enacted are now trapped in a legal limbo. In Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey Syrias neighbours airports reported that around a dozen families who had been turned away at US immigration had returned after leaving for what they finally thought was a new life. (On Monday, Mr Trump said the chaos at airports worldwide was the result of a Delta Airlines system malfunction rather than his order. He defended implementing the legislation without warning so bad dudes didnt scramble to enter the US beforehand.) For those already in the US, the situation is still fraught with untested complications. Amer Doko managed to flee Syria for Jordan in 2013 after being released from one of the Syrian regimes notorious prisons for dissenters. Now based in Washington DC, he works for a non-profit organisation which aims to strengthen democratic institutions in developing countries and lives with his young family in Virginia. In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Show all 30 1 /30 In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria A Syrian family arrives at a checkpoint, manned by pro-government forces, at the al-Hawoz street roundabout, after leaving Aleppo's eastern neighbourhoods Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria A Syrian woman, fleeing violence in the restive Bustan al-Qasr neighbourhood, reacts as she stands with her children in Aleppo's Fardos neighbourhood, after regime troops retook the area from rebel fighters Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian pro-regime fighters, gesture as they drive past resident fleeing violence in the restive Bustan al-Qasr neighbourhood, in Aleppo's Fardos neighbourhood Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian rebels withdrew from six more neighbourhoods in their one-time bastion of east Aleppo in the face of advancing government troops, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian rebels withdrew from six more neighbourhoods in their one-time bastion of east Aleppo in the face of advancing government troops, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian residents, fleeing violence in the restive Bustan al-Qasr neighbourhood, arrive in Aleppo's Fardos neighbourhood , after regime troops retook the area from rebel fighters Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian pro-regime fighters, gesture as they drive past residents fleeing violence in the restive Bustan al-Qasr neighbourhood, in Aleppo's Fardos neighbourhood Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian residents, fleeing violence in the restive Bustan al-Qasr neighbourhood, arrive in Aleppo's Fardos neighbourhood, after regime troops retook the area from rebel fighters Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian residents, fleeing violence in the restive Bustan al-Qasr neighbourhood, arrive in Aleppo's Fardos neighbourhood Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria A Syrian pro-regime fighter speaks with a child, as residents flee violence in the restive Bustan al-Qasr neighbourhood. Syrian rebels withdrew from six more neighbourhoods in their one-time bastion of east Aleppo in the face of advancing government troops AFP/Getty Images In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Smoke rises as seen from a governement-held area of Aleppo, Syria Reuters In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian soldiers targeting rebels-held areas in the eastern neighborhoods in Aleppo, Syria. According to media reports, the army is now holding on 99 percent of Aleppois eastern neighborhoods EPA In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian pro-government forces patrol Aleppo's eastern al-Salihin neighbourhood after troops retook the area from rebel fighters Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian soldiers rest following the battle at al-Sheik Saeed neighborhood in Aleppo, Syria EPA In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria A Syrian pro-government fighter walking past closed shops in the Bab al-Nasr district of Aleppo's Old City. Once renowned for its bustling souks, grand citadel and historic gates, Aleppo's Old City has been rendered virtually unrecognisable by some of the worst violence of Syria's war Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria The crucial battle for Aleppo entered its 'final phase' after Syrian rebels retreated into a small pocket of their former bastion in the face of new army advances. The retreat leaves opposition fighters confined to just a handful of neighbourhoods in southeast Aleppo, the largest of them Sukkari and Mashhad Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian civilans arrive at a checkpoint, manned by pro-government forces, at the al-Hawoz street roundabout, after leaving Aleppo's eastern neighbourhoods. Syria's government has retaken at least 85 percent of east Aleppo, which fell to rebels in 2012, since beginning its operation Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian civilians flee the Sukkari neighbourhood towards safer rebel-held areas in southeastern Aleppo Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrians celebrate in the government-held Mogambo neighbourhood of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, after rebel fighters retreated into a small pocket of their former bastion in the face of new army advances Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrians celebrate in the government-held Mogambo neighbourhood of the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, after rebel fighters retreated into a small pocket of their former bastion in the face of new army advances. The fall of Aleppo would be the worst rebel defeat since Syria's conflict began in 2011, and leave the government in control of the country's five major cities Getty In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria A Syrian refugee camp in the Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, close to the Syrian border PA wire In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian refugee Aliya inside the tent where she lives with her husband and ten children in a camp in the Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, close to the Syrian border PA wire In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Syrian refugee women and children outside the entrance to their tents in the refugee camp in the Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, close to the Syrian border PA Wire In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria A Syrian refugee camp in the Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, close to the Syrian border PA wire In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria A Syrian refugee camp in the Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, close to the Syrian border PA Wire In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria A Syrian refugee woman outside the entrance to the tent where her family live, in the refugee camp in the Bekaa Valley, Lebanon, close to the Syrian border PA wire In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria A vehicle drives past a mosque at night in Idlib, Syria. Picture taken with a long exposure Reuters In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Damaged buildings stand in the rebel-controlled town of Binnish in Idlib province, Syria Reuters In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria The night sky is seen through damaged windows in the rebel-controlled town of Binnish in Idlib province, Syria Reuters In Pictures: The crisis unfolding in Syria Damaged buildings stand in the rebel-controlled area of Maaret al-Numan in Idlib province, Syria Reuters I did not see this coming. I thought I would be safe with my permanent residency, he said. Even people with dual citizenship are being affected. No Syrians are safe here anymore. Amer travels with work several times a year, and says the ban will adversely affect his ability to do his job as he dares not leave the country now. His original hope of returning to Syria after finishing a Masters degree at Georgetown University died when he realised the war was still far from being over. The situation is very volatile. Being denied entry back into the US? Trust me, no Syrian can pay that price or take that risk. Even if you have all the reassurances in the world you will not put yourself in that position now, he said. We are heading into a very dark era. For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emails Sign up to our free breaking news emails Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Breaking News email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} As the world adjusts to a reality with Donald Trump in the White House, renewed concerns over the handling of North Koreas nuclear threat are soon likely to emerge. If the last 12 months are any guide, 2017 is shaping up to be dominated by news coverage of further nuclear and missile tests. But under the radar and crucial for North Koreas residents is a painstaking diplomatic effort to put the regime under pressure on another front: its dismal human rights situation. In the three years since the landmark 2014 report of the UN Commission of Inquiry, which laid out in harrowing detail a number of North Korean crimes against humanity, there are, sadly, few discernible signs of improvement within the country. But the international community is slowly starting to step up. The UN Security Council recently held its third annual meeting on North Korean violations of human rights. This went ahead despite a renewed Chinese attempt to block discussion of the issue on procedural grounds, which like previous such efforts failed to garner the required number of council votes. Among a litany of horrors, the latest Security Council meeting focused on the continuing separation of families and the regimes use of forced labour overseas. In comments clearly aimed at an obstructionist minority of states sitting on the council, a number of speakers emphasised the link between Pyongyangs internal and external behaviour. Recommended Trump working on missile defence system to protect from North Korea However, the councils members remain far from united. There was no push to refer the situation to the International Criminal Court (ICC), nor any consideration of targeted sanctions against individual figures in the regime. The council is unlikely to go further any time soon, but human rights advocates are keeping up pressure on its members nonetheless. Given that permanent council members China and Russia are the principal obstacles to full-on action, the strategy is to keep enough non-permanent members on board to at least make sure formal discussions can continue to take place. The point is to build a robust global consensus on the nature and consequences of the abuses occurring inside the country. The United Nations Security Council gather together. North Korea may fall increasingly on their radar (Getty) (Getty Images) The cracks appear The Security Councils recent meeting took place not long after it adopted Resolution 2321, its response to the North Korean nuclear test of two months earlier. As well as strengthening the sanctions regime against the country, this was also the first non-proliferation resolution to include any language on human rights. This built on a precedent set by Resolution 2270, adopted after the Norths January 2016 nuclear test, which broke new ground by referring to humanitarian concerns in its opening paragraphs. These expressed the councils deep concern at the grave hardship faced by the population, and criticised the redirection of scarce funds away from their unmet needs. Resolution 2321 reiterated these same concerns and then went further, pointedly emphasising the necessity of respecting and ensuring the welfare and inherent dignity of North Koreas people. In a nod to the use of forced labour, it also called on all states to exercise vigilance over North Korean workers being sent overseas to earn hard currency for the regimes nuclear and ballistic missile programmes. These subtle changes to the wording of resolutions may seem trivial in the face of such appalling human rights violations, and its true that they certainly dont go so far as to invoke any explicit responsibility to protect people on the part of either the North Korean government or the wider international community. But they are far from insignificant. Until 2016, this sort of language was entirely absent from North Korean non-proliferation resolutions, and the fact that its starting to creep in indicates that a change is really underway. Beyond the Security Council Similar things are also happening in the 193-member UN General Assembly, which has consistently issued non-binding annual resolutions on North Korean human rights since 2005. By 2012, these increasingly condemnatory resolutions were being passed by consensus but after the release of the Commission of Inquiry report in 2014, the consensus broke down as a number of countries took umbrage at specific language on crimes against humanity, and at recommendations that the Security Council refer the situation to the ICC. The General Assemblys 2016 resolution, however, was passed by consensus again, despite even stronger language concerning both the nature of the crimes being committed and the culpability of the North Korean leadership. Remarkably, after more than a decade, that resolution was also the first of its kind to mention North Koreas pursuit of nuclear weapons as a threat to the well-being of its own people. (Similarly encouraging noises are emanating from the 47-member UN Human Rights Council.) It would be naive to imagine that slow-bore UN diplomacy will suddenly force the Pyongyang government to change its ways. Nor will global diplomatic pressure immediately sway its increasingly frustrated Chinese patron state. But its now more widely accepted than ever that these across-the-board rights violations are so egregious (and so entwined with wider security threats) that the international community has to take them seriously. And sure enough, a clearly riled Pyongyang is tactically giving way on certain incremental points, its ratification of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities being the latest example. However small these concessions are, some theorists of human rights change would suggest that theyre a vital early phase of deeper, broader reform. The argument is that if North Korea takes small steps away from outright denial and towards limited engagement, space for domestic opposition groups will perhaps begin to open up. South Korean human rights activists advocate for refugees (Getty) (Getty Images) North Korea Prison Camps Show all 7 1 /7 North Korea Prison Camps North Korea Prison Camps An overview of Camp 25 Amnesty International/DigitalGlobe North Korea Prison Camps The administration area of Camp 15 Amnesty International/DigitalGlobe North Korea Prison Camps A water treatment system in Camp 25 Amnesty International/DigitalGlobe North Korea Prison Camps Crop fields and, inset, prisoners in Camp 25 Amnesty International/DigitalGlobe North Korea Prison Camps The reported crematorium in Camp 25 Amnesty International/DigitalGlobe North Korea Prison Camps A possible mine Amnesty International/DigitalGlobe North Korea Prison Camps A walled compound in Camp 15 Amnesty International/DigitalGlobe This is admittedly a bit of a stretch when it comes to present-day North Korea, where organised civil society is essentially non-existent and open political dissent ruthlessly crushed. But however slim a hope, its better than nothing. Ben Willis, PhD Researcher, School of Politics and International Studies, University of Leeds. This article first appeared on The Conversation (theconversation.com) Sign up to Simon Calders free travel email for weekly expert advice and money-saving discounts Get Simon Calders Travel email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Simon Calders Travel email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} The latest glossy openings and faux-speakeasies tend to grab the column inches when it comes to New York Citys bar scene. But there are still a few watering holes in New York that started serving long before Trump Tower was built, before Prohibition came and went, before the United States even became an independent republic. The best of these old saloons and taverns continue to exist almost timelessly. Some agreeably shabby, others lately renovated, they make space for visitors to mix with locals and mingle with the citys ghosts. Here are five to try on your next visit. McSorleys Old Ale House This spit-and-sawdust Irish pub has scowled at every social change since opening in 1854. One cast-iron house rule stated men only until city legislation finally forced the owners to admit female patrons in 1970. On a Wednesday night in early 2017 the place still seems a living shrine to its own past, give or take the flat-screen TV. The walls are scarred with ancient, hieroglyphic graffiti, carved right into the original wood, and the bar is festooned with historic curios, from Harry Houdinis handcuffs to wishbones left behind by regulars who never came back from the First World War. Its present, independent owners do not cater to contemporary tastes and choices the only two drinks available remain McSorleys own light and dark ales, each pint poured in two old-school half-pint mugs by barrel-chested, shaven-headed Irishmen. The atmosphere is entirely convivial though, the dim lighting and ambient hubbub creating something of a 19th-century mood. Except of course for the welcome presence of 21st-century women, a group of whom are discussing quantum mechanics at the table beside mine. 15 East 7th Street; mcsorleysoldalehouse.nyc The Ear Inn Celebrating its 200th anniversary this year, the bar on the bottom floor of Sohos historic James Brown House has sold booze in various incarnations since 1817. Its been a tavern, a liquor store, a speakeasy, and a club for longshoremen from the Hudson River dockyard down the street. According to my bartender Barbara, there used to be a brothel and a smugglers den upstairs too. Pouring me a pint of Ear Inn Ale (made specially by Brooklyn Brewery), she says the place is supposedly haunted by the ghost of a sailor called Mickey, who was either killed by a car or died of drink while waiting for his clipper to come in, depending on who you ask. I work the day shift, says Barbara, so Ive never seen him. The Ear Inn used to have a brothel and a smugglers den upstairs (Stephen Phelan) This afternoon the bar gives off a modern, greenish neon glow, while English and Irish regulars watch an Arsenal-Chelsea match on the TV. Current owner Martin Sheridan does his bit to preserve the old days by asking customers to refrain from mobile phone calls. Texting is okay, just make it quick, says Barbara. 326 Spring Street; earinn.com Petes Tavern Petes first opened in 1864, when Lincoln was president and the civil war was still raging. It has kept its original tin roof and tiled floor, and the walls are decked with portraits of famous patrons, from former mayors to Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie celebrating the release of their woeful movie The Tourist. My bartender Garrett, a fellow Irishman from County Monaghan, is an amateur historian of the place. He says he often thinks about the staff and patrons who have come and gone, and wonders if their spirits pop back in sometimes. During Prohibition, the front section became a flower shop to hide the speakeasy in the back. He invites me to check out old photos in the rear dining area, where an elderly lady looks up from her Spaghetti a la Petes to point out her grandfather in one of them. He was a city politician at nearby Tammany Hall, she tells us. So he opposed Prohibition, I ask? Well, what do you think? He was in here every day. 129 East 18th St; petestavern.com Pete's Tavern opened when Lincoln was president (Stephen Phelan) Fraunces Tavern Now dwarfed by the surrounding financial towers of Broad Street and Wall Street, this is the bar in which General George Washington said farewell to his officers on December 4, 1783, after beating the British in the Revolutionary War. Today the upper rooms house a rich gallery of paintings, weapons and artefacts from that period, while the bar and restaurant downstairs have been restored to something like their 18th-century appearance. Theyre semi-separate entities, says museum curator Jessica Phillips, who enjoys pseudo-historical dishes like the Jefferson Cobb Salad while knowing very well that Thomas Jefferson never ate any such thing. Fraunces Tavern has restored its 18th-century appearance (Stephen Phelan) If you want the real history, you come upstairs, if you want a good pint you go down there. Sure enough, the Porterhouse Bar does a really excellent Oyster Stout. 54 Pearl Street; frauncestavern.com Chumleys Socialist socialite Leland Chumley opened his own joint in 1922. It was an HQ for fellow members of the Industrial Workers of the World, and a hangout for writers like William Faulkner, Orson Welles and the Fitzgeralds, who supposedly drank here on their wedding day. Table 26 is now a shrine to that unhappy couple in the newly reopened Chumleys. Orson Welles regularly hung out at Chumleys (Stephen Phelan) Closed for a decade after a chimney collapsed, I find the place beautifully fixed up by busy owner Alessandro Borgognone. Hes restored the speakeasy feel, with no sign outside to help you find the place, and a cosy interior lined with leather, wood and brass, original photos and book jackets. We wanted that old New York hustle and bustle, says Borgognone. You come in for a cocktail or sit down for dinner. Its not trendy, its classic. The house burger is now said to be the best in the city and people are booking weeks ahead, but theres no special treatment for big names who want a table at short notice. Not even President Trump? Nope, says Borgognone. Were very democratic that way. 86 Bedford Street; chumleysnewyork.com Sign up to Simon Calders free travel email for weekly expert advice and money-saving discounts Get Simon Calders Travel email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Simon Calders Travel email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} A beach on the west coast of Florida is alluring enough. Even better: a beach with a fun city attached, with an abundance of places to eat, drink and shop. Ive driven the coast so that you dont have to, and have concluded the ideal location is Naples. I first arrived here in the Eighties yes, I was very young at the time, thanks as I drove the Tamiami Trail. This road, also known as Highway 41, was carved through the Everglades in the Twenties to connect Tampa with Miami hence the name. The highway provides an artery for a region rich in nature, in the sensuous shapes of the Ten Thousand Islands and the ever-mysterious Everglades. Its worth discovering, so take advantage of seven days hire of a compact car from Miami International Airport from 166 or upgrade to a Chevrolet Camaro Convertible from 263 through Hertz.co.uk Base camp for my expedition is the Lemon Tree Inn, promising A Touch of Key West in the heart of Old Naples, this marvellous throwback to the 1960s is cheap, cheerful and close to the action on 5th Avenue. Other streets with this name are available I believe theres one in New York City but the version in Naples is low-rise and instantly likeable. For example, as you window-shop or gaze at the works in some of the 100-plus art galleries, you can park for free. Dont try that in Manhattan. 5th Avenue, Naples Despite its 21st Century ambiance as a great place to relax, Naples is also a working port, with dozens of fishing vessels based at Crayton Cove, where the bay infiltrates inland. Forty years ago a young man called Vin DePasquale arrived here from California and decided that what Naples needed was a waterside restaurant. And The Dock at Crayton Cove was born. Initially, the price for oysters was 30 cents each. Theyre slightly more expensive these days, but diners still pack the place like sardines. Crayton Cove, Naples Mangroves, crabs and alligators The south-west corner of the Sunshine State is called Floridas Paradise Coast. South from Naples, the Ten Thousand Islands are scattered across the Gulf: fragments of land, swathed in mangrove and rich in wildlife. Hire a good captain, and you can step ashore on your own desert island, where the sands and shells tell a story. Back on the highway theres plenty of roadside Americana. The smallest post office in the US puts its stamp on the Tamiami Trail, and close by theres a corrugated iron barn thats been turned into Joanies Blue Crab Cafe. No prizes for guessing whats on the menu. Joanie's gets very busy, especially at the weekend. You may be waiting a while, but as they say here: If you want fast food, keep driving 42 miles west, 66 miles east. Everglades, Florida If, however, you want a close, safe encounter with an alligator, step aboard an airboat a launch fitted with a giant fan rather than a propeller, to avoid entanglement in these shallow, mysterious waters. You can travel at 40mph through the mangrove swamps of the Everglades natural thoroughfares that lead deep into the past of the planet. Discover more at Visit Florida Sign up to Simon Calders free travel email for weekly expert advice and money-saving discounts Get Simon Calders Travel email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Simon Calders Travel email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} At 9.15am on Monday 30 January, a piece of aviation history was made. On a day when the headlines were filled with tougher US restrictions on travellers, including extreme vetting of some nationalities, Scottish aviation made a move for more relaxed, passenger-friendly travel. The unlikely setting was Campbeltown airport in south-west Scotland henceforth known as the no-frills airport with subtracted security. For the first time in nearly half a century, a scheduled flight took off from an airport on the British mainland without the usual security checks for passengers or their possessions. Loganair flight 6844 departed from Campbeltown, destination Glasgow, with 15 passengers aboard none of whom had been frisked or had their baggage rummaged through. The rules banning sharp objects, firearms and liquids in containers over 100ml still apply, but travellers simply make an oral declaration that they are not carrying any of the banned items. Simon Calder tries out first flight with no security check in 50 years It is believed to be the first time anyone has breezed through a mainland airport on to a scheduled flight since the early 1970s. Since Britain ratified the "United Nations Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Seizure of Aircraft", more crisply known as the Hague Hijacking Convention, passengers have been subject to personal searches and cabin-baggage checks. Highlands and Islands Airports Ltd (HIAL), which operates Campbeltown, said: These new arrangements have been agreed and approved by the Department for Transport and the Civil Aviation Authority. They continue to place safety and security at the forefront of every passengers journey, whilst offering facilitation benefits in most cases. Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow Show all 9 1 /9 Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow Campbeltown Airport Campbeltown's no-frills terminal with subtracted security Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow Check-in "Did you pack everything yourself?" Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow Boarding pass Pass go: Flybe handles the ticketing for Loganair Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow Boarding flight Not quite a Jumbo - the De Havilland Twin Otter Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow Extra legroom Extra legroom - a relative concept on the Twin Otter Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow Kintyre Peninsula Plane with a view: the Kintyre Peninsula Simon Calder Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow X marks the Loganair plane X marks the Loganair plane Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow At Glasgow Airport Any landing you can walk away from is a good one Simon Calder's security-free flight from Campbeltown to Glasgow Aircraft at Glasgow Airport Grown-up planes at Glasgow airport - you need a security check for these But the Prospect union, which publicised the abolition of security at Campbeltown and two island airports, claims the move makes a terrorist attack "far more likely", pointing out that flight paths into Glasgow pass close to nuclear power facilities, an oil terminal and Ministry of Defence establishments. The Prospect negotiator, David Avery, said: The rules we had have been in place for more than 10 years, since September 11 and the terrorist attacks in America, to stop people taking over planes. "Even with planes the size of these, which are very small, when theyre flying over urban areas, when theyre flying over oil depots, the size doesnt particularly matter. My view, and my unions view, is that there should have been a public consultation with users, the public and the staff about the change before it was made, rather than it being done behind closed doors with the company and ministers. Recommended Airline pilot reveals what frightens him most about flying Loganairs managing director, Jonathan Hinkles, disagreed, rejecting the concept of what he called a one-size fits all approach to airline security. On short, regional flights in Scotland, he said, Everyone knows each other very well. And the vast majority of customers are using it as purely a local bus service. Support for the lighter-touch approach came from the leading aviation security expert, Philip Baum. He said: Routine, predictable security is the enemy of effective security. Screening does not have to be performed by examinations by X-ray systems. Where better to perform behavioural analysis than in a community where the travellers are known and where baseline behaviour is easy to identify? It is only routine screening which is not going to be performed - there is nothing to prevent the authorities implementing additional procedures as and when concerns arise." Normally when a domestic flight arrives at Glasgow airport, passengers are free to go straight to another airside departure gate to catch an onward flight. But travellers on flight 6844 were diverted away to the baggage reclaim area and the landside exit. Anyone catching an onward flight from Glasgow must go through the full security check. Jonathan Hinkles of Loganair said the arithmetic made it sensible to conduct checks at Glasgow, not Campbeltown: Less than one in 10 of our customers are taking an onward connecting flight. As Claire Ross, one of the passengers, left the aircraft, she pronounced herself happy with the new regime: Seemed fine to me. It was great fun. Its a small, local flight for local people. Click here for the latest tours, holidays and cruises from Independent Holidays Sign up to Simon Calders free travel email for weekly expert advice and money-saving discounts Get Simon Calders Travel email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the Simon Calders Travel email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Q What does the executive order say? For the next 90 days, nationals from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Syria and Yemen can travel to the US only if they have either a Green Card entitling them to permanent residence in America, or one of five specific visas for official bodies such as the United Nations. The order implies any normal visitor to the US from one of those countries, whether on holiday, seeing friends and family, or on business, is banned. Q Does it include British people who were born in one of those countries, and/or those with dual nationality? No. On Monday afternoon, the FCO said: "We have confirmed with the US government that British passport holders (regardless of country of birth or whether they hold another passport/nationality) arent affected by the Executive Order." Q So, who is banned? The most forthright clarification was from the UK Foreign Office. Late on Sunday, it said the ruling was far more nuanced than it originally appeared. Assuming the Foreign Office's interpretation is correct, the ban will affect a much smaller number of travellers than originally feared - though of course the effect for those individuals and their families is likely to be extremely distressing. People who are nationals of one of the seven named countries and travelling from one of the seven named countries. So for anyone whose journey starts in the UK, elsewhere in Europe or in almost any other nation in the world, there is no prospect of being banned. There are no direct flights from any of the countries on the list to the US. Therefore the decree can apply only to people flying via a third country where they are purely in airside transit. For example, the order might apply to someone intending to fly on Air France from Tehran to Paris on Air France then immediately board an onward flight to the US. But someone flying on British Airways from Tehran to Heathrow, who clears UK immigration and customs before checking in for a transatlantic flight, will not be affected. Q But weve heard lots of stories of people with Green Cards or dual nationality not being allowed on board flights to the US. Why? have misinterpreted the rules and erred, as they would see it, on the side of caution. Even in the UK there are occasional problems with passengers to Europe who are wrongly denied boarding despite their passports being valid. Airlines are heavily fined if they allow someone who is inadmissable to board a flight to the US. Inevitably with a sudden bureaucratic change like this, mistakes are made in the high-pressure environment of an airport shortly before a flight departs. Anyone who is wrongly denied boarding should try again. For nationals of one of the seven countries who were planning to fly to the US from one of those countries, the travel ban appears to be simple to circumvent. A Libyan could cross the land border to Tunisia and fly onwards from there; a Syrian could fly from Damascus to one of the Gulf airports, go through passport control and then check in to a US-bound flight; and from the other countries, a flight to Istanbul should avoid problems, so long as they can be legally admitted to Turkey. Q For people who find themselves correctly denied boarding, what are their options? Any passenger denied boarding because the US has changed its rules has no claim against the airline for a refund or rebooking. American Airlines conditions are typical: Youre responsible for bringing the correct documents for international travel. If you dont have the required documentation and identification, you will not be allowed to board the plane and would be responsible for any resulting costs. However, given the extreme circumstances, with thousands of prospective travellers discovering that they are suddenly inadmissible to the US, airlines are being reasonable. The two main UK airlines to the US, British Airways and Virgin Atlantic, are offering such passengers full refunds or the chance to change destination or postpone their trip. But thats for customers directly impacted by this executive order to use Virgins terms. It is not clear what will happen to a family group where one passenger is ineligible to travel but others are. Q Meanwhile, there will soon be more red tape for everyone who visits the US At present there are no passport controls when you leave America: at the airport you just go through a security search and step aboard the plane. President Trump has ordered that state of affairs to end, and is demanding full biometric checks on every departing passenger, saying: "The Secretary of Homeland Security shall expedite the completion and implementation of a biometric entry-exit tracking system." That will entail being photographed and fingerprinted on your way out of the US, as well as the way in. Click here for the latest tours, holidays and cruises from Independent Holidays Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 Trend: Bakcell, The First Mobile Operator and The Leading Mobile Internet Provider of Azerbaijan is pleased to announce the signing of 7 new agreements with 7 more worlds leading telecommunications operators so its subscribers could access the most beneficial internet in roaming. The company continually expands the list of countries where its subscribers can benefit from high speed data for as low as 1 qepik per MB. Starting from January 2017, Bakcell subscribers have started to benefit from attractive roaming data in several new destinations such as Georgia, Ukraine, Israel, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Now, its customers can benefit the offer in 28 countries (Turkey, Georgia, Russia, Ukraine, Iran, UK, Germany, USA, UAE, Czech Republic, Italy, Netherlands, Hungary, Spain, Kazakhstan, Israel, Greece, Portugal, Romania, Ireland, Malta, Uzbekistan, Egypt, New Zealand, Kirgizstan, Tajikistan, Albania, South Africa. Thanks to these new agreements, Bakcell subscribers who travel to any country listed above will enjoy using high speed internet for as low as 1 qepik per MB. To benefit from this offer subscribers should simply dial *125*1000#YES and activate the roaming data package. It should be noted that by means of the Bakcell Roaming Application, subscribers who travel abroad may get all the necessary information about the prices for calls, SMS and the Internet, as well as the current roaming campaigns at all partner roaming countries and operators, and even get support through online communication with Bakcell. Moreover, subscribers can easily top-up their balances through this application. For more detailed information about Bakcell Roaming Application, please, visit: http://www.bakcell.com/az/bakcell-rouminq-ap Bakcell, The First Mobile Operator and the Leading Mobile Internet Provider of Azerbaijan, offers a variety of products for modern mobile communications customers. Bakcell provides class leading 3G and 4G mobile internet experience in the country under the Su[email protected] brand name. With more than 5300 base stations Bakcells network covers more than 99% of the population and 93% of the land area of the country (excluding occupied territories). Bakcell is a leader in innovation and it focuses on bringing the best of the mobile internet to Azerbaijanis through new partnerships and its Su[email protected] services. Bakcell 3G service is available in all regions of Azerbaijan and covers 93% of population. For more information about Bakcell products and services, please visit www.bakcell.com or call 555.For press releases please see www.bakcell.com/az/news (or www.bakcell.com/en/news for press releases in English). If you are not a Bakcell subscriber, but wish to find out about Bakcell and its services, please call 055 000 05 55. Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inbox Get our free View from Westminster email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the View from Westminster email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Rhino Conservation Botswana (RCB) has announced that Botswana's Honourable Minister of Environment, Wildlife and Tourism Tshekedi Khama has agreed to be its new Patron. The charity works closely with partners, including the Botswana Government and the Botswana Defence Force, and supporters across Africa and around the world, to protect ark populations of black and white rhinos. Tshekedi Khama is an existing board member of the Giants Club's partner charity the Tlhokomela Trust, Botswanas endangered wildlife trust. Founded in 2014, RCB is an international organisation that monitors and protects black and white rhinos it helps rescue from poaching hotspots across southern Africa and move to Botswana. Here, thanks to the governments robust anti-poaching laws and the support of the military, the rhinos can thrive and ultimately become one of the last great hopes for the survival of their kind. Prince Harry has also been named as a Patron of the charity. RCBs director, Martin Map Ives explains the importance of the organisation's work to protect rhinos and maintain the important biodiversity these animals depend on to survive in the wilderness: Across Africa, rhinos are being poached for their horns at a rate that could make them extinct in the wild within 10 years. Its a senseless trade; rhino horn has no proven medicinal value. Even so, demand is increasing. "Today rhino horn is worth more than gold. Despite their size, rhinos have no defences against bullets and high-powered weapons. They are completely reliant on our protection and on our efforts to turn the current tide of poaching for their survival. RCBs message is one of hope. Together, we can stop rhinos from going extinct and build a safer future for these magnificent animals. To learn more about RCB visit www.rhinoconservationbotswana.com Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inbox Get our free View from Westminster email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the View from Westminster email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} New figures suggest there may have been a slump in the membership of the UK's main club for climate change sceptics, as it today hosts a press conference for an architect of President Donald Trump's assault on environmental regulations. The official accounts for the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), which were quietly released last week by Companies House, reveal that its membership fees in the year ending 30 September 2016 generated just 5,409. This was the lowest annual total in the foundations seven-year history. The organisation has always asked each member to pay at least 100 per year. If every member is complying with this request, the latest sums suggest that it now has fewer than 60 members. In comparison, previous accounts show that in the year ending 31 July 2011, the income from membership fees was 14,330, showing that the total has fallen by two-thirds over the past five years. 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Show all 10 1 /10 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A group of emperor penguins face a crack in the sea ice, near McMurdo Station, Antarctica Kira Morris 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Floods destroyed eight bridges and ruined crops such as wheat, maize and peas in the Karimabad valley in northern Pakistan, a mountainous region with many glaciers. In many parts of the world, glaciers have been in retreat, creating dangerously large lakes that can cause devastating flooding when the banks break. Climate change can also increase rainfall in some areas, while bringing drought to others. Hira Ali 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Smoke filled with the carbon that is driving climate change drifts across a field in Colombia. Sandra Rondon 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Amid a flood in Islampur, Jamalpur, Bangladesh, a woman on a raft searches for somewhere dry to take shelter. Bangladesh is one of the most vulnerable places in the world to sea level rise, which is expected to make tens of millions of people homeless by 2050. Probal Rashid 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Sindh province in Pakistan has experienced a grim mix of two consequences of climate change. Because of climate change either we have floods or not enough water to irrigate our crop and feed our animals, says the photographer. Picture clearly indicates that the extreme drought makes wide cracks in clay. Crops are very difficult to grow. Rizwan Dharejo 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Hanna Petursdottir examines a cave inside the Svinafellsjokull glacier in Iceland, which she said had been growing rapidly. Since 2000, the size of glaciers on Iceland has reduced by 12 per cent. Tom Schifanella 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A river once flowed along the depression in the dry earth of this part of Bangladesh, but it has disappeared amid rising temperatures. Abrar Hossain 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A shepherd moves his herd as he looks for green pasture near the village of Sirohi in Rajasthan, northern India. The region has been badly affected by heatwaves and drought, making local people nervous about further predicted increases in temperature. Riddhima Singh Bhati 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change A factory in China is shrouded by a haze of air pollution. The World Health Organisation has warned such pollution, much of which is from the fossil fuels that cause climate change, is a public health emergency. Leung Ka Wa 10 photographs to show to anyone who doesn't believe in climate change Water levels in reservoirs, like this one in Gers, France, have been getting perilously low in areas across the world affected by drought, forcing authorities to introduce water restrictions. Mahtuf Ikhsan It is not clear to what extent the fall in income reflects a drop in numbers as GWPF does not publish details of its membership. It seems likely that its membership is predominantly male. There is only one woman among the foundations 10 trustees, and its Academic Advisory Council consists of 27 men and no women. All seven of its annual lectures have been delivered by men. Despite its dramatic decline in popularity, the foundation still managed to secure 257,044 from secret donors during its most recent financial year. In 2015, GWPF formed a sister company, The American Friends of the GWPF, in order to ensure that its funding from the United States is eligible for tax relief. The foundation was launched as a registered educational charity in November 2009 by Lord Lawson, who often boasts of its impact on government policies. However, it has been dogged by controversy, particularly over its failure to reveal the identities of its main funders. Ed Miliband: PM must discuss climate change with President Trump In September 2014, the Charity Commission ruled that the foundation had breached its guidelines by promoting climate change denial. The foundation responded by creating a lobbying arm, the Global Warming Policy Forum, which is not subject to the Charity Commissions regulations. The forum continues some of the practices that caused trouble for the foundation, such as inserting fake headlines above newspaper articles reproduced on its website. However, the foundation has also continued to distribute propaganda that misrepresents the work of climate change researchers. For instance, the foundation hosted a lecture in October 2016 by Viscount Ridley, during which he falsely accused Professor Ranga Myneni of Boston University and his 31 co-authors of delaying publication of a paper in order to avoid it being taking into account by the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Recommended Government facing legal action over failure to fight climate change Later the same month, the foundation published a pamphlet by Peter Lilley MP, one of its trustees, which made a large number of inaccurate and misleading claims about the review in 2006 of the economics of climate change carried out by Nicholas Stern, now chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. The latest accounts also show that GlWPF recorded a loss of 39,422 in the year ending 30 September 2016. The forum is due to hold a press briefing for journalists in London on Monday for Myron Ebell of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a lobby group in Washington that has gained notoriety for its efforts to promote climate change denial. Mr Ebell reportedly helped Donald Trumps team to draw up plans to limit the work of the Environmental Protection Agency to tackle climate change. While the foundations membership appears to be dwindling, it still enjoys a cosy relationship with some parts of the British media, particularly the Mail on Sunday. It also benefits from the activities of its affiliated parliamentarians who host events for it in the House of Commons and House of Lords. Bob Ward is policy and communications director at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics and Political Sciences Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inbox Get our free View from Westminster email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the View from Westminster email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Just over 30 years ago my family and I arrived in England as refugees. We fled war torn Cambodia, trekking through the jungle with my elderly grandmother who had to be carried, dodging bullets as we reached the border to live in a refugee camp in Thailand. We were there for almost three years before finally being able to come to England. If we had stayed where we were, theres no doubt we would have died. This is the situation Syrian refugees find themselves in as they try to escape their war ravaged country as US President Donald Trump has placed an indefinite travel ban on their entry to the US. Refugees from other nations are not permitted to enter the US for the next 120 days. After this date, they can only enter the country if they are on the list of counties the US has okayed. All other immigrants or visa holders from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria or Yemen are unable to enter the US for the next 90 days. Vocal protests at US airports attack Donald Trump's executive action The only exception to this rule is if a refugee is a religious minority who is being persecuted in their homeland. Essentially, Christian refugees are ok, but Muslims can think again about trying to enter the US. The Trump administration is framing the executive order as a security measure, titled Protecting the Nation from Terrorist Attacks by Foreign Nationals, but it is worth bearing in mind that no one from the seven countries on the banned list has been responsible for a terror attack on American soil. This ban is not rational, it is racist. Last night an invite began to circulate on my Facebook feed for an Emergency Demo against Trumps #MuslimBan and UK complicity. Marches are scheduled to take place in London, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Manchester. Some of my white friends have clicked interested, but few have confirmed that they will join me on the march. For all of their moaning in the pub and political rants online, they are slow to actually stand up against Trump. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters The response from our own government has been equally as reticent. Prime Minister Theresa May failed to condemn the policy, while other world leaders were quick to censure. Her reserve a clear message that the UK is willing to forgo any moral purpose for the sake of a post-Brexit trade deal with the US. Later a spokesperson confirmed that Downing Street does, not agree with this kind of approach. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said that it was, divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of the nationality. Still, Trump is due to visit the UK, despite a petition to stop his state visit reaching 1m signatures. So why are my friends not willing to stand up and show that they stand on the right side of history unlike our government? Evil happens when good people to do nothing. Dont be a good person that does nothing. White friends, lending your voice to this is one of the most important things you can do. Just because it doesnt directly affect you doesnt make it OK. Refugees are your doctors, taxi drivers, colleagues and friends and you have to stick up for them. Its not enough just to "not be racist" anymore, because the racists are winning. They are in power and they are emboldened. Protesting Trumps polices in the UK might not make him reverse his executive order overnight, but it will make our elected representatives see that we wont stand for it. Sign the petitions, go to the marches, write to your MP, donate to charities that provide support to refugees. Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inbox Get our free View from Westminster email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the View from Westminster email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} In US President Donald Trumps first week in office, three policy issues dominated the headlines: his plans to build a wall on the Mexican border, the Presidents support for torture, and his executive order targeting refugees, residents and visitors from seven Muslim majority countries. All three have prompted widespread outrage, in particular, the ban on refugees and blanket immigration restrictions being applied on the basis of national origin and religion. British Prime Minister Theresa May, however, only issued a reluctant and mealy mouthed criticism of Trumps scorched-earth approach to his first few days in the White House. May is one of only a handful of world leaders seemingly eager to position themselves at Trumps right hand side. One other leader, however, has gone even further than the British PM in seeking to praise Trump, both before and since his inauguration and thats Israeli premier Benjamin Netanyahu. There are a few reasons for this, including the tacit approval a Trump administration is expected to give to the settlement expansion bonanza already underway. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters But theres another element at play here, which goes deeper than Netanyahus political agenda. For what many do not realise, is that the policies and their undergirding ideology that Trump is unleashing on the US have been pursued by the state of Israel for decades. First, lets take the wall. Israel began the construction of its Separation Wall in the occupied Palestinian territory (OPT) almost fifteen years ago. Justified in the name of security, some 85 percent of the walls route is built inside the OPT, to incorporate illegal West Bank settlements. It was on that basis that, in 2004, judges at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague deemed the wall illegal, and called for its immediate dismantling. Israels Wall is not even the security miracle that its defenders claim. None other than Israels own security services attributed a sharp decrease in terror attacks in 2005 to the truce unilaterally adopted by Hamas. Tens of thousands of Palestinian workers without permits enter Israel every day, with some 200 miles of gaps in the Walls route remaining. Bill de Blasio: Trump's travel ban is "unamerican" The real link to Trumps ideas comes in the justification of Israels Wall on demographic grounds; in other words, keeping Palestinians out because they are Palestinians and note that the idea of a wall aimed at separation actually pre-dates the Second Intifada. An Israeli official admitted in 2010 that the Wall was built for political and demographic reasons, while the man who designed it revealed how the main thing the government told me in giving me the job was to include as many Israelis inside the fence and leave as many Palestinians outside. Then theres torture. Trumps unabashed endorsement of torture has horrified politicians, human rights activists and former prisoners alike. In Israel, however, the torture of prisoners is routine and rubber-stamped by not just the state, but also by Israels Supreme Court. Just last week, Israeli interrogators confirmed in Haaretz some of the methods used on detainees including physical and psychological abuse. The revelations came as no surprise to Palestinians, nor those Israelis who have documented practices such as sexual torture. This grim reality is also well-known to international human rights groups Amnestys most recent annual report described how Israeli military and police forces, as well as Israel Security Agency (ISA) personnel, tortured and otherwise ill-treated Palestinian detainees, including children. Methods included beating with batons, slapping, throttling, prolonged shackling, stress positions, sleep deprivation and threats, Amnesty added, further noting how despite almost 1,000 complaints since 2001, the authorities have not opened a single criminal investigation. And finally, what about immigration? As horrendous as Trumps orders have been, thus far they pale in comparison in scale and duration to what Israel has been implementing for some seven decades. Since 1948 Israel has enforced a Palestinian Ban (Muslims and Christians), designed to ensure that no refugees can return to the lands and homes from which they were expelled. In parallel, the states borders are open for any Jewish person, from anywhere in the world. Not only that, but in more recent times, Israel has also passed legislation backed again by the Supreme Court that prevents Palestinians with Israeli citizenship from family reunification purely on the basis of the ethnicity or national belonging of their spouse. Former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said of the law: There is no need to hide behind security arguments. There is a need for the existence of a Jewish state. Trump and the likes of Steve Bannon would approve. Just as they would, no doubt, of the fact that Israel approved just eight requests for asylum, out of 7,218 requests filed by Eritreans from 2009 to 2016. Writing in +972 Magazine, Edo Konrad noted the double standards of those who condemn Trump, but who back institutionalised racism in Israel. Here in Britain too, Trumps critics include those who justify, or ignore, Israels own toxic mix of walls, discriminatory immigration system and torture. This dissonance is only likely to become more publicly uncomfortable for Israels friends in the West. For Netanyahus embrace of a Trump White House is not just political manoeuvrings it is reflective of a disturbing reality with which the Palestinians are only too familiar. Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inbox Get our free View from Westminster email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the View from Westminster email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} I note a call to boycott America in response to President Trump's actions. Realistically, we cannot enter into commerce-based aggression against a major trading partner. Equally realistically, now the wrong-headed muddled invitation for the man to visit has been tendered and accepted, it is virtually inconceivable that it will be rescinded (although I will surely sign the appropriate petition). However, the most practical show of public disapproval would be to hit him where it hurts most his overinflated, fragile ego. Therefore I invite the populations of London and Scotland (to our shame, one of the nations that engendered him) to simply not turn up to celebrate his pomp and glory. Simply boycott the parades. We already know that it will be stated by Trump News that more than 75 million people will have turned up the biggest crowd in history, ever, period. But the man himself will see just what we think of him, his alternative facts notwithstanding. Stuart Baker Address supplied If Donald Trump makes a state visit to the UK, maybe he could be told that the Queen has been unavoidably detained and that Prince Charles will be his host! Sarah Pegg East Sussex Please, if Donald Trump does visit the UK, put your coverage in a short paragraph at the bottom of page 11! Ann Smith Southport The hypocrisy over Trump's state visit is palpable Jeremy Corbyn and a million others question the state visit later this year of President Trump (long after the Muslim ban will have been lifted). Were they all as vociferous in the lead-up to the state visit a year or so ago for the President of China a country where human rights abuses are in excess of anything Trump could imagine? Edward Thomas Eastbourne We should have a referendum over Trump Less than one-sixtieth of the UK population has signed a petition against a state visit by Donald Trump; this is the vocal minority. The only way to find out what the British people really think is to have a referendum. The last time that happened things didn't go too well for the liberal left who found that they were out of touch with the feelings of a sizeable portion of the population. Andy Brown Derby Theresa Mays response to Trump is shameful Immediate condemnation should have been the unequivocal response of any Western democracy to Trump's latest shameful affront to decency. The fact that it has been clarified that the impact on certain UK nationals will be less adverse than at first thought is irrelevant. Theresa Mays belated statements are weak and pathetic. If the US no longer speaks up for the free world then the UK must. Debbie Stamper Epsom The British people are not by nature xenophobic bigots. So May's inability to recognize and immediately condemn Trump's latest attack on liberal democracy is more than a simple diplomatic failure. She has failed our great country. She shames us all. Mark Grey London Is this really the best time to leave the EU? In June 2016 the British public voted by a small majority to leave the European Union. They did that based on a very unclear understanding of what Brexit would entail, and also the world situation at the time. However, the world has changed a lot since June and we now find ourselves having to align with an increasingly xenophobic United States run by a leader whom no one can trust. We also find ourselves making overtures to an equally dubious regime in Turkey. In view of this, all MPs of whatever party have a duty to ask themselves whether the British public are now best served by leaving the EU at this time. MPs are far better placed to understand the consequences of this than most of their constituents, and their constituents expect them to make up to date decisions on the publics behalf. Given where we are now, do the majority of MPs really think that our long term interests are best served by leaving the EU and aligning ourselves with the US and Turkey? All MPs ought to be given a free vote uninfluenced by the June referendum result or party whips. Charles Tricks Bristol Hurrah for Corbyn he has realised that democracy trumps socialism The claim made by the critics of Jeremy Corbyn's stance on Brexit that he is betraying the grassroots whom they represent is both misguided and arrogant. I must be amongst tens of thousands of his supporters who feel that, between a rock and hard place as the Labour party is, its leader has made the right and principled call. To go against the referendum result would not only have finished his personal reputation as a man of integrity but it would have set an extremely dangerous precedent available to anyone who wishes to oppose decisions they do not like. The assertion that socialism takes precedence over democracy shows a woeful ignorance of its history in the last century when it was clearly shown that socialism without democracy was a tragic nonsense. David Parker Address supplied Brexit is far worse than Trump I disagree with the comment in your editorial that the election of Trump was more momentous than the result of the referendum and the choice of a hard Brexit by the Government. Trump will be gone relatively soon, and may well not succeed in making any lasting changes but the Brexit referendum will affect all of Europe for the foreseeable future. Dale Thomson Winchester Trump cannot sugarcoat this it is a Muslim ban The ban on immigration from seven countries by President Trump is not only unconstitutional but utterly nonsensical. Trump claims that "This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. However, of those from the Muslim-majority countries of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, none were involved in the 9/11 attacks in the US. Indeed, it has been reported that 80 per cent of terrorist attacks in the US have been undertaken by US citizens. This a Muslim ban, nothing more and nothing less, truly contemptible and reprehensible. Trump should wake up to the mass protests and court rulings, and reverse this executive order. Alex Orr Edinburgh Why are we in the UK, as a Government and country, not railing against Donald Trump and his preposterous order to prevent people from mainly Muslim countries entry to the US? Theresa May should stand up and be counted as vociferously against it on our behalf. It is a travesty of people's right to freedom and should be fought at every step. Added to which, it gives Isis the best reason ever to attack America. Can no one stop him? Are we truly looking at the end of days? I despair. Fiona Coombes Clitheroe The treatment of racehorses is despicable RIP, Many Clouds, the former Grand National winner who collapsed and died of a suspected heart attack at Cheltenham this weekend. Of course, it didn't take a crystal ball to predict that he would die while racing, given that he'd been raced nearly to death at last year's Grand National and had needed oxygen and treatment immediately afterwards just to stay alive. His death will by no means be the last in the racing industry, which routinely pushes horses beyond the breaking point. No decent person should tolerate allowing animals to suffer and even pay the ultimate price for humans' cruel pursuits. Jennifer White Assistant Press Officer, Peta UK London Twitter is a breeding ground for idiocy Twitting would be a more apt word for using Twitter. Tweeting is too twee for the uses to which it is now put. Steve Ford Haydon Bridge Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inbox Get our free View from Westminster email Please enter a valid email address Please enter a valid email address SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy notice Thanks for signing up to the View from Westminster email {{ #verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ ^verifyErrors }}Something went wrong. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }} Donald Trumps travel ban on refugees and visitors from seven Muslim countries entering the US makes a terrorist attack on Americans at home or abroad more rather than less likely. It does so because one of the main purposes of al-Qaeda and Isis in carrying out atrocities is to provoke an overreaction directed against Muslim communities and states. Such communal punishments vastly increase sympathy for Salafi-jihadi movements among the 1.6 billion Muslims who make up a quarter of the worlds population. The Trump administration justifies its action by claiming that it is only following lessons learned from 9/11 and the destruction of the Twin Towers. But it has learned exactly the wrong lesson: the great success of Mohammed Atta and his eighteen hijackers was not on the day that they and 3,000 others died, but when President George W Bush responded by leading the US into wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that are still going on. Al-Qaeda and its clones had been a small organisation with perhaps as few as a thousand militants in south east Afghanistan and north west Pakistan. But thanks to Bushs calamitous decisions after 9/11, it now has tens of thousands of fighters, billions of dollars in funds and cells in dozens of countries. Few wars have failed so demonstrably or so badly as the war on terror. Isis and al-Qaeda activists are often supposed to be inspired simply by a demonic variant of Islam and this is certainly how Trump has described their motivation but in practice it was the excesses of the counter-terrorism apparatus such as torture and rendition, Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib which acted as the recruiting sergeant for the Salafi-jihadi movements. Rudy Giuliani explains how he helped Trump put together 'Muslim ban' legally The Trump administration is now sending a message to al-Qaeda and Isis that Washington is easily provoked into mindless and counter-productive repression targeting Muslims in general. Those affected so far are limited in number and about the last people likely to be engaged in terrorist plots. But the political impact is already immense. Salafi-jihadi leaders may be monsters of cruelty and bigotry, but they are not stupid. They will see that if Trump, unprovoked by any terrorist outrage, will act with such self-defeating vigour, then a few bombs or shootings directed at American targets will lead to more scatter-gun persecution of Muslims. Like leaders everywhere, Isis commanders will wonder how unhinged Trump really is. The banning order may in part be a high profile way of assuring Trump voters that his pledges on the campaign trail will be fulfilled. But demagogues tend to become the creatures of their own rhetoric and certainly Trumps words and actions will be presented as a sectarian declaration of war by many Muslims around the world. Isis will also see that by pressing their attacks they will deepen divisions within American society. Bush targeted Saddam Hussein and Iraq in response to 9/11, though it was self-evident that the Iraqi leader and his regime had no connection with it. It was notorious that 15 out of 19 of the hijackers were Saudis, Osama bin Laden was a Saudi and the money for the operation came from private Saudi donors, but Saudi Arabia was given a free pass regardless of strong evidence of its complicity. Much the same bizarre mistargeting of Muslim countries least likely to be sending terrorists to the US is happening in 2017 as happened in 2001. Though 9/11 is cited as an explanation for Trumps executive order, none of the countries whose citizens were involved (Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt and Lebanon) are facing any restrictions. The people who are being refused entry come from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Sudan, Yemen and Somalia. Since the main targets of al-Qaeda and Isis are Shia Muslims primarily in Iraq but also in other parts of the word, Iran is the last place which is likely to be their base. The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Show all 9 1 /9 The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the media White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer takes questions during the daily press briefing Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Union leaders applaud US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order withdrawing the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations during a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington DC. Mr Trump issued a presidential memorandum in January announcing that the US would withdraw from the trade deal Getty The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Mexico wall A US Border Patrol vehicle sits waiting for illegal immigrants at a fence opening near the US-Mexico border near McAllen, Texas. The number of incoming immigrants has surged ahead of the upcoming Presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, who has pledged to build a wall along the US-Mexico border. A signature campaign promise, Mr Trump outlined his intention to build a border wall on the US-Mexico border days after taking office Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and abortion US President Donald Trump signs an executive order as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus looks on in the Oval Office of the White House. Mr Trump reinstated a ban on American financial aide being granted to non-governmental organizations that provide abortion counseling, provide abortion referrals, or advocate for abortion access outside of the United States Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the Dakota Access pipeline Opponents of the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines hold a rally as they protest US President Donald Trump's executive orders advancing their construction, at Columbus Circle in New York. US President Donald Trump signed executive orders reviving the construction of two controversial oil pipelines, but said the projects would be subject to renegotiation Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and 'Obamacare' Nancy Pelosi who is the minority leader of the House of Representatives speaks beside House Democrats at an event to protect the Affordable Care Act in Los Angeles, California. US President Donald Trump's effort to make good on his campaign promise to repeal and replace the healthcare law failed when Republicans failed to get enough votes. Mr Trump has promised to revisit the matter Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Donald Trump and 'sanctuary cities' US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January threatening to pull funding for so-called "sanctuary cities" if they do not comply with federal immigration law AP The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and the travel ban US President Donald Trump has attempted twice to restrict travel into the United States from several predominantly Muslim countries. The first attempt, in February, was met with swift opposition from protesters who flocked to airports around the country. That travel ban was later blocked by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The second ban was blocked by a federal judge a day before it was scheduled to be implemented in mid-March SANDY HUFFAKER/AFP/Getty Images The controversial orders Donald Trump has already issued Trump and climate change US President Donald Trump sought to dismantle several of his predecessor's actions on climate change in March. His order instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to reevaluate the Clean Power Plan, which would cap power plant emissions Shannon Stapleton/Reuters Since Isiss great victories in 2014 when it captured Mosul and conquered a vast area in Iraq and Syria, it has been beaten back by a myriad of enemies. Though it is fighting back hard, its eventual defeat has seemed inevitable, but with Trump fuelling the sectarian war between Muslims and non-Muslims which Isis and al-Qaeda always wanted to wage, their prospects look brighter today than they have for a long time. Alleged former IRA leader Thomas Murphy has lost his appeal against being jailed for tax evasion Alleged former IRA leader Thomas "Slab" Murphy's appeal against being jailed for tax evasion has been dismissed. The prominent republican, 67, was found guilty of nine charges at the non-jury Special Criminal Court in Dublin last year and imprisoned for 18 months. In November, he launched a three-day bid to overturn the verdict in the Court of Appeal. Lawyers for the bachelor farmer claimed he had been unfairly jailed because of a misunderstanding by prosecutors, arguing he was being pursued for taxes already paid by others in his family. Murphy, from Ballybinaby, Hackballscross, Co Louth, on the border with Northern Ireland, was found to owe the Irish exchequer taxes, penalties and interest of almost 190,000 euro for tax dodging from 1996 to 2004. He was charged with knowingly and wilfully failing to make tax returns and doing so without reasonable excuses. The trial court found he did not furnish Ireland's Revenue authorities with a return of income, profits or gains or the sources of them over the period but received 100,000 euro in farm grants and paid out 300,000 euro to rent land. Murphy sought to overturn his conviction on 53 grounds of appeal. The Court of Appeal said the scale of the written submissions in the case was daunting, extending to more than 350 pages from Murphy and over 100 pages from the Director of Public Prosecutions. Mr Justice Sean Ryan, President of the Court of Appeal, said it was not tasked with a reconsideration of the entire trial. But it essentially had to consider if the Special Criminal Court was entitled to find Murphy guilty, whether it was a satisfactory judgment and whether there was any reasonable doubt in the case. In a 94-page ruling, Mr Justice Ryan said the accused could be in no doubt as to the reasons that led the Special Criminal Court to its conclusions. The Court of Appeal had no difficulty with the reasoning of the ruling, which, he said, reflected the fundamental simplicity of the issue on the "counts in the indictment, the strength of the prosecution case and the essentially hypothetical nature of the defence." He concluded: "The court accordingly dismisses the appeal against conviction." Ireland has backed Theresa May's goal of securing a "friction-free" trading relationship with the European Union after Brexit. Taoiseach Enda Kenny said helping the UK Prime Minister agree a deal to keep UK-EU trade as close as possible would be an "absolute priority" for Ireland ahead of Brexit negotiations. Setting out her strategy earlier this month, Mrs May strongly hinted that Britain could leave the European customs union (CU), stating she wanted "frictionless" cross-border trade, but had an "open mind" on whether it should be done through associate membership or a new agreement. Speaking after talks with the PM in Dublin, Mr Kenny echoed her language, suggesting he would support the strategy during divorce talks. "Our two governments are agreed that a close and friction-free economic and trading relationship between the Untied Kingdom and the European Union, including Ireland, is in our very best interests," he told a press conference. "And as the UK prepares for its formal notification under Article 50, we want to see that these deep trading ties between our two countries are recognised and facilitated. "That will continue to be an absolute priority for my government, not just in our discussions with the British Government, but also with our EU partners as we prepare for the negotiation process on the EU side of the table." Both Mr Kenny and Mrs May have insisted they do not want to see a return to the "border of the past" between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. There have been suggestions that leaving the tariff-free customs union could imperil the soft border and see the reintroduction of customs checks and controls unless an agreement can be reached. Mrs May said staying fully in the customs union would leave the UK unable to agree free trade deals with other countries from around the world, which she is aiming to do. But she said she was working towards maintaining the border rules currently in place and stressed that Britain and Ireland had open borders "long before either of us were members of the European Union". "We have of course said we do not want to see a return to the border of the past - that isn't just a phrase, actually it symbolises the sort of seamless, frictionless border that we want to see in the future," the PM said. "Of course there are elements of full membership of the customs union that would restrict our ability to trade and do trade agreements with other parts of the world. "But I believe, and this is what we are working on, that we need to find a solution which enables us to have as seamless and frictionless a border as possible between Northern Ireland and Ireland so that we can continue to see the trade, the everyday movements, that we have seen up to now. "And of course we also want to ensure that we carry on with the Common Travel Area, which was in existence long before either of us were members of the European Union or its predecessors." Dublin Airport is among the few in the world that offer pre-clearance by US immigration officials Enda Kenny has ordered a "complete review" of a special agreement with the US for air passengers leaving Ireland amid claims Donald Trump's travel ban could be illegal. Dublin and Shannon airports are among the few in the world that offer pre-clearance by US immigration officials, since a deal between the countries in 2008. Airport authorities have confirmed the US president's travel ban on citizens from seven mainly-Muslim countries - Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen - is being implemented by US officials in Ireland. Mr Kenny said he does not agree with the ban and has ordered a review of the almost decade-old agreement. "In respect of the policy introduced by the American government, I disagree with it," he told a press conference. "I will obviously say that to the (US) president and vice president when I meet with them." Mr Kenny added: "I have asked for a complete review now of the pre-clearance facilities here in Ireland, in respect of the three departments dealing with this, so we can be absolutely clear about the importance of it." The Taoiseach's announcement follows warnings from one of his own ministers that implementing the travel ban at Irish airports could be illegal. Katherine Zappone, children's minister, had written to Mr Kenny seeking an investigation into its operation. She suggested it "may be unlawful" because the US-Ireland pre-clearance agreement upholds the rights of people under Irish law. It is understood Ms Zappone is concerned that the implementation of the ban on Irish soil could amount to nationality and religion-based discrimination. She also said Ireland has a moral obligation to "stand with our fellow human beings against discrimination of this kind". Speculation is mounting that more independent government ministers in the Fine Gael-led coalition will back Ms Zappone's stance at a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday. Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams has also written to the Taoiseach urging him not to "allow Irish airports to enforce this fundamentally unjust order". A joint statement from five human rights organisations - including Amnesty, the Irish Council of Civil Liberties and the Irish Refugee Council - said the pre-clearance agreement means gardai and immigration officials may be helping implement Mr Trump's travel ban. They have demanded an urgent review of the system including its suspension if a person's rights under Irish and EU law are under threat. "This executive order is a barely concealed attempt to discriminate on nationality and religious grounds, itself a gross violation of freely accepted international human rights obligations," the statement said. Junior minister John Halligan said Mr Trump is "close to being a fascist"' and has backed calls for Mr Kenny to snub the annual invite to the White House for the traditional gifting of a bowl of shamrock to the US president on St Patrick's Day. Labour leader Brendan Howlin and Green Party chief Eamon Ryan have also urged a boycott of the March 17 event. But Mr Kenny said he will travel to Washington because it is "more important now than ever before to speak face-to-face to the American president." The Taoiseach said he would be putting Ireland's case to the president on a number of issues, including his disapproval of the travel ban. The four are being detained at several stations under section four of the Criminal Justice Act Four men have been arrested over the murder of a man following a gun attack on a house and a car chase. Neil Reilly, in his thirties, was found near his home on the edge of the Glebe estate in the Esker area of Lucan, west Dublin, in the early hours of January 18. He had been beaten and stabbed, suffering a number of slash wounds, and there were also reports he was hit by one of the cars involved in the chase. Gardai said f our men, aged from their late teens to early fifties, were arrested in the Dublin area in connection with the killing and were being detained at several stations under section four of the Criminal Justice Act. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 Trend: Azerbaijans economy was developing, and the main tasks have been fulfilled, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said. The president was speaking in Baku Jan. 30 at a conference dedicated to the results of implementing the "The State Program on socio-economic development of the regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan in 2014-2018." Ilham Aliyev added that the main indicators of Azerbaijans economy are positive. Azerbaijans agriculture sphere grew by 2.6 percent, the countrys non-oil industry - by 5 percent, despite the fact that the global oil price fell by 3-4 times, he said. We were able to ensure this development due to work carried out over the preceding years and deep reforms implemented in 2016. Of course the ongoing global economic and financial crisis negatively affected our work as well, but I believe that Azerbaijan managed to get out of such a hard situation with minimal losses in comparison with other countries, Ilham Aliyev said. More than 100,000 permanent jobs were created last year. This process has been going on since 2004. The president went on to say that Azerbaijan was able to maintain the currency reserves of the country's State Oil Fund. "I think this is very significant," he said. "The majority of oil-rich countries spent a part of their currency reserves, while we tried to save, and succeeded. We are going to need our currency reserves for today, tomorrow, and these reserves are a factor that strengthens our economic opportunities, economic independence in general, President Aliyev said. Ilham Aliyev went on to add authoritative international economic institutions also highly assessed the work carried out by Azerbaijan in 2016. The biggest global non-governmental economic institution among them - the Davos World Economic Forum, which unites all the world leaders, as well as worlds political and economic elite, - once again gave a positive outcome in its report on Azerbaijan, he said. Thus, in terms of competitiveness of countries, Azerbaijan has stepped up, settling for 37th place, he said. According to another indicator of inclusive development among the developing countries, these estimates bring together about 80 developing countries, and Azerbaijan shares first and second places in this rating. This is the assessment given to our work by the leading international economic institutions. Of course, we are doing our work not for the rating, but naturally, when such opinions are voiced, this pleases us even more, and at the same time, it is a kind of a signal to all financial structures in the world, Ilham Aliyev said. So today its not a problem for Azerbaijan to get a loan for any project. Even our current policy is that we are not especially prone to attracting foreign loans. Azerbaijani president noted that from now on, it is necessary to seek to have the work done using the internal capabilities, because the growth of external debt is not a positive factor. In Azerbaijan, this indicator stands at a very good level, at about 20 percent, he said. This is a higher figure compared to previous years, and the reason is the devaluation of the manat. During the previous periods, our foreign debt didnt exceed 10 percent. Nowadays, this is also an acceptable level, but we must try so that this figure wouldnt grow, but on the contrary, would decrease. In order to reduce the external debt, we must take foreign loans with utmost care, Ilham Aliyev said. But we can take foreign loans for projects of strategic importance for Azerbaijan. In short, I believe the overall economic development in 2016 should also be positively assessed. In particular, the dynamics of the work carried out in the countrys districts was also preserved, he said. Much work was done in Azerbaijans districts last year, he added. Social and economic development of the districts and implementation of state programs have changed the image of our districts. The Azerbaijani president reminded that todays conference is the 14th in a row. It has been 14 years already that in the beginning of each year we evaluate the work done, identify shortages and compile an action plan for the future, he said. This year too we are holding this meeting, remaining true to this tradition. He expressed hope that the discussions to be held at the conference will make it possible to form an opinion about the work to be additionally implemented in 2017. While compiling the regional development programs we obtained conclusions from districts and the third state program, which is being discussed by us today, was drawn up and adopted in 2014 based on the proposals received and considering the strategic directions of the country, Ilham Aliyev added. President Aliyev said the programs are aimed at solving all the existing problems, the social issues worrying people. These programs are very concrete, and specific objectives are set in them, he added. Ilham Aliyev noted that both the first and the second programs were successfully implemented, expressing confidence that the result of implementation of the third program will be the same. The president said the adoption of the state program in 2014 is a historic event, because the development of Azerbaijani districts, diversification of the countrys economy, the implemented measures and infrastructure projects have created todays reality. If we hadnt adopted the program on my initiative at that time, of course, we wouldnt have achieved todays success in the districts, Ilham Aliyev said. All our districts and cities have become well-maintained, beautiful, he said. Our main cities Baku, Ganja, Sumgait delight the eye, they are a kind of example for the world. Improvement work was carried out in all our cities and major infrastructure projects were realized. This contributes to todays dynamic development of Azerbaijan, as well as the effective use of these opportunities by business structures, said Ilham Aliyev. Efforts to remove tariffs costing EU farmers up to 1bln per year have stalled in Brussels, according to a recent update by the Minister for Agriculture, Michael Creed. The Irish Government has been lobbied heavily by IFA on the issue and it commissioned IFPRI (International Food Policy Research Institute) report which showed a failure of competition in the European fertiliser market, costing farmers up to 1bn. The IFA says the removal of the tariffs and duties on EU fertiliser imports, which would deliver 50 to 70m in annual savings to Irish farmers According to Minister Creed, the matter of reducing fertiliser costs throughout the EU gained traction in early 2016 due to the ongoing market difficulties being experienced by farmers across the dairy, pigmeat and fruit and vegetable sectors. I have long believed that the elimination of fertiliser tariffs and anti-dumping duties is something that could help farmers reduce their input costs and in this context I asked the Commission to consider a temporary suspension of customs tariffs and anti-dumping duties on fertilisers in the lead up to the Council of Agriculture Ministers in March last year, he said. Minister Creed says this is something that he actively pursued at Council throughout 2016, both with the Commission and in consultation with my Council colleagues, and he says in fact raised again at Council of Agriculture Ministers last week when he asked the Commission to address the significant overpricing of fertilisers in the EU brought about by the imposition of anti-dumping duties on imports. The Minister said Commissioner Hogan acknowledged the desirability of bringing about lower prices, but indicated that, despite considerable efforts on his part both with other Member States and internally within the Commission, this is proving very difficult to achieve. Delays in the issuing of key environment scheme payments to thousands of farmers, has reached boiling point with a host of farm protests set to take place today and tomorrow. Today, ICSA staged a protest at the Department of Agriculture, Johnstown Castle, Co Wexford to highlight the mounting anger among farmers over extended delays with payments for the GLAS environment scheme. ICSA rural development chairman Seamus Sherlock said ICSA has decided to take this stand to show solidarity with farmers who have been waiting patiently for payment and suffering the consequences of doing without. That patience has now run out. ICSA president Patrick Kent said it was acknowledged by the department that the delays are imposing hardship to those who have yet to receive payment and that they will do their utmost to clear the backlog as soon as possible. "It was also confirmed to ICSA that a further 1,200 farmers will be paid today." Meanwhile, IFA president Joe Healy will lead an IFA protest outside the Department of Agriculture, in Dublin tomorrow (Tuesday) on behalf of farmers who have yet to be paid long overdue GLAS Agri-Environment Scheme payments, which are due since October 2016. And, the national chairman of the Irish Natura & Hill Farmers Association (INHFA) Vincent Roddy has said "enough is enough" and that the association will start to host a number of protests from tomorrow. This comes in response to the fact that the Minister for Agriculture, Michael Creed has failed to heed the warnings coming from the INHFA that action would be taken if the problems within his Department to issue GLAS payments to desperate farmers wasn't sorted out. "We've had enough of being treated as second class citizens and putting up with broken promises", continued Roddy, "from this Minister who gave assurances that farmers would be paid 85pc of their GLAS money before Christmas". The INHFA believe that it's unacceptable that farmers should be penalised for the Departments obvious inability to sort out its own internal inefficiencies. Roddy said "that if necessary, experts in IT systems must be outsourced to sort out this mess, farmers cannot wait any longer for their wages, what other sector in Irish society would put up with this." "We intend to keep our promise and are staging a number of protests to highlight this matter beginning on Tuesday, January 31 outside Davitt House, the Department's headquarters, Castlebar, Co. Mayo". The protest will start at 12pm and run for the afternoon. The 2016 GLAS payments underway since December 2016 represent the first full year payment schedule under the GLAS scheme. To date 27,400 of the 37,500 participants in the scheme have received 85% of their payment totalling almost 100 million. In a recent statement Minister Creed said he is keen to provide clarity to the almost 10,000 farmers still awaiting payment at this stage. Furthermore, he said in order to ensure outstanding payments are issued without delay, all resources from an IT and administrative perspective are being directed towards resolving the outstanding issues. The Minister says he understands and regrets the difficulty this uncertainty will cause for farmers involved and is being updated on a continuous basis by his officials on progress. A decision on a 2017 National Reserve for young farmers and new entrant priority categories is imminent with farm organisations and the Department set to meet in the coming weeks on the issue. Speaking ahead of the upcoming, Macra na Feirme National President Sean Finan said, having consulted with young farmers across the country we have identified a clear need for a 2017 National Reserve. Finan also says Macra believe it have identified a mechanism to fund it which would avoid a linear cut to all farmers direct payments. This would involve distributing unused funds from the young farmers top up and recouping them to create a fund for a 2017 National Reserve for the priority categories of new entrants and young farmers," he said. Finan said Macra na Feirme and young farmers are very clear that we have to get away from the stop- start nature of young farmer schemes and a 2017 National Reserve is vitally important for young farmers and their successful futures in the industry. "Funding allocated to young farmer schemes should remain with young farmers. We look forward to engaging with Agriculture Minister Michael Creed, Department of Agriculture officials and the other farm organisations to discuss the finer detail." In 2015 the National Reserve fund was based on a 3% cut to the Basic Payment Scheme financial ceiling and provided some 24 million in funding which was the maximum financing rate available under the relevant EU Regulations. Some 6,300 farmers received an allocation of entitlements under the 2015 National Reserve. There was no National Reserve in 2016 as all available funding had been utilised under the 2015 scheme. In order to provide for a National Reserve in 2017 funding is required to replenish the Reserve. EU Regulations governing the scheme provide that funding for the replenishment of the National Reserve may be obtained by means of surrender of entitlements that remain unused by farmers for two consecutive years and by claw-back derived following the sale of entitlements without land. It is envisaged that funding derived from these two sources in 2017 will be very limited. The Regulations also provide for the application of a linear cut to the value of all farmers entitlements to replenish the National Reserve. Under the National Reserve priority access for an allocation of entitlements is given to the two mandatory categories of young farmer and new entrant to farming. The Minister for Agriculture Michael Creed has said decisions in relation to the National Reserve in 2017 will be made once the position on potential funding has been established. Consultation between Department officials and the Direct Payments Advisory Committee comprising members of the main farming organisations, agricultural education and farm advisory bodies takes place annually as part of the decision making process for the National Reserve. Consultation in relation to the 2017 Reserve is due to take place shortly. The last two years has seen consumers in France switching to home-produced lamb at the expense of imported product, according to an analysis by the AHDB in the UK. It says this development has been influenced by what it calls the 'renationalisation' of French consumers and the fact that the retail sector has also committed to increased domestic sourcing. "The 2015 protests by French farmers over imported food have contributed to this," it said. However, the AHDB also cites that the long-term decline in consumption has continued, it has averaged 3pc per annum during the current decade. "Lamb continues to suffer from its high price relative to other mainstream meats, that it is not widely consumed by younger age groups, and the ongoing difficult economic situation," it said. France imported some 16,000t of lamb from Ireland last year down substantially from the heady days of the mid-noughties when the French market took well over 30,000t annually. The switch to the preference for domestic lamb has been helped by some stability in French production in the last three years, the AHDB analysis notes. It had previously been in long-term decline. Production has been edging up since 2014, and, in 2016, data for January-November indicates a rise of 3pc in both lamb and total sheep meat production. The proportion of home-produced sheep meat consumed had been stable at 42pc in the 2012 to 2014 period, but it has risen to an estimated 47pc in 2016. As a result, the gap between consumption of imported lamb over domestic product has been narrowing. There are also indications that the price premium for home-produced lamb over imported lamb has widened. According to the AHDB, based on wholesale prices for grade R carcases at Rungis market, the premium averaged 0.80 per kg in the year 2014 but by 2016 it had increased to 1.50. A young priest from Mullingar parish has been out meeting local farmers recently, on a pretty unique mission Fr Robert McGivney was visiting a farming family in his parish recently when they decided to bless the new born lambs on the farm. The priest has a farming background himself and says that farming is a very important sector in his parish. The people I deal with on a daily basis are taking about calving and lambing. Its coming up to a busy time of the year for farmers and its important to be out with them. "I became friendly with the Fagan family following a family bereavement and Ive been out to visit a number of times. They're lovely people. "On my most recent visit we decided a blessing ceremony for the lambs and the farm would be a nice." "Its a busy time of the year for farmers and its important the church recognises the vital work that farmers do. We need to be present in the community. "The Pope recently said priests should be like shepherds living with the smell of sheep." "While he probably didnt mean for us to take this literally, it's an important message priests must take on board," he said. "Religion is not something abstract - it's real life." Uber drivers are confined to strict terms and conditions and, if they fail to comply in time, they will find themselves timed out of the app. Stock photo Technological advances have led to the emergence of the so-called 'gig economy' - an environment in which temporary positions are the norm and organisations contract with individuals, usually via apps, for short-term engagements. Does this modern business phenomenon unleash innovation into the market place or reduce employment rights? Uber Working in the gig economy involves being hired by a company on a job-by-job basis and often being subject to similar rules to that of an employee, without any of the job security. Many were unaware of this new phrase until the landmark ruling in a recent UK Employment Tribunal decision, Aslam, Farrar and Others v Uber. At the centre of this case was the question of whether Uber controls and subordinates its drivers to an extent that makes them 'workers'. James Farrar, an Irish man, was one of the two claimants in the significant legal victory. He described working for Uber as "brutal" and alleged that if something went wrong, he was very much on his own. Uber argued that it was not a transport business but a platform to connect passengers with drivers. It described itself as "a mosaic of 30,000 small businesses linked by a common platform", a description the tribunal rejected as "faintly ridiculous". Uber drivers are confined to strict terms and conditions and, if they fail to comply in time, they will find themselves timed out of the app. Drivers can be "removed from the platform" for low passenger rides or low passenger ratings and the penalties are communicated to them via their smartphones. The ultimate penalty is "deactivation". Furthermore, drivers cannot set their fares, nor are they allowed to contact passengers directly. The 'worker' status sits inbetween an employee and an independent contract (the concept does not yet exist in Ireland). It was held that the two drivers were 'workers' and, therefore, under the Employment Rights Act 1996 they are entitled to rights such as pension contributions, minimum wage, paid annual leave and rest breaks. This decision was based on the fact drivers "do not and cannot negotiate with passengers" and they are "offered and accept trips based on Uber's strict terms". This decision leaves Uber exposed to claims from its 40,000 drivers in the UK and it is planning an appeal. CitySprint A similar result arose in a further UK ruling concerning a bike courier for CitySprint. Maggie Dewhurst cycled up to 75km a day making deliveries in London. She told the tribunal she feared her work would deplete if she "didn't do as she was told". The tribunal found Ms Dewhurst was a 'worker' rather than self-employed. The British government has responded by commissioning a review of modern working practices, while the European Parliament has voted to back a report calling for better worker protections in the gig economy. Although this isn't binding, it does present a real threat to companies such as Uber. However, not all gig-economy workers are unhappy. Those who benefit most are those who do not rely on this work as their primary source of income. Ireland So what does this mean for Ireland? The decisions are unlikely to affect those working in the taxi industry, as current Government policy restricts apps like Uber contacting anyone other than registered taxi drivers and chauffeur-driven cars. However, it may affect other companies such as Deliveroo (an app which delivers restaurant food straight to your door) and, currently, a UK union is pushing for a pay deal for its Deliveroo 'riders'. Unlike the UK, Ireland has only two categories of employment status: independent contractors and employees. Other countries such as Germany, Canada, France and Italy have all introduced a similar third category of 'worker'. If Ireland was to introduce this hybrid status it could afford those working in the gig-economy some protection. There would need to be clear guidance in order for someone to be considered a 'worker'. Catherine O'Flynn is a partner in William Fry's employment and benefits department UK-based buyers largely returning Irish emigrants who left here in the 1980s or after the recent economic crash had been making up to one-in-five sales in some counties, particularly those on the Border and in popular tourist areas The Irish property market is being hit increasingly hard by Brexit, with estate agents all over the country reporting an average fall-off in demand by one-third from across the water. UK-based buyers - largely returning Irish emigrants who left here in the 1980s or after the recent economic crash - had been making up to one-in-five sales in some counties, particularly those on the Border and in popular tourist areas. Most have properties to sell in Britain and have lost purchasing power thanks to the difference in sterling. But at the same time, overall overseas enquiries for Irish properties are up, according to the Real Estate Alliance (REA), which estimates that close to one-in-five Irish property sales (18pc) nationally is currently made to someone who is based abroad. REA, which represents more than 50 property firms nationally, estimates that property enquiries from the UK have fallen by 32pc compared with the same period last year. "Our agents report that enquiries from the UK have dipped by a third since the Brexit vote, and the attendant fall in the value of sterling against the euro," it said. The Brexit impact is being felt most in Border counties with holiday homes. Agent Michael McElhinney of Bundoran said that sterling buyers previously accounted for half of all properties sold. "The exchange rate drop has resulted in reduced enquiries by about 30pc and equivalent sales," he said. "Brexit has had a negative effect on the market and brought in uncertainty." Despite the fall-off, UK buyers still account for 37pc of all overseas-based sales here. Meanwhile 19.6pc are now coming from the US, 18pc from Australia, 15pc from mainland Europe and 11pc from other locations - especially Canada. "A total of 78pc of our members report an increase in enquiries from overseas overall in the last year, with the average agent seeing a 22pc rise in calls from outside Ireland," McElhinney said. In contrast to the fall in British-based buyers, the Trump factor and a strong dollar is boosting enquiries for Irish properties from parties based in the USA. Almost one-in-five of overseas enquiries about Irish property is now coming from the United States, from almost nothing two years ago, according to the Real Estate Alliance nationwide survey. Eamonn Spratt, chairman of the Real Estate Alliance, said: "Property buyers from the US are increasingly securing homes and investment properties in Ireland, buoyed by a strong dollar and the lure of a resurgent economy for emigrants." The surge in demand from American-based parties has spurred the REA to organise an exhibition of Irish property for sale in Boston which will take place at the Lenox Hotel on March 23. "The average house price in the US in November 2016 was $365,200 (341,739), compared to our Average House Price survey national value of $216,856 (202,926), so there is obvious value for American buyers in Ireland," said Mr Spratt. "But the biggest increase in calls came from Irish emigrants planning to return from Australia, a tally which increased from 11pc of overseas based enquiries in 2015 to 18pc in 2016. "The resurgent economy is having a positive effect on the market with the number of overseas buyers enquiring about moving to live and work in Ireland rising by 9pc over the past year." Exactly 40pc of sales to overseas purchasers are for properties valued above 200,000 - a rise of 9pc on the 2015 figure. The biggest change in the market has been the drop of 25pc in sales of properties below 100,000, said Mr Spratt. "This reflects the decline in stocks of excess housing for under six figures in rural counties." Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 Trend: Over the past 24 hours, Armenias Armed Forces have 7 times violated the ceasefire along the line of contact between Azerbaijani and Armenian troops, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said Jan. 30. The Azerbaijani army positions located in Alibayli, Kokhanebi villages of the Tovuz district underwent fire from the Armenian army positions located in Aygepar, Chinari villages of Armenias Berd district. The Azerbaijani army positions were also shelled from the Armenian positions located near the Armenian-occupied nameless heights of the Fuzuli district of Azerbaijan. The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts. The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding districts. Pony Express Couriers have made what is being claimed as Irelands first drone delivery. The delivery took place on Saturday evening in Dun Laoghaire. The Irish courier firm flew a DJI Inspire 1 drone 200 metres from the shore to a boat moored in the harbour. The package it delivered was a 250-gram box of medical supplies, taking took two minutes to complete. The company obtained clearance from the Irish Aviation Authority to make the delivery, but executives say that it may be a while before widespread commercial drone delivery services are available in Ireland. The delivery of low value, urgent items such as takeaway food, especially to remote rural areas is highly likely, said Audrey Browne, operations manager of Pony Express. But important city deliveries such as the majority of our same-day express services could not be trusted to drones yet as the possibility of interception, loss or damage would be too great. When parcel delivery by drone can be proven to work safely in an urban context, then we will reevaluate the situation, but for now we will continue offering delivery by the traditional methods of bicycles, motorbikes, vans and trucks. In practice, drone deliveries look to be some way off, not least because of the regulatory hurdles to be overcome. To complete a two-minute parcel delivery flight, Pony Express Couriers had to apply for permission from the IAA weeks in advance. It also had to inform Dublin Airport of its plans because of restricted airspace rules around Dublin. A spokeswoman said that the company would have to repeat the exhaustive measures for each individual delivery flight. The IAA were exceptionally good to us, said Paula Moore, an executive with Pony Express Couriers. But you need very exact permission and there are lots of forms and other things to be done. So we arent planning on offering the service just yet. Nevertheless, we want to be at the front of innovation in the sector. And we wanted the first drone delivery flight to be completed by an Irish firm rather than a multinational delivery firm. I get up fairly early in the morning, at 6.30am. I try not to disturb the rest of the house. I shower and dress. Each Monday and Friday, I cross my courtyard here in River House, west Cork. I live a number of miles outside Skibbereen. It's quiet and peaceful, and right by the water. It's very beautiful. If it's Australia, I teach at 7am, and if I'm teaching Singapore, it's 8am. Then I plug in and teach them live. I'm very much practising what I preach. I grab myself a coffee. I do a two-hour seminar - from what was, at one point, my garage - to various places in the world. I lecture to students about the role of cinema in society. I'm looking at a very large screen, like a wide-screen TV, and I can see my students sitting there. I can interact with them, and I then send them clips from the movies. They are clips from my own movies - like The Mission, Chariots of Fire and others. I'm using them to illustrate various aspects of film-making. Sometimes I show them the things that I got wrong, and I even have a trick of showing them what they would have been like if I hadn't made that mistake. I've been doing these seminars for five years. Putting the technology together was a complex operation, and that had to be matched at the other end, but now it's absolutely seamless. I don't for one second feel that I'm not with them. They are on a big screen, and I'm on a huge screen at their end. When I started doing this, it was very unusual, and I now think it's a lot more usual. Yes, it means that people don't have to leave home to work, but more importantly, it means that people can be beamed in who would not normally be teaching that sort of course at that university. I'm available to five different universities around the world where, under normal circumstances, I couldn't possibly teach. Then I come back and have some breakfast. I've been having fried tomatoes on toast for many years. Then I check my emails. I've got a schedule that the office has prepared for me. If it's a Monday, I have a brief lunch here, and then I drive up to Cork Airport and I catch the 4pm flight to London. I know them all at the airport, and I've cut the timings down. I have a little file I put aside, which is work I'm going to do during the journey. It gives me a nice quiet time to deal with things. The moment I leave the house, I'm working on my iPad. Had I had the availability of the iPad throughout the whole of my career, I think I could have been 25pc more productive. It's the perfect tool. I've always liked composing my own letters. It keeps me in touch. If I'm voting at the House of Lords, I'll have dinner there, otherwise I'll normally have a dinner set up with somebody. The House of Lords is an enormously polite place. The issues that we get to deal with are significant, and we have to approve or change every piece of legislation that comes through. I've got three areas of expertise - education, media and the environment. You don't have to enter the debates. Sometimes you can just sit and listen. For my three London days, I usually have breakfast, lunch and dinner with different people. It's a mixture of politicians, people I'm working with and catching up with friends. It's full-on. Then I'm out of there on Thursday afternoon and back to west Cork. I quite like the mix of city life and country life. Yes, I could be taking it easy, but the idea of retirement is anathema to me. I don't do anything that I don't enjoy. Fifteen years ago, I promised myself that I didn't mind working every hour that God sends me, but I didn't want to work with people I didn't like. That has been my criterion. Another part of my working life is being the Irish Digital Champion. Pat Rabbitte asked me to do it when he was the minister for communications. Back then, I was already lecturing from home, and arguing that it was necessary for Ireland to become a connected nation. Every six weeks, I spend three days in Dublin doing a variety of things that the department has set up for me. It could be seminars or discussions. If you go way back, you will find that every single technological development has had some sort of criticism. Aristotle and Plato hated writing, because they thought it ruined memory. And when I was young, they said that television was ruining eyesight and their lives. If you want to use it well, the internet is a fantastic tool, and if you want to piss your life away only playing video games, then, yeah, it is a massive distraction. It's up to the individual. I feel very passionately about the power of technology. Being elderly in the modern world, as opposed to 50 years ago, is an exercise in loneliness for many people, but technology destroys distance. Years ago, people going off to Australia would wave goodbye at Cork harbour, thinking that they'd never see their family again. Today, a grandmother can speak to her grandson every day. Here in west Cork, the Ludgate Hub is a phenomenon. Years ago, if you grew up here, you had to go to Dublin or abroad to create a life for yourself, but now, as a result of the [1,000Mb] broadband here, people have a real choice. It's making the world more local, and offering local and rural communities exactly the same employment opportunities we traditionally thought of as only existing in cities. That's a big plus. If I'm in London, I start my day with an email to my wife, Patsy, telling her I'm up, and asking how she is. Then last thing at night, I tell her, by email again, what sort of day I've had, and I ask about her day. Sometimes she'll send some images of the dogs. This makes me feel in touch. But above all, she writes beautifully, and is very funny. It's so much more than a phone call. I try to be in bed by 11pm. I like my life enormously. I live in a very warm, comfortable environment, with fantastic friends and great family. What more could you ask for? In conversation with Ciara Dwyer Donald Trump's press secretary Sean Spicer has retweeted a satirical Onion article saying he provides 'robust misinformation'. On Saturday night, Sean Spicer retweeted a video from satirical news site the Onion. If you're not aware, the Onion is a mock news site which parodies news stories. It's been around since 1988 and some of its articles include Mom Thinks You'd Enjoy Restaurant She Can't Remember The Name of Right Now and CIA Realises Its Been Using Black Highlighters All These Years." So, you know, not real news. Alternative news, if you will. Over the weekend, it published a video which listed "Five Things To Know About Sean Spicer", which the White House press secretary then retweeted along with the caption "You nailed it." The video says that Spicers role in the Trump administration will be to provide the American public with robust and clearly articulated misinformation. The videos things to know also include Spicers former role as a senior correspondent for NPR (untrue), his defensive speaking style (could be true), and praises him for "nailing the pocket square on his suit jacket. Thing-to-know number four is whether or not Spicer has ever knowingly lied to the press. Ones own mental activity is the only unquestionable fact of ones experience, the Onion explains in its answer. It is unclear whether Spicer was attempting to get in on the joke by tweeting the satirical article, or whether he simply misread "misinformation." Last week, Spicer was called out on Twitter for tweeting what appeared to be a password code (or gibberish) twice. @mrDaveKrumholtz @seanspicer @TheOnion I'm convinced these people are playing the most elaborae practical joke in history. John Fud Zavacki (@fudloe) January 29, 2017 *whispers* did @seanspicer realize @TheOnion is a satirical website or is he being sarcastic...why is the press secretary so bad at twitter Rachel (@rachela_94) January 29, 2017 @rachela_94 @seanspicer @TheOnion Trump may need to give him lessons on how to Twitter bigly Sheri Young (@Saethella) January 29, 2017 @rachela_94 @seanspicer @TheOnion don't think he knows the difference between the words information & misinformation or truth & lie... Barbara Taylor (@BarbaraPTaylor) January 29, 2017 .@seanspicer @TheOnion I cannot tell the difference between real life and satire anymore. I guess you can't either. Maris Kreizman (@mariskreizman) January 29, 2017 @seanspicer how many pieces of gum did you swallow today? pic.twitter.com/rvR8xhhJvF Daniel Johnson-Kim (@djjkim) January 29, 2017 18 hours on, Sean Spicer's Onion tweet is still there. Richie McCormack (@RichieMcCormack) January 29, 2017 Sean Spicer, White House Press Secretary, is retweeting--THE ONION! What is happening!!?? Who are these people?!?! https://t.co/hyi4eSNaQG Misha Collins (@mishacollins) January 30, 2017 FYI: "senior administration official" is Sean Spicer, the press secretary who retweeted an Onion article about his own habit of lying. https://t.co/0NLmS4R9Mv Heidi N Moore (@moorehn) January 30, 2017 SEAN SPICER THINKS THE ONION WROTE A GENUINE ARTICLE ABOUT HIM BEING ARTICULATE. And for 2 blessed minutes everything makes perfect sense. Ana Lily Amirpour (@Lilyinapad) January 29, 2017 Video of the Day Thalia Heffernan dancing with partner Curtis Pritchard, amid rumours she's dating dancer Ryan McShane, during the Second live show of RTEs Dancing with the Stars. Photo: Kyran O'Brien Thalia Heffernan has responded to the rumours that she's danced her way into the heart of one of the professionals on Dancing With The Stars. The model was the second contestant to be voted off the RTE show as she received the lowest score in the public vote. She described it as "the most amazing thing Ive ever done in my life" and looked emotional as she and partner Curtis Pritchard got the bad news. Her exit from the show may come as a double blow for Thalia as the Herald revealed last week that the 21-year-old has reportedly hooked up with Ryan McShane (23), who's partnered with Red Rock's Denise McCormack on the show. Expand Expand Previous Next Close Thalia Heffernan and Curtis Pritchard who were eliminated. Photo: Kyran OBrien Thalia Heffernan & Curtis Pritchard in 2017 / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Thalia Heffernan and Curtis Pritchard who were eliminated. Photo: Kyran OBrien Speaking to the Ryan Tubridy Show on RTE Radio One this morning, Thalia responded to the romance rumours. "I think I'll remain silent on that matter to be honest, just for the sake of it," she said. Expand Close Denise McCormack during the Dancing with the Stars live performance with partner Ryan McShane, who is reportedly dating Thalia Heffernan. Photo: Kobpix / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Denise McCormack during the Dancing with the Stars live performance with partner Ryan McShane, who is reportedly dating Thalia Heffernan. Photo: Kobpix I've got to keep people guessing, you know. I'm out [of the competition] now so I have to have some sort of interest... keep people interested," she joked. When pushed for a comment from radio host Tubridy, Thalia replied: "There are so many cameras backstage and on stage that if there is a romance somewhere there's no doubt that it's been captured somewhere. So it will come out somewhere... if it is happening." A source told the Herald that the pair had been spotted getting intimate at Krystle nightclub after the show finished last weekend. "Everyone noticed that Thalia and Ryan have got close in recent weeks and always have a great laugh together," the source revealed. Expand Close Thalia Heffernan / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Thalia Heffernan "They all had a great night out in Krystle last Sunday, and at one point Thalia and Ryan were seen sharing a kiss in a corner of the club, so it's kind of an open secret now among the cast and crew. "They're both single and just enjoying each other's company." Video of the Day Sunday night's show was movie themed and saw Thalia and her dance partner Chris dance to Pharrell Williams' Happy, dressed as mimions and using inflatable and real bananas as props. The judges loved the couple and despite providing one of the best performances the public vote went against them. Speaking of her exit from Dancing with the Stars, Thalia said she was "shocked". Expand Close Thalia Heffernan dancing with partner Curtis Pritchard, amid rumours she's dating dancer Ryan McShane, during the Second live show of RTEs Dancing with the Stars. Photo: Kyran O'Brien / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Thalia Heffernan dancing with partner Curtis Pritchard, amid rumours she's dating dancer Ryan McShane, during the Second live show of RTEs Dancing with the Stars. Photo: Kyran O'Brien "I don't know to be honest, people have been pretty shocked by what happened. Sure look when it comes down to public votes it's always going to be shocking." However, despite leaving the show in the second week, Thalia said that she enjoyed the experience. "It's been wonderful, absolutely wonderful," she said. "It is bittersweet leaving and it's sad that we don't get to be there to participate every week and the rehearsals on a Saturday and Sunday down in Ardmore, despite them being ridiculous hours, they were some of the best hours of my life. "I'm just really happy that everyone else is still in and they get to compete. That's what the bittersweetnes is, the sweetness is that the people are still there." President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017, before signing an executive order. Picture: AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais Donald Trump has said only 109 out of 325,000 people "were detained and held for questioning" following his executive order to bar people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US. The US president claimed on Twitter on Monday that "big problems" were created at airports by a Delta Airlines computer outage, protesters and the "tears of Senator Schumer". A Delta systems outage on Sunday night led to departure delays and cancellations of at least 150 flights for the airline. Protesters packed many of the country's major airports over the weekend protesting the executive order. Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer tweeted on Friday that "tears are running down the cheeks of the Statue of Liberty" over the ban. Mr Trump also tweeted on Monday that "there is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country". Expand Close President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017, before signing an executive order. AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017, before signing an executive order. AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais Read More President Trump's chief spokesman is defending the manner in which the White House rolled out the immigration restrictions. Sean Spicer says officials were concerned about the possibility that doing it in a more open fashion would "telegraph what you're going to do" to people who might have rushed to airports to beat the ban. In an appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" on Monday, Mr Spicer also said officials' highest priority was "to protect our own people" and said everybody in the government who needed to be consulted was consulted. Mr Spicer also says that Mr Trump respects "people who are Muslim and peace-loving. But he also recognises that certain countries and certain areas of the world produce people who seek to do us harm". The spokesman, asked about delays at airports experienced by travellers with valid papers, said that 109 of some 325,000 travellers "were slowed down" in their trips, and called that "a small price to pay" for protecting the American people. Late on Sunday Mr Trump insisted that it was not an outright ban on Muslims. He said: "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." Mr Trump added: "America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. "I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. "My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help those who are suffering." In a background call with reporters on Sunday, a senior administration official declared the order's implementation "a massive success story," claiming it had been done "seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism". Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement on Sunday saying that, in the absence of information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a "dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination". That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent US residency "green cards" will not be barred from re-entering the country, as officials had previously said. It remains unclear what kind of additional screening they will now face. Mr Trump's order, which also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria, has sparked widespread protests and denunciations from Democrats and a handful of Republicans. Many have accused the administration of rushing to implement the changes, resulting in panic and confusion at the nation's airports. Protests were held at a number of airports across the US against the measure, including in Chicago, Detroit and Washington DC. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said the changes were "a small price to pay" to keep the nation safe. Meanwhile German Chancellor Angela Merkel has renewed her criticism of President Trump's order. Read More Ms Merkel said on Monday that "the necessary and determined fight against terrorism in no way justifies a general suspicion against people of a certain faith - in this case against people of Muslim faith - or people with a certain origin." She added that she believes the US action also "contradicts the basic concept of international help for refugees and international co-operation." A man who robbed a pensioner and attacked him with a hammer when the victim resisted has been jailed for five years. Warren Brennan (25) targeted his victim after the man had withdrawn 5,000 cash from a bank to give to his family. Wearing a motorcycle helmet and waving a claw hammer Brennan went up to the 71-year-old man and started shouting give me the money. When the victim refused and called him a scumbag Brennan hit him repeatedly with the hammer around the head and body. The victim was knocked to the ground and Brennan punched him in the face. The victim managed to pull Brennan's helmet off and tried to gouge into his eyes. Brennan then bit down on the victim's thumb breaking the skin before running off with the cash. The man told gardai that he thought the attacker was going to bite his thumb off. He was released from hospital later with no serious problems. In a victim impact report he said that every time he sees a hammer or motorcycle helmet he has flash backs of the attack. He said he thinks this will continue for the rest of his life. Brennan of Pearse House, Pearse Street, Dublin pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to robbery at Alderwood Park, Tallaght on October 27, 2015. He has 54 previous convictions including convictions for possession of firearms, theft, burglary and assault. In 2011 he was jailed for three years for carrying out an attempted robbery during which he held a gun to a shop assistants head. Brennan was on bail at the time of this robbery on a charge of aggravated burglary at a bookmakers on Lombard Street, Dublin city on December 20, 2014. He has since pleaded guilty to this offence and to resisting a garda on the same occasion. He was armed with a kitchen knife during this robbery and he tried to stab gardai with it as they tried to arrest him. Judge Catherine Murphy told Brennan she recognised him from dealing with him in the Children's Court a decade ago. I told you you needed to get your act together and start living a crime free life, she told the accused. What I said to you clearly didn't have the effect it was supposed to. I have no doubt you're capable of changing life if you decide to keep away from drugs or alcohol, the judge said. Judge Murphy imposed consecutive sentences totalling seven years and suspended the final two years on strict conditions. The judge described the robbery as particularly nasty and said that Brennan had used gratuitous violence. She said the elderly victim is never going to be the same man again. She said both of the crimes were very well thought out and deliberate. Sean Gillane SC, defending, said his client had a difficult childhood after been born into addiction but was lucky enough to be parented by his maternal grandparents. His grandfather died when he was a young teenager. Counsel said this led to a loss of direction in his own life and Brennan then became a daily abuser of serious drugs and began offending. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Elmira Tariverdiyeva Trend: Despite the fact that the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict poses a threat to the regional security of the wider Middle East, it has received very little attention, wrote political analyst Rachel Avraham in an article posted on JerusalemOnline.com. Since the beginning of 1988, there has been a conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh region, which was occupied by Armenia, wrote the author. As a result of this conflict, around 25,000 people have been killed and over one million people have been made refugees, according to the article. Armenia has illegally occupied one fifth of Azerbaijani territory and has made one out of every nine Azerbaijanis either a refugee or an internally displaced person as part of Armenias ethnic cleansing campaign, says the article. Numerous UN Security Council resolutions have demanded the withdrawal of the Armenian armed forces from the occupied Azerbaijani lands, says the article, however, Azerbaijani officials have complained that many governments have taken no action in support of implementing UN Security Council resolutions on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. While many refer to the Nagorno-Karabakh issue as the frozen conflict, it should be noted that it can erupt into a full-scale confrontation at any time and remains the most dangerous unresolved conflict in wider Europe, says Avraham. Last year, the conflict did erupt. Nevertheless, the international community still neglects to pay sufficient attention to this conflict. Azerbaijans Ambassador to the US Elin Suleymanov explained the situation in his interview with the Jerusalem Post, said Avraham. Our displaced population is not engaged in any violence. They did not emigrate anywhere. Our refugees and internally displaced people moved in the areas outside the occupied areas in Azerbaijan and have built their lives there, she quoted Suleymanov as saying. Suleymanov noted that Azerbaijan made great efforts in repatriating Azerbaijani refugees and if the refugees build a normal life for themselves, the world seems to say you have no rights. In a sense, it is unfair. The world rewards violence. The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts. The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding districts. Education Minister Richard Bruton is offering a cash sweetener for the Church in a new push for the handover of Catholic schools to other patron bodies. He plans to lease school properties from local bishops, rather than going through the legally complicated and time-consuming process of property transfers from Church ownership. Where a handover is agreed, it is expected that, in most cases, the new patron will pay the church an annual rent of around 10,000-20,000 a year. Mr Bruton is seeking to breathe life into the stagnant divestment process that has seen only 10 schools switch from being under religious control since that initiative was launched in 2012. The Government is committed to having a total of 400 primary and post-primary schools under multi-denominational or non-denominational patronage by 2030. The new approach, being announced today, will involve knocking heads together in areas where there is a demand for at least one different type of school, multi- or non-denominational, with a view to working out a local agreement. Mr Bruton is hoping for "live transfers" of existing schools, with the blessing of the local bishop and parents, and with staff and the majority of board of management members remaining in place. Mr Bruton's attempt to break the divestment logjam will involve a two-stage process - an identification phase and an implementation phase. The identification phase will be managed by local education and training boards (ETBs), which will identify towns or areas were there is likely to be demand for greater diversity. This will be done through a survey of parents of pre-school children, asking whether they want the choice of a multi- or non-denominational school. The ETB will write a report on the outcome, which will be published on the Department of Education website. Where demand for the transfer of at least one Church-run school is identified, bishops will be expected to consult with parents and the school about the options offered by other patrons. Apart from managing the initial stage in the process, ETBs have a direct interest, in that they are patrons of 11 Community National Schools and have ambitions to grow that number. Community National Schools are a hybrid between the traditional religious-run schools, which focus on teaching one religion, and the Educate Together model that provides for no religious teaching inside the school day. Mr Bruton and his officials consulted with the bishops, different patron groups as well as other education stakeholders before developing the plans being announced today. Mr Bruton has now written to the Catholic bishops outlining his proposals and seeking their nominations to working groups to develop detailed protocols for the process. Even with a positive response from the various stakeholders, any progress is expected to be slow. Mr Bruton has endorsed Community National Schools, but he said: "There was no one model that will provide the answer to this complex issue. "There is room for a number of different providers to respond to different parental wishes, in the context of an expanding population and increasing demand for multi-denominational education." Demand for change was previously identified in 28 areas, and the initial focus of the new initiative is likely to be on the 18 areas in which there has been no progress. Of the 400-school target in the Programme for Government, 130 are already in existence, while more than 100 brand new schools will be multi- or non-denominational, which leaves up to 170 to be created through this process. Minister Richard Bruton is outsourcing decisions about which of the country's 2,880 Catholic primary schools will remain under Church control and which will become either multi-denominational or non-denominational. Under his latest business model, up to 150 schools will be leased as "going" concerns, but under new management. Teachers and parents who want the traditional brand of Catholic schools will go elsewhere, or they can stay if they wish. The current owners will be paid an annual rent of anything up to 20,000 a year for each property. The new buzzword is reconfiguration, not divestment. Under the Bruton blueprint the local education and training boards (ETBs) and the local bishops will take the initiative. The ETBs will identify in which towns or areas there is likely to be demand for greater choice. Parents will be consulted, of course. But not all parents. This time round parents of children in existing church schools will not be asked for their views about the future of their children's schools. Instead, it will be parents of pre-school children who will be asked to vote on a simple choice - do you want a multi or non-denominational primary school or a denominational school? In other words, parents of children who are not in primary school yet will decide if one of the local primary schools be run by a different patron. It will be up to the bishop as patron to decide which local school to transfer if there is sufficient demand, but as a sweetener the minister will offer to lease the school from him. No doubt, critics will object to the idea of using public money to rent schools from the Church - even though the same taxpayers paid for most of the building and running costs of those schools for years, if not decades. And they will point out the same Church owes the State hundreds of millions of euro arising from the massive bill for victims of child abuse. Mr Bruton is hoping that something like 150 schools will be transferred, which will help him meet the Government's commitment to have one in every 10 of the country's 4,000 primary and second level schools either multi or non-denominational. Annual rent for a school could be from 10,000 to 20,000 a year. This would mean handing over anything up to 3m a year to the local bishops to do with what they will. That 3m is less than the cost of a large new school but would amount to a tidy sum over a decade or longer. It would also go against the view in the report of the Forum on Pluralism and Patronage that schools should be transferred at no cost to the taxpayer. But it may well be the only way to get the Church to hand over some schools. Mr Bruton is effectively challenging the bishops to do something they have been cautious about to date in the divestment process - take firm decisions about which schools will transfer to new patrons. Until now, they have encountered the Nimby (not in my backyard) response when the idea was suggested that one local school be vacated to make way for another patron. Now, they will have to display real leadership and run the risk of incurring the wrath of some local parents or politicians. If there is a demand for a multi or non-denominational school, the choice will effectively be left to the bishop who will be expected to engage in consultation. The main options are Educate Together, which has a network of non-denominational schools, the ETBs, which has 11 multi-denominational Community National Schools, An Foras Patrunachta, which runs both denominational and multi-denominational all Irish schools, and smaller groups such as the Steiner movement which has a couple of schools in Ireland. The big winners could well be the ETBs, which as local statutory education agencies are being charged with surveying the territory. From the Catholic Church's point of view, the Community National Schools are the least-worst option as they allow a limited amount of time for specific denominational activities during the school day. In other words, they will still prepare Catholic pupils for First Communion, unlike Educate Together which believes this is best done outside school hours and that all pupils follow a common ethical programme called Learn Together. Ironically, the minister picked the start of Catholic Schools Week to make his announcement. God or her secular equivalent loves a trier, and Richard Bruton certainly is one. The robots are coming to take a job near you soon. This was one of the final predictions from outgoing US president Barack Obama who talked about the "relentless pace of automation that will make many jobs obsolete". Today's school leavers need a good degree of preparation for this rapidly changing world. They will live longer than their parents and will have to learn to adapt to disruptive changes in work patterns. A new report from McKinsey estimates that half of all the tasks people currently perform at work could be automated through technology. The only question is when, rather than if, it will happen. And it won't just be the blue collar jobs that will be lost - the kind of jobs that Trump is trying to bring back to the Rust Belt states in America. Technology will destroy many of those working class jobs but will also wipe out large numbers of legal and accountancy jobs in America and everywhere else - the very jobs that tend to be the preserve of the educated classes. But like its predecessors, this Fourth Industrial Revolution will also create new kinds of jobs, many of them unimaginable at this relatively early stage of transformation in the employment market. To survive and thrive in this brave and slightly frightening new world of jobs you will need two things - a qualification and the ability to keep learning. As The Economist put it recently: "Today, robotics and artificial intelligence call for another education revolution. This time, however, working lives are so lengthy and so fast-changing that simply cramming more schooling in at the start is not enough. People must also be able to acquire new skills throughout their career." A further or higher education qualification can provide a good basis for lifelong learning. OECD studies have shown that Irish graduates in particular earn significantly more over their lifetime than those who finish their education at secondary school level. They also tend to live longer and have healthier lives. Increasingly though, they will have to use some of that time to catch up and acquire new skills. Nowadays nine out of 10 students are staying in the education system after they finish secondary school. The numbers applying to the Central Applications Office for college admissions keep rising. And, as our tables today show, more and more schools are sending all of their students to universities, institutes of technology or other higher education institutions. Other opportunities are opening up. On Thursday, Education Minister Richard Bruton and Skills Minister John Halligan launched the Government's plan to expand apprenticeships and traineeships. The very ambitious aim is to deliver 50,000 registrations by 2020. There are currently 27 apprenticeships in Ireland, in areas such as construction, engineering and the motor sector. Other countries have a much broader tradition of apprenticeship. Germany has over 300 apprenticeships across a wide range of sectors. Under the Government's 'earn and learn' plan apprentices and trainees will be embedded in enterprises and will get the chance to learn skills and get hands-on experience. It will give young people the opportunity to acquire applied, technical skills within a variety of sectors, and provide a very practical grounding which will stand to them as they move through their career and take advantage of promotional opportunities. Some of the new apprenticeship programmes will lead to degrees, eroding the often artificial divide between education and training, which is to be welcomed. Secondary school leavers face a myriad of choices. The ones they make in their Leaving Certificate year could define the rest of their lives so it's worthwhile putting some thought into it. The best advice is still to follow your heart and go where your interests lie. Close to home: Almost two thirds (62pc) of University College Corks (UCC) student population hail from Cork GOING to college can be a daunting prospect for any student as friends go their separate ways after the Leaving Cert and drift from a taught environment into one driven by self-learning. In most cases it can spark a voyage of discovery, but for others it can be unnerving and uncomfortable. For this reason it appears many students choose to study in colleges close to home, where they can tap-in to known support structures and help from family. Some may be tied to a part-time job or trying to avail of free lodgings at home as the national accommodation crisis looms over many university towns and cities, making finding a place to stay near college increasingly difficult. Data compiled by the Sunday Independent over the past eight years displays some notable trends, outlining where students prefer to study and their chosen third level institution's proximity to home. An analysis of this data shows significant numbers of students from Dublin, Cork and Donegal choose to stay in their own counties to study. Cork Institute of Technology's (CIT) student body has been made up of a higher percentage of students (72pc) from its own county than any other third level organisation over the past eight years. Almost two thirds (62pc) of University College Cork's (UCC) student population hail from Cork. Donegal students have demonstrated a longing to stay close to home, with nearly 70pc of Letterkenny IT students coming from the county. Half of the students in the University of Ulster and Queen's University Belfast who come from the Republic of Ireland have an address in Donegal. Dublin students have also shown a willingness to stay at home across the past eight years, but are evenly spread around the multiple universities and colleges in the capital. Their reluctance to travel is demonstrated by the fact that less than 1pc of the students in UCC and CIT came from Dublin. The figure stands at just over 1pc for the number of Dubliners in colleges in Limerick and Galway. One quarter of students at Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art and Design since 2009 have come from the capital. Further analysis shows institutes of technology are largely filled by students who went to school in the same county or nearby counties. At Waterford Institute of Technology, 79pc of the students came from schools in Waterford, Tipperary, Wexford, Kilkenny and Cork. This trend is also seen at the Institute of Technology Tralee, where 78pc of students come from Kerry, Cork or Limerick. At Dundalk Institute of Technology, some 73pc of students came from feeder schools in Louth, Meath and Monaghan. Parents are naturally hungry for information about the secondary schools their children may attend. They can read annual school reports, some of which are very good, while some are not. For years, they have been promised a Parent and Student Charter. Education Minister Richard Bruton has finally announced draft legislation which will compel all schools to consult a lot more with parents and to publish more information. This will include details of "extra-curricular activities and school performance". Quite what he means by "school performance" is not clear. Does the minister mean publishing details of Leaving Certificate exam results - an idea that Fine Gael has flirted with in the past and one which alarms the education establishment? It's unlikely. Feeder school league tables are a proxy for exam results - they are the nearest thing to the actual results. Schools profess to hate them (unless they do particularly well, of course) but parents love them. They know that they are not perfect and that they don't mirror the real value of a school. But league tables do, more or less, what it says on the tin: indicate how well individual schools perform in the college stakes. This Sunday Independent supplement goes further than the annual publication of feeder school lists. It allows parents to track transfer rates to higher education over an eight-year period, to see whether the percentages going to college are consistent, improve or take a sudden dip. And if they do drop suddenly, they want to know why. Parents are also aware of the school evaluation reports available on the Department of Education and Skills' website (education.ie). When these reports first appeared in 2003/2004, they were very anodyne and contained little criticism of individual schools. They still acknowledge and affirm good work going on in the schools but now, when it is necessary, they are quite tough on school failings. In some cases, the criticism is subtly worded, while in others it's quite clear to anyone where weaknesses in particular subjects exist in individual schools. That creates pressure on the teachers and the schools to improve in weak areas. Schools have to be constantly vigilant of the need to improve. Parents rely on these reports, on local information and advice, and on feeder school tables to guide them into making a choice for their children. That's assuming they have a choice of school - which many don't. But there are gaps in the league tables - such as the figures for those going to universities in the UK - which explains why schools like St Columba's in Dublin don't have a higher rank. The information published here is taken from data supplied by the higher education institutions themselves. And, unfortunately, they do not supply the details in the same way across the sector. Some, for instance, mention the last school a repeat student attended, while others list all schools where a student sat the Leaving. One obvious weakness is the absence of data about the numbers going on to the increasingly important further education sector. For years, this was the underdeveloped sector but there is now a strategy for development in place and the Government is, at last, placing more emphasis on further education and on apprenticeships. This point was made by Education and Training Boards Ireland (ETBI) CEO Michael Moriarty, who asks: "Are we to forever label success as third level transition when there are a number of alternative learning pathways which all need to be equally valued? This is what is happening across Europe (and Ireland) in regard to apprenticeship training. "Our view is that these tables measure success on a very narrow basis as transition to third level. Yet our education system needs to be measured in a more holistic way, which reflects the true value and success of schools. A school's success should be measured by the development of the student cohort in the context of student intake," he said, adding the point that ETBI schools are not selective about their intake, while others can be. He is correct in saying that schools with restricted enrolment do dominate the tables, but the increasing success of gaelscoileanna and schools in the Free Education scheme has to be noted as well. He is also correct about the unfortunate omission of transfer rates to the further education sector. But the explanation for this omission is simple - the information is not readily available. If the details were available they would be published and would give a more rounded view of the success of second level schools in sending students to higher or further education. While you would be right to question any fact presented by US President Donald Trump, an "alternative fact" presented to students in Ireland is that there is a correct route through college and to a career. This is not the case. Justification for the Leaving Certificate is based on the principle that the CAO system will offer you a place in a college if you get enough points. This place comes from a provisional list of preferred college courses you send the CAO months before your exams. If you are a wise and very determined 17- or 18-year-old who knows what the next 50 years of your career will have in store, you will not have had to amend this list. Others will not be so sure and will change the list multiple times. That is fine. Research by the professional networking website LinkedIn shows millennials are twice as likely as their parents to change jobs in their first decade out of college. Many of these changes are triggered by the uncertain times we live in. Most university and institute of technology courses will take up four years of your life. This makes committing a daunting prospect because external factors, like an industry collapsing - as Celtic Tiger builders will insist - are often not predicted and will impact your post-college job prospects. So what is the solution? Post Leaving Cert courses (PLCs) help students prepare for the leap into higher education or the workforce. Most run from September to May and take less than nine months to complete. They give you a flavour of a chosen career path without forcing you to commit to a four-year cycle. If you discover you don't like it, not only have you prevented yourself from wasting four years doing something you dislike, you have enhanced your CV while trying something new. At 17 years old, I was too young, immature and ill-equipped to cope with the demands of third level. First year drop-out rates currently stand at one in six, as concern grows that students are being shoehorned into college courses they are not suited to. I lasted three days into second year but then dropped out and opted to turn my part-time job in retail into a full-time one. Here, I received a true education by learning how to interact with people in a working environment and how to look after myself in the real world. However, I became disillusioned and felt my Leaving Cert was being wasted by not furthering my education. My As and Bs counted for nothing when I was stacking shelves. As I previously proved I was not equipped for college, I sought an alternative and enrolled in a PLC. This half-way house bridged the threshold between the Leaving Cert's taught approach and university's self-learning method. It gave me the skills to look ahead and a chance to try something new without being overwhelmed by a four-year commitment. This encouraged me to eventually go back to university after discovering a topic I wanted to pursue as a career - journalism and new media. My experience stood to me and without the PLC I would not have been able to bridge the gap between my Leaving Cert and chasing a degree. In school we are presented with the "alternative fact" that the best route to a successful career comes by taking the direct path to third level, but sometimes the scenic route can prove more rewarding. The publication of secondary school league tables usually engenders negative commentaries, which take aim at particular types of schools. Gaelscoileanna, fee-paying schools, or schools of a particular denomination are accused of being "private", "elitist" or "selective", and they are pitted against "public" state-funded schools. The parents of students in fee-charging schools such as Belvedere College SJ are portrayed as rich, privileged and selfish in their choice of school. The reality is, however, that the parent profile in Belvedere is not very different, in terms of occupation and wealth, from that in many non-fee and voluntary sector schools. They are civil servants, teachers, taxi drivers, middle-income taxpayers - all of whom make significant sacrifices to pay fees. They are not some mysterious 'elite'. The fees they pay go into paying the salaries of a significant number of staff because, unlike non-fee schools, not all staff are state funded. All building and running costs are also paid from fees. Parents of students in fee-paying schools are not the only ones who invest significantly in their children's education, as many mothers and fathers in Ireland well know. The JMB (Joint Managerial Body) states that up to 30pc of the running costs of voluntary secondary schools are paid for by parental contributions and school fundraising. Many parents across the country pay for additional tuition, courses in the Gaeltacht, foreign exchanges, revision courses, and a myriad of other educational experiences. Yet they are not blamed for the inequalities of society or portrayed as an elite, privileged group. It sometimes seems like accepted wisdom that fee-paying schools are to blame for many of our societal ills, in spite of the fact that less than 6pc of the total school population attend fee-paying schools. Sadly, what is not addressed in public discourse is the effort schools make to nurture students from every socio-economic background, helping them to become responsible citizens with a social conscience. In an article in the Irish Independent on January 7 last, the Jesuit delegate for education, Brian Flannery, raised an important and challenging question regarding the role of fee-paying schools in a unequal society. It is a question we take very seriously. Belvedere College SJ has a Social Diversity Programme, now in place over 25 years, and 10pc of our students come from socially disadvantaged backgrounds - almost all complete secondary school and progress to third level. Our students engage in an extensive social justice programme. They have a Soup Run for homeless people in the city centre, and students in the school's St Vincent de Paul society visit local elderly people weekly. Other students teach English to refugees and give peer tutoring in local primary schools. They also support the Belvedere Youth Club after-school activities in nearby Buckingham Street. Students accompany the sick on pilgrimages to Lourdes and recently raised 30,000 for charity on the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage. With the ever-generous support of the Irish people our annual Sleep Out on O'Connell Street raised 225,000 at Christmas for the homeless. The annual Block Pull, where students and staff walk to Galway, raises funds circa 60,000 for Temple Street, guide dogs and a hospice. Immersion programmes in Kolkata and Zambia help students develop a commitment to development education. All of this is not just paternalistic giving. As Brian Flannery also notes: "The Jesuits hope that their students become men and women for others at the service of the world." Many past pupils have been agents for change in society, and it is wrong to assume that they are any less committed to a more socially just society simply because their parents chose what they believed was the best school for their child. As part of the school curriculum students can take part in the choir, orchestra, drama, sports, debating and a host of extracurricular activities, such as the Urban Eco Farm thriving on the college roof. This should be the norm in terms of state provision of education for all schools. Criticising parents who invest in making that provision possible diverts us from the real challenge of creating cultural change, raising expectations and harnessing cross-community support so this type of education is available to all our young people. We need a strategically-managed approach which should include both serious investment in early childhood education and family support. It should also include support from corporate industry, as it is in the interest of this sector to create a well-educated workforce. School self-evaluation and inspection reports are far more informative than the league tables, which are often quoted when accusing fee-paying schools of being academically selective. Consider, for example, that 19pc of the Leaving Certificate class of 2016 in Belvedere had special needs, yet the league tables did not register this. Nor did they account for almost 10pc of the class who took a gap year before university, or for the students who have taken up apprenticeships, joined the Army Cadets, or gone to study at universities abroad. Studies by the ESRI show that schools which could be judged to be more successful, be they public or private, share some common features. They are communities with shared beliefs or values with high expectations and a positive atmosphere. In terms of academic achievement, highly effective schools tend to be more flexible in relation to subject choice, often delaying the choice of subject level so that more pupils can take higher-level subjects. Such schools also tend to have lower levels of misbehaviour, apparently, a consequence of consistent approach to school discipline. So, our focus should be on how best to realise the potential of students. And we should be helping schools to work together rather than pitting schools and parents against each other. This only creates a negative, divisive and unproductive culture. More importantly it ignores the fact that we do not help disadvantaged students by preventing parents from investing in their children's education. And so we must work to ensure that resources, education opportunities, and the chance to grow in civic responsibility are made available to all of the country's children, beginning at early childhood. Gerry Foley is headmaster at Belvedere College, Dublin 1 Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 Trend: An order has been signed to restore the Jabrayil Districts Jojug Marjanli village, liberated from the Armenian occupation in April 2016, and this projects implementation has a great symbolic meaning, said Azerbaijans President Ilham Aliyev. This is a historic event, noted the president addressing a conference dedicated to the results of third year implementation of The State Program on Socio-Economic Development of the Regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan in 2014-2018 in Baku Jan. 30. We are returning the residents to the liberated village. I am very glad that the residents of the Jojug Marjanli village have great enthusiasm and interest towards this issue, said President Aliyev. I am sure we will re-establish the Jojug Marjanli village within a short period of time. He noted that currently the mine clearance work is underway in those lands. The villages images were shown on the TV. The village was under occupation for several months. Then the Horadiz operation, directed by national leader Heydar Aliyev, drove the invaders, enemies out of the village, said President Aliyev. He said the invaders razed the village to the ground within a few months. Of course, mine clearance work and then infrastructure projects should be carried out there, added Ilham Aliyev. The president said he has instructed to appeal to international organizations for them to send their representatives to the village and see what the Armenian atrocity is. The head of state said that currently, Armenians dont allow international observers to view other occupied lands. We can rarely see the wreckages of Aghdam, Fuzuli and other our cities shown by the international media. Why? Because they wont allow. However, Jojug Marjanli is a witness of the Armenian brutality and vandalism. Let them come and see what atrocities are committed by those who present themselves as civilized people, said President Aliyev. He said all the paperwork must be done, the Armenian atrocities must be documented, footage and photos must be taken, all the dimensions of the destroyed buildings and the damage must be calculated. There must be a very reasonable approach to this work, and as I said, firstly, the infrastructure roads, gas, water and electricity lines must be provided and then a school, a kindergarten, a medical center and private houses must be built there. At the initial stage, 50 houses will be built, but I have instructed to prepare a master plan of the village. I am confident that 200 houses will be built there in the future. Of course, new job places must be opened for people who will live there. Measures will be taken in order to ensure sowing areas and other job places. We will return our citizens to their ancestral lands after a long hiatus, added President Aliyev. For some years now, national newspapers have published league tables of schools, ranking them by the percentage of young people who go on to higher education. These league tables have consistently shown that fee-paying schools, gaelscoileanna and all-girls secondary schools 'do better'. But what does this ranking tell us? Research by the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) has shown real differences between second-level schools in their Leaving Certificate grades and in progression to higher education. However, there are also clear differences between schools in the kinds of students they have - in terms of their gender, social class background and academic performance on leaving primary school. These differences are not accidental - they reflect the active school choices made by families, with around half of Irish students not attending their nearest (or most accessible) second-level school. Most differences in exam results between schools are, in fact, due to differences in their student intake. Knowing how many students a school sends to higher education therefore tells us little about the difference that school makes to the education and welfare of its students. Are league tables a good basis for choosing schools? The answer is no, because they largely reflect the kinds of students already attending the school. A school may rank highly merely because it draws on students with higher abilities and from more privileged social backgrounds. On the other hand, a school serving a more disadvantaged community may look relatively bad in a league table but may actually be achieving very significant academic progress with its students. These rankings do not give a good indication of how your son or daughter would get on in that school. League tables also foster a very narrow view of education, presenting entry to higher education as the only measure of success. They ignore other important goals of schooling - helping to develop young adults who are confident and adaptable in facing the future, who do not experience high levels of stress or emotional difficulties, who are actively engaged in their society and who are open to learning opportunities throughout their lives. None of these aims are reflected in the ranking of schools but few, if any, parents would not want their children to achieve these goals. There will always be a debate about what makes a 'good school'. But research can tell us a good deal about the kinds of schools that enhance the academic, social and emotional development of young people. ESRI research shows that the school climate (that is, day-to-day interactions between teachers and students) and teacher expectations have the strongest influence on how young people fare. Students who attend schools characterised by greater emphasis on praise and less emphasis on reprimand are less likely to drop out of school early and are more likely to achieve higher Junior and Leaving Certificate grades, be more self-confident and have lower stress levels. When we talk to young people about what helps them learn, they see teacher care and respect as vital. Teachers with high expectations set challenging (but realistic) learning goals for their students, encourage them to take higher level in as many subjects as possible and foster an openness to learning. In contrast, punitive measures (such as detention or suspension) and low teacher expectations can fuel a cycle of student misbehaviour and disengagement from education. How schools organise learning has a very significant effect on outcomes. Rigid forms of ability grouping (streaming) have a significant negative impact on student achievement for those allocated to lower stream classes without any gains for those allocated to higher stream classes. Schools which have mixed ability base classes therefore enhance achievement for all. Schools also differ in whether young people are required to choose their subjects before entry or have a chance to try out subjects before picking them. Young people themselves say that 'sampling' subjects gives them a better idea of what new subjects are like so that they can make a more informed choice. Schools can be an important source of support for young people at a turbulent stage in their lives, with some schools having highly developed structures to identify students having difficulties and providing assistance for them. After-school activities can provide young people with important opportunities to take part in sporting and cultural pursuits that they may not otherwise access. Recently published research shows that after-school cultural activities, such as choir and drama groups, foster a broader interest in the arts outside school hours. In picking a school, looking at league tables gives parents a very misleading picture of what a school is like. Research might not give us the 'best' school but it helps parents ask better questions about the kind of school that would suit their children, such as: n What kinds of subjects are offered? If my child is very interested in art or music, can they study it? Do students get a chance to try out different subjects in their first year? n Are students encouraged to take higher level in subjects for as long as possible? Or is rigid ability grouping used? n What kinds of support is available to my child? Are there good relationships between teachers and students in the school? n What kinds of after-school activities are offered? What is available if my child isn't interested in sport? Finally, ESRI research has shown that young people themselves have strong views on what school they would like to attend - an important factor to put into the mix. Emer Smyth is Research Professor at the ESRI. Gardai are investigating an assault on a woman in Dublin this evening. It is understood the woman in her 40s was attacked by a man close to the entry of the Bayview estate in Killiney. The assault took place at around 5.45pm, with gardai arriving on the scene a short while later. The woman suffered minor injuries and did not require medical assistance from the assault. The attacker fled the scene on foot towards the Killiney Hill road. No arrest has been made, with gardai in Shankhill investigating. Local representative, Cormac Devlin told Independent.ie that a larger garda presence is required in the area to fend off a number of recent incidents. "People are probably fearful, particularly women walking around alone," Mr Devlin said. "I would obviously urge local residents to be extra vigilant and to report any suspicious activity to the gardai. "This is a very worrying incident for this lady. "They lost Dalkey garda station a number of years ago, crime in the area has increased, unfortunately the number of gardai hasn't and that is leading to less visibility of gardai," he added. Anyone with information is asked to contact gardai. MORE than one in two Irish family doctors support the legalisation of cannabis for therapeutic use, according to a survey. But they are not in favour of decriminalisation of cannabis, according to the Irish College of General Practitioners. The online survey found a significantly higher percentage of male doctors (40.6pc) supported the decriminalisation of cannabis than female colleagues (15pc). The vast majority felt cannabis use was bad for peoples mental health and increased the risk of schizophrenia. Six in 10 saw cannabis has having a role in palliative care, pain management and treatment of multiple sclerosis . The national online survey published in this months Harm Reduction Journal was carried out by in early 2016, with 565 responses. An expert group is examining the issue of medicinal cannabis available for certain patients and is due to report shortly to the Minister for Health Simon Harris. Gardai from the Armed Support Unit at the scene of an arms and drugs haul in Sallins, Co Kildare. Photos: Fergal Phillips Gardai believe that the gang who hid firearms and drugs in a Kildare house did so because they believed it was a safe location after it was recently raided. Officers discovered an AK47 assault rifle, ammunition and 3m of suspected heroin and cocaine during the raid at the house in Sallins, Co Kildare. The detached dormer bungalow in a quiet cul-de-sac in the Sallins Bridge estate was the focus of Garda attention last Tuesday, the same day that a massive haul of guns was discovered in a unit in an industrial estate in Baldonnell. The raids were part of an ongoing operation targeting the Kinahan drugs cartel, currently embroiled in a murderous feud with the Hutch family based in north inner city Dublin. Expand Close Members of the Gardai at the scene. Photo: Gareth Chaney / Collins / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Members of the Gardai at the scene. Photo: Gareth Chaney / Collins Four people were arrested on foot of the Baldonnell raid, and three have since been charged with gun possession. The Sallins house was raided again on Saturday night by officers connected to the Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau. "This house had been under surveillance for a long time, and maybe this gang thought that because it was raided last week the gardai would be finished with it," a senior source said. "But the surveillance did not end there and there was activity at the house since so it was raided again and the drugs and gun and ammunition were found." Gardai believe that using the same house which was already raided shows how desperate the gang has become in moving and hiding their weapons, cash and drugs, "The gang is under huge pressure and this is evidenced by panicky behaviour as they try to find out where gardai are getting their success from," said the senior source. The property in Sallins has been rented for five years. Neighbours said they were shocked to learn that the raid could be connected to the ongoing murderous Kinahan and Hutch feud. "It's hard enough to get your head around the fact that there's a gun and drugs and bullets in that house, but what if someone wanted to target whoever brought them here, in a quiet cul-de-sac full of children," said one young mother. "I know it's a cliche you read all the time that the places where these things happen are quiet neighbourhoods, but this is just that, a quiet street," she added. The Garda press office confirmed that gardai from the Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau, supported by the Special Crime Task Force, seized a firearm along with large quantities of suspected controlled drugs during in an the operation. An assault rifle similar to an AK47, ammunition for a number of guns and approximately 3m worth of suspected heroin and cocaine were recovered during the operation. The drugs were wrapped in 1kg blocks and it is believed 20kg was cocaine and 30kg was heroin. The house remained sealed off yesterday and guarded by members of the armed support unit. The Garda technical bureau carried out a forensic examination of the property and a number of items of evidence were removed from the house. No arrests have been made and enquiries are ongoing. Members of the Public during a Green Party Protest over US President Donald Trump's policies outside the American Embassy in Ballsbridge, Dublin. Photo: Gareth Chaney Collins (L to R) Sandra Dunne from Carlow & Alanna Canton from Kilkenny during a Green Party Protest over US President Donald Trump's policies outside the American Embassy in Ballsbridge, Dublin. Photo: Gareth Chaney Collins Green Party leader Eamon Ryan TD with members of the Public during a Green Party Protest over US President Donald Trump's policies outside the American Embassy in Ballsbridge, Dublin. Photo: Gareth Chaney Collins Members of the Public during a Green Party Protest over US President Donald Trump's policies outside the American Embassy in Ballsbridge, Dublin. Photo: Gareth Chaney Collins PROTESTERS gathered outside the US Embassy this evening with a message to Taoiseach Enda Kenny - 'don't offer a shamrock to Donald Trump on St Patrick's Day'. A small group gathered outside the Ballsbridge building for a peaceful protest organised by the Green Party - in response to the US President's travel ban for nationals from seven different countries. The Executive Order prevents citizens from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Somalia, Yemen, Sudan and Libya travelling to the States over the next 90 days. Around 30 people were present outside the embassy this evening, with Green Party leader, Eamonn Ryan calling on Taoiseach Enda Kenny to take a stance when he travels to Washington in March for the St Patricks Day visit to the White House. Mr Ryan said the Taoiseach should look at doing something different this year. I think people in Ireland, while its not easy to do, should be standing up for what we believe in, Mr Ryan said. Expand Close Green Party TD Catherine Martin during a Green Party Protest over US President Donald Trump's policies outside the American Embassy in Ballsbridge, Dublin. Photo: Gareth Chaney Collins / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Green Party TD Catherine Martin during a Green Party Protest over US President Donald Trump's policies outside the American Embassy in Ballsbridge, Dublin. Photo: Gareth Chaney Collins Its up to the Government to represent us and to look at ways they can reflect the public mood here. We dont agree with the ban on refugees." Mr Ryan added that he believed the Taoiseach should not hand over a bowl of shamrock to Mr Tump. Irish-America takes that whole shamrock thing seriously, they have a romantic connection to our country thats very strong. If were handing over that bowl of shamrock, were saying that everything is the same and were still the best of friends, he added. Sandra Dunne (49) from Kilmainham said "my sign says not in my name and that says it all". I dont want him (Enda Kenny) to hand over the shamrock and act like its business as normal. I think he should make a stand, because he has been elected by us and we give him his mandate, she added. A hero police officer stabbed in the head while trying to save a woman and two young children is to receive a bravery medal. Sergeant Mark Wright, an officer with the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), will be awarded the Queen's Gallantry Medal. Commanders have praised him for putting his life in danger when he entered a house in Lurgan, Co Armagh, where a man armed with two knives had assaulted the woman and locked himself inside with the two children. He sustained serious head injuries in the February 2012 incident when the man attacked him and then tried to stab another officer in the throat. Mr Wright continued to wrestle with the man despite the major gashes to his head and managed to subdue and handcuff him. The arrested man was subsequently sentenced to seven years in prison. Expand Close Sergeant Mark Wright sffured serious injuries. Picture: PSNI/PA Wire / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Sergeant Mark Wright sffured serious injuries. Picture: PSNI/PA Wire The commended officer said: "I am extremely humbled and honoured to have been nominated for the Queen's Gallantry Medal. "Our job as police officers is to protect lives and to keep people safe and on that night in question I was only doing my job protecting the individuals within the house. "I will be accepting this award on behalf of all my colleagues with the Police Service of Northern Ireland as this was a team effort." PSNI Chief Superintendent Alywin Barton said: "I am hugely proud of Sergeant Wright and his colleagues. They have been recognised for their heroism and bravery. "Sergeant Wright put his life in real danger and doing so protected and indeed saved the lives of others." One person has been refused entry to the US at Dublin airport as part of Donald Trump's new travel ban, according to the Department of Transport. Over the weekend, Mr Trump put a 120-day hold on allowing refugees into the US, an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria and a 90-day bar on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Dublin and Shannon airports are among a small number of sites in the world that offer preclearance to passengers travelling to the US. A spokesperson for the Department of Transport confirmed to Independent.ie: "One person was refused US entry at Dublin airport. They were dealt with in accordance with US preclearance procedures as set out in the preclearance Act of 2009." The nationality of the individual has not been confirmed. This evening Taoiseach Enda Kenny asked for a complete review of US preclearance facilities in Ireland. Read More Earlier Katherine Zappone, who is a US native, demanded a review of the legal implications for Ireland of Mr Trump's order, which prevents travellers and refugees from seven predominantly Muslim countries gaining entry to the US. The American Embassy in Dublin has warned that even Irish passport-holders who also claim nationality in one of the seven countries will be turned away. In a major diplomatic departure, the Children's Minister said she will ask her Cabinet colleagues to act quickly to remove US Homeland Security's power to screen passengers on Irish soil if citizens are being discriminated against. "I think the Irish people would be in favour of that and certainly the Irish-Americans would be favour of that as well," she said. "We need to determine whether our Constitution and the international treaties we have signed up to, that those laws operate in context of Irish soil in terms of prohibiting those policies of discrimination against nationalities, and also people of particular religions, that Donald Trump has implemented." Legal sources last night told the Irish Independent that the arrangement between the USA and the Irish Government is based on the understanding that pre-clearance procedures do not diminish the rights enjoyed by individuals under our Constitution. It comes as the US Embassy in Dublin issued a notice to nationals of the countries affected, including dual nationals, stating that they will not be granted visas. People who have already scheduled a visa interview at the US Embassy in Ballsbridge have been told to not bother attending, "as we will not be able to proceed". The countries affected are Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. The Department of Justice was last night unable to supply figures for the number of Irish citizens from these countries; however it is likely to be in the thousands. More to Follow Enterprise Ireland (EI) is to get 39 extra staff who will be tasked with growing trade from countries such as China and India, and Latin America and Africa. The announcement will be part of Jobs Minister Mary Mitchell O'Connor's contribution to a major forum on Brexit to be held in Leitrim today. Ms Mitchell O'Connor will meet with the heads of the agencies leading Ireland's response in terms of trade and employment. The IDA is to recruit nine additional staff as part of what Ms Mitchell O'Connor will say is the plan to capitalise on the opportunities emerging from the UK's EU departure. "Ireland's value proposition remains strong including, in particular, our continued membership of the EU and access to the single market. We are very much open for business," Ms Mitchell O'Connor said. Among those attending a stakeholder engagement event in Carrick-on-Shannon, Co Leitrim, are senior representatives of EI, the IDA, IBEC, ICTU and the British-Irish Chamber. "We have a clear plan of action and are fully committed to supporting business to deal with the challenges and opportunities posed by the UK exit from the EU," she said. Meanwhile, a separate forum to be held in Dublin today will hear that children will need to be carefully factored into the Brexit negotiations. Children's Minister Katherine Zappone will meet with young people from across the country in Croke Park along with a number of advocacy bodies. In advance of the meeting, the Children's Rights Alliance reiterated its calls to Government to ensure children in Ireland are protected from the fallout from a hard Brexit. "Our concerns for children relate to poverty, child protection loopholes, harsh border controls, the status of human rights in the Good Friday Agreement, and the Common Travel Area," chief executive Tanya Ward said. She said the economic shock that will result from Brexit "may cause poverty rates to sky-rocket on both sides of the Border". The National Youth Council of Ireland - which represents organisations working with over 380,000 young people nationwide - noted that Ireland has one of the youngest populations in Europe, with one-third aged under 25. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Anakhanum Hidayatova Trend: Chair of the American Jewish Committees (AJC) Board of Governors, Harriet P. Schleifer expressed hope that the new US administration will be a new chapter in relations with Azerbaijan. We appreciate very much the partnership between Azerbaijan and Israel and the importance of Azerbaijan for the US, Schleifer told reporters in Baku Jan. 30. For us, American Jews, Azerbaijan continues to be a very important and friendly country, she added. Schleifer noted that during a meeting with Azerbaijans President Ilham Aliyev on Jan. 29, which lasted for more than an hour, a number of important issues between Azerbaijan and the US, Azerbaijan and Israel, as well as regional issues regarding the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and relations with Russia were discussed. There were very good discussions on many issues, she added. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @Anahanum US Congressman Peter King (R) addresses the media beside Gerry Adams, President of the Sinn Fein, in the Parliament Buildings in Stormont in Belfast 02 December 1999. Photo: ADRIAN DENNIS/AFP/Getty Images Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams is under pressure to condemn the comments of a close American ally who is at the centre of Donald Trump's 'Muslim ban'. It has emerged that Congressman Peter King was involved in behind the scenes planning for the restrictions on travellers and refugees from seven countries. The ban has caused international outrage, while at home the Government is to review the facilitation of US pre-clearance sites at Dublin and Shannon airports. Mr Adams has called for pre-clearance to be scrapped in protest at Mr Trumps policies but Fianna Fail is now demanding that he go further and criticise one of his key Republican supporters and return any money that he has donated to the party. Expand Close Sinn Fein lead Gerry Adams (L) and US Representative of New York Peter King (R) attend the annual St. Patrick's Day luncheon 17 March on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. Photo: LUKE FRAZZA/AFP/Getty Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Sinn Fein lead Gerry Adams (L) and US Representative of New York Peter King (R) attend the annual St. Patrick's Day luncheon 17 March on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. Photo: LUKE FRAZZA/AFP/Getty Images Mr King has repeatedly backed the Sinn Fein president over the years, including when he was arrested in connection with the murder of mother of 10 Jean McConville. Read More "I have every reason based on his past record to believe Gerry Adams," King said at the time. "I have known him since the early 80s and he has never told me something that turned out to be untrue." Fianna Fails jobs spokesman Niall Collins today said that Mr Adams is "uniquely placed to actually make a meaningful protest on this issue". "We know from archival footage that he enjoyed a warm relationship with the newly elected President in the past, when Mr Trump was a high profile attendee at Sinn Fein fundraisers, acknowledged publicly by the Sinn Fein leader. "We also know that Congressman Peter King, named by former Mayor Rudy Giuliani as one of the key architects of the travel ban, is a long time close personal ally of Deputy Adams and a major fundraiser for his party for over thirty years," Mr Collins said. While Rep King has now claimed that he didnt design the ban, he has expressed his strong support for it and has urged the President to go further, establishing a Federal Muslim Surveillance Programme Mr Collins called on Sinn Fein to publicly condemn the congressmans comments and "spell out how much Rep King has donated and helped raise for his organisation since he first came out in support of NORAID in the 1980s and return that cash". Will he spell out how much the US President and/or the Trump Organisation has donated to the party over the years?, Mr Collins asked. A request for comment has been sent to the Sinn Fein press office. Sources said that a small group of backbenchers, who came close to demanding Mr Kennys resignation during the summer, believe he is trying to remain on as leader long enough that he will accidentally on purpose have to lead them into another election Fine Gael backbenchers fear stumbling into an election with Enda Kenny still at the helm unless he moves quickly to enact a succession plan. Pressure is growing on Leo Varadkar and Simon Coveney to force the Taoiseach to give a timeline for his departure after the hugely embarrassing row over whether Fine Gael could do business with Sinn Fein. After appearing to open the door to a future coalition, Mr Kenny issued a statement on Saturday saying he didn't see "the parties to be in any way compatible". Fianna Fail has been closely watching the row, with Willie O'Dea telling the Irish Independent it was "mind-boggling" to see how "naive" the Taoiseach was to "fall right into an obvious trap set by Sinn Fein". Sources said that a small group of backbenchers, who came close to demanding Mr Kenny's resignation during the summer, believe he is trying to remain on as leader long enough that he will "accidentally on purpose" have to lead them into another election. The unprecedented scene of Cabinet ministers publicly distancing themselves from Mr Kenny over the weekend has badly damaged his standing within Fine Gael. However, sources said it is not enough for any of the main leadership contenders to launch a heave as "most people genuinely want Enda to go on his own terms". Social Protection Minister Mr Varadkar, who is seen as the frontrunner to replace Mr Kenny, pointedly said on RTE's 'The Week in Politics' that Mr Kenny "is going to want to preserve his legacy as a great leader for Fine Gael". "He'll know the right time to step down and ensure there's an orderly transition," he said. This was interpreted by some TDs as an indication that the ball is still in Mr Kenny's court - but he needs to play his next move carefully "to avoid chaos". One backbench TD said: "Kenny needs to say when he's going to go. There's a hardening of opinion that we need a change, to pass control to the next generation. "Fianna Fail are increasing in the polls and Sinn Fein are playing a new game so we need to react. A new leader would change the dynamic, even if that meant shortening the lifetime of the Government." However, former Fine Gael TD Paul Connaughton summed up what many Fine Gael TDs are saying privately, tweeting: "Getting to point now of where if you want top job, time to put up shut up." And another Cabinet minister told the Irish Independent: "The situation is very precarious. There's a lot of plotting going on." A number of Fine Gael backbenchers said last night that they wanted to save their comments on what is now being considered "the Sinn Fein gaffe" until a meeting of the parliamentary party on Wednesday. Louth TD Fergus O'Dowd, who shares a constituency with Sinn Fein's Gerry Adams and Imelda Munster, said that he welcomed the Taoiseach's clarification. "I think it's very clear that we won't be doing a deal with Sinn Fein. That is a view that is very strong across the whole party," Mr O'Dowd said. "I don't think the Taoiseach set out to end up in this situation. It was more by accident than intent, so I'm glad he has clarified the position." Fianna Fail's Mr O'Dea said he thinks "Enda Kenny's mask has slipped". "It seems he would do a deal with Kim Jong-un if it allowed him to stay in power," he said. He said Sinn Fein's talk of entering a coalition as a junior partner was a "cynical ploy to get the middle class who see them as undemocratic and controlled from the North as now being responsible. But Kenny fell for it hook, line and sinker". Asked about the growing calls for Mr Varadkar to intervene, Mr O'Dea said: "You can only be the great pretender for so long." Prime Minister Theresa May and Taoiseach Enda Kenny TD during their meeting at Government Buildings in Dublin. Photo: Chris Bellew/Fennell Photography/PA Wire Prime Minister Theresa May and Taoiseach Enda Kenny TD during their meeting at Government Buildings in Dublin. Photo: Chris Bellew/Fennell Photography/PA Wire Prime Minister Theresa May and Taoiseach Enda Kenny TD during their meeting at Government Buildings in Dublin. Photo: Chris Bellew/Fennell Photography/PA Wire Prime Minister Theresa May and Taoiseach Enda Kenny TD during their meeting at Government Buildings in Dublin. Photo: Chris Bellew/Fennell Photography/PA Wire Prime Minister Theresa May and Taoiseach Enda Kenny TD during their meeting at Government Buildings in Dublin. Photo: Chris Bellew/Fennell Photography/PA Wire British Prime Minister Theresa May has arrived at Government Buildings for her meeting with Taoiseach Enda Kenny. Following a series of meetings in Wales, Mrs May received a Garda escort through Dublin city centre in order to keep her 4.30pm appointment with the Taoiseach. #Breaking: Theresa May arrives for meeting with Enda Kenny. Only a little hand holding. @Independent_ie pic.twitter.com/jZY5x93alw Kevin Doyle (@KevDoyle_Indo) January 30, 2017 Unlike Cardiff where Mrs May was booed for not condemning US President Donald Trump's 'Muslim ban', there were no protesters in Dublin. The two prime ministers met to discuss the fallout from the UK vote to leave the European Union. Taoiseach Enda Kenny has said he disagrees with US President Donald Trumps controversial travel ban - but insists he will still visit the White House for the St Patricks Day celebrations. Mr Kenny said he will raise directly with Mr Trump his views on his own refugee policy that has led to widespread condemnation across the world. Speaking following a meeting with British Prime Minister Theresa May at Government Buildings, Mr Kenny said he has asked for a complete review of US pre-clearance facilities at Irish airports. It comes as it emerged one traveller was denied entry to a flight to the US at Dublin airport after Mr Trump banned the arrival of people from a number of Muslim countries. The meeting between Mr Kenny and Ms May was expected to focus solely on Brexit. However, the Trump ban dominated much of Mondays press conference at Government Buildings. Mr Kenny said he still intended to visit the White House for St Patricks Day, where he will meet Mr Trump in the Oval Office. He told reporters he wants to say face-to-face what Irelands problems are with Trumps policies. Its not about a visit to the US President. Its the symbolism of the connection between Ireland and the US, Mr Kenny said. Ms May also confirmed that an invitation she issued to Mr Trump to visit the UK still stands. The Tory leader said the US is a close ally of the UKs. On the issue of Brexit, Ms May said there will be no return to the borders of the past". She said she wants a seamless, frictionless border between the Republic and Northern Ireland - remarks reiterated by Mr Kenny. U.S. President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Hall of Heroes at the Department of Defense on January 27, 2017 in Arlington, Virginia. Trump signed two orders calling for the "great rebuilding" of the nation's military and the "extreme vetting" of visa seekers from terror-plagued countries. (Photo by Olivier Douliery-Pool/Getty Images) Calls are mounting for Taoiseach Enda Kenny to cancel his upcoming visit to the White House ahead of St Patrick's Day. Photo: Damien Eagers A spokesperson for Enda Kenny has confirmed that the Taoiseach will travel to the US to meet with President Donald Trump for the annual St Patrick's Day visit, despite calls to cancel the trip. Calls have been mounting for Taoiseach Enda Kenny to cancel his upcoming St Patrick's Day visit to the White House following President Donald Trump's "extreme vetting" order. A spokesperson for Mr Kenny said that the Taoiseach will travel to the US "in order to maintain the historically strong links between the Irish and American peoples." "In order to maintain the historically strong links between the Irish and American peoples it is important that the Taoiseach continues to engage with the US President and his administration in Washington around the events of St. Patrick's Day." Expand Close U.S. President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Hall of Heroes at the Department of Defense on January 27, 2017 in Arlington, Virginia. Trump signed two orders calling for the "great rebuilding" of the nation's military and the "extreme vetting" of visa seekers from terror-plagued countries. (Photo by Olivier Douliery-Pool/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp U.S. President Donald Trump signs executive orders in the Hall of Heroes at the Department of Defense on January 27, 2017 in Arlington, Virginia. Trump signed two orders calling for the "great rebuilding" of the nation's military and the "extreme vetting" of visa seekers from terror-plagued countries. (Photo by Olivier Douliery-Pool/Getty Images) "Doing so allows the Taoiseach to outline, in person, his Governments views on a range of issues, including business and economic ties, immigration and other matters of common interest. He will continue to act in the interests of Irish people and to that end he will raise these matters again this year." Labour Leader Brendan Howlin called on the Taoiseach on Saturday to confirm that he will not visit the White House on St Patricks Day as President Trump "does not share" Irish values. "For decades, Irish Governments have been able to enjoy significant access to senior US politicians in the days around St Patricks Day. This has allowed us to raise issues that matter to Ireland, and to Irish people in the US," he said in a statement. "President Trump does not share our values. Indeed, he is openly hostile to them. He and his team have made clear that he is unwilling to hear, or even listen to discordant voices." Mr Howlin said that by visiting the White House, Mr Kenny would be presenting Ireland as a "supporter of Trumpism" and that "such a presentation would be humiliating to the vast majority of Irish people who stand opposed to the policies being implemented by President Trump." "Put plainly, if the Muslim ban remains in place, Enda Kenny should not be boarding a plane to Washington in March. And our Government should be working might and mane to make sure that these policies are not enforced on Irish soil." Speaking on RTE's The Week in Politics, Minister for Social Protection Leo Varadkar said that the Taoiseach should go ahead with the annual visit to the White House, but "it cant just be smiles and shamrocks." Mr Varadkar said that its important for Ireland to "engage with the new administration." Foreign Affairs Minister Charlie Flanagan warned today that Trumps order to ban travellers and refugees from seven Muslim countries gaining entry into the US will have "far-reaching implications." "While US immigration policy is a matter for the US authorities, it is clear that the most recent decisions could have far-reaching implications - both on humanitarian grounds and on relations between the US and the global Muslim community." "Accordingly, I share the concerns of other EU partners regarding this most recent development," Mr Flanagan said. He will travel to Washington to meet with officials there next week and has pledged to discuss immigration. The Minister also defended Mr Kenny's decision to attend the White House in March. "I believe it's very important that the Taoiseach's visit on St Patrick's Day goes ahead. He was specifically invited very soon after the election by president-elect Trump," he said. "I believe in dialogue, I believe in discussion, walking away from an invitation, to my mind, is not the best way of dealing with international affairs and public issues. I strongly believe that the Taoiseach's visit should go ahead. "There are matters of great importance between Ireland and America. The unique relationship over generations, it's important that continues and I look forward to the Taoiseach engaging in a very successful visit on St Patrick's Day. "I have no doubt that the issues will be raised by the Taoiseach, there are many issues in relation to Irish-American affairs, I believe it will be a very important meeting and the Taoiseach will be fully engaged at that opportunity in March. I believe any postponement or any change in respect of those plans will in fact be detrimental to the great relationship between Ireland and America," he added. An online petition set up to call on Mr Kenny to cancel the visit has received over 11,000 signatures within 24 hours. The order, which has been denounced by civil rights groups as discriminatory, bars the entry of foreign nationals from certain countries for 90 days. While no countries are specifically named in the order, it refers to a statute that would apply to seven Muslim-majority nations: Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Iraq and a 120-day suspension of the US refugee programme. Travellers from those nations were either barred from getting on their flights or detained at US airports after they landed, including tourists, foreign students and people trying to visit friends and family. Protests broke out at several US airports where travellers were being held, including a gathering of several hundred people outside San Francisco's main airport and a raucous demonstration of at least 2,000 people at New York's Kennedy International Airport. Ireland should be prepared to withdraw permission for US immigration officers to operate in Dublin and Shannon airports in light of Donald Trump's 'Muslim ban', a Cabinet minister has said. Katherine Zappone, who is a US native, is demanding a review of the legal implications for Ireland of Mr Trump's order, which prevents travellers and refugees from seven predominantly Muslim countries gaining entry to the US. The American Embassy in Dublin has warned that even Irish passport-holders who also claim nationality in one of the seven countries will be turned away. In a major diplomatic departure, the Children's Minister said she will ask her Cabinet colleagues to act quickly to remove US Homeland Security's power to screen passengers on Irish soil if citizens are being discriminated against. "I think the Irish people would be in favour of that and certainly the Irish-Americans would be favour of that as well," she said. "We need to determine whether our Constitution and the international treaties we have signed up to, that those laws operate in context of Irish soil in terms of prohibiting those policies of discrimination against nationalities, and also people of particular religions, that Donald Trump has implemented." Expand Close People gather to pray in the baggage hall at Dallas/Fort Worth airport. Photo: Reuters. / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp People gather to pray in the baggage hall at Dallas/Fort Worth airport. Photo: Reuters. Legal sources last night told the Irish Independent that the arrangement between the USA and the Irish Government is based on the understanding that pre-clearance procedures do not diminish the rights enjoyed by individuals under our Constitution. It comes as the US Embassy in Dublin issued a notice to nationals of the countries affected, including dual nationals, stating that they will not be granted visas. People who have already scheduled a visa interview at the US Embassy in Ballsbridge have been told to not bother attending, "as we will not be able to proceed". The countries affected are Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. The Department of Justice was last night unable to supply figures for the number of Irish citizens from these countries; however it is likely to be in the thousands. While attending a Holocaust memorial event in Dublin, Foreign Affairs Minister Charlie Flanagan said he was "very concerned" by developments. He intends to raise the issue during a series of engagements in Washington this week. "Irish people are concerned at the dramatic changes in the United States of America. I look forward to visiting Washington on Tuesday next, I will be engaging with particular reference to immigration and Irish immigration," he said. "I believe that we all have obligations to the international community and in particular to the Geneva Convention and the terms and conditions, obligations to that convention, and I think it's important in these circumstances that we fully observe the letter of the Geneva Convention." Asked about the situations at Dublin and Shannon airports, Mr Flanagan said it was a matter for the US administration and the Department of Transport. A spokesperson for Transport Minister Shane Ross declined to comment but his Independent Alliance colleague Kevin 'Boxer' Moran has backed the idea of a legal review. "We have a moral duty to speak out and I find events that are unfolding in America over the last 24 hours to be deeply disturbing, a view shared by our EU partners," Mr Moran said. "It is my view that there should be no facilitation of such orders." Ms Zappone said Ireland should take its lead from the Irish-American mayors of US cities who are "out protesting". The level of clocking (lowering a cars odometer reading) rose again in 2016 despite it being a criminal offence Motorists are being urged to be alert for a wave of 'clocked' cars as latest figures show fraudsters are knocking an average of 120,000km off vehicles' true mileage. The level of 'clocking' (lowering a car's odometer reading) rose again in 2016 - despite it being a criminal offence. Experts say the problem is now widespread, even though current legislation criminalises the practice. Potential buyers are being warned they could be stuck with a car that has covered an average of 120,000kms more than the odometer shows. The figures were compiled for the Irish Independent by history-check specialists Motorcheck.ie and involved a sample of more than 85,000 vehicles. The analysis also found: The overall clocking rate has increased to 15pc (up from 14pc in 2015) despite legislation; All major brands were effected. The top 10 makes include models from Ford, Volkswagen, Toyota, Audi, BMW, Renault, Nissan, Vauxhall/Opel, Peugeot and Mercedes; 70pc of all clocked cars were diesel-fuelled. Diesels are generally bought by people who put up bigger annual mileage. Around 120,000km fewer would significantly enhance a car's asking price; The average age of a clocked car is eight years. Cars with two-litre engines account for 28pc of all those that were interfered with. Michael Rochford, managing director of Motorcheck.ie, said the rise in clocking may be explained by the increase in used imports. He says that is because "the rate of clocking for UK imports is normally slightly higher than that for Irish cars". With at least 70,000 cars expected to be imported in 2017, there is every likelihood that more clocked vehicles will come on the Irish market. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Anakhanum Hidayatova Trend: Constructive partnership between Azerbaijan, US and Israel has a big significance, President of the American Jewish Committee John Shapiro said in an exclusive interview with Trend. Shapiro reminded that the Israeli delegation, which is currently in Baku, met with Azerbaijans President Ilham Aliyev and Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov. The conversation has been very open, and we believe we have a very good and positive understanding of the challenges faced by Azerbaijan and importance for the country to have a constructive relationship both with US and Israel, he said. Shapiro noted that it is very important that Azerbaijan as a Muslim state is secular and can be friends with Israel. It is an example of how Jewish state and a country of Islamic culture can work together and have a constructive partnership. He added that the delegation met with the Jewish community in Azerbaijan and saw they are very happy and feel very comfortable living in the country. From our perspective, it is very positive, Shapiro said. The Gainsborough Bath Spa is one of the finest in the UK, says a blissfully rested Nicola Brady. Set the Mood Bath is a city known for many things: its honey-hued architecture, rambling cobbled streets, and the ancient thermal springs found underfoot. The Roman Baths are a huge tourist draw, but why simply tour them, when you can dive in yourself? The Gainsborough Bath Spa is the only hotel in the UK with access to natural thermal waters, which flow into its stunner of a Spa Village. Smooth limestone walls frame the pools, while light floods in from the glass ceiling. You amble between top-notch steam rooms and saunas, pause for a lavender-scented ice scrub, before easing your body slowly into the therapeutic waters. I've been to plenty of spas in my time but The Gainsborough surely ranks as one of the finest. Guilty Pleasure Expand Close The Aroma Room / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp The Aroma Room The treatments in the Spa Village come with a hefty price tag but oh, are they worth it. I opted for the Malay massage (from 120/140), a truly blissful therapy that was gentle enough to be relaxing but firm enough to work out some deep knots. Treatments start with a visit to the Aroma Bar (above), an apothecary of sorts where you sit, donned in the fluffiest of robes, for a consultation. While you sip on a homemade probiotic juice, your own bespoke aromatherapy scent is created in a silk sachet, ready for you to sniff throughout your journey. It's touches like this that make all the difference. Cheap kick Pop around the corner and you'll find the Thermae Bath Spa (thermaebathspa.com), Britain's original thermal spa. A session here starts at 35/41, for which you can drift between floors of pools, steam rooms and saunas. The rooftop pool is the real winner, where you enjoy views over the city's rooftops while shrouded in the bubbling, steaming waters. Utter bliss. If you want a walking tour without the slightly cringeworthy guides, download one of the free audio guides from visitbath.co.uk. Top tip Expand Close Plump: Lamb dish / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Plump: Lamb dish Don't skip dinner in the Gainsborough's restaurant (mains from around 24.50/28.70). There's a vague Asian influence to the menu, which showcases some stellar local ingredients. I'm still dreaming about my plump fillet of lamb, served with a delicate courgette flower and toasted seeds. Insider Intel For a relatively small city, Bath has several stonkingly good museums. There's free admission at the beautiful Holburne Museum (holburne.org), and The Fashion Museum (fashionmuseum.co.uk) is a must for fans of Austen-era dresses. Oh, and the Herschel Museum (herschelmuseum.org.uk) is where William Herschel discovered Uranus (no giggling, please). Afterwards, follow your nose to its fudge kitchen. Glitches Staying at The Gainsborough doesn't grant unlimited spa access - entrance is complimentary only from 7am to 9am and 8pm to 10pm, unless you're booking a treatment. Over at Thermae, the steam rooms are looking a little worn around the edges, though they are receiving a hefty renovation this January. Get me there Rooms at The Gainsborough Bath Spa (thegainsboroughbathspa.co.uk) start at 285/336, which currently includes a bottle of champagne and a 60-minute spa treatment for midweek stays, if booked directly. The bedrooms are the epitome of laid-back luxury, with raised, cocoon-like beds, huge windows and heated bathroom floors. The complimentary minibar is seriously well stocked, too. Ryanair (ryanair.com) flies to Bristol, from which Bath is an hour away by bus (parking in the city is a nightmare, so stick to public transport). Read more: How would you like to race in an adventure across Europe with your best friend and raise money for charity at the same time? This year, DCU's 'Beg, Borrow, Steal' has more than 200 eager students in teams of two, race to Rome all in an effort to raise as much money as possible for Movember. Independent.ie visited DCU to have a chat with last year's contestants to ask their top tips and tricks to win 'Beg, Borrow, Steal' and see the world for free. Later this week, the teams will receive a number of checkpoints in Europe they must reach without spending their own money. Only relying on the kindness of strangers, the teams can grab lifts and take donations of money,food or plane tickets to get to their chosen locations. Once they have reached their checkpoints, it's the final race to Rome. Each team must raise a minimum of 250 to take part, with the three teams who raise the most money getting a 15-minute head start on their competitors. With over 50,000 raised last year for the Irish Cancer Society, the event is hoping to smash that target this year for Movember. Make sure to follow their journey this Thursday here. WIN: Two match tickets, airfare & accommodation to watch Ireland face Scotland in Edinburgh this weekend! To kick off the RBS Six Nations we have partnered with Aer Lingus to give one lucky rugby lover and their guest of choice match tickets to watch Ireland take on Scotland in Edinburgh this weekend! This fantastic prize includes match tickets, airfare, two nights accommodation and airport transfers in Edinburgh to your hotel for two guests. Winners must be over the age of 18 years to enter and be available to fly from Dublin airport to Edinburgh midday on Friday 3rd February until their return flight on Sunday, February 5th. Terms and conditions apply, these are available within the rules section of the below form. To be in with a chance of winning this incredible prize, simply enter your details into the following form. Sponsored by: Liam Payne and Cheryl arriving at The Fayre of St James's Church on November 29, 2016 in London, England. (Photo by Mark Milan/GC Images) Handout issued by Hello! magazine of the front cover of the latest edition to go with PA story SHOWBIZ Walsh. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Issue date: Monday January 30, 2017. See PA story SHOWBIZ Walsh. Photo credit should read: Hello!/PA Wire Kimberly Walsh has revealed that her former Girls Aloud bandmate Cheryl was one of the first people to meet her newborn baby. Walsh welcomed her second baby, Cole, with husband Justin Scott in December and said that Cheryl was "desperate" to meet the newborn. "She came the next day and was desperate to meet him," she said. "She loved him. She lives nearby, which is really nice. They had lovely cuddles." Expand Close Handout issued by Hello! magazine of the front cover of the latest edition to go with PA story SHOWBIZ Walsh. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Issue date: Monday January 30, 2017. See PA story SHOWBIZ Walsh. Photo credit should read: Hello!/PA Wire / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Handout issued by Hello! magazine of the front cover of the latest edition to go with PA story SHOWBIZ Walsh. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Issue date: Monday January 30, 2017. See PA story SHOWBIZ Walsh. Photo credit should read: Hello!/PA Wire Cheryl, who dropped her previous surnames of Tweedy, Cole and Fernandez-Versini to be known simply as Cheryl, is reportedly expecting a child with pop star boyfriend Liam Payne. Walsh (35) joked she and her husband may end up celebrating their first wedding anniversary "in bed with the TV and sicky muslins". Walsh and Scott, a property developer and former boy band star, discovered they were expecting their second child just weeks after their wedding. She told Hello! magazine of their January 30 anniversary: "If it's anything like New Year, we'll be in bed with the TV and sicky muslins. Expand Close Liam Payne and Cheryl arriving at The Fayre of St James's Church on November 29, 2016 in London, England. (Photo by Mark Milan/GC Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Liam Payne and Cheryl arriving at The Fayre of St James's Church on November 29, 2016 in London, England. (Photo by Mark Milan/GC Images) "But we had the most amazing wedding and to now have two beautiful, healthy sons is wonderful enough, so whatever we do, I'll be happy." The couple are also parents to two-year-old son Bobby, who she said was delighted to meet his baby brother, and did "a little victory dance and was running around, singing 'My baby brother!'". Video of the Day "I really wanted a little brother for Bobby, close in age, so I'm over the moon to have our two beautiful boys," she added. :: Read the full article in HELLO! out now Actress Brie Larson attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Janelle Monae attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Ariel Winter attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actress Salma Hayek arrives for the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Exposition Center on January 29, 2017, in Los Angeles, California. / AFP / FREDERIC J. BROWN (Photo credit should read FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP/Getty Images) Actress Michelle Dockery arrives for the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Exposition Center on January 29, 2017, in Los Angeles, California. / AFP / FREDERIC J. BROWN (Photo credit: FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP/Getty Images) Actor Meryl Streep attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Taryn Manning attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Maisie Williams attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Kathryn Hahn attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Uzo Aduba attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Nicole Kidman attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Amy Landecker attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actress Emily Blunt attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actress Actor Samantha Isler attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Kaley Cuoco attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Thandie Newton attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Kate Hudson attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Jessica Pimentel attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Taraji P. Henson attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Sofia Vergara attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Gina Rodriguez attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Taylor Schilling attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Amy Adams attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Emma Stone attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Actor Michelle Williams attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) 25 Best and Worst Dressed at the SAG Awards. (L-R) Emily Blunt, Amy Adams, Brie Larson, Emma Stone Who wore what (and WTF?) at the Screen Actors Guild Awards. BEST: Michelle Williams Expand Close Actor Michelle Williams attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Michelle Williams attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Michelle Williams tops the best dressed list with this gold and silver striped gown that only she could make look cool. WORST: Emma Stone Expand Close Actor Emma Stone attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Emma Stone attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) We know, we're as shocked as you are that Emma Stone made the worst dressed list. While we love the lingerie trend, this dress just looks unfinished and we think Emma could have done better. BEST: Amy Adams Expand Close Actor Amy Adams attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Amy Adams attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Amy Adams is the queen of nailing classic red carpet glam, and proves that you can't go wrong with a LBD for any occasion. WORST: Taylor Schilling Expand Close Actor Taylor Schilling attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Taylor Schilling attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Orange is the New Black star Taylor Schilling's plum gown failed to impress, and reminds us of something we saw Keira Knightly wear in Pirates of the Caribbean. BEST: Gina Rodriquez Expand Close Actor Gina Rodriguez attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Gina Rodriguez attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Gina Rodriquez's embellished gown is what dreams are made of. WORST: Sofia Vergara Expand Close Actor Sofia Vergara attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Sofia Vergara attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Sofia Vergara's red carpet style usually blows us away, but this prom-style dress does her no favours. BEST: Taraji P. Henson Expand Close Taraji P. Henson attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Taraji P. Henson attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Need we say why this is on the best dressed list? One word: Incredible. WORST: Jessica Pimentel Expand Close Actor Jessica Pimentel attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Jessica Pimentel attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) While we admire Jessica Pimentel's confidence to wear this daring gown, we can only think of how much nicer it would have looked without the soaring thigh high split. BEST: Kate Hudson Expand Close Actor Kate Hudson attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Kate Hudson attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Kate took a chance with this risky gown - and it totally paid off. We love the mixture of both romantic and gothic vibes, not to mention the killer cape. Video of the Day WORST: Thandie Newton Expand Close Actor Thandie Newton attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Thandie Newton attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Putting a ferris wheel and animals on a dress is never a good idea unless you're less than five years old. Enough said. BEST: Kaley Cuoco Expand Close Actor Kaley Cuoco attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Kaley Cuoco attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Kaley Cuoco's ethereal gown is simply stunning. We'd go so far as to say that it's one of the best red carpet looks we've seen her wear. WORST: Samantha Isler Expand Close Actress Actor Samantha Isler attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actress Actor Samantha Isler attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) This green and black piece totally swamps Samantha Isler, and to be honest we can't find anything good about it. BEST: Emily Blunt Expand Close Actress Emily Blunt attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actress Emily Blunt attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Emily Blunt looks absolutely picture perfect in this shimmering gown. WORST: Amy Landecker Expand Close Actor Amy Landecker attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Amy Landecker attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) While we're big fans of leopard print, the pattern and fitting of this suit does nothing for Amy Landecker. BEST/WORST: Nicole Kidman Expand Close Actor Nicole Kidman attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Nicole Kidman attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) We can't make up our minds about whether we love or hate Nicole Kidman's emerald gown. We love its striking colour and shimmering finish, but the parrots on the shoulders and plunging neckline take away its style credentials. BEST: Uzo Aduba Expand Close Actor Uzo Aduba attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Uzo Aduba attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Uzo Aduba's monochrome dress is the epitome of old-school red carpet glamour. WORST: Kathryn Hahn Expand Close Actor Kathryn Hahn attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Kathryn Hahn attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Sorry, Kathryn Hahn, but it looks like you're wearing a black sheet with buckles. BEST: Maisie Williams Expand Close Actor Maisie Williams attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Maisie Williams attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Sometimes sweet and simple is all you need. WORST: Taryn Manning Expand Close Actor Taryn Manning attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Taryn Manning attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) While we love Taryn Manning's candy floss hair, we're getting flashbacks of debs photos from the 1970s thanks to this satin gown. WORST: Meryl Streep Expand Close Actor Meryl Streep attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Meryl Streep attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) We love you Meryl, but why are you wearing a dress with bird prints on it? The material and pattern look inexpensive, and we feel that Meryl could have done better. BEST: Michelle Dockery Expand Close Actress Michelle Dockery arrives for the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Exposition Center on January 29, 2017, in Los Angeles, California. / AFP / FREDERIC J. BROWN (Photo credit: FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actress Michelle Dockery arrives for the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Exposition Center on January 29, 2017, in Los Angeles, California. / AFP / FREDERIC J. BROWN (Photo credit: FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP/Getty Images) Michelle Dockery stood out from the crowd of nude and sequined gowns with this bright and bold piece. WORST: Salma Hayek Expand Close Actress Salma Hayek arrives for the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Exposition Center on January 29, 2017, in Los Angeles, California. / AFP / FREDERIC J. BROWN (Photo credit should read FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actress Salma Hayek arrives for the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Exposition Center on January 29, 2017, in Los Angeles, California. / AFP / FREDERIC J. BROWN (Photo credit should read FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP/Getty Images) We're blinded by this yellow and pink dress - and not in a good way. BEST: Ariel Winter Expand Close Actor Ariel Winter attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Ariel Winter attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Ariel Winter isn't afraid to go all out with her outfit choices, and that we greatly admire her for. WORST: Janelle Monae Expand Close Actor Janelle Monae attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actor Janelle Monae attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) There's way too much going on in Janelle Monae's prom-style dress, and it totally swamped her into oblivion on the red carpet. BEST: Brie Larson Expand Close Actress Brie Larson attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Actress Brie Larson attends The 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Auditorium on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. 26592_008 (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) Less certainly is more when it comes to Brie Larson's simplistic gown. Chen Peijie, Chinas consul-general in Sabah, checks her mobile phone at a jetty in Kota Kinabalu as she awaits news. Photo: AFP/Getty Twenty-two people wore life jackets and formed a human chain at sea for more than 10 hours before being rescued off Malaysia's coast after their boat sank yesterday. Authorities said three bodies were recovered and six other people were missing. The boat left Kota Kinabalu in Sabah state at 9am on Saturday on its way to Pulau Mengalum, an island about 60km west, and was reported missing about 12 hours later. The captain and a crew member were spotted by a military plane and rescued by another tourist boat yesterday afternoon, according to government minister Shahidan Kassim and the Malaysia Maritime Enforcement Agency. Fishermen found 20 survivors and three people dead - two men and a woman - the agency said. The survivors had huddled together in groups and were wearing life jackets. The agency said they had been adrift for 10 hours but did not say when the boat sank or give other details of what happened during the other hours since the boat departed. Mr Shahidan said search efforts were being intensified, including using surveillance planes which can see in the dark. The search area is about 400 square nautical miles of the South China Sea. Arwin Musbir, the captain of another boat that left for Pulau Mengalum at the same time, told the 'New Straits Times' newspaper that he was following the missing boat but lost sight of it shortly after they left. He said he realised it had gone missing only after he arrived at the island. Twenty-eight of the 31 on board were Chinese, with three crew members. Broken Many Chinese travel abroad during the Lunar New Year holiday, which began Saturday. "According to the skipper, the boat was 'broken' after being hit by strong waves, and sank. All the tourists were tied together and were carried away by the currents," Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency director-general Ahmad Puzi Ab Kahar told a news conference in Kota Kinabalu. Ahmad Puzi said authorities were investigating the sinking of the catamaran and whether it should have been used as a tourist vessel. The head of the Malaysian navy, Ahmad Kamarulzaman Ahmad Badaruddin, said ships and a C130 aircraft had been searching for those still missing. Authorities said the hunt had been hampered by rough seas and strong winds in the search area. Chinese President Xi Jinping "demanded all-out search and rescue efforts" by Malaysia, according to China's official Xinhua news agency. Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Razak has said he is monitoring developments closely. A man has been mauled to death by a tiger after he walked into its enclosure at a Chinese zoo. The man's wife and child watched him as he scaled the zoo's wall with his colleague and then dropped down into the enclosure, BBC reports. The man, who has only been identified by his surname 'Zhang', was rushed to the nearest hospital after the attack but was pronounced dead. The incident occurred on Sunday at the Youngor Zoo in the city of Ningbo, in eastern China. It is not yet known why the man entered the enclosure and authorities have opened an investigation. Witnesses described how the mauling took place during feeding time at the zoo in front of full view of park visitors, some of whom posted video clips and pictures of the attack online. Photos from the incident show how the tiger had his jaws around the man's head and neck, while the other two tigers circled him. Zookeepers attempted to halt the attack with fireworks and water cannons, before they shot one of the tigers dead. The zoo's authorities confirmed that they were prominent warning signs around the enclosure and iron fencing on top of the walls. At least seven Ukrainian soldiers died in the fighting At least seven Ukrainian soldiers have been killed in an apparent upsurge in fighting in the east of the country, government officials have said. An armed conflict between government troops and separatist rebels has killed more than 9,600 since it began in 2014, according to the UN Human Rights Office. A January ceasefire had until recently helped to limit the fighting to sporadic shootouts. The government's press office for the operation in the east said it recorded an increase in fighting on several fronts on Sunday which left at least five killed and nine troops injured. Two more were killed and five injured on Monday morning north of the rebel stronghold of Donetsk, the press office said. Kiev accused the rebels of using tanks and Grad multiple grenade launchers, and said they recorded intensified fighting all along the frontline - outside the separatist stronghold of Donetsk, in the south of the frontline north of Mariupol and west of Luhansk. The Grad launcher is among heavy-calibre weapons that should have been pulled back from the frontline under a 2015 truce between the warring parties. In Donetsk, self-proclaimed separatist authorities reported substantial damage to civilian infrastructure, with several villages and areas left without electricity and gas supplies. The separatist Donetsk News Agency reported one civilian killed and three injured in Makiivka, north-east of Donetsk. The rebels also reported that government forces opened fire on a checkpoint to the north of Donetsk where thousands of civilians pass through every day between rebel-held and government-controlled territories. Both sides reported that fighting continued on Monday morning. AP Details added (first version posted on 10:02) Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 Trend: A conference dedicated to the results of third year implementation of "The State Program on socio-economic development of the regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan in 2014-2018" started Jan. 30. President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev attended the conference. The president made an opening speech at the conference. Other speakers at the event included Minister of Economy Shahin Mustafayev, Minister of Agriculture Heydar Asadov, head of Azerbaijan Fruit and Vegetable Producers and Exporters Association Bashir Guliyev, chairman of Hazelnut Producers and Exporters Association Ismayil Orujov, chairman of Wine Exporters' and Producers' Association Elchin Madatov, head of Azerbaijan Tourism Association Nahid Baghirov and head of Fish Meal Manufacturing Plant Zaur Salmanov. The president made a closing speech at the conference. The shooting happened in a mosque in Quebec City (AP) Police at the scene of the shooting (The Canadian Press/AP) Quebec mosque attack suspect Alexandre Bissonnette has been charged with six counts of first-degree murder. Bissonnette has also been charged with five counts of attempted murder in connection with the shooting at a mosque late on Sunday. Quebec police had earlier said that a second man arrested following the attack was now being treated as a witness. Six people, ranging in age from 35 to 65, were killed in the shooting at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre, while five were in critical condition and 12 others suffered minor injuries. The six people who died have been identified as Mamadou Tanou Barry, 42; Abdelkrim Hassane, 41; Khaled Belkacemi, 60; Aboubaker Thabti, 44; Azzeddine Soufiane, 57; and Ibrahima Barry, 39. Bissonnette has made a brief court appearance at which he did not enter a plea. He appeared in a white prisoner jumpsuit, and stared at his feet and fidgeted during the hearing. His next court date is February 21. Brunhilde Pomsel attends the premiere of the film Eindeutsches Leben (A German Life) in Munich (Matthias Balk/dpa via AP) Brunhilde Pomsel, a former secretary of Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, has died aged 106. Ms Pomsel lived most of her life in relative obscurity until a German newspaper published an interview with her in 2011, prompting a flurry of interest in one of the last surviving members of the Nazi leadership's inner circle. Her death was confirmed by Christian Kroenes, a director and producer of the film A German Life. In the documentary, Ms Pomsel talks about her three years working for the man responsible for spreading Adolf Hitler's ideology in newspapers and across the airwaves. Mr Kroenes said Ms Pomsel had been lucid when he last spoke to her on her birthday on January 11. He said she died at her Munich home on Friday. Former President George HW Bush and his wife Barbara pose for a photo at Houston Methodist Hospital. (Courtesy the Office of George HW Bush via AP) Former President George HW Bush has been released from a Houston hospital where he received treatment for pneumonia for more than two weeks. Mr Bush's spokesman Jim McGrath said in a statement that the 92-year-old is thankful for the prayers and kind messages he's received during his stay at Houston Methodist Hospital and for the "world-class care" from doctors and nurses. Mr Bush was experiencing breathing difficulties when he was admitted on January 14. During his treatment, which included a stay in intensive care, doctors inserted a breathing tube and connected him to a ventilator. The nation's 41st president was joined at the hospital by his 91-year-old wife, former first lady Barbara Bush, who spent five days there for treatment of bronchitis until her release a week ago. The couple's 72-year marriage is the longest of any presidential couple in US history and the former first lady was with her husband during much of his stay, including when she was hospitalised for her own treatment. They were "essentially therapy for each other," Dr Clint Doerr, one of the physicians treating Mr Bush, said last week. Mr Bush, who served as president from 1989 to 1993, has a form of Parkinson's disease and uses a motorized scooter or a wheelchair for mobility. He was hospitalised in 2015 in Maine after falling at his summer home and breaking a bone in his neck. He was also hospitalised in Houston the previous December for about a week for shortness of breath. He spent Christmas 2012 in intensive care for a bronchitis-related cough and other issues. Despite his loss of mobility, Mr Bush celebrated his 90th birthday by making a tandem parachute jump in Kennebunkport, Maine. Last summer, Mr Bush led a group of 40 wounded warriors on a fishing trip at the helm of his speedboat, three days after his 92nd birthday celebration. George Herbert Walker Bush, born June 12, 1924, in Milton, Massachusetts, also served as a congressman, CIA director and Ronald Reagan's vice president. AP A US commando died in a dawn raid in southern Yemen yesterday that killed around 30 people including al-Qaida suspects and civilians, the US military and local Yemeni officials said. A US commando died in a dawn raid in southern Yemen yesterday that killed around 30 people including al-Qa'ida suspects and civilians, the US military and local Yemeni officials said. It was the first combat casualty of the Trump administration and its first operation in the war-damaged Arabian Peninsula nation against a powerful al-Qa'ida branch that has been a frequent target of US drone strikes. The gunbattle in the rural Yakla district of al-Bayda province killed a senior leader in Yemen's al-Qa'ida branch, Abdulraoof al-Dhahab, along with other militants, al-Qa'ida said. Medics at the scene said 30 people were killed, including 10 women and three children. The US military said in a statement that 14 al-Qa'ida militants died in the raid, which netted "information that will likely provide insight into the planning of future terror plots". Three US commandoes were also wounded in the operation in which a military aircraft experienced a hard landing and was "intentionally destroyed in place". "The operation began at dawn when a drone bombed the home of Abdulraoof al-Dhahab and then helicopters flew up and unloaded paratroopers at his house and killed everyone inside," one resident said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "Next, the gunmen opened fire at the US soldiers who left the area, and the helicopters bombed the gunmen and a number of homes and led to a large number of casualties." Bodies A Yemeni security officer and a local official corroborated that account. Fahd, a local resident who asked that only his first name be used, said several bodies remained under debris and that houses and a mosque were damaged in the attack. In a message on its official Telegram account, al-Qa'ida mourned al-Dhahab as a "holy warrior" and other slain militants, without specifying how many of its fighters were killed. Eight-year old Anwar al-Awlaki - the daughter of US-born Yemeni preacher and al-Qa'ida ideologue Anwar al-Awlaki, who was killed in a US drone strike in 2011 - was among the children who died in the raid, according to her grandfather. "She was hit with a bullet in her neck and suffered for two hours. Why kill children? This is the new administration - it's very sad, a big crime," Nasser al-Awlaki said. US forces have not conducted any special operations in Yemen since December 2014, before nearly two years of civil war offered al-Qa'ida leeway to expand into more lawless areas. US special forces then attempted to rescue an American and a South African hostage held by al-Qa'ida in another part of the country. The captives were killed in the subsequent firefight. The United States conducted dozens of drone strikes in Yemen throughout Barack Obama's presidency to combat al-Qa'ida in the Arabian Peninsula, regarded as one of the global militant group's most dangerous branches. The local al-Qa'ida unit organised the 'Charlie Hebdo' magazine attack in Paris in 2015 and has repeatedly tried to down US airliners. Miss France Iris Mittenaere during the question-and-answer section of the Miss Universe competition in the Philippines, which she won (AP Photo/Bullit Marquez) A 23-year-old dental student from France won the Miss Universe crown in the annual pageant held in the Philippines on Monday, saying her triumph will make the beauty contest more popular in Europe and help her efforts to put more underprivileged children in school. Iris Mittenaere, from Lille, in northern France, buried her face in her hands in shock and joy as the outgoing winner from the Philippines, Pia Wurtzbach, crowned her and the crowd erupted in cheers at the packed Mall of Asia Arena by Manila Bay. Miss Haiti, Raquel Pelissier, a 25-year-old survivor of the devastating 2010 earthquake which destroyed her hometown, was named first runner-up, while Miss Colombia, 23-year-old industrial designer and photographer Andrea Tovar, was second runner-up. "I think France and Europe really need a Miss Universe," Ms Mittenaere said in a post-pageant news conference when asked how her countrymen would receive her victory, the first by a French woman in more than 60 years. The beauty contest has not been as popular in France as in other countries, she said, but "French people will love it now and every year they will be watching Miss Universe." "I'm very proud to bring this crown to Europe," she said. Ms Mittenaere said she would focus during her reign on helping all children, especially girls, attend school. Ms Pellissier said surviving Haiti's quake, which officials in her country estimated killed more than 300,000 people and displaced more than 1.5 million others, and her pageant success underscored her rise from adversity because she "chose to be a very positive person and learned a great lesson from it". "If I am here today, it is because I am living my dreams," said Ms Pelissier, who is studying for a Masters degree in optometry research. Eighty-six candidates competed in this year's pageant, which was formerly owned by new US President Donald Trump. As he closed the ceremony, American comedian host Steve Harvey declared: "I got it right", referring in jest to his mistaken announcement of Miss Colombia as the winner in last year's pageant in Las Vegas. He was roundly criticised for the embarrassing error. "One thing I learned in life, when you make a mistake, you gotta keep on moving forward man, that's all," he said. In her farewell remarks as the outgoing winner, a smiling Ms Wurtzbach thanked Harvey for making her "the most popular Miss Universe". Harvey, laughing, thanked her for making him the most famous Miss Universe host. Judges initially selected a dozen candidates, with a 13th picked through online balloting involving 100 million votes worldwide. AP Ali Hanas says ban will affect Somalians in Ireland who have family in the US. Photo: Arthur Carron, Getty Ali Hanas has dual Irish-Somali citizenship and he believes the ban introduced by US President Donald Trump represents a "huge area of concern". Citizens from Somalia, Sudan, Libya, Iraq, Iran, Yemen and Syria included in the ban. But despite having dual citizenship and an Irish passport, Mr Hanas (28) will not be able to travel to the US under the ban and said he was shocked when he heard this. Expand Close Protesters at the Miami International Airport against the executive order that President Donald Trump signed clamping down on refugee admissions and temporarily restricting travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Photo: Joe Raedle/Getty Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Protesters at the Miami International Airport against the executive order that President Donald Trump signed clamping down on refugee admissions and temporarily restricting travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Photo: Joe Raedle/Getty Images "It was a huge challenge when I first heard about the ban but it's so difficult to take when you have an Irish passport," he said. "I know a lot of the Somalian population in Ireland were born in Somalia so this will affect a lot of those people, especially if they have family in the US," he said. Mr Hanas has lived in Ireland since moving from Somalia 12 years ago. "For Somalians with family living in the US, it represents a huge challenge. For the undocumented in the US currently, it makes Somalians and the other nations feel not safe," he said. "I have already heard that 90 Somalians have been deported and forced to return to our country this week alone," he said. Mr Hanas is the director of the Udug Association in Ireland. Udug provides support to migrant communities in the areas of youth development, community advancement and education. Mr Hanas said he would like to see more signs of solidarity from Irish authorities in the face of the ban. "Of course we are interested in what the Irish authorities have to say on the matter, as it represents one of the biggest challenges of our time," he said. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Seba Aghayeva Trend: The European Union (EU) intends to expand the dialogue and cooperation with Azerbaijan, said Christian Danielsson, director general for neighbourhood and enlargement negotiations at the European Commission, during a meeting with the Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov. The sides will soon start negotiating on the draft agreement on strategic partnership between the EU and Azerbaijan, he noted. During the meeting, the parties discussed the current state of the relations and prospects of cooperation, exchanged views on Azerbaijans participation in the EU Eastern Partnership program and noted the significance of mutually beneficial cooperation in various spheres. Mammadyarov said Azerbaijan welcomes the issuance of a mandate by the Council of the EU to start negotiations on the agreement on strategic partnership and expressed confidence that this decision will have a positive impact on the Azerbaijan-EU cooperation. The European Council adopted a mandate for the European Commission and the high representative for foreign affairs and security policy to negotiate, on behalf of the EU and its member states, a comprehensive agreement with Azerbaijan in November 2016. The new agreement should replace the 1996 partnership and cooperation agreement and should better take account of the shared objectives and challenges the EU and Azerbaijan face today. The agreement will follow the principles endorsed in the 2015 review of the European Neighborhood Policy and offer a renewed basis for political dialogue and mutually beneficial cooperation between the EU and Azerbaijan. Emirates airline has changed pilot and flight attendant rosters on flights to the United States following the sudden U.S. travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries, highlighting the challenges facing airlines trying to deal with the new rules. The world's largest long-haul carrier, which flies daily to 11 U.S. cities, has made "the necessary adjustments to our crewing, to comply with the latest requirements," an Emirates spokeswoman told Reuters by email on Sunday. She added U.S. flights continue to operate to schedule. President Donald Trump on Friday suspended the entry of people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The decision caught airlines off guard, according to the International Air Transport Association . "I cannot think of anything comparable. This brings a mix of administrative confusion, impact and uncertainty for many travellers as well as practical operational headaches and complexities for airlines in planning their flight programmes," independent aviation consultant John Strickland told Reuters. Expand Close A woman greets her mother after she arrived from Dubai on Emirates Flight 203 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, New York, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp A woman greets her mother after she arrived from Dubai on Emirates Flight 203 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, New York, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly The ban applies to pilots and flight attendants from the seven countries, even though all flight crew who are not U.S. citizens already need a special visa to enter the country. Read More Nicoley Baublies, from the German cabin crew union UFO, said the move was very unusual and meant uncertainty for airlines in terms of planning. Expand Close A woman exits immigration after arriving from Dubai on Emirates Flight 203 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, New York, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp A woman exits immigration after arriving from Dubai on Emirates Flight 203 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, New York, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly "Lufthansa has always ensured it has very diverse crews, with staff of different nationalities and that means that we are for the first time in decades having to look at where people come from," he told Reuters at Frankfurt airport. A spokesman for Lufthansa said on Sunday it was too early to comment on the effects of the order but that airlines and passengers were required to follow the new rules. Another Emirates spokeswoman said the impact of the ban on operations would be minimal. The airline employs over 23,000 flight attendants and about 4,000 pilots from around the world, including the United States, Europe and the Middle East. Meanwhile, a spokesman for Etihad Airways of Abu Dhabi said the airline had "taken steps to ensure there will be no issues for flights departing over the coming weeks." Japan Airlines (JAL) on Monday said it had begun screening passengers from the countries affected Trump's travel ban before their departure for the United States. JAL officials would contact the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency to confirm whether passengers would be allowed entry, a spokesman for Japan's second-biggest carrier said. Expand Close People exit immigration after arriving from Dubai on Emirates Flight 203 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, New York, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp People exit immigration after arriving from Dubai on Emirates Flight 203 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, New York, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly It is unclear if the ban applies to dual nationals - those who hold one passport from a country on the list and another from a non-U.S. country that is not. Etihad said on its website that dual citizens could travel to the U.S. using their non-banned passport. IATA have told its members that the ban does not apply to dual nationals if they have a passport not on the list, according to an email seen by Reuters. Expand Close Women check their luggage after arriving on a flight from Dubai on Emirates Flight 203 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, New York, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Women check their luggage after arriving on a flight from Dubai on Emirates Flight 203 at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, New York, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly However, the Guardian reported on Saturday, quoting State Department officials, that dual nationals were banned. US officials said on Sunday holders of green cards need to check with a U.S. consulate and will be cleared on a case by case basis. EFFECT ON TRAVEL DEMAND? On Sunday, IATA sent another email to member airlines, seen by Reuters, asking for examples of Green Card holders being denied boarding. It also said it was seeking more information from authorities in Washington. Baublies said the uncertainty over the rules was not helping. "Trump reacts in 140 characters, we don't know what it means - for people with the wrong entries in their passports or with dual nationality or married to someone from one of the countries affected, are they allowed to travel?" There are also concerns the restrictions could dampen travel demand. Read More "Ultimately this could feed through to the role airlines play in the global economy in supporting business and tourism due to as yet unquantifiable impacts on demand & cost," Strickland said. Baublies said airlines were usually among the first affected by global crises. "We hope it doesn't mean that seats are left empty because people don't know where they can travel with which passport." Dubai-based Emirates and Etihad Airways are both owned by the governments of the United Arab Emirates, a U.S. ally and Muslim-majority country. Both carriers said they would continue to comply with the new rules on U.S. immigration but where possible would offer to refund or rebook affected passengers. Emirates and Etihad have also said that passengers were affected by the ban over the weekend but their flight crews had not been impacted. Qatar Airways declined to comment on the impact of the ban on flight operations, although on Saturday it issued a statement on its website that passengers would need a green card or diplomatic visa to enter the U.S. Emirates and Etihad issued similar statements. US President Donald Trump's travel ban on seven mainly Muslim countries is a "chilling example that other countries may imitate", the CEO of the Irish Refugees Council has warned. Nick Henderson said he and his organisation were "hugely concerned" by Mr Trump's immigration ban and condemned it in the strongest terms. "The ban is contrary to the values of generosity and tolerance that underpin the US's refugee resettlement programme," he said. "(Former) president (Barack) Obama had recently pledged that the US would resettle 111,000 people in 2017, including around 10,000 Syrian people. The US is also a significant funder of the UN refugee agency. "Most worryingly, this ban could result in the loss of life as people lose a crucial route to safety and security from situations of profound danger. "Refugee protection exists to ensure people are safe from persecution, it is a cornerstone of international law. Mr Trump has, in one executive order, undermined these essential principles." Yahya al-Hussein from the Islamic Foundation of Ireland said that the imposed ban on Muslims entering the US was "a disgrace". "For a leading nation to resort to this type of law is very disappointing and it is important that other nations react well," he told the Irish Independent. "It is so important that other nations call on people to get together and practise the fundamentals of liberty. "I have seen nothing of this scale of discrimination, for no good reason at all, before." Mr al-Hussein, who is 60 years old, was born in Sudan but has lived in Ireland for the past 30 years. "To see citizens who have never been involved in violence discriminated against in this way is truly disappointing," he said. Sahar Ali, a 26-year-old student who has dual citizenship for Ireland and Sudan, said "it is bizarre to see this ban in the 21st century". Ms Ali currently has family members in the US who she said "can't leave now, as once they leave they will not be able to go back". "It's incredible, there are so many great Sudanese businessmen in the States who are benefiting the business community there and then this happens," she said. Ms Ali moved to Ireland in 1997 following a year in Saudi Arabia and five years in Scotland, but her mother and father are both Sudanese. "One thing I fear is a spread of this mentality. As soon as the ban was announced, a mosque in Texas was burned down, so I worry it will trickle across. "If I went to America my mother would be very worried but now I absolutely would think twice about going," she said. Meanwhile, more than 9,000 people have signed a petition in the last 24 hours calling on Taoiseach Enda Kenny to refuse to visit the White House on St Patrick's Day. Siobhan O'Donoghue, director of Uplift, which organised the petition, said: "People in Ireland are disgusted by the behaviour of Mr Trump since he became president nine days ago, and want to see Enda Kenny show real leadership." Ignoring Donald Trump won't make him go away. The US president has now proven himself to be not just an egomaniac but also a bully, in the oldest sense of the word. His ban on people from some of the most troubled parts of the world travelling to the US is something that should resonate in Ireland. Nobody needs a history lesson on how Irish migrants sailed what James Joyce described as a bowl of bitter tears to help make America great. As a result of that legacy, we now have a standing invitation to visit the White House once a year - a 'special relationship' that no other country in the world is afforded. In the good times, it has all been 'great craic', with Bill Clinton throwing lavish parties and Barack Obama joking about his own Irish ancestors in Moneygall. What display Trump will put on is unclear but for the travelling Taoiseach, it cannot be business as usual. There were calls last night for Enda Kenny to call the whole thing off - but that would achieve little. We would be slamming the door on an opportunity to show what Ireland now stands for. The country that fought its way back from economic collapse, and celebrated with scenes of unbridled joy when a referendum passed marriage equality, and one that works to maintain a fragile peace agreement that is quoted the world over. Labour Party leader Brendan Howlin said that if the Muslim ban remains in place, "Enda Kenny should not be boarding a plane to Washington in March". "President Trump does not share our values. Indeed, he is openly hostile to them." He warned a visit by the Taoiseach to the White House could "present Ireland as a supine supporter of Trumpism". The Green Party espoused similar views, and Children's Minister Katherine Zappone said the situation should be kept under "review". For its part, Fianna Fail's foreign affairs spokesman Darragh O'Brien argued that the Taoiseach should travel because "not talking to people serves no purpose". Foreign Affairs Minister Charlie Flanagan indicated that the Government has no intention of blanking Trump. "I believe in dialogue, I believe in discussion. Walking away from an invitation, to my mind, is not the best way of dealing with international affairs and public issues," he said. In truth, the symbolism of the Irish 'prime minister' not showing up to the White House on March 17 would be a major story here - but a blip on the international radar. What would make a bigger impact is if Mr Kenny goes to the White House and, rather than blushing for the cameras, makes a real statement of intent. He must stand beside the president, in full view of the media, and say Ireland does not respect his policies. Mr Kenny must show the strength of character to tell the leader of the free world to stop curtailing freedoms. It might seem cliched to quote John F Kennedy but I'd suggest that the Taoiseach read his 1963 address to the Dail before jetting off. "In an age when 'history moves with the tramp of earthquake feet', in an age when a handful of men and nations have the power literally to devastate mankind, in an age when the needs of the developing nations are so large and staggering that even the richest nations often groan with the burden of assistance - in such an age, it may be asked, how can a nation as small as Ireland play much of a role on the world stage?" JFK asked. He goes on to describe the virtues of "five feet high" nations, concluding: "The heroic deeds that thrill humanity through generations were the deeds of little nations fighting for their freedom. And, oh, yes, the salvation of mankind came through a little nation." Perhaps instead of the bowl of shamrock, Mr Kenny could just give the incumbent a print-out of that speech, describing how Irish sons and daughters went to America "in a mixture of hope and agony". Mr Kenny must use St Patrick's Day to tell the Irish story in defence of the defenceless. Former President Barack Obama has praised protesters who amassed across the country in opposition to President Donald Trump's immigration orders, breaking his silence on political issues for the first time since leaving office. "The president fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion," Mr Obama's spokesman Kevin Lewis said. In his first statement on behalf of the former president, Mr Lewis said Mr Obama was "heartened" by the amount of engagement taking place in US communities. Read More Mr Lewis, a former White House official, pointed out that Mr Obama used his last official speech as president to talk about Americans' responsibility to be "guardians of our democracy," even in non-election years. "Citizens exercising their constitutional right to assemble, organise and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake," Mr Lewis said. Mr Lewis did not specifically invoke President Trump's immigration order. But he rejected comparisons between Mr Trump's recent actions and Mr Obama's foreign policy decisions. President Trump said he took cues from Mr Obama by temporarily banning travel to the US from citizens of seven countries that Mr Obama's administration identified as places of terrorism concern. But Mr Obama's designation related strictly to eligibility to enter the US without a visa; he never considered a travel ban. Mr Obama's office also circulated excerpts from a speech the former president gave in November 2015, in which he called the idea of a ban on Muslims "shameful". "That's not American. That's not who we are. We don't have religious tests to our compassion," Mr Obama said in the aftermath of attacks in Paris that prompted calls for the US to restrict Syrian refugees from entering the United States. President Trump and the White House have vigorously disputed the notion that Mr Trump's order is a "Muslim ban". The order halts all refugee admissions for 120 days, suspends the Syrian refugee programme indefinitely and also suspends entry to the US from seven majority-Muslim countries for 90 days. But the White House has stressed that dozens of other Muslim-majority countries are not included. Mr Lewis's comments mark the first time Mr Obama has weighed in on President Trump's actions since he left office on January 20. In his final weeks as president, Mr Obama said he planned to follow George W Bush's example by giving his successor room to govern without being second-guessed. Yet Mr Obama pointedly reserved the right to speak out if President Trump violated what Mr Obama called basic American values. He suggested a ban on Muslims or a move by President Trump to deport immigrants brought to the US illegally as children would cross that threshold. Four-time Olympic champion Mo Farah said he was "relieved" he can return to his US home after it was clarified that President Donald Trump's travel ban did not apply to him. Somali nationals are among those banned from travelling to the US under the executive order issued on Friday. That had applied to Farah (33), who was born in Somalia, and the athlete called Trump's policy "divisive and discriminatory". British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson held conversations with the US government late yesterday and was told by some of Donald Trump's closest advisers that British citizens will be allowed to continue to travel from the UK to the US. The Foreign Office then advised British travellers that dual citizens were only affected if travelling to the US from one of the seven banned countries. A spokesperson for Farah, who has lived in Oregon for six years with his family, said that they were happy with the clarification. "We understand from the statement released by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office that the executive order will not apply to Mo, and we are grateful to the FCO for urgently clarifying the situation," they said. "Mo is relieved that he will be able to return to his family once his current training camp concludes." The statement added that Farah "still fundamentally disagrees with this incredibly divisive and discriminatory policy". Earlier he wrote on Facebook that the temporary travel ban leaves him unsure whether he can return to his US home. "On January 1 this year, Her Majesty the Queen [of England] made me a knight of the realm. On January 27, US President Donald Trump seems to have made me an alien," Farah said in his statement. "It's deeply troubling that will have to tell my children that Daddy might not be able to come home - to explain why the president has introduced a policy that comes from a place of ignorance and prejudice. "I am a British citizen who has lived in America for the past six years - working hard, contributing to society, paying my taxes and bringing up our four children in the place they now call home. Now, me and many others like me are being told that we may not be welcome." Farah is currently training in Ethiopia. His wife, Tania, and four children are in Portland, Oregon, where the Farah family have lived for the past six years. Anger and dismay rippled across the world as politicians reacted to the entry ban. Theresa May arrived back in Britain to a storm of fury over her refusal to condemn Donald Trump's widely-criticised ban on refugees entering the US. Conservative MPs joined the attacks on the prime minister after she refused to speak out about the controversial move and one Tory said he would be hit by the ban. Labour said it should "sadden" the country that Mrs May had failed to condemn the move and the Liberal Democrats said her behaviour was "shocking". Mrs May does "not agree" with Mr Trump's order and will challenge the US government if it has an adverse effect on British nationals, a spokesman said. A French-Canadian university student has been charged with six counts of first-degree murder after a shooting at a Quebec City mosque that killed six people and injured 17 others, Canadian authorities said on Monday. The suspect in custody for the attack on Sunday evening prayers was Alexandre Bissonnette, according to a source familiar with the matter. A man of Moroccan descent who had also been arrested was now considered a witness, although his nationality was not immediately known, the source said. Police declined to discuss possible motives for the shooting at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec. Police said they were confident no other suspects were involved in the attack. "They consider this a lone wolf situation," the source said. Expand Close Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau delivers a statement on a deadly shooting at a Quebec City mosque, in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, January 30, 2017. REUTERS/Chris Wattie / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau delivers a statement on a deadly shooting at a Quebec City mosque, in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, January 30, 2017. REUTERS/Chris Wattie The suspect was expected to appear in a Quebec City courtroom on Monday afternoon. Trudeau, who has made a point of welcoming refugees and immigrants from Muslim-majority countries, told the House of Commons in Ottawa: "Make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack." He added a personal message to Canada's one million Muslims: "Know that we value you. You enrich our shared country in immeasurable ways. It is your home. Last night's horrible crime against the Muslim community was an act of terror committed against Canada and against all Canadians. We will grieve with you. We will defend you. We will love you. And we will stand with you." Sombre parliamentarians observed a moment of silence. Trudeau will visit Quebec City later on Monday, a spokesman said. The attack was out of character for Quebec City, a city of just over 500,000 which reported just two murders in all of 2015. Mass shootings are rare in Canada, where gun control laws are stricter than in the United States. In addition to the six killed, five people were critically injured and 12 were treated for minor injuries, a spokeswoman for the Quebec City University Hospital said. U.S. President Donald Trump called Trudeau to express his condolences "and offered to provide any assistance as needed," said Trudeau spokesman Cameron Ahmad. Over the weekend, Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, his response to an executive order by Trump on Friday to halt the U.S. refugee program and to temporarily bar citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. Trump's action, which the president said was "not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe," was widely condemned in the United States and abroad as targeting Muslims. On Monday, White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters that the Quebec shooting was "a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant, and why the president is taking steps to be proactive, rather than reactive, when it comes to our nation's safety and security." FATHER OF FOUR KILLED A father of four, the owner of a halal butcher near the mosque, was among those killed, said Pamela Sakinah El-hayet, a friend of one of the people at the mosque. The mosque concierge was killed, as was Ahmed Youness, a 21-year-old student, El-hayet told Reuters. One of El-hayet's friends, Youness' roommate, was in the mosque at the time of the shooting. He was unharmed, she said, but in total shock. Ali Assafiri, a student at Universite Laval, said he had been running late for the evening prayers at the mosque, near the university in the Quebec City area. When he arrived, the mosque had been transformed by police into a crime scene. "Everyone was in shock," Assafiri said by phone. "It was chaos." Universite Laval is the oldest French-language university in North America, with 42,500 students. Vigils were planned for Montreal and Quebec City, the provincial capital, as well as in Edmonton. There was an outpouring of support for the mosque on social media. Citizens for Public Justice, a group of Canadian Christians, churches and other religious congregations, expressed their solidarity with the Muslim community of Quebec City. "Last night's shooting, targeting people of faith during their worship and prayer, is a deplorable attack on all Canadians and our most deeply-held values," the group's executive director, Joe Gunn, said. While the motive for the shooting was not known, incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. US President Donald Trump has vigorously defended his immigration restrictions, saying "this is about terror and keeping our country safe". In a statement, Mr Trump said: "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." The president addressed the issue late on Sunday as some Republicans in Congress urged caution amid legal challenges to the order banning travellers from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Top congressional Republicans have largely remained behind Mr Trump on the issue. Mr Trump added: "America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. "I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. "My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help those who are suffering." In a background call with reporters on Sunday, a senior administration official declared the order's implementation "a massive success story," claiming it had been done "seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism". Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement on Sunday saying that, in the absence of information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a "dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination". That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent US residency "green cards" will not be barred from re-entering the country, as officials had previously said. It remains unclear what kind of additional screening they will now face. Mr Trump's order, which also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria, has sparked widespread protests and denunciations from Democrats and a handful of Republicans. Many have accused the administration of rushing to implement the changes, resulting in panic and confusion at the nation's airports. Protests were held at a number of airports across the US against the measure, including in Chicago, Detroit and Washington DC. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said the changes were "a small price to pay" to keep the nation safe. The developments came a day after a federal judge in New York issued an emergency order temporarily barring the US from deporting people from the seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trump's 90-day travel ban. The order barred US border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the US with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. The Department of Homeland Security said the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. Police officers are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger Police officers are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger Police officers are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger People are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger Mohamed Oudghiri speaks with the media near a Quebec City mosque after a deadly shooting Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017. (Francis Vachon/The Canadian Press via AP) Police survey the scene after deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City, Canada, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017. Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard termed the act "barbaric violence" and expressed solidarity with victims' families. (Francis Vachon/The Canadian Press via AP) Police survey the scene after a deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City, Canada, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017. Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard termed the act "barbaric violence" and expressed solidarity with victims' families. (Francis Vachon/The Canadian Press via AP) Police survey the scene after a deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City, Canada, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017. Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard termed the act "barbaric violence" and expressed solidarity with victims' families. (Francis Vachon/The Canadian Press via AP) Martin St. Louis holds a sign that reads "la paix pas la guerre" (peace, not war) near a Quebec city mosque after a deadly shooting in Quebec City, Canada, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017. (Francis Vachon/The Canadian Press via AP) A police officer patrols the perimeter near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger Police officers patrol the perimeter near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger A police officer patrols the perimeter near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger First responders look on after a shooting at a mosque in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger A police officer patrols the perimeter near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger Six people were killed and eight wounded when gunmen opened fire at a Quebec mosque during Sunday night prayers, in what Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a "terrorist attack on Muslims". Police said two suspects had been arrested, but gave details about them or what prompted the attack. Initially, the mosque president said five people were killed and a witness said up to three gunmen had fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre. Police said only two people were involved in the attack. "Six people are confirmed dead - they range in age from 35 to about 70," Quebec provincial police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told reporters, adding eight people were wounded and 39 were unharmed. Expand Close People are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp People are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger The mosque's president, Mohamed Yangui, who was not inside when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. "Why is this happening here? This is barbaric," he said. Expand Close Police officers are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Police officers are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement: "We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge". "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country." Expand Close Police officers are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Police officers are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger The shooting came on the weekend that Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, after U.S. President Donald Trump suspended the U.S. refugee program and temporarily barred citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States on national security grounds. A Canadian federal Liberal legislator, Greg Fergus, tweeted: "This is an act of terrorism -- the result of years of sermonizing Muslims. Words matter and hateful speeches have consequences!" Expand Close Police officers are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Police officers are seen near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said police were providing additional protection for mosques in that city following the Quebec shooting. "All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something," he tweeted. 'NOT SAFE HERE' Expand Close A police officer patrols the perimeter near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp A police officer patrols the perimeter near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them from North Africa. In June last year, a pig's head was left on the doorstep of the cultural centre. Expand Close Police officers patrol the perimeter near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Police officers patrol the perimeter near a mosque after a shooting in Quebec City, January 29, 2017. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger "We are not safe here," said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque in the middle-class, residential area, but did not on Sunday. Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now "very worried" and thinking of moving back to Morocco. Mass shootings are rare in Canada, which has stricter gun laws than the United States, and news of the shooting sent a shockwave through mosques and community centres throughout the mostly French-language province. "It's a sad day for all Quebecers and Canadians to see a terrorist attack happen in peaceful Quebec City," said Mohamed Yacoub, co-chairman of an Islamic community centre in a Montreal suburb. "I hope it's an isolated incident." Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of the province was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighbouring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. Zebida Bendjeddou, who left the Quebec City mosque earlier on Sunday evening, said the centre had received threats. "In June, they'd put a pig's head in front of the mosque. But we thought: 'Oh, they're isolated events.' We didn't take it seriously. But tonight, those isolated events, they take on a different scope," she said. Bendjeddou said she had not confirmed the names of those killed, but added: "They're people we know, for sure. People we knew since they were little kids." US President Donald Trump is standing firm over his controversial Muslim travel ban, which has provoked international condemnation. His new policy prompted worldwide protests and caused chaos at airports with flights to the United States. Denying it is a Muslim ban, Mr Trump says he will lift the restrictions when the threat is lifted. And the US immigration visa clearance facilities at Dublin and Shannon airports will be reviewed in the wake of the ban. A Cabinet minister says we will have to be prepared to withdraw permission for US immigration officers to operate in Irish airports in light of the ban. Children's Minister Katherine Zappone, who is a US native, is demanding a review of legal implications for Ireland of Mr Trump's executive order which prevents travellers and refugees from seven predominantly Muslim countries gaining entry to the US. The American Embassy in Dublin has warned even Irish passport holders, who also claim nationality in one of the seven countries, will be turned away. However, UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnston last night revealed that a special deal had been agreed for British dual passport holders. And concerns are now being expressed for undocumented Irish emigrants in the US. US judges in at least four states have attempted to block enforcement of President Donald Trump's executive order restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. Judges in Massachusetts, Virginia and Washington state issued their rulings following an order by Brooklyn District Judge Ann Donnelly. Donnelly had ruled in a lawsuit by two men from Iraq being held at JFK International Airport in New York. While none of the rulings struck down the executive order, the growing number of orders could complicate the administration's effort to enforce it. Trump's order on Friday halted immigration from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days, and stopped the resettlement of refugees for 120 days. The new Republican president said these actions were needed "to protect the American people from terrorist attacks by foreign nationals admitted to the United States". Across the US, thousands of protesters arrived at airports to voice their anger at the ruling against immigration, chanting: "Let them in, let them in." Lawyers worked overnight to help confused international travellers, and activists and lawyers tracking the arrivals said some Border Patrol agents appeared to be disregarding the various court orders. Lawsuits brought on behalf of more than 100 individual travellers have been filed around the country. Expand Close Crowds gather in Copley Square, Boston, Massachusetts, to protest against the immigration ban. Photo: Darren McCollester/Getty Images. / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Crowds gather in Copley Square, Boston, Massachusetts, to protest against the immigration ban. Photo: Darren McCollester/Getty Images. "There is really no method to this madness," Becca Heller, director of the New York-based International Refugee Assistance Project organisation, said. However, the Trump administration showed no sign of backing down from the executive order. "Prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the US government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety," a Department of Homeland Security statement said. "No foreign national in a foreign land, without ties to the United States, has any unfettered right to demand entry into the United States or to demand immigration benefits in the United States." Trump took to Twitter yesterday morning to insist the move was needed to halt terrorism, stating: "Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world - a horrible mess!" He later tweeted: "Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue!" In an official statement last night, he said: "America is a proud nation of immigrants." He said the country "will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression", but "while protecting our own citizens and border". Trump insisted it's "not a Muslim ban" and blamed the media for that suggestion. Trump said the US would resume issuing visas to all countries impacted after a review of security policies. Trump's aggressive action triggered a wave of criticism from Democrats on Capitol Hill, but also from a growing number of lawmakers in his own party. "You have an extreme vetting proposal that didn't get the vetting it should have," Senator Rob Portman said. The Department of Homeland Security noted that "less than 1pc" of international air travellers arriving on Saturday in the United States were "inconvenienced" by the executive order - though the situation described by lawyers and immigrant advocates across the country was one of widespread uncertainty and even chaos at airports. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 Trend: Those who organized the dirty campaigns against Azerbaijan have already been removed from the political scene, said Azerbaijans President Ilham Aliyev as he addressed a conference dedicated to results of third year implementation of The State Program on Socio-Economic Development of the Regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan in 2014-2018 in Baku Jan. 30. It is hard to list all the works that have been carried out in recent years. I just bring to your attention the highlights, because it is our history. Without it, we wouldnt have been able today to talk about future plans. Azerbaijan is one of those countries that have used oil rationally and cleverly. I remember that even in late 1990s and early 2000s, some analysts said that oil wont bring happiness to Azerbaijan and will bring problems. However, we were able to use of this natural wealth as much as possible, have strengthened our country, built a strong state; it has been 25 years that we are living as an independent state, built cities, created a beautiful life for ourselves. More extensive work will be carried out in the future, said President Aliyev. Of course, Azerbaijani citizens are at the center of this work, he noted. If the people had not supported us, we wouldnt be able to carry out all this work. Therefore, a citizen of Azerbaijan stands at the center of our success. This support that has been provided and is provided by the people and public, of course, gives us power and encourages us, said the president. He also noted that Azerbaijan has carried out all this work in difficult conditions. You are well aware that defamatory, slanderous campaigns with threats are constantly held against us. However, none of them affects us. Because we know the source of these campaigns, who stands behind them, what are they aimed at. Therefore, we are following our way and life puts everything in its place. Those who organized the dirty campaigns against us have already been removed from the political scene, added President Aliyev. He said the world already knows Azerbaijan better and sees that it is an independent and worthy state. The Azerbaijani people are proud people, who will never allow someone to dictate us anything. We have always kept and keep our dignity. We have to address all necessary issues in order to continue to confidently move our country forward. Of course, the regional development program has a special place. I am confident that all issues envisaged in the program until 2018 will be addressed and additional issues will be included in the program, added President Aliyev. Romania's president has urged the government to scrap a proposal to pardon thousands of prisoners, a move which has led to massive protests. President Klaus Iohannis spoke after tens of thousands of people marched through capital Bucharest and other cities on Sunday to protest the initiative, which critics say could reverse anti-corruption efforts. It was the third large-scale protest to erupt after premier Sorin Grindeanu requested an emergency ordinance allowing the government to pardon prisoners to ease overcrowding in jails. On Monday, Mr Iohannis posted a message on Facebook urging the government again to drop the initiative and said: "The voice of the people can no longer be ignored." The German embassy in Bucharest said on Monday that Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke to Mr Iohannis on Friday, saying "diluting the anti-corruption fight and making the rule of law a relative thing" would send "an absolutely wrong signal". Critics say the proposal could benefit party allies convicted of corruption including the chairman of the ruling Social Democratic Party, Liviu Dragnea, who was handed a two-year suspended prison sentence for vote-rigging in April 2016, which bans him from being prime minister. Romania's top prosecutor has also criticised the plan, which magistrates say should be debated in Parliament. It would primarily affect people serving sentences of less than five years, except those convicted of sexual or violent crimes. Prisoners aged over 60, pregnant women and inmates with young children would see their sentences halved regardless of the charges on which they were convicted. The government says its proposal would lead to the release of 2,500 prisoners. Prison authorities estimate 3,700 prisoners could be released. AP People gather to protest against the travel ban imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order, at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport in Dallas, Texas, U.S. January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Laura Buckman Protesters gather outside Terminal 4 at JFK airport in opposition to U.S. president Donald Trump's proposed ban on immigration in Queens, New York City, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Stephen Yang Protesters gather outside Terminal 4 at JFK airport in opposition to U.S. president Donald Trump's proposed ban on immigration in Queens, New York City, U.S., January 28, 2017. REUTERS/Stephen Yang US border agents are checking peoples Facebook pages for their political views before allowing them into the country, an immigration lawyer has claimed. Houston-based lawyer Mana Yegani said several green card holders, who have the right to live and work in the US, were detained by border agents at American airports hours after President Donald Trump signed an executive order banning immigration from seven countries in the Middle East and Africa. The ban affect travellers with passports from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen and also extends to green card holders who are granted authorisation to live and work in the United States, according to a Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman. Ms Yegani, who works with the American Immigration Lawyers Association (Alia), said she and her fellow lawyers had worked through the night fielding calls from people with legitimate visa being detained before entering the US or ordered back on flights to the Muslim-majority countries on the list. In one alleged incident a Sudanese PhD student at Stanford University in California, who has lived in the US for 22 years, was held for five hours in New York and in another a dual Iranian-Canadian citizen was not allowed to board a flight in Ottawa. The Alia said border agents were checking the social media accounts of those detained and were interrogating them about their political beliefs before allowing them into the US. She said: "These are people that are coming in legally. They have jobs here and they have vehicles here. "Just because Trump signed something at 6pm yesterday, things are coming to a crashing halt. It's scary." Read More A spokesman for the Alia told The Independent that they had heard were anecdotal reports of peoples social media accounts being targeted this tactic had been used by border agents for several years despite doubts over whether it is constitutional. It comes as several immigration organisations and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLA) launched a lawsuit in New York on behalf of two Iraqi men, one a former US government worker and the other the husband of a former US security contractor. It said they had been given visas to enter the US but were detained at JFK airport hours after Mr Trump issued the executive order. Meanwhile in Cairo, five Iraqis and one Yemeni passenger were barred from boarding a connecting EgyptAir flight to New York and were redirected to flights back to their home countries, despite holding valid visas. Dutch airline KLM said it had similarly refused carriage to seven passengers from Muslim countries because there was no point taking them to the US. The order, signed on Holocaust Memorial Day, means Syrian refugees have been banned from entering the country indefinitely though the White House has said it will consider admitting Syrian Christians and the entire US refugee programme has been suspended for 120 days. Nationals from the six other countries on the list have been banned from entering the US for 90 days. The move has been condemned by the UNs refugee agency (UNHCR) and the International Organisation for Migration who said: The needs of refugees and migrants worldwide have never been greater and the US resettlement program is one of the most important in the world, The longstanding US policy of welcoming refugees has created a win-win situation: it has saved the lives of some of the most vulnerable people in the world who have in turn enriched and strengthened their new societies. Additional reporting by Reuters Washington state's attorney general is suing President Donald Trump over an executive order that suspended immigration from seven countries with Muslim-majority populations. Attorney General Bob Ferguson announced his lawsuit on Monday, becoming the first state attorney general to announce a legal action against the Trump administration over one of its policies. President Trump signed an executive order on Friday that suspends all immigration for citizens of the seven countries for 90 days. Mr Ferguson was one of 16 state attorneys general who released a statement on Sunday calling Mr Trump's immigration action "un-American and unlawful". President Trump's order sparked large protests around the country over the weekend. Mr Trump has repeatedly said that the move is aimed at protecting the nation against extremists looking to attack Americans and American interests. The president has repeatedly said that the move is aimed at protecting the nation against extremists looking to attack Americans and American interests. Mr Ferguson said the lawsuit against Trump and high-ranking Trump administration officials would be filed later on Monday in federal court in Seattle. He said it would seek to have key provisions of the executive order declared unconstitutional. The lawsuit also seeks a temporary restraining order against enforcement of the executive order. "We've had folks in our office working all weekend on a legal action," said Mr Ferguson, who was joined at a news conference by Washington Gov Jay Inslee. "This is un-American, it is wrong, and it will not stand," Gov Inslee said. "The clear intent of this executive order is to discriminate against one faith amongst all God's children." Mr Ferguson said he has been in contact with other attorneys general, but that at this point Washington state was acting on its own regarding the legal action. The Port of Seattle said over the weekend that people who were detained at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport as a result of President Trump's order have been released. US Rep Pramila Jayapal said on Sunday that two individuals were released. One is a citizen of Sudan and the other a citizen of Yemen, both countries named in President Trump's order. AP This month, Special Forces candidates participated in the Robin Sage training exercise, held within 15 North Carolina counties as the final test of their Special Forces Qualification Course training. Between Jan. 21 and Feb. 2, students will participate in this exercise before graduating the course and moving on to their first assignments in the Army's Special Forces community. Robin Sage is a two-week culmination exercise. The participants are students at the U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School based out of Fort Bragg. The exercise's notional country of Pineland encompasses Alamance, Anson, Cabarrus, Chatham, Davidson, Guilford, Hoke, Montgomery, Moore, Randolph, Richmond, Rowan, Scotland, Stanly and Union counties. Throughout the exercise, Special Forces candidates and Robin Sage role-players not only conduct training missions such as controlled assaults and key-leader engagements, but also live, eat and sleep in these civilian areas. All Robin Sage movements and events have been coordinated with public safety officials throughout and within the towns and counties hosting the training. Residents may hear blank gunfire and see occasional flares. Controls are in place to ensure there is no risk to persons or property. Residents with concerns should contact local law enforcement officials, who will immediately contact exercise control officials. With the help of civilian authorities and local residents, Robin Sage has been conducted since 1974. For the U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School, safety is always the command's top priority during all training events. The following measures have been implemented: Formal written notification to the chiefs of law enforcement agencies in the affected counties, with a follow-up visit from a unit representative. All civilian and non-student military participants are briefed on procedures to follow if there is contact with law enforcement officials. Students will only wear civilian clothes if the situation warrants, as determined by the instructors, and will wear a distinctive brown armband during these instances. Training areas and vehicles used during exercises are clearly labeled. Military service members from units across Fort Bragg will also support the exercise. These military members act as realistic opposing forces and guerrilla freedom fighters, also known as Pineland's resistance movement. These troops play a critical role in the training exercise. To add realism of the exercise, civilian volunteers throughout the state act as role-players. Participation by these volunteers is crucial to the success of this training, and past trainees attest to the realism they add to the exercise. Robin Sage is the U.S. military's premiere unconventional warfare exercise and the final test of over a year's worth of training for aspiring Special Forces Soldiers. Candidates are placed in an environment of political instability characterized by armed conflict, forcing soldiers to analyze and solve problems to meet the challenges of this "real-world" training. Questions concerning the exercise should be referred to the U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School Public Affairs Office at 910-396-9394, or by email at pao_swcs@socom.mil. In the event of an emergency, contact a local law enforcement agency. In calls with the leaders of Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi on Sunday afternoon, the White House says President Donald Trump brought up the idea of building "safe zones" in Syria. That concept appeared in early drafts of the executive order the president signed Friday that barred all Syrian refugees from resettling in the United States - but it did not appear in the final version that was released Friday night. For more than a year on the campaign trail, Trump promised to halt the flow of Syrian refugees into the country, warning that they could be a "Trojan horse," a secret terrorist army that could destroy the nation. But he said that the United States would aid the humanitarian crisis caused by millions of Syrians fleeing the war in their country by setting up a "safe zone" in Syria and then forcing wealthy Persian Gulf nations such as Saudi Arabia to pick up the bill. "They're gonna put up all the money," Trump said during a major immigration speech in Phoenix in August. "We're not gonna put up money. We're gonna lead it, and we'll do a great a job. But we're gonna get the Gulf states to put up the money." Trump brought up safe zones during phone calls with Saudi Arabia's King Salman bin Abdul Aziz and Abu Dhabi's crown prince, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, according to statements from the White House that make no mention who will fund the safe zones. Following the call with Salman, the White House said in a statement: "The President requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts." Salman's office released a statement about the call that made no mention of safe zones. The White House released a second statement following Trump's call with Abu Dhabi's crown prince that said: "The President also raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative." Trump has provided no details about what this safe zone would look like and who would protect it. The Obama administration ruled out the idea, which both Trump and his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, proposed on the campaign trail. In the call with Salman, the White House also said that the president discussed the Iran nuclear agreement. Trump had originally said that he would rip up or renegotiate the deal as soon as he took office, but on Sunday the two leaders "agreed on the importance of rigorously enforcing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran and of addressing Iran's destabilizing regional activities," the White House said. The White House stated that the two leaders discussed "the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of radical Islamic terrorism," while the statement from the Saudi government instead referred generally to "terrorism." "The views of the two leaders were identical on the files that were discussed during the call, including the fight against terrorism, extremism, their finance, formulating the appropriate mechanisms for that, and confronting those who seek to undermine security and stability in the region and interfere in the internal affairs of other states," that statement read. Details added (first version posted on 17:04) Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 Trend: President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev received a delegation led by Director General for Neighborhood and Enlargement Negotiations at the European Commission Christian Danielsson Jan. 30. Saying this is his first visit to Azerbaijan, Director General for Neighborhood and Enlargement Negotiations at the European Commission Christian Danielsson noted that he was deeply impressed by the architecture of the capital, in particular by the beauty of the Heydar Aliyev Center. President Ilham Aliyev highlighted the reforms, as well as the diversification of economy, including the export, development of non-oil sector, energy, as well as works done under TAP project and in transportation, agriculture and a number of other areas. He hailed the importance of major projects being implemented in all these areas in the context of cooperation with the European Union. Danielsson underlined the importance of the work done in Azerbaijan in terms of discussing Azerbaijan-Europe cooperation. They exchanged views on a number of other issues of mutual interest. We have reported about Star Plus' popular show Saath Nibhana Saathiya team to fly to the US to shoot one of the major sequences. However, according to the latest news and our sources, we hear that the US shoot has been canceled and the team will now be flying to Singapore for the same shoot. The reason we hear is the issues with the visa for the actors. The shoot in the US, therefore, had to been called off. Devoleena Bhattacharjee aka Gopi will be going through a lot of ups and downs and her track will be shown in Singapore, where she will be seen facing new hurdles. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 Trend: Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov met with the delegation headed by David Harris and John Shapiro, Executive Director and President of the American Jewish Committee. At the meeting, Minister Elmar Mammadyarov noted that different religious confessions historically lived in peace in Azerbaijan and stressed the existence of Jewish community in our country for centuries. Saying that the multiculturalism is a life style of Azerbaijani people Elmar Mammadyarov underlined Azerbaijan's contributions to the promotion of intercultural and interreligious dialogue at the international level. In this context, he brought into the attention the events such as the 7th Baku Forum of the UN Alliance of Civilizations and the International Humanitarian Forum. David Harris expressed his high appreciation for the historical atmosphere of tolerance existing in Azerbaijan, the support and care devoted to the Jewish community of Azerbaijan. The sides also exchanged their views on the prospects of development of Azerbaijan-United States and Azerbaijan-Israel bilateral relations. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 Trend: Scottish Day dedicated to the 258th Anniversary of worldwide-known Scottish poet and lyricist Robert Burns was held at Baku Higher Oil School (BHOS). Officials from SOCAR, representatives of diplomatic missions accredited in Azerbaijan and international companies operating in the country attended the event. Its program included Scottish songs and dances as well as performances by BHOS students. Welcoming the guests, Rector of the Higher School Elmar Gasimov noted that cooperation between Azerbaijan and Great Britain would continue to develop for the mutual benefit of the two countries. As he informed, according to a bilateral agreement between BHOS and Heriot-Watt University (HWU) the Scottish Day for the first time is celebrated at the Higher School. Also for the first time, Azerbaijani Day will be celebrated at HWU in Edinburgh on May 28 this year. In his poetry, Burns drew inspiration from Scottish history, traditions and folklore literature and, thus, won popular affections, Gasimov said while speaking about Robert Burns works. It is the cultural wealth that unites every nation, and every person shall cherish their moral and spiritual values. Deputy Head of Mission of the UK Embassy to Azerbaijan Stephen McCormick emphasized that Azerbaijan and Great Britain are tied by close political, economic and cultural relations. BP-Azerbaijan Communications, External Affairs, Strategy and Region Vice President Bakhtiyar Aslanbayli, BP-Azerbaijan ACG Global Projects Organization Vice President Cathal Kelly, and Education and Society Manager the British Council Office in Azerbaijan also spoke about long-term strong cooperation between two countries. They emphasized that such events help young people better understand importance of learning their and other peoples cultural and historical heritage. The celebration continued with demonstration of a documentary about Scotland. Then the Higher School students Narmin Bakhishli and Gurban Gurbanov recited well known Farewell To Eliza and A Red, Red Rose poems by Robert Burns, BHOS students Lala Mammadova, Fidan Guliyeva and Aytaj Iskandarova sang Scottish folk-songs, and members of the Baku Caledonian Society performed Scottish country dances. At the end, Caledonian Societys representative Innes Moir showed bagpipes performance. Robert Burns is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland and is celebrated worldwide. He started writing poems when he was 14 years old. Robert Burns is the best known of the poets who have written in the Scots language, and is regarded as a pioneer of the Romantic movement. His influence has long been strong on Scottish literature, and in 2009 Robert Burns was chosen as the greatest Scot by the Scottish public in a vote run by Scottish television channel STV. Burns Night is celebrated on Burns's birthday, 25 January, with Burns suppers around the world. According to the bilateral agreement between the Baku Higher Oil School and Heriot-Watt University on Bachelor degree programs, Petroleum Engineering and Chemical Engineering education programs at BHOS are based on the HWU curricula. First specialists with Bachelor degree will graduate from BHOS in 2017. Also this year, Higher School will commence Master degree programs. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 Trend: A meeting of Rector of Baku Higher Oil School (BHOS) Elmar Gasimov with the Ambassador of the United Mexican States to Azerbaijan Rodrigo Labardini and attache of the Embassy Mario Fernandez took place at BHOS. The rector informed the guests about activity of the Higher School established upon a decree of the President of the Azerbaijan Republic Ilham Aliyev, attainments achieved with a short period of time, teaching process and conditions created for the BHOS students. He also spoke about international ties of the Higher School with leading universities, international companies and organizations from other countries. Having expressed his gratitude for the warm reception, Labardini dwelled on the prospects of BHOS partner relations with higher education institutions in Mexico. Speaking about significance of cooperation between two countries in the field of education, he emphasized that it would be important to develop BHOSs cooperation with the Mexican Petroleum Institute. The meeting participants discussed possible spheres of future cooperation and implementation of joint projects including student and teachers exchange programs and scientific research. An option to arrange a Day of Mexico at the Baku Higher Oil School was also considered. As we all know Thala Ajith's 'AK 57' was predominantly shot in Bulgaria and its nearby countries as it will be an International espionage thriller flick. A few weeks back the team seems has returned to Chennai without completing the shoot against the earlier plan. Ajith participated in the Silent protest organised by the Nadigar Sangam on January 20, 2017. Now we learn from reliable sources that the shooting of 'AK 57' is actually progressing in Chennai. The shooting has been happening in a set erected in Binny Mills amid tight security arrangements. When we further inquired with sources close to the unit, they revealed that the team is actually shooting the indoor sequences. Later this month the unit will again fly to Bulgaria to shoot some important sequences. Directed by Siva and produced by Sathya Jyothi Films banner, 'AK 57' stars Ajith and Kajal Aggarwal in lead roles. The film is expected to hit the screens in June 2017. JMC Projects India secures new orders of Rs2,277 crore; Stock gains 2.6% JMC Projects (India) Limited (JMC), a leading Civil Engineering and EPC Company has secured new orders of Rs2,277 crores. The details are as follows: Water Projects in India of... November 04, 2022 | 04-11-2022 2:08 pm Lupin receives USFDA tentative approval for Drospirenone Tablets Global pharma major Lupin Limited (Lupin) has announced that it has received tentative approval from the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for its Abbreviated New Drug ... November 04, 2022 | 04-11-2022 1:26 pm Bloomberg Report: Pegatron Corp starts production of iPhone 14 in India Pegatron Corp., a Taiwanese contract manufacturer for Apple Inc., has begun producing the most recent iPhone 14 model in India. Pegatron is now the second Apple supplier to manufacture th... November 04, 2022 | 04-11-2022 12:48 pm JMC Projects India allots NCDs for Rs100 crore; Stock rallies over 3.5% The Management Committee of the Board of Directors of JMC Projects (India) Limited at its meeting held on November 04, 2022 has allotted 1000 Repo Rate, Unsecured, Rated, Listed, Rede... November 04, 2022 | 04-11-2022 12:34 pm Nykaa receives shareholders' approval for bonus issue and ESOP; Stock down 1% The Board of the lifestyle retailer FSN E-Commerce Ventures Limited (Nykaa), on October 3, 2022, approved Bonus Issue of Equity Shares in the proportion of 5 (Five) fully paid-up Equity Sh... November 04, 2022 | 04-11-2022 12:03 pm Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Anvar Mammadov Trend: One of the main priorities of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) in Azerbaijan for 2017 will be to support the local corporates with direct financing, Ivana Duarte, head of the banks Baku office, told Trend. The EBRD will also help partner banks in Azerbaijan in on-lending to micro, small and medium enterprises and in the development of new financial instruments to target improved access to finance, for example for agribusiness sector projects, according to her. The EBRD will continue to pursue investments in energy projects, especially where there is a gap to improve efficiency and energy security, Duarte said. "We will also continue to invest into the road infrastructure as well as continue our work in natural resources sector." "Additional efforts will be made to improve the situation in the financial sector to boost confidence in lending in order to stabilize the business environment," she said, adding that EBRD will also continue to work with the authorities in the implementation of the structural reforms to improve the business environment. Duarte also spoke about the projects which were agreed on in 2016 and the Banks portfolio for Azerbaijan. "In 2016, EBRD signed nine projects with Azerbaijan with the total amount of investments reaching 59 million euros," Duarte said. EBRDs portfolio in Azerbaijan currently includes 160 projects, with net investments equal to over $3 billion, she added. "Energy sector investments account for 43 percent of the Banks portfolio, followed by 40 percent into infrastructure development. Financial, manufacturing and services sectors jointly account for 17 percent of the portfolio," Duarte said. Azerbaijan has been cooperating with the EBRD since 1992. One of EBRDs main tasks is to ensure stable development of Azerbaijan's non-oil sector by investing in small and medium-sized private enterprises. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Azad Hasanli Trend: Chairman of Azerbaijani Hazelnut Producers and Exporters Association Ismayil Orujov has proposed to simplify the export of hazelnuts from the country. Orujov was speaking at the conference dedicated to results of third year implementation of The State Program on Socio-Economic Development of the Regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan in 2014-2018 in Baku Jan. 30. Among other proposals, Orujov mentioned the necessity to train highly qualified specialists - agronomists and experts, open laboratories in the major districts of hazelnut production, implement and enhance the appropriate analyses, as well as improve access to financing sources, including through the provision of concessional loans. To date, producers of hazelnuts in Azerbaijan have received preferential loans worth 10 million manats, the chairman of the association added. Orujov said that Azerbaijan ranks fourth in terms of hazelnuts exports. Azerbaijan grows 35,000 tons of hazelnut, 90 percent of which are shipped abroad, he noted. Last year alone, we exported hazelnuts worth $105 million. Nearly 25 countries, including Italy, Germany and Russia are the main consumers of our hazelnuts. Growing and processing of hazelnuts is one of the main areas providing Azerbaijan with foreign currency. Ever since Sanjay Leela Bhansali's slapgate, the film industry has gone all out to fight for their creative freedom. From filmmakers to actors, everyone has shown solidarity with SLB's project Padmavati. Many, in fact, are even seeking PM Modi's intervention on the same. Director Anurag Kashyap, who has vehemently opposed Hindu extremists for violence on the set of Padmavati in Jaipur, recently said that he has grown up learning to question those that govern the country. BCCL He took to Facebook to write a long post on the same. It reads,I have been taught to engage and question those that govern us and I have been doing that since I was a student and V.P. Singh was the PM, followed by Congress and now BJP. I have been taught that your PM is the head of the state or country, who you can question, seek answers, argue with, but never fear him, because you chose him and he represents your well being. If one has to fear him than thats sad. Respect cannot be demanded its commanded. Its earned. It does not deter me from asking and engaging. BCCL (Also Read: Karan Johar Owned A Twitter Troll Who Asked Anurag Kashyap To 'Stop Sleeping' With Him!) For the uninitiated, workers of Karni Sena have expressed disappointment over distortion of historical facts in the film, which is based on Alauddin Khilji, the medieval-era Delhi ruler, who fell in love with Rajput queen Padmavati. Interestingly, Kashyap was one of the first film fraternity members to speak up in favour of Bhansali. Just like Sushant Singh Rajput who dropped Rajput from his surname after the whole fiasco, even Anurag went on to say that he is ashamed to be a Rajput himself. BCCL In his post, he further expressed, It does not matter what you say or do, attack me physically or verbally, I will voice what I feel. You mobs dont scare me, my voice will always rise over your screaming and shouting, I embrace my truth and I do not fear accusations, he added. Kashyap maintained that he has been taught to have the liberty to utter, argue, question freely according to my conscience, and above all, liberties. And I will always take that right I believe in my Constitution, my rights, my liberties and I will take them and exercise them when I deem fit. So thank you for all this intense passionate love that you send my way, you are not going to stop me. After Sanjay Leela Bhansali was attacked by the fringe group Karni Sena, the director promised that he would clarify any concerns that the Rajput Sena may have. Following that offer, the Sena has now released three demands for Bhansali. video grab First, there should be no intimate scenes in the movie between the characters of Rani Padmavati and Alauddin Khilji. Second, no historical facts should be distorted while making the movie. Third, the Karni Sena should be allowed to review the movie before its release. bccl The demands were raised at a joint conference which was called by the group. Some of the group's members also demanded for the title of the movie 'Padmavati' to be changed. Shobha Sant, CEO of the Bhansali Productions, said, "There is no romantic dream sequence or any objectionable/romantic scene between Rani Padmavati and Allauddin Khijli. It was not a part of the script. It was misconception and considering the sentiments of the community, we have clarified to them. We are trying to present Rani Padmavatis courageous nature. We will make the film which will make the country proud on Rani Padmavati." While State President of Karni Seva, Mahipal Singh agreed with the demand of changing the film's name, at the same time he added, "We are thankful to the Bhansali Productions that they have agreed to our demand that there will be no distortion of the historic facts in the movie." Twitter Referring to the demand of the title change, Sant said, "They have made this fresh demand for which I have nothing to say anything. This is not in my jurisdiction. They also did not raise this point in our discussion held before." They dont call her the best TV host for nothing. The receiver of Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor, Ellen DeGeneres invited an Iraqi Gay couple on her show recently. The objective of doing so was to throw some light on their inspiring love story and the struggles that they went through to be together. The Ellen Show Nayyef Hrebid and his partner Btoo Allami were serving the military in Iraq when sparks flew and the duo fell head over heels in love with each other. Nayyef was working as a translator for the US military and Btoo was a soldier in the Iraqi army. Unfortunately, they had to keep their relationship a big secret as homosexuality is illegal in Iraq and punishable by death. Yes, you read that right. Video grab "If they find out about you, you either get tortured or get killed," Hrebid told DeGeneres. To escape the swords hanging over their heads, Nayyef decided to apply for asylum in the US. He went to the States for four years without his partner Btoo. Those four long years of separation did not deter the two and they kept in touch over Skype every single day. video grab The odds finally worked in their favour and the two lovers were eventually reunited. They are now married and are leading their lives together in Seattle. This inspiring Gay couple now concentrates on helping other LGBT refugees like themselves. video grab Their appearance together on The Ellen Show was to spread the message of love and that it conquers all. Ellen was so moved by their heartwarming story that she presented them with a cheque for $25,000 to put towards their first home. Watch their amazing love story here: However, considering the current situation in their country, life wont come so easy for this duo. With the immigration ban and President Trump and his teams aversion towards LGBT might bring a lot of hurdles for them. The only solace is that they will face it TOGETHER. Hollywood actor, Kal Penn, has raised over $160,000 in funds for Syrian refugees after an Instagram user posted this vile comment on his post: "You dont belong in this country you f***ing joke". reuters The Harold and Kumar actor, who joined the Obama administration as Associate Director in the White House Office of Public Engagement, tweeted a picture of the comment along with the link to his fundraising page titled "donating to Syrian refugees in the name of the dude who said I dont belong in America". To the dude who said I don't belong in America, I started a fundraising page for Syrian Refugees in your name. https://t.co/NOR5P48fBi pic.twitter.com/jtJOsK9GrU Kal Penn (@kalpenn) January 28, 2017 Penn was born as Kalpen Suresh Modi to Indian immigrant parents in New Jersey. Pete Souza On his fundraising page, he wrote, "We are better than the hateful people who tell us we don't belong in our own country, that America can't be a beacon of freedom and hope for refugees from around the world. We will turn their bigotry, along with the President's, into love." @kalpenn it's beautiful to see so many people donating (under amazing names!) to Refugees! thank you #resist https://t.co/NOR5P48fBi Kal Penn (@kalpenn) January 28, 2017 And in less than a day after he created the page, Penn had already amassed over $160,000 for Syrian refugees. The money will be donated to the International Rescue Committee which works for refugees around the world. US space agency NASA sent one of a pair of twins to spend a year in space to study the potential effects and stresses a trip to Mars could do to the human body. NASA Astronaut Scott Kelly travelled to the International Space Station In March 2015, while his twin brother and a retired astronaut, Mark Kelly, remained on Earth. NASA researchers have now revealed some information on the differences in the genes activities as a result of the trip. NASA Gene expression signatures According to data revealed, there was an obvious difference in Mark and Scott Kellys gene expression signatures, which is the process through which information from a gene is used in the synthesis of gene products such as producing insulin. However, a change in environment can change the number and rate of products produced. And the year-long stay in space showed that there was a substantial change in Astronaut Scotts gene expression. NASA Other information revealed showed that DNA Methylation process where methyl groups are added to a DNA molecule decreased in Scott while it increased in Mark. Andrew Feinberg, a John Hopkins geneticist, said, The greatest importance of the study is to show that we can do it. I dont think people realised it would be so easy to do genomics on astronauts in space. NASA revealed the first set of results on January 26 and more information will come in the months to follow. NASA Head of NASAs human research program said, Were working with a small number of highly identifiable people here. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan.30 By Leman Zeynalova Trend: The volume of petroleum import from non-OPEC countries averaged 6.631 million barrels per day in the first ten months of 2016, as compared to averagely 6.619 million barrels per day in the same period in 2015, according to the Monthly Energy Review of the US Energy Information Administration (EIA). The average volume of petroleum import from non-OPEC stood at 5.931 million barrels per day in the first ten months of 2014, said the report. The highest volume of petroleum import from non-OPEC countries in the first ten months of 2016 was recorded in August (6.888 million barrels per day), while the lowest level was observed in October (6.394 million barrels per day), according to the EIA. This figure averaged at 6.554 million barrels per day in 2015, as compared to 6.004 million barrels per day in 2014. Oil production from countries outside the OPEC currently represents about 60 percent of world oil output, according to the EIA. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @Lyaman_Zeyn Sushma Swaraj has offered to help a 90-year-old woman who wants to spend her remaining days in her motherland, India. External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj tonight offered to help a nonagenarian Indian-origin woman, who was reportedly sent back by her son to India from the US, with visa issues. BCCL "Thanks for bringing this to my notice. We will help her," was Swaraj's response to a report which said 90-year-old Kantaben Shah has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to prevent her from being forcibly sent back to the US. Also Read: Sushma Swaraj Promises To Bring Back The Sikh Boy Who Was Stabbed To Death In New Zealand According to reports, Shah was sent back to India from the US by her younger son without checking her valid visa. She has appealed for help as she is in no position to go back to the US and does not have a valid visa to stay in India. TOI Shah is resisting her deportation to the US as she wants to spend her last years in her motherland. In a separate tweet, Swaraj, responded to a man seeking medical help for his daughter. Also Read: Sushma Swaraj Takes No Nonsense, Slams A Man's Twitter Request To Get His Wife Transferred Swaraj, who last week helped a Bhopal family to get an admission for their infant baby in AIIMS, asked the man to approach his constituency's MP for help. BCCL The External Affairs Minister last week had offered to help the two-day-old infant, who was born in Bhopal, with a heart disease. President Donald Trump insisted on Sunday that his executive order temporarily halting travel from seven majority-Muslim countries was "not a Muslim ban," after it was met with confusion, global outrage and huge protests across the United States. AFP "America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave," Trump said in a statement. "This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe," he said, adding that more 40 Muslim countries were not affected by his order. His defense came in the form of an official written statement issued by the White House, a rare move for a president who has favored speaking directly to his audience via Twitter. The president singled out the media, which he has attacked repeatedly since coming into office just over a week ago. "We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows," he said, referring to the United States. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." Reuters Trump signed the executive order on Friday, suspending the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and barring citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. While Trump has cited the September 11, 2001, attacks as justification for his move, he did not target any of the 9/11 hijackers' home countries Egypt, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Judges in at least four states with major international airports Massachusetts, New York, Virginia and Washington issued temporary stays to block parts of Trump's executive order, preventing authorities from deporting people who had been detained. Trump recalled that his predecessor Barack Obama, a Democrat, had paused for six months in 2011 the Iraqi refugee program. And he stressed that the seven countries targeted by his ban were also listed by Obama. Reuters But the previous administration's restrictions were of a different sort, requiring visas for people having traveled to those countries in the past five years. "We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days," Trump added. "I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as president I will find ways to help all those who are suffering." 3 men have been placed in judicial custody after being arrested in connection with the gang-rape of a woman in Sweden. The event was reportedly live streamed on Facebook, and police were tipped off by members of the closed Facebook group where it was streamed. #Sweden: One of three Middle Easterners laughs as they broadcasts gang rape live on Facebook. Scumbags!!! https://t.co/MBxGlMccdLpic.twitter.com/XI770cwn6P Onlinemagazin (@OnlineMagazin) January 23, 2017 2 of the men, of Afghani origin, have been detained on suspicion of rape. The third, a Swedish citizen, was detained for failing to report a rape. "A woman is said to have been raped in an apartment. He is suspected of that," said the 20-year-old's lawyer, Christer Soderberg. "He denies any criminal offence, and he has given in my opinion a perfectly coherent story about what happened. I cannot go into details, but he has told me in a way that is not contradicted by anything else," he told Swedish news agency TT. Facebook has been asked for help to retrieve the video, Lead prosecutor Pontus Melander said "Facebook has said that they want to cooperate, but they are based in the US so we need international legal aid, which I have requested," Mr Melander told TT. Swedish daily tabloid Aftonbladet interviewed some of the members of the 60,000-strong group. They said the girl was "close to unconscious. A woman who saw the live stream thought it was "poorly-orchestrated joke". "Two guys pushing down a girl on the bed... I first thought it was a poorly-orchestrated joke. But it was not," 22-year-old Lovis said. She claims that 200 people were watching the video at one point, before the police showed up on the scene. Also read: Five Refugees In Sweden Gangrape An Afghan Boy For Over An Hour, All May Be Deported Permanently Thousands of people are protesting across America including Washington DC and New York against the ban imposed by President Donald Trump after he signed an executive order on Friday, which temporarily stops people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering America and indefinitely bans Syrians. People are chanting no walls no Muslim ban with their arms punching the air, and hands holding posters with slogans no hate, no fear, refugees are welcome. Reuters This nefarious ban is an exemplification of power in its cruellest form. There are millions of displaced refugees fleeing war and/or persecution in their home country, who were forced to look at international waters and borders for support. Placing a blanket ban on certain people because of the supposed threat they might hold, President Donald Trump is disrupting the life of common people just looking to start afresh. We have collated a few simple facts for Donald Trump in case they exited his memory while he sat in the Oval Office, pen in hand and signed that piece of paper that led to hundreds of lives to hang in limbo. Number of displaced people in the world Reuters Forced displacement reached the highest level recorded in 2015 as a result of global conflicts and persecution, according to the UN Refugee agency, UNHCR. At the end of that year, for the first time the world surpassed the 60 million displaced people mark with 65.3 million people displaced globally. UNHCR contrasted this figure against the total population of Earth and found that one in every 113 people is either an asylum seeker, a refugee or internally displaced. The impact of displacement runs deep from the education of children being halted to malnutrition because of a steady access to food. The people who are knocking on Americas door are doing so because they have run out of options in their home country. Children make up more than half of the world's refugees Reuters According to a report released by UNICEF in September 2016, children constitute more than half of the worlds refugees even though they account for less than a third of the worlds population. Displaced children are at the risk of a number of abuses that includes human smuggling and trafficking. The report also says that worldwide 50 million children have either migrated to another country or been internally displaced, and 28 million of these have been forced to flee because of conflict in their home state. As is often said, todays children are tomorrows future and by denying them the opportunity to live a life without conflict, then we are also denying them the opportunity to be educated and shape their being that will, in turn, contribute to shaping the world. Persecuted Yazidis Reuters One of hundreds of those affected by the blanket ban on people from majority Muslim countries was a Yazidi woman from Iraq. UN officials have said that so-called Islamic State is committing acts of genocide against Yazidis, a religious minority group, in Iraq and Syria. The UN report also said that IS is trying to erase the identity of this group and no other cohort has suffered such violent atrocities. Strengthening Islamic State's propaganda euroculturer The lens through which so-called Islamic State sells its propaganda is that America is war with Islam at war with Muslims. President Donald Trump, by placing a ban on Syria, Somalia and Iraq, among others, is helping IS strengthen their propaganda. And by showing a bias towards Christians fleeing from the list of banned countries, Trump is subtly spreading the message that he, and by extension, America doesnt care for Muslims as much as it does for people of other religions. If we are to step into the realm of conjecture, then Trumps ban can be used by IS in the future, near of far, to recruit more people who might be feeling disillusioned. America waged or supported war in some countries from where people are fleeing Reuters Ironically America, whose head has barred people fleeing either war or persecution from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Somalia, Yemen, Libya and Sudan from entering, is the very country that has either instigated or supported war or violence in some of those nations. Iraqs status quo is a result of the war led by America in 2003 in their quest to find so-called weapons of mass destruction, which since then has been proved false. In the case of Yemen, a war that has largely gone unreported in the country is inconspicuously supported by America because it sells weapons to Saudi Arabia and is not in the interest of the nation to bring the plight of Yemeni people to notice because it would place them in a contradictory position. Reuters The protests across America against this ban provide solace and hope that the people do not believe in the ideals that President Trump is propagating. A democracy, after all, can only work if people actively participate in politics. American people must continue to uphold the values they stand for, which includes equality for all no matter their gender, sexuality, race or religion. All the people who have been stranded in Canada due to Donald Trump's Muslim ban will be given temporary residence permits so that they can stay in the country. The Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said, "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past." Justin Trudeau/Twitter The number of people to be affected by this decision remain unclear but Hussen said that as of Sunday afternoon, the Canadian officials had no idea about how many refugees were stranded in Canada due to the ban. reuters Hussen also added that the Trump administration had assured Ottawa that Canadians holding dual nationality with the seven countries banned by Trump will not be affected by the order - that they will still be able to enter the US if they have a valid Canadian permanent residency card. People, however, from the targeted nations who are passing through Canada will not be allowed entry to the US. Hussen said that there were over 35,000 Canadians with dual citizenship that had citizenship with one of the seven nations and Canada will continue to uphold its immigration policy that's founded in compassion while protecting its citizens. On Saturday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcomed immigrants to Canada and tweeted, To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 28, 2017 Canada has welcomed more than 39,670 Syrian refugees from the beginning of November 2015 till now. Chaos is ensuing at US airports after President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Holocaust Remembrance Day (Friday) placing a temporary ban on people from seven majority Muslim countries from entering America. As he penned his signature down on the piece of paper implementing the ban, some people were already on the plane to the States. According to officials, an estimated number of 109 people were detained on Saturday. Reuters Here are some stories of those who have been affected by the order: 1. A Yazidi couple from Iraq were unable to unite after the wife was barred from entering America. Yazidis are a religious minority in Iraq, who have been at the receiving end of violence and persecutions from Islamic States presence in the war-torn middle eastern country. Husband Khalas was employed as an interpreter by the US Army in Iraq and has been living in Washington D.C since July 2016 after he was granted a Special Immigrant Visa for his service to the American army. His wife, Nada, received her passport with an approved American visa one day before Trump signed the executive order. 2. An Iranian woman, who has been a US green card holder for five years and was due to become a citizen in two weeks, was held up. She was travelling with her 11-month-old baby, who is an American citizen. Reuters 3. Discrimination in Sudan led Alwia Abdulla, her husband and six children to flee from Darfur to Jordan and their asylum application to the US was approved. However, Trumps indefinite ban has left the entire family in a state of limbo. The New York Times reported her as saying, We left because we were discriminated against in Darfur. So to be discriminated against by a US president, by a nation we see our future in, is so disheartening. How do you live with that? 4. The executive order includes an indefinite ban on all Syrians from entering America and this includes those fleeing the civil war, which in five running six years are displaced 4.8 million people. A Syrian family was among the many affected by the ban. The family of six was going to arrive in Cleveland, Ohio from a refugee camp in Turkey, where they had an apartment waiting for them but the executive order forced their plans to collapse. Reuters 5. Officials at Cairo Airport told Reuters that five Iraqis and one Yemeni were not allowed to board a New York-bound flight, a result of Trumps ban. However, authorities in Cairo have not yet been able to confirm whether the travellers were refugees. 6. In the picture below, Teija, 7, stands outside Los Angeles Airport protesting against Trump's ban as her father is stuck in Iran. Reuters There is much ambiguity about how many people have been detained, stopped in transit of barred from boarding US-bound flights altogether. What we do know is that many Americans have not taken this ban sitting down and have been protesting in cities across the country including New York and Washington DC. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan.30 By Leman Zeynalova Trend: A wave of liquefied natural gas (LNG) is the catalyst for a second natural gas revolution, said executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA) Fatih Birol. He made the remarks during GE Oil and Gas annual meeting which kicked off in Italys Florence on Jan.30, according to the events official Twitter page. Birol noted that IEA doesnt expect the oil demand to peak any time soon due to rising consumption in developing economies. He added that oil markets could enter a period of high volatility unless companies develop new projects after two years of sharp drops in investments sparked by low oil prices. We have no control on oil prices. We need to focus on what we can control, improving operational performance and production efficiency, said Arnaud Breuilla, President of Exploration and Production at Frances Total company, --- Follow the author on Twitter: @Lyaman_Zeyn Why We Should be More Afraid of Mike Pence Than Trump By Travis Gettys January 30, 2017 " Information Clearing House " - " Raw Story " - Right-wing Christians have been plotting their takeover of the U.S. government for nearly 50 years and the rise of Donald Trump and his evangelical sidekick, Mike Pence, have finally set up the tragedy playing out right now. Kieryn Darkwater is a transgender former evangelical Christofascist who grew up in the Quiverfull movement and uses they as a personal pronoun, wrote about their experience as a homeschooled right-wing political activist for the website Autostraddle. I watched the Tea Party takeover and was surprised no one saw it coming, Darkwater wrote. After all, this was part of the plan. Trump being elected is also part of the plan, although not Trump specifically; the true goal is Pence. Evangelical conservatives started taking over local Republican groups in the 1970s and setting up right-wing advocacy groups to push their agenda into the mainstream which, of course, is the standard form political activism while all along training their children in home schools and church groups to fight in the culture wars. Its a loose and ambiguous term that basically means anything or anyone that doesnt align with this very specific view of Christianity must not be allowed to continue, Darkwater wrote. The Christian right hopes to overturn court decisions protecting reproductive rights and non-discrimination on race, and Darkwater warned that these religious extremists intend to amend the U.S. Constitution to legalize discrimination against women, people of color and LGBT people . The only way to do this is to infiltrate the government, Darkwater wrote, recalling the training and activism they took part in as a teenager. We were sneaky and polite Trojan horses, Darkwater wrote. We had an agenda. Yes, even as 15-year-olds. Right-wing Christians have wanted someone like Pence in the White House for years, but a hardline religious conservative hasnt even been able to win the GOP primary until Trump emerged as a blank slate with no real principles beyond his own self-aggrandizement. They know Trump is easily manipulated and will change his mind with the wind if it makes him feel more powerful and famous, Darkwater wrote. Trump couldnt care less about policy, a fact hes made quite obvious. The Right has given a tyrant power and fame; he will do whatever they want him to do in order to keep it. With Trump apparently willing to sign anything Pence and congressional Republicans hand him, Darkwater wrote, right-wing Christians see an opportunity to finally take over the U.S. government with an army of homeschooled religious extremists. Those of us who didnt leave the far Right are being elected to federal positions or are taking over states and cities, Darkwater wrote. With Pence in office, even the reasonable-seeming incumbents who have been and are still at the mercy of the Tea Party are growing more bold in their attempts to further the Christofascist agenda: To Take Back The Country For Christ. The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House. I Was Trained for the Culture Wars in Home School, Awaiting Someone Like Mike Pence as a Messiah : We were, after all, being trained to take over the country for Christ, literally. This is the 8-year-old girl killed in US raid in Yemen, Arabic media reports https://t.co/nPlWh6LqE3 US killed her teen American brother too pic.twitter.com/QP0TsgdIfq Ben Norton (@BenjaminNorton) January 29, 2017 As noted by my colleague Jeremy Scahill who extensively interviewed the grandparents in Yemen for his book and film on Obamas Dirty Wars the girl was was shot in the neck and killed, bleeding to death over the course of two hours. Why kill children?, the grandfather asked. This is the new (U.S.) administration its very sad, a big crime. The New York Times yesterday reported that military officials had been planning and debating the raid for months under the Obama administration, but Obama officials decided to leave the choice to Trump. The new President personally authorized the attack last week. They claim that the main target of the raid was computer materials inside the house that could contain clues about future terrorist plots. The paper cited a Yemeni official saying that at least eight women and seven children, ages 3 to 13, had been killed in the raid, and that the attack also severely damaged a school, a health facility and a mosque. As my colleague Matthew Cole reported in great detail just weeks ago, Navy Seal Team 6, for all its public glory, has a long history of revenge ops, unjustified killings, mutilations, and other atrocities. And Trump notoriously vowed during the campaign to target not only terrorists but also their families. All of that demands aggressive, independent inquiries into this operation. Perhaps most tragic of all is that just as was true in Iraq Al Qaeda had very little presence in Yemen before the Obama administration began bombing and droning it and killing civilians, thus driving people into the arms of the militant group. As the late, young Yemeni writer Ibrahim Mothana told Congress in 2013: Drone strikes are causing more and more Yemenis to hate America and join radical militants . . . Unfortunately, liberal voices in the United States are largely ignoring, if not condoning, civilian deaths and extrajudicial killings in Yemen. During George W. Bushs presidency, the rage would have been tremendous. But today there is little outcry, even though what is happening is in many ways an escalation of Mr. Bushs policies. . . . Defenders of human rights must speak out. Americas counterterrorism policy here is not only making Yemen less safe by strengthening support for A.Q.A.P. [al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula] but it could also ultimately endanger the United States and the entire world. This is why it is crucial that as urgent and valid protests erupt against Trumps abuses we not permit recent history to be whitewashed, or long-standing U.S. savagery to be deceitfully depicted as new Trumpian aberrations, or the War on Terror framework engendering these new assaults to be forgotten. Some current abuses are unique to Trump, but as I detailed on Saturday some are the decades-old by-product of a mindset and system of war and executive powers that all need uprooting. Obscuring these facts, or allowing those responsible to posture as opponents of all this, is not just misleading but counter-productive: much of this resides on an odious continuum and did not just appear out of nowhere. Congress voted on border wall in 2006, Hillary, Schumer, Feinstein voted Yes https://t.co/70y1dwH1J7 Bernie voted no https://t.co/QWcWWQZ602 Lee Fang (@lhfang) January 30, 2017 Its genuinely inspiring to see pervasive rage over the banning of visa-holders and refugees from countries like Yemen. But its also infuriating that the U.S. continues to massacre Yemeni civilians, both directly and through its tyrannical Saudi partners. That does not become less infuriating Yemeni civilians are not less dead because these policies and the war theories in which they are rooted began before the inauguration of Donald Trump. Its not just Trump but this mentality and framework that needs vehement opposition. The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House. Mexico Needs to Stop Accommodating Trump Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto needs an overhaul of his foreign policy towards the US. By Miguel Guevara January 30, 2017 " Information Clearing House " - " Al Jazeera " - On January 26, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto faced off with US President Donald Trump on Twitter. They both took credit for canceling a meeting they were scheduled to have in Washington DC on January 31. Political commentators and the Mexican public had been asking for a cancellation of the meeting after Trump decided to stick to his position that Mexico will have to pay for a wall along the US-Mexico border. The online standoff was seen an embarrassment for President Pena, who has advocated for dialogue with Trump. It is time that the Mexican government switches gears and moves forward with tougher policies on the US, seeking to break its economic dependence on US markets. Not doing so will bring great perils to Mexico and set a bad precedent for Latin America. Economic dependence For much of the 20th century, the Mexican state encouraged nationalism based on the idea that Mexico was at its core a Latin American country (not a North American one), sharing a common revolutionary heritage with its southern neighbours. In a radical departure from this ideology that gave birth to Mexico on the eve of the 20th century, the Mexican government started improving relations with the US in the 1990s. This change was led by a group of US-educated technocrats who populated the Mexican government and pushed the idea that Mexico's future lay north, neglecting relations with other Latin American countries. One of their main arguments was that looking north benefited Mexico as the US economy was bigger and thus held better prospects for Mexico. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which Mexico, the US and Canada signed in 1994, was the cornerstone of that political consensus, paving the way for significant economic dependence. As a result, Mexico's economy developed to cater overwhelmingly to US import needs; almost 80 percent of Mexican exports now go north across the border. Whole industries were dedicated to US consumer needs. For example, Mexico became the world's seventh biggest car manufacturer with support from the US and a steady supply of US-made car parts; the vehicles it produces are almost exclusively exported to the US. Economic dependence led to political acquiescence to US domination of Mexico's foreign policy. In 2002, Mexico hosted the International Conference on Financing for Development which a number of Latin American leaders attended, including the late Cuban leader Fidel Castro. Amid pressure from the US, then Mexican President Vicente Fox called the Cuban leader and asked him to only attend the leaders' lunch and then leave in order to please US President George W Bush, who was also in attendance. This sparked popular outrage in Mexico. In more recent years, the US has played an important role in Mexico's internal security decisions. As the number of Central Americans attempting to get into the US surged, the US government provided financial support to Mexico to help it detain and deport migrants en route to the US. As a result, in 2016 the number of migrants detained in Mexico increased threefold compared to 2012. True to the tradition of his predecessors accommodating the US at any cost, Pena tried to have a dialogue with Trump, despite his anti-Mexican posturing. In August 2016, while Trump was struggling in the polls, he invited him to his office. The visit was widely criticised within Mexico and prompted the organiser of the meeting, then Finance Minister Luis Videgaray, to resign. After Trump's election, Videgaray came back to the cabinet as foreign minister. It was rumoured that he has close ties with Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and adviser, and was tasked to manage the relationship with the new US administration. New Mexican foreign policy Mexicans are not happy with Pena's approach. They are very proud of their heritage, their culture and its effect on the world, and see Pena's weakness in front of Trump as humiliating. It is imperative that Pena listen to his people and stand up to Trump. It is time for the Mexican government to change its foreign policy towards the US and be bolder in its approach. Pena must be clear that Mexico will not tolerate Trump's tantrums. If Trump decides to pursue his populistic policies, then Mexico must be ready to seek alternatives and a future of its own. In doing so, Mexico can lead with an example of how developing countries can break free from the chains that tie them to industrialised powers. Last Thursday's Twitter embarrassment, just like the August one, was the result of Videgaray's actions. He should resign and Pena should appoint an experienced diplomat who can introduce tough new policies to stand up to Trump. Mexico needs to be serious about leaving NAFTA. Mexico shouldn't be willing to tolerate any embarrassment for the sake of staying within NAFTA. The free trade agreement has brought positive results mainly to the north of Mexico, but many swaths of the agricultural south have deeply suffered from US competition. Small Mexican producers can't compete with the US' subsidised industrialised farming. In today's interconnected world, there are vast markets that the Mexican economy can tap into. China is one of them. Pena should consider very seriously strengthening relations with China. In recent years China has sought a closer relationship with Latin America, but Mexico hasn't been a major part of this endeavour because of its US focus. Mexico must also vow not to deport any foreign citizens in Mexico en route to the US. Pena should immediately instruct all federal agencies to stop detention and deportations of the 120,000 Central Americans who cross Mexico annually trying to reach the US. The government should provide shelter and humanitarian aid to them and stop mistreatment. Mexico should set an example for the rest of the Latin American countries to follow in facing an uncooperative US president and looking for foreign policy alternatives. If they don't do so, Mexico and other Latin American countries risk becoming Trump's backyard and being continually humiliated. Relations with the US are not as valuable as national sovereignty and that should never be compromised on. Miguel Guevara was born and raised in Cuernavaca, Mexico. He holds a Master's degree in public policy from Harvard University's John F Kennedy School of Government. He currently lives and works in California, where he collaborates with Latino community organisations. The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House. American Psychosis By Chris Hedges January 30, 2017 " Information Clearing House " - " Truth Dig " - Reality is under assault. Verbal confusion reigns. Truth and illusion have merged. Mental chaos makes it hard to fathom what is happening. We feel trapped in a hall of mirrors. Exposed lies are answered with other lies. The rational is countered with the irrational. Cognitive dissonance prevails. We endure a disquieting shame and even guilt. Tens of millions of Americans, especially women, undocumented workers, Muslims and African-Americans, suffer the acute anxiety of being pursued by a predator. All this is by design. Demagogues always infect the governed with their own psychosis. The comparison between totalitarianism and psychosis is not incidental, the psychiatrist Joost A.M. Meerloo wrote in his book The Rape of the Mind: The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide, and Brainwashing. Delusional thinking inevitably creeps into every form of tyranny and despotism. Unconscious backward forces come into action. Evil powers from the archaic past return. An automatic compulsion to go on to self-destruction develops, to justify one mistake with a new one; to enlarge and expand the vicious pathological circle becomes the dominating end of life. The frightened man, burdened by a culture he does not understand, retreats into the brutes fantasy of limitless power in order to cover up the vacuum inside himself. This fantasy starts with the leaders and is later taken over by the masses they oppress. The lies fly out of the White House like flocks of pigeons: Donald Trumps election victory was a landslide. He had the largest inauguration crowds in American history. Three million to 5 million undocumented immigrants voted illegally. Climate change is a hoax. Vaccines cause autism. Immigrants are carriers of [t]remendous infectious disease. The election was riggeduntil it wasnt. We dont know who really knocked down the World Trade Center. Torture works. Mexico will pay for the wall. Conspiracy theories are fact. Scientific facts are conspiracies. America will be great again. Our new president, a 70-year-old with orange-tinted skin and hair that Penn Jillette has likened to cotton candy made of piss, is, as Trump often reminds us, very good looking. He has almost no intellectual accomplishmentshe knows little of history, politics, law, philosophy, art or governancebut insists [m]y IQ is one of the highestand you all know it! Please dont feel so stupid or insecure, its not your fault. And the mediocrities and half-wits he has installed in his Cabinet have by far the highest IQ of any Cabinet ever assembled. It is an avalanche of absurdities. This mendacity would be easier to repulse if the problem was solely embodied in Trump. But even in the face of a rising despotism, the Democratic Party refuses to denounce the corporate forces that eviscerated our democracy and impoverished the country. The neoliberal Trump demonizes Muslims, undocumented workers and the media. The neoliberal Democratic Party demonizes Vladimir Putin and FBI Director James Comey. No one speaks about the destructive force of corporate power. The warring elites pit alternative facts against alternative facts. All engage in demagoguery. We will, I expect, be condemned to despotism by the venality of Trump and the cowardice and dishonesty of the liberal class. Trump and those around him have a deep hatred for what they cannot understand. They silence anyone who thinks independently. They elevate pseudo-intellectuals who adhere to their bizarre script. They cannot cope with complexity, nuance or the unpredictable. Individual initiative is a mortal threat. The order for some employees of several federal agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Agricultures research service, the National Park Service and the Department of Health and Human Services, to restrict or cease communication with the press or members of Congress, along with the attempt to impose 10-year felony convictions on six reporters who covered the inauguration protests, signals the beginning of a campaign to marginalize reality and promote fantasy. Facts depend solely on those who have the power to create them. The goal of the Trump administration is to create an artificial consistency that conforms to its warped perception of the world. Before they seize power and establish a world according to their doctrines, totalitarian movements conjure up a lying world of consistency which is more adequate to the needs of the human mind than reality itself; in which, through sheer imagination, uprooted masses can feel at home and are spared the never-ending shocks which real life and real experiences deal to human beings and their expectations, Hannah Arendt wrote in The Origins of Totalitarianism. The force possessed by totalitarian propagandabefore the movements have the power to drop iron curtains to prevent anyones disturbing, by the slightest reality, the gruesome quiet of an entirely imaginary worldlies in its ability to shut the masses off from the real world. Trumps blinding narcissism was captured in his bizarre talk to the CIA on Jan. 21. [T]hey say, is Donald Trump an intellectual? he said. Trust me, Im, like, a smart persona. I have a running war with the media, he added. They are among the most dishonest human beings on earth. And they sort of made it sound like I had a feud with the intelligence community. And I just want to let you know, the reason youre the number one stop [in the new presidency] is exactly the oppositeexactly. And they understand that, too. He launched into an attack on the media for not reporting that a million, million and a half people showed up for his inauguration. They showed a field where there was practically nobody standing there, he said about the medias depiction of the inauguration crowd. And they said, Donald Trump did not draw well. I said, it was almost raining, the rain should have scared them away, but God looked down and he said, were not going to let it rain on your speech. He has been on the cover of Time like, 14 or 15 times, Trump said in speaking of his criticism of the magazine because one of its reporters incorrectly wrote that the president had removed a bust of Martin Luther King Jr. from the Oval Office. I think we have the all-time record in the history of Time magazine. Like, if Tom Brady is on the cover, its one time, because he won the Super Bowl or something, right? Ive been on it for 15 times this year. I dont think thats a record, Mike, that can ever be broken. Do you agree with that? What do you think? [Editors note: Photographs or drawings of Trump were on the cover of Time 10 times in the last year and a half and once in 1989.] Trumps theatricality works. He forces the press and the public to repeat his lies, inadvertently giving them credibility. He is always moving. He is always on display. He has no fixed belief system. Trump, as he consolidates power, will adopt the ideology of the Christian right to fill his own ideological vacuum. The Christian rights magical thinking will merge seamlessly with Trumps magical thinking. Idiocy, self-delusion, megalomania, fantasy and government repression will come wrapped in images of the Christian cross and the American flag. The corporate state, hostile or indifferent to the plight of the citizens, has no emotional pull among the public. It is often hated. Political candidates run not as politicians but as celebrities. Campaigns eschew issues to make people feel good about candidates and themselves. Ideas are irrelevant. Emotional euphoria is paramount. The voter is only a prop in the political theater. Politics is anti-politics. It is reality television. Trump proved better at this game than his opponents. It is a game in which fact and knowledge do not matter. Reality is what you create. We were conditioned for a Trump. Meerloo wrote, The demagogue relies for his effectiveness on the fact that people will take seriously the fantastic accusations he makes, will discuss the phony issues he raises as if they had reality, or will be thrown into such a state of panic by his accusations and charges that they will simply abdicate their right to think and verify for themselves. The lies create a climate in which everyone is assumed to be lying. The truth becomes suspect and obscured. Narratives begin to be believed not because they are true, or even sound true, but because they are emotionally appealing. The aim of systematic lying, as Arendt wrote, is the transformation of human nature itself. The lies eventually foster somnambulism among a population that surrenders to the magical thinking and ceases to care. It checks out. It becomes cynical. It only asks to be entertained and given a vent for its frustration and rage. Demagogues produce enemies the way a magician pulls rabbits out of a hat. They wage constant battles against nonexistent dangers, rapidly replacing one after the other to keep the rhetoric at a fever pitch. Practically speaking, the totalitarian ruler proceeds like a man who persistently insults another man until everybody knows that the latter is his enemy, so that he can, with some plausibility, go out and kill him in self-defense, Arendt wrote. This certainly is a little crude, but it worksas everybody will know who has ever watched how certain successful careerists eliminate competitors. We are entering a period of national psychological trauma. We are stalked by lunatics. We are, as Judith Herman writes about trauma victims in her book Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of ViolenceFrom Domestic Abuse to Political Terror, being rendered helpless by overwhelming force. This trauma, like all traumas, overwhelms the ordinary systems of care that give people a sense of control, connection, and meaning. To recover our mental balance we must respond to Trump the way victims of trauma respond to abuse. We must build communities where we can find understanding and solidarity. We must allow ourselves to mourn. We must name the psychosis that afflicts us. We must carry out acts of civil disobedience and steadfast defiance to re-empower others and ourselves. We must fend off the madness and engage in dialogues based on truth, literacy, empathy and reality. We must invest more time in activities such as finding solace in nature, or focusing on music, theater, literature, art and even worshipactivities that hold the capacity for renewal and transcendence. This is the only way we will remain psychologically whole. Building an outer shell or attempting to hide will exacerbate our psychological distress and depression. We may not win, but we will have, if we create small, like-minded cells of defiance, the capacity not to go insane. Chris Hedges, spent nearly two decades as a foreign correspondent in Central America, the Middle East, Africa and the Balkans. He has reported from more than 50 countries and has worked for The Christian Science Monitor, National Public Radio, The Dallas Morning News and The New York Times, for which he was a foreign correspondent for 15 years. The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House. Pre-Emptive Attack Iran Bill Active in US House By Dan McAdams January 30, 2017 " Information Clearing House " - You will often see potentially important pieces of legislation languish in the US House. A bill will remain active, meaning that it can be brought to the Floor at any time. But it flies just under the radar. Other times the language floats around Washington for years until a crisis necessitates its activation and passage. As we know well, what eventually became the PATRIOT Act one of the single greatest attacks on civil liberties in US history started out and spent much of its early life as a sugar-plumb fairy dancing in neocon fantasies. Then came 9/11 and it was dusted off and imposed on the American people. And the United States has never been and may never be the same. Either way, these measures are important if seldom seen. So it may well be with H.J.Res. 10, introduced in the House just as the new Congress began at the beginning of this month. The title of the bill tells the tale: a bill To authorize the use of the United States Armed Forces to achieve the goal of preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. This legislation, introduced by Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-FL), is as it appears: an authorization for the President to use military force against Iran. But it is much worse than that. Why so? Because it specifically authorizes the president to launch a pre-emptive war on Iran at any time of his choosing and without any further Congressional oversight or input. The operative sentence in the resolution reads, The President is authorized to use the Armed Forces of the United States as the President determines necessary and appropriate in order to achieve the goal of preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. (Emphasis added). President Trump and, importantly, his entire national security team has been extraordinarily aggressive toward Iran, repeatedly threatening that country both at the negotiating table and on the battlefield. H.J.Res 10 would be just the blank check the Administration craves to realize such threats. And thanks to ongoing US and allied sabre-rattling in the Persian Gulf, tensions continue to escalate. At the end of this month, the UK, US and allied military forces will take part in operation Unified Trident, a joint exercise in the Persian Gulf that will simulate a military confrontation with Iran. How would Washington respond if a bill was active in the Iranian parliament authorizing war on the United States and the Iranian navy began conducting joint exercises with the Chinese in the Gulf of Mexico simulating an attack on the United States? Reprinted from the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity. The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House. The Left Is Self-Destructing By Paul Craig Roberts January 30, 2017 " Information Clearing House " - The mindlessness is unbearable. Amnesty International tells us that we must fight the Muslim ban because Trumps bigotry is wrecking lives. Anthony Dimaggio at CounterPunch says Trump should be impeached because his Islamophobia is a threat to the Constitution. This is not to single out these two as the mindlessness is everywhere among those whose worldview is defined by Identity Politics. One might think that Amnesty International should be fighting against the Bush/Cheney/Obama regime wars that have produced the refugees by killing and displacing millions of Muslims. For example, the ongoing war that Obama inflicted on Yemen results in the death of one Yemeni child every 10 minutes, according to UNICEF. Where is Amnesty International? Clearly Americas wars on Muslims wreck far more lives than Trumps ban on immigrants. Why the focus on an immigration ban and not on wars that produce refugees? Is it because Obama is responsible for war and Trump for the ban? Is the liberal/progressive/left projecting Obamas monstrous crimes onto Trump? Is it that we must hate Trump and not Obama? Immigration is not a right protected by the US Constitution. Where was Dimaggio when in the name of the war on terror the Bush/Obama regime destroyed the civil liberties guaranteed by the US Constitution? If Dimaggio is an American citizen, he should try immigrating to the UK, Germany, or France and see how far he gets. The easiest and surest way for the Trump administration to stop the refugee problem, not only for the US but also for Europe and the West in general, is to stop the wars against Muslim countries that his predecessors started. The enormous sums of money squandered on gratuitous wars could instead be given to the countries that the US and NATO have destroyed. The simplest way to end the refugee problem is to stop producing refugees. This should be the focus of Trump, Amnesty, and Dimaggio. Is everyone too busy hating to do anything sensible? It is very disturbing that the liberal/progressive/left prefers to oppose Trump than to oppose war. Indeed, they want a war on Trump. How does this differ from the Bush/Obama war on Muslims? The liberal/progressive/left is demonstrating a mindless hatred of the American people and the President that the people chose. This mindless hatred can achieve nothing but the discrediting of an alternative voice and the opening of the future to the least attractive elements of the right-wing. The liberal/progressive/left will end up discrediting all critics, thereby empowering those to whom the liberal/progressive/left are most opposed. The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House. Tashkent, Uzbekistan, Jan. 30 By Demir Azizov Trend: Uzagroexportbank, a joint stock commercial bank, will be created in Uzbekistan to support manufacturers and exporters in the agricultural sector, according to the decree of the Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev. The founders of the newly established bank with an initial registered capital of 10 million euros will include the Fund of the Reconstruction and Development of Uzbekistan with a share of 75 percent in the share capital, the Uzbekinvest National Export-Import Insurance Company (10 percent), the Uzbekozikovkatholding holding company, Uzagrosugurta and Kafolat insurance companies (five percent each). The decree stipulates that both residents and non-residents of Uzbekistan, including the international financial institutions can also act as shareholders of the Uzagroexportbank. By 2020, the Uzagroexportbank will have to expand capitalization by attracting strategic foreign investors with a share of at least 15 percent of the authorized capital. The new bank and its branches will be exempt from all kinds of taxes and mandatory contributions to the Uzbek state funds for five years from the date of registration, and the saved funds will be allocated to strengthen the resource and logistical base of the bank. Currently, the banking system of Uzbekistan is represented by 26 commercial banks. Trump Lets Saudis Off His Muslim Ban By leaving Saudi Arabia and other key terrorism sponsors off his Muslim ban, President Trump shows the same cowardice and dishonesty that infected the Bush and Obama administrations. By Robert Parry January 30, 2017 " Information Clearing House " - " Consortium News " - President Trumps ban against letting people from seven mostly Muslim countries enter the United States looks to many like a thinly concealed bias against a religion, but it also is a troubling sign that Trump doesnt have the nerve to challenge the false terrorism narrative demanded by Israel and Saudi Arabia. The Israeli-Saudi narrative, which is repeated endlessly inside Official Washington, is that Iran is the principal sponsor of terrorism when that dubious honor clearly falls to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other Sunni-led Muslim states, including Pakistan, nations that did not make Trumps list. The evidence of who is funding and supporting most of the worlds terrorism is overwhelming. All major terrorist groups that have bedeviled the United States and the West over the past couple of decades from Al Qaeda to the Taliban to Islamic State can trace their roots back to Sunni-led countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Qatar. Privately, this reality has been recognized by senior U.S. officials, including former Vice President Joe Biden, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Trumps National Security Advisor Michael Flynn. But that knowledge has failed to change U.S. policy, which caters to the oil-rich Saudis and the politically powerful Israelis. For instance, in August 2012, the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency then headed by General Flynn warned that Salafists, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Al Qaeda were the major forces driving the insurgency against the largely secular government in Syria. Flynns DIA advised President Obama that rebels were trying to establish a Salafist principality in eastern Syria, and that western countries, the gulf states, and Turkey are supporting these efforts to counter the supposed Shiite threat to the region. Hillary Clinton also was aware of this reality, as the threat from the head-chopping Islamic State also known as ISIL or ISIS grew worse in summer 2014. In September 2014, the former Secretary of State wrote in an email that Saudi Arabia and Qatar were providing clandestine financial and logistic support to ISIL and other radical Sunni groups. Later in 2014, Vice President Joe Biden made the same point in a talk at Harvards Kennedy School: Our allies in the region were our largest problem in Syria the Saudis, the emirates, etc. what were they doing? They were so determined to take down Assad and essentially have a proxy Sunni-Shia war, what did they do? They poured hundreds of millions of dollars and tens of thousands of tons of military weapons into anyone who would fight against Assad, except the people who were being supplied were Al Nusra and Al Qaeda and the extremist elements of jihadis coming from other parts of the world. [Quote starts at 53:25.] Known But Unknown So the truth was known at senior levels of the Obama administration and now via National Security Advisor Flynn at the top of the Trump administration but the Israelis and the Saudis dont want that reality to shape U.S. foreign policy. In other words, this truth about the real source of terrorism was known but unknown. Instead, Israel demands that Washington share its hatred of the Lebanese militant group, Hezbollah, a Shiite force that organized in the 1980s to drive the invading Israeli army out of southern Lebanon. Because Hezbollah dealt a rare defeat to the Israeli Defense Force, Israel puts it at the top of terrorist organizations. And, Hezbollah is supported by Iran. Saudi Arabia, too, hates Iran because the Sunni-fundamentalist Saudi monarchy considers Shia Islam heretical, a sectarian conflict that dates back to the Seventh Century. So, the Saudi government has viewed Sunni jihadists as the tip of the spear against these Shiite rivals. Israeli and Saudi officials have even made clear that they would prefer Al Qaeda or Islamic State to prevail in the Syrian war rather than have the largely secular government of President Bashar al-Assad survive because they see his regime as part of a Shiite crescent reaching from Tehran through Damascus to the Hezbollah neighborhoods of Beirut. In September 2013, Israels Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren, a close adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told the Jerusalem Post that Israel favored the Sunni extremists over Assad. The greatest danger to Israel is by the strategic arc that extends from Tehran, to Damascus to Beirut. And we saw the Assad regime as the keystone in that arc, Oren said in the interview. We always wanted Bashar Assad to go, we always preferred the bad guys who werent backed by Iran to the bad guys who were backed by Iran. He said this was the case even if the bad guys were affiliated with Al Qaeda. And, in June 2014, speaking as a former ambassador at an Aspen Institute conference, Oren expanded on his position, saying Israel would even prefer a victory by the brutal Islamic State over continuation of the Iranian-backed Assad in Syria. From Israels perspective, if theres got to be an evil thats got to prevail, let the Sunni evil prevail, Oren said. [For more on this topic, see Consortiumnews.coms Israel, Saudi Arabia and Terrorism.] The Wests Worries However, when Americans and Europeans worry about terrorism, they are talking about Al Qaeda and Islamic State, terror groups led by Sunni extremists. Those are the groups that have been responsible for bloody attacks on the United States and Western Europe. The absurdity of Trumps immigration ban is underscored by the fact that it would not have kept out the 15 Saudi hijackers dispatched by Al Qaeda to carry out the 9/11 attacks. They came from the home country of Al Qaedas Saudi founder Osama bin Laden. Neither would Trumps ban have stopped Muhamed Atta, one of the 9/11 ringleaders who was from Egypt, another country ignored by Trump, which also happens to be the original home of Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al Qaedas current leader. So, what Trumps initial foray into the complex issue of terrorism has revealed is that he is unwilling to take on the real nexus of terrorism, just as Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama shied away from a clash with Israel, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf sheikdoms. In the first week of Donald Trumps presidency, the regional interests of Israel and Saudi Arabia have continued to dictate how Official Washington addresses terrorism. Trumps seven-nation list includes Iran, Syria and Sudan as state sponsors of terrorism and Iraq, Yemen, Somalia and Libya as countries where there has been terrorist activity. But the governments of Iran and Syria arguably have become two of the leading fighters against the terrorist groups of most concern to the U.S. and European populations. Iran is aiding both Syria and Iraq in their conflicts with Al Qaeda and Islamic State. Inside Syria, the Syrian army has borne the brunt of that fighting against terror groups funded and armed by Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, and yes at least indirectly, the United States. Yet while none of the Al Qaeda/Islamic State benefactors made Trumps list, Iran and Syria did. In other words, not only is Trumps ban a blunderbuss blast at thousands of innocent Muslims who have no intention of hurting the United States but it doesnt even take aim at the most dangerous targets which represent a genuine terrorist threat. Trumps ban is really a twisted case of political correctness purporting to reject political correctness. While Trump claims to recognize that it is dangerously naive to let in Muslims when Islamic terrorism has remained a threat to Americans, Trump has left off his list the most likely sources of terrorists because to do otherwise would have negative political consequences in Official Washington. By going after Iran and Syria, in particular, Trump appears to be currying favor with neoconservatives and liberal hawks in Congress and across Official Washington. Perhaps, he is simply hesitating while the Senate considers confirmation of his choice for Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson. The Senate also could reject other of his foreign policy nominees. But that is exactly the kind of compromising that undermined any attempts by President Obama to engineer a real change from the war of terror strategy of George W. Bush. Obama was so afraid of going against the Israelis and the Saudis that he only altered U.S. policy on the margins and let himself get dragged into Israeli-Saudi-favored regime change adventures in Syria and Yemen. Dashed or Delayed Hopes When Trump initially rebuffed the neocons and liberal hawks who dominate Official Washingtons foreign establishment, there was hope that he might at least try to hold Saudi Arabia accountable as the chief sponsor of terrorism, rather than to continue the Israeli-Saudi-imposed narrative. But to do so carried political risks beyond offending the politically potent Israelis who have forged a quiet alliance with the wealthy Saudis. Trump would also have to recognize the important role of Republican icon Ronald Reagan in creating the terrorist threat. After all, the origins of the modern jihadist movement trace back to the $1 billion-a-year collaboration between the Reagan administration and the Saudi monarchy to support the Afghan mujahedeen in their war against a secular government in Kabul backed by the Soviet Union. The extravagant arming of these Afghan fundamentalists, who were bolstered by international jihadists led by Osama bin Laden, dealt a harsh blow to the Soviet forces and ultimately led to the collapse of the secular regime in Kabul, but the victory also paved the way for the rise of the Taliban and Al Qaeda, blowback that hit the United States on 9/11. The U.S. reaction to that shock never directly addressed how the problem had originated and who the underlying culprits were. Though George W. Bushs administration did begin by invading Afghanistan, the neoconservatives around him quickly turned the U.S. retaliation against longstanding Israeli targets, such as Iraqs Saddam Hussein and Syrias Assad dynasty though they had nothing to do with 9/11. The fiction that these largely secular governments were responsible for Islamic terrorism and the mislabeling of Shia-ruled Iran as the chief sponsor of such terrorism have remained the myths confusing the American people and thus justifying continued U.S. support for the Israeli-Saudi war against the Shiite crescent. Trump, who is heavily criticized for his inability to distinguish fact from fantasy, could have displayed a brave commitment to truth-telling if he had fashioned his counter-terrorism policy to actually address the real sponsors of terrorism. Instead, he chose to continue the lies that the Israelis and Saudis insist that Official Washington tell. In doing so, Trump is not only offending much of the world and alienating countries that are at the forefront of the fight against the worst terrorist threats, but he is continuing to shield the key regimes that have perpetuated the scourge of terrorism. Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, Americas Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com). The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House. Miss France Iris Mittenaere is the new Miss Universe! In celebrating the 65th Miss Universe, here are 10 things you need to known about the stunning model turn beauty queen. *Iris Mittenaere was born in Lille, France, to Yves Mittenaere, a professor of history and geography, and Laurence Druart, a schoolteacher and lecturer. She has a brother, sister, and half-sister. *Mittenaere attended school in Steenvorde, where she lived with her mother. In 2011, she graduated lycee with a degree in science. After graduating, she moved back to Lille, where she attended Lille 2 University of Health and Law, studying dentistry. *Mittenaere represented Nord-Pas-de-Calais at the Miss France 2016. On 19 December 2015, she was crowned Miss France by Miss France 2015 Camille Cerf in Lille. *She competed in Miss Universe 2016 where she succeeded Miss Universe 2015 Pia Wurtzbach of the Philippines. *When she won the Miss Universe final, she became the first European (official) winner since 1990. *She became only the second woman from her country to win the crown after Christiane Martel won in 1953 breaking Frances 63 year title drought. *This is only the third time a French woman was among the Top 5 delegates of the Miss Universe competition, after Flora Coquerel in 2015 and Christiane Martel in 1953. *Iris says she loves extreme sports, including skydiving, bungee jumping and hang gliding. She also enjoys cooking French food and traveling. *As Miss Universe, she wants to advocate for access to education and childrens rights. As a dental student, she also wants to continue her awareness campaign for dental and oral care, taking her campaign all around the world. *When asked what quality makes someone confidently beautiful, Iris said, Beauty shines from the inside out. Be kindhearted, believe in moral values, have confidence in myself, but also admit my flaws, that is the way to work on myself and become confidently beautiful. The month isnt over yet, but were already convinced that Bisi Ibidapo-Obe threw the best celebrity birthday party for January. The Yoruba actress kicked off celebrations for her 40th year of being an earthbound by visiting the Heart of Gold Orphanage. From there, she joined close friends to celebrate at a popular restaurant. Before hosting her family, friends and well wishers to a special Thanksgiving service and classy Owambe party. Watch highlights HERE See more photos below. Immediate past American President, Barack Obama has thrown his weight behind protesters criticizing an executive order issued by President Donald Trump in the past week. The executive order imposed a 90-day immigration ban on citizens from nine Islamic countries and has already been labeled a Muslim ban. Trumps order temporarily banned immigration from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia and indefinitely stopped Syrian refugees from coming to the United States. Hundreds of Americans have staged protests at airport with several celebrities condemning the move and former President Barack Obama has now weighed in. The President fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion, said Kevin Lewis, spokesman for the former president, in a statement. It marks very early criticism for Trump from his predecessor from whom he took over just ten days ago but the new President remains resolute as he said on Monday, America will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression Some Nigerian celebrities, say they will boycott the planned protest by award winning musician Tuface Idibia, against unfavourable policies of the Federal Government. Tuface, the African Queen crooner recently took to his Instagram handle: @official2baba, calling on his fans and followers to join in the nationwide protest scheduled for February 5. He stated: First Massive Nationwide Protests. A call for good governance. A call for urgent explanation into the reckless economic downturn nationwide.to come out and protest this obnoxious and baseless policies and excuses of the government of the day. Reacting, popular comedian, Bovi Ugboma, said he would not be joining the protest. Bovi on his Instagram handle: @officialBovi stated, Boycott is too strong a word to describe my not attending. I wont be there. Simple. It doesnt define whether I support it or not. I am not joining the protest, and stop saying we and us. You dont belong..my life is not governed by your opinions of me. Tuface, real name Innocent Ujah Idibia, is also a producer, entrepreneur and one of the most decorated and successful Afro pop artists in Africa. Similarly, popular Yoruba actress, Funke Adesiyan who disagreed with 2face over the plan said that protest was not the only option. The actress, who recently completed a course in film-making and directing at the New York Film Academy in the U.S, stressed the importance of youth participation in governance. The Yoruba actress of Ibadan origin who contested and lost Oyo State House of assembly election under the umbrella of PDP in 2015, stated on her instagram handle @funkeadesiyan: When people ask me why I joined politics, I tell them from the truest of my heart that it is because I got tired of how things were being done in my country. Its not enough for us to protest, its more important for us, youths of this beloved nation, to get involved in governance. You could try many times before you achieve it, Adesiyan stated. Tuface started his music career while studying at Institute of Management Technology (IMT) Enugu where he recorded several jingles for Enugu state radio broadcasting station. His professional career did not begin until he moved to Lagos where he met other members of the rested Plantashun Boyz group, comprising Black Face and Faze in 1996. Idibia has received several awards including MTV Europe Music Award, world Music Award, Headies Awards (Hip-hop award), and Channel O Music Video Awards. Others are BET awards for his musical work, MTV Africa Music Awards, MOBO award, KORA award among others. Source: Guardian The two armoured Bell helicopters seized by Nigerian Customs Service, NCS, and given to the Nigerian Air Force, NAF, were ordered by former Governor Rotimi Amaechi, when he was at the helms in Rivers State, an official has said. His successor Nyesom Wike made this known on Saturday contradicting the claim of the NCS that the owner of the aircraft was not known. Mr. Wike made the clarification in a statement released by his spokesman, Simeon Nwakaudu. The governor said he officially wrote to President Muhammadu Buhari asking him to hand over the helicopters to the Air Force. The governor said he took the step because of the high custom duties the helicopters attracted and the refusal of the Federal Government to grant waiver on the helicopters. According to him: These helicopters were imported by the immediate past administration; and when I assumed office, we wrote to the Federal Government that the helicopters were strictly for security use. I went to the Federal Government to give me waiver for us to clear the helicopters but they refused. Thereafter, I wrote to President Buhari to assure him that the helicopters are meant for security purpose and that it should be handed over to the Nigeria Air Force. We stated that we cannot pay the custom duties because the helicopters are not for commercial use; but to monitor the creeks and track criminals. In any case, where will the Rivers Government get money at this time to import armoured helicopters to which the previous administration imported because it had money (at the time). Im surprised that they have started propaganda and political falsehood on the said armoured helicopters. What am I going to use armoured helicopters for; what kind of country are they turning Nigeria into? he asked. Mr. Wike said it was unfortunate that some security agencies would allegedly resort to political propaganda and outright lies when facts of the seized armoured helicopters were known. He said it was shocking that NCS would turn around to claim that it impounded the helicopters rather than telling the truth. He claimed that the chief of staff to the president commended the Rivers government when the letter was delivered to the president. On Friday, the Murtala Muhammed International Airport Command of NCS handed over two civil model Bell helicopters imported into the country by unknown persons to the NAF. The Service said the aircraft were seized on November 7 2016. It explained that the aircraft were handed over to NAF because of the failure of the yet-to-be-identified importers to produce end user certificate from the office of the National Security Adviser. The Customs said the action contravened the Customs and Excise Management Act. (NAN) Anambra state born Big brother Naija house mate, Gifty, who seems to be the finest in the house and always trying to flirt with all the guys in the house is married to a Nollywood movie director, David Sorochukwu Akumah. The way she gets close to every guy in the house made viewers feel she must be single. But yesterday after she rushed up to the new male housemate, Bassey, people started investigating her and found out she has been married since 2014. Check out more photos after the cut source Lailasblog Mr Ben Onyechere, the former Media Adviser to ex-governor of Abia State, Chief Theodore Orji, has been killed by unknown gunmen. It was gathered that Mr Onyechere was kidnapped at about 8 p.m. in Ikenegbu axis of Owerri where he had gone with his driver to do some shopping. A source who spoke on condition of anonymity said the gunmen numbering five trailed Onyechere to a popular super market in Ikenegbu and forced his driver out of his car before they sped off with Onyechere. The following day the lifeless body of Oncheyere was found a few streets away from Maris Junction, Ikenegbu Owerri, after he was shot several times. It is sad. The source added that the deceaseds driver, who put up initial resistance was shot twice on the legs before Onyechere was kidnapped. The detail of the assassination are still sketchy. When contacted, the Police Public Relations Officer in Imo command, DSP Andrew Enwerem, said that he was informed of the incident, but could not confirm the identity of the victim. Protests have sprung up around around airports in America as President Donald Trump orders a four-month ban on all refugees entering the US. The President singled out refugees from Syria as barred from entering the country indefinitely, or until he himself decides they are allowed in. No visas will be issued to immigrants from seven mainly-Muslim nations including Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen for 90 days. Im establishing new vetting measures to keep radical Islamic terrorists out of the United States of America. Dont want them here, Trump said earlier on Friday at the Pentagon. We only want to admit those into our country who will support our country and love deeply our people, he said. See the photos from the protest below Source: BreakingTimes Nigerian newspaper headlines January 30, 2017. Punch A former Governor of Rivers State, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, has blamed former President Goodluck Jonathan and Governor Nyesom Wike for the inability of the state to take possession of the two helicopters, which were seized by the Nigeria Customs Service and handed over to the Nigeria Air Force last week. Guardian Amid rife speculation over the health status of President Muhammadu Buhari, Governor Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo state yesterday refuted reports that governors were summoned for an emergency meeting in Abuja to discuss the issue. Vanguard A MAJOR crisis has erupted in the ancient Nri Kingdom in Anambra State, regarded as the ancestral homeland of the Igbo and the custodian of the Igbo culture and tradition, with the traditional ruler of the town, Igwe Obidiegwu Onyesoh, announcing the sacking of the 12-member royal cabinet, following what had been described as irreconcilable differences between them. The Nation General Overseer of Omega Fire Ministries, Apostle Johnson Suleman has asked the Federal Government to compel Kaduna State Governor, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai to produce Fulani herdsmen to whom money was paid so as to disabuse the minds of Nigerians that Christians are not the target of President Muhammadu Buharis administration. Leadership The Ondo State House of Assembly has suspended the Speaker, Jumoke Akindele, and her deputy, Fatai Olotu, based on allegations of fraud. Thisday Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has requested President Muhammadu Buhari to refer allegation of corruption made by the Senate against the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Mr. David Babachir Lawal, to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) for further investigation. Premium Times The Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN, has restated its support for the founder of the Omege Fire Ministries, Johnson Suleman, after he was invited by operatives of the State Security Service, SSS. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 29 By Farhad Daneshvar Trend: Iran's Minister of Industry, Mine and Trade Mohammad Reza Nematzadeh has denied that government owns the large part of the shares of the leading car manufacturers in the Islamic Republic. Mohammad Reza Nematzadeh said that the automotive sector is not a state-run industry in Iran and the government owns only 20 percent of the stocks of the Iranian carmakers, the Fars News Agency reported. The minister further added that the government has 14.5 percent of the shares of Iran Khodro and 17.5 percent of the stocks of SAIPA. Iranian carmakers manufactured more than 946,000 vehicles over the first nine months of the current fiscal year (starting March 20, 2016), indicating a 38.7 percent growth year-on-year. In the meantime, multinational companies have demonstrated a surge in interest in investment in Irans car sector following the implementation of the nuclear deal between the Islamic Republic and the world major powers in January 2016. Despite a last minute effort by the Federal Government to stave-off a nationwide strike, the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP) has decided its members will down tools by 12 noon Monday, January 30, to press home the implementation of their demands. The General Secretary of ASUP, Mr. Anderson Ezeibe, told the Daily Sun that lecturers in the nations polytechnics have been mobilized for the one week warning strike stressing that we will withdraw our services, both academic and administrative jobs. Ezeibe disclosed that no polytechnic is exempt from the national strike. According to him, the Federal Government ought to have averted the strike if it had addressed the issues at stake when the union issued the first ultimatum on July 20, 2016 and another notification on November 14, 2016. The ASUP leader confirmed that the Minister of Education, Malam Adamu Adamu, invited the leadership of the union to a meeting but warned that unless the issues in contention were addressed, the one-week warning strike will go ahead as scheduled. Ezeibe said after the National Executive Council (NEC) in Abuja that the union served the Ministry of Education the strike notice last Thursday and that they wrote on Friday inviting the leadership to a meeting by 12 noon Monday. The chairman of ASUP, Federal Polytechnic, Ado Ekiti, Mr. Tunji Owoye, said his members will comply with the NEC directive and that the congress of the union is scheduled for Monday. He explained that the management of the institution will be informed of the industrial action after the congress. The Secretary of ASUP, Lagos State Polytechnic (LASPOTECH), Mr. Uthman, disclosed that a decision on whether to join the national strike will be taken at a congress Monday by 2 pm. Among the issues raised by the union are the sustained poor funding of public polytechnics as reflected in the unimplemented capital grants, withdrawal of allowances since 2016, shortfalls in personnel allocations as well as non-funding of promotion exercises. Other issues are the victimization of union officials, interference in union activities, non release of visitation panel reports, delays in the review of the Federal Polytechnics Act, non-commencement of renegotiation of ASUP/FG agreement of 2010, and tardiness in appointment of rectors of federal polytechnics. Source: TheSun Toyota has relinquished the title of the worlds biggest automaker, reporting Monday that it sold 10.175 million vehicles worldwide in 2016, fewer than Volkswagens 10.31 million. General Motors reports its tally next week. If GMs number falls short, it will be the first time the German automaker has become No. 1. Its a milestone achievement despite the taint to VWs reputation from a huge scandal over cheating on emissions tests. Booming China sales helped offset that damage. Seiji Sugiura, senior auto analyst at Tokai Tokyo Research Institute, said the results highlight the importance of the Chinese market, where few of VWs tainted diesel models are sold, and the popularity of VWs widespread brand portfolio. Volkswagen could stay at the top for the next few years, he said. Toyotas global sales last year were slightly better than in 2015, up 0.2 percent, but not good enough to beat Volkswagen, which has the Audi, Porsche and Skoda brands, and boosted its global sales 3.8 percent from the year before. GM makes the Cadillac and Opel cars. In 2015, Toyota sold 10.15 million vehicles while Volkswagen was second with 9.93 million and Detroit, Michigan-based GM third with 9.8 million. Sugiura said Toyota still is likely beating VW in terms of profitability. The Japanese automaker has focused on regional balance in production, lacks the range of brands that VW has, and is cautious about growth to avoid quality lapses. GM also is seeing strong growth in China, as are other automakers like Nissan Motor Co. and Hyundai Motor Co., Sugiura said. Toyotas vehicle sales in Japan grew in 2016, but the domestic market is relatively small compared to the U.S. and China. Toyota sales fell on-year in the U.S., but they rose in China. GM was the top-selling automaker for more than seven decades until Toyota, which makes the Camry sedan, Prius hybrid and Lexus luxury models, surpassed it in 2008. Toyota held the global auto crown for the past four years after falling behind GM in 2011, when production was hit by a quake and tsunami in northeastern Japan. Toyota officials have repeatedly said they are not concerned with being No. 1 and just want to make good cars. Volkswagen was keen to dethrone Toyota but disavowed that goal after CEO Martin Winterkorn lost his job over the emissions scandal. At Toyota, we are not focused on chasing volume. We believe that our sales volume is just the result of our focus on making ever-better cars and providing better customer experiences, Toyota said in a statement. Our goal is to be No. 1 with consumers by engineering and producing ever-better cars. We are grateful to every customer who has chosen a Toyota vehicle. The annual figures come as the industry faces an uncertain outlook year with President Trump threatening punitive tariffs on imports into the United States in a bid to force them to manufacture and hire there. Trump targeted Toyota in one his fiery tweets, criticising its ongoing project to build a new factory in Mexico and threatening it with painful tariffs. He has also pledged to review several trade deals that he says are detrimental to American workers. Japans Kyodo News agency reported Monday that Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda will meet Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday, ahead of the latters scheduled summit next week with Trump. Google has launched its own root Certificate Authority (CA), which will allow the company to issue digital certificates for its own products and not have to depend on third-party CAs in its quest to implement HTTPS across everything Google. Thus far, Google has been operating as its own subordinate CA (GIAG2) with security certificates issued by a third party. The company will continue the third-party relationship even while rolling out HTTPS across its products and services using its own root CA, said Ryan Hurst, a manager in Google's Security and Privacy Engineering group. Google Trust Services will operate the root CA for Google and its parent company, Alphabet. [ Expand your security career horizons with these essential certifications for smart security pros. | Discover how to secure your systems with InfoWorld's Security Report newsletter. ] It was only a matter of time, as the internet giant is likely tired of various authorities mistakenly issuing incorrect/invalid Google certificates. GlobalSign had a problem revoking certificates last fall that affected the availability of several web properties, and major browser makers led by Mozilla decided to revoke trust in WoSign/StartComm certificates for violations of industry practices. Symantec has been called out for repeatedly generating certificates it is not authorized to, then accidentally leaking them outside the company's test environment. Now, Google is able to issue verifiable Google certificates, freeing the company from the legacy certificate authority system. To kick off the move to an independent infrastructure, Google purchased two Root Certificate Authorities, GlobalSign R2 (GS Root R2) and R4 (GS Root R4). It takes a while to embed root certificates into products and for the associated versions to be broadly deployed, so buying existing root CAs helps Google begin independently issuing certificates sooner, Hurst said. Google Trust Services will operate six root certificates: GTS Root R1, GTS Root R2, GTS Root 3, GTS Root 4, GS Root R2, and GS Root R4. All GTS roots expire in 2036, while GS Root R2 expires in 2021 and GS Root R4 in 2038. Google will also be able to cross-sign its CAs, using GS Root R3 and GeoTrust, to ease potential timing issues while setting up the root CAs. "Google maintains a sample PEM file at (https://pki.goog/roots.pem) which is periodically updated to include the Google Trust Services owned and operated roots as well as other roots that may be necessary now, or in the future to communicate with and use Google Products and Services," Hurst said. Developers working on code designed to connect to Google web services or products should plan to include "at a minimum" the root certificates operated by Google as being trusted, but try to keep a "wide set of trustworthy roots," which include, but are not limited, to those offered through Google Trust Services, Hurst said. When it comes to working with certificates and TLS, there are certain best practices all developers should be following, such as strict transport security (HSTS), certificate pinning, using modern encryption cipher suites, secure cooking, and avoiding mixing insecure content. There's no reason why Google can't manage its own root CA, as it has the expertise, maturity, and resources to operate a top-level authority. Google is no stranger to the requirements of a trusted CA, having issued TLS certificates for Google domains over the years, and the company has been very involved in the CA/Browser Forum promoting the "highest level of security for the internet," said Doug Beattie, a vice president at the certificate authority GlobalSign. Google is "well educated in what it means to be a CA," he said. Google also launched Certificate Transparency, a public register of trusted certificates that can be audited and monitored. While CT originally let Google keep an eye on whether anyone was issuing fraudulent Google certificates, this also means anyone can keep an eye on what kind of certificates Google is issuing. Transparency goes both ways. That said, Google is becoming a root CA so that it can officially state which services and products are Google. Becoming root CA doesn't mean Google will issue certificates to non-Google parties. If it does, then it's worth going back to discuss whether Google is taking advantage of its massive control over internet infrastructure unfairly. Until then, all Google is doing is saying it is Google. Today would be a good day to remember that Steve Jobss biological father, Abdulfattah Jandali, grew up in Syria the country from which Donald Trumps executive order banned all refugees indefinitely on Friday. Make no mistake. That action, which included a 90-day ban on entry into the United States by nationals of seven Muslim-majority countries and a 120-day ban on all refugees globally, has dire implications for the tech industry, despite a court order Saturday that halted part of the ban. The most glaring immediate example: According to a report by Bloomberg News, Google CEO Sundar Pichai asked more than 100 employees traveling abroad to return to the United States. In an internal memo Pichai said: "Were upset about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US." Incredibly, the executive order was so poorly conceived that it was not known whether the ban applied to green card holders until Sunday, when Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly clarified that it did not. In the confusion, green card holders were detained at airports and families were separated. It appears that H-1B visa holders from the seven countries will not be admitted during the ban at all. The implications are wide-ranging and profound. Of the hundreds of technologists Ive met over the years, probably more than half are foreign-born. Some have told me they periodically consider returning to their country of origin, but time and again have been held back by the open culture and intense concentration of expertise in the Valley. If ugly, primitive xenophobia is the law of the land, how many brilliant minds will simply decide its time to leave? Think also of the impact on new talent. According to a 2015 analysis by Pew Research, over 50 percent of all doctorates in computer and information sciences at U.S. universities were earned by foreign students. How will foreign tech students of any religion or ethnicity feel about coming to America now? Particularly when the likes of Trump strategist Steve Bannon lament that there are too many Asian CEOs in Silicon Valley? Prospective foreign students may simply decide to get their education elsewhereand never consider following the immigration path so many took before them. Their contributions will be lost. No wonder the tech industry is speaking out. At this writing, in addition to Google, tech company executives from Microsoft, Apple, Facebook, Netflix, Salesforce, Twitter, Etsy, Airbnb, and others have spoken out against the executive order. Some have been more forceful than others. In a pair of tweets, Box CEO Aaron Levie was right on target: On every level moral, humanitarian, economic, logical, etc. this ban is wrong and is completely antithetical to the principles of America. Donating to the @ACLU today. We cannot let America turn into a closed off, fearful country. Were better than this. Theres a reason the United States has been the global leader in technology development instead of, say, Russia. A free and open society fosters the exchange of ideas and encourages entrepreneurship. Rational immigration laws and acceptance of cultural differences has enabled the diverse contributions on which the technology industry has been built. If those core tenets are swept aside, so too will be United States technology leadership. AFS opens Iowa innovation centre Applied Food Sciences (AFS) has opened an Innovation Center in Iowa City, Iowa. The Austin-based company is a natural ingredient supplier specialising in botanical extracts for food, beverages and supplements. Applied Food Sciences (AFS) has opened an Innovation Center in Iowa City, Iowa. The Austin-based company is a natural ingredient supplier specialising in botanical extracts for food, beverages and supplements. The newly opened Research and Development Center is a multi-million-dollar investment located at the University of Iowa BioVentures Center (BVC) featuring molecular biology labs, advanced analytical and materials research laboratories, and a pilot production plant. "AFS chose the BVC as our home for innovation for a number of reasons," said Chris Fields, VP of Scientific Affairs at Applied Food Sciences. "The University of Iowa is home to a strong work ethic, a high level of professionals, and culture of innovation in the areas of Biotechnology and Food Science. What makes us the most excited is the opportunity to collaborate with other innovative companies in the areas of food technology, then merge those lessons learned with our expertise in life sciences." One of the primary goals at the new Innovation Center is said to be to help foster the growth of plant-based science; how the evolution of food fits into the current and future food supply and how it can help to not only continue to feed the growing population, but also make it healthier, and more nutritionally sound. AFS says it believes having a great location in the Midwest United States moves them that much closer to both the farmers who feed the community and processors who utilise plants for added-value end products. "We are creating the ideal environment to foster collaborative teams with the mission of touching all aspects of how advances in food sciences can produce long term significance to the positive impact on health and wellness," said Loretta Zapp, CEO of AFS. "This new center is evidence of our commitment to our customers and the enhanced value we strive to bring to their products. AFS is excited about these additional resources that will add even more value to our current offerings that include supply chain sustainability, innovation, formulation and manufacturing support." Should Investors Sweat the 2022 Midterm Elections? Young & The Invested - 1 hour ago Election Day is right around the corner. And while there's plenty to be anxious about, Wall Street strategists say your portfolio shouldn't be one of them. Cotton Closes with another Triple Digit Gain Barchart - Fri Nov 4, 4:46PM CDT Front month cotton futures added triple digits to the climb on Friday. Dec cotton closed up by another 4.73%, for a weekly gain of 20.5%. The December to December spread is now an 8.56 cent premium for... CTZ22 : 86.93s (+4.73%) CTH23 : 85.67s (+4.26%) CTK23 : 84.63s (+3.21%) Cattle Markets Fade into Weekend Barchart - Fri Nov 4, 4:46PM CDT Live cattle futures ended the Friday session 10 to 50 weaker in the front months. For the week, Dec fats faded by $1.35. The weeks cash price was mostly near $150 in the South and mostly near $153 in... LEZ22 : 151.650s (-0.20%) LEG23 : 154.375s (-0.32%) LEJ23 : 158.000s (-0.19%) GFX22 : 177.825s (-0.10%) GFF23 : 179.625s (+0.11%) Mixed Close for Hog Futures Barchart - Fri Nov 4, 4:46PM CDT Hogs went into the weekend mixed but mostly lower with 15 to 40 cent losses in the nearbys and 5 to 20 cent gains in the deferred contracts. For the week, December hogs ended with a $13.13 loss, while... HEZ22 : 82.975s (-0.48%) HEJ23 : 92.400s (-0.16%) KMZ22 : 93.875s (-0.13%) Soy Futures Rally into Weekend Barchart - Fri Nov 4, 4:46PM CDT Soybean prices traded higher with 1.14% to 1.7% gains in the front months to go into the weekend in the black. Jan beans closed the week with 4.4% gains. Soy oil futures led the rally, closing the week... ZSX22 : 1451-4s (+1.73%) ZSPAUS.CM : 14.2554 (+1.92%) ZSF23 : 1462-2s (+1.76%) ZSH23 : 1469-0s (+1.73%) Wheat Futures Gain on Friday Barchart - Fri Nov 4, 4:46PM CDT Fridays wheat trade worked higher after a re-balancing from the Russia related run-up to start the week, and subsequent collapse on Wednesday. On net, December SRWs 7 1/4 cent gain into the weekend... ZWZ22 : 847-6s (+0.86%) ZWH23 : 866-6s (+0.81%) ZWPAES.CM : 7.7988 (+0.94%) KEZ22 : 953-2s (+1.27%) KEPAWS.CM : 9.1129 (+1.33%) MWZ22 : 954-4s (+1.22%) In the face of Trumps immigration order barring travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S., a slew of financial services executives moved to reassure employees BlackRock, Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan Chase have told employees that the firms will support them in the face of President Trumps executive order issued on Friday that temporarily bans people traveling from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. On Sunday night, Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs, left a voicemail message to Goldman staffers saying the firm does not support Trumps policy and pointing to challenges the executive order is already facing in federal court. The order applies to travelers entering the U.S. from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. It is seen as a nod from Trump to his supporters that he would honor promises made during the campaign to be tough on immigrants in an effort to stem terrorism threats. But the measure was met with immediate backlash from corporate CEOs. Blankfein said Trumps measure could disrupt the firms business and pledged his support to employees and their families who may be affected by the ban. Blankfein closed his message by reiterating Goldmans commitment to diversity and continued efforts to attract people from different backgrounds. Being diverse is not optional; its what we must be, he told employees. BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, President Robert Kapito and human resources chief Jeff Smith wrote to staff that the firm values its clients and employees in Muslim nations and has worked hard to create a diverse culture. Meanwhile, a spokesman for State Street Global Advisors said, As a global company, we strongly believe that diversity is a strength and inclusion a value that is important for all of our stakeholders. J.P. Morgan Chases operating committee, which includes CEO Jamie Dimon, also addressed the issue head on, sending a memo yesterday telling staff of its support and communicating that the bank had already reached out to all employees who are on sponsored visas. Like Goldman, J.P. Morgan emphasized that the diversity of its work force has strengthened the bank. Silicon Valleys top technology CEOs, including Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, have been outspoken in their criticism of Trumps immigration moves, which so far have only hit countries that have a majority of Muslims. Executives from the financial industry have not reacted as vehemently. Although money managers and banks may not have as many foreign-born employees as technology companies, the financial industry has become increasingly dependent on highly skilled and tech-savvy employees who are recruited from outside the U.S. But finance executives, who are inherently more conservative than their tech world counterparts, may just be taking their time. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Khalid Kazimov Trend: The total volume of oil products and crude oil loaded and unloaded at Iranian ports increased by six percent over the last month, year-on-year. According to the countrys Ports and Maritime Organization, 13.573 million tons of crude oil and oil products were loaded and unloaded at ports across Iran in January. In the mentioned period, the country unloaded about 2.36 million tons and loaded about 11.213 million tons of oil products and crude at its ports. A broker has called for more regulations for add-on insurance to help protect clients and the industry.As insurance becomes more widely distributed through a host of third parties, David Coe, managing director of Northwest Insurance, said that more needs to be done from a regulatory standpoint.I would like to see tighter regulations on car yards and the like, Coe told Insurance Business. Also, the banks offering products, particularly insurance products.We are getting a lot of people coming back to us from the banks that are very unhappy about the way that they have been treated.Coe called for regulation or audits into third-party insurance businesses to ensure that customers are being treated fairly.Last year, ASIC made it known that they were putting insurers on notice over the sale of add-on insurance through car dealers.A report released by the regulator found that consumers were being sold expensive products that had little benefit for consumers in a pressure-filled sales environment rife with high commissions.It was found that consumers paid $1.6 billion in premiums for add-on insurance, receiving only $144 million in successful insurance claims a payout of just 9%.There are serious problems in this market that need to be immediately and comprehensively addressed by insurers, ASIC deputy chair, Peter Kell , said at the time.The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) is set to make a draft determination on the commissions generated by the car dealership industry, related to add-on insurance, in the not too distant future with the insurance industry seeking a commissions cap. Professional services firm Deloitte has warned that Australia faces the threat of over 10 million cyber attacks in total a year.In a set of predictions for the coming year, Deloitte warned that cyber attacks, particularly Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, will become harder to mitigate and more frequent over the next 12 months.Historically, you needed to be a skilled programmer to launch a DDoS attack, Stuart Scotis, Deloitte consulting and TMT partner, said.However, in 2017, how to instructions and source code can be found online, which can only help to increase attacks. Adding to this is rising uplink speeds (wireless and fixed), which increase the speed and impact of such attacks.Last year, an attack on a domain name server saw global websites such as Netflix, Twitter and PayPal taken offline as part of a DDoS attack that utilised products connect to the Internet of Things (IoT).Deloitte expects that hackers will continue to target relatively weak products on the IoT as a way to launch malicious attacks.Earlier this week, Prime Minister Malcom Turnbull called cyber security the new frontier of warfare, after attending a meeting at the Australian Signals Directorate in Canberra.Turnbull called for more to be done to increase awareness around the threat of cyber attacks and the best ways to mitigate against the risk.We need to be aware of the threats and how to mitigate them and protect against them, he said.Awareness is absolutely the most important first step.As many cyber professionals note, brokers have a key role to play in developing awareness in their clients around cyber risk.Cyber security has dominated the headlines of 2017 thus far following attacks made by the Russian Government to sway the outcome of the US election.With so much press coverage, now is the time to reach out to clients on the issue and ensure they understand the reality of the threat that they face. A former unionist and Labour powerbroker has been accused of committing insurance fraud, in addition to corruption charges arising from the Royal Commission into Trade Union Governance and Corruption.Dave Hanna, former secretary of the Builders Labourers Federation and ex-president of the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union has been charged for dishonestly obtaining $4,250 from Youi Insurance in between November 28 and December 02 2015, AAP reported.According to The Australian, the charge was related to a fraudulent insurance claim for a family car.The 52-year old Hanna has also been charged of corruptly receiving $400,000 in free work from two executives of development giant Mirvac for the construction of his luxury suburban Brisbane home.Hanna and Mirvac ex-directors Adam Moore, 53, and Matthew McAllum, 41, are each facing seven corruption charges for either giving or receiving secret commissions in the form of construction work for Hannas Brisbane home between December 2012 and November 2013, the reports said.The construction work, which included electrics, bricklaying, plumbing, painting, interior design, and tiling, was allegedly done by Moore and McAllum to gain Hannas favour. He was said to have held substantial power and influence over union involvement in construction sites in the state, according to The Australian.The corruption charges were mentioned in the Brisbane Magistrates Court last week. The lawyers for the three defendants have indicated that Hanna, Moore, and McAllum will fight the charges. "I was a bit surprised by that," says expert As many as 1,300 new jobs could be up for grabs in the Northern Territory by 2020 thanks to the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).According to the National Disability Insurance Agencys (NDIA) Northern Territory Market Position Statement (MPS), a total workforce of between 2,150 and 2,700 is estimated at full scheme in three years, News.com.au reported.Along with the creation of new jobs, the Territory disability services market is also expected to double to $320 million.Christian Porter, minister for social services, said the significant growth in disability expenditure and increase in localised service delivery will bring significant economic opportunities in NT.What this will look like is more than twice as many jobs and a big injection of dollars into the local market, he told the publication.Most importantly, an additional 3,345 people with permanent and significant disability in the Northern Territory will receive funded supports an increase of 103%, the second largest expected percentage increase of all states and territories nationally.This will drive increased demand for quality services, new products and technologies, increased jobs, and strong economic growth right across the territory.Porter said local markets in NT were already expanding and diversifying to meet the schemes participant demand. RSG Underwriting Managers (RSGUM) has agreed to acquire the total assets and operations of Interstate Insurance Management Inc. (Interstate). Interstate was represented in the transaction by Marsh, Berry & Company Inc. Terms of the agreement were not released. Interstate is a transportation managing general agent founded in 1970 and led by President and CEO Jack Buchan. Headquartered in Johnstown, Penn., it serves the greater mid-Atlantic region and maintains underwriting authority with multiple transportation markets. In addition to transportation coverages, Interstate underwrites specialty property and casualty coverages through its regional retail distribution network. The acquisition is expected to help Interstate expand its geographic presence and product set while giving its employees an opportunity for continued growth, according to Buchan in a press release issued by Ryan Specialty Group. Ryan Specialty Group LLC is an international holding company consisting of a wholesale broker, R-T Specialty LLC, a series of underwriting managers, RSG Underwriting Managers LLC, and an insurance service provider, Ryan Direct Group Limited. Each services a client base of brokers, agents and insurance carriers. RSGUM is the managing general underwriting division of RSG and consists of a series of specialty property and casualty managing general underwriters. It provides centralized governance, shared services and executive oversight to its specialty underwriting businesses. Source: Ryan Specialty Group LLC Topics Mergers & Acquisitions Excess Surplus Underwriting Insurance Wholesale Pennsylvania Human Resources A group of South Dakota lawmakers has introduced a bill that would require certain information from the state-subsidized insurance company tax credit program for scholarships be made public. The tax credit scholarship program passed through the Legislature last year and has so far received $325,000 from insurance companies for students attending private schools. Those companies in turn get substantial tax credits. Nothing in the original bill forces program leaders to share which companies are receiving tax credits, or how much money schools are getting. Some of the information has been shared on the programs website, and several insurance companies announced their involvement, but the proposed bill would require that information. The bills primary sponsor, Republican Rep. Herman Otten of Lennox, says the program should be more open because it uses taxpayer funds. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Carriers An Indiana doctor accused of operating a pill mill saw as many as 100 patients in a single day and traded pain pills for work on his farm, federal investigators say. Dr. Tristan Stonger faces 55 felony charges stemming from a three-year investigation by the Drug Enforcement Agency, which spent months surveilling his Pain Management Centers of Indiana office in Peru, The Kokomo Tribune reported. He also operated offices in Bloomington and Indianapolis. The charges Stonger faces include dealing in a controlled substance, possession of a narcotic drug, corrupt business influence and insurance and Medicaid fraud. Greg Westfall, a DEA assistant special agent in charge, said Stonger faces serious charges, considering the crisis we have throughout the U.S. with our epidemic of opiate-based drugs. We charge those who exploit the weakness of addiction and bring those people to justice, Westfall said. The investigation revealed the Peru clinic was open only on Fridays, when more than 100 patients would sometimes visit the office, a probable cause affidavit said. Investigators determined Stonger spent only two to five minutes with each patient and did not perform any physical exams before writing them prescriptions, the affidavit said. At least two patients told investigators they were employed by Stronger at his farm near Bunker Hill, where they worked on his vehicles or fed animals in exchange for pills. On one occasion, one of the workers reported he was baling hay when Stonger said Ill bet you a bottle of hydro that you cant get that bale up there. The worker told investigators he then loaded the hay and Stonger gave him a bottle of the prescription opiate painkiller hydrocodone that he had at his house. Another worker said Stonger wrote him a prescription while he was at the farm even though Stonger knew he was addicted to pills. Agents identified two patients who died from overdoses after Stonger refilled their prescriptions, the newspaper reported. On Jan. 27, Stonger was being held in the Miami County Jail on $300,000 bond. Stonger also is awaiting trial after initially being arrested in April in Marion County on charges he traded prescription pills for sex with one of his female patients. His physicians license to practice medicine in Indiana was suspended days later. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Indiana Drugs A divided Iowa Supreme Court on Jan. 27 upheld a legal doctrine going back 100 years that protects agriculture drainage districts against lawsuits. The ruling presents an obstacle for the Des Moines Water Works, which is pursuing a lawsuit in federal court in Sioux City filed in March 2015. The water utility for 500,000 Iowans alleges the three counties that oversee 10 agricultural drainage districts should be required to obtain federal water pollution discharge permits and pay the utility the more than $1.4 million it has spent to remove nitrates from the water supply. The decades-old rules that govern drainage systems first established in Article 1 of the Iowa Constitution and updated periodically by the Legislature have largely been untouchable in the agriculture-heavy state. But attorneys for the utility say agriculture has changed dramatically in the last 100 years and that the health implications of farm chemicals in water are clearer, justifying a fresh look by the courts. The majority concluded that changes in environmental laws have not undermined the basis for the drainage districts immunity, because the districts have limited purposes for existing and limited governmental power. While attitudes toward the environment may differ today from when the first drainage tiles were placed generations ago, tort claims based on alleged pollution are nothing new, the court said. The court said Iowa law immunizes farmers who comply with fertilizer label instructions from liability for nitrate contamination, including money damage claims or cleanup costs. We defer to the legislature whether to reassess that policy choice. The court concluded that the cost of removing nitrate from the water is about one cent per day for Des Moines customers and it is up to lawmakers to decide whether the costs should be shifted back to the farmers. The opinion is written by Thomas Waterman and fully supported by Edward Mansfield and Bruce Zager. Chief Justice Mark Cady and Brent Appel said they believe Water Works likely has some avenues to pursue action against the drainage districts. Appel said in a dissenting opinion that the lawsuit should be allowed to proceed and Water Works should be able to sue at least for compensation for the cost of cleaning up the water. Cady agreed. One of the fundamental principles of law is for remedies to be available when we discover wrongs. Pollution of our streams is a wrong, irrespective of its source or its cause, he said. Justices David Wiggins and Daryl Hecht did not participate in the opinion. U.S. District Judge Mark Bennett, who initially oversaw the case, decided to ask the Supreme Court to clarify the issue of immunity for drainage districts concluding the novel legal issues presented in the case havent been directly addressed by Iowas highest court or federal courts. The case returns to federal court for further proceedings. If the judge dismisses the state claims based on the courts opinion Water Works still has federal claims to pursue which include seeking to have the districts obtain federal water pollution permits. The ruling is a victory for farmers because it means the court holds that they cannot be held financially responsible for pollution they may send downstream. By adhering to the law the court helped avoid potential catastrophe for Iowas farm economy, said Mike Reck, an attorney for the drainage districts. Water Works officials and their attorneys had no immediate comment. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Agribusiness Pollution Iowa Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren on Friday accused the U.S. Labor Department of dismantling a website designed to help Wells Fargo workers file whistleblower retaliation and other complaints against the bank, and asked the department to reinstate it. In her letter to Acting Labor Secretary Edward Hugler, Warren said she noticed on Tuesday that the site (www.dol.gov/wellsfargo) was gone and contained the words Page Not Found. Labor Department spokesman Steve Barr told Reuters the site was removed on January 9, but did not comment further on the reasons why it was taken down. Former Labor Department Secretary Thomas Perez created the special website last September, shortly after Wells Fargo was ordered to pay $190 million in fines and customer restitution after its high-pressure sales environment led to the opening of as many as two million accounts that customers may not have authorized. Some of the banks employees filed whistleblower complaints with the Labor Departments Occupational Safety and Health Administration, saying they had been fired for reporting the gaming of sales quotas by Wells Fargo, while others complained that they were forced to work late. Taking down this website enables Wells Fargo to escape full responsibility for its fraudulent actions and the department to shirk its outstanding obligations to American workers, wrote Warren, who is a member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, which oversees the Labor Department. When he launched the site, Perez pledged to Warren he would conduct a top-to-bottom review of all the Wells Fargo complaints the department had received to see how they were handled. The website also offered assistance on issues including proper pay for employees and workplace discrimination. Reuters has reported on issues with some of the whistleblower cases, including one involving a former Wells Fargo employee who waited nearly five years to be interviewed after telling OSHA she was fired for reporting the gaming. On Friday, Warren also asked for an update on the Labor Departments review. The findings have not been made public, but a person familiar with the review said that OSHAs San Francisco office, which handled the bulk of the Wells Fargo complaints, faced a particularly high caseload-to-staff ratio. The review also found that OSHA does not have an effective case management system to track what is going on in the field, the person added. Labor spokesman Barr declined to comment on that part of the letter, saying he cannot discuss ongoing investigations. Warrens concerns could resurface on Feb. 7, when fast-food executive Andrew Puzder is expected to appear for his confirmation hearing to become the next labor secretary. Puzder is already facing a backlash by some of his own workers at CKE Restaurants, who allege they are victims of wage theft. (Reporting by Sarah N. Lynch; editing by Leslie Adler, G Crosse and Chizu Nomiyama) Topics Workers' Compensation Training Development Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Khalid Kazimov Trend: Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has called for constructive interaction with the world. We are neither xenophiles nor xenophobic. We are Muslims and Iranians and we will use constructive interaction with the world in favor of our people and national interest, IRNA news agency quoted him as saying on Jan. 30. Rouhani made the remarks on the occasion of the 38th anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution at the mausoleum of Iranian revolutions late leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. President Rouhani further elaborated on the goals of the Islamic Revolution and urged the country to follow up on its aspirations. Three days before the inauguration of President Donald Trump last week, a panel of experts on insurance regulation predicted that state and federal regulators of the financial services sector would refocus their efforts in the year ahead. Changes at the state level, within state insurance departments, will not a direct result of the new administration coming into power in Washington; instead, they will be spearheaded by one of the panelists, Ted Nickel, Wisconsin commissioner of insurance and president of the National Association Insurance Commissioners, who promised to open a path to innovation in the insurance industry that might otherwise be blocked by existing rules and unyielding regulators. My concern is that the innovation side is going to run smack dab into the wall of the regulatory framework, he said, during a session of the Property/Casualty Insurance Joint Industry Forum last week. Nickel vowed to educate roughly a dozen new commissioners who are coming on board about the ideas that insurers are bring to his office about data and analytics and emerging technologies, and to work to convince incumbent commissioners to ease up on their by-the-book stances on these ideas. Nickels remarks came after Panel Moderator Chuck Chamness, president and chief executive officer of the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies, teed up a question about technologies and disrupters likely to impact the P/C insurance industry. While technologies like driverless cars and insurtech disrupters were a hot topic at the forum, impending disruption from the Trump administration was the more popular talking point of the day. And on that score, Nickel and others welcomed possible changes to DoddFrank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, particularly those that might weaken the power of the Financial Stability Oversight Council to designate insurers as systemically important. Tech Future As for technological disruption, Ian Adams, a senior fellow from the R Street Institute, a free market think tank, singled out autonomous vehicles as the technology most likely to impact the P/C insurance industry in the next two-to-four years, basing his assessment on information he took in at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January. I do get the sense that these vehicles will start to appear on the timeline that a number of these companies are talking about2020, 2021, he said, distinguishing fully autonomous vehicles (no driver, no steering wheel) from the sophisticated systems that already on vehicles today, including stability control and lane-keeping assist features. For the insurance industry, there are going to be some fairly major impacts, particularly when it comes to underwriting and understanding what will need to be taken into account moving forward, Adams warned. He noted, for example, that carriers writing auto insurance policies in California today are required to take a drivers experience, first and foremost, into account. With an autonomous vehicle, that might not be the best indicator of the risk of operating that vehicle. Thats something thats going to need to be reexamined, he said. Adams also said questions about data sharing between original equipment manufacturers and insurers are starting to emerge. Auto manufacturers have their own standards, [and] the insurance industry is going to have to come into dialogue with them sooner rather than later, he said, noting that the NAIC and the National Conference of Insurance Legislators are already thinking about data-sharing rules. Nickel reported that the NAIC established a big data working group under its market regulation committee last year but the plan is to move it to a new innovation and technology committee. We want to move it away from stigma of it being a market regulationthen people get the wrong ideaand move it to an area where we can embrace a lot of the change going on thats occurring out there, he said. So many [insurance] companies are trying to leverage and harness big data, using analytics to improve the customer experience. And thats great. They should, he said, noting, however, that education is required to help regulators move forward with insurers as well. One of my goals for 2017 is to really dial it in and dig down, continuing to spend more time on big data and the analytics and the innovation area in terms of getting my fellow regulators comfortable with whats going on out there. You can come to my department and talk to me. I get what you all are trying to do, and we have good conversations. There are others that are just reflexively concerned, maybe just because of lack of knowledge. Nickel said hes also committed to prodding existing commissioners to be a little bit more flexible on the existing regulatory framework. So much of what is going on right now does not fit nicely in our traditional regulatory framework, our toolbox. And thats what also makes regulators cringe a little bit. It makes it much easier to say no to great ideas. Well, we cant do that because it says right here. Nickel continued: My concern is that theres not going to be ultimately as much development and innovation [in insurance] as there could be if we had a regulatory frameworkand regulatorswho were more comfortable with understanding the change that is going on. There are so many great things going on out there. But its got to start at the regulatory level to catch up with what many of you and your companies here in the audience here are doing, he told insurance executives. P/C Surveys Insurance executives taking part in some recent industry surveys seem to agree with the commissioner that regulators are blocking their path to innovation. Forty-two percent of 200 senior insurance executives participating in a 2016 survey by Willis Towers Watson and Mergermarkets cited the complex regulatory requirements as the most important barrier to digital adoption in the insurance sector to date. (Related CM article here. Report titled, New horizons: How diverse growth strategies can advance digitalization in the insurance industry.) A survey of 41 CEOs of large insurance companies conducted by KPMG in November revealed as these CEO seek to transform their businesses, the main obstacle they see in their way is cyber risk (52 percent), but regulatory risk followed close behind (46 percent). KPMGs report on the survey titled, Embrace Change in Changing Times: 2016 insurance CEO outlook, also notes that 93 percent of insurers (P/C and life) say they worry that regulations will inhibit their growth; 90 percent indicated that innovation is on their personal agenda, and 66 percent believe that it is very important to foster a culture of innovation. Executives speaking at a later session of the III P/C forum said while they welcome the forthcoming flexibility that Nickel spoke about, they believe internal issues for individual companies are bigger hurdles on the path to innovation. Sclafane is senior editor of Carrier Management, the magazine and website for property/casualty C-suite executives. This article was originally published on CarrierManagement.com. Topics Carriers Legislation InsurTech Tech Property Casualty Market In celebration of Black History Month, which begins Feb. 1, Allstate Insurance Co. is launching its annual digital, social and radio campaign, Worth Telling. We are celebrating Black History Month by sharing inspirational stories of African-American pioneers who are impacting communities across the country today, said Georgina Flores, vice president, Product Marketing, Allstate. This year the campaign spotlights three African Americans with ties to Mobile, Alabama, Philadelphia and New Orleans. Allstate reports that these individuals are creating career opportunities for the underserved through barbering, raising awareness about diversity and representation through comics, and providing tools that support the advancement of African Americans through entrepreneurial opportunities. Through a series of documentary-style videos and supporting content, Allstate will share these individuals stories at Allstate.com/WorthTelling and on the companys official YouTube, Instagram and Facebook channels using the hashtag, #WorthTelling. The campaign will also run online and on national radio throughout the month of February. In addition, Allstate said it will host events in Mobile, Philadelphia and New Orleans that highlight the individuals in the Worth Telling campaign. The 2017 Allstate Worth Telling campaign will feature: Isaac White, Sr. Founder of Whites Barber College (Mobile, Alabama) Teaching a community how to stay a cut above is #WorthTelling. Teaching a community how to stay a cut above is #WorthTelling. Isaac White is a pillar in Mobile. He began his career as a barber in the 1940s and opened Whites Barber College in 1960, which offers barbering courses tuition-free to students who complete the work necessary for a barbers license and secure a job by the end of the program. To many, the college has been a lifeline, and to others, a staple in the Mobile community. White is a hometown legend, and at 97 years of age, his smile remains undimmed. Ariell Johnson Owner, Amalgam Comics & Coffeehouse (Philadelphia) Breaking through on diversity and inclusion is #WorthTelling. Breaking through on diversity and inclusion is #WorthTelling. Johnson opened Amalgam Comics & Coffeehouse as a way to promote diversity and inclusion within the comic book industry. Understanding the significance of African Americans seeing characters that look like themselves depicted as the hero or heroine of a story, she hoped that her shop could help promote the importance of representation in fictional stories. After opening the cafe in December 2015, and becoming a vocal advocate for diversity in the comic book community, Johnsons likeness appeared on the illustrated cover of MARVELs Invincible Iron Man #1. Aaron Walker Founder and CEO of Camelback Ventures (New Orleans) Using ingenuity to improve the collective reality is #WorthTelling. Using ingenuity to improve the collective reality is #WorthTelling. Walker founded Camelback Ventures to address the inequities of education and social innovation by providing coaching, capital and connections to people of color and women entrepreneurs through a six-month fellowship. Camelback Ventures was built on the notion that genius is equally distributed across communities, but access to funding and start-up mentoring is often limited in communities with people of color. Camelback Ventures has worked with more than 20 early-stage entrepreneurs to give them access to the tools they need to be successful. Source: Allstate J.M. Wilson has added Adam Bolinger to its North Charleston, S.C. office. As a transportation underwriter, Bolinger is responsible for quoting new and renewal transportation risks, and serving independent insurance agents in Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. Bolinger is currently attending Indiana University to pursue a Bachelor of Business Administration. Prior to J.M. Wilson, he worked at Baldwin & Lyons as an underwriting rater and underwriting analyst. Bolinger is also a licensed property & casualty producer in the state of Indiana. J.M. Wilson is a managing general agency and surplus lines broker providing independent insurance agents access to specialty markets for both personal and commercial lines. With branch and affiliate offices in eight states, J.M. Wilson covers standard and hard-to-place commercial, transportation, property & casualty, brokerage, professional liability and errors and omissions, personal lines and surety classes in thirty-one states. Topics Underwriting South Carolina President Donald Trump has declared a major disaster exists in Oregon from a severe winter storm and flooding in December. The White House says Trump ordered federal aid to supplement state, tribal, and local recovery efforts. The White House said the federal funding is available on a cost-sharing basis for emergency work and the repair or replacement of facilities damaged by the severe winter storm and flooding that hit Josephine and Lane counties Dec. 14-17. Oregon Office of Emergency Management Director Andrew Phelps said in a statement Friday the disaster declaration will provide much-needed financial assistance to the two counties. Gov. Kate Brown had requested the Presidential Disaster Declaration. The storm caused more than $16 million in damage, including to hundreds of miles of publicly owned power lines Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Windstorm Oregon (Bloomberg) -- There was chatter for months within the tight-knit network of Silicon Valley self-driving whizzes: Where was one of their industrys most-prominent players going to land? The world found out last week when Tesla Motors Inc. sued Sterling Anderson, the former director of its Autopilot program. The electric-car maker alleged Anderson started working months ago with Chris Urmson, the former head of Googles self-driving car program. The legal fight involving autonomous-driving hot shots is the latest to show how the war for talent in Silicon Valley is heating up, as tech and auto companies alike compete for skilled engineers. Autonomous-vehicle startups are emerging at a frenetic pace after General Motors Co. and Uber Technologies Inc. valued upstarts -- each with just a few dozen employees -- as worth hundreds of millions of dollars in separate acquisitions last year. All of the sudden, people realize that self-driving cars are becoming a reality, said Sebastian Thrun, who founded Googles self-driving car project and researches robotics and artificial intelligence as a professor at Stanford University. Every CEO of an automaker has made autonomous cars a priority, and 2016 was the year when people of influence woke up to the potential of this. Urmson led whats now known as Alphabet Inc.s Waymo starting in 2009 and oversaw about 1.8 million miles of driving before leaving in August. Anderson managed Autopilots hardware and software teams and helped steer Tesla through a regulatory probe involving a driver who died in a Model S sedan using the system last year. Anderson left Tesla in December. Teslas Complaint Teslas lawsuit against Anderson, filed in a California state court, revealed that Urmson and Anderson started a competing venture called Aurora Innovation LLC. The lawsuit alleges Anderson attempted to poach colleagues from Tesla and violated his contract, speaking to the threat more established companies face when executives with experience leading teams in a highly competitive field want to move on. Aurora called the Tesla suit meritless and a malicious attempt to stifle a competitor in a statement last week. This is the most impactful large-scale deployment of advanced technology in the past 100 years, said Karl Brauer, an analyst at Kelley Blue Book. To get it right will require an unprecedented degree of collaboration across high-tech disciplines, meaning the company with the largest brain trust has the greatest advantage. Teslas lawsuit follows Ubers acquisition in August of Otto, a self-driving truck startup that had been founded seven months earlier, in a deal worth as much as $680 million. General Motors Co. in March announced plans to buy Cruise Automation and later disclosed paying about $581 million at closing. The total cost of the deal would be more over time, Detroit-based GM said in July. By October, Kyle Vogt, Cruises founder, paid more than $21 million for what the San Francisco Business Times said at the time was the most expensive home sale in the city year to date. Get Rich Quick In their zeal to play catch-up, traditional automakers have created a get-rich-quick environment, Tesla said in its lawsuit against Anderson. Small teams of programmers with little more than demoware have been bought for as much as $1 billion, the company said, referring to GMs purchase of Cruise and reports of the deals total value. Engineers have plenty options for employment within the burgeoning field of autonomous driving. In California, 21 companies have been issued autonomous-vehicle testing permits from the states department of motor vehicles. The ranks include established automakers Ford Motor Co. and BMW AG; suppliers Robert Bosch GmbH and Delphi Automotive Plc; and lesser-known startups including Zoox Inc., AutoX Technologies Inc. and Drive.ai Inc. Inevitable Fights Google last month filed suit against a former software engineer, alleging the employee breached contract obligations related to the possession and use of confidential information. The ex-employee, Leonid Shamis, reportedly joined Drive.ai in November. Personnel moves within the self-driving space are fast and frequent. Andrew Gray, an early member of Teslas Autopilot team, joined Cruise Automation in September 2015, according to his LinkedIn profile. After GM said it would acquire Cruise, Gray left for Otto, a startup founded by former Google employees, which was then bought by Uber. Grays journey spanning these companies transpired over the course of little more than a year. Many of the companies involved in automated driving are motivated by an intense combination of hope, greed and fear, said Bryant Walker Smith, a law professor at the University of South Carolina whos written about driverless car liability. The tremendous competition for individuals and ideas was inevitably going to reach a courtroom, particularly given all the overlapping and conflicting interests in this field. (Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trumps clash with Silicon Valley over immigration is about to become even more contentious. After the new president banned refugees and travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries, Google, Facebook, Salesforce, Microsoft and others railed against the move, saying it violated the countrys principles and risked disrupting its engine of innovation. Trumps next steps could strike even closer to home: His administration has drafted an executive order aimed at overhauling the work-visa programs technology companies depend on to hire tens of thousands of employees each year. If implemented, the reforms could shift the way American companies like Microsoft Corp., Amazon.com Inc. and Apple Inc. recruit talent and force wholesale changes at Indian companies such as Infosys Ltd. and Wipro Ltd. Businesses would have to try to hire American first and if they recruit foreign workers, priority would be given to the most highly paid. Our countrys immigration policies should be designed and implemented to serve, first and foremost, the U.S. national interest, the draft proposal reads, according to a copy reviewed by Bloomberg. Visa programs for foreign workers should be administered in a manner that protects the civil rights of American workers and current lawful residents, and that prioritizes the protection of American workers -- our forgotten working people -- and the jobs they hold. The foreign work visas were originally established to help U.S. companies recruit from abroad when they couldnt find qualified local workers. In many cases, the companies are hiring for highly technical positions in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM. But in recent years, there have been allegations the programs have been abused to bring in cheaper workers from overseas to fill jobs that otherwise may go to Americans. The top recipients of the H-1B visas are outsourcers, primarily from India, who run the technology departments of large corporations with largely imported staff. Immigrant STEM workers have contributed an outsize share to founding new companies, getting patents, and helping build up American companies, which in turn because of their success have created tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of jobs, said Gary Burtless, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who does research in labor markets. Discouraging such people to apply for visas to enter the United States to work -- I cant imagine how that can be considered to be in the American national interest. The Trump administration did not respond to a request for comment on the draft. The proposal is consistent with the presidents public comments on pushing companies to add more jobs to the U.S., from auto manufacturing to technology. Its not clear how much force the executive order would have if it is signed by the president. Congress is also working on visa reforms and the parties will have to cooperate to pass new laws. Zoe Lofgren, a Democratic congresswoman from California, introduced a bill last week to tighten requirements for the H-1B work visa program. My legislation refocuses the H-1B program to its original intent to seek out and find the best and brightest from around the world, and to supplement the U.S. workforce with talented, highly-paid, and highly-skilled workers, Lofgren said in a statement. Indias technology companies, led by Tata Consultancy Services Ltd, Infosys and Wipro, have argued they are helping corporations become more competitive by handling their technology operations with specialized staff. They also contend the visa programs allow them to keep jobs in the U.S. and that if they have to pay more for staff, they will handle more of the work remotely from less expensive markets like India. Inspections and investigations in the past have shown no cases of wrongdoing by Indian IT services companies, which have always been fully compliant with the law, said R Chandrashekhar, president of Nasscom, the trade group for Indias information technology sector. The industry is open to any kind of checks in the system, but they should not cause any hindrance to the smooth operation of companies. Wipro and TCS declined to comment for this story. A spokeswoman for Infosys said the company is monitoring the U.S. visa proposals, but it is too early to assess their impact given the uncertainty of what will be approved. We continue to hire and invest locally, the company said in an e-mail. However, given the skill shortages in the U.S. and the availability of technically skilled workforce in various global markets, we also rely upon visa programs to supplement these skills. For the long term, we are also exploring new operating models to ensure business continuity as we navigate this dynamic environment. This includes reducing our visa dependency and efforts towards making Infosys a preferred employer in the U.S. The draft of Trumps executive order covers an alphabet soup of visa programs, including H-1B, L-1, E-2 and B1. The first is a popular program with technology companies and is aimed at allowing them to bring in high-skill workers when they cant find local hires with the appropriate skills. The legislation caps the number of people who can enter the U.S. annually at 85,000, including those with undergrad and masters degrees. In recent years though, outsourcing companies have received the most H-1B visas, while other tech companies have struggled to get all they want. In 2014, the most recent year for which data is available, the top five recipients were all outsourcing companies, led by Tata Consultancy. Ron Hira, an associate professor at Howard University, who has done extensive research on the subject, points out workers at outsourcers are typically not treated as well as others. The median wage at outsourcing firms for H-1B workers was less than $70,000, while Apple, Google and Microsoft paid their employees in the program more than $100,000, according to data he collected. That suggests the American companies are going after true, highly skilled employees, while the outsourcers are recruiting less expensive talent, he said. The proposed Trump order is also aimed at bringing more transparency to the program. It calls for publishing reports with basic statistics on who uses the immigration programs within one month of the end of the governments fiscal year. The Obama administration had scaled back the information available on the programs and required Freedom of Information Act requests for some data. Whatever specific changes are implemented, they are likely to add to the expenses for Indias technology companies. That may accelerate a shift to new kinds of services, such as cloud computing and artificial intelligence, said Raja Lahiri, partner at the Mumbai-based partner at consultancy Grant Thornton India The visa challenges are not going to go away easily, he said. They will continue to be a challenge for Indian IT companies. Jeremy D. Morley concentrates on International Family Law. The firm works with clients around the world from its New York office, with a global network of local counsel. Mr Morley is the author of "International Family Law Practice", the leading treatise on international family law in the U.S., and "The Hague Abduction Convention", published by the American Bar Association. He is a Fellow of the International Academy of Family Lawyers and a former law professor. Top News - Investor Idea A Boat-full of Potential - Renewed Interest in the Cruise Industry Bolsters Luxury Markets (OTC: MASN) (NYSE: CCL) (NYSE: CUK) (NYSE: RCL) (NYSE: NCLH) Vancouver, Kelowna, Delta, BC - November 2, 2022 (Investorideas.com Newswire) Investorideas.com, a leading investor news resource covering luxury goods and cruise ship stocks releases a special report featuring Maison Luxe, Inc. (OTC: MASN), a company that offers luxury retail consumer items. Top AI Stock News - Investor Idea Breaking AI Stock News: GBT's (OTCPK: GTCH) AI Driven Financial Technology Patent Application Received a Notice of Publication San Diego, CA - November 3, 2022 (Investorideas.com Newswire) GBT Technologies Inc. (OTC PINK: GTCH) received a notice of publication for its financial software patent application. Top AI Stock News - Investor Idea Breaking AI Stock News: Intellagents, a FatBrain AI (OTCQB: LZGI) Company, Announces Hiring of Insurtech Industry Veteran as Chief Revenue Officer NEW YORK, NY - November 2, 2022 (Investorideas.com Newswire) FatBrain AI (LZG International, Inc.) (OTCQB: LZGI), the leader in powerful and easy-to-use artificial intelligence (AI) solutions for star enterprises of tomorrow, announces the hiring of Euan King, an experienced and respected Insurtech industry leader as Chief Revenue Officer for insurance technology-focused subsidiary Intellagents. Top Health and Wellness News - Investor Idea Health and Wellness Stock News - Endexx (OTCBB: EDXC) Secures $3.8M Order for Non-Nicotine Vape Product HYLA from Italy CAVE CREEK, Az. - November 2, 2022 (Investorideas.com Newswire) Endexx Corporation (OTCBB:EDXC), a provider of innovative, plant-based, and sustainable health and skincare products, today announces it has secured a new $3.8 million USD order for its newly acquired, non-nicotine based vape product, HYLA from customers in Italy. Check out our Podcasts for great investor ideas: Get new posts by email: Subscribe Powered by Investorideas.com Newswire: Subscribe to Investor Ideas Newswire The Center for the Development and Application of Internet of things Technologies (CDAIT) at Georgia Tech recently announced that it has continued to expand in membership and impact. Since launching in 2014, CDAIT has grown from three founding members to eighteen, including the following companies from the United States, Asia, Australia and Europe: AIG Amazon AT&T Brambles Cisco Comcast Corning Flex Global Payments IBM Infor Landis+Gyr Merial (Boehringer Ingelheim) Samsung Stanley Black & Decker Verizon VMware Airwatch Wipro The center, dedicated to Internet of Things (IoT) interdisciplinary research, education and industry outreach, has also grown in influence. A paper released on January 12 by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) at the U.S. Department of Commerce, titled Fostering the Advancement of the Internet of Things, included input from Alain Louchez, managing director , CDAIT. Reviewing the nature of IoT, the study quoted Louchez, who said, Of all the many facets of the Internet of Things as it is understood today, the one single groundbreaking element is not the connectivity [but] the smartness of things. Also announced in January, CDAIT was named one of the best IoT blogs/websites by the Internet of More Things. CDAIT was commended for providing informative analysis. In addition to corporate members, CDAIT has reached out to non-for-profit IoT-focused organizations and signed two memoranda of understanding (MoU). The first one was with the International Telecommunication Union, a specialized agency of the United Nations. The second MoU was with the Centre of Excellence for Internet of Things of Indias National Association of Software and Services Companies. As CDAITs influence grows globally, Louchez has been invited to join the distinguished international panel of judges for the IoT Global Network Awards 2017. These are small steps, but they are important steps, Louchez said. These recognitions show that we are having an impact and the world is beginning to take notice. Georgia Tech is a resource for all seeking to innovate in the Internet of Things space, and thanks to the forward-looking and forward-thinking companies and individuals who have joined us, we are having influence on how the Internet of Things will take shape. Housed at the Georgia Institute of Technology in the Georgia Tech Research Institute, CDAIT (pronounced sedate) is a global, non-profit, partner-funded center located in Atlanta, Georgia, United States, that fosters interdisciplinary research and education while driving general awareness about the Internet of Things. It aims at efficiently identifying, understanding and solving for its sponsors challenges and problems that may arise along the whole IoT value chain. CDAIT bridges sponsors with Georgia Tech faculty and researchers as well as industry members with similar interests. Edited by Stefania Viscusi Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Khalid Kazimov Trend: Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has hailed expansion of ties with Russia. Zarif said that expansion of ties between the two countries plays a significant factor in protecting security in Central Asia and the Middle East, ISNA news agency reported. He made the remarks through a message addressing a conference marking 515 years of ties between Iran and Russia. His message was read out at the conference. According to the foreign minister, the ties between the two countries also contribute to the development of the regional countries. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Khalid Kazimov Trend: French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault is scheduled to confer Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani in Tehran during his upcoming visit to the Islamic Republic. Ayrault will arrive in Tehran on Jan. 31 to discuss political and security issues in international and regional levels with the Iranian officials, ILNA news agency reported. The issues of implementation of Irans nuclear deal, Syrian developments, terrorism as well as economic cooperation are among the main topics expected to be discussed during the French ministers upcoming visit to Tehran. Ayrault, chairing a high-ranking political and economic delegation is expected to arrive in Tehran on Tuesday afternoon. A Cork mother who sadly lost her son an hour after he was born has called for anomaly scans to be made available to all expectant parents. Diane Magee from Tower, Co Cork shared her tragic story in hope that other parents could avoid a similar experience. Her son, Christopher, was born a year and three months ago when she was 32 weeks pregnant. He was born with his bowels outside his body, extra fingers, and a nose that was a little out of place. Diane did not receive an anomaly scan, which is offered to private patients at 20 weeks and checks that the baby is developing normally. She was unaware of any issues with her preganancy before Christopher's birth. Diane contacted her doctor when she "didn't feel happy with the kicks" she was feeling. Hours after attending Cork University Maternity Hospital, she delivered baby Christopher, who was born with a number of serious health issues. "We found out months afterwards with the post mortem that he had a foetal abnormality," she told Neil Prendeville on Cork's RedFM. Christopher lived for over an hour, enough time for Diane to recover consciousness and meet her son. "He hung on to meet his mummy. I was asleep for the first half an hour for Christopher's life and he lived for just over an hour. My husband had him in his arms and he had the awful ordeal of telling me when I woke up that I had a beautiful baby boy, but he wasn't going to live long. "It was a shock, and there, that's where my story starts." Diane described the conflicting emotions both she, her husband, and their extended families felt following Christopher's short life. "He brought us so much happiness. We had him for four or five days afterwards, we had a funeral for him and he filled the North Cathedral and the bishop came. We made a really good positive experience out of it and treasured every moment of him. "We think about him all the time, but to be honest I'm selfish. I wish he was here now but he would have been a very sick child and no mum would want that for their child. He's in no pain where he is." Diane is determined to alert more parents about the risks of not getting an anomaly scan - which she had never heard of before Christopher was born. "I should have done more, I should have asked more questions. I didn't ask questions, I didn't even ask close friends of mine. I didn't know about the scan, and every mother should get that scan, it should be such a basic." Diane expressed her frustration with the current health system, which, she feels, lets down expectant parents. "It shouldn't happen. I definitely think there is a frustrastion that this scan should be given to every mother." Despite her heartbreak, Diane is grateful for every moment she shared with baby Christopher. "I wouldn't have changed my story with Christopher. I've had miscarriages, I know the pain of them. This is very separate. It's hard enough for people to get pregnant and it's hard enough to get the child into the world, but I just feel the way it happened for me, it happened for a reason. I've got to believe in that, because if I don't I'll be very angry. "I was planning ahead, I had all my dreams and hopes ahead. "I have a good belief. I know when I get up to heaven - and I hope I will get to heaven - that I'll have my baby in my arms. I will cuddle him, I will kiss him, I will tell him I love him for the rest of my life." In cases of major foetal abnormality, the anomaly scan allows parents to prepare psychologically for the birth and loss of a baby, rather than finding out in the delivery suite. Parents of babies born with health issues could plan appropriate care for their child in advance. Hospital staff would also have advance warning of a difficult delivery. Some conditions that can be detected by an anomaly scan include: Taoiseach Enda Kenny has said he has ordered a complete review of US preclearance in Ireland after the President Trump's controversial clamp down on immigration last weekend, Daniel McConnell, Political Editor. It has been confirmed that the issue of preclearance at Irish airports will be discussed at Cabinet tomorrow after Childrens' Minister Katherine Zappone called for it to be put on the agenda. Mr Kenny, speaking at a press conference in Dublin with British Prime Minister Theresa May, said he has ordered the review in light of the executive order from President Trump. In respect of the policy that used by the American government, I disagree with it. I will say that to the President [Trump] and the vice-President [Mike Pence] when I meet with them. I have asked for a complete review now of the pre-clearance facilities here in Ireland in respect of the three departments that are handling this so we can be clear of the importance of it, Mr Kenny said. It must be remembered that pre-clearance bring enormous convenience to a lot of people so these are issues we are happy to negotiate on. I don't agree with this policy and he will my reasons when I meet him, the Taoiseach said. Mr Kenny was speaking at about the same time that news broke of the first person being stopped at Dublin Airport on foot of Trump's controversial executive order. For her part, Mrs May, took a softer line. In respect of the policies which have been announced by the United States, the UK takes a different approach, she said. At no stage in the six years when I was Home Secretary did I introduce those sort of arrangements. Obviously, President Trump has been elected and is implemented what he promised he would. But we have a different approach, she said. Over the weekend, Mr Trump put a 120-day hold on allowing refugees into the US, an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria and a 90-day bar on citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Dublin and Shannon airports are among a small number of sites in the world that offer preclearance to passengers travelling to the US. By clearing customs and immigration checks before departure, they are then treated as domestic arrivals on reaching the US. A spokesman for the Department of Transport confirmed that there has been one case where a person was refused preclearance to the US at Dublin Airport. It is not known where the individual is from. It is understood that the new immigration regulations have so far had no impact on passengers travelling to the US through Shannon Airport. Since the regulations were introduced over the weekend, a number of scheduled flights have departed Shannon for New York and Boston. It is believed that none of those travelling were found to be in breach of the restrictions. Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport Shane Ross has said the Trump administration's decisions on immigration will have earth-shattering consequences globally. Speaking after addressing a meeting of the Association of European Journalists, Mr Ross said he was very concerned about what President Donald Trump had done. US President Donald Trump has vigorously defended his immigration restrictions, saying "this is about terror and keeping our country safe". In a statement, Mr Trump said: "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." The president addressed the issue late on Sunday as some Republicans in Congress urged caution amid legal challenges to the order banning travellers from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Top congressional Republicans have largely remained behind Mr Trump on the issue. Mr Trump added: "America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. "I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. "My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help those who are suffering." In a background call with reporters on Sunday, a senior administration official declared the order's implementation "a massive success story," claiming it had been done "seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism". Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement on Sunday saying that, in the absence of information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a "dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination". That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent US residency "green cards" will not be barred from re-entering the country, as officials had previously said. It remains unclear what kind of additional screening they will now face. Mr Trump's order, which also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria, has sparked widespread protests and denunciations from Democrats and a handful of Republicans. Many have accused the administration of rushing to implement the changes, resulting in panic and confusion at the nation's airports. Protests were held at a number of airports across the US against the measure, including in Chicago, Detroit and Washington DC. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said the changes were "a small price to pay" to keep the nation safe. The developments came a day after a federal judge in New York issued an emergency order temporarily barring the US from deporting people from the seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trump's 90-day travel ban. The order barred US border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the US with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. The Department of Homeland Security said the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. AP Two days after that speech, I attended a public meeting on Brexit in a midlands town. There were over 300 people there. After the clear signal of intent that a hard exit from the EU was on the cards, people are beginning to want answers to the issues that affect them on a day-to-day basis. Because nothing is finalised, nothing can be certain. However, since Theresa Mays speech it has become possible to speculate with greater accuracy on what a lot of people at the meeting wanted to know, such as what will be the impact of Brexit on consumer prices here? There are at least two forces in play. The devaluation of sterling should have led to lower prices on some goods imported from the UK, but there hasnt really been much evidence of this so far. The second force is customs duties. Once the UK finally leaves the EU, the likelihood is that a system of customs duties will be charged on items imported from the UK. Many imported foodstuffs from the UK (dairy, meat and fish in particular) will be subject to rates of duty which are likely to add 10% or more to the price in the shops. Those of us who buy goods online from the UK will also encounter additional costs. Just because something is being bought online doesnt mean it wont attract customs duties, and customs operates on the basis that the purchaser pays. Another cost driver is Vat. Its not that the rates of Vat charged on goods imported from the UK will change, but the manner in which Vat on imports from non-EU countries is charged tends to lead to higher prices. While there are some Vat and customs reliefs for small individual orders, all in all, its not a great outlook for consumer prices on goods coming in from the UK. Irish consumers should hope the EU can cut some kind of future trade deal with the UK to lessen the hit on prices. Another concern voiced at that meeting was whether there would be restrictions on people moving freely between here and the UK. That could have knock-on effects but will inevitably involve some additional border controls on travellers. Travel arrangements between Ireland and the UK are governed by the Common Travel Area, which currently is one of the very few items under the EU treaties where Ireland and the UK were allowed make their own arrangements. Retaining it, however, is a different matter and may require EU Treaty change, in turn prompting a constitutional referendum in this country. Companies are thinking about Brexit consequences. The realities should now be dawning on all of us. Brian Keegan is director of public policy and taxation at Chartered Accountants Ireland Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Fatih Karimov Trend: Iran will pursue the US President Donald Trumps executive order to ban entry for nationals of seven Muslim-majority countries in international organizations, the Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Hassan Qashqavi said. Qashqavi condemned the measure saying it is against the international laws, Fars news agency reported. He further said that Tehran will reciprocate the US presidents measure at any level. President Trump signed an executive order on Jan. 27 to suspend refugee arrivals and impose tough control on travelers from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Iran on Jan. 29 summoned the Swiss ambassador, who represents Washington's interests, to protest the measure. Qashqavi further said Tehran has told its diplomatic representatives across the world to reciprocate the US decision, adding that Irans Foreign Ministry will take strong decision in this regard without explaining further details. He added that at least six million Iranians are living abroad, expressing concern that many of them would face problems due the US administrations new decision. They sang Woody Guthries This Land Is Your Land to show support for people who had been detained because of Donald Trumps immigration restrictions. Several US flags waved in the background. Mr Trumps order suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria. In the first visit by a Government member since US president Donald Trumps inauguration, Mr Flanagan will meet Irish-American politicians. The visit comes amid uproar over Mr Trumps immigration ban. Mr Flanagan said the immigration restrictions could have far-reaching implications both on humanitarian grounds and on relations between the US and the global Muslim community. In November, the Irish Examiner revealed the files of mothers and children used in the 1960/61 4-in-1 vaccine trial were altered in 2002 just weeks after the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse sought discovery of records from the religious order running the home. Mari Steed was born in Bessborough in 1960 and subsequently adopted in the US. Her natural mothers file is one of those listed as having been changed. Earlier this month, Ms Steed made a formal complaint to the gardai and Data Protection Commissioner concerning the matter. In the Garda complaint, which has been seen by the Irish Examiner, she states she has also informed the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes of the complaint as it has requested her to provide documentation to it relating to her participation in the vaccine trial. I have notified the commission that I wish to file formal charges against the order and will then submit testimony as directed and aided by my legal counsel, and where it does not impact my own legal rights to pursue this matter further, states the complaint. A document obtained by the Irish Examiner last year under Freedom of Information revealed that alterations were made to the records of mothers and children used in the 1960/61 4-in-1 vaccine trials. The Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse (CICA) had sought discovery of these records from the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Mary on July 22, 2002. An affidavit was sworn on October 3, 2002, and on a number of later dates in 2002 and 2003. The changes made to files include: The alteration of discharge dates of mothers (by a period of one year and two years); The changing of discharge dates of children; The changing of admission dates of mothers; The alteration of the age of a mother (by two years); The alteration of dates of adoption; The changing of baptism dates and location of baptism; The insertion of certain named locations and information into admission books. In November, the Irish Examiner put a series of questions to the the Sisters of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary in relation to the document. In a series of statements, the order said it wished to categorically state that no documents were altered. In your recent correspondence, you are suggesting that something illegal or inappropriate had occurred in regard to the documents to which you refer. This is entirely untrue; and we will continue to deal directly with the official commission on all such matters, said a statement. Mr Trumps executive order calling for a suspension on accepting refugees and citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries into the US has led to pressure on Mr Kenny from a number of opposition politicians. Transport Minister Shane Ross and the Independent Alliance will raise the issue of the immigration ban at Cabinet this week, with an Alliance source describing the developments as very serious. However, last night Mr Kennys officials strongly defended the opportunity in making the annual trip, with a government spokesman saying it would be politically negligent to break the link with Washington. In order to maintain the historically strong links between the Irish and American peoples, it is important that the Taoiseach continues to engage with the US President and his administration in Washington around the events of St Patricks Day. Doing so allows the Taoiseach to outline, in person, his governments views on a range of issues, including business and economic ties, immigration and other matters of common interest. He will continue to act in the interests of Irish people and to that end he will raise these matters again this year, the spokesperson said. Social Protection Minister Leo Varadkar yesterday said the trip could not all be about smiles and shamrocks. Childrens Minister Katherine Zappone wants an urgent review of the pre-clearance system at Irish airports in the context of Trumps ban. Our pre clearance immigration agreement with US does not undermine rights contained in Irish Constitution....legal review urgently needed. Katherine Zappone (@k_zappone) January 29, 2017 Green Party leader Eamon Ryan said Mr Kenny should postpone the visit, in protest at the travel ban. Labours Brendan Howlin also said the Taoiseach should not board the plane to Washington, unless he expressed the Irish peoples anger over the order. The matter is also likely to be raised in the Dail, after People Before Profit said they would draft a motion and circulate it, calling on Mr Kenny to cancel the trip. Mr Varadkar pointed out that very few countries had the opportunity Ireland has, in being able to meet the US administration every year. He said Ireland could afford to voice its concern when visiting Washington DC and should stand by our values. Meanwhile, the US Embassy has warned nationals of the seven countries in question, including dual nationals, not to attend any scheduled visa interview at the Embassy in Dublin as it will not be able to proceed with the visa interview. US Customs and Border Protection has implemented this provision at its Pre-Clearance facilities, including at Dublin and Shannon airports, the embassy said. Several Fine Gael TDs have told the Irish Examiner it is time a full-time minister, potentially at senior Cabinet level, is considered in order to best protect Irelands interests in Britains EU exit. A number of TDs also want Mr Kenny to press British prime minister Theresa May when she visits Dublin today about a special side deal over Brexit. Speaking in favour of having a specific Brexit minister, Wexford TD Michael DArcy said: Id fully support this, so the person could exclusively focus on Brexit. One person for all departments. The concern at the moment is that they fall between too many sectors. Mr DArcy said he was unconvinced by the Department of Finance, which recently told a committee it only has a handful of staff working full time on Brexit. You need a full Cabinet position with a full secretary general, to coordinate with departments and the Taoiseach. Negotiations will take anything from five to 10 years. And it [a minister] would help businesses, said the Oireachtas finance committee member. Carlow-Kilkenny TD Pat Deering said: Theres a lot of work to be done, which will continue for years, indifferent of who is Taoiseach. It is a concern with so much going on [at home] with the Taoiseach, where will he have the time and ability to concentrate on it? Maybe we could look at a minister who would act as a liaison [with others]. It would free up the Taoiseach, lead to better coordination of departments. A junior minister position, to alleviate the pressure on the Taoiseach who has so much to resolve for a minority government. Cork South West TD Jim Daly supports the appointment of a Brexit minister: There should be one, either from existing ones or a new appointment. It would reassure the public, someone would be responsible. The Taoiseach has massive work leading the party, managing the Independents [in Government]. Mr Daly said businesses wanted to see such a minister appointed. The Dublin Airport Authority, Irish Pharmaceutical Healthcare Association, Retail Excellence Ireland and the Irish Exporters Association among others have indicated support for the idea of a Brexit minister. The call has also been echoed by the Centre for Cross Border Studies, which notes both the Westminster and Holyrood parliaments, in London and Edinburgh, have a dedicated Brexit minister. Louth TD Fergus ODowd said: The more ministers or delegations there are, the better. Brexit is coming down the tracks like an express train coming at us. Others who have backed the prospect of a Brexit minister include former taoiseach Bertie Ahern, Fianna Fail TDs as well as Transport Minister Shane Ross, who said: There is a case for putting a minister there. Some Fine Gael TDs though said Mr Kenny should remain as the de facto Brexit minister. Louths Peter Fitzpatrick said that when you manage a football team, you either do or you dont. Kildare Norths Bernard Durkan said the chief executive of the government should front the talks. Longford-Westmeath TD Peter Burke questioned if restructuring government for such a role would help Brexit negotiations. A weekend Red C poll said 74% of voters want a Brexit minister. The findings and calls will fuel opposition demands for the dedicated role, especially as Mr Kenny meets Theresa May today. Mr Kenny will also face questions this week about why he left the door open to Fine Gael working with Sinn Fein in government, comments he was forced to roll back on after a backlash from ministers and TDs. News: 4 Editorial: 10 A survey by the Irish College of General Practitioners (ICGP) found male GPs and those with higher levels of addiction training are more likely to support a more liberal drug policy approach to cannabis for personal use. Two in five male GPs support the legalisation of cannabis compared to 15% of female doctors. Childrens charity Cari said it was unacceptable that there was only one such facility in the entire country, located in Galway, forcing the bulk of families to struggle in the dark for help. Cari chief executive Mary Flaherty said the needs were enormous and said there should be at least the same level of service as adults have, for whom there are six Sexual Assault Treatment Units (SATU) nationwide. Fr Flannery, who is forbidden to minister as a priest, has described the papal nuncio, Archbishop Charles Browne, as the single most destructive factor in the Irish church. He said the churchs biggest problem and the one thing he would like to change, was the way bishops were appointed. It was why the church did not have proper leadership. I would love to see the present papal nuncio being removed because I think he is doing great damage to the Irish church by the policies by which he is appointing bishops, he said. Fr Flannery believes the Irish church needs a charismatic leader who would mobilise the laity because the future of the church depended on a massive lay involvement. He said it was very courageous of the Taoiseach, Enda Kenny, to raise his case and that of other censored priests when he met the Pope last November. The founder member of the Association of Catholic is hoping all of the cases will be dealt with before the popes visit to Ireland next year. Fr Flannery was disciplined in 2012 by the Vaticans Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith (CDF) for the views he expressed on Catholic teachings. Just over a week ago he marked his 70th birthday by celebrating Mass in public at a community centre near where he lives in East Galway. He knew that people felt he should not remain in the church because of his views, but he did not think so. None of us own the church. From my position, I am as entitled to be part of the community, and the community must be open to people of all views and all attitudes. Pope Francis is saying that day after day. So when people accuse me of fundamentally disagreeing with the church I say I am very much in tune with Pope Francis. He would still have things to say about the church even if he was allowed to minister again, he said on RTE radio. As a young man knowing what he knew now he would not be part of an institution that discriminated so blatantly against women. And he feels he has missed out in not being able to marry. But there you go. Thats life and you make choices. Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 30 By Orkhan Quluzade Trend: Turkeys President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will participate in agitation rallies before the referendum on amendments to the Turkish Constitution, the countrys media outlets reported. Erdogan supports the adoption of amendments to the Turkish Constitution which envisage introduction of a presidential system of government in the country instead of the existing parliamentary system. Agitation rallies will start in mid-February. It was also noted that Erdogan intends to take part in 40 rallies in various cities of the country. A referendum on making amendments to the Constitution can be held in early April. According to the amendments, the number of seats in the Turkish Parliament will increase from 550 to 600. It is also suggested that Turkish citizens run for the MP seats from the age of 18. Currently, the lowest age limit is 25. It is offered to hold parliamentary elections every 5 years. Currently, the parliamentary elections are held every 4 years. A Turkish citizen not younger than 40 can become president of the country, according to the amendments. The Turkish president will also have the power to appoint ministers and replace them. The president-elect will not be obliged to be a non-party nominee any more. --- Follow the author on Twitter: @o_quluzade With only 10 school properties so far handed over to multi-denominational patrons under current divestment arrangements, he is announcing details of a new process to encourage more divestment of religious-controlled primary schools where parents want alternative patrons. The ability of some religious orders to retain ownership of school properties while they might still owe the Department of Education millions of euro for redress over industrial school child abuse could cause political headaches for the minister. But his department told the Irish Examiner that this process and the redress issue are entirely separate. It is envisaged these transfers of patronage will be voluntary in nature, it said. Rather than transferring property to a new multi-denominational patron, a process Mr Bruton says has proved complicated in many areas so far, school properties will now be leased by the existing landowner in most cases where a new patron is required and selected. The decision on which alternative patron takes over a school will be left to the landowner, usually the local bishop or a trust acting for religious orders, instead of the minister or his department. Such a policy could lead to concerns that bishops or religious bodies might try to keep control of schools away from patrons whose treatment of religious education they do not support. However, Mr Bruton says the new process should respond to the wishes of local families, and is based around principles of transparency. Where the need for a transfer to a multi-denominational patron is identified, the existing landowner, in co-operation with the local school community, will decide what multi-denominational patron to transfer to, he said. The minister has outlined the proposals to Catholic bishops and wants them to make nominations to working groups that will develop protocols on the reassignment of patronage and on school amalgamations. Where they wish to do so, existing staff and pupils whose parents allow it, could remain in place under the new patron in an existing school building, or should be free to transfer to local schools that remain under religious patronage. The plans are part of the Programme for Government. The final of the prestigious music competition takes place at the Rochestown Park Hotel next weekend in an event which also includes the congress Comhdhail na gCeoltoiri. The congress will allow participants to interact with publishers, broadcasters, and representatives of arts organisations. Gardai from the Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau, supported by the Special Crime Task Force, seized the weapons, ammunition, and suspected heroin and cocaine following a search of the house in Sallins, Co Kildare. The ongoing operation at Sallins underlines again the fact that An Garda Siochana are being relentless and resourceful in tackling the menace of organised crime gangs, said Ms Fitzgerald. They are determined to hit those gangs where it hurts to deprive them of their profits and to bring them to justice. No one should underestimate the scale of the challenge which An Garda Siochana face, or the time it may take to put particular gangs out of business. But however long it takes, those involved in such gangs will come to realise that no one is above the law. The Government will, of course, continue to support fully An Garda Siochana in these efforts, Ms Fitzgerald said. No arrests have been made following the find and investigations are ongoing. The raid came just days after another significant seizure by gardai in an industrial estate in Dublin. Fifteen firearms, including a number of revolvers and semi-automatic weapons, a sub-machine gun, and an assault rifle were seized, along with 1,300 rounds of ammunition, and what was described as a substantial amount of cash. They were found by gardai in Greenogue Industrial estate, Baldonnel, Co Dublin. Three men appeared in court on Friday following the Baldonnel raid, charged with unlawful possession of firearms and ammunition in suspicious circumstances, the unlawful possession of five handguns, and the unlawful possession of a silencer. A fourth man arrested as part of the same investigation was released without charge on Wednesday, and gardai said a file will be prepared for the DPP. ITS been a pretty fucking miserable year all round, it has to be said. Such is Enda Walshs take on a 12-month period in which his recent collaborator David Bowie died, and we also had Brexit, Syria and Donald Trump to add to a generally miserable panoply of global events. I did give up reading the news for about four weeks recently, he admits. But then my wife reminded me of 1930s Germany people turning a blind eye away from Nazism and allowing it happen. And I was like, fucking hell. An enabler. This is Walsh the man, the citizen, the Londoner speaking. But Walsh the artist has had a pretty stellar year working on David Bowies play Lazarus, staging Arlington to great acclaim in Galway, and now starting 2017 with a new play for Cork company Corcadorca for the first time in 18 years. And yet, you wonder do our interesting times impinge upon him as an artist? Its a question he admits hes pondered. When you realise you are living through big history, there is a part of you that goes, whats the point of doing this? Who needs to step in and see a play? Should I be trying to produce work that is representational, work that responds quickly to what were seeing in Syria, say, and putting that on stage as fast as I can, rather than letting this percolate through as they do and come out in allegorical way? There are all those sorts of questions that you have in your head. OBLIQUE REFERENCES The Dublin-born playwright admits hes not really wired to represent the immediate world, yet a play like Arlington, with is dystopian vision, has been described as a political piece of work. Yet its political in an oblique way, in a way that suits Walshs view of himself as an artist. I always think the job of the playwright is to allow something come out in a completely different form, he says. People have got so much news around them, so much documentation about what the hell is going on, that my response is surely we should do something else. Something that is underneath all that, true to that but reflected in a different form, not just talking heads. Another feature of Arlington was that it represented another step towards dissolving the distinction between drama and art, between words and movement, between the play and dance. It sounds so pretentious, Walsh says, but its trying largely to be a kind of an atmospheric, sort of moving thing as opposed to anything thats plot driven. I wanted to get away from words being so literal. How do I make something that is understandable but allows an audience to get lost in a work? With Ballyturk there was a lot of slapstick, a lot of the silence in between words. Arlington feels like pieces of music or movement. He references the expressionist middle act OCaseys The Silver Tassie. Ive nicked the form, he says, and put it into Arlington, so the effect of movement in the second act is felt on my text in the third. I love creating that surprise in an audience, the realisation that its a dance piece. Story isnt just about words. JAIL TIME Walsh sees his new work for Corcadorca, The Same, as continuing in that vain, largely via the collaborative approach taken with director Pat Kiernan that will bring in sound installations and site-specific elements the play will be staged in the former Cork prison on the north side of the city. The story, if we can use that word, is about a woman who somehow meets her future self. Thats a strange, shocking thing to happen, Walsh says. But the other side of that is very simple: about how we really relate to our own selves, the person you were 10 years ago or 15 years ago. Youre dragging bits of yourself and echoes of who you are through your life. You cant escape that. You have to embrace all the shit things you did, all your failures, all your mistakes. The play, which will be performed by sisters Catherine and Eileen Walsh, has brought Walsh and Kiernan together in a rehearsal room for the first time in more than a decade and a half. Of course, one of the first times they gathered like this was for Disco Pigs, Walshs modern classic that originally starred Eileen Walsh and Cillian Murphy and pretty much launched all of their careers. The wheel has come full circle, with the room in Triskel, where Disco Pigs was first performed, now serving as a rehearsal space for The Same. It was really fantastic, Walsh says of this revived personal relationship. We were both grinning. I remembered why wed worked together so well as younger men. Pat thinks in a very different way to what I do, but we complement each other in the way were trying to scratch around an idea. Id forgotten how keen his mind is and how ridiculously sloppy mine is. Hes an extraordinary man. As a writer Im trying to push it away from words and make it more visual, but Pat is way ahead of me on that. Hes been working on that for a long time. He throws out a lot of ideas. Im fascinated by that. And Im fascinated to see what this is going to be. Ive never been interested in the work in terms of its destination but Ive always had real confidence in the collective process. The journey of that will be far greater than anything my little head could have spat out, thats for sure. ABBEY ROAD This spring, Walsh will make his debut at the Abbey Theatre with new productions of Arlington and Ballyturk. I really like the new regime in there, he says. I think the programme is fascinating and I love the idea of doing so many bloody shows in the year. I think thats the way it should be very kinetic and full. I think the wider community needs something that feels more bustling. I think those two guys [Graham McLaren and Neil Murray] will grow it and grow it. And I think there will loads of projects outside of Dublin as well. Its really great to be involved in it. I think between them and Selina Cartmell in the Gate its exciting times for Irish theatre. The significance of Theresa Mays visit to Dublin today, though brief, cannot be underestimated. It may be one of Taoiseach Enda Kennys last face-to-face meetings with the British prime minister ahead of her triggering Article 50 at the end of March, marking the beginning of Britains exit from the EU. In trying to tease out as much detail as possible about a hard Brexit, Mr Kenny will be guided by what the Tory leader said in her major 12-point Brexit speech this month. While not giving away too much on Britains regard for Ireland and the North, she reiterated that nobody wanted to return to borders of the past. Indeed, thats the wish. But she didnt rule it out. She did emphasise the need to keep the common travel area between Ireland and Britain. But this is partially determined by changes if Britain leaves the single market and customs union, a scenario the EU would move swiftly to address. It is also unclear how important the CTA is, given it was number four in Ms Mays Brexit speech. While pressure continues on the Taoiseach and Merrion Street to seek a side deal or pre-Brexit bargaining terms with Britain, there is still an element of dont rock the boat coming from Government Buildings. European Affairs Minister Dara Murphy told the Irish Examiner that the peace process would be top of the agenda for the meeting with Ms May. He said both sides would concentrate on the unique and special relationship between both countries. The trade issue is complex and will take many years, added the Cork North Central TD. Barriers to trade must also be avoided, Mr Kenny is expected to suggest. This follows growing apprehensions, especially among food producers and farmers, that hefty World Trade Organisation tariffs could be slapped on Irish produce going into Britain. Ms May though wont land here unencumbered. During the day, she will meet leaders of the devolved governments of Scotland, Wales and the North. And while government sources last week revealed Downing St rejected an invitation for her to address the Dail, the stress is on the fact that Ms May is visiting Dublin at all, especially given the fact her predecessor only came here during the Queens visit. International attention will be on Ms May too, given her contentious meeting with US president Donald Trump on Friday In fact, the whole Brexit-themed meeting, talks on the peace process and upcoming elections in the North could be overshadowed by disturbing developments with the immigrant ban in the US. Crucially, Enda Kenny must come away with some win or result. He is under pressure to appoint a Brexit minister and faces criticism over preparing for Brexit. THE US sanctuary movement that shields illegal immigrants, many thousands of whom are Irish, could be described at the conscience of America as it battles President Donald Trumps efforts to bring it to heel. But Mr Trump is not the first US president to take on the movement. In its previous incarnation, back in the 1980s, some of its leaders were imprisoned when they defied similar efforts by another Republican president, Ronald Reagan. Where the threat then was prison, the threat now is a financial one in the form of a potential cut-off of billions of dollars in state and local funding from Washington unless mayors abandon the concept of sanctuary cities. Details of an executive order signed by Mr Trump on Wednesday directing the Secretary of Homeland Security to look at federal funding to cities to figure out how we can defund those streams remain vague but it could jeopardise billions of dollars in housing, health, education, and other types of federal aid. Some are casting the issue as a David and Goliath struggle in which plucky states and cities defending their most vulnerable communities are pitted against the might and money of the federal government. The Trump administration, however, tends to cast the issue in terms of national security in the post-9/11 era, while his opponents counter that the new president is simply exploiting the issue to consolidate his power, having demonised immigrants and other vulnerable groups during his election. The sanctuary movement began over 30 years ago as a religious and political campaign championed by progressive American Catholics and other religious groups, who saw it as their duty to provide a safe haven for vulnerable refugees, some fleeing death squads in US-backed conflicts in a number of Central American countries. By declaring themselves official sanctuaries, such groups committed to providing shelter, material goods and legal advice to these Central American refugees faced with government policies that made obtaining asylum almost impossible. Many who found their way to the United States were placed in detention centres and sent home, where they sometimes disappeared or were tortured or killed. The movement originated in Mexico and Arizona and quickly gained momentum, spreading across a number of states and cities, and was particularly strong in Chicago, Philadelphia, California and Texas. In the mid and late 1980s, a number of its leaders, many of them religious figures, were arrested and put on trial for defying federal laws. By 1985, with more than 10,000 people reported killed in conflicts in El Salvador and Guatemala, sanctuary became a national movement with some 500 member-sites across the United States taking part. Activists developed a number of safe routes for transporting people to communities that sheltered them. The movement was sometimes compared to the Underground Railroad a century earlier when a network of secret routes and safe houses were used by thousands of African-American slaves to escape from the south to free northern states and to Canada, helped by sympathetic abolitionists. The US Immigration and Naturalization Service began to crack down on sanctuary movement members by the mid-1980s, which culminated in a series of high-profile trials on alien smuggling charges in Texas and Arizona. These became known as the sanctuary trials, sparking a national outcry and demonstrations in many cities, especially as a number of those on trial were either priests or nuns. In the end, most of the sanctuary defendants received suspended sentences or short periods of house arrests and the government eventually granted asylum status to many of the refugees involved in the trials. By 1989, President Reagans term had ended and there were moves in Congress to ease immigration and naturalisation policies for those from Central America states and other countries, including Ireland. Over the next decade Irish-American leaders like the late Senator Ted Kennedy continued to work on immigration reform. In recent years, however, Republicans in the House of Representative blocked reform measures that would have eventually led to a path to citizenship for illegals. It is against this background that the role of sanctuary cities in helping such illegals has once again come centre stage under the Trump presidency. While the federal government accuses these sanctuary cities of thwarting the efforts of the immigration authorities to seize and deport illegals, the mayors have said their job is to protect their communities not to do the work of implementing and assisting federal immigration officials. The level of sanctuary also varies from city to city and state to state. While some cities and counties merely refuse detention requests against immigrants, other communities instruct their local police not to ask about immigration status, and still others issue identification cards and drivers licences to undocumented immigrants, as well as providing other services. Speaking at the Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday, Mr Trump singled out sanctuary cities as causing immeasurable harm to the American people by refusing to help the federal government identify and deport undocumented residents. Its not yet clear if his move is targeting all illegals or those convicted of crimes. He went on to direct the department to examine ways to limit federal funds, except as mandated by law to sanctuary cities, sending shockwaves through city halls and across the country. Many mayors were defiant, however. Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, the Irish-speaking son of Connemara emigrants, pledged to use all city resources to protect the citys illegal immigrants even if that means using City Hall itself as a last resort. New York Mayor Bill de Blasio was similarly defiant, while Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel vowed his city would defend its illegal immigrants, including the Irish. Were going to stay a sanctuary city, Emanuel pledged. We welcome people, whether youre from Poland or Pakistan, whether youre from Ireland or India or Israel, and whether youre from Mexico or Moldova, where my grandfather came from, you are welcome in Chicago as you pursue the American Dream. All of which puts the mayors and their cities on a collision course with President Trumps version of that dream. Burma NLD to Tighten Security Following Lawyers Assassination NLD spokesperson U Win Htein / The Irrawaddy NAYPYIDAWA leading member of Burmas ruling party the National League for Democracy (NLD) said security measuresincluding for the partys leadershipwould be beefed up and described the assassination of the partys legal advisor on Sunday as a threat. Legal advisor for the NLD U Ko Ni was killed at Yangon International Airport by a lone gunman at close range on Sunday afternoon. Although assassinations are rare in Burma, the event has prompted security concerns for the countrys State Counselor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. NLD spokesperson and the person responsible for Daw Aung San Suu Kyis security U Win Htein told The Irrawaddy on Sunday that the current security measures for Daw Aung San Suu Kyi were good. But [given to U Ko Nis assassination] I will have to make them stricter, he said. The assassination is a security threat. I will advise to tighten the security for the current leadership, he added. We will take this matter seriously and will increase security during [Daw Aung San Suu Kyis] local and international tours, he said. Daw Aung San Suu Kyis name was found on an ISIS target list sent to Malaysias Negri Sembilan police station in August last year, along with the Malaysian prime minister, his deputy, as well as the attorney-general, the inspector-general of police, and three ministers of Malaysia. In response to the ISIS threats, President Offices Spokesperson U Zaw Htay told The Irrawaddy last year that they didnt need to worry too much but they also cant underestimate it. On Sunday, the NLD released a statement condemning the killing as an act of terrorism and urging members not to react strongly to the assassination. Kyaw Phyo Tha in Rangoon contributed to this report Burma Police Investigate U Ko Ni Assassination Amid Condolences and Demands for Justice Police in Chanayethazan Township of Mandalay on Sunday. / Zaw Zaw / The Irrawaddy MANDALAY Police searched Chanayethazan Township in Mandalay on Sunday for the home of a man suspected of shooting Burmas ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) legal advisor U Ko Ni earlier that day as leading figures at home and abroad expressed shock and sadness at the news and demanded justice. Acting on information from suspect Kyi Linarrested after allegedly shooting U Ko Ni in the head at close range outside Yangon International Airport on Sunday afternoonpolice gathered at an apartment suspected of being his home in the townships 34th Street. After initial confusion as the suspect provided no house number during questioning, the suspected apartment was found to be locked with no one inside. We are here on the ground to check the address, we still dont know his house number. Even the quarter administrator said he doesnt know him [Kyi Lin], Mandalay Division Police Chief Han Tun told the media. He added that the suspected gunman is from Kyaukme Township, Shan State and was in prison from 2003 to 2010 for smuggling ancient Buddha statues. A crowd gathered on 34th Street with some shouting to storm the apartment and others urging burning down the houses of Chinese residents, although the suspects ethnicity is unconfirmed. U Ko Ni, a Muslim, was a long-time advisor to Daw Aung San Suu Kyis National League for Democracy. He was an expert on Burmas controversial 2008 Constitution and worked together with the party to amend the charter that is widely criticized as undemocratic. The 65-year old lawyer was a strong opponent of the countrys Race and Religion Protection lawsthe controversial legislation proposed by the Buddhist nationalist group Ma Ba Tha and approved by the previous U Thein Sein government. U Win Hteinmember of the NLDs steering organ the Secretariatdescribed U Ko Ni as someone irreplaceable and called the assassination horrible. Although he was not among the partys leadership, he was really good at giving legal critiques and suggestions to the party, he told The Irrawaddy, he worked behind the scenes to advise the partys leadership. Patron of the National League for Democracy U Tin Oo expressed his condolences to family members of assassinated lawyer U Ko Ni at the familys home in downtown Rangoon on Monday morning. On Sunday the NLD released a statement condemning the killing as an act of terrorism and urging members not to react strongly to the assassination. U Ko Nis daughter and grandson were present at the airport when the lawyer was assassinated. His funeral will be held on Monday afternoon. Burmas state-run daily The Mirror editorial hailed U Ko Ni as a good citizen who had been working for the national cause of democracy and justice. It is evident that the ones who killed him are those who want to damage the national cause that we have been working for, the paper said on Monday. In response to the lawyers killing, international groups also called on the government for a thorough, independent and impartial investigation. The UN special rapporteur on human rights in Burma Yanghee Leewho met with U Ko Ni on her visit to the country this monthexpressed her condolences via Twitter and wrote that all responsible people must be brought to justice. Josef Benedict, Amnesty Internationals Deputy Campaigns Director for Southeast Asia and the Pacific, said U Ko Nis death will send shock waves across the human rights community in the country and beyond, and authorities must send a clear message that such violence will not be tolerated and will not go unpunished. The International Crisis Group said in a statement that no stone must be left unturned in finding the truth about the incident and who may have been behind it. The killing also underlines the urgency of the Myanmar [Burma] government and society to come together to condemn all forms of hate speech, confront it wherever it occurs, and take resolute action against those responsible for disseminating it. Zarni Mann in Mandalay, Htet Naing Zaw in Naypyidaw, and Kyaw Phyo Tha in Rangoon contributed to this report. Saudi Arabia's King Salman, in a phone call on Sunday with U.S. President Donald Trump, agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, a White House statement said, Reuters reported. Trump, during his presidential campaign last year, had called for Gulf states to pay for establishing safe zones to protect Syrian refugees. A statement after the phone call said the two leaders agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of Islamic State militants. "The president requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the statement said. The Saudi Press Agency, in its readout of the call, made no specific mention of safe zones. It said the two leaders had affirmed the "depth and durability of the strategic relationship" between the two countries. Burma U Ko Nis Assassin Fleesan Eyewitness Account U Nay Win, 48, seen with his taxi while working as a volunteer for the Yangon Bus Service. / Facebook U Soe Myint, the chairman of Shwe Lun Pyan taxi drivers association, was at Yangon International Airport when National League for Democracy lawyer U Ko Ni was shot. He witnessed the assassin fleeing the scene and fatally shooting a taxi driver before being arrested at gunpoint. U Soe Myint told The Irrawaddys reporter Tun Tun what he saw: We taxi drivers saw it as soon as [the shooting] happened, and chased [the gunman]. At that time, he was holding a gun, and we chased him behind and from his left and right-hand sides, shouting He has a gun! He has a gun! There are four taxi drivers associations at the airport, and all of the drivers came out and chased him, so there were about 100 people. The man with the gun was running about 20 feet ahead of us. U Nay Win threw a brick at the gunman while running after him. The man turned and fired at him, and he was shot dead. We thought he was hit in the haunches, but later we learned that he had an exit wound near his bladder. The man with the gun fired two or three shots from both his right and left side [into the chasing crowd] while running. By then, police at the airport had also joined the crowd to chase him. The man with the gun kept on running. He saw a taxi in front of a restaurant called Amazing and stopped it at gunpoint. He got in it and asked the taxi driver to drive. He was a little bit far from me but as he got in the taxi, the chasing taxi drivers surrounded the taxi and blocked it from moving. Then, police arrived and aimed their guns [at the suspect] and arrested him. U Nay Win was rushed to hospital. We heard after a while that he was dead. We went to North Okkalapa Hospital and found the body of U Nay Win was being kept at the mortuary there. U Nay Win, 48, is survived by a wife and three children aged 7 years, 4 years, and 45 days. The Rangoon Divisional Government will pay for his funeral scheduled to be held on Tuesday. Monday, January 30th, 2017 (8:45 am) - Score 1,126 The Welsh Government has revealed that the uptake of their two broadband voucher schemes, which are designed to help businesses and rural homes gain access to a faster connection, has been fairly small and as a result some tweaks may be required in order to boost uptake. At present Wales is home to two voucher schemes Access Broadband Cymru (ABC) and Ultrafast Connectivity Vouchers (UCV) and these were revised in January 2016 (details). The ABC scheme offers vouchers to homes in areas that arent currently planned to benefit from the Superfast Cymru project with BT and which dont have access to a superfast connection speed of 30Mbps+. Meanwhile UCV provides assistance (worth up to 10,000) towards the capital costs of helping businesses in Wales to install an ultrafast service offering speeds of 100Mbps+ (30Mbps upload), which requires that related firms exist in an area where speeds of 100Mbps+ cannot currently be achieved via an existing network. ABC The Access Broadband Cymru scheme funds (or part-funds) the installation costs of new broadband connections for homes and businesses in Wales. There are 2 levels of funding available depending on the needs of the consumer and the speed required, 400 for download speeds between 10 and 20 Mbps, and 800 for download speeds of 30Mbps and above. UCV The maximum grant available is 10,000. It will provide 100 per cent funding for the first 3,000 and 50 per cent between 3,000 and 17,000. The business will be expected to match fund the remaining 50% and any further costs over 17,000. Since being revised in Jan 2016 the ABC scheme has only attracted a total of 722 applications and just 128 of those have been approved (installations completed), with 302 receiving offers of funding. Common reasons for not continuing with an application are that superfast broadband has become available or that there has been an uplift in their traditional broadband speed, said the Welsh Government last week. The ABC scheme tends to support connection technology solutions like 4G (Mobile Broadband), Satellite and Fixed Wireless Access (FWA). However 4G coverage and performance is still weak in many parts of rural Wales, while FWA ISPs only exist in some areas and Satellite is not a hugely popular choice, not least due to its limited usage allowances and high latency. However the Welsh Government has promised to continue the ABC scheme with a further 1.5 million over the next two years to ensure that this vital lifeline operates in parallel to Superfast Cymru and successor projects, with equivalent funding being put in place to extend for a further two years beyond 2018. The story for uptake under the UCV scheme is considerably worse. Since the scheme started just 50 applications have been received, of which 8 have been approved and a further 12 offers of funding made. The staggeringly low uptake is perhaps a reflection of the awkward positioning of the vouchers, which tend to favour more expensive leased lines or FoD (FTTP on Demand) style services. The problem is that not every business requires that sort of connectivity and the on-going rental charges can also be a significant factor (particularly for smaller organisations). Some businesses have indicated that they do not need the speeds stipulated by the scheme, and that the cost of the leased line that accompanies the speeds is prohibitive, said the Welsh Government. As a result the ultrafast scheme is about to be reviewed and the Welsh Government has said that they will consider introducing different levels of upload and download speeds, which might allow a wider selection of connection technologies to become viable. Wed expect an approach like the ABC scheme, with different funding available for different levels of speed. Mind you one area that the Welsh Government appears to overlook is advertising and if looking to improve uptake then this is one avenue that might be worth pursuing. ABC has been around for awhile and so is more familiar, but weve seen very little promotion of UCV and it wouldnt surprise us if many businesses had no idea that it even existed. Credits to Thinkbroadband for pointing us to the report. At least two law enforcement officers and three militants have been killed during the police operation in the city of Shali located in Russia's Chechen Republic, Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said Monday, Sputnik reported. "[The militants] opened fire and threw a grenade after the proposal to show their documents Due to the received wounds Sgt. 1st Class Ali Muslimkhanov and a serviceman of the Patrol-Guard Service of the Police Islam Yakhadzhiev died. Also two local residents were injured. The immediately taken actions allowed to kill three militants," Kadyrov said. He added that the group was controlled from the Syrian territory by a recruiter of the Islamic State jihadist group, outlawed in Russia. Google and BlackBerry are two of the most popular names when it comes to smartphones, which is why it's kind of a positive news that these two are allegedly releasing less-expensive phones this 2017. What makes it even better is that these budget-friendly phones could also be released outside the US. Meaning, markets who haven't really experienced a lot of Google and BlackBerry phones will now get a chance to have a Pixel or BB. BlackBerry to Launch A Midrange Phone This 2017 The BlackBerry Mercury may be the most awaited BB phone to come in this year. However, the company is also rumored to release a different smartphone in the coming months. According to Tech Radar, a certain tipster who goes by the handle @quandt has leaked the midrange BlackBerry device. It was said that a certain BB100-1 smartphone will be introduced in the near future and it would come with a 5.5-inch 720p display. This phone is expected to be powered by a Snapdragon 425 chip and come with 4 GB RAM. Additionally, this new BlackBerry smartphone is rumored to have a 3000 mAh battery, a 13 MP rear camera and an 8 MP front camera. Also, it was said that this BB could be exclusive to developing markets. Google To Release A Budget-friendly Pixel Phone In 2017 The Pixel and Pixel XL were quite big news when they were released last year. Google's decision to change its smartphones' name from Nexus to Pixel was also kind of a big surprise to its fans. Nevertheless, the first Pixel phones did well and they pretty much impressed their users in general. With that said, Google is rumored to be moving forward with new Pixel devices. As per 9to5Google, Google will be releasing the Pixel 2 alongside a budget-friendly Pixel 2B smartphone. This Pixel 2B phone will come with a non-flagship set of specs and is expected to be aimed towards "different markets". It was said that Google's goal for the next Pixel release is to bring in the Google experience to other markets. BlackBerry And Google's 2017 Midrange Phones It's worth noting, however, that these two phones are still in their rumor stages. Meaning, their existence are still uncertain and even if they do exist behind their manufacturers' doors, they are still prone to get postponed or canceled. Nevertheless, between these two, only the BlackBerry phone got a more detailed rumored specs sheet, and so far, it looks good. Granted that the phone will indeed come with 4 GB RAM and 3000 mAh battery, it is already on par with last year's premium phones. The Pixel 2B on the other hand also has good chances of bringing in a lot of Google goodness to the market. This includes the possibility of an improved camera and most importantly, the Android update priority. If one would read between the lines, Apple is all set to join the vaping game. Apple has recently been awarded a patent for some sort of vaporizer or sublimator. The patent for the device which was invented by Tetsuya Ishikawa was filed back in June last year with the United States Patent and Trademark Office. It was only granted last Jan. 26, 207. The patent describes the device as a chamber body that receives "a substance that is to be vaporized or sublimated into a vapor". iWeed? CNN Tech sees this development as Apple's possible venture into the weed business though vapes are also used in agriculture and healthcare. After a landmark decision by California to legalize the recreational and medical use of marijuana in 2016, almost all U.S. states have followed its lead. This opened the opportunity for the vaping business to boom. CNN pointed out that Apple is based in Cupertino, CA which makes it quite logical for the tech giant to dip its hands into the vaping and weed industry. This, of course, is only a speculation as Apple has not responded to CNN's queries. While Apple is popular for its iPhones and Macs, it does not limit itself to only these electronic devices. In fact, throughout is history, the tech giant has explored other industries or fields such as wearables, music players, televisions, and even cars. Back in its early days, Apple released products such as watches, multi-tool or Swiss knives, and, believe it or not, apparel. Now, it seems like it will enter the fast-rising vaping industry with its own vaporizer. It remains to be seen if the vaporizer or sublimator will make it to shelves at all. In fact, Apple has filed and received patents that have yet to be introduced to the market. The US Food and Drug Administration have recently approved three types of drugs in the immunotherapy class with the hopes of treating cancer. Accordingly, Assoc Prof Narin Voravud from the Chulalongkorn University Department of Medicine said that the FDA has allegedly approved three drugs that are set to be used for treating several types of cancer. It was found that due to its great potential and efficacy, Immunotherapy has been noted to be a new form of treatment that is found to be using a patient's own immune system to help ward off cancer cells. FDA Approves Immunotherapy Cancer Drugs In one of his statements reported by Bangkok Post, Prof Narin has revealed that the drugs had been approved particularly for the treatment of skin cancer, cancer of the large intestine, lung cancer, cancer of the bladder and cancer in the lymph nodes. Experts believe that these drugs that have been approved by the FDA are administrated by injection by medical doctors. Additionally, Dr. Narin has also clarified that although immunotherapy treatments might be a bit costly, patients who were treated this way were reported to have fewer side effects than patients who receive standard chemotherapy. More Good News On Cancer Meanwhile, according to The Chicago Tribune, Northwestern Medicine is currently on the move to fight up a notch, which is also believed to be co-leading a national trial to test an immunotherapy drug combination on people with rare cancers. Chief of hematology and oncology at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, Dr. Frank Giles has described immunotherapy as a revolution since he believes that nothing will be the same after what the said occurrence. It was found that Dr. Giles has been allegedly one of four principal investigators on the study called DART, which is also being spearheaded by the University of California at San Diego. Our faith in humanity is restored. The online home sharing network service Airbnb has announced that they will be offering free accommodation to detainees and travelers who are affected by the United States President Donald Trump's travel restrictions. Brian Chesky, the Airbnb chief executive, made the announcement on Sunday as the company joins others in protesting Trump's executive order which blocked citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S for 90 days. The banned countries are Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Somalia, and Libya. Citizens include refugees and people who hold valid visas or permanent residence permits. The order also sees it that refugees from anywhere in the world are banned for 120 days, and gives priority admission to Christians. The news has been leaving the world in shock, and tech companies which employ foreign workers are clamoring that the ban is immoral and un-American. One of the vocal CEOs is Brian Chesky who took to Twitter to air out his disappointment. "Not allowing countries or refugees into America is not right and we must stand with those who are affected," said Chesky in a tweet. In another Twitter post, Chesky announced their generous offer, "Airbnb is providing free housing to refugees and anyone not allowed in the US. Stayed tuned for more, contact me if urgent need for housing." According to Chesky, they have 3 million homes where places to stay for refugees and people in need who were denied the ability to board US-bound flights. There is currently no other detail about how the plan is going to be implemented aside from Chesky asking the people in need to reach out to him directly. Other tech heads who voiced out about the ban include Netflix Inc. chief executive, Reed Hastings who said it was a "sad week" and called to link arms together to "protect American values of freedom and opportunity."; CEO Tim Cook who forwarded a letter to employees saying that the new order was "not a policy we support." As you may have heard, Xiaomi and Samsung are skipping the Mobile World Congress trade show that is set to happen next month in Barcelona. But why is HTC not going to unveil its latest flagship smartphone, the HTC 11 there? The event itself is a playground for tech companies to show off their latest developments in mobile technology. Why Is HTC Skipping The Mobile World Congress? Well, the real reason for HTC to skip the big event is because of the chip, specifically the Snapdragon 835 chipset which is still due on April. To back this up, in an interview with TBreak, Chialin Chang, the HTC President of Smartphones and Connected devices explained as to why the company will not be part of the MWC. He explained that HTC has always been a company that is on the forefront of the latest technology, especially when it comes to the newest CPU. He then added that once that they acquire the CPUs that they wanted, HTC will release its newest iteration based on the latest processor. With this being said, then it can be assumed that the HTC 11 will be the company's 2nd flagship smartphone for this year. When Will The HTC 11 Be Released? Well, it's hard to tell, because it could take time for HTC to set it all up right after they get their hands on the Snapdragon 835 this April. However, according to Android Central, the HTC 11 could be released in the second quarter of the year. HTC 11's Specs And Features Now, you must be wondering what could be the possible specs and features of the HTC 11 will be. Here are its rumored specs and features according to Phone Arena: Display And Platform According to the source, it will have a 5.5-inch screen with a screen resolution of 1440 x 2560 pixels (534 PPI). It will be running on Android 7.0 Nougat, an Octa-core Kyro 200 64 Bit processor, and an Adreno 540 for its GPU chip. Camera And Battery The HTC 11 is rumored to feature a 12 MP dual rear camera and an 8 MP front-facing camera. It will be powered by a 3,700 mAh battery. The Verdict I really appreciate that HTC is not playing it safe and really giving it all for their new upcoming device, unlike what LG did with its LG G6. And about the device, there is so much potential with just its chipset alone and could be one of the best smartphones of 2017. However, I just hope that they could at least adjust the screen because I like my phone's screen size to be at least 5.7 inches. I also want it to have a 3.5 mm headphone jack, and some new features. Yeah, I think non-wireless headphones are more useful and efficient, because the way I see it when compared to the wireless AirPods, those things can be easy to be stolen, regardless if the new iOS 10.3 has this feature that could help find the AirPods by making it emit a high-frequency noise. Not only that, given that they are wireless and tiny, there is a high chance that they could shoot into holes when accidentally dropped and you can never recover them. The hashtag #DeleteUber became Twitter's top trending topic on Sunday. Users took aim at the app for not participating in the NY taxi drivers' strike at John F. Kennedy International Airport against Donald Trump's immigration order. The protests were staged as two Iraqis were detained after the new president's controversial executive order. It seems that protesters of United States President Donald Trump's Immigration Order have been deleting the popular Uber app from their smartphones. Trump administration's order prohibits citizens including refugees and even visa holders from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S for 90 days. The Uber beef started when the company decided to announce that they will not be surging prices, following a strike by taxi cab drivers. The protesters did not take rides from the airport, but Uber still pushed through with the promise of not increasing the fare price despite the great demand for taxis. The New York Taxi Workers Alliance announced that there would be a pause in taxi operations as they tweeted, "NO PICKUPS @ JFK Airport 6 PM to 7 PM today. Drivers stand in solidarity with thousands protesting inhumane & unconstitutional." JFK terminals echoed with chants: "No ban, no wall, sanctuary for all!" and "no hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here!" Uber NYC then made their no price surge announcement. Hundreds of Uber users were then consecutively posting screenshots taken of deleting the Uber app. Users also pointed their fingers at Uber's CEO Travis Kalanickwith suspicion of collaborating with Donald Trump after joining Trump's business advisory council. Uber's competitor, Lyft, found favor from the masses when they pledged to donate 1 million USD to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). According to Lyft, "Banning people of a particular faith or creed, race or identity, sexuality or ethnicity, from entering the U.S. is antithetical to both Lyft's and our nations' core values." Last year, both tech giants Samsung and Apple released waterproof flagship smartphones with the Galaxy S7 and iPhone 7 series. Also, Google released a smartphone called as the Pixel and Pixel XL but not like Samsung's and Apple's, they don't have that waterproof feature. Today, a new report claims that Google smartphone successors, presumably called Pixel 2 and Pixel XL 2, will have a new waterproof design. New Waterproof Design: Is It Google Pixel 2 Pixel XL 2's Best Feature? Stephen Hall, the Senior Editor of the fan blog 9to5Google, said on Twitter that "Little tidbit we were told in October last year that I forgot about: Waterproofing definitely coming with next Pixel device." According to Hall, this fact was something Google wanted to do on its original Pixel devices but instead, it prioritized the camera output. Now, Google decided to put enough time to make the phone waterproof as well. If there has just been one feature lacking in every Google Pixel and Google Pixel XL, it is said to be the waterproof build. So it certainly seems plausible that Google would please its critics by adding the feature to the Pixel 2 and Pixel XL 2 in the fall. Also, it has been reported that Google wanted the first-generation Pixel and Pixel XL to be waterproof, but the feature was dropped because of the internal conflict between the camera hardware and/or waterproofing versus the price point. As reported before, HTC silently builds the Pixel and Pixel XL for Google. But it's unclear whether the company has been commissioned to build the next smartphones under the series of both Pixel and Pixel XL. If that will not happen, Google may use its playbook for the Nexus series, which saw the company partner with various Android licensees such as Samsung, LG, Motorola as well as Huawei to manufacture its devices. Back in 2016, Apple joined the waterproof smartphone devices with the release of the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus. LG is also expected to follow the thread by making its upcoming LG G6 waterproof. We can now expect to see Google "definitely" add the popular feature to its next-generation Pixel smartphones. According to TechTimes, even though the lack of waterproofing is an issue for some people, both the Google Pixel and Pixel XL remain two of the most popular flagship smartphones on the market. Verizon, one of the Google's exclusive carrier partner, remains to be sold out of both Pixel and Pixel XL devices and it's showing that the shipping date of the devices will be on Feb. 14 and March 3, respectively. Other Expected Features Of The Upcoming Google Pixels The Samsung Galaxy S5 was released in 2014 and it was the first water-resistant smartphone to be released by Samsung. The feature was dropped the following year with the launch of the Samsung's very ownGalaxy S6 and S6 edge. But aside from the Google Pixel 2 and Google Pixel XL 2 having its new waterproof design, both of the two smartphones are said to be the new major Android challengers, as Samsung is getting ready for the release of its next flagship named as the Galaxy S8. The two upcoming Google Pixel smartphones could each be fitted with 6 GB of RAM and a dual camera set-up. They could also feature a tri-camera technology and an OIS support for clearer and better quality pictures. Both the Google Pixel 2 and Pixel XL 2 may feature support for the second gen Daydream VR as well as water and dust resistance capabilities. Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin announced that Russias Proton-M rockets will be grounded for more than three months because of engine flaws during production. A report from Kommersant newspaper reports that the Russian space agency has decided to recall the Proton-M engines due to problems. It was revealed during an investigation that the illiquid components used is unable to stand extremely high temperatures. Rogozin visited the Voronezh Mechanical Plant the company that produces the Proton-M engines and called for an investigation. At least three Proton-M rockets will have to be unassembled and the production process has to be halted. Rogozin wrote that the people who are responsible for the substitution of technology and documentation will be strictly punished. Rogozin stated the people who allowed the problem to slip through had known perfectly well that their actions could lead to accidents and event death. Rogozin is seeking the toughest internal investigation to be conducted after his meeting with the heads of VMP. The Proton-M launches is set to resume in three and a half months. One launch is scheduled in February. The Proton-M is a key rocket in Russias space program. The rocket is used to make deliveries to the International Space Station. The Proton-M rocket successfully launched an Intelsat 31/DLA-2 communications satellite from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan last June 2016. The rocket also had its share of incidents over the past years as reported by RT. After Russian officials put the blame of a crash of a Progress cargo ship in December was a result of a malfunction by engines that were built at the plant, the head of the Voronezh factory resigned. The accident is one of several serious incidents to trouble Russias space industry. In May 2015, a Progress cargo ship plunged into the Pacific Ocean. In May of 2014, a Proton-M rocket broke up while carrying an advanced satellite up in the atmosphere as reported by abc NEWS. A Central Investigation Agency (CIA) report revealed 6 UFO sightings over the skies of India, Bhutan and Nepal. The report was part of the 930,000 declassified documents recently shared online by the agency. Details of the sightings were then disclosed to the public and UFO hunters are then speculating that alien domination might soon happen as the appearance of more mysterious aircraft is being reported. The U.S. Airforce and the CIA appear to have seriously taken past UFO sightings as they have reportedly formed teams to look into the incidents. It can even be remembered that the CIA declassified 930,000 documents or totaling to 12 million pages, and were released on Jan. 17. Following this, it was seen that there were six notable UFO sightings over the skies of South Ladakh and North Sikkim in India, Bhutan and Nepal. Reports of these sightings were said to be compiled in April 1968, according to Hindustan Times. UFO Sighting in North Sikkim The report claims that a bright and fast-moving, mysterious aircraft was spotted over north Sikkim and Bhutan on Feb. 19, 1968, at 9 in the evening. The object reportedly hovered over the areas of Lachung, Lachen, Muguthang, Thangu and Cholamu in Sikkim. It was also revealed that the light from the object was bright enough to light the said areas that night. As per report, there was a thundering sound after the alleged UFO was spotted in Cholamu. UFO Sighting in Ladakh Meanwhile, another UFO was claimed to have been seen flying over Chang La, Koyul and Fukche in Ladakh on March 4, 1968, at one in the afternoon. Witnesses claim to have seen and heard a white light and simultaneously two blasting sounds, respectively. There was also a reddish light-tailed by a white smoke. The alleged UFO was said to have been flying from east to west over the said locations. Two more sightings of the same nature were spotted on the same day and another on March 25. However, the UFO sighting on the latter was reportedly moving towards Demchok. The CIA report also said that the rocket-like object during the March 25 incident had a white-yellow-white trail and was approximately 20 yards long and was flying at a height of 20-25,000 feet. UFO Sighting in Bhutan According to the International Business Times, Bhutan recorded its UFO incident on Feb. 21, 1968 at 9:30 in the evening. A bluish-colored object was said to have been spotted over the capital Thimpu, and reportedly moved speedily and silently. It was also said that the alleged UFO emitted light that was able to brighten up the area. Following these sightings, it was not revealed though how the CIA looks at the incidents and how the agency responded accordingly. A science studying team, Scientific Advisory Panel, was reportedly formed by the CIA which collaborated with the Air Technical Intelligence Centre to study the evidence of the reported UFO sightings. It was also reported that the teams assessed the potential dangers to UFO sightings to the national security and came up with the conclusion that the incidents do not constitute direct physical threats. However, the CIA continued to track on UFO sightings which others believe still exists today. Five dead after shots have been fired at Quebec city mosque, Sputnik reported. Several shots have been fired at a mosque in Quebec, Canada, local media reported. There were about forty people inside at the moment of the accident, according to witnesses. The mosque president has told reporters that five people were killed. The shots were fired during evening prayers around 8 PM EST, there were three gunmen according to reports. The police have reportedly detained two suspects. Apple has just publicly begun to roll its latest iOS 10.2 update, which brings some new features to the company's devices. But for those that prefer their smartphones to be jailbroken, the update posses a problem. Famed hacker Luca Todesco has been rolling out his own jailbreaking tools, but iOS 10.2 might just be the last one. As Forbes notes, Todesco's Yalu jailbreak has been split the public because it has been relatively limited. His iOS 10.1.1 jailbreak tool only worked on Apple's newest models and his recent iOS 10.2 tool is not compatible with the iPhone 7 and the iPhone 7 Plus. Moreover, it is still in its beta stage, which makes it unstable to download and use. Todesco also went on his Twitter to announce that following his iOS 10.2 release, he will step away from the jailbreaking stage. The timing of his announcement was a little indefinite so it is unclear whether or not the public will see his return eventually. This means that the jailbreaking public might have to settle their sights on hacking group Pangu once again. Pangu has not released a jailbreaking device since iOS 9, but it has been a constant rumor in the market that the group does have one up its sleeve. The reason for the delay has often times revolved around timing, mostly that the group is waiting for Apple to breath between each update. This was logical as a new jailbreaking tool would have to follow each release. This is again being reported for iOS 10.2 by Tech Times. The publication claims that Pangu has a tool in their hands, but has again delayed its release. Reportedly, the group has shown a demo of the same and is now working on making the same stable enough for the public. If this is the case, the public might see the release of a tool within the next few days. Parasite proteins plays a role in new tuberculosis cure. A study reveals that proteins produced by parasites could stimulate a molecular activity which can help fight tuberculosis. Researchers suggest host-directed tuberculosis therapies involving these proteins. Tuberculosis is an infectious disease caused by the bacteria called mycobacterium tuberculosis. In most cases, it affects the lungs however, it can also infect other parts of the body. Some common symptoms of tuberculosis include cough with blood-containing sputum, weight loss, fever and night sweats. Tuberculosis is thought to affect about one third of the world population. In 2014, there were 9.6 million cases of active tuberculosis resulting to less than 2 million deaths. Still, the statistics continue to increase each year. Proteins from parasites which causes toxoplasmosis can help fight mycobacteria. A study published in PLOS Pathogens reveals that these proteins could be used in a new potential host-directed therapy for tuberculosis. Host-directed therapies are those which involve targeting the processes which help the bacteria survive rather than the bacteria itself. Researchers at Hanyang University in South Korea tested the new tuberculosis cure in mycobacteria-infected mice. They were treated using mycobacteria-infected mice to observe the activity of GRA7 proteins. GRA7 are proteins produced by parasites after the host cells are infected. They found out that a host protein, PKC, is important to the interaction between GRA7 and ASC or PLD1. This contribute to the antimicrobial defense against mycobacterium tuberculosis. "Taken together, these results underscore a previously unrecognized role of GRA7 in modulating antimicrobial host defense mechanism during mycobacterial infection," the researchers said on the study. The study gives insight to the development of new potential tuberculosis cure using GRA7-based host-directed therapies, cited Science Daily. Common treatments to tuberculosis include use of antibiotics to kill the bacteria, however, some antibiotics become ineffective due to the unusual structure of the mycobacteria. More research is needed as the study was conducted on mice and human cells and not actual tuberculosis patients. Key personalities in the tech industry are taking a stand against the U.S. President's immigration law. The controversial EO signed by Donald Trump which prohibits immigrants from entering the United States has been met with disdain by many including from the tech sector. It is quite clear why people of different races, genders and status quos are up in arms protesting this new executive order. The involvement of tech companies is nothing to be surprised of, as well. During the campaign period, Trump has been vocal in his opposition to the supposed ways tech companies are working against the American people. He has openly criticized Apple and insisted that he will block the merger of AT&T and Time-Warner. But more importantly, Trump has indicated that he will impose new laws that are seen by tech companies as major impediments to the industry. Tech People vs The Immigration Ban One of Trump's first actions as the 45th president of the U.S. is to ban immigrants from entering the country. Immediately, its repercussions were felt. Google has already instructed all its employees in other countries to come back to the U.S. before the EO takes full effect. Google co-founder Sergey Brin, whose family emigrated from the Soviet Union, was seen at the San Francisco International Airport "in a personal capacity" among the protesters calling for a stop to the supposedly unjust rule. Microsoft is offering legal assistance to any of its people that will be affected by the ban. Uber is offering the same though it remains a controversial figure due to its CEO's connection to Trump. Apple's Tim Cook sent out an email saying the company owes its existence to immigrants and refugees. He went on to say that Trump's immigration policy is not something that the company supports especially since Apple employs workers who are directly affected by the order. Other personalities to protest the immigration policy include Netflix's Reed Hastings which is afraid that Trump's actions "will make America less safe", and Twitter's jack Dorsey who described the EO as "real and upsetting". Effect Of The Ban On The Tech Industry The H-1B visa program, allows skilled people to work in the U.S. and eventually earn green cards. Some of the brightest minds and talented hands working for different companies come from all over the world. Even some of the CEOs and other tech leaders are of foreign descent. The idea that these people will not be permitted to work let alone enter the country will leave a huge dent in America's tech industry. Asus Zenfone 3S Max is the newest smartphone from the Taiwanese manufacturer. Asus seems to be on a roll as the Zenfone 3S Max is the latest one on its lineup. With a 5000 mAh, this phone seems to be quite promising but the newest reviews say otherwise. Here's a quick review on why the Asus Zenfone 3S Max is different from other phones in the lineup. Asus Zenfone 3S Max Features This phone comes with a 5.2-inch display and a metal build. The phone comes in two colors: gold and black. Zenfone 3S Max has a candy bar design and it has been altered to be more ergonomic. The phone fits perfectly into one's hand thanks to the chamfered back and rim. Based on the phone, which has been reviewed by one tech insider, the fingerprint sensor is placed in front of the device. Meanwhile, the speakers and the micro USB is at the bottom. The power button and the volume control are located on the right side of the phone and on the left side, there's the headphone jack and the SIM card tray. The compact design also offers a major advantage and it has a premium feel. Asus Zenfone 3S Max Review When it comes to performance, Zenfone 3S Max disappoints especially when the user is keen on playing games and using the camera. The phone heats easily and it is prone to lagging. However, the smartphone performs better when users are only doing basic functions like texting and calling. Multitaskers also find this phone to be a tad disappointing. Switching between apps can be hard to do. While the phone runs on Android Nougat, the interface was seen to be full of bugs. The battery, which has been the main focus of Asus, is definitely impressive. Overall, Asus Zenfone 3S Max is a good pick when users only need the basics phone functionality and a good battery life. Justin Trudeau said that the deadly shooting conducted in the Islamic Cultural Center in the country's Quebec City was of a cowardly nature, Sputnik reported. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that the deadly shooting conducted in the Islamic Cultural Center in the country's Quebec City was of a cowardly nature. "Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families," Trudeau said Sunday on his Twitter account. At around 8 p.m. on Sunday a group of gunmen attacked the Islamic Cultural Center in Quebec and had reportedly killed five and injured several more people. Local law enforcement officers have reportedly detained two attackers. The number of powerful chips coming out of China keeps growing as a war of words on semiconductors with the U.S. escalates. A joint venture between Qualcomm and China's Guizhou province, called Huaxintong Semiconductor Technology, has started the development of a new server chip based on ARM technology. The joint venture is "now busy developing a customized server CPU product based on our technology and designs for the China market," said Derek Aberle, president at Qualcomm, according to a Seeking Alpha transcript of an earnings call last week. Other companies are also developing custom chips for the Chinese server market. Suzhou PowerCore is developing a CPU based on IBM's Power architecture, though the venture has raised security concerns. AMD has also created a joint venture to create Chinese x86 server chips. Chipmakers are making a run at the Chinese market, which is considered a big opportunity for data center technologies. Like Facebook and Google in the U.S., Chinese companies like Alibaba and Tencent are establishing mega data centers for cloud and machine-learning services. But the Chinese market has its quirks because companies there prefer to buy hardware from local vendors. It's partly because servers made by Chinese companies are cheaper and potentially come with fewer national security risks. China's long-term goal is to be self reliant in the hardware market, with a majority of devices in the country running on homegrown components. The country already has the world's fastest supercomputer, TaihuLight. A Chinese company called Tsinghua Unigroup, the majority of it state-owned, is building a US$30 billion chip factory and investing $4.3 billion in a city to serve the factory. "The Chinese have been transparent about their desire to have a strong, indigenous semiconductor industry because they have spent so much importing this stuff," said Nathan Brookwood, principal analyst at Insight 64. In 2014, the Chinese government said it would spend $150 billion over the next 10 years to grow its local semiconductor market. The U.S. has accused China of rigging the semiconductor market by giving an unfair advantage to Chinese chip companies. Though Intel rules the China server chip market, Qualcomm is trying to push its chips, based on ARM architecture. Qualcomm late last year announced its first 48-core server chip, the Centriq 2400. It is considered the best ARM server chip yet. But Intel has more than a 90 percent server chip market share, while ARM servers are virtually nonexistent and are still being tested. China represents a big opportunity to Qualcomm and ARM architecture to grow in the server market. The Guizhou province is building up a reputation as a hub for big data, with many cloud server and telecom companies establishing data centers there. Making homegrown chips and servers will boost the region's economy and keep more workers employed. Huaxintong Semiconductor Technology is a separate company from Qualcomm and developing its own CPU technology, a Qualcomm spokeswoman said in an email. What the joint venture company is developing is unclear, but the technology could be based on the Falkor CPU core used in Centriq 2400. Huaxintong Semiconductor Technology could take Qualcomm's technology and customize the CPU for local customers. It could strip out or add I/O and throughput technologies to directly address customer needs, Brookwood said. The chips could drive cloud installations and target Intel's Xeon E3 and E5 chips. Alternately, Huaxintong Semiconductor could create an ARM chip for high-performance computing by cramming many ARM CPU cores together, Brookwood said. That could allow the joint venture to create a chip to compete with Intel's Xeon Phi. The server chip design will also depend on the software a customer uses. For now, the only proven software stack for ARM architecture is LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) for web serving, but new usage models in areas like deep learning and high-performance computing are emerging every day. US President Donald Trump and South Korea's acting President Hwang Kyo-ahn discussed security measures to tackle potential threat posed by North Korea, the White House said in a statement, Sputnik reported. On Sunday, Trump and Hwang held a phone conversation and discussed a number of issues, including the existing alliance between the two countries. "The two leaders agreed to take steps to strengthen joint defense capabilities to defend against the North Korean threat," the statement said on Sunday. The statement added that the leaders had also discussed a number of issues, including the forthcoming visit of Secretary of Defense James Mattis to the Asian country, reflecting the "close friendship" between Washington and Seoul. EACH week we look back at Isle of Wight history and heritage, using the Isle of Wight County Press Archive.For more, please see the Isle of Wight County Press newspaper, every Friday.Search for your own stories by accessing our archive here. Fifty years ago: It was a melancholic scene at Coppins Bridge, as another Island rail landmark disappeared. The viaduct bordering the river, which had once kept the lines safe from flooding, was demolished by the IW County Council. Because of the proximity of houses and shops, the use of explosives was ruled out, so it was the tried and tested method of a wrecking ball which erased this small slice of Island history. 100 Years Ago January 27, 1917 THE Island was facing numerous food production problems. It was reported pig-keeping was unviable because of the cost of feed and the availability of land was worthless without sufficient labour or manure. To make things worse, sparrows were rapidly becoming a problem as they stripped crop fields bare. The same was said for crows, wood pigeons, jays, stoats and foxes and it was advised clubs be formed to tackle their numbers. 75 Years Ago January 31, 1942 A report from the Special Committee for Harvest Camps stated schoolboy labour proved invaluable in the previous years harvest and said attention should be paid so it might be fully utilised again. 50 Years Ago January 21, 1967 The January meeting of the UFO Society took place in the Unitarian Church Hall, Newport. The meeting was addressed by Anthony Durham, of Cambridge University Group for the Investigation of UFOs. Mr Durham stressed the need for a scientific approach to UFO investigation and, through experiments, demonstrated how 95 percent of sightings could be explained, leaving the remainder a genuine mystery worthy of the societys time. 25 Years Ago January 24, 1992 Fossil remains of an iguanodon found at Brighstone Bay were thought to be the oldest ever to be discovered on the Island. Martin Simpson, with fellow palaeontologist John Wince, discovered the remnants of the giant lizards left leg, pelvis, ribs and vertebrae. Large quantities of superglue were used as part of an unorthodox means of keeping the fossil intact during extraction. The beast would have roamed around 120 million years ago and been 25ft tall. 10 Years Ago January 26, 2007 A Cowes woman pressed the town council to launch a case for an inquiry into unfair competition on cross-Solent ferry travel. The anonymous commuter even compiled a dossier of evidence, which she sent to each town councillor. From the study conducted by her and fellow passengers, it was said Islanders were being outpriced for getting to the mainland. Search for stories using our Online Archive THE Isle of Wight will add its voice to the global condemnation of President Donald Trump's travel ban on mainly Muslim citizens and refugees, at a demonstration tomorrow (Tuesday) evening. People will gather at St Thomas' Square, Newport, from 6pm. Almost one million people have signed a petition calling for the cancellation of President Trump's state visit to the UK later this year and a demonstration, expected to attract tens of thousands of protesters, will be held at Downing Street tonight (Monday). All are welcome to attend tomorrow's event in Newport, to stand up for the rights of law abiding citizens and refugees across the world and send a clear message that no-one should banned from travel due top their religious beliefs. Speaking in support of the event, Isle of Wight Green Party parliamentary candidate Vix Lowthion said: "'The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. "Whilst standing up for refugees in a town square on a dark winters night may not set the world alight, we join many thousands of other concerned people across the country in taking the first of many steps to condemn the actions of President Trump, and those who support him. "History will judge us at this moment, just as history judges citizens who turned a blind eye in the 1930s. I urge islanders to take 60 minutes out of their day, and join us in Newport on Tuesday evening." In a weird turn of events, President Donald Trump was the one who reacted first when former President Barack Obama was lambasted by a former Army intelligence analyst that he commuted. Trump's criticism of the former Army intelligence analyst may have shocked the world because he himself has been hard on Obama even before he campaigned for the presidency. Former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning wrote an opinion piece in The Guardian that partly disparaged how Obama handled his administration. The article prompted Trump to hit back against Manning, FOX News reported. Manning penned the piece just a few weeks after Obama decided to shorten her prison sentence. Manning was accused of leaking confidential information and was supposed to serve 35 years in prison. Obama commuted Manning's sentence by 28 years. In her article, Manning accused the former president of not having enough accomplishments because of his choice to compromise. Manning pointed out that Obama has been called "too weak" by his enemies, a point that Trump highlighted in his tweet against the former Army intelligence analyst, USA Today reported. Trump called Manning an "ungrateful traitor" for calling Obama weak. However, it may be that the attack actually stemmed from the fact that Manning expressed disapproval of the new administration. In her article, Manning expressed fear that Trump's administration may foster hatred against minorities and the LGBT community. Trump's largely conservative administration has threatened to throw out immigrants and cut funding for minorities. White House press secretary Sean Spicer said Trump does not agree with Obama's decision to commutate Manning's sentence. The president reportedly feels that the action sends a wrong message to those who mishandle confidential information. Jobs & Hire previously reported about Trump's meeting with CEOs of the largest U.S. companies, signaling that his administration will be business friendly. It did not take Hugo Barra too long to find another company to work for. Facebook Founder Mark Zuckerberg proudly announced that Barra will be under his wings. Barra, who served as an executive at tech company Google and smartphone company Xiaomi, became a vice president of virtual reality at Facebook, CNET reported. The CEO of the popular social media app Facebook said he and Barra go way back from the time that the former Google executive was working on the Android operating system. Barra left Xiaomi after almost four years in the company due to health reasons, as previously reported by Jobs & Hire. It appears that the environment in Beijing, which is known for its smog, did not agree well with Barra's body, prompting his return to Silicon Valley in the United States. Facebook has been trying to further develop its virtual reality technology, believing that the future lies in it. The social media company has further expanded into the tech industry with its acquisition of Oculus VR for about $3 billion. The acquisition did little to boost Facebook's topline and bottomline as customers are slow to adopt the technology. Adding Barra on its management team is expected to boost its augmented reality project. Zuckerberg said that he and Barra share the same believe that virtual and augmented reality will become more ubiquitous in the near future, PCMag reported. Barra said his job will not start until a few months later. As vice president of virtual reality, Barra will have to handle all of Facebook's initiative in connection with the development of the technology. Barra, a Brazilian computer scientist, has spent years as vice president of product management for Android at Google. He left the tech giant in 2013 to pursue a career in China as an executive within the Chinese mobile company Xiaomi. The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) expressed grave concern at the Executive Order passed by the US President banning nationals of 7 OIC Member States from the United States and excluding those holding valid visas and permanent residence cards from entry. The OIC General Secretariat stated that this decision will further complicate the already grave challenges facing refugees. As a result of this ban many of those fleeing war and persecution have been adversely and unjustly affected, OIC website reported. Such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism at a critical time when the OIC has been engaged with all partners, including the US, to combat extremism and terrorism in all their forms and manifestations. The OIC calls upon the United States government to reconsider this blanket decision and maintain its moral obligation to provide leadership and hope at a time of great uncertainty and unrest in the world. Every day, millions of workers rush to the office as they want to get to work on time. Though some people would give anything to avoid the morning rush, Utah resident Brian Smith wanted to be among the throng of people heading to their jobs, as he was laid off nearly a year ago. Since losing his job in February 2016, Smith submitted more than 180 resumes, hoping to hear from just one of them. Little did he know that a donated suit would change his life, as Smith, who has been homeless, has just been hired. Speaking with KSL, Smith recalled how he became homeless after he was let go from his job. It was reported that rent 30 days past due became 60, then 90 days, until eventually, he was evicted from his home. Off and on, yes, said Smith. Staying at hotels, couches, carsanything you can find. Smith said that after getting rejection upon rejection, a man can only take so much. These last 10 months, Ive lost faith in humanity, in God, in life, he tearfully recalled. There were many times when shotguns lookedvery tempting. It was reported that Smith decided to try one more time and checked KSL.com to look for more jobs. Upon scanning the website, he stumbled upon a story about a Utah company giving away new suits to homeless people to help them feel confident during job interviews. The clothing store, Utah Woolen Mills in Salt Lake City, gives away hundreds of suits to those desperate for a job. Smith got the suit Saturday, was interviewed Monday, and got the job Tuesday. I didnt think it would happen to me, and it did, said Smith. I owe them so much. The project, called Suited for Good, said on its website that for every suit that Utah Woolen Mills sells in 2017, a suit will be donated to a man that is committed to improving his life for the better. Candidates for a free suit are nominated via an application on www.suitedforgood.com. Each application is reviewed by a committee, and chosen candidates are invited to come to Utah Woolen Mills for fitting and proper dress instruction. A week later, the suit is finished and candidates are equipped for interviews and the next steps towards making their lives better. But UWM goes beyond that, as they follow up with the candidates after four months to ensure that proper steps have been taken and that no further help is needed. To nominate a candidate or to apply for a new suit, go to the Suited for Good nomination page here. For more, check out Jobs & Hires report on the man who was fired from his job for attending his babys birth. Most high school graduates look forward to starting college after graduation, but over the past few years, more and more students are opting to take a gap year. Though gap years have been a common occurrence in Europe, it is now a growing trend in the U.S. as young people want a chance to see the world, gain some work experience, or earn a little money before heading to university. Take for instance former President Barack Obamas eldest daughter, Malia Obama. The 18-year-old made headlines last year when it was announced that she would be taking a gap year before entering Harvard University. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Malia is making the most of her gap year by working as an intern for Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein. A source said that she is expected to begin work in the New York office of Weinstein Co. in February before she attends Harvard this fall. Apart from working for a Hollywood producer, what else can high school graduates do to make the most out of their gap year? Here are a few suggestions on what graduates can do before heading to college. Earn some money There are several ways that high school graduates can earn some money before heading to college. Dont just go to the corner coffee house for a barista jobtry something out of your comfort zone. You could look into internships in other parts of the world. This way, you could travel and gain some life experience while saving up for the future. If a family member has a business, you could work for him or her and ask if you could learn how to run a business. You can also take this opportunity to start your own small business. If youre crafty, you can sell your wares on Etsy, Facebook, or Instagram. Travel According to Online College, most people want to spend their gap years traveling as much as possible. Though some might balk at the cost of traveling, there are many inexpensive ways to see the world. Backpacking is one inexpensive way to see the world, and Southeast Asia is a backpackers paradise as there are various places that are rich in culture, the food is flavorful and cheap, and one can stay at hotels or backpacker hostels for about $15 a night. If youre hesitant about leaving the country, you can always take a road trip across America with friends. Its a chance to see the country and visit relatives and friends in other states. Volunteer There are plenty of opportunities to volunteer in the country and in impoverished parts of the world. You can volunteer for community projects in Africa, where people are needed to teach school and build homes, among others. If you dont want to leave home, you can always volunteer in your communitys organizations. You could also check your local hospital to find out if there are any volunteering programs which will allow you to get a firsthand look at careers in healthcare. For more, check out Jobs & Hires report on low-cost business ideas. It appears that the market welcomes the possible merger of two huge telecommunication companies. The price of Charter's stock skyrocketed following the news that Verizon is planning to make an offer to acquire the telecommunication company that recently bought Time Warner Cable. As reported by Tech Times, the resulting company if Verizon and Charter join forces would lead to a company that could dominate the communications industry in terms of wired and wireless. Reports say that the CEO of Verizon, Lowell McAdam, has already initiated merger discussions with Charter. JPMorgan predicted that T-Mobile will become part of the potential merger one way or another. JPMorgan projected that President Donald Trump's administration would spur the merger of the two communications company on expectations that the new administration would be friendlier to businesses. Earlier reports say that Verizon was choosing between Charter and Comcast as it plans to take advantage of the friendly business environment under Trump's administration. Yakima Herald reported that other communications companies may be forced to consolidate if the deal pushes through. Verizon has 114 million cellphone subscribers, 4.6 million television customers and 7 million Internet subscribers, while Charter has 17 million television customers and 21 million Internet subscribers. The combination of the two companies will definitely expand their customer base and will leave other communication companies with little leverage to compete. Verizon has been reportedly facing some issues with its wireless division. It is not clear how Charter will be able to help, but the addition of another communication company with a large customer base would definitely give Verizon some synergy that it can use to boost its divisions. The merger poses a threat to other communication companies like AT&T and T-Mobile, two other players in the wireless industry. Jobs & Hire previously reported that Verizon will release Samsung's Note 7 bricking update. A Singapore-based investment fund is interested in putting some of its money in Verily Life Sciences. If the deal materializes, it would add to the list of transactions that Asian companies entered into with companies based in the United States. As reported by San Francisco Business Journal, Temasek, an investment fund based in Singapore, plans to acquire a minority stake in Verily Life Sciences. Alphabet Inc. launched Verily Life Sciences a few years ago as part of its effort to expand into the biomedical industry. Verily Life Sciences, which was previously known as Google Life Sciences Sanofi, is one of Alphabet's more experimental business units. These units carry a lot of financial risk for the company, and looking for some investors who will put some money into them is expected to reduce the risk. Temasek is willing to pay $800 million just to get a minority stake in Verily Life Sciences. The Singapore-based investment fund has long been trying to get into life sciences, and its investment in Verily Life Sciences will help it achieve its goal. Deal Street Asia reported that in exchange for the investment, Temasek will get a seat on Verily Life Sciences' board, which means it will have a say on the operations and future direction of the company. Meanwhile, Verily Life Sciences will be able to develop its experimental products outside of the United States, including China. Some of the $800 million will be given to Verily Life Sciences in the coming days, while some of it will be invested in the second half of 2017. Temasek's portfolio has a net value of roughly $170 billion. It has invested in several industries, including real estate, energy, transportation, telecommunications and financial services. Alphabet is the holding company of tech giant Google. Jobs & Hire previously reported an update to Google's Project Abacus by removing the password. The African Union (AU) satisfied on Monday the Moroccan bid for restoring its membership in the regional organization, Sputnik reported. An overwhelming majority of the African Union member states voted in favor of Moroccan returning to the organization, Moroccos news agency MAP reported. Morocco was the only African country that was not a member of the bloc after withdrawing in 1984 over AU's official recognition of Western Sahara, a territory claimed by Rabat. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has accepted an invitation to visit with President Donald Trump in the United States on February 15, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said in his press briefing on Monday, Sputnik reported. Earlier it was reported that Trump held a phone conversation with Netanyahu, in which he invited Israeli PM to Washington in February. "Im pleased to announce that Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel will visit the United States on February 15," Spicer stated. Winston-Salem police are looking for two men, possibly three, who have robbed 10 convenience stores since Dec. 20. The men also have been linked to an armed robbery at a convenience store in Archdale as well, authorities said. In Winston-Salem, investigators have looked over video surveillance and pictures of the robberies as well as interviewed witnesses. Police also have distributed video and photographs of the suspects to Triad news media. Officers are watching the activities at gas stations and convenience stores in an effort to catch the suspects, police Lt. Mike Cardwell said. Anyone who commits these type of robberies this many times are desperate individuals, Cardwell said of the suspects. The robberies have occurred at night in convenience stores in the 3900 block of North Patterson Avenue, the 1100 block of North Cameron Avenue, the 1000 and 2000 blocks of South Broad Street, the 2100 block of South Main Street, the 3000 block of Waughtown Street, 100 block of South Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, the 1500 block of East Sprague Street, the 4800 block of Old Rural Hall Road and the 3700 block of Indiana Avenue. The robbery spree began Dec. 20 at the Stanleyville Grocery at 3990 N. Patterson Ave., and the latest one happened last Monday at the Three Brothers Quick Market at 3719 Indiana Ave. In each case, two armed men enters the store. One suspect jumps over the counter, threatens the clerks and demands money, police said. The men then typically steal money, cigarettes and small cigars, and run from the business. They are in and out of those stores in less than a minute, Cardwell said. In some instances, a third man likely drove the robbers away from the stores, Cardwell said. Witnesses describe the getaway vehicles as a dark colored SUV and a tan passenger car. The suspects were armed with dark colored handguns, Cardwell said. No shots have been fired in the robberies, and no one has been injured. However, one suspect struck a clerk in the robbery at the Three Brothers Quick Market, police said. The clerk wasnt injured. The suspects are described as black males in their 20s, wearing masks on their faces and dark colored hooded sweatshirts, police said. The suspects have been linked to a robbery that happened at 11:26 p.m. on Jan. 17 at the Circle K convenience in the 11000 block of North Main Street in Archdale, said Detective Clifford C.J. Chewning Jr. of the Archdale Police Department. No one was injured. In that incident, two armed men entered the store and one of them jumped over the counter and threatened the clerk, Chewning said. The suspects stole an undisclosed amount of money and merchandise and ran from the store. Investigators have video surveillance of the Archdale robbery, which links the Winston-Salem suspects to that incident, Chewning said. Anyone who has information about these suspects or the robberies can call Crime Stoppers at (336) 727-2800. Q: Ive noticed that my mother seems weaker than she used to be, and sometimes complains of dizziness. She hasnt fallen, but Im concerned she might. Are these serious signs that I should bring up with a doctor? TE Answer: If your loved one is experiencing lightheadedness, or seems worried that they dont have enough strength to complete a task such as getting up from a chair without falling or walking without staggering, it is a good idea to seek out a doctors advice. Feeling dizzy or unsteady, as if everything around her is moving, may indicate that your loved one is experiencing problems with her sense of balance. One common balance disorder is Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (BPPV), which causes vertigo when moving around or getting up out of bed, and is more likely to occur in adults over age 60. While balance disorders like BPPV are only one reason for it, more than one-third of adults over the age of 65 fall every year. A fall or even the fear of falling can have long-term effects on elderly adults. Those with a fear of falling might avoid activities such as walking, shopping and socializing. This lack of variety and spontaneity can plague a homebound senior with boredom and loneliness. Additionally, a fall resulting in injuries could make it difficult for a senior to live independently and meet all of their own care needs. An intact sense of balance is important for maintaining a bodys position, both while moving and standing still. Exercise is one of the best ways to improve your balance and strengthen your muscles. Helping your elder loved one think of ways to introduce a low-impact exercise routine every day can help to ease the fear of falling and actually prevent future injury. Once again, seek a doctors advice before beginning any exercise routine. You may wish to look into Matter of Balance, an evidence-based program designed to reduce fear of falling and increase activity levels in seniors. For more information on local Matter of Balance classes visit the Piedmont Triad Regional Councils website at www.ptrc.org. Q: Can you provide tips on how to stay active for those living with arthritis? RT Answer: Even for those who were once very active and had a regular exercise routine, the pain of arthritis can make exercise seem almost impossible. Staying active is not impossible, however. In fact, many doctors believe exercise is crucial to treatment plans for rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis (OA). As we age, it is common to gain weight and do less physical activity, significantly increasing our risk for these conditions. Being overweight or obese is actually a major contributor to OA, due to the fact that for every pound a person gains, four times that pressure is put on their knees, and six times that pressure on their hips. Here are some tips to use exercise and healthy activities to improve your lifestyle with arthritis: Understand your available range of motion and dont push yourself too far, as this will only increase your joint pain. Instead of doing weight bearing exercises, try water-based activities in warm water. Check with your local YMCA to see if they offer any special aquatics classes for those with arthritis. Stay active if you sit for a good portion of the day, make sure to get up and stretch every 30 to 60 minutes. When you do get up, make sure to take your time and pay attention to what your body is telling you. When planning for your daily lifestyle activities like cooking and getting ready, you can decrease joint pain by making items accessible at the shoulder to thigh range. Strategizing a little so you wont have to lift heavy items or reach uncomfortably will save you pain and keep your body happy and willing to exercise! Eat a healthy diet filled with colorful fruits and vegetables, lean meats and whole grains. This will contribute toward feeling able to get moving. Work on incorporating a daily exercise program into your life but consult your physician before beginning. Forecasters are warning of high winds and increased fire danger Monday across central North Carolina, including the Triad. Winds on Monday are expected to reach sustained levels of 15 to 20 mph with gusts up to 30 mph, forecasters with the National Weather Service said. Humidity levels are already low and outdoor burning is discouraged, forecasters said. Otherwise, the forecast calls for sunny conditions in Forsyth County with a high of around 45. The low Monday night will fall into the mid 20s. Hassiem Muhammad and his sisters are born and bred Americans. But hes deeply troubled by President Donald Trumps immigration crackdown. Muhammad, a junior at UNC School of the Arts, was one of at least 30 to express outrage at the presidents executive order at a rally Saturday for Muslim and immigration rights in Winston-Salem. Chants of When immigrants are under attack, we stand and fight back broke out at a lot at the intersection of Silas Creek and Peters Creek parkways. Participants of various races and backgrounds shouldered signs and shared testimonies. The rally was part of the fallout this weekend as legal permanent residents and visa-holders from seven Muslim-majority countries found they would not be able to return for 90 days after leaving the country. The immigration crackdown sparked anger and fear, leaving some Americans stranded at airports around the world. The executive order suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and bars all immigration for 90 days from countries with terrorism concerns: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. It does not bar immigration from countries linked to funding terrorism, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates. This is discrimination based on religion, said Muhammad, 21. If you dont stand up for what you believe in, how can you expect anything to ever get done? Trumps order singled out Syrians for the most aggressive ban, ordering that anyone from that country, including those fleeing civil war, will be indefinitely blocked from coming to the U.S. Muhammad said he has many friends overseas and had met Syrian refugees through his mosque. While at Saturdays rally, they received insults from people driving along the road. Muhammad applauded countries that preach tolerance and acceptance, and said Trumps move will contribute more to hatred than fixing any problem. In response to Trumps actions, Justin Trudeau, the prime minister of Canada, issued a statement, saying: To those fleeing persecution and war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength. Muhammad said Trumps actions make him fear for his mother and sisters in South Carolina, who are easily identified as Muslim since they cover their heads with scarves. Our president is spewing hatred and discrimination against everyone whos not part of the white America, Muhammad said. Trump said the halt in the refugee program was necessary to give agencies time to develop a stricter screening system. The U.S. may admit refugees on a case-by-case basis during the freeze, and the government will continue to process requests from people claiming religious persecution, provided that the religion of the individual is a minority religion in the individuals country. Muhammad said he hopes the order will be ruled unconstitutional and that it will not foster a climate of hate in the meantime. As a nation, we need to change our state of mind and figure out how to move forward with love, not hate, Muhammad said. Although Trump holds the pen its really the people who give him the power. Jihadist groups on Sunday celebrated the Trump administrations ban on travel from seven Muslim-majority countries, saying the new policy validates their claim that the United States is at war with Islam. Comments posted to pro-Islamic State social media accounts predicted that President Trumps executive order would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists. One posting hailed the U.S. president as the best caller to Islam, while others predicted that Trump would soon launch a new war in the Middle East. [Islamic State leader Abu Bakr] al-Baghdadi has the right to come out and inform Trump that banning Muslims from entering America is a 'blessed ban, said one posting to a pro-Islamic State channel on Telegram, a social-media platform. The writer compared the executive order to the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, which Islamic militant leaders at the time hailed as a "blessed invasion" that ignited anti-Western fervor across the Islamic world. Several postings suggested that Trump was fulfilling the predictions of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American born al-Qaeda leader and preacher who famously said that the West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens. Awlaki was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Yemen in 2011. When U.S. President Donald Trump says We dont want them here and bans the Muslim immigrants from Muslim countries, there is one thing that comes to our mind, said another posting, beneath a banner of al-Awlaki and his quote. Another posting on the Telegram channel Abu Magrebi said Trumps actions clearly revealed the truth and harsh reality behind the American governments hatred toward Muslims. Leaders of the Islamic State speak frequently of their intention to drive a wedge between Western governments and their Muslim populations, and have welcomed outside help intentional or not in fulfilling that goal. In a 2015 essay in the Islamic States English-language magazine Dabiq, the group said that its motivation for launching terrorist attacks in Europe was to provoke an anti-Muslim backlash that would force ambivalent Muslims to enlist with them. Jihadists would have to argue to lengths that Obama, Bush, and others held anti-Islam agendas and hated the religion not just radical terrorists, said Rita Katz, founder of the SITE Intelligence Group, a private organization that monitors jihadist websites. Trump, however, makes that argument a lot easier for them to sell to their followers. The reaction to the ban from Islamic State sympathizers came as current and former U.S. officials also expressed concern that the temporary ban would undermine the global fight against violent Islamic militants. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he worried about the bans impact on Muslim troops fighting alongside Americans to destroy the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. The effect will probably in some areas give ISIS some more propaganda, McCain told CBSs Face the Nation on Sunday, using an acronym for the Islamic State. Robert Richer, a 35-year CIA veteran and former chief of the agencys Near East division, said the ban was a strategic mistake that could undermine future efforts to recruit spies and collect vital information about terrorists and their plans. How, he asked, can CIA officers persuade Iraqi and Syrian nationals to risk their lives to help the United States? This was a win for jihadists and other anti-U.S. forces, said Richer, the deputy chief of the agencys Operations Directorate during the George W. Bush administration. It fuels the belief out there that Americans are anti-Islam. Otherwise, it accomplishes nothing, because the ones we are most concerned about can still get to the United States. ADS ADS After positive news about the Richemont Groups end of year sales (see our newsletter of 16th January), the December export figures for the Swiss watch industry, released last Thursday, made for slightly less depressing reading than usual, with a faint glimmer of hope that the decline might just be bottoming out. The full-year 2016 figures for the Swatch Group, due out this week, will be a look back rather than forward, but analysts at Vontobel have already forecast positive growth for the worlds biggest watchmaking group in 2017. Having sifted through our notes from the SIHH 2017, we have identified a number of trends, which we will be looking at in more detail over the coming weeks. The automotive world was not a trend, but a theme at SIHH 2017, with a number of brands showing off their associations with the car industry. Camille Gendre takes our first look at this on Thursday with a joint interview with Alexandre Peraldi, Design Director at Baume & Mercier, and Pete Brock, the designer of the very rare Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupe that was on display at the entrance to the brands booth. The SIHH also offers us the opportunity to talk to the bosses of the big and small brands, getting an idea of what we can expect over the coming year. In our first such interview post-SIHH, David Chokron spoke to Juan-Carlos Torres, CEO of Vacheron Constantin, about the duo of million-dollar talking pieces presented during the show, among many other things. You can read his interview on Friday. New materials are also showcased during the SIHH and this year offered some interesting twists, which we will come back to soon. But having bumped into Xavier de Roquemaurel, CEO of Czapek & Cie. during the week, I was able to elicit a small but important snippet of information about the brands XO Steel. You can find out today why this steel is unlike any other used in watchmaking. Party update We have added a photo gallery and video from the GMT/WorldTempus party held in partnership with Propaganda Live, TimeCrafters, AsiaTatler and Vontobel. Relive the event (or see what you missed) here. SUBSCRIBE TO OUR WEEKLY NEWSLETTER TO GET ALL THE WATCH NEWS RIGHT IN YOUR MAIL BOX. TORONTO Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has a message for refugees rejected by U.S. President Donald Trump: Canada will welcome you. He says he also intends to talk to Trump about the success of Canada's refugee policy. Trudeau reacted to Trump's visa ban for people from certain Muslim-majority countries by tweeting Saturday: "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada." Trudeau also posted a picture of him greeting a Syrian child at Toronto's airport in late 2015. Trudeau oversaw the arrival of more than 39,000 Syrian refugees soon after he was elected. A spokeswoman for Trudeau said he has a message for Trump. "The Prime Minister is looking forward to discussing the successes of Canada's immigration and refugee policy with the President when they next speak," spokeswoman Kate Purchase told The Associated Press. Trudeau is expected to the visit the White House soon. The prime minister has refrained from criticizing Trump to avoid offending the new president. Canada wants to avoid becoming a target like Mexico has. More than 75 percent of Canada's exports go to the U.S. Brad Wall, the conservative premier of the Canadian province of Saskatchewan, offered his support to Trudeau. "Sask has welcomed approx 2000 refugees this past year," Wall posted on Twitter. "We stand ready to assist fed gov't re: anyone stranded by the US ban." Toronto Mayor John Tory also weighed in, noting that the city is the most diverse in the world. "We understand that as Canadians we are almost all immigrants, and that no one should be excluded on the basis of their ethnicity or nationality," Tory said in a statement. Trump signed a sweeping executive order Friday that he billed as a necessary step to stop "radical Islamic terrorists" from coming to the U.S. Included is a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program. Trump's order singled out Syrians for the most aggressive ban, ordering that anyone from that country, including those fleeing civil war, are indefinitely blocked from coming to the United States. White House National Security adviser Michael Flynn told Canada's national security adviser that holders of Canadian passports, including dual citizens, will not be affected by the ban, Purchase said. "We have been assured that Canadian citizens traveling on Canadian passports will be dealt with in the usual process," Purchase said. Trudeau later posted the statement on Twitter with the hashtag "ACanadianIsACanadian." Earlier the U.S. State Department said that Canadians with dual citizenship from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya would be denied entry for the next three months. The Syrian refugee crisis became a major issue in Canada's election in late 2015 because of the haunting image of a drowned 3-year-old Syrian boy washed up on a Turkish beach. The boy had relatives in Canada. Tima Kurdi, the aunt of the boy who became a symbol of the Syrian refugee crisis, called the U.S. ban on Syrian refugees inhumane and said she was proud of Canada. Trudeau's tweet quickly received more than 150,000 likes. "Welcome to Canada" trended on social media in the country. WASHINGTON Missing from President Donald Trumps blitz of immigration orders was any mention of the fate of hundreds of thousands of young immigrants protected from deportation by former President Barack Obama. That omission has left immigration advocates hopeful Trump has softened his opposition to what he once derided as illegal amnesty, while others say he has quickly abandoned a core campaign pledge. Trump and Republican leaders in Congress have said they are working on a plan that will address the status of the roughly 750,000 immigrants currently protected by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA. The program allows young people who were brought into the country illegally as children to stay and obtain work permits. Neither the president nor GOP leaders have disclosed details on their discussions, although both have suggested those currently protected under the program wont face immediate deportation. Whether they will be allowed to continue to work remains unclear. Trump said this past week he intends to reveal a proposal within a month. They shouldnt be very worried, Trump told ABC News. I do have a big heart. Were going to take care of everybody. ... Where you have great people that are here that have done a good job, they should be far less worried. Trumps delay and the tone of his remarks were a striking shift from the campaign, when he promised to quickly end the program and labeled it amnesty. We will immediately terminate President Obamas two illegal executive amnesties, in which he defied federal law and the constitution to give amnesty to approximately 5 million illegal immigrants, Trump said in August. His current approach appears to be a concession to Republican leaders in Congress who have called for a less aggressive stand on an issue that has pushed some Latino voters away from the party. House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., has argued for a more compassionate approach in dealing with these young immigrants. He has discussed the issue privately with the president and recently said congressional Republicans had been working with his team on a solution. DACA was arguably the most significant and high-profile change Obama made to immigration policy, one he said he made only after Congress failed to enact a broader immigration overhaul. The status of the immigrants, some of whom have little or no connection to the country where they were born, has been a focus of advocates anxiety and activism since Trumps election. The program would be relatively simple for Trump to reverse. The policy does not require an executive order. As of Friday afternoon, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said it was still processing DACA-related work permits. Trumps White House is thought to be divided on the how to handle the issue. Those who have pushed Trump to embrace more restrictive immigration policies, including policy guru Stephen Miller, are said to prefer a harder line. On the other side are those in the White House considered more moderate, including chief of staff Reince Priebus, who said recently that the White House is planning to work with House and Senate leadership to get a long-term solution on that issue. Under a draft executive order first published by the news site Vox, the government would immediately halt processing new DACA applications, but would allow those who already have work permits to retain them until they expire sometime over the next two years. Trump faces pressure from GOP hard-liners, including Iowa Rep. Steve King, who has chafed at signals from Trump aides that immigrants covered by DACA are not a priority for deportation. King said Trump risks a backlash from his political base if he doesnt act swiftly because it was a clear and definitive promise that he made. And when you hear these kinds of statements coming out of the chief of staff and some of these statements that echo pretty closely out of the speaker of the House, it gives real pause to rule of law conservatives, he said. Advocates on both sides are expecting a compromise in which the president perhaps ends DACA and then works with Congress on a permanent solution that allows these immigrants to stay in the country. Mark Gonzales, the president of the Hispanic Action Network, said Trumps actions this past week have definitely shaken up our Hispanic community and the immigrant community in particular. But he said that hes confident from Trump and his aides rhetoric that young immigrants currently protected by DACA dont have to be alarmed. Mark Krikorian, the executive director of the conservative Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for tighter restrictions on immigration, said hes open to a compromise in which, for instance, those previously covered by DACA receive green cards in exchange for other concessions. Suspending DACA processing is an extremely simple, clear-cut thing. And if they havent done it by now, theres some reason for it, said Krikorian. Young people covered by the program have been glued to their televisions anytime Trump takes action, said California lawyer Sergio Garcia, who estimates hes handled more than 15,000 DACA applications. Theres a lot of anxiety, uncertainty of not knowing what tomorrow holds, he said. PASADENA, Calif. The story of Nelson Mandela has been told before, notably in the acclaimed 2013 theatrical film Mandela: Long Walk To Freedom, which starred Idris Elba. But the new miniseries Madiba, premiering Wednesday night on BET, will run six hours, giving its producers a chance to dig deeper into his story than a theatrical film would allow. Nelson Mandela was one of the greatest men ever to live, said Lance Samuels, the executive producer. It was such a complex, huge story that the reason we decided to do it in six hours was because that gave us time to really explore who Nelson Mandela was. The additional time also allowed us to tell the story, not only about Nelson Mandela, but the many people who surrounded him that made him the great man that he was. The miniseries is based on two autobiographies by Mandela. It takes its title from Madiba, the name of the Mandelas clan. The Nelson Mandela Foundation describes the name as much more important than a surname as it refers to the ancestor from which a person is descended. Laurence Fishburne stars as Mandela, with a supporting cast including Terry Pheto as Winnie Mandela; and Orlando Jones and David Harewood as two of his closest allies, Oliver Tambo and Walter Sisulu. The miniseries was filmed in South Africa. Fishburne said that he never met Mandela, who died in 2013, but once saw him in person. I actually saw Nelson Mandela speak in Atlanta when he did his American tour, after he was released from prison, Fishburne said. I got some nosebleed seats, you know. I wanted to say that I had seen him. In preparing for the role, Fishburne met with several people who had known Mandela, including his personal secretary and a man who had spent time in jail with him. Because we were in (Johannesburg), and we were shooting in a lot of locations where all of this history really happened, Fishburne said, and because the history is so recent its only 20-something years since Apartheid has been dismantled you could feel sort of the energy of what transpired in that country. Its still very fresh, so it was kind of all around us. ADS ADS The marine world has been an integral part of Ulysse Nardins history since 1846, when young Ulysse Nardin created the first coveted marine deck chronometers. These precision navigational instruments, prized by mariners and navies the world over, were valued for their accuracy. These early timepieces were the precursors of the Ulysse Nardin Marine collections to come, like this new Marine Tourbillon. This timepiece unites the three fundamuntals so essential to Ulysse Nardins identity: in-house production, technical avant-garde and rare artistry. 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The power reserve has always been a historically important aspect of the Marine Collection, as it harks back to a time when sailors relied on the power of their precision navigational instruments to determine their position at sea. With its 60-hour power reserve, the Marine Tourbillon proves itself a reliable partner to all those who require reliable accuracy over time. The enduring style of the Marine Tourbillon recalls of the characteristic design of those heritage marine time-keepers. At its heart, a Grand Feu white enamel dial, with its lovely pale milky color, is a direct result of the process of this challenging art. Dating back to the 17th century, the Grand Feu enamel gets its name from the incredible heat required to fuse the enamel powder in a kiln. Complementing the classic elegance of the Grand Feu dial, are the elegant hands and roman numerals that instantly mark the timepiece as belonging to the Marine Collection. They indicate hours and minutes, while the indicator at 12 oclock shows time remaining on the 60-hour power reserve. A 43 mm stainless steel case with beveled edges combines sophisticated design and pure practicality. The crown is designed for easy handling, complete with a rubber notch for comfortable winding, and water resistance to 100 m. With decades of teaching experience in several capacities in Texas and over the past three years with The Flowertown Blossoms in Summerville, Anicia D. Brown is dead set on handing youngsters the tools to master stage acting and production, while also imparting impactful life lessons along t Read moreFlowertown Blossoms preaching the value of teamwork Reddit Email 18 Shares By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | Here are two newspaper articles from spring, 1933. They concern the issue of early Nazi policy toward Germanys Jews. In the first, the German ambassador to the UK maintains that the issue isnt Jews but Immigrants. In the second, it is clear that only a few weeks later German Jews with citizenship were nevertheless being forced out. Those Jewish residents of Germany with other passports or with no citizenship (like the Palestinians of today) were facing special problems. Many of those with citizenship hoped they could temporarily relocate in Paris or Antwerp until things settled down (big mistake). The Trump regimes exclusion or expulsion of refugees without regard to the danger awaiting them on their return to their point of origin has some resemblance to this Nazi callousness in expelling stateless people who had nowhere to go and who lacked proper passports, having only a laissez-passer from Geneva. I draw attention to these two because, of course, of the parallels to what happened this weekend. In particular, I see a similar logic at work, whereby a profound racial and religious animus against a minority was initially publicly denied in favor of a discourse of the nation. It was only non-national members of the minority who were, to begin with, objectionable flotsam coming in from other countries because of foreign economic collapse. That these immigrants were members of the hated minority was only, it was asserted, an accident. They were hated because foreign, not because national-but-different. Why Fascists in power should have at first been reluctant to speak the truth is an interesting question. Apparently even they initially had some shame about being perceived as mere bigots, and took refuge in the hot issue of immigration (which had been exacerbated by the high joblessness of the Great Depression in the 1930s). Their sense of shame was fleeting. Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor on January 30, 1933. The day after a fire at the parliament building, on Feb. 28, civil liberties were abolished. Political dissidents began being rounded up in March. On March 5 there were elections in which the National Socialists got 43% of the vote. On March 22, Hitler was made dictator of Germany by a pliant legislature. In early April, Jews were subjected to a boycott and then expelled from the civil service and professions. I was not kidding when I said that I saw many similarities between the Trump / Bannon inaugural speech and Fascist ideology. We didnt just elect a new government, Trump said, we provided an opportunity for a revolution in which power would be turned over from corrupt elites to the people by the white billionaires. I suggest that the excerpts of these two newspaper articles below be read as allegories for our own moment, substituting Trumpism for national socialism and Muslims for Jews. 1. German Ambassador and the Nazi Terror: Replies to a Deputation; Hostility to Jews Aimed Mainly at Immigrants' The Manchester Guardian, March 23, 1933. Miss G. A. Coombs and mr. R. Bridgeman, representing the Anti-War Council, were recieved at eleven oclock this morning by the German Ambassador (Herr [Leopold] von Hoesch) in response to a request by the council . . . The Ambassador then said that the world must realise that what had taken place in Germany was a complete revolution, or, rather, counter-revolution, and not merely a change of Government. It was the reply to the revolution of 1918 which in sweeping away the monarchy had inaugurated a period of Socialism. Since 1918 Germany had suffered complete national humiliation . . . While stressing the revolutionary character of the change of Administration in Germany, the Ambassador maintained that it had been supported by a majority of the people* . . . He said that the election was decisive because 90 per cent of the electors had voted. This was the highest percentage of any previous election in any country . . . Herr von Hoesch said that very bitter feeling had been caused by the opening of large Jewish stores in all the big towns in Germany, which had swallowed up the small shopkeepers . . . Herr von Hoesch anticipated that in about a couple of weeks everything would have quietened down in Germany. The Ambassador said that he had no anti-Semitic feeling himself. He regretted that the houses of Jews like Einstein who was his personal friend, should have been raided, and said that Herr Hitler was seeking to restrain his followers from maltreating the Jews. . . The Ambassador agreed that those Jews who had been long established in Germany should be treated in every respect as Germans. It was only the Jewish immigrants who had recently come to Germany, chiefly from Poland, who were looked upon as aliens . . . With regard to the pacifists, particularly Lehmann Russbuldt and General von Schoenaich, he said that he knew them both personally. They had been in prison not because they wee pacifists but because they had taken an anti-national line in foreign countries and were therefore considered to be guilty of treason+ . . . * Ed. note: This was a lie and fake news. The Nazis did not get a majority in the March elections. +I believe the term Steve Bannon and the alt-Neo-Nazis now use for this is snowflakes or perhaps advocates of white genocide. 2. 10,000 Jews Flee Nazi Persecution, New York Times, April 15, 1933. Ten thousand Jews have fled from Hitlerite terrorism in Germany . . . The refugees are divided into three categories: German-born citizens, nationals of other countries who have resided in Germany for many years, and those without any national status who are holders of Nansen passports. . . The nationals of other countries will be repatriated to their native lands, except those who wish to join relatives already settled in overseas countries. The refugees without any national status who have Nansen passports represent the greatest problem. Representations have already been made to the International Nansen Bureau in Geneva in their behalf, so as to assure their protection. Quite a number of the refugees have some means, but the larger number are virtually without funds . . . - Related video: Ruptly TV: USA: Chaos at JFK airport as hundreds protest Trumps Muslim ban' Two bottles of Prozac are seen on a pharmacy shelf on Jan. 4, 2005 in New York City. (Photo : Getty Images) With the numbers rising, China's putting in double efforts in helping patients who are diagnosed with clinical depression. But it still has a long way to go as other areas lack trained mental health professionals and the challenge of making ordinary people understand the condition of their family members. Advertisement "It is a feeling of endless loss and perplexity. You feel absolutely uncertain about your life, your family, your relationships with others and your future," said Mo Qing, a Zunyi-based university teacher, who was diagnosed with clinical depression about a decade ago. "You cannot make choices because you believe that whatever decisions you make will result in things getting worse. You feel exhausted, absent-minded, in a melancholy state. You don't know what to do and frequently forget things." It is estimated that around 30 million Chinese citizens are diagnosed with clinical depression, with two-thirds of them adult women. But medical experts say that the actual number is much higher because of the low rate of diagnosis. "Because of the more intense pressure of life in an era of accelerated economic and social transformation, the number of people in China with mental health issues keeps rising year after year, resulting in obvious social problems," said the National Health and Family Planning Commission. While many patients receive psychological counseling, medication is also necessary for those with serious cases of depression. According to a study, it is estimated that the global depression drug market will continue to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 2.50 percent between 2015 and 2020. The revenues were up to $14.51 billion in 2014 and is expected to generate $16.8 billion by the end of 2020. Aside from the lack of diagnosis and treatment, China's battle with clinical depression has many obstacles. Especially for rural areas, people do not have proper support services when they are sent back to their communities or homes to recover. The lack of a strong support system for patients is also a big problem. Because like in other parts of the world, people in China are still beginning to understand mental health issues and the proper ways to address them. China may still have a long way to go in its battle against mental health problems, just like anywhere else in the world. By doing its part in helping their patients, the country is making a contribution in a global campaign to address mental health issues that aims to understand and help those who are diagnosed with it. Reddit Email 0 Shares TeleSur | Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years amid a political debate over banning the niqab. At least two people have been arrested in the aftermath of the deadly shooting of a Quebec City mosque that has left five people dead in the eastern Canadian province, according to reports. Many others were left with injuries and have been taken to the University Hospital of Quebec. Others are in hospitals throughout the city, hospital spokesman Richard Fournier told CNN. The attack occurred around 8 p.m., during evening prayers at the Islamic Cultural Center of Quebec City, also called the Grande Mosque de Quebec, on Sainte-Foy Street. A witness told Reuters that three armed men had opened fire on about 40 people inside the mosque. According to news agency La Presse, one of the suspects, who was later caught by police on a bridge, was carrying an AK-47 assault rifle. Local newspaper Le Soleil said police told them a third suspect could still be on the run. At least 20 emergency vehicles arrived at the scene and police quickly set up a security perimeter. Quebec City Police later confirmed that the area had been secured. The site is secure and the occupants (of the mosque) were evacuated. The investigation continues, the department tweeted. Why is this happening here? This is barbaric, said the mosques president, Mohamed Yangui. Yangui, who was not inside the mosque when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. He did not know how many were injured, saying they had been taken to different hospitals across Quebec City. Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years amid a political debate over banning the niqab. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of Quebec was splattered with what was believed to be pigs blood. And in the neighboring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015. In June 2016, a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the cultural center once again, with an Islamophobic letter being subsequently distributed in the vicinity. According to Yangui, however, the mosque had stopped receiving threats after that. We have a very good relationship with the neighbors, with the community, he told the Edmonton Journal. Theres mutual respect and now today we have this dramatic event. Canadian leaders have already condemned the attacks. Quebecs Premier Philippe Couillard expressed solidarity with the Muslim community, tweeting, Lets unite against violenceWe stand in solidarity with the Muslim people of Quebec, CNN reported. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also took to social media, tweeting: Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families, in both French and English. Via TeleSur Related video added by Juan Cole: CBS New York: 5 Dead In Quebec Mosque Shooting Reddit Email 0 Shares By Nomi Prins | ( Tomdispatch.com | Irony isnt a concept with which President Donald J. Trump is familiar. In his Inaugural Address, having nominated the wealthiest cabinet in American history, he proclaimed, For too long, a small group in our nations capital has reaped the rewards of government while the people have borne the cost. Washington flourished but the people did not share in its wealth. Under Trump, an even smaller group will flourish in particular, a cadre of former Goldman Sachs executives. To put the matter bluntly, two of them (along with the Federal Reserve) are likely to control our economy and financial system in the years to come. Infusing Washington with Goldman alums isnt exactly an original idea. Three of the last four presidents, including The Donald, have handed the wheel of the U.S. economy to ex-Goldmanites. But in true Trumpian style, after attacking Hillary Clinton for her Goldman ties, he wasnt satisfied to do just that. He had to do it bigger and better. Unlike Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, just a sole Goldman figure lording it over economic policy wasnt enough for him. Only two would do. The Great Vampire Squid Revisited Whether you voted for or against Donald Trump, whether youre gearing up for the revolution or waiting for his next tweet to drop, rest assured that, in the years to come, the ideology that matters most wont be that of the forgotten Americans of his Inaugural Address. It will be that of Goldman Sachs and it will dominate the domestic economy and, by extension, the global one. At the dawn of the twentieth century, when President Teddy Roosevelt governed the country on a platform of trust busting aimed at reducing corporate power, even he could not bring himself to bust up the banks. That was a mistake born of his collaboration with the financier J.P. Morgan to mitigate the effects of the Bank Panic of 1907. Roosevelt feared that if he didnt enlist the influence of the countrys major banker, the crisis would be even longer and more disastrous. Its an error he might not have made had he foreseen the effect that one particular investment bank would have on Americas economy and political system. There have been hundreds of articles written about the worlds most powerful investment bank, or as journalist Matt Taibbi famously called it back in 2010, the great vampire squid. That squid is now about to wrap its tentacles around our world in a way previously not imagined by Bill Clinton or George W. Bush. No less than six Trump administration appointments already hail from that single banking outfit. Of those, two will impact your life strikingly: former Goldman partner and soon-to-be Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and incoming top economic adviser and National Economic Council Chair Gary Cohn, former president and number two at Goldman. (The Council he will head has been responsible for policy-making for domestic and international economic issues.) Now, lets take a step into history to get the full Monty on why this matters more than you might imagine. In New York, circa 1932, then-Governor Franklin Delano Roosevelt announced his bid for the presidency. At the time, our nation was in the throes of the Great Depression. Goldman Sachs had, in fact, been one of the banks at the core of the infamous crash of 1929 that crippled the financial system and nearly destroyed the economy. It was then run by a dynamic figure, Sidney Weinberg, dubbed the Politician by Roosevelt because of his smooth tongue and Mr. Wall Street by the New York Times because of his range of connections there. Weinberg quickly grasped that, to have a chance of redeeming his firms reputation from the ashes of public opinion, he would need to aim high indeed. So he made himself indispensable to Roosevelts campaign for the presidency, soon embedding himself on the Democratic National Campaign Executive Committee. After victory, he was not forgotten. FDR named him to the Business Advisory Council of the Department of Commerce, even as he continued to run Goldman Sachs. He would, in fact, go on to serve as an advisor to five more presidents, while Goldman would be transformed from a boutique banking operation into a global leviathan with a direct phone line to whichever president held office and a permanent seat at the table in political and financial Washington. Now, lets jump forward to the 1990s when Robert Rubin, co-chairman of Goldman Sachs, took a page from Weinbergs playbook. He recognized the potential in a young, charismatic governor from Arkansas with a favorable attitude toward banks. Since Bill Clinton was far less well known than FDR had been, Rubin didnt actually cozy up to him from the get-go. It was another Goldman Sachs executive, Ken Brody, who introduced them, but Rubin would eventually help Clinton gain Wall Street cred and the kind of funding that would make his successful 1992 run for the presidency possible. Those were favors that the new president wouldnt forget. As a reward, and because he felt comfortable with Rubins economic philosophy, Clinton created a special post just for him: first chair of the new National Economic Council. It was then only a matter of time until he was elevated to Treasury Secretary. In that position, he would accomplish something Ronald Reagan the first president to appoint a Treasury Secretary directly from Wall Street (former CEO of Merrill Lynch Donald Regan) and George H.W. Bush failed to do. He would get the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933 repealed by hustling President Clinton into backing such a move. FDR had signed the act in order to separate investment banks from commercial banks, ensuring that risky and speculative banking practices would not be funded with the deposits of hard-working Americans. The act did what it was intended to do. It inoculated the nation against the previously reckless behavior of its biggest banks. Rubin, who had left government service six months earlier, wasnt even in Washington when, on November 12, 1999, Clinton signed the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act that repealed Glass-Steagall. He had, however, become a board member of Citigroup, one of the key beneficiaries of that repeal, about two weeks earlier. As Treasury Secretary, Rubin also helped craft the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). He subsequently convinced both President Clinton and Congress to raid U.S. taxpayer coffers to help Mexico when its banking system and peso crashed thanks to NAFTA. In reality, of course, he was lending a hand to American banks with exposure in Mexico. The subsequent $25 billion bailout would protect Goldman Sachs, as well as other big Wall Street banks, from losing boatloads of money. Think of it as a test run for the great bailout of 2008. A World Made by and for Goldman Sachs Moving on to more recent history, consider a moment when yet another Goldmanite was at the helm of the economy. From 1970 to 1973, Henry (Hank) Paulson had worked in various positions in the Nixon administration. In 1974, he joined Goldman Sachs, becoming its chairman and CEO in 1999. I was at Goldman at the time. (I left in 2002.) I remember the constant internal chatter about whether an investment bank like Goldman could continue to compete against the super banks that the Glass-Steagall repeal had created. The buzz was that if Goldman and similar investment banks were allowed to borrow more against their assets (leverage themselves in banking-speak), they wouldnt need to use individual deposits as collateral for their riskier deals. In 2004, Paulson helped convince the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to change its regulations so that investment banks could operate as if they had the kind of collateral or backing for their trades that goliaths like Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase had. As a result, Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, and Bear Stearns, to name three that would become notorious in the economic meltdown only four years later (and all ones for which I once worked) promptly leveraged themselves to the hilt. As they were doing so, George W. Bush made Paulson his third and final Treasury Secretary. In that capacity, Paulson managed to completely ignore the crisis brewing as a direct result of the repeal of Glass-Steagall, the one I predicted was coming in Other Peoples Money, the book I wrote when I left Goldman. In 2006, Paulson was questioned on his obvious conflicts of interest and responded, Conflicts are a fact of life in many, if not most, institutions, ranging from the political arena and government to media and industry. The key is how we manage them. At the time, I wrote, The question isnt how its a conflict of interest for Paulson to preside over our countrys economy but how its not? For men like Paulson, after all, such conflicts dont just involve their business holdings. They also involve the ideology associated with those holdings, which for him at that time came down to a deep belief in pursuing the full-scale deregulation of banking. Paulson was, of course, Treasury Secretary for the period in which the 2008 financial crisis was brewing and then erupted. When it happened, he was the one who got to decide which banks survived and which died. Under his ministrations, Lehman Brothers died; Bear Stearns was given to JPMorgan Chase (along with plenty of government financial support); and you wont be surprised to learn that Goldman Sachs thrived. While designing that outcome under the pressure of the moment, Paulson pled with Nancy Pelosi to press the Democrats in the House of Representatives to support a staggering $700 billion bailout. All those taxpayer dollars went with the 2008 Emergency Financial Stability Act that would save the banking system (under the auspices of saving the economy) and leave it resplendently triumphant, bonuses included), even as foreclosures rose by 21% the following year. Once again, it was a world made by and for Goldman Sachs. Goldman Back in the (White) House Running for office as an outsider is one thing. Instantly inviting Wall Street into that office once you arrive is another. Now, it seems that Donald Trump is bringing us the newest chapter in the long-running White House-Goldman Sachs saga. And count on Steven Mnuchin and Gary Cohn to offer a few fresh wrinkles on that old alliance. Cohn was one of the partners who ran the Fixed Income, Currency and Commodity (FICC) division of Goldman. It was the one that benefited the most from leverage, trading, and the complexity of Wall Streets financial concoctions like collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) stuffed with derivatives attached to subprime mortgages. You could say, it was leverage that helped propel Cohn up the Goldman food chain. Steven Mnuchin has proven particularly adept at understanding such concoctions. He left Goldman in 2002. In 2004, with two other ex-Goldman partners, he formed the hedge fund Dune Capital Management. In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, Dune went shopping, as Wall Street likes to do, for cheap buys it could convert into big profits. Mnuchin and his pals found the perfect prey in a Pasadena-based bank, IndyMac, that had failed in July 2008 before the financial crisis kicked into high gear, and had been seized by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). They would pick up its assets on the cheap. At his confirmation hearings, Mnuchin downplayed his role in throwing homeowners (including members of the military) out of their heavily mortgaged homes as a result of that purchase. He cast himself instead as a genuine hero, the guy who convened a cadre of financial sharks to help, not harm, the banks customers who, without their benevolence, would have fared so much worse. He looked deeply earnest as he spoke of his role as the savior of the common or perhaps in the age of Trump forgotten man and woman. Maybe he even believed it. But the philosophy of swooping in, attacking an IndyMac-like target of opportunity and converting it into a fortune for himself (and problems for everyone else), has been a hallmark of his career. To transfer this version of over-amped 1% opportunism to the halls of political power is certainly a new definition of, in Trumpian terms, giving the government back to the people. Perhaps what our new president meant was the people at Goldman Sachs. Think of it, in any case, as the supercharging of a vulture mentality in a designer suit, the very attitude that once fueled the rise to power of Goldman Sachs. Mnuchin repeatedly blamed the FDIC and other government agencies for not helping him help homeowners. In the press it has been said that I ran a foreclosure machine, he said, On the contrary, I was committed to loan modifications intended to stop foreclosures. I ran a Loan Modification Machine. Whenever we could do loan modifications we did them, but many times, the FDIC, FNMA, FHLMC, and bank trustees imposed strict rules governing the processing of these loans. Nothing, that is, was or ever is his fault reflecting his inability to take the slightest responsibility for his undeniable role in kicking people out of their homes when they could have remained. Its undoubtedly the perfect trait for a Treasury secretary in a government of the 1% of the 1%. Mnuchin also blamed the Federal Reserve for suggesting that the Volcker Rule part of the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010 designed to limit risky trading activities was harming bank liquidity and could be a problem. The way he did that was typically slick. He claimed to support the Volcker Rule, even as he underscored the Feds concern with it. In this way, he managed both to make himself look squeaky clean and very publicly open the door to a possible Trumpian revision of that rule that would be aimed at weakening its intent and once again deregulating bank trading activities. Similarly, at those confirmation hearings he said (as Trump had previously) that we needed to help community banks compete against the bigger ones through less onerous regulations. Even though this may indeed be true, it is also guaranteed to be another bait-and-switch move likely to lead to the deregulation of the big banks, too, ultimately rendering them even bigger and more dangerous not just to those community banks but to all of us. Indeed, any proposition to reduce the size of big banks was sidestepped. Although Mnuchin did say that four monster banks shouldnt run the country, he didnt say that they should be broken up. He wont. Nor will Cohn. In response to a question from Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell, he added, No, I dont support going back to Glass-Steagall as is. What weve talked about with the president-elect is that perhaps we need a twenty-first-century Glass-Steagall. But, no I dont support taking a very old law and saying we should adhere to it as is. So, although the reinstatement of Glass-Steagall was part of the 2016 Republican election platform, its likely to prove just another of Trumps many tactics to gain votes in this case, from Bernie Sanders supporters and libertarians who see too-big-to-fail institutions and a big-bank bailout policy as wrong and dangerous. Rest assured, though, Mnuchin and his Goldman Sachs pals will allow the largest Wall Street players to remain as virulent and parasitic as they are now, if not more so. Goldman itself just announced that it was the worlds top merger and acquisitions adviser for the sixth consecutive year. In other words, the real deal-maker isnt the former ruler of The Celebrity Apprentice, but Goldman Sachs. The government might change, but Goldman stays the same. And the traffic pile up of Goldman personalities in Trumps corner made their fortunes doing deals and not the kind that benefited the public either. A former Goldman colleague recently asked me whether it was just possible that Mnuchin was a good person. I cant answer that. Its something only he knows for sure. But no matter how earnest or sympathetic to the little guy he tried to be before that Senate confirmation committee, I do know one thing: hes also a shark. And sharks do what theyre best at and whats best for them. They smell blood in the water and go in for the kill. Think of it as the Goldman Sachs effect. In the waters of the Trump-Goldman era, dont doubt for a second that the blood will be our own. Nomi Prins, a TomDispatch regular, is the author of six books. Her most recent is All the Presidents Bankers: The Hidden Alliances That Drive American Power (Nation Books). She is a former Wall Street executive. Special thanks go to researcher Craig Wilson for his superb work on this piece. Follow TomDispatch on Twitter and join us on Facebook. Check out the newest Dispatch Book, John Feffers dystopian novel Splinterlands, as well as Nick Turses Next Time Theyll Come to Count the Dead, and Tom Engelhardts latest book, Shadow Government: Surveillance, Secret Wars, and a Global Security State in a Single-Superpower World. Copyright 2017 Nomi Prins Via Tomdispatch.com Reddit Email 204 Shares By Daniel Brumberg | (Informed Comment) | Is Donald Trump rational? Is he sane? Often posed before his election, this question is now a matter of urgent debate among commentators, pundits and political leaderseven from his own party. As Trump upends US immigration policy, and as his chief White House strategist projects the presidents anger by telling the press to keep its mouth shut, we must ask two questions: first, is the man at the helm of the strongest country on earth more than a little unhinged? Second, are his closest advisors essentially his emotional enablers? These are vital questions: to address them seriously, I suggest starting with a basic refresher course in the Psychology of Political Leadership 101. Probing the psychic forces that make Trump tick reveals that for him, the first purpose of politics is to manage a severe psychological pathology. This fact alone should disqualify him from any leading position in national or international politics, much less the seat of power in the Oval Office. The study of political psychology addresses psychological pathologies that are found in the general population. But such pathologies assume a much larger significance when they are endured by political leaders in positions of power and authority. Under these conditions, instead of serving public interests, politics serves as self-therapy. Thus to look for a basic rationality behind Trumps actionsfor example, to argue that he lies because its a way of throwing his opponents off baseis completely off point. He lies because lying is a defense mechanism nearly as critical to Trumps existence as is breathing air. This is how he functions. The most useful theories of political psychological draw from studies of narcissistic personality disorder(NPD). While it can come from various sources, this disorder is often rooted in the parent-child relationship. At some critical point one or both parents fails to provide their child with the intense emotional engagement that all children need to build a core sense of Self or ego. When this bond is not forged, or when the individuals sense of Self is dismissed or threatened, this searing experience provokes rage. Subsequent efforts to contain this fury in ways that make life bearableand sometimes even productiveproduce the disorder, the key elements of which are as follows: 1) Incessant feelings of rage. These feelings lurk beneath the surface but can erupt suddenly and violently. Thus the narcissist is usually unhappy and often depressed. 2) An enormously vulnerable ego and incessant feelings of low self esteem, combined with an inflated sense of importance or grandiosity. The latter feelings must be protected so they do not succumb to sentiments of Self-worthlessness. 3) A constant emotional protection and rescue effort that obstructs empathizing with the feelings of even close friends and family. This rescue effort also makes it hard for the narcissist to listen to others or to engage in meaningful conversation. 4) A parallel struggle to shield a fragile ego either by seeking adulation, or by punishing behavior that denies adulationor worse, that is construed as a deliberate and hurtful effort to undermine that ego. Paranoia and narcissism are often closely aligned. 5) Uncontrolled lashing out. Because all criticism is experienced as threatening to the entire defense mechanism, the narcissist must silence both the criticism and its human source. The latter must pay in ways that deter further criticism of any kind. 6) Constant manipulation. Having no firm sense of Self and needing praise, the narcissist invents whatever statement, excuse or demeanor that most effectively elicits praiseor deflects criticismfrom whoever happens to be present. In this sense, every encounter with another person is a stage. Human relations that would normally provide the closest emotional and physical bonds are the usual arenas for controlling narcissism and spreading its pain. Parents, children and lovers are the narcissists first targets. But as Harold Lasswell noted in his seminal work, some fields such as the military, business and especially politicsoffer especially wide and thus useful arenas for sustaining coping mechanismsproviding that the person rapidly rises up the chain of command and thus can wield and feel power. To rest in a subordinate position denies precisely the arena of manipulation that public narcissists requires and thrives on. I can only guess as to what experiences forged Donald Trumps narcissism. Perhaps, as various accounts including his own suggest, it was his controlling and sometimes violent father. But whatever its sources, Trump presents a textbook case of NPD. Indeed, his actions, statements and tweets on and since January 20, 2017 indicate that that his narcissism is reaching unprecedented heights. After all, he is no longer limited to the arenas of business or acting. Now, as president, he can seek adulation from nothing less than the American people. When Trump promises to make America great again, he signals that this project is fatefully bound up over with making him feel great. Still, you cant make things great again unless things are already terrible or are made to seem so. A savior must have people to save to earn their love. Hence, in his Inaugural Address Trump did not rest with the claim that wealthhas dissipated over the horizon. Defying the facts, he invented a national catastrophe by announcing that the entire country was sinking into carnage. His speech, shaped by him but apparently written by White House Chief Strategist Stephen Bannon, had the feel and sweep of the Gettysburg Address. But if Lincolesque, his words displayed none of the charity displayed by the humble leader who had tried to heal the wounds of the Civil War. On the contrary, while Trump promised that your voice, your hopes, and your dreams will define our American destiny, he made it clear that his election and his presidency herald the decisive moment for the American people to rekindle its national pride. Imagine, then, how angry and resentful Trump must have felt after discovering that his grandiose bid to channel Lincoln was quickly and widely ridiculed. Indeed, the ritual of mass reverence that he and his advisers had seemingly pulled off was threatened the very next day by hundreds of thousands who took to the streets in Washington DC and other cities to reject his message. Adding salt to Trumps wounded ego were pictures that showed a gigantic disparity between numbers of people who had come to Washington to celebrate his investiture and those who had jammed the streets to ridicule him. This was intolerable, as it threatened the feelings of exhilaration and public adoration that he had lifted his ego just a day before. Thus Trump did precisely what any sufferer of NPD would do: he repeatedly lied and lashed out at everyone who had felt had helped to create this unexpected calamity. As is typical of narcissists, those who bore the brunt of Trumps anger were those closest to him, especially those whose mission is to circle the wagon around his ego. Press reports suggest that Trump was furious with White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer for failing to nip the assault on his president in the bud. Spicers January 21 Saturday press conference, during which he claimed that this was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration periodboth in person and around the globe was widely panned but actually served its purpose. Deliberately obscuring the difference between those who witness something in person and those who watch the same event on TV or the Internet, Spicer made a clever if spuriousclaim that the world itself had been present at the Inauguration. This, along with his tirade against the media (whose reporting, he argued in a revealing moment, was shameful) reportedly reassured Trump that his aides would use any argument to defend the president or punish his apparent detractors. The entire White House staff, especially its media experts, are now the Presidents great enablers. Underscoring this narcissistic project, several hours after Spicers press conference Trump came to the CIA, where he engaged in a televised exercise in ego projection that shocked all those present. Trumps assertion that it looked likea million and a half people was revealing. Perhaps he actually imagined that this was the size of the inauguration crowd? To many who were listening this sounded like a lieor what Presidential Counselor Kellyanne Conway has called alternative facts. But this perception doesnt hit the nail on the head. The problem with narcissists is that the border between truth and falsehood must be blurred, if only because facts must be bent to shield their fragile Selves. It is this quest to invent reality that impels Trumps bullying authoritarianism. He believesand will use the power of the White House to ensurethat the world of politics either conforms to his truths or suffers his wrath and vengeance. This will to deploy whatever lie or pretext that secures adulation or enforces obedience was vividly exhibited by the Presidents January 26 executive order on immigration and refugees. As one would expect, Trump tried to justify the order by asserting that the US faces unprecedented peril. Tens of thousands of people, he claimed in a Fox News interview, got in even though we know nothing about them. Asserting that had they even been let in without papers, he painted a perilous situation. Never mind that there was not a shred of evidence to either support the assertion that existing laws and procedures are weak (in fact they are very tough), or to back his claim that immigration is the principle cause of domestic terrorism ( in fact from 1990 to now not a single terrorist attack in the US was committed by someone from the seven countries covered by the executive order!). A supposedly extreme situation required, Trump insisted, extreme vetting, and thus he promulgated a new order whose draconian content and scope is unprecedented and possibly illegal. But this was not enough. Playing to the fears and assumed religious preferences of his loyal followers, in an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network Trump asserted that If you were a Muslim you could come in, but if you were a Christian, it was almost impossible. This was a bald-faced lie: in fiscal 2016, nearly as Christians were let into the US in as Muslims. Again: the world must be made to conform, the facts constructed by the new leader-savior. Indeedthe world. As the chaos and global indignation inflamed by his immigration order show, Trump is looking to the international arena as a crucial zone for managing his narcissism. Leaders like Vladimir Putin are glad to oblige. After all, the Russian president has a strategic interest in giving the new American president the pleasuring therapy he needs to contain his emotional problems and sustain equilibrium. But what about those foreign leaders who, rather than go down the adulation route, instead insult and provoke Trump? Will he explode? Will he lash out and if so, how? A president who has his finger on the nuclear buttonbut who must also contend with similarly narcissistic leaders like North Koreas Supreme Leaderis a clear and present danger. In the movie Dr. Strangelove a paranoid psychotic US general orders a nuclear strike on the Soviet Union while his eminently sane president struggles (and fails) to prevent a holocaust. But this was just a movie. By contrast, the man who once starred in his own TV reality show, and who now sits in the Oval Office itself, seems to many Americansand to others around the world to be just plain nuts. They are not far from wrong. Alarmist? Perhaps. But if we dont appreciate the deep emotional pathology that makes Trump tick, if we assume that rational calculation is the principle force motivating him, we will never fully grasp the measures requiredparticularly from our elected representativesto limit the further damage that Trump could unleash. While he is busy planning his wall with Mexico, and while the president and his enablers bend facts to justify their efforts to stop hordes of (Muslim) terrorists from sneaking through our airports, all those who care about the future of this country must get busy building a firewall between Trumps maniacal ego and the democratic institutions that define and protect the public interest. Daniel Brumberg is Director of Democracy and Governance Studies at Georgetown University. This article represents his personal views and not those of any institution. Join our email lists Email Address: Email Marketing by VerticalResponse Jungle Red Writers has been named one of the top 101 Best Websites for Writers by Writers Digest, one of the top 50 mystery blogs by CourtReporter, and one of the top 100 creative writing blogs by Best Colleges Online [JURIST] The attorneys general of 16 states, plus the District of Columbia, issued a joint statement [text] on Sunday calling US President Donald Trumps [official profile] executive order [text] on immigration un-American. The attorneys general pledged to work together to ensure the federal government obeys the Constitution, respects our history as a nation of immigrants, and does not unlawfully target anyone because of their national origin or faith. The attorneys general from California, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia and Washington originally signed [Reuters report] the statement. Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Kilmartin [official website] showed support for the statement via Twitter and added his name. As of yet, no attorneys general have stated they will file a lawsuit challenging the order. They say they will work to minimize suffering until the executive order is struck down by the judiciary. On Friday Trump issued an executive order restricting access to the US for refugees and visa holders from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The order also indefinitely suspends the entry into the US of Syrian refugees. The order further suspended admission of refugees from any country for 120 days while the administration is reviewing the visa program and limited the number of possible refugees for 2017 to 50,000. Over the weekend, several federal judges blocked [JURIST report] parts of the executive order. The government of Argentina made changes to the countrys immigration laws on Monday that will make the deportation of alleged criminals easier and restrict entry for those with an outstanding criminal case in other countries, according to a post in its Official Bulletin [text, in Spanish]. In explaining the need for the changes, the posting cites a drastic increase in the number of foreign nationals that currently make up Argentinas prison population, noting that the percentage reached 21.35 percent among all prisoners in 2016, and 33 percent among those imprisoned for narcotic-related offenses. These numbers are much higher than the international averages, according to the posting, which says that most countrys prison populations are comprised of less than 5 percent foreign nationals. In an interview with Radio Nacional [text, in Spanish], Migration Director Horacio Garcia said the objective of the change is to expel the criminals, and not to diminish Argentinas pro-immigration policy. He went on to say: We want a difference between those who come to the country to produce and work and those who are criminals. We do not discriminate against foreigners, it has to do with security. We need to gather more information to know who wants to come to Argentina. Argentine Vice President Gabriela Machetti stated [Clarin report, in Spanish] that the changes are the completely opposite idea of Donald Trump. Machettis statement made reference to the US Presidents executive order [JURIST report] signed last week banning travelers from seven muslim-majority countries. Trump has addressed immigration before in his orders. On Wednesday he signed two orders [JURIST report] withholding federal funding to cities that provide safe haven to illegal immigrants, directing the construction of a wall along the US and Mexican border and an increase in the number of enforcement officials to remove undocumented immigrants. The US District Court for the Eastern District of NY in an emergency ruling [text] Saturday stayed the execution, until further notice, of an executive order signed by US President Donald Trump [official website], which would restrict access to the US for visa holders and refugees from certain countries. Trump signed the executive order: Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into the United States [text] on Friday. The order suspends entry into the US for nationals from any country who was facing restrictions under the Visa Waiver program [official website]. In the lawsuit, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) [advocacy website] filed a petition [text] on behalf of two Iraqi refugees who were holding valid US visas, but had been denied entry because of the order. The order has already been challenged in court by several lawsuits, claiming that the order is unconstitutional and that it is in conflict with several federal statutes. The US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia also issued a decision [text, PDF] Saturday stating, that all legal permanent residents detained had the right to a lawyer and they could not be removed from the US for the next seven days. The countries in question were not mentioned directly in the order, but the White House has confirmed that the countries are: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen. The order also indefinitely suspends the entry into the US of Syrian refugees. According to the order, no Syrian refugees will be allowed into the US before changes are made to the system, possibly referring to a more thorough system of vetting incoming refugees. The order further suspended admission of refugees from any country for 120 days while the administration is reviewing the visa program and limited the number of possible refugees for 2017 to 50,000. When signing the order, Trump said the order would help to: keep radical Islamic terrorists out of the United States of America. The order was signed during Trumps visit to the Department of Defense, during which he also signed an order promising to invest in and rebuild the armed forces of the US. Fridays executive orders are only two of several orders signed by the President since his inauguration on January 20, 2017. On Tuesday the President signed an executive order to withdraw the US [JURIST report] from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade agreement with 11 Pacific Rim Nations signed a year ago. Also on Tuesday, Trump signed [JURIST report] another order preventing foreign non-governmental organizations from receiving US funding if they provide abortions or promote policies that may lead to abortions. Trump has also addressed the immigration area before in his orders. On Wednesday he signed two orders [JURIST report] withholding federal funding to cities that provide safe haven to illegal immigrants, directing the construction of a wall along the US and Mexican border and an increase in the number of enforcement officials to remove undocumented immigrants. The US District Court for the Western District of Texas [official website] continued the suspension of a Texas health department regulation [text, PDF] on Friday which would require the burial or cremation of all fetal remains in Texas. The regulation is on hold until further notice and the constitutionality of the regulation will be determined at an upcoming trial. The lawsuit [text] was filed by abortion rights groups who argued that the new regulation unfairly burdens women seeking pregnancy-related medical care. The presiding judge had previously suggested that the new regulation had public health benefits, but decided to suspend the regulation on Friday after hearing two days of testimony. Similar regulation has been struck down in federal courts in Louisiana and Indiana in the past. Abortion restrictions have been a much contested issue in Texas and other states in recent years. Much of the discussion is about when a proposed state law regulating abortion can be considered an undue burden on access to abortion. The US Supreme Court struck down [JURIST report] a Texas law in June 2016, that imposed certain requirements on abortion clinics and doctors. The Texas regulation mandating the burial of fetal remains in Texas was challenged [JURIST report] in court in December by abortion rights groups. The court temporarily suspended [JURIST report] the regulation in December and extended the suspension [JURIST report] in January. A three-judge panel for the US District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin [official website] ordered [decision, PDF] the state legislature on Friday to redraw legislative district lines by November 1. The panels decision, which they stated was to spare the state voters from further enduring the current unconstitutional reapportionment scheme, was celebrated by state Democrats. However the party was not pleased with the courts decision to delegate the actual redrawing of district lines to the Republican-led state legislature, who drew the current lines. The Wisconsin Department of Justice and Governor Scott Walker have expressed their intention to appeal [WPR report] this decision to the US Supreme Court. The implications of such an appeal would be far-reaching, and Gerry Herbert, the attorney for the Democratic challengers here, stated he believes such an appeal would fair well for their cause, saying [w]e do think that five justices are looking to curb one of the most fundamental abuses of the democracy we have in the United States, and thats extreme partisan gerrymandering. Voting rights and gerrymandering have become increasingly important issues over the past year. Earlier this week the US Supreme Court blocked [JURIST report] a ruling ordering the redrawing of the congressional district map and special elections to be held in North Carolina. This came after the Supreme Court heard arguments [JURIST report] in racial gerrymandering cases from Virginia and North Carolina in December. In September several organizations filed a federal lawsuit challenging Georgias voter registration system [JURIST report]. In April the Supreme Court unanimously upheld [JURIST report] an Arizona commissions decisions regarding the redistricting of voting districts in the state. Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte [official website], who was elected last May after campaigning on a promise to be extremely harsh on drug users [JURIST report], announced the suspension of the island nations war on drugs [statement] during a press conference Sunday night. In a statement to reporters on Monday, Philippines National Police [official website] chief Ronald dela Rosa confirmed [Rappler report] that Dutertes decision would mean the abrupt dissolution of the Anti-Illegal Drugs Group [website], which some media outlets have accused [Rappler report] being connected to more than 6,000 killings. Dutertes announcement comes after the highly publicized murder of Jee Ick-joo, a South Korean businessman who was taken from his home in the Philippines, allegedly by rogue high-ranking anti-drug officials, and held for ransom. Jee was then strangled to death, cremated and flushed down a toilet, according to Duterte in an apology to South Korea. The announcement comes just weeks after Duterte threatened [JURIST report] to implement martial law to deal with the countrys drug issue. During his campaign, Duterte said that 100,000 people would die [Guardian report] in his crackdown on crime. Since Duterte has taken office, more than 400 suspected drug dealers have been killed and 600,000 have surrendered to the police. In October the International Criminal Court [official website] expressed concern [JURIST report] over the rising occurrence of extrajudicial killings in the Philippines in connection with the ongoing war on drugs. In September Duterte declared a state of lawlessness [JURIST report] in the Philippines, which would allow police and military personnel to frisk individuals and search cars. In August Duterte threatened to withdraw [JURIST report] the country from the UN following criticisms against his controversial crackdown on illegal drugs. A Chinese-made Geely electric car is on display at the Beijing Auto Show near the capital's airport on April 26, 2010. (Photo : Getty Images) If U.S. President Donald Trumps proposal to impose border taxes on imported vehicles pushes through, it may likely affect the plans of Chinese automaker Geely Automobile Holdings Ltd to launch the Lynk & Co brand in the U.S. and Europe, a senior company executive said. Geely is planning to launch the brand in San Francisco and Berlin before covering other cities in the next months, Alain Visser, senior vice president, said. Advertisement At the sidelines of the National Automobile Dealers Association convention in New Orleans, Visser told Reuters that the U.S. tax or tariff on imported cars may pose a risk to the company. "That's an open question but we're going to offer employment in the U.S. so we believe there's a positive business case to let us in," Visser said. The company said that Lynk is targeting the middle of the market where it is expected to challenged more recognized brands like Honda and Toyota, while Volve, which it bought from Ford in 2010, will concentrate on the premium vehicles market. Meanwhile, Lynk & Co is set to partner with auto dealers to enable it to sell electric and hybrid cars in other company stores, while repair needs will be doneby a franchised dealer network. "Our target is not to upset the dealers or say their model doesn't work," Visser said. "The dealer model can exist and we're going to offer them business." According to the company, plug-in hybrids or full electric vehicles could be the brand's first vehicles that they will launch in Europe and the U.S. "Because of the cost structure we have, we would be able to offer an electric car at the price of a normal combustion-engine car," Visser added. Tesla Motors' plan to sell directly to consumers, instead of using franchisees, has been criticized by U.S. dealers and individual states. In October last year, Lynk launched the compact SUV, 01 model, in Berlin. This year, the company plans to open about 170 stores in China and around 100 stores in U.S. cities. Lynk said it will allow customers who do not want to buy a car to use cars for a subscription fee, with the revenue shared by Lynk and the owners. Turkey threatened [Reuters report] to scrap an agreement with Greece on refugees and migrants on Friday if eight soldiers from Turkey are not retried in Greece. The soldiers fled Turkey for Greece following last years failed coup. Greeces Supreme Court on Thursday rejected Turkeys extradition request, saying they feared for the soldiers lives. In response to the decision, Turkeys Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu [official profile] was reported as saying we are evaluating what we can do [in response to Greece hosting the soldiers], including the cancellation of the re-admission deal with Greece. The agreement would slow down the current wave of migrants leaving Turkey for Europe. While the soldiers current asylum applications, which were denied, are currently being appealed, the Turkish justice ministry submitted a second extradition request. Thursdays decision [JURIST report] regarding the extradition request is the final. Lower courts in December were previously divided on the issue, with it being decided that three men would be extradited just after a court said three others should remain in Greece [JURIST report]. In November Erdogan threatened [JURIST report] to send a new wave of migrants to Europe following a vote to halt negotiations [JURIST report] over EU membership. The fallout with the EU is a continuance of the aftermath Turkey has faced since crackdown after the attempted coup. Since then the government has dismissed [JURIST report] 10,000 civil servants with links to the plotters of coup. In September Turkish Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said [JURIST report] that approximately 32,000 people had been arrested in relation to the coup attempt, and 70,000 had been questioned. [JURIST] UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar Yanghee Lee [official profile] on Monday strongly condemned the murder of Muslim lawyer Ko Ni, who was shot to death on Sunday outside of an airport in Myanmar. In a press release Lee said [text] I am shocked to the core by the senseless killing of a highly respected and knowledgeable individual, whom I have met during all of my visits to the country. The lawyer, who worked as the legal adviser to the National League for Democracy [advocacy website], was shot while holding his grandchild. Lee called on the Myanmar government to condemn the killing and thoroughly investigate. A suspect has been taken into custody [BBC report], but no motive has been determined. Reports of human rights violations in Myanmar has prompted international concern. In November a spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights expressed concern [JURIST report] about possible crimes against humanity committed against Myanmars Rohingya Muslim minority. The Myanmar militarys campaign of violence against Rohingya people constitutes crimes against humanity [JURIST report], according to an Amnesty International (AI) report in December. The UN announced [JURIST report] in early January that Lee would travel to the country to assess the human rights situation following concerns over the safety of refugees in Kachin State and reports of increased violence in Rakhine State. Last Lee voiced concern [JURIST report] that the people of Myanmar who met with her might face retaliation. The Singaporean army will continue military exercises with Taiwan. (Photo : Getty Images) The government of Singapore remained firm in their stand on the One China policy amid repeated requests from China. The requests were forwarded and China said that this was necessary for the release of two armored vehicles held in Hong Kong. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said during a press briefing, "We hope Singapore can cooperate with the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region to handle the follow-up issues and take warning from the incident." Advertisement In Nov. 2016, nine special army forces vehicles from Singapore were taken by the Hong Kong customs. These were vehicles used during military exercises between the military forces of Singapore and Taiwan. According to the website of the Ministry of Defense of Singapore, "the Singapore Government has communicated its formal position to the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR) on the detention of SAF Terrex Infantry Carrier Vehicles and associated equipment by the Hong Kong Customs and Excise Department. We await a full resolution of this matter and return of our property by the Hong Kong SAR Government." The customs department committed to returning the vehicles. "The military vehicles and the associated equipment will be returned to Singapore through the carrier, while the investigation might lead to criminal prosecution," said Commissioner of Hong Kong Customs and Excise Roy Tang Yun-Kwong. He added that while the investigation on the vehicles is finished, punishment will be given to those involved. Meanwhile, the Ministry of Defense has maintained that they will abide by their government's stance on the One China Policy and will continue with their bilateral partnership with Taiwan. Singapore's foreign affairs minister Vivian Balakrishnan said that both countries are still in good terms. She said: "One thing in Chinese culture is you never forget your old friends, people who were there with you in the beginning, people who were there with you through thick and thin, and surely in Chinese culture you appreciate this concept of loyalty to old friends. And at the same time, you know full well where I stand, that I believe in One China and we will not deviate from that." First Lady Michelle Obama at Peking University (Photo : Getty Images) The Lauder Institute of University of Pennsylvania (T.T.C.S.P.) released a report indicating that the worlds best think tanks are from China. The report was the 2016 Global Go To Think Tank Index. The index listed 175 institutions which were at the forefront of research and scientific study. There were nine think tanks that came from China. Advertisement The think tanks included are Chinese Academy of Social Sciences; China Institute of International Studies; Development Research Center of the State Council; Shanghai Institute for International Studies; Institute of International and Strategic Studies Peking University; Unirule Institute of Economics; Center for China and Globalization; and Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies; and China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations. The China Institute of Contemporary International Relations ranked the highest at 33rd place. Experts said that the results of the index were good news for China and were indicative of the fast progress that the country has made. According to Wang Huiyao, president of the Center for China and Globalization, "It's very meaningful that a number of Chinese think tanks are influencing the world," adding that more think tanks are needed to help our government in making decisions accurately and scientifically. Meanwhile, think tanks serve more like a "soft power," which can also help enhance our country's international stature, said Wang. Other institutes who made it to the index are from South Korea, Japan and India. While the best think tanks in China dominated the world's research, some are being censored. Recently, the website of Unirule Institute of Economics, a think tank which criticized the government, was shut down. The think tank is founded and led by Mao Yushi. He started Unirule 24 years ago. The think tank's director is Sheng Hong and said that their site was removed because Mao criticized a top judge. A legal activist, Xiong Wei, said, "Unirule is undoubtedly the country's most influential think tank in the private sector and it blazed the trail. But Beijing only wants think tanks under its control." Employees operate at Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC) in Shanghai. (Photo : Getty Images) China downplayed U.S. concerns over the country's ambitions in the semiconductor industry, saying that those concerns are overblown, China's technology ministry said. Peng Hongbing, vice director of information technology at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said that Chinese officials were worried at the U.S. criticism of its efforts, considering that many of its programs are still being planned. Advertisement "There's been unnecessary panic," Peng said in an interview. "We don't want the U.S. and China to have these conflicts." Peng is involved in drafting plans for the country's semiconductor industry. According to The Wall Street Journal, Peng's remarks echo the Chinese government's sentiment as China tries to talk down the economic rivalry with the U.S. amid Trump's strong criticism of some Chinese trade policies. In recent weeks, Chinese officials have been meeting with U.S. trade groups and speaking to the Western media, in a bid to send a message to the new administration. For both countries, the technology of building semiconductors is crucial to national security and economy. According to Nathaniel Ahrens, director of China affairs at the University of Maryland, semiconductors are considered "the holy grail for both sides." In its final year, the Obama administration took a more serious look at Chinese money flowing into the sector and blocked one deal in December. The former administration estimated that China had invested nearly $150 billion for the next decade to bolster its chip industry. Wilbur Ross, Trump's Commerce secretary, said in a confirmation hearing last week that it can be expected that the U.S. will continue with its hard stance against China's chip efforts as Trump is "very, very concerned" about the Chinese investments in the sector. Peng, however, said that the $150 billion estimate exceeds the actual amount that the government is spending as the estimate includes projects that may never be funded. He added that the development of the chip sector is needed by the country to reduce its dependence on imports. China imported about $228 billion worth of integrated circuits last year, customs data showed. According to the White House report, the $150 billion estimate included all of China's planned chip investment over the next decade, such as money for building plants and overseas acquisitions of chip technology. It also includes investments by private groups with government links. But analysts said that although China is planning significant investments on semiconductors, the reality should match official pronouncements. "Many of the pledges continue to be more on paper than real dollars spent," Randy Abrams, an analyst at Credit Suisse, said. Meanwhile, Ahrens said that the trade conflict between the U.S. and China may be expected to escalate as U.S. plans to recover its manufacturing jobs and China gets into advanced technologies. For companies with investments in both countries, it would be a difficult choice as leading U.S. chip manufacturers often partner with the same Chinese companies that U.S. regulators are trying to foil. This includes Intel Corp, which bought a 20-percent stake in the chip-design unit of China's Tsinghua Unigroup in 2014. The same Chinese company tried to buy Micron Technology Inc. in 2015. Tsinghua Unigroup said that it will invest $53 billion to build two chip factories, after it failed to buy one. Last year, Intel also said that it would spend $5.5 billion to transform its old factory in Dalian into a "leading-edge" memory-chip plant. Qualcomm Inc. has partnered with Guizhou Province in a joint venture to develop China-customized server chips, with the Chinese government having 55 percent ownership of the company. "Most of these firms want to succeed in both China and the U.S.," Ahrens said. "It's going to be very hard for these companies to please two masters with conflicting goals." German Chancellor Angela Merkel is hoping for improved ties between China and Germany. (Photo : Getty Images) Both leaders from China and Germany were optimistic that the relationship between the two countries will be promising but numerous challenges are facing them. Li Keqiang said that there were "several uncertain factors" in the international political and economic scene. Li added that Germany should join the world in safeguarding trade and investment liberalization. He also told Merkel that China will still support the European integration and will continue working with the European Union. Advertisement The Chinese premier also expressed that he is hoping that the west will stop investigating China's violations on anti-dumping policies, as agreed with the World Trade Organization in 2001. Analysts, on the other hand, think that the relationship between China and Germany is headed to a downward spiral. A senior fellow at the Center for Transatlantic Relations at Johns Hopkins University, Klaus Larres, wrote an article analyzing the relationship between China and Germany: "The prolonged honeymoon between China and Germany has come to an abrupt halt. In Berlin awareness has grown that Beijing has moved from being an economic partner to a serious global competitor." Many businessmen in Germany are complaining that foreign investors in China are not treated fairly. This has struck criticism among many foreign leaders as well. Larres added, "What was once applauded as an emerging German-Chinese 'special relationship' has turned into a much less happy association, at least at the level of policymakers and leading industrialists." Many are concerned that German companies are being bought by Chinese state owned and private enterprises, according to the expert. He reported that in 2016 alone, over 40 German companies were sold to the Chinese. "Berlin became seriously concerned that important technological knowledge was being handed over to an ever-more aggressive economic competitor," he said. The continuing expansion of Chinese businesses in the U.K. and overseas provides the impetus for law firm Yingke's involvement in the global economy. (Photo : Getty Images) Commercial law firm Yingke, considered as among China's largest law firms, has embarked on a journey to take on international markets with its sharp expertise in providing legal advice. It has since made waves in both the U.K. and European markets through serving clients with vast commercial interests. Advertisement Demonstrating a firm understanding on how to deal with the ins and outs of the global economy, Yingke endeavors to go beyond what many would deem as a strict interpretation of roles encompassing lawyers. Culture and market trends form a significant part of the law firm's legal advice. Linda Yang, Yingke's global partner and executive chairman of the law firm's global board of directors, said that the law firm's rather-unconventional approach to its clients have led to exciting opportunities for the law firm to become part of several global expansion stories, China Daily reported. Although Yingke's first international foray was through the formation of its U.K. subsidiary, Yingke U.K. Consulting, such has expanded to greater heights thanks to its exclusive cooperation agreement with London-based international law firm Memery Crystal in 2015, per The Lawyer. The agreement has been envisioned to serve as a strategic legal conduit for Chinese investors to make headways into the U.K. market, as well as for U.K. businesses looking to do the same in China. Yingke's London China Centre is set to benefit from Memery Crystal's involvement. As businesses from China continue to flock to the U.K., as shown by the 91 Chinese mergers and acquisitions with British firms between 2012 and 2016, Yingke's role is set to grow from strength to strength. Brexit, specifically, will make the law firm busier in dealing with more Chinese investors. Apart from the U.K., Yingke is currently gearing up for greater international involvement. The law firm successfully became a party to the UN Development Program's (UNDP) Global Coalition of Think Tank Networks for South-South Cooperation due to its international network. Given said development, alongside the emphasis on providing opportunities to develop younger partners, Yingke is well-equipped to take on the challenges of facilitating global commercial expansion deals. China's growing importance in the global economy makes it even more unstoppable. When we booked our Viking Mekong trip with Viking River Cruises, the dilemma we had was whether or not to book an extension. Two extensions are offered with the Viking Mekong itinerary through Vietnam and Cambodia. One is for a couple days in Bangkok , but wed already been, and the other is a side-trip from Hanoi to Ha Long Bay. The Ha Long Bay extension effectively adds two days on to the trip, 24 hours of which is spent on a trip to Ha Long Bay and the rest of which provides additional time in Hanoi. I read mixed reviews about Ha Long Bay. On one hand, Ha Long Bay is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the New 7 Wonders of Nature . On the other hand, Ive heard some complain that it is overrated and touristy and not as spectacular as advertised if it is overcast. However, we are never ones to discard a place because its touristy, especially since places are usually touristy for a reason and we are suckers for natural beauty. Ha Long Bay is comprised of 1,969 islands which are uninhabited. Ninety-percent of those islands are made of limestone. Approximately 775 islands, in an area of 434 square kilometers, are protected by UNESCO. The islands took 60 million years to form. Many of the islands have caves or grottos. These limestone karsts stand like pillars jutting out of the water, and the bases are worn away by the constant movement of water. They are very similar to the karsts we kayaked in Thailand , but more extensive. Our half-day Ha Long Bay cruise started with a very nice lunch on the junk boat, which we enjoyed while watching the scenery pass by outside the windows. After lunch was completed, we headed up to the top deck for an even better view and a bit of relaxation. Sometimes water destinations that are popular with tourists like this end up being filled with boats and polluted. While there were many boats on the water, it didnt necessarily feel overcrowded, and the boats also added to the picturesqueness. The only bummer was that none of the boats had their signature red sails up. I was pleased to notice that, while cloudy, the water appeared to be clean and we did not see trash floating by, which is a common sight in some over-touristed, polluted waterways. After making a loop through the karsts of Ha Long Bay, we stopped to tour one of the most famous caves, Sung Sot Cave, which means surprising cave. Sung Sot Cave is located within Bo Hon Island. To reach the cave, we first had to climb a hundred steps. The cave system has high ceilings covered in curving, dripping stalactites. A paved path leads through Sung Sot Cave, passing from room to room. Colored lights brighten the cave walls, illuminating the alien-like formations. After our cave exploration, we boarded the boat once more and slowly made our way back to port while the sun began to set. The drive between Hanoi and Ha Long Bay is about four hours (without traffic jam), so we made a rest stop on the way from Hanoi to Ha Long Bay and back again at the Hong Ngoc Fine Art Company Ltd-Sao o . This is a place to stretch the legs, visit the restroom, have a bite to eat . . . and shop. Hong Ngoc Fine Art Company sells stone statutes, pearls, jewelry, hand-embroidered pictures, clothing, and more. While definitely frequented by many tourists on the way to and from Ha Long Bay, the products appear to be good quality, many are unique, and prices are negotiable. I have this issue where I cant buy anything so early on in a trip, so we didnt end up buying anything but snacks, but it was fun to look at everything. Hong Ngoc Fine Art Company was founded in 1996 to provide training and jobs for disabled people. In addition to products available for purchase, workers create some of those products on the shop floor for visitors to see, like the embroidered pictures. When we were driving through Ha Long City, we saw what looked like a resort on its own private island. We speculated what that hotel must be like. To our surprise, that is where we were booked for the night. There are two parts to the Vinpearl Ha Long Bay Resort . A building that looks like a hotel on its own is on the mainland. This is the lobby where you check in. After receiving your room key, you use the key to pass through the gate to board a boat that takes you to the island. Here is another lobby and the hotel. The hotel is so fancy, the prime minister of Vietnam was there and the hotel was surrounded by government and military cars. passis The Vinpearl has three restaurants, but only one was open during our visit, and only the buffet was available for dinner. The buffet was a mixture for all cultures. There was Vietnamese soup, there was sushi, there were pizza bites. I wasnt crazy about the buffet dinner options, but the buffet breakfast options were a different story. In the morning there were four choices of soup, lots of tropical fruit, dim sum, and a lot more. Our room was enormous, the decor was fancy, and the view was of the outdoor pool and Ha Long Bay. My favorite thing about the hotel was the misty view of Ha Long Bay in the morning, best seen while enjoying breakfast on the restaurant patio. While it is possible to do a day trip to Ha Long Bay from Hanoi, there is nothing like waking up to the view of Ha Long Bay clouded in a heavy mist which makes it look like it must be cold outside, but it still isnt. After our 24 hours in Ha Long Bay concluded, we determined the side-trip from Hanoi to Ha Long Bay was definitely worth it. The scenery on our Ha Long Bay cruise was stunning and it was the perfect way to start our trip to what can be a hectic and overwhelming Southeast Asian country: slowly, calmly, and beautifully. We have read about day-trips from Hanoi to Ha Long Bay, but with the long drive, it is better to have an overnight. We have also read of overnight visits to Ha Long Bay which include spending the night on a junk boat. That also sounds very enjoyable, but we didnt mind missing out on that experience since we would be spending a week on a boat cruising the Mekong River on a Viking River Cruises Southeast Asia ship. Besides, in addition to our Ha Long Bay cruise, we had a breathtaking morning view of Ha Long Bay from our Ha Long Bay hotel. Visitors wait for the casino hotel Crown Macau official opening May 12, 2007 in Macau, China. (Photo : Getty Images) The Chinese government has just announced that it will be extending the investigation period to further probe into the alleged charges filed against the staff from James Packer's Crown Resorts. The Australian billionaire has made the resolution of this problem as his top priority. Last October, a total of 18 Crown employees were detained in a coordinated police operation across several Chinese cities, with several being chased from criminal charges. Among those who are in detention is Jason O'Connor, Crown's vice president for international VIP operations. Advertisement The coordinated raids are part of President Xi Jinping's campaign against anti-corruption which targets money laundering and illicit money transfers offshore. This campaign has negatively impacted the gambling industry in China, scaring away the high rolling patrons of the junkets. Gambling is illegal in the mainland and casino companies are prohibited from directly marketing their gaming centers. Crown was warned in 2015 to stop luring Chinese high rollers to gamble overseas. According to experts and gambling industry insiders, the arrests shows that the Xi government is intent on enforcing its rules on marketing and promotion of gambling in the country. In response to the arrests, Packer announced that it would reduce its stake in Macau-based casino operator Melco Crown and pulled out of a casino project in Las Vegas. The arrest has sparked concern from other gambling companies who are operating in China. "Chinese authorities have advised that the investigation period has been by one month," said a spokeswoman from Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. The Australian government added that they continually extend help for the three Australian Crown workers who are still detained in China. Upon his return to the Crown board this month, Packer announced that resolving the problem in China was his top priority. While this may extend troubles for Packer, it shows that the government will not make any exceptions to the rule, not even for foreign business. Vats of locally made wine called baijiu are seen at a distillery on the Chishui River, on Sept. 23, 2016, in Maotai, Guizhou Province, China. (Photo : Getty Images) While baijiu is widely known as one of the expensive Chinese liquors in the market, prices for this drink have soared in some retail stores just before Chinese New Year. Industry insiders share that the sector is yet to fully recover. In some stores in Beijing, a 500ml bottle of Kweichow Moutai's classic Feitian 53 percent alcohol is being sold for as much as 2,000 yuan ($290). This an increase of almost 40 percent compared to a few weeks back. Meanwhile, if you try buying the same bottle online, you can get it for as low as 1,288 yuan on JD.com. Advertisement According to analysts, the greater demand for the premium liquor during the Spring Festival coupled by the limited supplies caused the surge in prices. Premium baijiu is an extremely profitable business. It is estimated that the top four baijiu producers in China account for 27 percent of earnings before interest and taxes of the global spirits industry. "With more disposable income, consumers are willing to spend more, and their mindset is to buy liquors when prices are going up," shared Ding, a distributor from the Ningxia Hui autonomous region. He added that despite the recovery, the prices haven't rebounded to the levels before the government's austerity drive and anti-graft campaign. Retail store prices for baijiu in 2012 have peaked above 2,000 yuan. It dropped to 1,800 in early 2013 then decreased later to 1,200 before stabilizing at about 1,000 yuan. "After a few years of market volatility, the baijiu, or white spirits, industry is gradually recovering, and the demand has expanded as consumer spending has risen," said Wang Chonglin, deputy manager of Kweichow Moutai Co. The baijiu sector has helped drive stock gain this year, leading the country's consumer staples stocks. With things going quite well for this sector, baijiu continues to attract investors because of its stability amid the volatile situation in the markets. With how things are going in the spirits market, the baijiu sector will definitely be able to gain ground and recover from the effects of market volatility in the previous years. On Jan. 23, President Trump formally abandoned the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Nebraska farmers desperately needed the shot in the arm offered by this agreement, in the judgment of an overwhelming number of agricultural organizations. Last spring a coalition of more than 200 of them drafted an open letter to congressional leaders urging the approval of TPP. In Nebraska, our major agricultural commodities corn, soybeans, wheat and cattle are in a severe economic slump and are highly dependent on the export market. More than half of our soybean production is exported. About one-fourth of our corn exports go to just one Asian country, Japan. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the TPP agreement would have dramatically reduced tariffs on U.S. beef with Japan. Trump may be able to negotiate favorable agreements with individual countries. He will, however, be attempting to negotiate, for example, a reduction in Japans high beef tariffs, while simultaneously increasing our tariffs on their electronics, automobiles and other goods as part of his campaign promise to bring jobs back to America. The author of the Art of the Deal will face a daunting task. Meanwhile the clock is ticking on Nebraska farmers. Many farm households had negative incomes in recent years more than half last year, according to USDA and the prospects are even higher for this year. For new farmers and farmers who did not set aside a cash reserve when times were good, 2017 is going to be a major test. Tina Barrett, executive director of Nebraska Farm Business Inc., recently wrote, The reality is that some operations are going to be faced with the real issue of foreclosure this year. Others will have to look hard at restructuring debt, switching lenders, making major changes to their operations and/or living, and maybe even selling off excess assets. Barrett concluded: Bankruptcy may be a word that comes back into the national conversation. Time will tell if new agreements can be negotiated and, if so, if they can be negotiated in time to save many Nebraska farmers. Complex problems are called complex for a reason they do not respond to simple solutions. A simple solution that may placate underemployed Ohio steel mill workers can result in bankruptcy for some Nebraska farmers who voted overwhelmingly for President Trump. Elections do have consequences. Sometime those consequences are quite personal. Larry Hardesty, Kearney In the face of many challenges, including an endless churn of regulations from Washington, D.C., the efficiency and dedication of our producers has made the 3rd District the top-producing agriculture district in the country. Nebraska farmers and ranchers deserve our gratitude for their tireless work and greater certainty and opportunity for future success. This was my motivation for founding the Modern Agriculture Caucus, of which I continue to serve as co-chairman. The caucus promotes innovation and science-based policies in agriculture while educating members of Congress from urban areas about the needs of rural producers. These conversations are increasingly necessary as we prepare to work on a new farm bill. My new role as chairman of the Ways and Means Human Resources Subcommittee provides opportunities to work with House Agriculture Committee members on structuring parts of the farm bill. Because your input in this process is invaluable, I will be hosting a farm bill listening tour to hear directly from 3rd District producers. Dates and locations will be announced as soon as possible. As we work through these issues, I am pleased to have Sallie Atkins on my team as agriculture director. Atkins has firsthand knowledge of producers needs and concerns from her more than 30 years of experience in Nebraska agriculture. In addition to farming and ranching with her husband in Thomas County, she spends significant time each week traveling the district to meet with producers and agriculture groups. President Trump also recognizes the importance of hearing directly from Nebraska producers, demonstrated by his selection of numerous Nebraskans to serve on his Agricultural and Rural Advisory Committee. Much of the reaction to Trumps nomination of Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue for agriculture secretary has been positive, and I look forward to working with him to help U.S. farmers and ranchers feed the world. The official White House website has been updated with Trumps policy plans, including his commitment to eliminate the Waters of the U.S. rule. This is welcome reassurance to farmers and ranchers across the country who do not want Washington bureaucrats controlling the puddles and irrigation ditches on their properties. The death tax also is on Trumps list of regulations to abolish. Rep. Kristi Noem, R-S.D., introduced H.R. 631, of which I am a cosponsor, last week to permanently repeal this onerous tax, which penalizes farmers, ranchers and small business owners who have worked all their lives to build their family businesses. The repeal bill falls under the jurisdiction of the Ways and Means Committee, and I will continue to advocate for its swift passage. While we work to get government out of producers way, we must also open more markets to their exports. The Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, found wide support within the agriculture sector, but Trump signed an executive order withdrawing the U.S. from this agreement with 11 countries on the Pacific Rim during his first week in office. Though the TPP was not perfect, I supported establishing this framework for U.S. exporters to pursue greater economic opportunity in the Asia-Pacific region. Our country is moving in a new direction on trade, but agriculture can still benefit. In his executive order, President Trump announced his intention to pursue bilateral trade agreements. I was pleased to hear this, as I strongly believe our country must be a leader in writing the rules of the global economy rather than allowing other world powers to take our place. Adrian Smith represents Nebraskas 3rd Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives. The district spans 68 counties and is the nations largest rural district. What do you suppose would happen if Russian strongman Vladimir Putin decided to clarify remarks he reportedly made about Donald Trump during the campaign? I never said Trump was brilliant, he might say. That was a poor translation. I said he was colorful, which nobody denies. Unfortunately, he is also an ignorant buffoon. Would Trump confine himself to mocking Putins short stature and bare-chested TV appearances on his Twitter account? Or would the United States and Russia go to war footing overnight? Fortunately, we can all relax. Everybody understands that Trump lives so deep in Putins pocket that no such exchange seems possible. When it comes to foreign affairs, the only constant in our new presidents pronouncements is that he has never yet said anything not one single thing that the Russian dictator would find objectionable. Its really remarkable. On everything from the invasion of Crimea to the obsolescence of NATO and the breakup of the European Union, Trumps remarks may as well have been crafted in the Kremlin. Weakening NATO, the military alliance that has brought stability and prosperity to the west since 1945, is the No. 1 priority of Putins foreign policy, exposing Eastern Europe to the tender mercies of the Russian army. One neednt yearn for a new Cold War to realize what a terrible thing that would be. As for the European Union, here are some relevant numbers: In 2016, total U.S. trade with the EU was roughly $650 billion. Its our most important economic partnership by far. Total trade with Russia totaled $20 billion. Economically speaking, the EU is more than 30 times more valuable to the United States than Russia. Any questions? Russia occupies a vast landmass and has a formidable military, but its economy is smaller than Italys. The Russians are a great, long-suffering people; we couldnt have won World War II without them. But does anybody want to buy Russian cars, computers or TVs? No, they do not. The last thing the world needs is Russia looming over once-captive nations such as Poland and Lithuania like a bear at a picnic table. A Democrat who proposed such things would be accused of treason. So anyway, heres what its come to: In the course of defending Trump from scurrilous accusations in Buzzfeed, Putin also praised the beauty and skill of Moscow prostitutes, who he proclaimed the best in the world. Back in 2013 when the president-elect visited Moscow for the Miss Universe pageant, Putin alibied, He wasnt a politician, we didnt even know about his political ambitions. Do they think that our special services are hunting for every U.S. billionaire? Actually, Vladimir, yes they do. Even Trump knows that. During his recent press conference, he said he warned friends to behave themselves, Because you dont want to see yourself on television. Cameras all over the place. In Moscow, they even have a word for it kompromat a combination of the Russian words for compromising and information. Luring public figures into proverbial honey traps or manufacturing scandal against troublesome individuals is a common practice of authoritarian regimes everywhere but nowhere more so than in Russia. Its well known that Putin got his big break in politics when, as a young intelligence officer, he affirmed that a murky videotape of a man cavorting with hookers was indeed a foe of Boris Yeltsins. Today, sleazy videos of public figures are a regular feature on Russian TV. The sheer coarseness of political dialogue can be hard to believe. I got a small taste of it last summer after unmasking a pair of Russian trolls that I called Boris and Natasha. That said, apart from one lurid detail I wont repeat, none of the naughty bits in the dodgy Trump dossier struck me as shocking. Trump has long boasted to radio shock jock Howard Stern and others about barging into beauty contestants dressing rooms, copping feels, etc. Hes also on record about the supposedly loose morals of Russian women. That said, whatever Putin has on Trump, I doubt its sexual everybodys favorite distraction. The real purpose of kompromat isnt necessarily blackmail, but the promotion of discord, cynicism and widespread disbelief in such liberal values as the distinction between truth and make-believe. And when people come to believe that everybodys crooked and nobody can be believed, the strongman always wins. Arkansas Times columnist Gene Lyons is a National Magazine Award winner and co-author of The Hunting of the President. The Families OverComing Under Stress, better known as FOCUS, is a program aimed at providing resiliency training for military couples and families. Whether a couple or family is dealing with lifestyle transitions, deployments or relationship difficulties, FOCUS facilitators strive to teach skills to families that will help their communication flow and create a better understanding of one another, especially children. Kim Perez, FOCUS site director and licensed professional counselor, said their goal is to work with each individual so that they can express themselves in a more conducive way. We all handle situations differently as individuals, and it really helps to have a common communication, Perez said. Working with kids can be a little more challenging, Perez said. We work with kiddos as young as 3, helping families find a more appropriate way to communicate with their little ones. Working with children on sensitive topics like a deployment or divorce can be difficult she noted. Couples without kids can also use to the program to build better communication skills and positively impact their relationship, even if there are no immediate stressors such as deployments or temporary duty assignments. Perez said the difference between their program and mental health is that mental health provides actual counseling. Were not counseling at all. Were not diagnosing anyone, were just introducing skills, Perez said. The program consists of roughly five to eight meetings with each meeting introducing a new skill to the family or couple. The counselors are flexible to work with dates and times that fit the familys needs. Deborah Brewster, a licensed master social worker, is a resilience trainer at FOCUS and has helped numerous families since coming to Keesler in September. We want to give families tools to open that line of communication. We help them be proactive and prepared in case bad situations do arise, Brewster said. FOCUS hopes to see families and couples from across the base, not just students or permanent party. We really see quite a mix of folks, and were open to all the branches of the military including Coast Guard, Brewster said. Until a month ago, Keesler was the only Air Force base with a FOCUS program; however, it is now offered at MacDill AFB, Flordia, and Cannon AFB, New Mexico. The program in not mandatory and details of the session remain confidential. For more information about the FOCUS program, visit www.focusproject.org. To set up an appointment, call Perez and Brewster at (228) 377-3453 or via email at keesler@focusproject.org. We're always interested in hearing about news in our community. Let us know what's going on! Go to form A chef prepares dumplings in a restaurant in China Town on Feb. 18, 2015 in London, England. (Photo : Getty Images) Food will always be one of the highlights in any celebration, and the Chinese New Year is no exception. While the Spring Festival is all about family and tradition, it seems that people in Tianjin have other ways of celebrating the Year of the Rooster. During the holiday, Chinese families would come together, make dumplings, and have a feast while watching a gala program on the television. Pomelos, tangerines, longevity noodles and sesame balls are just few among the essential dishes being prepared for the Lunar New Year celebration. Advertisement While people in other parts of the world are preparing traditional Chinese dishes for the celebration, people in Tianjin are choosing to "eat foreign" on the eve of the Lunar New Year. "I'm from the northeastern part of China. This is the first time for me to celebrate the Chinese New Year without going back to my hometown. I'm not good at cooking so I'll be dining out. I think I'll go have pizza just like usual at weekends, and have some beer with friends," said Dai Bin, a 25-year-old who is based in Tianjin. He also shared that he is only one among many who have opted out to go home for the holidays. Foreign cuisine is not something unusual in Tianjin. The area was a trade concession before the Second World War and had become a home to foreign restaurants of various styles. While the fast food business has been growing in China, fine dining has not been left behind. "We prepared for the Chinese New Year festival something new. We prepared a new menu about food, a new menu about drink. We have some booking from foreign people, but also from Chinese. Because we have a lot of customers, that come frequently. Many for eight or nine years," shared Renato Pegoraro, owner of the Venezia Club. With so many dining options available--from fast food to fine dining--China's taste in food have progressed over time. The diversified taste in food is a signal of China's inclusiveness. No matter the background or personal preferences, good food is always a great way to celebrate the Lunar New Year. A Hausa/Fulani man and strong supporter of President Muhammadu Buhari has declared that there will be civil war and bloodshed in Nigeria if the president should die. Haruna Maitala posted the warning on the Facebook page of a group known as Nigerian Civil Rights Movement, in the wake of the wicked rumour that has been making the rounds on the death of the president. Maitala was unequivocal when he said that the Hausa/Fulani would never accept a situation where the Vice President, Yomi Osinbajo, would assume leadership of the country because power belongs to them and they are not ready to let it go. The Jos, Plateau State-based Maitala added that in the event of Buharis death, anyone taking over must be of the Hausa/Fulani stock or there will be war in the country and that as long as the person is their brother, they will be satisfied. This is what Maitala wrote: President Buhari is healthy and enjoying his time in UK. God forbid if Buhari is to die, Christians/Southerners should not celebrate because Osinbajo or any other Christian will not take power because this power belongs to the North (Hausa/Fulani) we will never agree to lost power how we did in 2010. If Osinbajo did not resign, then another civil war awaits Nigeria. Or Buratai should stage a coup. Or they should bring anyone else from the North (Hausa-Fulani) as far as our brother is in power we are satisfied. This should serve as a warning. With this mindset of Maitala and his likes, no one knows where Nigeria will be heading if anything should happen to the president. President Donald Trump (Photo : Donald J. Trump/Twitter) The world is preparing for war, according to former Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev and one chilling reminder that the end is near for humanity seems to agree with the sentiment. The Doomsday Clock is now only two minutes and 30 seconds away from midnight and experts points to Donald Trump and Vladimir as chief reasons for the reset. Advertisement The Clock that reminds man of the nearing danger of a nuclear showdown between the great powers - at present, that would be the United States, Russia and China - now reads at 11:57:30, which according to NPR is the closest to midnight since 1953. And when it hits 12, it will be the end. The same reading appears the exact observation by Gorbachev. In a piece written for Time, the last USSR president warned of imminent danger. In Europe particularly, Russia and Europe "are now placed closer to each other, as if to shoot point-blank." The prevailing scenario could easily escalate into a shooting war - one that could devastate the world unless leaders are willing to talk. "We must break out of this situation. We need to resume political dialogue aiming at joint decisions and joint action," Gorbachev called on the worlds' great powers. But world leaders finding a common ground on nuclear disarmament and averting war seems a remote possibility now. The signs are not too encouraging, according to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists - the same body responsible for the Doomsday Clock, which first ticked in 1947. In a new advisory, the group's board has moved for a reset and adjusted the Clock, dialing up the second hand by 30 seconds. "Over the course of 2016, the global security landscape darkened as the international community failed to come effectively to grips with humanity's most pressing existential threats, nuclear weapons and climate change," was the Bulletin's explanation, according to NPR. And in the same statement, the group pinned the blame on newly-installed U.S. President Donald Trump. "Donald Trump, made disturbing comments about the use and proliferation of nuclear weapons and expressed disbelief in the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change," the body said. The Bulletin also pointed to Russian President Vladimir Bulletin as equally responsible. The two, according to board member and physicist Lawrence Krauss are prone to making crazy statements that nudge the world closer to a disastrous end. "President Trump and President Putin, who claim great respect for each other, can choose to act together as statesmen, or act as petulant children, risking our future," Krauss said in a call for the two to turn back the Doomsday Clock. Experts and observers are wary of a trade war ensuing between the U.S and China. (Photo : Getty Images) One mention of Donald Trump these days would recall his petty and often vitriolic commentary on Twitter. But despite the U.S. President's spicy rhetoric against China, his "tweets" have nonetheless become the subject of lampooning in Chinese social media, thanks to Shanghai startup Jike. Sensationalism best describes Trump's way of doing things on the microblogging site, with several of his posts, ranging from fantastically mundane to utterly despicable, having shaped his trademark persona. His attacks on media critical of his behavior have given the term "fake news" an entirely new dimension. Advertisement But as far as fake news can get, Trump's "tweets" have rocked social media networks in China--in a rather sensational manner that's quite well-deserved. Jike has been responsible for the influx of fake Trump tweets, which users can use to enter custom content a la Trump, The Independent reported. Fake Trump tweets generated using Jike have become the newest Internet running gag in China, despite Twitter itself being blocked in the country. The orange-faced leader of the free world has his standard fare for flame-baiting apparent in every fake tweet the website generates. Jike then allows users to share the generated tweets, which by the can be in either English or Chinese, to social media accounts. The sheer virality of the fake Trump tweets is characterized by the blonde 70-year-old's penchant for exclamation marks and assertively-aggressive tone, The Hollywood Reporter said. Several people have already been fooled by the fake Trump tweets, and such demonstrates how Twitter can permeate markets that are outside its scope of operations. The U.S. President's tweeting habit has become an unlikely source of awareness by Chinese users towards the social media giant. Moreover, Trump's sheer audacity has been thought of by the younger contingent in Chinese social media as an unmistakable display of American-style arrogance. Then again, it would be best for them to stay away from his trigger-happy remarks against China, a country he regularly sees in a negative light. Have more of those entertaining fake Trump tweets in this collection from Buzzfeed. The Originals Cast (Photo : Getty Images/Ethan Miller) "The Originals" Season 4 will see Hope (Summer Fontana) changing the lives of her parents, Hayley (Phoebe Tonkin), Klaus (Joseph Morgan), and uncle, Elijah (Daniel Gillies), tremendously. While speaking with TV Line, former executive producer Michael Narducci said that there will be changes in the dynamics of Hayley and Elijah's relationship, and Hope will have something to do with it. He added that Hayley and Elijah's connection will also be dramatized throughout the entire season. Advertisement To make viewers understand Hayley and Elijah's relationship better, Narducci explained that the two characters clearly love each other despite the complicated situation they are in. Elijah has so much honor and dignity for being a thousand-year-old vampire, while Hayley has only lived a mortal lifetime. The latter has values and ethics that may not necessarily be applied to Elijah. But even though they have tons of differences, the minute their family is put in jeopardy, both Hayley and Elijah will step up their game to help and protect each other, as well as Hope. Meanwhile, the "Originals" Season 4 still has not started yet, but there are already rumors that a Season 5 renewal may not take place. Earlier this month, Narducci left his post as executive producer of the hit The CW series in place of a better opportunity at ABC. "The Vampire Diaries" executive producer Julie Plec has taken her place. While speaking with The Hollywood Reporter, Plec said that Narducci could not pass up the opportunity. She added that she will miss working with him in the coming weeks. Plec's new post has also triggered speculations that "The Originals" Season 5 could be a go. Since "The Vampire Diaries" Season 8 is ending in March and "The Originals" is premiering on the same month, Plec will have more time to focus on the latter. "The Vampire Diaries" Season 8 airs Fridays at 8 p.m. EST on The CW. "The Originals" Season 4 will premiere on the network on March 17 at 9 p.m. EST. 45 Shares Share So lets step outside our traditional arguments when discussing the health care problem of gun violence in this country. We all know the entrenched opinions of both sides: The second amendment is inviolable vs. there are over 30,000 deaths from guns per year in this country, and why on earth does anyone need an assault weapon? But the city with the strictest gun laws, Chicago, has the most gun deaths, so clearly, based on this n of 1, gun laws do not work. Right? Confused? You should be. Instead, lets talk about the limits of human performance and how this should influence our policy on guns. To illustrate this point look no further than the African-American caregiver in Florida last summer who was lying next to his autistic patient, on his back with his hands up, telling the police in a clear and calm voice, He (my patient) has a toy truck in his hands. Shortly thereafter, a highly trained officer, himself a member of a minority community in this country, shot the caregiver in the leg. To be sure there was some confusion introduced over the radio by his commanding officer. In a fraction of a second, in spite of all of his training, that officer made a mistake. For those familiar with human the limits of human performance this outcome is expected and will happen predictably at a certain rate. About 11 years ago, I was at a lecture on the very subject of human performance and how it relates to decision-making during Surgery. The lecturer was Manfred Mueller, a lead aviation safety officer at Lufthansa. His critical point: If you give a person a simple task, train them to do it, and have them repeat it, they will make a mistake every 5 minutes. If you give them a complex task and have them repeat it, they will make a mistake every 90 seconds. Add stress to that complex task, and they will make a mistake every 30 seconds. These are the limits of all humans. Manfred Mueller and Lufthansa have repeated this experiment 4 times a year on all the highly trained pilots in their airline for decades, and the needle never moves! I am not using the above scenario to pick sides in the blue vs. black lives matter debate. I do not condone that those police in Florida left a man, handcuffed and lying on the hot pavement for 20 minutes with a leg wound from which he could have exsanguinated. I am not saying bias had no role in the decision to shoot. I am simply pointing out that an officer, even with the best of training and the most conscientious decision-making will make an error at a set rate because he is engaged in a complex task, under significant stress. And mind you we are talking about individuals who are continually being trained for these complex, stressful scenarios. Now knowing the data about the limits of human performance, can anyone really make a reasonable argument that the solution to crime and violence in this country is unfettered access to guns? If you accept the zetabytes of data on the limits of human performance, the answer is no. Unleashing an armed population with zero or minimal training in complex, stressful scenarios involving weapons will result in a higher rate of errors than we are currently seeing with the police. And dont think for a minute that having a weapon will serve as a deterrent to an armed criminal. The data on that is overwhelming as well. If you carry a weapon, the likelihood of getting in a gunfight goes up nearly 100 fold. To be clear, this is not a screed arguing that we roll back the second amendment. That is a different debate. This is not a judgment on whether carrying a gun determines what kind of human being you are. This is simply a statement that if you carry a gun, and are in a situation where you may decide to use it you will be prone to a very high rate of error in the moment of decision. If you go under extensive training to mitigate that risk, you will still have a significant rate of making errors although at a lower rate. So ask yourself whether unleashing an army of untrained gun owners on our streets, in our universities is really the answer to crime in this country of if it is going to result in many more unnecessary deaths. The author is an anonymous physician. Image credit: Shutterstock.com 313 Shares Share Every medical couple knows that the lifestyle and career choice brings with it adjustments and sacrifices. Physician spouses and partners often take on more housework and childcare to accommodate long working hours. Physicians may work unusual hours that lead to late-night arrivals, missed bedtime tuck-ins, and less face-to-face time. This can lead many couples to blame medicine for their struggling relationship. Take the example of a resident who has been working long hours and has little time to spend with her husband. When Dr. Wife comes home late at night, husband starts listing the things that need to be done around the house, things that he always has to do because she is always working. The argument turns to her inaccessibility while she is at work. On and on they go, comparing how much time they each spend at their jobs, measuring exactly how much housework they each do, and explaining why they, not their partner, are misunderstood. Invariably, they reiterate the same arguments they have made a hundred times before and wonder why the outcome of these arguments is always the same. Any couple stuck in this loop will tell you that it can be incredibly painful. The interactions are characterized by palpable anger and a sense of hopeless and inevitable circularity. Eventually, that circularity becomes the norm, one that the couple easily falls into again and again. The conversations become an infinity loop with each partner triggering a predictable response in the other. The pain that at one time felt sharp and biting settles into a familiar ache. Its almost manageable. Maybe, they each think, medicine is to blame. A career in medicine is too all-consuming. Maybe this is nobodys fault. No. Medicine is not the culprit. Yes, a career in medicine tests a relationships strength and stamina and yes, the sacrifices can lead to very real frustration. But blaming the physician lifestyle robs the couple of the chance to examine what is truly happening when they have this conversation again and again. What is this couple feeling beneath the anger? I miss you. Im scared. We seem to be living parallel lives and I do not want to lose you. Im scared that you work long hours because you dont want to be with me. Im scared that we cant make this work and I dont know how to fix it. Im scared that Im losing myself in this relationship. I miss you. When the couple starts arguing about long hours, household responsibilities, or missed events, they dance around underlying issues and attack medicine instead. While anger is a primary emotion, it sometimes functions as a secondary reaction to underlying emotions like fear. But fear and vulnerability are incredibly painful to address because they ask the couple to risk rejection. Compared to that, arguing about a partners long shift feels safe. For some, the vicious cycle escalates, and the physician decides that she might as well do the very things her partner has accused her of. She starts working longer hours, seeing more patients, and taking longer to complete tasks. Medicine is a great way to stay away from home, and it comes built in with morally superior answers for why the hours drag out. But avoiding the issue by working longer hours only creates misdirection, encouraging both partners to point at medicine and say, See? It takes your time, your love, and your energy. For others, the anger comes from a genuine place of hurt and an inability to see past the symptoms because the realities of medical life can be stressful. Breaking those cycles is difficult. It involves writing a new script and exposing yourself to more difficult emotions. Still, an excellent first step might be replacing, Why are you late again?! with I miss you. Sarah Epstein is a masters candidate in couples and family therapy who blogs at Dating a Med Student. Image credit: Shutterstock.com Farmers from Webb and Zapata County are being advocated for at the State Capitol. The Webb County Texas Farm Bureau President is at a Leadership Convention discussing how farmers in Webb and Zapata county can be better served. Bureau President Buddy Earles says issues coming up in legislation will be talked about, such as ground and surface water issues and eminent domain. "Hopefully they will pay attention to the issues we have in the State of Texas," Earles said. "Issues that cost us money. Because we are trying to keep the cost down, so we can have good food for the State of Texas and other areas at a reasonable cost." For the next three days, over 200 farm bureau presidents will be meeting with state representatives. Olympic athlete and champion runner Ciara Everard took some time out from the track on Friday, and instead went ribbon cutting at her old primary school. She was the guest of honour at the official opening of St John of God NS' new extension, which boasts shiny new classrooms and top facilities. The school hall was packed with students, staff, parents and people from the community who gathered to celebrate the opening. The occasion was marked by an overwhleming sense of pride. From little acorns... According to Ciara, her journey t can all be traced back to there. My very first race was in first class, in Ms O' Neill's class So when anyone asks me where it all began, that's what I tell them, she said. I have to thank Ms O' Neil for that. Ciara said she still felt a great sense of belonging at the school, and had many great memories. She encouraged the girls to find something they were good at or enjoyed, and to keep at it and work hard. So, thanks to the school for all the opportunities it gave me I know I couldn't have had a better starting point than this school, she said. The proceedings were confidently officiated by MCs Ava and Sophie, who introduced guests and kept things moving along in a very professional manner. Several students were involved in telling the history of the school, and reading out their version of the Proclamation composed as part of the 1916 centenary celebrations. The children also sang several songs, including the school anthem. Principal Ann Foley thanked everyone for their patience and assistance with the project. In 2013, the school applied to the Department of Education for a grant to replace the prefabs that were in place at the back of the school. When the Department agreed to fund two new state-of-the-art classrooms, the journey began. We often talk about community today is a wonderful example of the school and the wider community coming together to appreciate and celebrate [the opening], she said. Chairman of the Board of Management Father Dan Carroll said he was particularly proud to be there at the official opening of the extension. He thanked everyone who had been part of the project, including the trustees, Board, the Department, Jan and Eoghan of McIntyre O' Shea architects, and others. Msgr Michael Ryan said that the children's song, 'A whole new World', had been very appropriate. He said he had recently been in the company of Pope Francis on a visit to Rome, and that the pontiff had spoken particularly about the role of Catholic education in the formation of faith in young people. He thanked and congratulated all involved with making the new extension a reality. Miss Universe 2015 Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach crowned Miss France Iris Mittenaere as her successor on Jan. 30, Monday, at the Mall of Asia Arena, Pasay, Metro Manila, Philippines. Here are 10 facts about the new queen: 1. Born on Jan. 25, 1994, Mittenaere is 23 years old when crowned Miss Universe 2016. Advertisement 2. She is 5'8" tall. 3. She was born in a town called Lille in France. 4. She is not someone who says no to extreme sports. 5. She is interested in cooking new French dishes. 6. She loves to travel. 7. She enjoys volunteering at Bienvenue-Tongasoa and Les Bonnes Fees. 8. Before winning Miss Universe 2016, she has been pursuing her degree in Dental Surgery. 9. Her advocacy as Miss Universe 2016 is dental and oral hygiene. 10. She is the second Miss France to win Miss Universe with Christian Martel, who won in 1953, as the first. During the Miss Universe 2016 coronation night, the judging panel included Miss Universe 1993 Dayanara Torres from Puerto Rico, Miss Universe 1994 Sushmita Sen from India, Miss Universe 2011 Leila Lopes from Angola, TV and film producer Francine LeFrak, Paper Magazine editorial director Mickey Boardman and "The Real Housewives of Atlanta" star Cynthia Bailey. The musical performers were Flo Rida and Boys II Men. Steve Harvey returned as the host of the coronation night with "America's Next Top Model" judge Ashley Graham as the backstage host. The former arrived in Manila on Jan. 28, Saturday, ABS-CBN News reported. United States president Donald Trump had sent a message to Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte through officials of the Miss Universe Organization, Rappler has learned. Duterte acknowledged the message and thanked Miss Universe Organization president Paula Shugart, who she mistakenly identified as Miss USA 2016, a title that belongs to Deshauna Barber. On Jan. 18, Wurtzbach participated in a dinner program in Baguio City, Philippines, which was hosted by Miss Universe 2011 third runner-up Shamcey Supsup. Distinguished people of the city welcomed them along with Shugart, Miss Universe 2016 host committee chairman Chavit Singson, and some Miss Universe 2016 candidates including Mittenaere. Have a glimpse of the Miss Universe 2016 event in Baguio here: The Irish Community Air Ambulance (ICAA) was scheduled to land in Nowlan Park and Inistioge GAA Grounds but due to cloud cover and weather issues, it was unable. The purpose of the visit was to bring attention to the service and promote the current plan to launch a Helicopter Emergency Medical Service (HEMS) which will serve the southwest and east of Ireland. The service will have a qualified doctor on board which will provide a life-saving treatment within the first hour. ICAA is a service which is operated by Irish Community Rapid Response, an innovative charity that was set up 10 years ago to deliver professional pre-hospital and A&E care via a voluntary network of doctors and medical professionals. The HEMS service will begin operation during the summer months and will work coincide with the Irish Community Rapid Response and the National Ambulance service. The service, however, is entirely funded by the community and ICAA are in need of donations to keep the service running and further expand its service. Visit www.communityairambulance.ie to help donate to the service and find out more details on their life-saving work. SARAJEVO, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Bosnia's autonomous Serb Republic raised 19.8 million Bosnian marka ($10.4 million) in an auction of one-year treasury bills on Monday, aimed at helping it plug a budget gap in the absence of funds from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Data from the Banja Luka Stock Exchange (BLSE) showed the average yield rose to 1.0 percent from 0.3 percent at the last comparable sale in July 2016, as investors placed bids for 37.4 million marka against 20 million marka on offer. The Serb Republic is awaiting a loan instalment from the IMF, which last September approved a three-year extended loan arrangement for Bosnia worth 553.3 million euros ($592 million) to back the Balkan country's economic reforms. The lender has already paid out 79.2 million euros. But to access the next tranche of 80 million euros, Bosnia must pass a law raising excise taxes, and its other autonomous region, the Bosniak-Croat Federation, must adopt a new banking law. The IMF distributes the loan payments to Bosnia's central government in Sarajevo, but the principal beneficiaries are the two autonomous regions. ($1 = 1.833 Bosnian marka) (Reporting by Maja Zuvela; Editing by Alexander Smith) Gold miner Randgold says talking to Tongon mine employees to end sit-in Jan 30 (Reuters) - Gold miner Randgold Resources Ltd said it is negotiating with some of its employees to end their illegal sit-in at its Tongon mine in Ivory Coast demanding annual ex-gratia payments. Randgold said representatives of the government and the union, which does not support the sit-in, are working with the company in engaging with the workers to end their action. (Reporting by Rahul B in Bengaluru; Editing by Sunil Nair) Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and may not reflect those of Kitco Metals Inc. The author has made every effort to ensure accuracy of information provided; however, neither Kitco Metals Inc. nor the author can guarantee such accuracy. This article is strictly for informational purposes only. It is not a solicitation to make any exchange in precious metal products, commodities, securities or other financial instruments. Kitco Metals Inc. and the author of this article do not accept culpability for losses and/ or damages arising from the use of this publication. kitco news By Sindhu Chandrasekaran Jan 30 (Reuters) - Southeast Asian stock markets edged up on Monday as trading remained subdued with some markets shut for Lunar new year, while concerns over U.S. President Donald Trump's immigration curbs hurt the sentiment. Trump on Friday barred refugees for four months, with an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria and a 90-day bar on citizens from seven other nations. "Last week Trump made good on promises towards immigration and withdrawing from trade deals," said James Woods, global investment analyst at Rivkin Securities in Sydney, in a note. "The concern for the market is, if he continues to prioritise achieving these policies over his economic policies, the market's patience will begin to wear thin the longer this takes and that is the key threat to new all-time highs," Woods said. Philippines shares rose as much as 0.6 percent, extending gains into a third session with financials leading the way. Ayala Corp rose 2.1 percent, while Metropolitan Bank and Trust Co gained 2.4 percent. Thailand shares recovered to trade marginally up. Kasikornbank PCL climbed 0.5 percent. Indonesia shares also edged up. Chandra Asri Petrochemical Tbk PT rose 0.7 percent. While the investors are still nervous about the U.S. policies, there is a plethora of key data being released this week including central bank decisions in Japan, the United States and the UK. "All three central banks are expected to keep monetary policy unchanged as they wait and see for progress towards stimulatory policies in the U.S. and the potential flow on effects," analyst Woods said. Vietnam , Malaysia and Singapore markets are closed on account of a public holiday. For Asian Companies click; SOUTHEAST ASIAN STOCK MARKETS; Change at 0510 GMT Change on the day Market Current previous Pct Move close Bangkok 1591.55 1590.8 0.05 Manila 7370.28 7333.67 0.50 Jakarta 5314.612 5312.84 0.03 Change so far this year Market Current End 2016 Pct Move Bangkok 1591.55 1542.94 3.15 Manila 7370.28 6840.64 7.7 Jakarta 5314.612 5296.711 0.34 (Reporting by Sindhu Chandrasekaran; Editing by Gopakumar Warrier) JOHANNESBURG, Jan 30 (Reuters) - South African fast-food company Nandos Group is considering an initial public offering (IPO), possibly in London, Bloomberg reported on Monday, as the maker of Portuguese-style peri-peri chicken seeks to raise funds. Bloomberg quoted unnamed sources, who said that no final decisions had been made yet and the company could look at other ways to raise funds. The company, which traded on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange between 1997 and 2003, is weighing a London listing among other potential venues, Bloomberg reported. Nandos, which operates restaurants selling peri-peri chicken, has grown from being a local brand to an international one operating in countries that include the United Kingdom, the United States, India, Australia, Qatar and Malaysia. Nandos could not immediately be reached for comment. (Reporting by Nqobile Dludla. Editing by Jane Merriman) (Adds detail, share price) Jan 30 (Reuters) - Gold miner Randgold Resources Ltd said it was in talks with some of its employees to end their illegal sit-in at its Tongon mine in Ivory Coast over demands to make some additional annual payments. The miner said the sit-in began at the mine late on Thursday with some employees demanding annual ex-gratia payments, which refers to sums of money paid without any legal obligation. The Tongon gold mine is owned by the Ivorian company, Societe des Mines de Tongon SA, in which Randgold has an 89 percent stake. Randgold said representatives of the government and the union, which does not support the sit-in, are working with the company in engaging with the workers to end their action. Shares in the company were down 1.1 percent at 6,505 pence at 0839 GMT. (Reporting by Rahul B in Bengaluru; Editing by Sunil Nair) Liam Hehir writes: Obama ran for the presidency campaigning against American involvement in wars of choice like Iraq. He was even awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in anticipation of the more peaceful times his presidency would bring. And yet the record shows that he involved America in the Syrian and Libyan conflicts, both of which have become geopolitical and humanitarian nightmare. On assuming the presidency, one of Obamas first actions was to order the closure of the American military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. At the time, this was intended as a powerful symbolic rebuke to the Bush years. Eight years later, the prison remains open and very much operational a fact that is itself deeply symbolic. Or consider the manner in which Obama drastically escalated the use of unmanned drone strikes. Heres an incredible statistic in the past eight years, more people not in declared war zones were summarily executed by drone than were killed by the three and a half centuries of the Spanish Inquisition. No one ever expects the Spanish Inquisition! The Spanish Inquisition saw 3,000 people killed over 350 years. In 2008, at the height of his messianic fervour, Obama decreed that, generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless. This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal. Following the inauguration of Trump, all references to climate change have been removed from the White House website. One of the first actions of the new president was the signing of an executive order aimed at frustrating the Obamacare healthcare law pending its full repeal. For those who supported the substance of Obamas agenda, this will be the bitterest legacy of all. When he was inaugurated, serious people were talking about a coming 40 years of dominance for the Democratic Party. Instead, the party has lost the Senate, the House of Representatives, 12 governorships, nearly 1000 state legislative seats and, of course, the presidency. By the way, none of this points to any character defect on the part of the now former president. What it does do, however, is point to three incontrovertible truths about politics. First, that idealism in opposition must yield to realism in office. Secondly, that there are no permanent victories. Thirdly, that in an imperfect world, we wont be saved by politicians. Obama did about as well as I expected for someone who became President with just a couple of years experience in the Senate (when he started campaigning) and no executive experience. That is one of the reasons in 2008 I thought Clinton would be a better nominee than Obama. Of course John McCain was my preferred choice and I think he would have been a great President. Share this: Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Reddit WhatsApp More Pinterest Print Tumblr The ODT reports: The food industry in Australia and New Zealand has managed to hold off near-universal calls from public health experts for government to crack down on junk food and sugar through its influential lobbying tactics, says the co-author of an Australian study. The study, published in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public Health, interviewed high-level people, including former politicians and civil servants with first-hand experience of these corporate activities, said University of Aucklands Boyd Swinburn, in a media release. The main tactics used by the industry identified in the study included framing the solutions to obesity in terms of personal responsibility, using private dinners and other opportunities for lobbying politicians, cherry-picking and promoting the evidence to suit their case, promotion of deregulation and self-regulatory approaches, funding professional nutrition organisations, sponsoring childrens sport and nutrition education materials, and personal criticism of public health advocates, Swinburn writes. This is hilarious. A public health activist publishes a study which is basically a whine that Governments wont do what the activists demand, and they blame everything for this apart from the fact that there is zero evidence that a sugar tax will reduce reduce obesity. A tax on sodas in NZ that reduced consumption by 10% (which is highly unlikely) and resulted in no substitution (even more unlikely) would reduce the average calorie intake by 3 calories. This is equivalent to walking for an extra 45 seconds a day. So they want a costly and pocket hitting tax that will rake in tens or hundreds of millions of dollars and have the same impact (at best) of 45 seconds of walking. And they think the reason the Government hasnt jumped at this stupidity is because of lobbying. It is because they are moronic. Share this: Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Reddit WhatsApp More Pinterest Print Tumblr Maxine Medina, Miss Universe Philippines 2016 competes on stage in Yamamay swimwear featuring footwear by Chinese Laundry during the 65th MISS UNIVERSE Preliminary Competition at the Mall of Asia Arena on Thursday, January 26, 2017. The contestants have (Photo : The Miss Universe Organization) - Hopes are high for Miss Universe Philippines Maxine Medina to win the crown this year - The Filipina beauty failed to achieve a back-to-back win for her home country after she did not make it in the Top 3. - The PH's bet has an interpreter for the Question-and-Answer portion, but chose to answer the query in English Advertisement Even with the help of an interpreter, Philippines failed to achieve a back-to-back win in the most prestigious beauty pageant. Expectations are high for Maxine Medina as the former Miss Universe is a Filipina and the pageant was held in her home country. The beauty queen has very large shoes to fill. Even before the pageant, Medina met backlash for her grammar and lack of substance in her past interviews making some people worried that she may have a difficult time in the Q&A portion. Former beauty queens and netizens think that Medina should get the aid of an interpreter, which she did. In the competition, the interpreter translated the question to Maxine, but the Philippines' bet has decided to provide an answer in English. The audience felt that the candidate's answer is lacking causing her early demise in the competition. However, USA, considered as one of the strong candidates, was dropped out of the Top 6. Meanwhile, Filipina beauty queen and Miss Universe 2010 fourth runner up Venus Raj admitted that she requested for an interpreter when she was filling the form for the competition. However, the form must be submitted first to the Binibining Pilipinas Charities Inc. (BPCI) to get their approval before it could be handed over to the Miss Universe Organization. However, BPCI denied Venus of her request saying, "They (BPCI) said, 'No, you don't need an interpreter, because the Philippines is actually known as [an] English-speaking [country], so hindi mo kailangan," she recounted. She thought that if she has been allowed an interpreter, she could have phrased her answer better and say some thing that could have impressed the judges. Shenandoah, IA (51601) Today Rain and snow tapering off this morning. Clearing late in the day. High 54F. Winds WSW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Snowfall around one inch.. Tonight Clear to partly cloudy. Low 39F. Winds SSW at 10 to 20 mph. Jurassic World 2' plot: Star Bryce Dallas Howard teases sequels story; Two more Jurassic movie sequel to be released in the future? It was revealed that Jurassic Worlds sequel plot will include war between dinosaurs and reptiles. (Photo : YouTube/BTV) "Jurassic World 2" is definitely happening and prediction says that it will be about Jurassic War. In "Jurassic World," Vincent D'Onoforio's character Vic Hoskins has pushed to turn raptors as means of becoming a weapon for war. Speculations say that the next sequel is said to be going towards that direction. Advertisement According to Digital Spy, the sequel will be more suspenseful and scary as it is how it was designed. The "Jurassic World 2" may also be a parable about animal rights. Saying that dinosaurs are a parable of the treatment of the world's animals today, causes such as animal abuse, experiments in medicine, pets, wild animals in zoos like in prisons, and so on. Fans can expect that there will be at least two more "Jurassic" movies, as Universal Pictures chief Donna Langley reveals that Collin Trevorrow is already busy working on an outline of the film. Trevorrow will be working alongside with his "Jurassic World" co-writer Derek Connolly as they continue to cook up the story. Also, Steven Spielberg will be joining the team as their executive producer, and news has it that they already have an idea for the next two movies. While Trevorrow may be already hooked up to direct "Star Wars Episode 9," "Jurassic World 2" will be getting a new director in the name of J.A Bayona. The said director was first considered to helm the first "Jurassic" movie but later declined. News has it that Bayona is viewing it as "Jurassic Park 5," in which we can presume that he's acknowledging sequels 2 and 3. Furthermore, Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard will be back to reprise their role as dino trainer Owen Grady and former park chief Claire Dearing, respectively. Unfortunately, we won't be seeing Jeff Goldblum and Jake Johnson in the movie. "Jurassic World 2" will most probably be reaching an estimated amount of $260MM investment for the production. The movie has no evident rival yet, but competitions ahead between "Godzilla 2" and Marvel's "Black Panther." The upcoming film's released date is set to be on June 22, 2018, Comic Book reported. While "Jurassic World 2" will hit the cinemas on June 7, in UK two weeks before its US debut. Knoxville students win regional National Science Bowl Competition 2017 National Science Bowl Competition. Image by DOE. WASHINGTON A team of Farragut Middle School students from Knoxville won their regional competition for the 2017 National Science Bowl (NSB) last Thursday. They will advance to compete in the NSB National Finals this spring in Washington, D.C. The National Science Bowl continues to be one of the premier academic competitions across the country and prepares America's students for future successes in some of the worlds fastest growing fields in science, technology, and engineering, said Dr. J. Stephen Binkley, Acting Director of the Departments Office of Science, which sponsors the nationwide competition, now in its 27th year. Each year the DOE Office of Science provides this unique opportunity, and I am honored to congratulate all the competitors who are advancing to the national finals, where they will continue to showcase their talents as top students in math and science. The NSB brings together thousands of middle and high school students from across the country to compete in a fast-paced question-and-answer format where they solve technical problems and answer questions on a range of science disciplines including biology, chemistry, Earth and space science, physics and math. A series of 116 regional middle school and high school tournaments are being held across the country from January through March. Winners will advance to represent their areas at the National Science Bowl held from April 27 to May 1 in Washington, D.C., for the final middle school and high school competitions. The top 16 high school teams and the top 16 middle school teams in the National Finals will win $1,000 for their schools science departments. Prizes for the top two high school teams for the 2017 NSB will be announced at a later date. The high school team that won the 2016 NSB received a nine-day, all-expenses-paid science trip to Alaska, where they learned more about glaciology, marine and avian biology, geology and plate tectonics. The second-place high school team at the 2016 NSB won a five-day, fully guided adventure tour of several national parks, which included a whitewater rafting trip. Approximately 265,000 students have participated in the National Science Bowl in its 26-year history, and it is one of the nations largest science competitions. More than 14,000 students compete in the NSB each year. DOEs Office of Science manages the NSB Finals competition. Published January 30, 2017 Jared Padalecki (L) and Jensen Ackles speak onstage at the 'Supernatural' panel during Comic-Con International 2015 at the San Diego Convention Center on July 12, 2015 in San Diego, California. (Photo : Getty Images/Kevin Winter) While Orlando Jones may have left "Sleepy Hollow" on a rather less-than-happy note back in 2015, last week at the winter previews of the Television Critics Association, he said on an interview that he would return to the show under one condition. The 49-year old actor shared his idea of a spin-off between "Sleepy Hollow" and the CW's "Supernatural." He also expressed that if they can get Misha Collins from "Supernatural" to team up with, then he will definitely consider returning to the show. Advertisement "I would do Sleepy Hollow spinoff if you could get Misha Collins from Supernatural to team up, and we'd be demon exterminators together," Jones says on an interview. Collins is popular for his role as angel Castiel in the CW's "Supernatural." He first appeared during the fourth season of the show and has starred ever since on the series. "Supernatural" is currently in the midst of Season 12 and has just renewed for the thirteenth season. According to Variety, Collins is set to guest star on an upcoming episode of the NBC action-adventure drama. The actor will portray the role of the historical figure Eliot Ness. The show is set to air on Feb.13. While the spin-off idea sounds like an epic notion, a Captain Frank Irving and a Castiel team up however is unrealistic for a lot of reason and it is most unlikely to happen, TV Guide reported. With Jones pretty much packed up with other projects on the small screen, he apparently has landed a part in the Starz adaptation of "American God." Furthermore, he also has signed a role on the upcoming BET series of "Madiba," since his leave on "Sleepy Hollow" in 2015. Should the odds be in our favor, getting Fox and The CW together for the "Sleepy Hollow" and "Supernatural" spin-off would still be a little bit tricky to fit into Jones' hectic schedule, Cinema Blend reported. Meanwhile, Jones was at the Television Critics Association promoting the upcoming BET mini-series of "Madiba." "Madiba" is a six-part miniseries about the life of South African revolutionary Nelson Mandela. The show premieres on Wednesday, Feb. 1 at 9/8c on BET. To share with friends and brethren The Gospel of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ (the Everlasting Gospel), and to prepare a people to stand when He returns to redeem His remnant. Also, to share relevant information of current events, and to show how they relate to prophecy; By means of articles, editorials, opinions, scripture readings, and poetry. Disclaimer Endrtimes does not necessarily endorse or agree with every opinion expressed in every article/video posted on this site. The information provided here is done so for personal edification; It's up to the reader to separate truth from error, and to examine everything (like the Bereans) from a Biblical perspective. Let the Holy Scriptures be you guide! - - - FAIR USE NOTICE: These pages/videos may contain copyrighted () material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available to advance understanding of ecological, POLITICAL, HUMAN RIGHTS, economic, DEMOCRACY, scientific, MORAL, ETHICAL, and SOCIAL JUSTICE ISSUES, etc. It is believed that this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior general interest in receiving similar information for research and educational purposes. By Jun Ji-hye North Korea has reportedly set up land-based sensors along its border with China to block attempts to flee the country. The North's national security agency has installed unmanned detection devices at barbed-wire fences located in the North Korea-China border area upon its leader Kim Jong-un's order, Yonhap News Agency said, citing sources familiar with the matter. It is the first time testimony on the land-based sensors has been reported. Previous reports had it that the Kim regime set up infrared search cameras along the border to detect people trying to defect. The young leader has stressed the importance of effectively dealing with defectors as quickly as possible especially after Thae Yong-ho, who was deputy ambassador at the North Korean Embassy in Britain, fled to South Korea last August, becoming one of the highest-ranking North Korean officials to escape the repressive state, according to sources. The land-based sensors have been placed on well-known escape routes, such as Hyesan in Ryanggang Province and around Hoeryong in North Hamgyong Province, the sources said, adding that the North plans to set up more sensors. The sensors are designed to detect motion by humans or animals. Once any motion is detected, relevant information is transmitted to security forces stationed near the border area. "Kim Jong-un ordered the national security agency not to waste too much time on dealing with defectors and to solve the matter at the earliest possible date," a source said. "In accordance with such an order, the agency has expanded its informers working at the border area." The informers hired by the agency even work together with some North Korean defectors living in the South to concoct a trap to hunt potential defectors. "The informers are asking the defectors in the South to disguise themselves as brokers who pretend to assist would-be defectors," the source said. "The disguised brokers contact residents in the North and tempt them to defect. Then, the informers are hunting for those who are trying to defect." In this process, dozens of residents have been arrested by the agency and executed for espionage, the source said, adding that the Kim regime's reign of terror has resulted in a decrease in the number of residents attempting to defect. The head of a Seoul-based group helping North Koreans defect to the South, asking not to be named, said 20 to 30 defectors have entered South Korea via China each month until last year, but this number has fallen off noticeably from this year. Thae fled to the South with his wife and children, revealing that his disillusionment with Kim's reign of terror prompted his defection. Since his arrival, Thae has been expressing his willingness to devote the rest of his life to the reunification of the two Koreas. Acting president, Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, talks with U.S. President Donald Trump on the phone at his office in Seoul, Monday. The two agreed to strengthen cooperation to cope with North Korea's nuclear threats. / Yonhap By Rachel Lee U.S. President Donald Trump and Korea's acting president, Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn, have agreed to strengthen joint military capabilities to cope with against North Korea's nuclear threats, according to Hwang's office and the White House. In a 30-minute phone conversation Sunday, the two reaffirmed the importance of the alliance. This was the first time Hwang held a phone conservation with the U.S. leader, and the conversation was made at Trump's request, Hwang's office said. According to Hwang's office, Trump said the U.S will always be with South Korea "100 percent" and bilateral relations will be "better than ever." "The acting president called for further joint efforts to strengthen strategic ties encompassing a wide range of areas including security and business," the office said in a press release. "Hwang also stressed the need for joint efforts to take stronger action against Pyongyang's further provocations in the future." In response, President Trump "reiterated our ironclad commitment to defend the ROK, including through the provision of extended deterrence, using the full range of military capabilities," the U.S. presidential office said in a statement. "The two leaders agreed to take steps to strengthen joint defense capabilities to defend against the North Korean threat." The two leaders also talked about U.S. Secretary of Defense James Mattis's upcoming visit to Seoul, noting that his trip reflects the "close friendship between our two countries, and demonstrates the importance of the U.S.-ROK alliance," the White House statement said. Trump and Hwang "pledged to advance mutual security and prosperity," it said. Hwang expressed his hopes that Trump will visit Seoul as soon as possible. Mattis's visit comes as tensions are escalating after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said Pyongyang is apparently ready to test-fire an intercontinental ballistic missile at any time from any location. Mattis is expected to arrive in Seoul, Thursday, and meet with South Korean Defense Minister Han Min-koo. The secretary of defence will also visit Japan the next day and talk with his Japanese counterpart Tomomi Inada. Upon his election victory, Trump already had a telephone conversation with Korean President Park Geun-hye on Nov. 10 before she was impeached. During the talks, the U.S. President was quoted as saying his country will stay "firm, strong" in defending against provocations from North Korea. Park emphasized during the talks that the two nations have built mutual trust based on the alliance and overcoming challenges over the past six decades, which has laid the foundation for peace and prosperity in Asia-Pacific. Hwang assumed interim presidential power Dec. 9 after the National Assembly voted in favor of impeaching the scandal-ridden President Park. Nguyet Thi Thanh, one of the survivors of a Vietnam War massacre committed by South Korean soldiers, speaks at a weekly demonstration by former comfort women in front of the Japanese Embassy in Seoul, during her first visit to Korea last April. / Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-chul 'Peace is possible when putting myself in the shoes of an assailant' By Choi Ha-young Koreans usually see themselves from the point of view of the victims, for example, of wartime sex slavery under Japanese imperialism. So, more than 40 years after the Vietnam War ended, it is difficult to find any feelings of guilt here over Korea's role in that war, even if the nation sent over 300,000 soldiers to Vietnam. There, 11,000 of them died and some still suffer long-term effects from exposure to defoliants. According to a Vietnamese military report published in the 1980s, South Korean soldiers killed about 5,000 Vietnamese civilians. Some researchers speculate the number could be as high as 9,000. In September 1964, South Korean soldiers landed in civil war-ravaged Vietnam to support U.S. attacks on communist forces. Then President Park Chung-hee, President Park Geun-hye's father, signed a deal with the U.S. to get long-term loans for economic growth. The troops were dedicated to building humanitarian facilities and providing necessities, but also were involved in battles. From Dec. 3 to 6, 1966, the 2nd Marine Division of Korea killed about 430 civilians in Binh Hoa, in Vietnam's south. Reportedly, more than half the victims were women and seven were pregnant. Among them were 166 children. "The sin, enough to reach the sky, will be remembered eternally," a monument erected in the village reads. Across Vietnam, around 80 monuments recall the wartime crime committed by Koreans. Scholars and journalists investigated the tragedy, and it came to light in 1999 through media reports. But Seoul has never apologized officially. Former President Kim Dae-jung expressed regret in 1998 during a visit to Hanoi, but no progress has been made since. Only civic groups have continued medical volunteer activities in Vietnam to offer an apology and some activists campaigned to build a museum to inform the Korean public about the issue. However, the Korean government recently set back the clock. One of President Park's flagship policies, state-authored textbooks, justified the nation's participation in the war, omitting descriptions of the anti-war movement of the time. And most textbooks don't mention the massacres. Instead, Korean students would learn of the war's economic benefits. So, many Koreans are unaware that the country' soldiers were "assailants." Vietnam's change of view Originally, Vietnam demonstrated the rule of "shutting out past affairs and opening to the future." But Ku Su-jeong a master's degree and Ph.D. holder from the Vietnam National University, Ho Chi Minh City says the phrase doesn't mean the Vietnamese will cover up the memories forever. "Rather, the Vietnamese government has investigated the atrocities, published booklets and designated the massacre sites as historical remains and organized events to commemorate," said Ku, who exposed the massacres in Korea for the first time as a correspondent of a local media outlet, Hankyoreh. In December, a documentary titled "The Last Lullaby," which dealt with the Binh Hoa massacre, won an honorable mention from Vietnamese state-run broadcaster VTV. "Above all, it is shameful not to recognize wrongdoings citing that victims don't demand an apology," the longtime observer told The Korea Times by email. A local resident looks at a monument inscribed with 74 victims' names, which was erected in a village in Hoi An. / Korea Times files Chain of brutality Interestingly, she pointed out that looking back on the tragedy will help Korea reflect on its own unresolved historical issues. "There are considerable connections between the massacres that occurred around the Korean War, those during the Vietnam War and those during the May 18 Democratization Movement in Gwangju in 1980," Ku said. In 1948, two years before the Korean War, government forces killed Jeju residents who protested the nation's division. In 1980, a military government ordered the shootings of civilians in Gwangju, which also involved torture and sexual assaults. Chae Myung-shin, then commanding officer of the Republic of Korea forces in Vietnam, is the thread that connects the consecutive atrocities, Ku said. "Chae's first post was Jeju Island in 1948 and he conducted sweep-up operations against suspected communists," she said. "The achievements during the Vietnam War gave a chance for advancement to the soldiers, who formed a strong bond. This is the beginning of Hanahoe which means Group of One the unofficial private group in the military." Two leading members of Hanahoe former presidents Chun Doo-hwan and his right-hand man Roh Tae-woo approved atrocities against the Gwangju Democratization Movement to strengthen their grip on power. There were similarities in the murders across the massacres: cutting off females' breasts after rape, killing children and senior citizens and incinerating all after the brutalities. "Korea has a long history of ideological conflicts," Ku said. "The experiences on Jeju and massacres during the Korean War would be a background of the orchestrated atrocities under stern anti-communism education." Additionally, she said the soldiers' panic, caused by an unfamiliar environment and the language barrier, would be a further reason for the cruelty. How to apologize Ku calls for an unlimited apology to Vietnamese victims first and also recognition of what happened, fact finding, an official apology, legal compensation, punishment of offenders, documentation in textbooks and the erection of memorials. "This is what Korean civil society has urged of Japan," she said. "If Korea treads in Japan's steps like the so-called Reconciliation and Healing Foundation, this would be a secondary victimization. Above all, the most important thing is a sincere apology and self-reflection." Recently, Ku led a group trip to the massacre sites in Vietnam, on the 50th anniversary of the Binh Hoa massacre. The participants paid their respects at the memorial and met the survivors. Among the participants were a conscientious objector, who has rejected mandatory military service because of their belief in peace. The phrase "Peace is possible when putting myself in the shoes of an assailant" has inspired Ku and her longtime movement to build peace between Vietnam and Korea. Now she is preparing the establishment of the Korean-Vietnamese Peace Foundation, based in Seoul, to push for a public awareness campaign on the issue. Along with the preparation, she has to deal with a lawsuit filed by 831 Korean veterans who deny all allegations about all massacres. By Lee Han-soo A woman has been found guilty of falsely accusing a man of raping her. On Monday, Ulsan District Court sentenced the woman to eight months' jail, suspended for two years, and 120 hours of community service. According to the court, the woman falsely accused a man of raping her when she was drunk last year. But the court found that the woman had consented to having sexual intercourse. When her boyfriend found out that she cheated on him, she falsely told police the man had raped her. "Sexual crimes often have no objective evidence other than the statement of the victims," the court said in a ruling statement. "Therefore a false claim can greatly hinder the justice system and needs to be severely punished." Lee Kyu-chul, spokesman for the special prosecution team speaks during a press briefing at the team's office in Daechi, southern Seoul, Monday. / Yonhap Ambassador to Myanmar to be summoned today By Lee Kyung-min President Park Geun-hye's confidant Choi Soon-sil, the central figure in the influence-peddling scandal, is facing an additional charge of seeking personal gain in state business worth 76 billion won ($65 million) in Myanmar, prosecutors said Monday. Choi is already on trial for abuse of authority, coercion and bribery. The independent counsel team said it plans to file additional charges of receiving valuables in exchange for helping a company to participate in an Official Development Assistance (ODA) project last year. The amount of the bribes and the identity of the company have yet to be disclosed. The team will question Korean Ambassador to Myanmar Yoo Jae-kyung today over his role in the allegation. According to the team, the state project called "Myanmar K-Town" was spearheaded jointly by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy to find partners in untapped overseas markets, to boost hallyu, or the Korean wave, and to help achieve an economic initiative under the Park administration. While the project initially was to be led by a private consortium, it was later taken over by the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), a development aid organization under the foreign ministry. The project, however, was scrapped as KOICA objected to the plan citing a lack of viability, coupled with an on-site report that concluded the project's low marketability would yield little profit. The team is looking into whether Choi sought to influence the decision to benefit her or the Mir Foundation, one of two organizations set up by her alongside the K-Sports Foundation. This, the team added, shares too many similarities with "Iran K-Tower," another state project spearheaded by Park. Last May, Park and her delegation visited Iran to sign a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the Korea Land and Housing Corp (LH) and Iran's Teachers' Pension Fund. The MOU, however, came under heavy criticism for specifically requiring the Mir Foundation to play the central role in the bilateral deal. The team believes Choi, through the Mir Foundation, not only exerted influence with state decisions but also netted financial benefits. Meanwhile, the team is going after Choi, who failed to appear before the team at 11 a.m. citing her objection to the team's aggressive methods of interrogation. Earlier last week, the team executed a court-issued custody warrant in bringing Choi to the team's office in Daechi, southern Seoul, as she repeatedly refused to cooperate with the investigation. By Choi Ha-young Hwang Kyo-ahn Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn is emerging as a powerful presidential candidate for conservatives, as former U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's approval rating remains stagnant. Hwang, serving as acting president in place of the impeached President Park Geun-hye, ranked fifth on a poll by Realmeter, Thursday, standing at 7.4 percent. He was ranked higher than South Chungcheong Governor An Hee-jung, one of the emerging liberal candidates. Ban stood at 15.4 percent, down from 22.1 percent a month ago, while Moon Jae-in of the Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) extended his lead to 32.8 percent as the most favored candidate. The poll also showed Ban's lack of competitive edge in the face of the DPK hopefuls. Assuming bilateral matches Ban versus Moon, versus Seongnam Mayor Lee Jae-myung and versus An Ban was defeated by gaps of 23.3 percent, 18.1 percent and 21.1 percent, respectively. "If Ban's approval rating makes no more progress after the Lunar New Year holidays, Hwang's poll number will grow more," political analyst Hwang Tae-soon told The Korea Times. "For conservatives, Hwang has shown conservative values, as seen by his previous decision to disband the Unified Progressive Party as justice minister." The ruling Saenuri Party, without its own candidate, openly supported Hwang. "The opposition parties should refrain from undermining the efforts Hwang has made," the ruling party's floor leader Rep. Chung Woo-taik said Thursday. Hwang has neither dismissed speculation about his bid for presidency, nor admitted it. "What I'm doing and thinking now is to make every effort to overcome domestic and international difficulties and stabilize state affairs as the acting president," he said in a press conference on Jan. 23. However, he actively expressed his views on sensitive diplomatic issues, such as the deployment of Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, rather than keeping the status quo until the Constitutional Court makes a ruling on Park's impeachment. Hwang has also had a schedule similar to those of presidential hopefuls visiting military camps, kindergartens and street markets attracting criticisms from opposition parties. "Hwang should be aware that he is also tied in to the influence-peddling scandal involving Park," Rep. Koh Yong-jin, spokesman of the DPK, said in a statement Thursday. Rep. Yoo Seong-min of the Bareun Party pointed out a procedural problem, saying the deputy prime minister will have to replace the acting president in case he decides to run for president. The court is expected to make a decision by March 13. If it acknowledges the impeachment, the presidential election will be held at the end of April. If Hwang is to run in the election, he will have to resign from his post at least by mid-March because candidates need to be out of official posts at least 30 days before the election. By Kim Rahn February will be a crucial month for President Park Geun-hye, who faces the independent counsel's face-to-face questioning over the influence-peddling scandal and related searches of Cheong Wa Dae. The Constitutional Court impeachment hearings are also likely to wrap up within February as it plans to make a decision before one of its justices retires on March 13. The President will have a busy month preparing for the questioning as well as possible attendance at one of the court hearings. Since the launch of the special investigation team, independent counsel Park Young-soo has said the team would question the President face-to-face. The President has also said she would comply with the questioning, although she had refused earlier questioning requests by the prosecution. But the two sides are having a war of nerves over when and how to have the questioning. While the probe team wants to grill the President as late as early February because its investigation period will finish by the end of the month, Park's lawyers are trying to delay the questioning as much as possible to cause a setback in the team's probe. Regarding where to quiz her, Park's lawyers prefer Cheong Wa Dae citing security reasons, while the probe team prefers a third place. The counsel team is planning a search of Cheong Wa Dae soon as well, but it is unlikely for the presidential office to open up its premises to the investigators, also citing security reasons. Also, the court is holding a tight schedule over the impeachment decision, having two to three hearings a week. While court President Park Han-chul's term ends today, another among the remaining eight justices, Lee Jung-mi, will also retire March 13. Although the court can technically proceed with deliberations with the remaining seven justices, Park Han-chul said last week it is desirable to make the decision before Lee's retirement because a single vacancy could pose a significant threat to the fairness of the ruling in this historically important case. If the court follows the timetable, it would close hearings within February and afterward the justices would review testimony and draw up the verdict for one to two weeks. So both the National Assembly seeking impeachment and Park opposing it will have a fierce legal battle in court this critical month. Before and during the Lunar New Year holiday, Park met with her attorneys to prepare for the hearings, according to Cheong Wa Dae officials. It is said Park may hire additional attorneys. She and her lawyers are also reportedly talking about her attending a hearing herself. The President is not required to attend the impeachment hearings, but Park's aides have said she may need a chance to express her account of the scandal on her own to the public. In appealing to the public, it is also possible for her to opt for a press conference. Since the scandal emerged, Park has issued three short apologies, had a meeting with journalists and an interview with a conservative online media outlet. On these occasions, she denied all allegations surrounding her but failed to present grounds to back up her explanations. By Stephen Costello Dear Korean presidential candidates, I write to you as an outsider who supports Korea, the US-Korea alliance, and our common effort to make progress on the big issues that confront us. The many experiences and values we share are not a little thing; they are the main thing. I am amazed at the clarity, determination and civic openness of your recent demonstrations. Our own demonstrations last week have been important for us, as well. Among other things, both have been attempts to reaffirm deeply held values, and to stand against backsliding in social progress. Let's say a few things at the beginning. One president does not change bedrock values or real national interests. A look at the recent history of Korea and the US confirms this. We in the US have survived incompetent and corrupt presidents, and so have you. If our current president will not be able to help you much, that's unfortunate, but it's also not new. As for the similarities between Presidents ParkGeun-hye and Donald J. Trump (arguing about crowd size, for instance), we can put that aside for now. Militarily, both of our governments have been focused on overblown threats from North Korea while refusing to return to credible and sincere talks. If you want to change this dynamic, you had better know a great deal about the issues, and consult with a wide range of experts.Regarding broader military issues, there are important decisions to make regarding force structure, equipment, regional and alliance roles, and of course, OpCon. You can't learn these things later. Across the range of key issues you will have to address, very few will really be matters of left vs right or progressive vs conservative. You should address this fact now in your public discussions. Both right and left in Korea are emerging from difficult and tragic recent histories. Conservative leaders are still struggling to emerge from an identity tied to Chaebol-authoritarian capitalism, nostalgic anticommunism, and a fear-based, dependent view of national security. President Park has not helped much with this. Progressives are still trying to mend the internal war between Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun groups, started by Roh in 2003. It makes sense that you and your fellow candidates must now find new language to talk about common goals and interests. One of the signs that you are serious about this election which could be in April or early May will be demonstrating that you can unite the public in ways that the last three presidents did not. Roh, Lee Myung-bak and Park, in important ways, were alldivisive. You cannot afford to continue this self-defeating trend. If you cannot authentically bring factions and power groups together, please find something else to do, and step away from this contest. As you gear up to run as a candidate, you should have a serious, open, and long-term policy shop. In the best case, the parties will have the strongest policy organizations. Most importantly, you should base your candidacy on your program, not on yourself. This is an old dilemma, but right now in Korea it is urgent. Despite the fact that parties often align with individuals, you still have two main worldviews and programs. So a clear campaign at the end, with two candidates, may be best for voters. But that may not happen. You may have four parties running. If democrats have a rigorous primary and select one candidate, you could still have three, with pro- and anti-Park groups running. If the opposite happens, voters could elect a conservative once again. Think hard about those possibilities. We in the US are right now giving you a negative example of presidential campaigning and governing. Please take our example for the warning that it is. Among the lessons are these: A campaign based on a personality is fragile and unlikely to move the massive bureaucracy of the state in any clear direction. Base your appeal on a program, and on trusted, experienced and expert allies. You should ally with other figures who embrace your vision for Korea, before the election. Let voters see who you would trust as Prime Minister or Foreign Minister or Economics Minister. The inequality gap has finally become the most important political fact in democracies. That does not require so-called "populist" appeals for free lunches or less military service. Instead it requires that the public, through their government, grow a smart social net of health, jobs and financial security. It also means ending, for good, special treatment of the Chaebol and their ruling families. Slogans will not do here. You must know the issues, and how to improve Korean systems. The North Korea issue and the US alliance issue will shadow everything that happens from now until the next election. Treat this seriously, by being very careful and listening closely. Try to see US Defense Secretary Mattis when he is here this week, and listen. He is respected in Washington, and he will be important in coming years. You don't have to comment on what the US is doing now, since even we don't know for sure. But you can, and should, think and talk about how Korea can take more responsibility and be more independent in its foreign policy. Such a change, if you explain it well, will improve and strengthen the Korea-US alliance. It will also improve your power and Korea's ability to remain friends with China. With new flexibility in hand, you can put a full stop to the counterproductive and dangerous bullying by the Xi Jinping government. That is your international priority number one. Talk about Korean relations with Japan. You should lead this discussion, because it has become twisted by irresponsible governments temporarily in power in Japan and Korea. These two middle powers hold the future of the neighborhood very much in their hands. The reasons for cooperation and common interests are extensive and enduring. Talk beyond current governments to the public, and make the case for coming together on a range of issues. This will be among the most important presidential votes in Korean history. You don't want to get this wrong. Good luck to you, and Happy Lunar New Year. Stephen Costello is a producer of AsiaEast, a web and broadcast-based policy roundtable focused on security, development and politics in Northeast Asia. He writes from Washington, D.C. He can be reached at scost55@gmail.com. Kodo Nishimura is a monk and also a makeup artist. / Courtesy of Hankook Ilbo By Ko Dong-hwan Japanese monk Kodo Nishimura believes all people are equal. This typical message, however, carries more weight because Nishimura is a transvestite who works during daytime as a renowned makeup artist. The seemingly weird mixture of professions started from a pre-teen identity crisis, which was overcome by self-enlightenment and matured into discovering a destiny of helping others look good while reminding them not to deny their natural appearances. Nishimura, 27, says cosmetic artists and monks have something in common in that they "make others happy." "Each person carries a unique hue," he says. "My hands and heart make it shine brighter." Nishimura has been travelling Tokyo and New York putting colorful touches on celebrities. His coming-out in 2013 did not solve his deep questions of "why do people live" or "why should people do good things." This situation led him to train to be a monk, which he did two years later. He had pondered whether to give up either of the two worlds because being a cosmetic artist violates the rules of becoming a monastery member. But his makeup teacher encouraged him that "when you go outside and grab attention, you are spreading Buddhism's message that all living creatures are equal." Nishimura's Instagram page vividly portrays his life as a makeup artist. Outside the monastery, Nishimura lives an exotic life. His Outside the monastery, Nishimura lives an exotic life. His Instagram pages are filled with selfies of himself as a woman wearing different makeup styles and wigs; and photos of him with other models in glamorous outfits. Offline, he gives makeup lessons to other sexual minority celebrities in Japan. "Transgender people still have men's skin, which cannot be the same as that of biological women," he says. "Transgender people need makeup techniques that can enliven their unique skin tone. When their confidence grows, I become happy too." Realizing that his sexual orientation was unlike that of other boys when he was eight years old, he hid the fact throughout the teenage years and went to the U.S. to study fine arts after graduating from high school. But with a different skin color than that of Caucasians, his ethnicity-based psychological exploration continued, until Japanese model Mori Riyo won Miss Universe in 2007. Her typical Asian look, which did not have double eyelids or a sharp nose, became the champion's look with the help of makeup that accentuated such traits instead of hiding them. Riyo's make-up artist then taught him cosmetic techniques. Nishimura considers the world as a kaleidoscope, where everyone has unique beauty. "Whatever people say about your skin color, you go ahead and cultivate your own self,"he says. This is what he teaches. A scene from "The Orphan of Zhao." / Courtesy of National Theater Company of Korea By Kwon Mee-yoo "The Orphan of Zhao," a play highly acclaimed for its impressive directing intersecting comedy and tragedy, and its absorbing performances by polished actors, returned to the Myeongdong Theater in downtown Seoul for a second run. The play, produced by the National Theater Company of Korea (NTCK), attracted unexpected publicity earlier this year as its director Koh Sun-woong was associated with the notorious blacklist allegedly created by President Park Geun-hye to list artists critical of her administration. During a hearing on the blacklist, it was revealed that Koh was originally included on the list, but Park Min-kwon, former vice minister of culture, asked for clemency for Koh because his play was too good. Park's request was denied and he was replaced as vice minister of culture. The mention immediately evoked curiosity over the play, which was already highly anticipated after its award-winning premiere in 2015. The play is based on Chinese author Ji Junxiang's 13th century script of the same name and director Koh adapted the play focusing on Cheng Ying, the man who gives up his only child to save the "seed of revenge." The first act revolves around the tragic fate that strikes Cheng Ying. The second act is on Cheng raising the orphan of Zhao and shepherding the boy to avenge his family's enemy. Koh uses a handful of symbolic objects _ a tree, a wheel, a moon, a chair and clubs of different sizes _ to progress the story. The original play often referred to as the Chinese "Hamlet" due to its revenge nature, but director Koh was more interested in the human nature behind the vengeance. In the end when the orphan of Zhao completes his revenge, Duke Ling suggests he and Cheng Ying annihilate Tu'an Gu's entire family and relatives to be fair. However, Cheng Ying, who devoted 20 years of his life to the revenge plot, looks rather empty and hollow instead of being overwhelmed by joy. Cheng Ying faces the ghosts of those related to this long-time reprisal behind the curtain, but they just slide by Cheng Ying, intensifying his loneliness and vanity. The futility expressed in the face of actor Ha Sung-kwang, playing Cheng Ying epitomizes what the play wants to convey. The play centers around the meaning of revenge and the vanity behind vengeance, but it also questions what makes a good leader. "All of the problems are rooted in poor judgment," director Koh said. "When General Tu'an Gu remonstrated Duke Ling to annihilate the entire family of Zhao Dun, Duke Ling could think wisely and make a different decision, which could have prevented the ravages of the vengeance." The play runs through Feb. 12. Tickets cost from 20,000 to 50,000 won. It is performed in Korean with Chinese subtitles on Thursday and Sunday, and with English subtitles on Friday. For more information, visit www.ntck.or.kr or call 1644-2003. Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi is set to meet on Monday with Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn on the sidelines of the African Union summit in Addis Ababa, MENA agency reported. El-Sisi will participate in the AUs 28th General Assembly, themed Harnessing the Demographic Dividend Through Investments in Youth, which kicked off in Addis Ababa on 22 January and will conclude on 31 January. Last week the Egyptian president told attendees of a youth conference in Aswan that although Egyptians' concerns about the under-construction Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam are legitimate, Egypt was dealing with the issue "in a good way" and in accordance with the agreements reached between Cairo and Addis Ababa. He told the audience that Egypt takes the issue seriously, saying the issue of Egypt's water supply is a matter of "life and death." He will also present a final report on the efforts conducted by Egypt during its two-year chairman of an African leaders; council on climate change, where he will then hand over the chairmanship to Gabon counterpart Ali Bongo Ondimba. El-Sisi, who is expected to arrive to the Ethiopian capital on Sunday, will meet in Addis with his counterparts from Kenya and the Republic of the Congo to discuss methods of bolstering relations with the African countries in various fields, as well as other regional issues. Speaking at last Julys presidential-level AU meeting, El-Sisi told his African counterparts that there was no substitute for adopting a model of regional integration in Africa. Egyptian-Ethiopian relationship will witness 'major push' In statements to Egyptian journalists in Addis Ababa on Sunday, Egypt's envoy to Ethiopia and the AU, Abu Bakr Hanafy, said that both countries were able to overcome the transient conflict in their relationship following accusations by Ethiopian officials that Egypt had supported anti-government demonstrations by the Oromo ethnic group in Ethiopia last summer. Hanafy added that the trust built between the two countries since El-Sisi came into office helped to overcome this crisis through high level calls between the two countries away from the media. Hanafy also discussed Ethiopia's Grand Renaissance Dam, saying that the dam's consultancy operations were starting to comply with the technical aspects stipulated in the March 2015 declaration of principles which both countries, along with Sudan, have signed. There were tensions between Egypt and Ethiopia in the last five years as the dam construction got underway, with Cairo expressing fears that the project could negatively affect Egypts water share. Addis Ababa maintains that the dam, which Ethiopia needs to generate electricity, will not harm downstream countries. In 2015, Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan signed a declarations of principles in Khartoum on the the dam project, in which the three nations resolved to take all measures to avoid causing damage to the others when using the Blue Nile, and to discuss compensation measures if such damages occur. Last September in Khartoum, the three countries signed contract with the French engineering consultancy Artelia and BRL groups to study the impacts of the GERD on the downriver states Hanafy said that Egypt has sensed positive consent from the Ethiopian side, adding that the issue of the dam has resolutions that fall under the framework of respecting Ethiopian sovereignty and Egypt's share of Nile water, respectively. He predicted that Egyptian-Ethiopian relations will witness a major push in the upcoming period especially with Egypt, Ethiopia, Senegal being non-permanent members representing the African continent on the UN's Security Council. Search Keywords: Short link: By Doug Bandow After spending a quarter century treating NATO as an international social club to which every reasonably civilized European nation should belong, the alliance has begun to focus again on its original role as a military alliance. Rather than expect the U.S. to burnish NATO's nuclear deterrent, European nations should consider expanding their nuclear arsenals and creating a continent-wide nuclear force. Since its creation NATO has stood for North Atlantic and The Others. America dominated the alliance and offered a continental security guarantee, both conventional and nuclear. France and Great Britain created their own nuclear forces, but they likely would have been reluctant to engage in a nuclear war with the Soviet Union to protect West Germany. If any country was going to engage in nuclear exchanges with Moscow, it would have been the U.S. That almost certainly remains the case today. European tensions with Russia have greatly increased, mostly tied to Moscow's seizure of Crimea and support for separatists in Ukraine's east. There is no evidence that the Putin government intends to start an aggressive war against Europe, and no alliance member, including the Baltic States and Poland, has boosted military outlays as if it believed conflict was imminent. Rather, the Europeans have concentrated on demanding that America do more. That's certainly the case when it comes to nuclear weapons. In a study last year for the Atlantic Council Matthew Kroenig argued that NATO needed emphasize nuclear deterrence. Any additional weapons likely would be AmericanWashington currently shares control over U.S. nukes with several alliance membersand the country most in Russia's retaliatory sites would be America. Since two European nations possess nuclear weapons and others could develop them, why should the U.S. remain the country expected to bring Gutterdaemmerung to life? Americans should ask whether it is truly in America's interest to use nuclear weapons to defend Europe? The Soviet Union was an ideological and global competitor to the U.S. During the Cold War Moscow's domination of the more populous and productive Western European states would have made for a much scarier world. Very different is Russia, which looks a lot more like pre-1914 Imperial Russia with far more bounded ambitions. Moscow's present aggressiveness is unpleasant, but not particularly threatening to the U.S. Putin's Russia appears most interested in respectfor its interests and borders. If anyone is at risk, it is the three Baltic States, though Moscow would gain little benefit from attacking them while the costs would be significant. Nothing in Russia's posturing today looks like the opening salvo of an expensive Russian blitzkrieg over a geopolitical cliff. And if Putin surprised in a bad way, does defense of the Baltics warrant Washington taking steps that could incinerate to the American homeland? In this case for what? To protect a continent which appears to have little interest in arming itself? Only the specter of Donald Trump becoming president appears to have caused a few European nations to reluctantly do a bit more. But the difference is hard to notice. Nuclear nonproliferation is a worthwhile goal, but not if it increases the likelihood of America being involved in a nuclear war. If anyone should take that risk for Europe, it should be European nations. A possible solution would be to create European nuclear deterrent through contributions from member nuclear states. Roderich Kiesewette, a German Bundestag leader on foreign policy, suggested turning to Britain and France, with a build-up financed by a joint European military budget: "If the United States no longer wants to provide this guarantee, Europe still needs nuclear protection for deterrent purposes." Berthold Kohler, a publisher of the conservative Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, followed with the suggestion that Germany might need to augment the small British and French arsenals to successfully confront Russia and maybe China. However, a nuclear Germany isn't a new idea. It came up during West Germany's rearmament and induction into NATO. A German nuclear capability deserves a full debate today. For much of the foreign policy community, what has always been must always be is the guiding mantra. The incoming Trump administration is likely to provide greater opportunities to rethink Washington's conventional wisdom. One policy which deserves rethinking is Washington's extended deterrence in Europe. The continent already has two European nuclear states as members of NATO. Instead of expecting the U.S. to risk a nuclear exchange to protect Europe, the Europeans should take over that risk. With their continent already hosting two nuclear states, it is time to ask whether that number should grow. Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and a former special assistant to President Ronald Reagan. He is the author of "Foreign Follies: America's New Global Empire." US defense secretary's visit to determine status of alliance U.S. Secretary of Defense James Mattis will visit Korea this week on the first stop of his foreign tour after being confirmed for the job Jan. 20. His reputation precedes this visit fitting his nickname "Mad Dog," the retired marine general is known for his toughness and fairness. Ahead of him is a task he can only make a success of by using both of his characteristics well. His toughness should be shown toward North Korea. Mattis should reconfirm the ROK-U.S. alliance to be as intact as before the inauguration of his boss, President Donald Trump, and will be strengthened to deter the North from invading, and defeating it if it attacks. This show of unity between the two allies will be pivotal in keeping the North's nuclear and missile challenges at bay. This also would help the U.S. tailor its strategy of countering China's risky hegemonic endeavors. The North has vowed to test another intercontinental ballistic missile with reports that preparations are in the final stages. The U.S. should closely consult South Korea and Japan, and if the projectile overflies the latter, respond in a way that undercuts the North and leaves it with little room to pit the two allies against each other. Mattis would be right to ask Seoul to hasten the deployment of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile interceptor or THAAD, which is being held up amid the leadership vacuum created by the impeachment of President Park Geun-hye. Acting leader Hwang Kyo-ahn is widely seen to lack the political authority to push it ahead in the face of popular opposition and pressure from Beijing, which wrongly claims that THAAD's powerful radar system will spy not just on the North but on China's interior military facilities. Perhaps the bigger job for Secretary Mattis is about mending ties. Trump ruffled a lot of feathers here, calling Korea a "freeloader" for passing its own defense bill onto the U.S. and encouraging a small and dangerous group of nuclear armament supporters. This is interpreted as his willingness to withdraw the vaguely defined "extended deterrence," a supposed successor to the "nuclear umbrella," the Cold War U.S. guarantee of protection. Seoul may increase its share in the cost of maintaining U.S. forces because its ally Washington feels its burden is too heavy, not because it is a free rider as Trump claimed. Mattis should use his sense of fairness. If he threatens Seoul merely as a messenger of his boss and forces it to pay more, he would do so at the risk of poisoning the 70-year military alliance and turning U.S. soldiers, sailors and marines into mercenaries. That would be an affront to the long proud U.S. military tradition that he is a part of. The adventure-themed variety show "Law of the Jungle" has its highest ratings in its history peaking at 17 percent. As a way of his support for the show, BTS' Jin made a hilarious deal with his fans on Twitter. According to All Kpop, Jin used the official Twitter page of BTS and posted a very funny deal which made fans anticipate further on his appearance on "Law of the Jungle." His post stated that once their show surpassed 17 percent of the nationwide viewership ratings in the Friday evening timeslot, he will eat samgyupsal next to his co-member Sleepy. While doing this, Sleepy also promised to do some national gymnastics. As if the deal isn't funny enough, Jin still added humorously some pun with his group's latest hit single. He added in the same post that, he will not only eat the samgyupsal alone but he will also spill some 'blood, sweat, and tears' on it, referring to the title of their song included in their "Wings" album. The producers of the show including the brainchild of the program, Kim Byung Man, applauds the efforts and strategies for this season of "Law of the Jungle" which captured the highest ratings in the history of the show. The show is already active on its SNS platforms including their Instagram account and the PDs also thank the fan bases of the current members where Jin has the largest because of BTS' popularity worldwide, according to Koreaboo. Shot in the very scenic Kota Manado in Indonesia, "Law of the Jungle" continuously soars high in the viewership ratings in South Korea. Would fans finally see Jin and Sleepy fulfill their hilarious deal in the coming episodes? Catch "Law of the Jungle" every Friday nights only on SBS. "Missing 9" is still struggling for its rating. Even though the actors and producer hopes for a high rating, their rating is still considered low, compared to other drama. The highest rating so far is still got by "Saimdang, Light's Diary". But the producer of "Missing 9" promises great acting from Chanyeol. EXO's Chanyeol has been in acting before. His movie "So I Married An Anti Fan" was well received in China. His acting is also great. His previous dramas were "Welcome to the Royal Villa", "EXO Next Door", and many more. According to report from Soompi, the producer said that Chanyoul wouldn't come up at first episode, but he would show up at the next episode and viewers could anticipate his progress in acting through this drama. The story of the drama is about 9 people who end up in an island after they have a plane crush. They need to survive in the island with everything left on them. They build shelter and try to find food for survive. People will be curious of how they try to survive with their different personality. It is a great project for Chanyeol to prove himself that he can act in a drama. While he has succeeded in the movie before, he needs to adapt to new environment for filming drama. But the producer praises him for following his senior actors really well. Viewers will be able to show how Chanyeol grow with his acting. Chanyeol is known as a rapper in EXO. He has tried acting to expand his career, as well as D.O. Chanyeol is also known to be entertaining when he appears in variety. According to report from Bintang, he said he was nervous during the first take, but his seniors helped him a lot and he could do it well. He wanted to change the stereotype of actor-idol and wanted to prove that he could act well. Being in a bigger project, he felt a bit pressured, but he did his best. The rating for the first episode of "Missing 9" got 6.5%, a a bit lower than other dramas. Hope it will increase soon when Chanyeol appears in the next episode. Prosecutors have concluded questioning Egyptian MP and film director Khaled Youssef after he was stopped on Sunday from boarding a flight at Cairo International Airport for possessing 100 Xanax pills without a prescription, Al-Ahram Arabic website reported. Youssef, who has been released on his own recognisance, was stopped from boarding a flight at Cairo International Airport for possessing 100 Xanax pills without a prescription, Al-Ahram Arabic website reported. Security officials say that Youssef, who was set to board an EgyptAir flight to Paris, was stopped after the pills were discovered in his suitcase during security screening. Youssef, who has been referred to the prosecution, says that he obtained the drug legally to give to his wife, who resides in Paris. Youssef's doctor told prosecutors that the amount Youssef was carrying is the standard number of pills found in a large pack, which is not indicative of trafficking or addiction. Xanax, which is used to treat anxiety, panic disorders and depression, is a schedule B controlled substance in Egypt and cannot be legally purchased without a doctors prescription. Youssef won a seat in Qalyubia governorate's Kafr Shukr constituency in the second stage of the 2015parliamentary elections. He is a member of parliament's left-leaning 25-30 bloc and an outspoken supporter of the 25 January Revolution that toppled long-time president Hosni Mubarak in 2011. In December 2015, prominent TV host Ahmed Moussa aired images allegedly showing Youssef in sexual situations with a naked woman. Youssef said at the time that the images are 100 percent fabricated. Following the incident, dozens of Egyptian journalists endorsed a campaign demanding legal action be taken by the Journalists Syndicate against Moussa, a strong opponent of the January 25 Revolution. Moussa later apologised for airing personal images of the director. Search Keywords: Short link: Egypt's Prime Minister Sherif Ismail issued on Monday a decision to form a committee to legalise the status of churches that were constructed without licenses, in accordance with the 2016 law regulating the construction and renovation of churches. The newly formed committee will include the ministers of defense, housing, urban development, justice, antiquities, parliamentary and legal affairs, in addition to representatives from the intelligence and security agencies, and representatives of different churches. The committee will be empowered to study and verify applications submitted by Christian congregations to legalise the status of churches and attached worshipping buildings. Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi ratified in September 2016 a law regulating the building of churches after it was approved by the House of Representatives. The long-awaited law was issued after months of talks between representatives of Egyptian churches and cabinet officials. According to official figures from 2011, Egypt has 2,869 churches and over 108,000 mosques. Egyptian Christians, estimated at around 10-15 percent of the country's 91 million people, have long struggled to obtain official permits required to build churches, with the process at times taking years. Due to the restrictions, many congregations have been forced to build unlicensed churches or carry out their religious sermons in buildings that have not been designated for religious use. Search Keywords: Short link: An Egyptian misdemeanour court sentenced on Monday a police officer to six months in prison for assaulting a communications engineer in what is commonly known as the "Kneeling case." The court ordered the officer released on bail pending appeal. The case dates back to 2016 when a police officer and a communications engineer engaged in a brawl that escalated from a traffic argument on Cairo's Mehwar Road. The officer ordered the engineer to kneel before him. When the victim refused, the officer fired a gun shot from his weapon, injuring the engineer in the shoulder. The officer was referred to criminal court in July 2016 on charges of attempted murder. Search Keywords: Short link: The committee tasked with preparing names of imprisoned youths for a presidential pardon is compiling a third list to be submitted to the presidency, Karim El-Sakka, a member of the panel, told Ahram Online on Monday. The second list, according to El-Sakka, was recently submitted to the presidency but is still awaiting approval. El-Sakka said he could not reveal the number or names on the list, but he confirmed "the list includes people who received final verdicts including students, women, people accused of contempt of religion, journalists, and members of a number of syndicates." On 17 November 2016, Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi pardoned all 82 prisoners included on the first list recommended for pardon by the committee. The list mostly included students, but also recommended former TV host and Islamic studies researcher Islam El-Behery and doctor Ahmed Saeid. In late October 2016, El-Sisi formed the committee to review the cases of youth imprisoned in politically related cases as well as humanitarian cases such as when families have more than one member imprisoned. Article 155 of the Egyptian constitution stipulates that the president has the power to issue a pardon or mitigate a sentence after consulting with the cabinet. "We are adopting the same criteria we followed from the beginning, all prisoners [in politically-related cases] are eligible to be included in the list except those who committed violence, or members in terrorist groups," El-Sakka added. The controversial 2013 protest law, which was widely criticised by local and international rights groups, led to the detention of thousands of protesters. Last December, Egypts Supreme Constitutional Court issued a ruling deeming Article 10 of the protest law, which permits the countrys interior minister to bar scheduled protests, unconstitutional. The ruling added that those looking to organise street protests are merely obliged to notify authorities, and are not required to obtain prior approval. Earlier this month, the parliaments Legislative and Constitutional Affairs Committee approved a bill to amend the protest law in accordance with a Supreme Constitutional Court verdict. Search Keywords: Short link: Nashwa Alhoussaini 21, Syria Nashwa Alhoussaini is originally from Damascus, Syria. She was at a protest at the Detroit Metropolitan Airport on Sunday, January 29. I have a lot of family that lives overseas, she said. I actually have one family member that is trying to get his fiancee over here and we were gonna have her wedding next month, but its officially been canceled. Babak Seradjeh 39, Iran Seradjeh is an associate professor of physics at the University of Indiana. He was born in Tehran, spent eight years in Canada and currently lives in Bloomington, Indiana. He has dual citizenship Iran and Canada. Seradjeh was planning to fly to Tel Aviv on Saturday to meet with his research partner, Eytan Grosfeld, a professor at Ben-Gurion University. Continue below I flew to Newark for my connection, but with all the news of people including green card holders and dual nationals being turned away, I decided not to take the rest of my trip. Ive been rerouted to go back to Indy This effectively suspends my research trip until further notice. This research is funded partly through the National Science Foundation. It is unclear to me how or when I can take this trip or what other effects the executive order will have on my work. Raya Bidshahri21, Iran A student at Boston University, Bidshahri has lived in the United States for three years and considers Boston her home. She fears she will have to leave the country when she graduates in May and her student visa expires. A student at Boston University, Bidshahri has lived in the United States for three years and considers Boston her home. She fears she will have to leave the country when she graduates in May and her student visa expires. Bidshahri is studying neuroscience and says the university has warned her not to leave the country because she might not be able to re-enter. Her family was planning to attend her graduation, but because they are Iranian theyre now covered by the ban. Above all, its heartbreaking. My family and I have always dreamed of coming to the United States and accomplishing our dreams here. My family put in all of their investments and financial resources to allow me to come here and make things happen. We are treated like were terrorists, as if we want to cause trouble when above all we just want to make the United States a better place contributing whether its through research, studying, or entrepreneurship. Said HajouliSyria Hajouli is a trainee doctor from Aleppo who has lived in the US for about two years. He and his wife both fled Syria after the civil war broke out. His wife has been living in Turkey and he has not seen her in almost two years. Hajouli said his wife was recently granted a J2 visa and flew Saturday from Istanbul to Dulles International Airport outside Washington. She was being detained at the airport and had not yet seen a lawyer. Hajouli said he feels more hopeful after a federal judge granted an emergency stay for citizens of the affected countries who have already arrived in the US. Zainab Abdo 21, Syria Abdo came to the U.S. seven months ago and is living in Lowell, Massachusetts. Shes learning English and eventually wants to study nursing. Abdo is working the overnight shift at Walmart to help make ends meet, but doesnt have a green card yet. Speaking through an interpreter, she said shes scared about what that means for her future. Abdo came to the U.S. seven months ago and is living in Lowell, Massachusetts. Shes learning English and eventually wants to study nursing. Abdo is working the overnight shift at Walmart to help make ends meet, but doesnt have a green card yet. Speaking through an interpreter, she said shes scared about what that means for her future. I have family back home in Syria and in Turkey. A lot of people have lost hope. Muhamad Alhaj Moustafa, Syria Moustafa is a trainee doctor at a hospital in Washington, D.C. Like his friend Hajouli, he was raised in Aleppo and left Syria soon after the civil war started. He is in the US on a cultural exchange visa along with his wife, who had been visiting family in Qatar. She arrived back at Dulles airport early Saturday morning, but Trumps executive order was signed while she was in the air. Because she has a Syrian passport, she was sent back several hours later, he said. Moustafa is devastated and is wishing the New York judges emergency stay had come earlier in the day. But he said the crowds at Dulles chanting Refugees are welcome here have given him hope. Hesham Al Madwami 37, Yemen Hesham Al Madwami and his wife, Frannie, live in Clarkston, Georgia. Hesham Al Madwami and his wife, Frannie, live in Clarkston, Georgia. I am from the capital of Yemen (Sanaa). I waited four years before I got a visa to come to the US and marry my wife. After I got to America, a terrible war started in Yemen. I am always thinking about my family and my country, counting down the days until this war ends. I thought all I wanted was for the airstrikes to end and the airport to open in Sanaa, so me and my wife could visit my family. Now this new executive order would mean that if I left the country to visit my family, I would not be allowed to return to Georgia where I live now with my wife, even though I am a legal permanent resident. I am so upset. Mohamad Zandian 26, Iran Zandian is a doctoral student in biochemistry at Ohio State University. His wife Parisa was detained at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. Zandian is a doctoral student in biochemistry at Ohio State University. His wife Parisa was detained at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. [My wife] was not feeling very well at the beginning [of being detained], but we will get through this. I came here thinking that here I will have a life like a dream, but it didnt sort out very well. I didnt think this would happen but now that its happened, Im just thinking about somewhere else. If Im going to be an imprisoned person, Id rather be imprisoned back home. Hameed Khalid Darweesh 53, Iraq Darweesh was one of two Iraqis detained at New Yorks Kennedy airport after the travel ban was announced. Darweesh, who worked as an interpreter for the US military during the Iraq War, was released from detention Saturday afternoon. America is the land of freedom, he told reporters after his release. America is the greatest nation. Follow Us on Facebook @LadunLiadi; Instagram @LadunLiadi; Twitter @LadunLiadi; Youtube @LadunLiadiTV for updates A delegation of Russian security experts will arrive in Egypt in the next 48 hours for what is expected to be the final security check of Egyptian airports before the resumption of Russian flights to Egypt, Al-Ahram Arabic news website reported on Monday. The Russian team will inspect biometric equipment recently installed in Egyptian airports. The delegation will review security measures at Cairo International Airport as well as the international airports in the resort cities of Sharm El-Sheikh and Hurghada, all of which recently saw security upgrades. The Russian experts will also review CCTV camera footage of recordings from the past 30 days to assess the security procedures put in place, as well as luggage inspection and handling, Al-Ahram Arabic website reported. Sources in the civil aviation ministry say the resumption of Russian flights to Egypt should start at Cairo International Airport through the airlines EgyptAir and Russias Aeroflot, with flights to Hurghada and Sharm El-Sheikh to follow. Biometric equipment, which has been asked for by Russian experts, has already been installed at staff gates in the two resort cities airports. The equipment has also been installed at Cairo International Airports Terminal 2. Last week, a source in Cairo close to the ongoing inspection checks told the Russian news agency TASS only after [the completion of those procedures] will we talk about the timing of flight resumption. In the best case, we can expect it by the end of February, and most likely in March. The upcoming visit by the Russian delegation will be the second in less than one month, as a team of Russian experts conducted a security inspection of the Sharm El-Sheikh and Hurghada airports earlier this month. Egypt has been implementing tighter security measures at its airports since a Russian passenger flight crashed shortly after taking off from Sharm El-Sheikh International Airport in October 2015. Russia suspended passenger flights to Egypt shortly after the crash, and since then it has dispatched its experts for several inspections of Egyptian airport security measures in preparation for the resumption of flights. A number of European countries that suspended flights to Sharm El-Sheikh following the 2015 crash have recently reinstated direct flights to the South Sinai tourist hotspot. Egyptian tourism, a pillar of the country's economy and a key source of hard currency, has taken a blow since the passenger plane crash. Sharm El-Sheikh's economy is believed to have suffered the most. Egypts revenues from tourism dropped from $6.1 billion in 2015 to $3.4 billion in 2016, according to statements by the Central Bank of Egypts governor Tarek Amer in January. Search Keywords: Short link: Egypts army Chief of Staff Mahmoud Hegazi met on Monday in Cairo with the Chief of Greeces Navy General Staff Nikolaos Tsounis for talks over means of expanding joint military cooperation, a statement by the Egyptian Armed Forces read. Egyptian army spokesman Tamer El-Rifaei said that the talks involved several issues of common interest, including an exchange of viewpoints towards developments taking place in the MENA region and their impact on the regional and international arenas. Hejazi affirmed the depth of the ongoing partnership and cooperation between the Egyptian and Greek armed forces to support the efforts of security and stability in the Middle East. Egyptian and Greek Armed Forces concluded in December the Medusa 2016 joint military drills in Greece. During the training, Egyptian air and naval forces participated in the drills with Greek forces, which were held in the southeastern Aegean Sea and on the island of Crete. Search Keywords: Short link: Leading Sunni Muslim body Al-Azhar, Egypt and Jordan on Monday condemned an attack in which six people were killed during prayers at a mosque in the Canadian city of Quebec. Gunmen stormed the Islamic Cultural Center in Quebec on Sunday evening, killing six and wounding eight before police arrested two alleged assailants. "These abhorrent attacks... lead to the spread of division, hatred, racism, and create a fertile ground for terrorism and extremism," said Al-Azhar. Al-Azhar called for "the need to protect places of worship from any aggression, respect of their sanctity, and providing a safe environment to practise religious rites. "Shedding blood, whatever its sex, belief or colour, is something all religions prohibit, and is rejected in all laws, norms, international charters, and human values," it said in a statement. Egypt and neighbouring Jordan also condemned the attack. The foreign ministry in Cairo called for stronger international cooperation against terrorism, and offered its condolences to the families of the victims. In a message to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, King Abdullah II said Jordan stood with Canada following the "odious terror attack". The attack on the mosque came after Canada vowed to open its arms to Muslims and refugees after US President Donald Trump's controversial immigration ban Friday prompted travel chaos and outrage around the world. Search Keywords: Short link: Los Angeles Magazine posted photos from the LAX protests by Julia Herbst. President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily but immediately banning refugees, travelers from seven Muslim nations and even legal U.S. residents and visa holders from entering the country caught Homeland Security officials by surprise and led to chaos at airports. At Los Angeles International, numerous arriving passengers were detained by confused border officials and the airport was descended upon by lawyers, protesters and elected officials including Mayor Eric Garcetti. By the end of the weekend, federal judges across the country had issued stays of the order and Homeland Security announced that green card holders would be allowed back in to the U.S. One Iranian man deported from LAX was ordered to be admitted by a federal judge, but the order came down after he was already put on a plane to Dubai. Amid widespread questions about whether the executive orders from Trump are constitutional, and whether they do anything to help U.S. security, the ACLU reported receiving a record number of online donations during the weekend. Trump tweeted that the surprise nature of his bans was purposeful giving notice for the bans would have allowed "bad dudes to rush into our country." He also denied that the actions were a Muslim ban or about religion, but chose to tweet this on Sunday: Christians in the Middle-East have been executed in large numbers. We cannot allow this horror to continue! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 There were remarkable scenes at airports across the country, with crowds of protesters turning out to support the innocent victims of the Trump disarray. In some cases, reporters interviewed military veterans who turned out to protest. At many airports, volunteer lawyers poured in to help and recorded some victories. The New York Times lede: Travelers were stranded around the world, protests escalated in the United States and anxiety rose within President Trumps party on Sunday as his order closing the nation to refugees and people from certain predominantly Muslim countries provoked a crisis just days into his administration. The White House pulled back on part of Mr. Trumps temporary ban on visitors from seven countries by saying that it would not apply to those with green cards granting them permanent residence in the United States. By the end of the day, the Department of Homeland Security formally issued an order declaring legal residents exempt from the order. But the recalibration did little to reassure critics at home or abroad who saw the presidents order as a retreat from traditional American values. European leaders denounced the order, and some Republican lawmakers called on Mr. Trump to back down. As of Sunday evening, officials said no one was being held at American airports, although lawyers said they believed that dozens were still being detained. At LAX, several thousand protesters added to the chaos, closing parts of the loop road past the terminals. Police negotiated with the protesters to limit the amount of time that traffic was blocked. At various times, the protests disrupted traffic on the lower and upper road. Most of the attention was focused on the Tom Bradley International Terminal. City Attorney Mike Feuer said he was refused access to arriving passengers who were detained by federal officials at the airport. He said he went to see that the stay was being enforced. "It is time not only for officials in my position, but all Americans, should find this a breathtaking violation of rights, Feuer said of the bans ordered by Trump. From the latest LA Times story: Jennie Pasquarella, director of immigrant rights for the ACLU of California, said her group had filed habeas petitions on behalf of seven people who were detained at LAX on Saturday. All seven were later released, and of those, two elderly women were held for longer than 24 hours, she said. On Sunday, the ACLU also requested that a federal judge order that all detainees receive access to lawyers as well as phones. A judge could hear the petition on Monday or Tuesday. Reliable statistics on the number of people detained at LAX were difficult to access. One detainee told the ACLU that at least 100 people were being held on Saturday. Late Sunday, immigration attorneys working at LAX estimated that about 20 people were being detained at any given time. A law enforcement source told The Times that 13 people had been detained at Terminal 2 on Saturday night, but each of them held a green card and was eventually released. The source could not provide detention figures for the Tom Bradley International Terminal, the airports locus of international travel. Pasquarella also said federal immigration officials have been urging some detainees to waive their applications for admission to the U.S., an allegation echoed by ACLU officials in other cities. It was not clear what detainees were faced with, but Pasquarella suggested that officials could threaten to deport detained individuals, which could have a long-term effect on their ability to reenter the U.S. at a later date. Attorneys were also having difficulty accessing those being held. The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency did not respond to requests for comment. The man who was deported, Ali Vayeghan, arrived from Tehran on Friday night with a visa. He was enroute to join his wife and son in Indiana. After he was deported back to Iran via Dubai, "a federal judge in Los Angeles ordered authorities to transport Vayeghan back to the U.S. and admit him under the terms of his visa, which is set to expire Feb. 14," the Times story said. The Iranian ex-pat community in Los Angeles was following the news closely. Garcetti on Trump's order and LAX protests: Los Angeles will always be a place of refuge, where the most vulnerable people fleeing war, or religious or political oppression, can find a safe and welcoming home. Congress outlawed the banning of immigrants by nationality more than 50 years ago, because we have long known that it does not make us safer. It only fans the flames of hatred that those who wish us harm seek to spread. I am closely monitoring the situation at LAX and staying in close touch with locally based officials in the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, and other partner agencies. I understand that some Angelenos are planning to express their support for immigrants by demonstrating at the airport. There is power in standing strong for our values but we must remain calm, and act lawfully and peacefully so LAX can continue to operate smoothly and our passengers stay safe New Senator Kamala Harris: Make no mistake - this is a Muslim ban. Broad brush discrimination against refugees and immigrants from Muslim-majority countries, most of whom are women and children, runs counter to our national security interests, and will likely be used as a terrorist recruitment tool. Opening our doors to those fleeing war and oppression has been the policy of presidents of both parties for decades. This moral leadership enhances our ability to shape world events, promotes global stability, and makes us stronger at home. Whether its a small business owner in Sacramento employing fellow Californians or a student in Los Angeles completing cutting edge research, refugees are contributing to our country and our economy. They enrich our communities; they do not make us less safe. California Attorney General Xavier Becerra http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article129457614.html called Trump's action in so many ways unjust and anti-American and joined with 16 Democratic state AGs to label the orders unconstitutional. It discriminates against human beings based on their faith. It denies entry to those with proven and legitimate fears of death and persecution. It tramples on centuries of American tradition. Backlash came came from sources as varied as Republican senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham and the president of the Charles Koch Foundation, who sharply criticized Trump's refugee and Muslim ban as counter-productivel. An opinion piece in the New Yorker noted that the order "was reviewed by virtually no one. He is a dangerously isolated president." Eliot A. Cohen, the Republican former advisor to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice and a Trump critic, says a big decision time is coming for fellow conservatives who will have to choose how much Trump damage to American standing and security interests to abide. In an epic week beginning with a dark and divisive inaugural speech, extraordinary attacks on a free press, a visit to the CIA that dishonored a monument to anonymous heroes who paid the ultimate price, and now an attempt to ban selected groups of Muslims (including interpreters who served with our forces in Iraq and those with green cards, though not those from countries with Trump hotels, or from really indispensable states like Saudi Arabia), he has lived down to expectations. Precisely because the problem is one of temperament and character, it will not get better. It will get worse, as power intoxicates Trump and those around him. It will probably end in calamitysubstantial domestic protest and violence, a breakdown of international economic relationships, the collapse of major alliances, or perhaps one or more new wars (even with China) on top of the ones we already have. It will not be surprising in the slightest if his term ends not in four or in eight years, but sooner, with impeachment or removal under the 25th Amendment. The sooner Americans get used to these likelihoods, the better.... He will do much more damage before he departs the scene, to become a subject of horrified wonder in our grandchildrens history books. Actual security experts were aghast that Trump has also excluded the chairman of the joint chiefs and the director of national intelligence from key meetings of the National Security Council and elevated political strategist-agitators Steve Bannon and Stephen Miller to the meetings. "The last place you want to put somebody who worries about politics is in a room where theyre talking about national security, said Leon E. Panetta, the former White House chief of staff, defense secretary and CIA director. Ive never seen that happen, and it shouldnt happen." PRESS RELEASE Russian Senators Give Qualified Support for Trumps Call for Safe Zones in Syria Jan. 28, 2017 (EIRNS)The Chairman of the Federation Councils International Affairs Committee, Sen. Konstantin Kosachev, told Izvestia that he viewed positively President Donald Trumps call for establishing "safe zones" in Syria. "We can only welcome the initiatives aimed at enhancing the security of Syrias civilian population.... However, if any initiatives on that score are put forward unilaterally and are not agreed on with other countries involved in the efforts to resolve the issue, this would raise some doubt. If Mr. Trump is willing to discuss this idea with those who are really working in Syria, that is, Russia, Turkey and Iran, not only with former U.S. allies of the so-called anti-terrorism coalition hastily forged by Barack Obama, I do not rule out the emergence of some viable agreements." Similarly Franz Klintsevich of the Federation Councils Defense Committee, said this was the "right issue," but "we would like all issues concerning Syria to be discussed with the legitimate authorities taking into account all parties interests." The Federation Council is the upper house of the Russian Federations Federal Assembly. PRESS RELEASE Trump, Putin Agree: Terrorism Is the Main Threat Jan. 28, 2017 (EIRNS)President Trump spoke to Russian President Vladimir Putin by phone at mid-day today in what the Kremlin reports as a wide-ranging discussion, lasting roughly one hour. The two Presidents "had a detailed discussion of pressing international issues," and they "emphasized that joining efforts in fighting the main threatinternational terrorismis a top priority. " According to the Kremlin, "The Presidents spoke out for establishing real coordination of actions between Russia and the U.S.A. aimed at defeating ISIS and other terrorist groups in Syria." According to the White House, the call ranged in topics from mutual cooperation in defeating ISIS to efforts in working together to achieve more peace throughout the world, including Syria. The positive call was a significant start to improving the relationship between the United States and Russia that is in need of repair, a White House readout of the call said. Both President Trump and President Putin are hopeful that after todays call the two sides can move quickly to tackle terrorism and other important issues of mutual concern. The Kremlin readout doesnt specifically say whether or not they discussed the lifting of U.S. sanctions on Russia, but they did discuss improving trade between the U.S. and Russia. They "stressed the importance of rebuilding mutually beneficial trade and economic ties between the two counties business communities, which could give an additional impetus to progressive and sustainable development of bilateral relations. "During the conversation, both sides expressed their readiness to make active joint efforts to stabilize and develop Russia-U.S. cooperation on a constructive, equitable and mutually beneficial basis," the Kremlin report said. They also agreed to initiate a process to "work out possible dates and venue of their personal meeting." Trump asked to convey his wishes of happiness and prosperity to the Russian people, saying that the American people have warm feelings towards Russia and its citizens. "Putin, in turn, emphasized that the feeling is mutual, adding that for over two centuries Russia has supported the United States, was its ally during the two world wars, and now sees the United States as a major partner in fighting international terrorism," the Kremlin reported. Trumps discussion with Putin was the third of five phone calls he had with foreign leaders, today. He began with an early morning discussion with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, and then spoke with German Chancellor Angela Merkel for 45 minutes just before the call with Putin. These were followed by calls to French President Francois Hollande and Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. The Baileys Womens Prize for Fiction is looking for a new sponsor and a new name, reports the Guardian. The British literary award, given annually to a novel written in English by a female author, is losing the sponsorship of Baileys, the liquor company best known for its Irish cream. The founder of the prize, novelist and journalist Kate Mosse, said she was optimistic that the award would find a new sponsor. Advertisement Which may be confusing, as many in the literary world still know the award by its previous name, the Orange Prize for Fiction, which it was called from its founding in 1996 until 2012. It was originally named for its then-sponsor, Orange, a British telecommunications company. The prize had its genesis in 1992, when several literary insiders held a meeting after an all-male shortlist for the Booker Prize was announced. The idea to establish a prize for women writers came, according to legend, after some hours and several bottles of wine. Women of any nationality are eligible for the award, as long as theyve written a novel in English. Translated works are not considered for the prize. Last year, outspoken author Lionel Shriver attracted controversy after criticizing the award, which she won in 2005 for her novel We Need to Talk About Kevin. It is not as meaningful to me to have won the Orange prize as, say, it would have been to win the Booker, Shriver said while speaking on a panel on International Womens Day. Most people who win that prize surely say the same thing: You have eliminated half the human race from applying. The prize was first awarded in 1996, to British author Helen Dunmores A Spell of Winter. Since then, its been given to writers including Ann Patchett, Zadie Smith, Marilynne Robinson and Barbara Kingsolver. Mosse, the prizes founder, put a positive spin on Baileys departure. This is an unparalleled opportunity for a sponsor to champion womens voices and we are interested in the womens prize becoming a year-round platform for womens voices, Mosse said. We feel ambitious. She also said that some companies have already expressed interest in sponsoring the prize. We are talking to a wide variety of businesses across all sectors, she said. The most recent winner of the prize is Irish author Lisa McInerney, who took home the award last year for her debut novel, The Glorious Heresies. Baileys will continue its sponsorship of the prize through 2017. The award will be presented on June 7 at the Royal Festival Hall in London. A number of company chief executives, ranging from Starbucks Corp.s Howard Schultz to Googles Sundar Pichai, have spoken out about or taken action after President Trumps temporary travel ban on refugees. Trump signed a controversial executive order Friday that blocks all refugee entry for 120 days, with an indefinite block on Syrian refugee entry. Entry to the U.S. by people with passports from Libya, Sudan, Syria, Somali, Iran, Iraq and Yemen is also suspended for 90 days. Late Sunday afternoon, the ban was modified to exclude green card holders. Several of the companies said some of their employees would be affected by the ban. Advertisement Here is what CEOs have said about the order. Coca-Cola Muhtar Kent, chief executive of the beverage giant, condemned the ban in a statement Monday and pledged support to any affected employees. We do not support this travel ban or any policy that is contrary to our core values and beliefs, he said. As a U.S. company that has operations in more than 200 countries and territories, we respect people from all backgrounds and greatly value the diversity of our global systems more than 700,000 associates. Netflix Reed Hastings, chief executive of Netflix, warned in a Facebook post that these actions could make America less safe through hatred and loss of allies. Trumps actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world and are so un-American it pains us all, he wrote. Etsy The online shopping marketplaces chief executive, Chad Dickerson, tweeted his opposition to the travel ban Saturday. We are a nation of immigrants, and are stronger for it. I oppose excluding people from US based on their nationality or religion, period. Chad Dickerson (@chaddickerson) January 28, 2017 American Airlines In a letter to employees Monday, American Airlines Chief Executive Doug Parker said the order places difficult operating conditions on some employees. Reservations agents and airport teams have witnessed turmoil in our airports that shows how divisive this order can be, he wrote. However, it is the current law of the U.S., and so long as that is the case, we must comply. We are doing everything we can to care for any affected customers and team members and treat them with the utmost respect. Starbucks Howard Schultz, the Seattle coffee companys chief executive, said in a statement Sunday that Starbucks is developing plans to hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years. We will start this effort here in the U.S. by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support, he wrote. Lyft Logan Green, chief executive of the San Francisco ride-hailing firm, announced Sunday that Lyft would donate $1 million to the American Civil Liberties Union over the next four years. The ACLU filed suit Saturday against the executive order on behalf of two Iraqis, and a federal judge in New York halted deportations for those who had already arrived at U.S. airports. 1/ Lyft has worked hard to create an inclusive, diverse and conscientious community where all our drivers and passengers feel welcome. Logan Green (@logangreen) January 29, 2017 2/ Trumps immigration ban is antithetical to both Lyft's and our nation's core values. Logan Green (@logangreen) January 29, 2017 3/ We are donating $1,000,000 over the next four years to the ACLU to defend our constitution. https://t.co/0umGOlkhSx Logan Green (@logangreen) January 29, 2017 Google Google Chief Executive Sundar Pichai was perhaps the first tech executive to speak out against Trumps travel ban. In a memo to employees Friday night, Pichai said more than 100 company staff members were affected by the order, according to Bloomberg News. Its painful to see the personal cost of this executive order on our colleagues, Pichai wrote, according to Bloomberg. Weve always made our view on immigration issues known publicly and will continue to do so. On Monday, Google said it had created a fund that could raise up to $4 million to support the ACLU and three other immigrant rights organizations. For generations, this country has been home to immigrants like Sanaz. Her story is playing out all over the country. Google is with you. https://t.co/mllnZ5gNDB Sundar Pichai (@sundarpichai) January 29, 2017 Ford Ford Motor Co. Executive Chairman Bill Ford and Chief Executive Mark Fields also slammed Trumps travel ban in a message to employees Monday. The automaker said it was currently not aware of any employees directly affected by the order. Respect for all people is a core value of Ford Motor Company, and we are proud of the rich diversity of our company here at home and around the world, the executives wrote in the memo. That is why we do not support this policy or any other that goes against our values as a company. Airbnb Short-term home rental website Airbnb said Saturday that it would offer free housing to refugees and others who have been affected by the travel ban. Not allowing countries or refugees into America is not right, and we must stand with those who are affected. Brian Chesky (@bchesky) January 29, 2017 Airbnb is providing free housing to refugees and anyone not allowed in the US. Stayed tuned for more, contact me if urgent need for housing Brian Chesky (@bchesky) January 29, 2017 Tesla/SpaceX Elon Musk, chief executive of Tesla Motors Inc. and SpaceX, had initially faced criticism from supporters for backing secretary of State nominee Rex Tillerson, who was CEO of Exxon Mobil, and joining Trumps advisory panel on business issues. On Sunday, he asked Twitter followers for specific amendments to Trumps executive order. Musk said he would seek advisory council consensus and present those thoughts to Trump. Over the weekend, Musk spoke out against the executive order. Many people negatively affected by this policy are strong supporters of the US. They've done right,not wrong & don't deserve to be rejected. Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 29, 2017 Facebook In a Facebook note Friday, Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said he was concerned about the impact of recent executive orders signed by Trump. His note dipped into his and his wifes personal histories Zuckerberg said his great-grandparents came from Germany, Austria and Poland, while wife Priscilla Chans parents were refugees from China and Vietnam. We need to keep this country safe, but we should do that by focusing on people who actually pose a threat, he wrote. We should also keep our doors open to refugees and those who need help. Thats who we are. Uber As a protest against the order by taxi drivers at New Yorks Kennedy International Airport wrapped up Saturday evening, Uber advertised on Twitter that it would turn off surge pricing for airport trips. Even though Chief Executive Travis Kalanick had criticized the order earlier that day, the company faced immediate backlash, spawning the #deleteuber hashtag. Kalanick said Sunday that the ride-hailing company would compensate drivers who were unable to work because of the ban. Like Musk, Kalanick is a member of Trumps business advisory panel and said he would use his position to stand up for whats right. 2/ Any driver who can't work because of the ban will be compensated for lost earnings. We have set up $3mm legal defense fund as well. travis kalanick (@travisk) January 29, 2017 Goldman Sachs Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein spoke out against the order in a voicemail to employees Sunday night. This is not a policy we support, and I would note that it has already been challenged in federal court, and some of the order has been enjoined at least temporarily, he said. Amazon Amazon.com Inc. Chief Executive Jeff Bezos took a stand on Trumps order in an email to employees Monday afternoon. In the email, Bezos said the companys public policy team in Washington, D.C., has reached out to senior administration officials to make our opposition clear. He said Amazon has also reached out to congressional representatives to explore legislative options. This executive order is one we do not support, Bezos wrote. Our legal team has prepared a declaration of support for the Washington state attorney general who will be filing suit against the order. We are working other legal options as well. samantha.masunaga@latimes.com @smasunaga UPDATES: Jan. 31, 2:40 p.m.: This article was updated with comments from CEOs from Coca-Cola, Netflix, American Airlines and Etsy. Jan. 30, 4 p.m.: This article was updated with comments from Amazon.com Inc. Chief Executive Jeff Bezos. This article was originally published on Jan. 30 at 1:40 p.m. An Ohio newspaper reported that Steve Mnuchin, President Trumps nominee to be Treasury secretary, misled senators about foreclosures by OneWest Bank while he was chief executive, providing more fuel to opponents ahead of a contentious committee confirmation vote scheduled for Tuesday. The Columbus Dispatch reported Sunday that Mnuchin denied in written responses to questions from the Senate Finance Committee that OneWest engaged in so-called robo-signing of mortgage documents. The paper said its analysis of nearly four dozen foreclosure cases in Ohios Franklin County in 2010 showed that the bank frequently used robo-signers. Advertisement The practice, prevalent throughout the mortgage industry in the aftermath of the financial crisis, involved employees at financial firms signing foreclosure documents en masse without properly reviewing them. Democrats sharply criticized Mnuchin during his Jan. 19 confirmation hearing concerning OneWests foreclosures while he ran the Pasadena bank from 2009 to 2015. They called the institution, which formerly had been troubled subprime lender IndyMac Bank, a foreclosure machine. Mnuchin ran a bank that was notorious for aggressively foreclosing on homeowners, and now hes lying about his banks dismal track record in his official responses to the Finance Committee, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said Monday. Working families simply cannot trust him to be the countrys top economic official. At the hearing, Mnuchin blamed the large amount of foreclosures on bad IndyMac loans he inherited. Mnuchin and other investors put up nearly $1.6 billion to buy IndyMac and renamed it OneWest. They sold the bank to CIT Group in 2015 for $3.4 billion. The new report is expected to be raised by Democrats when the committee meets Tuesday morning to vote on his nomination. Many, if not all, of the 12 Democrats on the committee are expected to oppose Mnuchins confirmation. At least three Democrats already have said publicly they will not support him. A vote had been scheduled for 3 p.m. PST Monday. But Democrats objected to a procedural move that forced an unfortunate and needless delay, said Julia Lawless, spokeswoman for Finance Committee Chairman Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah). Democrats wanted the delay so they could attend a candlelight vigil Monday protesting President Trumps executive order temporarily banning refugees and blocking all admissions from seven mostly Muslim countries, said Rachel McCleery, a spokeswoman for Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the committees top Democrat. Wyden said Monday that it was extremely disturbing that Mr. Mnuchin flatly denied OneWests robo-signing practices and announced that he would vote against confirmation. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), who sits on the committee, also has said he would vote against Mnuchin. Mnuchin profited off of kicking people out of their homes and then gave false testimony about his banks abusive practices, Brown said Sunday. He cannot be trusted to make decisions about policies as personal to working Ohioans as their taxes and retirement. Another Democrat on the committee, Sen. Mark R. Warner of Virginia, said Monday that he also would vote against Mnuchin. The Columbus Dispatch cited a foreclosure involving a mortgage signed by Erica Johnson-Seck, a OneWest vice president who said in a deposition in a 2009 Florida case that she signed an average of 750 documents a week. Barney Keller, a spokesman for Mnuchin, said Monday that several courts had dismissed cases involving allegations of robo-signing by Johnson-Seck. The media is picking on a hardworking bank employee whose reputation has been maligned but whose work has been upheld by numerous courts all around the country in the face of scurrilous and false allegations, Keller said. In written questions to Mnuchin, Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) asked if OneWest engaged in robo-signing. OneWest Bank did not robo-sign documents, Mnuchin said. He added that the bank was the only one to successfully complete an independent foreclosure review process by federal banking regulators looking into robo-signing allegations. In 2011-12, several mortgage servicers agreed to pay a total of $3.9 billion to borrowers for foreclosure errors as part of a settlement with regulators. OneWest was not part of the settlement because an independent consultant hired by the bank completed its own review and remediation checks have been issued to those borrowers where financial injury was identified, according to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. Casey said Mnuchin continues to deny his bank robo-signed documents, while evidence from court cases, bank regulators and news reports continues to show the opposite. jim.puzzanghera@latimes.com Follow @JimPuzzanghera on Twitter ALSO The U.S. labor forces guy problem: Lots of men dont have a job and arent looking for one How Trump could use the presidency to help his own business interests UPDATES: 4:25 p.m.: This article was updated with Sen. Ron Wydens announcement that he would vote against confirming Mnuchin. 2:35 p.m.: This article was updated with a spokeswoman for Sen. Ron Wyden explaining why Democrats wanted the delay in the vote, as well as Wydens comments about the Columbus Dispatch report and Sen. Mark R. Warner announcing that he will vote against Mnuchin. 1:45 p.m.: This article was updated to note that the Senate Finance Committee vote has been delayed until Tuesday. This article was originallypublished at 10:40 a.m. Joan Claybrook, head of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration during the Carter administration, had an immediate reaction when informed Monday of President Trumps executive order requiring that federal agencies scrap two existing regulations for every new one adopted. She burst out laughing. Thats a completely illogical way of doing things, Claybrook told me. Its going to harm the public. People are going to die if you start eliminating safety standards. I reached out to a number of former federal regulators after Trumps order was announced. I wanted to know how such an arbitrary approach to rule-making squared with their real-world experience of keeping the public safe and monitoring businesses. Advertisement Every one of them, Republican and Democrat, said Trumps approach to the highly complicated task of official oversight is reckless and irresponsible. I cant think of a single regulation that has no basis in fact, said Christine Todd Whitman, head of the Environmental Protection Agency under former President George W. Bush. Its going to be hard to find regulations that arent important to protecting human health. She called Trumps executive order mindless. In signing his order, Trump called it a big one and said his goal is the largest-ever cut by far in terms of regulations. There will be regulation, there will be control, but it will be a normalized control where you can open your business and expand your business very easily and thats what our country has been all about, he said. Trumps order specifically requires that the cost of any new regulation be offset by eliminating existing rules with the same costs to businesses. Military regulations are excluded. Inez Tenenbaum, head of the Consumer Product Safety Commission under former President Obama, said Trump doesnt seem care which regulations are abandoned, as long as there are significantly fewer rules for businesses to follow. Thats not a formula for rule-making, she said. Thats a formula for just pulling things out of the air. As with many of Trumps pronouncements, details are a work in progress. But the order suggests a sweeping emphasis on deregulation affecting numerous aspects of peoples lives, from environmental protection and healthcare to banking practices and workplace safety. What the president is talking about is reducing public health protection, said David Michaels, who oversaw the Occupational Safety and Health Administration under Obama. Even so, he pointed out that getting rid of regulations can be just as hard as implementing new ones. Its not a matter of simply crossing out rules in some regulatory ledger book. To scrap a regulation, a federal department or agency needs to notify the public, businesses, unions and others of its intentions, explain the rationale for the move, receive comments, and undergo the horse trading that typically surrounds decisions with potentially far-reaching ramifications. This can take years. Responsible companies want regulations, Michaels said. They want a level playing field with rules that everyone has to follow. As with his ban on travel from some predominantly Muslim countries, Trumps 2-for-1 approach to deregulation represents fulfillment of a campaign promise. His position prior to the election was that businesses are burdened by too many rules and we can easily get rid of most of them. Hes said his objective is to eliminate 75% of existing regulations. That might work as a sound bite, but in reality hes tackling a highly complex, deeply nuanced process that cuts across virtually all aspects of society and commerce, with trillions of dollars in economic activity on the line. For example, Trump said Monday that he intends to do a big number on Dodd-Frank financial regulations that have become part of the corporate DNA of financial-services companies and created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Gerald Sachs, a former senior attorney with the CFPB, said banks have spent millions figuring out how to comply with Dodd-Frank. Theyd have to spend just as much, he said, figuring out any significant changes to the law. Having no regulation is just not practical, Sachs said. What we cant have is a race to the bottom. Trump lacks the power to demand specific changes from independent government agencies such as the CFPB and the Federal Communications Commission that operate outside the control of Cabinet secretaries. However, he can sack agency leaders under certain circumstances or use the Republican-controlled Congress to slash their budgets. There are lots of ways presidents can take action against an agency that doesnt follow an executive order, said Lisa Heinzerling, who served as associate administrator of the Environmental Protection Agencys Office of Policy under Obama. Its very unsettling. Whitman, the former EPA administrator and New Jersey governor, told me that everyone is scared at the agency as a result of Trump nominating Oklahoma Atty. Gen. Scott Pruitt to take charge. Pruitt, a strong supporter of the oil and gas industries, has described himself as a leading advocate against the EPAs activist agenda. Whitman said a likely scenario is that the EPA and other agencies will stop seeking new regulations so they can protect existing rules. I think people will go to extremes to avoid running afoul of this administration, she said. Theres always room for revisiting regulations once their true impact on businesses or the public becomes known. Some might be discarded. Most simply need to be improved. Trumps 2-for-1 deal is governing by foolishness, treating the public interest like a cheesy offer on late-night TV. He might just as well offer free steak knives to the regulator who does the most cutting. David Lazarus column runs Tuesdays and Fridays. He also can be seen daily on KTLA-TV Channel 5 and followed on Twitter @Davidlaz. Send your tips or feedback to david.lazarus@latimes.com. Television composer and songwriter John Henry Kreitler and his wife, jazz vocalist-percussionist Patsy Meyer, have put their home in Valley Village on the market for $1.299 million. The French Country-inspired home, built in 1930 and since updated, features a detached studio that the couple use for recording music, film editing and post-production work. The 1,000-square-foot workspace replaced a four-car garage on the property and includes a control mix room, an isolation booth, a kitchen and an office as well as a separate entrance and additional parking. Advertisement Within the main house is an open-plan kitchen, a dining room with pitched ceilings and a family room. The master suite has a walk-in closet and decorative tilework in the bathroom. Another bedroom has a wood-burning fireplace and French doors that open to the swimming pool. Including a 900-square-foot guest house, which has its own kitchenette and washer/dryer unit, there are four bedrooms and and four bathrooms. The couple bought the house more than a decade ago for $573,000, records show. Jeff Hartman of Rodeo Realty holds the listing. Kreitler has won Emmys for his work on the shows The Guiding Light, Another World and Passions. His other credits include the series Friends, Melrose Place and Saturday Night Live. Meyer, a three-time Emmy nominee, has toured with such artists as Patti Austin and Peabo Bryson. neal.leitereg@latimes.com Twitter: @NJLeitereg MORE FROM HOT PROPERTY: Late actress Patricia Barrys longtime home in Brentwood lists for $10.5 million R&B singer Akon lists his mansion near Atlanta for nearly $7 million Beverly Hills home of Moroccan royal entertains an offer Spanish Revival estate recalls an era of gracious living in Beverly Hills Anyone tuning in to the SAG Awards on Sunday thinking they might be escaping news headlines for a couple of hours was quickly disabused of that notion as winner after winner used the platform to speak out against President Trumps immigration ban. This immigrant ban is a blemish and is un-American, said Veeps Julia Louis-Dreyfus, the evenings first award recipient, getting the ball rolling. Later, life achievement honoree Lily Tomlin noted: The doomsday clock has been moved up to two and a half minutes to midnight and this award came just in the nick of time. Advertisement Politics blended into the awards themselves, including the nights biggest winner, Hidden Figures, a historical drama about the largely unknown black women who helped NASA launch the space program. The films predominantly black cast won for ensemble, and its message of women of color overcoming prejudice was a perfect fit with the mood at the Shrine, where the SAG Awards were presented. 1 / 38 Emma Stone won for female actor in a leading movie role. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 38 The cast of Hidden Figures accepts outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture. (Kevin Winter / Getty Images) 3 / 38 John Lithgow wins male actor in a drama series for The Crown. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 38 Claire Foy wins female actor in a drama series for The Crown. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 38 Emma Stone (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 38 Stranger Things wins ensemble in a drama series. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 38 Sofia Vergara and Naomie Harris (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 38 Stranger Things actor Finn Wolfhard leaps for joy as his show wins the ensemble award. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 38 Lily Tomlin was the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 38 Lily Tomlin, right, accepts the life achievement award from Dolly Parton. (Kevin Winter / Getty Images) 11 / 38 Salma Hayek presents the award for outstanding performance by a male actor in a television movie or limited series. (Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press) 12 / 38 William H. Macy won for male actor in a comedy series. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 38 Denzel Washington wins for male actor in a leading role for Fences. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 38 LOS ANGELES, CA - January 29, 2017a Bryan Cranston won the ACTOR for Male Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series during the show at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, CA on Sunday, January 29, 2017. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 38 Taraji P. Henson receive a hug during the show. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 38 LOS ANGELES, CA - January 29, 2017aMahershala Ali won for Male Actor in a Supporting Role for MOONLIGHT during the show at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, CA on Sunday, January 29, 2017. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 17 / 38 Jon Lithgow shares a laugh with Claire Foy. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 18 / 38 Kate Hudson (Kevin Winter / Getty Images) 19 / 38 Lucas Hedges and Casey Affleck (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 38 The Orange Is the New Black cast gathers onstage after winning ensemble in a comedy series at the SAG Awards. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 21 / 38 Actors Seth Gabel and Bryce Dallas Howard. (Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images) 22 / 38 Model Chrissy Teigen and recording artist John Legend. (Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images) 23 / 38 Emma Stone, left, chats with and Octavia Spencer. (Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images for TNT) 24 / 38 Recording artist Keith Urban, left, with actors Bryan Cranston and Robin Dearden (Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images) 25 / 38 Sarah Paulson, left, accepts from Michelle Dockery the award for performance by a female actor in a miniseries or television movie. Paulson won for The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story. (Kevin Winter / Getty Images) 26 / 38 Sarah Paulson addresses the audience after receiving her award for her performance in The People v. O.J. Simpson. (Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press) 27 / 38 Viola Davis, left, and Denzel Washington introduce Fences. (Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press) 28 / 38 Actor Viola Davis accepts the award for performance by a female actor in a supporting role for Fences. (Kevin Winter / Getty Images) 29 / 38 Hidden Figures actors Janelle Monae, from left, Octavia Spencer and Taraji P. Henson speak at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards. (Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press) 30 / 38 Actors Viggo Mortensen and Kathryn Hahn introduce their film, Captain Fantastic. (Kevin Winter / Getty Images) 31 / 38 Ashton Kutcher speaks onstage during the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium. (Kevin Winter / Getty Images) 32 / 38 Julia Louis-Dreyfus accepts the award for performance by a female actor in a comedy series for Veep. (Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press) 33 / 38 Stranger Things actors Noah Schnapp, Caleb McLaughlin, Finn Wolfhard and Gaten Matarazzo. (Kevin Winter / Getty Images for TNT) 34 / 38 Westworld actors Evan Rachel Wood and Leonardo Nam. (Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images) 35 / 38 Actors Meryl Streep and Viola Davis (Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images) 36 / 38 William H. Macy won for male actor in a comedy series for his work in Shameless. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 38 Actors Kevin Spacey and Denzel Washington (Kevin Winter / Getty Images) 38 / 38 Last-minute preparations are made for the show. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) This film is about unity, Hidden Figures star Taraji P. Henson said of the movie, which tells the story of the black female mathematicians who helped put John Glenn into space. When we come together as a human race, we win love wins every time. Love wasnt in the air when it came to Trumps executive order that suspended entry of all refugees to the United States for 120 days, blocked Syrian refugees indefinitely and denied entry into the country for 90 days for citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries. The controversy over the immigration ban continued to be front-and-center throughout the night. In that respect, much like the previous two years when the #OscarsSoWhite controversy dominated the SAG Awards, this years ceremony was less about who won and more about what was said from the stage. Some winners made explicit pleas (Sarah Paulson called for donations to the American Civil Liberties Union), some went on epic, ferocious rants (Stranger Things actor David Harbour, with an assist from costar Winona Ryders facial expressions) and others, such as Moonlights Mahershala Ali, related their own experiences about the importance of valuing peoples differences. Said an emotional Ali, who won for supporting film actor: My mother is an ordained minister. Im a Muslim. She didnt do backflips when I called her to tell her I converted 17 years ago. But I tell you now, you put things to the side, and Im able to see her and shes able to see me. We love each other. The love has grown. 1 / 76 Julia Louis-Dreyfus backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine in Los Angeles. She won for Veep. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 76 Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer, and Janelle Monae backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. They won for Hidden Figures. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 76 Ashton Kutcher and Julia Louis-Dreyfus backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 76 Ashton Kutcher and Julia Louis-Dreyfus backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 76 Ashton Kutcher and Julia Louis-Dreyfus backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 76 William H. Macy, who won for Shameless, and Gina Rodriguez backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 76 William H. Macy and Gina Rodriguez backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 76 The cast of Orange Is the New Black with Yael Stone and Uzo Aduba backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. They won the award for comedy series ensemble. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 76 Viggo Mortensen and Kathryn Hahn backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. They were nominated for Captain Fantastic. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 76 The cast of Orange Is the New Black backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 76 Gina Rodriguez and John Legend backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 76 Danielle Brooks of Orange Is the New Black backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 76 Elizabeth Rodriguez of Orange Is the New Black backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 76 Ashton Kutcher backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 76 Lin Tucci of Orange is the New Black backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine . (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 76 Backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 17 / 76 SAG Awards winner Viola Davis (Fences) and presenter John Krasinski backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 18 / 76 SAG Award winner Viola Davis is seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 76 SAG Award winner Mahershala Ali (as supporting actor for Moonlight, and again with the cast of Hidden Fences) is seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 76 SAG Award winner Mahershala Ali takes the stage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 21 / 76 SAG Award winner Mahershala Ali is seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 22 / 76 SAG Award winner Sarah Paulson (The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story) backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 76 SAG Award winner Sarah Paulson, right, and Michelle Dockery (a nominee with the cast of Downton Abbey) backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 76 SAG Award winner Sarah Paulson, right, embraces Michelle Dockery backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 76 Presenter Dolly Parton backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 76 SAG Award winner Sarah Paulson is seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 76 SAG Award winner Sarah Paulson is seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 76 SAG Award winner Sarah Paulson is seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 29 / 76 SAG Award winner Bryan Cranston (All the Way) and presenter Salma Hayek are seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 30 / 76 Lucas Hedges and Casey Affleck, nominees for Machester by the Sea, backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 31 / 76 The SAG life achievement award recipient Lily Tomlin backstage with Dolly Parton, her 9 to 5" costar, who introduced her at the ceremony. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 32 / 76 Dolly Parton is seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 33 / 76 Dolly Parton welcomes life achievement award recipient Lily Tomlin to the stage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 34 / 76 Lily Tomlin delivers her humor-laced life achievement award acceptance speech. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 35 / 76 Riz Ahmed, a nominee for The Night Of, with Rashida Jones and Alia Shawkat backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 36 / 76 SAG Award winner Claire Foy (The Crown) backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 76 SAG Award winner Claire Foy (The Crown) backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 38 / 76 Alia Shawkat backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 39 / 76 Stage manager Valdez Flagg and Common backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 40 / 76 SAG award winnner John Lithgow (The Crown) and publicist Rosalind Jarrett Sepulveda backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 41 / 76 Alia Shawkat backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 42 / 76 Stage manager Valdez Flagg and Common backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 43 / 76 Emma Stone onstage after winning outstanding performance by an actress in a leading role for La La Land. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 44 / 76 Emma Stone onstage after winning outstanding performance by an actress in a leading role for La La Land. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 45 / 76 Emma Stone and presenter Jonah Hill after she won outstanding performance by an actress in a leading role in La La Land, as seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 46 / 76 Emma Stone reacts after winning outstanding performance by an actress in a leading role for La La Land. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 47 / 76 Matthew Modine and the cast of Stranger Things onstage after winning outstanding performance by an ensemble in a drama series. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 48 / 76 Winona Ryder and the cast of Stranger Things react after winning outstanding performance by an ensemble in a drama series. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 49 / 76 SAG Award winner Claire Foy won outstanding performance by a female actor in a drama series for The Crown. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 50 / 76 SAG Award winner John Lithgow took the prize for outstanding performance by a male actor in a drama series for The Crown. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 51 / 76 SAG Award winner John Lithgow is seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 52 / 76 Riz Ahmed, Rashida Jones and Alia Shawkat backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 53 / 76 Brie Larson backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 54 / 76 Brie Larson backstage with stage manager Valdez Flagg. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 55 / 76 Emma Stone reacts after winning outstanding performance by an actress in a leading role for La La Land. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 56 / 76 Emma Stone, followed by Jonah Hill, reacts after winning outstanding performance by an actress in a leading role for La La Land. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 57 / 76 Denzel Washington onstage after winning outstanding performance by an actor in a leading role for Fences. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 58 / 76 Denzel Washington onstage after winning outstanding performance by an actor in a leading role for Fences. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 59 / 76 Denzel Washington after winning outstanding performance by an actor in a leading role for Fences. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 60 / 76 Denzel Washington after winning outstanding performance by an actor in a leading role for Fences. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 61 / 76 Taraji P. Henson backstage after winning for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture for Hidden Figures. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 62 / 76 Hidden Figures director Theodore Melfi, left, and actors Octavia Spencer, Kirsten Dunst, Taraji P. Henson and Janelle Monae celebrate backstage after winning for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 63 / 76 Hidden Figures writer-director Theodore Melfi, left, Octavia Spencer, Taraji P. Henson, and Janelle Monae backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 64 / 76 Taraji P. Henson seizes her SAG statuette backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 65 / 76 The director and cast of Hidden Figures celebrate backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 66 / 76 The director and cast of Hidden Figures celebrate backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 67 / 76 Octavia Spencer, center, and Taraji P. Henson celebrate backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 68 / 76 Hidden Figures Theodore Melfi, Taraji P. Henson, Janelle Monae and Octavia Spencer celebrate backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 69 / 76 Hidden Figures cast members Aldis Hodge and Janelle Monae, who play a married couple in the film, celebrate the casts big win backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 70 / 76 Mehershala Ali holds his supporting actor (Moonlight) and motion picture cast (Hidden Figures) awards. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 71 / 76 Janelle Monae from Hidden Figures backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 72 / 76 Octavia Spencer, Taraji P. Henson, and Janelle Monae from Hidden Figures backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 73 / 76 Kirsten Dunst, Octavia Spencer, Taraji P. Henson and Janelle Monae backstage.. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 74 / 76 Viola Davis squeezes through the crowded backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 75 / 76 Aldis Hodge speaks with Hidden Figures cast mate Taraji P. Henson backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 76 / 76 Janelle Monae, left, Octavia Spencer and Taraji P. Henson backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) And you didnt even have to win (or present) an award to get in on the action. Scandal actress Kerry Washington tweeted: Whoa. Lotta truth telling here at #SAGAwards Whether the dialogue was appreciated or appropriate will be left to viewers discretion. Backstage, Bryan Cranston, honored for his portrayal of President Lyndon B. Johnson in HBOs All the Way, said speaking out against something that appears before you in a way that feels like oppression is up to the citizenry. The collective of people coming together and talking about the issues as youve seen tonight its alive, Cranston said. As for the awards themselves, if last years ceremony was, in the words of two-time winner Idris Elba, a moment of diverse TV, this years slate was all that and then some with three of the four individual prizes on the film side going to black actors (Ali, Denzel Washington and Viola Davis for Fences) and the aforementioned cast award going to Hidden Figures. The Hidden Figures win gives the crowd-pleasing, hit movie a boost a month before the Oscars ceremony on Feb. 26. Best picture front-runner La La Land won the Producers Guilds top honor Saturday night, and its headlining actress Emma Stone took the SAG Awards lead actress prize. Damien Chazelles musical wasnt nominated in SAGs cast category, as it is mainly centered on the romance between Stones aspiring actress and a jazz pianist played by Ryan Gosling. Full coverage: 2017 Screen Actors Guild Awards features, news and photos Washingtons win for his towering turn as the charming, troubled and dialogue-devouring storyteller in Fences adds a wrinkle to the lead actor Oscar race. Previously, Casey Affleck won the Globe and countless critics prizes for Manchester by the Sea. But the actor has been dogged in recent weeks with media reports focusing on past allegations against him of sexual harassment. Constance Wu, star of the ABC television comedy Fresh Off the Boat, took to Twitter shortly after Oscar nominations were announced, slamming voters who checked off Afflecks name. Hes running for an award that honors a craft whose purpose is examining the dignity of the human experience & young women are deeply human, she wrote. Whether qualms over Afflecks past had any impact or if the 121,546 eligible SAG-AFTRA members who voted simply preferred Washingtons outsized acting over his inward turn is difficult to know. (Or maybe it was simply Washingtons time. He was one of five actors with four SAG Awards nominations for lead actor in a film. The other four Russell Crowe, Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hanks, Sean Penn had won prizes.) But Sundays win does give Washington momentum as we head into the awards seasons final lap. The last 12 actors to win SAGs lead honor went on to take the Oscar. That itself is enough to make Washington the favorite even if, on this night of politics, he was one of the few who kept his expressions of gratitude on the traditional side God, family and colleagues. Times staff writer Yvonne Villarreal contributed to this report. glenn.whipp@latimes.com Twitter: @glennwhipp ALSO Protesters block traffic at LAX as thousands rally against Trump travel ban Big Bang Theory actor makes big anti-Trump statement on the SAG red carpet 2017 Awards season: Stranger Things and Hidden Figures take top SAG Awards prizes Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi met on Monday with Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn on the sidelines of the African Unions 28th General Assembly in Addis Ababa, where the two leaders discussed Egyptian-Ethiopian bilateral relations, MENA news agency reported. President El-Sisi also discussed bilateral relations with Zambia's President Edgar Lungu on the sidelines of the summit on Monday, the Egyptian presidency announced. The Egyptian president participated in the closed session of the AU earlier on Monday, where he spoke about Egypt's support of structural reforms in the African Union. The AUs 28th General Assembly, themed Harnessing the Demographic Dividend Through Investments in Youth, kicked off in Addis Ababa on 22 January and will conclude on 31 January. Search Keywords: Short link: Iris Mittenaere was crowned Miss Universe on Sunday night in the Philippines, winning the honor on behalf of France for the first time since 1953. We need good news in France, and I think this is very good news, Mittenaere told reporters after the show. She also predicted that her victory would make the competition more popular with her countrymen. Mittenaere, who just turned 24, told reporters shell focus on helping children especially girls attend school. The Miss Universe website also said the dental-surgery student hopes to advocate for dental and oral hygiene. Advertisement I think France and Europe really need a Miss Universe, she said, according to the Associated Press. The Continent hadnt seen a hometown winner since Amparo Munoz of Spain was crowned in 1974. Raquel Pelissier, Miss Haiti, was first runner-up, and Andrea Tovar, Miss Colombia, was second runner-up. Mary Were, Maxine Medina and Chalita Suansane, representing Kenya, the Philippines and Thailand, respectively, rounded out the top six. The passing of the crown: Let the journey begin for Iris Mittenaere. #MissUniverse pic.twitter.com/LrhTXqzIv6 Miss Universe (@MissUniverse) January 30, 2017 As always, the question round offered some of the most awkward moments of the evening, especially given host Steve Harveys U.S.-centric focus on politics and world events. All six contestants gave at least a nod to coming together and getting along. Were was asked what most excited her and most concerned her about the presidency of Donald J. Trump. Pelissier, a survivor of Haitis devastating 2010 earthquake, was quizzed about what she would have been marching for had she participated in the Womens March on Jan. 21. Mittenaere was asked whether nations had an obligation to accept refugees. Pelissier worked Eleanor Roosevelt into her answer, which was essentially human rights. Were acknowledged divisions in the U.S. but didnt quite get it right when she said Trump brought the country together once he finally took office. Mittenaere left the decision about refugees up to each nation. Countries should have the right to open or close their borders , she said through a translator. In Europe we have open borders. In France we want to have the most globalization that we can. We want to have the biggest exchange of people that we can. Maybe someday that will change in the future, but now we have open borders. So having open borders allows us to travel more through the world and find out more of whats out there in the world. Tovar, who was asked about violence in todays society, didnt have an explanation for the trend but said through a translator that respect and inclusiveness would help educate children against violence in the future. Suansane stayed loyal by naming the king of Thailand not sure which one as the current or former world leader she most admired, and hometown contestant Medina declared that the most significant change shed seen in the world in the last decade was the coming together of so many people for the Miss Universe pageant. Were guessing thats not exactly what she meant. Highlights from the 2017 SAG Awards show When it came time to announce the winner, there was a lighthearted acknowledgment of the awful gaffe Harvey made in 2015. He announced that year the wrong contestant as Miss Universe, 2015 leaving winner Miss Philippines Pia Wurtzbach briefly thinking she was first runner-up to Miss Colombia Ariadna Gutierrez. (This year, both of those countries were once again represented in the final six contestants.) As Harvey went to open the envelope this time around, Wurtzbach tapped him lightly on the shoulder and handed him his reading glasses. Thank you. Thank you so much, Pia, he said with exaggerated gratitude. A year late, but thank you. Thank you, God. Miss Universe is now owned by WME/IMG, which bought it from then-presidential candidate Donald Trump in 2015. Trump, who co-owned the organization with NBCUniversal since 2002, owned it outright for three days prior to flipping it to the talent agency. He bought out his former partner to end a dispute that began after he made disparaging comments about Mexican immigrants during his presidential run. The pageant, which had aired on NBC for years, was broadcast Sunday night on Fox. cdz@latimes.com @theCDZ ALSO This is not a joke: Samantha Bee to host Not the White House Correspondents Dinner Actress Mischa Barton hospitalized after talking incoherently and wandering around a WeHo neighborhood Celebration of women filmmakers triggers heated debate among Salma Hayek, Jessica Williams and Shirley MacLaine The latest Doctor is out. Peter Capaldi, who joined the BBCs Doctor Who back in 2014, will be stepping away from his fancy waistcoat and jacket and retiring from the role by the end of 2017. Capaldi made the announcement on the BBC Radio 2 show. And the BBC has since confirmed the Twelfth Doctors departure with a statement from Capaldi himself. One of the greatest privileges of being Doctor Who is to see the world at its best, Capaldi said in the statement. From our brilliant crew and creative team working for the best broadcaster on the planet, to the viewers and fans whose endless creativity, generosity and inclusiveness points to a brighter future ahead. I cant thank everyone enough. Its been cosmic. Advertisement The 2017 Doctor Who Christmas special will be Capaldis last episode. The Scottish actor (who kept his accent for his time on the series) took the reigns over from Matt Smith (the 11th Doctor), who coincidentally was the subject of a set of his own will he return to Doctor Who rumors that were quickly squashed by the actor himself. However, it should be noted that the long-running rule of the British series has always been: The doctor lies. See the most-read stories in Entertainment this hour Comic-Con 2016 On Now Cast of 'American Gods' drop divine secrets on the new Starz series On Now Liam Cunningham and Isaac Hempstead on finding the humor in 'Game of Thrones' On Now Acting opposite a giant Hollywood monster on 'Kong: Skull Island' On Now Luc Besson takes us inside his next space odyssey 'Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets' On Now Norman Reedus on the secret Walking Dead' cast Comic-Con ritual On Now The cast of 'Orphan Black' reveal what they want to see resolved in the series finale On Now 'Supergirl' cast on inspiring little girls to pick up a cape of their own On Now Video: Comic-Con: Wishing there could be a body swap between Fitz and Mac on 'Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.'... On Now Charlie Hunnam on the hyper-stylized antics of 'King Arthur: Legend of the Sword' On Now Comic-Con: Ana Gasteyer and Wyatt Cenac on 'People of Earth' meredith.woerner@latimes.com Twitter: @MdellW ALSO: Doctor Whos Peter Capaldi feels at home wherever he lands The Doctor is in again, and in finer fettle than before For the love of monsters: An insider tour of Guillermo del Toros Bleak House before his LACMA show Backstage and unguarded with the Hidden Figures cast after winning their SAG Awards Hidden Figures writer-director Theodore Melfi and actors Octavia Spencer, Taraji P. Henson and Janelle Monae celebrate after winning for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) Hold it, baby! Taraji P. Henson urged Janelle Monae, passing her their casts just-won Screen Actors Guild Award as if to prove it was real. It seemed that no one in the cast of Hidden Figures expected to win the biggest film prize of the night on Sunday. Leading up to the telecast, nearly all of the award season pundits had the best film ensemble race between Moonlight and Manchester By the Sea. So as the Hidden Figures cast bounded from the stage, their disbelief was palpable. Octavia Spencer, dabbing her eyes with a tissue, kept screaming suddenly as she made her way toward a room filled with photographers. Every few moments, she would stare down in awe at the envelope Nicole Kidman had delivered to the cast, announcing their win. Im not letting this out of my sight, she said aloud. As the cast circulated through the tiny hallways of the Shrine Auditorium, the group swelled when Glen Powell -- who plays late astronaut John Glenn in the film -- invited his family to tag along with the melee. His mother introduced herself to Henson, who took a moment to tell her what a polite son shed raised. Im a mom, Henson said, so I know its all because of you. Anticipating the impending onslaught of selfie-seekers, Henson and Spencer stopped at a LOreal touchup station, dabbing off their sweat. We are going to take pictures, so pat down, ladies! Pat down! Spencer advised. Before they could pose for photos, however, the cast had to pick up their individual trophies. (Theyd only been given one onstage by Kidman.) The bronze statues -- which are 16 inches tall and weigh 12 pounds -- were all accounted for, save for Kevin Costners. The actor wasnt in attendance, so his award remained on a table with an unsigned contract meant to acknowledge receipt of the prize. With the bronze men finally in hand -- This is heavy! Henson noted -- the group made its way to the press room to field questions. Saniyya Sidney, the 10-year-old actress who plays one of Hensons daughters in the film, trailed behind, crying quiet tears of joy. Is she still crying? her mother asked. She is an actress, guys, her father said with a smile. Sidney pulled herself together before standing on the podium in front of reporters, where the cast fielded questions about the relevance of Hidden Figures -- which Henson noted just hit $100 million at the box office. The movie reminds us that weve been through harder times, suggested Monae. And as Kevin Costner says in the film, we all pee the same color. Were not that damn different. Well, unless you eat a lot of beets, noted Spencer. A publicist signaled it was time for the group to make its way to another stop, and Henson sighed. Can we go to the bar now? she asked Kirsten Dunst, who replied, I think we can go get a drink! On Friday, just a few hours before Donald Trump would announce an executive action banning many residents of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S., the filmmaker Evgeny Afineevsky was engaging in a different sort of governmental interaction. Afineevsky was at a Salt Lake City science museum screening his new film, Cries from Syria, for Salt Lake County Mayor Ben McAdams and other local officials. The film offers a detailed and devastating account of the civil war that has gripped the country for more than five years, and its director was on a mission he wanted the images of brutality to serve as a wake-up call for supporters of exactly the kinds of policies undertaken by the new president. FULL COVERAGE: Sundance Film Festival Advertisement As soon as its seen, it open minds and hearts these are human beings that have families, Afineevsky said in an interview. This movie can be a tool in helping people understand. McAdams, a Democrat, later said his jurisdiction would not enforce Trumps ban. You can talk to a lot of artists about repression. Few have the experience that Afineevsky does. The 44-year-old filmmaker, who now makes his home in Los Angeles, was born in the U.S.S.R. circa 1972. He spent the first 18 years of his life under Soviet rule, in the Muslim-majority republic of Tatarstan. He left because he felt he couldnt express himself artistically in his home country, emigrating first to Israel and then to the U.S., where he is now a citizen. More recently, though, hes been toiling much farther away: on the Turkey-Syria border, and sometimes in war-torn Syria itself, with the people who either cant afford or cant bring themselves to leave. Hes spent two years there investigating the Syrian civil war for his new movie, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival last week ahead of its debut on HBO in March. People need to hear these stories. But the world is silent, Afineevsky said, speaking in the incongruous precincts of this picturesque resort town. 1 / 77 Gael Garcia Bernal speaks during the 2017 Sundance Film Festival Awards at Basin Recreation Field House in Park City, Utah, on Saturday. (Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images) 2 / 77 Bryan Fogel, right, with cast and crew members, accepts the Orwell Award for his film Icarus. (Michael Loccisano / Getty Images) 3 / 77 Director Michael Larnell, right, and Sean Kirkland accept the US Dramatic, Breakthrough Performance award on behalf of Chante Adams for the film Roxanne Roxanne. (Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images ) 4 / 77 Peter Dinklage presents the U.S. Dramatic Grand Jury Prize at Sundance. (Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 5 / 77 Larry Wilmore speaks during the 2017 Sundance Film Festival Awards ceremony. (Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 6 / 77 Actors Kevin Bacon, left, and Kathryn Hahn at the premiere of I Love Dick at the MARC Theatre. (Arthur Mola / Invision / Associated Press) 7 / 77 Actor Peter Dinklage, left, and filmmaker Mark Palansky of Rememory attend The IMDb Studio featuring the Filmmaker Discovery Lounge. (Rich Polk / Getty Images for IMDb) 8 / 77 Analeigh Tipton and Jason Schwartzman attend the Creators League Studio. (Jonathan Leibson / Getty Images for Creators League) 9 / 77 Actor Mark Hamill attends the Brigsby Bear premiere at Eccles Center Theatre. (Valerie Macon / AFP/Getty Images) 10 / 77 Actors Anne Heche, Thomas Sadoski and AnnJewel Lee Dixon of The Last Word attend The IMDb Studio featuring the Filmmaker Discovery Lounge. (Rich Polk / Getty Images for IMDb) 11 / 77 Actors Zoey Deutch and Nicholas Hoult, director Danny Strong of Rebel in the Rye and Kevin Smith, top, attend the IMDb Studio featuring the Filmmaker Discovery Lounge. (Rich Polk / Getty Images ) 12 / 77 Actors Tim Robbins, Jon Hamm, Lois Smith and Geena Davis attend the Marjorie Prime premiere at Eccles Center Theatre. (Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 13 / 77 Brigsby Bear attends the Brigsby Bear premiere at Eccles Center Theatre. (Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 14 / 77 Actor Lakeith Stanfield, left, and the film subject he plays, Colin Warner, attend the Crown Heights premiere at Library Center Theater. (Sonia Recchia / Getty Images) 15 / 77 Actor Nicholas Hoult at the premiere of Rebel In The Rye. (Danny Moloshok / Invision / Associated Press) 16 / 77 Comedian Patton Oswalt speaks onstage at the Shorts Program Awards and party at Jupiter Bowl. (Matt Winkelmeyer / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 17 / 77 Times reporter Amy Kaufman and Logan Lerman speak at the Cinema Cafe at Filmmaker Lodge. (Michael Loccisano / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 18 / 77 Actress AnnJewel Lee attends the The Last Word premiere at Eccles Center Theatre. (Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 19 / 77 Executive producer Harvey Weinstein and executive producer and rapper Shawn Jay-Z Carter attend the Time: The Kalief Browder Story Sundance world premiere at The Marc Theatre. (Neilson Barnard / Getty Images for Spike TV) 20 / 77 Actress Sanaa Lathan attends the Shots Fired premiere. (Michael Loccisano / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 21 / 77 Marti Noxon attends the Feature Fillm Competition dinner. (Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 22 / 77 Director Mark Palansky, actor Martin Donovan, actress Katheryn Kirkpatrick, Matt Ellis, actress Julia Ormond and actor Peter Dinklage attend the Rememory premiere. (Matt Winkelmeyer / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 23 / 77 Actors Logan Lerman, Blake Jenner, Elle Fanning, Michelle Monaghan and Margaret Qualley attend the Sidney Hall party at the Acura Studio at Sundance Film Festival 2017. (Neilson Barnard / Getty Images for Acura) 24 / 77 Cast and crew speak onstage during the Shots Fired premiere. (Michael Loccisano / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 25 / 77 Actress Chloe Sevigny at the premiere of the film Beatriz at Dinner at the Eccles Theatre. (Arthur Mola / Invision/Associated Press) 26 / 77 Chef Cat Cora prepares entrees during a luncheon hosted by Glamour editor Cindi Leive and photographer Amanda de Cadenet. (Vivien Killilea / Getty Images) 27 / 77 Actresses Alfre Woodard and Elle Fanning attend the Lunch Celebrating Films Powered by Women. (Vivien Killilea / Getty Images for Glamour) 28 / 77 Jon Hamm, left, and Tim Robbins of the Indiewire in Conversation panel. (Jack Dempsey / Invision / Associated Press) 29 / 77 Shirley MacLaine, left, Salma Hayek, Cindi Leive, and Dee Rees at the Lunch Celebrating Films Powered by Women event. (Vivien Killilea / Getty Images for Glamour) 30 / 77 Reginald Hudlin, left, Stephanie Allain, Gerard McMurray, Mel Jones and Jason Michael Berman at the premiere of director McMurrays Burning Sands. (Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images ) 31 / 77 Malia Obama strolls on Main Street at the Sundance Film Festival at Park City, Utah. (Danny Moloshok / Invision / Associated Press) 32 / 77 Producer Noshre Chkhaidze, left, director Simon Grob, actress Ia Shugliashvili and producer Jonas Katzenstein attend the My Happy Family premiere at Egyptian Theatre. (Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images) 33 / 77 Viewers take in Al Gores film Melting Ice on Condition Ones virtual-reality system at the Sundance VR release party. (Valerie Macon / AFP/Getty Images) 34 / 77 IMDb founder and Chief Executive Col Needham enjoys his 50th birthday party. (Rich Polk / Getty Images ) 35 / 77 Actress Connie Britton attends the Beatriz at Dinner premiere at Eccles Theatre. (Valerie Macon / AFP/Getty Images) 36 / 77 Marti Noxon, left, writer and director of To the Bone, poses with cast members Lily Collins, center, and Carrie Preston at the Jan. 22 premiere of the film in Park City Utah, during the 2017 Sundance Film Festival. (Chris Pizzello / Invision /Associated Press) 37 / 77 Cartoonist Daniel Clowes, the screenwriter of Wilson, poses at the Jan. 22 premiere of the film in Park City, Utah, during the Sundance Film Festival. (Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press) 38 / 77 Chante Adams, Roxanne Shante and actress Nia Long pose at the Jan. 22 premiere of the film Roxanne Roxanne in Park City, Utah, during the Sundance Film Festival. (Arthur Mola / Invision / Associated Press) 39 / 77 From left, Jeff Skoll, Al Gore, Heather Rae and David Suzuki speak on stage Jan. 22 at the New Climate Lunch Roundtable during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Matt Winkelmeyer / Getty Images ) 40 / 77 David Suzuki speaks on stage Jan. 22 at the New Climate Lunch Roundtable during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Matt Winkelmeyer / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 41 / 77 Strong Island executive producer Danny Glover relaxes Jan. 22 at the Indiewire Photo Studio at Chase Sapphire on Main during Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Jack Dempsey / Invision / Associated Press) 42 / 77 Actress Brittany Snow of Bushwick attends the Acura Studio on Jan. 22 during Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Neilson Barnard / Getty Images ) 43 / 77 DJ Cool V and Biz Markie attend the Acura Studio Jan. 22 during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Neilson Barnard / Getty Images) 44 / 77 Luca Guadagnino, Timothee Chalamet, Armie Hammer, Michael Stuhlbarg and Walter Fasano attend the Jan. 22 Call Me By Your Name premiere at Eccles Center Theatre during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images ) 45 / 77 Roxanne Shante performs onstage at the Jan. 22 Roxanne, Roxanne party in the Acura Festival Village during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Neilson Barnard / Getty Images ) 46 / 77 Biz Markie performs onstage at the Jan. 22 Roxanne, Roxanne party in the Acura Festival Village during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Neilson Barnard / Getty Images ) 47 / 77 Michaela Watkins, Jill Soloway, Jessica Williams and Stacey Wilson Hunt speak onstage Jan. 22 at an event hosted by the Bentonville Film Festival during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Joe Scarnici / Getty Images) 48 / 77 Roxanne Shante and Chante Adams attend the Jan. 22 Roxanne, Roxanne party during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Neilson Barnard / Getty Images ) 49 / 77 Jon Daly, Brett Gelman, Nia Long, Judy Greer, Janicza Bravo and Shiri Appleby attend the Jan. 22 Lemon premiere at Library Center Theater during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Matt Winkelmeyer / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 50 / 77 Jack Black attends the Jan. 22 premiere of The Polka King at the Eccles Center Theatre during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images ) 51 / 77 Willie Garson, Jason Schwartzman, Jack Black, Jacki Weaver and Jenny Slate pose at the Jan. 22 premiere of The Polka King during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (Danny Moloshok / Invision / Associated Press) 52 / 77 Tim Robbins, center, shakes hands with Mary J. Blige, left, while introducing Blige to his son, Jack Robbins, at Sundance at the Music Lodge during the Sundance Film Festival. (Jud Burkett / Invision for The Music Lodge) 53 / 77 Actresses Elizabeth Olsen, left, and Aubrey Plaza from Ingrid Goes West during the Indiewire in Conversation panel at Chase Sapphire on Main. (Jack Dempsey / Invision for Chase Sapphire) 54 / 77 Executive producer John Legend poses at WGN Americas Underground Sundance red carpet screening. (Danny Moloshok / Invision / Associated Press) 55 / 77 Actors Aldis Hodge, left, and Jurnee Smollett-Bell at WGN Americas Underground Sundance red carpet screening during the 2017 Sundance Film Festival. (Danny Moloshok / Invision / Associated Press) 56 / 77 People march down Main Street during the March on Main event during the Sundance Film Festival. (Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times) 57 / 77 Brett Haley, left, director of The Hero, poses with cast members Nick Offerman, Sam Elliott and Katharine Ross at the premiere of the film at the Library Center Theatre. (Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press) 58 / 77 Laura Prepon, left, a cast member in The Hero, with her fiance, actor Ben Foster, at the premiere of the film at the Library Center Theatre. (Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press) 59 / 77 Director Anthony Hemingway, left, producer John Legend, actors Jurnee Smollett-Bell and Aldis Hodge, and writer Misha Green speak at WGN Americas Underground panel at the Blackhouse Foundation. (Gustavo Caballero / Getty Images for WGN AMERICA) 60 / 77 Jason Mitchell, left, Dee Rees, Rob Morgan, Carey Mulligan, Mary J. Blige and Garrett Hedlund attend the Mudbound premiere at Eccles Center Theatre. (Valerie Macon / AFP/Getty Images) 61 / 77 Actors Lily Mojekwu, left, Griffin Dunne, Kathryn Hahn and Kevin Bacon of I Love Dick attend The IMDb Studio featuring the Filmmaker Discovery Lounge. (Rich Polk / Getty Images for IMDb) 62 / 77 Harvey Weinstein attends the Wind River party at the Acura Studio at Sundance Film Festival. (Neilson Barnard / Getty Images for Acura) 63 / 77 Actress Brittany Snow attends the Bushwick premiere. (Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images) 64 / 77 A policeman with a bomb sniffing dog checks out a snow pile next to a Banksy artwork along Old Main Street on the first day of the 2017 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (George Frey / EPA) 65 / 77 Omar Wasow, left, an assistant professor at Princeton in the department of politics, and director Jennifer Brea attend An Artist at the Table benefit during the 2017 Sundance Film Festival at DeJoria Center in Kamas, Utah. (Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 66 / 77 Former Vice President and cast member Al Gore speaks as he arrives for the premiere of An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (George Frey / EPA) 67 / 77 Kristen Stewart, left, David Shapiro, Josh Kaye and Sydney Lopez attend the world premiere of director Kristen Stewarts Come Swim at Prospector Square Theatre. (Joe Scarnici / Getty Images for Refinery29) 68 / 77 Kristen Stewart attends the world premiere of Come Swim. (Joe Scarnici / Getty Images for Refinery29) 69 / 77 Actresses Molly Shannon, Alison Brie, Kate Micucci, and Aubrey Plaza attend The Little Hours premiere at Library Center Theater. (Michael Loccisano / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 70 / 77 Jon Gabrus, Dave Franco, Nick Offerman, Trevor Groth, Aubrey Plaza, Jeff Baena, Molly Shannon, Alison Brie, Jemima Kirke, Kate Micucci, Adam Pally and Lauren Weedman, from left, attend The Little Hours premiere. (Michael Loccisano / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 71 / 77 Former Vice President and cast member Al Gore, left, and Director of the Sundance Film Festival John Cooper arrive for the premiere of An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power. (George Frey / EPA) 72 / 77 Actors Nick Offerman, left, Molly Shannon, and Dave Franco attend The Little Hours premiere. (Michael Loccisano / Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival) 73 / 77 Executive director of the Sundance Institute Keri Putnman, left, founder and president of the Sundance Film Festival Robert Redford and director of the Sundance Film Festival John Cooper talk to the media to open the 2017 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. (George Frey / EPA) 74 / 77 Robert Redford, founder of the Sundance Institute, addresses the audience at the opening night premiere of the film An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power, at the Eccles Theater. (Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press) 75 / 77 People are bundled up as temperatures dropped below 20 degrees along Main Street in Park City, Utah, as the start of the Sundance Film Festival approached. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 76 / 77 A trolley rolls up Main Street in Park City, Utah, as the Sundance Film Festival approached. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 77 / 77 The Egyptian Theatre on Main Street, one of the major venues for the Sundance Film Festival, is lit up a few nights before the festivals opening in Park City, Utah. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) The obligation is for filmmakers to take the accounts of those no longer with us and bring them to people. Its depressing to read the news, he added. Nobody wants to educate themselves. I want to tell a comprehensive story the audience needs to hear. Afineevsky is certainly well-positioned to convey whats happening in the most volatile and, as the events of the last few days make clear, sometimes most misunderstood country in the Middle East. At a time when many in Hollywood are countering the Trump ban with statements and speecheswitness the comments at the SAG Awards by actors from Stranger Things, Moonlight and Hidden Figures Sunday nighthis movie offers a more tangible response. There is value in public pronouncements, which can elicit hot and even necessary reactions on social media. But with his new work, the Russian-American director proves that the most enduring way for entertainers to challenge undesirable policies is to make art about it. Cries from Syria shows, via both direct interviews with a range of Syrian people and voluminous images from citizen journalists, the ordinary folks caught in the war between Bashar Assads military, the Free Syrian Army, the Syrian Democratic Forces and various jihadi groups a conflict that has claimed as many as 470,000 lives and still rages on. Screening for the first time just days before Trumps executive action, the film serves as a kind of humanist response to the presidents ban. To those who say such measures are needed to stop terrorism, the film powerfully and often graphically shows what many of these so-called threats are: victims themselves. In one scene, a father is seen trying to save his children on a rickety boat in the Mediterranean as, one by one, they slip through his hands and drown. In another, a school is under an aerial attack a tragedy remembered only because a young boy and his cousin were allowed to leave after sitting more quietly than anyone in the class. By the time they arrive home, the entire school has been razed by a missile, scores of their classmates killed. In perhaps the most horrific scene, dozens of children are killed in a chemical raid by Assads army an event portrayed with startling explicitness. Afineevsky, who documented the 2014 Ukrainian revolution from the ground in his previous film, Winter On Fire (it was nominated for the documentary Oscar), has again gone deep to show a side of a conflict most mainstream journalism institutions lack either the resources or fortitude to chronicle. Cries from Syria is thus more than a journalistic snapshot; its a definitive document of one of the most bloody of modern conflicts. What it lacks in easy digestibility images such as the gassing make this one of the most difficult documentaries to watch in recent memory it compensates for with historical importance. When, years from now, in a bid to understand or administer self-blame, the world looks back at the Syrian civil war, its movies like this that will pinpoint most clearly what happened, told by the people to whom it was happening. People say, Why did you show so much? Afineevsky said, referencing some murmurs at the festival that the film can be hard to watch, in particular because of all the images of children. But you have to show it to understand what happened. Otherwise its just an abstraction, something on the news. Viewers might be moved by the stories of many of the adults too. Among the most powerful is Kholoud Helmi, a resident of Darayya, a suburb of Damascus. Helmi talks movingly, in fluent English, about the suffering she witnesses and the changes shed like to see. Even less personal moments land with a visceral power: as an animated map indicating where chemical weapons have fallen begins to unnervingly fill up, for instance, as an unseen man sings plaintively, driving home the tragedy. And if the film is often told from the perspective of supporters of the Free Syrian Army they comprise many of the interviews it also is interested in victims far more than fighters. When children make up a disproportionate amount of the film, thoughts about politics can fall away; among the many haunting images is a young boy nonchalantly drawing a picture of the various armies closing in around his town the way most children crayon their handprint or the family pet. (Two other movies about the region, City of Ghosts and Last Men in Aleppo, also premiered at Sundance, completing a kind of trilogy of war horror. The former, about citizen journalists behind the groundbreaking Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently Facebook page comes from a different Oscar nominee, Cartel Land director Matthew Heineman; encountering the heroic subjects at a festival party was one of the most chilling-but-inspiring experiences this reporter has ever had at Sundance. The latter, meanwhile, takes a more focused look at the White Helmets, the wars bold rescue group, and won a documentary prize Saturday night.) The message of Syria movies should not be limited to far-flung places, Afineevsky said. These people start with a dream theyve never had, of democracy. Theyve never had free speech, said the director, who with a thick beard, tousled salt and pepper hair and intense way of speaking projects a moral seriousness above his outgoing demeanor. And we have all of that in the U.S. But we should cherish it. There were states last week that wanted to ban protests. The idea that this could only happen in a place like Syria is not true, he added. I want people in America to see this movie and appreciate what we have. We have to cherish it so we can fight for what we have. Afineevsky hopes to show Cries from Syria to wide swaths of this nations capital, including to members of the Trump administration, before its cable debut. He says he strongly opposes Trumps executive action restricting entry from countries including Syria, not only on humanitarian grounds but pragmatic ones. Trump is making a mistake if he thinks closing the border will prevent things. At the end of the day were talking about a lot of kids. And if we dont help them and provide shelter, [Islamic State] will be their only shelter. He noted that Syrians make up barely a quarter of the refugees that come to the U.S., and also noted that this was the wrong way to neutralize a threat for other reasons. Its not 20 or 30 years ago where you can shut doors and prevent terrorism, he said. It doesnt work that way. There are people who live here who follow [Islamic States] ideology. It has very little to do with Syrians. Syrians are the ones suffering the most from terrorism. But he also retains optimism that the White House will see his film and keep an open mind. Im targeting everybody, he said. Almost every senator has kids or grandkids. Same with Donald Trump he has a wife and kids and grandkids. Mike Pence has a wife and kids. We need to remind them all these people [caught in the Syrian civil war] have wives or kids, or are wives and kids. For the moment, one can be forgiven for seeing reasons to lose hope. Helmi had come to the U.S. to promote the movie at Sundance. She made appearances at screenings, speaking to audiences eager to hear her story firsthand. She set out on Wednesday to return to her temporary home on the Turkish side of the Turkish-Syria border, where she has lived since fleeing Darayya. When she boarded a plane at Salt Lake City International Airport, Helmi believed shed be returning to the U.S. in about eight weeks for the next round of publicity, including the HBO premiere. The ban has now thrown that into doubt. There are a lot of questions right now. Will she be able to travel to our country? Will she be able to talk about this important story? Afineevsky said. Asked about her state of mind, the director pulled no punches. She was devastated, he said, noting he had spoken to her this past weekend after the ban was announced. This movie was hope for her, hope for a lot of families that were coming to Utah. (The state has been hospitable to refugees, with an estimated 60,000 from Syria and elsewhere currently living here.) But Afineevsky said he refuses to give in. Its a dream slowly. These people have hope, I still have hope. We want to be able to change something in our country too. Late in his movie, that central tension between optimism and despair, belief and doubt is given expression by several subjects. Besieged by years of death and displacement, one shaken Syrian civilian says, I cannot imagine how a person does this to another person, adding, For Syrians I think it becomes normal. It will never be normal but it becomes like daily things you see. Another is more bright-eyed. We want to see a more beautiful Syria so we are working on rebuilding it. Our big dream is to see our country more beautiful. Our dream is to end this war. But hovering over them are more grim realities. As one person talks about using music to ease the pain, another offers a tart response. With such brutality, they say, it is not enough just to sing. See the most-read stories in Entertainment this hour steve.zeitchik@latimes.com Twitter: @ZeitchikLAT By the time the Sundance Film Festival came to a close Saturday night, it was clear that there had been no 2017 equivalent of The Birth of a Nation at the festival this year no cinematic sensation that swooped in from nowhere to dominate the prizes, score the biggest acquisition deal and promise the industry a badly needed diversity makeover. (Happily, this years Academy Award nominations have spared us a three-quel to #OscarsSoWhite.) If anything, a certain amount of caution could be detected on the part of distributors, journalists and even filmmakers, as though everyone in attendance were trying to avoid the trap of self-importance in a year when real-world matters from President Trumps inauguration and the womens march to reports of a cyber attack on the festival provided more than their fair share of off-screen drama. Which is not to suggest that the films unveiled over 10 days in Park City, Utah, were somehow disappointing, or not up to the challenge of speaking to our politically fraught moment. Far from it. There were, as usual, movies about fractious racial divisions, including Mudbound, Dee Rees symphonic, superbly acted drama about two Mississippi families one white, one black struggling to survive in the shadow of World War II. Advertisement Less widely seen, although it won the audience award in the festivals Next sidebar (devoted to innovative, low-budget work), was Justin Chons Gook, a raucous, bittersweet comedy set during the Los Angeles riots in April 1992. Shot in black-and-white, the movie both explores and sneakily subverts the fractious relations between Korean and African Americans during that tumultuous chapter. Even apart from the confrontationally titled likes of Trumped: Inside the Greatest Political Upset of All Time, many of the films on offer could scarcely help engaging directly with the election and its consequences, to a surprising and mostly heartening degree. Few of us who filed into the first screening of Beatriz at Dinner director Miguel Arteta and screenwriter Mike Whites elegant, squirm-inducing dark comedy about a Mexican-born masseuse (Salma Hayek) clashing with an obscenely wealthy real-estate mogul (John Lithgow) expected to find ourselves face-to-face with the first cinematic allegory of the Trump era. What seems at first like a too-easy skewering of racial and class divisions soon veers into richly unsettling dramatic territory, anchored by perhaps the finest, most controlled performance of Hayeks career. If Beatriz at Dinner felt so eerily timely that it might well have gone into production on Nov. 9, a number of documentaries proved no less accommodating of extremely recent headlines. An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power, a stirring follow-up to An Inconvenient Truth (2006) from directors Bonni Cohen and Jon Shenk, follows Al Gore on his latest rousing crusade against climate change, then builds to a forlorn postelection shot of the former vice president vanishing into an elevator in Trump Tower. Nobody Speak: Trials of a Free Press, Brian Knappenbergers account of the legal battle between Gawker and Hulk Hogan, and how the interference of billionaires like Peter Thiel might jeopardize the 1st Amendment going forward, received its first public screening on Tuesday, which gave the filmmakers just enough time to squeeze in footage from Trumps Jan. 20 inauguration. It was hard to watch Bryan Fogels entertaining Russian-doping Olympics expose, Icarus which drew the meaningfully titled Orwell Award from the U.S. documentary jury without thinking about Vladimir Putins other alleged behind-the-scenes manipulations on a different international stage. Similarly, it was difficult to see Jonathan Olshefskis deeply moving, years-in-the-making documentary Quest, about the everyday travails of a black family living in north Philadelphia, and not share his subjects indignation when they hear news of Trumps birther conspiracy a reminder of just how significant and symbolic a victory the Obama presidency remains for so many minorities in this country. Meanwhile, over in the U.S. dramatic competition, the grand jury prize went to a violent dark comedy whose title, I Dont Feel at Home in This World Anymore, seemed to capture the political mood. But this Netflix original production, skillfully written and directed by Macon Blair, wasnt especially political or maybe it was, given that it focuses on a woman (the terrific Melanie Lynskey) who slowly but surely seizes control of her life, reminding the people around her that every mean, mindless action has a consequence. Blairs movie was scarcely the only Sundance title about a woman, or group of women, rebelling against a repressive order. The highlight of the dramatic competition, for me, was Novitiate, a revealing portrait of life among aspiring nuns in a 1960s convent, which earned filmmaker Maggie Betts a breakthrough director prize from the jury. Splendidly acted by an almost all-female ensemble, the film features particularly standout performances by Margaret Qualley as a sensitive young postulant, and by Melissa Leo as the convents not-unsympathetic Gorgon of a Reverend Mother. Another dramatic competition entry bolstered by an actress superb lead turn was Roxanne Roxanne, Michael Larnells rickety but heartfelt film about the straight-out-of-Queens hip-hop legend Roxanne Shante (Chante Adams, who won the jurys breakthrough performance prize). Roxanne Roxanne would make a fine double bill with another competition title, Patti Cake$, Geremy Jaspers exultant, energetic fiction about a young New Jersey rapper (the sensational Danielle Macdonald), which became one of the festivals big hits and was acquired by Fox Searchlight Pictures for $10.5 million. The theme of female empowerment extended to the World Cinema dramatic competition, where one of the standouts was Nana Ekvtimishvili and Simon Gross My Happy Family, a beautifully crafted drama about a middle-aged Georgian woman (Ia Shugliashvili, in a remarkable big-screen debut) who makes the simple, radical decision to find her own apartment after spending years under the same roof with her husband, children and parents. Set to screen next in February at the Berlin Film Festival, My Happy Family was a reminder that not every excellent film emerges from a festival with an award under its belt. Many of them, like Michael Showalters terrific cross-cultural, cross-generational dramedy The Big Sick, starring and co-written by Kumail Nanjiani (Silicon Valley), are not even awards-eligible at Sundance, where the competitions consist of mostly first- and second-time filmmakers. Nevertheless, The Big Sick got the prize it wanted: a $12-million acquisition by Amazon Studios, in one of the festivals richest deals. Also ineligible for Sundance awards though its distributor, Sony Pictures Classics, is surely hoping for prizes later in the year was Call Me by Your Name, Luca Guadagninos gay love story about the slowly growing attraction between a precocious 17-year-old (Timothee Chalamet) and his familys academic houseguest (Armie Hammer). This was the best movie I saw at Sundance 2017, for its ravishing filmmaking as well as its piercing wisdom about the evanescence of first love. Its sun-drenched northern Italian setting couldnt have been farther away from Park City, but Call Me by Your Name nonetheless captured the enduring spirit of Sundance: aesthetically bold, emotionally complex and, in ways that dont immediately announce themselves, political to the bone. justin.chang@latimes.com The Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday night served as an opportunity for actors to honor their own but also for Hollywoods brightest stars to speak out about the increasingly volatile political climate. Here are five of the evenings most impassioned pleas for humanity and empathy in the face of conflict. I am the daughter of an immigrant. My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France. And Im an American patriot. And I love this country. And because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes. And this immigrant ban is a blemish, and its un-American. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, female actor in a comedy series winner for Veep FULL COVERAGE: 2017 SAG Awards Advertisement 1 / 16 Annalise Basso plays with her red dress on the red carpet. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 16 Jessie Tyler Ferguson shoots a selfie with fans during the arrivals. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 16 Television personality Keltie Knight makes a grand entrance during the arrivals at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 16 Jocelyn Towne makes a statement during the arrivals. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 16 Viola Davis is the first black actress to win five SAG awards. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 16 Michelle Dockery congratulates SAG Awards winner Sarah Paulson (right) while backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 16 Actor Finn Wolfhard leaps for joy after winning Ensemble in a Drama Series. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 16 Actress Danielle Brooks receives a hug from Tony Hale after winning Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 16 Brie Larson smiles while backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 16 Emma Stone, followed by Jonah Hill, reacts backstage after winning Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role for La La Land. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 16 Missi Pyle reacts as she arrives for the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 16 Janelle Monae and Aldis Hodge embrace backstage after winning for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Theatrical Motion Picture for Hidden Figures. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 16 Lily Tomlin was the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 16 Hidden Figures writer/director Theodore Melfi congratulates Octavia Spencer, Taraji P. Henson, and Janelle Monae after winning Outstanding Performance by a cast in a Theatrical Motion Picture in Hidden Figures. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 16 Denzel Washington is congratulated backstage by stage manager Valdez Flagg and Rosalind Jarrett Sepulveda eft) after winning Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role for Fences. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 16 Taraji P. Henson grabs her SAG statuette backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) My mother is an ordained minister. Im a Muslim. She didnt do backflips when I called her to tell her I converted 17 years ago. But I tell you now, you put things to the side and Im able to see her and shes able to see me. We love each other. The love has grown. And that stuff is minutia. Its not that important. Mahershala Ali, male actor in a supporting role winner for Moonlight What August [Wilson] did so beautifully is he honored the average man, who happened to be a man of color. And sometimes we dont have to shake the world and move the world and create anything that is going to be in the history book. The fact that we breathed and lived a life and was a god to our children, just that, means that we have a story and it deserves to be told. Viola Davis, female actor in a supporting role winner for Fences We will shelter freaks and outcasts, those who have no homes. We will get past the lies. We will hunt monsters. And when we are lost amidst the hypocrisy and casual violence of certain individuals and institutions, we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the meek and the disenfranchised and the marginalized. David Harbour, speaking for the winning ensemble in a drama series, Stranger Things This story is of unity. This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race. We win. Love wins. Every time. Taraji P. Henson, speaking for the winning cast in a motion picture, Hidden Figures See the most-read stories in Entertainment this hour libby.hill@latimes.com @midwestspitfire ALSO Political issues, travel ban a running theme at SAG Awards Stars arrive at the 2017 SAG Awards red carpet Big Bang Theory actor makes big anti-Trump statement on the SAG red carpet After a weekend of airport protests across the country in response to President Trumps temporary ban on refugees coming into the U.S., pushback has also come in another form: money. The American Civil Liberties Union, which successfully fought for an emergency stay late Saturday night to halt the deportations of any refugees or others who hold valid visas to enter the U.S., received $24 million in donations over the last few days. Then theres the effort put forth by actor Kal Penn. Penn, who stars in ABCs politically charged Designated Survivor and briefly served in the Obama administration, took a moment of online harassment and made it the footing for a fundraising campaign on behalf of the International Rescue Committee, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping people whose lives and livelihoods are shattered by conflict and disaster. Advertisement After someone left a comment on an Instagram post by Penn saying that he [doesnt] belong in this country, Penn, who was born to Indian parents in New Jersey, set up a fundraising page Saturday donating to Syrian refugees in the name of the dude who said I dont belong in America. And then he tweeted out the link. The hope was to raise at least $2,500. As of Monday afternoon, the page has accrued more than $650,000 in donations. We spoke to Penn by phone Monday morning to talk about the response. This all started with a comment left on your Instagram page. What was it about this one that prompted you to find a way to change the narrative? Usually, I ignore that stuff. But then I thought, this is ridiculous. Weve, unfortunately, seen a rise in rhetoric like this because of the presidents own rhetoric on things like this. Its not the America I know and love. And I feel like most people would agree with me on that. So I thought, lets flip the narrative a little bit. I felt like we could raise, like, $2,500 for Syrian refugees in this guys name. And IRC is a great organization that does work particularly with Syrian refugees, which were specifically named as not being allowed in. I went to their website and they have a partnership with CrowdRise, so in, like, a minute, you can set up a funding page. I tweeted the link thinking we could raise $2,500, and within 20 minutes, we hit the goal. So then I raised the goal, thinking maybe we could get $5,000 and so on. The nice thing about CrowdRise is once you hit your goal, you can keep accepting donations. Youve now raised over $600,000. Well, I havent done any of it! This is the beautiful thing about it. All I did was set up a page. Its tens of thousands of people who feel exactly the same way, who are thinking this is not the America I know and love. The people who think we should be a beacon of hope for everybody. Thats whats really inspiring about all this. Whats the data on where people are donating from? People from all 50 states have donated. We just got the data on that. And 45 different countries, so far. Thats really inspiring. I would not say I was dry-eyed in that moment. How long will you keep up the page? I dont know. Its literally being driven by the people. Im technically the editor of the page. That means I can raise the goal of the page, I guess. I think it just depends on how people are feeling. I cant underscore that enough. Im sitting here so inspired by all of these people. We saw that, certainly, with the Womens March, we saw all the people who rallied this weekend at airports in support of the folks who were being detained. Its just beautiful. The president signed this executive order. Its obviously a Muslim ban and its a ban on refugees. There are two things that are at play here: Theres the moral imperative, which is abhorrent and un-American and this is not who we are. Then theres the national security element of it, which is that something like this actually makes us less safe because its a tool that ISIS and other groups use to say, Look, the United States doesnt like Muslims which is not true. The president is making a truth out of that, unfortunately. What do you say to those who feel like theyre not welcome here? Thats the beauty of what youre seeing on social media and, physically, at airports right now. We have an incredibly regressive president who is signing these bigoted executive orders. But then you have the majority of the American people who dont feel that way and are speaking out speaking out boldly in a really beautiful way. The hope, certainly, is that actions like that show the rest of the world how we really feel and who we really are and that he does not speak for us. And what about those who strongly believe in this executive order and its mission? I think thats a question that folks are not answering in nuanced ways. If you look at what the president has done with his National Security Council, removing essentially any unbiased opinion from the intelligence community the director of national security, the joint chiefs these are people whose job it is to give the president the most unbiased advice on national security possible and hes just removed those people from the National Security Council. Theres no logical support mechanism for a bigoted executive order like this, as evidence that the president is removing any objectivity to his entire process. Hes not acting on a recommendation to keep us safe. Hes acting despite the recommendation that doing this would make us less safe. And that, I think, is one of the most dangerous parts of all this. Last night at the SAG Awards, a lot of actors used their time on stage to speak about the current political climate. Some people, particularly Trump supporters, say celebrities shouldnt use such venues as platforms for their political viewpoints. What do you say to them? I think youd have to ask them why theyre upset when they voted for a reality TV star to be the president. The most-read Entertainment stories this hour yvonne.villarreal@latimes.com Twitter: @villarrealy If anyone thought that the winners and presenters at Sunday nights 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards would avoid addressing the protests happening at airports around the nation, they were wrong. The show, telecast on TNT and TBS live from the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, was political from the opening moments, with a series of nominated actors in the audience talking about what it means to be an actor, which includes, said Scandals Kerry Washington, expressing political opinions. FULL COVERAGE: 2017 SAG Awards Advertisement 1 / 18 Octavia Spencer, left, Taraji P. Henson and Janelle Monae, winners of performance by a cast in a motion picture for Hidden Figures. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 18 Mahershala Ali holds his awards for supporting actor in Moonlight as well as his award for Hidden Figures, which won an ensemble award. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 18 Finn Wolfard, left, Gaten Matarazzo, Millie Bobby Brown, Noah Schapp and Caleb McLaughlin, winners of ensemble in a drama series for Stranger Things. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 18 Sarah Paulson, winner of female actor in a miniseries or television movie for The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 18 Bryan Cranston, winner of male actor in a miniseries or television movie for All the Way. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 18 The Crowns John Lithgow, winner for male actor in a drama series, with co-star Claire Foy, winner for female actor in a drama series. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 18 The Crowns John Lithgow, winner for male actor in a drama series. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 18 Claire Foy, winner for female actor in a drama series for The Crown. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 18 William H. Macy, winner of male actor in a comedy series for Shameless. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 18 Lily Tomlin with her lifetime achievement award. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 18 The co-winners of the ensemble in a comedy series for Orange Is the New Black. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 18 Elizabeth Rodriguez, left, Selenis Leyva, Diane Guerrero and Jackie Cruz, co-winners of ensemble in a comedy series for Orange Is the New Black. (Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images) 13 / 18 Uzo Aduba, left, and Lin Tucci with their awards for ensemble in a comedy series for Orange is the New Black. (Jordan Strauss / Invision / AP) 14 / 18 Viola Davis, winner of female actor in a supporting role for Fences. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 18 Denzel Washington poses in the press room with the award for performance by a male actor in a leading role for Fences. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 18 Winona Ryder, co-recipient of the ensemble in a drama series award for Stranger Things. (Frazer Harrison / Getty Images) 17 / 18 Emma Stone, winner of female actor in a leading role for La La Land. (Jordan Strauss / Invision / AP) 18 / 18 Julia Louis-Dreyfus, winner of female actor in a comedy series for Veep. (Frazer Harrison / Getty Images) Although the show normally eschews a formal host, Ashton Kutcher did welcome viewers to the broadcast and everyone in airports that belong in my America. We love you and we welcome you. The nights first winner, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, addressed the issue head-on in her acceptance speech for performance by a female actor in a comedy series for her role on Veep. I am the daughter of an immigrant. My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France. And Im an American patriot. And I love this country. And because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes. And this immigrant ban is a blemish and its un-American, she said, before reading the Writers Guild of America statement on the issue. The trend continued as the show progressed. Moonlight actor Mahershala Ali spoke eloquently of his character Juan, during his acceptance of the award for performance by a male actor in a supporting role in film. I think what Ive learned from working on Moonlight is we see what happens when you persecute people. They fold into themselves and what I was so grateful about in having the opportunity to play Juan was playing a gentleman who saw a young man folding into himself as a result of the persecution of his community. Taking the opportunity to uplift him and to tell him he mattered, that he was OK and accept him. I hope that we do a better job of that, he said. Sarah Paulson made a plea that anyone with money to spare to please donate to the ACLU to protect the rights of people across the country as she accepted the trophy for performance by a female actor in a television movie or miniseries for The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story. Dolly Parton, on hand to present her 9 to 5 co-star Lily Tomlin with the SAG Lifetime Achievement Award, went a much lighter route. After receiving a standing ovation from the room, the country legend joked that she had trouble getting into the show. I almost didnt get in. Seriously, I didnt. They were holding me backstage. They kept wanting to see my IDs. Well, I think it was IDs, maybe it was just double Ds. Im glad to get that off my chest, she quipped. Although Tomlin has famously been an activist throughout her 50-year career, her lengthy and frequently hilarious acceptance speech only partially touched on political issues. She riffed on various topics including her misspent youth and nuggets of wisdom for young actors. Among those nuggets: Dont leave the house when youre drunk, she said to laughter from the audience. And if youre already out there, then you must learn to tell you when youve had too much to drink. Listen to your friends. When they stop talking to you and start talking about you saying things like Did she have a purse? And dont be anxious about missing an opportunity. Behind every failure is an opportunity someone wishes they had missed. 1 / 16 Annalise Basso plays with her red dress on the red carpet. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 16 Jessie Tyler Ferguson shoots a selfie with fans during the arrivals. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 16 Television personality Keltie Knight makes a grand entrance during the arrivals at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 16 Jocelyn Towne makes a statement during the arrivals. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 16 Viola Davis is the first black actress to win five SAG awards. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 16 Michelle Dockery congratulates SAG Awards winner Sarah Paulson (right) while backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 16 Actor Finn Wolfhard leaps for joy after winning Ensemble in a Drama Series. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 16 Actress Danielle Brooks receives a hug from Tony Hale after winning Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 16 Brie Larson smiles while backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 16 Emma Stone, followed by Jonah Hill, reacts backstage after winning Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role for La La Land. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 16 Missi Pyle reacts as she arrives for the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 16 Janelle Monae and Aldis Hodge embrace backstage after winning for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Theatrical Motion Picture for Hidden Figures. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 16 Lily Tomlin was the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 16 Hidden Figures writer/director Theodore Melfi congratulates Octavia Spencer, Taraji P. Henson, and Janelle Monae after winning Outstanding Performance by a cast in a Theatrical Motion Picture in Hidden Figures. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 16 Denzel Washington is congratulated backstage by stage manager Valdez Flagg and Rosalind Jarrett Sepulveda eft) after winning Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role for Fences. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 16 Taraji P. Henson grabs her SAG statuette backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) Near the end of her speech she did talk about contemplating what signs she might need to make for whatever marches may come next. We could all go out and really change things, she said, concluding with, As long as I dont have to audition I just may be back. Many of the winners, of course, were profusely grateful to their fellow actors and creative collaborators in film and television. Claire Foy took time to thank the casting directors of the Netflix royal drama The Crown while accepting the trophy for performance by a female actor in a drama series. Viola Davis spoke at length about playwright/screenwriter August Wilson and his capacity to encapsulate lives after winning performance by a female actor in a supporting role in film. John Lithgow, who won for performance by a male actor in a drama series, also graciously made sure to acknowledge his fellow nominees. The In Memoriam reel was predictably tough with many familiar faces gone, some far too soon, and ended with Carrie Fisher intoning May the Force be with you. David Harbour was the nights most impassioned speaker, however, as he accepted the award for performance by an ensemble in a drama series for the cast of Netflixs retro series Stranger Things. As Winona Ryder and his fellow cast mates cheered him on, Harbour talked about how he and his fellow thespians believe great acting can change the world and that their win was a call to arms to go deeper and through our art to battle against fear, self-centeredness and exclusivity of our predominantly narcissistic culture and through our craft cultivate a more empathetic and understanding society by revealing intimate truths that serve as a forceful reminder to folks that when they feel broken and afraid and tired, they are not alone. The night concluded on a note of uplift via Taraji P. Henson. This story is of unity. This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race. We win, the actress said while accepting the nights final award for performance by a cast in a motion picture for Hidden Figures. Love wins, every time. ALSO: Watch Mahershala Alis emotional SAG acceptance speech 2017 Screen Actors Guild Awards: Complete list of winners SAG voices: Five calls for empathy in politically fraught times UPDATES: 5:55 p.m.: This story was updated with additional details from the Screen Actors Guild Awards. President Trumps ban on immigration led to protests in various U.S. cities this past weekend, just a week following the Womens March on Washington went worldwide. The protests were centered around major U.S. landmarks, including the White House, Copley Square in Boston and Battery Park in Manhattan. Among those who joined Sunday afternoons #NoBanNoWall march in New York City were model sisters Gigi and Bella Hadid. The immigration ban likely hit home for the sisters, whose parents are immigrants; their mother, Yolanda, hails from the Netherlands, and their father, Mohamed, was born in Israel. Both Gigi and Bella were born in Los Angeles. Bella shared an image via Instagram from the march and in it, shes holding up a sign that reads We are all Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, atheists, Christians, Jews. The words are arranged in such an order as to spell out the word Human with each religion. While Gigi and Bella took to the streets, others, including Zac Posen and Prabal Gurung, joined in on the #NoBanNoWall conversation via social media. Gurung shared a clip of We Are the World, the USA for Africa charity single written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie. I am an immigrant, and we are all immigrants, he wrote in the caption field. Though its an increasingly busy time in the fashion world, it seems as though designers and models are staying tuned to the political world as well. ALSO Designer Q-and-A: Rachel Comey on the women's march, the future, and the transformative power of fashion 2017 SAG Awards fashion: Black and white and red (and pink) all over SAG Awards 2017: WWD picks the best hair and makeup looks from the red carpet African Union leaders meet Monday for a summit that has exposed regional divisions as they mull whether to allow Morocco to rejoin the bloc, and vote for a new chairperson. The two-day summit in Ethiopia comes after several shake-ups on the international stage: the election of US President Donald Trump and a new head of the UN, Antonio Guterres, who will address the opening of the assembly. On Sunday in Addis Ababa, Guterres praised Ethiopia's generosity in welcoming refugees from the region while battling its worst drought in 50 years. It is "an example that I would say needs to be thought about in a world where unfortunately so many borders are being closed," he said in a veiled dig at the US ban on travellers from seven Muslim countries, including Libya, Somalia and Sudan in Africa. Uncertainty over Africa's relationship with Trump's America is one of several issues demanding the attention of AU leaders -- from turmoil in Libya, radical Islam in Mali, Somalia and Nigeria, to stagnating peace efforts in South Sudan. However Monday's talks will be dominated by Morocco's bid to return to the fold 33 years after it quit in protest against the AU's decision to accept Western Sahara as a member. The membership of affluent Morocco could be a boon for the AU, which lost a key financier in late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and is working hard to become financially independent. Currently foreign donors account for some 70 percent of its budget, according to the Institute for Security Studies. A Moroccan diplomat said Sunday the country had the "unconditional support" of 42 members of the bloc. However in a sign of the resistance Morocco is facing, 12 countries including heavyweights Nigeria, South Africa, Algeria, Kenya and Angola, requested a legal opinion from the AU on whether the bloc could accept a country that some members consider is occupying another member's territory. These nations have long supported the campaign for self-determination by Western Sahara's Polisario movement. Morocco maintains that the former Spanish colony under its control is an integral part of the kingdom, while the Polisario Front, which campaigns for the territory's independence, demands a referendum on self-determination. The AU's legal counsel, in a document seen by AFP, said the nations raised "fundamental concerns that have to be taken into account". However the decision to weigh Morocco's request ultimately rests with heads of state. Also on Monday, leaders will vote for a new chairperson six months after failing to decide on a replacement for South Africa's Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma. Fragmented regional interests -- whether on Morocco's bid or divisions over membership of the International Criminal Court (ICC) -- will shape the choice between five candidates from Kenya, Senegal, Chad, Botswana and Equatorial Guinea. Kenya's foreign minister Amina Mohamed, Chad's former prime minister Moussa Faki Mahamat and Senegal's veteran diplomat Abdoulaye Bathily are the newcomers and frontrunners in the race. The winner will have to obtain a two-thirds majority. The choice of a new leader is crucial for the future of a bloc still seen as largely irrelevant in the daily lives of most Africans, and which is undergoing deep introspection on how to reform. Rwanda's President Paul Kagame was tasked with drawing up a report recommending an overhaul of the bloc, which he presented to heads of state on Sunday. According to the Kenyan government, the "biting" report criticised "chronic failure to see through African Union decisions (which) had resulted in a crisis of implementation and a perception that the AU was not relevant to Africans". Kagame also slammed "over-dependence on (donor) funding." Efforts to obtain more financial independence are likely to gain even more significance as Africa faces uncertainty over its partnership with the United States after Trump's vow to put "America first". The US is one of the main contributors to the fight against the Shabaab Islamist militants group in Somalia, and the AU Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) has already been hit by funding cuts from the EU. Search Keywords: Short link: Tom Ford International is getting into the luxury timepiece sector, as first reported in WWD in December. Ford has revealed a collaboration with Bedrock Manufacturing Co., founded by Tom Kartsotis, to design, manufacture and distribute a collection of Swiss-made watches. Details about the designs and launch dates and strategy were not disclosed. Watches have long been an obsession of mine and I have been waiting for the perfect moment in our brand development to introduce this category and have also waited for the perfect partner, said Ford. We have found that in Tom Kartsotis and Bedrock Manufacturing Co. Kartsotis has a long history in watches, having founded Fossil in 1984 and grown it into a billion-dollar public company. Kartsotis was chairman and chief executive officer of Fossil until 2000, remaining chairman until 2010. In 2003 he launched Texas-based private equity firm Bedrock, named for the hometown of Fred Flintstone. Under the Bedrock umbrella are Shinola, the Detroit-based watch brand Kartsotis launched in 2011, and Filson, a heritage hunter and fishermans clothing brand. Advertisement We have a deep appreciation for the craft, detail, quality and of course taste, that Tom Ford stands for, said Kartsotis. These values are relevant now more than ever. We are [pleased] about this collaboration and look forward to helping Tom express his vision. Bedrocks brands are focused on American heritage with marketing programs centered around a Made in USA theme. For the Tom Ford timepieces, it will establish a presence in Switzerland, marking its first entry into Swiss-made watches and also its first tie up with a designer label for watches. Its not the brightest moment for luxury watches. The high-end sector has wilted due to a crackdown on gifting in China, changing tourist patterns, caution in Asia, and cyclical market movements many high-fliers have already purchased their multithousand-dollar timepieces, and are sated. According to the latest statistics from the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry, exports of Swiss watches declined 16 percent in October, the steepest fall of the year. Only two markets showed improvement: the U.K., rising 9 percent because of the sterling depreciation in the wake of the Brexit referendum, and China, improving 2.8 percent and marking a gradual recovery since July. ALSO Harpers Bazaar celebrates the worlds most fashionable women in style 2017 SAG Awards fashion: Black and white and red (and pink) all over Model Anais Mali unveils collection of bodysuits A day after Donald Trump was elected president, two detectives walked up to a building site in Koreatown. The pair was hoping to find someone who might have witnessed a motorist intentionally knocking down a construction worker. They introduced themselves to a group of Latino workers. The workers got up and walked away. Trump is coming, one of them said as he left. To Det. Brent Hopkins, the scene was a stark illustration of the difficulties he could face depending on how far President Trump goes in enlisting local law enforcement to rid the country of people who are in the U.S. illegally. Advertisement It is my job to investigate crimes, said Hopkins of the Los Angeles Police Departments Wilshire Division, who also serves on the police unions communications committee. And if I cant do that, I cant get justice for people, because all of a sudden, Im losing my witnesses or my victims because theyre afraid that talking to me is going to lead to them getting deported. After Trumps unveiling last week of two executive orders that called for empowering local law enforcement officers to take on the duties of immigration agents, police officers and sheriffs deputies across the Los Angeles area said in interviews that enforcing immigration laws is not in their job descriptions. Many expressed concerns that immigrants already wary of reporting crimes or being interviewed as witnesses will retreat further into the shadows. They should be running to us, not away from us, said LAPD Deputy Chief Robert Arcos of Central Bureau, which includes Boyle Heights, MacArthur Park, Chinatown and other areas with many immigrant residents. We are here to be their protectors. Besides, some officers said, they are too busy answering 911 calls, arresting robbers, stopping erratic drivers and solving homicides to add federal immigration enforcement to their to-do lists. We have enough issues just trying to keep the peace anyway, said J.C. Duarte, a veteran LAPD officer in Northeast Division. Its just going to create a wedge between immigrants and law enforcement. Whether theyre here legally or not, theres going to be a fear generated. Many officers said they believe their bosses will resist Trumps directives, despite the presidents threat to withhold federal funding. The LAPD has long had a policy that forbids officers from initiating contact with a person solely to ask about immigration status. On Wednesday, hours after Trump unveiled his executive orders, LAPD Chief Charlie Beck reiterated that his officers would continue to focus on building relationships with city residents, regardless of where they were born. L.A. County Sheriff Jim McDonnell said his deputies do not ask anyone about their legal status and that immigration enforcement remains a federal responsibility. In the state Legislature, Senate leader Kevin de Leon is championing a measure that would prohibit California police officers from engaging in immigration enforcement. Were not going to be enforcing any immigration laws whatsoever, said Cmdr. Keith Swensson, who oversees the Central Patrol Division, which includes Compton and parts of East and South L.A., for the L.A. County Sheriffs Department. The whole concept seems to be overpoliticized, when in fact were going to be doing the same thing weve always been doing. The racial demographics of L.A Countys two largest law enforcement agencies reflect those of the region as a whole. In both the LAPD and the countys Sheriffs Department, nearly half of the sworn officers are Latino. It is not uncommon for a police officer or sheriffs deputy to be an immigrant or the child of immigrants. Duarte, the Northeast Division officer, came to the U.S. legally from Guatemala at age 2. During the presidential election, Trump found support among some law enforcement officers who viewed him as more pro-police than his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton. But locally, even some officers who privately said they voted for him are not eager to help with his immigration agenda. Trumps executive orders call for the resurrection of Secure Communities, a program from earlier in Obamas administration that asked jail officials to hand over inmates to immigration authorities, including inmates who had no criminal records and were guilty only of immigration violations. But Trump has not spelled out any specific plans to enlist street officers in apprehending immigrants without legal status. The executive orders say that local law enforcement agencies will be empowered to perform the functions of an immigration officer to the maximum extent permitted by law but provide no detail. An Arizona law, Senate Bill 1070, tested the legal limits of what immigration enforcement duties police officers could perform. In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down most of the Arizona law but let stand a provision that required police to check the immigration status of someone they had already stopped if there was reasonable suspicion the person was in the country illegally. If Trump asks police agencies to perform immigration checks along the lines of the Arizona law, participation would have to be voluntary, because the federal government cannot coerce local governments to do its work, constitutional law scholars say. The funding component of Trumps executive orders, which involves withholding federal funds to so-called sanctuary cities, could face legal hurdles, because courts could view it as an underhanded way to force cooperation, said Hiroshi Motomura, an immigration scholar and professor at UCLA School of Law. If the LAPD doesnt want to be involved in immigration checks, the feds cant force the LAPD to do that, Motomura said. Still, the specter of police officers checking residents legal status has stirred anxiety among some immigrants. At roll calls, Capt. Martin Baeza of the LAPDs Hollenbeck Division has been reiterating to his officers that their job is enforcing state laws, not federal immigration laws. At community meetings, he tries to tamp down fears, answering questions that included one about whether internment camps, such as those used to imprison Japanese Americans during World War II, might arise again. I completely understand the anxiety that our community is having, because Ive lived that as a child, said Baeza, who came to the U.S. from Mexico when he was 2. Baezas parents had green cards, but they still viewed the police with fear. His parents would tell him not to get into trouble and not to have anything to do with the police, he recalled. After the presidential election, the LAPDs Central Division, which includes Hollenbeck, held a series of community meetings to reassure immigrants that police officers are there to help them, not deport them. But comforting words can only go so far when people fear being separated from their families and livelihoods. At a community meeting in South Los Angeles on Thursday night, a man asked if he could be deported for a traffic ticket. LAPD Officer Marcela Garcia assured him that would not happen. Inglewood Police Officer Chris Beckman said that when he investigated sex crimes, he had a hard time getting some Spanish-speaking victims to come forward because they feared being deported. If police officers do take a role in immigration enforcement, some victims are not going to want to deal with the police whatsoever, Beckman said. Some police officers and sheriffs deputies said that if their bosses tell them to ask people about immigration status, they will have to obey the orders. But Duarte, the LAPD officer in Northeast, said he would flat out just refuse. He plans to retire next year and has little to lose. At this point in my career, Id take whatever consequence came down the pipe, he said. So what? Go ahead and suspend me for 10 days. Im not going to do it. Times staff writer Alene Tchekmedyian contributed to this report. cindy.chang@latimes.com kate.mather@latimes.com nicole.santacruz@latimes.com For more law enforcement news from Southern California, follow us on Twitter: @cindychangLA, @katemather and @nicolesantacruz ALSO Are you an immigrant? We want to hear your story Protesters block LAX traffic, face off with police as they rally against Trumps travel ban Travel ban is the clearest sign yet of Trump advisors intent to reshape the country The thousands of protesters who converged on Los Angeles International Airport to speak out about President Trumps travel restrictions won praise from many for taking a stand. They also faced some criticism for blocking traffic at the bustling airport. LAX officials said some flights were delayed Sunday because airline employees and passengers could not reach the terminals. Advertisement Motorist Rebekah Bergeron, 22, was sitting at the head of a line of cars blocked by the protesters. Though she said she didnt object to their demonstration, she also wanted to get home to Arizona. I have no problem if they want to protest this, but I just missed my flight, she said. I just watched it take off. I have no problem if they want to protest this, but I just missed my flight. I just watched it take off. Rebekah Bergeron, 22 1 / 62 Supporters of President Trump rally in favor of his immigration ban executive order Saturday at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 62 Protesters rallying against the first travel ban signed by President Trump march around Los Angeles International Airport in February. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 62 Trump supporters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 62 Muhaned El Hindi protests the immigration ban Saturday during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 62 Mathew Woods, a supporter of President Trump, voices support for an immigration ban during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 62 Passengers stand in the doorway of a baggage claim area to take pictures and video of marchers protesting the immigration ban of President Trump at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 62 Supporters of President Trumps travel ban stand across the street from the #NoBanNoWall protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 62 Cooper Chvotkin, 6, gets a turn to voice his opinion on the megaphone with other protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 62 Protesters march through the Tom Bradley International terminal at LAX on Saturday to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 62 Abeer Abdelrahman, left, hugs her sister Areej Ali at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday after Ali, who has a green card, was able to come through the arrivals area with the help of an attorney after being detained and questioned. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 62 Noor Hindi, left, and Sham Najjar, right, join the protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Monday. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 62 Attorneys crowd a small table at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 62 Immigration Attorney Monica Glicken, left, listens to Mohamed, right, as she tries to find travelers to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 62 Hundreds of people protested President Trumps original travel ban at LAX in January. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 62 Protesters block traffic at LAX, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 62 Demonstrators take a pizza break while blocking traffic on the upper level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal while police monitor the rally. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 17 / 62 A pro-Trump supporter argues with protesters about the presidents travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 18 / 62 Hundreds sit in on the arrival level of LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal, blocking traffic to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 62 Airport police plead with protesters to get off the pavement in order to let stranded motorists exit. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 62 Protesters block traffic, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal of LAX. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 21 / 62 Muslims pray as hundreds stand in support on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during a protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 22 / 62 Police position themselves as a man takes photos on the on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during protests to President Donald Trumps new immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 62 A police officer watches protesters at the lower deck of the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 62 Assmaa Kalm, left, and Rosanna Sounbl, right, protest President Trumps travel ban at Los Angeles International Airport on Jan. 29, 2017. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 29 / 62 Police keep an eye on people who continue to protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 30 / 62 Hundreds take part in an impromptu sit-in at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 31 / 62 People hang a banner in support of immigrants on a parking structure across the street from the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 32 / 62 Meg Heatherly, 27, of Los Angeles holds a Shame sign during a protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Jan. 29, 2017. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 33 / 62 Attorney Lisa Smith joins people at LAX who continue to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 34 / 62 A lone supporter of President Trump and Vice President Pence is protected by police while a large group of people continue to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 35 / 62 Chella, from Sherman Oaks, holds the U.S. flag with words from the tablet on the Statue of Liberty. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 36 / 62 Hundreds of people gather at Los Angeles International Airport to continue protesting President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 62 Donald Trump supporters hold signs across the road from protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 38 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 39 / 62 Brothers Adam, left, and Noah Reich show their support of immigrants as they join opponents of Donald Trumps new immigration order at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 40 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 41 / 62 A protester holds up sign at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 42 / 62 Hassan Al Garaawi, of San Diego, right, looks for his mother-in-law Gish Alsaeedi who has been detained at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Sunday. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 43 / 62 Passengers arrive at LAX as protests continue Sunday over President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 44 / 62 Izzy Berdan, of Boston wears an American flag as he chants slogans with other demonstrators Sunday during a rally against President Trumps order that restricts travel to the U.S. by people from seven majority-Muslim nations. (Steven Senne / Associated Press) 45 / 62 People gather in Bostons Copley Square to protest the travel ban enacted by President Trump. (Darren McCollester / Getty Images) 46 / 62 Demonstrators gather Sunday near the White House to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban. (Zach Gibson / Getty Images) 47 / 62 People continue to protest President Trumps travel ban on Sunday at Los Angeles International Airport. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 48 / 62 Attorney Dana Clausen waits on Sunday to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX as people continue to protest President Trumps executive order that led to travelers from several majority-Muslim countries being detained upon arrival. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 49 / 62 Kamryn Taghizadeh, 18, holds up a sign Saturday night as she waits for grandfather Reza Taghizadeh, 78, a minimalist painter who was detained as he arrived at Tom Bradley International Terminal from Iran. The artist and green-card holder was later released. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 50 / 62 Reza Taghizadeh, 78, an artist from Iran who holds a U.S. green card, is released after being detained at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 51 / 62 Seattle police use pepper spray and push the last group of protesters out of a Seattle-Tacoma International Airport terminal after giving a final dispersal order at about 2 a.m Sunday. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 52 / 62 Saffiya Hrahsheh, center, is helped away from police by Liz Bates, left, and others after being pepper sprayed by officers breaking up protests early Sunday at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 53 / 62 Siavosh Naji-Talakar greets his grandmother, Marzieh Moosavizadeh, 75, at LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal. She was detained upon arriving from Iran. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 54 / 62 People arrive and LAPD officers stand by at Tom Bradley International Airport at LAX as the protest continues peacefully. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 55 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to oppose President Trumps refugee ban. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 56 / 62 Saudia Airlines flight attendants wait to pass through a securioty checkpoint at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 57 / 62 Protesters rally against Trumps refugee crackdown at at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 58 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to speak out against President Trumps refugee policy Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 59 / 62 Protesters march through Tom Bradley International Terminal to voice opposition to President Trumps refugee policy. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 60 / 62 Protesters rally against the new immigration order at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 61 / 62 Protesters hold signs during a protest against Trumps immigration executive order at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City. (Stephanie Keith / Getty Images) 62 / 62 Protesters assemble at John F. Kennedy International Airport after two Iraqis were detained while trying to enter the country. (Craig Ruttle / Associated Press) An ESPN anchor who vented about missing her flight because of airport immigration protesters is drawing criticism from people who say she is being insensitive. Sage Steele posted a photo of protesters speaking out against President Trumps order to temporarily suspend immigration from seven Muslim-majority nations at Los Angeles International Airport on Instagram on Sunday night. In the caption, she noted that she and other passengers had to drag luggage nearly 2 miles to get to the airport, but still missed their flights. On Sunday evening, protesters faced off with police in riot gear. Marchers chanted and renounced the legitimacy of Trumps presidency. At one point, a group of Muslim demonstrators formed rows and knelt down to pray. By nightfall, dozens had blocked traffic along the departures level of World Way the main thoroughfare that snakes through the airport and Michel Moore, assistant Los Angeles police chief, used a megaphone to repeatedly ask protesters to move to the sidewalk. Two people were arrested for allegedly blocking the roadway, according to LAX Police Officer Rob Pedregon. The two were cited and released. Late Sunday, police also brokered an agreement with demonstrators, allowing them to alternate between the airports upper and lower levels for 30-minute intervals. At each interval, protesters were allowed to fully close a road for 15 minutes, according to a statement released by LAX. Demonstrators eventually dispersed, and the upper- and lower-level roadways were fully open, with traffic flowing normally Monday morning. Los Angeles Times staff writers James Queally and Javier Panzer and the Associated Press contributed to this report. ALSO As of Sunday night, no more foreign travelers in airport detention, officials say The travel ban is the clearest sign yet of Trump advisors intent to reshape the country When Muslims got blocked at American airports, U.S. veterans rushed to help After a weekend of heavy protests, lawyers and demonstrators returned to Los Angeles International Airport on Monday, even as federal officials insisted that travelers initially affected by President Trumps travel ban were no longer being detained. As of Sunday night, U.S. Customs and Border Protection had processed all cases of individuals who were initially affected by the order at airports around the nation, according to Gillian Christensen, acting spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security. Christensen, however, said in an email that she was unsure whether additional travelers were being processed on Monday. Advertisement Customs and Border Protection did not respond to a request for comment. Protesters and volunteer lawyers began assembling at the Tom Bradley International Terminal late Monday morning. By noon, roughly 20 members of the local United Service Workers West, which represents airport workers under the Service Employees International Union, chanted No ban, no wall! in front of the terminal. The employees had initially planned to picket for higher pay and better contact terms, but decided to weigh in on the ban following events this weekend. Our workers were looking around and saying, these people who are being detained, they look like us, said USWW communications director Elizabeth Strater, who said most of the union members are people of color. They dont want to see their workplace turned into a detention center. Trumps sweeping travel ban on people from seven predominantly Muslim countries triggered protests at airports across the nation during the weekend. At LAX, an undisclosed number of people from countries affected by Trumps order Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Syria had been detained despite having valid visas and green cards. 1 / 62 Supporters of President Trump rally in favor of his immigration ban executive order Saturday at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 62 Protesters rallying against the first travel ban signed by President Trump march around Los Angeles International Airport in February. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 62 Trump supporters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 62 Muhaned El Hindi protests the immigration ban Saturday during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 62 Mathew Woods, a supporter of President Trump, voices support for an immigration ban during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 62 Passengers stand in the doorway of a baggage claim area to take pictures and video of marchers protesting the immigration ban of President Trump at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 62 Supporters of President Trumps travel ban stand across the street from the #NoBanNoWall protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 62 Cooper Chvotkin, 6, gets a turn to voice his opinion on the megaphone with other protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 62 Protesters march through the Tom Bradley International terminal at LAX on Saturday to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 62 Abeer Abdelrahman, left, hugs her sister Areej Ali at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday after Ali, who has a green card, was able to come through the arrivals area with the help of an attorney after being detained and questioned. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 62 Noor Hindi, left, and Sham Najjar, right, join the protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Monday. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 62 Attorneys crowd a small table at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 62 Immigration Attorney Monica Glicken, left, listens to Mohamed, right, as she tries to find travelers to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 62 Hundreds of people protested President Trumps original travel ban at LAX in January. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 62 Protesters block traffic at LAX, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 62 Demonstrators take a pizza break while blocking traffic on the upper level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal while police monitor the rally. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 17 / 62 A pro-Trump supporter argues with protesters about the presidents travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 18 / 62 Hundreds sit in on the arrival level of LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal, blocking traffic to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 62 Airport police plead with protesters to get off the pavement in order to let stranded motorists exit. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 62 Protesters block traffic, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal of LAX. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 21 / 62 Muslims pray as hundreds stand in support on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during a protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 22 / 62 Police position themselves as a man takes photos on the on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during protests to President Donald Trumps new immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 62 A police officer watches protesters at the lower deck of the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 62 Assmaa Kalm, left, and Rosanna Sounbl, right, protest President Trumps travel ban at Los Angeles International Airport on Jan. 29, 2017. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 29 / 62 Police keep an eye on people who continue to protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 30 / 62 Hundreds take part in an impromptu sit-in at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 31 / 62 People hang a banner in support of immigrants on a parking structure across the street from the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 32 / 62 Meg Heatherly, 27, of Los Angeles holds a Shame sign during a protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Jan. 29, 2017. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 33 / 62 Attorney Lisa Smith joins people at LAX who continue to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 34 / 62 A lone supporter of President Trump and Vice President Pence is protected by police while a large group of people continue to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 35 / 62 Chella, from Sherman Oaks, holds the U.S. flag with words from the tablet on the Statue of Liberty. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 36 / 62 Hundreds of people gather at Los Angeles International Airport to continue protesting President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 62 Donald Trump supporters hold signs across the road from protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 38 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 39 / 62 Brothers Adam, left, and Noah Reich show their support of immigrants as they join opponents of Donald Trumps new immigration order at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 40 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 41 / 62 A protester holds up sign at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 42 / 62 Hassan Al Garaawi, of San Diego, right, looks for his mother-in-law Gish Alsaeedi who has been detained at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Sunday. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 43 / 62 Passengers arrive at LAX as protests continue Sunday over President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 44 / 62 Izzy Berdan, of Boston wears an American flag as he chants slogans with other demonstrators Sunday during a rally against President Trumps order that restricts travel to the U.S. by people from seven majority-Muslim nations. (Steven Senne / Associated Press) 45 / 62 People gather in Bostons Copley Square to protest the travel ban enacted by President Trump. (Darren McCollester / Getty Images) 46 / 62 Demonstrators gather Sunday near the White House to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban. (Zach Gibson / Getty Images) 47 / 62 People continue to protest President Trumps travel ban on Sunday at Los Angeles International Airport. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 48 / 62 Attorney Dana Clausen waits on Sunday to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX as people continue to protest President Trumps executive order that led to travelers from several majority-Muslim countries being detained upon arrival. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 49 / 62 Kamryn Taghizadeh, 18, holds up a sign Saturday night as she waits for grandfather Reza Taghizadeh, 78, a minimalist painter who was detained as he arrived at Tom Bradley International Terminal from Iran. The artist and green-card holder was later released. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 50 / 62 Reza Taghizadeh, 78, an artist from Iran who holds a U.S. green card, is released after being detained at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 51 / 62 Seattle police use pepper spray and push the last group of protesters out of a Seattle-Tacoma International Airport terminal after giving a final dispersal order at about 2 a.m Sunday. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 52 / 62 Saffiya Hrahsheh, center, is helped away from police by Liz Bates, left, and others after being pepper sprayed by officers breaking up protests early Sunday at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 53 / 62 Siavosh Naji-Talakar greets his grandmother, Marzieh Moosavizadeh, 75, at LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal. She was detained upon arriving from Iran. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 54 / 62 People arrive and LAPD officers stand by at Tom Bradley International Airport at LAX as the protest continues peacefully. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 55 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to oppose President Trumps refugee ban. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 56 / 62 Saudia Airlines flight attendants wait to pass through a securioty checkpoint at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 57 / 62 Protesters rally against Trumps refugee crackdown at at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 58 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to speak out against President Trumps refugee policy Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 59 / 62 Protesters march through Tom Bradley International Terminal to voice opposition to President Trumps refugee policy. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 60 / 62 Protesters rally against the new immigration order at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 61 / 62 Protesters hold signs during a protest against Trumps immigration executive order at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City. (Stephanie Keith / Getty Images) 62 / 62 Protesters assemble at John F. Kennedy International Airport after two Iraqis were detained while trying to enter the country. (Craig Ruttle / Associated Press) Homeland Security officials later clarified that green card holders from the affected countries would face additional checks when returning from trips abroad, but suggested they would not be denied entry unless a problem arose. Areej Ali, 33, experienced the additional scrutiny firsthand Monday, when she returned to California from her native Sudan. Ali had boarded a plane in Khartoum on Sunday and was detained after a connecting flight in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where she was nearly sent back to Sudan, said Alis sister, Abeer Abdelrahman. If not for a letter sent to the airline Ali was traveling on by a lawyer that her family hired Sunday a letter that explained Ali was a green card holder and should be cleared for entry Ali wouldnt have been released from Saudi Arabia, her family said. The missive sent on letterhead bearing the name of the familys attorneys firm, Hueston Hennigan had news releases attached to it stating that the ban did not apply to green card holders. We were desperate as they were threatening to deport her in less than four hours, said attorney Courtney Black, adding that she had also prepared a habeas petition on Alis behalf. Abdelrahman was waiting for her sister in the arrivals area of the international terminal with other family members Monday. Abdelrahman said her sister was texting her from within LAX that she was being held back for questioning. After about 90 minutes, Ali finally emerged from the terminal and instantly fell into an embrace with her sister, mother and brother-in-law. Never in a million years did I imagine something like this would happen, said Ali, a software developer. This is home for me. Ali said part of her trip to Sudan was to obtain a Sudanese passport as part of the process to gain her U.S. citizenship. Weve worked so hard to come here to express ourselves and live as we should as humans, she added. I felt like in the past three or four days, all my rights had been stripped and everything Ive worked for had been taken away in a snap. Attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California and other public interest law groups worked Sunday to file court papers to release those who were held. Jennie Pasquarella, director of immigrant rights for the ACLU of California, said her group had filed habeas petitions on behalf of seven people who were detained at LAX on Saturday. All seven were later released, and of those, two elderly women were held for longer than 24 hours, she said. The group filed a complaint on behalf of U.S.-visa holders who were held in detention by U.S. Customs and Border Protection at LAX and were denied access to legal counsel, said Marcus Benigno, communications and media advocacy director at ACLU of Southern California. The ACLU was continuing to monitor arrivals at LAX on Monday, he said. The issue is not over, far from it, Benigno said. He noted that there are U.S. visa holders stranded abroad and being denied entry back into the country. That is equally wrong, he said. Immigration attorneys working at LAX on Sunday estimated that about 20 people were being detained at any given time. A law enforcement source told The Times that 13 people had been detained at Terminal 2 on Saturday night, but each of them held a green card and was eventually released. The source could not provide detention figures for the Tom Bradley International Terminal, the airports locus of international travel. Thousands gathered at the airport Sunday, rallying outside terminals, marching through roadways and blocking traffic. Two people arrested for allegedly blocking the roadway were cited and released, airport police said. Far fewer protesters assembled on Monday, although they included unionized baggage handlers, janitors and customer service agents. Khamin Khan, 62, who works at LAX as a lobby agent, said an anti-immigrant mood in the country has made her fearful. Im a citizen and Im a Muslim, but sometimes Im afraid of people finding out Im a Muslim, said Khan, who wore her work uniform. She said shes mainly fighting to protect her job but also opposed to Trumps actions. He should be treating people with respect, she said. As Khan and others gathered outside the terminal, volunteer attorneys continued to staff a table inside. As of Monday morning, they had no solid information on whether anyone was still being detained, said Aman Thind, immigration project director at Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Los Angeles, who is coordinating the lawyers. Cynthia Santiago, who has a solo immigration practice and spent part of the weekend providing services at LAX, said airport immigration officials have not given out information about possible detainees. The only way lawyers have a sense of whether people are being detained is if family members in the arrivals area say theyve been waiting for a relative from abroad and havent seen them emerge for a long time. The Council on American-Islamic Relations greater Los Angeles chapter held a news conference in Anaheim on Monday where attendees denounced the travel ban. An attack on any community is an attack on all of us, said Hussam Ayloush, the chapters executive director. The people have spoken for tolerance, unity, mercy and justice against bigotry. Jose Moreno an Anaheim City Council member who heads Los Amigos, a countywide alliance focusing on politics and civil rights also spoke out against the ban that he said works against the interest of the American community. Moreno said he had a message for the Trump administration: You will not divide the city of Anaheim. You will not divide our community. We will stand together. Times staff writers Cindy Carcamo, James Queally, Javier Panzar and Matt Hamilton contributed to this report. brittny.mejia@latimes.com Twitter: @Brittny_Mejia ALSO The travel ban is the clearest sign yet of Trump advisors intent to reshape the country When Muslims got blocked at American airports, U.S. veterans rushed to help Protesters block LAX traffic, face off with police as they rally against Trumps travel ban UPDATES: 3:35 p.m.: This article was updated with details of the CAIR news conference and comments from Ali. 12:15 p.m.: This article was updated with comments from the SEIU and ACLU. 10:50 a.m.: This article was updated with details of a CAIR-LA news conference. This article was originally published at 8:55 a.m. Marzieh Moosavizadeh landed at Los Angeles International Airport on Saturday expecting to be welcomed in the arms of her grandson who had flown from Phoenix to meet her flight. Instead, the 75-year-old matriarch was pushed in her wheelchair into a waiting room with a couple dozen other passengers. About 6 p.m., two hours after her flight landed, an attendant offered her a cellphone to call her grandson. Advertisement Passengers were afraid to talk to one another, Moosavizadeh said. Most of them, they thought they were going to get deported, she said, through her son, translating by telephone. The confusion and consternation after President Trumps order barring the entry of citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries has hit an established community of Southern California immigrants whose flight to this country was precipitated by the rise of a Muslim theocracy. Moosavizadeh is among those who remained in Iran as relatives fleeing the Islamic Revolution flocked to the United States. Now she visits almost every year. She has never had an arrival like this. Siavosh Naji-Talakar greets his grandmother Marzieh Moosavizadeh, 75, at LAX at about 1 a.m. Sunday. He said his grandmother, who has had a green card since 1997, was detained for hours after arriving from Iran. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) Taking her to a room, customs officers asked her when she last visited the U.S., who she lives with in Iran and where she gets her income. Meanwhile, in Phoenix, her sons frantically refreshed news articles and peppered her grandson, Siavosh Naji-Talakar, with questions he couldnt answer. Huddled among throngs of boisterous protesters demanding the detainees be released, Naji-Talakar could do little but wait. Moosavizadehs name was among the last ones called, about 1 a.m. When Naji-Talakar saw her, he bolted. I pushed people out of the way, I was like, Get out of my way! he said. I ran up to her and gave a big old hug. Finally, she said, she was released from prison. Of the 87,000 people of Iranian ancestry who live in Los Angeles County, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, most trace their roots in this country to the Islamic revolution that overthrew the Western-oriented rule of Shah Reza Pahlavi in 1979. They have formed prominent communities in well-to-do neighborhoods, including Westwood and Beverly Hills. And despite the deep political differences that still exist between the two nations, family connections persist, and thousands of Iranians travel back and forth each year. Among them are Jews and Christians as well as followers of lesser-known faiths such as Zoroastrianism and Bahai, said Shakeel Syed, spokesman for the newly formed Muslim-Latino Collaborative. Marzieh Moosavizadeh packs in her hotel room in El Segundo after she was detained at LAX. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) That organization formed on the day of Trumps inauguration to unify the response of two groups that were being demonized by the president-elect. Now, Syed said, Trumps order is producing the same kind of bond among Iranians of different backgrounds. At the same time, it is drawing the less religiously oriented Iranian Muslims closer to the immigrants from countries such as Iraq and Syria. All of these folks are cultural or marginally practicing Muslims now standing shoulder to shoulder with the practicing Muslim community from Iraq and scores of other Muslim communities in Southern California, Syed said. That unifying sentiment rose in Ava Lalezarzadehs voice as she and her parents finished breakfast Sunday morning at the Pink Orchid Bakery, one of many Persian shops that dot a stretch of Westwood Boulevard. The 18-year-old UCLA freshmans mother and father fled Iran as teenagers in the late 1980s, in fear of the persecution for being Jewish. Lalezarzadehs mother worked her way through Pakistan and Vienna before gaining legal entry to the U.S. Her husband came on a visa and applied for political asylum when it expired. Both became U.S. citizens when their daughter was in elementary school. If this ban had taken place when my parents needed help, I wonder: Would we be here today? Would you even be alive? Lalezarzadeh asked, turning to her mother. I think about the Syrians who are going through such turmoil in their country and how you guys were lucky enough to be able to come here. They dont have that. Theyre us right now, Lalezarzadeh continued. And its just so unfortunate. Her father, Fariborz Lalezarzadeh, 44, is a surgeon at a hospital in San Bernardino, where victims of the deadly 2015 terrorist attack were taken for treatment. He said he understands the desire to prevent another one. But he believes Trumps ban unfairly targets too many people and ignores other countries with links to terrorism. I understand the background of why hes doing this. Im just not sure if this is the best way of doing it, he said. Youre going to hurt a lot of innocent people in the process. I understand the background of why hes doing this. Im just not sure if this is the best way of doing it. Fariborz Lalezarzadeh, 44 But not all the Iranian Americans spending Sunday on Westwood Boulevard had qualms about Trumps travel ban. In one hair salon, some women were for it. We dont want any terrorists in this country, one woman said as a stylist finished her hair. Youre right, chimed in another, who later declined to give her name. We came here as immigrants as well, but we do all the steps. We did it the right way. The stylist, Minoo Toovia, saw more nuance. She immigrated to the U.S. from Iran 35 years ago, she said, and became a citizen a long time ago. She thought of the students in other countries who now may not be able to come to America, others who live abroad but want to visit their families here. Some people are innocent. Some are good. Some bad. You cant mix them all together, she said. Its not fair. Back at the bakery, Danny Shoumer and Fred Gal also expressed their support of Trump and his stance on immigration. The men, who are in their 60s and have been friends since their childhood in Iran, both immigrated to the U.S. in the 1970s and later became citizens. Shoumer came to the U.S. for college, then briefly returned to Iran as the revolution there began. He got a green card, returned to the U.S. and became a citizen in the late 1980s. Putting aside concerns about terrorism, Schoumer said he worked hard to make a life for himself in America and believes other immigrants should do the same. I came here, went to college, busted my butt every night at a restaurant, he said. Now a bunch of people are going to come here, use our tax money and do nothing. Across the street, Dariush Zarang unlocked the door of another Persian restaurant, the Farsi Cafe, as it opened for business. The 46-year-old assistant manager said that a co-worker who went to visit his mother in Iran was now stuck abroad, in limbo despite holding a green card. The co-worker was supposed to return to the U.S. two days ago, Zarang said, but was instead stopped in Istanbul. People are confused. Even the airports are confused, Zarang said. We dont know whats going on. Zarang immigrated to the U.S. as a refugee nearly two decades ago, fleeing religious persecution in Iran because of his Bahai faith. He became a citizen a few years later. He understands and supports the idea of exploring the backgrounds of people who come to the U.S. But he doesnt believe people should be stopped or vetted just because theyre from a certain country. Someones ideas, good or bad, matter more than where they are from, he said. I dont think its fair, he said. Dariush Zarang, 46, is assistant manager at the Farsi Cafe in L.A. He said that a co-worker who went to visit his mother in Iran was now stuck abroad. (Christina House / For The Times) alene.tchekmeydian@latimes.com kate.mather@latimes.com doug.smith@latimes.com ALSO Protesters block traffic at LAX as thousands rally against Trump travel ban Travel ban is the clearest sign yet of Trump advisors intent to reshape the country When Muslims got blocked at American airports, U.S. veterans rushed to help This was a reunion 12 years in the making. Ali Vayeghan was set to fly from Tehran to Los Angeles, make his way to Indiana, and after a years-long wait, see his son, a U.S. citizen. He was also reuniting with his wife, who arrived in the U.S. four months ahead of him. Instead, Vayeghan was ensnared by President Trumps executive order, held at Los Angeles International Airport for hours, and deported to Iran by way of Dubai. The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California intervened, petitioning the courts to release him. Advertisement On Sunday afternoon, U.S. District Judge Dolly M. Gee issued an order instructing authorities to transport Vayeghan from Dubai to the U.S. an infrequently used but not unprecedented legal remedy and admit him under the terms of his visa, which is set to expire in February. Citing the irreparable harm Vayeghan would face, Gee ruled that his attorneys had showed a strong likelihood of successfully arguing that his deportation violated federal law. By then, Vayeghan was on a plane bound for Tehran. Its a story about a son who wants to see his dad after 12 years, and just be with our family, said Vayeghans niece, Marjan Vayghan, who lives in West Los Angeles. We did not think this would be a big deal wed pick my uncle at LAX, eat, hang out, travel. We didnt know our entire world would turn upside down. 1 / 62 Supporters of President Trump rally in favor of his immigration ban executive order Saturday at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 62 Protesters rallying against the first travel ban signed by President Trump march around Los Angeles International Airport in February. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 62 Trump supporters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 62 Muhaned El Hindi protests the immigration ban Saturday during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 62 Mathew Woods, a supporter of President Trump, voices support for an immigration ban during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 62 Passengers stand in the doorway of a baggage claim area to take pictures and video of marchers protesting the immigration ban of President Trump at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 62 Supporters of President Trumps travel ban stand across the street from the #NoBanNoWall protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 62 Cooper Chvotkin, 6, gets a turn to voice his opinion on the megaphone with other protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 62 Protesters march through the Tom Bradley International terminal at LAX on Saturday to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 62 Abeer Abdelrahman, left, hugs her sister Areej Ali at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday after Ali, who has a green card, was able to come through the arrivals area with the help of an attorney after being detained and questioned. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 62 Noor Hindi, left, and Sham Najjar, right, join the protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Monday. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 62 Attorneys crowd a small table at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 62 Immigration Attorney Monica Glicken, left, listens to Mohamed, right, as she tries to find travelers to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 62 Hundreds of people protested President Trumps original travel ban at LAX in January. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 62 Protesters block traffic at LAX, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 62 Demonstrators take a pizza break while blocking traffic on the upper level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal while police monitor the rally. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 17 / 62 A pro-Trump supporter argues with protesters about the presidents travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 18 / 62 Hundreds sit in on the arrival level of LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal, blocking traffic to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 62 Airport police plead with protesters to get off the pavement in order to let stranded motorists exit. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 62 Protesters block traffic, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal of LAX. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 21 / 62 Muslims pray as hundreds stand in support on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during a protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 22 / 62 Police position themselves as a man takes photos on the on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during protests to President Donald Trumps new immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 62 A police officer watches protesters at the lower deck of the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 62 Assmaa Kalm, left, and Rosanna Sounbl, right, protest President Trumps travel ban at Los Angeles International Airport on Jan. 29, 2017. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 29 / 62 Police keep an eye on people who continue to protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 30 / 62 Hundreds take part in an impromptu sit-in at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 31 / 62 People hang a banner in support of immigrants on a parking structure across the street from the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 32 / 62 Meg Heatherly, 27, of Los Angeles holds a Shame sign during a protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Jan. 29, 2017. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 33 / 62 Attorney Lisa Smith joins people at LAX who continue to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 34 / 62 A lone supporter of President Trump and Vice President Pence is protected by police while a large group of people continue to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 35 / 62 Chella, from Sherman Oaks, holds the U.S. flag with words from the tablet on the Statue of Liberty. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 36 / 62 Hundreds of people gather at Los Angeles International Airport to continue protesting President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 62 Donald Trump supporters hold signs across the road from protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 38 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 39 / 62 Brothers Adam, left, and Noah Reich show their support of immigrants as they join opponents of Donald Trumps new immigration order at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 40 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 41 / 62 A protester holds up sign at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 42 / 62 Hassan Al Garaawi, of San Diego, right, looks for his mother-in-law Gish Alsaeedi who has been detained at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Sunday. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 43 / 62 Passengers arrive at LAX as protests continue Sunday over President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 44 / 62 Izzy Berdan, of Boston wears an American flag as he chants slogans with other demonstrators Sunday during a rally against President Trumps order that restricts travel to the U.S. by people from seven majority-Muslim nations. (Steven Senne / Associated Press) 45 / 62 People gather in Bostons Copley Square to protest the travel ban enacted by President Trump. (Darren McCollester / Getty Images) 46 / 62 Demonstrators gather Sunday near the White House to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban. (Zach Gibson / Getty Images) 47 / 62 People continue to protest President Trumps travel ban on Sunday at Los Angeles International Airport. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 48 / 62 Attorney Dana Clausen waits on Sunday to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX as people continue to protest President Trumps executive order that led to travelers from several majority-Muslim countries being detained upon arrival. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 49 / 62 Kamryn Taghizadeh, 18, holds up a sign Saturday night as she waits for grandfather Reza Taghizadeh, 78, a minimalist painter who was detained as he arrived at Tom Bradley International Terminal from Iran. The artist and green-card holder was later released. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 50 / 62 Reza Taghizadeh, 78, an artist from Iran who holds a U.S. green card, is released after being detained at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 51 / 62 Seattle police use pepper spray and push the last group of protesters out of a Seattle-Tacoma International Airport terminal after giving a final dispersal order at about 2 a.m Sunday. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 52 / 62 Saffiya Hrahsheh, center, is helped away from police by Liz Bates, left, and others after being pepper sprayed by officers breaking up protests early Sunday at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 53 / 62 Siavosh Naji-Talakar greets his grandmother, Marzieh Moosavizadeh, 75, at LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal. She was detained upon arriving from Iran. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 54 / 62 People arrive and LAPD officers stand by at Tom Bradley International Airport at LAX as the protest continues peacefully. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 55 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to oppose President Trumps refugee ban. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 56 / 62 Saudia Airlines flight attendants wait to pass through a securioty checkpoint at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 57 / 62 Protesters rally against Trumps refugee crackdown at at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 58 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to speak out against President Trumps refugee policy Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 59 / 62 Protesters march through Tom Bradley International Terminal to voice opposition to President Trumps refugee policy. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 60 / 62 Protesters rally against the new immigration order at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 61 / 62 Protesters hold signs during a protest against Trumps immigration executive order at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City. (Stephanie Keith / Getty Images) 62 / 62 Protesters assemble at John F. Kennedy International Airport after two Iraqis were detained while trying to enter the country. (Craig Ruttle / Associated Press) Vayeghan was set to land at 7:15 p.m. Friday, but he never emerged from customs, his niece said. The family waited at LAX until after 3 a.m. Saturday, with scant information about his whereabouts. Attorneys were not allowed to meet with him, the ACLU said. The ACLU and L.A.-based immigration attorney Stacy Tolchin stepped in, filing a habeas corpus petition on Saturday and the legal aid organization published a copy of the petition online. Attorneys argued that Trumps executive order violated Vayeghans due process and was hostile to a specific religion, Islam, putting it at odds with the 1st Amendments establishment clause. The lawyers secured the necessary paperwork for his release, but it arrived about 45 minutes too late. Vayeghan was put on a plane to Dubai, United Arab Emirates, at 3:15 p.m. Saturday. When his family contemplates the razor-thin margins of time that have worked against them at every step, it compounds their frustration. If he had left for Los Angeles one or two days earlier, hed be fine, his niece said. If he hadnt been deported a half hour earlier, hed be fine. The family spoke to him by phone after he landed in Dubai, where he was waiting to be put on a flight to Tehran. We only have an hour and one minute, Marjan Vayghan said Sunday afternoon. My family is just here staring at the clock. Hes literally crying in the airport in Dubai, she added. The order from Gee, the federal judge, came down Sunday afternoon and called for Vayeghan to be transported back to the U.S. The judge ruled Vayeghans lawyers had demonstrated a strong likelihood of success in establishing that removal violates the Establishment Clause, the Immigration and Nationality Act, and his rights to equal protection guaranteed by the United States Constitution. The judges relief may have come too late. Vayeghans plane was set to touch down in Tehran on Sunday evening. His family did not know what would happen next. matt.hamilton@latimes.com Twitter: @MattHjourno UPDATES: 10:20 p.m.: This article was updated with minor editing. This article was originally published at 6:20 p.m. Thousands gathered at Los Angeles International Airport on Sunday, rallying outside terminals, marching through roadways and blocking traffic in a forceful denunciation of President Trumps sweeping travel ban on people from seven predominantly Muslim countries. The demonstrations were mostly confined to the area around the Tom Bradley International Terminal, a hub of global travel, and as the day continued, the show of civil unrest became more insistent. The crowd faced off with police in riot gear. Marchers chanted and renounced the legitimacy of Trumps presidency. At one point, a group of Muslim demonstrators formed rows and knelt down to pray. Advertisement By nightfall, dozens had blocked traffic along the departures level of World Way the main thoroughfare that snakes through the airport and Assistant Police Chief Michael Moore used a megaphone to repeatedly ask protesters to move to the sidewalk. We do not want to arrest you, Moore said. Youre making the local law enforcement be the bad guy here. We dont want to be the bad guy. The protesters asked him to demand the release of detainees in exchange for clearing the roadway. At 10 p.m., two people were arrested for allegedly blocking the roadway, according to LAX Police Officer Rob Pedregon. The two were cited and released. Late Sunday, police also brokered an agreement with demonstrators, allowing them to alternate between the airports upper and lower levels for 30-minute intervals. At each interval, protesters were allowed to fully close a road for 15 minutes, according to a statement released by LAX. Demonstrators dispersed and upper- and lower-level roadways were fully open, with traffic flowing normally, LAX officials said in a 12:30 a.m. statement. Well be monitoring social media for any events that may come up, Pedregon said Monday morning Inside the airport, untold numbers of people from countries affected by Trumps order Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Syria were detained despite having valid visas and green cards. Attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California and other public interest law groups raced to file court papers to release those being held. Jennie Pasquarella, director of immigrant rights for the ACLU of California, said her group had filed habeas petitions on behalf of seven people who were detained at LAX on Saturday. All seven were later released, and of those, two elderly women were held for longer than 24 hours, she said. On Sunday, the ACLU also requested that a federal judge order that all detainees receive access to lawyers as well as phones. A judge could hear the petition on Monday or Tuesday. Reliable statistics on the number of people detained at LAX were difficult to access. One detainee told the ACLU that at least 100 people were being held on Saturday. Late Sunday, immigration attorneys working at LAX estimated that about 20 people were being detained at any given time. A law enforcement source told The Times that 13 people had been detained at Terminal 2 on Saturday night, but each of them held a green card and was eventually released. The source could not provide detention figures for the Tom Bradley International Terminal, the airports locus of international travel. 1 / 62 Supporters of President Trump rally in favor of his immigration ban executive order Saturday at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 62 Protesters rallying against the first travel ban signed by President Trump march around Los Angeles International Airport in February. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 62 Trump supporters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 62 Muhaned El Hindi protests the immigration ban Saturday during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 62 Mathew Woods, a supporter of President Trump, voices support for an immigration ban during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 62 Passengers stand in the doorway of a baggage claim area to take pictures and video of marchers protesting the immigration ban of President Trump at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 62 Supporters of President Trumps travel ban stand across the street from the #NoBanNoWall protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 62 Cooper Chvotkin, 6, gets a turn to voice his opinion on the megaphone with other protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 62 Protesters march through the Tom Bradley International terminal at LAX on Saturday to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 62 Abeer Abdelrahman, left, hugs her sister Areej Ali at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday after Ali, who has a green card, was able to come through the arrivals area with the help of an attorney after being detained and questioned. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 62 Noor Hindi, left, and Sham Najjar, right, join the protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Monday. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 62 Attorneys crowd a small table at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 62 Immigration Attorney Monica Glicken, left, listens to Mohamed, right, as she tries to find travelers to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 62 Hundreds of people protested President Trumps original travel ban at LAX in January. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 62 Protesters block traffic at LAX, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 62 Demonstrators take a pizza break while blocking traffic on the upper level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal while police monitor the rally. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 17 / 62 A pro-Trump supporter argues with protesters about the presidents travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 18 / 62 Hundreds sit in on the arrival level of LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal, blocking traffic to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 62 Airport police plead with protesters to get off the pavement in order to let stranded motorists exit. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 62 Protesters block traffic, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal of LAX. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 21 / 62 Muslims pray as hundreds stand in support on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during a protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 22 / 62 Police position themselves as a man takes photos on the on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during protests to President Donald Trumps new immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 62 A police officer watches protesters at the lower deck of the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 62 Assmaa Kalm, left, and Rosanna Sounbl, right, protest President Trumps travel ban at Los Angeles International Airport on Jan. 29, 2017. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 29 / 62 Police keep an eye on people who continue to protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 30 / 62 Hundreds take part in an impromptu sit-in at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 31 / 62 People hang a banner in support of immigrants on a parking structure across the street from the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 32 / 62 Meg Heatherly, 27, of Los Angeles holds a Shame sign during a protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Jan. 29, 2017. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 33 / 62 Attorney Lisa Smith joins people at LAX who continue to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 34 / 62 A lone supporter of President Trump and Vice President Pence is protected by police while a large group of people continue to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 35 / 62 Chella, from Sherman Oaks, holds the U.S. flag with words from the tablet on the Statue of Liberty. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 36 / 62 Hundreds of people gather at Los Angeles International Airport to continue protesting President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 62 Donald Trump supporters hold signs across the road from protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 38 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 39 / 62 Brothers Adam, left, and Noah Reich show their support of immigrants as they join opponents of Donald Trumps new immigration order at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 40 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 41 / 62 A protester holds up sign at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 42 / 62 Hassan Al Garaawi, of San Diego, right, looks for his mother-in-law Gish Alsaeedi who has been detained at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Sunday. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 43 / 62 Passengers arrive at LAX as protests continue Sunday over President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 44 / 62 Izzy Berdan, of Boston wears an American flag as he chants slogans with other demonstrators Sunday during a rally against President Trumps order that restricts travel to the U.S. by people from seven majority-Muslim nations. (Steven Senne / Associated Press) 45 / 62 People gather in Bostons Copley Square to protest the travel ban enacted by President Trump. (Darren McCollester / Getty Images) 46 / 62 Demonstrators gather Sunday near the White House to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban. (Zach Gibson / Getty Images) 47 / 62 People continue to protest President Trumps travel ban on Sunday at Los Angeles International Airport. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 48 / 62 Attorney Dana Clausen waits on Sunday to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX as people continue to protest President Trumps executive order that led to travelers from several majority-Muslim countries being detained upon arrival. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 49 / 62 Kamryn Taghizadeh, 18, holds up a sign Saturday night as she waits for grandfather Reza Taghizadeh, 78, a minimalist painter who was detained as he arrived at Tom Bradley International Terminal from Iran. The artist and green-card holder was later released. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 50 / 62 Reza Taghizadeh, 78, an artist from Iran who holds a U.S. green card, is released after being detained at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 51 / 62 Seattle police use pepper spray and push the last group of protesters out of a Seattle-Tacoma International Airport terminal after giving a final dispersal order at about 2 a.m Sunday. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 52 / 62 Saffiya Hrahsheh, center, is helped away from police by Liz Bates, left, and others after being pepper sprayed by officers breaking up protests early Sunday at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 53 / 62 Siavosh Naji-Talakar greets his grandmother, Marzieh Moosavizadeh, 75, at LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal. She was detained upon arriving from Iran. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 54 / 62 People arrive and LAPD officers stand by at Tom Bradley International Airport at LAX as the protest continues peacefully. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 55 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to oppose President Trumps refugee ban. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 56 / 62 Saudia Airlines flight attendants wait to pass through a securioty checkpoint at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 57 / 62 Protesters rally against Trumps refugee crackdown at at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 58 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to speak out against President Trumps refugee policy Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 59 / 62 Protesters march through Tom Bradley International Terminal to voice opposition to President Trumps refugee policy. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 60 / 62 Protesters rally against the new immigration order at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 61 / 62 Protesters hold signs during a protest against Trumps immigration executive order at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City. (Stephanie Keith / Getty Images) 62 / 62 Protesters assemble at John F. Kennedy International Airport after two Iraqis were detained while trying to enter the country. (Craig Ruttle / Associated Press) Pasquarella also said federal immigration officials have been urging some detainees to waive their applications for admission to the U.S., an allegation echoed by ACLU officials in other cities. It was not clear what detainees were faced with, but Pasquarella suggested that officials could threaten to deport detained individuals, which could have a long-term effect on their ability to reenter the U.S. at a later date. Attorneys were also having difficulty accessing those being held. The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency did not respond to requests for comment. At LAX, some protesters marched around the lower level beating drums, blowing whistles and chanting, No ban, no wall, sanctuary for all. Holding a sign that read, Our Anne Frank Is a Syrian Child, Alexandra Noyes, 41, said her background as a Jewish woman made her decide to drive to the airport Sunday morning. As a Jewish kid you are relentlessly trained to stand up for people who are being oppressed in the way that the Jews have been in the past, Noyes said. Around the time of the election, it became pretty clear that now is that time. About a dozen counter-protesters popped up on the street across from the Bradley Terminal, holding signs that read X-treme Vetting and Keep Refugees Out, saying they were tired of the flow of illegal immigrants into the U.S. that they believe jeopardizes the safety of American citizens. Chanell Temple, 63, of Los Angeles said she was sick of watching immigrants in the country illegally steal benefits and services from American citizens, specifically veterans and homeless persons who need aid. They are coming here and taking everything away, said Temple, a former bookkeeper who said she lost her job and healthcare after she was fired because she couldnt speak Spanish. Throughout the day, protesters intermittently froze traffic. Officials with LAX said some flights were delayed because airline employees and passengers could not reach the terminals. Motorist Rebekah Bergeron, 22, was sitting at the head of a line of cars blocked by the protesters. Though she said she didnt object to their demonstration, she also wanted to get home to Arizona. I have no problem if they want to protest this, but I just missed my flight, she said. I just watched it take off. On Saturday, after mass demonstrations across the country, a federal judge in New York ordered a halt to deportations of travelers who arrived at airports with valid visas to enter the U.S., saying that sending them back to the affected countries could cause them irreparable harm. But she did not rule on the legality of the order. Rulings from the federal bench appear to have come too late for some. Marjan Vayghan of West Los Angeles said her uncle was deported from LAX on Saturday afternoon just before the ACLU arrived with paperwork to stop the deportations. Ali Vayeghan arrived at 7:15 p.m. Friday from Tehran. He was going to stay with Marjan Vayghans parents, then go to Indiana to join his wife, who arrived in the U.S. four months ahead of him, and his son. But he never emerged from customs. She said he was put on a plane to Dubai, United Arab Emirates, at 3:15 p.m. Saturday. The ACLU was trying to prevent his deportation but arrived with paperwork 45 minutes too late. The family spoke to him by phone after he landed in Dubai, where he was waiting to be put on a flight to Tehran. On Sunday afternoon, a federal judge in Los Angeles ordered authorities to transport Vayeghan back to the U.S. and admit him under the terms of his visa, which is set to expire Feb. 14. By the time the order came down, Vayeghan was on a plane bound for Tehran, and his family said they were uncertain what would happen next. james.queally@latimes.com javier.panzar@latimes.com matt.hamilton@latimes.com ALSO L.A.'s Iranian American community reacts to President Trumps travel ban When Muslims got blocked at American airports, U.S. veterans rushed to help Travel ban is the clearest sign yet of Trump advisors intent to reshape the country Santa Ana police gang detectives shot and killed a man Sunday following a foot chase, authorities said. At 4:33 p.m., gang suppression detectives were patrolling in the 400 block of South Birch Street due to recent shootings and gang activity in the neighborhood, according to the Santa Ana Police Department. During their patrol, detectives tried to talk to a man who was getting out of a vehicle in an alley. Advertisement But the man ran out of the alley onto Birch Street and ignored detectives orders to stop, according to police. Thats when detectives fired at the man, striking him. The man, whose identity has not been released, was pronounced dead at 4:42 p.m., police said. Police Cpl. Anthony Bertagna said he did not know if the man was armed or if a weapon was found at the scene. Bertagna said the Orange County district attorney and the departments homicide detectives are investigating the shooting. The shooting comes almost three months after police fatally shot a man following a dispute in a strip mall parking lot. David Contreras Jr., 33, of Santa Ana was sitting in a truck about 11:30 p.m. on Nov. 6 when two officers confronted him in the vacant lot on Edinger Avenue and Sullivan Street, police said. A fight erupted between the officers and the man. During the brawl, one of the officers used a Taser. Then both officers fired at the man, who later died at a hospital, police said. veronica.rocha@latimes.com For breaking news in California, follow @VeronicaRochaLA on Twitter. The typical signs of a recent storm dotted this quaint coastal village. Near an elementary school, concrete barriers blocked a flooded road. Across town, a creaking excavator whined near the beach, filling a massive sinkhole. Farther down, soggy driftwood blanketed half the sand. Still, hundreds of people flocked to Seacliff State Beach last week many of them locals, acting like tourists. Advertisement They came to see something more dramatic: the broken hull of the Palo Alto, a World War I-era tanker that was pummeled by the Pacific storms that ravaged the California coastline, including much of Santa Cruz County. The tidal barrage twisted the ships stern to a 45-degree angle. Although the severe list to port might seem inconsequential to some, Seacliffs Cement Ship is this towns most iconic monument. They said, Youve gotta see the ship. Itll never be the same. John Hibble, Aptos History Museum curator The historic World War I-era tanker Palo Alto was torn apart by massive waves. (Kevin Johnson / The Santa Cruz Sentinel via AP) After almost a century, any change to the stalwart tanker that rests at the end of a pier sends shock waves through the community. Nothing short of peoples memories, sense of place and even mortality are tied up in the mass of concrete and rebar. On the first day of the big surf, we were up on the cliff watching, and it was rolling back and forth, said Brad Sampson, 63, one of many locals who sneaked out on the sand to take photos of the landmark they walked on as children. You think of cement as this solid object, he added. Now, to see it moving with the waves thats kind of sad. All the stuff that I remember from my childhood, my early years, its all changing. The history of the Palo Alto is as familiar to the locals here as the history of the Owens Valley is to Angelenos. According to a variety of state park documents, historical material and interviews, the story goes like this: Steel shortages during World War I gave rise to the idea of building a ship made from reinforced concrete. U.S. officials eventually bought into the concept and commissioned the construction of several ships, including two built at the U.S. Naval Shipyard in Oakland, the Peralta and the Palo Alto. But the war ended before the Palo Alto was finished. Consequently, the 435-foot oil tanker made only one trip across San Francisco Bay before docking in Oakland. It sat dormant there as concrete ships fell out of favor. The $1.5-million vessel was later sold for just $18,750 and converted to a party boat by the Seacliff Amusement Corp. After buying the ship, Seacliff towed it to the beach, sank it on the shallow ocean bottom and built a pier to its stern. By the summer of 1930, the Palo Alto was ready for guests, and for two glorious summers it was a popular attraction. It featured the Rainbow Ballroom with a dance floor, tall windows and a 10-piece orchestra. Tables in the dining saloon were covered with fine white linens; there was a fishing deck on the bow, bingo in the arcade, and, as the stories go, illicit gambling and bootlegged alcohol available below deck. In 1932, nature took its first big bite out of the ship, when storms cracked the hull. The Seacliff company went bankrupt that same year, and the Palo Altos decks were stripped of valuables. California State Parks bought the vessel for $1 in 1936. Over the years, the ships foredeck was closed and the masts removed. Storms worsened the crack in the hull and then ruptured it so badly in 1978 that officials closed the ship. By that time, the community had grown attached to the Palo Alto and later led an effort in the 1980s to repair it. When the ship reopened with new handrails and asphalt, visitors could once again walk onto it to fish. But the end arrived around 2000 when officials permanently shut down the deck. A few years later, they cleaned up the oil in the hull. Since then, the defunct landmark with a ghost-ship vibe has slouched below the pier. This will definitely go down as a historic storm with regards to surf impacting the Central Coast. Matt Mehle, National Weather Service meteorologist Last winter, nature struck again. Waves from El Nino storms cracked the stern in two and tilted it slightly. Then came Jan. 21. Record-setting surf engulfed the ship that Saturday morning, slicing into its cracks with enough force to rend the Palo Altos stern again and rotate it further onto its port side. Locals said cars lined up on State Park Drive all weekend, as hundreds of people packed the beach to get a glimpse of the twisted hull. I got a telephone call and an email about 8 a.m. [Saturday], recalled John Hibble, curator of the Aptos History Museum. They said, Youve gotta see the ship. Itll never be the same. The powerful waves resulted from an area of low pressure that had developed earlier that week over the Pacific. Those conditions generated a large swell that moved gradually toward the coast, arriving just as the third of three winter storms struck Santa Cruz County. Together, the weather systems combined to make history. On that Saturday, a network of buoys almost 30 miles off the coast recorded groundswells of up to 34.12 feet high the largest since officials began recording data there in 1987. This will definitely go down as a historic storm with regards to surf impacting the Central Coast, said Matt Mehle, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Monterey. It generated extremely dangerous situations. During the storms, the Coast Guard headed to Pebble Beach and searched in vain for a man and a woman who vanished along the coastline. Less than 2 inches of weekend rain was enough to close more than 30 roads in Santa Cruz County. Trees fell and mud slid. Santa Cruz was among the counties Gov. Jerry Brown declared to be under a state of emergency. Local officials estimated that this winters storms have caused at least $15 million in damage, and a State Parks superintendent said they were also responsible for felling another area landmark: the Advocate Tree in the Forest of Nisene Marks. Still, locals say nothing is threaded into the fabric of Aptos like the Palo Alto. It takes center stage at Seacliff State Beachs visitors center, where the gift shop sells hats with an artists rendering of the vessel at sunset. Photos of the Palo Alto fill a wall at the history museum, which also displays pieces of the ships concrete. A mural on the corner of the Seacliff neighborhoods main street depicts a grand version of the Palo Alto as it looked in 1930. Inside Forget Me Not, a clothing boutique down the street, owner Diane Strickland had only three sweatshirts with ship logos left to sell on Thursday. All the T-shirts had been sold. Weve already reordered, said Strickland, who opened her shop in 1977. Were going to take the plate we use for this and put a crack in it. ... But Im not going to tip it. Aptos is filled with people like Strickland who take pride in the towns long, rich history and their place within it. Its the sort of community where she felt comfortable strolling to the mural while a customer roamed her shop unsupervised. Some of the towns winding roads and residential streets lack curbs and sidewalks. Even the towns Starbucks looks quaint inside one of the Old-West style, wood-shingled buildings that fill the village. Mike Murray, 38, lives in one of Seacliffs many modest beach houses. Inside, a framed photo of the Palo Alto hangs on a wall. As a child, Murrays mother would wheel him down to the beach in a red Radio Flyer wagon. She would wash clothes at the laundromat. His grandfather would get doughnuts at the drive-in. Halfway to the beach, he would warn of bears in the bushes. Yet they never emerged. Murray always made it to the sand, the pier and the ship. Once you went out there, it was this huge skeleton of a thing, Murray said. It felt like yours, like something you had to check on. Murray guesses he performed some version of this routine dozens, perhaps 100 times. Each time he returns today, he passes the same laundromat and the same drive-in. The ship, of course, has changed. State officials plan to let it continue to degrade as it evolves into an artificial reef. But Murray hopes that in the years ahead there will be at least some shred of the ship left to point at. Hes expecting a boy of his own this summer. matt.stevens@latimes.com Twitter: @ByMattStevens MORE CALIFORNIA NEWS Protesters block traffic at LAX as thousands rally against Trump travel ban Californias new pot economy valued at $7 billion After a frantic search, body of fire chiefs son found in frigid waters of Lake Arrowhead Child protection agency misses hundreds of payments due to computer glitches An off-duty Los Angeles Police Department officer shot and wounded two suspects in a Downey neighborhood early Monday, officials said. The shooting was reported about 1 a.m. in the 7800 block of Borson Street, LAPD Capt. Andrew Neiman said. Details about the shooting remain unclear because authorities have not yet spoken to the officer, he said. The suspects, whose identities have not been released, were taken to a hospital, police said. Their condition was not immediately known. Advertisement The officer was injured but was not shot, Neiman said. The officer was taken to a hospital to be treated for non-life-threatening injuries, he said. Downey Police Department detectives will perform a criminal investigation, while LAPD officials conduct an administrative investigation. veronica.rocha@latimes.com For breaking news in California, follow @VeronicaRochaLA on Twitter. ALSO As of Sunday night, no more foreign travelers in airport detention, officials say Off-duty LAPD officer shoots and wounds 2 suspects in Downey Rape victim did her own detective work to find her assailants Two lawmakers say that the Iraqi parliament has approved a "reciprocity measure" after U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily banning citizens from Iraq and six other Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. The measure, adopted by lawmakers at a Monday session of parliament, is to apply to Americans entering Iraq. Lawmakers Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun told The Associated Press that decision is binding for the government. Both say the decision was passed by a majority votes in favor but couldn't offer specific numbers. No further details were available on the wording of the parliament decision. It was also not immediately clear who the ban will apply to American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and other Americans doing business in Iraq. It was also not known if and how the Iraqi measure would affect cooperation in the fight against the Islamic State group in Mosul. Search Keywords: Short link: Authorities say a handyman has been arrested on suspicion of strangling a former Silicon Valley school board member whose body was found in a shallow grave. Christopher Ellebracht, 38, is facing murder, financial elder abuse and forgery charges in connection with the death of Gin Lu Tommy Shwe, whose body was found Jan. 25 in Tulare County hundreds of miles from the victims home, according to the Santa Clara Sheriffs Office. Ellebracht, a handyman who had worked for Shwe for two years, was scheduled to be arraigned Monday afternoon. Advertisement This is a callous and cold-hearted murder of a prominent community member, pioneer and family man, Sheriff Laurie Smith said at a news conference Monday. Any loss of life is tragic, but the strangulation and soulless burial in an effort to cover and evade the pursuit of justice is especially troubling. The 70-year-old Cupertino resident had disappeared roughly two weeks ago. Shwe, a former Cupertino Union School District board member and prominent real estate agent, was last seen leaving 24-hour Fitness in Sunnyvale on the evening of Jan. 17, deputies said. Shwes family reported him missing the next day when he didnt show up to a work meeting. His family was also concerned about his health because he required insulin and was known to get disoriented. According to sheriffs officials, his cellphone was turned off and he was not talking to his family. Meanwhile, detectives continued digging into Shwes whereabouts and learned that Ellebracht had been hired by Shwe to do handiwork at his businesses, according to Lt. Julian Quinonez. As detectives sifted through Shwes financial records, they discovered Ellebracht had deposited a forged check in Shwes name in the amount of $10,000 at an ATM in Morgan Hill on Jan. 18, according to the lieutenant. Surveillance cameras had also filmed Ellebracht buying a shovel at Home Depot on the morning Shwe disappeared, deputies said. Days after Shwes disappearance, detectives got a major break in the case. On Jan. 20, the California Highway Patrol found Ellebrachts white cargo van abandoned on a mountain road near the community of Three Rivers, in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. Authorities searched the van and found items of evidence that implied possible foul play, Quinonez said. Authorities may have also found Shwes cellphone near the van. As detectives began examining the van, Ellebracht was arrested Jan. 22 by Visalia police in an unrelated matter. Ellebracht had brandished a knife at someone near a fast-food restaurant and was taken into custody, Quinonez said. Authorities found Shwes wallet on Ellebracht, he said. Detectives returned to the site where Ellebrachts van had been found and started searching nearby. As police dogs, volunteers and detectives combed the area, they found Shwes body in the shallow grave. The grave was off a remote road near the area where Ellebrachts van was discovered. We believe Mr. Ellebracht took a trip to Visalia to complete what he had started in our county, Quinonez said. News of Shwes death came as a blow to Cupertino residents. Mayor Savita Vaidhyanathan said Shwe was a community leader who was devoted to making the city a better place to live. This is a very sad time for the Cupertino community, she said. When Shwe wasnt serving on the school board and working with other community groups, he worked with his son, Huei-Saint Shwe, and his niece as a real estate agent. On Monday, Huei-Saint Shwe told reporters his family was devastated by their fathers death. We were shocked and saddened that my fathers life story has come to such a tragic end, he said. It is incomprehensible to us how something like this could happen to a soul as kind and giving as my fathers. veronica.rocha@latimes.com For breaking news in California, follow @VeronicaRochaLA on Twitter. ALSO Crews demolish Pacifica apartment building that threatened to collapse into ocean Some criticize anti-Trump protesters for jamming LAX and causing missed flights Rape victim did her own detective work to find her assailants Stuart Timmons, a journalist, activist and authority on the role of gays and lesbians in Los Angeles history, has died. He was 60. Timmons, who suffered a debilitating stroke nine years ago but remained active in the community, died Saturday, his sister Gay Timmons said. For the record: In an earlier version of this story, it incorrectly stated that the late activist Jeanne Cordova had commented on Stuart Timmons death. She commented in that earlier interview on the influence of Timmons book, Gay LA. Timmons was best known as the author of two books on gay history. With Lillian Faderman, he co-wrote Gay L.A.: A History of Sexual Outlaws, Power Politics, and Lipstick Lesbians (2006), which traces more than 200 years of gay and lesbian life in Los Angeles, beginning with Spanish missionaries encounters with cross-gendered Native Americans in the late 1700s. Advertisement He also wrote The Trouble With Harry Hay (1990), a biography of the founder of the Mattachine Society, the nations first gay political organization, which was launched in Los Angeles in 1950. In an interview before her death last year, Jeanne Cordova, a longtime activist in the Los Angeles gay and lesbian community, called Timmons a great gay historian. She said his book with Faderman, Gay L.A., was the most in-depth look at the history and development of the gay liberation movement in Los Angeles, the best to be published so far. Born Jan. 14, 1957, in Minneapolis, Timmons grew up in the Bay Area, which along with New York had long overshadowed Los Angeles as a bastion of early gay activism. But the UCLA journalism graduate discovered that Los Angeles, his home for three decades, deserved more credit for its role in the vanguard of the gay liberation movement. As he and Faderman noted in their book, Los Angeles was the site of many firsts in gay history. In addition to the Mattachine Society, these include the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center, the countrys first major gay community center; the Advocate, the nations first gay magazine; and the Metropolitan Community Church, the largest LGBT-friendly church, with 300 congregations in 22 countries. To put it in a word, Timmons told the San Francisco Chronicle in 2007, without Los Angeles, we wouldnt have institutions. We wouldnt have the institutional press and we wouldnt have the institutional church. The book, written in what Timmons called a juicy but scholarly style, also described a disturbance at a Los Angeles doughnut shop frequented by gays that may have been the first gay uprising in modern times. The incident at Coopers Donuts took place in 1959, a full decade before the more famous Stonewall Riots in New York City that are widely regarded as the event that launched the gay rights movement. He and Faderman conducted 300 interviews for the book in addition to examining old newspaper articles, police ledgers, letters and photographs. Much of the research was conducted at the ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives, a major repository of materials by and about gays and lesbians, on the USC campus. Timmons was its executive director from 2002 to 2004 as well as a member of the board of directors. Gay L.A. received high praise from critics, such as Eloise Klein Healy, who wrote in the Los Angeles Times that it was meticulously researched and reads like a novel. The book was honored in 2007 with two Lambda Literary Awards. Timmons first book, The Trouble With Harry Hay, chronicled the life of Hay, a longtime Angeleno who paved the way for the modern gay rights movement when he started the secretive Mattachine Society in 1950. Publishers Weekly said the book was written with a verve worthy of its subject. Though they lived on opposite sides of the country, Gay Timmons said she spoke with her brother on a daily basis. She said that following his stroke, he remained active in the community, though on a limited basis. The love and support of his community was one of the most amazing things Ive ever seen, she said. Besides his sister, Timmons is survived by his father, Samuel; a second sister, Emily Theobald; and four nieces, Kaitlin and Madeleine Franklin and Emilia and Mariah Theobald. Elaine Woo is a former Los Angeles Times staff writer. The Trump administrations temporary ban on refugees entering the United States until measures can be adopted to ensure more extreme vetting has sparked criticism from human rights activists, security specialists and some U.S. lawmakers. They argue that current screening procedures for refugees are already adequately exhaustive and rigorous. I just struggle to see how it can be made much more thorough than it already is, said John Sandweg, former acting general counsel to the Department of Homeland Security and former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Its an intentionally slow process. Its a multilayered and multilevel approach. Homeland Security is among the entities heavily involved in the screening, together with multiple intelligence agencies, the Department of Defense and other law enforcement agencies. Advertisement Refugees are more scrutinized than other traveler to the U.S., said Noah Gottschalk, a Washington-based senior humanitarian policy advisor for Oxfam America. But critics say no system is fail-safe and they insist loopholes exist such as the lack of proper documents by people fleeing war that could allow those who want to harm Americans to slip in as refugees. President Trump signs his executive order on immigration. (Susan Walsh / Associated Press) Heres how the system works The refugee intake program begins with the United Nations Commissioner for Refugees, which registers individuals claiming to be refugees. The agency determines, usually through an interview, whether an applicant qualifies under international laws for refugee status and collects identity documents, biographical information, and biometric data, such as iris scans for Syrians, according to information published by the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, or USCRI. An initial rough cut of refugees is then referred to the U.S. government for resettlement. Refugee support centers, contracted by the U.S. State Department, compile a refugees personal data and background information for the security clearance process and an in-person interview with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. According to USCRI, the State Department checks the refugees name against a watch list. Certain refugees might be required to undergo an additional security review, according to the agencys checklist. The National Counterterrorism Center then conducts an inter-agency check on certain applicants, such as males considered to be of combat age and those who are single with no family commitments or ties, to determine if any new derogatory information has come up since the initial check that might disqualify the applicant, according to the U.S. refugee agency. There are individuals who are collecting information on the battlefield, from sources and electronic intercepts. That is all fed into the refugee screening process. said Sandweg, who as acting director of ICE led around 20,000 employees across the U.S. and in 47 countries. Syrian refugees referred for resettlement in the U.S. face additional screening. Before Citizenship and Immigration Services schedules an interview with the applicant abroad, officials with the agency review the application and investigate any discrepancies. Once an applicant is cleared to move forward, Citizenship and Immigration Services officers conduct another in-person interview that includes any family member older than 14. The officers are highly trained, Sandweg said. Not only is the applicants eligibility checked, they are looking for inconsistencies, he said. The officers collect the applicants fingerprints and photographs and determine whether the individual qualifies as a refugee. Only then is the status conditionally approved for resettlement and submitted to the U.S. State Department for final processing. What happens next? The applicants fingerprints are screened by the FBI, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Defense before the candidate for resettlement is sent for medical tests to ensure that he or she is free of any communicable diseases that could pose a public health threat, according to USCRI. Once the results of the security checks and medical screening have been cleared, the refugee is approved for resettlement. The entire screening process takes between 18 months and two years, according to U.S. State Department data. But the vetting doesnt end there. The refugee faces further interrogation at the border upon entry to the U.S. Protesters gather at San Francisco International Airport on on Saturday to denounce President Trumps executive order barring citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries from entering the U.S. (Marcio Jose Sanchez / Associated Press) The individuals are recurrently vetted even after they are in the United States, Sandweg said. You are constantly running them through a database to see if any new information has come in to say that they are a threat. The State Department also requires that the resettlement agencies provide employment statistics after refugees have been in the country for three months, according to the departments Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration. Why do critics insist the vetting isnt stringent enough? Critics say records can be questionable when dealing with people who are fleeing conflict and may not have proper documents, allowing would-be terrorists to slip in. In the aftermath of the series of coordinated attacks in Paris in November 2015 in which Islamic State militants killed 120 people, authorities revealed that two of the attackers entered Europe by posing as refugees and using fake Syrian passports. As a result, at least 31 U.S. governors vowed not to take in any more Syrian refugees. Security experts acknowledged that no system is completely foolproof but insisted that the situation in the U.S. differs from Europe, where migrants were streaming across the border. Refugees were getting into Europe without any vetting whatsoever, Sandweg said. Its a radically different situation in the U.S. How will extreme vetting affect those already in the pipeline? Tens of thousand of refugees are currently in the process of being vetted, and completed security checks and medical screenings are valid for only a limited time, humanitarian officials say. If these approved checks expire, you will be resetting the clock, Gottschalk said. You will be asking many refugees to start from square one. Even a suspension of one month could be enough to make these refugees start from the beginning. The Obama administration had wanted to increase the refugee intake from 85,000 to 110,000 in fiscal year 2017. Trumps executive order limits the total number of refugees allowed into the U.S. to 50,000 this year. ALSO When Muslims got blocked at American airports, U.S. veterans rushed to help The uncensored Trump repeatedly interrupted the more sober one in the first week They gambled, and lost: Migrants braved jungles, seas and bandits to reach the U.S. Then they were sent home. Robert Cameron drove his pickup truck toward the Texas-Mexico border, past cotton and sugar cane fields, up to a 20-foot-tall metal and concrete border fence and passed right through a gap in the barrier wide enough for a tractor-trailer. Because of international treaty and flood zone requirements, the fence is set back from the winding Rio Grande, and since it divides some U.S. properties, the fence is broken up by gaps Texas residents use to traverse their land. Smugglers use them too. Bad guys could be crossing into the sugar cane and whos here to stop them? said Cameron. He voted for President Trump and supports his border wall proposal but said construction here will be tricky. Advertisement How do you build a wall thats impenetrable and still allow farmers, property owners, access to their land? Cameron asked. Its doable, its just getting over the obstacles. As Trump issued an executive order to start construction on a wall, nowhere are the challenges more apparent than here in the Rio Grande Valley, ground zero for the flow of migrants and drugs north. The difficulties of building near a waterway and the clashing opinions about a wall are all on display here in Texas southern tip. Cameron, 39, runs Texas Border Tours, which caters to outdoor enthusiasts, in Progreso Lakes, about 40 miles west of Brownsville. He pointed to Border Patrol cameras and observation towers. Robert Cameron stands on the south side of the border fence in Progreso Lakes, where he does tours for people who want to see the border area. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) Hes filmed smugglers who waded into the shallows to carry bundles to the U.S. side. Hes seen migrants fleeing past homes, trampling fences, spooking his horses. Migrants once mobbed his sisters car, mistaking it for a smugglers vehicle. Nearly half of the migrants caught on the southern border last fiscal year nearly 187,000 were captured in the Rio Grande Valley, according to Customs and Border Protection. A third of the cocaine recovered on the southern border was found here. About a third of the entire border is fenced, nearly 700 miles. But just 17% of the border in the valley has fencing, about 55 miles, a Border Patrol spokesman said. Much of that fence was built during Barack Obamas presidency as part of the Secure Fence Act of 2006, which some residents and environmental groups unsuccessfully sued to block. The fencing had to meet requirements of a 1970 treaty administered by the International Boundary and Water Commission, a joint U.S.-Mexican agency, which requires that structures built along the Rio Grande cannot disrupt its flow. The result: some U.S. property lies south of the fence but north of the Rio Grande. Many locals have opposed fencing not just on political grounds (the border is largely Democrat and Latino), but because barriers split their land and, they fear, possibly affect water supply and wildlife. To the east in Brownsville, near where the valley meets the Gulf of Mexico, the federal government seized land in 2009 to erect a stretch of fence on Eloisa Tamezs ancestral home, a Spanish land grant from 1767. Tamez, 81, a nursing professor at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, filed a federal lawsuit to stop the fence. The government ultimately took part of her property, paying Tamez a $56,000 settlement. Though Tamez was given a code to open a gate in the fence, she insisted, I was denied access to the southern part of my land. While she wants the area secure, Tamez complained that she had no input before the fence was built and calls it a monstrosity. Tamez noted that the fence did not extend to wealthy nearby businesses and developments. She worried what the federal government would do next to her and other middle-class homeowners when constructing the new wall. Theres not a lot of trust there, she said. Pamela Taylor, 88, another longtime Brownsville resident, lives near a gap in the fence. She voted for Trump, but also built a sign at the end of her street that says, Were part of America, we need representation & protection, not a fence. Pamela Taylor, 88, lives on the border where she and her children have put up a sign to say they dont want a fence. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) Standing near the sign last week, Taylor waved to a passing Border Patrol agent. She and her neighbors live on the south side of the fence, and while theres a gap to accommodate a two-lane road, they are somewhat cut off from the rest of the area. She worries a new wall will isolate her even more and that there wont be enough agents to patrol it. They should hire more Border Patrol people, I mean lots more, Taylor said. You can have all the locks in the world but if someone wants to get in theyre going to find a way to do it. Its not clear where new stretches of border wall will be built. Finding space will be a challenge in the Rio Grande Valley, where the river winds alongside homes, through wildlife refuges and parks. Anzalduas Park in the town of Mission has become a popular spot for illegal crossings in recent years. Theres no border fence in the park. Last week, constables deputies and Border Patrol agents caught more than 160 migrants, mostly Central Americans, illegally crossing the river on rafts and climbing the banks to the park. 1 / 7 After crossing the Rio Grande River at night with the help of smugglers, group of mainly women and children from Central America are detained by U.S. Border Patrol agents before being taken into detention. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 7 Border Patrol agents patrol the Rio Grande River near the McAllen-Hidalgo International Bridge. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 7 U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents Isaac Villegas, right, and Rene Quintanilla, right, walk along the Rio Grande River looking for smugglers across the river who try to bring people from Miguel Aleman, Mexico to Roma, Texas. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 7 At sunrise at the McAllen-Hidalgo International Bridge, border patrol agents detain two illegal immigrants who tried to enter the U.S. but turned back towards Mexico after realizing they were not going to make it. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 7 A pair of pants abandoned at the U.S. side of the U.S.-Mexico border in an area where many immigrants cross illegally in McAllen, Texas. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 7 Santo Isido Villegas Gizman, age 38, a farmworker from El Salvador, holds his son Jefferson, 3, after being stopped by U.S. Border Patrol agents near Mc Allen, Texas. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 7 People cross the McAllen-Hidalgo International Bridge between the U.S. and Mexico. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times) Among them was Salvadoran migrant Silvia Segovia, 36, who emerged from riverbank brush after dark Thursday with 12-year-old son Jose by her side. They had hoped to join her sister-in-law in Los Angeles because of gang violence in El Salvador. Her 30-year-old brother was kidnapped and killed last fall. They decided to risk the trip now because they feared the Trump administration would make crossing even more difficult. Its a bad thing for us immigrants, she said of the wall. But its not clear whether the wall could be built here. The river has a mind of its own. In inclement weather if it floods, weve had the park flood before. Theres no feasible way to put a wall right up on the river, said Hidalgo County Constables Sgt. Dan Broyles. Chris Cabrera, vice president of the Rio Grande Valley chapter of the National Border Patrol Council, the union that represents agents, said plugging gaps and extending the wall will work only if enough agents are sent to monitor it. Trump has said he plans to add 5,000 agents to the roughly 20,000 deployed nationwide, 17,000 of them on the southern border. You can build the wall as long as you want, but if you dont have the agents to monitor it, people will still get through, Cabrera said. About 55 miles west near the edge of the valley in Roma, theres no fence to stop migrants who regularly dash up the riverbank, across yards to a church and Dollar General Store. The town of about 10,000 sits so close to the river, residents wonder where it would fit. Theres not enough space from here to the river, said Oziel Loera, 27, standing in his pharmacy work shirt and cowboy boots outside his riverfront house. The government could build a wall, but from where to where? asked Loera as Border Patrol agents passed on foot patrol. A wall might be needed, but residents should not be displaced to make way for it, he said. On the riverbank below, Border Patrol agents spotted a smuggler launching a yellow rubber raft with three people, a woman and two men, on board. The man at the helm, shirtless, paddled frantically against the current, drawing close to the U.S. side, where the raft could quickly be concealed by thick stands of Carrizo cane. On the U.S. bank, Border Patrol Agent Isaac Villegas whistled. That caught the paddlers attention and he quickly retreated to the Mexican bank. As Villegas watched the trio clamber ashore, a man in a dark coat stormed over to them, presumably another smuggler. He fumed loudly at the agents in barely audible Spanish. Villegas smiled. We deter them, the agent said as he climbed the bank. We did our job today. To read the article in Spanish, click here molly.hennessy-fiske@latimes.com @mollyhf ALSO No, Californias environmental laws probably wont block Trumps border wall Mexico-U.S. tensions escalate after Pena Nieto cancels his trip to Washington and Trump seeks 20% import tax El Paso and Juarez know what happens when a wall divides two cities The mere idea of President Trumps executive order suspending the entry into the country of various visitors, migrants and refugees was bad enough, based as it was on the erroneous assertion that people from predominantly Muslim countries posed an escalated threat to the United States, and the contention also without evidence that existing vetting of arrivals from those countries was inadequate. In execution, it was a disaster, plunging U.S. airports into chaos and displaying a shocking lack of forethought and planning and a deeply troubling failure of basic communication and coordination among and between federal and local authorities. Would the ban apply to arriving passengers who already are lawful permanent residents holding so-called green cards? Yes, said the White House and the Department of Homeland Security on Saturday. But on Sunday, they changed their minds, saying it would not. What about holders of properly issued visas, who left their home countries under U.S. assurance that they would be admitted here? Why was Saudi Arabia (where Trump has business interests but where most of the 9/11 hijackers came from) left off the list of banned countries? Advertisement The president appeared to believe he could spring his order on the world the same way he might suddenly switch plumbing contractors on one of his buildings. Set aside for a moment the question of whether denying entry to such people is manifestly unfair, illegal or even unconstitutional, and whether it is likely to set off a chain reaction of retaliatory measures against U.S. citizens living, working or visiting in other countries. Some more basic and urgent questions are what rules apply, who on the ground is interpreting them and whether those interpretations are being adequately and uniformly communicated. At Los Angeles International Airport, and presumably at other airports around the country, it was unclear well into Sunday how many people were being detained. Loved ones and others awaiting the arrival of passengers had little to no access to information. The horrendous episode smacks not just of a disregard for basic rights and decency, but of a level of amateurism not usually associated with the federal government. The president appeared to believe he could spring his order on the world the same way he might suddenly switch plumbing contractors on one of his buildings. He displayed a blind spot or a callous contempt for the impact of his action. If there was planning or consultation with career officials or homeland security experts, it was not apparent. The inescapable question is whether this is the manner in which we can expect other new presidential programs to be rolled out. We can hope the answer is no that the president will now have learned something of how government bureaucracy works, and of the impact of his decisions on real people in real time but we fear the answer will be yes. Consider the presidents insistence, in the face of criticism over the weekend, that he did nothing much different on entry to the U.S. than President Obama did in the first months of his administration. If that were indeed the case, why did Trump previously make such an issue of how different his policies were from Obamas? Can he truly believe that the chaotic scenes at airports were something manufactured by his political opponents? Trumps learning curve may be long. Lets hope that one at least exists. At stake is more than the fate of refugees fleeing desperate conditions in war-torn countries, or the American traditions of welcome and fair play. Also on the line is the confidence that Americans have, ought to have and are entitled to have in their government and the confidence that other governments have in us. In the event of a real emergency an act of war, a natural disaster, the outbreak of disease that confidence is essential. The good news arising from this weekends events is that the American system of law, of constitutionality and of checks and balances did work, after the fact and up to a point. Plaintiffs went to court. Judges stayed application of parts of Trumps order. Thats good, but it came after an awful lot of anxiety and consternation. Coming on top of Trumps battle with Mexican leaders last week, his petulant squabbles with the press, his pointless obsession with the size of his inauguration crowd, his irresponsible order on Obamacare, we have to wonder: What on earth will week two bring? Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and Facebook With major airports in chaos over the weekend, President Trump sought to deflect blame the same way Republicans have been doing for eight years: By blaming President Obama. At some point, thats going to stop working even for the GOP. But then, Obama spent years blaming President George W. Bush for the countrys ills, so. Anyway, as the protests grew and the heat on the administration intensified Sunday, Trump issued a statement claiming that he was effectively repeating steps taken by his predecessor. Advertisement My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months, Trump asserted. The seven countries named in the executive order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. What do details matter to a man of action? But Trump, for whom policy details seem as welcome as an extra helping of haggis, glossed over key differences between what Obama did and what he unleashed Friday. First, the Obama administrations actions in 2011 came in response to a specific weakness in the vetting of a specific group of immigrants. The background checks on Iraqi refugees didnt cross-reference a database of fingerprints gathered from fragments of explosive devices that had targeted U.S. soldiers in Iraq. When the FBI did those checks, it found matches to two Iraqis whod been allowed to resettle in the United States in 2009. That prompted Obama to act. Trumps action came in response to a campaign promise. Second, rather than canceling existing visas and harming people whod already sold their homes and started moving to the United States, as Trump did, the Obama administration stopped processing new applications from Iraq for refugee status or Special Immigrant Visas (e.g., for Iraqis who worked as translators for the U.S. military) while also conducting new background checks on current ones. No one was detained at an airport, pulled off of a plane or ordered back to the country he or she had just fled. And refugees from Iraq continued to be admitted throughout that period, according to Foreign Policy magazine, just in far smaller numbers. Third, the Obama administration made no public announcements about the change in policy. Instead, it came to light two years later, when ABC News apparently broke the story. Thats a sharp contrast to the Trump approach of alienating people around the world by publicly shutting the door on seven countries immigrants, visitors and refugees. And fourth, Obama didnt make exceptions based on the applicants religion. Trumps order gives non-Muslim refugees priority over Muslims after the ban on entry is lifted. Its odd to blame Obama for picking those seven countries. According to the Wall Street Journal, Congress rolled back the special access to the United States that citizens of four of those countries had been granted, ensuring that anyone from there or who had traveled there recently obtained a visa before coming here. The Obama administration later added the other three to the visa requirement. Nor, as the Journal piece points out, have those countries been the major sources of people who commit terrorist acts in the United States: Of 180 people charged with jihadist terrorism-related crimes or who died before being charged, 11 were identified as being from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Yemen, Sudan or Somalia, the countries specified in Mr. Trumps order, according to an analysis of data on the attacks by the Wall Street Journal. None of the 11 were identified as coming from either Syria, Libya or Sudan, and none of the 11 were involved in any major U.S. plot resulting in the deaths of Americans, including the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Instead, the largest source by far is the United States itself, followed by Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, the Journal reported. But hey, what do details matter to a man of action? jon.healey@latimes.com Twitter: @jcahealey Seeking to fulfill another campaign promise, President Trump issued an executive order Monday morning instructing the federal departments and agencies under his control to identify at least two regulations that could be repealed for every new regulation they propose. The two-for-one, new-lamps-for-old framework is just the sort of thing weve come to expect from the new president. Reductive, sure, but a dramatic departure from Washingtons way of doing things. None of that cost-benefit nonsense here; just focus on the costs that government imposes, and start whacking away. And with a clear formula one in, two or more out well be jettisoning rules in no time. For the record: The original version of this post incorrectly stated that the Mercatus Center is at George Washington University. Its at George Mason University. The order doesnt give any guidance, however, on which rules to wipe out. And gosh, there are so many that its hard to know where to begin. Advertisement So in the spirit of a new president whos trying to keep things simple, heres a suggestion for the bureaucrats who will be tasked with the new regulatory streamlining: Pick the rules you want to eliminate the same way youd go about decluttering your life. Not just old rules are in the administrations cross-hairs. Its anything that is expensive to comply with, regardless of how beneficial it might be. For example, consider a Six Month Dictum: If you havent enforced a particular rule in six months, donate it to the United Nations for some other country to use. Or try Marie Kondos advice from The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying: If a regulation no longer brings you joy, issue a notice of proposed rulemaking right now and begin the process of revoking it. I know what youre thinking: Sure, that rule may be gathering dust back there in the corner of the Code of Federal Regulations, but someday you may really need it. Thats why youve resisted the impulse all these years to leave it on the median strip for another department head to cart off. Its easy to get sentimentally attached to things even after they become obsolete. But thats how pack rats are born. And its not just old rules that are in the administrations crosshairs. Its anything that is expensive to comply with, regardless of how beneficial it might be to the countrys economic stability, human health, competition or consumer protection. The more compliance costs you can jettison, the more room youll create within the regulatory cost budget that the administration intends to impose on you. Thats why you should think about the regulations you oversee as an overstuffed closet, and focus on the biggest ones first. Take, for example, the Treasury Departments Liquidity Coverage Ratio rule requiring large banks with billions of dollars at risk overseas to keep larger reserves of cash and other reliably valuable assets. The Heritage Foundation estimates that this rule alone imposes an estimated $2.5 billion in costs, presumably on the banking industry. The rule may seem sensible, Heritage concedes, but the heck with that, right? Because all the big Wall Street banks maintained plenty of reserves before the housing bubble burst. Oh, wait. Another rich vein of costly rules that could be tapped is at the Food and Drug Administration. According to a study by the free-market-oriented Mercatus Center at George Mason University, jumping through the FDAs hoops adds an estimated $75 million to the cost of bringing a higher-risk medical device to the market, and $2.6 billion to the cost of a new drug. Why not dump some of those rules? What could possibly go wrong? Look, I said I was trying to simplify things, not that it would actually be easy. The dividing line between rules that waste money and those that deliver real public benefits varies according to your point of view and what interests you have at stake. Nevertheless, scrapping 75% of the federal regulatory burden the goal Trump laid out for a group of business leaders this month requires bureaucrats to be bold. Thats especially true given that some of the costliest regulations come from independent federal agencies that arent covered by Trumps order, such as the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Consumer Product Safety Commission and that pesky Environmental Protection Agency. Nor are rules that Congress wrote into law. So, Mr. and Ms. Department Head, start making a list now of all the rules and regulations you enforce. Then ask yourself, which ones dont bring you joy? jon.healey@latimes.com Twitter: @jcahealey To the editor: Last week, President Trump demanded more respect from Mexico. This is astounding, considering he has told Mexicans they will pay for a border wall. It doesnt seem the president understands that he is so widely disrespected because he constantly disrespects others. (Mexico-U.S. tensions escalate after Pena Nieto cancels his trip to Washington and Trump seeks 20% import tax, Jan. 26) I consider myself a strong American patriot, but in this matter I stand with the Mexican president. Regarding the wall, I hope that President Enrique Pena Nieto doesnt negotiate with Trump for a second. Mexican-Americans make up a sizable and an important group in this country. Mexico is a neighbor, friend and partner. Ive befriended and worked with very fine people from Mexico, a country that has sent us some of its best. Advertisement I grew up in a country with a wall. We were so happy when that thing came down. Lets not put another one up. Christoph Bull, Los Angeles .. To the editor: I agree with Trump that not only do we need a secure wall, but also that only Mexico should pay for the cost of completion. This would not be a two-way wall. The intent would not be to keep U.S. citizens from illegally entering Mexico, but to keep Mexicans and other non-U.S. citizens from illegally entering the U.S.. The majority of Mexicans entering the U.S. illegally are decent people trying to improve their lives. But the primary responsibility for improving the lives of Mexican citizens lies with the Mexican leadership. If the Mexican government could end corruption and defeat the drug lords, its economy could improve to an extent that Mexicans would have little reason to leave. The efforts of the U.S. government should be to aid Mexico in accomplishing these goals. Michael Gesas, Beverly Hills .. To the editor: With all of the talk about who is going to pay for the wall, there is practically no discussion of the fundamental question: Do we actually need a wall? A 2015 study by the Pew Research Center concluded that 140,000 more Mexicans returned to Mexico than entered the U.S. from 2009-14. It is probable that we are going to spend up to $30 billion for a project we dont need. And one must not be fooled by the various proposals such as a border tax to pay for the wall. The cost of any border tax will ultimately be paid by the people who buy the products (us) or the companies that import them, not the Mexican people. Bernard Peltzie, South Pasadena .. To the editor: In your account of the cancellation by Pena Nieto of a planned meeting with Trump, it states that Trump had his own, unique version of events. If Trump were in the vicinity of the event horizon of a black hole, or if he were somehow subject to laws of physics different from those known to govern the universe, he might have his own, unique version of events. This is not the case. What he does have are lies. His statement that he and Pena Nieto mutually agreed to cancel their meeting is a lie. It is a failure of journalism and a disservice to the public not to label it as such. Christopher John Smith, Los Angeles Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and Facebook To the editor: Torture? This is a word appearing on The Times editorial page associated with Chinese water torture, Christian inquisitions and other kinds of human depravity. It is also apparently a current topic of discussion deemed appropriate by the president of the United States of America, the leader of the free world. (Trump needs to stop sending mixed messages on torture, editorial, Jan. 27) What god-awful med-ieval nightmare is this? Torture? Are we returning to the national shame of black-ops sites in Eastern Europe? Trumps views are completely counter to the spirit and soul of America, where close to every jurisdiction has penalties for intentionally inflicting pain on another person. Americans have defined simple civic rules dictating fair play and harmlessness, and it is time for the new leader of this nation to learn the same on an international level. Advertisement Jacqueline Kerr, Los Feliz .. To the editor: Trump wants to do everything within the bounds of what youre allowed to do legally when it comes to torture. Who exactly is he talking about torturing? Me? Right now, he is torturing America with his tweets, and senior White House staffers Kellyanne Conway and Sean Spicer are being tortured by having to explain them. Tony Wood, Redlands Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and Facebook The level of ineptitude, hubris and callousness is breathtaking. Would-be czar Donald Trump and his scruffy Rasputin, Steve Bannon, seem to believe that they can run the world by edict, guided by nothing more than their own biases, whims and fantasies. And they get extremely peeved when someone questions them or dares to raise a challenge. Bannon tells the media to shut up. Trump tweets out another insult. What a way to run a government. After their first week in the White House, during which they issued daily decrees that either will have little effect or negative effects that are foolishly unanticipated, Trump and Bannon hit a big bump in their drive to turn the United States into a banana republic ruled by the whims of the ultimate leader. Friday, they declared a temporary ban on refugees and other foreigners entering the United States and targeted anyone coming in from seven particular Muslim countries (though not from any Muslim nations in which Trump has business ties, including Saudi Arabia, home of most of the 9/11 terror team). Within 24 hours, four federal judges in various jurisdictions partially blocked the order, its constitutionality was questioned, thousands of protesters gathered at the countrys major airports and even a few Republican senators questioned whether Trump knew what he was doing. Advertisement There were numerous stories of people holding legitimate green cards and visas being stopped when they got off airplanes in the U.S. or prohibited from getting on flights overseas. Among those detained at New Yorks John F. Kennedy International Airport was an Iraqi man who had fought alongside American troops in Iraq. An Iranian scientist with a fellowship at Harvard had his visa suspended. Syrian refugee families with sponsors waiting had their hopes crushed. Students about to start a new semester at U.S. universities suddenly found themselves with no way to return to their colleges. Lots of decent people were harmed for no good reason, and no terrorists were found. One 69-year-old Iraqi grandfather was prevented from boarding a flight that would have taken him to visit his family in America. His son, Long Beach resident Mohammed Rawi, was granted asylum after working a very dangerous job in the Los Angeles Times Baghdad bureau during the chaos and peril of the Iraq war. Whats next? Rawi asked in an interview with The Times. Is it going to be internment camps like World War II where they put all the Japanese in one camp? Theyll do the same for us? This is not what this country is all about. Trumps response to the outcry was, as usual, divorced from reality. Its working out very nicely, Trump said. You see it at the airports, you see it all over. On Sunday, a White House official declared that the ban was already a massive success story. 1 / 51 la-1491523602-y7ephyarj1-snap-image (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 51 la-1491368625-0bgh58ihw8-snap-image (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los angeles Times) 6 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 17 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 18 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 51 Trump inspires millions to take to the streets -- to oppose him. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 21 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 22 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 29 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 30 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 31 / 51 Top of the Ticket cartoon (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 32 / 51 Cartoon caption contest winner at the DENT conference in Sun Valley, Idaho: Jon Duval, executive director of the Ketchum Community Development Corporation. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 33 / 51 Old radicals and big media descend on Selma (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 34 / 51 Horsey imagined the creation of the Ann Coulter phenomenon in this cartoon from 2007. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 35 / 51 This David Horsey drawing is a reconfiguration of a cartoon he first published in 2006. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 36 / 51 Donald Sterling, owner of the L.A. Clippers, should give Cliven Bundy a call. After Sterling loses his NBA franchise and the deadbeat Nevada rancher loses his cattle, the two old racists will both need a buddy. Maybe they can team up together and open an all-white rodeo. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 51 Besides sending a chill up the spine of the international community, Vladimir Putin has accomplished one other thing by seizing Crimea and threatening the rest of Ukraine: Putin has brought back the bear. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 38 / 51 The right-wing insurrection at the Bundy ranch in Bunkerville, Nev., has taken another weird turn with new revelations about the family history of Cliven Bundy. (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 39 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 40 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 41 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 42 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 43 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 44 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 45 / 51 David Horsey / Los Angeles Times (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 46 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 47 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 48 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 49 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 50 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) 51 / 51 See full story (David Horsey / Los Angeles Times) Well, actually not. What is true is that Trump and Bannon made their declaration without going through normal procedures to check if there might be problems and complications. According to CNN, the White House developed the executive order on refugees and visas, and largely avoided the traditional interagency process that would have allowed the Justice Department and homeland security agencies to provide operational guidance. In fact, CNN reported, the Department of Homeland Security was overruled by Bannon and another member of Trumps inner circle, Stephen Miller, when department officials wanted to exempt from the ban people who are lawful permanent residents. This cruel mess is the product of Trumps ignorance and Bannons anti-immigrant extremism. During the campaign, Trump promised to slam the door on refugees and institute an extreme vetting process to weed out terrorists. As a candidate, and now as president, he was basing his policy on two false assumptions: One, that an effective vetting process is not already in place and, two, that there are hordes of terrorists among the desperate refugees fleeing terrorism in their home countries. And Bannon is a terrible source for sound advice. He joined the Trump team after running Breitbart News, one of the prime purveyors of untrue or wildly exaggerated scare stories about Muslim immigrants. Now, it is certainly the case that an American has a significant chance of being killed by a terrorist if that likelihood is compared with the odds of being gored by a unicorn or strangled by an evil leprechaun. But compared to real things, like lightning strikes and avalanches or some angry suburban school kid with his daddys assault rifle the risk of dying in a terror attack is infinitesimal. And yet, because of this false fear, Trump and Bannon have abandoned the American tradition and Christian principle of welcoming strangers and giving comfort to the refugees. Whats the chance of Americans being shamed and embarrassed by the new president? Closing in on 100%. David.Horsey@latimes.com Follow me at @davidhorsey on Twitter African Union leaders grappled with Morocco's divisive bid to rejoin the bloc at a summit Monday and sounded alarm for the continent over US President Donald Trump's immigration ban. "The very country (where) our people were taken as slaves... has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries," outgoing AU Commission chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told some 37 heads of state and leaders from across the continent. "It is clear that globally we are entering very turbulent times," she added. Trump's administration has faced outrage and widespread protests over the move to ban citizens from seven countries including Libya, Somalia and Sudan in Africa. In his opening address at the summit, new UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres didn't mention Trump's refugee and travel ban specifically, but criticised the closure of borders "even in the most developed countries in the world." All eyes at the summit are on a bid by Morocco to return to the fold 33 years after it quit in protest against the AU's decision to accept Western Sahara as a member. However proceedings began with the swift election of Chadian Foreign Minister Moussa Faki Mahamat, 56, as the new chairperson of the AU Commission, beating four other candidates. Faki won in a final battle against his Kenyan counterpart Amina Mohamed after seven rounds of voting, the Kenyan government said in a statement, praising a "valiant race" by their candidate. Faki takes on the role as his country's President Idriss Deby Itno hands over the rotating presidency of the AU to Guinea's Alpha Conde. Faki, a 56-year-old former prime minister, has been at the forefront of the fight against Islamists in Nigeria, Mali and the Sahel and has promised "development and security" will be top of his agenda as chief of the 54-member continental bloc. He said he dreams of an Africa where the "sound of guns will be drowned out by cultural songs and rumbling factories" and pledged to streamline the bureaucratic AU during his four-year term in office. Faki takes over from South Africa's Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma who is credited with advancing women's issues and moulding the ambitious Agenda 2063, but is seen to have dropped the ball on peace and security while focussing on personal political ambitions back home. The choice of a new leader is crucial for the future of a bloc which is undergoing deep introspection on how to reform to become more relevant and better respond to crises on the continent. Tasked with leading the reforms, Rwanda's President Paul Kagame delivered a "biting" report to heads of state on Sunday, according to a statement from the Kenyan government. He criticised "chronic failure to see through African Union decisions (which) had resulted in a crisis of implementation and a perception that the AU was not relevant to Africans". Kagame also slammed "over-dependence on (donor) funding" which accounts from 70 percent of the AU budget, according to the Institute for Security Studies. The membership of affluent Morocco could be a boon for the AU, which lost a key financier in late Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi and is working on ways to become financially independent. A Moroccan diplomat said Sunday the country had the "unconditional support" of 42 members of the bloc. However in a sign of the resistance Morocco is facing, 12 countries including heavyweights Nigeria, South Africa, Algeria, Kenya and Angola, requested a legal opinion from the AU on whether the bloc could accept a member that is "occupying parts of the territory" of another member. These nations have long supported the campaign for self-determination by Western Sahara's Polisario movement. Morocco maintains that the former Spanish colony under its control is an integral part of the kingdom, while the Polisario Front, which campaigns for the territory's independence, demands a referendum on self-determination. The AU's legal counsel, in a document seen by AFP, said the nations raised "fundamental concerns that have to be taken into account". However the decision to weigh Morocco's request ultimately rests with heads of state. Search Keywords: Short link: In the 2018 governors race, Gavin Newsom leads the pack in fundraising Gavin Newsom, the first major candidate to jump into CA's 2018 governor's race, narrowly lead the pack in 2016 fundraising w/ $4.27 million Phil Willon (@philwillon) February 1, 2017 Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Schwarzenegger: Were going through some difficult moments ... but I guarantee we will work our way out of this By Seema Mehta (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) Former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Tuesday that the United States had faced trying times and political crises before, and has always persevered. Yes, were going through some difficult moments right now, as we have in the past, but I guarantee we will work our way out of this, Schwarzenegger said, speaking at an electoral reform event at the University of Southern California. He recalled immigrating to the United States and seeing the violent protests at the Democratic National Convention in 1968, Watergate and the economic troubles during President Jimmy Carters tenure. One thing you can count on in America is even though it falls every so often as we all do it dusts itself off, gets up and gets going again, Schwarzenegger said. That is why its the number one country in the world. Although Schwarzenegger did not mention President Donald Trump by name during his remarks, the comments appeared to be a reference to the turbulence since Trump took office less than two weeks ago. Tensions between Schwarzenegger, who replaced Trump as the host of Celebrity Apprentice, and the new president and fellow Republican have been escalating. On Monday, Schwarzenegger called the implementation of Trumps temporary ban on immigration from several Muslim-majority countries crazy. The previous week, Schwarzenegger slammed Trumps pick to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, Oklahoma Atty. Gen. Scott Pruitt, as a hypocrite. Earlier in January, Trump mocked Schwarzenegger for the first ratings of Celebrity Apprentice after the former governor took over as the host. During the presidential campaign, Schwarzenegger repeatedly made clear his disdain for Trump, pointedly casting his ballot in the California primary for Ohio Gov. John Kasich after he had dropped out. On Tuesday, Schwarzenegger was headlining an event about redistricting reform at his namesake institute at USC. He did not respond to reporters questions after the event. While governor, Schwarzenegger championed electoral reform, including an ultimately successful effort to take the redrawing of congressional and legislative districts away from politicians and give them instead to an independent commission. Both political parties have long tried to use gerrymandering to create districts that favor their politicians. But David Daley, author of The True Story Behind the Secret Plan to Steal Americas Democracy, argued that Republicans were able to make unprecedented changes in the 2010 redistricting that will have long-lasting effects on this nations politics because of a confluence of factors, including unprecedented technology such as mapping software, and a flood of anonymous money due to the Citizens United ruling. In 2010, gerrymandering enters its steroid era, Daley said. The end result, he said, was that while the nation remained relatively closely divided between the two parties, the GOP was able to exponentially expand its hold of statehouses, governors mansions and congressional seats. Speakers urged Californians to take the lessons they had learned through the states redistricting reform and try to help voters apply them in other states, through the initiative, or legislative or legal systems. We are the model for the rest of the nation and that is why we in California have to do everything we can to pull together all the things that happen successfully in California and nationwide, Schwarzenegger said. Because the rest of the states are waiting for us. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Top Democratic donor Tom Steyer is planning a larger role opposing President Trump By Chris Megerian On Sunday, Tom Steyer was holding a cardboard sign saying not on my watch at San Franciscos airport, one of thousands protesting President Trumps order preventing visitors from several predominantly Muslim countries. I went out there to participate, but also to listen, he said. Like other liberal leaders, hes been hunting for the right approach to counter Trump. Now the deep-pocketed Democratic donor is launching a new effort that could expand the scope of NextGen Climate, the San Francisco-based organization he created and funded. Although Steyer expects to stay active on environmental issues the onetime hedge fund manager is best known for advocating stronger steps to fight climate change and support clean energy hes looking to play a more expansive role in opposing Trump. The number of issues that have to be addressed are broader, he said in an interview, pointing to Trumps statements on issues such as voting that he considers to be a broader attack on fundamental American rights. In a video posted on Tuesday night, Steyer says, I promise to do everything in my power to stand up to Trump and asks for the publics thoughts on what next steps should be taken. Steyer spent $74 million in the 2014 midterm election, and then millions more last year to support Hillary Clinton and other Democrats. Although results have been mixed Republicans gained ground in both years Steyer said the experiences have positioned NextGen to educate and mobilize voters across the country. There are very few people who are set up organizationally to do what were trying to do, he said. Steyer has already played a role in opposing Trumps nominees, running advertisements criticizing his choice for secretary of State, former Exxon Mobil Chief Executive Rex Tillerson. Besides simply fighting Trump, Steyer also hopes to project an alternative view of the country one that comes with a dose of California sunshine. America can pursue a much more optimistic, a much more prosperous, a much more equitable and a much healthier future, he said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Former aide is preparing to run for Rep. Grace Napolitanos seat if she retires By Javier Panzar Rep. Grace Napolitano (D-Norwalk), who turned 80 last year, has not made plans to retire. But one San Gabriel Valley politician is raising funds to run in case Napolitano does decide to bow out after 10 terms in Congress. Mary Ann Lutz, the former mayor of Monrovia and a former aide to Napolitano, reported having $101,000 in the bank to run for Napolitanos 32nd Congressional District seat, according to a new filing with the Federal Election Commission. But Lutz says she will run only if Napolitano retires. I have enormous respect for my former boss, Congresswoman Grace Napolitano, and would never run against her for any office, Lutz said in a statement. In the event that the 32nd Congressional District seat eventually opens up, I plan to run, and run aggressively. Napolitano suffered a minor stroke last February that affected her ability to write and slightly slowed her walk. She continued her reelection campaign and beat state Assemblyman Roger Hernandez (D-West Covina), who effectively ended his campaign in August after a judge granted his ex-wifes request for a domestic violence restraining order against him. During an interview with The Times a day before the November election, Napolitano said the health of her 90-year-old husband would be a key factor in her decision on whether to run for an 11th term in 2018. I would love to stay but it depends, she said. I will be ready to hang it up when I am ready. Lutz was elected in 2003 to the City Council in Monrovia, a city of 36,000 in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains, and was elected mayor in 2009. She lost her reelection bid in 2015 and went on to work for Napolitano as an advisor on water issues. Lutz raised $26,000 and loaned her campaign committee an additional $75,000. Napolitano has $144,692 in the bank if she wants to run again. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print State Senate committee votes in favor of funding legal aid for immigrants in California facing deportation By Jazmine Ulloa (John Moore / Getty Images) A state legislative bill seeking to expand legal services for immigrants in the U.S. illegally moved out of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday on a 5-2 vote. The bill, introduced by state Sen. Ben Hueso (D-San Diego), would create a legal defense program funded with state money that would provide lawyers for immigrants caught in deportation or removal proceedings. It comes roughly three years after the Unaccompanied Undocumented Minors program began providing state-funded legal services for young refugees fleeing gang violence in Central America. Hueso said the measure faced new urgency given President Trumps executive orders last week on immigration. This is a bill protecting Californians, protecting their families, but also protecting Californias economic prominence, Hueso said. I hope we can all stand united on this and say, Yes, we stand by our immigrant community in California. Members of the committee raised concerns about whether it whittled away at defense services available for detainees convicted of certain crimes and over how the state would be able to afford it amid a looming deficit and budget cuts from the federal government. It is well-meaning, but it is a whole different agency that we are setting up in an expedited way, Sen. Bob Wieckowski (D-Fremont) said. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement California assemblyman wants state to make cleaner purchases By Chris Megerian (Alexis Cuarezma / For The Times) A California lawmaker wants state officials to consider greenhouse gas emissions when making new purchases, a proposal that would add a new wrinkle to the bidding process for government contracts. Assemblyman Rob Bonta (D-Oakland) said the legislation (AB 262) would harness the states enormous buying power to support clean manufacturing. The measure, which includes state agencies and university systems, would affect the purchase of materials such as asphalt, cement, steel and glass for projects such as hospitals, dormitories and roads. Companies bidding on state contracts would be required to report greenhouse gas emissions generated by the manufacturing and transportation of supplies. Officials would then factor that information into their decision. Given Californias goal of slashing emissions, Bonta said he hopes that the legislation puts the states money where its values are. He doesnt expect the requirement to report more information would be a significant burden on companies seeking contracts. This will just be one more piece of information that will need to be added, he said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print First of several immigrant protection bills clears state Senate Public Safety Committee By Jazmine Ulloa (Justin Sullivan / Getty Images) As national debate and protests have taken place over President Donald Trumps executive actions on immigration and refugees, the state Senate Public Safety Committee on Tuesday passed the first of several bills aimed at protecting immigrants in California. Senate Bill 54, introduced by Senate President pro Tem Kevin de Leon (D-Los Angeles), would prohibit state and local law enforcement agencies from using resources to investigate, detain, report or arrest persons for the purposes of immigration enforcement. The proposal, dubbed the California Values Act, also aims to protect immigrants personal data, requiring state agencies to review their confidentiality policies and to ensure that they are only collecting information necessary to their departments. It moved out of committee with a 5-2 vote. Long line of advocates, lawyers in support SB 54, prohibiting law enforcement agencies from using resources for immigrants enforcement. pic.twitter.com/G0IV9ihRjE Jazmine Ulloa (@jazmineulloa) January 31, 2017 The bill seeks to strengthen immigrant protections threatened under Trumps executive actions. In orders signed last week, the president pledged to cut federal dollars from so-called sanctuary cities, which have policies limiting the cooperation between local law enforcement and federal immigration authorities. At a committee hearing Tuesday, De Leon said the proposal builds on the California Trust Act, which Gov. Jerry Brown signed in October 2013. The state law prevents law enforcement agencies from detaining immigrants longer than necessary for minor crimes so that federal immigration authorities can take them into custody. A long line of immigrant advocates, lawyers and lobbyists rose in support of the bill, saying it would continue to help law enforcement officials build trust within immigrant communities and allow more victims and witnesses to report crime. Democratic members in the committee urged their Republican colleagues to vote for the legislation and move away from Trumps rhetoric, which they said stereotyped immigrants as criminals. They pointed to low crime rates in immigrant communities and stressed that many police chiefs do not want to enforce immigration laws. Nancy Skinner (D-Berkeley), chair of the committee, said people across California were under economic stress that could be manipulated into fear. All of us want hardened criminals prosecuted under the law, she said. All of us. But what we are watching now is a pitting of people against each other, a targeting of immigrants. Opponents were not swayed. They said the bills language was too broad and could prevent communication among police agencies at different levels of government, allowing dangerous criminals to escape prosecution. Im concerned that you are basically making the state of California a de facto sanctuary state, Sen. Jeff Stone (R-Murrieta) told De Leon. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement California lawmakers seek stricter enforcement, more transparency at state toxics control agency By Melanie Mason Jose Gomez, at his home on South Hicks Avenue in East Los Angeles, is among thousands whose yards have been tested for contamination from the former Exide plant. (Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times) Assembly Democrats unveiled a package of five bills Tuesday aimed at reforming the state agency tasked with regulating toxic substances. The Department of Toxic Substances Control has been roundly criticized for its flat-footed response in regulating and cleaning up pollution from the now-closed Exide battery recycling plant in Vernon. A Los Angeles Times review in 2015 found the department knew for years that the plant was violating environmental regulations but was slow to act on it. Too many communities, including communities I represent, have been harmed by toxic emissions that were released into their neighborhoods emissions that could and should have been stopped, Speaker Anthony Rendon (D-Paramount) said in a statement. The goal of this legislative package is a more transparent, accountable, and responsive Department of Toxic Substances Control and safer and healthier communities throughout California. The proposed legislation includes: AB 245 by Assemblyman Jimmy Gomez (D-Los Angeles), which would require hazardous waste facilities to comply with higher financial assurance requirements to make sure there are adequate funds for contamination cleanup. AB 249 (Gomez), which would increase maximum penalties the department can assess to match what the federal government can assess in similar situations. AB 248 by Assemblywoman Eloise Gomez Reyes (D-San Bernardino), which would require hazardous waste facilities to submit permit renewals two years prior to the current permits expiration to avoid lapses. AB 246 by Assemblyman Miguel Santiago (D-Los Angeles), which would promote the use of fence line monitoring by facilities to better detect leaks. AB 247 by Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia (D-Bell Gardens), which would create a statewide task force focused on reducing lead poisoning in the state. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Sen. Dianne Feinstein says she will vote no on Jeff Sessions nomination for U.S. attorney general By Sarah D. Wire California Sen. Dianne Feinstein announced this morning that she will vote no on the nomination of Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions for U.S. attorney general. The statement comes after protestors visited Feinsteins home and office out of concern that she may vote in favor of the nomination. Protesters marched on her home and California offices last night. #CASen https://t.co/U0HhsJxwTB Sarah D. Wire (@sarahdwire) January 31, 2017 JUST NOW: On Sessions attorney general nomination: I must vote no. pic.twitter.com/lfQnX5Khug Sen Dianne Feinstein (@SenFeinstein) January 31, 2017 It is very difficult to reconcile for me the independence and objectivity necessary for the position of attorney general with the partisanship this nominee has demonstrated, Feinstein said Tuesday. We are being asked to determine whether this nominees record demonstrates that he will have the objectivity to enforce the law for all Americans and be an independent attorney general and not an arm of the White House. Feinstein is the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, which votes today on the confirmation of Sessions to be President Trumps attorney general. Feinstein pointed to former acting U.S. Atty. Gen. Sally Yates as an example of what she is looking for. Yates was fired Monday, just hours after she announced that the Justice Department would not defend Trumps controversial executive order banning refugees and travelers from certain countries. Yesterday, early in the evening, we clearly saw what a truly independent attorney general doesI have no confidence that Senator Sessions will do that, Feinstein said. Instead, he has been the fiercest, most dedicated, and most loyal promoter in Congress of the Trump agenda, and has played a critical role as the clearinghouse for policy and philosophy to undergird the implementation of that agenda. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Where do Californias members of Congress stand on President Trumps refugee order? By Sarah D. Wire Noor Hindi, left, and Shah Najjar, middle, join the protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Monday. (Al Seib/Los Angeles Times) President Trumps executive order Friday, which blocked U.S. entry to refugees and nationals of seven Muslim-majority nations, brought thousands of Americans to the nations airports in protest over the weekend. Several Democrats from Californias 54-member congressional delegation joined constituents at airports, and lobbied customs and Border Patrol officials to release the detained visa holders. Many of the states 14 Republican representatives were initially silent on the executive order. Several have since voiced their support, while others were critical of the orders rollout. Heres a look at what each member of the California congressional delegation has said about the executive order: Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print California state Senate passes resolution condemning President Trumps refugee ban By Jazmine Ulloa Protesters are held back by airport police on Sunday at LAX. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) After nearly two hours of debate, the state Senate on Monday passed a resolution that condemned President Trumps executive order banning immigrants and refugees from seven predominantly Muslim countries, calling it discriminatory overreach. Democrats introduced the resolution after the presidents order Friday spurred a weekend of protests and chaos at airports across the country. The resolution denounces Trumps actions and urges the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to comply with federal court orders permitting detainees to have timely access to counsel. It cleared the Senate floor with a 26-11 vote largely along party lines, reflecting the national rift over Trumps immigration order. Two Republican members abstained. On the Senate floor, Democrats called the executive order an affront on religious freedom that panders to fear and foments discrimination, and said it would not further public safety. Reaching to members across the aisle, they said the resolution was not about partisanship or opposing Trump, but about protecting American institutions. In a fiery speech, state Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson (D-Santa Barbara) said the order is unconstitutional and violates fundamental rights. You see this is how we end up with fascism and totalitarianism, she said. Sen. Holly Mitchell (D-Los Angeles) said she did not want four more years of executive orders crafted in the cover of darkness. But Republican members said that President Obama had taken similar actions and that they had a duty to their constituents, who were worried about national security and a vetting process they said did not stop terrorists from entering the nations borders. Obama has rejected comparisons of his policy to Trumps. We do not welcome those who have come here to harm us, Sen. Jim Nielsen (R-Gerber) said, urging a no vote. We cannot ignore contemporary reality. Our enemies do not reside beyond our shores. They are within. The resolution states that 134 million people are temporarily barred from entering or reentering the United States, including nationals with dual citizenship. Hundreds of thousands with visas are also blocked, it says. The resolution also denounces the manner in which the executive order was executed, saying it was not fully vetted by the departments tasked with protecting the nations national security interests. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print State attorneys general met in Florida to strategize on how to counter Trump, Becerra says By Patrick McGreevy California Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra. ((Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times) ) A joint statement by 15 attorneys general over the weekend condemning President Trumps refugee order grew out of a meeting in Florida between California Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra and some of his concerned counterparts, Becerra said Monday. Becerra gathered Thursday in Fort Lauderdale with other attorneys general, including Washington Atty. Gen. Bob Ferguson, to strategize about responding to the Trump administration on various issues. The meeting took place at the annual winter conference of the Democratic Attorneys General Assn. Several of the AGs have been in communication, Becerra said in an interview with The Times. We made it very clear in our joint statement that we are going to do everything we can to make sure that the unlawful, unconstitutional executive orders by the Trump administration dont see the light of day. Officials who signed the joint statement included legal representatives from Washington, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Vermont and Virginia. On Monday, Ferguson announced he was suing Trump over the executive order that suspended refugee entries for 120 days and barred entry to the U.S. for 90 days for those traveling from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Becerra said that he had been in contact with Ferguson and that the option to pursue legal action is under consideration for California. Thats one of many avenues of how we are looking to approach this, Becerra said. As a result of the Florida meeting, Becerra said, the top lawyers from the 15 states are collaborating on how to address various Trump directives. Everyone is doing a little bit of something, he said. Everyones trying to figure out how best to address this. Florida Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi, a Republican, did not attend the meeting, Becerra said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement California warily watches President Trump while pushing forward on climate change By Chris Megerian (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) Its been a decade since California set its first target for slashing greenhouse gas emissions, one of several policies that has made the state an international leader in the fight against global warming. So while President Trump suggests hes going to roll back the countrys environmental regulations, state leaders insist they wont be knocked off track here. This is when you do your best work, said John Laird, secretary of the California Natural Resources Agency. We cant worry about pulling back just to sink with everyone else who isnt moving at all. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Rep. Duncan Hunter urges Trump to make an executive order exemption for Iraqis who aided U.S. military By Sarah D. Wire Reps. Duncan Hunter (R-Alpine) and Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) are asking President Trump to approve waivers to his executive order for Iraqis who helped the American military. Hunter and Kinzinger, who both served in Iraq and Afghanistan, said in the letter to Trump that they supported a request from Defense Secretary James N. Mattis that visa reviews for some Iraqis be fast-tracked. For the safety of these courageous individuals and their families, and in the interest of our national security, its critical that we make this exception and do so swiftly, the congressmen said in a statement. The executive order Trump signed Friday bars all refugee entries for 120 days, blocks Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars for 90 days the entry of citizens from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Somalia. Some of the earliest stories of people caught up in the ban included military interpreters from Iraq who had visas. We respectfully ask that you take this action to ensure these individuals are not put in any further danger. Doing so would send a strong signal to those who show such immense courage to advance U.S. security interests at a risk to their own safety, as well as the many veterans and warfighters whove relied on the service of these individuals for their own protection and to accomplish their objectives, their letter states. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Democrats in the California Legislature move to condemn President Trumps immigration orders Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Assembly Republican leader Chad Mayes voices his misgivings about refugee order By Patrick McGreevy Assembly Minority Leader Chad Mayes (R-Yucca Valley) speaks in the Capitol on Jan. 11. (Rich Pedroncelli / AP) Assembly Republican Leader Chad Mayes of Yucca Valley on Monday joined a number of GOP politicians who are voicing misgivings about President Trumps order temporarily barring refugees from some majority-Muslim countries from entering the country. Religious liberty is a core value of our nation. My ancestors immigrated to America to flee religious persecution, Mayes said in a statement. While bolstering our national security is important, when forced to decide between security and liberty, I will always side with liberty. He is concerned about them [the orders], said Matt Mahon, a spokesman for the assemblyman. Trumps directives suspended refugee entries for 120 days and barred entry to the U.S. for 90 days for those traveling from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Rep. Zoe Lofgren and other ranking Democrats demand emergency meeting on refugee ban By Sarah D. Wire After two days of protests across the country over President Trumps order Friday banning refugees from seven countries, Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-San Jose) and the ranking Democrats of three committees that oversee immigration issues are demanding a meeting with President Trumps new Homeland Security secretary, John F. Kelly. The move by Trump prevented green card and visa holders from reentering the country, and led to the detention of more than a hundred people landing at U.S. airports with valid entry documents. Late Saturday, a federal judge in New York issued a temporary stay against the deportation of anyone who had arrived with a valid visa. The letter demanding the meeting, signed by Lofgren, Judiciary Committee ranking member John Conyers (D-Mich.), Homeland Security Committee ranking member Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and Foreign Affairs Committee ranking member Elliot Engel (D-N.Y.), calls for it be scheduled by the close of business Wednesday. The Democrats also ask for more information about how the order is being implemented, whether the stays placed by federal judges over the weekend are being followed and whether green card holders are affected. Only two days after the order was signed it is clear that it has already led to panic and disorder, not to mention protests, the letter states. This is apparently due in part to the lack of internal administration review prior to its issuance as well as a lack of clarity and guidance provided thereafter. Lofgren, a former immigration attorney and the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committees Immigration Subcommittee, also plans to file legislation today to rescind the executive order. Getting such legislation through the House could be difficult with Speaker Paul Ryan supporting the executive order. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) is proposing similar legislation in the Senate. House and Senate Democrats plan to hold a rally against the order outside the Supreme Court Monday evening. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement As California Democrats blast Trumps refugee order, Republicans in the congressional delegation hold their fire By Sarah D. Wire Only a few of the states 14 Republican representatives have publicly commented on an executive order signed by President Trump on Friday that barred refugees and green card holders from seven countries from entering the U.S. Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Tulare) released a statement Sunday night saying some tweaks are needed, but his background as chairman of the House Select Intelligence Committee leads him to support the executive order. In light of attempts by jihadist groups to infiltrate fighters into refugee flows to the West, along with Europes tragic experience coping with this problem, the Trump administrations executive order on refugees is a common-sense security measure to prevent terror attacks on the homeland. While accommodations should be made for green card holders and those whove assisted the U.S. armed forces, this is a useful temporary measure on seven nations of concern until we can verify who is entering the United States, he said. Rep. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton) told the Washington Post that pausing the intake of refugees from terror hotspots is the right call to keep America safe, but he hopes the cases of people traveling on visas who were prevented from reentering the country are resolved quickly. Rep. Jeff Denham (R-Turlock) said on Twitter on Sunday that the rollout has created confusion, and that executive orders arent the way to fix the countrys long-term problems. View Twitter post View Twitter post Several of Californias 38 Democratic congressional representatives and the states two senators were out in force over the weekend demanding the release of refugees and green card holders, and an end to the executive order. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) announced two pieces of legislation shell file in response. One would immediately rescind the presidents order. The second would limit executive authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act to prevent a president from unilaterally banning groups of immigrants. Its clear that the president gave little consideration to the chaos and heartbreak that would result from this order, she said in a statement. Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) joined protesters outside the White House Sunday afternoon. We will fight against racism. We will fight against anti-Muslim rhetoric. We will fight against those who will marginalize who we are. pic.twitter.com/R54f3MDhvo Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) January 29, 2017 In Los Angeles, Reps. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) and Ted Lieu (D-Torrance) joined protesters at Los Angeles International Airport. On Saturday, Reps. Judy Chu (D-Monterey Park), Nanette Barragan (D-San Pedro) and Lou Correa (D-Santa Ana) joined the initial protests at the airport, and worked to get some of those being held released. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin) accompanied protesters at San Francisco International Airport Sunday. Congresswoman @MaxineWaters is here at LAX protest leading the crowd in the chant "no ban, no wall, you build it up we'll tear it down" pic.twitter.com/iNEmkVVkmW Javier Panzar (@jpanzar) January 29, 2017 2:31 p.m. Jan. 30: This post was updated to clarify Rep. Ed Royces statement about the executive order. It was originally published Jan. 29. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print State Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra condemns Trumps refugee order and explores challenge By Patrick McGreevy Assyrian Christians, who fled unrest in Syria and Iraq, attend Mass at St. Georges Assyrian Church in Jdeideh, Lebanon. Trumps directive provides an exception for religious minorities. ( (AFP/Getty Images)) California state Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra on Saturday condemned an executive order by President Donald Trump barring people from some Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. and said he is consulting with legal advisors over a way to challenge the directive. Trump has suspended all refugee entries for 120 days and barred entry to the U.S. for 90 days for those traveling from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Justice in America doesnt live or die on the stroke of one mans pen regardless of how high his office, Becerra said in a statement late Saturday, less than a week after taking office. The Trump Administrations anti-religion, anti-refugee executive order is in so many ways unjust and anti-American He said the order discriminates against people based on their faith and denies entry to those with fears of death and persecution. I have conferred with my team, and we are reaching out to others as well, to find every avenue possible to defend our family members and those who live permanently in our communities who may be barred from re-entry into America, Becerra said. The Trump executive order should not stand and must be confronted as a constitutional overreach, he added. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement California Politics Podcast: Reactions to President Trumps first week By John Myers Even before the weekend controversy and protests, Californias top elected officials spent much of the last week reacting to the first moves by President Donald Trump. On this weeks California Politics Podcast, we take a closer look at the sharp words offered by Gov. Jerry Brown in his State of the State speech when it comes to the new politics of Washington. We also focus much of this weeks discussion around three big topics that caught the attention of a number of California lawmakers: immigration moves by Trump; the rough week that was for the nations environmental protection enforcers; and rekindled but unproven allegations of widespread voter fraud. Im joined by Marisa Lagos of KQED News and Anthony York of the Grizzly Bear Project. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Gov. Jerry Brown will undergo new round of treatment for prostate cancer, but wont miss any work By John Myers Gov. Jerry Brown, who first was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2012, will begin a new round of treatment for the disease, his office reported on Saturday. Brown, 78, will maintain his duties as governor during the treatment, according to his staff. No additional details were provided about how long the treatment will take, or what prompted its timing. Fortunately this is not extensive disease, can be readily treated with a short course of radiotherapy, and there are not expected to be any significant side effects, said Dr. Eric Small, a UC San Francisco oncologist, in an emailed statement provided to reporters. The prognosis for Gov. Brown is excellent. Brown initially learned he had prostate cancer in late 2012 and underwent similar treatment for several weeks. The governor has also been treated for basal cell carcinoma a type of skin cancer twice in the past nine years, with reconstructive surgery on the right side of his nose in 2011. With almost two years remaining on his final term in office, Brown is already the oldest governor in California history. He often made a point of pointing out his physical fitness in his return to the job in 2011, including a 2012 challenge to New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie of a 3-mile race, a push-up contest and a chin-up contest. Though hes been treated in San Francisco, the governor and First Lady Anne Gust Brown now live full-time in the historic governors mansion in Sacramento after moving out of Oakland last year. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra takes a jab at the Trump administration when asked about the battles to come Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Proposed law would make penalties for using fake immigration papers the same as those for using fake drivers license By Jazmine Ulloa A proposed California law seeks to ensure that a person who uses false documents to conceal their citizenship status faces the same punishment as a person who uses a fake drivers license. The legislation by Assemblyman Raul Bocanegra (D-Pacoima) would amend the penal code to make both crimes wobblers, meaning prosecutors would have the discretion to charge suspects in such cases with either felony offenses or lower-level misdemeanors. Under the proposal, the repercussions for defendants would be the same: If convicted of a misdemeanor, offenders would have to serve up to one year in county jail, while a felony conviction would mean up to 16 months in county jail, or two or three years in prison. A spokesman for Bocangera said the measure was introduced as a proactive response to President Trumps hard-line stance on immigration and would reverse part of Proposition 187, a controversial ballot measure to deny public services, such as education and healthcare, to immigrants in the country illegally. The proposition, approved by voters in 1994, requires any person who uses false immigration records to face felony charges. Bocangeras bill amending those provisions would need a two-thirds vote in the Assembly and the state Senate to pass. Today, if an underage college student uses a fake ID to purchase a six-pack of beer, he or she can be charged with a misdemeanor, Bocanegra said in a statement. However, if an immigrant is caught using that same fake ID, he or she is automatically charged with a felony and is subject to five years in prison. This is fundamentally unfair. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Fearing catastrophe, Californias Gov. Jerry Brown wants the worlds leaders to stop goofing off By Chris Megerian Gov. Jerry Brown pointedly criticized world leaders for goofing off instead of addressing looming problems with climate change and nuclear weapons during a radio interview on Friday. Theyre really averting their gaze, he said. And that is dangerous, very dangerous. Brown has become increasingly outspoken about issues he describes as existential threats to humanity, and the election of Donald Trump has only made him more concerned. During the interview, he spoke in sweeping terms about the need to support scientific research in the face of political denial. Darkness cannot totally extinguish the light, Brown said while criticizing Republicans for refusing to accept the scientific consensus around climate change and the need for dramatic changes to confront global warming. @JerryBrownGov in our studio (in fact, in my chair!) as he chats w/ Ira Flatow on @scifri pic.twitter.com/kIyGBFQW9X Beth Ruyak (@CapRadioRuyak) January 27, 2017 At another point, Brown mused that humans have accumulated vast power without a corresponding increase in wisdom. That creates a gap between the power to destroy and the wisdom to control those destructive forces. Brown reiterated his plan to push forward Californias policies on climate change even if Trump follows through on the federal governments plans. Were going to do everything we can to stay on track, he said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Some California lawmakers say its time to expand how the state defines violent crime By Jazmine Ulloa As California undergoes the largest overhaul of prison parole in a generation, some lawmakers and law enforcement officials say its time to revisit how the state legally defines a violent crime. Gov. Jerry Browns Proposition 57, which voters overwhelmingly approved in November, continues a statewide effort to increase rehabilitation services and decrease the prison population. Among its provisions, the initiative gives the state parole board greater latitude to consider the early release of prisoners who have served their primary sentences, and whose crimes are not designated as violent under the California penal code. But since the early days of the ballot measure campaign, debate has brewed over just who the law will benefit, with prosecutors saying that short and porous list excludes certain rape crimes and other dangerous offenses. This legislative session, the discussion moves to the Capitol. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Fearing deletion, Tom Steyer copies Environmental Protection Agency website on climate change By Chris Megerian (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) With President Trump in the White House, information about climate change has been disappearing from government websites. Some fear the same thing could happen with the Environmental Protection Agency. Now the advocacy organization run by environmentalist and political donor Tom Steyer is taking steps to preserve the information. We will not allow Trump and the oil corporations to push us towards an Orwellian world full of official lies and misinformation. Tom Steyer (@TomSteyer) January 27, 2017 NextGen Climate copied the website and made it available at SaveOurEPA.com. As Americans, we will not allow Donald Trump to erase the truth or rewrite history, Steyer said in a statement. This information belongs to the people, and the public has a right to know the truth. Trump has taken other steps that have alarmed environmentalists. For example, he greenlighted two oil pipelines that had been stopped by former President Obama. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print For California, a return to center stage in the 2020 presidential contest By Mark Z. Barabak (Jose Luis Magana / Associated Press) Kamala Harris hadnt even arrived in Washington to take up her job as Californias spanking-new U.S. senator when the chatter began: Kamala for president! Never mind her disavowals Seriously? or the fact that the first balloting of the 2020 race is, at a minimum, 1,000-plus days away. The soul-sapping election of Donald Trump has Democrats desperately looking far, far down the road. Usually the candidates start sending signals, said Jim Demers, a longtime party strategist in New Hampshire, the state that traditionally holds the first presidential primary. This time Im hearing activists begging for the race to begin. With a wide-open contest (read: not a Clinton or Obama in sight), the list of would-be contenders, real and imagined, is lengthy, even by the prodigious standards of this early stage. Whats different in 2020 is that California huge in population, mighty in economic power, desperate to matter in presidential politics figures to be at the center of speculation in a way it hasnt for a generation. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Theres a major fight on the way over Trumps plans for sanctuary cities By Liam Dillon Immigrant workers marching in Los Angeles in 2014. (Glenn Koenig / Los Angeles Times) Cities in California are gearing up for a legal fight against President Trumps plans to take away federal dollars from so-called sanctuary cities. These cities typically are defined as those that dont cooperate with federal immigration officials for deportation purposes, and the new president wants to strip them of funding unless they start doing so. But the language in Trumps executive order on the issue is vague, and San Francisco officials believe their city is already exempt from the mandate. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Fighting Trumps border wall on environmental grounds probably wont win in court By Liam Dillon A pair of fences separates Mexico, left, and the U.S. south of San Diego. (Bill Wechter / AFP) California political leaders are seeking all sorts of strategies to fight President Trumps plans to build a wall along the border with Mexico. One strategy thats likely to fail is a lawsuit based on state and federal environmental laws, legal experts said. Congress already has given the federal government broad authority to waive environmental laws to build a border fence and the courts have upheld that power. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Calexit organizers can now start collecting signatures to get California secession on the ballot By Christine Mai-Duc Supporters of the campaign for California to secede from the United States can now begin collecting the hundreds of thousands of signatures they need to get a proposed Calexit initiative on the ballot. California Secretary of State Alex Padilla cleared the proposed initiative to begin collecting signatures on Thursday. If the measure gets on the ballot and gains approval by a majority of voters, it would repeal clauses in the California Constitution stating that the state is an inseparable part of the United States and that the U.S. Constitution is the supreme law of the land, according to the title and summary prepared by the state attorney generals office. The measure would place another question on the ballot in 2019, asking whether California should become a separate country. If at least half of registered voters participate in that vote, with at least 55% of those voting to approve, the results would be treated as Californias declaration of independence. The current measures fiscal effect is dependent on various factors, writes the states nonpartisan legislative analyst, and if it succeeds would result in major, but unknown budgetary impacts. The proposals backers, known as Yes California, have argued that the state is culturally out of step with the rest of the U.S. and that California pays more money to the federal government than it receives in spending. The election of President Trump has only strengthened their argument, they say. California loses [by] being a part of America culturally and financially, said Marcus Ruiz Evans, one of the groups founders. It could be a nation all its own, everybody knows that. The only question is if they want to break off. Its unclear how the group will collect the required 585,407 valid signatures from registered voters over the next 180 days to qualify for the ballot. A campaign committee, Yes California Independence Committee, has raised no funds so far, according to records from the secretary of state. But Evans says that his group has more than 7,000 volunteers (significantly down from a 13,000 estimate in December) ready to gather signatures and that voters can expect to see signature gatherers on the streets in the next couple of days. Yes California says that even if the proposed initiative does land on the ballot and voters approve it, such an unprecedented move to secede would need to receive approval of at least a majority of the states in the union, among other legal hurdles. Evans says hes not fazed. America already hates California, and America votes on emotions, he said. I think wed have the votes today if we held it. UPDATE 7:01 p.m.: This post has been updated to clarify that the proposed initiative would place a future vote on Californias secession on the ballot in 2019. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Rep. Ted Lieu is trolling Donald Trump, and he hopes youre watching By Sarah D. Wire Rep. Ted Lieu is now placing an asterisk next to President Trumps name in news releases. Its the Torrance Democrats way of drawing attention to his concerns about the new administration, he said. Sometimes the best way to respond to crazy is with satire, Lieu said. Never before have I had this feeling where our leader is potentially unhinged and has a problem with the truth, and that is highly disturbing for the leader of the free world. So Ive decided Im just going to point that out as much as I can. The asterisk leads readers to the bottom of the email, where a postscript says: ***In addition to losing the popular vote, Trump as of January 20, 2017 is in violation of the Emoluments Clause set forth in Article I, Section 9 of the U.S. Constitution due to massive conflicts of interests and his refusal to put his global business holdings in blind trusts. Trump also benefitted from Vladimir Putin ordering a multifaceted and brazen Russian influence and cyber hacking campaign with the goals of undermining faith in the U.S. democratic process, denigrating Secretary Clintons electability, and helping Trumps election chances. Trump and his press secretary also routinely make stuff up. The sophomore congressman said he initially planned to give Trump the benefit of the doubt, hoping his rhetoric was a campaign tactic and that he would pivot to uniting the country following the election. Then Lieu listened to the presidents inaugural speech. I was hoping he would govern different than how he campaigned, he said. I came to the conclusion that it would be worse for America to normalize him. Lieu followed the addition to his news releases with a Cloud of Illegitimacy Clock that counts the time since Trumps swearing-in, which is how long Lieu says Trump has been in violation of the Constitution by not divesting from his businesses or putting them in a blind trust. The Constitution bans government officials from receiving gifts or payments from foreign governments. Next he posted a series of tweets mocking White House spokesman Sean Spicer for giving incorrect figures on how many people attended the inauguration, and top Trump aide Kellyanne Conway for using the term alternative facts. Was charged $2.99 for coffee listed at $2.59. That's why I have trust issues. Oh, and the fact that @seanspicer at #WhiteHouse makes shit up Ted Lieu (@tedlieu) January 23, 2017 Ive decided that the administration using alternative facts is more profane than anything that I could say, he said. When the administration lies, they just need to be called out on that. If they are going to lie about stupid little things, like crowd size, imagine what theyre going to say when they roll out their healthcare plan, whenever that might be. Lieu has needled Trump in responses to several executive orders this week, including by saying he would bet a nice bottle of California wine that the Administration will be unable to find a credible witness to testify under oath to the allegation that 3-5 million people illegally cast votes in 2016, and by mentioning the inauguration crowd while talking about Trumps proposed border wall. Lieu said hes absolutely hoping Trump will respond. I think satire is an effective way to highlight issues, and I want the American people to see who this president really is, because in 22 months they get to vote again on every member of Congress, and that will be a referendum on Donald Trump, Lieu said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print California Democrats propose adding third, nonbinary gender option for drivers licenses and other official documents By Melanie Mason View Twitter post California drivers licenses and birth certificates could have a third option for gender in addition to male or female under legislation unveiled Thursday by Democratic lawmakers. The bill by state Sens. Toni Atkins (D-San Diego) and Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) would establish a new nonbinary gender marker for official state documents. Lawmakers framed the measure as an expansion of rights for transgender, intersex and other people who do not identify as male or female. It will keep California at the forefront of LGBTQ civil rights, Atkins said at a Capitol news conference. The bill, SB 179, also would streamline the process for people to change their gender on such documents. It would remove the requirement that an individual obtain a sworn statement from a physician certifying medical treatment for gender transition. It also would create a process for people younger than 18 to apply for a change of gender on their birth certificate. Jo Michael, of Equality California, a gay rights advocacy group, said the bill had personal resonance. Michael identifies as transgender and nonbinary. For the first time, Californians like me could have accurate gender markers that truly reflect who we are, Michael said. Wiener said the proposal places California in stark relief to other states in the country, including North Carolina, where a high-profile law regulating transgender peoples use of public bathrooms roiled the state. As the LGBT community but especially the trans community is under assault in this country, California needs to go in the opposite direction and embrace the trans community and support the trans community and modernize these laws, he said. The legislation does not specify what the alternate gender marker would be, but other countries that have implemented such a policy, such as Australia and New Zealand, have used the letter X alongside M for male and F for female, according to Sasha Buchert of the Transgender Law Center. Atkins, who is a lesbian and a member of the California Legislative LGBT Caucus, said this proposal marks an evolution for her in better understanding the concerns of the transgender and intersex community. She authored a law in 2014 that ensures death certificates reflect a persons gender identity, an experience she said made her more aware of the bureaucratic hurdles that transgender people often face. This years bill, she said, is moving us forward into a new world, where acceptance is ... letting people be who they tell you they are. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Former U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric Holder will visit Sacramento to meet with Democratic legislators next month By Melanie Mason (Carolyn Kaster / Associated Press) California lawmakers will have a chance to meet the Legislatures new outside counsel on Feb. 7, when former U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. travels to the state to address Senate and Assembly Democrats. Holder, leading a team of attorneys from the firm Covington & Burling, has been hired by Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon (D-Los Angeles) and Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon (D-Paramount) to serve as outside counsel as the state prepares a legal strategy to deal with the administration of President Trump. But Senate and Assembly staff officials said his invitation to meet with lawmakers was extended prior to the contract, which begins in February, and that Holder is making the trip on his own personal time. His travel and accommodations expenses will not be paid with state funds, and his appearances will not be part of his billable hours, they said. Holder will address Senate Democrats at their annual policy retreat, and will speak to the Assembly Democratic caucus. His visit comes soon after state Democratic leaders this week denounced Trumps executive orders on immigration and pledged to take his administration to court should other legislative means of resistance fail. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement A guide to the guessing game that is the 2018 California governors race By Phil Willon While the race to succeed Gov. Jerry Brown already has attracted a small cadre of well-known Democrats, the behind-the-scenes strategizing, cajoling and guessing games surrounding a handful of other potential contenders could create havoc in whats expected to be Californias biggest political showdown since 2010. Among those watching closely are the candidates already definitely in the running, including Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and state Treasurer John Chiang. Delaine Eastin, who spent eight years as Californias top education official, announced she was running in November and officially launched her campaign and fundraising operation on Thursday. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print This is not a monarchy: California Senate leader Kevin de Leon bashes Trumps immigration orders By Jazmine Ulloa (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) California Senate leader Kevin de Leon took another shot at President Trump and his executive orders on immigration Wednesday night, calling his threat to withhold federal dollars from so-called sanctuary cities political blackmail and political vengeance. In an interview on the MSNBC show The Last Word with Lawrence ODonnell, De Leon said California was working with former U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. to study all of its legal options to oppose the directives. Under the 10th Amendment, the state Senate leader said, the federal government cannot commandeer and force local municipalities and police agencies from carrying out their work. The appearance came hours after Trump signed orders to temporarily halt the U.S. refugee program, cut funding for cities that offer immigrants protections and order federal officials to construct a U.S.-Mexico border wall. California will not become a cog in the Trump deportation machine, De Leon said. This is not a monarchy, and I know he fancies himself as a king, but this is a republic. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print President Trumps voter fraud allegation is a lie, says Californias top elections officer By John Myers Secretary of State Alex Padilla. (Damian Dovarganes/Associated Press) With President Donald Trump rehashing last years accusation of widespread voter fraud in California and elsewhere, the states top elections official is also restating his take: Its not true. When the president says millions of illegal ballots are cast, thats simply not the case, said Secretary of State Alex Padilla in an interview on CNN Wednesday. Its a lie. As was the case when Trump made the accusation in November, theres no evidence of such a broad attempt to sway the outcome in California. The president lost the Golden State to Democrat Hillary Clinton by almost 4.3 million votes. Trumps announcement on Wednesday of a major investigation into voter fraud reignited the issue, even though there was also Republican skepticism in the wake of the new round of accusations. Is it a question of millions of people? Thats a pretty steep hill to climb, said Assemblyman Matthew Harper (R-Huntington Beach), the vice chairman of the Assemblys elections committee. Youd have to have a very strong coordinated effort across California to pull that off. Harper said he believes the better discussion is whether new, independent audit capabilities need to be in place to examine election results. Others, though, were sharply critical of the presidents motives. Allegations of widespread voter fraud are not just alternative facts, they are a calculated and sinister attempt at voter suppression that takes a page from this nations bleak history of segregation, said Laphonza Butler, president of the state council of the Service Employees International Union. In the CNN interview, Padilla said he worried the president was sowing doubt in an effort to legitimize efforts such as a purging of voter rolls. I hope that its not a sign of things to come, he said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Intelligence committee led by Californians investigating Russian influence in 2016 election By Sarah D. Wire The House Select Intelligence Committee is examining allegations that the Russian government tried to influence the 2016 election, Republican Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes and ranking Democrat Rep. Adam Schiff said in a statement Wednesday. The two Californians said the committee is looking at Russian cyber activity and other active measures directed against the U.S. It also will examine links between Russia and people working for political campaigns as well as the federal response to Russia, including leaks of classified assessments from the intelligence community. The statement does not specifically mention President Trump, the assessment of the U.S. intelligence community that Russia attempted to intervene in the presidential election to ensure he would win or news that Trumps national security advisor was in frequent contact with the Russian ambassador as President Obama was considering sanctions against Russia. This issue is not about party, but about country. The Committee will continue to follow the facts wherever they may lead, the statement said. The Senate Intelligence Committee, on which Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) serves, also is investigating Russian interference in the election, and the U.S. response. Two Republican senators have joined a number of House and Senate Democrats, including House Select Intelligence Committee member Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin) in pushing for a nonpartisan independent commission to examine the issue. Nunes, who served on Trumps transition committee, has previously said he doesnt think an independent commission is necessary. The statement also asked the new, Trump-appointed heads of intelligence agencies to bring documents requested by the committee directly to committee members. It will not be adequate to review these documents, expected to be in the thousands of pages, at the agencies. They should be delivered to the House Intelligence Committee to provide members adequate time to examine their content, it states. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print No stamp, no problem: Lawmaker says postage-paid ballots should be available to all Californians By John Myers (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) California voters would no longer have to scrounge around in search of a stamp to mail in their ballot under new legislation introduced this week at the state Capitol. We want to make sure voters dont have any barriers, said Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher (D-San Diego), the bills author. Ballot envelopes sent by elections officials would be marked as prepaid postage and the postage costs would be paid for by individual counties. A key question will be the cost for mailing in as many as 10 million ballots statewide. Not all ballots will weigh the same, given the numerous city and county measures that also are considered in regularly scheduled elections. The initial language of Assembly Bill 216 doesnt offer specifics on reimbursing counties, though Gonzalez Fletcher said she expects the proposals ultimate cost could be under $2 million, if the law also makes clear that voters can still place a stamp on their ballot. Regardless, postage fees are likely to be deemed a mandated cost that state government must cover. Gonzalez Fletcher said the advent of email and online bill-paying services have meant that fewer voters have stamps readily available, with busy working Californians scrambling just to find the time to exercise their right to vote. It starts to feel like a very small poll tax, she said. The proposal is another example of the steady evolution of elections conducted less by the ballot box than the mailbox in California, as more than half of all registered voters now permanently receive absentee ballots. A number of the states most populous counties are expected to soon embrace a sweeping new law shifting elections away from neighborhood polling places and toward a substantial number of votes being cast by mail. This is welcome legislation, said Kim Alexander, president of the nonpartisan California Voter Foundation. Requiring voters to pay for ballot postage sends a message that the government is putting up obstacles to make it more difficult to vote. In many cases, ballots placed in the mail without proper postage are already being delivered by the U.S. Postal Service. Some counties in California have offered prepaid postage in the past, but the vast majority have not. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement California improves grades from anti-smoking group with barrage of anti-tobacco laws By Patrick McGreevy California led other states in adopting a flurry of new laws restricting tobacco products last year, resulting in a big improvement in the states grades from the American Lung Assn. In a report released Wednesday, the health group boosted the states grade for the level of tobacco taxes from an F last year to a B, in recognition that California voters in November approved a $2-per-pack increase in the cigarette tax. The Legislature last year also adopted a half-dozen new laws, including an increase in the minimum age for smoking from 18 to 21 and an expansion of a smoking ban in public places, including restaurants and theaters, to also include use of electronic cigarettes. The states grade for smoke-free air policies rose from a B to an A, while California received a B for restricting tobacco to young people. The group gave the state an incomplete for funding of tobacco prevention programs because officials have not yet started collecting money from the tobacco tax increase in Proposition 56. In 2016, Californians fought back against Big Tobaccos grip on our state, said David Pogue, chairman of the American Lung Assn. in Californias governing board. Tobacco-related illnesses remain the single most preventable cause of disease and death in California, and were proud to reaffirm ourselves as a national leader in the effort to reduce smoking rates and exposure to secondhand smoke and to protect our children from a lifetime of addiction. The group cited the lack of significant new tobacco laws passed in Los Angeles for its decision to leave the citys C grade unchanged. El Monte and West Hollywood passed some new tobacco policies and raised their grades. Santa Ana earned a C, but was at top of the list in Orange County, where almost all the other cities received Fs, officials said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Sen. Kamala Harris pushes Trumps budget director pick on timely disaster relief By Sarah D. Wire Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) pushed President Trumps budget chief pick Tuesday on whether hed advise the new Republican leader to offer timely disaster relief, especially to states like California that face earthquakes, fires, floods and other natural disasters. Can you assure me that when natural disasters hit various parts of the country like California, that you will be willing to put the immediate interests of people in need as the first priority for you, or will you insist that the budget cuts be made before agreeing to provide critical assistance to those victims? Harris asked Rep. Mick Mulvaney during a confirmation hearing Tuesday. The South Carolina Republican asked for spending cuts to offset billions in relief funding after Hurricane Sandy hit the East Coast. There is a proper federal role in dealing with natural disaster relief, Mulvaney said in response to Harris questioning. Sandy is a tremendous example of something so large, its simply too large for one state or local government to deal with, it is an appropriate function of the federal government. Harris pushed a second time, So can you assure me that if a natural disaster hits other states, like California for example, that you will not hold up relief for the state, waiting to determine whether there are going to be budget cuts or cuts in order to provide that relief? Or are you going to sit back and crunch the numbers while people are waiting for help? Mulvaney replied, No, I see my role in that particular circumstance as advising the president. Mr. President, heres what weve done it in the past, heres how it worked out, heres how I think we should proceed in this circumstance and heres why. And then whatever the president says to do, I will enforce. Harris is still weighing how to vote on Mulvaneys confirmation, her staff said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Trump is a hot topic in Californias race for governor, but not in a good way By Phil Willon Donald Trump at the California Republican Party convention in Burlingame in April. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) One of the most talked about politicians in Californias 2018 governors campaign isnt even running. Rarely does a day go by when Republican President Donald Trump isnt used as a political pinata by one of the top Democrats in the race. Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom took some jabs Tuesday when he addressed the California Legislature before Gov. Jerry Browns annual State of the State speech. Newsom mocked the Trump administration for its reliance on alternative facts a phrase used by a Trump senior advisor when defending inflated inauguration crowd figures and took a subtle shot at the presidents comment about American carnage in the nations cities. The insecurity of this man is near incomprehensible. These lies damage our democracy & country's reputation-Shameful https://t.co/ib7i6DqfH8 Gavin Newsom (@GavinNewsom) January 24, 2017 On Monday, state Treasurer John Chiang criticized Trump for doubting the scientific evidence of climate change. President Trump may believe global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing noncompetitive, Chiang said. We Californians stand with the scientific community and the 195 nations that have declared climate change is an urgent and potentially irreversible threat to human societies and the planet. When Antonio Villaraigosa announced his bid for governor right after the general election, the former Los Angeles mayor was sure to include a dig at Trump. Im running because I think the answer to the divisiveness we see in the country right now is unity, and the answer to fear is hope, he said. Last May, Villaraigosa compared Trump to segregationist George Wallace. Californias former superintendent of public instruction, Delaine Eastin, last week ripped Trump for nominating Betsy DeVos for Education secretary. Eastin said DeVos, a charter school advocate and Republican fundraiser from Michigan, was a threat to public education in the country. In speeches, in fundraising emails, in tweets and Facebook posts, the Democrats have liberally excoriated Trump while largely avoiding lobbing any criticism at one another. Its a safe and easy tactic that appeals to a sizeable majority of voters in left-leaning California. In the November election, Trump was trounced by Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in California losing to her by more than 4.2 million votes. San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, a Republican being urged to run by fellow party members, has also rebuked Trump in the past. In May, Faulconer said he rejected Trumps divisive rhetoric about women and immigrants. Faulconer was absent at Trumps inauguration and skipped a Trump campaign rally in San Diego last spring. For any Republican to have a legitimate shot in the governors race, or any statewide election, the more distance they put between themselves and Trump the better, said GOP political consultant Rob Stutzman. Its important that youre not on the record gushing about Trump, Stutzman said. 3:30 p.m.: This story was updated to correct the title of Delaine Eastin. She is a former state superintendent of public instruction. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Californias House members vote along party lines on permanently banning federal funds for abortion By Sarah D. Wire Californias House delegation split along party lines Tuesday on a bill to permanently prohibit the use of certain federal funds for abortions. President Trump promised the anti-abortion community during the campaign that he would make the funding ban commonly called the Hyde Amendment permanent. It passed the House 238-183 and goes next to the Senate. The 52 members who represent California in the House split along party lines, with 36 Democrats against for it, and 14 Republicans voting for it. Reps. Ted Lieu (D-Torrance) and Jim Costa (D-Lieu) did not vote. Their staffs each said the member would have joined Democrats in voting against the measure. If passed by the Senate, it would permanently prohibit federal funding from being used to cover abortion costs except in cases of rape, incest or if the mothers life is in danger. It effects government employees health plans, Medicaid and health insurance plans offered under the Affordable Care Act. The amendment has been added to the annual appropriations bill for the past 40 years and the bill approved by the House Tuesday would make it permanent. During debate on the House floor Rep. Judy Chu (D-Monterey Park) called the bill a womens health catastrophe that will keep poor women on Medicaid or the Affordable Care Act from having access to insurance. In effect it makes abortion only an option for the wealthy, she said. Previous versions of the bill twice passed the House but were not considered by the Senate while President Obama was in office. 11:09 a.m. Jan. 25: An earlier version of this article reported that Democrats voted for the bill and Republicans voted against the bill. It was the opposite. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print California lawmakers to weigh whether younger children should be allowed to testify in custody cases By Jazmine Ulloa California lawmakers will weigh whether family courts should allow children as young as 10 to testify before judges regarding parent custody or visitation rights. A bill filed by state Sen. Connie Leyva (D-Chino) would lower the current threshold from age 14 to enable more children to express their wishes in court, some of whom she said could find themselves in life-threatening situations. The legislation was co-sponsored by the California Protective Parents Assn. and the Center for Judicial Excellence. Neither current law nor the bill would require children to testify in family cases unless they choose to. In a statement, Levya called the proposal an important child safety measure. As a family court makes critical life decisions for children, it makes sense for them to be granted a greater voice in court proceedings since they can contribute essential information before final decisions are made, she said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Support for California secession is up, one poll says By Phil Willon Students from several high schools rally at City Hall in downtown Los Angeles on Nov. 14 after walking out of class to protest the election of Donald Trump. (Reed Saxon / Associated Press) Californians support for a breakaway California republic has increased, one poll has found. One-third of state residents support peacefully seceding from the United States, up from 20% since Californians were last asked the same question in 2014, according to a new Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll. The polls margin of error for the California answers was plus or minus 5 percentage points. Still, half of Californians opposed the idea of succession, though Democrats were more inclined to support it than Republicans. The survey found that 60% of Republicans gave the idea of peacefully seceding a thumbs down compared with 48% of Democrats and 50% of independents. Nationally, 22% of those polled supported having their state break away from the U.S., according to the survey. A Calexit campaign already is underway to make California an independent nation. The effort faces extremely long odds. The poll surveyed 14,000 adults nationwide, and 500 in California, from Dec. 6 to Jan. 19. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Gov. Jerry Brown defiantly tells lawmakers California is not turning back in face of Trump and GOP proposals By John Myers Gov. Jerry Brown used his State of the State speech on Tuesday to promise a forceful defense of Californias efforts on climate change, healthcare and assistance to those in the country illegally against new proposals by President Donald Trump and national Republican leadership. California is not turning back, Brown said to applause. Not now, not ever. The governors remarks, delivered in front of lawmakers and state elected officials in the Assembly chambers, came just four days after President Trumps forceful inaugural address that signaled a dramatic new course for the federal government. While he never mentioned the president by name during the 16-minute speech, Brown said there are disturbing signs as to whats on the horizon. We have seen the bald assertion of alternative facts, whatever those are, he said, a reference to top Trump advisor Kellyanne Conways weekend comments on NBCs Meet the Press. We have heard the blatant attacks on science. Familiar signposts of our democracy truth, civility, working together have been obscured or swept aside. The annual event in the chamber of the state Assembly was unusual from the outset. Just minutes before beginning his speech, Brown gave the oath of office to Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra, the former Los Angeles congressman confirmed to the post on Monday afternoon by the state Senate. Legislators have had a decidedly unusual start to their new two-year session. After a raucous opening day in December that laid bare wounds from the presidential race, lawmakers were presented two weeks ago with Browns projection of a $1.6-billion budget deficit looming on the states fiscal horizon. But the sea change in national politics has been a persistent buzz in the state Capitol, and Brown promised a strong defense of Californias unique view on major policy issues. The governor made a special mention of the issue of illegal immigration, offering perhaps his strongest words to date. Let me be clear, the governor said, his voice rising. We will defend everybody every man, woman and child who has come here for a better life and has contributed to the well-being of our state. Even with those critiques, the governor veered from his prepared remarks to praise Trumps call for a new focus on infrastructure projects. I say, Amen to that, man! he said. And Brown urged members of the Legislature to reject the bitter partisan divisions of this moment in the nations history. Democrats are in the majority, but Republicans represent real Californians, too, he said to bipartisan applause. We have generally been civil to one another and avoided the rancor of Washington. I urge you to go even further and look for new ways to work beyond party and act as Californians first. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Xavier Becerra takes oath of office, is first Latino to become California attorney general By Patrick McGreevy Xavier Becerra ((Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press) ) Minutes after resigning his seat in Congress on Tuesday, Xavier Becerra took the oath of office as Californias new attorney general, and he immediately made plans for a sit-down with sheriffs from throughout the state to talk about law enforcement issues. Becerra, 58, was given the oath of office at the Capitol by Gov. Jerry Brown, who predicted earlier that Xavier will be a champion for all Californians. The ceremony was held before Brown was scheduled to deliver his annual State of the State address, and a day after Becerra received final confirmation by the state Senate. I will do my utmost to uphold your faith in me to serve as our great states next chief law enforcement officer and legal advocate, Becerra said in a letter to Brown on Tuesday, letting him know he had resigned from Congress. And while I leave Congress with mixed emotions, I am ready to begin my work as Attorney General. Californias hard-working families are counting on us, and we wont let them down, Becerra said. Becerra was accompanied at the ceremony by his wife, physician Carolina Reyes, two of his three daughters, and his parents, both immigrants from Mexico. Brown appointed Becerra to fill a vacancy after former Atty. Gen.l Kamala Harris won election to a seat in the U.S. Senate. Becerra has pledged to challenge any attempts by the new administration of President Trump to roll back state policies on immigration, civil rights and the environment. Brown noted his appointees background during his speech. Like so many others, he is the son of immigrants who saw California as a place where, through grit and determination, they could realize their dreams, Brown said. And they are not alone, millions of Californians have come here from Mexico and a hundred other countries, making our state what it is today: vibrant, even turbulent, and a beacon of hope to the rest of the world. The first Latino to become state attorney general in California spent the last two weeks meeting with dozens of legislators as he went through confirmation hearings in both houses. Governor Brown and state legislators have already shared valuable ideas on our path forward, Becerra said in a statement after his confirmation. And next week I hope to sit down with sheriffs from across our state to begin our work together keeping our families safe and enforcing our laws fairly. The first focus on local law enforcement was welcomed by Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood, president of the California State Sheriffs Assn. He wants to start with law enforcement in the San Joaquin Valley, and I think thats a really positive step, Youngblood said. Im impressed with his credentials. Im impressed with his background, and I think hes going to be a good attorney general. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Watch: Gov. Jerry Brown delivers his State of the State address Gov. Jerry Brown will deliver his State of the State address at 10 a.m. PST. Watch live here: Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Xavier Becerras resignation from Congress took effect at 9:15 a.m.; he calls serving a distinct honor Xavier Becerra has submitted letter of resignation from Congress ahead of swearing in for California attorney general today Patrick McGreevy (@mcgreevy99) January 24, 2017 Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Californias senators split on CIA director confirmation By Sarah D. Wire Californias senators split Monday night on the confirmation of Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-Kan.), President Trumps pick to lead the CIA. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who serves on the Senate Select Intelligence Committee and backed Pompeo, said in a statement that Pompeo gave straightforward answers to her questions, and that House colleagues called him smart, hardworking and devoted to protecting our country. Congressman Pompeo has committed to following the law regarding torture, promised to provide objective analysis of Irans compliance with the nuclear agreement and insisted that he would continue to keep the Senate Intelligence Committee fully informed of CIA activities, Feinstein said. Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) said in a statement that she appreciated that Pompeo was responsive, engaging, and has made a number of positive commitments during the confirmation process, but said she couldnt vote for him after looking at his entire record on issues such as torture, surveillance, and the collection and use of metadata. Pompeo was confirmed 66 to 32 Monday evening. Thirteen Democrats joined Feinstein in voting for him. While House members dont get to vote for confirmation, the leaders of the House Select Intelligence Committee, Chairman Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Tulare) and ranking Democrat Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank) joined Feinstein in congratulating Pompeo for his confirmation. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Sen. Kamala Harris moves into some familiar digs on Capitol Hill By Sarah D. Wire (Barbara Davidson / Los Angeles Times) Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) and her staff can begin moving today into her official Senate office, the same space she interned in as a college student. Few offices can hold a staff as large as the ones allocated to the California members and as expected, Harris was assigned an office in the Hart Senate Office Building, the same space occupied by former Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.). Harris can start moving in this morning, her staff said. Back home, Harris plans to have state offices in Fresno, Los Angeles, Sacramento, San Diego and San Francisco, her staff said. It is a bit of a change from Boxer, who had additional offices in Oakland and Riverside, but did not have an office in San Francisco. The space in Washington should feel familiar. It was occupied by Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) when Harris interned for him as a mailroom clerk for a summer when she was a Howard University student in the 1980s. Two floors up in the same building is Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). Except for states where staff size is a consideration, Senate offices are assigned based on seniority and sitting senators have months to decide if they want to move offices. That means some new senators could spend months working out of temporary space. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Assembly speaker taps former Obama spokesman for communications strategy By Melanie Mason Bill Burton (Kirk McKoy / Los Angeles Times) With Californias face-off against Washington, D.C., getting widespread attention, Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon has turned to a veteran of national politics to help shape his public image: White House veteran Bill Burton. Burton, who once worked as deputy press secretary in the Obama administration, was hired this month by Rendon, a Democrat from Paramount, for communications strategy. Now a managing partner in the Los Angeles office for SKDKnickerbocker, a prominent liberal public affairs firm, Burton said he relished being involved in California politics, which he said sets a model for liberals nationwide. With President Trump and congressional Republicans controlling the national agenda, Speaker Rendon and his incredible staff are at the center of some of the most important progressive fights in the country and we couldnt be more excited to be helping any way we can, he said. Burton said his services, paid for out of Rendons campaign account, are meant to offer a more intentional approach to how hes been dealing with media a recognition, he said, of Rendons and Californias elevated role in national politics. Rendon is not the only legislative Democrat to be represented by SKDKnickerbocker. Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia of Bell Gardens also is a client. The firm also worked with Democratic Reps. Grace Napolitano and Linda Sanchez in their reelection bids, as well as freshman Rep. Nanette Barragan in her heated congressional race against fellow Democrat, former state Sen. Isadore Hall. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement State Senate votes for final confirmation of Xavier Becerra as state attorney general By Patrick McGreevy Gov. Jerry Brown, left, appointed Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-Los Angeles) as state attorney general. ( (Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press)) The state Senate on Monday voted 26-9 in favor of final confirmation of Rep. Xavier Becerra as Californias attorney general, putting on watch a veteran politician who has promised to block efforts by President Trump to roll back state policies on immigration, civil rights and the environment. Becerra, a Los Angeles Democrat and 12-term congressman, is set to take the oath of office on Tuesday before Gov. Jerry Browns State of the State address. As Attorney General, Xavier will be a champion for all Californians, Brown said in a statement after the party-line vote. Brown appointed Becerra as the states first Latino attorney general to fill the vacancy left when former state Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris was elected to the U.S. Senate. Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon said Becerra will be an effective counter force to Trump, who has threatened mass deportations and the repeal of some environmental laws. Many of us know him personally and can attest to his character, to his integrity and to his qualifications, De Leon said of Becerra. He will be a strong partner for our state to help us work with the federal government when we can and to resist when we must. State Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson (D-Santa Barbara) said Becerra understands the challenges ahead. He will indeed vigorously defend the values of our state by taking the fight to the federal government when necessary, said Jackson, who chairs the state Senate Judiciary Committee. Becerra, 58, said during two weeks of confirmation hearings that he would also fight any attempt to weaken environmental protections or adopt stop-and-frisk police policies that allow officers to search anyone on the street. All Republican senators voted against Becerra or withheld their vote. I think when you are the top cop you have to enforce the law to the fullest extent, said state Sen. Joel Anderson (R-San Diego) before he voted against Becerra. Opponents cited Becerras support for sanctuary cities that refuse to have their officers help enforce immigration laws. San Francisco prohibits local authorities from holding immigrants for immigration officials if they have no violent felonies on their records and do not currently face charges. Trump has threatened to withhold federal funds from sanctuary cities. Sen. John Moorlach (R-Costa Mesa) also opposed Becerra, saying he is worried that the antagonistic tone being set by Democratic lawmakers with Becerra could put at risk the $86 billion the state and its cities gets annually from the federal government. I dont want to jeopardize those funds, Moorlach said. Becerra said he was humbled by the vote and ready to get working.He plans to meet soon with county sheriffs to discuss local law enforcement issues. As I embark on this new journey, my compass will be the experiences of hard-working families like the one I grew up in, Becerra said. As the son of immigrants, I know how important it is to protect the rights and dreams of every aspiring American. I will make sure no headwinds from outside our state can knock us down. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Attorney general nominee Becerra questioned on guns, death penalty and pot during confirmation hearings By Patrick McGreevy Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-Los Angeles), shown at a gun violence event in June, was selected by Gov. Jerry Brown to be Californias next attorney general. ((Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times) ) In two weeks of confirmation hearings, state attorney general nominee Xavier Becerra has been asked for his position on many issues, including new gun control laws, the states death penalty policy and the recent voter approval of an initiative that legalized recreational marijuana use. The 12-term congressman is up for a possible final confirmation vote Monday in the state Senate. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print California attorney general nominee Xavier Becerra is warned against suing Trump early and often By Patrick McGreevy Rep. Xavier Becerra (Rich Pedroncelli / AP) With Xavier Becerra facing a final confirmation vote Monday for state attorney general, two former high-level officials in the office are warning against drowning President Trump in lawsuits. The pressure to sue Trump early and often is a trap, according to Michael Troncos, former chief counsel in the California attorney generals office, and Debbie Mesloh, a former senior advisor to the California attorney general, writing in an op-ed piece published by the Los Angeles Times. In this right-wing political moment, a major legal case on our climate change laws or our policies benefiting (young immigrant) Dreamers may well lead to a Trump White House victory, establishing precedents that far outlast this presidency, the two write. In fact, the cases Becerra chooses not to bring may be among his most important achievements. Courts cant rule on whats not before them. Troncos and Mesloh said California will be up against a U.S. Supreme Court remade in Trumps image, and that [a]sking a federal court to overturn federal immigration policies could be a fools errand. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print California cities would have to make it easier to build houses under new legislation By Liam Dillon California cities that are falling behind on housing production goals set by the state would be forced to remove some of their development restrictions under legislation from a Bay Area state senator. State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) released new details in his bill, SB 35, Monday morning that would require cities to approve new housing in areas already zoned for high-density development provided developers set aside some units for low-income residents. The bills provisions would only apply in cities where growth isnt keeping pace with housing production targets developed by the state every eight years that are designed to ensure California has enough homes for its growing population to live affordably. Right now, thats not happening. The states median home price of $485,800 is more than 2 1/2 times the national average, with the states poorest residents the hardest hit. And in the most recent eight-year housing cycle ending in 2014, production was less than half of the state target. Wiener, a former San Francisco supervisor, said Californias affordability crisis requires the state to involve its For nearly 25 years, Charlie Sykes was one of the most powerful and influential voices in Wisconsin. He cheer-led policies that turned this historically progressive state into a model of conservative governance. He made and destroyed political careers, using his perch on Milwaukee talk radio to help vault figures such as House Speaker Paul Ryan and Gov. Scott Walker to national prominence. But for the moment Sykes was speechless. He sank into the brown leather banquette of a suburban steakhouse. He stammered. He sighed. Advertisement When youve devoted your whole life to certain beliefs and you think now they have been undermined and that you might have been deluded about things, he began. So. So. Um... In 2016 Sykes emerged as one of Donald Trumps most prominent critics, a stance that outraged listeners, strained longstanding friendships and left him questioning much of what he once held true. What it means to be a conservative. The role of race in politics. The wisdom of voters. More troubling, Sykes believes he and others in the shoutrageous world of talk radio contributed mightily to the rise of Trump, to the contagion of fake news that abetted his presidential candidacy and to invigorating the racist, sexist and xenophobic elements drawn to his caustic campaign. Reaping the whirlwind, Sykes calls it, and though his heresy has opened new avenues, including a commentary role on left-leaning MSNBC, many erstwhile foes question both his motivations and avowedly sudden self-awareness the leitmotif for a book due out in October. They liken him to a pyromaniac grieving over the ashes he created, or, as former Wisconsin Democratic Chairman Mike Tate put it, a guy who slowly fed poison to his dog for 10 years then, when the dog dies of poisoning, throws up his hands and says, My God, how did that happen? For Sykes, it presents something of an existential crisis. Reviled by old allies on the right Judas goat! Benedict Arnold! and distrusted by many on the left, he quit his radio show and finds himself a bit at sea. Kind of the man without a country at the moment, Sykes said. :: For Trump supporters, Inauguration Day was a glorious pageant. Detractors called it Black Friday. Others who opposed Trump believe it signaled time to move on, swallow their qualms and, however grudging, hope for the best. In a word, surrender. I campaigned against him and I was beaten, said Katie Packer, who ran a political action committee that spent more than $18 million trying to stop Trump. I may find things that he does to be objectionable but I dont really have it in me to spend the next four years just hating on the guy every single day. Rob Stutzman, another outspoken Trump critic, has taken solace in his conservative Cabinet picks and the promise of tax cuts and a rollback of environmental regulations. Ive adopted more the notion of wait and watch at this point, but the first week was mostly appalling, said Stutzman, a Sacramento-based GOP consultant. Basically the music score of my last six months was Were not listening to you again, Whats up with you? Betrayal. Charlie Sykes Some, however remain firmly dug into their never-Trump trenches. John Weaver, who managed Republican John Kasichs White House bid, has never met Sykes, but expressed admiration. He hasnt been one of those so-called conservatives who modified their belief system in order to curry access or favor, said Weaver, who offers a steady stream of anti-Trump vituperation on his Twitter feed. Sykes own feed has become a catalog of contempt; recently its been filled with criticism of Trumps immigration ban and the failure to mention Jews in a White House statement observing Holocaust Remembrance Day. Sykes, who broadcast for 23 years before ending his radio show, gained national notice in March when an unwitting Trump called into his radio program a week before the Republican primary. Here in Wisconsin we value things like civility, decency and actual conservative principles, Sykes said by way of welcome, implying Trump lacked all three. For the next 16 minutes, a polite but persistent Sykes prodded the GOP front-runner about his history of supporting Democrats, his disparagement of women and playground behavior. Do you ever apologize? Sykes asked, suggesting it was something most real men do. Trump responded with rare equanimity, and no apologies. Afterward, he derided Sykes as a low life and whack job. He lost the primary a fact Sykes mentions with pride but the setback barely slowed his march to the nomination. (Trump narrowly carried Wisconsin in November.) The big loser, arguably, was Sykes. He is 62, with the tidy, all-American looks of the dad in a store-bought picture frame. His own father died of a heart attack at 63, so the age has long been a kind of benchmark; Sykes says even before Trumps rise he planned to end his radio show to pursue new interests. But the antipathy of old friends and allies made the decision much easier. Basically the music score of my last six months was Were not listening to you again, Whats up with you? Betrayal, Sykes said with a small, mirthless laugh. Some could have been trolls from Macedonia. Others were prominent Republican women from Waukesha Ive known for 20 years. His last show was Dec. 19, drawing a series of tributes, including Walkers declaration of Charlie Sykes Day in Wisconsin. Ryan was among the luminaries calling in; he pointedly ignored the hosts jocular plea to prove him wrong about Trump. The speaker, who hails from the policy wing of the GOP, is one of Sykes longtime political soulmates. Reince Priebus, a former state party chairman serving as Trumps White House chief of staff, has also been a friend, which only underscores Sykes estrangement from his old bedfellows. He speaks of a Faustian bargain What are you willing to sell out in order to get tax reform? and likened those around Trump to the dupes who surrounded Adolf Hitler, convinced they could control him once he gained power. So this is the Franz von Papen plan, right? Sykes said, referring to the German chancellor who preceded the Nazi dictator. I think ultimately its the triumph of hope over experience, he said, with another cheerless laugh. :: Before he was a talk-radio titan, Charlie Sykes was a hotshot journalist and, before that, a Eugene McCarthy-loving young Democrat. He followed his father in both directions. Jay Sykes was a reporter and editorial writer at the Milwaukee Sentinel before leaving the paper to teach journalism. As the Wisconsin director for McCarthys 1968 presidential campaign, he helped lead the anti-Vietnam War candidate to victory in the primary; 13-year-old Charlie was a volunteer. But he was no scruffy-haired radical; a 2000 Milwaukee Magazine profile describes him as a freckle-faced teenager in a button-down Oxford with hair conservatively shorn above his ears. Theres a fortune to be made going out speaking to liberals and telling them how evil and awful conservatives are. Mark Belling, Milwaukee talk radio host, on Sykes mea culpa By his 20s, Sykes had become increasingly alienated from the Democratic Party, put off by its permissive stance on abortion and the violence of the anti-war movement. His disenchantment grew as a City Hall reporter, covering what he considered costly but ultimately failed government programs. His evolution from Democrat to Reagan-era conservative is cited by skeptics who see Sykes latest incarnation as another case of expedient rebranding. Theres a fortune to be made going out speaking to liberals and telling them how evil and awful conservatives are, said Mark Belling, Milwaukees other major talk radio personality, who gave Sykes his start as an occasional fill-in host. (Sykes jumped to a rival station and began his own show after about a year.) However heartfelt his mea culpa, Belling said, Its undeniable that it has opened doors for him that otherwise would not have existed. Sykes doesnt disagree. I dont like it, he said quietly. But I understand why people say that. :: Regrets? Sykes has a few and as Frank Sinatra sang from the speakers overhead, he listed some. He remains devoutly conservative, so its not as though his political philosophy changed. But he wishes he had opened his show to more divergent viewpoints, instead of feeding the preconceptions of his audience. He wishes he hadnt done so much to denigrate legitimate news sources, to the point where listeners automatically dismissed facts if they were reported by outlets such as the Washington Post or New York Times. He wishes he had done more to try to bridge the vast racial gap between Milwaukee and its suburbs, which makes this perhaps the most segregated metropolitan region in the country. He wishes he more forcefully dismissed the Trump-peddled fiction that President Obama was born in Kenya. If I contributed to this, I got to own up to that, he said. When you have something this big its time for some serious introspection. Sykes had hoped to be somewhere far off on Inauguration Day, in the north of France, visiting family. But a book deadline disrupted those plans, and his obligation to MSNBC forced him to watch Trumps speech, painful though it was. Not in real time, however. He watched it on YouTube, pedaling furiously on his exercise bike to help ease his blood pressure. mark.barabak@latimes.com Twitter: @markzbarabak ALSO Trumps ban on some U.S. entries sparks confusion and protest worldwide, and legal rebukes at home A Missouri womans greatest wish was to have her husband present for her childs birth. But hes stuck in Iraq. Burglars stole from Seattle-areas rich and famous, but left a few too many clues behind Its what congressional Republicans had long dreamed about: a majority in both chambers to advance conservative policies and a president from the same party to sign them into law. But the Trump White House isnt turning out exactly the way they envisioned. The GOP establishment is experiencing whiplash after a week of President Trump bulldozing through the norms of policy and protocol dashing off executive orders without warning, escalating a diplomatic crisis with the countrys closest southern neighbor, triggering global confusion with a new refugee policy and generally hijacking party leaders agenda and replacing it with his own. Advertisement Rather than the hoped-for collaborative new relationship between the White House and Congress, GOP officials complain that Trump is brushing aside their advice, failing to fully engage on drafting tough legislative packages like tax reform and Obamacare, and bypassing Congress by relying on executive actions, something they frequently complained about under President Obama. At the same time, Trumps unilateral moves continue to blindside Republicans and direct the national focus toward topics many in the party would rather avoid, whether thats how to pay for building the border wall with Mexico, warming ties with Russia, investigating false claims about voter fraud or, most recently, implementing sweeping new policies on refugees and visas. In the name of party unity, many Republicans so far have refrained from publicly attacking the new president. But for some, the new refugee policy crossed the line, signaling the first major rift in their already fraught partnership. Its unacceptable, said Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona, one of the few GOP lawmakers critical of Trumps actions. We need to be careful as we do this, warned Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said. We dont have religious tests in this country. Trump responded testily with two Sunday afternoon tweets aimed at Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who had issued a statement that day criticizing the hasty implementation of the policy. The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong they are sadly weak on immigration. The two Senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III. For a party that lambasted Obamas reliance on his pen and phone to bypass congressional roadblocks, Trumps willingness to go it alone is testing the legislative branchs resolve to protect its power and maintain influence in the Trump era. Lawmakers appear to have little forewarning of what Trump is doing from one day to the next or even hour to hour learning about their party leaders latest moves the way everyone else does when his tweets light up their smartphones. This is obviously a transition thats underway here, said Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, the No. 3 Republican in the Senate. There are issues where there are going to be differences of opinion between the White House and the Congress. What we have to try and do is focus on the things that unite us. Perhaps nowhere was the political adjustment more on public display than at the congressional Republican retreat in Philadelphia last week as Trumps controversial pronouncements ricocheted up the Acela corridor from the White House. Republicans who had hoped to huddle privately to craft a policy agenda were forced to veer repeatedly off message as they fumbled to respond to Trumps string of actions and statements. Many were dismissive about some of Trumps moves, particularly his push for an investigation into unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud in the 2016 election. Have at it, said Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), the House Oversight Committee chairman who said his committee had no plans to look into the matter. Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) admitted to reporters he was barely able to keep up with the string of policy initiatives coming from the White House, and cautioned that Trumps approach might alienate Congress and others. Youre taking your eye off the message and harming your ability to unify Republicans in the country, Kinzinger said. Asked about Trump being a different kind of president, Sen. Jim Risch (R- Idaho), a former governor, quipped: You think? Both the president and Congress are adjusting, he added. Republicans have spent the last decade trying to climb back to power since President George W. Bush was in the White House and they lost control of Congress. Usually an election that puts the same party in control of both Congress and the White House would open the door to coordination and cooperation between the executive and legislative branches, which could seize the rare opportunity to muscle their priorities into law. For example, Obama used such a period to pass the Affordable Care Act, an economic stimulus package and financial reform. But few Republicans expected Trump would win the White House, so they didnt prepare a cohesive legislative agenda. They have been playing catch up ever since with a president who has no government experience, is unfamiliar with the lexicon of legislating and so far has had no qualms about leaving Congress in the dust. Much time has been spent behind the scenes trying to bring the president up to speed on how to transform his popular campaign slogans build the wall; bring back American jobs; destroy Islamic State into actionable policy. But it remains a work in progress. Some signs of morphing and splintering have emerged as each side steps up for a dance with the other. When Trump suggested Congress should pony up money for his promised border wall to deter illegal immigration on his word that Mexico would ultimately repay the cost Republicans signaled support, even if it means they initially add to the deficit. It was a stunning reversal for a party generally loath to pile on debt, having refused funds in the past for hurricane victims. At the same time, Trump appeared to inch closer to Republicans by suggesting funding for the wall could come through a so-called border-adjustment tax, something GOP leaders have been pushing as part of corporate tax reform. But the administrations position is unclear. Trump initially criticized the idea as too complicated, then the administration seemed to endorse it and then backed away, saying it was only one idea under consideration. At the same time, as lawmakers struggle to figure out a replacement plan for Obamacare, they have received little help from the White House in shaping the details of such a plan. Many Republicans appeared both enthralled with the prospect of swift, bold action after so many years of gridlock, and wary of an untested executive asserting power over the legislative branch. The strength of our government is three branches, said Risch. All three of those are important, and if everybody stays in their own lane, it works better. At the retreat, Trump gave a nod to the role Congress will play in the coming months. This Congress is going to be the busiest Congress weve had in decades maybe ever, he said, drawing cheers when he added that House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is writing his heart out with legislation. But even Ryan was circumspect about what is possible this year. Congressional leaders pushed aside the traditional 100 days agenda in favor of one that will be 200 days. We dont want to set arbitrary deadlines on things, Ryan said. Its going to take more than simply 100 days. lisa.mascaro@latimes.com @LisaMascaro ALSO Despite talk of GOP unity, Trumps programs face fight from Republican budget hawks Believe me: People say Trumps language is affecting political discourse bigly Trumps rise draws white supremacists into political mainstream: I am winning, says David Duke More coverage of Congress Live coverage from the campaign trail President Trump defended his new immigration crackdown on Sunday as a stand against terrorism that will improve American national security, even as the White House appeared to back away from a key element amid the chaos at U.S. airports over the weekend. Trump said in a written statement Sunday afternoon that his crackdown on admissions of travelers from seven majority-Muslim countries had nothing to do with religion but was instead about terror and keeping our country safe. I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria, he said. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as president I will find ways to help all those who are suffering. Advertisement The statement came after the White House facing a backlash from lawmakers, including some Republicans appeared to back down on one piece of the new immigration order, signaling that travelers trying to enter the country from the seven banned countries will be allowed in if they hold green cards. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said that these legal permanent residents are exempt from the travel ban moving forward, even though over the weekend other administration officials said the rule did apply to them. The apparent reversal came amid a national controversy over the new order that temporarily halts the entry of all refugees to the U.S. and any traveler from seven majority-Muslim countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Federal judges across the country have blocked parts of the presidents executive action since it came down on Friday, mostly preventing the deportation of some travelers who ran into the first wave of implementation. The back-and-forth over the green card holders reflected confusion about the policy, which also indefinitely bars Syrian refugees from entering the U.S. Lawyers for some of the affected immigrants said border agents were applying the rules differently. Further complicating the picture was a statement from the Department of Homeland Security asserting that its agents would enforce all of Trumps orders while also complying with judicial orders. As some of the orders block deportation, that left individual officers to try and figure out which priorities to honor. In the chaos, Trumps fellow Republicans waved red flags on Sunday, warning the administration to slow down and make sure the tough new rules were implemented with deliberation. U.S. Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) blasted the Trump executive order for what they said was a hasty implementation. It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trumps executive order was not properly vetted, McCain and Graham said in a joint statement. We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defense, Justice, and Homeland Security. Such a hasty process risks harmful results, the senators said. We should not stop green-card holders from returning to the country they call home. We should not stop those who have served as interpreters for our military and diplomats from seeking refuge in the country they risked their lives to help. And we should not turn our backs on those refugees who have been shown through extensive vetting to pose no demonstrable threat to our nation, and who have suffered unspeakable horrors, most of them women and children. Trump fired back with a late-afternoon tweet, saying their statement was wrong and that they are sadly weak on immigration. Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer said Democrats will introduce legislation as soon as Monday to stop the presidents actions. House Democrats are taking similar legislative action, and lawmakers from both chambers will rally Monday evening at the Supreme Court to protest Trumps orders. This executive order was mean-spirited and un-American, said Schumer, the New York Democrat, choking up as he stood with immigrants and refugees at a news conference Sunday. It must be reversed immediately. Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said House Democrats are exploring legal options, including an amicus brief in support of the lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union against the actions. But the chances of passing a bill through the Republican-controlled Congress are slim, as most GOP leaders and lawmakers have not objected to Trumps ban. White House officials on Sunday defended the Trump plan, insisting he took great care in crafting it. If the announcement came as a surprise to many, they say, that was by design. The White House did not want to tell too many people about it in advance, thinking that too much notice would compromise the strategy, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said. The people that needed to know, knew, he said Sunday on ABC. The appropriate leadership was notified. Still the confusion over the particulars was significant especially on the question of the green cards. In explaining the new order, administration officials on Saturday told reporters that the green card holders from the seven banned countries would have to get waivers in order to return to the U.S. after traveling outside the country. Speaking on condition of anonymity to reporters on Saturday, the White House official said green card holders from one of the seven affected countries who are currently outside the U.S. would need a case-by-case waiver to return to the U.S., according to a pool reporter who was present. Those green card holders in the United States would have to meet with a consular officer before leaving the country, the official said. On Sunday, Priebus said otherwise. As far as green card holders, moving forward, it doesnt affect them, Priebus told NBCs Chuck Todd in an interview, adding that border officials still retain discretionary authority to hold people from the suspect countries before letting them enter the U.S. The interpretation of the new rules continued in foreign capitals, with British officials announcing publicly that they had gotten clarification from the U.S. government regarding U.S.-bound travelers from their country. If you are a U.K. national who happens to be traveling from one of those [banned] countries to the U.S., then the order does not apply to you, even if you were born in one of those countries, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said in a statement to British citizens. The only dual nationals who might have extra checks are those coming from one of the seven countries themselves, for example, a U.K.-Libya dual national coming from Libya to the U.S., Johnsons statement said. The White House did not immediately confirm the British summary. christi.parsons@latimes.com Twitter: @cparsons lisa.mascaro@latimes.com Twitter: @LisaMascaro ALSO Confusion reigns at U.S. airports as protests of Trump executive order enter second day For those detained at LAX under Trumps ban, hours of fear, chaos and hope Trumps refugee policy raises a question: How do you tell a Christian from a Muslim? As havoc unfolded over the weekend following President Trumps temporary ban on refugees coming into the country, some longtime Washington hands were alarmed by something else: the revamping of the National Security Council, the group of Cabinet-level officials and others who deliberate on the countrys most pressing and often secret national security issues. Trump named one of his senior political counselors, Stephen K. Bannon, to a seat on the councils principals committee. The president also limited the attendance of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the director of national intelligence to an as-needed basis at the panels meetings. Stone-cold crazy, tweeted Susan Rice, former President Obamas national security advisor, sarcastically asking, Who needs military advice or intell to make policy on ISIL, Syria, Afghanistan, DPRK? using acronyms for Islamic State and North Korea. Advertisement Another top Trump aide, Stephen Miller, effectively ran the National Security Council principals meeting Saturday, according to two Trump administration officials, a highly unusual move. Miller was a major architect of the refugee and visa ban. The guiding hands of Bannon and Miller my two Steves, as Trump has affectionately called them who are only occasionally heard from publicly but almost constantly seen alongside Trump, were evident in much of the developments at the White House in Trumps first week. Bannon, the former head of the far-right website Breitbart News, once said his goal was to bring everything crashing down, and destroy all of todays establishment. Trump made clear through a series of acts in his first week that he intends to upend government policy, not only on reassessing the refugee program but directives to build a wall along the border with Mexico and changes on environmental, healthcare and other issues. Miller, who developed detailed knowledge of the nations immigration laws while working on the staff of Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), Trumps nominee to be attorney general, spent much of Saturday making policy decisions based on a strict interpretation of the immigration order and instructing senior Homeland Security officials on how to implement the plan. Trumps orders for stopping travelers from seven countries, blocking Syrian refugees and banning all refugee admissions for 120 days were pushed through at breakneck pace instead of what is usually a careful process of review by the departments of Justice and Homeland Security and the intelligence agencies for major changes to immigration policy. Instead, Homeland Security officials were given little time to review the order before it was made public. On one of the orders most controversial and confusing parts, the status of permanent residents, Bannon and Miller at one point overruled an interpretation by Homeland Security officials in favor of a more limited policy that blocked green card holders until they apply for a waiver from the ban, the officials said. 1 / 62 Supporters of President Trump rally in favor of his immigration ban executive order Saturday at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 62 Protesters rallying against the first travel ban signed by President Trump march around Los Angeles International Airport in February. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 62 Trump supporters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 62 Muhaned El Hindi protests the immigration ban Saturday during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 62 Mathew Woods, a supporter of President Trump, voices support for an immigration ban during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 62 Passengers stand in the doorway of a baggage claim area to take pictures and video of marchers protesting the immigration ban of President Trump at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 62 Supporters of President Trumps travel ban stand across the street from the #NoBanNoWall protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 62 Cooper Chvotkin, 6, gets a turn to voice his opinion on the megaphone with other protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 62 Protesters march through the Tom Bradley International terminal at LAX on Saturday to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 62 Abeer Abdelrahman, left, hugs her sister Areej Ali at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday after Ali, who has a green card, was able to come through the arrivals area with the help of an attorney after being detained and questioned. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 62 Noor Hindi, left, and Sham Najjar, right, join the protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Monday. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 62 Attorneys crowd a small table at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 62 Immigration Attorney Monica Glicken, left, listens to Mohamed, right, as she tries to find travelers to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 62 Hundreds of people protested President Trumps original travel ban at LAX in January. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 62 Protesters block traffic at LAX, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 62 Demonstrators take a pizza break while blocking traffic on the upper level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal while police monitor the rally. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 17 / 62 A pro-Trump supporter argues with protesters about the presidents travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 18 / 62 Hundreds sit in on the arrival level of LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal, blocking traffic to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 62 Airport police plead with protesters to get off the pavement in order to let stranded motorists exit. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 62 Protesters block traffic, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal of LAX. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 21 / 62 Muslims pray as hundreds stand in support on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during a protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 22 / 62 Police position themselves as a man takes photos on the on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during protests to President Donald Trumps new immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 62 A police officer watches protesters at the lower deck of the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 62 Assmaa Kalm, left, and Rosanna Sounbl, right, protest President Trumps travel ban at Los Angeles International Airport on Jan. 29, 2017. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 29 / 62 Police keep an eye on people who continue to protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 30 / 62 Hundreds take part in an impromptu sit-in at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 31 / 62 People hang a banner in support of immigrants on a parking structure across the street from the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 32 / 62 Meg Heatherly, 27, of Los Angeles holds a Shame sign during a protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Jan. 29, 2017. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 33 / 62 Attorney Lisa Smith joins people at LAX who continue to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 34 / 62 A lone supporter of President Trump and Vice President Pence is protected by police while a large group of people continue to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 35 / 62 Chella, from Sherman Oaks, holds the U.S. flag with words from the tablet on the Statue of Liberty. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 36 / 62 Hundreds of people gather at Los Angeles International Airport to continue protesting President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 62 Donald Trump supporters hold signs across the road from protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 38 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 39 / 62 Brothers Adam, left, and Noah Reich show their support of immigrants as they join opponents of Donald Trumps new immigration order at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 40 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 41 / 62 A protester holds up sign at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 42 / 62 Hassan Al Garaawi, of San Diego, right, looks for his mother-in-law Gish Alsaeedi who has been detained at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Sunday. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 43 / 62 Passengers arrive at LAX as protests continue Sunday over President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 44 / 62 Izzy Berdan, of Boston wears an American flag as he chants slogans with other demonstrators Sunday during a rally against President Trumps order that restricts travel to the U.S. by people from seven majority-Muslim nations. (Steven Senne / Associated Press) 45 / 62 People gather in Bostons Copley Square to protest the travel ban enacted by President Trump. (Darren McCollester / Getty Images) 46 / 62 Demonstrators gather Sunday near the White House to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban. (Zach Gibson / Getty Images) 47 / 62 People continue to protest President Trumps travel ban on Sunday at Los Angeles International Airport. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 48 / 62 Attorney Dana Clausen waits on Sunday to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX as people continue to protest President Trumps executive order that led to travelers from several majority-Muslim countries being detained upon arrival. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 49 / 62 Kamryn Taghizadeh, 18, holds up a sign Saturday night as she waits for grandfather Reza Taghizadeh, 78, a minimalist painter who was detained as he arrived at Tom Bradley International Terminal from Iran. The artist and green-card holder was later released. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 50 / 62 Reza Taghizadeh, 78, an artist from Iran who holds a U.S. green card, is released after being detained at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 51 / 62 Seattle police use pepper spray and push the last group of protesters out of a Seattle-Tacoma International Airport terminal after giving a final dispersal order at about 2 a.m Sunday. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 52 / 62 Saffiya Hrahsheh, center, is helped away from police by Liz Bates, left, and others after being pepper sprayed by officers breaking up protests early Sunday at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 53 / 62 Siavosh Naji-Talakar greets his grandmother, Marzieh Moosavizadeh, 75, at LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal. She was detained upon arriving from Iran. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 54 / 62 People arrive and LAPD officers stand by at Tom Bradley International Airport at LAX as the protest continues peacefully. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 55 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to oppose President Trumps refugee ban. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 56 / 62 Saudia Airlines flight attendants wait to pass through a securioty checkpoint at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 57 / 62 Protesters rally against Trumps refugee crackdown at at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 58 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to speak out against President Trumps refugee policy Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 59 / 62 Protesters march through Tom Bradley International Terminal to voice opposition to President Trumps refugee policy. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 60 / 62 Protesters rally against the new immigration order at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 61 / 62 Protesters hold signs during a protest against Trumps immigration executive order at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City. (Stephanie Keith / Getty Images) 62 / 62 Protesters assemble at John F. Kennedy International Airport after two Iraqis were detained while trying to enter the country. (Craig Ruttle / Associated Press) After a weekend of conflicting instructions to border officials at airports, the administration said late Sunday that green card holders would not be affected by Trumps order. About 170 permanent residents from the banned countries had applied for waivers to enter by Sunday afternoon, and all had been granted, a senior administration official said. After chaotic scenes at airport terminals across the country and multiple court orders limiting Trumps directives, the White House defended the rollout of the policy. The implementation was done seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism, a senior administration official told reporters Sunday, adding that the court orders had not undermined the policys substance or purpose. Trumps top spokesman, Sean Spicer, also defended Trumps decision to expand Bannons reach, telling ABC News This Week on Sunday that Trump is simply trying to streamline decision-making and cut bureaucracy. Hes got a tremendous understanding of the world and the geopolitical landscape that we have now, Spicer said of Bannon, noting that he is a former naval officer and adding that its only right for the presidents top strategist to come in and talk about what the strategy is going forward. Bannons and Millers increasing power potentially portends a new era of political calculus being applied to decisions on how to deploy American spies and soldiers overseas. Former President George W. Bush kept his powerful strategist Karl Rove out of the Situation Room, where National Security Council meetings are usually held, Joshua Bolten, a White House chief of staff under Bush, said at a conference in September at the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library in Austin, Texas. The signal he wanted to send to the rest of his administration, the signal he wanted to send to the public, and the signal he especially wanted to send to the military is that the decisions Im making that involve life and death for the people in uniform will not be tainted by any political decisions, Bolten said of Bush. The point was echoed by David Rothkopf, the CEO of Foreign Policy magazines parent company and an international relations expert. The idea that a purely political advisor should be at the table while the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the director of national intelligence are not shows a profound lack of understanding of what the NSC has been or what it should be, he wrote. Robert Gates, Defense secretary under both Bush and Obama, said that while he was not bothered by the addition of Bannon to the National Security Council, he was troubled by the removal of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the director of national intelligence, except when their issues are being discussed, calling the move a big mistake. They both bring a perspective and judgment and experience to bear that every president, whether they like it or not, finds useful, Gates said on This Week. National security experts and even some Republican lawmakers believe that Trumps executive orders, which dont target citizens who have been involved in attacks against the U.S., are more likely to inflame resentment against the U.S. than to make the country more secure. The confusion over who was allowed in and who was sent back out of the country made clear the executive order was not properly vetted, Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said in a statement, adding that they feared retaliation from extremists. The large majority of terrorism-related arrests on U.S. soil since the Sept. 11 attacks have been U.S. citizens or legal residents, not foreign travelers, according to a study by the New America Foundation that was released last year. Far from being foreign infiltrators, the large majority of jihadist terrorists in the United States have been American citizens or legal residents, the studys authors wrote. In addition, about a quarter of the extremists are converts, further confirming that the challenge cannot be reduced to one of immigration. Times staff writer Christi Parsons contributed to this report. brian.bennett@latimes.com Twitter: @ByBrianBennett ALSO Amid backlash, White House appears to back down on applying new ban to green card holders When Muslims got blocked at American airports, U.S. veterans rushed to help 75-year-old grandmother from Iran tells the story of her detention at LAX Thousands of Americans turned out to protest this weekend, including in the Golden States major cities. They came out in response to an executive order President Trump signed Friday that barred refugees from seven countries from entering the United States. Im Sarah Wire. Welcome to the Monday edition of Essential Politics. Heres what happened over the last few days of Trumps first week in office: The move by Trump prevented green card and visa holders from reentering the country, and led to the detention of more than a hundred people landing at U.S. airports with valid entry documents. Late Saturday, a federal judge in New York issued a temporary stay against the deportation of anyone who had arrived with a valid visa. Advertisement The administration backed away from one of the more controversial parts of the order Sunday evening, saying that most green card holders, who are permanent U.S. residents but not citizens, will not be affected by the new rules after all. The executive order Trump signed Friday bars all refugee entries for 120 days, blocks Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars for 90 days the entry of citizens from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Somalia. California Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra joined more than a dozen Democratic attorneys general from across the country who condemned the Trump administrations executive order. Meanwhile, Republican members of Congress have been largely silent on the order. Only a few of Californias 14 Republican members have spoken publicly on the issue, largely in support of the order if it is tweaked, while Democrats in the delegation blasted the directive and joined protesters. After some personally intervened on behalf of refugees and green card holders this weekend, House and Senate Democrats plan to file legislation this week to override the order, and are pressuring Republican colleagues to join them. Lawmakers from both chambers are set to rally tonight at the Supreme Court in protest. STEVE BANNON JOINING NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL Along with the refugee ban, Trump changed the composition of the National Security Council, giving his chief strategist, Steve Bannon, a seat at the table, while the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the joint military chiefs will only participate in the council, which helps set national security policy, when specifically summoned. Trumps actions, including multiple executive orders, during his first week in office have taken a rapid toll on his already historically low support, according to Gallup. Get the latest about the new Trump administration on Essential Washington and follow @latimespolitics. ANOTHER ROUND OF RADIATION THERAPY FOR GOV. JERRY BROWN Gov. Jerry Brown, who was first diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2012, will begin a new round of treatment for the disease, his office told John Myers on Saturday. Brown, 78, will maintain his duties as governor during the treatment, according to his staff, who provided no additional details on how long the treatment will take, or what prompted its timing. Keep an eye on our Essential Politics news feed for more throughout the week. CALIFORNIA SHOWS BRAVADO AND ANXIETY ON CLIMATE CHANGE When it comes to fighting global warming, the message from California leaders has been clear: Hold the line, no matter what Trump does. We cant worry about pulling back just to sink with everyone else who isnt moving at all, said John Laird, the state secretary for natural resources. Chris Megerian attended a recent conference in Sacramento where there was pride in the states climate policies, but also concern that national leaders in Washington would roll back environmental efforts. Brown issued another call to action during a radio interview on Friday, saying world leaders are goofing off rather than addressing climate change. Meanwhile, Democratic donor and environmentalist Tom Steyer launched a new website to preserve climate change information from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Activists have been concerned that the Trump administration would delete the website. ENVIRONMENTAL LAWS PROBABLY WONT STOP TRUMPS WALL While California political leaders are seeking all sorts of strategies to fight Trumps plans to build a wall along the border with Mexico, one strategy thats likely to fail is a lawsuit based on state and federal environmental laws, legal experts said. Congress already has given the federal government broad authority to waive environmental laws to build a border fence and the courts have upheld that power, Liam Dillon reports. SKELTON: TRUMPS VOTER FRAUD ALLEGATIONS ARE A WASTE OF TIME Trump announced last week that he will launch an investigation into unproven allegations of voter fraud in the 2016 election. But Trumps preoccupation with the idea that millions of people in the U.S. voted illegally is a time-waster, writes George Skelton in his Monday column. And charges about illegal voting threaten to tarnish American democracy abroad, Skelton writes. SAVE THE DATES: CONGRESSIONAL ELECTION SET TO REPLACE BECERRA Brown wasted no time setting the election dates for the race to fill the 34th Congressional District seat vacated last week when Becerra was sworn in as attorney general. The primary election in the crowded race will be held April 4. Want a refresher on the field of candidates? You can see the full list here. The latest candidate to announce a run is Ricardo De La Fuente, a 27-year-old San Diego native who helped run his fathers long-shot presidential bid last year. WHAT IS A VIOLENT CRIME? This legislative session will include discussion about what should be considered a violent crime under a new statewide effort to increase rehabilitation services and decrease the prison population. The initiative, Proposition 57, gives the state parole board greater latitude to consider the early release of prisoners who have served their primary sentences, and whose crimes are not designated as violent under the California penal code. But debate has long brewed about just who the law will benefit. PODCAST: CALIFORNIAS TRUMP REACTION On this weeks California Politics Podcast, Myers leads a discussion of how Trumps first week dominated the ideas and actions of everyone in the state Capitol. In particular, this weeks episode focuses on the first few days of debate over immigration, climate change and the presidents unfounded accusations of widespread voter fraud. TODAYS ESSENTIALS -- Is there bias baked into some official summaries of California ballot initiatives? Theres a new discussion about whether the way those summaries are written is in need of an overhaul. -- Hundreds rallied against the repeal of Obamacare at House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthys Bakersfield office Saturday. -- Organizers supporting the Calexit movement can now gather signatures in their effort to put an initiative on California secession on the ballot. Theyll need to submit at least 585,407 signatures to qualify. -- California drivers licenses, birth certificates and other official documents could have a third, nonbinary designation for gender under a new proposal introduced last week by legislative Democrats. -- A proposed California law would punish someone using false documents to conceal their citizenship status with the same punishment given to a person using a fake drivers license. LOGISTICS Essential Politics is published Monday, Wednesday and Friday. You can keep up with breaking news on our politics page throughout the day for the latest and greatest. And are you following us on Twitter at @latimespolitics? Miss Fridays newsletter? Here you go. Please send thoughts, concerns and news tips to politics@latimes.com. Did someone forward you this? Sign up here to get Essential Politics in your inbox. Maybe President Trump is delusional and really believes that Hillary Clinton received more votes than him only because millions were cast illegally. That would include hundreds of thousands of illegal ballots in California, which virtually no one who knows anything about the voting process thinks is remotely possible. Or maybe Trump is just spewing alternative facts his White Houses gift to the national lexicon and comedy and hoping people will buy the fiction. Advertisement It could also be because hes setting up an excuse for the Republican-controlled Congress to further dilute voting rights by erecting more hurdles between Democrats and the ballot box. But I dont think so. That would mean that Trump was actually trying to help the Republican Party. And, as weve seen, he is really all about himself. What got him all hot and bothered after being sworn in? The inaugural crowd size. It couldnt possibly have been smaller than Obamas. The media was lying. But, of course, it certainly was smaller, and by a lot. Aerial pictures were proof. His other nagging aggravation: More Americans voted for Clinton than him. Thats embarrassing. Enemies were challenging the legitimacy of his election, he believed, although I havent heard of one Democrat really doing that. One thing we know: Trump becomes unhinged at the thought of receiving roughly 2.9 million fewer votes than Clinton nationally. And he thinks its largely because of illegal voting in California and other blue states. Californians cast roughly 4.3 million more votes for Clinton than for Trump. He drew a smaller percentage of the California vote 31.6% than any GOP presidential nominee in 160 years. Trump must be the biggest sore winner in the history of American politics. Youd think hed graciously accept winning the electoral vote all that matters and bask in goose bumps while walking into the Oval Office, then clam up about himself and focus solely on solving problems Americans care about. Temper the egotistic self-obsession. But in his first meeting with congressional leaders, the president told them he lost the popular vote because 3 million to 5 million people voted illegally. Later Trump tweeted he would seek a major investigation into voter fraud, including those registered to vote in two states, those who are illegal and even those registered to vote who are dead (and many for a long time). OK, my hands are up. I surrender. Updates from Sacramento A long time ago, 36 years, I moved to Virginia from California to cover the Reagan White House. As a native Californian who planned to return, I kept my voter registration. I wanted to vote in California elections. But I also planned to vote in Virginia elections, so I registered there, too. (They made me take an illegal Jim Crow-era reading test.) So I was registered in two states. Not illegal. But I never voted twice, which would have been illegal. Maybe Ill escape the Trump inquisition, as presumably will his daughter, son-in-law, a Cabinet member and a strategist all of whom also have been registered in two states simultaneously. Whats truly scary is a commander in chief who sees things that dont exist: record inauguration crowds, hordes of illegal voters, thousands of Muslims in New Jersey cheering on 9/11. The danger for the nation is hell envision a false threat and squeeze the trigger. Weve already had a president who thrust us into a war chasing phantom weapons of mass destruction. Moreover, bellowing wild charges about illegal voting threatens to tarnish American democracy in troubled countries that were hoping will become more like us. Its 180 degrees from how Republican Richard Nixon treated credible allegations of voter fraud in Illinois and Texas after he barely lost to John F. Kennedy in 1960. Tombstones voted for Kennedy in Mayor Richard Daleys Chicago, journalists reported. In Democratic running mate Lyndon Johnsons Texas, Nixon votes apparently were stolen. Nixon was urged to challenge the elections validity. But he refused, saying it could create a constitutional crisis and sully the United States image abroad. Since then, election systems have developed effective cross-checks because of technology. We are not aware of any evidence that supports the voter fraud claims made by President Trump, the bipartisan National Assn. of Secretaries of State declared in a statement last week. The idea that you could have millions of noncitizens engaging in a vast conspiracy across many states some of them run by Republicans is beyond crazy, says Richard Hasen, a UC Irvine law professor who is an election law expert. So far in the 2016 election, he says, four cases of voter fraud have been uncovered across the whole country, including a Trump supporter who voted twice. Its unfathomable that immigrants here illegally would risk being nabbed by federal agents and deported just to vote for some politicians. I asked Dean Logan, the Los Angeles County voter registrar, whether there was a problem of noncitizens trying to vote. Ive never seen any incident of that, he said. There are severe penalties. Its a felony. Its a lie, California Secretary of State Alex Padilla said of Trumps allegations, using a favorite word of the president. President Trumps statements are outrageous because he has no evidence. Do dead people still vote? Its all urban legend, Padilla told me. This is a time-wasting subject for a new president. Trump needs to focus on keeping not making America great. george.skelton@latimes.com Follow @LATimesSkelton on Twitter ALSO Taking on Trump in his State of the State speech, Gov. Brown reminded us that he loves the limelight California is right to fight Trump. His idea of states rights is clearly limited Trumps inauguration is a reminder that rebelling against the ruling class is in Americas DNA Neil Gorsuch could fall somewhere between his hero, Justice Scalia, and former boss, centrist Justice Kennedy By David Savage Judge Neil M. Gorsuch was resting midway down a Colorado ski slope last year when his cellphone rang with the news that Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia had died. I immediately lost what breath I had left, Gorsuch recalled in an April speech, and I am not embarrassed to admit that I couldnt see the rest of the way down the mountain for the tears. Now, as President Trumps pick to replace Scalia on the high court, Gorsuch is seen by many on the right as a fitting replacement for the iconic jurist that Gorsuch considered a lion of the law. Like Scalia, Gorsuch, 49, who serves on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver, is a well-respected conservative who believes judges should decide cases based on the law as it was understood when passed, not on how they think it should be. Hes a clear, impassioned writer, albeit without Scalias flare for biting sarcasm. But Gorsuch also evokes the qualities of Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, for whom Gorsuch worked as a law clerk. (If confirmed, Gorsuch would join three justices who previously clerked on the high court, but he would be the first ever to serve alongside the justice he or she worked for.) Like Kennedy, 80, Gorsuch is a Westerner with a polite, congenial manner who at times has won praise from liberals. He may be more conservative than Kennedy when it comes to expanding individual rights, but he seems to lack Scalias fervor for overturning liberal precedents from decades past. Which way Gorsuch skews could be pivotal for the future of the court. Conservatives clearly hope hell be more like Scalia than Kennedy, a centrist swing vote who has often joined liberals on issues such as gay marriage and abortion. Some conservatives have even expressed hope that Gorsuchs personal history with Kennedy might enable him to draw the Reagan-appointee back toward the right. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Trump chooses Neil Gorsuch, a conservative seen as likely to be confirmed, for Supreme Court By Michael A. Memoli President Trump nominated federal Judge Neil M. Gorsuch on Tuesday to the Supreme Court to fill the seat of the late Antonin Scalia, choosing from his short list an appeals court judge from Denver seen as most likely to win Senate confirmation. Because Scalia was a stalwart conservative, Trumps choice is not likely to change the balance of the court. But it does set the stage for a bruising partisan fight over a man who could help determine law on gun rights, immigration, police use of force and transgender rights. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Trump administration is radicalizing Democratic voters, creating a challenge for the party, Rep. Adam Schiff says By Sarah D. Wire (Mark Wilson / Getty Images) As protests spread over policy announcements from the Trump administration, Democrats must work to encourage participation in politics, but face a danger of the party becoming too radicalized, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank) said Tuesday. The radical nature of this government is radicalizing Democrats, and thats going to pose a real challenge to the Democratic Party, which is to draw on the energy and the activism and the passion that is out there, but not let it turn us into what we despised about the tea party, Schiff said. During a meeting with reporters and editors in the Los Angeles Times Washington bureau, Schiff also discussed his role as the highest-ranking Democrat on the House Select Intelligence Committee under a Trump administration and how Democrats will manage in the minority. Ever since the election, party leaders have been debating: Did we lose because we were too far to the left and we had too small a tent, or did we lose because we are too mainstream and didnt energize the base? Schiff asked. We are obviously having that debate, but theres a whole new element, which is the reaction to the Trump administration that makes this different in kind, certainly different in intensity, than I think weve ever seen after an election, he said. The more radical the administration is, the more radicalized our base becomes, which just feeds the Breitbart crowd, and who knows where that ends. Democratic leaders have to channel public reaction to Trumps actions into progress, rather than deadlock, Schiff said. Reaction to Democrats seen as working with the Trump administration has been strong. Monday night, for example, protesters marched on Sen. Dianne Feinsteins home and office voicing fears she would back Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions for attorney general. The senator from California announced Tuesday that she would oppose Sessions. Several groups calling themselves indivisible have popped up in cities across the country as focal points for efforts to organize. We have two of the most capable strategists as the head of our House and Senate Democrats, Schiff added, referring to House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco and Senate Democratic leader Sen. Charles E. Schumer of New York. If anybody can grapple with this, they can, but its going to be a challenging and moving target day to day. I just hope that we can channel that energy in a way where we can provide a check on this administration because Ive never been more worried about the countrys future than I am right now, he said. Schiff said part of his role as the ranking Democrat on the House Select Intelligence Committee will be pushing back when the Trump administration puts out inaccurate information about the intelligence community and its findings. Trump has repeatedly dismissed or sought to minimize the intelligence communitys findings that Russia sought to intervene in the 2016 election to benefit him. Schiff said hes concerned about what else the administration might be willing to dismiss. I think that will be kind of a new frontier, he said. How do we contradict a president making representations about what the intelligence community has to say when the information is classified? Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Trump administration signals that some temporary bans on entry into the U.S. could become permanent By Brian Bennett Trumps orders put a greater emphasis on deporting those convicted of crimes and those in the country illegally who were charged with crimes not yet adjudicated The Trump administration doubled down Tuesday on its commitment to transforming the nations border law enforcement, signaling that some of the temporary bans on travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries are likely to be made permanent and elevating a deportations official to run the top immigration enforcement agency. Administration officials, led by newly sworn-in Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, moved to allay the havoc that marked the roll-out of the ban and another on refugees. They briefed reporters and planned to head to Capitol Hill later today in an apparent effort to smooth relations after reports that lawmakers and other stakeholders were left out of the crafting of the executive order on toughened vetting at border entry points. In a news conference, Kelly and other top Homeland Security officials conceded some problems, including poor communication. But they insisted that all court orders were followed over the weekend, rebutted reports that some legal residents were denied access to attorneys at airports and said they everyone detained by border agents was treated with dignity and respect. The vast majority of the 1.7 billion Muslims that live on this planet, the vast majority of them have, all other things being equal, have access to the United States, Kelly told reporters. And a relatively small number right now are being held up for a period of time until we can take a look at what their procedures are, he said, seeming to acknowledge that mostly Muslims have been affected by the ban. The moves signaled that the White House remained committed to remaking border law enforcement even in the face of widespread confusion and condemnation of President Trumps order. Kelly said for the first time that the some of the restrictions that caused confusion and sparked protests over the weekend could be extended well into the future. Some of those countries that are currently on the list may not be taken off the list anytime soon, he said. Trump also named a longtime deportation officer, Thomas D. Homan, as acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Homan, who will oversee the execution of Trumps immigration enforcement order, was most recently in charge of the agencys 5,000 deportation officers, a force Trump said he would triple to 15,000. Trumps orders put a greater emphasis on deporting not only those convicted of crimes, but also people in the country illegally who were charged with crimes not yet adjudicated, those who receive an improper welfare benefit and even those who have not been charged but are believed to have committed acts that constitute a chargeable criminal offense. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print White House tries to ban the word ban, hours after president uses it himself By Noah Bierman This is not a ban, spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters in a fiery news briefing. (Alex Wong / Getty Images) President Trump used the word ban in a tweet as recently as Monday to describe his new executive order suspending travel from seven Muslim-majority countries and halting the refugee program for several months. But facing backlash from many directions, the White House adamantly insisted Tuesday that the word is verboten. This is not a ban, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told reporters in a fiery news briefing. When we use words like travel ban, he said later, that misrepresents what it is. Its seven countries previously identified by the Obama administration, where, frankly, we dont get the information that we need for people coming into this country. In fact, people from the seven banned countries Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Somalia, Libya cannot enter the United States under the order. Spicer appeared to be making a renewed effort to distinguish the order from the all-out ban on Muslims entering the country that Trump proposed during the campaign. Many around the world see the newest policy as an outgrowth of that proposal. Trump himself conceded a religious connection when he said in an interview on Friday that he wanted to make it easier for Syrian Christians to enter the country. And former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani told Fox News that the order sprang from a group he formed at Trumps request to create a legal framework that would accomplish the campaign goal of a Muslim ban. But amid confusion and worldwide criticism in recent days, the Trump administration has tried to temper some of the more incendiary rhetoric around the proposal. Even the words extreme vetting, a favorite Trump slogan, were called into question by Spicer on Tuesday. Calling for tougher vetting [of] individual travelers from seven nations is not extreme, he said. It is reasonable and necessary to protect our country. But changing the ban branding around the program at this point will be difficult. Heres Trumps tweet from Monday: If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 And Spicer himself used the term ban as recently as Sunday: Sean Spiceer today: This is not a Muslim ban. It is not a travel ban. Sean Spicer in White House press release, Jan. 29: pic.twitter.com/axTM1m66nM Dominic Holden (@dominicholden) January 31, 2017 Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Senate confirms Elaine Chao as secretary of Transportation By Associated Press Elaine Chao testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington at her confirmation hearing before the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee on Jan. 11, 2017. (Zach Gibson / AP) The Senate has confirmed Elaine Chao to serve as Transportation secretary in the Trump administration. The vote was 93 to 6 on Tuesday. Chao is an experienced Washington hand. She was Labor secretary under President George W. Bush and is the wife of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Chao would be a lead actor in pursuing Trumps promise to invest $1 trillion to improve highways, rail service and other infrastructure projects. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Speaker Paul Ryan defends Trumps immigrant and refugee ban, as Congress grumbles about being left out By Lisa Mascaro "What is happening is something we support... we need to make sure that the vetting standards are up to snuff," Paul Ryan says of travel ban pic.twitter.com/iX6YkOLkLl CBS News (@CBSNews) January 31, 2017 House Speaker Paul D. Ryan on Tuesday stood by President Trumps temporary ban on refugees and citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations and indicated that he was confident the administration could fix the confusing rollout without action from Congress. What is happening is something we support, said Ryan, whose office was the target of a sit-in by protesters opposed to Trumps order. We need to pause and we need to make sure that the vetting standards are up to snuff so we can guarantee the safety and security of our country. Congress was blindsided by Trumps executive action -- Ryan learned about it as the public did when the White House announced it Friday afternoon. Many GOP lawmakers have raised concerns. During a private meeting in the Capitol basement Tuesday, Republican lawmakers were counseled on how to handle protesters and office sit-ins happening across the country. Its regrettable that there was some confusion on the rollout of this, Ryan said. No one wanted to see people with green cards or special immigrant visas, like translators, get caught up in all of this. Ryan also said he was concerned the ban could be used as propaganda by terrorist groups. The rhetoric surrounding this could be used as a recruiting tool, and I think thats dangerous, he said. Still, Republicans leaders as well as rank-and-file GOP lawmakers largely agreed with the presidents move to halt refugee admissions for 120 days, and to temporarily ban citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries, unless they are Christians or other religious minorities. The president was well within his right to issue an executive order, said Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Texas), chairman of the House Rules Committee. Do I feel let out? I feel like everybody was left out, he said. I wish they communicated it. I wish they had gotten more information to people. I wish they had measured three times and sawed once. Lawmakers have shown little appetite for Congress to get involved, and suggested the chaos that erupted at airports over the weekend was just part of a learning curve at the White House. I support the thrust of the executive order, said Rep. Pete King (R-N.Y.), who nevertheless said the administration should have been better prepared and will need to get your act together. Last year, Ryan had strongly condemned Trumps campaign-trail call for a Muslim ban. In recent days, Ryan, like other congressional leaders, was forced to dial up the administration with his questions and concerns about the order, conferring Monday with Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly. I am very pleased and confident that he is, on a going-forward basis, going to make sure that things are done correctly, Ryan said. Pressed on whether Congress would have a role, Ryan did not indicate any immediate legislative action. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Democrats boycott Senate committee votes on Price, Mnuchin By Jim Puzzanghera Senate Democrats speak with reporters after boycotting Finance Committee confirmation votes. (JIM WATSON / AFP/Getty Images) Senate Democrats on Tuesday boycotted a committee vote on two of President Trumps top Cabinet nominees -- Tom Price to lead Health and Human Services and Steve Mnuchin to be Treasury secretary. Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) blasted the Democratic move as he sat in a hearing room with only Republicans on the dais. They ought to be embarrassed. Its the most pathetic treatment Ive seen in my 40 years in the United States Senate, Hatch said. I think they should stop posturing and acting like idiots, he said. At least one Democrat needs to be present for the committee to vote on the nominations, Hatch said. He recessed the hearing until further notice, saying he hoped a vote could take place later Tuesday. But asked mid-afternoon if he thought the committee would be able to meet Tuesday, Hatch said it doesnt look like it. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the committees top Democrat, said Price and Mnuchin have misled the public and held back important information about their backgrounds. Until questions are answered, Democrats believe the committee should not move forward with either nomination, Wyden said. This is about getting answers to questions, plain and simple, he said. Ethics laws are not optional, and nominees do not have a right to treat disclosure like a shell game. Today @SenateFinance Democrats refused to move forward with nominations of Mnuchin & Price. Ron Wyden (@RonWyden) January 31, 2017 The litany of ethics revelations regarding @RepTomPrice are strong evidence that he cannot be allowed to have control of #Medicare. Ron Wyden (@RonWyden) January 31, 2017 Mr. Mnuchin continued to fail to come clean on shady foreclosure practices that hurt Americans. Ron Wyden (@RonWyden) January 31, 2017 Liberal groups cheered the boycott while Senate Republican leaders decried it as Democratic obstructionism. They are manufacturing issues on a daily basis to drag this process out, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kent.) said of the confirmations of Trumps nominees. I dont see how they can explain to the American people how it is appropriate to prevent the administration from getting up and getting started, he said. Democrats have said Mnuchin, a wealthy Wall Street executive, misled the committee in his response to a written question about foreclosures at Pasadenas OneWest Bank while he ran it from 2009-15. Democrats pointed to a report Sunday by the Columbus Dispatch that Mnuchin denied that OneWest engaged in so-called robo-signing of mortgage documents. The paper said its analysis of nearly four dozen foreclosure cases in Ohios Franklin County in 2010 showed that the bank frequently used robo-signers. The Columbus Dispatch cited a foreclosure involving a mortgage signed by Erica Johnson-Seck, a OneWest vice president who said in a deposition in a 2009 Florida case that she signed an average of 750 documents a week. Barney Keller, a spokesman for Mnuchin, said Monday that several courts had dismissed cases involving allegations of robo-signing by Johnson-Seck. The media is picking on a hardworking bank employee whose reputation has been maligned but whose work has been upheld by numerous courts all around the country in the face of scurrilous and false allegations, Keller said. Democrats also have problems with Price, a six-term congressman and former orthopedic surgeon who has distinguished himself in conservative circles for his staunch opposition to the Affordable Care Act and his plans to slash federal healthcare spending. His nomination has become among Trumps most controversial, in part because of his hostility to government safety net programs, including Medicaid and Medicare. Democrats have also been increasingly critical of Prices extensive trading in healthcare stocks while he has been in Congress, and in some cases while he has pushed legislation that would benefit his portfolio. Price has denied any wrongdoing. Also drawing criticism is Prices purchase of discounted shares in an Australian biotech firm, Innate Immunotherapeutics, which he was offered through a private deal not available to general shareholders. Price also denied that this was improper, and Senate Republicans have rallied to his side, saying he did not violate any ethics rules. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) said he and the other Democrats on the committee want Mnuchin and Price to explain their lies either in person before the committee or in new written answers. I want them to disclose this information that they seem not to want to disclose, Brown said. 12:10 p.m.: This post was updated with additional comments from Hatch as well as from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Sen. Sherrod Brown. 8:00 a.m.: This post has been updated with additional information and background. 8:07 a.m.: This post has been updated with additional information. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print White House aides who wrote Trumps travel ban see it as just the start By Brian Bennett (Pablo Martinez Monsivais / Associated Press) Even as confusion, internal dissent and widespread condemnation greeted President Trumps travel ban and crackdown on refugees this weekend, senior White House aides say they are only getting started. Trump and his aides justified Fridays executive order, which blocked travel from seven majority-Muslim countries for 90 days and halted refugees from around the world for 120, on security grounds an issue that they say they take seriously. But their ultimate goal is far broader. Trumps top advisors on immigration, including chief strategist Steve Bannon and senior advisor Stephen Miller, see themselves as launching a radical experiment to fundamentally transform how the U.S. decides who is allowed into the country and to block a generation of people who, in their view, wont assimilate into American society. That project may live or die in the next three months, as the Trump administration reviews whether and how to expand the visa ban and alter vetting procedures. White House aides are considering new, onerous security checks that could effectively limit travel into the U.S. by people from majority-Muslim countries to a trickle. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Why corporations cant risk keeping silent about Trumps immigration ban By David Pierson Starbucks Chief Executive Howard Schultz said the Seattle coffee company is developing plans to hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years. (Richard Drew / Associated Press) Corporate America generally prefers to stay quiet about partisan politics. Pick one side of a hot-button issue, the thinking goes, and youll risk losing customers on the other side. But like so many norms before it, President Trump has turned this one on its head. A growing number of companies are deciding its a bigger risk to their investors and bottom line to stay quiet than it is to protest Trumps ban on refugees and travel from seven Muslim-majority nations, betting vocal opposition to the executive order scores them a moral and fiscal victory. While it was possible for companies to take a wait-and-see approach leading up to Trumps inauguration, many firms can no longer ignore the White Houses policy given the effect the order is already having on employees either stranded or fearful of traveling. Only a week ago it seemed foolish to speak out against a president who has admonished individual companies on social media such as Carrier, Boeing and General Motors. Now the pendulum has swung the other way. Companies, mostly in technology but increasingly in other sectors, have decided that its not enough just to speak out against the immigration order. They believe that they must also take headline-grabbing action. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Op-Ed: Trump is taking the Bannon Way, and it will end in disaster By Jonah Goldberg Bannon has said hes a Leninist' but hes really more of a Trotskyist because he fancies himself the leader of an international populist-nationalist right wing movement, exporting anti-'globalist' revolution. In that role, his status as an enabler of Trumps instinct to shoot or tweet from the hip seems especially ominous. The Bannon way might work on the campaign trail, but it doesnt translate into good governance. Its possible and one must hope that Trump can learn this fact on the job. But what if he doesnt? He could put the country in serious peril. Jonah Goldberg Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Trump will leave LGBTQ protections in place By Associated Press (Evan Vucci / Associated Press) The White House says President Trump will leave intact a 2014 executive order that protects federal workers from anti-LGBTQ discrimination. In a statement released early Tuesday, the White House said Trump is determined to protect the rights of all Americans, including the LGBTQ community and that he continues to be respectful and supportive of LGBTQ rights, just as he was throughout the election. The Trump administration has vowed to roll back much of President Obamas work from the last eight years and had been scrutinizing the 2014 order. The directive protects people from LGBTQ discrimination while working for federal contractors. The recent statement says the protections will remain intact at the direction of Trump. Here is the text of Obamas executive order, signed on July 21, 2014: By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including 40 U.S.C. 121, and in order to provide for a uniform policy for the Federal Government to prohibit discrimination and take further steps to promote economy and efficiency in Federal Government procurement by prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, it is hereby ordered as follows: Section 1. Amending Executive Order 11478 . The first sentence of section 1 of Executive Order 11478 of August 8, 1969, as amended, is revised by substituting sexual orientation, gender identity for sexual orientation. Sec. 2. Amending Executive Order 11246 . Executive Order 11246 of September 24, 1965, as amended, is hereby further amended as follows: (a) The first sentence of numbered paragraph (1) of section 202 is revised by substituting sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin for sex, or national origin. (b) The second sentence of numbered paragraph (1) of section 202 is revised by substituting sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin for sex or national origin. (c) Numbered paragraph (2) of section 202 is revised by substituting sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin for sex or national origin. (d) Paragraph (d) of section 203 is revised by substituting sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or national origin for sex or national origin. Sec. 3. Regulations . Within 90 days of the date of this order, the Secretary of Labor shall prepare regulations to implement the requirements of section 2 of this order. Sec. 4. General Provisions . (a) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect: (i) the authority granted by law to an agency or the head thereof; or (ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals. (b) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person. Sec. 5. Effective Date . This order shall become effective immediately, and section 2 of this order shall apply to contracts entered into on or after the effective date of the rules promulgated by the Department of Labor under section 3 of this order. Update 6:45 a.m.: This article was updated with the text of the 2014 executive order. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Trump fires Justice Departments top official after she refuses to defend his refugee ban By David Lauter Sally Yates. (J. David Ake / Associated Press) President Trump fired acting Atty. Gen. Sally Yates on Monday, just hours after she announced that the department would not defend his controversial executive order banning refugees and travelers from certain countries. Yates has betrayed the Department of Justice by refusing to enforce a legal order designed to protect the citizens of the United States, the White House said in a statement. It is time to get serious about protecting our country. The move came after Yates sent a letter to Justice Department lawyers saying that she questioned the lawfulness of Trumps executive order. My responsibility is to ensure that the position of the Department of Justice is not only legally defensible, but is informed by our best view of what the law is after consideration of all the facts, Yates wrote. At present, I am not convinced that the defense of the executive order is consistent with these responsibilities, nor am I convinced that the executive order is lawful, she wrote. Consequently, for as long as I am the acting attorney general, the Department of Justice will not present arguments in defense of the executive order unless and until I become convinced that it is appropriate to do so. Yates was a holdover from the Obama administration. But because Trumps nominee for attorney general, Sen. Jeff Sessions, has not been confirmed and no other senior Justice Department officials have been appointed, firing her was expected to cause significant problems within the department. Among other issues, Yates is the only person in the department currently authorized to sign warrants for wiretapping in foreign espionage cases involving the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. Trump replaced Yates with Dana J. Boente, a three-decade veteran of the Justice Department who was appointed in 2015 by former President Obama as U.S. attorney for the eastern district of Virginia. 6:37 p.m.: The story was updated with Trumps decision to fire Yates. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print U.S. service member killed in Yemen identified as Navy SEAL from Illinois By Jeanette Steele The Pentagon on Sunday confirmed the death of a U.S. servicemember in a raid in Yemen targeting al-Qaeda, marking the first American combat death under the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump. A Navy SEAL from the Virginia-based elite unit known as SEAL Team 6 was killed Sunday during an unusual nighttime raid that put U.S. troops on the ground against Al Qaeda leaders in the middle of war-torn Yemen. The fallen sailor was identified Monday as Chief Special Warfare Operator William Ryan Owens, 36, of Peoria, Ill.. Three other Americans were wounded in the raid and an MV-22 Osprey had to be destroyed after the aircraft suffered a hard landing and couldnt fly. Another U.S. service member was injured in that crash. The raid marked the first known counter-terrorism operation and first confirmed combat fatality under President Trump. Steele writes for the San Diego Union-Tribune. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Protests against Trumps ban on certain immigrants continue across the country By Ann M. Simmons Protesters rally at Los Angeles International Airport on Jan. 29, demonstrating against the immigration ban imposed by President Trump. (Justin Sullivan / Getty Images) After a weekend of turmoil at many of the nations airports following President Trumps executive order to suspend the U.S. refugee program and temporarily prohibit entry to citizens of seven predominantly Muslim nations, federal officials said all people being detained on arrival to the U.S. had been released. But that hasnt put a stop to demands to lift the travel ban. Protests continued to be held and organized throughout the country incluidng in New York, New Orleans, Colorado and Connecticut. According to Ground Game, an online platform for organizing, at least a dozen demonstrations were planned for this week in what the group described as a fight against Islamophobia and Fascism. Calls to rally, demonstrate and protest swept social media platforms, including Twitter and Facebook. In Louisville, Ky., a rally was planned for Monday evening at the Muhammad Ali Center, in what organizers said would be a gathering for American values and to voice support for our nation and our city, which was founded and is strengthened by immigrants. In Hattiesburg, Miss., there was call to join a peaceful vigil in solidarity with refugees, immigrants, and Muslims on the University of Southern Mississippi campus on Monday evening. Declaring that Jersey City stands with our Muslim and immigrant community, organizers in that New Jersey city called on people to come to a pedestrian mall on Monday to stand in solidarity and peace as we show our strength in diversity as one of the most diverse cities in the nation. Other demonstrations were planned for later in the week in cities nationwide, including Tuesday in Tuscon, where organizers encouraged people to stand in solidarity with Senator (John) McCains strong public statement opposing the executive order banning refugees and Legal Permanent Residents from Muslim countries! Similar actions were planned on Tuesday at the South Carolina State House in Columbia and at the Worchester City Hall and Common in Massachusetts, while organizers in San Francisco, under the banner #NoBanNoWallSF, urged residents to join the resistance against Donald Trumps racist and exclusionary Executive Orders on Saturday. We will not allow our country to be divided by hate and religious persecution, read a statement from #NoBanNoWallSF posted on Facebook. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Obama carefully weighs in on refugee ban, says he is heartened by public response By Michael A. Memoli (Jim Watson / AFP/Getty Images) Former President Obama has offered his first public comment on the conduct of his successor, saying through a spokesman that he is heartened by public demonstrations against the Trump administrations controversial move to temporarily ban refugees and block all admissions from seven countries. President Obama is heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country, Kevin Lewis, a spokesperson for the former president, said in a statement emailed to reporters Monday. In his final official speech as President, he spoke about the important role of citizen and how all Americans have a responsibility to be the guardians of our democracy--not just during an election but every day. Citizens exercising their constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake. Lewis also said in the statement that Obama fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion. Trump aides deny that his executive order, released Friday, involves religious discrimination. The order temporarily blocked travel to the U.S. by residents of seven predominantly Muslim nations, but left many of the Islamic worlds largest population centers unaffected, they note. The order also included an exception for believers of minority religions in those countries, a provision that Trump explicitly said would help Christians. Obamas statement is notable less for its content than for the fact that it was issued at all. It reflected the delicate balance he feels he must strike between showing a degree of deference to the new president and speaking out on issues he sees as critically important. The statement tiptoed around the content of the order, focusing more on the former presidents interest in citizen engagement. Obama said before leaving office that he expected to choose carefully when to comment on the actions of his successor and would focus less on normal functioning of politics and more on certain issues or certain moments where I think our core values may be at stake, as he put it in his final news conference. Mondays statement did point, though, to comments Obama made at a news conference in November 2015, when he called the idea of a religious test for immigration policy shameful and not American. We dont have religious tests to our compassion, he said at the time. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement GOP-led Congress worries about its role in the Trump era By Lisa Mascaro Its what congressional Republicans had long dreamed about: a majority in both chambers to advance conservative policies and a president from the same party to sign them into law. But the Trump White House isnt turning out exactly the way they envisioned. The GOP establishment is experiencing whiplash after a week of President Trump bulldozing through the norms of policy and protocol dashing off executive orders without warning, escalating a diplomatic crisis with the countrys closest southern neighbor, triggering global confusion with a new refugee policy and generally hijacking party leaders agenda and replacing it with his own. Rather than the hoped-for collaborative new relationship between the White House and Congress, GOP officials complain that Trump is brushing aside their advice, failing to fully engage on drafting tough legislative packages like tax reform and Obamacare, and bypassing Congress by relying on executive actions, something they frequently complained about under President Obama. At the same time, Trumps unilateral moves continue to blindside Republicans and direct the national focus toward topics many in the party would rather avoid, whether thats how to pay for building the border wall with Mexico, warming ties with Russia, investigating false claims about voter fraud or, most recently, implementing sweeping new policies on refugees and visas. In the name of party unity, many Republicans so far have refrained from publicly attacking the new president. But for some, the new refugee policy crossed the line, signaling the first major rift in their already fraught partnership. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Washington state sues Trump over immigration order By Mark Z. Barabak President Trump signed an executive order Friday that suspends all immigration for citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries for 90 days. (Evan Vucci / Associated Press) Opening a new legal front, lawyers for the state of Washington filed suit Monday seeking to block President Trumps executive order temporarily banning foreign refugees from entering the United States. No one is above the law, not even the president, Atty. Gen. Bob Ferguson said in announcing the federal lawsuit. And in the courtroom, it is not the loudest voice that prevails. Its the Constitution. Over the weekend, a federal judge in Brooklyn issued an order curtailing portions of Trumps executive order, issued Friday, which temporary halts migration from seven predominantly Muslim countries for at least 90 days and also closed the nation to refugees for at least the next four months. Other challenges are pending. The lawsuit filed in federal court in Seattle was the first taken by a state attorney general, and its provenance was no surprise. Washington state and others along the West Coast voted overwhelmingly for Democrat Hillary Clinton in November and have emerged as a hotbed of anti-Trump sentiment. We will not yield, said Democratic Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, who joined Ferguson at a Seattle news conference. We will not be leveraged. We will not be threatened. We will not be intimidated. We will not be bullied by this. Trumps order, which has sparked demonstrations across the country, brought an outpouring of objection from Insleys Democratic colleagues around the country. President Trumps recent executive orders that divide and discriminate do not reflect the values enshrined in the U.S. Constitution or the principles we stand for as Oregonians, said Gov. Kate Brown. A single executive order does not define who we are as a country, said Connecticut Gov. Daniel P. Malloy. We are a nation of immigrants and must continue to fight for the tired, the poor, and the huddled masses yearning to breath free. In Massachusetts, another state that voted overwhelmingly for Clinton, Republican Gov. Charlie Baker joined the chorus of Democratic criticism, saying the travel ban would undermine the international relations forged by the states business, academic and healthcare communities. The confusion for families is real. The unexpected disruption for law-abiding people is real, Baker said. Thankfully, the federal courts will have an opportunity to straighten this out and it is my hope they do so, and do so quickly. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print How a top conservative radio host took on Trump, lost his audience and faith, but gained a new perspective By Mark Z. Barabak Charlie Sykes, right, interviews Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) before Wisconsins 2016 primary (Morry Gash/Associated Press) For nearly 25 years, Charlie Sykes was one of the most powerful and influential voices in Wisconsin. He cheer-led policies that turned this historically progressive state into a model of conservative governance. He made and destroyed political careers, using his perch on Milwaukee talk radio to help vault figures such as House Speaker Paul Ryan and Gov. Scott Walker to national prominence. But for the moment Sykes was speechless. He sank into the brown leather banquette of a suburban steakhouse. He stammered. He sighed. When youve devoted your whole life to certain beliefs and you think now they have been undermined and that you might have been deluded about things, he began. So. So. Um... In 2016 Sykes emerged as one of Donald Trumps most prominent critics, a stance that outraged listeners, strained longstanding friendships and left him questioning much of what he once held true. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Pentagon compiling a list of Iraqis who aided the U.S. military and wants them shielded from Trumps travel ban By W.J. Hennigan The Pentagon is compiling a list of Iraqi citizens who have worked with the U.S. military and is recommending that they be exempt from President Trumps temporary ban on entry to the U.S. by people from Iraq and six other predominantly Muslim countries, according to the U.S. military. The move could potentially shield tens of thousands of Iraqi interpreters, advisors, and others who have assisted the American military from the presidents controversial executive action that blocked visitors from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen. Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, told reporters Monday that the list will include names of individuals who have demonstrated their commitment to helping the United States. Even people that are doing seemingly benign things in support of us whether as a linguist, a driver, anything else they often do that at great personal risk, he said. So people who take these risks are really making a tangible signal of support to the United States, and thats something that will, and should be, recognized. The list would not require any changes to the presidents order, but rather serve as guidance to the Department of Homeland Security and the White House in implementing the new policy. White House spokesman Sean Spicer later pushed back against blanket exemptions. We recognize that people have served this country, we should make sure that in those cases theyre helped out, he said. But that doesnt mean that we just give them a pass. Trump, who signed the order at the Pentagon on Friday, did not consult Defense Secretary James N. Mattis or Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr., the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on the temporary suspensions of entry to visitors from the seven nations, according to U.S. officials. The executive action put the U.S. military in a difficult position because it works closely with the Iraqi government on a range of issues, including the fight against Islamic State, which necessitates travel between the two countries. For instance, Iraqi military pilots train to fly F-16 fighter jets at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona. Its not clear those pilots, who are active in the fight against Islamic State, could arrive in the U.S. for the training. 1:10 p.m.: This post was updated with White House response. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Trump signs order on rulemaking: For every regulation added, agencies have to cut 2 others By Noah Bierman (Evan Vucci / Associated Press) President Trump signed an executive order Monday designed to fulfill his campaign pledge reduce red tape for businesses. The two-page order requires that when a federal agency proposes new regulations, it shall identify at least two existing regulations to be repealed. We want to make the life easier for small businesses and big business, Trump said Monday from the Roosevelt Room of the White House, where he met with nine representatives of the small-business sector. Trump said he hoped to see up to 75% of federal regulations eliminated during his presidency. Regulation has been horrible for big business, but its been worse for small business, Trump said. He also reiterated his promise to gut the Dodd-Frank Act, the financial regulatory overhaul that was passed after the financial crisis. Dodd-Frank is a disaster, he said. Were going to be doing a big number on Dodd-Frank. Consumer advocates who backed the law say that eliminating it would help Wall Street and other players in the financial sector at the expense of consumers. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print U.S. diplomats to protest Trumps travel ban order By Tracy Wilkinson Protesters of President Trumps immigration order block traffic at LAX. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) A number of U.S. diplomats are condemning President Trumps ban on some Muslim immigrants and visitors, saying the abrupt order does not make the U.S. safer and will only stoke anti-American fervor overseas. The complaint, being made through the State Departments so-called dissent channel, echoes criticism coming from human rights attorneys, legal experts and lawmakers from both political parties, as well as world leaders. It is significant because it represents the viewpoint of the men and women who must carry out Trumps unconventional and often provocative foreign policy. A policy which closes our doors to over 200-million legitimate travelers in the hopes of preventing a small number of travelers who intend to harm Americans ... will not achieve its aim of making our country safer, said a draft version of the memo that was circulating Monday and was reviewed by the Los Angeles Times. It was first reported by ABC News. Moreover, such a policy runs counter to core American values of non-discrimination, fair play and extending a warm welcome to foreign visitors and immigrants. The White House was quickly dismissive of the dissent and seemed to suggest the diplomats should quit if they disagree with a policy. Trump spokesman Sean Spicer said the diplomats raising of opposition does call into question whether or not they should continue to work in the State Department. It was not clear how many officials would sign the memo. Dissent channel memos are in theory not made public. The mechanism is designed to allow diplomats to offer an alternative policy without fear of retaliation. Acting State Department spokesman Mark Toner confirmed the existence of the memo but declined to comment on its contents. The dissent channel is a longstanding official vehicle for State Department employees to convey alternative views and perspectives on policy issues, he said. "... It allows State employees to express divergent policy views candidly and privately to senior leadership. The agency is still waiting for a boss. Trumps pick for secretary of State, former Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson, is expected to be confirmed by the Senate this week. The last time a dissent-channel memo was reported publicly was last year, when about 50 diplomats protested Obama administration policy in Syria, which they described as inaction. 12:20 p.m.: This story was updated with White House comment. 8:40 a.m.: This story was updated with comment from a State Department spokesman. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Trump to announce his Supreme Court choice Tuesday -- in prime time By Michael A. Memoli (Susan Walsh / Associated Press) President Trump will announce his first Supreme Court nomination in prime time on Tuesday, he tweeted this morning. I have made my decision on who I will nominate for The United States Supreme Court. It will be announced live on Tuesday at 8:00 P.M. (W.H.) Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 The announcement was moved up two days amid the continued fallout from the executive action Trump signed temporarily banning refugee admissions from some countries. Trump had tweeted last week that he would announce his high-court decision Thursday. In an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network on Friday, Trump said his administration was doing some final vetting of his choice to replace the late Antonin Scalia, and that the pick would be from among the list of 20 names he issued during the election campaign. I think the person I pick will be big, big, he said. I think people are going to love it. I think evangelicals, Christians will love my pick. And will be represented very fairly. Times Supreme Court reporter David Savage profiled each of the leading contenders: Judge Thomas Hardiman of the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals, Judge Neil M. Gorsuch of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, and Judge William H. Pryor Jr. from the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. The move could prompt a major clash with Senate Democrats, who have warned the president against a choice outside what they consider the mainstream. Some are threatening to block any choice in retaliation for Senate Republicans refusal to even hold hearings on President Obamas choice to replace Scalia, Merrick Garland. Democrats 2013 change to Senate rules that allowed most nominations to advance with a simple majority vote exempted Supreme Court nominations, meaning that Democrats could potentially filibuster the choice. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) appeared to rule out any further rule change in an interview last week, though Trump urged him to consider doing so. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print As Hollywood gathered at the SAG Awards, some entertainers joined LAX protest Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Advertisement This New York doctor went to visit family in Sudan, and now hes stuck By Molly Hennessy-Fiske Dr. Kamal Fadlalla (Dr. Kamal Fadlalla / For The Times) Dr. Kamal Fadlalla, a hospital resident who has been working in New York for the last 20 months, was stuck in Sudan on Sunday, having gone there to see his family earlier this month. He had left Jan. 13, was due to return Feb. 4 but tried to return on Friday after hearing about President Trumps executive order on immigration, which suspended entry for people from seven countries, including Sudan. He made it past passport control, all the way to the gate at the airport in Khartoum, the Sudanese capital. One hour before departure they called my name, he said, and summoned him to the ticket counter, along with other New York-bound Sudanese passengers. When I got to the counter, they said there was a notice from Customs and Border Protection that ... they had to offload us from the flight. I was shocked. Fadlalla, 33, hoped for a reprieve as other passengers gathered, all stuck. One family, they came back from Dubai, she was a mother of three or four kids. She was waiting overnight at the Dubai airport. There were also two passengers turned back from New York, he said. It was a very tough night on me, He stayed for several hours, then returned to his mothers home in Madani, two hours south. Fadlalla is a second-year resident in internal medicine at Interfaith Medical Center in Brooklyn. He is hoping to specialize in hematology and oncology. The Committee for Interns and Residents found an attorney to represent him, he said, but he had not received any news about how a New York federal judges ruling late Saturday, which halted the deportations of people who had arrived in the U.S. with valid visas, could affect him. I dont know what Im going to do. My vacation is going to end and I have to join the hospital next week. Its going to be tough on me, Fadlalla said. I dont know for how long Im going to stay here. I dont know what Im going to do. My visa is valid for three months. Im really stuck. I have my house there, my utilities, my work, my patients, my colleagues. It was my life for the past 20 months. And Im stuck here. Fadlalla is from northern Sudan, and describes himself as a moderate Muslim. He said the executive order wont make the U.S. safer by barring valid visa holders like him because, Ive been through the whole process of visa interviews. He had planned to take board exams next year, and if he misses them, his schooling will be delayed. He had wanted to stay and work in New York, too. All my life is there. Now Im stuck here. I dont know what to do, he said. Its going to really affect my life, my patients, my colleagues and their work schedule. He said the executive order has shocked others in Sudan, too. Theyre talking about human rights. Everybody knows the United States is about freedom, he said. Everybody knows America is a free country, a country of chances for everybody. Still, people have hope in those protesting at airports all over the United States and attorneys who have volunteered to help immigrants and refugees, he said. He said the order is especially worrying for aspiring Sudanese medical residents who have been preparing to match with a hospital in March to study in the United States. A lot of my colleagues who are preparing for exams are really, really worried about this, Fadlalla said. Im really worried about the future of these young people. They study a lot and spend a lot of money, a lot of effort to enter the United States. Im concerned about my future and my colleagues future. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Californias congressional Republicans hold their fire on Trumps refugee order By Sarah D. Wire Only a few of the states 14 Republican representatives have publicly commented on an executive order signed by President Trump on Friday that barred refugees and green card holders from seven countries from entering the country. Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Tulare) released a statement Sunday night saying that some tweaks are needed, but that his background as chairman of the House Select Intelligence Committee leads him to support the executive order. In light of attempts by jihadist groups to infiltrate fighters into refugee flows to the West, along with Europes tragic experience coping with this problem, the Trump administrations executive order on refugees is a common-sense security measure to prevent terror attacks on the homeland, Nunes said. While accommodations should be made for green card holders and those whove assisted the U.S. armed forces, this is a useful temporary measure on seven nations of concern until we can verify who is entering the United States. Rep. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton) told the Washington Post that the executive order is the right call to keep America safe, but he hopes the cases of people traveling on visas who were prevented from reentering the country are resolved quickly. Rep. Jeff Denham (R-Turlock) said Sunday on Twitter that the rollout has created confusion, and that executive orders arent the way to fix the countrys long-term problems. View Twitter post View Twitter post Several of Californias 38 Democratic congressional representatives and the states two senators were out in force over the weekend demanding the release of refugees and green card holders as well as an end to the executive order. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) announced she would file two pieces of legislation in response. One would immediately rescind the presidents order. The second would limit executive authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act to prevent a president from unilaterally banning groups of immigrants. Its clear that the president gave little consideration to the chaos and heartbreak that would result from this order, she said in a statement. Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) joined protesters outside the White House on Sunday afternoon. We will fight against racism. We will fight against anti-Muslim rhetoric. We will fight against those who will marginalize who we are. pic.twitter.com/R54f3MDhvo Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) January 29, 2017 In Los Angeles, Reps. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) and Ted Lieu (D-Torrance) joined protesters at Los Angeles International Airport. On Saturday, Reps. Judy Chu (D-Monterey Park), Nanette Barragan (D-San Pedro) and Lou Correa (D-Santa Ana) joined the initial protests at the airport, and worked to get some of those being held released. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin) accompanied protesters at San Francisco International Airport on Sunday. Congresswoman @MaxineWaters is here at LAX protest leading the crowd in the chant "no ban, no wall, you build it up we'll tear it down" pic.twitter.com/iNEmkVVkmW Javier Panzar (@jpanzar) January 29, 2017 Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Legal moves come too late for Iranian man who arrived at LAX after Trumps order By Matt Hamilton Ali Vayeghan arrived at 7:15 p.m. Friday from Tehran. He was going to stay with relatives, then go to Indiana, to join his wife, who arrived in the U.S. four months ahead of him, and his son. But he never emerged from customs. His niece said he was put on a plane to Dubai, United Arab Emirates, at 3:15 p.m. Saturday. The ACLU was trying to prevent his deportation but arrived with paperwork 45 minutes too late. The family spoke to him by phone after he landed in Dubai, where he was waiting to be put on a flight to Tehran. Hes literally crying in the airport in Dubai, Ali Vayeghans niece, Marjan Vayghan, said. On Sunday afternoon, a federal judge in Los Angeles ordered authorities to transport Vayeghan back to the U.S. and admit him under the terms of his visa, which is set to expire Feb. 14. U.S. District Judge Dolly M. Gee said in her order that Vayeghan had demonstrated a strong likelihood of success in establishing that removal violates the Establishment Clause, the Immigration and Nationality Act, and his rights to Equal Protection guaranteed by the United States Constitution. But by the time the order came down, Vayeghan was on a plane bound for Tehran. Federal judge in LA has issued order allowing Iranian man deported from LAX yesterday to be admitted to US pic.twitter.com/yPth0xEQpv Matt Hamilton (@MattHjourno) January 29, 2017 Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print The political climate is a hot topic at the Screen Actors Guild awards The Actor statue watches over the red carpet at the Shrine Auditorium. (Matt Sayles / Invision / Associated Press) Stars on the red carpet and at the winners podium tonight in Los Angeles are not keeping their mouths shut on current affairs. The 23rd Screen Actors Guild awards are being held at the Shrine Auditorium. Heres what they have had to say so far: I want you all to know that I am the daughter of an immigrant. My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France, and Im an American patriot, and I love this country, and because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes and this immigrant ban is a blemish and it is un-American. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, accepting her award for her role in Veep We need to vote. Had we all voted, we wouldnt be here. You dont like it, you dont have nothing to say if you didnt vote. Get a clipboard, get organized and get in it. Dont sit back on the sidelines. Get in it. This is a fight for the country right now. Its worth fighting for. Courtney B. Vance, nominated for his performance in The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story For the first time ever in my lifetime, Ive been concerned about where its going to go. It doesnt seem to be that its going to go in a very positive direction. Claire Foy, nominated for her role as Queen Elizabeth in the Netflix series The Crown Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Green card holders will not be blocked by Trumps order, Homeland Security says By David Lauter (Francine Orr/Los Angeles Times) The Trump administration backed away from one of the most controversial parts of its new executive order on immigration Sunday evening, saying that permanent U.S. residents in most cases will not be affected by the new rules. Since the president issued the order Friday, confusion has been rampant over the effects on permanent residents, noncitizens who hold so-called green cards that allow them to live and work legally in the U.S. Many were stopped and detained at airports for many hours on Friday and Saturday and, in some cases, reported that they had been threatened with being returned to their home countries. An undetermined number of other green card holders were stopped from boarding U.S.-bound planes. Late Sunday, however, the secretary of Homeland Security, retired Gen. John Kelly, issued a statement changing the policy. Statement By Secretary John Kelly On The Entry Of Lawful Permanent Residents Into The United States https://t.co/Es1qivoR3J pic.twitter.com/hffMK2MOQC Homeland Security (@DHSgov) January 29, 2017 I hereby deem the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest, Kelly wrote. Green card holders from one of the seven countries covered by the 90-day ban will still need to request a waiver to gain reentry to the U.S. if they have traveled abroad. But unless officials have significant derogatory information about a green card holder that indicates a serious threat to public safety and welfare, lawful permanent resident status will be a dispositive factor in deciding the case, Kellys statement said. A White House official, briefing reporters about the change in policy, said that about 170 people have applied for a waiver to the ban so far, and all 170 have received a waiver and have been allowed to enter the U.S. The seven countries affected by the ban are Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Uber fights immigration order -- and #DeleteUber hashtag -- with $3-million legal fund for drivers By Tracey Lien Hours after Lyfts co-founders announced a $1-million donation to the American Civil Liberties Union to defend the Constitution, Uber Chief Executive Travis Kalanick pulled out his pocket book as well. Kalanick promised in a Facebook post that the company would create a $3-million legal defense fund to help drivers affected by the Trump administrations move to restrict immigrants and refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries. The fund will help drivers with immigration and translation services. Kalanick also said the San Francisco ride-hailing company will provide 24/7 legal support to drivers stuck outside the country and compensate them for lost earnings. Drivers eligible for assistance were directed to contact the company via an online form. Although the announcement was greeted with some support on Facebook and Twitter, many saw it as too little too late. The company had come under fire a day earlier for advertising on Twitter that it was operating at New Yorks Kennedy International Airport during a taxi strike protesting the executive order. That gaffe, coupled with Kalanicks involvement in a panel advising President Trump on economic issues, helped spawn the Twitter hashtag #DeleteUber, which encouraged customers to delete the app from their phones in protest. You are 20 hours too late, one person wrote in response to Kalanicks Facebook post. Still deleted my account today, wrote another. Though Kalanick issued a statement on Saturday opposing the executive order, it didnt stop thousands of Twitter users from adopting the trending the #DeleteUber hashtag to decry Ubers actions. They accused the company of attempting to profit from the strike and prioritizing business interests over a moral imperative. Celebrities also jumped on the bandwagon, with actor and activist George Takei on Sunday tweeting to his 2.9 million followers: Lyft donates $1mil to ACLU while Uber doubles down on its support for Trump. #DeleteUber. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print 75-year-old grandmother from Iran tells the story of her detention at LAX By Alene Tchekmedyian Siavosh Naji-Talakar of Phoenix hugs his grandmother Marzieh Moosavizadeh after she was released from detention at LAX early Sunday morning. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) Marzieh Moosavizadeh and her grandson follow a routine when she visits almost every year from Iran. The 75-year-old, who travels in a wheelchair and speaks little English, struggles to find direct flights to Phoenix, where he and his family live. So they meet in Los Angeles and he escorts her on the last leg of her trip. This time was different. Moosavizadeh landed at Los Angeles International Airport a day after President Trump signed an executive order banning citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries, including Iran, from entering the United States. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement GOP senators call executive order a self-inflicted wound. Trump calls them wrong and weak By Matt Ballinger McCain and Graham in 2013. (Evan Vucci / Associated Press) U.S. Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and John McCain of Arizona released a statement Sunday saying that confusion at U.S. airports shows that President Trumps executive order on immigration was not properly vetted. Such a hasty process risks harmful results, the Republicans statement read. We should not stop green-card holders from returning to the country they call home. We should not stop those who have served as interpreters for our military and diplomats from seeking refuge in the country they risked their lives to help. And we should not turn our backs on those refugees who have been shown through extensive vetting to pose no demonstrable threat to our nation. It went on: Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. The president responded on Twitter: The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong - they are sadly weak on immigration. The two... Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 ...Senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print At least 600 people wait to greet Syrians arriving in Phoenix By Nigel Duara Elijah Chavez and Brandi Hernandez protest in Phoenix (Nigel Duara/Los Angeles Times) A Phoenix-bound British Airways flight was scheduled to arrive from London at Sunday evening carrying several Syrians. A protest of about 600 people was waiting at a Phoenix international airport terminal for the flight to arrive. The outcome when these people arrive is uncertain at best, said Tanveer Shah, an Arizona attorney in private practice who volunteers with the ACLU. Shah said Syrians on board the flight would, in the best case, walk off the plane without a problem. But given the outcomes in other cities on Saturday and Sunday, Shah said it was incumbent on civil liberties attorneys to be there when the plane arrives. We have staff attorneys here ... who are prepared to file emergency pleadings, Shah said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print When Muslims got blocked at American airports, U.S. veterans rushed to help By Matt Pearce (G. Morty Ortega / Getty Images) Jeffrey Buchalter was reflooring his foyer in Chesapeake Beach, Md., and listening to MSNBC over the weekend when he heard the news: An Iraqi who had worked with American forces as an interpreter had been stopped from entering the U.S. under a new executive order on immigration from President Trump. The story stopped him cold. Buchalter, an Army veteran who works as a law-enforcement instructor at the Department of Homeland Security, had served multiple tours of duty as a military policeman in Iraq, service that cost him dearly. He was decorated for injuries sustained from gunfire and improvised explosive devices. Exams revealed hed suffered herniated discs, traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder, and he spent 2 years at Walter Reed Army Medical Center trying to get right. But he was still alive, and now the married father of two children. And he believes thats thanks in part to the work of Iraqi interpreters who acted as guides during his work in their country. So he told his younger daughter and son they were going to take a trip: a two-hour drive to Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C., where, for the first time in his life, Buchalter would join a protest. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Demonstrators against Trumps immigration limits and a few who like them surge through LAX By Javier Panzar The crowd at LAX is getting bigger and bigger. pic.twitter.com/dJ281TETXj Javier Panzar (@jpanzar) January 29, 2017 Thousands of people filled the international terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Sunday afternoon to call for the release of an unknown number of people being detained by immigration authorities. Filling the arrivals section of the terminal and spilling into the street outside, the throng chanted, Let them in, and Love, not hate, makes America great. Jacob Kemper, a 35-year-old Army veteran who fought two tours in Iraq, said he was infuriated to think soldiers he fought alongside might be denied entry to the country. I really dont care about religion, but I really hate oppression, he said, holding a sign that read, I Fought Next To Muslims. Shay Soltani, a network engineer, fled the Iranian revolution 40 years ago and still has family members in Iran. She doesnt know if she will be able to see them again. As she and hundreds of others marched through the airport, she said she was horrified by Trumps order. I am so hurt by this, she said. He is against freedom of speech and the constitution and everything I believe in as an American. Meanwhile, about a dozen counter-protesters popped up on the other side of the street, holding signs that said X-treme vetting and Keep Refugees Out. They said they were tired of immigrants entering the U.S. illegally, which they said jeopardizes the safety of American citizens. Chanell Temple, 63, of Los Angeles said she was sick of watching immigrants here illegally steal benefits and services from American citizens, specifically veterans and homeless people who need aid. I worked out here for 40 years and they are coming here and taking everything away, said Temple, a former bookkeeper who said she lost her job and healthcare after she was fired for an inability to speak Spanish. Raul Rodriguez Jr., coordinator of a group called America First Latinos, said he was concerned about what he considers a surge in crimes committed against Americans by those who are in the country illegally. They are lawbreakers. They have violated federal law and they need to be deported, he said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Silicon Valley execs speak out against immigration ban By Tracey Lien Technology executives are speaking out against President Trumps executive order on immigration, highlighting how the ban hurts their businesses. Leaders of companies that include Google, Microsoft, Apple, Facebook, Uber, Lyft, Airbnb, Dropbox and Twitter denounced it over the weekend. Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do, said Apple chief executive Tim Cook in a memo to employees. In my conversations with officials here in Washington this week, Ive made it clear that Apple believes deeply in the importance of immigration both to our company and to our nations future. General Electric Co. chief executive Jeff Immelt said Sunday that businesses with global operations must balance working with the new administration while also supporting their workers and partners. We have many employees from the named countries and we do business all over the region, Immelt said in a statement. These employees and customers are critical to our success and they are our friends and partners. We stand with them and will work with the U.S. administration to strive to find the balance between the need for security and the movement of law abiding people. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print LAX protest grows as families wait Meg Heatherly, 27, of Los Angeles holds a Shame sign during a protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement L.A. city attorney barred from seeing detainees at LAX By James Queally Los Angeles City Atty. Mike Feuer said he was repeatedly denied access to federal detainees or an attorney who could discuss the situation with him at Los Angeles International Airport on Saturday night and Sunday morning. Federal officials have declined to discuss the LAX detentions or respond to Feuers criticisms. While he was at the airport, Feuer said he was approached by a woman who claimed her father, suffering from Parkinsons disease, was among the detainees. It is those kind of real stories that are at stake because of this outrageous action by the feds. It is time not only for officials in my position, but all Americans, should find this a breathtaking violation of rights. Mike Feuer Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Democratic attorneys general from 15 states condemn Trump immigration order By Ann M. Simmons California Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra (Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times) More than a dozen Democratic attorneys general from states across the country have condemned the Trump administrations executive order suspending acceptance of refugees and have vowed to oppose it to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created. In a communique Sunday, the group said: As the chief legal officers for over 130 million Americans and foreign residents of our states, we condemn President Trumps unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful Executive Order and will work together to ensure the federal government obeys the Constitution, respects our history as a nation of immigrants, and does not unlawfully target anyone because of their national origin or faith. The executive order places an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria and prohibits citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering as refugees for four months. It also places a suspension on admissions of other citizens of those countries. The legal officials represent 15 states. They include California Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra and his contemporaries in Washington, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia, as well as the District of Columbia. Religious liberty has been, and always will be, a bedrock principle of our country, and no president can change that truth, the attorneys general said in the statement. They praised the decision of multiple federal courts to order a stay on some aspects of the order. We are confident that the Executive Order will ultimately be struck down by the courts, the statement said. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print 13 people who had been detained at LAX have been released, source says By James Queally Protesters at LAX on Sunday. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) Thirteen people who were detained Saturday night at Los Angeles International Airports Terminal 2 were eventually released, a law enforcement source told The Times. Each of them held green cards, which grant permanent residency in the U.S. The source, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the situation at the airport, could not provide detention figures for the Tom Bradley International Terminal, which has been the center of protest activity. Thats where protesters were gathering Sunday. Nurse Jamie Shoemaker, 51, of Los Angeles held an American flag in one hand and carried a sign that read, Muslims are welcome here, racists and fascists are not. She called Trumps order un-American. This is not the country I want, she said. This is not the country I grew up in. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Democrats in Congress drafting legislation to repeal Trumps refugee ban, pressuring GOP for support By Lisa Mascaro Sen. Chuck Schumer becomes emotional speaking against Pres. Trump's immigration order, calling it "mean-spirited and un-American." pic.twitter.com/NkhUdpaNyV ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) January 29, 2017 Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer and Democrats will introduce legislation as soon as Monday to stop President Trumps actions temporarily banning refugees and arrivals from certain Muslim countries. House Democrats are taking similar legislative action, and lawmakers from both chambers will rally Monday evening at the Supreme Court to protest Trumps orders. This executive order was mean-spirited and un-American, said Schumer, the New York Democrat, choking up as he stood with immigrants and refugees at a press conference Sunday. It must be reversed immediately. Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said House Democrats are exploring legal options, including an amicus brief in support of the ACLU lawsuit against the actions. The chances of passing a bill through the Republican-controlled Congress are slim, as most GOP leaders and lawmakers have not objected to Trumps ban. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Sunday that while he was personally opposed to a religious test on admissions, it was best left to the courts to resolve the issue. Its hopefully going to be decided in the courts as to whether or not this has gone too far, McConnell said on ABCs This Week. House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) expressed his support Friday for Trumps action. A handful of Republicans, though, are uneasy with Trumps orders, and have spoken against them. Schumer noted that just few more Republicans would be needed to reach the 60-vote threshold for advancing Senate legislation. Maybe we can pass something in Congress, Schumer said. Its up to Republicans. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Emotional reunion at JFK airport after release of elderly Sudanese man from immigration detention By Barbara Demick Tears and hugs at JFK's international arrivals as a detainee is released, reuniting father with son. More families wait, cheering. pic.twitter.com/WrVpoocWjY Jack Smith IV (@JackSmithIV) January 29, 2017 For those immigrants temporarily detained under a new Trump administration executive order at New Yorks John F. Kennedy International Airport, attorneys have put a priority on getting some of the older detainees released to their families. One small victory for the lawyers was the case of Yassin Abdelrhman, a 76-year-old green card holder from Sudan who had been detained after a trip home to visit family. He was released about noon on Sunday after being detained for 30 hours. Soon, he was reunited with his sons. He is a strong individual, but he has some health challenges, said U.S. Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), who had been working on their case. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Iranian director Asghar Farhadi will not attend Oscars Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi after winning an Oscar in 2012. ((Allen J. Schaben/ Los Angeles Times) ) In a statement to the New York Times today, Oscar-winning Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi said he no longer planned to attend this years ceremony. Farhadis film The Salesman is nominated in the foreign language film category. Farhadi had initially hoped to attend despite the prohibition on visitors from Iran. But he said he had decided the possibility of this presence is being accompanied by ifs and buts which are in no way acceptable to me even if exceptions were to be made for my trip. Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print How an Iranian Fulbright scholar got into the U.S.: We found a lawyer who found a lawyer who found a lawyer By Barbara Demick Iranian students in front of a makeshift law office in JFKs Terminal 4. (Barbara Demick / Los Angeles Times) Perhaps nothing encapsulates the chaos emanating from President Trumps executive order better than what happened with Ukrainian Airlines Flight 232. The regularly scheduled flight to Kiev had to turn around on the tarmac at John F. Kennedy Airport early Sunday after a federal judge issued a stay of a deportation order of dozens of foreigners, including a 32-year-old Iranian linguist who is a doctoral candidate and former Fulbright scholar. With just minutes to spare, Vahideh Rasekhi -- helped by volunteer lawyers and her smart phone managed to prevent the flight from taking off. She had arrived Saturday afternoon, but was blocked from entering the United States by the executive order barring arrivals of citizens of Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Somalia and Libya. Around midnight, she was put on the Ukrainian Air flight to return to Tehran, via Kiev. We found a lawyer who found a lawyer who found a lawyer, said Mehdi Namazi, 29, a friend who has been waiting for her at the airport. The lawyers were showing officials a copy of the order issued a few hours earlier by U.S. District Court Judge Ann Donnelly in Brooklyn. It was all very confusing. They were arguing as the plane was taxiing, Namazi said. According to one lawyer, Melissa Trent, Rasekhi herself was walking up and down the aisles arguing for the plane not to take off. She knew that if the plane left she would never get back to the United States again, Trent said. Rasekhi spent most of Sunday in detention with other Iranians, but was released into the United States at around 3 p.m.. A dozen Iranian friends had been waiting inside the airports Terminal 4 amid a clutter of discarded coffee cups and half-eaten donuts in front of a diner that had been turned into a makeshift law office. Another Iranian student was waiting for her parents, who were taken into detention after arriving on another flight I havent seen them in 3-1/2 years. They dont speak English. But Im hopeful, said the student, who gave her name as Sahar. The students were both furious at the way their country had been targeted by Trumps order and touched by the outpouring of support from the volunteer lawyers. We see two different Americas here. There is this order banning us, and than there are all these people here who came to the airport. If it werent for these volunteers, she would have been deported, said Namazi. Im very depressed. We feel betrayed by this country that we invested so much energy and hope into. We are all graduate students, professors, PhDs, engineers. To say this is for national security, it doesnt add up, said Tahmineh Tabrizian, 33, another friend of Rasekhis. She said her own parents had planned to come to the United States and had spent $14,000 on tickets and visas and would now have to cancel their trip. Rasekhi, who has lived in the United States for a decade, was a Fulbright scholar at UC Santa Barbara and received a masters degree at Fresno State University, according to a resume supplied by one of her friends. She had been studying for a PhD at Stony Brook University on Long Island. She had gone to Tehran over the Christmas break to visit her parents and was on her way back to resume her studies when she was detained. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Protests begin again at LAX on Sunday morning By Genaro Molina Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Protesters in Tel Aviv compare Trump immigration order to Israeli refugee policies By Joshua Mitnick Demonstrators in Tel Aviv protest U.S. President Trumps new immigration order. (Joshua Mitnick / Los Angeles Times) Holding signs reading Refugees Welcome and chanting No Ban, No Wall, Sanctuary for All, several dozen demonstrators gathered outside the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv on Sunday to join protests in the U.S. against President Trumps new immigration policy. Mia Zur Szpiro, a 36-year-old filmmaker, said she felt compelled to demonstrate because her parents survived the Holocaust. We are a country of immigrants, and to me it was astounding that this [order] was passed on Holocaust Memorial Day, she said. Its wrong to stereotype, and its wrong to send people who are in need back into the face of danger and the risk of death. Elliot Vaisbrub Glassenberg, a protest organizer and migrant rights activist, compared the new U.S. policy to Israeli policies toward tens of thousands of Eritrean and Sudanese migrants who crossed into the country illegally from Egypts Sinai desert. The policies that Trump has enacted are no worse than the policies that [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu has enacted for years here such as not allowing any non-Jews to be given refugee status in Israel, except for a select few. Togod Omar, a native of Sudan who was at the protest, said he applied for political asylum in Israel three years ago, and is still waiting. He said Sudanese friends hoping to be resettled in the U.S. were upset by the new executive order. Trump doesnt understand whats going on in Sudan, Omar said. You cant punish the Sudanese people for what the Islamic government is doing. You cant banish someone because of their religion. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print President Trump hits majority disapproval in record time, Gallup finds By David Lauter Days until achieving MAJORITY disapproval from @Gallup Reagan: 727 Bush I: 1336 Clinton: 573 Bush II: 1205 Obama: 936 Trump: 8. days. pic.twitter.com/kv2fy0Qsbp Will Jordan (@williamjordann) January 29, 2017 President Trumps actions during his first week in office have appeared to be aimed at the voters who already supported him, not at reaching out to the rest, and thats taken a rapid toll on his support, which was already historically low. Gallup, which has measured job approval for presidents for decades, shows Trumps approval so far at 45%, with 48% disapproving. Thats an average of several days polling. The daily trend lines are not kind to the new administration. As of Saturday, 51% of Americans disapproved of Trumps performance. Thats a record for the speed of getting to majority disapproval. By comparison, President George W. Bush hit majority disapproval six months into his second term, in June 2005, and remained in negative territory for the rest of his tenure. President Obama did not hit 51% disapproval until August of 2011, during the crisis over the federal debt ceiling that summer. His approval rebounded later that year, but he had a second period of majority disapproval during late 2013 and much of 2014. He ended his term with widespread approval and 37% of Americans disapproving. Trump Job Approval: Approve 45% (-1); Disapprove 48% (+3). Get the full trend https://t.co/BjTUhf0NAM. GallupNews (@GallupNews) January 27, 2017 Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Hundreds of travelers were caught in limbo over rushed visa ban By Brian Bennett (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) Hundreds of travelers were blocked from entering the U.S. or prevented from boarding flights in the hours after President Trump signed his order banning arrivals from seven predominantly Muslim countries, according to the Department of Homeland Security. In the order, Trump temporarily suspended refugee admissions and banned travelers from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Scores of people from those countries were aboard airplanes flying toward the U.S. when Trump signed his executive order on Friday afternoon, setting off waves of confusion among border officials and the traveling public. Upon landing at U.S. airports, 109 people from the listed countries were detained by immigration officials and prevented from entering the U.S., officials said. The department had approved 81 waivers to the new travel ban by Saturday afternoon, the official said, but at least some of the people detained on arrival were sent back to their countries of origin. Court orders issued Saturday evening required U.S. border officials to stop returning people who had already arrived with valid visas. It is unclear how many people were deported before the orders were issued. It is also unclear if the Trump administration has fully complied with those orders. In addition to the people who arrived in the U.S. and were detained, as of 3 p.m. on Saturday, an additional 173 travelers from the listed countries had been stopped from boarding flights to the U.S., a Homeland Security official said in a statement. The department did not make an official available to describe the actions and the agencys response. As many as 3,250 travelers may have been inconvenienced by the new visa restrictions, officials for the department said in a statement Sunday. Yesterday, less than 1% of the more than 325,000 international air travelers who arrive every day were inconvenienced while enhanced security measures were implemented, the statement read. The department will comply with court orders, the statement said. But no evidence was given to confirm this. Lawyers seeking to meet with detainees at Dulles International Airport outside of Washington and at San Francisco have said that they were blocked by officials on Sunday. The Department of Homeland Security will comply with judicial orders, faithfully enforce our immigration laws, and implement President Trumps executive orders to ensure that those entering the United States do not pose a threat to our country or the American people, according to the departments statement. All of the visa holders and travelers from the listed countries blocked from entering the U.S. since Friday already had gone through multiple steps of security screening that checked their biographical information and travel history against U.S. terrorism databases. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print White House seems to back down on part of new vetting policy By Christi Parsons The White House on Sunday appeared to back down on a key part of President Trumps tough new immigration order, signaling that travelers trying to enter the country from seven banned countries will be allowed in if they hold green cards. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said that these legal permanent residents are exempt from the travel ban moving forward, even though over the weekend other administration officials said the rule did apply to them. The apparent reversal came amid a national controversy over the new Trump order that temporarily halts the entry of all refugees to the U.S. and any traveler from seven majority Muslim countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Federal judges across the country have blocked parts of the presidents executive actions since they came down on Friday, mostly preventing the deportation of some travelers who ran into the first wave of implementation over the weekend. The back-and-forth over the green-card holders reflected a generalized confusion about the new order, which also bars Syrian refugees from entering the United States indefinitely. Lawyers for some of the affected immigrants said border agents seemed uncertain about the new rules and were disagreeing with one another about which travelers were affected and which were not. Further complicating the picture was a statement from the Department of Homeland Security asserting that its agents would enforce all of Trumps orders while also complying with judicial orders. As some of the orders block deportation, that left individual officers to try to figure out which priorities to honor. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Advertisement Op-Ed: Trumps cruel, illegal refugee executive order By Erwin Chemerinsky Protesters demonstrate at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City on Saturday. (Stephanie Keith / Getty Images) Barring individuals fleeing persecution from entering the United States is simply inhumane. Adding irony to injury, Trumps executive order was issued on Holocaust Remembrance Day, which should have been an occasion to atone for turning away refugees during the 1930ssome of whom then died in concentration camps. For example, in 1939, the United States turned away the St. Louis, a boat filled with refugees, many of them German Jews. According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 254 passengers from the St. Louis died in the Holocaust. Erwin Chemerinsky Read More Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Copy Link URL Copied! Print Lyft pledges to donate $1 million to ACLU following Trumps immigration order By Tracey Lien (Richard Vogel / Associated Press) Tech executives had been mostly quiet for the first week of Donald Trumps presidency but that changed after his controversial executive order restricting refugees and immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries. Executive after executive spent Saturday tweeting and posting messages to Facebook decrying the administrations actions. Lyft co-founders John Zimmer and Logan Green went a step further: On Sunday, they announced they would donate $1 million to the American Civil Liberties Union over the next four years. Banning people of a particular faith or creed, race or identity, sexuality or ethnicity, from entering the U.S. is antithetical to both Lyft and our nations core values, the co-founders wrote in an email to Lyft customers. We stand firmly against the actions, and will no Mexico called on Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday to apologize for praising US President Donald Trump's border wall plan but the Israeli prime minister denied he was targeting the Latin American country. Netanyahu has shocked Mexico and the country's small Jewish community in praising Trump's wall plan on Twitter over the weekend. "We are expecting a clarification, a rectification. I think that an apology would be something appropriate in this case," Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray told the Televisa network. Videgaray said Mexico rejects Netanyahu's statement "and we hope that the government of Israel has sensitivity to correct this position." Videgaray said the Israeli government's explanation so far was not acceptable. US-Mexican relations plunged into the worst crisis in decades last week after Trump ordered the construction of the wall to stop illegal immigration and insisted that Mexico will pay for it. Israel built a more than 150-mile (240-kilometer) barrier along its border with Egypt, a route previously taken by many African illegal migrants and traffickers. Trump hailed the Israeli wall as an example last week, prompting Netanyahu to express his support for the new US president's plans to build a wall. "President Trump is right. I built a wall along Israel's southern border. It stopped all illegal immigration. Great success. Great idea," Netanyahu tweeted in English, adding the Israeli and American flags. On Monday, the Israeli prime minister blamed the media for the controversy. "They say 'you've hurt Mexico, you've ruined the relationship with them.' Who even referred to Mexico? We've had a good relationship with them and we will keep on having one," he said. The Israeli leader, speaking at a meeting of his right-wing Likud party, accused the media of overplaying the dispute, failing to focus on the "fantastic success" of the fence built in southern Israel to prevent migrant traffic and spreading "fake news." "I am not surprised. The left-wing media is on a Bolshevik hunting trip, brainwashing and character-assassination against me and my family," he said. Since the end of 2016, Netanyahu has been the subject of two police investigations -- one regarding luxury gifts he and his family allegedly received and the other concerning a meeting with the head of a prominent newspaper to try to negotiate better coverage. He denies any wrongdoing. Israel's ambassador to Mexico, Jonathan Peled, said he would meet with foreign ministry officials on Monday but he did not say whether an apology would be given. "A tweet should not affect this very good relationship," Peled told Radio Formula, denying that Netanyahu was referring to "relations with Mexico." Mexico's foreign ministry had already expressed its "deep surprise, disapproval and disappointment" on Saturday. The Central Committee of the Jewish Community of Mexico said in a weekend statement: "We strongly reject (Netanyahu's) position." The tensions with the United States over the proposed border wall had prompted Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto to cancel a meeting with Trump scheduled for Tuesday in Washington. The Jewish community voiced support for Pena Nieto and his decision to scrap the meeting with Trump. Mexicans "live and work in and contribute to the neighboring country. Their human rights must be respected at all moments," the statement said. Search Keywords: Short link: Hours after Lyfts co-founders announced a $1 million donation to the American Civil Liberties Union to "defend the constitution," Ubers chief executive pulled out his pocket book as well. Travis Kalanick said in a Facebook post that Uber would create a $3 million legal defense fund to help drivers affected by the Trump administration's move to restrict immigrants and refugees from seven majority-Muslim countries. The fund will help drivers secure immigration and translation services. Kalanick also said the San Francisco ride-hailing company will provide 24/7 legal support to Uber drivers stuck outside the country, and compensate them for lost earnings. Drivers eligible for assistance were directed to contact the company via an online form. (https://goo.gl/forms/AIJTivooFxuExX1p1) Although the announcement was greeted with some support on Facebook and Twitter, many saw it as too little too late. The company had come under fire a day earlier for advertising on Twitter that it was operating at New Yorks Kennedy International Airport during a taxi strike held in protest against Trump's executive order. That gaffe, coupled with Kalanicks involvement in a panel advising President Trump on economic issues, helped spawn the Twitter hashtag #DeleteUber -- which encouraged customers to delete the app from their phones in protest. You are 20 hours too late, one person wrote in response to Kalanicks Facebook post. Still deleted my account today, wrote another. Kalanick issued a statement Saturday opposing the executive order. That didn't stop thousands of Twitter users from adopting the trending #DeleteUber hashtag. They accused the company of attempting to profit from the strike and putting business interests ahead of human rights. Celebrities jumped on the bandwagon. Actor-activist George Takei tweeted Sunday to his 2.9 million followers: "Lyft donates $1mil to ACLU while Uber doubles down on its support for Trump. #DeleteUber." The Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday night served as an opportunity for actors to honor their own but also for Hollywoods brightest stars to speak out about the increasingly volatile political climate. Here are five of the evenings most impassioned pleas for humanity and empathy in the face of conflict. I am the daughter of an immigrant. My father fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France. And Im an American patriot. And I love this country. And because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes. And this immigrant ban is a blemish, and its un-American. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, female actor in a comedy series winner for Veep FULL COVERAGE: 2017 SAG Awards Anuncio 1 / 16 Annalise Basso plays with her red dress on the red carpet. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 16 Jessie Tyler Ferguson shoots a selfie with fans during the arrivals. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 16 Television personality Keltie Knight makes a grand entrance during the arrivals at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 16 Jocelyn Towne makes a statement during the arrivals. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 16 Viola Davis is the first black actress to win five SAG awards. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 16 Michelle Dockery congratulates SAG Awards winner Sarah Paulson (right) while backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 16 Actor Finn Wolfhard leaps for joy after winning Ensemble in a Drama Series. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 16 Actress Danielle Brooks receives a hug from Tony Hale after winning Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 16 Brie Larson smiles while backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 16 Emma Stone, followed by Jonah Hill, reacts backstage after winning Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role for La La Land. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 16 Missi Pyle reacts as she arrives for the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 16 Janelle Monae and Aldis Hodge embrace backstage after winning for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Theatrical Motion Picture for Hidden Figures. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 16 Lily Tomlin was the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 16 Hidden Figures writer/director Theodore Melfi congratulates Octavia Spencer, Taraji P. Henson, and Janelle Monae after winning Outstanding Performance by a cast in a Theatrical Motion Picture in Hidden Figures. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 16 Denzel Washington is congratulated backstage by stage manager Valdez Flagg and Rosalind Jarrett Sepulveda eft) after winning Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role for Fences. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 16 Taraji P. Henson grabs her SAG statuette backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) My mother is an ordained minister. Im a Muslim. She didnt do backflips when I called her to tell her I converted 17 years ago. But I tell you now, you put things to the side and Im able to see her and shes able to see me. We love each other. The love has grown. And that stuff is minutia. Its not that important. Mahershala Ali, male actor in a supporting role winner for Moonlight What August [Wilson] did so beautifully is he honored the average man, who happened to be a man of color. And sometimes we dont have to shake the world and move the world and create anything that is going to be in the history book. The fact that we breathed and lived a life and was a god to our children, just that, means that we have a story and it deserves to be told. Viola Davis, female actor in a supporting role winner for Fences We will shelter freaks and outcasts, those who have no homes. We will get past the lies. We will hunt monsters. And when we are lost amidst the hypocrisy and casual violence of certain individuals and institutions, we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the meek and the disenfranchised and the marginalized. David Harbour, speaking for the winning ensemble in a drama series, Stranger Things This story is of unity. This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race. We win. Love wins. Every time. Taraji P. Henson, speaking for the winning cast in a motion picture, Hidden Figures See the most-read stories in Entertainment this hour libby.hill@latimes.com @midwestspitfire ALSO Political issues, travel ban a running theme at SAG Awards Stars arrive at the 2017 SAG Awards red carpet Big Bang Theory actor makes big anti-Trump statement on the SAG red carpet No one would call the Aranui 5 a thing of beauty. Half cruise ship and half freighter, it has a cockeyed profile that only its maker could love. It may not look like much, but it manages to sail to some of the most beautiful islands in the world. The Aranui navigates the waters of French Polynesia, delivering cargo and passengers to places such as Bora Bora, the Tuamotu Atolls and the Marquesas Islands. Its itinerary offers a daydreamers voyage to the dazzling shores of paradise. Advertisement Its not the kind of cruise that would appeal to most people who hop on a ship for a weeks vacation. No midnight buffets. No casino. No stage shows. But if youre a Walter Mitty type who fantasizes about jumping on a freighter to see the world, this type of ship might make your dream come true. Call it Freighter Lite. These ships are more workhorse than thoroughbred, capable of doing an honest days work as well as carrying passengers. Surprisingly, some also offer a high level of comfort, given their hard-working nature. They can be found, among other places, in Alaska, where the Marine Highway System ferries cars, supplies and tourists through the dramatic scenery of the Inside Passage or along the stunning coast of Norway, where Hurtigruten ferries carry freight and passengers year-round. 1 / 15 A crewman pulls a line on Hiva Oa, one of the Marquesas Islands. The Aranui 5 is a half cargo, half cruise ship. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 2 / 15 The Aranui 5 unloads passengers and cargo via tender boats on the island of Hiva Oa as it tours the Marquesas Islands. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 3 / 15 A morning exercise class aboard the Aranui 5 ship during the cruise in the Marquesas. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 4 / 15 A suite on the Aranui 5 ship. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 5 / 15 Often meal time would include entertainment from the ships crew aboard the Aranui 5 ship. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 6 / 15 As the tender that brings ship passengers to shore pulls in, local girls sing a traditional song of greeting to the passengers in the Marquesas Islands. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 7 / 15 On Rangiroa, one of the largest atolls in the world, an Aranui 5 passenger uses binoculars to look at the birds and the Aranui 5 ship, background, before the translucent lagoon. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 8 / 15 On Ua Pou, a local girl, left, runs into the ocean as she and her friend play in the gentle waves as the Aranui 5 unloads its cargo, background. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 9 / 15 On the island of Fatu Hiva, in the the village of Omoa, handmade dyed cloth is for sale to tourists visiting the Marquesas Islands aboard the Aranui 5 ship. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 10 / 15 A local Hiva Oa Island family plays in a natural ocean pool as the Aranui 5 ship anchors, background. Hiva Oa is part of the Marquesas chain of Islands. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 11 / 15 Aboard the Aranui 5. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 12 / 15 People on the Aranui 5 participate in a dance lesson at sunset during a tour of the Marquesas Islands. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 13 / 15 A festive dinner on the pool deck of the Aranui 5 during the cruise. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) 14 / 15 Hurtigruten passes Trondheim, Norway. (Universal Images Group / Getty Images/Universal Images Gr) 15 / 15 Hamnoy, Lofoten Islands (Dave Moorhouse / Getty Images/Moment RM) In French Polynesia, the Aranui 5 visits South Pacific isles carrying a couple of hundred passengers who delight in watching the ship off-load cars, fuel, pallets of toilet paper and other supplies and onload bananas, coconuts, citrus and fish. These ships offer an incredibly authentic experience, said Carolyn Spencer Brown, editor of CruiseCritic.com. You wont find bingo or any of the other trappings. Im not denigrating these activities, but there are travelers who want more than that. They want to travel with locals and get to know the people, not just see the scenery. Those are the big pluses on these ships. You not only travel with vacationers like yourself, but you also are getting to know the single mother who has boarded the ship or ferry for a weekend visit with family members in a nearby village. Youre rubbing shoulders on the tender with a tattooed seaman whos going ashore to visit his wife and kids. When you go ashore, youll meet villagers who turn out to greet the ship, not because they want to sell you something but because theyre friendly. These ports are nothing like the ones you visit on cruise ships, said Calabasas resident Mathy Simon, who sailed the Norwegian coast on a Hurtigruten ferry. Youre not going to get off the ship and see a row of jewelry stores that open whenever a ship is in the harbor. For the most part, her ship visited tiny communities where the residents only access to the outside world was the ship. They use it like a bus or a train: They get on and get off at the next village. Its their only mode of transportation, said Simon, who traveled with Kyle, her college-age son. The bottom line: The trip was amazing. Id do it again in a heartbeat. Aboard the Aranui 5 A local Hiva Oa Island family plays in a natural ocean pool as the Aranui 5 ship anchors, background. Hiva Oa is part of the Marquesas chain of Islands. (Daniel A. Anderson / Zumapress.com) Hiva Oa, Ua Pou, Nuku Hiva, Fatu Hiva. The words dont exactly roll off the tongue. But thats not surprising. Theyre the names of some of the most remote islands in the world; all are part of the Marquesas Archipelago, 852 miles northeast of Tahiti and about 3,000 miles from the west coast of Mexico, the nearest continental land mass. I visited them in the fall aboard the freighter-cum-cruise ship Aranui 5 (the word means the great highway), which carries cargo and passengers on 14-day, 2,200-mile round trips from Papeete, Tahiti, the capital of French Polynesia. The ship came online in winter 2015, when it replaced earlier versions. Although it lacks some of the perks of large cruise ships, it makes up for it in the access it provides to a beautiful place thats off the radar for most people. We visited six Marquesas islands, plus Bora Bora and two islands in the Tuamotu Archipelago. At each stop, I thought I had discovered Eden. But then on the next stop, Id feel that way again. All of the ports were tiny; at some, virtually every resident turned out to greet us, dancing, singing and playing instruments. They were our entertainment, and we were theirs. Excursions were limited; for the most part, we took strenuous hikes each day. Then we dined in whatever village we were visiting, with our international group of travelers broken into language groups: Australians, New Zealanders, Brits and Americans made up one group, French speakers (the largest group) were another and Germans made up a third group. My fellow passengers seemed a hardy lot; they loved the daily hikes that took us to the top of volcanic mountainsides for inspiring views. One day, our tender dropped us off at an isolated beach where we played in the water. Another day, some of the passengers chose an excursion by horseback. Snorkeling was available on some islands. Cabins ranged from tiny, four- to eight-bed dorms most of which were used by locals traveling from one island to another to luxe penthouse suites. Most cabins featured balconies and 55-inch flat-screen TVs. Unless you speak French, however, youll have only one oldies-movies station and CNN. But the inconveniences are minor compared with the pluses, most travelers said. This trip introduced us to an incredibly beautiful area of the world, said Catherine Cheshire, of Palm Springs. It was money well spent. Info: Aranui 5, (800) 972-7268, www.aranui.com. Fourteen-day round-trip cruises from Papeete to the Marquesas Islands, including Bora Bora and Rangiroa: dorm rates, per person, from $2,920 (sharing room and bath); deluxe balcony rooms, per person, from $5,642. Rates include accommodations, meals and excursions. Sailing the Inside Passage Many people see Alaskas Inside Passage from the deck of a plush, comfy cruise ship while holding a cocktail in one hand and binoculars in the other. I saw it from the deck of a ferry. Not plush. Not comfy. No cocktails. But I had binoculars, and that was all I needed to appreciate a combination of land and sea that stretches from Vancouver, British Columbia, to Skagway, Alaska. The inland waterway snakes past magnificent fiords, mountains and islands, where bears roam and bald eagles soar. The ferry system is called the Alaska Marine Highway because its the closest thing the state has to a freeway in the coastal regions. When the ferry network launched more than 50 years ago, it opened the states isolated coastal towns to tourism and gave residents easier access to the outside world. Today, it also gives tourists an alternative to exploring the state by cruise ship. You can hop on a ferry with or without a vehicle in Bellingham, Wash., about 90 miles north of Seattle, and get off 1,437 miles later in Whittier, Alaska, near Anchorage. Eleven ferries sail various sections of the 3,500-mile route. Most have food service, but theres little else in the way of amenities. Unlike a cruise ship, the ferry allows passengers to hop on and hop off. You can stay a few days in a pretty port such as Ketchikan or Juneau in Alaska, meet the locals, go exploring at an unhurried pace, and get on a later vessel. You can choose your level of comfort. You can rent a simple cabin furnished with bunks and a shower, sack out on a chair in the lounge, or set up a pup tent on the deck. (But dont forget the duct tape to fasten down the tent. Its a ferry, not a luxury liner.) Info: Alaska Marine Highway, (800) 642-0066. Sample fares: Valdez to Whittier, Alaska: (six hours): $215 for one adult fare, including a 19-foot vehicle. Prince Rupert, British Columbia, to Skagway, Alaska (1 1/2 days): $890 for one adult fare, including a two-berth cabin and a 19-foot vehicle. Bellingham, Wash., to Skagway, Alaska (three days): $2,096 for one adult fare, including a two-berth cabin and a 19-foot vehicle. Norwegian thrills without frills Hamnoy, Lofoten Islands (Dave Moorhouse / Getty Images/Moment RM) Fiords, mountains and beautiful scenery arent limited to Alaska. Many people rank Norway as the most beautiful country in the world, primarily because of those attributes and its magical coastline. Enter Hurtigruten (literally swift route), which has provided a lifeline for isolated Norwegian communities for more than 120 years. From a travelers standpoint, the lines 12-ship coastal fleet also provides a healthy dose of Mother Natures finest along more than 1,000 miles of Norways pristine coastal waterway. More than 10,000 Americans sail the route annually, many taking a six-day sailing from Bergen to Tromso that will take them above the Arctic Circle. Calabasas resident Mathy Simon and her son made the trip in February. We wanted to explore the Arctic in winter, see the Northern Lights and stay at a snow hotel. They met those goals while also learning about the communities they visited. Its amazing how these ships deliver not just people but goods along the route, she said. The ship delivers an authenticity you dont get when youre just stopping in a port. Simon, who sails frequently, said that the Hurtigruten rooms are simpler than those on cruise ships but that the food far exceeded that on a big ship. The food was over the top, she said. She described dining on cheeses and other products collected from farmers along the coast, and on giant fresh crab delivered to the ship early in the day. Shell go back, she said: Next time, Ill see the verdant hills of Norway in the summer. Info: Hurtigruten, (888) 412-3059, www.hurtigruten.com. Daily departures for trips of six, seven and 12 days. Seven-Day Classic Voyage North summer cruise: Rates begin at $2,036 per person, double occupancy, including accommodations and meals. Should you go? These vessels are cruise ships for people who dont like cruise ships. Should you set sail on one? Heres the nitty-gritty: Dont go if you enjoy: Large-scale entertainment such as stage shows All-you-can-eat buffets Dressing up for dinner Exploring large cities on port stops Hitting the casino Spending a day in the ships spa Go if you enjoy: Low-key activities on board Cultural and historical activities (lecturers often add perspective about upcoming stops) Visiting people in their environment Hiking ashore Learning about local lifestyles Seeing magnificent scenery travel@latimes.com Twitter: @latimestravel ALSO Taking the kids on a cruise for spring or summer break Catch cruise deals during wave season Free cruise upgrade coming soon: A wearable device to meet your every need Six people died and eight were injured after gunmen opened fire at a Quebec City mosque, a shooting that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned Monday as a "terrorist attack." Police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told journalists that two suspects were arrested following the attack, that police were also treating as an act of terrorism. Trudeau said in a statement that "we condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge." "Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, city and country." According to witnesses interviewed on local television, two masked gunmen entered the cultural center around 7:15 pm (0015 GMT) on Sunday. The motive of the attack was not immediately clear. Police quickly set up in the mosque's vicinity. Coulombe said those killed were between ages 35 and 70. Police did not rule out the possibility of a third suspect who had fled the scene. "It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence," Trudeau said. "Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear." Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard said in a series of Twitter posts that the government was "mobilized to ensure the security of the people of Quebec." "Quebec categorically rejects this barbaric violence," he wrote. "Solidarity with Quebec people of Muslim faith." Police stationed near the mosque told AFP that they had been preparing for this type of attack "because it's happening all over the world." "I don't understand why here -- it's a small mosque," said a man who was inside the center at the time of the attack. "It's not Montreal or Toronto." The mosque has already been the target of hate: a pig's head was left on the doorstep last June during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Other mosques in Canada have been targeted with racist graffiti in recent months. The attack comes as Canada has vowed to open its arms wide to Muslims and refugees after US President Donald Trump's controversial immigration ban Friday sparked travel chaos and outrage around the world. Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of Trump's order, the immigration ministry said Sunday. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. Trump has suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Hussen, who is of Somali origin, did not condemn the US measure but stressed that Canada would continue to pursue an immigration policy based on "compassion" while at the same time protecting the security of its citizens. "We welcome those fleeing persecution, terror and war," he said, echoing a welcoming Twitter post by Trudeau on Saturday. According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one out of five people in the country are foreign-born. Canada has welcomed more than 39,670 Syrian refugees between November 2015 and early January 2017, according to government figures. Search Keywords: Short link: Though sailings today are not the events they were in the heyday of transatlantic liners bon voyage parties, streamers and waving crowds on the wharf I try never to miss a cruise ships undocking as it heads out on a voyage. Thus Laurel, my wife, and I were on the Sky Deck, as far up as we could get on the Koningsdam, Holland America Lines newest and largest ship, for our sailing from Romes port of Civitavecchia. It was a lovely, breezy afternoon as we steamed around the breakwater and into the Mediterranean, but we already had misgivings. Advertisement Im an unabashed Holland America loyalist, but my heart sank when we stepped aboard on Oct. 24, about six months after the ships maiden voyage. Although it took the better part of our 16-day repositioning cruise to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., the Koningsdam eventually won us over. Even before sailing the word had spread among like-minded cruisers: No library? That cant be! And no teak promenade deck with wooden deck chairs? Those chairs would have been ideal for sea-gazing and reading books no longer available onboard. No library? That cant be! A good library and that classic deck and chairs are Holland America hallmarks. But as with most stories, theres more to it. Were taking a step away from what we used to be, said Don Habets, Koningsdams veteran hotel director, when I asked about the changes. We need to get rid of the image that our ships are only for old people. Theres a new slogan too: Savor the Journey. Stainless flatware has replaced silver in the dining room, and logos are gone from the china. Not just for old people Ultimately, the changes are more about additions than subtractions, and Koningsdam has introduced features appealing to more age groups. Although Holland America has long offered dining options, beginning years ago with the Pinnacle Grill, still a favorite, the new ship has added more choices. Theres Sel de Mer, intimate and specializing in fish, where guests order and pay a la carte, as at a shore-side restaurant. At the Culinary Arts Center, $39 will get you a five-course dinner with organic wine, and you get to watch your meal being prepared by a miked head chef. The Grand Dutch Cafe and New York Deli & Pizza, both complimentary, are open for breakfast and lunch. The ships main performance space, the 640-seat World Stage, is state-of-the-art with high-definition LED screens that surround the audience. At Blend, a partnership with Chateau Ste. Michelle, passengers can be winemakers in the only blending venue at sea, according to a chalkboard at its door. Partnerships abound The Music Walk, another recent Holland America innovation, involves partnerships with B.B. Kings All Stars, Billboard Onboard and the Lincoln Center Stage. Each has its own space, although the B.B. King group shares the two-deck Queens Lounge and its daytime activities, including white-glove afternoon teas on sea days, some with dancing. An online Navigator app allowed us to create a daily itinerary of events. I could view my account, explore and book shore excursions, and connect to the Internet (for a fee, of course). Meal reservations automatically appeared. Stop, stop, then go Typical of westbound repositioning cruises, our initial ports (all Spanish) came in a flurry: Palma de Mallorca, Barcelona, Alicante, Malaga and Cadiz. All offered what we like best, the chance for independent exploration on foot. Helping with this was a young Dutch woman who called herself Dora the Explorer, a location guide not part of the shore-excursions desk. We also wandered on our own in Funchal, on the Portuguese island of Madeira. When we sailed from that lovely harbor, we had a seven-day crossing ahead. So what might we do on those sea days? Yes, we would read. It turned out that, when our group pooled the books we had brought, we were adequately supplied. But so loud was the outcry about the lack of a library that Holland America has decided to retrofit one. And we would walk. Indeed, there is a promenade deck that allows circling the ship, three laps to the mile. Its narrow in spots, not teak and has no deck chairs. For much of the way lifeboats block views of the sea. Since 2015 maritime law requires lifeboats to be on the embarkation deck of all new ships, not suspended above it. Weve always prided ourselves on our wide, walk-around teak decks, Habets told me. We were very disappointed. Koningsdams theme is music; its decks are named for composers. Much of the art very contemporary and favoring op and pop reflects that as well. Most evenings we would catch one of three daily sets by a string quartet with piano on the Lincoln Center Stage, sometimes focused on a composer (Dvorak, Brahms, Schumann) or a theme (Classic Favorites, French Connections, All American). After dinner, if we skipped the main show in the World Stage, we would drop in at Billboard Onboard to hear talented performers including musicians who played country, 1960s and British invasion on keyboards disguised as pianos. Dining was, of course, an important part of our shipboard experience. Though the main dining room was fine, we chose to add the Ultimate Dining Package, which included dinners in the Pinnacle Grill, the Culinary Arts Center, Tamarind (a wonderful Asian-fusion restaurant, our favorite), Sel de Mer ($30 credit toward the a la carte bill) and Canaletto (Italian specialties). The package price was $119 apiece, but as three-star Mariners (members of the lines loyalty program), we received a 25% discount. Of the 2,389 passengers on our crossing (capacity is 2,650), more than 80% had previously sailed with Holland America. In fall 2018, Koningsdam is scheduled to gain a sister, to be named Statendam. What exciting new features aboard can we expect? I asked the hotel director. A library, he said. travel@latimes.com If you go Koningsdam, (877) 932-4259, will cruise the Caribbean from Fort Lauderdale, Fla., through March, then leave on April 2 on a 13-night repositioning sailing to Civitavecchia, Italy. After a summer of European sailings, on Oct. 3 the ship will leave Civitavecchia on a 15-night transatlantic voyage like the one we took. travel@latimes.com @latimestravel Is this the year you pack your bags and set sail for Cuba? Perhaps. By spring, traveling by cruise ship to Cuba will become more common than it has been for the last five decades. Pearl Seas Cruises, Norwegian Cruise Line and Royal Caribbean International are set to begin sailing regularly to the island nation from the U.S., and more lines may soon join the flotilla. Former President Obama further eased restrictions on travel to Cuba last year, making it less difficult for U.S. citizens to visit the island, which had been a largely forbidden fruit for American travelers. Advertisement Land tours are thriving, and Alaska Airlines has recently added nonstop service to Havana, Cubas capital, from Los Angeles. You also can take an 80-minute JetBlue hop from Fort Lauderdale, Fla., to Havana for less than $100. Previously air travel was by charter. Cruise ships joined the rush to Cuban shores last year, when Carnival Corp.'s Fathom brand became the first U.S. line to legally land in Cuba in more than 40 years, offering weeklong sailings on the ship Adonia. Fathom will continue to sail to Cuba through May, a spokesman said, adding that Carnival has asked Cuba for permission for other Carnival brands, which include Princess, Holland-America, P&O and Seabourn, to begin sailing in June. Meanwhile, Pearl Seas Cruises launched its first Cuba sailing this month, offering a high-end, 10-day voyage that visited Havana and four other Cuban cities. Sailings are scheduled through April. Prices start at $7,810 per person, double occupancy. With other cruise lines offering trips for much less, will Pearl Seas be able to compete? We cost a bit more, said Charles Robertson, chief executive of American and Pearl Seas cruise lines, but our ship is smaller, newer and more intimate. It has larger staterooms and bigger verandas. The ship carries only about 200 passengers, he said. That means well be able to do things bigger ships cant, he said. Norwegians Sky, which holds more than 2,000 passengers, will begin Cuba visits May 1. The ship will arrive in Havana on Tuesday mornings and depart Wednesday evenings on four-day voyages that will include a visit to Great Stirrup Cay, NCLs private island. Prices start at $699 per person, double occupancy. Royal Caribbean International, has scheduled Empress of the Seas, which just underwent a $50-million renovation, to visit Havana during a five-night sailing that departs April 19 from Miami. Rates begin at $1,025 per person, double occupancy. The 1,062-passenger ship will reposition to Tampa, Fla., offering two itineraries with calls to Havana on April 30 (seven-night sailing) and May 20 (five-night sailing). Regardless of the cruise line or tour company, visiting Cuba still has legal requirements: American travel must include educational, people to people elements. Your cruise ship will handle the paperwork and probably offer excursions that focus more on the cultural aspects of the country, rather than time sitting on a beach. To read more about travel, see the Treasury Departments rules. You can take a sightseeing tour of a UNESCO World Heritage site; discover the colonial architecture of old Havana; visit Cojimar, one of Ernest Hemingways favorite retreats; or hop into a vintage American car and take a step back into the 1950s. Jayne Beezley, an Amarillo, Texas, resident who visited in September on a Fathom cruise, enjoyed her experience. The people are wonderful, very open and hospitable, she said. And the old cars were amazing. We loved the cars. Jayne and her husband, Michael, owners of a gold 69 Chevelle, gave shirts and hats with their cars logo and illustration to car-fancying Cubans. It was our version of a people-to-people experience. travel@latimes.com Twitter: @latimestravel Question: I am flying from Tokyo to Paris, and Im confused about daylight saving time. Is this a worldwide policy? Should I set my clock ahead one hour in Tokyo, the way I would in Los Angeles? Mark Watters Simi Valley Answer: In answer to Watters questions, no and no no, the whole world doesnt use daylight saving, and no, you should not move your clock by an hour. But in answer to musical questions posed by the pop-rock group Chicago, Does anybody really know what time it is? Does anybody really care? Yes and yes. Several travelers made suggestions on how to cope with timetable turmoil. Advertisement Lets see if we can get this sorted out. The U.S. begins daylight saving time March 12 and ends it Nov. 5, according to the U.S. Naval Observatory whose chart (www.lat.ms/navalchart) shows the dates well be changing through 2025 unless we decide to chuck the whole thing, which we have a few times. Our country made standardized time zones the law in 1918 (although U.S. and Canadian railroads got things under control in the 1880s, coming up with a time scheme to get the trains to run on time), the observatory notes in its History of Daylight Time in the U.S. The 1918 Standard Time Act also included daylight saving time. At least it did until 1919, when it was repealed. Local governmental entities got to choose whether to implement daylight saving, but in 1942, the U.S. mandated the spring-ahead, fall-back way of life for all. That ended in 1945, and time became a hodgepodge of local desires. Fast forward to 1966 and the Uniform Time Act, which establishes a system of uniform Daylight Saving Time throughout the nation and its possessions, according to the Department of Transportation. Uniform is a bit of a misnomer. Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and big chunks of Arizona dont observe daylight saving time, according to DOT. Confused? Carry on, and we promise you will be more so. Most of Europe observes daylight saving time, called summer time, Jeanna Bryner writes in Daylight Saving Time 2017: A Guide to the When, Why, What and How on the Live Science site. Europe begins its one-hour shift the last Sunday in March (March 26 this year) and ends it the last Sunday of October (Oct. 29). But most of the rest of the world about 60% -isnt on daylight saving, according to Timeanddate.com, which offers calendars, tells you holidays and so much more. Japan started using daylight saving in 1948 but stopped in 1951, the site said, adding Tokyo currently observes Japan Standard Time (JST) all year. If youre traveling between Tokyo and Paris, the calculation on what time it is is fairly simple. The difference between Paris and Tokyo is eight hours before March 26 and seven hours after March 26, Wojciech Borkowski of FlightFox.com, an online travel concierge and a lecturer at Frequent Traveler University, which teaches travelers to travel economically and efficiently. Heres the easiest part of this equation: Japan has only one time zone, Marian Goldberg, a travel marketing consultant and Japan travel planner, said in an email. So how do you know what time it is? Lauren Ball is owner and operator of TheHolidayGirl.com, an L.A. agency for millennial women travelers and the people who love them. In her spare time, she is a background vocalist for Katy Perry and has 67 countries on her travel resume. Her suggestion: All international travel is calculated on the GMT/UTC system, which is essentially like the equator but for time, she said in an email. All cities have a time assigned to this system and are either ahead or behind. Time zones are shown as +/- GMT/UTC [Greenwich Mean Time/Universal Time Coordinated]. Its worth memorizing how many hours your hometown is from GMT/UTC, depending on the time of the year. You can find your time zone at WhatIsMyTimeZone.com, among other sites. Ball also may wear an inexpensive wristwatch (rather than exposing a cellphone) that she sets to GMT/UTC time, making sure she knows how far ahead or behind her destination or home is. Other travelers suggest using Timeanddate.com. And then there is your smartphone. If you have an international cellular plan, it will adjust to your new location. (If youre in airplane mode and using Wi-Fi, Goldberg noted in her email, it will not.) Afrodite Pastroumas, a senior director product for TCS World Travel, a private jet tour operator, takes the phone idea a step further: She enters various cities shes traveling to or tracking in the world clock function on her smart phone. Kathy Cheng, who founded ThankfulRegistry.com, a gift registry that helps with baby or wedding gifts, is based in Taipei but works with people in different time zones. She uses the phone/clock too, but she said, If Im second-guessing myself, I literally Google Whats the time in Tokyo? and let Google enlighten me. Now, ladies and gentlemen, that is all because we are out of time. Have a travel dilemma? Write to travel@latimes.com. We regret we cannot answer every inquiry. travel@latimes.com @latimestravel Anyone tuning in to the SAG Awards on Sunday thinking they might be escaping news headlines for a couple of hours was quickly disabused of that notion as winner after winner used the platform to speak out against President Trumps immigration ban. Here are some images from inside and outside of the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles form the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) Jessie Tyler Ferguson takes a selfie with fans during the arrivals at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) Television personality Keltie Knight walks the red carpet during the arrivals at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) Annalise Basso during the arrivals at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) Missi Pyle during the show at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) "Orange Is the New Black" won best ensemble in a comedy series at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) Lily Tomlin was the recipient of the Life Achievement Award at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) Jocelyn Towne during the arrivals at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. SAG Award winner Viola Davis is seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) SAG Award winner Viola Davis is seen from backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) SAG Awards winner Sarah Paulson, right, and Michelle Dockery backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) Brie Larson backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) Denzel Washington is congratulated by stage manager Valdez Flagg and Rosalind Jarrett Sepulveda, left, after winning outstanding performance by an actor in a leading role for "Fences" from backstage at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) From left, "Hidden Figures" writer/director Theodore Melfi and actresses Octavia Spencer, Taraji P. Henson and Janelle Monae backstage after winning for outstanding performance by a cast in a theatrical motion picture for "Hidden Figures" at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) Actress Danielle Brooks receives a hug from Tony Hale during the show at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times) Actor Finn Wolfhard leaps for joy as "Stranger Things" won best ensemble in a drama series during the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) Janelle Monae and Aldis Hodge backstage after winning for outstanding performance by a cast in a theatrical motion picture for "Hidden Figures" at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles. Taraji P. Henson seizes her SAG statuette backstage. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) Taraji P. Henson seizes her SAG statuette backstage. A petition urging the British government to cancel a state visit by President Trump in response to his controversial new immigration policy has amassed more than one million signatures. The groundswell of public support for the petition began as news spread about Trumps executive orders to stop accepting refugees and temporarily block people from seven countries with a majority Muslim population. Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen, the petitions author, a solicitor from Leeds, a city in the north of England, wrote. Advertisement Prime Minister Theresa May was widely criticized in Britain on Monday for failing to speak out against the measures which were introduced hours after she became the first foreign leader to meet with the newly-inaugurated president at the White House on Friday. It was during that visit that May announced Queen Elizabeth II had invited Trump to visit Britain later this year as part of a formal state visit.Mays office sought to qualm the outrage by issuing a statement saying we do not agree with this kind of approach but firmly stated that immigration policy in the U.S. was a matter for the U.S. government alone. Many lawmakers on all sides of the political divide said that was simply not good enough. Opposition Labor leader Jeremy Corbyn said the country should be in no rush to welcome Trump onto home soil adding that he would object to Trumps visit until the current ban is lifted. Even within Mays own Conservative Party, there was outrage.Im a British citizen & so proud to have been welcomed to this country. Sad to hear Ill be banned from the USA based on my country of birth, Iraqi-born MP Nadhim Zahawi wrote on Twitter. During a debate in the House of Commons on Monday, foreign secretary Boris Johnson condemned Trumps actions but also stopped short of saying that the state visit should be cancelled. I share the widespread disquiet and I have Ive said that its divisive, Ive said that its wrong and that it stigmatizes people on the grounds of their nationality. But, he added, the government would be working to protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals globally and did not want to severe ties with its US allies for fear that would have a detrimental impact on British citizens. There was, however, widespread confusion, and conflicting information, about how the ban would affect Britons. On Sunday, the foreign office said the clampdown would not likely impact British citizens traveling to the US, even if they had shared nationality with a country on the temporarily banned list, namely Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sunday, Syria and Yemen. But the US embassy in London temporarily posted an urgent notice on its website saying any citizens from those banned countries, including dual nationals, should hold off applying for a visa. The page has since been removed from the website. The petition quickly became the second most popular on the governments website, behind one calling for a second referendum on Britains membership of the EU after the country voted to leave by 52% to 48% in June. A previous petition calling for then-Republican presidential candidate Trump to be banned from the UK for suggesting he would ban Muslims from entered the U.S. also received more than half a million signatures, prompting a debate in parliament where MPs discussed the issue passionately, describing Trump as a buffoon and a man who invited violent ideology. Any petition that amasses more than 100,000 votes must be debated in Parliament, though the outcome is not legally binding.Graham Guest, the petitions author, said he was not a political man but started the petition because he thought a state visit would legitimize his presidency in a way that it shouldnt be. Boyle is a special correspondent ALSO When Muslims got blocked at American airports, U.S. veterans rushed to help Benoit Hamon is known as the Bernie Sanders of France and he just won the Socialist Party primary for president A terrorist attack in Germany could have hurt Angela Merkel politically. So far, it hasnt All thats left are some dirt tracks, a handful of trailers and a steel skeleton, ghostly remnants of what was once the next big thing in a desert boomtown. The grand blueprint of a U.S. auto behemoth has given way to this: clearing up the mess, paying off the bills and getting out of town. For Mexican officials and global automakers, the dispiriting scene the site of Ford Motor Co.s now-scrapped plans to build a $1.6-billion factory in central Mexico stands as the harbinger of a clouded future. The good times of hefty profits based on cheap Mexican labor and tariff-free exports to the United States may be coming to a crashing halt. Advertisement Citing a $60-billion trade deficit with Mexico, President Trump has vowed to renegotiate deals and possibly slap a tax of 20% or more on goods imported from Mexico. That would threaten some two decades of steady growth in Mexican manufacturing exports to the United States, spurred by the North American Free Trade Agreement. The nightmare scenario of an abrupt halt on trade, the regions lifeblood, has yielded profound disquiet in board rooms from Detroit to Tokyo and here in Mexico. The countrys leaders have bet the house on duty-free exports, mostly to the United States, a strategy that critics in Mexico have long assailed as short-sighted. A man who lost his job after plans for a Ford car factory were called off at his home at La Presita village in Villa de Reyes, near San Luis Potosi, Mexico. (Pedro Pardo / AFP/Getty Images) Now, Fords retreat and the tough talk from Washington stands as a cautionary tale in a new and uncertain era. If Trump were here, I would tell him that Mexico is your best commercial partner and your principal ally in the American bloc, said Gustavo Puente, secretary of economic development for the state of San Luis Potosi. Many are assuming that Trumps hard-line stance on tariffs is a tough-talk negotiating gambit. Their hope is that U.S.-Mexico trade talks eventually will lead to a revised trade regimen, probably tilting more in favor of U.S.-made content, but not what they view as a prohibitive new tariff structure that could also cost the jobs of thousands of U.S. workers dependent on the cross-border commerce. To close this off now is to shoot yourself in the foot, Puente said in an interview at the cavernous convention center in the state capital of San Luis Potosi, just north of the abandoned Ford plant in Villa de Reyes. Youre hurting yourself. Ford insists that slumping demand for compact cars not a hostile Twitter barrage from the then-president elect was behind its decision in early January to cancel plans to open the plant here, which was to produce Focus compacts. Two countries, one economy: A Mexican town whose chief earners are in the U.S. worries what happens if theyre sent home Still, Fords decision to walk away was like being drenched by a pail of cold water, said Gabriel Solis Avalos, mayor of Villa de Reyes, where the 700-acre Ford plant was to be built, employing almost 3,000 workers, not including new jobs for suppliers. Everything was agreed upon, lamented Solis, a construction entrepreneur in Villa de Reyes, a once-sleepy ranching and farming community, now home to a number of massive, post-modern industrial parks. But we arent going to cry about it. We have to move on. Last weeks U.S.-Mexico war of words centered on Trumps insistence that Mexico pay for his beautiful wall along the border. But that nasty row was a sideshow for the managerial class in Mexicos north-central highlands, a mesquite and cactus-spiked expanse transformed into an industrial powerhouse. Here, trade is the big-ticket item on the U.S.-Mexico agenda. Billboards in English blaring Land Available rise from empty lots on the grounds of sprawling industrial zones. One sign implores: Join Success. Yet cattle still forage among the endless stands of nopal and maguey. Yellow company mini-buses disgorge legions of workers in the morning and pick them up in the afternoon. Construction crews hasten to finish factories that resemble airline hangers and complete new overpasses, bristling with rods of rebar, to accommodate the ever-increasing truck traffic rumbling down the roads. Ford may be gone, but General Motors is here and both BMW and Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. are building immense new factories, Trump or no Trump. Highway 57, which passes by sundry factory complexes en route to the northern industrial hub of Monterrey, has been dubbed the NAFTA Highway, after the landmark trade pact that went into effect Jan. 1, 1994, and prompted Mexico to abandon its protectionist trade policies. Almost a quarter-century later, the results are easy to see in San Luis Potosi and the nearby auto-manufacturing region known as the Bajio, an industrial juggernaut with efficient road and rail links to the U.S.-Mexico border. Though U.S. firms dominate here, this is a multinational affair. Sizable numbers of Japanese, German, South Korean, French and Italian factories are part of the mix, many producing parts for U.S.-bound autos. Free-trade backers say export-linked job creation in Mexico has a positive effect on immigration. Many Mexicans no longer have to contemplate sneaking across the U.S.-Mexico border. It seems a bit contradictory to want to stop illegal immigration but also be against something that creates jobs for people in Mexico so they dont feel forced to leave, said Manuel Lozano Nieto, secretary of labor for the state of San Luis Potosi. He spoke from his office in the citys Tangamanga Plaza, where the upper-floor windows offer a glimpse of another side of globalization: a cluster of international chain stores, including Wal-Mart, Costco, Sams Club, Best Buy and Home Depot. That NAFTA has generated employment and some measure of prosperity in Mexico is beyond doubt. Many Mexican workers have moved up the economic ladder thanks to international investment. Homes in the newly constructed La Esperanza gated community, which advertises homes for workers using government real estate loans, in Villa de Reyes, Mexico. (Rebecca Blackwell / Associated Press) Throughout Mexicos export-oriented industrial zones, new housing developments line the highways of dusty towns-turned-industrial-hubs that churn out cars, refrigerators, air conditioners and other products for the U.S. market. But not everyone in Mexico is on board with the cross-border strategy embraced by the nations economic and political elite. Free trade is as controversial in Mexico as in the United States, perhaps more so. Critics say NAFTA has fallen short of its promises to lift the Mexican economy, which still suffers from sluggish growth, stagnant wages, rampant inequality and a huge informal sector. Free trade made a lot of money for foreign companies and rich Mexicans, but it hasnt really helped the working classes, said David Rios, an independent union leader who was among labor activists in the central plaza of San Luis Potosi on a recent evening protesting the layoffs of state workers. Its fine with us if Trump gets rid of it. The nearby plants have brought new spending power to Villa de Reyes. But residents said that wages for unskilled workers in the factories hardly allow for a middle-class lifestyle. Someone is making a lot of money here, but its not us, said Roman Benoso, 24, who was found on a recent afternoon walking beneath a searing sun through the expansive confines of the World Trade Center industrial park. Benoso, who hopes to finish high school and study to be an engineer, was headed to a German auto-parts company to receive his severance pay. He quit after more than a year on the assembly line to take a better-paying post at a U.S. car assembler. His weekly salary rose from the equivalent of about $50 to $65 hardly enough, he said, to marry and start a family on his own. Benoso, who has an uncle in Oklahoma, said he had contemplated heading to the United States to work illegally, following the well-worn path of many compatriots from the region. Ultimately, he decided otherwise. With all thats going on in the north with Trump, I think Id rather stay here in Mexico, Benoso said as he made his way through manicured streets lined with box-like factories and a United Nations-style mix of flags fluttering on each side of the road. I really dont want to get mixed up in all that. Cecilia Sanchez of the Times Mexico City bureau contributed to this report. ALSO Mexican drug lord Joaquin El Chapo Guzman has a new home: The Guantanamo of New York Families divided by Trumps refugee order worry about the future Haitians, Africans, Asians: The sharp rise in non-Latin American migrants trying to cross into the U.S. from Mexico All material is subject to strictly enforced copyright terms & conditions and cannot be repurposed or reproduced. 19882022 Latin American Financial Publications Inc. The decision by Brazil Supreme Court President Carmen Lucia Rocha could lead to new revelations about the involvement of politicians and business leaders in the Lava Jato corruption scandal At the entrance of Trump administration, it has already gained massive protests and defiance, a divided nation over differences in political beliefs. Now, with the cancellation of Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto first visit to meet the new U.S president, the wall that was once invisible, can be clearly seen now. This wall for Mexico's borderline will cost an additional 'burden' tax to some products that Mexico regularly imports to the U.S. Based on reports from Bloomberg, the products highly affected by the 20% tax on imports includes fresh vegetables, fruits and beer. Fresh vegetables like tomatoes, onions and chili peppers are frequently imported from Mexico as well as fresh fruits like raspberries, strawberries and avocados, even wines, beers and snack products. Considering that these are all in-demand products in U.S, the country gets the highest importations in Mexico, Canada only in the second place. In 2015, Mexico exported almost $21 billion worth of foods and drinks in U.S alone, while U.S exports $17.7 billion to Mexico in 2015 despite news of trade deficit. U.S. had been partners of trade by Mexico over the past years but based on reports from The Boston Globe, it was only in 2015 that the agricultural trade-deficit has happened between the two countries. For one, Mexico is the biggest consumer of U.S. corn, soybean meal, rice and dairy products in 2015 since oilseed and grains become very expensive. With the recent decisions of both leaders of each country, agricultural goods will suffer as well as the common buyer. With the social media hype, alarming netizens of a possible price hike for fruits such as avocado, raspberries and strawberries and other products, memes were made and others tried to joke around a serious problem. Everybody is now worried on how to budget their groceries just to pay for the cost of building the 'politically intriguing' wall. The latest update of Android Nougat is out and various smartphone users are anticipating the arrival of the update on their devices. Xiaomi is planning on releasing the new update to its various handsets. Xiaomi is known to introduce feature-rich but budget-friendly smartphones each passing year. The China-based company has managed to establish a mark of its own in the recent past. Due to the fact that the smartphone maker makes such advanced specifications available at such a low price, there are a lot of users that opt for Xiaomi. With the given latest update of Android Nougat 7.0 already out, it's quite natural for the fans to expect the same on their devices as well. The latest Android 7.0 Nougat comes with numerous new features, security patches and exciting customizations that give an enhanced performance to the smartphone. The Android Nougat update will be called MIUI9, reports Gadget360. Reports suggest that Xiaomi is planning on releasing the latest Android 7.0 Nougat update some time soon, even though, it did take the Chinese smartphone manufacturer took longer than expected in rolling out the update. The first Xiaomi smartphone that is expected to receive the latest Android 7.0 Nougat update is the company's Redmi Note 4. According to the report, the company has already made MIUI 8 global beta ROM 7.1.19 based on Android Nougat available for Redmi Note 4. In other words, Xiaomi sure is prepping up for the final version of the update for Redmi users soon. According to DeccanChronicle, most of the Xiaomi phones will get the details in Q1 of 2017. Some other report indicates that while the company hasn't announced the list of devices eligible for Android 7.0 Nougat update, if rumours are to be believed, the following smartphones will be receiving the upgrade: Mi 5, Mi Max, Note 4, Note 3, Redmi 3, Mi Max, Mi 5s Plus, Mi 5s, Mi 5, Mi 4, Mi 4s, Mi 4c, Redmi Note 4, Redmi Note 3, Redmi 4, Redmi 4 Prime, Redmi 4A, Redmi 3, Redmi 3A, Redmi 3s, Redmi 3s Prime, Mi Note 2, Mi Max, Redmi Pro, Mi Note Pro, Mi Pad 2. Three Islamic insurgents and two policemen were killed in a shoot-out following an attack on police in Russia's Chechnya region, strongman leader Ramzan Kadyrov said Monday. He said militants attacked a police post in Chali, a town about 30 kilometres (20 miles) south of the capital Grozny, during the night. Two policemen and three assailants were killed during the fire-fight, Kadyrov was quoted as saying in a statement from his office. Two civilians were wounded. Russia fought two brutal separatist wars over the past two decades in Chechnya but the region has been largely pacified under Kadyrov's iron-fisted rule. A dwindling group of Islamist insurgents are still fighting the authorities in Chechnya and across the volatile North Caucasus and sporadically launch eye-catching attacks. Fourteen security officers were killed when armed militants stormed several buildings in Grozny on the day of President Vladimir Putin's state of the nation address in December 2014. Rights activists and the opposition accuse Kadyrov of running Chechnya as his personal fiefdom, with kidnapping and torture widespread and little oversight from Moscow. The Russian North Caucasus is one of the major sources of foreign militants fighting in Syria and Iraq. The FSB security service last month said it had killed a regional "emir" of the Islamic State group in a raid. Search Keywords: Short link: US President Donald Trump's border clampdown has stirred Starbucks and Airbnb to help those affected by the temporary immigration ban -- pledging to hire more refugees and provide accommodation. Trump's measures suspend the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for three months, affecting many companies' plans. With lives plunged in chaos, Starbucks said it planned to take on 10,000 refugees worldwide over the next five years in response to Trump's decree. "I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise," Starbucks chairman and chief executive Howard Schultz said in a letter to employees posted on the company's website Sunday. "We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question." Schultz, a Democratic Party supporter, said his company had been in touch with employees affected by the Republican president's executive order signed Friday. The CEO said the refugee hires would be fleeing war, persecution and discrimination in the 75 countries where the company operates -- with a particular focus on those who "have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel," alluding to Iraq and Afghanistan. Airbnb said it would offer free accommodation "to refugees and anyone not allowed in the US." "Open doors brings all of US together," tweeted company CEO Brian Chesky, asking those stranded by Trump's ban to contact him for a place to stay. "Closing doors further divides US." "Not allowing countries or refugees into America is not right, and we must stand with those who are affected." The company will utilise its disaster response program, which connects hosts willing to offer their space to displaced people. Some 80 percent of the online rental platform's listings are outside of the United States. Airbnb also has measures in place to ensure housing for those in areas where no hosts are providing free shelter. Schultz of Starbucks also defended Mexico, which Trump has said will have to pay for a wall along its long and porous border with the United States to deter immigrants, perhaps by imposing a 20 percent tariff on Mexican imports. "Building bridges, not walls, with Mexico," he wrote, voicing support for the country that has provided Starbucks with coffee for three decades and where nearly 600 Starbucks coffee shops employ 7,000 people. "We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. "But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same." Other companies also expressed solidarity and pledged hard cash. Lyft, a US ridesharing company, said it would donate $1-million to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which has issued lawsuits against Trump's measures. The company's competitor Uber -- which had come under fire on social media for continuing to operate during a New York taxi strike against the immigration ban -- said it was committed to assisting drivers affected by the restrictions. After a number of Silicon Valley bosses at the weekend slammed Trump's sweeping immigration crackdown, several East Coast executives pledged their support to employees. General Electric has "many employees from the named countries and we do business all over the region," said CEO Jeffrey Immelt. "We stand with them and will work with the U.S. Administration to strive to find the balance between the need for security and the movement of law abiding people." JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, who is on a council of corporate bosses tasked with advising Trump on job growth, promised "unwavering commitment" to staff in a statement. Search Keywords: Short link: Austria's chancellor said Monday he will seek to ban full-face veils in public, as part of a wide-ranging government programme aimed at fending off the challenge of the far-right. "The full-face veil will be banned in public spaces," Christian Kern said after ministers signed off on the new programme of policies set to be implemented over the coming 18 months. There was no mention of a headscarf ban for civil servants but the text said that state representatives must "present themselves as religiously neutral". Kern said he wanted to avoid "giving 600,000 Muslims in Austria the feeling that they are not part of our society." The 35-page programme also includes beefing up surveillance and security measures, obliging migrants granted the right to stay to sign an "integration contract" and a "statement of values". "Those who are not prepared to accept Enlightenment values will have to leave our country and society," according to the text. It also promises the government will lower taxes and non-wage labour costs, restrict access of foreign workers to the Austrian labour market and create 70,000 new jobs. Many of the measures set out in the programme must be hammered out in detail and receive parliamentary approval before they can come into force. The move comes eight months after Kern, 51, replaced Werner Faymann at the head of an unhappy "grand coalition" between his Social Democrats (SPOe) and the centre-right People's Party (OeVP). Both are facing a strong challenge from the Freedom Party (FPOe), which like similar groups across Europe has stoked concerns about immigration, security and the EU to top opinion polls. There has been speculation for months that the Austrian coalition might call early elections. Monday's programme was aimed at showing it aims to govern until its mandate expires in late 2018. Search Keywords: Short link: by Its hardly a secret that I did not vote for Donald Trump for President. I dont agree with 95% of what he says and 99% of what he does. I have actually met him twice, neither of which were memorable-just shook hands in a group of people doing the same thing. I believe that he has been a black eye for the United States in the eyes of the world. I almost always look at things from a global perspective for obvious reasons. Of course his Presidency creates many issues for people like me who travel internationally often. Heres what to expect traveling in the time of Trump. Before I get into it. I just want to say, I am not a Democrat, I am not a Republican, I am not a Conservative and I am not a Liberal. I am an American who really cares, loves his country greatly and pays attention to politics and global affairs. I believe that every person in America has some liberal and some conservative views and thats OK. I also believe those are the two most polarizing words in the American vernacular these days and its a shame. Its OK to have differing views but to go crazy on others, whichever side of the aisle you fall, is preposterous and immature. I believe Congress is a total disaster and it was and still is time for a change. I think term limits on Congress need to be implemented. I am not bitter that Trump won the election at all. I dont like it but I respect the outcome because I respect America-even those that disagree with me. I wont even touch on the hacking thing. It wasnt as if I liked Hillary Clinton either. I believe she would have been status quo, which to me was another 4 years of whatever, but she was the safe candidate. Initially I really wanted to get behind Donald Trump. I think America needs a strong leader without political ties who would stand up to foreign powers the way President Obama did not. I like Obama a lot as a person but I dont think he was a strong enough leader and failed miserably in Syria along with Libya, Russia and China. I did however think he brought back a sense of respect for the office of the President and cyclical things like the stock market, gas prices and unemployment all improved greatly to his credit. Like I said, I wanted to like Trump. But his childish antics, his lewd comments about women and seemingly general lack of knowledge really turned me off. Making fun of disabled people, insulting Gold Star families, his hate filled comments, his blatant lies, his insanely massive ego, his way of internalizing everything, and his tweet storms make me ashamed. However, what Trump has been and is doing is unsafe for the United States in my view. His recent Muslim ban, while still not 100% clear on what that means has alienated just about everyone in the International community. While he says itll make us safer, I feel it does the complete opposite both at home and abroad. Aside from the obvious backlash something like this will get from liberal groups and the Muslim people throughout the world, 99.999999% of whom are amazing people, he has made us less safe. There will almost certainly be retribution from somewhere in our country. Plus someone like me who travels a lot just became a lot less safe when traveling abroad. So what to expect traveling in the time of Trump, you askexpect the expected backlash and then prepare for the unexpected. I started traveling in 1998 during the Bill Clinton impeachment proceedings after the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Bill Clinton disgraced the office of the President but everyone loved him so traveling when he was President was a breeze. In fact, I was rarely asked about him but that was also before the Internet became big so people had much less information back then. George W. Bush was a whole other story. I did the majority of my international travel during his Presidency and after starting the Iraq war without viable cause he became enemy #1 in the International community. Everyone I met while traveling during that era, when they found out I was an American would say something to the extent of I hate your President or How could America elect that man. Obviously that puts you off and I dont like to engage in political discussions with strangers because people react unpredictably to politics. Its actually scary at times. Barack Obama was a champion of the global community. He was the savior, the Anti-Bush and was anointed the greatest President of all-time before he even took office. I mean he won a Nobel Peace Prize before even taking office-what was that?! That said, while he had his ups and downs in the US, abroad he was and still is insanely popular. Traveling with him as President was a pleasure and it made you feel pride to be American and I would have voted for him a 3rd time without question against Trump. Now that brings me back to Trump. I just spent a week in England. Nearly every single person I met and I meet a lot of people asked me about Trump within a minute of meeting me. Zero percent of those were anything positive. So immediately youre put on the defensive. This is exactly how it will be for at least the next 4 years. You cannot win this argument so avoid it. I simply say something to the extent of I didnt vote for him and leave it at that. People will generally leave you alone about it. No matter where you travel that will be what youre asked about when youre an American abroad. Think about it, what do your friends and family talk about these days? Trump. Hes the single most polarizing character that America has ever seen. I truly believe that. I also believe that by the end of his Presidency, he will have done so much damage to the reputation of America around the world that it may take decades for America to recover. I believe that China and Russia will capitalize on him on the global field and I believe there will be an increase in terrorism both home and especially abroad. So as a traveler traveling in the time of Trump expect to be hassled constantly by any and everyone you meet when they learn youre American. My advice, based on my time traveling in the Bush years is to make a joke of it so to speak and avoid. Youve already been pre-judged and cannot win nor change their opinions so dont try. Thats what to expect when traveling in the time of Trump. Sounds like fun rightbeing villainized without cause. Welcome to the new world disorder! Sharing is caring! French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said Monday in Tehran that it would be "common sense" for US President Donald Trump to scrap a travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries, including Iran. "I think that it would be common sense" for Trump to rescind the executive order imposing travel curbs on Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, said Ayrault at the start of a visit to Iran. The measure was "inacceptable and very punishing for those concerned," he told members of the French community gathered at the ambassador's residence in Tehran. Search Keywords: Short link: Jan 30, 2017, 1:41am ET Next Volkswagen GTI to go hybrid? The next GTI will ditch the current model\'s turbocharger and adopt an electric compressor. A hybrid drivetrain could make the next generation of the Volkswagen GTI faster and more efficient than ever before. The next GTI will retain the current model's 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine, according to inside sources who spoke to British magazine Autocar. However, the turbocharger will be replaced by an electric compressor wired to a 48-volt system. An electric motor sandwiched between the four-cylinder and a seven-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission will provide a power boost when needed while improving gas mileage. What remains to be seen is whether the electric motor can be integrated into a manual transmission. We can't imagine the GTI going automatic-only, so Volkswagen could offer a more basic, non-hybrid model with a six-speed stick. A re-engineered version of Volkswagen's modular MQB platform will underpin the hybrid GTI. Lightweight metals will help offset the weight added by the electrified drivetrain, though it doesn't sound like the next GTI will make significant use of carbon fiber. If the rumors are accurate, the next-generation Volkswagen GTI will debut at a major auto show in 2020. Sales will kick off in time for the 2021 model year. Gov. Wolf with Assali family of Allentown Gov. Tom Wolf tweeted this photo of him, center, with members of the Assali family of Allentown during a news conference in Philadelphia on Jan. 29, 2017. (Courtesy photo) While two Syrian families headed to the Lehigh Valley were turned away this weekend at Philadelphia International Airport, organizers are working on ways to get them back to the United States. Ghassan Assali, a dentist who lives in Allentown, prepared for 13 years to welcome his two brothers and their families. The family members are Christian immigrants from Damascus -- not refugees -- with approved visas. Following President Donald Trump's Friday night Executive Order restricting travel from seven Muslim countries, when the families landed Saturday morning in Philadelphia International Airport, they were blocked and then sent back to Qatar. Attorneys for the families said they may have to start the visa process all over, according to The Morning Call. "The outcome is uncertain. If they are successful, they will incur huge expenses in connection with travel back to the States. They had already depleted their life savings to come to America, only to have that dream destroyed and their finances eradicated," according to the GoFundMe page called "Bring the Assali Family Back!" The campaign has a $25,000 goal to pay for the family's travel expenses to return to the U.S., and by Monday afternoon it was already close to $8,000. The page states if the family is unable to reenter the U.S., the money will be donated to an organization "dedicated to ensuring others do not face the same fate," like the America Civil Liberties Union. The ACLU and several other groups sued over Trump's executive order, which blocked for at least 90 days citizens Yemen, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya, Somalia and Sudan from entering the U.S. Saturday night, a judge granted an emergency stay that temporarily allowed people with a valid visa to remain in the U.S. but by then the Assali family's relatives were flying back to Qatar. Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf, U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney and Lehigh Valley Congressman Charlie Dent all criticized the effect the president's order had on the the Assali family. Sen. Pat Toomey, in an official statement Monday morning, said the order was "too broad and improperly explained." It made no mention of the Assali's relatives. Sarah Cassi may be reached at scassi@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow her on Twitter @SarahCassi. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. Elias Pellot Elias Pellot (Courtesy Photo) Elias Pellot's victim wanted no part of his scheme involving her 10-month-old son. When the Bethlehem woman refused to go along with the man she had been dating for about a month, he lost his temper, according to Northampton County Assistant District Attorney Laura Majewski. "He became enraged and then assaulted her," she said Monday during the opening arguments of Pellot's trial. The 41-year-old Allentown man punched her, kicked her and stabbed her in the buttocks on Feb. 23 at her home in the 1400 block of East Sixth Street. All of it took place within view of the child, Majewski said. "He made her clean out the wound with salt," she said. "Blood was going everywhere." The victim went in and out of consciousness after Pellot choked her, Majewski said. She said Pellot refused to let her leave. He did take her to a hospital the next day but ordered her to not blame him for the stab wound. "If she did, he said he would gut her baby and make it squeal like a pig," Majewski said. Pellot didn't cause the stab wound, according to defense attorney Ed Andres. While Majewski accused Pellot of changing his story, Andres said the victim changed hers. If Pellot's story changed it remained consistent in one way - his denial of the stabbing. "He repeatedly and clearly and consistently denied doing it," Andres said. He said no fingerprints or DNA link Pellot to the crime. Andres said the stab wound isn't serious enough to warrant an aggravated assault charge. Majewski said the dispute originated because Pellot wanted to use the 10-month-old as "bait" to lure out Pellot's ex-girlfriend. She refused to cooperate in the plan. Majewski described the victim as someone with a "very meek lifestyle." She was placed in her apartment through a program with the Lehigh Valley Council of Churches. The victim told police Pellot threw the knife over the balcony of the third-floor apartment. Police found it below. She also accused Pellot of laundering bloody sheets and clothes to eliminate evidence. The trial will continue through Wednesday, Majewski said. Pellot is charged with two counts of aggravated assault and single counts of simple assault, making terroristic threats, recklessly endangering another person and unlawful restraint. Rudy Miller may be reached at rmiller@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @RudyMillerLV. Find Easton area news on Facebook. David A. Repyneck has announced his candidacy for Hellertown-area district judge. The Lower Saucon Township resident works as an adjunct professor of criminal justice at Lehigh-Carbon Community College. He previously served 28 years with the Pennsylvania Army National Guard. David A. Repyneck has announced his candidacy for Hellertown-area district judge. (Courtesy photo) "My knowledge, education, professional experience and certification have uniquely qualified me to serve as Magisterial District Judge," Repyneck says in a news release. "As a criminal justice professional, I am eager to serve the residents of Hellertown and Lower Saucon, and intend to restore honor, integrity and respect back to the office." The vacant district judge seat was previously occupied by David Tidd, who resigned last July and is accused of judicial misconduct. Repyneck unsuccessfully ran against Tidd in 2015, before the allegations of misconduct became public. Repyneck, a graduate of Saucon Valley High School and DeSales University, is currently certified to serve as a district judge. He intends to cross-file as a Democrat and Republican to run on both tickets in Pennsylvania's primary election May 16. Candidates can begin circulating nomination petitions in February. Repyneck lives in Lower Saucon Township with his wife, Leslie, and family. Nick Falsone may be reached at nfalsone@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @nickfalsone. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. Robert F. Mateff Sr. has announced his candidacy for Hellertown-area district judge. Robert Mateff is the former Northampton County director of emergency management services. (Courtesy photo) Mateff, a former Northampton County deputy sheriff and county director of emergency management services, is a public safety consultant. He left his county emergency management job in May 2015 after being appointed by Gov. Tom Wolf to work on the state's emergency 911 system. He said in a news release that he's a lifelong resident of the Hellertown and Lower Saucon Township area who has been active in youth sports, church groups, the Leithsville Fire Co. and Dewey Fire Co. ambulance squad. "I have spent my career ensuring the public has equal access to emergency services and providing for the safety of the residents of this community," he said in a statement. "I see service as a district judge as a continuation of ensuring the public's safety." The vacant district judge seat was previously occupied by David Tidd, who resigned last July and is accused of judicial misconduct. "I would like the opportunity to restore dignity to this position in Hellertown and Lower Saucon and look forward to the opportunity to continue to serve the public as a district judge," said Mateff, who is 50 and lives in Hellertown. He is a graduate of Saucon Valley High School and DeSales University, with a degree in criminal justice. He said he started his career as a dispatcher with the Hellertown Police Department and has worked more than 25 years in public safety in the county and state. He has two sons, Robert Jr. and Kevin. Mateff, a Democrat, intends to cross-file as a Democrat and Republican to run on both tickets in Pennsylvania's primary election May 16, he said. Candidates can begin circulating nomination petitions in February. Mateff said he left the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency in October to become director of emergency communications at the University of Pennsylvania, where he worked until December. Jim Deegan may be reached at jdeegan@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @jim_deegan. Find lehighvalleylive on Facebook. James Hill has announced his candidacy for Hellertown-area district judge. Hill currently serves on Hellertown Borough Council and is a lawyer who's been practicing in Pennsylvania for 16 years. He says he will close his private practice if elected. James Hill on Jan. 30, 2017, announced his candidacy for Hellertown-area district judge. (Courtesy photo) He is a lifelong resident of the area and also serves on several other government commissions including the Hellertown Civil Service Commission and the Hellertown Historical Society Board. Hill says in a news release that he is "dedicated to the legal profession, and also to his community. He views the position of Magisterial District Judge as his opportunity to serve the public." The vacant district judge seat was previously occupied by David Tidd, who resigned last July and is accused of judicial misconduct. Hill says in the release that he is "committed to: treating the court staff and the public with fairness and respect, being more accessible to the public with reasonable business hours, and conducting fair and impartial hearings in the courtroom." He is a graduate of Lehigh University and Penn State University's Dickinson School of Law. Hill said he plans to cross file as both a Democrat and Republican. Pennsylvania's primary election is May 16. Candidates can begin circulating nomination petitions in February. Nick Falsone may be reached at nfalsone@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @nickfalsone. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. UPDATE: Forks Township police shooting 'justifiable homicide,' DA says Northampton County District Attorney John Morganelli has called a news conference Monday to discuss results of investigation into the fatal shooting of a Forks Township man by a police officer. Scott Macintosh (Courtesy photo) The press conference is scheduled for 2 p.m. at the Northampton County Courthouse, 669 Washington St., Easton. The district attorney last week said Pennsylvania State Police have concluded their investigation into the fatal shooting of Scott MacIntosh. A Forks Township police officer on Dec. 9, 2016, shot the 35-year-old following a confrontation at his home in the 500 block of Apple Blossom Road. MacIntosh was taken to a hospital at 4:30 p.m. and was pronounced dead, Morganelli said. Few details about the incident have been released, including the identity of the male officer. A neighbor heard multiple shots and said police broke down a fence to get into MacIntosh's yard. Morganelli last week planned to meet with state police and learn the identity of the officer. Police Chief Greg Dorney had said the officer remains on leave pending the outcome of the investigation, as per standard protocol. Morganelli could decide Monday whether to file charges in the case, if any. He also could send the case up to the state attorney general's office. Pamela Sroka-Holzmann may be reached at pholzmann@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow her on Twitter @pamholzmann. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. Furry sex abuse arrest Officials with the Bucks County District Attorney's Office and the Pennsylvania Attorney's General's Office on Jan. 29, 2017, announce a fifth arrest Jan. 27, 2017, in a child sex abuse case involving men who dressed as animals. (Courtesy photo | For lehighvalleylive.com) A Bucks County man is free on bail after he was charged in a case of a Monroe County man who provided a 9-year-old boy to men who raped him, authorities report. Kenneth Fenske, 57, of Milford Township, is charged in a child sex abuse ring that involved adults dressing as animals, the Pennsylvania Attorney General's Office and Bucks County District Attorney's Office report. (Courtesy photo | For lehighvalleylive.com) Kenneth C. Fenske, 57, of the 2700 block of North Old Bethlehem Pike in Milford Township, was one of a group of men dressed as animals at parties, the Bucks County District Attorney's Office and the Pennsylvania Attorney General's Office said in a new release. Starting in 2009, 38-year-old David R. Parker, of Saylorsburg, took the child to "Furry" parties in a home, authorities said. Furries is a term used to describe people who dress up and identify as an animal in what authorities said can be a form of a sexual fetish. The child identified Fenske as the man dressed as a red fox, known as "Lupine," who would take him upstairs and sexually abuse him, authorities said. Fenske was arraigned Friday before District Judge Gary Gambardella on charges of rape of a child, and two counts each of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a child and unlawful contact with a minor (sexual offenses) involving an Aug. 1, 2009, incident, according to court records. Bail was set at 10 percent of $750,000 and Fenske, who tax records show owns a home in the township near Quakertown, posted bond on Friday. His preliminary hearing is tentatively scheduled 10 a.m. Feb. 3 before District Judge Charles W. Baum. Four other men are also charged in the case, authorities report. Parker, child rape and related offenses. Jeffrey Harvey, 40, of West Wyoming in Luzerne County, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and related offenses. Craig Knox, 35, of Henrico, Virginia, rape of a child and related offenses. Stephen Taylor, of Virginia, no age or charges listed. The district attorney's office worked with the state attorney general's office, Bucks County detectives, Pennsylvania State Police and other law enforcement to bring the charges, Bucks County District Attorney Matt Weintraub said in a news release. "This case and these arrests cut across county and state boundaries, and the arrests would not have happened without the close, working cooperation of each of these law enforcement agencies," Weintraub said. "We're grateful to every police officer and law enforcement agent involved in relentlessly tracking down these child abuse suspects and bringing them to justice." The child is currently in foster care and receiving therapy, authorities said. The boy has slowly revealed more information to a member of the attorney general's Child Predator Unit and "another deeply disturbing revelation" led to Fenske's arrest last week, authorities said. The case is "active and ongoing," authorities said. "This is a horrendous case," Attorney General Josh Shapiro said in the news release. "It is deeply disturbing to me not only as attorney general of Pennsylvania, but as a father of young children. We care about this victim and all victims of sexual abuse. "Our investigation is not done, and it is likely there will be more arrests. We believe it is likely there could be more victims out there from this ring of abuse. We want to help them and protect them from any further abuse. "We're seeking the public's help today and asking people to come forward and speak with our office or the Bucks DA's Office if they know anything." The attorney general's office is asking anyone with information to call its tip line at 800-385-1044. People can remain anonymous and provide a tip at www.attorneygeneral.gov. Tony Rhodin may be reached at arhodin@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @TonyRhodin. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. Gov. Wolf with Assali family of Allentown Gov. Tom Wolf tweeted this photo of him, center, with members of the Assali family of Allentown during a news conference in Philadelphia on Jan. 29, 2017. (Courtesy photo) With their Allentown family members at his side, Gov. Tom Wolf on Sunday said he was outraged by President Trump's travel ban that sent six Syrians bound for the Lehigh Valley back overseas. Wolf appeared in Philadelphia on Sunday with Ghassan Assali, a dentist, and his wife Sarmad Assali, of Allentown. Ghassan's two brothers and their families were denied entry on Saturday at Philadelphia International Airport in spite of having immigration visas and were told they had to return back overseas. Wolf said they were denied permission to enter the United States even though they had been working for an immigration visa for the past 13 years and had all of their documentations in order. "This family has done great things in Allentown and I think it's a dark day for all of us that the Assali family was treated this way," Wolf said. "As a Pennsylvanian and an American, this is not who we are. Pennsylvania is a place of welcome. "This is not a place people come to experience oppression and that's what their family members experienced." Wolf said Pennsylvania is joining 16 other states in condemning Trump's travel ban on refugees and citizens of seven Muslim-majority nations. Attorney General Josh Shapiro said he and 16 other attorneys general consider the action "unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful" and vowed to "use all of the tools of our offices to fight" it, according to the Associated Press. Sarmad Assali said her two brothers-in-law and their families are back in Damascus, and she's "heartbroken because they had to be sent back to the war zone." The family members are Christian immigrants from Damascus -- not refugees -- with approved visas. The Assalis had planned to reunite with their relatives Saturday at Philadelphia International Airport and bring them to Allentown, where they had a home ready for them. Attorney Jonathan Grode, a lawyer with Green and Spiegel, said his firm is calling on the American Immigration Lawyers Association and American Civil Liberties Union to see what legal action they can take to help the Assalis. Sarmad Assali said one of her brothers-in-law was in Allentown as recently as 2013, but he wanted to wait for his visa process to be completed before he returned, pennlive.com reported. The trip to Philadelphia was the first for either of Ghassan Assali's brothers since they received their visas. Besides Wolf, U.S. Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Pa., was critical of Trump's executive order and was working to bring about a resolution. But the Assalis' relatives boarded a flight back to Qatar on Saturday before a federal judge issued a temporary stay of Trump's order. They had to pay their own airfare and an immigration lawyer planned to establish a GoFundMe campaign to help cover the costs, according to The Morning Call of Allentown. Trump on Friday suspended all refugee admissions to the U.S. for four months and banned the entry of Syrian refugees indefinitely pending a security review meant to ensure terrorists cannot slip through vetting. Trump also issued a 90-day ban on all entry to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries with terrorism concerns, including Syria. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Jim Deegan may be reached at jdeegan@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @jim_deegan. Find lehighvalleylive on Facebook. Kareem Mitchell is facing trial later this year, accused of driving the getaway SUV in a Lehigh Valley killing spree that claimed three people in the summer of 2015. While Todd West had admitted gunning down Kory Ketrow in Easton, and Francine E. Ramos and Trevor D. Gray in Allentown, there were two other people with him and both have been charged: Robert Jourdain and Mitchell. The 24-year-old Mitchell, of Newark, is charged with three counts each of homicide and conspiracy, and a single count of attempted homicide. The Northampton County and Lehigh County cases are being prosecuted together in Lehigh. West was charged with seven killings in all -- he pleaded guilty to the three in the Lehigh Valley and avoided the death penalty. He is awaiting trial in four that occurred earlier in New Jersey. On Monday, Mitchell's attorney said his client continued driving out of fear, and there was no intent on his part to participate in the killings. Mitchell's defense would be a combination of duress and mental infirmity, and his attorneys are waiting on a forensic psychologist's report. West admitted gunning down the three victims at random. He previously told investigators Ketrow looked tired as he was walking along Lehigh Street in Easton, and that he was going to "help" Ketrow. At his plea hearing, West said he killed the pair in Allentown because "I just wanted to kill them." "Under the circumstances, a reasonable person might be in fear of leaving," defense attorney Brooks Thompson said on Monday. Mitchell, of Newark, previously told investigators he was giving Jourdain a ride with his 2-year-old son to Easton, and West, whom he had never met before, came with them. After dropping off the child, the trio went to Allentown so West could get a haircut, then went to an after-hours club, according to police. Jourdain bought the ammunition for the killings at a Lower Nazareth Township Wal-Mart, prosecutors said, and Mitchell drive the Mercedes SUV the entire night, until it was disabled by a damaged wheel. Eventually, Mitchell parked the damaged SUV in Allentown, bought a bus ticket back to northern New Jersey and walked around Allentown with the other two before taking a bus the night of July 6. Sarah Cassi may be reached at scassi@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow her on Twitter @SarahCassi. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. The UN refugee agency said Monday it was "alarmed" by the consequences of US President Donald Trump's order barring refugee arrivals, describing those targeted as "anxious, confused and heartbroken." "This week alone, over 800 refugees were set to make America their new home," the Geneva-based UNHCR said in a statement. The order signed by Trump on Friday suspends arrivals by refugees in general for 120 days and Syrian refugees indefinitely. "UNHCR estimates that 20,000 refugees in precarious circumstances might have been resettled to the United States during the 120 days covered by the suspension," the statement added, basing that figure on averages over the last 15 years. "Refugees are anxious, confused and heartbroken at this suspension," it further said, describing UNHCR chief Filippo Grandi as "deeply worried" by the impact of Trump's move. Refugees who qualify for resettlement to the US or other developed countries have typically endured extreme hardships and have no prospect of safely returning to their home countries. The US president's widely-condemned executive order also bars entry for travellers from seven mainly Muslim countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen -- for 90 days. Search Keywords: Short link: Trump-Refugees Protesters assemble at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York Saturday after refugees were detained while trying to enter the country. On Friday, President Trump signed an executive order suspending all immigration from countries with terrorism concerns for 90 days. (Craig Ruttle) President Trump says his executive order banning Syrian refugees and restricting travel to the U.S. from seven Middle Eastern nations is an anti-terrorism precaution and not about religion. The president's action Friday set off a flurry of protests, mostly at airports, over the weekend. Some people with visas or green cards -- including two Syrian families who had arrived Saturday in Philadelphia, trying to return to Allentown -- were placed on flights and sent back to their homeland. Lawyers and the ACLU responded by meeting with travelers caught up at airports, and seeking relief in the courts. A federal judge ruled that people who arrived legally from the seven nations with visas or green cards could not be deported. Trump said his order -- a 90-day ban on travel from Syria, Libya, Yemen, Sudan, Somalia, Iran and Iraq -- was "about keeping our country safe" from terror-prone nations and wasn't targeting Muslims. While he promised during the campaign that he'd seek a "total and complete shutdown" of Muslims entering the U.S., he noted that 40 other Muslim-majority nations were not included in his executive order. He blamed most of the confusion on a Delta Airlines computer breakdown and protestors. Still, many called the order discriminatory and unnecessary. U.S. Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Lehigh Valley, said disrupting the travel of people with documentation "ridiculous." A protest of the travel ban was scheduled for Monday evening in Easton's Centre Square. What do you think? Is the travel ban a sensible response to weed out potential terrorists -- or a discriminatory move that violates due process rights? Have a say in our unscientific poll, and feel free to join the conversation in the comments section. By Ed Inghrim Harrisburg, once again, is discussing school property tax relief. One method under consideration is shifting some or all of the burden for funding schools to higher sales and income taxes. But based on Harrisburg's past history of fixing the school property tax problem, they are likely to fail. Ed Inghrim Local school boards and administrators are opposed to funding schools with sales and income taxes because they don't want to lose control of their current major revenue source, property taxes. Further, they don't trust Harrisburg controlling the distribution of those new sources of revenues. As a school board member I personally don't like driving elderly home owners out of their homes because they can't pay their school property taxes, and I would like to suggest a different solution -- taxing total personal income, which is what taxpayers claim on their federal income tax form. A personal income tax (PIT) places the cost of funding public education on ability to pay and does not burden struggling lower-income families with higher sales taxes. In the Saucon Valley School District about 12 percent of the households have annual incomes of $20,000 or less. They generate about 2 percent of the total personal income within the district but pay 12 percent of the total school property taxes. The average annual income for this group is about $10,000; the average assessed value of their homes is approximately seven times their annual income, or $70,000. About 25 percent of the households in our district earn $100,000 or more and generate 57 percent of the total district personal income, yet they pay only 39 percent of the total property taxes for schools. The average annual income for this group is about $200,000; the average assessed value of their homes is $125,000. Thus, households earning less than $20,000 per year are paying a much higher property tax in proportion to their incomes. Something is inherently wrong. Assuming a revenue-neutral policy, if we replaced the current district property tax of 57.14 mills with a PIT of about 4.9 percent, homeowners in Hellertown and Lower Saucon with annual incomes of $100,000 or more would see their property tax drop to zero, but their local school income tax would provide 57 percent of the district's local revenues, not 39 percent. Homeowners with incomes of $20,000 or less would see decreases of about 80 percent or more in their obligation to fund public schools. If our Legislature were really serious about keeping elderly homeowners in their homes and allaying the fears of school boards, the shift to a PIT should include a mandate to keep this local income for schools out of the state budget, and be passed directly to school districts. The local PIT collection might only require adding one line to the current Pennsylvania income tax form and a table that lists the tax rate for each municipal entity. Another option would be for districts to collect a PIT directly from local households using a modified version of the process they now use to collect property taxes. To avoid double taxation for school funding, the legislature should eliminate the earned income tax collected by schools. Also, landlords should be encouraged to pass on property tax reductions in the rents they charge -- or property tax elimination should be restricted to owner-occupied residences and property taxes continued for rental and business properties. This, unfortunately, might require a change in the state constitution. Edward Inghrim, of Lower Saucon Township, is a member of the Saucon Valley School Board. A burglar wielding a screwdriver at the co-owner of a Slate Belt greenhouse was after the man's business partner to settle a debt, Pennsylvania State Police said. Alan Edward Vest, 46, of Bangor, at 11:10 a.m. Friday allegedly attacked the 41-year-old male victim from Upper Mount Bethlel Township when he entered the greenhouse off Shawnee Drive. State police at Belfast said the victim was knocked to the ground, struck below the eye with the screwdriver and scuffled with Vest. Court records indicate the victim co-owns the greenhouse with another man and the greenhouse is next to the victim's property. The victim's wife called him to return home from work when she noticed someone was inside, police said. Police said the victim at one point punched and tackled Vest to the ground. Vest then asked if he could explain why he was there and the victim let him free, according to police. Vest then allegedly said he was there to collect a debt belonging to someone the greenhouse's other co-owner owed. When the victim's wife said she was calling police, Vest fled, running south toward River Road. A state police aviation unit and a police dog canvassed the area unsuccessfully in search of Vest. Vest eventually was arrested just before 4 p.m. Friday at Driftstone Campground on River Road -- about a half-mile south from Shawnee Drive. The greenhouse co-owner told police he didn't owe anyone money and gave no one permission to be in the greenhouse. Vest is charged with burglary, aggravated assault, criminal trespass, possessing an instrument of crime, simple assault, reckless endangerment and harassment. He was arraigned Friday before District Judge Alicia Zito, who set bail at $200,000. In lieu of bail, Vest was taken to Northampton County Prison, where he remained Monday. Pamela Sroka-Holzmann may be reached at pholzmann@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow her on Twitter @pamholzmann. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. A 62-year-old Upper Mount Bethel Township man on Monday morning was in the intense care unit at St. Luke's University Hospital after a crash Sunday night in the Slate Belt community, officials said. Brian S. Grimshaw was driving south at 7:15 p.m. in the 500 block of Ridge Road when he drove off the side of the street and struck a reflector, Pennsylvania State Police report. He crossed back over the road and hit a mailbox and a culvert, then another mailbox on the east side of the street, police said. The driver's side of the 2012 Dodge Avenger then hit a Met-Ed utility pole before the car crossed the street again and stopped between trees, state police said. Suburban EMS took Grimshaw to the Fountain Hill hospital. Passenger Brandon M. Latteman, 27, of Bangor, wasn't hurt, state police said. Both men were wearing seat belts. Grimshaw will be cited with driving out of his lane, according to state police. Tony Rhodin may be reached at arhodin@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @TonyRhodin. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. A 3-month-old infant was left alone in a Warren County apartment with several bags of marijuana found inside a crib, police said. Mansfield Township police officers at 11:44 p.m. Jan. 18 were dispatched to an apartment in Mansfield Village. Police did not specify in a news release the exact location. A female victim fled the apartment out a window and was found by officers outside the complex. She reported to investigators that her 29-year-old boyfriend, who police did not identify, slapped her, threw a drink at her and grabbed her by the neck, slamming her into a bathroom mirror. The boyfriend sped off in a car from the complex, leaving an infant alone in the apartment, according to police. Officers seized several bags of marijuana in the crib, as well as other places throughout the apartment, according to police. A warrant was issued for the man on charges of simple assault, harassment, possession of under 50 grams of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia, as well as a citation for reckless driving. The New Jersey Division of Child Protection and Permanency was notified. The male was located in Morris County and arrested Wednesday on charges out of Mansfield Township, as well as other areas, police said. Pamela Sroka-Holzmann may be reached at pholzmann@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow her on Twitter @pamholzmann. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook. US Muslim leaders filed suit against President Donald Trump Monday over an immigration order that they said was a "fear-mongering" attempt at keeping members of their religion out of the country. Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, joined 26 others as plaintiffs in the lawsuit alleging that Trump's temporary ban on immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries was in fact a "Muslim exclusion order" that violates the US constitution's religious freedom protections. "Donald Trump's executive order is not based on national security, it is based on fear-mongering," Awad said Monday. "This is not a Muslim ban, it is a Muslim exclusion order." Besides excluding Muslim refugees and immigrants from abroad, the suit alleges Trump's executive order will force out US-resident Muslims from those seven countries "by denying them the ability to renew their lawful status or receive immigration benefits... based solely on their religious beliefs." That will lead to "the mass expulsion" of both immigrant and non-immigrant Muslims, the suit, filed in the district court in Alexandria, Virginia, alleged. Plaintiffs in the lawsuit include several CAIR officials, among them prominent Muslim-American lawyers and activists. They also include unnamed plaintiffs described as legal residents and visitors to the country who would, if they left temporarily, would not be able to return under Trump's order. The suit said the order, announced Saturday, reflected anti-Muslim sentiments that Trump expressed during the presidential campaign. "The Muslim Exclusion Order is the as-promised outcome of Defendant Trump's hateful, year-long campaign which was fueled, in significant part, by a desire to stigmatize Islam and Muslims," it said. Lawyers said the order violates the US Constitution's protections of religious freedoms and the "establishment clause," which bans the government from making laws that favor or discriminate against specific religions. Search Keywords: Short link: A Portlaoise man has been charged with assaulting an inmate of the Midlands Prison. At last week's sitting of the district court, Michael OShea (47), with an address at 207 St Brigids Place, Portlaoise, was charged with assault causing harm, at the Midlands Prison on October 31, 2015. Inspector Eamonn Curley gave evidence that the accused was in the recreation room of the prison when a fellow prisoner entered on that date. It was alleged that the accused approached the other man and punched him in the face a number of times, causing him to fall to the ground and lose consciousness. The injured party was left confused and drowsy, with a laceration to his eyebrow and a laceration to the bridge of his nose, as well as blood in both nostrils, said Insp Curley. Defence, Mr Philip Meagher requested a statements order in the case. The matter was put back to February 2 for a guilty plea to be entered, or for a hearing date to be fixed. Portlaoises Borris Road is one of several roads in Laois set to benefit from a total Government funding of 7,688, 729 this year. Laois TD and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Charlie Flanagan, has confirmed Government funding of 7,688,729 for roads in the county, which is part of a 324 million national investment programme for regional and local roads in 2017. Fine Gael in Government is determined to use our strong economy to benefit all areas of the country, and roads funding is just one example of this. The funding announced by the Government today constitutes a 9% increase on last years allocation, which is only possible as our economy continues to grow, said Minister Flanagan. This funding is for the local authority to maintain and strengthen our roads here in Laois. It will also help to stimulate local job creation which is really important to local communities here. Minister Flanagan revealed that the total figure of 7,688,729 for Laois includes the significant amount of 75,000 in a Specific Improvement Grant for Borris Rd, Portlaoise. There is also funding of 220,000 for bridge rehabilitation works including work at Poormans Bridge, Abbeyleix and Colt Railway Bridge. Road safety is an important part of this announcement also. Nationally, funding of over 1.3 million will be allocated to local authorities to continue with the implementation of 30km/h speed limits in housing estates across Ireland. Here in Laois, funding of 150,000 has been allocated to safety improvement works on roads such as Barrowhouse Cross, Junction at Ballybrophy Railway Bridge and Clonmeen North, said the Minister. He went on to say that this funding for roads in Laois will make a big difference to people and businesses locally. This announcement comes in the same week as the Government launched its Action Plan for Rural Ireland which, with its 270 targeted actions, will help to deliver benefits to people and communities all across Laois, concluded Minister Flanagan. I feel as if a little part of who I am is struggling to survive. A little part that has been nurtured and has grown since, as a teenager, I marvelled at the liberal values and writings of Robert Kennedy and Dr Martin Luther King. Its the part that grew up regarding US history as testament that a people can use lessons of a divided past to create a society that offers opportunity for all. And its the same part of me thats always been so proud that I have family amongst those tired and huddled masses who were welcomed with open arms to a nation founded on that simple, yet beautiful, declaration: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. Thats the promise of the United States. A promise to which so many have trusted their futures, and their dreams. But its a promise that today seems under threat. Perhaps not all are equally welcome. The cruel irony is that the threat comes from one whose own forebears trusted their future to that promise. Whose mother left the Hebrides to live the epitome of the American dream. Last year I visited the United States three times. I love the place. And the people. Its culture, its literature and its politics. Today I doubt I will visit again, for at least four years. Thats not a stand I take easily. I have friends I would love to see. Places I may not get another chance to visit. But looking at the immediate impact of Trumps Presidency I am not sure that I want to experience it up close. What is the moral imperative now guiding America? Of course there are aspects of life and politics in the US with which I have always differed, often argued, with American friends about. I prefer our health care system, even with all its problems. I feel much more secure in our stricter anti-gun culture. I often find their politics a little more to the right than my own instincts. But those differences and the debates they provoke are what is part of what makes democracy so wonderful, and our relationship so special. Through debate and creative discussion you find the way ahead. Only by listening to others can you see the potential flaws in your own ideas and strategies, and find improvement. On the last of those three visits last year I travelled to Virginia to observe, and help where I could, the campaign to elect Hillary Clinton 45th President. At no time did I regard the former Senator and Secretary of State as the least worst option, particularly for those of us living firth of the US, but dependent on a strong cohesive administration to bolster world security. No. I saw Hillary as the best, most liberal, most reforming option. Neither did I see Donald Trump as some dangerous demagogue, or a threat to the established order. I thought he simply was not qualified for the job. When the shock of his victory was met by reassurance from many of those on the right of British politics that it wasnt really that bad. Or pleas to give him a chance to prove his worth. I hoped they were right. Now I fear there can be no doubt they were mistaken. When a British Prime Minister instructs her Foreign and Home Secretaries to make representations to the US about policy, you cannot help but feel you are in uncharted territory. It may yet, of course, be fine. Reason may prevail. These first few days of walls, deportations and bans may be some exaggerated muscle-flexing exercise. Lets hope so. But even though I find the situation we now face challenges so much of what I thought America is, that little part of me is refusing to give in. Refusing to accept that this really is America. Its certainly not the American that the majority of the people voted for. And then at the 11th hour the wisdom of the founding fathers, the same men who wrote that most beautiful of declarations, came to the rescue. Their system of checks and balances so cherished by Americans allowed the judiciary to block the Presidents executive order. But it may be only temporary respite. In all sections of US society there are citizens, judges and senators like Elizabeth Warren standing up against, what they see as an assault on Americanism. But they need to know they have our support. Never before, perhaps, has the special relationship mattered so much to Americans. Our Prime Minister tells us she can be frank with the President if necessary. She has asked her ministers to speak to their counterparts in Washington. Its a start. Perhaps that little part of my ideals that is struggling will survive yet. * Christine Jardine is the Liberal Democrat MP for Edinburgh West (No, Ive no idea what it means, either: Ed) The Federal Conference Committee met for the first time of the new cycle over the weekend of 28th and 29th January 2017. This new committee that has been elected is due to serve for a three-year period. Membership of the Federal Conference Committee A number of new members have joined the committee. They include Robert Adamson, Victor Chamberlain, Nick Da Costa, Heidi Worth, Jennie Rigg, Susan Juned, and Alex Hegenbarth. We also welcomed back a few familiar faces. The first substantive item on the agenda was the election of officers. Andrew Wiseman was re-elected as Chair of FCC and Zoe OConnell as the Vice-Chair responsible for Conference Communications. I was re-elected Vice-Chair responsible for the General Purposes Sub-Committee (G.P.S.C.). The following people were appointed to the General Purposes Sub-Committee: Qassim Afzal, Nick Da Costa, Jennie Rigg and Chris Maines. That committee deals with registration rates in the first instance, finances and budgets, stewards and eligibility for the concessionary party body rate. Robert Adamson was appointed as the Access Rep. He is going to chair the Conference Access Group. Chris Maines as appointed as the Stewards Rep; he is going to liaise with the Stewards Team. A small group was established to consider ways of making FCC members more contactable by and accessible to members. We also set up a small task and finish group to consider the electronic submission of Speakers Cards. This was quite a major point to come out of the most recent Access Forum and it is one that we are going to look at closely. We also need to look at the format of the Q&A and intervention cards because they do not contain non-binary options for gender. Autumn Conference 2016 Brighton The committee went through in some detail the feedback received from conference attendees at Brighton. There were several hundred responses overall with 21% of them coming from those aged 20-39, 32% from those aged 40-59 and 38% from those aged 60-74. 23% of the responses came from first time attendees. It was good to see that well over 95% of attendees received enough pre-conference support to feel happy about attending. The majority found the Agenda, Directory, Conference Extra and Conference Daily useful and easy to use although a slightly worrying 18% did not use Conference Daily and 39% did not use Conference Extra at all! Over half of attendees downloaded the app and only 6% did not think it was satisfactory, easy or very easy to use. The majority of the respondees preferred it to paper. Brighton again came out as a popular venue. Most people rated it. The same went for the catering. The reviews for the Metropole were a little more mixed but most people thought it suitable. The overwhelming majority thought that the balance between debate and non-debate items was about right although a small but nonetheless significant number thought there were too many non-debate items. The balance between debates and fringe meetings was generally thought to be correct. 75% liked or did not mind the 9am start on the Saturday. About the same number gave the same answer about the 3pm finish on the final day. Most people thought the fringe was satisfactory, good or excellent, with most opting for good. For those that attended the fringe, the average number was between three and six. The majority of people travelled to conference by train or in a car-share. For most, the journey was 1-3 hours. In terms of accommodation, most people stayed in an independent hotel or B&B. There was a good spread of accommodation from 20 per night right up to 200 per night. Only a relatively small minority thought their accommodation poor value for money. Overall, the vast majority of people rated their experience at conference as excellent or good. Just a tiny handful of people rated it as poor. Again, the vast majority said that it made them more motivated to support the party or to campaign for it and that it made them feel more involved in the democratic process and proud to be a member. Spring Conference 2017 York We will returning to York for Spring Conference 2017. The dates are 17th to 19th March 2017. York is an extremely popular venue for conference attendees. Registration numbers are running high with a very large number of new members. The remaining deadlines are as follows: Drafting Advice deadline (amendments): 28th February 2017 Amendments and Emergency Motions deadline: 14th March 2017 On the Sunday, the committee selected the agenda for that conference. FCC members will be writing back to the proposers of unsuccessful motions shortly. The following motions were accepted from the Federal Policy Committee: the sex work policy paper, Nuclear Weapons and Faith Schools. In addition, we also selected some local party motions and those submitted by conference reps. Zoe OConnell will be writing her usual report on the motions selections process. We will have an Emergency Motions slot and topical issue. There will be an opportunity to discuss BREXIT. There will also be set-piece speeches from the Leader and others and there will be the usual reports and Question and Answer sessions including one with Tim Farron. The outline agenda will be out on Thursday 2nd February (that will be just motion titles. It is likely that the agenda itself will be out by 20th February 2017. Those organising local party meetings to discuss the motions would be safe to do so in that week. It may come out up to a week earlier. Autumn Conference 2017 Bournemouth We will be returning to Bournemouth this Autumn. It will take place from 16th to 19th September 2017. The committee considered whether we should adopt the trial that we ran last Autumn of running conference for four days. Usually, Autumn Conference lasts for five days, opening on Saturday afternoon and finishing on Wednesday. In Brighton, conference opened at 9am on the Saturday and closed at 3pm on the Tuesday. We managed with only a very small loss of debate time. It had the benefit of saving money although it was initially triggered by a review of the Parliamentary recess normally allowed for Autumn Conferences. The committee overwhelmingly voted to carry on with the four-day conference for 2017 only. There may be a case for increasing the time later in the Parliamentary cycle but we are not going to do that this year. We felt that that that was in accordance with what members wanted and it had other important benefits. The conference deadlines are as follows: Drafting Advice deadline (motions): 14th June 2017 Motions deadline: 28th June 2017 Drafting Advice deadline (amendments): 21st August 2017 Amendments and Emergency Motions deadline: 4th September 2017 FCC will be meeting on 9th September to select the amendments. Chairs Training In order to chair Federal Conference, the committee runs a series of training events. For the most part, they take place at conference itself but, because there of the number of new members of the committee, it was decided to run the training at this weekend meeting. There were three sessions. The first was an introductory session to explain the basics about chairing. The second was a session on planning a debate and selecting speakers and the third was a session on understanding and applying the Standing Orders. Overall, the training lasted two and a half hours. The committee next meets on the Friday before Spring Conference. I am happy to answer any questions on the work of the FCC. You can reach me with any questions or comments on 07956 472 769 or [email protected] * Geoff Payne is the Chair of Federal Conference Committee. The news that everyones favourite athlete Mo Farah may not be able to return to his family in the US has encapsulated the impact of Trumps vicious travel ban. He was, of course, born in Somalia, one of the banned countries, although he is a British citizen and does not hold dual nationality. He is currently at a training camp in Ethiopia. Mo Farah wrote: I am a British citizen who has lived in America for the past six years working hard, contributing to society, paying my taxes and bringing up our four children in the place they now call home. Now me, and many others like me, are being told that we may not be welcome. Tom Brake, our Foreign Affairs spokesperson, made these comments: Sir Mo Farahs dignified criticism of the Trump ban spoke for decent, liberal values while Theresa May was more interested in remaining friends with Donald Trump. Sir Mos potential ban shows just how wide and unthinking the Trump order is. From Olympic athletes to Conservative MPs to ordinary, innocent people who simply have a different faith to the president so many people are getting caught up in this chaotic ban. Now that even Boris Johnson seems to understand that Theresa May has committed a huge diplomatic blunder by not distancing herself sufficiently from Donald Trump, the British government needs to demand instant clarification from the new American administration. If our relationship with America is as special as the government claims, it must use its influence to secure safe passage for all British citizens with American visas intending to enter the United States. * Mary Reid is a contributing editor on Lib Dem Voice. She was a councillor in Kingston upon Thames, where she is still very active with the local party, and is the Hon President of Kingston Lib Dems. We're sorry that the ministry you were looking for is no longer available on LightSource.com. However, below are some great ministries that offer related content. Enjoy the inspiration, encouragement, and Biblical challenge from these LightSource.com ministry partners! FAILTE Ireland is looking for a second interchange as past of the new Adare to Foynes road, according local Fine Gael councillor Stephen Keary. And he argues that this interchange could and should be at Croagh. This is encouraging. But until we get to sit down with the executive and the design team, we dont know. I am not going to tell them how to do their job but they should listen to the public representatives, he said. He said he was deeply disappointed that local concerns about being by-passed and the call for an interchange at Croagh were still not being heard. It is two months since we had a special meeting on the issue and where I asked for a meeting between local councillors, the council executive and road design team and there has been no progress on that, he told the Limerick Leader following last week's meeting of Limerick City and County Council where he again raised the issue. At the meeting, director of transport Kieran Lehane told Cllr Keary that the road design team was actively looking at the suggestion for an interchange at Croagh. But Cllr Keary has said he was disappointed and unhappy with this response. I would expect that the executive would engage in dialogue with us, the local public representatives, he said. All six councillors in the Adare Rathkeale Municipal District want an interchange to Croagh. There are four junctions on the design for the 33km route," Cllr Emmett OBrien Ind is on record as saying. We are proposing one extra. We were all absolutely flabbergasted when we realised that Croagh was being by-passed again, a by-pass of a by-pass. What village or town has been subjected to that? declared Cllr Kevin Sheahan FF at a previous meeting. The proposal had been passed to the design team, Mr Lehane assured councillors. It is under active consideration, he said. He was not refusing to convene a meeting, he told Cllr Keary, but felt more work needed to be done first. FOR their personal commitment and substantial contribution to the saving of lives in local waters, the volunteers of Limerick Marine Search and Rescue have been awarded the Limerick Person of the Month award. Joe Morgan, chairman of Limerick Marine Search and Rescue accepted the award this Tuesday on behalf of the hugely respected organisation. It was a huge shock when I got the call last week about the award. We are delighted, commented Joe who has been involved in Limerick Marine Search and Rescue for just over 13 years. Limerick Marine Search and Rescue celebrated its 30th anniversary last year. The organisation, which is based on the Dock Road in Limerick city, currently has 25 volunteers including two female members. Over the Christmas period Limerick Marine Search and Rescue responded to seven call outs, one of which, sadly, resulted in a fatality. Volunteers are mobilised after an initial call goes through to Valentia Coast Guard. When someone rings the emergency number and say there is an issue on the river, it goes to Valentia. Valentia will then task ourselves and Limerick Fire Brigade and the Irish Coast Guard helicopter based in Shannon, depending on what the call is. So we have three assets coming to the river for a rescue, Joe explained. A rescue operation has a very small time window in terms of ensuring a successful outcome. Our main aim is rescue - we aim to get the boats out on the water as fast as possible but if it doesnt result in a rescue we go to recovery mode and we start searching. We have a dive team with 11 divers below as well so they will start diving and doing boat searches normally twice a day in high and low water, said Joe. The divers would be in the water for an hour to an hour and a half. Every search, Joe explains, last for between two to two and a half hours and it can go on for a month, or longer. The visibility changes the whole time - it depends on what is happening at Ardnacrusha. There is normally fairly low visibility and it is freezing, said Joe. Limerick Marine Search and Rescue carry out its own internal debrief after a call-out. Particularly with newer members, we would ring them the next day and we also have counselling available through the Navy if anyone felt that they were having issues - we look out for each other that way. Limerick Marine Search and Rescue cover the water from Ardnacrusha Power Station to Foynes. On a personal level, Joe say, his work within the organisation is very rewarding. Its nice to give something back and its a great unit to be involved in, said Joe who hails from Garryowen and is now living in Raheen. Today I was up in Limerick Senior College doing a talk about search and rescue service and water rescue. We do a lot on the positives of the river. Its great to see people enjoying the river which is a great asset to the city, he added. Joe, a self-employed electrician, is married to Katrina and they have two young daughters Olivia and Julia. TWO men have been charged in connection with the seizure of an estimated 160,000 worth of cannabis plants at a premises in Adare. John Caulfield, aged 58, of Kilknockane, Adare appeared before Limerick District Court on Friday while James Bride, aged 56, of Old House, Moig North Askeaton appeared before a special court sitting on Saturday. On Friday the court was told Caulfield denied growing the plants following his arrest last Wednesday evening. I wasn't growing them; they are not my property, he stated. Caulfield, who faces three charges was granted conditional bail and is due to appear in court again next month In the case of Mr Bride, who also faces three charges, solicitor Ted McCarthy said his client was not seeking bail. He was remanded in custody and is due to appear before the court again this Tuesday via video link from Limerick prison. Around 200 cannabis plants at various stages of growth were discovered when a derelict shed was searched as part of an ongoing operation targeting the sale and supply of drugs in Limerick. The grow house, which is located in a cul-de-sac at Kilknockan, Adare has been examined by technical and forensic experts and the cannabis plants which were at various stages of growth - have been sent for analysis. THE TAOISEACH Enda Kenny should travel to the US on St Patricks day to meet with President Donald Trump, the Minister for Finance Michael Noonan has said, inspite of growing protests and international condemnation following Trumps ban on Muslims entering the States. Speaking to the Limerick Leader this morning, Minister Noonan said: I think the Taoiseach should visit. State visits arent always organised on the basis of friendships, and the Taoiseach will go and have a private conversation with him and give the Irish view on things. Of course he should visit. Hell be highlighting his concerns around a range of issues and hell have a full discussion as he always does when he visit foreign leaders, said Minister Noonan. President Trump's ban on refugees and immigrants from entering the US from seven predominantly Muslim countries has led to mass protests and international condemnation, with protests due at Shannon Airport and the Dublin Embassy this week. Over 28,000 signatures from the Irish public have now been added to an online petition, against the Taoiseach travelling in their name to present the traditional bowl of shamrock in the White House on St Patrick's day. The Minister for Finance has been made aware of the petition and the growing concern amongst the public, but stressed that the visit should go ahead. A protest is also planned for Shannon Airport this coming Thursday, as it is one of two hubs, alongside Dublin, which has US pre-clearance facilities, the only airports in European that have these facilities. Sinn Fein deputy Maurice Quinlivan said he believes that Enda Kenny "seriously consider" his meeting with the US President on St Patrick's day. But other Limerick deputies - particularly those within Fianna Fail - have urged the public to recognise Ireland's dependence on the US for job creation, and particularly the wider economic landscape post-Brexit. "It's deeply concerning what he has done," said deputy Quinlivan. "I was undocumented in the US in the past myself and can only imagine the trauma of what people are going through. "There is no logic to what he is doing. Let's call it what it is - it's racism - and the Taoiseach should seriously consider travelling to the US. What happens in the next few weeks may change his mind. If he does go, he should urge Trump to lift that ban, and address the 50,000 undocumented Irish we have there," he told the Limerick Leader. Speaking from a conference on Brexit, in Leitrim this morning, he said Ireland also has to weigh up its economic position as "we are being squeezed in the middle". Fianna Fail deputy Niall Collins said "we strongly disagree with the policy being adopted by President Trump's administration. Stopping someone from entering the USA on race and religion is unjust and unacceptable. "However, each country decides on its own immigration and security policy. Pre-clearance is carried out by US authorities in Dublin and Shannon and allows both airports to be hubs, easing passage for travellers from Ireland when they arrive in the US. Rejecting this facility would serve only to make travel between Ireland and the US more difficult and would be a premature reaction," he said. "These are very early days for President Trump's administration and it is important that the Government closely monitor its progress. Cutting off diplomatic and political contact would be premature and short sighted," he said. In relation to St Patrick's Day, he said "it is our view that this annual opportunity to engage with the US presidency is of major strategic importance to the country and should be maintained. "Tens of thousands of Irish people are employed by overseas companies in Ireland. Maintaining professional relationships with the Governments of other countries is central to the country's industrial policy. "The upcoming visit to Washington DC should be used as an opportunity to press President Trump on his latest changes to stop people from the seven countries he has listed from entering the USA, and also on the plight of undocumented Irish and to explain in clear terms the mutual advantage to both our countries of the presence of US companies operating in Ireland," he said. Fianna Fail deputy Willie O'Dea said while he disagrees with Trump's policy, he said "Ireland is very economically dependent on the US, and the Taoiseach will have to look at the bigger picture. "It's a difficult decision. While we disagree with what Trump is trying to do in his policy platform generally, we have to bear in mind we could be in a difficult position in time depending on how Brexit plays out." The Social Democrats in Limerick city have also called on the Taoiseach to clearly outline views of the Irish people if his State visit goes ahead in March. Former general election candidate and national executive vice chair, Sarah Jane Hennelly, said a ban on entry to a state on the basis of religion is fundamentally wrong - be it on a political or a human level. There is zero evidence to show that these people pose a heightened threat to the state. We as a community, as a country and as a people cannot stand idly by whilst human rights and basic common decency is undermined in this way." The Shannon Watch group will hold a protest at Shannon Airport this Thursday, February 2, at 6pm. People are urged to bring banners and placards. Minister for Children Katherine Zappone has said that the operation of US immigration pre-clearance at Irish airports must be urgently reviewed, after experts in human rights law warned the application at Irish airports of the US ban on people from seven mainly Muslim countries may be illegal. The online petition is here: https://my.uplift.ie/petitions/shamrock-not-in-my-name?bucket=&source=twitter-share-button A wooden Ushabti figurine stolen from an Aswan storehouse to be returned from London The Egyptian embassy in London received a wooden Ushabti figurine that was stolen in 2013 from an Aswan storehouse and illegally smuggled out of the country. The figurine is to be returned to Egypt soon. Shaaban Abdel Gawad, the head of the antiquities repatriation department at the Ministry of Antiquities, told Ahram Online that the Ushabti was uncovered in 2009 by a Spanish archaeological mission in Qubet Al Hawa necropolis in Aswan and was stored among other artefacts in the storehouses. In 2013, following the departure of the mission, the Aswan storehouse was subjected to looting and the Ushabti figurine was stolen, along with other artefacts. The statuette is 16.5 cm tall and carved in wood with golden decorative elements. In 2016, Abdel Gawad explained, a curator at the British Museum in London noticed the figurine with a British citizen and reported the incident to the antiquities ministry. After diplomatic negotiations, the Ushabti was recovered and handed to the Egyptian embassy in London. Search Keywords: Short link: LIMERICKS pre-eminent Hunt Museum, which has a collection valued at over 70m, has now remained without a director for more than eight months and the vacant position has yet to be advertised. The museums former director, Dr Hugh Maguire, who held the position for six years and six months, since December 2009, vacated the role last May. John Moran, the former Department of Finance secretary general, and chairman of the Hunt Museums board since 2015, confirmed to the Limerick Leader that the position will not be advertised for some time, until a long-term strategic review of the museums operations is completed by its board. Mr Moran, a former investment banker and a director of the European Investment Bank, said the museums revenue sources continue to be a concern, and that it has traditionally been run by a very significant volunteer team and an unpaid part-time board. This museum was run for many years on effectively less cash every year, but now were in a different world. Our plan for the future of the museum is much more ambitious now than it was during the post-crisis years when it was a case of being able to keep the lights on, but it requires considerable and increased support, and not just monetarily. We have had some large bequests, but most of the money coming through is from Government grants and the Department of Arts, he outlined. Mr Moran said he could not determine at this point a salary scale for any prospective candidate, but said: Well pay for the best talent we need to get, because we have to be serious about what we want to do. We cant hire someone for a role now that could be way above them or way below them, depending on what the job specifications are, especially if they have to oversee capital building works, he explained. Naomi ONolan, pictured below with John Shinnors, who has held the position as head of collections and exhibitions for many years, has been appointed acting director in the interim. We would be in a much different position now and over the next four years if Limerick had won the bid to be European Capital of Culture in 2020, but its not necessarily fatal to us because I think it has still put Limerick on a cultural map, which is wasnt on several years ago. A lot of people are looking at Limerick now than have ever looked at Limerick before, and are excited by whats happening here. "There are a lot more people willing to attach their name to Limerick now than was the case maybe 15 years ago, and that makes it easier for us to attract a different type of talent into the city as well. Limericks cultural scene is going through a really exciting period at the moment, he said. He outlined that ideally one third of its funding in future should come from Central Government, and two-thirds should come from fundraising in the region of 500,000 in the Mid-West region. Operational challenges remain and are largely beyond the control of the company and reflect more on the wider economy and the immediate surrounds of the museum premises, state the financial accounts, in reference to the 150m Opera site which is awaiting development across the road. Visitor numbers to the museum were 112,415 for 2016, up several thousand on 2015. Mr Moran said among its challenges is to take away peoples inhibitions and intimidation of coming to a museum, and reach out to the wider community, through its various outreach programmes. The hardest part is to get people to cross the road the first time, because if what you do is done well and its interesting, then they come back. Its our fault that many people dont know theres a Picasso here, for instance, because its our job to plant that in peoples knowledge, he said. The museum which includes works by Pablo Picasso, Pierre Auguste Renoir, Jack B. Yeats, and artefacts from Greece, Rome, Egypt and the Olmec civilisation saw a deficit of 158,575 for the end of December 2015. The annual upkeep of its collection amounts to over 1m, including exhibition costs. Among the challenges facing the museum includes the costs of serious structural issues in repairing the roof, but Mr Moran remained reluctant to outline expected costs as they have yet to go to tender for the works. The museum is also awaiting confirmation from the Department of Arts for an allocation of funding for other capital building works. Among its current exhibitions is a series of oil paintings and works on paper inspired by the West of Ireland by the Limerick-born acclaimed artist Donald Teskey. It has been curated in collaboration with Oliver Sears Gallery, Dublin. It will be on display until February 19. Due to be launched is Faces and Places, an exhibition of by the acclaimed photographer Gerry Andrews. His exhibition will be running from Friday, February 24to Sunday, April 2, in the temporary exhibition gallery. Admission free. On Monday, February 6, from 1-2pm there will be a talk by Tuula Harrington, a goldsmith, jewellery designer and proprietor of Designworks Studio in Cork. On Thursday, February 9, from 1-2pm, there will be a talk by Denis Kenny, maker and lead designer at Ceadogan Rugs, a small enterprise dedicated to the craft of rug-making, pairing the traditional values of remarkable craftsmanship with contemporary design. We and our partners use cookies to Store and/or access information on a device. We and our partners use data for Personalised ads and content, ad and content measurement, audience insights and product development. An example of data being processed may be a unique identifier stored in a cookie. Some of our partners may process your data as a part of their legitimate business interest without asking for consent. To view the purposes they believe they have legitimate interest for, or to object to this data processing use the vendor list link below. The consent submitted will only be used for data processing originating from this website. If you would like to change your settings or withdraw consent at any time, the link to do so is in our privacy policy accessible from our home page. A spokesman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Sunday that Merkel "is convinced that even the necessary, resolute fight against terrorism doesn't justify putting people of a particular origin or particular faith under general suspicion." "We want to make sure that we are not admitting into our country the very threats our soldiers are fighting overseas. We only want to admit those into our country who will support our country and love deeply our people," Trump said in announcing the ban. The president said that only people who support the United States should be allowed into the country. The executive order he signed discussed identification and verification procedures that U.S. consular officers should use in extensive detail. In addition to barring residents of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen from entering the U.S. for 90 days, the Trump executive order put a permanent ban on admission of Syrian refugees and a 120-day ban on all other refugees entering the U.S. International reaction to U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order banning entry to refugees and citizens from seven mostly-Muslim countries has begun. May faces criticism Meanwhile, British Prime Minister Theresa May has been slammed by her fellow politicians for not condemning Trump's ban when she was in Ankara meeting with her Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan. May said in Turkey, "The United States is responsible for the United States' policy on refugees. The United Kingdom is responsible for the United Kingdom's policy on refugees." Back in England, May said that Britain does "not agree" with Trump's ban on Muslims, adding that the approach was "not one we will be taking." British lawmaker Heidi Allen said on social media that "Strong leadership means not being afraid to tell someone powerful when they're wrong... I don't care how special the relationship is - some lines just shouldn't be crossed." Another lawmaker Jeremy Corbyn said, "Theresa May should have stood up for Britain and our values by condemning [Trump's] actions. It should sadden our country that she chose not to... After Trump's hideous actions and May's weak failure to condemn them, it's more important than ever for us to say to refugees seeking a place of safety that they will always be welcome in Britain." Trump is scheduled to visit Britain later this year, but British lawmaker Sarah Wollston said the U.S. leader should not be invited to address Parliament, adding that "those who wish to fawn over him" could do that someplace else. Other World Reactions French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said of Trump's ban, "Welcoming refugees, who flee war and oppression, is part our duty." Ayrault's German counterpart Sigmar Gabriel said, "The United States is a country where Christian traditions have an important meaning. Loving your neighbor is a major Christian value and that includes helping people." Retno Marsudi, the foreign minister of Indonesia, which has the world's largest Muslim population, but was not included in the nations whose citizens face restrictions for entering the United States, told Reuters in a social media message, "We have deep regrets about the policy." Iran on Saturday announced it will bar all U.S. citizens from entering the Islamic republic in retaliation for the curbs on citizens from its country. "Unlike the U.S., our decision is not retroactive. All with valid Iranian visa will be gladly welcomed," Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took to Twitter to express his country's attitude towards refugees. He tweeted, "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength. #Welcome to Canada." The Canadian leader also tweeted a photograph of himself greeting a Syrian child at Toronto's airport. "CERN 'weasel' 2," a stone marten that was electrocuted at CERN in 2016, is the latest addition to the "Dead Animal Tales" exhibit. Deceased animals in a range of compromising poses share cautionary stories of times when wildlife interactions with humans turned deadly for the wildlife in the unusual exhibit "Dead Animal Tales" at the Natural History Museum Rotterdam (NHMR) in the Netherlands. Recently, NHMR welcomed a new addition to the exhibit: a stone marten (Martes foina) that met its end Nov. 20, 2016, after it bumbled its way into a substation at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Geneva, Switzerland. The marten known as "CERN 'weasel' 2" jumped a fence and was instantly electrocuted when it encountered an 18,000-volt transformer. The incident interrupted power to part of CERN's particle accelerator, called the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), NHMR representatives said in a statement. [See Photos of Lake Animals 'Turned to Stone'] Not many exhibits can say they began with homosexual duck necrophilia but this one can. The specimen that launched "Dead Animal Tales" was a mallard that suffered a fatal collision with a window at the museum in 1995. Almost immediately afterward, another mallard approached and began having sex with the dead bird. Exhibit curator and NHMR director Kees Moeliker wrote a study about the highly unusual behavior, which earned him the Ig Nobel Prize an award for thoughtful research that also inspires laughter in 2003. "Thanks to the Ig Nobel Prize that my First-Case-of-Homosexual-Necrophilia-Paper won, the story of that poor bird became widely known and people wanted to see and admire the duck," Moeliker told Live Science in an email. In 2005, after the museum acquired "Domino Sparrow" a bird that was shot and killed after it disrupted a competitive domino event by knocking down 23,000 domino tiles curators had two candidates to inspire a new twist on museum specimens, of which NHMR had 400,000, Moeliker said. Other animals that died under similarly peculiar circumstances were donated over the years, and today, that first dead duck has plenty of company. In fact, "Dead Animal Tales" is one of the museum's most popular exhibits, Moeliker told Live Science. A fate worse than death The exhibit's unlucky inhabitants met their demises in different unpleasant ways. But every specimen represents a circumstance in which some type of human activity shortened its life. [Gallery: Freeze-Dried Pets] "Salty Snack Mouse," a 10-day-old house mouse, was donated to the exhibit in 2012, after it was discovered in a bowl along with the contents of a bag of salty snacks. Such a young mouse would be physically unable to climb into a bowl, so it likely was already in the bag and was poured into the bowl along with the snacks, according to a NHMR statement. The tapering lid of a McDonald's ice-cream container caused the sticky end of "McFlurry Hedgehog" in 2007. The hapless, hungry hedgehog wedged its head inside the cup, looking for leftover ice cream, but its spines prevented it from pulling back out. This unfortunate hedgehog died after trapping its head inside a McFlurry container. (Image credit: Kees Moeliker/Natural History Museum Rotterdam) "Trauma Gull" was a traffic victim, a black-headed gull that expired after a midair head-on collision with a flying trauma helicopter in 2011. The force of the impact knocked a hole in the cockpit, and the pilot was forced to make an emergency landing after securing the hole with duct tape. Singed and charred The latest specimen to join the exhibit, "CERN 'weasel' 2," was so named because it was the second weasel-like mammal to fry itself to death at CERN. The first, a stone marten that short-circuited a transformer in April 2016, shut down the LHC for close to two weeks, CERN officials reported. However, that animal's body was destroyed at CERN before NHMR curators could collect it. They were luckier after the November incident, recovering a female that measured about 2.3 feet (70 centimeters) in length, with scorched whiskers and fur, and charred soles and skin on its legs, NHMR representatives explained in a statement. And the exhibit will likely continue to grow, as Moeliker frequently fields queries from people offering him dead animals, victims of the sometimes lethal collisions between animal and human lives. "Today, I got a phone call from somebody who found a mummified turtle in a wash dryer. Their pet was lost for six years," he told Live Science. The exhibit "Dead Animal Tales" is on permanent display at the Natural History Museum Rotterdam. Original article on Live Science. The largest coal-fired power plant in the West one of the biggest climate polluters in the nation could close later this year, a major symbolic blow to the future of coal as the backbone of America's electric power grid. The owners of Arizona's Navajo Generating Station northeast of the Grand Canyon announced (opens in new tab) in early January that low natural gas prices and the rising costs of generating electricity using coal make it too expensive to operate the plant. A decision on the plant's fate is expected this spring.Coal-fired power plants, once the workhorse of the nation's electricity grid, are the biggest individual climate polluters in the country, and they're falling victim to coal's biggest competitor plentiful, cheap natural gas flooding the country because of fracking. It's a trend all across the nation, even as President Trump tries to begin to make good on his campaign promise to revitalize America's declining coal fields while dismissing the threat they pose to the climate. The Navajo plant may soon be the West's largest victim of the move toward natural gas. It is America's seventh-largest single source of the carbon dioxide emissions driving climate change. Its closure would relieve Arizona of a source of pollution long targeted by federal regulators for contributing to regional haze and poor air quality over the Grand Canyon. RELATED Interior Nominee Zinke Doubles Down on Coal Number of U.S. Coal Mines Falls to Lowest on Record U.S. Coal Production Dropped to 30-Year Low in 2015 The six other largest carbon polluters are coal-fired power plants scattered around the country, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. "The owners' decision to consider its future is based on the changing economics of energy primarily the low cost of natural gas and other resources," said Scott Harelson, spokesman for the Salt River Project, Arizona's primary electric power company and one of the plant's owners. "Coal plants across the West face a variety of issues that their respective owners must face with respect to their ongoing operations that could lead to additional closings." Compared to coal, natural gas pollutes the atmosphere with about half as much carbon dioxide when it is used to generate electricity. Beginning in the middle of the last decade, the fracking boom flooded the U.S. with cheap natural gas, driving prices down to 18-year lows in 2016. Federal mercury pollution regulations are also a factor in coal plant closures because energy companies were required to install special "scrubbers" on their coal-fired power plants costing hundreds of millions of dollars each. "Nobody in this country is building new coal plants because they're too expensive," said Jeremy Richardson, an energy analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists. "As you look into the future, it's cheaper to either shift to an existing natural gas plant where the capacity is available or even in some cases switch to renewable energy." These changing energy economics have felled a flurry of coal-fired power plants across the U.S. since the fracking boom took hold more than a decade ago. Major electric utilities across the country operated 353 coal-fired power plants of various sizes in 2005, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Over the next decade, 97 of those shut down. At the same time, electricity generated using coal declined by 32 percent nationwide, while power generation from natural gas skyrocketed 159 percent. Coal and natural gas each generate about 33 percent of America's electric power, with wind and solar trailing far behind at about 7 percent. In 2016, natural gas surpassed coal as the primary source of electricity for the first time in U.S. history. Renewables, such as wind and solar, have been exploding in growth over the past decade, too, but they're still just a tiny player. In 2015, less than 2 percent of electricity in the U.S. came from wind and solar. The changing economics of electricity and the rise of natural gas are occurring regardless of any climate policy, such as the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan, which was meant cut down on the carbon pollution from most coal-fired power plants. Trump, who has promoted both fracking and coal, has scoffed at the idea of greenhouse gas controls because he and many of his cabinet nominees deny the existence of climate change and have vowed to kill the plan. The nation's largest electric power companies are responding differently to these changing economics. We Energy, an electric power company in Wisconsin, announced in January that it will be shutting down one of its largest coal-fired power plants for six months each year during the spring and fall when demand for electricity and natural gas prices are both low. "Low natural gas prices allow natural gas plants to generate power at lower costs than most coal plants during those months," said We Energy spokesman Brian Manthey. "Lower natural gas prices and environmental regulations have led to the addition of more natural gas-fueled power generation throughout the country. In fact, we recently converted our downtown Milwaukee Valley Power Plant from coal to natural gas." The Tennessee Valley Authority, which is one of the largest electric power providers in the South, has closed three coal-fired power plants since 2011 mainly because of Environmental Protection Agency air pollution regulations, not cheap natural gas. Two more and part of another are expected to shut down through 2018, leaving TVA with six. "Few of these closures are related to coal and gas prices," TVA spokesman Scott Brooks said. "It all relates back to an agreement we reached with EPA in 2011 to evaluate all our coal units that weren't fitted with environmental controls. Gas prices are attractive, but our strategy is toward a diverse portfolio so that we don't rely on one generation source too heavily." Duke Energy, the nation's largest electric utility, shut down 12 coal-fired power plants over the past five years, with another in Asheville, N.C., scheduled to close in 2020. Duke spent more than $9 billion to modernize 40 others across the South and Midwest to help them comply with environmental regulations, spokesman Jeff Brooks said. State-level climate policies are having an effect, too, and are likely to be factors in any decision to shutter the Navajo plant, said Colleen Regan (opens in new tab), head of North America power and environmental markets for Bloomberg New Energy Finance. For example, California's cap-and-trade program prompted Los Angeles' city electric utility to sell its stake in the Navajo plant, Regan said. The program the nation's first caps the amount of climate pollution the state can release and issues pollution permits called allowances to utilities and companies. Allowances are auctioned and traded among polluters. A Nevada electric company's plan to cut its carbon pollution also led it to cut ties to Navajo by 2019, Regan said. "These climate-motivated deals have put an increasingly large onus on Salt River Project," she said, adding that these factors and cheap natural gas are helping to put coal-fired power plants such as Navajo out of business. "This story is playing out across most of the country," Regan said. Though the federal government and independent analysts are projecting a small boost in the use of coal for electricity over the next several years, the long-term outlook for coal is dim. "In the near term, there is a chance coal may rebound as gas finds new markets, pushing gas prices up slightly," Regan said. "But even looking out to 2020, 2025, I don't see much of a comeback, irrespective of the Clean Power Plan." That's true even if Trump administration policy heavily supports both fracking and coal because when it comes to generating electricity, natural gas and coal compete with each other. "Anything that boosts domestic natural gas production will directly, negatively impact coal-fired power plants by reducing their margins as gas prices depress wholesale power prices," Regan said. One of Trump's biggest campaign promises to voters in coal-producing Appalachian states such as West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Kentucky was that he'd "bring back coal" by killing off the Clean Power Plan and other regulations seen as detrimental to the coal industry. But those same states also depend heavily on natural gas production. "It's going to be difficult for Trump to be both pro-natural gas and pro-coal at the same time, unless he intends to directly subsidize coal plants or find other markets for U.S. coal," Regan said. You May Also Like: 100 Days of Climate Exxon's Tillerson Murky on Future of Paris Climate Pact Canada's Vast Source of Climate Pollution May Go Bust Watch Rex Tillerson's Confirmation Hearing Live Originally published on Climate Central. In the summer of 2012, a group of archaeologists turned over a broken block of limestone on the floor of a rock shelter in southwestern France and discovered what could be one of the oldest examples of art in Europe. Scrawled with the image of an aurochs (an extinct species of cattle) and dozens of small dots, the slab was created by the Aurignacians, the first Homo sapiens to arrive in Europe. Radiocarbon tests showed that the engraving dates back to about 38,000 years ago, according to a Jan. 24 report in the journal Quaternary International. New York University anthropologist Randall White, a co-author of the study who led recent excavations at the rock shelter, said that the discovery "sheds new light on regional patterning of art and ornamentation across Europe" at a time when humans were just starting to spread across the continent. [Gallery: Photos of Europe's Oldest Rock Art] The slab comes from a partially collapsed rock shelter called Abri Blanchard, where groups of hunter-gatherers would have congregated during the winter. This 65-foot-long (20 meters) shelter is located near the small town of Sergeac in France's Vezere Valley, a region famous for having some of Europe's oldest examples of cave art. Several other carved slabs were already discovered at Abri Blanchard a century ago, during excavations by amateur archaeologists Louis Didon and Marcel Castanet from 1910 to 1912. Many of the early artistic representations from this region have been interpreted as vulvas, ever since a French abbot was presented with an image of a heart-like engraving from Abri Blanchard and declared in 1911 that it was a "pudendum muliebre" ("a woman's thing to be ashamed of"). But the artists at Abri Blanchard didn't just have an interest in the female form. They chose a diverse array of artistic subjects, from horses and cats to geometric designs such as rings, according to White and his colleagues. Didon's team had nearly emptied the rock shelter in the early 20th century. So when White's team returned to the site in 2011, they dug underneath the previous excavators' old dirt piles into heavily concreted, untouched prehistoric sediments. In addition to the aurochs carving, the researchers found hundreds of stone tools and stone tool fragments, as well as animal bones, mostly from reindeer. They also found decorative bone, including an ivory bead and a pierced fox tooth. White and his colleagues speculate that the carved block was a freestanding slab when it was decorated, meaning that either an Aurignacian found it and brought it into the rock shelter for engraving or the block had fallen from the ceiling and was engraved later on. Aurignacian images of aurochs have been found at other sites, such as Chauvet Cave, also in France. Aligned dots have also been seen before on Aurignacian objects such as mammoth-tooth plaques and ivory pendants, but the combination of this design with an animal figure is "exceptional," the researchers wrote. The discovery of the slab fits into the patterns researchers usually see in the earliest European art: There are broad shared features, with some regional quirks that stand out, White said in a statement. "This pattern fits well with social geography models that see art and personal ornamentation as markers of social identity at regional, group and individual levels," White said. Original article on Live Science. Mittenaere was speechless and put her hands on her face as the outgoing winner from the Philippines, Pia Wurtzbach, crowned her as the crowd erupted in cheers and applause at the packed Mall of Asia Arena by Manila Bay. In her profile, she said she would "advocate for dental and oral hygiene" if she takes home the crown. Iris Mittenaere from the small town of Lille in northern France said in reply to a final question from pageant host Steve Harvey that she would be honored if she just landed among the three finalists, but was visibly stunned when she was announced the winner among the field of 86 contestants. In the final question to the top three finalists, the candidate were asked to cite a failure in their life and explain what they learned from the debacle. "I've failed several times in my life," Mittenaere said without elaborating but added that "when you fail, you have to be elevated and you have to try again and keep going... I have failed before but for me this is the great first opportunity." Miss Haiti, Raquel Pelissier, a 25-year-old survivor of the devastating 2010 earthquake that destroyed her hometown, was named first runner up while Miss Colombia, 23-year-old, Andrea Tovar, was second runner up. "I survived the earthquake," Pelissier said in reply to the same question, citing the quake the Haiti government estimated to have killed more than 300,000 people and displaced more than 1.5 million others. "I felt I was failing myself because I was not living my dreams... But I chose to be a very positive person, and learned a great lesson from it because if I am here today, it is because I am living my dreams." As he closed the ceremony, the American comedian host declared: "This is Steve Harvey, I got it right," referring in jest to his mistaken announcement of Miss Colombia as the winner in the last pageant in Las Vegas more than a year ago that sparked an uproar. Visually compelling artwork by renowned Southwestern-based artist Lahib Jaddo will make its home at Laredo Community College in the Martha Fenstermaker Memorial Visual Arts Gallery, located inside the Visual and Performing Arts Center at the Fort McIntosh Campus. Admission is free and open to students and the public. Born in Baghdad, Iraq, Jaddo's latest exhibit, "Water" explores the identity and cultural imagery of her homeland. The exhibit will include an array of paintings and mixed media pieces that span nearly three decades of her life. Through her work, Jaddo expresses her views on the shifting, evolving ideas of home and its purpose, as told through her perspective as a Middle Eastern diaspora artist. "Whether placed in landscapes of belonging, or negative abstract spaces of isolation, the female figures in my work explore the circumstances of planting roots in a new world, while remaining inextricably connected to another," explained Jaddo. Jaddo, a retired professor of architecture at Texas Tech University, has received several accolades for her art work, including awards at the Lubbock Arts Festival, the Corsicana Annual National Art Competition, and the McNeese National Works on Paper Award, among others. Artwork will be on display until Friday, March 3. Gallery hours are Monday through Thursday from 8:30 to 11:30 a.m. and 1 to 5:30 p.m. and Friday from 8:30 to 11:30 a.m. For more information on the exhibit, contact the LCC Visual Arts Department at 721-5224. The photos are haunting - family members standing in an unattended room or holding a picture of a loved one. Photographer Nuria Lopez Torres is telling the stories of the families of those kidnapped in Mexico through pictures. She's compiled the pictures in an online gallery called "Stolen." Fifty years ago, Texas Ranger Ramiro Ray Martinez helped stop one of the most infamous and deadly mass shooters in U.S. history. Martinez will share his story with Laredo Community College students, faculty, staff and the public during a special presentation on Monday at 6:30 p.m. in the Kazen Student Center. Martinezs place in history was solidified in August 1966 when Charles Whitman, a 25-year-old college student and former Marine, headed up to the top of the University of Texas Tower and began shooting at the people down below. For more than an hour and a half, Whitman terrorized the campus, using his high-powered rifle and other firearms to shoot 43 people, killing 13. It was the first in a deadly history of mass school shootings. Martinez, who was an officer with the Austin Police Department at the time, responded to the scene and raced up to the tower with a fellow police officer to help take down Whitman. Risking life and limb, the pair was able to bring Whitman down before any more people were killed. Martinez eventually left Austin PD to serve 18 years as a Texas Ranger before becoming a justice of the peace. The presentation is free of charge. Currently Reading The best anti-Muslim ban protest signs from around the world Ina Mc Cormack, Loughill, Coolarty , Co Longford passed away on Christmas day 2016. The date was entirely appropriate because Ina was like Santa Claus distributing goods and goodness to a vast array of people, near and far but - on every day of the year. Born in 1931 in Lisnanagh, Ina first attended school in Corboy at the tender age of 3, before finishing her national school education in Edgeworthstown. However , a weak heart prevented her completing her secondary school. But because times were tough, a determined Ina headed to London where she found work as a Nanny. Any extra money was sent home to help her widowed mother. It was at this early age that Ina started helping people in need. When her work in London ended, Ina moved on to Birmingham where she soon was a valued staff member in a chemist shop. Ina married her husband Joe while in Birmingham. They married in the morning and Ina returned at work in the afternoon. Different times, for sure. Having saved diligently, a wool shop was purchased. With her strong work ethic and pleasant personality, the wool shop proved to be a huge success and life was busy. However, in 1983 the family moved back to Ballymahon to care for her uncle Willie. Within a year or so, the ever industrious Ina opened a second hand shop in Ballymahon. Her next move brought her closer to her original roots when Ina bought Brady's shop in Edgeworthstown. In name it was a newsagents and sweet shop but to her growing customer base, it became so much more. It was a social centre before the term was coined. It was open all hours with a warm welcome for young and old. Ina would never see anyone stuck and nothing was too much bother. No one has the perfect life and Ina too too, had her share of sadness and huge challenges. The tragic death of her son in England in a hit and run accident just before his 24th birthday was particularly tough. A daylight robbery in the shop didn't help. Seeing the robbers also make off with her many charity boxes on the counter, she bravely pleaded that they leave them back they flung them at her. She was always proud of the fact that she saved her charity money. In 2006, Ina finally retired and sold her shop in Edgeworthstown. But the big hearted Ina missed the company and being able to help a myriad of different charitable causes. So four years later, the ever determined Ina returned from retirement and opened Ina's Charity Shop on the Granard Road, Edgeworthstown. Though only opened for the second half of the week, it soon became social hub and magnet for both locals and passers by. With Ina sitting beside her turf stove, there was a constant flow of steaming mugs of tea with biscuits for all comers. Some called and purchased an item , many others popped in for a chat and a bit of good humoured banter. You always left feeling better . Ina was truly a remarkable human being. She cared greatly about the most vulnerable in society, regardless of age, creed or nationally. Deeply spiritual, her favourite book was the Bible. But she did so much more than read it, she lived its good news in deed and action. Despite ailing health, Ina soldiered on regardless, always saying that there was so much more to be done for the needy. Complaining wasn't part of Ina's set up. Having spent some time on a hospital trolley, she quipped sure, amn't I grand, God help the poor nurses. An other time, Ina was found , haven fallen outdoors on a cold Christmas Eve, her response was I'm grand, sure I have a good heavy coat on me, just help me get up, please. An avid cards player, Ina was a regular in Cullyfad,Granard, Ballinalee, Ballyleague and Kenagh. If there was any event for charity, Ina would be first to but some tickets. Even when in failing health, Ina attended as many Car Boots Sales as humanly possible. She donated enough to send two children to Lourdes recently because I may not be around to send one next year. When GOAL in Longford was the greatest contributor per capita in Ireland, Ina was Longford's greatest contributor. About three years ago Ina was chosen to be honoured by President Michael D Higgins for her overseas charity work, she very reluctantly accepted. Not for Ina, the limelight. Afterwards, she mentioned that he was a lovely, little, kind man with a beautiful dog and very helpful staff. Animals were also dear to this big hearted lady. Apart from organising fund raisers for the Guide Dogs for the Blind, Ina also adopted any and every stray. While in various hospitals she always worried about her six dogs and seven cats, which she rescued . Her pride and joy, was her old billy goat which she managed to save and get walking again. Ina Mc Cormack was truly a remarkable lady who touched all, fortunate enough to have known her. To know Ina was to be her friend. People were her life. Making life better for other people was Ina's life achievement . Thousands of vulnerable in the developing world have benefited from Ina's incredible generosity. So too have a great amount of people closer to home but known only to themselves and Ina. At her packed funeral service in her beloved Corboy Presbyterian church, on New Year's eve the Minister referred to Ina as a precious gem. Ina is buried with her son, John in England. Sincere sympathy to Ina's sons Neil,Richard, relatives and a wide circle of great, loyal friends. May Ina Mc Cormack rest in peace, perfect peace. Local News, Crime, Health & Wellness, Press Releases By Long Island News & PR Published: January 30 2017 The Nassau County Police Department is currently monitoring a drug outbreak. Call 911 immediately if you know someone who may be using heroin and experiencing an overdose. Nassau County, NY - January 27, 2017 - The Nassau County Police Department is currently monitoring a drug outbreak that is occurring in Atlantic City, N.J. The Atlantic City Police Department released a Public Safety Announcement about a bad batch of heroin on Wednesday January 26, 2017. Approximately 10 suspected heroin overdoses (6 fatal, 4 non fatal) have been reported within Atlantic City over the past week which include six on Wednesday, January 26, 2017 between 4:00 and 10:00 pm. Two of the overdoses on Wednesday were fatal and four were revived with Narcan. Wax fold/bags stamped King of Death were found at two of the scenes on Wednesday and are reportedly responsible for the two deaths. The Nassau County Police Department would like to inform the public and ask that they be aware of the situation. Call 911 immediately if you know someone who may be using heroin and experiencing an overdose. For more information about how you can help a family member or friend regarding addiction you can contact the services listed below: Nassau County Heroin Prevention Task Force New York State Office of Alcohol & Substance Abuse Services (OASAS) 1-877-8-HOPE-NY (1-877-846-7369) Nassau Alliance For Addition Services (NAFAS) 516-481-4000 Local News, National & World News, Community, Charity & Cause, Press Releases By Long Island News & PR Published: January 30 2017 At least 30,000 New Yorkers - including immigrants, refugees, Muslims and allies - gathered to demand that Trump rescind his recent executive orders and end all hateful policies. New York, NY - January 29, 2017 - At least 30,000 New Yorkers - including immigrants, refugees, Muslims and allies - gathered in Battery Park City across from the Statue of Liberty to demand that Trump rescind his recent executive orders and end all hateful policies. Photo by MRNY. They then marched to Foley Square, wearing colorful butterfly wings and signs reading, "no ban, no wall" and "here to stay." The march comes the day after massive protests -- organized by Make the Road New York and the New York Immigration Coalition, among others -- rocked JFK airport and Cadman Plaza, demanding release of refugees who were being held at the airport under Trump's "Muslim ban." Last night, in response to a lawsuit brought by the ACLU on behalf of the refugees who had been held, federal judge Donnelly in Brooklyn issued a stay on Trump's Muslim ban. This means that those who would've been allowed into the US before the ban are, for the time being, not subject to deportation, though they can still be detained and refused entry. More than ten people are still detained at JFK airport . Marchers today demanded their release and an end to this vicious and unjust practice, and called uncompromisingly for justice for all who are impacted by Trump's policies. Protests are spreading across the country. There are actions organized by Make the Road Connecticut and Make the Road New Jersey happening in the next 48 hours, among many others. Elected officials in attendance today included US Representatives Nydia Velazquez, Joe Crowley, Carolyn Maloney, Adriano Espalliat and Jerry Nadler, who were also the very first elected officials to join us at JFK airport yesterday to advocate for the release of the refugees. US Representative Jeffries was also on the scene today, as were Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer, Corey Booker, NYC Comptroller Scott Crowley, NYC Public Advocate Tish James and several NYC councilmembers and NYS elected officials. Javier Valdes, Co-Executive Director of Make the Road New York, said: "Today thousands of people from Make the Road New York's community - including our immigrant members and members of our aliados (allies) network - came together with other New Yorkers to make it crystal clear that we will fight Trump's anti-Muslim and anti-refugee policies every step of the way. The energy is spreading, and protests are occurring across the country. Our sister organizations, Make the Road New Jersey and Make the Road Connecticut are getting ready to take action in their states, as are many, many others. Our message is clear: We will not let Trump separate families and attack our communities." Steve Choi, Executive Director of the New York Immigration Coalition, said: "This weekend, we saw thousands of New Yorkers come out to protect immigrants and refugees in an outpouring of both love and anger at the fear-mongering and hate wrought by President Trump's executive orders. And we're starting to win. Less than 48 hours after the orders were signed, our efforts and those across the country helped stop the order in court - and forced the White House to allow American legal permanent residents from those countries to come back home. This is just the start. We're ready to mobilize this mass movement - immigrants and allies, Muslims and Jews, New Yorkers of all stripes - to show the White House what our New York and our country really stand for: dignity, justice, and inclusion." Donna Lieberman, Executive Director, New York Civil Liberties Union, said: "The United States is not a country that should stand for religious discrimination and for putting the lives of vulnerable children at risk during the greatest refugee crisis since World War II. President Trump's ban on the entry of people from Muslim countries and suspension of the entire U.S. refugee program goes against everything this country represents from the very day it was founded. We are proud of the work of the ACLU in stopping parts of Trump's order and our lawyers for working with those whose loved ones are detained or at risk. With the support of mass protests around the country, we will never stop defending our values and our Constitution." Fahd Ahmed, Executive Director of Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM), said: "We now have confirmations that Customs and Border Protection has been violating the Judge's stay order. Department of Homeland Security issued a statement in clear defiance of the judge's order, and they are putting people on planes back for deportation. At least 5 people were scheduled to be put on a plane for 1:30pm . This isn't a matter of "bad policy", but rather an administration and their aligned forces that are committed to an ideological agenda of white supremacy, xenophobia, Islamophobia, and bigotry." Mohammad Khan, Campaign Manager, MPower Change, said: "This moment calls for us to be consistent and persistent in our outrage and demand that the Administration abide by the constitution and uphold fundamental values of inclusion and respect. MPower Change is committed to a type of organizing that keeps our voices loud and feet in the streets." Jackie Vimo, policy analyst at National Immigration Law Center, said: "We continue to receive reports that agents are threatening to put refugees and others on planes and out of this country. This blatant disregard for a federal order is simply unacceptable. At a minimum, all agents should comply with the order immediately. But the truth is that DHS's messaging continues to instill fear in the community. We should demand nothing less than that the government rescind this heinous executive order. It has caused irreparable harm already, and we will not stop fighting until the government protects the rights of our clients and those like them.The National Immigration Law Center, with our partners, will continue to fight. No Ban. No Wall." Bill Lipton, Working Families Party State Director, said: "The Working Families Party stands side by side with our brothers and sisters who are refugees, Muslims and immigrants. In New York and across the country we will stand up to resist Trump's hate. Yesterday 14 million people watched WFP's livestream of the demonstrations, and our support is growing every day. We will not stop until we win opportunity and equality for all who are in the US, no matter how recently they arrived." Jennifer Friedman, Director of Immigration at The Bronx Defenders, said: "The administration's actions are extreme, dehumanizing, and urgently require a response from all people of conscience in this city and across the nation," said Jennifer Friedman, Director of the Immigration Practice at The Bronx Defenders. "Our presence on the streets makes a difference. We must make clear that we will not tolerate anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant bigotry in our name." Shelby Chestnut, Director of Community Organizing and Public Advocacy at the New York City Anti-Violence Project, said: "The New York City Anti-Violence stands in solidarity w immigrant and Muslim communities around New York City as we move into the second day of protests following Trumps Executive Order banning refugees and Muslims from seven countries entering the US. We know that LGBTQ peoples safety and rights are deeply connected to the safety and rights of all immigrant communities in New York City and we must stand together during this difficult times." Sonia Guinansaca, operations manager at Culture Strike, said: "Artists across the country are demanding the reverse of the executive order. This attack on refugee and Muslim communities impacts our most vulnerable communities and spreads a culture of terror and fear. We urge fellow artists, culture makers and art institutions to continue to put pressure and help end the unjust targeting and separation of families." Amaha Kassa, Executive Director, African Communities Together, said: "The Muslim ban and the refugee freeze are inhumane, unconstitutional disasters. African immigrants and refugees have been hit hard by the executive orders, and we will keep hitting back hard to reverse them." Local News, Crime, National & World News, Press Releases By Long Island News & PR Published: January 30 2017 Nassau County Executive Edward P. Mangano and Acting Police Commissioner Thomas C. Krumpter express their condolences to those impacted in light of the recent attack. If you see something say something. If you hear something say something. Nassau County, NY - January 30, 2017 - Nassau County Executive Edward P. Mangano and Acting Police Commissioner Thomas C. Krumpter express their condolences to the victims, their families and the people of Quebec, Canada in light of the recent attack on a Quebec City, Mosque. Although there are no known imminent threats to Nassau County, police are monitoring these attacks along with federal, state, and local authorities. Nassau County Police are intensifying patrols at all Mosques, other religious institutions and in all areas of mass transit, critical infrastructure, and will increase patrols at significant public events. The public is reminded if they see any suspicious activity to contact 911 immediately. Suspicious social media activity can also be reported through Text-a-Tip via the Nassau County Crime Stoppers app available free for smartphones and tablets. If you see something say something. If you hear something say something. In mid-November of last year, the government of Turkey began an assault on the Islamic State stronghold of Al Bab, Syria. The effort, which was led by fighters from Turkeys Operation Euphrates Shield, eventually stalled. The jihadis have held onto Al Bab, which is located in the northern part of the Aleppo province, for more than two months since. Al Bab has become the latest flashpoint in the Syrian war a complex, multi-sided conflict with various actors converging in the area. Both the US and Russia have bombed Islamic State targets from the air, while Turkey and Bashar al Assads regime have closed in on the ground. The US initially hesitated to provide direct aerial support for Turkeys military operations in and around Al Bab. That changed after the Turks turned to Russia for additional air support. The New York Times described their cooperation as an important evolution in a budding Russian-Turkish partnership. The US-led coalition continues to provide intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance to support its Turkish partners in the fight against ISIL [Islamic State] around al Bab in northwestern Syria, Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, told the press on Jan. 26. Additionally, the coalition continues to conduct deliberate and dynamic strikes against [Islamic State] targets of the vicinity of Al Bab, Davis added. Since the beginning of 2017, coalition warplanes have conducted about 20 strikes in the vicinity of Al Bab, destroying ISIL vehicles, fighting positions, indirect-fire systems, command-and-control nodes and vehicle bombs, the Defense Departments news release reads. According to data released by Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR), two strikes engaged four [Islamic State] tactical units and destroyed a vehicle near Al Bab on Jan. 30. The airstrikes in Al Bab are part of a new American effort to give Turkish-backed fighters air support during the offensive. Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook was asked about American air operations in Al Bab on Jan. 3. He denied that the Americans were bombing Islamic State targets near the town. During a press briefing, Cook said that coalition aircraft had responded to a call for assistance from Turkish-forces that had come under fire. But the Americans didnt carry out a strike specifically. Instead, according to Cook, coalition aircraft provided a visible show of force. Cook added that Turkish fighters and allied Syrian forces are involved in a serious and important fight for the town. The Islamic States propaganda arm, Amaq News Agency, has celebrated the jihadis ability to hold off Turkey in Al Bab thus far. On Jan. 12, Amaq released an infographic (seen above) offering self-reported statistics on the fighting. Amaq claimed that 21 martyrdom operations (suicide attacks) and other tactics had thwarted the Turkish advance up until that point. Amaq has also streamed other content from the battle, including images of Turkish tanks and vehicles that have been allegedly destroyed. Al Bab has long been one of the Islamic States main hubs inside Syria. Abu Muhammad al Adnani, the groups spokesman and senior manager tasked with overseeing plots against the West, was killed in an American airstrike near the town in Aug. 2016. The Islamic State is no longer contending with just Turkish-backed ground forces approaching from the north. In mid-January, Bashar al Assads regime, with Russian air cover, began their own push toward Al Bab, thereby squeezing the jihadis from multiple directions. Syrian regime forces approaching Al Bab from the south Syrian Armed forces and allied militias have captured a number of towns and villages south of Al Bab since beginning their assault. Their offensive has been documented by pro-regime news sources, as well as independent, anti-regime outlets. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported on Jan. 27 that the Syrian regimes assault is led by Suheil al Hassan, the commander of the Tiger Forces. Al Hassans men have reportedly captured villages, a university and various other points on their approach. SOHR described it as a wide military operation by the Assad regime, and pointed out that al Hassan has battled the Islamic States men in Aleppo before, including during clashes at a power plant in the province last year. The so-called caliphates Amaq News Agency has released a number of videos and photos from the fighting. One video, released on Jan. 26, documents a suicide attack on Syrian regime forces using a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (VBIED). According to Amaq, the bombing took place in a village named Madyunah, which is southwest of Al Bab. A screen shot from Amaqs short clip can be seen on the right. Plates of armor were added to the front of the explosives-laden vehicle and also covered its wheels. This is a common tactic used in the Islamic Statess VBIED operations, as it is intended to prevent the vehicle from being disabled by enemy fire before reaching its target. Another video, released on Jan. 27, includes scenes of Islamic State fighters clashing with Syrian regime forces near the same village. Later that day, Amaq posted a video of Syrian regime helicopters dropping barrel bombs in the area. Still other Amaq videos and statements purportedly document battles with Assads loyalists near the town of Khanasir, which is also located in Aleppo province. It remains to be seen if this ad hoc coalition of forces can eject the Islamic State from Al Bab in the coming weeks. Thomas Joscelyn is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Senior Editor for FDD's Long War Journal. Are you a dedicated reader of FDD's Long War Journal? Has our research benefitted you or your team over the years? Support our independent reporting and analysis today by considering a one-time or monthly donation. Thanks for reading! You can make a tax-deductible donation here. Apple has championed the causes of marriage equality and environmental sustainability in recent years, so its employees looked to the companys leadership in the wake of President Donald Trumps executive order on immigration from predominantly Muslim countries. The order, which restricts immigration from seven countries and outright bans refugees from Syria, was handed down late Friday and led to protests in several U.S. cities and at airports where refugees were being detained. Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do, Apple CEO Tim Cook wrote in an email to the companys employees, later published by Re/code. Ive heard from many of you who are deeply concerned about the executive order issued yesterday restricting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. I share your concerns. It is not a policy we support. Cook has met with Trump before, both on his own and as part of a group of tech industry executives, and said Apple has reached out to the White House to explain the negative effect [of the order] on our coworkers and our company. Some have noted that Apple founder Steve Jobs was the son of a Syrian immigrant, and that other world-changing tech companies were founded by or are currently led by first- and second-generation immigrants. Apple hasnt released a public statement on the executive order or its effects. Other tech companies have: Airbnb is offering free housing to refugees, Lyft has pledged $1 million to the American Civil Liberties Union over the next four years, and Uber is setting up a $3 million legal defense fund for drivers affected by the new policy (though the company is facing its own backlash over a decision to turn off surge pricing at New York Citys JFK airport while drivers were protesting). Google is donating $4 million to immigrant aid organizations, such as the ACLU and the UN Refugee Agency. A slew of other tech companies have come out against the executive orderBuzzFeed is rounding up each statement here. Trump is expected to use his pen to gut an issue that is perhaps even more relevant to the tech industry: the H1B visa program. According to Bloomberg, Trumps administration has drafted an executive order that would require companies to hire American first and pay foreign workers higher salaries so they wouldnt undercut American pay. Its unclear how the executive order would change the H1B visa program, which is already capped at 85,000 visas a year and is designed to help companies find overseas talent to fill the shortage of skilled workers in the States. The great Gold Rush Music Festival returns to the township of Waihi, with the first nuggets of gold dropping for the highly anticipated return of the 2023 festival. Thiruvananthapuram: Referring to the protests in several private colleges in Kerala, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said that even hearing the name of some of the colleges is frightening the students. He mentioned the Pampady Nehru College and Mattakkara Toms College but did not mention the Law Academy where students demand the removal of the Principal Dr.Lekshmi Nair. He also said that he and the Education Minister will take part in a meeting next week that includes university vice-chancellors to discuss the problems facing the private colleges. New Delhi: Declassified reports suggest that the RSS tried to create a rift in the Indian Army during the 1950s by instigating an attempt of life on the then Field Marshal K.M Cariappa. There was an attempt on General Cariappas life and six people were convicted in the case. Through Cariappas assassination, the RSS wanted to create a rift in the army between South and North Indians by spreading false information that Cariappa bore ill-will towards the Sikhs. According to records when the Maharashtra Brahmins came under the RSS, the latter dropped the plan. Anupama Parameshwaran, who debuted as Mary in Premam, has landed in gossip columns along with one of her Telugu co-stars, Sharwanand. The Engeyum Eppothum fame Sharwanand and Anupamas latest film Shatamanam Bhavathi released on the same day as the Malayalam film Jomonte Suviseshangal. While the latter film also stars Anupama, critics say that she promoted her Telugu film more on Facebook than the other one. Paparazzi also noted how excited Anupama was when she talked about Sharwanand during a TV interview. To top it all, she had said she is most comfortable with him. And, when asked how she learnt Telugu to dub for her three Telugu films, she said she learnt it from Sharwanand when trying to teach him Malayalam! 7 PHOTOS click for more This story was originally published on April 5th, 2016. I was walking down Carmine Street two summers ago with an iced coffee in my left hand, and my arm, decorated by a small Israeli flag bracelet, was bent towards my mouth. This was in the thick of an especially bloody conflict between Israel and Gaza and an oncoming looker, upon noticing the bracelet, shouted at me, Racist murderer! It was one of few times Ive been the butt of anti-Semitic or anti-Zionist sentiment in New York. I felt violated and misunderstood. In some ways, it proved the power of fashion how what you put on your person will ultimately command what the world chooses to see of you but mostly, I was frustrated. Perhaps by this very power: here was a man whod written a story about who I was in the 5-second flash we intersected, and I remained silent. Following the November attacks in Paris, December attacks in California, January attacks in Turkey, March attacks in Belgium and Pakistan, the violent persecution that is committed daily across the world under the radar of the media machine and now, nearly a year following the original publication date of this story, on the Monday morning after President Donald Trumps Muslim Ban has been put into effect, Im thinking. About that summer day and how I felt and how those on the receiving end of an anti-Islamic bias in America are managing the grim effects of unfounded judgement in an especially tumultuous and unique political climate. Which is where the following stories, from seven Americans sharing their experiences with Islamophobia (and more broadly, being Muslim in America) come in. Today we must demonstrate our kindness, recognize prejudice and with a common interest in mind our safety and our freedom honor the very simple virtue that, above all else, it is our humanity that keeps us alive. Photographed by Krista Anna Lewis. 10 Things I learned From Meetings With Trumps Transition Team I was in Washington, DC, on Inauguration Day. That gave me the opportunity to set up a few meetings with members from Trumps transition team (many of whom read my free weekly letter, Thoughts from the Frontline). During those talks, I gained some insight into what the first 100 days, the first six months, and the first year of the Trump administration might look like. Heres a summary of my impressions. Lets dive in. Everything is planned out in detail If you listen to the media, you might have the impression that the Trump transition team is in complete disarray. But my talks with leaders of the transition team certainly didnt leave me with that impression. They have broken the transition process down into over 30 departments and have created a landing document for each department. The analogy they are using is that this process is like planning an invasion... theyre going to hand the landing document off to the beachhead teams who will then execute the plans. I was briefly allowed to look at (without actually being able to read) the plan for one cabinet-level department. It appeared to be about 100 pages plus of serious detail as to exactly what executive orders would need to be removed and added, what personnel would have to be replaced (both appointees and regular staff), what policies would need to be changed, and so forth. I was told that this level of planning was being done for every department. My impression is that there are a lot of people from various think tanks and others with experience in the presidential transition process who are involved in directing the plan for each department. That level of detailed planning doesnt happen in less than two months. My guess is that some of that thinking has been going on for years, and now it can be implemented. When I asked a key person how much of the overall plan would likely come to fruition, I got a rueful smile and a shrug. If we even get half of this done in the first few years, that will be major reform. There seem to be two general types of agency plans First, there are those where the culture of the department has to be changed, and then are those where the current staff seems to be doing its job, but the culture surrounding the department has to be dealt with. Those are entirely different issues. The first can be handled to some degree by the executive branch, but the latter needs to be dealt with by congressional action. Trumps management style is going to drive the world nutsuntil we get used to it One person who has worked closely with Trump during the transition says it is a lot like the HBO show Entourage and not at all like the British sitcom Yes, Minister. Trump will have people in his entourage competing to give him the pieces of information he needs. In his business organization, he sets the vision and hires people to execute that vision. He then goes back to doing what we have seen him do so well, which is to create the brand and image. He is bringing in people to execute his vision, and hes going to expect them to get it done. He will jump in when he thinks hes needed or when he can add something to the process, but he will mostly be paying attention to his teams performance. One assessment suggests that there is going to be more than the usual amount of personnel turnover in the first six months. The media will be writing about how Trump cant keep people and about all the chaos in the White House and other parts of government. But from Trumps perspective, and given his management style, thats not necessarily bad in terms of his longer-term goal of changing things. We have not had a president with this type of management style in my lifetime. Since its not something that any of us are going to be familiar with, it is going to make some of us uncomfortable until we get used to it (and some people never will). Everyone in the new administration and Congress agrees there is going to be significant tax reform That is where the agreement ends. There is absolutely no consensus on what that tax reform should actually look like. Among members of the US Congress (and others that youd think should know), the universal answer is I have no idea. I will candidly admit that some of the tax ideas Ive been reading about make me nervous. The wrong type of tax reform can do serious damage to the economy. One of the few things that nearly all economists can agree on is that getting the incentive structure correct is critical. I am not sure that some of the people who seem to be in a position to influence the proposals really understand the importance of incentives and the impact they could have on trade and business. Part of the reason the market is up and that optimism levels are up in all the polls is that people have high expectations about the nature and depth of the tax reform well get. Failure to deliver on something that at least comes close to meeting those expectations is going to have a significant negative impact,, not just on the economy but also on the markets. I dont know how long the new administration will have to stand and deliver. Everyone is convinced that Obamacare will be repealedbut no one knows how There are considerable differences in the plans that would replace Obamacare. (I wrote a few ideas about this back in October in "How to Build Healthcare Right.") My guess is that we are going to get substantial relief for small businesses and move towards more significant health savings accounts. There will not be a single mandate for an insurance company to cover all sorts of things. A 55-year-old woman is not going to have to purchase insurance that has prenatal care in it. People will have much more ability to tailor insurance to their own personal needs. This should help a great deal on costs to individuals and businesses, but it doesnt deal with the overall cost of the system. DoddFrank is going to be restructured It is also very likely that the new DOL rule on fiduciaries and ERISA plans will at least be will be postponed... if not significantly changed. On a personal note, there are parts of the DOL fiduciary rules that make sense, and I support them. But it appears to me that DOL was trying to make a one-size-fits-all rule that was just a bridge too far. Trump can withstand more resistance than we think Steve Moore passed on a story to me. He and my friend Larry Kudlow were meeting with Trump, and Trump asked them if they would like to be part of his economic advisory team during the campaign. They looked at each other and back at Mr. Trump and said something to the effect of, You cant use us. We believe in free trade. And Trump then said, But we agree on nearly everything else. Lets agree to disagree on trade and figure out where we can work together. Not many presidents are willing to have that level of disagreement from the outset. That is somewhat comforting to me. I will admit that, having asked a few questions of people who have interacted with Peter Navarro, he still makes me very nervous. The biggest problem will be bureaucracy There is a general understanding on the part of nearly everyone I talked to that the biggest problems are going to be in dealing with the entrenched bureaucracy. It is highly likely that Congress will pass legislation that requires any department making a ruling that could cost over $100 million to get congressional approval for that rule. There are literally thousands of presidential appointees that dont have to be approved by the Senate But the proper procedure is to wait until the cabinet-level officers and senior management are in place so that they can have input on those appointments. If you expect appointees to run a department or agency, you need to give them the people they want. Well see a lot of legislation passed in the first six months Congress has been passing literally hundreds of pieces of legislation, knowing full well they would be vetoed and never see the light of day. Not all of these will be brought back up, as the Republicans were counting on Obama vetoing them. But I think we will see a great deal of legislation passed in the first six months to one year. These are bills that have already been through committee and have enough support to get action. Final thoughts On Monday, some 538 people who are the initial members of the transition beachhead teams will show up in offices all over the country, but mostly in DC. It is going to be quite some time before we begin to see much change and can begin to figure out what that change will actually look like. Im not going to offer my thoughts on the inaugural speeches and events, as my political leanings are really not the focus of Thoughts from the Frontline (subscribe here for free). But in the areas where politics and economics intersectan intersection that seems to be expandingwe may have to revisit the political arena again. Watch my exclusive video about Trump's inauguration (3:16) below and don't forget to subscribe to our Youtube channel for more fresh analysis and insider information. Get a Birds-Eye View of the Economy with John Mauldins Thoughts from the Frontline This wildly popular newsletter by celebrated economic commentator, John Mauldin, is a must-read for informed investors who want to go beyond the mainstream media hype and find out about the trends and traps to watch out for. Join hundreds of thousands of fans worldwide, as John uncovers macroeconomic truths in Thoughts from the Frontline. Get it free in your inbox every Monday. John Mauldin Archive 2005-2019 http://www.MarketOracle.co.uk - The Market Oracle is a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication. Brace Yourself For The Battle Of the Senate Republicans BY GEORGE FRIEDMAN : On Jan. 20, Donald Trump became the 45th president of the United States. For Trump (as with every president before him), all that he said up until that point consisted of promises. But now, the focus must shift... from what he will do, to what he is doing. (Subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, This Week in Geopolitics, and stay informed on the most important geopolitical developments) Presidents dont stop promising, but the promises become more hollow over time if they are not matched by some degree of achievement. The presidents weak position The American presidency is a paradox. It is the most noted position in the world. Observers imbue it with the same level of command held by the world's most powerful country. Thats why everyone is now trying to understand what Trump intends to do. In reality, the American president is one of the weakest institutional leaders in Euro-American civilization. He can do some things unilaterally, particularly in foreign policy, but Congress can block them. He can do some things by executive order, but the Supreme Court can overrule them. He can pass certain programs that require cooperation from states, but the states can refuse to do so. At every step, as the founders intended, his ability to act unilaterally is severely limited. What will Congress do? So now, the most important question is not, what does Trump intend to do but instead, what will Congress do? Both chambers have Republican majorities. Republican control of the House of Representatives is overwhelming. Republican control of the Senate, though, is not. The Senate has 52 Republicans, 46 Democrats, and two independents who are likely to vote with the Democrats. This, in essence, gives the Republicans a four-vote majority. Because the vice president would be the deciding vote in a tie and because he is a Republican, three Republicans would have to switch sides to defeat any legislation. Under the Constitution, senators are not elected to rubber-stamp the president. They represent their states. So this battle will not be between Republicans and Democrats. Nor will it be between both chambers. The real battle will be among Senate Republicans. Three defections make it impossible to pass any proposed legislation. As such, any Republican senator who can position himself as a potential defector will be able to negotiate for the presidents support on a number of issues. The president will either be forced to compromise or risk having the legislation defeated. Trumps approval ratings are key Senators are not free actors. They need to be re-elected. Their decision to oppose a Republican president will depend heavily (if not entirely) on whether the president will help or hurt their re-election bids. And that depends on the presidents approval ratings particularly in the senators home states. According to a Fox News poll taken just before Inauguration Day, 37% of those polled approved of Trumps performance and 54% did not. Therein lies Trumps problem and battleground. President George W. Bush, President Richard Nixon, President Lyndon B. Johnson, and President Harry S. Truman all had approval ratings around 37% toward the end of their terms. This number is normal for a failed or worn-out presidency. I know of no president in the 20th century who began his term this way. Each party historically commands about 40% support among voters. When a president falls below 40%, he is actually losing support from his own party. It is normally hard to come back from that and it usually takes years to get to that low level. This poses a problem for Trumps administration. With these numbers, its possible that more than three Republican senators could decide that rigid support for the president might cost them their political lives. Trumps approval ratings are not likely to fall below 37%. But to be effective, he cant stay at that level. Republican senators will look at Trumps negative ratings in their states and calculate whether supporting his programs might lock 50% of voters against them. Because public support wanes over the course of a presidency (though it sometimes blooms with nostalgia later in his term), it is essential to start a term with as much support as possible. If Trump wants to get his controversial bills passed, he must build his popularity quickly. His staff, particularly the vice president, will be examining every Republican senator who is up for re-election in 2018 to determine how to help sway their states voters. Trumps fear will be that he will alienate his core while failing to make inroads with his enemies. The power of the filibuster The final point to consider is the use of filibusters. This is a deep tradition in the Senate, and it has served as another check on power that the founders would have been proud of. Any senator may filibuster a bill. If a whole party does it, the filibuster can only be stopped by getting 60 votes in favor or by letting the senators go on until they drop. If they act as a party, the Democrats in the Senate would be able to block Trumps entire agenda. Alternatively, Trump would need the support of eight Democrats to get 60 votes to end a filibuster. That isnt likely to happen. The president can achieve some things with an executive order, assuming the Supreme Court doesnt step in. But broader policies like infrastructure development wont get passed without congressional support. The battleground will be within the Republican Party in the Senate. The result will depend on whether Trumps approval ratings increase above 37%. Just holding there wont do it. That number has been Death Valley for other presidencies although this is a unique case since we have no way to benchmark a presidency that starts at this level. Prepare Yourself for Tomorrow with George Friedmans This Week in Geopolitics This riveting weekly newsletter by global-intelligence guru George Friedman gives you an in-depth view of the hidden forces that drive world events and markets. Youll learn that economic trends, social upheaval, stock market cycles, and more are all connected to powerful geopolitical currents that most of us arent even aware of. Get This Week in Geopolitics free in your inbox every Monday. John Mauldin Archive 2005-2019 http://www.MarketOracle.co.uk - The Market Oracle is a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication. The Virginia Capitol stands more than 170 miles from the New College Institute in Martinsville, but the two institutions are becoming closer by the day. A budget amendment the House Appropriations Committee staff drafted at the direction of its chairman would put the state in the middle of a brewing dispute over the future of the institute, formed in 2006 with the hope of providing a higher education option to economically depressed Martinsville and surrounding Henry County. The amendment would offer two blunt options to the New College Institute Foundation, a nonprofit organization that owns the institutes home in the Building on Baldwin: either sell the building, or the state will build a new home for the school. The state already is enmeshed in the long-running debate over how best to invigorate the New College Institute, whose board of directors includes five Republican state legislators, led by its chairman, Sen. Bill Stanley, R-Franklin. My hope is this will encourage all of the groups to get together to find a solution that honors the original intention of New College and will benefit the citizens of the region, Appropriations Chairman Chris Jones, R-Suffolk, said of the amendment proposed by Stanley and Del. Danny Marshall, R-Danville, who is also a member of the institutes board. Stanley and Marshall outlined the amendment on Thursday to the New College board of directors, which convened in a Senate meeting room in the Capitol to discuss the institution and control of the state-of-the-art facility it occupies in downtown Martinsville. On the House side, Marshalls amendment was co-sponsored by two other board members, Del. Charles Poindexter, R-Franklin, and Del. Les Adams, R-Pittsylvania. We do not want to have to use the sledgehammer, Marshall told the board on Thursday. Another legislator on the board, Sen. Emmett Hanger, R-Augusta, sought a more conciliatory approach. His budget amendment would finance a new five-year plan for the institute and direct it to negotiate with the foundation to determine whether state or foundation ownership of the facility is in the best interest of the commonwealth. In an interview on Friday, Hanger called Stanleys proposed amendment a bit confrontational. I dont think we want to put ourselves in an unnecessarily adversarial relationship with other organizations in the community, said Hanger, who is co-chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. Bob Burger, a member of the New College board, had a simple explanation for the legislative push. We just want to buy our building back, he said. Representatives of the NCI Foundation did not return calls requesting comment on Friday. The Building on Baldwin was constructed and equipped with more than $19 million raised by the institutes previous executive director, former Sen. Bill Wampler from Bristol. Wampler retired from the institute in mid-2015. Subsequently, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported he had been paid $450,000 a year to lead the fledgling institution. It was graduating few students from its academic degree programs, but providing worker training in advanced manufacturing and other high-tech trades to help attract industries to the impoverished region. Wampler had cobbled together funds from what is now called the Tobacco Region Revitalization Commission, on which he had served. They included federal grants, donated city land in a previously neglected downtown neighborhood and $8 million from The Harvest Foundation, a nonprofit philanthropy that enabled the creation of the institute with a $50 million challenge grant more than a decade ago. Harvest doesnt share in ownership of the building or have a position on who should. But the foundation is poised to end the challenge grant, with about $26 million unspent, because of concern about the institutes lack of commitment to the academic degree programs it was created to deliver. Weve not seen where they are working to get degrees to people in the region, said Allyson Rothrock, Harvests executive director. The Harvest board of directors voted in September to end the challenge grant on Jan. 31, this Tuesday, unless the institute either established itself as a four-year institution or affiliated with one, such as Longwood University in Farmville. Longwood has expressed interest in incorporating New College, a move backed by the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia . Rothrock said the Harvest board is open to funding future requests from New College, but does not want to maintain an open-ended commitment to the institute. The original funding for $50 million is off the table, she said. If we kept it on, that would be unconditional funding. Stanleys amendment would allow the institutes board to reach contracts with colleges and universities that lead to degrees, certificates or credentials that maximize meeting the needs of the citizens of the region. New College would provide what he and Marshall call Plus Two, or the final two years of a four-year degree for students who already had received two-year associate degrees from local community colleges, as well as credentials and certifications in trades sought by industry. It specifically would allow the institute to contract with George Mason University and Old Dominion University to provide New College students to have online access to their programs. The commonwealth does not need another four-year college, period, House committee chairman Jones said. What we need is more collaboration. The executive order filed this weekend by President Trump raised strong opinions from people on all sides of the political spectrum. To help everyone understand it, here's the document in its entirety: By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and laws of the United States of America, including the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), 8 U.S.C. 1101 et seq., and section 301 of title 3, United States Code, and to protect the American people from terrorist attacks by foreign nationals admitted to the United States, it is hereby ordered as follows: Section 1. Purpose. The visa-issuance process plays a crucial role in detecting individuals with terrorist ties and stopping them from entering the United States. Perhaps in no instance was that more apparent than the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, when State Department policy prevented consular officers from properly scrutinizing the visa applications of several of the 19 foreign nationals who went on to murder nearly 3,000 Americans. And while the visa-issuance process was reviewed and amended after the September 11 attacks to better detect would-be terrorists from receiving visas, these measures did not stop attacks by foreign nationals who were admitted to the United States. Numerous foreign-born individuals have been convicted or implicated in terrorism-related crimes since September 11, 2001, including foreign nationals who entered the United States after receiving visitor, student, or employment visas, or who entered through the United States refugee resettlement program. Deteriorating conditions in certain countries due to war, strife, disaster, and civil unrest increase the likelihood that terrorists will use any means possible to enter the United States. The United States must be vigilant during the visa-issuance process to ensure that those approved for admission do not intend to harm Americans and that they have no ties to terrorism. In order to protect Americans, the United States must ensure that those admitted to this country do not bear hostile attitudes toward it and its founding principles. The United States cannot, and should not, admit those who do not support the Constitution, or those who would place violent ideologies over American law. In addition, the United States should not admit those who engage in acts of bigotry or hatred (including "honor" killings, other forms of violence against women, or the persecution of those who practice religions different from their own) or those who would oppress Americans of any race, gender, or sexual orientation. Sec. 2. Policy. It is the policy of the United States to protect its citizens from foreign nationals who intend to commit terrorist attacks in the United States; and to prevent the admission of foreign nationals who intend to exploit United States immigration laws for malevolent purposes. Sec. 3. Suspension of Issuance of Visas and Other Immigration Benefits to Nationals of Countries of Particular Concern. (a) The Secretary of Homeland Security, in consultation with the Secretary of State and the Director of National Intelligence, shall immediately conduct a review to determine the information needed from any country to adjudicate any visa, admission, or other benefit under the INA (adjudications) in order to determine that the individual seeking the benefit is who the individual claims to be and is not a security or public-safety threat. (b) The Secretary of Homeland Security, in consultation with the Secretary of State and the Director of National Intelligence, shall submit to the President a report on the results of the review described in subsection (a) of this section, including the Secretary of Homeland Security's determination of the information needed for adjudications and a list of countries that do not provide adequate information, within 30 days of the date of this order. The Secretary of Homeland Security shall provide a copy of the report to the Secretary of State and the Director of National Intelligence. (c) To temporarily reduce investigative burdens on relevant agencies during the review period described in subsection (a) of this section, to ensure the proper review and maximum utilization of available resources for the screening of foreign nationals, and to ensure that adequate standards are established to prevent infiltration by foreign terrorists or criminals, pursuant to section 212(f) of the INA, 8 U.S.C. 1182(f), I hereby proclaim that the immigrant and nonimmigrant entry into the United States of aliens from countries referred to in section 217(a)(12) of the INA, 8 U.S.C. 1187(a)(12), would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, and I hereby suspend entry into the United States, as immigrants and nonimmigrants, of such persons for 90 days from the date of this order (excluding those foreign nationals traveling on diplomatic visas, North Atlantic Treaty Organization visas, C-2 visas for travel to the United Nations, and G-1, G-2, G-3, and G-4 visas). (d) Immediately upon receipt of the report described in subsection (b) of this section regarding the information needed for adjudications, the Secretary of State shall request all foreign governments that do not supply such information to start providing such information regarding their nationals within 60 days of notification. (e) After the 60-day period described in subsection (d) of this section expires, the Secretary of Homeland Security, in consultation with the Secretary of State, shall submit to the President a list of countries recommended for inclusion on a Presidential proclamation that would prohibit the entry of foreign nationals (excluding those foreign nationals traveling on diplomatic visas, North Atlantic Treaty Organization visas, C-2 visas for travel to the United Nations, and G-1, G-2, G-3, and G-4 visas) from countries that do not provide the information requested pursuant to subsection (d) of this section until compliance occurs. (f) At any point after submitting the list described in subsection (e) of this section, the Secretary of State or the Secretary of Homeland Security may submit to the President the names of any additional countries recommended for similar treatment. (g) Notwithstanding a suspension pursuant to subsection (c) of this section or pursuant to a Presidential proclamation described in subsection (e) of this section, the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security may, on a case-by-case basis, and when in the national interest, issue visas or other immigration benefits to nationals of countries for which visas and benefits are otherwise blocked. (h) The Secretaries of State and Homeland Security shall submit to the President a joint report on the progress in implementing this order within 30 days of the date of this order, a second report within 60 days of the date of this order, a third report within 90 days of the date of this order, and a fourth report within 120 days of the date of this order. Sec. 4. Implementing Uniform Screening Standards for All Immigration Programs. (a) The Secretary of State, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Director of National Intelligence, and the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation shall implement a program, as part of the adjudication process for immigration benefits, to identify individuals seeking to enter the United States on a fraudulent basis with the intent to cause harm, or who are at risk of causing harm subsequent to their admission. This program will include the development of a uniform screening standard and procedure, such as in-person interviews; a database of identity documents proffered by applicants to ensure that duplicate documents are not used by multiple applicants; amended application forms that include questions aimed at identifying fraudulent answers and malicious intent; a mechanism to ensure that the applicant is who the applicant claims to be; a process to evaluate the applicant's likelihood of becoming a positively contributing member of society and the applicant's ability to make contributions to the national interest; and a mechanism to assess whether or not the applicant has the intent to commit criminal or terrorist acts after entering the United States. (b) The Secretary of Homeland Security, in conjunction with the Secretary of State, the Director of National Intelligence, and the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, shall submit to the President an initial report on the progress of this directive within 60 days of the date of this order, a second report within 100 days of the date of this order, and a third report within 200 days of the date of this order. Sec. 5. Realignment of the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program for Fiscal Year 2017. (a) The Secretary of State shall suspend the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) for 120 days. During the 120-day period, the Secretary of State, in conjunction with the Secretary of Homeland Security and in consultation with the Director of National Intelligence, shall review the USRAP application and adjudication process to determine what additional procedures should be taken to ensure that those approved for refugee admission do not pose a threat to the security and welfare of the United States, and shall implement such additional procedures. Refugee applicants who are already in the USRAP process may be admitted upon the initiation and completion of these revised procedures. Upon the date that is 120 days after the date of this order, the Secretary of State shall resume USRAP admissions only for nationals of countries for which the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Homeland Security, and the Director of National Intelligence have jointly determined that such additional procedures are adequate to ensure the security and welfare of the United States. (b) Upon the resumption of USRAP admissions, the Secretary of State, in consultation with the Secretary of Homeland Security, is further directed to make changes, to the extent permitted by law, to prioritize refugee claims made by individuals on the basis of religious-based persecution, provided that the religion of the individual is a minority religion in the individual's country of nationality. Where necessary and appropriate, the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security shall recommend legislation to the President that would assist with such prioritization. (c) Pursuant to section 212(f) of the INA, 8 U.S.C. 1182(f), I hereby proclaim that the entry of nationals of Syria as refugees is detrimental to the interests of the United States and thus suspend any such entry until such time as I have determined that sufficient changes have been made to the USRAP to ensure that admission of Syrian refugees is consistent with the national interest. (d) Pursuant to section 212(f) of the INA, 8 U.S.C. 1182(f), I hereby proclaim that the entry of more than 50,000 refugees in fiscal year 2017 would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, and thus suspend any such entry until such time as I determine that additional admissions would be in the national interest. (e) Notwithstanding the temporary suspension imposed pursuant to subsection (a) of this section, the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security may jointly determine to admit individuals to the United States as refugees on a case-by-case basis, in their discretion, but only so long as they determine that the admission of such individuals as refugees is in the national interest -- including when the person is a religious minority in his country of nationality facing religious persecution, when admitting the person would enable the United States to conform its conduct to a preexisting international agreement, or when the person is already in transit and denying admission would cause undue hardship -- and it would not pose a risk to the security or welfare of the United States. (f) The Secretary of State shall submit to the President an initial report on the progress of the directive in subsection (b) of this section regarding prioritization of claims made by individuals on the basis of religious-based persecution within 100 days of the date of this order and shall submit a second report within 200 days of the date of this order. (g) It is the policy of the executive branch that, to the extent permitted by law and as practicable, State and local jurisdictions be granted a role in the process of determining the placement or settlement in their jurisdictions of aliens eligible to be admitted to the United States as refugees. To that end, the Secretary of Homeland Security shall examine existing law to determine the extent to which, consistent with applicable law, State and local jurisdictions may have greater involvement in the process of determining the placement or resettlement of refugees in their jurisdictions, and shall devise a proposal to lawfully promote such involvement. Sec. 6. Rescission of Exercise of Authority Relating to the Terrorism Grounds of Inadmissibility. The Secretaries of State and Homeland Security shall, in consultation with the Attorney General, consider rescinding the exercises of authority in section 212 of the INA, 8 U.S.C. 1182, relating to the terrorism grounds of inadmissibility, as well as any related implementing memoranda. Sec. 7. Expedited Completion of the Biometric Entry-Exit Tracking System. (a) The Secretary of Homeland Security shall expedite the completion and implementation of a biometric entry-exit tracking system for all travelers to the United States, as recommended by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States. (b) The Secretary of Homeland Security shall submit to the President periodic reports on the progress of the directive contained in subsection (a) of this section. The initial report shall be submitted within 100 days of the date of this order, a second report shall be submitted within 200 days of the date of this order, and a third report shall be submitted within 365 days of the date of this order. Further, the Secretary shall submit a report every 180 days thereafter until the system is fully deployed and operational. Sec. 8. Visa Interview Security. (a) The Secretary of State shall immediately suspend the Visa Interview Waiver Program and ensure compliance with section 222 of the INA, 8 U.S.C. 1222, which requires that all individuals seeking a nonimmigrant visa undergo an in-person interview, subject to specific statutory exceptions. (b) To the extent permitted by law and subject to the availability of appropriations, the Secretary of State shall immediately expand the Consular Fellows Program, including by substantially increasing the number of Fellows, lengthening or making permanent the period of service, and making language training at the Foreign Service Institute available to Fellows for assignment to posts outside of their area of core linguistic ability, to ensure that non-immigrant visa-interview wait times are not unduly affected. Sec. 9. Visa Validity Reciprocity. The Secretary of State shall review all nonimmigrant visa reciprocity agreements to ensure that they are, with respect to each visa classification, truly reciprocal insofar as practicable with respect to validity period and fees, as required by sections 221(c) and 281 of the INA, 8 U.S.C. 1201(c) and 1351, and other treatment. If a country does not treat United States nationals seeking nonimmigrant visas in a reciprocal manner, the Secretary of State shall adjust the visa validity period, fee schedule, or other treatment to match the treatment of United States nationals by the foreign country, to the extent practicable. Sec. 10. Transparency and Data Collection. (a) To be more transparent with the American people, and to more effectively implement policies and practices that serve the national interest, the Secretary of Homeland Security, in consultation with the Attorney General, shall, consistent with applicable law and national security, collect and make publicly available within 180 days, and every 180 days thereafter: (i) information regarding the number of foreign nationals in the United States who have been charged with terrorism-related offenses while in the United States; convicted of terrorism-related offenses while in the United States; or removed from the United States based on terrorism-related activity, affiliation, or material support to a terrorism-related organization, or any other national security reasons since the date of this order or the last reporting period, whichever is later; (ii) information regarding the number of foreign nationals in the United States who have been radicalized after entry into the United States and engaged in terrorism-related acts, or who have provided material support to terrorism-related organizations in countries that pose a threat to the United States, since the date of this order or the last reporting period, whichever is later; and (iii) information regarding the number and types of acts of gender-based violence against women, including honor killings, in the United States by foreign nationals, since the date of this order or the last reporting period, whichever is later; and (iv) any other information relevant to public safety and security as determined by the Secretary of Homeland Security and the Attorney General, including information on the immigration status of foreign nationals charged with major offenses. (b) The Secretary of State shall, within one year of the date of this order, provide a report on the estimated long-term costs of the USRAP at the Federal, State, and local levels. Sec. 11. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect: (i) the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency, or the head thereof; or (ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals. (b) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations. (c) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person. DONALD J. TRUMP THE WHITE HOUSE, January 27, 2017 Best Of Mass judges Alex Parnicky, Michelle Williams and Shaina Mishkin finished wings judging with visits to five Eastern Massachusetts restaurants: Buff's Pub in Newton, Wendell's Pub in Norton, DJ's Famous Wings in Falmouth, the Rose Alley Ale House in New Bedford and Wicked Wing Co. in Worcester. These five Eastern Mass. eateries were nominated by readers and voted into the Top 10. At every stop, judges tried wings without sauce, buffalo wings and a specialty wing flavor suggested by the restaurant. Here's a look at each stop, including a tour of the restaurant and live tastings: Buff's Pub, Newton Wings tried: Medium buffalo Honey Hot Wendell's Pub, Norton Wings tried: Classic buffalo Medium buffalo DJ's Famous Wings, Falmouth Wings tried: Medium buffalo Garlic Parmesan Rose Alley Ale House, New Bedford Wings tried: Medium buffalo Garlic and herb Wicked Wing Co., Worcester Wings tried: Ghost Pepper buffalo Maple Bacon Barbecue Follow MassLive.com on Facebook for live videos, and check back for the results on Tuesday. Slow. In today's fast-paced world, this four-letter word can seem almost like an affront to everyone in a rush. And yet, the desire to slow down, to take our time seems stronger than ever. Slow TV has become a phenomenon in Norway, a cellphone-obsessed culture that made single-camera footage of an 8-hour train ride or week-long cruise up the country's coastline must-watch television. Nothing beats slow reading if you really want to understand an author's intentions. Same goes for slowly walking through a new city or the countryside, so you can truly experience everything around you. And like many people, I love just sitting and watching the sun slowly set, especially if it involves the sun disappearing into the water and there's a drink of some kind in one hand. And then there's the slow food movement. Instead of processed food and instant-microwave meals, fresh food prepared at a snail's pace has caught on around the world. For some, it's taking a few hours instead of few minutes to prepare meals from scratch. For others, it's foraging for their own food or growing their own ingredients. Then there's people like my wife, who seem to love recipes that take all day or several days to prepare. For years, I've been treated to ribs, pork and other meats slow cooked in our meat smoker for 8 hours or longer in our back yard, followed by a day of rest so the meat can really soak up the flavors. One of the wines positioned near the guest of honor - homemade cassoulet. Then recently, my wife and a friend went one step further. They made cassoulet. I had never heard of this dish before I met my wife. That's probably because I can't even imagine making something that takes several days to prepare. Cassoulet contains special white beans you can only find in France (or special order from California) and several kinds of slow-cooked meats, including duck, pork and several kinds of sausage. Since this dish takes so long to make, my wife rarely makes it. The last time she did so was seven years ago. This was my first time trying cassoulet. And let me say I understand what the fuss is all about. It's a popular dish in southwest France. So I figured why not serve red wines worthy of such a hearty dish from the same region. I went to two stores and found 6 different wines from southwest France. They ranged in price from $9 to $18. And let me add that all six of the wines - and the cassoulet - were absolutely delicious. The six wines are: 2014 Dom Brunet Malbec ($8.99 at Table & Vine in West Springfield) 2014 Vino San Estaben Malbec Reserve ($9.99 at Table & Vine) 2014 Gouleyant Cahors Malbec ($11.99 at Table & Vine) 2014 Chateau Le Payral Merlot Cabernet Bergerac ($13.99 at Provisions in Northampton) 2012 Chateau Armandiere Malbec Ancestral Cahors ($17.99 at Provisions) 2010 Chateau Peyros Vieilles Vignes Madiran ($17.99 at Provisions) WHERE IS SOUTHWEST FRANCE? Opinions sometimes differ on the exact location of southwest France. But in general, southwest France consists of the following regions in this part of the country: France's Atlantic Ocean coast south of Bordeaux to the Spanish border. Aquitaine Dordogne Midi Pyrenees WINE REGIONS IN SOUTHWEST FRANCE Here again, opinions sometimes differ on exactly which wine regions are located in southwest France. Most people agree that southwestern France's wine regions begin south of Bordeaux and, often, west of the Langedoc region. Based on this description, southwest France's wine regions include: Bearn Bergerac Cahors Fronton Irouleguy Jurancon Madiran Saint Mont Sud-Ouest COMMON GRAPES IN SOUTHWEST FRANCE The Malbec grape has long been synonymous with southwest France, especially the Cahors region. But many other red wines are made with many other grapes in southwest France, including: Cabernet Sauvignon Gamay Merlot Tannat TASTING NOTES 2014 Dom Brunet Malbec REGION: Cahors GRAPE: Malbec NOTES: This generic-looking wine has long been one of my favorite low-cost wines. I first wrote about this wine three years ago and it was one of my top 5 wines under $10 for 2014. This time around, the latest vintage of this wine tasted just as rich and robust. Paired with the cassoulet, the wine had a full, plum-like taste. One of the great things about this wine is it tastes great straight out of the bottle. So if you're serving cassoulet or another hearty dish, you don't have to worry about your food getting cold while you enjoy this wine. 2014 Vino San Estaben Malbec Reserve REGION: Cotes du Lot GRAPE: Malbec NOTES: One of the great things about tasting several wines made with the same grape side by side is you get the see the versatility of the grape. In the case of this tasting, anyone who thinks all Malbecs are big and bold simply needs to taste this wine. The 2014 Vino San Estaben Malbec Reserve had a smooth, velvety taste I would normally associate with a Cabernet Sauvignon-based wine from southern France or Bordeaux. However, like many Malbecs, I also noticed a subtle hint of cherries, blackberries and dark chocolate in the aftertaste. A really nice, easy-drinking wine. 2014 Gouleyant Cahors Malbec REGION: Cahors GRAPE: Malbec NOTES: Like the Dom Brunet, the 2014 Gouleyant Cahors Malbec tasted great right from the start. Compared to the Dom Brunet and the Vino San Estaben, this wine fell somewhere in between on the full and smoothness scale. Let me add that this full, hearty wine was one of the first ones finished among the six wines served to a group of friends with the cassoulet. I find that's often a good indication of which wines are the best wines - which one disappears the quickest. Highly recommend this affordable, complex wine. 2014 Chateau Le Payral Merlot Cabernet Bergerac REGION: Bergerac GRAPE: Merlot, Cabernet Franc NOTES: I wrote about a different vintage of this delicious, easy-drinking wine two years ago. At the time, I wrote that this wine had "a slight hint of raisins at first. But that taste quickly gives way to a long, smooth aftertaste." This time, I didn't detect any hint of raisins in the 2014 vintage. Instead, this smooth, velvety wine had more of a blackberry taste that paired perfectly with the cassoulet. I was actually surprised the wine held up so well against the other wines and the hearty food since it's not as big or bold as some of the other wines reviewed this week. 2012 Chateau Armandiere Malbec Ancestral Cahors REGION: Cahors GRAPE: Malbec NOTES: If I had to pick one Malbec wine from Cahors among the ones reviewed here, this one would narrowly be my favorite. Flinty at first, this dry, red wine needed time to fully open up. But once it did, the wine tasted absolutely terrific. This wine has an almost smokey, woodsy flavor. I also noticed hints of dried blackberries and dark chocolate. The long, full aftertaste pairs perfectly with hearty food like cassoulet and, I would suspect, steak and other red meats. Will know for sure next time I have this interesting wine with another hearty meal. 2010 Chateau Peyros Vieilles Vignes Madiran REGION: Madiran GRAPE: Tannat, Cabernet Franc NOTES: Of all the wines reviewed here, if I had to pick just one to have with cassoulet - or frankly even on its own - this would definitely be my first choice for several reasons. First, it's so hard to find wines made with Tannat grapes in this country. I first tasted Tannat-based wines several years ago in Uruguay and rarely see them in the United States.. Second, I've never had a Tannat-blend wine before. Third, this wine simply tastes great. The wine had a slight bite at first and needed time to breathe. But like many interesting wines, this one tasted terrific once it had enough time for all its flavors to fully emerge. This dense, delicious wine smoothed out about 30 minutes after I opened the bottle. Once the sharp edge disappeared, you could taste hints of plums, roasted almonds and what seemed like roasted coffee. A fun wine from a lesser-known wine region I'm eager to learn more about. Cheers! Wine Press by Ken Ross appears on Masslive.com every Monday and in The Republican's weekend section every Thursday. Thousands decried Donald Trump's executive order banning refugees from predominantly Muslim countries during a Sunday afternoon rally at Copley Square. "President Trump's order had nothing to do with security," Sen. Elizabeth Warren shouted to the electrified crowd. "We will not turn our backs on refugees and immigrants." Warren recalled a trip she took to Lesbos, where she encountered a 7-year-old girl fleeing ISIS on her own. "President Trump is trying to close the door on little girls like her and we are here to fight back. Warren was one of a handful of speakers to denounce the executive action Trump signed on Friday. "The uncertainty that we feel, I think, is something that is really going to cause us to question our identity as human beings," said Francesco Logozzo, 21, a Boston University student. Logozzo, who studies music, sang "America the Beautiful" into a megaphone. "People who suffer from injustice every day knew it wasn't over," he said. The executive order "flies in the face of historical precedent," Logozzo added. The crowd chanted, "No hate, not fear, refugees are welcome here" and "Shame on Trump" during the demonstration. Signs demanding no wall and rainbow flags popped up from the crowd. "Shame on Trump" chant emerging from crowd at Copley Square. #Boston pic.twitter.com/KZivh1k1Hv Melissa Hanson (@Melissa__Hanson) January 29, 2017 Chants are super loud here at Copley in Boston. pic.twitter.com/FnaH4iK6ZT Melissa Hanson (@Melissa__Hanson) January 29, 2017 The crowd began gathering before 1 p.m. and grew as elected officials and members of the ACLU and CAIR asked the group to "stand up, fight back." A group of students from Brown University took the train to Boston from providence "We're here to show everyone that the actions of a few people in the administration doesn't reflect the actions of an entire nation," Zahra Asghar said. "We are America, we are the majority and we stand with all the refugees, all the Muslim people of all religions, all minorities." Allison Meakem said she had just gotten out of class on Friday when she turned on CNN in her dorm and watched live as Trump signed the order. "I was watching it in disbelief," Meakem said. "I knew it was coming, unfortunately, but to actually see it materialize was shocking and to see the immediate aftermath of people at airports being stopped and not being allowed in, I think that truly made it real." She said it was a wake-up call. "We need to show them it's hypocritical," Sumaiya Sayeed said. "This country is built off immigrants." MONTVILLE, Conn. Connecticut State Police are investigating an officer-involved shooting Sunday that took the life of an unidentified man. WFSB-TV reported that police said the shooting took place at the Chesterfield Lodge motel on Grassy Hill Road, also known as Rt-85, in Montville. Police were summoned to the motel with the report of a disturbance at about 2:30 p.m. Authorities are not releasing details of the shooting only to say that a Montville police officer was involved and that the victim was taken to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead. State Police investigators say they have not been able to positively identify the victim. A Montville police officer was also transported to the hospital with a non-gunshot related injury. Police said the there is no threat to the public. The State Police Major crime unit is in charge of the investigation. SPRINGFIELD -- Police said they arrested a 47-year-old Enfield man Saturday night after he intentionally rammed two police cruisers, injuring two officers. Capt. Brian Keenan told Western Mass News the two officers were treated at a hospital and released. Police arrested the suspect, identified as George Dobitsky, and charged him a number of charges, including seven counts of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, Keenan said. The incident began Saturday night when police spotted the suspect driving erratically in the area of School and High streets and attempted to pull him over. The driver didn't stop and drove into Connecticut, Western Mass News reported. Some time later, at about 9:30 p.m., police spotted the suspect again on School Street. When officers blocked the suspect in - with one cruiser to the side of his vehicle and another behind it - he repeatedly rammed the cruisers, police said. Dobitsky is being held in lieu of $15,000 bail and is slated to be arraigned today in District Court. Western Mass News is television partner to The Republican and MassLive.com. WINDSOR LOCKS, Conn. - Several hundred people protested at Bradley International Airport on Sunday in response to President Donald Trump's temporary refugee ban and immigration restrictions. Over the weekend, protesters in cities from Boston to Los Angeles denounced the executive order that temporarily halted all refugee arrivals and banned immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, stranding entire families and creating chaos in airports. Civil rights attorneys sued on behalf of several detainees, and a federal judge, ruling in favor of the ACLU, blocked officials from deporting anyone with a valid visa. The protest at Bradley was organized by the Council of American-Islamic Relations of Connecticut. Protesters at one point filled the baggage area, waving signs and chanting "No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here." Jennai Williams of Meriden said Trump's policies amount to "a religious litmus test." She said she's not afraid of terrorists sneaking into the country disguised as refugees. "It projects the wrong image of our country, and of Christians. It projects an image that we are a nation built upon fear," said Williams. "Those things, I believe, are going to cause people to hate us and to mobilize against us." Organizers were encouraged by the high turnout. "We thought that this executive order was discriminatory, was racist, and we felt that we had to come out and join our fellow Americans in protesting it," said CAIR-CT Chairman Farhan Memon, according to NBC Connecticut. "We are stronger as a country because of immigrants from around the world." David McGuire, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut, said attorneys are standing by to help anyone detained at Bradley, but so far, they are not aware of any cases, the Hartford Courant reports. Gov. Dannel Malloy, a Democrat, called Trump's move a "grave injustice." "This executive order conflicts with rights guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States, and it must be contested in our courts," Malloy said in a statement. One protester at Bradley, a black woman who grew up during the Civil Rights era, said Trump's policies are racist. "I feel like my aunts in the sixties," said the protester, who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution. "My grandbaby looks like she could be from any of those countries." Related Photos: Former President Barack Obama released a statement Monday supporting ongoing demonstrations across the country, in the wake of mass protests against President Donald Trump's order banning entry to the United States from seven Muslim-majority countries and suspending refugee admissions. "Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake," Obama spokesman Kevin Lewis said in the statement. Politico reports that it is Obama's first public statement since leaving office. Frm Pres @BarackObama is heartened by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country. pic.twitter.com/X5Fk3xRDEX Kevin Lewis (@KLewis44) January 30, 2017 Trump's order banned entry in the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen for 90 days, in what the White House described as a preliminary step in developing "extreme vetting" procedures to weed out potential security threats. The order also suspended the country's refugee program for 120 days, and banned the entry of Syrian refugees indefinitely. But the ban, which went into effect immediately on Friday, also affected hundreds of legal permanent residents and visa-holders who landed at U.S. airports in the hours after the order was enacted. Thousands of protesters and volunteer lawyers rushed to international airports across the country in efforts to halt the detention and deportation of travelers whose documentation had, in some cases, been rendered invalid while they were in transit. In Massachusetts, demonstrators crowded the international arrivals terminal of Logan airport, and thousands rallied against the order in Copley Square on Sunday. A series of federal legal decisions over the weekend granted temporary stays to deportations under the order, and the Department of Homeland Security released a statement Sunday saying that it would abide by orders while continuing to prevent travelers excluded under the ban from boarding flights to the U.S. Trump has said that his order was similar to an Obama administration slowdown of Iraqi refugee applications in 2011. Obama foreign policy advisor Ben Rhodes rejected the comparison on Twitter, saying that the 2011 case was a reduction due to a specific threat while vetting was improved, not a total ban that included not just refugees but all travelers and visa-holders from seven countries. 1/3) There was no 2011 ban on Iraqis. There was no Executive Order. In response to specific threat, additional vetting was added Ben Rhodes (@brhodes) January 30, 2017 And Obama's statement appeared to respond to that claim, without specifically referencing Trump or the executive order. "With regard to comparisons to President Obama's foreign policy decisions, as we've heard before, the President fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion," Lewis said in Monday's statement. Sen. Ed Markey said that today is "one of the darkest days in the history of the United States of America" in front of a crowd of thousands as they rallied against Donald Trump's executive order that banned people from predominantly Muslim countries from entering the U.S. "Donald Trump's executive order is not about extreme vetting, it's about extreme xenophobia," Markey said. He called it a "keep out" sign at America's borders. Markey was one of a handful of local lawmakers who spoke at the rally on Sunday, showing support for immigrants and refugees. Boston Mayor Marty Walsh called discrimination against specific religions unconstitutional. "It's not who we are as Americans," Walsh shouted. The mayor asked the crowd to turn to those next to them and tell them they loved them for who they are. Sen. Elizabeth Warren also decried the order, saying that some of the immigrants Trump was trying to shut out were coming here legally. "We will not stop fighting until this executive order is tossed in the dust bin of history," she shouted, as the crowd erupted in cheers. The officials noted that the ban was keeping out a diverse group of people: Students, teachers, workers and grandparents. "An attack on one of us is an attack on all of us," Warren said. U.S. Rep. Joseph Kennedy told the crowd he would fight for them in Washington D.C. Kennedy spoke of a recent trip to a community health center where a Muslim refugee from Baghdad was seeking shelter with his family after fleeing Iraq. The man and his wife had both been shot, Kennedy said. His brother was burned alive. A doctor at the health center brought the man, who was a musician in Iraq, a trumpet. "As our meeting began, this 42-year-old refugee took out a trumpet, and played the Star Spangled Banner with tears in his eyes," Kennedy said. The crowd, however, noticed that one local official was missing from the rally. Rep. Marjorie Decker said that the crowd had heard from the state's senators and from the Boston mayor, but not from Gov. Charlie Baker. "Where is the governor," the protesters began shouting. Baker was not at the rally, but released a statement on Sunday. "The federal government's recent decision puts this at risk and I believe focusing on countries' predominant religions will not make the country safer as terrorists have showed they intend to strike from across the world," Baker said. "The confusion for families is real. The unexpected disruption for law abiding people is real. And the lack of guidance associated with such an abrupt and overwhelming decision is hugely problematic for all involved." Baker said he hoped federal courts would straighten out the order quickly. U.S. Rep. Richard E. Neal said in a statement that banning refugees would damage America's reputation across the world. "For more than 200 years, the Great Seal of the United States has been inscribed with the motto 'E Pluribus Unum.' It means from many, we are one," Neal said. "President Trump's ill-advised executive order, issued in his first week in office, contradicts that historical belief. As a result, I will support legislation in Congress this week to immediately overturn this misguided policy." The Connecticut State Police announced they have made their third arrest in connection with the investigation of the homicide of Todd "T.J." Allen, the 18-year-old Sterling man who was found stabbed to death 18 days after being reported missing. Police said that on Monday announced the arrest of David Howard, 19, of Sterling for his involvement in the case. He was charged with tampering with evidence, hindering prosecution, and interfering with a police officer. He was booked at the state police Troop D barracks in Danielson, and then released on $125,000 bail. He is due to appear in Danielson Superior Court on Feb. 10. His arrest comes one day after another Sterling man, Dustin Warren, 18, was arrested for the same charges. Another Sterling man, Kevin Weismore, 19, was arrested on Jan. 15 and charged with murder and tampering with evidence. Kevin Weismore, 19, of 61 Laiho Road, Sterling, was arrested. He faces charges of murder and tampering with evidence, police said. Allen was last seen alive on Dec. 26 when he left his home on a dirtbike to go for a ride in the woods near his house. He never returned. His family contacted police and initiated a missing persons search involving mutiple agenices. The search lasted 18 days until Allen's body was found in some woods. An autopsy determined he had been stabbed multiple times. stirlacci.jpg Dr. Frank Stirlacci is interviewed by Western Mass News in March of 2015. (Credit: Western Mass News) SPRINGFIELD - Dr. Frank Stirlacci, 55, of Ludlow, and Jessica Miller, 36, of Springfield have been indicted by a Hampden Superior Court grand jury on charges of filing false health care claims and uttering false prescriptions. On February 9, 2016, Stirlacci surrendered his license to practice medicine by signing a voluntary agreement not to practice. He had offices in both Agawam and Springfield. The investigation centered around the time period of April 2015 through May 2015 while Stirlacci was imprisoned in Kentucky on failure to pay child support, Hampden District Attorney Anthony Gulluni said. Allegedly, while imprisoned, narcotics were routinely being prescribed through Miller from his office on pre-signed prescription pads to patients who were not seen by a doctor. While the indictments centered on a four day period when 26 prescriptions and 2,030 pills were issued, the investigation found that while imprisoned, a total 116 opiate prescriptions were issued accounting for 15,059 pills. Gulluni said Stirlacci and Miller were indicted after a lengthy investigation by the Massachusetts State Police Detective Unit assigned to his office, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, the Insurance Fraud Bureau of Massachusetts, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Gulluni said, "I would like to commend the grand jury for their service. I would also like to thank the Massachusetts State Police detectives assigned to my office and, in particular, Trooper Michael Martin, the Drug Enforcement Agency, the Insurance Fraud Bureau of Massachusetts and the FBI for their thorough investigation into this matter." He said, "Illicit issuing of opioid medications is a driving force behind the addiction epidemic. In battling the scourge of addiction, we will continue to aggressively go after those who wish to profit from it." Stirlacci and Miller were indicted Thursday on 20 counts of uttering false prescriptions and 23 counts of false health care claims. Stirlacci also faces one count of improper prescribing. Arraignment dates have not been set yet for the two defendants. New Year Wishes 2017 from Ecuador Source:english.eastday.com Date:2017-01-26 Karina Morales Herrera, Consul General of Ecuador in Shanghai Photo of staff of the Consulate General of Ecuador in Shanghai I am Karina Morales Herrera, Consul General of Ecuador, to Shanghai and the vibrant provinces of the Yangtze River Delta. I wish for all Chinese and foreign citizens a prosperous and happy 2017, the year of the Rooster. May we become a mature humanity capable of learning from future challenges we are facing, so that we can say for sure, the end of this year that we have indeed become better human beings. Our Consulate is preparing cultural, tourist and academic events for 2017, including a famous painting and photographic exhibition about Ecuador. Also, several agreements will be signed between Ecuadorian and Chinese Universities from this important region. As a result of President Xi Jinpings visit to Ecuador in November 2016, China and Ecuador strategic and integral relationships were established, which give us the opportunity for exchanges on various issues in which we share a common vision. From this year onwards, Ecuador will be presiding over the G77+ China, which is the largest intergovernmental organization of developing countries in the United Nations, and which provides the means for the countries of the South to articulate and promote their collective Economic interests and their joint negotiating capacity on all major international economic issues within the United Nations system, and to promote South-South cooperation for development. We are expecting more official visits from Shanghai authorities (and from Jiangsu, Anhui, and Zhejiang) to Ecuador this year, and there will be more Ecuadorian officials visiting this great region as well. Our world spins faster and keeps on shifting to higher gears. Some of us focus on the past. Things that were. Those people sometimes get nausea when the world spins faster around their heads. Others enjoy the ride, the speed, the experience. They explore the new opportunities, new ways of working. Driven by curiosity what another year will bring. I get excited by these trends and changes and will keep on thinking and writing about them for one reason put perfectly into words by Michael Anissimov: "One of the biggest flaws in the common conception of the future is that the future is something that happens to us, not something we create." by Patrick Willer Full Story: http://innovationexcellence.com/blog/2017/01/18/these-2017-trends-will-change-our-world/ It was like a scene from Star Wars at Montana State University tonight, as the state robotics competition kicks off. More than a hundred teams from across the state are competing to make the event the largest ever in Montana. 36 teams competed today, grades seven through twelve, in an effort to make it to the regional competitions. We got behind the scenes with one team from Eureka, Montana. This team has been competing in this event together for five years. By Kolby Crossley Full Story: http://www.abcfoxmontana.com/story/34367907/36-teams-compete-in-a-robotics-competition-at-msu The strength of their modeling was illustrated by how well it could predict a subjects answers. On the basis of an average of 68 Facebook "likes" by a user, it was possible to predict their skin color (with 95 percent accuracy), their sexual orientation (88 percent accuracy), and their affiliation to the Democratic or Republican party (85 percent). But it didnt stop there. Intelligence, religious affiliation, as well as alcohol, cigarette and drug use, could all be determined. From the data it was even possible to deduce whether deduce whether someones parents were divorced. WRITTEN BY HANNES GRASSEGGER AND MIKAEL KROGERUS Full Story: http://motherboard.vice.com/read/big-data-cambridge-analytica-brexit-trump You probably grew up thinking that batteries are those things we put in flashlights, or maybe the rechargeable ones that come in phones and laptops. Now its time to install batteries into the biggest machine of all: The United States electrical grid that huge, aging, complex network of power plants and wires that bring power to our homes and buildings. CBS Sunday Morning Full Story: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/making-a-better-battery/ They would be mostly but not all good for state and local revenues. For states and localities, such a reduction could signal an end to what Barclays calls "the fretting" about investing in additional highway lanes or new roads. by Frank Shafroth Full Story: http://www.governing.com/columns/public-money/gov-driverless-car-state-local-revenue.html The public is hereby informed that the traffic scheme initially set up as regard to works in the context of the Metro Express Project, along St Jean Road between Avenue des Tulipes and Avenue des Glaieuls will be modified as from Thursday 08 April 2021. Accordingly, St Jean Road will be realigned between the mentioned junctions for the progress and safe execution of works. Traffic signs will be set up to inform and guide road users on the approach to the works area. Drivers are strongly advised to exercise caution when approaching the works area and to drive within the prevailing speed limit. The Ministry regrets any inconvenience caused and relies on the cooperation and collaboration of the public. Partager et informez vous aussi...... 0 shares Share Tweet LinkedIn Articles similaires WASHINGTON - Thousands of demonstrators rallied outside the White House and in cities nationwide Sunday to protest President Trump's refugee ban, as the executive order continued to halt travel in some locations, despite being weakened by federal judges overnight and having its constitutionality called into question as rulings spilled into Sunday. In addition to Washington, large protests took place in New York, Philadelphia, Boston and Atlanta, and at airports in dozens of cities, as demonstrators created cheering sections for arriving refugees at Dulles International Airport in Northern Virginia. In Washington, swarms of protesters amassed in front of the White House by 1 p.m., and the crowds proceeded to the nearby Trump International Hotel and U.S. Capitol. Later the group made its way back toward the White House, shutting down Pennsylvania Avenue. By evening, an impromptu Catholic Mass brought hundreds more to the lawn to resist Trump's order. Among the protesters was Shohreh Rahnama, of Bethesda, Md., whose 5-year old son was detained for several hours at Dulles Airport following a flight from Istanbul on Saturday night. Artiman Jalali was born in the United States and has dual citizenship with Iran. He was traveling back from a visit with relatives with his cousin, 25-year old Aida Mohammadi, a student at University of Maryland and a green card holder. Rahnama said she waited for hours at the airport, with friends and family and a growing crowd of strangers who came to support them and others whose loved ones were detained. They were finally released around midnight. "He was hungry and he was thirsty, and I could not see him," she said. "How can a five-year old be banned? Just because his parents are Iranian? We are American too," she said. "I almost died in that airport. I can say it was the worst day of my life." Sunday morning, she brought her son and other family members to join the protest at Trump's door step. She wanted to send a message. "I am here to say: You cannot do this. You are our servant. The people elected you," she said. "Other countries are thirsty for the rights we have in America. We can't become a dictatorship." Trump reaffirmed the order in a statement Sunday, saying it did not constitute a "Muslim ban" and compared it to President Obama's 2011 action blocking visas for Iraqi refugees for six months. Trump said he intends to prioritize persecuted Christians in the Middle East for admission as refugees, and in a weekend television interview former New York mayor Rudy W. Giuliani said Trump wanted a "Muslim ban" and asked him to assemble a commission with the knowledge to institute one "legally." The travel ban bars entry into the United States from seven predominately Muslim countries. Despite a federal judge's ruling late Saturday, and similar court decisions with varying degrees of power, the Department of Homeland Security issued a statement Sunday that it would continue to implement order. Demonstrators also gathered Sunday morning at the U.S. Capitol to protest Trump's education secretary nominee Betsy DeVos. At least one demonstrator was equipped for both protests, carrying a poster board that addressed one of the issues on each side. Meanwhile Sunday afternoon, several U.S. congressmen squared off with authorities at Dulles Airport trying to get information on the identities and status of detainees. Democratic Reps. Don Beyer and Gerald E. Connolly, both of Virginia, and Jamie B. Raskin of Maryland, were followed by a crowd to a hallway that led toward internal offices where they believed customs officials were located. Connolly pressed an airport police officer to get a Customs and Border Protection official to meet with the group. While squeezed up against the narrow hallway Connolly challenged the officer. "Are people being detained?" Connolly asked the officer, J. Damskey, a member of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority police. "How can you enforce the law if you're not enforcing a judge's order?" Connolly was handed a cellphone. On the line was a Customs and Border Protection congressional affairs official. Connolly asked for information on possible detainees, including those traveling on a flight from Turkey from which airline customers reported some passengers had been pulled. No one on site from CBP would meet with the congressmen. "That is unacceptable. It is our understanding you are detaining people . . . Our understanding is you have not followed that order," Connolly said. Connolly said that a lawyer for one of his constituents was allowed to communicate with his client late Saturday night, and that the person was released. Virginia immigration attorney Sharifa Abbasi was among the lawyers on hand at Dulles Sunday pressing for information on passengers potentially detained under the executive order. Abbasi asked a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent for information on who is currently detained at the airport. She pointed to an order from U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema in Alexandria, which says lawyers must have access to U.S. green card holders detained under Trump's measure. Abbasi said she was turned away. "They won't give us any information," she said. Inside the airport, hundreds of peaceful demonstrators sang the "National Anthem" and created a cheering gauntlet for travelers emerging from Customs. The crowd yelled "Let them in!" and "Welcome!" as passengers, including some from majority-Muslim countries, rolled their suitcases through gray doors and into a section of the airport that had become a makeshift law office and civics classroom in response to Trump's executive order. "My kids go to school with people from everywhere," said Sasha Moreno, of Reston, Va., whose six-year-old daughter drew a little red statue of liberty on poster board along with the message: "Welcome to America." Her daughter's kindergarten class includes many students from Sudan, one of the countries targeted by Trump's order, which has brought a sense of anxiety in her own family. The idea that her daughter's friends' grandparents would be barred from visiting the United States just because of who they are is unacceptable, and she wants her children to know that's not what America stands for, Moreno said. "There are lots of Muslim students at her school. Hearing this stuff going on is really confusing" to them, Moreno said. "We like the idea of them having friends from everywhere." Downtown, protesters lined Pennsylvania Avenue and filled out Lafayette Square. They cycled through a variety of chants, and wielded poster boards bearing messages such as "Islamophobia is un-American" and "Dissent is patriotic." "Say it loud, say it clear, refugees are welcome here! . . . No hate! No fear! Refugees are welcome here!" they chanted. "No justice! No peace! No justice! No peace!" The tone vacillated between forceful and unifying, as protesters alternately chanted "SHAME" and partook in renditions of "America the Beautiful" and "This Land is Your Land." George Formukong, a police officer in the District, came to the rally with his family still wearing their dress clothes from church. They flew back from their native Cameroon on Saturday to learn that other travelers were being denied entry. "Because our country was not on the list we were able to travel," Formukong said. "Everyone is an immigrant here. We should have equal treatment." Georgia Warner brought her nearly 3-month-old son to Dulles on Sunday, along with a sign that said "Raising my son to tear down your wall #NoBanNoWall." He was born on Election Day. Warner is an 11th grade American history teacher in the District, about to end her maternity leave. "There might not be a better time in my lifetime to teach the U.S. Constitution and U.S. history," Warner said. Her message to visitors from around the world: "There are still people who will stand by them and defend their rights."' Her husband, Chris Miller, said America's "capacity for inclusiveness" deserves to be protected. "It's my job as a patriotic American to stand up for American values," Miller said, as he fed and burped his infant son. The family also was headed to protest at the White House. "My oath didn't end when my enlistment did," said Lee Carter, another demonstrator who served in the Marines and is running for state office in Virginia. He carried an oversized florescent green declaration: "I, Lee Carter, do solemnly affirm that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign AND DOMESTIC #nevertrump #resist". For others, the demonstrations were personal. Amira Hassan, 26, remembered the excitement she felt when she flew into John F. Kennedy International Airport with her family as a refugee from Somalia in 2001. Hassan is graduate student in public administration at American University and a naturalized citizen. Since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, she said she has watched the rise of Islamophobia as her family built a life in the U.S. "It's hard not to feel terrified and angry and sad and heartbroken," she said. ZAGAN, Poland - On a snowy field in southwest Poland, U.S. tanks and troops gathered on Monday to defend against a resurgent Russia that President Donald Trump wants to befriend. The troops - part of the largest U.S. deployment to Europe since the Cold War - plan to spread across Eastern Europe, fanning into the Baltic nations, digging in to Poland and also deploying to Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary. Major new commitments were made in July at a NATO summit in Warsaw by then-President Barack Obama, and at the time they seemed like a bipartisan expression of support for U.S. allies at a moment of heightened fear about Russia. Now, however, they are coming despite the White House, not because of it. Eastern European nations say they fully trust Washington's commitments - but the jubilation of the summer has been replaced by concern over Trump's overtures to Russian President Vladimir Putin. NATO leaders acknowledge that the alliance would be rocked if Trump abandons the troop deployments. The uncertainty has led to an unusual gap between Trump's rhetoric and that of nearly the entire military establishment underneath him. "It was the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the unlawful annexation of Crimea" that forced the deployments, said Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, the commander of U.S. Army ground forces in Europe, ahead of a frigid Monday ceremony on a military exercise range outside the Polish town of Zagan, where a Polish military band played "The Star-Spangled Banner" to welcome their American counterparts. "The last American tank left Europe three years ago because we all hoped Russia was going to be our partner. And so we had to bring all this back," Hodges said. Just over a week into the Trump presidency, the new U.S. leader has shown mixed messages on NATO. He called the alliance "obsolete" in an interview days before the inauguration. But Defense Secretary James Mattis called NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on his first full day on the job last week, praising "the fundamental and enduring value of NATO for the security of both Europe and North America," according to NATO. Later in the week, British Prime Minister Theresa May stood by Trump's side and said he had "confirmed that you're 100 percent behind NATO." The uncertainty has weighed on Eastern European leaders, who have welcomed the international deployment of several thousand troops to their nations. Any reversal of deployments "would be an issue of concern to us," said Ojars Kalnins, the head of the foreign affairs committee of Latvia's parliament. In Zagan, the site of a vast Communist-era artillery training field, there was little explicit acknowledgment of the new questions over NATO's future. But phrases that would have been unexceptional before Trump's November election victory took on new meaning after his inauguration. "An attack on any of us is an attack on all of us," said U.S. Ambassador to Poland Paul Jones, the senior representative of the Trump administration at the event. Polish leaders said they were delighted to be able to choose their friends, something they said was not possible during more than four decades of communist rule. "Thirty years ago, which is not that long in history, we had units here in Zagan which we were forced to treat as allies," said Polish President Andrzej Duda, referring to Soviet Army troops. "And today we have in Zagan allies who symbolize freedom." After the celebratory speeches, Polish and U.S. tanks and heavy artillery conducted live-fire exercises intended to show that they could work together to fend off a common enemy. Explosions and gunfire rang out across a vast, deforested plain, which was covered in the snow and mud of a Polish winter. The fifth annual WIRED Health conference will be held on March 9 in London, bringing together entrepreneurs, techies, and many others who are participating in digitizing and revolutionizing how medical care is delivered. Weve attended WIRED events in the past, and they stand out for their breadth, a focus on discussing actual problems and solutions, and networking opportunities with really smart people. This year we again are proud to be a WIRED Health media partner. This years speakers include Emmanuelle Charpentier, co-inventor of CRISPR gene-editing technology that should help bring cures for a variety of diseases, Dame Sally Davies, chief medical officer for England, Department of Health, and Peter Piot, co-discoverer of Ebola and director of London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. Info page and to register: WIRED Health by Steve McClellan @mp_mcclellan, January 29, 2017 Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide CEO John Seifert announced a number of new organizational and talent moves Friday, which collectively represent the biggest changes hes instituted since being named the global leader of the WPP agency network a year ago. On the talent front, Lou Aversano was promoted to CEO of Ogilvy USA. Aversano was previously CEO of Ogilvy East and will now oversee the agencys operations in New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Boston and Denver, as well as specialty units FKH (healthcare), Effective UI (web design) and Leopard (B2B) as an integrated business group under a single P&L. Carla Hendra, who established and leads OgilveyRed, a unit focused on strategic branding and marketing has been tasked with leading two the agencys most important next chapter priorties, Seifert stated in a memo to staffers. Those initiatives include the agencys digital transformation across its global network and developing a plan for its own global health and wellness network. advertisement advertisement Seifert also told the troops in his memo that Jennifer Risi, a senior executive at Ogilvy PR, and head of its media influence team has been appointed Chief Communications Officer at the agency. Shell now report to Lauren Crampsie, the agencys global CMO. Our ambition, wrote Seifert, is to shape a One Ogilvy branded marketing function that builds our brand and creative reputation as a global enterprise, and helps accelerate each markets next chapter transformation strategy. He added that the effort was all in service to our Make Brands Matter brand purpose. Seifert also disclosed a new function he dubbed Ogilvy Delivery, which will be overseen by Gunther Schumacher as Chief Delivery Officer. Our next chapter puts clients at the center of our business strategy and operating structure, Seifert wrote. However, there are no brilliant ideas or differentiated client experiences without flawless execution. Simply put, without world-class delivery we will not be able to produce great work and deliver the value that our clients seek from their marketing investments. Schumacher will oversee the agencys program management office, production capabilities and technology model. Schumacher had previously overseen the agencys IBM account and he is succeeded in that role by Todd Krugman who has been named President, Global Brand Services, IBM. Also on the account side, Philip Heimann has been promoted to Global Managing Director, overseeing the SC Johnson account, and Jamie Prieto has added American Express to his remit. He also oversees the global Kimberly-Clark and Lenovo accounts. by Joe Mandese @mp_joemandese, January 30, 2017 In its first week in office, actions by the Trump Administration have triggered international crises for many marketers, some of whom are taking their own form of action in what might well be described as opposition branding. Executive orders to build the wall between the U.S. and Mexico and to ban travel from some mostly Islamic nations prompted a number of brands to make public statements, contribute financial support and even run ads in opposition to the White House actions. Not surprisingly, some of the greatest opposition to the new establishment president came from new establishment brands such as Airbnb and Lyft. Within hours of an email and PR campaign criticizing Trumps immigration ban, particularly on refugees, and donating $1 million to the American Civil Liberties Union, Lyft begin seeing some brand lift as a number of Hollywood celebrities tweeted their support for the ride-sharing service and called for a boycott of rival Uber, which was perceived as supporting the White House. advertisement advertisement We stand firmly against these actions, and will not be silent on issues that threaten the values of our community, Lyft co-founders Logan Green and John Zimmer wrote. A grassroots social media campaign urging people to delete Uber was prompted when Uber drivers broke the yellow taxi strike at JFK airport in New York City and because Uber CEO Travis Kalanick has been seen as collaborating with Trump. Kalanick is one of several members of industry that have been appointed to Trumps business advisory group, and he recently called on Uber employees to be supportive of the new administration, noting, "We'll partner with anyone in the world as long they're about making transportation in cities better, creating job opportunities, making it easier to get around, getting pollution out of the air and traffic off the streets. By late Sunday, Uber had shifted its public position on at least one Trump action, as the #DeleteUber campaign began trending. In response, Kalanick tweeted that Trump's travel ban "is against everything Uber stands for." He noted the ban affects thousands of Uber drivers and said Uber would compensate them for lost earnings if theyre unable to work because of the ban. Another sharing economy brand, Airbnb, meanwhile, extended a welcome hand, offering free housing to refugees and anyone allowed in the U.S., according to a tweet by CEO and Co-Founder Brian Chesky. While most conventional consumer brands have been sitting on the sidelines, the tech industry and especially Hollywood have been taking vocal positions against the Trump Administrations actions. Though one of those actions, Trumps order to begin building a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico, did prompt some marketing from at least one brand. Corona, which is actually owned by Dutch brewer Heineken, broke an ad celebrating that American has always been great. The spot ends with the tagline: America es grande. In a tweet on Friday, Sen. Lindsey Graham leaned in with some support of the Corona brand, noting, Simply put, any policy proposal which drives up costs of Corona, tequila, or margaritas is a big-time bad idea. Mucho Sad. With Madison Avenues biggest game looming, observers are wondering if any of this years Super Bowl spots will take an oppositional position, though most of the spots teased or previewed to date have been safe and politically neutral. Though at least one campaign has already been rejected by Super Bowl network Fox for hitting the wall, literally. A 90-second recruitment ad from construction materials supplier Lumber 84 was rejected by the network because it depicted the wall and was deemed too controversial. Meanwhile, the material impact of the new immigration policies stands to impact Madison Avenue as much as any other industry, maybe more. These rules could have implications for agency holding companies if the policy persists and is more likely if the policy is expanded, Pivotal Research Group Analyst Brian Wieser writes in a note sent to Wall Street investors late Sunday. While press has focused on the impact that restrictive immigration policies may have on the technology industry, the largest advertising and marketing services companies are also affected, and could be to a greater degree, he continued, adding, The industrys most important clients typically have global operations, and its talent base (especially its most valuable business unit, professionals) is also commonly global by nature and birth. "Beyond the impact of banning individuals born in specific countries, if the U.S. is viewed as less hospitable to foreigners, individuals with roots or family members outside the U.S. will be discouraged from working for agency groups with significant U.S. operations given the need to travel to the U.S. for internal and external meetings. If this occurs, independent or geographically contained agencies based outside of the U.S. could benefit. As we believe that at least some share of global agency holding companies growth occurs because they have gained market share from such agencies, any reversal of this trend would be negative for the group. by Tobi Elkin @tobielkin, January 30, 2017 At its annual leadership meeting in Florida, The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) elected Jim Norton, chief business officer and president of revenue at Conde Nast, to the post of chairman of the IAB Board of Directors. Scott Schiller, NBCUniversal's executive vice president/general manager, marketing, advertising sales & client partnerships, was elected vice chairman, the post held previously by Norton. Both men will steer the IAB agenda in 2017. "I look forward to leading the IAB Board of Directors as we tackle delivering consumers a superlative user experience, supporting quality content, fighting fraud, optimizing data, adopting and enforcing technical standards, and more, stated Norton. In addition, newly elected members of the IAB Board of Directors include Jeff Lucas, vice president and head of global sales, Snap Inc., Steven Wolfe Pereira, chief marketing and communications officer, Neustar, and Samantha Skey, president and chief revenue officer, SheKnows. More than 30 industry executives were re-elected to the IAB Board of Directors. by Thom Forbes @tforbes, January 30, 2017 As worldwide furor over the administrations temporary ban on admitting refugees and travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries grew over the weekend, President Donald Trump blamed the media for misrepresenting the action and insisted it was not a ban on Muslims. Meanwhile, executives at a number of prominent companies led by the tech industry denounced the action even as Bloomberg reports the situation may get ever tougher for companies who rely on foreign workers. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," Trump said in a statement yesterday, the BBC reports. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. advertisement advertisement Theres another side to that point, however. President Trumps executive order banning travel to the United States from seven predominantly Muslim countries is being rightly challenged in the courts for, among other things, its unconstitutional interference with free exercise of religion and denial of due process, write Richard W. Painter and Norman L. Eisen, who were chief White House ethics lawyers for Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, respectively, in an opinion piece in the New York Times. Overlooked in the furor is another troubling aspect of the situation: President Trump omitted from his ban a number of other predominantly Muslim nations where his company has done business, they point out. Meanwhile, USA Todays Jon Swartz reports that Google has created a $2 million crisis fund that can be matched with up to $2 million in donations from employees, totaling $4 million, for four organizations: the American Civil Liberties Union, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee and UNHCR. It is Google's largest crisis campaign ever in response to Trumps executive order suspending refugee arrivals for at least 120 days and barring visas from seven Muslim countries. The order could greatly disrupt the businesses of tech companies, which rely heavily on foreign-born workers. In a staff memo, CEO Sundar Pichai said the move affects at least 187 of the Internet giant's staff, Swartz reports. Indeed, the move blindsided the technology industry, which thought that its main battle on the immigration front was over the number of H-1B visas granted to high-skilled foreign workers that will be made available each year, reports Tracey Lien for the Los Angeles Times. The tech sector relies heavily on foreign-born software engineers to meet its staffing needs, and it has long lobbied for the government to lift the cap on the H-1B visa program to allow more foreign workers temporary employment with U.S. firms. But just because travel bans came first doesnt mean the administration isnt planning to take action on work visas, too. The Presidents clash with Silicon Valley over immigration is about to become even more contentious if a draft proposal Bloombergs Peter Elstrom and Saritha Rai have seen becomes official policy. His administration has drafted an executive order aimed at overhauling the work-visa programs technology companies depend on to hire tens of thousands of employees each year, they write. If implemented, the reforms could force wholesale changes at India companies such as Infosys Ltd. and Wipro Ltd., and shift the way American companies like Microsoft Corp., Amazon.com Inc. and Apple Inc. recruit talent. Companies would have to try to hire Americans first and if they recruit foreign workers, priority would be given to the most highly paid. The administration did not respond to a request for comment about the draft, Elstrom and Rai report. Meanwhile, Apple CEO Tim Cook issued a letter reacting to what he called deep concerns among employees. He assured them Apple does not support Trump's policy. Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do, he wrote in an email obtained by CNN, CNN Moneys Laurie Segall and Jackie Wattles write. Microsoft which is run by Satya Nadella, who immigrated to the U.S. from India told employees Saturday that the company is committed to providing legal advice and assistance to its 76 employees that are citizens of the affected countries, they report. Amazon also sent an email to employees about the potential implications of Trump's order and offered legal assistance to employees who might be impacted. Perhaps the hed in the Wall Street Journal not known for liberal leanings puts it best: Donald Trumps Immigration Ban Sows Chaos. by Erik Sass , Staff Writer @eriksass1, January 30, 2017 Amid mounting opposition to many of President Trumps early executive orders, and with even more controversial actions probably on the way, one of the more radical ideas under discussion in some quarters is a general or national strike. The basic idea is that the entire working population, or at least a significant portion of it, stops work and engages in mass civil disobedience in order to paralyze the government in effect, shutting society down until the objectionable policies are withdrawn. There are a number of obvious questions about this possibly far-fetched proposal. Most importantly, while this tactic has been employed in Europe with some success, it has never been used in the United States; are Americans simply too individualistic to cooperate across lines of class, race, and geography? Additionally, what proportion of the working population would have to participate in order for it to be effective? And would the administration back down, even when faced with the prospect of economic chaos? advertisement advertisement These are big unknowns, which only politicians, political scientists, economists and historians can speculate about, and far beyond the scope of this blog. However, one thing is certain: in 21st century America, to have any chance of success a general strike would have to rely heavily on social media. Indeed, social media is pretty much the only channel by which such a massive effort could be organized and its not implausible, considering recent precedents like the Egyptian Revolution and, yes, the success of Donald Trumps own social media efforts during his presidential campaign. So what are some of the key functions social media would have to perform in the case of a general strike? 1. Do people care enough? Given the countrys deepening political divisions, a strike would logically be limited to areas where opposition to these policies is already entrenched, meaning (in the accepted political shorthand) blue states rather than red states. Even in the most partisan blue states, however, its still necessary to determine whether the level of opposition is sufficiently intense for a general strike to become possible and social media provides a tailor-made means for doing this. One model might use a simple platform similar to Kickstarter, in which people pledge to participate once a certain critical mass has been reached using fairly simple criteria say, 25% of each states workforce, in states containing at least half the countrys population. 2. Choosing leaders and setting an agenda. Although social media has helped catalyze spontaneous mass movements with remarkable speed in the past, subsequent events have revealed the shortcomings of the leaderless, crowd-sourced approach to social movements specifically, their apparent inability to accomplish anything beyond very short-terms goals. For example, the Occupy Wall Street movement agreed to do one thing occupy a public space near some banks before splintering into factions and eventually petering out. On the other hand, social media could help overcome this obstacle, by enabling participants to debate and vote on goals and leaders before taking action. The goals would have to be limited, specific, and realistic, and people could make their pledges to participate contingent on agreement with the goals, in order to prevent the platform from becoming too extreme. The leaders would serve as spokespeople for the movement, presenting their demands and deciding when these demands had been met. 3.The thorniest issue for any general strike would be that of solidarity, meaning spreading the risk and mitigating negative impacts on participants. A mass labor outage carries the obvious risk of people losing their jobs, and even if employers are willing to temporarily overlook the disruption to their businesses, they are unlikely to sign paychecks for absent workers. While everyone participating would presumably be aware of these risks going into it, for a general strike to become practical, some kind of temporary financial support would have to be arranged for a considerable number of people who otherwise would be unable to participate as well as longer-term (but not indefinite) relief for people who actually lose their jobs. This would require crowdfunding on an unprecedented scale, with contributions deposited and disbursed from a central fund under the management of an independent financial controller. The risk of fraud could be limited, though not eliminated, with some of the verification techniques developed by fintech and microfinance companies. Social media could also help find new employment for people who lose their jobs, and reward employers who allow employees to participate with buycotts. by Philip Rosenstein , Staff Writer, January 30, 2017 Responses to President Donald Trumps travel moratorium executive order illustrate the growing chasm between two major sociopolitical factions in 21st-century America. Many see a de facto ban on Muslim travelers from the seven countries designated by the executive order and it is shaking the cage of an already unstable start to Donald Trumps presidency. From the spontaneous protests at airports around the country, where even some legal permanent residents were prevented from entering the United States, to the more organized rallies held in New York City and Washington, D.C. among many others on Sunday, many Americans are enraged by Trumps actions. Conversely, per Breitbart, Trump supporters are calling the progressive response: a superb example of media-magnified shrieking about fascism, bleating about white nationalists, howling about religious persecution, false invocations of the Constitution, and theatrical sobbing on behalf of the Statue of Liberty. advertisement advertisement These vastly opposite reactions to this order strike at the core of a growing division in Americas social fabric exemplified by the tension between America First and America for all. It is difficult to see how the two sides can reconcile these differences, particularly as Trump and his surrogates dig in and appear poised to expand the ban to other countries. Or so they claim. Countries where Trump does business Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates were excluded. Commentators repeatedly questioned why Saudia Arabia and Pakistan, leaders in global terrorism, were left off the list. Democrats, progressives and even some Republicans oppose the ban for its religiously infused xenophobia, its seeming uselessness and unconstitutionality. For many, it up-ends what makes America great, its desire (though often untrue in practice) to include rather than ostracize. Republicans and conservatives declare the order isnt a Muslim ban, that it has its genesis in designations made by the Obama administration. President Obama's restrictions specifically limited what is known as visa-waiver travel. Trump insists his edict, which is far broader in scope, will help deter or prevent terrorists from entering the country. Worth noting: Neither of the attackers in the San Bernardino shooting would have been affected by the new ban. Potential future policies put forth by the Trump team will only serve to exacerbate the chasm growing between two large ideological sections of the American electorate. The stark differences in their approach to human dignity, human rights and, above all, the Constitution, produces what Alexander Hamilton feared most: Putting party before country. by Sara Guaglione , January 30, 2017 The Dallas Morning News will outsource the design and layout of its print edition to GateHouse Media and cut around 20 jobs from its 50-person print team. Five other positions in the newsroom have been cut as well. In a memo to staff, editor Mike Wilson referred to the papers ongoing declines in print-related revenues and total revenue declines, which are forcing The Dallas Morning News to make difficult but necessary changes...to help the company continue to align its revenues with its expenses. Wilson said he will prioritize reporting and editing over product, and contract GateHouse Media to design its newspaper. The Dallas Morning News will eliminate the roles of copy editor and designer by early June, a total of 20 production jobs. GateHouse has a production hub in Austin called the Center for News and Design, where it produces pages for dozens of newspapers at a lower cost, Wilson wrote. GateHouse copy edits and designs more than 200 newspapers. advertisement advertisement The Dallas Morning News will create a team of multiplatform editors who will produce stories for the Web, as well as copy edit and write headlines for print. Moving forward, we need as many people as possible contributing to our our Web sites, Wilson wrote. For those whose jobs have been eliminated, they will have the opportunity to apply for the new positions, Wilson added. GateHouse Media CEO Kirk Davis told The Dallas Morning News he expects to hire around 50 new people this year at its production center, and Dallas Morning News employees can apply for jobs there. In a post on Dallas Morning News site, the company said it is working to build its marketing services divisions and digital and print subscriptions this year. Earlier this month, the newspaper finalized an agreement to relocate to The Statler Library. The papers chairman, president and CEO Jim Moroney told the Dallas Business Journal the smaller space will encourage more collaboration and communication inside the newsroom. The Dallas Morning News plans to move into its new home by mid-2017. by Wayne Friedman , January 30, 2017 The traditional pay TV business continues to show some worsening metrics, with the median decline for pay TV homes down 1.9%, according to current estimates. Analysis from the Pivotal Research Group -- by way of Nielsens February reporting period data -- shows these results are troubling with regard to the growth of cord-cutting, especially in light of overall growth for TV households, which was up 1.7%, a monthly percentage gain repeated every month since September 2016. That means the gap between pay TV subscriber declines and the rise of overall U.S. TV homes was 3.7% -- worse than any month during which we have data back to 2010, writes Brian Wieser, senior research analyst at Pivotal. Wieser does caution that this data does not include new digital multichannel/video program distributors -- Sling TV, DirecTV Now, or PlayStation Vue, for example. The reality is certainly better than this because VMVPDs [Virtual Multichannel Video Programming Distributors] would reduce the decline, although not likely by much more than a percentage point or so. Comprehensive VMVPD data will not be included in these estimates until the middle of 2017. In February 2016, there was a pay TV median decline in subscribers of 1.6% -- with declines dipping lower in the summer 2016 period, anywhere from 2.2% to 2.4%. But there was no change in the overall growth of U.S. TV homes during the period. The big cable network subscriber showing declines for February included NBCUs Esquire -- which had already announced it will abandon its efforts as a linear TV network and turned into a Internet/digital Web site network programmer -- falling 33.2%; Viacoms Nicktoons, down 9.6%; and Viacoms Centric, losing 7.1%. Time Warners Boomerang slipped 7.0%, while HBO gave back 5.5% and Disneys ESPN2 and ESPN were down by 3.4% and 3.5%, respectively. Those showing growth in subscribers were AMCs Sundance, 12.1%; CBS Smithsonian, adding 8%; Foxs FXX, 7.5%; FX Movie Channel, 5.1%; Discoverys Velocity, 7.0%; and AMCs BBC America, 4.6%); Pivotal Research says that among 117 measured networks this year and last, 27 showed some subscriber growth. Local self-government minister MB Rajesh said on Saturday that the temporary openings in the Corporation would be filled through employment exchange. Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, commonly known as ADHD, affects millions of children and often continues into adulthood. Diagnosis usually happens during the elementary school years, but it can happen earlier, when the child is still a toddler. Children with ADHD often have trouble paying attention, and they may display hyperactive and impulsive behaviors. These features can affect the childs relationships with family, friends, and teachers. In the United States, there is concern that growing numbers of children are receiving this diagnosis and that some may be taking medication too early. Others argue, on the other hand, that an early diagnosis can lead to more effective treatment. At what age does ADHD begin, and can infants and toddlers have symptoms? At this early stage, is there any way to treat ADHD? Age at diagnosis Share on Pinterest d3sign/Getty Images The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have reported that, as of 2016, around 6.1 million children ages 217 in the U.S. had received a diagnosis of ADHD. This figure included around 388,000 children aged 25 years. Before 2011, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) only had guidelines for diagnosing ADHD in children ages 612. In 2011, they expanded their guidelines to include preschoolers and adolescents, widening the range to incorporate ages 418. Some children receive a diagnosis before the age of 4. However, there are no clinical guidelines for diagnosis at this age. Symptoms in toddlers It can be hard to notice symptoms of ADHD in children younger than 4 years of age. A short attention span, impulsivity, tantrums, and high levels of activity are common during certain stages of development. Many children go through the terrible twos, and not all have ADHD. Children who are very active and have a lot of energy but not ADHD can usually focus when necessary for stories or to look through picture books. They are also able to put toys away or sit and do a puzzle, for example. Children with ADHD are often unable to do these things. They may show extreme behavior that disrupts activities and relationships. For a diagnosis of ADHD, a child must display these behaviors for at least 6 months in more than one setting, such as at home and at nursery school. Toddlers with ADHD may: be restless run around, climb, and jump on everything be constantly on the go, as if they are driven by a motor talk nonstop be unable to concentrate or listen for long find it hard to settle down, take naps, and sit for meals However, some children with ADHD may focus well on things that interest them, such as particular toys. If a parent or caregiver thinks that their toddler is displaying behavior that is excessive and intense, and if this behavior affects family life and occurs frequently, they should speak with their childs doctor for an evaluation. Diagnosis Guidelines for diagnosing ADHD do not cover children ages 3 years or younger. However, there is evidence that doctors are diagnosing ADHD in toddlers. Factors that may cause a doctor to suspect ADHD at this age include: genetic factors if the mother used drugs or alcohol during pregnancy if the mother smoked during pregnancy if the mother was exposed to environmental toxins during pregnancy preterm birth or low birth weight central nervous system problems at critical moments in development a delay in motor development, speech, and language behavioral difficulties a family history of ADHD The 20102011 National Survey of Childrens Health in the U.S. found that around 194,000 children ages 25 had received a diagnosed of ADHD during the year. How do doctors diagnose ADHD? In order to diagnose ADHD in an older child, a doctor may: perform a medical examination look at personal and family medical histories consider school records ask family, teachers, babysitters, and coaches to complete a questionnaire compare symptoms and behavior to ADHD criteria and rating scales To diagnose ADHD in older children and adults, a doctor will also observe and ask about characteristics, such as: lack of attention to detail when performing tasks difficulty staying focused on tasks appearing not to listen when spoken to not following instructions difficulty organizing chores often losing things and forgetting to do things fidgeting and not being able to stay seated running or climbing in inappropriate places excessive talking inability to do something quietly difficulty waiting for their turn What about diagnosing younger children? For younger children, it may be difficult to know whether they would meet these criteria. Sometimes, a problem with development, such as a language delay, may lead to a wrong diagnosis of ADHD. Other medical conditions can cause similar symptoms, including: a brain injury learning or language problems mood disorders, including depression and anxiety other psychiatric or neurodevelopmental disorders seizure disorders sleep problems thyroid problems vision or hearing problems Preschool-age children or infants who show symptoms of ADHD should see a specialist for an evaluation. A relevant specialist may be a speech pathologist, developmental pediatrician, psychologist, or psychiatrist. They can help a physician make an accurate diagnosis. Treatment There are guidelines for treating ADHD in children ages 4 years and older, but there are currently no guidelines for treating ADHD in toddlers. In children aged 45 years, a doctor might recommend : Behavioral therapy: A parent or teacher could deliver this. Medication: If symptoms do not improve with behavioral therapy, and especially if they are moderate to severe, a doctor may recommend methylphenidate hydrochloride (Ritalin) and other stimulant medicines. The doctor will monitor the dosage and change it, if necessary, to ensure that the child experiences the maximum benefit and the fewest possible side effects. It is important to note that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have not approved the use of this drug in children under 6 years old, due to a lack of evidence that it is safe or effective. The FDA note that stimulant medications can have side effects, including slowing a childs growth. Early treatment for toddlers The CDC recommend training for parents and behavior therapy for young children. As a first step, they say that behavior therapy: teaches parents ways to manage their childs behavior appears to work as well as medication in young children prevents the side effects that can occur with medication The therapist will work with the child to help them learn: new ways of behavior that do not cause problems new ways of expressing themselves When the child is old enough to attend kindergarten or school, the parents or caregiver should ask the school about the possibility of educational support. What about medication? In 2014, a CDC official presented a report, stating that over 10,000 toddlers aged 23 years may be receiving medication for ADHD in ways that do not meet the established guidelines in the U.S. The mental health watchdog Citizens Commission on Human Rights has gathered data suggesting that the number of toddlers receiving treatment for ADHD and other mental health issues in the U.S. may be higher than this. They say that in addition to the 10,000 toddlers receiving ADHD medication: 318,997 are being administered antianxiety drugs 46,102 are being given antidepressants 3,760 are receiving antipsychotics They also found that among babies aged 1 year or younger: 249,669 are being given antianxiety medications 24,406 are being administered antidepressants 1,422 are receiving drugs for ADHD 654 are taking antipsychotics The figures above indicate that babies and toddlers may be overmedicated. There are no guidelines for treating toddlers or babies with ADHD. However, guidelines for slightly older children suggest trying behavioral therapy before using medication. In addition, one study reports that nearly 50 percent of toddler participants aged under 3 and receiving psychotropic medications were not monitored as often as every 3 months. This suggests that toddlers and babies may be taking ADHD medications for up to 6 months at a time without doctors checking on the effects. The AAP call on doctors to weigh the risks of administering ADHD medication to very young children against the potential harm of delaying diagnosis and treatment. Ductal carcinoma in situ is a noninvasive form of breast cancer. Although the condition is not life-threatening in itself, it may increase the chances of developing an invasive form of breast cancer later in life. However, a new study suggests that women who have been treated for ductal carcinoma in situ continue to live as long as other women. Share on Pinterest New research suggests that DCIS patients are expected to live as long as the general female population. According to the American Cancer Society, ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) accounts for approximately 1 in 5 newly diagnosed breast cancers. DCIS is found in the breasts milk ducts and is deemed noninvasive because it does not spread to the rest of the body. However, there is a risk that DCIS evolves into an invasive form of breast cancer currently estimated at under 30 percent which is why the condition is typically treated with surgery or a combination of surgery and radiation therapy. New research presented at the European Cancer Congress 2017 (ECCO) suggests that women aged 50 and above who have been diagnosed and treated for DCIS tend to live longer than women in the general population. The study was carried out by a team of researchers from the Netherlands Cancer Institute in Amsterdam, and it was led by Dr. Jelle Wesseling, a breast pathologist. The findings were presented at the Congress by Dr. Lotte Elshof, research physician and epidemiologist at the Netherlands Cancer Institute, and the first author of the study. DCIS patients at lower risk of all-cause mortality than general population Dr. Wesseling and team investigated clinical data on nearly 10,000 women who were treated for DCIS with surgery, radiation therapy, or both. The researchers followed the women between 1989 and 2004. The scientists compared the cause-specific mortality in this cohort with the expected mortality rates in the general female population by calculating standardized mortality ratios. During the follow-up period, 1,429 deaths occurred. Of these, 368 deaths were caused by cardiovascular disease, and 284 by breast cancer. Overall, the study participants had a considerably lower risk of all-cause mortality, compared with the general population. Specifically, women aged 50 and over who had been treated for DCIS had a 10 percent lower risk of dying from all causes combined, compared with the general population. Former DCIS patients had lower chances of dying from circulatory, digestive, and respiratory disorders, as well as mental and behavioral disorders. Additionally, they also had a lower risk of dying from endocrine, metabolic, and nutritional diseases, as well as lung and urogenital cancer. However, the study also revealed that after 10 years, DCIS patients had a slightly higher risk of dying from breast cancer than the general female population. At 10 years, this risk was approximately 2.5 percent, and at 15 years after the DCIS diagnosis, it raised to 3.9 percent. A new study reveals that the microbe communities of the cervix and vagina are significantly linked to the risk of premature birth. It suggests that, with further research, the finding could lead to therapies that promote the beneficial bacteria or reduce the risk-raising ones as a way to prevent premature birth. Share on Pinterest Researchers found that the risk of preterm birth appears to be linked to the types of bacteria in the vagina and cervix, with some species tied to a higher risk and others tied to a lower risk. The study, led by the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, featured recently at the annual meeting of the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine in Las Vegas, NV, where it received the March of Dimes Award for Best Abstract on Prematurity. The abstract is published in the American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology. Premature or preterm birth defined as that which occurs before 37 weeks of pregnancy is the leading cause of death worldwide among children under 5 years of age. In 2015, around 1 in 10 babies born in the United States were premature. Rates of premature birth in the U.S. fell between 2007 and 2014, partly due to reductions in the number of births to teenagers and young mothers. More recently, however, preterm birth rates have begun to rise again, as Michal Elovitz, a professor in obstetrics and gynecology at Perelman and lead author of the study, explains: For the first time in 8 years, the number of preterm babies in the United States actually increased in 2016, and unfortunately, there are underlying causes that doctors still dont understand. Babies born too early can experience serious problems, some of which can be lifelong. These include feeding difficulties, jaundice, problems with breathing, vision loss, developmental delay, vision loss, cerebral palsy, and hearing impairment. In addition to these health problems, premature births incur an emotional and financial toll on families. At a national level, the burden can exceed $26 billion per year in avoidable medical and societal costs. The last time you had a stomach bug, you probably didn't feel much like eating. This loss of appetite is part of your body's normal response to an illness but is not well understood. Sometimes eating less during illness promotes a faster recovery, but other times - such as when cancer patients experience wasting - the loss of appetite can be deadly. Now, research from the Salk Institute shows how bacteria block the appetite loss response in their host to both make the host healthier and also promote the bacteria's transmission to other hosts. This surprising discovery, published in the journal Cell, reveals a link between appetite and infection and could have implications in treating infectious diseases, infection transmission and appetite loss associated with illness, aging, inflammation or medical interventions (like chemotherapy). "It's long been known that infections cause loss of appetite but the function of that, if any, is only beginning to be understood," says Janelle Ayres, assistant professor at Salk Institute's Nomis Foundation Laboratories for Immunobiology and Microbial Pathogenesis. Mice orally infected with the bacteria Salmonella Typhimurium typically experience appetite loss and eventually become much sicker as the bacteria become more virulent - spreading from the intestines to other tissues in the body. Ayres' team tested different conditions in the infected mice and found that sick mice that consumed extra calories despite their appetite loss actually survived longer. It turns out this survival wasn't due to a more active immune response by well-fed animals (as measured by levels of the bacteria in the host). Instead, it was because the Salmonella weren't spreading outside of the intestines and throughout the body when the mice ate more, which enabled the animals to stay healthy despite infection. Even more surprising, the Salmonella were acting on the intestine to try to suppress the appetite loss in the host. The finding was initially puzzling: why would the bacteria become less virulent and not spread to other areas in the body when nutrients were more plentiful? And why would Salmonella actively promote this condition? It turns out the bacteria were making a tradeoff between virulence, which is the ability of a microbe to cause disease within one host, and transmission, which is its ability to spread and establish infections between multiple hosts. "What we found was that appetite loss makes the Salmonella more virulent, perhaps because it needs to go beyond the intestines to find nutrients for itself. This increased virulence kills its host too fast, which compromises the bacteria's ability to spread to new hosts," explains Sheila Rao, a Salk research associate and the first author on the study. "The tradeoff between transmission and virulence has not been appreciated before - it was previously thought that virulence and transmission were coupled." When the host ate more and survived longer during infection, the Salmonella benefitted: bacteria in those mice were able to spread via feces to other animals and increase its transmission between hosts, as compared to bacteria in mice who didn't eat and died sooner due to heightened bacterial virulence. The researchers discovered that, to halt the appetite-loss response and boost transmission between hosts, Salmonella produces a molecule called SlrP, which blocks activation of an immune protein (cytokine) in the intestines. This cytokine typically communicates with the brain's appetite center, called the hypothalamus, to prompt the host to lose its appetite during infection. The team found that mice infected with Salmonella that couldn't make SlrP ate less food while infected, lost more weight and died faster than control mice. Though the same gut-brain pathway tied to appetite loss exists in the human as in mice, Ayres cautions that infection responses are dependent on many factors and that whether eating - or fasting - during illness can improve one's health will depend in large part on what the causative agent of the infection is. Her team is planning to search the human microbiome (the collection of bacteria that live in people's bodies) to find other microbes that might have a similar effect on this pathway and explore those for new therapies tied to appetite loss and treating disease. The lab also wants to investigate whether drugs could be used to turn up or down the sickness-induced appetite-loss pathway that SlrP targets. "Now that we'd identified this mechanism that regulates appetite, we want to turn it on the flip side and see if we can decrease appetite via this mechanism to help in cases of metabolic disease," says Ayres. The discovery also points to the tantalizing possibility of treating infectious diseases with approaches other than antibiotics, such as nutritional intervention. "Finding alternatives to antibiotics is incredibly important as these drugs have already encouraged the evolution of deadly antibiotic-resistant strains," says Ayres. In the United States alone, two million people annually become infected with bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics and at least 23,000 people die each year as a direct result of these infections, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. The work and the researchers involved were supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health, the Nomis Foundation, the Searle Scholar Foundation and the Ray Thomas Edward Foundation. Further information can be found in this video from Salk Institute. Johns Hopkins researchers report that a new peptide holds promise for improving treatment for degenerative retinal diseases, such as age-related macular degeneration, diabetic macular edema and diabetic retinopathy. These vascular diseases often result in central vision loss as blood vessels grow into tissues at the back of the eye, where such growth should not occur. The study, published in Science Translational Medicine, shows that the injectable peptide may more strongly suppress abnormal blood vessel growth and leakage in the eye, cause regression of established abnormal vessels, and may last longer when compared to current treatments. If proven effective in humans, this could mean that patients need only a few needle injections to the eye per year, instead of the monthly injections that are the current standard of care. Aflibercept is the standard treatment for these retinal diseases and specifically targets one protein, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), which signals for the production of these new problematic blood vessels. Treatments are administered by injecting drugs that bind VEGF directly into the eye. "The production of VEGF is chronic, so repeated injections every four to six weeks is needed in most patients, often indefinitely," says Peter Campochiaro, M.D., the George S. and Dolores D. Eccles Professor of Ophthalmology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Jordan Green, Ph.D., associate professor of biomedical engineering at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, says, "These frequent visits can become a burden for patients due to the discomfort and small risk of each injection and, for some patients, because their vision is not good enough to drive to appointments." Using animal models of human disease, the researchers tested whether the peptide, named AXT107 after its discovery in the laboratory of Aleksander S. Popel, Ph.D., professor of biomedical engineering at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, was more effective at suppressing vascularization than currently used treatments. To do this, researchers ruptured tissues at the back of mice's eyes to induce vascular growth. The mice were then separated into four treatment groups. One received the AXT107 peptide, another received aflibercept, a third control group received an inactive peptide, and a fourth group received both AXT107 and aflibercept. The researchers found that the AXT107 peptide and aflibercept significantly suppressed new vessel growth, and the combination of AXT107 and aflibercept caused significantly more suppression than either alone. In another experiment, mice had laser-induced rupture of tissue and then no treatment for seven days, allowing new vessels to grow. The baseline area of new vessels was measured in one group, and other mice were treated with AXT107 or a control peptide. One week later, the area of new vessels was observed to be less in AXT107-treated mice compared to those treated with control peptide and less than the baseline area measured at day seven, indicating that treatment with AXT107 between days seven and 14 caused regression of already established new vessels. Campochiaro explains: "Unlike the current standard, which only targets the VEGF protein, our peptide also binds to cellular receptors that recognize growth factors like VEGF. The cellular signals for vascular growth are blocked in many ways by the peptide, allowing it to have a stronger effect." The research team then proceeded to test the peptide in rabbit models of human disease, which are structurally more similar to human eyes, to see whether AXT107 treatment could outlast the effects of aflibercept. The rabbits were divided into three groups: one group received the peptide treatment, another received aflibercept and one received a control. Thirty days after treatment, vascular leakage was reduced by 86 percent in the rabbits treated with AXT107 and 69 percent in rabbits treated with aflibercept, when compared to controls. Sixty days after treatment, AXT107 treated rabbits showed 70 percent less leaking than control rabbits, while the aflibercept-treated rabbits had about as much leaking as the controls. The reason for AXT107's longevity is its interactions once inside of the eye, the researchers say. They found that when in the fluid of the eye, the peptides naturally aggregated to form a small, gel-like depot, a structure that keeps the peptide inside the eye for longer. "The peptide self-assembles into an aggregate and then slowly disassembles to provide sustained delivery of the peptide," says Campochiaro. The researchers now plan to investigate delivery mechanisms and the safety of the peptide for humans. The researchers believe the peptide could be encapsulated into biodegradable microparticles, which could release the drug in a controlled manner, extending efficacy of a single treatment to many months. In addition, the small peptide is easily made in large quantities chemically, compared to the large, complex protein used in current treatments, which must be manufactured biologically. "The peptide can be manufactured for clinical use and scaled up very easily," says Green. "In addition to potentially improving treatment for patients, combined with needing less frequent clinical visits, this could bring down the cost of treating these diseases." Age-related macular degeneration and diabetic retinopathy are the two leading causes of vision loss in the U.S. - 1.6 million Americans 50 and older are currently affected by vision impairment related to age-related macular degeneration, and 5.3 million people 18 and older have some form of diabetic retinopathy, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Funding for this research was provided by the Edward N. and Della L. Thorne Memorial Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the National Eye Institute (1R21EY022986-01, 1R43EY-24495, 1R43EY025903), the Maryland Biotechnology Award and TEDCO Maryland Innovation Initiative Phases 1 and 3, and the Johns Hopkins-Coulter Translational Partnership. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced today that its laboratory analysis found inconsistent amounts of belladonna, a toxic substance, in certain homeopathic teething tablets, sometimes far exceeding the amount claimed on the label. The agency is warning consumers that homeopathic teething tablets containing belladonna pose an unnecessary risk to infants and children and urges consumers not to use these products. In light of these findings, the FDA contacted Standard Homeopathic Company in Los Angeles, the manufacturer of Hyland's homeopathic teething products, regarding a recall of its homeopathic teething tablet products labeled as containing belladonna, in order to protect consumers from inconsistent levels of belladonna. At this time, the company has not agreed to conduct a recall. The FDA recommends that consumers stop using these products marketed by Hyland's immediately and dispose of any in their possession. In November 2016, Raritan Pharmaceuticals (East Brunswick, New Jersey) recalled three belladonna-containing homeopathic products, two of which were marketed by CVS. "The body's response to belladonna in children under two years of age is unpredictable and puts them at unnecessary risk," said Janet Woodcock, M.D., director of the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. "We recommend that parents and caregivers not give these homeopathic teething tablets to children and seek advice from their health care professional for safe alternatives." Homeopathic teething products have not been evaluated or approved by the FDA for safety or effectiveness. The agency is unaware of any proven health benefit of the products, which are labeled to relieve teething symptoms in children. In September 2016 , the FDA warned against the use of these products after receiving adverse event reports. Consumers should seek medical care immediately if their child experiences seizures, difficulty breathing, lethargy, excessive sleepiness, muscle weakness, skin flushing, constipation, difficulty urinating, or agitation after using homeopathic teething products. The FDA encourages health care professionals and consumers to report adverse events or quality problems experienced with the use of homeopathic teething products to the FDA's MedWatch Adverse Event Reporting program : SMITHS FALLS, ON Jan. 30, 2017 December 1, 2016 January 31 Canada Canada Canada TORONTO and/CNW/ - Mettrum Health Corp. ("") (TSXV: MT) and Canopy Growth Corporation (TSX: CGC) ("", and together with Mettrum, the "") are pleased to announce that the Ontario Superior Court of Justice has issued a final order approving the proposed acquisition by Canopy Growth of all of the issued and outstanding common shares of Mettrum by way of a plan of arrangement (the ""), as previously announced by the Companies onCompletion of the Arrangement remains conditional on certain closing conditions customary for transactions of this nature pursuant to the terms of the definitive arrangement agreement dated November 30, 2016, as amended. Subject to the satisfaction or waiver of all such closing conditions, it is anticipated that the Arrangement will be completed after the markets have closed on January 31, 2017.The Arrangement, if completed, will result in the creation of a world-leading diversified cannabis company with six licensed facilities and a licensed production footprint of approximately 665,000 sq. ft. with significant acreage for expansion. Following completion of the Arrangement, Mettrum will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Canopy Growth, trading of Mettrum's common shares on the TSX Venture Exchange will be halted after closing onand Mettrum's common shares will be delisted from the TSX Venture Exchange in the normal course shortly thereafter.Mettrum Health Corp. is a Tier 1 Industry Issuer listed on TSX Venture Exchange. With three licenses to produce and sell medical cannabis under the, Mettrum Health Corp. is a leading producer and vendor of medical cannabis. In addition, through its wholly-owned subsidiary Mettrum Hempworks, Mettrum also is a licensed producer and distribution of industrial cannabis (hemp) products, including Mettrum's functional food line, Mettrum Originals, under the) issued pursuant to the). For more information, visit www.mettrum.com.Canopy Growth is a world-leading diversified cannabis company, offering diverse brands and curated cannabis strain varieties in dried and oil extract forms. Through its wholly-owned subsidiaries, Tweed, Tweed Farms, and Bedrocan Canada, Canopy Growth operates three state-of-the-art production facilities with over half a million square feet of indoor and greenhouse production capacity. Canopy Growth has established partnerships with leading sector names inand abroad. For more information, visit www.canopygrowth.com.SOURCE Canopy Growth Corporation Advertisement Based on the cases and deaths statistics from 2009-2013, in the U.S the number of new cases of esophageal cancer was 4.3 per 100,000 men and women per year and number of deaths was 4.1 per 100,000 men and women per year.The number of new cases of stomach cancer was 7.4 per 100,000 men and women per year and the number of deaths was 3.3 per 100,000 men and women per year.In 2013, there were an estimated 36,857 people living with esophageal cancer and 79,843 people living with stomach cancer in the United States.There were an estimated 16,910 new cases of esophageal cancer and 26,370 new cases of stomach cancer in 2016 in U.S.Ambiguous symptoms and late diagnosis, often bring down the level of the five-year survival rate for these two types of cancer to 15%.The new research showed that the test could diagnose cancer with an overall accuracy of 85%.Dr Sheraz Markar, an NIHR Clinical Trials Fellow from Imperial College London, under the supervision of Professor George Hanna, told the Congress "At present the only way to diagnose esophageal cancer or stomach cancer is with endoscopy. This method is expensive, invasive and has some risk of complications.""A breath test could be used as a non-invasive, first-line test to reduce the number of unnecessary endoscopies. In the longer term this could also mean earlier diagnosis and treatment, and better survival." Dr Marker added.Previous research had suggested that there are differences in the levels of specific chemicals such asbetween patients with stomach or esophageal cancer and patients with just upper gastrointestinal symptoms but without cancer.The new research, which is based on this research, aimed to test whether thiscould be the basis of a diagnostic test.The research team collected breath samples from 335 people at St Mary's Hospital, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust; University College London Hospital and the Royal Marsden Hospital, London.Among them, 163 had been diagnosed with stomach or esophageal cancer through an endoscopy and 172 showed no evidence of cancer when they had an endoscopy.All the samples were analyzed with a technique called. This test accurately measures small amounts of different chemicals in mixtures of gases such as breath.Researchers measured the levels of the five chemicals in each sample to see which ones matched to the 'chemical signature' that indicated cancer.The results showed that the test was 85% accurate overall, with a sensitivity of 80% and a specificity of 81%.The test was sensitive- which meant that it was good at picking up those who had cancer, it was also specific- which meant that it was good at correctly identifying who did not have cancer.Dr Markar said "Because cancer cells are different to healthy ones, they produce a different mixture of chemicals. This study suggests that we may be able detect these differences and use a breath test to indicate which patients are likely to have cancer of the oesophagus and stomach, and which do not. However, these findings must be validated in a larger sample of patients before the test could be used in the clinic."The researchers plan to conduct a larger trial using the test in patients who are being given an endoscopy for gastrointestinal symptoms but not yet diagnosed with cancer.This will assess the ability of the test to pick up cases within a group that is likely to contain only a small percentage of cancers.Breath tests for other types of cancer, such as colorectal and pancreatic, are also being researched upon. This could be used as first-line tests in general practice surgeries.Source: Medindia Advertisement There is no known cause for mucosal melanoma and usually has a poor prognosis due to late diagnosis. Most of the patients with metastatic cancer would survive for less than a year if they had received the conventional treatment.The study results of the pembrolizumab drug for melanoma patients were reported. Dr.Marcus Butler, medical oncologist, Princess Margaret Cancer Center, Toronto, Canada, has also told the European Cancer Organization2017 that out of the 1567 patients who participated in the clinical trials KEYNOTE-001,002 and 006 had advanced mucosal melanoma.He said, "Sixteen of these patients (19%) responded to treatment with pembrolizumab, of whom 12 are still alive without their disease progressing and, so far, the longest time some of these patients have continued to be successfully treated is more than 27 months."Out of the 1483 patients who had other forms of advanced melanoma and who had received atleast one dose of the pembrolizumab drug - 33% of patients were found to respond to treatment and 72% were still alive without any disease progression. The average overall survival rate of the patients was nearly two years while for mucosal melanoma it was nearly 11.3 months.Immunotherapy has improved treatment options for melanoma. Some patients with mucosal melanoma have also received complete responses for pembrolizumab drug which was given intravenously at doses of 2 mg/kg or 10 mg/kg every three weeks, or 10 mg/kg every two weeks, and were able to return to a normal life. Few of them have less responses and yet still benefited from treatment.The study findings suggest that mucosal melanoma patients should be offered immunotherapy as a standard of care and must not be excluded even though it offers a bit lower response rates when compared to other melanomas. However further studies are conducted to improve benefit.The drug mainly acts by binding to the programmed cell death protein 1 receptor and blocks the interaction between PD-1 and its ligands.The ligands may activate the T lymphocyte cells and may affect both the tumor cells and the healthy cells.Programmed-cell death protein 1 (PD-1) receptor is a receptor present on the surface of the T cells. Programmed death ligand 1 is a molecule which binds to the PD-1 receptor and is often over expressed in the cancer cells that enable them to evade the immune system and allows the cancer cells to grow.Around 70% of the patients with mucosal melanoma with known PD-L1 status had PD-L1 positive tumors.Dr. Butler, said, "The data presented here are important because they prove that patients with mucosal melanoma can benefit from anti-PD-1 therapy and should not be excluded from this treatment.""At this stage we don't know why some mucosal melanoma patients responded to pembrolizumab, while others did not. This is an important question and research is ongoing." he added.About 99% of the patients with mucosal melanoma received atleast one prior treatment and 39% of them received ipilimumab drug, a type of monoclonal antibody which is used in the treatment of melanoma.The author also said that the results show patients to be benefited from pembrolizumab drug irrespective of whether they were being pretreated with ipilimumab drug.Professor Peter Naredi, from the Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden, Chair of the Congress and President of the ECCO, also commented, "For rare cancer types it is difficult to evaluate new treatments in normal sized trials. But here Butler and colleagues pull three trials together and show that long-lasting responses also occur with pembrolizumab in patients with mucosal melanoma."Dr Andrea Necchi, attending physician in the Department of Medical Oncology at the Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori, Milan, Italy, said, that the results of the pembrolizumab drug trial were found to improve the overall survival with fewer side effects for patients with advanced bladder cancer when compared to patients given with chemotherapy.Bladder cancer is the seventh most common cancer in men and is the seventeenth most common cancer in women. Around 430,000 cases of bladder cancer are being diagnosed every year.The overall survival rate was 10.3 months with pembrolizumab while it was only 7.4 months with chemotherapy. The researchers also estimated that around twice as many pembrolizumab responders would respond to the therapy for atleast one year.Dr Necchi, concluded, "In addition to the overall survival benefit over chemotherapy, pembrolizumab was also associated with a much lower incidence of treatment-related side effects. This is important because this patient population tends to be mostly elderly patients who have many other illnesses and health conditions as well. These results support the use of pembrolizumab as the new standard of care for advanced bladder cancer."The side effects of the drug with any grades of severity were reported in 61% of the patients when compared to 90% of the patients treated with chemotherapy. Around 15% and 49% of patients with severe side effects with grade3,4 and 5 respectively.Source: Medindia President Donald Trump in a statement Sunday mourned the loss of a U.S. service member in a raid on the Al-Qaida branch in Yemen; it was the first combat action he personally authorized as the new Commander-in-Chief. Americans are saddened this morning with news that a life of a heroic service member has been taken in our fight against the evil of radical Islamic terrorism, Trump said. My deepest thoughts and humblest prayers are with the family of this fallen service member, Trump said. I also pray for a quick and complete recovery for the brave service members who sustained injuries. Trump said that the successful raid against what he described as a headquarters in Yemen of Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula resulted in U.S. forces killing an estimated 14 AQAP members and capturing important intelligence that will assist the U.S. in preventing terrorism against its citizens and people around the world. U.S. Central Command said that one U.S. service member was killed, three were wounded, and a fourth was injured in the hard landing of a military aircraft after the raid. The identity of the service member who was killed was withheld until the family could be notified. Several news outlets reported that the service member was serving with the elite Navy SEAL Team 6. Army Gen. Joseph Votel, commander of CENTCOM, said in a statement that We are deeply saddened by the loss of one of our elite service members. The sacrifices are very profound in our fight against terrorists who threaten innocent peoples across the globe. The military aircraft that made the hard landing was reportedly an MV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft. That aircraft was unable to fly after the landing (and) the aircraft was then intentionally destroyed in place, the CENTCOM statement said. Richard Sisk can be reached at Richard.Sisk@Military.com Here are five noteworthy stories and events to start your week. US Troop Killed in Yemen in First Raid Authorized by Trump A U.S. service member was killed and three were wounded on Saturday in a rare raid on the Al-Qaida branch in Yemen, and a fourth was injured in the "hard landing" of a V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft afterward, US. Central Command said in a statement on Sunday. President Donald Trump in a statement mourned the loss of the service member, an event that marked the first combat action he personally authorized as the new commander-in-chief. Trump said the "successful raid" against a headquarters in Yemen of Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula resulted in U.S. forces "killing an estimated 14 AQAP members and capturing important intelligence that will assist the U.S. in preventing terrorism against its citizens and people around the world." Trump Shuffles National Security Council The president on Saturday announced a reorganization of the National Security Council. The move gives Trump's chief political strategist, Stephen Bannon, the former head of the website Breitbart News, and other advisers seats on the principals committee. The order also changes the status of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the director of National Intelligence, who are invited to attend such panel meetings when "issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed," the order states. Robert Gates, the former defense secretary and CIA director, called excluding such officials "a big mistake." "They both bring a perspective and judgment and experience that every president -- whether they like it or not -- finds useful," Gates told ABC News. Republicans Criticize Trump's Immigration Order Some Republicans criticized Trump's immigration order that came late Friday and quickly impacted refugees and citizens from Muslim countries traveling to the United States. The directive, which has spurred protests and legal action, suspends for 120 days all refugee admissions; indefinitely bars Syrian refugees from entering the country; and blocks for 90 days citizens of certain Muslim-majority countries from entering the country, including Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, according to The New York Times. Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina in a statement said, "It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trump's executive order was not properly vetted." Iraq quickly approved a similar measure applying to Americans. VA Secretary Nominee to Testify at Confirmation Hearing The Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, headed by Sen. Johnny Isakson, a Republican from Georgia, is set to hold a hearing on Wednesday as part of the confirmation process for Dr. David Shulkin, the undersecretary for health at the Veterans Affairs Department, to become VA secretary. If Shulkin is confirmed, he would be the first VA secretary without prior military service and Trump's first cabinet member who served in the Obama administration. Many vet groups, including the Disabled American Veterans, had pushed for Trump to keep Robert McDonald on the job, but the president-elect signaled he wanted someone else to reform the agency in part by giving vets more access to private care. Trump raised the issue frequently during his campaign. Navy to Decommission World's First Nuclear-Powered Aircraft Carrier The U.S. Navy on Friday will hold a ceremony to officially mark the decommissioning of the world's first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, the USS Enterprise, known as the "Big E" and inactivated in 2012 after joining the fleet in 1961, according to The Virginian Pilot. Some 12,000 people turned out for the inactivation five years ago. The ceremony in Newport News Shipbuilding, a division of Huntington Ingalls Industries in Virginia, is expected to draw about 100 people; it will be closed to the public but video of the event will be posted on the Navy's Facebook page, according to the newspaper. The process of decommissioning the massive ship included defueling its eight reactors and preparing the full for dismantlement, according to Naval Today. -- Richard Sisk contributed to this report. -- Brendan McGarry can be reached at brendan.mcgarry@military.com. Follow him on Twitter at @Brendan_McGarry. Camp Lejeune Town Halls Aim to Help Those Exposed to Toxic Water. Heres How You Can Go. Retired Marine Master Sgt. Jerry Ensminger made it his mission to tell the world that if they lived or served on Camp Lejeune... Navy SEAL Team 6 fought and killed female fighters of an al-Qaida affiliate in the raid Saturday in Yemen in which a team member was killed, three were wounded and three injured, the Pentagon said Monday. "There were a lot of female combatants that were a part of this," Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said of the firefight in the raid Saturday, which the Defense Department and White House said killed at least 14 enemy fighters. "Some of those enem[ies] killed in action were female." Davis said the SEALs saw the women running to fighting positions as the team approached an enemy compound in Yemen's interior. The main al-Qaida group generally limits women to support roles and suicide attacks, but AQAP reportedly has put women through training for combat. The White House said the raid collected intelligence on AQAP's plans for attacks in Europe and elsewhere. Davis said the materiel gathered would give the DoD "a deeper insight into the group's planning." AQAP has claimed responsibility for the "Charlie Hebdo" terror attacks in Paris in 2015 and for the attempt to bring down an airliner over Detroit in December 2009 by the so-called "underwear bomber." The raid was planned months ago under the administration of former President Barack Obama, Davis said, but was personally authorized by President Donald Trump in the first combat action he approved as the new commander in chief. In a White House statement, Trump called the raid "successful" and said it resulted in the capture of intelligence that would "assist the U.S. in preventing terrorism against its citizens and people around the world." "Americans are saddened this morning with news that a life of a heroic service member has been taken in our fight against the evil of radical Islamic terrorism," Trump said in the statement. The SEAL team member reportedly was killed in the firefight in a remote desert area of Yemen's Shabwah governorate. Late Monday, he was identified as Chief Special Warfare Operator William "Ryan" Owens, of Peoria, Illinois. Three other team members were wounded in the firefight, and three other service members were injured in the "hard landing" of V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft as it evacuated the raiders and the casualties, Davis said. Davis said it was unclear whether the Osprey was the MV-22 Marine version of the aircraft or the CV-22 special operations variant. The Osprey could not be flown out after the hard landing and was destroyed in an airstrike, he said. A Yemeni official told The Washington Post that about 35 to 40 people were killed in the raid on the village where AQAP had a presence. Davis said the U.S. is still assessing whether civilians were killed. The U.S. raiders rappelled from aircraft as the militants gathered for a late-night session of chewing qat, the leafy narcotic used by most Yemeni males, the Yemeni official said. Editor's Note: This story has been updated to identify the SEAL killed in the Yemen raid. -- Richard Sisk can be reached at Richard.Sisk@Military.com. Iraqi nationals who risked their lives to help American troops in wartime should not be subject to a recent executive order halting immigration from Iraq, a bipartisan group of lawmakers wrote in a letter to President Donald Trump on Monday. The letter, a joint effort by Reps. Duncan Hunter, R-California, and Adam Kinzinger, R-Illinois, asks Trump to grant the request of Defense Secretary James Mattis to exempt Iraqi military interpreters, aides and allies from the scope of the order. Both Hunter and Kinzinger are veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, respectively. The letter was also signed by Reps. Steve Stivers, R-Ohio; Earl Blumenauer, D-Oregon; Seth Moulton, D-Massachusetts; and Peter Welch, D-Vermont. Stivers and Moulton are also veterans. Moulton, a Marine Corps veteran of Iraq, has publicly discussed bringing his own interpreter to the United States on a Special Immigrant Visa. RELATED: Pentagon Creating List of Iraqis Who Have Worked With US Troops "We made a promise to the men and women who served alongside us on the battlefield, and we must uphold that promise to leave no man behind," Hunter and Kinzinger said in a joint statement. "We urge the president to honor Secretary Mattis' requests, and stand up for those who stood by our military and American personnel. For the safety of these courageous individuals and their families, and in the interest of our national security, it's critical that we make this exception and do so swiftly." On his own, Moulton has taken an even stronger stance in full opposition to Trump's executive order. In a statement, he warned that closing doors to immigration would fuel antipathy against the U.S. and help Islamic State radicals recruit new suicide bombers. "His policies literally put our troops' lives at risk -- I've heard this loud and clear when I have visited them overseas," he said. "They also prove he has zero understanding of our country's values and no intention of defending our Constitution." Trump's executive order, published Jan. 27, put an immediate temporary halt to immigration from seven countries, including Iraq. The order caused immigrants currently in transit to be taken into custody, including Hameed Khalid Darweesh, who had reportedly worked for the U.S. government in Iraq for more than a decade. Darweesh, who was granted a Special Immigrant Visa on Jan. 20, was ultimately released into the U.S. a full day later. A Pentagon spokesman, Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, told reporters Monday that the Defense Department is making a list of Iraqis who had worked to help U.S. troops for submission to the government agencies carrying out the executive order. Special Immigrant Visas were created in 2008 for the express purpose of providing a special path for people from Iraq and Afghanistan who had assisted American troops to resettle in the United States, a recognition that these individuals and their families often faced greater danger because of their service. "It is important that a special exception is made for the consideration of individuals who directly supported American personnel overseas," the lawmakers wrote in their letter. "We respectfully ask that you take this action to ensure these individuals are not put in any further danger. Doing so would send a strong signal to those who show such immense courage to advance U.S. security interests at a risk to their own safety, as well as the many veterans and warfighters who've relied on the service of these individuals for their own protection and to accomplish their objectives." -- Hope Hodge Seck can be reached at hope.seck@military.com. Follow her on Twitter at@HopeSeck. Jeanice Swift.jpg Superintendent, Jeanice Swift, hosts "Continuing the Conversation" meeting at Clague Middle School, Tuesday, January 20, 2015. The board of education increased Swift's compensation in an amendment to her contract approved Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2016. (The Ann Arbor News file) ANN ARBOR, MI - Ann Arbor Public Schools have confirmed their commitment to protect children of all immigration statuses. In a statement released Monday, Jan. 30, in response to President Donald Trump's recent executive order on immigration, Ann Arbor Public Schools Superintendent Jeanice Swift said the district will remain "strong in support of our immigrant, Muslim, and refugee students and their families." The order, which has been called a "Muslim ban," indefinitely barred Syrian refugees from entering the United States, and temporarily suspended refugee admissions and the entry of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries. The efforts are an attempt to keep out radical Islamic terrorists, Trump said at the signing Friday, and followed an order for construction of a wall at the U.S.-Mexico border. In her statement, Swift said the district sees diversity as its strength, a child's education as a constitutional right, and a child's feeling of safety as a necessity for education to occur. She noted students may be experiencing fear due to the recent developments. "Our school teams, teachers and principals remain ready to support our children and families who are experiencing distress," she said. "Specifically, We will continue in our commitment and practice that a child's immigration status will have no impact whatsoever on his or her education in the AAPS. Children have a constitutional right to equal access to education regardless of their immigration status or their parents' status. The fundamental right to access public education is constitutionally protected, and cannot be taken away by the president or state or federal legislators. In the AAPS, we will not ask about a child's immigration status at school. Public school districts have an obligation to enroll students regardless of their immigration status and without discrimination on the basis of race, color or national origin." Those in need of additional support are asked to contact their school principal or call (734) 994-2200. Information is also available on the district's website at AAPS Immigrant Students FAQ, and "Immigrant and Refugee Children: A Guide for Educators and School Support Staff" from Teaching Tolerance. The statement follows similar ones by University of Michigan President Mark Schlissel and Ann Arbor Mayor Christopher Taylor. To read the full statement from AAPS, click here: Saline students.jpg (From left to right) Saline High School senior Max Ellsworth, sophomore Jack Werner and senior Robbie Felton look at a website on Jan. 25, 2017. They discuss how to identify credible information online. (Lauren Slagter | The Ann Arbor News) ANN ARBOR, MI - With a cursory look at slate.com's homepage, Saline High School students Max Ellsworth, Jack Werner and Robbie Felton identify the different types of content. The banner at the top of the page is an advertisement because it offers a discount code, said senior Robbie Felton, 17. The block below it that reads, "Should California Stop Growing Almonds?" is an article because there's a byline with the author's name, sophomore Jack Werner, 15, points out. Another link promising to explain, "The Real Reasons Women Don't Go Into Tech" gives them pause. The "sponsored content" label on that piece means the content is likely trying to sell you something, said senior Max Ellsworth, 18, although it still could be useful information. "I don't really think this is an advertisement ... although it does say 'sponsored content,' which makes me think that this may or may not be biased because some organization is clearly sponsoring this article or this headline," Ellsworth said. "I think it kind of goes back to what Robbie said of just taking things with a grain of salt." The Slate example was used in a Stanford University study published in November 2016 that found middle school, high school and college students are not especially adept at evaluating the credibility of online information. "Overall, young people's ability to reason about the information on the Internet can be summed up in one word: bleak," the study says. Of the 7,804 student responses included in the study, 80 percent of middle schoolers didn't know "sponsored content" is a type of advertising, fewer than 20 percent of high school students questioned the credibility of a photo from an unknown source, and less than one-third of college students considered the political leanings of an organization tweeting a statistic about gun owners. With an infinite amount of information available online, a growing national debate about what qualifies as "fake news" and President Donald J. Trump's spokespeople using the phrase "alternative facts," it can be hard to tell what's real. How are schools preparing these digital natives to evaluate information online? Schools have always taught students to think critically about information presented to them, said Sarah Andrew-Vaughan, Ann Arbor Public Schools' English language arts department chair for secondary education. "It's great work to teach students to be critical thinkers," she said, noting that the ability to evaluate information is part of Michigan's academic standards. "That's the work of all of our disciplines." About five years ago, AAPS began focusing more specifically on digital literacy, Andrew-Vaughan said, through a partnership with the University of Michigan's School of Education. In three days of workshops each fall, U-M student-teachers talk to Scarlett Middle School students about appropriate online behavior and the tools available to help them determine if information on the Internet is credible. Other Ann Arbor schools are adopting similar programs, she said. "Students ask the right question - 'How is this relevant to me?' They ask that of all curriculum for all time," Andrew-Vaughan said. "Right now makes those evaluation skills feel very relevant, which is great." The spread of misinformation pre-dates the Internet, said Josh Pasek, a U-M assistant professor of communications studies, but there is a growing number of websites intentionally sharing inaccurate information and the term "fake news" is relatively new. Pasek is studying how social media might be changing the political information environment. "Fake news doesn't have a definition at this point," Pasek said. "What that means is we're negotiating what fake news is as part of this large public debate on the preponderance of fake news." A baseline definition of "fake news" would be information that is entirely fabricated for the sake of getting clicks online, Pasek added. To stem the flood of fake news online, he advised sharing articles only from media outlets known to be credible and pointing out when other social media users are perpetuating false information. "As a society we've shifted from where the bulk of news went through professional gatekeepers with formal, institutionalized outlets that needed a lot of money to publish their stories ... to a model where anybody can publish anything," Pasek said. "The filtering to see what was quality is done by the consumer, not by the producer. At this point, we are no longer in a position where you can assume that because something has been published it carries some weight. That makes the whole situation much more challenging. "It means that fundamentally, it's no longer the writer's job and the editor's job to figure out what's true. It's your job as a reader," he added. "It's a big responsibility, and one we haven't trained people for." Ellsworth, Werner and Felton agreed with Pasek's definition of fake news. Felton said he can tell fake news by its controversial headlines and baseless claims. He, Ellsworth and Werner said they identify credible information online based on the sources cited in an article, whether claims are supported by research and finding out whether there's a known bias of the author or media outlet publishing the information. Fake news aside, it also can be tricky to identify biased news and opinion pieces, the students said. It's confusing when two different media outlets present opposite views on the same issue, Werner added. Ellsworth subscribes to the New York Times online, and Werner and Felton said they usually find articles by following media outlets' social media accounts. They said they're likely to click on pieces from the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Huffington Post, VICE News and Buzzfeed. Learning to sort through what's true and what's not comes from experience, they said. Ellsworth developed those skills through Model UN, where they had to find accurate information about different countries. Writing research papers for classes helps, Werner said, and Felton said preparing for debates as a member of the debate team taught him a lot. "You have to fact check other people. You have to make sure what you're saying is credible," Felton said of his time on the debate team. "You have to make sure everything you say is backed up and supported or else you can get exposed, and you don't want to be looked at as a fraud for having fake information and spreading lies." YPSILANTI TOWNSHIP, MI - An Ypsilanti Township home was damaged by a fire on Sunday, Jan. 29. Firefighters were called about noon Sunday to the fire at the home in the 9800 block of Bemis Road, Chad French of Huron Valley Ambulance confirmed. The ambulance service handles dispatches for fire departments. Bemis Road borders Ypsilanti and Augusta townships. A portion of the home's roof was destroyed during the fire and firefighters remained on scene about 3:15 p.m. Further information about the fire was not immediately available. Old dump site for dredged soils raises concern Bayside Park in Bangor Township was an old dump site for dredged spoils from the Kawkawlin River. (Gavin McIntyre | MLive.com) BANGOR TOWNSHIP, MI -- Bangor Township officials are releasing environmental testing results of a neighborhood park this week after residents raised concerns of contamination and possible health side effects. The meeting, scheduled for 6 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 31, at Bangor Township Hall, 180 State Park Drive, is going to address an environmental study that was done last year at Bayside Park on the Kawkawlin River. Nearly 200 people live in the neighborhood adjacent to the park, officials said. Residents argue the park should have never been used as a dumping site for dredge spoils and, as a result, there have been negative environmental and health ramifications. Glenn Rowley, the township's supervisor, said test results by AKT Peerless and the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, show nothing of concern. "All the levels are acceptable of what they found in their samples," Rowley said. But some residents disagree. Marti Murphy, a Bangor Township government watchdog who is serving as a spokesman for the neighborhood, said the test results show an "unacceptable" level of heavy metals in the park, citing government standards. "They're going to say it's not that bad, but I've seen the results," Murphy said. "It's like playing Russian roulette with contaminated soil, but it's playing Russian roulette every day. People are living next to it every day." Rowley met with Joel Strasz, director of the Bay County Health Department, on Monday, Jan. 30, to prepare for Tuesday's meeting. Based on that meeting, he contends if people take a multi-vitamin, they're being exposed to a higher amount of metals than what was found in Bayside Park. "If you have a deck at your house with treated lumber, you have higher arsenic levels than you have in Bayside Park," he said. Rowley expects Tuesday's meeting to be "very adversarial." He is having officials from AKT Peerless and the DEQ, in addition to Strasz and Laura Ogar, Bay County's director of environmental affairs, explain the test results and answer questions. The testing cost the township $25,000, but officials anticipate to be reimbursed $9,000 from the Bay County Health Department. The contamination concerns have been serious, Rowley said, including people arguing that cancer rates are higher in the neighborhood as a result of what's in the park. Bay County Commissioner Ernie Krygier, D-2nd District, who represents Bangor Township, said one household had a husband and wife who were diagnosed with the same type of cancer. "That's quite unusual," he said. Murphy said he wants the government to test residents' sump pump water to see if any of those heavy metals have leached into their water systems. Their other concern is the fact that dredging spoils were dumped at the park in the first place. Bayside Park was given to the residents of the neighborhood and entrusted to Bangor Township. Citing land records and court documents, Murphy said it was only to be used as a park -- not as a dumping spot for dredging spoils. One of the options on the table, he said, could involve a lawsuit against Bangor Township for the removal of the spoils. Rowley said he hasn't heard any talk about a lawsuit against the township. In response to President Donald Trump's executive order to ban entry of people from seven Muslim-majority countries and refugees, Detroit's mayor said he is proud of the city's status as a "Welcoming City." Duggan, in a Monday morning, Jan. 30 news release, summed up Trump's order by saying "that's just not who we are as Americans." The executive order temporarily freezes travel to the United States for refugees and visa holders from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. A federal judge enacted an emergency stay Saturday night, ordering the release and halt of deportation for any travelers with permanent residency status in the U.S. under the changes ordered by Trump. Sunday saw at least four protests in the Detroit area Sunday in response to the controversial order. Thousands gathered at Detroit Metro Airport on the inside and out, as protesters chanted, raised signs and listened to speakers, dozens of Muslims knelt and prayed toward Mecca. There was one in Hamtramck, which has one of the highest concentrations of Muslim residents in Michigan. There was another at Dearborn's Henry Ford Centennial Library, and a sit-in was planned at Wayne State University in Detroit. The protest at the airport in Metro Detroit was the largest in the area Sunday. "When President Obama was attacked for his decision to increase acceptance of Syrian refugees, Detroit became a national leader in publicly offering a home for these families," Duggan writes in the statement. I've had a chance to visit some of our refugees as they've moved into their new homes in Detroit. "Their stories are deeply moving: fleeing with young children from the horrors of war, barely subsisting in overcrowded refugee camps in Turkey or Jordan, often for years, until the lengthy U.S. vetting process finally clears them." Trump's executive order won't impact diplomats or government officials, but there are reports of refugees headed to the United States being turned around, students blocked from flying to the United States to attend college and an Iraqi interpreter who spent a decade working with the U.S. Army stopped from entering the country. The immigration ban order is available in full here. Across the state, protesters also gathered in Ann Arbor and at Gerald R. Ford International Airport in Grand Rapids. "When you hear the pride and excitement in their voices for their chance to start a new life in this country, you realize what America means to so many in the world," Duggan writes in the statement. "Our country won't be made safer by telling victims of oppression that America's doors are closed to them or by telling them they're unwelcome because of their religion. "That's just not who we are as Americans." Lily Tomlin Lily Tomlin poses in the press room with the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 23rd annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium & Expo Hall on Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP) (Jordan Strauss) LOS ANGELES - One of Michigan's own has received one of Hollywood's highest honors. Detroit native Lily Tomlin, an actress and comedian known for roles on Broadway, in TV and in film spanning six decades, was honored by the Screen Actors Guild with a lifetime achievement award at the 23rd annual SAG Awards on Sunday, Jan. 29. Tomlin, using her usual quirky charm, had the audience of peers laughing throughout her speech. She jokingly offered advice for young actors, telling them to make sure they wear sunscreen and "Don't leave the house when you're drunk." "Live your life so that when you are being honored for your achievements the people called upon to make laudatory remarks can feel reasonably honest about their comments," Tomlin said during the speech. Tomlin, born in Detroit in 1939, is a graduate of Cass Tech High School and Wayne State University. During her remarkable career, she has been nominated at Tony Awards, the Emmys, Golden Globes, BAFTA and SAG awards. She also won a Grammy Award in 1972 and was nominated for an Academy Award for her role in the 1975 film "Nashville." Tomlin's breakout role came as a cast member on the variety show Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In from 1969 until 1973. She is also known for her performances as Margo Sperling in The Late Show, in the Broadway show The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe and as the voice of Ms. Frizzle on the children's series The Magic School Bus Dolly Parton, who co-starred with Tomlin in the popular 1980 comedy film "9 to 5," presented the honor which recognizes not only Tomlin's lengthy career, but also her activism and humanitarian work. "Lily Tomlin is an extraordinary actress, as equally adept at narrative drama as in comedy roles," said SAG-AFTRA President Gabrielle Carteris in a statement. "But it is through her many original characters that Lily's creative genius fully shines. "She has an ability to create diverse and distinct characters that are at once familiar, eccentric and oh so honest - in a way that illuminates life's hidden corners. "From Edith Ann to Frankie," she continued. "Her characters are wholly unique, and by exposing every nuance of human behavior they widen our scope of understanding. On behalf of nearly 160,000 SAG-AFTRA members, we are honored to bestow our SAG Life Achievement Award on the truly amazing Lily Tomlin." Tomlin currently stars alongside Jane Fonda in the Netflix series "Grace and Frankie," for which she was nominated for a SAG Award. The show tells the story of two women who discover that their husbands are not just work partners, but have also been romantically involved for the last 20 years. Together, the two women with an already strained relationship try to cope with the circumstances together. Recent winners of the SAG lifetime achievement award include Carol Burnett, Debbie Reynolds, Rita Moreno, Dick Van Dyke, Mary Tyler Moore, Ernest Borgnine, Betty White and Jame Earl Jones DETROIT, MI -- Thousands gathered Sunday afternoon, Jan. 29 at Detroit Metropolitan Airport in one of at least four protests statewide to President Donald Trump's executive order to ban entry into the U.S. of people from seven Muslim-majority countries and the entry of refugees. Inside the baggage claim area of Detroit Metropolitan Airport on Sunday evening, as protesters chanted, raised signs and listened to speakers, dozens of Muslims knelt and prayed toward Mecca. They used a cellphone application to figure out the proper direction to face. Traffic coming off Interstate 94 at the Detroit-area airport slowed to a crawl as protesters late to the rally that began about 4 p.m. waved signs from their windows. "Welcome to America," read the handwritten sign sticking up from the open passenger window of one black sedan. Another SUV drove with an Iraqi flag rustling out the window while a rap song with lyrics blasting Trump played from inside. As the traffic jam crept into a tunnel beneath a runway, a chorus of horns filled the air. There were at least four protests in the Detroit area Sunday in response to the controversial executive order, one in Hamtramck, which has one of the highest concentrations of Muslim residents in Michigan, including many who came from Yemen, one of the countries Trump named in the ban; another at Dearborn's Henry Ford Centennial Library; the largest took place at Detroit Metro Airport's international terminal; and a sit-in was planned at Wayne State University in Detroit. Protesters gathered in Ann Arbor and planned a demonstration at Gerald R. Ford International Airport in Grand Rapids Sunday. Outside Hamtramck City Hall, hundreds gathered in a circle filling the lawn. New and first-generation immigrants stood alongside activists and politicians, several holding signs calling for Trump to be impeached, or comparing his intent to create a border wall and to ban certain immigrants with pre-World War II Nazi Germany. As the Hamtramck rally died down, many were not done protesting. They instead hopped in vehicles bound for the airport. "Racism is not patriotism," "Let them in," and "Don't repeat history," read some of the signs they packed with them. The executive order temporarily freezes travel to the United States for refugees and visa holders from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. The order won't impact diplomats, government officials or employees of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, but there have been reports of refugees headed to the United States being turned around, students blocked from flying to the United States to attend college and an Iraqi interpreter who spent a decade working with the U.S. Army stopped from entering the country. A federal judge on Saturday night enacted an emergency stay ordering the release and halt of deportation for any travelers no longer allowed in the United States under the changes ordered by Trump. "In order to protect Americans, the United States must ensure that those admitted to this country do not bear hostile attitudes toward it and its founding principles," Trump's order reads. "The United States cannot, and should not, admit those who do not support the Constitution, or those who would place violent ideologies over American law. "In addition, the United States should not admit those who engage in acts of bigotry or hatred ... or those who would oppress Americans of any race, gender, or sexual orientation." The immigration ban order is available here in full here. "The majority of people come here for opportunity, or to get their education here," said Zryan Hassam, who is from Kurdistan in northern Iraq and attended the rally at Detroit Metro Airport. He moved here with his family to study medicine. He now works as a paramedic in Detroit and says he's saved "many lives." Hassam said it's natural for the United States to want to vet immigrants, but he feels the process is already very thorough. "I don't blame that," Hassam said. "There's no way we are going to say, 'Hey, everybody, come here.' "For me and my family, I did five years of interviews with Homeland Security. There is investigation ... They want to know what kind of background you have. Are you a safe guy? Are you a bad guy?" Under the current order, Hassam, who has a visa and carries an Iraqi passport, said he wouldn't be allowed to travel home or visit family. "You have to respect human beings," he said. "We are beautiful together ... Because we are Muslim, should not make us enemies." Also among the crowd was Josh Berkow, 35, a Jewish man who lives in Detroit. His mother and grandparents were refugees after World War II and spent seven years after the end of the war living in a U.S.-run refugee camp for Jews in Germany. "Jews have a position of great privilege in this country, but we are a historically persecuted people," he said. "We have responsibility to stand with other persecuted people, whether it is us or somebody else, because it originally was us and still is in other parts of the world." North Korea fired four short-range ballistic missiles (SRBM) toward the Yellow Sea Saturday, the South Korean military said. The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said it detected th... The South Korean football governing body confirmed on Saturday the men's national team captain Son Heung-min had undergone successful surgery on fractures around his left eye, thou... In a crucial South Korean baseball championship game with his club's title hopes hanging in the balance, Kiwoom Heroes left-hander Lee Seung-ho delivered the best postseason outing... "The Astronaut," the first official single by Jin of the K-pop supergroup BTS, has landed at No. 61 on the British Official Singles Chart Top 100. According to the latest chart ... you are here: budget Budget 2017: Expect job creation to be a guiding theme, says BMR Legal Ravi Uppal, the Managing Director and Group CEO of Jindal Steel and Power says he hopes the government will reduce the corporate tax rate to 25 percent in this Budget. live bse live nse live Volume Todays L/H More ICICI Direct's research report on Alembic Pharma APLs exports generic business (contributed 51.6% to revenues in FY16) grew at 56% CAGR in FY12-16 to Rs 1650.8 crore driven by strong traction in the US (75% of export generic sales). The US traction was on the back of consistent product launches including limited competition products. Outlook High gAbilify continued to weigh on FY17 numbers and Q3 was no exception. The numbers were further impacted by a price reduction in the domestic market and demonetisation. With the announcement of aggressive R&D and capex plans, the management has signalled the strategy for the next five to six years, especially on the US front. This includes a foray into niche areas like oncology, injectables, derma, etc. This, we believe, is fraught with a new set of challenges and the benefits are most likely to be back-loaded. Immediate cash-burn is likely to weigh on sentiments in the near term. We have ascribed a target price of Rs 615 based on 20x (22x earlier) FY19E EPS of Rs 30.6. For all recommendations, click here Disclaimer: The views and investment tips expressed by investment experts/broking houses/rating agencies on moneycontrol.com are their own, and not that of the website or its management. Moneycontrol.com advises users to check with certified experts before taking any investment decisions. The views and investment tips expressed by investment experts/broking houses/rating agencies on moneycontrol.com are their own, and not that of the website or its management. Moneycontrol.com advises users to check with certified experts before taking any investment decisions. Read More business Finance book grew by 4% YoY in Q3: Bajaj Finance Bajaj Finance reported a 36 percent rise in net profit to Rs 555.56 crore for the third quarter of current fiscal. Total Income rose to Rs 2,729.08 crore in comparison to Rs 2,069.62 crore quarter-on-quarter. The chronicle of a life split between urban Manhattan and rural Montana. January 30, 2017 Open Thread 2017-04 News & views ... Posted by b on January 30, 2017 at 17:44 UTC | Permalink Comments next page I found myself in the quilting room of the Me, You and Some Glue craft studio two Fridays ago, taking pictures of beautiful quilt tops made for owner Dr. Amber Halliburtons Sunshine Courage Quilts project, and talking with volunteers about quilting, the grieving process and other subjects. Halliburton was inspired to start the project with her textiles instructor, Sharon Taylor, after her husband, Jimmy, became an honoree of the North Carolina Fallen Firefighters Foundations annual ceremony in 2015, as I reported earlier this week. Each family who has lost a loved one in the line of duty the previous year receives an American flag and a rose. Jimmy was killed in an accident while moving fallen trees in his job as a forest ranger. Halliburton and Taylor are recruiting volunteers from the community to come to the studio, located in a portion of the ground floor of First United Methodist Church in Morganton, on Fridays to make quilts to present to the families in the next ceremony in May. Her husbands loss marked the beginning of some dramatic changes in her life. She finished earning her doctoral degree in education while working as a behavioral specialist at Burke County Public Schools and raising two children under the age of 4 by herself. Despite these challenges, Halliburton felt a call from God to leave her position in August of 2015 to realize a dream she and her husband had shared: to open a craft studio for kids of all ages. I was at the craziest point in my life, but I just prayed about it and took a huge leap of faith, Halliburton said. As I packed my gear to head out, Halliburton offered me a tour. The studio was a lot bigger than I had thought. The space she leases from the church is a maze of corridors leading to room after room. The pottery storage room was long and narrow, lined with shelves filled with ceramic creations of all kinds. One corner of the room had a computer wired into an array of space-age looking equipment. She said she used the area to teach digital design to older children. I asked Halliburton how she learned how to do all these things, and she said shed had a diverse education, not always formal. I read and You Tube and (do things) trial by error and trial by fire, she said. I focus a lot on creativity and play. The pottery painting room seemed to be a favorite of Halliburtons. Folks come in, parents with their children, and you hear them having authentic conversations, she said. Theyre not in front of the TV or playing some game. We have regulars come in, and this is their time together. Halliburton led me to another painting room, this one with dozens of designs cut out of thin wood hanging from hot-pink walls. There were small cursive letters to large signs. She purchases the cut-outs from a church in Kentucky, who makes them to fund a recovery house for women. I was praying about adding this on, and stumbled across their website and read their backstory, Halliburton said. She also has local guitarist Michael Hefner come in to teach classes and private lessons, including a class in instrument building, and has someone teach a Pintastic class, showing people how to do projects made popular by the Pinterest app, such as wreaths and different seasonal items. On the heels of the new quilting room, Halliburton has plans to add a drawing class and hold book readings in the fall. She said she uses her studio to supplement arts education at BCPS, focusing more on the process of students learning creatively as opposed to the finished product. We have a great relationship with the schools, she said. We have lots of field trips. We do art in the schools, art after school and art camps on days when theres no school. Its been a good joint effort. She said the prices for her craft classes range from $20-$40 per month, depending on what type of craft is being taught. As someone whos made writing, art and music a primary focus in life, I asked Halliburton why she thought it was important to nurture creativity in a world so focused on the lucrative nature of business, math and science. Technology should never replace creativity, Halliburton said. I think we will fail as humans if we let our creativity dissipate, because you can program a computer to do anything, but creativity has to grow. Innately, thats who we are as humans. Tammie Gercken is a member of the Morganton Writers Group. Burke United Christian Ministries got a hand up Thursday in their mission to help those in need to stay warm this winter. Duke Energy Community Relations Manager Lisa Parrish stopped by the ministry to present a check for $2,829 as part of the utilitys Share the Warmth fundraising campaign. The annual distribution of funds goes to help those in need pay their winter heating bills. It really helps us this time of year with our heating (assistance), said Rosemary Ohnesorge, interim director for BUCM. Heating is essential, and we do spend quite a bit trying to help folks keep their homes warm. A lot of them are trying to get help with their heating costs, and we use the Share the Warmth funds every year. They (Duke Energy) also help us in the summer with air conditioning fees. We have depended on Duke Energy for many, many years. Parrish said the utility company began the Share the Warmth project 31 years ago, and since then, has distributed more than $34.4 million to those in need. In 2016 alone, Duke provided $1.4 million in bill assistance to the Duke Energy Carolinas service area. The utility offers similar assistance programs across all of its territories. Were glad to be partnering with you all, Parrish said. Share the Warmth funds are contributed by our generous customers and our employees, and is matched dollar-for-dollar by our Duke Energy Foundation, up to $500,000. Were proud to share this amount with your organization. A press release on the program reported that Duke disburses Share the Warmth funds to more than 80 agencies annually in the Carolinas service area to help ensure no one has to go without heat during the coldest months of the year. Duke Energy customers who would like to contribute to the program may get more information at www.duke-energy.com. Contributions may be tax-deductible. We greatly appreciate the many customers and Duke Energy employees who contribute to Share the Warmth and our other energy assistance programs each year, said David Fountain, Duke Energys North Carolina president. Their generous support provides a meaningful impact for thousands of people across the Carolinas. Tammie Gercken can be reached at tgercken@morganton.com. Maintaining independence and editorial freedom is essential to our mission of empowering investor success. We provide a platform for our authors to report on investments fairly, accurately, and from the investors point of view. We also respect individual opinionsthey represent the unvarnished thinking of our people and exacting analysis of our research processes. Our authors can publish views that we may or may not agree with, but they show their work, distinguish facts from opinions, and make sure their analysis is clear and in no way misleading or deceptive. To further protect the integrity of our editorial content, we keep a strict separation between our sales teams and authors to remove any pressure or influence on our analyses and research. Read our editorial policy to learn more about our process. In its latest quarterly assessment of markets nationwide, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. cited Victoria as one of the cities that are now exhibiting strong evidence of problematic conditions, and pointed at scarcity as a leading cause.The supply of existing houses for sale is limited, with active listings at their lowest point since 2003, a time when price growth was similarly strong. CMHCs chief economist Bob Dugan stated on January 26, as quoted by the Times Colonist.As of the end of 2016, the number of properties listed for sale through the Victoria Real Estate Boards MLS sharply declined by 41 per cent year-over-year, down to 1,493 listings.This accompanied record-breaking sales volume in the capital region, reaching 10,622 last year. Price growth has not seen respite as well, with the benchmark value for a single-family home in downtown Victoria increasing by 24 per cent year-over-year (up to $758,500).Other markets that have been similarly tagged by the CMHC with overvaluation included Vancouver, Toronto, Hamilton, Regina, and Saskatoon.The conditions in these markets indicate that home-price growth may be driven by speculation as it is outpacing what economic fundamentals like migration, employment and income can support.For this reason, homebuyers should ensure that their purchases are aligned with their needs as well as the long-term market outlook, Dugan said. Two Democratic lawmakers are joining the fight between the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and PHH.Last year, the CFPBs leadership structure was deemed unconstitutional by a three-judge panel of the US Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. The panel ruled that the CFPBs structure, under which the director can only be removed for cause, meant Director Richard Cordray lacked necessary accountability. But the CFPB is demanding that the full Court of Appeals hear the case.Last week, 17 Democratic state attorneys generals filed a motion to intervene in the case on the side of the CFPB. Now Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) are following suit, according to a HousingWire report.Brown and Waters are arguing that they cant rely on the CFPB under the Trump Administration to adequately represent its own interest as an independent agency, according to a report by the CFPB Monitor.The lawmakers claim that they have grounds to intervene in the case because they voted for the Dodd-Frank Act, which established the CFPB. According to Brown and Waters, if the CFPB acting at the Trump administrations direction fails to adequately defend its own constitutionality, their votes to establish the Bureau as an independent agency will be nullified without full judicial review of the constitutional question presented in this case, according to court documents.Congressional Democrats have already made it clear that any attempt to replace or weaken the CFPB will result in a fight. Earlier this month, Democrats on the House Financial Services Committee led by Waters sent President Trump a letter demanding that he reject any attempt to remove CFPB Director Richard Cordray before the expiration of his term in 2018. Redfin enters mortgage business, hiring advisers Real estate brokerage Redfin has launched a mortgage lending business and expects to start originating loans in the first half of 2017. The company says its ultimate aim is to offer a fully-digital service which it says will drive down costs. The lending service will only be available to those buying homes through the company and will initially only be available in Austin, Dallas, Houston and San Antonio markets. The new mortgage business is being led by Jason Bateman, former executive VP of mortgage operations at BBVA Compass. The firm will hire its own mortgage advisers. Redfin says that there will be no incentive for its real estate brokers to recommend one of the firms mortgages and it will continue to work with other lenders. The new mortgage arm will not offer refinance mortgages or loans for those buying through other agents, however this could change later. Even hottest markets can be relatively affordable The US housing markets where homeowners have the largest mortgage burdens can still offer some relatively affordable options according to Zillow. One example is metro San Jose one of the most expensive parts of the country, where buyers in Palo Alto can expect to pay 75 per cent of their income on a house payment. But just 15 miles away in Milpitas buyers would need 35 per cent of their income for a median home. "The Bay Area and other expensive West Coast markets get a lot of attention for being unaffordable, but even they have some areas where the share of income spent on housing is relatively low," said Zillow Chief Economist Dr. Svenja Gudell. "Of course, buyers have to be willing to make some trade-offs to live in more affordable cities within the metro. Some cities in the most in-demand housing markets across the country have such a high housing burden that they are simply not feasible for buyers with lower incomes. If income growth doesn't keep pace with home value growth, especially as mortgage rates rise, inequality will persist." Zillows analysis shows that the benefits of a wider-net home search has less impact in less-heated markets. For example, Kansas City buyers will spend between 7.3 per cent and 13.2 per cent of their income on home payments wherever they buy in the metro. Black Knight closes out record 2016 loan processing on schedule Mortgage tech firm Black Knight says it closed out 2016s year-end processing for clients on schedule. With a record of nearly 45 million loans for 67 servicers, including millions of mortgages, the firm reported that all processing was completed by early morning on New Years Day 2017, allowing servicers to complete their reports for IRS and other agencies without delay. All students who are involved in faculty-guided research and creative activitywhether conducted as part of a class, internship, or programare eligible to participate in the symposium, and they are encouraged to submit an abstract. Students may compete in six categories: Humanities Business, Engineering, and Technology Social Sciences Physical and Biological Sciences Health Sciences Education. It is the responsibility of the student and his/her faculty sponsor to properly classify the project and to select the category in which the student wants to compete. Entries can include current or past work completed in the classroom. Entries might include business plans, literature reviews, stories, music, artwork, theatre demonstrations, or poetry, as well as technology, science projects, theory developed using mathematical tools, surveys, or data analyzed using statistical techniques. The poster for the virtual symposium this year will be a digital creation as a single PowerPoint slide accompanied by a 5-minute voiceover recording. Because students will not be able to discuss their poster in a public forum, the voiceover will allow them to present their research to a virtual audience. There is no cost to attend or participate in the Student Research Symposium. The event is open to all students, staff, faculty, and community members. First and second-place winners will be awarded in each of the six categories. Winners will receive an Amazon gift certificate in the amount of $100.00 for first place and $50.00 for second place. There will also be a top prize of $100.00 for best overall poster. Please note the submission deadline for abstracts is Wednesday, March 30 by 5:00p.m. Submitted abstracts should describe the students research within the specified word limit. Students interested in submitting an abstract should know this is a professional conference. You will be notified by Wednesday, April 6 as to whether or not your abstract has been accepted for inclusion in the Student Research Symposium. For more information please contact Dr. Michael Howarth Women's Track and Field | 1/28/2017 6:51:00 PM The Minnesota State women's track and field team hosted the Minnesota State University Open and Multi at Myers Field House Friday and Saturday.Friday evening startedearning eighth place in the weight throw with a distance of 49'7". In the Pole Vaultjumped 11'3.75 to claim seventh place. The 3000-meter run had(11:11.87),(11:38.17), and(11:39.69) finish eighth, ninth and tenth respectively. In the most exciting moment of the night the team of, andcrushed the competition in the distance medley with a final time of 11:58.09, good enough for provisional qualifying and first place.The success would continue Saturday as(7.63),(7.72), and(7.77) would claim the top three spots in the 60-meter dash. Gregory's time was also good enough to meet provisional qualifying standards.(7.87) and(7.94) also finished fifth and seventh. In the 60-meter hurdlesfinished third with a time of 9.02.continued her great season by taking first place in the 200-meter dash with a time of 24.92, a provisional qualifying time.earned first place in the 400-meter dash with a time of 58.16.finished sixth in the event with a time of 59.97.In the 600-meter runfinished first with a time of 1:39.03 andfinished second with a time of 1:39.49. The Mavericks claimed the top three spots in the 800-meter run led by(2:13.22) with(2:14.07) and(2:18.46) finishing second and third.finished fourth in the 1000-meter run with a time of 3:07.96.In the one mile run a pair of Mavericks earned new personal best times.finished in first place with a career best time of 5:06.58 andplaced sixth with a personal best time of 5:22.86.also competed in the 5000-meter run and finished second with a time of 18:36.70.The excellent performances continued in the field for Minnesota State asset a new personal best in the high jump with a leap of 5'7.75" to earn first place as well as meet provisional qualifying standards.earned second in the high jump with a leap of 5'4.5". To finish the dayplaced eighth in the triple jump with a distance of 33'7.50".Minnesota State will be home next Saturday for the Ted Nelson Classic, which will be hosted at Myers Field House. He is a radical who seems to listen to no one. He wants to win by having things done his way a man who plays the role of a mean boss who will accept no discrepancy from his employees or change his way of doing things. 1. His political program is full of protectionist proposals. For example, the building of a 2,000 mile long wall along the border with Mexico. According to him, this will put an end to the immigration that is taking jobs away from Americans. Then there is the threat of high tariffs on American companies that manufacture abroad and later want to import their products. He has refused to sign trade agreements with Asia (TPP) or with the European Union as well as planning the withdrawl of trade agreements with Mexico and Canada (NAFTA) In addition, he scorns the politicians in Washington and brags saying he is not a politician. Then he plans to remove controls on healthcare, known as Obamacare and bills against climate change. NATO defense expenses should be divided up among the other member countries. American and European political analysts claimed he would not carry out his populist program. They believed that if he was elected, he would become more moderate and that his Cabinet, the Congress and the Senate would force him to become more moderate. But now many of us think that nothing could be farther from the truth. 2. His Inauguration Address. Nothing has changed since he was elected. His inauguration speech was just more of the same an empty message, 16 minutes full of populism, nationalism and resentment. It hardly inspired anyone. The Americans voted for him and the Americans will have to put up with him and suffer, especially the average American or as he says the People. He claims he will get back the power for the people. We willl lreturn the power of the politicians in Washington to the people. Let the people control the government. We will never again be ignored Some wonder how he plans to do that when he has appointed so many family members to different posts. This is like sending the big, bad Wolf to take care of the sheep. Trump says he will do this by putting people back to work with jobs only for Americans, with closed borders anstates d with protectionism that will encourage American companies to return to the United States and set up their businesses there. He advocates nationalism (the United States is superior other countries) and a strong Army. America first. His goal is to make America great again. Trumps friends are the American people who also happen to the victim because they have nothing. Trump is the Messenger, the one who will solve everything. He is to recover the glory lost by the politicans in Washington. It makes no difference whether he tells the truth or has the know-how to do it. If he is attacked, he becomes strong. His enemies are foreign coudntries ( immigrants, terrorisists overseas companies that import godos into the United States and Natos armed forces). Also to be included are the politicians in Washington. His nationalism is agressive. We will make the United States strong, rich and great. God bless America Gods chosen country as if he were excluding the rest of the world. 3. Day by day he sings into action the beginning of his program. Trump has appointed ultraliberal members to his Cabinet who have no political preparation to carry out his program. They are incapable of covering up this braggartsmputh with his old-fashioned and detrimental ideas like setting up a barrier to the Exchange of goods, which is, in fact, one way of putting an end to the interests of American companies. Trump expects to create growth with his infrastructure plans (highways and railroads), to renovate old city areas and factories that will increase quality jobs. He reaffirms himself as a nationalist and xenophobe and in favor of torture.Immigration will come to an end with a high wall and the closing of borders. Trump creates aggresivity and fear. Everyone should have that one and only thought. According to him, tariffs defend jobs, making Americans self-sufficient.That 20% tax on imports from Mexico will be paid by American consumers. 4. What does the future hold? First of all, he has threatened or one could say blackmailed the companies which invest abroad with high tariffs. But if cars are manufactured in Detroit, they will be more expensive and less competitive. And if he does ban imports from the EU (Germany with its Mercedes, BMWs and Audis) or from Japan and China, these countries will answer back. The Chinese president said in Davos No one will come out a winner in a trade war. Secondly, healthcare for the underpriviledged may fall apart. There is also the possibility of a trade war against Mexico,China or the EU. In addition, a military problem could arise with China over the artificial islands. There could be other military issues although Trump claims to be friends with Putin. And finally an economic crisis could break out over financial deregulation. The American people are divided. Trumps term in office will be risky. He could come up against Congress and the rest of the world. He does not seem willing to respect any of the worlds politicians. He is at odds with the media in the States. His populist ways may put an end to the way of governing that has provided well-being since the Great Depression in 1929. Yet Trump cannot change the principles of politics or the economy. He could hurt the world but cannot stop it. Trump will pass on and the American people will send him into the corner to be forgotten as they did to former President Richard Nixon. New members inducted into Institute of ... President Donald Trump View Photos President Trump delivered the first weekly address of his presidency after completing his first full week in office. Trump was Mondays KVML Newsmaker of the Day. Here are his words: My fellow Americans, One week ago, our administration assumed the enormous responsibilities that you, the American People, have placed in us. There is much work to do in the days ahead, but I wanted to give you an update on what we have accomplished already. In my first few days as your President, Ive met with the leaders of some of our nations top manufacturing companies and labor unions. My message was clear: we want to make things in America, and we want to use American workers. Since my election, many companies have announced they are no longer moving jobs out of our country but are instead keeping and creating jobs right here in America. Every day, we are fulfilling the promise we made to the American People. Here are just a few of the executive actions that I have taken in the last few days An order to prepare for repealing and replacing Obamacare, its about time. The withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership so that we can negotiate one-on-one deals that protect American workers. That would have been a disastrous deal for our workers. An order to begin construction of the Keystone and Dakota Access pipelines, following a renegotiation of terms, with a requirement that pipelines installed in America be built with American steel and manufactured here. A directive to expedite permits for new infrastructure and new manufacturing plants. An order to immediately begin the border wall and to crack down on sanctuary cities. They are not safe, we have to take care of that horrible situation. This administration has hit the ground running at a record pace, everybody is talking about it. We are doing it with speed and we are doing it with intelligence and we will never, ever stop fighting on behalf of the American People. God bless you, and God Bless America. The Newsmaker of the Day is heard every weekday morning at 6:45, 7:45 and 8:45 on AM 1450 and FM 102.7 KVML. Sacramento, CA Lawmakers Frank Bigelow and Tom Berryhill are introducing legislation calling for an annual expenditure report related to the $150 Fire Prevention Fee. Approved in 2011, the SRA Fee is placed on owners of habitable structures within CAL Fires State Responsibility Area. Assemblyman Bigelow says, The taxpayers in the State Responsibility Areas have a right to know where their hard earned money is going. While I continue to oppose this tax on rural residents, these tax dollars are intended to be spent to mitigate the threat of catastrophic fire throughout California. There is no way to know if these dollars are being spent effectively, and it is the legislatures duty to ensure accountability. Senator Berryhill adds, If taxpayers in SRA areas are forced to pay a fee for fire prevention, I want to ensure every nickel collected is used to protect them from catastrophic wildfiresnot just swallowed up in the bureaucracy. Assembly Bill 211 would require the legislature to receive an annual expenditure report, indefinitely. Angels Camp, CA A local police chief shares that his hackles are still up after a disturbing incident involving a transient and a juvenile. As reported here, Angels Camp Police Chief Todd Fordahl points out that the encounter between the two last week caused his department to circulate a be on the lookout (BOL) community bulletin for a man staying at an Angels Camp motel who had attempted to make suspicious contact with a juvenile. Today, while speaking with Clarke Broadcasting, the chief reinforced the importance of alerting the community to the very real perils of stranger danger. He emphasizes, Reiterate with the public to speak to their children that anytimea stranger approaches them to report it right away to the police. Recalling more details about 47-year-old Victor R. Vaniers odd encounter last week with the juvenile, Chief Fordahl shares, The person in question had an arrest record in several states. He is very transient. We were able to speak with him by telephone because he did leave his cell phone number with one of the local churches that he was reaching out to get a hotel room for another night, which was denied, fortunately. Vanier was subsequently given a ride to Modesto through the auspices of another area church, according to the chief. Police, who shortly thereafter called the phone number were able to talk directly to Vanier, who stated that he had received some assistance to buy a train ticket from there to Louisiana. Restless Drifters With Reckless, Suspect Behaviors Continuing to share his concerns the chief warns, This is a person who basically travels all over the countryfortunately the kidwas able to get away from him and notify a parent, who in turn notified us. It is very disturbing that somebody like this was even in our community, doing what he was trying to do. There is no way really, at this point, to prove what his intentions were but just the fact that he was behaving and acting the way he was was the cause of a lot of concern for us. While Vanier did not appear to have a previous record of sexual offenses, Chief Fordahl somberly notes, He has a lot of violence in his background including domestic violence, assault, resisting and obstructing an officer, and assault on an officer with injury. Sharing more from Vaniers rap sheet, the chief adds that the man also served prison time in Indiana for fraud after which he was paroled in 2013; he was more recently arrested in Montana for DUI and disorderly conduct. Choosing his words carefully, the chief quietly states his case: You know, that is sometimes how these things start. [Convicts] may start off doing smaller crimes. The fact that he has been in the state prison system is a concern and the violence and other things sometimes escalate to the point where the crimes can turn sexual in nature. He maintains, Now I am not saying that it is the case with this gentlemanwe do not know, and that is what is kind of disturbing. Stressing a few last words on the matter he summarizes, But it is just not normal behavior for somebody to approach a young-looking juvenile, who is walking home from school, and asking him to come hang out in his hotel room. Here are the top stories for Monday that you need to know about. Helicopter sightings puzzle community Three helicopters have been spotted flying in formation over Meriden in recent weeks, prompting questions from the community. Drought conditions continue put Meriden reservoirs below comfort levels The citys reservoir levels remain well below desired capacity as central Connecticut continues to experience drought conditions, officials say. Downtown Wallingford brewery receives zoning approval A brewery is one step closer to opening in downtown Wallingford after gaining approval from the towns planning department. Meriden public safety forum slated for Monday The citys second public safety forum will be held Monday at 6 p.m. at Washington Middle School. The forum is scheduled to start with presentations from City Manager Guy Scaife and Police Chief Jeffry Cossette, followed by a question and answer session. A day of fun and chili with Wallingford Elks The Wallingford Elks Lodge held its annual chili cookoff Sunday afternoon. Southington students provide input on Apple Harvest Festival marketing Two Southington High School students put together a 30-page report on ways to better market the Apple Harvest Festival, ideas that are being put into practice by the festivals public relations firm. Lawmakers push against marijuana legislation Three local lawmakers, including two representing Durham, spoke against proposed legislation to legalize marijuana in Connecticut and listened to public feedback at a recent forum. MERIDEN Three helicopters have been spotted flying in formation over Meriden in recent weeks, prompting questions from the community. The helicopters, observed flying west toward Cheshire on Jan. 25, resemble the Sikorsky CH-53 Sea Stallion. The first reported sightings were in November, and more were reported on Jan. 11, according to social media posts, with residents reporting the helicopters were very loud and shook the house. After being shown a photo of the helicopters, the Connecticut National Guards director of public affairs, Maj. Michael Petersen, said that while the National Guard lands at Meriden-Markham Airport routinely for training, the helicopters in question do not appear to be the National Guards. The Connecticut National Guard does not have any aircraft resembling the one in that photo in its inventory, Petersen said. I can speak to the capabilities of Connecticut National Guard aviation assets, but since we were not flying any aircraft in the area, I would only be speculating on both the organization flying and the purpose of the flight. The Coast Guard in New Haven was also unable to solve the mystery. We havent been flying over there, said Operations Specialist First Class Morgan Gallapis. We have kind of a restricted airspace because of Sikorsky flying in and out of there. Sikorsky spokesman Paul Jackson said the helicopters do not appear to be from the Stratford company, either. Those aircrafts were not ours and the tower confirmed for me that they almost never fly in formation and when they do its two aircraft, Jackson said. The only guess I could make, it would probably have to be the active Army. Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Jim Peters said the FAA does not release information on military flights. Mark Jones, public affairs officer for the Naval Submarine Base New London, was also unable to identify the helicopters. Unfortunately we do not have any helicopters stationed here in sub base New London, Jones said. ltauss@record-journal.com 203-317-2231 Twitter: @LeighTaussRJ MERIDEN The citys reservoir levels remain well below desired capacity as central Connecticut continues to experience drought conditions, officials say. In June, the citys reservoir levels were at about 85 percent capacity. The citys public utilities director, Dennis Waz, said reservoir levels fell to about 50 percent in November and are now 62 percent. Waz said levels change throughout the year. A comfortable level at this time of year would be about 80 percent. I think we have a significant way to go before that happens, Waz said. Levels are measured weekly. The city continues to ask residents to conserve water. I hope we can continue that way, Waz said. Gary Lessor, meteorologist with the Weather Center at Western Connecticut State University, said northern New Haven County and most of Hartford County is in an extreme drought. An extreme drought is categorized as widespread water shortages or restrictions and major crop pasture losses. Forecasts for the next three weeks call for just half an inch of rain. Lessor warned drought conditions could worsen if there is little rainfall this spring and summer. We could be facing even more dire situations, Lessor said. blipiner@record-journal.com 203-317-2444 Twitter: @BryanLipiner MONTVILLE Connecticut State Police are investigating an officer-involved shooting in Montville. State police say they responded to a disturbance at the Chesterfield Lodge Sunday afternoon in Montville. They say one person was shot and later died. Authorities have not released that persons name. No police officers were shot. State police say one Montville officer is being treated for a non-life threatening injury. Police say theres no danger to the public. MERIDEN Members of a city mosque say theyre encouraged by rallies throughout the state and country in response to a travel and immigration ban from predominantly Muslim countries. Government officials say the bans were instituted as a counter-terrorism measure. It was a little bit upsetting and shocking, Zahir Mannan, director of outreach for the Baitul Aman Mosque in South Meriden, said of the ban. There was something good that came out of it, which is that a lot of our community members showed us support. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday night that initially prohibited green card holders from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Sudan and Yemen from traveling to the United States for the next 90 days. The White House addressed that aspect of the order on Sunday, when John Kelly, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, said those who hold green cards will be permitted to enter the United States but others will not. The order also suspends the immigration of refugees for 120 days and indefinitely bars Syrian refugees from entering the country. Trump said Monday on Twitter that only 109 of 325,000 travelers were detained and held for questioning over the weekend. There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country, Trump tweeted. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world! If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the bad would rush into our country during that week, he added. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said homeland security is Trumps top priority. Hes doing exactly what he told the American people he would do. The President will always put the safety and prosperity of our country first and foremost, Spicer said Monday. Large rallies were held at airports around the country Saturday night and Sunday. David McGuire, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut, said about 2,000 people attended a protest Sunday afternoon at Bradley International Airport, organized by the Council of American-Islamic Relations. The crowd was about 15 people deep; it was a lot of people, McGuire said. Lt. Gov. Nancy Wyman and Attorney General George Jepsen were among those who attended. Both spoke against Trumps executive order. Its an impressive reaction to policies a lot of people have problems with, McGuire said. Mannan said he started praying after learning the travel ban was signed by Trump. I see this as counter to our universal human values, he said. To discriminate against any particular group of people, be it religious, ethnic or nationality, its not right. Mannan said rallies are more beneficial than protests because they unite communities. Protests can potentially create a larger divide. Our purpose is to win the heart, its not to go against any particular person or any group of people, Mannan said. We do want to stand up for justice, but we want to do it in the right way. We dont want to do it in a way that creates disorder in the earth. In November 2015, Meriden resident Ted Hakey Jr. fired several shots at the mosque from his nearby Main Street home. Hakey was charged with a federal hate crime in December 2015 and pleaded guilty in February 2016. He was sentenced to six months in prison in June, began serving in August and was released on Jan. 26. After pleading guilty, Hakey apologized to members of the mosque, built a friendship with mosque leaders and set out to combat Islamophobia. That was a shocking event. That was a disappointing event, Mannan said of the November 2015 incident. We have to learn from that experience of how our response was able to change our neighbor and also win the hearts of everybody else. On Monday, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz announced plans to hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years in 75 different countries. Staff reporter Lauren Takores contributed to this report, and information from The Associated Press was included. blipiner@record-journal.com 203-317-2444 Twitter: @BryanLipiner California state senator Nancy Skinner is asking the White House to release First Lady Melania Trump's immigration documents in light of the president's recent executive orders on immigration. Skinner (D-Calif.) told POLITICO California that transparency is needed regarding the First Lady's immigration status. "No one in the Trump operation has released any of the documentation to indicate what was the circumstance, or whether she had full legal status,'' Skinner told POLITICO. "We only know they had a lawyer look at whatever papers she chose to give." Melania Trump, who came to New York City from Slovenia in 1996 to pursue her modeling career, was the subject of an AP investigation last November. The investigation found that she had been paid for 10 modeling jobs in the U.S. before she had legal permission to work. Her visa allowed her to be in the country and search for employment, but it did not permit paid work at that time. Sen. Skinner's demand comes as part of her protest against Trump's executive order on sanctuary cities. The order blocks all "federal grants, except as deemed necessary for law enforcement" to sanctuary cities. MORE: Obama rejects comparison between Trump's immigration policy and his own, encourages protests San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera has said that the order will be challenged in court. "This executive order tries to turn cities and states into U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. That's against the law," Herrera said. "Cities cannot be coerced into becoming the deportation arm of the federal government." Schools vary widely in the Bay Area, but some things are universal: California mission projects, a unit on the Gold Rush and that end-of-year field trip to Marine World. Sure, it's been renamed "Six Flags" since 1998, but you'll never call it that. After all, you remember when they had animals lots of animals. Elephants, tigers, dolphins all kept in an environment that, upon reflection as an adult, seem a little rough for those critters. A fire erupted in a Pittsburg power plant Sunday afternoon, sending 40-foot flames and black plumes of smoke into the air. The fire was reported just before 4 p.m. at the Delta Energy Center, on the 1200 block of Arcy Lane. There were no reported injuries and Contra Costa County Fire District personnel had extinguished the fire by 6 pm, Cpt. Lisa Martinez said. Protesters, civil rights lawyers and families descended upon airports across the country Sunday amid confusion over the enforcement of an order signed by President Trump barring entry of people from seven majority-Muslim countries. A string of legal decisions, including the late-Saturday ruling by a federal judge in New York halting the government from enforcing Trumps order against people with valid visas, had added to the uncertainty. Advocates on the ground said customs officials had appeared confused about how to enforce the dueling edicts of the executive order and the federal stay. As Trump continued to double down on the ban, Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a major clarification Sunday night that green-card holders would automatically be allowed to enter the U.S., unless there is some evidence of a threat to public safety. By Sunday afternoon, all detainees at San Francisco International Airport affected by the executive order had been released, said Doug Yakel, a spokesman for the airport. A White House official told reporters that all 170 green-card holders who applied for a waiver had received one as of Sunday afternoon. Meanwhile, at SFO, many who had been waiting anxiously for family members caught in the orders web were reunited. One Iranian American man had been waiting more than 12 hours for a call from his older brother who was detained at SFO. Finally it came at 7 p.m. Saturday: Im safe. Im sound, said his brother, who was attempting to come to the U.S. from Iran with a valid visa. Then the phone cut off. Nothing. The family was set to have their first reunion in six years. But the man was detained. The family is not Muslim and requested anonymity due to fears of religious persecution in Iran. The federal court ruling appeared to offer hope by preventing the government from sending back travelers, such as the older brother from Iran. But on Sunday, family members were told by their attorney that the older brother was being sent from a detention facility back to the airport for a flight to the Middle East. They were stunned. The family went to the airport and waited. Just after 3 p.m. Sunday, they got word he was being released. The two brothers ran to each other in the airport, held each other and cried. Their mother almost collapsed from joy. I never thought Id see this. I thought this was a lost fight, the younger brother said. The peoples willpower works. A group of other immigrants had been released earlier Sunday, including an elderly Iranian couple who had been traveling with a visa but were held for more than 30 hours at the airport. I think customs and border control is trying to make sense of a poorly worded executive order and then an emergency stay on that poorly written executive order, said Zahra Billoo, head of the Bay Areas Council on American-Islamic Relations chapter. Thats led to confusion and even less clarity than we ordinarily get in border stop situations. Billoo, who was at the airport Saturday evening, said it was difficult to figure out exactly what was happening behind closed doors. Unless people traveling provided itineraries, or their families made contact with them, attorneys were out of the loop. And while those traveling from abroad may contact family when they land, phone use is generally not permitted as they go through customs, she said. Its very challenging, Billoo said. Meanwhile, as Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina criticized the order, Trump doubled down on the edict. Trump said the two senators were weak on immigration. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting, he said in a statement. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. Trumps chief of staff, Reince Priebus, told NBC Sunday morning that it was possible more countries could be added to the list of those currently barred Sudan, Syria, Iran, Somalia, Libya, Iraq and Yemen. Senate Democrats were gearing up to fight the order in Congress. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said she would introduce two bills on Monday. One would rescind the order, while the other would add congressional oversight over the presidents authority to ban people from the U.S. The presidents blatantly discriminatory executive order should be rescinded immediately, she said in a statement. The consequences of this order will be far-reaching and were obviously not carefully considered. People all around the world will be affected, including Americans. Meanwhile, the impact of the order remained painful to families across California. Khayrat Rochan, a 41-year-old Syrian American who owns a business in Daly City, canceled a planned flight for his mother set to arrive in San Francisco Monday. His 78-year-old mother holds a green card, and Rochan had spent his recent days setting up a home he had rented for her. His mother had sold her land and house in Syria because she planned to come and live in the U.S. It is inhumane. ... I dont know what to do, he said of his mother, who must be transported at airports in a wheelchair and has limited vision. He did not want her to travel during the uncertainty of how the order was being implemented. Elsewhere, an attorney for a 12-year-old girl in Yemen whose parents are U.S. citizens in the Central Valley and who was turned away from a flight to the U.S. on Saturday had sent a letter to the U.S. Embassy in Djibouti requesting that she be allowed to come the U.S. The family has yet to receive a reply. And in Berkeley, Omid Solari, a 28-year-old Iranian obtaining his doctorate at UC Berkeley who is in the country on a student visa, was contemplating whether hed ever see his family again. An appointment for his parents in Iran to apply for a visa was suddenly canceled this weekend. Now neither I can go out of the U.S. to meet my family and come back, nor they can come here and meet me. I really miss my family, he said. Trumps order temporarily halts refugee admissions while indefinitely suspending Syrian refugees from being admitted into the country. The Department of Homeland Security said Sunday night that the agency was working closely with airlines to prevent those would not be allowed into the country under the order from getting on flights. Therefore, we do not anticipate that further individuals traveling by air to the United States will be affected, the statement read. A department official said Saturday evening that 73 people had been told not to get on airplanes headed to the U.S. For many Muslims living in America, the Trump order was met with shock, said Dalia Mogahed, the director of research at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding. I've been in two states over the past 48 hours meeting with families and students and I can tell you these executive orders have triggered widespread trauma among Americans who are Muslim, she said Sunday. These edicts send a simple message: If you're a Muslim, the White House doesn't want you here, and looks at you with suspicion because of your faith. The impact of these decisions is the breakup of families, the disruption of work and education. They do absolutely nothing to make us safer. Hamed Aleaziz is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: haleaziz@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @haleaziz This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Dropbox on Monday announced it had become a billion-dollar-a-year business and unveiled a slate of document-editing tools designed to help the San Francisco company compete to take more dollars from business customers away from the likes of Microsoft and Google. The announcements, which include a redesigned website, automatic file syncing and a new team document-sharing product, mark the latest step in the decade-old companys evolution from a consumer-oriented photo- and file-saving service to a business software firm. To one extent, its a sharpening of our focus, CEO Drew Houston said in an interview following a news conference at the Contemporary Jewish Museum. To another extent, its opening up a broader aperture. The company moved Dropbox Paper, a Google Docs competitor that allows teams of employees within a business to create, share, manage and edit projects that include documents, photos, videos and other types of content, out of a six-month public testing phase and made it immediately available in 21 languages. The company also introduced Smart Sync, a storage system that synchronizes files and folders to make them accessible to a team of employees. Smart Sync will work for Windows or Macintosh computers. Both products are part of Dropboxs business subscription service, which competes against document sharing and messaging services from companies like Google, Microsoft and Slack. Houston said Dropbox now has about 200,000 paying customers out of about 500 million users around the world. Analyst Cheryl McKinnon of Forrester Research said that Dropbox is making a significant push into the enterprise collaboration market: They havent really put their foot down before and said Enterprise is my focus and then made the investments behind that. Dropbox touted several clients that have already used the products, including the International Refugee Assistance Project, a New York nonprofit that helps resettle refugee families. Before using Dropbox, the organization could help 50 families per year. Dropboxs document-sharing tools have helped the group work with more immigration attorneys looking for pro bono work, Houston said. The group now helps about 500 families per year, he said. Especially given the events of the last few days, and the executive orders on immigration, (the projects) work is more important than ever, Houston said. Yves Behar, CEO of San Francisco design firm Fuseproject, said the Dropbox tools are important for his firm because clients now require him to be able to show work in progress, to show things are evolving, to share ideas as they happen. ... So the big difference is going from presentation to collaboration. Citing data from the research firm IDC, Houston said Dropbox has become the fastest software-as-a-service firm to hit an annual revenue run rate of $1 billion. The run rate is based on revenue numbers from a short period of time projected to show what the company can expect to generate over a full year. Bloomberg News contributed to this report. Benny Evangelista is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: bevangelista@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ChronicleBenny Tech companies forcefully condemned President Trumps order that suspended refugee entry to the U.S. for 120 days and banned all citizens from seven majority-Muslim nations for 90 days. Here are some of their responses: Airbnb Brian Chesky, the chief executive officer of on-demand lodging startup Airbnb, announced that the company would be providing free housing to refugees and anyone not allowed in the U.S. Amazon.com The online retailer, which wrote an internal memo to employees about its commitment to equal rights, tolerance and diversity asked employees from the affected countries to refrain from traveling and told those already abroad that the company was working on contingency plans. Amazon did not overtly denounce or rebuke Trumps order. Chief Executive Jeff Bezos, who once offered to launch Trump into space following a Twitter broadside by the now-president, also remained quiet on the matter. Apple CEO Tim Cook wrote a letter to his employees denouncing Trumps order and reaffirming his commitment to diversity: Apple is open. Open to everyone, no matter where they come from, which language they speak, who they love or how they worship. Our employees represent the finest talent in the world, and our team hails from every corner of the globe. Cook, who wrote the memo from Washington, D.C., where he had been meeting with lawmakers, reportedly had dinner last week with Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, the presidents daughter and son-in-law and influential Trump advisers, according to Politico. eBay Devin Wenig, eBays chief executive, said in an internal memo obtained by The Chronicle that though the company employs people from the countries named in Trumps order, none had been outside of the country when the executive action was signed. Wenig asked employees from those nations here on visas or green cards to refrain from traveling outside the U.S. until further notice. Wenig said the order fundamentally contradicts our companys values and Americas values. Etsy CEO Chad Dickerson wrote in a tweet that we are a nation of immigrants, and are stronger for it. I oppose excluding people from the U.S. based on their nationality or religion, period. The punctuated ending appeared to be a jab at White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer, who used the interjection in a recent press briefing to underscore a contrafactual assertion. Facebook Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg referenced his own immigrant grandparents and the parents of his wife, Priscilla Chan, who were refugees from China and Vietnam, in a post on his Facebook page Friday. Dropbox Dropbox founder Drew Houston called out the presidents actions explicitly in a tweet, saying, Executive orders affecting worlds most vulnerable are un-American. Dropbox embraces people from all countries and faiths. Google Hours after the order came down on Friday, Google Chief Executive Sundar Pichai was the first to issue a directive to affected workers: return to the U.S. right away. In a memo to Google employees, Pichai noted that at least 187 workers could be barred from entering the U.S. under Trumps order. Lyft Lyft, the ride-hailing service, on Sunday pledged to donate $1 million to the American Civil Liberties Union over the next four years. Addressing Trumps order directly, the company wrote in a note to users that banning people of a particular faith or creed, race or identity, sexuality or ethnicity, from entering the U.S. is antithetical to both Lyfts and our nations core values. Microsoft At least 76 Microsoft employees were impacted by the travel ban, according to an internal memo sent out by Brad Smith, Microsofts chief legal officer. Smith wrote that Microsoft believes in a strong and balanced high-skilled immigration system. We believe that immigration laws can and should protect the public without sacrificing peoples freedom of expression or religion. And we believe in the importance of protecting legitimate and law-abiding refugees whose very lives may be at stake in immigration proceedings. Microsoft will hold a Q&A with employees on Monday. Netflix The CEO of streaming giant Netflix, Reed Hastings, wrote in a heated Facebook post that Trumps actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all. He added the travel ban would not only impact his company, but also make America less safe (through hatred and loss of allies). Salesforce Marc Benioff, chief executive of Salesforce, wrote on Twitter: When we close our hearts & stop loving other people as ourselves (MK 12:31) we forget who we truly are a light unto the nations. Tesla Teslas chief executive, Elon Musk, who last month agreed to join Trumps economic advisory council, tweeted that a blanket entry ban on citizens from certain primarily Muslim countries is not the best way to address the countrys challenges. Musk is himself a South African immigrant. Twitter Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey wrote that the humanitarian and economic impact of Trumps order is real and upsetting. Twitter issued a tweet from its company account noting that it is built by immigrants of all religions. It promoted the tweet as an advertisement on the social network in an effort to have more people see it. Uber Uber CEO Travis Kalanick, who also volunteered to serve on Trumps economic advisory committee alongside Musk, wrote in a note to his employees that the administrations ban would impact many innocent people, including some Uber drivers. Kalanick, who has been widely criticized for what some see as an effort to cozy up to Trump, said his company would compensate drivers stuck outside of the United States due to the travel ban to help mitigate some of the financial stress and complications with supporting their families and putting food on the table. Uber pledged 24/7 legal support to drivers trying to re-enter the U.S., compensation for lost earnings, the creation of a $3 million legal defense fund to help drivers with immigration and translation services and efforts to lobby the government to reinstate the right of travel for U.S. residents. Ubers plan was announced Saturday after nearly a day of social media backlash when the hashtag #DeleteUber began trending Saturday night. Backers of a boycott proposed that users quit the app en masse because the on-demand ride service broke ranks with New York City taxis, who held a strike at John F. Kennedy International Airport in protest of the ban and the detention of foreign citizens at the New York airport. Y Combinator Sam Altman, president of famed startup accelerator and investment firm Y Combinator, called for more than words from tech companies and their leadership. The tech community is powerful, he wrote in a blog post Saturday morning. But talking is only somewhat effective, and employees should push their companies to figure out what actions they can take. Altman was later seen joining in the San Francisco airport protests, according to multiple reports. 500 Startups Entrepreneur and angel investor Dave McClure, who founded tech accelerator 500 Startups, used the first five minutes of his keynote address at the Middle-Eastern themed tech conference TechWadi on Saturday to condemn Trumps actions. Silicon Valley itself was built by immigrants we should not forget that, he said, speaking before a room of American and foreign entrepreneurs and tech workers. On the screen behind him was a slide with images of the Statue of Liberty and an illustration of a Muslim woman wearing a hijab spangled with the stars and stripes of the American flag. The founders and leaders of Facebook, of Twitter and Google seem to have found their voices in the last 24 to 48 hours, he said. I wish theyd found those voices two months ago, or six months ago; we might have had a different outcome for this election. But I at least applaud and respect their ability to finally speak up and say something. Perhaps only when it affects their own employees. But good on them for finally starting to say something. Marissa Lang is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mlang@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @marissa_jae Mason Creek Business Center, a four-building industrial complex in Katy, has been sold for an undisclosed sum. Houston-based Transwestern Development Co. sold the 339,900-square-foot property, at the northeast corner of Interstate 10 and Mason Road, to an unnamed buyer, according to a company statement. Rusty Tamlyn and Trent Agnew of Holliday Fenoglio Folwer, LP represented the owner. Darryl Noon and Jude Filippone of Transwestern will continue providing leasing services. RELATED: Industrial projects still humming along in Houston market "With the current strength of the Houston industrial market and the recent leasing momentum at Mason Creek Business Center, this was an ideal time to execute our disposition strategy," Transwestern's Senior Vice President Pete Johnston said in a statement. "The leasing team has done a tremendous job of marketing the property to attract high-quality tenants and make this asset a compelling opportunity for investors," Johnston continued. Current tenants include Williams-Sonoma and Memorial Hermann. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Dr. Paul Klotman, president and CEO of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, estimated "dozens" of faculty or researchers and students appear to be caught in the controversial White House immigration ban. "We, as a global research institution, have lots of people from all over the world," Klotman said in an interview Monday. "This whole thing has been a giant, messy distraction." The medical school in one of the nation's largest and most prestigious and has 10,000 faculty, clinicians, researchers, medical students and trainees. Klotman said "dozens," if not more, at his institution are affected by the ban that was enacted swiftly Friday night against refugees and people from seven mostly Muslim nations seeking to enter the United States. That could include those in Houston whose families are overseas or those who might not return home for a visit for fear of not being able to re-enter the U.S. On Friday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order that immediately shut the door to Syrian refugees indefinitely and all other refugees for 120 days. The action also barred entrance for at least 90 days to anyone from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Somalia, Yemen, Libya and Sudan. Initially the executive action blocked even legal permanent U.S. residents holding green cards but that part of the order appeared to be lifted on Sunday. The order still presumably affects foreign students, workers and other visa holders from the targeted countries. It is unclear if there are any Baylor College of Medicine students or faculty still in their home countries who were scheduled to come to Houston for jobs or education. But Klotman said it would not surprise him. "We get the best and the brightest from these countries," he said. "This is the last thing they need." On Sunday his office sent out an institution-wide email that said it was working to understand the new immigration policy and the impact of a federal judge's ruling staying the order. "There likely will continue to be changes in this policy over the coming days and weeks which is why it is important for us to carefully monitor the political and legal issues while providing support to all members of the Baylor community. If anyone potentially affected by the order is scheduled to leave the county on business, please contact the Office of the General Counsel for guidance," the email said. Klotman said Monday that even students in countries not named in the ban were feeling the chill. "It makes them nervous about their future in the country," he said. The order caught even some within the White House off guard. Travelers overseas were pulled from line as they boarded planes and others who were in midair were detained when they landed. Chaos was reported in many airports and days of protest have followed both in Houston and across the nation. Klotman minced no words about the unfolding drama. As a CEO and administrator, he said, he thought there needed to be more forethought of the fallout. "It was done like an amateur," he said. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Hundreds of readers have written me with their ideas about what to do with Obamacare. Now there's a website where everyone can create their very own _(insert last name here) care. Would you keep young adults on their parents plans? Should large employers be required to provide health insurance? Should women pay more than men, because they have babies and men don't? Those are the easy questions. Polls show those are the most popular aspects of Obamacare, also known as the Affordable Care Act. The website doesn't stop there, though, it digs into the nitty gritty. Should health benefits be taxed the same as other forms of compensation? Should health costs be subsidized by taxes? Should the government make sure the insurance industry doesn't suffer huge losses in order to make sure everyone is covered? Those are the tougher questions. And frankly, that's why this process is important, to help people fully understand how complex health care insurance really is. The website was created by HealthMarkets, of North Richland Hills, near Fort Worth. The company is one of the largest independent health insurance agencies in the nation, and they will ask for some personal information before it generates your very own revision of the Affordable Care Act. But it also encourages you to Tweet your bill to the president and Congress so they know what you expect from Trumpcare. "We stand at a precipice of another massive overhaul, but the details of where we are going are not very clear," said Mike Stahl, senior vice president at HealthMarkets. "We need an open and honest conversation about those details." Stahl said he is frustrated by the focus on politics around overhauling Obamacare rather than the substance of what will stay or go get added on. The biggest problem with Stahl's tool, though, is it doesn't tell you how much your bill will cost the taxpayer. Though I have to admit, coming up with an accurate cost estimate is something even the Congressional Budget Office doesn't do very well. "But we do frame each issue to help people understand the offsets, and we do ask tax questions, because there has got to be taxes to pay for this," Stahl said. "We try our best within the context of making it a usable experience." Paying for health care, though, is really at the heart if the debate. A December poll found that 80 percent of Republicans want young adults to remain on their parent's policies, 77 percent believe preventive services should be free, and 67 percent believe the government should help pay to cover low-income Americans. The same poll, though, found that Republicans opposed all the methods Obamacare uses to pay for the program. So we are all watching to see what Congress comes up with. If health care is important to you, and at some point it will be critical in all of our lives, check out the Build Your Own Bill site. You'll get a new appreciation for what our representatives are going through. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate As if a Walking Dead comic for a quarter wasnt enough of a deal, San Antonios Heroes & Fantasies is giving away the specially priced comic for free. You can grab a free copy of The Walking Dead No. 163 Wednesday at both H&F locations: 4923 NW Loop 410, and its newly relocated store at 920 Pat Booker in Universal City. Like the hit AMC TV series the comic inspired, the new Walking Dead issue is for mature audiences. H&F will require any guest younger than 17 be accompanied by a legal adult guardian to get their free copy. Walking Dead No. 163 is also available at other comic shops Wednesday. So why offer whats typically a $2.99 comic for 25 cents, much less for free? For one, the quarter-comic is part of a promotion for the 25th anniversary of its publisher, Image Comics. Walking Dead writer Robert Kirkman will have two other Image titles available in February for 25 cents: Invincible No. 133 on Feb. 15 and Outcast No. 25 on Feb. 22. The new Walking Dead comic also kicks off a new story arc called Conquered. The tale unfolds after a major battle between series hero Rick Grimes and his compatriots against the zombie skin-wearing baddies known as the Whisperers, who get their name from how they blend in with the undead. So the new comic is both a celebration for Image and Walking Dead fans, and a jumping-on point for new readers. The dirt-cheap price has generated plenty of reader and retailer interest. Walking Dead No. 163 is the highest-ordered comic in almost two decades, according to Image, with pre-orders topping 730,000 copies. H&F said in a press release theyll have enough copies at both stores to satisfy expected demand, so theres no need to create a long waiting line before the stores open at 10 a.m. Of course theres more to the H&F giveaway than just the free funny book. Both H&F locations will hold a free raffle for two rare variant-cover editions of Walking Dead No. 163: a color version and a black-and-white version, both featuring Rick Grimes rocking the look of another popular Walking Dead character. Check out the regular and variant covers in the gallery above. Both shops also will host their own horde of zombie cosplayers. And official Walking Dead artist and S.A. native Freddy Lopez will be at the 410 location at 4 p.m., signing and sketching zombies for fans. H&F artist Ray Roberts also will appear at the 410 H&F to sign his limited-edition Walking Dead art, which is available as a print at both stores. A portion of the print sales benefits Kathlyn Chassey, a 24-year-old from San Antonio with cystic fibrosis, who recently received a lung transplant. More Walking Dead fun at the 410 store: Alamo City Comic Con founder Alfredo Apple De La Fuente is slated to reveal another Walking Dead TV star who will attend this years convention, which runs May 26-28 at the Convention Center. ACCC has hosted Walking Dead performers before and already has former Walking Dead stars Scott Wilson (Hershel) and Michael Cudlitz (Abraham) slated for the May show. The Walking Dead TV series returns at 8 p.m. Feb. 12 on AMC. EDITORS NOTE: The story has been updated to correct the availability dates for Invincible No. 133 and Outcast No. 25 and to clarify the recipient of Ray Roberts print sales. rguzman@express-news.net This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate MOTRAN annual meeting The Midland-Odessa Transportation Alliance held its annual meeting last month at the Permian Basin Petroleum Museum. James Beauchamp, the organizations president, presented the outgoing chairman, Trey Crutcher, with a gavel as a special thank you. The meetings keynote speaker was Tryon Lewis, chairman of the Texas Transportation Commission. While dining on quail, prime rib, green beans and jalapeno mashed potatoes, guests heard detailed updates on bringing Interstate 14 to the Midland-Odessa area and the progress on the Permian Basin Natural Gas Exports into Mexico along the La Entrada al Pacifico Corridor. Texas Tech campaign kickoff Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center recently announced it first comprehensive campaign during an event at Wagner-Noel Preforming Arts Center. Tedd Mitchell, president of the TTUHSC said the goals is to raise $150 million over three years. Cocktails and hors doeuvres were served in the Grand Lobby. Guests were then taken onto the elegantly appointed stage where tables were formally set in black and white, and special lighting hit the crystal glasses for additional shimmer. Peppered beef tenderloin, chicken-fried quail breasts, cowboy potatoes, country mixed greens and mini cornbread muffins were served family style in bowls, skillets and kettles. As dessert was being served, Odessan Betsy Triplett-Hurt spoke about how she became involved with health science center, and doctors also shared their experiences. To have an event included in "Out and About," contact Julie Donnelly at mrtjulie@outlook.com. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Local religious leaders this weekend took issue with President Donald Trumps executive order temporarily banning refugees and immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. The Rev. Jack Gilpin, of St. Johns Episcopal Church in New Milford, said he alluded to the order during his Sunday sermon on the Beatitudes, the nine blessings in Jesus Sermon on the Mount. Jesus affirmed ... the responsibility of each of us to take care of those who cant help themselves, who for one reason or another, because of the way the world works, have been hurt or lame or downtrodden, Gilpin said. That is where God is to be found, with them. For these reasons, Gilpin said he strongly opposed the presidents order. From a Christian point of view, its directly contrary to Christian teachings throughout history, and directly contrary to both the spirit and the letter of what Jesus says in the Gospel, he said. It really just takes your breath away. Rabbi Ari Rosenberg, of Temple Sholom in New Milford, said the order goes against the Torah as well. The first thing that comes to my mind is the responsibility of Jewish people toward strangers, he said. The Jews were strangers in Egypt, he said, and are taught to treat everyone equally. Rosenberg said the act has outraged many in the Jewish community, as it is a reminder of the United States turning away Jews seeking refuge from the Third Reich in 1939. According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum website, 937 Jews sailed from Germany to Havana on the German transatlantic liner St. Louis. The majority of the Jewish passengers had applied for U.S. visas, and had planned to stay in Cuba only until they could enter the United States. But by the time the St. Louis sailed, there were signs that political conditions in Cuba might keep the passengers from landing there, and the passengers were turned away. Most returned to Europe and many later died in the Holocaust. People were horrified to see this executive order come down on Holocaust Remembrance Day, because it reminds Jewish people of the anti-immigration movement prior to World War II, Rosenberg said. The Rev. Bryn Smallwood-Garcia is the senior pastor at the Congregational Church of Brookfield, which has a refugee-resettlement program and settled a Syrian family in town. During the Sunday service, he said, parishioners prayed for refugees and rejoiced the family they helped is now safe and a part of the community. During her sermon on the Beatitudes, Smallwood-Garcia stressed Jesus message Blessed are the poor and the meek. I was kind of making the point that were called to be peacemakers and to care for our neighbors whether close by or far away, Smallwood-Garcia said. Still, she said, she does not like to bring politics directly into her worship services and did not mention any politician by name. Thats kind of an intentional direction of our church, she said. So we can recognize that we're not all on the same page about how to solve problems, but we all want peace for all. Gilpin said Trumps executive order likely will encourage the Islamic State, or ISIS. I abhor ISIS as much as anyone does, as I would say any religious community does because of their brutality and their resort to violence, he said. This is only going to feed their ability to recruit because it confirms their commitment to the view that is a war of Islam against Christianity. And weve managed to get through many, many centuries of brotherhood with our Muslim brothers and sisters. Gilpin said after Trumps election, he spoke with the Islamic Center of Western Connecticut to affirm his commitment to Muslims. This isnt going to deter us from being friends and colleagues in faith, he said. We call God by different names, but so what? Thats a matter of human limitations. The Danbury-based Association of Religious Communities will host a Rally for Humanity at Central Christian Church at 2 p.m. Feb. 12 for people to learn more about different faiths and programs that support refugees and immigrants. Temple Sholom and St. Johns Episcopal Church are involved in the New Milford Refugee Resettlement program. Gilpin said the order will only strengthen the resolve of its members to support refugees. We will continue to work with New Milford Refugee Resettlement and make our voices known in the political arena, as well, he said. Fairfield County may be associated with affluence, but with pockets of poverty scattered throughout, the issues affecting the nation are no less an issue in Connecticut, according to a new study of the area. The regions income inequality ranks first in the 100 largest U.S. metro areas when comparing salaries of top and bottom earners. The study was conducted by the Fairfield County Community Foundation and DataHaven, a New Haven-based nonprofit that collects, interprets and shares public data. I think some of this we always knew, but we never had any concrete data to back it up, said Juanita James, president and CEO of the Fairfield County Community Foundation in Norwalk. This now allows us to illustrate to donors what the scope of the issues actually are, and they can see where their philanthropy will be most effective. The wage gap in Stamford is not as palpable as in the neighboring towns of Greenwich and Darien. However, Stamfords exceedingly high living costs place the city above the average for Fairfield County and the state, with nearly a quarter of households spending more than 30 percent of their earnings on shelter alone. The study assessed the overall well being of residents bringing to light towns, neighborhoods and issues that social services agencies had only known about through anecdotes. Using factors like income, commute time, housing-cost burden the proportion of housing costs to income and overall feelings of contentment as assessed by the survey, DataHaven produced a Community Wellbeing Index. Stamford scored relatively well overall on the index, coming in third for both personal and community wellbeing. The study also splits Stamford in half to expose an inner-city gap between the wealthier northern and central neighborhoods, which scored slightly higher than neighborhoods surrounding Interstate 95. The Central area of Stamfordwhich appears to encompass the Downtown, West Side, East Side, Waterside and South End report much higher rates of severe housing cost burden and low-income children. People who live in distressed neighborhoods have much lower rates of well being even as their incomes climb, said Nancy von Euler, vice president of programs for the community foundation. If you live in a poor neighborhood, thats going to affect your overall feeling of well being. Shrinking middle The study also highlights a shrinking middle class countywide. The number of people living in middle-income neighborhoods has declined 16 percent since 1980, while populations in poor neighborhoods have grown 3.5 times. The regions income inequality ranks first in the 100 largest U.S. metro areas. In 2014, the top 5 percent of earners in Fairfield County made an average of $558,970 per year, nearly 18 times the $31,330 that the bottom 20 percent earn. Fairfield County Community Foundation is committed to addressing the most pressing issues facing Fairfield County, but to do that we first need to be able to identify and understand those issues, von Euler said. The data in the survey will help us develop priorities for collective action to build a stronger, healthier Fairfield County where everyone has the opportunity to thrive, regardless of their zip code. Bright spots Despite the issues highlighted by the study, the typical resident reported better levels of health and personal well-being than the average U.S. or Connecticut citizen. Fairfield Countys death rate is lower than average, adult smoking rates are declining and health insurance coverage has dramatically improved, according to the survey. From 2000 to 2014, 100 percent of the net population growth in the county is attributed to immigration from other countries. Mark Abraham, executive director of DataHaven, said developing the report allowed local agencies to identify links between the well being of residents and the places they live. Looking beyond typical measures like income levels or unemployment rates, the Community Wellbeing Index reveals a much more uneven distribution of opportunities in areas such as neighborhood walk-ability, economic development, public health and education, Abraham said. The impact that these barriers to opportunity have on overall well being and happiness will serve as a call to action for many groups working to improve Fairfield Countys diverse neighborhoods and towns. FCCF and DataHaven will visit the Ferguson Library at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 8 to share highlights from the study with residents and discuss the overall results. Washington So far, President Donald Trump's plan to restore American manufacturing amounts to threats and promises to CEOs, and a pledge to end the "American carnage" of "rusted out factories scattered like tombstones across the landscape of our nation." But although upstate New York has long struggled with such a backdrop Trump himself once called the region a "wasteland" political, industrial and labor leaders prefer to focus on the new manufacturing reality taking the place of the old. Trump met last week with CEOs and car-manufacturing executives, coupling promises of less regulation and dramatic corporate-tax-rate reductions with threats to impose "a very major border tax" on U.S. manufacturers who export jobs. For upstate, Trump's vision of industrial decline and what it takes to get offshored jobs back in the U.S. arguably is out of date. Nothing Trump has said suggests any understanding of advanced manufacturing exemplified by concerns, for example, of GE in Schenectady and GlobalFoundaries, a chip manufacturer that employs 3,000 at its plant in Malta. And the president's threats to break up or significantly rewrite NAFTA and other trade deals rings hollow in a state that ranks No. 3 in exports, according to Business Roundtable data. "You can do all the bullying you want on Twitter or at the White House, but it's not a jobs plan," said Rep. Paul Tonko, D-Amsterdam, himself an engineer by training. Part of the disconnect is that Trump is likely speaking to the rust belt states of the Midwest and Pennsylvania, and the coal-mining region of West Virginia and Kentucky. All these states have suffered decades of industrial decline and ultimately won the election for Trump. In upstate New York, the effort to revitalize manufacturing and replace vacant factories has come in fits and starts, with progress slowed by the corruption scandal surrounding the indictment of SUNY Polytechnic Institute guru Alain Kaloyeros, among others, on bid-rigging charges. But even as manufacturing jobs have plunged statewide and nationwide in recent years and decades, the Capital Region saw manufacturing employment grow a modest 400 jobs in the past year, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, BLS. Educators and industrialists in the region insist the uptick is no mirage. For them, the problem is less about the availability of jobs than the gap between those jobs and the skills necessary to take them. "Half our freshman class is already spoken for,'' said Dave Larkin, who teaches advanced manufacturing technology at Hudson Valley Community College. In addition to learning how to read blueprints and do precision measurement, students learn the all-important skill of computer numerical control, which guides the increasingly robotic process of 21st-century production. Larkin cited studies showing that nationwide, some 300,000 openings exist in manufacturing for machinists and CNC operators, "even with all the robots we have now." "Until the feds and state pols take notice and start putting money into two-year job-ready degree technical programs, instead of investing it in casinos and other non-technical non-winning ventures, New York and the U.S. will remain trapped in a downward manufacturing death spin," Larkin said. dan@hearstdc.com HARTFORD The Public Utilities Regulatory Authority is being asked to investigate price gouging and deceptive marketing by third-party electricity suppliers who state officials say target Connecticuts most vulnerable consumers, including the elderly, disabled and non-native English speakers. Consumer Counsel Elin Swanson Katz and Senate President Pro Tempore Martin M. Looney on Monday charged that in 2016, residential customers paid about $59 million more than the so-called standard offer required. If found in violation of a 2014 law establishing a bill of rights, third-party electric providers could be fined millions of dollars. The standard offer, under the states 1998 deregulation of the electric industry, is what customers of United Illuminating and Eversource pay when they dont opt for a third-party provider. Abusive sales practices and exorbitant rate charges are among the allegations that Katz and Looney have asked PURA to investigate. About 35 percent of electricity customers get their energy from suppliers other than UI and Eversource. Electric bills tend to be quite complex and it is sometime difficult to ferret through the verbiage to find out exactly what is being stated and exactly what is being charged, Looney said in a morning news conference. He warned that less-sophisticated consumers are particularly vulnerable to exploitation by third-party electric suppliers that may offer low introductory rates that balloon over time. Katz cited one consumer complaint that said her bills went from $230 a month to $393. She said that while in recent years major improvements have been made in terms of transparency, we have continued to see troubling allegations of vulnerable populations being adversely affected, particularly by door-to-door sales and telemarketing sales. Katz noted that customers of UI and Eversource end up paying for tens of millions of dollars in uncollected third-party bills, so the gouging not only affects the less-savvy consumers, but those who remain with traditional suppliers, as well. There are too many stories not to have a hard look at this particularly vulnerable population, Katz told reporters. I do think that most of the suppliers, particularly reputable ones, remain concerned about how this tarnishes the industry, she said, adding that she is suspicious that some of the suppliers might be targeting some customers. Michael A. West Jr., vice president of UIs parent company, Avangrid, said Monday that since 2000, when the company was required to divest from electric generation, confusion has been common in a segment of the Connecticut electric market. We consistently provide education to customers who may incorrectly believe that UI owns and/or controls generation prices. In addition, we routinely utilize different techniques both written, digital and oral to communicate with customers where English is a second language for them, West said in a statement. In the past, PURA has levied millions of dollars in fines and has the power to revoke the licenses of electricity suppliers. Katz said that none have lost licenses. It can also decide to open cases in which consumer service can be reverted to the standard offer, after cases of marketing and service malfeasance is proven. kdixon@ctpost.com; Twitter: @KenDixonCT Albany Battles over internet sales taxes have ebbed and flowed for years, both in the legislature and in the courts. Now, a proposal by Gov. Andrew Cuomo to expand the universe of taxable internet sales is re-igniting the fight, with players lining up on both sides of the issue. "We think this is a plus," Ted Potrikus, president and CEO of the Retail Council of New York State, said of the latest proposal, part of Cuomo's 2017-18 budget. "It's basically a fair application of an existing tax and it recognizes the changes in shopping patterns," he said. As more and more sales go to websites such as Amazon, traditional brick-and-mortar retailers are increasingly calling for a level playing field when it comes to taxes. Also supporting the proposal are county and municipal governments who see the move as a revenue-booster that is increasingly important since property taxes are capped. The new tax could generate an estimated $128 million to $135 million in the coming fiscal year, according to budget projections by the governor and lawmakers. "For counties, the balance of this state budget from a plus/minus perspective hinges on this proposal," Association of Counties spokesman Mark Lavigne said in a prepared statement. His group sees the tax as a priority this year. "With the property tax cap firmly in place, the sales tax is the only viable revenue for counties to continue to fund state mandates and also address critical local needs," Lavigne said. In opposition are business groups that are generally against more taxation and who point to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that requires a retailer to have a physical location, or nexus, in the state where they are taxed. "It is obviously unconstitutional," said Andrew Moylan, executive director of R Street, a Washington, D.C.-based free market oriented think tank. "They are mounting this purposeful unconstitutional measure in an attempt to draw litigation that they can push to the Supreme Court," he said, referring to New York as well as the approximately half dozen other states proposing similar measures this year. "It could be precedent-setting,'' added Doug Kellogg, spokesman for Reclaim NY, a conservative state think tank that also opposes the tax. They note that such taxes are passed on to the consumer. This wouldn't be the state's first internet sales tax. New York has had one since 2008 when it imposed the so-called Amazon tax that levies sales taxes on items sold through that Washington state-based retailer as well as other major online retailers. But the sales tax hasn't applied to items sold on Amazon's "marketplace," which is described as a platform or conduit for thousands of other online retailers, many of which are mom-and-pop operations. Under the marketplace concept, Amazon, as well as other companies such as eBay or Etsy, contend that they simply offer a venue for retailers to digitally display their wares. Those sales aren't taxed. Cuomo's latest budget proposal would change that, stating that marketplaces with more than $100 million in annual sales would be responsible for collecting state and local sales taxes on transactions by the individual retailers using their platforms. There would still need to be a New York ''nexus'' or some state-based connection such as a point of contact or seller in the state. "It recognizes the changes in shopping patterns,'' said Potrikus. "This is just making sure that we are keeping up with the way that the internet continues to evolve,'' said state Budget Division spokesman Morris Peters. Opponents like Moylan, though, say that's counter to Quill Corp. v North Dakota. In that landmark 1992 ruling, the court found that the state couldn't impose a use tax on an Illinois-based office supply firm without having a presence in the state. But supporters of the tax argue that approach is outdated. With the internet continuing to eclipse traditional retail, many have said that Congress needs to set clear guidelines for sales taxes. But they've been unable to agree on a plan. "Every state that has a sales tax has been spending the last 20 years trying to work around the lack of Congressional action,'' said Potrikus. rkarlin@timesunion.com 518-454-5758 @RickKarlinTU This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate By a margin of 2-1 most Americans want Congress - not President Donald Trump -to handle America's policy towards Russia, a new poll by Quinnipiac University has found. In a separate question, voters support 62 - 32 percent, investigations into potential links between Trump's campaign advisers and the Russian government. The poll, released Monday by the Hamden-based university, also found that American voters believe 53 - 39 percent that the Russian government interfered with the 2016 presidential election. And, they support 56 - 30 percent the sanctions imposed on Russia by the Obama Administration.. In fact, 76 percent of those who support existing sanctions want tougher sanctions. "Beware the Russian Bear, say American voters, most of whom believe the Kremlin meddled in the U.S. presidential election," Tim Malloy, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll, said in a release announcing the poll. "President Donald Trump is too friendly with Russia and voters say 2-1 they would rather have Congress, not the president, handle future relations with Russia. The poll also found: Russia is an adversary of the U.S.; 46 percent of American voters say, while 9 percent say Russia is an ally and 41 percent say it is neither an ally nor an adversary. A total of 67 percent of American voters say alleged Russian interference is a "very important" or "somewhat important" issue, and 68 percent want the matter investigated. Trump is "too friendly" towards Russia, 49 percent of voters say, while 3 percent say he is "too unfriendly" and 43 percent say he has the right attitude towards Russia. Voters trust Congress more than Trump 60 - 29 percent to handle America's policy towards Russia. "Should we let bygones be bygones? Absolutely not, say Americans, who want an investigation - and tougher sanctions," Malloy said. On Putin American voters have a 70 - 9 percent unfavorable opinion of Russian President Vladimir Putin and say 78 - 8 percent that he is not democratically elected. On Mexico Trump is "too unfriendly" towards Mexico, 53 percent of American voters say, while 42 percent say he has the right attitude. On NATO Voters are divided on Trump's attitude towards NATO allies as 44 percent say he is "too unfriendly" and 42 percent say he has the right attitude. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate 3 1 of 3 Show More Show Less 2 of 3 Show More Show Less 3 of 3 AMSTERDAM -- A woman drove drunk to a State Police barracks Sunday and tried to pick up her friend, who had been detained for driving while intoxicated hours before, troopers said. At about 2:30 a.m. Sunday, troopers saw a 2006 Ford Escape drive by with an equipment violation. When they tried to stop the car, it continued for a few blocks before stopping in the middle of Slater Street, State Police said. NEW SCOTLAND -- A 42-year-old man drove drunk to a State Police barracks late Sunday and tried to pick up someone who had been arrested, troopers said. When John M. Hendrickson of Ravena arrived at the New Scotland barracks, a trooper smelled alcohol on his breath and investigated, State Police said. Texas university presidents urged students to be cautious as they traveled after President Donald Trump signed executive actions on immigration. Federal officials closed the border to refugees and temporarily blocked citizens of seven majority-Muslim nations from entering the U.S. over the weekend. The White House said the executive action aims to strengthen the country's borders and sovereignty. Protests around the nation and in Houston called the action discriminatory and unjust, as families separated by the action worked to reunite. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate This story appeared in the Houston Chronicle on Dec. 16, 1965. The words and headlines are reprinted as they ran then. Gemini-6 astronauts jubilantly maneuvered their spacecraft to within six feet of the Gemini-7 spacecraft today in the greatest achievement so far in man's exploration of space. They began flying in formation at distances ranging from six to 10 feet. "We did it!" cried a voice, not immediately identified, from one of the spacecraft. The successful in-flight formation of the two craft, scheduled to fly together for about four hours, pushed the United States past a major milestone in its journey to the Moon. Announced by Stafford The calm voice of astronaut Thomas P. Stafford announced the feat to a waiting world: "We're at 120 feet and sitting." Although the two craft almost minutes later moved nearer together, this was the point at which the rendezvous was officially proclaimed. The rendezvous was right on schedule: 1:26 p.m. (Houston time). At the moment of Stafford's announcement, the 40-man team in the Mission Control Center at the NASA Manned Spacecraft Center here jumped up and exuberantly waved American flags. Flew Nose-to-Nose Although Stafford announced the achievement, it was command pilot Walter M. Schirra Jr. who maneuvered Gemini-6 nose-to-nose with the Gemini-7 craft of Frank Borman and James A. Lovell Jr. Borman and Lovell, in their 12th day of an epic 14-day voyage in space, were the "targets" in the history-making rendezvous. They maintained their position as Schirra jockeyed the Gemini-6 spaceship near and nearer to them. As they closed the distance between the two space ships, Schirra and Stafford reported they could glimpse the two stars from which the Gemini program takes its name: Castor and Pollux. The astronauts were able to gauge the distance between the two crafts by radar, which supplies range information in a manner resembling an automobile speedometer. Saw Each Other The four astronauts could see each other plainly, though the windows of the Gemini-6 spacecraft had become "cloudy" for as yet unexplained reasons. It was feared that this cloudiness might diminish the quality of any photographs that Borman and Lovell might take through the windows. Before the actual rendezvous, the two spacecrafts were in radio contact and Schirra reported to Borman the time he planned to fire the thrusters to start the final maneuver that would achieve the rendezvous. Then he counted it down. At first, Schirra told Borman he was having difficulty spotting the flashing running lights of the Gemini-7 spacecraft. Schirra started the final maneuver by pitching the nose of Gemini-6 up 27 degrees, the firing the jets to increase his speed by about 23 miles an hour. Stafford operated computer that calculated the moves and the radar that locked onto Gemini-7 and told them how far away it was. Shifted Orbits Schirra and Stafford started out 1200 miles behind the Gemini-7 spacecraft. But as both spacecraft sped around the world at speeds in excess of 17,000 miles an hour, Schirra and Stafford executed several orbit-shifting maneuvers to gradually close the gap between the two ships. After one orbit of Gemini-6, the two craft were 730 miles apart. At the end of three orbits, they were only about 100 miles distant. Early in the chase, Gemini 6 had turned around 180 degrees so that its nose was pointed toward the onrushing Gemini-6. The turnaround was necessary because the beacon that answers the Gemini-6 radar signal is in the Gemini-7 nose. The rendezvous, while dramatically exciting, is of the greatest importance to Project Apollo, the successor to the Gemini program, in the American program to place a man on the Moon before 1970. Of Vital Importance In the actual journey to the Moon, a spacecraft will orbit the Moon while a smaller ship - a Lunar Exploration Module - will descend to the surface of the Moon. Because the LEM must then ascend to the orbiting spacecraft and rendezvous with it, today's exercise in rendezvous techniques was of vital importance. The schedule of the mission called for Gemini-6 after maneuvering to within six feet of the Gemini-7 spacecraft, to pull back and forth from the spacecraft of Borman and Lovell for several hours, possibly as much as five. Some of the drama of the rendezvous was lessened by static-plagued radio- transmissions from the spacecraft. Climax of Day The rendezvous was the climax of a shining day in the history of the nation's exploration of space. Twice thwarted by technical failures, Gemini-6 blasted off at 7:37 a.m. (Houston time) in a brilliant display of technical achievement. The initial orbit with a high point (apogee) of 170 miles was exactly on the button, NASA spokesmen said. Eight Maneuvers Schirra and Stafford, who started out 1200 miles behind Gemini, executed eight jet-firing maneuvers to gradually achieve almost the same orbital path as Gemini-7. Each move slightly increased the speed of Gemini-6, which went into orbit at about 17,500 miles an hour. The first maneuver, at 9:12 a.m. over the Gulf of Mexico, raised the high point (apogee) of the G-6 orbit to 170 miles. At 9:55 a.m. over the Indian Ocean, a blast of the small jets elevated the low point (perigee) to 135 miles. After the second maneuver, the distance between the two craft narrowed to 495 miles. 'Looks Good' "Everything looks good." Said flight director Christopher G. Kraft at the NASA Manned Spacecraft Center here. Schirra said cabin temperature in the spacecraft was a little higher than normal - about 90 degrees - but that it was dropping steadily. He also reported seeing the star constellation Orion, which Schirra and Stafford selected as the symbol of their flight. Orion in the Greek mythology was a hunter. The successful launch of Gemini-6 was a joy to both pair of astronauts. "We didn't get to see the liftoff," Borman radioed NASA technicians at the Manned Spacecraft Center here. "but we saw them coming through the fog" over the Atlantic Ocean. When Gemini-6 blasted off, Gemini-7 was in its 162nd revolution of the Earth and was 270 miles down range. Forty-three minutes after liftoff, Gemini Control gave Gemini 6 a "go" for 16 orbits, or a full day's flight. Thursday Splashdown That means Schirra and Stafford will fire retro-rockets on their spacecraft at 8:45 a.m. (Houston time) Thursday, splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean east of Bermuda at 9:29 a.m. Mission Control, however, could continue the Gemini-6 flight another day. The launch itself set a new record for the United States. It was the first time in history that four human beings were in space at the same time. Gemini-7 astronauts Borman and Lovell were jubilant at the successful launch of Gemini-6. "Please confirm," Borman radioed MSC technicians, "(whether) all dust covers removed," in a reference to the tiny dust cover which caused the launch of Gemini-6 to be postponed Sunday. "All dust covers removed," Gemini Control replied. Schirra and Stafford were awakened at 3:02 a.m. Houston time and had the usual astronaut breakfast-filet mignon, eggs, toast, juice and coffee. They entered their spacecraft at 5:35 a.m There had been a little concern that light morning fog -the Cape was socked in Tuesday morning-would cause a third and perhaps final cancellation of the flight. It was scrubbed Oct. 25 when the Agena target rocket apparently exploded before going into orbit and scrubbed again Sunday. Two discrepancies were found on the big Titan 2 rocket that boosts GT-6 into orbit. 1 Flights grounded: Delta Air Lines grounded its domestic flights Sunday because of automation issues, according to an advisory from the Federal Aviation Administration. Delta spokesman Morgan Durrant said the airline was facing a systems outage but flights already in the air were unaffected. The Atlanta airline responded to customer complaints on Twitter by saying it was working hard to get them fixed quickly to minimize the impact to our customers. The FAA says international flights were exempt from the grounding. In August, Delta suffered a computer breakdown after a power failure in its operations center. The airline canceled more than 2,000 flights over three days. Last year, a rash of computer failures disrupted flight operations at U.S. airlines. 2 Train threat: A woman in Burlington, N.J., who allegedly threw a 5-year-old girl onto the tracks as a train was approaching has been charged with attempted murder. Police went to the light rail platform Friday night after a New Jersey Transit bus driver reported a suspicious woman. As officers walked onto the platform to approach Autumn Matacchiera, 20, she allegedly grabbed the girl who had been standing with her mother and her mothers boyfriend and threw the child onto the tracks. The boyfriend quickly got the girl to safety. Matacchiera was taken to a hospital for a mental health evaluation. Have a story idea or tip about something happening in the East Village? Or maybe a photo? Or several photos? Or video! We'd love to hear about it. Or see it. Or something. Please go here to submit a tip. Community members gathered in downtown Montgomery on Sunday to show support for their officers in blue. The rally was hosted by Americans Stand United, a non-profit organization dedicated to removing any stigmas surrounding police officers. "My husband has been a law enforcement officer for nine years in Montgomery County," ASU President Mary Jobe said. "So back in July, we lost the officers in Dallas and I thought that we need to do something. Not only in times of tragedy, but every year in every town in Montgomery County to show support for these men and women." Jobe said she created Americans Stand United in October 2016 after organizing a successful rally in Magnolia on July 31 that gathered roughly 600 guests and raised $8,700. ASU Vice President Pamela Morris said all money raised from the events benefits local law enforcement, helping officers get additional resources like Tasers, medical kits and active shooter bags. "We go to the agencies and ask what are their needs, what are their must-haves, what are they working their extra jobs for," Morris said. "Every officer is going to be different, but we reach that goal of what they want and what hasn't been provided and we go from there." Another aspect of ASU is the Kids for Cops initiative, which currently has 70 kids involved. It focuses on fostering a relationship between children and law enforcement from a young age. Through discussions and demonstrations, such as anti-bullying and cyber bullying, ASU organizers said they hope children will grow up without fear of law enforcement. During Sunday's rally, multiple businesses donated their time and resources from 2 to 6 p.m. A bounce house and face paint tent was set up for kids, the Community Center held a silent auction and local musician Jason Allen performed. The Easley family was the official food provider for the event, preparing home-smoked barbeque from their catering business, Easley Brothers Hog Heaven BBQ, to raise money for the cause. Owner Arnett Easley, along with wife Sherry, brothers Lewis and Clayton, and sister Annett, often give back in the community by way of cooking, they said. For this occasion, the Easley's started smoking meat around 7 a.m. on Sunday, preparing 10 briskets, 30 or 40 pounds of sausage, and 10 racks of ribs - and they "wouldn't have had it any other way," Arnett said. "We know that we are trying to heal the wounds of America, so if we can be that Band-Aid, that suture to bring that unification, we want to do that," Arnett said. "We're all part of the same race - the human race - so we have to constantly keep that trust in God that we can make things possible for people less fortunate than we are." Local officials, like Montgomery Chief of Police Jim Napolitano, Montgomery County Precinct 1 Constable Philip Cash and Captain Melvin Franklin of the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office spoke at the event, expressing their appreciation for the support the community showed. The support comes in midst of a nation griped with racial tension and division, often between citizens and police officers. However, citizens and officers at the event said this hasn't been an issue in Montgomery County. "We live in a county where the community has good relationship with law enforcement-and its gonna get better with more community involvement," Cash said. "These officers work away from their families on holidays, they work weird night shifts, they are away from their kids When the community gives back and shows they care, it's touching to all law enforcement officers." It's the beginning of a new month and you know what that means - a new project for you to start! I heard from so many of you last month when we talked about cleaning windows with Renz EZ. It was so very encouraging and gave me so many ideas for months to come. So this month I want to encourage you to tackle cleaning up your furniture. If you are like most people, you buy a piece of furniture and expect to last for years and years. It should, for what furniture costs. Little nicks and stains will make your furniture look old but it's so easy to take care of that. If your furniture is dirty or has a sticky feel, you can clean it with Fine Wood Cleaner. For little nicks, use a putty stick in the color closest to the furniture color. Rub it in the nick or scratch. Be aggressive and get it down into the area. Don't worry if you get the putty stick on the furniture in the area around the scratch; it will buff out. Take your time and get all the scratches out down by the legs where you run into it with the vacuum cleaner. The Finish Fixer by Howards is an excellent putty stick, soft enough to go into any abrasion or scratch and firm enough to stay there. After you rub the putty stick into the wood, you need to buff the area and reapply if required. If you have discoloration in the wood from sun damage or age, use Restore A Finish in the color of the furniture. The color match doesn't have to be perfect; Restore A Finish is very forgiving. Wipe on the Restore A Finish like you are dusting and let dry. After it's dry, inspect the piece and if necessary repeat the process. If you just have a cloudy look from a wet glasses use the White Ring Remover and just wipe it across the stain. After you have taken care of any imperfection in your furniture protect finish with Feed and Wax. It's a formulation of beeswax, orange oil and carnauba wax which makes furniture look like it just came off the showroom floor plus it smells so good. If you did everything I wrote about it would be just a couple of hours of your day. Time well spent for good-looking furniture! Now to the email Question: I enjoy ready your Happy Handyman articles in our Katy newspaper and have used your recommendations to repair various projects around the house. My issue is with rust in my garage. All my tools and everything else metal is slowly rusting away. I can only assume it's a result of the salt from the water softener which is also in the garage. Any suggestions? I can't be the only person with this problem. Answer: After talking with numerous soft water companies in San Antonio I am convinced that is not the problem. It never caused a problem in any house of mine or dads. But the salt water pool you have does give me concern. So I am throwing this out to all readers, if you have experienced rust in the garage, email me the problem at www.happyhandyman2@yahoo.com and I will pass on the answers to this reader and post later. Thanks! Question: Hi Trudy! Do you have any recommendations on getting water marks off granite and putting a shine back on the surface? Answer: I am assuming that the watermarks are just that and not a buildup. Granite Gold is a line of cleaners just for granite, marble and stone. Use the Shower Cleaner to remove any water marks. Spray on and let sit and then wipe off. Then afterwards use the Daily Cleaner and wipe dry. To restore shine use the Polish. Simply spray on and then wipe off. It will restore shine, and the granite will feel smooth to the touch like when it was new. If you haven't sealed the granite in a while now would be a good time to do that. It will cut down on staining and keep the granite looking good. If you cannot find the products mentioned here locally, you can find them at www.happyhandyman.com. Click on Shop Johnnie's Favorites, or call the store at 210-341-1573. Email Trudy Chuoke Lesage at happyhandyman2@yahoo.com. Mail can be sent to Johnnie Chuoke's Home and Hardware, 2361 NW Military, San Antonio, TX 78231. Have you ever wondered why we seem to have a ho-hum experience as we come together to worship? We all know that there is so much appreciation for what the Lord has done in our lives, yet there is just not much excitement, such anticipation for seeing the Lord work His wonders when we come to worship. There are several things that can cause us to have this joyful kind of attitude when we come to church on Sunday morning. First, when we do not worship the Lord daily as we read and study His word and spend time seeking His face in prayer, we can almost depend on not really having a real experience of praise, thanksgiving and worship when we meet with others at church. II Timothy 2:15 tells us to "study to show thyself approved unto God, a worker that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the Word of Truth." A victim mentality will always blame others. For instance, children blame parents, parents blame schools, husbands blame their wives and wives blame their husbands. People in debt blame the economy, the rich blame or accuse the poor and the poor against the rich. Criminals are quick to point the finger at society and the society blame the government. Christians blame the devil or God. All of these see themselves as victims. This kind of thinking produces a "what if" mentality. What if I get hurt or become ill or what if I lose my job? What if people don't like or accept me? What if I can't find someone to love me and I end up alone? What if I'm not hearing from God and I make a mistake? A victim mentality keeps us from taking risks. For instance, Peter was willing to take a risk and got out of the boat when the Lord said, "Come." This thinking will stop us from walking by faith. Author John Mason said, "You never get your head above water if you never stick your neck out." To be a success we have to cast down this victim mentality and the "what if" mentality. II Corinthians 10:5 says, " Cast down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against God." David Viscot wrote, "If your life is ever going to get better you will have to take risks. There is simply no way you can grow without taking changes." Because the devil is the accuser, he will constantly point to our flaws and failures and tell us we are not worthy. Don't listen, he is the father of lies. You are not a victim, you are a victor. I John says, "This is the victory, that overcomes the world even our faith." I encourage you to start confessing, "I have victory in Jesus." Have a great week. The boards of Deer Park, Pasadena and Friendswood ISDs recently joined those of more than 425 other school districts from across the state in passing resolutions to oppose the Texas Education Agency's tentative new public school accountability system, which is based on A-F letter grades. "The A-through-F grading system is not an accurate representation of the school district and our talented students, many of whom come from diverse backgrounds," Pasadena ISD Superintendent DeeAnn Powell said. "Our ultimate goal as educators is to equip students with the knowledge and skills to reach their highest potential and become productive members of society. The grading system pulls focus from these goals and puts pressure on students and staff to achieve high scores on standardized tests, preventing students from reaching their full potential." Deer Park ISD Superintendent Victor E. White Jr. voiced his concerns in a letter to the community on Jan. 5. "As expected, the preliminary ratings in our district and across the state align with wealth and poverty," he wrote. "Poverty has an undeniable connection with low academic performance. "Schools with a higher number of children from low-income families receive lower ratings, and schools in wealthier areas receive higher ratings," White wrote. "The poor schools are judged as bad and the wealthy schools are judged as good when neither statement is entirely true." TEA reports show approximately 43.9 percent of Deer Park ISD's 13,152 students are classified as economically disadvantaged and 11.7 percent are English-language learners. More Information RATINGS FOR LOCAL DISTRICTS The Texas Education Agency has released unofficial grades for more than 1,000 school districts in a new rating system Deer Park ISD Student Achievement: B Student Progress: B Closing performance gaps: B Graduation Rates and Post-Secondary College Readiness: F Pasadena ISD Student Achievement: C Student Progress: B Closing performance gaps: B Graduation Rates and Post-Secondary College Readiness: D Friendwood ISD Student Achievement: A Student Progress: A Closing performance gaps: B Graduation Rates and Post-Secondary College Readiness: C See More Collapse "I believe strongly in the value of accountability, and I think our schools should be held accountable for our community's expectations; however, this work-in-progress A-F system is not an accurate representation of the accomplishments of our students and staff," White wrote. "It's simply another attempt to categorize our public schools in a negative and inaccurate light." Friendswood trustee Ralph Hobratschk also had concerns. "Accountability to our constituents is extremely important to me. The very simple 'A-F Rating' preliminary results are not indicative or representative of our FISD educational processes and way too arbitrary," Hobratschk said. "For example, the area of most importance to our community (from survey results) is safety. In the A-F rating system, safety is a minor footnote. "As the school board presentation on this rating system and its domains proceeded over some forty minutes, I concluded that a minor in statistics would be necessary to explain this single, simple letter grade. There has to be a better way to be transparent and accountable." In a letter to parents shortly after the first preliminary A-F ratings were released in January, Friendswood ISD Superintendent Trish Hanks told parents the grades were based on a first draft of the grading criteria that still needed work. The grades, based on the 2015-16 school year, are meant to show districts the marks they could potentially receive and are not official. Official letter grades would be released in fall 2018. Currently, the state only has two accountability rankings: "met standard," and "improvement required," and Commissioner of Education Mike Morath said those ratings issued in November are the official ratings of the 2015-16 school year. Hanks wrote: "In the report, TEA and the Commissioner of Education warn against drawing any inferences or predictions from the (A-F) ratings, as the real ratings in 2018 will be based on scores from the 2017-18 school year and different criteria will be used. I agree with the Commissioner of Education. This system needs more work. "In FISD, we want to know how our schools compare to others serving similar students. We value data, and we have many sources that we use to help us improve," Hanks wrote. One concern raised by a number of education officials is how to measure affluent school districts against others where students may face more challenges. In Friendswood ISD, the TEA reports roughly 9.1 percent of the district's students are considered economically disadvantaged and 2.5 are classified as English-language learners. In Pasadena ISD, approximately 76.4 percent of students are considered economically disadvantaged and 30 percent are English-language learners. State lawmakers have argued a new standardized measure to compare how well schools are performing is needed. "This new system, once finalized, will be far superior to the current nebulous 'needs improvement/met standard' grading system we have today," said state Sen. Larry Taylor, R-Friendswood. "Our students and parents deserve a grading system that helps individual students, their campuses and their districts transparently measure academic success and clearly delineate where improvements are needed. "I realize that some folks are frustrated with accountability, but the taxpayers of Texas deserve to know if their hard-earned tax dollars are being wisely spent and that our students are getting the quality education they deserve," Taylor said. "There are innumerable false assumptions and claims being made about the upcoming A-F program. "It is worth reminding people that this is a work in progress and not all of the scoring parameters are even currently available. I look forward to working with parents, teachers, our education commissioner and the professional education community to make sure that this system is a fair way to measure a school's strengths and properly assesses areas where they need improvement." Under the A-F grading system, the TEA assigns letter grades for schools and districts based on overall performance in five categories: student achievement on all subjects on state assessments, student progress, how well campuses and school districts close performances gaps between low-income and high-income students, community engagement and a category combining graduation rates and post-secondary and career readiness. The community engagement scores were not included in this year's reports. Other school districts in the greater Houston area that have sent resolutions to lawmakers protesting the A-F plan include Alvin, Dickinson, Clear Creek, Fort Bend and La Porte. In a template resolution crafted for use by school districts, the Texas Association of School Administrators calls for replacing the A-F grading legislation with a plan that rates schools on "community-based" accountability involving evaluation based on performance reviews by visiting teams, classroom-centered evidence of progress and some standardized testing among other things. TASA officials say the new rating system relies too heavily on standardized test scores, provides no direction for schools with low scores and "creates a false impression about an entire neighborhood of children and shames students." TASA, a nonprofit organization funded by dues and other funds paid by school districts, offers a plethora of information and materials for school districts to help lobby state lawmakers to repeal the rating system. When the first scores were released earlier this month, Morath stressed this year's ratings are to be considered a work-in-progress for "informational purposes only." "No inferences about official district or campus performance in the 2015-16 school year should be drawn from these ratings, and these ratings should not be considered predictors of future district or campus performance ratings," he said. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate A discussion over the appointment of members to the San Jacinto County Emergency Service District (ESD) board at the Jan. 24 Commissioners Court turned into accusations made about various individuals involved in emergency services around the county. Issues regarding the ESD started during public comments when Waterwood Volunteer Fire Department Assistant Chief Lee Ashby, Jr. spoke before the court about allegations involving other volunteer firefighters and their alleged actions during Ashby's time serving as a Point Blank VFD firefighter. Ashby further commented that the ESD board is very controlling of fire departments in their district in situations involving conflicts among personnel and alleged criminal accusations, which he claims are being swept under the rug. "We will not bow down to the ESD," said Ashby. "They don't control us and if we have a question concerning the issues of communications we should be able to go and do that." Waterwood Volunteer Fire Department is not part of the San Jacinto County ESD. The discussion for appointing members to the ESD board began with a recommendation for Tammy Russell to be appointed as the representative of Pct. 2. Pct. 2 Commissioner Donny Marrs made a motion to approve her with Pct. 1 Commissioner Laddie McAnally seconding the motion. Ashby spoke on Russell's behalf, stating she can be an asset to the ESD board. However, Denise Lewis of the ESD board noted that Ashby and Waterwood VFD are not a part of the organization. Members of the board discussed the appointment further with Michael Smith noting that Russell cannot be involved with decisions involving items regarding the Texas Forest Service. The discussion went further as other members of the ESD board made note that Russell is allegedly disruptive during many of the board's meetings. "It is hindering some of the processes," said Lewis. Lewis and Smith continued discussing issues the board is reportedly having with Russell with Lou Rogers also making a note that they did not recommend appointing Russell to the ESD board. "We spend a lot of time going over things that are non-issues," said Smith. Marrs brought up concerns he has with the ESD board, noting that at times he has asked questions of the board's decisions and has never received any answers. He cited one incident regarding an alleged decision made by the ESD to get rid of one ambulance. "Not one person on that board could give me an answer," said Marrs. Marrs further expressed his concerns about the board's hesitation to appoint Russell, feeling as though they were verbally beating her up. The discussion turned heated between Marrs and the board before County Judge John Lovett intervened to calm the situation down. The court eventually voted on Russell's appointment with Marrs and McAnally voting to appoint her while the rest of the court voted against her appointment. The court then discussed appointing Smith as a representative for Pct. 4, but Ashby spoke once again and voiced his concerns over the appointment and made various accusations of different individuals involved in emergency services. Lewis spoke on Smith's behalf, stating that he has been a valuable asset to the board. He is currently serving as treasurer. Ashby further explained many of the points he expressed in public comments, stating that during his time in the Point Blank VFD a number of other firefighters have created certain problems with Ashby. Ashby said Smith along with Lewis were allegedly helping to cover up these incidents. Another accusation from Ashby is that Smith allegedly accused to cut funding to Point Blank VFD if they did not get Ashby under control. Lewis and Smith both stated to the court that this is the first time they've heard of any of the allegations Ashby has made against other firefighters. "This has never been brought to the ESD board," said Lewis. Lewis further commented that Point Blank VFD and 980 North VFD have both released Ashby from service due to alleged problems they have had with him. Smith also stated in his defense that he does not have the power to cut funding on his own authority. "I can't do that," he said. "I'm one person on the board." The court also approved Smith's appointment to the ESD board. Boards for Friendswood, Deer Park and Pasadena ISDs recently joined those of more than 425 other school districts from across the state in passing resolutions to oppose the Texas Education Agency's tentative new public school accountability system, which is based on A-F letter grades. Friendswood trustee Ralph Hobratschk expressed concerns with the new system. "Accountability to our constituents is extremely important to me. The very simple 'A-F Rating' preliminary results are not indicative or representative of our FISD educational processes and way too arbitrary," he said. "For example, the area of most importance to our community (from survey results) is safety. In the A-F rating system, safety is a minor footnote. As the school board presentation on this rating system and its domains proceeded over some forty minutes, I concluded that a minor in statistics would be necessary to explain this single, simple letter grade. There has to be a better way to be transparent and accountable." In a letter to parents shortly after the first preliminary A-F ratings were released in January, Friendswood ISD Superintendent Trish Hanks told parents the grades were based on a first draft of the grading criteria that still needed work. The grades, based on the 2015-2016 school year, are meant to show districts the marks they could potentially receive and are not official. Official letter grades would be released in fall 2018. Currently, the state only has two accountability rankings: "met standard," and "improvement required," and Commissioner of Education Mike Morath said those ratings issued in November are the official ratings of the 2015-2016 school year. Hanks wrote: "In the report, TEA and the Commissioner of Education warn against drawing any inferences or predictions from the (A-F) ratings, as the real ratings in 2018 will be based on scores from the 2017-18 school year and different criteria will be used. I agree with the Commissioner of Education. This system needs more work. "In FISD, we want to know how our schools compare to others serving similar students. We value data, and we have many sources that we use to help us improve," Hanks wrote. One concern raised by a number of education officials is how to measure affluent school districts against others where students may face more challenges. In Friendswood ISD, the TEA reports roughly 9.1 percent of the district's students are considered economically disadvantaged and 2.5 are classified as English-language learners. In Pasadena ISD, approximately 76.4 percent of students are considered economically disadvantaged and 30 percent are English-language learners. "The A-through-F grading system is not an accurate representation of the school district and our talented students, many of whom come from diverse backgrounds," Pasadena ISD Superintendent DeeAnn Powell said. "Our ultimate goal as educators is to equip students with the knowledge and skills to reach their highest potential and become productive members of society. The grading system pulls focus from these goals and puts pressure on students and staff to achieve high scores on standardized tests, preventing students from reaching their full potential." Deer Park ISD Superintendent Victor E. White Jr. voiced his concerns in a letter to the community on Jan. 5. "As expected, the preliminary ratings in our district and across the state align with wealth and poverty," he wrote. "Poverty has an undeniable connection with low academic performance. "Schools with a higher number of children from low income families receive lower ratings, and schools in wealthier areas receive higher ratings," White wrote. "The poor schools are judged as bad and the wealthy schools are judged as good when neither statement is entirely true." TEA reports show approximately 43.9 percent of Deer Park ISD's 13,152 students are classified as economically disadvantaged and 11.7 percent are English-language learners. "I believe strongly in the value of accountability, and I think our schools should be held accountable for our community's expectations; however, this workinprogress A-F system is not an accurate representation of the accomplishments of our students and staff," White wrote. "It's simply another attempt to categorize our public schools in a negative and inaccurate light." State lawmakers have argued a new standardized measure to compare how well schools are performing is needed. "This new system, once finalized, will be far superior to the current nebulous 'needs improvement/met standard' grading system we have today," said state Sen. Larry Taylor, R-Friendswood. "Our students and parents deserve a grading system that helps individual students, their campuses and their districts transparently measure academic success and clearly delineate where improvements are needed. "I realize that some folks are frustrated with accountability, but the taxpayers of Texas deserve to know if their hard-earned tax dollars are being wisely spent and that our students are getting the quality education they deserve," Taylor said. "There are innumerable false assumptions and claims being made about the upcoming A-F program. It is worth reminding people that this is a work in progress and not all of the scoring parameters are even currently available. I look forward to working with parents, teachers, our education commissioner and the professional education community to make sure that this system is a fair way to measure a school's strengths and properly assesses areas where they need improvement." Under the A-F grading system, the TEA assigns letter grades for schools and districts based on overall performance in five categories: student achievement on all subjects on state assessments, student progress, how well campuses and school districts close performances gaps between low-income and high-income students, community engagement and a category combining graduation rates and post-secondary and career readiness. The community engagement scores were not included in this year's reports. Other school districts in the greater Houston area that have sent resolutions to lawmakers protesting the A-F plan include Alvin, Dickinson, Clear Creek, Fort Bend and La Porte. In a template resolution crafted for use by school districts, the Texas Association of School Administrators calls for replacing the A-F grading legislation with a plan that rates schools on "community-based" accountability involving evaluation based on performance reviews by visiting teams, classroom-centered evidence of progress and some standardized testing among other things. TASA officials say the new rating system relies too heavily on standardized test scores, provides no direction for schools with low scores and "creates a false impression about an entire neighborhood of children and shames students." TASA, a nonprofit organization funded by dues and other funds paid by school districts, offers a plethora of information and materials for school districts to help lobby state lawmakers to repeal the rating system. When the first scores were released earlier this month, Morath stressed this year's ratings are to be considered a work-in-progress for "informational purposes only." "No inferences about official district or campus performance in the 2015-16 school year should be drawn from these ratings, and these ratings should not be considered predictors of future district or campus performance ratings," he said. With the Texas Legislature's 85th session in full-swing, The Woodlands Township Board of Directors created an Ad Hoc Legislative Committee and authorized board Chairman Gordy Bunch to make legislation-related decisions on the board's behalf. For months, the township board has met with legal counsel and legislative consultants in executive session to develop an agenda for proposing legislation related to The Woodlands Township. Foremost in the planning is the initiative to revisit and clarify issues with The Woodlands' current governance structure, as well as changes that might clear a path toward incorporation, Bunch said. The board voted unanimously to name Bunch and board members Ann Snyder and Brian Boniface to the Ad Hoc Legislative Committee. Township President Don Norrell explained that the township staff would be working with legal counsel and legislative consultants during the session on a bill. "We need, potentially, to act very quickly if an issue does come up," Norrell said. The idea of the legislative committee is that the three members would be able to get together and make decisions on behalf of the township on short notice, should a legislative issue requiring timely attention arise. In the event that an immediate decision must be made, the board also authorized Bunch alone to make a decision on behalf of the board. Bunch said the township is working on drafting legislation that would "clean up" the original legislation that formed The Woodlands Township, which is the only governing body of its kind in Texas. The bill also would allow the citizens to vote on the issue of incorporation and establish a city tax rate simultaneously. "This is our attempt to say it'll be fully transparent. We're not asking for new authority or powers," Bunch said. "Just clarity." Passing the legislation to clarify the township's enabling legislation is just a preliminary step in the process of planning for incorporation, Bunch said. Should the legislation pass, the next step would be to hold public forums and conduct comprehensive tax-impact studies. "Today, there is no transition plan," Bunch said. He expects to release the draft of the legislation that the township is working on with state Sen. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, and Rep. Mark Keough, R-The Woodlands, in the next month or so. AUSTIN -- Parents could receive part of the money spent on public education to send their kids to a different school under a plan unveiled by a group of senators and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick. Patrick said that this plan seeks to give all students in Texas the right to seek a quality education. "We already have school choice in Texas. If you are rich enough, you send your child to private school," he said. "But if you're not wealthy enough to do that, then you don't have any options. Every parent has a right to send their child to the school that they think is best for them." Senate Bill 3 aims to create school choice through two methods. The first will allow parents to receive a portion of the money intended to educate their child at a traditional public school, which averages about $9,000 per year. This money would be placed in a trust account and could only be used for educational costs, like private school tuition or online courses. The amount received is based on need, ranging from 60 percent of the cost for educating a student at a public school in a year for families above twice the poverty line, to 75 percent for poor families, and 90 percent for families with disabled children. Bill author and Senate Education Committee chair Sen. Larry Taylor of Friendswood says that the state will split the cost with districts in the first year. He added that the lack of school choice programs in Texas is holding the state back. "Thirty other states have school choice programs across this nation. We are behind the curve," said Taylor. "If Texas wants to remain economically soundwe need to pass school choice legislation, to give our students the opportunity to receive a great education tailored to their specific needs." This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Washington Legal scholars predicted a clash on constitutional issues under Donald Trump they just didn't expect it would come only a little more than a week into his presidency. Trump's order banning entry into the United States for citizens of seven Muslim nations triggered a legal showdown that played out in the nation's busiest international airports Sunday. Four federal judges intervened to prevent the deportation of permanent residents and holders of valid U.S. visas back to their home countries. Scenes of family members waiting for detained loved ones dominated international arrival terminals, while volunteer attorneys worked around the clock to stop deportations and free detained passengers. Trump's directive reportedly was imposed with little notice or guidance to the relevant authorities, creating havoc in arrival halls and triggering late-night legal challenges in federal courts. Despite the court orders, lawyers reported Sunday that new arrivals were still being handcuffed, questioned about their beliefs and detained for hours without legal counsel. Deportation proceedings continued despite a New York judge's nationwide freeze on cases related to Trump's ban. Airports remained the frontline in the battle. Crowds gathered at airports in Miami, Dallas, Cleveland, Charlotte, N.C., New York, Washington, San Francisco and Chicago. Exasperation grew on all sides, and some immigration officials threw up their hands. "They finally stopped talking to us altogether and told us to call President Trump," said Becca Heller, director of the International Refugee Assistance Project. Thousands of demonstrators gathered outside the White House, and a chanting crowd of hundreds also besieged the entrance to the Trump Hotel a few blocks away. But the White House showed no signs of backing down. Trump and his chief of staff, Reince Priebus, rejected charges of constitutional overreach. Priebus said the list of banned nations for travel may expand to "Pakistan and other countries." A Priebus statement that the ban would not apply to permanent U.S. residents from those countries "going forward" went unexplained, and there was no new document from the White House changing what Trump had signed on Friday. A Trump statement issued in the afternoon provided no clarification, though Trump did say the U.S. would begin issuing visas "to all countries" after the 90-day ban lapses. "My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months," the statement said. "The seven countries named in the executive order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." "Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world a horrible mess!" Trump said in a Twitter post Sunday morning. Precinct 3 Commissioner James Noack wants Montgomery County to consider offering all residential property owners some type of homestead exemption. Noack has requested the placement of an item on the Feb. 14 Commissioners Court agenda to discuss seeking the tax assessor-collector's assistance in performing a revenue impact study for a general homestead exemption of up to 20 percent. Montgomery County homeowners already can receive a school district exemption, as required by state law, and the county does offer an exemption to those over 65 years old. However, while state law allows for a local option homestead exemption for all homeowners, the county currently does not offer one. Texas law, under the state's tax code, enables governing bodies of counties, municipalities and special districts the local option of adopting a homestead exemption up to 20 percent of the assessed value of a home. Meaning, the owner of a home with an assessed value of $100,000 would be taxed on $80,000 of the value. The minimum exemption amount allowed for a homeowner under the law is $5,000. As Texas lawmakers grapple with bills addressing appraisal caps this legislative session, Noack believes it is the right time for Montgomery County to explore an exemption. "After speaking with citizens, it seems to be what they want to see," Noack told The Courier. "It's more of a three-legged stool when it comes to legislative efforts, homestead exemptions and then spending, which I will address later." According to data, there is approximately $31.32 billion worth of assessed residential property value in Montgomery County, coming from 116,555 home sites with an average assessed value of $268,685. With the current approved property tax rate of 46.67 cents per $100 valuation, there is approximately $146.2 million in tax revenue generated from residential property before any exemptions are taken into account. Based on those figures, the maximum 20 percent homestead exemption could provide tax relief of up to $29.2 million combined for Montgomery County homeowners. With a county operating budget of $352 million, commissioners would be charged with figuring out how to cut around 8.3 percent of expenditures if a 20 percent homestead exemption were approved. "We're already looking at some exemptions as long as it doesn't impact the budget in such a way that it impairs our ability to provide services," County Judge Craig Doyal said. "I'm all for cutting the burden to taxpayers, but we still have a job to do." Noack hopes Tax Assessor-Collector Tammy J. McRae will be able to give Commissioners Court a better idea of what it can afford in terms of budget cuts. "I'm not suggesting we cut $29.2 million. I'm suggesting we begin to look at the effects of a homestead exemption on the county budget and to taxpayers," said Noack, who proposed a 1-cent reduction in the county property tax rate last year that was approved by the court. When Noack took office in January 2013, the county budget was around $270 million and has grown by around $80 million over the past four years. "This ensures that the hardworking taxpayers in Montgomery County begin to see some relief," Noack said. "We shouldn't depend solely on legislative action; we can do it with a homestead exemption." According to a September article posted on the Texas Association of Counties website, 117 counties out of the 254 statewide offered the local option homestead exemption. Any homestead exemption would have to be approved by July 1 for it to take effect this year. "I fully support efforts to lower the property tax burden on Montgomery County taxpayers," McRae stated. "I look forward to sharing my findings with the court." Montgomery County does provide a local option $35,000 exemption for those over 65 years old. School districts also are required by law to provide a $25,000 exemption, and the Lone Star College System provides a 1 percent exemption. There also are state-mandated exemptions for disabled veterans and their surviving spouses. "I've asked Tammy to look at the 65-and-older exemption to enhance it and look at other counties around us and what their doing, so we can provide for our seniors who are hurt the most by tax increases," Doyal said. "We've refinanced the debt to lessen the impact on our residential taxpayers and still provide services to the seventh-fastest growing county in the nation." Now is the appropriate time to start debating it." Noack also has discussed property tax reform via legislative measures with state Rep. Mark Keough, R-The Woodlands, state Sen. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, and state Sen. Paul Bettencourt, R-Houston. Noack wants Commissioners Court to approve a resolution, drafted by County Attorney J D Lambright, to support those efforts in Austin to bring property tax reform to Montgomery County. "I believe any time we can put money back into the pockets of Montgomery County taxpayers, it is our responsibility to do so," said Noack, who wants more significant tax relief in 2018 through local and statewide action as well. "In March is when the county auditor sends out a budget request. We need to take everything into account. Now is the appropriate time to start debating it." This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Ann M. Donnelly waited half a year for her chance to convince the Senate that she'd make a good federal judge. When the day finally came, she packed as many relatives as she could into the benches. In her opening comments, she named every single one of them. Donnelly introduced the senators to her husband, Michael. Her sister Sarah and brother Thomas. And then their spouses and their four children. And to her mother and late father - "I know he is watching," she told the judiciary committee in spring of 2015. And her two daughters, and their boyfriends - one of whom would be Donnelly's future son-in-law by the time she was sworn in the next year. And then Saturday night, after a year and a week on the federal bench, Donnelly sat in her own courtroom in Brooklyn while families shouted and cried in airports across the country. President Donald Trump's sudden ban on refugees and visitors from seven Muslim-majority countries had interrupted reunions midflight, leaving aunts and nephews and fathers and daughters stranded on opposite sides of security cordons, while federal officials decided who would be deported by presidential decree. That's the night the daughter of Mary and Jack Donnelly - whose speeches and rulings had rarely traveled beyond courthouse walls - became known across the world as the first judge to block Trump's order. Never before in her long legal career had Donnelly gained such attention. Nowhere close. Her old college roommate, Darcy Gibson Berglund, remembers the Ohio-raised English major starring in a campus rendition of "Pippin" in the late 1970s - but quickly leaving the stage for the law. "She's an intellectual, she was not going to pursue theater," Berglund said. But she said her friend retained "a facility with language" after graduating law school in 1984, which occasionally showed up in the papers. Donnelly spent the next quarter-century as a New York prosecutor. Her most famous case was against two executives who looted their company - a trial that the New York Times described as "six months of sometimes tedious testimony." The paper recounted Donnelly's closing arguments in the Tyco International case, when she "at times seemed like a schoolteacher lecturing her students." The executives "believed they were above the law, and they believe the rules that apply to other people do not apply to them," Donnelly told the jury in 2004. The men were convicted. This week, some of Donnelly's old colleagues praised her demeanor during that trial - one telling the Times she was "the calm center of the spinning wheel," even then. She made state judge a few years after her victory in the Tyco trial, in 2009, and for years handled mostly criminal trials. Donnelly would later tell senators that sentencing someone to prison "is one of the most difficult tasks a judge faces." Some of her cases, however, we so horrific it didn't seem hard. "Not only did you strangle this woman, you then chopped her up," she told a man in 2010, according to the New York Daily News, before sentencing him to 19 years to life for killing his ex-girlfriend and burying her in concrete. If the killer were ever released, the paper noted, he would be deported because he had come to the United States illegally. Several years later, a populist Republican would begin crafting campaign speeches around violent immigrants, as Trump and Donnelly approached intersection. But first, Donnelly had to wait. And wait, and wait, and wait after President Barack Obama nominated her to the federal circuit in November 2014, promising she would "serve the American people with integrity and an unwavering commitment to justice." The Senate Judiciary Committee did not hold hearings to approve her for months, a common theme in an era when White House and Congress stood divided. "I'm thrilled the committee is finally moving forward," Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., said in May 2015. "I know Ann well." He spoke of her parents in Ohio, and her work prosecuting sex crimes. He told his colleague of offices Donnelly had left long ago, where "her reputation is legendary." "She is at her core a kind, thoughtful, compassionate person," Schumer said. He asked her family to stand. "You'll see, it's a great sight." Donnelly's mother and a dozen-some siblings, children, spouses, nieces and friends all rose in the chamber. One woman wiped tears from her eyes after Donnelly took the table at the front of the room. The senators asked her only two questions, and only about criminal law. "It's a certain risk a judge takes," Donnelly told Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., speaking of times she had tried to rehabilitate rather than punish a young offender, in hopes to "save someone from what is bound to be a life of crime." But mostly, Donnelly spoke of her family before ceding the table and waiting for the Senate's decision. Another half a year passed until the Senate confirmed her, nearly unanimously, with only two nays. Yet more months went by before Donnelly was sworn in, quoting Abraham Lincoln in Brooklyn, and speaking once again about her family. She made no great news for a full year on the federal bench - until Saturday evening, when protesters thronged major U.S. airports and an executive with the American Civil Liberties Union tweeted directions to Donnelly's courthouse. "Go right now if you can," he wrote. It had by then been a full day since Trump signed an executive order he said would "keep radical Islamic terrorists" out of the country - but which turned out to instantly bar people who had spent weeks or years planning journeys to the United States, and in some cases were already here. They had names like Labeeb Ali, who told The Washington Post he had sold his business and belongings in Iraq and obtained a U.S. visa before finding out at the airport he couldn't even board his flight. And Binto Adan, who The Post reported had flown thousands of miles with her 8 and 9-year-old children expecting to see her husband, but who ended up held all day by Dulles Airport security because her family was Somali. "I am looking for my parents! They are elderly!" a crying woman shouted in the same airport that night. And in cities from Dallas to Seattle, bewildered families sought missing members, and the ACLU's emergency request to stop the deportations found its way to Donnelly's courtroom in New York. She had once been a government lawyer herself, but that night showed little patience for their arguments, The Post reported. "Our own government presumably approved their entry to the country," Donnelly said, weighing the risks of sending unknown numbers of people back across the oceans. An ACLU lawyer interrupted the hearing to warn Donnelly that a flier was about to be deported to war-torn Syria unless she acted immediately. Donnelly asked if the government could guarantee that person's safety, and unconvinced by their answer, issued her order just before 9 p.m. Sending travelers back could cause "irreparable harm," she ruled. She'd turned more eloquent phrases, but this time her written words were photographed and immediately shared across the world. "Stay is granted," the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union Voting Rights Project wrote on Twitter. "Stay is national." By early Sunday morning, tearful and exhausted people were emerging from security areas across the United States. They had no guarantee for their future in the United States, but they had a reprieve from immediate deportation. And as families filtered out into the cities, the name of a federal judge they'd never heard of was in headlines across the globe. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate The onetime handyman for a prominent Silicon Valley community member was charged Monday with strangling his employer and burying the body in a shallow grave in remote foothills in the Central Valley, officials said. Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith called the slaying of former Cupertino school board member Gin Lu Tommy Shwe callous and cold-hearted while announcing the arrest of the suspected killer at a news conference. Christopher Ellebracht, a 38-year-old Cupertino resident with a history of recent arrests in the South Bay, was arraigned Monday in Santa Clara County Superior Court on murder, financial elder abuse and forgery charges. We are shocked and saddened that my fathers life story has come to such a tragic end, said Shwes adult son, Huei-Saint Shwe. It is incomprehensible for us how something like this could happen to someone who was as kind and giving as our father. Gin Lu Shwe, a 70-year-old real estate agent and respected member of the Chinese community in the greater Bay Area, had hired Ellebracht at times over the past two years to work on his businesses, said Lt. Julian Quinonez, a detective with the Santa Clara County Sheriffs Office. That work relationship, though, came to an end sometime around Jan. 17 when Shwes family reported him missing. Detectives were tipped off on Ellebracht after learning he had recently deposited a $10,000 check from Shwe into his bank account through an ATM in Morgan Hill. Then on Jan. 20, California Highway Patrol officers found a van registered to Ellebracht ditched on the side of a rural road in the mountains outside Three Rivers (Tulare County). Inside the van, investigators found items of evidence that implied possible foul play, Quinonez said. There was no sign of Ellebracht, but two days later police in nearby Visalia picked him up after they said he pulled a knife on someone near a fast-food joint. Ellebracht, police said, had Shwes wallet on him when he was arrested. On Wednesday, search teams and canines fanned out in the remote area where Ellebrachts van was found and eventually discovered Shwes strangled body buried in a shallow grave. Investigators were working to determine a motive and pinpoint where Shwe was killed, but Smith on Monday said they dont think he was killed in Cupertino. Any loss of life is tragic, but the strangulation and soulless burial in an effort to cover and evade the pursuit of justice is especially troubling, she said. Officials said the suspect was captured on surveillance video buying a shovel at a Home Depot the morning Shwe was reported missing. We believe Mr. Ellebracht took a trip to Visalia to complete what he started in Santa Clara County, Quinonez said. Shwe was the first Chinese American elected to the Cupertino school board, serving from 1985 to 1993. Those in the Cupertino community who worked with him, meanwhile, were still reeling from the shocking loss of their friend and colleague. This is a very sad time, Cupertino Mayor Savita Vaidhyanathan said. We have lost a beloved resident and community leader who was devoted to making the life of our residents better. Evan Sernoffsky is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: esernoffsky@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @EvanSernoffsky Vista Bancshares, Inc., the holding company for Vista Bank, on Monday announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire The Hamlin Financial Corporation and its subsidiary, Hamlin National Bank. The Hamlin Financial Corporation, through Hamlin National Bank, operates full service banking locations in Hamlin and Rule. Hamlin National Bank was established in 1907 and has assets of $84 million, $35 million in total loans and $69 million in deposits, as of Dec. 31, 2016. Based upon its Dec. 31, 2016 balance sheet, Vista Bancshares, Inc. would have total assets of approximately $480 million upon completion of the transaction. Vista Bank has a number of banking centers in the area, including Plainview, Hale Center, Petersburg, Abernathy, Idalou, Ralls, Crosbyton and Lubbock. The transaction has been approved by the boards of directors of both companies. Vista Bancshares, Inc. will issue shares of its common stock and cash for all outstanding shares of The Hamlin Financial Corporation common stock. The transaction is expected to be completed in the second quarter of 2017, subject to customary conditions, and shareholder and regulatory approvals. In connection with the closing of the transaction, Hamlin National Bank will merge into Vista Bank. Certain directors and executive officers of Hamlin National Bank have entered into agreements with Vista Bank. John D. Steinmetz, president and chief executive officer of Vista Bank said, We are excited about the opportunity to serve Hamlin, Rule, and the surrounding areas and want to welcome Hamlin National Banks team, clients, and shareholders to Vista Bank. We look forward to delivering competitive products and innovative technology to the area and upholding Hamlin National Banks commitment to community. Mickey Long, chairman of Vista bank said, Vista Bank continues to look for opportunities to enhance our presence across Texas, and Hamlin National Banks locations in Hamlin and Rule are an excellent fit for us. Gary Ford, president of Hamlin National Bank said, We are excited to become part of the Vista Bank family. We chose Vista Bank as a merger partner because their history and operating philosophy is similar to ours while at the same time allowing us to bring new financial capabilities to our customer base in Jones and Haskell counties. We are confident all our stakeholders and our communities at large will benefit from this transaction and the future growth of Vista Bank. Completion of the transaction is subject to certain closing conditions, including customary regulatory approvals and approval of The Hamlin Financial Corporation shareholders. Vista Bancshares, Inc. was advised in this transaction by Stephens Inc. as financial advisor, and Fenimore Kay Harrison & Ford LLP as legal counsel. The Hamlin Financial Corporation was advised by Hunton & Williams as legal counsel. Vista Bancshares, Inc. is a Texas-based bank holding company with $396 Million in assets as of Dec. 31, 2016. The company owns Vista Bank which operates 11 full-service locations in Lubbock and the surrounding area, and loan and deposit production offices in Dallas and Fort Worth. Formed in 1912 and operating as a true community bank, Vista Bank seeks to serve families and businesses by offering the best in banking technologies, products and services. Vista Bank offers a variety of traditional loan and deposit products to its customers, which consist primarily of small and medium sized businesses and consumers. The companys website is www.vistabank.com. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate 3 1 of 3 Courtesy/Bexar County Sheriffs Office Show More Show Less 2 of 3 Google Maps Show More Show Less 3 of 3 SAN ANTONIO The Bexar County Medical Examiners Office has identified the man shot and killed Saturday by another man who police believe later jumped to his death from Interstate 10. Christian Vera-Cadena, 32, died at 7:41 p.m. Saturday after being shot at the entrance of the gated Scenic Oaks subdivision in far Northwest Bexar County, according to the Bexar County Sheriff's Office. Vera-Cadena was found lying on the ground near a vehicle with a woman inside. SAN ANTONIO Two men were wounded, one critically, in an East Side shooting Monday that San Antonio Police Department Chief William McManus said may be connected to drugs or gang activity. At least four units responded at about 2:15 p.m. Monday near the intersection of Morningview Street and Wheatley Avenue, about a block from Gates Elementary. McManus said in an interview with mySA.com officers found two men at the scene, one in the driver seat of a Nissan sedan, and the other behind a store. Both men were transported to San Antonio Military Medical Center, with the driver suffering critical injuries, McManus said. READ ALSO: BCSO: 3 arrested in revenge robbery of teens, kidnapping at far NW Side park Several gunshots were fired and shell casings were found at the scene, McManus said. Police currently have no details or vehicle descriptions regarding the shooting suspects Gates Elementary was been placed on a "lockout," according to SAISD spokeswoman Leslie Price. The restriction was lifted before school let out at 3:20 p.m. SAPD spokesman Sgt. Jesse Salame said he does not believe the shooting is a threat to the school. McManis said that although this area has seen violence in the past, it has been calmer in recent days. READ ALSO: Officials: 32-year-old killed at far Northwest Side gated community Dorothy Wilkins, an East Side resident who lives down the street from where the shooting occurred, said since the store at the intersection has closed the violence and crime has decreased in the area. "We're just trying to clean up the neighborhood," Wilkins said. "We're trying to build the East Side up." This story will continue to be updated as details become available. Text "Breaking" to 48421 for breaking news alerts from mySA.com twhite@mysa.com Twitter: @tylerlwhite A 46-year-old woman from the Houston area pleaded guilty Thursday to trading child pornography, including at least one topless photo of her juvenile relative, with another man. Tracey Lynn Bautista faces up to 20 years in prison and up to $250,000 in her sentencing hearing April 29. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate The latest protest against President Donald Trump's border wall calls for Mexicans to dump American products. "#AdiosProductosGringos," began after Trump signed an executive order calling for the construction of a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border Jan. 25. The following day, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said the president would impose a 20 percent tax on Mexican imports, a proposal that was quickly walked back hours later by Reince Priebus, the White House chief of staff, who called the idea one among a "buffet of options" to pay for the president's wall. RELATED: White House press secretary says border wall will be funded by 20 percent tax on Mexican goods A 20 percent tariff would represent a major tax increase on imports to the U.S., raising the likelihood of costs being passed on to consumers. Half of all non-agricultural goods enter the U.S. duty free, according to the office of the U.S. Trade Representative. The other half face import tariffs averaging 2 percent. Mexican Foreign Relations Secretary Luis Videgaray said Jan. 26, "A tax on Mexican imports to the United States is not a way to make Mexico pay for the wall, but a way to make the North American consumer pay for it through more expensive avocados, washing machines, televisions." RELATED: Texas Rep. Will Hurd rips plan for border wall, calls it 'impossible' Mexico is one of America's biggest trade partners, and the U.S. is the number 1 buyer, accounting for about 80 percent of Mexican exports. A complete rupture in ties could be damaging to the U.S. economy and disastrous for Mexico's. Such a blow to Mexico's economy could spur more people to risk deportation, jail or even death to somehow cross the border to the U.S. undercutting Trump's major goal of stopping illegal immigration. On Twitter in the days after Trump's border wall announcement, Mexicans said they would stop buying U.S. products. RELATED: Trump orders 'immediate' construction of border wall Dr. Pepper products, McDonald's, Starbucks and Wal-mart are among the few companies Mexicans are planning to boycott in the campaign. In addition to companies, social media users urged each other to support local celebrities instead of those based in the U.S. Click through the slideshow to see how Mexican residents are reacting to Trump's border wall. The Associated Press contributed to this report. kbradshaw@express-news.net Twitter: @kbrad5 And so it begins. President Donald Trumps war of words on Mexico and Mexicans has taken a darkly ominous turn. They are no longer just words. Even if his proposals dont come true, they are tantamount to the beginning of trade war. If there was ever any idea that Trump should not be taken literally on what he said during the campaign, his presidential pen has put that fanciful notion to rest. Last week, the president mulled a plan to impose a 20 percent tax on all Mexican imports, promised to withhold federal funds from so-called sanctuary cities, took the first steps to build that border wall, and signaled that he would triple border security manpower and vigorously go after undocumented immigrants in this country. And his ban on refugees is more than ominous. With a visit from Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto in the works (amid reports that he was contemplating not coming because of the border wall announcement), Trump said he should cancel if he was going to continue to insist that Mexico would not pay for the wall. Pena Nieto canceled. How could he not, without seeming Trumps lap dog? The disrespect directed toward Mexico was palpable and will have repercussions that will hurt the U.S. economy and Americans pocketbooks. As important, it will diminish an important relationship for the United States. Trump says he wants to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement. What kind of negotiating mood does he suppose these actions will instill in Mexico? A unilateral tariff, in fact, would violate that pact and likely doom it. The actions are undertaken as if immigration and Mexican trade are black-and-white, us-vs.-them issues, as if plenty of benefits dont accrue to Americans from both these issues. Yes, there are costs associated with undocumented immigration, but most credible studies point to net economic gains among them goods and services that are more affordable because of these immigrants presence. The stakes are particularly high for Texas. In 2015, Texas exported $92.5 billion in goods to Mexico, according to the International Trade Administration. And this has translated into some 382,000 jobs here that the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars has said are linked to trade with Mexico. Nationally, an estimated 1.9 million U.S. jobs are pegged to Mexican exports. And, as the Washington Post reported, Mexico is the worlds second-largest customer for U.S.-made products and 80 percent of all Mexican exports come to the United States at a value in 2015 of $296 billion. Texas border communities are particularly threatened, as is San Antonio, with long-standing cultural and economic ties to Mexico. The reverberations from this would ripple through Mexico, and the healing would take years. There is a legacy of rough treatment from the U.S. including a Mexican-American War in which this country took much Mexican territory, followed by a lack of civil rights for a long time for Mexicans who settled here. This has bred long-simmering resentments that are now likely to boil over and threaten a host of bilateral issues among them a shared commitment to fighting drug cartels that send poison to the United States and destabilize Mexico. An unstable Mexico is not in the U.S. interest. Despite this history, Mexican leaders have pursued a course of mutual benefit, even acting in the U.S. interest in tightening its own southern border to stem the flow of Central Americans seeking refuge in the United States. All of this is under threat. Because much of this involves money, Congress can and must act. Only it can appropriate the money to build that wall at an estimated cost of $8 billion to $20 billion. And only it has the taxing authority to levy that 20 percent tax which Trump says is one way he could get Mexico to pay for the wall. And that means Congress is in a position to reverse Trumps course. Texas congressional delegation is particularly well-positioned to inject more reason into the debate. Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Woodlands, chairs the taxing Ways and Means Committee in the U.S. House. And Sen. John Cornyn is the No. 2 Republican in the Senate. Both Houses are controlled by the GOP. Trump whose administration says it will be eyeing imports from other countries for taxes is embarking on a perilous course that would spark a trade war and lasting enmity between the United States and Mexico, as well as other countries. Congress must assume the role of the adult in this fracas, with the Texas delegation leading the way. Rep. Lamar Smith, R-San Antonio, said recently that rather than rely on the media, it would be better to get your news directly from the president. In fact, it might be the only way to get the unvarnished truth. This is the kind of statement one would expect in a totalitarian state, not one in which a free press is a bedrock of our constitutional form of government. Paul Fitzpatrick Not very neighborly Re: Trump orders immediate start to wall along border, front page, Thursday: President Donald Trump and many people in the U.S. want a wall to separate Mexico from us. A wall between any two countries is mean, insane, and a waste of trucks and money. And it is pointless. Instead, the U.S. must work with Mexico, appreciate Mexico, listen to Mexico, visit Mexico. Good God, we are neighbors! Martin Elsner Strength in diversity Re: Trumps inaugural address was glorified stump speech, Gilbert Garcia, Jan. 22: I read this column religiously despite being a conservative Republican. We are usually miles apart, but I recognize intelligence and sharp writing. As far as the presidents speech, what my ears heard was exactly as I expected. Short, to the point, graphic, spirited and straightforward. President Donald Trump has awakened America. In my own immediate family, 32 members at present, our political views vary across the board. Thats fine; its what I expect from intelligent people. The reason for this letter is personal. I believe in Trumps spirited rhetoric; it is a good thing for our country, as was the Womens March on Washington. Since I have five daughters and 11 granddaughters, you wouldnt expect me to say something different. After all, they totally overwhelm me with their love, spirit and intelligence. So keep writing, Mr. Garcia, and Ill keep reading. After all, this is the United States of America. May we all prosper under Gods watch, in a united spirit. Kerry Brian Charlton A tragic day On Jan. 20, 2017, I was thinking of FDR A date which will live in infamy. Sally Chizek Petty example Rep. Joaquin Castro skipped the inauguration of President Donald Trump. I must be mistaken to think that elected officials are there to represent all residents of their district. I am deeply grateful that my children are no longer attending school in San Antonio. What a petty example he sets. I suppose, like any good liberal, he found himself a nice comfortable safe place to sit so that he could cry in peace. Edward Kleitches Good riddance Some members of the do nothing Congress refused to attend the inauguration ceremony. These people continued to show their lack of respect for our nation and its system of government, similar to their blind ignorance in approving Obamacare without knowing what it contained, following political partisan leadership by an inept Nancy Pelosi, who also had no idea what it provided. Who cares that these anti- American members of Congress were not there? The celebration was much better without them and others who cant seem to accept Hillary Clintons loss! Lynn Swatzell The ban on refugees from all countries but singling out also those fleeing seven Muslim-majority countries is billed as temporary. The damage, however, is likely to be permanent unless its is rescinded. The damage will be to U.S. image abroad, but will be a boon to jihadists who have been eager to convince Muslims worldwide that the U.S. is waging war on Islam. In fact, jihadist groups have already billed the ban on refugees from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen as precisely that. The ban on refugees from all countries will be for 120 days, on refugees from Syria participating in a resettlement program indefinitely and from the other countries named for 90 days. This, the Trump administration says, will be so the U.S. can design more extreme vetting to root out terrorists. The order, signed Friday, caused massive confusion, detentions, questioning of even folks with permanent legal residency, barred people overseas from boarding planes destined to the United States and sparked legal challenges that halted deportations. But the effects of those various court orders remain unclear, amid uncertainty about whether the administration will interpret them correctly or comply with them at all. If that happens, a constitutional crisis on separation of powers will be in the offing. This occurs only two weeks into the Trump presidency and follows similarly counterproductive orders on a border wall and immigration. But the real damage will be to the U.S. value of offering sanctuary to refugees fleeing violence and repression. Particularly puzzling is the ban on Syrians, in whose country we are waging war on those causing them to flee, and on Iraq, many of whose citizens helped the U.S. oust dictator Saddam Hussein and where we continue to help in the war against the Islamic State, which is also causing refugees to flee. Texas has a long tradition of welcoming refugees, despite unsuccessful attempts last year by top leadership Gov. Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton to halt the states participation in the federal governments refugee resettlement program. We contrast President Trumps action which will surely be interpreted as at least the first step on that ban on Muslims he promised during his campaign with the outpouring of sympathy and help for those who worshiped at a mosque in Victoria, Texas, destroyed by a fire over the weekend. The cause of that fire remains under investigation, but that didnt stop Texans from gathering to offer support to the worshipers. They recognize that a nation of immigrants is also, by definition, a nation of refugees, some of whom came simply for better economic futures but others seeking the freedom to worship as they please. And we note another event also still under investigation a shooting in a mosque in Quebec Sunday night, killing six people and wounding eight others in what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a terrorist attack on Muslims. This demonstrates that Muslims are more likely to be victims in these heated, intolerant times. The Trump administrations ban is not helping the tenor of these times. It says this is definitely not a ban on Muslims. And technically that is true, as other Muslim-majority nations were not included. And this list of those unaffected includes countries whose nationals have committed terrorist acts here and where the Trump empire has business. Saudi Arabia is not on the list presumably because it is an ally. But isnt Iraq one as well? We even have troops stationed there to help it regain territory from the Islamic State. In fact, no national from any of the seven majority-Muslim nations on the list has committed terrorist acts on U.S. soil since 2001, according to news reports The experts credibly say that this order will have the opposite effect from the one intended that this will embolden terrorists because they will view this order as proof the jihadists were correct about U.S. waging war on Islam. The need is for the federal government to focus on individuals as possible terrorists, not national or religious groups. And the country already has rigorous vetting in this regard. We await the effects of what will surely be a string of court orders testing the legality of the order. But we need not wait for that nor for any possible congressional counteraction to arrive at the conclusion that President Trump has just done incalculable damage to American values and to the esteem this country has been held throughout the world as a beacon of hope. Ethics reform might not be the biggest priority of the Legislature this session, but it's close. Once again, in an effort that is both noble and slightly amusing, Gov. Greg Abbott and the Legislature's two leaders are getting behind a major overhaul of Texas ethics laws. Voters may be forgiven for being a little cynical about this effort. It's very close to the same package that Abbott and the House speaker and lieutenant governor supported in the 2015 session - and which was killed at the last minute by lawmakers wary of tighter controls. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Tucked away in the San Juans, between Lopez and Decatur sslands, sits a small landmass. It encompasses just 29 acres, but its luxurious amenities make up for its small size. It features a helicopter pad, a caretaker's cottage, a dock and a luxury home spanning more than 7,000 square feet. It's called Trump Island, but don't assume any relation to the president. The story is more complicated than that. A Washington Post story about the property notes that the home's listing agent, Leigh Zwicker, insists the home has no relation to the first family. The Trumps do, however, have an interesting connection to Washington state. Donald Trump's grandfather emigrated to America from Germany in 1885. He arrived in New York but eventually made his way to Seattle. An issue of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer lists him as a registered Washington state voter in the Nov. 5, 1892 issue. Despite the obvious name connection, Kevin Loftus, executive director of the San Juan Historical Museum, said the name of the island probably preceded the arrival of Trump. "The name has been used since at least the mid-1870s as determined by the Washington State Board of Geographic Names in 1976," he told the Washington Post. The home on the island is impressive. Built in 2000, it boasts six bedrooms, 4 bathrooms and a massive wine cellar. Not to mention it's literally on a private island. The entire property is listed for $8.75 million, which is almost $1 million dollars more than it was listed for just last month. The home has been on the market for just over 2 years. You can see the full listing here. Submitted Photo SANDUSKY It was down to seven business from across seven counties who vied for the "Catapult Your Craft Food & Beverage Business Competition," with Elk Street Brewery, from Sandusky in Sanilac County, taking home the top honors and the $5,000 grand prize. The final round of the business plan competition was held Jan. 24 as part of the 5th Annual Regional Summit, hosted by the I-69 Thumb Region at the Davison Country Club. Cash prizes of $3,000 and $1,000 respectively, were awarded to the second-place winner, Harsens Island Brewery, (St. Clair County), and third place finisher The Tap Room at Bird Creek Farms from Port Austin in Huron County. Fantasia Fantastica: Imaginative Spaces and Other-Worldly Collage, at the National Hispanic Cultural Center, Albuquerque, N.M., until May 22, features the fantastical creations of four artists whose works toy with space and expand the parameters of collage. The artists, Nick Abdalla, Cynthia Cook, Carlos Quinto Kemm, and Rachel Muldez, collect objects and images that populate the day-to-day but often go unnoticed. They then reframe them as part of a new imaginative whole. The works in this exhibition offer opportunities to contemplate how fantasy and the imaginary inform daily life as well as the historical and contemporary climate of Hispanic and Latina/Latino art more broadly. Space and scale are key components in each artists work. Each artist interacts with space both by changing the setting that encompasses their work, as well as by creating a new world within the object. From delicate and intimate scenes to sizable, yet graceful sculptures, the magic is in the details as much as it permeates the broader environment created by the artworks. Nick Abdalla collects objects such as beads, twine, cardboard and rattan furniture parts. With a little sculpting putty and paint, he builds large-scale creations that seem to take on a magical life of their own. Each sculpture taunts the imagination with agile forms that appear to be something different from every angle. Cynthia Cook works with collage, metal, and ephemera. She considers herself self-taught with can metal which she uses to create intricate frames and nichos out of recycled cans and tins. Many of her pieces are small and filled with natural materials, mythological creatures, or self-portraits almost as though each frame and image offers a glimpse into another world. Carlos Quinto Kemm creates stunning painted collage interpretations of the dream-like and mystical. His use of color, texture, and dimension lure the eye deep into the image. Each scene is rich in detail as well as a myriad of mythological, literary, and art-historical references that play hide and seek within the composition. Rachel Muldez describes her current work as nature collage. She collects materials from the natural world and reframes them either within larger installation patterns that sprawl across a gallery floor or in much smaller compositions that seem as though they could be a little niche for some small creature. Come see this exhibit at the National Hispanic Cultural Center, TuesdaySunday, 10 a.m.5 p.m. Editors Note: This content is made possible by National Hispanic Cultural Center. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of The San Antonio Express-News' or mySanAntonio.com's editorial staff. Learn more about our advertising products at www.hearstmediasanantonio.com. A 15-year-old Gwelutshena girl lost her life after she was fatally stabbed by her 16-year-old rival when the two had a misunderstanding over a boyfriend. The girl died after she was stabbed with a kitchen knife. The incident happened last week on Friday. In a statement that was released by the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) on its Twitter page, the law enforcement agents said investigations are still underway. Below is the full statement by ZRP: Police in Gwelutshena are investigating a murder case in which a learner (15) died while fighting over a boyfriend with another learner aged (16) on 29/10/21 at Mawala, Ngwaladi area. The suspect stabbed the victim with a kitchen knife which she was given by her cousin (14). Police in Gwelutshena are investigating a murder case in which a learner (15) died while fighting over a boyfriend with another learner aged (16) on 29/10/21 at Mawala, Ngwaladi area. The suspect stabbed the victim with a kitchen knife which she was given by her cousin (14). Zimbabwe Republic Police (@PoliceZimbabwe) November 1, 2021 iHarare Breaking News via Email A top Mnangagwa aide, the same man who secretly carried through the presidents Robbin Hood warning earlier in November after fleeing the country, Larry Mavhima, says Zimbabwe needs its own currency. Mavhima who together with former Cabinet minister July Moyo, has worked on Mnangagwas public profile, says Zimbabwe needs to have its own currency so that it can shape its own monetary policy. Mavhima told the local daily NewsDay, Look, everything depends with (sic) the confidence levels of the people of Zimbabwe. We need our own currency and I am sure that in time policies will be crafted that will see the re-introduction of the Zimbabwean currency. No country can exist without its own currency. At the moment, Zimbabwe is one of three countries in the world that doesnt have its own currency and that is not sustainable. We cannot continue to work with the United States dollar as our currency, we have no control over its monetary policy. We need to have a currency where we can have control of the monetary policy. This government, this President is going to give direction that will give stability to the local currency. Breaking News via Email BOSTON McDonalds is testing a new twist on the fast-food restaurant experience that has nothing to do with whats on the menudoing away with interaction between customers and employees, reports the Boston Globe. This week the QSR is trying out its customized digital Big Mac ATM at a Kenmore Square location that will dispense free Big Macs to patrons between 11 am and 2 pm. To receive the free sandwich, users will need to enter their Twitter handle on the touchscreen, which will generate a tweet from their accounts that reads, Check out the new Big Mac. Its really just a fun way to be modern and progressive, Vince Spadea, a McDonalds franchisee, told the Globe, adding, I think well have lines out the door. Spadea added that the vending machine is being used primarily as a marketing tool, and not a first step toward automation. Meanwhile, Timothy Carone, a professor at the University of Notre Dame and author of the Future Automation Changes to Lives and to Businesses, told the Globe that the fast-food industry is on the forefront of the automation. Things like this are going to be in our future, so you have to accept it, he said. Its inevitable. Carone continued that automation wont lessen labor costs because automated systems will still require maintenance. But where automation can excel is helping operators manage food costs and consistency. Were in the exploratory phase, he told the Globe, adding, Eventually, businesses will figure out what kind of automation people like and what they dont like. Yves is stranded in the Deep South thanks to the inability of Delta Airlines to keep its systems up and running. Gandhi, who helped defeat the mighty British empire, struggled to win the battle with his own people Scroll.in. On 30th January 1948, Jawaharlal Nehru announced the death of Mahatma Gandhi, assassinated by a Hindu extremist hours earlier, in an impromptu speech outside Birla House, Delhi: The light has gone out of our lives. Quebec City Mosque Shooting Leaves Multiple People Dead WSJ I am a difficult person at work and proud of it FT. Sorry to see Lucy Kellaway will be leaving the FT, in order to retrain as a maths teacher. Ill miss her writing. 3-D-Printed Skin Leads the Way Toward Artificial Organs MIT Technology Review Frances wild hamsters being turned into crazed cannibals by diet of corn The Guardian (Dan K). We Cant Think of Society As Similar to the Market: Pankaj Mishra The Wire Consumers lash out at Uber and turn to Lyft after Ubers immigration response MarketWatch 2016 Post Mortem With more than 1,000 water crossings, extra large fight possible with Keystone XL pipeline Rapid City Journal (Anita F). Theres more to this war than the fight over #NoDAPL. Hamons win highlights hunger for political change FT Greece has three weeks to deal with potentially disastrous debt, says IMF Guardian Refugee Watch Move over skimmers, shimmers are the newest tool for stealing credit card info CBC (Tony K). Another reason good old cash is superior for customers. Indian Currency Train Wreck Pause! We Can Go Back! New York Review of Books. Bill McKibben. Can we? Crowds are wise enough to know when other people will get it wrong Ars Technica Fake News The Real 007 Used Fake News to Get the U.S. into World War II The Daily Beast (furzy). If I had a quid for every Brit identified as the real 007 (FWIW, I think the model was Fitzroy Maclean author of the splendid Eastern Approaches pick up a copy if you can. You wont be disappointed.) Amazon Enters Trillion Dollar Ocean Freight Business: How Many Jobs Will Vanish Michael Shedlock (EM) New Cold War Much of the Cuisine We Now Know, and Think of as Ours, Came to Us by War Simithsonian (Micael) Do they want war with Russia because there is no good russian restaurant where you can get a decent borscht and a smooth vodka in the US? The Brilliant Way FDR Got America Back to WorkWhile Beautifying the Country and Protecting Our Environment Core77.com (resilc) Hidden no more: Katherine Johnson, a black NASA pioneer, finds acclaim at 98 WaPo (Kokuanani) Trump Transition Antidote du jour (J-LS photo, Gir National Forest, October 2016): See yesterdays Links and Antidote du Jour here. Introducing the little black graphene dress (Nanowerk News) Science and fashion have been brought together to create the worlds most technically advanced dress, the intu Little Black Graphene Dress. Graphene dress The new prototype garment showcases the future uses of the revolutionary, Nobel Prize winning material graphene and incorporating it into fashion for the first time, in the ultimate wearable tech statement garment. The project between intu Trafford Centre, renowned wearable tech company Cute Circuit which has made dresses for the likes of Katy Perry and Nicole Scherzinger and the National Graphene Institute at The University of Manchester, uses graphene in a number of innovative ways to create the worlds most high tech LBD highlighting the materials incredible properties. The dress is complete with a graphene sensor which captures the rate in which the wearer is breathing via a contracting graphene band around the models waist, the micro LED which is featured across the bust on translucent conductive graphene responds to the sensor making the LED flash and changing colour depending on breathing rate. It marks a major step in the future uses of graphene in fashion where it is hoped the highly conductive transparent material could be used to create designs which act as screens showcasing digital imagery which could be programmed to change and updated by the wearer meaning one garment could be in any colour hue or design. The 3D printed graphene filament shows the intricate structural detail of graphene in raised diamond shaped patterns and showcases graphenes unrivalled conductivity with flashing LED lights. The high tech LBD can be controlled by The Q app created by Cute Circuit to change the way the garment illuminates. The dress was created by the Manchester shopping centre to celebrate Manchesters crown as the European City of Science and will be on display during the Manchester Science Festival at Museum of Science and Industry. The dress will then be on display at intu Trafford Centre, it will then be available for museums and galleries to loan for fashion displays. Richard Paxton, general manager at intu Trafford Centre said: We have a real passion for fashion and fashion firsts, this dress is a celebration of Manchester, its amazing love for innovation and textiles, showcasing this new wonder material in a truly unique and exciting way. It really is the worlds most high-tech dress featuring the most advanced super-material and something intu is very proud to have created in collaboration with Cute Circuit and the National Graphene Institute. Hopefully this project inspires more people to experiment with graphene and its wide range of uses. Francesca Rosella, Chief Creative Director for Cute Circuit said: This was such an exciting project for us to get involved in, graphene has never been used in the fashion industry and being the first to use it was a real honour allowing us to have a lot of fun creating the stunning intu Little Black Graphene Dress, and showcasing graphenes amazing properties. Explained: Greenhouse gases (Nanowerk News) When hearing the words greenhouse gas, most people think immediately of carbon dioxide. This is indeed the greenhouse gas that is currently producing the greatest impact on the Earths rapidly changing climate. But it is far from the only one making its mark, and for mitigating climate change its important to be able to compare the effects of the various gases that contribute to warming the planet. But thats not easy to do. Greenhouse gases vary in not only their sources and the measures needed to control them, but also in how intensely they trap solar heat, how long they last once theyre in the atmosphere, and how they react with other gases and ultimately get flushed out of the air. The differences make it impossible to do the very thing researchers and policymakers want most to do: come up with a simple conversion factor to allow exact comparisons among them. Lets take a look at the most extreme case: chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). Compared to carbon dioxide, CFCs can produce more than 10,000 times as much warming, pound for pound, once they are in the air. Fortunately, CFCs were banned by an international agreement called the Montreal Protocol in 1987 not because of their dramatic warming potential, although that was a secondary reason recognized at the time, but because they were found to be the primary cause of the rapidly escalating destruction of the Earths ozone layer, which protects the planet from dangerous, cancer-causing levels of ultraviolet radiation. This chart from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 2011 report shows the relative importance of different factors in driving climate change through their influence on the atmospheres radiative forcing, an index of the amount of incoming heat from the sun that is absorbed by the Earth rather than radiated back out into space. Carbon dioxide (top bar) is the greatest factor. The second bar includes methane (CH 4 ), nitrous oxide (N 2 O), and halocarbons, such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). Other factors have weaker effects. (Image from the 2014 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Synythesis Report) (click on image to enlarge) Out of the picture CFCs would be a major player by now in contributing to global warming if they hadnt been phased out, says Susan Solomon, the Ellen Swallow Richards Professor of Atmospheric Chemistry and Climate Science at MIT. By now, if they were still being used at the same rate as before the phaseout, CFCs would be contributing about one-third as much to the Earths greenhouse effect as carbon dioxide, which remains by far the biggest contributor, she says. For comparison, she says, the Kyoto Protocol (now superceded by the Paris Agreement of 2015), which called for a series of measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions around the world, produced a total reduction of about 2 gigatons of carbon equivalent emissions per year, while the phaseout of CFCs has already eliminated five times as much an estimated 10 gigatons of carbon equivalent gas per year. Today, the number-two producer of human-caused greenhouse effects is methane, the main constituent of natural gas. When initially released, methane is about 100 times more potent than carbon dioxide, but its lifetime in the atmosphere is much shorter about a decade, unlike carbon dioxides residence time of centuries. When averaged over a 20-year period, methanes greenhouse gas equivalency is about 72 times that of carbon dioxide, but when looked at on a timescale of 100 years, that equivalency drops to just 25 times. Methane comes from multiple sources, some of which are relatively hard to measure. For example, leakage from natural gas wells, storage facilities, and distribution systems is a significant source. But because such leaks are highly variable and depend on factors such as well construction methods and maintenance systems for infrastructure which in some cases are proprietary information there has been a great deal of controversy over the extent of such leaks. Other sources, such as emissions related to wetlands, deforestation, and cattle, are difficult to measure accurately. Accounting for dynamics Jessika Trancik, the Atlantic Richfield Career Development Associate Professor in Energy Studies at MITs Institute for Data, Systems, and Society, says that because of the very different dynamics of methane in the atmosphere compared to carbon dioxide, it can be misleading to rely on the conventional single-factor comparisons that are often used. Instead, she and collaborators suggested in a 2014 research paper (Nature Climate Change, "Climate impacts of energy technologies depend on emissions timing") and further expanded on the idea in 2016 (Environmental Science & Policy, "Testing emissions equivalency metrics against climate policy goals") that a measure of the relative effects of different gases based on specific climate mitigation goals should be used, for example where the time horizon for the comparison is based on a specific stabilization goal. The usual way of comparing greenhouse gases is through a single conversion factor, called the global warming potential, which uses a somewhat arbitrarily chosen time horizon of 100 years. For methane, this is usually given as a factor of 25 (that is, methane is 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide). But Trancik suggests that it is more meaningful to use goal-inspired metrics, which incorporate the different residence times of different gases over a time span that depends on when the emissions occur relative to a mitigation goal: an instantaneous climate impact (ICI) and a cumulative climate impact (CCI). She says that how much weight to give the different factors comes down to how much you care about the rate of change in the short term, as opposed to the equilibrium state that the climate will ultimately settle in to which may not be reached for centuries. Solomons research has recently shown that some of the effects of greenhouse gases can persist for centuries, even after the gases that initially triggered those changes are no longer being emitted at all. Specifically, the expansion of water as it warms, combined with the melting of polar and glacier ice, can lead to significant sea-level rise that would last for centuries even if all new greenhouse gas emissions were stopped altogether. Thats because these gases will remain in the atmosphere and continue to trap heat long after their sources are eliminated a fact thats sometimes overlooked in discussions of mitigating climate change. If all carbon dioxide emissions were eliminated by 2050, Solomon and her co-authors found, as much as half of the emissions would still be in the air 750 years later, and still warming the planet. Theres no question that carbon dioxide is the biggest contributor to human-caused climate change, Trancik says, so thats the big focus of mitigation efforts. But there are a number of others that are also significant. These non-carbon dioxide emissions often come from some sort of leakage in the supply system, unlike the direct emissions of carbon dioxide that result from combusting carbon-containing fossil fuels. There are opportunities to clean these systems up to reduce leakage, though its not always easy. Also, she says, theres a challenge in understanding the atmospheric lifetimes of all these greenhouse gases and how the radiative forcing changes as the concentration changes. There are interactive effects that change the radiative efficiencies of all these gases. Gases are not the only contributors to the greenhouse effect: Black carbon, otherwise known as soot, as well as some other particulate matter can also play a role. But such materials have even shorter residence times, typically just days or weeks, as they tend to be flushed out of the air by the next rainfall. Which brings us to the biggest greenhouse gas of all: water vapor. Theres no doubt that water vapor is responsible for more greenhouse warming than any other atmospheric constituent. But water vapors behavior depends on the climate, so it is not a driver of climate change but rather an amplifying feedback, since the water cycle is a constant part of the atmospheric circulation. As the air gets warmer, it can hold more water vapor, so a warming climate leads to more vapor in the air, providing a feedback effect and potentially leading to dramatic changes in rainfall patterns. But, water vapor only stays around until the next rainfall. Water vapor is a slave to the climate system, its not a master, Solomon says. Find the newest releases to watch from National Geographic on Disney+, including favourite documentary series and films Free Solo, The Rescue, Shark Beach with Chris Hemsworth and The World According to Jeff Goldblum. NATO Secretary General, Mr. Jens Stoltenberg will meet with the President of the Republic of Bulgaria, Mr. Rumen Radev, at NATO Headquarters on Tuesday 31 January 2017. Media Advisory 09:30 NATO Secretary General and the President will jointly meet the press Main entrance The press point will be streamed live on the NATO website and available on satellite on demand via Eurovision Geneva. Still and video imagery of the meeting will be available after the event on the NATO website. Follow us on Twitter (@NATOPress and @jensstoltenberg) (Natural News) After decades of prohibition, hemp is once again an agricultural commodity in the US. Hemp is a variety of Cannabis that lacks THC, the plants psychoactive constituent, so hemp is not used as a recreational drug. Real Farmacy tells us that hemp was first grown in Kentucky in 1775, and that nearly all of Americas hemp production after the Civil War came from the Bluegrass region of the state. Now almost 25% of the nations 9,650 acres of hemp are planted in Kentucky. Tobacco production still leads that of hemp in Kentucky by far, with 72,900 acres cultivated in 2015. But the winds of change are blowing across the state. Real Farmacy attributes that change to the growing acceptance of Cannabis nationwide, with more and more states allowing for medicinal and recreational use. Quoting from the website, There were strict controls on hemp for many decades amid anti-drug sentiments, making it illegal to grow without a permit from the government. In 2014, the U.S. farm bill authorized state agriculture departments to create industrial hemp research pilot programs, reopening production opportunities. Only 33 acres were planted in Kentucky that year. By 2015, seedings rose to 922 acres, and jumped to 2,350 acres in 2016, according to the states agriculture department. As the tobacco market continues to decline and prices for grains and commodities remain depressed, farmers are looking for alternatives. The industrial hemp business will only grow stronger as the years go by and this seems promising to a lot of Kentucky farmers. Total retail sales of hemp products in the U.S. reached $573 million in 2015, according to the Hemp Industries Association. Sales by conventional retailers are growing. Products can even be found in stores like Costco and Target, in addition to specialty retailers. Hemp is one of the most useful plants on the planet Our founding fathers grew it to make ship rigging and other rope, canvas sails, and caulking for the wooden hulls of ships. Indeed, colonial America was required to grow hemp by the British Crown, as it was considered an indispensable and strategic crop. Hemp makes a very high quality cloth (often labeled as linen) as well as paper (the Constitution was written on it). Hemps uses are numerous and diverse, and it was grown in the US until the end of World War II, where it was utilized in the war effort. A hundred years ago Cannabis was part of Americas pharmacopeia (official list of medicines), but it was stigmatized, demonized, and illegalized due to its psychoactive properties. Moreover, in the 20th century, petroleum supplanted hemps preeminence as an industrial raw material. Nevertheless, hemp can be made into thousands of different products. (RELATED: For the latest hemp info go to HempScience.news ) Hemp is natures gift to mankind Besides its myriad of other uses, hemp has significant food value. The juice of its leaves can be drunk for its health benefits. Hemp seeds are a true superfood, containing all twenty amino acids, including the nine essential amino acids required for human metabolism, making it a rare vegetarian source of complete protein. Additionally, hemp seeds are one the very best sources of oils in the plant world, containing a 3:1 balance of omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids. Hemp seeds are also an excellent source of gamma linolenic acid (GLA), a fatty acid that has been found to be useful in treating a variety of conditions. And the seeds also are rich in vitamins and minerals. In the years to come, hemp farming will become an increasingly important contributor to the US economy. For all its benefits, hemps status as a newly legal crop should be celebrated. Sources: RealFarmacy.com FarmCollector.com (Natural News) For decades, cannabis advocates have pushed for universal legalization of medical marijuana. Citing scientific study after scientific study, they have forcefully (and truthfully) argued that legalization would provide much needed relief to millions of people suffering from a host of medical ailments. But the federal government has only responded with continued bans and regulatory restrictions that have limited access to the many who wish to freely choose this alternative medical treatment. In fact, the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) has now technically reclassified cannabis extracts as a Schedule I substance, putting them in the same category as heroin. Now, however, the nightmarish over-regulation of cannabis may be about to be dismantled. President Donald J. Trump may be about to nominate someone to head up the Food and Drug Administration who believes in, and is a fan of, medical marijuana. (RELATED: Discover the latest scientific data on cannabis, hemp and marijuana at HempScience.news) As reported by The Anti Media, Trump has spoken to two potential candidates: Balaji Srinivasan, CEO of bitcoin start-up 21.co, and Jim ONeill, the managing director of investment firm Mithril Capital Management. Both met with Trump about a week before his inauguration. Srinivasan, Recode noted, does not have much use for the FDA. Though they are now deleted, Srinivasans Twitter archive at one time contained huge criticisms of the federal agency. Now that hes being considered to run the agency, he apparently does not want to give senators critical of him any more ammunition to fire against him than necessary. And while a Srinivasan nomination would certainly be in the same mold of Trumps previous picks most of his nominees have been critical of the agencies they are about to lead its the potential selection of ONeill that should excite cannabis and medical marijuana supporters more. The Anti Media noted: As a member of the Board of Directors of the Coalition for Cannabis Policy Reform, ONeill has been fighting for weed legalization for years. The Coalition is known for having helped to legalize the plant in the Golden State. Peter Thiel, billionaire founder of PayPal, and the most vocal and perhaps the only supporter of Trump in Silicon Valley, has ties to both men. That could weigh heavily in Trumps eventual decision about which one to nominate because Thiel is a close Trump adviser. It should also be noted here that Thiel was the first major investor in the cannabis industry. ONeill is both a vocal supporter of marijuana legalization and an advocate of a more lenient FDA. He has also talked about the importance of implementing dramatic FDA reforms that would permit Americans the choice to start using [drugs], at their own risk. He is also a board member at the Seasteading Institute, an organization that seeks to create new societies at sea and away from current governments. This organization has been linked to libertarian movements in the past. Patri Friedman, the grandson of free market economist Milton Friedman, was a founder of the institute (as is Thiel). Plus, ONeill has served in government before; he served as the principle associate deputy secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services during the George W. Bush administration. ONeill voiced support for free market ideals in 2009, saying that because theres not a free market in healthcare, people are suffering very significant health consequences that in a free market they would not suffer. (RELATED: Get the latest news and information on cannabis and medical marijuana at MedicalMarijuanaUpdate.com). By embracing the free market, he noted, drug prices and healthcare costs would be much lower and allow innovation in cheaper delivery of care, both in terms of drugs and devices and better forms of delivery. The FDA currently has some of the broadest regulatory powers of all federal agencies. By picking a libertarian-minded nominee to run it, Trump may be signaling that he is prepared to de-emphasize the FDAs role and rein in much of its authority. Personally, Trump has expressed his support for medical marijuana and, as far as overall legalization, he has said he believes it should be a state-by-state issue. But most of the mainstream scientific community and Big Pharma have been lying about the benefits of cannabis for years. J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for Natural News and News Target, as well as editor of The National Sentinel. Sources: TheAntiMedia.org Recode.net TheGuardian.com Bloomberg.com Science.NaturalNews.com (Natural News) Most Americans understand that in order to continue maintaining the worlds leading economy, corporations have to be regulated as lightly as possible and allowed to make a profit. But most also understand that there should be limits to both; regulations cannot be so light as to allow corporations to harm people or the environment, and profits should never be tied to products that harm. But Dow Chemical is being allowed to do both, as it puts pressure on farmers to continue using a pesticide that scientists and researchers have tied to childhood ADHD and autism. As reported by The Intercept, no comprehensive studies were done prior to 2014 into the link between autism and the chemical chlorpyrifos, which Dow manufactures as one of its principle pesticide ingredients. The CHARGE study, conducted by the University of California-Davis, examined the environmental causes of autism and developmental delay. It found that nearby applications of agricultural pesticides dramatically boost the risk of autism. Researchers found that mothers who lived less than a mile from fields being sprayed with chlorpyrifos during their second trimester of pregnancy increased their chances of having their child develop autism more than threefold. Since then, dozens of other studies have linked even small amounts of fetal exposure to the chemical with other neurodevelopmental problems, including ADHD, lower IQ and intelligence, and difficulties in learning. Finally, in November, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a groundbreaking report that made clear the serious health dangers posed by chlorpyrifos. The report, titled, Chlorpyrifos Revised Human Health Risk Assessment, detailed evidence that the pesticide produces intelligence deficits as well as motor, attention and memory problems in children. The report states that children under the age of 2 risk exposure to the chemical just in their food alone, at levels that are 14,000 percent higher than the level the EPA now considers to be safe. (RELATED: What else is the EPA up to? Stay informed at EPAWatch.org) Dow, which still makes most of the products that contain chlorpyrifos, has consistently disputed the steadily mounting evidence that its bread-and-butter chemical harms kids. However, the government report makes it clear that the EPA now believes and accepts scientific research conducted independently that the chemical which is used to grow so much of our food is dangerous. A pre-publication copy of the report, The Intercept noted, said that residues of chlorpyrifos on most individual food crops exceed the reasonable certainty of no harm safety standard under the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act. In laymans terms, that simply means that any particular sample of food may contain unacceptably high levels of chlorpyrifos. But thats not all. Officials believe that drinking water and non-drinking water exposures to chlorpyrifos also exceed what is safe. So the only remaining reasonable step is to ban the chemical altogether. Advocates for public health have been pressuring the EPA to ban the pesticide for a number of years. Also, The Intercept reported, four months prior to the release of the report, 47 scientists and doctors who have expertise in childhood neurological development, to include the director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, warned that toxic chemicals in the environment are boosting childrens risk of developing cognitive, behavioral and social disorders, as well as contributing to the rise of ADHD and instances of autism. Called the TENDR statement, it included a list of the most dangerous neurotoxins, and was akin to a plea for immediate action from government regulators to take them off the market. Organophosphate pesticides, the group to which chlorpyrifos belongs, sat atop the list. However, when the EPAs report was published indicating that the agency appeared ready to finally take action against chlorpyrifos, there was not much joy among scientists and environmental activists because, just a few days earlier, GOP nominee Donald J. Trump was elected president. The fear among scientists is that Trump will ignore the rule or try to change it. His inauguration Jan. 20 was three days after the mandatory 60-day commentary period for the rule/ban ended. The final rule would then take effect March 31. (RELATED: Whats the latest on the science front? Find out at Scientific.news) Trump has not indicated that he would block this ban, and The Intercept offered no evidence that it would happen. The fear revolves around Trumps pledge to cut red tape and bureaucracy. However, if there is solid evidence that this chemical is harming children and causing autism, Trump may prove to be the environmentalists best friend on this one, given his belief that too many vaccines, too quickly, can lead to autism. J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for Natural News and News Target, as well as editor of The National Sentinel. Sources: TheIntercept.com BeInCharge.UCDavis.edu Science.NaturalNews.com (Natural News) Eighty-seven percent of the worlds 1.6 billion Muslims are not affected by President Donald Trumps Friday decision to temporarily withhold visas from citizens of seven Middle Eastern countries. Approximately thirteen percent of the worlds Muslims, or 199.4 million out of up to 1.6 billion, live in those seven countries, according to a 2015 Pew Research Report, The Future of World Religions: Population Growth Projections, 2010-2050. (Article by Michael Patrick Leahy, republished from BreitBart.com) So Trumps reform policy only impacts one of every eight Muslims worldwide. The Muslim population in each of these seven countries, estimated by Pew Research as of 2010, is: Iran (74 million), Sudan (33.6 million), Iraq (31.7 million), Yemen (24 million), Syria (20.4 million), Somalia (9.3 million), and Libya (6.4 million). The 90-day temporary block on new visas does not apply to citizens of the six countries with the largest Muslim populations, as determined by Pew Research Indonesia (209 million), India (176 million), Pakistan (167 million), Bangladesh (134 million), Nigeria (77 million), and Egypt (76 million). It does apply citizens of Iran, the country with the seventh largest Muslim population (74 million). But it does not apply to citizens of the other top ten Muslim population countries: Turkey (71 million), Algeria (35 million), and Morocco (32 million). None of the seven countries on which a temporary visa ban has been placed were listed by name in Fridays, executive order, Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry Into The United States. Instead, the order referenced previous laws and findings that designated three of these countries state sponsors of terrorism (Iran, Sudan, and Syria) and four of them (Iraq, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen) as countries of concern who are ineligible to participate in the Visa Waiver Program, according to the Visa Waiver Program Improvement and Terrorist Improvement Act of 2015. The 2015 bill was made law once it was signed by President Barack Obama. Six of the seven countries to which the temporary visa issuance block applies were designated as state sponsors of terrorism or countries of concern by previous Democrat administrations. Only one Iran in 1984 was designated by a Republican administration. Syria was first designated as a state sponsor of terrorism during the Jimmy Carter administration on December 29, 1979. Iran was designated as a state sponsor of terrorism during the Ronald Reagan administration on January 19, 1984. Sudan was designated as a state sponsor of terrorism during the Bill Clinton administration on August 12, 1993. Syria and Iraq were labeled countries of concern ineligible to participate in the Visa Waiver Program in the original Visa Waiver Program Improvement and Terrorist Improvement Act of 2015 signed into law by President Obama in December 2015. On Feb. 18, 2016, the Obama administrations Department of Homeland Security added Libya, Somalia, and Yemen to that list: The Department of Homeland Security today announced that it is continuing its implementation of the Visa Waiver Program Improvement and Terrorist Travel Prevention Act of 2015 with the addition of Libya, Somalia, and Yemen as three countries of concern, limiting Visa Waiver Program travel for certain individuals who have traveled to these countries. Pursuant to the Act, the Secretary of Homeland Security had sixty days to determine whether additional countries or areas of concern should be subject to the travel or dual nationality restrictions under the Act. After careful consideration, and in consultation with the Director of National Intelligence and the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Homeland Security has determined that Libya, Somalia, and Yemen be included as countries of concern, specifically for individuals who have traveled to these countries since March 1, 2011. At this time, the restriction on Visa Waiver Program travel will not apply to dual nationals of these three countries. DHS continues to consult with the Department of State and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to develop further criteria to determine whether other countries would be added to this list. The executive order also temporarily banned refugees from all countries for 120 days. Read more at: BreitBart.com See more coverage of total news hoaxes from the left-wing media at HOAX.news. Contra Costa County school board trustee Jeff Belle tweeted his support for President Donald Trumps executive order on immigration, breaking away from a slew of local leaders and educators who have condemned the travel ban. Belle, who serves as vice president of the board and represents District 5s East County schools, retweeted a flurry of messages from pro-Trump, anti-Muslim accounts on Saturday and Sunday. One meme he retweeted said "Sorry illegals, America is closed." He also linked to an anti-Islamic screed titled "My Islam Problem and Yours" and wrote that Muslim Congressman Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) is "hateful." This is not the first time Belle's tweets have landed him in hot water. In early January, he faced swift backlash after he wrote "Jesus dislikes you" to a detractor. He has also faced legal troubles for lying on election paperwork, practicing respiratory care without a license and for bogus checks. Trumps order, which went into effect Friday, indefinitely suspends Syrian refugees' entry to the United States while also barring entry of individuals from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen for 90 days. The ban's implementation caused widespread chaos and protests at airport terminals across the country, with thousands flocking to San Francisco International Airport to demand the release of detainees. Belle said in an interview with NBC Bay Area that he tweets as a private citizen, not as a representative of the school board, despite his Twitter profile identifying him as a trustee and linking to the board's website. "You dont have to like Trumps policy," Belle said. "But the right thing to do as an elected official is not start crying and whining about the winner." He went on to say that "its a new day in town" and that the election "will turn out to be the best thing to happen to us." Belle is also supportive of Trump's executive order that threatens to slash federal funding for sanctuary cities an action that would have dire consequences for a slew of programs that help children and families across the Bay Area. On Tuesday, San Francisco became the first city to file suit against that order. Belle described Trump's stance on sanctuary cities as being a "reset in America in terms of immigration." "We are going to follow the law," Belle said. "I don't care what (the county's office of education) says. ... We are going to do whatever federal law says." The board distanced itself from Belles remarks in an interview with NBC Bay Area on Monday. "While Mr. Belle certainly has a right to free speech and to his own opinion, he is not acting within the capacity of his role as a board of education member," said an exasperated Terry Koehne, a spokesperson for the Contra Costa County Office of Education. "His views do not reflect the views of this agency, or the board as a whole." Koehne continued: "We are about diversity and inclusion. We are about safe school campuses. We teach tolerance, but we dont tolerate hatred." The board hears appeals on expulsion disputes, approves the budget for the County Office of Education and establishes policies for programs like special education and career development. It has not formally denounced the immigration ban or made any declarations supporting sanctuary campuses or cities. The office did, however, publish a post-election toolkit that includes sample resolutions for districts that would like to implement sanctuary policies. Titled "All Kids Are Our Kids," its safe haven resolutions have been implemented in some county schools, including Pittsburg and Antioch, which are both in Belles district. Belle is up for re-election in 2018. San Franciscos Millennium Tower is notorious for its sinking and tilting foundation but residents say that foul odors also routinely permeate their luxury condos. I am furious -- I dont want to be here, said Paula Pretlow, who has lived on the 31st floor of the troubled 58-story building since 2012. Its not just the furor over the sinking foundation that leaves her feeling trapped. Pretlow told NBC Bay Area that she is surrounded by strange smells that regularly invade her unit. Ive smelled soup, I have smelled barbecue, I smelled dirty diapers, I have smelled chemical smells, she says. The list goes on and on, and none of it is mine. Pretlow says she has been complaining about the problem since she moved into the unit, but until recently, nothing had been done. Ive been told for years that it was me, not the building and finally I have proof that this is a defective unit that I live in," she said. Just recently, crews hired by the homeowners association cut open her walls and the walls of a unit directly below her in search of the source of the leaks. They even set off smoke bombs inside the open walls. Smoke billowed up into my unit, choking smoke," Pretlow said. "It was as if that smoke bomb had been set off here. The draft report they prepared identifies stray odors seeping from gaps in her walls and getting sucked up into the air conditioning system from at least two locations within her unit. There are areas in my apartment, which were not sealed during construction, Pretlow says. There are holes that are allowing for the transfer of odor from one unit to the next, directly into mine. Prelow says she has had headaches, coughing and other symptoms she believes are tied to the bad air and odors. I firmly believe this has affected my health," she stressed. Pretlow also pointed to a section of the report that dealt with findings about her unit but was blacked out. Part of it is redacted, I have no clue as to why, she added. According to Pretlow, an attorney for the homeowners association warned her about sharing the findings of the report with her Millennium Tower neighbors. But Pretlow says people should know what is going on. Thats why I am talking to you she said, because I dont think I should keep this secret. I want people to know whats going on with me it may be happening to them as well. At least four of Pretlows neighbors have recounted suffering odor problems, to some degree. One of the residents we talked to described the overpowering stench of mold or algae. But none of the building's residents wanted to be named or interviewed on camera in light of the buildings other troubles. One resident, Pat Dodson, confirmed, however, that she has heard several neighbors complain about the odor issues after the Millennium Towers now notorious sinking problem became public last year. I think a lot of people are now talking to each other when that hadnt happened before, she said. While Dodson says she does not suffer from foul odors, she said she is troubled that building management would censor the report about Pretlows problem. If it were the CIA, it wouldnt be puzzling, she told us, but the fact that management in our own building -- its shocking to me that there would be something we couldnt know about our apartment where we live. Pretlow says she complained to the developer for years, without any action. Only recently did the homeowners association pay for the testing that confirmed that her unit has a problem. They didnt want to fix it, she said of the developer, Millennium Partners. Thats the bottom line. She says her problem is still unfixed and there is no timetable for the work needed to keep the smells from drifting up from the unit below her. Both the Millennium Tower homeowners association and the developer declined NBC Bay Area's requests for comment. However, Pretlow said the building's management contacted her late Friday with an assurance that a fix is in the works. A civil rights lawyer in Santa Clara is one of 15 plaintiffs and 12 other "Jane and John Does" to sue Donald Trump and some of the government's top leadership over what they say is an unfair "Muslim Exclusion Order." Zahra Billoo is the executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, San Francisco Bay Area, who along with the others is asking for injunctive and declaratory relief in a 57-page lawsuit. "Yes, this is my first time suing a sitting president," Billoo told NBC Bay Area. Is she scared? "All the plaintiffs are putting their safety on the line in order to advocate for American values," she said. "I am cautious, but I am also so incensed that Trump and his advisers would have the audacity to attempt a Muslim ban." Billoo said that during the Women's March on Jan. 21, she encouraged people to choose a "lifestyle of resistance, and I'm taking that advice myself." The suit against Trump, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, the U.S. Department of State and the director of National Intelligence was filed Monday in the United States District Court of the Eastern District of Virginia. Other notable plaintiffs include Linda Sarsour, a Palestinian activist and executive director of the Arab American Association of New York, who was also an organizer of the Women's March and Rashida Tlaib, the first elected Muslim woman to serve in the Michigan Legislature who is a lawyer at the Sugar Law Center for Economic and Social Justice. The unnamed plaintiffs represent people who are lawfully living in the United States and prevented from traveling and and from the country because of their immigrant status. NBC Bay Area Trump has defended his executive order, saying that it was not a ban on Muslims but about terror and keeping our country safe. The ban, he said, was similar to action taken by President Barack Obama in 2011 when visas for Iraqi refugees even those who risked their lives to help the American war effort were all but halted. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting, Trump issued over the weekend in a statement. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering. Protesters Against Trump's Immigration Policies Take Over SFO But the plaintiffs, who are part of a national CAIR lawsuit challenging Trump's executive order that bans travel directed at seven Muslim-majority nations, allege the order gives Islam the "stigma of government disfavor." They also allege the order violates the Establishment Clause to the First Amendment because they are being discrimination against for their religion. The suit characterizes the ban as a first step in fulfilling Trump's campaign promise to impose "a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States" until the government "can figure out what is going on." The plaintiffs call the order full of "vulgar animosity" and refer to it as the "Muslim Exclusion Order." The plaintiffs refer to Trump's "hateful, yearlong campaign which was fueled, in significant part, by a desire to stigmatize Islam and Muslims." And "Trump's bigoted views on Islam," the plaintiffs say, is the "legal manifestation of those bigoted views," the suit alleges. Since the signing of the travel ban on Friday, the suit says that five district courts around the country have issued stays. Google is celebrating the late Fred Toyosaburo Korematsu as its Google Doodle on Monday, paying tribute to the Oakland-born civil rights activist who refused to go to the governments incarceration camps for Japanese Americans. And according to his daughter, his debut appearance on the world's largest search engine is especially relevant in today's atmosphere regarding immigrants. Korematsu, who would have turned 98 on Monday, was the first AsianAmerican to get a day named after him in the United States. Since Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed legislation establishing the day into law in 2010, Hawaii, Virginia and Florida now also recognize Jan. 30 as Fred Korematsu Day. But Monday was his first debut as a Google Doodle, according to his daughter, Karen Korematsu, the founder of the Fred T. Korematsu Institute in San Francisco. In my opinion, when you have made a Google Doodle, you have made it, she said in a phone interview Monday on her way to Sacramento, where her father's memory will be honored. She said that her family tried to get her dad to be represented by Google last year, but it was unsuccessful. This time, her brother, Kenneth, knew artist Sophie Diao, herself a child of Asian immigrants, who drew the patriotic portrait of Korematsu. In the picture, he's wearing his Presidential Medal of Freedom given to him by then President Bill Clinton with a scene of the internment camps to his back. He's surrounded by cherry blossoms and flowers that have come to be symbols of peace and friendship between the United States and Japan. Fred Korematsu was born to Japanese parents in Oakland and graduated from Castlemont High School, which is where his daughter said he learned about the Constitution. When the United States entered WWII, he tried to enlist in the U.S. National Guard and Coast Guard, but was turned away because he was Japanese, according to the institute. He was 23 years old and working as a foreman when Executive Order 9066 was signed in 1942 by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The order sent more than 115,000 people of Japanese descent living in the United States to incarceration. Rather than relocate to an internment camp, Korematsu went into hiding. He was arrested in 1942 and despite the help of organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union, his conviction was upheld in the landmark Supreme Court case of Korematsu v. United States. Because of that, he and his family were sent to the Central Utah War Relocation Center at Topaz, Utah, until the end of WWII in 1945. In 1976, President Gerald Ford formally ended Executive Order 9066 and apologized for the internment, stating "We now know what we should have known then not only was that evacuation wrong but Japanese-Americans were and are loyal Americans. Fred Korematsus conviction was overturned in 1983 in the U.S. District Court in San Francisco after evidence came to light that disputed the necessity of the internment. Some of his lawyers who represented him then, Dale Manami and Don Tamaki, formed a law firm, and he was also represented by the Asian Law Caucus, among other attorneys. Many lawyers from that firm and the law caucus were at the San Francisco International Airport this weekend providing free legal service to Muslim refugees detained there briefly. To Karen Korematsu, the choosing of her fathers image to be represented as a Google Doodle is highly relevant as the Donald Trump administration has issued travel bans to citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries. I think one of the main reasons he was chosen by Google was the opportunity to educate people on the mistakes of our past history, his daughter said. This new order is very scary. This is not what America is about. You dont put the fear of God into people. This is not right. UC Berkeley Chancellor Nicholas Dirks denounced President Donald Trumps executive order on immigration on Sunday and advised students and staff from banned countries not to leave the U.S. He noted that the ban reflects a pivitol moment in U.S. policy one in which the nation's values and ideals will be tested. Beyond the (Executive Orders) effect on the Berkeley community, there is a far larger story at play: our country itself is at an historic crossroads, in debate not simply over a particular immigration policy, but over the very ideals that define our nation, Dirks wrote. Trumps order, issued Friday, indefinitely suspends Syrian refugees entry to the U.S., while also barring entry of individuals from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen for 90 days. The orders impact was immediate. Many affected travelers were mid-air when it came down, leading to chaos and a slew of protests at airport terminals across the country. In the Bay Area, thousands flocked to San Francisco International Airport to demand the release of detainees. University of California President Janet Napolitano also advised some students and faculty not to leave the United States even if they hold visas or are lawful permanent residents. Individuals originally from the banned countries with immigrant and nonimmigrant visas, as well as those with green cards, have been denied entry into the United States. At least 375 travelers have been impacted by the ban, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Its unclear if any Berkeley students were detained at airports over the weekend, but other schools, including Stanford, reported that students coming back from research trips were handcuffed upon trying to enter the country. "I felt humiliated and scared," Nisrin Elamin, a PhD student at Stanford, told NBC Bay Area. "At that point, I thought I was probably going to either get deported or detained in some place. Why else would they put handcuffs on me? And I started crying." Dirks directed worried community members to take advantage of the campus mental health resources and to brief themselves on information provided by the Berkeley International Office. Right now, it is paramount that the students, staff and faculty affected by this EO find the support they need, Dirks wrote. A statement from the president of the American Association of Universities urged the Trump administration to immediately lift the ban and to protect students like Elamin. The order is stranding students who have been approved to study here and are trying to get back to campus, and threatens to disrupt the education and research of many others, President Mary Sue Cleman wrote. Accusing her of betrayal and insubordination, President Donald Trump on Monday fired Sally Yates, the acting attorney general of the United States and a Democratic appointee, after she publicly questioned the constitutionality of his controversial refugee and immigration ban and refused to defend it in court. The dramatic public clash between the new president and the nation's top law enforcement officer laid bare the growing discord and dissent surrounding Trump's executive order, which temporarily halted the entire U.S. refugee program and banned all entries from seven Muslim-majority nations for 90 days. The firing came hours after Yates directed Justice Department attorneys not to defend the executive order, saying she was not convinced it was lawful or consistent with the agency's obligation "to stand for what is right." Trump soon followed with a statement accusing Yates of having "betrayed the Department of Justice by refusing to enforce a legal order designed to protect the citizens of the United States." He immediately named longtime federal prosecutor Dana Boente, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, as Yates' replacement. Boente was sworn in privately late Monday, the White House said. He promptly order Justice Department lawyers to "do our sworn duty and to defend the lawful orders of our President." Boente said Trump's executive order was "both lawful on its face and properly drafted." Yates' refusal to defend the executive order was largely symbolic given that Sen. Jeff Sessions, Trump's pick for attorney general, will almost certainly defend the policy once he's sworn in. He's expected to be confirmed Tuesday by the Senate Judiciary Committee and could be approved within days by the full Senate. The chain of events bore echoes of the Nixon-era "Saturday Night Massacre," when the attorney general and deputy attorney general resigned rather than follow an order to fire a special prosecutor investigating the Watergate scandal. The prosecutor, Archibald Cox, was fired by the solicitor general. Yates's abrupt decision reflected the growing conflict over the executive order, with administration officials moving Monday to distance themselves from the policy. As protests erupted at airports over the weekend and confusion disrupted travel around the globe, even some of Trump's top advisers and fellow Republicans made clear they were not involved in crafting the policy or consulted on its implementation. At least three top national security officials Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly and Rex Tillerson, who is awaiting confirmation to lead the State Department have told associates they were not aware of details of the directive until around the time Trump signed it. Leading intelligence officials were also left largely in the dark, according to U.S. officials. Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations committee, said that despite White House assurances that congressional leaders were consulted, he learned about the order in the media. Trump's order pauses America's entire refugee program for four months, indefinitely bans all those from war-ravaged Syria and temporarily freezes immigration from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Federal judges in New York and several other states issued orders that temporarily block the government from deporting people with valid visas who arrived after Trump's travel ban took effect and found themselves in limbo. Yates, who was appointed deputy attorney general in 2015 and was the No. 2 Justice Department official under Loretta Lynch, declared Monday she was instructing department lawyers not to defend the order in court. "I am responsible for ensuring that the positions we take in court remain consistent with this institution's solemn obligation to always seek justice and stand for what is right," Yates wrote in a letter announcing her position. "At present, I am not convinced that the defense of the Executive Order is consistent with these responsibilities nor am I convinced that the Executive Order is lawful." Trump said the order had been "approved" by Justice Department lawyers. However, the department has said the Office of Legal Counsel review was limited to whether the order was properly drafted, but did not address broader policy questions. Other parts of Trump's administration also voiced dissent Monday. A large group of American diplomats circulated a memo voicing their opposition to the order, which temporarily halted the entire U.S. refugee program and banned all entries from seven Muslim-majority nations for 90 days. White House spokesman Sean Spicer challenged those opposed to the measure to resign. "They should either get with the program or they can go," Spicer said. The blowback underscored Trump's tenuous relationship with his own national security advisers, many of whom he met for the first time during the transition. Mattis, who stood next to Trump during Friday's signing ceremony, is said to be particularly incensed. A senior U.S. official said Mattis, along with Joint Chiefs Chairman Joseph Dunford, was aware of the general concept of Trump's order but not the details. Tillerson has told the president's political advisers that he was baffled over not being consulted on the substance of the order. U.S. officials and others with knowledge of the Cabinet's thinking insisted on anonymity in order to disclose the officials' private views. Despite his public defense of the policy, the president has privately acknowledged flaws in the rollout, according to a person with knowledge of his thinking. But he's also blamed the media his frequent target for what he believes are reports exaggerating the dissent and the number of people actually affected. After a chaotic weekend during which some U.S. legal permanent residents were detained at airports, some agencies were moving swiftly to try to clean up after the White House. Homeland Security, the agency tasked with implementing much of the refugee ban, clarified that customs and border agents should allow legal residents to enter the country. The Pentagon was trying to exempt Iraqis who worked alongside the U.S. and coalition forces from the 90-day ban on entry from the predominantly Muslim countries. "There are a number of people in Iraq who have worked for us in a partnership role, whether fighting alongside us or working as translators, often doing so at great peril to themselves," said Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman. On Capitol Hill, lawmakers in Trump's party sought to distance themselves from the wide-ranging order. While Spicer said "appropriate committees and leadership offices" on Capitol Hill were consulted, GOP lawmakers said their offices had no hand in drafting the order and no briefings from the White House on how it would work. "I think they know that it could have been done in a better way," Corker said of the White House. Thousands of activists turned out Sunday afternoon in Boston to protest President Donald Trump's actions on Muslim immigrants. The Massachusetts chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations started its rally at 1 p.m. on Boston's Copley Square. CAIR-Massachusetts Executive Director John Robbins said Trump is playing on "religious bigotry and intolerance"' and will end up turning away men, women and children fleeing violence and persecution. The president's order immediately suspended for four months a program that last year resettled in the U.S. roughly 85,000 people displaced by war, political oppression, hunger and religious prejudice. An immediate 90-day ban was put in place for all immigration to the U.S. from seven Muslim majority nations. Trump also indefinitely blocked Syrians, including those fleeing civil war. The rally took place at the site of the Kahlil Gibran Memorial. Protesters quickly filled the area holding signs and chanting and singing songs like "America the Beautiful." Senator Elizabeth Warren joined CAIR and the ACLU to speak against the temporary ban. He is even trying to shut the door on people who are here legally. On students, on faculty, on workers right here in Massachusetts who live here legally and we are here to fight back, said Warren "Its a security test, we were the victims in our city of a bombing recently, said Joseph Coutlis who attended the rally. The brothers behind the bombings and their family were not from any of the 7 countries on the travel ban list, but Coutlis says he still supports President Trumps efforts. Lilia Laitouti questions the treatment being meted out to her. I love this country as my second home, I pay my taxes and dont do anything wrong here and I dont see why I am different this is my question, why am I not welcome here? asks Laitouti. Sunday marked the second day of protests in Boston and across the country. While there was a smaller demonstration Saturday afternoon in the city's Chinatown neighborhood, hundreds of activists gathered for an impromptu demonstration at Boston's Logan International Airport after there were reports of detainees, whom were eventually granted their release by a federal judge overnight Sunday. MBTA Spokesperson Joe Pesaturo said for safety precautions, Copley Station would be closed beginning at 11:30 a.m. and would remain closed until the demonstration ended. Green Line customers were being asked to use Arlington and Hynes Stations instead. Pesaturo also said that extra trains were being added on the Green Line in anticipation of extra customers. Meanwhile Immigration lawyers kept busy at the Boston Logan airport. Nearly a day after a restaining order was placed on Trump's executive order, things have eased a little. They said that they think the right thing to do is take 7 days and just stop. Stop the president's executive order to give time to hear the constitutional issues, for both sides to present their evidence and to make a decision on the constitutionality of president trump's executive order," says Jeff Goldman, an Immigration Attorney. The president has singled out 7 countries in his 90-day immigration ban. Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. White House officials say that US residents - those with green cards from these 7 countries are now exempt from the executive order. "So if the permanent resident has documentation saying they're allowed to enter the United States, they should be let in," added Goldman. That wasn't the case yesterday as two UMass Dartmouth professors who have green cards were detained for hours. "Its one thing to ask questions. Its another thing to have someone head into secondary inspection, which is the side room and have to wait 4,5,6 hours," said Goldman. Customs and Border Protection does have the ability to label a permanent resident as a possible threat to national security. Goldman says they should be given the right to have a hearing in front of a judge before being sent back on a plane. Immigration lawyers have been asking clients to fly in to Logan since the restraining order was signed yesterday. Sens. Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth are calling for an independent investigation into the implementation of President Donald Trumps recent executive order on immigration. Trumps order halts all refugee resettlement into the U.S. for 120 days, imposes an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria, and suspends entry of immigrants from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen - all Muslim-majority nations - for 90 days. In response, protests broke out at airports across the country this weekend, including at Chicagos OHare International Airport, where more than a dozen people were released late Saturday after being detained. The chaotic execution of this [Executive Order] raises serious concerns in regard to whether taxpayer dollars were efficiently and effectively spent, rather than wasted on unwarranted and unjust detentions of lawful permanent residents and others who posed no security threat, and who had already been authorized by the United States Government to enter our country, Durbin and Duckworth wrote in a letter to Department of Homeland Security Inspector General John Roth. We are deeply concerned by [Custom and Border Protections] failure to respond to time-sensitive Congressional oversight inquiries and allegations that the agency refused to permit attorneys to meet with detained [lawful permanent residents] at OHare and other airports across the country, the senators added. In their letter to Roth, Durbin and Duckworth pushed for an investigation into how the Department of Homeland Security and the Custom and Border Protection prepared to implement Trumps executive order and what guidance those agencies provided to the White House during the orders development. The Illinois senators are also pushing an investigation into the guidance and training provided to CBP employees to ensure that the order was implemented in accordance with the constitutional rights of detainees. Additionally, Duckworth and Durbins letter seeks to investigate how DHS and CBP determined which information to share publicly and whether they kept a list of all detained individuals. On Saturday, a federal judge in Brooklyn issued an emergency order temporarily barring the U.S. from deporting people from the seven countries included in Trumps travel ban. The judge said travelers who had been detained had a strong argument that their legal rights had been violated. In their letter, Durbin and Duckworth pushed for an investigation into whether CBP officers were informed of court orders and given instructions on how to comply with them, whether CBP violated any court order, and what complaints about violations of court orders have been received and how they were resolved. DHS issued a statement early Sunday that said the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of Trumps order, claiming it affected a relatively small number of travelers who were inconvenienced by security procedures upon their return. Trump aides insist the judgment has little impact. The United States Constitution means little if law enforcement agents disregard it, or if Americans are unwilling to defend its principles and respect foundational constitutional rights, from due process to equal protection under the law," the senators wrote. "The American people are relying on your independent investigators to serve as a check against a powerful law enforcement agency that may be violating the civil rights of [legal permanent residents] and operating in violation of the law." Durbin and members of the Senate Judiciary Committee also sent a letter Monday to Acting U.S. Attorney General Sally Yates Monday demanding answers about the U.S. Department of Justice's role in reviewing Trump's executive order. President Trump has insisted that his order is not a blanket ban on Muslims. On Monday, the Republican downplayed the order's impact, slamming New York Sen. Chuck Schumer, a vocal opponent of the move. "Only 109 of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning," Trump tweeted. "Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outages, protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. [Department of Homeland Security] Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems." "MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN," Trump added. President Donald Trump has scheduled a Thursday trip to the Milwaukee area to discuss the economy, the White House confirmed Milwaukees State Fair Park and Harley-Davidson Museum are being considered as potential venues for the event, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, although a time for Trumps visit has yet to be determined. The president is scheduled Thursday morning to attend the National Prayer Breakfast at the Hilton Hotel in Washington, D.C. Trump would then make his first trip to Wisconsin since taking office. In November, Trump became the first GOP presidential candidate to win Wisconsins popular vote since 1984, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports. Additionally, Trump announced on Twitter that he plans to name his nominee for a vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday. Just over a week into his presidency, Trump has faced pushback against an executive order that temporarily suspends all immigration for citizens of seven majority Muslim countries for 90 days. This weekend, protests against the ban broke out at airports across the country, including Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. Bond was set at $1 million on Sunday for a mother charged with shooting her son during a family gathering in the Lawndale neighborhood on the West Side, according to court records. Angeline Minniefield, 43, faces one felony count each of attempted first-degree murder and aggravated battery with the discharge of a firearm, according to Chicago Police. Minniefield was at a family party about 12:45 a.m. Saturday in an apartment in the 1400 block of South Avers when she got into an argument with a 21-year-old man, police said. She pulled out a gun and shot the man in the neck. Sources confirmed he is Minniefields son. The man was taken to Mount Sinai Hospital, where he was listed in good condition, police said. Minniefield, who lives on the same block as the shooting, was arrested at the scene and subsequently charged. She was next scheduled to appear in court on Feb. 3. Four men were killed and at least 23 other people, including an off-duty Cook County sheriffs courts deputy, were wounded in shootings across the city between Friday afternoon and Monday morning, according to Chicago Police. The latest fatal shooting happened about 11 p.m. Sunday in the Brighton Park neighborhood on the Southwest Side. A 31-year-old man was standing in a backyard in the 3500 block of West 38th Place when someone in a silver SUV fired shots, police said. He suffered a gunshot wound to the back and was pronounced dead at the scene. Earlier Sunday, a 23-year-old man was found shot to death in the Belmont Central neighborhood on the Northwest Side. Officers responding to a call of a person shot about 5:35 p.m. found the man with a gunshot wound to the head in the 6200 block of West Grand. He was taken to Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, where he died, police said. The Cook County medical examiners office did not immediately provide information on either fatality Monday morning. About 1:40 a.m. Saturday, Kentrell Thompson, 25, was sitting in a vehicle at a gas station in the 1200 block of North Halsted in the Goose Island neighborhood on the Near North Side when someone fired several shots at the vehicle, according to police and the medical examiners office. Thompson suffered a gunshot wound to the head and was pronounced dead at the scene at 2:29 a.m. He lived in the Humboldt Park neighborhood on the West Side. Another killing happened about 7:45 p.m. Friday in the West Pullman neighborhood on the Far South Side, where officers responding to a call of shots fired in the 400 block of West 129th Place found a 34-year-old man with gunshot wounds to the head and thigh, authorities said. He was taken to Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, where he died at 8:27 p.m. His name has not been released. The sheriffs deputy was among three people wounded when gunfire erupted outside a Gold Coast bar where he was working security while off-duty about 3:30 a.m. Saturday near State and Division, authorities said. Detectives were questioning a person of interest in the attack, which a police source said stemmed from a dispute over payment. A 39-year-old man grazed in the head was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital along with a 33-year-old man shot in the leg, and a 30-year-old man shot in the back was taken to Illinois Masonic Medical Center. Fire officials said they all were in serious condition, but police said they had stabilized by mid-morning. The weekends latest nonfatal shooting wounded a 16-year-old boy about 6:50 p.m. Sunday in the Hermosa neighborhood on the Northwest Side. He was walking in the 1900 block of North Pulaski when he heard gunfire and realized hed been shot in the right foot, police said. He took himself to Saints Mary Mary and Elizabeth Medical Center, where he was listed in good condition. At least 19 more people were wounded in other Chicago shootings between Friday afternoon and Monday morning. Last weekend, 53 people were shot in Chicago, six of them fatally. More than 285 people have been shot in the city during the first month of the year. Two lawmakers say that the Iraqi parliament has approved a "reciprocity measure" after U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily banning citizens from Iraq and six other Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. The measure, adopted by lawmakers at a Monday session of parliament, is to apply to Americans entering Iraq. Lawmakers Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun told The Associated Press that decision is binding for the government. Both say the decision was passed by a majority votes in favor but couldn't offer specific numbers. No further details were available on the wording of the parliament decision. It was also not immediately clear who the ban will apply to American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and other Americans doing business in Iraq. It was also not known if and how the Iraqi measure would affect cooperation in the fight against the Islamic State group in Mosul. Trump's order includes a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program. Oscar season is looking more and more like one very well-dressed protest against President Donald Trump. In speech after fiery speech at Sunday night's Screen Actors Guild Awards, winners struck a defiant tone against Trump's sweeping immigration ban. Their words varied from tender personal reflections to full-throated battle cries, but they were nearly uniform in channeling the nationwide demonstrations sparked by Trump's halting of immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim nations. The SAG Awards culminated with the evening's top honor, best movie ensemble, going to the cast of "Hidden Figures," an uplifting drama about African-American mathematicians who aided NASA's 1960s space race, starring Taraji P. Henson, Janelle Monae and Octavia Spencer. Henson concluded the show the same way its first presenter, Ashton Kutcher, began it: with the kind of pointed politics that have traditionally been more an aberration than a constant at Hollywood award shows. "This story is about unity," said Henson, who stars alongside Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monae in "Hidden Figures." ''This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race. We win. Love wins. Every time." It was a surprise win for "Hidden Figures." With the Oscar front-runner "La La Land" (which took the Producers Guild Awards' top honor on Saturday) not nominated in the category, most expected a contest between "Moonlight" or "Manchester by the Sea." Such a result could now mean "Hidden Figures" is the strongest challenger to the "La La Land" dominance, or, perhaps, that none of the three films will be able to muster enough to topple the song-and-dance juggernaut. Yet if Damien Chazelle's musical is to go on to win best picture, it will be just the second film to do so without a SAG ensemble nod in the category's history. Only Mel Gibson's "Braveheart" managed it in 1996. But such Oscar handicapping usually the prime drama at the SAG Awards largely took a backseat to politics on Sunday. (That is, with the possible exception of Denzel Washington's surprise win over Casey Affleck.) Whichever film ultimately triumphs at the Oscars, it seems assured of being dwarfed by the growing off-screen clamor. The immigration ban has already altered the Academy Awards. On Sunday, the revered Iranian filmmaker Asghar Farhadi, whose "A Salesman" is nominated for best foreign language film, said he would boycott the Oscars, even if he was allowed to travel for them. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who added another honor for her performance on the political satire "Veep," said she was the daughter of an immigrant who fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France. "Because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes," said Louis-Dreyfus. "And this immigrant ban is a blemish and it is un-American." Perhaps the most moving speech came from Mahershala Ali, who won best supporting actor for his acclaimed performance in Barry Jenkins' coming-of-age portrait, "Moonlight." Ali said the film, about a shy, gay Miami boy's hard life, held lessons of acceptance. "We see what happens when you persecute people," Ali said. "The fold into themselves." Ali said his own relationship with his mother exemplified tolerance. The son of a Protestant minister, Ali converted to Islam 17 years ago. "We put things to the side," Ali said of their differences. "I'm able to see her. She's able to see me. We love each other. The love has grown. That stuff is minutia. It's not that important." Ali was among the several Oscar favorites who cemented their front-runner status, including best-actress winner Emma Stone for "La La Land" and best-supporting actress winner Viola Davis for "Fences." But best actor went to Davis's co-star (and director) Washington for his performance in the August Wilson adaptation. Most expected the award to go to Affleck, apparently including Washington himself. "I'm a God-fearing man," he said, still shaking his head as he reached the podium. "I'm supposed to have faith, but I didn't have faith." The most blistering speech was by David Harbour, who led the cast of Netflix's "Stranger Things" another big surprise winner on stage to accept best ensemble in a TV drama series. "We will hunt monsters," Harbour vowed in lengthy remarks that drew a standing ovation. The hit Netflix series "Orange Is the New Black" won best ensemble in a comedy series for the third straight year. "We stand up here representing a diverse group of people, representing generations of families who have sought a better life here from places like Nigeria, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Ireland," said star Taylor Schilling, while a cast member added "Brooklyn!" ''And we know that it's going to be up to us and all you, probably, to keep telling stories that show what unites us is stronger than the forces that divide us." Lily Tomlin was the lifetime achievement honoree Sunday. The 77-year-old actress gave a warm, rollicking speech that dispensed both drinking advice and regret over wasting "a lot of time being ambitious about the wrong things." "Did you hear? The Doomsday Clock has been moved up to two and a half minutes before midnight," said Tomlin. "And this award, it came just in the nick of time." In the aftermath of the President Donald Trumps controversial executive action to suspend the United States refugee program and restrict entry to the United States from seven predominantly Muslim countries, faith leaders in our state are coming together to revisit the idea of sanctuary congregations. We are refugees, Rabbi Herbert Brockman, of Congregation Mishkan Israel in Hamden, said. I cannot imagine turning our backs, particularly at a time of need. Brockman said the idea of the sanctuary being a place of refuge and safety is as old as biblical times. In modern times, we believe that the congregations at churches and synagogues, in particular, could be places where people could come and be safe, he said. Trump issued a statement amid the protests, claiming his executive order is not a "Muslim ban" and blaming the media for portraying it as so. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," the statement read. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe." Trump issued a statement amid the protests, claiming his executive order is not a "Muslim ban" and blaming the media for portraying it as so. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," the statement read. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe." Brockman is leading the initiative for congregations to provide assistance to people at risk of deportation or government action. Brockman said he began discussing the idea with other faith leaders shortly after the presidential election. It means that we as an institution commit ourselves to going with them to deportation hearings, Brockman said. That, if necessary, we would provide legal assistance, financial assistance to the families that may be no longer able to work because they now face deportation. The congregation took in a family of Syrian refugees Thursday, hours before the executive order that wouldve barred them from entering the country. Brockman called the suspension of the refugee program unconscienable and added that now, more than ever, leaders need to step up to help those in need. Weve got to be there for these people. Just seeing them, its so sad, Brockman said. Approximately 40 congregations are expected to participate in a training on Feb. 19 about what it means to be a sanctuary congregation. A national Quinnipiac university poll released today says American voters support, 48 - 42 percent, "suspending immigration from 'terror prone' regions, even if it means turning away refugees from those regions." Quinnipiac University conducted the poll between Jan. 5 and Jan. 9, weeks before President Donald Trump issued the recent executive orders, ordering "new vetting measures" to keep "radical Islamic terrorists" out of the United States. The orders the president signed last week suspend the U.S.'s refugee program for 120 days and single out Syrian refugees as "detrimental to the interests of the United States," ban the issuance of visas to people from Syria until the president feels the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program's vetting process is strengthened, suspends entry for 90 days for immigrants from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen all Muslim majority nations and caps the number of refugees from other countries at 50,000 people in fiscal year 2017. In response to the presidential orders, there were several rallies and protests. Quinnipiac also found that American voters support, 53 - 41 percent, "requiring immigrants from Muslim countries to register with the federal government." The same survey found that 59 percent of American voters believe illegal immigrants should be allowed to stay in the U.S. and "eventually apply for U.S. citizenship." In cities across the U.S., demonstrations formed for a second straight day to protest President Trump's executive order that temporarily restricts entry to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries and indefinitely bans Syrian refugees from crossing into the country. Trump issued a statement amid the protests, claiming his executive order is not a "Muslim ban" and blaming the media for portraying it as so. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," the statement read. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe." In New York, thousands of protesters streamed into the city's Battery Park to demand an end to the ban. An elderly husband and wife died in an apparent murder-suicide in Washington state, and police say they found notes about the couple's struggles to afford needed medical care, NBC News reported. A 77-year-old man called 911 on Wednesday morning saying he planned to die by suicide, the Whatcom County Sheriffs Office said in a Facebook post. Deputies went to the home of the man in Ferndale, a town about 100 miles north of Seattle near the Canadian border, and set up outside. A crisis negotiator attempted to contact the couple in the home by phone and loudspeaker for about an hour, said the sheriff's office post on Wednesday night. They then found both the man and his wife, 76, dead inside. Authorities are investigating the case as a murder-suicide. The big crowd gathered Sunday near the ferries that carry tourists to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, the place where 12 million people entered the United States in the golden age of immigration. U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer addressed the crowd, saying, "We are gonna win this fight everybody!" People held signs with slogans including "America was built by refugees," and "Muslim ban is un-American." The rally followed a night of big demonstrations at New York's Kennedy Airport, where thousands of people spontaneously gathered to demand the release of detained travelers. South of New York in Philadelphia, protesters gathered at Philadelphia International Airport. The protesters began waving signs and chanting "Let them in!" and other slogans Sunday afternoon. Protesters also gathered Saturday night at the airport. [NATL] Trump Immigration Order Triggers Protests Across US The American Civil Liberties union earlier said everyone detained at the airport was being released and no one else would be detained following a judge's order. Deputy legal director Mary Catherine Roper of Pennsylvania ACLU said the decision cleared the way for three people detained overnight to continue to other U.S. destinations Sunday, while another person was allowed to leave Saturday night with relatives who are U.S. citizens. In Washington, hundreds of demonstrators holding signs with slogans such as "No Ban, No Wall," and "We are all immigrants in America," gathered outside the White House. Federal Judge Ann M. Donnelly of the Eastern District of New York Courthouse in Brooklyn granted an injunction in response to a request filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and other legal organizations on behalf of individuals subject to President Trumps immigration ban from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Vocal and expressive, the crowd was alternately solemn and warm in expressing peaceful solidarity with refugees affected by Trump's order. Maryam Kanna, a 24-year-old Iraqi-American who lives in Arlington, Virginia, called the executive order "totally alienating." Kanna said she worries about her uncle, a British citizen, and her cousins in Canada, who may no longer be able to enter the U.S. The crowd moved to the Trump International Hotel near the White House and chanted "the whole world is watching" from the street. Crowds gathered in protest at Dulles International Airport's international terminal for the second day in a row, and Sunday protesters amassed at Baltimore-Washington International Airport as well. Protests also formed in Dallas, Miami, Chicago, Los Angeles, Boston and San Francisco. Also on Sunday, attorneys general from 16 states and the District of Columbia issued a statement condemning the order. As the chief legal officers for over 130 million Americans and foreign residents of our states, we condemn President Trump's unconstitutional, un-American and unlawful Executive Order and will work together to ensure the federal government obeys the Constitution, respects our history as a nation of immigrants, and does not unlawfully target anyone because of their national origin or faith," they wrote. "We are confident that the Executive Order will ultimately be struck down by the courts. In the meantime, we are committed to working to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created," the statement concluded. Osama Al Olabi and his brother, Tarek Al Olabi, spent two days at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport waiting for their parents. After an emotional stay overnight, their parents, Basima Labbad and Ahmed Al Olabi, were two of the nine detainees released on Sunday. "We are free now. We feel we are free," said Ahmed Al Olabi. "I have a real passport. I have a real visa. I have a stamp of the USA." Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings and Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins met privately with the detainees and their families. "For me the headline of this is, 'It's a family day.' We just witnessed what family was all about," Rawlings said. "It tells you that this world is a very human place. It is made up of strong ties. Dallas is a place where we honor those family ties." Jenkins, who was at D/FW Airport late Saturday night, claimed victory. "It's a day when we reaffirm our American value of welcoming the stranger. It's a value that is held beyond our patriotic values," Jenkins said. Osama and Tarek Al Olabi are students at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. Their parents have visited multiple times in the past. "I can't even tell you how happy I am. I'm just super happy to see my family," Osama Al Olabi said. "They are safe, they are healthy and nothing happened to them. I was worried. You saw how worried I was yesterday." The Al Olabi's said they would celebrate at In-N-Out Burger on Sunday. Lisa Hendrickson, Denton County Republican Party chair, sat down with NBC 5's Kristin Dickerson to talk about President Donald Trump's executive order on immigration as people demonstrated at airports across the country, including Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. The order temporarily restricts entry to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries and indefinitely bans Syrian refugees from crossing into the country. Hendrickson spoke in favor of the executive order, saying it's important to keep Americans safe. "They're putting the American people and the safety of the American people first," said Hendrickson, referring to the actions of Trump's administration. One month into 2017, and murder cases continue to build for investigators with the Dallas Police Department. In 2016, the murder rate increased 28 percent. The clearance rate dropped to 48 percent, meaning more than half of Dallas murders remained unsolved. "There were 86 unsolved homicide cases in 2016," said Deputy Chief Thomas Castro. "We have 15 cases in 2017. Are goal is to get these perpetrators off of the street." Currently, 14 homicide detectives are working up to 12 cases a piece. There have been several arrests made, involving murders in 2016 and 2017, but Castro says that is not enough. "One unsolved case is too many. We need the community's help. We have to build trust and gain understanding. If there are people who know something, have seen something, or heard something we need them to come forward. Witness testimony is critical," said Castro. The majority of unsolved cases are located in the south side of Dallas. "I want residents to know that I care, that my detectives care. We get frustrated when the case stalls out, we live with these cases too," said Castro. Monday night is the start of series of community meetings on behalf of the Dallas Police Department. "For the first time, homicide detectives will come to the meetings and explain to the residents the investigation process," said Castro. "There will also be a question and answer period." Detectives will also discuss a few previous murder cases. The meeting will take place at Salem Institutional Baptist Church in Dallas at 6 p.m. Questions still linger for many Mexican-Americans when it comes to talk of a wall between Mexico and the Unites States. For many, there is still uncertainty about the possibility of a 20 percent tariff on imported goods from Mexico and what it could mean to everyday life. Some North Texans fear that tariff could put some Mexican-American communities in a financial crisis and threaten quality of life. We get pretty upset because [President Trump] is trying to make it so difficult on us, Dalia Arce of Grapevine said. As Mexican immigrants, Arce and her siblings were born in the United States. The stores and this country are all they have ever known. I grew up working here basically since I was a little baby, she said. Arce and her family own two stores in Grapevine that carry Mexican made and imported goods ranging from food to clothing. They fear that their merchandise could get harder to get and keep in stock. There are also fears of having to raise prices if a tariff is put in place. "It would be very difficult just because this is what I have so that I can have what I need," she said. "This is where it all comes from for me. My clothes, my food." Arce said stores like theirs are more than a luxury for some local families. They are often a necessity in some communities. They work maybe two jobs or one job and they have to take care of their daughters and they send money every day, she said. Their store also makes it possible for those living in the United States to send money home to family members. She said people are watching politics a little closer than ever. "Mostly people are pretty upset [and] very scared, she said. A lot of people are just trying to do everything they can to be ready just for anything and that's the scarier part because we don't know what might happen. We can get ripped apart from everything that we have." Arce is worried about the community and also how a tariff would affect her family business. My parents really wanted to open their own business so they could have something for me and my siblings mostly, she said. Thats the big dream. To give the family something that they couldnt get when they were younger. Restaurants in several North Texas cities Monday will be part of the continuing support for the family of a Little Elm police officer fatally shot in the line of duty. Detective Jerry Walker, 48, was shot during a standoff Jan 17. He was the first officer in the history of the Little Elm force to be killed in the line of duty. He left behind four children ranging in age from to 22-years-old to a few months. Special t-shirts sold today between 5-9 p.m. at 11 Chick-Fil-A restaurants will support Det. Walker's family. The #LittleElmBig Hero t-shirt will cost $10 each. A page on Facebook lists all the participating restaurants from Crossroads to the Colony, Corinth, Denton, Flower Mound, Frisco, Mansfield and Plano. Cousins BBQ, 9560 Feather Grass Lane in Fort Worth, will also participate. Monetary donations will also be accepted. The Whataburger restaurant at 8000 FM 423 in Frisco will also host a fundraiser tonight called "Oh Whata Night" to support the detective's family. "Walker was a frequent customer" at the restaurant, said Sarah Sutton, a restaurant spokeswoman said. "We're happy to do what we can to help support his family as well as the Little Elm Police Department during this time." Monday night from 5-8 p.m, 20 percent of sales at that Whataburger location will be donated to the America's Defenders Foundation in honor of fallen officer Jerry Walker. A Texas House Democrat has filed a ceremonial resolution denouncing President Donald Trump's ban on travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries. Dallas Rep. Rafael Anchia labeled Trump's action a fulfillment of his "intention to shut down the entry of Muslims into the United States." Anchia introduced his resolution Monday. It condemns Trump's executive order as an act of discrimination against Muslims and a violation of the U.S. Constitution. Trump's order bans travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries for 90 days while also halting the processing of refugees from the war in Syria. Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick have yet to comment on Trump's order, while House Speaker Joe Straus, a fellow Republican, has signaled unease. NBC 5 has been reaching out to your lawmakers regarding President Donald Trumps Executive Action on refugees. We have asked for comments from the North Texas Delegation in Washington, D.C. and both senators. Sen. Ted Cruz issued the following statement regarding President Trumps recent executive order exclusively to NBC 5: "We live in a dangerous world, and for eight long years the Obama administration remained willfully blind to the threat of radical Islamic terrorism, admitting tens of thousands of refugees whom the FBI expressly told Congress they could not be certain were not terrorists. That Obama policy made no sense, and it made America less safe. If we are serious about combating the threat of radical Islam, we must reform and strengthen our refugee programs to ensure proper vetting of those entering our countryespecially when they are coming from nations that are hotbeds of terror. This is crucial to our national security and to protecting American lives, and it is a priority for which I have long advocated. "I commend President Trump for rejecting Obama's willful blindness, and for acting swiftly to try to prevent terrorists from infiltrating our refugee programs. In contrast to the hysteria and mistruths being pushed by the liberal media, President Trumps executive order implements a four-month pause in refugee admissions so that stronger vetting procedures can be put in place. This is a commonsense step that the American people overwhelmingly support. The executive order also calls for the prioritization of religious minorities, a welcome change from an Obama administration that functionally discriminated against religious minorities, who are especially vulnerable to persecution and genocide. "DHS Secretary John Kelly was just confirmed overwhelmingly, and I have confidence that he will provide the leadership needed to properly implement these reforms. I am already pleased to see him announce that some legitimate concerns about the non-refugee aspects of this order are being handled properly, and that lawful permanent residents will be given priority in entering the country. "It is incumbent upon Congress to pass legislation to further assist in these efforts. Congress should pass the Terrorist Refugee Infiltration Protection Act, to insure that all refugees are properly vetted. In addition, the executive order calls for greater influence from the states in this process, and the State Refugee Security Act that I just introduced with Rep. Ted Poe (R-Texas) would do just that. Both bills are commonsense steps to keep us safe, and should be something that all senators and representatives, regardless of political party, can unite behind." Senator John Cornyn: "I'm glad they revised it to make sure that legal permanent residents would not be included unless there was derogatory information. I just think they got in a big hurry. But I also think that public that public safety is the number one responsibility of the federal government, so I certainly support the vetting of refugees and people coming into the country." Here are the statements we have received from our representatives. A spokesperson for Republican Congressman Joe Barton-6th District: "Congressman Barton has heard from constituents experiencing delays. He will continue to review the Executive action this week with his colleagues in Washington." Representative Michael Burgess, R-26th District: "My top priority has always been to protect Americans at home and to do so by securing our borders. As he has made clear, President Trump is taking the steps well within his authority, and based off intelligence gathered in the Obama Administration, to keep our country safe. Congress should remain involved in the process and provide legislation to strengthen not only border security but vetting those who wish to enter the country through any means." Representative Kay Granger, R-12th District: "I am convinced that President Trump made the decision because he believes it will make us safer. I cut funding that would increase the number of refugees coming from Syria when I was briefed that we could not adequately vet that population before granting them refugee status to the United States. The job of the President is to defend and protect our nation. We must also protect our well-earned position as a caring and humanitarian nation. I pray that we do both." Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, D-30th District: I stand in solidarity with the refugees, immigrants and their loved ones who are being banned from entering our country. This does not represent the America that is made up of immigrants or the values we cherish, one being freedom of religion. Yesterday across the nation and here at the Dallas/Forth Worth International Airport many people were being detained and were not allowed entry into our country. This was all a result of the most recent executive action signed by President Trump banning individuals from seven dominant Muslim countries to enter our country. During this time there is a lot of confusion and families being torn apart. I am aware and waiting to be fully briefed on how many people are being detained at the D/FW airport, so my staff and I can fully provide assistance and guidance to those who need it. Representative Pete Sessions, R-32nd District: This morning I spoke with Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings about passengers detained at the Dallas Fort Worth International Airport as a result of the Presidents executive order. We have confidence that officials from the Department of Homeland Security are working to comply with the executive order and any subsequent judicial action on this matter. I believe our first and foremost priority is to protect the American people and safeguard our homeland. Just as President Obama suspended the refugee program in 2011 for six months, the Trump Administration is working to protect national security by making adjustments in the refugee vetting process. It is critical that we address the threat of individuals who come to our country to create chaos and threaten our freedom. Representative Marc Veasey, D-33rd District: "President Trump's latest executive action is already causing mass confusion for international airports nationwide. I have been in contact with all relevant agencies and I will continue to monitor the situation closely. I have heard reports of upwards of 50 detainees and I am traveling to DFW airport to gather more information. In the meantime, airport officials are providing cots, blankets, food and water to those detained. The Trump Administrations refugee ban and their instruction to suspend entry from Muslim-majority countries is wholly un-American and challenges our countrys humanitarian leadership. Representative Roger Williams, R-25th District: "The national security of the United States and its citizens is paramount to anything else. I firmly support a temporary travel ban on individuals from countries of concern- a designation given by the Obama Administration's Department of Homeland Security. During this time we must ensure our vetting process is completely foolproof." Representative Sam Johnson, R-5th District: The number one priority of any president is to ensure the safety of all Americans. As a 29-year Air Force veteran who fought in two wars in the name of freedom, I appreciate that our new Commander-In-Chief is taking the safety of the American people seriously. As recent terrorists attacks both at home and abroad underscore, we must do everything in our power to ensure we dont let terrorists slip through the cracks. Representative Jeb Hensarling, R-5th District: President Trump made clear that keeping America safe is a top priority for his Administration, and it is refreshing to see that he is willing to take swift and decisive action to achieve that goal. And, while the rollout of his executive action could have gone more smoothly, I believe most Americans, and particularly the East Texans I represent, would agree that its just common sense to take a closer look at people trying to enter the U.S. from nations with broad terrorist networks. In fact, more than a year ago Congress passed, and President Obama signed into law, a bill that placed a higher threshold for entry into our nation. The legislation blocked people who have traveled since 2011 to Iran, Iraq, Sudan, and Syria from entering the United States through our Visa Waiver Programno matter their country of citizenship. Several months later, the Obama Administration added Libya, Somalia, and Yemen to that list. These seven countries, are the exact same countries included in President Trumps executive order. And, while critics claim this temporary pause in immigration amounts to a Muslim ban, this couldnt be further from the truth. In fact, more than 40 countries with Muslim majorities were not included on President Trumps list at all. America is a nation of immigrants, and should continue to be. Although we cant take in the world, we should strive to find places for people who come here legally, seeking freedom and opportunity. But, we need to make sure those seeking to come to America mean us no harm. In the coming days and weeks, Congress should exercise its responsibility to take a careful look at the underlying policies to ensure they are effective in achieving the goal of making America safer and preventing terrorists from coming to our shores. Representative John Ratcliffe, R-4th District. Marzieh Moosavizaveh lives in Iran and visits her family in the United States every year since 1993. It usually takes her a few minutes to get through customs -- time spent anticipating the meeting with her family. But on Saturday, the process took 10 hours. "Every time Grandma comes to visit I go escort her from the international terminal to the Southwest terminal, but this time around, she didn't come out," Moosavizaveh's grandson Siavosh Naji-Talakar said. Moosavizaveh, 72, was unaware of President Donald Trump's executive order, which imposed a temporary ban on travel to the United States from seven majority Muslim countries, signed during her 19-hour flight to Los Angeles. The U.S. green card holder was detained along with several other Iranian citizens at LAX, where attorneys responded to the Tom Bradley International Terminal to assist travelers as protesters rallied outside. "All they told them was just sit there and wait," her son, Babak Naji-Talakar, said. "For a lady with arthritis, a lot of bone problems, two open heart surgeries. Imagine sitting in the chair for 10 hours." Moosavizaveh and her grandson already missed their flight home to Phoenix by the time the check Saturday at LAX was complete. Translating for his mother, Babak said this about the message she has for President Trump: "She respects him, and she can't understand why he's that angry towards us." Trump's order, signed Friday, suspends all refugee entries for 120 days, indefinitely blocks all Syrian refugees, and bars entry for 90 days to all immigrants from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. The ban also applies to people with passports from more than one country including those not covered also those that are, green cards and student visas. The Department of Homeland Security released a statement Sunday morning stating less than 1 percent of travelers had been inconvenienced by the executive order. A Department of Homeland Security official said Sunday night that customs and border officers had "cleared out all cases that resulted in individuals who were affected by the order at airports around the country." A federal judge in New York has issued an emergency order temporarily barring the U.S. from deporting people from the seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trump's 90-day travel ban. The Department of Homeland Security said Sunday the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. Trump has repeatedly said that the move is aimed at protecting the nation against extremists looking to attack Americans and American interests. White House press secretary Sean Spicer said officials were concerned about the possibility that rolling out the order in a more open fashion would "telegraph what you're going to do" to people who might have rushed to airports to beat the ban. In an appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" Monday, Spicer also said officials' highest priority was "to protect our own people" and said everybody in the government who needed to be consulted was consulted. "It's a shame that people were inconvenienced, but at the end of the day we're talking about a couple of hours," Spicer said Monday. "Being able to come to this country is a privilege, not a right." Los Angeles has one of the largest populations of immigrants from Iran, with estimates ranging from 300,000 to 500,000 people. And for the people in LA's Persian Square, President Donald Trump's travel ban and immigration actions are stirring up fear that their families will be torn apart. One of those people who could be potentially affected is Aida Elyasian. Elyasian owns Shaherzad, a family-owned restaurant located in what is known as Tehrangeles. The restaurant serves cuisine typically found in Iran. "It's what smells like home, what reminds us every day what we came from and what we're here for," she said. Elyasian is now an American citizen although she grew up in Iran during the revolution. She said she feels the fear amongst the local Iranian community with Trump's travel ban. "There are people who are very much worried." Some are even putting plans to visit loved ones on Iran on hold for fear that if they leave the United States, they may not be allowed to come back. "It's very personal because I'm the daughter of immigrants who came from Iran," Elyasian said. The Matuszewski family faces a similar plight. They are worried their little ones may never be able to see their relatives abroad. "We are a country founded on the freedom of religion and our forefathers were fleeing persecution of their religion and now here we are as a country fighting that same threat, but within our own country." Through the chaos and confusion, Elyasian told NBC4 she sees America's melting pot. "I'm proud to be an American, but I'm also proud of where I came from." Protesters were blocking crosswalks at times at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX even though their numbers have shrunk from thousands to about 100, authorities said. As of 11 p.m. the numbers of protesters were down from earlier in the day but still large enough to stop traffic, said Ron Pedregon of the Los Angeles Airport Police. "About 100 protesters are left. It's been peaceful," Pedregon said. "At certain points they occupy the crosswalk." The protesters return to the sidewalk in the time allowed by police. Throughout the afternoon, thousands of protesters at LAX decried the temporary travel ban above and around them and hundreds of arriving and departing passengers stood waiting on a lower loop virtually devoid of traffic, trying to figure out what to do. The upper deck was at a complete standstill, but portable signs outside the airport still directed motorists to use the upper deck for both departing and arriving passengers. The disturbances didn't hold back many passengers from finding their eventual seats on aircraft, as flights in and out of the airport mostly remained on schedule, LAX officials said. Hundreds of protesters carried hand-made signs and banners, many of whom had begun to stream away from the Tom Bradley terminal in the late afternoon after a long day of protesting. Three youths carrying a large banner showing the flags of countries from where people have been banned from coming and going received cheers as they marched down the empty roadway. Some protesters sang "Amazing Grace," as the remarkable scene was monitored by a small crew of Los Angeles police officers. At the traffic light next to terminal 1, airport trucks and barricades kept vehicles from going through into the lower terminal level. The lower level roadway was closed on Sunday starting at 2 p.m., outside the Bradley International Terminal, which sits between Terminal 3 and Terminal 4, Pedregon said. The number 4 lane and the outer curb area of the lower level roadway was reopened by 3 p.m., but airport police urged travelers to arrive early and plan on delays. The inner curb lanes on the lower arrival level were temporarily blocked for vehicles in front of the Bradley Terminal as thousands of protesters denounced the federal travel ban on some Muslims and throngs of arriving passengers stood waiting on a lower loop that was devoid of traffic. Airport officials urged motorists to use the upper, Departure Level loop. But traffic on both levels was congested. The upper deck was at times a complete standstill, but portable signs outside the airport still directed motorists to use the upper deck for both departing and arriving passengers. By 6:30 p.m., the crowd of protesters had shrunk considerably and police were prepared to just wait them out. That restraint by police was made possible by the fact the crowd was well-behaved and stayed within boundaries allotted to them, according to Pedregon. "So far there have been no arrests or detainments by officers," Pedregon said as the crowds began to disperse and traffic congestion -- which gridlocked some drivers for as long as two hours -- started to dissipate. U.S. & World News from around the country and around the globe What to Know New Jersey is the first state where parents can get a free "baby box" when they complete an online course Baby boxes include diapers, wipes, a box for the baby to sleep in and other must-haves for new parents The boxes have been credited with preventing SIDS and dropping infant mortality rates New Jersey has become the first state where expectant parents can get a free "Baby Box" for their newborn. The Baby Box Co. announced the Baby Box University program on Thursday. The global integrated program looks to reduce Sudden Unexpected Infant Death Syndrome (SUIDS) and provide a safe start for newborns in the state by providing their parents with potentially life-saving boxes. The boxes, which are made from a durable cardboard, can be used as a baby's bed for the first months of life. Inside, the box contains diapers, wipes, and other goodies that are worth about $150. Expectant parents in New Jersey just need to complete a short parenting education course online to get their free baby box. The Baby The New Jersey Child Fatality and Near Fatality Review Board (CFNFRB) is supporting the program using a grant from the CDC, which reviews fatalities and near-fatalities of children in order to identify their causes, relationship to governmental support systems, and methods of prevention. The program will distribute approximately 105,000 Baby Boxes in 2017, according to Baby Box Co. The use of baby boxes has been credited with helping Finland achieve one of the worlds lowest infant mortality rates. "I'm grateful to the Child Fatality and Near Fatality Review Board for their efforts to promote infant safe sleep," said Commissioner Allison Blake of the New Jersey Department of Children and Families. "Through greater awareness and education, and by working together, we can make sleep time safe time for babies." "Every year we review instances in which infants die suddenly and unexpectedly," said CFNFRB chair Kathryn McCans. "In a significant proportion of these deaths, an unsafe sleep circumstance is a contributing factor. Baby Box University will help families make safe and healthy choices for their children by educating them about simple changes that will decrease the risk that a death will occur due to an unsafe sleep environment or SIDS." The use of Baby Boxes has been credited with helping Finland achieve one of the world's lowest infant mortality rates. The initiative is credited with helping to decrease Finland's infant mortality rate from 65 deaths for each 1,000 children born in 1938 to 1.3 deaths per 1,000 births in 2013, according to the World Health Organization. Parents can pick up their baby boxes at Cooper University Healthcare, Southern New Jersey Perinatal Cooperative and other locations. They can also have them delivered to their home. Heres how New Jersey parents can get a free baby box: 1. Register for free online at babyboxuniversity.com as a New Jersey resident. Be sure to include your correct contact information, including mailing address. 2. Watch the 10-15 minute New Jersey syllabus at babyboxuniversity.com. After taking a short quiz, you will receive a certificate of completion and be able to select local pick-up or direct delivery of your Baby Box. 3. If you select direct delivery, your Baby Box will ship to the address you provided when you registered on Baby Box University. If you select local pick up, bring your Baby Box University certificate to the closest participating distribution partner to collect your Baby Box. An Atlanta Braves infielder and his family are recovering after police say their SUV was hit by a man who had stolen a police officer's cruiser in Miami. News outlets report that 31-year-old Miami native Sean Rodriguez, his wife Giselle and their two young children were T-boned by the stolen cruiser Saturday afternoon in Miami-Dade County. The unidentified suspect was killed in the crash. Rodriguez was not hurt, but the other members of his family were hospitalized. Rodriguez's wife was listed in fair condition Sunday and the 2-year-old and 8-year-old children were in serious but stable condition. A 9-year veteran, Rodriguez attended G. Holmes Braddock High School in Miami and played the last two seasons with the Pittsburgh Pirates. He signed with the Braves in November. The Braves confirmed Rodriguez's involvement in the crash in a statement on Twitter. Our thoughts and prayers are with the health and well-being of Sean Rodriguez and his family as they recover from a car accident in Miami. Atlanta Braves (@Braves) January 30, 2017 [NATL] Top Sports Photos: Washington Nationals Win World Series, and More Police said an officer was investigating a suspicious incident in the area of Southwest 16th Street and 107th Avenue when her vehicle was stolen. The crash happened just a few minutes later. One by one, a judge detailed the 22 charges against an Alaskan man accused of killing five people and wounding six others in the Florida airport shooting spree. Then, Esteban Santiago pleaded not guilty. Santiago, 26, stood in chains Monday in a red "max custody inmate" jumpsuit as U.S. Magistrate Judge Barry Seltzer took the unusual step of reading the entire 17-page indictment aloud in court - with repeated emphasis on the victims' names. After each count, Santiago said he understood and was asked if he realized he could get the death penalty if convicted. "Yes, I do," he replied. Santiago, an Iraq war veteran who lived in Anchorage, Alaska, was taken into custody shortly after investigators say he opened fire in a baggage claim area Jan. 6 at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. He is being held without bail on charges of causing death or bodily harm at an international airport, causing death during a crime of violence and using a firearm during a crime of violence. His court-appointed attorneys declined comment after Monday's hearing. According to the FBI, Santiago flew on a one-way ticket from Alaska to Fort Lauderdale with a 9mm Walther handgun and two ammunition clips in a case in checked luggage. Authorities say he picked up the case, loaded the gun in a bathroom and came out firing randomly at other travelers. Santiago was arrested after firing 15 shots. The FBI says he told agents he did the shooting because of some form of government mind control, later saying he was inspired by videos and chatrooms linked to the Islamic State. The indictment contains no terrorism-related charges despite those claims. It's also not clear why Santiago came to Fort Lauderdale. The FBI previously said Santiago visited its office in Anchorage last year complaining about hearing voices and supposed CIA mind control, which led to Anchorage police temporarily seizing his gun and Santiago's brief stay in a mental hospital. Records at the Alaska Psychiatric Institute show Santiago was given anti-anxiety medications but no prescriptions for drugs that would treat serious mental conditions such as schizophrenia. He was released after a five-day stay with no restrictions that might prevent him from possessing a gun, and his weapon was returned by police. That same gun was used in the airport shooting. A trial date has not yet been set. A small plane had to make an emergency landing on Interstate 95 near central Florida on Monday. According to WPTV, a Piper Cherokee single-engine plane landed in the median of I-95, south of the State Road 60 exit at mile marker 144. The Florida Highway Patrol said no injuries were reported and the plane didn't hit any cars. It is currently unclear why the plane had to make the landing. According to FHP Sgt. Mark Wysocki, officials are still trying to determine how to get the plane out of the median, either dismantling or having it towed. What to Know Thousands of people marched from the Statue of Liberty Viewpoint to the Customs and Border Patrol offices in lower Manhattan Sunday New York Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand and Charles Schumer addressed the crowd President Trump denied Sunday that his order was a "Muslim ban" and pledged "to show compassion to those fleeing oppression" Protests against President Trump's immigration ban continued into Monday, as thousands of people across New York and New Jersey demonstrated for a third straight day. CUNY students rallied for Saira Rafiee, the grad student barred from returning to the U.S. from Iran, and Columbia University held a demonstration of its own on campus. Later in the evening on the Lower East Side, neighbors and officials gathered at Tompkins Square Park to protest. At Rutgers Presbyterian Church on the Upper West Side, members lit candles for a family of Syrian refugees who were scheduled to arrive Monday as guests of the church but are now among those banned indefinitely under Trump's executive order. And across the river, more than 1,000 people rallied in Jersey City, packing the Grove Street Plaza. Among them was Shahida Shahid, a Muslim immigrant from Pakistan, who said she took comfort in the large gathering -- a sign that she's not alone. "We are not afraid," she said. Trump's controversial order, which has ignited protests across New York and the nation, places a 90-day travel ban on immigrants from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen. It also indefinitely bans Syrian refugees from entering the U.S. New Jersey Democrats joined their New York brethren in blasting Trump's "appalling" refugee ban as Sen. Chuck Schumer vowed to try to bring a vote to repeal the order to the Senate floor. Sen. Bob Menendez, who serves on the National Security Committee, called Trump's order imposing a 90-day travel restrictions on immigrants from several Muslim-majority countries "un-American and not in the interest of our national security." Menendez said the executive order undermines the "very essence of what America is all about." Congressman Bill Pascrell, who represents New Jersey's ninth district, piggy backed on Menendez's sentiments, calling the order "distraction and excuses." "Shame on them," Pascrell said. Speaking on "Today" Monday morning, Schumer said, "This is a blanket ban. It hurts innocent people and doesnt stop terrorism. Its just appalling." About an hour before the Democrat's appearance on "Today," Trump tweeted that only 109 of 325,000 people "were detained and held for questioning" following his executive order. He said "big problems" were created at airports by a Delta Airlines computer outage, "protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer." The president also tweeted, "there is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country." Schumer joined thousands of New Yorkers at a protest in Battery Park, in sight of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, Sunday -- the second day of major demonstrations in the city and across the nation. The 66-year-old Democrat got choked up as he called Trump's actions mean-spirited and un-American. International Arrivals Hall is at capacity. @PhillyPolice Airport unit directing demonstrators to A bag claim. PHLAirport (@PHLAirport) January 29, 2017 Sunday's rally followed a night of demonstrations at John F. Kennedy Airport, where thousands of people spontaneously gathered to demand the release of detained travelers. What to Know President Trump signed the executive order imposing a 90-day travel ban Friday afternoon Tens of thousands of people in New York City and across the nation have protested the order Trump has denied that his order was a "Muslim ban" and pledged "to show compassion to those fleeing oppression" President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday at 4:42 p.m. ET imposing a 90-day travel ban for immigrants from several Muslim-majority countries -- Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen -- and an indefinite ban for Syrian refugees trying to enter the United States. The order prompted a series of protests across New York City, with tens of thousands decrying the newly inaugurated president's order as "un-American" and oppressive, as more than 100 people were detained at airports, many of them without legal representation. Many more individuals, including a CUNY doctoral student visiting family in Iran on her winter break, were stranded abroad. In Pictures: Thousands Protest in NYC Over Trump's Immigration and Travel Order Here are 12 ways you can get involved: For more on how you can help, visit your local governments' websites to find lists of immigrant and refugee advocacy groups in your area. For the second night, demonstrators clogged airports nationwide, including JFK, where several passengers remain detained. Ida Siegal reports Authorities have released the name of a man who was accidentally shot and killed while hunting in Ocean County. Prosecutors say 26-year-old Richard Pereira, of Barnegat, was hunting deer with his father and two friends in a wooded area of Berkeley Township when the shooting occurred Saturday morning. Pereira was shot by one of the friends, a 41-year-old Lacey Township man whose name was not released. Pereira's father immediately tried to render aid to his son while another group member called 911. But Pereira was pronounced dead at the scene a short time later. Authorities declined further comment Sunday on the shooting, saying the investigation was ongoing. A Long Island man is having trouble returning home as a result of President Trump's new travel ban, and his wife is fighting to bring him back. "I am angry. I am outraged," his wife Barbara Gundrum told NBC 4 New York Monday. "He's at the airport [in Saudi Arabia] right now, along with hundreds of other families trying to get home." Abdulelah Othman was visiting his mother in Saudi Arabia, but is having difficulty getting back to his home and wife in Selden, New York, because he is a citizen of Yemen, one of the seven Muslim-majority countries included in the temporary travel ban. Gundrum said her husband is no threat to anyone, but knows what the executive order is implying. "He's a terrorist. He's gotta be a terrorist because he comes from Yemen, right?" she said sarcastically. Gundrum met Othman in Saudi Arabia while she was working as a nurse, and he was working as a legal secretary. The two have been married five years. But not even the green card Othman secured a year ago has helped clear his passage home, his wife says. "It's not nice. I'm not good," Othman said over the phone. Gundrum said her husband wasn't even allowed to buy a planet ticket. By phone, Othman told NBC 4 he plans to look for help Tuesday at the U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia. From their Long Island home, Gundrum has been calling federal officials, asking them to intervene. A spokesperson for Rep. Lee Zeldin's office says the congressman is currently working to help Othman get home. Gundrum said her spirits were lifted only after joining protesters at JFK demonstrating against the travel ban. "This whole thing, it shouldn't be happening," she said. "He loves America, he loves his home. He loves being part of this country." Despite the incident, Othman said he still loves the U.S. and hopes to become a citizen one day. He's continuing to study English and wants to become an auto mechanic. Among other local people stranded overseas is Saira Rafiee, a doctoral student enrolled at the CUNY Graduate Center. She was spending winter break visiting family in her native Iran, one of the seven countries affected by Trump's 90-day travel ban. Rafiee was trying to return to New York, to school, when customs officers in Abu Dhabi told her she couldn't go back because of the president's executive order. Essex County investigators are working to piece together the puzzle surrounding a triple homicide in Maplewood over the weekend. Two men and a woman were found dead in a Van Ness Court apartment when firefighters went to the home for a wellness check Sunday morning, authorities have said. The victims have been identified as Michael Davis, 45, of Maplewood, Roshana Kenilson, 30, of Paterson and Lance Fraser, 44, of Newark. Prosecutors say all three victims had been shot, though a medical examiner is expected to conduct autopsies Monday to confirm how they died. Law enforcement sources tell NBC 4 New York there was indications of criminal activity, possibly involving drugs, but the investigation remains fluid. No suspects have been identified in the case. Anyone with information is asked to call the Essex County prosecutor's tip line at (877) 847-7432. Mary Tyler Moore was laid to rest Sunday in Fairfield, Connecticut, police confirmed. A funeral was held for Moore, who died Wednesday at age 80, at Oak Lawn Cemetery in Fairfield, police said. Officers were on hand, but said there were no disruptions or issues. The star of TV's beloved "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" won seven Emmy awards over the years and was nominated for an Oscar for her 1980 portrayal of an affluent mother whose son is accidentally killed in "Ordinary People." Moore was born in Brooklyn and died in Connecticut. A mother of two young children has been missing for two weeks and police asked Sunday for help finding her. Yuridia Merino, 32, was last seen Jan. 13 when she left her East Harlem home, the NYPD said. Merino's children are 3 and 7 years old, state Assemblyman Robert J. Rodriguez said. She has a history of chronic depression, he said. Merino was wearing a black hooded jacket when she was last seen, police said. She is 4 feet, 11 inches tall and weighs about 120 pounds. Anyone with information is asked to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 800-577-TIPS. A New York lawmaker says his idea to require presidential candidates to release their tax returns is catching on in other states. State Sen. Brad Hoylman says lawmakers in more than a dozen other states are working on similar proposals. The Manhattan Democrat says it's appropriate for state lawmakers to set the rules for ballot eligibility and that voters have a right to know whether a candidate has possible financial conflicts of interest before making their decisions. Hoylman crafted the legislation after President Donald Trump chose not to release his returns during the campaign. The bill requires candidates release their tax returns if they want their names on the ballot. Hoylman says versions of the legislation have been introduced in Massachusetts, California, Rhode Island, New Jersey and Virginia and that lawmakers in several other states have vowed to follow suit. Top Tri-State News Photos What to Know The NYPD said its officers are safeguarding houses of worship The move comes in response to a deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec on Sunday The NYPD said it is monitoring the situation in Canada The NYPD is stepping up patrols at mosques and other houses of worship in the city following the fatal shooting of six people at a mosque in Canada. The agency issued a statement Sunday night saying Critical Response Command personnel have been "assigned to extended tour coverage" at certain mosques. The department says it's monitoring the situation in Quebec City. Quebec police say six people were killed and eight others wounded in the shooting. Two suspects have been arrested. Quebec City police say two suspects have been arrested. On Twitter Sunday night, Mayor de Blasio tweeted: "To my fellow New Yorkers who are Muslim: New York City will protect you. The NYPD will protect you. We will fight all hatred and bias." NYPD is providing additional protection for mosques in the city. All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something. https://t.co/WazzPd7Z8O Mayor Bill de Blasio (@NYCMayor) January 30, 2017 Top Tri-State News Photos What to Know Richard Doyle owned and operated three retail pet stores in Westchester and the Hudson Valley The NY AG's office opened a probe into him in 2015 after getting multiple complaints from customers that pets they got from him were sick Doyle was arrested in 2015 on a series of animal cruelty charges involving multiple store locations A man who owned and operated three retail pet stores in Westchester and the Hudson Valley has been permanently barred from working as a pet dealer and faces fines and penalties for repeated animal cruelty, the office of the New York attorney general announced Monday. Richard Doyle, who ran American Breeders, Inc. in Wappingers Falls, Puppies and Kittens in Mohegan Lake and Best Breeds, Inc., in Larchmont, engaged in disturbing practices to make sick animals appear healthy, Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said. Doyle, who is not a veterinarian, regularly performed surgery on animals in the back rooms of his stores, Schneiderman said. Doyle also ordered high school-aged employees to routinely administer injectable medications and intravenous fluids to mask rather than cure diseases and infections in sick animals. Doyle would then lie or ask his young employees to lie to the inspecting veterinarians regarding the illnesses so the veterinarians would not mark the animals unfit for sale, Schneiderman said. These procedures were not carried out in a sanitary environment and there was no veterinarian supervision or approval, according to Schneiderman. Syringes were re-used and pre- and post-operative infection control was not practiced. In some cases, when Doyle was unable to "cure" an animal himself, he let the sick animal suffer and, in some cases left it to die, rather than paying for routine veterinary care, Schneiderman said. Schneiderman's office began investigating Doyle in 2015 after getting multiple complaints from customers who bought pets from his stores only to discover shortly thereafter that the animals were quite sick. The investigation also found Doyle use fake names and license numbers of suppliers to make it appear he got the animals from reputable sources. Doyle initially was arrested on a series of animal cruelty charges involving multiple store locations in 2015. In accordance with the agreement announced Monday, Doyle must surrender all licenses related to the sale of animals and pay $15,000 in restitution to be distributed to the customers who bought sick animals from his stores. He also has to pay $5,000 to the state. The 27-year-old suspect in a terrorist attack against Muslims at a Quebec City mosque was charged Monday with six counts of first degree murder and five counts of attempted murder. Alexandre Bissonnette was known for taking right-wing, nationalist positions and supporting the French far-right party of Marine Le Pen. The shooting during evening prayers Sunday left six people dead in an attack that Canada's prime minister called an act of terrorism against Muslims. Bissonnette has Le Pen and U.S. President Donald Trump as likes on his Facebook profile, and Francois Deschamps, an official with a refugee advocacy group, said he was known for his far-right views. "It's with pain and anger that we learn the identity of terrorist Alexandre Bissonnette, unfortunately known to many activists in Quebec for taking nationalist, pro-Le Pen and anti-feminist positions at Laval University and on social media," he wrote on the Facebook page of the group, Bienvenues aux Refugies, or Welcome to Refugees. More than 50 people were at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre when the shooting erupted. In addition to the six who died, five were in critical condition and 12 others suffered minor injuries, University of Quebec Hospital Centre spokeswoman Genevieve Dupuis said Monday. The dead ranged in age from 39 to 60. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard both characterized the attack as a terrorist act, which came amid heightened tensions worldwide over Trump's travel ban on seven Muslim countries. Trudeau said in Parliament the victims were targeted simply because of their religion and spoke directly to the more than 1 million Muslims who live in Canada, saying, "We are with you." "Thirty-six million hearts are breaking with yours," Trudeau said. "Know that we value you." The suspect was arrested in his car on a bridge near d'Orleans, where he called 911 to say he wanted to cooperate with police. Authorities, who initially named two suspects, said the other man taken into custody was a witness to the attack and was released earlier Monday. They said they did not believe there were other suspects but were investigating. Police did not give a motive for the attack. Trump called Trudeau to express condolences to the Canadian people and to offer any assistance that might be needed. The White House pointed to the attack as an example of why Trump's policies were needed. "We condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms. It's a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant and why the president is taking steps to be pro-active, rather than reactive when it comes to our nation's safety and security," White House spokesman Sean Spicer said. The victims were businessmen, a university professor and others who had gathered for evening prayers, said Mohamed Labidi, the vice president of the mosque. "'It's a very, very big tragedy for us," Labidi said tearfully. "We have a sadness we cannot express." He said the victims were shot in the back. "Security at our mosque was our major, major concern," he said. "But we were caught off guard." The shooting took place just before 8 p.m. Sunday. Witnesses described chaos as worshippers scrambled to find friends and loved ones, as police responding to the scene called for backup. Canada is generally welcoming toward immigrants and all religions, but the French-speaking province of Quebec has had a long-simmering debate about race and religious accommodation. The previous separatist government of the province called for a ban on ostentatious religious symbols, such as the hijab, in public institutions. Couillard said he would "not go there" when asked if he blamed recent rhetoric in in the U.S. for the attack. "Quebec is a good, generally loving society, but we have these devils as other societies have. We have to recognize that and fight them," Couillard said at a news conference in Quebec City at which he and Muslim leaders held hands in a display of solidarity. "The Muslim community was the target of this murderous attack," Couillard said, adding that solidarity rallies would be held across Quebec later Monday. The mosque has been a target of hate crimes in the past, including last summer when pig's head was left on its doorstep during Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. Practicing Muslims do not eat pork. Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume, appearing shaken, said: "No person should have to pay with their life, for their race, their color, their sexual orientation or their religious beliefs." Worshipper Ali Hamadi said he left the mosque a few minutes before the shooting and a friend, Abdelkrim Hassen, was killed. He said Hassen, who worked in information technology for the government, had three daughters and a wife, whom he had to notify of the death. Majdi Dridi of the Muslim Association of Canada said he knew two of the victims. One was a work colleague who was a father of three little girls, he said. "I don't know what to say, I just hope that his family and his children can have the patience to accept what happened," Dridi said Trudeau had earlier reacted to Trump's visa ban for people from some Muslim-majority countries by tweeting Saturday: "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada." Trudeau also posted a picture of himself greeting a Syrian child at Toronto's airport in late 2015. Trudeau oversaw the arrival of more than 39,000 Syrian refugees soon after he was elected. The mayor of Gatineau, Quebec, near Canada's capital of Ottawa, said there would be an increased police presence at mosques around his city following the attack. The New York Police Department also said it was stepping up patrols at mosques and other houses of worship. An 8-year-old transgender boy has sued his local New Jersey Boy Scouts' Council for discrimination after he was kicked out of his Cub Scout troop. The suit, filed by the boy and his mother Kristie Maldonado, claims the Boy Scouts of America Northern New Jersey Council violated the state's law against discrimination. Joe Maldonado was accepted into Pack 87 in Secacus in October, but expelled in November following complantes from parents, according to The Record. Boy Scouts of America Spokeswoman Effie Delimarkos has previously said in a statement to NBC New York that Joe doesn't meet the eligibility requirements to participate in the Cub Scout program. However, the organization did offer information on alternative program options. "The BSA grants youth membership to Cub Scout to boys in the first through fifth grades, or 7 to 10 years of age," she said. "If needed we defer to the information provided for an individual's birth certificate and their biological sex." She added that scouting "teaches its youth members and adult leaders to be respectful of other people and individual beliefs." In a statement earlier this month, Delimarkos said the organization does not restrict members based on sexual orientation, but considers gender identity a separate issue, and that Cub Scout programs are for those identified as boys on their birth certificates. Earlier this year, the Boy Scouts told The Associated Press that it would admit transgender children to its coeducational programs, but not to programs that are for boys only, like the Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts. A Muslim-American woman felt uneasy while waiting at Philadelphia International Airport for her husband to arrive on a flight back from the Middle East Monday morning. Samira Todd paced back and forth under a large American flag in the international arrivals area as she waited with her daughter for her husband, returning from a month-long visit to the Middle East. "It's very scary not knowing what's going to happen when he gets here," Todd said. Todd's husband arrived on a Qatar Airlines flight from Doha to Philadelphia. It's the same route that two Syrian families took before being detained in Philadelphia over the weekend and sent back to Qatar in the wake of President Donald Trump's executive order banning travel from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Qatar isnt included in the list of countries and the executive order doesnt target anyone with an American passport, like Todd's husband, who wound up quickly making it through customs to get a hug from his wife. Both Todd and her husband are born in American and practice Islam, dressing in traditional Muslim clothing. The uncertainty of Trump's travel ban on people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen has caused unease for Todd. [[412059543, C]] "It's a personal attack we're not foreign," said Todd, who saw the order as an assault on those following Islam. "I was born here, lived here all my life." "We don't know exactly what immigration or Homeland Security has planned for anybody it's not what's going on with the immigrants, it seems to be a Muslim situation," Todd said. Todd's husband, tired from his flight, declined NBC10's request for comment. The lasting effects of Superstorm Sandy continue to wash across New Jersey, evident today on a century-old railroad bridge that nearly became a casualty of the ferocious October 2012 onslaught. The storm surge from the Atlantic Ocean up into the Raritan Bay pushed a barge into the bridge, dislodging the deck and moving several steel girders that weigh several tons apiece. In what may qualify as a small bit of irony, it may have been the best thing to happen to the Raritan River Drawbridge. With about $450 million in funding already secured from the Federal Transit Administration, NJ Transit is pushing ahead with a project to replace the 109-year-old span. It could wind up taking less time to complete than a higher-profile project to replace its northern counterpart, the much-maligned Portal Bridge over the Hackensack River, which wasn't affected by Sandy. "In a strange way, Sandy helped us," said Jeff Tittel, director of the Sierra Club in New Jersey. The Portal Bridge, a regular source of delays on the heavily traveled Northeast Corridor rail line between Washington and Boston, is included in the Gateway project that also includes the building of new rail tunnels under the Hudson River and expanding New York's Penn Station. Environmental and engineering work has taken about eight years to complete, New Jersey Transit Executive Steven Santoro said last week. The Portal Bridge needs about $1 billion for construction that would take an estimated additional four to five years. That the Raritan bridge remained standing after Sandy was something of a marvel. Its deck moved about 18 inches from the storm surge and the blow from the barge. "If it had moved 24 inches, it might have gone down and we'd be standing here wondering how people are going to get to work," Santoro said. That question was answered during the three weeks crews spent repairing the bridge. Buses were jammed and commutes lengthened by hours in some cases as the roughly 10,000 people who take trains from shore areas to Newark or New York sought other modes of transportation. Santoro said environmental studies on the bridge project should be completed within a few months, and NJ Transit's board is then expected to vote on a final design. Construction is tentatively set to begin in 2019 and take roughly four years. Unlike the existing bridge and the Portal Bridge the new Raritan Bridge will lift up its center section to allow boats to pass under, rather than swing open. That will make the opening higher and wider, and could require fewer openings for smaller recreational boats. Currently the bridge is opened between 10 and 15 times per day during the summer and four or five times per day in the offseason, according to R.J. Palladino, a senior program manager for NJ Transit. More important, the bridge will be designed to withstand a Sandy-like storm should another one visit New Jersey, something scientists say is likely. "This is more vulnerable to another storm, and so we felt it was prudent to put in an application to get funding to make this bridge more resilient," Santoro said. "People depend on it to get to their jobs, and it's certainly a critical bridge for tourism in the summer, which is related to the economics of New Jersey. So when you look at the big picture, you can see why the federal government allowed this project to be funded." [[238427591, C]] UPDATE: Kenneth Fenske has been acquitted of all charges. New details here. Police arrested a group of men accused of repeatedly sexually abusing a boy while dressed up as "furries" in Bucks County. Kenneth Fenske, 57, of Quakertown, Bucks County; David Parker, 38, of Stroudsburg, Monroe County; Jeffrey Harvey, 40, of West Wyoming, Luzerne County; Craig Knox and Stephen Taylor were all arrested in connection with the case. Investigators say the abuse began in 2009 when Parker began taking a 9-year-old boy to a Bucks County home where a group of men dressed up as animals and referred to themselves as "furries." Furry fandom is a subculture in which people dress up in animal costumes and identify as a chosen animal. It mostly consists of visual art, conventions, games, toys and online communities, though in rare cases it also involves a sexual fetish. The boy told investigators that a man dressed up as a Red Fox who called himself "Lupine," would take him upstairs during the parties and sexually abuse him. The boy said the abuse occurred several times over a seven-year period. The boy identified "Lupine" as Kenneth Fenske. Fenske was arrested Friday and charged with child rape, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and unlawful contact with a minor. He was arraigned and was held on $750,000 bail. Online court records don't list an attorney for him. Parker, Harvey, Knox and Taylor were arrested as well, on a variety of charges. Parker is charged with child rape, possession of child pornography and other related offenses. Harvey is charged with unlawful contact with a minor, criminal use of a cell phone, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and statutory sexual assault. Knox, who was arrested in Virginia, is charged with sexual offenses. Taylor was also arrested in Virginia for bestiality and other related offenses, investigators said. Officials say the victim is currently in foster care and receiving therapy. They also say the victim is related to one of the suspects, according to court documents, though they would not go into further detail in order to protect the boy's identity. "This is a horrendous case," Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro said. "It is deeply disturbing to me not only as Attorney General of Pennsylvania, but as a father of young children. We care about this victim and all victims of sexual abuse." Shapiro said the investigation is ongoing and there will likely be more arrests. "We believe it is likely there could be more victims out there from this ring of abuse," Shapiro said. "We want to help them and protect them from any further abuse. We're seeking the public's help today and asking people to come forward and speak with our Office or the Bucks DA's Office if they know anything." If you have any information on the case, please call 1-800-385-1044. You can also give an anonymous tip on the Attorney General website. In the wake of President Donald Trump signing an executive order banning travel and immigration from some predominantly Muslim countries, Philadelphia-area university leaders spoke out against the ban and offered advice -- mainly not to travel outside the United States -- to impacted students and faculty. Penn State University monitored over the weekend if the order could impact PSU students studying abroad, said PSU President Eric Barron in a statement posted online. "Fortunately, to the best of our knowledge, none of our students or scholars who are from the named countries are currently traveling abroad," said Barron. "But the problems that are surfacing with the order are clear, and we join the Association of American Universities and universities all across the country in asking that the order be ended as soon as possible." The AAU's called for an end to the travel ban "to make clear to the world that the United States continues to welcome the most talented individuals from all countries to study, teach, and carry out research and scholarship at our universities." In a letter to "Penn students, faculty and staff," the University of Pennsylvania also expressed concern for the potential impact of Trump's order. "Recent changes to federal policy suspending immigration from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen have raised concerns for many members of the Penn community," said the statement from a group of university provosts. "We share these concerns and are working with outside counsel to clarify the implications for nationals from these countries who are currently at Penn and for those who might be planning to travel to or attend Penn. We advise all nationals from the affected countries to defer travel until there is some clarification of the situation. We urge passport holders, citizens, nationals, dual nationals, etc. from the impacted countries and their supervisors and advisors to reach out to the Office of International Student and Scholar Services for guidance on travel outside the United States and to discuss additional specific questions resulting from the immigration suspension. [[412059543, C]] "... Penn remains fully committed to these valued members of our community, and to engaging globally to bring the best scholars and students from around the world to our campus. At the same time, we will be working to express our concerns about the effects of recent policy actions on our community, as well as our view that rapid changes in immigration policy create uncertainty for those who are eager to come to the United States to learn and to participate in research and the global exchange of knowledge." Temple University President Richard Englert said in a statement that the order "has caused uncertainty and anxiety for members of the Temple community and all of higher education." The North Philadelphia school advised anyone from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen to not travel until more can be known about the order. "We hope the coming days and weeks will provide greater clarity, for the benefit of you as individuals and for Temple and other institutions of higher education," said Englert. "Temple prides itself on being a community of diverse scholars, many of whom come to us from foreign nations. We are committed to enabling our faculty, students and visitors -- both from the U.S. and from locations around the globe -- to contribute to the vitality of the education we provide and the role we play in the local, regional and global economy. We embrace diversity as integral to our mission of education and discovery. Temple is a better university because of this diversity." Princeton University also "strongly advised" its impacted students and scholars to avoid traveling outside of the United States until more is revealed about the executive order. "We do, however, want ... to express our deep concern about any potential impact on the ability of this and other American universities to engage in teaching and research of the highest quality," wrote Deborah Prentice, a professor of psychology and public affairs at the Ivy League school, in an email to her colleagues. Drexel University President John Fry assured students from the Philadelphia university that the administration planned to support international students and staff "by every measure possible." They also echoed other universities' suggestions for students from the banned countries not travel until more is known. "The chaotic implementation of the presidential order over this weekend -- with key provisions modified, and others halted by federal judges on Saturday -- has only intensified our shared concerns," said Fry. "As evidenced by statements issued across the landscape of American higher education, such a blanket ban is antithetical to many of the values we cherish. Drexel believes in inclusion and equality, and we are committed to celebrating and recognizing the fruits of diversity and global engagement." In a statement Sunday, La Salle President Colleen Hanycz advised students from the impacted countries to avoid international travel for at least 90 days. "La Salle has throughout its history welcomed students from countries around the world, and is deeply concerned with their wellbeing," said Hanycz. "We encourage students from the seven affected countries to contact the Multicultural and International Center at 215.951.1948 or stop by their offices located at 1900 West Olney Avenue (directly across the street from College Hall) for additional information." Students and staff at other universities should contact their universitys international affairs office with any questions about college policy about the immigration ban. [[238427591, C]] U.S. & World Stories that affect your life across the U.S. and around the world. Around 5,000 protesters gathered at Philly International Airport Sunday afternoon to rally, for a second day, on behalf of immigrants who were detained under President Trump's recent executive action restricting access through America's borders. Sunday's protest at the airport began at 2 p.m. Police say around 5,000 people took part in the demonstration. At least one person was arrested during the protest for a minor offense, according to NBC10's Aundrea Cline-Thomas. He later returned to the protest less than two hours later. Airport officials said the International Arrivals Hall in Terminal A West was at capacity. Additional demonstrators were being directed to baggage claim. [[412128593, C]] "This is what democracy looks like," the protesters chanted. The protesters held signs that included the messages, "#NoBanNoWall." They demanded that airlines take a stand against Trump's executive order. They also gave letters asking airline officials to make a "moral choice" and "side with humanity." Local lawmakers also attended Sunday's demonstrations and stood side by side with protesters. "The big thing for me is that instead of us having a process that is orderly and makes sense, we instead have confusion and fear," said Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D, Del.). "And that's the last thing we need right now." Rep. Bob Brady (D, Pa.) also protested at the airport Sunday. "This can't be happening in the United States of America," Brady said. "This is a free country. Free for all. They've been vetted, they have visas, they're ready for green cards. They've been vetted for months and months and months! That's not right. And that's what this is about, to make sure that they hear our voices." Rep. Dwight Evans (D, Pa.) criticized Trump's executive order on social media and stood with Sunday's protesters as well. "Our goal is to repeal that executive order," Evans said. "It's wrong to do profiling of people. And this is profiling of people." Both Republicans and Democrats from our area are sounding off on President Donald Trumps immigration travel order. NBC10s Denise Nakano has the details. The protesters first demonstrated inside the airport and then marched outside, creating traffic problems on I-95 approaching PHL. SEPTA suspended bus service to the airport due to the protest. Service was later restored. The demonstration lasted for about five hours before the protesters finally left. Protestors at Terminal A baggage claim at @PHLAirport. As a result allow more time to get here if you have a flight. @NBCPhiladelphia pic.twitter.com/WFiFZtkeNH Aundrea Cline-Thomas (@AClineThomas) January 29, 2017 Sunday's protest followed a quickly formed event the day before when several travelers were detained or turned away at customs after arriving to Philadelphia. An attorney with the ACLU of Pennsylvania told NBC10 Saturday at least five people were detained under an executive order signed Friday evening by President Donald Trump that immediately put restrictions on travel from seven predominantly Muslim countries and temporarily halted a refugee program for Syrian immigrants. Three of the detainees were adults from Qatar, according to the ACLU. City officials told NBC10's Aundrea Cline-Thomas that one of the men has worked as an interpreter for the U.S. government. Sunday afternoon, Philadelphia Mayor Kenney announced all of the detainees who were at PHL were released in the morning. Mayor Kenney, Gov. Tom Wolf, Senator Bob Casey (D - Pa.) and Rep. Brady joined demonstrators at the airport Saturday calling for intervention on behalf of the immigrants. "These are people who have gone through all the hurdles and they have chosen to come and live with us here in Pennsylvania," Wolf said. "And I say to them you are welcome here." The four were joined by civil rights attorneys, more than 150 protesters holding signs and chanting, as well as City Councilwoman Helen Gym and federal lawmakers incised by the effects of the immigration ban. "Hey, hey! Ho, ho! The Muslim ban has got to go," the demonstrators shouted. Protestors chant at the airport as officials and attys are trying to help people are who are being detained @NBCPhiladelphia pic.twitter.com/e7Z8uUbDO8 Aundrea Cline-Thomas (@AClineThomas) January 29, 2017 Two Syrian families who arrived at Philly International Airport were also briefly detained Saturday and sent back on a return 18-hour flight to the Middle East. Sarah Assali, a family member of those six Syrians, attended Sunday's demonstration at the airport. "Seeing this much support, it brings hope that our family will be able to come and be welcome," Assali said. After Saturday's protest began, a federal judge granted an injunction in response to a request filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and other legal organizations on behalf of individuals subject to President Trump's Muslim ban. The stay blocks anyone with a valid visa being held at airports from being deported. However, the stay only applies to those currently within the U.S., but not to anyone who tries to come to the U.S. going forward. It also does not mean detainees will be released, only that they can't be deported, according to ACLU attorneys. UPDATE from Mayor Kenney @PhillyMayor about detained individuals at the airport @NBCPhiladelphia pic.twitter.com/hYPRV82zZq Aundrea Cline-Thomas (@AClineThomas) January 29, 2017 The protest was one of several at major air hubs around the country. Throngs of people gathered outside John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City where 12 refugees were detained Saturday. The protests continued nationwide Sunday. [NATL] Trump Immigration Order Triggers Protests Across US Thousands Gather at Philadelphia International Airport to Protest Travel Ban When Aaron Cutchon was laid off from his job at an auto body shop, he could no longer afford to pay for two traffic tickets he got for driving in a carpool lane. His license was suspended, and he had to stop attending classes at a Napa junior college where he was working toward an associate's degree. New legislation in California supported by Gov. Jerry Brown would eliminate such a dilemma by forbidding courts from taking licenses from people just because they can't pay their fines. State Sen. Robert Hertzberg introduced a bill this week that would ban the practice. Brown and Hertzberg say the current policy disproportionately targets low-income Californians and can send people into a cycle of job losses and more poverty. "What we've learned is it ruins people's lives," said Hertzberg, a Democrat from Van Nuys. "The privilege of driving should not be connected with the size of your wallet." Cutchon, 35, said his two tickets have snowballed from roughly $900 to about $2,000 because of added fines and fees. He found a new job at a warehouse but said he doesn't make enough to pay off the tickets and can't get a higher-paying job because he doesn't have a license. The money he does make goes toward rent and taking care of his three children, said Cutchon, who lives in Cordelia, an area that overlaps the Bay Area city of Fairfield. "I'm kind of stuck, in a sense, with this job," Cutchon said. Theresa Zhen, an attorney at the East Bay Community Law Center in Berkeley, said she often sees clients who are limited to low-paying jobs because of suspended licenses. "People's lives are unraveled by one traffic ticket," Zhen said. The issue garnered national attention after the U.S. Department of Justice found similar laws in Ferguson, Missouri, burdened poor residents with "crippling" debt, according to a 2015 report. In California, about 613,000 people had suspended driver's licenses for unpaid traffic tickets or missing related court appearances as of August 2015, the most recent number the department could provide, DMV spokesman Artemio Armenta said. In his state budget proposal this month, Brown called for ending the practice, saying "there does not appear to be a strong connection" between the license suspensions and collecting unpaid fines. "Often, the primary consequence of a driver's license suspension is the inability to legally drive to work or take one's children to school," the Democratic governor wrote. Hertzberg said his new bill, SB185, prevents courts from suspending someone's license simply because they can't afford to pay. He said he agreed to drop a similar proposal last year after the Department of Finance asked for more time to study the idea. Opponents have argued removing the penalty would eliminate a tool to help the state collect traffic fines. The California State Association of Counties and the California Police Chiefs Association declined to comment on the governor's proposal, although they opposed Hertzberg's previous plan, which was part of early versions of the 2016 bill SB881. SB881 "eliminates any incentive for individuals to pay outstanding debt for traffic violations they received and failed to pay," the California Association of Counties wrote in a June letter to Hertzberg. The group noted that those affected would still have "burdensome court-ordered debt that they cannot afford to pay." Supporters say there are other, more effective ways to collect fines, including putting people on payment plans and garnishing their wages. The state's finance agency does not have an estimate for how much the governor's proposal might cost because license suspension is one of many collection methods and courts have not shown license suspensions lead to more collections. Hertzberg's new bill comes more than a year after California started an amnesty program to help low-income people pay traffic tickets by reducing fines for those who are too poor to pay them and allowing some residents to have their licenses reinstated. A report on its first nine months found more than 175,000 accounts have been resolved and courts have collected more than $18 million through the amnesty program, which is scheduled to end in March. Hertzberg said his proposed law would help people whose licenses or permits have been suspended because they can't afford to pay, but it won't let dangerous drivers off the hook. "If you're a bad driver, you still lose your license," Hertzberg said. "But if you're a poor driver and you can't afford to pay, you don't lose your license." For the second day in a row demonstrators gathered at the San Diego International Airport to protest a travel ban signed into law by President Trump. The executive order, put into action Friday, bans travel from seven Middle Eastern countries although the specific exceptions have been a bit unclear. The crowd gathered in front of the international terminal had grown from around 300 during Saturday's protest, to what appeared to be upwards of 2,000 protesters Sunday. Chief Bolduc from Harbor Police says 2,000-2,500 ppl. Showed up to protest at Lindbergh Field. Called it peaceful, no arrests. #NBC7 pic.twitter.com/2eJUFUIFeY Astrid Solorzano (@solorzanoastrid) January 30, 2017 Im here because Im tired of Donald Trump uttering the words that Muslims are not welcome here," psychology doctoral student Muhammad told NBC 7. "The words 'Make America Great Again' have brought on so much hate to the Muslim population and to the refugees and so were here, banded together unified Muslims, Women, LGBT, Native Americans - were all here to say to Donald Trump that were here to make a statement to him. The San Diego protest is one of many across the country, including LAX, New York, Boston, Seattle and Dallas just to name a few. The temporary bans also suspends the U.S. refugee program for 120 days and indefinitely bans Syrian refugees from entering the U.S. In the last 24 hours there have been refugees and visa-holding immigrants detained at airports across the country stuck in legal limbo. Secretary of Homeland Security John F. Kelly eased a key part of the executive order, saying the people from affected countries who hold green cards will not be prevented from returning to the United States. 1000+ ppl protesting @ Lindbergh Field. Organizers say they'll protest Trump's ban of Muslim refugees until ban is overturned. #NBC7 pic.twitter.com/tCR3sIUlkW Astrid Solorzano (@solorzanoastrid) January 30, 2017 Sunday, President Trump defended the order, saying in part: The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe." Even though some of the detainees have been released, some protesters say they wont leave until the entire executive action is lifted. The airport confirmed that no one has been detained at Lindbergh Field. Airport's director of public affairs confirms no one is detained at SAN. People are still protesting at the airport. #NBC7 pic.twitter.com/u0KhsMUiNf Astrid Solorzano (@solorzanoastrid) January 30, 2017 The airport suggests anyone traveling to the airport to give themselves extra time because the protest, although peaceful, is slowing down traffic near terminal 2. The San Diego ACLU sent out a Tweet advising those affected of their rights. A truck driver crashed straight into the children's playroom of a family's home, toppling over a power line in Lemon Grove early Monday morning, the San Diego County sheriff's Department (SDSO) said. The collapsed power line fell onto the house, causing a dangerous hazard for the family and nearby neighbors, said SDSO deputies. It happened on the 1600 block of Colfax Drive, near Skyline Drive, at about 2 a.m. Monday. Fortunately, no children were playing in the room when the truck crashed, and no one was hurt in the crash. The impact left a mess in the room, with the glass door leading to the playroom left shattered in pieces. The woman who lives at the home says four months ago, a driver ran into a tree in their front yard; the toppled tree stopped her from going into their home. Now, they are planning to build a cement wall around the house for added protection. A fallen power line prompted SDG&E to shut off power to the house, also leaving several other houses in the neighborhood without power, according to SDSO. The pole has since been replaced, but crews do not have an estimated restoration time for the electricity. The driver, Nathan Casaday, age 40, was arrested and booked into San Diego Central jail on a suspected DUI charge. SDG&E crews are still working to make sure the area is safe before towing the truck. Red Cross will be helping the family find a temporary place to stay. No other information was immediately available. Check back for updates on this breaking news story. The southbound lanes at the San Ysidro port of entry have reopened after shutting down for several hours due to protests along the U.S.-Mexico border Sunday. This is the fourth weekend in a row protests have caused a traffic diversion at the border. Southbound Interstate 5 and SB I-805 were closed at State Route 905, Caltrans officials said. Lanes reopened around 5 p.m. Northbound traffic was not affected by the protest, according to the CHP. Those looking to cross into Mexico had to go to the Otay Mesa Port of Entry. In Tijuana, Mexico, protesters continue to voice their objections to a sudden hike in gas prices in Mexico: 20 percent in one day. President Donald Trump's immigration order is getting pushback from some Republicans in Congress, even as officials from Trump's administration insist it's a small price to pay to keep the nation safe. Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., released a joint statement Sunday about the order, which went into effect Friday and temporarily banned refugees seeking asylum into the U.S. and those traveling with visas from seven Muslim-majority nations. As NBC News reports, the senators say the order was not "properly vetted" and was responsible for the disarray seen at airports across the country. "Such a hasty process risks harmful results," the statement said. "We should not stop green-card holders from returning to the country they call home. We should not stop those who have served as interpreters for our military and diplomats from seeking refuge in the country they risked their lives to help. And we should not turn our backs on those refugees who have been shown through extensive vetting to pose no demonstrable threat to our nation, and who have suffered unspeakable horrors, most of them women and children." The order sends a "signal," the statement added, that the U.S. does not want to work with its one of its most important allies in the fight against ISIS "the vast majority of Muslims who reject its apocalyptic ideology of hatred." "Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism," the statement said. Trump took to Twitter in direct response to the senators' statement, calling them "former presidential candidates" and criticizing their priorities. "The joint statement of former presidential candidates John McCain & Lindsey Graham is wrong - they are sadly weak on immigration," Trump tweeted. "The two Senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III." Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, said Sunday that it would be best for the new president to "slow down" and work with lawmakers on how best to tighten screening for foreigners who enter the United States. Portman said everyone should "take a deep breath and come up with something that makes sense for our national security" and reflects the fact that "'America's always been a welcoming home for refugees and immigrants." He said America is "this beacon of hope and opportunity for the rest of the world" and should remain that way. The comments came the morning after a federal judge issued an emergency order temporarily barring the U.S. from deporting people from seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trump's travel ban. The judge said travelers who had been detained had a strong argument that their legal rights had been violated. The Department of Homeland Security issued a statement early Sunday that said the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order and it affected a relatively small number of travelers who were inconvenienced by security procedures upon their return. Trump's aides insist the judgment has little impact. Trump's order, which also suspends the U.S. refugee program for 120 days and bars the entry of Syrian refugees indefinitely, has sparked major protests, including at several of the nation's international airports. It also puts Republicans who criticized Trump's initial campaign proposal to block foreign Muslims from entering the country in a tough spot. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said he supports more stringent screening mechanisms, but cautioned that Muslims are some of the country's "best sources in the war against terror." "I think it's a good idea to tighten the vetting process But I also think it's important to remember that some of our best sources in the war against radical Islamic terrorism are Muslims, both in this country and overseas," he said. He stressed the need "to be careful as we do this," and said it would be up to the courts to decide "whether or not this has gone too far." Trump, meanwhile, took to Twitter to defend his actions, and his aides insisted the new measures were a small price to pay to keep the nation safe. "Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW," Trump wrote. "Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world - a horrible mess!" The emergency order was issued by U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly in New York on Saturday night after lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union filed a court petition on behalf of people from the seven predominantly Muslim nations who were detained at airports across the country as the ban took effect. The order barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. It was unclear how quickly the judge's order might affect people in detention, or whether it would allow others to resume flying. "Realistically, we don't even know if people are going to be allowed onto the planes," ACLU lawyer Lee Gelernt said. "This order would protect people who they allow to come here and reach U.S. soil." Trump billed his sweeping executive order as a necessary step to stop "radical Islamic terrorists" from coming to the U.S. It included a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program. The directive did not do anything to prevent attacks from homegrown extremists who were already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. It also omitted Saudi Arabia, home to most of the Sept. 11 hijackers. Trump is scheduled to speak Sunday with King Salman of Saudi Arabia and with the crown prince of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. Portman was on CNN's "State of the Union," while McConnell appeared on ABC's "This Week." A bobcat has gone missing at the Smithsonian's National Zoo after apparently escaping her enclosure, a zoo spokeswoman said. The 25-pound bobcat, named Ollie, was last seen with two male bobcats at 7:30 a.m. Monday during a routine count. When a zookeeper went to feed the bobcats at 10:40 a.m., Ollie was gone. D.C. police and the Humane Rescue Alliance are assisting in the search. A keeper said they are hoping Ollie will return to her enclosure on her own. The bobcat exhibit and surrounding areas are closed, although the zoo itself remains open. A female bobcat has escaped. Bobcats are not known to be aggressive to humans. Sighting call 202.633.7362 https://t.co/7Y5cmCEkpp pic.twitter.com/QLM6Im7418 National Zoo (@NationalZoo) January 30, 2017 American University sent students a text message warning that the animal had escaped. Zoo officials said there is no imminent danger to the general public or zoo guests. Anyone who spots the bobcat is advised not to approach her. However, bobcats are not known to be aggressive to humans, the zoo said. Dr. Brandie Smith, associate director of animal care sciences for the zoo, said it looked like one of the ropes that holds the bobcats' mesh enclosure had broken. Smith said it didn't look like a deliberate act, but the break left a gap through which they believe Ollie was able to escape. Craig Saffoe, a curator for great cats at the zoo, said Ollie is a capable hunter and would be able to care for herself while on the loose. "Cats are... they're survivors. This is not like she's out in an area, in an environment that she can't survive," Saffoe said, noting that bobcats are actually indigenous to the D.C. area, although rare. "This a very survivable habitat; it's one of the things that will make it very difficult for us to ensure that we can find her." Saffoe said Ollie is equipped to survive and that the bobcats sometimes catch birds that land in their enclosure. He said keepers are reasonably certain Ollie is in the general area, but he said he was not completely confident they will be able to find her. "We are doing everything we can to ensure that we can get her back. The likelihood that we get her back? I mean, I'd be lying to you if I said that we're definitely going to get her back," Saffoe said. "We're setting everything up to get the best chances of success here." He said it's more likely Ollie will return to her enclosure on her own. [NATL] Adorable Zoo Babies: White Lion Cubs Nala and Simba Born in France Smith said that keepers train for "events like this," so they immediately began a search after discovering Ollie was missing. However, they quickly changed tactics out of fear that they could end up scaring her away. "We actually created a bigger perimeter search so that any looking would drive her toward her exhibit," Smith said. Ollie has a chip for identification purposes but not a tracker. She was born in the wild and is close to 7 years old. Zoo officials believe she may return to her enclosure for food and shelter on her own. "There's food; there's shelter; there's warmth at her exhibit," Smith said. Bobcats can run up to 30 mph and are excellent climbers, according to the zoo's webpage on the animals. At the zoo, they eat prepared meat, mice, rats and chicks. In the wild, they eat rabbits, hares, squirrels and mice. "She is a carnivore, so for small birds, small animals in the area, which could even include small cats and dogs, she could be a threat," Smith said. "And I think the best way for people to think about this is: I would treat her the same way that I would treat a stray dog. You wouldn't approach a stray dog. And she's the same thing. She's not a threat unless you become a threat to her." Anyone who spots Ollie should not approach her and instead should call a zoo hotline at 202-633-7362. The most recent animal to escape the zoo was an agouti, which is a small mammal, in July 2015, a zoo spokeswoman said. The agouti escaped from exterior habitat but was found on the walkway and was easily recaptured, she said. In 2013, a red panda named Rusty famously escaped from the National Zoo. He was recaptured in D.C.'s Adams Morgan neighborhood the following afternoon. Ashley Foughty spotted Rusty and tweeted pictures that helped keepers find him in a tree. Zoo officials said Rusty likely escaped the zoo by "climbing across a 'bridge' created by rain-laden trees and bamboo" -- and he probably did it for a snack of some nearby bamboo, they said. Stay with News4 for more details on this developing story. In the wake of President Donald Trump's order banning travel from seven Muslim-majority countries, several universities in the D.C. area are advising students from those countries to stay in the United States. American University, Georgetown University and George Washington University all are advising some students to remain in the country. "As a result of this executive order, we are warning affected individuals that travel outside of the United States for the foreseeable future is risky because it is likely that you will not be re-admitted to the United States," George Washington University said in a statement. The university said at least 74 students, visiting scholars and alumni are affected by the order. One student was not allowed to board a plane in Iran, a spokeswoman said. The action Trump took Friday bars travel from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen, and temporarily halts the entry of refugees from anywhere. American University also has several students affected by the crackdown. Twenty-one students are nationals of one of the countries listed in the ban, the university said in a statement. Those students all were in the U.S. when the order was signed and were not detained. American University also is advising community members "who may be affected to postpone travel" outside the U.S. Georgetown University issued a statement warning students affected by the ban to remain in the country and consult an immigration attorney if travel is necessary. University president John DeGioia addressed students in an email. "In this moment of challenge and uncertainty, we have an ever more urgent responsibility to care for one another, to empathize with those in need, to dedicate our knowledge to service, and to place above all, the betterment of humankind," he said. In 2016, more than 11,000 foreign students studied in D.C., according to data from the U.S. State Department and the Institute of International Education, the organization that administers the Fulbright scholar program. Stay with News4 for more details on this developing story. A former school aide in Prince George's County, Maryland, pleaded guilty Monday to sexually abusing 12 children inside his school. Deonte Carraway entered guilty pleas to 15 federal charges of sexual exploitation of a minor to produce child pornography. The plea came during a proceeding at the U.S. District Courthouse in Greenbelt. He now faces between 60 and 100 years in prison. Carraway is 22 and was an aide at Judge Sylvania Woods Elementary School in Glenarden. His case, which rocked the elementary school and wider Prince George's communities, involved minors ranging in age from 9 to 13 years old. Carraway admitted in his plea agreement that he engaged in sex acts with the children, using a cell phone to record the acts. He also told the children to perform sex acts with each other, and gave them phones to record the acts. He had founded a club at school, Carraway admitted in the plea agreement; to join in, children had to send him sexually explicit images. In court, prosecutors said Carraway video chatted with one 12 year old, telling the victim to perform inappropriate behaviors. He also went into some children's homes, prosecutors said in court. Carraway was arrested in February of 2016 after the uncle of a 9-year-old boy saw a nude image on the child's phone, police said. Investigators then linked the aide to other victims in the case. Last year, Carraway was also indicted in Prince Georges County Court on 270 local criminal charges of sex abuse of a minor, sex offenses and child pornography. He pleaded not guilty. His lawyers argued that the court should suppress some of the defendant's statements because they may have been "involuntary." His attorneys said Carraway "exhibited significant cognitive deficits, with a full scale IQ of 63, which placed his overall intellectual functioning in the deficient range." A young male deer that had a plastic pretzel container stuck on his head for several days has finally been freed. Maryland Department of Natural Resources said the deer was nicknamed Jughead by residents of Bel Air, Maryland. Residents began a Facebook page to get attention for the trapped animal they had been tracking since Jan. 19, WTOP reported. DNRs Wildlife Response Team tranquilized the deer Sunday evening after spotting the deer on and off throughout the last week. Paul Peditto, director of the DNR Wildlife and Heritage Service, told WTOP staffers had to get close enough to the buck to get an accurate shot from a tranquilizer gun and that weather conditions played a role. Peditto said dart guns are subject to the wind, and if a dart were to get blown in the chest cavity of a deer, it would have killed it. Peditto tweeted video of the deer after it had been tranquilized having the plastic jug removed from his head. The Associated Press reported DNR spokesman Gregg Bortz said the Wildlife Response Team released the deer from the container, monitored him until he recovered from the tranquilizer and then released him into the wild with new ear tags. The deer appeared alert and healthy when he was released, DNR said in a statement. Chris Beauchamp, a resident of the Glenwood Country Club Park neighborhood, told WTOP it was upsetting to see the deer unable to free itself of the container. The whole community has kind of chipped in to kind of watch out for this guy and try to get it some help, Beauchamp told WTOP. Peditto told WTOP its not unusual for deer to get their heads stuck in containers recalling a similar case in Montgomery County where a deer had a bucket stuck on its head. Peditto told WTOP deer are often drawn to discarded snack containers because they look for the salt inside. Peditto said you can help prevent these happenings by sealing the container before you throw it away. Put the lid back on and this problem wont happen, Peditto told WTOP. Prosecutors asked a judge to admit more evidence in the case of Eulalio Tordil, a Maryland man accused of a deadly shooting spree in Montgomery and Prince Georges counties in May 2016. Montgomery County prosecutors want the court to formally allow evidence of the first shooting, in which Tordil is accused of killing his wife outside High Point High School in Beltsville. Tordil is scheduled to go on trial in October in Rockville for the Montgomery County shootings. Prosecutors argue the details of the shooting of his wife in Prince Georges County are relevant to prove Tordils motives and intent in the Montgomery County shootings. In their court filings, obtained and reviewed by News4, prosecutors said Tordil and his wife Gladys argued in Gladys Tordils car outside the high school as she awaited her daughters on May 5. At some point during the argument, Gladys Tordil began honking her car horn and screaming for help," the filings said. "One of Gladys daughters approached the car, and Gladys yelled for her to run back inside the school. In their request to the court, prosecutors said police seized a notebook from Tordil which contained information about the shooting outside the high school. The notebook, which was handwritten in a technical police nomenclature, stated that the writer went to High Point High School to ask his wife, Gladys Tordil, to help him with a loan and vehicle registration," their filings said. "He admitted to shooting his wife 'several times in the upper body/head.' The notebook also referenced a financial dispute between the Tordils, prosecutors said. Prosecutors also detailed bullet evidence they intend to introduce in their case against Tordil. Their court filings said investigators removed bullets from the three victims later shot at the Montgomery Mall and Aspen Hill shopping center. The firearm examination unit, using sophisticated microscopic tool-mark analysis, concluded that all of the bullets were .40 caliber and had been fired from no other gun that the defendants Glock, prosecutors said. The same type of bullets were removed from Gladys Tordils body, prosecutors said in their filings. Tordils attorney did not immediately return requests for comment. President Donald Trump signed an executive order Friday temporarily barring visitors from seven predominantly Muslim countries and refugees worldwide. The order sparked confusion at airports, protests around the country and denunciations from leaders around the world, leading the Trump administration to clarify its meaning. Now, the order will face scrutiny in federal courts. Here's what we know about it so far: Who is barred from entry to the U.S.? Trump's executive order temporarily suspends travel to the United States by citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries for 90 days. The countries are: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The State Department is no longer offering visas to citizens of those nations, unless they are also citizens in the United Kingdom. The order includes a four-month suspension of America's refugee program. The suspension is intended to provide time to review how refugees are vetted before they are allowed to resettle in the United States, according to the Trump administration. What is the status of green card holders and dual citizens? Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday declaring that residency would be a "dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination." That means citizens of the seven target countries who hold permanent U.S. residency "green cards" will not be barred from re-entering the U.S., as officials had previously said. Officials also clarified to The Associated Press Sunday that dual citizens who are nationals of one of the seven target countries and a country that is not on the list will be subject to additional security screenings, but will likely be allowed through. The clarifications came after green card holders were detained in airports on Saturday when the executive order was applied to them too. [NATL] Trump Immigration Order Triggers Protests Across US How does the reception of refugees change with this executive order? Trump's order cuts the number of refugees the United States plans to accept this budget year by more than half, to 50,000 people from around the world. During the last budget year the U.S. accepted 84,995 refugees, including 12,587 people from Syria. President Barack Obama had set the current refugee limit at 110,000. The temporary halt to refugee admissions does include exceptions for people claiming religious persecution, as long as their religion is a minority faith in their country. How many people were affected by the order? There were 109 people denied entry to the U.S. upon arrival in the first 23 hours of the order, according to a senior Department of Homeland Security official. Abroad, 173 were denied entry on flights to the U.S. from the seven countries listed in the order. That's compared to 325,000 average daily travelers, which Trump spokespeople have called "a small price to pay" compared to the threat of a terrorist attack. Why are people protesting the order? Trump's order sparked immediate chaos and outrage in the United States, with travelers getting detained at airports, panicked families searching for relatives and protesters marching against the measure parts of which were quickly blocked by several federal courts. The outrage stemmed from the perception that the U.S. was going back on its history as a beacon of freedom and opportunity for the whole world. One protest was held in sight of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island in New York City. Why does the Trump administration say this immigration ban is necessary? The executive order called said refugees and people from the seven predominantly Muslim countries entering the U.S. would be detrimental to the interests of the United States. America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border, said Trump in a statement on Sunday. Despite critics who refer to the action as a Muslim ban, Trump said the order is not about religion but keeping Americans safe. Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. Look what is happening all over Europe and, indeed, the world - a horrible mess! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 29, 2017 Were making sure that the priority is American citizens, American institutions, American businesses, American families, press secretary Sean Spicer said on Morning Joe Monday morning. Thats the number one job of any government and any leader, to protect its people. But critics have seized on the words of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani who told Fox News that Trump had wanted a "Muslim ban" and asked Giuliani to create a commission to show him "the right way to do it legally." They also say that no one from the nations listed in the order has been responsible for an attack on U.S. soil. By comparison, most of the Sept. 11 attackers were from Saudi Arabia, which was left off the list. How is Syria specifically affected by the immigration order? Trump's order directs the State Department to stop issuing visas to nationals of conflict-torn Syria and halts the processing of Syrian refugees. That will remain in effect until Trump determines that enough security changes have been made to ensure that would-be terrorists can't exploit weaknesses in the current vetting system, according to the administration. How have leaders abroad reacted? America's closest allies spoke out against the entry ban to varying degrees. The British prime minister wouldnt condemn the move but said she did "not agree" with the executive order. Other allies, such as France and Germany, criticized the ban as an act of discrimination, arguing that receiving refugees is a duty necessary for international cooperation. Canada's prime minister did not explicitly mention the ban while reaffirming the nation's commitment to receiving refugees, citing the necessity for diversity. On the other hand, the far-right National Democratic Party in Germany celebrated "the massive restriction on the entry of pseudo-refugees and Muslims to the USA." To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 28, 2017 A petition on the British Parliament's website attracted over 1 million signatures backing a call for Trump, who has been invited to meet Queen Elizabeth II, to be barred from the U.K. on the basis of misogyny and vulgarity. How will immigration vetting change moving forward? During the Obama administration, vetting for refugees included in-person interviews overseas, where applicants provided biographical details about themselves including their families, friendships, social or political activities, employment, phone numbers, email accounts and more. They also provided biometric information, including fingerprints. Syrians were subject to additional, classified controls that administration officials at the time declined to describe, and processing for that group routinely took years to complete. Trump's order did not spell out specifically what additional steps he wants to see the Homeland Security and State departments add to the country's vetting system for refugees. Instead he directed officials to review the refugee application and approval process to find any security measures that could be added to prevent people who pose a threat from using the refugee program. What challenges have been filed so far? The American Civil Liberties Union quickly filed a lawsuit challenging the executive order on behalf of two Iraqi refugees stopped at John F. Kennedy International Airport, arguing that the order violates due process, equal protection, international law and immigration law. A federal judge in Brooklyn issued an emergency stay of parts of Trumps executive order Saturday night and prevented the government from deporting some people detained at airports across the country after their arrival in the United States. The judge did not rule on the constitutionality of the executive order. Federal Judge Ann M. Donnelly of the Eastern District of New York Courthouse in Brooklyn granted an injunction in response to a request filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and other legal organizations on behalf of individuals subject to President Trumps immigration ban from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Other lawsuits were filed in Boston, Seattle and Alexandria, Virginia. On Monday, the first state-level action came from Washington. Attorney General Bob Ferguson announced a lawsuit asking a federal judge to declare key provisions of President Trumps immigration executive order unconstitutional. "No one is above the law not even the president," Ferguson said in a statement. "And in the courtroom, it is not the loudest voice that prevails. Its the Constitution." Whats next? The ACLU is expected in the coming days to try to overturn the executive order, The Washington Post reports. It will argue that Trumps executive order discriminates against Muslims and is unconstitutional. Trump is denying that the order is a Muslim ban, but the ACLU plans to rely on Trumps own words in the past, according to The Washington Post. We are likely to file a broader challenge to the Executive Order in the coming days, and well likely seek temporary relief, Lee Gelernt, a senior lawyer at the ACLUs national office, told The Washington Post. The Council on American-Islamic Relations said it would file a federal lawsuit Monday on behalf of more than 20 people challenging the ban. The lawsuit, to be filed in the U.S. District Court of the Western District of Virginia, will challenge the constitutionality of the order, arguing that its apparent purpose is to ban Muslims from the seven designated countries. The courts must do what President Trump will notensure that our government refrains from segregating people based on their faith, Gadeir Abbas, a lawyer who is co-counsel on the lawsuit, said in a statement. The Trump administration has yet to respond in detail to the lawsuits. The Department of Homeland Security said the Trump order "protects the United States from countries compromised by terrorism and ensures a more rigorous vetting process." And administration lawyers cite another provision of federal law that allows the president to "suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or non-immigrants" if the president determines that their entry would be "detrimental to the interests of the United States." Protests continue across the US over immigration ban Maine officials say two people have been arrested following the largest seizure of heroin in the state in an operation that spanned several states. According to the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency, Jason Bolduc, 39, of Parsonsfield, and Nichole Farrar, 35, of Sanford, are facing drug trafficking charges. Bolduc was pulled over in Sanford on Jan. 13 following an investigation spanning four months on suspicion Bolduc was selling heroin throughout southern Maine from his home at 27 Franks Place. During his arrest, officials seized 3.88 pounds of heroin from the rental vehicle and $2,473. Officials then tracked down a storage unit he rented in Wakefield, New Hampshire, and found $177,881 in cash, ledger books and handguns. Following Bolduc and Farrars arrest, investigation led officers to an undisclosed location in Massachusetts, where 4.4 pounds of heroin which was destined for Maine was seized. Additional suspects have been identified and more arrests are expected. Agents also seized multiple vehicles believed to have been purchased with illegal drug money at Bolduc's rented home. Both Bolduc and Farrar are being held on $250,000 bail each. A court date was not immediately available. Its not clear if the two have attorneys. Authorities in Boston and Cambridge say they're increasing patrols around mosques after an attack on a Canadian mosque left six dead and eight injured. Boston police say they're monitoring the ongoing investigation in Quebec City. Although there haven't been any credible threats, Boston officers will step up their visibility and patrols near mosques. "BPD volunteered before we even had to ask. They have been fantastic in defending the local Muslims community from these external assaults," said John Robbins of the Council on American Islamic Relations. Robbins told NBC Boston that dealing with threats is nothing new for the Muslim community. "Right after the Presidents election, over 12 mosques in New England received hateful letters saying they were going to do to them what quote Hitler did to the Jews," Robbins said. While many appreciate the stepped up security, some are frustrated that it is even needed. "It is a religion of love. We say As-salamu alaykum that means peace," said Mohamed Nour of the Islamic Society of Boston Attendee. "Every religion in every country has evils and they are all terrorists." Cambridge police said officials will be speaking with mosque leaders to get "a sense of their sentiments," and usually add more patrols in the area. The Sunday shooting in Quebec City happened during evening prayers, and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called it act of terrorism. Two people have been arrested in connection with the shooting, but their names have not been released. "No person should have to pay with their life, for their race, their color, their sexual orientation or their religious beliefs," Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume said. The Council on American-Islamic Relations said shortly after President Trump was elected, 12 mosques in New England received hateful letters. Since the attack in Quebec City, there haven't been any threats. A Providence, Rhode Island man has been sentenced to life in prison plus 15 years after he was convicted of beating his newborn daughter to death five years ago. Christopher Jimenez was found guilty of second-degree murder and first-degree child abuse in the death of his daughter, Christina. Jimenez was sentenced on Friday. Authorities say the 30-year-old Jimenez beat his 5-week-old daughter in June 2012. She was hospitalized and taken off life support more than two weeks later. Prosecutors say the girl suffered four skull fractures and more than two dozen rib fractures, as well as broken legs, fingers and toes. Her mother, Mayra Gonzalez, was convicted of child neglect in 2013. Hartford police have arrested a man accused of sexually assaulting three juvenile victims, police said Sunday. Israel Nieves, 46, was charged with three counts of first-degree sex assault and three counts of risk of injury. Police said they began investigating one sex assault case on Oct. 18, 2016. During that investigation Nieves was identified as a suspect and police also discovered there were additional victims. On Jan. 18 police secured three arrest warrants for Nieves. Police said that on Thursday Nieves turned himself in to the Hartford Police Department. He is being held on a $1.3 million bond and is scheduled to appear in court on Feb. 10. No other information was released. A 15-year-old Rockville boy is in critical condition after he was shot in the head Saturday night, according to police. Police said they received a 911 call at around 7:58 p.m. reporting a shooting at 102 Talcott Ave. and found the 15-year-old victim, police said. The victim, whose name has not been released, was brought to Rockville Hospital by Vernon EMS and LifeStar later flew him to Connecticut Childrens Medical Center, where he had emergency surgery, according to police. Investigators learned that several youths were using alcohol and marijuana at the time of the shooting, according to police. Officials obtained a search warrant and recovered a firearm at the scene, police said. According to police, officers found several people leaving the scene of the shooting, including 19-year-old Joey Maddox, of Rockville. Officers arrested Maddox and charged him with assault, reckless endangerment, criminal possession of a firearm, risk of injury to a minor, possession of a weapon with an altered ID, unlawful discharge of a firearm and possession of marijuana, police said. According to police, Maddox is being held at Vernon Police Department in lieu of a $400,000 bond and is scheduled to appear in Rockville Superior Court on Monday. No one else was injured, police said. Vernon police detectives are investigating the shooting with assistance from the Connecticut State Police Eastern District Major Crimes Unit and the Tolland States Attorneys Office, police said. If you have any information related to this investigation, please contact Vernon police at 860-872-9126. Many people in Vermont continue expressing deep disappointment with President Donald Trump's recent executive order which, among other changes, indefinitely suspends the resettlement of Syrian refugees in the United States. Before the order came down, the city of Rutland was in the process of welcoming 100 refugees from Syria and Iraq this year, with more expected in future years. Those refugees have undergone close scrutiny through a lengthy and rigorous U.S. vetting process conducted overseas, leaders at Vermont Refugee Resettlement have said. The volunteer group Rutland Welcomes had organized the collection of necessity kits to help those refugees start new lives in Vermont. The kits consisted of everything from mops to alarm clocks. But now, following President Trump's signature, those kits will remain in storage until the best use for them can be determined. Jennie Gartner, a volunteer with Rutland Welcomes, said she remains hopeful that national policy may change, and refugee resettlement can resume in Rutland. "It's so incredibly important that we can say, wow, these are real families," Gartner said on Monday. "These are families who need our help, these are families who very well could die if we don't do something." Gartner was part of a large crowd in Rutland that protested the executive order this weekend. "We have to be hopeful," Gartner said. "We have to hope that at a certain point, the president and his administration will say, 'OK, the security is OK, and we can let these people in,' because you can't keep the borders of America closed forever--it's just absolutely ridiculous." President Trump reaffirmed his position that a halt on refugees from Syria and other nations is an important part of a series of reforms that he sees as critical to national security. Trump tweeted Monday, "There's nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country." However, multiple opponents to the order have argued that it could actually make the country less secure, by making the United States appear to enemies like ISIS to be anti-Muslim. Gov. Phil Scott, R-Vermont, said Monday at a luncheon hosted by the Rutland Region Chamber of Commerce that he and his cabinet are looking for ways to push back against the White House. "I think this infringes upon our constitutional rights," Scott said in his speech. "I truly believe, to build a strong, vibrant economy, we need peaceful families from all walks of life." Scott later added, "I don't believe that federal funding should be used as a tool to force us into anything." The Vermont Mayors Coalition said it appreciated Gov. Scott standing up for human rights. The coalition, made up of the mayors of Rutland, Burlington, Winooski, St. Albans, Barre, Montpelier, Newport, and Vergennes, called on President Trump to rescind his order. "The United States, the State of Vermont, and our towns and cities have a long and proud history of welcoming immigrants and refugees from all cultures and backgrounds, and we believe we are a better country and State for it," the Vermont Mayors Coalition said in a statement Monday. "Fridays Executive Order stands in stark contrast to that history, and should not be allowed to stand." Congressman Peter Welch met last week with two Syrian refugee families who moved to Rutland before the executive order came down. Monday, the Democrat said he hopes to blunt the impacts of the order, looking for support for legislation that could perhaps de-fund its implementation. "People of Vermont are going to stand up for the rights and opportunities of all people, regardless of their race, regardless of their religion," Rep. Welch said. Welch further described Trump's order as "just wrong." Also Monday, Vermont Attorney General T.J. Donovan joined a coalition of attorneys general from across the country who condemned Trump's executive order. Several hundred people marched and spoke out in Burlington, Vermont Sunday against President Donald Trump's executive order limiting access to the US by refugees and others from a list of foreign countries the administration deems risky to national security. The grassroots demonstration wound down Burlington's Church Street Marketplace toward City Hall Park, with participants chanting, "No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here!" The large group also expressed support for peace-loving Muslims living across Vermont and elsewhere, and raised concern about other causes, including environmental protection and reproductive rights. The Trump administration insists bold steps are needed to protect the nation from terrorism, and has said limiting travel, immigration, or refugee resettlement from countries like Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and Sudan is a fair step considering the seriousness of protecting the United States from violence. However, the demonstrators in Burlington blasted that theory, saying the executive order violates the welcoming tradition of Vermont and the rest of the country. Many participants in the march and rally also argued that President Trump's order was unconstitutional and worsens our standing on the global stage. "Rise up!" shouted rally participant James Ehlers from the steps of Burlington City Hall, to an echo from a crowd of several hundred. "We fight! This is our country, not his country!" In a written statement Sunday, Gov. Phil Scott, R-Vermont, said he will always stand up for human rights, including against any executive order from Washington he sees as crossing legal, ethical, or moral lines. Members of Maine's refugee and immigrant community are reeling from President Donald Trump's executive order on immigration this weekend. The order stops refugees from seven predominantly Muslim countries for 120 days, and requires officials to conduct additional screening. The Trump administration has stated the executive order seeks to keep out radical Islamic terrorists. Maine has a large Somali immigrant population, and Somalia is one of the seven countries listed on the immigration ban. "It's concerning being on a list of countries that are 'too dangerous,'" said Mahmoud Hassan, president of the Somali Community Center of Maine. "It's just sad, to be negatively singled out, to be suspect until proven innocent." Pious Ali, an immigrant from Ghana, and Portland's first African-born, Muslim city councilor, said many people have been calling him, asking questions about the immigration process in light of Trump's executive order. "It's scary," Ali said. "People don't know where to turn." "We came here because we felt this was the most safe place in the world, and for this to be happening here, now we don't know where to go," said Ali. "Where are we going to run to?" Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) held a press conference with members of the ACLU of Maine and former immigration lawyers to discuss the so-called Muslim ban. "This is unconscionable, unthinkable, and unconstitutional," said Rep. Pingree. Beth Stickney, an immigration lawyer for three decades, believes the challenges to Trump's executive order could end up in front of the Supreme Court. The debut of the F-35A Lightning II at Red Flag has afforded the pilots and maintainers of the aircraft a chance to be a part of the Air Force's premier air-to-air combat training exercise. For Airmen involved with the F-35, Red Flag 17-1 provides a unique type of training that prepares them to be fully mission ready. Its been great coming here and doing something that some of us havent necessarily done before, said Senior Airman John Girtman, an F-35A avionics systems specialist assigned to the 388th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron, Hill Air Force Base, Utah. It gives us the ability to exercise our strength. Being able to work in an environment like Red Flag and seeing all of our training and hard work from back home come to fruition is extremely beneficial. A major part of the success so far of the F-35 aircrew can be contributed to the planning and training that went into getting prepared for Red Flag 17-1. Before we came out to the exercise we sat down and came up with a game plan as to what we may encounter or any issues we might face and how we can overcome those challenges, said Staff Sgt. Brandon Bailey, 388th AMXS crew chief. Now that we are here, the challenges we face during Red Flag helps us see what kind of challenges we might be faced with in a deployed environment and how we can overcome those, said Bailey. The things we learn during this exercise will allow us to progress and get better. Red Flag exercises are fast-paced and provide aircrews the experience of multiple, intensive air combat sorties in the safety of a training environment. Here at Red Flag there is a great sense of urgency, said Airman 1st Class Anhre Bourgeois, 388th AMXS, F-35A weapons troop. We are always on the go. If it ever came to a real world contingency I think it will be the same thing. Just constantly on the go to get the job done and the jets up in the air. Red Flag really prepares me for that. The F-35s combined lethality and survivability make it the platform of choice for operations in a highly-contested threat environment. The F-35 will be the backbone of future joint and combined air operations, enabling critical interoperability. Its an eye opening experience to be out here, said Bourgeois. Its not every day that you get to work on an aircraft as smart as the F-35A. Its definitely taught me a lot and Im very humbled to be working on an aircraft like this. This is the first deployment to Red Flag for the F-35A and the first large movement since the Air Force declared the jet combat ready in August 2016. Red Flag is going great for the Rams, said Lt. Col. George Watkins, 34th Fighter Squadron commander Hill Air Force Base, Utah. It is exciting to integrate the newest operational fighter squadron and the newly initial operational capability F-35A with all the other experienced war fighter including two of our partner nations. The professional aggressors are giving us great training, but enemy is no match for our integrated fourth and fifth generation Air Force. Women's Prayer day in Gorleston and Yarmouth This years Women`s World Day of Prayer event has been prepared by Christian women of the Philippines under the title of "Am I being Unfair to you?", and there will be services in Great Yarmouth and Gorleston. God gave the Philippines abundant resources, both human and material. God is the great provider and provision is for all of creation. This is Gods display of economic justice in contrast to the economy where the strong and powerful take Gods resources for themselves and their families. The kingdom of God provides for all, even for those who do not acknowledge it. - A Glimpse of the Philippine Situation, by Rowena Apol Laxamana-Sta.Rosa. The service at Magdalen Way Methodist Church, Magdalen Way, Gorleston, Great Yarmouth, NR31 7DB will take place at 1.30pm on Friday March 3, with light refreshments after the service. The choir from Peterhouse C.E. Primary Academy will be taking part by singing and helping with some of the readings. Further information can be obtained by telephoning Gillian Woolger on 01493 718669 (Gorleston Branch Secretary). The service at St Mary's Church, Southtown Road, Great Yarmouth, NR31 0JB will have a similar theme, and will be at 10.30am on the same day, March 3. The speaker will be Rev Marilyn Zipfel. The image above is courtesy of the World Day of Prayer website. Visit http://worlddayofprayer.net/philippines-2017.html Do you have a news story or forthcoming event relating to Christians or a church in East Norfolk? If you are dependent upon an embedded medical device, should the device that helps keep you alive also be allowed to incriminate you in a crime? After all, the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution protects a person from being forced to incriminate themselves. Nonetheless, thats what happened after a house fire in Middletown, Ohio. WCPO Cincinnati caught video of the actual fire, as well delivered news that the owners cat died in the fire. As a pet owner, it would be hard to believe that a person would set a fire and leave their pet to die in that fire. The fire in question occurred back in September 2016; the fire department was just starting an investigation to determine the cause of the blaze. A month later, 59-year-old homeowner Ross Compton was arrested and charged with felony aggravated arson and insurance fraud. The cause of the fire was still undetermined, but it had resulted $400,000 in damages to the house and contents of the 2,000-square-foot home. Fire investigators knew there had been multiple points of origin of the fire from the outside of the residence. At the time, the police cited inconsistencies in Comptons statements when compared with the evidence from the fire. There were additional conflicting statements given to the 911 operator; Compton had said everyone was out of the house, yet the 911 operator also heard him tell someone to get out of here now. In the 911 call published by WLWT5, an out-of-breath Compton claimed he had grabbed a bunch of stuff, threw it out the window. He claimed to have packed his suitcases, broken the glass out of bedroom window with his walking stick, and tossed the suitcases outside. Compton also told the dispatcher he had an artificial heart. After this, things really get interesting because police investigators used data from Comptons electronic heart device against him. Isnt that self-incrimination? Can a person plead the Fifth when it comes to self-incriminating data collected from their medical device? Police set out to disprove Comptons story about the fire by obtaining a search warrant to collect data from Comptons pacemaker. WLWT5 reported that the cops wanted to know Comptons heart rate, pacer demand and cardiac rhythms before, during and after the fire. On Friday, Jan. 27, the Journal-News reported that court documents stated: A cardiologist who reviewed that data determined it is highly improbable Mr. Compton would have been able to collect, pack and remove the number of items from the house, exit his bedroom window and carry numerous large and heavy items to the front of his residence during the short period of time he has indicated due to his medical conditions.' + What do you think? Share your thoughts about the use of pacemaker data as evidence on our Facebook page. + Middletown Police said this was the first time it had used data from a heart device to make an arrest, but the pacemaker data proved to be an excellent investigative tool; the data from the pacemaker didnt correspond with Comptons version of what happened. The retrieved data help to indict Compton. Lt. Jimmy Cunningham told WLWT5, It was one of the key pieces of evidence that allowed us to charge him. Its worth noting that gasoline was also found on various pieces of Comptons clothing. Could police have indicted him without using the data from his pacemaker against him? While new U.S. President Donald Trumps recent proclamations related to immigration have centered on his plans for a Mexican border wall and bans on Syrian refugees, the IT outsourcing industry is anticipating details on his strategy for reforming the H-1B visa program. Trump railed against the shifting of U.S. jobs overseas during his campaign and called for raising the minimum salary for H-1B holders to $100,000 per year, from the current threshold of $60,000 per year. A purported draft of an executive order recently published called for an investigation into the impact of such nonimmigrant visa programs on American workers and directed the Department of Homeland Security to "consider ways to make the process for allocating H-1B visas more efficient and ensure that beneficiaries of the program are the best and the brightest. [ Related: Trump eyes an H-1B visa aimed at best and brightest ] A new bill was also announced last week by U.S. Senators Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) that explicitly prohibits" the replacement of American workers by visa holders and give foreign students who graduate from U.S. schools priority in obtaining H-1Bs. [ Related: New senate bill seeks sweeping H-1B changes ] Over the last two weeks, Indias top IT outsourcing providers have acknowledged the uncertainty around potential changes the H-1B program, which they use to transfer employees to work at client sites in the U.S., and said that they are prepared for the impact. Natarajan Chandrasekaran, CEO of Indias largest IT services firm Tata Consultancy Services, said the company began taking steps more than a year ago that will help it operate in a visa-constrained regime. TCS had applied for around 14,000 visas in 2015, but only 2,000 in 2016, Chandrasekaran noted. The chief executive of number two Infosys, which earns about 60 percent of revenues from U.S. clients, acknowledged in a press conference two weeks ago that there were likely changes coming to the H-1B program but said he was not overly concerned because the company had already increased local hiring. This is something that I have been focusing on since I started, said CEO Vishal Sikka, himself a U.S. citizen. So, we are absolutely committed to creating U.S. jobs, similarly in Australia, in Europe and other geographies where we operate in... Regardless of visa policy, the right thing to do for innovation is to have a lot of rich local talent. Likewise, HCL Technologies CEO C. Vijayakumar told reporters this week that the company has already been increasing campus and entry-level hiring in the U.S. to support future growth. Wipro CEO Abidali Z. Neemuchwala told a reporter at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week that potential changes to U.S. skilled temporary worker visas are just one challenge the Indian IT industry is facing. Indeed, the offshore IT services market is being disrupted by smaller and shorter deals, cloud computing options, increased automation, and intense competition. Similarly, Tech Mahindra vice chairman Vineet Nayyar said in a television interview that adapting to automation would be a bigger challenge for outsourcing providers than dealing with the new American political administration. Both executives said they were confident in the resilience of the Indian IT services industry. Regarding any forthcoming limits on temporary skill worker visas, Wipros CEO said it was partnering with U.S. schools and recruiting more local workers, and Nayeer noted that less than five percent of Tech Mahindras workforce required H-1B visas. Given the continued lack of clarity on changes to the H-1B program, the muted response of Indias IT leaders makes sense. Everyone wants to avoid the attention of the new administration, and their stance reflects this, says Peter Bendor-Samuel, CEO of outsourcing consultancy and analyst firm Everest Group. This includes companies like IBM and Accenture which stand to benefit from the changes, but the being seen to utilize this might cause reputational damage in their client base and also make them a target for the administration. The likely impact of H-1B caps, restrictions, or increased fees will be an increase in landed labor costs for IT service providers. Everest Group estimates that onshore costs for H-1B dependent firms could surge as much as a 20 percent if the Senate bill proposed by Grassley and Durbin becomes the basis of visa reform. The net effect of these changes will not dramatically change the offshoring equation, says Bendor-Samuel. However, they will further level the playing field between Indian heritage and [U.S.-based] multinational providers. To offset the prospective profit margin hits, Indian service providers will need to accelerate their adoption of robotic process automation, DevOps, and other emerging tools and processes, Bendor-Samuel adds. The hope is that the efficiencies derived from these investments in productivity will offset the increased cost. This story, "IT service providers prepare for potential H-1B visa changes" was originally published by CIO . Oindrila Sarkar By Express News Service BENGALURU: With the de-legalisation of high-denomination currency crippling growth, the infrastructure sector would need a fresh round of fiscal stimulus to put growth back on track. And, this will be a major focus of the finance minister in the upcoming Budget, says Devendra Kumar Pant, chief economist and senior director at India Ratings and Research. He says that in the backdrop of lower growth due to note ban, the Budget will have to focus on growth-enhancing policies with steps towards implementation of the goods and services tax. The Budget needs to give some guidance on how investments can be attracted for the development of roads, ports, railways and aviation sectors. There has to be a clear boost and improvement in capital inflows for which the dictum of ease of doing business needs to be revisited seriously. According to Vishwas Udgirkar, senior director, Deloitte India, the Railways needs government support to buttress safety measures and to finance long-term projects. A number of accidents happened in the past year and I hope the FM will bring about some measures to allocate money for the safety of the railway passenger. He will have to come up with some innovative ways to cater to the railways financial needs especially in those long-term ambitious projects like freight corridors. This year, it will be interesting to see whether the FM will touch upon various aspects of the railways or just talk about a broad allocation of funds. He adds that the government has to make roads for the overall economic development but roads by themselves dont earn the revenue. In ports and railways there is return on investment as they are more commercially focused. Roads and highways will need much more governmental support whereas ports and railways will need money to meet the gaps. However, they also need to increase their efficiency so that direct support from the government goes down. Railways will have to think about newer ways of garnering revenue like advertisement and commercialisation of e-portals. Udgirkar notes that railways reliance on gross budgetary support from the government will increase this time. The current level of cross-subsidisation of passenger fares needs to be reduced. The merger of the railway budget with the main Budget will create more capacity for the sector. BENGALURU: With the de-legalisation of high-denomination currency crippling growth, the infrastructure sector would need a fresh round of fiscal stimulus to put growth back on track. And, this will be a major focus of the finance minister in the upcoming Budget, says Devendra Kumar Pant, chief economist and senior director at India Ratings and Research. He says that in the backdrop of lower growth due to note ban, the Budget will have to focus on growth-enhancing policies with steps towards implementation of the goods and services tax. The Budget needs to give some guidance on how investments can be attracted for the development of roads, ports, railways and aviation sectors. There has to be a clear boost and improvement in capital inflows for which the dictum of ease of doing business needs to be revisited seriously. According to Vishwas Udgirkar, senior director, Deloitte India, the Railways needs government support to buttress safety measures and to finance long-term projects. A number of accidents happened in the past year and I hope the FM will bring about some measures to allocate money for the safety of the railway passenger. He will have to come up with some innovative ways to cater to the railways financial needs especially in those long-term ambitious projects like freight corridors. This year, it will be interesting to see whether the FM will touch upon various aspects of the railways or just talk about a broad allocation of funds. He adds that the government has to make roads for the overall economic development but roads by themselves dont earn the revenue. In ports and railways there is return on investment as they are more commercially focused. Roads and highways will need much more governmental support whereas ports and railways will need money to meet the gaps. However, they also need to increase their efficiency so that direct support from the government goes down. Railways will have to think about newer ways of garnering revenue like advertisement and commercialisation of e-portals. Udgirkar notes that railways reliance on gross budgetary support from the government will increase this time. The current level of cross-subsidisation of passenger fares needs to be reduced. The merger of the railway budget with the main Budget will create more capacity for the sector. By Express News Service NEW DELHI: UK telecom major Vodafone Plc UK has begun talks with Aditya Birla Groups Idea Cellular Ltd for a merger of its Indian arm Vodafone India. The move could trigger a merger and acquisition season in the telecom sector, with consumers hoping to get better service and a choice of quality operators in India. If concluded, the deal will push the merged entity as the leading telecom operators in India with 43 per cent market share, leaving behind the current leader Bharti Airtel that has 33 per cent market share. It is inevitable now with high cost of managing telecom network, says Rajan Mathews, director general, Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI). Vodafone Plc confirmed in a statement that it is in talks but clarified that, There is no certainty that any transaction will be agreed, nor as to the terms or timing of any transaction. Idea cellular also acknowledged the talks of merger, but refused to give further details. With the deal underway, the consumers can now hope for limited players in the market. Mathews feels there is an opportunity of a merger of Reliance Communications with Aircel and the merged entity merging with Reliance Jio and BSNL merging with MTNL. Soon, the customers would get to choose preferred service from four telecom companiesRjio, Bharti Airtel, BSNL and Vodafone. The telecom industry will become stronger in a couple of years from now with M&As and that should result in better investment into the network and quality service to the consumersgood things can happen in telecom sector now, said T.V Ramchandran, telecom expert and first DG of COAI. The challenge however for Voadfone-Idea cellular will not be regulatory but proper alignment of their strengths and weakness. Both companies have expertise on regulationthis deal is not going to fall out on issues of regulation, said Sanjay Kapoor, former MD and CEO of Airtel. However, Kapoor says, the issues that needs to be closely watched aretwo different management stylesVodafone with more professionals and Idea Cellular more family managed, the investments made on infrastructure and market- Vodafone is an urban brand while Idea has done well in tier 2-3 markets . If they fail to align properly on any oneit could be a problem, said Kapoor. Industry observers opine that the recent move by Vodafone is a reflection of Reliance Jios entry into the market. The data market is emerging and voice is significant part of the incumbent leader Airtel, the merged entity is looking at that space, hence we can expect stiff competition where all operators will invest in networks to offer enhanced customer service, says Jaijit Bhattacharya Telecom expert KPMG. NEW DELHI: UK telecom major Vodafone Plc UK has begun talks with Aditya Birla Groups Idea Cellular Ltd for a merger of its Indian arm Vodafone India. The move could trigger a merger and acquisition season in the telecom sector, with consumers hoping to get better service and a choice of quality operators in India. If concluded, the deal will push the merged entity as the leading telecom operators in India with 43 per cent market share, leaving behind the current leader Bharti Airtel that has 33 per cent market share. It is inevitable now with high cost of managing telecom network, says Rajan Mathews, director general, Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI). Vodafone Plc confirmed in a statement that it is in talks but clarified that, There is no certainty that any transaction will be agreed, nor as to the terms or timing of any transaction. Idea cellular also acknowledged the talks of merger, but refused to give further details. With the deal underway, the consumers can now hope for limited players in the market. Mathews feels there is an opportunity of a merger of Reliance Communications with Aircel and the merged entity merging with Reliance Jio and BSNL merging with MTNL. Soon, the customers would get to choose preferred service from four telecom companiesRjio, Bharti Airtel, BSNL and Vodafone. The telecom industry will become stronger in a couple of years from now with M&As and that should result in better investment into the network and quality service to the consumersgood things can happen in telecom sector now, said T.V Ramchandran, telecom expert and first DG of COAI. The challenge however for Voadfone-Idea cellular will not be regulatory but proper alignment of their strengths and weakness. Both companies have expertise on regulationthis deal is not going to fall out on issues of regulation, said Sanjay Kapoor, former MD and CEO of Airtel. However, Kapoor says, the issues that needs to be closely watched aretwo different management stylesVodafone with more professionals and Idea Cellular more family managed, the investments made on infrastructure and market- Vodafone is an urban brand while Idea has done well in tier 2-3 markets . If they fail to align properly on any oneit could be a problem, said Kapoor. Industry observers opine that the recent move by Vodafone is a reflection of Reliance Jios entry into the market. The data market is emerging and voice is significant part of the incumbent leader Airtel, the merged entity is looking at that space, hence we can expect stiff competition where all operators will invest in networks to offer enhanced customer service, says Jaijit Bhattacharya Telecom expert KPMG. By Associated Press TOKYO: Toyota has relinquished the title of the world's biggest automaker, reporting Monday that it sold 10.175 million vehicles worldwide in 2016, fewer than Volkswagen's 10.31 million. General Motors reports its tally next week. If GM's number falls short, it will be the first time the German automaker has become No. 1. It's a milestone achievement despite the taint to VW's reputation from a huge scandal over cheating on emissions tests. Booming China sales helped offset that damage. Seiji Sugiura, senior auto analyst at Tokai Tokyo Research Institute, said the results highlight the importance of the Chinese market, where few of VW's tainted diesel models are sold, and the popularity of VW's widespread brand portfolio. "Volkswagen could stay at the top for the next few years," he said. Toyota's global sales last year were slightly better than in 2015, up 0.2 percent, but not good enough to beat Volkswagen, which has the Audi, Porsche and Skoda brands, and boosted its global sales 3.8 percent from the year before. GM makes the Cadillac and Opel cars. In 2015, Toyota sold 10.15 million vehicles while Volkswagen was second with 9.93 million and Detroit, Michigan-based GM third with 9.8 million. Sugiura said Toyota still is likely beating VW in terms of profitability. The Japanese automaker has focused on regional balance in production, lacks the range of brands that VW has, and is cautious about growth to avoid quality lapses. GM also is seeing strong growth in China, as are other automakers like Nissan Motor Co. and Hyundai Motor Co., Sugiura said. Toyota's vehicle sales in Japan grew in 2016, but the domestic market is relatively small compared to the U.S. and China. Toyota sales fell on-year in the U.S., but they rose in China. GM was the top-selling automaker for more than seven decades until Toyota, which makes the Camry sedan, Prius hybrid and Lexus luxury models, surpassed it in 2008. Toyota held the global auto crown for the past four years after falling behind GM in 2011, when production was hit by a quake and tsunami in northeastern Japan. Toyota officials have repeatedly said they are not concerned with being No. 1 and just want to make good cars. Volkswagen was keen to dethrone Toyota but disavowed that goal after CEO Martin Winterkorn lost his job over the emissions scandal. "At Toyota, we are not focused on chasing volume. We believe that our sales volume is just the result of our focus on making ever-better cars and providing better customer experiences," Toyota said in a statement. "Our goal is to be No. 1 with consumers by engineering and producing ever-better cars. We are grateful to every customer who has chosen a Toyota vehicle." TOKYO: Toyota has relinquished the title of the world's biggest automaker, reporting Monday that it sold 10.175 million vehicles worldwide in 2016, fewer than Volkswagen's 10.31 million. General Motors reports its tally next week. If GM's number falls short, it will be the first time the German automaker has become No. 1. It's a milestone achievement despite the taint to VW's reputation from a huge scandal over cheating on emissions tests. Booming China sales helped offset that damage. Seiji Sugiura, senior auto analyst at Tokai Tokyo Research Institute, said the results highlight the importance of the Chinese market, where few of VW's tainted diesel models are sold, and the popularity of VW's widespread brand portfolio. "Volkswagen could stay at the top for the next few years," he said. Toyota's global sales last year were slightly better than in 2015, up 0.2 percent, but not good enough to beat Volkswagen, which has the Audi, Porsche and Skoda brands, and boosted its global sales 3.8 percent from the year before. GM makes the Cadillac and Opel cars. In 2015, Toyota sold 10.15 million vehicles while Volkswagen was second with 9.93 million and Detroit, Michigan-based GM third with 9.8 million. Sugiura said Toyota still is likely beating VW in terms of profitability. The Japanese automaker has focused on regional balance in production, lacks the range of brands that VW has, and is cautious about growth to avoid quality lapses. GM also is seeing strong growth in China, as are other automakers like Nissan Motor Co. and Hyundai Motor Co., Sugiura said. Toyota's vehicle sales in Japan grew in 2016, but the domestic market is relatively small compared to the U.S. and China. Toyota sales fell on-year in the U.S., but they rose in China. GM was the top-selling automaker for more than seven decades until Toyota, which makes the Camry sedan, Prius hybrid and Lexus luxury models, surpassed it in 2008. Toyota held the global auto crown for the past four years after falling behind GM in 2011, when production was hit by a quake and tsunami in northeastern Japan. Toyota officials have repeatedly said they are not concerned with being No. 1 and just want to make good cars. Volkswagen was keen to dethrone Toyota but disavowed that goal after CEO Martin Winterkorn lost his job over the emissions scandal. "At Toyota, we are not focused on chasing volume. We believe that our sales volume is just the result of our focus on making ever-better cars and providing better customer experiences," Toyota said in a statement. "Our goal is to be No. 1 with consumers by engineering and producing ever-better cars. We are grateful to every customer who has chosen a Toyota vehicle." By Express News Service NEW DELHI: After superseding two senior officers while appointing Army chief, on Monday central government once again superseded two senior officers in the appointment of Delhi police commissioner hinting that seniority is no criteria. On Monday, Union government appointed 1985 Batch IPS officer Amulya Patnaik as Delhi Police commissioner. Apart from Patnaik, other two officers were in race Dharmender Kumar and Deepak Mishra who were one batch senior to Patnaik. This is the second time, Mishra and Kumar are being ditched by the government while appointing Delhi police commissioner. Currently, Mishra and Kumar are working in CRPF and CISF in the Additional Director General rank while Patnaik, who is a batch(1985) junior has been appointed to a Director General rank. This year, this is the second time the union government has ignored seniority criteria in appointment of hhigh-profilepost. Earlier this month, government appointed Bipin Rawat as army chief superseding two senior officers. Later when questions were raised over the appointment, the government said that they are well within its rights to appoint then Lieutenant General Bipin Rawat as the Chief of Army Staff. "Amulya Kumar Patnaik, IPS (AGMUT: 1985) has been appointed to the post of Commissioner of Police, Delhi from the date of actual assumption of the charge, in place of Shri Alok Kumar, IPS (AGMUT: 1979) who has been appointed as Director, CBI, till further orders," an order issued by the Government said. By appointing Patnaik, currently Special Commissioner(Administration), the government has superseded two senior officers, Dharmendra Kumar and Deepak Mishra, both 1984-batch IPS officers of AGMUT cadre. Interestingly, last year, when BS Bassi was retiring from the post of Delhi police chief, Mishra and Kumar were the main contenders for the post but then government picked up Alok Verma on the basis of seniority. Kumar was special commissioner of police (Special Unit) during then Commissioner B S Bassi's tenure. Both Mishra and Kumar were made senior special commissioners, a post created by Bassi during his tenure that was later scrapped. Two other senior officers of the cadre, 1982-batch JK Sharma and A K Singh of 1984 batch, have not been empanelled for the post of Director General at the centre. Patnaik is a recipient of the President's Police medal for distinguished service and the Police medal for meritorious service. NEW DELHI: After superseding two senior officers while appointing Army chief, on Monday central government once again superseded two senior officers in the appointment of Delhi police commissioner hinting that seniority is no criteria. On Monday, Union government appointed 1985 Batch IPS officer Amulya Patnaik as Delhi Police commissioner. Apart from Patnaik, other two officers were in race Dharmender Kumar and Deepak Mishra who were one batch senior to Patnaik. This is the second time, Mishra and Kumar are being ditched by the government while appointing Delhi police commissioner. Currently, Mishra and Kumar are working in CRPF and CISF in the Additional Director General rank while Patnaik, who is a batch(1985) junior has been appointed to a Director General rank. This year, this is the second time the union government has ignored seniority criteria in appointment of hhigh-profilepost. Earlier this month, government appointed Bipin Rawat as army chief superseding two senior officers. Later when questions were raised over the appointment, the government said that they are well within its rights to appoint then Lieutenant General Bipin Rawat as the Chief of Army Staff. "Amulya Kumar Patnaik, IPS (AGMUT: 1985) has been appointed to the post of Commissioner of Police, Delhi from the date of actual assumption of the charge, in place of Shri Alok Kumar, IPS (AGMUT: 1979) who has been appointed as Director, CBI, till further orders," an order issued by the Government said. By appointing Patnaik, currently Special Commissioner(Administration), the government has superseded two senior officers, Dharmendra Kumar and Deepak Mishra, both 1984-batch IPS officers of AGMUT cadre. Interestingly, last year, when BS Bassi was retiring from the post of Delhi police chief, Mishra and Kumar were the main contenders for the post but then government picked up Alok Verma on the basis of seniority. Kumar was special commissioner of police (Special Unit) during then Commissioner B S Bassi's tenure. Both Mishra and Kumar were made senior special commissioners, a post created by Bassi during his tenure that was later scrapped. Two other senior officers of the cadre, 1982-batch JK Sharma and A K Singh of 1984 batch, have not been empanelled for the post of Director General at the centre. Patnaik is a recipient of the President's Police medal for distinguished service and the Police medal for meritorious service. Team Edex By Express News Service Jallikattu Jaunt The major demand was the promulgation of the ordinance for the removal of bulls from the list of performing animals in the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (PCA) Act 1990, Delhi When the VP Singh government announced its decision to implement the Mandal Commission report, spontaneous protests erupted. Students of higher castes organised agitations against the implementation of the report. The protests were spontaneous and had no specific organisers. It began at Marina Beach in Chennai along with sit-ins at large grounds across Tamil Nadu. The protests were initially formed by members of the student community across the state which was further Strengthened by people from various sections such as IT professionals who later joined in. The lack of leadership was seen as a stumbling block for the State Government because it could not call people for talks. The protests were largely peaceful. January 2016, India What kicked up a political storm was the suicide committed by a Dalit student, Rohith Vemula, in a hostel room on January 17, 2016. Hundreds of students from universities across India participated in a Justice for Rohith Vemula protest rally and expressed solidarity with the students of the University of Hyderabad by converging at the campus. January 2017, Chennai The chief motivation of the protest was against the Supreme Courts order to ban Jallikattu, a traditional Tamil bull-taming sport. The sport was banned by the Supreme Court in a decision citing animal cruelty. Several apolitical groups, organised largely via social media, conducted a protest at Marina Beach in Chennai to revoke the ban on Jallikattu and soon gained momentum all over Tamil Nadu. 2006, India It was the second major protest against the reservation system. In 2006, widespread protests took place in India to oppose the decision of the Congress-led UPA government to implement reservations for OBCs in both central and private higher education institutes. Students and doctors belonging to upper castes disregarded this move as discriminatory. August 2011, Chile Chilean students rejected President Sebastian Pineras proposed education reforms. The main goal of these massive strikes was to increase funding for public education. March 11, 2013, Marina beach, Chennai The war crimes committed by the army against Tamils in Sri Lanka during the Civil War has been a sensitive issue for the Tamil community. Students in Tamil Nadu were seen holding a series of protests and agitations led by the Students Federation for Freedom of Tamil Eelam. The protesters had only one demand from the Government of India: vote in support of the UN resolution for an independent international investigation against alleged war crimes in Sri Lanka. The agitations, which started on March 11, 2013, saw an ugly turn after Tamil Nadu police arrested students of Loyola College who were fasting. November 14, 1973, Athens, Greece When their strike on November 14, 1973 elicited no response, students from Athens Polytechnic barricaded themselves inside the university, building a radio station using supplies from a laboratory. They broadcast across Athens, urging the people of Greece to join them in their stand against the military junta and dictatorship. The death toll came to at least 24, and as many as 1,000 people were arrested. June 16, 1976, Orlando Stadium, South Africa The South African Department of Education decreed that Afrikaans was to be used in schools. Many African teachers couldnt even speak Afrikaans, and students found their grades declining. Thousands of students walked out of their classrooms and headed for the Orlando Stadium, to take part in a rally planned by the Soweto Students Representative Councils (SSRC) Action Committee. April 11, 1968 West Germany Students protest the shooting of anarchist-leaning leader Rudi Dutschke by fascist Josef Bachmann, and the Bild newspapers message to eliminate the troublemakers. 50,000 young people took to the streets and prevented the delivery of the newspaper. Police fought back with water cannons and officers on horseback, arresting over 180 students. May 1968, France Twenty-two percent of the entire working population went on strike, demanding concessions for their working conditions, and bringing the capitalist government to the verge of collapse. April 21, 1989, Tiananmen Square, China Set against a backdrop of rapid economic development and social changes in post Mao-era China, the protests reflected anxieties about the countrys future. Students called for democracy, greater accountability, freedom of the press, and freedom of speech. Party authorities declared martial law on May 20, and mobilised as many as 300,000 troops to Beijing. Jallikattu Jaunt The major demand was the promulgation of the ordinance for the removal of bulls from the list of performing animals in the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (PCA) Act 1990, Delhi When the VP Singh government announced its decision to implement the Mandal Commission report, spontaneous protests erupted. Students of higher castes organised agitations against the implementation of the report. The protests were spontaneous and had no specific organisers. It began at Marina Beach in Chennai along with sit-ins at large grounds across Tamil Nadu. The protests were initially formed by members of the student community across the state which was further Strengthened by people from various sections such as IT professionals who later joined in. The lack of leadership was seen as a stumbling block for the State Government because it could not call people for talks. The protests were largely peaceful.January 2016, India What kicked up a political storm was the suicide committed by a Dalit student, Rohith Vemula, in a hostel room on January 17, 2016. Hundreds of students from universities across India participated in a Justice for Rohith Vemula protest rally and expressed solidarity with the students of the University of Hyderabad by converging at the campus. January 2017, Chennai The chief motivation of the protest was against the Supreme Courts order to ban Jallikattu, a traditional Tamil bull-taming sport. The sport was banned by the Supreme Court in a decision citing animal cruelty. Several apolitical groups, organised largely via social media, conducted a protest at Marina Beach in Chennai to revoke the ban on Jallikattu and soon gained momentum all over Tamil Nadu. 2006, India It was the second major protest against the reservation system. In 2006, widespread protests took place in India to oppose the decision of the Congress-led UPA government to implement reservations for OBCs in both central and private higher education institutes. Students and doctors belonging to upper castes disregarded this move as discriminatory. August 2011, Chile Chilean students rejected President Sebastian Pineras proposed education reforms. The main goal of these massive strikes was to increase funding for public education. March 11, 2013, Marina beach, Chennai The war crimes committed by the army against Tamils in Sri Lanka during the Civil War has been a sensitive issue for the Tamil community. Students in Tamil Nadu were seen holding a series of protests and agitations led by the Students Federation for Freedom of Tamil Eelam. The protesters had only one demand from the Government of India: vote in support of the UN resolution for an independent international investigation against alleged war crimes in Sri Lanka. The agitations, which started on March 11, 2013, saw an ugly turn after Tamil Nadu police arrested students of Loyola College who were fasting. November 14, 1973, Athens, Greece When their strike on November 14, 1973 elicited no response, students from Athens Polytechnic barricaded themselves inside the university, building a radio station using supplies from a laboratory. They broadcast across Athens, urging the people of Greece to join them in their stand against the military junta and dictatorship. The death toll came to at least 24, and as many as 1,000 people were arrested. June 16, 1976, Orlando Stadium, South Africa The South African Department of Education decreed that Afrikaans was to be used in schools. Many African teachers couldnt even speak Afrikaans, and students found their grades declining. Thousands of students walked out of their classrooms and headed for the Orlando Stadium, to take part in a rally planned by the Soweto Students Representative Councils (SSRC) Action Committee. April 11, 1968 West Germany Students protest the shooting of anarchist-leaning leader Rudi Dutschke by fascist Josef Bachmann, and the Bild newspapers message to eliminate the troublemakers. 50,000 young people took to the streets and prevented the delivery of the newspaper. Police fought back with water cannons and officers on horseback, arresting over 180 students. May 1968, France Twenty-two percent of the entire working population went on strike, demanding concessions for their working conditions, and bringing the capitalist government to the verge of collapse. April 21, 1989, Tiananmen Square, China Set against a backdrop of rapid economic development and social changes in post Mao-era China, the protests reflected anxieties about the countrys future. Students called for democracy, greater accountability, freedom of the press, and freedom of speech. Party authorities declared martial law on May 20, and mobilised as many as 300,000 troops to Beijing. S Subhakeerthana By Express News Service CHENNAI:Hari Viswanaths 83-minute film Radiopetti won many international honours, but couldnt make it to theatres. After approaching many leading producers and distributors in Ktown for the past 18 months, he finally decided to release it on Netflix recently. Though independent filmmakers are increasing, we find it difficult to market our products. Without the minimum guarantee of returns, neither theatres nor individuals are buying the films, says Hari, who has written, directed and co-produced Radiopetti, which narrates the relationship between an old man and his radio. director Hari Viswanath When his film won an award at the Busan International Film Festival, his hopes were high. He was desperate to get it released in theatres. Thats when he realised Making films is easy, whereas, releasing them isnt. To his disappointment, every time he met a producer, he was told that his movie was like Balu Mahendras Veedu. Class-a iruku padam; aana inga odadhu (Film is classy but it wont run here). This isnt cut-out for our audience is what most of them had told me, he avers, The director is a big fan of festival kind of films. He thinks such avenues encourage filmmakers who push the barriers of cinema, explore a larger connection to the space around him. More producers should invest in independent cinema, so that there is a sustainable movie-production atmosphere, he adds. Citing Thailand and Indonesia as examples, he elaborates how the scene is healthier abroad. We need more theatres to show art films and have new avenues for screening films, he shares. He opines that digital platforms definitely benefit filmmakers. Youngsters are churning out films one after the other, seeking ways to reach out to viewers. The audiences who subscribe to digital platforms are less, but Netflix offers subtitles as well. We (filmmakers) should look at it as creating more access and viewership rather than generating revenue. Let people get used to it first, he smiles. Radiopetti has no comedy tracks or dance sequences. It was shot in 15 days on a budget of less than `1 crore. Having a mix of true experiences and fiction, the story, set in Puducherry, deals with how senior citizens are unable to cope with the fast-paced world of today. While stage artiste Lakshmanan has played the lead role of the old man, Nivas Adithan of Kaaka Muttai (2015) fame, plays his son. Richard Ford, a British music composer, has worked on music. Up next, hes working on a realistic feel-good film. Id not say its a commercial movie, but hey... wait, it has songs. So, naturally it becomes one! he laughs. CHENNAI:Hari Viswanaths 83-minute film Radiopetti won many international honours, but couldnt make it to theatres. After approaching many leading producers and distributors in Ktown for the past 18 months, he finally decided to release it on Netflix recently. Though independent filmmakers are increasing, we find it difficult to market our products. Without the minimum guarantee of returns, neither theatres nor individuals are buying the films, says Hari, who has written, directed and co-produced Radiopetti, which narrates the relationship between an old man and his radio. director Hari ViswanathWhen his film won an award at the Busan International Film Festival, his hopes were high. He was desperate to get it released in theatres. Thats when he realised Making films is easy, whereas, releasing them isnt. To his disappointment, every time he met a producer, he was told that his movie was like Balu Mahendras Veedu. Class-a iruku padam; aana inga odadhu (Film is classy but it wont run here). This isnt cut-out for our audience is what most of them had told me, he avers, The director is a big fan of festival kind of films. He thinks such avenues encourage filmmakers who push the barriers of cinema, explore a larger connection to the space around him. More producers should invest in independent cinema, so that there is a sustainable movie-production atmosphere, he adds. Citing Thailand and Indonesia as examples, he elaborates how the scene is healthier abroad. We need more theatres to show art films and have new avenues for screening films, he shares. He opines that digital platforms definitely benefit filmmakers. Youngsters are churning out films one after the other, seeking ways to reach out to viewers. The audiences who subscribe to digital platforms are less, but Netflix offers subtitles as well. We (filmmakers) should look at it as creating more access and viewership rather than generating revenue. Let people get used to it first, he smiles. Radiopetti has no comedy tracks or dance sequences. It was shot in 15 days on a budget of less than `1 crore. Having a mix of true experiences and fiction, the story, set in Puducherry, deals with how senior citizens are unable to cope with the fast-paced world of today. While stage artiste Lakshmanan has played the lead role of the old man, Nivas Adithan of Kaaka Muttai (2015) fame, plays his son. Richard Ford, a British music composer, has worked on music. Up next, hes working on a realistic feel-good film. Id not say its a commercial movie, but hey... wait, it has songs. So, naturally it becomes one! he laughs. Express News Service PATIALA: While Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh and the Akali Dals J J Singh, the former Army chief, square off in Patiala, it is really their families that are doing all the toil. With Captain Amarinder required to barnstorm the entire state for the Congress, his wife Preneet Kaur, an MLA herself, is leading the campaign in Patiala along with her daughter Jaya Inder Kaur and granddaughter Seherinder Kaur. And in Lambi, where the Congress chief ministerial candidate is taking on Punjabs chief minister Parkash Singh Badal, it is son Raninder Singh who is putting in the shift. Gen J J Singhs family is doing its bit for him too.His wife Anupama Kaur, daughter Urvashi, a fashion designer, and son Vivek Pal Singh are on the campaign trail as well. Preneet Kaurs day starts early and ends late. She meets people at their Moti Bagh Palace residence till 10.30 am after which she ventures out on a door-to-door campaign accompanied by 21-year-old Seherinder Kaur, who is just back home from a diploma from Kodaikanal International School. Preneet Kaur is surprised by her granddaughters intensity. I never thought that she will campaign so passionately for her Dadaji. She knows the issues, be it the drug menace, unemployment, farmerss distress, and so on. Seherinder is confident that Dadaji will win Patiala. After all its a family bastion. Unemployment is a big issue here besides drugs, she says. In the rival camp, Gen J J Singhs family are out in full strength. While the retired Army chief travels on the stump with his trusted lieutenants, his wife Anupama Kaur, campaigns alone. Being the wife of an Army officer, I have interacted with women from all sections of society and I know the problems of the common man, she says. The generals son Vivek Pal Singh is a local councilman in Normany, France, where he lives. The politics here and in France are totally different as there is so much disparity in income and education in India unlike France, he says. Campaigning there is very easy as the population is less compared to India, says Vivek. But the people here are warm. Ove in Lambi, Capt Amarinder Singhs campaign is being led by his politically savvy son Raninder Singh. Usually dressed in a white kurta-pyjama, an olive green pullover and a matching turban, he has covered 64 of the 74 villages in the constituency. PATIALA: While Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh and the Akali Dals J J Singh, the former Army chief, square off in Patiala, it is really their families that are doing all the toil. With Captain Amarinder required to barnstorm the entire state for the Congress, his wife Preneet Kaur, an MLA herself, is leading the campaign in Patiala along with her daughter Jaya Inder Kaur and granddaughter Seherinder Kaur. And in Lambi, where the Congress chief ministerial candidate is taking on Punjabs chief minister Parkash Singh Badal, it is son Raninder Singh who is putting in the shift. Gen J J Singhs family is doing its bit for him too.His wife Anupama Kaur, daughter Urvashi, a fashion designer, and son Vivek Pal Singh are on the campaign trail as well. Preneet Kaurs day starts early and ends late. She meets people at their Moti Bagh Palace residence till 10.30 am after which she ventures out on a door-to-door campaign accompanied by 21-year-old Seherinder Kaur, who is just back home from a diploma from Kodaikanal International School. Preneet Kaur is surprised by her granddaughters intensity. I never thought that she will campaign so passionately for her Dadaji. She knows the issues, be it the drug menace, unemployment, farmerss distress, and so on. Seherinder is confident that Dadaji will win Patiala. After all its a family bastion. Unemployment is a big issue here besides drugs, she says. In the rival camp, Gen J J Singhs family are out in full strength. While the retired Army chief travels on the stump with his trusted lieutenants, his wife Anupama Kaur, campaigns alone. Being the wife of an Army officer, I have interacted with women from all sections of society and I know the problems of the common man, she says. The generals son Vivek Pal Singh is a local councilman in Normany, France, where he lives. The politics here and in France are totally different as there is so much disparity in income and education in India unlike France, he says. Campaigning there is very easy as the population is less compared to India, says Vivek. But the people here are warm. Ove in Lambi, Capt Amarinder Singhs campaign is being led by his politically savvy son Raninder Singh. Usually dressed in a white kurta-pyjama, an olive green pullover and a matching turban, he has covered 64 of the 74 villages in the constituency. By ANI PUNE: In an official statement, Infosys on the murder of their 25-year-old woman employee said they are focused on assisting the police with the investigation and providing all possible support to the deceased family. Saddened and shocked at unfortunate incident of the loss of our colleague. Our prayers and sympathies are with our employee's family and friends, Infosys said in a statement. Focused on assisting police with the investigation and providing all possible support to her family, the statement added. A 25-year-old woman software engineer from Kerala, who worked with Infosys, was found murdered at the software firm's Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park office in the Hinjawadi area of Pune yesterday. She had allegedly been strangled to death by an unidentified person. A security guard working at the office has been detained by the police in connection with the case. While cops are yet to ascertain what led to her murder, they have zeroed down on the prime suspect Bhaben Saikia, a 26-year-old from Assam who worked as a watchman in the office. PUNE: In an official statement, Infosys on the murder of their 25-year-old woman employee said they are focused on assisting the police with the investigation and providing all possible support to the deceased family. Saddened and shocked at unfortunate incident of the loss of our colleague. Our prayers and sympathies are with our employee's family and friends, Infosys said in a statement. Focused on assisting police with the investigation and providing all possible support to her family, the statement added. A 25-year-old woman software engineer from Kerala, who worked with Infosys, was found murdered at the software firm's Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park office in the Hinjawadi area of Pune yesterday. She had allegedly been strangled to death by an unidentified person. A security guard working at the office has been detained by the police in connection with the case. While cops are yet to ascertain what led to her murder, they have zeroed down on the prime suspect Bhaben Saikia, a 26-year-old from Assam who worked as a watchman in the office. By Express News Service MUMBAI: K Rasila Raju, the 23-year-old systems engineer working at Infosys in Pune, was killed for objecting to staring and stalking by the security guard, the police have said. She was strangled to death with a computer cable at her workstation in Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park in Hinjawadi on Sunday evening. Bhaben Sailcia, a 26-year-old from Assam who worked as a watchman in the office, was arrested by the police from Mumbai on Monday morning. Rasila had warned Bhaben over stalking a few days ago, angered by which he was searching for an opportunity to teach her a lesson, the police told the Express. Bhaben's shift got over at 6.30 pm and he left the campus like any other day. He went to his house, packed his bag and left for Mumbai in a bid to escape, the police said. Cops were able to ascertain that Bhaben was the only one who had accessed the room where she was sitting alone and working. She had come to work at 2 pm and was to work till 11 pm. Police said that she was killed at around 6.30 pm but the murder came to light only at around 8 pm when a security guard found her body lying on the floor in the conference room. Her manager was trying to get in touch with Rasila but after around 5.30 pm she did not respond to any call. After trying to call her for some time, the manager contacted security personnel and asked them to check if Rasila was at her desk. When the security guard came to her desk, he spotted Rasila's body lying on the floor, police sources said. Infosys released a statement on Monday, saying it is doing all it can to help police with their investigation. By the time cops reached the crime scene it was around 8.30 pm. It took them a couple of hours to figure from access codes to the room and CCTV footage of the building. They were able to track the watchman's mobile number and trace his movements constantly. By around 3 am a team of cops from Hinjewadi was able to nab Bhaben from CST from where he was preparing to head to his hometown in Assam. MUMBAI: K Rasila Raju, the 23-year-old systems engineer working at Infosys in Pune, was killed for objecting to staring and stalking by the security guard, the police have said. She was strangled to death with a computer cable at her workstation in Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park in Hinjawadi on Sunday evening. Bhaben Sailcia, a 26-year-old from Assam who worked as a watchman in the office, was arrested by the police from Mumbai on Monday morning. Rasila had warned Bhaben over stalking a few days ago, angered by which he was searching for an opportunity to teach her a lesson, the police told the Express. Bhaben's shift got over at 6.30 pm and he left the campus like any other day. He went to his house, packed his bag and left for Mumbai in a bid to escape, the police said. Cops were able to ascertain that Bhaben was the only one who had accessed the room where she was sitting alone and working. She had come to work at 2 pm and was to work till 11 pm. Police said that she was killed at around 6.30 pm but the murder came to light only at around 8 pm when a security guard found her body lying on the floor in the conference room. Her manager was trying to get in touch with Rasila but after around 5.30 pm she did not respond to any call. After trying to call her for some time, the manager contacted security personnel and asked them to check if Rasila was at her desk. When the security guard came to her desk, he spotted Rasila's body lying on the floor, police sources said. Infosys released a statement on Monday, saying it is doing all it can to help police with their investigation. By the time cops reached the crime scene it was around 8.30 pm. It took them a couple of hours to figure from access codes to the room and CCTV footage of the building. They were able to track the watchman's mobile number and trace his movements constantly. By around 3 am a team of cops from Hinjewadi was able to nab Bhaben from CST from where he was preparing to head to his hometown in Assam. Santwana Bhattacharya By Express News Service After the embrace The one-line condemnation for use of religion to justify, sustain and sponsor terrorism against other countries by States (to be read as Pakistan) in the joint statement issued by the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi was no doubt a major breakthrough for New Delhi. But Abu Dhabi refrained from committing itself to any concrete steps against Indias Most Wanted, Dawood Ibrahim. In fact, Ambassador Ahmed Al Banna went out of his way to deny his government had raided Dawoods alleged multi-crore assets in the UAE. Nor was there much progress on the National Infrastructure Investment Fund, intended to mobilise an estimated $75 billion for long-term infra-projects. It seems Indias inability to create an adequate legal framework for the special purpose vehicle to the satisfaction of the UAE officials came in the way of a follow-up on the 2016 MoU between the two countries. Modis trusted man Trust factor is touted as one of the prime reasons why S Jaishankar was given a one-year extension as Foreign Secretary. Apart from his excellent working relations with the Prime Ministers core team, inclusive of NSA Ajit Doval, Jaishankar has handled the Trump transition rather well. In short, no replacement to him could be found. However, the FS will have his work cut out slowly steering India off from SAARC towards BIMSTEC and revisiting the MEA architecture. Already two divisions have been merged, and over two dozen top vacancies like Secretary (West), Secretary (Economic Relations), ICCR chief (to retire in May) have to be filled. Also, envoy appointments to Nepal, Indonesia, Geneva and Italy are pending. On SAARC too, the PM wants India to move towards a wholesale suspension of the framework in its present shape to avoid further embarrassment from Pakistan. The Priyanka puzzle Despite the SP-Congress alliance and the Akhilesh Yadav-Rahul Gandhi press meet and roadshow in Lucknow, the wrangle over assembly seats in the Amethi-Rae Bareli belt continues. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, the newly nominated star campaigner, has been flooded by phone calls from Congress candidates who are refusing to budge. The SP is yet to withdraw a single candidate from the Gandhi family bastion. So the moot point now is, who will Priyanka campaign for? Shes still reluctant to step out of the family borough, but cannot be campaigning for Akhileshs candidates! Last-minute panic Kerala Governor P Sathasivam nearly derailed the jallikattu ordinance by pointing out a few lacunae in it to his Tamil Nadu counterpart, C Vidyasagar Rao, sending the CMO, the PMO and the Presidents Office into a last-minute tizzy. The former CJI, it seems, conveyed to Rao that legal hurdles may arise if the wording of the ordinance was not changed. Such was the apprehension given Sathasivams legal/judicial background that AIADMK office-bearers deleted their victory tweets within minutes of posting. However, all was sorted out in due course. Hindi-Russi bhai bhai Not many know or remember that the longest-serving Russian diplomat in New Delhi, Alexander Kadakin, an Indophile, had first come here as a correspondent of the Soviet mouthpiece, Pravda. An association that at one point raised suspicion of his links with KGB. However, thanks to his Hindi skills, Kadakin picked up a wide circle of friends here. Prime Minister Modi in his condolences message to Kadakins family mentioned his language skills and love for India. The author is Political Editor of TNIE. Email: santwana@newindianexpress.com After the embrace The one-line condemnation for use of religion to justify, sustain and sponsor terrorism against other countries by States (to be read as Pakistan) in the joint statement issued by the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi was no doubt a major breakthrough for New Delhi. But Abu Dhabi refrained from committing itself to any concrete steps against Indias Most Wanted, Dawood Ibrahim. In fact, Ambassador Ahmed Al Banna went out of his way to deny his government had raided Dawoods alleged multi-crore assets in the UAE. Nor was there much progress on the National Infrastructure Investment Fund, intended to mobilise an estimated $75 billion for long-term infra-projects. It seems Indias inability to create an adequate legal framework for the special purpose vehicle to the satisfaction of the UAE officials came in the way of a follow-up on the 2016 MoU between the two countries. Modis trusted man Trust factor is touted as one of the prime reasons why S Jaishankar was given a one-year extension as Foreign Secretary. Apart from his excellent working relations with the Prime Ministers core team, inclusive of NSA Ajit Doval, Jaishankar has handled the Trump transition rather well. In short, no replacement to him could be found. However, the FS will have his work cut out slowly steering India off from SAARC towards BIMSTEC and revisiting the MEA architecture. Already two divisions have been merged, and over two dozen top vacancies like Secretary (West), Secretary (Economic Relations), ICCR chief (to retire in May) have to be filled. Also, envoy appointments to Nepal, Indonesia, Geneva and Italy are pending. On SAARC too, the PM wants India to move towards a wholesale suspension of the framework in its present shape to avoid further embarrassment from Pakistan. The Priyanka puzzle Despite the SP-Congress alliance and the Akhilesh Yadav-Rahul Gandhi press meet and roadshow in Lucknow, the wrangle over assembly seats in the Amethi-Rae Bareli belt continues. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, the newly nominated star campaigner, has been flooded by phone calls from Congress candidates who are refusing to budge. The SP is yet to withdraw a single candidate from the Gandhi family bastion. So the moot point now is, who will Priyanka campaign for? Shes still reluctant to step out of the family borough, but cannot be campaigning for Akhileshs candidates! Last-minute panic Kerala Governor P Sathasivam nearly derailed the jallikattu ordinance by pointing out a few lacunae in it to his Tamil Nadu counterpart, C Vidyasagar Rao, sending the CMO, the PMO and the Presidents Office into a last-minute tizzy. The former CJI, it seems, conveyed to Rao that legal hurdles may arise if the wording of the ordinance was not changed. Such was the apprehension given Sathasivams legal/judicial background that AIADMK office-bearers deleted their victory tweets within minutes of posting. However, all was sorted out in due course. Hindi-Russi bhai bhai Not many know or remember that the longest-serving Russian diplomat in New Delhi, Alexander Kadakin, an Indophile, had first come here as a correspondent of the Soviet mouthpiece, Pravda. An association that at one point raised suspicion of his links with KGB. However, thanks to his Hindi skills, Kadakin picked up a wide circle of friends here. Prime Minister Modi in his condolences message to Kadakins family mentioned his language skills and love for India. The author is Political Editor of TNIE. Email: santwana@newindianexpress.com Prasanta Mazumdar By Express News Service GUWAHATI: On a high after winning Assam by way of a vote and Arunachal by way of political manoeuvring, the BJP has now set its sights on the Manipur election (March 4 and 8) in pursuit of achieving a Congress-mukt Northeast. Going into the polls, the party is in a good place. It won the 2014 election in Assam and won power in Arunachal when chief minister Pema Khandu and most of his Peoples Party of Arunachal (PPA) MLAs merged with the BJP in December, effectively making it a saffron party government. The party has four MLAs in Nagaland and is a constituent of the ruling Democratic Alliance of Nagaland. In Manipur, it had two MLAs in the outgoing Assembly but one defected to the Congress last year. It is only in Left-ruled Tripura and Congress-ruled Meghalaya and Mizoram that the party is yet to open its account. In Manipur, the party is faced with an Assam-like situation. The Congress has been in office there for 15 years, and anti-incumbency is evident. And lately, tribal divisions have come to the fore. But while there is an opportunity for the BJP, there is also a challenge. In Assam, the BJP ousted Tarun Gogois 15-year Congress government by playing the Assamese identity card. Cashing in on media speculation that the Congress was hand in glove with the All India United Democratic Front in protecting the interests of illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, the BJP went to the people with an appeal to save the Assamese culture, language and land. It helped: the partys tally in the Assembly rose from five seats in 2011 to 60 in 2016. In Manipur now, the situation is tailor-made for the BJP. The ethnic divide between tribal Nagas, who are Christians, and the predominantly Hindu Meiteis (Manipuris) has widened after the Okram Ibobi Singh government created seven new districts and the United Naga Council launched a blockade of two national highways. In carving out new district the Ibobi government of the Congress was giving the Kukis what they had been demanding for years, a Sadar Hills district. But it decision ruffled the feathers of the Nagas, who claim Sadar Hills is their ancestral homeland. The BJP is happy fishing in these waters. Its spokesperson N Biren told New Indian Express, The Congress is trying to divide it by making it an issue between Kukis-Meiteis and Nagas. That is Ibobis plan. However, we wont allow this to happen. We want a united Manipur. The BJP got a shot in its arms following the defection of five Congress MLAs -- Biren being one of them -- to its side in recent months. All of them have been given BJP tickets. Weve opened the gateway to the Northeast by winning Assam. We will capture the rest of the states in the region one by one, BJP leader Mahendra Singh asserted. GUWAHATI: On a high after winning Assam by way of a vote and Arunachal by way of political manoeuvring, the BJP has now set its sights on the Manipur election (March 4 and 8) in pursuit of achieving a Congress-mukt Northeast. Going into the polls, the party is in a good place. It won the 2014 election in Assam and won power in Arunachal when chief minister Pema Khandu and most of his Peoples Party of Arunachal (PPA) MLAs merged with the BJP in December, effectively making it a saffron party government. The party has four MLAs in Nagaland and is a constituent of the ruling Democratic Alliance of Nagaland. In Manipur, it had two MLAs in the outgoing Assembly but one defected to the Congress last year. It is only in Left-ruled Tripura and Congress-ruled Meghalaya and Mizoram that the party is yet to open its account. In Manipur, the party is faced with an Assam-like situation. The Congress has been in office there for 15 years, and anti-incumbency is evident. And lately, tribal divisions have come to the fore. But while there is an opportunity for the BJP, there is also a challenge. In Assam, the BJP ousted Tarun Gogois 15-year Congress government by playing the Assamese identity card. Cashing in on media speculation that the Congress was hand in glove with the All India United Democratic Front in protecting the interests of illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, the BJP went to the people with an appeal to save the Assamese culture, language and land. It helped: the partys tally in the Assembly rose from five seats in 2011 to 60 in 2016. In Manipur now, the situation is tailor-made for the BJP. The ethnic divide between tribal Nagas, who are Christians, and the predominantly Hindu Meiteis (Manipuris) has widened after the Okram Ibobi Singh government created seven new districts and the United Naga Council launched a blockade of two national highways. In carving out new district the Ibobi government of the Congress was giving the Kukis what they had been demanding for years, a Sadar Hills district. But it decision ruffled the feathers of the Nagas, who claim Sadar Hills is their ancestral homeland. The BJP is happy fishing in these waters. Its spokesperson N Biren told New Indian Express, The Congress is trying to divide it by making it an issue between Kukis-Meiteis and Nagas. That is Ibobis plan. However, we wont allow this to happen. We want a united Manipur. The BJP got a shot in its arms following the defection of five Congress MLAs -- Biren being one of them -- to its side in recent months. All of them have been given BJP tickets. Weve opened the gateway to the Northeast by winning Assam. We will capture the rest of the states in the region one by one, BJP leader Mahendra Singh asserted. By PTI NEW DELHI/ ISLAMABAD: Amidst chill in Indo-Pak ties, Pakistan has declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend South Asian Speakers' Summit to be held next month. "Pakistan and Myanmar which were among the countries in the South Asian nations invited to the Speakers' meet in Indore on February 18-19 have declined the invitation," official sources in New Delhi said. India had invited the Speaker of the National Assembly of Pakistan, Sardar Auaz Sadiq, for the regional summit. In Islamabad, a senior official said Sadiq would not be able to participate in the summit due to crucial national engagements. The official told PTI that the schedule of the summit clashes with an important session of the National Assembly, the lower house of parliament. "The Speaker would be needed to chair the crucial session and we have already conveyed this to India," the official said. The Summit, which is primarily an IPU initiative and not a SAARC activity, will be attended by Speakers of Parliament from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka among other countries, the sources said. Significantly, in 2015, India had boycotted a Commonwealth Parliamentary Union (CPU) meeting in Islamabad to protest against Pakistan's decision to not invite the Speaker of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. The discussions during the Speakers' Summit on achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will update the participants on implementation of the SDGs in their region and globally. Special emphasis will be laid on sharing experiences and increasing understanding about how parliaments in the region institutionalise the global goals, capture the synergies and build coherence at the policy level, IPU said on its website NEW DELHI/ ISLAMABAD: Amidst chill in Indo-Pak ties, Pakistan has declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend South Asian Speakers' Summit to be held next month. "Pakistan and Myanmar which were among the countries in the South Asian nations invited to the Speakers' meet in Indore on February 18-19 have declined the invitation," official sources in New Delhi said. India had invited the Speaker of the National Assembly of Pakistan, Sardar Auaz Sadiq, for the regional summit. In Islamabad, a senior official said Sadiq would not be able to participate in the summit due to crucial national engagements. The official told PTI that the schedule of the summit clashes with an important session of the National Assembly, the lower house of parliament. "The Speaker would be needed to chair the crucial session and we have already conveyed this to India," the official said. The Summit, which is primarily an IPU initiative and not a SAARC activity, will be attended by Speakers of Parliament from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka among other countries, the sources said. Significantly, in 2015, India had boycotted a Commonwealth Parliamentary Union (CPU) meeting in Islamabad to protest against Pakistan's decision to not invite the Speaker of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. The discussions during the Speakers' Summit on achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will update the participants on implementation of the SDGs in their region and globally. Special emphasis will be laid on sharing experiences and increasing understanding about how parliaments in the region institutionalise the global goals, capture the synergies and build coherence at the policy level, IPU said on its website By PTI NEW DELHI: Trinamool Congress, which is angry over the arrest of its two MPs by CBI in connection with the chit fund scam, will not attend Parliament on February 1 when the Budget is presented, citing Saraswati Puja on that day as the reason. Trinamool will also not attend the all-party meeting convened by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan this evening ahead of the Budget session of Parliament beginning tomorrow. "Trinamool will not attend Parliament on February 1 because of Saraswati Puja which is a big day in Bengal," party leader and MP Derek O'Brien told PTI. He said that on Saraswati Puja, day, there is a custom of keeping away from work and not even touching the tools. "Saraswati Puja is beyond a religious festival. It is a socio-cultural festival of Bengal," he added. The budget will be presented by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday. About not attending this evening's all-party meeting, he said this was because Trinamool supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had called a meeting of party MPs for today "10 days back". Asked whether the party was "boycotting" these proceedings or just skipping, he replied, "It is open for your interpretation". Trinamool Congress has been angry over the arrest of its two MPs Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Tapas Pal by CBI in connection with the Rose Valley Group chit fund scam. NEW DELHI: Trinamool Congress, which is angry over the arrest of its two MPs by CBI in connection with the chit fund scam, will not attend Parliament on February 1 when the Budget is presented, citing Saraswati Puja on that day as the reason. Trinamool will also not attend the all-party meeting convened by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan this evening ahead of the Budget session of Parliament beginning tomorrow. "Trinamool will not attend Parliament on February 1 because of Saraswati Puja which is a big day in Bengal," party leader and MP Derek O'Brien told PTI. He said that on Saraswati Puja, day, there is a custom of keeping away from work and not even touching the tools. "Saraswati Puja is beyond a religious festival. It is a socio-cultural festival of Bengal," he added. The budget will be presented by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday. About not attending this evening's all-party meeting, he said this was because Trinamool supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had called a meeting of party MPs for today "10 days back". Asked whether the party was "boycotting" these proceedings or just skipping, he replied, "It is open for your interpretation". Trinamool Congress has been angry over the arrest of its two MPs Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Tapas Pal by CBI in connection with the Rose Valley Group chit fund scam. Manish Anand By Express News Service ALIGARH: Even while the Utter Pradesh Assembly elections are seen as the semi-final for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, there appears no fever-pitched campaigning on the ground as is the usual case in the Hindi heartland in the past. The long drawn out family battle in the Mulayam Singh Yadav clan for political supremacy along with strict norms imposed by the Election Commission appear to have dried the colour of electioneering, besides silencing the blaring noise in the first phase of polling for 73 constituencies scheduled for February 11. "It's hard to believe that we have to vote for a candidate in another 10 days. No candidate has come to my locality yet for any campaigning. The festivity associated with elections is hardly visible. I have been a traditional Congress voter, but I don't yet know if there is any candidate from my favourite party for the Aligarh (town) seat," said Noor Bano, a shopkeeper outside a city mosque. The walls boast of commercial advertisements with no evidence of any posters of any candidates of political parties. The roads are neither littered with pamphlets of candidates. There are hardly any vans blaring out the slogans of any political parties in any of the districts heading for the first phase of elections. Even the hoardings hardly belong to any political outfits. "The Election Commission has come out with strict norms for pasting of posters on walls and putting up hoardings, besides taking out the vans for canvassing. Each candidate has to apply at the administration for such activities. But it has been seen that the district electoral officials are close-fisted in giving approvals," said Dilip Yadav, a political observer in Mathura, who added that demonetisation has also rendered the political parties and candidates cashless, which in turn is affecting the campaigns. Incidentally, the hoardings of the district electoral officials exhorting the voters to exercise their respective franchise are common place. Even the vans of the Election Commission with names printed of senior officials are regularly seen in the poll-bound areas. With the family feud in the Samajwadi Party coming to an end recently and the party announcing names of candidates relatively later, the usual din and bustle have taken a back seat. We are closely following media reports to keep a tab on elections. If not for the media, we may not even know the names of candidates," said Sayed Kaleem of Kabir Colony in Aligarh. ALIGARH: Even while the Utter Pradesh Assembly elections are seen as the semi-final for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, there appears no fever-pitched campaigning on the ground as is the usual case in the Hindi heartland in the past. The long drawn out family battle in the Mulayam Singh Yadav clan for political supremacy along with strict norms imposed by the Election Commission appear to have dried the colour of electioneering, besides silencing the blaring noise in the first phase of polling for 73 constituencies scheduled for February 11. "It's hard to believe that we have to vote for a candidate in another 10 days. No candidate has come to my locality yet for any campaigning. The festivity associated with elections is hardly visible. I have been a traditional Congress voter, but I don't yet know if there is any candidate from my favourite party for the Aligarh (town) seat," said Noor Bano, a shopkeeper outside a city mosque. The walls boast of commercial advertisements with no evidence of any posters of any candidates of political parties. The roads are neither littered with pamphlets of candidates. There are hardly any vans blaring out the slogans of any political parties in any of the districts heading for the first phase of elections. Even the hoardings hardly belong to any political outfits. "The Election Commission has come out with strict norms for pasting of posters on walls and putting up hoardings, besides taking out the vans for canvassing. Each candidate has to apply at the administration for such activities. But it has been seen that the district electoral officials are close-fisted in giving approvals," said Dilip Yadav, a political observer in Mathura, who added that demonetisation has also rendered the political parties and candidates cashless, which in turn is affecting the campaigns. Incidentally, the hoardings of the district electoral officials exhorting the voters to exercise their respective franchise are common place. Even the vans of the Election Commission with names printed of senior officials are regularly seen in the poll-bound areas. With the family feud in the Samajwadi Party coming to an end recently and the party announcing names of candidates relatively later, the usual din and bustle have taken a back seat. We are closely following media reports to keep a tab on elections. If not for the media, we may not even know the names of candidates," said Sayed Kaleem of Kabir Colony in Aligarh. By PTI CUTTACK: A minor girl was allegedly raped by a boy who befriended her on Facebook, police said. The girl, a native of Jaipur, was in touch with the minor boy through social media for the last six months. The accused asked her to come to the city and she arrived here on January 26, police said. "The boy took her to a rented house in Badambadi area. They stayed there for three days. But the boy went missing on January 29," an FIR registered on the basis of a complaint filed by NGO Childline that traced the boy said. The boy has been arrested on charges of "sexual assault under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offence Act". CUTTACK: A minor girl was allegedly raped by a boy who befriended her on Facebook, police said. The girl, a native of Jaipur, was in touch with the minor boy through social media for the last six months. The accused asked her to come to the city and she arrived here on January 26, police said. "The boy took her to a rented house in Badambadi area. They stayed there for three days. But the boy went missing on January 29," an FIR registered on the basis of a complaint filed by NGO Childline that traced the boy said. The boy has been arrested on charges of "sexual assault under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offence Act". Gautam Pingle By Describing the character of an entire group of people is difficult. And, it is almost impossible to describe the character of Hindusdivided by region, language, caste and sect. Nonetheless, foreign observers have attempted the task based on their personal experience. The following is an account of some of these over time. Ktesias, the Greek Physician of Persian King Artaxerxes [404-358 BC] has a special chapter on the justice of the Hindus in his Indica. Megasthenes [c.350c.290 BC] states thefts were extremely rare, and the people honoured truth and virtue. Arrian [c.86-160 AD] on officials: They oversee what goes on in the country or towns, and report everything to the king, where the people have a king, and to the magistrates, where the people are self-governed, and it is against the use and wont of these to give a false report; but indeed no Hindu is accused of lying. The Chinese Buddhist Hiuen-Tsiang, who travelled in India between 629 and 645 AD made nearly 30 specific comments on the disposition, nature and manners of the people of the various regions he visited. We can put these comments into five groups. The first group: active and impetuous; lively and courageous; brave, true and upright; brave and impetuous; hard and fierce; regard justice and bravery; simple and honest, resolute and fierce, ardent and courageous. The second: timid and soft; soft and agreeable; docile and virtuous; soft and complacent ... contended and peaceful; light and frivolous, weak, pusillanimous. The third: sincere and truthful (mentioned three times); pure and honest and honest and sincere. The fourth described many negative qualities but combined them with positive ones: soft and effeminate, and somewhat sly and crafty; fierce and value highly the quality of courage, given to deceit; no refinement; hard and rough ... cold and insincere. The fifth group described the unpleasant elements: rough and rude; quick and violent; savage kind; violent and headstrong; quick and hasty Marco Polo [1254-1324] says: ... these Abraiaman [of Mysore] are the best merchants in the world, and the most truthful, for they would not tell a lie for anything on earth. Muslim chroniclers also wrote of their Hindu subjects. Idrisi, in his Geography [11th century] summed up his opinion of Hindus: The Hindus are naturally inclined to justice, and never depart from it in their action. Their good faith, honesty, and fidelity to their engagements are well known, and they are so famous for these qualities that people flock to their country from every side. In the 13th century, Shems-ed-din Abu Abdullah [13201380] (quotes Bedi ezr Zenan): The Hindus are innumerable, like grains of sand, free from all deceit and violence. They fear neither death nor life.[36] In the 16th century, Akbars Minister, Abul Fazl [15511602] states: The Hindus are religious, affable, cheerful, lovers of justice, given to retirement, able in business, admirers of truth, and grateful and of unbounded fidelity; and the soldiers know not to what it is to fly from the field of battle. British comments of their Hindu subjects are interesting. Warren Hastings [1732-1818]: They are gentle and benevolent, more susceptible of gratitude for kindness, and less prompted to vengeance for wrongs inflicted than any people on the face of the earth; faithful, affectionate, submissive to legal authority. Bishop Heber [1783-1826]: The Hindus are brave, courteous, intelligent, most eager for knowledge and improvement; sober, industrious, dutiful to parents, affectionate to their children, uniformly gentle and patient, and more easily affected by kindness and attention to their wants and feelings than any people I ever met with. Sir Thomas Munro [1761-1827]: I do not exactly know what it means by civilizing the people of India. In the theory and practice of good government they may be deficient; but, if a good system of agriculture, if unrivaled manufactures, if the establishment of schools for reading and writing, if the general practice of kindness and hospitality, and, above all, if a scrupulous respect and delicacy towards the female sex denote civilized people; then the Hindus are not inferior in civilization to the people of Europe. About the working people, H H Wilson [1786-1860]: always found amongst them cheerful and unwearied industry, good humoured compliance with the bane of their superiors, and a readiness to make whatever exertions were demanded from them: there was among them no drunkenness, no disorderly conduct, no insubordination There was considerable skill and ready docility I should say that where there is confidence without fear, frankness is one of the most universal features in the Indian character. Wilson of the Pundits: In them I found the similar merits of industry, intelligence, cheerfulness, frankness, with others peculiar to their avocation. Of the higher classes, Wilson found polished manners, clearness and comprehensiveness of understanding, liberality of feeling and independence of principle that would have stamped them gentleman in any country in the world. Sir William Sleeman [1788-1856]: They adhere habitually, and I may say religiously, to the truth; and I have had before me hundreds of cases in which a mans property, liberty, or life has depended upon his telling a lie, and he has refused to tell it to save either ... I believe there is no class of men in the world more strictly honourable in their dealings than the mercantile classes of India. If this is how some foreigners especially those important ones who exercised power over the people and ruled over the land felt about their Hindu subjects, how then had character of the Hindus changedif at all? Gautam Pingle Former Dean of Research at Administrative Staff College of India, Hyderabad Email: gautam.pingle@gmail.com Describing the character of an entire group of people is difficult. And, it is almost impossible to describe the character of Hindusdivided by region, language, caste and sect. Nonetheless, foreign observers have attempted the task based on their personal experience. The following is an account of some of these over time. Ktesias, the Greek Physician of Persian King Artaxerxes [404-358 BC] has a special chapter on the justice of the Hindus in his Indica. Megasthenes [c.350c.290 BC] states thefts were extremely rare, and the people honoured truth and virtue. Arrian [c.86-160 AD] on officials: They oversee what goes on in the country or towns, and report everything to the king, where the people have a king, and to the magistrates, where the people are self-governed, and it is against the use and wont of these to give a false report; but indeed no Hindu is accused of lying. The Chinese Buddhist Hiuen-Tsiang, who travelled in India between 629 and 645 AD made nearly 30 specific comments on the disposition, nature and manners of the people of the various regions he visited. We can put these comments into five groups. The first group: active and impetuous; lively and courageous; brave, true and upright; brave and impetuous; hard and fierce; regard justice and bravery; simple and honest, resolute and fierce, ardent and courageous. The second: timid and soft; soft and agreeable; docile and virtuous; soft and complacent ... contended and peaceful; light and frivolous, weak, pusillanimous. The third: sincere and truthful (mentioned three times); pure and honest and honest and sincere. The fourth described many negative qualities but combined them with positive ones: soft and effeminate, and somewhat sly and crafty; fierce and value highly the quality of courage, given to deceit; no refinement; hard and rough ... cold and insincere. The fifth group described the unpleasant elements: rough and rude; quick and violent; savage kind; violent and headstrong; quick and hasty Marco Polo [1254-1324] says: ... these Abraiaman [of Mysore] are the best merchants in the world, and the most truthful, for they would not tell a lie for anything on earth. Muslim chroniclers also wrote of their Hindu subjects. Idrisi, in his Geography [11th century] summed up his opinion of Hindus: The Hindus are naturally inclined to justice, and never depart from it in their action. Their good faith, honesty, and fidelity to their engagements are well known, and they are so famous for these qualities that people flock to their country from every side. In the 13th century, Shems-ed-din Abu Abdullah [13201380] (quotes Bedi ezr Zenan): The Hindus are innumerable, like grains of sand, free from all deceit and violence. They fear neither death nor life.[36] In the 16th century, Akbars Minister, Abul Fazl [15511602] states: The Hindus are religious, affable, cheerful, lovers of justice, given to retirement, able in business, admirers of truth, and grateful and of unbounded fidelity; and the soldiers know not to what it is to fly from the field of battle. British comments of their Hindu subjects are interesting. Warren Hastings [1732-1818]: They are gentle and benevolent, more susceptible of gratitude for kindness, and less prompted to vengeance for wrongs inflicted than any people on the face of the earth; faithful, affectionate, submissive to legal authority. Bishop Heber [1783-1826]: The Hindus are brave, courteous, intelligent, most eager for knowledge and improvement; sober, industrious, dutiful to parents, affectionate to their children, uniformly gentle and patient, and more easily affected by kindness and attention to their wants and feelings than any people I ever met with. Sir Thomas Munro [1761-1827]: I do not exactly know what it means by civilizing the people of India. In the theory and practice of good government they may be deficient; but, if a good system of agriculture, if unrivaled manufactures, if the establishment of schools for reading and writing, if the general practice of kindness and hospitality, and, above all, if a scrupulous respect and delicacy towards the female sex denote civilized people; then the Hindus are not inferior in civilization to the people of Europe. About the working people, H H Wilson [1786-1860]: always found amongst them cheerful and unwearied industry, good humoured compliance with the bane of their superiors, and a readiness to make whatever exertions were demanded from them: there was among them no drunkenness, no disorderly conduct, no insubordination There was considerable skill and ready docility I should say that where there is confidence without fear, frankness is one of the most universal features in the Indian character. Wilson of the Pundits: In them I found the similar merits of industry, intelligence, cheerfulness, frankness, with others peculiar to their avocation. Of the higher classes, Wilson found polished manners, clearness and comprehensiveness of understanding, liberality of feeling and independence of principle that would have stamped them gentleman in any country in the world. Sir William Sleeman [1788-1856]: They adhere habitually, and I may say religiously, to the truth; and I have had before me hundreds of cases in which a mans property, liberty, or life has depended upon his telling a lie, and he has refused to tell it to save either ... I believe there is no class of men in the world more strictly honourable in their dealings than the mercantile classes of India. If this is how some foreigners especially those important ones who exercised power over the people and ruled over the land felt about their Hindu subjects, how then had character of the Hindus changedif at all? Gautam Pingle Former Dean of Research at Administrative Staff College of India, Hyderabad Email: gautam.pingle@gmail.com By Express News Service KANNUR: In yet another incident of political violence in the district, a local Congress leader was brutally beaten up allegedly by RSS workers, at Pathayakunnu, Patyam on Monday. According to police, the incident happened at 7 AM, when 64-year-old M Sukumaran, a former block vice-president came to open his shop. A gang of six RSS workers destroyed the shop and broke his legs and hands by hitting him with an iron rod. According to Congress leaders, he might have been targeted for the initiative in placing a CCTV camera in the area, which helped in nabbing a BJP/RSS worker who destroyed the shop in a similar attack as it was captured in the camera. The gang also destroyed the camera after beating up Sukumaran in revenge. He was immediately shifted to the Indira Gandhi Cooperative Hospital where he underwent a surgery. Police registered a case and are investigating the matter. This follows the attack on a KSU worker, allegedly by CPM activists here recently. A protest-meet is scheduled to be held on Wednesday in this regard, which will witness participation from KPCC president VM Sudheeran KANNUR: In yet another incident of political violence in the district, a local Congress leader was brutally beaten up allegedly by RSS workers, at Pathayakunnu, Patyam on Monday. According to police, the incident happened at 7 AM, when 64-year-old M Sukumaran, a former block vice-president came to open his shop. A gang of six RSS workers destroyed the shop and broke his legs and hands by hitting him with an iron rod. According to Congress leaders, he might have been targeted for the initiative in placing a CCTV camera in the area, which helped in nabbing a BJP/RSS worker who destroyed the shop in a similar attack as it was captured in the camera. The gang also destroyed the camera after beating up Sukumaran in revenge. He was immediately shifted to the Indira Gandhi Cooperative Hospital where he underwent a surgery. Police registered a case and are investigating the matter. This follows the attack on a KSU worker, allegedly by CPM activists here recently. A protest-meet is scheduled to be held on Wednesday in this regard, which will witness participation from KPCC president VM Sudheeran By Express News Service THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: In the wake of Jishnu Pronoys mother Mahija's open letter to Pinarayi Vijayan doing rounds in the social media, the Kerala CM, while breaking his silence, clarified that instructions were given to the police chief to intensify the probe. The state police was also instructed to include demands raised in her petition to the education minister C. Raveendranath, under the investigation's purview. "Government has taken a considerate approach towards Jishnu's family. The cabinet met on the fifth day of his death, decided to give a solatium of Rs 10 lakh to the family. Within two days, excise minister TP Ramakrishnan visited them and directly handed over the money," the CM said in a Facebook post. He also pointed out that it is for the state police chief to furnish a reply to the complainant once the probe is over. The opposition leader who raised the issue too has been given a reply in this regard, the CM said. THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: In the wake of Jishnu Pronoys mother Mahija's open letter to Pinarayi Vijayan doing rounds in the social media, the Kerala CM, while breaking his silence, clarified that instructions were given to the police chief to intensify the probe. The state police was also instructed to include demands raised in her petition to the education minister C. Raveendranath, under the investigation's purview. "Government has taken a considerate approach towards Jishnu's family. The cabinet met on the fifth day of his death, decided to give a solatium of Rs 10 lakh to the family. Within two days, excise minister TP Ramakrishnan visited them and directly handed over the money," the CM said in a Facebook post. He also pointed out that it is for the state police chief to furnish a reply to the complainant once the probe is over. The opposition leader who raised the issue too has been given a reply in this regard, the CM said. By Express News Service KOCHI: Though one of the finest celebrity chefs in the state who would cook any variety of dishes and present it with a smile, the last three weeks were tough for Lakshmi Nair in her other role as a Principal which she was handling for some eight years. The pan Kerala strike against the harassment of students at the Self-financing colleges in the state following the death of an engineering student at Thrissur suddenly turned against her and her institution Kerala Law Academy Law College, (KLALC). The demand by all the protesting groups is the same: remove Lakshmi Nair as the Principal of the college which will turn 50 next year. She joined the KLALC as a Guest lecturer in History in 1988 and in Law two years later. She became a full-time lecturer in 1994 and became Professor in 2007. She did her LLB, LLM and PhD from KLALC. She is a second rank holder of the Kerala University in B.A History and a first rank Holder in LLM from the same University. A familiar figure in mini screen for three decades, Lakshmi Nair was a news reader with Doordarshan (Malayalam) from 1986 to 1988. A celebrity culinary expert as the host of the most popular cookery show Magic Oven as well as Flavours of India, in CPM-backed Malayalam Television Channel, Kairali, with a high viewership rate among similar programmes. She was also a member of the Kerala State Film Censor Board since 2005. KLALC shut down indefinitely after the joint strike, launched by student organisations against the management's denial of permission to hold a protest march in the campus, turned violent. Kerala State Human Rights Commission has registered suo motu case in connection with the student's protests and the SC/ST Commission and Youth Commission sought an explanation from college authorities over students' allegations of harassment by college authorities. On Monday, a non-bailable case has been slapped against her for allegedly harassing a student belonging to scheduled caste by addressing him by caste. This shows the level of suffering the students had to endure. They are frustrated as there is no transparency in the marks. Over the years, she has given internal marks to those students she liked and it decided their fate, said Parvathi T, popular anchor, social activist and also a former student of the KLALC who could not complete her course, as the college claimed she had shortages in attendance in 2005. As N Narayanan Nair, the director of KLALC, who is also the father of Lakshmi, is one of the power centres in state politics and the family is close to CPM, the party had to take a cautious step backward from arriving at a hasty decision. The Education Minister's efforts to defuse the crisis failed as the students stick to their stand and demand of Lakshmi Nair's resignation. Meanwhile, Kerala University debarred Lakshmi Nair from all examination-related matters as a sub-committee of the syndicate found that many of the allegations to be true. The list included installation of CCTV cameras at the college women's hostel intruding into the privacy of the students, the sole power to give internal marks with the principal. More internal marks were allotted to Lakshmi Nair's future daughter-in-law, who had only 50 percent attendance. The principal even refused to submit documents which committee sought as part of the probe. The audio clippings also substantiated charges against her. KOCHI: Though one of the finest celebrity chefs in the state who would cook any variety of dishes and present it with a smile, the last three weeks were tough for Lakshmi Nair in her other role as a Principal which she was handling for some eight years. The pan Kerala strike against the harassment of students at the Self-financing colleges in the state following the death of an engineering student at Thrissur suddenly turned against her and her institution Kerala Law Academy Law College, (KLALC). The demand by all the protesting groups is the same: remove Lakshmi Nair as the Principal of the college which will turn 50 next year. She joined the KLALC as a Guest lecturer in History in 1988 and in Law two years later. She became a full-time lecturer in 1994 and became Professor in 2007. She did her LLB, LLM and PhD from KLALC. She is a second rank holder of the Kerala University in B.A History and a first rank Holder in LLM from the same University. A familiar figure in mini screen for three decades, Lakshmi Nair was a news reader with Doordarshan (Malayalam) from 1986 to 1988. A celebrity culinary expert as the host of the most popular cookery show Magic Oven as well as Flavours of India, in CPM-backed Malayalam Television Channel, Kairali, with a high viewership rate among similar programmes. She was also a member of the Kerala State Film Censor Board since 2005. KLALC shut down indefinitely after the joint strike, launched by student organisations against the management's denial of permission to hold a protest march in the campus, turned violent. Kerala State Human Rights Commission has registered suo motu case in connection with the student's protests and the SC/ST Commission and Youth Commission sought an explanation from college authorities over students' allegations of harassment by college authorities. On Monday, a non-bailable case has been slapped against her for allegedly harassing a student belonging to scheduled caste by addressing him by caste. This shows the level of suffering the students had to endure. They are frustrated as there is no transparency in the marks. Over the years, she has given internal marks to those students she liked and it decided their fate, said Parvathi T, popular anchor, social activist and also a former student of the KLALC who could not complete her course, as the college claimed she had shortages in attendance in 2005. As N Narayanan Nair, the director of KLALC, who is also the father of Lakshmi, is one of the power centres in state politics and the family is close to CPM, the party had to take a cautious step backward from arriving at a hasty decision. The Education Minister's efforts to defuse the crisis failed as the students stick to their stand and demand of Lakshmi Nair's resignation. Meanwhile, Kerala University debarred Lakshmi Nair from all examination-related matters as a sub-committee of the syndicate found that many of the allegations to be true. The list included installation of CCTV cameras at the college women's hostel intruding into the privacy of the students, the sole power to give internal marks with the principal. More internal marks were allotted to Lakshmi Nair's future daughter-in-law, who had only 50 percent attendance. The principal even refused to submit documents which committee sought as part of the probe. The audio clippings also substantiated charges against her. By Express News Service BHUBANESWAR: Union Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan on Sunday lambasted Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik for rejecting the negotiation committee formed by the Centre to resolve the Mahanadi river water dispute with Chhattisgagh government. Justifying the formation of a negotiation committee, Pradhan said section 4(1) of the Inter State River Water Dispute Act, 1956 gives an opportunity for settlement of disputes through negotiation before constitution of a waster dispute tribunal. The same procedure was followed before the formation of Vansadhara Tribunal. Though the State Government moved the Supreme Court in 2006 seeking a direction to the Centre for constitution of a tribunal, the apex court adjourned the matter following a request from the State for negotiated settlement of the disputes with Andhra Pradesh. "It (negotiation committee) is a last ditch effort by the Centre to resolve the inter-state water dispute. "The Chief Minister is not very keen to resolve the dispute through negotiation as his basic motive is to keep the issue alive for narrow political gains," Pradhan told reporters here. He accused the Chief Minister of doing enormous damage to the State by giving precedence to his party's interest. To the objection raised by the Chief Minister on induction of members from non-contesting basin states like Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, Pradhan said the state government has made these states parties in its petition to the Centre for formation of a tribunal under Section 3 of the Inter-State River Water Dispute Act. "It is ridiculous to ask the Centre about nomination of members from these state who have no stake in the dispute," he remarked. Criticising the "double standard" of the state government, the Union Minister asked the Chief Minister who prevented him from taking up the issue with Prime Minister Narendra Modi if he is not satisfied with the meetings convened by Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti. The Chief Minister has visited New Delhi several times in the past six months. He has never cared to meet the Prime Minister to discuss the issue which is very important for the state, he said. Claiming that Naveen had agreed to the proposal for formation of a committee at the Chief Ministers' meeting presided over by Union Water Resources Minister, Pradhan said he changed his mind later at the instance of a subordinate staff. Proceeding of the meeting has been recorded and it will be put out as a proof at right time. BHUBANESWAR: Union Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan on Sunday lambasted Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik for rejecting the negotiation committee formed by the Centre to resolve the Mahanadi river water dispute with Chhattisgagh government. Justifying the formation of a negotiation committee, Pradhan said section 4(1) of the Inter State River Water Dispute Act, 1956 gives an opportunity for settlement of disputes through negotiation before constitution of a waster dispute tribunal. The same procedure was followed before the formation of Vansadhara Tribunal. Though the State Government moved the Supreme Court in 2006 seeking a direction to the Centre for constitution of a tribunal, the apex court adjourned the matter following a request from the State for negotiated settlement of the disputes with Andhra Pradesh. "It (negotiation committee) is a last ditch effort by the Centre to resolve the inter-state water dispute. "The Chief Minister is not very keen to resolve the dispute through negotiation as his basic motive is to keep the issue alive for narrow political gains," Pradhan told reporters here. He accused the Chief Minister of doing enormous damage to the State by giving precedence to his party's interest. To the objection raised by the Chief Minister on induction of members from non-contesting basin states like Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, Pradhan said the state government has made these states parties in its petition to the Centre for formation of a tribunal under Section 3 of the Inter-State River Water Dispute Act. "It is ridiculous to ask the Centre about nomination of members from these state who have no stake in the dispute," he remarked. Criticising the "double standard" of the state government, the Union Minister asked the Chief Minister who prevented him from taking up the issue with Prime Minister Narendra Modi if he is not satisfied with the meetings convened by Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti. The Chief Minister has visited New Delhi several times in the past six months. He has never cared to meet the Prime Minister to discuss the issue which is very important for the state, he said. Claiming that Naveen had agreed to the proposal for formation of a committee at the Chief Ministers' meeting presided over by Union Water Resources Minister, Pradhan said he changed his mind later at the instance of a subordinate staff. Proceeding of the meeting has been recorded and it will be put out as a proof at right time. By Express News Service BALASORE: Six workers sustained serious injuries after the roof of an under-construction building collapsed in the industrial area on the outskirts of Balasore on Sunday. The workers were rushed to District Headquarters Hospital in a critical condition. The incident occurred at about 2.30 pm when the workers were engaged in concrete roofing of hostel building of Central Institute of Plastics Engineering and Technology (CIPET). As the news of the mishap spread, locals rushed to the spot to rescue the trapped workers. Later, the district administration pressed a team of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), two fire tenders and two bulldozers in rescue operation. Though initially it was feared that some were trapped under the debris, no casualty was reported. All injured workers belonged to Kaptipada and Khunta in Mayurbhanj district. The condition of two is stated to be critical. Police sources said the hostel was being built by National Bridge Construction Corporation (NBCC) which had engaged local contractors for construction activities. As many as 36 workers were at the site when the roof caved in. Additional District Magistrate Manmath Pani, who visited the spot, suspected that the roof collapsed as the contractor used wooden structure instead of iron for construction of the roof nearly 30 feet high. We have instructed police to file a case against the construction company. A fact-finding team will be formed to ascertain the cause of incident and action would be initiated against those found guilty, he added. BALASORE: Six workers sustained serious injuries after the roof of an under-construction building collapsed in the industrial area on the outskirts of Balasore on Sunday. The workers were rushed to District Headquarters Hospital in a critical condition. The incident occurred at about 2.30 pm when the workers were engaged in concrete roofing of hostel building of Central Institute of Plastics Engineering and Technology (CIPET). As the news of the mishap spread, locals rushed to the spot to rescue the trapped workers. Later, the district administration pressed a team of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), two fire tenders and two bulldozers in rescue operation. Though initially it was feared that some were trapped under the debris, no casualty was reported. All injured workers belonged to Kaptipada and Khunta in Mayurbhanj district. The condition of two is stated to be critical. Police sources said the hostel was being built by National Bridge Construction Corporation (NBCC) which had engaged local contractors for construction activities. As many as 36 workers were at the site when the roof caved in. Additional District Magistrate Manmath Pani, who visited the spot, suspected that the roof collapsed as the contractor used wooden structure instead of iron for construction of the roof nearly 30 feet high. We have instructed police to file a case against the construction company. A fact-finding team will be formed to ascertain the cause of incident and action would be initiated against those found guilty, he added. By Express News Service HYDERABAD: Former Union finance minister P Chidambaram, who had played a key role in the formation of Telangana state, has breathed fire at chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao for constructing a palatial camp office-cum-residence, Pragathi Bhavan, with a whopping Rs 40 crore of public money. How can the chief minister construct such a vast bungalow with peoples money without fulfilling his poll promises? He constructed Pragathi Bhavan for himself without achieving any pragathi (progress) in the new state, he remarked sarcastically while addressing the extended executive meeting of the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee at Gandhi Bhavan here on Sunday. Former union finance minister P Chidambaram delivers a talk on Demonetisation - A Perspective during the second anniversary of Mana Telanganas foundation day on Sunday | r satish babu Days after Congress leader Jairam Rameshs act of terming the bifurcation of erstwhile united state as a suicidal move for the Congress in the Telugu-speaking states, his party colleague Chidambaram on Sunday took a different view and defended the division of erstwhile Andhra Pradesh. Claiming that smaller states paved the way for all-round development of any territory, the Congress leader cited Gujarat, Punjab and Haryana as classic examples. We formed Telangana state as per the wishes of the people of the region. I am sure smaller states progress steadily on all fronts in comparison with larger ones, he said. Earlier, during the TPCC meeting which was presided over by party state unit chief N Uttam Kumar Reddy, Chidambaram, who visited Hyderabad on Sunday for the first time after formation of the new state, wanted to know why chief minister Rao had failed to implement his poll promises such as distribution of 3 acres of land to every Dalit family, providing 12 pc reservation to STs and creation of more jobs for unemployed youth. Coming down heavily on the way the ruling TRS leadership had induced legislators belonging to opposition parties into it, Chidambaram wanted to know why the Assembly speaker was not discharging his duty by disqualifying such lawmakers. In Telangana the speaker has not discharged his constitutional duty of implementing anti-defection law. Further, it is a matter of deep regret that even the court so far has not acted on this, he said and demanded that the MLAs, who had crossed over to the TRS from other parties, should resign and seek fresh mandate. The Congress heavyweight asked his party cadre to intensify the agitations to expose the failures of the TRS government. HYDERABAD: Former Union finance minister P Chidambaram, who had played a key role in the formation of Telangana state, has breathed fire at chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao for constructing a palatial camp office-cum-residence, Pragathi Bhavan, with a whopping Rs 40 crore of public money. How can the chief minister construct such a vast bungalow with peoples money without fulfilling his poll promises? He constructed Pragathi Bhavan for himself without achieving any pragathi (progress) in the new state, he remarked sarcastically while addressing the extended executive meeting of the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee at Gandhi Bhavan here on Sunday. Former union finance minister P Chidambaram delivers a talk on Demonetisation - A Perspective during the second anniversary of Mana Telanganas foundation day on Sunday | r satish babuDays after Congress leader Jairam Rameshs act of terming the bifurcation of erstwhile united state as a suicidal move for the Congress in the Telugu-speaking states, his party colleague Chidambaram on Sunday took a different view and defended the division of erstwhile Andhra Pradesh. Claiming that smaller states paved the way for all-round development of any territory, the Congress leader cited Gujarat, Punjab and Haryana as classic examples. We formed Telangana state as per the wishes of the people of the region. I am sure smaller states progress steadily on all fronts in comparison with larger ones, he said. Earlier, during the TPCC meeting which was presided over by party state unit chief N Uttam Kumar Reddy, Chidambaram, who visited Hyderabad on Sunday for the first time after formation of the new state, wanted to know why chief minister Rao had failed to implement his poll promises such as distribution of 3 acres of land to every Dalit family, providing 12 pc reservation to STs and creation of more jobs for unemployed youth. Coming down heavily on the way the ruling TRS leadership had induced legislators belonging to opposition parties into it, Chidambaram wanted to know why the Assembly speaker was not discharging his duty by disqualifying such lawmakers. In Telangana the speaker has not discharged his constitutional duty of implementing anti-defection law. Further, it is a matter of deep regret that even the court so far has not acted on this, he said and demanded that the MLAs, who had crossed over to the TRS from other parties, should resign and seek fresh mandate. The Congress heavyweight asked his party cadre to intensify the agitations to expose the failures of the TRS government. By IANS ISLAMABAD: Afghanistan's top envoy to Pakistan Omar Zakhilwal on Monday said his government was open to unconditional peace negotiations with the Taliban group. "We are in contact with the Qatar office and also a number of influential individual Taliban leaders and commanders but there are no formal negotiations," the Afghan ambassador told Xinhua in Islamabad. The remarks came after foreign and Afghan media reported senior Afghan officials had met the Taliban political representatives in Qatar. The Afghan government and the Taliban have not officially commented on the reports. "Taliban could bring any proposal to the negotiating table but we have ruled out preconditions for talks," Zakhilwal said, when asked about the Taliban's certain conditions ahead of the talks. Taliban negotiators have publicly called for reopening of their political office in Qatar, lifting of UN sanctions on their senior leaders and release of prisoners. "We are open to any and all opportunities for peace talks. We can find our way with the Taliban if external support to them stops," the Afghan envoy said. Regarding the Taliban's long-standing call for the withdrawal of foreign troops, he said war in Afghanistan provides opportunity for the foreign troops to stay. "If there is no war, then there is no reason for their stay in our country - therefore, if Taliban genuinely want the foreign troops to leave Afghanistan, peace, not war will do that," Zakhilwal said. When asked if he expects a rise in violence in the coming spring and summer, he said the security situation will be "challenging," adding that guerrilla type and terrorist attacks are difficult to prevent entirely, but the Afghan security forces will "endure as they have proven themselves by now." Taliban traditionally launch their so-called Spring Offensive usually in April that marks the beginning of the fighting season in the war-torn country. A former Taliban minister Agha Jan Mutasim said there could be an increase in fighting this year if the Taliban and the government failed to come to the negotiating table. Mutasim, who was a close confidant of Taliban founder Mullah Omar, had been involved in peace efforts while living abroad in Turkey and the United Arab Emirates. Speaking to Xinhua on Skype, he urged Kabul and the Taliban leaders to use the opportunity of the winter lull in the fighting and start a political process. "Rise in violence will diminish the chances of dialogue," the former Taliban minister said. About the threat of the Islamic State or Daesh in Afghanistan, the Afghan ambassador admitted that Daesh activists operate in some areas but they would not take root in the country. "They are in small number but are dangerous. Their approach is not popular among Afghans. Their model does not go with the psyche of Afghans. If Taliban join the peace process, Afghanistan will not have the IS problem," the envoy said. ISLAMABAD: Afghanistan's top envoy to Pakistan Omar Zakhilwal on Monday said his government was open to unconditional peace negotiations with the Taliban group. "We are in contact with the Qatar office and also a number of influential individual Taliban leaders and commanders but there are no formal negotiations," the Afghan ambassador told Xinhua in Islamabad. The remarks came after foreign and Afghan media reported senior Afghan officials had met the Taliban political representatives in Qatar. The Afghan government and the Taliban have not officially commented on the reports. "Taliban could bring any proposal to the negotiating table but we have ruled out preconditions for talks," Zakhilwal said, when asked about the Taliban's certain conditions ahead of the talks. Taliban negotiators have publicly called for reopening of their political office in Qatar, lifting of UN sanctions on their senior leaders and release of prisoners. "We are open to any and all opportunities for peace talks. We can find our way with the Taliban if external support to them stops," the Afghan envoy said. Regarding the Taliban's long-standing call for the withdrawal of foreign troops, he said war in Afghanistan provides opportunity for the foreign troops to stay. "If there is no war, then there is no reason for their stay in our country - therefore, if Taliban genuinely want the foreign troops to leave Afghanistan, peace, not war will do that," Zakhilwal said. When asked if he expects a rise in violence in the coming spring and summer, he said the security situation will be "challenging," adding that guerrilla type and terrorist attacks are difficult to prevent entirely, but the Afghan security forces will "endure as they have proven themselves by now." Taliban traditionally launch their so-called Spring Offensive usually in April that marks the beginning of the fighting season in the war-torn country. A former Taliban minister Agha Jan Mutasim said there could be an increase in fighting this year if the Taliban and the government failed to come to the negotiating table. Mutasim, who was a close confidant of Taliban founder Mullah Omar, had been involved in peace efforts while living abroad in Turkey and the United Arab Emirates. Speaking to Xinhua on Skype, he urged Kabul and the Taliban leaders to use the opportunity of the winter lull in the fighting and start a political process. "Rise in violence will diminish the chances of dialogue," the former Taliban minister said. About the threat of the Islamic State or Daesh in Afghanistan, the Afghan ambassador admitted that Daesh activists operate in some areas but they would not take root in the country. "They are in small number but are dangerous. Their approach is not popular among Afghans. Their model does not go with the psyche of Afghans. If Taliban join the peace process, Afghanistan will not have the IS problem," the envoy said. By Associated Press PARIS: Air France has blocked 15 passengers from Muslim countries from traveling to the U.S. because they would have been refused entry under President Donald Trump's new immigration ban. Air France said in a statement it was informed Saturday by the U.S. government of the new restrictions, and had no choice but to stop the passengers from boarding U.S.-bound flights. An airline spokeswoman said Monday that the passengers were taken back to their point of departure or otherwise taken care of. She would not provide the passengers' names, nationalities or other details. The company earlier had reported that 21 passengers had been turned away, but then corrected its count. The passengers were from seven Muslim-majority countries affected by the three-month immigration ban: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. PARIS: Air France has blocked 15 passengers from Muslim countries from traveling to the U.S. because they would have been refused entry under President Donald Trump's new immigration ban. Air France said in a statement it was informed Saturday by the U.S. government of the new restrictions, and had no choice but to stop the passengers from boarding U.S.-bound flights. An airline spokeswoman said Monday that the passengers were taken back to their point of departure or otherwise taken care of. She would not provide the passengers' names, nationalities or other details. The company earlier had reported that 21 passengers had been turned away, but then corrected its count. The passengers were from seven Muslim-majority countries affected by the three-month immigration ban: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. By IANS SANAA: The 8-year-old daughter of al-Qaeda crusader Anwar al-Awlaki was one of the civilians killed in a US raid on al-Qaeda militants in Yemen, media reports said. "She was hit with a bullet in her neck and suffered for two hours", Middle East Eye quoted the eight-year-old's grandfather as saying. "The daughter of Shaykh Anwar Al-Awlaqi is martyred in the US raid in Yemen today. Obama killed his son and now Trump kills his daughter," Jihadist group Al Maqalaat tweeted. The raid that killed Awlaki's daughter was part of a dawn attack in southern Yemen on Sunday that killed a US commando and around 30 people including al-Qaeda suspects and civilians, the US military and local Yemeni officials said. It was the first combat casualty of the Trump administration and its first operation in the war-damaged Arabian Peninsula nation against a powerful al-Qaeda branch that has been a frequent target of US drone strikes. Medics at the scene said 30 people were killed, including 10 women and three children. Anwar al-Awlaki was an American and Yemeni imam and Islamic lecturer, who US government allege was a senior recruiter and motivator. He was killed in a US drone strike in 2011. SANAA: The 8-year-old daughter of al-Qaeda crusader Anwar al-Awlaki was one of the civilians killed in a US raid on al-Qaeda militants in Yemen, media reports said. "She was hit with a bullet in her neck and suffered for two hours", Middle East Eye quoted the eight-year-old's grandfather as saying. "The daughter of Shaykh Anwar Al-Awlaqi is martyred in the US raid in Yemen today. Obama killed his son and now Trump kills his daughter," Jihadist group Al Maqalaat tweeted. The raid that killed Awlaki's daughter was part of a dawn attack in southern Yemen on Sunday that killed a US commando and around 30 people including al-Qaeda suspects and civilians, the US military and local Yemeni officials said. It was the first combat casualty of the Trump administration and its first operation in the war-damaged Arabian Peninsula nation against a powerful al-Qaeda branch that has been a frequent target of US drone strikes. Medics at the scene said 30 people were killed, including 10 women and three children. Anwar al-Awlaki was an American and Yemeni imam and Islamic lecturer, who US government allege was a senior recruiter and motivator. He was killed in a US drone strike in 2011. By AFP LONDON: British Prime Minister Theresa May is facing criticism for her initial response to Donald Trump's border clampdown, as the UK won an exemption for its citizens from the US president's restrictions. Shortly after the prime minister held talks with Trump at the White House on Friday, the new president signed an executive order to suspend refugee arrivals and impose tough new controls on travellers from seven Muslim countries. Trump's move prompted an online petition to stop him making a planned state visit to Britain, a regal and glitzy affair which involves formalities such as a royal banquet in the Buckingham Palace Ballroom. By early Monday the petition to the British parliament had attracted almost 900,000 signatures. May sparked controversy Saturday after refusing to condemn Trump's immigration clampdown when pressed by journalists during a trip to Turkey, but later issued a stronger statement as it emerged British citizens had been affected. "Immigration policy in the United States is a matter for the government of the United States, just the same as immigration policy for this country should be set by our government," a spokesman from her office said on Sunday. "But we do not agree with this kind of approach and it is not one we will be taking," he added. Foreign Minister Boris Johnson said it was "divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality." - UK wins exemption - High-profile British citizens caught up in the new US rules included double-double Olympic champion Mo Farah, who slammed a policy based on "ignorance and prejudice" that could keep him apart from his US-based family. "On January 1 this year, Her Majesty The Queen made me a Knight of the Realm. On January 27, President Donald Trump seems to have made me an alien," wrote the athlete, who represents Britain but was born in Somalia. Iraqi-born MP Nadhim Zahawi, from May's Conservative Party, had earlier revealed he would be barred from entering the US under the clampdown. "A sad, sad day to feel like a second class citizen! Sad day for the USA," he added. But later on Sunday Johnson won an exemption for British citizens and dual nationals after he discussed the matter with Washington. The foreign ministry subsequently announced the order would only apply to individuals travelling directly to the US from one of the seven listed countries -- Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Sudan. "If you are travelling to the US from anywhere other than one of those countries (for instance, the UK) the executive order does not apply to you and you will experience no extra checks regardless of your nationality or your place of birth," the foreign ministry said in a statement. The foreign ministry added that dual nationals might have extra checks if they are coming from one of the seven named countries, "for example a UK-Libya dual national coming from Libya to the US". Following the foreign ministry advice a spokeswoman for Farah said he was "relieved" but nonetheless "fundamentally disagrees" with Trump's order. Zahawi praised the government for securing assurances for British citizens, adding that he still believed the new US rules amount to a "mistaken policy". - Pressure mounts on May - Trump's move prompted protests globally and demonstrators are due to gather outside Downing Street on Monday and hold rallies in cities across Britain. Domestic pressure has mounted on May to distance herself from Trump, with opposition Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn urging the government to put off the president's scheduled state visit until the ban is rescinded. May "would be failing the British people if she does not postpone the state visit & condemn Trump's actions in the clearest terms," he wrote on Twitter. The online petition against Trump's planned state visit later this year will be considered for debate in parliament, but a government spokesman said the invitation "was extended and has been accepted" by Washington. LONDON: British Prime Minister Theresa May is facing criticism for her initial response to Donald Trump's border clampdown, as the UK won an exemption for its citizens from the US president's restrictions. Shortly after the prime minister held talks with Trump at the White House on Friday, the new president signed an executive order to suspend refugee arrivals and impose tough new controls on travellers from seven Muslim countries. Trump's move prompted an online petition to stop him making a planned state visit to Britain, a regal and glitzy affair which involves formalities such as a royal banquet in the Buckingham Palace Ballroom. By early Monday the petition to the British parliament had attracted almost 900,000 signatures. May sparked controversy Saturday after refusing to condemn Trump's immigration clampdown when pressed by journalists during a trip to Turkey, but later issued a stronger statement as it emerged British citizens had been affected. "Immigration policy in the United States is a matter for the government of the United States, just the same as immigration policy for this country should be set by our government," a spokesman from her office said on Sunday. "But we do not agree with this kind of approach and it is not one we will be taking," he added. Foreign Minister Boris Johnson said it was "divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality." - UK wins exemption - High-profile British citizens caught up in the new US rules included double-double Olympic champion Mo Farah, who slammed a policy based on "ignorance and prejudice" that could keep him apart from his US-based family. "On January 1 this year, Her Majesty The Queen made me a Knight of the Realm. On January 27, President Donald Trump seems to have made me an alien," wrote the athlete, who represents Britain but was born in Somalia. Iraqi-born MP Nadhim Zahawi, from May's Conservative Party, had earlier revealed he would be barred from entering the US under the clampdown. "A sad, sad day to feel like a second class citizen! Sad day for the USA," he added. But later on Sunday Johnson won an exemption for British citizens and dual nationals after he discussed the matter with Washington. The foreign ministry subsequently announced the order would only apply to individuals travelling directly to the US from one of the seven listed countries -- Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Sudan. "If you are travelling to the US from anywhere other than one of those countries (for instance, the UK) the executive order does not apply to you and you will experience no extra checks regardless of your nationality or your place of birth," the foreign ministry said in a statement. The foreign ministry added that dual nationals might have extra checks if they are coming from one of the seven named countries, "for example a UK-Libya dual national coming from Libya to the US". Following the foreign ministry advice a spokeswoman for Farah said he was "relieved" but nonetheless "fundamentally disagrees" with Trump's order. Zahawi praised the government for securing assurances for British citizens, adding that he still believed the new US rules amount to a "mistaken policy". - Pressure mounts on May - Trump's move prompted protests globally and demonstrators are due to gather outside Downing Street on Monday and hold rallies in cities across Britain. Domestic pressure has mounted on May to distance herself from Trump, with opposition Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn urging the government to put off the president's scheduled state visit until the ban is rescinded. May "would be failing the British people if she does not postpone the state visit & condemn Trump's actions in the clearest terms," he wrote on Twitter. The online petition against Trump's planned state visit later this year will be considered for debate in parliament, but a government spokesman said the invitation "was extended and has been accepted" by Washington. By PTI NEW YORK: Protests against President Donald Trump's travel ban on people from seven predominantly Muslim nations continued for the second day, with thousands of demonstrators gathering at airports and outside the White House in solidarity with those hit by the controversial move. Protesters gathered outside the White House and raised slogans like 'This is what America looks like!', 'The people united, will never be divided' and 'No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here,' as they waved the American flag and held placards, opposing Trump's order to block any visitors for 90 days from seven designated countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Similar protests were held across the nation and at airports, where confusion continued to prevail over the order after a New York judge's order temporarily halting removal of individuals detained in the country. People gathered at Battery Park in Lower Manhattan, within sight of the Statue of Liberty, Boston's Copley Square as well as popular spots across San Francisco demonstrating and extending their support and solidarity with refugees and those impacted by the ban. Hundreds of protesters had gathered at the Dulles International Airport, while at the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, scores of Muslims pulled out their prayer rugs and knelt, and at least 50 people were taken into police custody. Mohammad Abdulhadi said he was blown away that hardly any of those protesting appeared to be Muslim. "I think the most beautiful thing about the entire evening was it wasn't predominantly Muslim," he told WFAA-TV. "There were Mexicans, priests, rabbis, men, women, everybody." It was the second consecutive weekend that protests were held across the country against the Donald Trump administration. Last weekend, just a day after Trump was sworn-in as President, millions of women and men had joined the 'Women's March' across the nation against Trump's policies on a host of issues. Maryam Kanna, a 24-year-old Iraqi-American who lives in Arlington, Virginia, told WTOP News that the executive order was "totally alienating." Kanna said she worries about her uncle, a British citizen, and her cousins in Canada, who may no longer be able to enter the US. A woman who identified herself as Sonia from Sterling, Virginia., said she doesn't recognise what she sees in the United States right now. "My dad's a green card holder, and granted, the country he's from is not on the ban list, but it really could easily be," she said. "This is not the America I was raised in." NEW YORK: Protests against President Donald Trump's travel ban on people from seven predominantly Muslim nations continued for the second day, with thousands of demonstrators gathering at airports and outside the White House in solidarity with those hit by the controversial move. Protesters gathered outside the White House and raised slogans like 'This is what America looks like!', 'The people united, will never be divided' and 'No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here,' as they waved the American flag and held placards, opposing Trump's order to block any visitors for 90 days from seven designated countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Similar protests were held across the nation and at airports, where confusion continued to prevail over the order after a New York judge's order temporarily halting removal of individuals detained in the country. People gathered at Battery Park in Lower Manhattan, within sight of the Statue of Liberty, Boston's Copley Square as well as popular spots across San Francisco demonstrating and extending their support and solidarity with refugees and those impacted by the ban. Hundreds of protesters had gathered at the Dulles International Airport, while at the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, scores of Muslims pulled out their prayer rugs and knelt, and at least 50 people were taken into police custody. Mohammad Abdulhadi said he was blown away that hardly any of those protesting appeared to be Muslim. "I think the most beautiful thing about the entire evening was it wasn't predominantly Muslim," he told WFAA-TV. "There were Mexicans, priests, rabbis, men, women, everybody." It was the second consecutive weekend that protests were held across the country against the Donald Trump administration. Last weekend, just a day after Trump was sworn-in as President, millions of women and men had joined the 'Women's March' across the nation against Trump's policies on a host of issues. Maryam Kanna, a 24-year-old Iraqi-American who lives in Arlington, Virginia, told WTOP News that the executive order was "totally alienating." Kanna said she worries about her uncle, a British citizen, and her cousins in Canada, who may no longer be able to enter the US. A woman who identified herself as Sonia from Sterling, Virginia., said she doesn't recognise what she sees in the United States right now. "My dad's a green card holder, and granted, the country he's from is not on the ban list, but it really could easily be," she said. "This is not the America I was raised in." By AFP MUMBAI: A Nepali who will become the first transgender model to walk the runway at an Indian fashion show hopes to inspire other victims of gender identity discrimination across conservative South Asia. Anjali Lama, who was born a man in rural Nepal, was ostracised by members of her own family after telling them twelve years ago that she wanted to live as a woman. She overcame abuse and prejudice to become the Himalayan country's first transgender model and is now preparing to strut the catwalk at Lakme Fashion Week in Mumbai, India's premier fashion show, next month. "Growing up in Nepal as a transgender was extremely difficult," Lama, 32, told AFP in an email interview ahead of the fashion extravaganza, which runs from February 1 to February 5. "In South Asian countries people still aren't that accepting, they treat it like an illness. The public looks at you differently and treats you in a different manner." "One has to stay strong and reach out for their dreams," she added. Lama was born Nabin Waiba to a family of poor farmers in remote Nuwakot in mountainous Nepal. But she always knew that she had been born in the wrong body and in 2005 took the decision to dress as a woman for the first time. "I knew I couldn't feel like another person living in someone else's body. Hence, I was ready to face the cruel words that people threw at me," said the model. "Most of the people, including my own brothers, weren't ready to accept me for who I was. I had to stay strong and believe in myself. My mother and sisters were the only ones who supported me throughout." Lama found some acceptance in Kathmandu, where she moved to study, and later became an activist for an LGBT rights group called Blue Diamond Society. She underwent partial sex reassignment surgery in 2009 and her interest in modelling was piqued the following year when she was pictured on the front cover of a magazine featuring an article about transgender people. New York, Milan, Paris? It spurred her to pursue a career in modelling full-time. She enrolled in classes but initially found work hard to come by. "I was getting rejected because of my identity and that was extremely disheartening," said Lama, who has established herself as a successful model in her native Nepal over the past couple of years. In 2014 she featured in a documentary titled "Anjali: Living Inside Someone Else's Skin" in which she said she hoped to become completely female one day -- an operation that is financially out of reach for most Nepalis. Her recent success has come as Nepal has increased its recognition of transgender people. In 2015 the country, which allows citizens to choose their sex, started issuing third gender category passports for those who identify themselves as transgender. "With the changing times people have become more accepting," explained Lama. Manisha Dhakal, one of the founders of the Blue Diamond Society, said Nepal's government needed to do more to provide equal opportunities in education and employment for transgender people. "To get the acceptance in society we need to be economically empowered," she told AFP. In neighbouring India, "Hijras" have also long complained of discrimination and marginalisation. They are recognised as a third gender but are often shunned from society with some forced into begging or prostitution. Lama -- who said it would be a "dream come true" to follow other transgender models onto major catwalks such as New York, Milan and Paris -- hopes her turn at Lakme Fashion Week will make a difference in the battle for acceptance. She added: "I do hope to be an inspiration for other transgender people. I'd like to tell them to always believe in themselves and to work towards their goals." MUMBAI: A Nepali who will become the first transgender model to walk the runway at an Indian fashion show hopes to inspire other victims of gender identity discrimination across conservative South Asia. Anjali Lama, who was born a man in rural Nepal, was ostracised by members of her own family after telling them twelve years ago that she wanted to live as a woman. She overcame abuse and prejudice to become the Himalayan country's first transgender model and is now preparing to strut the catwalk at Lakme Fashion Week in Mumbai, India's premier fashion show, next month. "Growing up in Nepal as a transgender was extremely difficult," Lama, 32, told AFP in an email interview ahead of the fashion extravaganza, which runs from February 1 to February 5. "In South Asian countries people still aren't that accepting, they treat it like an illness. The public looks at you differently and treats you in a different manner." "One has to stay strong and reach out for their dreams," she added. Lama was born Nabin Waiba to a family of poor farmers in remote Nuwakot in mountainous Nepal. But she always knew that she had been born in the wrong body and in 2005 took the decision to dress as a woman for the first time. "I knew I couldn't feel like another person living in someone else's body. Hence, I was ready to face the cruel words that people threw at me," said the model. "Most of the people, including my own brothers, weren't ready to accept me for who I was. I had to stay strong and believe in myself. My mother and sisters were the only ones who supported me throughout." Lama found some acceptance in Kathmandu, where she moved to study, and later became an activist for an LGBT rights group called Blue Diamond Society. She underwent partial sex reassignment surgery in 2009 and her interest in modelling was piqued the following year when she was pictured on the front cover of a magazine featuring an article about transgender people. New York, Milan, Paris? It spurred her to pursue a career in modelling full-time. She enrolled in classes but initially found work hard to come by. "I was getting rejected because of my identity and that was extremely disheartening," said Lama, who has established herself as a successful model in her native Nepal over the past couple of years. In 2014 she featured in a documentary titled "Anjali: Living Inside Someone Else's Skin" in which she said she hoped to become completely female one day -- an operation that is financially out of reach for most Nepalis. Her recent success has come as Nepal has increased its recognition of transgender people. In 2015 the country, which allows citizens to choose their sex, started issuing third gender category passports for those who identify themselves as transgender. "With the changing times people have become more accepting," explained Lama. Manisha Dhakal, one of the founders of the Blue Diamond Society, said Nepal's government needed to do more to provide equal opportunities in education and employment for transgender people. "To get the acceptance in society we need to be economically empowered," she told AFP. In neighbouring India, "Hijras" have also long complained of discrimination and marginalisation. They are recognised as a third gender but are often shunned from society with some forced into begging or prostitution. Lama -- who said it would be a "dream come true" to follow other transgender models onto major catwalks such as New York, Milan and Paris -- hopes her turn at Lakme Fashion Week will make a difference in the battle for acceptance. She added: "I do hope to be an inspiration for other transgender people. I'd like to tell them to always believe in themselves and to work towards their goals." By PTI JERUSALEM: Israel's parliament began discussions today on the final adoption of a bill that would allow it to appropriate hundreds of hectares of Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank. The text was approved by a parliamentary committee today morning, despite a spate of amendments by the opposition, and is scheduled for debate by MPs in the afternoon. Lawmakers are expected to vote on it tomorrow, with adoption seen as likely. Backed by the country's right-wing government, the bill has alarmed the international community and supporters of an independent Palestinian state. The Palestine Liberation Organisation labelled the bill a "declaration of war", and called on the international community to intervene. It would be the first time Israel has applied its own civil law to land it recognises as Palestinian-owned in the West Bank, law professor Amichai Cohen told AFP. Around 2,000 Israelis, including many settlers, protested outside Israel's parliament today in support of the law, an AFP correspondent said. The law would legalise at least 3,921 homes built in contravention of Israeli law, according to the anti-settlement organisation Peace Now. Israeli law distinguishes between settlements it considers legal and so-called "outposts", but the bill would legalise 54 of the latter, Peace Now said. The owners of the land would be compensated financially or with land elsewhere. The attorney general has told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the bill would be unconstitutional and could open up Israel to international criminal prosecutions. Even if passed by parliament, the bill could still be struck down by the Supreme Court. In a statement, Peace Now said the bill would "stain Israel's law books". "The draft law will practically allow the government and private individuals to steal lands of Palestinians without any legal implications," it said. International law considers all Israeli settlements in the West Bank, the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, to be illegal, and they are seen as a major obstacle to peace between Israelis and Palestinians JERUSALEM: Israel's parliament began discussions today on the final adoption of a bill that would allow it to appropriate hundreds of hectares of Palestinian land in the occupied West Bank. The text was approved by a parliamentary committee today morning, despite a spate of amendments by the opposition, and is scheduled for debate by MPs in the afternoon. Lawmakers are expected to vote on it tomorrow, with adoption seen as likely. Backed by the country's right-wing government, the bill has alarmed the international community and supporters of an independent Palestinian state. The Palestine Liberation Organisation labelled the bill a "declaration of war", and called on the international community to intervene. It would be the first time Israel has applied its own civil law to land it recognises as Palestinian-owned in the West Bank, law professor Amichai Cohen told AFP. Around 2,000 Israelis, including many settlers, protested outside Israel's parliament today in support of the law, an AFP correspondent said. The law would legalise at least 3,921 homes built in contravention of Israeli law, according to the anti-settlement organisation Peace Now. Israeli law distinguishes between settlements it considers legal and so-called "outposts", but the bill would legalise 54 of the latter, Peace Now said. The owners of the land would be compensated financially or with land elsewhere. The attorney general has told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the bill would be unconstitutional and could open up Israel to international criminal prosecutions. Even if passed by parliament, the bill could still be struck down by the Supreme Court. In a statement, Peace Now said the bill would "stain Israel's law books". "The draft law will practically allow the government and private individuals to steal lands of Palestinians without any legal implications," it said. International law considers all Israeli settlements in the West Bank, the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, to be illegal, and they are seen as a major obstacle to peace between Israelis and Palestinians By Associated Press ROME: Italian government and church officials welcomed 41 Syrian refugees at Rome's airport Monday, saying they wanted to show solidarity with those fleeing war at a time when the U.S. is sending refugees away and building a wall to keep migrants out. The children among the Syrians were given balloons as they arrived, and a colorful sign reading "Welcome to Italy" greeted them and their parents in the airport terminal. They were the latest group of refugees to be resettled in Italy via a "humanitarian corridor" agreement between the Italian government and a Catholic-Protestant collaborative project. "At a moment in time where they're building walls in other parts of the world, we are making bridges and bringing by air those who have the right to come to arrive in security," said the vice prefect of the interior ministry, Donatella Candura. The airlift was organized by the Sant'Egidio Community and the Federation of Evangelical Churches in Italy, an ecumenical collaboration that has resettled some 540 people in Italy in the past year as an alternative to the deadly sea crossings most migrants make to try to get to Italy at the hands of smugglers. Aid workers identify refugees in Lebanon and arrange for visas via the Italian embassy. Once in Italy, the churches take charge of finding the refugees housing, schooling and other immediate services to help them integrate into Italian society. "We thank Italy for this hospitality, and we hope that all countries in all the world will do what Italy has done saving people who have escaped from Syria, from the war that is going on right now," said Ahmad Alkhaled, one of the refugees who fled his home in Homs. The refugees said many of them planned to return home after peace is restored to their country, and that regardless they didn't represent a security threat as the Trump administration charged. "Islam is full of people who are friendly, who are full of friendship. There are no terrorists among us refugees," said M'aha Aleiwer from Homs. Italy's deputy foreign minister, Mario Giro, greeted the Syrians at the airport and denounced as inefficient the Trump administration's immigration restrictions banning travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries, Syria included. He said walls, as proposed by the Trump administration along the Mexican border, have similarly been shown not to work. What works, Giro said, is the organized acceptance and distribution of refugees, with all security provisions necessary, coupled with economic accords with countries of origin to try to stem the flow of economic migrants. "This works. Everything else doesn't," Giro said. Italy has been on the front line of Europe's migration crisis, coordinating the EU Mediterranean rescue operation and processing the migrants for asylum. While Italy has demanded the EU do more to help out, the government accepts its obligations to protect those who flee war, he said. At the same time the Syrians were being welcomed with open arms in Rome, police in Milan were announcing the results of a two-year investigation into a land-based trafficking nework for migrants who reach Italy by sea. Thirty-four arrest warrants were issued in Italy, France and Germany against the Egyptian-headed organization that arranged transport for the migrants from Sicily to Milan and beyond. Police showed images of migrants crammed into trucks that were stopped at the Ventimiglia border crossing with France and said they had documented some 60 such trafficking efforts. Chief prosecutor Ilda Boccassini called the phenomenon of human trafficking and exploitation of desperate migrants the "globalization of hatred." ROME: Italian government and church officials welcomed 41 Syrian refugees at Rome's airport Monday, saying they wanted to show solidarity with those fleeing war at a time when the U.S. is sending refugees away and building a wall to keep migrants out. The children among the Syrians were given balloons as they arrived, and a colorful sign reading "Welcome to Italy" greeted them and their parents in the airport terminal. They were the latest group of refugees to be resettled in Italy via a "humanitarian corridor" agreement between the Italian government and a Catholic-Protestant collaborative project. "At a moment in time where they're building walls in other parts of the world, we are making bridges and bringing by air those who have the right to come to arrive in security," said the vice prefect of the interior ministry, Donatella Candura. The airlift was organized by the Sant'Egidio Community and the Federation of Evangelical Churches in Italy, an ecumenical collaboration that has resettled some 540 people in Italy in the past year as an alternative to the deadly sea crossings most migrants make to try to get to Italy at the hands of smugglers. Aid workers identify refugees in Lebanon and arrange for visas via the Italian embassy. Once in Italy, the churches take charge of finding the refugees housing, schooling and other immediate services to help them integrate into Italian society. "We thank Italy for this hospitality, and we hope that all countries in all the world will do what Italy has done saving people who have escaped from Syria, from the war that is going on right now," said Ahmad Alkhaled, one of the refugees who fled his home in Homs. The refugees said many of them planned to return home after peace is restored to their country, and that regardless they didn't represent a security threat as the Trump administration charged. "Islam is full of people who are friendly, who are full of friendship. There are no terrorists among us refugees," said M'aha Aleiwer from Homs. Italy's deputy foreign minister, Mario Giro, greeted the Syrians at the airport and denounced as inefficient the Trump administration's immigration restrictions banning travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries, Syria included. He said walls, as proposed by the Trump administration along the Mexican border, have similarly been shown not to work. What works, Giro said, is the organized acceptance and distribution of refugees, with all security provisions necessary, coupled with economic accords with countries of origin to try to stem the flow of economic migrants. "This works. Everything else doesn't," Giro said. Italy has been on the front line of Europe's migration crisis, coordinating the EU Mediterranean rescue operation and processing the migrants for asylum. While Italy has demanded the EU do more to help out, the government accepts its obligations to protect those who flee war, he said. At the same time the Syrians were being welcomed with open arms in Rome, police in Milan were announcing the results of a two-year investigation into a land-based trafficking nework for migrants who reach Italy by sea. Thirty-four arrest warrants were issued in Italy, France and Germany against the Egyptian-headed organization that arranged transport for the migrants from Sicily to Milan and beyond. Police showed images of migrants crammed into trucks that were stopped at the Ventimiglia border crossing with France and said they had documented some 60 such trafficking efforts. Chief prosecutor Ilda Boccassini called the phenomenon of human trafficking and exploitation of desperate migrants the "globalization of hatred." By PTI LONDON: An online petition seeking cancellation of US President Donald Trump's State Visit to the UK has quickly crossed the one-million signature-mark to be considered for a debate in British Parliament, amid international uproar over his controversial immigration ban on people from seven Muslim nations. The petition titled 'Prevent Donald Trump from making State Visit to the United Kingdom' on the UK Parliament website had been created on Saturday afternoon and rapidly collected the 100,000 signatures needed for it to be considered for a debate in the House of Commons. The issue will be discussed in the House Commons tomorrow for a date to be set for the debate. "Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen," the petition reads. "Donald Trump's well-documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore, during the term of his presidency Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official State Visit," it adds. British Prime Minister Theresa May had communicated the invitation to Trump on behalf of Queen Elizabeth II during her US visit last week. Downing Street has indicated that it has no plans of withdrawing the invitation for the state visit, which involves lavish pomp and ceremony, often with a stay at Buckingham Palace hosted by Queen Elizabeth II. "We extended the invite and it was accepted," a Downing Street statement said. UK Opposition parties have also called for a postponement of the visit, scheduled for June this year. "Theresa May would be failing the British people if she does not postpone the state visit and condemn Trump's actions in the clearest terms. Thats what Britain expects and deserves," Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn said. Palace has so far declined to comment on the controversy gathering momentum in the wake of the US President's executive order that temporarily suspends all immigration for citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. UK foreign secretary Boris Johnson has secured assurances from the White House that the vast majority of British citizens with dual nationality of countries on the list will be exempt from the new US travel ban. Trump has provoked a fierce backlash after his ban on people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from travelling to America. LONDON: An online petition seeking cancellation of US President Donald Trump's State Visit to the UK has quickly crossed the one-million signature-mark to be considered for a debate in British Parliament, amid international uproar over his controversial immigration ban on people from seven Muslim nations. The petition titled 'Prevent Donald Trump from making State Visit to the United Kingdom' on the UK Parliament website had been created on Saturday afternoon and rapidly collected the 100,000 signatures needed for it to be considered for a debate in the House of Commons. The issue will be discussed in the House Commons tomorrow for a date to be set for the debate. "Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen," the petition reads. "Donald Trump's well-documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore, during the term of his presidency Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official State Visit," it adds. British Prime Minister Theresa May had communicated the invitation to Trump on behalf of Queen Elizabeth II during her US visit last week. Downing Street has indicated that it has no plans of withdrawing the invitation for the state visit, which involves lavish pomp and ceremony, often with a stay at Buckingham Palace hosted by Queen Elizabeth II. "We extended the invite and it was accepted," a Downing Street statement said. UK Opposition parties have also called for a postponement of the visit, scheduled for June this year. "Theresa May would be failing the British people if she does not postpone the state visit and condemn Trump's actions in the clearest terms. Thats what Britain expects and deserves," Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn said. Palace has so far declined to comment on the controversy gathering momentum in the wake of the US President's executive order that temporarily suspends all immigration for citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. UK foreign secretary Boris Johnson has secured assurances from the White House that the vast majority of British citizens with dual nationality of countries on the list will be exempt from the new US travel ban. Trump has provoked a fierce backlash after his ban on people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from travelling to America. By PTI NEW DELHI: Amidst chill in Indo-Pak ties, Pakistan has declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend South Asian Speakers' Summit to be held next month. "Pakistan and Myanmar which were among the countries in the South Asian nations invited to the Speakers' meet in Indore on February 18-19 have declined the invitation," official sources said. However, officials did not elaborate on the reasons given by Pakistan and merely noted that these two countries have written that they will not be able to attend the meet. The Summit, which is primarily an IPU initiative and not an SAARC activity, will be attended by Speakers of Parliament from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka among other countries, the sources said. Significantly, in 2015, India had boycotted a Commonwealth Parliamentary Union (CPU) meeting in Islamabad to protest against Pakistan's decision to not invite the Speaker of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. The discussions during the Speakers' Summit on achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will update the participants on the implementation of the SDGs in their region and globally. Special emphasis will be laid on sharing experiences and increasing understanding about how parliaments in the region institutionalise the global goals, capture the synergies and build coherence at the policy level, IPU said on its website. NEW DELHI: Amidst chill in Indo-Pak ties, Pakistan has declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend South Asian Speakers' Summit to be held next month. "Pakistan and Myanmar which were among the countries in the South Asian nations invited to the Speakers' meet in Indore on February 18-19 have declined the invitation," official sources said. However, officials did not elaborate on the reasons given by Pakistan and merely noted that these two countries have written that they will not be able to attend the meet. The Summit, which is primarily an IPU initiative and not an SAARC activity, will be attended by Speakers of Parliament from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka among other countries, the sources said. Significantly, in 2015, India had boycotted a Commonwealth Parliamentary Union (CPU) meeting in Islamabad to protest against Pakistan's decision to not invite the Speaker of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. The discussions during the Speakers' Summit on achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will update the participants on the implementation of the SDGs in their region and globally. Special emphasis will be laid on sharing experiences and increasing understanding about how parliaments in the region institutionalise the global goals, capture the synergies and build coherence at the policy level, IPU said on its website. By PTI WASHINGTON: Top Democratic leaders, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Indian-American Senator Kamala Harris, today urged US President Donald Trump to rescind his alleged "Muslim ban". "This is effectively a Muslim ban. One that will do nothing to keep us safe and undermines our core American values," Harris, who is of mixed Indian-American and African- American heritage, said as she launched an online petition campaign urging Trump to rescind the ban. The White House has denied that this is a ban on Muslims. Senator Schumer, the Senate Minority leader, said the executive orders are wrong. He demanded that the President immediately rescind the executive orders. "Executive orders make US less safe and secure; turn much of the world against us. Joining recent refugees today to call on President Trump to rescind," he tweeted. "Still much more work to do; President Trump must overturn this awful executive order," he said. Schumer demanded that those refugees coming here must not be coerced without advice from supporters and advocates to sign 'voluntary' deportation orders. Referring to a phone call he had with Gen (rtd) John Kelly, Secretary of Homeland Security, Schumer said he has been assured that the court order will be complied with. "All those still in airports expected to be admitted," he said. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said the Muslim ban is unconstitutional. "The injunction against President Trump's Executive Order must be immediately enforced nationwide to prevent further harm from his immoral and unconstitutional ban on Muslims," she said. Pelosi said she supports the efforts of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and others to challenge this order on Constitutional grounds and call on the Department of Homeland Security and US Customs and Border Protection to respect the district court's nationwide injunction prohibiting the US government from removing lawful permanent residents and other visa holders who are returning home to the United States. "Any delays in implementing the injunction will have extremely harmful ramifications across the United States as families, coworkers and communities will be arbitrarily separated. I expect a full report from the Department of Homeland Security and US Customs as to the wellbeing and status of those who have been affected by the Executive Order," Pelosi said. "As the Statue of Liberty holds her torch of welcome high, there are tears in her eyes as she sees how low this Administration has stooped in its callousness toward immigrant families and refugees who have trusted in the laws and protections of the United States," she said. WASHINGTON: Top Democratic leaders, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Indian-American Senator Kamala Harris, today urged US President Donald Trump to rescind his alleged "Muslim ban". "This is effectively a Muslim ban. One that will do nothing to keep us safe and undermines our core American values," Harris, who is of mixed Indian-American and African- American heritage, said as she launched an online petition campaign urging Trump to rescind the ban. The White House has denied that this is a ban on Muslims. Senator Schumer, the Senate Minority leader, said the executive orders are wrong. He demanded that the President immediately rescind the executive orders. "Executive orders make US less safe and secure; turn much of the world against us. Joining recent refugees today to call on President Trump to rescind," he tweeted. "Still much more work to do; President Trump must overturn this awful executive order," he said. Schumer demanded that those refugees coming here must not be coerced without advice from supporters and advocates to sign 'voluntary' deportation orders. Referring to a phone call he had with Gen (rtd) John Kelly, Secretary of Homeland Security, Schumer said he has been assured that the court order will be complied with. "All those still in airports expected to be admitted," he said. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said the Muslim ban is unconstitutional. "The injunction against President Trump's Executive Order must be immediately enforced nationwide to prevent further harm from his immoral and unconstitutional ban on Muslims," she said. Pelosi said she supports the efforts of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and others to challenge this order on Constitutional grounds and call on the Department of Homeland Security and US Customs and Border Protection to respect the district court's nationwide injunction prohibiting the US government from removing lawful permanent residents and other visa holders who are returning home to the United States. "Any delays in implementing the injunction will have extremely harmful ramifications across the United States as families, coworkers and communities will be arbitrarily separated. I expect a full report from the Department of Homeland Security and US Customs as to the wellbeing and status of those who have been affected by the Executive Order," Pelosi said. "As the Statue of Liberty holds her torch of welcome high, there are tears in her eyes as she sees how low this Administration has stooped in its callousness toward immigrant families and refugees who have trusted in the laws and protections of the United States," she said. By PTI WASHINGTON: Saudi Arabia's King Salman has backed US President Donald Trump's request to have safe zones in war-torn Syria and Yemen as the two leaders agreed to strengthen bilateral cooperation and "rigorously" enforce the Iranian nuclear deal, the White House has said. "The President requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said after Trump and the Saudi King had their first telephonic conversation yesterday. During the conversation, the two leaders reaffirmed the longstanding friendship and strategic partnership between the US and Saudi Arabia. "They agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of radical Islamic terrorism and also on the importance of working jointly to address challenges to regional peace and security, including the conflicts in Syria and Yemen," the White House said. Trump and Salman agreed on the importance of "rigorously" enforcing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran and of addressing Iran's "destabilising regional activities". Trump voiced support for the Kingdom's Vision 2030 economic programme. Both leaders expressed desire to explore additional steps to strengthen bilateral economic and energy cooperation. "The two leaders also discussed an invitation from the King for President Trump to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future, economically and socially, for the people of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the region," the White House said. "The President and King Salman closed by underscoring their personal commitment to continued consultations on a range of regional and bilateral issues," it said. According to the White House, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad bin Zayid Al Nuhayyan in another telephone call also supported the idea of safe zones in Syria and Yemen. "The two leaders reaffirmed the strong partnership between both countries and committed to further strengthen cooperation on fighting radical Islamic terrorism. They discussed recent developments in the Middle East, including the fight against ISIS and joint efforts to address the conflict in Yemen and elsewhere in the region," the White House said. "The President also raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative. The President and Crown Prince closed by underscoring their commitment to close consultations on issues of mutual concern," it added. WASHINGTON: Saudi Arabia's King Salman has backed US President Donald Trump's request to have safe zones in war-torn Syria and Yemen as the two leaders agreed to strengthen bilateral cooperation and "rigorously" enforce the Iranian nuclear deal, the White House has said. "The President requested and the King agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said after Trump and the Saudi King had their first telephonic conversation yesterday. During the conversation, the two leaders reaffirmed the longstanding friendship and strategic partnership between the US and Saudi Arabia. "They agreed on the importance of strengthening joint efforts to fight the spread of radical Islamic terrorism and also on the importance of working jointly to address challenges to regional peace and security, including the conflicts in Syria and Yemen," the White House said. Trump and Salman agreed on the importance of "rigorously" enforcing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran and of addressing Iran's "destabilising regional activities". Trump voiced support for the Kingdom's Vision 2030 economic programme. Both leaders expressed desire to explore additional steps to strengthen bilateral economic and energy cooperation. "The two leaders also discussed an invitation from the King for President Trump to lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism and to help build a new future, economically and socially, for the people of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the region," the White House said. "The President and King Salman closed by underscoring their personal commitment to continued consultations on a range of regional and bilateral issues," it said. According to the White House, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad bin Zayid Al Nuhayyan in another telephone call also supported the idea of safe zones in Syria and Yemen. "The two leaders reaffirmed the strong partnership between both countries and committed to further strengthen cooperation on fighting radical Islamic terrorism. They discussed recent developments in the Middle East, including the fight against ISIS and joint efforts to address the conflict in Yemen and elsewhere in the region," the White House said. "The President also raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative. The President and Crown Prince closed by underscoring their commitment to close consultations on issues of mutual concern," it added. By AFP NEW YORK: Starbucks plans to hire 10,000 refugees worldwide over the next five years in response to President Donald Trump's travel ban, the head of the US coffee-chain company said Sunday. "I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise," Starbucks chairman and chief executive Howard Schultz said in a letter to employees posted on the company's website. "We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question." Schultz, a Democratic Party supporter, said that Starbucks had been in contact with employees affected by the new Republican president's executive order signed Friday. The decree suspends the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The CEO said the refugee hires would be fleeing war, persecution and discrimination in the 75 countries where the company operates. "And we will start this effort here in the US by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support," he said. Schultz also defended Mexico, which Trump has said will have to pay for a wall along its long and porous border with the United States to deter immigrants, perhaps by the US imposing a 20 percent tariff on Mexican imports. "Building bridges, not walls, with Mexico," he wrote, voicing support for the country that has provided Starbucks with coffee for three decades and where nearly 600 Starbucks coffee shops employ 7,000 people. "We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. "But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same." Schultz is close to Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential candidate who lost to Trump in the November election, and supported her during her White House campaign. But he has dismissed persistent rumors that he would seek the highest office in the land. NEW YORK: Starbucks plans to hire 10,000 refugees worldwide over the next five years in response to President Donald Trump's travel ban, the head of the US coffee-chain company said Sunday. "I write to you today with deep concern, a heavy heart and a resolute promise," Starbucks chairman and chief executive Howard Schultz said in a letter to employees posted on the company's website. "We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question." Schultz, a Democratic Party supporter, said that Starbucks had been in contact with employees affected by the new Republican president's executive order signed Friday. The decree suspends the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The CEO said the refugee hires would be fleeing war, persecution and discrimination in the 75 countries where the company operates. "And we will start this effort here in the US by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support," he said. Schultz also defended Mexico, which Trump has said will have to pay for a wall along its long and porous border with the United States to deter immigrants, perhaps by the US imposing a 20 percent tariff on Mexican imports. "Building bridges, not walls, with Mexico," he wrote, voicing support for the country that has provided Starbucks with coffee for three decades and where nearly 600 Starbucks coffee shops employ 7,000 people. "We stand ready to help and support our Mexican customers, partners and their families as they navigate what impact proposed trade sanctions, immigration restrictions and taxes might have on their business and their trust of Americans. "But we will continue to invest in this critically important market all the same." Schultz is close to Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential candidate who lost to Trump in the November election, and supported her during her White House campaign. But he has dismissed persistent rumors that he would seek the highest office in the land. By Associated Press MEDFORD: Harold Hayes, an Army medic and the last survivor of a group of medics and nurses who spent nine weeks evading capture in Nazi-occupied Albania during World War II, has died. He was 94. All 30 men and women in the group eventually made it out, but it was kept secret to protect partisan fighters who helped them. Hayes' daughter, Margaret Bleakley, told The New York Times that he died Jan. 22 in a hospital in Medford, Oregon, following an operation to remove a blood clot from his leg. Hayes was among 13 medics, 13 nurses and four crew members to board a twin-engine cargo plane in Nov. 8, 1943, in Sicily expecting a two-hour flight to help wounded troops in Italy. "It sure wasn't something any of us expected," said Hayes in a 2013 interview with the Medford Mail Tribune. "We thought we would be in Italy for a very short time, then return." Bad weather caused the plane to go off course, and it was attacked by German fighters before ducking back into the clouds, finally running low on fuel and landing 25 miles inland. "The pilot made a skillful landing," Hayes said. "But it came to an abrupt stop when the wheels bogged down in the mud. It turned up on its nose and fell back again." A 23-year-old crew chief was the only casualty, unable to walk with a knee injury, and the others carried him for much of their 600-mile trek out. Along the way they suffered dysentery, lack of food, lice, and the dangers of German patrols and getting caught up in Albania's civil war. "We were caught in the middle of all that," Hayes said. "Some days we walked 24 hours without stopping." They were listed as missing in action and letters went out to their families. In late November, British intelligence in Albania learned the American plane had crashed and those aboard were alive. American and British rescue plans were developed. On Jan. 9, 1943, 10 nurses and 17 medics and crew members boarded a British launch and crossed to Italy. Three nurses who remained behind in the German-occupied city of Berat made it across in March 1944, riding pack mules to the coast and then a torpedo boat across the Adriatic. The escape was kept classified for years because some partisans who helped the Americans were shot by Germans and, after the war, those suspected of helping the Americans were executed by Enver Hoxha, Albania's Communist dictator. He died in 1985. "For many years, I didn't say anything about what happened in Albania," Hayes told The New York Times in a 2015 telephone interview. MEDFORD: Harold Hayes, an Army medic and the last survivor of a group of medics and nurses who spent nine weeks evading capture in Nazi-occupied Albania during World War II, has died. He was 94. All 30 men and women in the group eventually made it out, but it was kept secret to protect partisan fighters who helped them. Hayes' daughter, Margaret Bleakley, told The New York Times that he died Jan. 22 in a hospital in Medford, Oregon, following an operation to remove a blood clot from his leg. Hayes was among 13 medics, 13 nurses and four crew members to board a twin-engine cargo plane in Nov. 8, 1943, in Sicily expecting a two-hour flight to help wounded troops in Italy. "It sure wasn't something any of us expected," said Hayes in a 2013 interview with the Medford Mail Tribune. "We thought we would be in Italy for a very short time, then return." Bad weather caused the plane to go off course, and it was attacked by German fighters before ducking back into the clouds, finally running low on fuel and landing 25 miles inland. "The pilot made a skillful landing," Hayes said. "But it came to an abrupt stop when the wheels bogged down in the mud. It turned up on its nose and fell back again." A 23-year-old crew chief was the only casualty, unable to walk with a knee injury, and the others carried him for much of their 600-mile trek out. Along the way they suffered dysentery, lack of food, lice, and the dangers of German patrols and getting caught up in Albania's civil war. "We were caught in the middle of all that," Hayes said. "Some days we walked 24 hours without stopping." They were listed as missing in action and letters went out to their families. In late November, British intelligence in Albania learned the American plane had crashed and those aboard were alive. American and British rescue plans were developed. On Jan. 9, 1943, 10 nurses and 17 medics and crew members boarded a British launch and crossed to Italy. Three nurses who remained behind in the German-occupied city of Berat made it across in March 1944, riding pack mules to the coast and then a torpedo boat across the Adriatic. The escape was kept classified for years because some partisans who helped the Americans were shot by Germans and, after the war, those suspected of helping the Americans were executed by Enver Hoxha, Albania's Communist dictator. He died in 1985. "For many years, I didn't say anything about what happened in Albania," Hayes told The New York Times in a 2015 telephone interview. By IANS DAMASCUS: Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem warned on Monday against any attempt by foreign powers to establish safe zones in northern Syria, state news agency SANA reported. Al-Moallem made the remarks at a meeting with visiting United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi, where both agreed that imposing safe zones, as proposed by US President Donald Trump, would be "unsafe" and violate the sovereignty of Syria. On Wednesday, Trump said he "will absolutely do safe zones in Syria" for refugees fleeing the war in the country, amid reports that he will task the Pentagon to prepare a plan for setting up safe zones in northern Syria. Turkey agreed with the idea, as Ankara has long been seeking to create such zones in northern Syria, especially when it has forces there fighting the Islamic State group and Kurdish-backed militias. In separate phone calls with Trump on Sunday, Saudi King Salman and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen to help refugees "displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said in a press release. Earlier in the day, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said his country may support the US initiative to establish safe zones for refugees in Syria, noting that the plan would require close cooperation with the UN and approval from the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad. DAMASCUS: Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem warned on Monday against any attempt by foreign powers to establish safe zones in northern Syria, state news agency SANA reported. Al-Moallem made the remarks at a meeting with visiting United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi, where both agreed that imposing safe zones, as proposed by US President Donald Trump, would be "unsafe" and violate the sovereignty of Syria. On Wednesday, Trump said he "will absolutely do safe zones in Syria" for refugees fleeing the war in the country, amid reports that he will task the Pentagon to prepare a plan for setting up safe zones in northern Syria. Turkey agreed with the idea, as Ankara has long been seeking to create such zones in northern Syria, especially when it has forces there fighting the Islamic State group and Kurdish-backed militias. In separate phone calls with Trump on Sunday, Saudi King Salman and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen to help refugees "displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said in a press release. Earlier in the day, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said his country may support the US initiative to establish safe zones for refugees in Syria, noting that the plan would require close cooperation with the UN and approval from the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad. By PTI GENEVA: US President Donald Trump's travel ban on citizens from mainly Muslim countries is illegal and "mean-spirited", the United Nations human rights chief Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein said today. Zeid, who rarely communicates on Twitter, said in a tweet that "discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law", adding that "the US ban is also mean-spirited and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism." Trump on Friday signed an executive order suspending the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely -- and barring citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The measures introduced a week after his inauguration were fiercely criticised over the weekend, although UN reactions were largely tepid. The UN bodies most directly engaged with migration -- the UN refugee agency and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) -- issued a statement on Saturday which made no mention of the executive order and stopped far short of condemning it. Instead, the agencies urged the US to "continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution." They also vowed "to engage actively and constructively with the US Government... to protect those who need it most". GENEVA: US President Donald Trump's travel ban on citizens from mainly Muslim countries is illegal and "mean-spirited", the United Nations human rights chief Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein said today. Zeid, who rarely communicates on Twitter, said in a tweet that "discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law", adding that "the US ban is also mean-spirited and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism." Trump on Friday signed an executive order suspending the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely -- and barring citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. The measures introduced a week after his inauguration were fiercely criticised over the weekend, although UN reactions were largely tepid. The UN bodies most directly engaged with migration -- the UN refugee agency and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) -- issued a statement on Saturday which made no mention of the executive order and stopped far short of condemning it. Instead, the agencies urged the US to "continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution." They also vowed "to engage actively and constructively with the US Government... to protect those who need it most". By IANS ANKARA: Twenty Islamic State fighters were "neutralised" in northern Syria over the past 24 hours as part of Turkish-backed operation against the jihadist group, the state-run Anadolu news agency said quoting the military. Turkey's military did not specify if the IS militants had been killed, captured, or wounded, Anadolu reported. Turkish armed forces also hit 23 IS targets in northern Syria, according to a statement from its general staff. Turkish jets destroyed two gun positions, 20 buildings, and 76 handmade explosives, Anadolu said. Turkey launched its "Euphrates Shield" operation in late August last year to sweep the Sunni hardliners and Kurdish fighters from its Syrian border using Free Syrian Army rebel fighters and Turkish artillery backed by Turkish jets and in since early January, Russian warplanes. Turkish security forces have defused nearly 3,500 handmade explosives and over 55 mines under controlled conditions since the operation started, Anadolu said. More than 1,300 IS militants have been killed since the operation began, the Turkish armed forces general staff stated on January 6. ANKARA: Twenty Islamic State fighters were "neutralised" in northern Syria over the past 24 hours as part of Turkish-backed operation against the jihadist group, the state-run Anadolu news agency said quoting the military. Turkey's military did not specify if the IS militants had been killed, captured, or wounded, Anadolu reported. Turkish armed forces also hit 23 IS targets in northern Syria, according to a statement from its general staff. Turkish jets destroyed two gun positions, 20 buildings, and 76 handmade explosives, Anadolu said. Turkey launched its "Euphrates Shield" operation in late August last year to sweep the Sunni hardliners and Kurdish fighters from its Syrian border using Free Syrian Army rebel fighters and Turkish artillery backed by Turkish jets and in since early January, Russian warplanes. Turkish security forces have defused nearly 3,500 handmade explosives and over 55 mines under controlled conditions since the operation started, Anadolu said. More than 1,300 IS militants have been killed since the operation began, the Turkish armed forces general staff stated on January 6. By Associated Press WASHINGTON: The White House is vigorously defending President Donald Trump's immigration restrictions, as protests spread throughout the country. Some Republicans in Congress urged caution amid legal challenges to the order banning travellers from seven predominantly Muslim countries, though top congressional Republicans remain largely behind the new president. In a background call with reporters Sunday, a senior administration official declared the order's implementation "a massive success story," claiming it had been done "seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism." That, despite widespread confusion and an apparent walk-back about how the order, which temporarily bars the citizens of seven majority Muslim nations from entering the U.S., would be applied to certain groups, like U.S. legal permanent residents. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday saying that, absent information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a "dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination." That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent U.S. residency "green cards" will not be barred from re-entering the U.S., as officials had previously said. It remains unclear what kind of additional screening they will now face. Trump's order, which also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria, has sparked widespread protests and denunciations from Democrats and a handful of Republicans. Many have accused the administration of rushing to implement the changes, resulting in panic and confusion at the nation's airports. "You have an extreme vetting proposal that didn't get the vetting it should have had," said Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, who urged the new president to "slow down" and work with lawmakers on how best to tighten screening for foreigners who enter the United States. "In my view, we ought to all take a deep breath and come up with something that makes sense for our national security" and reflects the fact that "America's always been a welcoming home for refugees and immigrants," he said. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said the changes were "a small price to pay" to keep the nation safe. But it's unclear whether the order will accomplish that. The order does not address homegrown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. And the list of countries in Trump's order doesn't include Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. Trump, meanwhile, defended his actions, insisting it was "not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." The developments came a day after a federal judge in New York issued an emergency order temporarily barring the U.S. from deporting people from the seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trump's 90-day travel ban. The order barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. The Department of Homeland Security said Sunday the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. Top congressional Republicans, meanwhile, were backing Trump despite concerns raised Sunday from a handful of GOP lawmakers and condemnation from the Koch political network, which is among the most influential players in the conservative movement. Republican Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham warned of unintended consequences, expressing fear the order could "become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism." "This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security," they wrote. Trump fired back on Twitter, calling the pair "sadly weak on immigration." WASHINGTON: The White House is vigorously defending President Donald Trump's immigration restrictions, as protests spread throughout the country. Some Republicans in Congress urged caution amid legal challenges to the order banning travellers from seven predominantly Muslim countries, though top congressional Republicans remain largely behind the new president. In a background call with reporters Sunday, a senior administration official declared the order's implementation "a massive success story," claiming it had been done "seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism." That, despite widespread confusion and an apparent walk-back about how the order, which temporarily bars the citizens of seven majority Muslim nations from entering the U.S., would be applied to certain groups, like U.S. legal permanent residents. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement Sunday saying that, absent information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, residency would be a "dispositive factor in our case-by-case determination." That means citizens of the seven countries who hold permanent U.S. residency "green cards" will not be barred from re-entering the U.S., as officials had previously said. It remains unclear what kind of additional screening they will now face. Trump's order, which also suspends refugee admissions for 120 days and indefinitely bars the processing of refugees from Syria, has sparked widespread protests and denunciations from Democrats and a handful of Republicans. Many have accused the administration of rushing to implement the changes, resulting in panic and confusion at the nation's airports. "You have an extreme vetting proposal that didn't get the vetting it should have had," said Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, who urged the new president to "slow down" and work with lawmakers on how best to tighten screening for foreigners who enter the United States. "In my view, we ought to all take a deep breath and come up with something that makes sense for our national security" and reflects the fact that "America's always been a welcoming home for refugees and immigrants," he said. Several Democrats in Congress said they would be introducing legislation to stop the ban. White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said the changes were "a small price to pay" to keep the nation safe. But it's unclear whether the order will accomplish that. The order does not address homegrown extremists already in America, a primary concern of federal law enforcement officials. And the list of countries in Trump's order doesn't include Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. Trump, meanwhile, defended his actions, insisting it was "not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." The developments came a day after a federal judge in New York issued an emergency order temporarily barring the U.S. from deporting people from the seven majority Muslim nations subject to Trump's 90-day travel ban. The order barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. The Department of Homeland Security said Sunday the court ruling would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order. Top congressional Republicans, meanwhile, were backing Trump despite concerns raised Sunday from a handful of GOP lawmakers and condemnation from the Koch political network, which is among the most influential players in the conservative movement. Republican Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham warned of unintended consequences, expressing fear the order could "become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism." "This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security," they wrote. Trump fired back on Twitter, calling the pair "sadly weak on immigration." By PTI GENEVA: The aviation industry's trade association today criticised US President Donald Trump's travel bans for "causing confusion" and called on Washington to clarify the new rules. "We ask for early clarity from the US administration on the current situation," the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said in a statement. On Friday, Trump signed an executive order barring US entry for travellers from seven mainly Muslim countries Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen -- for 90 days. It also suspends the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, and Syrian refugees indefinitely. The order led to chaotic scenes at airports around the world, as well as mass protests in major American cities and a diplomatic outcry. Trump's order was "issued without prior coordination or warning, causing confusion among both airlines and travellers," the Geneva-based IATA said. "It also placed additional burdens on airlines to comply with unclear requirements, to bear implementation costs and to face potential penalties for non-compliance." IATA member airlines can be fined if they allow individuals who lack proper permits to board, and can be responsible for returning passengers who are denied entry to their point of departure. Much of the chaos surrounding Trump's policy has been triggered by the fact that it affects dual nationals as well as those with valid US entry permits. Airlines can meet each country's requirements only with "advance coordination as well as with detailed and consistent operational information", the association said. GENEVA: The aviation industry's trade association today criticised US President Donald Trump's travel bans for "causing confusion" and called on Washington to clarify the new rules. "We ask for early clarity from the US administration on the current situation," the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said in a statement. On Friday, Trump signed an executive order barring US entry for travellers from seven mainly Muslim countries Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen -- for 90 days. It also suspends the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, and Syrian refugees indefinitely. The order led to chaotic scenes at airports around the world, as well as mass protests in major American cities and a diplomatic outcry. Trump's order was "issued without prior coordination or warning, causing confusion among both airlines and travellers," the Geneva-based IATA said. "It also placed additional burdens on airlines to comply with unclear requirements, to bear implementation costs and to face potential penalties for non-compliance." IATA member airlines can be fined if they allow individuals who lack proper permits to board, and can be responsible for returning passengers who are denied entry to their point of departure. Much of the chaos surrounding Trump's policy has been triggered by the fact that it affects dual nationals as well as those with valid US entry permits. Airlines can meet each country's requirements only with "advance coordination as well as with detailed and consistent operational information", the association said. InvestorPlace When investors think of tech stocks, they dont often think of dividends. And dividend investors dont often think about tech stocks. However, there are undervalued tech stocks with dividends that are worth focusing on. In fact, there are a handful of tech stocks with low valuations and attractive dividends. Of course, not all tech stocks with nice dividends are worth buying, but a handful of them certainly are. As investors continue to fish for a low in the stock market, many of these stocks ar Sri Venkateswara College wins Great Britain debate in Delhi New Delhi [India], Jan.28 : The Delhi edition of the Great Britain Debate organised by the British High Commission and hosted by the Lady Sri Ram College was won by Anmol Sharma and Sidaq Batra of Sri Venkateswara College. The runners up were Pratyaksha Jha and Aritro Bose of Ashoka University. (Posted on 28 January 2017, 1667650551 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/education-news.php (Posted on 28 January 2017, 1667650551 173O212O198O32) The audience witnessed a high intensity and quality competition among 32 top debating teams from across universities and colleges in Delhi who spoke for and against topics on gender equality and sustainable development.At the event, Hannah Cockburn, Head of Political and Bilateral Affairs, British High Commission said:"This is the fourth consecutive year that we have conducted the Great Britain Debate. We are delighted this time to have been able to increase our nationwide footprint to include debaters from across the country. I am happy to have heard some of the fine voices of the next generation. The youth of India are important constituents of a 'Living Bridge' between UK and India. I congratulate the winners and urge all of the participants to use the Great Britain Debate as a springboard to go and achieve great things for India."Just like the debating competition, the prize is also special. Each element of the prize has been carefully handpicked to enable the winning team's journey to success through knowledge and education. Winners of the Great Britain Debate will get a Kindle, annual British Council Library membership, 'HeySuccess' premium membership. Most importantly they will get an exclusive opportunity to meet and interact with Sir Dominic Asquith KCMG, British High Commissioner to India."Organised by the British High Commission network in India, the Great Britain Debate competition is one of the biggest since its conception. In its 4th edition, the competition is being held in eight cities - Bhopal, Visakhapatnam, Hyderabad, Delhi, Kolkata, Dehradun, Jaipur and Patiala.The debate is being organised in association with Chevening Scholarships. Sorry, that page not found! Please visit our Home Page for latest updates BJP to release its Goa poll manifesto Panaji (Goa) [India], Jan. 29 : Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar will on Sunday release the Bharatiya Janata Party's election manifesto in Goa ahead of state assembly polls. (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650554 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/more-news.php (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650554 173O212O198O32) Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadanvis and others will also be present on the occasion.Assuring the people of Goa a better life, Prime Minister Narendra Modi yesterday said they would ensure that the state 'blooms' if the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is voted to power.Asserting that the government has contributed a lot towards the development of Goa, Prime Minister Modi said they have given more to Goa in 25 months than what other governments in past gave it in 50 years.Taking a dig at the Congress, Prime Minister Modi said Goa witnessed slow development during 1990-2000 due to political instability.Appealing the people of Goa to vote for them, Prime Minister Modi said, "I would make the state most comfortable in the country if the voters give us a comfortable majority."Goa goes to polls on February 4. Nitish Kumar has all the qualities, qualifications of a PM, says Bihar minister Patna, Jan 29 (TheBiharPost/IBNS): A senior minister in Bihar finds in chief minister Nitish Kumar all the qualities and qualifications of a Prime Minister days after his party, JD-U, pulled out of UP polls when no parties showed any interest in allying with it. (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650555 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/more-news.php (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650555 173O212O198O32) Nitish Kumar has all the qualities and qualifications of a Prime Minister. Be is the clear vision, integrity, strong will and experience, everything is present in him, Bihar water resources minister Rajiv Ranjan Singh told a section of media on Sunday.Ranjan, more popular as Lalan Singh, said rather than projecting someone as the PM candidate, its the political circumstances which decide it.In October last year, the JD-U leadership had even projected Kumar as the perfect challenger to PM Modi saying he has all the qualities of a PM and also authorized him to explore options for a broad anti-BJP front to take on Modi.The JD-U took this decision at its two-day partys national council meeting held in Rajgir which invited strong protests both the Congress and the RJD.In fact, it was over the issue of Prime Ministership that the JD-U had broken its 17-year-old alliance with the BJP in 2013, analysts say.It is said Kumar turned angry moments after Narendra Modi, the Gujarat chief minister, was named as BJPs campaign committee chief for 2014 Lok Sabha polls at partys Goa conclave.(thebiharpost) PM Modi spells 'smile more, score more' mantra for students New Delhi [India], Jan. 29: Giving a message of encouragement to the students who are set to appear in the upcoming board examinations, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday gave them a 'smile more, score more' mantra to elevate their stress. (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650556 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/india-news.php (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650556 173O212O198O32) Addressing the nation in the 28th edition of his 'Mann ki Baat' programme, Prime Minister Modi said how examinations must be taken as "a pleasure" and not "a pressure"."I will tell all students smile more and score more. Why should exam time be a time of stress or sadness? Want to talk about exams and what so many people have written to me. Do not think about exams as pressure; they should be celebrated as festivals," he said.The Prime Minister advised the students that during examinations there should be an environment of festivity as it will turn 'P' for pressure into 'P' for pleasure, adding that when students are relaxed the recall value increases."Relaxation is the best tonic for memory. A happy mind is the secret of a good mark sheet," he added.Prime Minister Modi tried to encourage the students by saying that the examinations are test of this year's preparation and not of a lifetime."We sometimes do not see exams in the right perspective; Exams are not a benchmark of your success in life. If your mission and ambition are in sync, marks will follow," he added.With concluding remarks, Prime Minister Modi urged the students to compete with themselves to see how they can improve their performance. Have always stood against Congress whenever they did injustice: Punjab CM Lambi (Punjab) [India], Jan. 29 : Accusing the Congress Party of indulging in vendetta politics, Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal on Sunday rubbished the baseless allegations being levelled by the opposition and said that the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD)-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) alliance will form the next government in Punjab. (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650558 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/punjab-news.php (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650558 173O212O198O32) "Our campaigning is going on in full swing. Me and Sukhbir have attended all the major rallies. The people are very much excited. The people want peace which even the BJP-SAD wants. Our cadre is very strong. Earlier also, we formed our government and even now we will do the same," Badal told ANI in an exclusive interview."We have always done what the party has said. The party is supreme. We lead all the battles which are in the interest of the nation," he added.Talking about the progress in agriculture, the Chief Minister said that his government has done everything possible for this sector.Rebuffing the opposition's assertion of drug menace in the state, he said, "Drugs are exported from outside. These are baseless allegations. Heroin comes from Afghanistan. Drugs are not here. They are not made here...even if you make any issue."All 117 constituencies in Punjab will vote on February 4 and the results will be announced on March 11. Upper caste students boycott meal cooked by Dalit lady Tikamgarh (Madhya Pradesh)[India], Jan. 29: In a shocking incident related to caste-based discrimination, the children of a government school in Tikamgarh, Madhya Pradesh, allegedly refused to consume mid-day meal cooked by a Dalit woman. (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650559 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/more-news.php (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650559 173O212O198O32) When asked, the children said the food is being prepared at home by a woman, who doesn't belong to their community."We don't eat the meal because it is prepared by the women from Banskar community. Only Banskar community people consumes the food," Muskan, a student said.The Dalit woman, who is appointed to prepare mid-day for the school children, said: "Only 12 students came to my home and ate their meal while the others left allegedly and boycotted the meal saying 'we don't want to have food here as you hail from a lower caste'."The school headmaster, however, attempted to downplay this report."The midday meal should be cooked inside the school's kitchen, not at cook's home. Secondly, kids avoid the meal just because the meal is prepared in someone else's home," he said.However, the children belonging from the lower caste have no problem in consuming the mid-day meal and were seen having it with full delight. SAD-BJP needed in Punjab for country's protection from Pakistan: PM Modi Kotkapura (Punjab) [India], Jan. 29 : Invoking security threats from Pakistan as a bid to woo voters, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday took on the Congress party and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), saying that Punjab, which shares the border with the neighbouring country, needs a strong government to protect not only the state, but the whole country from infiltrators from across the border. (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650559 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/punjab-news.php (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650559 173O212O198O32) He also urged the people of the state to not vote for outsiders, but for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)."The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD)-BJP coalition government is necessary in the state not only for Punjab's security but for the country's need," he said, while addressing an election rally at Kotakpura in Faridkot district of Punjab ahead of the assembly polls in the state.He added, "Don't rely on those have aristocratic life style and the outsiders for state and country's security. We have to ensure that we have a strong government. You have to ensure that you vote properly."Prime Minister Modi also alleged that it was the Congress that defamed the Sikhs in the 1980s and called them terrorists and now it is the AAP which is calling the youth of the state 'drug addicts'."Congress labelled youth of state as terrorists. Few others are calling them drug addicts. That cannot be accepted," Prime Minister Modi said.Making a veiled attack on the AAP and the Congress, the Prime Minister warned those who were bad mouthing the outgoing Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal."People are speaking wrong about Badal Sahab. This is not at all acceptable for a leader of his stature. And when these people are not honest, how can we expect them to speak well about Badal Sahab? They will not think about the welfare of the people of the state," Modi said."What matters most for Badal Sahab is welfare of Punjab, its farmers and the people," Prime Minister Modi added.He also laid down the BJP's plans for the development of the state."We want our farmers to prosper. So, we have initiated several measures. We have brought Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchai Yojana for them," he said."An ethanol production plant will also be set up soon in the state," he added.Punjab goes to the assembly polls for 117 seats on February 4. 'Destructive' Congress can never speak anything good, taunts Adityanath Gorakhpur (Uttar Pradesh) [India], Jan. 29 : Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Yogi Adityanath, in a scathing attack on the Congress, said the older 'destructive' symbol of the party (a couple of bulls) indicated it can only ruin Uttar Pradesh. (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650560 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/more-news.php (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650560 173O212O198O32) Reacting on Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi's comment on the Bahujan Samaj Party's (BSP) ideology not dangerous like that of the BJP, Adityanath said people with destructive mindset can only utter foul words."Have you seen the older symbol of the Congress? It was a couple of bulls, which showed that it will destroy Uttar Pradesh, not prosper it," said the BJP MP."Expecting destructive people to speak something good is in itself wrong to think," he added.Rahul Gandhi, in a joint press briefing with Uttar Pradesh Akhilesh Yadav earlier today in Lucknow, scoffed at the BJP, saying that at least BSP's ideology was not dangerous like that of the saffron party, adding that he holds immense respect for Mayawati.Uttar Pradesh goes to polls on February 11. Tata Steel Kolkata Literary Meet 2017 concludes at picturesque Victoria Memorial Kolkata, Jan 29 : The Tata Steel Kolkata Literary Meet 2017, the city's most-awaited event that recognises and celebrates exchange of ideas and thoughts held in the backdrop of the iconic Victoria Memorial, culminated today with a series of thought-provoking sessions spanning for five days. (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650562 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/west-bengal-news.php (Posted on 29 January 2017, 1667650562 173O212O198O32) The audience at the Tata Steel Kolkata Literary Meet were treated to thoughtful and engaging discussions involving more than 130 luminaries from the field of literature, films, sports, economics, theatre, and many more in over 90 sessions. The last day of the coveted literary meet, too, witnessed a huge gathering.Speaking at the valedictory session, T V Narendran, Managing Director, Tata Steel India SEA, thanked the people of Kolkata for their enthusiastic participation at TSKLM.{image_1}It is indeed heartening to know that people in such large numbers participate so enthusiastically at this literary meet. We thank all the authors, artists, opinion makers, celebrities and the people of Kolkata making TSKLM a huge success, Narendran said.Speaking on the success of this years edition of TSKLM, Chanakya Chaudhary, Group Director, Corporate Communication Regulatory Affairs, Tata Steel, said: It has been a pleasure to bring this knowledge platform to the people of Kolkata whose enthusiastic participation, which has indeed made TSKLM among the top literary meets in the country. We feel encouraged to make this event bigger and better in the years ahead.Prominent authors like Ruskin Bond, Tagore researcher Martin Kampchen, historian Romila Thapar, the multifaceted Ramachandra Guha, Hollywood actress Ashley Judd, William Dalrymple along with several writers and actors of international and national repute graced the event.The audience was also enthralled by free flowing conversations by legends like Rishi Kapoor, Sunil Gavaskar, Abhinav Bindra, Soumitra Chatterjee, P. Chidambaram, and more.The Tata Steel Kolkata Literary Meet was also the occasion when the book lovers got a taste of Paul Beatty, the Man Booker Prize winner for 2016.Another highlight of the meet was the bringing together writers from two different generations with the mother and daughter duo of Anita and Kiran Desai, Nabaneeta Dev Sen and Nandana Sen and the father-son combination of Shashi and Kanishk Tharoor who enthralled the audience over the five-day literary extravaganza.The Tata Steel Kolkata Literary Meet, 2017 edition was witnessed the first edition of Write Brain Challenge, a short story competition for students.{image_2}The winners were announced during the concluding ceremony of the Tata Steel Kolkata Literary Meet, 2017.People filled the venues at the Victoria Memorial, Bengal Club and Calcutta Club where sessions of the literary were held. Tata Steel is the titled sponsor of the Tata Steel Kolkata Literary Meet which is held in association with Victoria Memorial Hall. 'Young' Rahul Gandhi neglecting Congress veterans: BJP Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], Jan. 30 : In the wake of senior Congress leader S.M. Krishna's resignation, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Monday launched a scathing on Rahul Gandhi and said the 'young' Congress vice-president is overlooking the leadership of his senior colleagues. (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650563 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/india-news.php (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650563 173O212O198O32) BJP leader S. Prakash told ANI the 'misguided' youth in Gandhi's leadership is consistently disregarding the loyal services of the party veterans."His target (Krishna) by the resignation was Mr Rahul Gandhi, who did not recognise the services of S.M Krishna. The leadership of the present Congress is overlooking the leadership of senior Congress members of the party which is seriously hurting them," he added.Prakash further said that in past as well, several leaders like Karnataka's Janardhan Poojari, former Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president and reputed Dalit leader Srinivas Prasad also raised a strong point against Gandhi's leadership."The exit of S.M. Krishna is a big blow to the national leadership of Congress. He has clearly stated that Rahul Gandhi is incapable of leading Congress. I think Congress is going to pay in the coming days," he added.The attack comes a day after Krishna resigned from the Congress Party, who said the grand old party doesn't need mass leaders like him and only wants managers, who can handle a situation."The party demands only managers. They don't need time-tested leaders and workers like me. With pain and anguish, I have decided to quit the Congress. This is a time to do some introspection," Krishna told the media here.Expressing pain over his ouster from the Congress, Krishna alleged that the party had sidelined him citing his old age.In a written letter to Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Krishna yesterday tendered his resignation from the party's membership."I am herewith tendering my resignation to the primary membership of the Congress Party," it read. PM Modi pays tribute to Mahatma Gandhi on his 69th death anniversary New Delhi [India], Jan. 30 : Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday paid tributes to the Father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi on his 69th death anniversary. (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650564 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/india-news.php (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650564 173O212O198O32) President Pranab Mukherjee, Vice-President Hamid Anasri and Prime Minister Narendra Modi will pay tributes Bapu at Rajghat here.An inter-religious prayer will also be organised to mark the day.Later in the day, Urban Development Minister Venkaiah Naidu will inaugurate improvement works at Gandhiji Samadhi.On this day in 1948 he was assassinated at a prayer meeting. Govt. convenes all-party meet ahead of Budget Session New Delhi [India], Jan. 30 : The government has convened an all-party meeting today ahead of the Budget Session of Parliament to seek opposition's support for the smooth conduct of proceedings in both the Houses. (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650564 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/india-news.php (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650564 173O212O198O32) Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan has also called a meeting of leaders of political parties in the House same evening.The Budget Session will start from Tuesday with President Pranab Mukherjee's address to a joint sitting of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha.The Economic Survey will also be presented on the first day of the session. General Budget will be presented on Wednesday.The two Houses will have a month long recess from February 10 to March 8 to enable the Standing Committees to consider the Demands for Grants of Ministries and Departments and prepare their reports. BJP backs Mulayam, asks Akhilesh to explain 'unbalanced' alliance New Delhi [India], Jan. 30 : Dubbing the alliance of the Samajwadi Party and Congress as 'unbalanced', the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Monday backed party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav's assertion and asked Uttar Pradesh Chief minister Akhilesh Yadav to 'explain' the tie-up. (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650565 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/india-news.php (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650565 173O212O198O32) "Mulayam has just said the truth. This is unbalanced alliance. Question should be asked to Akhilesh Yadav as to what is the reason behind the alliance with a party which has lost its grounds not only in the state but the entire country," BJP leader Mahesh Sharma told ANI.Taking a jibe at the prolonged rift in the Yadav family, Sharma saidthe Samajwadi Party is tarnishing the relation of a father-son and uncle-nephew, adding that the people of Uttar Pradesh would not fall into the trap of this drama.Expressing his anger over the newly-formed alliance of the Samajwadi Party and Congress, Mulayam yesterday said the party has the capability to win the elections without any support."Our party has the capability to contest this election without any support. I am confident that it would have marked victory had it contested alone," he added.He asserted that he would not campaign for the alliance in the assembly elections."I am against the alliance formed between the Samajwadi Party and Congress. I will never acknowledge this alliance. The Congress was in power for so long, but it did not do anything for the development of the country. I will not campaign in this election," Mulayam told ANI in an exclusive interview.Mulayam further lambasted Akhilesh for going against his wishes and jeopardising the chances of his own party members.Uttar Pradesh will be voting for a new state assembly in a seven-phase election between February 11 and March 8.Out of the 403 assembly seats, the Congress will be contesting in 105 seats and the Samajwadi Party will field its candidates in rest of the 298 seats. AG and P signs MoU with Hindustan LNG to build new LNG import terminal in Andhra New Delhi [India], Jan. 30 : AG and P (Atlantic, Gulf and Pacific Company), the leading global integrator of LNG infrastructure solutions including LNG terminals and the supply chains that emanate from them, and Hindustan LNG (HLNG), a Hyderabad-based LNG import terminal development company, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to supply tolled gas to power stations in the East Godavari region of Andhra Pradesh, India. (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650567 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/business-india-news.php (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650567 173O212O198O32) Under the agreement, AG&P will provide an integrated solution to deliver regasified LNG through a new LNG import terminal that AG&P will also design and build at the port in Andhra Pradesh.The MoU was signed at the Partnership Summit 2017 organized by Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and the signing was graced by Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu. The MoU has launched a fully integrated solution for delivering tolled gas in India, including design, construction, financing, operations and maintenance of the new terminal, which will ensure a reliable and low-cost supply to power producers, fertilizer plants, cold storage and other industries in Andhra Pradesh and other markets along the east coast.Speaking at the signing ceremony in Andhra Pradesh on 28th January, 2017, Dr C.R. Prasad, Chairman of HLNG said: "Andhra Pradesh is the ideal place for developing an LNG import facility to serve the growing energy demands of the east coast of India where existing gas-fired power projects urgently need a reliable supply of LNG. The partnership with AG&P will provide a strong platform to develop a fast-track and low-cost LNG import solution that enables the region to continue on its growth trajectory."AG&P will be responsible for designing and building all the required facilities for the import terminal, including a floating storage and mooring system, regasification terminal, related utilities and the provision of tolled gas to power plants and other users. AG&P will also carry out any necessary conversion works and, upon commissioning, ongoing operations and maintenance activities."It is a great privilege for AG&P to help implement India's vision for clean, low-cost, flexible and reliable power. Andhra Pradesh is playing a critical role in manufacturing and trade. The state and its people are on a strong, upward trajectory. We see the provision of tolled gas to supply power and fuel to factories, homes and even transport in an environmentally clean way as crucial elements of Andhra Pradesh's future. We are honoured to be a part of this exciting phase of the state's development," said Dr Jose P. Leviste, Jr., Chairman of AG&P.About AG&P:Atlantic, Gulf & Pacific Company of Manila (AG&P) is a global leader in infrastructure solutions for energy, natural resources and other industrial companies, delivering state-of-the-art, modularized products and support services to vessels, projects and plants. The company has deep experience in modular manufacturing of E-houses, LNG liquefaction and other process modules, refineries, petrochemical plants and mining operations for blue-chip clients globally. AG&P is now at the forefront of developing small-scale LNG infrastructure. AG&P designs, manufactures, finances, charters/leases, operates and maintains LNG terminals and the supply chains that emanate from them. AG&P leverages its partnerships with leading LNG experts to deliver flexible solutions across the LNG value chain in the shortest possible time with lower capital investment.About Hindustan LNG:Hindustan LNG is a Liquefied Natural Gas Supply Company with required infrastructure facilities in the east cost of Andhra Pradesh, India. The company is establishing itself across the natural gas value chain by foraying into LNG imports, regasification and gas evacuation for customers in the State of Andhra Pradesh and across India. Our aim is to play a prime role in the LNG supply chain in India by setting up the required infrastructure for importing LNG and for credible supply of LNG to consumers, thereby contributing to the energy security of India. Our motto is to create value by fulfilling our commitments to our partners, customers, employees and communities and societies at large. Manmohan Singh helped Vijay Mallya get bank loans : BJP New Delhi, Jan 30 : : The BJP on Monday alleged that former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh helped business tycoon Vijay Mallya get loans, NDTV reported. (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650572 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/more-news.php (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650572 173O212O198O32) Citing letters that have been reported in the media, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra asked : From where did Vijay Mallya procure such funds? Was sinking ship (Congress) helping sinking airline (Kingfisher) ?One of the reports said the the UPA Government had facilitated loans to Mallya after his request to Manmohan Singh and former Finance Minister P Chidambaram in 2011 and 2013.The letters allegedly requested that loans to Mallyas defunct Kingfisher Airlines from a consortium of banks be expedited.Patra alleged that even though the loans were not repaid, Mr Mallya was granted loans again and again.Mallya moved to Britain in March last year as the controversy over non-repayment of loans broke out and a group of banks began efforts to recover nearly 9,000 crores given out as loans to Kingfisher airlines.Mallya faces warrants in India and investigating agencies are trying to bring him back home. China urges Malaysia to continue search for missing Chinese tourists Beijing [China], Jan. 30 : China on Monday asked the Malaysian authorities to continue its search and rescue effort for Chinese nationals from a boat that sank off Malaysia's Sabah State on North Borneo on Saturday evening. (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650573 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/world-news.php (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650573 173O212O198O32) Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang also expressed hope that Malaysia would report the developments promptly, reports Xinhua."In the meantime, China hopes the Malaysian side will carry out fair and objective investigation to find out the truth as early as possible," said Geng.According to Chinese Foreign Ministry, 20 Chinese tourists had been rescued, with three dead and five missing.The boat carrying 31 people, including 28 tourists from China, went missing on Saturday after sailing from Kota Kinabalu in Malaysia to Pulau Mengalum, a popular tourist island, some 60 km west to Kota Kinabalu. OPPLE lighting organizes All India Trade Partner Conclave for channel partners New Delhi , Jan 30 : Opple, a global integrated lighting solutions company and one of World's Leading LED Lighting brand organized their all India Dealer Meet. Involving more than 100 dealers, this event awarded channel partners for their contribution to the brand sales. (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650576 173O212O198O32) https://www.newkerala.com/business-india-news.php (Posted on 30 January 2017, 1667650576 173O212O198O32) The event stared with the introduction of Li Qiuyang, the new International Business Unit Head, Opple Lighting. He addressed the distributors with a welcome speech followed by an award ceremony. He shared various insights on the target achieved in 2016 along with a strong sales and marketing plan for 2017. The major milestones for 2016 included:Various lighting projects all across industries (Hotels, Hospitals, Institutes).Aggressive participation in Light India 2016-New DelhiConsumer offer launch - Become a Millionaire OfferAchieved Growth of more than 200 percent over last year (2015)There were 11 categories involving the All India Champion of Champions, All India Best Distributor and many other different categories. All traders were presented with Certificates and brand trophies for their immense contribution to the brand.Talking about the meet, Opple India Head, Rambo Zhang, said, "We've been focusing on customers from some time now, but Channel Partners are our backbone. They are the ones who buy a large part of our produces. So we thought of rewarding them for their effort. This event will not only reward our regular partners but also entice new vendors to get associated with the brand. By initiating such an affair, both the dealers and the brand benefit."The brand has achieved their target of 100 crore in 2016 and aims to reach 125 crore this year. The event was concluded with food and drinks for all. Champaign, IL (61820) Today Rain showers this morning, then remaining overcast and windy during the afternoon hours. Morning high of 60F with temps falling to near 50. Winds SSW at 25 to 35 mph. Chance of rain 50%. Winds could occasionally gust over 50 mph.. Tonight Clear skies. Low 42F. Winds SSW at 10 to 15 mph. Global warming is expected to increase runoff and input of organic matter to aquatic ecosystems in large regions of the Northern hemisphere including the Baltic Sea. Research performed at Umea University and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences is now indicating a sevenfold increase in poisonous methylmercury in zooplankton as a consequence. This increase is due to an altered structure of the aquatic food web. The study has been published in the journal Science Advances. "The study has revealed a phenomenon that has not been described before. The results are critical in the prediction of how global climate changes can affect the exposure of methylmercury to ecosystems, and humans," says Erik Bjorn, associate professor at Umea University and leader of the research project. Mercury is regarded as one of the top ten chemicals of public health concern according to the World Health Organization, WHO. The problems with mercury are mostly caused by methylmercury, an organometallic mercury compound that acts as a strong neurotoxin and that can be accumulated in the food webs of seas and lakes. The content of methylmercury in fish and other living organisms is controlled both by the total content of mercury in the ecosystems and by complex chemical and ecological processes in the environment. Climate changes and land use are expected to affect these processes in several ways, for instance by input of organic matter, humic substances, from land through watercourses out to lakes and seas Humic substances affect the aquatic environment in several ways - for instance by reducing the reach of sunlight into the water. That can lead to reductions in the production of phytoplankton via photosynthesis and instead favour growth of bacteria which can make use of humic substances for their growth. In turn, this can cause a trophic shift in the food web where it goes from being dominated by phytoplankton production (autotrophic) to being dominated by bacterial production (heterotrophic). A heterotrophic food web generally has more levels of different organisms than an autotrophic food web, and the researchers' hypothesis was that this phenomenon would lead to an increased number of potential steps where methylmercury can be concentrated before reaching predators such as zooplankton and fish. "Our study confirms this hypothesis and shows that an increase of 15-20 per cent of the content of organic matter in our waters can cause a shift from an autotrophic based to a heterotrophic based food web and lead to the content of methylmercury increasing two to sevenfold in zooplankton," says Erik Bjorn. An increase in the content of organic matter by 15-20 per cent caused by increased precipitation and runoff is in accordance with climate change scenarios for large regions of the northern hemisphere, including the Baltic Sea region. The experiment also shows that the measured increase in methylmercury (two to sevenfold) is on a par with the estimated total increase (two to fivefold) of mercury in the ecosystems caused by human emissions during the entire industrial era from 1850 up until present time. "The results emphasise the critical importance of including effects of changes to the food web in lakes and seas into models and risk assessments of mercury in a changing climate," says Erik Bjorn. The study, which is a collaboration between researchers at Umea University and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, could be carried out thanks to access to the technologically advanced mesocosm facility at Umea Marine Sciences Centre in northern Sweden. The mesocosms consist of water-filled tubes with temperature and light control, which enable large-scale experiments under well-controlled conditions. Source: http://www.umu.se/english/about-umu/news-events/news/newsdetailpage/climate-changes-may-lead-to-more-poisonous-mercury-in-plankton.cid278602 Standards for authorizing first-time trials of drugs in humans are lax, and should be strengthened in several ways, McGill University researchers argue in a paper published today in Nature. While regulators in North America and Europe evaluate safety before human trials can proceed, they do not currently demand meaningful evidence for potential efficacy, write McGill bioethicist Jonathan Kimmelman and PhD student Carole Federico in a commentary article. "We believe that many (first-in-human) studies are launched on the basis of flimsy, under-scrutinized evidence." Trials of ineffective therapies place burdens on society even if research participants aren't harmed directly, the researchers argue. Drug development soaks up financial and research resources; patients and healthy volunteers involved in testing a dud treatment miss out on more promising ones; and expenses wasted on ineffective therapies are often passed on to healthcare systems in the form of higher drug prices. The argument for better scrutiny of animal studies may be especially timely, since the incoming U.S. president has indicated he intends to weaken requirements for clinical evidence of efficacy before drugs are approved. Lab Diagnostics & Automation eBook Compilation of the top interviews, articles, and news in the last year. Download a copy today A clinical trial in France that led to the death of one person last year and hospitalization of five others has drawn intense scrutiny into how the drug's toxicity could have been anticipated, the researchers note. Yet ethical review boards -- bodies at research institutions and universities that are set up to protect patients in clinical trials -- seldom recognize that they have a duty to evaluate whether an experimental treatment is promising enough to warrant human testing. "Commercial interests and hope, alone, cannot be trusted to ensure that human trials launch only when the case for clinical potential is robust," says Kimmelman. "Ethics requires a clear-eyed evaluation of a drug's potential." The McGill researchers propose several measures to reinforce standards, including: Require drugs sponsors to include negative results from animal studies in documents submitted to investigators and ethics committees; Allow trials to proceed only after careful vetting of the preclinical evidence by independent experts; Encourage reviewers to consider a broad base of evidence in assessing the probability that a drug will prove clinically useful: for example, how have other drugs in the same class performed in trials? Critics of the proposal may object that this approach could increase costs and time for drug development, the researchers note. But more-thorough assessments of clinical potential before trials could reduce failure rates, they say, and thereby offset development costs. An enzyme found in many bacteria, including the bacterium that gives us strep throat, has given mankind a cheap and effective tool with which to edit our own genes. This technology, called CRISPR, is also being used to understand how the immune system responds to a viral attack. Numerous researchers around the world have begun to use the gene editing tool CRISPR as an way to explore some of the most intriguing questions raised by molecular biology. Richard Kandasamy, an associate professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology's (NTNU) Centre of Molecular Inflammation Research (CEMIR) is putting this tool to work to understand inflammatory reactions that occur in many diseases. Using large amounts of data, his research reveals what happens minute-by-minute when the immune system responds to a virus. The results of his team's research were recently published in the respected online journal Systems Biology and Applications. When the flu or any other virus attacks the body, it has to react with lightning speed. "It's not like defense cells are just sitting around waiting in some corner of the body to gobble up viruses - and boom, it's all taken care of," says Kandasamy. Kandasamy came to NTNU through the Onsager Fellowship programme, which is designed to recruit some of the most talented international young researchers to the university. Just before Christmas, Kandasamy was awarded a generous grant from the Research Council of Norway's FRIPRO programme for talented young researchers. As Kandasamy explains, "What happens inside the defense cells is a very comprehensive step-by-step reaction. Signals are sent to the nucleus to initiate a production of new proteins that will take part in the inflammatory reaction and that the cell will use to destroy the virus. This all takes some time. But even a tiny chemical modification of proteins in the cell also enables the cell to start reacting super quickly." He and his team can map these reactions in extreme detail from the moment a virus infects a cell. By frequently repeating the mapping process in the hours after infection, they can create a detailed map of the cell's reactions. Most scientists who are working on CRISPR research either proceed by analysing one gene at a time, or upwards of 20,000 genes at a time. Kandasamy uses both approaches. He also uses large computing systems to analyse this complex dataset. This approach of combining modern technologies and mapping reactions minute-by-minute is one of the unique approaches his research group uses to understand reactions in the cell. Leading passenger vehicle maker, Maruti Suzuki flagged off the Desert Storm from GIP Mall, Noida. In its 15th edition, the rally will cover a total of 2000 km over a span of 6 days. The rally lovers will get a chance to navigate through Rajasthans picturesque yet challenging terrains of Hanumangarh, Bikaner and Jaisalmer to conclude in Jodhpur on February 4th wherein the winners will be felicitated through a prize-winning ceremony. Speaking about this adventurous journey R S Kalsi, Executive Director, Marketing & Sales, Maruti Suzuki said, Pioneered in 2003, Desert Storm has been an effort to replicate our success in off-road rallying in the Western region of the country. The perfect recipe of thrill and competition challenges motorsport enthusiasts to achieve greater milestones in their motorsport journey. At Maruti Suzuki, we believe that rallies bring out the best in men and machines, and the increasing participation each year is encouraging and helps us strengthen such motorsport events. With no restriction on participation, we encourage all motor enthusiasts be it amateur or professional, man or woman from all regions to gain as much experience as they can from these events. The rally promises great excitement with three categories XTreme, NDure, Xplore and Moto. The rally will also see 10 women participants, which includes Bani Yadav and Sarah Kashyap podium finishers of previous editions of Maruti Suzuki Desert Storm, Dakshin Dare and Raid de Himalaya. Known as mini Dakar, Maruti Suzuki Desert Storm 2017 will feature a 207 km stage which is the longest stage in Indian Motorsport history. Participants are provided clearance for their vehicles after a strict one-day scrutiny check prior to the flag-off ceremony. As challenging as the rally is expected to be, all the participants are provided with on-ground safety measures at regular intervals during the course of the rally. From mixing pure gold paint to searching swamps for 48,000-year-old wood, the world's luxury car makers are going to greater and greater lengths to meet their clients' needs, but they're doing so in a way that maintains their brand ethos and keeps their cars out of independent tuner and customization garages.Rolls-Royce this month put the final touches to the biggest single bespoke order in its history -- 30 unique extended wheelbase Phantoms that will serve as guest shuttles for THE 13, an ultra-exclusive Macau hotel.Each car's exterior boasts a unique shade of red paint, created specifically for the client, plus equally original alloy wheels. However, two of the cars also sport badges made from the finest enamel and surrounded by pave set diamonds, plus a layer of pure gold paint on top of the bespoke red exterior finish."A Rolls-Royce motor car is commissioned to express the tastes, desires and lifestyle of its patron," said Giles Taylor, the company's Director of Design.And to meet the specifications of the client, Stephen Hung, Rolls-Royce needed to devise a new type of paint and a new method of applying it so that the finish would be perfectly even."[It] took eight attempts to mix the perfect color," said Rolls-Royce Material Scientist, Nick Geehan. It consists of 23.75 carat gold particles, applied at a 40-micron thickness, mixed with glass and aluminum so that the car literally shimmers. As well as new application equipment, the vehicles required 10 layers of paint to get the right effect, 250% more than usual.And Rolls-Royce isn't the only established automotive firm going to extraordinary lengths to keep its customers satisfied and away from firms like Mansory, who pride themselves on being able to offer any type of internal, external or under the hood customization on any car."We fill the niche in the market the manufacturers can't, or don't want to fill in," explains Ralph Niese, Manosry's marketing head. "It is all about individualization. We offer our customers the possibility to create their very own car, with the interior, the aerodynamics and the engine power they want to have."Purists feel that these sorts of services can sometimes be detrimental to the car's intended aesthetic or positioning. But at the same time, Rolls-Royce isn't the only company that recognizes tastes are changing and that they need to move with the times.It's why Bentley bid an undisclosed amount at auction for a tiny piece of a 350-year-old walnut tree from the Fulbeck estate in the UK that it will reserve as a veneer option for just a handful of most important clients.BMW can now trim a car's cabin with 48,000-year-old swamp-preserved kauri wood from New Zealand.And Audi this week announced it's developed a new method of applying paint that will allow clients to etch their car's surface with patterns and symbols. The effect is achieved by adding matte elements to the existing paint finish."With this process, we modify the brilliance of the paintwork and the intensity of its sheen. Light hitting the surface is then reflected diffusely by the individualized surface areas. This makes it appear matte," explained project manager Dr. Erhard Brandl. Production section head Mirko Endres added: "This form of individualization is weather resistant, unlike conventional lettering and stickers, and it has a much more high-quality appearance." : Telecom operator Vodafone on Monday confirmed to moneycontrol.com that it is in exploratory discussions with the Aditya Birla Group's telecom arm Idea Cellular for a merger.The landmark merger, if it goes through, will create India's largest telecom company with revenues of over Rs 80,000 crore. It is expected to take on the likes of market leader Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio.Vodafone Group Plc said that any merger would be effected through issue of new shares in Idea to Vodafone which will result in deconsolidation of Vodafone India. CNBC-TV18 had in August reported that the two telecom players are in exploratory talks for a possible merger.The latest entrant in the telecom sector, Reliance Jio, is fast acquiring subscribers on the back of free voice and data services under its Happy New Year offer. Reliance Industries telecom subsidiary Jio acquired 72.4 million subscribers in the four months of commencement of services.Nitin Soni, Director-Asia Pacific technology, media and telecommunications at Fitch Ratings, told CNBC-TV18 that there is a high possibility of a Vodafone-Idea merger over the medium-long term. In case of a successful merger, both companies will stand to benefit from lower cost of operations, he added. While Vodafone has a stronger base in metros, greater rural focus is Ideas game.Regulatory challenges There are, however, regulatory hurdles on the mergers and acquisitions front that await Vodafone and Idea Cellular. M&A norms mandate that revenue market share of the merged entity should not exceed 50 percent in any circle.Also, the rules dictate that spectrum holding shouldnt exceed 25 percent across all bands and 50 percent in each band individually. Experts see a spectrum cap breach in at least 5 circles in the 900 MHz band. Besides, revenue market share of the merged entity will overshoot the 50 percent threshold in six circles. Bengaluru: The news channel to be launched by Arnab Goswami will now be known as Republic TV and not Republic as earlier proposed, according to a fresh application filed with the Union Ministry for Information & Broadcasting. A few weeks ago, BJP MP Subramanian Swamy had written to the ministry objecting to the new channels name, requesting it to look into the use of the word Republic. He had claimed it would be violative of the Emblems Act, 1950. According to the fresh application, which has been reviewed by News18, Goswami, in his capacity as the managing director and Editor-in-Chief of ARG Outlier Media Pvt Ltd that will run the new channel, has requested that all references to Republic in their previous applications be now read as Republic TV. Goswami didnt respond to emails and text messages sent by News18 asking if the name change was in response to Swamys objections. However, Swamy claimed Goswami was forced to change the name because of his objections. The nation wants to know if Arnab Goswami knows the law. I know the law, and because of that he has been forced to change the name of his channel. I am still studying it, he told News18. Earlier, in his letter dated January 13, 2017, sent to Secretary, Ministry of I&B, Swamy had argued that that as per the schedule accompanying the statute, under Item 6, there is an express prohibition from using the phrase Republic. Goswami, former Editor-in-Chief of 'Times Now', quit in November 2016 to found ARG Outlier Media Pvt Ltd. Dhar: Four tribal women in Gandhwani area of Madhya Pradeshs Dhar district have accused that policemen raped them during a raid conducted on the night of January 25 to catch hold of some thieves. Local Congress MLA from Gandhwan, Umang Singhar accompanied by a group of villagers, on Monday reached police headquarters in Bhopal and complained to the Director General of Police, RK Shukla. Alleging that the said women were not medically examined after the sexual assault, the MLA produced a video showing inebriated police personnel looting villagers' belongings. We are yet to receive report of the medical examination of the women concerned. A team of six officers led by DSP (AJK) BK Chhari has been formed and action would be ensured on the basis of the report, Superintendent of Police Dhar Virendra Singh told News18. Singhar is said to have had a tough time while getting the case registered at Tanda police station. Leader of Opposition Bala Bachchan also staged a dharna outside the police station on Saturday. The Manawar MLA and minister, Ranjana Baghel, addressed media at BJP office in Dhar and appreciated police action against criminals and sought action against those who were trying to shield them. Jamanda and Bhutia villages in Gandhwani area are considered notorious for nurturing criminals who have been arrested in states like Delhi, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Rajasthan previously. Following a raid in Jamanda and Bhutiya villages on January 25 by police, MLA Singhar had accused police of rape and loot the same evening. However, Police registered an FIR booking locals for pelting stones on the police and refuted rape charges. According to police, there are 143 accused of loot and other crimes in the said villages. According to Dhar Police, the locals in had earlier assaulted police teams, which encouraged them to send a large team to the area on January 25. Pune Police have arrested a watchman after a 25-year old woman was found murdered inside the Infosys office at the city's IT hub of Hinjawadi.The victim, identified by PTI as systems engineer OP Rasila from Kerala, worked on the ninth floor office at the Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park.The accused, identified as Bhabhen Saikia, allegedly killed Rasila by strangling her with a computer cord in her cabin inside the office on Sunday night. A case of murder has been registered.A source said Saikia is from Assam and was preparing to flee there when he was detained by the police at Mumbai Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus railway station on Sunday night. He was formally arrested on Monday morning."The incident might have taken place around 5 PM but we received a call around 8 PM. Rasila was employed as a software engineer by the firm," Assistant Commissioner of Police Vaishali Jadhav-Mane said."Her manager was trying to call her, but there was no response. He then called and asked a security guard to go and check, and when the security guard went to see her, the woman was found lying on the floor in an unconscious state in the conference room," the officer added.The cause of the murder is not yet known.(With inputs from PTI) Bengaluru: The Karnataka High Court on Monday refused to lift the ban on Kambala. It said that it would wait for the Supreme Courts decision on Jallikattu on Tuesday, before it decides on Kambala. The court had stayed the buffalo racing sport in November 2016 citing cruelty to animals on a petition by animal activists. The Karnataka government on January 28 resolved to move amendment in the forthcoming legislature session from February 6th. This came after neighbouring Tamil Nadu amended laws to facilitate Jallikattu last week. We requested the court to allow Kambala with the provision that the expert committee set up in December to ensure there is no cruelty can oversee this. But the court noted that the case is coming up in Supreme Court, so lets wait. It is adjourned by two weeks, but if the SC gives any order on Tuesday, we can move the high court once again by Wednesday, said S Rajashekar, counsel for the Kambala Committee. The state government has been arguing that there are vast differences between Jallikattu and Kambala primarily that buffaloes are not among the animals notified as banned for sporting events by the Central government (as against bulls, which are banned). Besides, Kambala has not seen as much harm as Jallikattu which has recorded even deaths almost every year it has been held. Kambala is typically held by farming families/ groups between November and February in the coastal Karnataka region. New Delhi: Amidst chill in Indo-Pak ties, Pakistan has declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend South Asian Speakers' Summit to be held next month. "Pakistan and Myanmar which were among the countries in the South Asian nations invited to the Speakers' meet in Indore on February 18-19 have declined the invitation," official sources said. However, officials did not elaborate on the reasons given by Pakistan and merely noted that these two countries have written that they will not be able to attend the meet. The Summit, which is primarily an IPU initiative and not a SAARC activity, will be attended by Speakers of Parliament from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka among other countries, the sources said. Significantly, in 2015, India had boycotted a Commonwealth Parliamentary Union (CPU) meeting in Islamabad to protest against Pakistan's decision to not invite the Speaker of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly. The discussions during the Speakers' Summit on achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will update the participants on implementation of the SDGs in their region and globally. Special emphasis will be laid on sharing experiences and increasing understanding about how parliaments in the region institutionalise the global goals, capture the synergies and build coherence at the policy level, IPU said on its website. New Delhi: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has lifted the restrictions on cash withdrawals from bank accounts and ATMs, in a sign that the pace of remonetisation is picking up. In a statement on its website, the central bank said that restrictions on withdrawal of cash from current accounts, cash credit and overdraft accounts have been lifted with immediate effect. Further, limits on cash withdrawals from ATMs will be withdrawn from February 1, 2017. However, the limits on savings bank accounts will continue for the present, until further review by the RBI. The latest directive from the RBI is an indication of its confidence in the pace of supplying new currency to banks and ATMs across the country. On November 8, the RBI imposed limits on the withdrawal of cash from bank accounts and ATMs following the decision to demonetise, as it feared it could lead to mass withdrawals of cash. The central bank move also comes amidst RBI rejecting a a request by the Election Commission to lift withdrawal limits for the candidates in five poll-bound states and a day ahead of the Budget Session of Parliament. The central bank said the limits on cash withdrawals from current accounts or cash credit accounts or overdraft accounts is withdrawn with immediate effect. RBI, however, said banks may, at their discretion, have their own operating limits as was the case before November 8, when the note ban was imposed. Following demonetisation, RBI had put withdrawal limit Rs 2,000 per day from ATMs and Rs 10,000 per week. Customers holding a current or overdraft or cash credit accounts, were allowed to withdraw up to Rs 50,000 in a week. Towards November end, RBI increased the caps on savings bank withdrawals to Rs 24,000 a week. Early January, it was further relaxed to Rs 4,500 per day from ATMs, but retained the weekly withdrawal limits. On January 16, RBI enhanced the ATM withdrawals further to Rs 10,000 daily, while keeping the weekly limits at Rs 24,000. The central bank also enhanced the limit on withdrawal from current accounts, overdraft and cash credit accounts to Rs 1,00,000 per week. (With inputs from PTI) The BJP on Monday hit out at former prime minister Manmohan Singh over emails which showed he helped absconding business tycoon Vijay Mallya get funds for his sinking Kingfisher Airlines in 2011.This comes two days after CNN-News18 broke the story on how Manmohan Singh may have taken special interest to allegedly help Vijay Mallya's ailing airline.Holding a press conference on Monday, BJP spokesman Sambit Patra said, Letter shows that Manmohan Singh gave support for loans and it was because of this Vijay Mallya was pleased with him.In the series of emails accessed by CNN-News18, Mallya thanked the former PM for sparing the time to talk to him and also acknowledged that former principal secretary in the PMO TKA Nair spoke to the ministries concerned civil aviation and petroleum to help the airliner.Thank you for sparing time to meet me on September 8th to explain the... difficulties being faced by Kingfisher Airlines. I had also informed your goodself that we had approached our consortium of Banks, led by State Bank of India to grant us additional financial support urgently. You had asked me to follow up with Mr TKA Nair, which I did and I am deeply appreciative of the fact that Mr Nair immediately spoke to the concerned people in the Ministries involved (sic), Mallyas letter to Singh on October 4, 2011 said.Patra further said citing the emails, The copy of the letter number 1, written by Vijay Mallya to then PM Manmohan Singh, was sent to advisor of PM TKA Nair and Personal Secretary of PM Pullock Chatterjee. And as we remember through Sanjay Baru's book Pullock Chatterjee use to run with all the files every evening to 10 Janpath even before the PM saw it.Reacting to the CNN-News18's report, former principal secretary to PMO, TKA Nair told CNN-News 18, "I don't remember anything. This thing may or may not have happened.I have not seen anything and can't comment on it."Earlier, a source close to the former PMO responded to CNN-News18 queries saying the government always tries to bail out troubled companies. No favour was given to Mallya. No funds were given, it was only preferential allotment, the source said.Former Union finance minister P Chidambaram whose name also figures in mail trail said he needed to go through the papers before commenting.Another letter sent by Mallya to his top management showed the business tycoon was expecting an infusion of funds after his requests to the top government.Speaking to CNN-News18 after the expose, Former Aviation Minister Vaylar Ravi said, "I can't remember what I did but any minister in my position would do what I have done. I am not running away from anything. All the decision were taken in the interest of the industry.""I did not give any undue favours. I was incharge of the ministry for a very short period of time for me to do anything.And I won't deny that Vijay Mallya knew me very well," Vaylar Ravi added.Reacting on the CNN-news18 report, BJP leader Subramanian Swamy said, "If Mallya wrote such a letter to his staff, it must be probed with extreme seriousness.Mallya got everything he wanted from the Congress. He is really a Congressman.On TKA Nair's role, Swamy said, "This is what Nair was doing all the time. He has been part of several other such unscrupulous activities. I think the CBI, the ED should interrogate Nair thoroughly to find out what his role was."Mallya, who has been declared by some banks as wilful defaulter, had left the country in March and is currently said to be in the UK. Bhansali Production has assured that there is no romantic dream sequence between Rani Padmavati and Alauddin Khilji in Sanjay Leela Bhansalis upcoming film Padmavati. The statement comes soon after political party Karni Sena attacked the films crew and created massive destruction on sets at Jaigarh fort in Jaipur on Friday, where the film was being shot. Director Sanjay Leela Bhansali was assaulted, equipment were damaged and shooting was stalled by the Karni Sena. They were protesting against an alleged romantic dream sequence that the film was to have featuring Padmavati and Khilji. On Monday afternoon, in a joint press conference Karni Sena and Bhansali production clarified that an agreement has been reached between the two parties. Production company assured that the film had no such dream sequence and that they were willing to screen whatever they had shot so far to the Karni Sena. We want the name to be changed, we just want to tell Bhansali to agree to our demands and ensure that sentiments of the Rajput community is not hurt due to the film, said Makrana and added, History should not be distorted, wrong is wrong. We did not do anything (on the sets of Padmavati). the security personnel fired on us and then we reacted. Speaking to CNN News 18, Shobha Sant of Bhansali Production stated that the film would not be shot in Jaipur and that they respected the sentiments of the people of Rajasthan. While the Karni Sena have allegedly demanded a name change for the film, spokesperson of Bhasali Production have stated that no such demand has been put forth by them. Padmavati, Sanjay Leela Bhansali's new film, features Deepika Padukone in the titular role along with Shahid Kapoor and Ranveer Singh. The 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards 2017 Denzel Washington, Emma Stone and the cast of Hidden Figures took the top awards of the night as several actors spoke out against Donald Trump. Just days after Trump became the 45th President of USA and imposed a ban on immigrants, Hollywood used SAG as a platform to speak out their opinions. On the winner's front, Hidden Figures emerged as an underdog as it bagged the Best Performance in a Motion Picture Award. The night belonged to the coloured actors as Fences, Moonlight and Hidden Figures made it to the top honours. On television front, Netflix shows Stranger Things and The Crown bagged the top awards while the best cast award went to Orange is The New Black. Here's the complete list of awardees: Here is the list of winners for the 23rd Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards, held on Sunday in Los Angeles: Film Winners: Outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture: Hidden Figures Outstanding performance by a male actor in a leading role: Denzel Washington, "Fences" Outstanding performance by a female actor in a leading role: Emma Stone, "La La Land" Outstanding performance by a male actor in a supporting role: Mahershala Ali, "Moonlight" Outstanding performance by a female actor in a supporting role: Viola Davis, "Fences" Television Winners: Outstanding performance by an ensemble in a drama series: Stranger Things Outstanding performance by an ensemble in a comedy series: Orange is the New Black Outstanding performance by a male actor in a drama series: John Lithgow, "The Crown" Outstanding performance by a female actor in a drama series: Claire Foy, "The Crown" Outstanding performance by a male actor in a comedy series: William H. Macy, "Shameless" Outstanding performance by a female actor in a comedy series: Julia Louis-Dreyfus, "Veep" Outstanding performance by a male actor in a television movie or miniseries: Bryan Cranston, "All the Way" Outstanding performance by a female actor in a television movie or miniseries: Sarah Paulson, "The People vs. O.J. Simpson" Ashton Kutcher at #SAGawards: "Good evening ... everyone in airports that belong in my America. You are a part of the fabric of who we are" pic.twitter.com/JOaTktnJlJ Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) January 30, 2017 I'll be wearing one of these tonight. On my arm. To show solidarity. We will not stop fighting for our safety & the safety of our fellow citizens and human beings. #NoBanNoWall #safetypin A photo posted by Kerry Washington (@kerrywashington) on Jan 29, 2017 at 4:04pm PST Politics took centre stage at the SAG Awards 2017 as many stars delivered fiery speeches to directly or indirectly criticize US President Donald Trump's ban on immigrants from 7 middle east nations.Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who won best comedy TV actress for playing flawed fictional U.S. President Selina Meyer on HBO's political satire Veep, called Trump's ban a "blemish.""Because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes, and this immigrant ban is a blemish," she said. "It is un-American."Mahershala Ali, who won best supporting actor for his role in Moonlight, noted that he is the Muslim son of a mother who is a Christian minister."She didn't do backflips when I called her to tell her I converted 17 years ago, but I tell you now, we put things to the side," he said.Emma Stone, who won best actress for musical romance, praised her fellow actors for "reflecting society.""We're in a tricky time in the world and in our country, and things are very inexcusable and scary and need action," she said. "And I'm so grateful to be part of a group of people that care and want to reflect things back to society."It seems the entire Hollywood had plans to use the night as a way to speak out and share their strong opinions about the President's decision. One of the most powerful speeches of the night was delivered by David Harbour who took the stage with the rest of the cast of the Netflix showand spoke about being united and standing out against bullies.He said: I would just like to say that in light of all thats going on in the world today, its difficult to celebrate the already celebrated Stranger Things.'We are united in that we are all human beings and we are all together on this wonderful painful, horrible painful joyous exciting and mysterious ride that is being alive.'Now as we act in the continuing narrative of stranger things, we 1983 mid-westerners will repel bullies, we will shelter freaks and outcasts those who have no home, we will get past the lies we will hunt monsters and when we are at a loss amidst the hypocrisy and the casual violence of certain individuals and institutions we will, as per Chief Jim Hopper punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the weak and the disenfranchised and the marginalized and we will do it all with soul with heart and with joy.'The entire tone of the award show was set quickly when Ashton Kutcher took the stage to deliver his opening remarks.The award host kicked off the night by saying: 'everyone at airports who belong in my America, you are a part of the fabric of who we arewe welcome you.'William H Macy accepted his award for the Best Male Actor in a Comedy Series for Shamelss during the awards, and actually thanked President Trump for: 'Making Frank Gallagher look normal'Actress Sarah Paulson, who won the award for Best Actress in Limited TV Series, made a plea to her fellow actors and actresses, as well as anyone who is watching the awards, saying: 'I'd like to make a plea for everyone if they can, any money that they have to spare, please donate to the ACLU to protect the rights and liberties of people across this country. It's a vital, vital organization that relies entirely on our support. So please, if you can.'Kerry Washington made her opinion clear while still on the red carpet. The Scandal actress said: 'A lot of people are saying right now that actors should keep our mouths shut when it comes to politics. But the truth is, no matter what, actors are activists because we embody the humanity and worth of all people. This union helps me to do that. I am Kerry Washington, and I am an actor'Washington also posted an Instagram before arriving at the awards of the safety pin that she is wearing on her dress. She said: 'I'll be wearing one of these tonight. On my arm. To show solidarity. We will not stop fighting for our safety and the safety of our fellow citizens and human beings.'Actor Simon Helberg and his wife actress Simon Helberg make a political statement about the current US restriction on refugees.The cast ofstood on the stage after receiving an award, and star Taylor Schilling said: 'What unites us is stronger than the forces that seek to divide us'Bryan Cranston accepted an award for his portrayal of the 36th president of the United States, Lyndon B Johnson.He said, in his acceptance speech: 'I'm often asked how Lyndon Johnson would think about Donald Trump. And I honestly think 36 would put his arm around 45, and earnestly wish him success.'John Lithgow accepted an award for Male Actor in a Drama series for 'The Crown', in which he played United Kingdom Prime Minister Winston Churchill. He spoke directly to Meryl Streep during his acceptance, saying that Streep managed to speak his exact thoughts'.Indeed, celebrities are leaving no stone unturned to make their stand in this appalling ban very clear and hope their fans do the same. New Delhi: Its alliance with the Samajwadi Party could be the elusive opening that the Congress may have been patiently waiting for since the 1989 meltdown in the politics of the Hindi heartland. Not just Muslims, the Congress seems to be using this opportunity to send a subtle message to the Dalit electorate, both in and outside Uttar Pradesh. It was quite evident during the joint press conference by the two allies. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav came across as more spontaneous and natural, while Congress leader Rahul Gandhi had to quite forcefully revisit some of the issues concerning the Hindi heartland. Two points, which the Congress vice-president made during the interaction, assume significance both in the current and post-poll scenarios. The first was the suo-moto comparison between the BJP and the BSP. There can be no comparison between the two, said Rahul, topping up the statement with kind words for BSP chief Mayawati and her mentor Kanshi Ram. In doing so, the Congress party not only reached out to BSP's Dalit votes, which for the first four decades after Independence were firmly in Congress's grasp. And, there is a sound political logic behind the move. There is no harm in even being the second preference for the Dalits voters in Uttar Pradesh. In a triangular fight, it might even help in certain areas. Moreover, Rahul Gandhi is also looking at the post-poll scenario. Over the last 15 years, the BSP has conceded a lot of space outside Uttar Pradesh. It is now, more or less, a UP-centric party with a limited presence elsewhere. And Congress sees itself as a natural claimant of the constituency being vacated by the BSP. Further, in Uttar Pradesh, the BSP has been out of power since 2012. It failed to send even one MP to the Lok Sabha in the last General Election despite winning close to 20% votes. This election, thus, is very crucial for Mayawati. She needs to revive and inspire her vote bank; project her party as a viable alternative. Both the Congress and the BJP would be attempting to woo the Dalits at the periphery of the BSPs core Jatav vote bank. Rahul Gandhi, in his Lucknow press conference, laid the ground for precisely that. The other politically significant point made during the press meet was the repeated and direct attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the RSS. By taking pole position on the two, the Congress is sending a message to the minorities, both in Uttar Pradesh and outside, and is projecting itself as the natural alternative to the BJP at the Centre. The intent for the Congress, as a pan-India party, is to position itself to accrue the gains whenever there is counter-polarisation at the national level. Lucknow: Having lost the battle for the Samajwadi Party control and symbol to son Akhilesh, Mulayam Singh Yadav has struck back with a vengeance. A former wrestler, Mulayam seems to have clearly planned his opening move, timing it with the announcement of the Congress-Samajwadi Party alliance. He had been lying low since the Election Commission virtually handed over the party reins to Akhilesh. Mulayams sharp criticism of the grand alliance came on the day when Akhilesh and Rahul held their first-ever joint press conference and put up a show of unity on the streets of Lucknow, which echoed with their slogan UP ko yeh saath pasand hai. With Mulayam expressing a clear annoyance to this alliance, the stage seems set for a new phase of intense bickering within the Samajwadi Party. This time around, it is not intended at gaining control of the SP, but strike at the alliances electoral prospects. The key question now is whether Akhilesh will be able to survive the blow. Mulayam has appealed to his supporters to file nominations against Congress candidates on the 105 seats Akhilesh has given to the alliance partner. It is a clear indication of his political move. In the people's court, Mulayam wants to project himself as a victim, who may not be personally against his son, but is definitely opposed to his political decisions. Speaking to News18, Mulayam said: Alliance with the Congress party will jeopardise Samajwadi Party's political future. Akhilesh should consider calling off the alliance. The intent is clear: Mulayam wants to question Akhilesh's political acumen, and thereby, lay a justifiable ground for himself to wage a political battle against his son. Mulayam's open criticism and declaration that he will not campaign for the alliance also has the potential to upset the Akhilesh and Rahuls calculation for consolidating the minority vote bank. After all, Mulayam is the one leader revered by Muslims over the decades for his tough stand since the Babri Masjid demolition. The Opposition has been quick to lunge at the opportunity. Mulayam loyalist Narad Rai, who recently joined the BSP, says: Wait for more to come. Many like me have been forced to leave SP because of the insult meted out to Mulayam Singh Yadav. BJP's state general secretary Vijay Bahadur Pathak says the phrase UP ke ladke coined by Rahul and Akhilesh is an insult to Mulayam. Is he (Mulayam) not the son of the soil? It's an alliance of opportunism. Akhilesh should first clarify on the questions raised by Mulayam. BJP president Amit Shah on Sunday launched a sacating attack on Captain Amarinder Singh who is Congress partys chief ministerial face for the Punjab assembly polls 2017. He said, Mujhe samajh nahin aata ye Captain (Amarinder Singh) kis prakaar ke Capt hain, jinko Rahul baba ke order manne padte hain (I dont understand what kind of Captain Amarinder Singh is who always follows Rahul Gandhis orders). I am shocked at the words used by some people for Parkash Singh Badal ji, Punjab is known with Badal jis name across the country, he added. Stay tuned for live updates: Read all the Latest News , Breaking News , watch Top Videos and Live TV here. (Photo: Emirates) On Jan. 27, President Donald Trump signed an Executive Order issuing a travel ban on seven predominantly-Muslim countries. The action ignited large protests at airports around the United States, as refugees and citizens on incoming flights were detained at airports or sent back to their countries. The ban on refugees is expected to last 120 days, and suspends entry of citizens from Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen for 90 days. Refugees from Syria have been blocked from entering indefinitely. One unexpected group of victims is airline flight crews, some of which are international citizens who have to attain Crewmember Visas before working for an international airline in the US. Up until now, that visa was enough to legally enter the US. Now, if a crew member holds a passport for one of the banned countries, it is unclear if they will be able to clear customs after landing at a US-based airport. According to the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA-CWA), which has United Airlines (UAL), Alaska Airlines (ALK) and Hawaiian Airlines (HA) in its union, the ban has already had a negative effect on this community of workers. I can confirm that this has impacted crew in the US. It will impact them economically, as well, says Taylor Garland, spokesperson for the AFA-CWA. Its total chaos in the workplace because there was no implementation process. There seems to be no regard for the impact on lives and families. Garland told Yahoo Finance that we cant yet see the full ramifications of this executive order, but so far a few airlines have taken bold action to protect their employees. Reuters reports that Emirates adjusted which staff to put on US-bound flights in order to comply with Trumps ban. The Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways also told Reuters that it has taken steps to ensure there will be no issues for flights departing over the coming weeks. When it comes to US carriers, Delta says its working with government officials to understand how the travel ban will impact the companys employees. We are doing all that we can to assist our people and their families who may be impacted by this executive order, the airline said in an email to Yahoo Finance. Story continues American Airlines and United could not be reached for comment. The International Air Transport Association, which works with 265 airlines to facilitate the free movement of travel and people across borders, says airlines are still trying to figure out what the travel ban means for their employees because they simply didnt know the new restrictions were coming. [The ban] placed additional burdens on airlines to comply with unclear requirements, to bear implementation costs and to face potential penalties for non-compliance, the IATA said in a statement on their website. We urge all governments to provide sufficient advance coordination of changes in entry requirements so that travelers can clearly understand them and airlines can efficiently implement them. On Monday, a Department of Homeland Security official told ABC news that there were no more travelers detained at US airports. Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi will appear in a Bhiwandi court on Monday in connection with a defamation case over his alleged remarks blaming Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) for the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.Rahul made the remarks during an election rally in Mumbais Bhiwandi on in 2014.The case against Rahul was filed by a local RSS functionary for blaming the saffron organization for Mahatma Gandhis killing.Meanwhile, Rahuls lawyer said there is no question of the Congress vice president apologizing for the said remarks.There is no question of apology in this case. The matter is sub-judice. At appropriate time we will prepare appropriate defence and will emerge victorious, Rahuls counsel Narayan Iyer, told CNN-News18.Rahul was granted bail by the court last November after a surety bond.Rahul had in September last year said he would face the trial after Supreme Court refused to interfere in the criminal proceedings pending against him in trial court. Manmohan Singh is a man of few words. And it was on this plank that the Modi government came to power. Modi had, throughout his campaign for the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, hit out at Dr Manmohan Singh for being silent and not speaking up, even when 'rules were being flouted under his watch'.But even by his standards of speaking less, Manmohan Singh has been rather too silent in the two-and-a-half years that he has been out of power.There have been only two occasions when Manmohan Singh has spoken out and both the occasions have been significant.Responding to a CNN-NEWS18 expose on the Mallya Mails, Manmohan Singh denied that any undue favours were given to liquor baron Vijay Mallya when he was Prime Minister. I did nothing that flouted the rules. I only followed procedure, he said.In fact, Manmohan Singh, an economist who believes in open economy, has always advocated helping industrialists for ease of doing business. But it has come back to haunt the former prime minister.The last time Manmohan Singh spoke was on demonetisation. He called it a monumental disaster and coming from a former prime minister and a known economist, his criticism carried weight. The BJP was quick to hit back.Manmohan Singhs defence on the Mallya Mails is significant. He has had to face the maximum brunt of the coal and 2G scams. His clean image took a hit when it was alleged by the BJP that the former prime minister had flouted rules to help coal companies and some mobile service operators.Manmohan Singh is now ready to speak is because he doesnt want to end up with another tag. And he has perhaps learnt it the hard way that silence doesnt always help. The U.S. tech industry, a major employer of foreign workers, hit back on Saturday at the sudden executive order on immigration, with some leaders calling it immoral and un-American.Read more: BlackBerry Dual SIM Budget Android Smartphone Surfaces A group of Canadian technology company founders, executives and investors on Sunday called in a letter for Ottawa to immediately give temporary residency to those displaced by a U.S. order banning the entry of people from seven Muslim-majority countries.Don't miss: Vivo V5 Plus Review: Ups the Selfie Ante With Class The open letter said U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order, which temporarily bars travelers from Syria and six other countries and also puts a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States, had already "impacted several in our community."Read more: Vodafone May Join Hands With Idea Cellular "Canadian tech companies understand the power of inclusion and diversity of thought, and that talent and skill know no borders," said the letter, signed by more than 200 industry players."Many Canadian tech entrepreneurs are immigrants, are the children of immigrants, employ and have been employed by immigrants."Signatories included John Ruffolo, head of the venture arm of one of Canadas biggest pension funds, and Tobias Lutke, chief executive officer of e-commerce software company Shopify, which went public in 2015 and is valued at around $4.6 billion.The Canadian government has not said what, if any, tangible action it could take, but in tweets on Saturday Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Canada welcomed those fleeing war and persecution and posted an archived picture of him greeting Syrian refugees arriving in Toronto in 2015.Canada is eager to attract skilled tech workers from abroad while also retaining existing workers and students that are often lured away by global tech firms. More than 300,000 Canadians currently work in Silicon Valley in the United States.Last year, Canada benefited from the raucous U.S. election campaign, with new Canadian work permits for highly skilled workers from the United States soaring nearly 54 percent in the first eight months of the year.One Ontario-based software developer, Sortable, ran an ad campaign targeting tech workers that extolled Canadas calm political climate. In November, Canada introduced new visa measures that would allow tech firms to quickly recruit foreign talent, including fast approvals and 30-day work permits."Policies such as (Trumps) put everybody in the business community on edge because all global firms have a multicultural work force. But its also an opportunity, Jim Balsillie, former co-CEO of BlackBerry Ltd, said in the Globe and Mail newspaper on Saturday."If Canada can quickly implement the global skills visa for tech talent we can reinforce our country as the place to attract the best talent. The hottest smartphone of 2017 pic.twitter.com/dQknX0XmfD IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) January 29, 2017 Aimed to keep communications secure, the Israeli army has launched its first smartphone in collaboration with Motorola.The Israeli army announced the launch in a video on its Twitter feed on Sunday, Times of Israel reported.According to the video, the device has both 4G and military networks which would enable the soldiers to securely send classified visuals and footage from the field.The new smartphone, developed after Israel Defense Forces signed a $100 million contract with Motorola Solutions in January 2014 to produce new encrypted smartphones, would serve military personnel for the next 15 years.At that time, the IDF had said that the smartphones would include a touchscreen, GPS and an 8MP camera, however, no specific information was provided during the launch.The device is reportedly waterproof, dirt-resistant and will have a battery that can last for up to 400 minutes of talk time and 500 minutes on standby.Theses smartphones would replace the "Mountain Rose" phone system used by the IDF which were also developed by Motorola Solutions. Google's India-born Chief Executive Sundar Pichai critcised US President Donald Trump's executive order suspending the entry of people from Muslim-majority countries to the United States and stressed its negative influence on US attractiveness for foreign talent. Pichai suggested that the ban could affect at least 187 Google employees as the Internet search giant ordered its travelling staff to return to the United States. "We're upset about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US," The Wall Street Journal quoted Pichai as saying in an e-mail to staff. "It's painful to see the personal cost of this executive order on our colleagues," he added. On Friday, Trump signed an executive order blocking from entering the United States all Syrian refugees until the adequate changes are made to the Refugee Admission Program (USRAP) and suspending the entry for all nationals of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. "Our first order of business is to help Googlers who are affected," he assured his staff, urging them to reach out to Google's global security team if they were abroad and needed help. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg also expressed his concern over the order. "We need to keep this country safe, but we should do that by focusing on people who actually pose a threat," he wrote on his Facebook page on Friday. Immigrants make up much of the workforce in Silicon Valley, including many executive roles, and the tech industry has long advocated for more open immigration laws in the US, saying they need more skilled foreigners to fill technical jobs, the WSJ added. Earlier on Saturday, thousands of academics, including 11 Nobel Laureates, signed a petition against the immigration ban calling it discriminatory and detrimental to the country's national interests. Trump's order means that thousands of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries may not be allowed to board flights bound for the US -- even if they hold "green card" (permanent residents' permit). Trump said the measure would "keep radical Islamic terrorists out of the US". But rights groups said there is no link between Syrian refugees in the US and terrorism. According to the BBC, there were already reports of travellers from the countries targeted being turned away as they tried to board flights to the US. Some Republicans welcomed Trump's announcement, including the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Paul Ryan, who said it was "time to re-evaluate and strengthen the visa vetting process". The Google-backed race to the moon between various private space companies across the globe has reached its final stage.The top 5 finalists for Google Lunar XPRIZE, a worldwide competition offering $30 million in prize to any private space company which is able to land its rover on the moons surface and do a specific set of tasks, were announced recently.Indias Bengaluru-based Space Company, TeamIndus, is one of the finalists along with Floridas Moon Express, Israels SpaceIL, an international team called Synergy Moon and Japans Hakuto.In order to reach the final stage, these companies had to secure a verified launch contract before the end of 2016.Team Indus and Hakuto will both be sharing a ride to the moon on ISROs PSLV rocket.To be eligible for the winning prize, the companies need to land their rovers successfully on the moons surface, travel at least 500 m on the moons surface and transmit HD videos from there, all before December 31, 2017.The winner amongst these will be entitled to a prize of $20 million followed by a $5 million prize for the runner up. Rest of the amount will be distributed as per the feats achieved.The competition directly aims at exploring the lunar surface and proving the fact that private space companies are as much capable of achieving such deeds as the government funded organisations. After banning immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries, President Donald Trump has reportedly drafted an executive order to revamp the H1-B visa, which allows thousands of Indians to work at tech giants like Google and Mircosoft in the US.If implemented, the order could force Indian companies like Infosys and Wipro, and affect the hiring process of US companies like Microsoft, Amazon and Apple, a report in the Livemint said. Indian IT companies generate around 55-60 per cent of the revenue from the US.Our countrys immigration policies should be designed and implemented to serve, first and foremost, the US national interest, Livemint quoted from a Bloomberg review of the draft proposal. Visa programs for foreign workers should be administered in a manner that protects the civil rights of American workers and current lawful residents, and that prioritizes the protection of American workers our forgotten working people and the jobs they hold.Silicon Valley's top executives, including India-born CEOs Google's Sundar Pichai and Microsoft's Satya Nadella, have already condemned Donald Trump's immigration ban on people from Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Iraq.H-1B visas are intended for foreign nationals in "specialty" occupations that generally require higher education, which according to US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) includes, but is not limited to, scientists, engineers or computer programmers. The government awards 65,000 every year.Companies say they use them to recruit top talent. But a majority of the visas are awarded to outsourcing firms, sparking criticism by skeptics that say those firms use the visas to fill lower-level information technology jobs. Critics also say the lottery system benefits outsourcing firms that flood the system with mass applications.The H-1B visa program tends to be more critical to outsourcing firms than US tech firms. For instance, more than 60 percent of the US employees of Infosys are H-1B holders, and the company in its annual report has cited an increase in visa costs as among factors that could hurt its profitability.(With agency inputs) Hafiz Muhammad Saeed detained in Jamia Qadsia Lahore along with 5 others Hamid Mir (@HamidMirGEO) January 30, 2017 Govt placed JuD charity organisation FIF under observation for 6 months Hamid Mir (@HamidMirGEO) January 30, 2017 JuD chief Hafiz Saeed placed under house arrest https://t.co/HBzfsjOwaW pic.twitter.com/cszoGM2zQ4 Geo English (@geonews_english) January 30, 2017 Hafiz Saeed, the Jamaat ud-Dawa chief and mastermind of the 2008 attacks in Mumbai, has been placed under house arrest in Lahore, Pakistani media reported late on Monday.The JuD is most likely to be banned and its leadership may also be arrested, the Pakistan Today quoted a Dunya News report as saying. Media reports said Saeed was detained at Lahores Jamia Masjid Al Qadsia Chowburji.Apart from Saeed, four others have reportedly been placed under house arrest. They were identified as JuD founding member Zafar Iqbal, editor of JuD magazine Kazi Kashif Nawaz and members Abdu Rehman Abid and Abdullah Ubaid. All five will reportedly be produced in court within 24 hours.Three days ago, Punjab's Ministry of Interior had included names of Saeed and four others Abdullah Ubaid, Zafar Iqbal, Abdur Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Niaz in the Watch List as per UNSC 1267 Sanctions and ordered their preventive detention.Saeed, who is also the founder of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, carries a $10-million bounty on his head.PTI quoted JuD member Ahmed Nadeem as saying that Saeed "is at Masjid-e-Qadsia Chauburji and a heavy contingent of police has surrounded the JuD headquarters." "The commanding police officer told us that he has with him the house arrest order of the JuD chief issued by the Punjab Home Department," Nadeem told PTI. The News International quoted media reports which said that the Chinese government had conveyed to Pakistan to rein in Hafiz Saeed and Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Masood Azhar.The News quoted a senior official who said: Consultations are going on whether to declare JuD as defunct or not. However, the final decision will be taken after consultations between the civilians and military authorities. The report said the official was directly linked with the matter.The report further said that the JuD has started discreetly working under the name of Tehreek-e-Azadi-e-Kashmir (Kashmir Freedom Movement). It added that the outfit may enter politics with a new name in 2017, which Saeed had declared as the year for Kashmir.JuD is the front for the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror outfit which is responsible for numerous terror attacks in India, including the Mumbai terror strike of November 26, 2008, which was masterminded by Saeed.JuD has already been declared as a foreign terrorist organisation by the United States in June 2014.(With agency inputs) Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has called the shooting attack on a Quebec Mosque as a "terrorist attack on Muslims".At least six people were killed and eight wounded when gunmen opened fire at a Quebec mosque during Sunday night prayers.Police said two suspects had been arrested, but didn't give the details about them or what prompted the attack.Initially, the mosque president said five people were killed and a witness said up to three gunmen had fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Centre. Police said only two people were involved in the attack."Six people are confirmed dead - they range in age from 35 to about 70," Quebec provincial police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe told reporters, adding eight people were wounded and 39 were unharmed.The mosque's president, Mohamed Yangui, who was not inside when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers."Why is this happening here? This is barbaric, he said.Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement: "We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge".Muslim-Canadians are an important part of our national fabric, and these senseless acts have no place in our communities, cities and country."The shooting came on the weekend that Trudeau said Canada would welcome refugees, after U.S. President Donald Trump suspended the U.S. refugee program and temporarily barred citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States on national security grounds.A Canadian federal Liberal legislator, Greg Fergus, tweeted: "This is an act of terrorism -- the result of years of sermonizing Muslims. Words matter and hateful speeches have consequences!"New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said police were providing additional protection for mosques in that city following the Quebec shooting. "All New Yorkers should be vigilant. If you see something, say something," he tweeted.'NOT SAFE HERE'Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them from North Africa.In June last year, a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the cultural centre."We are not safe here," said Mohammed Oudghiri, who normally attends prayers at the mosque in the middle-class, residential area, but did not on Sunday.Oudghiri said he had lived in Quebec for 42 years but was now "very worried" and thinking of moving back to Morocco.Mass shootings are rare in Canada, which has stricter gun laws than the United States, and news of the shooting sent a shockwave through mosques and community centres throughout the mostly French-language province."Its a sad day for all Quebecers and Canadians to see a terrorist attack happen in peaceful Quebec City," said Mohamed Yacoub, co-chairman of an Islamic community centre in a Montreal suburb."I hope its an isolated incident."Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 Canadian federal election, especially in Quebec, where the majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies.In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of the province was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighbouring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris.Zebida Bendjeddou, who left the Quebec City mosque earlier on Sunday evening, said the centre had received threats."In June, they'd put a pig's head in front of the mosque. But we thought: 'Oh, they're isolated events.' We didn't take it seriously. But tonight, those isolated events, they take on a different scope," she said.Bendjeddou said she had not confirmed the names of those killed, but added: "They're people we know, for sure. People we knew since they were little kids." (New throughout, adds judge denying detention request, Uber comment) By Hugh Bronstein BUENOS AIRES, Jan 30 (Reuters) - A Buenos Aires judge on Monday denied a prosecutor's request to jail local executives of ride-hailing company Uber Technologies Inc, though the court did order the company's platforms to be shut down, raising the prospect of a prolonged legal conflict. In April, a Buenos Aires court said Uber, which has been criticized for failing to register its drivers or pay appropriate taxes, was in violation of local transportation and labor standards and ordered it to stop operating. The application continues online nonetheless, spurring prosecutor Martin Lapadu to request additional measures that were only partially accepted by a local judge on Monday. "The detention order has been struck down," Lapadu said on local television. "What the judge did was order the Uber page blocked," he added. Lapadu said, however, Internet providers could only close Uber Argentina platforms if the ban were extended to the whole country, not just the capital. Uber in Argentina said the judge's decision was "a new step forward" in its defense. The San-Francisco based company has clashed with government authorities in many cities and countries around the world. Taxi services and labor groups have been frequent opponents of the Silicon Valley startup. In Buenos Aires, taxi drivers have blocked streets while protesting against the company, saying it undercuts them by operating tax-free and outside of regulations that apply to taxis. Some traditional yellow and black Buenos Aires taxis sport signs saying "No Uber". Signs have also been posted on billboards and buildings saying "Uber = Fake Taxis". In June, the company said on its Argentine website that it had no plans of slowing down even after some users reported local credit cards were blocked from Uber's application. "In spite of the obstacles that continue to be put in our path, Uber's business and plans for its expansion continue," the June post said. (Additional reporting by Eliana Raszewski, Caroline Stauffer and Maximilian Rizzi; Editing by David Gregorio) Kathmandu: Senior officials of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) are scheduled to meet in Kathmandu this week for the first time since the summit was postponed last year to discuss various issues. The meet on February 1-2 to attend the Programming Committee will be the first meeting of the SAARC member states since the postponement of the 19th SAARC that was supposed to take place in Islamabad, Pakistan, November last year, a Foreign Ministry official said. During the meeting, SAARC member states will discuss a number of issues, including the budget of the SAARC Secretariat and five regional centers of SAARC, according to Foreign Ministry sources. The matter relating to rescheduling the next SAARC summit will also come up during the meeting, to be attended by joint secretaries of the SAARC countries. Nepal, current chair of the SAARC, had decided to postpone the SAARC Summit until further notice after four nations Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh and India requested to postpone the summit in Islamabad scheduled for November 9 and 10 last year, following escalation of tension between India and Pakistan. India and three other countries had blamed Pakistan for not creating a conducive environment and not cooperating on combating cross-border terrorism in South Asia for holding the SAARC Summit, while Pakistan has rejected the charges. The decisions made by the programming committee will be forwarded to the Standing Committee for endorsement. SAARC is a regional body founded in 1985 in South Asia, comprising Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Washington Defending his controversial executive order on banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering America, US President Donald Trump has insisted that it is "not a Muslim ban" as is "falsely" reported by the media. Trump signed the order on Friday which bans Syrian refugees and people from six other countries from entering the US. The move has triggered widespread outrage. The seven countries mentioned are Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order," Trump said. Trump said his administration will again be issuing visas to all countries once the US is sure that it has reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. "I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering," he said in a statement. Noting that America is a proud nation of immigrants, Trump said the country will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but will do so while protecting its own citizens and border. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave, he said. "We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say," Trump said, adding that his policy is similar to that of his predecessor Barack Obama who in 2011 banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. "The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror," Trump said. In series of tweets, Trump slammed Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham for being critical of his immigration policies. In a joint statement, the two Senators feared that this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. "At this very moment, American troops are fighting side-by-side with our Iraqi partners to defeat ISIL. But this executive order bans Iraqi pilots from coming to military bases in Arizona to fight our common enemies," the two Senators said. "Our most important allies in the fight against ISIL are the vast majority of Muslims who reject its apocalyptic ideology of hatred. This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security," they said. Trump said the joint statement of former presidential candidates McCain and Graham was wrong and they are weak on immigration. "The two Senators should focus their energies on ISIS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III," Trump tweeted. McCain and Graham said the government had responsibility to defend American borders, but must be done in a way that makes the US safer and upholds all that is decent and exceptional about the nation. "It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trump 's executive order was not properly vetted. We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defence, Justice, and Homeland Security," they said. "Such a hasty process risks harmful results. We should not stop green-card holders from returning to the country they call home. We should not stop those who have served as interpreters for our military and diplomats from seeking refuge in the country they risked their lives to help," they said. "We should not turn our backs on those refugees who have been shown through extensive vetting to pose no demonstrable threat to our nation, and who have suffered unspeakable horrors, most of them women and children," they added. Coming out in support of Trump, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes said in light of attempts by jihadist groups to infiltrate fighters into refugee flows to the West, along with Europe's tragic experience of coping with this problem, the executive order on refugees is a common-sense security measure to prevent terror attacks on the homeland. "While accommodations should be made for green card holders and those who've assisted the US armed forces, this is a useful temporary measure on seven nations of concern until we can verify who is entering the United States," Nunes said. "I've stated repeatedly that refugee flows from certain war-torn regions pose a serious national security threat to the US," the top Republican Congressman said. Defending his controversial executive order on banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering America, US President Donald Trump has insisted that it is "not a Muslim ban" as is "falsely" reported by the media.Trump signed the order on Friday which bans Syrian refugees and people from six other countries from entering the US. The move has triggered widespread outrage.The seven countries mentioned are Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia."To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order," Trump said.Trump said his administration will again be issuing visas to all countries once the US is sure that it has reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days."I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering," he said in a statement.Meanwhile, throngs of noisy demonstrators -- and scores of lawyers -- poured into Dulles International Airport outside Washington on Sunday to show support for immigrants impacted by President Donald Trump's contentious travel restrictions.Similar protests were taking place outside the White House and across the United States as outrage grew over Trump's executive order, signed on Friday, that imposed sweeping restrictions on some travelers to the country.Saif Rahman, a 38-year-old Iraqi-born US citizen who lives in Virginia, had just flown into Dulles from Istanbul, via Frankfurt. He said two border agents were waiting as people got off the plane.About 16 people, including him, were called in for additional screening but he was let through fairly quickly."I just hope that we can pass this difficult period while maintaining our values as a country," Rahman said.Trump's executive order suspended the arrival of all refugees for at least 120 days, Syrian refugees indefinitely -- and bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days.With each new international arrival at Dulles, whoops of support erupted from a crowd of up to some 400 people gathered at the exit point from US customs.People handed out flowers and food, waved greeting signs and chanted slogans, including: "No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here," and "Let them in! Let them in!"It was unclear if, or how many, travelers had been detained at Dulles.Four congressmen said they had been refused access to the area where the travelers would be held, a move lawyers said was in contempt of a court order issued late Saturday."The executive order is terrible, it's bad and we are going to fight it," Democratic Representative John Delaney told AFP.Trump should "realize the error in his ways, which is something I believe he is incapable of doing, and reverse this thing," Delaney added.Julia Mendelson, 31, came to protest with her mother."I had family killed in the Holocaust, and I think it's shameful to have any ban on immigration," she said."When you see injustice, it's important to stand up and do whatever possible."Outside the White House, thousands gathered to express their anger at Trump's move.Khadija Shakour, an American Muslim, said the order was unconstitutional."It's wrong, it's hateful, it's bigotry," she said."He says it's not a Muslim ban. It is a Muslim ban, especially when you say, 'I'm gonna look after the Christians,'" Shakour added, referring to Trump saying his plan favored Christian refugees.Trump's executive order has already faced legal setbacks and lawyers around the country are massing in person and online to lend pro-bono support to those whose lives have been upended by the travel ban.Kate Belinski, a Washington attorney who specializes in political law, was one of about 100 lawyers who showed up at Dulles to offer support. Several volunteer interpreters were also present to lend their help.Many attorneys held bright signs offering legal advice to anyone who had been detained or for their relatives.Belinski called it "unconscionable" to turn back travelers who have already undergone the laborious, and often yearslong process of getting visas."It is completely beyond the pale, I never would fathom that this could be happening," Belinski said."I am concerned this could be an incremental step. It's got to be stopped so it doesn't go further." Addis Ababa: The U.N. Secretary General has commended African countries for opening their borders to refugees and people fleeing violence while other parts of the world, including the developed West, close boundaries and build walls. Antonio Guterres made the remarks Monday in Addis Ababa where several dozen African leaders are attending the summit of the African Union. "African nations are among the world's largest and most generous hosts of refugees," said Guterres, attending the summit for the first time as head of the U.N. "African borders remain open for those in need of protection when so many borders are being closed, even in the most developed countries in the world." Guterres didn't make a direct reference to the recent executive orders signed by U.S President Donald Trump to build a wall along the Mexican border and also ban the entry of people from seven Muslim nations, including three in Africa, but his comment drew enthusiastic applause from hundreds of African leaders, officials and dignitaries who attended the opening of the summit. African leaders are expected to hear Morocco's request to rejoin the body. Morocco left the pan-African bloc 32 years ago after a majority of the member states recognized the disputed territory of Western Sahara as a member. Morocco claims the territory in defiance of U.N. resolutions for a referendum on the independence. Morocco is now trying to rejoin as it claims it has backing from two-thirds of the African Union's member states. The African Union Commission is also expected to choose among five candidates to replace outgoing chairwoman, South African diplomat Nkosazana Dlami- Zuma, whose term has expired. Gambia's new leader, Adama Barrow, has failed to show up at the summit and has sent his deputy to attend Monday's meeting. Several world leaders and governments have hit out at the immigration restrictions imposed by US President Donald Trump.Here are some of the top reactions:Downing Street said on Sunday Prime Minister Theresa May does "not agree" with the restrictions and would intervene if they affected British nationals.While US immigration is a matter for Washington, "we do not agree with this kind of approach and it is not one we will be taking," London said.Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson tweeted Britain "will protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals home and abroad. Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality."European Union foreign policy supremo Federica Mogherini pledged the bloc would "continue to support, welcome and take care of those who flee from war"."We will continue to celebrate for every wall that is torn down and for every new bridge that is built up. We will keep working for peace and coexistence. This is our history, this is our identity, our work and our commitment," added Mogherini.Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif slammed Trump's move as "a clear insult to the Islamic world" and said it "will be recorded in history as a great gift to extremists and their supporters".Zarif said Trump's decision "only serves to provide a fertile ground for more terrorist recruitment by deepening the ruptures and fault-lines which have been exploited by extremist demagogues to swell their ranks".His ministry said earlier it would reciprocate with a ban on Americans entering the country, though it will not apply to those who already have a valid visa.Angela Merkel's spokesman said the German chancellor "regrets the entry ban" and "is convinced that even in the necessarily resolute battle against terrorism, it is not justified to place people from a certain origin or belief under general suspicion".Berlin "will now examine the consequences" of the ban for German citizens with dual nationality affected by the decision, added the spokesman.Indonesia "deeply regrets" the move "because we believe it would affect the global fight against terrorism and the refugees management negatively," foreign ministry spokesman Arrmanatha Nasir told AFP."It is wrong to link radicalism and terrorism with one particular religion," Nasir said.French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said: "Welcoming refugees who are fleeing war is part of our duty.""We must... ensure that this happens in a fair, just way and with solidarity ... This decision can only cause us concern."Swedish Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Margot Wallstrom called the decision "deeply unfortunate"."This decision increases mistrust and tensions between people. Not since World War II have so many people fled war and conflict," she wrote."It is the joint responsibility of all countries to help them, including the US."Trump's decision is "wrong", Swiss Foreign Affairs Minister Didier Burkhalter said."We have always been opposed to discrimination against human beings on the basis of religion or nationality," he said. "In that sense, the US order clearly goes in the wrong direction."Burkhalter said the Swiss government would confer with American representatives to find out how the order would affect Swiss residents, especially dual nationals from countries affected.Burkhalter also invoked the Geneva Conventions, saying they "mean that all countries welcome people affected by war for humanitarian reasons"."It is therefore contrary to the Conventions to stop welcoming people coming from Syria," he added.Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said all refugees fleeing war and violence "deserve a safe haven, regardless of their ethnicity or religion".He added that while his government is conscious of the potential to abuse the refugee system, "we regret the US decision to ban the travel of people from seven Muslim countries and we reject it."However, Geert Wilders, a lawmaker from the far-right Freedom Party, tweeted Sunday: "Less Islam means more freedom" and "No more immigration from an Islamic country is exactly what we need. Also in The Netherlands, Islam and freedom are incompatible."Going against the grain of global condemnation, a spokesman for Czech President Milos Zeman came out in favour of the ban."US President Trump protects his country, he's concerned with the safety of his citizens. Exactly what EU elites do not do," Jiri Ovcacek said.Polish Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski also refused to condemn the ban, saying "it's the right of every sovereign state to determine its own immigration policy"."The scale of this phenomenon is so large that in many countries at the moment the immigration issue is a matter of government policy and should remain government policy," he told Polish private news channel Polsat News on Sunday."No country currently has the obligation to welcome immigrants. Countries have the obligation -- in accordance with international conventions -- to welcome refugees, if they arrive," he added. RICHMOND A House of Delegates subcommittee killed more than 20 proposed amendments to the Virginia constitution in a single vote before 9 a.m. Monday, including those related to redistricting reform and restoring felons rights. After voting to pass resolutions on three constitutional amendments, the subcommittee lumped the rest together, including proposals brought by Republicans and Democrats. Despite protests from Democrats urging individual votes, the majority grouped the resolutions together and killed them on one 4-to-3 vote. The resolutions that passed would allow the General Assembly to nullify administrative regulations; maintain a real property tax exemption for surviving spouses of disabled military veterans even if they move residences ; and control the use of state transportation funds. Constitutional subcommittee members said Privileges and Elections Committee Chairman Mark L. Cole, R-Spotsylvania, wanted to limit the number of resolutions going to the full committee so only a few would appear on the ballot in 2018. When you have someone say that you can only take four forward and then you basically base it on the chronology of the vote as opposed to voting on each one and its merit, then thats an interesting message to be sent to voters, said Del. Marcia S. Cia Price, D-Newport News. Ahead of what would have been a voice vote, Price moved that the vote on the group of bills be recorded. She voted against laying the resolutions on the table with Del. Jason S. Miyares, R-Virginia Beach, and Del. Joseph C. Lindsey, D-Norfolk. Price carried a resolution that would have banned redistricting for political purposes. The amendment also would have made legislators communications regarding redistricting available to the public. It received a 5-to-2 vote because Price made a motion to report it to the committee before the group of bills was formed. Miyares joined the other Republicans in voting against it. Mondays 30-minute meeting followed a three-hour hearing a week ago in which the subcommittee heard testimony on each resolution. I think theres a lot of caucus pressure to not do the right thing, OneVirginia2021 Executive Director Brian Cannon said after the meeting. OneVirginia2021, a nonprofit redistricting advocate, has lobbied for reform while also challenging existing district lines in court, saying legislators being allowed to pick their own districts naturally trends toward corruption and gerrymandering. When asked whether Republicans in the caucus pressured subcommittee members to vote down redistricting reform, Del. Jackson H. Miller, the Majority whip and a constitutional subcommittee member, said, not really. I just dont think theres caucus support; I wouldnt say pressure, said Miller, R-Manassas. The redistricting process doesnt need reform, he said. Miller said he would have voted against each resolution individually. Miller voted to kill the group of proposed amendments with Cole, subcommittee Chairman Del. J. Randall Minchew, R-Loudon, and Del. Timothy D. Hugo, R-Fairfax. If voters dont feel represented, they can remove their legislator on Election Day, Miller said. Redistricting reformers argue gerrymandered districts result in unreasonably strong incumbents who only can be challenged from the extreme base of either party. The Republicans were able to take control of the legislature with the Democrats controlling redistricting, and it can work the other way around, Miller said. Price said after the meeting redistricting reform inevitably will be an election issue this year when all 100 members of the House of Delegates are up for re-election. Whoever is elected governor in November will sign into law maps redistricted after the 2020 census. If it wont come to the voters in the form of a constitutional amendment, it will come to the voters in their opportunity to vote on those who are for redistricting reform in November, Price said. Among the amendments killed was a resolution proposed by Del. Gregory D. Habeeb, R-Salem, calling for compromise on restoring voting rights to felons. Another resolution would have given voters a chance to repeal the state constitutions ban on gay marriage, the substance of which was deemed unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court. It died on an unrecorded vote before the group of bills formed. Miyares said he would have liked to vote for the resolution by Del. R. Steven Landes, R-Augusta, to ban redistricting for political purposes as well as the effort by Habeeb to restore voting rights for felons. I think there were some pretty darn important issues, both restoration of rights and redistricting, that I thought would have been good to put in front of the voters, Miyares said. LIGNUM A 17-year-old in Culpeper County shot and killed what may be Virginias largest-ever feral hog as it charged at him in his front yard. According to state wildlife officials, the 545-pound male beast could have been an escaped domestic pig or a feral swine that someone fattened up for recreational hunting, which they do not encourage due to the significant damage the disease-ridden creatures can cause to crops, property and people. Whatever it was when Jacob Breeden of Lignum saw it tearing up his yard last Saturday, he grabbed his rifle. I went outside, and it charged me, he said. He was flapping its jaws together and running toward me. I was kind of shocked to see how big it was. When he came up to me the way he did, I had no choice but to shoot him. Breeden said he was scared for himself and his young nieces and nephews in the house, calling the thing with tusks a wild boar. His adrenaline kicked in and he took down the beast that measured 6 feet and 10 inches long from snout to tail. Breeden, who lives in a wooded area, later weighed the hog at a nearby farm. He said hes had encounters with supposed wild boars in the area before, but that he doesnt usually hunt them. I believe it was a smart one that had been hanging out in the woods for a while, Breeden said. Mike Dye, district wildlife biologist with the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, said the creature could not be definitively identified at this point. If it was a feral hog, it was being fed a lot, he said. They typically do not have the resources to get that big in nature. Feral swine are the same species as and often look very similar to domestic hogs, but are generally thinner with thicker hides of coarse bristly hair and longer tusks. The animals are called by many names, including wild boar, wild hog, razorback, piney woods rooter and Russian or Eurasian boar. The average feral hog in Virginia is typically much smaller with an average weight of around 200 pounds for adult males and slightly smaller for females, Dye said. Larger feral hogs are somewhat uncommon as there is a high mortality rate as there is a lot of hunting pressure on this population, he said. The beasts are classified as nuisance species in Virginia and can be killed or trapped at any time of the year with no bag limit. They are very destructive to agriculture and environmental resources, Dye said. He added that its uncommon for feral hogs to show aggressive behavior, but that it has happened. The state game department has worked for years with the U.S. Department of Agriculture to eradicate the species first brought to the country in the 1500s by early settlers as a source of food. A tissue sample was taken for testing from the large pig, said Jeffrey Rumbaugh, staff wildlife biologist with the USDA office based in Moseley. The sample will be compared with a genetic archive to see if the creature is related to other feral swine from the area. Breeden said hes not eating his recent kill, saying he was advised it was not safe to eat because the meat of males is loaded with testosterone. If it was a sow, I could have enough sausage for the next few years! he squealed. After a psychiatric crisis, Alexandra Kedrocks son was released from a hospital at 3 a.m. without his house key, identification, a phone or money. Chad, 48, didnt want to wake his mother, so he wandered through the streets of Norfolk until he thought she might be awake. Another time, a hospital worker in Hopewell sent Chad away in a taxi with little more than a bus ticket, she said. He made it as far as Richmond before a friend of Kedrocks drove up to find him huddled and delusional in a corner of the bus station. After 26 years of battling schizophrenia by Chads side, Kedrock has had an intimate look at how Virginias mental health system helps people with mental illness and the myriad ways in which it doesnt. Twice in the past few weeks, shes traveled to Richmond from her new home in Charlottesville to ask lawmakers to stop studying the behavioral health system and instead invest money in programs that are known to work. She was among about 150 people who descended on the Capitol on Wednesday to push for mental health reform, and she spoke at a budget hearing a few weeks earlier. Kedrock, a clinical social worker, and others specifically question Gov. Terry McAuliffes $4.5 million budget proposal for a study and redesign of the structure of the behavioral health system that would be contracted out to consultants. The proposal was one of many intended to improve mental health services in Virginia. Senator Deeds has a commission already studying this, so (McAuliffes study) is really redundant, Kedrock said, referring to state Sen. R. Creigh Deeds Joint Subcommittee Studying Mental Health Services in the Commonwealth in the 21st Century. I think the money needs to be spent on many things, but my priority would be ... taking mental illness out of the Dark Ages. Bruce Harlow Sr., the father of a son diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, agreed with Kedrock as they waited to talk to Deeds on Wednesday. The studies have been done, said Harlow, a resident of Virginia Beach, whose son violently attacked him in July. That money needs to be spent on programs that work. *** Brian Coy, a spokesman for McAuliffe, said the $4.5 million would fund far more than a study. It would pay for a blueprint of a complete overhaul of the mental health system from the 40 Community Services Boards on the front lines to the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services at the top. Its not redundant, Coy said. What the Deeds commission is doing is an important first step in terms of identifying challenges within the mental health system. What the governor has proposed is a wholesale top-to-bottom redesign of the states mental health system. Deeds joint subcommittee has been toiling with ways to improve the system incrementally, but the group hasnt gotten as far as redesigning it. The Dec. 1, 2017 deadline for finishing its work was extended recently by two years. One of the biggest proposals that came out of the committee this year involves increasing the amount of money spent on supportive housing for people with mental illness by $10.2 million a proposal Kedrock strongly supports, because it has helped her son. Another would require same-day screening at Community Services Boards; only a handful of the 40 offer so-called same-day access now. McAuliffes proposed budget did not include any money for supportive housing this year. Suzanne Gore, senior policy adviser for health care for McAuliffe, said the governor selected programs he thought would be the best use of resources. I think that the governors budget is really in line with the work of the Deeds commission, Gore said. There are somewhat different priorities, but the governors job is to run the government, and running the government sometimes means you need to invest in a business plan. The $4.5 million proposed for overhauling the system pales in comparison with the hundreds of millions spent by the government each year, Gore said. Several million dollars for a very complex system serving individuals with complex needs is frankly a drop in the bucket, Gore said. *** Aside from supportive housing, Kedrock said her son Chad has been stabilized by a PACT team, which stands for Program of Assertive Community Treatment. The people on the team keep in constant contact with him and intervene immediately if his symptoms flare up. Kedrock would like to see the states money pay for an expansion of PACT programs across the state, because the one in Charlottesville has been so effective at keeping her son out of crisis. Chad has been battling schizophrenia since he was diagnosed at 22 while studying aerospace engineering at Virginia Tech. He had no signs of developing schizophrenia as he grew up, Kedrock said. His disease has worsened over time. I often say that he was abducted by the schizophrenic patrol, and they hold him hostage and torture him in front of me, and I cant get him free, Kedrock said. He has been hospitalized at least 15 times, Kedrock said, but the programs in which he has been enrolled have kept him out of hospitals since November 2015. (She asked that his last name not be used to protect his privacy.) A PACT team member visits him every day and gives him the medicine hes supposed to take, which has led to a remarkable improvement, Kedrock said. When he was trying to take medicine on his own, he often confused days of the week, and at times he took all his medicine at once instead of one set of pills at a time. The team also helps him pay his bills and shop for groceries. A psychiatrist, who is part of the team, keeps a close eye on him. As soon as his symptoms start increasing, they work to stabilize him before he reaches a point of crisis. Last fiscal year, 1,807 people received PACT services through 22 full-size teams and three smaller teams, said Maria Reppas, spokeswoman for the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services. The state spent about $16.7 million on PACT services, and the federal government contributed $668,000. A previously approved budget allowed for the creation of two new teams in the current fiscal year at $850,000 apiece, but there isnt any money in the budget proposals in front of the 2017 General Assembly for additional PACT teams in the future. Reppas said the state does not keep waiting lists of people in need of PACT services. Mira Signer, executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness in Virginia, who has been involved as an outside expert with Deeds subcommittee, said PACT teams still are a priority, but the state needed time to absorb the additional teams that were funded in the past before asking for more this year. The major push this year is supportive housing for a group of Virginians who have the most chronic mental illnesses. Though McAuliffes budget didnt include funding for housing, lawmakers on Deeds subcommittee have proposed spending about $10.2 million to fund housing for about 660 of the 5,080 people in need of it. Signer said it would only be a bite out of the problem, but it would save Virginia $2.2 million to $6.8 million in hospitalizations and other services for people in crisis. Kedrock said supportive housing has been instrumental in keeping her son safe. Until the last two years, his psychiatric treatment has been less than adequate and at times hurtful, Kedrock said recently. But, for the first time in 25 years, he has comprehensive services with competent, informed and caring people, she wrote to Deeds in March. For the first time, I can relax that he is safe. WASHINGTON Thousands of demonstrators rallied outside the White House and in cities nationwide Sunday to protest President Trump's refugee ban, as the executive order continued to halt travel in some locations, despite being weakened by federal judges overnight and having its constitutionality called into question as rulings spilled into Sunday. In addition to Washington, large protests took place in New York, Philadelphia, Boston and Atlanta, and at airports in dozens of cities, as demonstrators created cheering sections for arriving refugees at Dulles International Airport in Northern Virginia. In Washington, swarms of protesters amassed in front of the White House by 1 p.m., and the crowds proceeded to the nearby Trump International Hotel and U.S. Capitol. Later the group made its way back toward the White House, shutting down Pennsylvania Avenue. By evening, an impromptu Catholic Mass brought hundreds more to the lawn to resist Trump's order. Among the protesters was Shohreh Rahnama, of Bethesda, Md., whose 5-year old son was detained for several hours at Dulles Airport following a flight from Istanbul on Saturday night. Artiman Jalali was born in the United States and has dual citizenship with Iran. He was traveling back from a visit with relatives with his cousin, 25-year old Aida Mohammadi, a student at University of Maryland and a green card holder. Rahnama said she waited for hours at the airport, with friends and family and a growing crowd of strangers who came to support them and others whose loved ones were detained. They were finally released around midnight. "He was hungry and he was thirsty, and I could not see him," she said. "How can a five-year old be banned? Just because his parents are Iranian? We are American too," she said. "I almost died in that airport. I can say it was the worst day of my life." Sunday morning, she brought her son and other family members to join the protest at Trump's door step. She wanted to send a message. "I am here to say: You cannot do this. You are our servant. The people elected you," she said. "Other countries are thirsty for the rights we have in America. We can't become a dictatorship." Trump reaffirmed the order in a statement Sunday, saying it did not constitute a "Muslim ban" and compared it to President Obama's 2011 action blocking visas for Iraqi refugees for six months. Trump said he intends to prioritize persecuted Christians in the Middle East for admission as refugees, and in a weekend television interview former New York mayor Rudy W. Giuliani said Trump wanted a "Muslim ban" and asked him to assemble a commission with the knowledge to institute one "legally." The travel ban bars entry into the United States from seven predominately Muslim countries. Despite a federal judge's ruling late Saturday, and similar court decisions with varying degrees of power, the Department of Homeland Security issued a statement Sunday that it would continue to implement order. Demonstrators also gathered Sunday morning at the U.S. Capitol to protest Trump's education secretary nominee Betsy DeVos. At least one demonstrator was equipped for both protests, carrying a poster board that addressed one of the issues on each side. Meanwhile Sunday afternoon, several U.S. congressmen squared off with authorities at Dulles Airport trying to get information on the identities and status of detainees. Democratic Reps. Don Beyer and Gerald E. Connolly, both of Virginia, and Jamie B. Raskin of Maryland, were followed by a crowd to a hallway that led toward internal offices where they believed customs officials were located. Connolly pressed an airport police officer to get a Customs and Border Protection official to meet with the group. While squeezed up against the narrow hallway Connolly challenged the officer. "Are people being detained?" Connolly asked the officer, J. Damskey, a member of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority police. "How can you enforce the law if you're not enforcing a judge's order?" Connolly was handed a cellphone. On the line was a Customs and Border Protection congressional affairs official. Connolly asked for information on possible detainees, including those traveling on a flight from Turkey from which airline customers reported some passengers had been pulled. No one on site from CBP would meet with the congressmen. "That is unacceptable. It is our understanding you are detaining people . . . Our understanding is you have not followed that order," Connolly said. Connolly said that a lawyer for one of his constituents was allowed to communicate with his client late Saturday night, and that the person was released. Virginia immigration attorney Sharifa Abbasi was among the lawyers on hand at Dulles Sunday pressing for information on passengers potentially detained under the executive order. Abbasi asked a U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent for information on who is currently detained at the airport. She pointed to an order from U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema in Alexandria, which says lawyers must have access to U.S. green card holders detained under Trump's measure. Abbasi said she was turned away. "They won't give us any information," she said. Inside the airport, hundreds of peaceful demonstrators sang the "National Anthem" and created a cheering gauntlet for travelers emerging from Customs. The crowd yelled "Let them in!" and "Welcome!" as passengers, including some from majority-Muslim countries, rolled their suitcases through gray doors and into a section of the airport that had become a makeshift law office and civics classroom in response to Trump's executive order. "My kids go to school with people from everywhere," said Sasha Moreno, of Reston, Va., whose six-year-old daughter drew a little red statue of liberty on poster board along with the message: "Welcome to America." Her daughter's kindergarten class includes many students from Sudan, one of the countries targeted by Trump's order, which has brought a sense of anxiety in her own family. The idea that her daughter's friends' grandparents would be barred from visiting the United States just because of who they are is unacceptable, and she wants her children to know that's not what America stands for, Moreno said. "There are lots of Muslim students at her school. Hearing this stuff going on is really confusing" to them, Moreno said. "We like the idea of them having friends from everywhere." Downtown, protesters lined Pennsylvania Avenue and filled out Lafayette Square. They cycled through a variety of chants, and wielded poster boards bearing messages such as "Islamophobia is un-American" and "Dissent is patriotic." "Say it loud, say it clear, refugees are welcome here! . . . No hate! No fear! Refugees are welcome here!" they chanted. "No justice! No peace! No justice! No peace!" The tone vacillated between forceful and unifying, as protesters alternately chanted "SHAME" and partook in renditions of "America the Beautiful" and "This Land is Your Land." George Formukong, a police officer in the District, came to the rally with his family still wearing their dress clothes from church. They flew back from their native Cameroon on Saturday to learn that other travelers were being denied entry. "Because our country was not on the list we were able to travel," Formukong said. "Everyone is an immigrant here. We should have equal treatment." Georgia Warner brought her nearly 3-month-old son to Dulles on Sunday, along with a sign that said "Raising my son to tear down your wall #NoBanNoWall." He was born on Election Day. Warner is an 11th grade American history teacher in the District, about to end her maternity leave. "There might not be a better time in my lifetime to teach the U.S. Constitution and U.S. history," Warner said. Her message to visitors from around the world: "There are still people who will stand by them and defend their rights."' Her husband, Chris Miller, said America's "capacity for inclusiveness" deserves to be protected. "It's my job as a patriotic American to stand up for American values," Miller said, as he fed and burped his infant son. The family also was headed to protest at the White House. "My oath didn't end when my enlistment did," said Lee Carter, another demonstrator who served in the Marines and is running for state office in Virginia. He carried an oversized florescent green declaration: "I, Lee Carter, do solemnly affirm that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign AND DOMESTIC #nevertrump #resist". For others, the demonstrations were personal. Amira Hassan, 26, remembered the excitement she felt when she flew into John F. Kennedy International Airport with her family as a refugee from Somalia in 2001. Hassan is graduate student in public administration at American University and a naturalized citizen. Since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, she said she has watched the rise of Islamophobia as her family built a life in the U.S. "It's hard not to feel terrified and angry and sad and heartbroken," she said. --- The Washington Post's Perry Stein contributed to this report. immig-protests-1stld-writethru Washington Post News Service (DC) 1/29/2017 6:45:19 PM Central Standard Time RICHMOND At least 28 firearms belonging to people accused of domestic violence were surrendered to local police departments in Virginia under a new law that requires alleged abusers to sell or transfer their weapons within 24 hours, Virginias secretary of public safety says. The measure, adopted last year as part of a bipartisan gun safety deal struck between Gov. Terry McAuliffe and state lawmakers, has resulted in at least 66 law enforcement agencies across the state agreeing to accept and store firearms from people subject to family abuse permanent protective orders, said Brian J. Moran, state secretary of public safety and homeland security, whose office has been tracking certain elements of the law. From July 1, when the law took effect, until the end of October, 18 handguns and 10 rifles or shotguns were turned over to various police agencies, Moran said. And an undetermined number of firearms have been turned over to defendants relatives, which also is permitted. The measure was designed to remove guns from domestic violence situations. The law doesnt require police to accept and store the weapons, because some agencies dont have the available storage or have other concerns about keeping the weapons, Moran said. However, 66 agencies in Virginia have volunteered to accept firearms. Many [defendants] can give it to a family member, which is fine, as long as they have no record, Moran explained. But we would encourage law enforcement [to maintain the firearm] for its safe keeping. In working with the Virginia Supreme Court, Moran said, the state added language to protective order forms that instructs defendants subject to the writs that they must surrender any guns they own or possess within 24 hours. Judges presiding in the states juvenile and domestic relations district courts also have the option of verbally instructing defendants about firearm prohibition, Moran said. Some judges do enter into a colloquy with the defendant, saying, Hey, you need to turn in your guns, Moran said. Others wont, or dont, because theyre not required by the Supreme Court or by law. You have to leave that up to the respective judges. Federal law already prohibits people under restraining orders from owning or possessing guns, but Moran said the state measure enhances federal law, primarily by requiring those subject to protective orders to surrender their firearms within 24 hours. The number of people who were denied the purchase of a gun in Virginia because they were under a protective order rose 15 percent in 2016, from 227 denials in 2015 to 261 last year, records show. But it is impossible to discern whether the increase is due to the new state law or a reflection of the states record number of firearm transactions in 2016, which topped a half million and jumped 14 percent over 2015. 'One man, one vote' is sacred I found Guy Andersons Jan. 22 letter to the editor, Virginia needs its own Electoral College, to be very unAmerican and about as partisan as one can get. His basic message was that now that Virginia is becoming a majority Democratic-leaning state, we need to take steps to thwart the Democrats by eliminating one man one vote in favor of geographic representation. As someone who owns nearly 12 acres of land, this clearly favors me, but the idea that protecting the Republican Party is more important than protecting the very principles on which our republic is founded should terrify us all. No, sir, while you are speaking in the language of our Founders, you are not really defending their ideas. Already Republicans have an outsized voice in our government. They control eight of 11 congressional seats in a state that runs 50-50 so far as the vote is concerned and dominate both houses in the General Assembly. Thats pretty good for a minority party. Furthermore, I think the Electoral College is simply a bad idea the way it is run. A state that votes 60-40 for a certain presidential candidate should not throw 100 percent of its support for the winner. This essentially disenfranchises nearly half the voters and distorts the process. In a sense thats why Donald Trump won, despite losing the popular vote. In the same sense, why should we even consider what clearly is a broken system nationally for state-wide implementation? Although Anderson couched his arguments in some of the important ideas of our Founders, that large states should not wield undue power, he is hiding a more basic issue. The Republican Party, as one dominated by an older, less inclusive demographic, is losing its influence and cannot easily stay in power without playing games with how our leaders are chosen. If the Democrats ever get their act together and truly become the party of the working person, the Republicans are in trouble, and I think they know it. KENNETH NAUGLE Forest At many cafes, the focus is on food. At Meeples in downtown Lynchburg, the focus is on naval battles, fighting global plagues, teamwork to escape a sinking island and many other challenges. Meeples is a board game cafe, a place for people to gather and play board games of various types and difficulties. For a flat rate of $4 per day, players can play any number of more than 150 games for as long as they want, with snacks and drinks available for purchase. The cafe is owned by husband-and-wife duo Patrick and Whitney Logan. Both enjoyed playing board games for years and became even more into the hobby while attending Liberty University. Board gaming has always been a hobby of ours, said Whitney Logan, a 23-year-old Cincinnati native. Weve gotten more into it while in college, mostly from sitting around trying to figure out what were going to do. Whitney Logan said Lynchburg has a thriving gaming community but players are isolated from each other because they play in their own homes or in lounge spaces on college campuses. We want to provide a space for people to come and try new games, meet with friends, relax more casually, she said. Or if you have a serious group of friends that you want to board game but you dont want to clean your house every week when they come over you can play here. The Logans started kicking around the idea of a board game cafe in Lynchburg about a year ago when Whitney took a small business entrepreneurship class last spring. From there they began developing the concept and getting the word out on social media. They were approached in August by Noah Barnett, co-founder of TOOLRY, a downtown cooperative workspace for creative entrepreneurs, about using his space to host weekly game nights for free. When we started TOOLRY we wanted to be a platform for people to pursue what they love, so for people to be able to use TOOLRY in a different way has been really cool, Barnett said. Seeing the way they use games as a common ground to bring different people together and bring people downtown has been really exciting to see. After hosting game nights on Thursdays during the fall, Meeples expanded after the New Year to being open all weekend inside TOOLRY for games. Open for six hours on Friday and Sunday and 12 hours on Saturday, Meeples offers weekend and month passes for frequent visitors. Mike Gallo, a regular Meeples visitor, said he has been able to make new friends through the business. I like this place because I can meet people I wouldnt meet otherwise and try new games, he said, while in the process of teaching a friend to play the strategy game Star Wars Rebellion. When you meet people here you already have gaming in common, so its easy to make friends. Meeples has games of all varieties, which are marked with colored stickers to denote different levels of difficulty in learning them. For Whitney Logan, a huge part of running Meeples is finding and teaching games to customers. I personally have a passion for finding the right game for everyone, she said. Were trying to build a collection that is something for everyone. We have five- to 10-minute games that we can teach you super quick, six-hour strategy games that are super fun to play and everything in between. For Kenny Bruce, another Meeples customer, playing games is about socializing with people in order to get to know them better. Playing games is great because you learn a lot about people youre playing with, he said. When you go see a movie you just stare at a screen and then maybe talk about it, but when you play a game you interact with everyone and learn a lot about them. Whitney Logan said most American board games traditionally have been very simple. On the other hand, European games were centered around more in-depth strategy. Now, the two categories are converging to create more gaming options. Gaming in America has mostly been roll the dice and move kinds of games or party games, she said. And then there are European games which are heavier where youre trying to get the most victory points. Theres been a board game revolution in the last decade where these two are merged into all sorts of strategy games that arent necessarily 5 hours long. Originally, Whitney and Patrick were considering a location in the Timberlake area to be closer to families and LUs campus. After being located downtown for a while through the partnership with TOOLRY, they are growing attached to the downtown community. Were relatively new to the downtown community, said 23-year-old Patrick Logan, who is from Raleigh, North Carolina. Weve been down here, but we havent really been invested into the downtown until game night started. Were relatively new to experiencing downtown as a whole but its been interesting to see all of the events going on recently and weve enjoyed the atmosphere. For now, Meeples plans to continue renting space in TOOLRY on weekends until they get money to open their own space. Our preferred business model is, If you spend X amount on food and drink, you can play for free, but at the location were at we dont have a cafe space available so were charging admission, Whitney Logan said. Weve really enjoyed downtown and if we find the right space and the money works out, we would like to continue being down here. Update: A Bedford man has been found guilty in southern Florida of numerous felony charges accusing him of a scheme to defraud his employer and the U.S. government and then avoiding taxes on his income. Brian Charles Tolley, 41, was convicted by a West Palm Beach jury of wire fraud, identity theft, aggravated identity theft, possession of counterfeit government seals with the intent to defraud, money laundering, making and subscribing false federal income tax returns and failing to file federal income tax returns, prosecutors said in a Jan. 26 news release. The jury verdict was reached Jan. 25 in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, online records show. Tolleys case stems from what prosecutors described as a complex scheme in which, as a corporate officer for PartsBase, he allegedly billed his company for fraudulent expense reports related to collecting U.S. defense procurement data. The scheme took place from 2007 to 2013, and Tolley fraudulently billed more than $1.6 million to the company, which serves as a large marketplace for aviation parts, the news release from the U.S. Attorneys Office said. Tolleys attorney in Florida could not be immediately reached for comment. Among the ways Tolley used the fraudulent income was to buy real estate in Bedford, according to prosecutors, who said he also used the money for a 2011 Buick Enclave, a 2011 Lincoln Navigator and other items. He also failed to report income from the scheme on tax returns from 2007 through 2011 and failed to file returns in 2012 and 2013, they said. Brian Tolley lived a life of luxury by abusing his corporate leadership position to defraud his employer and the United States government, Wifredo Ferrer, U.S. attorney for the southern district of Florida, said in the release. All corporations and our American taxpayers deserve to have their financial pockets protected against illicit fraud schemes, Ferrer said. Prosecutors said Tolley faces the possibility of decades in prison: a maximum of 20 years on each count of wire fraud; 15 years on each count of identity theft; five years on each count of possession of counterfeit government seals; 10 years on each count of money laundering; three years on each count of making and subscribing false federal income tax returns; and one year in prison on each count of failing to file federal income tax returns. Tolley also faces a mandatory consecutive sentence of two years imprisonment for aggravated identity theft. Court documents show the jury found him guilty on 49 total counts for the various offenses. Sentencing in the case is set for April 21 in U.S. District Court. Earlier: A Bedford man has been found guilty in southern Florida of numerous felony charges accusing him of a scheme to defraud his employer and the U.S. government and then avoiding taxes on his income. Brian Charles Tolley, 41, was convicted by a West Palm Beach jury of wire fraud, identity theft, aggravated identity theft, possession of counterfeit government seals with the intent to defraud, money laundering, making and subscribing false federal income tax returns, and failing to file federal income tax returns, prosecutors said. The verdict was reached Jan. 25 in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, online records show. Tolleys case stems from what prosecutors described as a complex scheme in which, as a corporate officer for PartsBase, he allegedly billed his company for fraudulent expense reports related to collecting U.S. defense procurement data. The scheme took place from 2007 to 2013, and Tolley fraudulently billed more than $1.6 million to the company, which serves as a large marketplace for aviation parts, the U.S. Attorneys Office said. Tolleys attorney in Florida could not immediately be reached for comment. GamesRadar+ is supported by its audience. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Heres why you can trust us. Resistance of the Black Carib POETRY is an earthshaking tool used to convey love and hope. It bemoans injustice and rallies for change. But seldom is it used as a medium for a historicity that is profound, instructive and arguably prophetic. Reverend Canon Horatio Nelson Huggins has accomplished this rare feat with Hiroona a narrative that details the epic struggle between the Black Caribs (also known as Garifuna) of St Vincent and the British. In this fictionalised but ironically accurate account of the Second Carib War of 1795- 97 we are teleported to the birth of the so-called New World where Social Darwinism lay waste to many an innocent people. It is revelatory work of qualitative existential value, a work that mirrors some of the lethal confrontations between expeditionary forces and indigenes throughout the world. Hiroona proves that warfare is but a matrix of multiple forces jockeying for mastery of people and resources. What defines this literary monument is the medium it uses to tell this tragic tale, a medium characterised by a rich poetic style that is colourful, nuanced and equally bold. Equally impressive is the editors ability to recapture the originality of the manuscript. We are enraptured by the subtly of expressions and the varied play on words. While contemporary, standard literature may advocate different constructs we cannot help but be mesmerised by Huggins linguistic adaptations. His is an offering that explores just about every human experience - romance, politics, enculturation, and miscegenation (between black Africans and Caribs that changed the phenotypic characteristics of the later). The author who died in 1895 relies on oral tradition that is hardly remote and uncorroborated. He injects tales told by those who were directly involved in the deadly fray, a fray that saw the Black Caribs expelled and culturally gutted. We end up with an incisive look at their culture social and political hierarchy, rituals, and the intriguing role of the Carib woman. And there is romance, passion and sensibility. But it is the insurgency that excites the imagination. We relive the ferocious resistance of the indigenous people. Huggins writes of one raid in this vividly captivating verse, Around and scattered abroad, The Homesteads desecrated sward, The charred and littered fragments lay of household furniture and store; And grimmed with smoke and smeared with gore, The severed limb and mangled corpse, Of negro slave, and mule and horse. And yonder, midst the fire and smoke, Whose volume for a moment broke; The hideous forms of Carib glide, Ghoullike, and hugely magnified! Later, he gets more impressively graphic, Secure; the prowling Caribs crept, with neither moon to guide nor star, The bloody foot-steps of their war - So settlers old traditions say, they crept like midnight beasts of prey, And sprang, as savage and as wild, on helpless woman, maid, and child; they sprang ferocious in attack. Alike in white man and in black; they spared no life that night, but gave to death the master and the slave. Indeed, the Black Caribs fought back valiantly but succumbed and were expelled; many were sent to Honduras under insufferable conditions. Decades later others moved to Trinidad, Guatemala and New York. Today, Black Caribs are seeking redress for past wrongs. And we are ever moved by Dr Ralph Gonsalves, the Prime Minister of St Vincent, who, oftentimes addresses this tragedy. In 2015 at the annual Wreath-Laying ceremony in Dorsetshire to commemorate national hero Joseph Chatoyer, he expressed his outrage at the demise of the islands indigenous people. If the International Criminal Court existed back then, he averred, the British would have been hauled before it for genocide. He detailed the whole scale massacre of men, women and children. Many rather than being killed jumped off from cliffs and went to their watery graves; even to the last that was their resistance. He then asked rhetorically, They took all the lands and you tell me I must not get reparations? As the legal battle continues unabated Hiroona assumes new importance. Without question, Huggins signature work is must read for anyone roused by injustice of any kind. Book: Hiroona: An Historical Romance in Poetic Form by Reverend Reverend Canon Horatio Nelson Huggins Publisher: The University of the West Indies Press, Jamaica ISBN: 978-976-640- 553-3 Available at Amazon Ratings: Recommended 3 suspects detained The suspects remain in custody at the Central Police Station and are being quizzed by CGIU officers as well as their colleagues from the Special Branch. According to reports, on Friday afternoon, the three men in a black Nissan X-Trail SUV went to the house, where the President and his family usually spend weekends and public holidays, and enquired from the female caretaker when Carmona would be at the house. One of the men left a phone number and asked the caretaker to contact him when next Carmona arrives. The caretaker became frightened and alerted the police as well as President Carmona via his private cellular phone. This resulted in police taking prompt action and the X-Trail being intercepted in the Maracas Bay area. The three were taken to the Central Police Station and on the weekend, were being interviewed by a joint team of intelligence officers. Newsday understands that as a result of a threatening phone call made to the E999 Command Centre by a man claiming to be an army officer, who said he intends to kill the President and all of them. Head of Special Branch Ag Snr Supt Austin Lee went to Presidents House last Monday and spoke with Carmona and advised him on new security measures in light of the threatening phone call. Minister of National Security Edmund Dillon confirmed last Thursday that new security arrangements had been put in place for his excellency, his family, and certain officials in light of the threat. He said that the authorities were also taking the threat very seriously. Also last week, special branch officers met again with the president and members of his family and issued precautions to them. Some members of staff at Presidents House were also privy to the advice of caution. A Special Branch source said yesterday that due to the threatening phone call made last Sunday they will continue to be rigorous in this investigations involving the detention of these three men who were inquiring about the presidents whereabouts at his Blanchicheusse house. Sources at Presidents House said that President Carmona has expressed concern over the new developments and has agreed to follow the advice of the police with respect to his safety and security. Possible corruption The TTEITI said, The research that goes into the production of the EITI Reports has found no evidence of corruption at the level of upstream oil and gas companies, both local and foreign, in the dealings with Government. However the committee added, That is not to say that there may not be some form of corruption in the energy sector. The committee continued, We are aware of allegations made of mismanagement and corruption in the award of contracts by companies to suppliers and contractors but that is not part of the EITI remit, therefore, we are not in a position to form an opinion on those allegations. Speaking in the House of Representatives last Friday, Finance Minister Colm Imbert said, We have just engaged international consultants last week to start to look at the value chain in terms of energy commodity pricing because there is a view in TT that the multinational companies cheat on the declaration of income and the prices of commodities, and they use a technique called transfer pricing. Imbert, who is also Acting Energy Minister, said, It is said to be happening with the sale of LNG. There is an allegation that the persons who produce the LNG, sell the LNG to an associated company and they sell it at a low price, so that the Government gets its profits based on the sale price and not market price. Therefore TT is robbed of income. There is a strong belief that this is happening. The committee said this country has published four EITI Reports, covering 2010 to 2015. Based on the reports findings, an estimated $840 million in differences between extractive companies declared tax and other payments and Governments corresponding receipts have been identified, audited and reconciled to our satisfaction, the TTEITI said. The committee also said the reports have also provided extensive recommendations on improving Government revenue collection, data management and audit and assurance processes. Data generated in the reports have also informed the findings of the recent Gas Master Plan and assisted Trinidad and Tobago in meeting its obligations to the Open Government Partnership, the committee added. Indicating the EITI is one tool which can be used to reduce the perception of corruption in TT, the committee said, The work we are doing to promote resource revenue transparency and to unveil the names of the real owners of companies investing in our oil and gas sector holds lessons for other sectors as well. The CPI 2016 showed that, based on the results of surveys conducted in 2014 and 2015, TTs score has dropped from 39 to 35. The Peoples Partnership coalition was in government from May 2010 to September 7, 2015. The Peoples National Movement (PNM) has been in office since September 7, 2015 to the present. TTEITI committee chairman Victor Hart will attend the next EITI International Board Meeting in Bogota, Colombia, from March 7 to 9. Still no ID on headless body Police sources yesterday said that a motive has not yet been ascertained in the unidentified mans death. Homicide Investigations Bureau detectives are citing drug related activities, radical cult behaviour and/or gang activity as some of the possible motives for the mans dismemberment. On Saturday morning at about 10 am, a Lopinot villager was walking along the roadway, when he noticed blood on the street. The man followed the trail of blood, until he stumbled across the body minus its head and hands. The body was clad only in a pair of boxer shorts. Since the discovery of the body, several persons had come forward to the Arouca police hoping that the body was that of their missing relatives. So far, police have not been able to match the description given by family members of missing persons, but they have encoraged the public to continue assisting the police. LATEST: There were reports last night of a murder being committed in Penal in which a man was found shot to death in his house. No further details were forthcoming in what is the countrys 51st murder for January. (Adds comment from Canadian trade minister's spokeswoman) By Alonso Soto and Anthony Boadle BRASILIA, Jan 26 (Reuters) - Canada has signaled it is willing to negotiate with Brazil to resolve a feud over funding for jet maker Bombardier Inc that threatens to turn into an international trade dispute, Brazilian Trade Minister Marcos Pereira said Thursday. In December, Brazil said it will start proceedings against Canada at the World Trade Organization over what it calls unfair support worth $2.5 billion for Bombardier from the province of Quebec. Pereira said Canada's International Trade Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne told him at the World Economic Forum in Davos last week that his government wants to discuss the case. "He (Champagne) signaled, very clearly, that he would like to talk to try to find a solution before litigation materializes," Pereira said. Brazil has argued that Quebec's investment coupled with plans by the Canadian government to inject $1 billion into Bombardier's CSeries jet program has allowed aggressive discounts hurting Brazilian rival Embraer SA, along with Boeing Co and Airbus Group SE. Asked for a reaction to Pereira's comments, Champagne spokeswoman Anne-Louise Chauvette said by e-mail that "at this time, no dispute settlement proceedings have been filed on this matter at the WTO". In July, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau brushed off Brazil's concerns as evidence that rivals were afraid of strong competition from the CSeries. Bombardier and Embraer have battled for decades over the regional jet market. The plane makers traded accusations of unfair subsidies in the late 1990s that their countries hashed out at the WTO. Pereira said he is confident the trade row will not derail talks between Canada and the South American trade bloc Mercosur to start free trade negotiations. The bloc is made up of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay. "I believe both countries are mature enough to separate both issues," Pereira said. (Additional reporting by Allison Lampert in Montreal; Editing by David Gregorio and Chizu Nomiyama) Rowley to visit Cuba, Chile He reported that Rowley addressed the general council membership and spoke of the initiatives and successful negotiations between this country and Venezuela for the Dragon gas field. Rowley also said that the US $50 million revolving trade agreement between Trinidad and Tobago and the eastern coast of Venezuela has been continuing and local manufacturers continue to provide goods to that country. He also reported that Rowley had accepted an invitation from the Chilean president, Michelle Bachelet, for a State visit and they would have to work out when this would take place. Because we see the hydrocarbon industry in Trinidad and Tobago and in particular what is taking place in Point Lisas over the many years with the fertilisers, the ammonia and the urea and a new market is opening up in South America and Chile is a gateway to that, he said. Rowley also spoke about Cuba and Young said they had seen the opening of a new market last year particularly regarding the new relations between the United States and Cuba. Young said the Trade Ministry had recently visit Cuba and plans were being made this year for a state visit.THIS GOVERNMENT sees muchas oportunidades (many opportunities) in Latin America and Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley is planning State visits to Cuba and Chile. This was announced on the weekend by Peoples National Movement (PNM) PRO Stuart Young at the post-PNM general council media conference at Balisier House, Port-of-Spain, the first meeting for 2017. He reported that Rowley addressed the general council membership and spoke of the initiatives and successful negotiations between this country and Venezuela for the Dragon gas field. Rowley also said that the US $50 million revolving trade agreement between Trinidad and Tobago and the eastern coast of Venezuela has been continuing and local manufacturers continue to provide goods to that country. He also reported that Rowley had accepted an invitation from the Chilean president, Michelle Bachelet, for a State visit and they would have to work out when this would take place. Because we see the hydrocarbon industry in Trinidad and Tobago and in particular what is taking place in Point Lisas over the many years with the fertilisers, the ammonia and the urea and a new market is opening up in South America and Chile is a gateway to that, he said. Rowley also spoke about Cuba and Young said they had seen the opening of a new market last year particularly regarding the new relations between the United States and Cuba. Young said the Trade Ministry had recently visit Cuba and plans were being made this year for a state visit. No One Has Done This Before in Billboard's History By David Ljunggren and Alastair Sharp OTTAWA/TORONTO (Reuters) - Canada will offer temporary residency to any travelers stranded by U.S. President Donald Trump's orders temporarily barring people from seven Muslim-majority countries, a senior official said on Sunday. Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen told a news conference he did not know how many people might be eligible but said only a handful of passengers headed to the United States from Canada had been denied boarding. Trump's decision on Friday, which also affects refugees, left many people uncertain of whether they could enter the United States. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if they need it," Hussen said. Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government has refrained from criticizing the United States, which takes 75 percent of Canadian exports, preferring instead to stress Canada is open to refugees. "Every country has the right to determine their policies," said Hussen. The Canadian Council for Refugees and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, or CCLA, called on Ottawa to withdraw from a Safe Third Country agreement with the United States, under which Canada returns asylum seekers crossing the border. "There's a danger that the U.S. is doing blanket detentions and deportations ... and not honoring asylum claims," said CCLA Executive Director Sukanya Pillay. Such a move would be diplomatically insulting and Hussen said the pact would remain unchanged for now. Local and national politicians have condemned Trump's ban and the opposition New Democrats want an emergency debate in the federal Parliament. The U.S. Consulate in Toronto said it would suspend services on Monday because of a planned demonstration. More than 200 Canadian technology company founders, executives and investors said on Sunday that Ottawa should immediately give temporary residency to those displaced by Trump's order. "(We) understand the power of inclusion and diversity of thought, and that talent and skill know no borders," they said in an open letter. Canada wants to attract tech workers from abroad while retaining those who are often lured away. More than 300,000 Canadians work in California's Silicon Valley. Bob Vaez, the Iranian-born chief executive of tech firm Event Mobi, canceled plans on Sunday to accept an industry award in Las Vegas. Many event organizers could seek alternative locations, he said. "Are they going to keep their conferences in the U.S., knowing that so many people are going to be barred?" he said. (Additional reporting by Anna Mehler Paperny in Toronto and Andrea Hopkins in Ottawa; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Peter Cooney) Kal Penn has just turned lemons into lemonadesome pretty darn valuable lemonade. On Saturday the actor tweeted what looked to be an Instagram comment that read in part "you don't belong in this country you f---ing joke." Penn wrote, "To the dude who said I don't belong in America, I started a fundraising page for Syrian Refugees in your name." And the pagewhich states "We will turn their bigotry, along with the President's, into love"has gone wild. As of early Monday, more than $500,000 has been raised on the CrowdRise site; the money will go to the International Rescue Committee, Mashable reports. That's way more than the original goal, as Penn, the New Jersey-born son of immigrants from India, pointed out on Twitter. He observed Sunday morning that "If we hit $250k, that's 100x more than our original goal! How's that for showing the world who we are?" (Read more Syrian refugees stories.) When the British warship Lord Clive was blasted by Spanish cannon fire just off the coast of Uruguay in 1763, about 270 crew members went down with the ship. Now a treasure hunter from Argentina hopes it's also still home to more than $1 billion in gold coins, reports the London Timeshalf of which he could be entitled to. Ruben Collado also thinks the ship is stocked with the likes of rum, opium, and silk, and he plans to prove it by raising the vessel next month. Collado himself found the ship by accident in 2004, just 380 yards off the coast and 16 feet underwater. (Spaniards had pinned it under rocks to keep it submerged). The shallow depth is what gave up its location: Collado's vessel struck its mast in the River Plate estuary, reported AFP. He then waited more than a decade for Uruguay's permission to salvage it. The Lord Clive went down during a military mission amid the Seven Years' War, in which British and Portugal were trying to take the city of Colonia del Sacramento. Collado thinks the 64-gun ship, which belonged to the British East India Company, made the fatal error of anchoring too close to shore, within range of Spanish cannons. The Feb. 10 operation is expected to cost about $5 million for the team of 80 divers, technicians, and other support staff to raise the ship. The hope is that it can shed more light on British naval expeditions in South America. "The rescue of the ship would have an impact on the city no less important than when UNESCO declared it, justly, a World Heritage Site," says Colonia's director of tourism. (One famous wreck has been particularly dangerous for divers.) Since Jessica Runions went missing in September, family and friends have formed a search party and combed the Kansas City area week after week. And while they have yet to find the 21-year-old Missouri woman or clues as to her possible whereabouts, on each of the past two Saturdays the search has yielded something entirely unexpected: the discovery of a man's body, reports the Kansas City Star. "Two bodies two weeks in a row?" says father John Runions, who has turned his home's hallway into a giant map of the area that's being searched. "It's unbelievable." And as frustrated as he is by not yet finding his own child, he adds that discovering other bodies is "good" because, as he well knows, "families deserve closure." Police said on Sunday they hope to identify the second body soon, the AP reports, while the first belongs to 21-year-old Brandon Herring of Raytown. He was reported missing in November and police are investigating his death as a homicide. As for Runions' case, ABC News reports she was last seen giving 27-year-old Kylr Yust, a friend of her boyfriend, a ride home after a Sept. 8 get-together. Her burned car was found two days later in a wooded area, and Yust has been charged with burning it. He happens to have been a boyfriend of Kara Kopetsky, who went missing at the age of 17 nine years ago; NBC News reports her body was never found. He's been questioned, but not charged, in Runions' disappearance as well. (Cops say this mom's story about her missing twins doesn't check out.) In what Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called "a terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge," six people were killed and at least eight others injured in a shooting at a mosque in Quebec City on Sunday night. Police initially arrested two menAlexandre Bissonnette and Mohamed el Khadir, according to a Quebec City court clerkbut later said just one remains a suspect, without naming him. One was arrested at the scene and another nearby, in his car on a bridge near d'Orleans where he called 911 to say he wanted to cooperate with police. Police said they did not believe there were other suspects but were investigating. A witness tells the CBC that two masked men with local accents started shooting after entering the men's section of the mosque at around 8pm. "They started to fire, and as they shot they yelled, 'Allahu akbar!' The bullets hit people that were praying. People who were praying lost their lives." "Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City," Trudeau tweeted. "My thoughts are with victims & their families." Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard also called the "barbaric violence" an act of terrorism and said flags would be lowered to half-staff. The Montreal Gazette reports that the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center is one of six mosques in the region and had a pig's head dumped on its doorstep with a card reading "bonne appetit" last June. In a statement, the mosque urged "the Muslim community to remain calm and united and to know that the Canadian people stand with us in solidarity." (Read more Canada stories.) Brunhilde Pomsel, the former secretary to Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, died in her sleep at a care home in Munich on Friday, a few weeks after her 106th birthday. Christian Kroenes, who extensively interviewed Pomsel for last year's documentary film, A German Life, confirmed the news, per the AFP. In the film, Pomsel described how she joined the Nazi party in 1933 only so she could work at German national radio, after previously finding work with a businessman and a lawyer, both of whom were Jewish, reports the BBC and Washington Post. She then worked as Goebbels' secretary from 1942 to 1945, when Goebbels and his wife poisoned their six children and committed suicide, reports Deutsche Welle. "I will never forgive Goebbels for what he did to the world or for the fact that he murdered his innocent children," Pomsel said in 2011. But in A German Life, she said she "knew nothing" of the Holocaust at the time. Instead, she believed Jews were moved to territory in Czechoslovakia that was annexed by Germany in 1938. Those who now claim they would've done more to help Jewish people were kidding themselves, Pomsel added. "The whole country was as if under a kind of a spell," she said. "I could not put up resistance. I was too much of a coward." After A German Life was released, Pomsel explained she had finally decided to speak out in the hope "that the world doesn't turn upside down again as it did then," per the Times of Israel. (Read more Joseph Goebbels stories.) The Philippines has suspended its merciless war on drugs in order to "cleanse" police forces of corruption, officials say. The move comes after a killing seen as excessive even in a campaign that has seen at least 7,000 extrajudicial killings, the BBC reports. Officials say Jee Ick-joo, a South Korean businessman, was seized from his home in October by anti-narcotics officers who claimed to be carrying out a drug raid. His kidnappers strangled him to death inside Philippine National Police Headquarters at Camp Crame in Manila, officials say, then pretended he was still alive in order to extort $100,000 in ransom money from his wife. "That it happened inside Camp Crame is really bad, and we admit that," President Rodrigo Duterte told reporters Sunday evening, per the Wall Street Journal. He accused police forces of being "corrupt to the core" and vowed to send offenders to fight insurgents in the south of the country. At a press conference Monday, national police chief Gen. Ronald dela Rosa said the Philippines DEA would handle all drug cases until police corruption had been dealt with. "Rogue cops, beware!" he said. "We no longer have a war on drugs; we now have a war on scalawags." (Last month, Duterte boasted about throwing criminals from a helicopter.) Masaya Nakamura, the "Father of Pac-Man," who founded the Japanese video game company behind the hit creature-gobbling game, has died at age 91, the AP reports. At the time of his death on Jan. 22, Nakamura held an honorary position at Bandai Namco, formed in a 2005 merger with the pioneering company, then called Namco, he started in 1955. With humble beginnings in two mechanical horses on the rooftop of a department store, the company went on create video game arcades and amusement parks. The most successful game was Pac-Man, which went on sale in 1980. Guinness World Record has named it the world's most successful coin-operated arcade game. Designed by video game maker Toru Iwatani, the idea for Pac-Man came from the image of a pizza with a slice carved out. It launched at a time when rival games such as Space Invaders were few. Pac-Man is estimated to have been played more than 10 billion times. Nakamura reportedly chose the word "Pac" to represent the munching of the Pac-Man devouring its prey. The yellow character is iconic in Japanese culture, having inspired T-shirts and other merchandize, animation shows and the nickname for Filipino boxer Manny Pacquiao. Nakamura was a key player in the global growth of Bandai Namco. The company announced Nakamura's death on Monday, but would not comment on the cause of his death or other personal details, citing his family's wishes. (Read more Masaya Nakamura stories.) Google has joined a host of other tech companies condemning President Trump's Muslim travel ban, which affects employees across the tech world who come to the US through high-skilled immigration programs. CEO Sundar Pichai says the company will donate $2 million to four groups, including the ACLU and UNHCR, to fight the order, which affects at least 187 Google employees and their families. Employees are encouraged to match that figure, reports USA Today. Google co-founder Sergey Brin, who came to the US as a refugee, was also among protesters at San Francisco International Airport on Saturday. Others speaking out: On Twitter, Elon Muska White House economic advisersays the ban "is not the best way to address the country's challenges." He hopes to present Trump with better suggestions from the public on Friday, per Gizmodo. In an email to employees, Apple CEO Tim Cook says the company "believes deeply in the importance of immigrationboth to our company and to our nation's future," so the ban is "not a policy we support," reports Politico. Microsoft says it's exploring legal options to help its 76 workers who are citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen, and have a US visa. Box CEO Aaron Levie calls the order "disastrous" and nonsensical. "It's neither moral or humanitarian nor is it that logical if it's about protecting America," and there isn't "a single business that would benefit from this," he tells Inc. "This crosses a threshold." Netflix CEO Reed Hastings agrees in a Facebook post, noting the "un-American" order is "will make America less safe through hatred and loss of allies." Hostility between Trump and the tech world may be about to peak: Bloomberg reports the Trump administration has drafted an executive order that would force tech companies to hire American workers ahead of highly skilled foreign engineers, and pay more for foreign workers permitted to work in the US. (Read more Trump travel ban stories.) A state visit to Britain by President Trump later this year will go ahead, the prime minister's office said Monday, despite increasing calls for it to be canceled over his temporary ban on residents of seven majority-Muslim countries from traveling to the US, the AP reports. Furor over the travel ban has tarnished what British officials had considered a highly successful trip to Washington by Prime Minister Theresa May. She met Trump at the White House on Friday and announced he'd been invited to come to Britain later this year as Queen Elizabeth II's guest. Only hours after she'd left the White House, the president signed his executive order. May's Downing St. office said Monday "an invitation has been extended and accepted," and the visit is still on. No date has been announced for the state visit, which involves lavish pomp and ceremony, generally with a stay at Buckingham Palace. Britain's three biggest opposition parties have called for the visit's cancellation, and an online petition opposing it currently has 1.3 million signatures. Per the Telegraph, it's now the second-most popular petition on the government's website, behind the 4 million people asking for a 2nd EU referendum. The petition argues "Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen." Any petition with more than 100,000 signatures must be considered for a debate in Parliament, though not a binding vote. Protests against the ban are planned Monday in London. (Read more Donald Trump stories.) Last year, scientists made an amazing discovery under the mud and muck at the mouth of the Amazon River: a long-rumored 600-mile-long coral reef. Now the first images of the natural phenomenon are emerging, captured from a sub sent 720 feet down into the murky waters off a Greenpeace boat, the Guardian reports. The reef stretches from French Guiana to the Brazilian state of Maranhao, per a Greenpeace press release, and is astonishing researchers for its ability to flourish in dark waters. The Guardian notes corals tend to flourish in clear, sun-penetrating waters. That makes "this reef system important for ... the fact that it has unique characteristics regarding use and availability of light," a Federal University of Para researcher says, adding that the reef also holds "huge potential for new species." But just as scientists have started to study the reef, oil companies have started to move inand if Brazil's government OKs the permits they're seeking, these companies (including Petrobras, BP, and Total) will be able to start drilling in the area, the BBC reports. With drilling comes the risk of spills, and Greenpeace warns that some ecosystems such as the mangroves in Cabo Orange National Park won't be able to receive proper cleanup if oil does leak out. A Greenpeace Brazil activist reiterates the call to defend the reef, as well as the entire region, "from the corporate greed that puts profits ahead of the environment. One of Total's oil blocks is only [5 miles] from the reef, and environmental licensing processes are already under way." (The Great Barrier Reef lost nearly a quarter of its coral last year.) If Donald Trump chooses to roast journalists, celebrities, and politicians at the annual White House Correspondents' Dinner in Washington, DC, this year, it'll be with the knowledge that he's being brutally mocked not too far away. Samantha Bee of TBS' Full Frontal says she'll host celebrities, journalists, and comedians at a Trump roast at the Willard Hotel in Washington on April 29. Bee tells the New York Times that the goal of the event, dubbed "Not the White House Correspondents' Dinner," is not to "supersede" the official dinner scheduled for the same night, but simply to "ensure that we get to properly roast the president." She promises "plenty of surprises," per Variety. "If you're not careful you just might learn something. Specifically, you'll learn how screwed we'd be without a free press," she adds. It's not yet clear when or how the event will be broadcast, or even who will attend, but Bee says proceeds will go to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Whether the official Correspondents' dinner will happen is also unclear given Trump's tumultuous relationship with the press, his history with the dinner, and "his oft-demonstrated thin skin," reports the Times. The Independent notes the dinner has been an annual occurrence since 1983. (Read more Donald Trump stories.) A 23-year-old dental student from France won the Miss Universe crown Monday in a pageant held in the Philippines, saying her triumph will make the beauty contest more popular in Europe and help her efforts to put more underprivileged children in school. Iris Mittenaere from Lille city in northern France buried her face in her hands in shock and joy as the outgoing winner from the Philippines, Pia Wurtzbach, crowned her and the crowd erupted in cheers at the packed Mall of Asia Arena by Manila Bay, the AP reports. Miss Haiti, Raquel Pelissier, a 25-year-old survivor of the devastating 2010 earthquake that destroyed her hometown, was named first runner-up, while Miss Colombia, 23-year-old industrial designer and photographer Andrea Tovar, was second runner-up. Eighty-six candidates vied in this year's pageant, which was formerly owned by Donald Trump. Mittenaere's victory was the first by a French contestant in more than 60 years. "I think France and Europe really need a Miss Universe" after failing to win the crown for so long, she said at a post-pageant news conference. Mittenaere said her victory would also help cheer French people following terrorist attacks in recent years. Mittenaere said she would focus during her reign on helping all children, especially girls, attend school. As he closed the ceremony, the host, American comedian Steve Harvey, quipped, "I got it right," referring to his mistaken announcement of Miss Colombia as the winner in last year's pageant in Las Vegas, for which he was roundly criticized. (Read more Miss Universe stories.) For a chef who's filleted and flambed in some of Europe's top restaurants, planning a dinner party for two dozen people shouldn't present an issueunless that dinner party happens to be nearly 18,000 feet in the air. Outside magazine outlines the challenges faced by James Sharman as he prepped for a gourmet meal at Mount Everest's Base Camp in December, an endeavor attempted at least once before but abandoned when the chef took ill with altitude sickness. Not only did Sharman and his team have to learn in general about Nepalese delicacies like goat spinal cord and yak yogurt, which they weren't terribly familiar with: They also had to figure out how to keep the victuals fresh during the nine-day trek to Base Camp and how to set up an entire kitchen and dining area on the icy landscape. This wasn't the first unconventional meal Sharman and his crew had overseen. Since last year, Sharman and his One Star House Party pop-up restaurant have been roaming the world, feeding free-spending diners in exotic locales such as Bangkok and Beijing. The 15 or so paying guests for the Everest shindig, which Sharman calls "humbling," coughed up $1,050 for accommodations and food during the 14-day experience. "Looking back, I can't believe all the things that came together," Sharman says. Some of the next few destinations on Sharman's itinerary, which a September New York Times article noted will span a two-year period: Nairobi, Reykjavik, and, per Vogue India, a possible "Darjeeling Limited" experience in which Sharman whips up a feast on a train that's chugging through India's tea country. (Meanwhile, celebrity chef Jamie Oliver recently caused a kerfuffle with sausage.) When Alyssa Elkins sat down with her eight siblings to write a bucket list, she thought about a video she'd seen of her uncle being struck by a Taser during his training with the Ohio State Highway Patrol. She added firing a Taser to the list, partly as a joke. And yet the Ohio teen found herself bringing down Sergeant Doug Bline with a Taser at the Newark Police Department on Sunday. Bline, who willingly volunteered for the task, says it was well worth the pain. After beating her leukemia into remission, Alyssa, 16, discovered her cancer had returned on Jan. 19, leaving her with less than six months to live, reports the Columbus Dispatch. Her bucket list "lets us focus on other things," her dad says. Firing a Taser "was awesome," adds Alyssa, per 10TV. It wasn't the only excitement she's experienced recently. She also tried on a wedding dress, got a miniature pig, and had friends drop her message in a bottle into the ocean. Next up, she'll visit Disney World with her family in February. She also hopes to see New York, Cedar Point, and get a tattoo, per WCMH. But for now, "I'm very, very grateful and appreciative for everything that everybody's doing for me," Alyssa says. And even given her prognosis, "I'm not really scared. If [God] takes me, I know where I'm going." (A teen's dying act fulfilled her bucket list.) Donald Trump is returning to prime time. The president on Monday morning announced via Twitter that he'd be naming his pick for the Supreme Court live on TV. The 8pm Tuesday announcement speeds up the original plan, which the New York Times reports had Antonin Scalia's replacement being named Thursday. The Times bets on one of these three federal appeals judges: Neil Gorsuch, Thomas Hardiman, and William Pryor (the links take you to SCOTUSblog profiles of each). Business Insider puts its money on the 51-year-old Hardiman, and gives three reasons why: A 95-0 vote got him onto the 3rd US Circuit Court of Appeals, with both Chuck Schumer and Dianne Feinstein giving him the green light; Maryanne Trump Barry (that would be the president's sister) is a fan of him; and he's "down-to-earth." But the Hill notes Trump suggested he would go with "very much in the mold of" Justice Scalia, and "Neil Gorsuch is about as close as it gets." It outlines why here. (Read more US Supreme Court stories.) Our very primitive beginnings look to have been very primitive indeed. It turns out the earliest known ancestor of humans was a sea creature a millimeter in size that likely lacked an anus. In a study published in Nature on Monday, scientists named Saccorhytus coronaries as a 540 million-year-old memberat that age the oldest oneof a category of animals called deuterostomes. The BBC explains deuterostomes gave rise to vertebrates. "All deuterostomes had a common ancestor, and we think that is what we are looking at here," researcher Simon Conway Morris tells the BBC. As for what they're looking at, "the bag-like body bears a prominent mouth and associated folds," the researchers write. Live Science reports the deuterostome groups scientists have previously discovered were at most 520 million years old, and had begun evolving into vertebrates, echinoderms (ie, starfish), and hemichordates (acorn worms). That left scientists stumped as to what a common ancestor would have looked like. Now they say they know. "We had to process enormous volumes of limestoneabout [3 tons]to get to the fossils, but a steady stream of new finds allowed us to" answer that question, says co-author Jian Han of the find, made in China. Two other details, from a Cambridge press release: The minuscule creature is thought to have lived between grains of sand on the sea bed, and it featured small conical structures that the water it ingested may have exited through "and so were perhaps the evolutionary precursor of the gills we now see in fish." (Scientists have found Earth's oldest civilization.) A Delta passenger sits on the floor while waiting in line at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport after Delta Air Lines grounded all domestic flights due to automation issues, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Branden Camp) DALLAS (AP) -- Delta Air Lines, recovering from a weekend technology outage, canceled more flights Monday but said that the issue has been resolved. The airline said Monday that 110 flights had been canceled and more could be scrubbed. That followed the cancellation of about 170 flights Sunday night. By late Monday afternoon, Delta had not offered an explanation for the cause of the outage. President Donald Trump blamed Delta for weekend problems at many airports, where large protests were held to oppose his executive order that temporarily banned travel to the U.S. by refugees and citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries. Federal judges blocked part of the order. Trump tweeted early Monday morning that only 109 people were detained for questioning under the order out of 325,000 coming to the U.S. "Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,.....protesters and the tears" of Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., who criticized the travel restrictions, Trump tweeted. Delta officials declined to comment on the president's tweet. Just two weeks ago, Delta CEO Ed Bastian praised Trump, saying that he was "very excited" about the possibility that the new administration might upgrade airport facilities, reduce taxes and cut regulations. Bastian also expressed hope that Trump might give a new airing to complaints by Delta, American Airlines and United Airlines that Middle Eastern competitors receive unfair subsidies from their governments. On Sunday, Delta asked the Federal Aviation Administration to hold up its departures at six major airports including Atlanta, Kennedy and LaGuardia in New York, and Los Angeles International, for several hours. Bastian apologized on the company's website to customers affected by the "frustrating situation." Delta apologized on Twitter that some delays and cancellations were not showing up on its own systems including its website and mobile app. Delta offered to let passengers booked on flights Monday to delay travel plans for a few days without incurring the usual fee $200 for domestic flights for changing a ticket. Story continues In August, Delta suffered a computer breakdown after a power outage in its operations center. The airline canceled more than 2,000 flights over three days and said the outage cost it $100 million. Shares of Delta Air Lines Inc. fell $2.03, or 4.1 percent, to close at $47.67. Most U.S. airline stocks fell more sharply than the broader market. None of the major U.S. airlines fly to the countries covered by Trump's order, but they have foreign partners who do. Jim Corridore, an analyst for CFRA Research, said the travel ban wasn't likely to have much effect on demand because of the light amount of traffic between the U.S. and those countries Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya, Sudan, Somalia and Yemen. But he said it could hurt Boeing Co. by raising the possibility that Iran and Iraq could retaliate by canceling multibillion-dollar jet orders. ___ Josh Boak reported from Washington. David Koenig can be reached at http://twitter.com/airlinewriter New Delhi: Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Ex-Finance Minister P Chidambaram addresses media in New Delhi on Monday. Manmohan Singh said that Indian economy is not in good shape. He added that as per International Monetary Fund, growth will slip to less than 6.6 per cent. Here are the live updates from the press conference: # BJP is hiding behind a GDP number which is being challenged. People aren't dazzled by it, but are asking where are the jobs?: P Chidambaram # NDA Govt tends to believe exaggerated version of economy, this research document is closer to truth than what government will say tommorow: P Chidambaram # Every government must be optimistic, but optimism must stem from a realistic assessment of the situation, says P Chidambaram # Yet if government presents tomorrow a rosy picture of the economy, people of India are entitled to question that: P Chidambaram # There are no jobs, capital formation is declining, credit growth is the lowest in several decades, says P Chidambaram # Where are the jobs?Where is new capital investment? Where is credit growth?: P Chidambaram, Former Finance Minister # The document released candidly, truthfully assesses the state of India's economy, supported by hard research, data: P Chidambaram # IMF says growth will slip to less than 6.6 per cent: Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh # Indian economy not in good shape, says Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh For all the Latest Business News, Economy News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi : Busting a fake currency notes racket in the capital, Delhi Police has arrested one more person in the case. Earlier, 3 other members of the gang were held with Rs 2000 fake notes worth 18 lakhs. The person named Sumit, who is 26-years-old is a resident of Sonipat and has been accused of supplying 70 fake notes amounting to Rs 1.40 lakh to other accused Manoj alias Soni who further passed on the notes to his cousin living in Haryana. Heavy amount of half printed notes have been recovered from Sumit with a number of other equipment including a scanner-cum-color printer, a steel scale, a cutter and 20 prints of one side of Rs 2000 i.e incomplete fake notes. Arrested on Sunday night, He is senior secondary graduate and a dropout from Polytechnic. He has been working with a company at IGI airport. Earlier, Delhi Police had arrested other accused Azad Manoj and Sunil from Delhis Narela area. New Delhi: Commoner Manveer Gurjar, the desi lad who belongs to Haryana, was announced the winner of Bigg Boss 10 after winning hearts of millions of Indians, thanks to his honesty and dedication towards his friends. After Manveer's triumph, his father announced that 50 per cent of the prize money will be donated to Bigg Boss 10 host and Bollywood actor Salman Khan's charity Being Human. Manveer, Lopamudra Raut and Manu Punjabi have spoken to News Nation in an exclusive interview. Here is what they all have to say about their journey in Bigg Boss 10. Manveer Gurjar: "I would like to thank all the viewers for their votes and support. I have won Rs 40 lakh prize money. But what matters for me is name and fame not money. Money has never been my priority. I will remain the same and will never change. Yes, I have donated 50% of the prize money to Salman Khan's charity Being Human." Lopamudra Raut: "I controlled my anger most of the times. But whenever I was angry, there was a genuine reason for it. But when somebody will do atyachar with me, I would not tolerate, I will always give it back. I do not regret for losing my cool in Bigg Boss House. I still feel at number 1, I feel like winner. But I am very happy for Manveer and would like to congratulate him for winning Bigg Boss 10." "Swami Om talks just anything. He is a big coward. He is someone who shouldn't be taken seriously. I am sorry I cannot give respect to him because he never respected any women in Bigg Boss House. He doesn't deserve any respect. Beware of Om!" "He cannot even hit a mosquito, how could he slap Salman Khan. How is that possible? All lies. Whatever he speaks is all fiction, all non-sense." Manu Punjabi: "I am very happy on Manveer's win. The journey with Bigg Boss was very beautiful. If I get a chance in Bollywood, I would like to do a film with Salman Khan." "Nobody can dare to touch Salman Khan, not even in dreams. Swami Om is a liar." Mumbai: Bollywood stars Salman Khan and Akshay Kumar may not be the best of friends but Akshay maintains that both of them have mutual admiration for each other. "Friendship doesn't mean you meet everyday. We don't meet everyday. I haven't gone to his house or he has come to my place. We have mutual admiration for each other. I admire him and so does he," Akshay said in an interview on Mumbai. The "Dabangg" star, Akshay and filmmaker Karan Johar are coming together for a movie slated to release in 2018. The yet-to-be titled project will be produced by Salman and Karan, while Akshay will star in the lead role. "It's for the first time that a big actor like him has signed me. It usually happens in Hollywood where one big actor signs another big actor. If this works on Bollywood it will become a trend. Hats off to Salman to put money on me," Akshay said. There were rumors that the film will revolve around the Battle of Saragarhi. On this Akshay said, "No nothing is finalised...everything is going on. If I say anything my agreement will get cancelled." According to the "Rustom" star there is still some time before the film goes on floors. In the trailer of Akshay's upcoming film "Jolly LLB-2" a situation comes when Akshay raises a question on Salman Khan's marriage. Talking about this particular scene, the "Special 26" star said, "Don't worry, don't create anything he knows everything. And after that only he signed me." This upcoming courtroom drama film is a sequel to the 2013 released film "Jolly LLB" that starred Arshad Warsi, Amrita Rao and Boman Irani in the lead roles. Produced by FoxStar Studios, the film is all set to hit theatres onFebruary 10. For all the Latest Entertainment News, Bollywood News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Mumbai: Congress on Monday played down Samajwadi Party partriach Mulayam Singh Yadavs non-endorsement of its alliance with the regional outfit in Uttar Pradesh and claimed the people in the poll-bound state are in favour of the tie-up. The Sonia Gandhi-led party said Mulayams comments opposing the alliance were his personal views. Congress has aligned with Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Singh Yadav, and going by the tremendous response to (joint press meet of) Rahul Gandhi and Akhilesh yesterday, it is clear the people of UP favour the alliance between the two young leaders. It is time to support the new leadership, party leader and MP Shashi Tharoor said. He was addressing a press conference here after releasing a chargesheet against the two-decade-old rule of Shiv Sena-BJP combine in the Mumbai civic body, which goes to the polls on February 21. Asked about Mulayam voicing displeasure over the SP-Congress tie-up for the Assembly polls in the most populated State, the Lok Sabha MP from Thiruvananthapuram said the former UP Chief Minister was entitled to his personal views. I am completely against the alliance. I will not campaign for it, Mulayam said yesterday. ALSO READ | UP Polls: Akhilesh Yadav expresses surety of Mulayam Singh Yadav campaigning for SP Asked whether the tie-up with Samajwadi Party will be extended to the Mumbai civic elections also, Tharoor said his party takes alliance decisions as per local conditions. Mumbai Congress President Sanjay Nirupam, who was present at the press meet, said it was too late to discuss an alliance with SP for the BMC elections, but his party is open to a post-poll pact with the UP-based party. We are open to a post-poll alliance with the Samajwadi Party for betterment of Mumbai, he said. Referring to the Mumbai civic polls, Tharoor said the civic corporation, which has an annual budget of Rs 38,000 crore, was not efficiently managed by the Sena-BJP combine. The saffron combine, which had been voted to power four times in the civic body, has no competence to run the civic administration, the diplomat-turned-politician said. They have betrayed people with their failure in governance. Rs 1 lakh crore budgetary expenditure is unaudited. A sum of Rs 28,000 crore had been spent on roads in the last 10 years but this year there was 13 per cent rise in number of potholes as compared to the previous year, he said. Tharoor said the chargesheet brought out by the Mumbai Congress highlights the civic bodys failures related to providing water, roads, garbage disposal, solid waste management and running hospitals and schools. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: More than 25 people, including 20 army personnel, have died in avalanches in Gurez, Kupawara sector of Jammu and Kashmir since Wednesday caused due to fresh snow across Kashmir over the past six days. Five army personnel who had been trapped under snow after the caving in of track in Machill sector on Saturday succumbed to injuries on Monday. Earlier, ten Army soldiers were killed when two avalanches struck an Army post and a patrol in Gurez sector. According to sources, the five soldiers belong to 56 Rashtriya Rifles and were on routine counter insurgency duties when the mishap occurred. Also Read | Kupwara: All 5 army personnel rescued from avalanche succumb to injuries Mortal remains of 14 in Gurez, which could not be evacuated earlier because of inclement weather, were brought to Srinagar on Monday. The mortal remains of the soldiers will be taken to their native places on Tuesday for last rites. Earlier avalanche had hit an army camp in Gurez sector of Bandipora district near the Line of Control in which several soldiers were trapped. More than 20 people, including 15 army personnel, have died in avalanches in Gurez sector of Jammu and Kashmir since Wednesday caused due to fresh snow across Kashmir over the past four days. Also Read |J&K avalanche: Bodies of 4 missing soldiers recovered; death toll rises to 14 ARMY PERSONNEL MARTYRED IN SONAMARG, KUPWARA AND GUREZ AVALANCHES IN JANUARY 1. Major Amar Sagar DOB : 02 May 1974 Next of Kin: Mrs Parul (Wife) Children : Daughter (18 years), Son (12 Years) Home Address: C/2/3 Aditi Appts, D-1 Block, Janakpuri, New Delhi 2. Nb Sub Amar Singh Gurjar Date of Birth: 08 Jul 1974 Next of Kin: Smt Bimlesh (Wife) Details of Children: Minisha (16 Yr), Sanjay Singh (14 Yr), Rajkumari (13 Yr), Samita (11 Yr), Avadhesh (08 Yr) Home Address: Vill - Bilai Teh - Madoti, Distt - Karoli, State - Rajasthan 3. Hav Vijay Kumar Shukla Date of Birth: 21 Feb 1983 Next of Kin: Smt Manorama (Wife) Children : Yashi Shukla (07 Yrs) Home Address: Vill - Porsa, Teh - Porsa, Distt - Murena, State - MP Also Read |J-K: 10 soldiers killed after two avalanches hit Kashmir's Gurez sector, PM Modi condoles deaths 4. Nk Ajit Singh Date of Birth: 12 Jun 1981 Next of Kin - Smt Priampdhi Singh (Wife), Children - Aryan (Son) 9 yrs, Pratap (Son) 7 Yrs Home Address: Vill Jamirpur, PO- Pitorapur, Teh Mehnagar, Distt- Azamgarh, State UP 5. Sepoy Anand Gawai Date of Birth: 24 Apr 1990 Next of Kin: Smt Gaukarha Gawai (Mother) Home Address: Vill - Akola, PO - Akola, Teh - Akola Distt - Akola State - Maharashtra 6. Sepoy Azad Singh Date of Birth - 01 Jul 1985 Next of Kin - Smt Pushpa Yadav (Wife), Details of Children - Pranashi (08 Yr), Divyanshi (04 Yr) Home Address: Vill-Rohilla, PO- Rohilla, Teh Sadar, Distt- Farukkhbad, State- UP 7. Sepoy Devander Kumar Soni Date of Birth: 10 Jul 1990 Next of Kin: Smt Laxmi Soni (Mother) Home Address: Vill - Shahdol, PO - Shahdol, Teh - Sahagapur, Distt - Shahdol, State - MP 8. Sepoy Elaverson B Date of Birth - 30 Jul 1989 Next of Kin - Smt Amatha (Mother) Home Address: Vill - Kannanthangudi, PO - Kannanthangudi, Distt - Thanjaur Teh - Orathanado, State- Tamilnadu. 9. Sepoy Nagaraju Mamidi Date of Birth - 28 Feb 1990 Next of Kin - Smt M Anushka (Wife) Home Address : Vill - Maradam, PO - Dattirajeru, Distt - Vijaynagar, State - Andhara Pradesh 10. Sepoy Samundare Vikas Date of Birth - 05 Jan 1990 Next of Kin - Smt Samundare Jandvi Pandurang (Mother) Home Address Vill - Ganjpur, PO - Ganjpur, Teh -Dharur, Distt - Beed, State - Maharashtra 11. Sepoy Sandeep Kumar Date of Birth - 21 Jul 1989 Next of Kin - Smt Ganjavathi (Mother) Home Address: Vill - Devihalli, PO - Devihalli, Teh - Hassan, Distt - Hassan, State - Karnataka 12. Sepoy Sanju Suresh Khandare Date of Birth - 23 May 1990 Next of Kin - Smt Sheetal Sanju Khendru Home Address: Vill - Mana, Teh - Murtizatur, Distt - Akola, State - Maharashtra 13. Sepoy Sundar Pandi Date of Birth: 08 Jun 1991 Next of Kin: Smt Tamilselvi (Mother) Home Address: Vill - Pallakuapatar, PO - Pallakuapata, Teh - Tirumangalam, Distt - Madurai, State - Tamilnadu 14. Sepoy Sunil Patel Date of Birth - 25 Jul 1992 Next of Kin - Smt Pritibha Ben (Wife) Details of Children - Ardi Ben (02 Yrs) Daughter Home Address: Vill - Balupura, PO - Blaupura, Teh - Godra, Distt - Panchmahal, State - Gujarat 15. Cfn Ankur Singh Date of Birth - 16 Mar 1992 Next of Kin - Priti Sharma (Wife) Home Address: Vill - Ukhalchana PO - Kot, Teh - Jhajjar, Distt - Jhajjar, State - Haryana 16.Sep Dhavale Ganesh Kisan Date of Birth - 19 Aug 1987 Next of Kin - Smt Reshma Hagwane (Desai) (Wife)Child - Master Samrath ( DOB 13 Aug 2016) AddressVill - Asare, Post - Asare, Teh - Wai, PS - Wai, Dist - Satara, State - Maharashtra 17. Naik Mane Ramchandra Shamrao Date of Birth - 17 Jun 1983 Next of Kin - Smt Sunita (Wife) Children -Master Sanket (DOB- 24 Jul 2008), Master Rohan (DOB-12 Feb 2011) Address:Vill - Karoli-T, Post - Karoli-T, Teh - Kavathe- Mahankal, PS - Kavathe- Mahankal, Dist -Sangli, State- Maharashtra 18.Gnr Thamothara Kannan M Date of Birth - 12 Jun 1990 Next of Kin - Smt Rani M (Mother) Address: Vill - Kvellakullam, Post - KvellakullamT, meh - Thirumangalam, Ps - Kalikudi, Dist - Madurai, State- Tamilnadu 19.Sigmn Parmar Deva Haza Bhai Date of Birth - 03 May 1990 Next of Kin - Smt Gauri Ben (Wife) Address: Vill - Karmadiyam, Post - Bagdana, Teh - Mahuba, PS - Bagdana, Dist - Bhavnagar, State - Gujarat 20.Sep Ambore Balaji Bhagwanrao Date of Birth - 28 Oct 1991 Next of Kin - Smt Latabai (Mother) Address: Vill - Tadkhlas, Post - Tadkalas, Teh - Purna, PS - Tadkalas, Dist - Parbhani Civilian Casualties There was one fatal casualty, Defence Ministry spokesman Col Rajesh Kalia told The Indian Express. The base was hit by an avalanche. The rescue operation was launched immediately. One body was recovered. All others were rescued, he said. Four members of a family were killed when their house collapsed at Tulail near the Line of Control in Gurez sector. The house collapsed because of heavy snowfall. Four members of the family were killed while one was rescued, Bandipore Deputy Commissioner Sajad Hussain Ganai said. The deceased were identified as Mehraj-ud-Din Lone (55), his wife Azizi (50), son Irfan (22) and daughter Gulshan (19). Meanwhile, a 60-year-old man died after he came under an avalanche in Uri sector of Baramulla district. Fateh Mohammad Mughal ventured out of his home on Thursday evening when he came under an avalanche. Local residents and police pulled Mughal out of the avalanche debris and removed him to a nearby hospital where doctors declared him dead on arrival. The Valley remained cut off from the rest of the country while normal life was affected in Himachal Pradesh due to snow. High danger avalanche warning was again issued on for some avalanche-prone slopes of Jammu and Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi addressed rally in Mapusa ahead of Goa polls. Rahul said that PM Modi says I have eliminated corruption, but entire Goa knows PM is lying. Here are the updates from Rahul Gandhis rally in Mapusa: # We won't give you any dictator. Goa is functioning from a remote control in Delhi. What you want will happen under our leadership # Congress not ready for any compromise, will work properly and eliminate corruption from Goa # Modi speaks well, speaks a lot but he doesnt listen # PM Modi says I have eliminated corruption, but entire Goa knows PM is lying. Even the PM knows this fact For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and former Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Monday dismissed BJPs charges that they had helped Vijay Mallya get bank loans during UPAs tenure, even as Congress hit back raising a series of questions asking who let the beleaguered businessmen flee. Ahead of the Budget Session, BJP alleged Congress has been pushed against the wall as corrupt hands of Singh and Chidambram ensured bank loans to Mallyas sinking Kingfisher Airlines. The party quoted from purported letters written by businessman Mallya to Singh in which he sought his intervention following which his now defunct company received loans. Both Singh and Chidambaram insisted that letters from captains of industry were routine and were marked down to appropriate authorities and no law of the land was violated. I think what I have done was done with a full satisfaction of mine that we were not doing anything which was against law of the land, Singh said rubbishing the charges at a press conference jointly addressed by him and Chidambaram at AICC headquarters. Singh said all Prime Ministers and other Ministries in any government receives representations from various captains of industry. In normal course... we pass on these to appropriate authorities. It was a normal routine transaction and therefore the letter that is being talked about is nothing but an ordinary piece of letter which any government in my position would have dealt with, he said. Chidambaram, on his part, said the hundreds of representations received in the government are not dealt by Ministers themselves. No Minister can deal with each one of these representations. They are marked down to departments and officers concerned, who will then take appropriate follow-up action, he said, adding that there was absolutely nothing wrong if somebody seeks some policy changes or forbearance. If letter to PMO is marked down to Principal Secretary to PM and Principal Secretary forwards it to department concerned, these are normal, he claimed. Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala posed a set of questions on BJP, asking the ruling party as to who was responsible for allowing the escape of Mallya from India despite the fact that a consortium of banks had moved against him for recovery of over Rs 9,000 crore. Was Vijay Mallya tipped off to run away from India by a high ranking official inside the Modi Government?, he asked. Surjewala also asked why did BJP vote for and help him get elected as an MP of Rajya Sabha in June 2010 and if it was true that Vijay Mallya has been Working President of Subramaniam Swamys Janata Party. Why did Modi Government permit Diageo plc which now owns United Breweries, make payment of USD 40 Million as part of agreement dated 25.02.2016 as also receive this money in an offshore account? What action has Modi Government taken against Diageo plc and United Breweries?, the Congress leader asked. Chidambaram said, Please ask this government whether it received any letter at all in the last three years. Maybe they say they have received no representation... That will be a very serious reflection (on how) the government is functioning. The former Finance Minister said the loans that are under investigation were given in 2009, when he was not the Finance Minister. The letter does not concern Kingfisher, it concerns United Spirits Limited, which was and is a thriving, flourishing profitable company. The letter does not talk about any loan, the letter talks about an NOC for a preferential allotment of shares. That is capital, equity, not loans, he said. I think, before you start over-analysing the letters, you should keep in mind the distinction between USL and Kingfisher and equity and loan. If you keep that distinction in mind, you will not ask these questions, Chidambaram said. Surjewala said newspaper reports have also reported that another sum of USD 58 Million was paid by Diageo plc to Vijay Mallya in two trenches for acquisition of South African Breweries. He said Diageo plc supposedly paid USD 141 Million to Standard Chartered Bank after default on a loan taken by Vijay Mallyas UB Group Company, Watson Ltd and it is also reported that Finance Arm of Diageo plc paid another USD 42 Million for previous guarantee to Standard Chartered Bank on a loan taken by UB Overseas Ltd. Why has Modi Government not investigated these payments nor taken action against the guilty? Why has Modi Government not sought deportation of Vijay Mallya from UK till today?, he asked. Surjewala also questioned why did Modi Government waive Rs 1200 crores owed by Vijay Mallya to State Bank of India on 16th November 2016. Who is the helping hand for Vijay Mallya in the Modi Government?, he said. Taking a dig at Modi governments claims of bringing back black money within 100 days of coming to power, the Congress spokesperson said, In actuality, a single defaulter with a default of over Rs 9,000 crore has run away from under the watch of the government. He alleged that all this has happened despite the fact that a criminal case for financial irregularities and diversion of funds was lodged by CBI nearly seven months ago i.e., 29th July, 2015. Vijay Mallya was also interrogated but he was neither arrested nor his passport impounded...Facts available clearly demonstrate the laxity and negligence on part of Finance Ministry and Consortium of Banks led by SBI in delaying proceedings thereby permitting Shri Vijay Mallya to escape, Surjewala alleged. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: Reserve Bank of India on Monday finally lifted the cash withdrawals from current bank accounts and ATMs ordered in the wake of demonetisation. The pre-Nov 8 limits will be applicable from February 1, 2017 the day of Union Budget 2017. RBI in a circular, issued on its website on Monday afternoon, said: On a review of the pace of remonitisation, it has been decided to partially restore status quo ante as under: Limits placed vide the circulars cited above on cash withdrawals from Current accounts/ Cash credit accounts/ Overdraft accounts stand withdrawn with immediate effect. The limits on Savings Bank accounts will continue for the present and are under consideration for withdrawal in the near future. Limits vide the circulars cited above placed on cash withdrawals from ATMs stand withdrawn from February 01, 2017. The central bank has, however, allowed banks to practice discretion at their discretion, have their own operating limits as was the case before November 8, 2016, subject to conditions of the circular. Further, banks are urged to encourage their constituents to sustain the movement towards digitisation of payments and switching over of payments from cash mode to non-cash mode, RBI circular said. Highlights of circular: #RBI: Limits on Cash withdrawals from Bank accounts and ATMs - Restoration of status quo ante #The limits on Savings Bank accounts will continue for the present and are under consideration for withdrawal in the near future: RBI #Limits placed on cash withdrawals from Current accounts/ Cash credit accounts/ Overdraft accounts stand withdrawn with immediate effect: RBI #Limits placed on cash withdrawals from ATMs stand withdrawn from Feb 01. Banks may,at their discretion,have their own operating limits:RBI For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: Former National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon on Monday said the choice between continuing with or suspending dialogue with Pakistan was a false binary as talks and action against terrorism could go on simultaneously. His comments came on a day Pakistan declined an invitation by Indian Parliament and Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to attend the South Asian Speakers Summit in Indore next month. Making a distinction between what he called the many Pakistans, Menon, during a discussion in New Delhi, said while talks may be conducted with traders, ISI or the Pakistani army had an institutional interest in hostilities with India. I think, it is a false choice. If you stop talking, will terrorism stop? No. If you do talk, will terrorism stop? No. I think, it is a false binary. You talk if it is in your interest, if there are things you want to do. I think, it is in your interest. Talks are not going to solve all the problems and those have to be dealt with separately. You have to counter terrorism while you are engaged in dialogue. It is not an either-or problem at all, he said. Video | JuD chief Hafiz Saeed, mastermind of 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, placed under house arrest in Pakistan The discussion on Choices: Inside the Making of Indian Foreign Policy, a book authored by Menon, also saw the participation of former diplomats Shyam Saran and Ronen Sen at Sapru House here. Menon said in the age of ultra-nationalism, India will have to make difficult choices. Speaking on the role of leadership in foreign policy, Saran, a key player in the erstwhile UPA administration, said interventions made by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and former US President George Bush were crucial in pushing through the nuclear deal between the two countries. Sen, who was Indias Ambassador to the US when the deal was being finalised, said he had received incredible support for his headless chicken comments that had landed him in a soup and attracted summonses from the privileges committees of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. He was let off the hook after he had tendered an apology. His remarks were seen as an affront to Parliamentarians. Meanwhile, both Saran and Menon batted for strategic autonomy over strategic alignment in Indias foreign policy, dwelling on the issue of whether groupings such as the NAM were relevant anymore. However, Saran explained that any quest for autonomy did not necessarily have to be rigid and cited the example of Indias alignment with the erstwhile Soviet Union when it served the countrys interest. Today, alignment with the US in certain areas is good for us and I agree with Ronen (Sen) that we found China more amenable, more sensitive to our interests, because of the prospect that we could be moving closer to the US, he said. For all the Latest India News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Thiruvananthapuram: The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is gearing up for a big launch the launch of 103 satellites under a single mission. This is going to be a feat that no other country has achieved yet. Hence the path-breaking move by ISRO is crucial for India. About ISRO's next big launch: 1. ISRO's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C37) will carry 103 satellites from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh in February. 2. 100 out of the total 103 satellites are foreign, including the US and Germany, while 3 belong to India. 3. S Somnath, Director of the Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre of ISRO, says the space agency is making a century by launching more than 100 satellites at one go. 4. Earlier, ISRO had plans to launch 83 satellites in the last week of January out of which 80 were foreign ones. But later, 20 more satellites belonging to foreign countries were added due to which the launch was postponed. 5. The 100 satellites will be micro-small satellites and will be launched using a PSLV-C37. The weight of the payload will be 1350 kgs, of which 500-600 kgs will be the satellite's weight. The record holders: ISRO had launched record 20 satellites under single mission in 2016. Russia holds a record of launching highest number of satellites at 37, followed by the US space agency NASA, which has launched 29. PM Narendra Modi's pet project: Prime Minister Narendra Modi's pet South Asian satellite project will be launched in March this year. The South Asian satellite will be a part of GSAT-9, which will be launched in March this year. The communication satellite was scheduled to be launched in December 2016, but was slightly delayed as some other satellites are to be launched before that. Sources said talks with Afghanistan to have the country on-board for the project is in its final stages. Envisaged as a gift to its neighbours, the project, earlier known as SAARC satellite, faced stiff resistance from Pakistan. The neighbouring country wanted it to be launched under the aegis of the South Asian regional forum. It later backed out of the project. Apart from India, the satellite will benefit Sri Lanka, Maldives, Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan. For all the Latest Science News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi : In the latest report, The Quebec city police has now confirmed that at least 6 people have died and 8 others have been injured in the Canadas Quebec City mosque after a gunman open fired during evening prayers on Sunday. The mosque administration confirmed the news while the witnesses said that there were around 40 worshippers present inside the mosque when the incident happened. They also said that there were 3 gunmen who executed this gruesome act. Police has sealed off the traffic for now in the area and have confirmed the fatalities at the mosque. Meanwhile 2 suspects have also been held in the case. Reportedly the shooting took place at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center on Sainte-Foy Street. Media reports suggest that there were at least two shooters and one of them was believed to be carrying an AK-47 assault rifle. More details awaited. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Abu Dhabi: Abu Dhabi will set up a court for non-Muslims to strengthen the culture of tolerance and acceptance of other communities and ensure access to services for all segments of the society, a media report said. Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Presidential Affairs and Chairman of Abu Dhabi Judicial Department, has issued a resolution for the setting up of a Personal Status and Inheritance Court for non-Muslims in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, the largest of the UAE's seven emirates. The move is in line with the strategic goals of the AbuDhabi Judicial Department to enhance the effectiveness and sustainability of the judicial procedures and ensure access to services for all segments of the society, the official WAMnews agency reported. This will also ensure prompt justice and strengthen the culture of tolerance and acceptance of others by creating institutional infrastructure, it added. Chancellor Yousef Saeed Al Ibry, under-secretary of the department, said an integrated action on all the social, educational and institutional levels, is required to spread the culture of tolerance in the judicial domain. He also pointed out that the UAE legislative system practically promotes the culture of tolerance and acceptance of others values at the judiciary level, in harmony with the prevailing norms in the community. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Dubai: Dubai carrier Emirates said it has adjusted its crews for flights to the United States following President Donald Trumps travel ban on people from seven predominantly Muslim countries. The new president faced mass protests and global outrage over the controversial bar on travellers from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen, as around 300 people were stopped or detained worldwide en route to the US. We have made the necessary adjustments to our crewing, to comply with the latest requirements, a statement from Emirates said. The carrier added that no staff member had yet been affected by the travel restrictions and stressed that all flights to the US were operating as scheduled. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Lahore: Amid pressure on Pakistan from the Trump administration, Mumbai attack mastermind and Jammat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed and four others were on Monday night put under detention in Punjab Province. Punjab governments Home Department issued the detention order of Saeed and Lahore Police reached JuD headquarters in Chauburji to implement the order, JuD said. He is at Masjid-e-Qadsia Chauburji and a heavy contingent of police has surrounded the JuD headquarters, JuD official Ahmed Nadeem, who was present at the premises of the outfit, told PTI by phone. The commanding police officer told us that he has with him the house arrest order of the JuD chief issued by the Punjab Home Department, Nadeem said. Three days back, Punjabs Ministry of Interior had included names of Saeed and four othersAbdullah Ubaid, Zafar Iqbal, Abdur Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Niazin the Watch List as per UNSC 1267 Sanctions and ordered their preventive detention. Ubaid, Iqbal, Abid and Niaz were also also taken into preventive custody. Punjab governments action comes amidst pressure on Pakistan from the Trump administration that it must take action against JuD and Saeed to avoid sanctions. JuD is the front for the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror outfit which is responsible for numerous terror attacks in India, including the Mumbai terror strike of November 26,2008, which was masterminded by Saeed. The Ministry of Interior, in its January 27 order, has placed Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF) and Jamaat-Ud-Dawa (JUD) on the Watch List and have listed these organizations in the Second Schedule of the ATA 1997 (as amended). Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, Abdullah Ubaid, Zafar Iqbal, Abdur Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Niaz are reportedly active members of the aforementioned organizations within the meaning of Section 11EEE(1) of the ATA 1997 (as amended). As such, they must be placed under preventive detention, Pakistani media reported. The notification asked the Home Secretary to kindly direct the concerned agencies to move and take necessary action as the matter is most urgent. Earlier during the day, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said the PML-N government was taking steps to fulfil our obligations with regard to JuD. The organisation [JuD] has been under observation since 2010-11. Since it has also been listed by the UN Security Council [Sanctions Committee], we are bound to take some steps. We are taking those steps to fulfill our obligations,? he told reporters after inaugurating a passport office in Islamabad. JuD has already been declared as a foreign terrorist organisation by the United States in June 2014. Saeed also carries a reward of USD 10 million announced by the US for his role in terror activities. Also Read: Video | Modi effect: JuD chief Hafiz Saeed, mastermind of 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, placed under house arrest in Pakistan For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Rome: Italian government and church officials have welcomed 41 Syrian refugees at Romes airport, saying they wanted to show solidarity at a time when the US is sending refugees away and building walls to keep them out. The Syrian children were given balloons as they arrived, and a colorful sign reading Welcome to Italy greeted the latest group of refugees to be resettled in the country via an agreement between the government and a Catholic-Protestant collaboration. Italys deputy foreign minister, Mario Giro, greeted the Syrians and insisted on the obligation to welcome those fleeing war. He said walls, as proposed by the Trump administration, have been shown not to work. What works, he said, is the organised acceptance and distribution of refugees, coupled with economic accords with countries of origin. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New Delhi: Jamat-ud-Dawa (JuD ) chief Hafiz Saeed was placed under house arrest on Monday by Punjab Home Department, reportedly. This apparently happened after Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan in a statement said that there has been a check on Saeeds activities since 2011. Further details of this action would be divulged on Tuesday. Nisar added that JuD has been declared as banned outfit in a resolution of Security Council of the United Nations (UN) and every state is required to take action. He further added that Pakistan was going to take an action against the group now which was pending. Hafiz Saeed is a co-founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba and the chief or amir of Jamaat-ud-Dawah, which operates mainly from Pakistan. He is the mastermind of 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. ALSO READ | 26/11 attack: David Headley puts India-Pakistan relations in limbo At least 164 people were killed and about 308 were injured in the series of attacks that took place in November 2008 in Mumbai. He "is at Masjid-e-Qadsia Chauburji and a heavy contingent of police has surrounded the JuD headquarters," JuDofficial Ahmed Nadeem, who is present at the premises of the outfit, told PTI by phone. ALSO READ | Do not forge friendship with India, JuD chief Hafiz Saeed to Pakistan government Punjab government's action comes amidst pressure from the Trump administration to act against terror. The US has clearly told Islamabad that in the case of not taking action against JuD and Saeed, it may face sanctions. With PTI Inputs For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Kathmandu: Senior SAARC officials will meet in Kathmandu this week for the first time to discuss a new date for the 19th SAARC summit which was postponed by Pakistan last year after India and four others pulled out of it accusing Islamabad of not cooperating on combating terrorism. The meet on February 1-2 to attend the Programming Committee will be the first meeting of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) members since the postponement of the 19th summit that was supposed to take place in Islamabad November, a Nepalese Foreign Ministry official said. During the meeting, the member states will discuss a number of issues, including the budget of the SAARC Secretariat and five regional centers of SAARC, according to Foreign Ministry sources. The matter relating to rescheduling the next SAARC summit will also come up during the meeting, to be attended by joint secretaries of the SAARC countries. Nepal, current chair of the SAARC, had postponed the SAARC Summit until further notice after Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India requested to postpone the summit in Islamabad scheduled for November 9 and 10 last year, following escalation of tension between India and Pakistan. India and others had blamed Pakistan for not creating a conducive environment and not cooperating on combating cross-border terrorism in South Asia for holding the SAARC Summit, charges rejected by Pakistan. The decisions made by the programming committee will be forwarded to the Standing Committee for endorsement. SAARC, a regional body founded in 1985 in South Asia, member states include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, the Maldives, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Last week, Pakistan Prime Ministers advisor on foreign policy Sartaj Aziz said his country remains committed to hosting the 19th SAARC Summit at Islamabad at the earliest so that the objectives of regional cooperation under the SAARC umbrella can be pursued more vigorously. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Washington: Pakistan could be another country whose name could be added in the list of Trumps visa ban on refugees from seven countries entering in the United States. Recently, a top White house official has indicated the possibility in the future of including Pakistan in the list of countries from where immigration has been banned. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, told CBSNews, "The reason we chose those seven countries was, those were the seven countries that both the Congress and the Obama administration identified as being the seven countries that were most identifiable with dangerous terrorism taking place in their country." "Now, you can point to other countries that have similar problems, like Pakistan and others. Perhaps we need to take it further. But for now, immediate steps, pulling the Band-Aid off, is to do further vetting for people traveling in and out of those countries," Priebus said. Trump has ordered "extreme vetting" of people entering theUS from seven Muslim-majority countries and banned the entry of Syrian refugees until further notice, as part of new measures to "keep radical Islamic terrorists" out of America. "It's working out very nicely. You see it in the airports, you see it all over. It's working out very nicely," Trump told reporters on. "We are going to have a very, very strict ban and we are going to have extreme vetting, which we should have had in this country for many years," Trump said. Also Read: Trump defends his order on refugees entering US, says it is not a 'muslim ban' He, however, denied that barring refugees from several predominantly Muslim nations amounted to a ban on Muslims. "It's not a Muslim ban, but we are totally prepared, "Trump said. The countries impacted are the controversial move signed a week after he was sworn-in as the President includes countries like Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia. The order, which bars Syrian refugees and halts the country's refugee resettlement programme for four months has triggered widespread criticism, including from Google's India-born CEO Sundar Pichai and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Video | Trump's immigration executive orders: Over 100 people detained at US airports; Federal judge grants emergency stay for citizens in transit Trump defends his order on refugees entering US, says it is not a 'muslim ban' For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. London: An online petition seeking cancellation of US President Donald Trumps State Visit to the UK has quickly crossed the one-million signature-mark to be considered for a debate in British Parliament, amid international uproar over his controversial immigration ban on people from seven Muslim nations. The petition titled Prevent Donald Trump from making State Visit to the United Kingdom on the UK Parliament website had been created on Saturday afternoon and rapidly collected the 100,000 signatures needed for it to be considered for a debate in the House of Commons. The issue will be discussed in the House of Commons on Tuesday for a date to be set for the debate. Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen, the petition reads. ALSO READ | US checking immigrants' social media accounts for political view before issuing visa Donald Trumps well-documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualify him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore, during the term of his presidency Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official State Visit, it adds. British Prime Minister Theresa May had communicated the invitation to Trump on behalf of Queen Elizabeth II during her US visit last week. Downing Street has indicated that it has no plans of withdrawing the invitation for the state visit, which involves lavish pomp and ceremony, often with a stay at Buckingham Palace hosted by Queen Elizabeth II. We extended the invite and it was accepted, a Downing Street statement said. UK Opposition parties have also called for a postponement of the visit, scheduled for June this year. Theresa May would be failing the British people if she does not postpone the state visit and condemn Trumps actions in the clearest terms. That?s what Britain expects and deserves, Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn said. Palace has so far declined to comment on the controversy gathering momentum in the wake of the US Presidents executive order that temporarily suspends all immigration for citizens of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for 90 days. UK foreign secretary Boris Johnson?has secured assurances from the White House that the vast majority of British citizens with dual nationality of countries on the list will be exempt from the new US travel ban. Trump has provoked a fierce backlash after his ban on people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from travelling to America. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Washington: Starbucks says it will hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years, a response to President Donald Trumps indefinite suspension of Syrian refugees and temporary travel bans that apply to six other Muslim-majority nations. Howard Schultz, the coffee retailers chairman and CEO, said in a letter to employees on Sunday that the hiring would apply to stores worldwide and the effort would start in the United States where the focus would be on hiring immigrants who have served with US troops as interpreters and support personnel. Schultz, a supporter of Hillary Clinton during the presidential run, took aim at other parts of a Trump agenda focused on immigration, repealing former President Barack Obamas health care law and restructuring trade with Mexico. The letter said that Starbucks would help support coffee growers in Mexico, provide health insurance to eligible workers if the health care law is repealed and back an Obama-era immigration program that allows young immigrants who were brought to the country as children to apply for a two-year reprieve from deportation and a work permit. The move reflects the increasing complexity that businesses face when dealing with the Trump administration. Trump has met with CEOs at Ford, General Motors and Boeing and asked them to create jobs in the United States, while touting each announcement about new factory jobs as a success even if those additions had been planned before his presidential victory.But not all corporate leaders have embraced Trump. Schultz added that Starbucks would aim to communicate with workers more frequently, saying on Sunday, I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. New York: President Donald Trumps immigration order sowed more chaos and outrage across the country on Sunday, with travelers detained at airports, panicked families searching for relatives and protesters registering opposition to the sweeping measure that was blocked by several federal courts. Attorneys struggled to determine how many people were affected by the rules, which Trump said Saturday were working out very nicely. But critics described widespread confusion, with travelers being held in legal limbo because of ill-defined procedures. Some lawyers manned tables at New Yorks Kennedy Airport to offer help to families with detained relatives. We just simply dont know how many people there are and where they are, said Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Unions Immigrants Rights Project. Advocates for travelers say they did not have clear picture about whats happening and that the chaos is likely to continue. The executive director of National Immigration Law Center, Marielena Hincapie, said this is just the beginning. Were really in a crisis mode, a constitutional crisis mode in our country, and were going to need everyone, she said. This is definitely one of those all-hands-on-deck moments. Protests were planned or underway on Sunday, including one in suburban Chicago organized by Jewish groups to show support for Muslims, as well as at Dulles International Airport in Washington, DC, and Detroit Metropolitan Airport. A federal judge in New York issued an order on Saturday temporarily blocking the government from deporting people with valid visas who arrived after Trumps travel ban took effect. But confusion remained about who could stay and who will be kept out of the country in the coming weeks. Federal courts in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state took similar action. Michigans civil rights chief, Agustin Arbulu, condemned Trumps order, saying he hoped the federal court ruling would led him to narrow its scope. During this time of uncertainty and confusion, we urge everyone to act with restraint and not in ways that foster fear and division, Arbulu said. Criticism also continued abroad. The European Unions foreign policy chief, EU High Representative Federica Mogherini, lashed out at Trump yesterday, insisting that instead of building walls, the continent will celebrate every wall which is torn down and every new bridge that is built up. Among those caught in limbo: Iraqis who had been promised a life in America because of their service to the US military, frail and elderly travelers from Iran and Yemen, and longtime US residents traveling abroad who dont know if they will be allowed to return home. For all the Latest World News, Download News Nation Android and iOS Mobile Apps. Elon Musk Elon Musk is getting cozy with the Trump administration. Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, is now part of two advisory committees under President Donald Trump: the economic advisory board and the Manufacturing Jobs Initiative. He has met with Trump on two separate occasions, once with tech leaders in New York, and once earlier this week at the White House for a discussion on US manufacturing. Of course, US manufacturing is a major part of Trump's agenda. The President ran his campaign on the premise of bringing back American jobs by keeping manufacturing in the US. He is now threatening to impose heavy import taxes on anyone who manufactures abroad while promising to cut regulations and taxes for those who keep their plants in the US. Although Musk and Trump have diametrically opposing views when it comes to matters like climate change, many may see the two as more aligned when it comes to manufacturing. After all, Tesla is building its giant battery plant, the Gigafactory, in Sparks, Nevada that is expected to employ 6,500 people upon completion in 2020. Tesla also assumed responsibility for SolarCity's plant in Buffalo, New York upon acquiring the solar installation company last November. That plant is expected to employ 1,460 people. But Musk has global ambitions. And while he's in favor of US-based manufacturing, he also plans to expand manufacturing abroad. Sights set abroad Tesla gigafactory Tesla plans on opening up a second Gigafactory in Europe that will produce both batteries and vehicles, Musk said in November. He said at the time that Tesla plans to have at least one, if not multiple, factories in Europe in the future. As of November, Musk said Tesla will look at locations for its second Gigafactory at some point in 2017. Officials from the Finnish city of Vaasa are working to convince Tesla officials to build the factory there because of its access to a lithium mine, YLE, Finland's public service broadcasting company, reported on Tuesday. Story continues Tesla did not respond to Business Insider's request for comment as to whether those plans still hold true under the Trump administration. But considering Europe is the second-largest EV market in the world, it only makes sense that Tesla would set its sights abroad for expediency. For reference, China is the largest EV market, with Norway and the US ranked third and fourth for EV sales, respectively. In fact, in 2014, the Tesla Model S was the number one selling car in Norway, Jalopnik reported. Tesla also has already made public comments to quell fears that it will buckle under pressure from the Trump administration to keep manufacturing in the US. On Friday, Tesla canceled an order with a German parts supplier, but was quick to say it was unrelated to Trump's comments on manufacturing. The main reason why we now confirm that we canceled the order is to counter those utopian claims that we were acting in response to political pressure. The fact is the order was canceled because technical standards werent complied with," a Tesla spokesperson told Reuters. Musk and robotics Tesla Robotic Arm But perhaps more important than Musk's global manufacturing ambitions is his investment in automation, something Trump has yet to touch upon in any of his speeches especially considering he is largely pushing to save the jobs most at risk for automation like, say, the production of vehicles. Musk has said he plans to increase automation at his factories to speed up the production process for Tesla vehicles. There are 580 robot arms currently assembling Tesla's Model S and Model X cars at Tesla's factory in Fremont, California. In a September interview, Musk told Y Combinator's Sam Altman that he plans to increase automation to improve the Fremont factory's production speed. Musk has said increasing automation is part of his goal to turn the factory into an "alien dreadnought." "Our internal code name for the factory, the machine that builds the machine, is the alien dreadnought," Musk said. "[When] our factory looks like an alien dreadnought, then we know its probably right." Tesla will also rely on autonomous robots at its Gigafactory in Nevada. Additionally, Tesla announced in November it was buying Grohmann Engineering, a German automated manufacturing company, to increase automation. Grohmann is serving as the base for Tesla Advanced Automation Germany headquarters, with other locations to follow, which will provide 1,000 advanced engineering and skilled technician jobs in Germany over the next two years. Bottom line trump None of this means that Musk should be seen as an American job killer it's really not that black-and-white. That would be to overlook the jobs he is adding by building brand new facilities, ones dedicated to sustainable energy no less, on American soil. But he also shouldn't be seen as being in complete alignment with Trump, despite serving on his manufacturing board. Musk hasn't shown any signs of nixing his factory ambitions abroad and it seems unlikely he'll be ditching robots in favor of traditional manufacturing jobs. If anything, Musk is likely trying to stay on Trump's good side. And if that means an opportunity to pitch a carbon tax to political echelons every now and then, it's not a bad call. NOW WATCH: Poll: Trump begins his presidency with the lowest initial approval rating in history More From Business Insider This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate RIDGEFIELD An entertaining economist may sound like a contradiction in terms but Nicholas Perna knows how to get a laugh as well as he knows how to break down the states consumer price index. After 15 years as Webster Banks economic adviser, Perna announced that he has retired to spend more time at his cottage in Old Lyme and with his grandchildren in California. Perna was a regular speaker at regional chamber of commerce events and other economic forums. I dont think anyone in the state of Connecticut can provide as entertaining and informative a presentation about the states economy as Nick Perna, Edward Musante Jr., president of the Greater Norwalk Chamber of Commerce, said. Hes got a great way about him and well really miss him. John Ciulla, president of Webster, added: Nick has made so many outstanding contributions and has achieved numerous accomplishments over the years. His economic presentations are not only informative, but also very entertaining. We thank him for all the work hes done for Webster and the broader New England financial community and we wish him well in retirement. Perna, a Ridgefield resident, said being financial adviser to Webster Bank was his dream gig. What I was able to do was write and speak without having to worry about employee performance analysis and all that other stuff, Perna said. It was just 100 percent the stuff I like to do. It was an unusual and great gig. Perna had a full-time career in banking before branching off into teaching and advising. He was a professor at Yale Universitys Department of Economics for 13 years. His part-time advising position with Webster Bank was his last professional commitment. Little by little, as Ive gotten older, I started shedding some of these things, he said. I need to free up some time to play with my toys. Im an amateur woodworker and the first thing Im going to do is clean up my woodshop. I think I have a table saw somewhere in there, but I cant find it. Perna said he will also continue to write, but not about economics. He is working on a project involving his fathers diary and enjoys writing op-ed pieces for publications. Writing is fun, especially if you dont have to do it and dont have a deadline, he said. Perna made the announcement in the January issue of the Economic Review, a newsletter he wrote for Webster Bank. In the publication, he looks back on the economy of the past 15 years and offers predictions for the future. He said the last 15 years have been a fascinating and sometimes tumultuous period. He recalled the Great Recession and its slow recovery, and called the adoption of the euro as a mistake from the get-go. On the regional level, Perna compares Massachusetts to Connecticut. In 2007, Connecticut fared better coming out of the previous recession and was growing jobs at a quicker pace than Massachusetts, Perna wrote. Following the Great Recession, Massachusetts has fared far better. It has more than recovered all of the jobs it lost during the recession and did so several years ago. Connecticut has yet to recover all the jobs it lost. Perna said Massachusetts success is largely due to Boston, which has a number of universities, is attractive to young professionals and is a hub for high-tech businesses. Connecticut, on the other hand, doesnt have the same basket of fast-growing high tech industries, but its main problem is severe state budget problems, he wrote. The state has a decent future, he wrote, if (the governor and legislature) can bring spending under control, especially the cost of state employee retiree pension and medical benefits. cbosak@hearstmediact.com; 203-731-3338 This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate President Donald Trumps executive order suspending the refugee program and temporarily banning all people from seven Muslim-majority countries has been met with shock, protests and confusion by the refugee community in Connecticut and the Danbury area. The order puts a 120-day halt to the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, creates a new limit on the total refugees to be allowed into the country in 2017 and places a 90-day visa suspension on anyone arriving from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. Chris George, executive director of New Haven-based Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services, said this will affect 186 people they were helping come to Connecticut within the next few months, about 12 of whom already had their arrival dates scheduled. Although IRIS expected the ban, he said he was still shocked when it was signed. Cutting the number of refugees is shameful and is going to have deadly consequences, George said. [These people] are now condemned to stay in refugee camps and figure out some other way to survive. They may even take desperate measures like crossing the Mediterranean, and many are going to drown in the process. The order lowered the annual cap on refugees the U.S. will allow from President Obamas limit of 110,000 to 50,000. George said this equates to about 15,000 families that will no longer be able to start the new lives they had planned. James Naddeo, founder of Danbury Area Refugee Assistance, said the executive order will also prevent refugees already in the U.S. from being reunited with family members. The Trump administration said it will use the suspension of refugees and visas to review the current vetting process and introduce more stringent regulations. George said this was the most confusing part of the order, since the screening process for refugees is already the most rigorous for anyone trying to enter the country. Nobody has been able to tell us specifically whats wrong with the vetting process, George said. Do they have evidence that there are loopholes? Presumably thats why all these changes are happening but Im very interested in knowing how the Trump administration could make it more rigorous. Refugees currently face interviews with the Department of Homeland Security, database screenings by the FBI and CIA, fingerprinting and biometric tests, a process that usually takes two years, George said. In addition to its intent, there has also been confusion over who the order will actually affect. Hassam Kadhim, a Canadian citizen who was born in Syria and now works in Ridgefield, worried whether hed be allowed back in the country if he went on a pre-planned business trip to Toronto. The first thing I thought when I heard [about the executive order] was will I get discriminated against just because of where I was born, Kadhim said. Ive worked three decades in Canada and America, but I dont know how the border control will react. Kadhims parents decided to flee from Iraq to Syria due to persecution under the regime of Saddam Hussein before Kadhim was born. They then moved to Canada when he was 3 years old. Kadhim has been living in Danbury and working in Ridgefield on a work visa since 2013, but feared his Syrian birthplace would prevent him from returning to the U.S. He also worried whether his mother-in-law, also a Canadian citizen but born in Iraq, would be able to travel to the U.S. for the birth of his baby due in June. After calling friends and an attorney for advice, Kadhim said he got conflicting opinions on whether he should make the trip for a business meeting, but ultimately decided to go. Eman Beshtawii, a board member for the Council of American-Islamic Relations in Connecticut, was one of the friends Kadhim reached out to. She said it is one of many concerned calls shes received from Muslims since the executive order. I didnt have answers for him, Beshtawii said. [These people] have families, they want to travel, they are confused. Beshtawii herself is contemplating whether she will be safe to return to her home in Newtown if she makes her annual pilgrimage to Mecca. CAIR-CT organized protests at Bradley International Airport in Windsor Locks on Sunday, and Beshtawii said they will continue to encourage the community to speak out against the order. George echoed Beshtawiis confusion and said he and other members of IRIS are reluctant to give advice to anyone that the ban might affect. Theres a lot of chaos, and things are literally changing from hour to hour, George said. I would say be extremely cautious and dont travel unless you absolutely have to until we know more. He said IRIS will support legal action already taken against the order, but will spend most of its resources educating the public. We are convinced, and Ive seen it myself, that when people hear about the program and understand refugees theyll support it, George said. We are blessed with enlightened representatives here in Connecticut. Were asking people with friends or family in other states to reach out and make sure they get involved in refugee resettlement. Canadian Citizenship ceremony launches a year of joint initiatives to help ignite Canadian pride TORONTO, Jan. 28, 2017 /CNW/ - CIBC (TSX: CM) (NYSE: CM) co-hosted a Canadian Citizenship ceremony today in partnership with Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), serving as the launch pad for a year-long collaboration between the two organizations. Today's citizenship ceremony was one of several that CIBC will co-host with IRCC in 2017 across Canada. With the ceremony taking place in CIBC's historic banking hall at 25 King Street West in Toronto, CIBC President and CEO Victor Dodig, alongside The Honourable Ahmed Hussen, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship welcomed 21 people as new Canadian citizens. "I know from my own personal experience that citizenship ceremonies are a significant milestone and the final step along the path of becoming a Canadian citizen," says Minister Hussen. "This is a proud moment for new Canadian citizens, who have worked so hard to reach this point. IRCC is happy to partner with CIBC to host these special ceremonies across the country as we celebrate Canada 150. Throughout this commemorative year and beyond, I encourage all Canadians to celebrate their citizenship and reflect on what it means to be Canadian." "We are very proud of our shared 150-year history with Canada, and what better way to build a prosperous future than with the help of our newest Canadians," says Victor Dodig, President and CEO, CIBC. "My family chose Canada as our home a generation ago and I'm honoured to live in this great country that embraces and celebrates all aspects of diversity and inclusion which helps shape our strong communities." The location of today's ceremony was symbolic for CIBC. Known today as Commerce Court North, the building opened in 1931, and its 34 stories remained the tallest building in the British Commonwealth until 1962. Its construction during the Great Depression represented a statement of confidence in the stability of the bank and long-term growth in Canada. Founded in 1867, CIBC shares a longstanding history with Canada. As a proud Canadian company, it has contributed to shaping our nation into one of the best in the world, helping people prosper and businesses grow, as it builds the bank of the future. In celebration of 150, CIBC is asking Canadians how they #StandForCanada by joining the conversation on Twitter @CIBC, Facebook (www.facebook.com/CIBC) and Instagram @CIBCNow. To learn more about CIBC's proud history, download the CIBC150 App and discover new stories every week. About CIBC CIBC is a leading Canadian-based global financial institution with 11 million personal banking and business clients. Through our three major business units - Retail and Business Banking, Wealth Management and Capital Markets - CIBC offers a full range of products and services through its comprehensive electronic banking network, branches and offices across Canada with offices in the United States and around the world. Ongoing news releases and more information about CIBC can be found at www.cibc.com/ca/media-centre/ or by following on LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com/company/cibc), Twitter @CIBC, Facebook (www.facebook.com/CIBC) and Instagram @CIBCNow. SOURCE CIBC To view this news release in HTML formatting, please use the following URL: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/January2017/28/c7803.html For further information: Olga Petrycki, Director of Public Relations, CIBC, 416-306-9760 or [email protected] Related Links http://www.cibc.com Acquisition Highlights: District-scale 33,846 hectares Arizaro project is located in one of the world's largest and least explored salars thought to contain elevated lithium brine values Potential to increase and enhance brine processing at Sal de Los Angeles , Lithium X's flagship project, by combining with brine products from Arizaro , Lithium X's flagship project, by combining with brine products from Arizaro The entire salar is staked with other current land holders in Arizaro including Eramet, Sentient and REMSA (Salta Government) Purchase price of 3,500,000 common shares and USD $250,000 for a 100% interest, subject to certain conditions for a 100% interest, subject to certain conditions In line with Lithium X's growth by acquisition strategy to become the go to pure play lithium company in the world Sal de los Angeles Highlights: Metallurgical testing in on-site evaporation pools has achieved 4% lithium concentration at Sal de los Angeles with 5% expected by the end of Q1 2017 Salta Exploraciones S.A. Joint Venture has initiated construction of the camp expansion Construction equipment and supplies to be dispatched shortly, with a focus on construction of brine capture and pumping systems Exploration program to commence in February 2017 , focusing on resource expansion and resource category upgrade VANCOUVER, Jan. 30, 2017 /CNW/ - ("Lithium X", or the "Company")(TSX-V: LIX)(OTCQX: LIXXF) is pleased to announce that the Company has entered into a binding purchase and sale agreement (the "Agreement") to acquire 100% of the Arizaro lithium brine project (the "Project") in Argentina's Salta Province. The Project consists of 33,846 hectares in 11 mining claims covering parts of the western and eastern portions of the Salar de Arizaro, one of the district's largest known salt lakes. (Refer to Figure 1: The Arizaro Project, which can also be found on the Company's website at www.lithium-x.com.) "Arizaro is an accretive acquisition for Lithium X, well priced under current market conditions, with considerable exploration potential," commented Executive Chairman, Paul Matysek. He continued, "It is one of the largest salars in the world thought to contain elevated lithium brine values and has gone largely unexplored. Preliminary indications of brine geochemistry suggest the possibility of employing Arizaro Project brine products to increase and enhance processing of Sal de los Angeles brine, the Company's flagship asset, also located in Salta, Argentina." The Arizaro Project benefits from good infrastructure in the Puna region, and is set to benefit from further development of adjacent large-scale mining projects, including First Quantum's Taca-Taca copper project and Fortuna Silver's Lindero gold project. Salar de Arizaro is traversed by a highway and railroad that connect the Project to Chile and Pocitos, where natural gas and an Industrial Park are found. Other property owners in Arizaro include Eramet, Sentient and REMSA (Salta Government). Historical sampling on the western margins of the Salar de Arizaro show elevated lithium values near surface contained within a classic halite dominant salar, much like nearby Rincon, Salar del Hombre Muerto and Atacama projects, all of which host advanced or producing lithium brine operations. In consideration for the Project, Lithium X will pay USD $250,000 and issue 3,500,000 common shares to the Vendor for a 100% interest in the Project on closing, which is subject to receiving valid title certificates. In connection with the purchase a finder's fee of 5% of the total acquisition price (USD $12,500 and 175,000 shares) shall be payable. The acquisition of the Project is subject to certain conditions including, but not limited to, receipt of all necessary approvals, including the approval of the TSX Venture Exchange. The Company is currently planning an exploration program to assess the quantity and quality of the contained brine at Arizaro, as well as beginning to assess the brine for use in mixing with Sal de los Angeles brine. Sal de los Angeles Project Update Since Eduardo Morales, Chief Operating Officer and Andres Barrientos, General Manager, joined the Company the Company has been pilot processing Sal de los Angeles brine, testing two flow sheet designs both aimed at producing a 5% lithium brine concentrate. The evaporation and crystallization path of this brine has been within expectations, following a similar crystallization path to the Salar de Atacama brine employed in the current producing facilities at that location. The concentrated brine is currently at 4% lithium by weight and the first batches of product at 5% lithium concentration are expected by March 2017, which will then be shipped to potential end users and for testing of battery grade lithium carbonate at laboratory scale by the Company. "Half way through our first summer season, we are extremely pleased with the evaporation rates and crystallization path of our brine," commented Chief Operating Officer, Eduardo Morales. He continued "upon Andres Barrientos and my incorporation into the Lithium X team, we designed a ponding flow sheet that would enable the production of a 5% lithium brine that is both potentially a commercial product and feed for a battery grade lithium carbonate plant. The Sal de los Angeles brine is now at 4% lithium concentration, having followed the crystallization path at our on-site pilot pools within expectations, reaffirming my conviction as to the high processing quality of this brine. With current evaporation rates we expect to reach our target concentration before the end of March, 2017 demonstrating in this way a full cycle is achievable within a single summer season." Following the completion of the upgraded brine resource at SDLA in August 2016, follow-up exploration and resource definition was planned and is set to commence in February 2017. Work will focus on expanding the resource and upgrading the existing resource further. Resource expansion will consist of additional seismic surveys and drilling to basement depths to the north of the existing resource boundary. The northern portion of the basin contains the higher grade brines hosted in predominantly sand and gravel layers, with approximately 9 square kilometres of this area yet untested by drilling. Resource upgrading will consist of additional long and short term pump tests as well as collection of additional samples for relative brine release capacity testing. The Salta Exploraciones S.A. ("SESA") and Potasio y Litio de Argentina S.A. ("PLASA") Joint Venture "SESA JV") has initiated construction of the camp expansion required to commence construction of the pumping, piping and ponding facilities. The camp shall be increased from 17 people to 40 people, accommodating the additional work force to be employed during the upcoming construction. Equipment and supplies for construction of the brine collection, pumping and piping facilities are to be dispatched shortly followed by construction of these facilities once all necessary permits have been received. A detailed construction schedule will be released when such permits have been received. The scientific and technical content and interpretations contained in this news release have been reviewed and approved by VP of Project Development William Randall, a Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101, Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects. About Lithium X Energy Corp Lithium X Energy Corp. is a lithium exploration and development company with a goal of becoming a low-cost supplier for the burgeoning lithium battery industry. Lithium X owns 50%, and has the option to acquire up to 80%, of the Sal de los Angeles lithium brine project in the prolific "Lithium Triangle" in mining friendly Salta province, Argentina, a well-known salar with a large resource and high concentrations of lithium. Lithium X's Arizaro project consists of 33,846 hectares located in one of the world's largest salars thought to contain elevated lithium brine values. Lithium X is also exploring a large land package in Nevada's Clayton Valley, contiguous to the only producing lithium operation in North America Silver Peak, owned and operated by Albemarle, the world's largest lithium producer. Lithium X is listed on the TSXV under the trading symbol LIX. For additional information about Lithium X Energy Corp., please visit the Company's website at www.lithium-x.com or review the Company's documents filed on www.sedar.com. Join the Company's email list at http://lithium-x.com/subscribe. ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS "Paul Matysek" Paul Matysek Executive Chairman References to "production" or "pilot production" herein should not be construed to imply that the Company's Sal de Los Angeles Project is in commercial production or that it contains mineral reserves. Further technical studies will be required to assess the project's viability. There is no certainty that a potential mine will be realized or that a production decision will be made. 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. This news release contains certain forward-looking information and forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable securities legislation (collectively "forward-looking statements"). Certain information contained herein constitutes "forward-looking information" under Canadian securities legislation. Generally, forward-looking information can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "expects", "believes", "aims to", "plans to" or "intends to" or variations of such words and phrases or statements that certain actions, events or results "will" occur. Forward-looking statements are based on the opinions and estimates of management as of the date such statements are made and they are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements of the Company to be materially different from those expressed by such forward-looking statements or forward-looking information, including the business of the Company and the commencement of trading in the Company's shares. Although management of the Company has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in forward-looking statements or forward-looking information, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. There can be no assurance that such 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 and forward looking information. The Company does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements or forward-looking information that are incorporated by reference herein, except as required by applicable securities laws. SOURCE Lithium X Energy Corp. To view this news release in HTML formatting, please use the following URL: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/January2017/30/c5926.html For further information: Brian Paes-Braga, President and CEO, Director, Tel: 604-609-6113, Email: [email protected] OTTAWA, Jan. 30, 2017 /CNW/ - His Excellency the Right Honourable David Johnston, Governor General of Canada, will host a citizenship ceremony at Rideau Hall on Tuesday, January 31, 2017. He will be accompanied by the Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson, 26th Governor General of Canada, co-founder and co-chair of the Institute for Canadian Citizenship (ICC). This ceremony is part of a series of enhanced citizenship ceremonies celebrating Canada's 150th anniversary in 2017. Prior to the ceremony, the 37 candidates for Canadian citizenship will share their views on citizenship during a round-table discussion. Here is the detailed schedule: 9:30 a.m. Round-table Discussion on Citizenship Candidates for citizenship, guests and community members will participate in a round-table discussion to share stories and reflect on citizenship and the day's ceremony. This event is organized in partnership with ICC. The ICC inspires Canadians to be inclusive, to embrace fresh thinking, to practice active citizenship and to own our collective culture and spaces. For more information, please visit www.icc-icc.ca. Tent Room PHOTO OP 11:00 a.m. Canadian Citizenship Ceremony The Governor General will be the presiding official administering the Oath of Citizenship and conferring citizenship certificates to 37 new Canadians. He will be joined by the Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson. Ballroom OPEN TO MEDIA Media wishing to cover the round-table discussion should arrive no later than 9:15 a.m. Those wishing to cover the ceremony should arrive no later than 10:45 a.m. Media are asked to confirm their attendance with the Rideau Hall Press Office and arrive at the Princess Anne Entrance. Follow GGDavidJohnston and RideauHall on Facebook and Twitter SOURCE Governor General of Canada To view this news release in HTML formatting, please use the following URL: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/January2017/30/c2638.html For further information: Media information: Josephine Laframboise, Rideau Hall Press Office, 613-990-9324, 613-668-1929 (cell), [email protected]; Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, 613-952-1650, [email protected]; Julie Phillips, Institute for Canadian Citizenship, 416-459-6466, [email protected] OTTAWA, Jan. 28, 2017 /CNW/ - The Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, today issued the following statement on the Chinese New Year: "Today, Chinese Canadians will begin several days of celebrations for the New Year when they honour the beginning of the year of the Rooster, which in 2017 is also known as the year of the Fire Rooster. "During this special time, friends and families will join together to celebrate their hopes for a prosperous year to come. Celebrations are marked throughout Canada with many traditions including feasts and parades. "This year, as we celebrate our country's 150th anniversary, let us take the opportunity to honour the many cultures, traditions, and beliefs that make Canada such a wonderful place to live. Chinese Canadians have made enormous contributions to Canada and have helped make it the strong and diverse place it is today. "On behalf of our family, Sophie and I wish all those marking this occasion a very happy New Year. "Gong Xi Fa Cai! Gong Hey Fat Choy! Gong Xi! Gong Xi!" This document is also available at http://pm.gc.ca SOURCE Prime Minister's Office To view this news release in HTML formatting, please use the following URL: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/January2017/28/c4556.html For further information: PMO Media Relations: 613-957-5555 Related Links http://pm.gc.ca/ By John O'Donnell FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Germany's top regulators met about 50 envoys from foreign banks on Monday to explain how they could move business to Europe's biggest economy after Britain leaves the European Union, German financial watchdog Bafin said. Bafin, which has been approached by numerous banks in recent weeks, said it answered questions from the banks such as how to get a banking license in Germany. One official said representatives of about 25 banks had attended. Peter Lutz, a Bafin official in charge of bank oversight, said the authorities wanted to help banks considering a move to understand the rules in Germany. "Foreign banks are welcome," Lutz said, adding that U.S. banks, "real UK banks", as well as lenders from Japan and Australia had attended the meeting. He said he had made clear that strict rules would apply. "It's not enough to have a letter box here," he said, adding that senior managers must also be based in Germany. The meeting underscores a growing willingness to consider alternatives to London, after Prime Minister Theresa May said that Britain would leave the EU's single market, a move that would isolate the City of London from many European clients. Executives, chiefly those in charge of regulatory issues, from banks including Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and Citigroup were to attend the meeting in Bafin's Frankfurt offices, people familiar with the matter have said. Those banks declined to comment. Many Germans are skeptical of the aggressive practices of largely U.S. and British investment banks. Nonetheless, the country's politicians are seeking to show a friendly face to banks in London searching for alternative locations in the European Union to continue selling in the bloc once Britain leaves. May has said her government will invoke Article 50 of the EU treaty, starting two years of negotiations to arrange Britain's departure, by the end of March. Frankfurt looks set to be one of the biggest winners from any exodus from London. Hubertus Vaeth, head of Frankfurt Main Finance, a group backed by local government to promote the city, has predicted that 10,000 jobs will move from London to Frankfurt over five years, with investment banks among the early movers. Lutz said that no bank had yet signed up to move and that he expected decisions to be made around the end of March. Germany's economic strength and the fact that Frankfurt is home to the European Central Bank makes it attractive for banks. But it faces hurdles. There is a shortage of housing, while the region's 13 international schools are already well subscribed. Nightlife in the city - where many bars are largely empty for much of the week - is also seen as a turn-off. (Reporting by John O'Donnell; Editing by Adrian Croft) OTTAWA, Jan. 28, 2017 /CNW/ - The Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, today issued the following statement to recognize the Korean New Year, also known as Seollal: "This week, Korean communities in Canada and around the world will celebrate Seollal and welcome the arrival of the year of the Rooster. "Seollal is the most important traditional Korean holiday. This joyful time is an opportunity to reflect on the year that has passed, recognize good fortune, and look to the year ahead with hope and optimism. "To usher in the Korean New Year, family and friends will gather to celebrate, pay their respects to their elders and ancestors, and enjoy traditional feasts. "This year, as we celebrate our country's 150th anniversary, let us take the opportunity to honour the many cultures, traditions, and beliefs that make Canada such a wonderful place to live. Korean Canadians have made enormous contributions to Canada and have helped make it the strong and diverse place it is today. "On behalf of our family, Sophie and I wish all those celebrating Seollal health, peace, and success. This document is also available at http://pm.gc.ca SOURCE Prime Minister's Office To view this news release in HTML formatting, please use the following URL: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/January2017/28/c2745.html For further information: PMO Media Relations: 613-957-5555 Related Links http://pm.gc.ca/ OTTAWA, Jan. 28, 2017 /CNW/ - The Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, issued the following statement today on the Vietnamese New Year: "In the days ahead, the Vietnamese community in Canada and around the world will mark Tet Nguyen an, the Lunar New Year, and welcome the arrival of the year of the Rooster, which in 2017 is also known as the year of the Fire Rooster. "As family and friends get together and share special meals, Tet Nguyen an is an occasion to reflect on the past year and celebrate the arrival of spring. "This year, as we celebrate our country's 150th anniversary, let us take the opportunity to honour the many cultures, traditions, and beliefs that make Canada such a wonderful place to live. Vietnamese Canadians have made enormous contributions to Canada and have helped make it the strong and diverse place it is today. "On behalf of our family, Sophie and I wish all those marking this occasion a very happy New Year. "Chuc mung nam moi." This document is also available at http://pm.gc.ca SOURCE Prime Minister's Office To view this news release in HTML formatting, please use the following URL: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/January2017/28/c3319.html For further information: PMO Media Relations: 613-957-5555 Related Links http://pm.gc.ca/ TORONTO, Jan. 30, 2017 /CNW/ - The Law Society of Upper Canada* expresses grave concern about the harassment of lawyer Elchin Sadigov in Azerbaijan. Elchin Sadigov is a prominent criminal lawyer in Azerbaijan whose clients include several prisoners of conscience and other individuals who have faced politically motivated charges. It has come to our attention that on November 2, 2016, Elchin Sadigov was threatened by an investigator from the Main Organized Crime Department (MOCD) of the Ministry of the Interior after he disclosed, in an interview, information about the alleged torture of his client, journalist Fikret Farmazoglu, by MOCD staff. Fikret Farmazoglu is currently detained at the MOCD. Reports indicate that the investigator told Elchin Sadigov that he would "pay a high price" for accusing the MOCD of torture. Since the November 2, 2016 incident, Elchin Sadigov and his family have faced additional harassment and intimidation, including a media article accusing Elchin Sadigov of having an affair with Fikret Farmazoglu's wife, the hacking of his Facebook page and the creation of fake accounts using his name. In addition, police interrogated Elchin Sadigov's brother and asked for information about Elchin Sadigov's wife and children. It is our understanding that police later told Elchin Sadigov that they had received a request to collect data about him and his family, but declined to disclose the reasons. The Law Society is deeply concerned about Elchin Sadigov's case. Reports indicate that there have been a growing number of cases of harassment, intimidation and persecution of human rights defenders and human rights lawyers by Azerbaijani authorities in recent years. We believe strongly that lawyers should be able to exercise their legitimate duties without fear for their lives, for their liberty and for their security. The Law Society of Upper Canada urges the government of Azerbaijan to comply with Azerbaijan's obligations under international human rights laws, including the United Nations' Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers. Article 16 of the Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers states: Governments shall ensure that lawyers (a) are able to perform all of their professional functions without intimidation, hindrance, harassment or improper interference; (b) are able to travel and to consult with their clients freely both within their own country and abroad; and (c) shall not suffer, or be threatened with, prosecution or administrative, economics or other sanctions for any action taken in accordance with recognized professional duties, standards and ethics. Article 17 states: Where the security of lawyers is threatened as a result of discharging their functions, they shall be adequately safeguarded by the authorities. Article 18 states: Lawyers shall not be identified with their clients or their clients' causes as a result of discharging their functions. The Law Society urges the government of Azerbaijan to: a. put an end to all acts of harassment against Elchin Sadigov as well as other human rights lawyers and defenders in Azerbaijan; b. guarantee in all circumstances the physical and psychological integrity of Elchin Sadigov; and c. ensure in all circumstances respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms in accordance with international human rights standards and international instruments. *The Law Society of Upper Canada is the governing body for more than 50,000 lawyers and more than 8,000 paralegals in the province of Ontario, Canada. The Treasurer is the head of the Law Society. The mandate of the Law Society is to govern the legal profession in the public interest by upholding the independence, integrity and honour of the legal profession for the purpose of advancing the cause of justice and the rule of law. The Law Society of Upper Canada Osgoode Hall, 130 Queen Street West Toronto, Ontario, M5H 2N6, www.lsuc.on.ca Follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. SOURCE The Law Society of Upper Canada To view this news release in HTML formatting, please use the following URL: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/January2017/30/c1222.html For further information: please contact Susan Tonkin, Communications Advisor - Media Relations, at 416-947-7605 or [email protected] Related Links http://www.lsuc.on.ca BP says that while the world economy will almost double between 2015 and 2035, energy demand will increase by only around 30%. Energy consumption, it says, is expected to grow less quickly than in the past: 1.3% per year in the 2015-2035 period, compared with annual growth of 2.2% in 1995-2015. The latest Energy Outlook expects oil, gas and coal to remain the dominant sources of energy, accounting for more than three-quarters of total global energy supplies in 2035, down from 85% in 2015. Almost two-thirds of the increase in global energy consumption over the 2015-2035 period is used for power generation, BP says. As a result, the share of energy used for power generation rises from 42% in 2015 to 47% by 2035. Chinas rapid nuclear expansion program is expected to account for nearly three-quarters of the global increase in nuclear generation by 2035, according to the latest Energy Outlook from oil and gas giant BP. Global Energy consumption is projected to grow only at 1.3% per year from 2016-2035 instead of 2.2% per year from 1995 to 2015. In BPs base case, carbon emissions from energy use increase by about 13% between 2015 and 2035. This, it says, is far in excess of the International Energy Agencys 450 Scenario which suggests carbon emissions need to fall by around 30% by 2035 to have a good chance of achieving the goals set out in the Paris climate change agreement. However, BP notes emissions are projected to grow at less than one-third of the rate seen in the past 20 years. This, it says, would be the slowest rate of emissions growth for any 20 year period since BPs records began in 1965. Nuclear power generation is expected to grow 2.3% per annum, with its share of primary energy consumption over the 2015-2035 period set to increase from 4% to 5%, BP says. BP sees nuclear generating capacity in Europe declining as older plants are gradually decommissioned and there is little new investment. It expects the EUs nuclear power generation to be 30% lower by 2035 than in 2015. Japan is assumed to restart some of its reactors gradually by 2025, but does not recover to pre-Fukushima levels. However, Chinas nuclear generating capacity is expected to grow 11% per annum by 2035, accounting for almost three-quarters of the global increase in nuclear generation. Renewable energy sources are expected to account for 40% of the growth in power generation, leading to an increase in their share of global power from 7% in 2015 to nearly 20% by 2035. BP chief executive Bob Dudley said, The global energy landscape is changing. Traditional centres of demand are being overtaken by fast-growing emerging markets. The energy mix is shifting, driven by technological improvements and environmental concerns. He said a central feature of this energy transition is the continued gradual decarbonisation of the fuel mix. Rapid improvements in the competitiveness of renewable energy mean that increases in renewables, together with nuclear and hydro energy, provide around half of the increase in global energy out to 2035. The World Nuclear Association has developed its own vision for the future of electricity, referred to as Harmony. This is based on the International Energy Agencys 2-degree scenario which aims to avoid the most damaging consequences of climate change and requires a large increase in nuclear energy. Harmony envisages a diverse mix of low-carbon generating technologies deployed in such a manner that the benefits of each are maximised while the negative impacts are minimised. The Associations target for nuclear energy is to provide 25% of electricity in 2050, requiring roughly 1000 GWe of new nuclear capacity to be constructed. [January 30, 2017] SyndicateRoom Sponsors Master Investor Show 2017 LONDON, January 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Online investment platform, SyndicateRoom, which pioneered the investor-led model, is the latest company to partner with the UK's largest event for private investors. This year's Master Investor Show takes place at the Business Design Centre on Saturday 25th March. The CEOs and founders of 100 exhibiting companies will connect with an anticipated audience of 5,000 private investors. As well as exhibiting at the show, SyndicateRoom's Goncalo de Vasconcelos will deliver a keynote speech on the main-stage. SyndicateRoom is renowned in financial services as a quality leader in equity investment. Of the funding proposals published on its website, 73% have been fully funded, compared to the 42% industry average - testament to SyndicateRoom's network of high calibre business angels and investors, which lead each of the funding rounds. Since its inception in 2013, the company has raised 64.8m from 86 companies. SyndicateRoom will use the event sponsorship to reach an active delegate audience of private investors - many of whom are looking to expand their non-traditional investment portfolios. Swen Lorenz, CEO of Master Investor: "Online investment has become popular, but successful investing is all about investing into quality companies. With its unique approach to only featuring fundraising pitches that already have the backing of a successful lead investor, SyndicateRoom has created the model that we are happy to put in front of our delegates." SyndicateRoom will deliver two presentations, including a 30-minute eynote speech on the main-stage by founder and innovator, Goncalo de Vasconcelos. Jim Mellon, the self-made celebrity investor (net worth GBP 850m), who has already backed a company that raised funds through SyndicateRoom, will join Goncalo during the talk. "The Master Investor Show is one of the most important events in any serious investor's calendar, particularly for those hunting for growth in today's low-yield economic environment," said Goncalo de Vasconcelos, CEO and co-founder, SyndicateRoom. "SyndicateRoom provides its members with exclusive access to high-growth equity investment opportunities, which attendees will be looking for. We're looking forward to being a part of this prestigious event." This year's Master Investor Show is the 15th anniversary of the UK's largest investment event. SyndicateRoom is the sixth sponsor confirmed. Fidelity International, Selftrade, Seven Investment Management, Northland Capital Partners Limited and London South East are also sponsoring the event. To find out more about Master Investor Show 2017 visit: http://www.masterinvestor.co.uk/show About Master Investor Ltd. Master Investor Ltd. is an investment media and events company that delivers independent, financial commentary and analysis to UK private investors and traders. Master Investor Ltd. is backed by Jim Mellon, the well-known financier. It is privately held with offices in London and the Isle of Man. About SyndicateRoom SyndicateRoom is an online investment platform, encouraging transparency, fairness and access for all. By allowing members to co-invest alongside experienced investors in highly sophisticated opportunities, they get access to the same economic terms as the lead investors. This applies to opportunities across the entire funding journey, from early stage private companies to premium segment listings on the main market of the London Stock Exchange. Lead investors and advisers include UK Business Angel of the Year Peter Cowley and super-angel Jonathan Milner. SyndicateRoom is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and is a member of the London Stock Exchange. http://www.syndicateroom.com Website: http://www.masterinvestor.co.uk/show Social media: http://www.facebook.com/masterinvestor http://www.twitter.com/masterinvestor Media enquiries: [email protected] [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [January 30, 2017] UNIFI-IX Joins Telehouse Carrier-Interconnect LONDON, January 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Telehouse, a leading global provider of data centre services, announces today that it has been selected by UNIFI-IX a new internet exchange, to host its services including an exclusive launch offer available immediately across the London Docklands campus. (Photo: http://mma.prnewswire.com/media/462530/Telehouse_North_Two.jpg ) UNIFI-IX was established in 2016 with the objective of creating a global network, enabling the exchange of traffic to be either local or global with a single port of entry to the exchange. Alternatively, members can create private VLAN's across the network regardless of geographical location. UNIFI-IX is the latest connectivity provider to join Telehouse Carrier-Interconnect, which comprises of more than 750 Carriers, Mobile providers, Internet Exchanges and broadband providers. Tom Sanders, Managing Director of UNIFI-IX commented, "Our new infrastructure will significantly reduce the number of steps needed to interconnect major cloud, internet and content services. This will provide a huge benefit to consumers, who will see an improvement in the performance of their online applications. Telehouse was the obvious partner for us as they are at the heart of the London digital hub; it was paramount to be included. Tom continues "Some of the companies we are talking to already have networks of private circuits interconnecting with multiple international destinations. We offer more extensive connectivity on a single integrated network, guaranteed speeds and our market and technical analysis shows that companies choosing to interconnect with us will make cost savings of between 20 and 70 percent, depending on the profile of their network." UNIFI-IX is offering the first 50 ports to the exchange free of charge, and with ambitious growth plans over the next 18 months the network will expand to Paris, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Thailand. Michelle Reid, Sales and Marketing Director of Telehouse states, "We are delighted to welcome UNIFI-IX to Telehouse Carrier-Interconnect, our London Docklands campus is one of the most connected in the world and we are well positioned to support their future growth with our latest data centre, Telehouse North Two." Telehouse Carrier-Interconnect is just one aspect of Telehouse Interconnect, which brings together more than 3,000 business partners such as Cloud, Mobile and Content providers, Enterprises and Financial services companies. This firmly establishes the Telehouse Interconnect as the home of the connected world, and a unique place to create business opportunities, now and in the future. To learn more about Telehouse, visit http://www.telehouse.net. For all of our latest news follow us on Twitter via @TelehouseEurope or find our Telehouse Europe LinkedIn company page. About Telehouse Telehouse is the pioneering data centre colocation provider established in 1989. It is an owner operator of global data centres, connectivity and managed ICT solutions to over 3000 corporations around the world. Telehouse is the data centre subsidiary of Japanese corporation KDDI, a leading Japanese mobile and fixed-line telecommunications and ICT solution provider with 106 offices in 28 countries around the world and a Global Fortune company. Further Telehouse press information: [email protected] About UNIFI-IX UNIFI-IX was established in England in 2016 to create a global network enabling lower cost exchange of global and local data traffic. Its network currently connects to four data centres in London, one in Birmingham, one in Manchester and two in Dublin. It is currently building its network to connect Paris, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Thailand. Its customers will be able to peer with one another on the network and benefit from reduced bandwidth costs, reduced latency and reduced costs of transit. Further Unifi-IX press information: [email protected] Contact: James Davies, [email protected] , +44-(0)7714308811 [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [January 30, 2017] New Residential Announces Public Offering of Common Stock New Residential Investment Corp. (NYSE: NRZ; "New Residential" or the "Company") announced today its intention to offer 49,170,250 shares of its common stock in an underwritten public offering, subject to market conditions. In connection with the offering, the Company expects to grant the underwriters an option for a period of 30 days to purchase up to an additional 7,375,537 shares of common stock. The Company intends to use the net proceeds from this offering to fund a portion of the acquisition of approximately $97 billion unpaid principal balance of conventional mortgage servicing rights ("MSRs") from CitiMortgage, Inc. pursuant to an agreement, subject to certain closing conditions, to make additional investments and for general corporate purposes. Citigroup Global Markets Inc., Barclays Capital Inc., BofA Merrill Lynch and Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC are acting as joint book-running managers for the offering. BTIG, LLC and FBR Capital Markets & Co. are acting as co-managers. The offering will be made pursuant to the Company's effective shelf registration statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC (News - Alert)"). The offering will be made only by means of a prospectus and a related prospectus supplement. Prospective investors should read the prospectus supplement and the prospectus in that registration statement and other documents the Company has filed or will file with the SEC for more complete information about the Company and the offering. You may obtain these documents for free by visiting EDGAR on the SEC's website at www.sec.gov. Alternatively, copies of the prospectus and prospectus supplement may be obtained from Citigroup, c/o Broadridge Financial Solutions, 1155 Long Island Avenue, Edgewood, NY 11717, telephone: (800) 831-9146; Barlays Capital Inc., c/o Broadridge Financial Solutions, 1155 Long Island Avenue, Edgewood, NY 11717, email: [email protected], telephone: (800) 831-9146; BofA Merrill Lynch, attention: Prospectus Department, NC1-004-03-43, 200 North College Street, 3rd floor, Charlotte, NC 28255-0001, email: [email protected]; or Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC, attention: Prospectus Department, One Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10010, telephone: (800) 221-1037, email: [email protected]. This press release does not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy shares of common stock, nor shall there be any sale of these securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such jurisdiction. ABOUT NEW RESIDENTIAL New Residential focuses on opportunistically investing in, and actively managing, investments related to residential real estate. The Company primarily targets investments in mortgage servicing related assets and other related opportunistic investments. New Residential is organized and conducts its operations to qualify as a real estate investment trust for federal income tax purposes. The Company is managed by an affiliate of Fortress Investment Group LLC (NYSE: FIG), a global investment management firm. FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS Certain statements in this press release may constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including, but not limited, to statements relating to the offering and the intended use of proceeds of the offering. These statements are based on management's current expectations and beliefs and are subject to a number of trends and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements, many of which are beyond our control. The Company can give no assurance that its expectations will be attained. Accordingly, you should not place undue reliance on any forward-looking statements contained in this press release. For a discussion of some of the risks and important factors that could affect such forward-looking statements, see the sections entitled "Risk Factors" in the prospectus supplement and the prospectus related to the offering and in the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K and Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, as well as the sections entitled "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations" incorporated by reference in the prospectus supplement related to the offering from the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K and Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q. In addition, new risks and uncertainties emerge from time to time, and it is not possible for the Company to predict or assess the impact of every factor that may cause its actual results to differ from those contained in any forward-looking statements. Such forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this press release. The Company expressly disclaims any obligation to release publicly any updates or revisions to any forward-looking statements contained herein to reflect any change in the Company's expectations with regard thereto or change in events, conditions or circumstances on which any statement is based. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130005486/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [January 30, 2017] Zomedica Announces Two Transdermal Products for Cats ANN ARBOR, Mich., Jan. 30, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Zomedica Pharmaceuticals Corp. (TSX-V:ZOM), a veterinary pharmaceutical and health care solutions company, today announced that it opened its fourth Investigational New Animal Drug (INAD) application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration Center for Veterinary Medicine (FDA-CVM) for ZM-011, a transdermal behavioral medication to reduce inappropriate urination in cats. Both ZM-011 and the previously announced ZM-006 use the same transdermal gel technology for their feline-specific formulations. ZM-011: TRANSDERMAL FLUOXETINE The active pharmaceutical ingredient for ZM-011 is fluoxetine, most commonly known as Prozac, its human pharmaceutical brand name. While the FDA-CVM has not approved fluoxetine for use in cats, veterinarians frequently prescribe its human-approved counterpart to treat feline behavioral disorders such as inappropriate urination. Understanding the inherent challenges with orally dosing cats, ZM-011 is a novel transdermal gel for application to the cats ear. This route of delivery aims to maximize patient compliance and efficacy and replace the human-approved oral or compounded drug veterinarians rely on today to treat cats. Zomedica anticipates initiating a pilot study for ZM-011 in 2017. ZM-006: TRANSDERMAL METHIMAZOLE Zomedicas previously announced ZM-006 uses the same transdermal gel to deliver its active pharmaceutical ingredient methimazole, commonly used in veterinary medicine to treat the metabolic disorder hyperthyroidism in cats. Hyperthyroidism (overactive thyroid) is the most commonly diagnosed hormone disorder in middle-aged to older cats and, if left untreated, may have detrimental effects such as weight loss, abnormal appetite, and heart problems. Transdermal delivery of methimazole is an alternative to conventional oral tablets already approved by the FDA-CVM for cats. Because of the associated difficulties with administering pills to cats, methimazole continues to be one of the most frequently compounded drugs in other dosage forms. With ZM-006, Zomedica aims to offset the veterinarians reliance on compounding pharmacies for medication supply and bring associated pharmacy revenue back into the veterinarians clinic. Zomedica expects to finalize formulation work in the first half of 2017 and commence a pivotal efficacy trial in the first half of 2018 for ZM-006. Its very common for veterinarians to rely on human-approved drug formulations as well as data fro human trials to treat their pet patients, stated Zomedicas Chief Medical Officer William MacArthur, MS, DVM. With our transdermal formulations, we hope to offer veterinarians an affordable FDA-CVM approved option in a dosage-form-of-choice for cats to elevate safety, efficacy and patient compliance. In keeping with Zomedicas veterinarian-focused mission, ZM-011 and ZM-006 advances its innovative drug delivery technology while developing feline-specific drug formulations that maximize patient care and practice performance by keeping treatment regimens affordable. The FDA-CVM requires the use of animal approved drugs when available over human-approved drugs in veterinary species. About Zomedica With U.S. operations based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Zomedica is a veterinary pharmaceutical and health care solutions company creating products for companion animals (canine, feline and equine) by focusing on the unmet needs of clinical veterinarians. Zomedica is developing a diversified portfolio to include innovative drugs, drug-delivery technologies, diagnostics, and devices. With multiple clinical veterinarians in executive management, it is Zomedicas mission to give veterinarians the opportunity to lower costs, increase productivity, and grow revenue while better serving the animals in their care. For more information, visit www.ZOMEDICA.com. Follow Zomedica Email Alerts: http://www.zomedica.com/investor-information/ LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/zomedica Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/zomedica/ Reader Advisory 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 the release. Except for statements of historical fact, this news release contains certain "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable securities law. Forward-looking information is frequently characterized by words such as "plan", "expect", "project", "intend", "believe", "anticipate", "estimate" and other similar words, or statements that certain events or conditions "may" or "will" occur. Although we believe that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking information are reasonable, there can be no assurance that such expectations will prove to be correct. We cannot guarantee future results, performance or achievements. Consequently, there is no representation that the actual results achieved will be the same, in whole or in part, as those set out in the forward-looking information. Forward-looking information is based on the opinions and estimates of management at the date the statements are made, and are subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual events or results to differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking information. Some of the risks and other factors that could cause the results to differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking information include, but are not limited to: uncertainty as to whether our strategies and business plans will yield the expected benefits; availability and cost of capital; the ability to identify and develop and achieve commercial success for new products and technologies; the level of expenditures necessary to maintain and improve the quality of products and services; changes in technology and changes in laws and regulations; our ability to secure and maintain strategic relationships; risks pertaining to permits and licensing, intellectual property infringement risks, risks relating to future clinical trials, regulatory approvals, safety and efficacy of our products, the use of our product, intellectual property protection and the other risk factors disclosed under our profile on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Readers are cautioned that this list of risk factors should not be construed as exhaustive. The forward-looking information contained in this news release is expressly qualified by this cautionary statement. We undertake no duty to update any of the forward-looking information to conform such information to actual results or to changes in our expectations except as otherwise required by applicable securities legislation. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking information. Investor Relations Contact Shameze Rampertab, CPA, CA [email protected] +1 647.283.3630 Barry Mire, Renmark Financial Communications Inc. [email protected] +1 416.644.2020 or +1 514.939.3989 Media Contact Andrea Eberle [email protected] +1 734.369.2555 [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [January 30, 2017] AmpliPhi Biosciences Appoints Dr. Igor P. Bilinsky as Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer AmpliPhi Biosciences Corporation (NYSE MKT: APHB), a global leader in the development of bacteriophage-based antibacterial therapies to treat drug-resistant infections, today announced the appointment of Igor P. Bilinsky, Ph.D., as its Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, effective January 30, 2017. Dr. Bilinsky brings to AmpliPhi nearly two decades of experience as a life sciences company executive and consultant, serving public and private companies. He succeeds Wendy S. Johnson, who served as AmpliPhi's interim COO since September 2014 and continues to serve on AmpliPhi's board of directors. "Igor's broad experience in strategic planning, operational and entrepreneurial management at biopharmaceutical companies makes him ideal to lead operations at AmpliPhi," said M. Scott Salka, CEO of AmpliPhi Biosciences. "The expertise he brings to our executive team will help us achieve our ambitious plans to deliver a new generation of therapies to patients plagued by multi-drug resistant bacterial infections. All of us at AmpliPhi extend a warm welcome to Igor." "I am excited to join AmpliPhi, a company at the forefront of developing innovative bacteriophage-based therapies. These therapies have a unique and transformative potential to help patients with deadly antibiotic-resistant infections that are not susceptible to any existing therapies, which is an increasingly common problem that presents a significant threat to humanity," said Dr. Bilinsky. "Phage therapies also hold the promise of bringing precision medicine to the field of infectious diseases by enabling the precise targeting of pathogenic bacteria while sparing the microbiome, recognized as essential to robust human health. AmpliPhi's product pipeline is rapidly advancing toward Phase 2 clinical development later this year, and I look forward to leveraging my experience in building and leading a team of professionals to manufacture and develop these much-needed therapeutics and bring them to patients as soon as possible." Mr. Salka added, "We are extremely fortunate to have had Wendy Johnson serve as interim COO and have benefitted tremendously from her experience and guidance. Ms. Johnson continues to serve as a member of our board of directors and has also agreed to provide transition and other consulting services to AmpliPhi. We look forward to her continuing contributions to our company." Prior to joining AmpliPhi, Dr. Bilinsky was General Manager of Immuno-Oncology and Senior Vice Prsident of Special and Research Operations at Ignyta, Incorporated. Previously he was Senior Vice President of Corporate Development at Vical Incorporated and was Vice President, Business Development and Special Operations at Halozyme Therapeutics. Earlier in his career, Dr. Bilinsky was CEO of Androclus Therapeutics. At The Boston Consulting Group, he served in positions of increasing responsibility as a management consultant, project leader and ultimately as principal in the healthcare practice, where he advised companies in the biotechnology, pharmaceutical and life science industries on business strategy, operational performance and mergers and acquisitions. Dr. Bilinsky received a B.S. in physics from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and a Ph.D. in physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. About Bacteriophages Bacteriophages, or more simply "phages," are the natural predators of bacteria and are thought to be the most abundant life form on earth, outnumbering even the stars in our universe. Over eons, phages have evolved an incredible diversity of specialist strains that typically prey upon just one strain of bacteria, enabling a phage-based therapeutic to precisely target a pathogenic bacterial population while sparing the beneficial microbiota. Phages can infect and kill bacteria, whether they are antibiotic-resistant or not, and even when they have formed protective biofilms. Such biofilms are a major line of defense for bacteria, sometimes rendering them impervious to conventional antibiotics. Phages are able to penetrate biofilms, producing strong local therapeutic effects without the side-effects commonly produced by antibiotics. About AmpliPhi Biosciences AmpliPhi Biosciences Corporation is a biotechnology company focused on the development and commercialization of novel bacteriophage-based antibacterial therapeutics. AmpliPhi's product development programs target infections that are often resistant to existing antibiotic treatments. AmpliPhi has reported final results from two Phase 1 clinical trials of AB-SA01, one for the treatment of Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) in chronic rhinosinusitis patients and one to evaluate the safety of AB-SA01 when administered topically to the intact skin of healthy adults. AmpliPhi is also developing bacteriophage therapeutics targeting Pseudomonas aeruginosa (P. aeruginosa) and Clostridium difficile (C. difficile) in collaboration with a number of leading organizations focused on the advancement of bacteriophage-based therapies. For more information, visit www.ampliphibio.com. Forward Looking Statements Statements in this press release that are not statements of historical fact are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements include, without limitation, statements about the potential advancement of AB-SA01 into a Phase 2 trial later in 2017, the potential use of bacteriophages to treat bacterial infections, including infections that do not respond to antibiotics, the potential benefits of phage therapy, and AmpliPhi's development of bacteriophage-based therapies. Words such as "believe," "anticipate," "plan," "expect," "intend," "will," "may," "goal," "potential" and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements, though not all forward-looking statements necessarily contain these identifying words. Among the factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated in these forward-looking statements are risks and uncertainties associated with AmpliPhi's business and financial condition and the other risks and uncertainties described in AmpliPhi's Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 30, 2016, as filed with the SEC (News - Alert), and other filings with the SEC. 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, and AmpliPhi undertakes no obligation to revise or update any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this press release. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130005523/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [January 30, 2017] Leading Industry Analyst Firm Recognizes Mushroom Networks as an SD-WAN Market Leader SAN DIEGO, Jan. 30, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Mushroom Networks, an innovator in Broadband-Bonding and Software-Defined Wide Area Networking (SD-WAN) platforms, today announced leading global market research firm Quadrant Knowledge Solutions has recognized Mushroom Networks as the 2016 SD-WAN Company of the Year. This recognition comes in conjunction with the release of Quadrants recent study, the Software-Defined Wide Area Network (SD-WAN) Global Market Outlook. Significantly, this study also evaluated companies including Velocloud, Viptela, Silver Peak, Riverbed Networks, Versa Networks, CloudGenix, Aryaka Networks, Cisco, and others. Mushroom Networks, with its unique and innovative SD-WAN solution and Broadband Bonding technology, is well positioned to continue to help enterprises in improving WAN performance, said Jaideep Singh, Senior Analyst for Quadrant Knowledge Solutions. Driven by strong overall performance in terms of sophistication, depth and maturity of the technology, visionary innovation, and industry impact, Quadrant Knowledge Solutions recognizes Mushroom Networks as the 2016 Company of the Year in the global SD-WAN market. Quadrant specifically noted the advanced functionality of Mushroom Networks VNF Design Studio, which enables service providers and larger enterprises to easily build their VNFs with advanced capabilities that fit their WAN and traffic profile. Cahit Akin, CEO of Mushroom Networks, said, Our VNF Design Studio extends the programmability benefits of thesoftware-defined data center all the way to the branch office. Were thrilled that Quadrant has chosen to recognize our advanced approach to SD-WAN as the future of the market. As businesses begin to recognize the WAN as the primary performance bottleneck for cloud services and Internet connectivity, there has been a shift away from carrier-managed private networks like MPLS as the sole connectivity resource, due to hosted applications as well as lower cost and higher bandwidth availability. More and more businesses are looking to Managed Service Providers (MSPs) and distributors/VARs for solutions that enable them to remotely and easily manage multiple locations with disparate connectivity. Mushrooms channel partner programs include a wide range of SD-WAN and Broadband Bonding solutions for various vertical markets and are available for qualified resellers and service providers worldwide. To access Quadrant Knowledge Solutions report on the SD-WAN market, click here. http://quadrant-solutions.com/quadrant-research-recognizes-mushroom-network-2016-company-year-global-sd-wan-market/ About Quadrant Knowledge Solutions Quadrant Knowledge Solutions is a global advisory and consulting firm focused on helping clients in achieving business transformation goals with Strategic Business, and Growth Advisory services. At Quadrant Knowledge Solutions, our vision is to become an integral part of our clients business as strategic knowledge partner. Our research and consulting deliverables are designed to provide comprehensive information and strategic insights for helping client formulate growth strategies to survive and thrive in an ever-changing business environment. About Mushroom Networks Mushroom Networks, Inc., is a privately held company based in San Diego, CA, providing patent pending Broadband Bonding solutions to a range of Internet connection applications. The companys flagship product line serves SMBs, enterprises, multi-tenant buildings, and broadband service providers and bonds dissimilar broadband access technologies forming a single highly reliable broadband pipe that can easily scale based on needs. Mushroom Networks was the winner of the 2015 Most Innovative Product award by CONNECT, finalist for the coveted 2012 San Diego Business Journal Innovation Award, winner of the XCHANGE Tech Innovators Xcellence Award, and winner of the 2008 CONNECT Most Innovative New Product award, Network Worlds "top technology trend of 2008" award. For more information, please visit https://www.mushroomnetworks.com or call (858) 366-9255. Media Contact: Jay Nichols Mushroom Networks, Inc. [email protected] Tel: (858) 366-9255 ext 6039 [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] MIRAMAR, FL / ACCESSWIRE / January 30, 2017 / Hema Diagnostic Systems, located in Miramar, Florida, USA, a subsidiary of Generex Biotechnology Corporation (www.generex.com) (OTC PINK: GNBT), is proud to announce that Harold G. Haines, Ph.D., will expand his participation at Hema Diagnostic Systems to include project management of a new and novel multiplex assay designed for use with Sepsis. This new device has been issued the preliminary designation of RAPID 1-2-3 HEMA SEPSIS. Dr. Haines will lead a coordinated effort involving both Hema Diagnostic Systems and Generex Biotechnology and will undertake the new responsibilities of Chief Medical Officer for Hema Diagnostic Systems while retaining his current responsibilities as Director of Clinical Affairs, a position held since 2002. Dr. Haines has 45 plus years of executive managerial and consulting experience in the healthcare industry, with a broad background in pharmaceuticals, diagnostics, medical devices, and therapeutics and is a former tenured Professor of Pathology (with appointments in Microbiology, Immunology, Dermatology, and Obstetrics and Gynecology) at the University of Miami School of Medicine, Miami, Florida. He also established and served as Director of the Clinical Virology Laboratory at Jackson Memorial Hospital, the second largest hospital in the United States. Dr. Haines was founder and Director of the Virology Reference Laboratory at the University of Miami - School of Medicine. Both of these laboratories were among the first laboratories for the diagnosis of viral diseases in the Southeastern United States. He has founded and operated two commercial immunology and infectious disease laboratories. According to Dr. Haines, "Sepsis is a rapidly developing inflammatory syndrome and one of the major causes of serious disability and death in hospital settings in the United States and globally. Because it can develop and intensify extremely fast in a patient, it is critical that a very rapid and accurate diagnosis be made." Dr. Haines further stated,"Hema Diagnostic Systems is developing a multiplex assay for the detection and quantitative determination of several distinct biomarkers for the diagnosis of this devastating syndrome. The results of this assay, which can be conducted either at bedside or in a central laboratory, will be available in 10-15 minutes. This multiplex assay aims to help determine the status and origin of sepsis, which is a major cause of death in hospitals, with very high predictability. This, in turn, will give the physician essential information to take the necessary treatment steps in a manner which is much more efficient and rapid than currently available tests." Story continues Dr. Haines will be working with Dr. Jason Terrell, Chief Medical and Scientific Officer of Generex Biotechnology, in the development of the new Rapid 1-2-3 Hema Sepsis diagnostic. Dr. Terrell stated,"We are very fortunate to have Dr. Haines accept this position. Dr. Haines is among the most experienced and innovative diagnostic test developers in the industry. I look forward to working alongside him in development of the sepsis diagnostic and all future endeavors." Lawrence Salvo, President and CEO of Hema Diagnostic Systems, confirmed the commitment of HDS to the Sepsis Project: "Sepsis will be a major step forward for Hema Diagnostic Systems and will bring our technology in to new markets that will serve as a base for further product development and expansion. Dr. Haines and Dr. Terrell constitute a powerful team and we look forward to their success. HDS is committed to this effort which is greatly needed, not only here in the United States, but on a worldwide basis." This release may contain forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ, and such differences could be material. Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the following: continued acceptance of the Company's products, increased levels of competition in our industry, the acceptance of new products, inherent risks associated with product development and intellectual property rights, the Company's dependence on key personnel, third party sales, and suppliers. There can be no assurance that the Company will be successful in addressing such risks and uncertainties and the Company assumes no duty to update any forward-looking statements based upon actual results. For further information, please contact Hema Diagnostic Systems at: info@rapid123.com or at +1-954-919-5123 SOURCE: Hema Diagnostic Systems [January 30, 2017] A New Alternative to WhatsApp, Telegram Messenger LUCERNE, Switzerland, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- SafeSwiss Secure Communications AG have just released a new alternative for consumers in an already crowded market. With a myriad of competitors within this space SafeSwiss offers a total secure communication platform & unlike many others this includes secure voice, text chat, group chat & ephemeral messaging. SafeSwiss is now available to be downloaded free from both iTunes & Google Play stores. "A free PC version is expected to be released within the next week," says CEO Tim Gallagher. "We have some exciting developments on our roadmap moving forward including secure video calls & a comprehensive B2B offering." IOS: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/safeswiss-secure-communication/id1176312389?l=en&ls=1&mt=8 Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.safeswiss.prod Gallagher says "WhatsApp have done a remarkable job introducing encryption to the masses in an extremely short timeframe with over one billion users, recent headlines claiming WhatsApp had backdoor access was in reality media sensationalism, this issue stemmed from protocol for managing crypto key exchange a fundamental requirement for a robust encryption solution, It was unjustified to claim this was a back door, SafeSwiss we use state of art trusted open source NaCl cryptography library for encryption, all encryption keys are generated and safely stored on user's devices to prevent any backdoor access or copies eliminting any possibility of MiM (man in the middle) attack." WhatsApp users need to consider WhatsApp's announcement that they were sharing user data with owner Facebook that went back on earlier promises and caused upset with customers, but it is not the only company engaging in this type of behaviour. US wireless provider Verizon, for example, sells its customers' smartphone data to businesses via its Precision Market Insights program. This information includes searches, app usage, location and other data. Although Verizon says the data is stripped of any identifying features, the fact that it is collected at all is likely to make some users uncomfortable. An important consideration is "The companies whose services you use may not be keeping your data secure enough on your behalf." "Unlike most other providers, SafeSwiss allows users to determine their own unique ID, & it's optional if they want to include phone number and email details. This goes a long way to eliminate potential vulnerabilities associated with 2 x factor authentication and provides anonymity," says CEO Tim Gallagher. This vulnerability was exposed in a recent Telegram messenger hack where Iranian hackers compromised more than a dozen accounts on the Telegram instant messaging service and identified the phone numbers of some 15 million Iranian users, this is the largest known breach of the encrypted communications system, cyber researchers told Reuters. These attacks jeopardized the communications of activists, journalists and other people in sensitive positions in Iran, where Telegram is used by some 20 million people, said independent cyber researcher Collin Anderson and Amnesty International technologist Claudio Guarnieri, who have been studying Iranian hacking groups for three years. Telegram's vulnerability, according to Anderson and Guarnieri, lies in its use of SMS text messages to activate new devices. When users want to log on to Telegram from a new phone, the company sends them authorization codes via SMS, which can be intercepted by the phone company and shared with the hackers, the researchers said. Armed with the codes, the hackers can add new devices to a person's Telegram account, enabling them to read chat histories as well as new messages. When providers collect data on their customers, the threat to your privacy goes beyond just what they're giving to law enforcement agencies or selling to other companies. The Yahoo data breach or the LinkedIn hacks in 2012 and earlier this year show that the practice of collecting and storing your information leads to compromised situations - you can keep yourself secure, but the companies whose services you use may not be keeping your data safe enough on your behalf. By using secure, encrypted communication like SafeSwiss, you limit the amount of data that is being held on you by digital providers. www.safeswiss.com Media contact: Tim Gallagher [email protected] +6421341890 To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/a-new-alternative-to-whatsapp-telegram-messenger-300398138.html SOURCE SafeSwiss Secure Communications AG [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [January 30, 2017] Second Annual Report on Student Connectivity Reveals the States Leading the Way, According to EducationSuperHighway The second annual "State of the States" report on the state of broadband connectivity in America's schools finds a number of states are leading the way in ensuring that their students have access to equal educational opportunities provided by technology. The report was issued today by EducationSuperHighway, the leading national non-profit focused on upgrading the Internet access in every public school classroom in America. Among the highlights of the report, every student in Hawaii, Kentucky, North Dakota, South Carolina, and Wyoming meets the minimum connectivity goal of 100 kilobits per second (kbps) per student - meaning that every child in these states can take advantage of digital learning. Meanwhile, Kentucky and Hawaii also join Delaware, Tennessee and West Virginia in having every school connected to high-speed fiber - the infrastructure that will allow their school districts to increase bandwidth over time to keep up with demand. A full breakdown of states performing at the highest levels in various categories can be found below. Evan Marwell, Founder and CEO of EducationSuperHighway remarked, "It is clear: states are making tremendous progress in getting more and more students online at the speeds necessary to take advantage of digital learning. During the past year, an additional 10.4 million students gained the minimum connectivity they need, and 88 percent of school districts nationally are now meeting minimum connectivity goals. This is a credit to the governors, state and school district leaders, service providers, and many other partners who have come together to ensure that our students can fully access the modern learnin resources that are crucial to their academic development and future professional success. I congratulate the top-performing states and we look forward to another great year of connecting more students to high-speed Internet so they have access to all of the educational opportunities of the 21st century." The full "2016 State of the States" report can be found here: http://stateofthestates.educationsuperhighway.org/ 2016 State of the States Top Performing States States With All School Districts Meeting the Minimum School Connectivity Goal Hawaii Kentucky North Dakota South Carolina Wyoming States With All Schools Connected to High-Speed Fiber Hawaii Delaware Kentucky Tennessee West Virginia States With Highest Percent of School Districts That Have Affordable Broadband Hawaii Connecticut Delaware Maine South Dakota States That Are Most Improved in Percent of School Districts Now Meeting the Minimum Connectivity Goal (from 2015 to 2016) North Carolina Delaware Tennessee Nevada Virginia State That Upgraded the Most Students in 2016 North Carolina Tennessee Virginia New Mexico Arkansas States That Are Most Improved in School Broadband Affordability (from 2015 to 2016) South Dakota Nevada Rhode Island Nebraska Delaware About EducationSuperHighway EducationSuperHighway is the leading non-profit focused on upgrading the Internet access in every public school classroom in America. We believe that digital learning has the potential to provide all students with equal access to educational opportunity and that every school requires high-speed broadband to make that opportunity a reality. We catalyze federal and state action on K-12 broadband initiatives and are currently working with governors in 20 states covering 20 million students. We work directly with school districts to accelerate network upgrades by connecting them to competitive service provider options in their areas. Our Compare & Connect K-12 online tool helps schools and service providers view broadband services and bandwidth information for school districts nationwide so they can get and deliver more bandwidth for their broadband budgets. As a non-profit, our tools and services are offered free of charge. EducationSuperHighway is funded by national foundations including the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and our mission is supported by America's leading CEOs. Learn more about EducationSuperHighway here: https://www.educationsuperhighway.org View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130005125/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [January 30, 2017] 25 Gigabit Ethernet Consortium Members Validate Multi-Vendor Interoperability The 25 Gigabit Ethernet Consortium, established to develop 25G and 50G Ethernet specifications based upon 25 Gbps SERDES technology, today announced record participation in, and successful completion of, the first 25G and 50G Ethernet plugfest. Held at the University of New Hampshire InterOperability Laboratory (UNH-IOL (News - Alert)) in Durham, New Hampshire, the plugfest provided a forum where consortium members could collaborate and ensure interoperability of feature sets and configurability between their products. Sixteen companies attended the week-long event with a wide variety of test scenarios including auto-negotiation and stressed conditions. The testing demonstrated a high degree of multi-vendor interoperability and specification conformance. The plugfest was highlighted by the following activities: Interoperability between vendors including adapters, switches, test and measurement devices, and interconnects Proving advanced infrastructure connectivity Plug and play multi-vendor compatibility Successful auto-negotiation Supprt for both forward and backward compatibility here. "This is an encouraging sign as testing ensures vendors' conformance to a single standard and the success at the plugfest demonstrates its maturity," said Seamus Crehan, president of Crehan Research. "Ultimately this helps drive advanced network performance, enables the development of new innovation and benefits consumers and the industry as a whole." "In order to handle the increasing amount of data, server architectures all too often require multiple 10G ports. 25G Ethernet arrives just in time and has started its climb towards dominance as the leading server-to-ToR switch interconnect. As this transition occurs, plugfests assure users that 25G and greater speeds from different vendors will perform as advertised with solid plug-and-play interoperability," said Vittal Balasubramanian, chair of the 25G/50G Ethernet Interop (News - Alert) Committee and Principal Signal Integrity Engineer at Dell. "Due to the success of this interoperability test event, the steering committee of the consortium has decided to make its specification available to the public," stated Brad Booth, chair of the 25G Ethernet Consortium. "The consortium is looking forward to future events to evaluate interoperability between the consortium specification and IEEE (News - Alert) Std. 802.3by-2016." The new specification is available for download at the consortium's website. The 25 Gigabit Ethernet Consortium is open for membership to any organization willing to help facilitate industry adoption of 25G or 50G Ethernet technology. To become a member, please visit http://www.25gethernet.org/. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130005217/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [January 30, 2017] Northforge Innovations Expands Its Network Infrastructure Software Development Services With Addition of New Subsidiary in Israel Northforge Innovations, Inc., an expert software consulting and development company, today announced the establishment of a new subsidiary, Northforge Innovations Israel Ltd., which will extend and expand the company's efforts to advance the security, speed and intelligence of the communications infrastructure. The subsidiary, located near Tel Aviv, will provide Northforge with greater access to technologists with specialized network infrastructure expertise, particularly in cyber security. Northforge Innovations Israel Ltd. is a growing group of engineers and technologists who are providing software consulting and develpment services to Northforge's customers. "This subsidiary will bring additional Intellectual Capital to our expanding focus in network infrastructure and network security. Our Israeli team possesses our Intellectual Capital attributes of having passion towards every project and in approaching problem solving through increased performance," said Brenda Pastorek, President and Chief Operating Officer of Northforge Innovations. "Plus with the addition of a presence in Israel to our offices in Canada, we are able to service our customers more effectively on a worldwide basis. Being in compatible time zones makes it easier to communicate and collaborate on high quality software development." About Northforge Innovations Northforge Innovations is an expert software consulting and development company focused on advancing the speed, security, and intelligence of the communications infrastructure. We help customers bring innovation and quality to their network infrastructure, network security and multimedia systems products and services. For more information, visit www.gonorthforge.com. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130005034/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] [January 30, 2017] Creative Trends Report by Shutterstock Defines Visual Design in 2017 NEW YORK, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Shutterstock, Inc. (NYSE:SSTK), a leading global provider of imagery and music, today released its 2017 Creative Trends Report driven by global customer download and search data collected over the past year. Analyzed by our team of data scientists, creative professionals, and content reviewers, the report determines trends that will influence creative direction and design aesthetics in 2017 across images, videos, and music. Billions of searches within Shutterstock's collection of over 100 million images help determine the top performing global, cultural, design, and visual trends around the world. The report also identifies the percentage increase in searches over the last year for each keyword. Shutterstock's customers include designers, marketers, filmmakers, and bloggers whose download choices and search behaviors help forecast the trends in the advertising, film, and media industries. This year's predictions showcase a stark contrast between the real world and the digital world, between nature and technology, and between the past and the future. The 2017 global trends based on image searches include: White Texture : up 482% from the previous year. Adding a 3D feel, this trend can be sharp, intricate, or reflect the patterns found in nature. : up 482% from the previous year. Adding a 3D feel, this trend can be sharp, intricate, or reflect the patterns found in nature. Emojis : up 328% from the previous year. A truly global form of communication, emojis transcend language. : up 328% from the previous year. A truly global form of communication, emojis transcend language. Halftone : p 225% from the previous year. Evoking newsprint, analog TV, and pop art, the beauty of halftone lies in its imperfection. : p 225% from the previous year. Evoking newsprint, analog TV, and pop art, the beauty of halftone lies in its imperfection. Head-Up Display: up 135% from the previous year. A sleek dashboard style, with at-a-glance measurements and numbers. Jeff Weiser Explore the 2017 Creative Trends Report here. About Shutterstock, Inc. Shutterstock, Inc. (NYSE: SSTK), directly and through its group subsidiaries, is a leading global provider of high-quality licensed photographs, vectors, illustrations, videos and music to businesses, marketing agencies and media organizations around the world. Working with its growing community of over 160,000 contributors, Shutterstock adds hundreds of thousands of images each week, and currently has more than 100 million images and more than 5 million video clips available. Headquartered in New York City, with offices in Amsterdam, Berlin, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, London, Los Angeles, Montreal, Paris, San Francisco, and Silicon Valley, Shutterstock has customers in more than 150 countries. The company also owns Bigstock, a value-oriented stock media agency; Offset, a high-end image collection; PremiumBeat a curated royalty-free music library; Rex Features, a premier source of editorial images for the world's media; and Webdam, a cloud-based digital asset management service for businesses. For more information, please visit www.shutterstock.com, and follow Shutterstock on Twitter or Facebook. To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/creative-trends-report-by-shutterstock-defines-visual-design-in-2017-300398608.html SOURCE Shutterstock, Inc. [January 30, 2017] Employers Holdings, Inc. to Ring NYSE Closing Bell to Commemorate 10th Anniversary of Initial Public Offering Employers Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: EIG) will ring The Closing BellSM at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) today to commemorate the 10th anniversary of its initial public offering. Douglas D. Dirks, Employers Holdings, Inc. President and Chief Executive Officer, and members of the board of directors and executive leadership team will ring the closing bell. Employers Holdings, Inc. had its initial public offering in February 2007. Since the IPO, the organization has grown from writing insurance in 14 states through two insurance companies, to writing business in 36 states and the District of Columbia through four insurance companies. In the year preceding its IPO, the company produced $400 million of gross written premium compared to today's $700 million. The company's investment portfolio totaled $1.7 billion at the time of the IPO compared to $2.6 billion today. Adjusted shareholders' equity was $747 million at December 31, 2006 versus approximately $1 billion now, and the company returned approximately $475 milion to its shareholders in dividends and share repurchases. "This is an exciting milestone for EMPLOYERS, from our talented employees to our valued policyholders, agents, partners, and shareholders," said Douglas D. Dirks, president and chief executive officer. "I'm immensely proud of our growth and all we've accomplished together over the last decade." Added Dirks, "As we look forward to the next 10 years, we must also reflect on our company's rich history which spans more than a century. Throughout all of this time we have remained dedicated to serving America's small businesses as a specialty provider of workers' compensation insurance." The New York Stock Exchange will stream the closing bell ringing on its website: https://www.nyse.com/bell. The bell-ringing is scheduled for 4:00 p.m. Eastern Time. A video of the event will also be archived on that same page after the livestream. About Employers Holdings, Inc. Employers Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:EIG) is a holding company with subsidiaries that are specialty providers of workers' compensation insurance and services focused on select small businesses engaged in low-to-medium hazard industries. The company, through its subsidiaries, operates in 36 states and the District of Columbia. Insurance is offered by Employers Insurance Company of Nevada, Employers Compensation Insurance Company, Employers Preferred Insurance Company, and Employers Assurance Company, all rated A- (Excellent) by A.M. Best Company. Additional information can be found at: www.employers.com. Copyright 2017 EMPLOYERS. All rights reserved. View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170130005943/en/ [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ] MUMBAI, Jan 30 (Reuters) - India's natural rubber production in December jumped 12 percent from a year ago to 65,000 tonnes, the state-run Rubber Board said in a statement on Monday, as higher prices prompted farmers to raise tapping. The country's consumption stood at 85,000 tonnes in the month, slightly down from 85,250 tonnes a year ago, as the government's move to scrap high value currency notes hit demand. India's natural rubber imports in the month plunged 46.3 percent to 24,462 tonnes due to a rally in overseas prices that discouraged importers, it said. India imports natural rubber mainly from Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam and Malaysia. On Monday, prices of natural rubber in India jumped to a three-year high on thin supplies and tracking gains in overseas markets due to supply disruptions in top producer Thailand, dealers said. (Reporting by Rajendra Jadhav; Editing by Amrutha Gayathri) African Union leaders on Monday elected Chads candidate to chair the 54-nation body, headquartered in the Ethiopian capital.In the election held at a summit, Chadian Foreign Minister Moussa Faki Mahamat beat Kenyas top diplomat Amina Mohamed to secure the post as head of the commission of the AU, Reuters reports.He secured 39 votes in the final round. Faki, born in 1960, has served as foreign minister since 2008. His previous posts also included a stint as prime minister.Outgoing commissioner, South Africas Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, stayed in post an extra six months after leaders failed to agree on a candidate in July.She is now tipped as a contender to succeed her ex-husband, Jacob Zuma, as South Africas president.Other issues being discussed at the summit include whether to approve the re-admission of Morocco.The North African kingdom quit the AUs predecessor, the Organisation of African Unity, three decades ago amid a dispute over the bodys recognition of Western Sahara, most of which has been controlled by Morocco since 1976.The issue of International Criminal Court (ICC), which countries such as South Africa and Kenya say is a tool of Western imperialism is also being discussed.However, Nigeria, Botswana and others insist state the Hague-based court is an important legal backstop for countries whose domestic justice systems have been compromised by civil conflict. Happy New Month Nigeria! Welcome to the month of June. As the world searches for a respite from all its troubles since 2020 began, one can ... Surveying his sprawling car dealership on the fringes of Benins commercial hub Cotonou, Kassem Hijazi alternates between chainsmoking M... Surveying his sprawling car dealership on the fringes of Benins commercial hub Cotonou, Kassem Hijazi alternates between chainsmoking Marlboro cigarettes and puffing on a hookah. He and his colleagues dont have much else to do. There hasnt been a single customer since December, when neighbouring Nigeria banned car imports by land as part of a wave of protectionist policies that are strangling Benins economy.We spend our days smoking, its our life now, Hijazi sighs, sitting in a gazebo beside his stock of thousands of cars steadily accumulating the dry winter dust. This afternoon, Hijazi who, like the vast majority of car dealers in Benin, is Lebanese called in his Beninese accountant to help close up shop. Debts are accumulating and the stress is becoming too much. I lost in one year what I have earned in 16, Ali Assi, another car dealer, told AFP. Of the 2,500 Lebanese dealers in Cotonou, 1,600 have packed up and left in the last six months, shutting down businesses that employed dozens of drivers, cleaners and security staff.Unemployed people used to come here to find work, said Vincent Gouton, who represents a group of car dealership managers in Cotonou. The Benin car market began its free fall last year when neighbouring Nigeria entered its first recession since 1994. Nigeria, an economic behemoth of 190 million people, gobbles up 99 percent of car exports in Benin, according to Gouton. Benin, a tiny country with scarce natural resources, relies on its port business to survive. From the port city of Cotonou, imported cars, fabrics, and food from all over the world get distributed across west Africa.But since the Nigerian economy crashed following the collapse in global oil prices, Benin has been suffering knock-on effects. Nigerian President Muhammadu Buharis protectionist policies his government has banned a slew of items including cars imported by land has only aggravated the situation. Encourage smuggling This decision will encourage smuggling, its back to square one, Gouton said. Several agreements were signed in the past between Benin and Nigeria to facilitate legal trade. But Nigeria accuses Beninese customs of failing to monitor the exported goods and collect taxes. Buhari hopes that closing land borders will revitalise Nigerian industries and attract business to the port at Lagos, Nigerias economic capital and largest city. Today over 20 products the list has never been officially published are banned from being imported overland. For the past 18 months, we have seen a lot of policies that are not market friendly, said Nigerian economist Nonso Obikili. The self-sufficiency policy has led the government to create all sorts of hostile environments around import, Obikili said. The government wants to ban palm oil (imports) but our plantations are not ready to meet local demand, and it takes two years to get oil from trees. Its a mess, Obikili told AFP. And this will encourage illegal trade. Killing business It isnt just Benin which is hurting. Nigerian car dealer Olabanji Akinola said he had to fire half of his employees last week as a result of the ban. Business used to be brisk at Akinolas car dealership, located on the outskirts of Lagos. Yet now he cant pay any wages. In Cotonou, they tax 35 percent of the value of an imported car. In Lagos, its 70 percent, Akinola said. Its killing the business. The price of cars will go up, and the smuggling will increase. There are 200 roads through the bush to come to Nigeria, the borders are porous, Akinola said. This morning, customers begged me on my knees to lower my prices, but I cannot, Akinola said. Ultimately, it may only be the Nigerian government who benefits from the import ban. In 2016, customs seized 307 contraband vehicles, worth nearly 5 billion naira (about 15 million euros). The figure is expected to rise in 2017. Human rights activist, Femi Falana (SAN), has lamented that President Muhammadu Buhari was slow in handling Nigerias affairs. Human rights activist, Femi Falana (SAN), has lamented that President Muhammadu Buhari was slow in handling Nigerias affairs.Speaking on the status of the Acting Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Walter Onnoghen, whose acting tenure expires in less than two weeks, Falana described the situation as worrisome.The Buhari administration claims the delay is occasioned by the investigation of some justices of the Supreme Court, he told The Interview.But it should not take eternity to conduct the probe. The government should ensure that the investigation is concluded as soon as possible.The risk is that the delay may be politicised or even ethnicised. More dangerously, the Senate that will eventually confirm the nominee may be tempted to influence the decisions of the Supreme Court.That is what the delay in confirming the appointment of Mr. Ibrahim Magu as Economic and Financial Crimes Commission chairman has caused. The government must avoid a situation whereby the confirming authority is setting down conditions for the confirmation of the nominee for the post of the CJN.Asked if he thinks government might put Onnoghens name forward at the last minute, Falana said he could not afford to guess.President Muhammadu Buhari is generally very slow in handling affairs of state. The Senate has gone on recess and will not resume until February 21. In the circumstance, the acting CJN may be reappointed after the end of the mandatory period of three months.When the immediate past president of the Court of Appeal, Justice Ayo Salami, was suspended for over one year, Justice Bulkachuwa was acting president for over one year before she was eventually confirmed. In 2007, when the Senate deferred the confirmation of the appointment of the former CJN Legbo Kutigi, he was sworn in as acting CJN. The Katsina State Chapter of the All Progressives Congress, APC, has claimed that desperate oppositions were behind the death rumour of Pr... The Katsina State Chapter of the All Progressives Congress, APC, has claimed that desperate oppositions were behind the death rumour of President Muhammadu Buhari.In the past few days, the social media has been awash with series of news claiming that the President had died.The Presidency, however, denied the claim saying Buhari was hale and hearty and having a vacation in the UK.In a bid to prove rumour mongers wrong, two set of photographs were released showing the President is on vacation and not dead.But rising from a stakeholders meeting over the weekend, the state chapter of the party described the rumour as a pointer to the desperation that has overcome the opposition leaders in Nigeria.In a 15-point-communique signed by the National Vice-Chairman, North West, Inuwa Abdulkadir, the party condemned the rumour, saying it is callous, sadistic and inhumane politisation of the routine annual vacation of our dear President and Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buahri, by unscrupulous and unpatriotic opposition leaders.The party urged the National Assembly from the North West zone to fully support Buhari in his effort to provide responsive leadership to Nigeria.It affirmed its support to the seven state governors in the zone towards economic integration of the region within the context of the North West Economic Cooperation and Integration framework.The meeting appreciated the efforts of the seven state governors in the North West region in addressing the security challenges especially in the areas of cattle rustling, armed banditry and kidnapping. This effort has resulted in the region being one of the most peaceful regions in the country, the communique stated. Former aide to the former president Goodluck Jonathan, Reno Omokri has called for the arrest of the Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai ... Former aide to the former president Goodluck Jonathan, Reno Omokri has called for the arrest of the Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai for all lies during and after previous administration.Reno Omokri in a post published on his social media page said the Kaduna State Governor is one of the chief culprits responsible for spreading false information in Nigeria.So Kaduna State wants to prosecute those spreading false information? The first culprit should be their Governor, Nasir Elrufai who lied on October 1st, 2015 that former President Jonathan spent 64 billion to celebrate Independence Day during his tenure when only 332.6 million was spent, he said.Elrufai also falsely accused Jonathan of buying a private jet for pastor Ayo Oritsejafor.The same Elrufai profaned our Saviour, Jesus, by tweeting about an immoral relationship with Mary Magdalene on January 28, 2013 and tweeting again on November 9, 2013 calling then President Jonathan a lazy, docile, incompetent, clueless, hopeless, useless leader! while GEJ was praying to God.This is the man who wants to prosecute others! Talk of pot calling kettle black!!! Rotimi Amaechi, former governor of Rivers state, has admitted that his administration procured the two helicopters impounded by the Nigeri... Rotimi Amaechi, former governor of Rivers state, has admitted that his administration procured the two helicopters impounded by the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS).On Friday, customs announced that the aircraft, which were seized in November, had been handed over to the air force.The agency had said the helicopters were given to the force because the persons who imported them refused to show up and present end user certificates from the office of the national security adviser (NSA).Wike later issued a statement to debunk the claim that the importer of the helicopter was unknown.He accused customs of political propaganda and outright lies.But responding to Wikes statement, Amaechi alleged that the incumbent Rivers governor lied to former President Goodluck Jonathan that the helicopters would be used to campaign against him.Amaechi said the aircraft were procured for the purpose of combating crime in the state.Our attention has been drawn to misrepresentations and innuendoes as it concerns the immediate past governor of Rivers state and current minister of transportation Rt. Hon. Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi in the purchase and importation of two helicopters into Nigeria that was supposedly abandoned at the Murtala Mohammed International airport, Lagos, Amaechi said in a statement.Recall that when Rt. Hon. Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi took over as Governor of Rivers State, criminals masquerading as militants, kidnappers and all other criminal elements were on the prowl in Rivers state. With a strong political will to tackle these menaces and make the State a safe place, Amaechi initiated a lot of measures to deal with the menace.Purchasing these helicopters was one of the measures the Amaechi administration took to curb the clandestine and criminal activities in the state. And the decision to go for these helicopters was based on the advice and recommendation of security experts and specialists that were working closely with our Nigerian security agents to rid the state of these criminals- kidnappers, pipeline vandals, vicious political cultists etc.The federal government then was very impressed with the Amaechi administrations security plan to curb criminality in the state and supported the plan all the way. To show their support, the federal government through the office of the NSA contributed $15M (Fifteen Million Dollars), about half of the total sum, towards the purchase of the helicopters.Also, the then former President Goodluck Jonathans administration granted waivers to the Rivers state government to purchase and import the helicopters.He said when Rivers was ready to take possession of the helicopters, Jonathans government made a U-turn.Amaechi accused Wike of being an integral part, a major player in the whole conspiracy to block and prevent Rivers state government from taking possession of the helicopters.However, trouble started many months later when the helicopters became ready for the Rivers state government to take possession of them and use them to fight crime and the criminals in the land and creeks of the state, he said.The President Goodluck Jonathan administration frustrated and rebuffed all attempts by Amaechi and the Rivers State government to take possession of the helicopters.This strange twist was most baffling to the Rivers State government. It was obvious why the President Goodluck Jonathan administration acted the way it did.Then, as a minister in President Jonathans cabinet, Wike inundated President Jonathan with lies and fake stories of how then Governor Amaechi wanted to use the helicopters for Presidential campaigns against Jonathan, how Amaechi will use the helicopters to support President Jonathans opponents before and during the presidential elections and all sorts of concocted tales that created a false impression that the Amaechi government in Rivers state would use the helicopters against and to fight President Jonathan, and not to secure lives and property.Wike then, was already nursing the ambition to run for the office of Governor of Rivers State, he didnt care about the security of lives and property.It is worrisome and indeed pathetic that Governor Nyesom Wike as usual, is again playing politics with the safety and security of Rivers people. The helicopters were procured by the Amaechi administration to curb the wanton menace of criminals in the State (which has since worsened under Wikes watch), but in his usual habit, Governor Wike has decided to abandon and dump the helicopters, because he does not care about the safety and security of lives and property in the State. Sad, very sad. The senator representing Ogun East, Buruji Kashamu, has said it will be illegal to initiate another extradition proceedings against him f... The senator representing Ogun East, Buruji Kashamu, has said it will be illegal to initiate another extradition proceedings against him for drug dealing allegations in the United States.He said similar cases had been dismissed by two United Kingdom courts and a Federal High Court in Nigeria.At a briefing in Lagos at the weekend, Kashamu said the ruling by a US Appeal Court was twisted by the media, adding that his travails were politically motivated.Kashamu said the ruling was to the effect that the US police were free to initiate extradition proceedings against anyone in collaboration with a local police.But that does not mean the court is telling them they have the right to enter into our territory to arrest me. That does not mean our police will say come and kidnap him.But what we are saying is that they cannot bring another extradition suit against me, because the ones they brought to London were dismissed; the one in Nigeria was dismissed, he said.Kashamu said allegations of illicit drug dealing in the US were baseless because he had never been to America, adding that only fugitives could be extradited, which he was not.The senator urged the Federal Government to resist a sinister bid by his political enemies to extradite him at all cost.He also wants the government to defend the countrys territorial integrity, saying a situation where British investigators come to Nigeria for investigations and take witnesses away to testify abroad must no longer be tolerated. Can we do that there? he asked.Kashamu described the reports as the latest in a series of efforts by his political opponents to call a dog a bad name to hang it.The senator recalled that while on a business trip to the UK in 1998, he was arrested at City Airport in London and detained pursuant to an arrest warrant issued on the basis of an indictment in the US in which the name Alaji was introduced as a party to an alleged offence of importation of narcotics.I have never visited or resided in the U.S and certainly have never been involved in any business nlet alone a criminal activity whatsoever in the US, he said.He said his lawyers came across some exculpatory evidence, which the US government concealed from the courts in the extradition proceedings.The evidence, he said, was the outcome of a photo identification parade to identify Alaji held in the US Attorneys Office.Kashamu said: They took a mug shot of me and placed it with seven other photographs of black males, who had facial hair similar to mine and were about my age too.After viewing the photo lineup, Fillmore, one of the accused, said the third photograph in the lineup looked like a bad photograph of the man they were looking for.He also declared that the second, fourth, sixth, seventh and eighth photographs did not at all look like the said Alaji; my mug shot was the seventh in the lineup; that was one of the photographs that Fillmore said did not at all look like the wanted kingpin.So, my lawyers began a Habeas Corpus (a recourse in law whereby a person can report an unlawful detention or imprisonment before a court) application in the High Court of Justice, Queens Bench division, for my release and the vacation of the committal order made by the court.The English High Court, in its judgment delivered on October 6, 2000, agreed that the order for my committal was null and void, having been the product of unfair proceedings in which the U.S. government had suppressed exculpatory evidence.Kashamu said the US authorities did not appeal the decision but re-arrested him and began a second extradition proceeding at the Bow Street Magistrate Court in England before District Judge Tim Workman.Just before judgment was delivered, the U.S. government offered me a plea bargain by which they agreed to let me off with a suspended or short sentence if I would stop fighting the extradition proceedings.This offer was passed through Thomas Durkin, a U.S lawyer representing me. I rejected the offer.The Bow Street Magistrate Court delivered its judgment on January 10, 2003 wherein Judge Workman concluded that the new identification evidence produced by the US government was worthless and unreliable and that I was not the person involved in the narcotics transaction and should thus be discharged, the Senator said.Kashamu said there was a conspiracy against him, which culminated in a failed attempt to abduct him in 2015.When I became aware of these moves I began an action at the Federal High Court in Lagos against the AGF seeking an interpretation of the Nigerian Extradition Act and determination of some questions as to whether the AGF could exercise his powers under that Act against me.Prior to this, I had been elected a senator. My political foes, who were coincidentally dealing with a major defeat at the presidential elections, sought to sink with as many people as they could.I consequently filed an application for the enforcement of my fundamental rights. The court subsequently heard arguments in respect of the originating motion and reserved judgment to be delivered on May 27, 2015.Kashamu said the belated extradition proceedings initiated by the Federal Government did not include a request for his extradition by the US authorities as prescribed by the Nigerian Extradition Act. It was on that basis, he said, that the provisional warrant of arrest was set aside.Any attempt to condone or allow abduction in the guise of an extradition is an illegality and affront on our sovereignty, the rule of law, international and municipal laws.I am an employer of labour with hundreds of employees, who also cater for their immediate and their extended families. I have had more than enough distractions since this needless harassment began.I could hardly focus on building my businesses and the consequences on my bottom line and cash flow have saddled me with a N11billion deficit that I am still battling to offset, he said. (Adds background) BAGHDAD, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Iraqi Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari plans to meet the U.S. ambassador on Monday or Tuesday to express dismay at President Donald Trump's decision to bar Iraqis from entering the United States, a government official said. Trump's order has stirred angry reactions in Iraq, where more than 5,000 U.S. troops are deployed to help Iraqi and regional Kurdish forces in the war against Islamic State. Iraq has said it will lobby against the restrictions, arguing the two countries need to preserve their alliance against IS. Some members of parliament said Iraq should retaliate with similar measures against the United States. Trump's order suspends travel to the United States from Iraq and six other Muslim-majority countries for 90 days. It also puts a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the country, and imposes an indefinite ban on refugees from Syria. (Reporting by Huda Majeed; Writing by Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Mark Trevelyan) Gloria Samson, a Benue-based woman, has taken her life, leaving behind her husband and two children. Gloria Samson, a Benue-based woman, has taken her life, leaving behind her husband and two children.According to reports, one of the reasons given for her tragic action is her investment in the crashed Mavrodi Mondial Money box (MMM).She was said to have invested a N400,000 loan she procured into the ponzi scheme.The deceased reportedly took her leave on December 28, after she bade her children bye and apologised for any wrongdoing she might have committed against them.The same message of forgiveness was reportedly sent through the children to her husband, a printer, who was still at work at that time.Few hours after she left home without returning, her son, Wisdom, called his father using his mothers phone and informed him that his mother had left home for hours and was yet to return.Samson had assured his kids not to worry that she would return.Unfortunately this was not to be, as Gloria never reunited with her family.Tracing her became difficult and I had to return home around 11pm of that fateful day. The only thing I could do was to call my younger brother and brother in-law informing them of the sudden disappearance of my wife, David Samson, the deceaseds husband, told Tribune.Samson said he walked to a nearby police station to lodge a complaint of the sudden disappearance of his wife.From there, I was asked to make a statement and drop my phone number, but alas, I did not hear from them again, Samson added.It was later discovered that the woman had walked down to River Benue and drowned herself. The police recovered her body on January 2.Some of those who spoke to newsmen said the deceased was a very lively person until early December 2016, when news of the crash in MMM went viral.A foodstuff dealer identified as Madam Kate, narrated her encounter with the deceased.This woman came to my stall early December, she was so moody, unlike her usual way of life, she said.I asked what the problem was, and she told me that she had run into deep problem. She said she had collected a sum of money and put it into that business that brings in quick money but learnt that the thing had collapsed.She even threatened to run away, but I encouraged her to pray as God would intervene and she left. I did not hear from her until last Tuesday when the news came that she drowned in River Benue and her body was recovered here around Wadata.Over 3 million people invested in the scheme.Most participants of them lost hope earlier in the week when the news broke that Chuddy Ugorji, the initiator of the Nigerian faction of MMM, had fled the country with his wife, Amaka.The MMM number one guider has reportedly relocated to Philippines. The Minister of State for Industry Trade and Investment, Mrs Aisha Abubakar, says the Federal Government will support nine-year-old Nels... The Minister of State for Industry Trade and Investment, Mrs Aisha Abubakar, says the Federal Government will support nine-year-old Nelson Ashinze to realise his potential as a designer.Abubakar made the pledge during the presentation of Ashinzes brand of designs, Nelson George Clothing, on Monday in Abuja.She said that the young entrepreneur needed support to showcase his talent.The minister said that the ministry would ensure that Ashinze enjoyed the support of the Small and Medium Enterprise Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) and Bank of Industry (BoI), both agencies under it.According to her, the young entrepreneurs company has been duly registered, adding that the Nigeria Export Promotion Council (NEPC) would also assist him when his products were ready for export.We are going to make sure that he has the adequate training on entrepreneurship skills, we have BoI that will provide machines when he is in need of machines, we are going to help him access machinery from the bank.We are promoting Made in Nigeria and this is definitely a made in Nigeria initiative; so we are going to use him as one of our champions for the initiative.He is also promoting the cotton, textile and garment industries which again we are promoting, so we have a market for him and we are going to give him all the necessary support that he needs to ensure that he runs a successful business in Nigeria, Abubakar said.Master Nelson, the young entrepreneur, said that he discovered his talent on bow tie making in school during the craft class.He said he came this far with the support of his parents.His manager, Mr David Ashinze, said that the young entrepreneur was known for creative designs of handmade bow ties, pocket squares, headband and accessories with a classic touch of African prints.Ashinze said that at the age of eight in 2015, Nelson founded the Nelson George clothing where he doubles as a designer and a CEO.Since his debut production, Nelson has been able to put his craft on runway fashion platform,Ashinze said.Also speaking at the presentation, the Minister of State for Environment, Alhaji Ibrahim Jibir said that Ashinze needed not only the support of his parents but the government as well.I believe that with children like this young boy, there is hope for Nigeria.He is an encouragement to children out there, with what he is doing; the sky is his limit.Jibir, however, advised Nelsons parents not to exploit his talents, but to encourage him. Contrary to the claims by the Nigeria Customs Service that the two Bell 412 helicopters handed over to the Nigerian Air Force on Friday i... Contrary to the claims by the Nigeria Customs Service that the two Bell 412 helicopters handed over to the Nigerian Air Force on Friday in Lagos were imported by yet-to-be-identified importers, the aircraft were actually ordered by the Rivers State Government when Rotimi Amaechi was governor.It was also gathered on Saturday that the current governor of the state, Nyesom Wike, made series of requests for the release of the helicopters to Rivers when he assumed office.This is coming just as the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority declared that it was not notified before the helicopters were brought into Nigeria.Documents sighted by our correspondents showed that in 2015, the state government wrote different letters to the NCS and the Federal Ministry of Finance requesting the release of the helicopters.The Rivers State Government requested the release of the helicopters in a September 28, 2015 letter from the Office of the Governor and signed by Nyesom Wike, with reference number RVSG/GH/PRES/VOL.1/03, addressed to the Comptroller-General of the NCS, and had the title, Request for provisional release of two Bell 412 helicopters imported by the Rivers State Government for security surveillance services.In the letter, the state government said, We are all aware of the serious security challenges in the country, part of which is the recurring vandalism of oil pipelines and installations in Rivers State, which to a large extent adversely affect the economy of the country.As part of measures to tackle this challenge, the Rivers State Government has imported two Bell 412 helicopters into the country for aerial monitoring and security surveillance of oil and gas pipelines and other facilities in the state.It stated that the helicopters were fully equipped with night vision capabilities, camera and armoured plating, as well as other sensitive accessories for day and night operations, adding that the aircraft were among the transactions inherited from the previous administration.The state government stated that the aircraft were duly imported based on extant import guidelines to which invoice and Form M were duly obtained.The letter further noted that the aircraft were at the time domiciled on the premises of SAHCOL Limited at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos.It requested the NCS to release the helicopters due to the high sensitivity of the equipment attached to them, and also to avoid unbearable demurrage while awaiting a response from the minister of finance on our application for duty waiver.The letter from the governors office added, We undertake to make full duty payment in the event of a negative response to our pending application for waiver.The NCS replied the letter from the governors office in an October 7, 2015 letter that was addressed to the Rivers State governor, with reference number NCS/T&T/I&E/077/S.437, and signed by the Comptroller, Import and Exports, Jibrin M. for the Comptroller-General of Customs.The NCS, in its reply, told the state government to pursue the issuance of the duty exemption certificate for the helicopters.The letter, which was titled, Re: Request for provisional release of two Bell 412 helicopters imported by the Rivers State Government for security surveillance services, said, Reference is made to your letter No. RVSG/GH/PRES/VOL.1/03 of 28th September, 2015 on the above subject matter.I am directed to notify you, in line with extant import guidelines, to pursue the issuance of the duty exemption certificate, or in the alternative, pay the appropriate duties and apply for duty refund after duty exemption is granted by the minister of finance.Wike wrote another letter dated December 13, 2015, addressed to the minister of finance with reference number RVSG/GH/PRES/VOL1/05, which was titled, Request for Revalidation of expired certificate waiver of import duty, VAT, and all related taxes in respect of the importation of two units of Bell 412 security surveillance helicopters.In the letter, the governor stated that in 2013, the minister granted the state waivers for the importation of Bombardier aircraft (Global Vision 5000 Series), monorail equipment and two units of Bell 412 surveillance helicopters.He said, However, the honourable minister is invited to note that the waivers earlier granted on the importation of the two helicopters are yet to be utilised by the state government due to unforeseen circumstances occasioned by the inability of the previous administration to import the helicopters into the country.The governor urged the minister to consider and approve the revalidation of the expired certificate in waiver of import duty, VAT and all other taxes in connection with the importance of the two units of the Bell 412 helicopters.But in another letter from the Office of the National Security Adviser, dated November 3, 2016, signed by the Brigadier-General, AT Famadewa, for the NSA, and copied to the governor of Rivers State, as well as the comptroller-general of Customs, which was addressed to the Chief of the Air Staff, the NSA gave approval for the NAF to take custody of the helicopters.The NSA, in the letter with reference number NSA/452/S and titled, Re: Request for approval to take custody and manage two Bell 412 helicopters, however, said the approval was based on the request of the state.The letter from the NSAs office stated, I am directed to respectfully refer to your correspondence NA/905/D/CAS dated April 21, 2016 on subject. I am to convey the National Security Advisers approval for NAF to take custody and manage the two Bell 412 helicopters as requested by Rivers State government.Helicopters didnt follow civil import procedure NCAAExplaining the standard procedure needed before the importation of an aircraft for civil operations in Nigeria, the spokesperson of the NCAA, Mr. Sam Adurogboye, said, To bring a civil aircraft in, NCAA will be notified and a pre-shipment flight inspection carried out. If found suitable, then it will be cleared to be brought in.On arrival, a comprehensive audit will still be carried out on it, especially those for commercial use.Adurogboye, however, stated that the authority did not carry out any of the above processes on the controversial helicopters.Why helicopters were not released to AmaechiOne of our correspondents gathered that the then Rotimi Amaechi administration had ordered for the helicopters about two years into his tenure.However, it was learnt that when the helicopters, which were said to have been built from scratch, were already in the United States of America, the relationship between Amaechi and then President Goodluck Jonathan had turned sour.Because of this, it was learnt that the Amaechi administration was not cleared to bring the two helicopters into the country.A source, who was part of the administration, said the aircraft were abandoned at the airport in the US.The former Chief Press Secretary to Amaechi, Mr. David Iyofor, said through a text message that the two armoured helicopters belonged to the Rivers State Government, and insisted that all enquiries about the helicopters should be directed to the state government.But the NCS on Saturday said it was still searching for those that imported the two helicopters that were seized and handed over to the NAF on Friday.The acting Public Relations Officer, NCS, Joseph Attah, told newsmen that no one had come forward to claim ownership of the helicopter.He said, Investigation into the seized aircraft is still ongoing. You know that when something is seized by customs and that item is something that can be auctioned, then it is auctioned.But in this case, the helicopter is something that is useful to the nation and so, it was given to the Air Force.But despite the fact that it has been handed over to the Air Force, we are still conducting our investigations.Wike reactsWike, on Saturday, however disagreed with the Customs.He explained that he had officially written to Buhari, asking that the armoured helicopters be handed over to the NAF and wondered why the NCS claimed that the items were seized.The governor added that he wrote the letter following the high duty charged for the items and the refusal of the current administration to grant Rivers the waiver to clear the two armoured helicopters.Wikes position was contained in a statement issued by his Special Assistant to the Rivers State Governor on Electronic Media, Mr. Simeon Nwakaudu, on Saturday.The governor spoke during an interview with editors of The Sun at the Government House in Port Harcourt.The governor said, These helicopters were imported by the previous administration. When I assumed office, we wrote to the Federal Government that it was strictly for security use. What am I going to use armoured helicopters for?In any case, where will the Rivers State Government get money at this time to import armoured helicopters? The previous administration imported it because they had the money.I went to the Federal Government to give me a waiver to clear the helicopters, but the Federal Government refused. I wrote a letter to the president and assured him that the helicopters are meant for security purposes, so it should be handed over to the Nigerian Air Force.Speaking further, he said, I am surprised that they have started propaganda and political falsehood on the said armoured helicopters. What kind of country are they turning Nigeria into?We stated that we cannot pay the custom duties because the helicopters are not for commercial use. They are to be used to monitor the creeks and track criminals.I wrote to the President to give the helicopters to the Air Force. It is shocking that the Customs would turn around to claim that they impounded the helicopters. The Chief of Staff to the President admitted that I had done well when I wrote the letter to the President. Former Aviation Minister, Femi Fani-Kayode has called on Nigerians who are criticising Donald trump on his immigration order to keep quiet... Former Aviation Minister, Femi Fani-Kayode has called on Nigerians who are criticising Donald trump on his immigration order to keep quiet and focus on Nigerias internal and religious crisis.He said it was a shame that Nigerians were not talking about the killing of Christians by Muslims in the country.Fani-Kayodes reaction was in response to the outcry by some Nigerians on the social media regarding Donald Trumps executive order limiting immigration from seven Muslim-dominated countries.On his twitter page @realFFK, he wrote: You complain about Donald Trumps travel ban on Muslims but remain silent about the genocide of Christians in Nigeria.Shame on you! US President, Donald Trump's executive order may affect Nigeria's two-year visa validity entry into America if President Muhammadu... US President, Donald Trump's executive order may affect Nigeria's two-year visa validity entry into America if President Muhammadu Buhari-led federal government failed to take proactive measures.According to a recent analysis on the Trump's executive order, Nigerians will no longer be issued with American entry visas which have two-year validity.Reports claim that Nigerians who hold dual nationality will be affected if their other passport is from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen - the seven Muslim-majority countries of concern.Analysis shows that at least two clauses of the Executive order will affect Nigerians directly.Section 9 of the Executive Order states: The Secretary of State shall review all non-immigrant visa reciprocity agreements to ensure that they are, with respect to each visa classification, truly reciprocal insofar as practicable with respect to validity period and fees, as required by sections 221(c) and 281 of the INA, 8 U.S.C. 1201(c) and 1351, and other treatment. If a country does not treat United States nationals seeking nonimmigrant visas in a reciprocal manner, the Secretary of State shall adjust the visa validity period, fee schedule, or other treatment to match the treatment of United States nationals by the foreign country, to the extent practicable World leaders kicked at the weekend against United States President Donald Trumps controversial immigration order. World leaders kicked at the weekend against United States President Donald Trumps controversial immigration order.There were outrage around the world and protests in many United States airports.It was chaotic at major airports across the world as airlines adjusted their crew members to avoid running foul of the order.United States Republican senators John McCain and Linsey Graham drove home the deep implications of the order on United States security in their condemnation of the order, which bans citizens of seven majority Muslim countries in Africa and Asia Somalia, Sudan, Libya, Iran, Iraq, Yemen and Syria from visiting the U.S..It also puts a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the U.S.Sixteen Attorneys General in the U.S. have also declared the order as unconstitutional.In a joint statement, 16 attorneys general, from states including California, New York and Pennsylvania, said they would use all of the tools of our offices to fight this unconstitutional order and, until it was struck down, would work to ensure that as few people as possible suffer from the chaotic situation that it has created.British Prime Minister Theresa May said Britain did not agree with this kind of approach.May had been criticised by lawmakers in her ruling Conservative Party for not condemning Trumps decision.Her spokesman said: Immigration policy in the United States is a matter for the government of the United States, just the same as immigration policy for this country should be set by our government.But we do not agree with this kind of approach and it is not one we will be taking. We are studying this new executive order to see what it means and what the legal effects are, and in particular what the consequences are for UK nationals.Mrs May has told Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson and Home Secretary Amber Rudd to contact their U.S. counterparts and make representations about the order barring refugees and visa holders from the seven countries.Johnson tweeted it was divisive and wrong to stigmatise people on the basis of nationality.Mrs May has come under fire for not condemning the order earlier.A Conservative Member of British Parliament, Nadhim Zahawi, who was born in Iraq, is among those who have said they would not be able to travel to the U.S. while the temporary ban 90 days is in place.British Olympic champion Sir Mo Farah, who was born in Somalia and lives in the U.S., has also said it is deeply troubling that he may have to tell his children he cannot go home.The prime minister has had a conference call with Mr Johnson and Ms Rudd and instructed them to make representations to their opposite numbers in the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security, aimed at protecting the rights of British nationals.German Chancellor Angela Merkel also spoke out against the U.S. immigration ban.A spokesman said the German leader believes the measure is wrong.The German chancellor said the fight against terrorism does not justify putting people from specific background or faiths under general suspicion, her spokesman has told Germanys Spiegel newspaper.Germanys dpa news agency quoted Mrs Merkels spokesman Steffen Seibert saying yesterday that she is convinced that even the necessary, resolute fight against terrorism doesnt justify putting people of a particular origin or particular faith under general suspicion.Merkel and Trump spoke by phone on Saturday for the first time since his inauguration.Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted that his government remained committed to welcoming those fleeing persecution, terror and war.Trudeau has taken a stand on social media against the temporary US ban on refugees and immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries.Mr Trudeau underscored his governments commitment to bringing in those fleeing persecution, terror & war.The US Department of Homeland Security said the entry ban would also apply to dual nationals of the seven countries.However, Mr Trudeaus office says Canadian dual nationals are exempt.We have been assured that Canadian citizens travelling on Canadian passports will be dealt with in the usual process, a spokeswoman for Mr Trudeau said in an emailed statement.Trumps National Security Adviser Mike Flynn confirmed that holders of Canadian passports, including dual citizens, will not be affected by the ban, the statement said.Canadas Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen is a dual national who arrived as a Somali refugee.Senator John McCain (R-AZ) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) released the following a statement yesterday on the Presidents executive order on immigration:Our government has a responsibility to defend our borders, but we must do so in a way that makes us safer and upholds all that is decent and exceptional about our nation.It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trumps executive order was not properly vetted. We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defence, Justice, and Homeland Security.Such a hasty process risks harmful results. We should not stop green-card holders from returning to the country they call home. We should not stop those who have served as interpreters for our military and diplomats from seeking refuge in the country they risked their lives to help.And we should not turn our backs on those refugees who have been shown through extensive vetting to pose no demonstrable threat to our nation, and who have suffered unspeakable horrors, most of them women and children.Ultimately, we fear this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. At this very moment, American troops are fighting side-by-side with our Iraqi partners to defeat Isil. But this executive order bans Iraqi pilots from coming to military bases in Arizona to fight our common enemies.Our most important allies in the fight against ISIL are the vast majority of Muslims who reject its apocalyptic ideology of hatred. This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country.That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security.A US judge has issued a temporary halt to the deportation of visa holders or refugees stranded at airports after President Trumps ban order.The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a case in response to the order issued on Friday.The White House said 109 people were detained, and around two dozen travellers were still being held.Thousands of people gathered at U.S. airports to protest against the move.Defending his move, Mr Trump early yesterday tweeted: Our country needs strong borders and extreme vetting, NOW. He told reporters on Saturday that the executive order was working out very nicely. You see it at the airports, you see it all over.His Chief of Staff Reince Priebus denied that the introduction of the ban had been chaotic. He said that, of the 325,000 people entering the U.S. on Saturday, 109 were detained.Most of those people were moved out, he told NBCs Meet the Press programme. Weve got a couple of dozen more than remain and I would suspect that as long as theyre not awful people that they will move through before another half a day today.The ruling from federal Judge Ann Donnelly, in New York, prevented the removal from the U.S. of people with approved refugee applications, valid visas, and other individuals legally authorised to enter the United States.The emergency ruling also said there was a risk of substantial and irreparable injury to those affected.Her ruling is not on the constitutionality of Mr Trumps executive order.The department of homeland security said it would continue to enforce the measures.Ali worked for three years as an interpreter for the U.S. Army and gained admittance to the U.S. through a Special Immigrant Visa, reserved for Iraqi and Afghan nationals who face threats of violence for working for Americans during the conflicts there.He now has a green card, and returned to Iraq for his fathers funeral, only to be delayed for hours for questioning at Dulles.We are not terrorists. We are not bad people, said Ali. Its so hard. I hope they will change their minds on this position.The court case was brought early on Saturday on behalf of two Iraqi men detained at JFK Airport in New York. One worked for the US military in Iraq, while the other is married to a former US military contract employee.Both have now been released. Another court hearing is set for February.Lee Gelernt, deputy legal director of the Immigrants Rights Project, who argued the case in court, said that some people had been threatened with being put back on a plane later on Saturday.Mr Gelernt also said the judge had ordered the government to provide a list of names of those detained under the order.Judges elsewhere in the US have also ruled on the issue:In Boston, a judge decided two Iranian nationals, professors at the University of Massachusetts, should be released from detention at Logan International Airport.An order issued in Virginia banned, for seven days, the deportation of green card holders held at Dulles Airport and ordered the authorities to allow access to lawyersA Seattle judge issued an emergency stay of removal from the US for two peopleCriticism of Mr Trumps decision has been growing louder outside the US.Iran and Iraq are threatening a reciprocal ban on US citizens entering the country.Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany said even the necessary, determined fight against terrorism does not justify placing people of a certain origin or belief under general suspicion.Emirates airline has changed pilot and flight attendant rosters on flights to the U.S. as a result of the order.However, it said that U.S. flights continue to operate as scheduled.According to the International Air Transport Association, the decision caught airlines off guard.The ban applies to pilots and flight attendants from the seven countries, even though all flight crew who are not U.S. citizens already needed a special visa to enter the country.Another Emirates spokesperson said the impact of the ban on operations would be minimal.The airline employs over 23,000 flight attendants and about four thousand pilots from around the world, including the U.S., Europe and the Middle East.Etihad said on its website that dual citizens could travel to the U.S. using their non-banned passport.Qatar Airways declined to comment on the impact of the ban on flight operations.Although, on Saturday, it issued a statement on its website that passengers would need a green card or diplomatic visa to enter the U.S. Emirates and Etihad issued similar statementsIn Paris, Air France joined the airlines turning passengers away.An Air France spokesman said: The passengers arrived on flights to Paris where they were due to transfer to fights to the US. Air France took them in charge and flew them back to the airports where their trips had originated.This concerned less than 10 people in total who had arrived on various different flights. The flights were not from the countries on the (Trump) list but the passengers were citizens of the countries on the list.The spokesman said that henceforth passengers from countries on the list with tickets for the US from or via Paris would not be allowed board flights in whatever airport in whichever country.He said he didnt know how many had already reserved tickets for flights to the US who would now not be allowed to travel.He added that Air France would henceforth alert passengers to the new restrictions.Dutch airline KLM said it had refused carriage to the United States to seven passengers from predominately Muslim countries subject to a temporary immigration ban imposed by the Trump administration.A spokeswoman for KLM, part of the Franco-Dutch Air France KLM group, declined to specify which countries the passengers came from or where they were flying from.Worldwide, we had seven passengers whom we had to inform that there was no point in us taking them to the U.S., said spokeswoman Manel Vrijenhoek. There is still some lack of clarity about whom this ban affects. The Presidency on Sunday released another photographs of President Muhammadu Buhari who is currently on vacation in London, United Kingd... The Presidency on Sunday released another photographs of President Muhammadu Buhari who is currently on vacation in London, United Kingdom.The photographs showing Buhari and his wife, Aisha, came shortly after an earlier one released on Friday showing the Ogun State Governor, Ibikunle Amosun; and some persons with the President.The two photographs were released by the Special Assistant to the Presidents Wife on Media, Adebisi Olumide-Ajayi.The President and his wife were standing in one while they were sitting down in the second photograph.Buhari wore a brown pair of trousers, a sweater and a white skull cap in the pictures.Smile was noticed on the face of the bespectacled President.The photographs were released amidst increasing rumour over the state of health of the President since he announced his decision to embark on a short vacation during which he is also scheduled to visit his doctors. The U.S. says its Armys 3rd Armoured Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, is ready for any mission to protect the territorial in... The U.S. says its Armys 3rd Armoured Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, is ready for any mission to protect the territorial integrity of its allies in Europe, warning Russia over its invasion in Ukraine.U.S. European Commands Deputy Commander, Air Force Lt. Gen. Timothy Ray, gave the warnings on Monday at the units consolidation and validation event at U.S. European Command, according to a statement obtained by the Correspondent of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) from the U.S. Department of Defence.He said: these Iron Soldiers send a clear signal of our commitment as they round out our joint teams capability in a very significant way.The events in 2014, and the trans-Atlantic declarations from the Wales and Warsaw Summits, demonstrate the indivisibility and unity of the alliance in light of Russias invasion in Ukraine.These events forged a commitment, and a plan, to build our defence and deterrence posture in Europe.Know that our commitment to defence is rock-solid. We must maintain the territorial integrity of our alliance and maintain a Europe that is whole, free, prosperous and at peace, Ray said.He said the units deployment to Europe was part of Operation Atlantic Resolve, designed to reassure NATO allies and partners in the region after Russia invaded Ukraine.Ray said the arrival of the combat team was just one aspect of Americas commitment to the region through increased presence.He added that the thousands of Iron Soldiers here are a key part of our joint land, naval, air, space and cyberspace team.Be assured, the full weight of the U.S. military stands behind these sentinels of freedom, the general said.Deployed from Fort Carson, Colorado, the 3,500 soldiers and 2,000 vehicles of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team join a recently increased land, sea and air presence in the region, the Department said.It added that the arrival of the 3rd Armored Brigade Combat Team begins a series of back-to-back rotations of U.S. troops and equipment to the region.The soldiers and vehicles will mass in Poland and then disperse via convoy across seven locations in Eastern Europe for training and exercises with European allies.These forces represent one element of Americas commitment to European security, and it is ready to defend that security if called upon, it said.The U.S. forces, officials added, would train with U.S. allies and partners, ultimately leading to greater interoperability.We are invested from infrastructure upgrades across the continent, to airfields and ranges; were also prepositioning supplies and equipment and exercising with our allies and partners.We will also increase the scope and complexity of many exercises in our portfolio focusing on joint interoperability, missile defence and crisis-response operations, Ray said. Nigerias National Drug Law Enforcement Agency on Monday said they were pushing to extradite Nigerian lawmaker, Buruji Kashamu to the Unit... Nigerias National Drug Law Enforcement Agency on Monday said they were pushing to extradite Nigerian lawmaker, Buruji Kashamu to the United States on drugs.Buruji Kashamu has been wanted for years in connection with a heroin smuggling operation but maintains he is a victim of mistaken identity.The senator, who represents Ogun state in the upper chamber of parliament, claims his dead brother whom he reportedly resembles ran the international drug ring in the 1990s.He has a court order restraining the NDLEA from arresting him, we have also instituted a suit to vacate that order, and the process is ongoing, NDLEA spokesman Mitchell Ofoyeju told AFP.Well definitely proceed with the extradition proceedings, and once the court has ruled that he can be extradited then we have no choice to enforce the court ruling.Kashamu was reported as telling Nigerias Punch newspaper that there is no extradition that can be brought against me again and that he would not allow himself to be seized. Watford Manager, Walter Mezzarri has insisted Nigerias international, Odion Ighalo cannot be forced to stay at the club just as there a... Watford Manager, Walter Mezzarri has insisted Nigerias international, Odion Ighalo cannot be forced to stay at the club just as there are strong indications that Ighalo is set to move to, Chinese club Changchun Yatai.Mazzarri who spoke ahead of Watfords defeat to Millwall on Sunday said: Ighalo was always a very important player for this team, but there are times where a player can end its time with one club and make a decision on their career. These are decisions that are from the club, and from the players, and there is not much we can do about it.With Odion Ighalo we know there are some offers, but it is still too early to say anything.I just heard now there is a very important (bid), but again we will evaluate in the next days.I dont like to say all the details, because I dont know them, but I know there is more thanone, and there might be one from China, he said. Facebook engineer Murtadha Al Tameemi The last time the US was led by a Republican president, President Bush, the State Department launched a program that invited people from Muslim-majority countries to come to the US. The idea was to fight the rising tide of Islamophobia that occurred after 9/11 by inviting kids to study in the US via a cultural exchange program called Youth Exchange & Study (YES). YES was founded in 2003 and is still going strong today. About ten years ago, a high school kid named Murtadha Al-Tameemi from Iraq came to the US via the YES program, his travel expenses paid for by the State Department. Today, he's 24 and works as an engineer at Facebook in its Seattle office, and considers the US be his real home. He lives here under a work visa. In 2013, his family escaped their war-torn country and fled to Jordan as refugees. And, about a year ago, they got Canadian visas and moved to Vancouver, just a few hours from Al-Tameemi. He was finally able to see his family easily again, and he visited every weekend. Until Friday. The 'panic' zone That's when President Trump issued an executive order banning Al-Tameemi from entering the country, since he travels with an Iraqi passport. jfk airport protests Al-Tameemi was in Canada last on Wednesday, when he received a surprise call from a lawyer who worked at Facebook telling him that if he was out of the country, he needed to get back fast. There were warnings last week that President Trump was working on this order. "I got the call and the panic began," he told Business Insider. Grateful to the Facebook lawyer for thinking to call him, Al-Tameemi made it back across the border before the ban took place, but noticed that things felt different that day, writing: "The Secondary Inspection room, which I've had to visit during every single one of my 40+ entries into the US over the last two years, has never seemed so overcrowded with people who appeared from Arabic origins. There's often a mix of all sorts of nationalities and ethnicities of people in that room, but today, most of the names being called were ones like Ahmed, Fahad, Mohammed, Zahra, and so on." Story continues Now that the ban is active, he will be unable to see his family again for months. Even scarier, when he called the Custom Border Protection office for more information, an agent warned him that if he went to Canada and tried to reenter during the ban, his visa may be revoked altogether. American visas, particularly from Muslim-majority countries, take years to get. As an Iraqi citizen, if he lost his visa he might never be able to return. That's like losing your job, your career, your home, your friends, and your adopted country all in one fell swoop, with no place else in the world to go. "What makes this all the more ridiculous is that the only reason Im here in the first place, is that the US government brought me here. They covered my expenses to be here. Ten years ago, I came in a high school exchange program sponsored by the department of state, the very same entity that's now been told to ban me," he said. Terrorists vs. law-abiding, legal immigrants Al-Tameemi describes himself as a typical non-political young person. He said during the election there was a lot of talk about illegal immigrants, but he is a legal immigrant. YES program "The government has taken an official stance of 'we dont want them here," he says. "That's a direct quote from president himself. Hes referring to terrorists, but we [legal immigrants] have been lumped into 'them' and are being asked not to be here." There's now been over 10,000 kids that have taken part in the YES program and "it works," Al-Tameemi says. "I am one of the success stories of this program. I came to the US with very little knowledge about the culture and loads of misconceptions, and I learned so much. I immediately noticed the principals and values of American people, their kindness and generosity and welcoming nature. They would tell us this phrase, 'melting pot,' and it took me forever to understand. But now I cant see society as anything other than a melting pot." Al-Tameemi worries that this ban takes the US "many steps backward" with its international relationships and will actually fuel the recruitment messages of ISIS and Al Qaeda. He says they will use it to argue that America is targeting Muslims and cannot be trusted, and that's why they must join their organizations and fight. Al-Tameemi also wants the Americans who have downplayed the ban to understand how disruptive it is for the people it covers. "I was reading other perspectives, what some very Republican news outlets were saying and the word 'hysteria' kept showing up. People like me are not being hysterical. If any of these people were told, 'You cant come back into the country and you cant go to your work and you could lose your jobs, are they not going to respond in the same way that they are now calling hysterical?" 'Extreme vetting'? If travel restrictions do get reinstated for legal immigrants from the banned countries, and Al-Tameemi visits his family in Canada again, people have warned him he might still face trouble at the border. New Mexico anti-Trump protests "When the dust settles, down the road a few months, I'm hearing I'll need to be careful about what border officers start to do in screening people. Will they be asking people, 'Do you like our president?' Will they be looking at my social media for my posts? Will they construe me as being Anti-Trump and then oppose me from re-entering?" he says. If there's a silver lining to this all, it's that despite the ban, Al-Tameemi says he's never felt more supported by the American people: From the lawyer that called him to warn him to co-workers and executives at his company who have reached out to him, to strangers who have offered him support in response to his Facebook post. "This feeling of not being wanted here is so quickly offset by the outpouring of support that Ive received from people," Al-Tameemi says. "People have been saying to me, this is not OK and we will support you however we can. And I can do my part by telling my story, by speaking up." Here's his original story that he posted to Facebook. NOW WATCH: This woman is making a fortune selling $900 blankets she knits without needles More From Business Insider The Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN, has restated its support for the founder of the Omega Fire Ministries, Johnson Suleman, after h... The Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN, has restated its support for the founder of the Omega Fire Ministries, Johnson Suleman, after he was invited by operatives of the State Security Service, SSS.The security agency summoned the controversial cleric after a video surfaced showing him calling on his congregation to kill Fulani herdsmen so as to protect themselves.Reacting to rumours that CAN would send an entourage to accompany Mr. Suleman to the office of the SSS on Monday, media aide to CAN President Olasupo Ayokunle, Bayo Oladeji, said the associations leadership would not go with the pastor, but was solidly behind him.I spoke with him (Mr. Suleman) this morning. CAN is solidly behind him. He was invited to the office of the SSS; let him go. We are behind him, but as for whether or not we are going to the SSS office with him, my answer to that is no. He was invited alone. But we are solidly behind him, Mr. Oladeji said. Joe Lieberman Former Sen. Joe Lieberman doesn't think President Donald Trump is going to have much luck getting Mexico to pay for the wall he wants built on the southern border of the US. The former chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee called Trump's strategy for funding the wall "risky." "Will Mexico pay for the wall? Not voluntarily under any means that I can see," Lieberman told Business Insider this week. He explained why Trump's plan is dicey: "I suppose it's possible that the president and the administration would try to increase tariffs on Mexican goods coming into the United States and then use some of those tariffs to pay for the construction of the wall, but that's risky because it could lead to tariffs on the other side by Mexico for goods coming in from the United States and you know Mexico and Canada are our two biggest trading partners in the world." Republicans have estimated the wall would cost between $12 billion and $15 billion. White House press secretary Sean Spicer told reporters on Thursday that the administration is pushing for a 20% border tax on Mexican imports to help pay for the wall. "When you look at the plan that's taking shape now, using comprehensive tax reform as a means to tax imports from countries that we have a trade deficit from, like Mexico," Spicer said. Over 80% of Mexican exports went to the US in 2015, and the US imported $295 billion worth of goods from Mexico, accounting for 13.2% of all US imports. Lieberman also said Trump's plan is too vague. "President Trump is keeping his promises with executive orders that state an intention to do something, and that's the case here, but they're not all very detailed," Lieberman said. "He's saying 'I made this promise, I'm going to keep it, I'm going to put up a wall between Mexico and the United States, [Homeland Security Secretary] John Kelly, take care of it.' And we'll see what happens." Story continues Lieberman also noted that the flow of undocumented immigrants into the US already seems to have diminished in recent years. And ultimately, hurting the Mexican economy could end up leading to more illegal immigration. "The inflow of immigrants from Mexico has diminished insofar as we can count," Lieberman said. "Obviously, if somebody comes in here illegally, you don't know they're here but we tend to count by the illegal immigrants we pick up on the way in and it's gone down mostly because the economy of Mexico has gotten better and fewer people are coming over here for income." NOW WATCH: Mexican architects visualized Trump's proposed $25 billion wall to show how unrealistic it would be More From Business Insider lsd For nearly six years, the psychiatrist Humphry Osmond gave thousands of alcoholics LSD. The treatment was part of an experimental regimen that Osmond oversaw from 1954 to 1960. He thought the acid trip might mimic some of the symptoms of delirium tremens, a psychotic condition common in chronic alcoholics who stop drinking, and shock the alcoholics into not drinking again. But instead of terrifying his patients, the LSD trip an eight- to 14-hour affair that can involve powerful hallucinations appeared to produce positive, long-lasting changes in their personalities. Something about the experience appeared to help them "reorganize their personalities and reorganize their lives," Michael Bogenschutz, a New York University psychiatrist, said last year at a conference on therapeutic psychedelics. After a five-decade hiatus, scientists are finally returning to the study of psychedelics as a potential treatment for mental illnesses like addiction, anxiety, and depression. But the research, which has been incredibly promising so far, is still in its early stages. Most recent studies focus on "trip treatment" essentially giving someone what's considered a "full" dose of psychedelics so they trip or hallucinate. Patients in these studies have said the experience was overwhelmingly positive; many describe the trip as one of the most important experiences of their lives. But as this important research has gained steam, so too has another nonscientific trend: microdosing. People in Silicon Valley and elsewhere say they're using tiny doses of psychedelics to increase their productivity. Others say they've been self-medicating with microdoses for things like depression. Problem is, there are no existing scientific studies on microdosing, so it's impossible to say if people's anecdotal reports about the drugs' positive effects are legitimate. What you need to know about microdosing Psychedelic microdosing differs from a "trip treatment" in several key ways. Story continues First and foremost, researchers are not studying microdosing. Albert Hoffman, who synthesized LSD, is said to have described it as an under-researched area. This means that anyone who is doing it is self-administering an illegal drug there are no official experiments, no variables, no controls involved. In other words, it's impossible to use any of this data to come to any real conclusions about what the drugs are doing. (For example, someone who's taking microdoses of LSD and saying it alleviates their depression could also be taking another medication that interferes with their results.) night starry sky milky way galaxy illustration shutterstock Next, microdosing involves taking tiny amounts of a psychedelic drug several times over a few days, rather than a single, full dose that would generally cause someone to trip. In one study focusing on LSD, for example, participants were injected with 75 micrograms of the drug in 10 milliliters of saline enough to trip. By contrast, LSD microdosers report taking about 10 micrograms, or roughly one-fifth to one-tenth of a standard recreational dose, once every four days. These levels are intended to be "sub-perceptual," as an article in The New York Times notes, or "too small to inspire Technicolor hallucinations, but large enough to enhance a sense of mental flow." Again, though, the only research we have on microdosing is anecdotal. There are scattered self-reports of people doing the drug, discussion boards about the topic on sites like Reddit, and several more-organized written accounts compiled by doctors, such as those that James Fadiman, a Bay Area psychologist and the author of the book "The Psychedelic Explorer's Guide," have collected. Fadiman says people who've microdosed have reported things like enhanced creativity and fewer symptoms of anxiety and depression, but these claims remain unverified. What we know about what's going on in the brain during a psychedelic trip Scientists still can't say for sure what goes on in the brain during a trip induced by a full dose of psychedelics that appears to produce the types of life-altering experiences that people like Osmond's patients reported. Still, some researchers believe that whatever it is may also be happening to a lesser degree with several microdoses. On a psychedelic trip, "the normal hubs which control and regulate brain function become disrupted," David Nutt, the director of the Center for Neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London, told me earlier in January. "There's much greater connectivity parts of the brain that rarely talk to each other ... talk to each other." In low doses, he says, this might happen "to a lesser extent." David Nichols, a professor of pharmacology at Purdue University, told Wired magazine's Olivia Solon that it's "quite possible" that microdoses of LSD could activate the brain's dopamine pathways so as to produce a stimulant effect. woman backpacking travel alone mountains hiking Part of what's going on during a psychedelic trip has to do with the tamping down of certain brain circuits and the ramping up of others. One important circuit that appears to be subdued during a trip is the one that connects the parahippocampus and the retrosplenial cortex. This network is thought to play a key role in our sense of self, or ego. And deflating the ego appears to make people feel more connected to the people and environment around them. "The normal sense of self is broken down and replaced by a sense of reconnection with themselves, others, and the natural world," Robin Carhart-Harris, who conducted the first study of its kind to take images of a healthy brain on a trip-inducing dose of LSD, said at a conference in New York. Again, however, that's with a large dose. What happens with a microdose or several remains to be studied. NOW WATCH: What magic mushrooms do to your brain and state of mind More From Business Insider Man wanted for questioning in Little Woods murder, New Orleans police say Mark Cuban told CNBC on Monday that while he's not more bullish on stocks overall, he's extremely optimistic about the future of technology. "I think we're going to go through the biggest technological revolution we've ever seen over the next 10 years," Cuban told CNBC's " Squawk Box " on Monday. Mark Cuban is an entrepreneur, Dallas Mavericks owner and judge on the show, "Shark Tank," and has tweeted extensively about the possibilities of tech-savvy infrastructure in America. Cuban said that Netflix (NFLX) is one of the best investments for the coming revolution, even if Cuban doesn't always agree with Netflix CEO Reed Hastings. Hastings has been outspoken on several hot-button issues being targeted by the new administration, including immigration and net neutrality. "You want the CEO that is going to do what's right for his company and his shareholders," Cuban said. Donald Trump 's administration has instituted a travel ban on immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen and temporarily halted the entry of refugees. "Trump's actions are hurting Netflix employees around the world, and are so un-American it pains us all," Hastings said on Facebook. Cuban said he would prefer for companies that he invested in to be outspoken about the policy. For instance, any company hoping to hire an talented engineer working on artificial intelligence now has to consider the logistical challenges of their immigration and travel plans, Cuban said. "That type of uncertainty is not good for anybody," Cuban said. Trump's FCC pick, Ajit Pai, has told CNBC that he opposes net neutrality policies that reclassify broadband as a public utility. In the company's most recent earnings, Netflix said, "we hope the new U.S. administration and Congress will recognize that keeping the network neutral drives job growth and innovation." Cuban who as founder of dotcom-era company Broadcast.com, is not stranger to online content creation said he's long been against net neutrality. Disclosure: CNBC owns the exclusive off-network cable rights to "Shark Tank," which features Mark Cuban as a judge. WASHINGTON (AP) The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol has issued a subpoena to Donald Trump. The nine-member panel sent a letter to the former president's lawyers on Friday, demanding his testimony under oath by mid-November and outlining a series of corresponding documents. The decision by lawmakers to exercise their subpoena power comes a week after the committee made its final case against the former president, who they say is the "central cause" of the multi-part effort to overturn the results of the 2020 election. It remains unclear how Trump and his legal team will respond to the subpoena, if at all. Mark Cuban on Trump: Tweeting not leading, 'everything seems rushed' Mark Cuban , billionaire entrepreneur and outspoken critic of Donald Trump , told CNBC on Monday the Republican president has a communications problem. Everyone is waiting to see how Trump's management style evolves, Cuban said in a " Squawk Box" interview. "Everything seems rushed," citing this weekend's handling of the rollout of Trump's temporary immigration travel ban. In the first 23 hours, 109 people were denied entry upon arrival. According to NBC News, 173 were denied boarding of incoming flights to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. "Leadership can mean a lot of different things to a lot of people. But at some point, you have to communicate with people who don't agree with you," said Cuban, who campaigned for Democrat Hillary Clinton during the presidential campaign. "Just tweeting is not communicating," he continued, arguing that only a small number of Americans are on Twitter. "It's really the media that communicates with more of us." In a four-part tweet storm over the weekend, the Dallas Mavericks owner and "Shark Tank" investor wrote: "1) We already know @google @Microsoft and other tech companies have had their businesses disrupted and have had to deal with 7 country ban. "2) how many other businesses, large and small are having to deal with disruptions to the lives of employees and their families ? "3) let's not forget the disruptions and costs to airports, airlines and police depts that had no idea this was coming "4) and as @realDonaldTrump noted, FAKE PASSPORTS are a real issue. So just how effective will this ban be? How fast will bad guys react?" Earlier on "Squawk Box," presidential counselor Kellyanne Conway said there was no reason to delay carrying out the executive order. Story continues Trump tweeted about his reasoning to do it right away: "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there!" Cuban said: "Me personally, I think his tweets are ridiculous. But I'm glad he does then, because it gives us a window how he thinks and when he thinks" about the issues. Cuban said Trump is "reasonable" and seems open-minded in one-on-one meetings. "But all that is thrown out the window when he tweets and when he communicates with the media." "This dichotomy makes things very difficult for business," the Mavs owner said. For example, the travel restrictions make it confusing for employers' of foreign-born workers, Cuban said. "Now you have to give consideration to where they're from, what they're circumstances are, what type of travel that person is doing. Are they a risk?How does that impact my future hiring?" Disclosure: CNBC owns the exclusive off-network cable rights to "Shark Tank," which features Mark Cuban as a judge. More From CNBC HBOs documentary on Warren Buffett got an advance screening in Omaha on Monday, starting with images of a youngster sorting out used pop bottle caps and ending with the 86-year-old crooning Somewhere Over the Rainbow. In between, the film by Peter Kunhardt and his sons, Teddy and George, describes Buffetts investing philosophy and his buildup of Berkshire into the nations fourth-largest corporation. Business associates and Berkshire shareholders discuss his discipline in choosing the right investments and his decision to give his wealth to charity. But its the personal detail that sets Becoming Warren Buffett apart, Buffett said. It should be personal, he said. It doesnt tell the story thats already been told ... multiple times. He praised Peter Kunhardt. Its accurate. Its the way I lived my life, he said. Its what I hoped he would do. Buffett was among about 250 guests invited by HBO to view the film at the Holland Performing Arts Center. It premieres on the cable network at 9 p.m. CST on Jan. 30. At the Holland Centers Scott Recital Hall, the film was introduced by Buffetts youngest grandson, Michael Greenberg, who described growing up in Omaha and going to fine dining establishments, like Dairy Queen, with his grandfather. In the movie, Greenberg said, you will see him as a complete person. You will see he is as complicated as he is intelligent, as sensitive as he is calculating ... in short, hes a regular dude. The film is built around Buffetts personal relationships, especially his marriage to Susan Thompson Buffett. It includes family home movies and photos never shown publicly before and a detailed account of her illness and 2004 death, as well as Susan Buffetts relationship with his current wife, Astrid. Also attending the screening were George and Teddy Kunhardt. The family filmmaking business, based in Pleasantville, New York, has two more films under way, but they couldnt divulge the subject matter. Besides photos and movies from daughter Susie Buffett, the Kunhardt brothers visited Peter Buffett, her youngest brother, who said he might have some home movies in his basement. The two were rooting through boxes when George Kunhardt picked out one and said, I think this is it, recalled his brother, Teddy. It was amazing, Teddy Kunhardt said. The package had four rolls of 8-millimeter film, some of it undeveloped. At the time, they were just finishing a film on James Foley, an American journalist who was beheaded by the Islamic State in 2012 during the Syrian civil war. The Buffett film was a completely different project. For us, to meet and work with the person that the films about, in this case Warren Buffett, was a dream come true, George Kunhardt said. It was a great experience. The films opening bottle-cap segment is a re-enactment of Buffetts oft-told tale of his early market research. Based on his finding that Coca-Cola was the best-selling brand of pop, he bought Cokes for 25 cents per six-pack and sold each bottle for 5 cents, turning a 5-cent profit. The Buffetts also attended a showing of the Kunhardt film last week at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, with similar refreshments. Accounts of the showing said Buffett got two standing ovations. The Omaha showing was followed by a reception in the adjacent lobby that featured Dairy Queen Dilly Bars and Sees Candies. Both companies are parts of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., the Omaha-based conglomerate that Buffett heads. Buffetts gravelly rendition of the song from The Wizard of Oz serves as background music as the movies closing credits roll. In the film, Susan Buffett says it brings back fond memories. My dad used to rock me to sleep at night and sing, Over the Rainbow, so I have this insanely sentimental attachment to that song, she says. Ive always had a really close relationship with him. As the song ends, Buffett says, Good night, Suze. In the interview Monday, Buffett said he recorded the tune 30 years ago while on vacation in Edmonton, Alberta. If Susie woke up at 2 in the morning, I would go in and start singing, Buffett said. The only thing that might be noted is, I think she really didnt go to sleep. I think she pretended to go to sleep so Id quit singing. New U.K. Treasury chief Jeremy Hunt has reversed most of an economic package announced by the government just weeks ago, including a planned cut in income taxes. Hunt said Monday he was scrapping almost all the tax cuts announced last month by the Conservative government of Prime Minister Liz Truss, and also signaled that public spending cuts are on the way. It was a bid to soothe turbulent financial markets spooked by fears of excessive government borrowing. The move raises questions about how long the beleaguered prime minister can stay in office, though Truss insisted she has no plans to quit. She vowed to lead the Conservatives into the next general election, but many in the party want her gone. MANILA, Philippines (AP) A 24-year-old dental student from France won the Miss Universe crown Monday in a pageant held in the Philippines, saying her triumph will make the beauty contest more popular in Europe and help her efforts to put more underprivileged children in school. Iris Mittenaere from Lille city in northern France buried her face in her hands in shock and joy as the outgoing winner from the Philippines, Pia Wurtzbach, crowned her and the crowd erupted in cheers at the packed Mall of Asia Arena by Manila Bay. Miss Haiti, Raquel Pelissier, a 25-year-old survivor of the devastating 2010 earthquake that destroyed her hometown, was named first runner-up, while Miss Colombia, 23-year-old industrial designer and photographer Andrea Tovar, was second runner-up. As he closed the ceremony, the host, American comedian Steve Harvey, quipped, "I got it right," referring to his mistaken announcement of Miss Colombia as the winner in last year's pageant in Las Vegas. He was roundly criticized for the embarrassing error. "One thing I learned in life, when you make a mistake, you gotta keep on moving forward man, that's all," Harvey said. In her farewell remarks as outgoing winner, a smiling Wurtzbach thanked Harvey for making her "the most popular Miss Universe." Harvey, laughing, thanked her for making him the "most famous" Miss Universe host. Mittenaere's victory was the first by a French contestant in more than 60 years. "I think France and Europe really need a Miss Universe" after failing to win the crown for so long, she said at a post-pageant news conference when she was asked how her countrymen would receive her victory. The contest has not been as popular in France as in other countries, she said, but "French people will love it now and every year they will be watching Miss Universe." "I'm very proud to bring this crown to Europe," she said. Story continues Mittenaere said her victory would also help cheer French people following terrorist attacks in recent years. "We need good news in France and I think this is very good news," she said in response to a question from The Associated Press. Mittenaere said she would focus during her reign on helping all children, especially girls, attend school. Pellissier said surviving Haiti's quake, which officials in her country estimated killed more than 300,000 people and displaced more than 1.5 million others, and her pageant success underscored her rise from adversity because she "chose to be a very positive person and learned a great lesson from it." "If I am here today, it is because I am living my dreams," said Pelissier, who is studying for a master's degree in optometry research. She had to raise funds to compete in the pageant after her sponsors pulled out to help victims of Hurricane Matthew, which devastated parts of Haiti in October. Eighty-six candidates vied in this year's pageant, which was formerly owned by Donald Trump. A highlight was the national costume competition won by 24-year-old Myanmar model Htet Htet Htun, who carried a backdrop depicting her country's traditional puppet theatre. At center stage, she stood before the frame and mimicked a stringed puppet to the crowd's delight. Judges initially selected a dozen candidates, with a 13th picked through online balloting which drew 100 million votes worldwide. The contest was widely followed by Filipinos, known for their fascination with beauty contests, but their country came under the spotlight at a tough time. A deadly government crackdown on illegal drugs is underway and a major offensive against Muslim extremists in the south prompted extra tight security for the pageant. ___ Associated Press writer Jim Gomez contributed to this report. ___ This version corrects that Mittenaere's age is 24, not 23. LAGOS, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Nigeria has asked Goldman Sachs and the local unit of South Africa's Standard Bank to advise it on the sale of a debut "diaspora bond" targeted at Nigerians living abroad, Stanbic IBTC Bank said on Monday. Such bonds are a form of government debt that targets members of the national community abroad and Africa's biggest economy first announced plans to sell them in 2013 to raise between $100 million to $300 million. Goldman Sachs and Stanbic were due to manage the sale at the time, but the government then did not appoint any bookrunners before an election in 2015 that brought President Muhammadu Buhari to power. Nigeria is in its first recession in 25 years and needs to find money to make up for shortfalls in its budget. Low prices for crude and militant attacks in its oil-producing heartland, the Niger Delta, have slashed its revenues. A finance ministry source told Reuters this month that the country will look to issue a diaspora bond after completing a $1 billion eurobond sale. (Reporting by Chijioke Ohuocha; Editing by Alexander Smith) (Adds bookrunners, background) By Chijioke Ohuocha LAGOS, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Nigeria has asked Goldman Sachs and Stanbic IBTC Bank, the local unit of South Africa's Standard Bank, to advise it on the sale of a debut "diaspora bond" targeted at Nigerians living abroad, Stanbic said on Monday. Africa's biggest economy first announced plans to sell bonds targeting Nigerian nationals abroad in 2013 to raise between $100 million to $300 million. Goldman Sachs and Stanbic were due to manage the sale at the time, but the government did not appoint any bookrunners ahead of the election in 2015 that brought President Muhammadu Buhari to power. United Bank for Africa on Monday said the lender had been appointed as one of the bookrunners on the diaspora bond deal. First Bank and Standard Bank were also appointed, a local newspaper reported, quoting the debt office. Nigeria is the world's fifth-biggest destination for international remittances after China, India, the Philippines and Mexico, with 5 million Nigerians living abroad sending money back to relatives, according to Western Union. Remittances make up the second-largest source of foreign exchange receipts in Nigeria, after oil revenues. Citizens living abroad send at least $10 billion home annually. The diaspora bond will have a maturity of five to seven years and will be issued before the second half of the year, the newspaper reported. A finance ministry source told Reuters this month that the country will look to issue a diaspora bond after completing a $1 billion Eurobond sale this year. Last month the government appointed Citigroup, Standard Chartered Bank and Stanbic IBTC to manage the $1 billion Eurobond sale, which it hopes to carry out in March. Nigeria is in its first recession in 25 years and needs to find money to make up for shortfalls in its budget. Low prices for crude and militant attacks in its oil-producing heartland, the Niger Delta, have slashed its revenues. The government plans to borrow up to $10 billion, with about half of that coming from foreign sources. Story continues So far only the African Development Bank has confirmed a budget support package of $1 billion. The government has held talks for months with the World Bank, China and other institutions to fund the budget gaps. The government also plans to issue a debut sovereign sukuk in the local market and is looking to appoint advisers. (Additional reporting by Oludare Mayowa; Editing by Alexander Smith and Hugh Lawson) A man accused of trying to run over a Nebraska state trooper on Interstate 80 last March accepted a plea deal Monday in Lincoln County District Court. Aaron Suppes, 25, pleaded no contest to attempted assault on an officer with a motor vehicle, a felony, and first-offense driving under the influence, a misdemeanor. A charge of possession of a stolen vehicle was dropped. On March 10, Trooper J.J. Connelly pulled over a vehicle that matched the description of one that had been involved in an attempted carjacking in Brule, he told The Telegraph at the time. As Connelly conversed with the driver, he saw another car coming toward him. He said he saw the driver crank the wheel to the far right, as if he was intentionally coming at Connelly. A witness noted the same thing. The car did not hit Connelly but struck the car Connelly had pulled over. The driver of the second car, Suppes, was the man Connelly had been looking for. Court records show that Suppes was charged March 10 in Keith County Court with unauthorized use of a propelled vehicle defined as taking over a running vehicle without the owners consent. The charge is a misdemeanor. Judge Richard Birch set Suppes sentencing date for March 13. The National Wildlife Federation brings nature to life in the pages of our publications, inspiring people of all ages and reading levels to develop a deeper relationship with our natural world. To learn more about receiving magazines from the National Wildlife Federation, please visit our subscription page. For information about rights and permissions, visit our Permissions page or contact permissions@nwf.org. Northwest Indiana Bancorp, the parent company of Peoples Bank, realized the highest earnings in its 117-year history last year. The Munster-based bank made $9.1 million in 2016, a 16.4 percent increase over the $7.9 million it made in 2015. It marked Peoples Bank's fifth straight year of record annual profits. "The bancorps results this year are the culmination of a multi-year plan during which the bank invested in people, platforms and products," President and CEO Benjamin Bochnowski said. "The banks two recent mergers have also been fully integrated, and together have produced the growth that we are reporting today. As a result, Peoples Bank is better positioned to serve its customers than ever before." Peoples Bank has grown in scale after acquiring Liberty Savings in Whiting and First Federal in Hammond in recent years. It further grew assets by 5.6 percent to $913.6 million by the end of 2016, as compared to $864.9 million at the beginning of the year. "These results are consistent with our operating plan for the year, and are remarkable in that they significantly outpace growth in our core markets," Bochnowski said. "This has allowed the bank to continue to reinvest for growth, as significant investments were made in both technology and people." The bank plans to open a new branch in Highland in 2017. It has also invested in cybersecurity and credit risk management. Peoples Bank's net interest income rose 9.8 percent last year to $30.1 million. Interest-earning assets grew by 8.9 percent, and core deposit growth shot up by 11.6 percent. "During 2016, we were successful growing both our consumer and business deposit base," Chief Financial Officer Robert Lowry said. "The growth strategies along with pricing discipline increased the bancorps net interest margin to 3.85 percent for 2016. Peoples Bank has branches in Crown Point, Dyer, East Chicago, Gary, Hammond, Highland, Hobart, Merrillville, Munster, St. John, Schererville, Valparaiso, Whiting and Winfield. President Donald Trump's ban on immigration to the United States from seven predominantly Muslim countries has sent shockwaves through local colleges, which have both students and professors from those nations. Valparaiso University has about a dozen students and one staff member from the banned countries and has already reached out to them as well as the larger student community, said Jaishankar Raman, assistant provost for international affairs. He thinks the way President Trump's new executive order was announced was very abrupt, and guidelines were not in place to ensure the policies were implemented in the right way. "We are instructing our students, especially those from the seven countries, not to travel abroad. I have been in communication with other universities, and all of them are doing the same thing," Raman said. Under Trump's order, students from the seven nations could be denied entry back into the United States if they traveled abroad, even to nearby Canada or Mexico. Air travelers who had valid visas and valid documentation were told they could not come into the United States over the weekend, and that has the university worried, Raman said. Wes Lukoshus, a spokesman for Purdue University Northwest, with campuses in Hammond and Westville, said about a handful of students are from two of the countries included in Trump's ban. Purdue Northwest Chancellor Thomas Keon issued a statement reiterating the university's goal of inclusiveness and said he agreed with the concerns expressed by Purdue University President Mitch Daniels, in West Lafayette, on Sunday. The President's order related to immigration is a bad idea, poorly implemented, and I hope that he will promptly revoke and rethink it," Daniels said in the prepared statement. "If the idea is to strengthen the protection of Americans against terrorism, there are many far better ways to achieve it. About 100 of Purdues 40,000 students are from the countries named in the executive order from the White House and hold non-immigrant visas. Another 10 faculty are citizens of those countries. Multinational companies also were expressing their concerns, including Ford Motor Co., which employs thousands locally at its Chicago Assembly Plant in Hegewisch and its Chicago Stamping Plant in Chicago Heights. "Respect for all people is a core value of Ford Motor Co., and we are proud of the rich diversity of our company here at home and around the world," said Ford Chairman Bill Ford and President and CEO Mark Fields in a joint message to all Ford employees. "That is why we do not support this policy or any other that goes against our values as a company. We are not aware, to date, of any Ford employees directly affected by this policy. We will continue working to ensure the well-being of our employees by promoting the values of respect and inclusion in the workplace." At Valparaiso University, an informational session will be offered on Wednesday featuring two immigration lawyers and a couple of law professors, Raman said. "We will help students to understand what this means and also give students instructions, because not everything is clear yet," he said. Raman said it's not so easy to travel to the United States especially from Syria or other countries. Some people have had to file paperwork for years before finally being granted a visa to travel to the United States. Merrillville-based immigration lawyer Dana Rifai has been fielding calls about the policy. "It's a very fluid situation," said Rifai, of Burke Costanza & Carberry LLP. "It's a scary time. There's a sense of unfairness, that these people got visas and arranged for travel in a legal fashion just to be denied entry because of their citizenship in a particular country. It's keeping families apart." Times Staff Writer Joseph S. Pete contributed to this report. LAPORTE Preserving and documenting the city's oldest and most distinct homes isn't only about history. It is also about quality of life and economic development, said Tim Stabosz, LaPorte city councilman and vice president of LaPorte's nonprofit People Engaged in Preservation. "It is personal to me. I came from the southwest suburbs and fell in love with the place. LaPorte has an asset base of historic homes that are largely still intact. They are a value added asset to the community," said Stabosz, who happens to live in one of the historic homes in the city. Stabosz said he believes preserving the homes and businesses are a key to the city's downtown development and an attraction, not only to the heritage tourist who might spend a day or weekend in the city, but also to people, like himself, who are looking for a place to fall in love with. PEP was founded in 1994. In 1996, it began giving candlelight tours during the first weekend of December. Each year, those who participated viewed five or six homes decorated for Christmas, a historic business and a church, said PEP secretary Michele Barber. Each year they produced a brochure which explained the history of each of the homes. This year, the group is taking on a bigger project, thanks to a Heritage Support Grant provided by the Indiana Historical Society and made possible by Lilly Endowment Inc. The $10,670 grant will allow the group to self-publish a book through Infinity Publishing featuring the 106 homes highlighted during the 20 years of tours, Barber said. In addition to photographs and sketches of each home by Don Bowman, there will be a history of each home in the yet untitled book. "Many industrialists built these grand homes in LaPorte," said Barber, who has lived in the community since she was a child. Forty of the homes are designated historic landmarks. "We had written the histories and put them in the booklets. Then the opportunity to apply for the grant came that will allow us to put all the information into one place. We want these histories to exist in perpetuity. We are going to donate copies to museums, historical societies. We want to get them out there. We want to get the history of LaPorte out there," she said. "it is important because it connects us with our past and gives the community an identity. We have one of the largest collections of historic buildings." "This is really an effort putting together all the hard work we've done in the last 20 years," said Stabosz. "We thought it called for a compilations, something that we can be proud of , a feather in the cap of LaPorte, that will also bring awareness." Barber said a small group of PEP members will be working throughout the winter and spring researching and updating the history of the homes. The book is to be completed by the end of the year. She added this will not be PEP's lone attempt to secure a grant. The group itself owns two historic properties and they will be applying for a grant during the next cycle for funding to restore the former Christian Science Church on Michigan Avenue. VALPARAISO A 48-year Liberty Township man, who was shot by police in 2003 following an armed standoff, was sentenced to six years behind bars Monday for the latest in a long string of probation violations. Dale Sterling Jr. was in custody when he appeared before Porter Superior Court Judge Roger Bradford to plead guilty to being charged with theft and possessing a hypodermic needle, twice failing drug tests, failing to provide evidence of attending required 12-step meetings and leaving the state longer than 24 hours without permission. The plea agreement, which was accepted by Bradford, called for the six-year sentence with no time suspended for probation. Bradford granted a last-minute request by Sterling to be referred to a substance abuse program within the state prison system. While Bradford said he would not consider reducing Sterling's sentence if he completes the program, there could be an automatic time cut. "I can think of no one who would benefit more from Therapeutic Community than Mr. Sterling," defense attorney Larry Rogers said. Bradford too said he believes Sterling will benefit from the program before being released unsatisfactory from probation. "You're tired of seeing me and I'm tired of seeing you," the judge said. Bradford had sentenced Sterling in September 2005 to 10 years in prison with another eight years of formal probation on his original charges. The judge released Sterling after he served two years, citing good behavior while behind bars. That original case stemmed from Sterling threatening to kill himself and firing a gun at his parents' Liberty Township home May 5, 2003, before leading authorities on a chase. The chase ended along Ind. 149 south of County Road 1050 North when Sterling climbed on top of his van with a gun and was shot in the side by then-Portage police Sgt. Michael Vaughan. Sterling is son of Jacquelyn Sterling, a longtime elected official and employee of county government. Chief Deputy Prosecutor Matt Frost, who handled Monday's hearing, had said during Sterling's third probation violation in 2012 that he had prosecuted Sterling for half his professional career. CROWN POINT Two men are charged in the shooting Wednesday of a 38-year-old man during a home invasion in Hammond. Cordell Hall, 30, and Markest L. Hunter, 28, are each charged in Lake Criminal Court with two counts of attempted robbery resulting in serious bodily injury and two counts of burglary, among other lesser felony offenses. Hammond police Lt. Richard Hoyda said Monday Hunter, who is not afforded bail, turned himself into police Saturday. Cordell, who's bail is set at $100,000, remained a fugitive Monday morning, according to Hoyda. Hammond police were dispatched at about 4 a.m. Wednesday to a home in the 3000 block of 163rd Place after receiving a report of shots fired. Police learned at the scene two armed men in masks entered the home and threatened to shoot a 45-year-old woman, according to a probable cause affidavit. The men ransacked the bathroom at the residence as the woman screamed for her husband, the affidavit states. One man smashed his gun on the woman's head and shot at the husband when he exited the couple's bedroom, according to the affidavit. The husband fled back into the bedroom and jumped out a window as the men shot at him through the living room wall, the affidavit states. The man told police he ran naked and wounded to a neighbor's home and asked them to call police, according to the affidavit. The robbers then fled the home through a back door, the affidavit states. The couple told police they believed the robbers were Hall and Hunter. The husband said he knew both men for several years and he recognized their voices during the robbery, according to the affidavit. The woman was treated for a large laceration on her head and her husband was treated for a gunshot wound to the chest, the affidavit states. The couple's 16-year-old son was in the basement during the incident, but he was not harmed. The woman told police she suspected the robbers were searching for marijuana that was hidden in the house, according to the affidavit. INDIANAPOLIS The days of Hoosiers simply taking water availability for granted may be over. On Monday, the Indiana Senate voted 49-0 for legislation, sponsored by state Sen. Ed Charbonneau, R-Valparaiso, that begins the process of determining the state's current water capacity and future need, as well as how to rebuild its broken water infrastructure. Senate Bill 511, which now goes to the House, puts the Indiana Finance Authority in charge of various water studies and requires state agencies evaluating water rate hike proposals to consider long-term infrastructure replacement and regulatory costs. In addition, it aims to prevent a water crisis like that in Flint, Michigan, from happening in Indiana by authorizing water quality tests before the water source of a public utility is changed. Water in Flint is not potable without a filter after that city changed its water source in 2014 to the Flint River for two years to save costs. That water was contaminated. A recent IFA study determined that Indiana's water infrastructure requires $2.3 billion in immediate repairs, and $815 million a year in additional maintenance, to protect human health and stem the loss of some 50 billion gallons a year that never make it to a customer. Charbonneau's Senate Bill 416, creating an IFA grant program for water utility improvements, still is awaiting action by the Senate Appropriations Committee. CROWN POINT Lake County Surveyor Bill Emerson Jr. hopes to find federal dollars to offset the local cost of the Region's environmental improvements. Emerson said the National Association of Counties recently named him as one of two Indiana representatives on its Environmental, Energy and Land Use Steering Committee. "The National Association of Counties is a way for counties to join together and make their voice heard in Washington, D.C," Emerson said. He said the committee is responsible for: air and water quality, energy, land use, nuclear waste handling, pipeline safety, oil spills and parks and recreation. "One of big issues are these unfunded mandates that local government has a hard time complying with. Hammond is dealing with some of those right now with the combined sewer overflow and trying to find ways to pay for it," he said. Hammond and Munster residents can expect large rate increases in their sewer bills over the next two years to pay for $250 million in improvements to minimize sewer overflows into the Little Calumet and Grand Calumet rivers. The improvements are part of a mandate by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Justice and the Indiana Department of Environmental Management to clean up Lake Michigan. Emerson said he supports the federal clean water effort, but, "It's hard, especially for communities with lower-income households. "I am asking residents, community leaders, and business owners to contact me for any environmental, energy or land use concerns. My door is always open for any suggestions," Emerson said. DYER Dozens of residents crowded into the Town Council's recent study session meeting demanding to speak on various issues, including the towns pending resolution about the West Lake Corridor commuter rail project. The South Shore's preferred option would extend the railroad 9 miles south from a new Gateway station in Hammond to Main Street on the Munster-Dyer border. Currently plans call for a layover yard that would provide custodial service to six South Shore trains. The yard would stretch into a triangle of land bordered by Main Street, Sheffield Avenue and the new rail line to the east of the rail line. That triangle includes 11 homes that could be acquired through eminent domain and demolished. Several times during the meeting, newly elected Council President Jeff Dekker, R-2nd Ward, told the crowd that study sessions are informational only with no votes taken and no recording of comments. However, audience members continued to voice their opinions as Dekker tried to keep the study session on target. Councilwoman Mary Tanis, R-4th Wards, and Town Manager Tom DeGiulio suggested those who wanted to record public comments do so online at www.nictdwestlake.com, via email to project.email@nictdwestlake.com or by phoning (219) 250-2920 now through Friday. Some council members also indicated what they would like to include in the resolution. Councilwoman Cathy J. Lareau, R-3rd Ward, said she wanted the layover facility placed on the west side of the tracks to avoid eliminating the residential area.That comment met with applause from the audience. I dont believe this is in Dyers best interest, she said. Dekker suggested the resolution include a passage that said the Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District project would not, may not connect with any Dyer side street. Debbie Astor, R-5th Ward, attended the study session while Joe Cinko, D-1st Ward, was absent due to an unexpected work conflict. A period of public comment occurred after the study sessions adjournment; however, none of the comments were put into the official meeting record. Open houses about the West Lake Corridor have been held in Hammond, Munster and Dyer during which those for and against the plan could express their opinions and have them recorded. A federally mandated environmental impact statement for the project is expected to be completed this summer and will include those public comments. The Federal Transit Authority decision on the project will accompany the final EIS and will officially designate the preferred alternative for the West Lake line. The project will be submitted to the federal government for consideration for a 50 percent matching grant later this summer. Engineering and construction costs are estimated at $603 million with construction planned for 2019 through 2022. VALPARAISO Nour Ulayyet and her family were dealing with enough stress due to her mother's illness when President Donald Trump issued his immigration order Friday. The order created outrage across the country, with travelers detained at airports, families searching for relatives and protesters lining up at airports. Ulayyet's sister, Sahar Algonaimi, was among those detained at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport after she arrived from Saudi Arabia to help care for their cancer-stricken mother. Algonaimi, a 58-year-old Syrian woman, was sent back to Saudi Arabia. "This is a day I wish I can erase out of my life," Ulayyet said. When her mother became ill, Ulayyet asked Algonaimi to come to their home in Valparaiso, to help take care of her. Algonaimi had visited just last year and still has a U.S. visa good until June 2018. After texting to say her plane had touched down, she never arrived at the gate. A man identifying himself as an immigration officer eventually called Ulayyet to say her sister was being sent back to Saudi Arabia, where she teaches school. When Ulayyet asked why, he cited the president's executive order. "I asked if I could speak to a supervisor," Ulayyet said. "He was very nice, very sympathetic, but he said, 'Literally for me to help I'm going to be breaking the law and I'm not going to break the law.'" "My mom was in tears. My sister was in tears. I was in tears." Ulayyet said she is for the security of the country and against harm to any Americans anywhere, but this order was put into place too fast and needs to be rethought. She said it happened so fast that airport officials didn't seem to know what was going on. "They said the law passed while she was in the air," Ulayyet said. "They said there was nothing they could do." Ulayyet said if the law passed while she was in the air, that has to be put into consideration. "She did not know about it," Ulayyet said. "She's very sophisticated and well educated person. A mother, a grandmother. You can't just treat her like that with officers escorting her off of the flight." Ulayyet said her sister flew all the way over a continent and across an ocean to see her sick mom, who was released from Community Hospital in Munster on Saturday and is now in Ulayyet's Valparaiso home. She had a round-trip ticket and her stay was for only one week. "It was this country that gave her that permission," Ulayyet said. "She had a valid Visa and a valid reason. And she was not permitted in." Associated Press contributed to this report. VALPARAISO The citys advisory Human Relations Council is hoping a recent visit by the director of the Human Rights Commission in Columbus, Indiana, will encourage City Council members to hire a director in Valparaiso. Aida Ramirez, director of Columbus commission, spoke recently to about 50 residents and city officials gathered at the Valparaiso Chamber of Commerce. Ramirez said diversity and inclusion efforts in Columbus began in the early 1960s, and were spearheaded by the CEO of the Cummins engine company, J.I. Miller. Miller was a vocal proponent for workplace diversity many years ahead of his time, Ramirez said. When Miller discovered some of his employees were not able to live peacefully in Columbus because of racism, he urged the mayor to create a volunteer group to address the issue. Today, Columbus has a 12-member Human Rights Commission and a human rights department with three full-time staff members, Ramirez said. The departments annual budget is about $256,000, a tiny percentage of the citys general fund budget of $34 million, she said. The department is charged with promoting an inclusive community by enforcing the citys human rights ordinance, educating the public, challenging attitudes and systems that create barriers to equality and empowering residents to advance this mission. Ramirezs ultimate goal is to be proactive in resolving any disputes and to prevent bad publicity about her city from appearing in the media. My job is to wake up every day and not see anything bad about my city above the fold in the newspaper, she said. She said the Columbus human rights agency helps protect everyone in the community against discrimination, not just based on race, but also disability, age, gender, sexual orientation and religion. While the department has handled many types of cases over the years, the number of African-Americans and Hispanics living in the city has not grown significantly. Ramirez said the citys population has, however, increased in other ethnic and religious diversity. The lack of affordable housing remains an issue in Columbus, which is among the most expensive housing and renters' markets in the state. A 700-square-foot apartment rents for $1,100 a month, Ramirez said. Heath Carter, chair of Valparaisos Human Relations Council, said his panel invited Ramirez to speak because Columbus demographics are similar to Valparaisos. We think Columbus is a comparable city to Valpo in many ways, Carter said. Two recent initiatives in the city, ValpoNEXT and Altogether Valpo, have called for staffing on both the housing and diversity fronts, he said. Carter said the Valparaiso Human Relations Council unanimously recommends the City Council hire a full-time, management-level director of housing and community relations. The director could take on duties that Valparaiso currently contracts out, and would be a boost to the citys economic development, Carter said. The Indiana attorney general's office is not seeking penalties against a Crown Point medical lab whose patient records were found in a dumpster in 2015. Background In the spring of 2015, an employee at a Crown Point pizza restaurant was taking out the trash. In the dumpster, he saw some medical-testing equipment as well as several folders of patient medical files. He tipped off The Times, which obtained the records and turned them over to the Indiana attorney general's office. The approximately 170 records belonged to patients of My Fast Lab, a Crown Point medical testing company that had recently gone out of business. They included copies of Social Security cards, driver's licenses, insurance and voter registration cards. There were written prescriptions for lab work, medical diagnoses and results for paternity, drug and sexually transmitted disease tests. My Fast Lab was owned by Barry Walker and operated by Eryk Bilski. It was a so-called draw station, where technicians draw blood before sending the samples to actual labs for screenings. These businesses do not require professional licensing of any kind. The attorney general's office did not seek penalties against the company or its owner. "The office weighs various factors when deciding whether to pursue an abandoned records case to litigation," said Corey Elliot, a spokesman for the office. "These factors include the number of records abandoned, whether individuals were harmed by the abandonment, the availability of credible witnesses, whether the abandoning entity is an Indiana licensed professional, whether the abandoning entity is still operational, and the difficulty encountered by the office in effectively securing the records. Each case presents unique facts. The office determined that pursuing this case to litigation was not a viable endeavor." The attorney general's office has not received evidence of any identity theft or fraud connected to the records. What's next Patients of My Fast Lab who believe their documents may have been recovered can contact the attorney general's office at 317-232-6330 to obtain copies. The records are set to be destroyed July 1, 2018. Have an idea of story for us to update? Send tips to newstips@nwi.com with Follow-up File in the subject line. CEDAR LAKE An Illinois woman was killed in a two-vehicle crash early Sunday near 151st and Wicker avenues, officials said. Julia Hansen, 84, West Chicago, died at the scene from blunt force trauma, according to the Lake County coroner's office. Officers responded to the crash about 6:10 a.m. after an initial report of a vehicle on fire, department spokesman Mark Back said. Hansen was ejected from her 2001 Oldsmobile, police said. The driver of a 2007 Chevrolet pickup truck, a 38-year-old Merrillville man, was taken to Franciscan St. Anthony Health with non-life-threatening injuries, police said. NEW YORK President Donald Trump's immigration order sowed more chaos and outrage across the country Sunday, with travelers getting detained at airports, panicked families searching for relatives and protesters marching against the sweeping measure that was blocked by several federal courts. Attorneys struggled to determine how many people had been affected so far by the rules, which Trump said Saturday were "working out very nicely." But critics described widespread confusion and said an untold number of travelers were being held in legal limbo because of ill-defined procedures. Others were released. Lawyers manned tables at New York's Kennedy Airport to help families whose loved ones had been detained, and some 150 Chicago-area lawyers showed up at O'Hare Airport after getting an email seeking legal assistance for travelers. "We just simply don't know how many people there are and where they are," said Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Immigrants' Rights Project. Advocates for travelers say the chaos is likely to continue. The executive director of the National Immigration Law Center, Marielena Hincapie, said "this is just the beginning." "We're really in a crisis mode, a constitutional crisis mode in our country, and we're going to need everyone," she said. "This is definitely one of those all-hands-on-deck moments." On Sunday talk shows, White House officials defended Trump's actions. "I can't imagine too many people out there watching this right now think it's unreasonable to ask a few more questions from someone traveling in and out of Libya and Yemen before being let loose in the United States," White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said. White House adviser Kellyanne Conway described the changes as "a small price to pay" to keep the nation safe. By Sunday evening, officials said nearly all of those who had been detained were free or soon would be, but the status of some travelers was unclear. The released included nine people held at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings' office said. The people affected included a woman who was sent back to Saudi Arabia after traveling to Indiana to care for her cancer-stricken mother; a family physician who has lived in the U.S. for two decades who was held for nine hours; and a Minneapolis woman about to become a U.S. citizen who was questioned for 12 hours. Meanwhile, protests continued across the country Sunday, from smaller airports like Rapid City Regional Airport in South Dakota to one of the nation's busiest, Hartfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. Demonstrations first erupted Saturday, a day after Trump signed the order banning travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen. The president also suspended the U.S. refugee program for four months. In Washington D.C., hundreds of demonstrators gathered outside the White House, some holding signs that read, "We are all immigrants in America." Demonstrations also unfolded at Detroit Metropolitan Airport and Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, as well as in suburban Chicago, where a Jewish group organized a protest to support Muslims. Lawyers in Chicago crowded into a food court Saturday at O'Hare, some walking around with signs offering legal help. One volunteer attorney, Julia Schlozman, was among those who jumped on a subway and headed to O'Hare. "I just felt like I had to do something," she told the Chicago Tribune. A federal judge in New York issued an order Saturday temporarily blocking the government from deporting people with valid visas who arrived after Trump's travel ban took effect. But confusion remained about who could stay and who will be kept out. Federal courts in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state took similar action. A more decisive ruling on the legality of the Trump action by U.S. District Judge Ann M. Donnelly will probably take at least several weeks. Opponents and government attorneys will get a chance to lay out their arguments in filings and possibly in oral arguments in court, Gelernt said. Activists said their goal was to have Trump's order overturned entirely. Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich, known for usually tempering his public comments, did not hold back in a statement Sunday about Trump's measures: "Their design and implementation have been rushed, chaotic, cruel and oblivious to the realities" of security. They had, he added, ushered in "a dark moment in U.S. history." The president of the University of Notre Dame, Father John I. Jenkins, was also among the ban's sharp critics. "If it stands, it will over time diminish the scope and strength of the educational and research efforts of American universities," he said Sunday in a statement. And he added: "We respectfully urge the president to rescind this order." An official with the Department of Homeland Security who briefed reporters by phone on Saturday said 109 people who were in transit on airplanes had been denied entry and 173 had not been allowed to get on their planes overseas. No green-card holders were turned away from entering the U.S. as of Saturday, the official said, though several spent hours in detention before being allowed in. After an appeal from civil liberties lawyers, Judge Donnelly issued an emergency order Saturday barring the U.S. from summarily deporting people who arrived with valid visas or an approved refugee application, saying it would likely violate their legal rights. Before Trump signed the order, more than 67,000 refugees had been approved by the federal government to enter the U.S., said Jen Smyers, refugee policy director for Church World Service. More than 6,400 had already been booked on flights, including 15 families that had been expected over the next few weeks in the Chicago area from Ethiopia, Eritrea, Iran, Syria and Uganda. The bulk of refugees entering the U.S. are settled by religious groups. All that work ground to a halt after Trump signed the order. THE HAGUE, Netherlands Peter Plasman showed up at the Netherlands' national electoral commission's offices Monday to register one of the more unusual parties bidding to take part in the upcoming Dutch election a party for people who don't vote. Plasman was hardly an exception when it came to flouting convention. A record 81 parties have expressed interest in taking part in the March 15 parliamentary election. Monday was the day they all had to hand in their paperwork. Among the eclectic roster of potential players, there also is the Colorful Cow Party, which casts itself in part as an antidote to the fierce anti-Islam rhetoric of the Party for Freedom. Its website includes a recipe for a traditional Dutch mashed potato dish, prepared with Turkish sausages and Moroccan spices. Tiny splinter parties that tap into the Netherlands' long tradition of non-conformism could eat into the constituencies of the mainstream powerhouse parties of Liberal, Christian Democrat, anti-immigrant or Socialist bent. The real match-up is likely to be between the ruling People's Party of Freedom and Democracy the party of two-time Prime Minister Mark Rutte and the Party for Freedom fronted by firebrand Geert Wilders. But the tiny parties, if they manage to meet the electoral commission's criteria, will make for a colorful campaign. Plasman, a famous criminal defense lawyer, argues he wants to give non-voters a voice in Parliament. A quarter of the Dutch electorate didn't vote in 2012, and Plasman says they would have taken 37 of the legislature's 150 seats and been the biggest party if they had cast ballots as a unified bloc. So now, he wants the non-voters to vote for him. To honor their wishes, his party has a simple pledge: "We will never vote in parliament." Plasman's Niet Stemmers (Not Voters) party underscores a growing unease, even disgust, with politics as usual in a nation where the election system leads almost automatically to multi-party coalition governments and convoluted compromise decisions are the order of the day. "People want change. We need more influence on political matters," Thierry Baudet of the pro-referendum Forum for Democracy party said. "Our voice is not being heard, so we want more referenda, more direct democracy." According to rules published by the electoral commission, parties must submit lists of candidates. If they are taking part in their first election or failed to win any seats last time around, they must pay a deposit of 11,250 euros ($12,000) and hand in declarations of support from each of the Netherlands' 20 electoral districts. That is easier said than done: one of the districts is the Caribbean island of Bonaire, located 8,000 kilometers (5,000 miles) away. The official list of parties that qualified to take part in the election will be announced Friday. The NYPD has stepped up its presence at mosques around the city in response to the deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City on Sunday night. Officers and patrol cars were seen guarding several mosques Monday morning. Police say they are monitoring the situation in Canada, and Mayor Bill de Blasio has promised to protect Muslim New Yorkers. Six people were killed when gunfire erupted during evening prayers at the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center. Eight others were hurt. Two people are under arrest, according to authorities. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called the shooting an act of terrorism, and said his government would protect the rights of Muslim Canadians. New York State is setting up a hotline, and providing legal assistance, to those affected by President Trump's travel ban, as well as their families. 1-888-769-7243 is the number that families of those coming into the country can call so they can find out the status of their loved ones, if they suspect they were detained due to the ban. Gov. Andrew Cuomo had called a press conference Sunday afternoon to introduce legislation to protect airport workers' rights in the wake of a JFK Airport passenger allegedly attacking a Muslim Delta employee Wednesday night. Cuomo was then asked at the conference about the protests Saturday night at the airport railing against Trump's executive order. Trump's order, which he signed Friday, bans entry to the United States by residents of seven Muslim-majority countries Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen for the next 90 days. The Queens-native's executive order also bans U.S. entry of those fleeing war-torn Syria indefinitely, and bans the admission of all refugees for the next four months Cuomo acknowledged that the state has to abide by the executive order, and there are limits to what the state can do to fight it. However, the governor said his counsel's office and the Port Authority will provide assistance to those detained when coming from one of the seven countries. Cuomo said just before 3 p.m. Sunday that the state does yet not have a solid number of how many people have been detained at JFK Airport. They believe six people have been held at the airport, but the executive director of the Port Authority, Pat Foye, said the federal government has put a chokehold on providing that kind of information. Cuomo said the travel ban personally offends him. "As a New Yorker, I am Muslim. As a New Yorker, I am Jewish. As a New Yorker, I am black, I am gay, I am disabled, I am a woman seeking to control her health and her choices. Because as a New Yorker, we are one community. The New York community is composed of all the above." Cuomo also said at the press conference that he had to jump in Saturday night because there was a safety situation due to about 5,000 people gathering to protest the travel ban spontaneously. The governor said he wants to make sure people have the right to assemble safely. President Donald Trump says everything is going as planned with his executive order on immigration, and blamed the chaos that his order caused at the airports this weekend on a Delta Airlines computer problem, protesters, and a senator. Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,..... Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 30, 2017 Delta's IT system went down around 6:30 pm. Sunday and was restored a few hours later. However, people detained, along with officials, said they were held starting Saturday. Several people were seen being released Sunday from JFK Airport before Delta's system went down. The New York Immigration Coalition said about 41 people were detained and released at JFK Airport due to Trump's executive order. The group says two people were deported, and one, as of Monday morning, has not been reunited with his family and may still be detained. More than 100 were detained over the weekend at airports across the country due to Trump's ban, according to officials. Immigration lawyers working pro-bono are still in the airport, providing legal assistance. "These are people that have, in many cases if they are on a special immigrant visa, given their lives to the U.S. military, given their lives to the U.S," said Hallam Tuck of the New York Immigration Coalition. "So the idea they might be turned away is deeply disheartening." Trump's order, which he signed Friday, bans entry to the United States by residents of seven Muslim-majority countries Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen for the next 90 days. The Queens native's executive order also bans U.S. entry of those fleeing war-torn Syria indefinitely, and bans the admission of all refugees for the next four months. A federal judge in Brooklyn had issued a stay on the executive order Saturday, preventing deportations of people if they have valid visas. The stay, which covers the entire country, awaits further legal review. That judge's ruling, however, does not prevent people from still being detained. Trump said Christian refugees will be given priority over Muslims. The White House appears to have backed down on admission and re-admission of people from the affected countries who have green cards. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued a statement saying permanent U.S. residents from the seven countries on the president's list will be allowed to enter the country. Another travel ban protest is planned in Manhattan on Monday. john schnatter papa john's The founder of Papa John's isn't happy about where the US is headed. In his new book "Papa: The Story of Papa John's Pizza," CEO John Schnatter slams greedy executives and says regulations are steering the country in a dangerous direction away from the system of free enterprise he believes is crucial to the nation's success. "America in 2016 is on the path to becoming what Germany was in 1867," Schnatter writes in "Papa." 1867 is the year that Schnatter's great-grandfather immigrated to the US from Germany, as a young craftsman seeking work. "[Germany] was profoundly not a land of opportunity," Schnatter writes. "If you believed the wrong thing, the government attacked you. If you became successful, the government took your money. And if you dared go against the whims and will of societys rulers, the government beheaded you." Now, Schnatter believes the US is headed in the same direction. Papa John's "[F]ree enterprise is increasingly under assault by a government that grows bigger with every passing day," he writes. Speaking with Business Insider, Schnatter emphasized that he believes that regulation in the US needs to be dialed back to help businesses thrive. "You've got to have free markets with limited government, with the proper amount of regulation where you don't jam entrepreneurship," Schnatter said. In 2012, Schnatter came under fire for saying the Affordable Care Act could be "lose-lose" for Papa John's franchisees and employees, and said that the law would raise pizza prices. Papa John's shares slumped about 4.2% during the controversy, Forbes reported. Schnatter donated $1,000 to President Trump's campaign, but is wary about getting to too political these days. "As far as the politics, I have no idea," he said. "I do think we ought to give the new administration at least a chance to either do better things or to botch it." In terms of regulation, at least, President Trump seems likely to redirect the restaurant industry in a direction Schnatter would appreciate. The president has promised to eliminate "wasteful and unnecessary regulation which kills jobs." Story continues NOW WATCH: Here's where Shaq and other celebrities own fast food chains More From Business Insider Howard Schultz Some Starbucks customers are threatening to boycott the coffee giant after its CEO took a stand against President Donald Trump's executive order barring immigrants from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the US. On Sunday, Starbucks announced it planned to hire 10,000 refugees worldwide in the next five years. "We are living in an unprecedented time, one in which we are witness to the conscience of our country, and the promise of the American Dream, being called into question," CEO Howard Schultz wrote in a letter to Starbucks employees about the plan. While many customers were immediately supportive of Starbucks' actions on social media, others threatened to boycott after the letter's release. "Upon hearing about your decision to hire 10000 refugees instead of Americans I will no longer spend any money at Starbucks," one such Facebook user wrote on Starbucks' page. When .@Starbucks puts refugees before Americans safety Time for me to #BoycottStarbucks Sales will drop from me alone! Stick 2coffee please! pic.twitter.com/kwKX49tCOB MAGAMama (@tteegar) January 30, 2017 #BoycottStarbucks We put Trump in the White House We can Put Starbucks out of business They want to hire refugees over Americans go 4 it! Sandy (@sandra8301) January 30, 2017 Many said they were angry that Starbucks was hiring refugees instead of veterans. Starbucks, however, does have a program in place to support veterans and their families, hiring 8,000 veterans and military spouses since 2014. Story continues #starbucks Why don't you hire the vets instead of refugees who might really ruin your business? #BoycottStarbucks Marilynn Randall (@emjayr1942) January 30, 2017 Starbucks has no plans to end its program to hire veterans. So instead of hiring 10,000 unemployed Americans or out of work vets @Starbucks will hire 10,000 refugees to spite @POTUS #BoycottStarbucks pic.twitter.com/cPbM1FvCwu iaExtremeVetting (@nia4_trump) January 30, 2017 Other users said the plan to give jobs to refugees would make it harder for Americans to get jobs. The 10,000 hires will be spread out over the 75 countries where the company does business. Now they will hire people who don't belong here when AMERICAN high school/college students need a part time job. #BoycottStarbucks pic.twitter.com/17nip7wKmx Hutch (@LawlessPirate) January 30, 2017 .@Starbucks will hire refugees over Americans. CEO Schultz proudly implements his #AmericaLast hiring priorities at Starbucks. #BuyDunkin Small Biz for Trump (@SmallBiz4Trump) January 30, 2017 Some felt that Schultz was needlessly political in his plan to hire refugees. Anyone else sick of @Starbucks CEO's pushing HIS political agenda through our coffee and down our throats?#BoycottStarbucks pic.twitter.com/nKZCzbZknA McQ (@cultcommoncore) January 30, 2017 Schultz has long been vocal regarding his progressive beliefs as CEO of Starbucks. He endorsed Democrat Hillary Clinton for president in September, and he would have reportedly been Clinton's pick for secretary of labor had she won the election. The movement to boycott Starbucks has already inspired a counter-protest #BuyStarbucks, with supporters including actress Jessica Chastain. Hi yes can I get a salted caramel mocha with an extra shot of conservative tears? #buystarbucks #boycottstarbucks Graceful (@grace_sergott) January 30, 2017 The #BoycottStarbucks movement makes me want to #BuyStarbucks. Venti latte please. Real Americans believe in liberty and democracy. idea woman (@idea_woman) January 30, 2017 This is not the first time there has been an online movement to boycott Starbucks. In November, Twitter user Baked Alaska encouraged followers to visit a Starbucks location and tell the employees that their names are Trump in an effort to "normalize Trump" and the white-supremacist alt-right movement. When Starbucks introduced a green cup intended to promote unity in the week leading up to the election, social-media users accused the coffee chain of ""political brainwashing." Despite the protests, Schultz seems unlikely to back down from his political stances. For more news videos visit Yahoo View, available now on iOS and Android. In Sunday's letter, the CEO also expressed his support for immigrants who are part of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, as well as Mexican employees and customers. The letter restated Starbucks' policy that workers who are eligible for benefits would have the option to access health insurance through the company, whether or not the Affordable Care Act is repealed. "I also want to take this opportunity to announce specific actions we are taking to reinforce our belief in our partners around the world and to ensure you are clear that we will neither stand by, nor stand silent, as the uncertainty around the new Administration's actions grows with each passing day," Schultz wrote. NOW WATCH: 'This is not about religion': Trump defends his immigration ban as thousands protest around the US More From Business Insider Sophia Tiare Bartlow was a real-life mermaid a third-generation waterwoman known for her vibrant, bright smile but also her competitive-yet-graceful skills in the surf. The surf world is mourning the death of Bartlow, who was killed in a car accident on the North Shore of Oahu on Saturday. She was 26. Bartlow is the daughter of 1976 world champion surfer and womens surfing pioneer Jericho Poppler, who was inducted into the Surfers Hall of Fame in 2004. Her grandmother was a junior Olympics swimming champion. Bartlow, raised in Long Beach, was an accomplished competitor in her own right: She was the 2014 U.S. SUP Tour national champion; the California state champion for longboarding; and also named state champion for shortboarding in California and Hawaii, according to her website. Bartlow chased the sun, surfing Orange County during summer months and living in Hawaii during the winter. She received a B.A. in anthropology at the University of Hawaii. She had aspirations to win a world title and earn an Olympic Gold Medal. She was a surfer to the core, said Bartlows friend, San Clemente world champion paddler Candice Appleby. She was great at all (types of surfing) not to be called a waterwoman, just because she loved it all. In a 2011 video, Bartlow talked about her first memories surfing in Malibu, being on top of someones shoulders. Before that, I remember seeing a bunch of people out, just speckled little dots of pepper, she said with a glowing smile. I think something fun is going on out there, and I want to be a part of it. Her first board as a kid was bought from Katin Surf Shop in Sunset Beach, a shortboard treasure she still owned as an adult, she said. She said her biggest influence was her mom, founder of the Womens International Surfing Association, becoming the inaugural years world champion in 1976 and paving a path for female surfers. She has raised me on the ocean, inspiring a reverence and understanding for nature so great and profound, Ive yet to find the words that can describe it, Bartlow wrote on her website. She had the same dream, to be a pro surfer and follow but also make to a path for herself, Appleby said. Appleby said Bartlow was full of life and love. Her presence was liberating, her freedom to love other people and to choose joy and to be happy, Appleby said. And always be a child, to have a pure free childs heart, to frolic in the sand she was so bright and so full of life and love it caught people off guard sometimes. Its like this bright light you could barely look at it. She had a strong faith. Just two weeks ago she posted a photo of Jesus surfing a wave, his arms spread wide. With it, the words: Grant me Lord just a closer walk with thee. I know shes with Him and I know she would want me to tell people that, Appleby said. Huntington Beach surfer Mona Webster met Bartlow while out in the water at Doheny State Beach in Dana Point. She was a common face around Orange Countys surf spots. Shes goofy, fun and happy-going, Webster said. She loves to sing and hum while SUPing. Love her infectious smile and vibe. Bartlow went by the name Sea Sister Sophia. According to the Honolulu Advertiser, Bartlow was a passenger in a car driven by a 35-year-old man identified as Bartlows boyfriend, who lost control of the car and hit a large tree. Police said alcohol and excessive speed contributed to the crash. The driver, identified by news outlets as Sage Candelaria, was arrested for investigation of first-degree negligent homicide, drunken driving and driving without a license. Memorial services are pending. Contact the writer: lconnelly@scng.com While Sunday nights 23rd annual edition of the Screen Actors Guild Awards was about celebrating actors and their performances, the current political climate was rarely out of the picture. Hidden Figures the story of three African-American women who helped launch the Apollo moon program was a surprise winner for best ensemble performance in a motion picture. They are hidden figures no more! said star Taraji P. Henson as she accepted with the films cast. Fences Denzel Washington was a surprise winner of the best actor award after Casey Affleck had recently notched the Golden Globe. Im a God-fearing man, but I didnt have faith, said the longtime star. None of this is likely to derail La La Lands march toward winning an Oscar, however. As well, that films star Emma Stone probably cemented her chances by winning as the best female actor in a motion picture. The actress, who already won the Golden Globe for playing an aspiring actress, said she was thankful to be in a profession that gives people hope. The night will also be remembered for the power of Netflix as Stranger Things was named best TV drama, beating HBOs powerhouse Game of Thrones. David Harbour, who plays the sheriff on the fantasy-horror show set in the 1980s, gave an emotional acceptance speech, which like many of during the night, referenced Donald Trumps immigration ban. As we act in the continuing narrative of Stranger Things, we 1983 Midwesterners will continue to repel bullies, we will shelter freaks and outcasts those who have no homes, he said as the cast and the audience cheered. Political statements were a constant through the evening. Actors are activists no matter what, stated Kerry Washington at the beginning of the show, which unlike other awards shows like the Oscars and Golden Globes does not have a host. Introducing the first award from the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, Ashton Kutcher told the audience, Good evening to everyone in airports that belong in my America. Viola Davis won the best supporting female actor award for her role in Fences as the wife of an African-American man embittered by race and missed opportunities. She lauded her co-star Denzel Washington, who also directed the adaptation of the August Wilson play, and noted that her father was similar to the character he played. Mahershala Ali who plays a drug dealer with a heart in Moonlight, got his first SAG win for best supporting actor. Ali also was part of the Hidden Figures cast that won. What Ive learned from working on Moonlight is we see what happens when we persecute people they fold into themselves, he said. Ali told how his mother is an ordained minister who wasnt thrilled when he became a Muslim 17 years ago. But now we put things to the side, he added to loud applause. Sarah Paulson followed up her Emmy and Golden Globe wins for playing Marcia Clark in FXs The People v. O.J. Simpson, taking home the best female actor in TV movie or limited series. After her thank-yous, she made a plea for donations to the American Civil Liberties Union, calling it an organization that protects the rights and liberties of people across this country. Bryan Cranston took home the statuette for best actor in a TV movie or miniseries for playing President Lyndon Johnson in HBOs All the Way about the passage of the Civil-Rights Act in 1965. After thanking the cast and crew, the actor mentioned he often gets asked what LBJ would think of President Trump. After saying that the 36th president would wish 45 well, he then uttered one of LBJs famous lines about not fouling the soup we all gotta eat. Dolly Parton presented her 9 to 5 co-star Lily Tomlin with the lifetime achievement award. The country icon was subbing in for Jane Fonda, who was ill. Have you heard the Doomsday clock has been moved up to two and a half minutes before midnight? So this award came just in the nick of time, joked the 77-year-old Tomlin, who gave a humorous acceptance speech. Netflixs Orange is the New Black picked up its third straight win as the best comedy ensemble on TV. Star Taylor Schilling quickly thanked the appropriate people as she stood before the cast and said, We represent a diverse group of people representing generations of families who sought a better life here. Julia Louis-Dreyfus took her second straight trophy as best actor in a comedy for playing President Selina Meyer on HBOs comedy. It was the first award of the evening and helped set the tone. Whether the Russians hacked this election or not I won, joked Louis-Dreyfus, who noted her father fled Nazi-occupied France. Im an American patriot who loves this country, the Veep star added. This immigrant ban is a blemish and it is un-American. William H. Macy was a surprise winner in the as best male actor in a TV comedy for Shameless. John Lithgow was named best actor in a drama series for playing Prime Minister Winston Churchill in Netflixs series The Crown. I never would have cast myself as Winston Churchill, said the actor, who at 6-foot-4 is much taller than the real British leader. Lithgow then referenced Meryl Streeps fiery political Golden Globes speech, saying she had said what he was thinking. Golden Globe winner Claire Foy, who plays the young Queen Elizabeth II on The Crown also won best actor in a TV drama. She made a special call out to costar Matt Smith, who plays Prince Philip. http://launch.newsinc.com/js/embed.js var _ndnq = _ndnq || []; _ndnq.push([embed]); SANTA ANA Police and the District Attorneys Office are investigating an officer-involved shooting that left one person dead Sunday afternoon. Police Cpl. Anthony Bertagna said the shooting was reported around 5 p.m. at 400 South Birch St. A male suspect was reported to have died. Bertagna said detectives from the Police Departments gang detail either made a car stop in an alley or encountered a car in an alley with two occupants. The passenger from the car fled on foot through the neighborhood resulting in a foot pursuit and something occurred that led to an officer-involved shooting, Bertagna said. The Orange County District Attorneys Office was collecting information, together with homicide and internal affairs investigators. They are processing the scene and looking for witnesses, Bertagna said. Anyone with information can call 714-245-8390. Contact the writer: fswegles@scng.com or 949-492-5127 NORTH TUSTIN A deputy who came across a man with a large hammer fired two shots at the suspect in a rural stretch of unincorporated North Tustin shortly after 6 a.m. Monday with neither getting hurt, authorities said. The deputy had responded to the 12000 block of Vista Panorama after a caller told a dispatcher that a man was in the bushes with a backpack, sheriffs Lt. Mark Stichter said. A deputy located the man, who displayed a large hammer as he approached, Stichter said. The deputy fired two rounds at the suspect who was not hit, he said. The suspect immediately surrendered without further incident. The man was later identified as 52-year-old Donald Deangelis. He was booked on suspicion of possession of a deadly weapon though it was still unclear what he was doing in the bushes with a hammer. Deangelis pleaded guilty this month to drug possession charges, according to court records. The incident is under investigation. Contact the writer: 714-796-7802 or jsudock@scng.com JERUSALEM Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, who had been closemouthed on the contentious question of moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, noted Sunday that the embassy needs to be here. But he pointedly did not demand that President Donald Trump immediately follow through on his campaign promise to move the embassy made by many presidential nominees since the 1970s but never fulfilled. Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, and it is proper that not only should the American Embassy be here, but all embassies should come here, Netanyahu said before his weekly Cabinet meeting. And I believe that over time, most of them will indeed come here, to Jerusalem. The issue seemed to be put off when Trump told Fox News in an interview last week that it was too early to discuss any move. I dont want to talk about it yet, he told the network. The announcement of such a move had seemed imminent after Trumps inauguration Jan. 20. But Palestinian and other Arab leaders spoke forcefully against the move, saying it would amount to a formal recognition of the Israeli annexation of East Jerusalem, after its capture from Jordan in the Arab-Israeli War of 1967. Palestinian leaders said they would revoke recognition for Israel, and leaders on both sides worried about violence, in Jerusalem and elsewhere in the Muslim world. Israel considers the entire city its capital, and the Palestinians demand that East Jerusalem be the capital of a future state. No embassies are in the city. Most, including the U.S. Embassy, are in the commercial hub of Tel Aviv, and most world leaders say they will make no moves unless the two sides negotiate a deal on the status of Jerusalem. While many Israelis say they would like to see the embassy in Jerusalem, few count it high among their priorities, and many say it is not worth risking violence. Netanyahu has said almost nothing on the issue since Trump made his promise during the campaign to move the embassy. Farrells Ice Cream Parlour temporarily closed its Buena Park restaurant last week as the location will be remodeled under the control of The Profit millionaire Marcus Lemonis. The Buena Park location will be closed until mid-March, Marketing Director Shauna Parisi said Monday in an email to the Register. The Brea and Riverside locations will remain open to serve our guests. The makeover comes five months after Farrells aired its troubled finances on CNBCs The Profit, hosted by Lemonis. In the show, Lemonis came to the rescue, investing $750,000 in the company, which had was swimming in debt of nearly $2 million. After the show aired, Lake Forest-based Parlour Enterprises continued to spiral financially, prompting Lemonis to rescue the brand again only this time off-camera. In a phone interview Tuesday with the Register, Lemonis said Farrells owed its Buena Park landlord nine months rent to the tune of $200,000. The company had also failed to pay vendors. On several occasions, I had to loan them money to pay employees, Lemonis said. As a 51 percent stakeholder in the Farrells brand, Lemonis interceded this month when the Buena Park landlord sought to evict Farrells. I worked out a deal in 48 hours to take over the facility. I have a new lease. He said his company ML Foods plans to replace worn furniture and kitchen equipment. ML Foods also owns a majority stake of Amazing Grapes, a wine bar in Rancho Santa Margarita featured on The Profit in 2014. When the Buena Park restaurant reopens, we will have one Farrells that will be perfect, he said. Lemonis, who has invested more than $35 million in companies featured on his reality show, said hes spent beyond his initial investment on Farrells. I will have well over $1 million when its all said and done, he said of his investment. As for the fate of Riverside and Brea, he said he doesnt own those restaurants. They are run by licensees who must pay him royalties to remain open. He said Riverside is the only restaurant in danger of not meeting its obligation. I have full control of the brand, he said. If Riverside doesnt pay its royalty, their license will be terminated. Though Buena Park employees knew Farrells was in trouble, many said they were blindsided by last weeks abrupt closure. Raven Edmond, an ice cream scooper, said he and other employees received a group message through the companys HotSchedules app, notifying them of canceled shifts, effective last Thursday. The group message said Farrells had been working through a planned transition with our landlord and ML Foods. Things have progressed quickly and got word this morning that we are closing today. Buena Park will become a first prototype for Farrells. Parlour Enterprises President Paul Kramer called it a very exciting time. Some employees said they are concerned about the Profits takeover based on other changes Lemonis has made to the kid-friendly brand. After the show aired last summer, the restaurant stopped using drums and sirens for special celebrations because it was too noisy, employees said. The number of servers allowed to sing happy birthday to guests was also capped to three per table from as many as six another move to tame the restaurants loud acoustics. If you go to Farrells, you go for the noise and the chaos, said former employee Chris Byers, who quit last week. Byers said he quit last week, a day before the restaurant closed, because he was concerned about the restaurants stability. Things fell apart ever since the Profit. Lauren Galvan, a host for nearly two years, said when she first started working in Buena Park, the wait for a table was two hours. About a year later, foot traffic slowly began to diminish. After the Profit aired, she said the restaurant received a temporary boost in guests followed by a gradual decline. Its been very dead since summer, the 19-year-old college student said. Other employees had more immediate worries: Will they get rehired? Lemonis said some workers will be rehired, but others with terrible attitudes, will not. Farrells struggles come after Kramer and his business partner Mike Fleming resurrected the nostalgic ice cream brand in 2009 with the opening of Farrells Ice Cream Parlour at The Shops at Mission Viejo. Other locations followed in Sacramento, Brea, Riverside, Rancho Cucamonga and Buena Park. The comeback of the old-fashioned ice cream brand drew crowds. Diners came to relive memories of servers delivering monstrous ice cream concoctions while dressed in cane hats and pin-striped vests. Financial trouble emerged over the last two years. It has since closed locations in Mission Viejo, Sacramento and Rancho Cucamonga. Lemonis said Kramer and Fleming no longer have an equity stake in the brand. Contact the writer: nluna@ocregister.com SANTA ANA A man was shot once in the torso after, he says, a fist fight with two other men just at midnight escalated outside of Casa Del Rey, a bar in the 200 block of West Warner Avenue, authorities said. The victim and shooter both fled early Monday before officers arrived, police Cmdr. Jeffrey Smith said. While officers were still at the scene, Irvine police notified us that a shooting victim had driven himself to their city, Smith said. The man was found by his vehicle near Main Street ant Sky Park Circle. Paramedics took him to Orange County Global Medical Center with non-life-threatening injuries. What precipitated the argument was unknown. Anyone with information can report it anonymously to the Orange County Crime Stoppers at 855-847-6227. Contact the writer: 714-796-7802 or jsudock@scng.com Grocery chain Kroger, which operates locally as Food 4 Less and Ralphs, announced plans this week to hire 10,000 employees. The company would not disclose how many new jobs were aimed at Southern California but said Ralphs and Food 4 Less stores in the area are hiring. Interested parties can visit www.ralphs.com orwww.food4less.com and click on Careers at the bottom of the page. Last year the chain hired 12,000 employees. Wages for the new positions were not provided. Were looking for associates who are passionate about people and about food, and who want to make a difference for our customers, communities and each other, Tim Massa, Krogers group vice president of human resources and labor relations, said in a statement. Walmart also announced plans earlier this month to hire 10,000 people this year. Amazon said it would hire 100,000 over the next 18 months. Contact the writer: hmadans@ocregister.com or Twitter: @HannahMadans On the move Mazda North American Operations in Irvine has shuffled its senior management structure for U.S. operations. Robert Davis, previously senior vice president of U.S. operations, will assume a new role as senior vice president for special assignments. Davis will lead teams in recall compliance and cybersecurity, with a focus on upcoming legislation, regulations and compliance and their impact on Mazda and the auto industry. Tom Donnelly, previously general manager for the Western region, has been promoted to vice president of sales and retail operations, replacing Ron Stettner. Stettner leaves Mazda after nine years to pursue other opportunities. Kara Hudson, previously director of training, has been promoted to general manager of the Western region, replacing Donnelly. Richard W. Millar Jr. has joined Friedman Stroffe & Gerard in Irvine as of counsel. Millar will work in FSGs litigation and real estate and construction groups. Millars practice is primarily business, real estate and construction litigation. Leyla Riley is the new executive director of OC STEM in Corona del Mar. The group collaborates with other regional, state and national STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) networks to leverage resources. Riley has served as director of academic innovation and partnerships in the Henry Samueli School of Engineering at UC Irvine since 2011. Previously she served as the director of the MESA Schools program. Rick Sowers has been named president of Plaza Bank and the holding company Plaza Bankcorp in Irvine. Gene Galloway, who has served as president and CEO since 2009, will remain CEO. Sowers joined Plaza Bank in 2015 through the merger with Bank of Manhattan, where he served as president and chief operating officer. New ventures OSI Creative is joining forces with RP Creative Display. RP Creative Display specializes in permanent floor and counter displays, color and trim merchandising, signage and in-store promotions. Both companies are based in Irvine. Lake Forest-based Del Taco Restaurants has opened locations in Clovis and Fresno the first two stores in a development agreement in the Fresno area with franchisee Mike Sater. Del Taco also has agreements to expand with three other franchisees in central California, beginning this year in Delano, Visalia and Bakersfield. Orange Label, a marketing agency in Newport Beach, has launched Orange Social, a two-pronged marketing service that tackles social media strategy and implementation. Founded in 1972, Orange Labels clients include Chapman University, Greenwell Farms and Kahoots Feed and Pet Stores. Good works Laura Harpster of Orange received the January/February Oliver Halsell Care Award from Fairhaven Memorial Park & Mortuary. Harpster was honored for years of work with a client suffering from Alzheimers disease. Fairhaven will make a donation on Harpsters behalf to the Alzheimers Association. Fairhaven also is accepting nominations for the 2017 Oliver Halsell Care Awards. For more information and to nominate an outstanding citizen, call 714-633-1442 or email CareAwards@FairhavenMemorial.com. Milestones At least two local attorneys have been named to the Southern California Super Lawyers 2017 edition: Kay Anderle, a managing partner of Keller/Anderle in Irvine, and James J. McDonald Jr., managing partner of Fisher Phillips in Irvine. Apriem Advisors in Irvine has reached $500 million in total assets under management. The milestone follows a 20 percent year-over-year gain that was achieved without any mergers or acquisitions. Coming up EY has opened nominations for the 2017 EY Entrepreneur Of The Year Orange County Awards. Nominees eligible for consideration include not just company founders but also leaders of multigenerational family businesses and CEOs of public and private companies. Additionally, the nominees company must be at least 2 years old. Self-nominations are encouraged; there is no fee. The firm deadline for 2017 nominations is March 10. For information on EY awards, go to ey.com/us/eoy/OC. Status Update is compiled by contributing writer Karen Levin and edited by Business Editor Samantha Gowen. Submit items of interest to sgowen@scng.com. SANTA ANA A Santa Ana man who shot his sisters boyfriend to death was acting in self-defense when he opened fire on the unarmed man during a heated argument, a defense attorney told jurors Monday. Adan Rodriguez Leon, 34, faces a felony murder charge for the slaying of Paul Guzman, 39, during a mid-day argument in 2015. That Leon angered by Guzman and Leons sister for breaking into his parents home and stealing Leons tools shot and killed Guzman is not in dispute. Leon, his younger sister and Guzman all grew up on West Chestnut Avenue where the shooting would occur. Several months before, Guzman and Leons sister had begun a relationship that both the prosecutor and the public defender in Leons trial said was marked by methamphetamine use and domestic violence. Both attorneys told jurors that Leons parents had barred his sister and Guzman from being at the home. When the parents took a trip to Mexico, the attorneys said, the couple broke into the parents home and spent the weekend doing drugs and having sex. The morning of the deadly confrontation, Leon had learned that Guzman and his sister had stolen his tools, said Deputy Public Defender Jacob DeGrave, who is representing Leon. Leon showed up unannounced, Deputy District Attorney Keith Burke told jurors. After briefly speaking to his sister, Leon started talking with Guzman as the two began walking along the street. During an argument, Burke said, Guzman turned and put a beer he was holding down, then turned back around to face Leon, at which point the prosecutor alleged that Leon pulled out a revolver and shot Guzman four times. Mr. Guzman is not in a fighting stance, Burke told jurors during opening statements. His hands are at his side. He does not have a weapon. In fact, he is not moving toward the defendant. DeGrave told jurors that Leon was carrying the gun because he knew that Guzman, about a foot taller than Leon, was known to be violent and at times carried a knife. Guzman threatened to kill Leon, DeGrave said, a threat that Leon believed Guzman was going to carry out when he put down his beer. It all happened so fast, DeGrave said. Mr. Leon shot Mr. Guzman in self-defense. He is not guilty of murder. After the shooting, Leon fled on foot before getting a ride back to his apartment, where he got into his car and drove to Mexico. Mexican authorities picked up Leon days after the shooting. During interviews with detectives, Leon denied any knowledge of the shooting. If convicted of first-degree murder with a sentencing enhancement for use of a firearm, Leon would face up to life in prison. Contact the writer: semery@ocregister.com YANGON, Myanmar U Ko Ni, a prominent human rights lawyer and a legal adviser to Myanmars leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, was fatally shot Sunday at Yangon International Airport. Ko Ni, 65, a Muslim and member of the ruling National League for Democracy, was returning from Indonesia with about 20 other government officials and civic leaders, who had traveled there as part of a government-organized trip to discuss democracy and conflict resolution. He was shot in the head at close range as he was about to leave the airport in his family car, according to witnesses. During the shooting, he was holding his grandchild, said U Aung Myint Oo, an airport security guard. He fell down bleeding on the ground and died on the spot. As he attempted to flee, the gunman shot and killed a taxi driver who had tried to stop him. Other taxi drivers detained him until the police arrived and arrested him, seizing two handguns. The gunman was identified by police as U Kyi Lin from Mandalay. According to taxi drivers who witnessed the attack, the gunman shouted, You cant act like that, before opening fire. No motive for the murder has been given. Ko Ni was one of the best-known Muslims in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, serving as a legal adviser to the NLD. He was the author of six books on human rights issues and democratic elections. It seems the gunman knew the exact time of his arrival and was waiting to shoot him, said a member of the team who traveled with Ko Ni to Indonesia, and who spoke on the condition of anonymity over concern for his safety. I was shocked and scared. It is unsafe here. A spokesman for the NLD, U Win Htein, said Ko Ni was a key adviser in recent years to Suu Kyi, the former opposition leader turned leader of Myanmar, on constitutional amendments. His assassination was a big blow to the National League for Democracy, and it would be very difficult for us to replace him, Win Htein said. We lost a hero. It is a bad situation here. What started out as a friendly wager on Facebook turned into an epic pizza battle Sunday in Orange between old-school chefs and culinary rookies. The challenge: Who can make the best pizza a veteran team led by master baker Dean Kim of OC Baking Co. or a team led by young chefs Chad Urata and Brent Omeste. Urata and Omeste are preparing to open a pizza and taco joint in Lake Forest dubbed Centro Collective. Last month, the chefs challenged Kim and master pizza maker Sandro Nardone to a pizza battle. It was a joke, but Kim who loves a good bet took it seriously. He organized a team of culinary veterans for a pizza throwdown pitting the confident young chefs against seasoned veterans. The challenge turned into a fundraiser benefiting Brackens Kitchen, a local food truck that serves free top-quality dishes for the poor and the homeless. On Sunday, more than 200 people crowded OC Baking Co. in Orange to watch the two teams go head-to-head. Many of the chefs, including Kim, had been working for days perfecting their recipes. I havent gone to bed for two days, he said. In addition to Nardone, Kims team included Bill Bracken, Dee Nguyen of Break of Dawn, Tarit Tanjasiri of Crema Cafe, Greg Daniels of Haven Gastropub and Lisa Gilmore of Orange Home Grown Farmers and Artisan Market. The Old School team got a late assist from Michael Rossi. The executive chef at The Ranch Restaurant in Anaheim prepared a kimchi topping for the pizza, which was 6 feet by 7 feet and had a thick focaccia-style crust. Each chef designed their own section of the pizza, which had to be hauled into the oven with a forklift. Urata and Omestes New School team included Jeff Moore of Eats Kitchen & Bar at Hotel Irvine, Dino Duarte of Vaca, Trevor Kotchek of Sgt. Pepperonis Pizza and Richard Soto of Cucina Enoteca. They went with a simpler but larger 9.5-foot-wide pizza. They made an Italian sausage pizza with a thin and crunchy crust. Crowds followed each team as they loaded their pizzas into Kims state-of-the-art ovens. This is way bigger than we expected, Urata said. After the pizzas were cut, ticket holders voted for their favorite. At the end of the three-hour event, Old Schools flavorful pizzas topped with everything from duck confit to fried egg edged out the rookies. The Old School chefs playfully swatted the rookies with a pizza paddle a symbolic gesture of the culinary whupping they had been handed. With hundreds of dollars raised, Brackens final words drew applause from the crowd: The true winners are the people who we feed in Orange County. Contact the writer: nluna@ocregister.com QUEBEC CITY The 27-year-old suspect in a terrorist attack against Muslims at a Quebec City mosque was charged Monday with six counts of first degree murder and five counts of attempted murder. Alexandre Bissonnette was known for taking right-wing, nationalist positions and supporting the French far-right party of Marine Le Pen. The shooting during evening prayers Sunday left six people dead in an attack that Canadas prime minister called an act of terrorism against Muslims. Bissonnette has Le Pen and U.S. President Donald Trump as likes on his Facebook profile, and Franois Deschamps, an official with a refugee advocacy group, said he was known for his far-right views. Its with pain and anger that we learn the identity of terrorist Alexandre Bissonnette, unfortunately known to many activists in Quebec for taking nationalist, pro-Le Pen and anti-feminist positions at Laval University and on social media, he wrote on the Facebook page of the group, Bienvenues aux Refugis, or Welcome to Refugees. More than 50 people were at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre when the shooting erupted. In addition to the six who died, five were in critical condition and 12 others suffered minor injuries, University of Quebec Hospital Centre spokeswoman Genevieve Dupuis said Monday. The dead ranged in age from 39 to 60. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard both characterized the attack as a terrorist act, which came amid heightened tensions worldwide over Trumps travel ban on seven Muslim countries. Trudeau said in Parliament the victims were targeted simply because of their religion and spoke directly to the more than 1 million Muslims who live in Canada, saying, We are with you. Thirty-six million hearts are breaking with yours, Trudeau said. Know that we value you. The suspect was arrested in his car on a bridge near dOrleans, where he called 911 to say he wanted to cooperate with police. Authorities, who initially named two suspects, said the other man taken into custody was a witness to the attack and was released earlier Monday. They said they did not believe there were other suspects but were investigating. Police did not give a motive for the attack. Trump called Trudeau to express condolences to the Canadian people and to offer any assistance that might be needed. The White House pointed to the attack as an example of why Trumps policies were needed. We condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms. Its a terrible reminder of why we must remain vigilant and why the president is taking steps to be pro-active, rather than reactive when it comes to our nations safety and security, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said. The victims were businessmen, a university professor and others who had gathered for evening prayers, said Mohamed Labidi, the vice president of the mosque. Its a very, very big tragedy for us, Labidi said tearfully. We have a sadness we cannot express. He said the victims were shot in the back. Security at our mosque was our major, major concern, he said. But we were caught off guard. The shooting took place just before 8 p.m. Sunday. Witnesses described chaos as worshippers scrambled to find friends and loved ones, as police responding to the scene called for backup. Canada is generally welcoming toward immigrants and all religions, but the French-speaking province of Quebec has had a long-simmering debate about race and religious accommodation. The previous separatist government of the province called for a ban on ostentatious religious symbols, such as the hijab, in public institutions. Couillard said he would not go there when asked if he blamed recent rhetoric in in the U.S. for the attack. Quebec is a good, generally loving society, but we have these devils as other societies have. We have to recognize that and fight them, Couillard said at a news conference in Quebec City at which he and Muslim leaders held hands in a display of solidarity. The Muslim community was the target of this murderous attack, Couillard said, adding that solidarity rallies would be held across Quebec later Monday. The mosque has been a target of hate crimes in the past, including last summer when pigs head was left on its doorstep during Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. Practicing Muslims do not eat pork. Quebec City Mayor Regis Labeaume, appearing shaken, said: No person should have to pay with their life, for their race, their color, their sexual orientation or their religious beliefs. Worshipper Ali Hamadi said he left the mosque a few minutes before the shooting and a friend, Abdelkrim Hassen, was killed. He said Hassen, who worked in information technology for the government, had three daughters and a wife, whom he had to notify of the death. Majdi Dridi of the Muslim Association of Canada said he knew two of the victims. One was a work colleague who was a father of three little girls, he said. I dont know what to say, I just hope that his family and his children can have the patience to accept what happened, Dridi said Trudeau had earlier reacted to Trumps visa ban for people from some Muslim-majority countries by tweeting Saturday: To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength (hash)WelcomeToCanada. Trudeau also posted a picture of himself greeting a Syrian child at Torontos airport in late 2015. Trudeau oversaw the arrival of more than 39,000 Syrian refugees soon after he was elected. The mayor of Gatineau, Quebec, near Canadas capital of Ottawa, said there would be an increased police presence at mosques around his city following the attack. The New York Police Department also said it was stepping up patrols at mosques and other houses of worship. Authorities are looking for three men in connection with a shooting that left a 19-year-old man with a gunshot wound to the head. The shooting was reported about 2 p.m. Saturday in the area of Pacific Drive and Roberta Avenue in Orangethorpe School Park, said Fullerton police Sgt. Jon Radus. Officers found a man with a gunshot wound to the back of his head, Radus said, but the wound was not believed to be life-threatening. The initial investigation revealed the victim, with two males, was approached by three males who arrived at the scene in a vehicle, Radus said. An argument ensued, Radus said, and one of the males pulled out a handgun, shooting the victim in the back of the head. It is not believed that the victim and suspects knew each other prior to the shooting, Radus said. The suspects vehicle is described as an older Nissan four-door, either light gray or white, Radus said. The suspected shooter was described as about 5 feet 6 inches tall with a thin build, in his late teens, wearing a white T-shirt and tan shorts. The second suspect was about 20 years old, 5 feet 4 inches tall, heavy set, with a shaved head, white t-shirt and tan shorts. The third suspect was about 5 feet 8 inches tall, 200 pounds, about 17 years old, with a shaved head, white shirt and tan shorts or pants. All three suspects were described as Hispanic. Anyone with information was asked to call Fullerton police Sgt. T. Rios at (714) 773-5758 or Crime Stoppers at (855) TIP-OCCS or occrimestoppers.org. Contact the writer: 714-796-7868 or desalazar@ocregister.com SAN DIEGO On a day in which there were more lead changes than a NASCAR race, Jon Rahm passed the front-runners on the final straightaway and roared across the finish line Sunday to win the Farmers Insurance Open for his first PGA Tour victory. Rahm, the Pac-12 champion at Arizona State a year ago, played the final six holes at Torrey Pines South in 5-under par with a tying eagle on No. 13, a go-ahead birdie on No. 17 and a spectacular clinching eagle on No. 18 to lap the compressed field by three shots. When his delicate 60-foot putt trickled down the steeply sloped green and dropped in the right side of the cup for an eagle 3 on the par-5 closing hole, Rahm celebrated with two uppercut fist-pumps, a primal scream and a chest-bump with his caddie as the greenside gallery erupted in thunderous applause that lasted for a full minute. The last six feet (of the putt) felt like it took forever, Rahm said afterward, still smiling broadly an hour after the dramatic finish. When I saw it tracking (on the proper line), everything stopped. I did not hear anything . . . I truly dont know what happened after it went in. I saw the replay (on TV), my reaction, and I just dont remember doing what I did. The emotion just overwhelmed me. When Rahms last putt fell, the final group Brandt Snedeker, Patrick Rodgers and Tony Finau, all of whom had shared the lead at various times still had three holes to play. But Rahms closing eagle gave him a three-shot lead that became his margin of victory more than a half-hour later. Rahms 7-under 65 in the final round the low round of the day and the tournament gave him a winning four-day total of 13-under 275. Charles Howell III (68 Sunday) and Cheng Tsung Pan (70), two of 10 players tied for the lead midway through Sundays play, tied for second at 10 under. Five players tied for fourth at 9 under: Keegan Bradley (69), Justin Rose (70), Pat Perez (70), Patrick Rodgers (72) and Finau (71). All of them except Rose also had a share of the lead at least once. Former Santa Margarita star Beau Hossler shot an up-and-down 71 on Sunday to finish his first PGA start as a professional at 1 under, tied for 49th, earning him his first tour paycheck of $16,535.60. He finished one stroke behind former Trinity League rival Brian Campbell (Mater Dei High), who tied for 41st at 2 under. Irvine resident Brendan Steele (UC Riverside) shot a final-round 69 to finish 6 under, tied for 20th. Interestingly, Rahm, a native of Barrika, Spain who became a two-time Ben Hogan Award winner at ASU, flew totally under the radar this week until the 13th hole on Sunday. He began the final round tied for 13th, three shots behind co-leaders Snedeker and Rodgers. He also bogeyed his first hole to drop to 5 under. He remembers looking up at the leaderboard midway through the round and noticing that none of the leaders was separating himself from the pack. He said he was getting frustrated because most of his putts werent falling, but when he birdied the par-3 11th to get to 8 under, he saw he was only two shots behind the leaders Pan, Rodgers and Finau. Thats one of the reasons Rahm took a chance after hitting his drive on the par-5 13th hole into a fairway bunker on the elevated fairway. Most pros choose to lay up from the bunkers on the right side of the fairway into the deep valley fronting the elevated green. Not Rahm, even though he was 226 yards from the green. I was about to tell my caddie, Hey, how about laying up? I looked at him and he told me, Right at it, all day, Rahm said. So Rahm took out his 4 hybrid and waited for the green to clear. We had a couple minutes to wait and that wait I just visualized that shot about 15 times exactly what I wanted to feel, what I wanted that ball to do, how the contact was going to feel, where I wanted the ball to start. And then he executed the risky shot from the sand perfectly, his ball bouncing in front of the green and settling 19 feet from the flagstick. It was funny to actually see the ball fly exactly the way I visualized it 10 seconds before, Rahm said. Then he rolled in the eagle putt to tie the leaders at 10 under and celebrated with a fist pump and a yell. There would be more fist pumps and screams five holes later after the biggest eagle of his embryonic professional career the one that earned him a $1.2 million winners check and his first PGA Tour victory at age 22. NOTES After Hossler, 21, finished playing in his first PGA Tour event as a professional, he flew to Phoenix on Sunday night to compete in a Monday afternoon tournament in Scottsdale to try to qualify for next weeks Waste Management Phoenix Open. This was not the finish I wanted, but making the cut and playing four rounds out here in my first (pro event) is only helping my experience, he said. Im hoping to get better each and every week. His next scheduled start will be the Pebble Beach National Pro-Am (Feb. 9-12), another sponsors exemption. He also has four sponsors exemptions lined up in Texas tour events beginning in late March. LOS ANGELES On Sunday, more than a week after their father attended President Donald Trumps inauguration, Noah Reich and his 31-year-old brother, Adam, stood at LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal holding a sign that read: Two Jewish brothers standing with our Muslim brothers. Their blue hats read: Were still here. Reich, 27, said his mother was born in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. His grandparents were concentration camp survivors. So he and his brother know the power of what it means to be denied who you are based on your religion, Reich said. For us, we look at all the groups that stood up for us and we know discrimination when we see it. The least we could do is be here to stand with our Muslim brothers and sisters in this country. The Reich brothers brought their father to Sundays protests to show him the heart behind the Muslim community, Noah Reich said. Though he wasnt with his sons early in the afternoon, Adam Reich said his father was there soaking everything in. The brothers, who live in Encino, hope the days demonstrations open a dialogue, a healthy conversation, in the country and among family members. This is what America looks like, gatherers chanted several times over. Noah Reich agreed. Were here at an international terminal, where flights are coming in from all around the world, Reich said. People are visiting our country for the first time, and theyre really seeing that this is the beauty of America. There are people here marching, there are people here chanting people from all walks of life. At the end of the day, this is what America looks like. Bita Eghbali, a 22-year-old Muslim American, said she has family members in Iran who usually visit every few months but cant now due to the ban. Friends of hers with green cards who are in the process of receiving their citizenship wont return to Iran until they become American citizens, out of fear of being detained at airports, she said. The executive order affects everyone here, said Eghbali, a Los Angeles resident. You dont have to be Iranian or from Syria, Yemen, Turkey. All these places where there have been no attacks on U.S. soil. Matthew Spector held a sign Sunday that read: Diversity is strength on one side and Jews 4 Muslims on the other. The 22-year-old said his biggest takeaway from the protest was the uniting of all races and religions for a common cause. Even though we elected Donald Trump as president, he said, theres still a majority of people who believe in diversity, inclusivity and the belief that this country welcomes all people from different backgrounds and religions. For someone who grew up in the Jewish faith, Spector continued, I dont feel I am more deserving of being in this country than someone who practices another faith, including Islam. Bob Riley said two of his friends who recently visited their homeland had been detained at airports. One friend, Riley said, had his visa, is married to an American woman and has lived in the States for years. Riley comes from a family of immigrants and said the ban is not what this country was founded on. Being a part of Sundays protests makes me proud to be an American, Riley added. Trump, he makes me ashamed to be an American. We want the world to know that were not like him. Contact the writer: Contact: bwhitehead@scng.com Somehow it makes sense that Sessions West Coast Deli came to life in a hot tub in Cabo San Lucas. Longtime friends and avid surfers Matt Meddock and Beckham Thomas were dreaming big on their annual surf trip to Mexico. Meddock, a frustrated paramedic commuting to Riverside County from Newport Beach, told his buddy he wanted to open a sandwich shop that embraced the ethos of Californias tight-knit beach culture. Nobody had ever built a SoCal-inspired sandwich concept, Meddock said. Thomas, an entrepreneur with the finances to support his friend, said: Lets do it. The first Sessions West Coast Deli opened in April 2014 in the heart of Orange Countys bustling surf community Newport Boulevard in Newport Beach. A second Sessions opened in 2015 in Huntington Beach. Later this year, Sessions will open a third location in Irvine. The hipster sandwich shop will be a key new tenant at Woodbridge Village Center, an aging Irvine Co. center undergoing a $30 million makeover. Sessions has gained a cult-like following for its creative take on artisanal sandwiches and theyll be a much-welcomed addition to the Woodbridge community, Dave Moore, president of Irvine Co. Retail Properties, said in a statement. Opening in Irvine will be a milestone for the brand. The restaurant will be the largest of the three Sessions locations and marks the beginning of plans to grow the brand in Southern California. Meddock is scouting locations in Los Angeles and San Diego and is close to signing a deal in Yorba Linda. While Irvine and Yorba Linda are not beach communities, Meddock said its been vital for the early locations to be in familiar neighborhoods. He and Thomas grew up in Woodbridge, while his wifes family is from Yorba Linda. This is homecoming to me, Meddock said of the Irvine location. Its important for us to grow in areas where theres a lot of community. Their Newport Beach shop has proven that loyalty from locals and top-notch food are key to the success of Sessions, he said. Chilly winters are tough on restaurants with pricey coastal addresses. But Sessions has earned a steady following from health-conscious diners and year-round surfers who crave the shops eclectic mix of gourmet sandwiches from the hormone-free chicken wrap Yogi to the pulled-pork stuffed California Seoul. We really are what Southern California is: a smorgasbord of cultures, Meddock said. Though Sessions doesnt skimp on its proteins, its sandwiches emphasize layers of flavor over piles of meats common at East Coast delis. In fact, one of Sessions best-selling sandwiches is meatless. The Summer Zephyr is a vegetarian sandwich inspired by a classic Caprese salad. With a large variety of sandwich rivals Jersey Mikes and Firehouse Subs entering the region, Meddock said Sessions has been able to stay above the fray because diners appreciate the quality. Sessions makes all its sauces and dressings from scratch. Chef-partner Max Schlutz even roasts his own turkeys. He also uses unconventional ingredients to elevate each sandwich. The El Cubano, for example, is garnished with spicy cherry peppers and chow-chow (pickled relish) to bring out the flavor of the smoked ham and pulled pork sandwich. The Sessions in Irvine is slated to open in September as part of the Woodbridge makeover, the first major update for the retail center since it was built in 1979. The restaurant will have 60 to 80 seats triple the amount of seating at the Newport Beach and Huntington Beach restaurants. The center is in the middle of Irvines village of Woodbridge, which encompasses about 9,600 homes and 30,000 residents. Irvine-based Yogurtland is also adding a location to the center when it opens later this year. Rubys Diner and Barnes & Noble, existing tenants, will remain at the center. Sessions, at 4736 Barranca Parkway, will be next to CorePower Yoga. Contact the writer: nluna@scng.com Amazons Alexa is now able to order up a latte. Starbucks says its partnering with Amazons voice platform to offer what it calls on command ordering. Starting Monday, anyone who has an Amazon device with Alexa, like the Echo smart speaker, is able to place a Starbucks order by just using their voice. Starbucks is also launching a beta test of voice ordering through its iPhone app. The Seattle-based coffee giant says the feature is being rolled out to a limited group of 1,000 people nationwide Monday. It plans to expand the feature later this year. Starbucks chief technology officer Gerri Martin-Flickinger says in a statement that the company expects to learn a lot from both of these experiences and to evolve them over time. The companys CEO Howard Schultz said the company plans to hire 10,000 refugees over five years around the world. President Donald Trump issued an order on Jan. 27 suspending the admission of refugees into the U.S. for 120 days and banning citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries for 90 days. The directive has been criticized by U.S. allies Canada and Germany. Starbucks is in direct contact with employees affected by the immigration ban and will do everything possible to support and help them to navigate through this confusing period, Schultz said in a letter to employees posted on the coffee chains website. Schultz also said that he and Chief Operating Officer Kevin Johnson, who is due to take over as CEO this year, will begin communicating with workers more frequently through the Workplace program by Facebook Inc. I am hearing the alarm you all are sounding that the civility and human rights we have all taken for granted for so long are under attack, and want to use a faster, more immediate form of communication to engage with you on matters that concern us all as partners, Schultz wrote. Schultz said he strongly supported the Dreamers program, designed to help immigrants who arrive in the U.S. as children. The company also is offering legal counsel to a handful of employees whove been affected by Trumps ban. In an effort to ease the intense pressure that its students face in Chinas notoriously rigid exam-based education system, a school in Nanjing has created a grade bank that lets students borrow grades so that they can pass exams, and then repay them in subsequent tests. Oh man, I wish we had something like this when I was in school, because this system sounds awesome! So heres how it works: the innovative mark bank allows students to loan marks to make up for a failing grade in any exam. But, just like regular banks, it requires clients to pay back the loan on time, with interest. Thus, students have to make up for the loan by scoring extra points in future exams. Some teachers also allow the students to repay the bank by conducting lab experiments or giving public speeches. Pupils who default on their loans are blacklisted by the bank, just like in real life. Photo: Nanjing No 1 High School/Facebook Mei Hong, physics teacher at Nanjing No 1 High School, in Nanjing, said that the grade bank is designed to offer pupils a second chance. 59 points and 60 points are actually not that different, she told the Yangtze Evening Post. [But because the former means failing the exam while the latter means passing], the difference weighs heavily on students psyches. So instead of failing the exam, the student can just borrow that 1 point required to pass, just as long as they agree to pay it back, with interest. I was sick before the mid-term exams and missed several geography classes, one pupil surnamed Zhu said. I failed the exam, so I am glad the grades bank gave me a chance to fix that. The grade bank is a pilot system introduced in November 2016, and currently only available to the schools 10th grade Advanced Placement class. Out of the 49 students in the class, 13 have already borrowed marks from the bank. Kan Huang, a director of the school, told reporters that they decided to introduce the grade bank as a way of placing more emphasis on students growth, rather than their performance in grueling exams. He further complained that the current exam-focused education system in China has created a situation where a pupils future could be determined by a single major exam. That would be the infamous Gaokao, a national exam taken in the final year of school. Examinations should be more about improving the learning process, instead of a tool which is used to give students a hard time, Huang told the Yangtze Evening Post. Photo: Nanjing No 1 High School/Facebook While the intriguing grade bank has been hailed as a positive change, at least on social media, not everyone approves of the system. Education expert Xiong Bingqi, for example, believes that the loan system is improper for exam marks, but admits that it takes pressure off of students, who now know that they can just do better on their next test. Others think that such a system just causes pupils to be less diligent in their studies. Oh, and interestingly enough, if the grade bank sounds suspiciously like a real bank, thats because it was designed by banking professionals. Kan Huang revealed that the Nanjing school invited parents who work in the banking system to help them devise the loan scheme. Solid glass or crystal doorknobs look pretty cool, but it turns out that they can literally set your house on fire if hit by direct sunlight. One family from the UK learned that the hard way last September, when one of their glass doorknobs focused the suns rays on nearby clothing, setting them ablaze. Luckily for Londoner Clare Thomson and her family , who were at home at the time of the fire, a smoke alarm fitted on the property went off before the fire got out of control, and they were able to safely leave the house. I was amazed at how intense the low September sun could be and I was amazed at how quickly a small fire could take place, Thompson said. I would advise people not to buy crystal doorknobs, and I would advise home stores to be aware of the fire risk when stocking. Or, at least, such doorknobs should come with a warning. Photo: London Fire Brigade Shes not wrong about that. After all, the last thing that comes into most peoples minds when considering buying a glass doorknob is fire hazard, but according to Charlie Pugsley, head of the London Brigades fire investigation team, house fires started by glass and crystal knobs are not that uncommon. These sort of incidents are not as rare as you would think, he says. Ive seen everything from sparkly doorknobs and crystal balls to glass fish bowls and Nutella jars containing crystals starting fires. Crystal and glass ornaments and items such as shaving mirrors should be kept out of direct sunlight. The fire brigade was called at the Thomsons house Wendover Road, Willesden, on September 8th, 2016 and firemen were able to confine the blaze to the area of origin and eventually extinguish it. Investigation later revealed that the fire most likely started after a coat was removed from a glass doorknob, which focused sunlight onto nearby clothes, setting them alight. The incident prompted the London Fire Brigade to warn citizens about the dangers of glass furnishings and doorknobs. They advise everybody to keep concave mirrors and crystal or glass objects away from sunny sills and flammable materials. Source: London Fire Brigade via Neatorama Jan 30 (Reuters) - The following are the top stories on the New York Times business pages. Reuters has not verified these stories and does not vouch for their accuracy. - After the initial shock of President Trump's order on Friday restricting entry to the United States by citizens of seven predominantly Muslim nations and all refugees, businesses and trade organizations began to respond over the weekend, some with outrage, some with caution. http://nyti.ms/2khXZBu - Tech companies, which have embraced globalization, reacted more forcefully to the president's immigration order than counterparts in other industries. http://nyti.ms/2khUkUp - Gunmen opened fire in the Islamic Cultural Center of Quebec around 8 p.m., the police said, killing an unconfirmed number of people and wounding others. http://nyti.ms/2khYn2U - Authorities in Tikrit are evicting the families of ISIS recruits as a form of collective punishment, a practice that has been condemned by the national government. http://nyti.ms/2ki03ti (Compiled by Vishal Sridhar in Bengaluru) IRVINE, CA / ACCESSWIRE / January 30, 2017 / PRO-DEX, INC. (PDEX) today announced the sale of its Oregon Micro Systems ("OMS") division, effective on January 27, 2017, located in Beaverton, Oregon, to OMS Motion, Inc., a corporation newly formed by the division's long time general manager, Mr. Phil Brown. The OMS division designs and manufactures embedded multi-axis motion controllers, which are sold to distributors or original equipment manufacturers in the automation and research industries. "The sale of our OMS division will allow us to invest in our research and development efforts of our medical device product portfolio," said Richard L. ("Rick") Van Kirk, the Company's President and Chief Executive Officer. "We are pleased that this sale was consummated so quickly, in part due to the knowledge that Phil has regarding the business and its prospects. We wish Phil and OMS Motion, Inc. continued success in the future, and thank Phil for his many years of service and leadership." The aggregate purchase price for the OMS asset sale was $640,000, subject to adjustment based upon the value of the OMS receivables at the date of close. About Pro-Dex, Inc.: Pro-Dex, Inc. specializes in the design, development, and manufacture of powered rotary drive surgical and dental instruments used primarily in the orthopedic, spine, maxocranial facial, and dental markets. Its Fineline Molds division manufactures plastic injection molding for a variety of industries. Pro-Dex's products are found in hospitals, dental offices, and medical engineering labs around the world. Pro-Dex also provides quality and regulatory consulting services, as well as engineering consulting and placement services through its Engineering Services Division. For more information, visit the Company's website at www.pro-dex.com. Statements herein concerning the Company's plans, growth, and strategies may include "forward-looking statements" within the context of the federal securities laws. Statements regarding the Company's future events, developments, and future performance, as well as management's expectations, beliefs, plans, estimates, or projections relating to the future, are forward-looking statements within the meaning of these laws. The Company's actual results may differ materially from those suggested as a result of various factors. Interested parties should refer to the disclosure concerning the operational and business concerns of the Company set forth in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Story continues Contact: Richard L. Van Kirk, Chief Executive Officer (949) 769-3200 SOURCE: Pro-Dex, Inc. In every country on the planet, men don't live as long as women do. We've all come to accept this as a fact. After all, as my dad used to say, "It isn't manly to go to the doctor." This and many other gendered beliefs affect men and women's health habits, including the types of foods they choose to eat. For example, we're constantly bombarded with advertising and social messaging telling us that eating like a bird and dining on salad is feminine, while eating large portions and plenty of red meat is manly. These oversimplified representations of female and male eating habits may seem outdated, but research shows they persist for many of us. These socially influenced eating patterns could in part help explain why men are at a higher risk of heart disease and some cancers. Are our ideas about masculinity and femininity negatively affecting our health? This may not come as a surprise, but overall, women have healthier eating habits than men. Research suggests this is mostly a learned response. Luke Zhu, assistant professor at the University of Manitoba, researches societal aspects that affect food decisions. Based on the research of his group and others, Zhu says in an email, "Unhealthy eating habits and foods (e.g. fries, nachos) are psychologically associated with masculinity while 'healthy' eating habits and foods (e.g. salad, organic food) are psychologically associated with femininity." Joop de Boer is a retired social psychologist and guest researcher at VU University in Amsterdam. "Energy-dense, spicy and strongly flavored foods are perceived as masculine foods," de Boer says, "while soft and sweet foods are perceived as feminine foods." Do you like to have wine or beer with dinner? Do you have fruit or french fries with your lunch? Chances are, your answers could reveal your gender identity. According to de Boer, markers of masculinity include eating a burger with fries for lunch, or having pizza and beer for dinner. Markers of femininity include eating pasta salad and fruit for lunch, or rice and vegetables with wine for dinner. The health implications of these choices are obvious: Overall, women are choosing foods with more fiber and antioxidants, while men tend to overdo it on saturated fat and empty calories. This may be because women are more likely to seek out health information and, as de Boer says, buy in to information on the health aspects of specific foods - for instance, "super foods." De Boer suggests that men and women who see masculinity and femininity as less separate and strictly defined aren't as different in their meat preferences, while those with more traditional gender beliefs are more likely to eat more meat if they're men or to choose more sugar-laden desserts if they're women. "Our work shows that traditional framings of masculinity, emphasizing that 'real men' eat [red] meat, are associated with the men's preferences for large meat portions and almost no willingness to reduce," de Boer says. For these men, "eating large meat portions is a marker of masculinity, which reflects traditional, patriarchal notions of power and performance." This deep-set belief could pose a serious threat to men's health, as research suggests that incorporating more plant-based proteins can improve health and lengthen one's life. Zhu's research has found that regardless of gender, people make different food choices when the concept of masculinity or femininity is brought up. "When we made the idea of masculinity salient, people preferred less-healthy food. When we did so with femininity, people chose healthier food." As a result, women tend to be more comfortable making the healthier choice. Culture also affects gender roles and therefore food choices. In recent research published in Appetite, de Boer and colleagues examined beliefs about meat among young adults in the Netherlands who were either second-generation Dutch, Chinese or Turkish. The second-generation Turkish adults expressed a stronger association between meat and masculinity, while the second-generation Dutch group held the weakest link between ideas of meat as masculine. De Boer notes that people may try to manage their gender identity via food choices that could be positive or negative. For example, an individual might make unhealthy eating choices in an attempt to be more masculine - a change in behavior that could have serious health implications. The goal of learning about the affect of gender on eating habits and health is to make it easier to make healthy food choices. Gender can be a strategic factor for both sexes. Zhu and de Boer agree that increasing our awareness of gender-framed foods and eating behaviors gives us the power to change them. Zhu also suggests that being more mindful when making food choices can help you focus on the food rather than on external factors. Ask yourself why you're choosing a certain food. Is it peer pressure? Is it because it was advertised as a more masculine or feminine food? This awareness can help you make healthier food choices. Individuals can reframe their behavior to change any gendered preconceptions , says de Boer. For example, cooking at home isn't masculine or feminine - it's an essential skill for eating well and taking care of yourself. De Boer says, "Men who cook and see this as a more feminine behavior can give it a 'masculine makeover' by portraying themselves as gourmands who cook and clean and are efficient and urbane." For the food and nutrition writers, advertisers and marketers out there, your messaging affects more than purchasing behavior: It affects health. "We've found that people are more likely to choose unhealthy food if it's packaged in masculine packaging," Zhu says. "People have better evaluations and higher purchasing intentions for food that is unhealthy and packaged in masculine packaging." The opposite was also true, suggesting that healthier food choices can be achieved by selling healthy food in more feminine packaging. It's this type of purchasing psychology that could positively affect your health habits. De Boer points out that popular men's magazines can make vegetables and plant-based proteins appeal to readers by linking these foods to autonomy, performance and appearance-based goals. A man who believes in more-traditional gender roles may not eat more broccoli because of its cancer-fighting potential but because its nutrients could help support muscle growth. The same magazine also could have oversize steaks and racks of ribs in the same article. Whether you choose to buy that magazine or follow its advice is up to you. The title character of Becoming Warren Buffett told a quick joke and then ducked out the back door of the Scott Recital Hall after a special showing last week of the 90-minute biographical film about him. Bedtime for the chairman and chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.? Another important appointment? A phone call to set up a multimillion-dollar acquisition? Not at all. Buffett, with his daughter, Susie, and other friends, headed for the buffet tables nearby in the second-floor lobby of the Holland Center, stocked with Dairy Queen and Sees Candies treats as well as enough regular food for a balanced meal. The Buffett group staked out a round table near the Street Railway Co. Dixieland band as the other 250 attendees crowded into the reception area. Sure, it wasnt the Museum of Modern Art, where a New York crowd four days earlier was the first to see the HBO documentary, produced by Kunhardt Films. (It will be aired for the public on the cable channel Monday at 9 p.m. Central time.) MOMA guests included Brian Roberts, Steve Burke, Ken Chenault, Richard Plepler, Billie Jean King, Gloria Steinem and Vince Gilligan, according to the New York Post. If youre from New York, you know who all those people are. The Holland Center crowd had its own celebrities, on an Omaha scale. There was Robert Dorr, retired World-Herald reporter who wrote the first account of Buffett and his investment techniques. The judge who married Buffett and Astrid Menks. A few Buffett grandchildren. Paul Hornings godson. Nebraska Furniture Mart execs. Friends of friends. A steady stream of guests chatted with Buffett as the evening wore on, politely taking turns. By 9 p.m. the crowd was thinning. By 10 p.m. few were left, and the band was packing up. Still, the Buffett table was hopping, with lively discussions underway. Buffett was enjoying the evening. Ever careful of his time, the 86-year-old had agreed to the documentary project if it wouldnt require too much. In all, he said, the film crew spent about three hours interviewing him. Three hours being interviewed for the movie. Four and a half hours at an Omaha party with friends. Seems like just about the right work-life balance. Pipe company a fitting buy You might think the timing is perfect, buying a pipe company just as President Donald Trump signs executive orders to speed up completion of two international crude oil pipelines. But Trumps signature wasnt a factor in the upcoming purchase of German piping company Wilhelm Schulz GmbH by Berkshires Precision Castparts division. Rather, Precisions industrial customers include oil and gas companies that move energy-bearing materials via pipelines. The pipes, flanges and related products made and sold by the German company would seem to, as it were, fit. Based in Krefeld, near Dusseldorf in western Germany, Schulz has its U.S. headquarters in Houston and seamless-pipe facility in Tunica, Mississippi, plus other manufacturing sites in Germany and South America. Mechanical engineer Wilhelm Schulz started the company in 1945 to fabricate high-quality stainless steel pipe accessories for the chemical industry. Today Schulz has sales offices and warehouses on five continents and is credited with developing new pipe-making techniques. Bloomberg reported that Schulz CEO Rainer Floeth confirmed the purchase agreement but declined to discuss terms. The German newspaper Handelsblatt first reported the sale. Its the second acquisition of a German company by Berkshire, after the 2015 purchase of motorcycle accessory retailer Detlev Louis Motorradvertriebs. Raikes to chair Stanford board Nebraska native Jeff Raikes, former CEO of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, will become chairman this summer of the 35-member Stanford University board of trustees. Raikes, who grew up on a family farm near Ashland and is a Stanford alumnus, retired in 2008 as the No. 3 executive at Microsoft and then headed the Gates Foundation for five years before retiring again, this time to focus on his own foundation. He has been a Stanford trustee since 2012 and, among other programs, personally supports the California universitys Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity, the Knight-Hennessy Scholars and the Mindset Scholars Network. His contributions to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln also support the Nebraska Food for Health Center and the Raikes School of Computer Science & Management. He was on the search committee that hired Marc Tessier-Lavigne last year as Stanfords 11th president. In a press release, outbound Chairman Steven Denning praised Raikes experience in business, technology and philanthropy. The Stanford trustees oversee the universitys $22.4 billion endowment and its property, among other duties. Charter stock sees gains You can mark Berkshires 2014 investment in Charter Communications, a cable TV and Internet company from Stamford, Connecticut, as a potential winner, partly because of a possible merger reportedly pending with Verizon Inc. Berkshire has added to its Charter holdings since 2014, and the stock price has about doubled since the original purchase. Last week it gained another 6 percent after a Wall Street Journal story, attributed to anonymous sources, about a combination with Verizon. Berkshires decision to invest in Charter has been attributed to Todd Combs or Ted Weschler, or both of them. The Buffett lieutenants handle a portion of Berkshires investments but rarely disclose who makes final decisions. At the latest prices, Berkshire owns about $3.1 billion worth of Charter shares and, coincidentally, $775 million worth of Verizon shares. Verizon is worth about $200 billion on the stock market, twice as much as Charter. Combining the two would boost Verizons value from 20th- to ninth-largest among publicly traded companies. Charter Communications may not be a familiar name, but last May it acquired Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks for $65 billion, becoming the nations third-largest pay television company. The Omaha World-Herald is owned by Berkshire Hathaway Inc. A federal judge on Monday sentenced Patricia Urbanovsky, owner of an Omaha event-planning business, to 63 months in federal prison and ordered her to pay nearly $4.7 million in restitution in connection with the sale of thousands of worthless airline flight vouchers. At a sentencing and restitution hearing Monday in federal court, U.S. District Judge Joseph Bataillon accepted the plea agreement Urbanovsky brokered with federal prosecutors in September. He sentenced her for 16 counts of wire fraud. Urbanovsky was originally charged with 16 counts of wire fraud and nine counts of money laundering and faced up to 365 years behind bars. Under the plea agreement she pleaded guilty to only the wire fraud charges. Urbanovsky sold thousands of worthless flight vouchers through her business, Creative Creations. Before being sentenced, Urbanovsky offered the court a tearful apology: A lot of things got out of hand. I want the victims to know Im sorry. ... I hope to be able to grow and learn from this. Im sorry. I want to tell the court Im sorry. Based on the amount of loss, the number of victims and the judges determination that Urbanovsky operated a sophisticated scheme, the federal sentencing guidelines mandated a sentence of 63 to 78 months. Bataillon imposed a sentence of 63 months. There is no parole in the federal system. After her release from prison, Urbanovsky will begin a term of supervised release of three years. Urbanovsky, 31, was immediately taken into federal custody Monday following sentencing. Jan Sharp, chief criminal prosecutor of the U.S. Attorneys Office in Nebraska, said it was Urbanovskys intention that money used to purchase actual airline tickets or vacation packages for early voucher customers would come from money paid in by newer voucher customers. Prosecutors have called it a Ponzi-like scheme. Assistant U.S. Attorney Donald J. Kleine, who prosecuted the federal case, has said that Urbanovsky used a considerable portion of the funds she collected for personal things, including for buying vehicles and paying rent, he said. At Mondays hearing, a fraud investigator with Square Inc., a San Francisco-based payment-processing company, testified that the companys losses totaled more than $4.6 million. The company processed about $7.7 million in payments from Creative Creations. When Square tried to collect the chargebacks from Creative Creations, the money wasnt available. Urbanovsky was ordered to pay approximately $4.6 million in restitution to Square Inc. and about $63,000 to Southwest Airlines for losses the airline incurred when it covered the flights of some of the people who had bought the worthless travel vouchers. Southwest had no affiliation with Urbanovsky or Creative Creations. An FBI investigator testified that the agency went through each invoice and counted the number of flight vouchers that were sold. Creative Creations honored about 7,000 of the 36,000 vouchers it sold, the investigator said. Urbanovskys attorney, Steve Lefler, requested that a federal sentence of no more than three or four years be imposed. Lefler argued that it was difficult to reasonably tally the losses, and therefore the total loss should be capped at $3.5 million. He also argued that she operated not a sophisticated scheme but a mom-and-pop-type business that got out of hand and overwhelmed Urbanovsky, whom he said lacked business acumen. If allowed, each argument would have permitted the judge to consider a lesser sentence under federal sentencing guidelines. Bataillon, however, did not accept Leflers arguments, agreeing with prosecutors that the loss to Square was at least $4.6 million and that Urbanovsky operated a sophisticated scheme. Ms. Urbanovsky had to set up a number of things for this to work, Bataillon said. She had to set up a processor. She had to set up bank accounts. When the operation began to fall apart, he noted that Urbanovsky created a fictitious identity and an associated email account in which she posed as a vice president at Southwest Airlines to communicate with her employees and customers and further her scheme. It took a while to admit she was wrong, Lefler said after Mondays hearing. She feels terrible. She really does. That wasnt a fake cry. She feels bad people got screwed out of money. Last February federal authorities indicted Urbanovsky, charging her with nine counts of money laundering and 16 counts of wire fraud. In March she pleaded not guilty to all charges. In September she changed her plea to guilty. Urbanovsky has been on home detention since early September after she admitted to having violated one of the conditions of her federal pretrial release. The 16 counts of wire fraud stem from interstate wire communication that Urbanovsky admitted to using to solicit travel voucher sales. She communicated with employees and prospective customers throughout the country, including in Nebraska and Iowa, using Facebook, email and the companys website, according to charging documents. The scam came to light in spring 2015 when complaints about Urbanovskys business began trickling into the Better Business Bureau in Omaha from all over the country. The BBB eventually received more than 1,600 complaints. Purchasers booked flights through Creative Creations online portal. Some people were able to successfully book travel through late March 2015, but others came away with nothing. Creative Creations sold vouchers for travel on Southwest Airlines that it said were valid for travel anywhere in the U.S. for about $150 or less. Federal investigators say Urbanovsky ran the scam from about May 2014 to March 2015. The case was investigated by the Omaha Police Department, FBI and IRS, Sharp said. Meanwhile, Urbanovsky still faces three state felony counts of theft, accusing her of defrauding three Creative Creations employees out of $141,000. Her attorney said he expects Urbanovsky to enter a plea to those charges Friday in Douglas County District Court. A police call quickly turned violent Monday when a 20-year-old man was shot multiple times by police and an officer was wounded in the leg. The man, Monroe G. Evans III, was taken in critical condition to the Nebraska Medical Center, where he underwent surgery. He remained in critical but stable condition Monday night, his father said. The police officer, Jill Schillerberg, 39, was treated at the medical center and released. She had been struck in the lower left leg. Police say that Evans exchanged gunfire with officers and that his handgun was recovered at the scene. Evans father, Monroe Evans Jr., said he was surprised that his son would have been involved in the shooting, that hes had a history of only minor offenses. He said he was thankful that his son, nicknamed Trey, had survived the shooting and that Schillerberg did not suffer worse injuries. Evans said a doctor told him that his son had nine bullet wounds, including some that went through his arms. Police have not said how many times Evans III was shot, except that it was multiple times. A witness counted six shots. Evans Jr. questioned why his son was shot so many time and said he would like to see video. I dont have anything against the police, I just want answers, he said. I understand their right to return fire. ... At what point do you stop shooting? Police provided this account: Shortly before 12:55 p.m., police were sent to investigate a report of a suspicious person looking into vehicles and checking for open car doors near 1327 Park Ave. About 1:10 p.m., two Omaha police officers in a patrol car arrived in the area of 33rd and Jackson Streets. The officers saw a person who matched the description of the man who had been at the Park Avenue address, which is about a mile southeast of Dewey Park. Almost immediately, the altercation occurred. About 1:15 p.m., a help an officer call went out. A witness, Greg Powell of Omaha, watched the shooting unfold. Powell said he was walking east on Turner Boulevard near the park when he saw a female police officer talking to a man. The officer told the man to sit down and get his hands behind his back, Powell said. The man sat down, Powell said, but he didnt put his hands behind his back. Then, Powell said, the man pulled something out of his jacket or a backpack. The officer then fired at the man six times, Powell said. The man ended up face down on the ground, he said. Officer Schillerberg was on the ground in the park but later sat up on a stretcher as she was moved to a rescue squad. Schillerberg has been with the department since December 2000, has served throughout the city and has been a school resource officer. The officer who was with her was Matthew Skradski, 36, who has been with the department for 14 years. The two officers are in the uniform patrol bureau, assigned to the southeast precinct. Police said they have not yet determined whether one or both of the officers fired their handguns. Ballistic testing will be completed to determine if both officers fired, police said. The help an officer call was canceled about 5 minutes after it went out. Evans Jr. said he first learned of his sons injuries and encounter with police about 4 p.m., from a relative. His son already had been named on television but neither he nor his wife had been contacted, the father said. The parents went to the hospital about 5 p.m. and were able to see their son about 7:30 p.m., according to Evans Jr. They spoke to him, and he was able to open his eyes and appeared to understand, though he was groggy and unable to speak because of a tube in his mouth, the father said. Evans III graduated from North High School and was looking for work. The father said he was speculating a lot Monday, trying to figure out what his son might have been thinking. Perhaps he felt pressure about not having a job with a 6-month-old son to support, the father wondered aloud. He wasnt raised that way. Evans Jr. said he coached his son in football and basketball and that Evans III was in Boy Scouts. Traffic on Turner Boulevard and other area streets was blocked off during the investigation. Police interviewed four people who witnessed the altercation. Workers at Star Auto Repair, where the call about the suspicious person originated, said Monday afternoon that they saw a man wearing a black sweatshirt checking cars along Park Avenue as if he were trying to break into them. Manuel Zuniga, 29, a mechanic, said he confronted the man as he tried to get into the shop owners BMW sedan, which was parked on the street. The man claimed the BMW was his. I was trying to tell him it was not his car, Zuniga said. Zuniga said he told him he would call police. The man left, walking between buildings on the east side of the street. Zuniga called police. After the shooting, Zuniga was interviewed by detectives at Central Police Headquarters. Under Omaha Police Department policy, an officer who discharges his or her firearm during an incident is placed on paid administrative leave pending investigations by the Officer-Involved Investigations Team and Internal Affairs. Both officers involved in the Monday shooting have been placed on administrative leave, police said. World-Herald staff writers Kevin Cole, Alia Conley and Andrew Nelson contributed to this report. Correction: An earlier version of this article listed the wrong name of the park. The article has been updated. NORTH PLATTE, Nebraska Liquid, solids and gases are made of the same stuff but the atoms inside move around differently. That lesson was simple but fun at Cody Elementary Schools Title 1 Family Night on Thursday in North Platte, Nebraska. Mad scientist Jessica Brock showed students components like frozen nitrogen and dry ice, and their effects on items such as balloons and cheese puffs. Brock called up Cody Elementary School Principal Kim Flanders to partake in a special experiment. Though students were warned not to touch frozen nitrogen, both Brock and Flanders were able to eat a white cheddar cheese puff soaked in it so long as their teeth crunched it down because of the warmth of their mouths and how cheese puffs are made, Brock said. (Dont try this at home, kids.) Brock came from the Edgerton Explorit Center in Aurora. Harold Edgerton had grown up in Aurora, and though he wound up at MIT as an inventor and professor, he always appreciated his Nebraska roots, Brock said. Now, staff at the center, open since 1995, travel all over Nebraska, often to schools that may not receive funding for such programs otherwise, she said. Flanders said a Families First Partnership grant helped put on the event. Brock said kids often know at a young age whether they enjoy science, and seeing experiments like popping balloons and gaseous nitrogen leaves a positive impression in childrens minds. With the job title of mad scientist, all of a sudden theyre willing to listen to me like they werent before, she said. She also enjoys being a woman in the science field, as students have often tried to tell her that being a girl means you cant be a scientist. When she travels with a male coworker, she is easily seen as an assistant, she said. As she spoke after the presentation, she stepped away to take a comment from a girl who told Brock that she too loves science specifically magnetics. Brock talked to the girl and gave her encouraging words: Study your math. Carlee Wood, a seventh-grader at St. Patrick High School, said she learned more about subjects she thought she already knew. Wood attended expecting more of a lecture and instead saw Flanders involvement and the number of experiments. I thought it was really cool, she said. Her sister, Ashlynn, a fifth-grade student at McDaid Elementary School, was impressed by the use of carbon dioxide in the presentation. As Brock travels all over Nebraska, she said, the students reactions are what make it worth it. This is my full-time job, she said. I am a full time mad scientist and people say dreams dont come true. In elementary schools, parents are often asked to volunteer for various activities. A lot of times, these are parents that are involved in the schools parent-teacher organization. At Mockingbird Elementary School, there is no active PTO, as many of the parents are very busy. But the school is still finding ways for parents to get involved. This year, Principal Brian Ferguson and his staff came up with ways parents could volunteer. Weve been trying to think outside the box, Ferguson said. We wanted to think of ways because we dont have a PTO here. Ferguson said parents would often say they wanted to help, but couldnt commit to a long period of time. Events like holiday parties or school night activities require a longer time so Ferguson found ways for parents to get involved at different times of day without being at the school for very long. We have things that are small amounts of time that work for them, he said. Parents can be greeters in the morning as students arrive at Mockingbird. They can sit and eat lunch with students to exhibit good behavior. They can pop popcorn for the monthly spirit days. And so far, its been a hit. In the first three months of looking for parent volunteers, more than 50 have signed up to do anything and everything. Ferguson has even found a way for parents who dont speak English to feel welcome and involved. There are around 11 to 13 languages spoken in the building, Ferguson said. We have Russian, we have Arabic and a very large population of Spanish-speaking families. We want to make them feel welcome. Ferguson often has those parents as greeters and says they can greet students in their native language. Sometimes, even if they cant communicate well with him, Ferguson said they will still find a way to help. They will see Im busy they dont ask. They just see the need, he said. Were trying to get more people who are dual language to help communicate. Ferguson said that years ago, parents and anyone could walk into the building at any time they wanted. In recent years, he has seen that become less and less as security at schools everywhere has gotten tighter. This is a way parents can be there for their children. Because of no PTO and controlled access, I felt like we severed that relationship pretty hard, he said. Were trying to do something in between that. We want to give plenty of opportunity. LINCOLN How unremarkable is Nebraskas state flag? For 10 days, the state flag, which is hoisted over the State Capitols west side when lawmakers are in session, flew upside down. Nobody noticed it, State Sen. Burke Harr told members of the Legislatures Executive Board. It took someone drawing it to my attention before it was changed. The Omaha senator used the anecdote Monday to help make his pitch for why lawmakers should consider creating a task force that would decide whether the state should design a new flag. If so, the committee would submit recommendations to the full Legislature for approval. The sponsor of Legislative Resolution 3, Harr said the current flag doesnt stand out, and features elements that dont represent what the state is known for today. The current flag is blue, gold and silver and features the state seal, which shows a steamboat in the Missouri River, a train heading toward the Rocky Mountains, and a smith with a hammer and an anvil. The seal also shows a settlers cabin, sheaves of wheat and the states motto, Equality Before the Law. Thats fine for a state seal, Harr said, but a flag needs to be instantly identifiable. Critics agree the seal is hard to read, and that the overall design is similar to numerous other official state flags that use state seals on blue backgrounds. Nebraskas design ranks among the five worst flags of the 50 states, according to a survey by the North American Vexillological Association, a group that studies flags. Nebraskas flag design should be so simple a child can draw it from memory and use two or three basic colors, said Ron Sack, head of design for Bailey Lauerman, a Nebraska-based marketing and advertising agency. He testified in support of creating the task force. Sack also said the flag should have meaningful symbolism. He designed the logo for the states 150th anniversary this year. It shows a stylized ear of corn that incorporates art elements found in the State Capitol; the color of the state flower, the goldenrod; and a blue background like the flag. He pointed to Colorados simple flag with three white and blue horizontal stripes and a red C filled with the color gold. White represents snow on mountains, while gold is for Colorados sunshine, red is for the states red soil and blue is for its clear blue skies. Suzanne Wise, the executive director of the Nebraska Arts Council who has an extensive arts background, said that states with poorly designed flags fly them far less than states with better designs. And states with iconic flags have seen professional sports teams incorporate them into their brands, she said. As a Nebraskan, Wise said shes proud of states unicameral Legislature and unique State Capitol. Its galling our state flag doesnt embody that uniqueness, she said. I think our sesquicentennial year is an ideal year to do this. Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan are also looking to change their flags, Harr said. Harr first thought about the flag as a fourth-grader in Mrs. Pattersons class at Omahas Catlin Elementary, he said, recalling that his former teacher, whos now deceased, did not like it. Under an amended version of his resolution, Nebraskas task force would have five members, all senators: one member from each congressional district and two at-large members. The resolution heard no opponents, and the committee did not take immediate action. An effort in 2002 to develop a new flag design with the publics help, however, died after critics called it a blow to the states heritage. Harr brushed off criticism from earlier this month that the state has more pressing issues to deal with, saying that the lawmakers can take a look at the state flag while addressing the looming budget deficit, the troubled Department of Correctional Services and other areas of concern. We can walk and chew gum at the same time, he said. LINCOLN A dozen small-business representatives joined Gov. Pete Ricketts on Monday to call for cuts in the states top income tax rate. The governor also touted support for his proposed cuts from key business organizations and conservative advocacy groups. Four members of the Legislatures Revenue Committee joined in the press conference. Ricketts said his proposed plan would encourage economic growth in Nebraska by putting money back in the pockets of small-business owners and other taxpayers. If we want families to move here, if we want small businesses to grow, we need to make Nebraska more competitive, he said. Mike Mapes, president of a professional employer company from Omaha, agreed. He said Nebraskas income taxes drive away college graduates and discourage potential employees from other states. He called on lawmakers, if they really care about whats best for Nebraska and Nebraskas future, to support Legislative Bill 337. The measure was introduced by State Sen. Jim Smith of Papillion, the Revenue Committee chairman, on the governors behalf. It would cut the top individual income tax rate from 6.84 percent to 5.99 percent in eight steps. The first step could occur in 2020, depending on growth in state tax revenues. Barry Kennedy, president of the Nebraska State Chamber of Commerce, said in a statement that lawmakers need to focus on bringing down the top state income tax. Our high income tax has negatively affected economic growth and job creation and has hurt Nebraska families, he said. But Steve Nelson, president of the Nebraska Farm Bureau, took issue with the call for making income tax reductions first. In a statement, he said reducing Nebraskas heavy reliance on property taxes offers the best way to improve the business climate and spur economic growth in Nebraska. Fixing our property tax problem must be the priority for this legislative session, Nelson said. Renee Fry, executive director of the OpenSky Policy Institute, said the proposed income tax cuts would do little to help small businesses, as 90 percent of the benefit would go to the wealthiest Nebraskans. She raised concerns that the proposal could leave Nebraska short of money to fund schools, public safety and other services that support the states businesses, such as the Department of Economic Development. But Jim Vokal, chief executive officer of the Platte Institute for Economic Research, said LB 337 would take a responsible approach to making the state more competitive. The bill includes a trigger mechanism, meaning the state could take one step each year, but only if state tax revenues were projected to grow by more than 3.5 percent that year. If a cut was deferred in one year it would take place in the next year that met the trigger. The top income tax rate applies to the portion of an individuals income that exceeds $29,830 per year. For married couples, the rate applies to the portion of income that exceeds $59,660. Jack Schreiner, owner of Bruckman Rubber of Hastings, praised the incremental nature of the plan and the trigger mechanism. He said those would ensure that the state still has enough money to fund education while providing a boost to small businesses. Schreiner said the level of taxes and regulations in Nebraska make it hard for small businesses to survive. He noted that most small businesses are structured so that they pay individual income taxes, not corporate taxes. I pay the same type of taxes that my employees pay, he said. Smith, who is co-sponsoring a competing income tax cut proposal, acknowledged that income tax and property tax proposals have often conflicted in the Legislature. He expressed confidence that the two groups would work better together this year than in the past. Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert For decades, refugee families have settled in Omaha and contribute to the important cultural diversity of our city. The City of Omaha has always been, and will remain, a very welcoming city for legal refugees. We need to do all we can to protect our homeland, but I hope any delays in pending legal refugee resettlement will be as short as possible. Our Human Rights and Relations Department provides important assistance to refugees as they begin their new lives in our city, particularly in the areas of housing, employment and public accommodations. We will continue to work with local organizations such as Lutheran Family Services to provide safety and support for all Omaha residents. Heath Mello, former state senator and Omaha mayoral candidate As a former South Omaha state senator who represented the neighborhoods that are the gateways to the 'American Dream' for immigrants and refugees, I strongly believe that President Trumps latest impulse to ban Muslim refugees is un-American and is everything our community is against." NU President Hank Bounds and the NU system chancellors We are unanimous in our view that this executive order is disturbing and disruptive to our students and employees. It does not represent the values of the University of Nebraska. And we join leaders of universities around the country in urging that it be promptly reconsidered. About 150 members of our university family, including both students and faculty, come from the countries named in the ban. We have been working diligently to communicate with those individuals and to offer them critical guidance and support. ... Together our campuses make up a richly diverse community of scholars from around the globe, representing countless ethnicities, faiths, backgrounds and academic disciplines all brought together by a common desire to learn, to create a better future, and to use the power of education to change the world. ... Our pledge to you is that the University of Nebraska will keep working every day to be the kind of place where all feel welcome, valued and safe. Where each student has access to an excellent education and our faculty and staff are able to pursue their world-class work. Thats what our university stands for. The Rev. Daniel S. Hendrickson, president of Creighton University An issue that I share with fellow university presidents is the diminishment of the strength of American universities research and education if the numbers of international students and faculty are sharply limited. The Society of Jesus has a particularly rich history of engaging foreign cultures and customs and, in particular, working with people who are suffering and displaced. ... It is that very Catholic, Jesuit mission that invites us to reach out in support of immigrants and refugees. Creighton is holding an interfaith prayer service at St. Johns Church at 3:30 p.m. on Feb. 8. George Lucas, Archbishop of Omaha "As a member of the board of Catholic Relief Services (CRS) for the last five years, I have come to trust and admire CRS work with international refugees. In response to the recent executive order, I am reminded of the words of Pope Francis: There must be no family without a home, no refugee without a welcome, no person without dignity. "We do not know the short-term outcome of the executive order; however, we do know what we can do now. We have the freedom to be Christ for those already in our midst. I encourage all Catholics to reach out to refugees and immigrants in our community who need help, and to contact their Congressional representatives to make sure that this temporary moratorium is lifted as soon as possible. Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb. "Our No. 1 responsibility is to protect our nation, and I agree that we need to strengthen and reform the vetting process. Over the weekend we saw a lot of confusion and anxiety. The intention of this executive order is on point, but the implementation of it must be orderly, careful, and clear. As we work to keep dangerous individuals out, we must also remain a welcoming country to people of all faiths." Iowa State University President Steven Leath We welcome students and faculty from throughout the world who enrich the educational experience and enhance the research contribution of Iowa State. ... While we recognize the need for federal actions to protect our national security, we are concerned this executive order will unnecessarily interfere with members of our campus community. As a result, we will continue to work with leading national higher education organizations to advocate for immigration policies that protect national security, but also promote and safeguard the international relationships and people who are core to our success as an institution of higher education and as a nation. A rally Sunday in opposition to President Donald Trumps restrictions on travelers from seven Middle Eastern countries raised the spirits of Omahas refugees. About 1,800 protesters gathered to listen to speakers, wave homemade banners and get information about ways to fight the ban. Chants such as No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here, rumbled through Turner Park. A similar rally was held in Lincoln on Sunday. The large showing for Omahas Stop the Ban Rally heartened Feroz Mohmand, 31, an Afghan native who said his 7-year-old son was crying inconsolably Saturday night when he heard about restrictions on travel from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The boy feared that he and his family would somehow be forced to leave the country they love. In a country like Afghanistan, we never knew if wed make it home at night, Mohmand said. We had all this hope coming to the United States. Then we hear that because someone doesnt like our religion, they dont want us. Mohmand, speaking to the crowd, said that his wife was the youngest women ever elected to Afghanistans Parliament. He had been an aide to Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The couple and their child fled Afghanistan in 2013 after hard-liners smeared them as CIA spies and secret Christians, he said. They had less than 24 hours to leave after they endangered their own lives by warning U.S. officials of a possible plot to kill Americans. No one wants to be become a refugee. Its not a choice, he said. When its your turn, you become a refugee. The family found a welcoming community in Omaha, Mohmand said. Much different from the threats he received one day at a San Diego gas station when he was cursed and called a terrorist. I didnt want to come to Nebraska at first, but I was wrong, he said, getting a roar from the crowd. Ferial Pearson, an instructor in the University of Nebraska at Omahas College of Education, came to the U.S. from Kenya. She echoed Mohmands comment that no one wants to be a refugee as she read the crowd a poem, Home, by British-Somali poet Warsan Shire. The poem says in part, I want to go home, but home is the mouth of a shark, home is the barrel of the gun and no one would leave home unless home chased you to the shore. Opposition to Trumps executive order took root Saturday in Omaha as it has across the country, according to protest organizers Susan Nielsen, Kristin Mattson and Angie Philips. The three women organized last weeks Womens March in Omaha and said they knew they had to do something to rally people when they heard of the ban. Were hoping to send a strong message not only to our (political) representatives in Washington but also to the White House, Nielsen said. We wont stand for the ban. Former Rep. Brad Ashford and Douglas County Board member Mike Boyle and his wife, Anne, all Democrats, lent their support at the rally. The travel ban hits home for the Boyle family. Their son-in-law, a native of Iran, works for Google in San Francisco. Hes been here since he was 7 when his family had to leave because the shah was overthrown, Mike Boyle said. Now Google is telling its employees not to leave to see their families because they wont be let back in. As a congressman, Ashford said he learned from U.S. military leaders and foreign heads of state in the Middle East that baning Muslim refugees is the worst possible strategy we could adopt because it hands a propaganda tool to terrorist organizations such as ISIS and Al-Qaida. King Abdullah of Jordan, one of the best friends the United States has, said unequivocally that a ban on Muslims would be harmful, Ashford said. Hes coming to the U.S. next week, and I hope he can change some minds. WASHINGTON Rep. Jeff Fortenberry, R-Neb., said Monday that President Donald Trumps travel ban is a complicated issue and hed prefer not to be put in the box of completely supporting or opposing it. Im trying to do two things at once, keep two principles working in tandem: keeping America generous, keeping America safe, Fortenberry told The World-Herald. I think it is reasonable to pause and review our refugee policies from dangerous areas of the world, but the implementation of this has caused many difficulties and a lot of concerns so I think we need a process which I am starting to work on that potentially allows for expedited exceptions. The order Trump signed on Friday to suspend refugee resettlements and restrict travel for people from certain countries has created a firestorm prompting demonstrations in the streets, court challenges and bipartisan criticism. On Monday, for example, congressional Democrats rallied in opposition at the Supreme Court and offered Senate legislation to rescind the order an effort that was blocked by Republicans. Meanwhile, some Republicans representing Nebraska and western Iowa, including Fortenberry, were trying to walk a tightrope on Trumps new immigration policy. They expressed support for the presidents stated goals, while also suggesting that his order could work better. For Fortenberry, refugee issues strike close to home. One of his early pieces of legislation a copy of which still hangs in his office raised the number of special visas available for Iraqi and Afghan translators who helped the U.S. military. Fortenberry also represents Nebraskas 1st District, which includes Lincoln and one of the countrys largest communities of Yazidis a small group that follows an ancient faith tradition. He successfully pushed to get the plight of Yazidis and other religious minorities in Iraq and Syria designated as genocide in order to raise international attention. You cant sit idly by and watch people systematically targeted for extermination based upon their religion, Fortenberry said. He met Monday with a Yazidi man whose two brothers are in Lincoln. The man earned his U.S. citizenship by being a translator for the military, and his wife was supposed to arrive over the weekend. Because of Trumps order, she was not allowed to come. Fortenberry said he assumes that the administration will develop a process for exceptions while the travel ban is in effect. Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., was among those who kept a low profile through the weekend, declining opportunities to comment. She broke her silence Monday afternoon with a press release backing the purpose of the ban but also noting the confusion and anxiety produced by the new policy. Our number one responsibility is to protect our nation, and I agree that we need to strengthen and reform the vetting process, Fischer said in the release. The intention of this executive order is on point, but the implementation of it must be orderly, careful and clear. As we work to keep dangerous individuals out, we must also remain a welcoming country to people of all faiths. Sen. Ben Sasse was one Midlands Republican who did not support Trumps refugee policy. An outspoken critic of Trump during the presidential campaign, the Nebraskan was quick to say that while the president is right to focus on the importance of borders, his order is too broad. If we send a signal to the Middle East that the U.S. sees all Muslims as jihadis, the terrorist recruiters win by telling kids that America is banning Muslims and that this is America versus one religion, Sasse said in a press release. Democrats and a number of advocacy groups have been much harsher in their criticism, blasting the order as arbitrary, inhumane and un-American. Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, on the other hand, seemed very much in support of the move. He wrote on Twitter that Trump had temporarily blocked Obama-led hijrah to the U.S. It may be too late for Europe ... The word hijrah refers to Muslim immigration. King included a link to an article that characterized the flow of refugees into Europe from the Middle East as an attempt at Muslim colonization of that continent. Reps. Adrian Smith and Don Bacon, Nebraska Republicans, both sounded supportive of the ban in statements that touted the need to review vetting procedures. Rep. David Young, R-Iowa, said in a statement that the principal role of the federal government is to keep Americans safe. He compared the presidents action to a bill that overwhelmingly passed the House in 2015. It would have paused refugees from Iraq and Syria until more stringent vetting could be put in place. That legislation was supported by most House members from Nebraska and western Iowa, including former Rep. Brad Ashford, D-Neb., who now criticizes Trumps order. The one opponent was King, who said it didnt go far enough. Young also echoed other Republicans assertion that President Barack Obama instituted a similar pause on refugees from Iraq in 2011. That claim is disputed by Obama officials who told the Washington Post that their stepped-up vetting procedures only slowed the process and still allowed people to come to America. Young said the U.S. will continue to aid and be welcoming to those seeking refuge and asylum. But he said the nation needs to be extra cautious and vigilant, saying that terrorists seek to exploit the refugee program to harm Americans. Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, also said it was prudent to reassess the vetting process but called for more clarity about its implementation. Ernst, who served in Iraq as a company commander with the Iowa Army National Guard, expressed support for those who helped the U.S. as translators. In our efforts to protect our nation from ISIS, we also must ensure we are not inadvertently penalizing our allies in the fight against radical Islamic terrorism especially those who have supported U.S. military efforts in Iraq, she said. Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, said national security is the top responsibility of the federal government. The goals of the executive order are commendable, and something President Trump promised during the campaign, Grassley said in a statement. But implementation will be key to ensuring the bad guys are kept out while remaining a welcoming nation to people of all backgrounds and religions. Gov. Pete Ricketts LINCOLN Gov. Pete Ricketts on Monday expressed confidence that the federal government will fix the problems that have occurred with implementing the presidents executive order on refugees and immigrants. Theres always room for improvement, the governor said during a press conference. Ricketts made no comment about the order itself, other than to note that he had expressed concern last year about how well refugees are vetted. The order is just a temporary pause to look at the vetting process and make sure that the United States avoids problems, such as happened in Europe, where terrorists posed as refugees to carry out terrorist acts, he said. Ricketts said Nebraska has always been a welcoming state and last year welcomed more than its share of refugees. He encouraged Nebraskans concerned about those refugees to volunteer for one of the private agencies that help families get resettled in the state. Nebraska Legislature LINCOLN Nebraska lawmakers may have a chance to go on record expressing support for protecting refugees regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, age or sex. State Sen. Kate Bolz of Lincoln, with nine co-sponsors, introduced Legislative Resolution 27 on Monday. Nine introducers are Democrats, the 10th is a Republican. The resolution says that many refugees have earned green cards and call this country home, and others have been shown, through extensive vetting, to bear good will toward our nation. It also said refugees include people fleeing war and oppression and include children and families in need of safety. The measure will be referred to a committee for further consideration. University of Nebraska University of Nebraska President Hank Bounds and the four NU chancellors issued a joint statement Monday, calling the presidents executive order disturbing and disruptive to our students and employees. The statement said about 150 NU system students and faculty members come from the countries named in the ban. Together our campuses make up a richly diverse community of scholars from around the globe, representing countless ethnicities, faiths, backgrounds and academic disciplines all brought together by a common desire to learn, to create a better future, and to use the power of education to change the world, the statement says, in part. Now, more than ever, we must be more inclusive, not less. And universities should lead the way. The four chancellors are Ronnie Green of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln; Dr. Jeffrey Gold of the University of Nebraska Medical Center; John Christensen of the University of Nebraska at Omaha; and Doug Kristensen of the University of Nebraska at Kearney. Other statements in response to Trump order For decades, refugee families have settled in Omaha and contribute to the important cultural diversity of our city. The City of Omaha has always been, and will remain, a very welcoming city for legal refugees. We need to do all we can to protect our homeland, but I hope any delays in pending legal refugee resettlement will be as short as possible. Our Human Rights and Relations Department provides important assistance to refugees as they begin their new lives in our city, particularly in the areas of housing, employment and public accommodations. We will continue to work with local organizations such as Lutheran Family Services to provide safety and support for all Omaha residents. Mayor Jean Stothert As a member of the board of Catholic Relief Services for the last five years, I have come to trust and admire CRSs work with international refugees. In response to the recent executive order, I am reminded of the words of Pope Francis: There must be no family without a home, no refugee without a welcome, no person without dignity. We do not know the short-term outcome of the executive order; however, we do know what we can do now. We have the freedom to be Christ for those already in our midst. I encourage all Catholics to reach out to refugees and immigrants in our community who need help, and to contact their congressional representatives to make sure that this temporary moratorium is lifted as soon as possible. Omaha Archbishop George Lucas An issue that I share with fellow university presidents is the diminishment of the strength of American universities research and education if the numbers of international students and faculty are sharply limited. The Society of Jesus has a particularly rich history of engaging foreign cultures and customs and, in particular, working with people who are suffering and displaced. ... It is that very Catholic, Jesuit mission that invites us to reach out in support of immigrants and refugees. the Rev. Daniel S. Hendrickson, president of Creighton University Creighton will hold an interfaith prayer service at St. Johns Church at 3:30 p.m. on Feb. 8. Compiled by World-Herald staff writers Martha Stoddard and Rick Ruggles WINNEBAGO, Neb. The posters are up and billboards have been erected. Meetings are being held in several states. Even a TV ad is planned. A full-bore publicity campaign is underway on the Winnebago and Omaha Indian Reservations as part of a $2 billion effort nationally to persuade tribal members to sell property they personally own back to the tribe. In many cases, the tracts amount to only a few square feet. Thats because 40- to 160-acre tracts of land granted to individual tribal members back in the 1880s have been divided, as they were passed from one generation to the next, to the point that ownership is divided among dozens or hundreds of tribal members. That leaves owners of such so-called fractionalized land with only a few dollars in rent payments a year, and no control over what happens, since such properties are managed by the Bureau of Indian Affairs and not the local tribe. The result has diminished the power of the tribes to control how land on their reservations has been used. We want to consolidate these lands under tribal ownership for the betterment of the whole community, said Tony Wood, head of the Winnebago Land Corp. The whole idea is to get it back to communal use. Wood said that hes aware of parcels of fractionalized land in which each owner has only an 8-by-8 foot interest. The Winnebago Tribe has been allocated $18.5 million under the federal buyback program, and the Omaha Tribe has been given $7.1 million. The Santee Sioux Tribe has also been approved to participate in the program. The buyback program was the result of a court settlement of a class-action lawsuit. The lawsuit was filed by a member of the Blackfeet Tribe in 1996, who charged that lands owned by tribal members were being mismanaged by the federal government. The so-called Cobell Settlement, reached in 2010, provided $1.9 billion to tribes to buy back fractional land interests and restore them to tribal ownership. The land issue goes back to 1887, when, under the Dawes Act, Indian reservations were divided and tribal members were allotted plots ranging from 40 to 160 acres. Excess land was sold to white farmers. The goal was to turn Native Americans into self-sufficient farmers, but Wood said that individual landownership was a foreign concept to Native Americans. It was a way to weaken the tribal structure, he said. After a few years, many tribal members had to sell their land, facing large property tax bills that they didnt understand or bills with merchants that couldnt be paid with income from the property, Wood said. As a result, millions of acres of Indian land reverted to ownership by non-Indians. The Winnebago Tribe, for instance, lost about 80 percent of the 108,000 acres that tribal members once owned through allotments. The tribe, using $13 million of its own money, has bought back about 10 percent of that property over the past two decades. The parcels that werent sold were passed down from original owners to their children, and from those children to their children. After several generations, dozens of people shared in ownership of a plot of land, thus the term fractionalized. For instance, Lance Morgan, a member of the Winnebago Tribe and CEO of Ho-Chunk Inc., the tribes economic development wing, said he owns 1/10th of an acre of such land. I dont even know where that is, Morgan said. The land holding is so small that it cant be used as collateral for a loan, he said, and to redevelop the property into housing or something more valuable would take the agreement of dozens or hundreds of owners. The land has gotten so small, theres no incentive to pay attention to it. You end up stuck at the bottom of the economic food chain, Morgan said. The federal government is authorized to offer fair market value for the property. If more than half of a parcel comes under tribal ownership, then the tribe would determine the use of the land, according to Wood. That would allow the tribe to grow different and possibly more profitable crops on the land, adopt more environmentally friendly farming practices, or use the land for housing or economic development, he said. Postcards were mailed to owners of fractionalized lands on the Winnebago and Omaha Reservations in November. Purchase offers will go out in late March and April. About 40 percent of the 3,900 owners of fractionalized land on the Winnebago Reservation live in Wisconsin, so informational meetings have been held in that state, and others, about the buyback program. We want people to make educated decisions, Wood said. Tribal members will have 45 days to accept or reject the offers. Not everyone is expected to sell, said Everett Baxter Jr., who heads the Omaha Tribes land program. Baxter said his father was told by his parents to never sell his holdings, and is therefore abstaining from the program. Hes honoring the word of his father and mother, Baxter said. Nationwide, there are nearly 243,000 owners of fractional lands in Indian country eligible to participate in the buyback program, according to the U.S. Interior Department. Since the buyback program began in December 2013, about $900 million has been paid to individual landowners in 30 locations nationally. The program has restored the equivalent of about 1.7 million acres of land to tribal nations. An additional 63 locations were added to the program last fall. One was the Santee Sioux Reservation, which has not yet organized its buyback effort. * * * * * Correction: A previous version of this story included an incorrect figure. A total of 651 people share ownership of one 160-acre parcel of land on the Winnebago Reservation. That averages out to about 10,705 square feet of land per owner. An earlier version of this story incorrectly listed the average as 66 square feet of land per owner. President Donald Trump continues to shake certainty with impulsive tweets and executive actions. As promised during his campaign, President Trump signed an executive order to construct a wall on the US-Mexico border. On Wednesday, January 25th 2017, President Trump stated to the Department of Homeland Security, Beginning today, the United States of America gets back control of its borders. President Trump is determined to having Mexico pay for the wall by imposing a 20% tariff on the country. The project is estimated to cost between $12 billion and $15 billion. The above events have created heavy tensions between President Trump and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto. Both were scheduled to meet last week; however, President Pena Nieto canceled after refusing to pay for the wall. Today, Mexicos foreign minister Luis Videgaray stated that further meetings with the Trump administration are not ruled out. Among this crisis between U.S.-Mexico relations, Latin American Mutual Funds heavily weighted in Mexico are set to underperform. Deustche Latin American Fund A SLANX holds a Zacks Rank #4 (Sell). Their largest holding is in Mexican multinational beverage and retail company FEMSA FMX, which they hold 8%. The fund is a Zacks Rank #4 (Sell). FEMSA is the largest bottler of Coca-Cola KO in the world by product by volume. Due to the tariff President Trump has said to impose on Mexico, FEMSA is down 4.12% since President Trump made his announcement. Other Mutual Funds to remain skeptical of are T. Rowe Price Latin America PRLAX, which has Zacks Rank #4 (Sell), and Fidelity Latin American Fund A FLFAX, which also has a Zacks Rank #4 (Sell). PRLAX is weighted 18.74% in Mexico, while FLFAX is weighted 16.97% in Mexico. Amid political uncertainty between the two nations, Latin American Mutual Funds heavily weighted in Mexico will be pressured. Stocks that Aren't in the News. Yet. You are invited to download the full, up-to-the-minute list of 220 Zacks Rank #1 "Strong Buys" free of charge. 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He is co-author of a recent study on implementing the Affordable Care Acts insurance exchanges. The views expressed are solely those of the author and do not reflect the views of the university. With Republican control of Congress and the White House now official, who could stand in the way of their making good on seven years of campaign promises to repeal and replace Obamacare? The answer: They could. Repeal may be easy. The first legislative steps toward it preceded the inauguration, and President Donald Trump has signed an executive order giving federal agencies authority to dismantle parts of the law. But the challenge of replacement looms large. Even though commentators have detailed how complicated it will be to make changes in the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, voters reasonably could have expected Republicans to have a well-developed replacement for Obamacare ready to go once the party regained the White House and majority control in Congress. One of the least discussed factors contributing to the Republican inability to devise a replacement, however, is also one of the most ironic factors: Numerous core components of the Affordable Care Act were previously proposed by Republicans themselves. Three years ago, in the Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law, Professor Jill Quadagno of Florida State University described how 11 of 14 key provisions of the Affordable Care Act are nearly identical to elements of the 1993 Health Equity and Access Reform Today Act, put forward by Republicans as an alternative to then President Bill Clintons 1993 American Health Security Act, which never became law. The 1993 proposal guaranteed every individual access to affordable and secure health coverage through market reforms. Insurance plans would have had to meet strict requirements, including guaranteed eligibility and renewal, no pre-existing condition exclusions and a standard benefit package. Other provisions included fines on employers who failed to offer health benefits, state-based exchanges or purchasing groups, subsidies to low-income persons to buy insurance, equalized tax treatment for insurance of the self-employed, controls on high-cost plans and a mandate requiring individuals to buy health insurance or pay a substantial penalty. It also should be recalled that Republican Gov. Mitt Romneys widely praised 2006 Massachusetts Health Care Reform Plan drew many policy ideas from the 1993 plan and, as is widely known, was the template for Obamacare. In effect, the Republicans rejection of Obamacare has been a denial of their own partys approaches to health care. Trumps promise to provide insurance for everybody depends on whether he and his advisers can solve the Gordian knot of health care the inherent tradeoffs between access, cost and quality. Obamacare, in its attempt to increase access, control costs and improve quality, created a Rube Goldberg-like mechanism that has its own flaws but also incorporated several policies strongly supported by the general public. Replacement raises many difficult questions: Will replacement eliminate consumer protections and no longer cover pre-existing conditions? Will subsidies (whether as tax credits or vouchers) to assist lower-income persons be reduced? Will the individual mandate be removed? Will restrictions on interstate sales of health insurance end? Will Medicaid be converted from an entitlement program to a block grant program and will federal funds to the states be decreased? Answers to these and many other questions have pros and cons and have been part of the national health policy debate for years. If congressional Republicans want to follow Trumps call to action, then their talk will have to turn from complaints to compromises among themselves first and then with Senate Democrats. The likelihood is that Trumpcare will not be a radically new plan but rather an amalgamation of elements drawn from Obamacare and previous Republican ideas with a new name. Omaha was a territorial capital wallowing in streets of mud, stewing in political intrigue and echoing with whistles of riverboats and railroad locomotives when Nebraska steamed toward statehood in early 1867. The citys crude and undeveloped appearance was striking. It was a typical frontier outpost in the Old West, said David Bristow, editor of Nebraska History magazine at the State Historical Society. Boardwalks linked businesses. Residents pumped water from private or community wells and answered the call of nature in back-door privies. When you look at photos of that period, Omaha looks like it somehow just plopped down on the prairie, Bristow said. But it was a time of tremendous growth. Omaha-dominated Douglas County started the decade of the 1860s with 4,300 people. The population was 20,000 by 1870. Change was constant. Statehood arrived two years after the end of the Civil War, but the Indian war across Nebraska continued to flare. By the end of 1867, the Union Pacific Railroad completed track across Nebraska and rolled into Wyoming Territory on its transcontinental push. Land seekers taking advantage of the federal Homestead Act swelled Nebraskas population. Henry Stanley the same Henry Stanley of the famous, Mr. Livingston, I presume, encounter in Africa grumbled in his diary about 1867 Omaha. He wrote that no town on the Missouri River is more annoyed by moving clouds of dust and sand when the wind is up than Omaha. It is absolutely terrific. The lower terrace along the river is a waste of fine sand, which is blown about in drifts, and banked up against houses like snow in a wintry storm. For two or three days, people have been obliged to shut themselves up in their houses for protection from the sand. Dust storms were merely one of the plagues early Omahans endured. Others included mud, stray animals (both dead and alive), garbage and sewage, as historian Bristow chronicled in his book, A Dirty, Wicked Town: Tales of 19th Century Omaha. When Omaha was laid out in 1854, it had streets of native prairie grass. Horse hooves and wagon wheels quickly wore away the grass and exposed bare dirt that endured for years. The city made its first attempt at pavement in 1877 when a few blocks of Farnam Street were covered with a crushed-rock surface called macadam. Omaha did not impress Grant Marsh, who would become a noted steamboat captain, when he saw the town for the first time a decade before statehood. Marshs biographers description of 1857 Omaha: It was a veritable mud hole, consisting of two wretched streets straggling along the river bank and lined with flimsy frame and log structures of a people too eagerly bent upon the pursuit of success to squander time or expense on the niceties of civilization. Even two years after statehood, in 1869, the editor of the Omaha Daily Herald (a forerunner of todays World-Herald) wrote: There is not a citizen of Omaha who does not feel ashamed of the condition of our streets. From the deluges of the passing season for weeks together they have been well nigh impassable for teams and most uncomfortable for pedestrians. Ditches, holes and unfathomable mud have been the rule, an eyesore to ourselves as well as to strangers, and an expensive inconvenience to business men. Another news clipping from the era: Yesterday afternoon an express wagon containing the driver and a lady sitting in it and a horse hitched to it were going at a rapid rate down Farnam street when suddenly the horse plunged into a deep mire near Eleventh street. He became detached from the wagon and at once made a break for the stable, leaving the wagon, lady and driver in the mud to paddle their own canoe. And another clipping: Near the corner of Twelfth and Douglas streets yesterday there stood in the mud hole a white-washed barrel upon which was painted in large letters, No bottom! Trains leave daily for China and intermediate points. Bristow writes that, as late as 1880, Farnam Street reportedly had mud holes that could sink a horse belly-deep. As Omaha grew in the early years of statehood, its dog population expanded, too. City ordinances requiring the fencing or muzzling of dogs were generally ignored. Countless strays, often moving in packs, roamed streets and alleys, fighting, eating, excreting and reproducing, Bristow writes. By 1876, an exasperated Omaha Herald editor wrote: Men and women of Omaha: Your dearest liberties are being taken from you! Unless you rise up in honest indignation and kill off a few thousand dogs, the blessed privilege of going out at night without a corporals guard will be taken from you. When the fire alarm sounded yesterday morning, and the clattering engines rushed to the fire, five thousand dogs rushed out and pursued, and came very near eating up everybody who rushed out on the street to see whose house was on fire. Constantinople obtained a world-wide reputation on account of the number and worthlessness of her dogs. Omaha, proportion to her population, has more dogs than Constantinople. Then there were stray farm animals, including hogs that took shelter beneath Omahas wooden sidewalks in winter. Sometimes they died there. Bristow writes: Come spring, the result was ... unpleasant. Not until 1881 did city government create the job of city scavenger to remove dead animals from public property. The scavenger was paid $1 for each horse, mule, cow or other large animal removed. Pigs, goats and calves brought 25 cents. Chickens, ducks and dogs brought a dime apiece. Omahas original garbage collectors were hogs, naturally. The city had no garbage collection and no sewer system during its first few decades of existence. With no sewer system, Omahans relied on the outdoor privy a hole in the ground covered with a little shack for privacy. Privies eventually filled up and had to be cleaned out. Most Omahans, however, avoided the chore, according to historian Michael Harkins. He wrote in 1975: To avoid cleaning privies, Omahans usually provided openings in the rear of the outhouse and allowed waste to freely run out. The fecal matter found its way into alleys, streets and eventually into the local water supply. Hotels added to the mess when their cesspools backed up. The City Council proposed a sewer system in 1878, but it wasnt fully developed until 1895. Not until 1945 did the city outlaw privies and cesspools, but they continued to exist in some parts of the city into the 1970s. There werent many brick structures in 1860s Omaha, but one of them was the Omaha Daily Herald building at the corner of 13th and Douglas Streets precisely where the 16-story Omaha World-Herald Building stands today. The office of the Democratic Party-leaning newspaper was above a billiards saloon. The Republican Party headquarters was five doors up the street. Neighbors included a restaurant and shops that sold clothing, cigars and carriages. Other Douglas Street neighbors included at least three saddle and harness shops. An ox yoke and nails store also sold threshing and reaping machines. Empire Bakery and Confectionery advertised fresh bread, cakes and crackers. George T. Hoagland and Son operated Omaha Lumber Yard across the street. There were grocers, a jeweler, a gun dealer, stables and corrals. Two blocks up Douglas, bonnets could be altered, bleached and pressed in the latest styles at Miss A. McAuslands millinery. The citys landmark structure was the Capitol on the hill now occupied by Central High School. Omaha had many of the institutions of a city. There were hotels and a 170-acre poor farm. An Odd Fellows lodge had organized, and there were congregations of Catholics, Congregationalists, Episcopalians, Lutherans, Methodists and others. Prospect Hill Cemetery had been in business since 1858. Omahas prosperity was linked to railroads, particularly where the Union Pacific Railroad built its bridge across the Missouri River from Iowa. George L. Miller, editor of The Daily Herald, a tireless Nebraska booster, advocated for roads and bridges to make Omaha the future chief city of the Missouri Valley. When in New York City in 1867 to push for Omaha as the location of the railroad bridge across the river, he filed a dispatch to his newspaper: A gentleman of good standing, speaking of Nebraska yesterday in Broadway, inquired, How far is Nebraska from Omaha? This is fact. Besides illustrating Eastern ignorance of Western affairs, it has a good deal of meaning. It shows that even with otherwise intelligent men Omaha, as a town, has greater reputation than Nebraska as a state. Union Pacifics first tracks were laid in Omaha in 1865, but Omaha would not necessarily get the river bridge. Options included a site three miles south of Omaha at Childs Mill and another farther south at Bellevue. An early railroad decision to build at Childs Mill was viewed as a death knell to Omaha. The obvious result of the decision, Miller wrote, was that Council Bluffs would be the Great City and Omaha would be a farm. A state and city delegation, including Miller, traveled to New York to appeal. They won. When Miller, the citys first physician, arrived in Omaha in 1854 the year Nebraska Territory officially opened for settlement he was among the first wave of men and women who shaped the destiny of the state and city. His dream was to help build Nebraska into a great agricultural state, and Omaha into a great commercial city. For better or worse, Omahas fate wasnt to be a farm. We're all familiar with Omaha Steaks and Berkshire Hathaway as leading Nebraska businesses, but here are some more that deserve to be on the list. This article is taken from "Nebraska: 150 Years Told Through 93 Counties," a World-Herald book by staff writer David Hendee. Copies are available at the World-Herald store and at booksellers around Omaha. IMAGINED IN ST. PAUL Dorothy Lynch Home Style Dressing the sweet-and-tangy, orange salad dressing with a signature flavor associated with Nebraska by Dorothy enthusiasts was invented by a woman named Dorothy Lynch when she and her husband ran the Legion Club in St. Paul, Nebraska. Tasty Toppings of Columbus bought the brand in 1964. The dressing is bottled in nearby Duncan. The company and the product celebrated their 50th anniversary in 2014. KINGS OF CARDS Adam and Nannie Bozarth Hall homesteaded southeast of Brainard in 1870. Their three grandsons, Joyce, Rollie and William Hall, above, pooled their money and opened the Norfolk (Nebraska) Post Card Co. in about 1907. Three years later, they started selling greeting cards in Kansas City under the Hall Brothers label, which later became the Hallmark Co. A MEANS TO GROW Neligh Mill, built from locally fired brick in 1873 by John D. Neligh, was the first business in the newly platted town of Neligh. Popular brands produced included Neligh Patent Flour, So-Lite Flour and Crescent brand feeds. A good mill was a major factor in the growth of Nebraska communities during the 1870s and 1880s. Mills turned locally grown grain into flour, reducing expensive long-distance shipping. Mills with an ample water supply and situated on main rail lines were able to produce quantities in excess of local needs and sometimes received lucrative contracts with the Army and Indian Bureau or for overseas export. The Neligh Mills original 1880s equipment is still in place. U.S. CAPITOL IN NEBRASKA? Moses H. Sydenham was a Buffalo County pioneer who founded a newspaper in Kearney and used it to promote his idea to make Kearney the capital of the United States. COTTON MILL Kearney Cotton Mill was the largest manufacturing plant in Nebraska when it opened in 1892. Raw cotton came from the South by barge and railroad. At peak efficiency, the mill employed about 450 workers and produced 26,000 yards of muslin daily, with some of it shipped to Asia. The plant never operated at a profit and closed in 1901. BANK ON IT Banking came to Belden when Fred Kimball, a bank clerk from Coleridge, arrived on horseback with a gunnysack of money on his saddle horn. He set up a banking shop in front of the combination post office, drugstore and general store. PICK UP A RENTAL Located in a former horse stable, Ford Livery Co. at 1314 Howard St., was Americas first car rental company, dreamed up by Joe Saunders in 1916. Saunders Drive It Yourself System expanded to 56 cities by 1926. Saunders and his partner brothers sold to Avis in 1955. AN EARLY START Ponca is one of Nebraskas five oldest communities. The town got its start in 1856 when 11 settlers crossed the Missouri River into Nebraska Territory and camped south of Aowa Creek. Land on the north side of the creek was Indian territory and marked off-limits. Two settlers, however, knocked down the warning signs and laid out a 24-block town. Flour and saw mills along the creek helped the town grow in its early years. OIL COUNTRY Sleepy Hollow Field in Red Willow County is Nebraskas most productive oil field. It has produced more than 55.6 million barrels of oil since its discovery in 1960. HOME BREW Cody was a notorious gambling and bootlegging center. A train-car load of sugar a week was used for manufacturing moonshine in hidden stills. CAR COMPANY The Rogers Motor Car Co. in Ralston produced eight vehicles in the early 1900s. A NAME BRAND Dairy products from Beatrice Creamery Co. (started in 1894) were shipped across the nation early in the 20th century. The firms headquarters moved to Chicago in 1913, and the name changed to Beatrice Foods in 1946. The company has had the Meadow Gold brand since the 1890s. GOOD BUSINESS SENSE Nannie J. Osborne, who worked as a cook and housekeeper for the families of ranchers Ed Cook and Dr. George Towar, also was an astute businesswoman. She claimed a homestead as a head of household, and her 160 acres were along the railroad right-of-way in the new town site of Ainsworth. In addition to providing building sites for two churches Congregational and Methodist she filed a deed designating one full block for a courthouse. When the county was organized and Ainsworth was named seat of government, Osborne was ready. TALK LIKE AN EGYPTIAN It is said Cairo got its name when a railroad surveyor thought the land around a water stop 14 miles west of Grand Island resembled the African desert. Street names followed the Egyptian theme: Alexandria, Egypt, Nile, Said, Suez, Syria and Thebe. The village promotes itself as an Oasis of the Prairie. (It should be noted: Nebraskans pronounce the town name Cairo: Kare-Row, not Kye-Row.) HOUSE OF NINES La Vista was created in 1959 by a developer who planned to sell 335 houses priced at $9,999 each. It soon became known as House of Nines. The village incorporated in 1960. FIRST FINISHED INTERSTATE Construction of 455.3 miles of Interstate 80 across the state was formally completed with a Golden Link embedded in the roadway west of Sidney in 1974. Nebraska was the first state to complete its mainline Interstate system. Work started in 1955. Former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani said President Donald Trump wanted a "Muslim ban" and requested he assemble a commission to show him "the right way to do it legally." Giuliani, an early Trump supporter who once had been rumored for a Cabinet position in the new administration, appeared on Fox News late Saturday night to describe how Trump's executive order temporarily banning refugees came together. Trump on Friday signed orders not only to suspend admission of all refugees into the United States for 120 days but also to implement "new vetting measures" to screen out "radical Islamic terrorists." Refugee entry from Syria, however, would be suspended indefinitely, and all travel from Syria and six other nations Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen are suspended for 90 days. Trump also said he would give priority to Christian refugees over those of other religions, according to the Christian Broadcasting Network. Fox News host Jeanine Pirro asked Giuliani if the ban had anything to do with religion. "How did the president decide the seven countries?" she asked. "OK, talk to me." "I'll tell you the whole history of it," Giuliani responded. "So when (Trump) first announced it, he said, 'Muslim ban.' He called me up. He said, 'Put a commission together. Show me the right way to do it legally.'" Giuliani continued, saying he assembled a "whole group of other very expert lawyers on this," including former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey, Rep. Mike McCaul, R-Texas, and Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y. "And what we did was, we focused on, instead of religion, danger the areas of the world that create danger for us," Giuliani told Pirro. "Which is a factual basis, not a religious basis. Perfectly legal, perfectly sensible. And that's what the ban is based on. It's not based on religion. It's based on places where there are substantial evidence that people are sending terrorists into our country." It was unclear when the above-mentioned phone call took place and when the commission began working. An email to the White House press office was not immediately returned Sunday. Clips of the exchange between Giuliani and Pirro quickly went viral Saturday night, with some claiming that Giuliani's statement amounted to admitting Trump's intent had been to institute a ban based on religion. Others, including Trump senior adviser Kellyanne Conway and White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, have insisted it is not a ban on Muslims, but rather one based on countries from which travel was already restricted under the Obama administration. Priebus appeared on CBS's "Face the Nation" Sunday morning to say it was possible Trump would expand the list of countries included in the travel ban. "You can point to other countries that have similar problems, like Pakistan and others," Priebus told host John Dickerson. "Perhaps we need to take it further." Priebus also said there had been weeks of work and "plenty of communication" between the White House, the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security regarding the ban. "We didn't just type this thing up in an office and sign up," he told Dickerson. Later on the same program, Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., called out Giuliani's interview with Pirro from the night before. "They can't deny that this is a Muslim ban," Ellison told Dickerson. "On the campaign trail, (Trump) said he wanted a Muslim ban. ... Rudy Giuliani who helped him write it said that they started out with the intention of a Muslim ban and then they sort of 'languaged' it up so to try to avoid that label, but it is a religiously based ban." Senate Democrats vowed to draft legislation to block the travel ban. "We're demanding the president reverse these executive orders that go against what we are, everything we have always stood for," Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer. D-N.Y., said in a news conference Sunday morning, noting later that his middle name, Ellis, was originally inspired by Ellis Island. "It was implemented in a way that created chaos and confusion across the country, and it will only serve to embolden and inspire those around the globe those that will do us harm," Schumer added. "It must be reversed immediately." Trump's executive order caused mayhem and sparked massive protests at airports around the country Friday and Saturday, as reports surfaced that dozens of travelers from the affected countries, including green-card holders, were being detained. The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit Saturday morning challenging Trump's order after two Iraqi men with immigrant visas were barred from entering the United States at John F. Kennedy International Airport. As Giuliani was speaking, Fox News simultaneously aired an alert that noted federal judge Ann M. Donnelly had issued a stay to stop the deportations nationwide. Donnelly wrote that there was a strong likelihood the order had violated the petitioners' rights to due process and equal protection by the Constitution. "There is imminent danger that, absent the stay of removal, there will be substantial and irreparable injury to refugees, visa-holders, and other individuals from nations subject to the January 27, 2017 Executive Order," Donnelly wrote. The ACLU hailed the victory. "Clearly the judge understood the possibility for irreparable harm to hundreds of immigrants and lawful visitors to this country," ACLU executive director Anthony D. Romero said in a statement. "Our courts today worked as they should as bulwarks against government abuse or unconstitutional policies and orders. On week one, Donald Trump suffered his first loss in court." On Sunday, the Department of Homeland Security issued a statement saying it did not plan to back off enforcing Trump's orders. "President Trump's Executive Orders remain in place-prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety," the statement read. "President Trump's Executive Order affects a minor portion of international travelers, and is a first step towards reestablishing control over America's borders and national security." The department said that less than one percent of daily international air travelers to the United States had been "inconvenienced" on Saturday. Matthew Kolken, an immigration attorney based in Buffalo, said there has been "a systemic bias against individuals from Muslim countries in the U.S. immigration departments" for years, including under the Obama administration. "This isn't unprecedented," Kolken told The Washington Post by phone Sunday. "The unfortunate reality is the executive branch does have vast discretionary authority to determine who they are going (allow in or not)." That said, Kolken believes "Trump has gone a step further without a doubt" in including even people who are lawful permanent residents and suspending all immigration applications from people from the seven countries on the banned list. If there was evidence of disparate treatment of individuals from the same country - if there were anecdotal evidence of, for example, a Syrian family of one religious background allowed to enter over that of another religious background - then that is where lawsuits could "come to play," he said. "The question becomes whether they're trying to do an end-around by couching the ban as a country-specific ban based on a security-related issues when in reality it's a religious ban," Kolken said. A dinner in Pakistan that has Indian agencies worried India oi-Vicky New Delhi, Jan 30: A dinner hosted by the Lashkar-e-Taiba in Islamabad has yet again reiterated the fact that Pakistan has done little to curb terror groups. The dinner was hosted for the leaders of the Muslim World League by the chief of the LeT, Hafiz Saeed. The Muslim World League is an NGO based in Makkah, Saudi Arabia that propagates Islamic teachings specifically Wahhabism. The dinner was also attended by leaders of the Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat, Jamaat-e-Islami and Ansar ul Ummah. All these groups are on the ban list for propagating religious extremism. The meeting according to officials was held to discuss ways of spreading the Wahabi culture. Some groups in Saudi Arabia have been actively propagating religious extremism. The Wahabi culture which is also followed by the Islamic State is spreading at a rapid pace in India as well. Intelligence Bureau officials have cautioned against the spread of Wahhabism especially in the states of Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Kerala and Maharashtra. Officials in India say that that the dinner held on Saturday clearly shows that Islamabad has failed to crack down on any of the terrorist groups. "It was a brazen act that took place right under the nose of the Pakistan officials and they have not been able to curb terror related activities," the Intelligence Bureau official informed. OneIndia News Ban on Pakistan immigrants into the US is a welcome move, say Indian officials India oi-Vicky New Delhi, Jan 30: Indian agencies have welcomed the move by the United States of America which has proposed an immigration ban from Pakistan. Among all countries, Pakistan is without a doubt the most dangerous as terrorists have the backing of the ISI, which is one of the most dangerous spy agencies in the world, senior officials with the Research and Analysis Wing tell OneIndia. Pakistan has produced the likes of Sajid Mir who has been labelled as an international terrorist. Prior to plotting the Mumbai 26/11 attack, he was in France setting up an international cell for the Lashkar-e-Taiba. The investigation that was conducted clearly indicated that he was roping in several persons from Pakistan to carry out attacks across the globe. Indian officials say that the ISI has been picking several youth to immigrate into other countries to carry out terror strikes. Groups such as the al-Qaeda and the Lashkar-e-Taiba have always made it clear that the US and Israel are on top of their hit list. As per the executive order visitors from countries like Pakistan and Afghanistan are subject to extreme vetting. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus says, "We're not going to advertise to the world that we're going to put a stop or at least a further vetting on travel in and out of our country from these seven places. Some people have suggested, that, well, maybe we should have given everyone a three-day warning. But that would just mean that a terrorist would just move up their travel plans by three days. Identifying too many people in these countries and giving them a heads-up in these countries would only potentially flag the executive order for bad order," Priebus said. The White House on Sunday said there is a possibility in the future of including Pakistan in the list of countries from where immigration has been banned. This is for the first time that the Trump administration has publicly acknowledged about considering putting Pakistan into that list. Currently as per the executive order, visitors from countries like Pakistan and Afghanistan are subject to extreme vetting. (With agency inputs) OneIndia News Coast Guard to help Sri Lanka tackle pollution India oi-IANS By Ians English New Delhi, Jan 30: The Indian Coast Guard on Monday decided to help the Sri Lankan Navy in tackling pollution as and when requested, said an official statement. This was decided at a meeting between Rajendra Singh, Director General, Indian Coast Guards and Vice Admiral R.C. Wijegunaratne, Commander of the Sri Lankan Navy, at the Coast Guard Headquarters here. Wijegunaratne also held bilateral discussions with Indian Navy chief Admiral Sunil Lanba and other senior officials. He was also scheduled to meet Air Chief B.S Dhanoh, Army chief Gen Bipin Rawat and will call on Minister of State for Defence Subhash Bhamre. Wijegunaratne who is on an India visit from January 29 to February 2 also visited the control centre of the coastal surveillance network and was briefed about the capabilities of the network. Naval cooperation between India and Sri Lanka has been traditionally strong, encompassing a wide span which includes operational interactions through bilateral exercises, Training, port calls, hydrographic co-operation, Special Forces interactions, capability building and capacity augmentation initiatives. Goa Shipyard Limited is building two Advanced Offshore Patrol Vessels for the Sri Lankan Navy. Vice Admiral R.C. Wijegunaratne's visit follows closely on the visit of the Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Sunil Lanba's visit to Sri Lanka wherein he also participated in the 7th International Maritime Conference, Galle Dialogue 2016. IANS Demonetisation has had no impact on political party funding, say experts India oi-Vicky New Delhi, Jan 30: There is a nexus between the bureaucracy and politicians where recovering election expenditure is concerned said former chief election commissioner, Dr SY Qureshi. He was speaking at a discussion organised by the Association for Democratic Reforms on Effects of Demonetisation on Political Financing and Black Money. Dr Qureshi noted that political parties could not agree on expenditure limits or the rationalisation of expenditure limits. He recommended state funding of political parties be based on their performance, instead of state funding of elections. He proposed that in such a model regular CAG audits would be conducted and there will be a total ban on any private donations. Political parties never legislate against their interest, and all the electoral reforms till date have been through the Supreme Court's intervention. He suggested that the way forward was through collaboration between Civil Society organisations and the media, and stressed on the requirement of internal democracy in political parties. HS Brahma, former CEC said demonetisation has had no impact on political party funding. "Political parties can submit any amount of money and there is no restriction on their expenditure, therefore it's easy to convert black money by shifting it into the accounts of political parties. There should be a threshold limit of Rs 2,000 as ECI has recommended and political parties must be made accountable for the conduct of candidates they field during elections," Brahma said. Justice GC Bharuka added that election process is contaminated by two means, muscle power and money power. He also explained the Section 13(A) of the IT Act which states that political parties have to maintain accounts for their donations below Rs 20,000. Though they don't have to disclose the details of their source, they have to give proper balance sheet for expenditure. He added that there is a lack of coordination between ECI and the IT department. Justice Bharuka said that the theme of the Constitution is that there should be purity in elections. He said, the IT Act provides for remedies and political parties cannot escape from those provisions. "There are enough legal provisions but there is failure on the part of the administration. Good coordination is required between various government authorities for required political reforms," he stated. He added that under the Legal Services Authorities Act 1987, this is the duty of the authorities under the Act to educate citizens about their rights and duties. OneIndia News For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Monday, January 30, 2017, 9:23 [IST] All victims retrieved in Morbi Bridge collapse, no one missing: Report Gujarat Assembly polls 2022: Filing of nominations to begin from today Gujarat: Train accident averted India oi-IANS By Ians English Ahmedabad, Jan 30: A train accident was averted in Gujarat after the security personnel found 40 clips missing from a railway track early on Monday, an official said. The discovery was made between Unjha and Kamli stations in Mahesana section. According to Western Railway chief spokesman Ravinder Bhakar, a Railway Protection Force constable on routine inspection found the 40 'pandoral clips' displaced from the track. "This could be the work of miscreants," Bhakar told IANS. "A case has been registered," he added. As a precaution, the Bikaner-Secunderabad Express, which was set to cross the track, was halted. The train was later allowed to proceed. Following the incident, Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu again appealed to railway officials to stay alert. "Please be very vigilant, thwart these attempts of anti-social elements, playing with innocent and precious lives," Prabhu tweeted. In the last four months, three major train accidents occurred due to derailment. IANS For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Monday, January 30, 2017, 15:14 [IST] PM Modi to visit Himachal Pradesh on Oct 5; to launch various projects and inaugurate AIIMS Bilaspur Himachal was valued less on strength, more on Parliament seats before: PM Modi Himachal Pradesh proposes budget of Rs 5,700 crore India oi-IANS By Ians English Shimla, Jan 30: Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh on Monday said a state annual plan of Rs 5,700 crore has been proposed for the next fiscal with an increase of Rs 500 crore over the present fiscal. Presiding over a meeting of legislators here for finalising priorities for the 2016-17 budget, he said detailed project reports amounting to Rs 470 crore had been sanctioned through National Bank for Agriculture And Rural Developement (NABARD) for meeting out the priorities of the legislators. He said project reports of Rs 1,100 crore were ready and forwarded to NABARD for sanction. Singh said it was necessary to conduct the social audit of all the new schemes and also for those being implemented as it was important to know the reasons of delay in implementation, if any. "It's easy to correct oneself at the very beginning rather than wasting time in mending the mistakes afterwards," he said. He stressed the need to conduct social audit of the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation Yojna being implemented in Shimla and Kullu towns, all skill development schemes and the Mukhya Mantri Start-Up Yojna in a time-bound manner. Tourism, horticulture and hydro-power generation are major contributors to the state's economic development. IANS How an Indian spy helped Pak gain operational advantage during war India oi-Vicky New Delhi, Jan 30: The documents are classified and Pakistan can carry out corrective deployment to gain operational advantage during war. This information can be useful to an enemy country that is planning its operations against India, a report sent out by an Indian spy to Pakistan reads. The report is quoted by the Crime Branch of the Delhi police which probed an espionage case in which a Pakistan High Commission staffer was involved. Mehmood Akthar, the staffer was declared persona non grata and sent back to Pakistan as he enjoyed diplomatic immunity. Investigations led to the arrest of four persons including one Farhat Khan, who was the personal assistant to Samajwadi Party MP, Munawwar Salim. The crime branch in its chargesheet alleged that Khan misused the MP's office to procure sensitive documents. It was learnt during investigations that documents such as "fire plan of the Army," were procured and handed over to Akthar. Further details on the position of surface to air missiles and also deployment of the armed forces in Sir Creek were also shared. In its chargesheet the crime branch has named Indian agents, Maulana Ramzan Khan, Farhat Khan, Soheb Hussain and Subhash Jangir. Akthar was, however, not named in the chargesheet as he enjoyed diplomatic immunity. All the accused persons have been charged under Sections 3 and 9 of the Official Secrets Act and also under the Indian Penal Code for criminal conspiracy. OneIndia News Jallikattu legislation gets Presidents nod: AIADMK India oi-Anusha The AIADMK on Monday said that President Pranab Mukherjee had given his sanction to Tamil Nadu government's bill legalising Jallikattu. The AIADMK took to its official Twitter account to announce the same. The Tamil Nadu government in a special assembly session on January 23 had tabled and passed a bill legalising Jallikattu. The bill was passed unanimously in the assembly. The bill was sent to the President for approval and on Monday, President Pranab Mukherjee is said to have sanctioned the same. The sanction comes just a day before the Supreme Court takes up a petition filed by Animal Welfare Board challenging the bill. Meanwhile, after a meeting with Chief Minister O Panneerselvam, the Jallikattu committee announced that the event will be held in Avaniapuram on February 5, at Palamedu on February 9 and at Alanganallur at February 10. While organisers have announced the dates, the fate of the traditional sport now lies with the Supreme Court. OneIndia News For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Monday, January 30, 2017, 17:05 [IST] Why is the DMK continuing to oppose the imposition of Hindi? - 50 years of struggle and the truth! Tamil Nadu: Heavy rains in several parts of Tamil Nadu in next 2 days Jallikattu: Madras HC seeks report on police crackdown India oi-Anusha The Madurai bench of the Madras high court on Monday sought a detailed report on police action against Jallikattu protesters at Alanganallur in Madurai. The court asked the Tamil Nadu director general of police to file a report before February 15. Petitioner P Kanagavel had moved court alleging police excess while dispersing crowds gathered for a Jallikattu event on January 23 and sought a judicial inquiry into the same. The incident had left close to 40 people, including 10 policemen injured. The petitioner had also pleaded to the court for directions to the Tamil Nadu government to provide treatment to those injured in the police action. The alleged police excess at Alanganallur was also caught on camera by television channels. OneIndia News Mallya's 1.5 lakh mails under CBI scanner India oi-Vicky By Vicky The Central Bureau of Investigation which had filed a chargesheet against liquor baron Vijay Mallya is now scanning his 1.5 lakh emails. Sources say that these emails are crucial to the probe as it would help find if any undue favours were doled out to Mallya. Agencies are trying to find if favours were granted to Mallya who has been accused of defaulting on loans to the tune of Rs 6,900 crore. The mails under the scanner are those which have been sent to company officials, bankers and political leaders. Officials say that if evidence is found that favours were granted then it would form part of the additional chargesheet that they would file against Mallya and others. The CBI says that most of the loans were granted to Mallya between 2006 and 2009 when he was a member of Parliament. In the chargesheet that was filed last week, it was stated that undue favours were granted to Mallya who obtained a loan for Kingfisher Airlines from the IDBI bank. The loan amount was to the tune of Rs 900 crore. The CBI accused some officials of the bank of granting the loan despite the airline having negative ratings. OneIndia News For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Monday, January 30, 2017, 9:38 [IST] Manmohan Singh says Indian Economy in bad shape India oi-IANS By Ians English New Delhi, Jan 30: A day before the government presents the Economic Survey, former Prime Minister and Congress leader Manmohan Singh on Monday released a document detailing the current scenario of the Indian economy, which he said was not in good shape. Manmohan Singh, a former Governor of the RBI, has been critical of the Modi government's decision to demonetise Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 notes. "Tomorrow is the day when the government will present its economic survey. We thought it a good idea that we should also bring out a document which sets out what we consider is the real state of the economy. "So that the country as a whole has the ways and means of assessing where the economy is, where it is heading to and what can be done to bring on the right path," said Manmohan Singh unveiling the "Real State of Economy", prepared by the Congress. "Indian economy is not in good shape is now obvious. The IMF has projected that the growth rate of India this current fiscal year will not be 7.6 per cent but 6.6 percent. Several other agencies have made similar projections," said Manmohan Singh. "I will not comment on those projections, it is for you assess what the truth is. This is a contribution to the ongoing debate on where are economy stands, where it is heading to and what is to be done to pull it in the right path," added Manmohan Singh. IANS Manohar Parrikar calls vote pure donation India oi-IANS By Ians English Panaji, Jan 30: A day after telling voters that it is all right to accept money from rival parties as long as they vote for the BJP, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar on Monday said voters should not fall prey to greed during elections as voting is a "pure donation". "I want to say this to you: please do not fall for any greed. Voting is a pure deed... The government is for the next generation. So, while electing a government, you have to decide what the coming government will give us," Parrikar told a poll rally in the Porvorim assembly constituency near here late on Monday. Addressing a corner meeting in the Chimbel slum near Panaji on Sunday, Parrikar had said: "...I understand if someone organises a rally and you take Rs 500 for moving around with (the candidate), that is not a problem. But when you vote, choose the lotus (BJP's poll symbol). This you must remember." The Defence Minister's comments on Sunday resulted in a complaint filed against him by a regional party, Goa Forward. In its complaint to the state's Chief Electoral Officer, Goa Forward said that if Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has been booked for asking voters to accept bribes from candidates, then an FIR should also be booked against Parrikar. "You had initiated action against Kejriwal when he had made a similar statement. On behalf of Goa Forward Party, we urge you to kindly investigate the matter and direct police to register an FIR in this matter at the earliest," it said in its complaint. IANS Mulayam and Mayawati: A study in contrasts India oi-Ratan Mani Lal Mulayam Singh Yadav and Mayawati have dominated the socio-political discourse in Uttar Pradesh for close to a quarter century now. It was in 1992 that Mayawati first started emerging as a force in the state representing mainly Dalit population through her Bahujan Samaj Party, whereas in the same year Mulayam had formed his Samajwadi Party after a series of defections, manipulations, breakaways and stints in power. Both had placed their bets on a risky but useful political gamble by forming a coalition government in 1993 but the experiment failed amid conspiracy and violence in June 1995. But now, the two present a study in contrast that speaks volumes about their approach to political power and attitudes towards other parties. This contrast will certainly shape the things to come not only in Uttar Pradesh but in national politics as well in the next two years. On a day of quick political developments in Lucknow on Sunday, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and UP Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav appeared for a joint press conference and took part in a rally. Most significantly, Rahul said he had immense respect for Mayawati and indicated that because of her policies, she was more acceptable than the Bharatiya Janata Party. In the evening, Akhilesh's father - who had flown to Delhi the same day - told the media that he did not approve of the SP-Congress alliance and he will oppose it in the election campaign. On the other hand, Mayawati said that the alliance was "opportunistic and unholy" and a conspiracy to indirectly benefit BJP. She termed the alliance as being superficial, saying it was like dil mile na mile haath milate rahiye (join your hands even if your hearts do not join). The SP regime, she said, was marked by increase in crime and communal riots, and yet the Congress has decided to take the chance to face reverses from this alliance. She asked: "What else is this if not politics of opportunism?" The Congress couldn't have expected from Mayawati a welcome or praise for the "immense respect" shown by Rahul towards her. And her reaction was also among expected lines. Yet, the unusually soft and conciliatory expression by Rahul is a sign of the clout that Mayawati is expected to wield, and the eagerness with which Mayawati's political favours could be pursued by the Congress in days to come. The times are a changin' Compare this with what Mulayam has become now. Regardless of the lingering doubts that the so-called dispute within the Yadav family and the top leaders of the Samajwadi Party were scripted by Mulayam himself, the end result was that the legal and official control of the party finally went to Akhilesh, who also got rid of people he did not want in the party and the Government he headed. In the end, Mulayam was left with the company of his younger brother Shivpal Yadav, and a handful of supporters, the rest having deserted him for either the Rashtriya Lok Dal or, ironically, the BSP. And now, he is forced to condemn the alliance his son has forged with the Congress, while admitting that the formation of his Samajwadi Party has been on the basis of anti-Congress sentiments and policies. Mulayam has also claimed that he will campaign against the SP-Congress alliance in the coming days. He also feels that Akhilesh had better chances of retaining power if he had contested alone. Strikingly, Akhilesh did not express any eagerness to be respectful or accommodating towards Mayawati. Instead, he said the SP-Congress alliance could not accommodate someone as 'big' as Mayawati or her election symbol the 'elephant.' Akhilesh was reminded by the media that till some time ago, he used to call Mayawati his bua (paternal aunt), but he very firmly said he does not say so now. Is it that the alliance looks at a possible scenario where BSP could come to the aid of the party? And is this something that has the blessings of Mulayam? Or, it is the end of Mulayam's brand of politics where political foes are foes for all time to come - in this case, both the Congress and the BSP? As Mayawati has embarked upon her election campaign with a series of rallies planned across the state, Akhilesh and Rahul, too, have their campaign strategy in place, even if Rahul has stated that he shan't reveal the strategy to the media. And on the other hand is Mulayam, a lone crusader of his brand of socialism, preparing to do his bit to oppose the SP-Congress alliance. In the five years of Akhilesh's regime, Mulayam played the main opposition to his son's government. Now, he plans to do the same when Akhilesh is trying hard to retain power with forces that Mulayam abhors. It is over to the people now. OneIndia News For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Monday, January 30, 2017, 17:28 [IST] Punjab polls 2017: 100 candidates have declared criminal cases India oi-Vicky By Vicky Out of the 1,145 candidates contesting the Punjab assembly elections 2017, 100 have declared criminal cases against them. The analysis done by Association for Democratic Reforms stated that 77 candidates have declared serious criminal cases against them. Four candidates have declared cases related to murder (Indian Penal Code Section-302) against them. Eleven candidates have declared cases related to attempt to murder against them. Five candidates have declared cases related to crimes against women. Fourteen out of 117 candidates from the Indian National Congress, 12 (11 out of 112 candidates from Aam Aadmi Party, 10 out of 94 candidates from the Shiromani Akali Dal, 7 out of 77 candidates from the Apna Punjab Party, 5 out of 54 candidates from SAD-A, 2 out of 23 candidates from the Bhartiya Janta Party , and 19 (6%) out of 304 independent candidates have declared criminal cases against them in their affidavits. Party wise candidates with serious criminal cases: Nine out of 117 candidates from INC, 9 out of 112 candidates from the AAP, 8 out of 94 candidates from the SAD, 5 of 77 candidates from the APP, 5 out of 54 candidates from SAD-A, 1 out of 23 candidates from the BJP, and 18 out of 304 Independent candidates have declared serious criminal cases including murder, attempt to murder, crime against women, kidnapping etc. against them in their affidavits. OneIndia News For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Monday, January 30, 2017, 15:26 [IST] LeT terrorist Mohammad Arif to hang after SC confirms death in 2000 Red Fort attack case SC turns down Asaram's bail plea, orders fresh FIR for faking documents India oi-Oneindia By Oneindia Staff Writer The Supreme Court on Monday rejected the bail plea of self styled godman Asaram Bapu on health grounds and ordered filing a fresh FIR for faking documents concerning his health. Asaram was arrested by the Jodhpur police on August 3, 2013, after a teenager accused him of sexually assaulting her near Jodhpur ashram. The apex court has also slapped a fine Rs 1 lakh on the self styled godman and observed that the plea was devoid of merit. According to reports, the Gujarat governemnt has earlier told the top court that the trial in this case would be held in an expeditious mannner and , hence, oppossed the bail being granted to Asaram. The apex court had earlier asked All India Medical Sciences for a report on Asaram's prostate ailment. AIIMS said that the evaluation remained incomplete because of Asaram's refusal to undergo required tests. Ironically, at least two people who were among several prosecution witnesses in the case have been murdered in separate incidents. Reports state that some of the winesses have also received death threats from unidentified people. OneIndia News Shiv Sena rebuffs alliance proposal from MNS India oi-IANS By Ians English Mumbai, Jan 30: The Maharashtra Navnirman Sena on Monday said the Shiv Sena has rebuffed its proposal for an alliance for next month's civic elections in Mumbai. Senior MNS leader Bala Nandgaonkar said he personally went to Sena President Uddhav Thackeray's Bandra residence 'Matoshri' on Sunday with a proposal and submitted it to his team comprising Anil Desai, Rahul Shewale, Anil Parab, Subhash Desai and others. "They assured me it would be conveyed to their party chief," said Nandgaonkar, who is a close confidant of Raj Thackeray and enjoys a good rapport with Uddhav Thackeray. When asked about the MNS proposal on Monday afternoon, Uddhav denied outright about having received any such communication from his estranged cousin. "We have not received any proposal from any party... We have decided to fight on our own strength across Maharashtra," Uddhav said dismissively. Responding to this, Nandgaonkar glumly said: "If they are saying this, then I may be a liar." Elaborating, he revealed that in the past eight days, Raj called up Uddhav seven times since January 22. He followed it up by personally submitting an "unconditional alliance" proposal "in the interest of Mumbai" and since everybody desires the two warring cousins should come together again. Significantly, the MNS overtures started four days before Uddhav Thackeray on January 26 unilaterally snapped the 25-year-old ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party for the upcoming civic elections, though it continues to be partner in the state government and at the Centre. "Raj Thackeray made the gesture as 'a younger brother' and since he had made a commitment to the late Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray," Nandgaonkar said. Describing Uddhav as "a nice person", he admitted that though Uddhav was at home, he could not meet him (Uddhav), otherwise the situation would have been completely different. Saying "we are hopeful," Nandgaonkar pointed out that there is still time left and urged Uddhav to at least consider the MNS proposal, instead of summarily rejecting it. MNS corporator Sandeep Deshpande said an alliance could greatly benefit the Shiv Sena as it would prevent division of Marathi votes and in a municipal corporation elections, even a couple of hundred votes could make or mar the candidate's prospects. Plagued with desertions of its legislators and corporators across the state, the MNS is fighting a battle for sheer survival while the Shiv Sena is attempting to establish its supremacy over rivals by going alone in the state. IANS A new Trinamool Congress in six months? What we know Recruitment of primary teachers under TMC regime in Bengal on radar of agencies Mamata's party has replaced 'Rule of Law' by 'Rule by TMC law': Rijiju TMC to skip Budget day in Parliament India oi-PTI New Delhi, Jan 30: The Trinamool Congress will not attend Parliament on February 1 when the Budget is presented, citing Saraswati Puja on that day as the reason. The TMC is miffed over the arrest of its two MPs by CBI in connection with the chitfund scam. Trinamool will also not attend the all-party meeting convened by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan on Monday evening ahead of the Budget session of Parliament beginning on Tuesday. "Trinamool will not attend Parliament on February 1 because of Saraswati Puja which is a big day in Bengal," party leader and MP Derek O'Brien told PTI. He said that on Saraswati Puja day there is a custom of keeping away from work and not even touching the tools. "Saraswati Puja is beyond a religious festival. It is a socio-cultural festival of Bengal," he added. Budget will be presented by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Wednesday. About not attending the all-party meeting, he said this was because Trinamool supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had called a meeting of party MPs for Tuesday '10 days back'. Asked whether the party was 'boycotting' these proceedings or just skipping, he replied, "It is open for your interpretation". Trinamool Congress has been angry over the arrest of its two MPs Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Tapas Pal by CBI in connection with the Rose Valley Group chit fund scam. PTI For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Monday, January 30, 2017, 13:13 [IST] Trupti Desai seeks a 'liquor-free' Maharashtra India oi-PTI Mumbai, Jan 30: Bhoomata Brigade chief and gender rights activist Trupti Desai, who shot to fame for spearheading the agitation seeking parity to women over their restricted entry into places of worship, has now announced to launch a new campaign for a liquor-free Maharashtra. "I am going to launch the statewide campaign soon, and it will start from Pune. There are more men who consume liquor but its the women suffer most because of it. Liquor consumption also increases domestic violence; hence I am keen on setting up 'Taigiri' groups that would extend support to women suffering in such cases," Desai told PTI on Monday. "If a district like Chandrapur can successfully implement a flat ban on liquor, why not entire Maharashtra state follow suit," Desai said. If Guardian ministers of each district initiate the process, liquor ban can be implemented in a few days, she felt. Desai alleged that the state government seems to be not concerned with key issues of liquor consumption and its impact on lives of people, especially women in this state. "After holding a couple of meetings with the members of the Brigade, I will soon launch the campaign," Desai said. "I am going to follow the path of Mahatma Gandhi during my agitation across the state. If the state fails to take appropriate steps, then I am going to intensify the agitation," Desai warned. PTI US: India need not have 5,500-km range missiles India oi-IANS By Ians English New Delhi, Jan 30: The US always felt India had no reason to pursue a missile programme with a range beyond 5,500 km because it would be enough to target China and anything more than that would be useless, according to a declassified 1990 CIA document. The US assessment is borne out by India not yet deciding to go ahead with a missile beyond 5,000-km range of Agni V that was test fired recently even as reports suggest that a version of Agni V with Multiple Independently Targetable Re-entry Warheads is being developed. The Central Intelligence Agency in the partially declassified top secret intelligence assessment dated June 1, 1990, on the "Ballistic Missiles in India and Pakistan" said: "We see little benefit to India of developing ICBM-class (more than 5,500 km range) missile. A missile with considerable less range would be able to strike any target in China." Any Indian ballistic missile with beyond 6,000 km range would be able to reach parts of Europe -- a target India never considered in its strategic defence programmes. Most of the report has not been declassified. Talking about Pakistan's ballistic missiles, the report says: "Both Hatf (I-II) are flawed by the lack of a guidance system and, hence, have very poor accuracy... Pakistan is attempting to obtain Scud missiles technology from North Korea and is developing LD - a probably longer range system." "Pakistani officials have also been in contact with representatives of the European consortium that supervised the development of the 750-1,000 km range Condor II in Argentina. Production of the Condor II or another missile with a range longer than the Hatf II is likely in Pakistan by the mid-to-late 1990s." The report clearly shows the US did not make any serious effort in restricting Pakistan from violating the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR). Pakistan went on to develop Shaheen III with range beyond 2,500 km. India, on June 27, 2016, became 35th full member of the MTCR -- an informal and voluntary partnership among 35 countries, which prevent proliferation of missile technology over more than 300 km. IANS When Delhi HC decided to define what a sandal is! India oi-Vicky By Vicky The Delhi high court has passed a unique order in which it chose to clarify that a woman's footwear without a back strap is a sandal and not a chappal. The court was hearing the contention of the government which had argued a woman's footwear without a back strap is a chappal and not a sandal. The issue came up as the export of sandals attracts 10 per cent customs duty drawback, while that of chappals attracts only five per cent duty. The government had withdrawn a 10 per cent duty drawback given to a footwear manufacturer saying the footwear exported by it was chappals as these did not have back straps. The bench observed that the Centre and the revenue department acted upon prejudice and a preconceived notion that ladies sandals cannot be without a back strap. The court held that the orders upholding duty drawback withdrawal and imposing penalty cannot be sustained. OneIndia News For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Monday, January 30, 2017, 9:56 [IST] Value investing is easily one of the most popular ways to find great stocks in any market environment. After all, who wouldnt want to find stocks that are either flying under the radar and are compelling buys, or offer up tantalizing discounts when compared to fair value? One way to find these companies is by looking at several key metrics and financial ratios, many of which are crucial in the value stock selection process. Lets put Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited TSM stock into this equation and find out if it is a good choice for value-oriented investors right now, or if investors subscribing to this methodology should look elsewhere for top picks: PE Ratio A key metric that value investors always look at is the Price to Earnings Ratio, or PE for short. This shows us how much investors are willing to pay for each dollar of earnings in a given stock, and is easily one of the most popular financial ratios in the world. The best use of the PE ratio is to compare the stocks current PE ratio with: a) where this ratio has been in the past; b) how it compares to the average for the industry/sector; and c) how it compares to the market as a whole. On this front, Taiwan Semiconductor has a trailing twelve months PE ratio of 15.55. This level compares favorably with the market at large, as the PE ratio for the S&P 500 comes in at about 20.11. If we focus on the long-term PE trend, Taiwan Semiconductors current PE level puts it slightly above its midpoint over the past five years. Hence, this does not provide us with a conclusive direction as to the relative valuation of the stock in comparison to its own historical trend. Meanwhile, the stocks PE compares favorably with the Zacks classified Computer & Technology sectors trailing twelve months PE ratio, which stands at 22.08. At the very least, this indicates that the stock is relatively undervalued right now, compared to its peers. Story continues We should also point out that Taiwan Semiconductor has a forward PE ratio (price relative to this years earnings) of just 14.04, so it is fair to say that a slightly more value-oriented path may be ahead for Taiwan Semiconductor stock in the near term too. PEG Ratio While earnings are certainly important, it is essential to know how much you are paying for the growth of earnings as well. One can easily do that with the PEG ratio (ratio of the P/E to the expected future earnings growth rate).The PEG ratio gives a more complete picture of the valuation of a stock than the P/E ratio. Taiwan Semiconductors PEG ratio stands at just 0.94, compared with the Zacks Computer-Mini industry average of 1.75. This suggests a decent undervalued trading relative to its earnings growth potential right now. Broad Value Outlook In aggregate, Taiwan Semiconductor currently has a Zacks Value Style Score of B, putting it into the top 40% of all stocks we cover from this look. This makes Taiwan Semiconductor a solid choice for value investors. What About the Stock Overall? Though Taiwan Semiconductor might be a good choice for value investors, there are plenty of other factors to consider before investing in this name. In particular, it is worth noting that the company has a Growth grade of B and a Momentum score of A. This gives TSM a Zacks VGM scoreor its overarching fundamental gradeof A. (You can read more about the Zacks Style Scores here >>) Our VGM Score identifies stocks that have the most attractive value, growth, and momentum characteristics, and a good VGM score can increase your odds of success. All things considered, Taiwan Semiconductor seems to have pretty striking prospects. Meanwhile, the companys recent earnings estimates have been mixed at best. The current quarter has seen no revisions in the past sixty days, while the full year estimate has seen one upward revision and one downward revision in the same time period. This has had just a small impact on the consensus estimate though as the current quarter consensus estimate remained constant in the past two months, while the full year estimate has inched higher by 0.5%. You can see the consensus estimate trend and recent price action for the stock in the chart below: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Ltd. Price and Consensus Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Ltd. Price and Consensus | Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Ltd. Quote This somewhat mixed trend is why the stock has just a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) and why we are looking for in-line performance from the company in the near term. Bottom Line Taiwan Semiconductor is an inspired choice for value investors, as it is hard to beat its incredible lineup of statistics on this front. It forms a part of the Zacks categorized Semiconductor - Circuit Foundry industry which carries ranks in the Top 33% out of more than 250 industries. However, with a Zacks Rank #3, it is hard to get too excited about this company overall. So, value investors might want to wait for estimates and analyst sentiment to turn around in this name first, but once that happens, this stock could be a compelling pick. Zacks' Top Investment Ideas for Long-Term Profit How would you like to see our best recommendations to help you find todays most promising long-term stocks? Starting now, you can look inside our portfolios featuring stocks under $10, income stocks, value investments and more. These picks, which have double and triple-digit profit potential, are rarely available to the public. But you can see them now. Click here >> Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Ltd. (TSM): Free Stock Analysis Report To read this article on Zacks.com click here. Zacks Investment Research 4 killed after man goes on shooting spree across Memphis, gunman in custody Thailand shooting: 34 killed in a shooting and knife attack at child care center, officials say Gunmen open fire at Quebec mosque, 6 killed International oi-Oneindia By Oneindia Staff Writer Quebec, Jan 30: Six people were reportedly killed and several injured after three gunmen opened fire at a mosque here, the mosque's president Mohamed Yangui has said. The shooting was carried out while prayers were being conducted in the mosque. Two people have been arrested so far and the area around the mosque has been cordoned off. The same mosque, had last year, received a pig's head gift wrapped with a note stating 'bon apetite.' The mosque's president said that he was receiving frantic calls from people during the evening prayer. Yangui, who was not at the moque at the time of the shooting said that he didn't know how many people were injured. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took to Twitter to express his grief."My thoughts are with victims and their families," he wrote. Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec City. My thoughts are with victims & their families. Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 30, 2017 OneIndia News Anti-Trump petition to stop UK state visit smashes 1 million mark International oi-Oneindia By Oneindia Staff Writer Over a million people have signed a petition demanding that US President Donald Trump should not be allowed to stay at Buckingham Palace during his state visit to the United Kingdom. The petition, which had earned just 372 signatures since the end of November last year, claims that such a stay 'would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen'. At around 10 am on Monday, the petition had over a million signatories. The huge support shows the outrage at the President's ban on refugees and citizens from seven Muslim nations entering the US has not gone down well with many. When he signed the order on Friday night fewer than 10,000 people had backed the petition. It passed a million signatures by British citizens at 9.54 am on Monday. According to the rules, any petition with 1,00,000 signatures or more automatically qualifies it for consideration to be debated in parliament, though there are no guarantees. This makes the petition the second-most popular on the British parliament's website - and a committee of MPs will debate on Tuesday whether this merits it having a full debate. Amid global protests, Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn tweeted: 'Over 1 million people have signed. We will not back down, cancel state visit and condemn the Muslim ban.' Downing Street, however, has not indicated that it had any plans to cancel the state visit. A source told the BBC that cancelling the visit would be a "populist gesture" that would "undo everything". OneIndia News Donald Trump reaffirms support to South Korea's security International oi-IANS By Ians English Washington, Jan 30: US President Donald Trump reaffirmed Washington's "ironclad commitment" towards South Korea's security and agreed to take steps to bolster joint defence capabilities, the media reported on Monday. Trump made the remark when he had a telephonic conversation with South Korea's Acting President and Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn late on Sunday and discussed the importance of the alliance between the two countries, the White House said in a statement. "President Trump reiterated our ironclad commitment to defend South Korea, including through the provision of extended deterrence, using the full range of military capabilities. The two leaders agreed to take steps to strengthen joint defence capabilities to defend against the North Korean threat," Yonhap News Agency reported citing the statement as saying. The two leaders also discussed US Defence Secretary James Mattis' upcoming visit to Seoul next week and noted the trip "reflects the close friendship between our two countries and demonstrates the importance of the US-South Korea alliance." Hwang congratulated Trump on his inauguration and Trump wished Hwang and the South Korean people a prosperous and happy Lunar New Year. The phone conversation came amid heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un threatened in his New Year's Day address to test-fire an intercontinental ballistic missile apparently capable of reaching the US. Hwang has been serving as the acting president since President Park Geun-hye was impeached by parliament over corruption allegations on December 9. Trump already had a phone conversation with Park in November, after his surprise election victory. IANS Donald Trump's travel ban will get IS more support International oi-IANS By Ians English Washington, Jan 30: Jihadi groups celebrated the Trump administration's ban on travel from seven Muslim-majority countries, saying the new policy validates their claim that the US is at war with Islam, a newspaper here reported. Comments posted to pro-Islamic State social media accounts predicted that President Trump's executive order would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists, said a report in the Washington Post on Sunday. One posting hailed the US President as "the best caller to Islam", while others predicted that Trump would soon launch a new war in the Middle East. "[Islamic State leader Abu Bakr] al-Baghdadi has the right to come out and inform Trump that banning Muslims from entering America is a 'blessed ban'," said one posting to a pro-Islamic State channel on Telegram, a social-media platform. The writer compared the executive order to the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, which Islamic militant leaders at the time hailed as a "blessed invasion" that ignited anti-Western fervour across the Islamic world, said the Post. Several postings suggested that Trump was fulfilling the predictions of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born Al Qaeda leader and preacher who famously said that the "West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens". Awlaki was killed in a US drone strike in Yemen in 2011. "When US President Donald Trump says 'We don't want them here' and bans the Muslim immigrants from Muslim countries, there is one thing that comes to our mind," said another posting, beneath a banner of al-Awlaki and his quote. Another posting on the Telegram channel "Abu Magrebi" said Trump's actions "clearly revealed the truth and harsh reality behind the American government's hatred towards Muslims". "Jihadists would have to argue to lengths that Obama, Bush, and others held anti-Islam agendas and hated the religion -- not just radical terrorists," said Rita Katz, founder of the SITE Intelligence Group, a private organisation that monitors jihadi websites. "Trump, however, makes that argument a lot easier for them to sell to their followers," she said. The reaction to the ban from Islamic State sympathisers came as current and former US officials also expressed concern that the temporary ban would undermine the global fight against violent Islamic militants. Senator John McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he worried about the ban's impact on Muslim troops fighting alongside Americans to destroy the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. "The effect will probably in some areas give ISIS some more propaganda," McCain told CBS's Face the Nation on Sunday. Robert Richer, a 35-year CIA veteran and former chief of the agency's Near East division, said the ban was a "strategic mistake" that could undermine future efforts to recruit spies and collect vital information about terrorists and their plans. IANS Hafiz Saeed put under house arrest in Lahore International oi-PTI Lahore, Jan 30: Jammat-ud-Dawah chief Hafiz Saeed, the mastermind of Mumbai terror attack, was tonight placed under house arrest in Lahore, his outfit said. Punjab government's Home Department has issued detention order of Saeed and Lahore Police have reached JuD headquarters in Chauburji to implement the order, it said. He "is at Masjid-e-Qadsia Chauburji and a heavy contingent of police has surrounded the JuD headquarters," JuD official Ahmed Nadeem, who is present at the premises of the outfit, told PTI by phone. "The commanding police officer told us that he has with him the house arrest order of the JuD chief issued by the Punjab Home Department," Nadeem said. Punjab government's action comes amidst pressure from the Trump administration to act against terror. The US has clearly told Islamabad that in case of not taking action against JuD and Saeed, it may face sanctions. JuD is the front for the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror outfit which is responsible for numerous terror attacks in India, including the Mumbai terror strike of November 26,2008, which was masterminded by Saeed. JuD has already been declared as a foreign terrorist organisation by the United States in June 2014. PTI In Pics: Donald Trump's immigration order angers people International oi-Oneindia By Oneindia Staff Writer Washington, Jan 30: After US President Donald Trump suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries: Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, hundreds of passengers were stranded at airports, with some even being detained. Chaos erupted at many airports, with many passengers unclear of the order. On the other hand, many people protested against Trump's order. Protestors were seen raising slogans at the San Francisco airport, Miami and other places. Here are some images of the protests: People protest at San Francisco airport Protesters gather at San Francisco International Airport to denounce President Donald Trump's executive order that bars citizens of seven predominantly Muslim nations from entering the US. Protestors rally outside City Hall, San Francisco Protestors hold signs as they listen to speakers at a rally outside of City Hall in San Francisco. Many people protested against Trump's immigration order and took to the streets. Protestors take to the streets in Miami Protestors chant slogans against Donald Trump's executive order on immigration in downtown Miami. Protestors gather outside JFK airport Protestors assemble at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York after two Iraqi refugees were detained while trying to enter the country. Protestors seen at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport Demonstrators hold a sign that reads "We are America," as more than 1,000 people gathered at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, to protest Donald Trump's order that restricts immigration to the U.S. OneIndia News For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Monday, January 30, 2017, 11:06 [IST] Mexican president Enrique Pena Nieto gets new invite to US International oi-PTI Santa Fe (New Mexico), Jan 30: Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto has a new diplomatic invitation to visit the United States after canceling a trip to Washington in response to President Donald Trump's plans to build a border wall this time from a trio of Democratic lawmakers in the heavily Hispanic state of New Mexico. Democratic state Rep. Javier Martinez of Albuquerque on Sunday said that Trump's insistence on making Mexico pay for a border wall extension is a threat to centuries-old economic and cultural ties between Mexico and the state of New Mexico, including recent investments by taxpayers in the Santa Teresa-San Jeronimo border crossing that have spurred trade. Martinez, with state Reps. Bill McCamley of Mesilla Park and Angelica Rubio of Las Cruces, sent a letter on Friday inviting Pena Nieto to address the New Mexico House Chamber during the current legislative session. "If you look at the way Trump has spoken out against the Mexican president, the country of Mexico, his position to build this very expensive wall across the border and then his suggestions that it be paid for with a 20 percent tariff on imports those are all statements and actions that can only be detrimental to the state of New Mexico," said Martinez, an attorney and El Paso native who spent part of his childhood in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. There's no word yet if Nieto will accept the invitation. The decision by Pena Nieto to scrap a planned Jan. 31 meeting with Trump in Washington has boosted the Mexican president's lagging popularity as he struggles to contain rising crime, a sluggish economy and a series of corruption scandals in his party. Republican New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez has avoided criticizing Trump on his executive action pushing a border wall along the US-Mexico border. A spokesman for Gov. Martinez said on Friday that she "supports strengthening our border and giving the federal government a variety of tools" to protect residents, while declining to comment specifically on the border wall. The second-term governor of no relation to Javier Martinez said last year that building fences could impact the US economy and relationship with trading partners in Mexico and farther south. Martinez was a vocal critic of Trump during the presidential campaign for his derogatory comments about Mexican immigrants and women. Trump lost the popular vote in New Mexico to Democrat Hillary Clinton by about 8 percentage points. PTI Talented, driven and great potential: President Putin is all praise for India and Indians Nepal gets 249 mn aid for road project from India International oi-IANS By Ians English Kathmandu, Jan 30: India on Monday handed over to Nepal a cheque for NRs 249 million to help four road projects in the Himalayan country. Indian Ambassador Ranjit Rae handed over the cheque to Nepal's Physical Infrastructure and Transport Minister Ramesh Lekhak in Kathmandu at a function. The amount has been released towards 25 per cent of tendered cost (including 10 per cent mobilisation advance) of the four contracted road stretches. The roads are Birendra Bazaar-Mahinathpur, Janakpur-Yadukuwa, Manmat-Kalaiya-Matiarwa (0-15 km road), and Manmat-Kalaiya-Matiarwa (15-26.660 km road). The projects are being implemented under Postal Highway Project in Nepal with the Indian government grant assistance of NRs 8,000 million, an official statement said. Two roads -- Dhangadhi-Bhajaniya-Satti road and Lamki-Tikapur-Khakraula road -- constructed with Indian government's grant assistance worth NRs 1,020 million were inaugurated on January 19, 2017, at Dhangadhi in western Nepal, jointly by Indian Ambassador Rae and Minister Lekhak. These roads are India's flagship assistance projects, while Postal Road Project is key for the development of Nepal's Tarai region. India has been assisting Nepal in upgradation of 1,450 km of roads under the Postal Highway Project. Identified as strategic road network, the first phase aims to construct 19 roads of 605 km length at a cost of $166 million. IANS Nepal- Standoff between PM, Madhesis on International oi-IANS By Ians English Kathmandu, Jan 30: Nepalese Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' held another round of inconclusive talks with the Nepali Congress and the Madhesi Morcha on Monday as the Morcha said a firm no to local body polls before broad-based constitutional amendments. The Morcha alleges that the Prime Minister has repeatedly failed to keep his promises made to them while assuming office in August last year. "It has been almost six months that he has been in power, but he has not been able to amend the Constitution to address the demands of various groups and communities, including those based on federal demarcation, language and citizenship, among others, to make the constitution more broad-based," a Morcha leader charged. Madhesis in Nepal, who are mostly of Indian origin, also held a six-month-long agitation last year. The parties could not reach an agreement in the nearly two-hour consultations held at Prachanda's residence. Several rounds of talks have taken place since Prachanda came to power, but progress has always eluded such deliberations. In the meeting, Prachanda proposed to take forward the issues of constitutional amendment and elections to the local bodies, simultaneously. But the unrelenting Madhesi Front leaders said that no election would be allowed unless the issue of constitutional amendment is fixed. It was then that the parties agreed to hold another meeting aimed at seeking consensus on the two contentious issues. Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist-Centre) leader Narayan Kaji Shrestha said: "An agreement has been reached to finalise the issue of constitutional amendment and elections after consultations among the parties by Wednesday." The main opposition, the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist), which is against any amendment to the constitution, has also been invited for consultations on Wednesday. Shrestha said that while PM Dahal is pushing for the constitutional amendment and the poll process to go simultaneously, the Madhesi Front wants the amendments finalised before announcing the date for elections. The increasingly impatient Morcha has announced that they will hold fresh protests in Nepal's southern Terai region next week to mount pressure on the government for amendment of the Constitution to meet their demands. "We have decided to hold protests at all the district headquarters of Madhes-based districts on February 5 to demand implementation of a three-point agreement it had signed on August 3 -- the day Prachanda took over as the premier with the support of the Morcha," said a Morcha leader. Prachanda had committed to address the Morcha's demands through an amendment to the constitution, he added. Prachanda has also failed to announce local body polls, a constitutionally-mandated task. The agitating Madhes-based parties have been saying that they will not allow elections if the constitution is not amended to accommodate their expectations. IANS Reports say that US officials are checking Facebook profiles of immigrants International oi-IANS By Ians English New York, Jan 30: The US border officials are checking the Facebook profiles of immigrants before allowing them into the country, a media report said. The move came in the wake of US President Donald Trump's executive order to temporarily bar US entry to refugees and citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations. The US officials are reportedly checking the Facebook pages of immigrants for their political views, The Independent reported on Sunday. A Houston-based lawyer Mana Yegani was quoted as saying that several green card holders, who have the right to live and work in the US, were detained by border agents at American airports hours after Trump's executive order came into force. According to the American Immigration Lawyers Association, border agents were checking the social media accounts of those detained and were interrogating them about their political beliefs before allowing them into the US. "I and my fellow lawyers had worked through the night fielding calls from people with legitimate visa being detained before entering the US or ordered back on flights to the Muslim-majority countries on the list," said Yegani, who works with the Alia. "The ban has affected travellers with passports from seven Muslim majority countries and also green card holders who are granted authorisation to live and work in the US," a spokeswoman from Department of Homeland Security said. The ban on Saturday created chaos and outrage around the world, while numerous travellers found their access to the US territory blocked and protests were staged at several US airports. "In one alleged incident a Sudanese PhD student at Stanford University in California, who has lived in the US for 22 years, was held for five hours in New York and in another a dual Iranian-Canadian citizen was not allowed to board a flight in Ottawa," the report noted. "These are people that are coming in legally. They have jobs here and they have vehicles here. Just because Trump signed something at 6 pm on Friday, things are coming to a crashing halt. It's scary," Yegani said. The executive order bans immigration from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen under measures to 'keep radical Islamic terrorists out. "I am establishing new vetting measures to keep radical Islamic terrorists out of the US," Trump said on Friday during the signing at the Pentagon after the swearing-in of Defence Secretary James Mattis, CNN reported. IANS Those stranded by Trump's order, welcomed in Canada International oi-PTI Ottawa, Jan 30: Canada will offer temporary residence permits to people stranded in the country as a result of US President Donald Trump's travel ban, the immigration ministry has said. "Let me assure those who may be stranded in Canada that I will use my authority as minister to provide them with temporary residency if needed as we have done in the past," Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen said at a news conference. Hussen did not indicate how many people could be concerned by this measure, but he said that as of early Sunday afternoon, the Canadian authorities were unaware of anyone stranded in the country by the US order. Trump on Friday suspended the arrival of all refugees to the US for at least 120 days and barred entry for 90 days to people from seven Muslim-majority countries:Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Hussen, who is of Somali origin, said the Trump administration had assured Ottawa that Canadians holding dual nationality with those countries would not be affected by the US ban. He said that people from those seven countries who have a valid Canadian permanent residency card can still enter the United States. However, under the US order, the ban will apply to people from the targeted countries who are passing through Canada. More than 35,000 Canadians with dual citizenship have citizenship with one of the seven countries, he added. Hussen also stressed that Canada would continue to pursue an immigration policy based on compassion while at the same time protecting the security of its citizens. On Saturday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau welcomed immigrants to Canada, striking a sharp contrast with Trump's sweeping executive order restricting immigration the previous day. "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada," Trudeau posted on Twitter. According to the latest Canadian census, from 2011, one out of five people in the country are foreign-born. To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) January 28, 2017 Canada has welcomed more than 39,670 Syrian refugees between November 2015 and the beginning of this January, according to government figures. PTI Blacklisting Mahmood blocked by China: The man who raised funds under garb of religion in India UN denounces as illegal and mean-spirited US visa ban International oi-IANS By Ians English Geneva, Jan 30: The United Nations' High Commissioner for Human Rights on Monday denounced as illegal and mean-spirited the United States' visa ban on citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries. The official Twitter account for the UN Human Rights agency quoted its Chairman Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein as saying "discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law", efe news reported. Donald Trump's executive order bans US visas to citizens of Muslim-majority Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Syria for a period of at least 90 days. "The US ban is also mean-spirited, and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism," al-Hussein added. Trump's immigration order on Friday also saw the US suspend its refugee programme for a period of 120 days with the aim of restructuring the process to prevent visas from being issued to potential terrorists. Visas for Syrian asylum seekers would be indefinitely put on hold, according to the presidential order. The policy drew immediate protest from international institutions such as the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the international organisation for migration (IMO), which on Saturday petitioned the US government to uphold its long tradition of offering asylum to those fleeing conflict. In a joint statement, the two agencies said they "hope that the US will continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution." UN sources estimate that since October 2016, the US has admitted 25,600 refugees. According to the nation's Refugee Processing Center, the US accepted 85,000 refugees in the 2015-16 fiscal year. The country is also the world's biggest financial contributor to the UNHCR, investing roughly $1.5 billion into that institution in 2016, much more than the European Union ($341 million), Germany ($284 million) and Japan ($164 million). IANS UGC-NET 2022 results to be declared today; check steps to download scorecard 'Severe' yet again: Delhi air continues to remain toxic with AQI at 431 Anand Mahindra's tweet about UPI at country's 'last tea shop' is every Indian's emotion Manish Sisodiya claims his PA 'arrested' by ED after conducting raids Delhi fog: Landing ops suspended at Delhi airport, trains delayed New Delhi oi-Oneindia By Oneindia Staff Writer A thick blanket of fog engulfed the national capital on Monday morning, reducing the visibility level to zero, affecting rail, road and air traffic. Landing operations at the Indira Gandhi International airport were suspended because of the fog. According to ANI, as many as 28 trains were arriving late, 10 were rescheduled and one was cancelled. Temperatures have nose dived after a spate of showers last week. OneIndia News For Breaking News and Instant Updates Allow Notifications Story first published: Monday, January 30, 2017, 10:37 [IST] Pune: Infosys techie found dead at workstation, security guard arrested Pune oi-Oneindia By Oneindia Staff Writer Pune, Jan 30: A 25-year-old techie from Kerala working with Infosys was found strangled in her office here on Sunday. According to reports, the woman, Rasila Raju was strangled using a computer cable. According to latest reports, the security guard accused of the techie's murder has been arrested from Mumbai. He will be brought to Pune for further investigations. "On the basis of the CCTV footage from the company premises and other clues, we zeroed down on a security guard from Assam, who after the incident, fled and now has been held in Mumbai," said Arun Waikar, the senior police inspector with Hinjawadi Police Station. The suspect has been identified as Bhabhen Saikia, who was deployed as a guard at the Infosys unit he said. Infosys, in a statement, said: "We are saddened and shocked at this unfortunate incident and the loss of our colleague. Our prayers and sympathies are with our employee's family and friends." The company also offered to assist the police with their investigation. Though Raju had an off on Sunday, she came to office as she was working on a project and was in touch with her colleagues in Bengaluru. However, once her supervisor could not get in touch with her on Sunday evening, someone was asked to check on her. It was then that the murder came to light. This is the second such incident from Pune within a span of two months. In December last year, another woman employee was murdered outside her office in the Talawade area. (With PTI inputs) OneIndia News 2008-2022 One News Page Ltd. All rights reserved. One News is a registered trademark of One News Page Ltd. OTTAWA, ONTARIO--(Marketwired - Jan 10, 2017) - Tetra Bio-Pharma Inc. ("TetraBio", "TBP", or the "Company") (CSE:TBP)(TBP.CN)(OTC PINK:GROPF) through its subsidiary, Agro-Tek Health Inc. ("GTK"), is pleased to announce that it has entered into a binding letter of intent to form a joint venture with Ford's Family Pharmacy and Wellness Center ("FFP") in Moncton, New Brunswick. The primary objective of this venture is the development and commercialization of cannabinoid-based products for the Canadian health care market with a special focus on CBD and THC-free cannabis products for the USA cosmetic and supplement market. About Tetra Bio-Pharma Tetra Bio-Pharma, through its subsidiaries, is engaged in the development and commercialization of cannabis-based pharmaceuticals and consumer health products. www.tetrabiopharma.com About Agro-Tek Health Agro-Tek Health is a subsidiary of Tetra Bio-Pharma Inc. and is focused on commercialization of over the counter consumer goods containing cannabis and other non-controlled medicinal plants. About Ford's Family Pharmacy Ford's Family Pharmacy and Wellness Center currently holds a Controlled Substance License from Health Canada for the processing, packaging, and distribution of controlled substances. https://www.fordrx.com Since 1997, Ford's Family Pharmacy & Wellness Centre has helped clients improve and prolong their health, wellness, and vitality by providing personalized compounding and wellness solutions. Their team consists of: four pharmacists, 14 pharmacy technicians/assistants and two registered nurses. FFP provides innovative solutions to complex medical problems and works with Canadian healthcare providers (including physicians, veterinarians, and dentists) to create well-rounded, comprehensive natural and compounding treatment plans. To maximize the benefit of this venture, GTK will establish its health care product development and commercialization activities within the province of New Brunswick. New Brunswick is quickly positioning itself as a desired homebase for companies in the cannabis industry and GTK commends the government of New Brunswick for its assistance in establishing this project. Story continues Dr. Peter Ford, Pharm D will work with GTK to develop cannabinoid-based skin care and wellness products for the Canadian retail markets. This joint venture will allow GTK to develop a portfolio of innovative CBD-based products for patient self-care in addition to CBD and THC-free products for the USA cosmetic and supplement market. According to Mr. Andre Rancourt, Chief Executive Officer, "These products will allow GTK to commercialize cannabis-derived products for the Canadian and USA wellness market in preparation for the unveiling of Canada's new cannabis regulations." Dr. Ford will also assist TetraBio with its ongoing NSERC Engage partnership grant with McGill University (see press release from October 19, 2016). Dr. Ford's expertise will also be used for the development of the PPP001 dried cannabis pellets for upcoming phase 1 clinical trials. "The partnerships with McGill University and Dr. Ford are in line with the Company's vision to expand its commercial operations focused on the development and sale of cannabis-derived supplements and retail products for the North American market," commented Mr. Rancourt. Dr. Guy Chamberland, M.Sc., Ph.D., Chief Science Officer, commented, "Ford's Family Pharmacy and Wellness Center currently holds a Controlled Substance License from Health Canada for the processing, packaging, and distribution of controlled substances. Working with Dr. Ford will allow TBP to adhere to current regulations relating to controlled substances including cannabis. This resource allows TBP to further its ongoing projects while remaining compliant with Canadian and US narcotics regulations." He also stated, "Dr. Ford is a renowned expert in wellness and a highly-experienced formulator and this joint venture will help the Company bring cutting edge cannabis-based health and wellness products to patients and consumers in a timely and cost effective manner." This project will be funded via current working capital and the previously announced NSREC research grant in collaboration with McGill University. Closing of Non-brokered Private Placement The Company is also pleased to announce that, on December 30, 2016, it closed a non-brokered private placement of 2,395,500 units at a price of $0.20 per unit for aggregate gross proceeds of $479,100. Each unit consists of one common share and one non-transferable warrant, with a whole warrant entitling the holder to purchase one common share at a price of $0.26 per share for a period of twelve months expiring December 30, 2017. The securities issued pursuant to the private placement are subject to a four-month hold period from the closing date and subject to all necessary regulatory approvals, including the approval of the Exchange. The proceeds of the private placement will be used to pursue commercialization projects in 2017 and increase scientific staff. In Other News Tetra Bio-Pharma is also pleased to announce that, effective December 16, 2016, TBP has been added to the Canadian Securities Exchange composite index. The index is comprised of listed companies that meet market capitalization, trading, and seasoning criteria established by the exchange. The Canadian Securities Exchange (CSE) has not reviewed this news release and does not accept responsibility for its adequacy or accuracy. Forward-looking statements Some statements in this release may contain forward-looking information. All statements, other than of historical fact, that address activities, events or developments that the Company believes, expects or anticipates will or may occur in the future (including, without limitation, statements regarding potential acquisitions and financings) are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are generally identifiable by use of the words "may", "will", "should", "continue", "expect", "anticipate", "estimate", "believe", "intend", "plan" or "project" or the negative of these words or other variations on these words or comparable terminology. Forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond the Company's ability to control or predict, that may cause the actual results of the Company to differ materially from those discussed in the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results or events to differ materially from current expectations include, among other things, without limitation, the inability of the Company, through its wholly-owned subsidiary, GrowPros MMP Inc., to obtain a licence for the production of medical marijuana; failure to obtain sufficient financing to execute the Company's business plan; competition; regulation and anticipated and unanticipated costs and delays, and other risks disclosed in the Company's public disclosure record on file with the relevant securities regulatory authorities. Although the Company has attempted to identify important factors that could cause actual results or events to differ materially from those described in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that cause results or events not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. Readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. 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 legislation. by Graham Pierrepoint DENIAL IMDb Dir: Mick Jackson Starring Rachel Weisz, Timothy Spall, Tom Wilkinson, Caren Pistorious, Andrew Scott, Alex Jennings, Harriet Walter, Jack Lowden, Mark Gatiss 3.5 STARS (out of 5) Is there a film that is perhaps more better-timed for release than Denial? Maybe not. Denial is a movie which has arrived at a point of time in world politics and mass media coverage where both are threatened to change dramatically as a result of recently elected figureheads. I, of course, refer to the US Presidency and in the past few weeks, the term Alternative Facts has sprung up as a result of Donald Trumps staffers giving their account of how many people attended his inauguration. What exactly does this have to do with a film about Holocaust denial? Its extremely prescient that a movie which centres around a battle of facts should come along just when they are being challenged in the mainstream. This, thankfully, makes Denial for all the more interesting watch as without such importance, it may have fallen rather flat. Denial is based on true events and surrounds the unfolding saga of professor and author Deborah Lipstadt writing a novel about the act of denying the Holocaust the genocide of Jewish people by Germanys Nazi party and, in doing so, references historian David Irving. Irving takes unkindly to his inclusion in the book, and promptly sues Lipstadt for libel, forcing the academic to take to court and prove that Irving knowingly lied about the Holocaust having occurred. This, in turn, leads to a judge-only trial, and a case which hinges on the defence having to find genuine evidence to prove that, beyond evidence of doubt, that Jewish people were tortured and killed by order of the Nazi party. This is a film that, in short, isnt really as cinematic as it could be but does it need to be? It stands to reason that this is a story that needs to be told it shows that truth has just as much of a case against opinion in a landscape which is bogged down in hyperbole and hearsay, some of which is perpetuated by the political and media spheres. Its a film which points out that, while some cases and arguments can be patently ridiculous (it has been proven time and time again that the Holocaust did indeed occur), there is worth in challenging even the pettiest of arguments. Certainly, if nothing else, it gives hope to those who may feel that truth and honesty are being swept behind chaos and rhetoric. History, certainly, will repeat itself when it comes to the facts, media spin and politician hyperbole will ultimately be peeled away. In terms of film-making, its a piece of brilliant, thought-provoking cinema that poses plenty of intriguing questions and genuinely encourages viewers to read up on what was a particularly fascinating piece of legal history. The movie treads around the topic of genocide without respecting those affected by the atrocities and it is therefore a perfectly affable watch for anyone interested in the sheer premise. As a piece of cinema that could be considered dramatic, it misses out on really getting its teeth into anything nail-biting. Its clever, its well-scripted (by playwright David Hare), but it never seems to want to be on the big screen. Its quite strange why this wasnt considered for a TV release as opposed to a big screen debut seems to be a valid question. Its release has occurred quietly during the midst of Oscar fever, where audiences are more likely to be watching La La Land, Moonlight or Hacksaw Ridge while the message at stake is extremely important (and very timely indeed), its rather baffling why it was pushed for a big screen release. Denial - Official Trailer (BBC FIlms via Movieclips Trailers) The film boasts a great cast, among them a sturdy lead in Rachel Weisz, the ever-reliable Timothy Spall, and a horde of British TV royalty who can always be relied upon to beef up any screenplay. Its just as well, thankfully as with a lesser cast, the movie may not have hit as many notes as it does. It serves its audience well, giving us plenty to think about but little to marvel at. It rather plods along its path, perfectly reasonable and fairly entertaining but it never really takes us to any particularly dramatic highs. While the story is great its a true story which deserves reading up on outside of the movie I dare say that it isnt pushed far enough. As a result, while Denial is perfectly watchable and is, on the whole, satisfying for anyone keen on the premise, its not to be considered a piece of high drama by any account. As a result, due to its cinematic release, it may be doomed to be forgotten a crying shame, as it would have slotted in perfectly on mainstream British television. Here are four stocks with buy ranks and strong growth characteristics for investors to consider today, January 30th: Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. (RCL): This global cruise vacation company,which carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy), has witnessed the Zacks Consensus Estimate for its current year earnings increasing 3.1% over the last 60 days. Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. Price and Consensus Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. Price and Consensus | Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. Quote Royal Caribbean Cruises has a PEG ratio of 1.59, compared with 1.99 for the industry. The company possesses a Growth Score of B. Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. PEG Ratio (TTM) Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. PEG Ratio (TTM) | Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. Quote Alcoa Corporation (AA): This global industry leader in bauxite, alumina and aluminum products, which carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy), has witnessed the Zacks Consensus Estimate for its current year earnings jumping 53.8% over the last 60 days. Alcoa Corp. Price and Consensus Alcoa Corp. Price and Consensus | Alcoa Corp. Quote Alcoa has a PEG ratio of 0.26, compared with 28.80 for the industry. The company possesses a Growth Score of B. Eagle Bancorp Montana, Inc. (EBMT): This holding company for Opportunity Bank of Montana, which carries a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), has witnessed the Zacks Consensus Estimate for its current year earnings rising 2.1% over the last 60 days. Eagle Bancorp Montana, Inc. Price and Consensus Eagle Bancorp Montana, Inc. Price and Consensus | Eagle Bancorp Montana, Inc. Quote Eagle Bancorp Montana has a PEG ratio of 1.34, compared with 1.99 for the industry. The company possesses a Growth Score of B. Eagle Bancorp Montana, Inc. PEG Ratio (TTM) Eagle Bancorp Montana, Inc. PEG Ratio (TTM) | Eagle Bancorp Montana, Inc. Quote Bank of America Corporation (BAC): This major financial services company, which carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy), has witnessed the Zacks Consensus Estimate for its current year earnings advancing 9.5% over the last 60 days. Story continues Bank of America Corporation Price and Consensus Bank of America Corporation Price and Consensus | Bank of America Corporation Quote Bank of America has a PEG ratio of 1.59, compared with 1.99 for the industry. The company possesses a Growth Score of B. Bank of America Corporation PEG Ratio (TTM) Bank of America Corporation PEG Ratio (TTM) | Bank of America Corporation Quote See the full list of top ranked stocks here Learn more about the Growth score and how it is calculated here Zacks' Top 10 Stocks for 2017 In addition to the stocks discussed above, would you like to know about our 10 finest buy-and-hold tickers for the entirety of 2017? Who wouldn't? As of early December, the 2016 Top 10 produced 5 double-digit winners including oil and natural gas giant Pioneer Natural Resources which racked up a stellar +50% gain. The new list is painstakingly hand-picked from 4,400 companies covered by the Zacks Rank.Be among the very first to see it>> Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. (RCL): Free Stock Analysis Report Eagle Bancorp Montana, Inc. (EBMT): Free Stock Analysis Report Bank of America Corporation (BAC): Free Stock Analysis Report Alcoa Corp. (AA): Free Stock Analysis Report To read this article on Zacks.com click here. Visitors walk past a logo of Toyota Motor Corp on a Toyota Prius hybrid vehicle at the company's showroom in Tokyo August 5, 2014. REUTERS/Yuya Shino/File Photo TOKYO (Reuters) - Toyota Motor Corp's four-year run as the world's top-selling automaker has ended as the Japanese company said on Monday its global sales for 2016 fell short of Volkswagen AG's (VOWG_p.DE). Toyota said global sales across its Toyota, Lexus, Daihatsu minicar and Hino Motors Ltd truck brands rose 0.2 percent to 10.18 million last year from 2015. This was less than the 10.3 million sold by Volkswagen, which posted record high global sales despite its diesel emissions scandal. Toyota's overall global sales were supported by a 5.5 percent rise in domestic sales for the Toyota brand following new launches for models including the Prius, while overseas sales slipped 0.6 percent as demand eased in North America, in and around the Middle East and Africa. Toyota, which had been the world's top-selling automaker on an annual basis since 2012, estimates global sales to increase to around 10.23 million vehicles in 2017. (Reporting by Naomi Tajitsu; Editing by Amrutha Gayathri) Rumble 03 Feb 2022 Update on our new show, CCFR Radio On The Air, Mike Loberg comes on to talk about Section 74 challenges. The anti-gunners.. Our website uses cookies to improve your experience. Learn more PAPUA NEW GUINEA tuna which has preferential treatment in the Europe market faces uncertainty given Britains exit from the European Union. Australian economist with the Australian National University Paul Flanagan said given Brexit, it is not known what will become of the arrangement which PNG has enjoyed over other tuna exporting nations globally. He was responding to questions on the implications of the TPP and Brexit. That will depend on what future trade deals UK negotiates and that is unknown, he said.Mr Flanagan said his view was that preferential access to the remainder of Europe would remain subject to environmental and other conditions. He said PNGs tuna canning industry remained very dependent on its special access to the European Union market. Most producers in PNG also have factories in other Asian countries such as the Philippines and Indonesia. These other countries are much cheaper to produce than PNG.This is because of items such as fuel subsidies. When talking to manufacturers, the key differences related to items such as reliable and well-priced energy (PNG expensive), security costs (PNG higher) and labour laws (movements in the minimum wage appear to affect the industry, and PNGs minimum wage rates are comparatively high for unskilled labour), he said. On the issue of the dumping of the Trans Pacific Partnership by US president Donald Trump, Mr Flanagan said this will not have any direct impact on Papua New Guinea. Rather, he says there may be some indirect impacts as the three biggest anticipated winners from this trade agreement are Vietnam, Japan and Singapore. Their growth rates will now be lower, which will in turn limit the export opportunities for PNG businesses to such countries. Economic history indicates that globalisation has generally been very positive for development. The pro-trade policies of many Asian countries have led to dramatic reductions in poverty and opportunities for many. PNG is missing out on many of these opportunities.When PNG businesses are asked about the greatest impediments to business, they do not talk about a need for increased protection. Rather, their main perceived barrier currently is the lack of foreign exchange as well as the more traditional issues such as the need to improve the business environment generally - better regulations, better transport, better utilities, better security, Mr Flanagan said. He said that the Kina exchange rate should depreciate down to market levels and maybe even lower to counter-impact the resource curse which is hurting the PNG people. Mr Flanagan said the issue currently is not a need for action including import bans to protect PNG industry. Post Courier/ONE PNG White House counselor Kellyanne Conway has defended President Trump's controversial immigration order on Fox News Sunday, calling the disruptions a "small price to pay." This whole idea that they're being separated and ripped from their families, it's temporary and it's just circumstantial...as opposed to the over 3,000 children who will be forever more separated from the parents who perished on 9/11." The gross statement of Conway comparing Muslim families to 9/11 families certainly underlines the fear mongering Trump has relied on for the last two years. And it also brings about the lack of compassion the Trump presidency has brought to the White House and his administration. Trump's insulting our intelligence again. (Image by Donald J. Trump) Details DMCA Longstanding US allies jumped on social media to condemn what they saw as a deeply immoral policy aimed at dividing people and communities. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau extended an offer to accept refugees spurned by the US, and several European leaders followed suit. Even Christian clergy condemned ban and the preference given to Christian refugees: The announcement was met with immediate backlash from leaders of nearly every Christian denomination, along with those of other faiths. They argue that Trump's actions do not reflect the teachings of the Bible, nor the traditions of the United States, and they have urged the president to let them get back to work--many of the country's most prominent refugee resettlement organizations are faith-based. Of course, some of the Christian Right - ala Franklin Graham - totally approve of the ban: We should stop all immigration of Muslims to the U.S. until this threat with Islam has been settled. Every Muslim that comes into this country has the potential to be radicalized--and they do their killing to honor their religion and Muhammad. The Attack on Sanctuary Cities Whoever thought that living in a compassionate city like San Francisco would make you feel as if you are under siege? President Donald Trump has threatened sanctuary cities like San Francisco with withholding of federal funding for various programs serving its ill and needy. Why? Under the guise of enforcing strict immigration policies, Trump is actually targeting cities that didn't vote for him. With two different plans in one day [sanctuary cities and voter fraud investigation] to target parts of the country that didn't vote for him, it might be the case that his propensity for vindictiveness extends far beyond what his petty tweets suggest. The President Without Compassion If George Bush's term of "compassionate conservatism" was met with a bit of derision, then the thought of a compassionate President in Donald Trump is totally absurd no matter how his family and friends protest otherwise. Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 (Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher). We the people (Image by farley) Details DMCA Although this measure is supposed to protect the US from terrorists, the fact is that most terrorist acts in this country are committed by Americans, people who share Trump's values of racism, sexism and white supremacy. Jan12, 2017 The Trump team has deniedthat the president-elect supports the system, but Kobach confirmed the incoming administrationis preparing plans for a Muslim registry . https://mic.com/articles/165239/muslim-registry-under-trump-here-s-where-the-president-elect-s-cabinet-picks-stand#.4pSshYC0I Requiring registration historically leads to persecution. For example: From the German occupation headquarters at the Hotel D'Angleterre (in Copenhage) came the decree: ALL JEWS MUST WEAR A YELLOW ARMBAND WITH A STAR OF DAVID. http://www.snopes.com/history/govern/yellowstars.asp We all know that deportation to concentration camps followed fairly quickly. Of course, the idea of a Muslim registry is a total violation of the First Amendment, which says that " Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof ; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. I was born a Jew, and grew up on stories of the Holocaust and the preceding millennia of persecution of Jews throughout Europe. Thus, I'm especially outraged by the idea of a Muslim registry, of targeting a group of people because of their religion. A few years ago I asked a Muslim friend what it means to be Muslim, and how one becomes a Muslim. He replied "The word 'Muslim' means 'servant of God'. You already are a Muslim." "Isn't there any ceremony or initiation ritual?" I persisted. "No, you simply have to serve God, Allah", he replied. "You can also observe Ramadan, pray toward Mecca five times a day, make a pilgrimage to Mecca- but none of these are essential. They all help you to feel part of the umma, the body of Muslim believers, but the only essential is to serve Allah". Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 (Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher). (Image by Egberto Willies) Details DMCA While we hyperventilate about every tweet that Trump sends out, the real danger lies with the administration's indoctrination machine. This interview is riveting because it shows how and why his base lives in an alternate state of reality. This Trump voter makes it clear to me that one can have a degree of intelligence but still fall for the trappings of a false narrative that premises one's condition. That is the battle that we must fight. Between one and two thousand protesters descended on Terminal E at Bush Intercontinental Airport on Sunday afternoon in Houston Texas. The protest was loud but very peaceful. Every time a new refugee or detainee was released, the crowd cheered loudly as the sound traveled like a wave throughout the terminal. Many lawyers were present to assist the families and those held by immigration. Suddenly I heard some uncharacteristic noises as two guys, and the crowd shouted at each other. A Trump voter infiltrated the protest with a racist sign. A few protesters attempted to engage him, and we pulled him aside. I further pulled him aside for an interview which I found disturbing, mostly for his inability to break narrative even as his response showed that for one millisecond he understood the truth. The young man claimed to have voted for President Obama twice. I do not believe that he did. I also believe that he is an indoctrinated operative. In other words, I think he is a believer in the Trump narrative but versed on specific talking points. This Trump voter did not realize that Americans will ultimately pay for any wall built, whether through tariffs or with a potential trade war. He did not realize that it isn't immigration but automation that hurts low-skilled Americans. He believes most undocumented immigrants came to America via human traffickers. Worse, however, is his belief that InfoWars and Drudge are good sources of fact based information. We will be able to reach Trump voters. We must contrast their realities with the fallacies from the InfoWars, Breitbart, and Drudge. I have, many times, sitting down in a Starbucks done so. There are some who we should not waste resources on because they are not interested in reality. They are content in their ignorance because it gives them an excuse. It absolves them of any responsibility for their condition. They can blame 'the other' for all of their problems. We must, however, stay engaged with those that are on or approaching the fence. We have a lot of work to do. This is a reprint from NewsBred. what's history but a tale of conquerors? (Image by NewsBred) Details DMCA My first instinct on reading this Times of India (29.1.2017) headline was that the likes of Romilla Thapar and Irfan Habib have been pressed into service by that bird of the same feather, the English Mainstream Media. The actual piece though relies on the evidence of two Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) historians and one from Delhi University. First thing first. The reporter could've asked 10 different historians and would have arrived at a completely different conclusion if she had chosen so.That's the first bias, the report is not balanced, which is the first lesson a journalist is taught but probably this one was given a licence to be illiterate. I need to dwell on Romilla Thapar and Irfan Habib as my reflex reaction for these two left-Congress promoted, pampered and fattened historians for decades peddled the lie that Saraswati River never existed and that Aryans indeed drove the original inhabitants of our land into southern India on whom the title of "Dravidian" was affixed. The Aryans gave us Sanskrit language and Vedic literature, which we ignorant believed to be indigenous. Both claims have been proved to be bogus. There has been no evidence of Aryan invasion in India, our genealogy has been shown to be unbroken for 8,000 years, Or for instance this matter of Ashoka's remorse after Kalinga War is humbug. This is THE real history. But if you go to interpreters like Thapar and Habib, or for that matter these illiterate AMU scholars and DU professors, you surely would arrive at the bogus confirmation of your own agenda. This brings us to the history bit. We all know history is written by the conquerors. You write what you want to be read. You hide what you want to hide. That's the method every historian adopts. Surely, our despicable English mainstream media does. India treats its history not as "Itihasa." It's always people's history, not kings'. That's why you don't find any king's burial in Mohanjodaro or Harappa or for that matter in Kalibangan, Rakhigarhi, Hanumangarh, etc. "Itihasa" as history is an affix West stamped on us in order to hijack and distort our cultural heritage. In India , Itihasa is never removed from oral traditions. It relies more on "smriti" (memory) and "s hruti "(oral) traditions, not on written documents. It's because our Rishis and Yogis understood that history will always be victim of misrepresentation. That's why Hinduism has never relied on historical timelines which is central to Islam, Christianity and Judaism--all Abrahamic religions. Our Rishis and Yogis relied on smriti and shruti. India has always relied on oral traditions, not on written traditions that West employs less to document but more to twist and manipulate to their own ends. History is never for masses to understand in West. They are subjected to State control. That's why you have so many historical societies in West. Trust me, the history that reaches us is mostly fraud. History must never be treated in literal sense. Certainly not in written manner. Those tales that are passed on orally, through shruti, are far more reliable chronicles than the documents that paid historians and propagandists like English mainstream media indulges in. In such descriptions, 100 years from now on, the deaths of Akhlaq and Rohith would duly find mention in history but the deaths of BJP workers in Kerala, Karnataka or West Bengal would go completely unreported. That's history for you. So in that sense, the reporter's attempt to say Padmavati is not history is right. By another logic, those who say that Padmavati is real history are also right. Its defenders could "historically" claim that Khilji's lust for Hindu queens is an unassailable fact. Khilji fell for Queen Kamala Devi of Gujarat and the daughter of King Ramachandra of Devagiri. Even Amir Khusro, the court poet of Khilji, in his Khazain-ul-Fatuh, makes a covert allusion to Padmavati episode. This illiterate reporter states that Allauddin Khilji was India's most able administrator. She probably hasn't read of the 20,000 boy-slaves Khilji kept in his harem. She probably hasn't heard of Jazia Tax or thousands of temples Khilji destroyed. Or Khilji and Malik Kafur dalliance. She chose what good Khilji did. She ignored what was equally true but didn't suit her agenda. That's history for you. She says that the "Padmavati episode" was used to demonize Islamic empires. "Demonize" Islamic empire? So were they paragons of virtue? Isn't this assertion scandalous? Only one question to this reporter is enough to put her in spot: If Padmavati is a legend that Hindus have fostered how come they could do it as a subject race? Isn't it possible that they relied on "smriti" and "shruti." And hence no written records. Could it be that the chroniclers of Islamic rulers never allowed any written record of that period to survive? The fact that Padmavati has survived in the cultural memory of this land is enough to treat as "sacred". No need to affix it with the burden of "Itihasa" or history. From Truthdig Reality is under assault. Verbal confusion reigns. Truth and illusion have merged. Mental chaos makes it hard to fathom what is happening. We feel trapped in a hall of mirrors. Exposed lies are answered with other lies. The rational is countered with the irrational. Cognitive dissonance prevails. We endure a disquieting shame and even guilt. Tens of millions of Americans, especially women, undocumented workers, Muslims and African-Americans, suffer the acute anxiety of being pursued by a predator. All this is by design. Demagogues always infect the governed with their own psychosis. "The comparison between totalitarianism and psychosis is not incidental," the psychiatrist Joost A.M. Meerloo wrote in his book "The Rape of the Mind: The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide, and Brainwashing." "Delusional thinking inevitably creeps into every form of tyranny and despotism. Unconscious backward forces come into action. Evil powers from the archaic past return. An automatic compulsion to go on to self-destruction develops, to justify one mistake with a new one; to enlarge and expand the vicious pathological circle becomes the dominating end of life. The frightened man, burdened by a culture he does not understand, retreats into the brute's fantasy of limitless power in order to cover up the vacuum inside himself. This fantasy starts with the leaders and is later taken over by the masses they oppress." The lies fly out of the White House like flocks of pigeons: Donald Trump's election victory was a landslide. He had the largest inauguration crowds in American history. Three million to 5 million undocumented immigrants voted illegally. Climate change is a hoax. Vaccines cause autism. Immigrants are carriers of "[t]remendous infectious disease." The election was rigged -- until it wasn't. We don't know "who really knocked down" the World Trade Center. Torture works. Mexico will pay for the wall. Conspiracy theories are fact. Scientific facts are conspiracies. America will be great again. Our new president, a 70-year-old with orange-tinted skin and hair that Penn Jillette has likened to "cotton candy made of piss," is, as Trump often reminds us, "very good looking." He knows little of history, politics, law, philosophy, culture or governance, but insists "[m]y IQ is one of the highest -- and you all know it! Please don't feel so stupid or insecure, it's not your fault." The mediocrities and half-wits he has installed in his Cabinet have "by far the highest IQ of any Cabinet ever assembled." It is an avalanche of absurdities. This mendacity would be easier to repulse if the problem was solely embodied in Trump. But even in the face of a rising despotism, the Democratic Party refuses to denounce the corporate forces that eviscerated our democracy and impoverished the country. The neoliberal Trump demonizes Muslims, undocumented workers and the media. The neoliberal Democratic Party demonizes Vladimir Putin and FBI Director James Comey. No one speaks about the destructive force of corporate power. The warring elites pit alternative facts against alternative facts. All engage in demagoguery. We will, I expect, be condemned to despotism by the venality of Trump and the cowardice and dishonesty of the liberal class. Trump and those around him have a deep hatred for what they cannot understand. They silence anyone who thinks independently. They elevate pseudo-intellectuals who adhere to their bizarre script. They cannot cope with complexity, nuance or the unpredictable. Individual initiative is a mortal threat. The order for several federal agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's research service, the National Park Service and the Department of Health and Human Services, to cease communicating with the press or the public, along with the attempt to impose 10-year felony convictions on six reporters who covered the inauguration protests, signals the beginning of a campaign to marginalize reality and promote fantasy. Facts depend solely on those who have the power to create them. The goal of the Trump administration is to create an artificial consistency that conforms to its warped perception of the world. "Before they seize power and establish a world according to their doctrines, totalitarian movements conjure up a lying world of consistency which is more adequate to the needs of the human mind than reality itself; in which, through sheer imagination, uprooted masses can feel at home and are spared the never-ending shocks which real life and real experiences deal to human beings and their expectations," Hannah Arendt wrote in "The Origins of Totalitarianism." "The force possessed by totalitarian propaganda -- before the movements have the power to drop iron curtains to prevent anyone's disturbing, by the slightest reality, the gruesome quiet of an entirely imaginary world -- lies in its ability to shut the masses off from the real world." Trump's blinding narcissism was captured in his bizarre talk to the CIA on Jan. 21. He assured his audience that he knows "a lot about West Point." He said he "had an uncle who was a great professor at MIT for 35 years" who "was an academic genius." "[T]hey say, is Donald Trump an intellectual?" he said. "Trust me, I'm, like, a smart persona." "I have a running war with the media," he added. "They are among the most dishonest human beings on earth. And they sort of made it sound like I had a feud with the intelligence community. And I just want to let you know, the reason you're the number one stop is exactly the opposite -- exactly. And they understand that, too." He launched into an attack on the media for not reporting that "a million, million and a half people" showed up for his inauguration. "They showed a field where there was practically nobody standing there," he said about the media's depiction of the inauguration crowd. "And they said, Donald Trump did not draw well. I said, it was almost raining, the rain should have scared them away, but God looked down and he said, we're not going to let it rain on your speech." "So a reporter for Time magazine -- and I have been on their cover, like, 14 or 15 times," he said in speaking of his attack on Time for reporting incorrectly that he had removed a bust of Martin Luther King Jr. from the Oval Office. "I think we have the all-time record in the history of Time magazine. Like, if Tom Brady is on the cover, it's one time, because he won the Super Bowl or something, right? I've been on it for 15 times this year. I don't think that's a record, Mike, that can ever be broken. Do you agree with that? What do you think?" [Editor's note: Photographs or drawings of Trump were on the cover of Time 10 times in the last year and a half and once in 1989.] Trump's theatricality works. He forces the press and the public to repeat his lies, inadvertently giving them credibility. He is always moving. He is always on display. He has no fixed belief system. Trump, as he consolidates power, will adopt the ideology of the Christian right to fill his own ideological vacuum. The Christian right's magical thinking will merge seamlessly with Trump's magical thinking. Idiocy, self-delusion, megalomania, fantasy and government repression will come wrapped in images of the Christian cross and the American flag. The corporate state, hostile or indifferent to the plight of the citizens, has no emotional pull on the public. It is often hated. Political candidates run not as politicians but as celebrities. Campaigns eschew issues to make people feel good about candidates and themselves. Ideas are irrelevant. Emotional euphoria is paramount. The voter is only a prop in the political theater. Politics is anti-politics. It is reality television. Trump proved better at this game than his opponents. It is a game in which fact and knowledge are irrelevant. Reality is what you create. We were conditioned for a Trump. Next Page 1 | 2 (Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher). Presidential counselor Kellyanne Conway told CNBC on Monday there was no reason to delay carrying out the executive order on temporarily banning travel for "foreign nationals or citizens" from seven Muslim-majority countries. Appearing on "Squawk Box," Conway said President Donald Trump needs to tweet to get the real information out. "This total misinformation and what I would say information 'underload' about the facts and figures ... are astonishing." Trump tweeted this morning: "Only 109 people out of 325,000 were detained and held for questioning. Big problems at airports were caused by Delta computer outage,..... "protesters and the tears of Senator Schumer. Secretary Kelly said that all is going well with very few problems. MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN! "There is nothing nice about searching for terrorists before they can enter our country. This was a big part of my campaign. Study the world! "If the ban were announced with a one week notice, the "bad" would rush into our country during that week. A lot of bad "dudes" out there!" In the first 23 hours, 109 people were denied entry upon arrival. According to NBC News, 173 were denied boarding of incoming flights to the U.S. from the seven countries: Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. Story continues The number affected on Saturday was 375, compared with 325,000 travelers who arrive on average daily. After a weekend of protests and detentions of foreigners at American airports, Trump defended his move. He said the executive order he signed Friday was strictly about national security and not religion. "This is a very narrowly prescribed situation, executive order," for 90 days, Conway said. "Here it is: If you are a foreign national or citizen of one of these seven countries that were first identified by President Obama in 2015, then you cannot come to the United States at this moment." After the arrest of two Iraqis on federal terrorism charges in Kentucky that year, the State Department stopped processing Iraq refugees for six months, according to The Washington Post. "If you have a special situation, you'll be evaluated on a case by case basis," Conway told CNBC on Monday. "This country has an interest in the full faith and credit or our green card or LPR [lawful permanent resident] program," Conway said. "That is not who this narrowly prescribed, temporary halt is meant to apply to." On Saturday, a federal judge in New York temporarily barred the U.S. from deporting detainees from the countries covered in the order. In a background call with reporters on Sunday, a senior administration official declared the order's implementation "a massive success," claiming it had been done "seamlessly and with extraordinary professionalism." But Republican Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham on Sunday denounced Trump's order , calling it "hasty" and warning it could prove counterproductive in the fight against terrorism. Addressing of the execution of the order, Conway said: "Keeping the country safe is the president's first obligation. And why would you delay implementation of a measure that's meant to meet that objective." "[Trump's] first objective is not to mollify protesters who will never be happy even after they benefit from his rollback of regulations, his tax relief package, his infrastructure [spending], and his making health care more affordable," she said. Trump's move also drew sharp rebuke from Silicon Valley, which relies heavily on immigrant workers, some of whom have helped start Alphabet (GOOGL)'s Google, Facebook (FB), eBay (EBAY) and Yahoo (YHOO). Google co-founder and Alphabet President Sergey Brin who came to the U.S. from the Soviet Union joined protesters at San Francisco International Airport on Saturday night to show his personal support for the travelers caught up in Trump's order. Brin told a Forbes reporter "I'm here because I'm a refugee." Facing backlash from users , Uber said it would create a $3 million defense fund to help cover the legal expenses associated with the executive order. Customers became angered after the ride-hailing service did not shutdown service at New York's Kennedy International on Saturday, in solidarity with a work-stoppage called by a cab-driver group. Other companies also came out against the Trump order. Starbucks ' outgoing CEO Howard Schultz vowed to hire 10,000 refugees globally , and to refugees not allowed in the United States. From Consortium News King Salman of Saudi Arabia and his entourage arrive to greet President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama at King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Jan. 27, 2015. (Image by (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)) Details DMCA President Trump's ban against letting people from seven mostly Muslim countries enter the United States looks to many like a thinly concealed bias against a religion, but it also is a troubling sign that Trump doesn't have the nerve to challenge the false terrorism narrative demanded by Israel and Saudi Arabia. The Israeli-Saudi narrative, which is repeated endlessly inside Official Washington, is that Iran is the principal sponsor of terrorism when that dubious honor clearly falls to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other Sunni-led Muslim states, including Pakistan, nations that did not make Trump's list. The evidence of who is funding and supporting most of the world's terrorism is overwhelming. All major terrorist groups that have bedeviled the United States and the West over the past couple of decades -- from Al Qaeda to the Taliban to Islamic State -- can trace their roots back to Sunni-led countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Qatar. Privately, this reality has been recognized by senior U.S. officials, including former Vice President Joe Biden, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Trump's National Security Advisor Michael Flynn. But that knowledge has failed to change U.S. policy, which caters to the oil-rich Saudis and the politically powerful Israelis. For instance, in August 2012, the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency -- then headed by General Flynn -- warned that Salafists, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Al Qaeda were "the major forces driving the insurgency" against the largely secular government in Syria. Flynn's DIA advised President Obama that rebels were trying to establish a "Salafist principality in eastern Syria," and that "western countries, the gulf states, and Turkey are supporting these efforts" to counter the supposed Shiite threat to the region. Hillary Clinton also was aware of this reality, as the threat from the head-chopping Islamic State -- also known as ISIL or ISIS -- grew worse in summer 2014. In September 2014, the former Secretary of State wrote in an email that Saudi Arabia and Qatar were "providing clandestine financial and logistic support to ISIL and other radical Sunni groups." Later in 2014, Vice President Joe Biden made the same point in a talk at Harvard's Kennedy School: "Our allies in the region were our largest problem in Syria ... the Saudis, the emirates, etc., what were they doing? They were so determined to take down Assad and essentially have a proxy Sunni-Shia war, what did they do? They poured hundreds of millions of dollars and tens of thousands of tons of military weapons into anyone who would fight against Assad, except the people who were being supplied were Al Nusra and Al Qaeda and the extremist elements of jihadis coming from other parts of the world." [Quote starts at 53:25.] Known But Unknown So the truth was known at senior levels of the Obama administration -- and now via National Security Adviser Flynn at the top of the Trump administration -- but the Israelis and the Saudis don't want that reality to shape U.S. foreign policy. In other words, this truth about the real source of terrorism was known but unknown. Retired U.S. Army Lieutenant General Michael Flynn at a campaign rally for Donald Trump at the Phoenix Convention Center in Phoenix, Arizona. Oct. 29, 2016. (Image by (Flickr Gage Skidmore)) Details DMCA Instead, Israel demands that Washington share its hatred of the Lebanese militant group, Hezbollah, a Shiite force that organized in the 1980s to drive the invading Israeli army out of southern Lebanon. Because Hezbollah dealt a rare defeat to the Israeli Defense Force, Israel puts it at the top of "terrorist" organizations. And, Hezbollah is supported by Iran. Saudi Arabia, too, hates Iran because the Sunni-fundamentalist Saudi monarchy considers Shia Islam heretical, a sectarian conflict that dates back to the Seventh Century. So, the Saudi government has viewed Sunni jihadists as the tip of the spear against these Shiite rivals. Israeli and Saudi officials have even made clear that they would prefer Al Qaeda or Islamic State to prevail in the Syrian war rather than have the largely secular government of President Bashar al-Assad survive because they see his regime as part of a "Shiite crescent" reaching from Tehran through Damascus to the Hezbollah neighborhoods of Beirut. Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 (Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher). Judge halts deportation of refugees under President Trump's ban (Image by us.blastingnews.com) Details DMCA IT IS NOT difficult for any decent human being to immediately apprehend why and how Donald Trump's ban on immigrants from seven Muslim countries is inhumane, bigoted, and shameful. During the campaign, the evil of the policy was recognized even by Mike Pence ("offensive and unconstitutional") and Paul Ryan (violative of America's "fundamental values"), who are far too craven and cowardly to object now. Trump's own defense secretary, Gen. James Mattis, said when Trump first advocated his Muslim ban back in August that "we have lost faith in reason," adding: "This kind of thing is causing us great damage right now, and it's sending shock waves through this international system." The sole ostensible rationale for this ban -- it is necessary to keep out Muslim extremists -- collapses upon the most minimal scrutiny. The countries that have produced and supported the greatest number of anti-U.S. terrorists -- Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar, UAE -- are excluded from the ban list because the tyrannical regimes that run those countries are close U.S. allies. Conversely, the countries that are included -- Syria, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Iran, Sudan, and Yemen -- have produced virtually no such terrorists; as the Cato Institute documented on Friday night: "Foreigners from those seven nations have killed zero Americans in terrorist attacks on U.S. soil between 1975 and the end of 2015." Indeed, as of a 2015 study by the New America research center, deaths caused by terrorism from right-wing nationalists since 9/11 have significantly exceeded those from Muslim extremists. Trump's pledge last night to a Christian broadcasting network to prioritize Christian refugees over all others is just profane: The very idea of determining who merits refuge on the basis of religious belief is bigotry in its purest sense. Beyond the morality, it is almost also certainly unconstitutional in a country predicated on the "free exercise of religion." In the New York Times this morning, Cato analyst David Bier also convincingly argues that the policy is illegal on statutory grounds as well. Click Here to Read Whole Article Congress Switchboard: 202-224-3121 "The book is very well written...very important in this individualized capitalistic illusory world that enslaves us all within its tentacles and forces us to believe that we are atomized and disconnected beings. Indigenous Lakota people end prayers with "Mitakuye Oyasin...all my relations..." An ancient African proverb states, "A person is a person only because of and with others..." This instructive text is very useful for us living in what we are always told is the modern world, because it reconnects us all and reminds us that ultimately, the endless circle of the Universe binds and connects us all and the Earth is Mother to us with no hierarchy...the ones at the bottom matter the most...like the ants who build mounds and hills, all working in unison and harmony...the book teaches that we were created for community and our destiny is organic community...anything else is doomed..." Julian Kunnie, Professor of Religious Studies/Classics at the University of Arizona and author of The Cost of Globalization: Dangers to the Earth and Its People Congress Switchboard: 202-224-3121 "Just as The Tipping Point provides an explanation for big changes, Rob Kall offers a unified explanation for the magic behind the success of the biggest tech companies, the Arab Spring, Occupy and the social media revolution An important, big picture, visionary approach weaving together technology, economics, evolution, science and personal relationships -- even happiness -- to describe a wave of change as significant as the invention of the printing press that is well under way -- a wave that could rescue the planet from the top-down system that afflicts the planet." Thom Hartmann, host of nationally syndicated radio show, The Thom Hartmann Program, since 2003 and a nightly television show, The Big Picture, since 2008 Congress Switchboard: 202-224-3121 "We're at a paradigm-shift moment in history, where we will look back at it and realize that a particular model of how we govern our affairs together became outdated. Kall's book Bottom-Up offers great alternatives and solutions that are not found in conventional governing models." Carne Ross , is a former British diplomat, a strategy coordinator for the UN, and author of the book, The Leaderless Revolution. Progressive Content Not Found Sometimes, authors delete their progressive content after publishing. To see if the progressive content was renamed or re-published, please click here. (Image by John D Rachel) Details DMCA You've been avoiding this for a long time. You prefer to remember the times he took you to the park, that amazing camping vacation a few summers back, the funny things he often says at the dinner table, that beautiful dog he gave you on your 12th birthday. But you can't deny it any longer. The truth is painful. But ... Dad is an alcoholic and he beats mom. Do you hate him? Do you reject him as your father? No ... but things have to drastically change and very soon. This is not actually the story I wish to tell. I'm merely drawing a parallel. I'm talking about dealing with denial, facing reality, accepting responsibility, taking action. There are many situations in life for which the above scenario is a metaphor. The parallel I'm making is the relationship between a citizen and a government gone mad. We've avoided it for a long time. We prefer to think of America as a beacon of hope in the world, the fountainhead of truth and justice, a purveyor of democratic values and human rights. But we can't deny it any longer. The truth is painful. But . . . As Martin Luther King, Jr. said in his monumental, myth-shattering speech -- the one that probably got him assassinated -- at Riverside Church in New York City on April 4, 1967: "The greatest purveyor of violence in the world: My own government, I cannot be silent." I won't go into the long history of American aggression. Whole books have been written which detail our gruesome heritage of merciless wars, the most notable being Howard Zinn's classics, A People's History of the United States and the more recent A People's History of American Empire. Nor will I indict the U.S. foreign policy apparatus for its gross deceptions and hypocrisies, elucidated with unparalleled clarity and candor in William Blum's excellent work, America's Deadliest Export: Democracy. I won't talk about the millions of human carcasses piled on top of more carcasses, the result of countless war crimes and merciless military strategies which place no value on human life, whether the victims are in uniform or innocent civilians. I've realized that the scale of the horror is such that its incomprehensible to most good decent citizens. I myself when confronted by figures like 3 million Vietnamese killed, 1.5 Iraqis killed, on and on, find my eyes glazing over in the deluge of zeroes. I literally cannot grasp these numbers and apply them meaningfully to the grief and physical suffering which they are supposed to somehow encapsulate. Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 (Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher). (Image by Roy Eidelson) Details DMCA In recent days President Trump has, yet again, ludicrously asserted that millions of people illegally voted against him last November. Lies of such magnitude and consequence from the White House certainly deserve the attention and scorn they've received. After all, once we move beyond the realm of "alternative facts," the real evidence shows that a person is more likely to be struck by lightning than to impersonate someone else at the polls. But to fully understand Trump's complaints about "illegal voters," we need to recognize that voter fraud and voter suppression are opposite sides of the same coin. By promoting beliefs about the former, the groundwork is laid for pursuing the latter. In this way, tales of unlawful voting have long been a pretext for obstructing the voting rights of U.S. citizens. The mass manipulation at the heart of this strategy relies on what I call the "combating-injustice mind game." With two steps, this psychological ploy preys upon the public's acute and compassionate sensitivity to issues of right and wrong. First we're bombarded with dire warnings that something terribly unjust is happening. These overwrought claims aim to spur broad outrage and demands for reform. Then the propagandists step forward with carefully crafted proposals for how to address the purported injustice. But there's a catch. Their recommended changes are designed with a very different goal in mind: to advance a narrow self-aggrandizing agenda, one that leaves those who were already disadvantaged even worse off than before. So, behind the seductive facade of combating injustice, wealth is extracted, power is entrenched, and the common good is trampled. In short, complaints of rampant voter fraud are really just an elaborate cover story, constructed to hide repugnant attempts to gain electoral advantage by disenfranchising Americans. Paul Weyrich, for decades a leading voice of the conservative movement, indirectly acknowledged as much almost fifty years ago. In a speech in Texas back in 1980, he explained, "I don't want everybody to vote. "Our leverage in the elections, quite candidly, goes up as the voting populace goes down." That master plan hasn't changed in the intervening years. That's why the Republican Party's 2012 platform emphasized, "Every time that a fraudulent vote is cast, it effectively cancels out a vote of a legitimate voter"; why Reince Priebus, now Trump's chief of staff, has argued that requiring a photo ID at the voting booth is "fair, reasonable, and just"; why other right-wing mouthpieces insist we must "keep fraudsters away from polling places" and "vote fraud pervades our election process"; why True the Vote, the Koch-funded Tea Party outfit, cunningly describes itself as "regular citizens standing up for fair elections"; and why the GOP's 2016 platform endorsed legislation calling for both "proof of citizenship when registering to vote and secure photo ID when voting." It's no surprise that the favorite targets of voter suppression efforts include African Americans, Hispanic Americans, students, and low-income workers. That's because most members of these groups are traditionally unlikely to vote Republican. They're also less likely than most Americans to have a driver's license or other valid photo ID. Next Page 1 | 2 (Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher). There are legal actions now being contemplated to remove Trump from office, based upon his many conflicts of interests. Let us assume that none of them get past Congress or the Supreme Court. Then our great hope is that the momentum of demonstrations in every major city here and around the world will lead to actions that will stymie the intentions of the Trump administration. The gigantic women's march in Washington D.C. of January 21 kicked-off what could be an unending climate of resistance to Trump rule. It is fitting that women lead this movement to emphasize the determined but non-violent nature of it - like the Suffragette movement. They and cooperating groups plan to hold continuous demonstrations until their voices are acknowledged. How might it evolve? We have already seen a first sign of resistance, when mayors of 100 sanctuary cities declared they will not abide by Trump's declaration of removing any federal funding of these cities. As Trump rolls out his regulations of presidential powers, each will be met with gestures of disobedience ranging from token local protests to some forms of obstruction, charging up the atmosphere and keeping the issues on the front page. It is essential that the issues remain as a continuous subject matter in the media, in the classroom, in every place of assembly. As tensions increase, we may begin to see mass strikes disrupting essential services. This will greatly inconvenience both supporters and opposition to Trump, but it is the cost that must be paid for action. As in past episodes of history, state and federal governments are likely to bring out riot police and the national guard to obstruct and quell demonstrations. But with the exceptional climate surrounding the extremely unpopular presidential election, that strategy could backfire. Police and military personnel may sympathize with the crowds and be reluctant to carry out orders, as did the 100 mayors. The mothers of the women's movement could appeal to their sons in the militia to sympathize with the demonstrators. Among the civil servants of key government agencies, there might also be a clandestine movement - on a scale that could not be contained - to make Trump's regulations ineffective. Other civil actions that could be carried out are the total boycotting of Trump properties. This could happen on a world-wide basis. Overseas, there might be little restraint to violence. People would be intimidated to not patronize Trump's properties. ISIS might car-bomb them. Such covert actions could carry-over into the USA. The list goes on. At some point - sooner rather than later - Trump or his party might reconsider the insanity of having him as the president of our country in this critical time of history and very crucial time of environmental devastation. Before impeachment, he might consider doing a Nixon. Then perhaps, we would only have a humiliated and less reactionary Republican congress to worry about. Trump voters lost, they just don't know it yet (Image by cyanocorax) Details DMCA Of course a lot of Trump voters don't trust "government," because they have been taught that it is the problem." So we need to avoid framing our positive solutions as "government" supported by higher taxes. Being very specific about what an initiative would do to help them is the way to go: "Building bridges all across American will help us all move forward: more local jobs, more businesses able to move products safely etc." Of course, re that "government thing," there is huge bit of common ground staring us right in the face now. The "government" is now the GOP and the Trump cabinet, to say nothing of Trump himself, and Bannon, his puppeteer. The GOP has spent years pushing harmful ideas like killing Social Security and Medicare, along with slashing every kind of federal spending that could help our economy and all our people get into the 21st century and stay there. But now the "shoe," so to speak, is on their foot. If they actually try to do all they have promoted for so many years, the backlash will just continue to grow. We need to be part of that backlash, but carefully in sync with how it hurts everyone. Focusing on the specifics of how each destructive piece of GOP legislation, executive order or rule-dumping hurts us all is the way to go. Using simple words that are visceral in their impact is vital; no multisyllabic, latinate, fifty cent words! For example, try "Americans expect fair treatment about X, so we need to play by the rules about Y." "Fairness" is still a widely shared American value, if not by the 1%. So is "playing by the rules," which is another quintessentially American way of talking about fairness. Challenging the GOP/Trump axis to actually create real, lasting jobs is a good goal for us. Though Trump may make promises, true job creation is probably still just plain outside the GOP's DNA. But what about the Trump/GOP assault on environmental protection and climate change action just now picking up speed? Americans want clean water, air, and food, even if they don't all believe in climate change.(To see what I've already recommended about framing climate protection now given that fact, see my most recent blog on this subject.) So our focus needs to be on 'the rules that protect us all from dirty water, air, and food that make us too sick to work." That last point is vital. Everyone understands the price of not being able to work. Again, let's specify what we need to do instead to "Keep American workers healthy so they can keep working! Clean up our water, air and food by doing X." It all sounds like a tall order, doesn't it? But we must stretch to reach it. Of course a lot of Trump voters think "rigging" also includes government favoring freeloaders poorer than they are with handouts paid for with their hard earned tax dollars. This is hard for us to hear, but sometimes this is based on firsthand experience: In Hillbilly Elegy, J.D. Vance writes about seeing people on public assistance come to the grocery to buy things he couldn't afford. The basic problem here is that working folks can't afford what they want, and flat wages or no wages are the most basic cause. We need to show we care about that and avoid labelling it as just racism or selfishness. It's also very important for us to figure out how to support communities of color or difference in a style that avoids playing into the hands of GOP operatives too. They know very well how to use Trump supporters'gut resentment against us about that. Talking about creating more jobs, more opportunity, and more fairness for everyone is the best strategy. And here are some more suggestions along that line: Trump types define the "elite" not as the !% we mean by the word, but as the Democrats and liberals who use what they call "political correctness" in ways that make them feel unseen, uncared about, small, ashamed, stupid, bad, and worthless. They know we think they are less worthy than those folks who receive government welfare or aid through affirmative action. Tea Partiers feel we scorn them for their religion, their kind of patriotism, their lack of education, and their reliance on family, church, and community for support. We need to find ways to counter that impression, even if we don't agree with everything their churches believe. Let's try some versions of "All Americans deserve the same fairness, respect, and protection of the law" instead. Some Trump voters will believe our ideas for better job creation, health and safety if we have already established a reputation for feeling their pain and supporting their needs. It's also the first step of an American Political Framing process: listen to your audience. Pay attention to the images, metaphors, and catch phrases they use when talking about their problems. .Find a way to use that language for your own messages. (See our site for more on how to do this.) And if you are really serious, try being like Dr. Arlie R. Hochshild--get to know some local Trump voters. Find out what makes those particular people unhappy or scared. What are their hopes? Find out what their stories are. Some very good guidelines for exploring these kinds of conversations can be found at www.livingroomconversations.org>. Maybe it will take some time for all of the oncoming GOP mistakes to surface, even if Trump is impeached and replaced with Pence. Make no mistake--we will still be in big trouble if that happens. But the GOP also always goes too far, once they get their hands on the throttle. They are seriously out of touch with their own people, and they still believe they can get away with this forever. I don't believe it. Electoral and cultural history show that they do get a comeuppance in the end. In the meantime, we need to frame our messages about what the American people want and expect of our government in the broadest possible positive terms, ways that will include everyone, even Trump voters. After all, we Americans all want to protect our freedom, we all want things to be fair, and we want people in government and out to play by the rules, we all want economic prosperity that benefits everyone, we all want our communities to be clean, safe, secure, we all want practical solutions to our problems that work for everyone, and we all want to be able to keep up with other countries in the global economy.That's what being American means to the majority of Americans. Word frequency research shows that the most used words in Trump's inaugural speech were "Dream, American, and Jobs." Let's make sure we progressives sound even more American than that! -------------- Susan C. Strong, Ph.D., is the Founder and Executive Director of The Metaphor Project, http://www.metaphorproject.org, and author of our book, Move Our Message: How to Get America's Ear. The Metaphor Project has been helping progressives mainstream their messages since 1997. Follow Susan on Twitter @SusanCStrong and check out her TEDxtalk too. ------------ Notes: !. Bringing Down a Dictator, (film) and Blueprint for Revolution (book). See also veteran organizer George Lakey's http://wagingnonviolence.org/feature/stop-trump-10-point-strategy/. Trump claims his immigration ban is 'not about religion, even as order favors Christians President Donald Trump strongly defended his move to impose a travel ban on seven largely Muslim countries, saying that that while America was "a proud nation" of immigrants, his order was strictly about national security and not religion. As numerous foreign citizens were detained at airports around the globe, triggering spontaneous protests, part of Trump's executive order was temporarily blocked by a federal judge in New York. Barely a week after his inauguration, Trump moved to bar the travelers for at least 90 days, while declaring it would impose "extreme vetting" on those wishing to enter the country. Responding to the worldwide backlash and disarray, the president invoked the country's historic status as a harbor for immigrants as a reason for his decision. "America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border," Trump said in a statement issued by the White House. His public statement came as administration officials doubled down on the president's decision, fanning out across Sunday talk shows to defend Trump's travel restrictions. White House press secretary Sean Spicer told ABC the U.S. would "protect our country and our people," while Chief of Staff Reince Priebus told NBC's "Meet the Press" the administration had no apologies. Trump said the travel restrictions were similar to a six-month ban by the Obama administration on visas from Iraq in 2011. In addition to Iraq, the other countries in his executive order are Iran, Libya, Somali, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. All of those countries are currently roiled by active terror elements such as ISIS and al-Qaeda, yet few of them were involved in hundreds of domestic jihadi plots since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, according to an analysis by The Wall Street Journal. In his executive order, Trump invoked 9/11 several times as a rationale behind his move. Nevertheless, Trump argued his executive order was not against Islam, but against terrorism. Story continues "This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe," Trump declared. "There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order." In a subsequent tweet, Trump said he would be interviewed at 11 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on TheBrodyFile. The controversy drew criticism from within Trump's own party, as two senior GOP lawmakers denounced the executive order as "a self-inflicted wound." The humanitarian crisis stemming from the conflict in Syria has sent millions of refugees fleeing the country since 2011. Trump said visa issuance would begin anew "once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering." U.S. Department of Homeland Security Security Secretary John Kelly subsequently issued a statement that suggested flexibility in cases where traveler had residency status in the U.S. "In applying the provisions of the president's executive order, I hereby deem the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest," the statement from Kelly said. "Accordingly, absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, lawful permanent resident status will be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determinations." On Twitter, Trump responded to criticism by Arizona Sen. John McCain and South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, both Republicans, urging them to focus on the threat posed by Islamic State. This story was updated with a tweet from President Donald Trump on a planned television interview. More From CNBC Article Not Found Sometimes, authors delete their articles after publishing them. To see if the article was renamed or re-published, please click here. Snake Oil Man Meets We the People (Image by Akemi Ohira) Details DMCA While a flurry of photo-opts included a refugee Ban on Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen, Iran, Iraq and Syria -- all non-9/11 participants -- coincidentally, Middle East countries with whom The Don of Bankruptcy has business ties: Azerbaijan, UAE, Egypt, Frenemy Turkey and 9/11 contributor Saudi Arabia, were exempt from, executive abuse of power. As evidenced by January's Women's March heard round the world, women, from Millennials to Seniors, united -- and supported by men fearless in the face of gender equality -- most Americans represent American values that demonstrate our collective aspirations, better than our elected officials. Once again, our exceptional attempt to form a more perfect union is being challenged. However, as in Civil War, iconic assassinations, Kent State bloodshed and sitting UC Davis student protesters being pepper sprayed -- we will go high, and shall overcome. Nonetheless, Conservatives are serious about pushing America backwards, but deep in Liberal hearts and minds, Americans know compromise is as essential to global security, as family love is to the fabric of American progress. We now hold these truths to be self-evident: when people who hate government are elected by people who hate government, government becomes hateful. When conservatives like Cheney, Mitch McConnell and Mike Pence dominate public affairs: preaching oil wars for profit, obstructionism to the public good and denial of science, evolution and freedom of choice -- what is wrought on America is the havoc and chaos of a team of bigots herded by an emperor with no concept of helming a democratic ship of state. Once again, it is up to those who care about life before birth to unite with those who choose to live a life saving lives from, extremists more akin to authoritarians and demagoguery, than leaders of a free world. We the People, of every color & cause; stay-at-home or home-schooled; Wall Street to Main Street -- especially women of every political and sexual persuasion and every income disparity level -- need unite, to never again repeat McCarthyism's restrictions on our freedoms. Let's also prioritize less on organizing for Party victory, and more on how American citizens counter, when an American president becomes a global threat to human decency, mutual respect and indeed, humankind. We don't need to agree on everything to recognize the power of unity in the face of questioning misguided authority: One B2 Stealth Bomber costs ten times more than the entire annual budget of NEA Churchill or church member, when asked to cut Arts & Science budgets to fund wars, answer, what are we fighting for if not preservation of The Humanities Words like, Keep the oil and maybe we will have another chance, endangers American lives here, and abroad No political extremist is the solution for employment, fiscal responsibility, income parity, spiritual hope, peace of mind -- or Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Extremism offers only the demise of common cause, commonality and common sense. Our current abyss didn't begin with Bannon, Spicer, Conway or Islamophobia undoing, Love thy neighbor as thyself. America is the product of a checkered past: seeking religious freedom invaders, slaughtering those of differing beliefs Next Page 1 | 2 (Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher). It's Donald Trump's first work week as president of the United States and already, The Hill reports, he "may be headed into a big fight with Republican lawmakers with his plans for dramatic cuts to federal spending." Dramatic cuts? Not really: "Team Trump is relying on proposals outlined last year by the Heritage Foundation in its 'Blueprint for Balance: a federal budget for 2017.'" The Heritage plan is weak tea. It doesn't even claim to cut overall government spending, but rather to merely "control the growth" of that spending. And its claim to balance the budget by 2023 is pure sleight of hand. The "primary balance" it mentions excludes interest on existing government debt, which is fast approaching the half a trillion dollars per year mark. The developing Trump plan is the usual tinkering around the edges, searching for "waste, fraud and abuse" in "discretionary spending." Baby steps like that will never bring the budget into balance, but they're still too much for Congress. "Discretionary spending" is politicianese for "spending Congress uses to buy votes back home." US Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) and US Representative Don Young (R-AK) blew their stacks when they learned that something called the "essential air program" -- a federal subsidy for the rural airports so important to their state -- might be on the chopping block. Mississippi Republicans don't want to lose one of two federal "catfish inspection programs" that hand out artificial government and regulatory compliance jobs to their constituents back home. A few Republicans will likely peel away from their party to save some discretionary programs usually associated with Democrats: Legal services for the poor, arts funding, and state-subsidized media. And then of course there's the single biggest federal budget line: "Defense," politicianese for "government contracts for expensive planes, ships and weapons systems that keep my campaign contributors happy and let me artificially inflate my district's employment statistics." If you're not serious about cutting "defense" spending, you're not serious about cutting spending. The Trump White House and congressional Republicans want to increase, not cut, that budget line. Some Republicans point out that a balanced budget is impossible without reforming "non-discretionary" spending -- Social Security, Medicare and so forth. They're right. But they're also making excuses: They won't cut the spending that it's easy to cut unless they can also cut the spending that it's hard to cut, and come hell or high water they'll find a way to lose the latter fight. We've been here before. Ronald Reagan came into office with plans to balance the budget while cutting taxes and increasing military spending by going after "waste, fraud and abuse," too. It didn't work then and it won't work now. One difference: Reagan could fob some of the blame off on a Democratic House of Representatives. Trump doesn't enjoy that luxury. The Republican Party owns the House, and the Senate, and the White House -- they own the entire federal government. For at least the next two years, that means they also own 100% of the coming fiscal failure. From Paul Craig Roberts Website On January 23, 2017, I asked, "Are Americans Racist?" I pointed out examples where racist explanations prevail over empirical fact. I did not write that there is no racism in America. I said that racism is not the be-all and end-all explanation of American history and institutions. The point I made is that racist explanations are often inadequate and both work against racial harmony and blind us to more general and more serious problems. Perhaps the worst of America's failed institutions is the criminal justice system. The US has the largest prison population in the world, not only as a percentage of the population but also in absolute numbers. "Freedom and democracy" America has an absolute larger number of incarcerated citizens than "authoritarian" China, a country with four times the US population. Many factors contribute to this result. One is the privatization of prisons, which has turned them into profit-making enterprises ever needful of more labor to exploit, which adds to the pressure for convictions. Another factor is the disregard of the protective features of law in order to more easily pursue demonized offender groups, such as the Mafia, child abusers, drug dealers and users, and "terrorists." Lawrence M. Stratton and I describe the transformation of law from a shield of the people into a weapon in the hands of the state in our book, The Tyranny of Good Intentions. This transformation did not occur because of racism. It occurred because chasing after devils and convicting them became more important than justice. Today the criminal justice system is largely indifferent to a defendant's guilt or innocence. This is a far worst problem than racism. It is the main reason that there are so many false convictions in the US and so many wrongfully convicted Americans in prison. Indeed, even the guilty are wrongfully convicted as it is easier to frame them than to convict them on the evidence. To be clear: The primary reason for wrongful conviction is that the success indicator for police, prosecutor, and judge is conviction, not justice. Crimes are solved by wrongful convictions. High conviction rates boost the careers of prosecutors, and high profile convictions boost their political careers. The key to rapid and numerous convictions is the plea bargain. And plea bargains suit judges as they keep the court docket clear. Today 97% of felony cases are settled with a plea bargain. This means police evidence and a prosecutor's case are tested only three times out of 100. When the evidence and case are tested in court, the test confronts a vast array of prosecutorial misconduct, such as suborned perjury and the withholding of exculpatory evidence. In America, everything is loaded against Justice. In a plea bargain police do not have to present evidence, prosecutors do not have to bring a case, and judges do not have to pay attention to the case and be troubled by a growing backlog as trials consume days and weeks. In a plea bargain the defendant, innocent or guilty, is told that he can plead to this or that offence, which carries a lighter sentence than the crime that allegedly has actually occurred and on which the defendant is arrested, or the defendant can go to trial where he will face more serious charges that carry much harsher penalties. As it has become routine for police to falsify evidence, for prosecutors to suborn perjury and withhold exculpatory evidence, for jurors naively to trust police and prosecutors, and for judges to look the other way, attorneys advise defendants to accept a plea deal. In other words, no one expects a fair trial or for real evidence to play a role in the outcome. The short of it is that the pursuit of justice is not a feature of the American criminal justice system. Justice does not matter to the police, to the prosecutor, to the jury, to the judge, and often not to the hardened defense attorney who has witnessed so much injustice that he believes justice is a fairy tale. The only exception to this is the justice introduced from outside the justice system by innocence projects and pro bono attorneys, such as Bryan Stevenson, director of the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama. In 2014 Stevenson published Just Mercy, a fascinating collection of case histories of wrongful convictions that he and his colleagues managed to have overturned. A book such as this benefits from a main case, and the one that Stevenson delivers is that of Walter McMillian. It required six years for Stevenson to overturn what must be the most obvious, blatant frame-up of a completely innocent man in US history. There were a large number of witnesses who testified that they were with McMillian at a fish fry during the time that a murder for which McMillian was indicted and convicted took place. The only "evidence" against McMillian was the suborned perjury of a man who retracted his coerced testimony three times, once in the courtroom of Alabama Judge Thomas B. Norton, who simply ignored it. McMillian is black, and the sheriff, prosecutor, judge, and jury that framed him are white. This fact, together with the fact that the ignored witnesses whose testimony cleared McMillian were black and McMillian's sexual affair with a white woman in a small Alabama town, seem to convince Stevenson that McMillian was convicted because of racism. Using Stevenson's own account, I am going to show that many other factors in addition to racism played roles in McMillian's wrongful conviction. Stevenson's emphasis on a racist explanation of Alabama justice deflects attention from the fact that human corruption and evil go far beyond mere racism. McMillian was wrongfully convicted, because the justice system has no concern with justice. Letting the system off as merely racist doesn't nearly go far enough. The problem is much worse. McMillian was falsely convicted, (1) because sheriff John Tate was under community criticism for the failure to solve the murder case of a young woman and needed someone to arrest for the crime, (2) because Ralph Meyers gave false testimony against McMillian for confused reasons that did not work out for him, (3) because the local newspaper, as newspapers are wont to do, convicted McMillian in the press, which meant that the jury had to convict or be accused of letting off a murderer, and (4) because the judge, Robert E. Lee Key, not only is unworthy of his name but most certainly did not have the fortitude to run a fair trial when the only possible outcome for his career and reputation in the community was conviction. Neither did his successor, Thomas B. Norton, have fortitude for the same reasons. I am convinced that all of these representatives of the justice system are racists, but they would have convicted McMillian for the same reasons if he had been white. If the justice system was concerned with justice, he would not have been convicted irrespective of race or gender. Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 (Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher). From Reader Supported News Within hours of the leak (by a whistleblower) of a National Security Council draft Executive Order calling for the reinstatement of the illegal Bush-era CIA torture program, I was invited to participate in a round-table discussion about torture on Irish Public Radio. The other guests were an American living in London who claimed to have been a CIA counter-terrorism officer during the Bush administration (I was a CIA counter-terrorism officer at the same time this guy purported to be, and I had never heard of him) and a woman from New Jersey whose husband had been killed in the attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. It felt like a set-up from the interview's very first question. That first question was, "Do torture techniques like waterboarding work?" I was dying to jump in immediately, but I wasn't called, and my microphone was off. The other CIA officer, "Mike," said that yes, waterboarding works, it's a proven method, it saved American lives, it disrupted attacks, blah, blah, blah. Then the widow was asked. She went on a long soliloquy, talking about what it meant to lose a husband in a terrorist attack, and saying that her children had been left fatherless and the family nearly lost their home. She finished by saying, "I don't see how sprinkling a little water on their faces is torture. It's just water. What about my husband? Wasn't it a form of torture to murder him in the World Trade Center?" With all due respect to this woman and her family, their loss was irrelevant to the debate. The question of whether or not torture works also was irrelevant, and I said so. Lots of things "work," I said. Raping and sodomizing prisoners "works." We don't do that. (At least we're not supposed to. This and other horrors were carried out by military officers and enlisted personnel at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq in the last decade.) Raping prisoners' wives works. We don't do that. Beating and torturing their children in front of them works. We don't do that either. The issue isn't whether something works. The issue is whether what we're doing is moral, ethical, and legal. Torture is not. Torture is an abomination. I was called a "monster" and a "terrorist lover." I've been speaking out against torture for nearly a decade. I've debated a lot of people. But this encounter surprised and disgusted me. I think it's because people on the political right feel empowered by Trump's election. They feel like they can take outrageous -- and public -- positions on issues like torture (or rendition or secret prisons or drones) and the rest of us just have to accept them. The rest of us are the crazy ones. The rest of us are un-American. For the record, torture is illegal. It is a violation of the federal Torture Act and of the United Nations Convention Against Torture. It's a violation of the 2015 McCain-Feinstein Amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act. In 1946, the United States executed Japanese soldiers who waterboarded American prisoners of war. Waterboarding was a war crime that demanded the death penalty. Today, we have to hear Americans describe it as "sprinkling a little water" on the face of a prisoner. This is going to be a tough fight, especially with Trump in the White House. A recent Reuters poll showed that a clear majority of Americans -- 63 percent -- support the use of torture against terrorism suspects. Only 15 percent of us think that torture is never acceptable. Only 15 percent think that we should even bother to observe and respect the law. Many of us have consistently underestimated Donald Trump over the past two years. We can't any longer. Trump has surrounded himself with people who support torture. He has said that he wants to re-institute the torture program. He has said that he wants to reopen black sites -- secret prisons -- overseas. We have to take him at his word. And we have to fight him. We must take to the courts, shout to the press, and march in the streets. We are on the right side of history here. We cannot remain silent. Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader Supported News. In March 1845, the United States acquired a new president James K. Polk a forceful, aggressive political outsider intent on strengthening his country and asserting its pre-eminence in front of other world powers, especially Mexico and Great Britain, says The Book of Life. Within a year of his inauguration, he had declared full-scale war on Mexico because of squabbles over the Texan border, and was soon rattling his saber at Britain over the ownership of Oregon. To complete the picture, Polk was a vigorous defender of slavery, who dismissed the arguments of abolitionists as naive and sentimental. How did Americans who disagreed with this vicious-sounding character endure his term? Though Polk did enjoy popular support, a sizeable minority of the citizenry disliked him intensely, especially a certain citizen by the name of Henry David Thoreau. The author of Walden; or, Life in the Woods believed that true patriots were not those who blindly followed their administration but those who followed their own consciences and in particular, the principles of reason, even when it meant publicly standing against not just the man in office but the many who agree with him, or even when it meant running afoul of the laws of the land. He elucidated the principles behind this position in the 1849 essay Civil Disobedience, which Josh Jones wrote about here last November. The animated video above from Alain de Bottons School of Life, also the producer of The Book of Life, places Thoreaus ideas on the role of the individual versus the state in the context of Thoreaus life one he lived without fear of, say, getting thrown into jail for refusing to pay taxes to what he saw as an immoral state. Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the transcendentalist figurehead declares in Civil Disobedience, the true place for a just man is a prison. Well over a century and half on, Thoreau still reminds us that political systems, no matter how long they last, remain ever subject to breakdown, adjustment, and even dismantling and rebuilding at the hands of the rulers and the ruled alike. Politics, as history occasionally and forcefully reminds us, is negotiation without end, and sometimes negotiations have to get ugly. Related Content: Henry David Thoreau on When Civil Disobedience and Resistance Are Justified (1849) Henry David Thoreaus Hand-Drawn Map of Cape Cod (1866) 6 Political Theorists Introduced in Animated School of Life Videos: Marx, Smith, Rawls & More Read the CIAs Simple Sabotage Field Manual: A Timeless, Kafkaesque Guide to Subverting Any Organization with Purposeful Stupidity (1944) Based in Seoul, Colin Marshall writes and broadcasts on cities and culture. Hes at work on a book about Los Angeles, A Los Angeles Primer, the video series The City in Cinema, the crowdfunded journalism project Where Is the City of the Future?, and the Los Angeles Review of Books Korea Blog. Follow him on Twitter at @colinmarshall or on Facebook. Oral Healthcare Tracker Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2016 - 2024 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=16199 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/oral-healthcare-tracker-market.html http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/ Global Oral Healthcare Tracker Market: Drivers and OpportunitiesAs per the findings of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there are 27.4% of adults and 17.5% of children still untreated for their different oral diseases on a worldwide platform. These coarse-grained figures by the CDC have provided a wide opening for the new players to exhibit their innovative products and the battle-scarred vendors to make a promising comeback. Moreover, according to WHO, approximately 50.0% of HIV-positive patients are struggling with oral health problems such as oral bacterial, fungal, or viral infection.For Any Queries Get Solutions With A PDF Sample :A low degree of awareness about oral healthcare, especially amongst the disadvantaged population, is foreseen to blemish the progress of the global oral healthcare tracker market.Howbeit, rising voluntary and not-for-profit efforts toward general healthcare awareness and treatment around the globe is expected to gradually dissolve the ignorance pertaining to disease prevention and health benefits. Other factors that could heavily contribute to the healthy growth of the global oral healthcare tracker market include surging geriatric population, increasing per capita healthcare expenditure, oral healthcare technology innovation, agreeable insurance and reimbursement policies, and rising number of oral diseases.Global Oral Healthcare Tracker Market: Geographical Analysis and Key PlayersThe international oral healthcare tracker market is majorly influenced by the growing number of oral health problems and generous support to the public through Childrens Health Insurance Program (CHIP) and Medicaid programs in North America. The segment also receives support from the crucial involvements of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Following North America are other significant geographies, i.e. Europe and Asia Pacific.Some of the important vendors studied in the global oral healthcare tracker market report are Briggs Healthcare, Breathometer Inc., Medline Industries, Inc., Planmeca USA, Philips, Welch Allyn, Geratherm Medical AG, and Visiomed Group.Global Oral Healthcare Tracker Market: OverviewThe global oral healthcare tracker market is currently set to clutch auspicious growth opportunities and affirm broadening expansion with novel and technologically advanced products. For instance, the embedded artificial intelligence (AI) offered with oral health tech company Kolibrees smart toothbrush has recently made the headlines. According to Kolibree, Ara is the first toothbrush with AI technology. The smart toothbrush is able to record the brushing data of the user, even offline, which gets automatically synced with the Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE 4.0) app.Such innovative advancements in the field have supplemented personalized healthcare and the need for oral disease prevention and wellness, thus ensuring a tangible growth for the global market.The international market for oral healthcare tracker can see a stratification by product type, end user, application, and of course, geography. The product type of segmentation showcases the different technologies and devices used for measuring oral health while the application segments represent the various ways in which these tracking gadgets are used.View exclusive Global strategic Business report :The report on the global oral healthcare tracker market provides a thorough analysis of the epoch-making facets, including growth factors and limitations, company profiling, bargaining power of buyers, and the threat of new entrants and substitutes. The key inputs offered by our seasoned analysts have proved to be extremely decisive and vital for the report buyers to plan out result-oriented strategies.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.Contact us:Transparency Market Research90 State Street,Suite 700,AlbanyNY - 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Latest Research: Global External Electrical Stimulation Devices Market 2017-2021 Forecast Report http://www.orbisresearch.com/reports/index/2017-market-research-report-on-global-external-electrical-stimulation-devices-industry http://www.orbisresearch.com/contacts/request-sample/187541 http://www.orbisresearch.com/contacts/enquiry-before-buying/187541 https://www.linkedin.com/company/orbis-research https://twitter.com/orbisresearch The External Electrical Stimulation Devices Market 2017 Industry Research Report is a professional and in-depth study. This study covers, Global External Electrical Stimulation Devices Sales and External Electrical Stimulation Devices Revenue by Regions and industrial review, market analysis, market demands, opportunities and forecast. Market overview is provided on the basis of definition, product overview, applications and future scope of External Electrical Stimulation Devices.The External Electrical Stimulation Devices Market report provides Production and Revenue Data of External Electrical Stimulation Devices Industry. Production means the output of External Electrical Stimulation Devices and Revenue means the sales value of External Electrical Stimulation Devices.Browse The Complete Report @Some Major Key Points Covered in this report: This Report Studied on the basis of types, application, products, technology, etc The Report Covered Market Segments by region:1. North America2. Europe3. China4. Japan5. Southeast Asia6. India This Market Research Report of 2017 External Electrical Stimulation Devices provides market demand, market size and forecast for deferent regions. This Report Divides by product type, with production, revenue, price, consumption, market share and growth rate of each type can be divided into:1. Type I2. Type II This Report Divides by application, this report focuses on consumption, market share and growth rate of External Electrical Stimulation Devices in each application, can be divided into :1. Application 12. Application 2Request For Sample of 2017 Market Research Report on External Electrical Stimulation Devices Industry at:Topmost Leading Manufacturer Covered in this report:1. Boston Scientific2. BTL Industries3. Cyberonics4. DJO Global5. Medtronic6. Nevro Corp7. NeuroMetrix8. St. Jude Medical9. Cogentix Medical10. ZynexSome Points Covered In List Of Tables:Chapter One: External Electrical Stimulation Devices Market Overview1.1 Product Overview and Scope of External Electrical Stimulation Devices1.2 External Electrical Stimulation Devices Segment by Type1.2.1 Global Production Market Share of External Electrical Stimulation Devices by Type in 20151.2.2 Type I1.2.3 Type II1.3 External Electrical Stimulation Devices Segment by Application1.3.1 External Electrical Stimulation Devices Consumption Market Share by Application in 20151.3.2 Application 11.3.3 Application 21.3.4 Application 31.4 External Electrical Stimulation Devices Market by Region1.4.1 North America Status and Prospect (2012-2022)1.4.2 Europe Status and Prospect (2012-2022)1.4.3 China Status and Prospect (2012-2022)1.4.4 Japan Status and Prospect (2012-2022)1.4.5 Southeast Asia Status and Prospect (2012-2022)1.4.6 India Status and Prospect (2012-2022)1.5 Global Market Size (Value) of External Electrical Stimulation Devices (2012-2022)Chapter Two: Global External Electrical Stimulation Devices Market Competition by Manufacturers2.1 Global External Electrical Stimulation Devices Production and Share by Manufacturers (2015 and 2016)2.2 Global External Electrical Stimulation Devices Revenue and Share by Manufacturers (2015 and 2016)2.3 Global External Electrical Stimulation Devices Average Price by Manufacturers (2015 and 2016)2.4 Manufacturers External Electrical Stimulation Devices Manufacturing Base Distribution, Sales Area and Product Type2.5 External Electrical Stimulation Devices Market Competitive Situation and Trends2.5.1 External Electrical Stimulation Devices Market Concentration Rate2.5.2 External Electrical Stimulation Devices Market Share of Top 3 and Top 5 Manufacturers2.5.3 Mergers & Acquisitions, ExpansionReason to Purchase this Report:1. The report of External Electrical Stimulation Devices Market provides the detailed segmentation in terms of types, applications, manufacturers and regions.2. The current market scenario and future growth has also covered in this report.3. The research also offers manufacturing cost analysis, industry chain analysis in terms of upstream raw material sourcing and downstream buyers.4. Moreover, an extensive analysis of production, consumption, and revenue for each segment is offered for the forecast period.Enquiry about this report:About Us:Orbis Research (orbisresearch.com) is a single point aid for all your market research requirements. We have vast database of reports from the leading publishers and authors across the globe. We specialize in delivering customized reports as per the requirements of our clients. We have complete information about our publishers and hence are sure about the accuracy of the industries and verticals of their specialization. This helps our clients to map their needs and we produce the perfect required market research study for our clients.Contact Us:Hector CostelloSenior Manager Client Engagements4144N Central Expressway,Suite 600, Dallas,Texas - 75204, U.S.A.Phone No.: +1 (214) 884-6817; +912064101019Email ID: sales@orbisresearch.comFollow Us on LinkedIn:Follow us on Twitter: LOS ANGELES (AP) -- From Dubai to Los Angeles, President Donald Trump's order barring travelers from seven Muslim countries from entering the U.S. has thrown the lives of thousands into limbo. Middle Eastern scholars who have been studying in the U.S., foreigners planning to visit loved ones living in this country, and others who were outside the United States when the order was issued last week are struggling to find a way in. Also, some legal U.S. residents and visitors from the affected nations are afraid to leave the U.S. for business or family reasons, fearful they won't be allowed back. Meanwhile, attorneys and federal judges are working to clear a path for some of those who were turned away. One was Sahar Algonaimi, a Syrian-born schoolteacher from Saudi Arabia, who arrived at Chicago's O'Hare Airport on Saturday on her way to Indiana to care for her elderly, cancer-stricken mother. Although she had a visa and had visited the U.S. numerous times before, the 58-year-old woman was put on a plane back to Saudi Arabia after authorities persuaded her to give up her visa. An hour after she left, a judge blocked Trump's order, an act her family's attorney said would have allowed her to stay. "Now, unless we can get the government to give her humanitarian parole, she will have to apply for a new visa," Kalman Resnick said Monday. "This is just one of many stories from the weekend at O'Hare and all around the country." Nazanin Zinouri of South Carolina said she was barred from boarding a flight home over the weekend after traveling to Iran to visit her mother and other family members. A legal resident of the U.S. since 2010, she has earned master's and doctorate degrees in this country and works for a technology company. She fears she will lose her job, home, car and pet if she can't return soon. "What's going to happen to my dog? My dog is sick. Is anyone going to adopt him?" she asked. "Am I going to lose my job forever?" On Sunday, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly said green card holders, or legal permanent U.S. residents, will be allowed to re-enter the country unless there is information indicating the person is a serious threat. Story continues Trump denied his order was to blame for chaos at the nation's airports over the weekend, instead pointing to computer glitches and protesters. He took to Twitter to argue that swift action on immigrants was important, saying there are a "lot of bad 'dudes' out there." The president issued a 90-day ban on travelers from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. He also suspended the admission of all refugees for 120 days and indefinitely barred refugees from Syria. Even foreign-born U.S. residents on vacation cruises were affected, as Maysam Sodagari, an Iranian-born biotech scientist from San Francisco learned when his ship returned to port in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, after a seven-day sail to the Caribbean. Sodagari, who has lived in the United States for nine years, said he was pulled aside when he tried to leave the ship with friends. He was questioned for more than an hour by immigration agents who examined his green card and cellphone, scanned his fingerprints and denied his request to talk to a lawyer. As his interrogation continued, his friends posted about it on social media and more than 1,000 people reached out to him, including those in the office of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. Although thousands protested the order in airport demonstrations around the country and civil rights groups and some members of Congress denounced it, Trump supporters say it is needed to safeguard the country. "We need to know who these people are," said retired firefighter Charles Lewis of Topeka, Kansas. "I just don't think this nation is secure. We're a day late and a dollar short on everything." Among those kept out of the country was a California man's 12-year-old daughter, who was born in Yemen. Ahmed Ali, a 38-year-old manager of a market in Los Banos, said he had been trying to get a visa for his daughter Eman for five years, and she was finally issued one last Thursday. He had planned to take her to the U.S. on Saturday, but she was barred from boarding a flight in the African country of Djibouti. "It is racist," he said of the executive order. "We are being targeted for our nationality and religion." Ali, his wife and their two older children are U.S. citizens. Also barred from returning is Khaled Almilaji, a Syrian doctor who has been attending Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, on a scholarship while he studies ways to rebuild his country's health system. He said that his pregnant wife remains in the United States. "It is really sad where the world is going to," said Almilaji, who risked his life to provide medical care during Syria's civil war and coordinated a campaign that vaccinated 1.4 million Syrian children. ___ Associated Press Writers Deepti Hajela in New York; Amanda Lee Myers in Los Angeles; Jennifer McDermott in Providence, Rhode Island; Terry Spencer in West Palm Beach, Florida; John Hanna in Topeka, Kansas; and Martha Waggoner in Raleigh, North Carolina, contributed to this story. Fraud Detection and Prevention Market - Key Trends, Opportunities, Challenges, Report Overview And Competitive Landscape http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=2569 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/fraud-detection-prevention-market.html http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com Any illegal act involving the obtaining of something of value through willful misrepresentation is called fraud. Fraud detection and prevention systems (FDP) are those software applications which are used to provide analytical solutions for detection and prevention of fraud in future. Authentication solutions and fraud analytical solutions form the core of FDP systems. FDP systems analyze data from wide range of data sources for possible inaccuracies. It analyzes patterns, anomalies and trends in the transactions. It identifies the outliers and reports the same in case of doubtful situations and transactions. FDP prevents unauthorized access preventing fraud incidents. It also verifies user identity and maintains data integrity. Recently, with advent of solutions such as cloud services, internet enabled solutions, and increased preference for digital data modes, vulnerability of enterprises towards fraud has increased significantly. To prevent such occurrences companies are switching to fraud detection software, thus, fuelling the demand for FDP. Rising revenue losses by enterprises due to frauds has further magnified the need for preventive solutions, resulting in increased adoption of FDP solutions, thereby contributing t the marker growth.Get Sample Report Copy :Rise in the enterprise data and its complexity, industry specific requirements, and increase in cost of fraud, are some of the factors acting as drivers for FDP market. Apart from these, technological advancements and regulatory changes will also drive the demand for FDP. However, high cost involvement, low level of awareness, and unavailability of pre-deployment measures are expected to hinder the growth of the FDP market. The limited capability of legacy system has also led to the enterprises switching to FDP. The technological advancements and new FDP solutions will lead to increase in demand. The upcoming new visualization tools and applications along with customer analytics and predictive analytics will further increase the demand for FDP. Growing size of enterprise data and globalization has made it difficult to analyze real time data by legacy systems. This has led the companies to adopt FDP, subsequently pushing up the demand.Browse Market Research Report with ToC & Free Analysis :With high concentration of business enterprises, North America is expected to hold major share for FDP market in upcoming years, followed closely by Europe which has also shown similar trends. Asia-pacific is expected to provide highest growth rate due to globalization and new investment regulations fuelling the rise in number of small and medium scale enterprises (SMEs). India and Japan, with fast rise of SMEs and industrial sector growth, are expected to transform into lucrative markets with high growth potential. Latin America will also provide high growth rate because of increased investment opportunities. Fraud detection and prevention market is segmented as authentication and fraud analytics.The FDP solutions have wide applications across insurance, public sector/government sector, telecommunications and, banking and financial services. There is high demand for FDP in end-use sectors, such as retail, banking and financial services, healthcare, transportation, manufacturing, and professional services, among others; with banking and financial services holding a major market share for FDP. Insurance, telecommunication and retail sector is expected to provide highest revenue contribution in upcoming years with increased adoption of FDP. Rise in online transactions, insurance claim frauds and card related frauds are increasing the use of FDP in retail, insurance and banking and financial services sectors.Some of the prominent players in this market include Visa Inc., ACI Worldwide, Inc., SAS Institute Inc., BAE Systems Detica, SAP, Bosch Software Innovations Gmbh, Oracle, Computer Sciences Corporation, Mastercard, EMC Corporation, IBM, FICO (Fair Isaac Corporation), Fiserv, Inc., and FIS Company among others. Some of the key innovators functioning in this market are ValidSoft UK Ltd., Alaric Systems Ltd., Threatmetrix, Cvidya, Lavastorm Analytics and Easy Solutions Inc., among others.About Us :Transparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.TMRs data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With extensive research and analysis capabilities, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques to develop distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.Contact Us :-Transparency Market ResearchState Tower,90 State Street,Suite 700,Albany NY - 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Plastic Meal Tray Market - Global Industry Analysis & Key Insights by 2024 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=15260 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com Today increasing number of restraints, convenience stores, food suppliers, caterers and other food suppliers including online food delivery services find advantages when they switch from traditional paperboard, Styrofoam and aluminum material trays to plastic trays. Few major cities in USA has already banned the use of Styrofoam because of their disposable problem and it is very difficult to recycle them.Download Research Brochure PDF@Many food industry players are searching for alternative for Styrofoam packaging. Plastic meal trays are the solution for them. These kind of plastic meal tray also allows vacuum and gas packaging. It is now becoming a widely excepted product because of its benefits such as easy to seal and it allows vacuum and gas packaging.Due to socio-economic advancement all over the world and changing lifestyle, ready and packed meals has become a widespread solution for modern people. This is acting as one the important driver for plastic meal tray market. Demand for readily available fresh food, frozen food, dry fruits etc. is also driving plastic meal tray market. Attractive visual appearance and convenience to use are additional aspects which are expected to drive the plastic meal tray market. Moreover because of its environmental benefits recyclable plastic meal trays it is being used in college, schools and office canteens extensively. The plastic meal tray market is driven by the trend of shifting interest of consumers towards processed and specialty food. High raw material cost in less developed countries can act as restraint for this plastic meal tray market.Introduction of more eco-friendly tray material like sugar cane or bagasse trays may act a threat to this plastic meal tray market.Based on the type of plastic used the plastic meal tray market is segmented into:PolypropyleneCPETOthers (RePET, HIPS, HDPE and APET)Based on the application the plastic meal tray market is segmented into:Cold and Frozen foodPrepared foods (hot) and ready to eat mealsKosher mealsIn terms of geography, the plastic meal tray market has been divided in to five key regions including North America, Latin America, Europe, Asia-Pacific and Middle East & Africa. The plastic meal tray market is expected to register healthy CAGR during the forecast period. North America is anticipated to be the dominant market for plastic meal tray market followed by Asia Pacific and Europe. The market in Asia-Pacific region is expected to grow at highest CAGR over the forecast period. Countries with more population like China, India, USA etc. are likely to provide abundant opportunities for the growth of the plastic meal tray market.Some of the key players in the plastic meal tray market are Food Packaging (GREENDALE), Sonoco Products, Pactiv LLC, Cambro etc.About TMRTMR is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.Contact TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Harmonic Filter Market - Lack of Consumer Awareness Regarding Harmonic Suppression Impacts Demand http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=1411 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com Demand for Harmonic Filters Climbs High on Swelling Need for Power in UtilitiesGrowing concerns over the quality of power and power transmission, triggered by the swelling need for power on utilities, have boosted the demand for harmonic filters across the world, TMRs analysis notes. The sales volume of these filter has also been climbing high on the back on increasing installation of variable frequency drives (VFDS) in the recent past. In 2015, harmonic filters gained an overall market value of US$697.2 mn, globally.Over the next few years, the implementation of strict rules pertaining to energy consumption in industries is projected to upswing the demand for harmonic filters, specifically in IT industry and data centers. However, the dearth of consumer awareness regarding harmonic suppression will limit their application across other industries. Besides, harmonic filters are expensive and their installation and maintenance incur a significant amount as well, which also will hamper their adoption to some extent.Get More Information :The global harmonic filter market is expected to rise at a CAGR of 6.50% during the period from 2016 to 2024 and reach an opportunity worth US$1.2 bn by the end of 2024.Active Harmonic Filters to Gain ImpetusHarmonic filters are available in two types: Active and passive. Passive harmonic filters enjoy a higher demand in comparison with active harmonic filters, owing to their cost efficiency and robust design. In 2015, the passive harmonic filter segment accounted for more than a share of 75% of the overall demand. The segment is expected to remain dominant in the coming years; however, its share in the total demand is likely to drop to 74% by the end of 2024.Active harmonic filters will gain significant impetus over the next few years, states TMR. The rising awareness regarding the benefits offered by these filters in terms of voltage stability and harmonic mitigation is projected to drive this segment at a CAGR of 8.1% from 2016 to 2024.Asia Pacific to Remain at Center of Global Harmonic Filters MarketThe market for harmonic filters stretches across Asia Pacific, Europe, Latin America, North America, and the Middle East and Africa. With a share of nearly 38%, Asia Pacific has emerged as the largest contributor to the global market in 2015. The region has suffered massive losses of energy during distribution and transmission due to poor power quality, which has compelled enterprises operating in this region to deploy harmonic filters in order to ensure improved power quality.As the region witnesses a soaring need for electricity, the demand for harmonic filters is likely to increase extensively in the coming years. Rising at a CAGR of 6.80% during the period from 2016 to 2024, the market opportunity is estimated to increase from US$264.3 mn in 2015 to US$471.6 mn by the end of 2024.Europe emerged second in the global harmonic filter market in 2015; however, the region is likely to experience a sluggish demand for these filters in the coming years. Thanks to the availability of high-quality power infrastructure, harmonic concerns do not amount to be a problem in Europe.At the forefront of the global harmonic filter market are companies such as ABB Ltd., Emerson Electric Co., and Schneider Electric SE. Collectively, these three players account for a share of 41% in the overall market.MTE Corp., Eaton Corp. Plc, TDK Corp., Crompton Greaves Ltd., Schaffner Holding AG, Baron Power Ltd., Danfoss A/S, Siemens AG, and Comsys AB are some of the other prominent participants in the highly concentrated market for harmonic filters.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a 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. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Outdoor Wi-Fi Market - Key Trends, Industry Opportunities And Projections for Upcoming Years http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=1965 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/outdoor-wi-fi-market.html http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com Wi-Fi technology is crucial for various systems such as Machine to Machine (M2M), Hot Spots, Outdoor Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi on the Go and In-Flight Wi-Fi. Outdoor Wi-Fi market is expected to grow at a substantial growth rate throughout the forecast period. Outdoor W-Fi technology is emerging across various verticals such as healthcare, education, public sector and travel and hospitality among others.Get Sample Report Copy :The global outdoor Wi-Fi market is segmented into three major categories, on the basis of product into: access points, Wlan controllers, wireless hotspot gateways, and others (repeaters, relays). The market is also segmented by services into network planning and design, installation, support, survey and analysis. On the basis of end use industry the market is segmented into education, healthcare, public sector, logistics and transportation, travel and hospitality and others. The market is further segmented by geography into North America, Asia Pacific, Europe and rest of the world (RoW) regions.The market is driven by factors such as the rising adoption and popularity of smartphones, tablets, and Wi-Fi enabled consumer electronics. The growing population of mobile work force and growing demand for data connectivity in outdoor setups will also act as driver for the global outdoor Wi-Fi market. Some of the factors inhibiting the growth of the global outdoor Wi-Fi market are contention loss (too many clients converging on the single access point) and other technical challenges such as regulation of power limits etc.Browse Market Research Report with ToC & Analysis :Some of the key players dominating the market are Aerohive Networks, Airspan, Acatel-Lucent, Alvarion, Hewlett-Packard, Juniper Networks, Motorola Solutions, Nokia Siemens Networks, Avaya Inc., Aruba Networks, Ericsson, Netgear and Meru Networks.About Us :Transparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.TMRs data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With extensive research and analysis capabilities, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques to develop distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.Contact Us :-Transparency Market ResearchState Tower,90 State Street,Suite 700,Albany NY - 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Smart Elevator Market - Key Projections about the Future State of the Global Industry. http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=1795 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/smart-elevator-market.html http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com Smart elevator systems include modern digital controls systems such as access controls which include card based systems, biometric systems, touch screens & keypads and automation systems such as sensors & controllers, motors & drives and operating panels. As the requirement for higher safety, better controllability, ease of access and security has increased globally, it has given paramount market position to smart devices in industries and smart elevator system is one of them. Applications can be broadly classified into residential, institutional, commercial and industrial infrastructure. The smart elevator systems which have grown at the expense of conventional elevators have shown a considerable demand in recent past and this trend is expected to continue over coming years.Get Sample Report Copy :The rigorous directives being made obligatory by governments amplified by the need for saving cost of operation by building owners has improved the market for smart elevator access controls and security and automation. Increasing concerns related to safety and the developments towards the incorporation of access controls will be the driving force of the market in future. Other drivers include demand for more convenience, energy efficiency and enhanced security. There is global rise in construction industry due to intensification in urbanization and rise in demand for infrastructure for large sporting events is offering excellent opportunities for significant growth of smart elevator systems.North America and Europe have largest market currently. Asia Pacific which includes developing nations such as India and China where construction market is increasing have huge demand for smart elevator systems and comprise a fast growing market. Brazil, Russia and South Africa are also expected to register robust growth in the infrastructure segment and it is anticipated to drive the elevator industry.Browse Market Research Report with ToC & Analysis :Some of the key players in this market are Bosch Security Systems, Bio-Key International Inc, Cisco Systems Inc., Hitachi Ltd., Digitalpersona Inc., Honeywell International Inc., Identive Group Inc., Hyundai Elevator Co. Ltd., Ingersoll-Rand Plc, Keyscan Inc., Johnson Controls Inc., Kone Corporation, Mitsubishi Electric Corporation, Linear Llc., Otis Elevator Company, Schneider Electric SA, Progress Security and Safety Systems, Siemens Building Technologies AG and ThyssenKrupp Elevator.About Us :Transparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.TMRs data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With extensive research and analysis capabilities, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques to develop distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.Contact Us :-Transparency Market ResearchState Tower,90 State Street,Suite 700,Albany NY - 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: 4G Equipment Market - Technological Advancements Helping to Stay Ahead of the Competition. http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=1525 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/4g-equipment-market.html http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com The 4G Equipments are carriers to boost in-building wireless signal strength and coverage in areas such as stadiums, campuses, resorts, hospitals or other large places to provide increased network capacity and faster data transmission rates. The 4G Equipment are categorized as LTE (Long term Equipment) and Wi-max equipment. The 4G equipments are used in applications of 4G such as virtual presence, virtual navigation, crisis management, tele medicine and education, multimedia and video services, tele geo processing application. Major operators such as China Unicom and China Telecom are investing in large amount in LTE networks. Also, the Government of China is boosting market by providing subsidies to equipment manufacturers. China Mobile, the world's largest telecom operator by subscribers, posted an online tender saying it plans to purchase equipment for millions of base stations. Chinese vendors such as ZTE and Huawei are growing at a rocket pace and are expected to challenge global players such as Ericsson over coming years.Get Sample Report Copy :Exponential growth of network traffic is key factors contributing to this market growth. Increasing customers and need to narrow the connectivity gap are one of the factors boosting the growth of market. High end interactive mobile games which require highly efficient network services are leading to substantial growth of the market. Cost advantages in building contracts with new network vendors are the major challenge for the existing Equipment manufacturers. Large investment in the existing 3G technology could pose a major challenge to the growth of the market. Growing concern about security and privacy in implementing 4G network is hindering also the growth. China dominates this market contributing the largest share in terms of revenue. Regions in APAC such as Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Hong Kong are the potential hotbeds over coming years growing the market. Countries in Europe such as France, Germany have been showing relatively quicker growth and are expected to be the key markets in future.Browse Market Research Report with ToC & Analysis :Some of the key players of this market include Alcatel-Lucent, Nokia Siemens Networks, Ericsson Inc., Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. Some of the other players include Alvarion Ltd., Datan Mobile Communications, Cisco Systems Inc., Equipment Company Ltd., Fujitsu Ltd., HP Co., and NEC Corp.About Us :Transparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.TMRs data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With extensive research and analysis capabilities, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques to develop distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.Contact Us :-Transparency Market ResearchState Tower,90 State Street,Suite 700,Albany NY - 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Integration And Orchestration Middleware Market Revenues to Reach US$ 15.29 Billion by 2024 http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/12970 http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/market-research/integration-and-orchestration-middleware-market/toc http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/checkout/12970 http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/ According to Persistence Market Research, integration and orchestration middleware market will surpass US$ 15 Bn by 2024-end, expanding at a CAGR of 7.1% through 2024. Primarily fueled by widespread adoption of cloud computing, rapidly expanding digital transformation, and soaring adoption of API management, this market will also be impacted by several other technology trends.Top market players profiled in the report, include IBM Corporation, OpenText Corporation, Microsoft Corporation, Oracle Corporation, and Infor ION. SPS Commerce, Inc., Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT), Axway, Covisint, and Tibco Software Inc. are other leading companies on the markets competitive landscape.A sample of this report is available upon request @Based on middleware type,Integration middleware will remain the leading segment, followed by business-to-business middleware segment.Over 2016-2024, integration middleware segment is likely to gain over 700 BPS and expand at a healthy CAGR of 9.2%, reaching US$ 7.37 Bn in 2024.While integration segment is projected to account for over 48% share in terms of value, B2B middleware segment will hold around 25% share in 2024.However, event-driven middleware segment will witness a higher growth rate compared to B2B.By deployment type,On-premise will remain the largest segment slated for moderate growth over the forecast period, attaining a value of over US$ 9 Bn in 2024. However, this segment will reportedly lose its market share by 1400 BPS, resulting in nearly 60% of the total revenues by 2024-end.Growing popularity and rapid adoption of cloud-based middleware for quicker, more flexible, and scalable access to information will continue to drive the cloud-based deployment segment at a rapid pace.This segment will demonstrate the fastest growth at a promising CAGR of 12.9% and exceed US$ 6 Bn by the end of the assessed period. From around 26% market share in 2016, cloud-based segment is expected to reach a notable share of over 40% in 2024.On the basis of application,Consumption by the BSFI sector will account for the revenues worth US$ 5.23 Bn by 2024 end, making it the largest application segment with over 34% share in 2024 market revenues.IT and telecommunications, the second largest segment, is anticipated to achieve a value of nearly US$ 4 Bn that roughly accounts for over 26% market value share in 2024.The next key segments include government and retail. However, healthcare segment, thought the smallest one so far, will demonstrate the highest growth during the next eight years at an estimated 8.9% CAGR.APAC Set for Impressive Growth at a CAGR of over 7%Regional analysis reaffirms the preeminence of North America, foreseen to capture over 38% value share in 2024, representing a value of over US$ 5.8 Bn. Europe will remain the second largest regional market for integration and orchestration middleware market with over 27% share in 2024. Asia Pacific, poised to register the highest CAGR of 7.6%, will also represent a sizeable market share of over 15%. Growth of middleware deployment markets in China, Japan, and India are primarily identified to boost the Asian market over the next few years.Technological Innovations Collectively Driving MarketIntegration and orchestration middleware solutions will continue to gain traction with growing innovation in IoT things and rising demand for digitization. A relatively quicker fundamental shift to cloud-based middleware, coupled with API evolution, will be responsible for the flourishing market. To be competitive within marketplace, enterprise managers can encounter opportunities that come along with business automation middleware. Moreover, burgeoning use of cloud for better agility will open new avenues for the entire middleware market over the next few years.Influential trends, such as PaaS, DevOps, containerization, and MBaaS will provide a strong impetus to technological innovation and demand for integration and orchestration middleware. While emergence of microservices is expected to be one of the most popular techniques for faster creation and testing of applications especially in the midst of connected devices, introduction of consumerization will allow end-users with self-integration and automation of applications.Request to view Table of Content @Integrated Machine Learning Presenting Big OpportunitiesIntegrated machine learning is believed to hold a major potential to act as a replacement technology in the global integration and orchestration middleware market. With a strong backup of high level, effective integration and orchestration techniques in the arsenal, leading vendors can focus on large scale distribution and work on delivering innovative integration and orchestration solutions.To Buy Full Report for a Single User @About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a 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. We have an experienced team of Analysts, Researchers, and Consultants, who use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.Each PMR Syndicated Research report covers a different sector - such as pharmaceuticals, chemical, energy, food & beverages, semiconductors, med-devices, consumer goods and technology. These reports provide in-depth analysis and deep segmentation to possible micro levels. With a wider scope and stratified research methodology, our syndicated reports strive to serve clients and satisfy their overall research requirement.For information regarding permissions, contact:Persistence Market Research305 Broadway,7th FloorNew York City, NY 10007United StatesTel: +1 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.comWebsite:media@persistencemarketresearch.com Food Packaging Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth | Trends and Forecast 2023 http://bit.ly/2jJcM70 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com The sea change in food habits and preference for processed food has propelled the food packaging market in the past. The market for packaged food has already reached a holistic level in North America and Western Europe, while rapid lifestyle changes and economic growth, coupled with rising population in Asia Pacific countries such as China and India, has spiked the growth rate of food packaging in the region. The growth rate in South America and the Middle East is also on the higher side compared to the developed economies.The main reason for increasing preference for processed food is the shifting population dynamics towards urban centers from rural areas. This has resulted in the advent of dual income urban families, who prefer processed food due to time constraints. Packaged food has evolved from super markets to neighborhood stores in countries such as China, India, Brazil and Thailand among others. The market dynamics in North America and Europe however, is governed by branding activities undertaken by food processing companies.View exclusive Global strategic Business report:Tremendous opportunity exist in the food packaging market in emerging economies as the food packaging technology is in its growth phase in this region. Antimicrobial packaging technique is of particular interest as it helps to improve the shelf life of perishable food products. The market is however, slightly restrained by the declining growth in North America and Europe.The food packaging market can be segmented into application segments such as convenience foods, confectionary items, dairy items, fruits and vegetables, meat and sauces and dressings. The popularity of the different food applications is different across the globe. For instance packaged meat is making foray into Asia Pacific region while it is mainstream in North America and Europe. Materials used to package food can also be segmented into plastic, paper & board, metal and glass. They may also be classified as rigid, semi-regid and flexible by type of packaging material. The preferences for different packaging materials also vary with regions due to the food habits specific to the regions. Flexible packaging accounts for the largest share of food packaging.North America is the largest food packaging market followed by Europe and Asia Pacific. However the growth rate exhibited by these regions has subsided considerably as the market is close to its peak. The growth parity is however, restored by the high growth regions of Asia Pacific and South America. China and India have exhibited exceptional growth potential and is expected to overtake the market leading position from North America in the near future.Some of the major players in the food packaging market are American Packaging Corporation, Anchor Packaging, Crown Holdings, Inc. and Bemis Company, Inc., among many others.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a 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. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Night Vision Goggles Market : Global Snapshot by 2026 Night Vision Goggles Market, Night Vision Goggles, Night Vision Goggle, Night Vision Goggle market http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/13273 http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/13273 www.persistencemarketresearch.com Night Vision Goggles Market: OverviewHuman eyes can see visible lights that are a part of the electromagnetic spectrum. Electromagnetic spectrum also comprises infrared and ultraviolet light rays that cannot be seen by naked eyes. Image enhancement and thermal imaging are the two types of technologies which help to see objects in the dark. Night vision goggles amplify the available light using image enhancement technology along with infrared light technology. Night vision goggles enable night fighters and soldiers to see, maneuver and shoot during night or at a time of reduced visibility. The night vision goggles industry has evolved through three generations, namely generation I, II, and III. Out of these three, generation I has become completely obsolete in the US market.TOC of this report is available upon request @Image intensifying devices are generally based upon amplification and thus, amplify available light by 2,000 to 5,000 times. With the advancements made in technology from 1950s to the present time, the scenario has changed completely. High military demands in U.S., Iraq, and Afghanistan has led to the growth of the night vision goggles market over the past few years. The distance at which the human-sized figure can be clearly recognized depends upon the image intensifier and magnifying power of the lens used. Night vision goggles are equipped with the automatic breakaway mechanism that separate them from the helmet when the force exceeds 11g to avoid any accidents during the war.Night Vision Goggles Market: DynamicsDrivers:Small size and light weight are the primary factors responsible for driving the growth of global night vision goggles market. Furthermore, low cost of goggles and low power requirements are the other two factors driving the growth of global night vision goggles market. Moreover, night vision goggles offer maximum viewing range, which can be from 100 feet to 400 feet. This range is ideal for the combat missions conducted by soldiers and this is yet another driving factor fueling the growth of global night vision goggles market.Restraints:The normal field of view may cut down from 190 degrees to 40 degrees, creating a narrow field of view. This is a restraining factor hindering the growth of global night vision goggles market. Apart from this, night vision goggles cannot provide the same level of sharpness as witnessed by naked eye during day time and that one is accustomed to. Moreover, one of the other restraining factors hampering the growth of global night vision goggles market is that the sharpness decreases as the distance increases. This makes the objects to appear unclear and vague, leading to accidents during the war.Night Vision Goggles Market: SegmentationGlobal night vision goggles market can be segmented on the basis of application, range and technology. Based on application, the global night vision goggles market can be segmented into security, hunting, military and others. According to technology, global night vision market can be segmented into image enhancement and thermal imaging. According to the range, global night vision goggles market can be segmented into spectral range and intensity range.Night Vision Goggles Market: Key PlayersSome of the market participants in the global night vision goggles market are as follows: PYSER-SGI LIMITED. Optix LTD. ATN Corporation Nivisys, LLC Tata Advanced Systems Limited Newcon Optik General Starlight Co, Inc. Starlight NV Ltd Dipol Ltd. Harris CorporationNight Vision Goggles Market: Region-wise OutlookAccording to region, global night vision goggles market can be segmented into North America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Japan, APEJ, Latin America, and Middle East and Africa. North America is expected to be the most dominating night vision goggles market, with U.S. accounting for maximum consumption, owing to army and military requirements. Asia Pacific, excluding Japan and Western Europe, is expected to grow significantly during the forecast period due to high demand in the region which is driven by security and surveillance needs. Middle East and Africa and Eastern Europe are anticipated to be the majorly growing regions in the global night vision goggles market.The research report presents a comprehensive assessment of the market and contains thoughtful insights, facts, historical data, and statistically supported and industry-validated market data. It also contains projections using a suitable set of assumptions and methodologies. The research report provides analysis and information according to market segments such as geographies, application, and industry.The report covers exhaust analysis on: Market Segments Market Dynamics Market Size Supply & Demand Current Trends/Issues/Challenges Competition & Companies involved Technology Value ChainRegional analysis includes: North America (U.S., Canada) Latin America (Mexico. Brazil) Western Europe (Germany, Italy, France, U.K, Spain) Eastern Europe (Poland, Russia) Asia Pacific (China, India, ASEAN, Australia & New Zealand) Japan Middle East and Africa (GCC Countries, S. Africa, Northern Africa)The report is a compilation of first-hand information, qualitative and quantitative assessment by industry analysts, inputs from industry experts and industry participants across the value chain. The report provides in-depth analysis of parent market trends, macro-economic indicators and governing factors along with market attractiveness as per segments. The report also maps the qualitative impact of various market factors on market segments and geographies.Sample of this report is available upon request @Report Highlights: Detailed overview of parent market Changing market dynamics in the industry In-depth market segmentation Historical, current, and projected market size in terms of volume and value Recent industry trends and developments Competitive landscape Strategies of key players and products offered Potential and niche segments, geographical regions exhibiting promising growth A neutral perspective on market performance Must-have information for market players to sustain and enhance their market footprintAbout UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a full-service market intelligence firm specializing in syndicated research, custom research, and consulting services. PMR boasts market research expertise across the Healthcare, Chemicals and Materials, Technology and Media, Energy and Mining, Food and Beverages, Semiconductor and Electronics, Consumer Goods, and Shipping and Transportation industries. The company draws from its multi-disciplinary capabilities and high-pedigree team of analysts to share data that precisely corresponds to clients business needs.PMR stands committed to bringing more accuracy and speed to clients business decisions. From ready-to-purchase market research reports to customized research solutions, PMRs engagement models are highly flexible without compromising on its deep-seated research values.Contact UsPersistence Market Research305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA - Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.commedia@persistencemarketresearch.comWeb: Cardboard Packers Market Trends, and Forecast 2016 - 2023 http://bit.ly/2jMXoEz http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com In present time, cardboard packers are not limited to protecting or packaging, it is used for informational as well as marketing purpose by using designer boxes, it can be used to display the product which help in sales and promotion and it will help in creating brand awareness and optimize use of shelf space by creating shelf ready packaging.Global Cardboard Packers Market DynamicsOne of the factor that is driving the cardboard packers is the growth of online shopping. The online vendors need to deliver the item safely to the consumer which increases the demand for the cardboard packers. Government regulation on plastic use is also driving the market for cardboard packers. The growing demand for point of sale display, retail ready packaging and merchandise unit will create a need for the cardboard packers. Environmental concerns might affect the growth of the cardboard packers as trees are the primary raw material used to make cardboard. Another major issue that cardboard packers face is that they are re-usable for a limited amount of time and after expiry there fibre will get weak and they needed to be dump.View exclusive Global strategic Business report atGlobal Cardboard Packers Market SegmentationCardboard packers are available in different shapes with different dimension, types, design, internal padding, flutes and sectors. If the product is fragile in nature or need to be kept separately, internal padding boxes cater that. These boxes are available in different sizes based on the number of segments that user needs. Cardboard packers are further segmented into different types named as Shelf Ready Boxes, Archive Lid & Box, Lid & Box, Die-Cut, Envelope Base, Five Panel Wrap, Full Overlap, Packing Carton, Packing Wallet, Pizza Style, Self-Locking and Self Locking Tray. The sectors that these packers covers are food products, durable goods, non-durable goods, retail sector, wholesale trade and service sector.Global Cardboard Packers Market: Regional OutlookGeographically, the Global Automotive Cyber Security Market can be divided by major regions which include North America, Latin America, Western and Eastern Europe, Asia-Pacific region, Japan, Middle East & Africa. Europe, Asia Pacific, and North America are the prominent market for cardboard packers. Emerging markets such as India and China grow with a significant CAGR from 2016 to 2026. Overall cardboard packers industry expected to gain as many countries are pushing paper packaging against plastic packaging as it is a threat to environment.Global Cardboard Packers Market PlayersThe major players identified across the value chain of global cardboard packers market include Cascades Inc., DS Smith PLC, International Paper, ITC Limited, Mondi Group, Georgia-Pacific LLC, Packaging Corporation of America, and Fencor Packaging Group Limited. The companies are focusing on developing advanced and recycled products in order to cater the growing demand from the end users and rising environmental concerns.The research report presents a comprehensive assessment of the market and contains thoughtful insights, facts, historical data, and statistically supported and industry-validated market data. It also contains projections using a suitable set of assumptions and methodologies. The research report provides analysis and information according to categories such as market segments, geographies, types and applications.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a 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. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: During Donald Trumps first week as president, Yahoo Finance mustered some optimism about his determination to create jobs. If Trump can stay focused on the economy and not get sidetracked, we predicted, he might actually do some good for struggling American workers. Well, so much for that. Trump has moved on from jobs and is now focused on a grandiose border wall, a ban on immigrants, a new and unproved health-reform law, and taxes on imports to punish Mexico for existing. Trump could still come to his senses and refocus on the issue Americans say is most importantthe economy, duhbut he seems more likely to lose interest and keep chasing whatever lands him in the headlines. In just the last few days, Trump has rolled out more ideas that would harm the economy than help it. Begin with immigration. Trump has fulfilled a campaign promise and imposed his version of extreme vetting of immigrants, by slashing the number of refugees allowed into the country and banning migrants from 7 predominantly-Muslim nations. He may also cut the number of foreign workers allowed into the United States on various types of work visas. This is supposed to be for national-security reasons, but it has big economic implications as well. The US actually needs more immigrants, not fewer, in order to grow faster. By limiting immigrants, Trump is making his goal of 4% economic growth that much harder. Thats because of slowing population growth, as this chart shows: Some people think slower population growth leaves fewer people to claim a fixed amount of prosperity, making everybody better off. But thats not how it works. In reality, a faster-growing population generates more economic activity that boosts growth and employment. Thats one reason the baby-boom generation enjoyed so much prosperity. A slower-growing population means lower growth and less wealth to go around. With the baby boomers aging and the US birth rate declining, immigrants are the most obvious source of population growth. Unless Trump wants to tell Americans to have a lot more babies. Story continues Immigrants are key to economic growth Immigrants are also more entrepreneurial than native-born Americans: They start businesses at nearly twice the rate as people born here. Latinos are the most entrepreneurial ethnic group in America, according to data from the nonprofit Kauffman Foundation, followed by Asians, whites and blacks. These can be high-tech businesses or corner delis, but whatever they are, new businesses account for a lot of job growth in America, while big businesses mostly hold steady on employment. Entrepreneurs are crucial to growth, and immigrants are the most active entrepreneurs. Trump has never acknowledged any of this. Instead, he stokes fear of outsiders by claiming they take American jobs and pose an outsize terrorist risk. Less than a month into office, Trumps actions on immigration have already triggered resistance from big companies such as Alphabet (GOOGL, GOOG), Apple (AAPL), Starbucks (SBUX) and Ford (F), which would otherwise prefer to stay continents away from Trumps self-generated controversies. Their willingness to speak out indicates just how damaging Trumps moves could be. Trumps oft-threatened border tax is another cloud on the economy. Trump has now suggested a 20% tax on all imports from Mexiconot because this would stimulate hiring, but because Trump has to come up with some way to offload the cost of a border wall that ranks low on Americans list of priorities. (Reminder: its the economy.) Getting Mexico to pay for a border wall was a Trump campaign promise, so he needs to shoehorn it into his first 100 days somehow. A 20% border tax would be a tax hike on Mexican imports totaling $60 billion or so, based on current import levels. Trump backpedaled from this idea a bit, saying it would have to be part of a big tax-reform package that also contained better, more thoughtful policies. Still, import tariffs dont usually get paid by the exporting country. They get passed along to consumers who buy the now-more-expensive stuff being imported. Thats you and me. So put a few extra bucks aside if youre planning to buy a car, TV or washing machine any time soon. There are other proposals in Trumps economic agenda that could turn out to be better, such as an overdue cut in the corporate tax rate and a careful pruning of old, outdated regulations. But Trump is showing a penchant for undermining good ideas with lousy and unnecessary ones. He vows to make America great again, but he never said hed have to wreck a bunch of things first. And thats not what voters asked for. All together, now: ITS THE ECONOMY, STU . Send confidential tips and story ideas: rickjnewman@yahoo.com Rick Newman is the author of four books, including Rebounders: How Winners Pivot from Setback to Success. Follow him on Twitter: @rickjnewman. Rising Scarcity of Drinking Water to Fuel Need for Water Purifiers http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=1749 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/pressrelease/water-purifier-market.htm http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com As the global population increases, an alarming rise in water pollution is being witnessed all over the world. According to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), around one-fifth of the worlds population lacks access to clean drinking water currently. The level of water pollution is specifically high in urban areas due to the presence of various industries that discard the waste they produce in the rivers. This, as a result, has augmented the need for water purification and, hence, the demand for water purifiers significantly across the world.In another report, the United Nations (UN) has estimated that, of 1.4 bn Km3 of water present on the earth, only 200,000 Km3 are fresh water available for human consumption. This uneven distribution of freshwater resources is also expected to fuel the demand for these purifiers considerably in the coming years. A study by Transparency Market Research (TMR) states that the opportunity in the global market for water purifiers, which stood at US$44.7 bn in 2014, is likely to expand at a CAGR of 9.0% during the period from 2015 to 2023 and increase to US$95.5 bn by 2023.Get More Information :In this blog post, researchers at TMR answer some important queries about the worldwide market for purifiers:Q. What are the key factors that will shape the future of the global water purifier market?The growing population and the rising urbanization are the two main factors that will have an extensive impact on the demand for water purifiers across the world. The United Nations stated that over 3.5 billion people, worldwide, were residing in urban areas in 2014. While the number is increasing enormously, a severe scarcity of water is being experienced around the world. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), in 2015, nearly 663 million consumers lacked access to a safe source of drinking water. The swelling scarcity of water has forced consumers to obtain water from various depositions and make it drinkable, which in turn, is leading to a high demand for water purifiers.On the other hand, the high cost associated with water purification technologies, such as ultrafiltration, reverse osmosis, and ultraviolet treatment may deter the adoption rate of water purifiers in the near future. The dearth of understanding pertaining to sanitation and hygiene among consumers in various rural areas, together with the low awareness level regarding the harm unclean water may cause to their health, is also expected to affect the market for water purifiers adversely in the long run.Q. Which of the regional markets will lead the global water purifier market in the near future?In the global market for water purifiers, Asia Pacific is likely to acquire the leading position in the near future. Driven by the massive rise in the population base, the growing need for clean drinking water is likely to accelerate the adoption of water purifiers in this region over the next few years.The rising number of government programs and initiatives to increase awareness regarding the health issues caused by consuming polluted water is also projected to boost the demand for these purifiers from consumers in Asia Pacific in the years to come.Q. What are the key strategies leading companies are implementing to sustain competition?GE Corp., Pentair Residential Filtration, Tata Chemicals Ltd., Eureka Forbes, Brita GmBH, A.O Smith Corp., Kent RO Systems Ltd., and Culligan International Co. are some of the leading manufacturers of water purifiers in the world. The market demonstrates a high degree of competition between these players. To withstand this rivalry, these companies are aggressively focusing on product innovation and advancement of current offerings.Read Full Press Release @Mergers, acquisitions, and alliances are also increasingly being adopted by them for the geographical expansion of their businesses in order to strengthen their presence in the global market.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a 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. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Recycled Metal Market - Global Industry Analysis 2016 - 2024 Recycled Metal Market http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=11726 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/ http://globalresearchmarket.blogspot.in/ Environmental sustainability has been the focus of most companies in various end-use industries and revamping strategic plans, policies, and developments to accommodate recycled materials is a trend that has gained much prominence in recent years. The growth of the recycled metals market is based on the rising consciousness and awareness of industries such as building and construction, automotive, and machinery manufacturing regarding the benefits of recycled metal. The urgent need to curb greenhouse gas emissions has also compelled industries to turn to eco-friendly raw materials and lower their environmental footprint.TMR predicts a steady outlook for the global recycled metal market for the period 2016 to 2024, registering a 4.8% CAGR therein. The opportunity in this market is poised to be worth US$476.2 bn by 2024, rising from US$312.9 bn in 2015.GET PDF BROCHURE FOR MORE PROFESSIONAL AND TECH-NICAL INSIGHTS:Rapidly Growing APAC Economies Boosting Demand for Recycled Metal from End-use IndustriesThe global market for recycled metal comprises North America, Asia Pacific, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East and Africa. Among these, Asia Pacific and Europe jointly dominate the overall market with a share of over 70% share in 2015.While China is the leading revenue generator in the Asia Pacific recycled metal market, India is estimated to expand at the fastest pace over the course of the forecast period. Other countries such as Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, South Korea, and Thailand also play a major role in the demand for recycled metal. The continuous growth in economy and the rising GDP in these nations have rendered a tremendous boost to industries such as automotive, construction, and industrial machinery and also resulted in the surge in infrastructure activities. This, in turn, has contributed toward the demand for recycled metal in Asia Pacific.The growing use of recycled metal in Europe can be attributed to the increase in environmental awareness among consumers and manufacturers alike. In addition to this, stringent regulatory laws and supportive policies of various governments in the region have augmented the adoption of recycled metal, especially in countries such as Germany and Italy.The recycled metal markets in the Middle East and Africa as well as Latin America are projected to exhibit promising growth during the forecast period, fueled by the rise in building and construction activities, an increase in automobile production, and growing consumer awareness regarding the impact of greenhouse gases and the benefits of recycled metal.Recycled Iron and Steel Most Widely Used MetalsFerrous and non-ferrous metals are the two key product segments, with the former dominating the overall recycled metal market in 2015. Among ferrous metals, iron and steel are the most prominent product types and find application in the manufacturing of electrical devices, construction materials, industrial machineries and equipment, and vehicles. Among non-ferrous metals, recycled aluminum constitutes a significant share of the total demand for recycled metals.Recycled metals are used in industries such as automotive, building and construction, electrical and electronics, industrial machinery, and shipbuilding. Among these, the building and construction sector has been the largest end-user of recycled metals. The automotive sector, on the other hand, is projected to expand at the fastest pace during the forecast period.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insights for decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.TMRs data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With extensive research and analysis capabilities, TMR employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques to develop distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.Contact Us:-Transparency Market Research90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Visit Blog: Worldwide Pressure Sensors Market reach CAGR of 6% and USD 9.5 billion in 2020 www.marketresearchstore.com/report/pressure-sensors-marke www.marketresearchstore.com Zion Research has published a new report titled Pressure Sensors Market by Technology (Capacitive, Electromagnetic, Optical, Piezoresistive, Resonant Solid-State) for Automotive, Consumer Electronics, Industrial, Medical, Oil & Gas and Other Applications: Global Industry Perspective, Comprehensive Analysis and Forecast, 2014 - 2020. According to the report, global demand for pressure sensors market was valued at USD 6.5 billion in 2014 is expected to reach USD 9.5 billion in 2020 and is anticipated to grow at a CAGR of around 6% between 2015 and 2020.Request Sample Report: bit.ly/1U4dCIhA pressure sensor measures pressure, typically of gases or liquids. Pressure sensors can be classified in terms of pressure ranges they measure, temperature ranges of operation, and most importantly the type of pressure they measure. Pressure sensors are variously named according to their purpose, but the same technology may be used under different names. Absolute pressure sensor, vacuum pressure sensor, gauge pressure sensor, differential pressure sensor and Sealed pressure sensor are major types of pressure measurements.Browse the full "Pressure Sensors Market by Technology (Capacitive, Electromagnetic, Optical, Piezoresistive, Resonant Solid-State) for Automotive, Consumer Electronics, Industrial, Medical, Oil & Gas and Other Applications: Global Industry Perspective, Comprehensive Analysis and Forecast, 2014 - 2020" report at...Pressure sensors industry is mainly driven by strong demand from automotive industry. Pressures sensors are used in wide ranging applications in automotive industry including TPMS (Tire Pressure Monitoring System), EGR (Exhaust Gas Pressure), etc. Stringent government regulations regarding use of pressure sensors in various applications have been resulted into immense demand for pressure sensors from automotive industry. Electronics is another major driving factor for pressure sensors industry. Strong growth of automotive and consumer electronics industry in Asia Pacific is expected to keep driving demand for pressure sensors industry in the years to come.Capacitive, electromagnetic, optical, piezoresistive, and resonant solid-state are the key technology segments of pressure sensors market. Piezoresistive sensors technology segment dominated the global pressure sensors market in 2014. Piezoresistive sensors accounted for around 30% share of global pressure sensors market in 2014. The automotive industry, biomedical applications, and household appliances are the key application markets for piezoresistive sensors. Capacitive sensors were the second largest technology segment of global pressure sensors market in 2014. Piezoresistive is also expected to exhibit fastest growth rate during the forecast period.Automotive, consumer electronics, industrial, medical, oil & gas and others are key application markets for pressure sensors. Automotive was the largest application market for pressure sensors and accounted for over 25% share in total revenue generated in 2014. Robust growth of automotive sector, especially in Asia Pacific region coupled with various regulations regarding use of pressure sensors in vehicles is expected to mobilize pressure sensors market at a rapid pace during near future. Consumer electronics and medical industry is also expected to exhibit strong demand for pressure sensors.Asia-Pacific dominated the pressure sensors market with highest contribution to the total revenue generated globally, in 2014. Asia Pacific accounted for over 30% share of the global pressure sensors market in 2014. Asia-pacific was followed by the North America and Europe. Pressure sensors market in Asia-Pacific region is also expected to witness rapid growth as compared to other regions. Over the past few years, Brazil has witnessed strong growth in automotive, electronics and medical industry. This is expected to boost demand for pressure sensors in Latin America.Do Inquiry before buying: bit.ly/2dXmp16Some of the key players in global pressure sensors market include ABB Ltd, Analog Devices Inc., Delphi Automotive PLC, Emerson Process Management, Freescale Semiconductor Ltd., Honeywell International Inc., Schneider Electric SE, Omron Corporation, Robert Bosch Gmbh, and STMicroelectronics N.V.The report segments the global pressure sensors market as:Pressure Sensors Market: Technology Segment AnalysisCapacitiveElectromagneticOpticalPiezoresistiveResonant Solid-StatePressure Sensors Market: Application Segment AnalysisAutomotiveConsumer ElectronicsIndustrialMedicalOil & GasOtherPressure Sensors Market: Regional Segment AnalysisNorth AmericaU.S.EuropeGermanyUKFranceAsia PacificChinaJapanIndiaLatin AmericaBrazilMiddle East and AfricaAbout UsZion Research is a 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. Zion Research experienced team of Analysts, Researchers, and Consultants uses proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edgeContact US:Joel John3422 SW 15 Street,Suit #8138Deerfield Beach,Florida 33442United StatesToll Free: +1-855-465-4651 (USA-CANADA)Tel: +1-386-310-3803Email: sales@marketresearchstore.comWebsite: Condom Market: China Industry Analysis, Forecast 2024 http://bit.ly/2jlL0Pn http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com The condom industry in China is expected to witness significant growth owing to the rising average income of consumers and the demand for a better quality of life. China is a huge market for international condom manufacturers and brand enterprises. In addition, emphasis on public education about the use of condoms in preventing HIV and other known sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) is an imperative part of government supported efforts to stop AIDS in China. The countrys plan to control, treat, and prevent HIV/AIDS for the period 2011 to 2015 estimates that approximate 90% of the key population is at higher risk, and 85% of urban residents aged between 15 to 60, and 80% of rural residents of the same group should be made aware about sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and HIV by 2015. In order to implement this plan, the government has planned on providing condoms or condom vending machines in 90% of hotels and other unspecified public areas by 2015. Endorsement by popular celebrities about prevention of AIDS by using condoms is another effective method to educate the masses about safe sex.Get a Sample PDF for Professional & Technical insights atMoreover, female condoms are used as a contraceptive and as a preventive measure against sexually transmitted diseases. According to the Centre for Young Womens Health (CYWH) which is a partnership between the Division of Adolescent/Young Adult Medicine and the Division of Gynaecology at Boston Childrens Hospital, the accuracy of a female condom is almost 95% if used properly. These products are also effective in preventing Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs). Their effectiveness as contraception and as a barrier for the entry of STI causing pathogens, coupled with female and active responsibility linked with female condoms for preventing pregnancy are some of the factors encouraging women to use female condoms.Further, a Chinese company Dahua Medical Apparatus Companyproducing female condoms has been approved by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Population Fund for global distribution as another effective and safe form of contraception. Female condoms in China are on the governments purchase list and they are usually distributed by local family planning groups. Although market for female condoms is on the lower side, the demand is rising at a steady pace. Consumer preference for female condoms has shown a positive impact on the condoms market in China.In addition, strengthening economic conditions in China has led to an increase in the average income of consumers and that in turn has resulted in aspiration for a better quality of lifestyle among the residents of China. This factor has in turn fuelled the demand for condoms among the Chinese population, and the demand is only expected to go up in terms of quality and quantity. Therefore, China is considerable an attractive market for brand enterprises and international condom manufacturers.Polyurethane, polyisoprene, lamb skin and pu leather are some of the materials that are majorly used to manufacture condoms. PU leather accounted for the lowest market share among the material types of condoms accounting for less than 5% of the total condom market in China. Condoms are very sensitive to high temperature and can melt if exposed to direct sunlight or a direct heat source and they should not be carried around in a wallet which is placed next to the body. They should be stored at a room temperature, usually between 55 degrees and 80 degrees Fahrenheit.The key players operating in the China condom market are, Reckitt Benckiser Group Plc England, U.K.), Ansell Ltd (Richmond, Australia), Karex Industries Sdn. Bhd (Johor, Malaysia), The Female Health Company Ltd. (Illinois, The U.S.), Church & Dwight Co. Inc. (Erwing, The U.S.), HLL Life Care Ltd. (Thiruvananthapuram, India.), Thai Nippon rubber Industru Co. Ltd (Sathon, Bangkok), Fuji Latex Co. Ltd (Tokyo, Japan), Geaphic Armor LLC (Florida, U.S.) and Sagami Rubber Industries. (Atsugi, Japan) among others.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a 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. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Environmental Health & Safety (EHS) Market is expected to Witness Prominent Growth In The Near Future http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=2292 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/ According to a new market report published by Transparency Market Research entitled Environmental Health & Safety (EHS) Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends and Forecast 2016 - 2024, the environmental health & safety (EHS) market was worth US$ 3,009.0 Mn in 2015 and is expected to reach US$ 8,315.1 Mn by 2024, expanding at a CAGR of 12.0% from 2016 to 2024. North America was the largest EHS market in 2015. The growth in this region is being driven by the implementation of EHS across a large number of major industry verticals, including chemical, oil & gas, construction, and mining.The EHS market is expected to witness prominent growth in the near future, especially in developing economies. Due to the high cost of environmental compliance software, the adoption of EHS across SMBs was too low in the early stage. Thus, in order to adhere with EHS norms and regulations, several Federal agencies have been operational across developing economies to mandate the implementation of EHS. Furthermore, these agencies have brought cost-effective solutions to comply with EHS standards primarily for SMBs and cost-sensitive economies. One of the most prominent driving factors for the EHS market is multiple statutory and legal requirements to maintain EHS safety standards. This has led the market to exhibit significant growth potential across all the regions over the forecast period.Get More Information :The report provides cross-segment analysis of the EHS market components, comprising software and services. The segmentation on the basis of software includes quality & risk assessment, data analytics, cost management, environmental compliance, energy & carbon management, and others. Environmental compliance software is expected to emerge as the fastest-growing software solution. The high growth in this segment is characterized by several norms and regulations implemented by federal agencies associated with environmental protection legislation around the globe. However, data analytics software held the dominant position in terms of EHS software type in 2015 due to rising demand for analytical tools to monitor health & safety issues.EHS services covered in the report are consulting, project management, analytics, training, implementation, auditing, and certification. Auditing services held the largest market share in terms of revenue for EHS services across all the regions. Auditing of EHS compliance includes heavy capital investments, thereby resulting in the largest market share across EHS services types. Furthermore, auditing service is also anticipated to be the fastest-growing segment across all the EHS service types.End-use industries deploying EHS software and services covered in the report are chemical & petrochemical, energy & mining, construction, agriculture, transportation, manufacturing, government & public sector, retail, healthcare, and others. The chemical and petrochemical industry verticals held major market share in terms of EHS adoption across a majority of the economies.Geographically, North America is the largest market for EHS and the region is anticipated to dominate the global EHS market over the forecast period. In 2015, North America accounted for approximately 32% of the global EHS markets revenue. Key players in the global EHS market include IHS Inc., 3E Company, International Finance Corporation, Enablon North America Corporation, SAP SE, UL LLC, and Medgate Inc.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a 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. TMRs experienced team of Analysts, Researchers, and Consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Harvesting Machinery Market - Global Industry Size, Share, Growth, Trends and Forecast Upto 2019 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=1661 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/harvesting-machinery-market.html Harvesting machinery is used to gather mature crops from the farmland. These machines perform various actions such as cutting, winnowing and threshing concurrently. Harvesting machinery is mostly used for agricultural purposes. They can be broadly classified into machines such as tree crop, root crop, row crop, grain & seed crop and hay & silage. Harvesting machines such as crushers, choppers and balers are used to control population of weeds. They are extensively used for the cultivation of silages.Download Research Brochure PDF@Increased demand for rising harvesting machinery in order to improve the efficiency of agricultural purposes is one chief reason responsible for driving the harvesting machinery market. In addition, there is increased pressure on the arable lands due to the rising demand for food grains, which fuels the growth of this market. Moreover, technological advancements in this market such as usage of, global positioning sensors and cameras have lead to creation of automated multitasking machines thereby increasing its demand. One of the major aspect restraining this market is the rising capital investment and large amount of power consumption required for the harvesting machinery. Due to the above factors, the industry is shifting towards manufacturing machines which make use of biobased products such as biofuels which is expected to open new opportunities for the growth of this market.On account of the increased automation and high labor cost the U.S. is the largest market. In addition, emerging regions such as Asia Pacific and Europe are expected to gain a good position in the harvesting machinery market owing to the low levels of farm mechanization and usage of traditional improficient machinery. Some of the key players in this market include John Deere, AGCO Corp., Sampo Rosenlew Ltd., Preet Agro Industries Pvt. Ltd., Deere & Company, Kubota and Dewulf NV among others.This research report analyzes this market depending on its market segments, major geographies, and current market trends. Geographies analyzed under this research report includeNorth AmericaAsia PacificEuropeRest of the WorldThis report provides comprehensive analysis ofMarket growth driversFactors limiting market growthCurrent market trendsMarket structureMarket projections for upcoming yearsThis report is a complete study of current trends in the market, industry growth drivers, and restraints. It provides market projections for the coming years. It includes analysis of recent developments in technology, Porters five force model analysis and detailed profiles of top industry players. The report also includes a review of micro and macro factors essential for the existing market players and new entrants along with detailed value chain analysis.Browse Full Report@About Us:-Transparency Market Research is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.Contact Us:-Transparency Market ResearchState Tower,90 State Street,Suite 700,Albany NY - 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.com Future of Global Life Sciences Controlled Substance Ordering System Market 2016 - 2026 http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/13183 http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/13183 The electronic pharmaceutical industry contains many organisations of differing sizes including controlled substance suppliers, purchasers, manufacturers, practitioners, pharmacies, federal agencies, retailers, distributors and service providers. Pharmaceutical companies within the supply chain wish to reduce costly paperwork like the paper Form-222 by shifting to electronic, centralised, cloud-based systems. This enables them to comply with DEA audit requests, while dramatically reducing implementation cost and time. They are adequately served by the Life Sciences Controlled Substance Ordering System Market.A Controlled Substance Ordering System (CSOS) is a form of digital identity issued by the Drug Enforcement Administrations CSOS Certification Authority, allowing electronic ordering of controlled substances under Schedule I, II, III, and IV. The CSOS certificate is the digital equivalent of identity information in the DEA Form-222. The Life Sciences Controlled Substance Ordering System Market mainly caters to individual buyers and it is a mandatory requirement for ordering Schedule I and Schedule II drugs. The CSOS certificate enables the power of attorneys and DEA registrants to order controlled substances electronically by providing identification and authentication details through digital signatures. While the paper DEA form-222 is still technically allowed, the CSOS certificate is the only way Schedule I and II drugs can be ordered today.A Sample of this Report is Available Upon Request @Some companies involved in the Life Sciences Controlled Substance Ordering System Market are Axway, Vormetric, Legisym, The Drummond Group, Attain Med and Bound Tree Medical.The research report presents a comprehensive assessment of the market and contains thoughtful insights, facts, historical data, and statistically supported and industry-validated market data. It also contains projections using a suitable set of assumptions and methodologies. The research report provides analysis and information according to market segments such as geographies, types and applications.To View TOC of this Report is Available Upon Request @The report is a compilation of first-hand information, qualitative and quantitative assessment by industry analysts, inputs from industry experts and industry participants across the value chain. The report provides in-depth analysis of parent market trends, macro-economic indicators and governing factors along with market attractiveness as per segments. The report also maps the qualitative impact of various market factors on market segments and geographies.About UsPersistence Market Research (PMR) is a U.S.-based full-service market intelligence firm specializing in syndicated re-search, custom research, and consulting services. PMR boasts market research expertise across the Healthcare, Chemicals and Materials, Technology and Media, Energy and Mining, Food and Beverages, Semiconductor and Electronics, Con-sumer Goods, and Shipping and Transportation industries. The company draws from its multi-disciplinary capabilities and high-pedigree team of analysts to share data that precisely corresponds to clients business needs.PMR stands committed to bringing more accuracy and speed to clients business decisions. From ready-to-purchase market research reports to customized research solutions, PMRs en-gagement models are highly flexible without compromising on its deep-seated research values.ContactPersistence Market Research Pvt. Ltd305 Broadway7th Floor, New York City,NY 10007, United States,USA Canada Toll Free: 800-961-0353Email: sales@persistencemarketresearch.com China Automated Material Handling Equipment Market by Manufacturers, Regions (Province), Type and Application, Forecast to 2022 https://www.reportsworldwide.com/report/china-automated-material-handling-equipment-market-by-manufacturers-regions-province-type-and-application-forecast-to-2022 https://www.reportsworldwide.com/enquiry?report_id=4557 ReportsWorldwide has announced the addition of a new report title China Automated Material Handling Equipment Market by Manufacturers, Regions (Province), Type and Application, Forecast to 2022to its growing collection of premium market research reports.In the industrial domain, varied equipment are required for storage, convey, control of material, products and goods, this is where automated material equipment is used. Automated Material Handling Equipment (or short as AMHE) can play an essential role in modern factories for work-in-process storage and offer the advantages of improved inventory control and cost-effective utilization of time, space and equipment. Warehouse material handling approaches are very commonly adopting Automated Material Handling Equipment, in which mainly includes: automated storage retrieval system, automatic guided vehicle, conveyor and sorter system.Scope of the Report:This report focuses on the Automated Material Handling Equipment in China market, to split the market based on manufacturers, Regions (Province), type and application.To view a detailed description and Table of Contents please visit:Market Segment by Manufacturers, this report covers Daifuku Schaefer KION GROUP(Dematic) Murata Machinery Vanderlande Mecalux Beumer group Fives group KUKA(Swisslog AG) Intelligrated Knapp Kardex AG TGW Logistics Grenzebach Witron Viastore System LogisticsMarket Segment by Regions (Province), covering South China Southwest China East China Northeast China North ChinaMarket Segment by Type, covers Automated Storage and Retrieval System(AS/RS) Automatic Guided Vehicle (AGV) Conveyor & Sorter Systems Robotic SystemsMarket Segment by Applications, can be divided into E-commerce & Retail Food & Beverage Manufacturing Pharmaceutical Airport OthersThere are 18 Chapters to deeply display the China Automated Material Handling Equipment market.Chapter 1, to describe Automated Material Handling Equipment Introduction, product type and application, market overview, market analysis by Region (province), market opportunities, market risk, market driving force;Chapter 2, to analyze the manufacturers of Automated Material Handling Equipment, with profile, main business, news, sales, price, revenue and market share in 2016 and 2017;Chapter 3, to display the competitive situation among the top manufacturers, with sales, revenue and market share in 2016 and 2017;Chapter 4,to show the China market by Regions (Province),covering South China,East China,Southwest China,North China,Northeast China,Northwest China and Central China,with sales, price,revenue and market share of Automated Material Handling Equipment,for each region,from 2012 to 2017;Chapter 5 and 6, to show the market by type and application, with sales, price, revenue, market share and growth rate by type, application, from 2012 to 2017;Chapter 7,8,9,10,11,12 and 13 to analyze the key Province by Type and Application,covering South China,East China,Southwest China,North China,Northwest China,Central China and Northeast China,with sales,revenue and market share by types and applications;Chapter 14, Automated Material Handling Equipment market forecast, by Regions (Province), type and application, with sales, price, revenue and growth rate forecast, from 2017 to 2022;Chapter 15, to analyze the manufacturing cost, key raw materials and manufacturing process etc.Chapter 16, to analyze the industrial chain, sourcing strategy and downstream end users (buyers);Chapter 17, to describe sales channel, distributors, traders, dealers etc.Chapter 18, to describe Automated Material Handling Equipment Appendix, methodology and data sourceTo Get Sample Copy of Report please visit @About ReportsWorldwide.comReportsWorldwide.com is a leading provider of global market intelligence reports and services. With research reports from top publishers, consulting and advisory firms, ReportsWorldwide.com offers instant online access to a growing database of expert insights on global industries, companies, products, geographies and trends.Press Contact:Abigail CrastoSenior Vice President101, Arch StreetBoston, MA 02110USPhone +1 (617) 398-4994Fax +1 (617) 398-4995abigail@reportsworldwide.com United States, EU, Japan, China, India and Southeast Asia Pulmonary Hypertension Market Emerging Companies & Forecast - 2021 http://www.qyresearchreports.com/sample/sample.php?rep_id=898594&type=E http://www.qyresearchreports.com/report/united-states-eu-japan-china-india-and-southeast-asia-pulmonary-hypertension-market-size-status-and-forecast-2021.htm http://www.qyresearchreports.com/press-releases.htm http://www.qyresearchreports.com/press-releases.htm United States, EU, Japan, China, India and Southeast Asia Pulmonary Hypertensiona is a comprehensive market study, which has been created with a sole goal to armor existing and new players to gain advantage over their competitors. For the development of the report, proven research methodology and reliable analytical tools are applied to gain accurate understanding and insightful foresight into its potential development. The report presents figurative scenario of the market in current situation as well as forecasts the future based on all the important factors that that primed to influence the United States, EU, Japan, China, India and Southeast Asia Pulmonary Hypertension market. The report covers all prevalent trends and products playing a significant role in the growth of the market for Pulmonary Hypertension over the forecast period.To Get Free Sample Copy of Report visit @Prepared after extensive primary and secondary research, the report contains findings that are both reliable and verifiable. With the use of research techniques such as Porteras five forces analysis and SWOT analysis, the important facets of each player and key segment are highlighted.One of the key feature of the report is the player profile section, in which it offers valuable information on the major players in the United States, EU, Japan, China, India and Southeast Asia Pulmonary Hypertension market, such as their manufacturing base, product specification, production capacity, revenue and gross margin, and competitors. The report also includes the major business strategies adopted by the players, their market positioning, and various recent developments.The report also divides the global market for Pulmonary Hypertension into important segments to present a clear picture of the opportunities available for the players. The segmentations have been done on the basis of product type, application, and technology. The geographical segmentation of the United States, EU, Japan, China, India and Southeast Asia Pulmonary Hypertension market is also examined in detail, with the development of the market in each region charted through accurate historical statistics.Browse Complete Report with TOC @Table of ContentsUnited States, EU, Japan, China, India and Southeast Asia Pulmonary Hypertension Market Size, Status and Forecast 20211 Industry Overview of Pulmonary Hypertension1.1 Pulmonary Hypertension Market Overview1.1.1 Pulmonary Hypertension Product Scope1.1.2 Market Status and Outlook1.2 Global Pulmonary Hypertension Market Size and Analysis by Regions1.2.1 United States1.2.2 EU1.2.3 Japan1.2.4 China1.2.5 India1.2.6 Southeast Asia1.3 Pulmonary Hypertension Market by End Users/Application1.3.1 Application 11.3.2 Application 21.3.3 Application 32 Global Pulmonary Hypertension Competition Analysis by Players2.1 Pulmonary Hypertension Market Size (Value) by Players (2015-2016)2.2 Competitive Status and Trend2.2.1 Market Concentration Rate2.2.2 Product/Service Differences2.2.3 New Entrants2.2.4 The Technology Trends in Future3 Company (Top Players) Profiles3.1 Actelion3.1.1 Company Profile3.1.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.1.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.1.4 Pulmonary Hypertension Revenue (Value) (2011-2016)3.1.5 Recent Developments3.2 Bayer3.2.1 Company Profile3.2.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.2.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.2.4 Pulmonary Hypertension Revenue (Value) (2011-2016)3.2.5 Recent Developments3.3 GlaxoSmithKline3.3.1 Company Profile3.3.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.3.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.3.4 Pulmonary Hypertension Revenue (Value) (2011-2016)3.3.5 Recent Developments3.4 United Therapeutics3.4.1 Company Profile3.4.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.4.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.4.4 Pulmonary Hypertension Revenue (Value) (2011-2016)3.4.5 Recent Developments3.5 Aires Pharmaceuticals3.5.1 Company Profile3.5.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.5.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.5.4 Pulmonary Hypertension Revenue (Value) (2011-2016)3.5.5 Recent Developments3.6 Arena Pharmaceuticals3.6.1 Company Profile3.6.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.6.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.6.4 Pulmonary Hypertension Revenue (Value) (2011-2016)3.6.5 Recent Developments3.7 Bial3.7.1 Company Profile3.7.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.7.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.7.4 Pulmonary Hypertension Revenue (Value) (2011-2016)3.7.5 Recent Developments3.8 DEKA3.8.1 Company Profile3.8.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.8.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.8.4 Pulmonary Hypertension Revenue (Value) (2011-2016)3.8.5 Recent Developments3.9 Dong-A ST3.9.1 Company Profile3.9.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.9.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.9.4 Pulmonary Hypertension Revenue (Value) (2011-2016)3.9.5 Recent Developments3.10 Gilead3.10.1 Company Profile3.10.2 Main Business/Business Overview3.10.3 Products, Services and Solutions3.10.4 Pulmonary Hypertension Revenue (Value) (2011-2016)3.10.5 Recent Developments3.11 Merck3.12 Northern Therapeutics3.13 Novartis3.14 Pfizer3.15 PhaseBio3.16 Radikal Therapeutics3.17 Reata Pharmaceuticals3.18 SteadyMed4 Global Pulmonary Hypertension Market Size by Application (2011-2016)4.1 Global Pulmonary Hypertension Market Size by Application (2011-2016)4.2 Potential Application of Pulmonary Hypertension in Future4.3 Top Consumer/End Users of Pulmonary Hypertension5 United States Pulmonary Hypertension Development Status and Outlook5.1 United States Pulmonary Hypertension Market Size (2011-2016)5.2 United States Pulmonary Hypertension Market Size and Market Share by Players (2015-2016)For Latest QYResearchreports Press Release Visit @QYResearchReports.com is an unimpeachable source of market research data for clients that comprise acclaimed SMEs, Chinese companies, private equity firms, and MNCs. We provide market research reports on various categories such as Energy, Chemicals, Alternative and Green Energy, Manufacturing, Machinery, Pharmaceuticals and Materials, and Glass.QYResearchreportsContact Us1820 AvenueM Suite #1047Brooklyn, NY 11230United States+1-518-621-2074866-997-4948USA-Canada Toll freesales@qyresearchreports.comFor Latest Press Release Visit @ Global Microfiber Cleaning Cloths Market 2016 Analysis, Research, Trends, Growth and Forecasts 2021 http://www.qyresearchreports.com/sample/sample.php?rep_id=546597&type=E http://www.qyresearchreports.com/report/global-microfiber-cleaning-cloths-consumption-2016-market-research-report.htm http://www.qyresearchreports.com/category/retail-market-reports-137.htm Qyresearchreports include new market research reportGlobal Microfiber Cleaning Cloths Consumption 2016 Market Research Report to its huge collection of research reports.This market intelligence report examines extensively the trends in the global Microfiber Cleaning Cloths market. It highlights the latest market state, the progress pattern in the previous years, and the prospects present for market participants in the near future. The research methods and tools employed in the achievement of this research publication are both secondary and primary. The market intelligence study also provides facts about the investments initiated by several organizations, institutions, government, and non-government authorities and regulatory bodies.To Get Sample Copy of Report visit @The publication further presents a valuation of the facets that are likely to prevent or encourage the expansion of the global Microfiber Cleaning Cloths market. The global Microfiber Cleaning Cloths market has been examined scrupulously based on aspects such as application, technology, product, end user, and geographical segment. An examination has been carried out in the research report of the chief regional segments and their respective place and share in the Microfiber Cleaning Cloths market. The estimated revenue and volume valuation of the global market for Microfiber Cleaning Cloths has also been stated in the study.An estimate of the market attractiveness and the level of competition that new entrants along with their new products are likely to offer to the experienced products and players has also been delivered in the market research publication. The market report also discusses the new expansions, the innovations, branding techniques, marketing approaches, and products of the chief players operational in the global Microfiber Cleaning Cloths market. The vendor landscape has been broadly scrutinized employing the Porters five forces and value chain analysis to deliver a strong conception of the market. The challenges and opportunities in the near future for the key participants have also been stressed upon in the research publication.Table of Contents1 Industry Overview of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.1 Definition and Specifications of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.1.1 Definition of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.1.2 Specifications of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.2 Classification of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.3 Applications of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.4 Industry Chain Structure of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.5 Industry Overview and Major Regions Status of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.5.1 Industry Overview of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.5.2 Global Major Regions Status of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.6 Industry Policy Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths1.7 Industry News Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning ClothsTo Browse a Complete Report with TOC Visit @2 Manufacturing Cost Structure Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths2.1 Raw Material Suppliers and Price Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths2.2 Equipment Suppliers and Price Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths2.3 Labor Cost Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths2.4 Other Costs Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths2.5 Manufacturing Cost Structure Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths2.6 Manufacturing Process Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths3 3 Global Market Size (Volume and Value), Sales and Sale Price Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths3.1 Global Market Size (Volume and Value) and Growth Rate of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths 2011-20163.2 Global Market Size (Volume and Value) of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Regions 2011-20163.3 Global Market Size (Volume and Value) of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Types 2011-20163.4 Global Market Size (Volume and Value) of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Applications 2011-20163.5 Global Sales Volume and Sales Revenue of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Companies 2011-20163.6 Global Sale Price of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Regions 2011-20163.7 Global Sale Price of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Types 2011-20163.8 Global Sale Price of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Applications 2011-20163.9 Global Sale Price of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Companies 2011-20164 USA Market Size (Volume and Value), Sales, Sale Price and End Users Analysis of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths4.1 USA Market Size (Volume and Value) and Growth Rate of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths 2011-20164.2 USA Market Size (Volume and Value) of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Types 2011-20164.3 USA Market Size (Volume and Value) of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Applications 2011-20164.4 USA Sales Volume and Sales Revenue of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Companies 2011-20164.5 USA Sale Price of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Types 2011-20164.6 USA Sale Price of Microfiber Cleaning Cloths by Applications 2011-2016Read More @QYResearchReports.com is an unimpeachable source of market research data for clients that comprise acclaimed SMEs, Chinese companies, private equity firms, and MNCs. We provide market research reports on various categories such as Energy, Chemicals, Alternative and Green Energy, Manufacturing, Machinery, Pharmaceuticals and Materials, and Glass.1820 AvenueM Suite #1047Brooklyn, NY 11230United States Global Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems Market 2017 - JTEKT, Bosch, NSK, Nexteer, ZF, Mobis, Showa, Thyssenkrupp, Mando http://www.fiormarkets.com/report-detail/27203/request-sample www.fiormarkets.com www.9dimenreports.com The recent report on Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems market offers insightful information about the present scenario of the market across the globe. The report, titled Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems points out the key factors affecting the growth of the market. Latest market trends as well as the future growth opportunities have been mentioned in the report. The report takes into account the various micro- and macro-economic factors governing the overall growth of the Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems market and assesses the valuation and size of the market in the coming years.The report talks about the distinct traits of the Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems market and provides in-depth study of the various segments of the market. The report especially focusses on the development of the Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems market in China owing to the increased demand from the region which has attracted the attention of the key manufacturers. Various regulations directly or indirectly affecting the Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems market in the region have been discussed in the report. The report takes note of the present state of the global economy, which after witnessing double-digit growth for three decades, is slowing down. Governments efforts to push the economy is expected to positively affect the various sectors and increase demand from the market.The report discusses the competitive vendor landscape of the Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems market in the globe. Some of the key players in the market have been profiled in the report and crucial information about them such as their business overview, revenue segmentation, and product segmentation have been mentioned in the report. The report takes note of the market share held by the key players and estimates their future growth through SWOT analysis. It serves as a useful guide for the new entrants in the Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems market.Download Free Sample Report @Several analytical tools such as market attractiveness analysis, investment feasibility analysis, and investment return analysis are employed to study the global Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems market, whereas SWOT analysis and Porters five forces analysis are utilized to evaluate the major players in the Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems market in this report.This report not only provides a complete picture of the overall condition of the Automotive Electric Power Steering Systems market, but also assists the players in this market to create profitable market strategies in order to gain a competitive edge.Fior Markets is a leading market intelligence company that sells reports of top publishers in the technology industry.Our extensive research reports cover detailed market assessments that include major technological improvements in the industry. Fior Markets also specializes in analyzing hi-tech systems and current processing systems in its expertise.We have a team of experts that compile precise research reports and actively advise top companies to improve their existing processes. Our experts have extensive experience in the topics that they cover.Fior Markets provides you the full spectrum of services related to market research, and corroborate with the clients to increase the revenue stream, and address process gaps.Contact UsMark StoneSales Manager2566, Lincoln StreetPrinceton,New Jersey 08540USAPhone: (201) 465-4211Email: sales@fiormarkets.comWeb:Blog: Telecom Data Center in Acilia now Tier IV Telecom Data Center in Acilia www.climaveneta.com https://www.climaveneta.com Mitsubishi Electric Hydronics & IT Cooling Systems, through its brand Climaveneta has recently supplied 8 chillers to the new Telecom data center in Acilia, Rome. The structure has just been certified as TIER IV by Uptime Institute. That is to say, that these facilities have multiple, independent, and physically isolated systems that provide redundant capacity components and multiple, independent, diverse, and active distribution paths, which simultaneously serve the critical environment, achieving a fully Fault Tolerant infrastructure.The cooling system is based on high efficiency Climaveneta units, linked to centralized free cooling and geo cooling systems. Specifically, the M&E designers have selected 3 TECS2/SL-CA-S 0913 and 5 i-FX(1+i)/CA-S 4202 / NR getting a total cooling capacity of 7,800 kW.The large experience in air conditioning and the reliability of its solutions make Mitsubishi Electric Hydronics and IT Cooling System the ideal partner for cooling TIER IV data centers, like the newly certified Telecom IT structure in Acilia.Follow Climaveneta:youtube.com/user/climavenetaweb, @ClimavenetaHVAC, linkedin.com/company/climaveneta, facebook.com/climavenetahvac/Media RelationsSara Di Clementesara.diclemente@melcohit.comClimaveneta, a leading brand in HVAC and HPAC with more than 40 yearss experience provides energy efficient heating, air conditioning and data center cooling solutions that enhance everyones comfort, improve the profitability of a building and do not contribute to an increase in CO2 levels.Mitsubishi Electric Hydronics & IT Cooling SystemsClimavenetaPlant of via Sarson, 57/c36061 Bassano del Grappa (VI)Italy+390424509500 Always a quality step ahead Moehrendorf 30 January 2017 The IT sector is developing at a phenomenal pace and it will continue to do so as shown by the trend study The Future of Testing. imbus, a leading solution partner for software quality assurance and testing, has been keeping pace with this evolution for the last 25 years and, what is even more, continues to advance further innovations. All this is reason enough to take a brief look in the companys past and future.Information processing, methods, consulting (German: Beratung) and (German: und) training (German: Schulung): The German terms behind the acronym imbus have been defining our portfolio ever since the business creation, explains board member Tilo Linz. Together with his fellow students Thomas Roner, Bernd Nossem, Jorg Schulten, Hendrik Rassler and Peter Studtrucker, he launched the software service provider 25 years ago. The entry in the commercial register was made on January 30th 1992.imbus is an owner-managed and independent solution partner which has completely devoted itself to software QA and testing. In contrast to many other providers, computer scientists make decisions at the top management level of imbus. That is why, innovations, methods and technology play a crucial role in most of our decisions, underlines board member Thomas Roner.The chosen office premises in 1992 were quite unconventional: The computers were established and connected via LAN in a more than 300 years old and listed half-timbered house in the Franconian village Moehrendorf. Back then, the IT sector was convinced, thatpeople were already living in a state of complete digitalization. But it had already just begun, smiles Tilo Linz.The number of imbus customers continuously grew and so did the number of industry fields which were served by the QA experts. In the beginning of the 1990s, testing backbone systems for the upcoming GSM mobile network was one of imbus main task areas. The high standards from fixed-network telephony were transferred to mobile telephony testing. Later on, imbus also supported the further development to UMTS and then LTE.Further important customers came from medical technology, railway technology and automotive. As the digitalization progressed, orders from banks and insurance companies, trade, logistics and public administration followed.Today, more than 260 employees belong to the imbus team. Sites in Munich, Hofheim near Frankfurt, Cologne, Norderstedt near Hamburg and Lehre near Braunschweig were established. Dependencies in China, Tunisia, Kosovo and Canada make the imbus expertise world-wide available today.There were also two economically turbulent years which proved that imbus can cope with crises successfully, too. One was a crisis in the mobile sector at the end of 2001, the other one the global finance crisis in 2009. Both incidents affected the customers testing budget with a certain delay. imbus corporate management and employees pulled together: cost-reducing measures were implemented and many employees temporarily reduced their working hours by their own choice, some of them even went on unpaid leave. In that way, we could cope with a 25% decline in sales in 2002 together with the entire team laying the foundation for our product imbus TestBench, says board member Bernd Nossem.Looking back, the last 25 years were exciting journey in the IT sector. The next 25 years will surely be at least as exciting, says Tilo Linz. In a few years, we will live in a completely software-based and connected world. The criticality will rise, too. Software QA experts will be even more demanded. imbus is ready for every test.imbus is a leading solution partner for professional software testing and intelligent software quality assurance.Our portfolio includes consulting for process improvement, software testing services, test outsourcing, test tools, and training.With our comprehensive know-how, the latest tools, and our proven methodology, we increase the reliability and performance of software products, software-intensive systems, and complete IT structures, and as a manufacturer-independent partner, we assure their correct functionality.Since 1992, the experienced and highly-qualified imbus team has been synonymous with across-the-board software quality assurance from a single source that covers the entire lifecycle.The expertise acquired from around 6,000 successful projects over a period of 25 years provides a solid foundation for the daily work of our experts, all of whom are ISTQB Certified Testers. Here you can find the corresponding reference projects.imbus is currently represented by more than 260 employees at locations in Moehrendorf near Erlangen, Munich, Cologne, Hofheim near Frankfurt, Lehre near Braunschweig, Norderstedt near Hamburg, Toronto (Canada), Shanghai (China), Peja (Kosovo) and Sousse (Tunisia).imbus AGPress OfficeFiona ProellKleinseebacher Str. 991096 MoehrendorfPhone +49 9131 7518-0Fax +49 9131 7518-50Mail presse@imbus.de An Inside Look at Near Vision Devices Market: One Big Trend http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=16253 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/near-vision-devices-market.html http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/ Near vision devices are implantable devices used for near vision correction in patients who didnt had cataract surgery. The device blocks unfocused light rays from entering the eye to improve patients near vision. These devices resemble the contact lenses and are made from hydrogel material. The device is implanted on a cornea of one eye to improve near vision in patients with presbyopia. Many of the surgeons use a laser to make a lappet on a cornea in order to implant near vision device. Presbyopia occurs in people aged between 40 to 50 years that results in difficulty with near vision. The growing prevalence of presbyopia has propelled the use of near vision devices owing to the ease of usage and effectiveness compared to cataract surgery. According to Medscape, around 14% of people of 80 million presbyopia patients develops from emmetropic presbyopia.Get the Future Market Forecast of Near Vision Devices at:Currently, there are only two near vision devices are approved by FDA i.e. Raindrop Near Vision Inlay and KAMRA inlay. AcuFocus manufactured Kamra Inlay was the first implantable near vision device approved by FDA in April 2015. Now the devices are commercially available in around 50 countries across the globe. Similar, ReVision Optics manufactured Raindrop Near Vision Inlay was approved in June 2016 and is commercially available in the U.S. Apart from these two; there are many vision care products manufacturers looking forward to develop implantable near vision devices. For example, Presbia PLC, an Ireland-based manufacturer has designed innovative corneal inlay i.e. flexivue microlens for the correction of presbyopia. The specialty of this devices is that it can be removed and replaced with a higher or lower power according to requirement. The devices did not receive FDA approval; however, it received CE mark for commercialization in European countries.The growth of the global near vision devices market is driven by increasing geriatric population prone to ophthalmic disease, growing prevalence of presbyopia and technological advancement in the healthcare industry. Similarly, sedentary lifestyle and increased usage of computer, television viewing would contribute towards the growth of near vision devices globally. Moreover, with the increase in the disposable income levels and health consciousness among the general population, the adoption of near vision device is expected the boost in the near future. Despite several advantages, the devices have few drawback such as, it cannot be used by patients with severe dry eye and active eye infection, the use of devices can lead to a risk of eye infection and inflammation, and can cause a decrease in distance vision.The global near vision devices market can be segmented based on end user and geography:By End User:> Hospitals> Ophthalmic ClinicsBy Geography:> North America> Latin America> Europe> Asia-Pacific> MEARead Current Market Analysis of Near Vision Devices at:Geographically, North America occupies the substantially larger market share, which is followed by Europe. The high attentiveness level in this region will lead the increasing adoption of implantable near vision devices. According to the American Academy of Ophthalmology, one of 5 American use reading glasses, which depicts the huge need for implantable near vision devices in North America. Moreover, it has been estimated that around 2.1 billion people are expected to suffer from an eye disease known as presbyopic by 2020. However, in the case of emerging economies, affordability has become a restraining factor for implantable near vision devices in, Asia Pacific and Latin America. Similarly, increase in disposable income, rising aging population, and growing awareness level are some of the key factors driving the global implantable near vision devices market. The Asian market is expected to witness entry of the higher number of new players compared to those in developed regions. Some of the top players in the global near vision devices market are AcuFocus, Presbia PLC, ReVision Optics, etc.Transparency Market Research (TMR) 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. TMRs experienced team of Analysts, Researchers, and Consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze 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.90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Floral Flavors Market Value Share, Supply Demand, share and Value Chain 2017-2027 http://www.futuremarketinsights.com/reports/sample/rep-gb-2809 http://www.futuremarketinsights.com/toc/rep-gb-2809 www.futuremarketinsights.com Floral flavors are the essential components which are used in our day to day foodstuffs that makes a person feel refreshed and provides a great aromatic flavored essence to the regular food.There are various floral flavors such as chrysanthemum, hibiscus, jasmine, lavender, rose, orange blossom, chamomile, cherry blossom and violet used in food and beverage industry. The new emerging trend in the floral flavor market is the combination of fruit and floral flavors in the food and beverages products. The floral flavors are mainly used in the ready to drink beverages. It is gaining popularity for a healthier lifestyle mostly in premium and elite population all over the world. The floral flavors provide excellent and unique benefits with an increased healthy attributes. Many beverage manufacturing companies are using various blends of floral flavors in tea and packed water and provides great aroma to the drinks. Apart from this, most health conscious people are moving towards the consumption of variety of flavored drinks. The floral flavored ingredients are usually integrated into natural food products essentially for health and new flavors.Due to increased benefits the floral flavor market is seeking towards healthy CAGR over the forecast period.Global Floral Flavors: Market SegmentationThe global floral flavors market can be segmented on the basis of raw material used such as hibiscus, chrysanthemum, jasmine, cherry blossom, orange flower, elderflower, lotus flower, violet and rose. Cherry blossom and hibiscus are most commonly used floral flavours in the tea and packed water. The global floral flavors market can be further segmented on the basis of application type such as beverages, dairy, desserts, tea & coffee, confectionery, nutraceuticals and others. Among these application segment tea & coffee segment contributes a major market share in terms of revenue contribution. Beverage segment is further sub-segmented as energy drinks, bottled waters and alcoholic beverages. Apart from this the global floral flavor market can be segmented on the basis of product form includes extract form, liquid form and distillate form.Request Free Report Sample@Global Floral Flavors Market: Growth DriversRobust growth of disposable personal income along with rising population is anticipated to bolster the growth of global floral flavors market. Along with this increasing interest in naturalness and spreading awareness of the health benefits of floral flavors with the desire to develop the rise for floral flavorings. Apart from this, changing lifestyle along with urbanization is expected to drive the global floral flavors market during the forecast period. The advent of new class of customers as well as the entry of various new global players is expected to intensify the growth of floral flavors market all across the globe during the forecast period. This is anticipated to further drive the growth of global floral flavors market over the forecast period.Global Floral Flavors Market: Regional OutlookGeographically, the global floral flavors industry can be divided by major regions which include North America, Latin America, Western and Eastern Europe, Asia-Pacific region, Japan, Middle East and Africa. Europe contributed the highest share in the global floral flavors market in 2015. Popularity of floral flavors in European region such as in Switzerland and Germany, also popular in Japan and Middle East and is expanding mostly in Western countries such as North America and has strengthened the growth of Europe market in the same year. The German flavor company Wild Flavors is expanding its range of floral flavor and blossom blends by using floral flavors such as lavender, rose and elderberry in fruit combinations. Rising economic growth along with better income of households especially in Europe is expected to expand the growth of floral favors market over the forecast period.Visit For TOC@Global Floral Flavors Market: PlayersSome of the key players identified across the value chain of the global floral flavors market includes Abelei Flavors, Teawolf Inc., Givaudan S.A., Symrise AG, Firmenich SA, Sensient Technologies, Mane SA, International Flavors and Fragnances (IFF), Aarav Fragrance and Flavors Pvt Ltd. and Frutarom Industries Ltd. The Givaudan S.A. incorporates highest market share in the floral flavors market in 2015. The Sensient Flavors is upcoming with eight new flavor trends along with fruit and floral flavor pairings, which is expanding worldwide in the floral flavor market.About Us Future Market Insights is the premier provider of market intelligence and consulting services, serving clients in over 150 countries. FMI is headquartered in London, the global financial capital, and has delivery centers in the U.S. and India.Contact Us:Future Market Insights616 Corporate Way,Suite 2-9018,Valley Cottage,New York 10989,United StatesTel: +1-347-918-3531Fax: +1-845-579-5705Email: sales@futuremarketinsights.comWebsite: New Research In Action Report - IT And Enterprise Service Management SaaS And Software: The Top 20 Global Vendors 2017 https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxkhSo7pLDUeQi1RZlUzYlJwWVU/view?usp=sharing www.researchinaction.de Hartenfels, Germany January 30th 2017: Renewed M&A activity with LANDESK, HEAT Software and HPE will be only the first wave; while HPE, CA and BMC continue to lead the market ahead of ServiceNow.Research In Action GmbH publishes its newest market analysis report Vendor Selection Matrix IT And Enterprise Service Management SaaS And Software: The Top 20 Global Vendors 2017.The Vendor Selection Matrix is a unique, primarily survey-based methodology for comparative vendor evaluation. A minimum of 60% of the evaluation results are based on a combined telephone and online survey covering 1,225 IT buyers in enterprises worldwide. The analysts opinion accounts for a maximum of 40% of the evaluation results (not close to 100% as in most other vendor evaluations).Detailed report information:Dr. Thomas Mendel Ph.D., Managing Director of the Research In Action GmbH comments on the results of the study: Today, IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) is more than just one standard amongst many others. According to the results of our survey, roughly 85% of enterprises around the globe are using ITIL. But ITIL will change. Despite the high usage and penetration rates, many IT managers are not particularly happy with the ITIL standard. Too rigid, Very complex, Dated are only a few of the comments we received. In fact, roughly 40% of the interviewed IT managers in our survey expect a simplification towards an ITIL Light in the future, 20% even an integration/migration of ITIL and Enterprise Service Management. Many enterprise IT departments are struggling with the fact that their Help Desk implementations are dated and are in dire need of refreshment. Help Desk/Service Desk solutions globally are on average Nine years old. This is coupled with the fact that many of the enterprises that participated in the first wave of IT Help Desk outsourcing became disenchanted and are looking to insource their IT Help Desk/Service Desk again. Globally, 66% of enterprises will start replacement projects in the next few years, according to our survey respondents. A bit more than 70% of those will be implemented in a SaaS model. The concept of the CMDB is now very well understood, the technology is mature, tried and tested extensively. Depending on their needs, enterprises can now select between centralized, decentralized and even virtual CMDB solutions. Roughly 60% of enterprises are going to revamp their CMDB implementations in the next few years. But the share of pure CMDB SaaS solutions will be at roughly 50%, lower compared to the Help Desk/Service Desk results. The vendor Top 5 of this market is comprised of the three long-term market leaders Hewlett Packard Enterprise, CA Technologies and BMC Software, followed by the SaaS pioneer in this market ServiceNow - and two well-known yet smaller players, HEAT Software and TOPdesk. Noteworthy new entrants in the top 10 are ITRP and SAP. This highly dynamic market will see a lot of M&A activity in the future, following Clearlakes acquisition of LANDESK and the contribution of its portfolio company HEATSoftware to the new entity Ivanti as well as the upcoming spin-off and merger of Hewlett Packard Enterprises non-core software assets with Micro Focus.Vendor Selection Matrix Disclaimer:Research In Action GmbH does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in our research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings. The information contained in this research has been obtained from both enterprise as well as vendor sources believed to be reliable. Research In Action GmbHs research publications consist of the analysts opinions and should not be considered as statements of fact. The opinions expressed are subject to change without further notice. Research In Action GmbH disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.About Research In Action:Research In Action GmbH is a leading independent information and communications technology research and consulting company. The company provides both forward-looking as well as practical advice to enterprise as well as vendor clients.Press Contact:Research In Action GmbHDr. Thomas Mendel Ph.D.Managing DirectorHauptstr. 956244 HartenfelsGermanyTelefon: +49 160 99492223E-Mail: tmendel@researchinaction.deInternet : Seed Industry Sales, Supply and Consumption 2017 Analysis and Forecasts to 2021 Seed Market https://www.wiseguyreports.com/sample-request/911608-china-seed-market-research-report-2017 https://www.wiseguyreports.com/enquiry/911608-china-seed-market-research-report-2017 https://www.wiseguyreports.com/checkout?currency=one_user-USD&report_id=911608 Seed MarketSummaryWiseguyreports.Com Adds Seed -Market Demand, Growth, Opportunities and analysis of Top Key Player Forecast to 2021 To Its Research DatabaseThis report studies Seed in China market, focuses on the top players in China market, with capacity, production, price, revenue and market share for each manufacturer, coveringBayer CropScience AGE. I. Du Pont De Nemours and CompanyMonsanto CompanySyngenta AGThe Dow Chemical CompanyKWS SAAT SEGroupe LimagrainSakata Seed CorporationRallis India LimitedLand OLakes, Inc.For Sample report @Market Segment by Regions, coveringSouth ChinaEast ChinaSouthwest ChinaNortheast ChinaNorth ChinaCentral ChinaNorthwest ChinaSplit by product type, with production, revenue, price, market share and growth rate of each type, can be divided intoConventional seedGM seedSplit by application, this report focuses on consumption, market share and growth rate of Seed in each application, can be divided intoOilseedsCereals & grainsFruits & vegetablesOthersEnquiry before buying @Table of ContentsGlobal Seed Market Research Report 20171 Seed Market Overview1.1 Product Overview and Scope of Seed1.2 Seed Segment by Type1.2.1 China Production Market Share of Seed Type in 20151.2.2 Conventional seed1.2.3 GM seed1.3 Applications of Seed1.3.1 Seed Consumption Market Share by Application in 20151.3.2 Oilseeds1.3.3 Cereals & grains1.3.4 Fruits & vegetables1.3.5 Others1.4 China Market Size (Value) of Seed (2011-2021)1.5 China Seed Status and Outlook1.6 Government Policies......3 China Seed Manufacturers Profiles/Analysis3.1 Bayer CropScience AG3.1.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base, Sales Area and Its Competitors3.1.2 Seed Product Type, Application and Specification3.1.2.1 Conventional seed3.1.2.2 GM seed3.1.3 Bayer CropScience AG Seed Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2015 and 2016)3.1.4 Main Business/Business Overview3.2 E. I. Du Pont De Nemours and Company3.2.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base, Sales Area and Its Competitors3.2.2 Seed Product Type, Application and Specification3.2.2.1 Conventional seed3.2.2.2 GM seed3.2.3 E. I. Du Pont De Nemours and Company 100 Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2015 and 2016)3.2.4 Main Business/Business Overview3.3 Monsanto Company3.3.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base, Sales Area and Its Competitors3.3.2 Seed Product Type, Application and Specification3.3.2.1 Conventional seed3.3.2.2 GM seed3.3.3 Monsanto Company 106 Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2015 and 2016)3.3.4 Main Business/Business Overview3.4 Syngenta AG3.4.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base, Sales Area and Its Competitors3.4.2 Seed Product Type, Application and Specification3.4.2.1 Conventional seed3.4.2.2 GM seed3.4.3 Syngenta AG Jan Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2015 and 2016)3.4.4 Main Business/Business Overview3.5 The Dow Chemical Company3.5.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base, Sales Area and Its Competitors3.5.2 Seed Product Type, Application and Specification3.5.2.1 Conventional seed3.5.2.2 GM seed3.5.3 The Dow Chemical Company Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2015 and 2016)3.5.4 Main Business/Business Overview3.6 KWS SAAT SE3.6.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base, Sales Area and Its Competitors3.6.2 Seed Product Type, Application and Specification3.6.2.1 Conventional seed3.6.2.2 GM seed3.6.3 KWS SAAT SE Million USD Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2015 and 2016)3.6.4 Main Business/Business Overview3.7 Groupe Limagrain3.7.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base, Sales Area and Its Competitors3.7.2 Seed Product Type, Application and Specification3.7.2.1 Conventional seed3.7.2.2 GM seed3.7.3 Groupe Limagrain Machinery & Equipment Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2015 and 2016)3.7.4 Main Business/Business Overview3.8 Sakata Seed Corporation3.8.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base, Sales Area and Its Competitors3.8.2 Seed Product Type, Application and Specification3.8.2.1 Conventional seed3.8.2.2 GM seed3.8.3 Sakata Seed Corporation Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2015 and 2016)3.8.4 Main Business/Business Overview3.9 Rallis India Limited3.9.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base, Sales Area and Its Competitors3.9.2 Seed Product Type, Application and Specification3.9.2.1 Conventional seed3.9.2.2 GM seed3.9.3 Rallis India Limited Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2015 and 2016)3.9.4 Main Business/Business Overview3.10 Land OLakes, Inc.3.10.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base, Sales Area and Its Competitors3.10.2 Seed Product Type, Application and Specification3.10.2.1 Conventional seed3.10.2.2 GM seed3.10.3 Land OLakes, Inc. Capacity, Production, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2015 and 2016)3.10.4 Main Business/Business Overview.Buy This Report @Continued ...Contact Us: Sales@Wiseguyreports.Com Ph: +1-646-845-9349 (US) Ph: +44 208 133 9349 (UK)Wise Guy Reports is part of the Wise Guy Consultants Pvt. Ltd. and offers premium progressive statistical surveying, market research reports, analysis & forecast data for industries and governments around the globe. Wise Guy Reports features an exhaustive list of market research reports from hundreds of publishers worldwide. We boast a database spanning virtually every market category and an even more comprehensive collection of market research reports under these categories and sub-categories.WISE GUY RESEARCH CONSULTANTS PVT LTDOffice No. 528, Amanora ChambersMagarpatta Road, HadapsarPune - 411028Maharashtra, India Europe Ultrasound Market 2017 - 2022 Industry, Trends, Demand, Growth, Share, Opportunities and Analysis Ultrasound Market https://www.wiseguyreports.com/reports/911565-europe-ultrasound-market-report-2017 https://www.wiseguyreports.com/sample-request/911565-europe-ultrasound-market-report-2017 https://www.wiseguyreports.com/enquiry/911565-europe-ultrasound-market-report-2017 www.wiseguyreports.com WiseGuyReports Publish a New Market Research Report On Europe Ultrasound Market Report 2017 Europe Sales, Price, Revenue, Growth Rate and Market Share.Description:This report studies sales (consumption) of Ultrasound in Europe market, especially in Germany, France, UK, Russia, Italy, Spain and Benelux, focuses on top players in these countries, with sales, price, revenue and market share for each player in these Countries, coveringBASF SECelanese CorporationMethanex CorporationMethanol Holdings (Trinidad) Limited(MHTL)Mitsubishi Gas Chemical Co., Inc. (MGC)Mitsui & Co., Ltd.Petroliam Nasional Berhad (Petronas)SABICValero Marketing and Supply CompanyZagros Petrochemical Company (ZPC)Complete Report Details @Market Segment by Countries, this report splits Europe into several key Countries, with sales (consumption), revenue, market share and growth rate of Ultrasound in these countries, from 2011 to 2021 (forecast), likeGermanyFranceUKRussiaItalySpainBeneluxSplit by product type, with sales, revenue, price, market share and growth rate of each type, can be divided intoDiagnostic ultrasoundTherapeutic ultrasoundSplit by application, this report focuses on sales, market share and growth rate of Ultrasound in each application, can be divided intoRadiology/general imaging applicationsObstetrics/gynaecological applicationsCardiological applicationsUrological applicationsVascular applicationsOther applicationsRequest Sample Copy of this Report @For more information or any query mail at sales@wiseguyreports.comTable of ContentsEurope Ultrasound Market Report 20171 Ultrasound Overview1.1 Product Overview and Scope of Ultrasound1.2 Classification of Ultrasound1.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound1.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound1.3 Application of Ultrasound1.3.1 Radiology/general imaging applications1.3.2 Obstetrics/gynaecological applications1.3.3 Cardiological applications1.3.4 Urological applications1.3.5 Vascular applications1.3.6 Other applications1.4 Ultrasound Market by Countries1.4.1 Germany Status and Prospect (2011-2021)1.4.2 France Status and Prospect (2011-2021)1.4.3 UK Status and Prospect (2011-2021)1.4.4 Russia Status and Prospect (2011-2021)1.4.5 Italy Status and Prospect (2011-2021)1.4.6 Spain Status and Prospect (2011-2021)1.4.7 Benelux Status and Prospect (2011-2021)1.5 Europe Market Size (Value and Volume) of Ultrasound (2011-2021)1.5.1 Europe Ultrasound Sales and Growth Rate (2011-2021)1.5.2 Europe Ultrasound Revenue and Growth Rate (2011-2021)2 Europe Ultrasound by Manufacturers, Type and Application2.1 Europe Ultrasound Market Competition by Manufacturers2.1.1 Europe Ultrasound Sales and Market Share of Key Manufacturers (2015 and 2016)2.1.2 Europe Ultrasound Revenue and Share by Manufacturers (2015 and 2016)2.2 Europe Ultrasound (Volume and Value) by Type2.2.1 Europe Ultrasound Sales and Market Share by Type (2011-2016)2.2.2 Europe Ultrasound Revenue and Market Share by Type (2011-2016)2.3 Europe Ultrasound (Volume and Value) by Countries2.3.1 Europe Ultrasound Sales and Market Share by Countries (2011-2016)2.3.2 Europe Ultrasound Revenue and Market Share by Countries (2011-2016)2.4 Europe Ultrasound (Volume) by Application.10 Europe Ultrasound Manufacturers Analysis10.1 BASF SE10.1.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors10.1.2 Ultrasound Product Type, Application and Specification10.1.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound10.1.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound10.1.3 BASF SE Ultrasound Sales, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2011-2016)10.1.4 Main Business/Business Overview10.2 Celanese Corporation10.2.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors10.2.2 Ultrasound Product Type, Application and Specification10.2.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound10.2.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound10.2.3 Celanese Corporation Ultrasound Sales, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2011-2016)10.2.4 Main Business/Business Overview10.3 Methanex Corporation10.3.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors10.3.2 Ultrasound Product Type, Application and Specification10.3.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound10.3.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound10.3.3 Methanex Corporation Ultrasound Sales, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2011-2016)10.3.4 Main Business/Business Overview10.4 Methanol Holdings (Trinidad) Limited(MHTL)10.4.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors10.4.2 Ultrasound Product Type, Application and Specification10.4.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound10.4.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound10.4.3 Methanol Holdings (Trinidad) Limited(MHTL) Ultrasound Sales, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2011-2016)10.4.4 Main Business/Business Overview10.5 Mitsubishi Gas Chemical Co., Inc. (MGC)10.5.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors10.5.2 Ultrasound Product Type, Application and Specification10.5.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound10.5.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound10.5.3 Mitsubishi Gas Chemical Co., Inc. (MGC) Ultrasound Sales, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2011-2016)10.5.4 Main Business/Business Overview10.6 Mitsui & Co., Ltd.10.6.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors10.6.2 Ultrasound Product Type, Application and Specification10.6.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound10.6.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound10.6.3 Mitsui & Co., Ltd. Ultrasound Sales, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2011-2016)10.6.4 Main Business/Business Overview10.7 Petroliam Nasional Berhad (Petronas)10.7.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors10.7.2 Ultrasound Product Type, Application and Specification10.7.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound10.7.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound10.7.3 Petroliam Nasional Berhad (Petronas) Ultrasound Sales, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2011-2016)10.7.4 Main Business/Business Overview10.8 SABIC10.8.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors10.8.2 Ultrasound Product Type, Application and Specification10.8.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound10.8.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound10.8.3 SABIC Ultrasound Sales, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2011-2016)10.8.4 Main Business/Business Overview10.9 Valero Marketing and Supply Company10.9.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors10.9.2 Ultrasound Product Type, Application and Specification10.9.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound10.9.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound10.9.3 Valero Marketing and Supply Company Ultrasound Sales, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2011-2016)10.9.4 Main Business/Business Overview10.10 Zagros Petrochemical Company (ZPC)10.10.1 Company Basic Information, Manufacturing Base and Competitors10.10.2 Ultrasound Product Type, Application and Specification10.10.2.1 Diagnostic ultrasound10.10.2.2 Therapeutic ultrasound10.10.3 Zagros Petrochemical Company (ZPC) Ultrasound Sales, Revenue, Price and Gross Margin (2011-2016)10.10.4 Main Business/Business Overview..CONTINUEDMake an Enquiry @CONTACT US:NORAH TRENTPartner Relations & Marketing Managersales@wiseguyreports.comPh: +1-646-845-9349 (US)Ph: +44 208 133 9349 (UK)Wise Guy Reports is part of the Wise Guy Consultants Pvt. Ltd. and offers premium progressive statistical surveying, market research reports, analysis & forecast data for industries and governments around the globe. Wise Guy Reports features an exhaustive list of market research reports from hundreds of publishers worldwide. We boast a database spanning virtually every market category and an even more comprehensive collection of market research reports under these categories and sub-categories.Pune, India Animal Wound Care Market Research Report by Key Players Analysis (B. Braun Melsungen AG, Johnson & Johnson, Medtronic) http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/animal-wound-care-market.html http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=18761 www.transparencymarketresearch.com Key players operating in the global animal wound care market include B. Braun Melsungen AG, Johnson & Johnson, Medtronic, Acelity L.P. Inc., Bayer AG, Neogen Corporation, and Virbac.Wound care is control of the overall steadiness of animal. Moreover, open wounds can detract attention from more delicate but potentially life threatening problems. After initial care, the animal should be calmed. Further, first aid should be followed immediately and safely for the prevention of infection which can cause life threatening disease. Active bleeding can be controlled with direct pressure by pneumatic cuff instead of a bandage. The cuff should be inflated until hemorrhage is controlled. The need for animal wound care is growing due to rise in pet adoption, growth in income in developed economies, and increase in awareness about animal health. Furthermore, rise in demand for pet insurance coupled with growth in animal health expenditure is propelling the market growth globally. Currently, the U.S. is the key country contributing toward the animal wound care market, where the quality of life of the animals with painful symptoms that are difficult to manage have become manageable. In addition, the market for animal wound care is expected to expand at a high rate in the next few years. However, lack of skilled personnel can prove to be a restraining factor for the overall growth of this market especially in low- to medium-income countries of the world.The treatment for animal wound should be directed toward removal of damaged tissue/foreign objects from the wound, as well as inflammation control and moisture control. Furthermore, the wound should be protected from further contamination by covering it with a lint-free dressing or sterile dressing. The time between examination and removal of damaged tissue/foreign objects should be reduced to decrease bacterial contamination. When the wound is infected, a sample is collected for culture and sensitivity testing. In addition, new development has to be incorporated for high performance, fast response time, and cost-effective tests.Browse Global Strategic Business Report:The animal wound care market can be segmented based on product, animal, end-user, and geography. Based on product, the animal wound care market can be categorized into surgical wound care, traditional wound care, advanced wound care, and others. Based on animal, the market can be segmented into livestock animals and companion animals. Based on end-user, the market can be categorized into veterinary clinics, veterinary hospitals, and homecare settings.Based on geography, the market is segmented into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, and Middle East & Africa. Globally, North America was observed to be a significant animal wound care market owing to high concerns for animal health and growth in pet adoption. Additionally, the U.S. and Canada have been successfully utilizing animal wound care products, which as a result is expected to boost the market growth. Moreover, presence of well-established health care organization, government initiatives in implementing animal wound care, and constantly improving reimbursement scenario are projected to further propel the market growth. Europe was a large animal wound care market owing to enhanced veterinary health processes and implementation of high veterinary health care concerns in the region.Asia Pacific is expected to be a fast growing regional market globally. The major factors that are expected to drive the growth of the animal wound care market in the region are the large population of companion and livestock animal and growth in awareness about animal health, especially in India and China. Additionally, China and India are the top emerging countries in the region and hence are anticipated to increasingly contribute toward the market growth. In Latin America, Mexico and Brazil are the countries that have significant potential for growth due to developing medical organization and rise in disposable incomes.Download Exclusive Brochure of This Report :About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a 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. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.Each TMR syndicated research report covers a different sector - such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals, energy, food & beverages, semiconductors, med-devices, consumer goods and technology. These reports provide in-depth analysis and deep segmentation to possible micro levels. With wider scope and stratified research methodology, TMRs syndicated reports strive to provide clients to serve their overall research requirement.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: North America Facial Injectables Market Expected to Reach US$5.8 bn By 2024 Due to Increasing Focus on Physical Appearance & Aesthetics http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/north-america-facial-injectables-market.html http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=18515 www.transparencymarketresearch.com The North America facial injectables market is quite monopolistic in nature with one player dominating the overall market dynamics. As of 2016, Allergan Plc., held a share 62.0% in the regional market. The company dominance is a result of the strong brand value of its drugs like Botox & Juvederm. Presently, Botox is leading the market and is expected to retain its stance all throughout 2024.According to the research report, the North America facial injectables market is expected to reach a valuation of US$5.8 bn by the end of 2024 as compared to US$2.1 bn by the end of 2015. Between the forecast years of 2016 and 2024, the global market is expected to rise at a CAGR of 12.0%.Browse Global Strategic Business Report:North America Facial Injectables Market: OverviewThe demand for facial injectables across North America has been on a continued rise due to changing lifestyles and rising disposable incomes. The increasing focus on physical appearance and aesthetics are also expected to drive the demand for facial injectables in the coming years. The research report states that the North America facial injectables market was valued at US$2.1 bn in 2015 and is expected to reach US$5.8 bn by the end of 2024. Between the forecast years of 2016 and 2024, the global market is expected to rise at a CAGR of 12.0%. The market for facial injectables in North America has also been gaining momentum due to the increased longevity of the effects of these injectables.North America Facial Injectables Market: SegmentationBased on product type, the North America facial injectables market has been segmented into Product Type Botulinum Toxin; Hyaluronic Acid; Collagen: Porcine/ Bovine based & Human based; Particle & Polymer Fillers (PPF): Polymethylmethacrylate Beads (PMMA microspheres), Poly-L-Lactic Acid & Calcium Hydroxyapatite). The market has been further studied from the point of view of major treatment types. Based on treatment type, the market has been categorized into facial pain, wrinkle treatment, lip augmentation and others. Based on end users, the market has been segmented into hospitals, ambulatory surgical centers, cosmetic centers, dermatology clinics and physician clinics.North America Facial Injectables Market: Regional OutlookGeographically, the North America facial injectables market has been segmented into: the U.S. & Canada. The report also profiles major players in the facial injectables market based on various attributes such as company overview, financial overview, SWOT analysis, key business strategies, product portfolio, and recent developments.Key Players Mentioned in this Report are:Key companies profiled in the report Allergan Plc., Galderma S.A. (Nestle), Merz Pharma & Co. KGaA, Prollenium Medical Technologies Inc., Ipsen Group and Bloomage BioTechnology Corporation Limited.Download Exclusive Brochure of This Report :About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a 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. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.Each TMR syndicated research report covers a different sector - such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals, energy, food & beverages, semiconductors, med-devices, consumer goods and technology. These reports provide in-depth analysis and deep segmentation to possible micro levels. With wider scope and stratified research methodology, TMRs syndicated reports strive to provide clients to serve their overall research requirement.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Healthcare BI Platform Market - Fastest Growing Functional Segment over the Forecast Period http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=2322 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com Business Intelligence (BI) platforms help build BI applications by providing competences in analysis, platform integration, and information delivery. As healthcare organizations are realizing the untapped potential of huge amounts of data, they are implementing solutions that utilize business intelligence to help collect, sort, and mine valuable insights from this data.The complex data gathered from numerous sources (operational, patient data) is analyzed and used by healthcare providers with the aid of BI platforms for the larger population.This research report provides a detailed analysis of trends in the healthcare BI platform market. It also comprises a broad analysis of the industry drivers, restraints, and opportunities. The report also provides a comprehensive assessment of key market player strategies.The market for healthcare BI platform has been segmented into various functions: clinical analytics, financial analytics, operational analytics, and others. Financial analytics is expected to be the largest healthcare BI platform function over the forecast period, whereas clinical analytics is expected to be the fastest growing functional segment over the forecast period. The global healthcare BI platform market has been extensively analyzed on the basis of deployment type into on-premise and cloud.Request A Sample Of This Report -Cloud is expected to be the fastest growing healthcare BI platform segment by deployment type over the forecast period. On the basis of model type, the healthcare BI platform market is segmented as self-service BI and corporate BI. Self-service BI is the latest trend in the BI market and is expected to be the fastest growing segment over the forecast period.The market size and forecasts in terms of revenue (US$ Mn) for each of these segments have been provided for the period 2013 to 2023, considering 2013 and 2014 as the base years. The report also provides the compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) for each segment of the market for the forecast period 2015 to 2023.The healthcare BI platform market is segmented based on geography into North America, Europe, Middle-East and Africa, Asia Pacific, and Latin America, and a detailed regional analysis is provided. A country-level analysis is also included in the report, covering the countries in each region.North America is expected to be the largest and fastest growing healthcare BI platform market among all regions. Europe is one of the mature markets for healthcare BI platform, whereas Asia Pacific is expected to be one of the most attractive markets in the near future.Market estimates for the healthcare BI platform have been assessed considering different political, environmental, social, technological, economic, and legal factors. The share of leading players of the global healthcare BI platform market is provided for the year 2014.Company profiles (CPs) of market leaders elucidate on details such as company overview, segmentation, recent developments, business strategies, and financial information in the healthcare BI platform market. Companies profiled in the report include SAP SE, Oracle Corporation, Microsoft Corporation, SAS Institute, Inc., IBM Corporation, OpenText Corporation, and Information Builders. The report would allow healthcare organizations and research and development agencies to make informed decisions about healthcare BI platforms, and thus gain competitive advantage in the market.About TMRTMR is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.Contact TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email:sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Cloud Security Market - Easier to Manage, Efficient, and can Provide High Levels of Security http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=197 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com Growing need for data security and prevention of data loss and theft are driving the global cloud security market. Companies need to protect privileged and confidential information such as intellectual property information, employee information, patents as well as pending patents, nondisclosure agreements, financial information, and others. Cloud-based security services have an edge over traditional premises-based models.These services are easier to manage, efficient, and can provide high levels of security. Many organizations started adopting cloud-based security services to benefit from its numerous advantages such as agility, cost cutting, and flexibility of IT infrastructure.Flexibility and ease of operation to manage cloud security services, increasing demand for cloud computing by small and medium scale businesses (SMBs) and proliferation of handheld devices along with rising trend of bring your own device (BYOD) and choose your own device (CYOD) has magnified the demand for cloud security services, globally.Nowadays, cloud security services have become crucial as these provide access to the most advanced security solutions, provide solutions to critical problems faced by companies in the current work scenario, and support remote workforce.Request A Sample Of This Report -As the number of mobile workers accessing the companys private network is growing substantially, identity and access management has become of prime importance. Due to increasing data breaches and security threats, the business risk associated with emails and the use of the Web is increasing.Companies are concerned about log maintenance and data loss prevention of their data processes and employees. All these problems are resolved easily with the deployment of cloud security services. This is because cloud security services target specific security problems of cloud computing, and minimize the complexities associated with cloud.Moreover, security applications delivered as cloud-based services provide a promising platform to manage security and threat concerns. Cloud-based services are gaining popularity owing to the unique benefits provided to users such as scalability, agility, business continuity, flexibility at work practices, and reduction in costs.The cloud security market is anticipated to expand at a CAGR of 12.8% during the forecast period from 2015 to 2022. However, lack of awareness and skeptical nature of enterprises towards adoption of cloud services are some of the factors inhibiting the growth of this market.On the basis of deployment, the global cloud security market is segmented into public cloud, private cloud and hybrid cloud. Among these types, hybrid cloud security market accounted for the largest share in 2014.A hybrid cloud service is a cloud computing model that enables the user to manage workload in public, on-premise, and private cloud. The user can move the data from available cloud deployments in less time and with more flexibility. The demand for hybrid cloud services is expected to increase in the coming years due to flexibility in storing data.Hybrid cloud helps the user to categorize critical data and store it in different cloud deployments. Hybrid cloud increases security risks due to continuous movement of data between clouds. Therefore, the market for cloud security is expected to increase in hybrid cloud services in the coming years.The application of cloud IAM, data loss protection, and SIEM is also expected to increase in hybrid cloud security in the future. Companies such as Intel Security Group, Trend Micro, Inc., and IBM Corporation have started providing hybrid cloud services.In terms of cloud security adoption in end-use segments, IT and telecommunication industry accounted for the largest share in 2014. Large IT businesses use cloud computing in their daily operations and for transferring huge amounts of encrypted data across the enterprise. Due to outsourcing of IT services, the demand for cloud computing is expected to increase in the IT industry in coming years.The use of cloud computing among telecom carriers is expected to increase due to increasing adoption of android-based phones among end-users. Most of the telecom carriers are providing subscription-based cloud storage services to their end-users. This is expected to increase the market for cloud security in these industries in the future.About TMRTMR is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.Contact TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email:sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Commercial Refrigerators Market - Market Witnesses Lucrative Prospects http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=13139 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com The commercial refrigerators market in Asia Pacific will continue to rise, with China leading the market from the front, Transparency Market Research says. As the region faces the mushrooming of convenience stores, hypermarkets, super markets, grocery shops, and restaurants, the installation of commercial refrigerators is expected to rise considerably in the forthcoming years.Along with this, the conspicuous demand for energy-efficient solutions will pave the way for research and development activities in the market.With opportunities for foreign direct investment widening in the food retail sector, Transparency Market Research (TMR) expects the commercial refrigerators market in Asia Pacific to surge at a 9.8% CAGR between 2016 and 2024. Around this time, technologies such as magnetocaloric refrigeration, which offer 20% to 30% reduced energy consumption, will witness wider commercialization.The commercial refrigerators market is gaining considerable traction across China, India, Thailand, and Indonesia. The rapid proliferation of quick service restaurants and the increasing penetration of multinational retailers in these countries have fuelled the demand for energy-efficient commercial refrigerators.Request A Sample Of This Report -China reports the highest demand for commercial refrigerators in Asia Pacific. It held over 33.5% of the Asia Pacific commercial refrigerators market in 2015. The country boasts a considerable presence of both local and multinational manufacturers; hence, commercial refrigerators are available at a comparatively lower purchasing cost in China. This will in turn propel the China commercial refrigerators market at a CAGR of 7.3% by revenue, from 2016 to 2024.The market for commercial refrigerators has been segmented based on beverage refrigerators, freezers, refrigerated display cases, glass door refrigerators, retail channels, and fridge freezers.Based on beverage refrigerator type, the market has been bifurcated into beverage refrigerator and wine refrigerator. In terms of revenue, the beverage refrigerator segment emerged dominant in the market, accounting for a share of over 57.2% in 2015.The growth witnessed in the tourism sector is expected to positively influence the sales prospects of beverage refrigerators during the forecast period. However, the segment is expected to lose its market share to the wine refrigerators as alcohol consumption increases in the Philippines.About TMRTMR is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email:sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: In-flight Autopilot Systems Market - Commercial Aircrafts Increase Demand http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=S&rep_id=8092 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com Most of the aircraft manufacturers are currently in a phase of evolving their pilot guidance and autopilot systems to implement the latest ones available. This falls in line with their drive to increase the scope of automation in aircrafts. This is a key driver for the demand for in-flight autopilot systems.Another factors that works in favor of in-flight autopilot systems providers is the overall improvements made by aircraft makers in enhancing operational efficiency, including the implementation of autopilot systems.This also includes the implementation of performance-based navigation, a new concept that improve the description of an aircrafts usage of fuel efficiency as well as maintenance of passenger safety.Another advantage that aircraft companies seek from in-flight autopilot systems is the reduction of pilot fatigue through the use of enhanced autopilot systems.Request A Sample Of This Report -The resultant progress shown by in-flight autopilot systems revenues from a global perspective is a CAGR of 4.0% from 2015 to 2021. This market is expected to reach US$8.14 bn by the end of 2021.North America Defense Modernization Allows Highest Regional Demand for In-Flight Autopilot SystemsNorth America has consistently provided the highest demand for in-flight autopilot systems over the recent past. It is expected to continue this trend till 2021, by the end of which it is expected to take up 45.50% of the in-flight autopilot systems revenue share.The biggest contributor to this demand is the U.S. defense industry, which is rapidly increasing the number of defense modernization programs for all sectors. This gives most key players a chance to introduce the latest systems to the automated aviation vehicles in the defense industry.The demand for in-flight autopilot systems in Europe is also on the rise, thanks to the highly developed network of airways that make it easier to introduce automation in the aviation industry. At the same time, the rising number of air travelers in Asia Pacific is fueling the demand for in-flight autopilot systems, thereby generating a higher interest from global players.Commercial Aircrafts Increase Demand for In-flight Autopilot Systems MarketBy 2021, the revenue generated by in-flight autopilot systems players in commercial aircraft applications is expected to reach US$5.2 bn, making it the largest one till then.The key reason for the high demand for commercial aircraft in-flight autopilot systems is the increasing number of air passengers across the world, for both domestic and international flights.This will have a highly positive effect on most of the key providers of in-flight autopilot systems in the coming years. The commercial aircrafts segment is also showing a greater focus on the use of autopilot systems to reduce the scope of human error during flight as well as landing, further boosting the demand for in-flight autopilot systems.About TMRTMR is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.Contact TMR90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email:sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: The Emerging Pulping Industry is expected to drive the Sodium Hydrogen Sulfide Market :2024 Global Sodium Hydrogen Sulfide Market http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=18836 http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/ Sodium hydrogen sulphide, also known as sodium bisulfide, sodium hydrosulfide, or sodium sulfhydrate, is a highly alkaline solution with a pH of 11.5 to 12.5. It is yellow to dark green in colour. Sodium hydrosulfide is manufactured by scrubbing hydrogen sulfide from outlet streams with sodium hydroxide. The NaSH solution is filtered and sold as a 44% to 46% solution. It is concentrated through evaporation to form a flake material of 70% to 72% sodium hydrogen sulphide. It reacts with all acids by releasing a highly toxic hydro sulphide gas. The NaSH solution reacts with oxidizing agents which helps precipitate the elemental sulphur. It is stable under ambient pressure and temperature conditions. It is used in various applications such as kraft pulping, copper minerals flotation, chemicals and dyes, leather processing, and rayon & cellophane desulfurization.Download the Exclusive Report Sample Here :Sodium Hydrogen Sulfide Market: Drivers and RestraintsSodium hydrogen sulfide is a low-cost alternative to chemicals such as sodium sulphate when it comes to kraft pulping. Low grade sodium hydrogen sulphide is preferably used for this purpose since it is a by-product from refineries and requires no prior treatment. Therefore, the emerging pulping industry is expected to drive the sodium hydrogen sulfide market. However, due to the low pricing and an oversupply situation in copper mineral flotation, the demand for sodium hydrogen sulfide in this sector is estimated to diminish. Also, the usage of sodium hydrogen sulphide in leather tanning been continually declining in the last few years owing to the relocation of tanneries outside the U.S. Environmental concerns associated with sodium hydrogen sulphide are predicted to hamper the expansion of this market too.Sodium Hydrogen Sulfide Market: SegmentationThe sodium hydrogen sulfide market could be segmented based on forms such as:-Solid fused form-Flakes-Aqueous solutionSodium hydrogen sulfide is mainly solid in nature but is preferred to be used as an aqueous solution due to its hygroscopic nature. Since it is more stable in its solution form, it is also transported as a liquid. In its solid fused form, it is packed and transported in iron drums, whereas the flakes are packed in polyethylene bags. The liquid solution (up to 72%) is delivered in tank wagons.Sodium Hydrogen Sulfide Market: SegmentationIn terms of end-users, the sodium hydrogen sulfide market could be divided into the following categories:-Mining-Leather-Pulp & Paper-Metal extraction-Textiles-Chemical processing-Sodium hydrogen sulphide is used a chemical intermediate in the manufacturing of thio-compounds such as sodium thiosulfate, thio & dithio benzoic acids, and thioamides. It is also employed as a finishing agent in leather tanning and glass making applications.Sodium Hydrogen Sulfide Market: Region-wise OutlookThe global sodium hydrogen sulfide market is geographically distributed over North America, Latin America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and Middle East & Africa. Asia Pacific holds the maximum share in this market, which is ascribed to the presence of a large number of secondary processed product industries such as paper & pulp, textiles, and leather processing in this region. Local manufacturers expanding their respective production facilities are also projected to drive this market. The overall demand for sodium hydrogen sulphide in North America is likely to decline on account of stringent regulatory policies on the use of toxic products in this region.Sodium Hydrogen Sulfide Market: Key PlayersSome of the key players identified in the sodium hydrogen sulfide market are:-Lion Oil-Albemarle-Akzo Nobel-Gary-Williams Energy-Chemical Products, Cartersville-PPG Industries-Crompton-Tessenderlo Kerley-Jupiter Chemicals-Great Lakes Chemical-The report offers a comprehensive evaluation of the market. It does so via in-depth qualitative insights, historical data, and verifiable projections about market size. The projections featured in the report have been derived using proven research methodologies and assumptions. By doing so, the research report serves as a repository of analysis and information for every facet of the market, including but not limited to: Regional markets, technology, types, and applications.The study is a source of reliable data on:-Market segments and sub-segments-Market trends and dynamics-Supply and demand-Market size-Current trends/opportunities/challenges-Competitive landscape-Technological breakthroughs-Value chain and stakeholder analysisThe regional analysis covers:-North America (U.S. and Canada)-Latin America (Mexico, Brazil, Peru, Chile, and others)-Western Europe (Germany, U.K., France, Spain, Italy, Nordic countries, Belgium, -Netherlands, and Luxembourg)-Eastern Europe (Poland and Russia)-Asia Pacific (China, India, Japan, ASEAN, Australia, and New Zealand)-Middle East and Africa (GCC, Southern Africa, and North Africa)-The report has been compiled through extensive primary research (through interviews, surveys, and observations of seasoned analysts) and secondary research (which entails reputable paid sources, trade journals, and industry body databases). The report also features a complete qualitative and quantitative assessment by analyzing data gathered from industry analysts and market participants across key points in the industrys value chain.About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a global market intelligence company providing business information reports and services. The companys exclusive blend of quantitative forecasting and trend analysis provides forward-looking insight for thousands of decision makers. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather and analyze information.TMRs data repository is continuously updated and revised by a team of research experts so that it always reflects the latest trends and information. With extensive research and analysis capabilities, Transparency Market Research employs rigorous primary and secondary research techniques to develop distinctive data sets and research material for business reports.ContactTransparency Market Research90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite:Visit Blog : http://cmfeglobalreports.blogspot.com/ Hemodynamic Monitoring Devices Market: Latest trends in Medical Devices Industry http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/hemodynamic-monitoring-devices-market.html http://www.transparencymarketresearch.com/sample/sample.php?flag=B&rep_id=14807 www.transparencymarketresearch.com Cardiovascular disorders are commonly observed in variable age group, which makes it necessary to see early detection and management of disease incidences. Burgeoning prevalence of lifestyle disorders and cardiac diseases is constantly raising the demand for hemodynamic monitoring devices. This has been a prominent driver for the growth of hemodynamic monitoring devices market globally, within the past decade.As cases of diabetes, obesity, blood pressure disorders, CVDs, stroke, and many more are on the rise, the need for routine assessment of standard hemodynamic parameters is also growing. These parameters include heart rate, blood volume, blood pressure, ECG, temperature, central venous pressure, blood gas analysis, and oxygen perfusion/peripheral venous oxygen saturation.When it comes to post-surgery monitoring of patients in critical care units, hemodynamic monitoring systems make one of the most critically required components in medical care arsenals of hospitals and healthcare facilities. As the number of both surgeries and hospitals are constantly increasing since the past few years, the demand for hemodynamic monitoring devices is also witnessing steady impetus.Hemodynamic monitoring primarily aims to accurately assess the cardiovascular system of patients and monitor their response to it but it also helps in recognizing the dysfunctioning of various organ systems. This has been another key factor propelling the demand for hemodynamic monitoring devices worldwide. Launch of new, innovative products will highly influence the market in the near future. In addition, growing popularity of disposables segment is also fueling recurrent demand for hemodynamic monitoring devices.Due to a growing trend of hospital system digitalization, the integration of monitoring devices with computers is gaining popularity worldwide, including developing nations, which are inclining more toward adoption sophisticated medical care infrastructure. These integrated systems enable critical care unit staffs to simultaneously view multiple patients parameters on the same machine. This is a key factor driving their popularity.Where cardiac output monitoring has been traditionally performed using the thermodilution method via a PAC (pulmonary artery catheter) that was first introduced in the 1970s, it is now monitored using lesser invasive and more efficient techniques. The advent of technology and value added benefits of newly emerging monitoring system models are positively impacting the market growth.Minimally invasive cardiac monitoring involves all such devices and methods, which evaluate the entire cardiac output without using a PAC. Minimally invasive or non-invasive systems are hitting the industry and capturing sizeable markets, prominently attributed to their non-invasive nature. There are a few more methods recently introduced with minimal invasiveness but are lesser popular than their mainstream counterparts. However, introduction of a miniature TOE probe, offering the real time information about cardiac function and anatomy, is expected to create a massive impact on conventional management methods for ITU patients.Browse Global Strategic Business Report:North America is the key market globally, registering the highest consumption of hemodynamic monitoring devices, more than 30%. With increasing number of clinics, hospitals, and individually operating physicians adopting these devices, the U.S. is witnessing robust sales of hemodynamic monitoring systems, which are equipped with non-invasive technology. The U.S. FDA has recently passed an approval to ClearSight, an advanced product in the category. It will further contribute to the market growth in the near future.According to a recent survey, over 85% of septic shock patients in Canada and Europe standardize central venous pressure as a parameter to monitor the resuscitation of fluid. This figure highlights the extensive need for hemodynamic monitoring systems in these regions. The most promising market is however emerging in Asia Pacific, owing to increased concentration of governments on high quality healthcare. Japan is currently leading the APAC market for hemodynamic monitoring devices.Based on type, hemodynamic monitoring devices are pulmonary artery catheters (PACs), pulse contours, monitoring sensors, and esophageal Doppler. By application, the market is segmented into invasive, non-invasive, and minimally invasive. Among end users of hemodynamic monitoring systems, hospitals and clinics dominate the market, whereas ambulatory surgery centers and home healthcare units also record significant consumption.Some of the key players dominating the global market for hemodynamic monitoring systems include ICU Medical, Inc., Edwards Lifesciences Corporation, Cheetah Medical, GE Healthcare, Philips Medical, LiDCO Group Plc., Teleflex Incorporated, Siemens, PULSION Medical Systems SE, McKessen, Deltex Medical Group Plc., Hemo Sapiens, In., Tensys Medical, Inc., Osypka Medical GmbH, Schwarzer Cardiotek GmbH, and Drager Medical GmbH.Leading players are constantly launching innovative products and investing increasingly in R&D. Geographic expansion and strategic company tie-ups has been a profitable move for key companies, supporting the overall market growth.Download Exclusive Brochure of This Report :About UsTransparency Market Research (TMR) is a 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. TMRs experienced team of analysts, researchers, and consultants, use proprietary data sources and various tools and techniques to gather, and analyze information. Our business offerings represent the latest and the most reliable information indispensable for businesses to sustain a competitive edge.Each TMR syndicated research report covers a different sector - such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals, energy, food & beverages, semiconductors, med-devices, consumer goods and technology. These reports provide in-depth analysis and deep segmentation to possible micro levels. With wider scope and stratified research methodology, TMRs syndicated reports strive to provide clients to serve their overall research requirement.US Office Contact90 State Street, Suite 700Albany, NY 12207Tel: +1-518-618-1030USA - Canada Toll Free: 866-552-3453Email: sales@transparencymarketresearch.comWebsite: Washington County police are on the lookout for a 30-year-old man from Seaside who's suspected in a burglary on Saturday. They asked the public to be on the lookout for Jacob Terrill, who is suspected of being among three people in a stolen Subaru who were chased by police through Beaverton. Jacob Terrill, 30 The incident started Saturday with the theft of a 2015 Subaru Outback from a residence in Seaside. Seaside police told Washington County Sheriffs deputies on Sunday that the suspects were trying to use a stolen credit card at a Washington County gas station. The Subaru was later spotted on U.S. 26 near Northwest 185th Avenue, prompting a police chase. Officers gave up because of the suspects' reckless driving. They abandoned the car in the area of Northwest 174th Terrace and Bernard Place and fled. With the help of a tracking dog, police arrested Cyrus Grabenhorst, 30 of Seaside. Autumn Brelin, 20 of Seaside, was arrested walking in the street. They were booked into Washington County jail on multiple charges. Terrill is on the run. Deputies said if anyone spots Terrill, they should call 503-629-0111. -- Lynne Terry Mark Parker_Nike Nike president and CEO Mark Parker issued a statement Sunday, Jan. 29, 2017, in response to an executive order signed Friday by President Donald Trump that bans all people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the United States for 90 days. (Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images ) Nike chief executive Mark Parker said the traditional values of inclusiveness his company stands for are being "threatened" by President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily banning visitors from seven Muslim-majority countries. "Nike believes in a world where everyone celebrates the power of diversity," Parker wrote in a rare Sunday afternoon memo to employees. "Regardless of whether or how you worship, where you come from or who you love, everyone's individual experience is what makes us stronger as a whole." "Those values are being threatened by the recent executive order in the U.S. banning refugees, as well as visitors, from seven Muslim-majority countries. This is a policy we don't support." Trump signed an executive order Friday prohibiting entry by people from seven majority-Muslim nations for 90 days. Citizens of Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Libya would be banned from entering the U.S. for the period, while the government determines what information it needs to safely admit visitors. Some visa and green-card holders were blocked from boarding flights to the U.S. after the order was issued and several people were being detained at U.S. airports when they arrived, The New York Times reported. The Department of Homeland Security issued a directive on Friday afternoon ordering the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency to enforce the order immediately. Corporate leaders from all corners of the business community have questioned Trump's ban. Google and Microsoft executives went public over the weekend criticizing the action.The two companies said they had more than 175 employees subject to the ban. Google called more than 100 workers home. On Friday, legendary investor Warren Buffet said ambitious, brainy immigrants are one of the secrets of America's global success. Protesters gathered at airports nationwide to protest the executive order, including at Portland International Airport. Nike officials declined to say whether any of their employees are subject to the ban or what steps the company is taking to protect them. Mo Farah, the native Somali distance running star, who runs for the United Kingdom but lives and trains in Oregon, issued a stinging Facebook post Sunday saying the Queen of England made him a knight of that country and Trump "seems to have made me an alien." "I am a British citizen who has lived in America for the past six years - working hard, contributing to society, paying my taxes and bringing up our four children in the place they now call home," wrote Farah, who has an endorsement contract with Nike. "Now, me and many others like me are being told that we may not be welcome. "It's deeply troubling that I will have to tell my children that Daddy might not be able to come home - to explain why the President has introduced a policy that comes from a place of ignorance and prejudice." Parker said that Farah and the rest of the Nike community can count on the company's support. "Nike stands together against bigotry and any form of discrimination," Parker wrote. "We learned that on the field of play, where fairness and mutual respect are the rule, not the exception. Now more than ever, let's stand up for our values and remain open and inclusive as a brand and a company. We are at our best when we recognize the value of our diverse community." -- Jeff Manning 503-294-7606, jmanning@oregonian.com donald trump President Donald Trump's executive order barring immigrants from seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the US doesn't include Saudi Arabia, the country where most of the 9/11 attackers came from. In fact, the executive order doesn't apply to any of the countries where the 9/11 attackers were from. Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, and Lebanon were also left off the list. The executive order temporarily bars citizens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen from traveling to the US. Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway said over the weekend that the order was "a ban on prospective travel from countries ... that have a recent history of training and exporting and harboring terrorists." Trump also cited the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York City and Washington, DC, directly several times in his executive order. "The visa-issuance process plays a crucial role in detecting individuals with terrorist ties and stopping them from entering the United States," the order said." Perhaps in no instance was that more apparent than the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, when State Department policy prevented consular officers from properly scrutinizing the visa applications of several of the 19 foreign nationals who went on to murder nearly 3,000 Americans." Fifteen of those 19 foreign nationals were from Saudi Arabia. Osama bin Laden was born in Saudi Arabia, and his family had strong connections to the Saudi royal family. The rest of the attackers were from Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, and Lebanon. Saudi Arabia in particular, however, has a long history of exporting Wahhabism, a strict strain of Islam that has been blamed for fueling extremism around the world. Farah Pandith, America's first special representative to Muslim communities at the State Department, wrote for The New York Times that in each of the 80 countries she visited from 2009 to 2014, "the Wahhabi influence was an insidious presence, changing the local sense of identity; displacing historic, culturally vibrant forms of Islamic practice; and pulling along individuals who were either paid to follow their rules or who became on their own custodians of the Wahhabi world view." Story continues Pandith continued: "Funding all this was Saudi money, which paid for things like the textbooks, mosques, TV stations and the training of Imams." She called on countries to "reject free Saudi textbooks and translations that are filled with hate" and "expose the Saudi financing of extremist groups masquerading as cultural exchanges and 'charity' organizations." Trump called Saudi Arabia the "world's biggest funder of terrorism" in 2011. On "Meet the Press" in 2015, Chuck Todd asked Trump why the US should have diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia if the country funded terrorism. "The primary reason we are with Saudi Arabia is because we need the oil," Trump said. "Now, we don't need the oil so much." He continued: "Like it or don't like it, people have backed Saudi Arabia. What I really mind though is we back it at tremendous expense. We get nothing for it." Saudi Arabia has been a major US ally for decades. From 2011 to 2015, Saudi Arabia has been the top destination for US arms exports. Trump also has a personal financial link to Saudi Arabia, as The Times noted. The Trump Organization registered eight companies in Saudi Arabia in 2015. White House press secretary Sean Spicer noted over the weekend that the seven countries included in Trump's executive order were first flagged by the Obama adiministration as "countries of particular concern" for visa screening. NOW WATCH: 'This is not about religion': Trump defends his immigration ban as thousands protest around the US More From Business Insider Car-sharing service Car2go is mixing up fleet of Smart two-seaters. The Daimler subsidiary announced Monday it will offer Mercedes-Benz CLA sedans and GLA SUVs in Portland, giving members access to vehicles that seat five or can carry a little more cargo that the diminutive Smart cars. "It's always been in the plan to move into four-door vehicles," said Ken Hills, Car2go's Portland general manager. "Opening up with our Smarts was great because of the visibility we got with those cars, but we've been working with four-door vehicles in Canada with just great results." The company added Mercedes-Benz sedans to its fleets in Vancouver, Calgary and Toronto in 2015. The fleet shakeup comes several months after the arrival of BMW-backed competitor ReachNow, which offers several models of BMW and Mini vehicles. Car2go, which rents vehicles by the minute, has ended the promotional pricing it introduced around the time ReachNow arrived. Though the larger vehicles eventually will cost more per minute to rent, they're being introduced at Car2go's standard rate of 41 cents per minute. Car2go will swap out some of its older Smart cars with 52 CLAs and 80 GLAs. It will maintain its current service area and fleet size of about 460 vehicles. The GLA vehicles are equipped with four-wheel drive, and all the larger vehicles come with luxury and safety features like blind spot awareness, heated seats and sunroofs. Both Car2go and ReachNow use a "floating" car-sharing model, in which its vehicles can be picked up and left at most street parking spots -- even in metered or permit districts, as long as they're within the companies' respective service areas. Customers pay an up-front registration fee, a base rental fee and a per-minute rental rate. In a news release, Daimler said it sees car-sharing as a priority for the future of driving, comparable with electric, connected and automated vehicles. Hills said car-sharing is a growing business for corporate parent Daimler, and that the company has 46,000 members in Portland. "We know we're nowhere near the upper end," he said. -- Elliot Njus enjus@oregonian.com 503-294-5034 @enjus 1wall.JPG A Border Patrol vehicle sits along the U.S.-Mexico border wall on January 25, 2017 in San Ysidro, California. (Sandy Huffaker/Getty Images) By Jennifer Rubin One hardly knows where to begin in describing the flaws in the batch of immigration actions President Trump announced on Wednesday. Here are 10 for starters: 1. This is more hysteria unrelated to actual border conditions. As the Wall Street Journal editorial board put it, "Border apprehensions were 192,000 last year, but that's down from 981,000 a decade ago. Pew estimates that about 11.1 million unauthorized immigrants live in the U.S. (3.5 percent of the population), and 52% are Mexicans. That share is falling every year amid rising illegal entries from Asia, Central America and sub-Saharan Africa. Most of these aliens arrive legally but overstay their visas." This is an expensive, counterproductive agenda in search of a problem. 2. The terrain of much of the border is not conducive to fencing. 3. Trump's obsession with the southern border and relative indifference to visa overstays suggests a bias against certain illegal immigrants. Trump thinks Mexican immigrants are "killers" and "criminals," while apparently never having used such invective against other illegal immigrant groups. 4. A physical wall is duplicative, ineffective and unnecessary. Cato Institute scholar David Bier explains that we have more than 600 miles of border fencing already. Moreover, "Tunnels are typically used more for drug smuggling, but they are still a serious vulnerability in any kind of physical barrier." Walls can be defeated by ladders and ramps. Zero evidence exists that a wall is a cost-effective means of stemming illegal entry. ("Despite the importance of this question, apparently no estimate of the impact of the current border fence on illegal immigration exists at all, let alone a comparison to other technologies. This is despite more than a decade to conduct such a study for the recent fences, and even longer to study the earlier fences.") 5. This is a boondoggle of the worst sort. "For the full 1,000 miles, Trump's 30-foot wall (with a 10-foot tunnel barrier) would cost $31.2 billion, according to the best estimate from Massachusetts Institute of Technology engineers-that is $31.2 million per mile," as Bier notes. 6. Building a wall will be a huge expansion of federal power and land, reinforcing Republicans' long-standing complaints that the feds gobble up too much state land. 7. Trump actually is making apprehension and deportation of criminals harder. The Obama administration already prioritized deportation of violent criminals. An immigration lawyer explained to me that contrary to the Obama administration, the Trump order "prioritizes nearly everything." He points out, "Labeling every person a 'priority' is like highlighting every word in a textbook." Since resources are finite, Trump increases the chances that a truly violent criminal won't be deported. When those people commit new crimes, Trump's scattershot policy will be partly to blame. 8. There is no way Mexico is going to pay for the wall. Trump's statement that U.S. taxpayers wouldn't pay the cost has morphed into a word salad. "Ultimately, it will come out of what's happening with Mexico," Trump told ABC's David Muir. "We're going to be starting those negotiations relatively soon, and we will be in a form reimbursed by Mexico." We have no idea what this means. 9. The notion of a "sanctuary city" is a misnomer. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents are free to apprehend individuals wherever they want. We are talking about the extent to which local law enforcement can be required to devote resources (e.g. hold illegal immigrants in jails) and whether, for example, it demands a warrant from the feds. Who is going to monitor and decide whether the cities are living up to the requirements? What if the federal government and cities disagree on whether the local authorities are being sufficiently cooperative? 10. If the federal government cuts off aid to cities, shortfalls in everything from schools to roads to anti-poverty programs to health care (what about Medicaid costs for people in those cities?) will be attributable to Trump's policy. When people "die on the streets" or shootings increase in a city, there will be a convenient person to blame: Trump. There are dozens of other reasons not to pursue these policies, including the damage it will do to relations with Mexico. Whatever you think about illegal immigration, Trump's approach -- like much of what he does -- makes for good PR with his base but is rotten policy for the United States. (c) 2017, The Washington Post Cowlitz County deputies are investigating a suspicious death after a man's body was found Sunday in the Coweeman River about 15 miles east of Kelso, Washington. Deputies said the body was found several miles past the end of Rose Valley Road. His identity has not been released and no details were provided by police. The scene was processed by search and rescue volunteers and a few items were collected, police said. Officials used a drone to snap photos above the river. An autopsy is scheduled for next week, possibly Wednesday. Police asked anyone with information to call the sheriff's office at 360-577-3092. Callers can text a tip anonymously to us by downloading the TIP411 app on their smart phone and make it attention to the Cowlitz County Sheriff's Office. -- Lynne Terry An old compatriot with fire in its, well, breath, joined the Lunar New Year celebration on Sunday in downtown Portland. Roughly 20 years after it last welcomed the new year in Portland's Chinatown neighborhood, the 100-foot long ceremonial dragon, a gift from the Taiwanese government, danced for paradegoers with the assistance of two dozen volunteers. Hundreds have seen the dragon since it was brought out of storage last year, but this was its formal return to the new year festivities. After its travels through downtown, the dragon, accompanied by Lion Dance teams, was taken to the Oregon Historical Society where the Portland Chinatown History Foundation and the historical society hosted an afternoon of activities. A group of Chinese Americans, working on a project to preserve Chinatown's history, helped bring the dragon out of retirement to restore some of the Chinatown spirit downtown. A group of Chinese Americans, working on a project to preserve Chinatown's history, helped bring the dragon out of retirement to restore some of the Chinatown spirit downtown. And you can still find celebrations related to the arrival of the Year of the Rooster. -The Oregonian Friday's U.S. immigration decree is reverberating well beyond the targeted seven Muslim-majority countries on President Trump 's list. Indonesiahome to the world's largest followers of Islam at 220 millionis not among the seven but Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi told Reuters over the weekend that her government held "deep regrets about the policy." A spokesperson from Jakarta's embassy in Washington meanwhile told AFP that the move would negatively affect the global fight against radicalism, adding that it was wrong to link terrorism with one religion. Passport holders of Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen are now forbidden from entering the world's largest economy for the next 90 days, with Syrian refugees indefinitely banned, according to an order that Trump signed into effect on Friday . Politicians in Malaysia, where 60 percent of the 28 million-strong population is Muslim, also voiced concern. On Sunday, Ong Kian Ming, an MP from the opposition Democratic Action Party (DAP), called Trump's policy "inhumane" and urged Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak to condemn the action, local news reported. Neither Najib nor Indonesian President Joko Widodo have addressed Friday's news. Both head of states offered Trump their congratulatory messages upon his November election victory but like other governments, fears about increased U.S. protectionism and 'America First' policies have clouded their respective relationships with Washington. For now, the U.S. immigration order isn't expected to hit political and economic ties with Jakarta or Kuala Lumpur but it could bring longer-term social costs. "While Trump's policies may not affect bilateral relations, it will certainly sway public perception, against the U.S," Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani, Malaysia analyst at BowerGroupAsia, told CNBC in anticipation of the ban on Friday. Many expect Trump's policies, perceived as unjust and discriminatory, could result in a decline of American soft power in Muslim-majority regions, which former U.S. president Barack Obama attempted to carefully rebuild in the aftermath of the Bush regime. Story continues In a statement on Sunday, the Republican leader insisted that Friday's directive was a counter-terror measure, not one aimed at religion. During his election campaign, Trump floated the idea of a ban on all Muslims entering the U.S. but political analysts told CNBC that it was unlikely such a move would be implemented because it would be counter-productive economically. Ultimately, the consequences of Friday's order for Indonesia and Malaysia depends on how Najib and Widodo react, Ahmad Fauzi Abdul Hamid, political science professor at Universiti Sains Malaysia, explained in an e-mail. If Widodo or Najib interpret the order as a broader act against Muslims, instead of one focused on U.S. national security, then all kinds of repercussions could happen, including a marked decline in travel states-side and a diminished view of America as a great power, he noted. In Malaysia, ethno-religious identities are more important than in Indonesia, where citizens tend to identify more with their nation instead, Hamid explained. So in that sense, Washington "stands to lose more in their bilateral relations with Kuala Lumpur, whose leaders are fond of whipping up religious sentiments for political mileage," he continued. Indonesia has been experiencing an ideological struggle between secular and religious politics in recent months as conservative Muslims protest against a local Christian politician. Follow CNBC International on Twitter and Facebook. Donald Trump President Donald Trump said last week that he would "absolutely do safe zones in Syria" to stem the flow of refugees into other countries. Trump is expected to ask the Pentagon and State Department to draft a plan for establishing the safe zones, so it's unclear which specific measures he would authorize. But experts warn that creating and defending safe zones inside Syria could lead to escalation and potentially drag the US into a global conflict. In the Syrian civil war, which is almost in its sixth year, the Obama administration supported Syrian rebels who opposed the regime of President Bashar Assad. But the primary US goal in Syria has been to eradicate terrorist groups like the Islamic State and Al Qaeda-affiliated factions. Then, in 2015, Russia entered the conflict to help the Assad regime. Iran, a major Assad ally, is also involved in the conflict. Establishing safe zones inside the country could therefore provoke those countries the US would need to defend the zone from external bombardment from both terrorist groups and a governing regime that has been known to indiscriminately bomb civilians. "I do think that it presents escalation risks," Melissa Dalton, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who was formerly a country director for Syria at the Department of Defense, told Business Insider. "If the US decides to pursue a safe zone, it needs to do so in the broader framework that looks at what sort of levers, what sort of coercive measures can the US bring to bear on Russia, Assad, and Iran to ensure that the safe zone is not violated and to mitigate the risks of military confrontation." It's unclear whether a safe zone would mean imposing no-fly restrictions above the territory, but protecting the airspace would most likely be necessary. And if that is the case, the US would need to be prepared to shoot down any aircraft that violates the no-fly zone a move that could lead to war. Story continues "I don't think my country is willing to risk World War III over Syria," Robert Ford, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute who was the US ambassador to Syria from 2011 to 2014, told Business Insider in June. A Syrian refugee woman walks between tents in Nizip refugee camp, near the Turkish-Syrian border in Gaziantep province, Turkey, November 30, 2016. Trump himself said in October that his then-political rival's plan for resolving the Syrian conflict, which included establishing no-fly zones and safe zones, would "lead to World War III." He used the same logic many experts are now using to express skepticism about his own plan. "What we should do is focus on ISIS. We should not be focusing on Syria," Trump told The Guardian. "You're going to end up in World War III over Syria if we listen to Hillary Clinton." He continued: "You're not fighting Syria anymore, you're fighting Syria, Russia, and Iran, all right? Russia is a nuclear country, but a country where the nukes work as opposed to other countries that talk." Russia also issued a veiled warning to the Trump administration. Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin, said in a conference call with reporters Thursday that it was important for the US to "think about the potential consequences of establishing safe zones" in Syria. Dalton explained that with Russia's involvement in the Syrian civil war, "any sort of military intervention by the US whether it's a no-fly zone or a safe zone would have to be coordinated with the Russians." Assad may also need to be involved in negotiations about a no-fly zone so that all parties in the conflict are in agreement about which areas are off-limits. "If there were terms struck with Russia and Assad such that they were supportive of the creation of this safe zone and it was far enough distance away from where extremist groups are operating such that Assad and the Russians are not going to strike in that area, perhaps the requirements for a complete no-fly zone might not be as strong," Dalton said. putin assad But the problem with this strategy is that the Assad regime considers his opposition to be entirely made up of terrorists, meaning he'd be unlikely to support a safe zone that included rebels who oppose him. "Given the marbled nature of the different groups that are present in northern Syria, it's very difficult to separate the interlaced communities that the US may deem as civilians versus what Assad and the Russians deem as a threat or extremists," Dalton said. "That then leads to the potential of escalation, whether or not the US has a strong no-fly zone in place or not." Negotiating with Assad would also most likely require concessions for his regime, which Syrians would not be happy with. Additionally, protecting the safe zone would most likely require an increased presence of US troops on the ground, and that also carries potential for escalation. "A safe zone is more than a no-fly zone," Ford, the former ambassador to Syria, said in an email Friday. "It presumably means that not only do enemy airplanes [not] drop bombs on civilians, but there is no tank/artillery shelling into the safe zone either. That means, of course, the possibility of [the US Air Force] attacking Syria/Iran-backed forces on the ground if they fire into the zone." Jim Phillips, a Middle East expert at the Heritage Foundation, told Reuters that "this essentially boils down to a willingness to go to war to protect refugees." NOW WATCH: Here's how President Obama starts every morning More From Business Insider By Tarek Amara TUNIS (Reuters) - Tunisia needs around $2.85 billion in external financing this year and plans to issue a Sukuk Islamic bond worth around $500 million to help cover the deficit, Finance Minister Lamia Zribi told Reuters on Monday. Zribi also confirmed a Reuters report that Tunis plans to sell 1 billion euros' worth of Eurobonds and hold a roadshow on Feb. 5. More Eurobond issues later in the year are possible depending on how the country's external financing needs are covered, she said. "After a delay of a few years, our plan this year is to issue $500 million to diversify our resources and cover the deficit of 2017," Zribi told Reuters on the sidelines of a government development presentation, referring to the sukuk issue. It is the first time the government has given details of the sukuk issue plan. "We are going with 1 billion euros in the European market, and we will start with the roadshow on Feb. 5," the minister said, confirming earlier reports on the initial Eurobond plan. "If we don't manage to fulfill our external financing needs of 6.5 billion dinars ($2.85 billion) then without a doubt we'll go to capital markets again this year." Since its 2011 uprising that led to a transition to democracy, Tunisia has struggled to enact economic reforms meant to curb public spending and help create jobs, while two major militant attacks in 2015 hit its tourism industry, a major source of income. A government source said last Thursday that the North African state would start a roadshow on Feb. 5 for a 1 billion Eurobond. He said the government could then go to capital markets twice more for a further 2 billion euros in total, although it was still undecided whether that would be in dollars or euros. (Writing by Patrick Markey; Editing by Hugh Lawson) By Yoshifumi Takemoto TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan is scrambling to respond to intensifying trade pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump, with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe planning to meet the head of Toyota Motor Corp this week and business lobby Keidanren planning a Trump task force. Abe will visit Washington on Feb. 10 for talks with Trump at which the U.S. leader is expected to seek quick progress toward a two-way trade deal with Japan and discuss the automotive sector. Ahead of those talks, Abe will meet with Toyota Chief Executive Akio Toyoda, two sources told Reuters. One of them said the meeting would take place on Friday. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga denied a meeting had been set for Friday, while Toyota Motor Corp declined to comment. In a phone call with Abe on Saturday, Trump reiterated his pledge to create jobs in the United States and asked that the Japanese auto industry contribute, the Nikkei business daily reported, quoting unidentified Japanese government officials. The two leaders discussed the automotive industry, senior government spokesman Koichi Hagiuda told reporters after the phone call, without giving details. A White House statement said the two "committed to deepen the bilateral trade and investment relationship". Japan needs to craft a plan to show that its firms, car makers especially, will contribute to creating U.S. jobs, a former Japanese diplomat said. "I think that is the only way forward to make the bilateral summit a success," the diplomat said. "Trump only cares about numbers. Everything has to be linked to jobs creation," he added. "Symbolically, autos is a very big player." Abe has left the door open to discussing a free trade agreement (FTA) with the United States, but some officials worry Japan would have little to gain while coming under intense pressure from Washington. Bilateral talks on specific sectors such as autos, however, are an option, officials have said. Trump, who last week dropped out of the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership pushed by his predecessor Barack Obama and favoured by Abe, has repeatedly attacked Japan's auto market as closed, in an echo of criticisms heard two decades ago. Japan has rejected that accusation, saying it does not impose tariffs on U.S. auto imports nor put up discriminatory non-tariff barriers. Over the decades, Japanese automakers have developed SUVs, mini-vans and pick-up trucks specifically targeting American consumers' taste for bigger cars, while U.S. brands have struggled to make inroads in Japan, where drivers overwhelmingly prefer domestic brands. Foreign-branded cars accounted for only 7 percent of the Japanese passenger car market, led by Germany. American brands collectively made up less than a third of 1 percent of passenger cars sold in Japan last year. TRUMP TASK FORCE Toyota has come under fire from Trump for plans, announced in 2015, to shift production of its Corolla sedan to Mexico from Canada. Earlier this month, Japan's top automaker said it would invest $10 billion in the United States over the next five years, the same as the previous five years. Toyota says it directly employed about 40,000 American workers as of December 2015, and indirectly more than 200,000 if dealers and suppliers are included. Japan's biggest business lobby Keidanren wants to beef up its information gathering and analysis of the Trump administration's policies, while also conveying data on Japan Inc's importance to the U.S. economy, a Keidanren official said. "We will create a task force, the main purpose of which is to convey correct information about the contribution of Japanese firms in the United States," said another Keidanren official, who declined to be identified because he was not authorised to speak to media. Japan's government is already trying to give Trump's administration a crash course on its companies' contribution to U.S. jobs and growth, with fact sheets showing, among other things, that Japanese companies created 839,000 jobs in America, second only to Britain. Tokyo came under harsh U.S. criticism in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when Japan accounted for up to 60 percent of the U.S. trade deficit. But now its share has shrunk to less than 10 percent, while China's has ballooned to nearly 50 percent - something Japanese officials are trying to stress to American counterparts. Automobiles and car parts account for about three-quarters of the overall Japan-U.S. trade gap, making it an easy target. Japanese media have begun reminiscing about the heated U.S.-Japan auto talks 20 years ago. A last-minute deal in June 1995 averted U.S. tariffs on Japanese luxury cars when Japan's automakers crafted "voluntary plans" to boost purchases of American auto parts and expand production in the United States. (Additional reporting by Chris Gallagher, Maki Shiraki, Kiyoshi Takenaka, Ami Miyazaki, Stanley White, Chang-Ran Kim and Tetsushi Kajimoto; Writing by Linda Sieg and Malcolm Foster; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Alex Richardson) This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Woodcrest Elementary School first-grade teacher Lynn Verdusco quickly applied what she had learned at a recent workshop to give her students new tools for understanding math concepts. On Wednesday, Verdusco and her class used elements of dance to illustrate an addition problem. Working primarily in groups of two, students applied techniques Verdusco learned at an arts integration workshop at the Midland Center for the Arts. The workshop showed teachers how to use BEST (body, energy, space and time) elements of dance to help students learn math. The students took a few moments to plan how they would illustrate 4 + 6 = ? and eagerly figured out how to depict the numerals, the plus sign, the equal sign and the answer. When each group presented its short dance to the class, most groups worked in tandem, although one pair chose to illustrate the problem individually. In most cases, the pairs of students used a combination of techniques such as body shape (some contorting themselves to look like a 6), quantity (using head, arms and feet), pathway (moving in a direction) and gesture (such as clapping) to depict the progression of a math problem. In several cases, one student would end up being a 1 and the other a 0 as they illustrated the solution to the problem. Verdusco made sure the students had a good understanding of the addition problem they had solved. Four plus six equals? she said. Ten! the students shouted back. Four plus six equals? Ten! Four plus six equals? Ten! Verdusco was one of 32 participants in Math on the Move, a recent Arts Integration workshop at MCFTA, co-sponsored by the center and Midland Public Schools. The event is part of the Partners in Education program of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. She said Wednesday she began putting what she learned into practice the day after the workshop. Ive found before that if you go to a workshop and dont immediately come back and implement it, you lose a lot, she said. A week earlier in the lobby of the MCFTA Auditorium, dancer, choreographer and Kennedy Center teaching artist Randy Barron led the assembled teachers in thinking about and then illustrating ways to use dance to teach math. What were doing is establishing a language, he said. The human body is an incredibly expressive instrument. The participants were split into several groups, each of which had to devise a dance to illustrate math concepts such as parts of a circle and the communicative property. Sure enough, the groups put across the concepts without a word instead using space, movement and their bodies to demonstrate 2 + 5 = 5 + 2 and parts of a circle including radius, diameter, arc and angles. Barron cued up music for an extra element for the brief dance pieces, and the other participants offered their opinions on both the dance elements and the clarity of the math messages. It was really clear, said one participant when assessing the communicative property piece. It was well-planned. During a break in the workshop, participants were enthusiastic about what they were learning. One teacher said she planned to implement some of the methods she had learned that very afternoon. Every time I take great ideas back to the classroom, said Adams Elementary School fifth-grade teacher Stacie Capua. It was Capuas third arts integration workshop at MCFTA, and she said the sessions are very in tune with what teachers need, and its very practical. Nicole Rahn, who teaches at Linsday and Kolb elementary schools in Bay City, said her district is emphasizing STEAM science, technology, engineering, arts and math and she was attending the workshop to learn ways to connect the A and the M. Its a big part of what were doing, she said, adding that she believes art can be a science. Siebert Elementary School first-grade teacher Kayla Lanphierd said she was excited about what she was learning. Its a great way to engage all of your class, she said. Although most of the participants were MPS teachers, the event also drew instructors from Bay City, Au Gres and Saginaw. Debbie Anderson, MCFTAs assistant director of education, said the center has gotten great feedback from teachers. Three workshops are offered each year, combining core curriculum with an art form. We try to offer a variety to hit a lot of teachers, she said. The techniques picked up at the workshops are especially effective in reaching students who may not respond as well to more traditional methods, said MPS Curriculum Specialist Scott Cochran. This type of technique reaches all types of students, he said. Some have no idea how the other half lives 11.5 percent in Midland County to be specific. More than 9,600 country residents live in poverty; about 20 percent is considered working poor, according to studies. It is easy to sit by and criticize. It is not so easy to live in the shoes of those struggling. A program designed by the Missouri Association for Community Action tried to show what it is like to be on the bottom rungs of society, economically. A poverty simulator took place recently, part of a grant from The Herbert H. and Grace A. Dow Foundation. Julia Terhune, assistant director for rural community health at Michigan State Universitys College of Human Medicine, coordinates the Rural Community Health Program out of Midland, and ran the simulation on Wednesday. The exercise is designed to show that people dont choose to be in situations that could lead to poverty; sometimes its a matter of circumstance. Participants were split into family units and given a poverty scenario to deal with. The goals are to keep the family structure intact, care for and send children to school, provide food and pay weekly bills. The simulation ran in 15-minute segments, each representing one week. So how did those participating manage? Well, some asked for help. Some were jailed. Others made tough choices food versus warmth. Others turned to crime. The simulator also showed how hardships hit those who experience other hardships, well, even harder. A theft of even a few dollars can have serious consequences. Sure, a number of families were able to navigate the simulator and come out a bit better. But as a society, we should aim to get every family possible out of these hardships. The program seems like something everyone could stand to experience one way or another. That is not to say that Midland does not have an active non-profit and volunteer community. We can always do better for those who have less and empathy is the first step. 20-year-old man launches ministry that provides homeless people with bags of food, tissues and hand sanitizer. Every week, 20-year-old Luke McAllister accompanies his dad to the grocery store in Thousand Oaks, California, where he sees homeless people in the parking lot. Luke identifies with the directionless nature of these folks because he has autism and struggles daily as a result of his condition. His autism made him more empathetic to the needy people he saw, says his mom, Dena. And his sensitive nature caused him to pursue a way to help. So, in early 2015, McAllister, then 19, launched a packet ministry, which provides homeless people with bags of food, tissues, hand sanitizerand two Bible passages that provide a message of hope and love: Isaiah 41:10 and Psalm 136:26. These individuals need to hear that God is able to help, McAllister says. Each quart-size Ziploc also includes two, $1 bills, bottled water and a note saying, This packet was prepared by Luke, a young man with autism. McAllister is mostly nonspeaking, but he communicates through typing, carefully spelling out his ideas for his ministry. When he presented these ideas in April 2015 to his 100-member congregation at Camarillo Church of Christ in Camarillo, California, they immediately embraced it. Heading up this ministry has been an empowering experience for McAllister, because where he was once perceived as the boy with the disability, hes now a proud leader with a focused mission. Its interesting because Luke has this quirk where he hates to backtrack, so if youve missed your turn while driving, he would rather not turn around, says Dena. However, if Luke spots a needy person on the other side of the street, hell insist we backtrack to give them a bag. Dena says that these packets (1,000 of which have been distributed in the first year of ministry) bridge a conversation that before may have been too awkward to initiate. Luke has shown us how to start up conversations with anyone, anywhere, says Dena. He has taught us how to communicate. Find more ways to serve your community CAMARILLO CHURCH OF CHRIST Camarillo, California This website is intended for U.S. visitors only. BLOOMINGTON When she was a teen, Joelle Charbonneau hated writing. Especially fiction, said Charbonneau. I was always worried about doing it wrong or having to find the right answer. Charbonneau is now a New York Times Best-Selling author of "The Testing," a trilogy of young adult fiction books about bright-minded teenagers chosen to help rebuild the war-stricken Earth in the future. Last week, Charbonneau visited Twin City schools to chat with junior high and high school students about finding a passion for writing and combining it with research through science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). I want them to know it doesnt matter if they dont like a certain subject at first. Dont let it limit your future, said Charbonneau. "The best fiction is based in real-life scenarios and the best stories come from research." Through a partnership with Northern Illinois University, Bloomington-Normal schools hosted Charbonneau for writing exercises, editing and revision workshops, and STEM activities related to "The Testing" story. On Friday, Charbonneau visited Parkside Junior High School in Normal where she encouraged a group of seventh-graders to think outside the box when creating a fictional universe. Revising your work is like playing, and today were going to play with a story, she said, encouraging the students to rewrite the story of Jack and Jill. Charbonneau pushed them with questions, asking if Jack and Jill were brother and sister and why they were going up a hill to fetch a pail of water. After hunching over their papers and jotting down ideas, students read their new stories aloud, with themes varying from zero-gravity universes to murder-mystery plots. This writing session really gets students asking deeper questions and developing their creativity, said Parkside librarian, Courtney Knowles. On Saturday, Charbonneau joined more than 100 students from the Pantagraph area at Bloomington High School to complete STEM activities related to her books. Students formed groups and learned exercises to reduce anxiety during testing, practiced first-aid training, worked through a puzzle box challenge and engineered a project to help them survive in a doomsday scenario, like in the book series. Gillian King-Cargile, STEM read director at NIU, helped coordinate the events with the schools and the author. Whenever we host an event like this, we look for great books and strong stories. The Testing trilogy had so many good STEM concepts, said King-Cargile. Then we look for fun and exciting games that get students excited about reading and STEM and careers that could come from them. She said many students are either interested in fiction reading or STEM, not both, but this sort of event encourages students to get swept up in all kinds of learning. Aja Martin, a BHS junior, chose to attend after she bonded with a friend in study hall over books and was given a copy of "The Testing." Aja, who enjoys writing fiction stories, said she likes the post-apocalyptic genre because its surreal. Math isnt really my thing, but its easier for me to grasp when its mixed with things I enjoy, like reading. It makes it easier and a lot more fun to me to learn, said Aja. Ian Kelly, a seventh-grader at Bloomington Junior High School, took a break from decoding a puzzle box challenge on Saturday. I always enjoy events like this with social activities, said Ian. I like things that have to do with science and math with some reading, too. At another table, Jade Bates group jumped to their feet after using math problems to decipher a tricky lock. Ive read the whole series and I really enjoyed it, said Bates, an eighth-grader at Thomas Metcalf School in Normal. I love science and reading. Im glad I found a way to combine those two. BLOOMINGTON A Bloomington man remains in McLean County jail on two charges of attempted murder following a Saturday night confrontation with a woman and her friend. Bond for Levi Gray, 36, was set at $3 million; he must post $300,035 to be released. He appeared in McLean County Circuit Court on Monday afternoon to face formal charges. McLean County States Attorney Jason Chambers said that around 8 p.m. Saturday, Gray contacted the woman, identified in court documents as Valerie Blea, and told her he had some of her property to return. He drove to the 1200 block of Zeta Street, in Bloomington's Maple Grove Estates mobile home park, where she was visiting a friend. When the defendant arrived at the residence in his minivan, (Blea) stated that he was in the drivers seat and asked her to come over to collect the property, Chambers said. When she opened the side door, the defendant got out of the van and stabbed her in the neck with a knife, which caused her to fall backwards, fracturing a vertebra. The defendant continued to swing the knife at her, cutting and stabbing her multiple times. According to Chambers, the male victim, identified in the charges as Jason Morton, then came out of the residence. Gray walked toward him and stabbed him multiple times, causing him to fall. Gray then returned to Blea, stabbed her again, took her cellphone and threw it before leaving the scene, Chambers said. Bloomington police officers arrived after receiving a 911 call from a neighbor to find both victims had lost a lot of blood, Chambers said Monday. It was later determined that Valerie had approximately seven to eight different stab wounds to different areas of her body, the most serious being a large puncture wound to her neck, Chambers said in court. Jason had a stab wound to the chest and one to the stomach that had exposed his internal organs. He remains in critical condition and unable to talk to police. Valerie told police that Levi Gray was the person who stabbed them. Police found a large knife with a fixed blade about 6 inches long near the scene, Chambers said. Also found in the road was a cellphone belonging to Blea. Grays minivan was also found near the scene. He was arrested and told officers he did not have the knife. Chambers said he had blood on his shirt and asked officers if the victims were OK. Chambers said Gray had two previous battery charges in 2009, both outside of McLean County. Gray, who did not speak during the hearing, is scheduled for arraignment at 9 a.m. Feb. 17. By Parisa Hafezi and Tim Hepher ANKARA/PARIS (Reuters) - A row over U.S. visa bans may further weaken Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's efforts to attract foreign investors to Iran, particularly if it slows the implementation of deals for Western aircraft, officials and analysts said. The deals for 80 Boeing (BA.N) jets and 100 from Europe's Airbus (AIR.PA) struck last year are seen by Western investors as a crucial test as they seek business in Iran in the wake of the nuclear deal that led to the lifting of most sanctions. People involved in the airline deals say it is too early to assess the impact of the U.S. visa ban but worry that hardening rhetoric in Tehran and Washington can only add to a list of complications that could slow, if not endanger, the jet sales. While Airbus planes come from Europe, the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump can veto the sale of all the planes to Iran because of the widespread use of U.S. parts in the aircraft which need U.S. export licences. The visa ban could also prolong a hiatus in talks about financing deliveries of jets, with European and Chinese banks reluctant to put up money to back Iranian jet purchases for fear of a backlash against their U.S. operations. "It will make people more nervous, more risk-averse, more inclined to wait and see," said a senior Western financier, who asked not to be named. Iranian officials say that even before Trump imposed restrictions on travel to the United States from seven mainly Muslim countries, concerns about what the new U.S. president might do had already put the brakes on post-sanctions business. During his election campaign, Trump criticised the nuclear accord six major powers struck with Iran and his victory in November increased uncertainty around Iran's investment drive. FINAL RULING "The process has been very slow ... foreign investors were very interested to work in Iran, but since Trump's election the process has almost stopped. Investors are worried about possible U.S. punishments if they work with Iran," a senior economy ministry official told Reuters. Story continues Final decisions on whether the plane deals go ahead may well lie with Trump and Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the ultimate broker in the country's faction-ridden politics who has the last say on key matters. Since taking office this month, Trump has largely ignored the Iranian jet deals in public, even as he lambasted U.S. aerospace firms including Boeing about other projects. For now, at least, Boeing appears comfortable that Trump won't automatically block its deal, though questions also remain over further approvals from Iran, two industry sources said. Boeing and Europe's Airbus declined comment. Still, any long-term U.S. travel curbs could also undermine the case for long-distance jets capable of linking Tehran with expatriate communities in cities such as Los Angeles. Boeing plans to start delivering its large 777 jets in 2018. IranAir has already cancelled orders for Airbus A380 superjumbos, initially meant to signal its ambitions to compete on equal terms with the hubs of Gulf rivals. Besides the Boeing and Airbus orders, state airline IranAir is planning to buy 20 small Franco-Italian ATR turboprops to help expand economic development to smaller Iranian cities. But officials say a final deal has been held up due to uncertainty over some licences for engines made by a Canadian subsidiary of Pratt & Whitney, America's top military engine maker and supplier to the colossal F-35 fighter project. Pratt & Whitney is seen to be wary of the political risks of dealing with Iran, especially with the F-35 project at the centre of Trump's criticism of aerospace firms for going over budget. A Pratt & Whitney Canada spokesman said it was, "working closely with ATR to ensure all necessary licenses are in place prior to providing any products or services". SHOWCASE FLIGHTS The renewal of Iran's unsafe, elderly fleet is also a major political battleground ahead of presidential elections in May as Rouhani's failure to boost the economy a year after the lifting of sanctions intensifies political infighting. Hardliners blame Rouhani for failing to deliver a swift improvement in domestic living standards following the nuclear deal, at a time when prices for oil exports are low and the promised foreign investment has yet to arrive. They have singled out long-range jets for particular criticism, arguing that they only benefit rich travellers. "The economy is the main factor for most of the Iranian voters ... Rouhani was hoping that the deal with major planemakers will encourage other investors to come to Iran," said political analyst Hamid Farahvashian. "That is why hardliners are mainly focussed on criticising this deal. Basically, Rouhani's political career depends on this deal." One senior Iranian official said he doubted the aircraft deals would be ditched altogether. "I don't think the deal will be cancelled because Rouhani signed it with the approval of the Supreme Leader ... but he might be forced to cancel some of the orders to save the deals," said one senior official.Others were more cautious, saying foreign investors would avoid being targeted by Trump for doing business with Iran. "This is good news for Rouhani's rivals," said another senior official, referring to the U.S. visa restrictions. For now, IranAir appears anxious is get airplanes into the country as an urgent priority ahead of May's presidential election, demonstrating tangible results from the nuclear deal. But so far, just one aircraft has been delivered: an Airbus A321, paid for in cash. It was promptly deployed widely on domestic routes in an apparent effort to showcase the benefits of the lifting of sanctions. In its first 12 days, Iran's first brand-new jet in decades covered 46,000 km (29,000 miles) between 15 cities, from the Kurdish city of Kermanshah in the West to the Shi'ite holy city of Mashhad in the northeast, according to FlightRadar24 data. (Additional reporting by Allison Lampert; editing by David Clarke) MOUNT PULASKI Mount Pulaski Courthouse State Historic Site will celebrate Abraham Lincolns birthday on Feb. 11. The event starts at noon, with an appearance by Lincoln as well as crafts, games, a scavenger hunt and apple pie with rum sauce. Cookies will be available. Lincolns friend, Mentor Graham, will speak at 1:30 p.m. The New Salem school teacher will give visitors a taste of what it was like to learn in a blab school, where students recited their lessons as a group. Children will be invited to write with a quill pen and draw pictures on a slate. Lincoln will be portrayed by Joe Woodward. Graham will be portrayed by Charles Starling, who will be greeted by Mount Pulaski resident Jeane Duff Connolley, the real-life Grahams great-great-granddaughter, and her two daughters. Mount Pulaski Courthouse Foundation cares for the building and plans special events. The site is open noon to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. Admission is free. The site is operated by the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency. Earlier today, the head of the African Union slammed Donald Trump's Muslim immigration ban, calling it "one of the greatest challenges to our unity and solidarity." The ban prevents refugees and immigrants from three AU members -- Libya, Somalia and Sudan -- from entering the US indefinitely. "The very country to which many of our people were taken as slaves during the transatlantic slave trade has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries," Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma said in her address to the AU's representatives. "What do we do about this?" A two-day summit of the AU's 53 member states in Addis Ababa, Dlamini-Zuma said their bloc was entering "very turbulent times" following Trump's election. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres also attended the AU summit and made reference to the ban. "African nations are among the world's largest and most generous hosts of refugees," he said. "African borders remain open for those in need of protection when so many borders are being closed, even in the most developed countries in the world." [h/t Reuters] photo via Youtube UPDATE 2.40pm EST: Obama has released his first statement post-presidency to encourage protests against President Trump's latest immigration policy, as well as to reject any comparison between the current administration's act and Obama's order to comprehensively screen Iraqi refugees in 2011. "With regard to comparisons to President Obama's foreign policy decisions, as we've heard before, the president fundamentally disagrees with the notion of discriminating against individuals because of their faith or religion," spokesman Kevin Lewis said. Lewis continued: "Citizens exercising their Constitutional right to assemble, organize and have their voices heard by their elected officials is exactly what we expect to see when American values are at stake." Daddy says go for it, guys. --- Amidst the global outrage in response to the Trump administration's "Muslim ban," Kellyanne Conway has defended the President and reinforced his claim that he is only following Obama's lead. To justify his executive order banning American entry and reentry from the members of seven majority-Muslim countries, the Trump-party line is, as Conway tells a TMZ reporter, "President Obama did it, now President Trump is doing it." The comparison, which is weak at best, refers to Obama's order to enhance background checks on Iraqi refugees coming into the the United States, which caused a six month delay in visa approval. This followed the discovery that two Iraqi refugees living in Kentucky constructed improvised roadside bombs back in Iraq which caused uproar in Congress. Unlike Trump, Obama's move did not ban visa applications, nor all Iraqi citizens (including green card holders) from the United States. Obama was also under significant pressure to respond to an actual threat. There have been no specific acts of aggression recently from radicalized Muslims towards the USA that the public can point to to warrant Trump's actions. When a TMZ reporter asked Conway about the Iranian director nominated for Best Foreign Film at the Oscars, Conway responded "if people have a reason to be here then they'll be here." [h/t TMZ, Chicago Tribune] Queen mother Kim Kardashian wasn't here for any of Trump's antics yesterday. In response to his executive order banning all refugees and immigrants from certain Muslim-majority countries, Kim K tweeted out statistics about "islamic terror." Without saying more than "Statistics," she shut down all Trump's claims that Muslims pose a threat to Americans. When compared to the annual fatality rate at the hands of "armed toddlers," "islamic jihadist immigrants" are barely a drop in the bucket. Kim DID THAT. Header photo via David X Prutting/BFA.com Another day, another Azealia Banks feud. I'm not exactly sure how a professional troll conducts her business, but I imagine she starts every morning reaching her hand into a large paper bag filled with celebrity names and a string of loose nouns and just takes it from there. In the last few months we've had "Russell Crowe; Hotel," "Kanye West; Inauguration," "Nicki Minaj; Butt implants," and yesterday, while the rest of the world was protesting, she pulled out "Rihanna; Muslim Ban." Sigh. It all started on Saturday, when Rihanna voiced her outrage on Twitter over Donald Trump's racist, xenophobic, unconstitutional Muslim travel ban: To which Azealia Banks, career sub-tweeter and noted Trump stan, replied: Then, in a series of since-deleted Instagram posts, Azealia criticized Rihanna for "chastising the president," calling it "stupid and pathetic": Rihanna, who never misses a good opportunity for a clap-back, responded with a photo of herself captioned "that face you make when you a immigrant," hashtagged #stayawayfromthechickens, #iheartnuggets and #saveourhens. ICYMI this is a reference to Azealia Banks' revelation that she has been ritually sacrificing chickens for brujeria purposes in her closet for the last three years. And then Azealia went ahead and accused Rihanna of having sex with people for drugs and lacing her blunts with crystal meth. Ok! This is deteriorating quickly, so in terms of Azealia Banks feuds, we're right on track. Rihanna's fandom wasted no time spamming Azealia's account with chicken emojis... Rihanna posted another photo on the 'gram, of a person with a bag made of the American flag over their head, captioned "that face you make when you screaming into an empty room." Azealia commented on this post, "You're clearly listening and responding to each and every post. These pop stars love me." Think we're done yet? Oh no no no. Not by a long shot. Rihanna then commented on stylist Fucci's post about the feud... ... and Azealia posted a video response that spends a lot of time unpacking the semantics about Rihanna's statements about saving the chickens and her love of nuggets. She then invites Rihanna uptown and tells her she'll make her some chicken nuggets. I'm lost. I bet when you opened this post, you had no idea how heavily chicken nuggets would be featured. Rihanna replied with a screen cap of texts that Azealia had sent her, in which Banks brings Beyonce into the mix (WHY) and calls Rih a "drug and sex" addict. The post, which also revealed Banks' phone number, was captioned 'weirdos' which will go down next to 'the audacity' in the museum of iconic Rihanna post comments (if we can ever get funding). Azealia reciprocated, posting Rihanna's phone number with the caption "bombs away." I need a nap. And that seems like that. The two of them disconnected their lines, deleted the phone number posts, Azealia deleted all of her posts from the feud, and Rihanna's back to posting kissy selfies. Anyway... donate to the ACLU! Splash images via Instagram Arizona parents are having their say and are closely working with lawmakers to push two mandatory laws in schools. One involves having a 50-minute mandatory recess for students and the other involves the use of sunscreen without needing a prescription or doctors' note. According to ABC15 Arizona, some parents want schools to allow the kids 50-minute recess that can be broken down into at least two or three sessions. As it is, most elementary students in Arizona enjoy a 20-minute break. Giving additional recess is left to the teacher's discretion and it's not usually observed. Mom Sandi O'Connor told the news outlet that a 20-minute recess is not enough when kids are in classes for seven hours. The children could get a burnout from school work, thus frequent breaks would be ideal so that it can help with their attention span, interest and enthusiasm for learning. Some kids also use their short recess break to play instead of eating lunch. As a result, they skip their meals altogether, which could lead to health problems in the kids. The problem, however, is that many teachers are pressured to make time adjustments as it is. Additional time for play or relaxation could rob the kids of the time that should be spent in learning. "[With] certain the Arizona Merit or the state test, they want their kids to perform their best and there's some anxiety about having the kids ready," Superintendent Quinn Kellis told the news outlet. Some parents, however, agree that the children have enough time to play at home and they are in school to study. Learn more about House Bill 2082. Meanwhile, Arizona lawmakers are also pushing to make sunscreens mandatory in school. According to AZ Central, sunscreens are currently disallowed unless it comes with a doctor's prescription. The Arizona School Boards Association confirmed sunscreen is regarded as medication in some of the schools. "This is a big issue in a state filled with 300-plus days of sunshine," Rep. Heather Carter told the news outlet. She believes that parents must also teach the kids the importance of sunscreen use and care against skin cancer. Learn more about House Bill 2134. There is harm in letting little girls play with Barbie dolls even for just one time. Experts have advised this to parents and claim the toy can have a huge impact on a girl's body image in a new study. Mattel, the maker of Barbie, however, disagrees with the study's claims. Marika Tiggemann, a professor of psychology at the Flinders University in Australia, conducted the study with her team by observing 160 kids between the ages of 5 and 8. Their findings were published in the journal Body Image. They concluded playing with Barbie dolls even for one time or just seeing its near-perfect image as thin and well-proportioned can lead to little girls thinking they should look like Barbie as well. The doll could promote that appearance is very important and that being skinny is better than being fat, Herald Sun reports. Thus, the experts are advising parents not to buy little girls below 8-years-old Barbie dolls. "If girls already have Barbies then parents should encourage them to do more than just make them look pretty," Tiggerman said, according to Daily Mail. This was not the first time researchers claim Barbie dolls affect young girls' body image. A separate team from Pennsylvania State University also conducted their own study which has also been published in the Body Image journal. This research has drawn up similar conclusions the doll is giving children an unrealistic image that being slim is better. It further cited Barbie dolls could trigger issues about body dissatisfaction that could lead to eating disorders. The researchers suggested parents should emphasize and discuss what entails having a healthy body with their little girls so that they can develop good body image concepts. Mattel isn't buying the study's claims though. The company cited they have regular conversations with parents and kids from around the world regarding their iconic product. Mattel's global insights VP Dr. Michael Shore told Herald Sun they have parents telling them of the positive impact of Barbie dolls on their girls because the toy sparks their imagination and creativity. Even so, Barbie has evolved over the years with different designs, looks and body types for the doll, including a Curvy Barbie, BBC reports. Free college tuition has been an important topic during the elections in 2016 and it looks like some states are going ahead with its plans to provide this for its constituents. Lawmakers from Kentucky, Rhode Island and New York have laid down their proposals, which are already in discussion with other state officials. In Kentucky, lawmakers filed the Work Ready Kentucky Scholarship Program, which will give state scholarships to students who enroll in courses that are considered in demand. These are advanced manufacturing, business services/IT, construction, health care and transportation/logistics. The Kentucky free college tuition is expected to take effect in the upcoming 2017-2018 school year. The state will determine what schools are eligible and there is an expiration condition to the scholarship as well, according to Courier-Journal. In Rhode Island, a proposal has been filed to provide free college tuition for two years for students who will attend either the Community College of Rhode Island, the University of Rhode Island or Rhode Island College. The scholarship will not, however, cover dormitory or room and board fees, and it will only cover two years of a 4-year-degree course, ABC News reports. Gov. Gina Raimondo is hoping the proposal will get the signatures it needs from the legislature. If this happens, the state will be the first to provide free college tuition in the country. In New York, Gov. Andrew Cuomo also passed a similar bill to help middle-class families avail of free college tuition for four years, minus dormitory room and board accommodations. The proposal will consider income caps beginning with an annual income of less than $100,000 a year, according to Yahoo Finance. These free college tuition proposals, however, are receiving criticisms and oppositions, PJ Media reports. Some are questioning where the state will get funding for this proposals if approved. Others believe these states must instead focus spending on improving the elementary and secondary schools system to help the kids become college-ready. Activists are still protesting against the Education secretary nominee, Betsy DeVos. They believe she is not fit for the position. The possible changes that she plans in theTrump administration have also been recently revealed. Huffington Post reported teachers from Fairfax County decided to make a move against the Trump administration and DeVos. They set up an event regarding a protest via Facebook and a few days after, 2,000 people said they will be going to the protest. The protest was planned to take place in Washington last Sunday. "We are gathering as teachers, students, parents, and stakeholders in our society to oppose Betsy DeVos as Secretary of Education," the event's description cited. Many have opposed DeVos being the Secretary of Education but the protests against her increased in number after her confirmation hearing last week before the Senate. Another group called Credo Action put up an online petition against DeVos. Credo Action is a progressive social change network and said they never had the same amount of response in the past compared to what they have now against DeVos. The petition, which claims DeVos is not qualified for the education department, received more than 1.4 million signatures and called on Senate Democrats to block the confirmation of DeVos. Despite the opposition, many Republicans and Democrats support DeVos. She spent many years as an education activist supporting charter schools and voucher programs. After Donald Trump announced DeVos is his pick for the Department of Education, many believed she would be destroying the public school system. She denied the issue saying she wants poor children to have educational options like those who have higher income. Michigan Live reported about the possible changes DeVos will make when it comes to education. It is believed she will pursue early childhood education reforms, university laundry machines, student loan recovery service, school employee retirement benefits and digital books. The senate is set to vote on DeVos this Tuesday. Democrats in the HELP committee claimed they will not be voting for her. A toddler went missing in Anderson, South Carolina and the boy's mother was arrested and charged. Authorities have filed a case of unlawful neglect of a child against her. The mother was identified as 25-year-old Heather Knight. Her son, Devon Burton, went missing on Friday after his mom left the boy unattended in their home at around 3 a.m. Knight, who lives with her father, did not tell him she was stepping out of the house. The 2-year-old boy then wandered off and went missing. Knight later told police that she went to get cigarettes. If Knight would be found guilty, she could face up to 10 years behind bars. Her bail was set at $50,000 and her first day in court is scheduled on March 3 at 9 a.m. This is not the first time Knight faced charges as she was cited in the past, Independent Mail reported. She was charged with the same offense in 2011 over her daughter, who has since been taken away from her because of drug usage at that time. Devon was found hours after he was first reported missing. The boy was located in a parked car on Hudgens Street in Anderson, a few blocks away from their home. Police also searched the residence after they found a glass pipe used to smoke illegal narcotics and five spray paint cans, two of which were empty. These were all found inside the bedroom of the toddler. WSPA.com reported Knight told the judge she is not using drugs and would submit to physical testing in order to prove it. She said she wants her child back, who is now in the custody of his uncle. The uncle of the child claims the father of Devon, Randolph Burton, was the reason why the child went missing. The uncle said Randolph took him from their home without any notice. It is unclear if this is what happened. Officials are still looking for Randolph to confirm this allegation. Other witnesses also said the boy was seen getting out of a car. Others claimed he was seen wandering around the area before he was found. The investigation is ongoing. It's being reported today that Lake County authorities have arrested a third out-of-state resident in connection with attempts to use another's identity to make purchases at the Apple store in Deer Park. The Chicago based Daily Herald reports that "John Michael Johnson, 18, of Ferndale, Michigan, was arrested at the store at 7 p.m. Saturday, on felony charges of identity theft and burglary. He was in custody Sunday at the Lake County jail on $100,000 bail, pending a scheduled court appearance Wednesday Johnson's arrest comes one day after sheriff's deputies arrested Alexander J. Soto, 25, of Yonkers, New York, and Diamand D. Reid, 22, of Roseville, Michigan, on burglary and identity theft charges alleging they used phony identities to make purchases at the store. Both also were being held at the county jail, on $70,000 and $60,000 bail, respectively. Investigators are trying to determine whether the three arrested over the weekend are linked to a New York-based criminal enterprise targeting Apple stores in the Chicago area. In July, the sheriff's office arrested seven New York residents accused of committing high-value thefts at Apple stores. Last month another gang related robbery took place at the Palo Alto Apple Store where individuals crashed a car through the window of the store to get at Apple merchandise. Another was caught on video in San Francisco as noted below. And in November there were a rash of robberies at the Apple Store in Berkeley. About Making Comments on our Site: Patently Apple reserves the right to post, dismiss or edit any comments. Those using abusive language or behavior will result in being blacklisted on Disqus. For roughly 2.5 hours, Shabir Ally and a mean-spirited Mormon hack who goes under the name of Daniel C. Peterson discuss The Concept of God in Mormonism and Islam in this videotaped discussion: https://www.youtube.com/shared?ci=n9T7E9lZdkU Honestly, I dont think that I knew that this video even existed, so Im grateful to Matthew Wheeler for calling it to my attention. It was obviously filmed a few years ago, since Im visibly less debonair and handsome in it than I am now. I remember this experience quite sharply. It was sponsored by the Muslim Students Association at Idaho State University, in Pocatello. It was supposed to be a friendly dialogue about common ground, of the kind in which Ive participated several times both before and since. (They had invited Elder Jeffrey Holland to represent the Latter-day Saints he was a member of the Seventy at the time, not yet in the Twelve but he had suggested my name, instead.) As the event drew closer, I began to wonder about it. I was picking up subtle vibes that it might not be as friendly as I had hoped. And my suspicions were confirmed when, entering the hall where the event was to take place, I saw a whole table of Muslim-produced anti-Mormon pamphlets. They werent very good, and I remember thinking to myself that the Muslims who wrote them could have profited by learning a few tricks of the anti-Mormon trade from our more experienced Evangelical friends. Youll note, early in my opening statement, my declaration that I didnt intend the evening to be a debate. That was an attempt to indicate that I hadnt been invited to a debate, and that I didnt want one. My comment had no effect, however. As I say, I had anticipated a nice little interfaith conversation, but I soon scrapped any notes I had for that kind of a meeting. My interlocutor, Shabir Ally, had come from Toronto to argue, and he was loaded for bear. His principal avenue of attack, as I recall I havent yet watched this video, and, frankly, it may take me a while to bring myself to do so was against the deity of Christ, a topic for which I hadnt planned or prepared. (I had to improvise all evening.) He had even brought with him a series of images showing pages from the specifically LDS edition of the King James Bible, for projection on a screen. One funny aspect of the event was that, although there are many Mormons in Pocatello, there were few in the fairly large audience that night. The LDS Institute director at Idaho State had apologized to me over an early dinner, saying that they were having a big event that evening for all of the LDS students. Theyd planned it for a year. So the audience that night was heavily Muslim, with quite a few Evangelicals joining them along with maybe two or three of my former students. The organizer for the event was a Muslim physician at a hospital in Rexburg. Hes the one who does the Muslim invocation at the beginning of the video. I thought, once it became clear that night that I was defending the divinity of Christ from attack, that the Evangelicals in the audience might (at least temporarily) come over to my side. But, so far as I could see, their hostility toward Mormonism was too strong to permit them to support me. It was a very long evening. It seemed much longer than 2.5 hours. Afterwards, the ISU grad student who was the president of the Muslim Students Association took me aside and apologized for the ambush (his word). He said that he had expected a cordial interfaith meeting, and that the Rexburg physician had turned the gathering in a direction that he himself strongly regretted and hadnt expected. Thats what it comes down to, ultimately. There are about 12.5 million Syrian refugees, according to SyrianRefugees.eu: According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), 4.8 million have fled to Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt and Iraq, and 6.6 million are internally displaced within Syria. Meanwhile about one million have requested asylum to Europe. For context, the prewar population of Syria was about 23 million. In 2016, the US resettled 0.1% of this total into the United States. 12,587 to be precise. Clearly, refugee resettlement is not the solution to the refugee crisis, and, in fact, Trump has proposed safe zones within Syria. Reportedly, that was even discussed as a potential part of Fridays executive order, but it was withdrawn, and for pretty much the reasons youd expect. As The American Interest wrote: The dangers of such a policy are clear. For one, the imposition of a no-fly zone in a theatre frequented by Russian and Syrian aircraft clearly raises the risk of a deadly confrontation. And even if Trump could get Russia on board, refugees would be loath to trust assurances from Moscow after its long history of violating ceasefires and targeting civilians. The Defense Department, meanwhile, has already been down this road under President Obama, who rejected a safe zone near the Turkish border after the Pentagon estimated that it would require 30,000 U.S. troops on the ground. If anything, those estimates are conservative; an expanded safe zone could easily demand a more extensive troop commitment while gobbling up defense dollars with no end in sight. So, readers, what responsibility, what role does America have? Image: By Voice of America News: Henry Ridgwell on Turkish border, Refugees Flee Aleppo; Hot, Barren Turkish Camps Await. [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons On a mild Monday in November, 2015, Mike Pence, then a Republican governor, abruptly banned Syrian refugees from Indiana. Indiana has a long tradition of opening our arms and homes to refugees from around the world but, as governor, my first responsibility is to ensure the safety and security of all Hoosiers, Pence said in a statement. He said he was directing all state agencies to stop resettling Syrian refugees in Indiana until the federal government can provide assurances that proper security measures are in place. There was a mad scramble after this announcement, and a Syrian refugee family initially slated for settlement in IndianaAbdullah, Fatema, and their 5-year-old sonhad to be rerouted to Connecticut when they arrived the following Wednesday. The family had already learned about Indiana and made contacts there; all of the arrangements had been made. Being rejected by Pence and having their plans appended was difficult for the family. It broke our hearts, Fatema said later. By the end of the week, nearly every other Republican governor had also made statements barring Syrian refugees from their states, twenty-nine in all. Only one Democratic governor did the same. That same week, the House passed a bill blocking Syrian refugees. This bill was proposed by Republican leaders, and received near-unanimous support from Republicans in Congress. I bring this all up because Im concerned that Trumps executive order of last Fridaybanning Syrian refugees and barring individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S.is being seen as a Trump thing rather than as the thoroughly Republican thing that it is. Ive seen numerous people in my extended friend circles suggest that the Republicans should be speaking up, opposing Trump, as though this was Trumps idea and Trumps alone. Ive even seen self-identified Republicans saying this. I feel the need to set the record straight. When Trump first called for barring all Muslims from traveling to the U.S. in December 2015, its absolutely true that Pence spoke up against the suggestion: Text of tweet by @GovPenceIN: Calls to ben Muslims from entering the U.S. are offensive and unconstitutional. By opposing a proposed ban on Muslims Pence could look like the good guy, the reasonable person, less than a month after banning Syrian immigrants from his own state. He was so successful in pulling this off, in fact, that some newspapers are scrambling to understand how Pence could go from that tweet to nodding and clapping as Trump signed his executive order on Friday. Its not hard to understand, though, when you look at the wording Pence used in his tweet and bear in mind his own executive action barring Syrian refugees from Indiana a month before. Ever since Friday, conservatives have been arguing that the immigration restrictions Trump signed on Friday are not a Muslim ban. After all, non-Muslims from the seven targeted countries are also barred from entering the U.S., and Muslims from countries not on the list are not banned. This is extremely convenient for Republicans. It is why Paul Ryan was able to look noble and heroic in speaking out against Trumps call for a Muslim ban last year, while supporting Trumps executive order today. Text of tweet by @SpeakerRyan: A religious test for entering our country is not reflective of Americas fundamental values. I reject it. Today, Ryans office is telling reporters that this is not a Muslim ban. Speaker Paul Ryans (R-Wis.) office said Saturday that President Trumps executive order limiting immigration from several Muslim-majority countries does not target Muslims. This is not a religious test and it is not a ban on people of any religion, AshLee Strong told The Washington Post. In calling for a ban on all Muslim immigration to the U.S., Trump handed the Republicans a gift. He gave even individuals like Pence, who had just barred Syrian refugees from their own jurisdictions, the opportunity to look fair, just, and open-minded by speaking out against the proposal. And then, today, Trump signing into action a less-extreme restriction allows Republicans to both argue that this is not a Muslim ban and deflect criticism onto Trumpafter all, the whole Muslim ban thing was his idea to begin with, so this, too, must be on him. Lets be clear here: Trumps executive order is a Republican thing. In fact, it may be more a Republican thing than it is a Trump thingafter all, his initial proposal was to ban all Muslims from entering the country; someone, perhaps even Pence himself, at some point suggested a way for him to design an executive order such that it would pass constitutional muster. Furthermore, top Republican politicians who decried Trumps call for a Muslim ban are now supporting his executive order. As much as Id love to imagine theres a Republican majority in Congress thats going to step forward and stop Trump, we need to face the factsthere isnt. For all their protestations over Trumps candidacy last year, Trumps positions tend to be standard Republican positions. And letting Trump enact policies that are widely unpopular so that they dont have to do so themselves and take the blame directly? Its damned convenient, really. It may be useful to think of the Republicans opposition to Trumps candidacy last year as some combination of anger at an outsider for stepping on their turf, and concern that in advocating standard Republican policies without the softening language Republicans tend to cloak them in, Trump would turn people against the party as a whole. Sometimes Trump gets a little ahead of thingssuch as proposing that we ban all Muslims from entering the countrybut the Republicans are there to help make adjustments, so helpful, as in the case of Fridays executive order. This ban? This is the Republican Party. This is who they are in 2017. I have a Patreon! Please support my writing! Patna: Noted computer scientist Vijay P Bhatkar who was appointed the new Chancellor of Nalanda International University (NIU) following the resignation of former Singapore minister George Yeo, ruffled a few feathers on Sunday when he said that the Nitish government had done 'some good work, particularly when it was part of the NDA government'. During a media interview, Bhatkar, who is credited with developing the first 'supercomputer' of India named 'Param' in 1991, while responding to a question whether he had ever been to Bihar, said that he was in Patna in 2005 though he could not visit Nalanda due to time constraints. "However, I believe the Nitish government has done some very good works, particularly when the Chief Minister was part of the NDA government," Bhatkar, who once led the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) science wing Vigyan Bharati, said. His open praise for the NDA government in Bihar is apparently not flying well with the Grand Alliance members including Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and Congress who, sources said, are seeking to hold a talk with Chief Minister Nitish Kumar in an attempt to block the appointment of Bhatkar. "I will do my best to make the dream of President of India late APJ Abdul Kalam come true. It was he who first came up with the idea of reviving the ancient Nalanda University in Bihar and I intend to turn it into a world class university to fulfill his vision," Bhatkar, a recipient of Padmashree and Padma Vibhushan Awards, said. Earlier on Friday, President Pranab Mukherjee, who also happens to be the Nalanda International University Visitor, had appointed Bhatkar as the new Chancellor of the university following the resignation of George Yeo who quit from his post nearly six weeks ago after complaining about lack of autonomy in the university. News and commentary on organized crime, street crime, white collar crime, cyber crime, sex crime, crime fiction, crime prevention, espionage and terrorism. Iran Retaliates With Entry Ban on US Citizens as Controversy Swirls 01/30/17 Source: VOA Iran says it will ban all U.S. citizens from entering the Islamic republic, in response to U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order limiting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries. In a statement Saturday, Iran's Foreign Ministry directly linked its ban to Trump's order, which Tehran called "an obvious insult to the Islamic world." The statement predicted that Trump's order "will be recorded in history as a big gift to extremists and their supporters." Tehran further cautioned that the U.S. ban, set Friday by Trump at 120 days, would not make America safer. The ministry also said its retaliatory measures would remain in place until the U.S. restrictions were lifted. The Iranian reaction was the first official response from any of the seven Muslim-majority nations named in Trump's ban. The other six countries are Iraq, Libya, Syria, Sudan, Yemen and Somalia. Trump's order suspends entry to the United States of all refugees for four months and bars Syrian refugees indefinitely. It also blocks green-card holders from the seven countries from re-entering U.S. territory, while directing U.S. agencies to fast-track entry procedures from minority Christians in those countries. The White House said the "extreme vetting" measures would protect the U.S. "from foreign nationals entering from countries compromised by terrorism." Iranian boy, 5 reunited with his mother after being held for hours at Washington DC airport (source: Daily Mail, UK) Reports spark criticism, praise Hours after Trump's decree, news outlets began reporting from U.S. airports on individuals directly affected by Trump's ban, including the case of an Iraqi national who worked as a translator for the U.S. Army after American forces invaded Iraq in 2003. Hameed Khalid Darweesh, who like many other U.S. contractors was eventually allowed safe haven in the United States, was detained overnight Friday along with another Iraqi national at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport. Hours later, lawyers filed an emergency motion that gained Darweesh's release, while the other refugee remained in detention. "What I do for this country? They put handcuffs on," Darweesh said. "You know how many [U.S.] soldiers I touch by this hand?" Darweesh's lawyers also filed emergency motions to extend the lawsuit on behalf of their client to include all refugees found to have been detained at U.S. airports since Trump issued his order late Friday. The New York Times quoted airport security officials as saying nine travelers had been detained by midday Saturday at Kennedy's Terminal 7. Two others were in reported in custody at Terminal 4, sparking small, peaceful protests at the huge facility. Elsewhere, security officials in Cairo said an Iraqi family of five had been barred from boarding a flight for New York, while Qatar Airways warned U.S.-bound travelers they would need a diplomatic visa or other official documentation before boarding U.S. flights. Authorities said a sixth U.S.-bound migrant, identified as a Yemeni national, had left the airport and returned to the capital. Others responded to the ban with praise, including far-right Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders, who tweeted that the ban "is the only way to stay safe." In New York, Kathleen Ganci, whose firefighter husband was killed in the 2001 World Trade Center attacks, told The New York Times, "I don't care how difficult [the ban] makes it for these people to come over. I don't want other Americans to go through what I did - because we have to care for our own first, before we care for others." A protester holding a sign against Trump's Muslim ban (source: Social Media) ACLU rips decree Anthony Romero, the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, said Trump's order violated the U.S. Constitution's ban on religious discrimination because it barred immigration from Muslim-majority countries. " 'Extreme vetting' is just a euphemism for discriminating against Muslims," he said. For its part, the U.S. State Department said Saturday that it was working to put the executive order into effect, telling VOA the "safety and security of the American people always comes first." "We take seriously our responsibility to safeguard the American public while remaining committed to assisting the world's most vulnerable people," acting State Department spokesman Mark Toner said. Adding to confusion surrounding the decree, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security told Reuters green-card holders would eventually be included in the ban. But spokeswoman Gillian Christensen did not provide details. On Capitol Hill, the leading Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee, Representative Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, called the refugee ban "shameful" and said it "does nothing to enhance homeland security." He also warned that the ban would have a "destabilizing effect on our relationship with our allies and partners in the fight against terrorism." Renowned Iranian Filmmaker To Skip Oscar Awards After U.S. Immigration Order (cartoon by Jalal Hajizadeh, Iranian daily Ghanoon) Trump defends order The president said Friday that only people who support the United States should be allowed into the country. The executive order he signed discussed identification and verification procedures that U.S. consular officers should use in extensive detail. "We don't want them here," Trump said. "We want to make sure that we are not admitting into our country the very threats our soldiers are fighting overseas. We only want to admit those into our country who will support our country and love deeply our people." Trump had pledged during his campaign for the presidency that, if elected, he would temporarily suspend refugee and immigration programs from countries or regions with a "proven history of terrorism" against the U.S. or its allies. cartoon by Firoozeh Mozaffari, Iranian daily Etemad Related Stories: "I Had Done Everything Right": Iranian Scientist, Set To Begin Funded Research At Harvard Medical School, Turned Away At Gate - The Intellectualist Emotional video shows Iranian boy, 5, finally reuniting with his mother after being held for hours at Washington DC airport following Trump's immigrant ban - Daily Mail, UK Metro Vancouver Persian community reacts to new Trump travel ban - CBC, Canada Residents of Los Angeles' Little Persia denounce Trump's 'unjust' travel ban - Guardian Trump's immigration ban stranded a scientist with no job and no home - The Verge Crystal Lake doctor with American, Iranian citizenship held for questioning at O'Hare -Chicago Tribune Trump's Immigration Ban Is Already Harming American Science - The Atlantic 20 Nobel laureates, thousands of academics sign protest of Trump immigration order - Washington Post mSecure password manager review TechRadar Pro Updated In our mSecure password manager review, we take an in-depth look at this password manager to help you decide if its the most secure way to handle your sensitive data. Dropbox kicked off its 2017 product launches with a pair of major announcements Monday aimed at improving users productivity at work. The cloud storage company announced the general availability of its Paper document collaboration service, along with the closed beta of a Smart Sync feature that gives users easy access to every file shared with them in Dropbox. Paper, first announced in 2015, gives users a shared workspace to work with one another on documents. Its designed to be the product people use for collaborative tasks like brainstorming and taking meeting notes. Dropbox A screenshot shows how Smart Sync looks in the MacOS Finder. Smart Sync is the official name for a feature that Dropbox unveiled last year as Project Infinite. The idea behind it is simple: users store more files in Dropbox than they want to sync to each individual computer they work with. Rather than requiring them to use the storage services web interface, Smart Sync shows users placeholder versions of those files in the MacOS Finder or Windows Explorer. When a user goes to open a file thats not stored locally, its downloaded from Dropboxs servers. Mondays announcements are part of Dropboxs overall push to make its product more useful and appealing to business users, as it competes in the crowded cloud storage market. Dropbox Paper Rob Baesman, the head of product at Dropbox, said in an interview that the company thinks people will reach for Paper as a tool to help collate information from different sources and kick-start their process of working on an idea. We see Paper really being this place to allow teams to collaborate across all their information, he said in an interview. When we look at the challenges many of our customers are facing, we see so much information fragmentation and it being difficult [for them] to not only locate but collaborate across all these different sources. Baesman said that Paper isnt meant to replace a traditional productivity suite like Microsoft Office or Google Drive. Instead, he sees it as a starting point for a lifecycle of ideas that includes other applications. Dropbox A screenshot shows enhancement to Dropbox Papers task management functionality, including support for assigning tasks and due dates. To that end, Dropbox launched new task management functionality in Paper that makes it easy for users to assign people to tasks and set due dates for them, all within a Paper document. Dropbox isnt the only storage company pushing a live document collaboration service to its users. Last week, Box unveiled a new standalone version of Notes, which offers much of the same functionality Paper does. Whats still largely untested is whether the vision of a collaboration product like Paper will actually prove commercially successful. It may be challenging for these companies to unseat traditional productivity systems. However, Dropbox says it already has several customers who began relying on the service while it was in beta, like InVision, Shopify and Getaround. Smart Sync Right now, Smart Sync is only available to Dropbox Business customers through the companys Early Adopter Program. It makes sense for Business users, since theyre likely to share files with other people inside an organization that dont require constant access. The new feature dovetails well with Dropbox Businesss existing Team Folders functionality, which lets administrators set up shared folders that multiple people have access to. Syncing a massive team folder down to each users computer would take a lot of hard drive space, and Smart Sync means that people can easily see files without all of the storage space concerns. While its a useful feature, Smart Sync is not without controversy. In order to provide that functionality on the Mac, Dropbox needs to use a kernel extension that could potentially cause performance or security issues. The company argues that it has battle-tested Smart Sync internally, and it shouldnt cause problems. IT managers, however, will be able to control whether or not their organizations opt in to Smart Sync. So, if for whatever reason, in your business, youre not sure about that level of functionality, you can turn it off, Baesman said. And, no problem, Dropbox will continue to work the way it always had, without Smart Sync. At launch, Smart Sync will be available for users running MacOS 10.9 and Windows 7. Baesman refused to provide a technical explanation for why the feature was being kept to only business users at this point. He did say that Dropbox is evaluating what to do about bringing Smart Sync to consumers, but that the company isnt announcing anything about its plans at this point. WhatsApps privacy policy change allowing Facebook to target advertising at its users has landed the company in a German court. The Federation of German Consumer Organizations (VZBZ) has filed suit against WhatsApp in the Berlin regional court, alleging that the company collects and stores data illegally and passes it on to Facebook, the federation said Monday. Facebook acquired WhatsApp in October 2014, but it wasnt until August 2016 that WhatsApp said it would modify its privacy policy to allow it to share lists of users contacts with Facebook. The move made it possible to match WhatsApp accounts with Facebook ones where users had registered a phone number, giving the parent company more data with which to make new friend suggestions and another way to target advertising. Of particular concern to VZBZ is the way that WhatsApp transfers numbers from its users contacts lists to Facebook even when those numbers are not WhatsApp users. The federation wants the companies to stop transferring such information, and to delete any already transferred. It is also objecting to eight clauses in WhatsApps revised terms of use, including one allowing WhatsApp to provide users with advertising materials from the rest of Facebook without their consent. The policy changes have also landed WhatsApp in hot water elsewhere. Within days, privacy campaigners including the Electronic Privacy Information Center and the Center for Digital Democracy complained to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, accusing the companies of unfair and deceptive trade practices. The city of Hamburg was first to rule against the companies, ordering Facebook in September to stop collecting data about WhatsApp users and to delete any data it had already gathered. In October, European Union privacy watchdogs asked the companies to end the data transfers while they investigated whether they needed additional user consent to comply with EU privacy laws. The following month, the U.K.s Information Commissioner said the company had agreed to stop the data sharing until it had obtained users consent. Theres even concern that the data transfer may have breached antitrust law. In December the European Commission said it was investigating concerns that Facebook had intentionally or negligently submitted incorrect or misleading information to antitrust regulators in the run-up to its acquisition of WhatsApp. Back then, the company told regulators that the phone number matching now being done could not be performed reliably. If the Commission concludes regulators were misled, it could fine the company 1 percent of worldwide revenue. Windows Cloud: That name has appeared in system files deep within some of the most recent Windows 10 Insider builds. While a few experts guess it could be a new version of Windows, what it actually is remains a mystery. As far as evidence goes, its pretty slim pickings. Two names, Windows Cloud and Windows Cloud N, appear in a list of Windows versions as early as the recent Windows 10 Insider Build 15002, as originally reported by the Walking Cat Twitter account. (The N designation likely refers to a version specifically designed for European countries.) ZDNets Mary Jo Foley, however,unearthed one other key bit of information: Instead of an operating system that lives in the cloud, as the name suggests, Windows Cloud is actually an operating system that can only run Microsofts own UWP apps, downloaded from the Windows Store. Foley draws the obvious conclusion: Windows Cloud is essentially the second coming of Microsofts unpopular Windows RT. The Walking Cat The Windows Cloud smoking gun, as discovered by Walking Cat. Windows RT was the operating system that powered the original Surface tablet as well as the Surface 2. Users criticized it for its inability to run anything but a limited number of apps directly from the Store. (At the time, Microsofts universal apps were in their infancy, while the vast majority of Windows applications were coded for the Win32 environment.) Though Windows RT had its fans, most customers quickly turned to the more advanced, Windows 8-powered Surface Pro tablets, and the Surface 2 quietly died in 2015. Windows Cloud, though, may actually prove to be useful in specific applications, including schools. Foley reasons that Microsoft developed Windows Cloud to fend off the wave of Chromebooks sweeping across schools. Over half of American classrooms use Chromebooks, according to a Futuresource study released last fall, and their simplicity has made them attractive to school administrators. That hasnt gone down well with Microsoft, which is working to recapture the classroom for Windows. Microsoft believes that its recent Intune for Education device and app management software is an important part of that. Further locking down those PCs with a dedicated OS would make a Windows 10 PC even more attractive, while offering digital inking and other features that Chromebooks lack. Microsoft has already indicated that a partnership between itself and Qualcomm will allow Windows 10 (and Win32) apps to run on Qualcomms ARM chipsthe processor that some Chromebooks already run on. One might think that Windows Cloud might be the name of the new, Windows on ARM OSbut if Microsoft plans to lock it down to UWP apps, then its Win32 compatibility would be effectively nullified. So is Windows Cloud actually Microsofts bid to take over the classroom? Microsoft declined to comment, so well have to wait and see. Why this matters: Because consumers soundly rejected Windows RT, it stands to reason that Windows Cloud will be a pretty niche offeringassuming all the reporting about Windows Cloud is accurate, of course. One thing to keep in mind: While we all value Windows complexity for general-purpose computing, the capability to lock it down to a single app or focus can be extremely useful. Thats why several versions of Windows offer kiosk mode, where Windows 10 can be locked down to a single app. The new Intune locks down Internet access during test mode. It sounds like Windows Cloud might offer just a bit more flexibility while still maintaining control. Updated on Feb. 1 with additional details. Southern Californias air quality agency is poised to approve a 15-year air cleanup plan that contains no emissions limits for the ports, rail yards or warehouse complexes that attract large numbers of ships, locomotives and big rig trucks. Those vehicles are among the regions greatest source of harmful emissions. But officials with the South Coast Air Quality Management say now is the time to seek cooperation from industry, not impose restrictions. Instead of rule-making, Wayne Nastri, the South Coast Air Quality Management Districts executive officer, said he first wants to determine what reductions the cargo-handing industries are willing to make on their own. Lets work voluntarily, Nastri said at the Jan. 6. meeting of the air districts governing board in Diamond Bar. Lets see what commitments we can get. As long as we are making progress, and we can demonstrate progress, all of the parties will be satisfied. Breathing bad air by The Press-Enterprise / pressenterprise.com on Scribd The regional cleanup plan is up for approval Feb. 3. Its emission-reduction goals for ports, rail yards or warehouse complexes all are listed as TBA, an acronym meaning to be determined. Philip Fine, the air districts deputy executive officer, said air district officials will work with industry and other affected parties for a year, and if no meaningful and enforceable reductions can be agreed to, the air district will then switch to a rule-making mode. The air district regulates air pollution in Orange County, and the urban portions of Los Angeles, Riverside, and San Bernardino counties. Nastri was hired last year after Republicans gained a majority on the governing board and sought a business-friendly approach to air pollution regulation. They lost that majority this month with the appointment of liberal Democrat Shelia Kuehl, a Los Angeles County supervisor, to the board. While the volunteer strategy is applauded by port and logistics industry officials, environmental groups argue the district is abrogating its responsibility to protect the health of millions of people. We need to make this industry clean up, said Adrian Martinez, a Los Angeles-based attorney for Earthjustice, which does legal work for the Sierra Club and other environmental groups. The longer we wait, it just means more people getting sick and dying from air pollution Ships, locomotives, and trucks are major sources of smog-forming nitrogen oxides, as well as soot, a toxic component of fine-particle pollution. Nitrogen oxides react with other pollutants to form lung-searing ozone. Last year, Southern Californias air basin failed to meet the federal health standard for ozone during 116 days. The region also failed to meet a 2015 federal deadline to bring diesel soot and other fine-particle pollution down to healthful levels. And people living near the ports, rail yards and warehousing centers get higher exposure to particle air pollution, and thus have higher risk for cancer and other health problems, studies have shown. But Port of Long Beach official Rick Cameron said he expects more emissions reductions under Nastris approach, because it would prevent potential lawsuits and other battles between the air district and the industry. The ports would enter talks in good faith, said Cameron, the Long Beach ports managing director of planning and environmental affairs. We are committed to doing our part, and we have always been, he said. Long Beach and Los Angeles ports, he said, met pollution reduction goals in the 2006 San Pedro Bay Clean Air Action Plan. Diesel soot emissions at ports have dropped by 80 percent due to rules requiring newer trucks at ports, among other measures. Generally speaking, state and federal agencies have legal jurisdiction over emissions from moving sources, such as boats, locomotives, and trucks, while the air district regulates stationary sources, such as factory smokestacks. Yet air district officials have said for years they have the authority to impose what they call indirect source rules for facilities that handle, transfer or store cargo to reduce pollution at warehouses and ports. Such rules could require limits on vehicle idling, fees based on cargo volume or facility size, the use of zero-emission cranes, forklifts, and other types of on-site equipment, charging stations for electric vehicles and electrical plugs for refrigerated trailers so engines dont have to idle to keep perishable goods cool. Yet, such rules could spur legal challenges, said Fine, the air district official. In 2007, a federal judge shot down an air district rule that would have limited locomotive idling in rail yards. U.S. District Court Judge John F. Walter found it was pre-empted by federal regulations that protect the free flow of interstate commerce. John Husing, an economist and warehouse-industry consultant, opposes air district rules for warehouse complexes, saying they would curtail job growth in Inland Southern Californias logistics industry. Such rules would cross a line in the sand and trespass on the land-use authority of cities and counties and thus usurp that local planning process, Husing said. Such rules would be staunchly opposed by industry and local government. Joseph Lyou, an air district board member and president and CEO of the Coalition for Clean Air, said he wants the air boards plan to do more to address pollution associated with ports, rail yards and warehouses. The 462-page air pollution plan fails to quantify any pollution reduction goals for these facilities, he pointed out. Another table in an appendix of the plan, however, projects a 14 percent increase in smog-forming nitrogen oxides from the ports by 2022. The lack of pollution-reduction goals is significant because once the cleanup plan is approved by state and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the goals become enforceable through lawsuits under the federal Clean Air Act. With no stated goals, citizens dont have the option of going to court to make the air district accountable for the reductions, said Lyou, who was appointed to the air board by former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Contact the writer: 951-368-9471 or ddanelski@scng.com Gone are the World War II-era Quonset buildings and 1950s former produce loading dock structure in Bannings city yard. In their place, a new, 20,000-square-foot warehouse will be used for equipment protection and supply storage. City officials and employees celebrated the $3.9 million makeover last week with tours, a slide show history and lunch at the facility at 176 E. Lincoln St., south of I-10. We used it all these years and made it work, said Fred Mason, the citys electric utility director. This new facility is going to provide a more safe a secure facility to work (in). Rick Diaz, the electrical operations manager who started in the city in 1975, had contemplated retirement, but decided to stick around to see the project completed. He shared with visitors some stories about the old place, a former packinghouse, including how old military oak shelving was used and that the storage space had just two lights. And for heating? We had a smudge pot, he said. Carl Morris, a warehouse specialist, noted how new shelving allows for much more organized storage and, though the warehouse doesnt have air conditioning, huge ceiling fans will draw in cooler air in the summer. The new storage space is illuminated by banks of florescent lights. The warehouse has offices, document retention storage, a multipurpose training room, space for city Public Works use, an upgraded emergency generator and an exercise room for employees. The original low bid for construct came to about $5.1 million. To cut costs, the project was divided into three phases and rebid with a savings of just over $2 million, according to a city statement. Moalej Builders of Sherman Oaks handled the hazard abatement, demolition, site preparation, exterior utilities and foundation, according to a summary from city spokesman Philip Southard. Kinsman Construction of San Diego designed and fabricated the structural steel, foundation and erection of the metal building, and International Computing Systems of Los Angeles handled interior finishing, ceilings, casework and interior plumbing, electrical and mechanical systems. Because of their historical value, all the Quonset huts went to the March Field Air Museum in Riverside. Contact the writer: 951-368-9075 or gwesson@scng.com A community rally in Riverside to mobilize against repeal of the Affordable Care Act attracted about 50 people who had to grip handwritten poster signs like Hands Off Our Healthcare against buffeting winds on Sunday Jan. 29. The group gathered outside Riverside City Hall on the Main Street Mall was smaller than what organizer Michele Campbell had hoped for. Participants said some had detoured to a rally at Ontario International Airport against President Donald Trumps immigration order. The Riverside demonstrators encouraged people to telephone and write their congressional representativesto discourage dismantling of Obamacare. Speakers said the law expanded health coverage to those who previously couldnt afford it. I am alive today and am here today because of Obamacare, said Brenda Bell, a former teacher who said she was disabled by anemia and fibromyalgia. It saved my life. With ACA coverage she was able to get a blood transfusion and continues to get iron infusions, she said. If they take it away, they are trying to kill me, Bell said, clutching her service dog, Phoenix, in her arms. Bell and others planned to leave the hour-long rally and head to Ontario. She said too much activity may leave her bedridden a day later, but wanted to stand up for other peoples civil rights. No counter-protestors were seen during a visit to the demonstration. Dr. Bill Honigman, an Orange County emergency room physician and leader in the Progressive Democrats of America group, called ACA afirst step in extending health care to those who couldnt previously afford it or obtain it. The time is now to resist, he said. If repeal moves forward, callers to their representatives should make it clear they will campaign in mid-term elections for new leaders, he said. One of Trumps first acts on inauguration day was to sign an executive order to put in motion steps toward repeal of the health care law. Signed into law in 2010, the Affordable Care Act extended insurance coverage to 20 million more people and brought the uninsured rate to a historic low of about 9 percent, reshaping the $3 trillion-per-year health system in the process. But the law has failed to win broad public approval, amid persistent concerns about rising premium rates through the insurance marketplaces the law created. A key GOP focus is to do away with the individual mandate requirement that all Americans have insurance or pay a fine. Trump has said he wants to replace the Affordable Care Act with a plan that provides insurance for everybody and lowers deductibles. But his pick for health secretary recently suggested the replacement isnt ready. The annual deadline to enroll in health plans for the 2017 year is Tuesday, Jan. 31. The Associated Press contributed to this article Contact the writer: 951-368-9075 or gwesson@scng.com Steve Jobs was the son of a Syrian migrant, Abdul Fattah Jandali. The order to ban citizens of seven majority-Muslim nations from entering the United States has awakened opposition across the country. Some of the most vocal critiques have come from Silicon Valley, which had previously seemed acquiescent to the election of US president Donald Trump. However late, the American tech sector has finally found its voice. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who is also founder of immigration reform lobbying group Fwd.us, was the first major tech executive to speak out on Trumps executive order in a carefully worded statement. Google CEO Sundar Pichai soon followed suit, and by Saturday, as protests intensified around the nation, defiance from tech leaders did too. Google co-founder Sergey Brin and Y Combinator president Sam Altman joined protesters at San Francisco International Airport. Venture capitalists offered to match donations to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in the tens of thousands of dollars. (The organization said it has raised $10 million and signed up 150,000 new members this weekend alone.) I hope this will be one of the defining moments where people came together against this administration, Altman told Forbes, hours before a federal judge issued a stay on Trumps immigration ban. Quartz compiled a list of tech leaders who are heading the charge among the business community against Trumps immigration ban. Well continue to update this story as more statements come in. * * * Adobe The company has a few employees who may be affected by the ban. As an immigrant, US citizen and CEO, I am deeply concerned about the impact of the recent executive order restricting entry into the United States for nationals of seven countries, CEO Shantanu Narayen emailed staff on Jan. 29. Affirm In a Jan. 28 post titled Reverse #MuslimBan! Affirm CEO and PayPal co-founder Max Levchin said his family came to the US as refugees in 1991. We must not close our doors to refugees, and those willing to contribute to Americas success, he wrote. I hope that our Congress and our Judiciaryrecognize this executive order for the xenophobic assault on freedom that it is, and respond. Story continues Airbnb Not allowing countries or refugees into America is not right, and we must stand with those who are affected. Brian Chesky (@bchesky) January 29, 2017 Airbnb is providing free housing to refugees and anyone not allowed in the US. Stayed tuned for more, contact me if urgent need for housing Brian Chesky (@bchesky) January 29, 2017 Amazon The company has advised employees affected by the ban to refrain from traveling abroad, and its working on contingency plans for those currently outside the US. We are committed to supporting all of our employees, VP of human resources Beth Galetti wrote in an email. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has yet to comment publicly on the order. Apple In a Jan. 28 memo, CEO Tim Cook said Apple will do everything we can to support affected employees. Apple believes deeply in the importance of immigrationboth to our company and to our nations future, he wrote. Apple would not exist without immigration, let alone thrive and innovate the way we do. Cook has been in DC meeting with top lawmakers. Autodesk On Jan. 29, Autodesk CEO Carl Bass expressed disapproval of Trumps immigration ban on Medium. We wont be successful as a nation with policies like these; our economy and our security rely on being both strong and welcoming, he wrote. Box On every level -moral, humanitarian, economic, logical, etc.- this ban is wrong and is completely antithetical to the principles of America. Aaron Levie (@levie) January 28, 2017 Levie, the cloud-storage companys CEO, also encouraged people to donate to the ACLU and other groups that will fight the ban on legal grounds, and to organizations like the IRC that help refugees from Syria and other countries. Chorus "Strongly" is the key here. Plenty of equivocal nonsense from people playing both sides. Trump is a coward and an idiot. Period. https://t.co/uTFgVgdeF5 dick costolo (@dickc) January 28, 2017 Dark Sky Dark Sky will be donating the next 7 days of app sale proceeds to the ACLU to fight the President's Executive Order. https://t.co/QLj7qIl1Cu The Dark Sky Company (@DarkSkyApp) January 30, 2017 Dropbox Executive orders affecting world's most vulnerable are un-American. Dropbox embraces people from all countries and faiths Drew Houston (@drewhouston) January 28, 2017 Etsy We are a nation of immigrants, and are stronger for it. I oppose excluding people from US based on their nationality or religion, period. Chad Dickerson (@chaddickerson) January 28, 2017 Facebook Mark Zuckerberg was the first major tech executive to speak out on the executive order, posting a short essay in defense of immigrants and refugees on Jan. 27. The United States is a nation of immigrants, and we should be proud of that, he wrote, noting that his own ancestors came from Germany, Austria, and Poland, and that his wifes were refugees from China and Vietnam. Like many of you, Im concerned about the impact of the recent executive orders signed by President Trump. Fiverr Fiverr CEO Micha Kaufman, an Israeli entrepreneur based in Tel Aviv, wrote about how hes usually proud of this beautiful country for being one of the worlds most diverse democracies, in a Jan. 29 Facebook post. Today Im not proud, he added, and I urge the White House to undo this mistake. Foursquare We @Foursquare oppose the executive order on immigration. Its against American openness to people seeking a better, safer or freer life 1/4 Foursquare (@Foursquare) January 30, 2017 Google (Alphabet) The company has nearly 200 employees affected. Google CEO Sundar Pichai was among the first tech execs to criticize the order publicly. Were upset about the impact of this order and any proposals that could impose restrictions on Googlers and their families, or that could create barriers to bringing great talent to the US, he emailed staff late on Jan. 27. Its painful to see the personal cost of this executive order on our colleagues. The next day, Google co-founder and Alphabet president Sergey Brin joined protesters at San Francisco International Airport. Im here because Im a refugee, he told a reporter. Former Google hiring guru Laszlo Bock tweeted that he also came to the US as a refugee. That time I fled Communist Romania to a refugee camp in Austria, came to America, & years later became an exec @Google creating 10ks of jobs https://t.co/iaerM5gLHc Laszlo Bock (@LaszloBock2718) January 29, 2017 IBM IBM CEO Ginni Rometty has joined the Trump administration as a business policy adviser. On Jan. 30, IBM provided a statement that weakly advocated for openness and expressed zero alarm at Trumps immigration ban. As IBMers, we have learned, through era after era, that the path forwardfor innovation, for prosperity, and for civil societyis the path of engagement and openness to the world, the company said. In late November 2016, Rometty wrote a letter to Trump suggesting ways to work with the new administration. Soon after, a senior IBM employee quit, explaining that she felt Rometty offered the backing of IBMs global workforce in support of his agenda, through an open letter. Instacart The company is donating $100,000 to the ACLU, funding office hours with its immigration counsel for employees and their families, and expediting H-1B visas and green cards for those currently on a TN visa. Im really sad and angry with what has happened over the last few days in our country, Apoorva Mehta emailed staff on Jan. 29. As an immigrant who grew up in one of the countries that was banned, the recent events hit really close to home. LinkedIn 40% of Fortune 500 founded by immigrants or their children. All ethnicities should have access to opportunity founding principle of U.S. Jeff Weiner (@jeffweiner) January 28, 2017 Lyft The ride-hailing startup pledged to donate $1 million to the ACLU over the next four years. Banning people of a particular faith or creed, race or identity, sexuality or ethnicity, from entering the US is antithetical to both Lyfts and our nations core values, Lyfts co-founders wrote on Jan. 29. We stand firmly against these actions, and will not be silent on issues. Lyft has surged in popularity in the iOS app store, according to data from analytics firm App Annie. Microsoft The company has at least 76 affected employees. We believe that immigration laws can and should protect the public without sacrificing peoples freedom of expression or religion, Microsoft president Brad Smith wrote in a Jan. 28 email. Satya Nadella, the companys CEO and an immigrant himself, reposted the email on LinkedIn and said Microsoft will continue to advocate on this important topic. Mozilla CEO Chris Beard called Trumps order overly broad and highly disruptive to innovation and economic growth. The ban will have an unnecessary negative impact to the health and safety of those affected and their families, not to mention rejecting refugees fleeing persecution, terror and war, he said in a statement. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, one of Silicon Valleys most outspoken leaders, sharply criticized Trump in a Jan. 28 Facebook post. The US presidents actions are so un-American it pains us all, Hastings wrote. Worse, these actions will make America less safe (through hatred and loss of allies) rather than more safe. Path In the long term, today will reflect one of the weakest decisions in American history. Dave Morin (@davemorin) January 28, 2017 Pinterest CEO Ben Silberman provided a statement to TechCrunch, indicating that we strongly support our employees from outside the US. Postmates The company is matching donations by Postmates employees to the ACLU and International Refugee Assistance Project. I no longer believe it to be reasonable to remain silent, CEO Bastian Lehmann wrote on Jan. 29. The trade-off of these policies is obvious. In exchange for the guise of safety rooted in fear of those with different religious, ethnic and cultural backgrounds we will be abandoning the diverse melting pot of culture and ideas that has made the United States prosper. Salesforce CEO Mark Benioff quoted scripture: When we close our hearts & stop loving other people as ourselves (MK 12:31) we forget who we truly area light unto the nations. #noban Marc Benioff (@Benioff) January 28, 2017 Vala Afshar, another executive at the company, provided a tally of iconic companies build by immigrants: US tech companies founded by 1st/2nd generation immigrants Apple Google Facebook Amazon Oracle IBM Uber Yahoo EMC eBay AT&T Tesla Reddit Vala Afshar (@ValaAfshar) January 28, 2017 Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield decried the immigration ban and openly matched donations to the ACLU, Southern Poverty Law Center, MALDEF, NAACP, and ProPublica. Stripe Trump's stated immigration policies would be economically damaging and will in time be seen as morally wrong. https://t.co/HSjJXJdsOq Patrick Collison (@patrickc) January 26, 2017 Tidemark In a tweetstorm, founder Christian Gheorghe reflected on immigrating to the US from communist Romania: 1/ Before getting a chance at building great companies with amazing immigrants, before sponsoring dozens and dozens of green cards Christian Gheorghe (@optian) January 28, 2017 2/ before driving a limo as the first US job I ever had, with none of us drivers speaking a word of English but seeking a better life, Christian Gheorghe (@optian) January 28, 2017 3/ years ago, at JFK, the modern version of Ellis Island, as I escaped a brutal communist regime in Romania, the officer asked me too: Christian Gheorghe (@optian) January 28, 2017 4/ "Why are you here?"; " I want to be free," I answered to a translator. "Here's the address to a hostel and welcome to America!" Christian Gheorghe (@optian) January 28, 2017 5/ That's the pull of freedom. Getting that chance. That's what America is all about. (End) Christian Gheorghe (@optian) January 28, 2017 Tesla Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX and chairman of SolarCity, was a vocal critic of Trump during his campaign, but has recently appeared to warm to the US president. Musk has joined Trumps business advisory team and tweeted Jan. 24 that former ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson has the potential to be an excellent Sec of State. Musk said Jan. 28 that Trumps immigration ban was not the best way to address the countrys challenges. The next day, Musk shared the text of the executive order and suggested he would share specific feedback with Trump via his advisory role. The first meeting of the business advisory group is scheduled for Friday (Feb. 3). Many people negatively affected by this policy are strong supporters of the US. They've done right,not wrong & don't deserve to be rejected. Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 29, 2017 Twilio In a Jan. 28 Medium post, co-founder Jeff Lawson urged people to donate to the ACLU and pled for Americans to find their backbone. Our enemy is not terror, it is losing our soul while fighting terror. America is stronger than this, he said. Twitter As the CEO of the platform that provides Trump with immediate access to more than 20 million personal followers, Jack Dorsey is in the hot seat. Industry leaders have repeatedly asked Dorsey to remove Trump from Twitter. Dorsey signaled his disapproval of the immigration ban by retweeting updates from yesterdays protests. Our full statement: Federal Court Grants Stay in Challenge to Trump Immigration Ban https://t.co/LRKgbcpeGx ACLU National (@ACLU) January 29, 2017 Dorsey also made public statements on behalf of Square, where he is also CEO, and Twitter. Notably, Twitter was the platform of choice for many tech leaders to voice their opinions on the immigration ban. Uber Like Elon Musk, Uber CEO Travis Kalanick also agreed to serve on Trumps advisory team, a decision that has incited conflict within the company. Uber has a dozen or so employees and thousands of drivers affected by the immigration ban. On Jan. 28, Kalanick said Uber was working out a process to identify and compensate drivers barred re-entry to the US. Later that day, the company was accused of profiting off a taxi-driver-led strike at New Yorks John F. Kennedy International Airport, sparking a #DeleteUber campaign among outraged consumers. On Jan. 29, as blowback against Uber continued, Kalanick called Trumps ban wrong and unjust. He said the companys lawyers would be on call to offer drivers legal support. He recommitted to compensating drivers for lost earnings and said Uber was creating a $3 million fund to help drivers with immigration and translation services. Y Combinator Y Combinator president Sam Altman joined protesters (and Googles Sergey Brin) at the San Francisco Airport on Jan. 28. I hope this will be one of the defining moments where people came together against this administration, he told Forbes. Just hours earlier, he published a blog post, Time to Take a Stand. Altman has controversially defended his decision to keep venture capitalist and Trump supporter Peter Thiel on as a partner at Y Combinator. Yelp Agreed. Sad day for USA. https://t.co/SikAaNVeAm Jeremy Stoppelman (@jeremys) January 28, 2017 * * * Just as notable as the tech leaders who voiced their dissent were those who didnt. Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, Trump advisors IBM CEO Ginni Rometty and Oracle co-CEO Safra Catz, and Google cofounder Larry Page were notably absent from those speaking out. While Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg was quick to denounce Trump for an executive order that threatens womens health care, she has remained silent on the immigration ban. Sign up for the Quartz Daily Brief, our free daily newsletter with the worlds most important and interesting news. More stories from Quartz: Riverside County Sheriffs deputies shot at an armed suspect Monday morning while serving a search warrant at a house in Moreno Valley. No one was injured in the incident. A 17-year-old boy was arrested and booked at Riverside County Juvenile Hall. He was arrested on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon upon a peace officer and being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition. Mona Sanders, 38, of Moreno Valley was arrested on suspicion of fraud. She was booked at Robert Presley Detention Center. The officer involved in the shooting was placed on administrative leave, per department policy. The officers name was not released Monday night. The shooting occurred about 10:10 a.m. in the 23400 block of Challis Court, sheriffs spokesman Sgt. Chris Durham said in a statement on Twitter. Challis Court, a cul-de-sac, is one block from Moreno Valley High School. The deputies entered the home to serve the search warrant and encountered a person with a gun, Durham said. Thats when the officers opened fire. Authorities said there was no threat to the public. Staff Writers Ali Tadayon and Alejandra Molina contributed to this report. Mr. Ken Ofori-Atta, assumed office as Ghanas Finance Minister after having been sworn-in on January 27, 2017, by his Excellency the President. He brings to the Ministry over 30 years experience in Ghanaian and international financial sector. 2. Hon. Ofori-Atta and twelve other Minister designates were approved by Parliament on Friday, January 27, after going through a successful vetting process by the Appointments Committee of Parliament. 3. The Hon Ministers immediate priority is to protect the public purse, stabilize Ghanas macro economy, spearhead anti-corruption, increase revenue and introduce policy initiatives to grow the economy for the private sector to thrive and create jobs. We will create wealth and improve peoples lives by ensuring economic freedom as mainstay of the economy, I am committed to cleaning up our public finances, managing the enormous debt that we have inherited in order to create the needed fiscal space, invest in critical infrastructure, and empower the private sector to create jobs, he said in response to his vision for his tenure. 4. The legacy of the Ministry will be a professional institution with global standards in treasury and risk management to give effect to enforcing the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA), he added. 5. He intends to work hard to get the economy growing eventually at double digits through policies and strategies that will increase revenue, reduce waste, control spending, grow the economy to create jobs. Source: Ministry of Finance 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 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. Adama Barrow, The Gambia's new president, has vowed to reform the country's notorious intelligence agency and promised to ensure media freedom in the country. Speaking at his first news conference since returning to take office on Thursday, Barrow announced plans to rename the National Intelligence Agency (NIA), a dreaded secret police accused by rights groups of forced disappearances and torture under the control of former leader Yahya Jammeh. Barrow told reporters on Saturday the NIA was "an institution that has to continue", but with a different name. "The rule of the law, that will be the order of the day," he said, adding that training would be given to NIA's operatives. Name change Barrow also said the country's official name will no longer contain the word "Islamic", which had been added by Jammeh in 2015. The new president said The Gambia, whose population is 90 percent Muslim, with the rest Christian and animist, was a republic "not the Islamic republic". Jammeh, who ruled the small West African nation for 22 years caused a major political impasse by refusing to give up power after losing the December 1 presidential election to Barrow. Source: Aljazeera 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 Joy News can confirm that the 60th Anniversary planning Committee has resolved to forfeit all allowances and remuneration following public concern that the national celebration will be a burden on a struggling economy. "The service to be rendered by the committee members will be strictly on a pro bono basis," a statement signed by Chair of the Committee, Ken Amankwa, said. President Nana Akufo-Addo put together the Committee last week to mark the 60th Anniversary of Ghana's independence from British colonial rule in 1957. The announcement of the Committee received a backlash on social media following the fiasco that characterised the Ghana @50 celebration under the John Kufuor administration. Critics also believe the celebration, which will be climaxed on Independence Day, March 6, 2017, is unnecessary since there is more work to be done to turn the fortunes of the nation around than to waste resources celebrating. Read below the full statement on the resolution by members of the Committee not receive any payment for their work FORFEITURE OF ALLOWANCE(S) BY MEMBERS OF THE 60TH INDEPENDENCE ANNIVERSARY PLANNING COMMITTEE The 60th Independence Anniversary Planning committee held its maiden meeting on Saturday, the 28th of January, 2017. At the said meeting, members resolved to forfeit any and all allowance(s) and/or remuneration which may be due them. The service to be rendered by the committee members will be strictly on a pro bono basis. This decision was largely motivated by H.E the President's attitude towards public service, that is to say, selfless service to one's homeland. Further, we are determined to religiously be guided by H.E. the President's directive for members to be mindful of the difficult financial and economic circumstances of our country, regarding our 60th anniversary commemoration. We continue to count on the support and prayers of all Ghanaians in this endeavour. Thank you and may God continue to bless our homeland. SGD KEN AMANKWA (CHAIRMAN, 60TH INDEPENDENCE ANNIVERSARY PLANNING COMMITTEE) Source: myjoyonline 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 Speaker of Parliament Professor Aaron Mike Ocquaye has entreated first-time Members of Parliament (MP) to make the effort to learn the ethics of the House. Speaking at an orientation ceremony held for the new entrants in Koforidua, the former MP for Dome Kwabenya cautioned them against using unsavory language and actions considered unacceptable in the House. Of the 275 MPs, 125 of them are new to parliament representing a 45.4 percent attrition rate. The orientation ceremony was to accelerate the learning curve for crucial work of holding the Executive to account. The orientation ceremony attended by the leadership of Parliament was to officially orient the new MPs on parliamentary standards. If the language is such that you cannot use it at the Otumfuors palace or the palace of any respected Chief please dont use it in Parliament," he told them. He also told them that just as a person cannot be called a liar in court, such words are unparliamentary. They were schooled about operations of the House and how they can contribute to discussions on the floor. Prof Ocquaye told them to be mindful about their pronouncements whenever they rise to speak on the floor, saying they would be responsible for their comments. He also advised them to conform to the official dress code of Parliament, assuring them that he would be fair to both minority and majority members. Majority leader, Osei Kyei Mensah-Bonsu also used the opportunity to ask the new MPs to read the 1992 Constitution and the Standing Orders of the House. He told them to access these two documents on daily basis to effectively execute their duties. On his part, Minority leader Haruna Iddrisu also tasked new members to dedicate some time to learn on the job. "...learn the techniques and proceedures of Parliament. Even if you knew them you will enhance or elevate them in order to make you effective and therefore take every aspect of this training very seriously," he said. Source: JFM/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 President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has recalled moments he shared with New Patriotic Party (NPP)s Volta Regional First Vice Chairperson, Dr Archibald Letsa. Announcing his Regional Ministers-designate on Tuesday at the Flagstaff House, the President said former President Jerry John Rawlings used to refer to the two of them as though they were twins. Former President Rawlings used to call us Aki and Pawpaw, he told the media amidst laughter. Aki and Pawpaw are names that became popular following the release of the film Aki na Ukwa which featured Nollywood actors Osita Iheme known as Pawpaw and Chinedu Ikedieze as Aki. The names are given to people who are vertically challenged, a euphemism for people who are short. Poking fun at the media briefing, President Akufo-Addo said Mr Rawlings used to tease them for being vertically challenged. He later introduced the NPP official as the Volta Regional Minister-designate. The other nominees include Sulemana Alhassan for Upper West; Kwaku Asoma-Cheremeh for Brong Ahafo, and Rockson Bukari for Upper East. Dr. Kwaku Afriyie was nominated for Western Region, Eric Kwakye Darfour for Eastern Region and Salifu Sawed for the Northern Region. Source: JFM 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 President Nana Akufo-Addo has sworn in Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey as Minister for Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration at Ghanas embassy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The former deputy Foreign Affairs Minister during the erstwhile Kufour administration was not available to be sworn in together with his twelve other colleagues who were sworn in at the Flagstaff House on Friday night. She is currently on international assignment attending the AU Summit. President Akufo Addo at the swearing in of the other ministers said the 13th minister, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey has already entered into her functions. She is in Addis Ababa attending the Foreign Ministers meeting in preparation for the AU summit of 29th to 31st of January, 2017. I will swear her in at Ghanas Embassy in Adis Ababa on Saturday evening. Source: kasapafmonline.com Disclaimer : Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. Featured Video Minister-designate for Gender, Children and Social Protection, Madam Otiko Afisa Djaba has rebuff attempts by some members of the vetting committee to impress on her to apologize to former President John Dramani Mahama for comments she made a couple of months ago. Madam Afisah Djaba was emphatic to the committee that she owes the former president no apology when she was referred to what Alhassan Sayibu Suhuyin, MP for Tamale North constituency labeled as unfortunate and unpalatable statement made against the former president. The nominee is reported to have made some scathing comments about former President Mahama in the line up to the 2016 general elections. The polyglot minister-designate was quoted to have said President Mahama's time is up...President Mahama is extremely wicked and so he must step down...He has the heart of the devil. We need change, we need someone is passionate about this country. You have to vote massively for Nana Akufo Addo. We need change this year. Your time is up President Mahama, You have to step down this year so Nana Addo can take over the management of this country,'' She told a teeming crowd of NPP supporters during the campaign season last year. But Madam Otiko, who is related to the former president, said her comments were made without any malice intended. Asked if she would apology for her comments, Madam Afisa Djaba said she has no apology to render. The president is my brother and I spoke from my convictions. I made the statement as a wakeup call for him. We are building a nation and he [John Mahama] was running for re-election and I felt the people who should tell him as it is were not telling him as it was, she said. Madam Otiko further explained that When I said the president was an embarrassment, I referred to SADA. SADA is very dear to my heart. The incident of poverty in the three Northern region where my mother comes from is very high. But the president who comes from the North did nothing to help the region. It was an embarrassment I dont owe him [President Mahama] or you [Alhassan Sayibu Suhuyin] any apology. We are developing and building a nation she firmly said. However, the Minority Leader and Member of Parliament for Tamale South, Haruna Iddrisu interjected and in some way attempt to corece Madam Otiko to retract and apologize to the former president. But the nominee, who is also the NPP's National Women's Organizer, strongly rebuff the call and maintained that I dont regret my comment. The president embarrassed Northerners and their chiefs have complained bitterly about that. When I talked about his [Ex-Prez Mahama] wickedness, Ghanaians were crying due to Dumsor and high tariffs. When asked to dissociate herself from those words by the ranking member, she quizzed - Are you trying to say that we cannot criticize? Are you saying that I dont have my right to speak? My words werent an insults, it was a criticism! Source: King Edward Ambrose Washman Addo/Peacefmonline.com/ Twitter: @Washman5/ Instagram: Washman007 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 If approved by parliament, Minister-designate of Gender, Children and Social Protection, Otiko Afisa Djaba, has assured that New Patriotic Party (NPP) women capable of providing catering services will not be left out of the National School Feeding Programme. Responding to questions from New Patriotic Party (NPP) Member of Parliament (MP) for Ablekuma West Ursula Owusu-Ekuful at the vetting of ministerial nominees on Monday, January 30, Ms Otiko explained that the ministry had plans to expand the National School Feeding Programme across the country. She said the previous administrations advertisement for caterers through national news channels as part of transparency measures will be continued adding that women organisers of the NPP will have the opportunity to be contracted to provide various services. In line with what my predecessor has done, this is what is there now, that to make it more transparent, the School Feeding Programme is advertised in the newspapers and so we will look at it and ensure that when we expand, it will include more womenand I will say the womens organisers should have no fears because they are all part of the inclusion agenda of the ministry. We cannot leave anybody out. Ms Djaba, who holds the National Womens Organiser of the NPP, told the Appointments Committee that she stood by comments she made against ex-president John Mahama. For her, Mr Mahama is, indeed, wicked and an embarrassment to people of the Northern Region. I dont owe him (Mr Mahama) or you (Alhassan Suhuyini) any apology she said in response to the Tamale North MPs question about whether she would apologise to the ex-president on whom she used those words during the electioneering period ahead of the 7 December 2016 elections. My comment about he being an embarrassment was in relation to SADA, It was in relation to SADA that I said he had embarrassed northerners and the northern chiefs themselves had come to say same, Ms Djaba justified on Monday, 30 January 2017, explaining that: When I talked about his wickedness, the people of Ghana were asking for reductions, they were asking for dumsor to be solved, people were losing jobs and so forth what I said was within the context of that period. When asked by Tamale South MP Haruna Iddrisu if she would withdraw those words owing to their harshness, which the minority too strong exception to, Ms Djaba retorted: Are you saying that we cannot criticise in this country? Are you saying that my right to speak [is curtailed?] It was not an insult, it was a criticism and Im allowed as a citizen of Ghana to criticise the president and these are descriptive words, it is not an insult. Asked by Mr Iddrisu is she stood by her words, Ms Djaba said: Yes Mr Chairman. I did not insult the president, I criticised him. In 2014, Ms Djaba told Moro Awudu on Radio XYZs breakfast show that: This President (Mr Mahama) is not serious. He has embarrassed a lot of Northerners. Reacting to Mr Mahamas promise, at the time, to progressively make Senior High School Education free as announced in the state of the nation address presented to Parliament in that year, Ms Djaba said: Hes embarrassing mother Ghana and the IMF is telling him that: E no dey go well, so he should stop the edey be kk, put down his Dubai things and get down to the ground and give us the bread and butter things that we need for the development of this country. Also, in the heat of the 2016 campaign, Ms Djaba said: President Mahamas time is up. President Mahama is extremely wicked, and, so, he must step down. We need change, we need someone who is passionate about this country. You have to vote massively for Nana Akufo Addo. We need change this year. Your time is up, President Mahama. Source: Classfmonline 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 Victorian police have announced that a sixth person has died as a result of the Bourke Street attack that took place in Melbourne ten days ago. The woman, who was identified as a 33-year-old from Blackburn South, passed away in hospital at around 7:30 this evening. Five other people were killed in the attack, including a three-month-old baby who died in hospital the following day. The other victims were a ten-year-old girl, a man aged 25, a 32-year-old woman and a 33-year-old man. 37 people were admitted to hospital following the attack, as of tonight there nine people are still receiving treatment. The man accused of perpetrating the attack, 26-year-old Dimitri Gargasoulas, is facing five counts of murder. A fund has been set up by the Victorian government to help support the families of the victims, you can donate here. Source: The Age. Photo: Getty Imags / Wayne Taylor. Last weekend, one of the celebrities that we saw plenty of photos and videos of at the Womens March in New York City was none other than pop icon Rihanna, who was without entourage or security, dancing in the street alongside fellow women protesting Donald Trumps threat to remove their rights to access medical services (primarily abortion). WHEN @rihanna SHOWS UP TO THE PROTEST AND GRABBED YOUR ARM AND DABS IN YOUR VIDEO OMG HELO #womensmarch pic.twitter.com/TvPt1AE7Bj Lauren (@lmacwhinney) January 22, 2017 Days later, she tweeted about Trumps ban on Muslim people entering the US, calling the President an immoral pig: Disgusted! The news is devastating! America is being ruined right before our eyes! What an immoral pig you have to be to implement such BS!! Rihanna (@rihanna) January 29, 2017 Today, the extremely vocal and oft-erratic Azealia Banks has posted an image to Instagram about RiRi, implying that these issues are none of her business due to the fact that she immigrated to the US from her home in Barbados: Banks says that celebrities are stir[ring] the public and need to shut up and sit down. She says in her caption, Theres absolutely no way to end this war but to finish it ourselves. Its TERRIBLE, do I agree with it , NO, do I personally like whats happening , NO! But I can say that as an American who enjoys her safety and overall ability to maintain a certain level of ignorance as pertains to the world outside of our borders , I am 100% shook about open borders and would be reallllllllllllly scared for my self and my family if any parts of that war began to become real on this soil. I like my life the way it is. She ends in yet another rant about sacrificing chickens, which is apparently a very important hobby of hers now: I was in west Africa killing chickens and being primitive while yall was over there arguing about who the saviour is. Please miss me with all of this shit. Pass me a chicken and leave me the fuck alone ! Up with this bizarre and poorly-thought-out attack, Rihanna will not put she responded on Instagram this morning, saying of Banks: the face you make when you a immigrant ???? #stayawayfromthechickens #iheartnuggets #saveourhens. A photo posted by badgalriri (@badgalriri) on Jan 29, 2017 at 9:18am PST Source: Instagram / @azealiabanks & @badgalriri. Photo: Christie Goodwin & David Becker / Getty. If your idea of fun is letting your lizard brain take control of your finances because youre surrounded by stress and excitement hormones whipped up by an entirely manufactured social phenomenon designed specifically to get you to part with much bigger sums of money than you would in any other case, then get ready to feel some hectic FOMO! Yesterday saw the Gold Coast host one of Australias biggest ever auction days, with Ray White Real Estates cultishly-named The Event. Two thousand people dutifully trooped into the Gold Coast Turf Club on Sunday morning to watch 333 giddy, disposable-incomed locals bid on 135 properties. Places sold include a $3.5 million riverfront mansion, a houseboat (!!), and a $312,000 unit, which was bought by a couple who asked not to be named because they hadnt even told their mates that they were moving to the GC yet. They told the media: We started looking for properties at 9am yesterday. I cant believe it within 48 hours we found a place to live. The aforementioned houseboat went for more than $600,000, and came complete with four bedrooms, a spa, and room for a jet ski. Your houseboats looking pretty shabby in comparison now, huh? Only 50% of the properties had sold by Sunday afternoon, but real estate experts at the event are still insisting that 2017 is going to be a strong year for the market, whatever the hell that means. At this point in my life, Ive so thoroughly given up on ever owning my own property that anything to do with real estate feels about as easy to relate to as the lives of those lipstick worms that live around 1000C thermal vents on the ocean floor. The state of the market, as relevant to you. Source and image: Domain. A petition to prevent President Donald Trump from meeting Her Majesty (and fam) if and when he goes ahead with a planned visit to the United Kingdom later this year is going gangbusters. At the time of writing this very sentence, the petition is sitting at 684,719 signatures, but its going up by a rate of a little over a thousand signatures per minute. It smashed its target of 100,000 while Australia was still asleep. The parliamentary petition, started by Graham Guest, says that Trump should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen. Donald Trumps well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore during the term of his presidency Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official State Visit. If parliamentary petitions reach 100,000 signatures which this petition well and truly has it must be considered by parliament. And theyre not too happy about Trumps visit, either. It obviously comes in the wake of Trumps draconian Muslim ban, whereby nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries (Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Iraq) are banned from entering the united states for a period of 90 days. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn made calls to cancel the proposed visit, who said it would be totally wrong for the visit to go ahead in the wake of Trumps executive order. I think we should make it very clear we are extremely upset about it, and I think it would be totally wrong for him to be coming here while that situation is going on, Corbyn told ITV. I think he has to be challenged on this. I am not happy with him coming here until that ban is lifted, quite honestly. He was backed up by several Tory MPs, the leader of the Liberal Democrats, and Mayor of London Sadid Khan (whos the first Muslim to become mayor of a major Western capital, let alone London). I am quite clear, this ban is cruel, this ban is shameful, while this ban is in place we should not be rolling out the red carpet for President Trump, Khan told Sky News. The trip was announced during UK Prime Minister Theresa Mays visit to the White House, although no date has been set. May has finally made some kind of stand against the order, despite the fact that she was literally holding hands with Trump the day after he signed the order. *vom* Shes ordered her foreign and home secretaries to speak to their US counterparts, in particular to secure the rights of UK nationals. That includes Olympic champion Sir Mo Farah, who wrote on Facebook that Her Majesty the Queen made me a Knight of the Realm President Donald Trump seems to have made me an alien. Photos: Getty / WPA Pool; Christopher Furlong. Youd be forgiven if people here in Australia reacted not only with understandable and totally justifiable anger at US President Donald Trumps swiftly enacted executive order which closed Americas borders to immigrants and travellers from several countries the US identifies as sources of danger that also ~extremely coincidentally~ happen to sport Muslim-majority populations but with a resigned, almost flashback-ish sense of frustration; as if weve all seen similar policies enacted from a source much, much closer to home. Judges in at least five US states issued rulings that blocked officials from enacting Trumps orders, and thousands of protesters flooded airports in major cities after people who had obtained US Green Cards in the past suddenly found themselves in dire limbo with a number of travellers held by authorities at international airports. And as far as former Immigration Minister Scott Morrison is concerned: This is all fine. ScoMo appeared on 2GB with gr8 m8 Ray Hadley earlier this morning and asserted that not only is the fact that Trump is doing this a good thing, but that it is all clearly a result of Australias own very successful border policies. The Federal Treasurer spoke thusly: I remember when we came in in 2013 and I was implementing our border protection policy people threw their hands up and I said Im doing what I said I would do in the way I said Id do it and guess what, Im now getting the results I said Id get. And we did that as a government, and weve continued that as a government, and we are the envy of the world when it comes to strong border protection policies. The rest of the world would love to have our borders and the way they are secured and the immigration arrangements we have put in place, particularly most recently, over the last three or four years. Weve got a good history around this. Really, the rest of the world is catching up to Australia. Scott, much like a Wikipedia page entitled Dave from third period science has a tiny dick, youre gonna have to cite your sources, buddy. ScoMo then went further, not only refusing to condemn Trumps executive immigration order, but seemingly backed up the barely-a-week-old Presidents tactics by asserting the move was a promise fulfilled. Now how the US wants to handle [border protection] is a matter for them. As you say, theyve had an election, and the president is implementing what he said he would do. Fair play to both Morrison and Trump here, thats 100% correct. Trump promised that he would implement abhorrent, discriminatory immigration policies, and then he went ahead and implemented an abhorrent, discriminatory immigration policy. For whats it worth, Labors Tanya Plibersek also stated earlier today that Australias had a non-discriminatory immigration policy for 40 years thats served us very well. This is all some horrid fever that were not gonna be able to sweat out for a while, isnt it. Source: The Guardian. Photo: Stefan Postles/Getty. I know that politicians have to come from somewhere. I know that allowing young people with similar political beliefs to organise and debate and network is a vital part of how politics works in Australia. I get that. But deep, deep in my heart, I dearly wish we could somehow do this without Young Labor, Young Greens or Young Libs. While a lot of these people are lovely and relatively normal, they seem to be (for the most part) extremely weird units. Think about everyone you knew or know at uni who is involved in student politics would you trust them to hold a knife around you? I didnt think so. I admire the passion and dedication of people who live and breathe politics while they could be doing normal uni stuff like drinking cleanskin wine and sleeping past noon, but at the same time, I never ever want to be handed a pamphlet ever again in my life. These people have their own jokes and their own traditions and their own ways of doing things. What could student politicians mean by crashing a Young Libs meeting in KKK hoods and booing like ghosts? I havent the faintest idea, but two of them sure did it. Its not clear who the two people in KKK hoods were. The moderate and hard right factions are blaming each other for organising it. Pic: pic.twitter.com/VQp5OhJWLs Michael Koziol (@michaelkoziol) January 30, 2017 According to Fairfax reporter Michael Koziol, the two hooded bandits received a mixed response: Hooded people came on stage during a motion in favour of non-discriminatory immigration policy. Some people apparently clapped and cheered. Michael Koziol (@michaelkoziol) January 30, 2017 The protesters (fuck knows what they were protesting) were pretty quickly kicked out and the meeting was called off. Did they intentionally appear during the vote for the non-discriminatory immigration policy? Was it to suggest people who didnt vote for it were (ghost?) racists? Or that people were using strawmen racists to silence discussion around immigration policy? Who knows. NSW Liberals party director Chris Stone released as statement saying the incident would be investigated: Two protesters wearing highly offensive costumes entered a Young Liberal Council meeting tonight. The identities of the protesters were not known to those present at the meeting. The meeting was immediately adjourned and the protesters ejected. An investigation into the incident will be undertaken. The Liberal Party highly condemns the offensive nature of this protest. More on this as it develops, if it does? I guess? Source and photo: Twitter. GATHER ROUND, MATES, because the tea continues to spill. So our mates The Weeknd and Selena Gomez are dating. Probably. It certainly looks like theyre dating, what with being caught canoodling behind the dumpsters and following each other on Instagram. A more cynical person like Selenas ex Justin Bieber, say, or any of you untrusting fucks might say this whole relationship was a gambit to raise the profile of one person and/or the other. And to that we say: maybe? But also why did The Weeknds ex Bella Hadid unfollow Selena on IG, hmmmm? Obviously this has drama all over it, whether real or imaginary. So yeah. These two are almost definitely doing smooches and The Weeknd just made it as close to Instagram official as weve seen yet. He uploaded a pic of Selena (or at least, someone whos back of head looks very much like Selena) to his Instagram story, showing her gazing up at Botticellis masterpiece, The Birth of Venus. The two have been spotted being all cute and couple-y around the streets of Florence, Italy (where this painting hangs) so the chances of that *not* being Selena are zilch. Selena & The Weeknd ?????..?? pic.twitter.com/2QE1Heuppf SelenaGomez Thailand (@SelenaGomez_TH) January 27, 2017 True love aint dead; its just temporarily swapped postcodes. Photos: Getty / Jamie McCarthy. Apple are no strangers to odd patents. It seems like they gather up a new pile of weird shit every year but like most of them, theyll rarely become anything beyond a collection of basic drawings. The latest addition to this stockpiled crap is a vaporiser patent that was filed in July and published on the 27th of January. The sublimator/vaporiser described in the patent is designed to evenly heat the contents of a bowl via a temperature controlled plate that sits on top of the substance instead of underneath it. As it vaporises the substance, the plate will compact it, ensuring maximum vape efficiency. Most current models position the plate underneath the bowl which can lead to wastage. Its unknown exactly what Apple are planning to do with this technology, but given the Californian legalisation of recreational weed and popularity of e-cigarettes, could this be a play at the consumer vape market? Alternatively, it could be used in an industrial or medical setting rather than the former. But more than likely, this is probably just another whacky patent that will never be fully realised by the company. Source: Gizmodo. Photo: boards.420chan.org / Barnaby Chillyville. By now, you would have been bombarded by news about American President Donald Trumps travel ban on citizens of seven majority-Muslim nations, but you may not have caught up on to how exactly the measures could impact you. After all, only the biggest pessimists among us would have thought hed pull something so decisively flawed in his first few days as POTUS. Nobody not even Americas own border security administrations was prepared for this. Simply put, the ban impacts citizens of the seven nations listed in Trumps executive order Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. This ban will last for at least 90 days, starting from the Saturday just passed. If you are a citizen of one of those nations, you will not be able to enter the US. That is the current, heartbreaking truth of the matter. Heres what the ban means for others looking to travel to the US in the next three months. Australian Citizens As simply as possible, if you are not a citizen of one of these nations, you will not be directly affected by the ban in any direct way. Upon arrival, you will not be subject to any checks, interviews, or any other procedures that werent present when Trump signed the order. You may, however, be held up due to the ongoing protests at many of the nations major airports and staff on-site who may be sick of dealing with this enormous clusterfuck of a ruling. There is one other thing worth nothing, though. Thanks to rules which were pushed through in June last year, people who have even visited those seven nations recently will need to jump through some hoops before entering the States. If you travelled to any of those nations after 1 March 2011, youll need to apply for a non-immigrant visa before travelling, and youll be asked to attend an interview at a US embassy or consulate. Thats in comparison to other Australian citizens, who may use the Visa Waiver Program (VWP) to get an Electronic System for Travel Authorisation (ESTA) to work or travel within the US for under 90 days interview free. Dual Nationals This is where it gets tricky: those who are citizens of both Australia and one of the seven nations listed will be adversely affected by the ban. Heres a sentence we compiled for this article yesterday afternoon: Hypothetically, if you hold citizenship of both Australia and Iran, you will not be issued a US visa, and you will not be able to enter the US. Welp, in the time between now and then, that hypothetical situation has become a reality. A 15-year-old Melbourne schoolboy with dual Australian-Iranian papers said his visa interview at the US Consulate was cancelled, meaning he wont be able to attend space camp in Orlando, Florida. While the United Kingdom has secured an agreement with US which ensures its dual nationals will be exempted from the ban (if they travel to the US from any nation but one of the seven blacklisted), Australia has not yet. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop issued a statement yesterday afternoon, saying she has directed our officials in Washington DC to work with US officials to ensure any preferential treatment extended to any other country is extended to Australia. Well have to wait and see on this one. Green Card Holders A green card is a kind of intermediary allowance available to some who move to the US. It grants the holder the ability to work, travel, and reside within the US for a decade at a time without the need for US citizenship. In the first few hours after the executive order was signed, it seemed likely the slap-dash enforcement of the rules would bar any green card holders bearing straight-up citizenship to one of the banned nations from re-entering the US. Fortunately, relevant green card holders have now been given the all-clear to travel to and from the US as they please, but a key figure in Trumps administration did say they may be subject to more intense questioning when re-entering. What Happens If You Get Caught Out? The situation regarding the execution of the executive order is most aptly described as fluid. Trump really did rush this one out, and each and every level of the nations administration is scrambling to figure out how the fuck to work it all out. As such, the information listed above is liable to change. If youre travelling to the US, its highly recommended you keep an eye on the SmartTraveller website for the latest information. Similarly, if you feel youre in a bad position upon arrival in the US, it may be worth making contact with the nearest Australian embassy or consulate. You can find a list of em here. If you are caught up in a situation that you believe is contrary to the rules laid out above, it would be worthwhile contacting the American Civil Liberties Union. Theyve been on the frontline in assisting people caught in this Kafkaesque nightmare, and in the past two days, theyve raised millions of dollars to keep their legal aid going. You may as well make the most of it, if you need to. If you do get turned away at the gates and youre flying with Qantas, youre in (some kind of) luck. The airline has offered to refund tickets for anyone hit by this rigmarole, and theyve also offered to amend the details on your ticket so you can head to a new, more accepting destination. Take care over there, mates. Photo: Miami Herald / Getty. People hold signs as the sit on the street near the U.S. Consulate during a protest against US President Donald Trump's executive order banning citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the United States in Toronto on Monday Jan. 30, 2017. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn Shannon Graham poses in her home in Bridgewater, N.S. on Saturday, August 27, 2016. Nova Scotia's highest court has dismissed an appeal by a man convicted of sexually assaulting his common-law wife, in an unusual case that garnered national attention when the victim asked the court to lift a publication ban on her name so she could speak out about her ordeal. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darren Calabrese Here, there, everywhere why car washes seem to be on every corner READ MORE: Marvin Debose In early November, three days after the presidential election, I traveled to South Africa. I always thought I was well-versed, that I knew Africa wasn't like what they showed on TV, but I still kind of expected what I saw on TV. When I got off the plane, it looked like South Africa, but it didn't feel like I was in Africa. But then I saw that 90 percent of the people looked like me. I felt at home because everyone treated me like family. I felt like a long-lost cousin. We were doing a tour to one of the poorest districts of Johannesburg, called Alexandria. We met an elderly lady who was a family member of one of our tour guides. She was a wearing a plastic smock because she was washing clothes, gray-haired, probably 5-foot-2, and she had a warm smile. She reminded me of my grandma. She saw me and said "You remind me of my son!" She hugged me. I just felt home. That's something that would happen at a family reunion. I remember going to the mall in Johannesburg, going to one of the stores run by black guys and talking to them about culture and music. It felt like I was talking to someone in my neighborhood. This was the first time that I ever took a vacation and felt such a kinship with strangers. I got to pet lion cubs and hiked through the countryside of Johannesburg, but visiting the Apartheid Museum was one of the most eye-opening experiences. I saw a lot of parallels between Johannesburg and the U.S. One of the main things that replayed in my mind was the phrase, "The struggle is global." When I was thinking of the Johannesburg issues, I still thought about Philly. I was always thinking about how the struggle is all connected. The first step is to work within your own community. Share your Black Joy story: We want to hear from you. Click here for the details on how to share your story about Black Joy and read more stories from around Philadelphia. Kavindu Jointe, 26, poet In August, when I planned my first trip to Asia, I didn't realize that it would fall a few weeks after the presidential election. After the onset of a spiraling depression caused by the outcome, I was able to escape for three weeks. When I boarded my flight, I was excited about my journey, but also overcome with the hopelessness of American racism and white-supremacist violence. There's a certain heaviness that becomes the norm as a black trans queer person in America, and when I boarded my flight, I carried this with me. I can't say Taiwan and Thailand were without their challenges, but they also charmed me in ways I had not expected -- the gentle tug of the waves in Koh Samet, the strength of the warm wind whipping us on a cliff in Kenting, the kindness of strangers despite our inability to find a common tongue. My last morning abroad was in the Taiwanese city of Taipei. My friend and I woke up at 5 a.m. and headed to watch the sunrise on Elephant Mountain. It took us half an hour to hike to the top, but when the sky brightened, it was so overcast that we couldn't see the sun rising. We sat on top of the mountain, overlooking the city as the clouds shifted and threatened rain. As I climbed to the top that morning, the words "There's a world waiting for you," from Nina Simone's "Young, Gifted and Black," kept replaying in my head. At the top, I played the song on my iPhone and let the words wash over me: "Young, gifted and black We must begin to tell our young There's a world waiting for you This is a quest that's just begun When you feel really low Yeah, there's a great truth you should know When you're young, gifted and black Your soul's intact" A 17- hour flight from everything I've ever known, I felt free. Humming along to Nina's voice, I felt more centered and calmer than I ever have. I felt a great swell of joy, as if I could do anything in the world, as if I could be anything, go anywhere; I felt a simple bliss that broke into my body. I regained a hope that America had robbed me of -- the belief that I could live a good life. I now know that I will. Share your Black Joy story: We want to hear from you. Click here for the details on how to share your story about Black Joy and read more stories from around Philadelphia. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email Print QUEBEC CITY (Reuters) Five people were killed after gunmen opened fire in a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers, the mosques president told reporters on Sunday. Earlier, a witness told Reuters that up to three gunmen fired on about 40 people inside the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center. Police put up a security perimeter around the mosque. Quebec police confirmed the shooting at a Quebec mosque in a tweet, and police on the scene said there had been fatalities. There are many victims there are deaths, a Quebec police spokesman told reporters. A police tweet said there were deaths and injuries and that suspects had been arrested. Why is this happening here? This is barbaric, said the mosques president, Mohamed Yangui. Yangui, who was not inside the mosque when the shooting occurred, said he got frantic calls from people at evening prayers. He did not know how many were injured, saying they had been taken to different hospitals across Quebec City. In June 2016, a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the cultural centre. Like France, Quebec has struggled at times to reconcile its secular identity with a rising Muslim population, many of them North African emigrants. The face-covering, or niqab, became a big issue in the 2015 national Canadian election, especially in Quebec, where the vast majority of the population supported a ban on it at citizenship ceremonies. Incidents of Islamophobia have increased in Quebec in recent years. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in the Saguenay region of Quebec was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In the neighboring province of Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. (Reporting by Kevin Dougherty in Quebec City; Editing by Peter Cooney) Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email Print Trump senior adviser Kellyanne Conway blew up on Fox News Sunday and went on a rant which compared President Trump and his staff to Jesus all because the White House thinks the media is biased against them. Video: https://youtu.be/2IKHJjgYYjg?t=14m2s Transcript via Fox News Sunday of Conway ranting about media bias and turning Trump into Jesus: Conway: Theres no question that when you look at the contributions made by the media, money contributions, they went to Hillary Clinton. We have all the headlines, people should be embarrassed. Not one network person has been let go. Not one silly political analyst and pundit who talked smack all day long about Donald Trump has been let go. They are on panels every Sunday. Theyre on cable news every day. Whos the first editorial the first blogger that will be left out that embarrassed his or her outlet? We know all their names. Im too polite to call them by name. But they know who they are, and theyre all wondering, will I be the first to go? The election was three months ago. None of them have been let go. If this were a real business, if the mainstream media were a thriving private sector business that actually turn a profit, which is not true of many of our newspapers, Chris, 20 percent of the people would be gone. They embarrassed, they failed to protect their shareholders and their board members and their colleagues. And yet we deal with him every single day. We turn the other cheek. If you are part of team Trump, you walk around with these gaping, seeping wounds every single day, and thats fine. I believe in a full and fair press. Im here every Sunday morning. I havent slept in a month. I believe in a full and fair press. But with the free press comes responsibility. And responsibility is to get the story right. Biased coverage is easy to detect. Incomplete coverage impossible to detect. Thats my major grievance, is the media are not theyre not giving us complete coverage. President Trump has signed all these executive orders this week. Hes met with these heads of states. Hes done so many things to stimulate the economy, to boost wages, to create jobs. Wheres the coverage? In case you didnt catch the reference, Donald Trump is Jesus walking around with the gaping, seeping wounds that are caused by biased media coverage. Kellyanne Conway and the rest of the White House are the disciples who are turning the other cheek while being assaulted by the media. Conways rant demonstrates how the White House can shrug off facts and invent their own reality. They are believers, not in God, but in Donald Trump as their almighty political messiah. For anyone who thinks that this administration is going be defeated by facts and reality, Kellyanne Conways rant should serve as a wake-up call. This White House appears to believe that they are on a mission to save America through the gospels of Trump. Their loyalty is to Trump, not the American people. Kellyanne Conway is truest of true believers, and she just couldnt help herself from coming a bit unhinged to defend her boss on Fox News Sunday. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email Print The following is an opinion column by R Muse* Even for those whose job it is to keep tabs on the consequences of Americans installing a bonafide fascist in the White House, it is getting to be a substantial chore to keep up with the atrocities coming at a frightening breakneck speed. It is apparent that there is a reason the public servants who take the oath of office and swear to defend and support the U.S. Constitution should have a fairly clear understanding of the nations founding document and uncontested law of the land; they are required to follow it like every other citizen and that includes the mentally ill fascist in chief Donald Trump. Of course Trumps executive overreach banning Muslims from a select few Muslim majority countries was both contrary to 239 years of American history and a decidedly bigoted act. It was also a decidedly profit-driven act because Trump only banned immigrants from the Muslim-majority nations that he doesnt have business investments in. It is also noteworthy that the countries he picked on have not been responsible for the death of even one American on American soil. The Muslim-majority nations that are responsible for all deaths on American soil, including the Saudis responsible for the terror attacks on 911, were spared Trumps executive action; only because he has investment and business interests in those countries. One wonders how the Trump will explain that little factoid to his bigoted followers; until realizing that they are stupid enough to believe whatever dirty lie the Trump tells them about how the media is lying about his very selective and profit-driven hatred of Islam. Despite Trumps selective defense against radical Islam he claims is the purpose of the ban, there are, as Slates Mark Joseph Stern points out, serious constitutional problems with Trumps executive order as a whole. Forget, for a moment, that Trumps order gave preferential treatment to Christians and denigrated Islam, what any reasonable person considers a religious test to enter a secular nation, or that Trumps order unilaterally established a state religion; he is shredding a mainstay of Americas democracy and civil rights. Trumps order violates the 5th Amendment of the United States Constitution because he believes the document cannot possibly apply to the Trump. What any fascist worth being compared to Adolf Hitler and Saddam Hussein knows is necessary to earn their stripes is eliminating the concept of due process; exactly what Trumps executive overreach accomplished. According to a lawsuit filed on Saturday by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Trumps religious, unconstitutional, illegal and profit-driven executive order has led to the flagrantly unconstitutional detention of perfectly legal immigrants whose lone crime is their national origin and religion. As any sane human being with an ounce of intellect and gram of decency knows intrinsically, Trumps nasty order isnt only wrong on moral and human grounds, it is also illegal in a nation with a 239-year old Constitution. Specifically, besides establishing, by Republican executive order, a religious test to create an America that is evangelically pure, Trump violated the Fifth Amendment he just publicly swore to god to uphold. That Amendment provides basic procedural guarantees to any person detained in the United States no matter if they are natural citizens, visitors, immigrants or Muslims. The Fifth Amendment forbids the government, including a bigoted fascist government employee in the White House who thinks he is above the law, from depriving any individual of liberty without due process of law. That includes an arrest warrant, indictment, charge, legal counsel, trial and so on. Thus far, the people being detained according to Trumps order all arrived in America lawfully and with the requisite documentation issued by the United States government. As noted by Mr. Stern, pursuant to the Immigration and Nationality Act those immigrants, Muslims or not, have a legal right to apply for asylum and have their claims processed by federal authorities. But this is Trumps America and instead of adhering to the law or the Constitution, on orders from fascist Trump the government has placed most immigrants in detention without a hearing or any kind of judicial oversight (due process), and banned them from speaking with legal advocates (attorneys). It doesnt matter how god-like Trump believes he is, he cannot issue an order that unconstitutionally deprives anyone in America, immigrant or not, of their liberty without due process of law. The government cannot indefinitely detain a lawful visitor without a hearing or any semblance of reasonable suspicion just because a so-called president issued an unconstitutional executive dictate. He is also prohibited by the equal protection segment of the Due Process clause from singling out lawful visitors based on their religion or nation of origin. Still, Trumps order mandates that federal law enforcement officers ignore longstanding fundamental constitutional principles because he thinks he can implement an illegal system. An illegal system, by the way, that informs any thinking person that in Trumps America the people are ruled by a government of one man, not laws or a Constitution. It is a governing entity that has no compunction about locking up [his] perceived enemies based on their identity and religion. The only reason due process laws even exist was to limit an authoritarian tyrants ability to summarily order unlawful arrests of his perceived enemies. Obviously, Trump really does want to emulate Philippine president Rodrigo Dutertes practice of detaining human beings without any evidence they violated any law or judicial process. At least Trump has not yet order law enforcement officials to summarily execute the legal immigrants, but if left unchallenged by decent Americans it cant be far off. Donald Trump is a danger to the nation, and the world, on myriad levels, and paramount among those dangers is his flagrant disregard for any laws, but particularly the nations law of the land, the Constitution. One thing is clear about Trump; he not only has no concept that he is not above the law, he willingly trashes the Constitution he just swore to somebodys god that he would support and defend. That is so much more than just really bad news, it is a Constitutional crisis informing that America is now really in crisis. The above commentary is the sole opinion of its author. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email Print The protests against Trumps Muslim ban are having an impact on the White House as the President has released a statement defending his executive order. In the statement, the President said, America is a proud nation of immigrants and we will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but we will do so while protecting our own citizens and border. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave. We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say. My policy is similar to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. We will again be issuing visas to all countries once we are sure we have reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering. It is telling that Trump White House used Obamas name more times than the phrase Muslim ban in their statement. Make no mistake about it; Trump is trying to use Obama as a human shield to deflect the protests and criticism that are coming at him. The difference between Obamas action and Trumps is simple. Obama banned Iraqi refugee applications for six months. Trumps executive order banned all types of visa applications from seven different countries. The Obama administration did their ban after it was found that al-Qaeda terrorists were trying to use the Iraqi refugee program to infiltrate the United States. The Trump administration is willingly admitting that their measure is proactive. They have no evidence to support the need for the ban at this time. Trumps statement is proof that the protests are working. The White House is on the defensive. The blame Obama excuse is not working, and the administration has painted themselves into a corner. The use by date on the blame Obama excuse expired on January 20, 2017. This is Donald Trumps mess, and the protesters are right to target their anger at him. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email Print While thousands of Americans and many around the globe express outrage over Donald Trumps recent travel ban from seven Muslim-majority countries, which has caused nothing but chaos and confusion, there is one group that is celebrating tonight: terrorists. According to a new report from the Washington Post, pro-ISIS social media accounts are rejoicing over Trumps latest action, saying it will help them convince more American Muslims to join their ranks. More from the report: Comments posted to pro-Islamic State social media accounts predicted that President Trumps executive order would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists. One posting hailed the U.S. president as the best caller to Islam, while others predicted that Trump would soon launch a new war in the Middle East. [Islamic State leader Abu Bakr] al-Baghdadi has the right to come out and inform Trump that banning Muslims from entering America is a blessed ban, said one posting to a pro-Islamic State channel on Telegram, a social-media platform. The writer compared the executive order to the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, which Islamic militant leaders at the time hailed as a blessed invasion that ignited anti-Western fervor across the Islamic world. Several postings suggested that Trump was fulfilling the predictions of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American born al-Qaeda leader and preacher who famously said that the West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens. Awlaki was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Yemen in 2011. When U.S. President Donald Trump says We dont want them here and bans the Muslim immigrants from Muslim countries, there is one thing that comes to our mind, said another posting, beneath a banner of al-Awlaki and his quote. Another posting on the Telegram channel Abu Magrebi said Trumps actions clearly revealed the truth and harsh reality behind the American governments hatred toward Muslims. While Trump and his supporters claim this isnt about religion and is instead about making America safe, zero deadly terrorist attacks have been carried out since Sept. 11, 2001, by any one of the seven Muslim nations hes targeting. There is also no arguing that Trumps executive order originated from his initial proposal, announced here in 2015, which called for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States. The administration may have found a new way to dress it up, as former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani admitted today, but it still meets the initial goal that Trump set of imposing an unconstitutional religious test on those coming to the U.S. This is why thousands of Americans and leaders from all over the world are standing united against Donald Trumps discriminatory and un-American executive order. Not only would it have failed to prevent any of the recent terror incidents in the U.S., but its a complete abandonment of American values that will only alienate peaceful Muslims in the United States and embolden terrorists who want to carry out attacks against our country. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email Print Donald Trump signed a new executive order today aimed at deregulation, which his administration is calling a one in, two out plan. In an era of bombastic pronouncements, Trump said this is a big one. A big one, but it sounds childish: There will be regulation, there will be control, but it will be a normalized control, he said, apparently having no idea what normalized means. Here is the text of the executive order: Apparently, agencies will propose which regulations they wish to drop and submit their choices to the White House, where Trump will give them their due attention. It is not known if new regulations can take effect before the old regulations have been revoked. New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd has observed that Donald Trump already seems drunk with power, and this flurry of executive orders seems to bear this up. This new order is already receiving the expected ridicule on social media, like Trumps other executive orders. The criticism is certainly well-deserved, as the rule with Trumps orders is that they are typically ill-thought out, hurried, slap-dash (in Chuck Schumers words) documents put out more for his ongoing theater than for their imagined positive effects. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email Print Senate Democrats are accusing Republicans of stealing the vacant Supreme Court and are vowing to filibuster President Trumps Supreme Court nominee. Politico reported: With Trump prepared to announce his nominee on Tuesday evening, Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) said in an interview on Monday morning that he will filibuster any pick that is not Merrick Garland and that the vast majority of his caucus will oppose Trumps nomination. That means Trumps nominee will need 60 votes to be confirmed by the Senate. This is a stolen seat. This is the first time a Senate majority has stolen a seat, Merkley said in an interview. We will use every lever in our power to stop this. Democrats have the 41 votes needed to block Trumps nominee confirmation by a super majority vote. Senate Majority Leader McConnell absolutely does not want to change the rules to get the Presidents nominee confirmed by a simple majority vote, because a change in the rules will come back to haunt Republicans once Democrats take back the Senate. Senate Democrats are enraged over McConnells blocking of Obama Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland, and they are determined to leave the seat vacant. With a midterm election coming up next year, the goal for Democrats should be to tie up Trumps Supreme Court nominee through at minimum November 2018. If Democrats take back the Senate in 2018, Trump will never get to fill the vacant Supreme Court seat. Democrats wanted action from their Senators in resistance to Trump. They are about to get it in a big way, as for only the second time in US history, a Supreme Court nominee is going to be filibustered. We value your privacy. Focus Taiwan (CNA) uses tracking technologies to provide better reading experiences, but it also respects readers' privacy. Click here to find out more about Focus Taiwan's privacy policy. When you close this window, it means you agree with this policy. Doug Mastriano knows that Shapiro is about to try to steal this election, but they have a foolproof plan to stop that steal. Everyone is going to vote as late in the day as possible. Charleston, SC (29403) Today Mostly cloudy skies. Slight chance of a rain shower. High 81F. Winds SE at 10 to 15 mph.. Tonight Mostly cloudy. Low 69F. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph. The first legal exports from Cuba to the U.S. in more than 50 years arrived at Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., last week. The shipment aboard the K-Storm included two containers of artisanal charcoal. The Village at Summerville, a Presbyterian Communities of South Carolina retirement facility, plans to add an 18-unit wing to its independent-living offerings. Another new building is expected to be announced in February. Rendering/FW Architects Watchdog and Public Service reporter Thad Moore is a reporter on The Post and Couriers Watchdog and Public Service team and a graduate of the University of South Carolina. To share tips securely, reach Moore via ProtonMail at thadmoore@protonmail.com or on Signal at 843-214-6576. Berkeley County, dating back to 1682, just 12 years after English settlers landed at nearby Charles Towne, is drenched in history, with Revolutionary War battles, a secret weapon developed during the Civil War, a man-made canal connecting two rivers and a lake built during the Great Depression. With much of the county protected in the Francis Marion National Forest, outdoor activites include hikes along the Palmetto Trail, boating and fishing on Lake Moultrie and numerous attractions such as the nature preserve Cypress Gardens, where numerous Hollywood films have been made. The county is now tapping into its assets to boost its tourism industry. Read moreBerkeley taps into battlefields, boating and butterflies to boost budding tourism business Just south of the North Carolina state line is one of Horry Countys last undeveloped stretches of oceanfront property, and everyone should celebrate now that a decades-long effort to keep it that way has finally paid off. And everyone should encourage South Carolinas political leaders and Read moreEditorial: Waties Island deal a win not only for SC environment but also for taxpayers Mayo Clinic put out this statement at 2:45 p.m. today: Statement from Mayo Clinic President and CEO on Middle-East travel ban January 29, 2017 Rochester, Minn -- On Friday, President Donald Trump issued an executive order that temporarily bans travel to the U.S. by citizens of seven Middle Eastern countries. The countries affected include Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. The following is a statement from John Noseworthy, M.D., Mayo Clinic President and CEO. ADVERTISEMENT "Although questions remain about the order's implementation, Mayo Clinic remains steadfast in supporting our patients, staff, families and community. Each year, we welcome thousands of visitors from across the globe, many of whom receive care from our incredibly talented and diverse team members. We value our international staff and partners, and are privileged to train a broad range of medical personnel from around the world. Mayo Clinic is a place of compassion, respect and trust, and our collective diversity helps make us the best place to work and receive care. We are actively monitoring the situation, exploring ways to ensure that the needs of our patients and staff are met, and will share new information as it becomes available." ### Cleveland Clinic also put out a statement today that's primarily about one of its docs being caught in the travel ban : Statement from Cleveland Clinic Recent immigration action taken by the White House has caused a great deal of uncertainty and has impacted some of our employees who are traveling overseas. We deeply care about all of our employees and are fully committed to the safe return of those who have been affected by this action. Statement from Suha Abushamma, MD "I want to personally thank everyone for their support and well wishes. Although this has been a difficult experience, I am grateful to be safe with my family in Saudi Arabia. Please know that I am deeply committed to my medical career and to helping patients at Cleveland Clinic," said Suha Abushamma, medical intern at Cleveland Clinic. ### ADVERTISEMENT Johns Hopkins University(and thus Johns Hopkins Hospital) in Baltimore issued a statement late Saturday by email that also says they're monitoring developments. The Johns Hopkins statement also says the university "fully endorses" a statement put out by the Association of American Universities that says in part: "We recognize the importance of a strong visa process to our nation's security. However, the administration's new order barring the entry or return of individuals from certain countries is already causing damage and should end as quickly as possible." FYI, Forbes.com posted a story today that says the travel ban "could exacerbate the U.S. doctor shortage and hurt patient care for thousands of Americans." To pigeonhole Douglas Preston a true-crime author is a gross understatement of his skills as a writer. Yes, his many best-sellers with Lincoln Child are fun, suspenseful romps chronicling the adventures of an FBI agent. But he's also an extremely capable investigator who, along with Italian journalist Mario Spezi wrote 2008's fabulous "The Monster of Florence: A True Story," a spellbinding work of nonfiction about a series of grisly murders in Tuscany. This time, the subject matter is equally compelling an ancient and sacred city in Honduras known as the White City or the Lost City of the Monkey God. For generations, indigenous people passed along stories of ancestors who fled there to escape Spanish invaders and that anyone who enters would get sick and die. In 2012, Preston joined a group of scientists, archaeologists, photographers and film producers who traveled to La Mosquitia, an unexplored and dangerous region of Central American jungle. They faced floods, mountains, jaguars, deadly snakes, disease-carrying insects and other inherent challenges. They brought along a new piece of NASA-owned laser technology known as LIDAR or Light Detection and Ranging, which confirmed a sprawling metropolis inhabited around the same time as the Mayan civilization in modern-day Mexico. Their intent was to map the city as well as explore and protect its rumored riches. Preston unspools the history of the White City, the expedition and the journey itself in detail sometimes in too much detail. The book originated as an article in National Geographic and it may have been a better story if kept restrained to magazine size. Lengthy discussions of scientific equipment, aircraft, landing zones and, later, infectious diseases, while fascinating on their own, feel somewhat superfluous and ill-placed. The latter especially an in-depth history of smallpox and other deadly diseases that systematically wiped out indigenous peoples was a compelling read, but its contribution at the end of this book felt out of place. ADVERTISEMENT It's possible that part of the dissatisfaction at the conclusion of this tale was rooted in the dissatisfaction in the expedition itself. While a remarkably important scientific discovery, the team's chief archaeologist decreed nothing could be excavated from the site at the time, which feels anticlimactic to the general public and readers. Abdelsalam Elshaikh, a 31-year-old medical school graduate, says he was devastated Friday when President Donald Trump ordered a temporary ban on immigrants and refugees from Muslim-majority countries such as Sudan, where he is from originally, and where his wife currently lives. The couple, who have been living apart since March 2016, were supposed to be reunited in early 2017, but the final step in her visa application process was delayed. Now, he has no idea when he'll see his wife next. "I couldn't believe that this is the country we dreamed of," Elshaikh said. If it isn't resolved, he said, he may be forced to give up his dream of being a doctor in the U.S. and have to return to Sudan to be with his wife. Now a U.S. citizen, Elshaikh said for him, the last two days were filled with fear and uncertainty, and he's not alone. Protesters expressing similar emotions packed Peace Plaza Sunday afternoon in reaction to Trump's order. The plaza was filled with more than 1,000 people lawmakers, community leaders, families and students. Their message to refugees, immigrants and Muslims was simple: "All are welcome here." ADVERTISEMENT Musse Mohamed, with the Olmsted County Human Rights Commission, said his phone line has been busy since the news broke Friday afternoon. Not only is he getting calls from fearful green card holders, but from those who are naturalized citizens and fear they'll be returned to their country of birth. He's not sure what to tell them. Elshaikh said the community's turnout was heartening, despite the fear that's so widespread among immigrants right now. "You know, when I come and see something like this, I feel that there still is faith, the people still tell us this is the true America we dream of," Elshaikh said. "So I feel a little more reassured with this kind of support," he said, looking at the crowd. A call to action Sunday's protest was organized by Rochester United Now, a new small grassroots political action group, whose goal isn't to repeat what other groups in Rochester are doing, but to mobilize people in coordination with existing organizations. "My immediate reaction was sadness, followed by disbelief and then anger. Many of us had feared the worst with a Trump administration, but we had hoped for the best and wanted to try to give him time to see what he would do before reacting," said Sara Hocker, an organizer with Rochester United Now. "But I think with his cabinet choices and executive orders and attempts to silence organizations that communicate with the public, it's really unfolding in a way that supports our worst fears," she said. ADVERTISEMENT Now, she hopes Rochester residents will follow up by getting involved with at least one thing in the community, for example getting involved with existing organizations like Rochester for Justice and Random Acts of Kindness. Or, she said, it could mean contacting one's elected officials, registering people to vote or attending community meetings. "We've got a pretty good grassroots effort going here in the community, and, I think, the surrounding community. I think we'll be able to mobilize this group quickly to action around other issues as well that's our hope," Hocker said. Although the implications for the Rochester community aren't immediately apparent, Hocker said the group was hoping to send a clear message that the city embraces its diversity and hate is not to be tolerated. "My biggest hope is that the communities that are affected and targeted by this executive order feel that they're welcome here, that they're wanted here and that they're safe here," Hocker said. The crowd reacts Others in the crowd, such as 21-year-old Naima Yusuf, who was born and raised in Rochester but is the daughter of immigrants and refugees, said that's why she came to Sunday's protest. "As a collective whole, we have to show what we stand up for, and if we're silent we just show that we agree," she said. ADVERTISEMENT Yusuf said Trump's actions will have major implications for the community, because "it vilifies us, and takes all the good that we've done for the community and tosses it aside." Twenty-one-year-old Dimitra Andreadaki immigrated to the U.S. when she was 5, so she said she knows the difficulties that come with that move to a new country. But the U.S. provides opportunities for families that "aren't available anywhere else." She thinks Trump's efforts are "short-sighted" because they don't address "the real concerns about terrorism." "These aren't terrorists, these are people fleeing war," she said of refugees. "Even at Mayo, there's so many people from around the world to heal people and make scientific advances, and part of what makes America great is that we can harness all this power from everywhere around the world." Impacts on local business Although it's unclear exactly what the far-reaching implications of this policy may be, Rochester has felt the pressure from previous immigrant bans. In 2000 and 2001, Rochester saw 2,100 patients from Middle Eastern counties arrive in connection to Mayo Clinic. By 2006, that fell to about 1,000 because of post-9/11 travel restrictions. By 2008, that number was back up to almost 1,500 patients coming from the Middle East. In 2008, Mayo said international patients were bringing $30 million to $50 million a year into Rochester. They also said that 10 percent of all international visitors coming to Minnesota annually arrived in Rochester. Mayo Clinic President and CEO John Noseworthy responded Sunday, issuing a statement asserting Mayo's support for its patients, staff and families who come from all around the world. "We value our international staff and partners, and are privileged to train a broad range of medical personnel from around the world," Noseworthy said. "Mayo Clinic is a place of compassion, respect and trust, and our collective diversity helps make us the best place to work and receive care." Noseworthy said though there are still questions, Mayo Clinic is "actively monitoring the situation, exploring ways to ensure that the needs of our patients and staff are met, and will share new information as it becomes available." Last week was without a doubt a tough one for DFL Gov. Mark Dayton. He fainted in the midst of his State of the State address on Monday night. The next day, he fielded questions about his health from reporters and disclosed he had recently been diagnosed with prostate cancer. While one might have expected a very serious, somber press conference given the issues, it was anything but. Dayton displayed his classic self-deprecating sense of humor throughout, generating plenty of laughs from the audience. Here are just a few of the jokes he cracked during Tuesday's press conference. Asked about his fainting spell, Dayton told the audience he had come to a conclusion: "The speech was too long." After recovering he asked his young grandson Hugo, "Did you think Grandpa gave a good speech? And he said no," the governor said. In terms of his prostate cancer diagnosis, Dayton stated he believes he is up for the job. He talked about when he underwent hip surgery at Mayo Clinic and told reporters there are no brain cells in his hip. "As far as I know, there are no brain cells in my prostate either," the governor said. He also joked that fainting at the State of the State may not have been such a bad thing after all. ADVERTISEMENT "If I knew it was going to result in Republicans not criticizing the speech, I would have tried it years ago," Dayton said. Legislative town hall Local lawmakers are slated to attend a town hall focused on disability, mental illnesses and health care policy. The event is hosted by Southeastern Minnesota Center for Independent Living. The non-partisan forum will be hosted by SEMCIL Executive Director Jacob Schuller and feature local lawmakers The discussion will be focused on current health care policy issues that may affect people with disabilities and mental illness. The forum is 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Sunday, Feb. 12 at SEMCIL, 2200 2nd St. SW in Rochester. Democrats in Minnesota's congressional delegation are condemning President Trump's recent executive order on immigration. On Friday, the Republican president signed an executive order restricting people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. The order also bars Syrian refugees from coming to the country and suspends all other refugee admissions for 120 days. First District DFL Rep. Tim Walz issued a statement Sunday blasting Trump's executive order, calling it "morally reprehensible." Walz said, "By unilaterally shutting America's door on those fleeing war and persecution in hope of a better life in the United States, we break the promise of our fundamental principle: that our nation is enriched by those who come from different lands, who bring their talents, their hopes and their hunger for freedom." DFL Sen. Amy Klobuchar also criticized the president's actions. ADVERTISEMENT "The president's executive order is already having devastating consequences, as legal residents with green cards, refugees fleeing violence, and travelers with visas are being denied entry to the United States and some are being detained in airports. Together, lawmakers and the American people must make it clear to the president that separating families and punishing those who followed the rules is not acceptable," Klobuchar said. Trump's executive order does have support among a number of Republicans, including House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wisconsin. "Our number one responsibility is to protect the homeland. We are a compassionate nation, and I support the refugee resettlement program, but it's time to reevaluate and strengthen the visa vetting process. This is why we passed bipartisan legislation in the wake of the Paris attacks to pause the intake of refugees. President Trump is right to make sure we are doing everything possible to know exactly who is entering our country," Ryan said in a statement. Also praising Trump's actions is Republican 1st District candidate Jim Hagedorn. He issued a statement saying he spoke out in favor of a refugee resettlement time out before Trump did on the campaign trail. "I understand that the first responsibility of a member of Congress is to defend the United States and protect the American people. Today's executive action is just the first of many, many border security and immigration initiatives that must be implemented to keep America safe from radical Islamists," Hagedorn said in a statement. In other words In the summer of 1858, Abraham Lincoln stood before his state convention and warned, "a house divided against itself cannot stand." The apt re Read moreThe danger of an island divided How good is President Trump? He not only makes Chuck Schumer cry, but he also has the left spitting mad at Schumer: Chuck Schumer under fire from left-wing activists Left-wing activists have found a collateral target in their efforts to resist President Trump powerful Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer. Enraged that the Senate Minority Leader has voted in favor of several cabinet nominees, a coalition of political, environmental and anti-poverty organizations led by the Working Families Party plan to protest near Schumers Park Slope home and in front of his Peekskill office this week. The Democratic base wants full-on resistance to everything this president does, said New York Communities for Change director Jonathan Westin. Trump is not negotiating on any of his positions; hes going full steam ahead. We should take the stance were not going to collaborate on anything. So far more than 1,600 people have RSVPed on Facebook and another 6,000 said they were interested in going to a What the f- -k Chuck?! rally at the Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn Tuesday night. At least five people were killed when gunmen opened fire at a mosque in Quebec City during evening prayers. The number of injured victims has not yet been reported. Approximately 40 people are said to have been at the religious service. The police reportedlly have arrested two men in connection with the shooting. According to a local newspaper, one of the arrested suspects was 27 years old and had a Quebecois name. Reuters notes that there have been a few incidents during the past few years in Canada where mosques were targeted. In 2013, police investigated after a mosque in Quebec was splattered with what was believed to be pig blood. In neighboring Ontario, a mosque was set on fire in 2015, a day after an attack by gunmen and suicide bombers in Paris. And in June 2016, a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the same Islamic center where tonights shooting occurred. Apparently, though, this was the first time one or more gunmen have targeted worshipers in a Canadian mosque. To my knowledge, this has never happened in the United States. There is much we dont yet know about this incident and, as always in cases like this, its possible that some of the initial reporting in incorrect. Developing. UPDATE: The latest report is that six people are dead and eight injured. Police say they have captured the two gunmen (initial reports of a third appear to have been wrong). Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard are calling the shootings an act of terrorism. The police are also characterizing them as such. At this point, that seems right. One of the stranger things in the world of energy is that the Department of Energy does not yet offer an official estimate of how much electricity use is now accounted for by our wireless world. Right now the official statistics only break down energy and electricity use by four broad sectors: residential, commercial, industrial, and transportation. But wireless technologyand all the energy-hungry internet server farms, cell towers, and end-use devices like smart phones, tablets, laptops, data-processing computers, etc.that are plugged into the grid may amount to as much as 10 percent of total electricity use today by some private estimates. In other words, all of the energy savings we have achieved though strenuous mandates to increase the energy efficiency of appliances has been more than overtaken by our new internet-based gadgets. One early controversial estimate is that every single Google search had a carbon footprint that could be measured in ounces, and that a smart phone has the equivalent energy footprint of a small refrigerator. Which would mean, by conventional green analysis, that social media activity is killing the planet! Yet another reason social media could be considered profoundly anti-social. Curiously, environmental groups with the notable exception of Greenpeace seem little interested in finding out how much energy use our wireless world uses, probably because they dont want to get crossways with many of their powerful patrons in Silicon Valley. Thus this story in the Washington Post a few days ago is worth noting: How bad is email for the environment? By Hayley Tsukayama A story started making the rounds last week about French energy regulators asking companies to cut back on email in order to save energy. It sort of sounds like a satirical piece. . . but the suggestion really does come from the French regulator RTE. Which got us thinking: How do our tech habits affect how much power we use and the environment? Finding an answer is harder than you may think. After all, the energy you use at your desk writing a typical email isnt all the energy that an email uses. As the French warning indicates, theres a whole infrastructure behind every message, which includes not only the electricity you use but also the energy it takes to store and transmit that information through data centers. . . Working off these and other sources, we were able to come up with some rough estimates about how your tech habits affect the environment. Your ultimate impact will, of course, depend on the way you power your own home solar, wind, etc. Email: The average spam email has a footprint equivalent to 0.3 grams of carbon dioxide emissions (CO2e), according to carbon footprint expert Mike Berners-Lees 2010 book How Bad are Bananas: The Carbon Footprint of Everything. A normal email, according to that book, has a footprint of 4 g of CO2e, which accounts for the power data centers and computers spend sending, filtering and reading messages. An email with a long and tiresome attachment can have a carbon footprint of 50g CO2e. Berners-Lee estimates that a typical year of incoming mail adds 300 pounds of emissions to a persons carbon footprint, or the equivalent of driving 200 miles in an average car. And just wait till you get to streaming video and gaming! I have on one or two occasions suggested to audiences of hip millennials who want to save the planet that they should start by giving up their smart phones, offering to take custody of them and make sure theyre properly recycled. Ive never gotten any takers. Reasonable people can disagree about the wisdom of the Trump administrations immigration order [NOTE: And the way it was implemented arguably left much to be desired]. But before agreeing or disagreeing, its important understand what the order does and does not do, and how it compares to recent policy. David French does a good job of separating the facts from the hysteria. For the hysteria, French cites the usual suspects: Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, the Huffington Post, etc. For the facts, and for perspective, French begins with this: [T]he order temporarily halts refugee admissions for 120 days to improve the vetting process, then caps refugee admissions at 50,000 per year. Outrageous, right? Not so fast. Before 2016, when Obama dramatically ramped up refugee admissions, Trumps 50,000 stands roughly in between a typical year of refugee admissions in George W. Bushs two terms and a typical year in Obamas two terms. . . .In 2002, the United States admitted only 27,131 refugees. It admitted fewer than 50,000 in 2003, 2006, and 2007. As for President Obama, he was slightly more generous than President Bush, but his refugee cap from 2013 to 2015 was a mere 70,000, and in 2011 and 2012 he admitted barely more than 50,000 refugees himself. The bottom line is that Trump is improving security screening and intends to admit refugees at close to the average rate of the 15 years before Obamas dramatic expansion in 2016. Obamas expansion was a departure from recent norms, not Trumps contraction. About the 90-day ban on people entering the U.S. from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen, French has this to say: [T]hese are countries either torn apart by jihadist violence or under the control of hostile, jihadist governments. The ban is in place while the Department of Homeland Security determines the information needed from any country to adjudicate any visa, admission, or other benefit under the INA (adjudications) in order to determine that the individual seeking the benefit is who the individual claims to be and is not a security or public-safety threat. It could, however, be extended or expanded depending on whether countries are capable of providing the requested information. The ban, however, contains an important exception: Secretaries of State and Homeland Security may, on a case-by-case basis, and when in the national interest, issue visas or other immigration benefits to nationals of countries for which visas and benefits are otherwise blocked. In other words, the secretaries can make exceptions a provision that would, one hopes, fully allow interpreters and other proven allies to enter the U.S. during the 90-day period. To the extent this ban applies to new immigrant and non-immigrant entry, this temporary halt (with exceptions) is wise. We know that terrorists are trying to infiltrate the ranks of refugees and other visitors. We know that immigrants from Somalia, for example, have launched jihadist attacks here at home and have sought to leave the U.S. to join ISIS. Indeed, given the. . .recent track record of completed and attempted terror attacks by Muslim immigrants, its clear that our current approach is inadequate to control the threat. Unless we want to simply accept Muslim immigrant terror as a fact of American life, a short-term ban on entry from problematic countries combined with a systematic review of our security procedures is both reasonable and prudent. French opposes application of the ban to green-card holders because they have already gone through round after round of vetting. He notes, however, that Trumps order, by its terms, doesnt apply to them. Thus, the administration should intervene to stop the misapplication of its order to green-card holders. If it doesnt, it should indeed be condemned, French says. What about the indefinite hold on admitting Syrian refugees? French finds this to be fairly inconsequential a return, largely, to the Obama administrations practices from 2011 to 2014: For all the Democrats wailing and gnashing of teeth, until 2016 the Obama administration had already largely slammed the door on Syrian-refugee admissions. The Syrian Civil War touched off in 2011. Here are the Syrian-refugee admissions to the U.S. until Obama decided to admit more than 13,000 in 2016:Fiscal Year 2011: 29Fiscal Year 2012: 31Fiscal Year 2013: 36Fiscal Year 2014: 105Fiscal Year 2015: 1,682. To recap: While the Syrian Civil War was raging, ISIS was rising, and refugees were swamping Syrias neighbors and surging into Europe, the Obama administration let in less than a trickle of refugees. Only in the closing days of his administration did President Obama reverse course in numbers insufficient to make a dent in the overall crisis, by the way and now the Democrats have the audacity to tweet out pictures of bleeding Syrian children? Its particularly gross to see this display when the Obama administrations deliberate decision to leave a yawning power vacuum in part through its Iraq withdrawal and in part through its dithering throughout the Syrian Civil War exacerbated the refugee crisis in the first place. There was a genocide on Obamas watch, and his tiny trickle of Syrian refugees hardly makes up for the grotesque negligence of abandoning Iraq and his years-long mishandling of the emerging Syrian crisis. When we know our enemy is seeking to strike America and its allies through the refugee population, when we know theyve succeeded in Europe, and when the administration has doubts about our ability to adequately vet the refugees we admit into this nation, a pause is again not just prudent but arguably necessary. What about Trumps directive to prioritize refugee claims made by individuals on the basis of religious-based persecution, provided that the religion of the individual is a minority religion in the individuals country of nationality? French puts this directive in perspective by noting the extent to which persecuted non-Muslims almost never seemed to benefit from Obamas refugee policy: [When] Obama dramatically expanded Syrian refugee admissions in 2016, few Christians made the cut:The Obama administration has resettled 13,210 Syrian refugees into the United States since the beginning of 2016 an increase of 675 percent over the same 10-month period in 2015.Of those, 13,100 (99.1 percent) are Muslims 12,966 Sunnis, 24 Shia, and 110 other Muslims and 77 (0.5 percent) are Christians. Another 24 (0.18 percent) are Yazidis. As a point of reference, in 2015 Christians represented roughly 10 percent of Syrias population. Perhaps theres an innocent explanation for the disparity. Perhaps not. In any event, federal asylum and refugee law already has a built-in religious test. The term refugee means (A) any person who is outside any country of such persons nationality . . . and who is unable or unwilling to return to . . . that country because of persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution on account of . . . religion [among other things] . . . Thus, as French says: Religious considerations are by law part of refugee policy. And it is entirely reasonable to give preference (though not exclusivity) to members of minority religions. Finally, French emphasizes that you can read the entire executive order from start to finish, reread it, then read it again, and you will not find a Muslim ban. He concludes: Now is the time to take a fresh look at our border-control and immigration policies. Trumps order isnt a betrayal of American values. Applied correctly and competently, it can represent a promising fresh start and a prelude to new policies that protect our nation while still maintaining American compassion and preserving American friendships. In my view, anyone who takes American security interests seriously and who has been paying attention will agree that a fresh look is overdue. In what might be described as the journalism equivalent of ambulance chasing, the Washington Post is inviting readers to tell it how their lives have been ruined by President Trumps executive order on immigration. The Posts main web page includes this: Are you, or someone you know, affected by President Trumps executive order banning refugees and migrants from the U.S.? Share your story with us. If you follow the link, you get this screen: Are you, or someone you know, affected by President Trumps travel restrictions? President Trump issued an executive order barring refugees and migrants from predominantly Muslim countries from entry into the United States. If this affects you or someone you know, The Washington Post wants to hear from you. *REQUIRED FIELDS Name * Who is affected and why? * Explain your/their situation to us in as much detail as you can provide. * For example, if the person affected is currently detained at an airport, left in limbo during travel, etc. How can we reach you or the person affected by the order? Please provide contact information phone, email, or both which a reporter may use to get in touch and learn more. We will not publish your contact information. Submit Reader response may already be robust. The main page currently contains these stories: She was barred from visiting her sick mother and Trump destroyed my life and Were second-class citizens and He was days from moving to the U.S. Ive been reading the Post for 55 years. I dont recall the paper ever running individualized story after individualized story about how particular people have been affected by a government policy. Nor do I recall the Post ever soliciting such stories. I also dont recall the Post engaging in this sort of journalism when Donald Trump intervened to prevent companies from moving plants from the U.S. to foreign countries. The Post easily could have run multiple stories about workers whose jobs Trump saved, thereby rescuing their economic situation. The Post could have elicited information about the dire consequences particular people would have faced if the company had moved its operation abroad. To the best of my recollection, the Post didnt do so. It cant be that the Washington Post is out to get our new president, can it? Przepraszamy! Ogoszenie na stanowisku: AP Junior Accountant with German wygaso z dniem 2017-02-27 Ta propozycja bya zozona przez Accenture Mozliwe przyczyny wygasniecia oferty to: propozycja zamieszczona przez pracodawce zostaa usunieta z serwisu praca.egospodarka.pl ogoszeniodawca zakonczy proces rekrutacji uzyskujac odpowiednia ilosc osob firma zmodyfikowaa tresc ogoszenia i jest ono dostepne pod innym adresem WWW dostawca tresci usuna ogoszenie z bazy danych zy adres url ogoszenia Jezeli poszukujesz pracy w branzy Ksiegowosc / Audyt, zajrzyj tutaj: Praca Ksiegowosc / Audyt Jezeli poszukujesz pracy na stanowisku AP Junior Accountant with German, zajrzyj tutaj: Praca AP Junior Accountant with German Jezeli poszukujesz pracy w miescie: Warszawa, zajrzyj tutaj: Praca Warszawa Pamietaj, ze mozesz takze rozpoczac poszukiwanie pracy od strony gownej, kliknij tutaj. Inne ogoszenia, ktore mogy byc w kregu Twoich zainteresowan: President Andrzej Duda will take part in an official ceremony inaugurating a joint Polish-American training in Zagan (western Poland) on Monday. American combat units are already participating in the first joint Polish-American exercise on the Polish territory. "Joint training of the Polish land forces and the units of U.S. Armoured Brigade Combat Team (ABCT) is being carried out, among others, as part of the ongoing Bison Drawsko 2017 exercise. Polish soldiers from the 12th Mechanised Brigade and the 1st Armoured Brigade are training with American troops with M109 Paladin howitzers," PAP was told by Lieutenant Colonel Szczepan Gluszczak, spokesman of the General Command of the Armed Forces. The Bison-17 exercise takes place at the military training ground near Drawsko Pomorskie (northern Poland) with some 4.5 thousand soldiers from Poland, the Netherlands and the U.S.A. Further joint exercises are planned for 2017, including Gepard-17, Dragon-17 and Sabre Guardian 2017. (PAP) Local leaders and community members are speaking out against President Donald Trumps recent executive order to temporarily halt refugee admission into the United States. About 250 people came together Sunday afternoon outside the Henry Ford Centennial Library to protest Trumps executive order and hundreds more joined a protest at Detroit Metropolitan Airport in Romulus. Among them was Imam Mohammad Ali Elahi of the Islamic House of Wisdom in Dearborn Heights, who said the order is an attack on the religious liberty found in the Constitution. Everybody is shocked and frustrated at this decision, Elahi said Monday. It is very dangerous, destructive and deceiving; it doesnt help anybody. Its embarrassing for our country. A draft of the order includes a 120-day ban on the refugee resettlement program. It also placed a 30-day ban on visas given out to people living in majority-Muslim countries including Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. On Saturday, a federal judge in New York issued an order to temporarily block the deportation of people with valid visas who arrived in the U.S. after the ban took effect. But details of the immigration order and who it will affect still remain unclear to many. According to an Associated Press report, 109 people who were in-transit to the U.S. were denied entry as a result of the order, and 173 were not allowed to board their planes overseas. As of Saturday, no green-card holders were turned away upon entering, but many spent several hours in detention centers at various airports. Elahi said the order only serves to segregate families and promote an agenda of fear without addressing the real source of terrorism. For example, someone who went overseas to attend a funeral for a family member now cannot come back, even if have they have a legal green card or visa, he said. Its hurting families. Its not just about refugees, these are professional people. More surprising is that the victims of the decision are the countries that are victims of terrorism, according to Elahi. Those countries who support ISIS are not on the list, he said. Trump promised on day one to be fair with everyone but this is not fairness. He said he is grateful for the support of people of intelligence and good conscience who are standing with the Muslim community. Weve got good solidarity, he said. I just received a supportive letter from the Catholic Church and we appreciate that. This is not just about Muslims; its about America. Its about justice and injustice. Today its Muslims, tomorrow its somebody else. As Martin Luther King, Jr said, Injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere.' The decision wont make the country safer, he believes, because the countries that support terrorism arent on the banned list. This is a gift for ISIS, he said. The Saudis who are supporting ISIS are not on this list, so what message will they get? To those who argue that the ban is temporary, Elahi said the length of time doesnt make it right. Wrong is wrong, he said. When you violate principles whether its one month or one year that absolutely doesnt make our country safe. It makes Americans vulnerable in the world because it isolates America and makes unnecessary enemies. This doesnt make us great again, he said. It makes stupid again. It makes us racist again. There is no glory in such an unjust and unthoughtful decision. Dearborn mayor responds Dearborn Mayor John OReilly Jr. said that the city has always been welcoming to immigrants throughout its 88-year history, and will continue to be. Three generations of my family have lived beside persons of many faiths and cultures, including Muslims, and they have actively participated in community events of every type, OReilly said. We are a model for how a city can be made up of people from many different backgrounds, yet remain a unified community. Our decades of success is proof that there is a reason that inclusion is an American value. People who are Muslims are our neighbors, teachers, doctors, colleagues, business owners, community leaders, and friends. We will continue to do everything within our authority as a city to ensure that all of our residents feel safe and welcome here. I stand steadfast with all of our community members who are dedicated to that commitment. Dingell condemns order U.S. Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-12th District) shared her thoughts in a statement issued Friday shortly after the order was signed, calling it deeply disturbing. While we all agree we need to provide for a strong national security, this approach is wrong, ineffective and jeopardizes the fundamental pillars of our constitution and the values that make this nation great: freedom of religion, compassion and justice, Dingell said. If you come to my hometown of Dearborn, you will see that Arab Americans and refugees are part of the fabric of our community they are our doctors, teachers, small business owners and service members, and they are among the most loyal and patriotic Americans I know. To single out this population for discrimination is wrong and reminiscent of one of the darkest periods in our nations history when thousands of Japanese-Americans were targeted and imprisoned in internment camps during World War II. Emphasis should be put on uniting, not dividing, she added. You cant make America great by eroding the very values that made it that way in the first place. Terror can be wrought by any race or religion and by forces both outside and inside our borders. Instead of creating division and reinforcing hatred, we need to focus on how we can all join together to keep our nation safe and secure. Catholic leaders stand with Muslims The Archidocese of Detroit lent its support to the Muslim community through thoughts from The Most Reverend Allen H. Vigneron, Archbishop of Detroit, who reaffirmed his stand to oppose all unjust discrimination on the basis of religion. Please know that the Catholic community will continue to speak out and care for immigrants and refugees, no matter their religion or their country of origin, Vigneron said. As I said in my statement last month: Our local community in metro Detroit is much richer for the contributions of our brothers and sisters from Mexico and El Salvador, from India and Pakistan, from Iraq and Syria, from China and Korea,from Ukraine and Poland, from Cameroon and Nigeria.' CAIR files lawsuit The Council on American-Islamic Relations said it would challenge the constitutionality of the executive order, and on Monday announced that it was filing a federal lawsuit against the ban. There is no evidence that refugees the most thoroughly vetted of all people entering our nation are a threat to national security, Lena Masri, the groups national litigation director. This is an order that is based on bigotry, not reality. Nihad Awad, CAIRs co-founder and national executive director, said at a press conference that millions of Americans are very concerned about direction in which the president is steering the country. Trumps policies are threatening to who we are as Americans, Awad said. The founding fathers fled religious persecution in other countries, he said. To me as an immigrant and refugee myself, I am so blessed to be in the United States. I am fulfilling my dream. These refugees are fleeing war, persecution and violence. They need us the most. Traditionally weve been open and also careful about who comes into the country. Awad said he believes the executive order is based on fear mongering, not national security. It takes two years for a refugee to come to the U.S. and they are extremely vetted, he said. The way I see it, this is the American values of openness, decency and respect versus Donald Trump. Local Arab American politicians speak out Newly elected state rep. Abdullah Hammoud (D-Dearborn) joined Sundays protest in Dearborn and spoke on social media about how his family is being affected personally. My aunt, who lives in Lebanon, called me this morning to talk about the recent executive orders my family submitted paperwork to sponsor her immigration to America just a few months ago, Hammoud wrote on Facebook. Whilst she doesnt reside in any of the seven nations listed on the ban, she understood that she would not be accepted here given the current political climate of our nation. For many, dreams of visiting family, attending an American university and pursuing the American dream have come to an end, according to Hammoud. This ban, along with the Mexican wall, are constructed on the notions of hate and fear, and are barriers that present a dangerous regression of our social and moral compass, he wrote. There has never been a time in our nations past when actions based on racism and bigotry were preserved on the right side of history whether it was to Keep Dearborn Clean or Make America Great Again. This country was founded on principles of religious freedom, equality, and justice for all. Our nation is unraveling at the hands of a president who acts in clear disregard of the very values he was elected to uphold. In contrast, Islam places justice as the standard for distinction between virtues and vice. Islam is not radical. Willful ignorance is. Dearborn City Council President Susan Dabaja also shared her thoughts about the executive order with followers on social media. I am angered and saddened by the executive order banning people based on religion, Dabaja said. While I strongly believe national security is important, and even more so as a mother, this order strikes at our very core as Americans and what our country is built on. She reiterated that the United States is a country of immigrants and refugees that was built on diversity. I am a proud Muslim from a family of immigrants, she said. I am a proud public servant. I am a proud American. I am also an attorney that took an oath to support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the state of Michigan. Dabaja added that the ban has already impacted a lot of families, violates our values as a nation and is against the fundamental principles our country was founded on. Civil rights leaders weigh in Agustin Arbulu, director of the Michigan Department of Civil Rights, said while his office has no legal authority over immigration or border security, he felt it necessary to state its position. When government treats entire groups of people based on its worst elements, it not only harms other members of the group, it hurts us all, Arbulu said. It is particularly damaging in times like now, when we must work to mend our divisions, not multiply them. Relying on stereotypes instead of facts will always foster unintended consequences, like bias, hate and prejudice. It strengthens our enemies and drives away our friends. Rula Aoun, director of the American Arab Civil Rights League, also issued a statement condemning the order. The ACLR strongly opposes these actions as they are designed to target immigrant communities and are disgracefully timed during an urgent humanitarian crisis, Aoun said. According to aids and experts, the ban is expected to limit immigration from countries that include Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. It is the ACRLs position that because these executive orders discriminate against a particular religion such orders would be unconstitutional, particularly since President Trumps campaign rhetoric focused on religion as the target. Also backing up those thoughts is The American Human Rights Council, which plans to work with other organizations, individuals and groups to get Congress to pass comprehensive immigration reform that is balanced and respects the human rights of immigrants and refugees. We are truly disappointed by Mr. Trumps immigration executive order, divisive rhetoric and plan to build a wall, AHRC Executive Director Imad Hamad said.. However, we are heartened with the outpouring of support for human rights and human dignity from people from all walks of life. Ford denounces ban Ford Motor Co. Executive Chairman Bill Ford and President and CEO Mark Fields said President Donald Trumps travel ban goes against our values as a company. In a joint statement shared with employees Monday, Ford and Fields said the company does not support Trumps executive order. Respect for all people is a core value of Ford Motor Company, and we are proud of the rich diversity of our company here at home and around the world, said Ford and Fields. That is why we do not support this policy or any other that goes against our values as a company. We are not aware, to date, of any Ford employees directly affected by this policy. We will continue working to ensure the well-being of our employees by promoting the values of respect and inclusion in the workplace. Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV and General Motors Co. declined to comment on the travel ban. When asked by reporters Monday in Detroit, Mark Reuss, GMs head of global product development, purchasing and supply chain, declined to comment directly on the ban and whether GM had been impacted. Im very, very proud of General Motors. Were a global company, he said. I think we have probably a really good representation of people from completely different backgrounds, culture, race, gender. Im very proud of that. United Auto Workers President Dennis Williams said in a statement Monday that the union would not exist if immigrants hadnt joined non-immigrants in fighting for the rights we cherish today. We must protect national security while remaining true to the very values that have made us a great nation, he said. The UAW opposes discrimination of any kind and denounces any policy that judges people based on their religion or nation of origin. Elon Musk, Tesla Motors Inc. founder and CEO, tweeted on Friday that entry bans are not the best way to address the countrys challenges. Many people negatively affected by this policy are strong supporters of the U.S., Musk wrote. Theyve done right, not wrong and dont deserve to be rejected. Musk is one of over two dozen business leaders advising Trump as part of the presidents manufacturing jobs initiative. He is also a part of Trumps strategic and policy forum, which will give input on job creation and the economy. The Ford statement comes a week after Fields spent two days in Washington, D.C., meeting with Trump on manufacturing and auto and environmental regulations. Fields said then that Ford was encouraged by the president and his economic policies, including his order Monday to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Weve been very vocal both as an industry and as a company, and weve repeatedly said that the mother of all trade barriers is currency manipulation, and TPP failed in meaningfully dealing with that, and we appreciate the presidents courage to walk away from a bad trade deal, Fields said. I think as an industry, were excited about working together with the president and his administration on tax policies, on regulation and on trade to really create a renaissance in American manufacturing. Trump in early January took credit for Fords decision to cancel plans for a $1.6-billion plant in Mexico and instead invest $700 million at its Flat Rock Assembly Plant in Michigan. Ford said at the 2017 North American International Auto Show that hed been in touch with Trump before the company announced the plans. He also said Trump did not play a part in the companys decision. We made that decision, Ford said. It was the right decision for us. It was a business decision. Well always make the right business decision for Ford. But I think its important that we inform him of that, its important that we understand his policies and where hes going. ACCESS town hall In response to concerns about the order, ACCESS will hold a town hall meeting from 6 to 9 p.m. Feb. 1 at the Ford Community & Performing Arts Center, 15801 Michigan Ave. Planned in conjunction with Take on Hate, a grassroots ACCESS campaign fighting discrimination, the meeting will focus on informing people of their rights and equipping them with tools and resources to deal with the order. The meeting is free for anyone to attend. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Mark Soifer, the Ocean City PR guru who apparently never met a goofy gimmick he didnt like or wouldnt try to turn into promotions and publicity for that town, actually lived up to the name of this column fairly quietly. At the start of this year, Soifer went Off The Clock permanently. He retired from his Rolodex of roles for the city: as the Poobah of DooDah the annual DooDah Parade he founded in Ocean City, after proudly stealing the idea from Pasadena, California as a trash-can-wearing environmental warrior he called TrashBuster, as the creator of a media-celebrity of a hermit crab named Martin Z. Mollusk and more. There was much, much more, mainly because Soifers career stretched on for 45 years, long enough to become probably the most influential person in Ocean City history, as a local official put it a few years ago. He took the towns motto/self-image as Americas Greatest Family Resort and burned it into the brains of anybody whod listen. He came up with an endless stream of events that basically begged parents to take the kids to them, from a dog parade for basset hounds to translating French fries into a sculpture medium to a few newer items, like an off-season Quiet Festival. And for that career of creativity, I have to publicly congratulate Soifer, a guy I first interviewed almost 25 years ago. And over that quarter of a century, I got to have some fun and some laughs dealing with him. He clearly thought fun was a big part of his work, that humor could draw people and laughs could create customers or at least create curiosity. And if that little huh? happened to lure people to the Boardwalk or beach to check out the towns latest shtick, and they happened to stay for lunch or the day or a weekend in Ocean City, then the PR guy was earning his keep. In a different century that only feels like a different lifetime I wrote a few columns for The Press that, on occasion, made some fun of Soifer and his creations. He was always a great sport about it, and even one year presented me with the DooDah Parades Golden Hot Dog award for long-time contributions to humor around here. Naturally, I made fun of that too, including the fact that Soifer admitted that the plaque that came with the award starring a gold-colored hot dog looks semi-pornographic. I disagreed, on the grounds that there was nothing semi about that last word in his description. And I goofed on more Soifer stuff, even mounting a mock campaign to force him to change the name of probably his most beloved character, the weather-forecasting hermit crab named Martin Z. Mollusk. (The attack was based on that name being too close to my own for a critter I called Punxsutawney Phil on the half-shell.) But the truth is, I always admired Soifers creativity, and his ability to not only have fun on the job, but to make his work fun for others. When he dreamed up hermit-crab races for Ocean City, he also dreamed up an official racing organization NASCRAB to govern the sport. Speaking of dreaming, his Quiet Festival got its own theme song, a yawn-along to Beautiful Dreamer. Oh, and the official great seal of the DooDah Parade features an actual seal: Yes, the critter that barks and bounces balls on its nose. That roster of ridiculousness rolled right on through the decades Soifer worked. And the stuff he came up with showed that even though this man had a real job, raised a family, contributed to society and even wrote poetry, he never grew up all the way. I think he made sure of that, to make sure whimsy was always part of his world and his work. And for that, he deserves an award. Hey, I have the perfect one and I swear, its only semi-pornographic. Neil Massaros parents describe him as wise beyond his years. Within a few minutes of speaking with the ambitious young poet, it shows. Though hes soft spoken, Neil is clear about where he wants to take his spoken word poetry and how he hopes to help others with his project, the You Matter Movement, which aims to spread positivity. At its core, Neil hopes to spread the message that people matter, the idea of living beyond what they, or society, thought they were capable of. I feel like we always get shot down by what society sets as normal, and I feel like, when we put each other down, we dont let each other accomplish what we want to do, and thats where beyond capable, comes in, he said. Live beyond what youre capable of and do other than what society says, accomplish what you want to accomplish despite what people say. The 16-year-old Hammonton High School student is working to grow his message through his website, YouTube videos, Instagram and Facebook. The movement was spurred from a feeling that his generation was going downhill and seeing the pain in others. Inspired by evangelist, poet and writer Clayton Jennings, Neil began to test his hand at spoken word. Obviously bullying is a huge thing. I feel like with social media, were so worried about how many people like our picture or follow us, and its kind of like a competition, he said. We value our material possessions, and its all we care about instead of caring about others anymore. The teenager recognized that some hide behind social media accounts and that a positive caption with a photo may mask the struggles of the poster. Some, he said, may look down on others because of the clothing they wear. No matter what your race is, no matter what your sexuality is, your religion I just want to be able to accept each other for who we are, he said. Neil is no stranger to having personal struggles, battling depression and bullying. Deeply dedicated to his Christian faith and active in his churchs youth group at HOPE United Methodist Church in Voorhees, Neil recounted how he would be teased for carrying around a planner that he would write in when he had tests, or called Jesus boy. They would call it, my little bible, he said of the students who bullied him. Obviously everybody slips, so if I throw a curse word out there sometimes theyll say hey you cant do that, youre a Jesus boy. Many, Neil said, are inspired by his videos, and he hopes to reach whomever is hurting even if theyre not in his age group though he has witnessed firsthand his message impacting one of his classmates. One girl, who he was sitting next to in class, cried after watching one of his videos, he said. Ive been there before where Ive heard someone give a message and you start crying because you cant help it youre moved, he said. You get this feeling inside and you start crying and you cant control it, I felt like I knew that was what was happening and she was moved by it and it made me feel really good that I was able to reach out to someone. Neils parents, Allan and Colleen Witten, said their son has always been compassionate toward others. Even when he was a little kid, his best friend in grammar school was a kid in a wheelchair, Colleen said. Hes just got this compassion. Colleen added with a laugh: He doesnt get it from us. Colleen has always seen this drive in her son, but has noticed it come out more in the past year. The Wittens are proud of Neil, who said when he first showed his parents his videos, they both cried. Neil said his parents are his biggest supporters, and his parents and two elder brothers always come first. In the future, Neil hopes to continue to grow his message. He even hopes to team up with YouTube celebrities to further spread the You Matter Movement. More than anything, Neil just would like to help others. I dont want to be famous for the fame and all the money, he said. I want to be famous to reach out to people. I want to be known to reach out to people and make an impact on people. TRENTON A state Assembly panel advanced a bill Monday that would add a $2 daily fee on Atlantic City hotel rooms to fund the citys police and fire departments, which are facing deep cuts under a state takeover. The Assembly Appropriations Committee released the bill by an 8-0 vote with three abstentions. The bill can now be considered by the full Assembly, although the measure still hasnt been introduced in the state Senate. The bill, sponsored by Assembly Speaker Vincent Prieto, D-Bergen, Hudson, would impose a $2 temporary surcharge for each occupied hotel room in the city. The fee would last two years, and all revenue would go to city public safety departments. Proponents of the bill, such as the state AFL-CIOs Eric Richard, said it would help avoid dangerous staffing reductions at the departments. Richard testified state officials are seeking $14 million in givebacks from the citys public safety unions by Feb. 1. The $2 fee, he said, would raise $8 million annually. The last thing we need for a struggling city like Atlantic City is to have a perception this city is now unsafe due to public safety layoffs, he said. Bill DiLorenzo, president of the citys firefighters union, said state officials have proposed cutting 106 firefighters. He said the departments call volume is up 23 percent over its five-year average this year, mostly due to delivery of the opiate antidote Narcan for drug overdoses. The bill would keep the city safe for the two years, when the union will be at the budget number we need to be, he said. Theyre building a university in the city, theyre building a South Jersey Gas (headquarters), and with that theyre going to cut the manpower by 54 percent, DiLorenzo said of potential layoffs. Bob Marshall, representing the Greater Atlantic City Chamber, testified against the bill, saying it would further put the city at a competitive disadvantage. He cited a study commissioned by Meet AC, the citys conventions bureau, that showed hotel taxes already make up 19 percent on casino rooms and 15 percent on noncasino rooms renting for $100. The 19 percent tax share was higher than hotel rooms in cities such as Philadelphia, Boston and Baltimore. Clearly in a resort town that relies primarily on tourism whether through conventions, trade shows or general visits this would severely affect the ability to compete with other towns for those conferences, trade shows and meetings, he said. In a statement issued after the vote, Prieto said the bill is a temporary solution for the next two years, which is hopefully enough time for the citys finances to be righted and smart decisions to be made about the citys future. The state hasnt commented on the labor negotiations. On Wednesday, State Local Government Services Director Timothy Cunningham said there has been a lot of misinformation on the labor talks, but he declined to comment further. A spokesman for the Senate Majority Office declined comment. A spokesman for the Governors Office did not return a request for comment. TRENTON Several bills aimed at fighting opioid addiction in New Jersey are one step closer to becoming law. State Senate and Assembly committees approved legislation Monday on expanding health insurance coverage for addiction treatment, raising public awareness on heroin and opioids, and creating an opioid task force. A bill sponsored by Sen. Joseph Vitale, D-Middlesex, and Senate President Stephen Sweeney would require health insurance carriers and public health benefits programs to provide unlimited benefits for inpatient and outpatient addiction treatment at in-network facilities with a prescription. By expanding insurance coverage to those who need immediate access to help ... we will save lives," Vitale said in a statement. The bill would require the benefits be provided for the first 180 days per plan year of inpatient and outpatient treatment of a substance-use disorder at the direction of a medical profession. There is no need for prior authorization or requirements. The bill now heads to the Senate for further consideration. Assembly Democrats were successful when the Assembly Appropriations Committee approved the H.O.P.E Initiative Act, which would create a public awareness campaign to educate New Jersey residents about the dangers, causes and responses to heroin and opioid addiction. We can also dispel commonly accepted myths and stereotypes of drug addiction and lead them to treatment facilities enabling them to rebuild their lives," said Assemblyman Joe Danielsen, D-Middlesex, Somerset. Bill sponsors said the state Division of Mental Health and Addiction Services would oversee the Heroin and Opioid Drug Public Education campaign and work closely with the Governors Council on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse, Partnership for a Drug-free New Jersey and the federal Drug Enforcement Administration. A different bill, passed by the Assembly Health and Senior Services Committee, would create the Joint Legislative Task Force on Addiction Prevention and Treatment. The six-member, bipartisan task force would focus its efforts on care issues, communication, expansion and improvement within addiction prevention and treatment. Legislators made a plea to President Donald Trump and Congress to allow Medicaid reimbursement for certain inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation and treatment programs for addicts. Currently, people in treatment are not eligible to get certain treatment covered by Medicaid. This antiquated exclusion has led to decreased access to these programs and is contributing to the substance use disorder epidemic that is gripping the nation and our state, Assemblyman Herb Conaway, D-Burlington said in a statement. PLEASANTVILLE Firefighters rescued a severely injured man from a burning townhouse early Monday, officials said. City police and firefighters responded to the blaze in the 1500 block of Sixth Avenue about 6 a.m. One of the two occupants of the three-story townhouse had already escaped, Pleasantville Fire Capt. Scott Trythall said. The other was rescued from the first floor in the rear of the burning unit. He suffered severe internal injuries and was transported to AtlantiCare Regional Medical Center, City Campus, for treatment and transferred to Crozer-Chester Burn Center in Pennsylvania, police said. The flames tore through all three floors and the roof of the townhouse and damaged an attached garage behind the building, Trythall said. The fire also caused minor smoke and water damage to a neighboring home, he said. The blaze was extinguished by 6:50 a.m., leaving the residence uninhabitable. The American Red Cross was notified to help the two occupants, Trythall said. Pleasantville fire and police, the Atlantic County Prosecutors Office and the State Fire Marshals Office are investigating the fire. It was the third fire in Pleasantville in less than a week. On Wednesday, a house fire broke out, damaging the bedroom of a home on Ingersoll Avenue. On Friday, fire damaged a vacant apartment on Sassafras Run. On Monday, neighbors watched as dozens of firefighters battled the blaze, while some attempted to move their cars or get their children to school. Neighbor Abel Aguilera, 42, was woken up by an odor. I smelled fire, looked through the window and saw a big flame, took the family and ran out, he said. The Farmington, Atlantic City International Airport and Absecon fire departments all responded to the blaze. Northfield firefighters covered Pleasantvilles station while firefighters were on the scene. New Jersey Democrats slammed President Trump's executive order limiting refugees from seven countries. U.S. Senator Bob Menendez Menendez chided the president's executive order in a written statement. With the stroke of a pen, President Trumps action has undermined the core values that built this country. It is profoundly un-American to turn away those fleeing horrific violence and persecution or to discriminate against people based on nationality and religion. More than half of the millions of vulnerable citizens seeking refuge from Syria are children, who are today trapped between a brutal regime and violent extremist groups. Make no mistake, a ban on refugees from certain countries, paired with the preferencing of religious minorities, makes this a ban on Muslims. National security experts from across agencies and political parties have repeatedly affirmed that refugees are already the most aggressively vetted category of people coming to the United States and top Pentagon officials tell us this ban will be used as a rallying cry for violent extremist movements seeking to attack Americans and American interests. The issuance of this order on International Holocaust Remembrance Day shows President Trumps disregard for the painful lessons of that horrific chapter of history. U.S. Senator Cory Booker: Booker attended a rally at the Dulles International Airport in Washington D.C. and addressed the crowd. We must stand as witness, we must stand as resistors, we must stand in opposition to what others are trying to do to violate the law, the constitution and our values, he said to the crowd. " But Im telling you right now that tomorrow more people will be trying to come into our country. And what frustrates me is that they are being singled out now simply because of how they have decided to pray and their country of origin. That has to be unacceptable to every American. Booker's comments were reported by Fox News. Assemblyman Vince Mazzeo Mazzeo, D-Atlantic, took to Twitter to voice his displeasure of the executive order. "Pushing back against Trump's unpatriotic blanket immigration ban shouldn't be a D vs. R issue -- it's an American one," he said. "We our a country of immigrants and we should never forget it. President Trump's blanket actions are just plain wrong." Gubernatorial Candidate Phil Murphy Murphy released a statement saying he was proud to live in one of the most diverse states in the country. "President Donald Trump's latest immoral executive order violates the very meaning of what it means to be both a New Jerseyan and an American. I stand in solidarity with all those who oppose his actions -- and I won't stop fighting until these orders are rescinded or found unconstitutional by the courts." "As governor, I will not take orders from Trump if I believe they are un-American or inconsistent with our constitution. I am not going to sell out Dreamers or split up families or register people based on religion. I'll have the backs of all New Jerseyans." Gubernatorial candidate John Wisniewski Wisniewski took part in protests outside of the Elizabeth Detention Center in Union County. It is outrageous that lawyers have to rush to airports across the country late on a Saturday night to defend people who thought they were simply coming home, Wisniewski said in the statement. The truth is Trumps executive orders do not make us safer and are nothing more than a sloppy and ignorant attempt to enact a Muslim ban that is fundamentally anti-American. We cannot stop fighting to end this Muslim ban. New Jerseys federal lawmakers, both Democrats and Republicans, raised questions Monday about Donald Trumps executive order banning travelers from seven majority Muslim countries. The strongest challenges to Trumps order, which prompted weekend protests outside airports, came from New Jerseys Democratic leaders, who threatened to defund the de-partments carrying out the orders. New Jerseys Republican congressmen, including U.S. Rep. Frank LoBiondo, questioned the way the ban was so quickly executed. Trump wasnt backing down Monday after issuing a 90-day ban on travelers from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen and suspending the admission of all refugees for 120 days. He denied his order was to blame for chaos at the nations airports over the weekend, instead pointing to computer glitches and protesters. He took to Twitter to argue that swift action on immigrants was important, saying there are a lot of bad dudes out there. New Jerseys Democratic U.S. Sens. Cory Booker and Bob Menendez said the order is unconstitutional and could end up jeopardizing national security. Is that the message we want to send the world? Menendez asked. He said that when the federal budget is debated, there may be challenges to defund the operation of any departments that would carry out the executive order. The order signed Friday prompted protests at airports around the country. Federal judges in New York and several other states issued orders that temporarily block the government from deporting people with valid visas who arrived after the travel ban took effect. Menendez said he hopes Republican senators who have questioned the order, such as Lindsey Graham, of South Carolina, and John McCain, of Arizona, will have the courage to stand up and join us and hopefully others as well. Booker noted the case of an Iraqi man who had served as an interpreter for the U.S. Army and was detained during the weekend at New Yorks JFK Airport before being released. It sends the global message, Dont join the Americans because one day theyll turn their back on you, he said. The mayors of Newark and Jersey City reiterated their positions that theyll resist Trumps efforts to withhold federal grants from so-called sanctuary cities that refuse to hand over noncriminal immigrants to federal authorities. We will not be bullied, Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop said. LoBiondo said that while he supports strengthening the refugee screening process, the hasty execution of Trumps order created confusion. The security of our nation and safety of Americans must come first as we combat radical Islamic terrorism, he said in a statement. This is a temporary pause in the refugee resettlement program so that we may strengthen the screening process to prevent Islamic jihadists from coming to our country to attack us. The hasty execution of such efforts have created widespread confusion, frustration and misrepresentation of what America stands for. This was avoidable and I urge the Trump Administration, working with appropriate federal, state and local agencies, to quickly reassess. Monday night, Trump fired acting Attorney General Sally Yates after she directed Justice Department attorneys not to defend the presidents controversial executive order. He named Dana Boente, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, to serve in her place. The White House press office said in a statement that Yates has betrayed the Department of Justice by refusing to enforce a legal order designed to protect the citizens of the United States. The statement called Yates an Obama administration appointee who is weak on borders and very weak on illegal immigration. Trump has picked Sen. Jeff Sessions to lead the Justice Department, but he has yet to be confirmed by the Senate. Many Trump voters across the U.S. say they are pleased with his executive order. They say hes doing exactly what he promised to do if elected. Barbara Van Syckel, of Sterling Heights, Michigan, said Trump is going to do what he says and says what he does. The 66-year-old said thats a little frightening for some people. (The Associated Press and Press Staff Writers Lauren Carroll and Steve Hughes contributed to this report.) 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. Were glad to see bipartisan enactment of two proposals weve supported. Away from the take-no-prisoners enmity of politics, government still gets needed things done. One will help advance South Jerseys new and potentially important aquaculture industry by developing a simpler review of applications and permits. A law directs the state Departments of Agriculture and Environmental Protection to adopt a coordinated process for aquaculture projects, and another requires them to establish with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers a joint application for projects needing federal and state approval. With its long bay and ocean shoreline and proximity to major metropolitan markets, South Jersey has the potential for a significant fish-farming sector. In 2015, members of the Rutgers Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences estimated growing oysters alone could be worth $30 million a year. Oyster farming on Delaware Bay has made a good start, and its Cape May Salts have been welcomed by oyster connoisseurs. Two oyster varieties bred by Rutgers for better disease resistance are raised. The permit streamlining comes as another potential hurdle to Delaware Bay aquaculture looks like it might be overcome. The bay near the shore is flat and shallow, conducive to working oyster racks from shore but also to horseshoe crabs spawning and federally threatened red knots feeding on their eggs. Preliminary research by a shellfish ecologist with the Haskin Shellfish Research Lab suggests the horseshoe crabs readily swim through the oyster farms to shore to lay their eggs. The labs Aquaculture Innovation Center also is developing a buttery tasting surf clam suitable for aquaculture. Clams and oysters are the product for the bulk of New Jerseys 160 aquaculture businesses, which already contribute $36 million annually to the state economy. When the Legislature approved the aquaculture permit streamlining in November, the Agriculture Department thought the laws might be too complex and comprehensive, and not focused enough on advancing clam and oyster farming. We assume (or hope, anyway) that concern was considered and the administration determined the laws as written were fine. The other proposal that became law this month is more straightforward. New Jersey will join the Interstate Wildlife Violator Compact and share information about wildlife violations with other states. Those convicted of violating hunting, fishing or trapping regulations wont be able to just come to New Jersey and continue their misdeeds. Since joining the compact was supported by the hunting, fishing and environmental communities, were surprised it took this long. New Jersey was one of the last nonmember states. For the New World Order, a world government is just the beginning. Once in place they can engage their plan to exterminate 80% of the world's population, while enabling the "elites" to live forever with the aid of advanced technology. For the first time, crusading filmmaker ALEX JONES reveals their secret plan for humanity's extermination: Operation ENDGAME. Jones chronicles the history of the global elite's bloody rise to power and reveals how they have funded dictators and financed the bloodiest warscreating order out of chaos to pave the way for the first true world empire. Watch as Jones and his team track the elusive Bilderberg Group to Ottawa and Istanbul to document their secret summits, allowing you to witness global kingpins setting the world's agenda and instigating World War III. to Ottawa and Istanbul to document their secret summits, allowing you to witness global kingpins setting the world's agenda and instigating World War III. Learn about the formation of the North America transportation control grid, which will end U.S. sovereignty forever. Discover how the practitioners of the pseudo-science eugenics have taken control of governments worldwide as a means to carry out depopulation. View the progress of the coming collapse of the United States and the formation of the North American Union. Never before has a documentary assembled all the pieces of the globalists' dark agenda. Endgame's compelling look at past atrocities committed by those attempting to steer the future delivers information that the controlling media has meticulously censored for over 60 years. It fully reveals the elite's program to dominate the earth and carry out the wicked plan in all of human history. Endgame is not conspiracy theory, it is documented fact in the elite's own words. LONDON, January 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- The following CEE Region Ministers & regulatory have confirmed their attendance at the Central & Eastern European Gas Conference: Ante Cikotic, State Secretary for Energy, Croatia Hristijan Delev - Deputy Minister of the Economy, Macedonia Joseph Petric , Assistant Minister for European Affairs, Croatia , Assistant Minister for European Affairs, Mrs. Zoltanne Farkas, Head of Gas Directorate, Hungarian Energy and Public Utility Regulatory Authority Mr. Zoltan Horvath, Head of Energy Supply Directorate, Ministry of National Development, Hungary Ms. Sandra Luetic , Head of Division for Economic Multilateral Relations, Hungary Also, Julieta Valls Noyes, U.S. Ambassador to Croatia is attending as part of a US Government delegation. William Robson, Event Director for dmg events said: "From the Balkans all the way up to the Baltic Coast, security of supply through diversity of supply is the key issue. The CEE Gas Conference in Zagreb has been seized upon by government ministers and energy executives from across the region as an opportunity to forge the partnerships and market framework required to build a fully-functioning and interconnected CEE, fed by multiple external supply sources." Janez Kopac - Secretary General of the Energy Community Secretariat - who will deliver a keynote speech summed up the requirements of the region: "In the same way that the development of gas infrastructure has followed common supply sources, not making any distinctions between countries in CEE region." Mr Kopac said "Any future European gas market strategy must take into account EU member states and neighbouring countries on an equal footing if it's to deliver in terms of competition, market integration, network rules and security of supply objectives." The Conference takes place in Zagreb, Croatia on 15 - 16 February, 2017 and will bring together all key stakeholders and public-private commercial market participants including Governments, Ministries, Regulators, Investors, Gas Consumers, Utilities, LNG Buyers, LNG and Gas suppliers, E&Ps, TSOs, EPCs and Financiers, the conference will provide an unrivalled platform for the strategic roadmap to a diverse and secure natural gas future for the region. For more information on the Conference please visit http://www.theceegas.com. SOURCE dmg :: events During her campaign Clinton made a point of listening to people. It was all over tv, her sitting with ethnic groups, women's groups, listening to their complaints. Well listening is one thing. Doing something about their complaints is another thing. Listening makes those people feel 'special' and important. But what they don't seem to realize that it is just a show. Politicians who make a big show of listening rarely follow through with solutions. Trudeau is doing the same thing. He is losing support so he travels the country 'listening' to people. Then he will go back to Ottawa and do what he and his government damned well please and forget all about the people's concerns. Politicians are a duplicitous, conniving lot who care nothing about the people. They just want power. At least Trump is taking action. He listened to the people and he's doing what they said they wanted. And to hell with those who don't like it. It's good to have someone in charge who will have the guts to take action and not dilly-dally around hoping to displease no one. The truth is, the people of a country are like the children in a family; if someone in charge doesn't take a firm hand and say 'this is the way it's going to be' , the ultimate result is chaos. HELSINKI, Jan 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Caverion Corporation Investor news - 30 January 2017 at 12.00 p.m. EET Caverion will implement the building systems at the new hospital in Kainuu in Finland: the value of the contract is EUR 45 million Caverion has signed a Large Project contract with the Kainuu social and health care local government regional authority for the creation of building systems and internal data networks for the new hospital in Kainuu. The area of the hospital project is 46,282 square metres gross, and the total projected cost is 153 million euros. Caverion's share of this is EUR 45 million. The contract is one of the largest project agreements that Caverion has ever undertaken. Caverion will be responsible for design management and implementing all of the hospital's building systems. The Total Technical Solutions delivery includes the following technical disciplines: Ventilation and Air Conditioning, Cooling, Electricity, Information and Communications Technology, Security, Automation, and Heating and Sanitation. In addition to these, Caverion will also deliver chute systems for waste and laundry, and internal information systems in line with the Smart Hospital concept. The construction phase is part of the joint and several liability alliance project, of which the partners are, in addition to Kainuu social and health care services, Caverion, Skanska and Sweco. Construction begins in February 2017 and is scheduled for completion in autumn 2021. The distinctive features of the project are the high security and non-disturbance demands, since the worksite is situated within the existing hospital area. Construction will be done in phases in such a way that the hospital can remain in operation without the need for moving to temporary locations. "Our fine-tuned project management and operating models make it possible to implement such a large and especially demanding hospital project. The guiding principle behind the energy-efficiency of the building, in line with the Smart Hospital concept, is the user-centred and need-centred," says Ville Tamminen, Head of Division Finland of Caverion. An energy-efficient smart hospital The design of the hospital places a heavy emphasis on efficient and safe care, ease of access, pleasantness and rehabilitation. The structural and technical solutions support the shared use of the premises between the various units and adaptability to future needs. Smart control systems of building systems will be used in the building, as will integrated security and communications technology, storage automation and localisation. In keeping with the Smart Hospital concept, for example ventilation, heating and lighting are designed and implemented so as to meet the needs of hospital users, and the technology used will be controlled using localisation data and other means. The building project is the largest public construction project in Kainuu, and will in the coming years employ tens of subcontractors and equipment and materials deliveries. The alliance model promoted cooperation The central principle of the alliance model that has been chosen for implementation is to work together to ensure the success of the project. All the design and implementation solutions will be decided on unanimously with the best interests of the project in mind and in line with the quality and budgeting targets. In accordance with the incentive system of the alliance model, bonuses will be given for excellent results but the sanctions for unmet targets will be shared equally. "The hospital is an extremely demanding project and, as the contractor and designers, we are responsible for ensuring that the client gets value for money. Major changes are underway in the construction sector, in an increasingly customer-centred direction, and we want to be at the forefront of these changes," say the leaders of the Kainua alliance: Tuomas Sarkilahti of Skanska, Ville Tamminen of Caverion and Markku Varis of Sweco. For more information, please contact: Kirsi Hemmila, Communications Manager, Caverion Finalnd, Tel: +358-50-390-0941, E-mail: kirsi.hemmila@caverion.com Carita Kottila, Public Relations and Communications Manager, Sweco Finland Oy, Tel: +358-40-148-3699, E-mail: carita.kottila@sweco.fi Cristina Rinnetie-Uski, Head of Marketing and Communications, Skanska Finland, Tel: +358 (0)40-501-9816, E-mail: cristina.rinnetie-uski@skanska.fi Maire Ahopelto, Director of the Joint Municipal Authority for social and welfare affairs in Kainuu, Tel. +358 (0)44 777 3033 Photos from the signing of the contract will be available starting from 30 January at 1 p.m. at the following address: www.kainua-allianssi.fi/media This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com http://news.cision.com/caverion/r/caverion-will-implement-the-building-systems-at-the-new-hospital-in-kainuu-in-finland--the-value-of-,c2176245 The following files are available for download: SOURCE Caverion DUBLIN, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Research and Markets has announced the addition of the "Global Drug Delivery Partnering 2010-2016: Deal trends, players and financials" report to their offering. The Global Drug Delivery Partnering 2010-2016 report provides comprehensive understanding and unprecedented access to the drug delivery partnering deals and agreements entered into by the worlds leading healthcare companies. This report provides details of the latest Drug Delivery agreements announced in the life sciences since 2010. The report takes the reader through a comprehensive review Drug Delivery deal trends, key players, top deal values, as well as deal financials, allowing the understanding of how, why and under what terms, companies are entering Drug Delivery partnering deals. The report presents financial deal term values for Drug Delivery deals, listing by headline value, upfront payments, milestone payments and royalties, enabling readers to analyse and benchmark the financial value of deals. Drug Delivery Partnering Terms and Agreements includes: Trends in Drug Delivery dealmaking in the biopharma industry since 2010 Analysis of Drug Delivery deal structure Access to headline, upfront, milestone and royalty data Case studies of real-life Drug Delivery deals Access to Drug Delivery contract documents Leading Drug Delivery deals by value since 2010 Most active Drug Delivery dealmakers since 2010 In Global Drug Delivery Partnering 2010-2016: Deal trends, players, financials and forecasts, the available deals are listed by: Company A-Z Headline value Stage of development at signing Deal component type Specific therapy target Technology type Key Topics Covered: Executive Summary 1 Introduction 2 Trends in Drug Delivery dealmaking 3 Leading Drug Delivery deals 4 Most active Drug Delivery dealmakers 5 Drug Delivery contracts dealmaking directory 6 Drug Delivery dealmaking by technology type 7 Partnering resource center For more information about this report visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/jplr3h/global_drug Media Contact: Laura Wood, Senior Manager press@researchandmarkets.com 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 Related Links http://www.researchandmarkets.com SOURCE Research and Markets DUBLIN, Jan 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Research and Markets has announced the addition of the "Industrial and Commercial Electric Vehicles on Land 2017-2027" report to their offering. Those selling components for electric vehicles and those wishing to make the vehicles themselves must seek where the majority of the money is spent and will be spent. That must lead them to industrial and commercial electric vehicles because today these represent 60% of the value of the electric vehicle market. Indeed, this sector is set to grow 4.5 times in the next decade. Industrial and commercial electric vehicles include heavy industrial vehicles, the term referring to heavy lifting, as with forklifts. This report covers the technical and market trends for industrial and commercial vehicles whether hybrid or pure electric, putting it in the context of electric vehicles overall and including the activities of a host of manufacturers of the vehicles and their components and even providing future technological development roadmaps. The market for electric industrial vehicles is already large because, by law, forklifts have to be electric when used indoors. Little growth remains in this market but outdoors almost all earthmoving and lifting vehicles use the conventional internal combustion engine. That is about to change dramatically because hybrid electric versions reduce cost of ownership and exposure to price hikes with fossil fuels. Hybrids increasingly perform better as well, with more power from stationary, ability to supply electricity to other equipment and other benefits including less noise and pollution. On the other hand, airports, often government owned or funded, are under great pressure to finish converting their Ground Support Equipment GSE to pure electric versions both on and off the tarmac partly using federal grants. Key Topics Covered: 1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS 1.1. Dominant electric commercial vehicle types and influences change 1.2. Market forecasts 1.3. Forecast for commercial vehicles 2017-2027 1.4. Latest progress 1.5. Examples of new industrial and commercial vehicles and projects announced in 2016 1.6. Electrical machine systems take more cost, batteries less 1.7. The elephant in the room: conventional vehicles 1.8. News in 2016 1.9. Buses will be taxis will be buses 1.10. Powertrain situation in 2017 2. INTRODUCTION 2.1. Urban logistics trends 2.2. Technology disagreement 2.3. The special case of China 2.4. Biggest EV? 2.5. Different strategies 2.6. Battery Vehicle Work Rounds for Very Long Range 2.7. Reusable electric powertrain 2.8. Here come the tougher emissions regulations 2.9. Cars are often fleets not private 2.10. US Postal Service 180,000 vehicles 3. LESSONS FROM RECENT CONFERENCES 3.1. Overview 3.2. Hydraulic vs electric efficiency 3.3. Market forecasts 3.4. Powertrain trends 3.5. Energy Independent Vehicles EIV 3.6. Projects and new industrial EVs 3.7. Wheel loaders 3.8. Star of the show 3.9. Components and systems 3.10. Energy storage 4. MARKET DRIVERS FOR INDUSTRIAL AND COMMERCIAL EVS 4.1. Trends 4.2. Advantages of electric commercial vehicles 5. HEAVY INDUSTRIAL EVS 5.1. What is included 5.2. Challenges 5.3. Forklifts 5.4. Listing of manufacturers 6. LIGHT INDUSTRIAL & COMMERCIAL EVS 6.1. Introduction 6.2. Sub categories 6.3. Local services 6.4. Airport EVs 6.5. Small people-movers 6.6. Chrysler minivan in 2015 6.7. Dong Feng China big minivan order 6.8. Kargo Canada 6.9. Light industrial 6.10. All-terrain vehicles for commercial use 6.11. Listing of manufacturers 7. BUSES AND TRUCKS 7.1. Introduction 7.2. Summary of technical preferences 7.3. Statistics issues 7.4. Successful pure electric buses vs addressable market 7.5. Chinese price/performance 7.6. Cost trends - China ready to pounce 7.7. Market drivers and impediments 7.8. Regional differences 7.9. China, India and cities 7.10. Radical change 7.11. Truly global market for similar buses 7.12. Large pure electric buses: first big orders 2014/5 7.13. Weak trend to larger buses but not in China 7.14. Value chain and powertrain 7.15. Hybrids becoming pure electric 7.16. Relative importance of technical options 7.17. Technology disagreement 7.18. Fuel cell buses: progress and potential 7.19. Background statistics: automotive industry and buses in general 7.20. E-bus news in 2016 7.21. Trucks 8. TAXIS 8.1. Electric taxi projects in China, Europe, Mexico, UK, UK, Japan 8.2. Huge order from the Philippines? 8.3. Terra Motors Interview Tokyo September 2015 9. THREE WHEEL COMMERCIAL VEHICLES 9.1. Background 9.2. Three wheelers as crossover products 9.3. Operational benefit of three wheel 9.4. Benefits of three wheelers 9.5. Three wheel electric vehicles: varied positioning in the market 9.6. Mule: Modern Electric Workhorse to Slice Through Urban Traffic Easily 9.7. Barriers for adoption of three wheel EVs 10. ELECTRIC VEHICLES FOR CONSTRUCTION, AGRICULTURE AND MINING 10.1. Overview 10.2. Value proposition and environmental restrictions 10.3. Autonomous vehicles for agriculture and mining 10.4. Energy and work synchronization in mining 10.5. Light manned vehicles - PapaBravo Canada 10.6. Examples of cranes and lifters 10.7. Caterpillar and Komatsu: energy harvesting on large hybrid vehicles 11. KEY COMPONENTS FOR INDUSTRIAL AND COMMERCIAL ELECTRIC VEHICLES 11.1. Types of electric vehicle 11.2. Many fuels 11.3. Born electric 11.4. Pure electric vehicles are improving 11.5. Series vs parallel hybrid 11.6. Modes of operation of hybrids 11.7. Microhybrid is a misnomer 11.8. Deep hybridisation 11.9. Hybrid vehicle price premium 11.10. Battery cost and performance are key 11.11. Trade-off of energy storage technologies 11.12. Ultracapacitors = supercapacitors 11.13. Range extenders 11.14. Big effect of many modest electricity sources combined 11.15. Energy harvesting 11.16. Trend to high voltage 11.17. Structural components 11.18. Trend to distributed components 11.19. Trend to flatness then smart skin 11.20. Traction batteries 11.21. Traction motors 11.22. Power electronics 12. INDUSTRIAL AND COMMERCIAL COMPANY PROFILES 12.1. Ayton Willow 12.2. Bradshaw Electric 12.3. Caproni JSC 12.4. Crown Equipment Corporation 12.5. Hyster-Yale 12.6. John Deere 12.7. Jungheinrich AG 12.8. Kion Group GmbH 12.9. Liberty Electric Cars 12.10. MAN Truck & Bus AG 12.11. Toyota Motor 12.12. Valence Technologies 12.13. VISEDO Oy 12.14. ZNTK Radom For more information about this report visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/6v5z9n/industrial_and Media Contact: Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager press@researchandmarkets.com 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 Related Links http://www.researchandmarkets.com SOURCE Research and Markets PASADENA, Texas, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Due to recent significant increases of key raw materials, Kaneka North America, LLC will increase the off list selling price for Kane Ace specialty additives per the following schedule Feb.1, 2017 or as Contracts or Agreements allow: PRODUCT Feb. 1, 2017 INCREASE Kane Ace MBS impact modifiers $0.23/lb. Kane Ace Processing Aids $0.06/lb. Kane Ace Acrylic impact modifiers $0.06/lb. Kane Ace K-Blend - Performance modifiers $0.06/lb. Account managers will be contacting customers to review this situation in greater detail. Kaneka North America, LLC values each business relationship highly and will continue to monitor changes in the raw material situation to keep pricing in line with the direction of those changes. About the Company Kaneka Corporation is a global, diversified manufacturing company that produces and/or distributes pharmaceutical intermediaries, synthetic fibers, fine chemicals, polyimide film, food ingredients, medical devices and certain other specialized products. Kaneka North America, LLC is a subsidiary of Kaneka Americas Holding, Inc. Kane Ace products are resin modifiers created based on a multilayer-structure polymer particle design (core-shell technology). These products disperse uniformly throughout the base resin and add a variety of functions. Kaneka manufactures and sells products that modify impact resistance, heat resistance and flame retardancy as well as products that add a light diffusion characteristic and other properties. Media Contact: Craig Bastian +1-281-291-3139 craig.bastian@kaneka.com SOURCE Kaneka North America, LLC Where Smart Thinking Happens NEW YORK, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- The International Licensing Industry Merchandisers' Association (LIMA) will host its second annual Mind Mix event March 30-31, 2017 in Milan, Italy. This two-day executive forum brings together leaders from a wide breadth of industries for high-level, interactive dialogue on the business of brands. "Licensing drives strategic business activity and thinking, and we're bringing together some of the biggest thinkers in the world of brands. This kind of high-level discussion and exchange of ideas is essential to business planning," said Charles Riotto, President, LIMA. LIMA will organize more than 15 moderated discussion groups to examine issues driving this dynamic industry; the challenges, and what the future looks like short and long term. Planned topics include: The Psychology of Consumers and Brands Licensing Digital Content and Personalities Tech Trends and How They'll Impact Licensing Responding Quickly to Consumer Demand and Trends Perspectives on China and India Event sponsor PwC will lead two keynote sessions: "World Business Climate and Forecast" and "International Retail and Consumer Survey." With Milan being a fashion capital of the world, the program will include a focus on the competitive challenges and opportunities facing fashion brand licensing. There will also be a panel of key European retailers as well as extensive networking opportunities among business leaders. "Mind Mix is a successful platform for global industry leaders to exchange experiences, discuss upcoming market challenges and network in a way that encourages interactive communication. I strongly recommend participation in this opportunity to help shape the global licensing business of the future," said Bettina Koeckler, CEO, DealFactory. For more details and registration, visit www.licensing.org/mindmix. About LIMA LIMA - the International Licensing Industry Merchandisers' Association - is the leading trade organization for the global licensing industry. LIMA's mission is to foster the expansion of licensing around the world, and create greater awareness of its benefits to the business community at large. Founded in 1985, LIMA maintains offices in New York, London, Munich, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Melbourne and Mexico City. Members in over 35 countries enjoy access to extensive educational programming and worldwide networking. LIMA is the exclusive sponsor of Licensing Expo, the industry's largest trade event, in addition to shows in London, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Tokyo. Visit licensing.org for more information. Contact : Christina Jordan, LIMA cjordan@licensing.org +1 646 744 3741 Related Links http://licensing.org SOURCE International Licensing Industry Merchandisers Association (LIMA) LONDON, January 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Indaba remains the largest mining event in Africa The Investing in African Mining Indaba, or Mining Indaba, is dedicated to the successful capitalisation and development of mining interests in Africa. Having run for over 20 years in Cape Town, the event brings together investors, mining companies, governments and other stakeholders from around the world. (Logo:http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20150909/264974LOGO) This year, Roskill will again be exhibiting - starting 6th February 2017. Visit booth #1102 or contact us directly to arrange a meeting on the side-lines of the conference. Roskill is a leader in international metals and minerals market research and consultancy focussing on minor metals, steel alloys and industrial minerals. Developments in the DRC could have major implications on metals and minerals markets The DRC is the 11th largest country in the world and the third-largest in Africa. Given its scale, it is perhaps unsurprisingly blessed with vast natural resource endowments including cobalt, copper, diamonds, gold, iron ore, manganese, phosphate, niobium, tantalum, tin, and zinc. The mining sector in the country faces several difficulties. Infrastructure and energy supply issues continue to hamper mining and processing operations, as well as the wider economy. Despite the country having huge hydropower potential, the energy sector remains a major inhibitor to economic development and social inclusion. Further, the DRC's restrictive railway and road infrastructure continues to impact negatively on the country's economic growth. A key issue likely to impact the sector is the potential of a political crisis. In 2006, the DRC held its first multi-party elections and in 2011, President Kabila was re-elected for a second term. Elections were due to be held in November 2016 but in January that year, the Independent National Electoral Commission of the DRC released a statement announcing that it would require a further 18 months to update the country's voters roll. Further, the Minister of Interior declared that several new electoral laws would need to pass through Parliament before an election could take place. These announcements were perceived by the opposition as strategy of glissement (sliding), seeking an indefinite delay of elections. The next Presidential election in the DRC is highly important as it marks the end of the maximum term that can be held by Joseph Kabila, whose second, and constitutionally last, term ended on 19th December 2016. Suspicion has continued to mount that, as has been the case in Burundi, Congo-Brazzaville, Uganda and Rwanda, Kabila is seeking to delay the electoral process in an attempt to extend his 15-year tenure. As of Q1 2017, the most likely fixed deadline for the next election, as set out in a 2016 national dialogue agreement, is April 2018. The delays have exacerbated local tensions and led to protests, subsequent crackdowns and fatalities. Any disruptions in the DRC are likely to impact the cobalt market more than any other. The DRC has by far the greatest cobalt resources of any country and accounted for roughly 65% of world mine supply in 2016. As such, it is the principal source of global feedstock for refined cobalt - consumed mostly in lithium-ion batteries. In South Africa, it remains an uncertain period for ferroalloys producers It has been an interesting period for the South African mining sector and for ferroalloys producers in the country. Several producers have reduced output, others have entered business rescue, and some have closed completely. Like the DRC, the country's mining sector faces several challenges that are by no means new. Energy prices, which will probably see double-digit percentage increases in Rand terms, remain an issue - and could eventually put pressure on ferroalloys producers. It is not clear whether higher coal prices (and maybe higher oil prices) will mean even higher electricity prices. Of course, owing to Eskom's infrastructure and generation issues, energy availability will also remain a factor. With regard to infrastructure, Transnet still has issues to resolve, in particular with regard of getting sufficient bulk commodities out of Port Elizabeth. In the vanadium market, the closure of Evraz Highveld in 2015 represented the most important supply-side development in the sector in recent years. In 2014, South Africa accounted for roughly 20% of global vanadium feedstock production but this figure dropped to below 10% in 2016. It remains to be seen if South Africa can remain a dominant force in the vanadium market. Glencore's Rhovan mine and plant remain in operation, and there are some projects out there - such as those of Ironveld and Bushveld Minerals. The chrome market has been very interesting in recent months. By Q1 2016, prices were at six-year lows and market conditions brought about the closure of several ferrochrome operations, many of which also struggled without a stable supply of ore. However, the price recovery in H2, driven by Chinese demand for South African ore, has seen chrome ore and ferrochrome prices recover to their highest levels since the global financial crisis. A series of takeovers, and price recovery, have started to consolidate and revive the South African sector as bigger producers acquired the assets of smaller, struggling operations. Traxys acquired Tata Steel KZN's ferrochrome plant in Q2; ASA Metals accepted an offer from Tubatse Ferrochrome in Q3; and in Q4, Samancor Chrome restarted production at the plant formerly owned by IFM, after acquiring the operation earlier in the year. More consolidation could occur over the coming months. The manganese market also started 2016 with prices at considerable lows. South African ore producers attempted to take action and adjust to lower demand by idling around 3Mt of capacity last year. Prices started to recover in late July, and surged through the second half of the year on the back of higher demand from China and because of Transnet's tippler loading constraints in Port Elizabeth restricting exports. Prices have fallen back in early 2017 but still remain well above 2015 and 2016 averages. In African countries with less developed mining sectors, there remains huge potential In Mozambique, for example, the extractive sector currently represents less than 4% of economic activity but has scope to grow considerably. The recent discovery of huge reserves of mineral resources, combined with ongoing reforms and subsequent improvement of the business climate in Mozambique, provide good opportunities for the transformation of the country into a middle-income nation. The country is host to mineral sands (zircon, ilmenite), gold, copper, nickel, iron ore, bauxite, graphite, rare earth minerals, lithium, bismuth and antimony, as well as world-class coal deposits and both onshore and offshore natural gas deposits. After decades of under investment, geographic challenges and outdated legislation, neighbouring Malawi's mining industries remain underdeveloped. However, this may all be about to change. Following the country's fifth successive democratic elections in 2014, the new government has set its sights on expanding the nascent sector, and with the completion of a World Bank sponsored geological survey in 2015 and the anticipated release of the new liberalised mining code, the development of Malawi's extractive industries may be about to accelerate. Compared to Mozambique and Malawi, Namibia has a long-established mining sector, which has been developed as a consequence of three key factors: an endowment of a wide array of natural resources, a stable pro-business government and an impressive transport infrastructure. As of 2016, the country had active mines extracting diamonds, uranium, gold, lead, zinc, manganese, iron ore, silver and copper. There is also a diverse pipeline of projects being developed. The launch of offshore diamond mining has reinvigorated diamond production levels, and output is forecast to increase in the coming years. What's more, reliance on diamond mining is likely to fall as several large uranium projects come online. The country has the recognised potential to produce over 10% of the world's uranium output and, should demand and prices recover, the supply capacity will be in place to exploit higher margins. Roskill will be exhibiting at the Investing in African Mining Indaba starting 6thFebruary 2017 in Cape Town. Visit Booth #1102 to find out more about our market analysis and consulting. SOURCE Roskill Information Services LONDON, January 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Ordnance Survey International and Deimos Space UK are to work with the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre in Dubai to help the United Arab Emirates (UAE) improve how it plans and manages its natural resources and infrastructure. Ordnance Survey International will establish a strategy for the development of a single source of digital geospatial data for UAE government departments to enable a variety of key policy initiatives. Advanced data analytic tools developed by Deimos Space UK and the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre will demonstrate the value of new geospatial data extracted from high-resolution satellite imagery. Andy Wilson, Director of Business Development, Ordnance Survey International, says: "UAE has undergone rapid growth and in developing their geospatial capabilities we are ultimately delivering the power of better decision making. In Great Britain, we see how Ordnance Survey's single source of accurate rich data drives innovation and collaboration, providing the platform, locally and nationally, on which to plan, build and maintain. Great Britain and the UAE have a long-standing friendship, and it's an honor for us to share our experience and expertise with the UAE, it's government, businesses and people." The project will deliver: 1. A proof of concept prototype to create (a) a vegetation index of the UAE (b) a palm tree counting algorithm. These will increase the level of awareness of the impact of urban development on the environment of UAE. The information, extracted from satellite data, will the study of aspects, such as vegetation dynamics, plant phonological changes over time, biomass production, land cover changes, soil moisture, irrigation needs and the effect of Climate Change. 2. A digital data model and strategic roadmap towards a common digital geospatial data platform to be deployed across UAE government departments, which will improve efficiency and provide the basis for future spatial projects. Peter Hedlund, Managing Director of Ordnance Survey International, explains: "The conservation of natural resources is a global concern, geospatial data often reveals the simplest answers to many of the world's most complex questions. In the UAE natural resources, rising population, high energy demands and Climate Change are very real challenges. The UAE's Ministry of Climate Change and Environment requires this reliable up-to-date geospatial information to support the development and implementation of plans to protect the environment and manage water resources." SOURCE Ordnance Survey MANCHESTER, England, January 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Purple, (http://purple.ai/ ) the intelligent spaces company, and its fully certified partner, FLEXdata Solutions, (http://www.flexdata.com.au/) have signed a three-year contract to supply guest WiFi and location analytics to Queensland Airports Limited (QAL). FLEXdata Solutions, a systems integrator located on the East Coast of Australia, installed Cisco Meraki Wireless and Purple's WiFi solution at four airports owned and operated by the firm. The jewel in the crown for QAL is Gold Coast Airport, which will be a central transport hub for the 2018 Commonwealth Games. Beau Tydd, General Manager for People and Technology at QAL, said: "Purple has given QAL insights into our passenger and guest traffic in and around our four airports via a well laid out, user friendly browser based environment. Purple and FLEXdata Solutions ticked every box throughout the open market evaluation process." Purple's cloud platform is being used by QAL to improve the customer experience in their terminals. Location analytics reports showing passenger queues and dwell times are helping to improve workflow management and reduce wait times in key zones. The solution has also enabled the business to distribute intelligent, targeted, marketing campaigns to airport travellers in real time. FLEXdata Solutions was keen to introduce a cloud based offering to its portfolio so that businesses, like QAL, can gain a deeper understanding of their customers and how they move around their space. Purple was identified as a solution that does just that. The data that Purple's platform generates, gives businesses providing guest WiFi the invaluable opportunity to interact with their customers in real time, highlighting products, information and rewards that are truly relevant to that individual. Reports available through a dedicated 'Purple Portal' include: repeat versus new visitors, most common visitor origin, number of visitors, type of device used, time spent in the premises, time of visit, key engagement metrics and many, many more. Gavin Wheeldon, CEO of Purple, comments: "It's great to see FLEXdata Solutions join our growing list of partners based in Australia. Having already secured a three-year contract with QAL, it will be exciting to see where this partnership can take us. FLEXdata Solutions recognises the true value of Purple's cloud based platform and how it allows businesses to understand more about their physical spaces." Contact: Lloyd Gofton - lloyd@liberatemedia.com - +44(0)7919-353-484 SOURCE Purple www.purple.ai OSTERSUND, Sweden, Jan 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Skanska invests about SEK 1.3 billion in the office building Sthlm 01 in Stockholm, Sweden, with a total leasable area of about 26,000 square meters. The construction contract is worth about SEK 1.0 billion, which will be included in the order bookings for Skanska Sweden for the first quarter of 2017. The office building is part of Skanska's larger investment in the area Hammarby Sjostad and will with its 27 floors become a new landmark in Stockholm. In total, Stockholm New Creative Business Spaces will consist of 100,000 square meters of offices and accommodate more than 6,000 workplaces. The area has a good selection of restaurants and services, proximity to Sodermalm and good transport links, both tram and metro. The construction work will commence immediately and the premises are expected to be ready for occupancy during the first six months in 2020. Skanska Commercial Development Nordic initiates and develops property projects in offices, logistics, business premises and rental apartments. The company's operations are concentrated in the three metropolitan regions in Sweden, the Copenhagen region in Denmark, the Oslo region in Norway, as well as Helsinki in Finland. The development of logistic properties is conducted in strategic locations in Sweden and rental apartments in Copenhagen. For further information please contact: Caroline Arehult, Managing Director, Skanska Fastigheter Stockholm, Tel: +46 (0)10-448-11-12 Andreas Joons, Press Officer, Skanska AB, Tel: +46 (0)10-449-04-94 Direct line for media, tel +46 (0)10-448-88-99 This and previous releases can also be found at www.skanska.com This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com http://news.cision.com/skanska/r/skanska-invests-about-sek-1-3-billion-in-the-office-building-sthlm-01-in-stockholm--sweden,c2175809 The following files are available for download: http://mb.cision.com/Main/95/2175809/620436.pdf 170130 SE office investment http://news.cision.com/skanska/i/170130-sthlm-01-skybar,c2065020 170130 Sthlm 01 Skybar http://news.cision.com/skanska/i/170130-sthlm-01-exterior,c2065021 170130 Sthlm 01 exterior http://news.cision.com/skanska/i/170130-view-from-sthlm-01,c2065022 170130 View from Sthlm 01 http://news.cision.com/skanska/i/170130-sthlm-01,c2065029 170130 Sthlm 01 Related Links http://www.skanska.com SOURCE Skanska LONDON, January 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Telehouse, a leading global provider of data centre services, announces today that it has been selected by UNIFI-IX a new internet exchange, to host its services including an exclusive launch offer available immediately across the London Docklands campus. (Photo: http://mma.prnewswire.com/media/462530/Telehouse_North_Two.jpg ) UNIFI-IX was established in 2016 with the objective of creating a global network, enabling the exchange of traffic to be either local or global with a single port of entry to the exchange. Alternatively, members can create private VLAN's across the network regardless of geographical location. UNIFI-IX is the latest connectivity provider to join Telehouse Carrier-Interconnect, which comprises of more than 750 Carriers, Mobile providers, Internet Exchanges and broadband providers. Tom Sanders, Managing Director of UNIFI-IX commented, "Our new infrastructure will significantly reduce the number of steps needed to interconnect major cloud, internet and content services. This will provide a huge benefit to consumers, who will see an improvement in the performance of their online applications. Telehouse was the obvious partner for us as they are at the heart of the London digital hub; it was paramount to be included. Tom continues "Some of the companies we are talking to already have networks of private circuits interconnecting with multiple international destinations. We offer more extensive connectivity on a single integrated network, guaranteed speeds, and our market and technical analysis shows that companies choosing to interconnect with us will make cost savings of between 20 and 70 percent, depending on the profile of their network." UNIFI-IX is offering the first 50 ports to the exchange free of charge, and with ambitious growth plans over the next 18 months the network will expand to Paris, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Thailand. Michelle Reid, Sales and Marketing Director of Telehouse states, "We are delighted to welcome UNIFI-IX to Telehouse Carrier-Interconnect, our London Docklands campus is one of the most connected in the world and we are well positioned to support their future growth with our latest data centre, Telehouse North Two." Telehouse Carrier-Interconnect is just one aspect of Telehouse Interconnect, which brings together more than 3,000 business partners such as Cloud, Mobile and Content providers, Enterprises and Financial services companies. This firmly establishes the Telehouse Interconnect as the home of the connected world, and a unique place to create business opportunities, now and in the future. To learn more about Telehouse, visit http://www.telehouse.net. For all of our latest news follow us on Twitter via @TelehouseEurope or find our Telehouse Europe LinkedIn company page. About Telehouse Telehouse is the pioneering data centre colocation provider established in 1989. It is an owner operator of global data centres, connectivity and managed ICT solutions to over 3000 corporations around the world. Telehouse is the data centre subsidiary of Japanese corporation KDDI, a leading Japanese mobile and fixed-line telecommunications and ICT solution provider with 106 offices in 28 countries around the world and a Global Fortune company. Further Telehouse press information: marketing@uk.telehouse.net About UNIFI-IX UNIFI-IX was established in England in 2016 to create a global network enabling lower cost exchange of global and local data traffic. Its network currently connects to four data centres in London, one in Birmingham, one in Manchester and two in Dublin. It is currently building its network to connect Paris, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Thailand. Its customers will be able to peer with one another on the network and benefit from reduced bandwidth costs, reduced latency and reduced costs of transit. Further Unifi-IX press information: sales@unifi-ix.net Contact: James Davies, james.davies@uk.telehouse.net , +44-(0)7714308811 SOURCE Telehouse International Corporation So where do a guy go who wants to upgrade those 16 inch GM factory wheels? The most obvious answer is to find the nearest GM dealership. There are plenty around the region. But the fact is, the upgrade you want is most likely now sitting in Heartland Area Accessories in Fremont. In 2005, General Motors needed a supplier of highly sought after accessories for a territory extending from West Iowa to the Nebraska/Wyoming border. The parent company was looking to partner with one of their dealerships to shorten the delivery of auto accessories to its customers. Sid Dillon Chevy emerged at the top of that mega-corporations list. You know they contacted us, but we were very interested in the option too, said company partner Sid Dillon, Jr. We had to apply, like everyone else, and qualify for the business. Once we got it, we immediately moved to set it up as we had high hopes for its success. The vacancy of the nearby Menards building was a boon to the project. Located just east of Sid Dillons present Chevrolet lot, the old Menards site was soon home to thousands of various accessories to be supplied to regional dealerships. We are actually a customer of ourselves, Dillon laughed. This is a warehouse that can only be accessed by GM dealers. It is not open to the general public. Our salespeople, working a block to the south, use the warehouse the same as any regional dealer would. The current unit was constructed over several months culminating in its recent opening about three weeks ago. When Hobby Lobby took over the Menards structure, the entire Heartland unit had to move to three separate sites around Fremont. That was not a simple transition, Dillon noted. We had to keep track of all items and their whereabouts. To complete the move to this 35,000 square foot location behind our Chevy store was a relief for all of us. To keep Heartland Area Accessories humming requires about ten full time positions. Four people work the roads promoting products to regional dealers. Two long-time Fremont residents, Tony Niday and Carter Burnside, also serve a managers. Four employees maintain the actual warehouse while three more run regular delivery routes across the two state area. While GM would rather have its warehouse located closer to the Interstate which would expedite delivery schedules, Dillons access to Nebraskas major population sites has proven to provide easy access to the states wider marketplace. Sales from Heartland Accessories have been consistently above expectations and are expected to continue its market climb in the future. Whether it be wheels, floor mats or running boards for the truck, the items any GM buyer wants are probably waiting in town at 2500 E 23rd Street. But customers need to go the Dillons Chevy door first. Delivery of the desired accessory will necessitate a very short walk. SACRAMENTO, Calif., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- At a time of uncertainty and challenging decisions ahead, leaders from First 5 commissions from throughout the state will journey to the state Capitol on Tuesday to speak with legislators on the importance of early childhood development and the state of declining First 5 revenues. For the past four years, the First 5 Association of California brings together First 5 leaders from across all 58 counties to urge lawmakers to prioritize young children in policy decisions and advocate for early care and education, home visiting, developmental screening and other policies to ensure that children get the best start in life. "Advocacy Day is an opportunity to bring county experiences to the Capitol on behalf of California's youngest constituents, who cannot advocate for themselves," said Moira Kenney, Executive Director of the First 5 Association of California. There are more than 3 million children ages 0-5 in California. Of these, 50 percent are Medi-Cal births, 25 percent live in poverty, 14 percent reported for abuse or neglect at least once, and 8 percent have been identified with special health care needs. For nearly two decades, First 5 has been a leader in providing essential and effective services for California's youngest children. In 1998, California voters passed Proposition 10, the ballot initiative that dedicates tobacco taxes to children's services and created First 5 commissions in every county. Last year alone, First 5 county commissions invested nearly $503 million towards the healthy development of children from birth through age 5 - the time when 90 percent of brain development occurs. The First 5 Association unites all 58 First 5 county commissions around a common agenda focused on these key impact areas: family strengthening, early identification, oral health, quality early learning and system sustainability & reach. Top on meeting agendas are discussions of declining First 5 revenues a result of fewer people smoking in California, and the governor's budget which fails to fulfill child care promises made in last year's budget. The governor's budget proposal amounts to $226 million not invested in child care through plateaued reimbursement rates and the postponement of nearly 3,000 preschool slots. By 2020, First 5 revenues are projected to be 40 percent lower than their peak in 2000, dropping to $400 million annually. "California has tied essential children's services to unstable tobacco taxes," continued Kenney. "We need lawmakers to understand that First 5 programs and services are unsustainable given the way we fund children's services." Tuesday's agenda includes more than 100 meetings between First 5 Executive Directors, the Brown Administration, and State Legislative leaders. More than 98 First 5 representatives will take part in this year's Advocacy Day, representing 39 First 5 county commissions. "Today is about helping leaders in the Brown Administration and the Legislature understand that quality early education, family strengthening, and health services make the difference in a child's life," concluded Kenney. "We look forward to working with Governor Brown, Senate President Pro Tem Kevin De Leon, and Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, on the many challenges facing our youngest residents, and ensuring that California fully supports our youngest children." SOURCE First 5 LA Related Links http://www.first5association.org "We are honored to have an accomplished business leader and innovator focused on our growth in North America and expanding our U.S. footprint," said Charles Weinland, chairman of the Board of Directors of Airmall. "Ben brings a depth of experience, tremendous energy and insight to our strategic vision. Our focus is on enhancing the customer and passenger 'breakthrough' experience at all of our airports. We and our airport partners are in excellent hands with Ben Zandi at the helm." Mr. Zandi has more than 30 years of experience in hospitality, business management and retail and restaurant development and operations with a record of increasing shareholder value and exceeding revenue and profitability goals. "Fraport is a major international player with an impressive wealth of knowledge, talent and resources," added Mr. Zandi. "I am passionately committed to positioning the Airmall brand for the 21st Century as best in class by creating breakthrough services, products and experiences to serve the shifting customer base. It's an exciting time." Mr. Zandi joins Airmall following his role as executive vice president of operations of PGHC Inc., a privately owned restaurant company based in Dedham, Mass. with annual revenue of $250 million. Prior to joining PGHC Inc., for 12 years, he owned and operated Zanick Inc., a regional restaurant group and consulting firm based in Bristol, Tenn., and grew the business to more than $15 million in annual revenue. He also served as director of operations of all retail, food and beverage concessions in major airports for Host Corporation by Marriott for 13 years. Mr. Zandi's commitment to serving the community has included his leadership of nonprofit organizations and term as vice mayor and as city councilman of Bristol, Tenn. Giving back is a high priority in his new role. "I am honored to be able to touch the community in a profound way with our partners at the airports and local and small business owners," said Mr. Zandi. "This is a unique opportunity to create better airports and better communities." Mr. Zandi is certified by the Management and Strategy Institute as a Six Sigma Black Belt Professional. About AIRMALL Airmall is the developer and manager of the retail, food and beverage operations at Pittsburgh International Airport, Boston Logan International Airport (terminals B and E), Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport, and Cleveland Hopkins International Airport. A leading airport concessions model in North America, Airmall boasts among the highest per-passenger spending and receives accolades for innovation and customer service. For more information, visit airmall.com. Airmall USA, Inc. is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Fraport AG Frankfurt Airport Services Worldwide, the global airport company based in Frankfurt, Germany. For more information about Fraport, visit fraport.com. SOURCE AIRMALL USA Related Links http://www.airmall.com NEW YORK, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- AJC is appalled by the fatal attack on a mosque in Canada. Six people were killed and eight wounded in the assault during evening prayers at the Quebec Islamic Cultural Center. Two suspects have been detained. "This was an attack on Canada, not only on one mosque. Indeed, it was an attack on any democratic society founded on religious pluralism that today faces threats against its Muslim populations," said Robert Silverman, AJC Director of Muslim-Jewish Relations. "Our thoughts are with the families of the worshippers senselessly murdered, and with the injured, who are in need of our prayers." Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the "terrorist attack on Muslims in a center of worship and refuge." SOURCE American Jewish Committee Related Links http://www.ajc.org OAKVILLE, ON, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ - Algonquin Power & Utilities Corp. ("APUC" or the "Company") (TSX: AQN, NYSE: AQN) is pleased to announce the appointment of D. Randy Laney to serve on the Company's Board of Directors (the "Board"). Mr. Laney brings over 30 years of management and capital markets experience as well as strategic and operational experience within the regulated energy utility sector. Mr. Laney joined the Board of Directors of The Empire District Electric Company in 2003 and served as the Non-Executive Vice Chairman of the Board from 2008 to 2009 and Non-Executive Chairman of the Board from 2009 to 2016. Mr. Laney has held numerous senior level positions with both public and private companies during his career, including 23 years with Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. in various executive positions including Vice President of Finance, Benefits and Risk Management and Vice President of Finance and Treasurer. "We are fortunate to have Randy Laney join the Board of Directors of APUC and look forward to his contribution," commented Ken Moore, APUC Board Chairman. "Mr. Laney further strengthens the APUC Board and will provide valuable continuity with our recent acquisition of The Empire District Electric Company." About Algonquin Power & Utilities Corp. APUC is a North American diversified generation, transmission and distribution utility with $10 billion of total assets. Liberty Utilities provides rate regulated natural gas, water and electricity generation, transmission and distribution utility services to over 782,000 customers in the United States. APUC is committed to being a North American leader in the generation of clean energy through its portfolio of long term contacted wind, solar and hydroelectric generating facilities representing more than 1,150 MW of installed capacity. APUC delivers continuing growth through an expanding pipeline of renewable energy development projects, organic growth within its rate regulated generation, distribution and transmission businesses, and the pursuit of accretive acquisitions. Common shares, preferred shares, and instalment receipts are traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange under the symbols AQN, AQN.PR.A, AQN.PR.D, and AQN.IR. APUC's common shares are also listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol AQN. Visit APUC at www.AlgonquinPowerandUtilities.com and follow us on Twitter @AQN_Utilities. SOURCE Algonquin Power & Utilities Corp. Related Links http://www.algonquinpower.com NEW YORK, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- AppNexus and Index Exchange today announced an expansion of their header bidding partnership to include the support of server-to-server integrations. Both AppNexus and Index Exchange will work as partners in each other's server-side solutions. In May of 2016, AppNexus and Index Exchange mutually agreed to support each other's header-based wrapper. "We strongly believe that publishers should have unbiased and transparent access to every exchange, not just the one that comes with their ad server," said Tom Shields, Chief Strategy Officer at AppNexus. "Our server-to-server offering builds on our years of delivering fast, reliable server-side connections to hundreds of industry partners, and just like the open source prebid.js, allows publishers transparent access to the exchanges that work best for them." Like traditional header bidding, server-to-server integrations run a unified auction in which Supply Side Platforms (SSPs) act as demand sources and bid on a publisher's inventory. The technology, however, is more similar to Real-Time Bidding (RTB). The auction takes place in the technology provider's server as opposed to the publisher's header. By design, the server-to-server solution works best in a hybrid capacity with a traditional header bidding wrapper. The combination of the two capabilities grants publishers the flexibility to maximize cookie matching with their header partners and increase bid density through their server partners, while managing latency and optimizing revenue. "We've been running server-to-server integrations for years, and our server-side wrapper solution will afford media companies unprecedented control in their integration make-up," said Drew Bradstock, SVP Product, Index Exchange. "Successful server-to-server connections depend on strong infrastructure and transparent reporting practices. Our solution will allow for full transparency into auction dynamics so media companies can decide which partners perform best client-side or server-side and whether mediation is the best fit for them." Publishers can work with AppNexus' server-to-server solution and prebid.js independently or as a part of the full-stack AppNexus Publisher Suite. Both tracks provide publishers with log-level data and a direct path to demand, so advertisers can optimize campaign spend and publishers can maximize yield. Similarly, Index Exchange's wrapper solution will allow publishers the flexibility to run a mix of both client side and server-side bidders that best maximize their revenue. ABOUT APPNEXUS AppNexus is an internet technology company that enables and optimizes the real-time sale and purchase of digital advertising. Our powerful, real-time decisioning platform supports core products that enable publishers to maximize yield; and marketers and agencies to harness data and machine learning to deliver intelligent and customized campaigns. For more information, follow us at @AppNexus or visit us at appnexus.com. ABOUT INDEX EXCHANGE Index Exchange is the principled ad exchange and a true technology organization with over two-thirds of our staff residing in engineering. Built on the pillars of neutrality, openness, and the most reliable technology, we aspire to be the exchange that media companies can trust. With no other business interests to divide our attention, our sole focus remains connecting media companies with premium demand at massive scale. This allows us to partner with the biggest names in ad tech to develop great technology with media companies in mind. For more information, follow @IndexExchange. SOURCE AppNexus Related Links http://www.appnexus.com Each day, millions of Americans struggle with the impacts of bladder health conditions and disease, including urinary incontinence, overactive and underactive bladder, interstitial cystitis, urinary tract infections, nocturia and neurogenic bladder. These can impact an individual's health, quality of life and result in significant health costs (estimated to be more than $70 billion per year). "Tens of millions of Americans live with bladder conditions and diseases," Representative Engel said. "These heavily stigmatized ailments have been linked to depression, decreased physical activity, hospitalizations the list goes on. It is vitally important that we discuss these serious conditions without shame, and we invest in the research needed to better understand and treat the bladder conditions that plague so many Americans." Bladder health conditions have a major impact on many Americans, including our veterans. More than 1 in 10 military service members injured in Afghanistan and Iraq have urotrauma injuries; 1 in 3 younger female veterans report stress urinary incontinence, overactive bladder or painful bladder symptoms; and bladder cancer is one of the most commonly diagnosed cancers among Veterans Affairs (VA) Health System patients. Medical and behavioral research to better understand and maintain bladder health and to treat bladder conditions is critically needed yet is neglected and underfunded compared to other health research. "Increasing awareness of bladder health conditions is a critical first step to reducing stigma and empowering individuals to discuss their bladder health symptoms with their providers," said Richard A. Memo, MD, chair of the Urology Care Foundation. "We are honored that Representative Engel is once again leading this important effort." Original cosponsors of H. Res. 67 include Congresswoman Grace Meng (NY-6) and Congresswoman Brenda Lawrence (MI-14). For more information about bladder health or H. Res. 67, please contact the AUA Communications office by calling 410-689-3932 or sending an email to [email protected]. About the American Urological Association Founded in 1902 and headquartered near Baltimore, Maryland, the American Urological Association is a leading advocate for the specialty of urology, and has more than 21,000 members worldwide. The AUA is a premier urologic association, providing invaluable support to the urologic community as it pursues its mission of fostering the highest standards of urologic care through education, research and the formulation of health policy. About the Urology Care Foundation Recognized by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services as the sponsor of National Bladder Health Month, the Urology Care Foundation is the world's leading nonprofit urological health foundation. They partner with physicians, researchers, healthcare professionals, patients, caregivers, families and the public to support and improve the prevention, detection and treatment of urological diseases through research and education. To learn more about the Urology Care Foundation and its programs visit: www.UrologyHealth.org. Members of the Bladder Health Alliance: Alliance for Aging Research; American Geriatric Society's Health in Aging Foundation; American Urogynecologic Society; American Urological Association; Association for Pelvic Organ Prolapse Support; Association for the Bladder Exstrophy Community; Bladder Cancer Advocacy Network; Blue Thong Society; Chesapeake Urology Associates; HealthyWomen International; Society for the Study of Women's Sexual Health; Interstitial Cystitis Association; Men's Health Network; Multiple Sclerosis Association of America; Multiple Sclerosis Foundation; National Multiple Sclerosis Society; National Association for Continence; National Association of Nurse Practitioners in Women's Health; Simon Foundation for Continence; Society for Women's Health Research; Spina Bifida Association; SUFU - Society of Urodynamics, Female Pelvic Medicine & Urogenital Reconstruction; United Spinal Association; Urological Association of Physician Assistants; Urology Care Foundation; Veterans Health Council; Women's Health Foundation; and the Wound, Ostomy and Continence Nurses Society (WOCN). Contact: Christine Frey, AUA 410-689-3731, [email protected] SOURCE American Urological Association Related Links http://www.AUAnet.org MINNEAPOLIS, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Bank of the West today announced the addition of its new dedicated business banking branch located at 5600 W. 83rd Street, Suite 200, Bloomington, Minneapolis. Adding to our current financial services offerings in the Twin Cities area, Bank of the West's new business banking branch is designed to help meet the growing demand for banking services for small- and medium-sized businesses in the community. This new facility is staffed by business banking professionals in an office environment designed to better serve business customers with financial solutions to support their business such as lending, deposits, cash management, and payment services. "As a relationship bank we pride ourselves on being focused on the needs of our customers and we are pleased to announce the opening of this new branch," said Michelle Di Gangi, executive vice president of small and medium-size enterprise banking at Bank of the West. "Our business banking experts bring local knowledge and experience to customers within the Twin Cities where we aim to help small and medium- size enterprise businesses thrive." Bank of the West's business banking professionals are equipped to help business owners address important issues, such as managing cash flow, planning for growth, and preparing for retirement. Bank of the West is the nation's third largest SBA 504 lender,1 the 14th largest small business bank,2 and has been the fastest growing small business bank for the past four years.3 "The Twin Cities is a vibrant and productive economy that consistently outperforms the rest of the region, 4 especially as it relates to small business formation and growth," said Scott Anderson, executive vice president and Chief Economist at Bank of the West. "The Twin Cities is a great location to start and grow a new business with an educated workforce, high-incomes, and a diversified-economy." In addition, Bank of the West's presence in the Twin Cities includes Bank of the West's Wealth Management Group, which offers objective strategic advice alongside global wealth management solutions through an extensive network of resources to serve high net worth individuals and their families. For more than 12 years, Bank of the West has served its larger corporate clients in the Twin Cities through its Commercial Banking Group. Embedded in communities across the U.S., the Commercial Banking Group's local bankers deliver specialized sector expertise and global banking solutions including international cash management and trade solutions to help businesses gain a competitive edge and accelerate growth in their home market and abroad. To further serve its business customers, Bank of the West provides tips and insights from Bank of the West's The Blog which is located on blog.bankofthewest.com. Bank of the West's SBA lender rank and performance based on the United States Small Business Administration's 2016 fiscal year end results ending September 30, 2016. SBA loans from Bank of the West are in participation with the U.S. Small Business Administration. Loans are subject to approval in accordance with Bank of the West and SBA eligibility and lending guidelines. Certain fees, conditions and restrictions may apply. 2 SB Ranking Data Source: FDIC with C&I and Non-farm/Non-residential loans less than $1mm (SNL Database) 3 SB Growth Data Source: FDIC with C&I and Non-farm/Non-residential loans less than $1mm (SNL Database) 4 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics/FRED About Bank of the West Bank of the West is a regional financial services company headquartered in San Francisco with $82.6 billion in assets as of September 30, 2016*. Founded in 1874, Bank of the West provides a wide range of personal, commercial, wealth management and international banking services through more than 600 branches and offices in 23 states and digital channels. Bank of the West is a subsidiary of BNP Paribas, which has a presence in 75 countries with more than 189,000 employees. To learn more about Bank of the West, visit About Us via BankoftheWest.com. Deposit and loan products offered by Bank of the West, Member FDIC and Equal Housing Lender. In South Dakota, Bank of the West operates under the name Bank of the West California. Bank of the West Wealth Management offers products and services through Bank of the West and its various affiliates and subsidiaries *Assets under management refers to assets under administration, management, advisement, and on deposit, including assets with our affiliate BancWest Investment Services ("BancWest") as of September 30, 2016. Securities and variable annuities are offered through BancWest Investment Services, a registered broker/dealer, Member FINRA/SIPC, and SEC Registered Investment Adviser. Financial Advisors are Registered Representatives of BancWest Investment Services. Fixed annuities/insurance products are offered through BancWest Insurance Agency in California, (License #0C52321) and through BancWest Investment Services, Inc. in AZ, CO, IA, ID, KS, MN, MO, ND, NE, NM, NV, OK, OR, SD, UT, WA, WI, WY, HI, Guam and CNMI. Bank of the West and its various affiliates and subsidiaries are not tax or legal advisors. BancWest Investment Services is a wholly owned subsidiary of Bank of the West. Bank of the West is a wholly owned subsidiary of BNP Paribas. Investment and Insurance Products: NOT FDIC INSURED NOT BANK GUARANTEED MAY LOSE VALUE NOT A DEPOSIT NOT INSURED BY ANY FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AGENCY https://twitter.com/BankoftheWest https://www.facebook.com/BankoftheWest/ https://www.linkedin.com/company/bank-of-the-west https://blog.bankofthewest.com/ SOURCE Bank of the West Related Links http://www.bankofthewest.com NASHVILLE, Tenn., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Captain D's, the leading fast casual seafood restaurant, announced today plans for continued development in Florida, targeting Tampa, St. Petersburg, Sarasota and Bradenton to expand its presence through franchise growth. Mark Levis, senior director of franchise development, will be at the Tampa Franchise Expo on Feb. 18 and 19 to meet with qualified prospective franchisees. Captain D's currently has 30 restaurants located throughout the state, opening three locations in North Florida last year and signing a multi-unit develop agreement to bring additional locations to Orlando. Captain D's Captain D's aggressive growth plans for Florida are part of the brand's overall franchise development plans for this year. This expansion is further driving Captain D's ongoing success, achieving its fourth successive year of record high system-wide AUV in 2016. Captain D's also saw a fourth-quarter system-wide same-store sales increase of 1.3 percent and a 2.3 percent system-wide same-store sales increase for the entire fiscal year, marking the company's 21st consecutive quarter and sixth consecutive year of positive growth. "Captain D's experienced tremendous growth last year and as we ride that momentum in 2017, we've made Florida a priority market for franchise expansion," said Michael Arrowsmith, chief development officer of Captain D's. "With existing restaurants in the area consistently performing well, we're eager to catapult our presence even more in the region, and encourage qualified and experienced franchise candidates interested in joining a nationally recognized brand with a proven record of success to visit us during the upcoming Tampa Franchise Expo." Those interested in developing Captain D's restaurants in Tampa, St. Petersburg, Sarasota and Bradenton are encouraged to contact Mark Levis, senior director of franchise development at (615) 603-8373 or (615) 231-2006 to discuss opportunities. Levis will be at booth 301 at the Tampa Franchise Expo on Saturday, Feb. 18 and Sunday, Feb. 19 from 10:00 a.m. 4:00 p.m. at the Tampa Convention Center, located at 333 S. Franklin Street. Captain D's success in 2016 was further driven by its seafood expertise and product innovation, with the introduction of new menu items including Nashville Hot Fish, Home-Style Flounder, Coconut Shrimp and Salmon Cakes. Coupled with its menu diversification and expanded array of offerings, Captain D's credits its new restaurant beach design with contributing to the brand's compounding success. To date, nearly 60 percent of all restaurants have been reimaged to the brand's new vibrant, coastal design, with another 50 locations to be remodeled by the end of this year. With these efforts, Captain D's has remained true to what it does best serving high-quality seafood with warm hospitality at an affordable price in a welcoming atmosphere. With 518 restaurants in 21 states, Captain D's is the fast-casual seafood leader and number one seafood franchise in America ranked by average unit volume. The company is currently seeking single- and multi-unit operators to join in the brand's rapid expansion. For more information about franchise opportunities, visit http://www.captaindsfranchising.com or call 877-635-6502. ABOUT CAPTAIN D'S Headquartered in Nashville, Tenn., Captain D's has 518 restaurants in 21 states, plus military bases around the world. Captain D's is the nation's leading fast casual seafood restaurant and was named the #1 seafood chain in the QSR 50, ranked by AUV. Founded in 1969, Captain D's has been offering its customers high-quality seafood at reasonable prices in a welcoming atmosphere for more than 47 years. Captain D's serves a wide variety of seafood that includes freshly prepared entrees and the company's signature hand-battered fish, which is cooked to order. The restaurants also offer premium-quality, grilled items such as shrimp, and surf and turf, as well as hushpuppies, desserts and freshly brewed, Southern-style sweet tea, a Captain D's favorite. For more information, please visit www.captainds.com. Contact: Samantha Russo Fish Consulting 954-893-9150 [email protected] SOURCE Captain D's Related Links http://www.captainds.com NEW YORK, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Information Builders, a leader in business intelligence (BI) and analytics, data integrity, and integration solutions, today announced that the Center for Autism and Related Disorders (CARD) is using WebFOCUS Business User Edition (BUE) to create analytic dashboards and interactive reports for more than 100 CARD clinics around the country. This new analytics environment will make CARD's operations staff much more efficient. By mapping and visualizing their data, the staff can make course corrections that positively impact the welfare of each patient. Tweet This: [email protected] has launched an #analytics environment w/ @infobldrs to improve patient care: http://ow.ly/D022308qcyj #healthIT CARD is one of the world's largest organizations using applied behavior analysis (ABA) in the treatment of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Its therapists conduct tens of thousands of sessions per month, which yields an enormous amount of data to deal with on a day-to-day basis. Senior managers at CARD implemented WebFOCUS BUE to streamline a wide range of analytics activities. For example, a business analyst can now create a dashboard and nearly a dozen alert-driven InfoApps, which will notify therapists and administrators of key developments within their cases. The new analytics environment enables non-technical users to easily explore data via charts, graphs, and reports. With so many therapists treating so many patients, even small adjustments have a big impact on the organization as a whole. For example, WebFOCUS can map patients to particular regions so CARD can make sure they are matched with the right therapists. This will minimize the number of hours therapists have to spend in transit between patient visits. Saving even one minute every hour adds up to many hours of additional therapy across the team which means more time available to treat patients. Alva Powell, chief technology officer, CARD, said: "Now we can much more easily process and visualize our data. The speed with which we got WebFOCUS up and running was amazing. It was at least ten times faster than any similar tool we have used partly because WebFOCUS performs lots of pre-data analyses, which is a big time saver. Now, we can more accurately track the treatment hours of each child. WebFOCUS will also allow us to share current information with clinical supervisors, operation managers, and schedulers." Gerald Cohen, president and CEO, Information Builders, said: "As a leader in the ASD community, CARD is widely known for its scientific approach to understanding the unique needs of each patient. Its data-driven mindset has helped the center achieve remarkable success with ABA therapy. We are pleased to supply technology that leads to better treatments and better outcomes for children with autism." About Center for Autism and Related Disorders (CARD) CARD treats individuals of all ages who are diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) at treatment centers around the globe. CARD was founded in 1990 by leading autism expert and clinical psychologist Doreen Granpeesheh, PhD, BCBA-D. CARD treats individuals with ASD using the principles of applied behavior analysis (ABA), which is empirically proven to be the most effective method for treating individuals with ASD and recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the U.S. Surgeon General. CARD employs a dedicated team of more than 2,000 individuals across the nation and internationally. For more information, visit centerforautism.com, or call (855) 345-2273. About Information Builders Information Builders provides solutions for business intelligence (BI), analytics, data integration, and data quality that help drive performance improvements, innovation, and value. Through one set of powerful products, we enable organizations to serve everyone analysts, non-technical users, even partners, customers, and citizens with better data and analytics. Our dedication to customer success is unmatched with thousands of organizations relying on us as their trusted partner. Founded in 1975, Information Builders is headquartered in New York, NY, with global offices, and remains one of the largest independent, privately held companies in the industry. Visit us at informationbuilders.com, follow us on Twitter at @infobldrs, like us on Facebook, and visit our LinkedIn page. Press Contacts Kathleen Moran Information Builders (917) 339-6313 [email protected] Kate Finigan LEWIS (781) 761-4500 [email protected] SOURCE Information Builders Related Links http://www.informationbuilders.com A Fremont woman was sentenced to spend one year at the Nebraska Correctional Center for Women after being found guilty in Dodge County District Court of stealing several items of property from individuals over the course of a little more than a year. Katherine A. Bloomberg, 34, was initially arrested in late December 2015 after a Dodge County Sheriffs Office deputy was called to assist with an investigation at the Sinclair Gas Station located in Dodge. The deputy made contact with Bloomberg, who told the deputy that she had two outstanding warrants, an arrest affidavit shows. In addition, Bloomberg matched the description of a suspect possibly involved in the theft of two vehicles on Dec. 20, 2015 from Dodge. The affidavit shows that Bloomberg eventually allegedly admitted to investigators that she took the vehicles because she was cold and had no other means of transportation from Dodge to Fremont, and vice versa. Bloomberg was again arrested in February 2016, July 2016 and Nov. 2016. The defendant who had multiple case files was charged with an assortment of crimes, ranging from theft by unlawful taking, to burglary to driving while her license was under suspension. During that stretch of time, the defendant was responsible for taking and driving multiple vehicles that were not hers, or that she didnt have permission to be driving when she elected to do so, information in several arrest affidavits shows. Bloomberg was transported to the Nebraska Correctional Center for Women, located in York, and under the Good Time Law of Nebraska could be eligible for release in 6 months. NEW YORK, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Charles F. Coleman, Jr. will once again "lead by example" in a most stylish fashion as the first recipient of the Harvest Male 2017 SWAG Man of the Year Award, a recognition that celebrates a community advocate whose style is set apart from the ordinary. This honor calls attention to a distinguished man who brings purpose and presence to the forefront. Harvest Male Harvest Male With regular appearances providing legal commentary and analysis on major media outlets including CNN and MSNBC, Huffington Post Live, Fox 5 News (NY) and many other television, radio and web outlets, Attorney Charles F. Coleman Jr. has become a powerful voice for social change, all the while being a style trendsetter. The former Brooklyn, NY prosecutor has become an avid civil litigator with an extensive portfolio in community mobilization and empowerment. In addition to his impressive career, Coleman maintains an eclectic style and culturally fluid sophistication that allows him to work effectively in the courtroom, on camera and in the neighborhood. "Charles F. Coleman Jr. epitomizes what we were looking for in the selection of our SWAG Man," noted Andrea L. Henderson, Managing Principal of the Harvest Male brand. "The Harvest Male SWAG Man is Stylish, Wise And Generous and Charles represents each component in his appearance and manner all while being committed to making positive social change." The Harvest Male brand, that was inspired by three generations of men who work tirelessly to be their best selves, both in terms of style & substance; offers a small but growing product line that currently includes bow ties, neckties, pocket squares & socks. "The selection committee felt that Charles' body of work serves as a kind of homage to those men who inspired the brand and to all men who feel that it is equally as important to look good as it is to do good," added Henderson. The trendsetting Coleman has broadened his empowerment scope to call attention to a missing link in the "Black Lives Matter" platform providing a safe harbor for dialogue for Black Males who are doing positive and productive things in their communities, but whose voices are lost in the discussions in the world around them. After years of introspection, outreach and development, Coleman recently launched Black Brilliance 360, which is a web-series consisting of original and in-depth conversations involving a diverse group of Black men who explore the concept of "Black Brilliance 360" through the male lens. "Black Brilliance 360 represents a conversation that crosses generations and geographies and encompasses Black men because our "swag" is constantly imitated and too often, only negatively represented in the media," stated Coleman. "This is not to diminish anyone else's shine, but it is designed to re-emphasize the brilliance in our own that is evidenced in the historic contributions that Black men have made and continue to make to the society as a whole that is too often undocumented." Style and fashion are important components for Coleman and the Black Brilliance 360 model and matched by his excitement regarding this recognition. "I am so honored to receive this award and welcome the opportunity to align with Harvest Male in the development of my SWAG Box. This will further the example of Black Brilliance 360 through attire that also empowers; because how you look plays a vital role in how you are viewed in the community." For More Information about, Harvest Male or the Harvest Male "SWAG Man of the Year"' contact: Meta J. Mereday, Media Consultant: [email protected] / 717.993.7924 SOURCE Harvest Male Related Links https://www.mybetterbasics.com/collections/harvest-male NORFOLK, ON, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ - Boralex inc. ("Boralex" or the "Corporation") (TSX: BLX) is pleased to announce the commercial operation, effective December 9, 2016, of the Port Ryerse wind farm located on privately-owned lands east of the hamlet of Port Ryerse in Norfolk County, Ontario. Representing an investment of slightly over $37 million, the project includes 4 turbines, with an installed capacity of 10 MW, and is endowed with a 20-year power purchase agreement with Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO). " After the recent acquisition and commissioning of a 230 MW wind farm project in Ontario, Port Ryerse wind farm is another great achievement that strengthens our position on the Ontarian market, bringing us closer to our goal to reach 2 000 MW by 2020," said Patrick Lemaire, President and Chief Executive Officer of Boralex. "I am very proud of the remarkable work of our teams which allowed us to deliver the project on time and on budget." The project construction will have created about fifty jobs and will supply electricity to nearly 1 965 people every year during its operation period while avoiding 12 200 tons of CO emissions. About Boralex Boralex develops, builds and operates renewable energy power facilities in Canada, France and the United States. A leader in the Canadian market and France's largest independent producer of onshore wind power, the Corporation is recognized for its solid experience in optimizing its asset base in four power generation types wind, hydroelectric, thermal and solar. Boralex ensures sustained growth by leveraging the expertise and diversification developed over the past 25 years. Boralex's shares and convertible debentures are listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange under the ticker symbols BLX and BLX.DB.A, respectively. More information is available at www.boralex.com or www.sedar.com. SOURCE Boralex Inc. NEW YORK, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Since 2015, Deerfield Management Company has contributed to advancing healthcare through the publication of 29 articles, editorials and abstracts. These publications are based on scientifically driven market research, development of novel approaches to constructing and analyzing clinical trials, and activities central to the analysis of markets and policy across the healthcare field. Deerfield believes that dissemination of novel findings could benefit academic, industrial and governmental organizations interested in understanding patient characteristics, improving patient care, speeding therapies to market, and optimizing healthcare policy. As an illustration of the impact of such publications in the healthcare policy environment, the September 2016 publication entitled "Use of FDA-Approved and Laboratory-Developed Tests in Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer: Results of a Retrospective Market Analysis" was used during a one-hour Senate briefing on the future of precision medicine and patient care: current landscape of genomic testing that took place on October 13, 2016, and organized by Friends of Cancer Research. The peer-reviewed publications and conference presentations produced in 2016 are listed below: 1. The Prevalence of Peyronie's Disease in the United States: A Population-Based Study. M. Stuntz M, A. Perlaky, F. des Vignes, T. Kyriakides, D. Glass. PLoS ONE 11(2): e0150157. 2. Awareness of nonalcoholic steatohepatitis and associated practice patterns of primary care physicians and specialists. S. Polanco-Briceno, D. Glass, M. Stuntz, and A. Caze. BMC Research Notes 2016 9:157. 3. Epidemiology of Low Dose Aspirin Use for Primary and Secondary Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease. M. Stuntz. Cardiology Vol. 134, Suppl. 1, 2016. 4. Mitral valve disease in the United States: retrospective analysis of hospitalizations and surgical procedures using the National Inpatient Sample. M. Stuntz. Cardiovascular Disease. Cardiology Vol. 134, Suppl. 1, 2016. 5. Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis: Physicians' perceptions of patient treatment with recently approved drugs. C. Audibert, C. Livoti, A. Caze. Contemporary Clinical Trials Communications Volume 3, 15 August 2016, Pages 8085. 6. Modeling the burden of abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) in the United States in 2013. M. Stuntz. Cardiology 2016; 135:127-131. 7. Building a drug development database: challenges in reliable data availability. C. Audibert, M. Romine, A. Caze, G. Daniel, J. Leff, and M. McClellan. Drug Development and Industrial Pharmacy 2016 Aug 24:1-5. 8. Use of FDA-Approved and Laboratory-Developed Tests in Advanced NonSmall Cell Lung Cancer: Results of a Retrospective Market Analysis. C. Audibert, M. Shea, D. Glass, M. Kozak, A. Caze, R. Hohman, J. Allen, E. Sigal, J. Leff. 2016 ASCO Annual meeting, Abstract # e20532 and Personalized Medicine in Oncology, September 2016, Vol. 5, No. 7. 9. Neuroendocrine tumor liver metastases treated with yttrium-90 radioembolization. K. Fan, A. Wild, V. Halappa, R. Kumar, S. Ellsworth, M. Ziegler, T. Garg, L. Rosati, Z. Su, A. Hacker-prietz, T. Pawlik, D. Cosgrove, K. Hon, I. Kamel, J-F. Geschwind, and J. Herman. Contemporary Clinical Trials Volume 50, September 2016, Pages 143149. 10. Recent Trends in Percutaneous Coronary Intervention Volume in the United States. M. Stuntz and A. Palak. Value in Health. November 2016 Volume 19, Issue 7, Page A641. 11. Epidemiology of Chronic Kidney Disease and Predictors of Hyperkalemia: Analysis of Nhanes 20072014. M. Stuntz and C. Livoti. Value in Health. November 2016 Volume 19, Issue 7, Pages A516A517. 12. Press releases for Phase 2 clinical trial topline results: Have the objective pre-specified efficacy results been disclosed? Z. Su and C. Livoti. Contemporary Clinical Trials Communications Volume 4, 15 December 2016, Pages A1A2. 13. A Brief Patent Primer. M. Shtilerman and J. Eng Jr. BiotechBlog. December 5, 2016. 14. Recent trends in the prevalence of low-dose aspirin use for primary and secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease in the United States, 20122015. M. Stuntz and B. Bernstein. Preventive Medicine Reports. 15. Communication practices and awareness of resources for acromegaly patients among endocrinologists. S. Polanco-Briceno, D. Glass and C. Plunkett. Patient Preference and Adherence. 2016; 10:2531-2541. Deerfield will continue to contribute findings and insights to the public domain in 2017. About Deerfield Deerfield is an investment management firm committed to advancing healthcare through investment, information and philanthropy. For more information, please visit www.deerfield.com. Contacts Deerfield Management Company Karen Heidelberger, 212-692-7140 [email protected] SOURCE Deerfield Management Company Related Links http://www.deerfield.com DETROIT, Jan. 29, 2017 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ --The archbishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Detroit, Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron, has expressed his support for and solidarity with Muslim leaders in Southeast Michigan, affirming his opposition to faith-based restrictions to immigration. In response, the co-chair of the Imams Council of the Michigan Muslim Community Council, Imam Steve Elturk, has thanked the archbishop and the entire Detroit archdiocese "for standing by the Muslims during such trying times." For the sake of expediency, Archbishop Vigneron's message was communicated via email on Saturday, January 28. More formal correspondence will be exchanged between the two religious leaders in the coming days. January 28, 2017 Dear Friends, I wrote to you a little over a year ago to share with you my statement to the priests of our Archdiocese regarding a proposal made during the presidential campaign to restrict Muslim immigration to the United States. At that time, I reaffirmed my commitment to stand with you in opposing any and all unjust discrimination on the basis of religion. Today, I reaffirm that pledge. Now that a federal government restriction has been placed upon refugees from mainly Muslim countries, I want to bring to your attention, and affirm my solidarity with, a January 27 statement made in Washington, D.C., by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Stating strong disagreement with the Executive Order, the bishops say "We believe in assisting all those who are vulnerable and fleeing persecution, regardless of their religion welcoming newcomers and refugees is an act of love and hope." Additionally, I call to your attention to a December 9, 2016 statement given by me: "We stand with our immigrant brothers and sisters." Please know that the Catholic community will continue to speak out and care for immigrants and refugees, no matter their religion or their country of origin. As I said in my statement last month: "Our local community in metro-Detroit is much richer for the contributions of our brothers and sisters from Mexico and El Salvador, from India and Pakistan, from Iraq and Syria, from China and Korea, from Ukraine and Poland, from Cameroon and Nigeria." Let us continue to stand together for the common good here in metro-Detroit. Sincerely yours, Allen H. Vigneron Archbishop of Detroit SOURCE Archdiocese of Detroit JACKSONVILLE, Fla., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Connected2Fiber, the leading SaaS market acceleration platform for connectivity companies, announced today that Dark Fiber Systems, Inc. has signed an agreement to implement the platform and leverage the Connected World. DFS will also be implementing the Building List Manager, an automated software module for creating and distributing OnNet and NearNet building lists. DFS is one of the largest competitive fiber operators in Jacksonville, extending its infrastructure over 140 miles and passing more than 2200 commercial locations, wireless towers, data centers and key government facilities. The company's network infrastructure reach necessitated a location management system incorporating both the identification of fiber paths, OnNet and NearNet buildings, and Connected2Fiber's demand generation tool, Building List Manager. "We are excited to launch the Connected World platform and leverage the Building List Manager. DFS has an incredible network in the Jacksonville metro area and with the new tools we are able to drive new revenue and let the market know what we have. Automating the process of creating building lists, mapping the lists to all of the carrier and channel formats; distributing that information in minutes, and on an updated basis, gives us the ability to drive participation. That translates into new revenue and growth," said Jered Bearden, President of Dark Fiber Systems. The Connected World uses a SaaS based GIS engine for displaying fiber routes, OnNet connected buildings and NearNet locations to visualize and analyze data related to the market. This information is crucial to ensure that network operators are pushing network reach information to key customers and inserting location information into their buying processes in an efficient and ongoing manner. "We are excited to welcome DFS to our platform and look forward to helping them drive market participation in the wholesale, channel and enterprise markets. DFS is currently performing a network wide NearNet analysis with Connected2Fiber's SaaS tools and establishing the tools as its primary mapping and market intelligence solution," said Ben Edmond, CEO & Founder of Customer at Connected2Fiber. About Dark Fiber Systems Dark Fiber Systems, Inc. (DFS) has been serving the Jacksonville market since 1997. We are the only service provider in Jacksonville who will offer Dark Fiber to "ALL" Carriers, Service Providers, Wireless Providers, Corporate Businesses, and Non-Profits. Dark Fiber is fiber that does not go through any active or passive equipment, and provides the customer with a completely private network without bandwidth limits. Dark Fiber always beats a bandwidth based service. See https://www.dfsfiber.com for more. About Connected2Fiber Connected2Fiber helps the network industry transact and improve its return on sales & marketing investment with the industry's only SaaS marketplace enablement platform that combines Account-Based Marketing, Location Intelligence with predictive algorithms that learns how to improve results. The platform helps network owners and network buyers improve transparency, speed and effectiveness with information, automation and predictive algorithms. Connected2Fiber is based in Hopkinton, MA, and was founded in 2015 by Ben Edmond. See http://www.connected2fiber.com for more. Media Hotline, 508-202-1807 [email protected] SOURCE Connected2Fiber Related Links http://www.connected2fiber.com TEL AVIV, Israel, January 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Earnix, a leading provider of predictive analytics solutions for the financial services industry, today announced it has completed a $13.5 million financing round with Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP), Vintage Investment Partners, both long-time investors, and Israel Growth Partners (IGP), a new investor. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20150721/238725LOGO ) The funding will be used to accelerate Earnix's growth strategy, which includes a combination of geographic expansion, deeper penetration into the banking vertical, and investment in new products. The company is ready to commercialize its next generation analytics platform, which embraces predictive analytics, deep machine learning and big data technologies. Earnix also announces that Reuven Ben Menachem has been elected as Chairman of the Earnix Board of Directors. Mr. Ben Menachem is the founder and former CEO of Fundtech, a leading global provider of software to the financial services industry, which he led since its inception until its acquisition by D+H in 2015 for $1.25 billion. Haim Shani, co-founder and general partner of IGP, has also been appointed as a Director. Mr. Shani is the former CEO of NICE Systems, as well as the former Director General of the Israeli Ministry of Finance. Both gentlemen bring extensive experience and a successful track-record of building high-tech companies into leading global providers in the highly competitive financial technology (FinTech) sector. Mr. Ben Menachem said: "I am honored to have been selected Earnix's Chairman, and I look forward to contributing to its purpose, vision and strategy. The investment enables us to capitalize on our successful business model and to solidify our position as a predictive analytics leader in the financial services software industry." Mr. Shani said: "IGP is very excited to join the Earnix family. We believe that Earnix has great potential in this dynamic high-growth predictive analytics market. We are extremely impressed by the quality of its employees, technology and products and I look forward to working with the management team as they implement their growth strategy." "This investment reflects our continued support and belief that Earnix is becoming the leading predictive analytics provider in the financial services industry," commented Raffi Kesten, Managing Partner at JVP. "As the largest investor in Earnix, I want to welcome Reuven and Haim to the Earnix Board of Directors. Their past accomplishments as CEOs of large companies servicing the financial services industry speak for themselves, and I believe they will make a substantial contribution towards our future success." About Earnix Earnix integrated customer analytics software empowers financial services companies to achieve optimal business performance through data science and predictive analytics. The Earnix analytical solutions drive superior product, pricing and marketing decisions, while ensuring alignment with changing market dynamics. Earnix combines predictive modeling and optimization with real-time connectivity to core operational systems, bringing the power of analytic-driven decisions to every customer interaction. For more information visit http://www.earnix.com For More Information : George Ravich, Earnix Chief Marketing Officer [email protected] +1-203-984-8765 SOURCE Earnix Ellie Kemper, nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor Nominee for Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt looked stunning in a dramatic pair of diamond drop earrings and a Forevermark Exceptional Diamond ring. Anna Chlumsky, nominated for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series for Veep also sparkled in dazzling shoulder-skimming earrings. Dascha Polanco was dripping in diamonds when she took the stage with the Orange Is the New Black cast to accept the award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series. Channeling old Hollywood glamour, Dascha layered three diamond necklaces for a bold statement and finished the look with oversized stud earrings, cuffs stacked on both wrists and several rings. Forevermark diamond looks at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards include: Who: Ellie Kemper, Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series Nominee for Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt The Look: Forevermark Long Diamond Drop Earrings with Princess Cut Diamonds set in 18k White Gold, 18.61 ctw Long Diamond Drop Earrings with Princess Cut Diamonds set in 18k White Gold, 18.61 ctw Forevermark Exceptional Diamond Ring with 9.04 ct Asscher Cut Forevermark Exceptional Diamond set in Platinum, 10.23 ctw Ring with 9.04 ct Asscher Cut Forevermark Exceptional Diamond set in Platinum, 10.23 ctw Forevermark Diamond and Pave Marquise Shaped Ring set in 18k Oxidized White Gold, 3.90 ctw Who: Dascha Polanco, Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series Winner for Orange Is the New Black The Look: Forevermark Double Halo Diamond Stud Earrings set in 18k White Gold, 6.01 ctw Double Halo Diamond Stud Earrings set in 18k White Gold, 6.01 ctw Forevermark by Maria Canale Deco Tassel Diamond Pendant set in 18k White Gold, 5.15 ctw Deco Tassel Diamond Pendant set in 18k White Gold, 5.15 ctw Forevermark Diamond Necklace set in 18k White Gold, 14.11 ctw Diamond Necklace set in 18k White Gold, 14.11 ctw Forevermark Degrade Diamond Line Necklace set in 18k White Gold, 33.61 ctw Degrade Diamond Line Necklace set in 18k White Gold, 33.61 ctw Forevermark Double Knot Diamond Cuff set in 18k White Gold, 25.45 ctw Double Knot Diamond Cuff set in 18k White Gold, 25.45 ctw Forevermark Zig Zag Diamond Bangles set in 18k White Gold, 6.36 ctw Zig Zag Diamond Bangles set in 18k White Gold, 6.36 ctw Forevermark by Natalie K Entwined 3 Stone Band with Pear and Marquise Diamonds set in 18k White Gold Entwined 3 Stone Band with Pear and Marquise Diamonds set in 18k White Gold Forevermark by Memoire Two Stone Halo Diamond Ring set in 18k White Gold, 2.05 ctw Two set in 18k White Gold, 2.05 ctw Forevermark by Maria Canale Deco Round Halo Diamond Ring set in 18k White Gold, 5.74 ctw Who: Anna Chlumsky, Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series Nominee for Veep The Look: Forevermark Long Drop Earrings set in 18k White Gold, 6.59 ctw Long Drop Earrings set in 18k White Gold, 6.59 ctw Forevermark Stackable Diamond Bangle set in 18k White Gold 5.30, ctw Stackable Diamond Bangle set in 18k White Gold 5.30, ctw Forevermark Deco Diamond Ring set in 18k White Gold 3.36 ctw Who: Giuliana Rancic, E! Host The Look: Forevermark Black Label Square Solitaire Stud Diamond Earrings, 4.45 ctw Square Solitaire Stud Diamond Earrings, 4.45 ctw Forevermark by Maria Canale Deco Medallion Ring with Round and Baguette Diamonds set in 18k White Gold, 3.73 ctw Notes to Editors: ABOUT FOREVERMARK Every Forevermark diamond undergoes a journey of rigorous selection. The unique Forevermark inscription is an assurance that every Forevermark diamond meets the exceptional standards of beauty, rarity and is responsibly sourced. Forevermark goes beyond the standard 4Cs to hand select diamonds that are among the most beautiful in the world. Less than one percent of the world's diamonds are worthy of the Forevermark inscription. Each Forevermark diamond is responsibly sourced and embodies Forevermark's principles of integrity, support for opportunities for women and dedication to the protection of the natural world. The inscription is an assurance of the physical integrity of a Forevermark diamond throughout its journey. Invisible to the naked eye, the inscription features a unique identification number and is just 1,5/000th the width of a human hair, made using bespoke technology from The De Beers Group of Companies. Forevermark is the diamond brand from The De Beers Group of Companies and benefits from over 128 years of diamond expertise. For more information and to find your nearest Authorized Forevermark Jeweler, visit www.forevermark.com. SOURCE Forevermark Related Links http://www.forevermark.com SAN FRANCISCO and STAMFORD, Conn., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- EPIC Insurance Brokers and Consultants, a retail property, casualty brokerage and employee benefits consultant, announced today that Christopher J. Giuditta has joined the firm as a vice president. Giuditta will focus on the cultivation and development of new revenue opportunities throughout EPIC's Northeast Region. He will be based in the Stamford, Conn. and report to Craig de Gruchy, Managing Principal. "CJ is a dedicated, result orientated individual, with a passion for service excellence and the delivery of value-added solutions," said de Gruchy. "He is well regarded in our industry and his commitment to customers is strongly aligned with EPIC's core values regarding client advocacy and putting 'people first.' We are excited to have CJ join our growing operation in the Northeast Region." Giuditta joins EPIC from H.D. Segur Insurance. During his 17 year career there, he provided individuals and business owners with customized risk management and insurance solutions while overseeing the service team regarding client satisfaction and retention. Additionally, Giuditta worked with third party referral partners to enhance their offerings, including ensuring their clients' awareness of and protection from a wide range of risk exposures. Giuditta was also a top producer for new affinity groups along with maintaining and growing the firm's Travelers Benefits Plus programs. For the past five years, Giuditta has concentrated on the private client segment, providing personal risk management guidance and custom insurance protection to high net worth individuals. Giuditta is a graduate of Post College, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Business Management. Professionally, he is a licensed property and casualty and life and health producer in both Conn. and N.Y. and is currently working toward his Certified Personal Risk Manager (CPRM) professional designation. Christopher J. Giuditta can be reached at: EPIC Insurance Brokers and Consultants 3 Landmark Square, 4th floor, Stamford, CT 06901 christopher.giuditta[at]epicbrokers.com 203-658-0529. About EPIC: EPIC is a unique and innovative retail property and casualty and employee benefits insurance brokerage and consulting firm. EPIC has created a values-based, client-focused culture that attracts and retains top talent, fosters employee satisfaction and loyalty and sustains a high level of customer service excellence. EPIC team members have consistently recognized their company as a "Best Place to Work" in multiple regions and as a "Best Place to Work in the Insurance Industry" nationally. EPIC now has more than 850 team members operating from offices across the U.S., providing Property Casualty, Employee Benefits, Specialty Programs and Private Client solutions to more than 13,000 clients. With more than $250 million in revenues, EPIC ranks among the top 20 retail insurance brokers in the United States. Supported by the Carlyle Group, the company continues to expand organically and through strategic acquisitions across the country. For additional information, please visit http://www.epicbrokers.com/. *PHOTO: Send2Press.com/mediaboom/17-0130s2p-Giuditta-300dpi.jpg *LOGO: Send2Press.com/mediaboom/16-0308-epic-insurance-300dpi.jpg This release was issued through Send2Press, a unit of Neotrope. For more information, visit Send2Press Newswire at https://www.Send2Press.com SOURCE EPIC Insurance Brokers and Consultants Related Links http://www.epicbrokers.com Fisher House is an organization that provides support to military families, helping them care for sick and injured family members during hospitalization. The foundation in primarily known for their network of "comfort homes" where military and veterans' families are able to stay at no cost while their loved ones receive treatment. The Dallas house opened in 2008 and is located at the Dallas VA Medical Center. "EquityBuild is honored to give to such an outstanding charity as Fisher House Foundation to help our country's veterans," said Shaun Cohen, vice president of EquityBuild. "We are a company that values freedom, and this charitable initiative is part of thanking those who let us be free." For more than 25 years, the Fisher House program has provided these comfort homes for families of patients receiving medical care at major military and VA medical centers. There are 71 Fisher Houses located in the world, with more than 307,000 families served since inception. "Contributions like the one graciously provided by EquityBuild help make the Fisher House a comfortable 'home away from home' for family members of veterans during their hospital stay," said Lydia Gray-Henderson, Fisher House Manager for the VA North Texas Health Care System. ABOUT EQUITYBUILD: EquityBuild is committed to putting its extensive knowledge and unique Operational Mastery of the real estate investing process to work for regular people, maximizing their returns and minimizing their risk at every step. By doing this EquityBuild helps its investors achieve financial freedom while improving neighborhoods and providing hard-working families with nicer, safer places to live. Founded by father-son team Jerry and Shaun Cohen, this company gives people the freedom and time to pursue their passions with the people they love. EquityBuild is ushering in a new era, making real estate investing more secure and reliable than ever. To find out more visit us at http://www.EquityBuild.com. Company Contact: 877-978-1869 SOURCE EquityBuild Related Links http://www.EquityBuild.com SCHAFFHAUSEN and ZURICH, Switzerland, January 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Marc Vollenweider, Evalueserve's co-founder and the author of the business book 'Mind+Machine - A Decision Model for Optimizing and Implementing Analytics', has decided to focus on a strategic role in the company. Marc will serve as Evalueserve's Chief Strategist and will continue to be a member of the company's Board of Directors. He will drive Evalueserve's strategic thinking and innovation, built on the success of the mind+machine strategy. He will continue to be actively engaged in key client situations. Marc will work with business leaders to further enhance and develop services and products, such as the InsightBee digital platform, Pharmafusion, and IP Dashboard (IPD). These innovations support further digitization of Evalueserve's offerings. "When I was writing my book, I saw huge potential for mind+machine not only within our company, but in thousands of use cases with our clients. I was already spending much of my time traveling to talk about it to clients or at conferences. The next logical step was to see how we can change our management structure to yield the best benefits. We felt well-prepared to make the change, and I can now fully dedicate my time to the continued success of the mind+machine strategy and Evalueserve", says Marc. In their new roles, Co-CEOs Ashutosh and Ravi will be responsible for executing the mind+machine strategy to deliver high value to Evalueserve's clients, and will work closely with Marc in advancing the innovation agenda. "We have terrific momentum in the market, and look forward to the next phase of our journey. Our mind+machine positioning is already helping deepen our engagement with clients. We believe the change in management structure will accelerate the success of our strategy", say Ashutosh and Ravi. In addition to their new responsibilities, Ashutosh and Ravi will continue to lead the FS (Financial Services) and CaPS (Corporates and Professional Services) business units, respectively. "Both Ravi and Ashutosh have been successfully leading their business units and have demonstrated that they are ready for the next step. This structure will allow us speed up decision-making to win the race for innovation", says Marc. Evalueserve Chairman Timo Vatto agrees with the strategy: "The Board of Evalueserve has evaluated different leadership scenarios. We concluded it was best to promote internal leaders, Ashutosh and Ravi, who have already proven themselves. They provide continuity, have an in-depth background on the company strategy and future planning, know its operations and its clients inside-out, and are well-respected by Evalueserve employees. We are proud to move forward with an internal CEO succession solution." About the CEOs Ashutosh Gupta is Evalueserve's Co-CEO and Global Business Unit Head for Financial Services. He joined the company in 2006, having previously been an Executive Director at Goldman Sachs in New York and London. At Goldman Sachs, he worked in the New Products group and the Equities division, and prior to Goldman Sachs he worked as a consultant with Roy F Weston, Inc., an engineering consulting firm in Philadelphia. Ashutosh Gupta received his Bachelor's Degree in Technology in Chemical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology in Delhi and an MBA from New York University Stern School of Business. Ravi Mehrotra is Evalueserve's Co-CEO and Global Business Unit Head for Corporates and Professional Services. Prior to joining Evalueserve in May 2011, he was a Senior Vice President and General Manager with SunGard Data Systems. He has also been a Vice President at SAP and a consultant at McKinsey & Co. He holds a Bachelor's Degree in Engineering from the University of Delhi, a Master's Degree from Ohio State University, and an MBA from the Wharton School in Philadelphia. About Evalueserve Evalueserve is a global professional services provider offering research, analytics, and data management services. We are powered by mind+machine - a unique combination of human expertise and best-in-class technologies that use smart algorithms to simplify key tasks. This approach enables us to design and manage processes that can generate and harness insights on a large scale, significantly cutting costs and timescales and helping businesses that partner with us to overtake the competition. For more information about Evalueserve, visit http://www.evalueserve.com For interview requests please contact Sandra Winkler: [email protected] / + 49-30-9486-4193 SOURCE Evalueserve MIAMI, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Fathom, one of Carnival Corporation's (NYSE/LSE: CCL; NYSE: CUK) 10 global cruise brands, has added significant savings for deluxe staterooms for its popular week-long cruises to Cuba. Travelers save up to 28 percent off the standard rate when booking by March 31 for Fathom's cruises to Cuba between March 5 and May 28. Choices feature premium balcony staterooms starting from $2,999 with an additional $150 shipboard credit, or ocean view staterooms starting from $2,499 with a $75 credit shipboard credit. Credit may be applied to popular onboard activities such as rejuvenating treatments at Fathom's full-service luxury spa, an appetizing dinner at the ship's specialty restaurant Ocean Grill or on one-of-a-kind collections located in any of the onboard retail stores. "Many of our travelers want to immerse themselves in another culture by richly exploring new communities in deeper ways but at times they may feel limited by their budgets," said Tara Russell, president of Fathom and global impact lead for Carnival Corporation. "Fathom's Cuba cruises open up the island beyond Havana and give our travelers time and space to explore, connect, reflect and truly understand the country's heritage." The new offers follow Fathom's recent announcement that allows travelers to book six unique upcoming voyages known as the "Cultures of Caribbean" for $399 that will visit the Dominican Republic and Santiago de Cuba, the second largest city in Cuba and the birthplace of salsa dancing. Fathom's people-to-people itinerary introduces travelers to the world beyond Havana with stops in the historic ports of Cienfuegos and Santiago de Cuba that provide greater context to the country's history and culture. From historical site visits to cultural experiences and everyday interactions with a broad range of people, travelers deepen their understanding and connections in a wondrous country. Every night, travelers return to the comforts of the playfully small ship knowing Fathom has handled all the details of getting from location to location in Cuba. This allows them to have the freedom and flexibility to savor each city from sun up to sundown, not worry about packing and unpacking at each destination, and make each moment even more noteworthy. The experience includes unique shore excursions -- featuring several included in the overall price of the cruise -- that provide travelers varying opportunities to interact with the Cuban people and become immersed in their culture. Some highlights include the island's famously friendly people, Spanish and French colonial architecture, traditional Cuban music and dance, restaurants with genuine Cuban cuisine, cathedrals, coastal fortresses, theatres, monuments, plazas, art installations and the cannons on San Juan Hill. Highlights of each destination include: Havana : Cuba's colorful capital is best known for the Spanish-influenced architecture of Old Havana, the classic American cars that cruise the island and its thriving nightlife. But its historic castles, fortresses, cathedrals, mansions and public buildings vie for attention with the city's lively music and entertainment scene, an eclectic and sophisticated mix of museums, art galleries, music, dance and open-air festivals that take full advantage of the island's sunny Caribbean climate. Cuba's colorful capital is best known for the Spanish-influenced architecture of Old Havana, the classic American cars that cruise the island and its thriving nightlife. But its historic castles, fortresses, cathedrals, mansions and public buildings vie for attention with the city's lively music and entertainment scene, an eclectic and sophisticated mix of museums, art galleries, music, dance and open-air festivals that take full advantage of the island's sunny climate. Cienfuegos: This coastal city is the center of Cuba's sugar, tobacco and coffee trades, and is known to Cubans as the Pearl of the South for its collection of French-influenced Neoclassical buildings and wide seaside boulevards, with a downtown that has been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Near the entrance to the city's spectacular natural bay stands the great stone fortress of Castillo de Jagua, built in 1745 to protect the city against pirate attacks. The city offers a chance to enjoy musical performances, city plazas and charming settings. This coastal city is the center of Cuba's sugar, tobacco and coffee trades, and is known to Cubans as the Pearl of the South for its collection of French-influenced Neoclassical buildings and wide seaside boulevards, with a downtown that has been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Near the entrance to the city's spectacular natural bay stands the great stone fortress of Castillo de Jagua, built in 1745 to protect the city against pirate attacks. The city offers a chance to enjoy musical performances, city plazas and charming settings. Santiago de Cuba : Capital of the Spanish colony of Cuba from 1522 to 1589, Santiago de Cuba is considered the birthplace of salsa dancing and rum. With its watchtowers and cannons used in the Spanish-American War still well-preserved, Cuba's second largest city is home to the popular festivals of Carnaval and the Fiesta del Fuego, as well as to many of the country's most famed musicians and artists and some of its most-visited historic sites. Cultures of Caribbean Cruises Only Fathom provides travelers with a single journey that provides two distinct experiences in one trip. The seven-day voyages combine the magnetic energy of Cuba with the Dominican Republic's charismatic charm and the opportunity to make lifelong connections through specially designed impact activities. Travelers are deeply immersed in the arts, history, culture and everyday lives of Cuban people while in Santiago de Cuba. While in the Dominican Republic, travelers have the opportunity to participate in social impact experiences that make a profound and meaningful difference in the lives of Dominican citizens and their communities. After a restful day at sea, travelers awake to spend one and a half days participating in optional and unforgettable impact activities to connect with the Dominican Republic and its people in exceptional ways. Impact activities are designed to address the economic, educational and environmental health of the community and enable travelers to collaborate with locals on meaningful activities like planting trees, helping a women's cooperative produce artisan chocolates and building water filters for Dominican homes. Participating in these activities allows travelers to fully experience the personal transformation that comes with this journey and being part of creating powerful and sustainable change. Special Offer Specifics Fathom's special Cuba offer is available for balcony and ocean view staterooms only. For more information or to book, travelers can call 1-855-932-1719 or their travel professionals by March 31 and reference code "RF." This promotion is not available for bookings on www.fathom.org, is non-refundable and cannot be combined with any other offers. Prices for ocean view and balcony staterooms to Cuba from March 5 to May 8 start at $2,499 and $2,999 per person based on double occupancy and include all meals on the ship, and lunch while in the three ports, onboard experiences and select on-the-ground activities. These prices do not include taxes, fees, port expenses, visa and gratuities. Estimated taxes, fees and port expenses vary by sail date and range from $144.02 to $165.98 per person. The required travel visa is $75 per person and gratuities are estimated at $80.50 per person. To secure a spot on a future sailing, a non-refundable $600 per person deposit is required at the time of booking and final payment is due 90 days prior to departure. Pricing for Fathom's seven-day Cultures of Caribbean itineraries to the Dominican Republic and Santiago de Cuba start at $399, excluding taxes, fees, port expenses and gratuities and Cuban visa, and include all meals on the ship and lunch in Santiago de Cuba, lunch during Dominican Republic impact activities, onboard experiences and select on-the-ground activities. The required Cuban travel visa is $75 per person and gratuities are estimated at $80.50 per person. The offer is applicable for all staterooms during cruises departing on February 26, March 12 and 26, April 9 and 23, and May 7. To secure a spot on future sailings, a fully refundable $300 per person deposit is required for all cabin categories and occupancy levels. Final payment is due 90 days prior to departure. To reserve a spot on future sailings, travelers may call Fathom toll-free at 1-855-932-8466 or work with a travel professional. Learn more at www.Fathom.org . About Fathom Travel Fathom pioneered a new category of travel designed to give travelers meaningful, engaging experiences that take people deep into the heart of a destination, inviting rich human connections between travelers and local people. Fathom currently offers uniquely different round-trip voyages from Miami into the heart of two of the Caribbean's most desired destinations the Dominican Republic and Cuba where travelers may explore the places and discover its people in unconventional ways and for longer amounts of time. What sets Fathom apart is the deep human connections, along with the rich and playful onboard and onshore journey, that was created for travelers who want to engage deeply and experience new places in purposeful ways. Lighthearted localized and personal enrichment onboard activities are available for travelers of all ages, and prepare and inform them about the communities they will visit. Travelers will also find new ways to discover themselves through onboard activities such as "storytelling and curiosity workshops." On the ground, Fathom helps travelers disconnect from the usual, and connect with new people and places to explore the world in unexpected ways. For example, in the Dominican Republic travelers may spend time alongside locals participating in activities that support and amplify existing programs that matter to the local communities, including planting trees, making chocolate and creating water filters. In Cuba, travelers get an up-close and personal look at the rich fabric of Cuban society as they enjoy people to people connections with local artists, musicians, business owners and families in the cities of Havana, Cienfuegos and Santiago de Cuba. Late in 2016, Fathom began expanding and evolving to better serve the broader audience of travelers that sail with Carnival Corporation annually. Beginning in November 2016, the Fathom experiences on the ground in the Dominican Republic were made available as experiential excursions in the Dominican Republic aboard six other Carnival Corporation brands that call on Amber Cove, including AIDA Cruises, Carnival Cruise Line, Costa Cruises, Holland America Line, Princess Cruises and P&O Cruises UK. Additionally, Fathom experiences will soon be offered onboard its sister brands, and in new and exciting ways in other parts of the world. For more information about Fathom or to book a voyage, contact your Travel Professional, call Fathom toll-free at 1-855-932-8466 or visit www.Fathom.org. SOURCE Fathom Related Links https://www.fathom.org PITTSBURGH, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Federated Investors, Inc. (NYSE: FII), one of the nation's largest investment managers, completed the acquisition of certain investment management related assets of Horizon Advisers, an unincorporated division of Whitney Bank. Federated and Horizon Advisers completed the reorganizations of three Hancock Horizon funds managed by Horizon Advisers into comparable Federated mutual funds managed by Federated's advisory subsidiaries. In connection with the reorganizations, approximately $435 million in assets of one fixed-income and two equity Hancock Horizon funds transitioned to Federated funds with comparable investment objectives and strategies. In relation to the reorganization, approximately $150.7 million was transitioned from the Hancock Horizon Value Fund to the Federated MDT Large Cap Value Fund, approximately $136.5 million was reorganized from the Hancock Horizon Growth Fund to the Federated Kaufmann Large Cap Fund, and approximately $147.8 million was transitioned from the Hancock Horizon Core Bond Fund to the Federated Total Return Bond Fund. "Federated's extensive experience in these types of transactions makes us an ideal fit for Horizon Advisers," said Joe Machi, director of alliances at Federated. "We will continue to seek alliance and acquisition opportunities with insurers, banks, broker-dealers and investment advisors in the United States and around the world." "Federated has been a trusted partner of Horizon Advisers for many years and we are pleased this project has been successfully completed," said David Lundgren, chief investment officer of Horizon Advisers. "Horizon Advisers will continue to concentrate on our remaining 10 Hancock Horizon Funds that are focused on small cap and other niche asset classes." Federated Investors, Inc. is one of the largest investment managers in the United States, managing $365.9 billion in assets as of Dec. 31, 2016. With 124 funds and a variety of separately managed account options, Federated provides comprehensive investment management to more than 8,500 institutions and intermediaries including corporations, government entities, insurance companies, foundations and endowments, banks and broker/dealers. For more information, visit FederatedInvestors.com. Horizon Advisers is an unincorporated division of Whitney Bank (established 1899) which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Hancock Holding Company. Whitney Bank manages assets for institutional and high net worth clients including pension plans, endowments, foundations, government entities, corporations, trusts, and estates. Whitney Bank uses these trade names: Hancock, Hancock Bank, and Whitney. For more information, visit hancockhorizon.com. Certain statements in this press release, such as those related to Federated's efforts to seek alliance and acquisition opportunities, constitute forward-looking statements, which involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements of the company or industry results to be materially different from any future results, levels of activity, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Among other risks and uncertainties is the ability of Federated to identify and complete suitable acquisitions, and the risk factors discussed in the company's annual and quarterly reports as filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. As a result, no assurance can be given as to future results, levels of activity, performance or achievements, and neither the company nor any other person assumes responsibility for the accuracy and completeness of such statements in the future. SOURCE Federated Investors, Inc. Related Links http://FederatedInvestors.com The meeting offered an inside look from industry experts on trends that drive shifting consumer demand and the changing mindset of the purchaser. "We are seeing changes in demographics. More singles are living alone, and the population growth is being driven by ethnic diversity," says Hill. These trends are creating a need for package innovation for individual or single servings and bringing more exposure to ethnic culture and flavors, making them mainstream. With declining birthrates, smaller households and more working moms, there is an emergence of a new consumer one that is demanding simplified solutions. Consumers are busier. They are looking for products to solve problems and save time. However, this demand extends beyond food think Tide Pods detergent packs or Greenies individually wrapped dog treats. "These products are intended to make life easier, and consumers are increasingly seeking out products that cater to their on-the-go lifestyles," says Elizabeth Stewart, Director of Investments at Fenwick. "People place value in that, and therefore, will pay extra for it. " Not only do consumers want easy solutions, but they are health-conscience now more than ever. According to Kantar Retail ShopperScape, 87% of all shoppers are managing their overall health and wellness in some way. This is a huge opportunity for CPG companies as there is a need in the market for better-for-you options, and people are willing to pay premium prices for these products. According to IRI data, natural and organic products make up 10% of the overall snacking category, but drive 36% of the category growth. "This gap is the opportunity that we at Fenwick recognize. Large brands are seeking accretive natural and organic expansion, but struggle to innovate in that space internally," says Stewart. "Large brands need to recapture the customer, and they can afford to pay for it. We've seen it in recent acquisitions like Dr. Pepper purchasing Bai, a line of antioxidant infused drinks and Unilever purchasing Seventh Generation, a natural cleaning line." Technology is shaping the way the consumer shops, and millennials are leading that change. Consumers can now compare prices, download coupons, read product reviews and have a product delivered to their front door all from their smartphone. According to Data 'N Charts, the usage of grocery apps has tripled over the last three years. "People are shopping differently, and technology is driving that shift," says Melissa Baker, President and CEO of Fenwick. "We are helping our brands navigate this new space by helping them focus on in-store marketing as well as digital. The whole landscape is changing, and we help founders and brands navigate these changes." New technology is driving the need for a multi-channel approach. "The traditional retail channels are becoming blurred," says Hill. "You can't just sell your product in a grocery store and think you're going to capture the consumer." Being accessible to the consumer through a traditional grocery store is key, but just as important are mass retailers like Walmart and Target, club stores like Costco, natural and specialty stores like Whole Foods, convenience stores, food service and e-commerce. "Having a multi-channel strategy is crucial to ensure consumers have access to your product," says Hill. All these trends are interconnected, and it is essential to make sure a business model has the ability to win with today's consumer. Fenwick believes there is an attractive opportunity for active investors to support businesses in the underserved segment of the consumer packaged goods marketplace between the initial startup and that brand to achieving scale. Small and mid-sized brands are gaining market share in the CPG space, and that's where Fenwick wants to put capital to work. "The opportunity gap is that these small companies oftentimes need full management teams but have limited resources. This is where Fenwick adds value," says Melissa Baker, President and CEO of Fenwick Brands. "Our team has over 100 years of combined industry expertise. We know who the consumer is, what they want and how they want it. Our operating team has worked for large industry players so we know how to scale and, more specifically, what will add the most value at exit. This dual approach is why Fenwick is able to be relevant across the entire consumer spectrum." Founded in 1988 in Birmingham, Alabama, Fenwick Brands is a leading equity investor and operator focused on the consumer goods space. Fenwick partners have over 100 years of combined operating and management experience in the consumer packaged goods industry. Fenwick invests exclusively in consumer products companies with emerging brands who need a combination of capital, strategic and operational expertise to deliver maximum shareholder value. To learn more, visit www.fenwickbrands.com. Founded in 1927 in Jacksonville, Florida, Acosta has grown from a local food broker to become the leading outsourced sales and marketing agency serving consumer packaged goods companies and retailers across the United States and Canada. Acosta offers a truly integrated approach that engages shoppers at every point along the path to purchase and ensures that our clients' products are strategically positioned to most effectively convert consumers in store. We also offer support services that help our clients drive innovation and achieve cost savings. Learn more about our services at www.acosta.com. SOURCE Fenwick Brands Related Links http://www.fenwickbrands.com SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- During this time of unprecedented global mobility, Andrew Fisher, President and Chief Investment Officer of Worldview Wealth Advisors, today has released a book, The Cross-Border Family Wealth Guide, published by Wiley. Tackling the unique financial, legal and regulatory challenges faced by global families, this first-of-its-kind book offers indispensable advice for American citizens and legal residents working and living around the world, and foreign citizens working in the United States. This book will also be extremely valuable to the financial advisors serving this community. Fisher navigates international wealth management more thoroughly in his book than any has before it. To this end, it is organized into six parts. The first chapter contains a broad discussion of financial challenges of a cross-border life. The second details how a global family can build their net worth. In the third chapter, Fisher offers a global perspective on 401(k)s, IRAs, and other retirement savings and investment vehicles. The fourth discusses buying, owning, and selling real estate across borders. The fifth is a comprehensive primer on cross-border taxation, both in the U.S. and abroad. Finally, the last section discusses retirement planning through a global lens. Fisher remarked, "To our knowledge, the information presented in the guide has never before been collected in one place, which means that as an internationally-oriented person, you now have a substantial opportunity before you." He continued, "The community of cross-border people with a connection to the United Stateslike cross-border people throughout the worldis growing very rapidly. Ultimately, if you are ablewith or without the assistance of a competent and caring financial advisorto benefit from even one of the hundreds of topics or pieces of advice given in this book, you will have done yourself and your family a great service." As Fisher explains, there are three unique challenges faced by cross-border professionals with a connection to the U.S.: Lack of Uniformity - The asymmetric nature of tax regimes and reach; that is, U.S. federal tax law reaches much farther than the tax laws of almost any other country - The asymmetric nature of tax regimes and reach; that is, U.S. federal tax law reaches much farther than the tax laws of almost any other country Complexity The intricacy of U.S. and foreign laws and regulations The intricacy of U.S. and foreign laws and regulations Scarcity of Resources - Lack of sufficient help and information, especially for those who are not very wealthy There is a large and growing demographic of cross-border professionals who have a financial connection to the U.S., including international citizens living in the U.S., Americans abroad, and foreign citizens overseas with assets stateside. Their common ground is having uniquely complicated financial affairs and a lack of experts to turn to for advice. In his book, Fisher takes a deep dive into the most common areas of confusion. What emerges is, quite simply, the most thorough guide to cross-border financial planning ever written. "Andrew Fisher's Cross-Border Family Wealth Guide comes to the rescue of those many (perhaps 30 to 40 million [global citizens] around the world, with 20 to 25 million of them in the United States) who may not even realize that they need to grapple with tax, financial, and investment requirements that are extremely complex," stated Tim Kochis, notable author, financial planner, and former CEO of Aspiriant. "Fisher shares decades of experience of practical solutions." Andrew Fisher is the President and Founder of Worldview Wealth Advisors, an independent wealth management firm advising globally oriented familiesboth Americans living abroad and foreign citizens living in the U.S. In addition to leading the investment team, Fisher serves as senior client advisor. In this role, he assists families with their complex, multinational affairs, seeking to optimize wealth, which is often located in multiple countries. For more information about The Cross-Border Family Wealth Guide or to purchase a copy, visit http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-1119234271.html. For more information about Worldview Wealth Advisors, visit http://worldviewwealth.com/. To arrange an interview with Andrew Fisher to discuss The Cross-Border Family Wealth Guide and key concepts from the book, please e-mail [email protected]. SOURCE Worldview Wealth Advisors Related Links http://worldviewwealth.com HOUSTON, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Flotek Industries, Inc. (NYSE: FTK) today announced the appointment of Michelle Adams, a recognized and highly-experienced technology executive, to Flotek's board of directors. Ms. Adams' appointment will expand Flotek's board from seven members to eight, and she will join the governance committee. She is the second woman to join the board and represents a strategic move by the company as it continues to evolve its perspective by adding leaders who are pioneers in their industries, with deep technical knowledge and innovative thought leadership. Adams is currently worldwide vice president for IBM Watson Platform. Prior to joining IBM in 2005, she began her career in software sales working with pre-IPO companies. Later at IBM, she managed software teams for more than a decade before assuming the role of leading all go-to-market operations for North and South America. Afterward, Adams became the vice president of customer engagement before taking over her current role. "Michelle is a forward-thinking leader who possesses a unique combination of expertise and passion for innovation, entrepreneurship and sustainability," said John Chisholm, chairman, president and CEO of Flotek. "We're excited to welcome her to the board and look forward to furthering our shared vision to make a difference." "This innovative company is on a mission to upend the traditional model of how chemistry is used in the reservoir and more sustainably develop our energy resources to meet the needs of the growing global population," said Adams. "I'm eager to join this team of visionary and experienced thinkers and look forward to working closely with Flotek as they set a new pace for the energy industry." Adams received her bachelor's degree from Villanova University and resides in Austin with her husband and children. About Flotek Industries, Inc. Flotek is a developer and distributor of prescriptive chemistry-based technology, including specialty chemicals, to clients in the energy, consumer industrials and food & beverage industries. Flotek's inspired chemists draw from the power of solvents and oils of oranges to deliver solutions that enhance energy production, cleaning products, foods & beverages and fragrances. In the oil and gas sector, Flotek serves large and independent energy producers and oilfield service companies, both domestic and international. Flotek Industries, Inc. is a publicly traded company headquartered in Houston, Texas, and its common shares are traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol "FTK." For additional information, please visit Flotek's web site at www.flotekind.com. Forward-Looking Statements Certain statements set forth in this Press Release constitute forward-looking statements (within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934) regarding Flotek Industries, Inc.'s business, financial condition, results of operations and prospects. Words such as expects, anticipates, intends, plans, believes, seeks, estimates and similar expressions or variations of such words are intended to identify forward-looking statements, but are not the exclusive means of identifying forward-looking statements in this Press Release. Although forward-looking statements in this Press Release reflect the good faith judgment of management, such statements can only be based on facts and factors currently known to management. Consequently, forward-looking statements are inherently subject to risks and uncertainties, and actual results and outcomes may differ materially from the results and outcomes discussed in the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences in results and outcomes include, but are not limited to, demand for oil and natural gas drilling services in the areas and markets in which the Company operates, competition, obsolescence of products and services, the Company's ability to obtain financing to support its operations, environmental and other casualty risks, and the impact of government regulation. Further information about the risks and uncertainties that may impact the Company are set forth in the Company's most recent filings on Form 10-K (including without limitation in the "Risk Factors" Section), and in the Company's other SEC filings and publicly available documents. Readers are urged not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this Press Release. The Company undertakes no obligation to revise or update any forward-looking statements in order to reflect any event or circumstance that may arise after the date of this Press Release. SOURCE Flotek Industries, Inc. Related Links http://www.flotekind.com PARIS and HOUSTON, January 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- The Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) is celebrating continuous improvement in food safety systems with a new award launched ahead of the Global Food Safety Conference taking place in Houston next month. (Logo: http://mma.prnewswire.com/media/462538/Consumer_Goods_GFSI_Logo.jpg ) The award comes at a time when food businesses throughout the supply chain are looking to further strengthen their food safety systems, meet new regulatory requirements, expand market access and most importantly, reinforce consumer confidence in the safety of the products they buy. "At GFSI, we want to raise the profile of companies around the world implementing this capability building programme and celebrate the work that's already having an impact," said Veronique Discours-Buhot, GFSI Director at The Consumer Goods Forum. This first ever GFSI award puts the spotlight on companies who have leveraged the GFSI Global Markets Programme, from beginning to end, resulting in full certification to a GFSI-benchmarked food safety management scheme. Winners will be recognised in front of 1,000 industry peers at the Global Food Safety Conference, with travel and attendance to both the conference and the Discovery Tours included. This opportunity is made possible through the generous support of greenfence. "I strongly encourage everyone who wants to make a difference in the supply chain to implement GFSI Global Markets!" urged Peter Begg, Chair of the Conference Committee. "To apply or nominate someone for this award is to help raise awareness around these incredibly important efforts." Applications are open until 7 February 2017. The GFSI Global Markets Programme sets out how companies who lack or have underdeveloped food safety systems can address the challenge of food safety. It provides an unaccredited entry point for these companies with its step-by-step programme designed to build capability within production and manufacturing operations, and implement a course of continuous improvement. Under the theme of "Leadership for Growth," the 16th edition of GFSI's flagship conference will convene delegates from 60 countries and a speaker line-up including eight CEOs of today's industry heavyweights. It will highlight how GFSI serves as a driver to the food safety ecosystem and how companies can leverage GFSI for growth, no matter where in the supply chain they operate. To learn more about what the jury are looking for, visit http://www.tcgffoodsafety.com/the-conference/global-markets-programme-award and apply before 7 February 2017. Programme and Registration: http://www.tcgffoodsafety.com/ Press contact: Lisa Prevert [email protected] SOURCE Global Food Safety Initiative BOSTON, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Haystack Information Discovery ("HAYSTACKID"), an international eDiscovery and litigation support service provider, announced today the opening of a new office in New York City. The launch further expands HAYSTACKID's brick-and-mortar presence on the Eastern Seaboard, joining a full-service facility in Washington, D.C., and its headquarters in Boston, Massachusetts. HAYSTACKID Announces Opening of New York City Office New York has long been a legal activity polestar, with some of the world's most prestigious litigation powerhouses residing in Manhattan. As digital forensics and eDiscovery carry an increasingly heavy weight in legal dispute outcomes, HAYSTACKID will assist local legal professionals optimize their responsiveness to digitally driven litigation proceedings. The office is located at 15 W 39th Street, New York, New York, right in the heart of Midtown Manhattan. It opens on February 1, and will offer eDiscovery and paper services. "I am very excited to watch this new operation launch and begin to grow," said Kevin D. Glass, HAYSTACKID President and Chief Executive Officer. "Every time we launch a new operation we grow stronger, thanks in large part to the valuable lessons new territories and fresh minds tend to yield. I am confident this trend will continue in Manhattan. This Midtown launch kicks off what will be a very exciting year at HAYSTACKID." The office will start with four specialists on hand, but expand quickly alongside the skyrocketing demand for eDiscovery and litigation support in The Big Apple. This fresh eDiscovery and paper services operation complements the sales and forensics office located on 6th Avenue and W 53rd Street. "We have grown rapidly in the past few years, but this operation - being in one of the biggest legal and commercial hubs on the planet - is certainly a milestone for the company," Jefferey T. Stevens, Chief Technology Officer, explained. "As many legal professionals have learned, having an eDiscovery service provider located nearby can make a huge difference, especially when on-site collections are necessary. HAYSTACKID aims to be that valuable partner to attorneys in Manhattan." HAYSTACKID has thrived since its inception, and earned higher rankings from the Inc. 500 Fastest-Growing Companies in America in each of the past two years. With this new location in Manhattan, HAYSTACKID remains poised to experience yet another successful, profitable year of growth and expansion. About HAYSTACKID HAYSTACKID is an international eDiscovery and digital forensics solutions provider, with office locations throughout North America and Europe. HAYSTACKID provides corporate customers and their counsel with cost predictability options that allow accurate budgeting and forecasting of their discovery expenses without the additional cost of software, hardware or implementation fees. HAYSTACKID is headquartered in Boston with offices in New York; Washington, D.C.; Chicago; Dallas; Houston; Los Angeles; San Diego; San Francisco; Beaverton, Oregon; Paris, France; Toronto, Canada; and Frankfurt & Berlin, Germany. Press Contact [email protected] 877.9.HAYSTACK (877.942.9782) This content was issued through the press release distribution service at Newswire.com. For more info visit: http://www.newswire.com SOURCE HAYSTACKID DENVER, CO, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ - Intermap (TSX: IMP), (ITMSF:BB), a leading geospatial intelligence Corporation, today announced that it has entered into an agreement to provide multi-frequency, high resolution radar mapping. Intermap will conduct an airborne survey, assign accurate coordinates (orthorectified data), and produce imagery and elevation products that will support risk management, infrastructure and security applications. In addition, the Company will provide supervisors who will train, assist and monitor local personnel and operations. A milestone payment of $2.67 million is expected during the first quarter of 2017. Intermap has also entered into a contract to upgrade its multi-frequency radar system. "Intermap's new airborne radar technology allows remote sensing of a wide range of geospatial targets, with applications for infrastructure, risk management, security, and damage assessment," commented Patrick Blott, Chairman and CEO of Intermap. "This continuing program, for a sovereign client, demonstrates our unique ability to fill gaps, where the performance of competing optical technology, whether from satellites, vehicles, drones, or ground sensors, is often inadequate." "Our radar upgrade has strengthened Intermap's dominant position in its key niche - cloud covered geographies where optical systems struggle. Our technology removes clouds as an obstacle. It can also see through the tree canopy," added Keith Tennant, SVP of Engineering of Intermap. At the same time, Intermap announced the promotion of Jennifer Bakken to Senior Vice President of Finance and acting CFO. "Jennifer has done tremendous work and demonstrated leadership throughout our transitional period," commented Patrick Blott, Chairman and CEO of Intermap. "There is no better confirmation of Intermap's talent than its ability to promote internally to a senior position. I want to thank Michael Hoehn for helping to transition the finance team during the past three months." About Intermap Headquartered in Denver, Colorado, Intermap (www.intermap.com) is an industry leader in geospatial intelligence solutions. It is the only company capable of fusing volumes of accurate bare earth and other geospatial data into a single source to provide location- based solutions for customers in diverse markets around the world. For more information please visit www.intermap.com. Intermap Reader Advisory Certain information provided in this news release constitutes forward-looking statements, including the intention of the Corporation to complete the Rights Offering. The words "anticipate", "expect", "project", "estimate", "forecast" and similar expressions are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. Although Intermap believes that these statements are based on information and assumptions which are current, reasonable and complete, these statements are necessarily subject to a variety of known and unknown risks and uncertainties. You can find a discussion of such risks and uncertainties in our Annual Information Form and other securities filings. While the Corporation makes these forward-looking statements in good faith, should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should underlying assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may vary significantly from those expected. Accordingly, no assurances can be given that any of the events anticipated by the forward-looking statements will transpire or occur, or if any of them do so, what benefits that the Corporation will derive therefrom. All subsequent forward-looking statements, whether written or oral, attributable to Intermap or persons acting on its behalf are expressly qualified in their entirety by these cautionary statements. The forward-looking statements contained in this news release are made as at the date of this news release and the Corporation does not undertake any obligation to update publicly or to revise any of the forward-looking statements made herein, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as may be required by applicable securities law. SOURCE Intermap Technologies Corporation DENVER, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ - Intermap (TSX: IMP), (ITMSF:BB), a leading geospatial intelligence Corporation, today announced that effective January 27, 2017, Mr. Philippe Frappier has joined the Board of Directors and will serve as Chairman of the Compensation Committee, while Mr. Andrew P. Hines has been appointed Chairman of the Audit Committee. "As we further Intermap's transition towards profitable growth, we are taking another big step forward with the addition of Mr. Philippe Frappier to our board," commented Patrick Blott, Chairman and CEO of Intermap. "An experienced human capital manager, Philippe believes strongly that the best measure of Intermap's potential comes from its capacity to develop its talent and promote internally. He has been an integral architect of our corporate restructuring since October, including our executive team selection, incentive benchmarking, and human capital development. We acknowledge and appreciate all the efforts of our associates during this transition period and know they see the progress the Company is making." The Company also reported that Mr. Michael Hoehn has resigned from both his Director and operating roles. "I want to thank Mike for his service to Intermap since 2015. We wish him well in his future endeavors," commented Patrick Blott, Chairman and CEO of Intermap. Intermap also announced a Director Retention Program designed to incentivize active engagement by our experienced Directors to help the Company re-build. During this period, while we restructure the business and financial affairs of the Company, Intermap has been challenged to develop a compensation program for its executive officers and directors that recognizes the significant engagement required of its management and Board. Since the restructuring commenced on July 27, 2016, with the election of Mr. Blott as Executive Chairman, the Company has made retention cash payments of $510,000 ($250,000 to the Executive Chairman and CEO, $80,000 to the Chief Financial Officer and $180,000 to the remaining Directors), and granted options to purchase 4,125,320 common shares at C$0.08 per share. The Company committed to issue an additional 2,704,680 options to purchase shares, following the annual shareholders meeting. The cash payments were advanced based on the achievement of certain strategic goals, including the two financings completed with the Company's largest shareholder and lender. Three of the current Directors of Intermap, including the Executive Chairman and CEO, also acquired from the Company's largest shareholder and lender, warrants to purchase an aggregate of 4,589,080 common shares of the Company at an exercise price of C$0.09 per share. Each Board members' agreement to acquire warrants from a third party provides a signal of the Board's strong commitment to the future of the Company. About Intermap Technologies Headquartered in Denver, Colorado, Intermap (www.intermap.com) is an industry leader in geospatial intelligence solutions. It is the only company capable of fusing volumes of accurate bare earth and other geospatial data into a single source to provide location-based solutions for customers in diverse markets around the world. For more information please visit www.intermap.com. SOURCE Intermap Technologies Corporation INDIANAPOLIS, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Eli Lilly and Company (NYSE: LLY) will host a call for investors, media and the general public at 11:30 a.m. Eastern Time on January 31, 2017 to discuss the company's fourth-quarter and full-year 2016 financial results. Originally, the call had been scheduled to begin at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time. A live webcast of the conference call will be available through a link that will be posted on Lilly's website at https://investor.lilly.com/events.cfm. A replay will also be available on the website following the conference call. This change is being made due to a scheduling conflict. The company's press release announcing its fourth-quarter and full-year 2016 financial results will be issued as originally planned at approximately 6:30 a.m. Eastern Time. About Eli Lilly and Company Lilly is a global healthcare leader that unites caring with discovery to make life better for people around the world. We were founded more than a century ago by a man committed to creating high-quality medicines that meet real needs, and today we remain true to that mission in all our work. Across the globe, Lilly employees work to discover and bring life-changing medicines to those who need them, improve the understanding and management of disease, and give back to communities through philanthropy and volunteerism. To learn more about Lilly, please visit us at www.lilly.com and www.lilly.com/newsroom/social-channels. F-LLY SOURCE Eli Lilly and Company Related Links http://www.lilly.com STAINES-UPON-THAMES, United Kingdom, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Mallinckrodt plc (NYSE: MNK), a leading specialty pharmaceutical company, announced today it has entered into an agreement under which it will sell its Intrathecal Therapy business to Piramal Enterprises Limited's subsidiary in the U.K., Piramal Critical Care, for approximately $203 million, including fixed and contingent consideration. Piramal Critical Care is an integral business unit of Piramal Enterprises Limited and a global leader in the field of anesthesia. Mallinckrodt's Intrathecal Therapy business markets products for the treatment of spasticity via intrathecal (spinal column) drug delivery. The key asset is Gablofen (baclofen injection), a product approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for use in management of severe spasticity of cerebral or spinal origin in adult and pediatric patients age 4 years and above. Gablofen is the only FDA-approved baclofen in prefilled syringes and factory-sealed vials. Mallinckrodt also has a higher Gablofen concentration in late-stage development which, if approved, would help address physicians' demand for more refill options. Both currently marketed intrathecal products and those in development are included in the transaction. "Mallinckrodt is transforming its portfolio to become a top-performing specialty pharmaceutical company, systematically divesting non-core businesses to build upon our growth platforms in autoimmune and rare diseases and hospital therapies," said Mark Trudeau, President and Chief Executive Officer of Mallinckrodt. "While net sales for our Intrathecal Therapy business have increased approximately 50% since 2012 and it has become significantly more profitable, the products have limited commercial synergy with other parts of our growing Specialty Brands segment. The sale of this business to Piramal is the best solution to meet patient needs and will free resources for us to invest in additional growth." Fiscal 2016 net sales of Intrathecal Therapy products were $44.6 million and reported as part of Mallinckrodt's Specialty Brands segment within the "Other" line. The sale of the business does not qualify for GAAP1 treatment as a discontinued operation, and therefore historical sales and earnings results will not be recast to reflect the divestiture. Assuming the transaction closes in the first quarter of 2017, the sale is expected to dilute 2017 earnings per share from continuing operations by between $0.20 and $0.25, with anticipated dilution declining in 2018 and beyond. Mallinckrodt believes the majority of the negative earnings impact will be offset by expense management, strength of the continuing businesses and further reduction in share count through ongoing share repurchases. "This divesture is in line with our ongoing focus on driving return on invested capital decisions we make on behalf of shareholders," said Matt Harbaugh, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Mallinckrodt. "The transaction is a perfect example of how we pursue activities that have positive economic outcomes." The approximately $203 million transaction will consist of $171 million of fixed consideration of which 10%, or $17 million, will be paid at closing, and an additional $154 million will be paid on the first anniversary of the close date. The remaining total consideration of up to $32 million is contingent, based on the gross profit of the Gablofen products in 2018 and 2019. The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions, and Mallinckrodt expects to complete the transaction in the first quarter of 2017. About Gablofen Gablofen is indicated for use in the management of severe spasticity of cerebral or spinal origin. Approved by the FDA in late 2010, Gablofen is a branded, AP-rated alternative for Lioresal Intrathecal (baclofen injection) and is listed in the FDA Orange Book: Approved Drug Products with Therapeutic Equivalence Evaluations. PLEASE SEE IMPORTANT RISK INFORMATION, INCLUDING BOXED WARNING BELOW. INDICATIONS AND USAGE Gablofen (baclofen injection) is a gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) ergic agonist indicated for use in the management of severe spasticity of cerebral or spinal origin in adult and pediatric patients age 4 years and above. Gablofen should be reserved for patients unresponsive to oral baclofen therapy, or those who experience intolerable central nervous system side effects at effective doses. Patients should first respond to a screening dose of intrathecal baclofen prior to consideration for long term infusion via an implantable pump. Spasticity due to traumatic brain injury: wait at least one year after injury before considering Gablofen therapy. IMPORTANT RISK INFORMATION WARNING: DO NOT DISCONTINUE ABRUPTLY Abrupt discontinuation of intrathecal baclofen, regardless of the cause, has resulted in sequelae that include high fever, altered mental status, exaggerated rebound spasticity, and muscle rigidity, that in rare cases has advanced to rhabdomyolysis, multiple organ-system failure and death. Prevention of abrupt discontinuation of intrathecal baclofen requires careful attention to programming and monitoring of the infusion system, refill scheduling and procedures, and pump alarms. Patients and caregivers should be advised of the importance of keeping scheduled refill visits and should be educated on the early symptoms of baclofen withdrawal. Special attention should be given to patients at apparent risk (e.g., spinal cord injuries at T-6 or above communication difficulties, history of withdrawal symptoms from oral or intrathecal baclofen). Consult the technical manual of the implantable infusion system for additional post-implant clinician and patient information. CONTRAINDICATIONS: Hypersensitivity to baclofen. Do not use Gablofen for intravenous, intramuscular, subcutaneous or epidural administration. WARNINGS AND PRECAUTIONS Risk of life-threatening overdose during pump refills. Use extreme caution when filling the Medtronic SynchroMed II Programmable Pump which is equipped with an injection port that allows direct access to the intrathecal catheter. Direct injection into the catheter through the catheter access port may cause a life-threatening overdose. Use only with Medtronic SynchroMed II Programmable Pump (or other pumps labeled for intrathecal administration of Gablofen (baclofen injection)). Potential for contamination due to non-sterile external surface of prefilled syringe. Although the drug solution and pathway in the Gablofen prefilled syringes are sterile, the external surface of the prefilled syringes (all strengths, including the 50 mcg/mL strength) are non-sterile and have the potential to lead to contamination and consequent adverse reactions. The use of Gablofen prefilled syringe in an aseptic setting (e.g., operating room) to fill sterile intrathecal pumps prior to implantation in patients is not recommended, unless the external surface of the prefilled syringe is treated to ensure sterility. Gablofen supplied in vials may be used with conventional aseptic technique to fill intrathecal pumps prior to implantation. Resuscitative equipment and trained staff must be available during screening dose, dose titration, and refills due to the potential life-threatening CNS depression, cardiovascular collapse, and/or respiratory failure. Overdose may cause drowsiness, lightheadedness, dizziness, somnolence, respiratory depression, seizures, rostral progression of hypotonia and loss of consciousness progressing to coma. Use with caution in patients with psychotic disorders, schizophrenia or confusional states as it may exacerbate condition(s). Fatalities have been reported with intrathecal baclofen use. Caution should be used in patients with a history of autonomic dysreflexia. Presence of infection may increase the risk of surgical complication and complicate dosing of Gablofen. May cause drowsiness: use caution in operation of automobiles, dangerous machinery and activity made hazardous by decreased alertness. Other CNS depressants and alcohol may add to this effect. Potential development of intrathecal mass formation. Clinicians should monitor for signs and symptoms of new neurologic symptoms including the use of imaging diagnostic modalities. Oral baclofen use has been associated with a dose-related increase in incidence of ovarian cysts. SERIOUS ADVERSE EVENTS: Sudden withdrawal of Gablofen can result in serious complications that include high fever, confusion, muscle stiffness, multiple organ-system failure, and death. Inform patients that early symptoms of Gablofen withdrawal may include increased spasticity, itching, and tingling of extremities. If Gablofen withdrawal or a pump malfunction is suspected, patients should be brought immediately to a hospital for assessment and treatment. Gablofen overdose may occur suddenly or insidiously, and that symptoms may include confusion, drowsiness, lightheadedness, dizziness, slow or shallow breathing, seizures, loss of muscle tone, loss of consciousness, and coma. Other serious adverse events may include: potential development of intrathecal mass formation, drainage, infection, meningitis, unmanageable trunk control, CSF leakage, coma and death. COMMON ADVERSE EVENTS: The most common adverse reactions in patients with spasticity of spinal origin were hypotonia (25.3%) somnolence (20.9%), dizziness, nausea/vomiting, hypotension, headache, and convulsions. The most common adverse reactions in patients with spasticity of cerebral origin were hypotonia (34.7%), somnolence (18.7%), headache (10.7%) agitation, constipation, leukocytosis, chills, and urinary retention. Other common adverse events may include hypoventilation, hypertonia, paresthesia, increased salivation, back pain, pruritus, diarrhea, peripheral edema, asthenia, pain, confusion, speech disorder, amblyopia, accidental injury and dry mouth. For Full Prescribing Information about Gablofen, click here. About Mallinckrodt Mallinckrodt is a global business that develops, manufactures, markets and distributes specialty pharmaceutical products and therapies. Areas of focus include autoimmune and rare diseases in specialty areas like neurology, rheumatology, nephrology, pulmonology and ophthalmology; immunotherapy and neonatal respiratory critical care therapies; and analgesics and hemostasis products. The company's core strengths include the acquisition and management of highly regulated raw materials and specialized chemistry, formulation and manufacturing capabilities. The company's Specialty Brands segment includes branded medicines and its Specialty Generics segment includes specialty generic drugs, active pharmaceutical ingredients and external manufacturing. To learn more about Mallinckrodt, visit www.mallinckrodt.com. Mallinckrodt uses its website as a channel of distribution of important company information, such as press releases, investor presentations and other financial information. It also uses its website to expedite public access to time-critical information regarding the company in advance of or in lieu of distributing a press release or a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission disclosing the same information. Therefore, investors should look to the Investor Relations page of the website for important and time-critical information. Visitors to the website can also register to receive automatic e-mail and other notifications alerting them when new information is made available on the Investor Relations page of the website. Cautionary Statements Related to Forward-Looking Statements Statements in this document that are not strictly historical, including statements regarding future financial condition and operating results, economic, business, competitive and/or regulatory factors affecting Mallinckrodt's businesses and any other statements regarding events or developments that we believe or anticipate will or may occur in the future, may be "forward-looking" statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, and involve a number of risks and uncertainties. There are a number of important factors that could cause actual events to differ materially from those suggested or indicated by such forward-looking statements and you should not place undue reliance on any such forward-looking statements. These factors include risks and uncertainties related to, among other things: the parties' ability to satisfy the conditions to the divestiture of the Intrathecal Therapy business and complete the divestiture on the anticipated timeline or at all; general economic conditions and conditions affecting the industries in which Mallinckrodt operates; the commercial success of Mallinckrodt's products; Mallinckrodt's ability to realize anticipated growth, synergies and cost savings from acquisitions; conditions that could necessitate an evaluation of Mallinckrodt's goodwill and/or intangible assets for possible impairment; changes in laws and regulations; Mallinckrodt's ability to successfully integrate acquisitions of operations, technology, products and businesses generally and to realize anticipated growth, synergies and cost savings; Mallinckrodt's ability to successfully develop or commercialize new products; Mallinckrodt's ability to protect intellectual property rights; Mallinckrodt's ability to receive procurement and production quotas granted by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration; customer concentration; Mallinckrodt's reliance on certain individual products that are material to its financial performance; cost containment efforts of customers, purchasing groups, third-party payers and governmental organizations; the reimbursement practices of a small number of public or private insurers; pricing pressure on certain of Mallinckrodt's products due to legal changes or changes in insurers' reimbursement practices resulting from recent increased public scrutiny of healthcare and pharmaceutical costs; limited clinical trial data for H.P. Acthar Gel; complex reporting and payment obligations under healthcare rebate programs; Mallinckrodt's ability to navigate price fluctuations; future changes to U.S. and foreign tax laws; Mallinckrodt's ability to achieve expected benefits from restructuring activities; complex manufacturing processes; competition; product liability losses and other litigation liability; ongoing governmental investigations; material health, safety and environmental liabilities; retention of key personnel; conducting business internationally; the effectiveness of information technology infrastructure; and cybersecurity and data leakage risks. These and other factors are identified and described in more detail in the "Risk Factors" section of Mallinckrodt's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2016. The forward-looking statements made herein speak only as of the date hereof and Mallinckrodt does not assume any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events and developments or otherwise, except as required by law. CONTACTS Investor Relations Coleman N. Lannum, CFA Senior Vice President, Investor Strategy and IRO 314-654-6649 [email protected] Daniel J. Speciale, CPA Director, Investor Relations 314-654-3638 [email protected] Media Rhonda Sciarra Senior Communications Manager 314-654-8618 [email protected] Meredith Fischer Chief Public Affairs Officer 314-654-3318 [email protected] 1 Generally accepted accounting principles in the U.S. SOURCE Mallinckrodt plc Related Links http://www.mallinckrodt.com DALLAS, Jan. 29, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Expert developer and investor, Marcus Hiles, has been offering luxury homes to working class Texans for nearly three decades and has since revolutionized the Dallas real estate landscape. Now, Hiles is taking his property expertise and focusing on the areas poised for exponential growth - Woodlands and coastal regions of Houston. As President Donald Trump assumed office in January, many investors are looking forward to having a businessman in the role of President of the United States. According to a recent Forbes article written by Lawrence Yun, the Chief Economist of National Association of REALTORS, one of Trump's biggest influences on the property industry could be changes in some form to the Dodd-Frank financial regulation. "A clear positive would be the lifting of compliance costs imposed on small-sized banks. Around 10,000 local and community banks have traditionally been the source of funding for construction and land development loans. With less regulatory burden, these small banks can make more loans and will boost home building activity." The growing municipality of Houston ranks as the fourth largest metro area in the United States, coming in just behind New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago. Nearly half of all Fortune 500 energy companies are headquartered here, giving the city unparalleled influence in the global energy industry. The expansion of the Panama Canal also offers big benefits to the city, where industrial giants strive to beat West Coast competitors in attaining foreign goods. The Port of Houston is the second busiest port in the United States, quickly becoming competitive with the Port of Los Angeles for trade and jobs. Marcus Hiles is a graduate of Pepperdine University and Rice University with a deep commitment to education. His philanthropic contributions include over $2.5 million donated to various K-12 initiatives, after school programs, and job placement programs. Hiles funded three large Churches in Texas as well as his home state of Massachusetts. Marcus Hiles is driven by his unwavering commitment to create communities and improve the lives of others. Marcus Hiles - Chairman & CEO of Western Rim Property Services: http://www.MarcusHiles-News.com MarcusHilestx (Marcus Hiles) - DeviantArt: http://marcushilestx.deviantart.com Marcus Hiles (@marcus_hiles) - Twitter: https://twitter.com/marcus_hiles Marcus Hiles - New Luxury Apartments in Frisco, TX - YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmsJNbfOh-g SOURCE Marcus Hiles SOUTHFIELD, Mich., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Multi-Bank Securities, Inc. (MBS), a Veteran-Owned Business Enterprise (VBE) and fixed-income securities broker-dealer, is pleased to announce it was recently invited to participate as a co-manager in IBM Corp.'s $2.75 billion four-part global offering of senior unsecured fixed and floating rate notes. The tranches comprised offerings with three-, five- and 10-year maturities. A three-year floating rate note in the amount of $500 million was issued at a rate per annum of three-month U.S. dollar LIBOR plus 23%, and a fixed three-year note in the amount of $750 million with a coupon of 1.90% was priced at a spread of 45 basis points over the three-year Treasury. A five-year note with a coupon of 2.50% at a spread of 60 basis points over the five-year Treasury was also issued, along with $500 million in a 10-year note with a coupon of 3.30% at a spread of 90 basis points over the 10-year Treasury. Due to strong investor demand, this transaction was oversubscribed and had tightened from its launch through final pricing. "The deal was well-received by investors, especially with IBM's strong credit rating," said Jim S. Powell, senior vice president of capital markets. "We applaud IBM's commitment to working with diverse firms by including Multi-Bank Securities, Inc. as a co-manager; it helps differentiate our Firm with institutional customers who seek new-issue fixed-income products to meet their investing needs." Since inception of the Firm's Corporate VBE Initiative in April 2014, MBS has acted in a variety of roles as an underwriter of corporate securities representing $82.4 billion in principal amount. About Multi-Bank Securities, Inc. Multi-Bank Securities, Inc. (MBS) is an independent, fixed-income securities broker-dealer that has been serving institutional investors across the U.S. for more than 29 years and is a veteran-owned business. Headquartered in Southfield, Mich., MBS has 14 additional offices across the U.S. and serves institutional investors in all 50 states. MBS is registered with the SEC and MSRB and Member of FINRA and SIPC. Visit finra.org to review our FINRA broker-dealer status CRD number 22098. For more information, visit www.mbssecurities.com . SOURCE Multi-Bank Securities, Inc. Related Links http://www.mbssecurities.com MILWAUKEE, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Multi-Pack Solutions has promoted David Sanchez-Turner to Operations Manager for their Milwaukee, Wisconsin-based wet wipes manufacturing business, where he will lead the company's Production, Procurement, and Logistics teams. David will be responsible for leading lean and quality-based production initiatives in support of the company's core commitments to delivering innovation and speed-to-market, with an initial emphasis on improving key metrics such as on-time delivery and quality. David joins Multi-Pack Solutions' Milwaukee location from their Mt. Prospect, Illinois facility, where for four years he was Operations Manager, responsible for one of the world's leading water-soluble pouches manufacturing sites. David's operations and leadership depth, along with a commitment to continuous quality improvement, make him an asset to the Milwaukee plant. "My vision is to follow proven Lean principles to become a world-class wet wipes manufacturing operation, meeting our customers' delivery dates and exceeding their expectations, while delivering the highest levels of quality," said Sanchez-Turner. David will report to Multi-Pack Solutions Milwaukee's Vice President & General Manager, Joe Ervin. "David has demonstrated significant operational leadership and has delivered constant improvements in a very demanding environment and market at our Mt. Prospect location. He'll be a tremendous leader and resource for us in Milwaukee," said Ervin. Prior to Operations Manager, David held numerous production supervisory and process engineering roles at Multi-Pack Solutions and elsewhere. David holds a bachelor's of science in Industrial Engineering and a bachelor's of engineering in Engineering/Industrial Management from Missouri University of Science and Technology. About Multi-Pack Solutions Multi-Pack Solutions (www.multipacksolutions.com) is a proven, quality-driven contract manufacturing and packaging partner to the most recognizable brands in the world in the consumer, personal care, OTC drug, medical, and industrial markets. With over 500 employees, the company has three manufacturing facilities totaling more than 300,000 square feet in Mt. Prospect, Illinois; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; and Greenville, South Carolina. Photo(s): https://www.prlog.org/12616585 Press release distributed by PRLog SOURCE Multi-Pack Solutions Related Links http://www.multipacksolutions.com HOUSTON, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Parker Drilling Company (NYSE: PKD) announced today that its 2017 Annual Stockholders' Meeting will be held at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel located at 6 East Greenway Plaza, Houston, Texas 77046 on Tuesday, May 9, 2017 at 9:00 a.m. Central Time (10:00 a.m. Eastern Time). Company Description Parker Drilling provides drilling services and rental tools to the energy industry. The Company's Drilling Services business serves operators in the inland waters of the U.S. Gulf of Mexico utilizing Parker Drilling's barge rig fleet and in select international markets and harsh-environment regions utilizing Parker-owned and customer-owned equipment. The Company's Rental Tools Services business supplies premium equipment and well services to operators on land and offshore in the U.S. and international markets. More information about Parker Drilling can be found on the Company's website at www.parkerdrilling.com. Contact: Jason Geach, Vice President, Investor Relations & Corporate Development, (+1) (281) 406-2310, [email protected]. SOURCE Parker Drilling Company Related Links http://www.parkerdrilling.com BELLEVUE, Wash., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Paul Gauguin Cruises (www.pgcruises.com), operator of the highest-rated and longest continually sailing luxury cruise ship in the South Pacific, the m/s Paul Gauguin, is celebrating Valentine's Day by offering an exclusive gift package to guests on select 2017 and 2018 sailings aboard The Gauguin who book between January 30 and February 18, 2017. The Valentine's gift package includes a $200 per-stateroom credit at the ship's Deep Nature Spa by Algotherm, a box of chocolates, and a bottle of sparkling wine (total package valued at $250). The package is available on voyages departing August 26, 2017, through December 29, 2018, excluding the October 7, 2017, sailing. As with all 2017 and 2018 sailings aboard The Gauguin, guests also receive 50% off standard all-inclusive cruise fares and included roundtrip airfare from Los Angeles. At the Deep Nature Spa by Algotherm, expert therapists and aestheticians offer an extensive menu of massages, skin care, facials, and authentic Polynesian treatments including Bora Bora Deep Blue Massages, Black Sand Body Scrubs, and Monoi Tradition Massages by Hei Poa, among a variety of other signature therapies and tropical treats. Designed to sail the seas of the South Pacific, The Gauguin offers the perfect setting to celebrate a wedding, renewal of vows, anniversaryor simply each other. Couples can take in the beauty of the islands of French Polynesia from the privacy of their suite or stateroom, sway to the sounds of a chanteuse at La Palette Lounge, explore paradise on land excursions, dine al fresco under a starry sky, and enjoy a Polynesian blessing ceremony performed by members of Les Gauguines and Les Gauguinsthe ship's own troupe of Polynesian entertainers. With one of the highest crew-to-guest ratios at sea, The Gauguin is renowned for the extra touches and attention to detail that make every occasion special. In addition, Paul Gauguin Cruises now offers wedding ceremony and renewal of vows packages that allow couples sailing on The Gauguin to celebrate their love in a romantic setting amid the turquoise lagoons and exotic islands of French Polynesia. Choices include Motu Mahana, the cruise line's private islet off the coast of Taha'a, and the luxurious InterContinental Bora Bora Resort & Thalasso Spa. Paul Gauguin Cruises also has a Gift Registry, where guests celebrating their honeymoon, anniversary, or other milestone event can choose a "wish list" of gifts, ranging from shore excursions to spa options. Friends and family can visit the gift registry quickly and conveniently to select the gift (or gifts) they would like to give, and Paul Gauguin Cruises takes care of the rest. For rates or more information on Paul Gauguin Cruises, please contact a Travel Professional, call 800-848-6172, or visit www.pgcruises.com. *One Valentine's Day gift package per booking. New bookings only. Please refer to promotion code: VALENTINES2017. Valid on sailing dates August 26, 2017, through December 29, 2018, excluding the October 7, 2017, sailing. Not combinable with Groups, Two-Week Sales, and other select reduced-rate offers. May or may not be combined with other Shipboard Credit offers. Complimentary sparkling wine upon embarkation only. Offer expires February 18, 2017. Call for details. Wedding ceremony is not legally binding. About Paul Gauguin Cruises Owned by Pacific Beachcomber S.C., French Polynesia's leading luxury hotel and cruise operator, Paul Gauguin Cruises operates the 5+-star cruise ship, the 332-guest m/s Paul Gauguin, providing a deluxe cruise experience tailored to the unparalleled wonders of Tahiti, French Polynesia, Fiji, and the South Pacific. Paul Gauguin Cruises accolades include being voted #2 in the category of "Top Small Cruise Lines" in the Conde Nast Traveler 2016 Readers' Choice Awards and recognition on the publication's 2016 "Gold List." Recently, readers voted Paul Gauguin Cruises "#1 Midsize-Ship Ocean Cruise Line" in the Travel + Leisure World's Best Awards 2016. Media Contact: Paul Gauguin Cruises Vanessa Bloy, Director of Public Relations (425) 440-6255 [email protected] From Travel + Leisure, August 2016 2016 Time Inc. Affluent Media Group. Used under license. Travel + Leisure and Time Inc. Affluent Media Group are not affiliated with, and do not endorse products or services of Paul Gauguin Cruises. SOURCE Paul Gauguin Cruises Related Links http://www.pgcruises.com FT. WASHINGTON, Pa., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- PetroChoice is pleased to announce the acquisition of Miller Industrial Fluids, LLC ("Miller"), an Indianapolis-based distributor and blender of metalworking products, specialty lubricants, and rust preventatives. Through this acquisition, PetroChoice will gain immediate presence in the Indianapolis market, providing a critical bridge between its current Ohio and Illinois locations. With the acquisition of Miller, PetroChoice now has 51 locations servicing 32 states. Founded in 2004, Miller serves a broad customer base primarily across the aerospace and automotive manufacturing segments and has earned a reputation for delivering high quality products and exceptional service. Ross Smith, President and CEO of Miller, will serve as PetroChoice's General Manager for the Indianapolis market. "The addition of Miller enhances our ability to service the metalworking market in the Indianapolis area and strengthens our geographic footprint in the Midwest. We are excited to welcome Ross Smith and Miller's outstanding employees to the PetroChoice team," said Shane O'Kelly, CEO of PetroChoice. "This transaction marks PetroChoice's fourth acquisition over the last twelve months and we will continue to evaluate ways in which we can expand our network through organic and inorganic growth opportunities, including strategic acquisitions." Ross Smith, President and CEO of Miller, said, "We are pleased to join forces with PetroChoice, the premier U.S. distributor of lubricants and services. We are a natural fit, with similar customer-centric cultures and values, rooted in a shared focus on delivering the highest-quality products and solutions to our customers." Kevin Lowe, CFO of Miller stated, "The team at Fifth Third Securities did an excellent job of bringing structure to the process. We are very excited that this led us to an agreement with PetroChoice." Fifth Third Securities, Inc. acted as exclusive financial advisor to Miller Industrial Fluids, LLC on its sale to PetroChoice. Nob Hill Law Group, P.C. provided legal advice to PetroChoice. About PetroChoice: PetroChoice is a leading value-added provider of petroleum based lubrication products and services, providing its customers with complete Lubrication Solutions to meet their Safety, Savings, and Sustainability goals. PetroChoice distributes an extensive product offering of lubricants, coolants, metalworking fluids, equipment, auto-lube and filtration systems, and contamination control devices backed by unmatched technical expertise and services. This is the 17th acquisition that PetroChoice has made since 2008. PetroChoice is a portfolio company of Golden Gate Capital. For more information about PetroChoice, visit www.petrochoice.com. About Miller Industrial Fluids, LLC: Miller Industrial Fluids, LLC is a custom blender and distributor of high quality lubricants, cutting fluids, rust preventatives, cleaners, coolants and drawing compounds. Miller provides reclamation and disposal services to provide a full product life cycle service. Miller is committed to the continued growth and improvement of their manufacturing and service capabilities and dedicated to long-term success of their customers. For more information about Miller Industrial Fluids, visit www.millerif.com. About Fifth Third Bancorp Fifth Third Bancorp is a diversified financial services company headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio. As of September 30, 2016, the Company had $143 billion in assets and operates 1,191 full-service Banking Centers, including 94 Bank Mart locations, most open seven days a week, inside select grocery stores and 2,497 ATMs in Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, Florida, Tennessee, West Virginia, Georgia and North Carolina. Fifth Third operates four main businesses: Commercial Banking, Branch Banking, Consumer Lending, and Wealth & Asset Management. SOURCE PetroChoice Related Links http://petrochoice.com "We're excited that Jonathan has elected to join AnyClip and we consider his decision to bring a wealth of experience and boundless creativity to our advisory board to be a testament to the value we're offering," added Gil Becker, AnyClip President and CEO. Adam Hopkinson, Managing Director of AnyClip, working locally with Jonathan, commented, "PHD is credited with inventing creative media in the 90s, and I believe together we have the opportunity to reinvent it today as we introduce content-driven, personalized video advertising to the market." AnyClip's video ads currently reach more than 100 million unique monthly visitors worldwide. The company was recently recognized by Deloitte as the second fastest-growing company on the 2016 Israel Technology Fast 50 and 14th on the Technology Fast 500 EMEA list. Durden co-founded Pattison-Horswell-Durden, later named PHD, in London in 1990. Built on principles of thought leadership, creativity and innovation, the company was acquired by the Omnicom in 2003 and has grown to 4,000 employees in more than 80 offices worldwide. About AnyClip AnyClip is leading provider of video personalization and monetization solutions. By providing a million clips of premium video content enriched with an Artificial Intelligence-driven metadata layer of insights, AnyClip enables better results for advertisers, unprecedented monetization for content owners and publishers, and a new level of video personalization for consumers. AnyClip has developed proprietary technologies and solutions that automatically analyze and tag video content, match and seamlessly blend content with relevant ads, and serve personalized ads to consumers by predicting the content they are most likely to find compelling. Based in Tel Aviv, with offices in New York and London, AnyClip is backed by Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP), Roman Abramovich's Millhouse Capital, former Sony America President & CEO Michael Schulhof, and Limelight Networks. In 2016 the company was named the second-fastest-growing technology company in Israel and 14th fastest in EMEA by Deloitte. For more information, visit www.anyclip.com |@anyclip Contact: Ari Applbaum [email protected] +1-347-809-3314 SOURCE AnyClip Related Links http://www.anyclip.com Duke University Chapel Restoration, Durham, NC General Contractor: Romeo Guest Associates, Durham, NC The Chapel at Duke University is a unique sight standing tall among Durham, North Carolina's skyline. The successfully-met goal of this intricate restoration included retaining the overall appearance, elegance and majestic nature of the building while enhancing and updating the building's structure, materials, systems and technology. The scaffolding alone was a maze of metal and walk-boards which provided exceptional levels of safe travel and work areas. It included a work platform known as the "dance floor" which provided a stable platform for ceiling work and a barrier of protection for those below. To retain the roof's historic appearance, the same lead-coated copper roofing was used, and each panel had to be customized. Inside, falling mortar meant that each of the 2000 joints had to be removed to full depth of the limestone, and then replaced with an advanced, more flexible mortar material. All the wood componentsevery nook and crannyhad to be hand-cleaned and then hand-rubbed to ensure consistency in color, protection and finish. This work (in addition to much more!) all had to be done while protecting the 11,600 pipes and working components of the Chapel's organ to ensure beautiful music would forever resound throughout the Chapel. Best Building Project Under $5 Million: The North Carolina A&T State University Deese Clock Tower, Greensboro, NC General Contractor: W.C. Construction Company, Winston-Salem, NC The Deese Clock Tower, named for benefactors Willie and Carol Deese, blends traditional masonry using concrete, steel and glass with state-of-the art sound and LED lighting. It reflects historical greatness while combining detailed workmanship, a complex design, and state of the art multi-faceted components. Topping the tower is an amplified electronically simulated carillon system which provides rich sound quality that rivals even the best of church bells. The carillon housing also allows for wind to pass through, adding to the stability of the tower. And in true North Carolina A&T spirit, the tower's lighting system illuminates in school colors of blue, gold, and white. Through value engineering, W.C. Construction determined that certain exterior finishes, which would have added cost to the University's bottom line, could be removed from the design without compromising value to the overall project. A big challenge was the 12 foot by 12 foot workspacecrews had to be stationed on equipment lifts and scaffolding on a very small footprint while constructing this 85-foot tower. Work was completed on time, under budget, with no compromise whatsoever to the safety of students and onlookers. Best Highway-Heavy Project $5 Million and Over: The Fayetteville Outer Loop, Cumberland County General Contractor: Barnhill Contracting Company, Rocky Mount, NC Interstate 295, also known as the Fayetteville Outer Loop, is a vital bypass which alleviates traffic congestion once confined to a road that went directly through Fort Bragg military base. More importantly, the Outer Loop provides greater security for the men and women of the United States Airborne and Special Operations who call Fort Bragg their home. The Outer Loop also connects Fort Bragg to Interstate-95, ensuring easier and more effective deployment of troops and military equipment from the base. This project faced many would-be schedule setbacks, including: the discovery of archeological significance, which lead to a full investigative dig; two separate police investigations relating to a dead body and a missing person; and a devastating tornado. Yet, the Fayetteville Outer Loop was still finished with little delay and a clean safety record, thanks to the proactive team of Barnhill Contracting and their partners. Best Highway-Heavy Project Under $5 Million: The FRP Bridge on the Mountains-to-Sea Trail, Blowing Rock, NC General Contractor: NHM Constructors, Asheville, NC The bridge, located on the Mountain-to-Sea trail off the Blue Ridge Parkway in Blowing Rock, NC, was a seemingly small but mighty project which came with some unique aspects and challenges. Previously, hikers wanting to access the Mountains to Sea Trail had to wade through a creekand those who had physical disabilities found it hard, at times impossible, to cross. The installation of this bridge has already added great value to the community by allowing all hikers, no matter their physical limitations, to cross the creek safely. The biggest challenge of this project was the site itself. Materials either had to be flown in via helicopter or hand carried about a mile from the road to the site. Given the landscape and terrane, safety was a vital aspect of this job. Daily safety meetings included all jobsite workers learning CPR (given the time it would take for emergency personnel to reach the sight if there were to be an accident); and briefings such as "what to do if the wind blows objects from the aircraft" and "what to do if tree limbs are knocked down by incoming/outgoing loads." The bridge was completed with no accidentsnot even any 'near misses.' Build With The Best Award: Christy Hall, South Carolina Department of Transportation Secretary, was awarded the Build with the Best Award for her leadership during the 2015 South Carolina flooding. In October 2015, more than a trillion gallons of water dumped on the state within a 48-hour period, washing out roads and bridges throughout the beautiful Palmetto state. Hall and her team quickly engaged numerous contractors to assist in emergency repairs and to help with clean-up and rebuilding efforts. During the peak of the storm, 541 roads and bridges were closed statewide. Just one month later, only 80 were still closedand by the busy Thanksgiving travel week, those 80 remaining road closures had reopened. The pre-planning, coordination and leadership that Hall and her team put in place allowed them to effectively manage this major catastrophe and keep the state moving forward. Congratulations to Christy Hall and her team at the South Carolina Department of Transportation! The CAGC Pinnacle Awards competition is co-sponsored by CPA firm GreerWalker LLP and the law firm of Johnston, Allison & Hord. The Pinnacle presentation was made at CAGC's 96th Annual Convention in St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands. Carolinas AGC is the construction industry association in the Carolinas, bringing value to our thousands of members through networking, government relations, job leads, meetings with owners/designers, education and training involving such issues as safety and open shop, and community development. Visit us at www.cagc.org, connect with us on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and LinkedIn. For more information on Pinnacle Award winners and photos visit the CAGC Pinnacle Awards page or contact Lori McGovern at 704/372-1450 ext. 5227. Contact: Lori McGovern, 704-372-7112, [email protected] SOURCE Carolinas Associated General Contractors Related Links http://www.cagc.org ST. PETERSBURG, Fla., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Poynter Institute, Google News Lab, Drone Journalism Lab, National Press Photographers Association and DJI have unveiled an innovative program to train journalists in using drones, or unmanned aerial systems, for their news coverage. The program, which features hands-on workshops and online teaching, is powered by the Google News Lab. Hands-on workshops, offered from March to August at universities from coast to coast, will offer training on safe drone operations as well as information that drone pilots need to study for the Federal Aviation Administration's new Part 107 Drone Pilot's Certificate. In addition, the three-day workshops will focus on the legal and ethical issues of drone journalism, community best practices and coordinated operations in a breaking news environment, as well as explore ways drone photography can be used in innovative storytelling. "As a certified drone pilot myself, I know how difficult the exam can be for people who have no other pilot training," said Poynter's Al Tompkins, who is organizing the workshops. "Our goal is not to make you 'test-ready' but to show you what will be on the exam and to give you the fundamental knowledge you will need to study for the test." "We're dedicated to supporting journalists' experimentation with new technology," said Erica Anderson of Google News Lab. "Drones present an opportunity for journalists to tell stories in visually rich and immersive ways, but there are still many open questions on how to apply them safely, ethically and creatively for news reporting. We couldn't be more pleased to partner with The Poynter Institute on the drone journalism program to help tackle these challenges." Poynter will be leading these workshops in partnership with the Drone Journalism Lab at the University of Nebraska, the National Press Photographers Association (NPPA), the Google News Lab and DJI. Additional online training will be available later this year via Poynter's e-learning platform, News University. "Drones are purpose-built context machines. They can, in less time and at vastly reduced costs, give a viewer an understanding of the scale and scope of a story unlike anything else journalists have in the toolbox," said the Drone Journalism Lab's Matt Waite, who has become a leading voice for drone journalism through his work at the University of Nebraska. "Just getting a drone straight up 100 feet in the air has the power to change our understanding of how big, how far, how wide, how massive something is. And it can be done safely and for very little cost." The workshops also will include NPPA's legal counsel Mickey H. Osterreicher, who has worked for years speaking on behalf of journalists as the federal government drafted regulations for where and when drone journalists could fly. "NPPA has been at the forefront in advocating for the use of drones for newsgathering. With that opportunity comes an inherent role of operating them in a legal, safe and responsible manner," Osterreicher said. "The legal landscape is especially complex because state and local governments increasingly are imposing their own restrictions on drone flights." The program also will feature hands-on introductory flight training sponsored by DJI, the global leader in drone technology and 2016 winner of NPPA's Lemen award for technology innovation in photojournalism. "We are thrilled to join with Poynter to empower journalists with state-of-the-art technology that inspires innovative storytelling," said DJI policy lead Jon Resnick. Four universities are serving as hosts and partners for these workshops: the University of Georgia Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication, March 17-19; Syracuse University Newhouse School of Public Communications, April 21-23; University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Journalism and Mass Communication, June 16-18; and the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication in Portland, Aug. 18-20. In addition, the Google News Lab will support a limited number of travel scholarships for members of the National Association of Black Journalists, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, the Asian American Journalists Association, Native American Journalists Association and NLGJA, the Association of LGBTQ journalists. Participation at each hands-on workshop will be limited to the first 60 people to register. Workshop details are available at http://about.poynter.org/training/in-person/drones-17. About Google News Lab Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. Google created the News Lab to support the creation and distribution of the information that keeps people informed about what's happening in the world todayquality journalism. Today's news organizations and media entrepreneurs are inventing new ways to discover, create and distribute news contentand Google News Lab is here to provide tools, data and programs designed to help. About the Drone Journalism Lab at the University of Nebraska The College of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln established the Drone Journalism Lab in November 2011 as part of a broad digital journalism and innovation strategy. Journalism is evolving rapidly, and journalism education must evolve with it, teaching new tools and storytelling strategies while remaining true to the core principles and ethics of journalism. The lab was started by Professor Matt Waite as a way to explore how drones could be used for reporting. About the National Press Photographers Association The National Press Photographers Association (NPPA) is the leading voice advocating for the rights of visual journalists today. As the voice of visual journalists since 1946, NPPA has led the fight to promote and protect integrity and excellence in visual journalism. Its code of ethics stands for the highest integrity in visual storytelling. Its advocacy efforts put NPPA in the center of today's thorniest issues in support of journalists throughout the country, while its educational initiatives seek to prepare visual journalists to meet the challenges of the profession. In light of these challenges, the work of NPPA has never been more vital than it is today. About DJI Founded in 2006, DJI is a global industry leader in high performance and easy-to-use aerial camera systems for recreational and commercial use. DJI products empower people of all skill levels to take to the skies and capture images that were once out of their reach. The company places heavy emphasis on R&D and innovation, and is committed to bringing aerial photography and videography to all. DJI currently has business operations in the United States, Europe, Japan, Hong Kong and mainland China. About The Poynter Institute The Poynter Institute for Media Studies is a global leader in journalism education and a strategy center that stands for uncompromising excellence in journalism, media and 21st century public discourse. Poynter faculty teach seminars and workshops at the Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla., and at conferences and organizational sites around the world. Its e-learning division, News University, www.newsu.org, offers the world's largest online journalism curriculum in 7 languages, with more than 400 interactive courses and 330,000 registered users in more than 200 countries. The Institute's website, www.poynter.org, produces 24-hour coverage of news about media, ethics, technology, the business of news and the trends that currently define and redefine journalism news reporting. The world's top journalists and media innovators come to Poynter to learn and teach new generations of reporters, storytellers, media inventors, designers, visual journalists, documentarians and broadcast producers, and to build public awareness about journalism, media, the First Amendment and protected discourse that serves democracy and the public good. Contact: Tina Dyakon Director of Advertising and Marketing The Poynter Institute [email protected] 727-553-4343 SOURCE The Poynter Institute Related Links http://www.poynter.org CHICAGO, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Taxpayers can stay home to make online payment of property tax bills that show them the debt of each local government that levies taxes on their homes and other real property, Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas said today. Nearly 1.8 million property tax bills for the First Installment of Tax Year 2016 have been mailed to owners of homes, businesses and land, and the due date for on-time payment is March 1, Pappas said. "No need to leave the house when you can pay online," Pappas said. Simply by logging onto cookcountytreasurer.com, online payment can be made from a smart phone, a laptop, or a computer at work or in a library. Anywhere from seven to 20 taxing districts such as local governments and school districts levy taxes on a given property, Pappas explained, adding that First Installment bills are 55 percent of last year's total property tax. On the front of every mailed bill, below the amount owed, is a section called "Taxing District Debt and Financial Data." That section lists each taxing district that levies a tax on a property and gives the following financial information about each district: Money Owed by Your Taxing Districts Pension and Healthcare Amounts Promised by Your Taxing Districts Amount of Pension and Healthcare Shortage Percentage of Pension and Healthcare Costs Taxing Districts Can Pay Those who log onto cookcountytreasurer.com can see even more information by selecting "Want to see your local government debt?" and entering the 14-digit Property Index Number for the property or the name of a taxing district. "Property owners should know how much they are being taxed and by which units of government," Pappas said. "The bill and our website tell them." SOURCE Cook County Treasurer's Office Related Links http://www.cookcountytreasurer.com NEW YORK, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Recently awarded "Vodka of the Year" ultra-premium vodka brand, Purity Vodka, announced today that David Szydlik has joined as President and Chief Executive Officer effective immediately. For the last 8 years, Szydlik has worked on multiple roles at Pernod Ricard. His most recent role was Director of Chains, prior to that his responsibilities included: Business Unit Director Southwest and National Director of Sales Operations and Planning. Before joining Pernod Ricard he worked on multiple management roles for Molson Coors and Coca-Cola Enterprises. "The Board of Directors is delighted that David has joined Purity Vodka at a very exciting time, his experience and expertise will propel the growth and success of Purity Vodka as a key player in the vodka category," said Alf Tonnesson, Chairman of Purity Vodka. Purity Vodka was created by Master Blender Thomas Kuuttanen, who has received the title of master blender of the year in 2016. The brand has been recognized for its exceptional taste with more than 125 gold medals in taste competitions over the last five years. "I am excited by the opportunity to work alongside our distributor network and dedicated team that has created great momentum behind Purity Vodka," said Szydlik. "We believe that the 34 distillations and organic ingredients that comprise our Purity Vodka give our consumers an exceptional vodka experience." ABOUT PURITY VODKA Purity Vodka is the result of the lifelong quest of "2016 Master Blender of the year" Thomas Kuuttanen to redefine the vodka category and develop the world's finest ultra-premium vodka. Purity Vodka utilizes the finest Swedish organic winter wheat and barley, and the heart of the vodka is distilled a remarkable 34 times for an exceptionally smooth yet complex taste. Purity Vodka has been awarded more than 125 Gold Medals in the top blind tasting competitions around the world and rated 100 points by The Spirits Business. For more information about Purity Vodka, please visit PurityVodka.com. Andres Zuniga [email protected] SOURCE Purity Vodka, Inc. Related Links http://www.purityvodka.com SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- A newly released study by The Moran Company, a Washington D.C. based health care research and consulting firm with extensive expertise in Medicare payment systems, has concluded that Puerto Rico's traditional Medicare (also known as fee-for-service) population is not representative of the island's much larger Medicare Advantage (MA) membership, questioning its use as the foundation for establishing MA benchmarks in Puerto Rico. "This study provides strong evidence to support the Puerto Rico healthcare community's longstanding call for administrative action by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to adjust the benchmark so that it properly accounts for marked differences in size, composition and behavior between the island's Medicare Advantage and traditional Medicare populations," said Roberto Garcia-Rodriguez, president of the Medicaid and Medicare Advantage Products Association of Puerto Rico (MMAPA) and CEO of Triple-S Management Corporation. The report indicates that erosion in the fee-for-service (FFS) Medicare population, differences in characteristics and utilization patterns between Puerto Rico's MA and FFS populations, and certain anomalies in the data that CMS uses to calculate MA benchmarks in Puerto Ricoalong with Medicare policies in Puerto Rico that differ from the mainland create selection bias. "The net effect of differences in utilization and demographics for the two populations, historically depressed payment rates, and different Medicare services on the island compared to the U.S., leads to the conclusion that the FFS utilization under-estimates MA benchmarks," the study asserts. The study further concludes that the nature of the resulting selection bias may understate the Puerto Rico benchmarks to the point where "it will be increasingly difficult for the MA plans serving these populations to provide the level of service needed." Puerto Rico's 2014 FFS enrollees who have both Parts A and B, which is the population used to set MA benchmarks, accounted for only 12% of the total eligible population, and has a much smaller proportion of dual eligible beneficiaries (10%) than the MA population (50%). This is markedly different from the rest of the nation. Puerto Rico is also unique across the nation in that MA enrollment exceeds 75% of the Medicare-eligible population (compared with a national average of 32%) and has been increasing every year, with 30% of Puerto Rico's FFS population switching to MA annually (compared with a national average switch rate of 3-5%). Utilization patterns between the populations are also quite distinct, suggesting access issues and differences in severity of illnesses that are not corrected by risk adjustment. Lastly, historical differences in how the Medicare program applies in Puerto Rico compared to the mainland (e.g., Part D low-income subsidies are not available and partial dual status does not exist in Puerto Rico) depress historical FFS costs on the island. As noted in the study, "If FFS beneficiaries are experiencing access to care barriers to getting the services they need, this will depress MA benchmarks and perpetuate inadequacies in the PR health care system, already challenged by depressed wages for health care workers and out-migration from the island." The MA benchmark in Puerto Rico, a national outlier, is currently $473 per beneficiary, or 43% below the U.S. average of $830, 38% below the state with the next lowest benchmark, and 26% below the U.S. Virgin Islands, another U.S. territory located less than 80 miles from San Juan. CMS establishes MA benchmarks for counties across the nation based on the cost of serving the corresponding FFS population. Its benchmark methodology assumes that FFS utilization is generally representative of MA utilization, and existing risk adjustment models are not designed to correct for selection bias. The assumption underlying this statutory requirement is that MA costs should not exceed that of the average FFS beneficiary. Selection bias is increasingly likely, however, as the FFS population decreases, and at a certain MA penetration level, the methodology begins to break down. As the study points out, "the MA program relies upon risk adjustment to standardize benchmark calculations, but such reliance depends on the stability of the population and its size. The risk adjustment model is less reliable as the size of the population decreases and as it varies in ways not accounted for in the model. Both of these issues are prominent in Puerto Rico." CMS has no methodology to examine high MA penetration jurisdictions in order to evaluate the viability of its methods. According to the study, however, CMS has the authority to adjust its methodologies consistent with the overall intent of the statute, and should consider ways to correct the bias and establish a proper MA benchmark for Puerto Rico. "Our commitment to future generations is to continually call on local and federal government leaders to unite on behalf of the Puerto Rico healthcare system and demand justice from CMS in its funding of the Medicare Advantage program for Puerto Rico's 570,000 beneficiaries. Permanent funding solutions are necessary to stabilize the Puerto Rico healthcare delivery system, which in turn is a necessary infrastructure component of Puerto Rico's economic recovery. Everyone needs quality healthcare," stated Jim O'Drobinak, MMAPA Board member and CEO of MCS. Broader policy questions on methodology as MA penetration rates increase in U.S. Importantly, the study is also a harbinger of what other U.S. jurisdictions with increasing MA penetration will face. "While Puerto Rico represents an outlier in its high rate of MA enrollment, it is likely that there are or will be U.S. counties that approach similar levels of MA enrollment, raising the question of how and when to evaluate the representativeness of a FFS population as the basis for accurately estimating MA benchmarks," the study indicates. "This study provides conclusive evidence that selection bias occurs when MA penetration reaches a tipping point, and has important policy implications," indicated Dr. Rick Shinto, MMAPA member and CEO of MMM Healthcare, LLC. "Puerto Rico is the canary in the coal mine, and can serve as a case study for HHS and CMS to evaluate new policies and methodologies that adjust for a high probability of selection bias in counties with large MA enrollments. As MA penetration continues to increase across the United States, this need will also increase. We invite policymakers to work with the Puerto Rico healthcare community to find a better waywith the proper level of fundingto provide quality care to our senior citizens," added Dr. Shinto. Call for action as funds dwindle and healthcare system is in dire straits By the end of 2017, Puerto Rico will have lost approximately $4 billion in aggregate MA funding since 2011. These funding cuts have already resulted in substantial benefit reductions and increased pressures to reduce provider compensation, which has contributed to the loss of over 3,000 physicians to the United States mainland since cuts associated with the Affordable Care Act began. "The Moran Company study strongly supports MMAPA's call in Washington D.C. for innovative policy solutions that address Puerto Rico's deteriorating healthcare delivery system, which directly impacts more than 570,000 of Puerto Rico's senior citizens," said Garcia-Rodriguez. He added, "We need CMS to act now and adjust its methodology." There is increasing awareness of the need to address this disparity as evidenced by the letter that 16 members of Congress from both parties sent on January 27, 2017 to CMS and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). In the letter, they echo a recommendation issued last December by the Congressional Task Force on Economic Growth for Puerto Rico, which stated the need "to ensure that MA plans, including those in Puerto Rico, are being fairly and property compensated for the services they provide to beneficiaries.'" Likewise, the Governor of Puerto Rico requested the support of the Acting Secretary of HHS and Acting Administrator of CMS in a January 25, 2017 letter to consider Puerto Rico's unique situation in the Advance Notice and Draft Call Letter for 2018, expected to be issued February 1, 2017. He also created a private-public group representing a broad cross section of the healthcare community to continue to address disparities in Medicare and Medicaid funding in Puerto Rico. These letters, as well as the Moran study, build on an Issue Brief released in December by HHS's Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) that highlights the challenges facing Puerto Rico's healthcare system and the need for supporting data. A full copy of the Moran study, the letters from members of Congress and the Governor, and the ASPE Issue Brief are available at the MMAPA website, www.mmapapr.org. About MMAPA The Medicaid and Medicare Advantage Products Association of Puerto Rico (www.mmapapr.org) is a non-for-profit association comprised of the leading Medicaid and Medicare Advantage organizations in Puerto Rico: First Medical, Humana, MCS, MMM/PMC, Molina Healthcare and Triple-S. This association was established in 2009 to evaluate and act on the implications of new government policy on funding for Puerto Rico's healthcare system. SOURCE Medicaid and Medicare Advantage Products Association of Puerto Rico Related Links http://www.mmapapr.org (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160303/792302 ) Browse 106 market data Tables and 82 Figures spread through 186 Pages and in-depth TOC on "Submarine Combat Systems Market" http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Market-Reports/submarine-combat-system-market-257188250.html Early buyers will receive 10% customization on this report. The increase in the growth of the market size can be attributed to the increasing investments in maritime security and enhancement of naval capability. The increasing tensions in South East Asia and the balance of power in the world is expected to drive the submarine combat systems market. The electronic support measure system segment is projected to witness high growth during the forecast period Enhancement in sensors and armament technologies have resulted in better anti-submarine warfare technologies. Electronic support measures systems are required for defensive measures and secure communications for submarines. These systems use different technologies to increase submarine capabilities in survivability and stealth by reducing the chances of detection by enemy platforms, and avoidance of incoming threats. Download PDF Brochure @ http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/pdfdownload.asp?id=257188250 The retrofit segment is expected to witness highest growth during the forecast period Retrofits of submarines are essential for mid-life upgradation of submarines. The new systems installed on submarines are cost-efficient methods to modernize submarines systems wherein submarines are fit with new generation sensors and submarine combat systems. Europe is expected to be the largest market for retrofit during the forecast period. Europe is expected to witness highest growth in retrofit market during the forecast period The cold war period saw huge investments in submarine platforms. After the end of the cold war, submarines introduced in late 1990's are expected to undergo mid-life upgrades. Russia is expected to be the main contributor to the submarine combat systems market during the forecast period. The older submarines are likely to go undergo upgradation programs and thus drive the retrofit market of submarine combat systems. Inquiry Before Buying: http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Enquiry_Before_Buying.asp?id=257188250 The major players in the submarine combat systems market are, Lockheed Martin (U.S), BAE Systems PLC (UK), Raytheon Company (U.S.), and Atlas Elektronik GmbH (Germany). Browse Related Reports C4ISR Market by Platform (Land, Naval, Airborne) Application (Command & Control, Communications, Computers, ISR, EW) Component (Networking Technologies, Communication Networks, Display Consoles, Software, EW Hardware) and Region - Forecast to 2021 http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Market-Reports/c4isr-market-1315.html Smart Weapons Market by Product (Missiles, Munitions, Guided Projectile, Guided Rocket, Guided Firearms), platform (Air, Land, Naval), Technology (Laser, Infrared, Radar, GPS, Others) & Region - Global Forecast to 2021 http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Market-Reports/smart-weapons-market-1284.html Subscribe Reports from Aerospace & Defence Domain @ http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Knowledgestore.asp About MarketsandMarkets MarketsandMarkets is the largest market research firm worldwide in terms of annually published premium market research reports. Serving 1700 global fortune enterprises with more than 1200 premium studies in a year, M&M is catering to a multitude of clients across 8 different industrial verticals. We specialize in consulting assignments and business research across high growth markets, cutting edge technologies and newer applications. 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. M&M's flagship competitive intelligence and market research platform, "RT" 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. The new included chapters on Methodology and Benchmarking presented with high quality analytical info graphics in our reports gives complete visibility of how the numbers have been arrived and defend the accuracy of the numbers. We at MarketsandMarkets are inspired to help our clients grow by providing apt business insight with our huge market intelligence repository. Contact: Mr. Rohan Markets and Markets 701 Pike Street Suite 2175, Seattle, WA 98101, United States Tel: 1-888-600-6441 Email: [email protected] Visit MarketsandMarkets [email protected] http://mnmblog.org/market-research/aerospace-defence Connect with us on LinkedIn @ http://www.linkedin.com/company/marketsandmarkets SOURCE MarketsandMarkets NEW YORK, Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Tarter Krinsky & Drogin is pleased to announce the formation of its White Collar & Government Investigations practice. This specialized practice group will counsel corporations, institutions, business executives and other professionals facing federal or state investigations, enforcement actions and prosecutions. The firm welcomes veteran litigator Michael Grudberg as a partner to lead the practice. Mr. Grudberg brings with him more than 25 years of criminal and civil litigation, and trial experience. He has handled federal and state criminal matters in the Southern, Eastern and Northern Districts of New York, District of Connecticut and New York State courts. Mr. Grudberg has tried cases involving a wide array of allegations, including insider trading, securities fraud, Medicare fraud, bribery and obstruction of justice. Prior to joining the firm, Mr. Grudberg was a partner at Ballard Spahr and litigation boutique Stillman & Friedman, where he worked closely with its founder Charles Stillman and other veteran white-collar colleagues. Mr. Grudberg's civil litigation experience encompasses complex securities class actions and arbitrations, civil RICO, trade secret, federal and state environmental claims, ERISA, breach of contract, employment, non-compete claims and defamation claims. On the regulatory side, he has represented dozens of clients in investigations and enforcement actions conducted by the SEC and FINRA, as well as the New York City Department of Investigation, the Attorney General's Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and numerous other state and municipal agencies. "In today's dynamic regulatory environment, our White Collar & Government Investigations group is well equipped to help corporate clients navigate white collar matters, corporate investigations and government regulatory and enforcement actions," said Alan Tarter, Managing Partner. "We have an outstanding group of litigators, including several Certified Fraud Examiners, who partner with clients to proactively assess risk, prevent fraud and advise on investigations. We are extremely pleased that Michael has joined this team to launch our White Collar & Government Investigations practice. He adds substantial bench strength to our litigation capabilities." "Tarter Krinsky & Drogin is one of the leading full-service firms in New York representing middle-market companies," said Mr. Grudberg. "I look forward to offering clients greater efficiencies and flexibility, and growing the White Collar & Government Investigations practice." Some of the White Collar & Government Investigations practice's recent matters include: Representing a securities analyst and broker in their respective insider trading prosecutions and related SEC enforcement actions in the Southern District of New York Representing the CFO of a Fortune 500 conglomerate in the trial and subsequent retrial of felony charges brought by the New York County D.A. Advising the former chief executive of a major New York hospital in a case alleging "honest services" wire fraud in the Southern District of New York hospital in a case alleging "honest services" wire fraud in the Southern District of Advising the principal of a New York brokerage firm who was featured in the "Wolf of Wall Street" film in securities fraud prosecutions in both the Eastern and Southern Districts of New York Mr. Grudberg received his J.D. from Yale Law School and his B.A., magna cum laude, from Colgate University. He clerked for the Honorable Ralph K. Winter of the U.S. Court of Appeals, Second Circuit. About Tarter Krinsky & Drogin LLP Tarter Krinsky & Drogin is the total legal solution for middle-market businesses. Since our founding in 2001, the firm has nurtured a dynamic collection of lawyers from a broad range of backgrounds and experience who share our common goal of effectively and efficiently serving middle-market businesses. Purposefully designed to serve as an integral part of any client's business team, we are a vibrant, full-service law firm dedicated to smart thinking and strong client relationships. Learn more at http://www.tarterkrinsky.com/. Contact: Stefanie Marrone Director of Business Development and Marketing Tarter Krinsky & Drogin LLP 212-216-1123 [email protected] SOURCE Tarter Krinsky & Drogin Related Links http://www.tarterkrinsky.com Quaker has been a 'first' in the morning for many people looking for the nourishment and potential to help them take on their day, so fittingly to close out National Oatmeal Month, below is a look at a few Quaker 'firsts' that have played a role in making it the iconic and beloved brand it is today: The first registered trademark for a breakfast cereal . Quaker Oats was registered as the first trademark for a breakfast cereal in 1877. The trademark was registered with the U.S. Patent Office as "a figure of a man in 'Quaker garb.'" The former owners, Henry Seymour and William Heston , selected the Quaker name as a symbol of good quality and honest value. . Quaker Oats was registered as the first trademark for a breakfast cereal in 1877. The trademark was registered with the U.S. Patent Office as "a figure of a man in 'Quaker garb.'" The former owners, and , selected the Quaker name as a symbol of good quality and honest value. The first recipe on packaging. Quaker became the first brand to put a recipe on product packaging when it debuted the recipe for "Oatmeal Bread" in 1886. Today, recipes on packaging are virtually a standard in the food industry. Quaker became the first brand to put a recipe on product packaging when it debuted the recipe for "Oatmeal Bread" in 1886. Today, recipes on packaging are virtually a standard in the food industry. The first round canister. Quaker Oats introduced the now-iconic round Quaker Oats package in 1915. Quaker produces approximately 120 million canisters annually at its Cedar Rapids plant. Quaker Oats introduced the now-iconic round Quaker Oats package in 1915. Quaker produces approximately 120 million canisters annually at its plant. The first food-specific heart health claim. In 1997, the FDA approved the first food-specific health claim for oatmeal. The claim reads: "Soluble fiber from oatmeal as part of a low saturated fat, low cholesterol diet, may reduce the risk of heart disease." It still appears on qualifying Quaker Oatmeal cereals. From 1877 to today, Quaker continues to demonstrate its commitment to delivering the goodness of oats in new ways and showcasing their versatility. Over the past few years, Quaker has introduced: Innovative formats. Understanding that today people are not always seated for their meals, Quaker debuted both Breakfast Flats and Breakfast Squares so people can enjoy oats away from the table. Understanding that today people are not always seated for their meals, Quaker debuted both Breakfast Flats and Breakfast Squares so people can enjoy oats away from the table. Innovative trends. Quaker helped make it cool to enjoy cold oats by tapping into the trend of overnight oats oats refrigerated overnight with layers of dairy and favorite toppings and showcasing their endless possibilities. Quaker helped make it cool to enjoy cold oats by tapping into the trend of overnight oats oats refrigerated overnight with layers of dairy and favorite toppings and showcasing their endless possibilities. Innovative processes. Quaker created a line of Gluten Free Oatmeal as a response to one of its top consumer requests for years. Boasting a breakthrough and industry-leading milling process, Quaker Gluten Free Oatmeal has become a trusted go-to for those who lead a gluten free lifestyle. Not only has Quaker been an innovator and leader in oats throughout history, but another integral part of Quaker's heritage is its first milling facility. Some notable facts: In 1873, Quaker opened its first mill in Cedar Rapids, Iowa and today it's still the world's largest milling facility. and today it's still the world's largest milling facility. Many of Cedar Rapids Mill's 900+ employees are part of families who have been working there for generations The Quaker Oats Company contributes more than 500 million pounds of whole grains to the American diet every year. "For the past 140 years, we have consistently delivered nourishing products that families love and trust and have cemented our legacy along the way by also being pioneers," said Becky Frankiewicz, senior vice president and general manager of Quaker Foods North America. "Today, we're still who we've always been oat millers who are dedicated to making the highest quality oats through the highest quality means and we are committed to upholding the values upon which Quaker was founded as we continue to carry this beloved nourishment brand into the future." For more information about Quaker's history and to learn about products, please visit QuakerOats.com, www.Facebook.com/Quaker or follow the brand on Twitter @Quaker. About The Quaker Oats Company The Quaker Oats Company, headquartered in Chicago, is a unit of PepsiCo, Inc., one of the world's largest consumer packaged goods companies. For 140 years, Quaker's brands have served as symbols of quality, great taste and nutrition. Quaker Oats, Quaker Rice Cakes and Quaker Chewy Granola Bars are consumer favorites. For more information, please visit www.QuakerOats.com, www.Facebook.com/Quaker or follow us on Twitter @Quaker. About PepsiCo PepsiCo products are enjoyed by consumers one billion times a day in more than 200 countries and territories around the world. PepsiCo generated more than $63 billion in net revenue in 2015, driven by a complementary food and beverage portfolio that includes Frito-Lay, Gatorade, Pepsi-Cola, Quaker and Tropicana. PepsiCo's product portfolio includes a wide range of enjoyable foods and beverages, including 22 brands that generate more than $1 billion each in estimated annual retail sales. At the heart of PepsiCo is Performance with Purpose our fundamental belief that the success of our company is inextricably linked to the sustainability of the world around. We believe that continuously improving the products we sell, operating responsibly to protect our planet and empowering people around the world is what enables PepsiCo to run a successful global company that creates long-term value for society and our shareholders. For more information, visit www.pepsico.com. SOURCE The Quaker Oats Company Related Links http://www.quakeroats.com SAN JOSE, Calif., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Five unique travel technology and service brands combine to form a revolutionary force "TravelCreed." TravelCreed is formed to represent five unique services for travel businesses. This unity offers member companies an opportunity to upsell, cross-sell and, more importantly, better serve a widespread and dynamic clientele. TravelCreed brands "TravelCreed is a name that represents our belief in the importance of travel," Ilyas Zameer said. "Travel and tourism make the world a better place, and we aim to make travel and tourism better with straight forward, honest business practices backed by powerful technology and resourceful tactics." "TravelCreed is in discussion with aspirational travel businesses in countries around the world to join the guiding force that is our company. Success comes in many shapes and forms," Zameer said. Ilyas Zameer is the Group CEO and founder of TravelCreed and TravelCreed subsidiaries. Zameer is a passionate entrepreneur with 16 years of experience in travel technology, which began with his first company TechTuners. TravelCreed also announces the opening of offices in East Africa, South Africa and Mauritius and a restructuring of existing offices in the United States, India and UAE. TravelCreed is home to a selection of brands, platforms and marketplaces, which address the dynamic aspects of the travel industry and the unique businesses that make travel so enjoyable. These brands come together to compliment one another's strengths and provide support to companies and the industry as a whole: TechTuners: An extension of your IT department with complete technical support and services providing on-site placement, offshore project development and technical consulting for the travel industry. REZY: A collection of platforms with complete end-to-end enterprise automation for loyalty redemptions programs, travel management companies and travel businesses. Brand2Fly: Delivering powerful branding and marketing for businesses in the travel industry with the latest technologies and emerging trends. TravelsBond: B2B aggregator of the most sought after travel content on the market with access to flights, hotels, activities, transfers, car rentals, cruises and more. HYEBYE.com: B2C lifestyle portal for activities, transfers, airport lounges and more to make moments special. iZED: Propelling the possibilities of the travel industry through investments, startup incubators and partnerships with industry disruptors, travel geniuses and entrepreneurial spirits. For more information about TravelCreed, visit the new website at www.TravelCreed.com. Press Contact: Kato Guzman [email protected] 408-512-2142 SOURCE TravelCreed Related Links http://www.TravelCreed.com Arrivals accounted for 50.4 percent of U-Haul traffic in 2016 thanks to locations like St. Louis, Liberty, Dardenne Prairie, Warsaw and St. Charles, the cities to pace Missouri in its net gain of one-way U-Haul trucks. St. Louis ranked 34th among U-Haul U.S. Growth Cities for locations with a population of more than 50,000 due to a 5 percent increase in year-over-year arrivals. Follow the Top 10 Growth States daily countdown through Feb. 3 on Twitter @uhaul and view other migration trends reports, including the U.S. Growth Cities release, at myuhaulstory.com. Growth States are calculated by the net gain of one-way U-Haul truck rentals entering a state versus leaving a state during a calendar year. Migration trends data is compiled from more than 1.7 million one-way U-Haul truck rental transactions that occur annually. "Downtown St. Louis has been revitalized," said Steve Langford, U-Haul Company of St. Louis president. "Many loft-style apartments, bars, retail stores and grocery stores are catering to a younger generation. In response to these urban developments, businesses are growing, expanding and evolving." Last year, U-Haul added company-owned and -operated stores in several cities including Kansas City, Lake St. Louis and Florissant. "The Midwest has hardworking people," said U-Haul Company of Northern Kansas president Gary Wittkopp, whose territory includes parts of Missouri, namely Kansas City. "People in Missouri like to move their own goods. They know U-Haul is the economic and convenient way to do that." Find U-Haul stores and neighborhood dealers in Missouri at uhaul.com/locations. U-Haul is the authority on migration trends thanks to its expansive network that blankets all 50 states and 10 Canadian provinces. The geographical coverage from more than 21,000 U-Haul locations, including neighborhood dealers and Company-owned and -operated stores, provides a comprehensive overview of where people are moving like no one else in the industry. About U-Haul Since 1945, U-Haul has been the No. 1 choice of do-it-yourself movers, with a network of more than 21,000 locations across all 50 states and 10 Canadian provinces. U-Haul customers' patronage has enabled the U-Haul fleet to grow to more than 139,000 trucks, 108,000 trailers and 38,000 towing devices. U-Haul offers more than 536,000 rooms and more than 50 million square feet of self-storage space at owned and managed facilities throughout North America. U-Haul is the largest installer of permanent trailer hitches in the automotive aftermarket industry and is the largest retailer of propane in the U.S. www.uhaul.com Contact Jeff Lockridge Sebastien Reyes E-mail: [email protected] Phone: 602-760-4941 Website: uhaul.com SOURCE U-Haul UOVO caters to leading museums, nonprofit institutions, commercial galleries, and foundations, as well as individual collectors and artists. It also offers fashion houses archival storage for couture collections. Since launching in 2013, UOVO's footprint has grown to over 550,000 square feet; the company now serves over 600 clients. UOVO addresses needs ranging from temporary storage of a single painting, to the development of bespoke private spaces within UOVO's facilities to store, preserve, and study collections. UOVO's state-of-the-art facilities and distinctive concierge service model have elevated the stewardship of artworks and archives. The newly renovated facility addresses the rapidly increasing demand for the company's high standard of collections care that is maximally efficient and cost-effective. In an art market characterized by an unprecedented volume of acquisitions by institutions and private collectors, UOVO has seen a correlated rise in demand for art and archival services including storage, transportation, installations, and private viewings. UOVO delivers tailored programs for each client's operational and budgetary needs, capitalizing on the building's 25-foot high ceilings and constructing specialized racking, cabinets, and furnishings suited to each client's objects and working preferences. The purpose-designed facility offers: Customized private rooms and concierge shared storage State-of-the-art security Strictly monitored climate and temperature controls An on-site viewing room with customizable lighting Private workspaces A digital inventory system which can integrate with a client-facing mobile database Same day access to Manhattan provided by UOVO's fleet of trucks The Founder and Chairman of the company is Steve Guttman, former CEO of the Federal Realty Investment Trust and the Founder of Storage Deluxe Management Company, which has developed over 55 properties in the New York region. He was recently awarded the Legion of Honor by France, the nation's highest honor, for his philanthropic work with the Centre Pompidou Foundation. Guttman explains, "In less than 3 years, UOVO has become the leader in art storage and services in the New York area. We have built relationships with many of the most important museums and collectors in the world, as well as smaller organizations and collectors that are just getting started. UOVO's expansion allows us to better serve to our clients by providing them with a broader array of customized solutions for their service and storage needs." About UOVO UOVO is elevating art storage and services. Through a holistic approach to collections management, UOVO has developed a new paradigm for the stewardship of the art, design, fashion, and archival collections that comprise our cultural legacy. From climate-controlled storage and private viewing rooms, to transportation, packing, crating, and installation services, UOVO provides an array of storage options and innovative service and management solutions tailored to meet the specialized needs of any collection. Each UOVO facility is purpose-designed and managed by a team of industry-leading experts dedicated to ensuring that works are safeguarded with the highest caliber of security, discretion, professionalism, and care. For more information, please visit www.uovo.org. PRESS CONTACT: Anna Raginskaya Vice President of Brand and Business Development UOVO Queens Plaza 41-54 22nd Street Long Island City, NY 11101 646-680-0500 [email protected] Hannah Schmidt Marketing and Communications Associate UOVO Queens Plaza 41-54 22nd Street Long Island City, NY 11101 646-747-4306 [email protected] SOURCE UOVO Related Links http://www.uovo.org KNOXVILLE, Tenn., Jan. 30, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- ZDi Solutions, LLC announced today that Justin Sims has joined the team as the new Executive Vice President of Sales. Justin brings over 25 years of domestic and international sales experience with him, specializing in team building, business growth, and advertising and marketing management. Justin Sims, EVP ZDi Executive Leadership Team, from left, Dutton, Hawkins, Turner, Sykes In his most recent role as Senior VP of the Commercial Division for DirecTV, Justin turned around the underperforming division, increasing sales from $150,000 per month to $3MM per month. He has also provided consulting expertise for AT&T, Comcast, Best Buy, Dish and more. Justin is a Combat Veteran, and while serving in the United States Army, fulfilled three tours of duty overseas, including one in Afghanistan. He trained as a member of an elite Airborne unit, and prior to being honorably discharged, established a computer system which allowed troops on the front lines to more effectively communicate with headquarters. "We're thrilled to have someone as experienced and enthusiastic as Justin to lead the push into new markets," ZDi Solutions CEO, John Hawkins said about Sims. He added, "After receiving FDA approval for our Z-System, both national and international radiation oncology communities have shown interest in our products and service. We think Justin is the perfect person to explore these new opportunities and reach our future goals." As ZDi's Executive Vice President of Sales, Justin will be focusing on building a solid foundation of trust to ZDi's clinics, physicians and staff to ensure delivery of quality products that provide great patient care. He will also maintain a standard of excellence that ZDi's customers and patients can rely on. Sims said, "The interest shown by oncology professionals and experts in ZDi is a testament to their commitment to delivering superior medical devices and services. It's an honor to be involved with a company that is involved with such groundbreaking work and I'm excited to see what's in store next." Sims joins the rest of the ZDi executive team, including John Hawkins, Chief Executive Officer, Zach Dutton, R.T.(R)(T), Chief Design Officer, Tim Sykes, Executive Vice President, and Cheryl Turner, Ed.D., R.T.(R)(T), Chief Learning Officer. ABOUT ZDI SOLUTIONS, LLC Headquartered in Knoxville, TN, ZDi Solutions, LLC is an innovative patient positioning and immobilization device manufacturer in the radiation oncology market. The company has developed a line of unique patient-centered products that allow the radiation therapist/proton therapist to more efficiently and precisely prepare patients for different modalities of imaging and treatment. The Z-System devices increase the accuracy and constancy of the patient's position for reduced risk to the patient during treatments. They also decrease liability for facilities, while providing better patient outcomes. More information may be found at http://www.zdirad.com. Agency: Chuck Morris Morris Creative Group LLC 865-637-9869 [email protected] Company: John Hawkins, CEO, ZDi Solutions, LLC [email protected] www.zdirad.com SOURCE ZDi Solutions, LLC Related Links http://www.zdirad.com Islamabad, Jan 26 : Pakistan electronic and print media watchdog, Pemra, on Thursday banned the country's prominent TV anchor Amir Liaquat for "preaching hate". "Amir Liaquat and his programme has been banned with immediate effect for preaching hate," a notification issued by Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) read. "Aamir Liaquat, the host of the programme named 'Aisay Nahi Chalay Ga' shall not host any programme or appear in any manner, including but not limited to, as a guest, analyst, reporter, actor, in audio, video beeper, promo/advertisement on BOL NEWS," the notice read. The media watchdog added: "In case of non-compliance of the above orders, the licence for the channel BOL NEWS shall be suspended with immediate effect." Social activist Jibran Nasir had filed an official complaint with the Pemra against the TV anchor for "maligning" him. In his complaint to the media watchdog, Jibran said the anchor of BOL Network started a "malicious, defamatory and life endangering campaign" against him and the bloggers who went missing between January 4 to 8. Islamabad, Jan 28 : Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai on Saturday said she was "heartbroken" by President Donald Trump's executive order calling for new vetting of refugees entering the US. "I am heartbroken that Trump is closing the door on children, mothers and fathers fleeing violence and war," the women's education rights activist said in a statement posted on Facebook. "I am heartbroken that America is turning its back on a proud history of welcoming refugees and immigrants -- the people who helped build your country, ready to work hard in exchange for a fair chance at a new life," Yousafzai said. "I am heartbroken that Syrian refugee children, who have suffered through six years of war by no fault of their own, are singled out for discrimination," the statement continued. Yousafzai cited an example of Zaynab, who fled wars in three countries -- Somalia, Yemen and Egypt -- before she was even 17, saying she was heartbroken for girls like her. The activist said "today Zaynab, who came to the US in 2014 and now in a college studying human rights, her hope of being reunited with her precious little sister separated when she fled unrest in Egypt, dims". "In this time of uncertainty and unrest around the world, I ask President Trump not to turn his back on the world's most defenceless children and families." The White House did not provide immediate details about Trump's executive order, but reports said the US would stop issuing visas to people coming from several Muslim-majority countries, including Iran, Sudan, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Iraq. People from countries such as Afghanistan, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia will face "extreme vetting", the US President said. The order is also expected to indefinitely block refugees from war-torn Syria from entering the US and suspend all refugee admissions for 120 days while the administration determines which countries pose the least risk. Yousafzai is an advocate for women's education who survived a terrorist attack when she was shot by the Taliban in 2012. In 2014, she became the youngest person to win the Nobel Peace Prize at the age of 17. Mumbai, Jan 28 : Supermodel Ujwala Raut will be seen walking as a showstopper for designer Vidhi Wadhwani, who is all set to make her debut at the forthcoming Lakme Fashion Week (LFW) Summer/Resort 2017 next month. "Model Ujwala Raut will be seen walking in as the showstopper since I feel that she is the perfect one to carry this look and can pull off anything and everything fabulously. Our aesthetics definitely match and I am sure she would definitely set the ramp ablaze," Wadhwani said in a statement. Her collection is all about fluidity and draping and delicate texturing so that an outfit can be interpreted and worn in different ways and not necessarily conform to a "type" (Indian/western). Versatility and wearability are the keys for this brand. The USP of the brand lies in its unique hand-done textures, seamless drapes and edgy elements that make each piece subtly stand out. The collection named "La-Isla" (The Island) derives its inspiration from the tiny island of Cyprus through its bohemian free-spirited culture, its exotic beaches and vibrant nightlife. Talking about her collection, Wadhwani said: "My new collection La-Isla is inspired by natural elements through juxtaposition of layers creating dramatic yet playful silhouettes focusing on neat lines and seamless drapes,value added with hand cut motifs and appliquA with white,gold and black accentuating the vintage look of pieces." The line consists of versatile separates in terms of dresses, jackets, jumpsuits and gowns in rich organzas, metallic linens, crushed silks and mesh. The collection is minimal yet luxurious, classic yet ostentatious, dramatic yet flattering occasion wear is the undertone of this Summer-Resort 2017 line. Bhubaneswar, Jan 29 : A day after Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik rejected the Centre's negotiation committee to resolve the Mahanadi water dispute with Chhattisgarh, Union Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Sunday accused Patnaik of creating hurdles to serve his political ends. "The Chief Minister has given precedence to his party's interest ignoring Odisha's interest on Mahanadi water issue," Pradhan told reporters here. He also criticised the "double standard" of the state government. "As per the Inter State Water Dispute Act, there is a right to form a tribunal. Let a tribunal be formed. But prior to the formation of the tribunal, the Centre has gone a step forward with the formation of a negotiation committee to resolve the Mahanadi issue. But, the Odisha government is not in a mood to agree to it," said Pradhan. He said the Centre had convened meetings of the Chief Ministers and Chief Secretaries to resolve the water dispute, but every time the Odisha government changes its opinion after the meetings. "A meeting of the Chief Secretaries of Odisha and Chhattisgarh was convened by the Water Resources Ministry. Although the Odisha Chief Secretary agreed to the decisions at the meeting, he changed his mind after talking to someone else, most probably, one of the clerks in the Chief Minister's office," said the union minister. He also said that Naveen Patnaik also changed his mind even though he had agreed to the proposal for formation of a committee at the Chief Ministers' meeting presided over by Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti. "The meeting has been recorded and it will be put out as a proof. Our Chief Minister, who had agreed to the proposal at the meeting, also changed his mind later at the instance of a subordinate staff," said Pradhan. He said that Patnaik has never raised the issue before the Prime Minister even though he has visited New Delhi about 10 times in the last six months. Notably, Naveen Patnaik on Saturday rejected the Centre's negotiation committee proposal for resolving the ongoing Mahanadi water sharing dispute with the Chhattisgarh government. In a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Chief Minister said: "The proposed committee will only delay the setting up of a tribunal, which will allow Chhattisgarh to complete the construction of disputed projects." Beijing, Jan 29 : From mythical 'Phoenix' to sentimental 'Chasing Dreams', China on Tuesday released a choice list of eight names for the country's first Mars spacecraft, which is scheduled to be launched by 2020, the media reported. The names -- "Fenghuang" (phoenix), "Tianwen" (questions for heaven), "Huoxing" (Mars), "Tenglong" (soaring dragon), "Qilin" (Kylin), "Zhuque" (rose finch), "Zhuimeng" (chasing dreams) and "Fengxiang" (flying phoenix) -- were chosen from over 14,500 choices submitted by people worldwide, Xinhua news agency reported. The final choice for the Mars probe will be announced around Space Day on April 24, space authorities said. Proposals were accepted from August last year. The eight names were selected through a jury review and online polls. China plans to launch its first Mars spacecraft by 2020, which will orbit, land on and explore the Red Planet. Sanaa, Jan 29 : Eight Al Qaeda militants and 12 civilians were killed on Sunday when the US Special Forces launched a pre-dawn security raid on a village in Yemen's al-Bayda province, the media reported. A senior Al Qaeda leader, Abdul-Raoof Dhahab, his two brothers, and five other terrorists were killed in the operation, which was carried out in cooperation with local authorities, military officials told Xinhua news agency. The 12 civilians included four women and three children. Local residents said that "four military planes participated in the operation and kept hovering over the village for hours." A source at Yemen's intelligence agency confirmed that helicopter-borne commandos raided houses held by the Al Qaeda militants. Some American soldiers were injured in the raid on the ground, the intelligence source said. Kathmandu, Jan 30 : Senior officials of the eight member states of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) will meet here this week to attend the Programming Committee. This will be the first meeting of the SAARC member countries since the postponement of the 19th SAARC summit in Islamabad last November, officials said on Sunday. During the meeting, SAARC member states will discuss a number of issues including the budget of the SAARC Secretariat and five regional centers of SAARC, Xinhua news agency quoted officials of the Nepalese Ministry of Foreign Affairs as saying. Nepal, current chair of the SAARC, had decided to postpone the SAARC Summit until further notice after four nations Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh and India decided to boycott the summit in Islamabad scheduled for November 9 and 10 last year. India and three other nations had blamed Pakistan for not creating a conducive environment and not cooperating on combating cross-border terrorism in South Asia for holding the SAARC Summit, while Pakistan vehemently denied the charges. SAARC is a regional body founded in 1985 in South Asia, comprising Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Sanaa, Jan 30 : The 8-year-old daughter of al-Qaeda ideologue Anwar al-Awlaki was one of the civilians killed in a US raid on al-Qaeda militants in Yemen, media reports said. "She was hit with a bullet in her neck and suffered for two hours", Middle East Eye quoted the eight-year-old's grandfather as saying. "The daughter of Shaykh Anwar Al-Awlaqi is martyred in the US raid in Yemen today. Obama killed his son and now Trump kills his daughter," Jihadist group Al Maqalaat tweeted. The raid that killed Awlaki's daughter was part of a dawn attack in southern Yemen on Sunday that killed a US commando and around 30 people including al-Qaeda suspects and civilians, the US military and local Yemeni officials said. It was the first combat casualty of the Trump administration and its first operation in the war-damaged Arabian Peninsula nation against a powerful al-Qaeda branch that has been a frequent target of US drone strikes. Medics at the scene said 30 people were killed, including 10 women and three children. Anwar al-Awlaki was an American and Yemeni imam and Islamic lecturer, who US government allege was a senior recruiter and motivator. He was killed in a US drone strike in 2011. Panaji, Jan 30 : A BJP minister has been accused of spreading rumours about AAP candidate Molu Velip's wife casting sexual aspersions while campaigning for the upcoming February state assembly elections. In a complaint filed at the Ponda police station on Sunday, the victim citing video footage of Industries minister Mahadev Naik verbally abusing her, has said that the latter accused her of sleeping around, while seeking for votes for her husband Velip. "My husband Molu Velip is the candidate of the AAP from Shiroda constituency and the said Mahadev Naik at a meeting abused me alleging that I go around to houses to canvass for votes for my husband by falling at people's feet, offer to sleep around and do whatever else," the complaint submitted to the Ponda police station said. In the video, Naik is heard saying: "Poonam Sawant (party worker) told me today that AAP candidate's wife is saying 'I will touch your feet', 'I will sleep too, but give me at least one vote', but do not give it. There are various ways of asking, I will not go into all those". While Naik was not available on phone for comment, sources close to him said that the complainant had misinterpreted the minister's words. "The minister did not imply this at all. All he was saying was that both the complainant and her husband are desperately campaigning for votes for the election," a close aide of Naik said. London, Jan 30 : British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has said no dual nationality Britons will be affected by US President Donald Trump's travel ban unless they travel to the US directly from one of the seven 'blacklisted' countries. The US President's team has told Johnson that Britons who have shared nationality with one of the mainly Muslim countries will not be stopped from entering America, Daily Mail online reported. But British dual citizens travelling to the US directly from one of the banned countries will face extra checks. It was feared more than 250,000 Britons with dual citizenship would be affected by the travel ban. Trump signed an executive order on Friday which prevents any citizen of seven Muslim-majority countries -- Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Syria, Libya, Sudan and Yemen -- from entering the US for 90 days. Latest figures show that more than 250,000 people who were born in Iraq, Iran and Somalia have dual British nationality. Manila, Jan 30 : Bollywood actress Sushmita Sen, who won her Miss Universe pageant in the year 1994 at Manila, is back in the city and this time as a judge. Before Sushmita, a single mother to two adopted girls, could respond to one of the queries asked by Harvey, she was greeted with a huge applaud by the crowd. Looking at the response, she said that she has to "reciprocate this love" before sharing her opinion on what are the things she is looking for in a winner. She further added: "This is the moment where a Miss Universe is created. She gives an answer that connects larger consciousness so a well spoken Miss Universe is the idea and tonight I can see six of them right there." Sushmita is one of the judges of the Miss Universe pageant, which is taking place at the Mall of Asia Arena, Pasay, in the Philippines capital. The actress previously said that she is "excited and emotional" about her stint because she had won the Miss Universe crown herself in Manila back in 1994. London, Jan 30 : Former Spice Girl Geri Horner says she feels lucky to have conceived naturally at 44. She gave birth to her first child with husband Christian, a son named Montague George Hector Horner, last week. Geri talked about her second pregnancy, including her joy at being able to give birth naturally and how yoga got her through the difficult times, in an interview with The Times, reports dailymail.co.uk. "I feel incredibly lucky to have conceived naturally at my age, 44. I see it as a miracle. Trust me, I can still moan like the rest of them but, equally, I remind myself every day that this is an absolute gift," she said. "This time round I was carrying quite a heavy baby - and it certainly felt more of a strain on my ligaments and my pelvis," Geri added, before crediting yoga for getting her through pregnancy. Geri, who is also mother to ten-year-old daughter Bluebell with ex Sacha Gervasi, said she wasn't going to be "fanatic" about losing weight and is "just like any other woman", who enjoys indulging. Sanaa, Jan 30 : Yemen's dominant Houthi-run government has strongly condemned a US raid in Baida that killed more than 30 people, mostly children and women, a government controlled news agency reported. "The National Salvation Government strongly condemns the big crime committed by the US marines on the residents of Qaifa town," a government spokesman said in a statement, Xinhua news agency reported on Monday. "This crime is a form of state terrorism practised by the US under the pretext of fighting terrorism," Saba news agency quoted the spokesperson on condition of anonymity. At least nine women and six children, including the eight-year-old daughter of former Al Qaeda leader Anwar Al-Awlaqi, were killed in the Sunday early morning raid on the village of Yakla in Qaifa area. About 10 Al Qaeda militants were also killed in the raid, according to local sources. The US has increased its military operations in Yemen since the civil war erupted in late 2014 after the Houthi militias, supported by Yemeni former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, seized power. The National Organization for Drone Victims, the first of its kind in Yemen, said that in every US drone strike or anti-terror operation, there are civilian casualties. The organisation documented 27 drone strikes in Yemen in 2016, which killed about 142 people, including many civilians. The drone strikes in 2016 were carried out in Marib, Shabwa, Abyan, Hadramout and Baida provinces, the organisation said. New Delhi, Jan 30 : Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Monday will appear in a Bhiwandi court in connection with a defamation case over his alleged remarks against the RSS regarding the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi. "Will be in Bhiwandi this morning before heading to Goa," said Gandhi in a tweet, who will be in Maharashtra during the day as he heads from the court-hearing to a political rally in the poll-bound state of Goa. The case against the Congress Vice President was filed by a Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) functionary, Rajesh Kunte, over his speech in Bhiwandi on March 6, 2014. During his party's rally the Congress leader had allegedly then said: "The RSS people had killed Gandhi." The court had granted him bail after he appeared before it at the last hearing. Manila, Jan 30 : Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has temporarily suspended his "drug war" to focus on eliminating corruption in the police force following the death of a South Korean businessman at the national police headquarters in Manila, the media reported on Monday. "We have to focus our efforts towards internal cleansing," Police Chief Ronald Dela Rosa said in a speech at Camp Crame in Quezon city, adding that when this had been carried out the president would then instruct the police to go back to the war on drugs, Efe news reported. "But right now, no more drug operations," he said. Dela Rosa made the comment after Duterte on Sunday slammed the Philippine National Police as "corrupt to the core", and he promised to focus police efforts on "cleansing" the force by conducting a thorough investigation to identify agents involved in illegal activities. However, the President said that after tackling police corruption, his drug war will continue until the end of his term in 2022, and not just for a year as he had previously planned. Since Duterte's arrival in power in June 2016, his campaign has led to more than 7,000 drug-related deaths, including 2,527 at the hands of the police in alleged clashes with suspects, according to data released last week. The new announcement comes as a result of the scandal over the case of South Korean businessman Jee Ick-joo, who was killed three months ago. On October 18, several individuals took Jee and his housemaid from his home in Angeles city, about 100 km north of Manila, in an alleged anti-drug operation. Both were taken to Camp Crame, where they released the housemaid, but the South Korean was strangled that day, according to the investigation. The case, whose investigation in the Senate began on January 26, has generated a great deal of controversy by demonstrating the climate of impunity generated by the president's anti-drug campaign. New Delhi, Jan 30 : Men migrating to bigger towns in search of employment, to support their families back home in the villages, is not uncommon. Climate change, which has caused a spike in natural disasters, has upped this "push" factor, adding to others like poverty and unemployment. But what about women? Not only has there been a rise in trafficking of women, but a World Bank study has also found that 14 per cent households in India are now women-headed, mainly because of male migration, creating an additional burden on them. This feminisation of climate change-induced challenges has, however, not got the attention of government agencies. This is a serious gap that needs to be addressed, says a new study by ActionAid, Climate Action Network-South Asia, and Brot Fuer Die Welt (Bread for the World). The study, Climate Change Knows No Borders, analyses climate-induced migration and the challenges involved in South Asia, including India. Take the case of 45-year-old Sandhya Kar of a village in Bolangir district in Odisha. Her 17-year-old son had to leave his studies mid-way and join his father who had migrated to Kerala for work after the village was hit by drought last year. "We have agricultural land -- three acres. But the crop died as the rains did not come on time last year. The ponds in our village dried up. What could we eat? We are not a family of menial labourers; we are farmers, but my son and my husband had to leave home because of this disaster," said Kar, who now lives with her daughter. As the men in the household left, the additional burden of tending to the agricultural land, over and above the household chores, fell on Kar's shoulders. "My daughter helps me out, even then it's a lot of work," she said. Rapid feminisation of agriculture as a result of male migration, the study says, has led to women reporting exhaustion, poverty and hunger. "The shortage of available labour can leave fields uncultivated during planting season," the report says. A 2015 UN Women study on the impact of climate-induced migration on women in Bangladesh found that "in most cases, migrated male family members were unable to or simply unwilling to send money back to their households, leaving the women (to seek) other means of survival during the period of migration". "A growing trend also has been noted of men who have migrated to cities abandoning their families and not returning," the study says, adding that in the absence of their husbands, women in some Bangladeshi communities reported high levels of harassment, including sexual violence. The study also points to the vulnerabilities of women and young girls migrating alone across borders from Nepal and Bangladesh to India in search of employment. They take the help of "agents" who turn out to be traffickers, forcing them into brothels in cities. "While this phenomenon has been happening for years and is widely recognised, the extent to which climate change is contributing to this, and further threatening girls' safety, is not fully understood," the study notes. Within India, climate-induced migration of women and girls from states like Assam -- annually ravaged by the floods, leading to loss of life and property -- to bigger cities like Delhi and Mumbai for employment has caught the attention of a child rights NGO. "A number of young girls are promised jobs in cities by the agents, who are actually traffickers. Trafficking cases see a spike especially after a natural disaster," said an activist of Bachpan Bachao Andolan (BBA) that is headed by Nobel Peace laureate Kailash Satyarthi. On the positive side, the study says that as a result of climate-induced male migration, women are discovering new roles as decision-makers and that they can cope in adversity. Strategies that encourage women to realise their potential and not buckle under negative social pressure may be key to their survival when they are left behind by migration. "In the face of increased risk of climate-induced disasters, the empowerment and training of women in disaster-preparedness strategies, including early warning systems, search and rescue, emergency response, and relief distribution may be key to their own and their communities' survival," the study suggests, especially in the backdrop of the 2015 earthquake in Nepal, where some communities had to rely on their women, children and the elderly to try to dig the survivors free. Further, the study also recommends research on the impact of high levels of migration on women and communities left behind, apart from developing targeted policies to tackle such challenges. (Azera Parveen Rahman can be contacted at azera.rahman@ians.in) US President Donald Trump speaks with Republican Hindu Coalition Shalabh Kumar at the Candlelight Dinner held in Washington on Jan. 19, 2017, the eve of Trump\'s swearing-in. The event was held for ... Image Source: IANS News US President Donald Trump with Bollywood celebrity Manasvi Mamgai at the Candlelight Dinner held held in Washington on Jan. 19, 2017, the eve of Trump\'s swearing-in, for high-level contributors to ... Image Source: IANS News Nikki Haley, the first Indian American to get a cabinet-level appointment, with Anika Arora, a co-founder of the Republican Hindu Coalition at the Candlelight Dinner held held in Washington on Jan. ... Image Source: IANS News New York, Jan 30 : US President Donald Trump's mantra of "Buy American" and Indian Minister Narendra Modi's 'Make in India' are not mutually exclusive because trade need not be a zero sum game, according to Shalabh Kumar, an Indian American Republican leader and the founder of the Republican Hindu Coalition (RHC). A harder line by Trump to stem the huge trade surplus with China and correct Beijing's unequal terms of trade will provide India with an opportunity to fill the void by exporting more manufactured goods, Kumar told IANS. "Increasing trade between the United States and India is my passion," he said and asserted that balanced trade can help both countries increase their exports to each other and create jobs and boost investments. He said that he expects the trade between India and the US that is over $100 billion now to rise to at least $300 billion by the end of Trump's current term and to $1 trillion in the four years after that in "Trump's second term". The policies of Trump and Modi to give priority to their respective country's job growth and investment does not mean a freeze or a shutout of trade with the other nation, Kumar said. Both countries have mutual needs and the US can increase exports of equipment in the defence, energy, nuclear and technology areas and India can grow its exports of services and manufactured products. If trade increases bilaterally, it will create more jobs in the US and in India, he said. A big donor, Kumar personally gave $898,000 to the Trump Victory fund, a joint programme of the Trump campaign, the Republican National Committee and state organisations to help his election effort. He is on Trump's transition committee for finance and the inaugural committee. Kumar was the prime mover of the RHC rally in October at which Trump campaigned on a promise of being a friend of Indian Americans and Hindus and praised Narendra Modi. He is close to former Speaker Newt Gingrich, who mentored the RHC and serves as its honorary chairman. At the Candlelight Dinner held last week on the of the presidential inauguration for major donors and VIPs, Trump spent 20 minutes with the Kumar family and RHC members, Kumar said. The high-level event was the main inaugural eve event and took place at the same time as the more general Asian Pacific American Presidential Inaugural Gala. Anika Arora, a co-founder of the RHC, said that when Trump met them at the dinner, he thanked the organisaiton for mobilising voters, especially in the crucial swing states, resulting in the "great culmination" of the campaign with his election. "He acknowledged our efforts in getting the community to turn out in large numbers to vote for him," she said. Trump also introduced the RHC to his cabinet nominees and told them about the role of its leadership to get the vote out for him, she added. For the Inauguration Welcome Concert held earlier, RHC arranged for a Bollywood performance led by the actress and supermodel Manasvi Mamgai at which Mika Singh made a special appearance. Trump's three high-level appointments of Indian Americans and Hindus to the administration and two to the senior White House positions showed his commitment to keeping his word that that the community would have a friend in him in the White House, Kumar said. For the first time, an Indian American, UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, was appointed to a cabinet-level position. Ajit Pai was made the chairman of the Federal Communication Commission and Seema Verma the head of the government health insurance programmes, Medicare and Medicaid. Trump has appointed lawyer Uttam Dhillon as his special assistant and associate counsel, and Raj Shah as his deputy assistant and research director. Kumar said that Trump's transition team had asked the RHC for resumes of suitable candidates for it to review as it goes about filling the the hundreds of jobs in the new administration. He said that he is scouting for talent and with better organisation and resume-matching a many more Indian Americans can find positions in an administration that is open to the community. In the US each administration can make political appointment for the duration of the term to better implement its policies. The administrations ask supporters to make recommendations. It is estimated that there about 4,000 political positions open and of them about 1,200, including ambassadorships, need Senate approval; about 475 are in the White House, and 750 are at the senior executive level. (Arul Louis can be reached at arul.l@ians.in) Jalandhar, Jan 30 : Punjab's strong non-resident community has arrived in hordes from Canada, Britain, the US and other countries for the February 4 assembly elections in the state. All major parties are paying special attention to the diaspora -- or non-resident Indians (NRIs) -- who have arrived here as the community is believed to have an influence on voting prospects in Punjab. In the past over one year, not only have NRIs extended support to the three major parties in the fray -- the Congress, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the ruling Shiromani Akali Dal -- but are also believed to have made major financial contribtions to the parties. Not only this, top leaders of all parties, be it AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal, Punjab Congress President and former Chief Minister Amarinder Singh, and Akali Dal President and Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal, have all travelled abroad in the last one year to woo NRIs. "The biggest gainer from the NRI support in recent months has been the AAP. A large number of NRIs, particularly from Canada, are already in Punjab to campaign for the party. The NRIs have funded the AAP in a big way," Harbaksh Singh, a NRI based in Vancouver-Canada, told IANS. When the first batch of AAP-supporting NRIs landed in New Delhi and Amritsar recently, top AAP leaders like Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, Kumar Vishwas, Sanjay Singh and others welcomed them with full fanfare. Amarinder Singh recently flagged off a special bus of NRIs, who had come to support the Congress from Britain and Canada, to move around in Punjab and elicit support for the party. The NRIs have fanned out in constituencies across Punjab, especially in their respective districts and villages, to campaign aggressively for their respective parties. On Saturday, carrying "Jhaaru" (broom, the AAP's election symbol) in one hand and the party's flag in the other, scores of Punjabi NRIs travelled through villages and towns of Doaba -- the area between the Beas and Sutlej rivers comprising the districts of Jalandhar, Kapurthala, Hoshiarpur and Nawanshehr -- that is also known as the "NRI belt". The 300-car cavalcade of NRIs started from Jalandhar, often called the NRI capital of Punjab, urging people to launch a "freedom struggle" in Punjab -- from the Akali Dal and Congress. But the arrival of NRIs has not been without controversy. Sukhbir Badal recently alleged that the AAP had aligned with pro-Khalistan and radical elements based in other countries. AAP national General Secretary Sanjay Singh condemned Badal for the remarks and for "branding the whole Punjabi NRI community as terrorists and blaming AAP for getting funds from radicals". "Sukhbir Badal's utterances against NRIs supporting AAP are unwarranted and a great insult of Punjabis settled abroad. NRIs in Canada had extended moral and financial support to AAP to see a prosperous Punjab," Singh said. "We (NRIs) have come to Punjab to ensure defeat of the SAD-BJP alliance and Congress. We must save Punjab from mafia rule. AAP is the only and last hope for the people of Punjab," said Surinder Mavi, convener of the "Chalo Punjab" campaign in Toronto. Badal's remarks are being questioned by some. "NRIs had supported SAD in 2007 and also funded their election campaign with the hope that Akalis would give good governance," Jagtar Singh Sanghera, head of AAP's NRI cell, pointed out, adding that the Akalis were now describing the same NRIs, who have switched to supporting AAP, as "terrorists and radicals". Joban Randhawa, youth wing convener of AAP in Canada, said that NRIs would work hard to get rid of the present SAD-BJP government. "We will spread into constituencies in Doaba and will target Majitha, the constituency of Bikram Singh Majithia who controls the drug trade. Over 35,000 NRIs have enrolled for the 'Chalo Punjab' movement in Canada and many of them would reach Punjab," Randhawa said. But not all are convinced about the role of NRIs in Punjab's assembly elections. "The NRIs who are coming to Punjab do not have a political background. There are a number of Punjabi NRIs who are successful politicians in the Britain, Canada and United States. They are not coming to campaign in Punjab," Harjit Gill, who was the first Asian mayor and sheriff of Gloucestershire in England, told IANS. "Most of the NRIs who have come before the polls are on a holiday. They have no experience in politics. They have collected huge amounts of money from people in these countries in the name of the parties," said Gill, who hails from Dakoha village near Jalandhar Cantt and is settled in Gloucester city since 1978. "The NRIs just want a good government and good governance in Punjab, their home state which they love. The parties make big promises to NRIs in their manifestos but there is hardly any implementation of the same," he added. (Jaideep Sarin can be contacted at jaideep.s@ians.in) Quebec, Jan 30 : Two gunmen opened fire in a Quebec mosque killing six people and injuring eight others. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called it a "terrorist attack on Muslims". Police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe said 39 others survived Sunday's shooting, reported the National Post newspaper. Police said two suspects were arrested - one near the mosque and another near AZle d'OrlAans island, about 40 km away. A man who said he was a witness to the attack told Radio-Canada that two masked suspects entered the mosque, they appeared to have thick QuAbAcois accents and they shouted "Allahu Akbar" as they began shooting. He said the bullets struck people who were praying. "We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge," the Prime Minister said in a statement. "On behalf of all Canadians, Sophie and I offer our deepest condolences to the family and friends of all those who have died and we wish a speedy recovery to those who have been injured," he said. The president of the mosque, Mohammed Yangui, told Postmedia News that he received a call about the mass shooting around 8 p.m. on Sunday. He said people were at the Centre Culturel Islamique de QuAbec for regular evening prayers and 60 to 100 people were in attendance. The mosque is one of six in the Quebec City region. "This is a terrible event," Yangui said. "We're in a state of shock. I can't find words to describe it." In June last year, worshippers at the same mosque discovered the severed head of a pig left in front of one of the doors. Yangui said the mosque had not received any threats recently. A non-profit group that fights Islamophobia in Quebec said it has been asking authorities "for years" to deal with threats and attacks on Quebec mosques. The Collectif Canadien Anti-Islamophobie said on Twitter that the Quebec City attack was preventable but nothing was done. The shooting came two days after US President Donald Trump imposed an American travel ban that bars citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the country. New Delhi, Jan 30 : Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday asked the Election Commission if it will "dare" act against Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and Congress leader Amarinder Singh for asking voters to accept money to attend rallies. Kejriwal's remarks came a day after Parrikar asked voters in Goa to accept money for attending rallies but vote only for the Bharatiya Janata Party. In Lambi constituency in Punjab, Captain Amarinder Singh, the Congress Chief Ministerial candidate, also reportedly told people that it was okay to accept money if offered by any party "but vote for the Congress". "Will Election Commission dare take action against Parrikar... I urge PMO (Prime Minister's Office) to allow Election Commission to act against Parrikar," Kejriwal tweeted on Monday. Kejriwal had earlier alleged that the poll panel was acting on the directions of the PMO. "Will Election Commission register an FIR against Captain? Or should I say, would Election Commission be granted permission by the PMO to act in this case," the Aam Aadmi Party leader asked. The Election Commission on Sunday pulled up Kejriwal and told Goa officials to file an FIR against him for telling voters to take money from other political parties but vote for the AAP. Washington, Jan 30 : US President Donald Trump held telephonic conversations with the King of Saudi Arabia and the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi to seek their support for the creation of safe zones in Syria and Yemen, a White House statement said. The calls on Sunday made no mention of Trump's ban on the entry of citizens and refugees from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Syria, Yemen, Libya and Somalia, the Politico news magazine reported. In his call to Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the President "requested, and the king agreed to support, safe zones in Syria and Yemen, as well as supporting other ideas to help the many refugees who are displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said. It was not immediately clear what Trump meant by "requested" safe zones in those two war-struck countries or what the Saudis are willing to do. The US President and King Salman also "agreed on the importance of rigorously enforcing the (nuclear) deal with Iran and of addressing Tehran's destabilising regional activities." The Saudi Arabian monarch also invited Trump to "lead a Middle East effort to defeat terrorism." However, the White House did not give details about Trump's conversation with Abu Dhabi's Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, other than to suggest the call went well and covered traditional subjects such as fighting terrorists. "The President also raised the idea of supporting safe zones for the refugees displaced by the conflict in the region, and the Crown Prince agreed to support this initiative," it added. New Delhi : Oommen C Kurian With 200 million people, Uttar Pradesh (UP) has about the same population as Brazil; an economy the size of Qatars -- which has 2.4 million people, the same as the UP town of Bijnore; per capita gross domestic product (GDP) comparable to Kenyas; and an infant mortality rate that rivals The Gambia, a poverty-ridden, peanut-growing west-African nation. With 75 districts, 814 blocks and 97,607 villages, UP is larger, by population, than all but five countries. It holds the key to political dominion over India, but, in terms of health and nutritional outcomes, infrastructure and coverage indicators, it is widely considered a laggard, improving slowly, with wide disparities within. The per capita public expenditure on health (by both Centre and states) is the lowest in UP among the five states with 169 million voters going to polls between February 4 and March 8, 2017, our analysis shows. Goa, a state with less than 1 per cent of UP's population, spends more than five times more, per capita, on its citizens' health. UP's average spending is 70 per cent of the Indian average. As we will see, this low spending leads to fewer doctors, nurses and paramedics in healthcare institutions, leaves one in two children without full immunisation, 14 per cent of the state's households faced with "catastrophic" health expenditure, higher than 25 per cent of total household spending, and a health insurance coverage of 4.2 per cent compared to the Indian average of 15.2 per cent. Not enough doctors, hospitals poorer health outcomes In Uttar Pradesh, doctors accounted for more than half of all health workers, the highest such proportion in the country, according to a 2016 World Health Organisation study, probably a result of not having enough other health workers in the first place. UP also had the lowest share of female health workers, 19.9 per cent, compared to the Indian average of 38 per cent. For example, most of the 30 Indian districts ranked lowest in terms of density of nurses were located in UP, with some also located in Bihar and Jharkhand. UP, which had 16.16 per cent of the country's population, had only 10.81 per cemt of overall health workers. Although numbers based on the latest census data -- as yet unanalysed -- may have improved partly because of improvement due to the 11-year-old National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), UP's overall rankings are likely to be unchanged, given that UP still has a 50 per cent shortfall of the nursing staff at primary health centres (PHCs) and community health centres (CHCs). The latest government data on UP's government hospitals is not promising. The CHCs in UP are 84 per cent short of specialists, according to the Rural Health Statistics, 2016. The PHCs and CHCs, taken together, have only half the staff they should have. Although all PHCs have doctors, one in three PHCs does not have a lab technician. Of 36 Indian states and union territories, UP was third from the bottom in terms of infant mortality rate (IMR, deaths per 1,000 live births) across rural and urban areas, the latest Sample Registration System bulletin for 2015, released in December 2016, showed. Many relatively poor states do much better than Uttar Pradesh. UP has India's second-highest maternal mortality rate (MMR, deaths per 100,000 births), according to government data. UP also has the lowest sex ratio at birth among bigger Indian states, barring Haryana, according to 2014 SRS data, the latest available. Over the last decade, UP's IMR was higher than the national average, across genders. Although the overall IMR has improved from 73 in 2005 to 46 in 2015, the gap between UP's IMR and the India IMR remains large, as the following figure shows. UP is among the few Indian states where the mean age at marriage for women is still below the legal age of marriage of 18, data from the Rapid Survey on Children (RSoC) 2013-14 showed, pointing to the need to fight child marriage to improve the high IMR and MMR in the state. Deaths that don't trigger debates UP reports more than 75 per cebt of Japanese encephalitis (JE) cases reported nationwide. In 2016, of 1,277 Acute Encephalitis Syndrome (AES) deaths reported in India, 615 were in UP, as were 73 of 275 reported JE deaths nationwide. However, even in areas of eastern UP, where JE/AES kill people year after year, such deaths have not been an election issue. Uttar Pradesh has the lowest birth-registration coverage in India Legal identity is a fundamental human right. A child who is not registered at birth is in danger of being denied the right to an official identity, a recognised name and a nationality, as Unicef observed. The UN's sustainable development goals (SDGs) -- which India has signed on to achieve -- recognise this and exhort that by 2030, all member countries should provide a legal identity for all, including birth registration. The overall level of registration of births in India has increased to 88.8 per cent in 2014 from 85.6 per cent in 2013, according to the latest available data, and 16 states/union territories achieved registration of all births, by 2014. This birth-registration progress has eluded UP, which registers no more than 68.3 per cent of all births. If one avoids official statistics and looks at third-party surveys, such as the RSoC 2013-14 , UP's registration of births is among the lowest at just 39.1 per cent, while the national average is 71.9 per cent. UP -- along with Bihar -- is often accused of pulling down the national average on registration of births. Until 2016, the Civil Registration System (CRS) reports had a separate India analysis that used the term "excluding UP and Bihar" to indicate India's progress. Why UP citizens spend their own money on healthcare than most other states UP spends Rs 488 on the healthcare of each citizen every year, according to recent research by Brookings India, a think tank, based on the latest government data available (71st round of National Sample Survey Office data). That is higher only than Bihar and Jharkhand, and just 26 per cent of Rs 1,830 that Himachal Pradesh spends. With health-insurance reaching 4 per cent of UP's 200 million people (the all-India average is 15 per cent), and gaps in public infrastructure, more people depend on private facilities for out-patient healthcare than any other state, barring Bihar and Haryana. Human-resource gaps in the public sector contribute substantially to high out-of-pocket (OOP) spending by UP households. With low state spending and predominance of private healthcare sector, 80 per cent of all health spending is done by households themselves, lower only than Kerala, West Bengal and Odisha, according to Brookings research. (In arrangement with IndiaSpend.org, a data-driven, non-profit, public interest journalism platform. Oomen Kurian is Fellow at Observer Research Foundation's Health Initiative.. The views expressed are those of IndiaSpend. Feedback at respond@indiaspend.org) Thane (Maharashtra), Jan 30 : Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Monday said that he was fighting against an ideology that killed Father of the Nation, Mahatma Gandhi. Interacting with the media after his appearance in a Bhiwandi court, the Congress leader said that Gandhi was killed but his teachings would never be erased. "Meri ladaayi vichaardhaara ke khilaaf hai, woh vichardhara jisne Gandhiji ki hatya ki (My fight is against the ideology that killed Mahatama Gandhi)," he said. He said that Gandhi lives in the heart of every Indian and that cannot be erased. The Bhiwandi court, where Rahul Gandhi appeared in connection with a defamation case over his alleged remarks against the RSS in connection with the assassination of Gandhi, adjourned the hearing till March 3. The case against the Congress Vice President was filed by a Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) functionary, Rajesh Kunte, over his speech in Bhiwandi on March 6, 2014. During his party's rally, the Congress leader had then allegedly said: "The RSS people had killed Gandhi." On January 30, 1948, Gandhi was assassinated by Nathuram Godse, a Hindu nationalist, who fired three bullets into his chest at a prayer meeting in New Delhi. Los Angeles, Jan 30 : Actors Denzel Washington and Viola Davis from the 2016 drama film "Fences" won the top honours at the 23rd Screen Actors Guild Awards (SAG-AFTRA) where stars talked about politics right from the moment the awards ceremony began. While Washington won the Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role award, Davis was given the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role trophy at the ceremony that took place on January 29 night, reports cnn.com. However, the highlight of the awards gala was how the stars slammed US President Donald Trump's executive order on banning citizens, including refugees, from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US. From "Scandal" star Kerry Washington explaining that actors are activists to Ashton Kutcher declaring "I am a citizen of the world", Hollywood did not shy away from criticising Trump's 'Muslim ban'. Kutcher, who was announcing the award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series, greeted "everyone in airports that belong in my US". "You are a part of the fabric of who we are. And we love you and we welcome you," Kutcher said. Kutcher presented the award to "Veep" actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who said in her acceptance speech that she is the daughter of an immigrant who fled the persecution of Nazi-occupied France. Besides them, actor William H. Macy, who won the Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series for his role in "Shameless", and "The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story" actress Sarah Paulson, who won the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Television Movie or Miniseries award, also talked about the ban. It was "Moonlight" star Mahershala Ali who raised eyebrows when he said that his mother is an ordained minister who was not thrilled when he converted to Islam 17 years ago. "But I tell you, now, you put things to the side and I'm able to see her and she's able to see me. We love each other. The love has grown. And that stuff is minutia. It's not that important," said Ali, who won the Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role trophy for his role in "Moonlight". Actress Emma Stone won for Outstanding Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role award for her role in "La La Land". The Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Theatrical Motion Picture was won by "Hidden Figures". London, Jan 30 : Actor Antonio Banderas was taken to a hospital near his home in Surrey after he reportedly suffered a major heart scare while exercising. Banderas was taken to hospital last week. Banderas was working out when he suddenly experienced agonising pain in his chest, reports aceshowbiz.com. An ambulance was called and he was rushed to St Peter's Hospital in Chertsey. Doctors kept the 56-year-old in for observation, but decided to release him after being satisfied that he was safe to go home. Banderas, who is now recovering, confirmed that he had an "episode". He praised the doctors who helped him during his health crisis. "The Expendables 3" star lives in Cobham after he divorced Melanie Griffith in 2015. He is currently dating a Dutch investment consultant named Nicole Kempel. New Delhi, Jan 30 : Ending months of speculation, Vodafone on Monday confirmed it is in talks with the Aditya Vikram Birla group for the merger of its Indian entity and Idea Cellular in what will be the largest such deal in the country's telecom space once it materialises. The merger will create an entity with a subscriber base of more than 400 million to emerge as the largest player in India, replacing the current dominant player Bharti Airtel, which currently has over 260 million users on its network. "Vodafone confirms that it is in discussions with the Aditya Birla Group about an all share merger of Vodafone India -- excluding Vodafone's 42 per cent stake in Indus Towers -- and Idea," the Indian entity's parent company said in a statement. "Any merger would be effected through the issue of new shares in Idea to Vodafone and would result in Vodafone deconsolidating Vodafone India." In a clarification later, Idea Cellular said it is in preliminary discussions with Vodafone. "In view of the fact that the discussion is at the preliminary stage, the company is not in a position to share any further details," Idea Cellular said in a regulatory filing. "However, it is important to mention that the fundamental premise of preliminary discussion is based on equal rights between Aditya Birla Group and Vodafone in the combined entity," the company added. Vodafone India has over 200 million subscribers, with a presence in all the 22 circles the country has been divided into. It intends to have 4G services in 17 circles, covering 2,400 towns, by the end of this fiscal. Idea, on the other hand, says it has a similar subscriber base, also with a presence in all the 22 circles. It intends to have 4G services in 20 circles by"March 2017. "Given the financial pressure and dynamics in the telecom sector consolidation is imperative. It is good for both industr" and consumers," Rajan S. Mathews, Director General, Cellular Operators' Association of India told IANS. Mathews said the merged entity of Vodafone and Idea Cellular will have 43 per cent of the revenue market share. "The merger confirms the trend towards consolidation. It shows that the companies recognise the nature and size of the challenge posed to their businesses by Jio. This will help both companies to improve their competitiveness," Mahesh Uppal, Director, telecom consultancy firm Com First told IANS. "Going forward there will be a reduction in number of players to four and consequently a decrease in the competition in the sector. This is not necessarily good for consumers in the short term. In the medium term, these consolidations will make the sector a bit a more stable," he added. Both Vodafone India and Idea have to figure out their long term business strategy and merger could well be the path, given current industry competitiveness and dynamics, said Amresh Nandan, Research Direct"r, Gartner. "As per our recent note, we believe that a potential Idea and Vodafone merger could make strategic sense. However, the merger would result in the combined entity facing practical implementation issues, the most significant of them could be the cost associated with liberalizing the spectrum. The combined entity would also breach spectrum caps in 5 circles, the market value of which comes t" Rs 75 billion," said Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Industry speculation over a possible merger has been doing the rounds for nearly a year and intensified after Reliance Jio entered the market with its mega voice and data offer, with an announcement that voice will be free on its network for life. But the Aditya Vikram Birla Group had scoffed at media reports suggesting merger talks in their regulatory filings with the stock exchanges, though analysts found a lot of synergies in such a move. Earlier this month, JP Morgan spoke about the merits of such a merger. "This could unlock more than $9 billion in potential synergies and offer an elegant route to deconsolidating India, thereby helping focus (Vodafone's) attention back onto a rebounding European equity story," the top investment banker said. As regards Idea, it said, in the migration towards free voice regime, the company stands to be the most vulnerable. Idea has a higher of rural and semi-urban subscribers, who are not as data-hungry as the creamy users in metros and cities, where it has a relatively limited presence. Analysts also maintained that the initial public offering by Vodafone India did not make sense. "We believe an elegant alternative would be for Vodafone to reverse merge into locally listed peer Idea (a deal that offers Idea a solution to their mounting balance sheet challenges)," JM Morgan said. Idea Cellular's stock prices spurt at the merger talks announcement. Its stocks closed at Rs 97.95 per share up by 25.90 per cent at the closing time of the BSE. Kuala Lumpur, Jan 30 : Malaysia has expanded the search area for the six persons still missing after their boat sank off Sabah state, with neighbouring Brunei also joining the search effort, authorities said on Monday. At least three persons were found dead and so far 20 Chinese tourists and two crew members have been rescued, while six persons remain missing. Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency said the search and rescue operations on Monday were launched at 7.00 a.m. with the search area expanded to 1,500 square nautical miles into waters in Brunei, Xinhua news agency reported. Vessels from the Maritime Enforcement Agency, Malaysian Navy and a C-130 aircraft from Malaysian air force are among the assets deployed for the search. Brunei is also sending a helicopter for the operations, according to the Maritime Enforcement Agency. The boat with a total of 31 persons on board, went missing on Saturday when travelling from Kota Kinabalu to Pulau Mengalum, a popular tourist island. Thane, Jan 30 : Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Monday said here that he is fighting against an ideology that killed the Father of the Nation, Mahatma Gandhi. Interacting briefly with the media after his appearance in a Bhiwandi court, the Congress leader said that Gandhi was killed but his teachings would never be erased. "Meri ladaayi vichaardhaara ke khilaaf hai, woh vichardhara jisne Gandhiji ki hatya ki (My fight is against the ideology that killed Mahatama Gandhi)," he said. Rahul stressed said his fight is against those who killed Gandhi, "against those who removed Gandhi from the calendar". He said that Gandhi will live in the heart of India forever. "They have killed Gandhi, but they cannot erase him." After the hearing today, the court adjourned the matter until March 3. At the previous hearing, on November 16, 2016, the Chief Judicial Magistrate had granted bail to Rahul Gandhi, who is an accused in a defamation case filed by a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh activist, Rajesh Kunte. Kunte had filed the case against him for his speech in Bhiwandi on March 6, 2014, during the campaigning for the Lok Sabha elections. At a party rally, he had allegedly then said: "The RSS people had killed Gandhi." On January 30, 1948, Gandhi was assassinated by Nathuram Godse, a Hindu nationalist, who shot three bullets at him at a prayer meeting in New Delhi. New Delhi, Jan 30 : The Soviets pumped huge amounts of cash to influence Indian politicians, including a large number of Congress MPs during Prime Minister Indira Gandhis government, to influence Indian policies, according to a now declassified December 1985 CIA report. This continued into the Rajiv Gandhi rule, although he tried to reduce the influence of Moscow on India, says the report. The confidential 24-page memo, redacted heavily with lots of pages removed, also notes that the Soviets funded opposition parties including the Communist Party of India (CPI) and the CPI-Marxist "through a combination of kickback schemes, normal business transactions and direct cash payments". "In addition to party funding, the Soviets channel money to individual Congress and opposition politicians (through) clandestine payments. This cash is reportedly obtained from the favourable Soviet trade balance," said the document titled "The Soviets in India", which is one of the millions of CIA memos declassified recently. "As many as 40 per cent Congress MPs in (Indira) Gandhi's last government had received Soviet political contributions," the report reads. "The Soviet embassy maintains a large reserve of rupees for various uses - including clandestine payments to Congress politiciansA Many Congress politicians are also businessmen who trade with the USSR." It says that the Soviets had also been orchestrating political activities of at least a dozen front groups in India -- including the Indo-Soviet Cultural Society, the local affiliate of the World Peace Council and a professional journalists' organisation. The 1985 document notes that the Soviet Union over the last three decades had "developed a substantial capacity to plan and orchestrate large-scale propaganda and disinformation campaigns involving the placement of article with the major Indian wire services and a wide range of Indian newspapers". It said that the Soviet had "considerable success in putting the United States on the defensive in its diplomatic and commercial dealings in India" because American officials in New Delhi would devote "much time and effort" to rebut Soviet articles in the pres The report named several leading Indian newspapers, including the Times of India, the Hindustan Times, the Statesman and the Hindu as often carrying Soviet propaganda without questioning the source, although often in their editorial stance the mainline newspapers did not buy much of the propaganda. The report quoting a defector (possibly Vasili Mitrokhin) said that the Soviets use 40 to 50 journalists annually to place material and over the last several years had used around 200 to 300 journalists for this purpose. It said that the focus of the Soviets was to place stories in the mainline press against the United States, but also in favour of the India government. It said that pro-soviet papers like the Patriot or the Blitz used the material but the Indian public by and large did not place much credibility in them. It said many Indian papers were reluctant to use stories without sources, so the press section spent a lot of effort to "develop a bogus source" for a story. Another technique was to place material with an Indian news agency which would run it with a Moscow dateline as its own story so that newspapers could run it. The CIA report said the Soviets had "immense success" using this technique with the Press Trust of India whose "key managers" were "on Soviet paroll." It also named United News of India and Samachar, as well as Communist party controlled small agencies as being used for placing Soviet stories. The CIA report quoted two Soviet defectors as saying that they had so much success with the main agency for placement of stories that among Soviet officials the joke was that PTI stood for "Press Tass of India." The press section of the Soviet Embassy in New Delhi was the central point for press placements operations in India and its various arms employed hundreds of Indians to further its propaganda, the report said. The press section regularly carried out campaigns and one such campaign, it said, even "jeopardized completion of a trade deal between the Indian government and a US firm". Also, often reports accusing the United States of aiming to "balkanize" India appeared. Some placements by the Soviets even accused the US of orchestrating assassination of Indira Gandhi. The revelations of the CIA report almost appear to corroborate a 2005 book by former KGB operative Vasili Mitrokhin. Mitrokhin claimed to have smuggled thousands of secret documents out from the erstwhile USSR. The documents said that Gandhi was sent money in suitcases for the Congress and the KGB had funded election campaigns of former defence minister V.K. Krishna Menon in the 1970s. Brussels, Jan 30 : Mohamed Abrini, the suspected "man in the hat" bomber caught on camera during the Brussels airport attack last year, has been charged in France over the November 2015 Paris terror attacks, the media reported. According to a BBC report on Monday, Abrini was handed over to French authorities by Belgium for questioning about the Paris attacks that left 130 dead, Belgian federal prosecutors said in a statement. He was detained last April for his suspected involvement in the March 22 Brussels attacks, which killed 32 people, and the Paris killings, both of which were claimed by the Islamic State militant group. "In the framework of the investigation related to the attacks in Paris on November 13, 2015, Mohamed Abrini was surrendered to the French judicial authorities for a period of one day," the prosecutor's office said in a statement. Abrini was spotted in a car with key Paris suspect Salah Abdeslam when it stopped at a petrol station in Ressons two days before the attacks on the French capital. His fingerprints and DNA were found in two "safe houses" in Brussels, as well as in a car used during the Paris attacks. Following his arrest, he also admitted picking up Salah Abdeslam after the attacks and driving him back to Belgium. Mohamed Abrini was driven to Paris from Belgium in a heavily-armed convoy so the case against him could be formally launched, BFMTV reported. Beijing, Jan 30 : China's plans for deep space exploration include two Mars missions and one Jupiter probe. China plans its first Mars probe by 2020, Wu Yanhua, Vice Director of the China National Space Administration, was quoted as saying by Xinhua news agency. A second Mars probe will bring back samples and conduct research on the planet's structure, composition and environment, Wu said. Also on the agenda are an asteroid exploration, and a fly-by of the Jupiter system. China aims to become a space power around 2030, with an advanced and open aerospace industry and space infrastructure. Pune/Mumbai, Jan 30 : Infosys software engineer K. Rasila Raju paid with her life for objecting to a security guard staring at her while she worked in office on Sunday evening, police said in Pune on Monday. Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Hinjewadi Ganesh Shinde told mediapersons that the security guard was arrested in Mumbai early Monday. An Assamese working as a security guard, the 26-year Bhaben Saikia was charged with Rasila's murder and remanded to police custody till February 4 by a Pune court on Monday evening. According to Shinde, the victim, K. Rasila Raju, 25, was a software engineer from Kerala and had been working with Infosys at its building in the Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park, Hinjewadi, since 2015. Though it was her weekly off, she had come to office to complete a project and had been engaged in online communication with her colleagues at the company's Bengaluru office, police said. Shinde said that the victim had objected to Saikia staring at her when she came out of her office and threatened to complain to his bosses. Around 5 p.m., Saikia entered her ninth floor office and allegedly strangled her with a computer cord. Rasila hailed from Ojhampoayil village near Peramabara in Kozhikode district of Kerala, and her family has been informed of the tragedy. According to a complaint lodged by her team manager, Abhijit Kothari, Rasila had reported for work around 2.30 p.m. and was alone after another colleague left at 3 p.m. Around 6.20 p.m., Kothari had attempted to contact her but got no response and the other team members, who were online, also reported that she had been incommunicado for an hour both on landline phones and her mobile phone. Finally, at 7.30 p.m. Kothari called the building security and asked them to check on her. Shortly afterwards, a security guard who went with an access card informed him of the tragedy which befell Rasila in the conference room of the office. Kothari, who rushed there from his home, said other security guards, a doctor and police also arrived and found Rasila with blood splattered on her face. She was assaulted brutally and strangulated with a yellow net LAN wire. The police immediately checked the CCTV footage which showed that Rasila entered the room around 3.05 p.m., came out for a break around 5 p.m. and later Saikia followed her into the office, though he was not authorised to enter that area. This is the second sensational murder of a young techie in Pune, Maharashtra's IT, culture and academic capital. A 23-year-old software engineer with Capegemini, Antara D. Das, was stabbed to death by her former colleague Santosh Kumar on the night of December 24. The victim's parents informed police that Kumar had been stalking her for eight months and trying to force her into marriage, but she rejected his overtures. Kumar was arrested a week later. Geneva, Jan 30 : The United Nations' High Commissioner for Human Rights on Monday denounced as illegal and mean-spirited the United States' visa ban on citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries. The official Twitter account for the UN Human Rights agency quoted its Chairman Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein as saying "discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law", efe news reported. Donald Trump's executive order bans US visas to citizens of Muslim-majority Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Syria for a period of at least 90 days. "The US ban is also mean-spirited, and wastes resources needed for proper counter-terrorism," al-Hussein added. Trump's immigration order on Friday also saw the US suspend its refugee programme for a period of 120 days with the aim of restructuring the process to prevent visas from being issued to potential terrorists. Visas for Syrian asylum seekers would be indefinitely put on hold, according to the presidential order. The policy drew immediate protest from international institutions such as the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the international organisation for migration (IMO), which on Saturday petitioned the US government to uphold its long tradition of offering asylum to those fleeing conflict. In a joint statement, the two agencies said they "hope that the US will continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution." UN sources estimate that since October 2016, the US has admitted 25,600 refugees. According to the nation's Refugee Processing Center, the US accepted 85,000 refugees in the 2015-16 fiscal year. The country is also the world's biggest financial contributor to the UNHCR, investing roughly $1.5 billion into that institution in 2016, much more than the European Union ($341 million), Germany ($284 million) and Japan ($164 million). Islamabad, Jan 30 : A fire destroyed over 90 shops, houses, vehicles and a food depot in a commercial area in the Leepa Valley in the Pakistan-administered Kashmir, officials and residents told Pakistani media on Monday. Leepa Valley is to the east of Muzaffarabad, the capital city of the region. The fire, reportedly caused by electrical short-circuiting in a shop, destroyed millions of rupees' worth of merchandise, locals said. The blaze started arround 11.00 p.m. Sunday night and rapidly engulfed the entire market, Jhelum Valley's Deputy Commissioner Abdul Hameed Kiani told Dawn. Since nearly all affected structures were made from wood and connected with each other, the fire spread rapidly even as owners watched their belongings being reduced to ashes, he said. When the winter sets in, Leepa Valley becomes inaccessible to vehicles as the only road link to the area runs through the over-9,800 feet high Birthwar Gali. A state-owned food depot, where 1,400 tons of wheat flour was stored, was also reduced to ashes, Kiani said. A mosque was partially damaged in the blaze. Patna, Jan 30 : Teenage love stories are common as are the stories of Cupid's arrows being shot across the internet. But rare indeed is the septuagenarian couple, falling in love on Facebook and ending up in a wedlock in Bihar's Jamui distrcit. Satrughan Prasad Singh, 77, an engineer by profession, left his Ghovghat village in Jamui in 1960s after completing his engineering studies in Kolkata and settled in Germany with his wife. She, unfortunately, died in 2014. Call it destiny or hand of technology, a depressed Singh met 75-year-old German woman Edeltrud Habib on Facebook and developed a friendship with her. That soon morphed into an old-age love story. "Soon we fell in love and decided to live as life partners. Now we are married," said a joyous Singh. Habib's husband died five years ago. "The marriage ceremony was held in a temple with austerity as per the age-old Hindu rituals on Sunday, and it was attended by his family members and other relatives," Mahender Singh, a relative of newly-wed Singh, said. Singh retired 16 years ago after he worked for 38 years in Germany while Habib retired from a judicial service. Singh recalled that after their friendship on Facebook, he met Habib at an airport in Germany. "I am happy that my family, relatives and others welcomed my decision and helped us to become a couple," he said. Habib said she would try to learn Hindi and would re-visit Singh's native place. "I love Indian people, their traditions, culture and heart-warming behaviour," she said. The newly-wed septuagenarian couple will after a few days return to Germany to begin a new life there. Washington, Jan 30 : Jihadi groups celebrated the Trump administration's ban on travel from seven Muslim-majority countries, saying the new policy validates their claim that the US is at war with Islam, a newspaper here reported. Comments posted to pro-Islamic State social media accounts predicted that President Trump's executive order would persuade American Muslims to side with the extremists, said a report in the Washington Post on Sunday. One posting hailed the US President as "the best caller to Islam", while others predicted that Trump would soon launch a new war in the Middle East. "[Islamic State leader Abu Bakr] al-Baghdadi has the right to come out and inform Trump that banning Muslims from entering America is a 'blessed ban'," said one posting to a pro-Islamic State channel on Telegram, a social-media platform. The writer compared the executive order to the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, which Islamic militant leaders at the time hailed as a "blessed invasion" that ignited anti-Western fervour across the Islamic world, said the Post. Several postings suggested that Trump was fulfilling the predictions of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born Al Qaeda leader and preacher who famously said that the "West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens". Awlaki was killed in a US drone strike in Yemen in 2011. "When US President Donald Trump says 'We don't want them here' and bans the Muslim immigrants from Muslim countries, there is one thing that comes to our mind," said another posting, beneath a banner of al-Awlaki and his quote. Another posting on the Telegram channel "Abu Magrebi" said Trump's actions "clearly revealed the truth and harsh reality behind the American government's hatred towards Muslims". "Jihadists would have to argue to lengths that Obama, Bush, and others held anti-Islam agendas and hated the religion -- not just radical terrorists," said Rita Katz, founder of the SITE Intelligence Group, a private organisation that monitors jihadi websites. "Trump, however, makes that argument a lot easier for them to sell to their followers," she said. The reaction to the ban from Islamic State sympathisers came as current and former US officials also expressed concern that the temporary ban would undermine the global fight against violent Islamic militants. Senator John McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he worried about the ban's impact on Muslim troops fighting alongside Americans to destroy the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. "The effect will probably in some areas give ISIS some more propaganda," McCain told CBS's Face the Nation on Sunday. Robert Richer, a 35-year CIA veteran and former chief of the agency's Near East division, said the ban was a "strategic mistake" that could undermine future efforts to recruit spies and collect vital information about terrorists and their plans. Amritsar, Jan 30 : A day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi invoked the possible threat of destabilisation and terrorism from Pakistan, BJP President Amit Shah on Monday urged people to vote for the SAD-BJP alliance in Punjab if they wanted a strong and stable government. Shah said that Pakistan was located next door to Punjab and only a strong and stable government, that can only be provided by the Shiromani Akali Dal-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) alliance, could ensure security and communal harmony in the state. He said that only Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal could provide able leadership for a development-oriented and prosperous Punjab. Shah took potshots at the Congress chief ministerial candidate Amarinder Singh and at Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Arvind Kejriwal. "When Amarinder was MP (of Amritsar), it was difficult to find him. If he becomes Chief Minister, you know where to go and find him. People of Delhi are also trying to find their Chief Minister (Kejriwal)," Shah said, cautioning people against voting for the Congress and the AAP. Invoking possible threats from Pakistan and the fear of revival of terrorism, Prime Minister Modi on Sunday urged people in Punjab to vote for the Akali Dal-BJP alliance to provide a strong and stable government in the border state. Elections to the 117-seat state assembly take place on February 4 with the main contest being between the Akali Dal-BJP combine, which has been in power in Punjab since 2007, the Congress and the AAP. Chennai, Jan 30 : It was great lucky escape for the two petroleum products carriers that collided against each other owing to grave human error and lack of communication on the part of their crews, said an inquiry officer. "It is certainly a great escape there was no explosion despite the collision. The inquiry is still in the process," Subash Kumar, Advisor, Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT) and formerly the Deputy Chairman, Chennai Port Trust told IANS on Monday. The collision between liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) vessel MT BW Maple and oil tanker MT Dawn Kanchipuram happened on Saturday early morning at 4 a.m. off Kamarajar Port in Tamil Nadu. "Normally ships - incoming and outgoing - would interact with each other when they are entering or exiting a port channel. But here, there was no interaction between the two ships," Kumar said. According to him, the pilot had deboarded the LPG tanker that was exiting the port while another pilot had boarded the incoming oil tanker. The LPG tanker was taking a left turn clearing the buoys on its way out while the oil tanker was coming into the port from the right side taking a left turn. "By the time the officials of both the ships started talking, the two ships were very close. Further the actions taken by them to avoid a collision were all wrong," Kumar said. As to the damage suffered by the ships, Kumar said the LPG tanker did not suffer minor damage while major damage was suffered by the oil tanker. Kumar said the oil tanker suffered a big hole measuring around 7-8 metres diameter below the water and 3-4 metre diameter triangular hole at the top. "The hole suffered by the oil tanker under water was in the void part of the ship and the cargo tank was not ruptured due the collision. Though there is water ingress there is no threat to the ship's stability," he added. The LPG tanker's bulbous bow, the strongest part of a ship, ploughed into the oil tanker's side. As the LPG tanker had unloaded major portion of its cargo, it was relatively light and the bulbous bow was on a higher level. Queried about the oil spillage, Kumar said it is from the oil tanker's pipelines and now there is no oil leak into the sea. The oil tanker - MT Dawn Kanchipuram - is being brought into the port for unloading of its cargo. Meanwhile, the oil spill that happened outside the port has spread along the coast resulting in the death of some turtles and fish. Turtles coated with thick bunker oil were washed ashore dead. Similarly, several fish also dead. Guwahati, Jan 30 : Reciprocating the peace offer of militant outfit Karbi Peoples' Liberation Tiger (KPLT), the Assam government has decided to stop counter insurgency operations by the security forces against KPLT till April 20 this year. A statement issued by the Assam government on Monday said that the decision was taken as a gesture of goodwill to the members of the outfit to enable them to join the mainstream. The Assam government's decision came two months after the KPLT declared a unilateral ceasefire for a period of six months on October 20 last year, which they communicated through a letter signed by the organisation's General Secretary Vojaru Hanjang. "The outfit also expressed its desire to come to the main stream in the interest of restoring peace and all round development in Karbi Anglong. The Assam government welcomes the above gesture of the organisation and sincerely hopes that all the group members along with the weapons retained by them, will come forward to the mainstream at the earliest," the statement added. The KPLT is a breakaway faction of the Karbi Longri National Liberation Front (KLNLF). Formed in 2011, its main objective is to carve out an Autonomous Karbi State out of Assam. Lilongwe (Malawi), Jan 30 : A China-funded state-of-the-art stadium has been inaugurated in Malawi capital Lilongwe, adding to the slew of key infrastructure projects that Beijing has undertaken in Africa. The US $70 million Bingu National Stadium was officially opened by President Peter Mutharika before tens of thousands of Malawians here last week, Xinhua news agency reported. The stadium is one of the most imposing infrastructures funded by the Chinese government in the country, located in southeastern Africa, alongside a new Parliament building, a park with a 12-storey 5-star hotel, an international convention centre and 14 opulent presidential villas in Lilongwe. Beijing is also building a Malawi University of Science and Technology. Mutharika thanked the Chinese government for the continued support to Malawi and dubbed China as a "brother and a friend indeed". The Malawi leader described Malawi as the Chinese people's home in Africa and said that they (Chinese) were all welcome to the southern African country at any time. "Feel free in the country of your brothers and sisters: Malawi is your home in Africa," said Mutharika. Chinese Ambassador to Malawi Wang Shiting said in his remarks that his government would continue to support Malawi and Africa. Malawi is not the only country where China is engaged in building infrastructure. It is building roads, railways and telecom systems in many of the countries in Africa. China is eyeing Africa to tap into its vast natural resources with many of the state-owned companies investing in the continent. Last year, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced a $60 billion loan and aid package to Africa. The continent is already the biggest trading partner of China. More than 1 million Chinese, most of them labourers and traders, have moved to the continent in the past decade. India has also been involved in infrastructure building in Africa, but on a much lower scale. India focuses its engagement with Africa in the form of capacity building and providing training, which fetches it goodwill. In 2014, China's trade with Africa stood at $200 billion, while trade between India and Africa is at $70 billion. New Delhi, Jan 30 : The BJP on Monday alleged former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and then Finance Minister P. Chidambaram favoured industrialist Vijay Mallya in getting huge loans for bailing out the now defunct Kingfisher Airlines. Both the Congress leaders rejected the allegations and asserted that the letters from the liquor baron were a routine affair. If the Bharatiya Janata Party, citing letters by Mallya to both Singh and Chidambaram, pointed fingers at Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Vice President Rahul Gandhi, the Congress, in turn, attacked the Narendra Modi government over 'loans waiver' to Mallya and his fleeing the country. Reading out the contents of the letters to the media, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra claimed a bailout package was given to Kingfisher Airlines (KFA) on "Manmohan Singh's insistence". He said that Mallya was allowed to procure loans worth Rs 9,000 crore without proper papers or proper accounts. "Were there certain hidden hands pulling the strings from behind? Was the sinking ship (Congress) helping the sinking airlines (KFA)?," asked Patra. "We now have certain emails, letters and correspondence that reveal that those hands belong to Manmohan Singh and Chidambaram," said Patra adding that on Manmohan Singh's "insistence" the Income Tax Department "went soft" on Mallya and his accounts were also "unfrozen". "In letter after letter written to Manmohan Singh, Mallya says he needs the indulgence of the PM and certain funds are released," said Patra. Pointing to a letter "to Chidambaram", Patra claimed that the industrialist had asked the minister to ensure that the State Bank of India (SBI) grants him a no-objection certificate (NOC) allowing his company United Spirits Limited (USL) to raise over Rs 2,000 crore through issue of shares on a preferential basis. "The SBI which did not want to indulge with a defaulter called Mallya, was ready to give the NOC to the USL only because it was rebuked by Chidambaram," alleged Patra. Pointing fingers at the Congress' top leadership, Patra said: "Both Sonia and Rahul Gandhi need to come out in public and declare in whose behest the then Prime Minister and his Finance Minister sanctioned loans to Mallya. They need to come clean on this." Both Manmohan Singh and Chidambaram denied favouring Mallya and asserted that the purported letters were only among the hundreds of letters routinely received by the then UPA government. "All prime ministers and other ministers in any government, receive representations from various captains of industry which we in normal course, pass on to appropriate authority. This is what I have done and done with full satisfaction that we were not doing anything which was against the law of the land," said Manmohan Singh. "The letter(s) being talked about, is nothing else but an ordinary piece of letter which any government in my position would have dealt with," he added. Chidambaram too rebutted Patra's claim. "There is absolutely nothing in it if anybody says we want some forbearance, we want some policy changes. "If a letter to PMO is marked down to the Principal Secretary which is then forwarded to the department concerned, it is normal," said Chidambaram referring to Patra's allegation that the letters to the PMO were forwarded to the bureaucrat to ensure "Mallya is helped". "Please ask the present government whether they received representations at all in the last three years. If they say they haven't received any representation, that will be serious reflection of the way this government is functioning," added Chidambaram. Returning the fire, the Congress questioned the Modi government over Mallya's "escape from the country". "Who permitted Mallya to escape, who waived loans to him? We want to ask was it not the BJP which voted Mallya and brought him in the Rajya Sabha," said Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala. "Was Mallya tipped off to run away from India by a high ranking official inside the Modi government," asked Surjewala and wondered "why the Modi government has not sought his deportation from UK". "Why has Modi government waived Rs 1,200 crore owed by Mallya to SBI on November 16, 2016? Who is the helping hand for Mallya in the Modi government?" asked Surjewala. New Delhi, Jan 30 : The Indian Coast Guard on Monday decided to help the Sri Lankan Navy in tackling pollution as and when requested, said an official statement. This was decided at a meeting between Rajendra Singh, Director General, Indian Coast Guards and Vice Admiral R.C. Wijegunaratne, Commander of the Sri Lankan Navy, at the Coast Guard Headquarters here. Wijegunaratne also held bilateral discussions with Indian Navy chief Admiral Sunil Lanba and other senior officials. He was also scheduled to meet Air Chief B.S Dhanoh, Army chief Gen Bipin Rawat and will call on Minister of State for Defence Subhash Bhamre. Wijegunaratne who is on an India visit from January 29 to February 2 also visited the control centre of the coastal surveillance network and was briefed about the capabilities of the network. Naval cooperation between India and Sri Lanka has been traditionally strong, encompassing a wide span which includes operational interactions through bilateral exercises, Training, port calls, hydrographic co-operation, Special Forces interactions, capability building and capacity augmentation initiatives. Goa Shipyard Limited is building two Advanced Offshore Patrol Vessels for the Sri Lankan Navy. Vice Admiral R.C. Wijegunaratne's visit follows closely on the visit of the Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Sunil Lanba's visit to Sri Lanka wherein he also participated in the 7th International Maritime Conference, Galle Dialogue 2016. Kathmandu, Jan 30 : India on Monday handed over to Nepal a cheque for NRs 249 million to help four road projects in the Himalayan country. Indian Ambassador Ranjit Rae handed over the cheque to Nepal's Physical Infrastructure and Transport Minister Ramesh Lekhak in Kathmandu at a function. The amount has been released towards 25 per cent of tendered cost (including 10 per cent mobilisation advance) of the four contracted road stretches. The roads are Birendra Bazaar-Mahinathpur, Janakpur-Yadukuwa, Manmat-Kalaiya-Matiarwa (0-15 km road), and Manmat-Kalaiya-Matiarwa (15-26.660 km road). The projects are being implemented under Postal Highway Project in Nepal with the Indian government grant assistance of NRs 8,000 million, an official statement said. Two roads -- Dhangadhi-Bhajaniya-Satti road and Lamki-Tikapur-Khakraula road -- constructed with Indian government's grant assistance worth NRs 1,020 million were inaugurated on January 19, 2017, at Dhangadhi in western Nepal, jointly by Indian Ambassador Rae and Minister Lekhak. These roads are India's flagship assistance projects, while Postal Road Project is key for the development of Nepal's Tarai region. India has been assisting Nepal in upgradation of 1,450 km of roads under the Postal Highway Project. Identified as strategic road network, the first phase aims to construct 19 roads of 605 km length at a cost of $166 million. Chandigarh, Jan 30 : The Haryana Police has obtained production warrants against a youth from Uttarakhand, who had committed an online fraud of Rs 10 lakh with the Fatehabad branch of the PNB recently, a police spokesman said on Monday. The accused, Virender Sahu, who has done his Masters in Business Administration (MBA), has been arrested along with his two accomplices by Uttar Pradesh Police. The arrested accomplices are Ajab Nagar and Arun Thakur of Ghaziabad. "The accused had committed the fraud through Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) from the Punjab National Bank (PNB) account of Balaji Automobiles Company, Fatehabad," a police spokesman said. Sahu, a resident of Rudrapura in Uttarakhand, has several cases of fraud registered against him. "In just two months, the accused have made a number of people their victim by using about 500 different mobile SIM cards. He said that they used to target operators of automobile showrooms by searching their mobile number on computer and later trapping them," the spokesman said. Haryana Police has booked all the three accused in Fatehabad police station, 200 km from here. Mumbai, Jan 30 : The Maharashtra Navnirman Sena on Monday said the Shiv Sena has rebuffed its proposal for an alliance for next month's civic elections in Mumbai. Senior MNS leader Bala Nandgaonkar said he personally went to Sena President Uddhav Thackeray's Bandra residence 'Matoshri' on Sunday with a proposal and submitted it to his team comprising Anil Desai, Rahul Shewale, Anil Parab, Subhash Desai and others. "They assured me it would be conveyed to their party chief," said Nandgaonkar, who is a close confidant of Raj Thackeray and enjoys a good rapport with Uddhav Thackeray. When asked about the MNS proposal on Monday afternoon, Uddhav denied outright about having received any such communication from his estranged cousin. "We have not received any proposal from any party... We have decided to fight on our own strength across Maharashtra," Uddhav said dismissively. Responding to this, Nandgaonkar glumly said: "If they are saying this, then I may be a liar." Elaborating, he revealed that in the past eight days, Raj called up Uddhav seven times since January 22. He followed it up by personally submitting an "unconditional alliance" proposal "in the interest of Mumbai" and since everybody desires the two warring cousins should come together again. Significantly, the MNS overtures started four days before Uddhav Thackeray on January 26 unilaterally snapped the 25-year-old ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party for the upcoming civic elections, though it continues to be partner in the state government and at the Centre. "Raj Thackeray made the gesture as 'a younger brother' and since he had made a commitment to the late Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray," Nandgaonkar said. Describing Uddhav as "a nice person", he admitted that though Uddhav was at home, he could not meet him (Uddhav), otherwise the situation would have been completely different. Saying "we are hopeful," Nandgaonkar pointed out that there is still time left and urged Uddhav to at least consider the MNS proposal, instead of summarily rejecting it. MNS corporator Sandeep Deshpande said an alliance could greatly benefit the Shiv Sena as it would prevent division of Marathi votes and in a municipal corporation elections, even a couple of hundred votes could make or mar the candidate's prospects. Plagued with desertions of its legislators and corporators across the state, the MNS is fighting a battle for sheer survival while the Shiv Sena is attempting to establish its supremacy over rivals by going alone in the state. Mumbai, Jan 30 : Actress Huma Qureshi says she has never played a character which is close to her personality. "I am yet to play a character which is close to my persona but I enjoy that. As an actor, playing different roles that are quite opposite of your own personality is fun," Huma, who is sharing screen space with Akshay Kumar in her upcoming film "Jolly LLB2", told IANS here on Monday. Talking about her character in the black comedy, the actress said, "Pushpa Pandey is a girl from a middle class family who is fun, mad, has her own quirks and she keeps fighting with her husband Jolly, who is the 19th Assistant of a lawyer!" When asked how is she in real life, she said: "Oh, I am so cluttered in my personal life. I am very inelegant who doesn't wear high-heels and a bookworm and movie buff. And I am very outspoken too." Huma said she is busy reading George Orwell's "1984". Talking about Subhash Kapoor, the director of the film, she said, "He is a brilliant director who wrote the script in a very interesting way. The story has a seamless shift from comedy to poignant moments and that makes the story so special." As the actress worked with Akshay for the first time, sharing her experience, Huma said: "It was great to work with Akshay as he is very disciplined and involved with the process of filmmaking. He does not go to his vanity when his scene is done, rather he interacts with all of us. In fact, I think we managed to finish shooting on schedule because of his discipline and dedication on the set." Directed by Subhash Kapoor, "Jolly LLB2", featuring Akshay Kumar, Huma Qureshi, Annu Kapoor, Saurabh Shukla, is releasing on February 10. Dharamsala, Jan 30 : India opener Shikhar Dhawan's poor run with the willow continued as Delhi went down to Punjab by two wickets in a thrilling Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 tournament North Zone tie here on Monday. Dhawan, who failed miserably in the three-match One-day International series (ODI) against England recently, managed just two runs from six balls before falling to Manpreet Gony in the second over. Dhawan's opening partner Gautam Gambhir, who made a return to the India team in Tests after a two-year gap against New Zealand, too got out for just five as Delhi could never stitch together a healthy partnership and were bundled out for a meagre 103/9 with Milind Kumar top-scoring with 26. Gony took three wickets while Sandeep Sharma picked up two. But it was not so easy for the Harbhajan Singh-led Punjab side, who recovered from being 3/3 at one stage to ride Sharad Lumba's (36) good show with the bat to cross the line with four balls and two wickets to spare in the last over. It was relatively smooth sailing in another match for Mumbai who beat just-crowned Ranji Trophy champions Gujarat by five wickets with 10 balls to spare. In reply to Gujarat's 131, Shreyas Iyer's 79 off just 49 deliveries sealed the deal for Mumbai in Vadodara. In the other West Zone game, Ankit Bawne -- who along with Swapnil Gugale put together 594 runs for Maharashtra in what is the highest stand for any wicket in a Ranji Trophy match -- scored a match-winning 71 off 52 balls to help Maharashtra beat Saurashtra by 15 runs at Vadodara. India Test regular Cheteshwar Pujara mustered just four runs. Down South, Hyderabad rode on opener Tanmay Agarwal's pyrotechnics (85 off 49 balls) to thrash hosts Tamil Nadu by 72 runs in Chennai. Hyderabad posted 165/5 to which the home side had no reply, falling for 93 in 19.1 overs. Hyderabad medium pacer Chama Milind returned with figures of 4/18. Elsewhere, Madhya Pradesh beat Rajasthan in Jaipur by 17 runs while Andhra won by six wickets against Goa in Chennai. The Services beat Jammu and Kashmir by five runs at Nadaun while Chhattisgarh won a low scoring affair against Vidarbha by nine wickets in Jaipur. Hosts Himachal Pradesh clinched a cliff-hanger against Haryana by five wickets here. New Delhi, Jan 30 : The US always felt India had no reason to pursue a missile programme with a range beyond 5,500 km because it would be enough to target China and anything more than that would be useless, according to a declassified 1990 CIA document. The US assessment is borne out by India not yet deciding to go ahead with a missile beyond 5,000-km range of Agni V that was test fired recently even as reports suggest that a version of Agni V with Multiple Independently Targetable Re-entry Warheads (MIRV) is being developed. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the partially declassified top secret intelligence assessment dated June 1, 1990, on the "Ballistic Missiles in India and Pakistan" said: "We see little benefit to India of developing ICBM-class (more than 5,500 km range) missile. A missile with considerable less range would be able to strike any target in China." Any Indian ballistic missile with beyond 6,000 km range would be able to reach parts of Europe -- a target India never considered in its strategic defence programmes. Most of the report has not been declassified. Talking about Pakistan's ballistic missiles, the report says: "Both Hatf (I-II) are flawed by the lack of a guidance system and, hence, have very poor accuracy... Pakistan is attempting to obtain Scud missiles technology from North Korea and is developing LD - a probably longer range system." "Pakistani officials have also been in contact with representatives of the European consortium that supervised the development of the 750-1,000 km range Condor II in Argentina. Production of the Condor II or another missile with a range longer than the Hatf II is likely in Pakistan by the mid-to-late 1990s." The report clearly shows the US did not make any serious effort in restricting Pakistan from violating the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR). Pakistan went on to develop Shaheen III with range beyond 2,500 km. India, on June 27, 2016, became 35th full member of the MTCR -- an informal and voluntary partnership among 35 countries, which prevent proliferation of missile technology over more than 300 km. New Delhi, Jan 30 : The Delhi High Court on Monday asked the AAP government to file a response to PILs against its decision to declare ex-serviceman Ram Kishan Grewal, who committed suicide over implementation of the OROP scheme, a "martyr" and give his family Rs 1 crore financial aid. A Division Bench of Chief Justice G. Rohini and Justice Sangita Dhingra Sehgal, asked the Delhi government, which had earlier defended its decision, to file a response and posted the matter for March 21. The Delhi cabinet had approved the government's proposal to provide Rs 1 crore financial aid to Grewal's family and decided to declare him a "martyr". But the Public Interest Litigations (PILs) said the Delhi government's action will promote more suicides for the award of assistance to families and it cannot "glorify" the suicide. One of the PILs filed by former central government employee Puran Chand Arya, through advocate Abhishek Chaudhary, said suicide is a "cowardly act" and it can "never deserve martyrdom/shaheed status". "Such acts amount to promotion of suicide in the society, which is a matter of national shame. The government is wasting public money for political gain." Another PIL filed by advocate Avadh Kaushik said granting martyr status to Grewal is "clear abuse, insult and disdain to the real martyrs who sacrifice their lives for the nation and for the good cause". The petitions also objected to the Delhi government's decision to give a job to any one member of Grewal's family, saying the decision is against public interest as it curtails and infringes upon the fundamental rights of the people, particularly the unemployed youth of Delhi who are waiting and trying for government employment on their own merit. The Delhi government's action would send a wrong signal to society that "committing suicide is an act of heroism and martyrdom", and thus the same is required to be curbed, said Kaushik. The pleas also sought direction to the government to frame a uniform recognition or compensation policy for martyrs so that all of them would be treated equally. Bhubaneswar, Jan 30 : Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) President Prasad Harichandan on Monday sought the intervention of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to resolve the Mahanadi water dispute with Chhattisgarh. In a letter to the Prime Minister, the PCC President urged him to ensure formation of an Inter-State River Water Dispute Tribunal and direct the Chhattisgarh government to stop all construction on the Mahanadi river and its tributaries. "I would urge upon you to keep aside narrow political considerations and play an active role which is imperative to safeguard the genuine interest of Odisha and basic co-operative federal ethos and principles," said Harichandan in the letter. He said the construction of a number of projects on the Mahanadi and its tributaries will deprive the people of Odisha their due share of water. "Such unilateral construction undertaken by the Chhattisgarh government amounts to gross breach of principles of cooperative federalism that our Constitution envisages," he pointed out. He blamed the Centre for doing little to resolve the issue. The PCC President also took a dig at Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik for "betraying the trust of people of Odisha". "For years together he remained silent on the issue and even when people reacted angrily against his inept handling of the issue, he initiated measures half-heartedly only to befool the people of the state," said Harichandan. In a separate letter to the Odisha Chief Minister, the state Congress President said the Chhattisgarh government carried out construction activities because of sheer administrative and political callousness of the Odisha government. "Not that you (Naveen Patnaik) did not know about the settled mechanism of dispute resolution of inter-state river dispute, but you cared little to invoke the same on time, as you felt that demonstration by the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) in the state against the Centre would ensure the formation of the Tribunal. "It was only after you realised that the demonstration was not serving your political interests and the people of Odisha were getting sufficiently angry realising your scheming political ploy, you resorted to writing the letter under reference," said Harichandan. Washington, Jan 30 : US President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily prohibiting entry into the country for migrants from seven Muslim-majority countries and refugees from around the world led to confusion, angst and a wave of protests across the country. World leaders and prominent figures blasted Trump's travel ban as divisive, illegal, insulting and discriminatory. Trump signed an executive order Friday barring citizens from Syria, Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Libya, Somalia and Sudan from entering the country for 90 days and also suspended the admission of all refugees for 120 days. The order bans entry of those fleeing from war-torn Syria indefinitely. While many countries lambasted the ban, Muslim-majority nations not on the blacklist have remained largely silent. Australia, which has implemented hardline policies against refugees, was one of the few nations to voice support for the ban. The ban is "not justified" and "supports the terrorists and sows divisions among people," Yemen's Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Affairs Minister Abdel-Malak al-Mekhlafi posted on Twitter. The Sudanese Foreign Affairs Ministry in a statement called on Washington to remove Sudan from the US list of states that sponsor terrorism. Iran called Trump's immigration order "insulting" and a "gift to extremists" and said it will also take "reciprocal measures in order to safeguard the rights of its citizens. British Prime Minister Theresa May also put out a statement saying her government did "not agree" with it, but said immigration was "a matter for the government of the US." A petition on the UK Government and Parliament website to prevent Trump from making a state visit to the UK passed the one million mark on Monday morning. Closer to home, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that refugees fleeing persecution, terror and war were welcome in Canada. Germany, France, Turkey, the Netherlands and New Zealand also condemned the ban. The United Nations' High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein denounced the move as illegal and mean-spirited. Pakistan, whose visa seekers have been put on "extreme vetting" under US President Donald Trump's new administration, on Monday said the new policy will affect international unity against terrorism. However, Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull became one of the few leaders to openly show support for the ban. "It is vital that every nation is able to control who comes across its borders," he said. Raucous protests erupted at US airport terminals from coast to coast. Tens of thousands of people protested outside the gates of the White House, in Boston's Copley Square and in New York's Battery Park, with its view over the Statue of Liberty, the Washington Post reported. Demonstrations continued across more than 30 American airports. The protesters outside the White House pushed on, wielding poster boards with messages such as "Islamophobia is un-American" and "Dissent is patriotic," chanting "No justice! No peace!" and singing renditions of "This Land is Your Land." And in airports from Baltimore to Bangor, from Dallas to Denver, shouts of "Let them go!" and "Let them in!" reverberated Sunday. In many cities, demonstrators invoked the same chant: "No hate, no fear. Refugees are welcome here." Scenes of relief, anxiety and sorrow played out around the globe. Trump issued a statement late Sunday that offered little clarity, even as he defended his executive order as necessary to protect the United States from terrorism. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," Trump said in the statement. "This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe." Still, barely 48 hours after Trump issued his order, confusion reigned over its reach and its implementation, said the report. Even as the President and other top advisers defended the ban, some Trump officials appeared on Sunday to walk back one of the most controversial elements of the action: its impact on green card holders, who are permanent legal residents of the United States. "As far as green card holders going forward, it doesn't affect them," Trump's chief of staff, Reince Priebus, said on NBC News' "Meet the Press," contradicting what government officials had said only a day earlier. In a separate statement, Homeland Security Secretary John F. Kelly was less definitive, suggesting that green card holders' status would help them gain entry to the country but that they nonetheless would be subject to a "case-by-case" review. As of Sunday evening, officials said no one was being held at American airports, although lawyers said they believed that dozens were still being detained, the New York Times reported. Democrats planned to assemble on Monday on the steps of the Supreme Court in a show of solidarity with legal attempts to block Trump's travel ban. Some Republicans grew increasingly alarmed by the backlash to the order. "This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country," Senators John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said. "That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security." Meanwhile, a federal judge in New York temporarily blocked deportations nationwide. Her ruling was followed by similar decisions by federal judges in California, Virginia, Seattle and Boston. New Delhi, Jan 30 : The Delhi Police has arrested six members of an inter-state gang which used to gatecrash marriage parties and rob the guests in Delhi-NCR, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and other states. "After receiving several complaints of thefts at marriage functions, the police identified the accused persons after examining the CCTV footage," Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Ishwar Singh said. Acting on a tip off, the police arrested the accused on January 23 in Mahipalpur area of south Delhi, he said. The police seized a stolen car from their possession, which they used to attend marriage functions. The police said Sawant Sisodiya, 19, Abhishek Sisodiya, 25, Vikas Sisodiya, 25, Lakan Sisodiya, 27, Gokal Prasad, 30, and their juvenile associate, are residents of Rajgarh district of Madhya Pradesh and had been involved in over 100 thefts. "It was found that the gang members sent the juvenile for committing the theft," Singh said. "The juvenile along with one senior gang member used to gatecrash the party, well-dressed and well-behaved like rich persons. The juvenile remained inconspicuous even when seated next to the bride or the groom during late night rituals and took off with expensive articles," the DCP said. "It was found that the juvenile was accompanying the gang after being taken on a 'contract of bondage' whereby his mother was paid a sum of Rs 2 lakh for the specific performance of commission of thefts," he said. The juvenile was produced before the Juvenile Justice Board as per the law from where he was sent to a remand home, the police said. New Delhi, Jan 30 : The Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance is likely to gain majority with 187 to 197 seats and around 35 per cent vote share in the forthcoming Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls, according to a recent survey. The ABP News-CSDS-Lokniti opinion poll, done in January, found that despite the recent family feud, Akhilesh Yadav, with 26 per cent support, continues to be the most preferred face as the next Chief Minister. However, demonetisation is not likely to play a total spoilsport for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) -- which is a close second with 118-128 seats according to the survey -- as the support for note-scrapping is rising, and has clambered to 41 per cent from 35 per cent in the last one month. The third major player in the fray, Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), is placed at third position with 76-86 seats, though the party is likely to do better in certain pockets including Bundelkhand, the opinion poll said. The seven-phase assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh are commencing on February 11 and would conclude on March 8. Fondness for Akhilesh Yadav is quite strong even among those who indicated a vote preference for the BJP. It was also quite high among upper castes, lower OBCs and non-Jatav Dalits, communities that have traditionally not been enthusiastic SP backers. In terms of caste and community support, not only is the SP-Congress alliance getting three-fourths support from it's core voters -- Muslims and Yadavs -- it is also picking up about one-fifth votes from communities that have traditionally overwhelmingly backed it's rivals. As many as 21 per cent of upper castes, who have traditionally voted for the BJP, were found to be voting for the SP-Congress alliance in the survey. Also, 21 per cent of non-Jatav Dalits, who have usually voted largely for the BSP, also expressed support for the alliance. Bengaluru/Pune, Jan 30 : Software major Infosys on Monday expressed shock over the alleged murder of its woman techie -- a software engineer -- on its Pune campus on Sunday. "We are saddened and shocked at this unfortunate incident and the loss of our colleague (K. Rasila Raju). Our prayers and sympathies are with our employee's family and friends," said the city-headquartered company in a statement. Although the IT major declined to share details of the employee and the gruesome incident with the media, it said: "We are focused on assisting police in their investigation and providing all possible support to her family." Pune police early Monday arrested security guard Bhaben Saikia, 26, in Mumbai for the alleged murder of the 25-year-old victim from Kozhikode district in Kerala, as he was trying to flee to his home state (Assam) by train. A local court remanded him to police custody till February 4. According to Ganesh Shinde, the Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP)-Hinjewadi, Pune, the suspect guard entered the company's ninth floor office building in the Rajiv Gandhi Infotech Park at Hinjewadi around 5 p.m., and allegedly strangled her with a computer cord when she was working on a project, though it was her weekly off. "The victim had objected to Saikia staring at her when she came out of her office and threatened to complain to his bosses," Shinde told reporters in Pune. A complaint lodged with police by her team manager Abhijit Kothari revealed that Rasila had reported for work around 2.30 p.m. and was alone after another colleague left at 3 p.m. The CCTV footage on the ninth floor showed that Rasila entered the room around 3.05 p.m., came out for a break around 5 p.m. and later Saikia followed her into the office, though he was not authorised to enter that area. The outsourcing firm's software development centre in the Pune campus is its largest across the country with seating facility for 42,403 techies in over 7.3 million square feet area, followed by its Bengaluru campus with 39,654 seats in over 5.7 million square feet. The global firm, including its subsidiaries, has 199,763 employees worldwide. Rasila is the company's second victim of a murder seven months after another woman techie Swathi S., 24, was hacked to death allegedly by her stalker Ram Kumar, 24, at a suburban railway station in Chennai on June 24, 2016, when she was on way to office by a local train. Islamabad, Jan 30 : Afghanistan's top envoy to Pakistan Omar Zakhilwal on Monday said his government was open to unconditional peace negotiations with the Taliban group. "We are in contact with the Qatar office and also a number of influential individual Taliban leaders and commanders but there are no formal negotiations," the Afghan ambassador told Xinhua in Islamabad. The remarks came after foreign and Afghan media reported senior Afghan officials had met the Taliban political representatives in Qatar. The Afghan government and the Taliban have not officially commented on the reports. "Taliban could bring any proposal to the negotiating table but we have ruled out preconditions for talks," Zakhilwal said, when asked about the Taliban's certain conditions ahead of the talks. Taliban negotiators have publicly called for reopening of their political office in Qatar, lifting of UN sanctions on their senior leaders and release of prisoners. "We are open to any and all opportunities for peace talks. We can find our way with the Taliban if external support to them stops," the Afghan envoy said. Regarding the Taliban's long-standing call for the withdrawal of foreign troops, he said war in Afghanistan provides opportunity for the foreign troops to stay. "If there is no war, then there is no reason for their stay in our country - therefore, if Taliban genuinely want the foreign troops to leave Afghanistan, peace, not war will do that," Zakhilwal said. When asked if he expects a rise in violence in the coming spring and summer, he said the security situation will be "challenging," adding that guerrilla type and terrorist attacks are difficult to prevent entirely, but the Afghan security forces will "endure as they have proven themselves by now." Taliban traditionally launch their so-called Spring Offensive usually in April that marks the beginning of the fighting season in the war-torn country. A former Taliban minister Agha Jan Mutasim said there could be an increase in fighting this year if the Taliban and the government failed to come to the negotiating table. Mutasim, who was a close confidant of Taliban founder Mullah Omar, had been involved in peace efforts while living abroad in Turkey and the United Arab Emirates. Speaking to Xinhua on Skype, he urged Kabul and the Taliban leaders to use the opportunity of the winter lull in the fighting and start a political process. "Rise in violence will diminish the chances of dialogue," the former Taliban minister said. About the threat of the Islamic State or Daesh in Afghanistan, the Afghan ambassador admitted that Daesh activists operate in some areas but they would not take root in the country. "They are in small number but are dangerous. Their approach is not popular among Afghans. Their model does not go with the psyche of Afghans. If Taliban join the peace process, Afghanistan will not have the IS problem," the envoy said. Damascus, Jan 30 : Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem warned on Monday against any attempt by foreign powers to establish safe zones in northern Syria, state news agency SANA reported. Al-Moallem made the remarks at a meeting with visiting United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi, where both agreed that imposing safe zones, as proposed by US President Donald Trump, would be "unsafe" and violate the sovereignty of Syria. On Wednesday, Trump said he "will absolutely do safe zones in Syria" for refugees fleeing the war in the country, amid reports that he will task the Pentagon to prepare a plan for setting up safe zones in northern Syria. Turkey agreed with the idea, as Ankara has long been seeking to create such zones in northern Syria, especially when it has forces there fighting the Islamic State group and Kurdish-backed militias. In separate phone calls with Trump on Sunday, Saudi King Salman and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Muhammad agreed to support safe zones in Syria and Yemen to help refugees "displaced by the ongoing conflicts," the White House said in a press release. Earlier in the day, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said his country may support the US initiative to establish safe zones for refugees in Syria, noting that the plan would require close cooperation with the UN and approval from the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad. Addis Ababa, Jan 31 : The newly appointed UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres expressed keen interest to work with the African Union (AU) and its member states. "The African Union is working for unity, peace and progress for all people in every corner of this great continent," Guterres said at the opening of the 28th AU summit here on Monday. He said the UN would work closely with the AU as the pan-African bloc endeavours towards realisation of its development agenda and ensuring peace and security across Africa, Xinhua news agency reported. "You can count on the full support of the UN for all your efforts to strengthen national institutions, to maintain the rule of law, ensure accountability, promote good governance, facilitate the peaceful transition of power and prevent violent extremism," he said. According to the Secretary-General, implementing agenda 2063 and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), promoting peace and security, and human rights are among the major areas that the UN envisages to work with AU. Guterres also commended African nations for providing large number of peacekeepers around the world, and for their "most generous host of refugees". He noted that Africa as a continent encompasses some of the world's fastest growing economies. The world is in the second year of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals and Africa has adopted a plan that is even more far-reaching and ambitious: Agenda 2063, he said. Islamabad, Jan 31 : Jammat-ud-Dawah (JuD) chief Hafiz Saeed, the mastermind of Mumbai terror attack, was placed under house arrest in Lahore, media reports said. "A large police team arrived (at JuD headquarters) and told us that Hafiz would be placed under house arrest," Dawn news quoted JuD's secretary of information, Nadeem Awan. Awan said the police told them they had an arrest warrant for Saeed and five others at JuD headquarters. The government launched a crackdown against JuD and a heavy contingent of police was deployed around the JuD headquarter and offices in Pakistan's Muridke and Lahore. Hafiz Saeed was reportedly present at the Qudsia Mosque located in Chauburji area of Lahore. Police sources further informed that Saeed will be shifted to his residence in the Johar Town area of the provincial capital, which will then be declared as a sub-jail. The move, which comes after years of pressure on Pakistan to put Saeed on trial, could ease recently escalating tensions with India. JuD is the front for the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror outfit which is responsible for the Mumbai terror strike of November 26, 2008. It has already been declared as a foreign terrorist organisation by the US in June 2014. Quebec, Jan 31 : A 27-year-old man has been detained in connection with the shooting in a Quebec mosque, media reports said. Authorities initially said that there were two suspects, but Canadian police said on Monday that only one man was a suspect and that another man -- identified as Mohamed Belkhadir -- was only a witness, New York Times reported. The remaining suspect, Alexandre Bissonnette, who according to a local newspaper has a history of provocative views and antisocial behaviour, has been detained. On Monday, two gunmen opened fire in a Quebec mosque killing six people and injuring eight others. "We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge," Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement. "On behalf of all Canadians, Sophie and I offer our deepest condolences to the family and friends of all those who have died and we wish a speedy recovery to those who have been injured," he said. The president of the mosque, Mohammed Yangui, said people were at the Centre Culturel Islamique de QuAbec for regular evening prayers and 60 to 100 people were in attendance. The mosque is one of six in the Quebec City region. The shooting came two days after US President Donald Trump imposed an American travel ban that bars citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the country. Barak Investors Group and MIP Investment Just announced the completion of the transaction for arranging a $16.75 MM acquisition of a Government / fully leased two-story office building in Torrance CA/South Bay. The property located at 20221 Hamilton in Torrance is a 100% leased asset by the County of Los Angeles, Child Support District Division. In this transaction, Barak Investors Group and MIP Investment represented the Buyer, PARKVIEW MANAGEMENT GROUP, INC. a known local investor from LA,. The buyer was represented by JLL as their exclusive adviser,. Originally constructed in 1982, the 2-story property was renovated in 2002 and also recently in 2016. The Property boasts a competitive parking ratio of 3.5 per 1,000 square feet and enjoys close proximity to multiple freeways including I-110, I-405, and the 91 freeway. The County of Los Angeles, which has occupied 100% of the Property since 1992, recently executed a new 8-year lease with multiple extension options offering a new owner, strong contractual cash flow and a high probability of renewal. Occupying the Property since 1992, the County of Los Angeles recently extended their existing lease through December 2024. The County has invested significant money into the Property during its tenancy, including approximately $2.4 million ($36 psf) in 2002 and ownership will invest another $3.8 million ($56 psf) as part of this extension. The Acquisition arranged by Barak Investors Group & MIP Investment has made an attractive initial yields and a projected trading price well below replacement cost for the buyers investment - PARKVIEW MANAGEMENT GROUP, INC. - 20221 Hamilton had attractive entry point for the buyer into one of the South Bays most resilient submarkets. FLTG Fiber Map Now, Norwich businesses can take advantage of a more complete portfolio of telecom products and services, all backed by our more than 100 years of experience," says Paul H. Griswold, President & CEO of FLTG. Businesses in the Norwich New York area will have the opportunity to take advantage of fiber optic telecommunication services from Finger Lakes Technologies Group, Inc. (FLTG). FLTG is expanding its services into the Norwich market following the addition of services into the Binghamton area last year. The continued expansion into neighboring communities allows businesses to unite with different areas of the state using state-of-the-art technology. With this expansion, FLTG is bringing more than a century of telephone experience and a host of state-of-the-art services, including: local and long-distance telephone, high-speed Internet, IP and hosted phone systems, data center, virtualization, telecom, dark and lit fiber and conferencing services. FLTG is thrilled to expand our service area into Norwich, said FLTG President & CEO Paul H. Griswold. Now, Norwich businesses can take advantage of a more complete portfolio of telecom products and services, all backed by our more than 100 years of experience. FLTG has extended its privately owned fiber-optic network to cover more than 2,500 miles across New York State and Pennsylvania, servicing more than 50 communities. The companys fiber-optic network has been built entirely through private company funding. About Finger Lakes Technologies Group Finger Lakes Technologies Group Inc. (fltg.com) is continuously expanding its privately owned 2,500-mile, fiber-optic network to serve the Upstate New York region. FLTG provides state-of-the-art voice, data and Internet solutions to business customers across New York State and Pennsylvania. The company is certified in all Cisco solutions. A subsidiary of Ontario and Trumansburg Telephone Companies, FLTG brings to its customers a more-than-100-year history in telecommunications. Headquartered in Victor, FLTG and its parent companies employ 140 people combined and have offices in Buffalo, Binghamton, Phelps, Romulus and Trumansburg. Roz Ridenoures delightful new childrens book Just a Plain Poor Simple Shepherd (hardcover, $20.99, 9781498487979; $9.99, paperback, 9781498487962; e-book, $4.99, 9781498487986) tells of the simple shepherd that received the news of the birth of Christ. The vivid artwork from an aerial perspective shows us the events of the night so long ago when God gave his greatest gift to the poor, plain, and simple of this world. Readers will see that no matter how humble and ordinary we are, we like the shepherd, can receive the gift of salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ. Gods promises are true, and we can trust God to keep our soul. Ridenoure says, We are hard pressed today to find childrens books that are Bible based, God-honoring, non-agenda driven that draw children to the truth of God. Just a Plain Poor, Simple Shepherd does exactly that, recounting events of the night Christ was born in simple and compelling text and original, vivid art. Having taught school for 15 years and worked in childrens ministries for over 35, Rozlah Ridenoure has a unique understanding of the simple yet deep thinking of the minds of young children. It brings her great joy to see and participate in that moment when a child grasps a concept, gains an understanding of truth, or experiences the life-changing revelation that God loves them. Ridenoure volunteers as a Storytime leader at the Roseville Public Library and is also available for independent spelling and reading seminars. Contact her on Facebook at Roz Ridenoure Childrens Books and Ministries for more information. Xulon Press, a division of Salem Media Group, is the worlds largest Christian self-publisher, with more than 12,000 titles published to date. Retailers may order Just a Plain Poor Simple Shepherd through Ingram Book Company and/or Spring Arbor Book Distributors. The book is available online through xulonpress.com/bookstore, amazon.com, and barnesandnoble.com. Media Contact: Rozlah Ridenoure Email: rozridenoure(at)gmail(dot)com Mestel & Company, a leading national attorney placement firm established in 1987, has announced the appointment of Executive Director, William (Bill) R. Giusti, who will specialize in the placement of partners, development of attorney groups, and facilitation of law firm mergers for the New York region. Throughout Bills extensive legal career, he has consistently been recognized as one of New Yorks leading lawyers in project and bank finance and in the energy sector. In addition, he has worked on various financing transactions, including acquisitions, highly leveraged transactions and LBO and structured financings. Before joining Mestel & Company, Bill was a Partner at Baker Botts L.L.P. for eight years and Shearman & Sterling LLP for 23 years. He began his career as an Associate at Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP. Bill graduated summa cum laude from Columbia University and attended Oxford University in England before earning his law degree from Yale University. Bill is a fantastic addition to our exceptional team of industry-recognized placement consultants, who are dedicated to candor, integrity, and the highest quality of service, stated Lynn Mestel, CEO and Chairman. The combination of his experience as a Partner at two of the most esteemed law firms and the professional relationships he has developed in the legal community throughout his career is invaluable to our clients and candidates. For nearly 30 years, our company has developed the careers of attorneys, built best in class legal teams, and effectuated law firm mergers. At Mestel, its who you know. About Mestel & Company Mestel & Company, a leading national attorney placement company established in 1987, specializes in assisting the careers of individual associates, partners and in-house counsel as well as effectuating the movement of legal teams and law firm mergers. Our experienced recruiters have first-hand knowledge of the practices and cultures of law firms and in-house legal departments, making us the acknowledged leader in our field. Mestel & Company is only 100% employee owned company in the attorney placement industry, ensuring that each of our recruiters, as an owner, provides best in class service and is committed to the needs and sensitivity of our attorneys. For more information, visit http://www.mestel.com or follow us on Twitter@Mestel. Jason Munn, Lead Audio Technology Instructor at SAE Institute Nashville Having the opportunity to share my industry experience in the classroom with our talented students as part of the SAE Institute faculty has been a rewarding experience. Jason Munn, Lead Audio Technology Instructor at the Nashville campus of SAE Institute, lends his audio mixing talent to a science fiction short film/music video, Light Up The Night. The 16 minute short film and music video is from the Nashville-based rock opera band, The Protomen, whose music is based on the popular Nintendo video game Megaman. The video will be released on Blu-Ray in the coming weeks. The video was filmed in Brooklyn and Manhattan and directed by Matt Sundin and Caspar Newbolt. Jason worked as the Re-recording Engineer for Surround Sound, mixing the film in surround sound. "It was an absolute honor to be invited to work on this project as a Surround Sound Mixer. This was my first experience working on a film and it was challenging, yet rewarding. I had so much fun working with the incredible Protomen. I have never had so much fun working on any project," says Munn. Light Up the Night premiered in September 2016 as an official selection at the Austin Music Video Festival. The short film was officially released on December 23, 2016, and it has since garnered great praise and press. Jason has been an instructor at SAE Institute Nashville for over 4 years, where he teaches multiple Audio Technology courses, facilitates workshops and tutorials, and has authored three courses in Signal Flow Concepts, Live Sound, and Audio Post Production & Multimedia. "Having the opportunity to share my industry experience in the classroom with our talented students as part of the SAE Institute faculty has been a rewarding experience," says Jason. After earning a Bachelors of Arts in Music Theory from the College of William & Mary, Jason also earned a Diploma in Audio Technology from SAE Institute Nashville. "SAE Institute delivers both educational and practical preparation, opening the door to entry-level career opportunities for its graduates. A big advantage for our students is that SAE Institute offers a solid curriculum and industry experienced instructors." Munns industry experience as a musician and audio engineer spans over 20 years. With numerous credits from various local, regional and international artists, some highlights of his career include: Re-recording Mixer (Surround Sound) - The Protomen - Light Up the Night (2016) - Short Film Producer, Recording & Mixing Engineer - Dave Coleman - 10 Tracks (2014) - Unfinished LP album Recording Co-Engineer - Striking Matches - Saving All My Tears (2013) single Recording Co-Engineer - Drew Scheuer - Drum Covers Sessions & Video Shoots (2012 & 2013) Drummer, Co-writer - An Alien Fire/Synergy Anomaly - Cover Band/Original Music (2006 - 2007) Lead Vocalist, Lead Guitarist, Writer - Velocity Groove - (2004) - LP album (tracking incomplete) Drummer - UPX - Bite Me EP (2002) - EP album Lead Guitarist, Co-Writer - Boot to the Head - Incriminating Evidence (2001) - EP album In addition to his busy career as a musician, audio engineer, and Lead Audio Instructor at SAE Institute Nashville, Jason also manages to fit in mixing, mastering, and recording for several clients at his studio, Synergy Occurrence Studio, in Cottontown, TN. He is also an Associate Member of the Audio Engineering Society, and a Peer Reviewer for Focal Press Professional Audio Engineering Books. About SAE Institute SAE Institute provides aspiring creative media professionals with a foundation of practical theory and valuable hands-on training in their chosen areas of concentration. Under the guidance of industry-experienced faculty, students gain the essential experience they need for entry-level jobs in the creative media industry. Students are supported in their job searches by SAEs international network of alumni, many of whom are leaders in the music, film, game arts, and live performance arenas. SAE Institute offers programs in Audio Technology in seven US campuses, along with a Music Business program at select locations, all fully accredited and focused on preparing students for employment upon graduation. Bachelors Degree programs in Animation & Visual Effects, Digital Filmmaking, Game Art & Design, Interactive Audio, and Sound Arts are available at SAE Institute San Jose and SAE Expression College in the San Francisco Bay Area, formerly Expression College. SAE Institute Group, Inc. is a part of Navitas LTD. Learn more at usa.sae.edu. About Navitas Navitas is an Australian global education leader, providing pre-university and university programs, English language courses, migrant education and settlement services, creative media education, student recruitment, professional development, and corporate training services to more than 80,000 students across a network of over 120 colleges and campuses in 31 countries. Learn more at Navitas.com. "There is a considerable lack of understanding of the governance requirements for addressing climate geoengineeringtechnologies that fundamentally require multilateral governance approaches. This is what the C2G2 Initiative plans to address. Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs announces the launch of the Carnegie Climate Geoengineering Governance Initiative (C2G2), led by Executive Director Janos Pasztor. Most recently, Pasztor was the United Nations assistant secretary-general for climate change under Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. This initiative comes at a very timely moment and addresses a critical gap in the world's response to climate change. With 2016 the hottest year on record, and 16 out of 17 of the hottest years in modern history occurring this century, it is clear the risks of dangerous climate change are accelerating. Scientists are exploring the possibility that climate geoengineering might be needed, in addition to the mitigation efforts under the 2015 Paris Agreement and elsewhere, to buy time or temporarily reduce global temperatures. However, at present there is no comprehensive international framework to govern these technologies, which have planetary-wide consequences, pose many serious, unknown risks, and raise profound ethical questions. "There is a considerable lack of understanding of the governance requirements for addressing climate geoengineeringtechnologies that fundamentally require multilateral governance approaches," said Pasztor, the executive director. "This is what the C2G2 Initiative plans to address." According to Pasztor, "The highest priority remains for countries to pursue their activities to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases in line with the Paris Agreement. Climate geoengineering is not a substitute for the aggressive mitigation efforts needed at national and sub-national levels." It is within this context that the C2G2 Initiative, supported by a generous grant from the V. Kann Rasmussen Foundation, will operate. The long-term objective of the C2G2 Initiative is to encourage policy dialogues on and to contribute to the development of governance framework(s) for climate geoengineering, which is defined as deliberate, intentional planetary-scale interventions in the Earth system to counteract climate change. The Initiative (http://www.carnegiecouncil.org/c2g2) will neither promote nor be necessarily against the potential use of climate geoengineering, but will advocate for the development of governance frameworks necessary for expanded research on such techniques, including their environmental, social, and economic impacts, as well as for their potential deployment. The Initiative is engaging relevant stakeholders in intergovernmental and international nongovernmental organizations, the research community, think tanks, the private sector, as well as government officials to raise awareness about the issues; to encourage policy dialogues; to develop elements of the necessary governance frameworks; and ultimately to catalyze intergovernmental action. Executive Director Janos Pasztor has over 35 years of work experience in the areas of energy, environment, climate change, and sustainable development, working in intergovernmental as well as in nongovernmental organizations. In addition to serving as the United Nations assistant secretary-general for climate change, he was the director of the UN secretary-general's Climate Change Support Team from 2008-2010 and executive secretary of the UN secretary-general's High-level Panel on Global Sustainability in 2011-12. The public launch of C2G2 will take place on February 16 at 8:30am EST in the Carnegie Council headquarters in New York City. The invitation-only event will be live-streamed for the general public at http://www.carnegiecouncil.org/live. The event will include a panel discussion of the key issues in relation to climate geoengineering, its governance, and what the C2G2 Initiative will do. Panelists include: Professor Simon Nicholson, director, the Global Environmental Politics program, American University (facilitator): Dr. Doug MacMartin, California Institute of Technology; Dr. Jane Long, whose current positions include co-chair of the Task Force on Geoengineering for the Bipartisan Policy Center; Pablo Suarez, Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Center; Jennifer Morgan, executive director, Greenpeace International; Oliver Morton, editor at The Economist; and Janos Pasztor, executive director, C2G2. ABOUT CARNEGIE COUNCIL Founded by Andrew Carnegie in 1914, Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs is an educational, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that produces lectures, publications, and multimedia materials on the ethical challenges of living in a globalized world. For more information, go to http://www.carnegiecouncil.org. Vista College was one of the top 20 fundraising companies for the 2016 Dallas Heart Walk American Heart Associations annual premiere event for raising funds to save lives from this countrys No. 1 and No. 5 killers: heart disease and stroke. In 2016, over 400 Vista College staff and families participated, raising $62,200 a 65 percent increase in the amount the company raised in 2015. Vista raised $25,200 more in 2016 and $16,600 more than the colleges overall goal. It is an honor to be ranked as #19 of all Dallas company participants with our fundraising totals, said Jim Tolbert, CEO, Vista College. This is incredible given our size compared to all corporations in Dallas. This year, our company has moved up six spots from our ranking last year by increasing our participation numbers and raising a significant amount of additional funds. I couldnt be more proud of all of our campuses and their involvement, which demonstrates the dedication of our employees toward such a worthy cause. Vistas Heart Walk campus participants included all seven of its Texas campuses, located in Amarillo, Beaumont, College Station, El Paso, Killeen, Longview and Lubbock, as well as its Las Cruces, New Mexico, and Fort Smith, Arkansas, campuses. Additionally, it includes Vistas online division at the Richardson headquarters. Vista College first became involved in Heart Walk in 2014 with the support of all of its on-ground campuses operating at that time, as well as its Richardson headquarters. The American Heart Associations Heart Walk is Vista Colleges primary way of giving back to our community, added Tolbert. We look forward to this event each year with the hope of not only raising much needed funds for the American Heart Association, but also increasing awareness of ways we can prevent heart disease and strokes. Simply teaching others the importance of eating right and exercising within our communities goes a long way in the fight to reverse these two leading causes of death. Vista College is a network of private, post-secondary career colleges offering a variety of training programs. These include healthcare, business, cosmetology, legal, technology and trades. Vista College offers online programs and has seven on-ground campuses in Texas (Amarillo, Beaumont, College Station, El Paso, Killeen, Longview and Lubbock), and campuses in Las Cruces, New Mexico, and Fort Smith, Arkansas. Vista College is accredited by the Commission of the Council on Occupational Education located at 7840 Roswell Road, Building 300, Suite 325, Atlanta, GA 30350. Call (770) 396-3839. Vista College also has a separate Online campus accredited by the Accrediting Commission of Career Schools and Colleges (ACCSC). Consumer information may be viewed at http://www.vistacollege.edu. In support of the continuation of their rapid growth and continuous customer expansion, Argos Risk, specialists in web-based technology solutions for B2B credit risk management, today announced the appointment of industry leader Kevin Sasser as Director of Sales and Marketing. Sasser will be responsible for leading the sales and marketing teams in developing new business opportunities, opening new markets and collaborating with current clients in developing new and innovative solutions. The companys growth has been fueled by the demand for persistent credit risk monitoring and advanced business intelligence driven by regulatory requirements, faster payment settlement, and increasingly diverse value chains. Early adopter industries such as financial services, manufacturing, logistics and distribution have embraced Argos Risk as a key component in their operational and strategic plans. Sasser will play a key role in developing new strategies to further leverage expansion opportunities. Kevin Sasser is well-known and highly respected as a sales and marketing expert in the technology industry. He is a valuable addition to our team and we feel fortunate to welcome him to Argos Risk, said Lori Frank, President and CEO. Kevin is a strong leader with an in-depth background in technology, sales, and marketing. He has a proven track record in developing partnership strategies for a wide range of businesses. It is with great pleasure that we welcome him aboard. Background on Kevin Sasser Mr. Sasser is a recognized expert in sales and marketing strategies for a wide range of verticals. Prior to joining Argos Risk, he served as Vice President of Sales for Atcore Systems, a cloud computing and professional services firm specializing in enterprise technology solutions. He also served as Interim President for GroundBreak Technologies, where he managed company strategy, implemented customer retention programs, established brand messaging and drove product innovation. Other executive positions include Vice President for Company.com, Senior Vice President of GoldLeaf Financial Solutions, and Board Member of Crop Ventures, Inc. Mr. Sasser holds his degree from Valdosta State University, GA (B.S. Computer Science) and is an active mentor within the Atlanta startup community. About Argos Risk Argos Risk, based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, specializes in web-based technology solutions for B2B credit risk management, enabling companies of all sizes to proactively manage and monitor risk. Leveraging data and information from thousands of sources, the Companys solutions assess risk and the overall business health of clients, vendors, partners, and competitors. Powered by their proprietary algorithms, known as Argonomics, Argos Risk deliver data and insight via real-time dashboards and daily alerts. Argos Risk monitors thousands of companies for clients in a broad array of industries including financial institutions, manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers and businesses of all types. Visit http://www.argosrisk.com. Lindberg/MPH announced the shipment of an atmosphere box furnace for research and development purposes. The maximum temperature rating for this furnace is 1100C and has a work chamber of 36 W x 48 D x 36 H making it ideal for heat treating a variety of part sizes. The atmosphere box furnace has a wide temperature range of 760C to 1,100C. The heat-treating furnace is constructed with mild steel construction and structural steel frame. A vacuum formed ceramic fiber insulation is used for quick heat up and low heat storage. A horizontal swing insulated plug door keeps the inner hot surface away from the operator when opening to charge or unload work. The programmable temperature controller is capable of running 50 programs with 500 segments. This capability allows the operator to set specific programs for the different parts that will be processed. By designing the furnace with a wide temperature range it provided the customer with the flexibility to process a variety of part sizes. Jason Dobberstein, Sales Manager Unique features of this Lindberg/MPH heat treat furnace include: Vacuum formed ceramic fiber modules with low heat storage for fast heat up rates Prewired, side mounted, forced air-cooled control console Programmable controller Vacuum formed ceramic fiber insulation Horizontal swing insulated door plug Door limit switch Nitrogen atmosphere This box furnace is CSA inspected and certified. All Lindberg/MPH equipment comes with an exclusive 3-year warranty, which covers all materials for all components (less wear items). About Lindberg/MPH Lindberg/MPH is a leading manufacturer of standard and custom industrial heat treat furnaces, including pit, box, IQ, and belt type for the ferrous and non-ferrous markets. Lindberg/MPH customers cover a wide range of industries including aerospace/military, automotive, commercial heat treating, energy/oil, electronics and the forging markets. Founded in 1917, the company has more than 75,000 industrial furnace installations worldwide and their equipment is backed by a full range of customer support services and the most extensive replacement parts inventory in the industry. Lindberg/MPH is a proven leader in the thermal processing industry, with a long track record of proven policies and management practices. Lindberg/MPH is owned by Thermal Product Solutions (TPS), a leading American manufacturer of custom industrial ovens used for heat treating, finishing, drying, curing, manufacturing automation and process control. TPS is a global leader in thermal processing products and test solutions with brands including Baker Furnace, Blue M, Gruenberg, Tenney, Lindberg, Lunaire, MPH, and Wisconsin Oven. For more information on equipment solutions from TPS visit the website at http://www.thermalproductsolutions.com. #225149 Amy Tankersley, NATIC Manager of Education and Research This combined experience allows me to bring a unique perspective in developing materials that will enhance our agents ability to serve their customers effectively. North American Title Insurance Co. (NATIC) has named Amy Tankersley manager of education and research. In this role, she will manage the companys publications, educational materials and customer outreach. In addition to serving as the editor of NATICs flagship publication, LookingNorth, Tankersley will produce webinars and other instructional tools to further NATICs educational outreach to its agents in the title insurance and settlement services marketplace. She will also focus on reporting industry news to NATIC agents, generating special reports for agents and their customers, and providing copywriting support for NATICs websites and other marketing materials. Having researched and written about the industry for more than a decade as a journalist, Amy understands the educational programs needed to create a platform for agent growth, said Kelly McCarel, NATIC vice president, director of marketing and educational programs. She is eager to apply her multi-industry experience and knowledge to serve the needs of our agents and their customers. Prior to joining NATIC, Tankersley covered the title insurance, mortgage, real estate, settlement services and financial services industries, both as the editor of several well-known industry publications, including The Title Report and The Legal Description, and more recently, as a freelance journalist. Much of her writing has focused on legal, legislative and regulatory developments in those industries and making that content accessible and useful to a diverse audience. In addition to writing about issues affecting the title insurance industry, I have also written extensively for our customers and partners in the mortgage and real estate industries, Tankersley said. This combined experience allows me to bring a unique perspective in developing materials that will enhance our agents ability to serve their customers effectively, as well as offer educational opportunities to those same customers to augment their expertise in navigating the real estate transaction. Tankersley works out of NATICs Ohio office at 7550 Lucerne Drive, Middleburg Heights, OH 44130, and may be reached at telephone number (440) 343-8531 or atankersley(at)natic(dot)com. About North American Title Insurance Co. (NATIC) North American Title Insurance Co. (NATIC) is a seasoned title insurance underwriter, helping title agents to achieve the goal of true business success for over 50 years. NATIC conducts real estate settlement services in 39 states and the District of Columbia. NATIC earned the reputation as the underwriter next door, because their decision makers and associates are easy to reach and their processes are quick and straightforward. The NATIC agency application process is fast and transparent for qualified agents. NATIC has a one-hour underwriting response guarantee that is unparalleled in the industry. NATIC is in Peer Group 1, which groups companies with total assets of greater than $100 million as determined by Kroll Bond Rating Agency, Inc. NATIC is ranked 6th by The Performance of the Title Insurance Underwriters in terms of cash or cash equivalents. NATIC maintains over $95 million* in cash and invested assets. This represents over 93 percent of the companys assets and is characteristic of the most important attribute to title protection, namely, financial responsibility. *As of 12/31/2015. Demotech, Inc. awarded NATIC a rating of: A (A Prime) Unsurpassed. A.M Best rated B++ (Good). NATIC is headquartered in Miami, Florida. To learn more, visit http://www.natic.com. For more information contact: Kelly McCarel, c: 440.590.6504; e: kmccarel(at)natic(dot)com. Christians for Biblical Equality (CBE) is pleased to announce the full speaker lineup for its 2017 conference, Mutual by Design: Building Gods Church Together. The conference will promote the view that the Bible places no gender-based limits on Christian service. The conference theme is based on 1 Corinthians 11:11-12: However, woman is not separate from man, nor man separate from woman in the Lord. For as woman came from man, so also man is born of woman. But everything comes from God. Plenary speakers include Dr. Joy J. Moore, assistant professor of preaching and academic liaison to the William E. Pannell Center for African American Church Studies at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, CA; Dr. Jamin Hubner, chair of Christian studies and director of institutional effectiveness at John Witherspoon College; Dr. Ben Witherington III, Amos Professor of New Testament for Doctoral Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary and emeritus doctoral faculty, St. Andrews University, Scotland; Rev. Gricel Medina, a leadership and community development expert and pastor in the Evangelical Covenant Church; and Dr. Michael F. Bird, lecturer in theology at Ridley College in Melbourne, Australia. In addition, seventeen more speakers will lead workshops. Workshop speakers include such leaders as Dr. Albert Kabiro wa Gatumu, associate professor of New Testament, biblical Greek and biblical hermeneutics in the Faculty of Theology at St. Pauls University in Kenya; Johnrice Newton, founder of Tapestry Ministries, which serves at-risk teens and provides counseling for abuse victims; Nilwona Nowlin, national staff member of the Evangelical Covenant Church, Dr. Aloo Osotsi Majola, professor of philosophy and translation studies at St. Pauls University in Kenya; and more. The full speaker lineup is available on CBEs website. According to Priscilla Her, CBEs conference coordinator, attendees can expect a diverse range of egalitarian perspectives. Our speaker lineup this year brings together leaders from academia and the non-profit world, from various cultural and national backgrounds, and from different Christian traditions. We are especially proud to welcome two professors from St. Pauls University in Kenya, an institution with an ongoing relationship with CBE and doing critical work on gender. Our speakers reflect the global and diverse nature of the egalitarian movement. Appropriately, CBEs conference stands out among evangelical Christian conferences in its gender-balanced speaker lineup, featuring 60% women to 40% men. About one-third of speakers are people of color. In its effort to advance a biblical foundation for gift-based rather than gender-based ministry and service, CBE sponsors annual conferences, facilitates local chapters, hosts an online bookstore, and publishes two award-winning journals. For more information, visit http://www.cbeinternational.org. Earley Executive Roundtable Delivers Valuable Insights on Digital Transformation if a task proves to be too complex, hand it off to a human with the bot serving as a partner by providing support where it can Companies of all kinds are deploying armies of chatbots and other virtual assistants to provide support for existing customers and to attract new ones. But even as the software that powers these assistants gets more and more sophisticated, the customers experience will not improve and will in fact suffer if the information needed for the chats remains incomplete, inappropriate or not readily accessible. In short, the touted potential of artificial intelligence (AI) will be compromised if care isnt taken to do the preliminary work of organizing the information properly, according to a panel of knowledge management experts who participated in an Executive Roundtable discussion hosted on Jan. 18 by Earley Information Science Corp. (EIS), a leading consulting firm focused on digital transformation. Otherwise, the interactions will be just the latest example of garbage in, garbage out, the experts agreed, suggesting approaches and processes to avoid that outcome. Chatbots are a channel, whether they take the form of an avatar or a chat interface, and their function is to serve as an access point to information, said one of the experts, Seth Earley, Chief Executive Officer and founder of EIS. To function successfully, he said, chatbots have to sit on top of a repository of content that is specifically structured to support the tasks in question. And they also need retrieval mechanisms that will allow them to quickly find and serve up the relevant slices of that content, he added. The discussion, Virtual Assistants & Chatbots: The Next Big Thing in Customer Experience, was led by David Hatch, Senior Vice President for marketing at EIS. Besides Mr. Earley, the panel included Dan Miller, Lead Analyst and Founder of Opus Research; Henry Truong, Chief Technology Officer at TeleTech Holdings; and Sumeet Vij, Chief Technologist specializing in data science and AI at Booz Allen Hamilton, the consulting firm. Another issue, Earley noted, is to recognize that AI, despite all that it can do, is still in its relative infancy, and a company has to be careful not to ask it to perform beyond its current abilities. Train chatbots to handle simpler tasks and processes, he cautioned, those that are repeatable, structured and unambiguous. Monitor call centers and study the transcripts of live agents to identify those simpler tasks and processes. And if a task proves to be too complex, hand it off to a human with the bot serving as a partner by providing support where it can. Opus Researchs Dan Miller described the broad spectrum of roles and tasks that intelligent assistants now handle from making homes and cars conversational and acting as virtual travel, wellness or financial advisors to support, sales and scheduling for enterprise customers and employees. TeleTechs Henry Truong discussed new approaches to building smarter solutions for customer care. Capitalizing on advances in automation maturity, these approaches produce more business value as they move from information-based learning to probability-based learning and eventually cognitive learning. The strategic goal, Truong said, is to develop partnerships in which digital workers simplify the tasks, allowing human workers to engage with customers in deeper ways. Such partnerships are acutely needed in the government sector, said Booz Allens Sumeet Vij, who described the growing service shortfall at such resource-strained agencies of the federal government as the Internal Revenue Service. Deployed well, chatbots would help these agencies leap frog their way to much better levels of service. One dividend, Vij said, is to use the bots to capture institutional knowledge, enabling future employees to learn from the collective intelligence of past and current employees. The roundtable featured a real-time survey of the webinar attendees, including these results: A quarter of the respondents said that chatbots are a major priority of their business, having won funding and executive buy-in. But nearly half, or 47%, said that bots, while important, still require a business case. And more than a quarter (28%) said that they are not a priority. More than half, or 51%, said that they are just starting to investigate the use of virtual assistants at their companies, with another 20% in an early stage of internal testing. As for the areas in which chatbots are being employed, with respondents allowed to pick more than one area, the top three answers were customer/member service (43%), technical support (19%) and the selling process (14%). Nowhere yet was chosen by 40%. Please use this link to access the roundtable. To learn more about practical applications of virtual assistants and AI, see this list of suggested resources. About Earley Information Science: EIS helps organizations establish a strong information architecture and management foundation to drive strategic business outcomes and enhance operational performance. EIS has more than 20 years of experience in working with Fortune 1000 organizations globally across many industries. Corporate headquarters are in the Boston metropolitan area with consultants working on projects around the world. For more about Earley Information Science, visit our website at http://www.earley.com or contact us at info(at)earley(dot)com. TTA Appraisal - Delivering the Promise Larry brings a wealth of industry related experience, as well as the insights that come from running numerous successful national corporations. TTA Appraisal Co. Inc. today announced that Larry Jordan, former President of SCA Franchising Company, former President of SCA Appraisal Company and former President of the PDA Corporation (Property Damage Appraisers) was appointed to TTAs Board of Directors. Larry has extraordinary expertise not only in the material damage appraisal industry, but in global business development as a whole. We are truly delighted that he is joining TTA, said Jon Gironda, TTA Appraisal CEO. Jordan served SCA Appraisal Company in Burbank, CA in various Executive positions from 2007 thru 2016. During that time, Jordan led the company through the transition from a wholly owned corporate business model to a nationwide franchise presence. Prior to SCA, Jordan served as President of PDA Corporation in Fort Worth, TX from 1993 to 2006. During Jordans time at PDA, he nurtured the organization into a claims management powerhouse and to become the largest independent claims network in the United States. Jordan also held a number of leadership positions at Firestone Tire Corp, Meineke Automotive Corp, Maaco organizations, along with numerous start-ups to his credit. Jordan received a Bachelor of Business Administration from Lamar University in Beaumont TX, and added advanced post graduate studies from Pepperdine University. Larry brings a wealth of industry related experience, as well as the insights that come from running numerous successful national corporations. He will be a great addition to our board, said Shawn Goins, President of TTA Appraisal Co. I am honored to join the TTA board and work with this exceptional team, Jordan said. TTA has become a leader in the independent appraisal industry in a very short time due to their passion for quality, their innovative technology, and their undying commitment to deliver exceptional quality to their claims industry partners. I look forward to sharing my experiences and contributing to the direction and growth of this leading-edge, future-thinking organization. Founded in 1998 as a regional independent appraisal company, and then expanded to a national scale in 2010, TTA Appraisal Company has grown to be, not only the nations largest Heavy Truck and Equipment material damage appraisal organization, but the fastest growing Auto, RV, Cycle, Marine and Property appraisal company in just a few short years. With the acquisition of the best talent in the independent appraisal industry combined with the release of their revolutionary field inspection technology in March 2017, TTA is setting their sights on becoming the very first global independent material damage appraisal company and to be the first independent appraisal company to set cycle time and severity standards as never seen before in the industry. Radio marketing leader CRN International has been recognized by the March of Dimes as winner of its regional Humanitarian Award for volunteerism, mission awareness and philanthropic efforts. The award, as part of the Connecticut-Western Massachusetts Chapters Spirit of Giving celebration here, is given annually to a corporate sponsor and was presented to CRN Executive Vice President and Partner Dick Kalt. The Spirit of Giving event is in its 28th year, and the organization depends on the support of millions of volunteers to help in efforts to prevent birth defects, premature births, and infant mortality. We chose this night to honor those volunteers whose passion for the mission have sent them above and beyond this past year, said Christina Chalfant, March of Dimes Development Manager, Special Events, for the chapter. We congratulate CRN International for its years of support and dedication to our mission. In receiving the award, CRNs Kalt said, We are very honored by this recognition. CRN has a strong commitment to community involvement, and we hope our support of the March of Dimes makes a difference to the families they serve throughout Connecticut. CRN International, based in Hamden, CT, is also proud of its longstanding support of the Alzheimers Association and the Walk to End Alzheimers, Homes with Hope, Yale New Haven Childrens Hospital, Connecticut Food Bank, New Haven Public Schools, and the Connecticut Department of Children and Families. About CRN International CRN International is the leading radio marketing company, pioneering strategies and producing creative programming that gives major advertisers competitive advantages through radio and emerging audio media. The company recently launched Collisions, which produces podcasts for curious people. The company is headquartered in Hamden, CT, with offices in New York, Minneapolis and Detroit. For more information: Jim Alkon, CRN, Marketing Director, jima(at)crnradio(dot)com, 203-4073341. This award is well-deserved recognition not only of their work, but the tremendous support they receive, as shown by the many outstanding reviews they have received from people who have direct experience working with The Blue White Scholarship Foundation. The Blue White Scholarship Foundation announced today it has been named a 2017 Top-Rated Nonprofit by GreatNonprofits, the leading provider of user reviews of charities and nonprofits. The Blue White Scholarship Foundation, first established in 1973, provides scholarship awards, mentoring, and networking programs to Villanova University undergraduate students in Villanova, Pennsylvania. Since 2001, the Blue White Scholarship Foundation directed their scholarships in aiding students to bridge the financial gap of approximately $13,000 per year while attending this top ranked university. We are honored to be named a 2017 Top-Rated Nonprofit, says Kathleen Cellucci, Executive Director. We are proud of our accomplishments, including having awarded over $2,300,000 over the years to 287 deserving Villanova undergraduate students. The lifetime impact of this investment will have a 720X financial impact to these students, their communities, and the world at large. This past year, 16 scholarship recipients were selected. All the scholarship recipients meet certain criteria that includes financial need, meaning the students must have exhausted all financial aid possible, as well as having excellent academic ability, superior work ethic, and a willingness to Pay It Forward. The Top-Rated Nonprofit Award is the based on the ratings and number of reviews that are received from volunteers, donors and aid recipients. The Blue White Scholarship Foundation is driven by good hearts. It recognizes ambitious students like me, who work multiple jobs, yet still fall short on tuition. As the last of seven children, I never had the luxury of a college fund. Fortunately, The Blue White Scholarship Foundation has helped meet some of the tuition gap, making my dream of getting a college degree possible. says Rita Marino, scholarship recipient and Villanova University junior. The Blue White Scholarship Foundation is a great example of a nonprofit making a real difference in their community, said Perla Ni, CEO of GreatNonprofits, Their award is well-deserved recognition not only of their work, but the tremendous support they receive, as shown by the many outstanding reviews they have received from people who have direct experience working with The Blue White Scholarship Foundation. GreatNonprofits is the leading website where people share stories about their personal experiences on more than 1.3 million charities and nonprofits. The GreatNonprofits Top-Rated Awards are the only awards for nonprofits determined by those who have direct experience with the charities as donors, volunteers and recipients of aid. The complete list of 2017 Top Rated Nonprofits can be found at: http://greatnonprofits.org/awards/browse/Campaign:Year2017/Issue:All ### About The Blue White Scholarship Foundation The Blue White Scholarship Foundation is a charitable fundraising organization whose mission is to provide scholarships to deserving Villanova University juniors and seniors who have encountered gaps in funding and financial difficulty that could prevent them from achieving their goal of graduating with a Villanova Degree. The vision of the Blue White Scholarship Foundation is to create a world where no Villanova undergraduate student should have financial hardship preventing him or her from completing their undergraduate degree program. Visit http://www.bluewhitefoundation.com for more information. About GreatNonprofits GreatNonprofits is the leading site for donors and volunteers to find stories, reviews and ratings of nonprofits. Stories and reviews on the site influence 30 million donation decisions each year year. Visit http://www.greatnonprofits.org for more information. Media Contacts Kathleen Cellucci The Blue White Scholarship Foundation 610-304-3848 katecellucci(at)bluewhiteclub(dot)com Leonard Lee GreatNonprofits 612-670-3445 leonard(at)greatnonprofits(dot)org The marketing college is vital to the execution of the STB marketing strategy After a competitive selection process, global marketing and sales capability expert Brand Learning has won Singapore Tourism Boards 3- year contract to build its Marketing College. This college will equip the team across the world to deliver the STBs exciting and ambitious new marketing strategy. Working in partnership with STB, Brand Learning will build and deliver a world-class marketing college to the global marketing community of over 250 marketers. Employees will experience a pioneering and leading-edge learning programme, blending face-to-face and digital learning across priority marketing competencies. The marketing college is vital to the execution of the STB marketing strategy and will be instrumental in conquering new frontiers. The programme is also anticipated to be available for their broader industry partners. Brand Learnings Managing Director APAC, Harriet de Swiet, said of the new project, We are deeply honoured to have been selected to be the STBs partner in building marketing capabilities. Our work across the world has proven that Marketing Colleges such as this are a vital ingredient in achieving organisations missions. The STB Board has an ambitious agenda which we fully support and we are excited to help deliver it. This win builds on an already successful year for Brand Learnings Singapore office which, established in 2014, has won new clients such as Otsuka, Grab and Zimmer Biomet and also supports existing global clients such as HSBC, Shell, AstraZeneca and GSK. You can explore some of their past work and a full list of clients here: http://www.brandlearning.com/our-clients/. When asked of the appointment of Brand Learning, STB Executive Director, Communications & Marketing Capability, Marketing Group, Oliver Chong said Brand Learning has a proven track record working with leading organisations the world over to build capabilities. They impressed us with their ability to blend sharp marketing thinking with an outstanding, fun learning experience. We look forward to developing a compelling marketing development programme that will strengthen our teams across the globe. About Brand Learning: http://www.brandlearning.com. Brand Learning is a global capability development consultancy, based in Singapore, New York, and London. It works with over 160 leading organisations (including Unilever, Shell, Diageo, PepsiCo, AstraZeneca and GSK) in more than 60 countries to create sustained performance change in their commercial teams. By equipping organisations to be more customer-centred across teams and remits, as well as to achieve deep functional excellence in marketing, sales, digital, leadership and HR, it enables them to achieve their growth goals. Discover more about their services here: http://www.brandlearning.com/what-we-do/ The company is privately owned. Its co-founders are two ex Unilever/ Pepsi-Co VP marketing executives - Mhairi McEwan (group CEO) and Andy Bird (executive director). They are also the co-authors of The Growth Drivers: The Definitive Guide to Transforming Marketing Capabilities (Wiley 2011). Join the conversation: https://twitter.com/brandlearning or https://www.linkedin.com/company/brand-learning For more information or images, please contact: hayley.spurling(at)brandlearning(dot)com. eHome America, the nations premiere online homebuyer education platform, and EnTitle Insurance Company, a national title insurance and settlement services company, recently announced an ongoing collaboration designed to enable more American families to realize the dream of homeownership. EnTitle Insurance Company will offer to all of eHome Americas partner network $100 in savings over the next 100 days, kicking off on February 1, 2017. Those members who choose to obtain their title and settlement services over the next 100 days from EnTitle Insurance Company will receive a $100 VISA gift card from EnTitle Insurance Company. Milt Sharp, President & National Administrator, of eHome Network, stated: We are constantly seeking to find ways to provide additional benefits to members of eHome America. Almost all mortgage lenders require title insurance in connection with a home purchase; that is why we are delighted that EnTitle Insurance Company will be offering our members an additional $100 gift card if they choose to obtain services from EnTitle Insurance Company. eHome America works with Housing Finance Agencies, lenders, realtors, and American families to provide online borrower education to help families prepare to become and succeed as homeowners. Borrower education is often a required component for obtaining a low down payment mortgage from Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae or the FHA. eHome America helps members qualify for these special mortgage loan products; qualify for down payment assistance programs like those offered by the Federal Home Loan Banking System; and get access to information on available down payment programs. This results in many first time homeowners realizing substantial benefits from becoming members of eHome America. EnTitle Insurance Company has been helping Americans save on title insurance premiums since it launched its direct-to-consumer website in 2009. Steven Palmer, CEO of Entitle Direct Group, Inc., parent company of EnTitle Insurance Company explains: We have endeavored to file title insurance premiums at rates that are up to 25% below the standard rates of our competitors in the vast majority of the states in which we operate. By choosing to obtain their title insurance and closing services from EnTitle Insurance Company, homebuyers have the potential to reduce their closing costs by hundreds of dollars leaving them with more money to invest in their largest asset their new home. The EnTitle Insurance Company eHome America collaboration is truly a win-win for American families! About eHome America eHome America (http://www.ehomeamerica.org) is an inter-active web-based homebuyer education program available 24/7 by computer, smartphone, or tablet. The program was developed in 2009, and to-date has educated over 250,000 homebuyers. The course is available in both English and Spanish and is endorsed by NeighborWorks America, numerous state and local housing finance agencies, and the U. S. Department of Agriculture Rural Development Services (USDA). In addition, eHome America exceeds the National Industry Standards for Homeownership Education and Counseling and meets HUDs curriculum content requirements. About Entitle Direct Group, Inc. Entitle Direct Group is the parent company of the country's first direct-to-consumer title insurance underwriter, EnTitle Insurance Company. Currently operating in 40 states and the District of Columbia, EnTitle Insurance Company has attempted to file title insurance premium rates up to 25% lower than the standard rates of our competitors wherever possible, saving consumers hundreds, sometimes thousands of dollars in closing costs. For more information visit http://www.ENTITLEDIRECT.com. CONTACT: Bill Shaughnessy Director of Marketing Entitle Direct Group, Inc. 203-724-1142 bill.shaughnessy(at)entitledirect.com http://www.entitledirect.com 'Ditch The Box' is an all-encompassing podcast, covering all sorts of industry topics. The ultimate goal of the show is to share industry knowledge and spark conversation that will be useful to our audience. Jamie Berling, Executive Producer After an extended, successful run as a radio show on Voice America Business Network, Ditch The Box has debuted in a podcast format and is available for listeners to stream or download via iTunes and DitchTheBoxes.com. This move came from show host David Marinac and his team to offer a more convenient, on-demand program that audiences can listen to anytime, anywhere. Marinac has more than 30 years experience in the custom packaging industry. His forward-thinking approach combines inventive marketing techniques, a powerful team and a can-do-anything attitude. In addition to serving as a charismatic podcast host, he also speaks about the importance of packaging, branding and marketing at industry events across the nation. Ditch The Box is an extension of the presentations and conversations Marinac regularly holds with clients, colleagues, partners and inquisitive audiences. With a total of 22 episodes available now for instant download, each one-on-one podcast interview conducted by Marinac focuses on topics such as modern marketing techniques, strategies for building a sustainable brand, establishing credibility using the latest technological advancements and designing retail packaging that connects with influential millennial consumers. New episodes are released each week and can be accessed on the Ditch the Box website or iTunes. Guests share insider secrets and tricks of the trade for finding success in markets like specialty foods, confections, contract manufacturing, animal products and even medical marijuana. No topic is off limits, and each episode is presented as a casual, open-ended conversation from game changers in a wide range of industries. Ditch The Box is an all-encompassing podcast, covering all sorts of industry topics. The ultimate goal of the show is to share industry knowledge and spark conversation that will be useful to our audience, said Jamie Berling, Ditch The Box Executive Producer. The most recent episode of Ditch The Box features an extended talk with Evan Delahanty, CEO of Peaceful Fruits. Delahanty explains how listeners can promote sustainability within their brands and give back to their communities in strategic, thoughtful ways while still earning a profit. The conversation takes place on the heels of Peaceful Fruits endeavors toward national product distribution, offering listeners a behind-the-scenes look into turning a social-good concept into a successful business. Other Ditch The Box guests have included: Jeff Fromm FutureCast President, Forbes Contributor, Author of Millennials With Kids Tom Szaky TerraCycle Founder and CEO Obeta Osolu Dominos International Quality Assurance, Peal Starch Founder Kevin Coen Fannie May Fine Chocolates and Harry London President Ditch The Box is affiliated with leading flexible retail packaging company, ABC Packaging Direct, home of StandUpPouches.net. Marinac serves as President and CEO of this organization. For more information about upcoming guests, or to inquire about appearing on an episode, contact Ditch The Box producer Jamie Berling here: http://ditchtheboxes.com/contact-us/ About Ditch The Box: Based in Cleveland, Ohio, but featuring guests from across the U.S., Ditch The Box serves to educate and inform listeners interested in exploring the good, the bad and the ugly of business from prominent leaders. Focusing primarily on the retail sector, host David Marinac interviews CPG brand entrepreneurs, longtime industry pros and marketing experts while sharing his own expertise about packaging and its role as the signature brands leave everywhere. The name Ditch The Box refers to both thinking outside of the box in terms of promoting and running a business, as well as embracing new solutions like scientifically advanced flexible retail packaging for consumer goods. About StandUpPouches.net: StandUpPouches.net is a leading online supplier of flexible retail packaging solutions for many of the world's largest brands. By partnering with small and mid-market businesses, the company has helped its customers build their brands and successfully market their products using the finest printed pouches in the industry. Karla Jo Helms, CEO of JoTo PR, discusses the amount of money being spent by the federal government on public relations. American taxpayers have paid to be subjected to economically damaging propaganda and non-transparency disguised as PR. Just when all sides of the political landscape cry for transparency, a cloud looms over questionable PR practices being used by the federal government, and the effect of such practices on the U.S. economy. True public relations persuade people to be more comfortable and cooperative in doing business with a company. If that isnt happeningwhether by business or by governmentit isnt being done right. PR veteran and CEO of JoTo PR, Karla Jo Helms, is leading a rally cry to urge businesses to demand proper PR, accountability and the return on investment of government PR strategies. Government is comprised of and elected by the peoplenot the other way around. Citing a Government Accountability Office report commissioned by Senate Budget Committee chairman Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.), the $1.5 billion spent on public relations by the federal government was largely driven by 10 agencies that made up 95% of the spending. The Department of Defense employs the greatest number of PR positions (5,238 in FY 2011) with a median salary of $90,000.(1) The amount of money invested in public relations does not correlate with public confidence in government. A study by Pew Research in 2016 found that Americans trust for government has declined from a high of 77 percent in 1964 to a mere 19 percent(2)an indicator that the PR is not working. But, unfortunately, fake PR is not new news. In 2005, the New York Times pointed to an increase in the amount of contrived and prepackaged news created by the Pentagon, the State Department and others.(3) They cited the use of PR in false news by the Bush administrationgovernment-made news segments that were made to look like local news and often used fake reporters. On other occasions, the tactic was that the public wasnt informed that the video segment was produced by the government. Helms therefore asserts that American taxpayers have paid to be subjected to economically damaging propaganda and non-transparency disguised as PR. In 2009, the government spent trillions on the Troubled Asset Relief Program. Its purpose was to ensure that financial institutions remained solvent in order to avoid another financial crisis such as that experienced in 2007-2009. In a report to Congress, Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general for the TARP, noted that governments ability to act in crises depended on its credibility with the market and with the public, whose political support was crucial. Unfortunately, several decisions by the Treasury ... have served only to damage the governments credibility and thus the long-term effectiveness of TARP, he said.(4) Credibility is the difference between public support and distaste. The events leading up to a crisis, as well as how it is managed, will have a direct impact on public trust. Helms reminds industry pros that the economy thrives on money being circulated and spent in businessmoney is, after all, only an idea backed by confidence. Investment arises from that confidence. Without confidence, the future of businesses is in jeopardy. So, the corollary is true, if there is no confidence in the government, yet expense in PR have increased then fake PR is being used. Helms states that PR must be used ethically. Historically, PR has been used to manipulate people. Thats not real PR, thats fake and it wont build relations. For the sake of our economy, businesses in the U.S. need to take charge of their own public relations and that of their industry by publicizing real news and demanding government PRs issue truth, not lies. The government doesnt change unless the people demand it. To learn more about JoTo PR and its intention to help companies disrupt the landscape of manipulative and fake PR and be in control of their message, visit http://www.jotopr.com. About JoTo PR: After doing marketing research on a cross-section majority of 5,000 CEOs of fast-growth trajectory companies and finding out exactly how they used PR, how they measure it and how they wanted the PR industry to be different, PR veteran and innovator Karla Jo Helms created JoTo PR and established its entire business model on those research findings. Astute in recognizing industry changes since its launch in 2009, JoTo PRs team utilizes newly established patterns to create timely PR campaigns comprising both traditional and the latest proven media methods. This unique skill enables them to continue to increase the market share and improve return on investment (ROI) for their clients, year after yearbeating usual industry standards. Based in Tampa Bay, Florida, JoTo PR is an established international public relations agency. Today, all processes of JoTo are streamlined PR services that have become the hallmark of the JoTo PR name. For more information, visit JoTo PR online at http://www.jotopr.com. About Karla Jo Helms: Karla Jo Helms is the CEO and visionary behind JoTo PR. She cut her teeth in PR via crisis management, working with litigation attorneys, private investigators and the media to help restore companies of goodwill back into the good graces of public opinion. Karla Jo learned firsthand how brutal business could be when there were millions of dollars to be hadand how to navigate those treacherous waters via control of public opinion. Since then, Karla Jo has patterned her agency on a combination of her hard-won public relations experience, uncompromising high standards and exacting nationwide market research across multiple industries. Shes a hands-on executive who hand-picks the PR professionals who work on her team, to ensure that client results always meet client expectations. Helms speaks globally on public relations and how corporations can harness it to drive markets. 1. Lee, Sarah. Report: The Federal Government Spends 1.5 Billion on Public Relations Each Year. TheBlaze.com. 01 January 2017. Web. 2. Adelmann, Bob. Federal Government Continues to Lose Trust of its Citizens. TheNewAmerican.com. 26 January 2016. Web. 3. Shah, Anup. Media Manipulation. Global Issues.Org. Globalissues.org. 17 April 2006. Web. 4. Nutting, Rex. Public distrust is biggest cost of TARP, Barofsky says. MarketWatch. MarketWatch.com. 21 October 2009. Web. Famous Toastery has seen a momentous 2016 as the better-breakfast franchise looks to triple its location presence within the next year. The brand began the year landing on CNBCs list of the top six food franchises in America. Theyve consistently won best breakfast and brunch awards in their hometown market, Charlotte, North Carolina, since the brands inception more than a decade ago. And to date, they boast 17 locations throughout the Southeast. Last spring, Famous Toastery opened their very first Florida location in Jacksonville Beach, and in the fall, a franchisee opened in Loudon, Virginia. New restaurants are also in the pipeline for Philadelphia, New York, Colorado and Georgia all new states for the brand. Additional new development will be scattered throughout South Carolina and North Carolinamost recently, a multi-unit franchisee signed on for 10 restaurants in Asheville, Greensboro and Raleigh-Durham. More and more people are starting to hear about us. People are learning about our genuine passion for better-breakfast and lunch, served up in a welcoming and friendly culture. When they find out what Famous Toastery has to offer, people are either going out of their way to dine with us, or theyre wondering what itll take to bring the brand straight to them, said Robert Maynard, the founder and CEO of Famous Toastery. That tells us that theres a real need for Famous Toastery. Better-breakfast is still an untapped market, and we have so much opportunity to broaden our already-tremendous following of loyal and regular customers by adding new locations across the country. Targeting New York in particular doesnt just make good business sense for Famous Toastery; however, Maynard and the brands other founder, Brian Burchill, grew up just down the street from each other in a Long Island neighborhood. They then ended up living on the same block in New York City, where Maynard gave up a musical career to work on Wall Street while Burchill pursued an acting career. With Maynards father a lieutenant in the New York City Fire Department during 9-11, the familys intense connection with the city grew, and it was a major driving factor in deciding to bring the area its first taste of Famous Toastery. Maynards father, now a commercial real estate broker, was instrumental in procuring the first Long Island location, now in its early building stages. Maynard is targeting the rest of the tri-state area for additional growthincluding upstate New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. As Famous Toastery continues to build out the East Coast, the brand is also looking to make a move Westward. In particular, theyre looking to develop in Kentucky, Alabama, Florida, Virginia, West Virginia, Tennessee and Georgia. In 2017, Famous Toastery has its sights set on signing 15 deals for a total of 75 locations. Theres a shift occurring lately in terms of what people look for when theyre dining out. People are shunning the idea of the greasy-spoon and artificial ingredients. Instead, theyre craving foods that are fresh and natural. They want meals that are made from scratch every single morning. Were bringing that concept to the booming breakfast and brunch crowds, and we believe that our growth potential is currently unmatched, Maynard said. From North Carolina to New York, people throughout the country all value those thingsthey want quality food without the pretention often seen in the brunch segment these days. And were excited to finally bring that option to them. ABOUT FAMOUS TOASTERY Famous Toasterys story began in 2005 in Huntersville, N.C. in a small house-turned-restaurant where best friends Brian Burchill and Robert Maynard opened their first breakfast spot. News of their fresh-made breakfasts and fun atmosphere spread. The concept quickly grew to three locations, serving new and loyal clients dishes such as made-from-scratch portabella mushroom benedict and avocado omelets. Never compromising fresh ingredients or friendly service, the demand for Toast kept growing. To satisfy its family of patrons pleas for more locations, Toast evolved into a franchise system in 2013. Dining customers always can expect impeccable service because at Toast, every server is your server. Breaking through the boring casual breakfast segment, Toast will continue spreading its success to new communities across the United States. For more information about Toast or to learn about franchising opportunities, please visit http://toastcafeonline.com/. Montrose Travel, a division of CTM (ASX:CTD), a $4 Billion global travel powerhouse and nationally recognized Top 12 Travel Management Company, was acknowledged by Royal Caribbean International as West Partner of the year for 2016. This commendation pays tribute to an elite group of travel agencies within the United States and Canada who embody passion, commitment and innovation and go above and beyond to achieve success. "2016 was another record breaking year for the Royal Caribbean brand, said Vice President of Sales & National Accounts, Joanne M. Schimelman. It is important to us to highlight the exceptional support that helped us achieve such a milestone. Montrose Travel was selected out of thousands of Travel Partners in the Western Region as the one that truly stood out based on the incredible loyalty displayed toward our brand, resulting in exceeding our mutual goal together. The Montrose Travel team is a true partner in every sense of the word and is a partner we know we can always count on". Montrose Travel and Royal Caribbean International are not new acquaintances. The decades-long relationship has resulted in many shared successes and celebrations. Montrose named Royal Caribbean their Supplier Partner of the Year in 2012, the same year Montrose was honored as Royal Caribbeans West Partner of the Year for the first time. We are thrilled to see how our hard work and success positively impact the success of our valued partners like Royal Caribbean International, states President of Montrose Travel, Joe McClure. We at Montrose Travel consider ourselves a family, and we extend that sense of family to those with whom we work closely. We are elated to see our relationship with Royal Caribbean continue to flourish. The 2016 accolade comes after a year of significant change for the travel agency. Not only did Montrose Travel celebrate 60 years in business, they as also joined forces with the Australian-owned Corporate Travel Management (CTM), and have increased their reach to incorporate a number of smaller agencies and independent contractors nationwide. What could have been a period of slow transition turned out to be one of prosperity and growth. I cannot recall another travel partner handling a merger and acquisition as successfully as Montrose has, states Doug Grau, Regional Director for Royal Caribbean International. We have always taken great care in nurturing our supplier relations, says Andi Mysza, Head of Allure Travel by CTM and MTravel Hosting Services for North America. With the new merger, we have an opportunity to expand and foster those relationships across the nation, and will continue to do so with our dedicated partners like Royal Caribbean International. We are honored and extremely proud to have earned this dedication from RCI. ### About Montrose Travel - Celebrating 60 years in business, family-operated Montrose Travel has grown a small local travel agency into a Top 30 Travel Management Company and a Top 5 Host Agency nationwide. Montrose Travel provides the highest quality services with complete vacation, corporate, loyalty and group travel management solutions for its clients and independent travel professionals. Learn more about its leisure division at http://www.MontroseTravel.com | 1-800-MONTROSE (666-8767); its corporate division at http://www.MontroseCorporateTravel.com | 1-800-766-4687; and its hosting division for independent travel professionals at http://www.MTravel.com | 1-800-870-5799. Christopher L. Musmanno Christopher L. Musmanno, Partner and Chair of Denville law firm Einhorn Harris Personal Injury Department was recently credited with six of the top legal settlements in the state of New Jersey as ranked by New Jersey Law Journals Top New Jersey Settlements of 2016. The six cases of distinction by Musmanno include: Hubert v. Netcong Heights Apartments - Tied for 28 in the premises liability category, settled in the amount of $350,000 prior to trial. According to court documents plaintiff sustained injuries when she slipped and fell on ice in the parking lot of her apartment complex. The case found that the defendant had allegedly not performed any ice or snow removal on the parking lot for two days prior to the plaintiffs fall nor was the complex salted or cleaned until five hours after plaintiffs fall. (MRS-L-2788-14 -Filed in the Morris County Court of New Jersey) Deter v. Huhn and Huhn Ranked number 34 in the motor vehicle category, settled in the amount of $280,000 prior to trial. According to court documents the plaintiff sustained injuries after he was struck by a car and thrown twenty to thirty feet, knocking him unconscious while riding his motorcycle. (MRS-L-2885-15 - Filed in the Morris County Court of New Jersey) Millichap v. Mountain Club Condo Ranked number 15 in the premises liability category and settled in the amount of $275,000 during a mediation hearing prior to trial. According to court documents, the plaintiff sustained injuries when she slipped on excessive gravel and fell in the parking area of her condominium complex. (MRS-L-2234-14 -Filed in the Morris County Court of New Jersey) Delle Monache v. 95 West Main Associates Ranked number 35 in the premises liability category, and after mediation, this case was settled in the amount of $250,000 prior to trial. According to court documents, the plaintiff sustained injuries when the plaintiff slipped and fell on black ice on the commercial sidewalk that runs the length of the strip mall where plaintiffs gym is located. (MRS-L-723-15 -Filed in the Morris County Court of New Jersey) Lanyard and Levine v. American Multi Cinema - Ranked number 36 in the premises liability category and settled in the amount of $245,000 prior to trial. According to court documents, the plaintiff sustained injuries when he slipped and fell on black ice after exiting a movie theater. According to court documents, the case found that the theater allegedly knew of the ice in the parking lot and an that an employee had been assigned to salt the steps and sidewalk three hours prior to the plaintiffs accident. (PAS-L-619-15 -Filed in the Passaic County Court of New Jersey) Velasco v. Widdoss and Hoffman Equipment - Tied for 40 in the motor vehicle category, this case settled in the amount of $200,000 subsequent to depositions of the parties prior to trial. According to court documents, the plaintiffs car was struck head-on by the defendant while stopped at an intersection and, therefore the plaintiff allegedly sustained injuries and was unable to work for a period of time, resulting in a lost wage claim. (WRN-L-162-15 - Filed in the Warren County Court of New Jersey) It is a tremendous honor to be included in New Jerseys Top Settlements of 2016, says Musmanno. Our team continuously strives for the best possible outcomes for our clients and we work diligently and passionately to achieve this. I share this recognition with all of my colleagues with whom I collaborate on a daily basis. Christopher L. Musmanno, Einhorn Harris Partner and Chair of the Firms Personal Injury Department, concentrates his practice in Personal Injury Litigation focusing on products liability, medical malpractice, work-related accidents, slip and fall cases, dog bite cases and automobile accidents. New Jerseys Top Settlements of 2016 was produced in partnership with ALMs VerdictSearch. VerdictSearch provides legal and insurance professionals with the most accurate, detailed case reports each week. All cases in the New Jerseys Top Settlements of 2016 were pulled from the VerdictSearch database and had to meet the criteria for inclusion into the VerdictSearch database. For more information please visit: http://www.verdictsearch.com. ABOUT EINHORN HARRIS Established in 1961, Einhorn Harris, based in Denville, New Jersey, is a comprehensive, full-service law firm devoted to serving a broad range of legal needs. In its more than 50 years in business, Einhorn Harris and its attorneys have earned a reputation for dedication to the community. The firm specializes in many areas of practice including Family, Criminal and Tax Law; Accidents/Personal Injury; and Commercial Litigation. http://www.einhornharris.com. ABOUT NEW JERSEY LAW JOURNAL Published since 1878, the New Jersey Law Journal is the indispensable legal authority for a state with the fifth largest attorney population in the country. This weekly publication presents a complete, official source for all state and federal court notices. It also provides up-to-the- minute digests of all relevant court decisions, published and unpublished, along with lively, much-talked-about journalism by award-winning reporters. Each issue features "In Practice," articles by contributing experts on legal developments, as well as editorials by an Editorial Board that is a who's who of bar leaders. Read more: http://www.njlawjournal.com/about-us#ixzz3wZKseMBm Dereck Bowlen Since this is our first venture into the Reno market, we thought it was very important to have someone who is well known and respected in the local mortgage industry. New Penn Financial announced today the hiring of Dereck Bowlen http://www.newpennfinancial.com/dbowlen as Branch Manager in Reno, Nevada. A 25-year veteran of the mortgage industry, Dereck has been recognized as a top producing loan originator throughout his career. Dereck has lived in Reno for 40 years and is a graduate of University of Nevada, Reno. Reno is new territory for New Penn Financial, said Mr. Bowlen. I was unfamiliar with the companys brand, and learned a great deal during the recruitment process. They stand out in terms their vision for customer service both in creating a superior customer experience and in providing alternative product solutions. The company originates under the New Penn Financial name and through multiple subsidiaries and joint ventures, including Shelter Mortgage Company. Since this is our first venture into the Reno market, we thought it was very important to have someone who is well known and respected in the local mortgage industry, said Corey Caster, Senior Vice President of Shelter Mortgage. I think that the combination of our loan products with Derecks regional experience and reputation will prove to be a strong combination. We look forward to serving the Reno market. About New Penn Financial New Penn Financial continues to assemble deeply experienced and highly seasoned industry leaders making us one of the fastest growing lenders in the nation. As a direct lender and servicer, we have positioned ourselves to be able to provide loans that serve a variety of scenarios. This allows us to assist more customers while maintaining the highest compliance standards and ensuring great customer service at every stage. Our leadership has successfully and strategically directed their teams to be prosperous during the downs of a challenging economy while capitalizing on the potential of a robust one. This depth of wisdom and focus on quality allows us to innovate with confidence, develop superior products, provide exceptional The International Institute for Analytics (IIA), the authority on analytics maturity and best practices, will host its 2017 Analytics Symposium at the VMware campus in Silicon Valley on March 14. The Analytics Symposium is an event that brings together analytics practitioners and thought leaders including IIAs clients, faculty and expert network for moderated discussions on key analytics topics, industry specifics and functional applications. I got an amazing high-level overview of what an enterprise analytics can and should do, as well as specific examples of how to do the actual work including templates and people to talk to, said Rena Kirsch, a senior manager at Abt Associates and 2016 Symposium attendee. It was an incredibly insightful way to spend my day! Speakers include Geoffrey Moore, renowned author and advisor; Cole Nussbaumer Knaflic, data storyteller and former manager of Googles People Analytics team; Paul Ballew, Global Chief Data and Analytics Officer at Ford Motor Company; and best-selling author Jerry Kaplan. The agenda also includes five more presentations by thought leaders, C-suite executives and industry experts. The event is designed to not only give executive professionals the actionable insights they need to accelerate their organizations analytics capabilities, but also provide best practice applications for a spectrum of industries. In past IIA events, attendees appreciated the variety of perspectives from peers and experts. Executives from Pandora, Eli Lilly, Dow Chemical, and Beam Suntory are among this years attendees. IIA is excited to host our Symposium in Silicon Valley, the hub of innovation and technology, said IIA CEO Jack Phillips. We look forward to hearing from an impressive lineup of keynote speakers about leadership and disruption in the field of analytics. Interested in attending? Register at http://www.iiasymposium.com/attend. The International Institute for Analytics (IIA) is an independent research and advisory firm for organizations committed to accelerating their business through the power of analytics. Co-founded by Tom Davenport and CEO Jack Phillips, IIA works across a breadth of industries to uncover actionable insights from its network of analytics practitioners, industry experts and faculty. IIAs research clients gain access to on-demand consulting, an extensive research library, faculty-moderated executive roundtables and expert network of practitioners. IIA also provides analytics assessments and training services designed to optimize performance in the new data economy. For more information about IIA, its services and how you can become a member visit http://www.iianalytics.com/. The 2017 Schools of Opportunity application cycle launched today at http://www.SchoolsofOpportunity.org. Building on the success of the past two years, the National Education Policy Center at CU Boulder will again recognize public high schools that are creating remarkable opportunities to learn for all their students. The application deadline is May 1, 2017. Schools that apply are asked to demonstrate how they work to close opportunity gaps across a range of key areas. The NEPC derived this set of opportunity measures from the expertise shared by top researchers in Closing the Opportunity Gap, the 2013 book published by Oxford University Press. Two criteria are required of all applying schools: (1) broadening and enriching learning opportunities and (2) creating and maintaining a healthy school culture. Applicants also select, from a menu of eight additional criteria, four that best represent how their school is responding to its unique local needs. All ten criteria are described on the Schools of Opportunity website, along with the scoring rubric used by the evaluation teams. NEPC designed the Schools of Opportunity project as a way to highlight the nations best schools and practices, shifting away from the nations imbalanced focus on standardized test scores. Even in the face of stark inequities across our social and economic systems, as well as our education system, every school can adopt research-based best practices, says Project Co-Director, Dr. Linda Molner Kelley. The 37 Schools of Opportunity recognized over the first two years of the project illustrate how all schools can work to provide great opportunities for their students. Along with Dr. Kelley, who is the former Assistant Dean of Teacher Education and Partnerships at CU Boulder, the project is led by Dr. Adam York, the Project Manager, and by NEPC director and CU-Boulder School of Education Professor Kevin Welner. The Ford Foundation and the NEA Foundation both provide funding to support the project. Each schools application will be reviewed by a team of evaluators from across the nation, including educational researchers and current and former school leaders. Finalists are selected based on narrative responses as well as data and other evidence submitted. Site visits to top schools are also a vital part of the project. Educators have found that the application process provides a rich opportunity for high school teams to work together to reflect on their strengths, assets and areas of potential improvement. Recognized Gold and Silver schools will be announced in winter 2017 in the Washington Post Answer Sheet blog and other media outlets. Applications are welcomed until May 1, 2017, with all nomination information and forms available online at: http://www.SchoolsofOpportunity.org Find Documents: Press Release: http://nepc.info/node/8450 The National Education Policy Center (NEPC), housed at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education, produces and disseminates high-quality, peer-reviewed research to inform education policy discussions. Visit us at: http://nepc.colorado.edu SourceMedia and American Banker are deeply engaged with communities of professionals in economically consequential markets SourceMedia and Junction Education today announce a strategic partnership to launch an innovative series of college-level economics courses leveraging market-defining insights from American Banker. The series, which will be hosted on Junction Educations adaptive courseware platform, will bring the study of economics to life by incorporating case studies and market analysis from American Banker, the leading resource for professionals in banking and financial services. The American Banker course series will be available in early 2017, exclusively through Junction Education. SourceMedia and American Banker are deeply engaged with communities of professionals in economically consequential markets - and thus ideally positioned to bring practical perspectives to students of micro- and macro-economics, said SourceMedia CEO Doug Manoni. Were convinced that Junctions easy-to-use adaptive courseware is an excellent way to immerse students in the implications of economics through the unique real-world coverage of American Banker. I was always impressed by the timely and multi-faceted coverage of American Banker when I was working in finance, said Vineet Madan, Founder and CEO, Junction Education. What better way is there to address the preparedness gap for students interested in banking, finance, venture capital or hedge funds than to engage them in active class discussions around real-world topics while they master the underlying economic concepts. Junctions features include: Closed captioned rich media with supporting terms and definitions Auto-graded assessments with 30+ item types Insight centers for faculty and students with real-time analytics Class discussion activities centered around American Banker content in every lesson Integration with any LTI-compliant learning management system A machine learning powered early alert system that furthers engagement by reaching students where they are - on their smartphones Junction is already in use by over two dozen colleges and universities including University of New Mexico Taos, Luzerne County Community College, and Montclair State University. For more information about Junction Education, visit http://www.junctioneducation.com. ABOUT SOURCEMEDIA: SourceMedia, an Observer Capital company, is a business-to-business digital marketing services, subscription information, and event company serving senior-level professionals in the financial, technology and healthcare sectors. Brands include American Banker, PaymentsSource, The Bond Buyer, Financial Planning, Accounting Today, Mergers & Acquisitions, National Mortgage News, Employee Benefit News and Health Data Management. ABOUT JUNCTION EDUCATION: Since 2014, Junction Education has been making available engaging, affordable and easy to use high-quality adaptive courseware in areas such as Economics, Psychology, Sociology, Biology and History that 82% of students prefer to alternatives. Media Contacts: SourceMedia Rocco Impreveduto Rocco.impreveduto(at)sourcemedia(dot)com (212) 803-8824 Junction Education Vineet Madan vineet(at)junctioneducation(dot)com 866-830-0400 x700 etouches to hire 100-plus people internationally in 2017 At a time when mergers and layoffs are commonplace, etouches has stepped up to create an innovative event management platform to cover the entire event lifecycle. etouches, a top global provider of cloud event management software, today announced plans to hire more than 100 people globally in 2017. Headquartered in downtown Norwalk, CT and with global offices in the United Kingdom, Australia, Belgium, Singapore, and Dubai, etouches plans to grow its team throughout these regions to meet the growing demands of the business. At a time when mergers and layoffs are commonplace, etouches has stepped up to create an innovative event management platform to cover the entire event lifecycle, said Oni Chukwu, CEO of etouches. Through innovative and organic new product development and carefully vetted product acquisitions over the past couple of years, we have created a robust, industry-leading enterprise solution. Now, we require a larger workforce to meet our growing global demand. The company was honored with the 2016 SIIA Codie Award for Best Event Management Software as a result of the products robust and comprehensive features. etouches' modern, integrated event management platform ranges from innovative venue sourcing solutions to real-time data and analytics dashboards that provide companies with the productivity and performance they need at a global level to save money, increase attendee engagement and develop more profitable business strategies for all their events. Adding to the already stacked event platform, etouches' recently acquired and integrated three leading event technology tools into its event management platform: venue sourcing solution inevention, event mobile app TapCrowd, and booking and venue sourcing solution Zentila. It is this unique and seamless offer that appeals to its 1,300 customers in more than 50 countries. It is critical to continue to hire top talent that include event experts, innovative technologists, sales directors, data engineers and exemplary support staff, said Chukwu. With these key people and our leadership team, we will accelerate at a faster pace to create more disruptive products that are essential to event professionals today and in the future. Following an impressive growth of team members internationally in 2016, the company is now aggressively looking to hire 100 people over the course of 2017 to fill positions in global sales, product development, customer support, data science and professional services. In addition to growing its global team, etouches enhanced security, transaction and data privacy features in 2016. These efforts allowed the company to be the industrys first to provide the entire SaaS platform localized in regions (North America, Europe and Asia Pacific) thanks to its dedicated, industry-leading Amazon Web Services infrastructures. With over 95% revenue retention and a 97% customer satisfaction rating, etouches has become the only at-scale enterprise alternative in the market. The companys roster of clients includes dozens of Fortune 5000 companies in the financial services, retail, airlines and technology sectors. With the new personnel, etouches is set to onboard several additional enterprise companies throughout 2017. User experience is key to our enterprise offer that ranges from SMM (strategic meeting management) features and integration to CRMs, mobile, data and event logistics, said Shane Edmonds, CTO of etouches. The talent that we have, and will continue to hire with discipline, brings a mix of event expertise and innovative disruptive thinking that will change the way we are able to serve enterprise customers in need of innovative, robust solutions. An award winning company, etouches was listed on Event Marketers Best Places to Work in Events in 2015, the Inc. 5000 list from 2012-2015, and the Deloitte Fast 500 consecutively in 2015 and 2016. These recognitions are a testament to the strong customer-centered culture that keep etouches positive momentum going. For current open positions across a variety of roles, departments, and regions, visit the Careers and Culture section at etouches.com. About etouches etouches is a global end-to-end event management software solution. The success oriented and cloud-based platform delivers innovative technology solutions to streamline the event process and increase ROI. Founded in 2008, etouches has assisted over 25,000 event professionals in planning, executing and measuring their events. With a focus on event sourcing, registration, marketing, logistics, engagement, mobile and data, the software platform serves more than 1,300 customers including leading corporations, associations, agencies and educational institutions globally. Headquartered in the United States in Norwalk, CT, the company also has offices in Orlando, Florida and five global offices in the United Kingdom, Belgium, Australia, UAE, and Singapore. Learn more about etouches at etouches.com. At Whataburger, we believe in serving great food thats full of flavor Whataburger and H-E-B are rolling out Buffalo Sauce, 40-ounce Fancy and 40-ounce Spicy Ketchup at H-E-B stores, offering customers a new flavor and two long-time fan favorites in a new size. Whataburgers new Signature Sauces include: Buffalo Sauce The flavor of our Buffalo Ranch Chicken Strip Sandwich lives on in this sauce. Its tasty and buttery and has just the right touch of heat for your home-cooked meals. 40-ounce Fancy Ketchup Originally launched at H-E-B in 2013 in 20-ounce bottles, Whataburgers Fancy Ketchup now comes in a larger 40-ounce size. Admirers even have a dedicated Facebook fan page with more than 20,000 fans, where fans have described the condiment as life-changing, best on the planet and ketchup of the gods. 40-ounce Spicy Ketchup First introduced as a limited-time offer in 2011, Whataburgers Spicy Ketchup was also added to H-E-B shelves in 20-ounce bottles and made permanently available in all restaurants in 2013. This jalapeno-infused condiment with a taste bigger than Texas is a fan favorite that combines sweet and spicy flavors that anyone can enjoy. At Whataburger, we believe in serving great food thats full of flavor, said Vice President of Retail Mike Sobel. We love hearing from fans about their favorite menu items and Signature Sauce pairings, and were happy to expand our lineup of sauces at H-E-B to help satisfy their cravings. Plus, we think our fans will be delighted to know they can get Texas-sized, larger versions of their go-to ketchup condiments. What People Are Saying About Whataburgers new Signature Sauce, Fancy and Spicy Ketchup: (Content provided directly from Whataburgers Twitter page) Who wants ordinary ketchup when there is Fancy Ketchup out there? Lucas I need Whataburger's Buffalo Sauce to run through my veins. Ashleigh Spicy Ketchup from Whataburger makes everything taste better. Dakota About Whataburger: Whataburger has focused on its fresh, made-to-order burgers and friendly customer service since 1950 when Harmon Dobson opened the first Whataburger as a small roadside burger stand in Corpus Christi, Texas. Dobson gave his restaurant a name he hoped to hear customers say every time they took a bite of his made-to-order burgers: What a burger! Within the first week, people lined up around the block for his 25 cent, 100 percent beef burgers served on five-inch buns. Today, the company is headquartered in San Antonio, Texas, with more than 800 locations in 10 states with sales of more than $2 billion annually. Visit http://www.whataburger.com for more information. Check out the company on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and follow them on their most recently launched channel, Snapchat, @WhataburgerLife. East 9 at Pickwick Plaza signs new UPS Store in downtown Kansas City. The Pickwick is a beautiful historic building, and UPS is proud to be a part of its rebirth. The UPS Store is excited to join the business community in downtown Kansas City, and we are especially thrilled to be one of the first tenants in the historical renovation of East 9 at Pickwick Plaza by Gold Crown Properties, Inc. Gold Crown has been an engaging and cooperative partner throughout the leasing process," said Bob Shulman, the franchise owner of The UPS Store in downtown Kansas City. They have worked hand-in-hand with us to provide an excellent retail space while still preserving the character of The Pickwick. It's a beautiful historic building, and we're proud to be a part of its rebirth. At The UPS Store, we're committed to providing convenient small business solutions with personalized and dedicated customer service. We look forward to serving individuals and local business owners as the one-stop shop for shipping, postal, printing, and comprehensive small business services. East 9 at Pickwick Plaza has opened the first phase, the North Tower that includes 45 residential units back in December, 2016. Residents have occupied the building making availability limited due to the high demand. The entire development will celebrate its Grand Opening in the spring of 2017. The new UPS Store at Pickwick Plaza is yet another excellent addition to our 30,000+ square feet of retail/commercial space, and will serve not only as an amenity to our residents, but will maintain our mission to position the Pickwick Plaza block as a destination. Strategically aligning commercial tenants that add value to our residents is of great importance to the project. We are also the first community in Kansas City to have Zipcar on our project with free membership to our residents. We will host additional transportation features such as electric vehicle charging stations and quick access to the KC Streetcar that will assist downtown residents that promote green living solutions, said Bryan Smith, Executive Vice President of Gold Crown Properties, Inc. Bob Shulman, is the franchise owner and operator, and owns other UPS locations throughout Kansas City. The new Pickwick UPS Store facility will feature domestic and international shipping, as well as: Full-service packaging Wide-format printing Presentation and document finishing (binding, laminating, etc.) Color and black-and-white copies Onsite notary Mailbox & postal services And a variety of other business services UPS Store Hours: Monday - Friday (8am - 7pm) Saturday - (9am 5pm) UPS was represented in their downtown search by Jared Frost of Point Commercial. East 9 at Pickwick Plaza is Downtown Kansas Citys spectacular new 260 apartment home, multi-use community, offering Flex sized luxury apartments that fit the sizemaintain affordable unit prices, while preserving the luxury that matches and price point ofparallels Kansas Citys growing market demand.. East 9 is flush with amenities and boasts one of the only indoor salt water pools in downtown Kansas City. The residents will enjoy additional features such as custom wine lockers, private event space, in-home grocery delivery, attached secure parking garage, business center & conference room, Google Fiber and pet friendly services. If youre interested in a new place to call home, please visit http://www.East9KC.com where you may view 360 tours, select your apartment and lease your space now. Pacific Center at 21250 Hawthorne Blvd. in Torrance T2 Techs new office supports an improved team environment and features a powerful onsite data center to better serve our clients." IT consulting firm T2 Tech Group recently moved its former headquarters in Redondo Beach to a larger space in Torrance, CA. The new office will be about three miles away from the old location. T2 Tech facilitates IT infrastructure transformations and assessments for healthcare, government and other industries. They have helped health systems in Los Angeles, San Diego, the San Francisco-Bay Area and the western United States expand or improve their IT environments. Over the course of 2016, the company doubled the size of its team. The companys expansion is the result of a growing client base as well as an increased effort to reach out to new partners. With growth planned over the next two years, the new office will provide optimized space for a much larger team. As the need for adaptable IT heightens, the company plans to continue expanding its client base and workforce. With more square feet of space and other improved facilities, the new office will accommodate the companys and their clients future needs. The space was custom-designed to facilitate efficient collaboration between engineers, project managers and leadership. The new office also features a tailored color scheme and design to promote T2 Techs business identity. In addition to facilities that will help drive the engine of T2 Tech Groups internal operations, the new office features a cutting-edge lab housed in an onsite data center. The lab will be used as a production environment to test proof of concepts for clients' IT environments before going live. The lab is a multimillion dollar investment that also contributes to internal staff education, enabling T2 Tech engineers to keep up-to-date with the industrys best technology. T2 Techs new office supports an improved team environment and features a powerful onsite data center to better serve our clients, said Kevin Torf, managing partner at T2 Tech. By supplying better facilities and resources to work with, the new office demonstrates T2 Techs commitment to professionalism and the people who bridge technology and business for end-users. The new office is at 21250 Hawthorne Blvd. Ste. 250, Torrance, CA 90503. It will be within the Pacific Center building, only 11 miles away from LAX. In a convenient location, the space will provide ease of access for clients and guests traveling to and from the freeway. Aside from the address change, contact information for T2 Tech Group will remain the same. Read more about the companys transition in their company blog about the move. About T2 Tech Group T2 Tech Group is a leader in the practical application of technology for healthcare and a range of other industries. Since its founding in 2006, T2 Tech has consistently delivered high-quality consulting and management advisory services to executives and IT leaders. Unlike many consulting firms, T2 Tech has no financial interest in vendor selection, freeing the company to focus completely on realizing client goals. The company balances business and IT needs, uses a proven adaptable framework, can see projects from assessment to post-implementation, and practices transparency in everything they do. For more information about T2 Tech Group, visit t2techgroup.com and connect with them on Twitter @T2TechGroup. The American Council on Education (ACE) and Credly announced today that participants in ACEs College Credit Recommendation Service (CREDIT) will now be able to issue digital credentials through Credly, making it easier for working professionals to request academic credit for workplace training and to share evidence of their achievements online. For more than four decades, ACE CREDIT recommendations have connected workplace learning to colleges and universities by helping students gain access to academic credit for formal training taken outside of traditional degree programs. ACE CREDIT organizations include major corporations, associations, labor unions, and government agencies, who offer a wide array of courses in numerous fields, from restaurant management to radiology. The addition of a digital credential platform is expected to generate new insights into the experiences and success of individuals who are awarded credentials through CREDIT-approved courses each year. Our work is rooted in the belief that experience in the workplace can lead to a more flexible pathway to earn college degrees and credentials and fuel career growth, said ACE President Molly Corbett Broad. Credly is helping us transform a powerful concept for the digital era through empowering professionals with portable credentials. We are pleased to enable our CREDIT organizations to tap into the promise of digital credentialing. As a result of the collaboration, organizations that offer training recommended for college credit will be able to issue secure, portable, and data-rich digital badges that recognize professional and academic achievements in addition to an ACE official transcript. Transcripts will continue to be used primarily to communicate credit recommendations to colleges and universities across the country. This spring, Walt Disney, KFC, AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps, and Jiffy Lube will be among the first CREDIT participants to offer digital credentialing. The ACE CREDIT program supports our vision for promoting integrity, excellence, and innovation across the Jiffy Lube service center workforce, said Kenneth Barber, Jiffy Lubes manager of learning and development. We believe the skills and experiences our franchisee employees develop on the job should be recognized and be readily convertible into further educational and professional opportunity. Digital credentials help capture and communicate both the achievements and potential of our franchisee employees. Once awarded a digital credential, individuals are able to showcase their accomplishments through professional networks online, or include in job applications and e-portfolios. Individuals can also seek academic credit for their achievements at colleges and universities by requesting their separate ACE official transcript through a single click within the digital credential itself. Meaningful learning increasingly happens in a wide variety of places, and quality alternative education experiences deserve to be recognized, said Credly CEO and founder Jonathan Finkelstein. Skills and knowledge, wherever earned or demonstrated, should be readily translated into opportunity. By partnering with one of the nations most trusted higher education organizations, we look forward to helping employers and employees better work together to align individual talent with workforce needs. To learn more about how to issue ACE CREDIT-verified digital credentials, visit https://credly.com/about/ace-credit. About the American Council on Education (ACE) Founded in 1918, ACE is the major coordinating body for all the nation's higher education institutions, representing nearly1,800 college and university presidents and related associations. It provides leadership on key higher education issues and influences public policy through advocacy. For more information, please visit http://www.acenet.edu. About ACE CREDIT The American Council on Education's College Credit Recommendation Service (CREDIT) was established in 1974 to connect workplace learning with colleges and universities by helping students gain access to academic credit for formal training taken outside traditional degree programs. With over 35,000 courses and exams reviewed, CREDIT is the national leader in the evaluation process for education and training obtained outside the classroom including courses, exams, apprenticeships, and other types of nontraditional forms of training. For 40 years, colleges and universities have trusted ACE to provide reliable course equivalency information to facilitate credit award decisions. Participating organizations include corporations, professional and volunteer associations, schools, training suppliers, labor unions and government agencies, with courses from Arabic to Waste Management. For more information about CREDIT, visit http://www.acenet.edu/credit. About Credly Credly is a leading digital credential service provider, helping the world recognize lifelong achievement with the most popular platforms for verifying, sharing and managing digital credentials and badges. The enterprise-class system allows organizations to officially verify skills and competencies; distribute portable and secure digital credentials and open badges; and gain actionable data and insights. Thousands of education institutions, industry associations, employers and workforce development programs use Credly to make achievements visible. For more information about Credly, visit http://www.credly.com. Our MVS client centric application is engineered to take our client support to the next level. Our solutions are created to be customer-centric in functionality, with the digital advantage." Zensar Technologies, a leading provider of digital solutions, software and infrastructure services, announced the launch of its eSupport Mobile App, a fully integrated mobile support solution that provides comprehensive case management, field engineering and technical support. The intuitive new mobile app enables users of Zensars eSupport Web portal to access world-class support functionality with the ease and agility of a truly digital experience anytime, anywhere and anyplace. Sandeep Kishore, CEO and Managing Director, Zensar Technologies commented, Zensar continues to develop client focused services and solutions that distinguish us within the industry as a digital innovator and leader. The mobile app, our latest digital solution, is designed to enable our clients to further benefit from their investments and realize their Return on Digital. Pinaki Kar, President and Head, Infrastructure Management Services & Cloud Business, Zensar Technologies said, Our MVS client centric application is engineered to take our client support to the next level. Our solutions are created to be customer-centric in functionality, with the digital advantage. The objective of our new mobile app showcases our commitment to delivering recognizable business value for our clients. Scott Fiore, Senior Vice President, Global Operations and Alliances, Infrastructure Management Services & Cloud Business, Zensar Technologies added, Our new eSupport Mobile App reinforces our approach to delivering Flexible, Integrated and Optimized Multi-Vendor Services. We are excited to launch this new app that increases our clients ease and flexibility working with Zensar as a third party maintenance provider. Zensars eSupport Mobile App enables support users to receive real time notifications via their smart device, and addresses the lifestyle needs of technical support contacts that are always on the go or working in and out of data center locations. The mobile app provides Zensars clients with the flexibility to open a support case in any manner by phone, email, web or mobile device. Key features of the Zensar eSupport Mobile App include: Full Case Management Manage and Receive Case Notes Field Engineering and Parts Requests View System and Contact Information Ticket Event Notifications Upload Images to Support Requests Zensars Multi-Vendor Services have been recognized by industry analysts and offer best in class service and delivery. Zensars long tenured client base reflects its dedication and commitment over the past 29 years for providing the most customizable and cost effective solutions in the industry. Zensar supports enterprise needs of today and the future through three customized Multi-Vendor Support packages MVS, MVS+ and MVSlifecycle. Zensars Maintenance Support Portfolio includes support for OEM platforms. Learn more on Zensars web site. Zensars eSupport Mobile App is free for eSupport clients to download from Google Play and the Apple App Store. About Zensar (http://www.zensar.com) Zensar is a leading digital solutions and technology services company that specializes in partnering with global organizations across industries on their Digital Transformation journey. A technology partner of choice, backed by strong track-record of innovation; credible investment in Digital solutions; assertion of commitment to clients success, Zensar s comprehensive range of digital and technology services and solutions enable its customers to achieve new thresholds of business performance. Zensar, with its experience in delivering excellence and superior client satisfaction through myriad technology solutions, is uniquely positioned to help them surpass challenges around running their existing business most efficiently, helping in their legacy transformation, and planning for business expansion and growth through innovative and digital ways. Follow Zensar via: Zensar Blog Twitter: https://twitter.com/Zensar LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/zensar-technologies Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Zensar About RPG Enterprises (http://www.rpggroup.com) Mumbai headquartered RPG Enterprises is one of India's largest industrial conglomerates. With over 15 companies in its fold, the group has a strong presence across core business sectors such as Infrastructure, Tyre, IT and Specialty. Established in 1979, RPG is also one of Indias fastest growing business groups with a turnover in excess of USD 3.2 Billion, 20000+ people and a global presence in over 100 countries. PR Contacts (Global Headquarters - India): Lavanya Jayaram Chief Marketing Officer Zensar Technologies +91 9922243544 lavanya(dot)jayaram(at)zensar(dot)com Aradhana Prabhu Public Relations Zensar Technologies +91-9765999749 aradhana(dot)prabhu(at)zensar(dot)com PR Contact (US) Julie Machnik Director of Marketing, US Zensar Technologies Tel: +508 621 4753 j(dot)machnik(at)zensar(dot)com Safe Harbor Certain statements in this release concerning our future growth prospects are forward-looking statements which involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in such forward-looking statements. The risks and uncertainties relating to these statements include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties regarding fluctuations in earnings, our ability to manage growth, intense competition in IT services including those factors which may affect our cost advantage, wage increases in India, our ability to attract and retain highly skilled professionals, time and cost overruns on fixed price, fixed-time frame contracts, client concentration, restrictions on immigration, our ability to manage our international operations, reduced demand for technology in our key focus areas, disruptions in telecommunication networks, our ability to successfully complete and integrate potential acquisitions, liability for damages on our service contracts, withdrawal of governmental fiscal incentives, political instability, legal restrictions on raising capital or acquiring companies outside India, and unauthorized use of our intellectual property and general economic conditions affecting our industry. The Company does not undertake to update any forward-looking statement that may be made from time to time by or on behalf of the Company. NuScale Submittal Package Produced by Certrec We are very pleased to have been a part of this important advancement of the commercial nuclear power technology. ~ Ted Enos, Certrec President Certrec, a leading regulatory compliance solution provider, is pleased to announce their support in the electronic processing and preparation of the first ever Small Modular Reactor Design Certification Application (DCA) on December 31, 2016, for NuScale Powers submission to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). NuScale Power, LLC, is developing a new kind of nuclear plant; a safer, smaller, scalable version of pressurized water reactor technology - a technology initially developed and tested at Oregon State University. NuScale is headquartered in Portland, Oregon, and has offices in Corvallis, OR; Rockville, MD; Charlotte, NC; Richland, WA; and London, UK. In partnership with NuScale, Certrec deployed its TAKTIX web-based workflow platform to manage and control the electronic development of the 12,000 page application. Certrecs personnel processed the final electronic files, meeting exacting government archival standards, and produced the actual submittal files and disks provided to the NRC by NuScale Power. In a major step toward the deployment of the next generation of advanced nuclear technology, NuScale Power asked the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) on December 31st, 2016, to approve the companys small modular reactor (SMR) commercial power plant design. This is the first-ever SMR DCA to be submitted to the NRC and marks a significant milestone for NuScale and the power generation industry. Certrec provided the web-based project collaboration tools, technical editing support, and document processing services that supported successful submission of the DCA. NuScales application consisted of nearly 12,000 pages of technical information, all of which were processed through Certrec and were used to create the final submission DVDs. Our team provided thousands of hours of work, including nights and weekends, to manage and support the timely submittal of the NuScale application. I am personally proud of our team, their capabilities and accomplishments, and our ability to support this project," states Michelle Thomas, Certrec Operations Director. Tom Bergman, NuScale Power Vice President of Regulatory Affairs stated, We are very appreciative of Certrecs tireless efforts, working holidays, weekends and late hours to meet our needs to finish the design certification application by the end of December. We couldnt have done it without them. Preparation of 12,000 pages of highly technical information by teams of people scattered across the country presents a number of time sensitive and logistical challenges. Certrecs TAKTIX web-based platform allowed NuScale project personnel continuous and real-time access to all project materials, regardless of their physical location, significantly streamlining the development process. Processing a DCA electronically is tough under any circumstances. When you combine the NRC requirements, our geographical differences, and the amount of work to be done, at times it almost seems impossible," says Ted Enos, Certrec President. "Using our TAKTIX platform, PDF commenting tools, and electronic submittal preparation, packaging, and pre-flight, the NuScale submission was successfully submitted to the NRC. I am quite proud of our staff for their dedication, hard work, and for this significant achievement. Certrecs large document processing services are in demand. The company is currently involved in several DCA/DCD/COLA projects, as well as supporting the ongoing maintenance of some plant UFSARs. CERTREC Founded in 1988, Certrec is an engineering and technology based organization providing regulatory support services in the electric power industry. With over 1,000 cumulative years of direct industry experience (including nuclear, fossil, and renewables), Certrec has developed exceptional capabilities to support regulatory activities emanating from regulatory entities such as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) , North American Electric Reliability Corporation and Regional Entities (NERC) Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and others regulatory agencies. Certrec's Office of Licensing and Compliance (OLC), Office of Assessment and Recovery (OAR), Office of NERC Compliance (ONC), and Office of New Plant (ONP) services are used by utilities and entities across the United States to help manage the regulatory process to their advantage. Certrec offers support from highly skilled and experienced industry professionals including degrees in a variety of engineering disciplines (Civil, Electrical, Mechanical, and Nuclear). Additionally Certrec's staff has multiple degreed personnel in physics, communications, a variety of MBAs, and information technology. This highly skilled team of personnel has direct working experience in all regulatory areas of licensing, compliance, and engineering including nuclear, fossil, and renewable generation and transmission. For over 25 years, Certrec has been utilizing its hundreds of years of industry experience to help clients develop and manage solutions to complex regulatory issues. Combining this direct industry experience with Certrec's Information Technology assets has led to development of technology-based solutions and tools directly targeted to the electric power industry and specifically focused on helping clients manage regulatory issues. Nomadix Towels for Yoga, Camp, Beach and Travel Are Now Stocked on UrbanOutfitters.com Nomadix is proud to partner with Urban Outfitters, who in recent years has made sustainability a priority in their business. California-based outdoor brand Nomadix announce the launch of their 100% recycled, quick-dry antimicrobial towels on urbanoutfitters.com. The partnership with Urban Outfitters adds to the fast-growing list of retailers, yoga studios, surf shops, and online platforms where you can find Nomadix products. Nomadix was founded in 2014 with the Only Towel You Need campaign on Kickstarter, which quadrupled its funding target. The companys versatile, sustainably manufactured towels quickly gained attention due to their travel-inspired designs and ability to perform for a variety of activities, including yoga, surfing, camping, and more. Co-Founder Chace Petersen says: Nomadix is proud to partner with Urban Outfitters, who in recent years has made sustainability a priority in their business. From Urbans Recycled By Design program, which preserves the historical buildings they occupy, to the reusable, washable bags they offer customers at checkout, the thoughtful practices at Urban Outfitters go a long way in setting an environmentally friendly example for retailers worldwide. Global Recycled Standard Nomadix puts sustainability above all else. Nomadix towels are sustainable by design, because now one versatile towel takes the place of three activity-specific towels. They are also manufactured to Global Recycle Standard. When combined with the Companys Own less. Do more ethos and its active participation in Fashion Revolution, Nomadix is leading the way in making thoughtful products for the active/outdoor segment. An Adventurous Following Used by big wave surfers, Instagram yogis, travelers, and environmentally conscious consumers, Nomadix towels have become a flag for sustainable goods among the planets most adventurous athletes. Zack Helminiak, Co-Founder, says, The relationships Nomadix has built in the outdoor lifestyle and adventure athlete arena have inspired us. These individuals are not only the best in the world at snowboarding, surfing, et cetera; they are the environmental leaders the world looks to at a time when global warming is the biggest threat to the places we love. We will continue to partner with the strong voices that protect our environment. We are proud to include Urban Outfitters among those partnerships. For more information, please visit http://www.nomadix.co Home Care People want a local agency, not an impersonal national chain, for their home care services not just in Belmont but throughout the affluent Peninsula region of the Bay Area. NuevaCare, a leading Bay Area home care agency servicing diverse cities such as San Mateo, Millbrae, Belmont, and environs, is proud to announce an update to its informational page on Belmont home care options. Many residents do not know that NuevaCare services a diverse group of cities such as Belmont, and the new page informs them about the company's philosophy and service offerings with respect to home care. "People want a local agency, not an impersonal national chain, for their home care services not just in Belmont but throughout the affluent Peninsula region of the Bay Area," explained Kamran Nasser, CEO of NuevaCare. "Our updated page on Belmont helps city residents learn about our own service offerings with respect to home care services and realize that we offer local home care options for them." Interested persons, including journalists or bloggers, can visit the Belmont home care page at http://nuevacare.com/belmont/. It should be noted that the company has other pages on city offerings such as its Hillsborough home care page at http://nuevacare.com/hillsborough-2/. Services Offered to Belmont Residents Needing Home Care Many families and patients need home care services. In some cases, this occurs after a visit to the hospital, but in other cases it is a long-term home care need, occurring after a stroke, or because of an ailment such as Alzheimer's. Once the patient and or their family realize that they need home care services, they often look for a local agency. People prefer local agencies over huge, impersonal, chains, because, after all, home care services are something that is intimately personal. The new Belmont home care informational page helps Belmont residence realize that NuevaCare can provide many of the types of services that they may be needing from a home care agency. For example, the agency can provide assistance with the activities of daily living, including things such as meal preparation, light housekeeping, and even companionship. Or, the agency can provide support for those who need medication reminders, or who are suffering from an ailment such as cancer or Alzheimer's, that makes them less able to be independent. The new Belmont page outlines those services that make this type of offering an ideal choice for any patient or family that needs extra help with care, but is not at the position where they need to be in a full-time care facility such as a nursing home or hospital. Anyone interested in learning more, can visit the website, or can reach out to NuevaCare for a consultation. Every family is unique, and therefore, the services provided can be tailored to the needs of that particular family. About NuevaCare A premier technology based home care company based in San Mateo and servicing the San Francisco Bay Area, NuevaCare delivers responsive, quality, and affordable in-home care to those who need care due to old age or recovering from surgery or illness. NuevaCare services clients in diverse Bay Area cities from Burlingame to Santa Clara, San Mateo to Palo Alto, Foster City to Hillsborough and everywhere in between. NuevaCare provides hourly, live-in, overnight, and 24/7 care. Recognized as one of the best home care agencies in the Bay Area, NuevaCare can be found at http://nuevacare.com/. NuevaCare is licensed by California Department of Social Services, Home Care Services Bureau, license #: 414700022. TMCs Annual INTERNET TELEPHONY Product of the Year Award recognizes and honors companies that have developed exceptional VoIP and IP Communications products and services. In the opinion of our distinguished judges, Heads Up Display (HUD) has proven to be among the best IP communications solutions available on the market. Fonality announced today that TMC, a global, integrated media company, has named its Heads Up Display (HUD) as a recipient of the INTERNET TELEPHONY Product of the Year Award for the fourth consecutive year. Its an exciting time for Fonality and we are thrilled to be setting industry standards with our innovative HUD Web. We are committed to the continuous evolution of HUD as new and exciting technologies rise up. We are honored to receive our fourth annual Internet Telephony Product of the Year Award in a row, said Ali Rizvi, Director of Product Management, Fonality. HUD Web helps employees be more efficient and effective, making it easier for them to select the best way to initiate, receive, and respond to business communications. Fonalitys web-based unified communications (UC) platform is all about collaboration, boosting productivity, improving customer service, and enabling employees to work smarter. It gives me great pleasure to recognize Fonality with a Product of the Year Award for 2017. I have always been impressed with their commitment to excellence and innovation, said Rich Tehrani, CEO, TMC. In the opinion of our distinguished judges, Heads Up Display (HUD) has proven to be among the best IP communications solutions available on the market. I look forward to continued innovation from Fonality. The winners of the 2017 INTERNET TELEPHONY Product of the Year are featured online at http://www.itmag.com. ABOUT FONALITY Fonality is a leading provider of business communications solutions. Their award-winning unified communications tools, Heads Up Display (HUD) and Advanced Call Center, are built with flexibility in mind. From multiple deployment options, to choice of software bundles and a wide selection of hardware (including bring your own), Fonalitys flexibility enables the customization you need to provide great service, sell confidently, and collaborate with ease. Founded in 2004, Fonality provides service to more than 30,000 companies across 99 countries. Our team shares a passion to deliver the best possible dental care to the Henderson community. I believe weve equipped our practice to do just that. We look forward to welcoming new patients in February, says Dr. Villamayor of Amber Hills Dental. Amber Hills Dental is set to open its doors on February 6, 2017. The Henderson dental practice aims to provide a comfortable and convenient dental experience for the entire family. Dr. Aimee Villamayor leads the practice as a skilled dentist who carries training and experience throughout a wide range of dental specialties. Patients can take advantage of general and restorative dentistry as well as cosmetic dentistry and orthodontics. Beginning from a first dental visit at six months old to getting dental implants as a senior adult, Amber Hills Dental is uniquely qualified to meet oral health needs through all stages of life. Patient comfort is deeply valued at Amber Hills Dental. They have designed their office environment to include patient amenities, such as Netflix, a beverage bar, childrens play area and video games. The entire practice is centered around taking the stress and anxiety out of dental care. This also includes easy financing options, family block appointments and same day dentistry. Amber Hills will be offering the latest and most preferred dental treatments available, ranging from Invisalign clear orthodontics to implant overdentures. Dr. Villamayor also treats children with a full menu of pediatric dental services, including stainless steel crowns and emergency dental care. Our team shares a passion to deliver the best possible dental care to the Henderson community. I believe weve equipped our practice to do just that. We look forward to welcoming new patients in February, says Dr. Villamayor of Amber Hills Dental. More About Dr. Aimee Villamayor: Dr. Aimee Villamayor received her Bachelor of Science in Biology from the University of San Francisco (USF) and earned her dental degree at New York University College of Dentistry (NYUCD). She is an advocate for continuous learning and completed one year of advanced general dentistry residency at the University of Texas, San Antonio (UTHSCSA). Dr. Villamayor participated in extensive training in dental implants, oral surgeries and dental IV/ oral sedation. Her experience has equipped her to handle dental emergencies and treat medically complex patients. Dr. Villamayor is an active member of the Academy of General Dentistry, American Dental Association and Southern Nevada Dental Association. For more information about the practice or to schedule an appointment at Amber Hills Dental, please visit amberhillsdental.com or call the Henderson office directly at (702) 830-7793. If you can free up some time by letting us do some of the housework for you, why not do it? Well get the work done for you, so you can have more time for family and even just to unwind and relax. EMJ Cleaning Services, an Atlanta-based maid service, announced today that it will be offering a 10 percent discount in February to new clients who set up a weekly or bi-weekly deep cleaning service schedule. In addition, clients who pay in advance by either credit or debit card will receive another 5 percent off, for a total 15 percent discount off the regular price. If youve ever thought about hiring a maid service, now is the time to do it, says Eric Cano, owner of EMJ Cleaning Services. Our goal has always been to provide homeowners with the very best in home cleaning services, at the most competitive rates. This special makes our already-low rates even better. EMJs residential deep cleaning services include a thorough cleaning of all rooms, hallways and entryways. Floors will be swept and/or vacuumed, surfaces and appliances will be cleaned and dusted, trash will be taken out and bags replaced, bathrooms will be cleaned, and clean linens will be placed on beds. Extra services such as cleaning a garage or patio are available for an additional fee. These days it seems that everyone is so busy with work, taking care of kids, household responsibilities, school, and on and on, Cano says. If you can free up some time by letting us do some of the housework for you, why not do it? Well get the work done for you, so you can have more time for family and even just to unwind and relax. To take advantage of EMJs deep cleaning special and schedule a cleaning appointment, please call EMJ at (678) 966-9469. For a free cleaning estimate, fill out EMJs online form at http://www.emjcleaning.com/free-estimates, or send an email to services(at)emjcleaning(dot)com. EMJ is also currently offering special deals to local property management companies, who require frequent move in/move out cleanings between tenants or for vacant homes. Property managers or companies are urged to contact EMJ for further details on these special rates. Interested parties should call (678) 966-9469 or send an email to services(at)emjcleaning(dot)com. About EMJ Cleaning Services: EMJ Cleaning is a licensed, bonded and insured professional home cleaning service in Atlanta, Georgia. The company has been in business for over 10 years, and provides cleaning services to residential and commercial buildings six days a week throughout metro Atlanta. EMJ Cleaning provides specific services such as window cleaning, carpet cleaning, heavy duty cleaning, weekly deep cleaning and move-out cleaning; these are offered in both EMJs office cleaning service and home cleaning service. For more information, visit http://www.emjcleaning.com. Attorney Joshua L. Turnham Collection agencies prefer payment by debit or credit card. They say that consumers demand the convenience of being able to pay with a card, but the collection agencies accept payment by debit or credit card because they are more likely to get paid. Past News Releases RSS Attorney Joshua L. Turnham... Attorney Joshua Turnham, founder of The Law Office of Joshua L. Turnham, PLLC, recently testified in the Washington State Senate in opposition to Senate Bill 5043, a bill that, if passed, would enable debt collectors to charge people an extra fee for using debit or credit cards. Collection agencies prefer payment by debit or credit card. They say that consumers demand the convenience of being able to pay with a card, but the collection agencies accept payment by debit or credit card because they are more likely to get paid, said Turnham, who focuses on consumer protection and consumer law. If they didnt accept those types of payments, they wouldnt collect half as much as they do. In addition to Turnham, eight other people testified in opposition to the bill, and also delivered a letter to all of the legislators on the committee that was signed by twenty-seven attorneys and consumer advocates. In his testimony, Turnham referenced the 2015 Washington State Civil Legal Needs Study Update, commissioned by the Washington Supreme Court, which found that the most prevalent legal problem facing low-income Washington residents is healthcare-related, primarily healthcare debt. The second biggest legal problem is consumer/finance issues. A study by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy shows that Washington state has the most regressive tax system in the nation, where poor families pay 16.8 percent of their income in state and local taxes while the wealthiest pay only 2.4 percent. So, this is a big problem in our state, and this bill would only make things harder for low-income Washingtonians, concluded Turnham. It would punish those who really cant afford it. Washington law already permits debt collectors to charge 12 percent interest. To listen to Turnhams testimony in its entirety, please visit http://www.tvw.org/watch/?clientID=9375922947&eventID=2017011218&eventID=2017011218&startStreamAt=2360&autoStartStream=true. About Joshua L. Turnham, The Law Office of Joshua L. Turnham, PLLC Attorney Joshua L. Turnham is a member of the Washington State Bar Association, King County Bar Association and National Association of Consumer Advocates. He also has the distinguished honor to be the first David Leen Consumer Justice Incubator Attorney to help clients with consumer law issues, such as debt and foreclosure. For more information, please call (206) 395-9267, or visit http://www.turnhamlaw.com. The law office is located at 214 East Galer Street, Suite 100, Seattle, WA 98102. About the NALA The NALA offers small and medium-sized businesses effective ways to reach customers through new media. As a single-agency source, the NALA helps businesses flourish in their local community. The NALAs mission is to promote a business relevant and newsworthy events and achievements, both online and through traditional media. For media inquiries, please call 805.650.6121, ext. 361. The eye clinics served 7,380 patients. Some walked as much as 60 kilometers to receive essential care. I have no words to express my satisfaction after attending the clinic. The Prem Rawat Foundation (TPRF) recently sponsored eye care clinics in four states across India, providing relief to thousands of people in need. The vast majority of the 7,380 patients were disadvantaged farmers, laborers and elderly people who had no other way of receiving essential care. Some walked as much as 60 kilometers to attend the free clinics, where they were warmly greeted by doctors, refractionists and hundreds of other skilled volunteers. I have no words to express my satisfaction after attending the clinic, said Chanri Devi of Uttar Pradesh. Devendra Marandi, who also attended the clinic in Uttar Pradesh, said it was the first time she was ever able to get her eyes examined. It felt nice and I got spectacles [glasses]. I was not able to read before the clinic. Now I can read clearly with the help of the specs. Devendra was one of the 4,535 people who received free glasses at the clinics. Another, Swacheen Mandal, noted that her new glasses will allow her to provide clothes for her family. I wasnt able to pass the thread through the needle when sewing. Now its clear with the new spectacles, she said. In addition to glasses, volunteers at the clinics distributed crucial medication to more than 6,500 people, and provided more than 1,500 with a diagnosis of cataracts to qualify them for surgery at a government hospital. This is the fourteenth year in a row that TPRF has sponsored such clinics in India, which has the dubious distinction of having one of the highest proportions of blind people in the world. Thankfully, about 80% of eye problems are preventable or curable with the type of modern care provided at TPRF clinics. The clinics are designed with respect for each person's dignity and a concern for each person's health, said TPRF Board Chair Linda Pascotto. "We consciously tailor these efforts so that each person who comes to the clinics is made comfortable and is treated with care. Our goal is to assist people unnecessarily handicapped by poor sight so that they can function better in their daily lives. Government officials and local leaders joined the patients in expressing thankfulness for the aid. Dr. Louies Marandi, who serves as the Honorable Minister, Welfare, Social Welfare, Women and Child Development, in the state of Jharkhand said, These services are widely appreciated. The poor people of the area will enjoy the benefits for a long time. Like last year, TPRF partnered with two Indian NGOs to organize the clinicsPremsagar Foundation and Raj Vidya Kender. Ram Charan Singh, a journalist who visited the clinic in a remote area of Bihar, said he was impressed with what he observed. These institutions, along with doing a public service, are bringing light to peoples lives. Very few institutions make this kind of effort. The learning industry has long sought a technology like xAPI to enable organizations to gain a better understanding of the online learning experience as well as those learning experiences that take place in more traditional settings. DigitalChalk, a leading Learning Management System (LMS) solutions provider, will showcase full use of xAPI within an LMS at Learning Technologies in London February 1-2, 2017. Troy Tolle, CTO and Co-Founder of DigitalChalk, was one of the earliest proponents of xAPI and has been leveraging its strengths as an emerging technology since xAPIs/TinCans inception. Tolle will represent DigitalChalk through an xAPIgo game in participation with Watershed (stand #A22) throughout the conference. He was invited by Watershed Founder, Mike Rustici, and xAPI expert, Andrew Downes to demonstrate how xAPI communicates analytical data from the DigitalChalk LMS to the Watershed LRS data collection platform. DigitalChalk is the first LMS to extend the use of xAPI to every aspect of the learning experience - from login, to course participation, to logout - and to send that data to any LRS platform, such as Watershed, there to reap the benefits of their enhanced reporting options. Over the years, Troy, Mike and Andrew have expanded their professional relationship around a shared passion for xAPI and its potential value to learning analytics. Each of them has made significant contributions in this innovative shift that is revolutionizing the way an LMS collects and analyzes experiential user data. For over 16 years, Learning Technologies has been Europes leading conference for organizational learning and the technology used to support learning in the workplace. This is DigitalChalks first-ever European conference participation. With more than 3,800 customers worldwide, DigitalChalk has been the technology leader in the LMS space and e-learning for the past 10 years, in part due to our continuous innovation, and furthered through development in xAPI, said Tolle. The learning industry has long sought a technology like xAPI to enable organizations to gain a better understanding of the online learning experience as well as those learning experiences that take place in more traditional settings. The combination of big data analytics and the learning experiences whether they be formal training packages, a VR training, simple participation in a discussion, or even on the job work experience brings the promise of learning management from vision to reality: a more accurate picture of a learners level of expertise. Read an interview with Troy Tolle where he discusses xAPI and its advantages for the LMS. http://www.digitalchalk.com/blog/xapi-interview-troy-tolle Tolle, whose DigitalChalk goal has always been to enhance learning through cutting-edge technologies, is one of xAPIs most committed and expert developers. Troy provided insights to the Data Interoperability Standards Consortium at Dev Learn in Las Vegas last November, and at the invitation of Aaron Silvers, will share his expertise in a discussion about emerging trends in xAPI at the xAPI Barcamp 2017 at the Britannia on February 1, 2017. The November 2016 DigitalChalk release extended xAPI capabilities beyond any other LMS use of xAPI. By second quarter 2017, DigitalChalk plans to add SalesForce.com integration, gamification capabilities and a new eCommerce affiliate program to their product features, all of which will utilize xAPI capabilities wherever possible. See how DigitalChalk works at http://www.digitalchalk.com/demonstration. ABOUT DIGITALCHALK DigitalChalk (http://digitalchalk.com) is the leading provider of learning management system (LMS) solutions, designed to help small to midsized businesses create, execute and manage their learning and development programs for employees and customers. Founded in 2006 by CEO Russ Stinehour and CTO Troy Tolle, DigitalChalk is known for its flexible full-featured LMS and superior customer service. DigitalChalk LMS gives businesses and corporate development professionals the ability to create and deliver training programs with engaging, impactful learning experiences for employees or customers. It enables monitoring of user progress, comprehension assessment, and automation of notifications to end-users and stakeholders, with reporting functions through a built-in tool. For those who want to sell their courseware online, DigitalChalks eCommerce Suite (built into the LMS platform), enables any business or individual to easily offer online courses with complete shopping, checkout and payment processing functionality. Learning Pinnacle (http://www.learningpinnacle.com), a subsidiary of DigitalChalk launched in 2016, delivers a curated, online learning library of courses produced on the DigitalChalk platform by leading content providers, covering topics from compliance and safety to Microsoft Office to management development. Welcome Guest! You Are Here: Home Regional News East News From Bulgaria Bulgarian Energy Holding Bought Nabucco Bulgaria BEH made the move in order to use the technical documentation for other projects and to not allow an unknown entity to take hold of the project work on the Bulgarian stretch of the cancelled Nabucco pipeline project AUTHOR: publics.bg Nabucco Gas Pipeline The state-run Bulgarian Energy Holding (BEH) has bought Nabucco Gas Pipeline Bulgaria from parent company in liquidation Nabucco Gas Pipeline International. The commercial activities of Nabucco Gas Pipeline Bulgaria in Bulgaria have been renewed after the deal was closed in September 2016, Mediapool reported. The deal was inked after an anonymous investor tried to acquire through an intermediary the assets of Nabucco Gas Pipeline Bulgaria from its parent company. BEH made the move in order to use the technical documentation for other projects and to not allow an unknown entity to take hold of the project work on the Bulgarian stretch of the cancelled Nabucco pipeline project. BEH declined to comment on the price of the deal without the consent of the seller. Mediapool however said it could be estimated at BGN 9.4 million (about EUR 4.8 million) at the lowest, mirroring the companys capital. The Bulgarian subsidiary was owned by the Austria-registered Nabucco Gas Pipeline International which was poised to build the natural gas pipeline of the same name. Nabucco was to bring natural gas to Austrias gas hub of Baumgarten via Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary. Until the summer of 2013, stakeholders in the international entity included Austrias OMV, Frances Gaz de France, Bulgarias BEH, Turkeys Botas, Romanias Transgaz and Hungarys MOL. The parent company had subsidiaries in all the countries along the route of the planned Nabucco Pipeline. There should be a 60 Minutes story about the surprising success of independent booksellers, said author Ann Patchett, dropping a not-so-subtle hint to television journalist Lesley Stahl as part of the keynote presentation on the second day of the American Booksellers Association Winter Institute in Minneapolis this past weekend. Patchett and Stahl, who bantered about their respective recent books Commonwealth and Becoming Grandma, surely could see from their dais the standing-room only crowd that packed the Hyatt hotel ballroom for their early morning talk. This years Winter Institute drew the largest crowed yet: 654 booksellers, of which 350 were first timers. In addition, 87 publishers signed on as sponsors. The overall message coming out of the event is that independent bookselling is thriving, particularly in light of the decline in e-book sales, Barnes & Nobles continuing stumbles and growing opportunities for community engagement. Oren Teicher, CEO of ABA, addressing a constituency of booksellers from abroad including Australia, New Zealand, Belgium, Sweden, the Netherlands, and elsewhere noted that independent bookselling in the U.S. now accounts for approximately $500 million in sales annually. Individually, bookstores typically need to generate about $750,000 in annual sales before they become profitable, he said, adding the the sweet spot is at $1.2 to $1.5 million." The ABA as a whole continues to focus its activities on streamlining operations at stores, and numerous panels and events throughout the weekend offered discussions of best practices, from how to brand your bookstore to setting up a childrens writing festival to fighting off Amazon. One panel, entitled The Life Cycle of a Book, brought together the author Elizabeth Strout, her agent Molly Friedrich, editor Susan Kamil and marketing executive Ruth Liebmann, both from Random House, as well as Pete Mulvihill of Green Apple Books in San Francisco, Ca, and Betsy Burton of The King's English Bookshop in Salt Lake City, UT to talk about the production and promotion of Strouts bestseller My Name is Lucy Barton. Perhaps the biggest revelation of the panel was the importance of the brief copy that will appear when a book buyer searches on a smart phone: I spend hours working on that copy, said Kamil, the first 25 words of the online description of our books is what we pour over. Despite its focus on pragmatic matters, WI12 also served as a forum for discussing cultural politics. High on the agenda was the role of bookstores to serve as inclusive safe spaces in Trumps America. This, acknowledged many, could only truly happen if the bookstores themselves became more inclusive of and reflective of the communities to which they might serves as havens: African-Americans, Asians, Muslims and other minority or marginalized groups. Writer and activist Roxane Gay kicked off the discussion during WI12s opening keynote speech by pointing out that most of the people in the room were white, as were many of the people shed encountered on her book tours: white women and the men who love them, said Gay. Underscoring that bookselling has a diversity problem, and that it is a problem seemingly without solution." The speech served as a catalyst for several booksellers to take stands throughout the weekend, in panels and at the ABAs Town Hall where booksellers made impassioned pleas for the ABA board to prioritize diversity as a topic. In response, ABA board president Betsy Burton announced on Monday morning that the ABA is forming a task force to address diversity. "We are an inclusive organization and we want to be diverse," she emphasized. Among the 41 prospective booksellers in attendance at WI12, were a handful of booksellers from minority groups, including Noelle Santos, who is running a crowdfunding campaign to open The Lit. Bar, a new bookstore / wine bar in the Bronx, New York and spoke at the Town Hall. Another hopeful bookseller was Trenessa Williams, a college professor who is currently looking for a space to open an bookstore in Orlando, Fla. It will be a general interest bookstore that will offer literature, history, travel books for the African-American community, Williams told PW. Asked about the conferences reoccurring theme of diversity, Laura Taylor, Bookstore Director of the Oxford Exchange bookstore in Tampa, Fla., told PW that it is an important conversation to have. Hiring good booksellers ones who know and can talk about books is difficult. She added that it's increasingly important to the success of any store to have a diverse staff. "Each year brings more and more great books, from Between the World and Me and The Association of Small Bombs, to Underground Railroad and Homegoing. In fact, I dont have enough room to stock all of the books I want to. Its a good problem to have. An East Moline man was sentenced to time served and three years of supervised release for his part in a Nigerian internet scam that defrauded victims of more than $100,000. Frederico Sausedo, 50, was charged in U.S. District Court for the Central District of Illinois with one count of conspiracy and nine counts of wire fraud, according to court records. Mr. Sausedo pleaded guilty in October 2016 to all of the charges. He will pay $121,210.33 in restitution to the victims and a $1,000 special assessment fee. Charges allege Mr. Sausedo and co-conspirator Barbara Segura, 59, also of East Moline, conspired with others from June 2014 to February 2015 to fraudulently obtain money through victims they met on Facebook. Victims were told they would receive prizes or grants if they first paid taxes and fees to a bank account controlled by Mr. Sausedo and Ms. Segura. Victims wired payments to the account but never received prizes or grants. Mr. Sausedo and Ms. Segura would then send the money to co-conspirators based in Nigeria. Ms. Segura said she and her boyfriend, Mr. Sausedo, got involved in the scam after falling victim to it and even reporting it to the police. The two sent about $1,800 without receiving a grant. Ms. Segura then maintained contact with those involved in the scheme for fear of losing her chance to obtain the promised money. Ms. Segura said when she and Mr. Sausedo opened the bank account where victims would direct payments, she believed the money was intended to help build an orphanage. Ms. Segura said she could tell the situation seemed "fishy," but that she eventually "got caught up in it." Mr. Sausedo and Ms. Segura were arrested in February 2015 by East Moline police and were indicted in federal court in May of that year. Ms. Segura pleaded guilty to conspiracy and wire fraud charges in December 2015 and was sentenced to 1 year in prison in October 2016. SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) Members of Illinois' largest public-employee union are voting on whether to authorize a strike as contract talks with Gov. Bruce Rauner's administration remain stalled. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31 vote is being held from Monday through Feb. 19. The vote doesn't guarantee a strike, but will indicate whether union members want to give their bargaining committee power to walk off the job. State labor regulators have declared the 2-year-old talks at "impasse." That allows the Republican governor to impose a contract and the union to strike. Earlier this month AFSCME offered a compromise that included forgoing general wage increases for four years. A Rauner spokeswoman called it "superficial." Rauner's administration says it seeking "commonsense changes," such as requiring a 40-hour work week. Had it not been for a heated exchange with Abraham Lincoln, James Shields would be remembered as the only man to serve in the U.S. Senate from three different states. But Shields, who represented Illinois in the Senate from 1849-55, is best known as the man who challenged Lincoln to a duel, a seriocomic affair that ended with no bloodshed but embarrassed Lincoln for the rest of his life. Shields was a rambunctious, hot-blooded Irishman, kind of a strange fellow, said Wayne Temple, deputy director of the Illinois State Archives in Springfield. I dont think he was really that popular. He was more politician than anything else. Born in Altmore, Ireland, in 1806, Shields came to America in 1823 and was admitted to the Illinois bar nine years later. He set up a practice in the former capital of Kaskaskia and earned a spot in the Illinois House as a Democrat in 1836. Five years later, he was sworn in as state auditor. Along the way, he became acquainted with Lincoln, though not always on the best of terms. In August 1842, a letter, purportedly from a widow named Rebecca, in a Springfield newspaper referred to Shields as a conceity dunce. Shields demanded the identity of the letter from the editor, and was told that Lincoln, a Whig, was the author. Days later, Rebecca struck again, claiming that she could fight Shields if he wore petticoats and she dressed in britches. This second letter was actually written by Lincolns high-spirited fiancee, Mary Todd, and a friend. The short-fused Shields then challenged Lincoln to a duel. Reluctantly, Lincoln accepted, but clearly thought the situation through. Believing he could not compete with Shields with pistols, the long-armed Lincoln selected broadswords, as his opponent was several inches shorter. Despite his size disadvantage, Shields was undeterred, and the challengers met on Bloody Island, a renowned dueling spot on the Mississippi River across from Alton, Ill. on Missouri soil. Friends finally intervened and the matter was called off, to Lincolns relief. That duel risked Lincolns political future, commented Temple. Under Illinois statute, anyone who engaged in a duel or accepted one in the state could be banned from public office. Since Lincoln and Shields were on Bloody Island in Missouri, there was the debate that they may have accepted and planned the duel there, rather than in Illinois. But that could have cost Lincoln everything. While some writers claim Lincoln and Shields became friends, Temple believes otherwise. I cant see Lincoln being that close to Shields afterward, he remarked. I dont think Lincoln completely forgot it. But I do think that the proposed duel changed Lincolns whole life. Before, he had written some cutting comments in papers under assumed names, which we now believe to be his, continued Temple. Afterward, he didnt do those kind of things, and was better with other people. In contrast, Shields often let his temper dictate his relationships. Though his law partner wrote that Shields could make friends quite readily, he added that Shields was exceedingly vain and very ambitioushe did not fail to show his displeasure and to become an open enemy. Shields was wounded in Mexican War service before earning a seat in the U.S. Senate from Illinois in 1848. He was defeated for re-election six years later, partially due to efforts from Lincoln. Shields then relocated to Minnesota, where he organized a number of townships and promoted Irish settlement. In 1858, he became one of the first two Senators from Minnesota, filling a 10-month term. Again, he lost a re-election bid and left for California, declaring he was sick and tired of public life. He subsequently was part-owner of a mine in Mexico, but was hardly through with politics. Though in 1860 he had declared never to helpimpose a Northern man on the South as President, Shields enlisted in Civil War service in August 1861, and President Lincoln appointed him brigadier general. I, and others who have studied him, think he was a third-rate general, remarked Temple. But Lincoln was known for appointing neutral or in-between Democrat politicians to those sort of positions, to stand well with Republicans and make the Democrats happy. It also earned good support from the Irish population. Shields resigned from the Army in 1863 and went back to California, but moved to Carrollton, Mo. after the war. He twice won a seat in the Missouri legislature, and in 1879, was appointed to a five-week unexpired term in the U.S. Senate from that state, the third he had represented in the upper chamber. Claiming poor health, he did not seek re-election. I think Shields was kind of in the right place at the right time on many occasions, said Temple. He never was re-elected to the Senate after any of his terms, which kind of says that he wasnt that great of a Senator. A beloved figure among Irish immigrants throughout his public life, Shields died on June 1, 1879 and is buried in Carrollton. In 1893, the state of Illinois placed a statue of him in the U.S. Capitol, while his would-be duel with Lincoln has been interpreted by historic sites in the Alton area. ROCK ISLAND -- About two weeks before Valentine's Day, visitors to The Chocolate Experience at the Quad City Botanical Center got some sweet gift ideas. "It's a very exciting day, very busy," said Baylee Panfil, QCBC marketing intern, in her first time working at a center event. "It's great. The samples are awesome. It's a great atmosphere." Twelve vendors on Sunday offered a wide variety of chocolate-related samples, serving as a fundraiser for the center's education programs. The tasty event has been held on and off over the years -- one year a little too popular, with 2,000 people in, then the center raised prices and it didn't work, said Ryan Willie, marketing and special events manager. "We rebranded it a little bit," he said, noting more than 750 people attended Sunday. Admission was $8 for members, $12 for non-members in advance, and $15 at the door. Fresh Blends, of 2307 Cumberland Square, Bettendorf, was one of the new vendors, offering samples of smoothies with caramel and peanut butter flavor, chocolate salted almond butter, frozen hot chocolate, and fresh juice with spinach, orange and apple. The six-month-old business also has a store at 4200 24th Ave., Moline. "We're still babies. We're both very new," said manager Erica Eastland. Of the smoothies, she said: "They're all natural -- no GMOs, no artificial flavors, no added sugars. It's all the good stuff you need for your body, no added anything." Among other tables were chocolate martinis (for 21 and older) from Bridges Catering, ice cream from Country Style and Whitey's, and samples from Fannie May. Country Style also offered iced mochas and promoted a Valentine's Day special of a dozen chocolate-covered strawberries and chocolate lovers' ice-cream pie with an Oreo crust. GameTime Snacks at 500 46th St., Rock Island, which sells Shakespeare's Chocolate, also was new to The Chocolate Experience, featuring a cornucopia of products including pretzels, marshmallows and popcorn. They also sell chocolate "roses" for Valentine's Day. First-time attendee Brandon Cirks, of Aledo, bought a container of their chocolate-covered marshmallows (including M & Ms) and admired an "Indoor S'Mores Kit" that included graham crackers and chocolate covered marshmallows, needing to be microwaved for nine seconds. "It's great," Mr. Cirks said. "I like it a lot; I'm coming again. "I can't wait to try these marshmallows," he said. He also liked chocolate toffee from Chocolate Manor and and white peppermint hot chocolate from Cool Beanz. "We're just patrolling, seeing what's around," Mr. Cirks said. "It's a great experience so far; I love it. If you like chocolate, this is the place to go. And right around Valentine's Day." Jody Wiersema, sales manager for GameTime, said her company has been in the Quad-Cities for a decade, first as Shakespeare's Chocolate. The current owner bought it two years ago and renamed it. They sell to major retailers like Cabela's, Neiman Marcus, Burlington Coat Factory and TJ Maxx, she said. "Another thing we do locally is fundraisers," she said. "We give back 50 percent to local organizations and groups. "Things have been really wonderful. It's been a great event," she said Sunday. "The first two hours, it was really full, oh my gosh. "It's really a nice event, a great stream of people," Ms. Wiersema said. "It's been fun meeting people who had no idea we were in the Quad-Cities." Chocolate Manor, at 110 E. 2nd St., Davenport, offered a new dark chocolate toffee with sriracha. Owner Rose Mohr experiments with ingredients, like bacon, in her hand-crafted chocolates. "It just depends on the venue. We try different ones, to stay up with what's going on in Chicago and New York," she said. "They like to try new things," she said of customers. "People say, 'we got it in Chicago; why can't we get it here?' Everybody here -- we're not hicks. We're trendy people in the Quad-Cities. We stay ahead of the trend, actually." Along with the edible samples, attendees also could take advantage of a cocoa-flavored massage treatment from Institute of Therapeutic Massage and Wellness of 1730 Wilkes Ave., Davenport. For February, they sell chocolate oil, chocolate body scrub (it scrubs off dead skin cells) and cocoa butter cream -- the latter with which co-owner Bonita Howes gave free hand massages. "You're eating chocolate and you get to smell like chocolate," she said. "It is butter cream and does look just like butter. It's beautiful and has a great texture to it." Ms. Howes also gave out small samples of the butter cream. "A little goes a long way," she said. "It doesn't taste good. Don't eat any of them. It smells great." Valentine's is the busiest time of year for the institute's students, she said, noting it's the school's 20th year. One-hour massages from students are $35, or $45 during the week of Valentine's Day. A couple's massage includes a free aromatic chocolate product. BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) President Donald Trump's order temporarily banning refugees and immigrants from seven mostly Muslim countries is playing well in Trump Country, those places that propelled him to the White House. The New York businessman and reality TV star promised to put America first during the campaign, his supporters say, and he's doing it. That includes securing the nation's borders and doing everything possible to prevent terrorists from entering the U.S. In their view, Trump is being Trump. They add that Democrats and liberal snowflakes and soft-hearted do-gooders just need to calm down. "He's going to do what he says and says what he does," said Barbara Van Syckel, 66, of Sterling Heights, Michigan. "That's a little frightening for some people." Thousands have demonstrated at U.S. airports since Trump issued an order Friday blocking people from seven countries in the Middle East and Africa from entering the U.S. and suspending refugee immigration for four months. The protests included a gathering of several hundred people at the Birmingham, Alabama, airport, the largest in a Southern state Trump carried with ease. Washington's state attorney general filed a lawsuit over the order, and a federal judge in New York issued an emergency order temporarily banning deportations of people from the seven nations. Some Republican lawmakers have questioned the order, with Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina saying they fear it will become "a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism." Yet none of that criticism matters much in Trump Country, those states and counties where Trump claimed the votes to win the Electoral College despite losing the popular vote to Democrat Hillary Clinton. Retired social service worker Judith Wilkenloh says the order shows Trump "means what he says." "He's just unafraid. He's just going ahead like a locomotive, and I like him more and more every time he does something," said Wilkenloh, 72, of Fredrick, Maryland. Trump supporters said they're satisfied with the immigration order and the ideas behind it, from improving national security to watching out for Americans first. Some Trump backers said they might do things a little differently than the president, but their overall reaction is positive. "We're not the world's Social Security office. We're not here to take care of people," said Jim Buterbaugh, the head of custodial work and maintenance at a public school in the western Montana town of White Hall. "I understand that people need help, but there are other ways besides bringing them here." Buterbaugh, who has actively fought the re-settlement of Syrians in Montana, was frustrated that Trump's moratorium did not include countries such as Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. The executive order also did not include the creation of safe zones for refugees, which he favors. Mike Honaker has some misgivings, too. A Trump supporter in a struggling West Virginia coal town, he didn't think "blitzing everybody" with an order that spread chaos around the world was the right way to go. But Honaker worries about terrorism and does not have a problem with Trump's plan to screen refugees more thoroughly. Overall, Honaker likes 85 percent of what the president has done so far. "I think he's shaking it up, the whole of Washington, D.C., and half the country, like he said he would," he said. Attorney Terri King, 56, said Trump's order has widespread support in her Rust Belt city of Middletown, Ohio. The only people who don't support it are "those who are paid to protest on the left ... and some Democrats," said King, an also-ran in a GOP congressional race last year. Venitta Ferguson of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, said national security was a priority for her during the election, and Trump has delivered on what he promised. "I couldn't be more pleased with what he's done," the 59-year-old Ferguson said. "We're in that kind of world where to ignore the possibility that even one person out of 10,000 has ill intentions is foolish." Charles Lewis, a retired firefighter in Topeka, Kansas, said he voted for Trump in part because of national security issues, and he supports the president's actions. "We need to know who these people are," said Lewis, 64. "I just don't think this nation is secure. We're a day late and a dollar short on everything." WASHINGTON The Senate should buckle up for a rough week. The bipartisan concern and outrage over President Donald Trumps executive order restricting access of immigrants from seven countries has likely ended any chance there will be smooth confirmation of additional members of the presidents national security team. And it comes as Trump is preparing to announce his choice to fill the vacant seat on the Supreme Court, which was already sure to be a flash point. Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Bob Corker, R-Tenn., said in a statement Sunday that the order relating to immigrants and refugees has been poorly implemented, especially with respect to green card holders. The administration should immediately make appropriate revisions, and it is my hope that following a thorough review and implementation of security enhancements that many of these programs will be improved and reinstated, Corker said. Critics on both sides of the aisle have said the executive order amounts to a ban on Muslim immigrants from certain countries. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly determined Sunday that the re-entry of current green card holders into the country is in the national interest under the executive order issued by Trump. Kellys call came after lawful permanent residents were detained at international airports around the country. But a senior administration official told reporters Sunday night that the order was a massive success story on implementation on every single level language that echoed what Trump himself said, even as thousands of protesters raged across the nation, and in some foreign cities as well. Senate Judiciary ranking member Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said Sunday she was planning to introduce two bills: one to nullify the executive action outright and another that would grant new powers to Congress to oversee determinations that exclude foreign nationals from certain countries from the United States. Its one thing to screen people before they come to this country. We already do that. Its quite another to say that individuals who are from a particular country, belong to a particular faith, or are refugees fleeing conflict are banned from the United States. Under this order, only Syrian Christians could be considered for the refugee program, said Feinstein. There is no legitimate national security reason to ban refugees the vast majority of whom are women and children who have experienced the absolute worst of humanity. Sen. Christopher S. Murphy of Connecticut also announced plans to introduce legislation to effectively upend the executive order. But the real leverage would come from slowing confirmation of Trumps nominees, particularly those for positions below the Cabinet, where Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., might be less likely to want to exhaust days of floor debate. Theres a debate-limiting cloture vote on the nomination of former Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson to be secretary of state. The Democrats are expected to exhaust post-cloture debate time, which would set up a vote on Tillersons nomination on Wednesday. The executive order fallout might have the most immediate effect on the tone of Tuesday mornings Senate Judiciary Committee vote on advancing the nomination of Sen. Jeff Sessions to be attorney general. Several of the top immigration staff of Capitol Hill were involved in drafting the executive orders, the senior Trump administration official said Sunday night, though there had been little sign of congressional involvement or notification. But Sessions, an Alabama Republican who had been an early and enthusiastic supporter of Trump, has had former aides intimately involved in the Trump campaign and the transition, with some now working down of Pennsylvania Avenue in the White House. Most prominent among them is Stephen Miller. It was already more than unlikely that Judiciary Democrats would back Sessions, but the immigration actions might cause them to be even more vocal in opposition. One soon-to-be Trump official who will not be swept up in the immigration issue is Transportation Secretary nominee Elaine L. Chao. Under a unanimous consent agreement reached before last weeks GOP retreat, Chao will face a confirmation vote shortly after noon on Tuesday. 2017 CQ-Roll Call, Inc., All Rights Reserved Visit CQ Roll Call at www.rollcall.com EBUHLENI, South Africa (AP) At least 1,200 men in ceremonial attire danced at a mainly Zulu gathering in South Africa on Sunday, wearing a mix of hides of illegally hunted leopards and Chinese-made, spotted capes designed by conservationists to reduce demand for the real thing. The phalanxes of dancers with shields, headgear of ostrich feathers and other regalia on Sunday evoked the proud traditions of one of South Africa's main ethnic groups, as well as the piety of the participants, whose Shembe religious movement blends Christian and indigenous beliefs. The event in Ebuhleni, north of the coastal city of Durban, also testified to an openness to change because roughly half the men were wearing fake leopard skins rather than genuine pelts, symbols of power because of the predator's grace and lethality. In fact, leopards are vulnerable on a continent with a rapidly growing human population, their numbers diminished by habitat loss, illegal hunting for their skins and other factors. "It's like abusing the animals if they're hunted to get the real skin," said 67-year-old Msoleni Manqele, who collected a manufactured copy of a leopard hide from a Shembe distribution office, which had in turn received a batch of fake pelts from the Panthera conservation group. The white-bearded Manqele spoke in awe of the leopard, describing it as a "king of the jungle" that fights with its claws, teeth and hind legs. He said he knows leopards "personally" because he lives near a wildlife park, but acknowledged with a laugh: "I'm also scared of them." One dancer, Madoda Zungu, wore a real leopard skin but said he also had one of the fake samples, first handed out in large numbers by Panthera in 2013 after years of negotiations with Shembe leaders, some of whom were resistant to shaking up an old custom at the behest of outsiders. "It's very important to know where we are coming from. This symbolizes our tradition," said Zungu, a municipal councilor. The leopard, he said, "is one of the animals that actually has got power in terms of the strength, in terms of thinking, in terms of doing and being a leader." Another man, Kholwali Nxumalo, said he had settled for a fake fur, but still hoped to buy a real one despite the expense. While the replica pelts, called "amambatha," have been distributed for free or a small levy, vendors near the dance site were selling real leopard skins for about $370, as well as the tails of monkeys, genets and serval cats worn by dancers, often around the waist. A few skins of cheetahs, another imperiled species, were also on display. The imitation leopard skins, besides being a free or cheap alternative to the real item, are more durable in the rain. The mock versions generally look shinier and neater than their real counterparts, which need to be replaced after about a decade. Learning about fashion was a challenge for Panthera's "Furs for Life" project, which modeled imitations on a haul seized from a poacher and used a complex weave technology that wasn't available in Africa. "We took those skins, we photographed them, we then digitized them into the pixels that the machine needs and then we sent that into the factories to try and make it exactly as that original fur," said Tristan Dickerson, the project manager. Dickerson also navigated the Shembe movement's divisive politics, saying it was sometimes hard to tell "if you were speaking to the right faction." A permit is required to own a leopard skin, but authorities don't crack down on Shembe dancers, mindful of cultural and religious sensitivities. Sunday's pageantry followed a pilgrimage to a nearby mountain and is one of the group's biggest occasions in the year, drawing followers from across South Africa, as well as neighboring Zimbabwe and Mozambique. An estimated 1,500 and 2,500 leopards are killed annually in the region to meet Shembe demand for skins, and some 15,000 real pelts are currently circulating in the religious community, according to Panthera. There are fewer than 5,000 leopards in South Africa, a relative stronghold of the animal on the continent. Conservationists hope to expand their fake skin campaign to other ethnic groups and African countries where the leopard is incorporated into ceremonial attire. The Cartier jewelry brand and the South Africa-based Peace Parks Foundation are major funders of the Panthera program. Decades ago, only Zulu aristocracy wore real leopard skins, but more people took up the custom, partly because of growing affluence. Lizwi Ncwane, a Shembe leader, wants the prestige of a real pelt to once again be the exclusive right of royalty, with followers using the copies. "We want to conserve the leopard," Ncwane said. "But at the very same time, we don't want to push people away from their culture and customary practices." Vacations are powerful. They have the ability to recharge and better connect us to the world all while making lasting memories. They have the ability to lift up the communities to which visitors travel, and while vacations can be to far-flung locales, they can just as easily be spent closer to home or even in your own backyard. The number of vacation days Americans take has been on a steady decline for years. Between 1976 and 2000, Americans took an average of 20.3 vacation days each year. In 2015, the average decreased to 16.2 -- thats the equivalent of nearly an entire week of paid time off wiped away. Consider this: If Americans were to use their allotted vacation days, it would deliver a $160 billion jolt to the U.S. economy, create 1.2 million new American jobs and generate $21 billion in federal, state and local tax revenues. In fact, in Illinois, travelers generated nearly $37.3 billion in direct spending, $2.7 billion in state and local tax revenue and 316,860 jobs in 2015. Moreover, tourism spending saves the average Illinois household $1,300 in taxes annually. Thats why the Illinois Office of Tourism is joining tourism professionals across the country in supporting the U.S. Travel Associations Project: Time Off initiative to encourage Illinoisans to use their well-earned vacation days with a simple strategy: take two- or three-day weekend trips right here in Illinois. As we mark Project: Time Off on Jan. 31, the tourism industry across Illinois is inviting Illinoisans to #PlanForVacation across the state, including exciting trips such as driving one of the states seven scenic byways, tasting the flavors of more than 100 local wineries, visiting one of seven National Park Service-affiliated sites, or experiencing the authentic view of Illinois through one of the local artisans and craft makers featured in the Illinois Made program. The Illinois Office of Tourism has resources to help you explore and plan. You also can find trip ideas at EnjoyIllinois.com. The funding package was approved by the Economic and Social Policy Council (Conpes) earlier this month and includes Pesos 12.8 trillion for the initial 15km phase of metro Line 1 from Portal Americas to Calle 6 in the city centre, which is due to open in 2022. The government will contribute Pesos 1.36 trillion towards the 41km RegioTram tram-train line, which will link Carrera Decima in Bogota with the town of Facatativa via Funza, Mosquera, and Madrid. The line is forecast to carry around 211,000 passengers per day with a journey time of 48 minutes. The project will be implemented as a PPP. In addition to the rail projects, the government has allocated Pesos 600bn towards the expansion of the TransMilenio bus rapid transit network. For detailed data on hundreds of new-build rail projects around the globe, subscribe to IRJ Pro. Africas intracontinental trade has nearly doubled since 1995 with Transnet handling 13,000 containers and 620,000 tonnes of freight a day, but the increasing volume of freight is causing transport and logistical problems which are slowing down traffic. Predix will digitalise processes such as payments, customs and inspection. The solution will be key in optimising freight efficiency and bringing products to market faster and for less cost across the continent, says Transnets Group CEO, Mr Siyabonga Gama. The Industrial Internet is transforming how we operate and our ability to deliver greater productivity for GE and our customers, says GEs chairman and CEO Mr Jeff Immelt. The digital partnership were embarking on with Transnet will not only improve Africas transport sector but unlock enormous opportunity for the supply chain fueling Africas economy. Stacy and Witbeck will work with the city of Tempe, project designer Stantec, five project artists and the local community to build the 4.8km line which is expected to open in 2020. The $US 186m project is expected to begin construction this year, and will have 14 stops. The Tempe Streetcar will travel on Rio Salado Parkway linking the Marina Heights development west to Mill Avenue. Six vehicles will run services along the line which will operate every 10 minutes during weekday peak and off-peak periods, every 20 minutes on weekday evenings, and every 15 minutes on weekends. The line has been financed using a mix of federal, regional and local funds. For the latest on railway projects around the world, subscribe to IRJ Pro. Expediency over principle describes a unanimous vote Jan. 27 by the three Surface Transportation Board (STB) membersActing Chairman Ann Begeman, a Republican, and Democrats Dan Elliott and Deb Miller. This is peripherally about a vote on an unremarkable administrative order delaying for 60 days a rulemaking affecting railroad reporting of certain service performance metrics. The issue is the Boards lack of respect for its cherished regulatory independence from the Executive Branch as defined and conferred by Congress. Also troubling is a seeming violation by these Senate-confirmed voting members of their oath of office to defend the Constitutions separation of powers. Following a gratuitous reference to the STB as an independent regulatory agency not subject to Executive Branch control in their unanimous decision, Begeman, Elliott and Miller voluntarily surrendered that distinction. They accepted as absolute a Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies from Reince Priebus, Chief of Staff to President Trump that the effective date of rules already published in the Federal Register, but that have not become effective, be postponed for 60 days. The purpose of the Priebus memo, as confirmed in an STB press release, is to allow the Executive Branch time for further review. Whoa. Further review by the Executive Branch of lawful rulemakings by a congressionally created independent regulatory agencyone considered an expert body by the federal judiciary that routinely gives great deference to STB expertise? What Begeman, Elliott and Miller accomplished on behalf of their constitutionally created independent federal regulatory agency was consent to abasement by an Executive Branch functionary whose memo deserved the identical response that 101st Airborne Division Brig. Gen. Anthony C. McAuliffe gave a 1944 Nazi ultimatum to surrender at Bastogne during the Battle of the BulgeNuts. Word leaked that Begeman, Elliott and Miller voted as they did because it wasnt worth the risk of becoming a target. Expediency over principle. Discarded was a 130-year fight their more resolute predecessors have waged for regulatory independence from the Executive Branch. This voluntary capitulation creates a slippery slope inviting further Executive Branch intrusion directed by a President increasingly tainted as a dictatorial demagogue. Congress declared STB predecessor Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) to be independent of the Executive Branch in 1889, two years following its creation. A subsequent dilution of ICC powers was eliminated by a short lived (1910-1913) Commerce Court. When President Warren G. Harding walked two blocks from the White House to the ICCs then offices on Pennsylvania Avenue in 1921 to lobby Chairman Edgar Clark on freight rates, there is no evidence the President received more than a polite audience. Subsequent efforts to dilute ICC independence by Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy and Johnson were rebuffed. In 1947, the Association of American Railroads warned that Executive Branch intrusion into ICC affairs would cause the ICCs independence to denigrate into fiction. Although certain administrative functions were transferred to the Department of Transportation by Congress in 1967, there was no chipping away at ICC regulatory independence. Those non-regulatory administrative functions were restored to the STB by the 2015 Surface Transportation Board Reauthorization Act. The lone dilution of ICC regulatory authority was allowed by Congress in agreeing to President Nixons 1969 government reorganization plan, permitting the President authority to appoint a permanent ICCnow STBchairman. But the 1976 Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform (4-R) Act provided that no federal officer shall have any authority to impede the free communication between the ICC and Congress with respect to budget requests. Congress preserved the ICCs regulatory independence and free communication with Congress in the 1995 ICC Termination Act that created the STB. Public choice theory may suggest the self-interest of federal officials owes loyalty to Presidents who nominateor may renominatethem, but Begeman and Elliott are term limited. No Board member risks removal for defending the independence of their agency. Begeman is in no fear of losing her Acting Chairman title as she intends to relinquish it once another Republican is Senate-confirmed to one of two vacant Republican seats. Nor is there logic for the capitulation in defense of the STB budget. The STBs budget request proceeds directly to Congress, and notions of the Presidents Executive Branch Office of Management and Budget (OMB) punishing the STB through the Presidents separate budget recommendations to Congress are unwarranted. The STB and its mission have exceedingly strong congressional support. The only recognized lawful limitation to STB regulatory independence exists in the 1996 Congressional Review Act, which allows an incoming President, but only with concurrence of Congress, to nullify regulations, including those of independent regulatory agencies, finalized during previous Administrations. That is unlikely for the rulemaking at issuepublic reporting of railroad service performance metrics on shipments of fertilizer and other agricultural products. Indeed, this rulemaking is of consequence to South Dakota farmersthe home state of Begeman and Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune (R-S.D.). This brings us to the principle, and implications of not defending it. President Trumps Cabinet and senior advisers are documented as the wealthiest in history, with the most business interests since the Eisenhower Administration, and sprinkled with investment bankers. It is not an alternative fact that Wall Street makes moneybig moneyon mergers and acquisitions (although this does not suggest government officials would benefit while in office). Would it be offensive if a President, previously assured of his influence over independent regulatory agencies, sought to bully the STB on a proposed railroad merger, or in favor of increased competition through, say, competitive switchingand the STB capitulated? We leave the answer to Vladimir Lenin: Probe with bayonets. If you encounter mush, proceed; if you encounter steel, withdraw. To view the STBs Jan. 27 decision, CLICK HERE. In 2012, under the radar of many Western countries, armed jihadis - some affiliated with Al Qaeda - took over a large swath of Mali, which borders Algeria and Mauritania in northern Africa. Along with its toll on the countrys residents, the terrorist occupation of Mali also put at risk a valuable historical resource - hundreds of thousands of precious, handwritten and illuminated manuscripts, containing ancient wisdom on all manner of subjects, from religion to science to art. The jihadis, who were known to destroy ancient temples and artifacts, threatened at one point in the occupation to burn the manuscripts. Determined to protect the manuscripts of Timbuktu, one of Malis major cities, a group of librarians and literature lovers risked their lives to protect the hand-written tomes, smuggling them out of the repositories where they resided and secreting them in trunks and foot-lockers in a series of safe-houses. In one particularly hazardous operation, the rescuers transported the trunks in small boats on the Niger River. The story of how the manuscripts were saved from destruction at the hands of terrorists is detailed in The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu, by Joshua Hammer, who was the featured speaker at the January meeting of the Rancho Santa Fe Literary Society, held at the Fairmont Grand Del Mar. The book was published by Simon & Schuster in 2016. In the books prologue, Hammer describes how a young librarian was accosted by armed jihadis at a checkpoint, his four-wheel drive filled with precious cargo: He cast a glance at the rear compartment. There, covered with blankets, lay five padlocked steamer trunks, each one filled with treasure: hundreds of illuminated manuscripts, including some from the 15th and 16th centuries, the Golden Age of Timbuktu. Encased in goatskin covers with inlaid semiprecious stones, they were gorgeous works composed by the most skillful scribes of the era, fragile pages covered with dense calligraphy and complex geometrical designs in a multitude of colors. Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, the terrorist group that had seized the north of the country four months earlier, had several times vowed on television and radio to respect them, but few in the city believed their promises. The extremists had declared jihad against anyone and anything that challenged their vision of a pure Islamic society, and these artifacts - treatises about logic, astrology, and medicine, paeans to music, poems idealizing romantic love - represented 500 years of human joy. They celebrated the sensual and the secular, and they bore the explicit message that humanity, as well as God, was capable of creating beauty. They were monumentally subversive. And there were thousands of manuscripts just like these hidden in safe houses in Timbuktu. Hammer, a former Newsweek bureau chief for Africa, who now writes as a freelancer for Smithsonian and Outside magazines, said he first learned of the manuscripts of Timbuktu while researching an article in the mid-2000s. Over the years, he kept in touch with Abdel Kader Haidara, the architect of the manuscript rescue effort, and he returned to Mali in 2013 as the French Army drove out the terrorists. The book, along with providing fascinating details about the manuscripts and the rescue operation, also provides a portrait of three central jihadist leaders. I felt people would want to know a bit about these guys, said Hammer in an interview before his talk at the literary society. While many of the terrorists met with violent ends, some survived to go on and fight with ISIS, Hammer said. After they were driven out by the French, they made it to the next jihad hot spot, he said. The manuscripts remain in Bamako, in southern Mali, the countrys capital, said Hammer, while Malis once thriving tourist trade has dried up to zero. In the book, Hammer also conveyed his appreciation for the local culture, including desert blues music festivals that once drew such rock luminaries as Led Zeppelins Robert Plant and U2s Bono. Mali, of all those countries in the Sahel (region of Africa) does seem to be this hotbed of art and music and literature, and its been that way for 600 years or longer, he said. Hammer, who lives in Berlin with his family, is now thinking about his next book, which may be set in America, and has also been approached by a London-based film producer who wants to make a docu-drama about The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu. I think its doable, he said of the film project. Hammers book, The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu, is available on amazon.com. As the Syrian Civil War approaches its sixth year, the country has been destroyed beyond repair. Even if the international community can cobble together a negotiated settlement that brings an end to the violence, overwhelming damage has been done. Since the war began in 2011, an estimated four hundred thousand Syrians have been killed, almost five million have fled the country and more than six million have been internally displaced. Most of Syria's major citiesincluding its former commercial hub Aleppohave been reduced to rubble. Many have lost so much in the ongoing conflict, yet some have benefited. None have gained more than the Shiite terrorist group Hezbollah. Hezbollah is a Lebanese militia group loyal to the legacy of the Iranian Revolution. It boasts a sophisticated fighting force and even controls key seats in Lebanon's parliament. It is a prominent example of a hybrid threat, which is an insurgent or terrorist group that is able to fightoften against superior adversariesrelying on a mix of conventional and unconventional military capabilities. Hezbollah also maintains a vast social-services network throughout Lebanon that would be the envy of some small nation-states. Led by Hassan Nasrallah, Hezbollah has long maintained ties to Iran and Syria, which effectively occupied parts of Lebanon between 1976 and 2005. For years, Syria was both a conduit through which Iran transferred weapons to Hezbollah and a place where some of its most influential leaders resided. Hezbollah has experienced mission creep in Syria, especially as circumstances have worsened for the Assad regime in the nascent stages of the conflict. From an advise-and-assist type of role, Hezbollah fighters progressed to direct training of Syrian militias and full-fledged combatincluding a ground offensive in April 2013 ( PDF ) in Qusayr in the Homs province. In late December, Hezbollah helped the Assad regime retake Aleppo.... The remainder of this commentary is available on nationalinterest.org. Colin P. Clarke and Chad C. Serena are political scientists at the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corporation. This commentary originally appeared on The National Interest on January 29, 2017. Commentary gives RAND researchers a platform to convey insights based on their professional expertise and often on their peer-reviewed research and analysis. Canal Sony is to premiere a second season of Top Chef Mexico throughout Latin America in February. Based on the NBCUniversal format and produced by Cinemateli Content , the second season (13x60) will be hosted by Ana Claudia Talancon, who will be assisted by four well known chefs.Canal Sony has achieved great success with its original productions, such as Top Chef Mexico, which are in line with viewers preferences and open important business opportunities for our advertisers, said Jose Antonio Hidalgo, VP and GM, Sony Pictures Television Networks Mexico . Top Chef Mexicos second season will keep focusing on the quality and the diversity of the Mexican cuisine.During its first season, which aired in the first half of 2016, the show doubled Canal Sonys figures during its time-slot with people aged 18-49 with medium-high income level, according to figures from the network.Its great to see Top Chef is coming back after its solid debut last year, added Yvonne Pilkington, senior VP, format sales and production, NBCUniversal International Formats. We have carried 20 adaptations of the format around the globe and we aim to keep increasing the shows international appeal. MOSCOW, January 30 (RAPSI, Oleg Sivozhelezov) The Moscow City Court has upheld a lower courts ruling to extend the house arrest of ex-Russian Economy Minister Alexey Ulyukayev, who stands charged with extorting a $2 million bribe, until April 15, RAPSI reported from the courtroom on Monday. Investigation into Ulyukayev has been extended until May 15. The Basmanny District Court earlier ordered the seizure of the former ministrys property valued at over 564 million rubles ($9.3 million). Ulyukayev was arrested while receiving a bribe. He allegedly demanded Russian state-controlled oil giant Rosnefts representative to pay him $2 million for lawfully providing a positive review and evaluation of a deal that allowed Rosneft to acquire governments share in mid-sized producer Bashneft. According to acting spokeswoman for the Investigative Committee Svetlana Petrenko, the former minister threatened to create obtrusions for Rosneft with use of his position. Ulyukayev has pleaded not guilty. On November 15, the ex-minister was put under house arrest. Later in the evening, President Vladimir Putin relieved Ulyukayev of his post because of loss of trust. MOSCOW, January 30 (RAPSI, Lyudmila Klenko) The Leninsky District Court of Kirov has granted a motion filed by prosecution to bring Russian opposition politician Alexey Navalny charged with embezzlement at the Kirovles timber company to courtroom, Navalnys press-secretary Kira Yarmysh announced on Monday. In November, Russia's Supreme Court overturned sentences against opposition politician Navalny and his accomplice Pyotr Ofitserov in Kirovles embezzlement case and sent it for retrial. Russia's Supreme Court delivered the ruling taking into consideration the judgement of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). Nevertheless, the Supreme Courts ruling didn't meet expectations of both prosecutors and defense lawyers. The ECHR ruled in February that Russia had violated Navalny's and and Ofitserovs right to a fair trial. In particular, according to ECHR, sentences against them were issued with numerous violations because of a lot of references being made regarding another defendant Vyacheslav Opalyov. Proceedings against Opalyov were treated as a separated criminal case after he had admitted his guilt. Additionally, ECHR noted that Russian courts failed to review claims by defense that Kirovles case may have a political motive behind it and did not provide adequate evaluations of such claims. ECHR itself did not find a political motive in the case. The court ruled to compensate Navalny with 48,000 euro of legal costs and Ofitserov with 22,000 euro. Additionally, Russia is to pay 8,000 euro each in damages. Russias Justice Ministry filed a request seeking referral of the case to the Grand Chamber of the ECHR, but the request was dismissed. Navalny was given a five-year suspended sentence for embezzlement at the Kirovles timber company in July 2013. In May, Moscow's Lyublinsky District Court increased a probation period for him to 5.5 years. Ofitserov received a four-year suspended sentence. According to investigators, while serving on a voluntary basis as an adviser to the Kirov Region governor Navalny organized the theft of over 10,000 cubic meters of timber from Kirovles company between May and September 2009. Investigators claimed that Pyotr Ofitserov, then Director of Vyatka Timber Company, and Kirovles CEO Vyacheslav Opalyov were involved in the scheme. Claims that 2016 was the hottest year on record are drawing sharp criticism from scientists who say it reflects how global warming has become more social crusade than evidence-based science. The Obama administration relentlessly politicized science and it aggressively pushed a campaign about that politicized science, said Steven E. Koonin, who served as under secretary for science in Obamas Department of Energy from 2009 to 2011. Koonin, a theoretical physicist at New York University who once worked for energy giant BP, also blamed a happily complicit media for trumpeting the now-departed Obama administrations dubious claim. The controversy began in mid-January when the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued a report declaring that the globally averaged temperature over land and ocean surfaces for 2016 was the highest among all years since record-keeping began in 1880. NOAA fixed the 2016 increase at 0.04 degrees Celsius. The British Met Office reported an even lower rise, of 0.01C. Both increases are well within the margin of error for such calculations, approximately 0.1 degrees, and therefore are dismissed by many scientists as meaningless. The reports, however, set the global warming bell towers ringing. Gavin Schmidt, head of NASAs Goddard Institute for Space Studies, was quoted at Climate Central referring to the past temperature record and saying 2016 has really blown that out of the water. Following the lead of the Schmidt and government press releases, USA Today wrote that the planet sizzled to its third straight record warm year in 2016. The New York Times front-page headline said, Earth Sets Temperature Record for Third Straight Year. The article declared that the latest readings were trouncing earlier numbers and the planet had thus blown past the previous records. Such characterizations are absurd, according to Richard Lindzen, a meteorology professor at MIT and one of the worlds foremost skeptics that global warming represents an existential threat. Its typical misleading nonsense, Lindzen said in an e-mail. Were talking about less than a tenth of degree with an uncertainty of about a quarter of a degree. Moreover, such small fluctuations even if real dont change the fact that the trend for the past 20 years has been much less than models have predicted. Koonin suggested the White House and the media could consider an alternative presentation of whats happening. I think simply by having the government press releases on the changing climate be fulsomely scientific that is, putting in all the relevant facts we would see more genuine science in the media discussions, he said. As an example, he offered a headline that read, Global Temperatures Up 0.0X for 2016; Within Margin of Error for Last N Years. Rather than exclaim Sea Levels Highest on Record, Koonin said, the press releases could encourage, and perhaps media outlets accept, one that reads, Sea Level Rose 0.1 Inches Last Year, Consistent With Century-Long Trend. But would that stir public opinion or sell papers? Its not my job to sell papers, Koonin said. The White House positions, the press releases, the published stories all of that is not exactly inaccurate but it is promoting something considerably less alarming or certain than the layperson might conclude from reading it all. The issue is not one of fake news or manipulated data but of emphasis. The Times said it did not rely solely on data sets that showed a 0.01C increase. The papers coverage incorporated other studies that showed a greater increase in average temperatures, particularly those that take Arctic changes into account, said Justin Gillis, who covers global warming for The Times. Gillis provided a bar graph to RealClearInvestigations that showed three other conclusions reflecting higher temperature jumps than those recorded by NOAA and the British meteorology office in conjunction with East Anglia University, one of the worlds centers of global warming research. Judith Curry, a former Georgia Tech scientist who left her academic post this month largely because of the charged politics surrounding global warming, said the other temperature data sets are less precise. She said there are some good reasons why one of the British 0.01C sources elects not to extend its coverage to the Arctic Ocean. There is little to no data, and the extrapolation methods are dubious, Curry wrote in an e-mail. Neither USA Today nor Schmidt replied to requests for comment. In addition to Curry, Koonin and Lindzen, five other experts told RealClearInvestigations the laymans understanding of the issue would improve if the Trump administration adopted a more neutral stance toward global warming stories. That would be certain to be interpreted as one of denial about global warming, and already several figures in the emerging Trump team have been denounced by The Times and others as climate deniers. This rhetoric again obscures the real issue, according to the skeptics, who insist the important question for government and taxpayers isnt global warmings reality but rather its extent and, consequently, the best policies that can be crafted to address it. Some experts pointed with approval to the incoming administration stripping global-warming material from the White House website literally moments after power changed hands. One suggested the Office of Science and Technology Policy could be transformed and its mission redirected. It will be a huge cross-agency effort to stem this flood, perhaps led by OSTP, said David Wojick, a government contractor who has tracked federal spending on global warming research for years. Alarmist federal press releases, websites and reports are very big beer indeed. Correction: Jan. 30, 2017, 5:53 PM Eastern An earlier version of this article misstated the global average temperature rise for 2016 reported by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It is 0.04 degrees Celsius, not 0.01, the increase reported by the British Met Office. The U.S. Department of Labors Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its annual report on union membership last week, and the numbers are not favorable for the U.S. labor movement. The BLS calculated (from data collected as part of the Current Population Survey) that union membership in 2016 was 10.7 percent, down 0.4 percent from 2015. This percentage loss translates to a decline of 240,000 union members since 2015. In 1983, the first year for which comparable union data is available to the BLS, the union membership rate was 20.1 percent; the 10.7 percent rate represents a 46.8 percent decline in American union membership over the ensuing 34 years. Moreover, as of 2016 there are 14.6 million union members, as compared to 17.7 million union members in 1983. Interestingly, private and public sector union membership in 2016 is now approaching parity, as approximately 7.4 million private sector workers and 7.1 million public sector workers are union members. Yet the union membership rates are significantly skewed, as the public sector union membership rate of 34.4 percent is over 5 times that of private sector union membership (6.4 percent). There is empirical evidence that supports the argument that union members are paid higher wages than their non-union counterparts. For 2016, the BLS reports that median weekly earnings of nonunion workers - $802 were only 80 percent of union workers ($1,004). But declining membership is not the only concern for organized labor, as state Right-to-Work (RTW) legislation has re-emerged as another threat to union survival. RTW legislation prohibits so-called union security agreements, or other forms of agreements between employers and labor unions, that govern the extent to which an established union can require employees membership, payment of dues to a union, or fees as a condition of employment, either before or after being hired. In a June 2015 report issued by National Economic Research Associates, and sponsored by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, an analysis of economic data from RTW states showed that, especially in heavily unionized industries such as manufacturing, businesses are more likely to locate in states with RTW laws. The report also found evidence that RTW laws have a direct, positive effect on employment, output, and personal income. Since Oklahoma became the 22nd state to allow RTW (after voters passed a Constitutional amendment) in late 2001, there was a decade-long hiatus before Indiana (2012) and Michigan (2012) became the 23th and 24th States to enact such legislation. Three other States quickly enacted RTW legislation in succession: Wisconsin (2015), West Virginia (2016), and Kentucky (2017), becoming the 25th, 26th and 27th RTW States, respectfully. Missouris Republican-controlled legislature has been busy this January moving RTW bills through its House and Senate, with recently elected Governor Eric Greitens (R) pledging to sign RTW legislation. Likewise, New Hampshire is also on track to pass RTW legislation in 2017, as the State Senate passed its bill earlier this month and it is expected to be taken up in the House in the next few weeks. New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu (R) has said he will sign RTW legislation into law. Not surprisingly, RTW legislation is a highly partisan issue, with Republicans generally in favor and Democrats strongly opposed to its enactment. Yet, in 2017, Republicans control both legislative chambers in 32 states, with 24 of these 32 states having Republican governors. Enacting RTW legislation requires control of both the executive and legislative branches of government. In those states without RTW laws and a Republican controlled government the stars have aligned, and legislative efforts this January beginning in Kentucky have been to rapidly vote this legislation out of state legislatures and send it for the governors signature. The National Labor Relations Board (board), which has been criticized for being an activist, strongly pro-union agency during the Obama years, is getting a new acting chair. Phillip Miscimarra, a Republican board member was named acting chair by President Trump last week, and will remain on the board until his term expires on August 17, 2018. In a statement, Miscimarra said: I remain committed to the task that Congress has assigned to the board, which is to foster stability and to apply the National Labor Relations Act in an even-handed manner that serves the interests of employees, employers and unions throughout the country. President Trump will also have the opportunity to name two new members to the board, as there are two unfilled seats. Under the new chair, and a majority of board members being Republican appointees, the days of the board seeking to expand and reinterpret existing federal labor rules, such as its controversial decision in 2014 to charge the McDonalds Corporation as a joint employer in a series of unfair labor practice complaints filed against the companys franchisees (even though the franchisees were privately owned and legally separate businesses) will become a fading memory under a newly reconstituted board. Traditionally, the American manufacturing sector has provided a fertile ground for supporting and expanding union membership. However, this sector has shed nearly five million jobs since 2001, declining from 17 million to just over 12 million in 2016. In addition, many manufacturers are located in RTW states where union efforts to organize have been less successful. Recent growth in U.S. service sector employment is, however, accompanied by low unionization rates. For 2016, this low unionization rate is reflected in the finance industry (1.2 percent), at food services and drinking places (1.6 percent), and in professional and technical services (1.6 percent). While President Trump has pledged his Administrations support for bolstering American manufacturing and investing in the nations infrastructure, while the construction industry has a high unionization rate (13.9 percent in 2016), Trumps policy efforts will not dramatically reverse this long-term trend of declining national unionization rates, but may help to stabilize private sector unionization rates and prevent the national unionization rate from slipping below 10 percent by the end of this decade. Imagine if President Trump announced that he wanted to oust California from the United States. If it weren't for us, after all, Trump would have won the popular vote he so lusts after by 1.4 million. Blue America would lose its biggest source of electoral votes in all future elections. The Senate would have two fewer Democrats . The House of Representatives would lose 38 Democrats and just 14 Republicans . The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, among the most liberal in the nation, would be changed irrevocably. And the U.S. as a whole would suddenly be a lot less ethnically diverse than it is today. President Donald Trump banned the entry of people from seven majority Muslim countries last week. Leaders as far apart ideologically as former Vice President Dick Cheney and Sen. Bernie Sanders warned the ban could become a recruitment tool for terrorists. President Donald Trump banned the entry of people from seven majority Muslim countries last week. Leaders as far apart ideologically as former Vice President Dick Cheney and Sen. Bernie Sanders warned the ban could become a recruitment tool for terrorists. In addition, the U.S. risks straining or losing important diplomatic ties and fragile relationships. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and even Theresa May have warned about the geopolitical effects of a ban on immigrants and refugees from predominantly Muslim countries. Iran has already promised to take reciprocal measures after Trumps immigration order, although the exact measures remain to be specified. Just last December, the al-Qaida affiliate in East Africa, Al-Shabab, used footage of Trumps call for a ban on the entry of Muslims as part of a recruitment film. Banning immigration from seven majority Muslim countries and selectively admitting Christians is a bad idea for many moral and legal reasons. A long history shows such policies also threaten national security. Our research for the book Culling the Masses: The Democratic Origins of Racist Immigration Policies in the Americas shows the perils of policies targeting particular nationalities. Losing Hearts and Minds From the 19th century to 1965, the United States discriminated against various groups. In the 1920s, the U.S. established national origins quotas that set the number of immigrants who were allowed to enter the U.S. from certain countries. These quotas were designed to restrict the entrance of southern and eastern Europeans because nativists like famed eugenecist Harry Laughlin and Senator Henry Cabot Lodge feared the newcomers were likely to be criminals, and even anarchist or Bolshevik terrorists. Anti-Catholic sentiment played a role as well. The laws kept out Asians altogether on grounds that no alien ineligible for citizenship shall be admitted to the United States (43 Stat. 153. Sec. 13 ). Asians were ineligible for citizenship because of their race. The quotas gave 51,227 of the 164,667 annual spots for immigration to Germans, 3,845 to Italians and zero to Japanese. Bipartisan coalitions ended this discrimination in large part because it hurt U.S. national security at key moments during World War II and the Cold War. A presidential commission after World War II found that U.S. exclusion of Japanese immigrants had contributed directly to the growth of Japanese militarism and helped motivate Japans attack on the United States in 1941. When the quotas ending Japanese immigration passed in 1924, the press in Japan declared a National Humiliation Day to protest the law. Seventeen years later, as the Japanese navy steamed toward Pearl Harbor, Commander Kikuichi Fujita wrote in his diary that it was time to teach the United States a lesson for its behavior, including the exclusion of Japanese immigrants. During World War II, China became a major ally of the United States. Japan tried to drive a wedge between the Chinese and the Americans by portraying Japan as the defender of Asians against U.S. racism. The fact that the United States had banned Chinese immigration since 1882 through the Chinese Exclusion Act helped make the case. Japanese media in occupied China pointed to the hypocrisy of the Americans, who presented the United States as a friend of the Chinese while banning their entry. A broad U.S. coalition called for Congress to end Chinese exclusion. President Franklin Roosevelt argued that repeal would silence the distorted Japanese propaganda and be important in the cause of winning the war and of establishing a secure peace. Congress halted the ban on Chinese naturalization in 1943 and allowed a symbolic annual quota. China remained the key U.S. ally in Asia during the war. During the Cold War, the quota system posed a new national security problem. The Soviet Union and United States were competing to win the hearts and minds of Asians in battlegrounds like Korea and Vietnam. Radio Moscows broadcasts to Asia pointed out that U.S. law continued to treat Asians as inferiors. How could Asians take the side of a country that shunned them? During the Korean War, Sen. William Benton of Arkansas highlighted the folly of spending billions of dollars and suffering 100,000 U.S. casualties while continuing to restrict the entrance of Koreans. In 1952 he told the Senate: We can totally destroy that investment, and can ruthlessly and stupidly destroy faith and respect in our great principles, by enacting laws that, in effect, say to the peoples of the world: We love you, but we love you from afar. We want you but, for Gods sake, stay where you are. By 1956, the Republican and Democratic party platforms both endorsed ending the national origins quotas. Congress finally ended the system in 1965. Post 9/11 Americans saw the challenge of singling out nationalities again after the 2001 terrorist attacks. The National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS) required male citizens of 25 countries who were in the United States on nonimmigrant visas to register with the government. With the exception of North Korea, all of the countries were predominantly Arab or Muslim. More than 1,000 immigrants were detained. None was convicted of terrorism. Governments in the Middle East and South Asia that had been working with the United States to counter terror were outraged by the harassment of their citizens. Its hard to work together when one part of the team feels denigrated by the other. The NSEERS program was suspended in 2011 by the Obama administration. Officials concluded that NSEERS had fueled the impression that the United States was hostile to Muslims without stopping criminal acts. History shows that humiliating national or religious groups on the world stage by restricting their entry makes it harder to keep our allies. It can create new enemies. This ban may put the United States at risk. David FitzGerald, Theodore E. Gildred Chair in U.S.-Mexican Relations, Professor of Sociology, and Co-Director of the Center for Comparative Immigration Studies, University of California, San Diego and David Cook Martin, Professor of Sociology and Assistant Vice President of Global Education, Grinnell College This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article. President Donald Trumps administration has three major options regarding policy toward Cuba. He can roll back President Barack Obamas controversial efforts to normalize Americas relationship with Cuba; maintain current arrangements; or negotiate a better deal, as yet unspecified, that expands U.S.-Cuban ties. Regardless of what it eventually chooses to do more broadly, the new administration should maintain the existing framework of pragmatic security agreements that directly benefit U.S. national security interests. This cooperation began during the George W. Bush administration with low-level contacts between the U.S. Coast Guard and the Cuban Border Guard, and has evolved to include a variety of security areas. Some have argued that security coordination with Cuba should be frozen or terminated until Cuba takes steps to democratize, but such a move could undermine U.S. national security. Given the high visibility of the embargo and other U.S. restrictions, most Americans do not know that the United States maintains low-key agreements with Cuba on a wide range of security matters. Far from the security relationships the United States typically develops with other nations, the dialogue with Cuba addresses functional areas advantageous to the United States. As the new administration considers the future of the bilateral relationship, Trumps national security team should weigh carefully the benefits of maintaining and expanding this dialogue. I recently returned from a six-day trip to Cuba, where our delegation examined the nature of current U.S.-Cuban security relations. We were briefed by the U.S. Embassy, the U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. and Cuban academics, and members of the Cuban foreign, justice, and interior ministries. We also talked to many ordinary Cubans regarding the state of Cuban affairs and prospects for the future. What we heard, and what I believe, is that the bilateral agenda on security cooperation serves the United States interest. Heres why. First and foremost, the physical proximity and geographic location of Cuba make it vitally important for U.S. agencies to become familiar with their Cuban counterparts. Until relatively recently, most U.S. authorities did not even know whom to call in Cuba concerning potential maritime or environmental emergencies in the Straits of Florida. Should a renewal of oil exploration by Cuba result in an environmental catastrophe, South Florida beaches and fragile coastal ecosystems would suffer the consequences before Cuba. A terrorist attack on an international cruise liner in Cuban waters would require a U.S. search and rescue (SAR) mission. Fortunately, over the last four years both countries have established mechanisms to respond to such emergencies; returning to an era of no contact and of operating blindly in a crisis would be counterproductive. In all, there are eight functional areas of ongoing dialogue and cooperation between the two countries. These range from SAR and environmental cooperation to law enforcement coordination counter-narcotics operations, and include efforts on cybersecurity and counterterrorism. Differences remain, but progress is steady. U.S. drug enforcement agents as well as the FBI, DHS, and officials in the Justice Department now have direct lines of communications with their Cuban counterparts and are establishing procedures and protocols that permit real-time cooperation during critical operations. Rather than resorting to ad hoc measures in serious, life-threatening situations that demand better communication and coordination, the United States should consider ways to build on the pragmatic cooperation already underway. For example, the Trump administration could consider inviting Cuban professionals to attend U.S. counterterrorism courses at the Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies. During these sessions, civilian and military officials from many countries evaluate how to improve transnational responses to terrorist threats around the region. Professional security counterpart dialogues are an important component of building effective collaboration. The United States cannot be naive -- it should not romanticize the relationship with Cuba. The United States has legitimate concerns about Cubas political system, its human rights practices, and its repressive treatment of political opponents. Nevertheless, the ongoing framework for dialogue on critical security issues can mitigate costly future problems, especially during crises. Greater operations-level collaboration on vital issues of common interest will permit better preparation and preclude mutual suspicions when professional cooperation may be required to save U.S. lives. A new Trump administration policy toward Cuba should not discard valuable progress in the security sector. As the French Fifth Republic lurches toward the starting line of this years presidential election, the republics founder, Charles de Gaulle, seems almost to be sitting in the judges chair. Francois Fillon and Marine Le Pen, the races two leading contenders, have each sought, in their way, the Gaullist imprimatur. Whether the late general would bestow his approval on either of these candidates, particularly in light of their relationships with Russia, is questionable. Equally questionable is what this will mean for Frances ties to the United States. As leader of the far-right Front National, Le Pen refuses the label Gaullist. Le Pen notes: Between de Gaulle and me, there is the Algerian War. Indeed, the FNs old guard damns De Gaulle for what they consider his betrayal of French Algeria. But Le Pen nevertheless describes herself as Gaulliene. Her reason? De Gaulle was the last head of state with a vision of France as free to choose her destiny. Fillon, the candidate for the neo-Gaullist party Les Republicains, has found other uses for the label. He used it to swat his primary rival Nicolas Sarkozy for the corruption cases hanging over his head: Who could ever imagine General de Gaulle being questioned by the police? Fillon has also used it as a flag in which to drape himself. Earlier in January he declared: I am Gaullist and, to boot, Christian. The declaration proved controversial, less because Fillon placed his Gaullist identity before his Christian one, and more because he had advertised himself as a Christian at all in the secular republic De Gaulle created. Putin and Paris Fillon and Le Pens efforts to cast themselves as Gaullist or as Gaulliene have collided with their public and private positions on Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin. Both candidates herald a dramatic change in Frances relationship to Russia -- a promise to alter a relationship that nearly 60 years after the republics founding still bears De Gaulles imprint. In her admiration for post-communist and post-democratic Russia, Marine Le Pen is a chip off the old block: Her father, Front National founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, visited Moscow in 2005. There he called for the creation of a Northern Realm [Espace Boreal] uniting northern Europe and Russia. Though Le Pen fille has since evicted Le Pen pere from the party, his particular brand of Russophilia remains. In 2011, she announced a project best labeled as Espace Boreal 2.0: the creation of a pan-European union with Russia and Switzerland (but, tellingly, without Turkey). More alarmingly, Marine Le Pen declared earlier this month that Putins seizure of Crimea was legal, insisting that the region was an integral part of Russia. Ukraines government proceeded to declare her persona non grata; Le Pen was unfazed. According to the French satirical and investigative weekly Le Canard Enchaine, it was no accident that her announcement coincided with her partys efforts to negotiate a hefty loan of nearly 30 million euros from Russian banks. (This loan would follow one obtained in 2014 from Russian banks for 9 million euros.) A Shift on Syria? Will Le Pens support for Russias ruthless intervention in Syria add a few million to the loan? While that remains unclear, what is quite clear is Le Pens enthusiasm for political leaders considered to be war criminals by others. Long an advocate for an alliance between Assads regime, Russia, and France, Le Pen concedes that Assad might be authoritarian, but believes he is not a barbarian. She has also dismissed claims that Russian airstrikes were targeting non-ISIS rebels as American propaganda aimed at undermining Vladimir Putins actions in Syria. Thanks to Le Pens many Russian affinities, LObs magazine recently graced her with the title Putins vice-tsarina. Is Fillon next in line? While he condemned the Russian and Syrian air strikes on Aleppo, he has oddly insisted that they were the result of the Wests refusal to dialogue as much as possible with Russia. Fillon executes a similar moral pivot on Russias complicity with Assads crimes, but wonders why everyone kept silent when the Americans destroyed Iraq. Fillon will not be silent over the beneficial impact he thinks Putins actions have had in Syria -- Russian intervention should be welcomed -- and his belief that economic sanctions on Russia should be lifted. There is also a personal element to Fillons pro-Russian views: His relationship with Putin goes back to 2008, when both men served as prime ministers in their respective governments. They have met dozens of times, occasionally at Putins private dacha near Moscow, and according to Fillons biographer Jean de Boishue, the two men hold one another in great esteem. No doubt Fillon, should he become president, will echo his American homologue in asserting this relationship is an asset. As for the Gaullist claims made by Fillon and Le Pen, the General would dismiss them out of hand. Though he portrayed himself as a realist and believed Moscows aims were driven not by Communist ideology but instead by Russian imperialism, De Gaulle had no illusions over the threat they posed to the West. He famously called for a Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals, but always insisted that the Urals had to come halfway -- not with tanks, but with treaties. When Herve Alphand, the minister of foreign affairs, once asked what he should make of the USSRs smiles toward France, De Gaulle replied that France must first learn if those smiles would be extended to Berlin and the United States -- a dictum that has since remained at the heart of French policy toward Russia. Should either Fillon or Le Pen move into the Elysee this spring, that policy may well come to an end. 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Shortly after lunch Saturday, attorney Julia Schlozman received an email calling for lawyers to help people being held at O'Hare International Airport in the wake of President Donald Trump's immigration order. Schlozman, who had only signed up to volunteer with the International Refugee Assistance Project a few hours earlier, quickly read the message and walked out the door. She hopped on a CTA bus, then transferred to the Blue Line to take her to the airport. Advertisement An attorney who specializes in criminal justice reform, Schlozman has never practiced immigration law. But she went anyway, believing her research skills, brainstorming ability and enthusiasm could somehow help. "I wanted to contribute in any way I could," she said. "I just felt like I had to do something." Advertisement She wasn't the only Chicago-area lawyer with that feeling. About 150 attorneys rushed to O'Hare Saturday to help secure the release of more than a dozen travelers held as part of Trump's crackdown on immigration from seven majority-Muslim countries. They threw their weekend plans away, postponing family outings, ignoring household chores and canceling restaurant reservations to assist clients they had never met nor would ever bill. Immigration attorney Maria Baldini-Potermin was catching up on work at her office when she received the email. Wearing yoga pants and a Girl Scouts T-shirt, she headed straight to the airport. "The Chicago Bar is responding to the challenge," she said. "It's inspiring to see." Armed with laptops and iPads, the attorneys looked like "The Paper Chase" cavalry as they commandeered the dining area directly across from the McDonald's kiosk in the international terminal. The initial call-to-action email quickly made its way to social media, leading to an overflow legal crowd in the O'Hare food court by 6 p.m. Nearly all had come expecting to assist refugees enter the country. They were stunned to discover that every traveler held at O'Hare on Saturday already had some kind of legal status in the United States. The travelers were not formally detained, which prevented the attorneys from speaking with them. Instead, the lawyers gleaned as much information as they could from the travelers' family members who were waiting anxiously at O'Hare. They shared that information with local congressional offices in the hopes that the elected officials could persuade the Department of Homeland Security to release them. While some attorneys lobbied Congress, others teamed up to work on legal briefs, do research or walk through the terminal with signs offering legal assistance. Advertisement "We had to be creative to make it known that we are here, and we can help," Chicago immigration attorney Gretchen Ekerdt said. "I think it made a difference." All the held travelers were released by 10 p.m. Saturday, following a ruling from a federal judge in New York that blocked the U.S. from sending people out of the country under Trump's order. Before leaving the airport, most travelers and their families stopped to thank the attorneys. Because they were not allowed to use cellphones while being held, the travelers had no idea there were dozens of lawyers fighting on their behalf. "This is the America I know," said 67-year-old Abdulsalam Mused, a legal U.S. resident who was held for six hours because he was born in Yemen. A photo of the attorneys' makeshift law office went viral on social media, prompting supporters to show their appreciation by having pizzas, doughnuts and water delivered to the terminal. Several passers-by stopped to buy coffee for those working at the cramped tables, while one person made a care package of Visine and cough drops. U.S. Reps. Brad Schneider and Raja Krishnamoorthi, both suburban Democrats, also came to thank them for their efforts. Advertisement "It feels like I'm in law school again, with the late-night hours and all the caffeine," said Fiona McEntee, an immigration attorney who helped organize the effort. "Everyone has so much passion, it's energizing. Everyone here feels like they had a duty to speak out for the most vulnerable in our society." Daywatch Weekdays Start each day with Chicago Tribune editors' top story picks, delivered to your inbox. > The duty, it seemed, fell regardless of legal specialty. While most of Saturday's volunteers were immigration attorneys, the ranks included criminal defense lawyers, corporate litigators and law school professors. Emily Benfer, a law professor and director of the Health Justice Project at Loyola University, worked on her first-ever habeas corpus brief a legal document demanding a person be brought before a judge at the airport. "It's incredibly inspiring," she said of the lawyers gathered. "It shows that when we stand up together instead of tearing each other apart positive things can happen." sstclair@chicagotribune.com gwong@chicagotribune.com Advertisement Twitter @stacystclair Twitter @gracewong630 "Apart from the shortage in available workforce, even in the universities, more than the 50 per cent of the enrolment in the STEM programme are foreign nationals. Even if you need to employ these foreign nationals, you need to have the H-1B visa programme." Nasscom President R Chandrashekhar discusses the ramifications of Trump's 'Buy American-hire American' agenda with Raghu Krishnan. IMAGE: Demonstrators hold welcome signs for immigrants during the second day of anti-Donald Trump immigration ban protests at San Francisco International Airport on January 29, 2017. Photograph: Kate Munsch/Reuters. India's export-focused software industry is facing its toughest period in around a decade. While technology shifts are disrupting the traditional IT services business, president Donald Trump's 'local hiring' means that companies would find it difficult to send engineers on projects. Software industry lobby Nasscom President R Chandrashekhar discusses the reality of creating jobs in the US, in a telephonic interview. Would Donald Trump's 'Buy American-hire American' impact IT jobs? Trump has said the same thing that he has been saying on the campaign trail. His priority is to get jobs into America, especially in the manufacturing space. As far as the industry is concerned, we have been very clear that it works with a majority of the companies in the country, including more than 75 per cent of the Fortune 500 companies. We make these firms more efficient and help them to continue creating jobs by offering them services in the Indian industry (for that). The fact also is that there is an acute skill shortage in the US that is increasing. What is the shortage of engineers in the US? By 2018, there will be more than 1 million IT jobs lying vacant in the US and there are no candidates. Apart from the shortage in available workforce, even in the universities, more than the 50 per cent of the enrolment in the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) programme are foreign nationals. Even if you need to employ these foreign nationals, you need to have the H-1B visa programme. This is a reality. We are aligned with the idea of creating jobs in the US and we believe the Indian IT industry helps the process by making corporate and business America more competitive and thereby abling to create more jobs. In his campaign, it is rhetoric, but as a president, would it not be a policy? You cannot think that the very second after he is sworn in, his views will change suddenly. He has made it clear those are his intentions. How these intentions are achieved is the question. There is a fair degree of clarity of intentions. He has been consistent in his campaign and been saying the same after he got elected. The issue comes in the implementation towards these objectives. Then, all these have to be considered. These facts have to be taken into account or will translate into the opposite of his intentions. That is why we have to wait and see. More importantly, our effort is to reach out to the people in the new administration among the law makers and make them aware of all these aspects. The second thing is that the law-making is a different branch in the US; different from the administration. That has its own independent dynamics. There is already a bill (to curb H-1B visas); there will probably be newer bills, but as they run their way through the legislative process, all these factors will come into consideration. Is there a team from India you are taking to the US? Are you mobilising your customers who have benefited from outsourcing? We are in the process. It takes some time for new people to settle. We will be taking a delegation to the US in February. US technology companies such as Google, Facebook and IBM have also supported liberalised visa regime. Would you be mobilising these, too? They are all our members. We will mobilise all our members. We will reach out to the US government with them. Some people argue that if there are restrictions on people's movement, upcoming development projects would just move offshore. What is your take? That is exactly what we are saying. It is not as if people are being brought in while there are others who are working there. There are going to be two things if you don't allow people to come in and I am talking in general. If they don't get people, either the work will go out of the country whether it is innovation, core development, or whatever, so either it will go out of the country or the job will remain undone. Both of it is more harmful to the US. Here, what appears on the surface is being different than the reality is. That is their reason we have to constantly message them, especially when there is a change in the administration. The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India has shortlisted the changes it hopes to see in Budget 2017. Go swadeshi to enjoy benefits of long-term capital gains In a bid to promote the Make in India scheme, ICAI has suggested that deductions/exemptions under sections 54, 54F, 24(b), 80EE, etc -- that help save tax on long-term capital gains -- should be made available only if the new house property is constructed/repaired out of indigenous material. The benefit of deduction may not be provided if the material has been imported from other countries, said the memorandum to government. Define yoga to prevent misuse of tax breaks The definition of charitable purpose under section 2(15) of the Income-tax Act, 1961, was amended in 2015 to include yoga as a specific category thereunder. However, yoga is not defined in section 2(15). In the absence of specific definition, the scope and ambit of what constitutes yoga would be a subject of litigation, especially in the context of claiming exemption under section 11, the memorandum said. Tax agricultural activities by corporate enterprises With the expansion of agricultural business, many corporates are undertaking composite activities in agriculture. It is suggested that income from agricultural activities carried out by the corporates might be brought into the scope of the tax net, said ICAIs pre-Budget memorandum. Amend definition of amalgamation It may not be possible to meet the conditions of amalgamation where the de-merged company is a subsidiary company and the resulting company is the holding company. Section 2(1B) of the Income-tax Act, 1961, provides for the definition of amalgamation which states that all the property of the amalgamating company or companies immediately before the amalgamation becomes the property of the amalgamated company. ICAI notes that this may lead to hardship in a case where the two amalgamating companies have cross holdings. Union Budget 2017: Complete Coverage Do away with Place of Effective Management (PoEM) provisions ICAI has advocated omitting the concept of PoEM from the I-T Act and defer its applicability, pending issue of final guiding principles. It would be difficult to implement the final guiding principles for the FY 2016-17 considering the fact that almost six months of the relevant year has already passed by. "Thus, there could arise an impractical situation where one would have to apply the provisions of PoEM read with the final guiding principles for a period which has already elapsed, ICAI note said. Defer country-by-country reporting by one year The Finance Act, 2016 provided a specific reporting regime in respect of country by country (CbC) reporting and also the master file. However, the elements relating to CbC reporting requirement are yet to be included through amendment of the Act in various relevant sections. Understanding the implications of these provisions and effective implementation of the same will require a lot of efforts on the part of the taxpayers as well as the assessing officers, ICAI said. Launch an amnesty scheme for dispute resolution A suitable amnesty scheme must be thought of for all central and state laws which have been merged in GST in one go to reduce existing litigation. Give CENVAT credit of inputs held in stock to traders While preparing for the GST regime, ICAI has suggested a provision to allow CENVAT Credit of inputs held in stock to traders under Central excise law. Alternatively, deemed credit of 75 per cent value of the output duties paid on inputs be allowed to traders. This notional credit would ensure no disparity between the traders and manufacturers. Illustration: Uttam Ghosh/Rediff.com. Union Budget 2017: Complete Coverage A body representing Indian Revenue Service officers has decided to stick to its earlier stand to observe Monday as a black day. This is against the Goods and Services Tax Council's decision to divide administrative turf between the Centre and states, despite an assurance by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley that the new indirect tax regime would create ample job opportunities. The officers would wear black bands on Monday, which is also Martyrs day, the IRS Association (Customs and Central Excise) said, in reply to whether they are relenting after the ministers assurance. As a mark of protest against Jaitley's reply to concerns of service, we shall wear black band/badge on 30 January, the association tweeted in its reply. CBEC Chairman Najib Shah had on Friday raised these issues on the same dais shared by the finance minister. Jaitley replied GST would create ample opportunities for all staffers. ... and therefore the kind of disquiet in service, the kind of personal pressure I see on you should reduce as there is no real occasion for a fear of this kind or a sense of insecurity for anyone in this service, he had told Shah. Former Central Board of Excise and Customs chairman Sumit Dutt Majumder echoed the officers stand, of feeling let down by the Centre's compromise with states for the proposed GST regime. Observers say that as the Council had worked out a broad agreement after extensive discussion, it should not be reversed. However, a lot of detailing is still required and could be so done as to assure the central officials that they would be engaged appropriately under the GST regime. The GST Council had decided states would have the power to assess and administer 90 per cent of payers of the new tax, with annual turnover of less than Rs1.5 crore. Over this threshold, states and the Centre would have administrative control over assessees in a ratio of 50:50. Grouse Majumder said the concerns were mostly related to services tax, on which central officials have expertise over 20 years and their state counterparts were novices. GST is a joint venture between Centre and states. No one should feel let down. But, central officials have expertise of over 20 years on services and now will control only 10 per cent of assessees up to Rs1.5 crore of turnover, he complained. Unlike goods, you need deft handling in taxing of services, he said, particularly when there is inter-state sale and purchase. You need expertise to determine the place of supply in intangibles. There will be fights between states whenever services move inter-state every now and then under GST, he added. And, quoted data from the directorate general of commercial intelligence that the highest incidence of tax evasion was in services below Rs1.5 crore. Soothe them However, M S Mani of consultancy Deloitte Haskins & Sells says the apprehensions of central officials seem to be exaggerated. GST would increase the powers of both Centre and states, he said. Both, central and state officials, are going to become more powerful. I don't think anyone is going to become less powerful. Pratik Jain of PwC said the same thing; various types of new work would emerge under GST where central tax officials could be employed. The Council had decided the broad issue of administrative turf. It should now work out specifics about who is going to do what and how will that be divided, he added. And, it should communicate more with both the Centre and state officials, reassuring them. Nobody's role is going to be undermined. If GST is successful, it is going to significantly increase revenues, scope of work, role and powers of both central and state officials. However, the roles are going to be different from the present roles, Mani added. Jain said the central officials worry was on how well theyd be engaged. Of the 10 per cent of assessees up to Rs1.5 crore of turnover (and the 50 per cent above that), it is understood that only up to five per cent could be taken up for scrutiny, he said. So, their concerns are over how the officials will be engaged. Since the decision has been taken, a solution has to be found out within that. A huge data will be generated under the GST regime. Somebody has to analyse it and make use of it. There would be enforcement issues, where lots of officials would be needed. Also, there would be an anti-profiteering body under the GST regime, where officials could be employed. Earlier The IRS Association had on January 25 decided to not celebrate Customs Day on January 27 and observe January 30 as a black day. They had also said that giving powers to states for taxing economic activities within 12 nautical miles of the coast was a national security issue. States are only getting power to levy and collect taxes, not other controls, is Jains comment on this. Image: A file photograph of a protest against Value Added Tax. Photograph: B Mathur/Reuters. The US presidents stance on immigration could lead to a change in H1B visa rules, reports Business Standard/Ayan Pramanik. Indias software services sector is bracing for the consequences of new US President Donald Trumps action against outsourcing of jobs. Trump has signed an order to block entry of people, including highly qualified professionals, from seven Muslim-majority nations. Having won the presidency on the promise of protecting US jobs and against moving work offshore, he has been warning big companies, such as Ford and Carrier, to cancel factory plans in Mexico and shift these home. And, extracted a promise from computer giant Apple and its supplier Foxconn, and online retailer Amazon, to generate as many as 150,000 American jobs. Thousands have demonstrated in the US to protest Trumps move to block people from Muslim nations, despite their having the needed permits. The US information technology industry has found a rare common ground, saying the measures are immoral and un-American. Trumps action comes soon after two senators of the US legislature proposed a new law for H-1B visa holders there. Indian IT is keenly watching for Trumps directions on H-1B visa norms -- a large chunk of Indian software engineers on site work in America are on H-1B and L1 visas. It is unclear at this point. However, if the proposals for changes at the H-1B visa norms (happen), the industry will surely have an impact, said S Gopalakrishnan, a co-founder and former chairman of Infosys. Indias software lobby group, Nasscom, has asked IT majors in America such as Apple, Google, Microsoft and IBM to lobby with Trump, to explain that more jobs would be generated by US companies if they outsource to India. The potential visa curbs come a time when the traditional IT services sector is under pressure from automation and the shift in spending on newer areas such as digital and cloud. So far, it appears Trump is following through on his poll promises. The IT industry is definitely little bit less optimistic. Indian companies will have to hire more locally and it is going to be difficult if such a sentiment continues, said Dinesh Goel of ISG, an IT research firm. The policies hint at the fact that there is no other way but more local hiring. Indian firms have to find ways to do business with the US, a 60 per cent revenue generator (for them). Some experts say Trumps order on refugees and immigration does set the tone but does not directly impact the IT sector. It is about the environment in the US, said Pareekh Jain of HfS Research India. Image: US President Donald Trump salutes as he exits Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House. Photograph: Drew Angerer/Getty Images While Silicon Valley is building apps to deliver ice cream at 2 am, Jacqueline Novogratz, founder and CEO, Acumen, tells Niraj Bhatt the really interesting entrepreneurs are taking on the world's problems like poverty, where India becomes not only the marketplace, but also the laboratory. IMAGE: With the local sales agents at Frontier Markets, a business that sells solar energy powered products at an affordable cost to rural India. Photograph: Kind courtesy Jacqueline Novogratz/Twitter When Jacqueline Novogratz was speaking at an event about Acumen's $1.5 million investment in a low-cost emergency ambulance service start-up Ziqitza Health Care in 2007, a prominent Indian businessman had looked at her like she was some Don Quixote and almost laughed her off the stage. He said nine ambulances the operation would make no difference in Mumbai, and that smart people like her investing their brain power in such small things was exactly what was wrong with social enterprise. Since then, both Ziqitza and Novogratz have come a long way. As an impact investor, Acumen's investments have multiplied manifold at $106 million across 96 companies. Ziqitza is among the top five ambulance companies in the world, with nearly 3,000 ambulances today. IMAGE: Jacqueline with her friends, Nadia Sood of Impact Investment Partners and Niti Bhan of Emerging Futures Lab. Novogratz started Acumen with the objective to revolutionise philanthropy to tackle poverty. She had realised that markets alone couldn't solve problems and charity and government aid have their shortcomings. She followed the path of 'patient capital', which can take high risks for the long term and bridge the gap between the social impact of philanthropy and the efficiency and scale of a market-based approach. The fund's donations are invested in entrepreneurs, who are building innovative businesses to serve the low-income segment. Besides early-stage equity and debt, Acumen comes on board to help the business grow and attain scale. Acumen's focus is on energy, health care, education and agriculture, where markets can play a role. In India, Acumen has invested $28 million in 25 enterprises. We are meeting for lunch at Pali Bhavan in the Mumbai suburb of Bandra, close to Acumen's India office. After ordering a pomelo and roasted coconut salad and mushroom galouti kebabs with fresh lime soda, which we plan to share, we return to Ziqitza's story. IMAGE: Ziqitza was the first to respond on the night of the terror attacks in Mumbai, November 26, 2008. Photograph: Uttam Ghosh/Rediff.com Ziqitza was the first to respond on the night of the terror attack in Mumbai on November 26, 2008. Its staff was going inside the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel and rescuing people without bulletproof jackets even as terrorists were still inside. "That's when I thought that we must be doing something right," she says. The ambulance company has provided stellar service in calamities like cyclones, and has transported close to six million patients and delivered more than 10,000 babies in ambulances. Ziqitza has a robust business model and has been awarded $80 million in government contracts to provide free or subsidised service under the public-private partnership model. While it transports accident and disaster victims, and unaccompanied victims free of charge, some patients pay a small fee. An investment from Acumen also results in other investors taking the enterprise more seriously. "For every dollar that we invest," Novogratz says. "another five dollars follow." Ziqitza has investments from a subsidiary of US-based ambulance service provider American Medical Response Inc, HDFC, IDFC and India Value Fund. While Silicon Valley is building the latest app to deliver ice cream at 2 am, the really interesting entrepreneurs are taking on major problems of society, poverty, where India becomes not only the marketplace, but also the laboratory. In 2001, when Acumen was started, it had a hard time finding the right investment -- either there were charities or for-profit companies targeting the middle class. After evaluating 700 organisations, Acumen made its first investment in the Madurai-headquartered Aravind Eye Care System, which has revolutionised eye surgeries. Its radical idea of a hybrid price structure at large scale has resulted in two-thirds of the patients paying nothing or near nothing, and the hospital is still profitable. Founder Dr G Venkataswamy has been a major influence on Novogratz. "In many ways Aravind is our spiritual home and we stand on Dr Venkataswamy's shoulders and try to live up to his standards," says Novogratz. "We started with India as we believed it was the laboratory for innovation and, 15 years later, I feel more excited and certain of that today," she says. IMAGE: Inspired by Ela Bhatt's Sewa Bank and Mohammed Yunus' Grameen Bank, she co-founded Rwanda's first microfinance institution. Acumen has invested in Drishtee, which brings Internet to villages along with computer education, consumer products and e-governance at its kiosks. "We went to East Africa, too, as the market approach to alleviating poverty should work anywhere," she says. Novogratz has worked in East Africa for several years. Acumen is also present in Pakistan, South America, West Africa and recently, the US. Explaining the reason for starting impact investing in the US, she says, "We no longer have rich and poor countries; all countries have the developed world and the developing world within." Novogratz asks for another fresh lime soda and over a lunch of lotus stem and water chestnut curry and lasooni palak, she talks about how she came into impact investing. IMAGE: Helping publicise a book on a topic that is close to her heart. She began her career in the 1980s as an international banker at Chase Manhattan on Wall Street. That was the time when South American countries were defaulting on loans, the money was being siphoned off to the Cayman Islands, while the people of these countries couldn't even walk into a bank. She learnt about Ela Bhatt's Sewa Bank and Mohammed Yunus' Grameen Bank, quit the bank and accepted a job that took her to Africa, where she co-founded Rwanda's first microfinance institution. Along the way she also did an MBA from Stanford. In 1999, she thought of the fund, which became operational two years later. I ask her about the coming job crisis, as automation and artificial intelligence could lead to a significant increase in unemployment, especially in a country like India. She says she is not pessimistic and that new industries like beauty salons catering to low-income communities will create jobs. Ziqitza has 6,000 people on its rolls. "Also, we have to redefine the idea of a job and it's not necessary that jobs are going to be nine-to-five office or factory jobs in the future." Its investee company, D.Light, which provides solar-powered solutions to the poor in 62 countries, has 10,000 distributors. "Retailers, who could be a housewife or a farmer, source the solar lamps from these distributors and sell these lights to their neighbours," says Novogratz. IMAGE: Spending some time with the Acumen India Fellows. Acumen has an investment in Labournet, which provides training to migrant, unorganised sector workers such as in the construction or leather tannery sectors, and provide training and certification. Labournet has trained half a million workers so far and trains 150,000 a year now. In order to measure the performance of its investee companies and bring transparency to philanthropy, Acumen developed the lean data approach to measure social performance where it uses standardised questions and SMS. It also runs a programme to train the next generation of social impact leaders, where it has trained 97 fellows so far. Novogratz is thinking of two things these days. "We are in a world where markets and technologies connect us like never before in history and those same forces are bringing in extraordinary inequality and division, which could easily tear us apart," she says. She is working on building bridges across these divides, finding innovations and creating more inclusive models. "I am also looking at India to become a self-sustaining, locally-funded entity by and for India, with world-class investments, and pioneering the next level of innovation and connecting that to other parts of the world," she says. IMAGE: Stopping for some warm roasted corn on the cob in Karachi, she can't help but admire the corn seller's entrepreneurial spirit. India is one of the most innovative countries on the planet, but much of the innovation is lost due to lack of capital, mentoring and scale, she believes. "There is tremendous ingenuity in Indian for-profit entrepreneurs and companies and if we have them as partners financially and in thoughts and ideas, then the opportunity to scale up in this space is huge." "The ability of Indian business leaders to be change agents is fantastic if they are convinced," she says. A local fund in India is Acumen's immediate target. After that, Acumen plans to take this model of individual self-sustaining businesses, leaders and ideas worldwide. "We then represent a new way of tackling poverty for the world. We have very big ambitions," Novogratz says, as we finish lunch. While there is no denying that certain sections of the community deserve aid, the politics of reservation can be suicidal for India, argues Vivek Gumaste. IMAGE: Telangana's move to provide 12 per cent reservation to Muslims raises the question if the community is in need of government upliftment. Photograph: Amit Dave/Reuters The 12 per cent reservation for Muslims in educational institutions and employment mooted by Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao is a blatant example of vote bank politics, a shameless quid pro quo that flies in the face of robust socio-economic statistics, makes a mockery of egalitarian governance and arbitrarily favours one community over another and thus accentuating the already existing schisms in our society. The million dollar question that this controversial decision provokes is whether the Muslim community as a whole is an especially indigent group (vis-a-vis the others) in need of government upliftment. The stock response to this query emanating from politicians and intellectuals clamouring for Muslim reservation is to point to the 2006 Sachar Report. The Sachar Report, whose explicit brief was to evaluate the condition of Muslims and propose measures for their betterment, is the biggest red herring to be dragged across the contentious topic of socio-economic inequity and affirmative action in India; an outrageous fraud perpetuated by relentless repetition. The report itself was methodologically challenged and statistically flawed from a selection bias that culled expedient information from particular states and select groups. The information was not subject to an objective and clinical analysis; the data was willfully distorted, shoddily analysed and selectively quoted to project a skewed view to match the vested agenda of certain political parties. In short, the conclusions and its recommendations were not sustained by the actual results. Similarly, the report of the United Progressive Alliance constituted the post-Sachar Evaluation Committee or the Kundu committee report (September 2014), which is garnering increasing attention in recent times, is likely to be the source of another deceptive disinformation campaign unleashing calls for undeserved reservations like the 12 per cent reservation for Muslims in Telangana. Therefore, it is imperative that we analyse the data carefully, honestly and intelligently. Let us focus on three broad areas, namely, employment figures (a proxy for possible discrimination), poverty levels and literacy rates to ascertain the true import of the current report. Employment IMAGE: When it comes to employment, Muslims fared better than most groups; only the Muslim-Others category did poorly. Photograph: Arko Datta/Reuters Employment within each religious community or relevant sub groups (Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes and Others) was ascertained by calculating the Work Participation Rate (percentage of working males (15 years plus) in the specific group) and the Unemployment Rate (percentage of unemployed (age range 15 to 29) in the designated cohort). The WPR for Muslim males in rural and urban areas in 2011-12 was 80.4 and 77.3 respectively, better than that of Hindus (80 and 73.7) and the national average (80 and 74.1). The Unemployment Rate corroborates these findings: Overall, Muslims fared better than most other groups; only the Muslim-Others category (urban) did poorly. The unemployment rates for rural Muslim males in the Muslim-OBC and Muslim-Others category in 2011-2012 were 5.27 and 7.34 compared to 5.61 and 7.92 for similar Hindu groups. Among urban males the rates were as follows: Muslim OBC -5.98, Hindu OBC- 8.31, Muslim -Others -12 and Hindu Others - 9.81. With regards to occupational distribution, the post-Sachar report categorically states: 'Their (Muslim) share in the professional category, comprising professionals, legislators, senior officials, managers, service shop-owners and salespersons is marginally higher than not merely the SC/ST but also the general population.' Attempts to project a false sense of discrimination by highlighting isolated areas of disparity in highly competitive government position like the IAS and IPS (3.32 and 3.19 per cent as per 2016 figures) do not pass muster when analysed objectively. This inequity cannot be automatically attributed to discrimination: Secular factors may be contributory. An examination of the educational profile of Muslims clears the air. Literacy IMAGE: Madrassas, maktabs (religious schools affiliated with mosques) and Urdu medium schools appear to be the dominant forms of schooling. Photograph: Ahmad Masood/Reuters Literacy rates (individuals of 6 years and above) among Muslims in 2011-2012 was 70 per cent -- only marginally lower than the national average (74 per cent). Hindu SC/ST groups had the worst literary rates of 66. However, when we delve deeper, another picture appears. Completion levels among Muslims begin to decline at higher levels of education. At the secondary and higher secondary levels Muslims had a completion rate of 18 versus 21 for Hindus. Hindu SC/ST category registered a completion rate of 15.3. Five per cent of Muslims (20 years +) are graduates (national average: 9 per cent), which clearly diminishes the appropriately qualified applicant pool, possibly leading to lower representation. Other factors intrinsic to the Muslim community include parochial schools. This was extensively addressed in the original Sachar report. Madrassas, maktabs (religious schools affiliated with mosques) and Urdu medium schools appear to be the dominant forms of schooling. The exact number of students attending these schools in unclear because of sketchy data. However, what can be gleaned is that a whopping 30 to 50 per cent students attend Urdu medium schools in some states whose performance at the CBSE exam level is below par, raising questions of the suitability of such schools to provide modern, mainstream education. This is the crux of the problem. Instead of pouring in large amounts to modernise these schools as envisioned by then prime minister Manmohan Singh's 15-point programme, which to date appears to have had minimal impact (external link), we need to move towards a more effective solution: Nainstream education for one and all. Poverty IMAGE: Except for a segment of urban Muslims, Muslims do well overall, consistently faring better than Hindu SC and ST groups. Photograph: Reuters Poverty indices like the Monthly Per Capita Expenditure (consumption expenditure per individual) and the Head Count Ratio (percentage with consumption below the poverty line), fail to make a strong case for extraordinary Muslim poverty. Except for a segment of urban Muslims, Muslims do well overall, consistently faring better than Hindu SC and ST groups. The HCR for rural Muslims in the OBC and Other Category were 30.8 and 25.4 -- better than that of Hindu ST (44.8) and Hindu SC (33.8). By the criterion of MPCE (in 1987-1988), a similar picture emerges. Among rural Muslims the MPCE was 207.9 only marginally less than the national average of 221.9, but better than that of Hindu ST at 167 and SC at 192. Urban Muslims are slightly disadvantaged, with an MPCE of 297 and HCR ratios ranging from 19.3 to 26.5. However, they compare favourably with Hindu ST (MPCE 320; HCR 27.3) and Hindu SCs (MPCE 305; HCR 21.8) Poverty in India is a hydra-headed monster which spreads its tentacles erratically clasping one community in one area and a different one in another; even segments of advanced communities are not immune. Generalisations can therefore be misleading. The post-Sachar report evaluation provides no new perspective and reiterates the findings of the original report. The only definitive conclusion that can be drawn is that the Hindu SC/ST as a group continues to be the most disadvantaged lot. Muslims have the highest WPR, a low unemployment rate and relatively acceptable poverty indices (better than Hindu SC/STs who constitute 25 per cent of Hindus) prompting the authors to rightly conclude: 'This would not entail extending reservation to the Muslim community in general in the country.' Quotas, while politically expedient, are not the panacea. With its myriad communities and religions, the politics of reservation can be suicidal for a country like India. This is not to deny that there are sections in the Muslim community deserving of governmental support: They should be a part of a broader inclusive programme that includes mainstream education for all and is need-based rather than religion-centric. The 'creamy layer' concept till now confined to OBCs needs to be extended to all categories with appropriate social and economic modifications. The Sachar report and the appraisal of its recommendations -- the post-Sachar evaluation report -- are classic examples of self-created reality in the 'post-truth' era. They have little utility value. They need to be rubbished. All data is from the Amitabh Kundu Committee report or the post Sachar evaluation committee report which was constituted by the UPA government in 2013 and which submittted its report to the ministry of minority affairs in September 2014. 'Nothing will change in the richest municipal corporation in the country.' 'New faces with the same surnames will get party tickets.' 'So the same order, the same money spending systems, will continue,' says N Suresh. The Shiv Sena split from the Bharatiya Janata Party for the civic election in Mumbai was just a matter of time. The two saffron parties had gone through a few rounds of talks during which its leaders kept firing barbs at each other. The main fight was over the number of seats each party would contest in the February 21 election to the BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation. The Sena -- which has ruled the BMC for close to two decades -- was not willing to part with more than 60 seats to the BJP. The BJP, riding high on its 2014 Lok Sabha and assembly victories in Maharashtra, wanted the lion's share of seats. After the alliance ruptured, Shiv Sena President Uddhav Thackeray declared that his party had rotted for 25 years in its alliance with the BJP. Both parties have a history, both parties are opportunists, so it will be a surprise to no one if they strike a post poll alliance. This was the same pattern adopted by BJP and Sena leaders during the 2014 assembly election campaign. We saw a long drawn out discussion before the Sena joined Devendra Fadnavis' government. So far, Sena ministers have not quit the Narendra Modi and Fadnavis governments. How then are the taunts and allegations made against each other being pursued diligently? The voters seem to be taken for a nice ride. There are many who say the Thackeray cousins -- Uddhav and Raj, who founded the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena -- should come together for the BMC election. Politically speaking, it would be harakiri for Uddhav if he helps revive the moribund MNS. These political kites are are obviously being flown by MNS leaders to ensure that they stay on the media's radar. BJP leaders have been screaming hoarse about the lack of transparency in the Sena-dominated BMC. The fact is BJP corporators are part of the BMC administration and decision making process. BJP councillors have passed many projects and taken decisions in the powerful BMC standing committee. Crores of rupees have been drowned in Mumbai's floods and wasted in the city's multitude of potholes. It is common knowledge that many corporators get a cut from the contracts sanctioned. Contractors, in fact, spend more money on these cuts than on the real costs of the projects. Nothing will change in the richest municipal corporation in the country. New faces with the same surnames -- spouses and children of councillors -- will get party tickets. So the same order, the same money spending systems, will continue. By then, we will hear that the saffron parties have formed yet another alliance. The Sena will direct its tirades through the party daily Saamna, the BJP will issue warnings and a mortified smaller party, the Sena, will eventually toe the line. IMAGE: Shiv Sena President Uddhav Thackeray, left, with Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. 'Given Chinese sensitivity to anything to do with Tibet -- and the fact that in the 1950s it was the Tibet issue which led to the deterioration of India-China relations and the border war in 1962 -- India should be particularly careful in not triggering a Chinese reaction which it may not be able to handle,' says former foreign secretary Shyam Saran. India-China relations appear to be sliding towards sharper confrontation as each country reacts to moves by the other, moves which are perceived to be hostile. We are witnessing the beginning of a cumulative action-reaction process, which could become self-reinforcing, taking the two countries in a direction neither may wish to traverse and more importantly, which is in neither country's interest. China has repeatedly maintained its 'technical hold' on the listing of Masood Azhar, the chief of the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammad (JuD), as a terrorist at the UN. India has accused China of indulging in double standards and flouting its own professed opposition to international terrorism. The two countries have repeatedly stated their convergent interest in combating terrorism so it is not unreasonable for India to regard Chinese stance on the JuD as inexplicable. China has also continued to oppose India's membership of the Nuclear Suppliers' Group on grounds that this would undermine the international non-proliferation regime. But in private China has made it known that it could accept both India and Pakistan becoming members of the NSG simultaneously. Thus, the common factor in both cases is Pakistan. India has reacted by ratcheting up the pressure on both counts, forcing China to take public positions in support of Pakistan which then heightens Indian perceptions of Chinese hostility. Having taken such positions, China finds it difficult to walk back to a more nuanced position as was the case in the past. India's recent Agni-IV and Agni-V inter-continental ballistic missile (ICBM) tests were presented in the Indian media -- as in the past -- as targeting China though the official announcement was as always circumspect, reiterating that the capability was not directed against any specific country. In a departure from the past, China chose to react officially to the tests by declaring them to be in violation of UN Security Council resolution 1172 of June 6, 2008. This resolution, under Chapter VI (hence non-binding), was passed in the aftermath of the series of nuclear weapon tests carried out by India and Pakistan in 1998. It had condemned those tests and had called upon India and Pakistan 'immediately to stop their nuclear weapon development programmes, refrain from weaponisation or from the deployment of nuclear weapons, to cease development of ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons and any further production of fissile materials for nuclear weapons.' The Chinese official spokesman chose to explicitly describe the Agni tests as violating the above resolution stating that 'the UN Security Council has explicit regulations on whether India can develop ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear weapons.' It should be noted that China has never acknowledged India as a Nuclear Weapon State and when pressed in various interactions, have often cited this resolution. Chinese media has gone a step further and threatened that if Western powers 'accept India as a nuclear country and are indifferent to the nuclear race between India and Pakistan, China will not stand out and stick to those nuclear rules as necessary.' There is an implicit threat in this of China reinforcing Pakistan's nuclear and missile capability to balance India. China has been doing this in any case, but what is different this time round is the public and threatening manner in which it is being articulated. In the past China would not acknowledge this support to Pakistan and claim that it was only involved in peaceful nuclear cooperation and 'normal' defence cooperation with that country. On the Indian side, there is a clear signaling of intent to rekindle the Tibet issue. The invitation to His Holiness the Dalai Lama to Rashtrapati Bhavan, for a Nobel Laureates conference, was a visible departure from a previous policy not associating the government with the Tibetan leader's activities in India. The Karmapa has also become more publicly active and this, too, must be due to a policy shift. Clearly the Indian side is indulging in its own ratcheting up of pressure on China. If such gestures towards the Tibetan religious leaders continue, there is little doubt that China will react and seek to 'punish' India in some fashion. India may wave a Tibetan card to cause discomfiture to the Chinese, but this will be more an irritant rather than a serious threat to China. On the other hand, given Chinese sensitivity to anything to do with Tibet and the fact that in the 1950s it was the Tibet issue which led to the deterioration of India-China relations and the border war in 1962, India should be particularly careful in not triggering a Chinese reaction which it may not be able to handle. Quite the contrary, the two countries need to engage with each other to find ways in which to manage the Tibet issue and prevent it from becoming, once again, source of escalating tensions. India's efforts should be towards encouraging a reconciliation between the Dalai Lama and the Chinese rather than hoping to exploit the differences between them. Both countries need to step back and orient their bilateral engagement towards defusing current tensions rather than expanding them. China needs to stop viewing India as just a sub-set of its relations with the US and now as a sub-set of its closer alliance with Pakistan. China appears to view India through the prism of its increasing rivalry with the US much as, in the past, it saw India as an ally of a hostile Soviet Union. There is also the element of hubris, the constant reference to China's GDP being five times that of India, and hence, India accepting its place in the junior league. China appears to forget that when its own GDP was a fraction of that of the US, it was not willing to accept a junior status; so why should India? On the part of India, one would hope that we avoid the urge to react to Chinese provocative behaviour with matching hostility. We should not get into an escalatory dynamic which neither country is able to control and whose consequences we are unable to manage. Nor should we allow a public opinion environment to take hold which then begins to dictate leadership decisions. India-China relations are adversarial and will remain so in the foreseeable future. It is in the interest of both countries not to let the adversarial descend into avoidable confrontation. IMAGE: Tibetan monks in Bodh Gaya. Photograph: M I Khan '340 films have been shot in Rajasthan in the last 50 years.' 'The Rajput community has never opposed any film except for Jodhaa-Akbar and Padmavati.' 'Rajasthan is known for welcoming guests, but why did these two films get into trouble?' 'They got into trouble because these two filmmakers wanted to create a controversy.' IMAGE: A video grab of director Sanjay Leela Bhansali being attacked on the sets of his film, Padmavati. Filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali was assaulted on January 27 by activists of the Rajput Karni Sena -- a Rajput community group -- while he was shooting his film Padmavati at the Jaigarh fort in Jaipur. Vijendra Singh Kalyanwat, spokesperson for the Rajput Karni Sena, tells Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf why his organisation opposes the film and what prompted the attack on Bhansali and the vandalisation of the movie set. What happened on Friday? We wrote many letters to Bhansali's office and expressed our opposition to the film. We wrote that history should not be distorted. We also wrote to the information and broadcasting ministry. On Friday, when we went to meet Bhansali at Jaigarh fort, his guards fired in the air. After the firing there was a scuffle. This 'firing' is only being proclaimed by your Sena. No one from Bhansali's team has confirmed the incident. There were thousands of people there. Ask anyone about this firing. Bhansali's bodyguards fired four rounds, following which the situation got out of hand. Since you went to speak to him, his bodyguards would not have fired in the air without provocation. Why would they fire in the air? Nobody knew what would happen when we went there. The firing incident led to a fracas. We went to meet Bhansali because we wanted to tell him that he should highlight the martyrdom of Rani Padmini in his film. Rani Padmini has no (romantic) link with Alauddin Khilji. How do you know what is in Bhansali's script? Why are you assuming things? The day after the incident, Bhansali said it was fortunate that Deepika Padukone and Ranveer Singh weren't on the sets. Now, you tell me, how can Ranveer and Deepika shoot for this film together? Alauddin Khilji (whose role is being portrayed by Ranveer Singh) must shoot at another place and Rani Padmini (being played by Deepika Padukone) should shoot at a different place. How can they shoot together? When we asked him this question, he did not give us a reply. What is Bhansali's motive? But... We believe in ahimsa, but if someone does not listen to us, violence becomes necessary. The newspaper Rajasthan Patrika carried a report that there was a dream sequence in the film, which shows Deepika meeting Ranveer Singh. Now Rani Padmini is not an ordinary woman. She is like a devi in Rajasthan. And you cannot show this devi meeting a terrorist like Alauddin Khilji even in his dreams. Rajputs will never tolerate this. If Bhansali distorts history and shoots the film in Mumbai, we will go there and destroy his sets like we did in Jaipur. Now you are making these threats on record. We will do whatever we can. We will not tolerate distorted history. We have written our history with our blood. Bhansali cannot play with our history. But historians say Alauddin Khilji never met Rani Padmini. They say Malik Muhammad Jaysi wrote the poem Padmavat, which has got nothing to do with Alauddin and Rani Padmini. He wrote it 200 years later. Lord Ram's history was written after so many years. Now today if some filmmaker writes that Sita was not kidnapped by Ravan, but she ran away with him because she fell in love with him, will anyone tolerate this? Filmmakers are distorting history and want future generations to believe in a different history, which is not factual. We will not allow this to happen. Till the 1990s, Rajputs were shown as villains in films. They were always goondas for the Hindi film industry. We kept quiet, but afterwards our organisation started opposing such films. Take Jodhaa Akbar. There was no queen like Jodhaa who married Akbar. Therefore, we opposed it. This is exactly what I am saying. Historians say Rani Padmini never attained martyrdom because Alauddin Khilji never even saw her, forget meeting her. Which history are you reading? Do you also deny that Lord Ram existed, Ravan ever existed, Lord Hanuman existed? Refuse everything. Who has gone back to check on history? But I am not the one saying it, noted historian Irfan Habib says so. The Rajput Samaj has got their whole history recorded. If you want, we will provide all the details. We will give it to Bhansali too, if he wants. We will give them the guidelines and let them make a film on those lines. But what about freedom of art, freedom of creativity? We believe in it. Make films on Rana Pratap or Prithviraj Chauhan. There are thousands of such martyrs in the Rajput community. Make films on their lives and no one will saying anything; show their bravery to the world. But you cannot dictate storylines to filmmakers. Bhansali is making the film based on Malik Jayasi's Padmavat. The Rajput Samaj is tolerant. If Bhansali has got guts, let him go to Germany and make a film on Hitler. Why is he not making a film on Aurangzeb's atrocities? But you don't know the script of his movie. How can you assume it shows romance between Alauddin Khilji and Rani Padmini? Everyone is intelligent today. In real life, Ranveer and Deepika can have an affair, and we have no problem with that. From whatever we read in the media, we found out that Ranveer wanted to do an intimate scene with Deepika in this film. You also know that in this film only Raja Ratan Singh (played by Shahid Kapoor) can do intimate scenes with Rani Padmini. Since Bhansali wanted to distort history, he made Ranveer Singh into Khilji and Deepika into Padmini. IMAGE: Vijendra Singh Kalyanwat, spokesperson, Rajput Karni Sena. What did Bhansali tell you when you met him? He sent his team and told us that he will discuss with them and make changes in the script. He agreed to change the script and said he will not play with our emotions. So, when his team said they will change the script, you should have left silently. They said this after the fight. I have followers in Mumbai too. They tried to meet Bhansali many times, but could not do so. We have sent thousands of letters to his office stating that we will not tolerate any distortion of history in his films. By committing violent acts, don't you think you are giving a bad name to the Rajput community? Actor Sushant Singh Rajput says he has temporarily withdrawn the 'Rajput' from his Twitter account. I want to tell Sushant Singh Rajput that he should change his name to Aurangzeb, I have no problems. Let filmmaker Anurag Kashyap too change his name to Mohammed Tughlaq, we have no problems. Which history are you reading? Do you also deny that Lord Ram existed, Ravan ever existed, Lord Hanuman existed? Don't you feel violence is wrong? It affects Rajasthan tourism. There is history in Rajasthan and therefore filmmakers come to Rajasthan. If there was no history in Rajasthan, no one would have come here. And if you want to distort that same history, it does not make any sense for us to live here. We believe in ahimsa, but if someone does not listen to us, violence becomes necessary. Don't you think you are running an intolerant brigade? Note my point. Why did Bhansali not file an FIR against us? He did not do so because his team was involved in the firing. Moreover, he had no permission from the Rajasthan government to shoot the film. In the future, how will anyone make a film if everyone needs permission from organisations like yours? To my knowledge, 340 films have been shot in Rajasthan in the last 50 years. This includes Hollywood films. The Rajput community has never opposed any film except for two -- Jodhaa-Akbar and Padmavati. Rajasthan is known for welcoming guests, but why did these two films get into trouble? They got into trouble because these two filmmakers wanted to create a controversy. What is the history of Rani Padmini, according to you? I am not a historian. I will say Rani Padmini is a devi of the Rajput community. We respect her and there is a johar mela that we host every year in her name. It is a big event, which even former prime ministers of India have attended. She sacrificed her life for future generations, therefore if someone questions her integrity and dignity, people like us will revolt. European aviation major Airbus has chosen Goa to set up a maintenance, repair and overhaul facility for the EC725 helicopter, provided it wins the over Rs 2,000 crore Coast Guard contract for which it has pitched. The facility, close to the Indian Coast Guard's main center of operations, is planned as part of Airbus' offer to equip the Indian Coast Guard with 14 EC725 for its Twin Engine Heavy Helicopter (TEHH) requirement and the foreseeable future needs for a helicopter of this category by the Indian armed forces, industry sources said. Asked about their plans, Airbus in a statement said, "We cannot comment on the location of the MRO for the EC725 but it is true that such a facility is envisaged as part of our offer to supply 14 EC725 to the Indian Coast Guard. All 14 EC725 will be integrated and flight-tested at this site." The Coast Guard had first raised the requirement post 26/11 which exposed the loopholes in its surveillance and interception capabilities. The force currently uses ageing Chetaks as well as indigenous Advanced Light Choppers (ALH) for patrolling, search and rescue and casualty evacuation. The competition was between the EC725 and the now part of Lockheed Martin, Sikorsky's S 92 chopper. The Airbus has emerged as the lowest bidder and has been in talks with the Coast Guard for over an year. Sources said the MRO will enable a comprehensive Performance-Based Logistic (PBL) support service that Airbus is offering to the Indian Coast Guard to ensure maximum fleet availability of its EC 725. The PBL service covers the complete aircraft -- 'nose to tail' -- including the Safran engines. While Goa will serve as the main location, infrastructure will be created and maintained at four other Coast Guard bases across India to deliver the service, the sources said. The MRO activities would include the scheduled and unscheduled maintenance activities which come within the ambit of intermediate and depot-level maintenance also known as 2nd and 3rd/4th level of maintenance. Sources said the green field facility would pave the way for an inflow of new military helicopter maintenance technologies and skill sets in addition to the creation of expert jobs in India. This would happen via transfer of engineering work, technical knowhow, training and setting-up of a logistics support and warehousing system by Airbus Helicopters in India. Over 140 EC725 (now marketed globally as the H225M) have been ordered so far by France, Brazil, Mexico, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Kuwait, and Singapore. 80 aircraft are currently in service. Amid pressure on Pakistan from the Trump administration, Mumbai attack mastermind and Jammat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed and four others were tonight put under detention in Lahore in Punjab Province. Punjab government's Home Department issued the detention order of Saeed and Lahore Police reached JuD headquarters in Chauburji to implement the order, JuD said. He is at Masjid-e-Qadsia Chauburji and a heavy contingent of police has surrounded the JuD headquarters, JuD official Ahmed Nadeem, who was present at the premises of the outfit, told PTI on phone. The commanding police officer told us that he has with him the house arrest order of the JuD chief issued by the Punjab Home Department, Nadeem said. Three days ago, Punjabs Ministry of Interior had included names of Saeed and four others -- Abdullah Ubaid, Zafar Iqbal, Abdur Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Niaz in the Watch List as per UNSC 1267 Sanctions and ordered their preventive detention. Ubaid, Iqbal, Abid and Niaz were also also taken into preventive custody. Punjab governments action comes amidst pressure on Pakistan from the Trump administration that it must take action against JuD and Saeed to avoid sanctions. JuD is the front for the banned Lashkar-e-Tayyaba terror outfit which is responsible for numerous terror attacks in India, including the Mumbai terror strike of November 26, 2008, which was masterminded by Saeed. The Ministry of Interior, in its January 27 order, has placed Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF) and Jamaat-Ud-Dawa (JUD) on the Watch List and have listed these organisations in the Second Schedule of the ATA 1997 (as amended). Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, Abdullah Ubaid, Zafar Iqbal, Abdur Rehman Abid and Qazi Kashif Niaz are reportedly active members of the aforementioned organizations within the meaning of Section 11EEE(1) of the ATA 1997 (as amended). As such, they must be placed under preventive detention, Pakistani media reported. The notification asked the home secretary to kindly direct the concerned agencies to move and take necessary action as the matter is most urgent. Earlier during the day, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said the government was taking steps to fulfil our obligations with regard to JuD. The organisation [JuD] has been under observation since 2010-11. Since it has also been listed by the UN Security Council [Sanctions Committee], we are bound to take some steps. We are taking those steps to fulfill our obligations, he told reporters after inaugurating a passport office in Islamabad. JuD has already been declared as a foreign terrorist organisation by the United States in June 2014. Saeed also carries a reward of $10 million announced by the US for his role in terror activities. A day after the Election Commission ordered a first information report against Arvind Kejriwal over his bribery remarks, the Aam Aadmi Party supremo on Monday demanded a similar action against Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and Congress leader Amarinder Singh, even as he ridiculed the poll body saying it should seek the nod of the Prime Ministers Officer for the same. In a letter to Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi, laced with sarcasm, Kejriwal claimed that former Goa chief minister Parrikar had made similar comments in the poll bound state, urging the people to accept money from other political parties, but vote for lotus (the Bharatiya Janata Partys poll symbol). Referring to media reports, the Delhi chief minister also alleged that Singh, the Congress chief ministerial candidate in Punjab, had also made a similar statement, imploring the voters to accept money, but vote for his party. 'If an FIR could be lodged over my comment, I hope the EC will also seek permission from the Prime Ministers Office (PMO) for action against these two leaders. I appeal to the EC to show the same enthusiasm and energy, which it has shown against me, and take action against these two leaders. 'The EC should take permission from the PMO at the earliest and register FIRs against the two, Kejriwal, who is currently campaigning in Punjab, wrote in the letter. The AAP supremo added that the EC was so quick to order an FIR against him that it even ignored the January 2016 orders of a Delhi court, wherein it had rejected the demand to file an FIR against him for similar comments. Meanwhile, the AAP stepped up its attack on the EC and even demanded an apology from the poll watchdog. 'If EC has any shame left it should withdraw FIR and apologize to @ArvindKejriwal. Take people's help and escape from Modi's dictatorship (sic), AAPs Punjab spokesperson Chander Suta Dogra tweeted. It was re-tweeted by Kejriwal. On Sunday, Kejriwals media advisor Nagendar Sharma had also questioned the ECs independence, targeting Election Commissioner A K Joti. 'Election Commissioner Joti never worked outside Gujarat in his entire career. 1975 batch IAS, Joti retired as chief secretary in Jan 2013. Is Election Commission impartial & independent? One of the commissioner was chief secretary of Gujarat before he retired in 2013?? (sic) 'Within 24 hours of PM Modi dictating criticism of EC is not acceptable, EC orders registration of FIR against @ArvindKejriwal coincidence? (sic) he had said in a series of tweets. His tweets were also re-tweeted by Kejriwal. The EC had on Sunday directed the poll authorities in Goa to lodge an FIR against Kejriwal for his bribery remarks allegedly made at an election rally in the state. The EC had termed as scurrilous the AAP supremos claim that it was encouraging bribery by restraining him from making such comments. IMAGE: AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal addresses a public rally at Naag Kalan village in Majitha constituency in Amritsar on Sunday. Photograph: PTI Photo In a new turn of events, Rajput groups protesting against Padmavati on Monday asked for a change in the title and a review before its release even as Bhansali Productions made it clear there is no romantic dream sequence between Rani Padmavati and Alauddin Khilji. The demand was raised at a joint press conference which was convened by Rajput Sabha to announce that the Karni Sena and it agree over the issues raised. However, later in the evening, founder and patron of the Karni Sena, Lokendra Singh Kalvi, clarified that the change of the movies title was only a suggestion. "Change of the title is our suggestion and we are not adamant if this cannot happen. Karni Sena is satisfied on their written assurance that there will be no intimate scene or dream sequence," Kalvi told reporters. Earlier in the day, some Karni members Sena demanded that the movies title should be changed and there should be no film in the name of Padmavati at all which was supported by state Karni Sena chief Mahipal Singh. Shobha Sant, chief executive officer of Bhansali Productions, however, said the demand for change in the title did not come up in previous discussions with the group. "They have made this fresh demand for which I have nothing to say anything. This is not in my jurisdiction. They also did not raise this point in our discussion held before," she said. "There is no romantic dream sequence or any objectionable/romantic scene between Rani Padmavati and Alauddin Khijli. It was not a part of the script. It was misconception and considering the sentiments of the community, we have clarified to them," she added. Union minister Giriraj Singh also demanded that there should be no distortion of historical facts in the movie. "The opposition over distortion of historical facts was right. The film is being made by those for whom Aurangzeb and such personalities are their icon," he told reporters in Jaipur, adding no attempt to distort historical facts will be tolerated. State Home Minister Gulab Chand Kataria has also said there should be no distortion of historical facts. He said the state government would provide security cover for the shooting, if requested. He also said the incident happened but no first information report was lodged, adding some members from Bhansalis team had met him earlier but he had no knowledge when the shooting started. Karni Sena members created a ruckus and manhandled Bhansali while the director was shooting the movie at Jaigarh Fort in Jaipur on Friday. The incident drew sharp reactions from the film industry with members demanding action against the attackers. Bhansali's production house released a statement clarifying the misconception about the story but the team also cancelled its shooting in the city. IMAGE: Karni Sena leader Lokendra Singh Kalvi with other leaders addressing the press in Jaipur. Photograph: PTI Photo Over 60 students of a government primary school in Madhya Pradesh, 16 of them from the Scheduled Caste category, have been skipping their mid-day meal cooked by a Dalit woman for the last few months. The shocking issue came to light after the schools headmaster Ramgopal Gupta shot off a letter to the chief executive officer of local body at Jatara (tehsil place) in Tikamgargh district. Gupta said he had written to superiors about the issue in the past as well but there had been no follow-up action. The primary school is situated at Madkheda village, 19 km off the district headquarters. Among the children who have refused to take meal are 16 belonging to a community under the SC category, on the ground that the cook belonged to a different Dalit community. The headmasters letter mentioned that a student who is not taking the meal said that his parents had asked him not to eat the food prepared by the Dalit woman. Others too echoed the same reason, says the letter. 67 students, including 16 students of SC category, are not eating the mid-day meal. They arent taking the food as it is cooked by a Dalit woman, Gupta said. The contract for providing the meal was bagged by a self-help group of the Dalit woman (of which she is the president). As many as 89 students used to take meal for three months when the food was prepared by a woman of an OBC community, engaged by the self-help group. But later,the self-help group president herself started cooking food after she had problem with the cook she initially engaged. That is when the problem started, mentions the letter. I have taken a serious view of the development. I am going to take tough action in this case, CEO of the panchayat said. Jatara Sub Divisional Magistrate (SDM) Aditya Singh said that he hasnt received a complaint of discrimination yet. There is a need to educate the students, he added. Image for representation only. Bharatiya Janata Party president Amit Shah on Monday asked the electorate to vote for the Shiromani Akali Dal-Bharatiya Janata Party combine in Punjab for the third time, stating that the alliances victory was necessary for the security of the country. The election in Punjab is an election for the security of the nation. Being a border-lying state, it is the responsibility of the electorate to choose a government which can ensure secure borders, communal harmony and peace. Punjab is the heart of India. If it is secure, the nation is secure, he said. Shah was addressing an election rally in Amritsar in support of BJP candidates for the Punjab assembly elections. Launching an offensive against the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party, he said Captain Amarinder Singh and Arvind Kejriwal were daydreaming of becoming the chief minister of Punjab. He said Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh is referred to as absent MP as he never attended the Parliament nor visited Amritsar after being chosen as the MP from Amritsar. Will you ever vote for a person who is an absent MP? One who has been missing since becoming an MP? Well, even if he manages to become the CM, where will you go to find him? He uses Captain in front of his name but he takes orders from Rahul Baba (Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi). India is moving towards a Congress-free nation and I appeal you people to bar the entry of Congress in Punjab too, he said. Similarly, he said, Kejriwal was dreaming of becoming the CM of every state he visits. Some people are trying to do their best to defame Punjab. They are fooling people in order to seize power in Punjab. But I must say the people know it all. The electorate of Delhi which voted for you (Kejriwal) is now looking for you with binoculars, the BJP chief said. I ask the people of Punjab to call up your relatives in Delhi and get a reality check, he said. Holding that Prime Minister Modi-led central government had ensured development of the state, Shah said, PM Modi and Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley have a deep connection with Amritsar. Today, Amritsar has been declared a Heritage City and will soon become a Smart City. Thousands of crores have been sanctioned by the central government for Amritsar and it is visible in the development that has taken place here, he said. The senior BJP leader also had a word of praise for Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal. There is nobody like CM Parkash Singh Badal. He is the epitome of sacrifice. He has dedicated his entire life for the betterment of Punjab. It hurts when people abuse him. Politics has hit a new low, he said. Shah added that ever since the Modi government came into power, no single allegation of corruption had been leveled against it. We have taken strong decisions like demonitisation, surgical strikes, neem-coated urea etc. We have given Punjab a lot and will give more in time to come. People of Punjab need to be united and ensure that there is Akali-BJP government here. The state government then in collaboration with Centre government will ensure even faster development of Punjab, he said. The BJP chief further exhorted the Punjab electorate to vote back the BJP-SAD alliance as it was a symbol of Hindu-Sikh unity and the only partnership which could bring peace and development in the state. He also attacked Congresss chief ministerial candidate Amarinder Singh for his anti-farmer and anti-youth policies. It was Amarinder when he was CM of the Congress government in Punjab, who had stopped giving free power to farmers. Today he claims to be a great sympathiser of the farm community, Shah alleged. Similarly he as the chief minister also introduced contract systems in jobs and put a stop to the regular recruitment of youth in the government, he added. IMAGE: BJP president Amit Shah poses with a sword presented to him during 'Vijay Sankalp Yatra' rally at Amritsar on Monday. Photograph: PTI Photo Protests against United States President Donald Trumps travel ban on people from seven predominantly Muslim nations continued for the second day, with thousands of demonstrators gathering at airports and outside the White House in solidarity with those hit by the controversial move. Protesters gathered outside the White House and raised slogans like This is what America looks like!, The people united, will never be divided and No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here, as they waved the American flag and held placards, opposing Trumps order to block any visitors for 90 days from seven designated countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Similar protests were held across the nation and at airports, where confusion continued to prevail over the order after a New York judges order temporarily halting removal of individuals detained in the country. People gathered at Battery Park in Lower Manhattan, within the sight of the Statue of Liberty, Bostons Copley Square as well as popular spots across San Francisco demonstrating and extending their support and solidarity with refugees and those impacted by the ban. Hundreds of protesters had gathered at the Dulles International Airport, while at the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, scores of Muslims pulled out their prayer rugs and knelt, and at least 50 people were taken into police custody. Mohammad Abdulhadi said he was blown away that hardly any of those protesting appeared to be Muslim. I think the most beautiful thing about the entire evening was it wasnt predominantly Muslim, he told WFAA-TV. There were Mexicans, priests, rabbis, men, women, everybody. It was the second consecutive weekend that protests were held across the country against the Donald Trump administration. Last weekend, just a day after Trump was sworn-in as President, millions of women and men had joined the Womens March across the nation against Trumps policies on a host of issues. Maryam Kanna, a 24-year-old Iraqi-American who lives in Arlington, Virginia, told WTOP News that the executive order was totally alienating. Kanna said she worries about her uncle, a British citizen, and her cousins in Canada, who may no longer be able to enter the US. A woman who identified herself as Sonia from Sterling, Virginia, said she doesnt recognise what she sees in the United States right now. My dads a green card holder, and granted, the country hes from is not on the ban list, but it really could easily be, she said. This is not the America I was raised in. Photographs: Baz Ratner, Ted Soqui, Laura Buckman/Reuters Self-styled godman Asaram, facing prosecution in sexual assault cases lodged in Rajasthan, on Monday failed to get relief from the Supreme Court which rejected his pleas seeking regular and interim bail on medical grounds. A bench comprising Chief Justice J S Khehar and Justice N V Ramana also rejected his interim bail plea on health grounds in another sexual offence case registered in Gujarat, saying the petition was devoid of any merit. The apex court also observed that Asaram had placed a fictitious document to persuade the court to grant him bail and ordered registration of an FIR against those responsible for preparing and filing the alleged fake papers. 'The instant act (of placing fictitious document through his parokar) constitutes a serious offence and it cant be let off merely by tendering an apology. We direct registration of an FIR based on the letter dated November 8, 2016 and also the affidavit filed in compliance of the order dated December 6, 2016," the bench said. "We direct the concerned investigating officer to complete the investigation thereof at the earliest and, in case an offence is made out, initiate criminal prosecution in accordance with the law against all the concerned parties, it said while rejecting the regular bail plea of Asaram. The apex court, while dismissing the regular bail plea, noted that trial in the matter was unnecessarily prolonged and the prosecution witnesses were being attacked, which has led to the death of two witnesses. "It is not possible for us to overlook the fact that trial in the matter was unnecessarily prolonged and one prosecution witness (Investigating Officer) was recalled for 104 days for his cross-examination. It can't be overlooked that when prosecution witnesses were examined, there were a number of attacks on the prosecution witnesses leading to the death of two of them. "We are of the view that accordingly, we find no justification in the prayer (seeking regular bail) made by the petitioner (Asaram)," the bench said. While rejecting his interim bail plea on medical grounds, the apex court said his present medical condition is not so serious which requires him to be transferred to another jail or another hospital as, according to the Rajasthan government, he is being treated in a hospital in Jodhpur which has all the facilities to treat him for the ailment. During the arguments, senior advocate Shekhar Naphade, who appeared for Asaram in interim bail matter, said as per the medical reports, Asaram was suffering from prostate problem and needed medical treatment for the ailment. Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for Rajasthan, argued that the medical condition of Asaram was stable and he had refused to undergo an MRI test without citing any reason. He said Asaram was being treated at the MahatmaGandhiHospital in Jodhpur since 2014 and high standard of treatment facilities are available there. The apex court, while rejecting Asarams regular bail plea, noted that the petition was based on a communication issued by Jail Superintendent of Jodhpur Central jail. Regarding the fictitious document, the bench said even the counsel for petitioner has said that it was unreliable. On October 28 last year, the apex court had asked Rajasthan government to respond to the plea of Asaram, facing trial in rape cases, seeking modification of the courts order, directing him to undergo treatment at AIIMS in Jodhpur. The Gujarat government had earlier told the top court that the rape case registered against him would very likely proceed in an expeditious manner and the trial would be completed within six months, so bail should not be granted to him in the case. The apex court had on November 18 last year sought the response of the Centre and five states on a plea seeking a Central Bureau of Investigation probe into the alleged murder of children through black magic and attacks on ten witnesses in the Asaram rape cases. Asaram was arrested by Jodhpur Police on August 31, 2013 and has been in jail since then. Two Surat-based sisters had lodged separate complaints against Asaram and his son Narayan Sai, accusing them of rape and illegal confinement, among other charges. The elder sister, in her complaint against Asaram, had accused him of repeated sexual assaults between 2001 and 2006 when she was staying at his ashram near Ahmedabad. A teenage girl had accused him of sexual assault at his ashram in Manai village near Jodhpur. The girl, who belonged to Shahjahanpur in Uttar Pradesh, was a student living in the ashram. Alok Verma, the 1979-batch IPS officer, will be in the hot seat because he will serve in 2018 and into 2019, the year of the general election, reports Aditi Phadnis/ Business Standard. Alok Verma, the newly appointed director of the Central Bureau of Investigation, is in the crosshairs of a political tug of war. The Congress party put on record that it does not agree with the governments choice. Verma, Delhis police commissioner for close to a year, deserves better. Admittedly, he is not a CBI man, not having risen up its ladder. However, he is technically qualified for the post. A 1979 batch Indian Police Service officer of the Arunachal Pradesh-Goa-Mizoram and Union Territories cadre, Verma will have a fixed two-year tenure as CBI chief. He had earlier served as director general of Delhis prisons network. The list of those considered for the job has not been made public. The selection committee is a panel of three -- the prime minister, the head of the largest Opposition party in the Lok Sabha and either the countrys chief justice or a judge nominated by him from the Supreme Court. They choose from a shortlist sent on from the home ministry and then the department of personnel. It is not clear whether the Congress is opposing Varma for the sake of opposition or because it believes he has been appointed so that the government can dictate to him. Either way, the partys stance is monstrously unfair to the new incumbent. I said that a person who fulfils all the conditions, who has a long service record, should be appointed. A person who has worked in the CBI, on corruption cases, should be given the post. They have ignored that, Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge said in his dissent note. Earlier, Rakesh Asthana, an IPS officer from the Gujarat cadre, was named interim CBI director. R K Dutta, who has served as CBI additional director, seems to have been preferred by the Congress. The party says, He was eligible for the directors post, but the government brought in someone from outside. Dutta was earlier moved from the CBI to the home ministry. Verma will have to address this sulking and bad blood in the two years ahead. He will be in the hot seat because he will serve in 2018 and into 2019, the year of the general election. Controversial Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Suresh Rana was on Monday booked by the Uttar Pradesh Police on charges of inciting hatred after he said that curfew will be imposed in Kairana, Deoband and Moradabad if he is elected again in assembly polls next month. Rana, an accused in the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots and the party candidate from Thana Bhawan seat in neighbouring Shamli district, had made the remarks at a gathering in his constituency on Saturday, evoking criticism from opposition. "If I emerge as the winner (in UP polls), curfew will be imposed in Kairana, Deoband and Moradabad," he said. A case was registered against Rana under IPC Section 505 (Making a statement with intent to incite) and Section 125 (Promoting enmity between classes in connection with election) of The Representation of the People Act for his controversial remarks, Thana Bhawan circle officer Sunil Kumar Tyagi said. The officer said that it was found that the MLA's statement violated the model code of conduct for elections. Rana on Monday tried to do some damage control claiming that his remarks were meant for goons who have spread terror in the state. "What I meant was many people have planned to leave western UP fearing the terror spread by goons and robbers. There is no city in that region where people have not planned to move out due to the fear of these goons," Rana said. "...when BJP forms government in UP, these goons who are part of the mafia, whose actions are feared and who forced residents to flee will have to leave the state. The residents of UP won't leave due to fear. The goons will have to leave the state," he added. Kairana made headlines last year after BJP MP Hukum Singh alleged that there was exodus of Hindus and released a list of more than 300 Hindu families who had reportedly fled the town following repeated extortion threats and violent attacks. Singh had alleged that the ruling Samajwadi Party was preventing action against anti-social elements responsible for the exodus since they happened to be its supporters. Hitting out at Rana, SP leader Juhi Singh said, "What does he want to do by imposing a curfew, he does not seem educated even to know when a curfew is imposed". "One list was brought out by Hukum Singh, which was wrong. They are just telling wrong things to people so that they don't ask them the important questions like what schemes have you brought for Kairana, for UP," she said. BJP leader Rita Bahuguna Joshi sought to distance from the MLA's remarks saying "the party is not responsible if a candidate says something". "Modi ji and Amit Shah are saying that such statements should not be made. I don't know in what context he (Rana) has said it but I understand that our party is contesting the UP elections on the development plank," Joshi said. Rana has also been booked for allegedly violating the model code of conduct after he held a public gathering and took out a road show at Hathi Karonda village in his constituency in Shamli district on Sunday without the permission of the authorities, police said. United States President Donald Trumps new executive order banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia has upended the lives of many families across the world. Here are some stories of how families were torn apart. Together again after seven years Elaf and Anfal Hussain couldnt wait to tell their mother Iman Alknfosche everything shed missed in the seven years since theyd last seen her as teenagers. However, thanks to Trumps order the daughters would have missed out this opportunity as Iman was detained for about 30 hours at John F Kennedy International Airport in New York. It was only after Alknfosches lawyers rushed in that she was released to her daughters, much to their relief. Photograph: Chris Franciscani/Reuters No country for Iranians? Mehdi Radgoudarzi had gone to Iran for 20 day study trip. Radgoudarzi is a green card holder and lives in Sacramento. However, on his return, he was detained for five hours due to new immigration laws at San Francisco International Airport in San Francisco, California. He was later reunited with his wife and daughter. Photograph: Kate Munsch/Reuters Teaching couple held Mazdak Tootkaboni and Arghavan Louhghalam are Civil and Environmental Engineering professors and, according to university officials, were on the way back from a conference in Paris when they were detained. Both are Iranian nationals, Muslims, and legal permanent residents of the United States with green cards. They landed at Logan Airport in Boston and were stopped from leaving the airport by US Customs and Border Protection agents and detained for three hours. The agents detained them pursuant to US President Trumps Friday executive order that halts any entry for people from several predominantly Muslim nations, including Iran. Tootkaboni was later released much to the relief of his friends and family. Photograph: Brian Snyder/Reuters Are we going to go down this path of racism? At Chicago OHare International Airport, brothers Bardia and Ayden Noohi waited for four hours for their father Kasra Noohi who has an Iranian passport and a U.S. green card to be allowed through. They knew Trump had pledged tougher rules but did not expect the problems. I didnt think hed actually do it, said Bardia Noohi, 32. A lot of politicians just talk. Part of me is angry, part of me is scared, Bardia Noohi said. I feel like this is just the beginning. Ayden Noohi said this incident makes him think of when people of Japanese descent were put into internment camps. Is history going to repeat itself? he said. Are we going to go down this path of racism? Photograph: Kamil Krzaczynski/Reuters What I do for this country? They put the cuffs on Hameed Khalid Darweesh was detained by immigration officials after landing at New Yorks John F Kennedy International Airport on Friday night. An interpreter for the US Army in Iraq -- was released on Saturday afternoon. After being detained for nearly 19 hours, he began to cry as he hugged friends and protesters in emotional scenes. He told reporters: What I do for this country? They put the cuffs on. You know how many soldiers I touch by this hand? Photograph: Andrew Kelly/Reuters -- ERA OF TRUMP BEGINS Defending his controversial executive order on banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering America, United States President Donald Trump has insisted that it is not a Muslim ban as is falsely reported by the media. IMAGE: Demonstrators shout slogans during anti-Donald Trump immigration ban protests outside Terminal 4 at San Francisco International Airport in San Francisco, California. Photograph: Kate Munsch/Reuters Trump signed the order on Friday which bans Syrian refugees and people from six other countries from entering the US. The move has triggered widespread outrage. The seven countries mentioned are Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Somalia. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion -- this is about terror and keeping our country safe. There are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order, Trump said. Trump said his administration will again be issuing visas to all countries once the US is sure that it has reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering, he said in a statement. Noting that America is a proud nation of immigrants, Trump said the country will continue to show compassion to those fleeing oppression, but will do so while protecting its own citizens and border. America has always been the land of the free and home of the brave, he said. We will keep it free and keep it safe, as the media knows, but refuses to say, Trump said, adding that his policy is similar to that of his predecessor Barack Obama who in 2011 banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror, Trump said. -- Thousands decry Trump's immigrant ban at US airports In a series of tweets, Trump slammed Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham for being critical of his immigration policies. In a joint statement, the two senators feared that this executive order will become a self-inflicted wound in the fight against terrorism. At this very moment, American troops are fighting side-by-side with our Iraqi partners to defeat the Islamic State. But this executive order bans Iraqi pilots from coming to military bases in Arizona to fight our common enemies, the two senators said. Our most important allies in the fight against IS are the vast majority of Muslims who reject its apocalyptic ideology of hatred. This executive order sends a signal, intended or not, that America does not want Muslims coming into our country. That is why we fear this executive order may do more to help terrorist recruitment than improve our security, they said. Trump said the joint statement of former presidential candidates McCain and Graham was wrong and they are weak on immigration. The two senators should focus their energies on IS, illegal immigration and border security instead of always looking to start World War III, Trump tweeted. McCain and Graham said the government had a responsibility to defend American borders, but must be done in a way that makes the US safer and upholds all that is decent and exceptional about the nation. It is clear from the confusion at our airports across the nation that President Trumps executive order was not properly vetted. We are particularly concerned by reports that this order went into effect with little to no consultation with the Departments of State, Defence, Justice, and Homeland Security, they said. Such a hasty process risks harmful results. We should not stop green-card holders from returning to the country they call home. We should not stop those who have served as interpreters for our military and diplomats from seeking refuge in the country they risked their lives to help, they said. We should not turn our backs on those refugees who have been shown through extensive vetting to pose no demonstrable threat to our nation, and who have suffered unspeakable horrors, most of them women and children, they added. -- THE ERA OF TRUMP BEGINS Coming out in support of Trump, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes said in light of attempts by jihadist groups to infiltrate fighters into refugee flows to the West, along with Europes tragic experience of coping with this problem, the executive order on refugees is a common-sense security measure to prevent terror attacks on the homeland. While accommodations should be made for green card holders and those whove assisted the US armed forces, this is a useful temporary measure on seven nations of concern until we can verify who is entering the United States, Nunes said. Ive stated repeatedly that refugee flows from certain war-torn regions pose a serious national security threat to the US, the top Republican Congressman said. Rediff.com's Aslam Hunani introduces you to the lively lot of politicians at the helm of India's most important political province. Uttar Pradesh has always been a hotbed of Indian politics. With a crucial assembly election around the corner in UP, all eyes are set on who will win India's most important political state, a province that sends 80 MPs to the Lok Sabha. Will Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav win an unprecented second term in office? Or will Akhilesh and his Samajwadi Party, bruised by a months-long family feud, be felled by Narendra Modi's unrivalled charisma and bring back the Bharatiya Janata Party to power after 14 years in political exile? The last time UP had a BJP chief minister was in March 2002 -- Rajnath Singh, currently India's home minister. And the Congress, you ask? The party, which dominated UP politics for about 40 years, is now a minor player, compelled by realpolitik to form an electoral alliance with the Samajwadi Party for this election or risk political evaporation. Finally, it is a do or die election for the Bahujan Samaj Party's Mayawati. If she loses a second assembly election in a row -- the BSP also did not win a single Lok Sabha seat in the 2014 election, from UP or anwyhere -- it could mean curtains for Behenji and an inevitable split in her party. Check out our fact files about the parties who have won elections in UP and the men and women who have ruled the state. Also note that UP is the only state in the Union which has come under President's Rule 10 times -- closely followed by Bihar at 9 times. IMAGE: A graphical representation of the political parties who have ruled Uttar Pradesh. The last time the Congress ruled UP was in 1988, when Narain Dutt Tiwari -- who may or may not have jumped ship to the BJP in neighbouring Uttarakhand this election -- was chief minister (June 25, 1988 to December 5, 1989). The Bharatiya Kranti Dal, a party formed by Chaudhary Charan Singh in the mid-1960s, ruled the state twice, for short spells of time. The BKD merged into the Janata Party after the 1977 general election, which saw the Congress ousted from power in New Delhi for the first time after Independence. The Janata Party too ruled the state twice, before Indira Gandhi returned to power at the Centre and UP in 1980. After her younger son Sanjay Gandhi declined to be UP chief minister, Vishwanath Pratap Singh, the raja of Manda, took office. V P Singh, later India's finance minister, would break away from the Congress during Rajiv Gandhi's reign and form the Janata Dal, a Janata Party-like political formation. Mulayam Singh Yadav was UP's first Janata Dal chief minister. After the Janata Dal disintegrated, he founded the Samajwadi Party. 'Netaji' -- as the former wrestler is hailed in his party -- is the only UP chief minister to represent two parties, the Janata Dal and the Samajwadi Party. Mulayam Singh Yadav and his elder son Akhilesh Yadav are the only father and son to rule UP. The BJP has ruled the state four times, but never completed a full five year term in office. Mayawati was not the state's first woman chief minister. That honour belonged to Sucheta Kriplani, who ruled UP for four years as the state's fourth chief minister and India's first lady chief minister. BJP President Amit Shah -- arguably the second most powerful politician in the nation -- granted a rare television interview to the Network 18 group of news channels. Rediff.com's Rajesh Alva checks out what the BJP boss said in this word cloud assessment of the interview. What Amit Shah told the Network 18 group of news channels. Transcript: Kind courtesy the Network 18 group of news channels. Let's begin with the state assembly elections, you just released BJP's manifesto in Uttar Pradesh. What does it have that others don't? The preamble of our manifesto says that over the last 15 years SP and BSP have taken UP backwards. A comparison with other states in the last 15 years will show UP, despite its huge potential, has seen very little development. This is true if you look from the perspective of governance, administration, law & order, and most all in the farm and industry sectors. Take employment, there has been little work done, all of this has held back UP's progress. So we have tried to give a platform to build a stronger structure so that in five years the BJP government can leap over the 15 years of developmental backwardness. We will take UP to the level of other developed states in the country. Your manifesto talks of waiving farmer loans, offers zero-interest loans, free laptops and promises schemes for education and health. You have laid emphasis on law & order, which is one of the biggest issues... Well, I would say you have to look beyond loan waivers and zero interest loans. We've also promised to set up a system to buy crops from farmers, start computerised e-mandis so that the farmer gets a good price for their produce. We will also try to give soil health cards to all farmers in three years. The farmers can assess the fertility of their land, get information on what kind of fertiliser and seed to use etc. Based on all this information the farmer can increase his yield to help UP make up for all the lost years. Many states have implemented zero interest loans. The farmers are desperate, we want to give a platform to do much better. You have also talked of the Ram Mandir, the Kairana exodus and stopping cattle theft and slaughter. You have also promised helicopter services but only to Hindu religious spots. Is this a return to soft Hindutva? Please don't see a ban on slaughterhouses from that point of view. In all of UP -- whether it is Western UP, Awadh, Rohailkhand or Purvanchal -- you will see that due to slaughterhouses, cows that give milk are finished. If there is a drought or flood, farmers fall back on cows for sustenance. UP has unlimited potential for milk production. I come from Gujarat where the availability of water is much less than in UP. But dairies have record production there. In UP, we want to prevent cattle smuggling and slaughter. Today even FIRs are not registered in UP in such cases. We have planned to set up dairies so that farmers will get good prices. This will also help them add value, and improve livelihoods. We'll return to some of these issues, but my first key question. How many seats do you give the BJP in Uttar Pradesh? It is too soon to speak of entire UP, but I strongly believe that in the first and second phases, we will win 90 of the 135 seats. So you are looking at a 2/3rds majority? Definitely. We will get a 2/3rd majority So who is your fight with: The SP-Congress alliance or Mayawati's BSP? With the alliance between the SP and Congress. Don't you think Muslims, Yadavs, some upper caste voters will stand behind the alliance and give the BJP a tough challenge? It is easy to talk theory. Look at the law and order sitation in UP, every girl, whether she is a Yadav or from any other community, is harassed. Poor and backwards suffer the worst... Urban law and order too is worse. That's why there is an exodus, everyone is affected. If mothers and daughters are raped on highways like it happened in Bulandshahr... if this is the kind of government we have, then it's everybody's problem. In the heart of Mathura, in Jawaharbagh, a gang led by Ram Vriksh Yadav occupies government land for three years and kills policemen who go there. No law abiding UP citizen can tolerate this situation. The election will be on this issue (of law and order). (UP Chief Minister) Akhilesh (Yadav) is wrong if he thinks he can fool people with his family drama and an alliance. That is not going to happen. Law and order is an issue today. Exodus in west UP is an issue. Cow smuggling and slaughter is an issue. Women's security is an issue. Land grab is an issue. Whatever you do, you will have to answer it all. It is said that these assembly polls will be a referendum on demonetisation. Do you think so? It won't be correct to say the UP polls would be a referendum on the note ban. Because in UP there are so many anti-incumbency issues. The mining mafia is running free; if it takes Rs 18 crore per km for constructing a road, tenders are given out for Rs 31 crores, people want to know where the Rs 13 crore has gone. But even if the Opposition wants a referendum on the note ban, we are open to it. On the issue of note ban, the people of UP are with the BJP. And they will vote on the lotus symbol. So you believe the note ban will help the BJP in the UP polls? Yes, definitely. Do you think the note ban has helped curb black money? I would say if someone wants to analyse the impact of such a historic decision looking at just 3 months, it would be a tad too fast. This is part of a big strategy. Right from the day the BJP government was sworn in at the Centre, we declared war against black money. The first resolution of the first Cabinet meeting was to implement the Supreme Court order to set up a special investigation team on black money. Till then up to demonetisation we have taken around 29 steps in this direction. But if within 3 months of the note ban someone expects black money to be extinguished, then that person needs to understand the principles of economics better. A lot of the demonetised money has come back to the system. So people believe big capitalists have gotten away. In the near future will you be taking these people to task through steps like IT raids? People are spreading this canard that all the money that has come back to the banks have automatically become white. Anyone who has deposited more than Rs 2.5 lakh in banks after demonetisation, there is a list of them, and agencies are working on that. And the government has brought in a tough legislation. The money that has come back to the system will be used for the betterment of the living conditions of the poor. Those who don't have food, those who don't have shelter, those who don't have toilets, those who don't have electricity or drinking water, this money will be used for their upliftment. Up until now, this money was locked up in the coffers of politicians and industrialists. Now it is back in the system. So will you make sure this money reaches the poor? There are schemes in place, more schemes are being chalked out. The Cabinet is working on these decisions. The surgical strikes against Pakistan was another big decision by the Modi government. Will your stand on Pakistan harden in the coming months? India's attitude towards Pakistan will depend on Pakistan's behaviour. We want good relations with all. Peace with our neighbours is a priority. But if this is seen as our weakness, then that is a mistake. This government is led by Narendra Modi. Putting our soldiers and borders at risk will not be tolerated anymore. Surgical strikes were a decision made of political will. The bravery of the army ensured it has changed the way the world looks at India today. In the coming days, it will only benefit India. And do you think it will it benefit you in the assembly elections? People of the entire nation, except some political leaders, are with us. You would have read Rahul Gandhi's statement of 'khoon ki dalali.' I am yet to understand what he wanted to say. You already rule the Centre, now if you come to power in UP too, will you build the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya? We have a very clear stand on the Ram Mandir, that we will explore ways of building a temple within the Constitutional framework. This can be done in two ways: Either through dialogue or through a court order. So your government is committed to the issue? Yes, we are committed. Within the Constitutional structure, we will find ways to build a temple. In 2014 when BJP got 71 seats in UP, people attribute it to the Modi wave and your Midas touch. Do you think this will work this time as well? In 2014, the entire nation wanted a strong leader and the BJP had made the right decision by announcing Narendra Modi as the party's PM candidate, and we fought under his leadership. There was a wave across the nation and UP was no different. I am indebted to the crores of BJP workers who worked tirelessly to convert that wave into votes and scale it upto a tsunami. As a result, the NDA got 73 out of 80 seats in UP. It's because of that decision by the people of UP that we are running a government with a full majority at the Centre. This time around people are tired of the misrule of this alternating governments of the SP and BSP. There has been no development in 15 years. Corruption is rampant, law and order has totally collapsed. Youth are leaving the state for jobs in Mumbai, Delhi, Gurgaon, Ahmedabad, Bangalore, leaving behind parents and wives. UP has everything. There's water below 50 feet; there is level, fertile, lands for kilometres on; there is abundant water thanks to the blessing of the Ganga and Yamuna. And there is talented, hardworking, youth. But there is no development because the system has collapsed. But you faced crushing defeats in Delhi and Bihar despite Modi's popularity. Have you learnt any lessons from those mistakes, which you wouldn't like to repeat this time? Our party had set up a committee to examine these two defeats. It won't be proper to discuss that in public, but I would like to clarify that both states had peculiar political environments. And we won Assam, all local polls, by-polls, made progress in states like Kerala, Bengal. Approval for Modi has come from across the country. This time the BJP's strategy has been breaking and making alliances. You have aggressively drawn key Opposition leaders into the BJP. How will you gain from this? It is not right to say these leaders are leaving their parties. This is political migration. Fed up with dynastic and caste-based politics and naked corruption practiced by parties like the BSP, many leaders are leaving their parties and migrating to the BJP. I believe that society will gain from the consolidation of such good leaders. If that consolidation happens towards the BJP, it will be good for the country, good for UP. Because India cannot dream of double digit growth without UP growing at double digits. You just spoke of dynasty politics. But the BJP had to distribute a lot of tickets to the kith and kin of senior leaders despite Modi's appeal not to ask for tickets for family members. Let me clarify our position here. Dynasty politics is when Akhilesh Yadav becomes CM of UP sidelining all other party leaders. Or when Omar Abdullah becomes CM after Farooq Abdullah. Jawaharlal Nehru followed by Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Sonia ruling through Manmohan Singh, and now Rahul... That is dynasty politics. In the BJP, family members of leaders are free to work hard for the party, run for elections and become MLAs. But whether they will become CM or not depends solely on their merit. So let's not have simplistic definitions on dynasty politics. If Rahul Gandhi has a child, there is no confusion then who will be the next Congress president. But can you guess who will be the next BJP president? No, you cannot. This is the difference between the BJP and all other parties. The greatness of the BJP is that a man from a poor household can rise up to become the PM... A booth worker like me who used to do wall paintings for the party can become the national president. In this party, there can never be any dynasty politics. As elections approach some politicians have started making communal statements, trying to polarise the electorate. How will you deal with such leaders? The PM has warned them in the past. Please do not link this with the BJP. UP presents a peculiar condition. There's anger among the general public. People are reflecting the public mood against the politics of appeasement and vote banks. If someone speaks up against the politics of appeasement and vote banks, he is only articulating the public mood. But I agree there should be no communal agenda in the polls. If we appeal to end mechanised slaughterhouses, then it cannot be called communal, we are doing it for the farmers. A taskforce against the exodus in Western UP can't be termed communal, it is a Constitutional right of the people. In UP, people have stopped sending their daughters to colleges because the girls get harassed. We have promised that the BJP will form an anti-Romeo squad to save these girls. This is not communal. It is the right of every girl to study in her own city or village. That is why it would not be correct to paint everything as communal. Western UP is very important for you. Who do you consider responsible for the 'exodus' there? Without doubt this is a result of the BSP and SP's vote bank and appeasement politics. This would have never happened if the police did its work within the framework of the Constitution. This only happened because the police was used to strengthen vote bank politics. Which Constitution mandates that FIRs be registered on the basis of caste and religion? This needs to be stopped. What steps will you take in this direction if you form the government? We raised these issues earlier also. When Kalyan Singh and Rajnath Singh were heading the government we took steps then and these activities did stop. We have 12 state governments in the country. There's no exodus happening anywhere. It is the police's job to maintain law and order within the framework of the Constitution. Pending payments for sugarcane farmers is a big, perennial, issue in Western UP. How do you plan to address this? No one cared for the sugarcane farmers for a long, long, time. But now the Modi government has started working to protect the interest of cane farmers. We increased ethanol consumption so that cane farmers get their due. We stopped imports so that farmers get the right price for their produce. Export subsidies have meant they get a good price for their produce. Cane farmers did not get their payments in time. We fixed that too. We have said two things in our manifesto. We will deliver the Rs 6,000 crores due to cane farmers within 120 days of coming to power. We will engage the banks and collectors to this effect within 120 days. We will set up a system where they will get a 14-day postdated cheque from the day he offloads cane in the mill. I think this will be a huge step. No one has taken a step like this in 70 years. We will be extending this assistance to all the sugarcane farmers upon assuming office. Any specific plans to fix road transport and infrastructure in UP? We have promised an East, West, North, South corridor to the people of UP. We have promised to connect every village to the tehsil office by bus. Along with this, we have also said we will improve medical facilities. Just before the Bihar assembly polls, RSS Sarsangchalak Mohan Bhagwat had raised some concerns on reservations. The BJP suffered the consequences. Last week, RSS spokesperson Manmohan Vaidya said something similar. We want to know what is your position as far as reservation is concerned? Neither Mohan Bhagwat said any such thing then nor has Manmohan Vaidya said any such thing now. Manmohan Vaidya was asked a question on religion-based reservation. But someone took away the question and showed just the reply. This caused the controversy. He clarified the next day. The question very clearly was about his view on the Sachar panel suggestion on religion-based reservation. The Sangh has always said that the present situation needs the existing system of reservation. The BJP' position is also clear. Constitutionally mandated provisions of reservation in India, with the cap prescribed by the Supreme Court, must continue. This includes SC, ST and OBC. We have miles to go. But now that you have asked this question, I want to ask a question to the SP, Congress and BSP. They talk about reservations for the minorities. Where will they get it from? The highest court has put a cap of 50 percent. So you cannot go beyond that. Many states have reached 50 percent already within the existing SC, ST and OBC reservations. If they want to give reservation to the minorities, then who will they take it away from? SC, ST or OBC? So it is not us who are opposing reservation for the Dalits, OBCs and tribals. They are. It is they who talk about giving reservation on religious grounds. They must clarify to the people of UP whether they want religion-based quotas or not. And if they want it, then they must specify who will they take it away from. We have clarified, now the SP, Congress and BSP should clarify. Grounds of reservation must not be religion. The Constitution does not mandate this. So we must all maintain the existing system. You fought many state elections without any CM face. There was a CM face in Assam and it helped. Why is there no CM face in Uttar Pradesh? This is always the decision of the parliamentary board. We had no face in Haryana, Maharashtra and Jharkhand. We won elections in these states. We've had no CM face in most of the elections we won. And whoever will be our CM face (in UP) will surely be better than theirs. That's certain. People have seen through these faces. The PM opposed triple talaq. Your manifesto also mentions it. What's your take? We believe that the Constitution mandates every woman should get her rights, and that includes Muslim women. Triple talaq curtails the rights of Muslim women. Moving away from UP, what are the realistic chances of you winning in Uttarakhand? We will certainly form a government in Uttarakhand by a good margin. A lot of Congress leaders in Uttarakhand have joined the BJP. You think that will help you? See, this is a process. One party is breaking up. And the good people are drifting towards ours. Don't look at this process as defection. This process has happened before elections and not after elections. This is not aaya ram-gaya ram politics. It is said that Goa is a close fight for you this time. It is also said that you had to prop up Manohar Parrikar as your face in Goa just before this difficult election. Do you agree? No, the party hasn't taken any such decision as of now that Manohar Parrikar will go back to Goa. We have said that if the people of Goa and elected MLAs feel this way, then both options are open. A decision will be taken by the parliamentary board based on the legislative party's opinion. We are in a strong position in Goa. For the first time, the state is seeing a government complete its full term. The Congress had 12 CMs in the first 10 years. Goa's growth had come to a standstill. You also had 2 CMs... We had two because one had to move to the Centre. Parrikar didn't have to leave because of any infighting. One CM became the defence minister, that's why we had another one. Had Parrikar not come to the Centre, he would have completed his 5 year term as CM. Will he go back if required? As I said, we have kept that open ended. What is your assessment of Punjab? It is said that AAP and Congress have a lead. It is a triangular contest in Punjab. The BJP-SAD is in the fray with full force. A tremendously talented man like Parkash Singh Badal is leading the charge there. There are very few leaders like Badalsaab in this country today. The Shiv Sena seems upset with you. They are fighting the corporation and zilla parishad elections on their own. Will this affect your relationship in the state and at the Centre? This is not our decision, but that of the Shiv Sena. We have an open mind and they are our trusted ally. We are with them in the Centre and state governments. What's happening is a friendly match. It is for the people to decide. So these are just differences and not a long-term fight? There are no differences. It is just that both parties have different internal calculations. Both parties believe in their position of strength. We have left it for the people to decide. But I don't agree that this is going to cause damage to our alliance. The next big election after this will be Gujarat. What according to you will happen there? We have swept all municipal elections and bypolls in Gujarat. We are in a very strong position. We haven't lost a single election since 1990. So you feel your new team is going to win again? Most certainly, we will form the government. And that too with a two thirds majority. What is your assessment of the 2019 elections? A survey in one of the newspapers says if elections are held now, then the NDA will get 370 seats. And the BJP will get an absolute majority. But we are not in 2019 yet. We will emerge stronger then. There will be more development, progress and safety by then. We will emerge stronger by raising the standard of living of the poorest of the poor. I am confident that this jan kalyan yojana will make the BJP emerge stronger. We have empowered the poor of this country. Only a poor woman would know the joy of having cooking gas as opposed to a smoke-filled hut. Only a poor woman would know the shame and pain of defecating in the open at 2 am for want of a toilet. It is our endeavour to have a toilet in each house. No government so far had thought of toilets, gas and even a small bulb to light up the house of the poor. Even after 70 years of Independence, 60 crore people did not have a bank account. We got these people connected to the mainstream by opening these bank accounts. I believe that the results will surely be positive. And we have honestly worked towards the upliftment of dalits and backward communities to raise their living standards. Some big economists feel that demonetisation will lead to slow growth... It is possible that a quarter or two may reflect this. As of now it doesn't. As of now nothing has gone down. Neither the revenue nor income. But even if we assume it does get reflected in a few quarters, just imagine what Rs 8 lakh crores in excess entering the system actually means. Rs 8 lakh crore that wasn't of much use to the country's growth! Money that was lying in coffers and chests has now come back into the system. I believe that this is going to create a massive difference. I have interviewed you on a number of occasions in the past. You always appear relaxed. I am quite relaxed today also. Any secret to this? We consider elections as a festival to celebrate democracy. We enter the electoral fray with our ideology, agenda, manifesto and the strength of the cadre. Winning and losing isn't important for us. We do not believe in caste-based politics. Neither do we believe in dynasty politics. We believe in the politics of performance. And we have started this type of politics. What is the next step for Amit Shah? Will you enter electoral politics in the Centre in 2019? Will you join the government, or go back to Gujarat? There is no question of me returning to Gujarat. I am in central politics only. Will you join the government? This is no time to think of that. My first objective is that the BJP wins 2019 with a bigger margin than 2014. 'Political parties have appropriated our military victories -- the Kargil war is the BJP's and the Bangladesh war is the Congress's -- what is going on?' As Uttarakhand -- where faujis number nearly 40% of the state's population -- prepares to vote, Rediff.com's Archana Masih discovers what upsets retired soldiers in Uttarakhand the most is a forgotten protest in the heart of Delhi. IMAGE: Bimla Devi Negi and Kamla Devi, wives of soldiers, have not received OROP and wonder why they have not got their due. Photographs: Archana Masih/Rediff.com The flowers under the flag post at the Uttarakhand Ex-Servicemen's League office in Dehra Dun are wet after the morning rain, but the petals appear fresh. It is the day after Republic Day, and a retired officer troops in saying that army officers who had been issued special passes and had arrived in full uniform to attend the parade in New Delhi could not find a place to sit. "The seats were taken up by the police chaps and their families. This is the state of army men in Modi's raj," he says, sitting down to write the details of a distressed mother, who has come into the office for the first time. The lady has not got the dues after the death of her 23-year-old son, a young lieutenant who died in a road accident while on duty in 1999. The Uttarakhand Ex-Servicemen's League office is a refuge for army widows, retired servicemen and officers who have been deprived of the right of compensation or are receiving less pension than what is due to them. Under the stewardship of retired Brigadier R S Rawat, president of the League, the organisation has a handful of retired officers who work pro bono so that widows and ex-servicemen get what is rightfully theirs. "My husband got his leg cut off in the service of Bharat Mata, but hasn't got any disability compensation. He started getting a pension of around 20,000 only last month, before that it was 16,000. Is this the reward for serving Bharat Mata for 27 years?" asks Kamla Devi, tears running down her cheeks. An infection resulted in the amputation of her husband's foot while he served the Defence Services Corps after his retirement from the Indian Army's artillery section as a havaldar. Kamla Devi, mother of five young girls, has tried her best for compensation with no luck. Once when she was told that Uttarakhand Chief Minister Harish Rawat was scheduled to visit the League's office, she carried her husband there. To her misfortune, the CM arrived early and she missed the chance of telling him her problem personally. "I have been failed by the fauj and the government. This time I am going to press all the buttons at the same time on the voting machine, so that my vote gets disqualified," she says, just as retired Colonel Cheema, a Bangladesh war veteran tells her that she has the option of 'None Of The Above' if she does not want to vote for any candidate in the assembly election. Uttarakhand goes to the polls on February 15. IMAGE: Brigadier R S Rawat (retd) helps widows and ex-servicemen receive pending dues. A retired general says of him, "He's junior to me, but I salute him for the work he is doing." Sitting beside her is Bimla Devi Negi whose husband, an honorary subedar major, died while in service after 29 years in 2005. She hasn't got one rank one pension and wonders why the widow of a sepoy -- junior in rank to her husband -- draws more pension than her. When OROP was meant to bring servicemen's pensions at par with each other, why hasn't it happened with her, she asks. One Rank One Pension was implemented by the Narendra Modi government in September 2015, but ex-servicemen stress that it has not been implemented fully and has been "twisted" in its interpretation. Explaining the shortfalls of One Rank One Pension or the details of the 7th Pay Commission, the officers flip through the government's compensation handbooks and painstakingly calculate what is the correct amount due, the difference to be paid etc. Brigadier Rawat works on charts on his computer and uploads the cases on the prime minister's office grievance redressal site. Since most of the women do not have email, he gives his own e-mail for the communication. Retired military officers, formally dressed in a habit carried on from the culture of the mess dress code, walk in and out. Many retired soldiers from Uttarakhand have participated in the OROP protest at Jantar Mantar in Delhi. One of them, Major General Lalji D Singh (retd), a veteran of three wars, whose son and granddaughter are army officers, has participated in the protest 30 times. "We are soldiers, we go to war on a verbal order given by the commanding officer. We trust the word," says General Singh. "The prime minister made a vow to us in front of 2.5 lakh servicemen in Rewari, Haryana, and under the flag on August 15 at the Red Fort that he would give OROP. We trusted him; voted for him, but we have been let down." Ex-servicemen, who number nearly 200,000, in addition to their families, will play a significant role in the outcome of the Uttarakhand election. While many say that OROP has been 85% been fulfilled, which the Congress government did not do even when soldiers returned their medals, others say what they have received is enhanced pension, not OROP. "It is in fact, One Rank Five Pensions," says Colonel Cheema, "My pension continues to be less than what a recently retired colonel gets." Though the government sanctioned OROP, which has brought pensions close to what is due, it has not been implemented as sanctioned by Parliament. The anomalies have twisted the very definition of OROP and comes with many strings attached, which need to be removed, adds retired Brigadier K G Behl. "In Rewari or Siachen or at the Red Fort or in Parliament, the prime minister did not say he will give us only 80% to 90% of what was promised, but when it was translated it turned out to be something quite different," says Brigadier Rawat. OROP states that defence personnel retiring at the same rank and the same length of service, irrespective of year of retirement, will get the same pension. "Ex-servicemen from the hills of Uttarakhand are very tough soldiers, but are not well informed," says General Singh. "They get happy that the basic pension -- that has been increased by 2.57% -- has come into their bank accounts, but do not know what the pending amount is that the government still owes them," the general adds. "A subedar who retired several years back when he fought the war with no electricity, water, roads, without modern equipment, jeeps or proper uniform realises that his counterpart blessed with a mobile phone, good military equipment and the best of walking boots is getting more pension than him if he has retired recently," explains Brigadier Rawat. "It is to be seen how the ex-servicemen vote in this election," the brigadier adds. "It appears that some people have been dogmatised or ideologised even though they have not got a fair deal by the government. This is the dilemma today." Pointing out to the glaring anomalies in pensions to widows whose husbands died while in service and the gross disparity when compared to civilian counterparts in government, Brigadier Rawat says the status of soldiers has been steadily reduced. "A soldier may have become disabled while on duty, but gets a lesser disability compensation than a civilian counterpart who may have slipped in North or South Block," he points out. "There are several clauses like this that have been struck down by the service headquarters and the government is supposedly having a rethink -- does it take so long to have a rethink?" asks Brigadier Rawat. IMAGE: Colonel Cheema listens to a mother who has not received the dues after the death of her 23-year-old son, a lieutenant. The retired officers are also deeply upset with the reduced stature of the military. They point to the army chief -- General Bipin Rawat, is incidentally, a native of Uttarakhand -- being number 42 in the list of precedence and give instances of ministers, IAS officers occupying seats ahead of senior military officers. A colonel was once senior to a collector, but now has been downgraded to the stature of a head clerk, says Colonel Cheema. "Moreover, a jawan serving in Siachen gets a (disturbed area) allowance of 31,000 while an IAS/IPS officer posted in Guwahati, Agartala or Tripura sitting in an AC office gets an allowance of 77,000; a disabled officer gets 27,000 while a disabled IAS officer gets 63,000 -- so a bullet injury of a soldier is considered less than a car accident of an IAS officer?" the colonel asks. A national war memorial is another unfulfilled promise that scrapes at their collective hearts. The one coming up in Dehradun exists more on paper than on the ground. "Other countries have a glorious war memorial and ours has been made by the British whom we curse. We are a country where ex-servicemen and servicemen have to demand for it," says Brigadier Rawat. "Political parties have also appropriated military victories -- Kargil is the BJP's and the Bangladesh war is the Congress's -- what is going on?" he asks. "We are soldiers, we don't fight for the BJP or Congress," interjects General Singh. "We fight for the nation." Citing the example of how America treats its military veterans, General Singh mentions how when he was travelling on a flight to Chicago he happened to mention to a fellow passenger that he was a retired general of the Indian Army. Word got around and when he disembarked, a porter greeted him as an Indian Army veteran and escorted him out of the airport. Talking about the Veteran's Museum in Chicago and a Veteran's Park in Atlanta, the general shakes his head at the way India treats its soldiers. "We are not beggars, we are asking for our due according to OROP, not an extra naya paisa." A havaldar saved his life in the 1962 War with China and the general remembers that sacrifice over 54 years later, tears running down his face. "How many politicians have children in the army? Tell me?" he asks. "And we have a minister of state for defence who says that some disgruntled elements are protesting in spite of getting OROP -- now we armymen have become 'disgruntled elements'." Pained that the government is turning a blind eye to its veterans who have been protesting for nearly 595 days at Jantar Mantar, says te general, "Look at what happened in Chennai over Jallikattu and during the Jat agitation in Haryana. Not a single chair has been broken by ex-servicemen at Jantar Mantar -- why?" "We have taken an oath to safeguard the Constitution -- and we stand by that." On February 15, when these military veterans go out to vote in Uttarakhand, the protest at Jantar Mantar and the plight of an ex-officer's wife hospitalised after being on hunger strike for a week, will not be far behind. Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. UN health agency stepping up efforts to provide trauma care to people in Mosul Publisher UN News Service Publication Date 27 January 2017 Cite as UN News Service, UN health agency stepping up efforts to provide trauma care to people in Mosul, 27 January 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f1492109.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. 27 January 2017 - As the conflict in Mosul intensifies and greater numbers of civilians are caught in the crossfire, the United Nations health agency and its partners have increased trauma care services to ensure that patients requiring medical care for injuries have a greater chance of survival. "WHO [The World Health Organization] remains committed to supporting the ongoing response provided by the Ministry of Health and other health partners," said Ala Alwan, WHO Regional Director for the Eastern Mediterranean, in a news release Wednesday. "However, additional funds are needed to provide the full scale of health services to the 2.7 million people affected by the Mosul operation." To fully support the health needs resulting from the Mosul operation, WHO requires a total of $65 million of which $14 million, or 21 per cent, has been received. Many hospitals in Mosul have suffered extensive damage and are no longer able to provide health services. Trauma casualty rates remain high near frontline areas, with many trauma cases requiring referral from Mosul to Erbil in northern Iraq. Three field hospitals, with a capacity of 40-50 beds, will soon be established to support access to trauma care to the west and south of Mosul. These hospitals will fill a critical gap, as trauma patients are currently transported to referral hospitals in Erbil, a one- to two-hour drive away. From 17 October 2016 to 18 January 2017, 1610 wounded civilians were sent to Erbil's two main hospitals. UN agencies express hope US will continue long tradition of protecting those fleeing conflict, persecution Publisher UN News Service Publication Date 28 January 2017 Cite as UN News Service, UN agencies express hope US will continue long tradition of protecting those fleeing conflict, persecution, 28 January 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f14e140e.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. 28 January 2017 - The United Nations agencies dealing with global refugee and migration issues today expressed the hope that the United States will continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution. The needs of refugees and migrants worldwide have never been greater, and the US resettlement programme is one of the most important in the world, says a joint statement from the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM). The agencies note that the longstanding US policy of welcoming refugees has created a 'win-win' situation: it has saved the lives of some of the most vulnerable people in the world who have in turn enriched and strengthened their new societies. The contribution of refugees and migrants to their new homes worldwide has been overwhelmingly positive, they add. The statement from the agencies follows incoming President Donald Trump's signing Friday of an Executive Order that, among things, reportedly suspends the US refugee programme for 120 days and, according to the media, bars entry of refugees from several mostly Muslim countries, including Syria, until further notice. Resettlement places provided by every country are vital. The UN refugee agency [and] the International Organization for Migration hope that the US will continue its strong leadership role and long tradition of protecting those who are fleeing conflict and persecution, the agencies state, adding that they remain committed to working with the US Administration towards the goal we share to ensure safe and secure resettlement and immigration programmes. UNHCR and the IOM go on to express the strong belief that refugees should receive equal treatment for protection and assistance, and opportunities for resettlement, regardless of their religion, nationality or race. We will continue to engage actively and constructively with the US Government, as we have done for decades, to protect those who need it most, and to offer our support on asylum and migration matters, the statement concludes. South Sudan: UN and regional partners call for immediate cessation of hostilities Publisher UN News Service Publication Date 29 January 2017 Cite as UN News Service, South Sudan: UN and regional partners call for immediate cessation of hostilities, 29 January 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f15d840c.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. 29 January 2017 - The United Nations, the African Union (AU) and regional partners today reiterated their call for an immediate cessation of hostilities in South Sudan and urged the parties to ensure an inclusive political process, both in the proposed National Dialogue and in the implementation of the 2015 peace agreement. Meeting in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, on the margins of the 28th African Union Summit, the AU, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), and the UN, held a joint consultative meeting on South Sudan. According to a joint press statement issued after the meeting, the participants expressed their deep concerns over the continuing spread of fighting, and risk of inter-communal violence escalating into mass atrocities, and the dire humanitarian situation in South Sudan. As such, they reaffirmed their continued and collective commitment in the search for lasting peace, security and stability in the country. Stating that there can only be a political solution to the conflict, within the framework of the 2015 Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (ARCSS), the AU, IGAD and UN reiterated their call for an immediate cessation of hostilities and urged the parties to ensure an inclusive political process, both in the proposed National Dialogue and in the implementation of the peace deal. The AU, IGAD and the UN reaffirmed their commitment and determination to further enhance their cooperation in support of the South Sudan peace process Further to the press statement, the participants commended the important work performed by the Chairperson of the Joint Ministering and Evaluation Commission (JMEC) responsible for monitoring and overseeing the implementation of the Agreement and encouraged the AU High Representative for South Sudan to undertake active shuttle diplomacy towards ensuring the inclusivity of the National Dialogue and the implementation of the peace accord, in close consultation with the JMEC Chairperson, the UN and IGAD. The AU, IGAD and the UN reaffirmed their commitment and determination to further enhance their cooperation in support of the South Sudan peace process, the statement added. The meeting, chaired by Hailemariam Desalegn, Prime Minister of Ethiopia and Chairperson of IGAD, was also attended by Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, Chairperson of the AU Commission; and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. The AU High Representative for South Sudan, former President Alpha Oumar Konare, and the Chairperson of the JMEC, former President Festus Mogae briefed the meeting. Also in attendance, were the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Ethiopia, the Executive Secretary of IGAD, the AU Commissioner for Peace and Security, and other senior officials of the three organizations. South Sudan has faced ongoing challenges since a political face-off between President Salva Kiir and his then former Vice-President Riek Machar erupted into full blown conflict in December 2013. The crisis has produced one of the world's worst displacement situations with immense suffering for civilians. Despite the August 2015 peace agreement that formally ended the war, conflict and instability have also spread to previously unaffected areas in the Greater Equatoria and Greater Bahr-El-Ghazal regions of South Sudan. Stage 'gradually being set' for Somalia to move to a new phase in sustaining peace UN envoy Publisher UN News Service Publication Date 27 January 2017 Cite as UN News Service, Stage 'gradually being set' for Somalia to move to a new phase in sustaining peace UN envoy, 27 January 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f160340e.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. 27 January 2017 - Briefing the Security Council on the situation in Somalia, the United Nations envoy for the country noted today that the recently concluded election was a "mirror" to Somalis, showing them the good and the bad regarding how power is exercised, relations between elders, clan power brokers, politicians, business, ordinary citizens, women and men. "They do not like everything they have seen, least of all the levels of corruption, and the absence of institutions that can ensure legal and financial accountability," said Michael Keating, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Somalia. Mr. Keating's briefing follows an extended parliamentary electoral process and comes less than two weeks ahead of presidential polls. It also comes against the backdrop of increased Al-Shabaab militancy aiming to disrupt the elections, as evidenced by a series of recent attacks. Stressing the importance that the last stage of the electoral process is conducted transparently and according to the agreed rules, designed to ensure free and fair elections, he noted: "The election of a President accepted as legitimate by the population and by the international community will set the stage for Somalia to tackle the serious challenges ahead." However, he added: "If voting [] is seen as compromised by corruption, coercion or external interference, then the country could face a protracted period of uncertainty." Despite problems, progress thus far 'very encouraging' - UN envoy In his briefing, Mr. Keating, who also heads up the UN Assistance Mission in Somalia (UNSOM), told Council members that despite the problems seen in the recently concluded elections, the process also had "very encouraging" outcomes, marking an important milestone in the country's evolution and post-conflict transformation. Special Representative and head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Somalia (UNSOM) Michael Keating briefs the Security Council. UN Photo/Rick Bajornas For instance, the number of voters had increased significantly and the electorate was expanded from 2012's 135 male elders to over 13,000 individuals (30 per cent of them female). It was also particularly notable that almost a quarter of the members of parliament are now female. "A truly remarkable achievement, the result of effective political mobilization of women, supported by the UN and the international community and some Somali leaders," noted the Special Representative. "The new Parliament is younger, more diverse and is likely to be more responsive to the electorate than the previous one. In short, this Parliament is more legitimate and representative than any since the last elections were held in 1969," he noted. Humanitarian plight adding to human suffering Turning to the humanitarian challenges facing the Horn of Africa country, he reported that about five million people are estimated to be in need around the country and an estimated 320,000 under-five-year-olds are acutely malnourished. "Coping capacities have been eroded to the point of collapse," he noted. The week before last, the humanitarian community in Somalia had launched an $864 million to reach 3.9 million people with urgent life-saving assistance in 2017, $300 million of this amount is required in the first quarter of this year. Further, noting the political and security implications of the drought, Mr. Keating said that a perceived inability of the federal and local governments to respond will damage their legitimacy - something that will be exploited by Al-Shabaab. "In a nutshell, failure to support the drought response could halt and even undermine the pursuit of key state-building and peace-building objectives," he cautioned. VIDEO: Michael Keating has lauded the recent election process in the country. Credit: UN News 'It is the Somalis who will determine their own fate' Reiterating that progress is fragile and reversible, and fraught with complexity, he said the stage is nevertheless gradually being set for Somalia to move to a new phase in sustaining peace, preventing and resolving violent conflict, and in building a functional, federal State. "Ultimately, it is the Somalis who will determine their own fate - but your support is central to their chances of success," he concluded. Also briefing the Council, Francisco Caetano Jose Madeira, Special Representative and Head of the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), stated: "The political environment is that of hope and confidence." National priorities are focused on completing the constitutional review, forming political parties, establishing local governments, continuing dialogue with Somaliland, strengthening revenue collection and building State institutions, among other things. AMISOM had been called upon to support Parliament's pursuit of those goals and the enhancement of its role as the forum for political debate. Noting that 15 per cent of new parliamentarians are aged between 25 and 35 years, he said 24 per cent of them are women - two social categories representing the majority of Somalia's people. The past four months also saw sustained international engagement in a political process aimed at ending the Federal Government's four-year mandate in 2016, he noted, cautioning that such gains could be compromised if the current political unease in regional states was not tackled, since such tensions could activate armed groups wishing to exploit such convoluted environments. 'Substantial and unprecedented achievement for Somali women' In her remarks, to the Council, Asha Gelle Dirie, Founder and Executive Director of the Asha Gelle Foundation and Chairperson of the Committee of Goodwill Ambassadors, said that, as the Committee Chair tasked by the President with helping women secure 30 per cent of the seats in Parliament, she had found the advancement of women's political empowerment challenging. Working towards that goal entailed mapping the distribution of seats per clan and launching "an advocacy campaign involving civil society actors, political lobbyists, as well as Federal and state Women's Affairs Ministries, to secure the buy-in of political leaders and clan elders," she explained, thanking the UN and the international community for their support. "This is a substantial and unprecedented achievement for Somali women, and for Somali society as a whole," she said, noting at the same time the numerous serious challenges they had faced, and that despite real progress "a massive structural transformation is required to advance women's representation in politics and the democratization process." Ms. Dirie said the absence of a legally binding provision had made it extremely difficult to enforce the political decision to reserve 30 per cent of parliamentary seats, which made it critically important to secure such a provision in order to further advance political equality for women. While women had presented a unified position during the electoral process, a lack of funding and logistical support posed a significant challenge during the campaign period, she said, stressing that provisions for adequate support and the creation of a level playing field would be critical for the future success of women candidates. RSF asks French foreign minister to plead for detained journalists Publisher Reporters Without Borders Publication Date 30 January 2017 Cite as Reporters Without Borders, RSF asks French foreign minister to plead for detained journalists, 30 January 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f40f14.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. On the eve of French foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault's visit to Tehran, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) reminds him of the deplorable level of media freedom in Iran and asks him to intercede personally with the Iranian authorities on behalf of its imprisoned journalists. There has been no let-up in the persecution of independent journalists, citizen journalists and media outlets in Iran, where the media are mostly under the Islamic regime's close control. Media personnel are still constantly exposed to intimidation, arbitrary arrests and long jail sentences imposed by revolutionary courts at the end of unfair trials. Since 29 July 2015, the date of an historic visit to Iran by Ayrault's predecessor as foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, RSF has tallied more than 100 cases of journalists being summoned by the Iranian authorities, threatened and often imprisoned. In the 37 arrests of journalists tallied by RSF since that date, 17 of the journalists were freed pending trial after paying exorbitant bail sums, six were released after serving a one-year jail sentence, 12 are still in prison after receiving sentences ranging from three to ten years in prison and two (both women) were held for a month in unknown locations without being charged. Not content with jailing, the Iranian judicial authorities often sentence journalists to inhuman and medieval punishments. In the space of a year, at least four were sentenced to flogging. They include filmmaker and journalist Kaivan Karimi (sentenced to 223 lashes), journalist Mohammad Reza Fathi (459 lashes) and Shahrood News website editor Mostafa Sharif (40 lashes). The sentences have not yet been administered to these three, butHossein Movahedi, a Najafabad News website journalist convicted of publishing "false information," was administered his sentence of 40 lashes on 4 January. To contest the legality of their detention and to protest against prison conditions, detained journalists are often driven to extremes. At least ten who were ill and were not getting medical care went on hunger strike in 2016 to demand appropriate treatment. Three were freed but the others are still held. They include Mohammad Sedegh Kabodvand, the onetime editor of the now closed newspaper Payam-e mardom-e Kurdestan; Narges Mohammadi, a woman journalist and spokesperson of the Centre for Human Right Defenders in Iran; Roya Saberi Negad Nobakht, a citizen journalist with British and Iranian dual citizenship; Afarin Chitsaz, a journalist with the daily newspaper Iran; and Ehssan Mazndarani, the editor of the daily Farhikhteghan. They could resume their hunger strikes at any time, as Issa Saharkhiz, a well-known freelance journalist and former editor of several, now-closed reformist newspapers, already did on 14 January, when he began his third hunger strike in a year in protest against the conditions of his detention. He is currently hospitalized after suffering a heart attack. Prisoners of conscience risk death in Iran. They have no choice but to put their lives in danger in order to contest the legality of their detention, says Asma Jahangir, a Pakistani human rights lawyer who recently took over as the UN special rapporteur on human rights in Iran. The Islamic Republic's government has not allowed the UN special rapporteur to visit Iran since May 2011. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein recently condemned this refusal to cooperate with the UN Human Rights Council. RSF asks Ayrault to use his meetings with Iranian officials to personally raise the issue of media freedom and the fate of all the journalists and citizen journalists held in appalling conditions. RSF is very concerned about the survival of several imprisoned journalists who are in very poor physical and psychological health. RSF thinks the French foreign minister should also use this visit to remind the Iranian authorities of their duty to respect the laws and regulations that they themselves issued*, as well as the international standards** established in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Iran signed. RSF also points out to the French government that a rapprochement with Tehran that does not stress the need to respect freedom of information and other fundamental rights will just reinforce the use of disproportionate repressive methods against a civil society seeking freedom. Ranked 169th out of 180 countries in RSF's 2016 World Press Freedom Index, Iran is one of the world's five biggest prisons for the media, with a total of 27 journalists and citizen journalists currently detained. *According to Iran's prison regulations, adopted by the judicial body that oversees the prison system, prison officials are supposed to provide detainees with any medical care they need. Articles 102 and 103 of the regulations say that "monthly medical checks are obligatory in the prison clinic" and that "if necessary, the detainee must be transferred urgently from the prison to the hospital." These regulations also say that the judge in charge of the case is responsible for the health and safety of any prisoner with a serious and incurable illness. **According to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Iran is party, depriving detainees of medical care constitutes a violation of the ban on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. 28/10/2016 28/01/2017 Citizen journalist completes third month in prison on Chinese New Year Publisher Reporters Without Borders Publication Date 27 January 2017 Cite as Reporters Without Borders, 28/10/2016 28/01/2017 Citizen journalist completes third month in prison on Chinese New Year, 27 January 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f42024.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. Huang Qi, a citizen journalist who founded the 64Tianwang news website, was arrested exactly three months ago. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) calls for his unconditional release and the release of all the other citizen journalists and bloggers imprisoned in China. As China and its president, Xi Jinping, prepare to celebrate the New Year on 28 January, RSF is concerned about the unprecedented decline in freedom of information in this country. The online activist Huang Qi was jailed exactly three months ago on a charge of "divulging state secrets," according to the regime. The website he founded, 64Tianwang, was the first human rights website to be established in China and continues to be one of the few such sites operating inside the country. Reprisals against journalists and bloggers continued and even intensified in 2016, making China the world's biggest prison for journalists and bloggers, with more than 100 currently detained. They include the well-known journalist Gao Yu, the Nobel peace laureate Liu Xiaobo, the Uyghur intellectual and journalist Ilham Tohti, and the citizen journalists Lu Yuyu and Li Tingyu, who were awarded RSF's Press Freedom Prize in 2016, as was 64Tianwang. In 2017, China continues to be on RSF's list of "enemies of the Internet" while President Xi is still on RSF's list of "press freedom predators." China is nowadays ranked 176th out of 180 countries in RSF's World Press Freedom Index. RSF decries seven-year jail term of journalist Nazir Al-Majid Publisher Reporters Without Borders Publication Date 30 January 2017 Cite as Reporters Without Borders, RSF decries seven-year jail term of journalist Nazir Al-Majid, 30 January 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f42924.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) calls for the immediate and unconditional release of Nazir Al-Majid, a Saudi intellectual and journalist held since 18 January, when a Riyadh court sentenced him to seven years Aged 40, Nazir Al-Majid is known in Saudi Arabia for expressing liberal philosophical views and for criticizing Shia religious doctrine and government policies in his published writings. He was convicted on a range of charges including disobeying the authorities, taking part in demonstrations in the Qatif region, criticizing the government in his writings (some dating back to 2007) and being in contact with the correspondents of such foreign media outlets as Reuters, AFP and CNN. Tried before the Specialised Criminal Court in Riyadh, which often handles terrorism cases, he was arrested immediately following the trial to begin serving the jail term and was given no time to warn his loved ones. "We condemn this journalist's imprisonment because of his writings and his opinions," said Alexandra El Khazen, the head of RSF's Middle East desk. "He is guilty only of exercising his right to freedom of information and telling regional and international media about demonstrations in his region. We stress the importance of allowing a public debate in Saudi Arabia, and we urge the authorities to free him at once and to overturn this conviction." According to RSF's sources, Majid was not accompanied by a lawyer during his trial and his family has yet to get access to a copy of the court's decision. He is currently being held in Riyadh's Ha'ir prison. The charges on which he was convicted date back to 2011, when he was detained and spent a total of 15 months in pre-trial detention. He was arrested for the first time on 13 April 2011, shortly after posing an article online entitled, "I protest, therefore I am a human being." According to a Human Rights Watch report and to the regional media, he was tortured while in detention and spent five months in solitary confinement. Majid has written for many Arabic-language newspapers including the pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat and the Saudi regional newspaper Al-Sharq. At least 11 journalists and citizen journalists are currently detained in Saudi Arabia, which is ranked 165th out of 180 countries in RSF's 2016 World Press Freedom Index. Burma: Investigate murder of lawyer Ko Ni, take measures to protect human rights defenders Publisher Reporters Without Borders Publication Date 30 January 2017 Cite as Reporters Without Borders, Burma: Investigate murder of lawyer Ko Ni, take measures to protect human rights defenders, 30 January 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f436c4.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. The Burmese Government must immediately conduct a swift, thorough, and impartial investigation into the murder of Ko Ni, a prominent Muslim lawyer and member of the ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party, and bring those responsible for his death to justice, the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders (an FIDH-OMCT partnership) and the Alternative ASEAN Network on Burma (ALTSEAN-Burma) said today. " With the murder of Ko Ni, Burma loses an important voice of moderation and a courageous advocate for religious tolerance and the rule of law. The NLD-led Government must quickly get to the bottom of this appalling murder to show that it is serious about combating rampant impunity and religious intolerance, " said FIDH President Dimitris Christopoulos. On January 29, 2017, Ko Ni, 65, was fatally shot in the head at point-blank range outside Rangoon International Airport. The suspected gunman was later arrested and detained for questioning by police. Ko Ni had just returned from Indonesia, where he had joined a Burmese Government-organized trip to discuss democracy and conflict resolution. The program included a panel discussion about religious violence in Burma's Rakhine State. In June 2016, Ko Ni played a crucial role in the establishment of the Muslim Lawyers' Association, an organisation aimed at providing legal assistance to members of Muslim communities in Burma. " The tragic death of Ko Ni must not become the latest case of an unsolved death of a human rights defender in Burma. Authorities must deliver justice in this case and those of all other slain human rights defenders and take all necessary measures to provide protection for human rights defenders at risk ," said OMCT Secretary General Gerald Staberock. The murder of Ko Ni is the latest in a series of killings targeting Burmese human rights defenders that have gone unpunished over the last three years. On June 4, 2014, San Tun, a 47-year-old land and environmental rights defender and local NLD leader in Hopong Township, Shan State, was shot and killed after two unidentified men abducted him from his home. San Tun had assisted local farmers to petition authorities for the return of their land that had been seized by the Burma military (Tatmadaw). On October 4, 2014, Aung Kyaw Naing, better known as "Par Gyi", a 49-year-old freelance journalist, was killed while in military custody after being detained by Tatmadaw soldiers in Mon State's Kyaikmaraw Township. Aung Kyaw Naing had regularly reported on ethnic issues along the Burma-Thai border and contributed to various Rangoon-based newspapers. On July 2, 2015, Johnny, a 51-year-old Karen land rights defender and NLD Chairman in Kawthinshu Village, Hpa-an Township, Karen State, was shot dead by unknown assailants in front of his house in Eindea Village, Hpa-an Township. Johnny had helped local villagers in several land grabbing cases. On November 19, 2016, Chit Pandaing, better known as "Eh Paw Tel", a 22-year-old Karen woman human rights defender working with the Mine Advisory Group (MAG), was stabbed to death by an unidentified individual in Dawei Town, Tenasserim Region. Chit Pandaing strongly advocated against land confiscation and the negative environmental impacts of mining in Dawei and other Townships in Tenasserim Region. On December 13, 2016, the body of Soe Moe Tun, a 35-year-old journalist with the Eleven Media Group, was found in Monywa, Sagaing Region. Wounds on his head and an apparent fractured skull led police to believe Soe Moe Tun had been beaten to death with a blunt object. Soe Moe Tun was known for his investigative work on illegal logging and timber smuggling in several areas of Sagaing Region, including Monywa and Sagaing Townships. Although authorities launched investigations into the above-mentioned cases, no one has ever been held accountable for any of the killings. " Ko Ni's assassination, if unaddressed, will have serious impacts on human security in Burma. The international community must act now to ensure the Burmese Government reverses the alarming trend exemplified by this crime ," said ALTSEAN-Burma Coordinator and FIDH Secretary-General Debbie Stothard. The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders (the Observatory) was created in 1997 by FIDH and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT). The objective of this programme is to prevent or remedy situations of repression against human rights defenders. FIDH and OMCT are both members of ProtectDefenders.eu, the European Union Human Rights Defenders Mechanism implemented by international civil society. ALTSEAN-Burma is FIDH's member organisation for Burma. 11-05 19:32 Myanmar: ARTICLE 19 Condemns Killing of Senior Muslim NLD Lawyer and Pro-Democracy Advocate U Ko Ni Publisher Article 19 Publication Date 30 January 2017 Cite as Article 19, Myanmar: ARTICLE 19 Condemns Killing of Senior Muslim NLD Lawyer and Pro-Democracy Advocate U Ko Ni, 30 January 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f43fc4.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. ARTICLE 19 condemns the killing of U Ko Ni, a senior National League for Democracy official and legal advisor to State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi. U Ko Ni was shot twice on Sunday by an assailant at the Yangon International Airport, as he was returning to Myanmar from an inter-faith trip to Indonesia. U Ko Ni was widely admired for his commitment to democracy in Myanmar, his advocacy for constitutional reform, and as a respected Muslim voice for tolerance. His death is a great loss. ARTICLE 19 sends it most sincere condolences to U Ko Ni's family, friends and colleagues, and to those of taxi driver U Nay Win who was killed giving chase to the gunman. We also join other members of the international and Myanmar community calling for a prompt, credible and transparent investigation into his killing. Anything less will contribute to the chilling effect that this tragic event is likely to have on the speech of other advocates of democratic reform and religious tolerance. Copyright notice: Copyright ARTICLE 19 Uganda rebel returns add to growing headache for Kabila and Congo Publisher IRIN Author Samuel Okiror Publication Date 27 January 2017 Cite as IRIN, Uganda rebel returns add to growing headache for Kabila and Congo, 27 January 2017, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f44f74.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. The Democratic Republic of Congo has accused neighbouring Uganda of allowing former M23 rebels to cross the common border, sparking fears of a new armed rebellion and yet more humanitarian suffering in a region long used to violence. Government spokesman Lambert Mende Omalanga said hundreds of armed ex-M23 fighters, supposedly exiled in Uganda, had re-emerged in North Kivu Province in eastern Congo, from where they waged a 19-month war against the Congolese government in 2012-2013. "We are disappointed with our Ugandan colleagues for letting these criminals out, moreover armed," said Mende. "We can't allow this [destabilisation] to happen. We engaged these criminals in confrontations and flushed them out." The clash he refers to took place in the border town of Ishasha on 14 January, but it's unclear how many ex-M23 or Congolese government troops were killed. The M23 (March 23 Movement), a largely Tutsi rebel group, began as a mutiny but rapidly gained ground in North Kivu, taking control of the provincial capital, Goma, in November 2012. It was finally defeated by the Congolese army and the UN's Force Intervention Brigade in November 2013. A UN group of experts' report in December 2013 concluded that the M23 fighters were backed by Rwanda and Uganda, a charge both countries' governments have denied. Under the terms of the Nairobi Declarations that ended the hostilities, the M23 renounced the rebellion in return for the Congolese government's commitment to a disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration (DDR) programme, and a limited offer of amnesty. Almost 1,400 M23 fighters were initially cantoned in the Bihanga Military Training School in western Uganda after surrendering nearby, awaiting eventual return to Congo. Fewer than 300 remain. New rebellion? Last week, Ugandan government spokesman Ofwono Opondo admitted that some ex-M23 rebels had escaped from Bihanga. They have "lately and quietly been escaping in small groups of about five into the general public, and some to unknown places," he told IRIN. On 18 January, the Ugandan military apprehended a group of 101 former M23 rebels in Uganda's western towns of Mbarara and Kabale. They were disguised as civilians en route to Congo. More arrests of former fighters have since been made. "There was always a danger of M23 returning to the DRC." "We caught them trying to escape back to DRC under unclear circumstances," said Ugandan army deputy spokesman Major Henry Obbo. Some 40 to 50 former combatants had also escaped a week earlier. But, according to a 19 January Ugandan government statement, just 270 of the original 1,377 ex-M23 fighters cantoned in Bihanga actually remain there. Subtracting those and the roughly 200 former fighters who have returned home to Congo under the DDR programme suggests around 900 have fled the camp. "With the M23 leadership and much of its rank and file still intact, there was always a danger of M23 returning to the DRC," Phil Clark, a Great Lakes expert at SOAS, University of London, told IRIN. Uganda insists it was not involved in the escape of the rebels and is in no way backing another rebellion. "These are individuals who are escaping on their own," said Opondo. "Uganda will not and does not support any armed activities to destabilise the DRC." Nicaise Kibel Bel'Oka, director of the Centre for Geopolitical Study and Research of Eastern Congo, believes Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni has no appetite for backing a new rebellion as he is more concerned about shoring up the support of his own generals. Bel'Oka told IRIN it was "an open secret" that there were now divisions within the Ugandan military, adding: "If Kampala takes the risk of arming ex-M23 elements and sending them to fight in Congo, it runs the serious risk of seeing them turn against the [Museveni] regime." Not enough amnesty Uganda has called repeatedly on Kinshasa to honour its DDR commitments, which were plagued by a lack of trust between the former M23 rebels and the Congolese government. "We can't be blamed for the failed repatriation of these people," said Opondo, the Ugandan government spokesman. "We want them out. We have always asked the DRC government to take them back. But they [authorities] seem unwilling and failed to convince them." A senior M23 official, who asked not to be identified, told IRIN the mass escape was a direct result of the Congolese government dragging its feet over the DDR programme and failing to provide the necessary security guarantees to convince the ex-rebels to return. "These combatants have been in Bihanga for over three years without knowing their next fate. [President Joseph] Kabila has failed to honour the implementation of the Nairobi Declarations and Addis Ababa Agreements for their return and reintegration," the M23 source said. "As Congolese citizens, they have a right to go back home without informing anybody," the source added, denying however that they had returned armed. In January 2014, violence flared in Bihanga when the former rebels protested against their return home, fearing ill-treatment. "The main sticking point was the government's refusal to offer an amnesty to the M23 leadership," said Clark. MONUSCO/Sylvain Liechti Bad timing The M23 fighters are arriving back in Congo at a particularly tense time. "The whole region is worried about Kabila's refusal to rule out running for a third term, and the ongoing uncertainty over when the Congolese elections will be held," said Clark. "The *situation in Congo potentially destabilises all of its neighbours. So, it isn't surprising that some armed actors may intervene militarily, either to try to resolve the political situation by force or to capitalise on the general uncertainty." Kabila was constitutionally due to step down in December last year, at the end of his two-term limit. But he has managed to cling on to power even in the face of a united and furious opposition. According to a deal mediated by the Catholic Church on New Year's Eve, he is supposed to stand down after elections at the end of 2017. But no one seems convinced that Kabila who came to power in 2001 after the assassination of his predecessor and father (former rebel leader Laurent-Desire Kabila) will stick to the agreement. "Even if the former M23 rebels do not seem to have any clear objective in reforming their group, the fact that Kabila has outstayed his welcome can make it easier for them to recruit new members in the Congo and legitimise their existence," said Nina Wilen, a postdoctoral research fellow at Universite Libre de Bruxelles. The New Year's Eve accord calls for the reform of the electoral commission, new voter registration, a new prime minister nominated by the opposition, and a follow-up committee to oversee implementation of the agreement. But the deal does not include a detailed calendar for implementation, nor is it even clear how the follow-up committee will be structured. Thierry Vircoulon, a lecturer on security issues at Sciences Po in Paris, told IRIN that Kabila has a habit of "playing for time" when pressed. "The Congolese political class as a whole likes the long negotiation," he said. "But the December accord is an emergency accord. The timeline for the elections is only 12 months, so very short. Given all these tasks and the 12 months' timeframe, we are already late." This tallies with a 12 January blog post by Ida Sawyer, Human Rights Watch director for Central Africa. "Credible elections can't be organised when opposition leaders and activists are thrown in prison and beaten, and convicted on trumped-up charges, when independent media outlets are shut down or blocked, and when security forces fire live rounds on peaceful protesters," she wrote. What needs to be done? Speaking to IRIN, Sawyer urged the international community and regional leaders to remain engaged. "They should support the organisation of credible, timely elections and signal that they stand ready to impose additional targeted sanctions and other punitive measures should the repression continue, if those responsible for past abuses are not held to account, or if efforts are made to prevent or delay the organisation of elections," she said. Bel'Oka believes the M23 are a symptom of a broader problem of governance in Congo and said that part of the solution involves facilitating their proper return. "Today, these former fighters cantoned in Uganda feel abandoned," he explained. "So they become easy to manipulate and are ready to conclude that, no matter what, they will be considered the enemy, especially by Kinshasa." (Additional reporting by Claude Sengenya, a freelance journalist and regular IRIN contributor based in Beni in the Democratic Republic of Congo) (TOP PHOTO: M23 soldier stands guard as M23 rebel spokesman Lt Vianney Kazarama makes a speech in Goma. CREDIT: Jessica Hatcher/IRIN ) *(An earlier version of this story wrongly attributed this quote to Ida Sawyer of Human Rights Watch. Sawyer is quoted lower in the story) Afghanistan: Civilians Caught Up in Revenge Attacks Publisher Institute for War and Peace Reporting Author Farid Tanha Publication Date 27 January 2017 Citation / Document Symbol ARR 564 Cite as Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Afghanistan: Civilians Caught Up in Revenge Attacks, 27 January 2017, ARR 564, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/588f45e6164.html [accessed 5 November 2022] Disclaimer This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States. Gul Khanim, 30, was forced to leave her home in Parwan province's Shinwari district after the Taleban killed her husband four years ago. Now living in the Ashaba valley of Jabal us Saraj district, she is spending the freezing winter months living in a threadbare tent with her five children. "One day the Taleban stopped my husband's car, took him out and murdered him just because my brother-in-law Abdul Maalik was a local police commander," she told IWPR. "I was so scared, I didn't say a word because I thought they would kill me." While she is now safe from insurgent threats, she struggles to support her family. "My brother-in-law helps us financially, but the amount of money he can give me is not enough," Gul Khanim said. Her two daughters and three sons, aged between three and 13, spend their days trying to find scraps of wood to burn so they can warm their tent. Eight-year-old Rafiullah said that he used to love going to school, but understood that the family was now too poor for him to continue his education. "My uncle was a policeman, but my father wasn't," he said. "So why did the Taleban kill my father?" A three-month IWPR investigation has revealed how numerous civilians in Parwan province have fallen victim to retaliatory attacks by insurgent forces. Some have been forced to flee their homes, while others have been murdered. But IWPR also found that local people whose family members had joined the Taleban also found themselves targeted by the state security forces. In some cases, merely coming from an area outside government control made people instantly suspicious. Despite the overwhelming evidence, both sides deny resorting to such tactics. STRATEGIC AIMS Najib Danish, the deputy spokesman of the ministry of interior affairs, said that such harassment was one way the insurgents' tried to discourage local people from working for the state. "The Taleban want to use various tactics to harm the security forces," he continued. "Threatening and intimidating their family members is one of their methods. The Taleban aim to dishearten and frighten security officers through pressure and coercion." Sometimes people were summarily executed for no other reason than their link to police officers or soldiers. Alozai Ahmadi, the commander of the security forces' joint base in Parwan, told IWPR, "More than 20 people have been killed by the Taleban in Shinwari, Siyahgird and Koh-e Safi districts just because members of their family were in the Afghan police force and national army." Ahmadi continued, "In the second week of December 2016, the Taleban seized three relatives of a member of the security forces, including two brothers, in the Ashtar area of Shinwari district in Parwan. All three were shot." In other cases, relatives were forced to flee their homes because of threats from the Taleban, Ahmadi explained.. "Forty-two families from the Yakh Dara and Syedan areas of Siyahgird district and 35 families from the Qawl Heer area of Shinwari district have had to move to more secure areas like Hofyan, Sharif, Tatmadra and the centre of Siyagird district. Some families have even gone to Kabul and other areas," he said. IWPR met and interviewed tens of families who had been displaced due to such threats. Bibi Ayesha, 60, is from Kuhn De in Shinwari district but now lives in rented accommodation in the centre of the province. "The Taleban killed my 18-year old young son because he refused to join them. The fighters accused him of spying for the government," she said. "I, along with my five grandsons and my daughter-in-law ran away from our home and came to the centre of Parwan province. If we had not escaped, we would have been killed by the Taleban too." She said that her experience was far from unique, adding, "The Taleban harass, torture and even kill the family members of those who work for the Afghan government." Abdul Samad, a 50-year old tribal elder from Hofyan Sharif in central Parwan center, said, "Two hundred families of security forces, of whom 30 are relatives of local police officers, have moved to Hofyan Sharif and the Tatmadra area of central Parwan from Shinwari district and these families now have many problems." Those who stay put risk injury or kidnapping. Noor Mohammad, who lives in the Qawl Heer area of Shinwari district, said, "Because my brother was a local policeman, his daughter-in-law was held hostage by the Taleban and now the Taleban want her husband to divorce her wife so that one of the Taleban fighters can marry her." UNDER SUSPICION Local people in Parwan also accuse the government forces of unfairly targeting those with family links to insurgents. Mirza Gul, whose son joined the Taleban six years ago, said that the security forces regularly harassed him despite the fact that he was not in touch with his child. The 40-year old, from the village of Qamchaak in Siyahgird district of Parwan province, said, "I have been threatened by the security forces, especially by the local police, just because my son is with the Taleban. My son is living a separate life and doesn't have any contact with me." Mirza Gul continued, "Whenever I went to the bazaar in Siyahgird I was arrested by the local police, who would take me in for questioning and keep asking why my son was with the Taleban. I told them that my son doesn't listen to me and does whatever he wants." This harassment had become so bad that he was too frightened to go to Siyahgird for fear of arrest. Other family members had also been targeted, he said, including his other son Syed Mohammad. "Last year when he went to the bazaar on his motorbike to buy some food, he was arrested by local police just because his brother had joined the Taleban. The local police took his bike and his cash and it was only after spending many days in prison that he was freed." Mirza Gul said, "My brother-in-law had two gas shops in Siyahgird bazaar which were set upon by the police and burnt down just because his nephew was with the Taleban. He had to escape the area for fear of his life." Mirza Gul said that he knew of 20 other families who were forced to leave their homes and seek refuge in other provinces because of harassment from the security forces. "If the security forces keep torturing and oppressing us, we will have to join the Taleban ourselves," he concluded. Others said that they had been harried by the security services just because they came from areas under insurgent control. Ghulam Mohammad, 65, lives in Gharo in the Siyahgird district of Parwan province, an area ruled by the Taleban. He said that this made him instantly suspicious to the security services every time he had to travel to the provincial capital. "I've been arrested many times by the security forces and they ask, 'Why do you do you come to the city from an area controlled by the Taleban?' I was even imprisoned for nine months by the security forces and only freed when they were finally unable to find any evidence against me." According to a 2016 Human Rights Watch (HRW) report, insurgents were responsible for most of last year's 8,000 civilian casualties. However the 687-page report also noted that the government had made little progress in improving its human rights record. Mosa Mahmoodi, chief executive of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) said, "The protection of civilians' lives and properties should be the priority in both politics and during military operations, but unfortunately this has not happened. This issue needs across-the-board improvement." Mawlawi Abdul Rahim Shah Hanafi, head of Parwan's council of religious scholars, said that the Koran prohibited any retaliatory action. This applied to both state actors and insurgents. "Islam doesn't permit parties involved in war to attack and injure civilians and vulnerable people who are non-combatants and not involved in the war, even if these civilians are unbelievers and non-Muslim." Deputy Parwan governor Shah Wali Shahid acknowledged that relatives of security forces personnel had been targeted, but denied that there had been any retribution. "The Taleban have killed some family members of the security forces, but government officials have not tortured or threatened relatives of Taleban. Their claims are false." But Parwan police chief Mohammad Zaman Mamozai appeared to contradict this when he described an incident that took place some months ago. "Last year one of the relatives of a local policeman was taken hostage by the Taleban in the Siyahgird district of Parwan, so Afghan police forces had to take a relative of a Taleban member hostage," he said. "After some days, when the Taleban freed the local policeman's family member, police forces also freed the Taleban fighter's relative in exchange." Although IWPR interviewed dozens of families threatened by the Taleban, the armed group also denied all such allegations. Taleban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said that it was the state's forces that were carrying out revenge attacks and intimidation campaigns. "Thirty relatives of Taleban members have been tortured, wounded and even killed by the Afghan security forces in Shinwari, Siyahgird and Koh-e Safi districts," he told IWPR in a telephone interview "If the relatives of members of the security forces are tortured, harassed or injured by our group, we investigate such cases," he continued. "Our policies do not permit us to abuse these families." This report was produced under IWPR's Promoting Human Rights and Good Governance in Afghanistan initiative, funded by the European Union Delegation to Afghanistan. Copyright notice: Institute for War & Peace Reporting A recent spat between Turkmenistan and Tajikistan is probably the lamest dispute between two Central Asian countries I can remember, though I think I know the real cause of the problem. Tajikistan is talking about constructing a new railway line that would connect the country to Russia via Uzbekistan. Some poorly considered language was used in the statement about this project and that was seized upon by Turkmenistans Foreign Ministry, which fired off an equally ill-advised statement rebuking Tajikistan. And while Tajikistan might technically have started this row, I get the feeling nerves are becoming frayed in Ashgabat these days over more important matters than a new railway line from Tajikistan to Russia. In a January 24 statement, the deputy head of Tajikistans state railway company, Usmon Kalandarov, mentioned the proposed new railway line that bypasses Turkmenistan. On January 25, the Turkmen Foreign Ministry released a statement calling Kalandarovs comments unethical and unfriendly. The Turkmen Foreign Ministry expressed bewilderment (they do that a lot in their statements, makes me wonder) and reminded that Turkmenistan has initiated a number of specific projects that involve Tajikistan and are aimed at further expanding cooperation between the two countries in the transport and communication spheres. The Foreign Ministry added: This statement by one of the leaders of the Tajik railways does not contribute to the practical efforts to achieve the above mentioned objectives. Assuredly not, but a quick look at the map shows there would be no reason for a railway from Tajikistan through Uzbekistan and on to Russia to ever pass through Turkmenistan. The line would have to be extended much farther west to incorporate Turkmenistan. So the project itself doesnt seem to be the problem. It seems more to be that a Tajik state official publicly mentioned Turkmenistan being left out of the project. That is what has irritated the Turkmen government and spurred a response from the Foreign Ministry. International rights organizations mention Turkmenistan critically all the time, but governments do not. For most of its 25 years as an independent country, Turkmenistans isolationism, couched as a state policy of positive neutrality, has kept the country out of international arguments, conflicts, and alliances. The name Turkmenistan just doesnt come up too much when top officials in other countries make policy statements. But that has changed lately. At the start of January, Iranian officials launched a verbal attack on Turkmenistan after Ashgabat shut off (Turkmen authorities say limited) gas supplies to Iran over an unpaid debt. The National Iranian Gas Company issued statements indicating Turkmenistan was violating their contract and threatened to take Turkmenistan to arbitration, which finally prompted the Turkmen Foreign Ministry to issue two separate responses in a 24-hour-period to defend Turkmenistans position that Iran was in the wrong. One year ago, Turkmen authorities were issuing similar statements after Russias Gazprom tore up gas agreements with Turkmenistan and refused to import any more Turkmen gas citing, very publicly, Ashgabats intractable position in negotiating prices. And before that, there were Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbaevs comments in mid-October 2015, right after a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, that the security situation along Turkmenistans border with Afghanistan was troubling. The Turkmen Foreign Ministry released a statement that same day that read, The Turkmen side expresses its extreme bewilderment (eds: what did I tell you?) and concern at this statement by the Kazakh side which is irrelevant to the situation on the state border of Turkmenistan. The statement went on to recommend Nazarbaev and others receive their information from more credible sources in the future, ignoring the fact that the Afghan government and media were acknowledging there was fighting in northwest Afghanistan near the border with Turkmenistan. Russias Federal Security Service and the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization, which does not include Turkmenistan, have also expressed concerns similar to Nazarbaevs since October 2015. Turkmen-Tajik relations probably wont be affected much by this recent tiff. There was a meeting of the Turkmen-Tajik intergovernmental commission on trade-economic and scientific-technical cooperation in Ashgabat on January 26-27. And the Turkmen Foreign Ministry was correct in pointing out it has initiated a number of specific projects that involve Tajikistan that are aimed at furthering cooperation between the two countries. Turkmenistan has offered to supply Tajikistan with electricity and oil but so far this has been impossible due to Uzbekistans refusal to allow these exports through its territory. That is the reason Turkmenistan and Tajikistan agreed to build the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Tajikistan (TAT) railway line that finally made it from Turkmenistan into Afghanistan at the end of 2016. Turkmen authorities might now wonder if Tajikistan could lose interest in TAT should the new railway project from Tajikistan through Uzbekistan advance. Of course, now that Uzbekistan has a new president, Shavkat Mirziyaev, who has vowed to improve ties with Central Asian neighbors, new opportunities for cooperation between Turkmenistan and Tajikistan could open up and TAT could soon become TUT (Turkmenistan-Uzbekistan-Tajikistan), a shorter and much more secure route. Turkmenistans diplomatic problems are coming at the same time economic problems are hammering Turkmenistan. The latest blow is the January 27 reports from Pakistani media that the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline will be delayed by one year due to problems with financing (Qishloq Ovozi says even that is overly optimistic). Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov has been promising for several years that TAPI would start operations by 2019 and Turkmenistan would have a new export route for 33 billion cubic meters (bcm) of its gas annually. Turkmenistan needs TAPI after losing Russia, and probably Iran soon as customers, two countries that 10 years ago combined for nearly 50 bcm of Turkmen gas sales. So the Turkmen Foreign Ministrys terse statement to Tajikistan might have been ill advised but it is to some extent understandable. Almost nothing seems to be going right for Turkmenistan lately. With material from RFE/RLs Turkmen Service, known locally as Azatlyk, and Tajik Service, known locally as Ozodi DES MOINES Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey is encouraging eligible farm owners to apply for the 2017 Century and Heritage Farm Program. The program is sponsored by the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship and the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation and recognizes families that have owned their farm for 100 years in the case of Century Farms and 150 years for Heritage Farms. These awards are an opportunity to recognize the hard work and commitment by these families that is necessary to keep a farm in the same family for 100 or 150 years, Northey said. If you consider all the challenges and unexpected obstacles each of them would have had to overcome during their life on the farm, it gives you a greater appreciation of the dedication and perseverance of each of the families being recognized. Applications are available on the Departments website at www.IowaAgriculture.gov by clicking on the Century Farm or Heritage Farm link under Hot Topics. Applications may also be requested from Becky Lorenz, coordinator of the Century and Heritage Farm Program, via phone at 515-281-3645, email at Becky.Lorenz@IowaAgriculture.gov or by writing to Century or Heritage Farms Program, Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, Henry A. Wallace Building, 502 E. Ninth St., Des Moines, IA 50319. Farm families seeking to qualify for the Century or Heritage Farms Program must submit an application to the department no later than June 1. The Century Farm program was started in 1976 as part of the Nations Bicentennial Celebration. To date more than 19,000 farms from across the state have received this recognition. The Heritage Farm program was started in 2006, on the 30th anniversary of the Century Farm program, and more than 900 farms have been recognized. Last year 320 Century Farms and 103 Heritage Farms were recognized. The ceremony to recognize the 2017 Century and Heritage Farms is scheduled to be held at the Iowa State Fair on Thursday, Aug. 17, in the Pioneer Livestock Pavilion. Century and Heritage Farm recognitions at the Iowa State Fair are a great celebration of Iowa agriculture and the families that care for the land and produce our food, Northey said. I hope eligible families will take the time to apply and then come to the State Fair to be recognized. Singapore -- (ReleaseWire) -- 01/29/2017 --SBS Consulting Pte Ltd is one of the highly recommended corporate services providers. It is one of the leading incorporation agent offering the cost-effective company registration Singapore services to local and foreign entrepreneurs. SBS Consulting also provides other services like bookkeeping, accounting, payroll services, etc. For their company registration Singapore, the entrepreneurs need to apply to the ACRA (Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority). It is an agency that also acts as the Company Registrar of Singapore. The process for company registration is easy and there are experienced incorporation services to assist the entrepreneurs in tackling it in an hassle-free manner. It involves completion of two procedures; a) Company name approval and b) Applying for Singapore company registration. A majority of entrepreneurs choose to incorporate a private limited company in Singapore. 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Our company registration package covers the statutory requirement and offers the services of a certified company secretary for free of cost for the first year," said Ms. Meena. SBS Consulting's company secretary services include: - Management of Shares - Rule Reminders - Handling Activities - Board Meetings - General Meetings - Maintenance of minute book and statutory register book (Directors, members, managers, secretaries, auditors and share transfers) - Circulating company's annual reports, interim statements, and accounts - Preparing director's report - Reviewing developments in corporate governance and assisting the directors on their duties and responsibilities - Safekeeping and proper use of company seal Singapore has achieved a high ranking on the list of top 3 economies offering the ease of doing business. Singapore has consistently made it to the list for the past eleventh consecutive years. Currently, Singapore ranks second among the 190 economies in the 'Ease of Doing Business Report 2017' prepared by the World Bank. Singapore is a vibrant marketplace. The start-up entrepreneurs and corporate favor it for its business-friendly environment, lower tax rates, tax incentives and schemes, and government grants. It also offers political stability and strong Intellectual Property (IP) laws and highly developed infrastructure that is very conducive to doing business. Each year, the number of new company registration Singapore is rising. "Outsourcing your company registration in Singapore to SBS Consulting Pte Ltd gets you services of an experienced team of incorporation specialists that is known for its professionalism, fast turnaround times, and as you have read, highly competitive incorporation package prices," quoted Ms. Meena. In addition to the above services SBS Consulting also delivers services mentioned below: - Accounting & Bookkeeping Services - Preparation of Directors' Report/Compilation Report - AGM Filing - Annual Return Filing - GST Registration & GST Filing services - Payroll Services - Corporate Taxation Services (Form C / C-S, ECI) - XBRL Services - Company Secretary Services Singapore - Registered Office Address Services, etc About SBS Consulting Pte Ltd SBS Consulting Pte Ltd is a Singapore-based incorporation services provider. Its corporate compliance services, including company registration services, are preferred by the owners of the start-ups, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and big businesses. It also provides bookkeeping, accounting, corporate secretarial, payroll, and taxation services to its valuable clients. Las Vegas, NV -- (ReleaseWire) -- 01/30/2017 --Men of Outdoors, an Instagram based company has taken upon itself to bring a better change to the world. The company recently launched its custom patented fabric made from cotton, beechwood and most importantly beeswax. The company is all charged with a mission to inspire people around the world to spend time outdoors and have challenged the contemporary fabric industry by launching a clothing brand that focuses entirely on very natural and healthy clothes for all. The t-shirts made from beeswax are the most comfortable and softest T-shirts to be launched in the clothing industry. The motto of the company is simple, with the launch of their new outdoor inspired t-shirts, Men of Outdoors want to encourage people to spend more and more time outdoors. Their clothes are healthy and made from all natural materials to ensure the company is doing its best it can for Mother Earth. Men of Outdoors encourages its followers to explore the outdoors and give them extensive travel and adventure ideas. The Instagram followers for Men of Outdoors can discover amazing ideas about exploring nature and outdoor activities. The ideas features on the Instagram feed by Men of Outdoors are endless, creative and inspired by the great outdoors; ideal for those who want to experience life changing journeys under the sun. About Men Of Outdoors Men of Outdoors started as a social media account on Instagram in July 2016. Initially the company only posted about men enjoying adventures in the outdoors. The company began selling its custom patented fabric made from beeswax in November 2016. Men of Outdoors is based in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA. For more information please visit https://menofoutdoors.com/ New York, NY -- (ReleaseWire) -- 01/30/2017 --Projek Raw has built its brand and reputation around designing a line of unique clothing and accessories that has quite literally changed the look of the men's wear market. Projek Raw has always been a step ahead in designing their collections. Although 2016 was a pivotal year in terms of growth and expansion for Projek Raw, the European fashion design company has plans for a bigger and even better 2017. Projek Raw will be attending the PROJECT Show in Las Vegas, Nevada in February 2017 to showcase pieces from their new 2017 Fall/Winter collection. About Projek Raw Projek Raw is a fashion company that originally started in Europe in 2001. Projek Raw was established with the mission to become a brand that redefined fashion in the men's wear market, a market that required an original touch to create unique free-spirited wear. Projek Raw stepped up to the challenge, and quickly became an international success in less than a decade. Projek Raw is a brand that appeals to young males ranging in age from twenty-somethings to mid-thirties. This particular market needed a unique yet casual style that truly set it apart from the "tired and boring fast fashion". The CEO and founder of Projek Raw, Dov Cohen claims, "Projek Raw was created with the inspiration for the young man looking for trendy fashions. He wants to look current and even a little ahead of the fashion trend. Every time we develop a new item, that's the question we ask ourselves; 'is this fresh, is this trendy, is this different? Most importantly, does it look like everyone else?' If it does, throw away the design." About PROJECT The PROJECT show is an annual event sponsored by UBM Fashion Group, a global fashion design company that serves comprehensive marketplaces in New York and Las Vegas. This year's PROJECT show will be held in Las Vegas, Nevada on February 21st through the 23rd, 2017 at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas. This show is the premier contemporary fashion event showcasing men and women's advanced premium denim and designer collections. PROJECT Show showcases some top designs and accessories and is attended by some of the top brands in fashion, including DKNY, Michael Kors, Valentino and Calvin Klein. Projek Raw announced their attendance at the PROJECT Show at the beginning of January at booth #34208. They plan to showcase pieces from their 2017 Fall/Winter collection. Although Projek Raw is confident that their collections will be just as successful as in previous years, the team is still excited to feature some of their top designs and items and interact with other brands and consumers. Contact: To learn more about the products, accessories, and offerings by Projek Raw, visit http://www.projekraw.com. Projek Raw also encourages visitors and customers to join their active community on social media, subscribe to their newsletter or check out the latest fashions at a local store. To see the outcome and results, as well as photos, interviews, and other media coverage from this year's PROJECT Show in Las Vegas, join the Projek Raw social media community today. For questions on products and other fashions, visitors and customers are welcome to contact the expert team here. DES MOINES | Iowa officials plan to use new federal grant money to review criminal cases that involved microscopic hair-comparison testing to determine whether the significant of the forensic evidence was overstated in wrongfully convicting Iowans accused of committing crimes. State Public Defender Adam Gregg said Monday the wrongful conviction division added to his office last October will use $632,765 in grant money to work with county attorneys and public safety officials in reviewing Iowa cases involving a forensic science technique that has been called into question by the FBI in recent years. FBI Director James Comey sent a letter last June to all U.S. governors encouraging them to review such cases in their states. "We're very proud of the fact that here in Iowa we have taken a proactive approach to tackling this issue, and we believe our process can serve as a model for other states to conduct their review," Branstad told reporters. "Justice is a balance," the governor added. "We want to see that people who commit dangerous crimes are convicted, but we certainly also want to make sure that people that are innocent are not unfairly or unjustly sent to prison." As a first step, Erica Nichols Cook, who directs Iowa wrongful conviction division, said she has been provided 184 DCI lab reports involving criminal convictions of which 96 cases were identified for further review of documents and testimony potentially including microscopic hair comparisons. Those comparisons involve a hair found at a crime scene that was compared to a hair of a suspect or a defendant. "Testimony provided by experts in these cases often exceeded the limits of science in ways that could have led to an injustice or wrongful conviction," Cook said of the review that focuses on cases between 1980 and 2000. Cook said the federal grant money will be used to prioritize cases and enlist private attorneys to help examine court transcripts, consult with experts and determine if evidence still exists that can be tested using new techniques to see if DNA results may exonerate a convicted individual or identity the perpetrator. "This is a years-long process," said Cook, who joined Gregg, Gov. Terry Branstad and Lt. Gov. Kim Reynolds in discussing the effort during the governor's weekly news conference Monday. "It takes a lot of time to track down evidence, find witnesses, legal filings and other documents from decades and years ago," she said, as well as getting post-conviction for individuals exonerated of a crime. "I do believe that all of this time and effort is worth it to ensure that justice is done here in Iowa," she said. Gregg noted the division already has had success in a case that did not involve microscopic hair comparison where an Iowa judge vacated the drug possession conviction of an Iowa man who spent 32 days in jail after being arrested by two Des Moines police officers who subsequently were accused of planting meth on him. "We created the wrongful conviction division in order to correct injustices like that case presented," he said. Citing government intimidation and fears of arrest, three Cambodian environmental activists will skip an appeals court hearing on Tuesday they had earlier requested, saying they will remain in hiding in a neighboring country until the court issues its ruling. Activist San Mala told RFAs Khmer Service on Jan. 29 that he and fellow activists Try Sovikea and Sim Somnang will not appear at the Appellate Courts Jan. 31 hearing on a request they had filed last year to overturn a previous conviction. We have no faith in the Cambodian courts, San Mala said. In the past, the courts have never given justice to activists or poor [Cambodians] who were in legal conflict with powerful figures or private companies. This is why we will boycott the hearing at the Appellate Court, he said. The three activists, members of the Cambodian environmental NGO Mother Nature, were first taken into custody on Aug. 17, 2015 after they failed to appear at a Koh Kong provincial police station to answer questions about their involvement in a protest against two Vietnamese firms engaged in sand-dredging operations. Dredging in the area had caused pollution and riverbank collapse, as well as reduced fish and crab populations on which local fishermen depend for their livelihoods, the Cambodian environmental group alleged. Later sentenced to 18 months in jail, the three were released on July 1, 2016 after the remainder of their sentence was suspended, and they immediately lodged an appeal asking that their convictions be overturned. Warnings, threats Speaking to RFA, Mother Nature founder Alejandro Gonzalez Davidson said however that the activists were recently threatened and warned to drop their appeal. The three were intimidated by government officials, Davidson said. We now fear that powerful figures, those standing behind the Appellate Court, will order judges to arrest the three and send them back to jail without presentation of evidence or witnesses being called, he said. At last years hearing at the Koh Kong provincial court, the court didnt follow legal procedures. Instead, they just followed orders given by powerful people. Meanwhile, a group of 48 Cambodian civil society organizations (CSOs) called in an open letter on Sunday on the Appeals Court to overturn what it called the wrongful convictions of the three Mother Nature activists. San Mala, Try Sovikea and Sim Somnang are not criminals; they are brave environmental defenders who have made enormous contributions to protecting Cambodias precious natural resources, the group said in its statement. [But] in retaliation for their activism, they were convicted on politically motivated charges. These convictions must now be overturned, the group said. Reported by Thai Tha for RFAs Khmer Service. Translated by Sovannarith Keo. Written in English by Richard Finney. Authorities in the Chinese capital have detained thousands of people who converged there to highlight grievances against government officials in their hometowns, sending them off to start the Year of the Rooster in a detention center. As the rest of the country got together with family to mark the Chinese New Year, crowds have continued to gather outside central government offices since the first day of the new year on Saturday, some in the hope of paying a visit to President Xi Jinping. Wu Jixin, a petitioner from the eastern province of Jiangsu, said he had been detained after staging a mini-protest during which he raised a banner with around a dozen fellow petitioners. But he said local government "interceptors" had been hard at work in Beijing detaining anyone from their region who complained about the government there. "The local governments are detaining people left, right, and center in Beijing because petitioning puts these governments under more political pressure," Wu said. "The petitioners just want their grievances to be dealt with." He said large numbers of people are now being held in huge detention centers on the outskirts of Beijing for "registration," before being sent home under the escort of interceptors. "There are several thousand people in Majialou [detention center]," Wu said. Government blacklist Sun Ning, a second petitioner from Jiangsu, said he had taken public transportation to Zhongnanhai, the headquarters of the ruling Chinese Communist Party leadership, in the heart of Beijing. "There are very large numbers of police in and around Tiananmen Square right now, maybe 1,000 or so ... checking people's ID," Sun said. "As soon as they swiped our ID cards, they said we weren't going any further. They didn't care if we were tourists or what we were." "They said we were on a government blacklist, and they detained us and brought us here to the Youjie police station," he said, speaking from inside the police station. Sun said many petitioners had converged on Zhongnanhai to engage in a low-key form of annual protest, wishing President Xi Jinping a Happy New Year. He said many of them are now sleeping rough in sub-zero temperatures. "There are so many sleeping rough right now, right there on the street, because they have no money," Sun said. "It is extremely cold, freezing ... about five degrees below freezing in Beijing." Repeated calls to the the Youjie police station rang unanswered on Monday. 'No use at all' Fellow Jiangsu petitioner Ji Qiyun said she was detained trying to pay a New Year visit to President Xi. "They didn't come out, so we wished the police a Happy New Year instead," Ji said. "They have worked so hard all year, and we felt bad about causing them all this trouble." Among those detained were a group of evictees from Shanghai, according to video footage shot by another petitioner. "We're from Sihai in Shanghai. We have no homes any more," one petitioner told the camera, adding that she is 82 years old. "We want to rely on the law for redress, because relying on the government was no use at all," she said. And petitioner Tang Xinbo, who was herself recently released from detention, told RFA that she had been questioned by police about a video she made of a "New Year's Eve" party run by petitioners in Beijing. "I made a video of the petitioners' New Year party, and they wanted to know who had organized it, who attended, and how the arrangements were made," Tang said. She said she had been detained in a raid during which police bashed down the door of the place she was staying, put handcuffs on her, and put her in a restraining chair for several hours. Violence used Meanwhile, the Weiquanwang rights website reported that Beijing rights activists Wu Yufen, Wu Jixin, Tang Shuxiu, Yang Jinzhi, and several others were detained after unfurling a banner wishing all jailed petitioners a Happy New Year. The petitioners' greetings were aimed at Liu Feiyue, who founded the Civil Rights and Livelihood Watch website, and Huang Qi, who founded the Tianwang rights website, among others. Interceptors frequently use violence against petitioners on the journey home, activists say, with a string of such incidents reported in recent weeks. On Jan. 22, a pregnant petitioner from the northeastern province of Heilongjiang said she was beaten, kicked, and bound and gagged on the long road trip home from Beijing. Earlier this month, petitioners Wang Shetao and Li Xiaocui, of Luoyang's Liangzhai village, reportedly burned to death in murky circumstances after a fire at a police station where they were detained. Petitioners also frequently report beatings from police back home, harassment by landlords and employers, and incarceration in psychiatric hospitals when they have no mental illness. Deaths and "disappearances" in unofficial detention centers, or "black jails," are also not uncommon, but evidence of police wrongdoing is hard to come by when authorities typically refuse to allow independent autopsies. Reported by Wong Lok-to for RFA's Cantonese Service, and by Qiao Long for the Mandarin Service. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie. The crew of the North Korean ship Paik Du San observes from the deck as bags of fertilizer are loaded onto the ship at a pier in Ulsan, South Korea, in a file photo. North Korean authorities have imposed limits on the operating hours of local markets nationwide to encourage residents to go the fields and collect manure to use as fertilizer in light of a shortage of chemical fertilizer, sources inside the country said. On Jan. 9, authorities shortened the operating hours of jangmadang to 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. from the regular operating hours of 8 a.m. (noon in some areas) to 9 p.m. so North Koreans could focus on the first battle of the new yearmanure collection. Such mandatory mass mobilization campaigns, or battles as the regime likes to call them, are routine in North Korea, where authorities use them to mobilize manpower for various projects and measure citizens loyalty to the state and Korean Workers Party. The move has caused great discontent among locals, many of whom shop for food and other necessities during the day, they said. The North Korean authorities have changed the operating hours of the local markets to the same operating hours as they did last year during the 200-day battle period starting on Jan. 9, which is the day after [leader] Kim Jong Uns birthday, said a source from Jagang province, in a reference to the regimes early 2016 effort to jumpstart a new five-year economic plan for the nation. With the change in operating hours, there are signs of rising prices, he said. Between April and October 2015, when North Korea held a 70th-anniversary celebration of the founding of the Korean Workers Party, authorities restricted the operating hours of the local markets from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. and made people work on construction projects, the source said. They did the same during the 200-day battle, he said. The source said that as the number of complaints about the limited market hours has grown, authorities are making excuses that the move is an unavoidable measure for the first battle of the New Year, he said. As a result of limiting the operating hours, the prices of groceries including eggs, tofu, and bean sprouts have all gone up, the source said. But a source who works in the agricultural sector in North Hamgyong province supported the move. In order to produce manure for the New Year, there is no choice except to limit the operating hours of markets, he told RFAs Korean Service. Fertilizer imports not enough Chemical fertilizersthe most important component in the North Korean farming industryare mainly produced from crude petroleum. North Korea made a large purchase of crude oil at low prices from Russia last year, so the country was able to produce a considerable amount of fertilizer on its own, said the source who works in the agricultural sector in North Hamgyong province. But it still had to import some chemical fertilizer from China in 2016 to make up for shortages, he said, adding that this year the situation is totally different because it is now more difficult to import fertilizer from China. There is now a slowdown in trade with China as many private Chinese traders who operate in North Korea return home to celebrate the Lunar New Year which begins on Jan. 28, sources said. This, along with the limited market operating hours, has led to a general increase in product prices, he said. The source from North Hamgyong province also said that while residents in various cities feel they are being inconvenienced by the limited operating hours of local markets, the markets in general have not had normal operating hours since 2015 because of the regimes continuous battles. Residents are expressing their discontent and questioning how authorities will be able to guarantee them their livelihoods if they have less time to shop for food and other necessities in local markets and must pay higher prices for products, he said. Reported by Sung-hui Moon for RFAs Korean Service. Translated by Hyosun Kim. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin. With U.S.-DPRK relations reaching an all-time low, some North Korea experts cautiously hope that both countries can explore a chance for re-engagement. A key test will be whether North Korea can halt its nuclear or ballistic missile tests in the initial days of the Trump presidency. Recently there have been press reports that North Korea may test its first intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) in the first few weeks of the new administration in order to draw Washingtons attention. Changsop Pyon of Radio Free Asia (RFA)s Korean Service recently asked Ambassador Joseph DeTrani, a former 6-Party Talks Special Envoy, about the prospects for improved relations between the two countries, along with the possible hurdles. Currently President of the Daniel Morgan Graduate School of National Security, Amb. DeTrani served as Senior Advisor to the Director of National Intelligence and the Director of the National Counter Proliferation Center and the Intelligence Community Mission Manager for North Korea. Amb. DeTrani also served as the U.S. Representative to the Korea Energy Development Organization (KEDO). RFA: The new administration led by President Donald Trump began on Jan. 20. Wouldn't this be a good opportunity for North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to engage with the Trump administration? As you know, North Korea missed chances of improving ties with the U.S. by conducting nuclear and missile tests during the Obama administration. A: This is a very good question. Yes, its an opportunity for the DPRK [Democratic People's Republic of Korea], and its an opportunity for Kim Jong Un to show to the new Trump administration that North Korea is determined to find a peaceful path to improving relations, certainly with the United States but also with the Republic of Korea, because ultimately were talking about a reunified Korea. So, I think this is an opportunity for Kim Jong Un to say, Lets turn the page, and lets move away from the elements of hostility to finding a peaceful path to addressing these issues. RFA: Shouldn't Kim Jong Un refrain from making any military provocations like nuclear or ballistic missile tests to show his sincerity to the new U.S. administration? A: Absolutely! I would highly recommend no missile launch, no nuclear test, no provocations toward the U.S. and its allies at this very important juncture with the new Trump administration coming into office. RFA: Kim Jong Un said in his New Year speech that North Korea was in the final stages of ICBM launch preparation, suggesting a possible clash with the Trump administration from the start. Do you think Kim made those remarks to send some sort of message to President Trump? A: Well, I dont know whether he made those comments in his New Year address to get a message to President Trump. North Korea has been working on its ICBM KN-08 for a number of years. My view is that he wanted to make it clear possibly to the new U.S. administration, but indeed to his own people and the region that includes China, that hes determined to launch an ICBM. He has not deviated from his original intention. RFA: Though its too early to say at this point, can you predict how the new Trump administration will deal with North Korea? A: My sense is they will look at all the options available. Obviously, negotiations. Can we come back to negotiations? Is there a possibility of revisiting the Sept. 2005 Joint Statement that spoke to denuclearization in return for security reassurances and other deliverables? So, my sense and also my recommendation would be to determine if negotiations are possible, so that we can come back to the table and we can move toward a whole lot of things such as North Koreas nuclear and missile programs, and move toward a peaceful resolution. And if peaceful negotiations are not possible, obviously other options have to be considered very, very carefully. RFA: Do you think the Trump administration should rule out any military option, as this might lead to a possible military clash on the Korean peninsula? A: Well, listen, my sense would be that initially were talking about reconstituting with some sort of dialogue--maybe initially bilateral dialogue, trilateral [dialogue], and eventually, hopefully, reconstituting with a 6-Party Talk process and so forth. If none of that is possible, or if peaceful resolution is not possible, all options have to be on the table. I dont believe you have to rule out anything. You have to look at all options available. RFA: Former North Korean diplomat Thae Yong Ho said, it is not a matter of the quality or quantity of incentives to have Kim Jong Un give up the nuclear program. As long as Kim Jong Un rules, North Korea will never give up the nuclear weapons. If this is true, what do you think is the best way for the U.S . and its allies to achieve the denuclearization goal on the Korean peninsula? A: I think the best option is to look at all the possibilities of reconstituting with some form of dialogue with the DPRK. Obviously Thae Yong Ho has a unique insight, but Im not sure he can speak for Kim Jong Un. Regardless of what he said, obviously what he said is very knowledgeable. I think the responsibility for all the countries is to determine if a peaceful resolution can be obtained. That should be the first goal. RFA: You attended a Track 2 meeting in Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia last September, where former U.S. government officials and North Korean officials gathered. But no specific details came out of that meeting. What is your sense of North Koreas position on denuclearization? Are they still serious about it, or do they insist on arms control talks instead? A: Thats a very good question. In my mind, North Korea wants to be accepted and recognized as a nuclear weapons state, but thats not where were going. And I think the DPRK understands that. So, its not a question of arms control negotiations, its a question of coming back to the issue of comprehensive, verifiable denuclearization in exchange for security assurances and other deliverables. The sense I had at the meeting was that the DPRK had a lot of issues they were concerned about. They were concerned about their security, sanctions, regime change, and so forth. Obviously were all concerned about their nuclear and missile programs, the threats to the region and beyond the region. So, all those issues were put on the table. I think what we came away with was, Lets explore the dialogue. Lets see if there is a way of both sides building confidence, so that we can move forward and look at initially halting the escalation of tension, and that would be the DPRK halting their nuclear and missile tests. RFA: Some North Korea experts argue that for a breakthrough in North Koreas nuclear talks, the U.S. and its allies should take some sort of interim steps such as first freezing North Koreas nuclear development rather than pursuing denuclearization from the start. What is your take? A: If we can get the DPRK to halt their nuclear weapons program and missile launches, and certainly production of fissile material, that would be very positive confidence-building steps. And if we can get North Korea to do that, we have to respond and give them something in kind. If we want them to build confidence with us, we have to build confidence with them. So, what do we do in return? If North Korea halts all those things, they will demand certain things, such as talking about a peace treaty, the intensity of sanctions, joint military exercises and the number of such exercises, etc. There could be a number of things they would put on the table. I agree that their halt at this moment would be an important first step as we progress. The Leap Day Agreement in 2012 was exactly like that. We had an agreement that North Korea would halt all the nuclear and missile programs in return for a significant amount of food and development aid. That didnt materialize, but hopefully this could be revisited. RFA: If you were President Trumps national security advisor, how would you advise him about North Koreas nuclear and missile issues? A: My advice would be this: We need to be as creative and diligent as possible in determining if we can come back to negotiations, bilateral and ultimately multilateral negotiations, and maybe we could even reconstitute the 6-Party Talk process. We have to work hard to use all means to peacefully resolve all these issues. And if thats not possible, obviously we have to look at all options, especially when North Koreans are talking about an ICBM, putting nuclear weapons on a missile delivery system that can become a nuclear threat to the U.S. Then, obviously, all available options have to be looked at. But at this point we are not there. Again I would advise President Trump that we have to work hard at finding a way to negotiate at this critical juncture to get North Korea to halt what they have been doing and give them something in return, and then move on to a path toward peaceful resolution. Ko Ni, a Myanmar human rights lawyer and advisor to the country's de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi, appears in an undated photo. A prominent Muslim human rights lawyer and advisor to Myanmars de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi was shot dead on Sunday at Yangon airport, prompting the country's president to issue an appeal for calm in the Buddhist-majority country and a call to remain watchful against agitation leading to religious disturbances. Ko Ni, a 63-year-old legal advisor to the ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party that came into power last April, was shot at close range in the back of the head while he held his grandson outside the Yangon airport following a trip to Indonesia as part of a Myanmar government delegation to discuss interfaith tolerance and reconciliation. Ko Ni was an outspoken critic of anti-Muslim attitudes held by Myanmars Buddhist nationalists and the countrys powerful military. He formally joined the NLD in October 2013, though he had previously supported Aung San Suu Kyis party process and provided legal advice. The office of President Htin Kyaw issued a statement on Monday saying the killing was meant to disrupt peace and stability in the country and thanking citizens for helping arrest of the gunman. It also requested that people remain calm. The initial interrogation indicates the intention to destabilize the state, said a translated copy of the statement. Investigations are being carried out by the government to find out the truth. Security has been heightened in the aftermath of the assassination. This being so, people are requested not to be stricken by panic and to stay quietly and peacefully, to be careful of religious and racial incitements and inform authorities concerned in case of finding evidence concerning this case of assassination and actions aimed at destabilizing the state. Ko Nis murder comes as the country grapples with a crisis in the northern part of its volatile Rakhine state where a crackdown by Myanmar security forces on Rohingya Muslims since October left about 90 people dead and forced more than 65,000 villagers to flee to safety in neighboring Bangladesh. The Rohingya have accused the military of indiscriminate killings, rape, torture and arson during the security operations, though both the Myanmar government and army have denied the allegations. A taxi driver who tried to detain the killer was also shot dead, and the gunman was arrested at the scene. The motive of Ko Nis murder remains unknown. His daughter ran and grabbed the child and screamed out, Father, Father, said Tin Hlaing, an ethnic Rakhine town elder from the Rakhine capital Sittwe who was on the Indonesia trip with Ko Ni. The gunman retreated 20 or 30 steps, yelled out not to come near him, and ran when the taxi driver gave chase, he told RFAs Myanmar Service. Tin Hlaing said that he, Ko Ni, and the other members of the government delegation were in Indonesia to learn about its policies and laws to forge peace between Muslims and Christian following clashes in the Maluku Islands in the late 1990s. Military and NLD comment The office of Min Aung Hlaing, commander-in-chief of the countrys defense services, said in a statement that it will cooperate with security personnel at Yangon International Airport in Mingaladon, 15 kilometers (9.3 miles) north of downtown Yangon, to investigate the case. The office also expressed condolences to the family of the deceased. The NLD issued a statement condemning the violent murder and described Ko Nis death as an irreplaceable loss for Aung San Suu Kyi and the party because he unfailingly provided necessary legal advice and suggestions to the party chairman. The NLD also applauded taxi driver Ne Win, a 42-year-old member of NLDs Mingaladon branch, who was shot by the gunman while trying to capture him. Win Htein, a member of the NLDs central executive committee, asked why Ko Ni in particular was murdered. He always talked about and supported efforts for the rule of law in the country, and he couldnt have had any bitter enemies, he told RFA. Hes irreplaceable for the NLD. Its a big loss. Win Htein also said the lawyers murder could have been politically motivated. NLD lawmaker May Win Myint called the assassination a blatant challenge to those of us who are working for democracy. I think they [the perpetrators] are trying to show that they can do anything to anyone of us anywhere, she said. Monywa Aung Shin, the NLDs information officer, took Myanmar authorities to task for not providing adequate security measures to protect Ko Ni. Those responsible in the government, parliament, and military should think hard and revamp their security programs, he said. You can never tell if this kind of attack wouldnt have targeted other leaders. Ko Ni was a brilliant lawyer both political and legally for the NLD, and it is not difficult to figure out why he was murdered, he said. Tin Oo (L), veteran patron of the ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party, comforts Tin Tin Aye (R), wife of prominent Muslim lawyer Ko Ni who was shot dead the day before, and his daughter (C) outside the family's home in Yangon, Jan. 30, 2017. Credit: AFP Politically motivated? Other politicians questioned whether the assassination was politically motivated. Thein Tun, a lawmaker from the opposition Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) called it a very rare incident, totally unexpected, in our country where we had lived in harmony with our own cultures. There could be a reason [for the killing] that is unknown to us, and I hope it was not religiously or politically motivated, he said. Ba Shein, an ethnic Rakhine representative for the Arakan National Party in the lower house of the national parliament believes weak security is to blame for Ko Nis death. [I] dont think it is politically or religiously motivated, he said. Ko Ni never spoke carelessly. It all happened because of a weakness in security measures. The 88 Generation Peace and Open Society Group, formerly known as the 88 Generation Students, which worked with the NLD to ensure free and fair general elections in 2015, and the Shan Nationalities League for Democracy (SNLD) party, also issued statements calling for effective action against the gunman and any others behind the assassination. Mya Aye, a Muslim youth leader of the 88 Generation group, who returned from Indonesia together with Ko Ni, told RFA that he was halfway home from the airport when he heard the news. I was really shocked to hear the news, he said. And I was really worried that misunderstandings and unnecessary problems might follow this incident. He said it was still too early to comment on the case, but that it is necessary for investigators to determine if there were any other people who planned the assassination behind the scenes and why they did it. The Myanmar Independent Lawyers Association of which Ko Ni was a central executive committee member called his death the murder of the rule of law and condemned it as a cowardly act. Rights groups weigh in Three international rights groups issued statements or commentaries on Ko Nis death. Josef Benedict, Amnesty Internationals deputy campaigns director for Southeast Asia and the Pacific, called the killing an appalling act that has all the hallmarks of an assassination and urged authorities to conduct a thorough, independent, and impartial investigation. His death will send shock waves across the human rights community in the country and beyond, and the authorities must send a clear message that such violence will not be tolerated and will not go unpunished, he said. Linda Lakhdhir, a legal advisor in the Asia Division of New York-based Human Rights Watch, wrote on Monday that Ko Nis death is a grave loss for Burma and for all those who seek to promote tolerance and respect for human rights in the country. As one of the few remaining Muslims with the stature to influence the NLDs policies, he was a voice of reason amid a rising tide of intolerance, she said. Matthew Smith, chief executive officer of Fortify Rights, called on authorities to find all those behind the attack. Were shocked and deeply saddened by this heinous act, he said in a statement issued Monday. Authorities should do everything in their power to ensure accountability and bring those responsible to justice. Fortify Rights noted that though Ko Nis work was widely respected, the lawyer faced frequent harassment and intimidation by Myanmars political and religious hard-liners. Mourners carry the coffin of prominent Muslim lawyer Ko Ni at a Muslim cemetery in Yangon, Jan. 30, 2017. Credit: AFP Laid to rest Ko Ni was buried on Monday afternoon according to Muslim rites at Yay Way Muslim cemetery on the outskirts of Yangon during a funeral attended by tens of thousands of people, while the gunman, 53-year-old Kyi Lwin, was being held at Mingaladon police station. The Yangon regional government said it will handle funeral arrangements for the taxi driver Ne Win who was shot in the groin by the gunman when he tried to hit the latter with a brick. The regional government will also oversee the prosecution of gunman Kyi Lwin, who served a prison sentence in the 2000s for smuggling ancient Buddhist stupas and was released in a presidential amnesty in 2014, according to a report in the online journal The Irrawaddy. Ne Win is survived by three children who are seven years old, four years old, and 45 days old. The 88 Generation Peace and Open Society Group said it is setting up a fund for the childrens future. Though Aung San Suu Kyi, who also serves as Myanmars state counselor and foreign affairs minister, has not publicly commented on the killing, the NLD has described Ko Nis murder as a terrorist act. Reported by Kyaw Thu, Thiri Min Zin, Thiha Tun, Waiyan Moe Myint, Win Naung Toe, and Win Ko Ko Latt for RFAs Myanmar Service. Translated by Khin Maung Nyane. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin. Authorities say two police officers and three alleged militants have been killed in Russia's volatile North Caucasus region of Chechnya. Regional leader Ramzan Kadyrov said on January 30 that the three men opened fire on police officers who asked for their identification documents. He said the exchange of gunfire took place in the central town of Shali overnight. According to Kadyrov, the three men opened fire at police when requested to present their identification documents. Kadyrov said authorities believe they were members of a militant group coordinated online by Magomed Rashidov, a Shali native who has allegedly joined Islamic State (IS) militants in Syria. The security situation remains unstable in Chechnya, where Moscow waged two wars against separatists following the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. Based on reporting by chechnya.gov.ru and Interfax Did Russia just implicitly admit that it hacked the United States? Reports last week that three cybersecurity experts, including two officers from the Federal Security Service (FSB), were arrested last month seem to suggest so. According to Russian media reports, Sergei Mikhailov, the deputy head of the FSB's Center for Information Security, is being charged with espionage for allegedly providing information to U.S. intelligence about a server that experts believe was the nexus for hacking attacks against the United States. If U.S. intelligence did indeed have a highly placed source like Mikhailov, it would explain why it was able to conclude with such a high degree of confidence that Russia was behind the cyberattacks during the election campaign. The timing of the arrests and the timing of the decision by former U.S. President Barack Obama to declassify and make public parts of the U.S. intelligence report on the alleged Russian hacking also makes sense. Mikhailov was arrested in December.And the U.S. released the intelligence report a month later, in January. If Mikhailov was indeed a source, then Washington would have been reluctant to declassify its intelligence for fear of compromising him. After he was arrested, this would no longer be an issue. But the question that is really on my mind is why the Kremlin decided to leak this information now, knowing full well the conclusions the West would draw from it. And the only conclusion I can come to is that Vladimir Putin's regime is feeling pretty confident. And it is not afraid to send a signal that it is powerful enough to interfere in Western countries, and it is not afraid to use it. Keep telling me what you think on The Power Vertical's Twitter feed and on our Facebook page. DES MOINES | A bill intended to give local school boards more decision-making authority ran into several challenges Monday, including testy exchanges between subcommittee members. Freshman Rep. Amy Nielsen, D-North Liberty, accused subcommittee Chairman Greg Forristall, R-Macedonia, of being a mean bully when he questioned whether she understood school funding law. During her first subcommittee meeting as a House member, Nielsen asked whether House File 26 solved the problems Forristall cited as reasons to give school boards home rule authority. The authority is similar to that given cities and counties through an amendment to the state Constitution. HF 26 calls for school boards to exercise any broad or implied power not inconsistent with state laws. That doesnt extend to levying taxes. Nielsen wondered about unintended consequences of the change, especially those stemming from the language calling for state laws relating to schools and school boards to be liberally construed. Now Democrats are complaining were too liberal, Forristall said. The bill has the support of the Iowa Association of School Boards, School Administrators of Iowa, Professional Educators of Iowa, Area Education Agencies, Rural School Advocates and Urban Education Network. However, Melissa Peterson of the Iowa State Education Association had the same question as Nielsen. She wondered what problem lawmakers were trying to solve. There are other bills that address specific problems without calling for such a large legislative change. Margaret Buckton of the Rural Education Advocates and Urban Education Network said the bill goes to the overarching philosophy of who makes decisions about local school operations. Too many times, she said, school districts need to change laws when a commonsense decision would solve their problem. As long as districts are held accountable and follow state law they should be given more latitude, Emily Piper of the Iowa Association of School Boards told the subcommittee. However, she thought the legislation needed a better definition of home rule. HF 26 now goes to the Education Committee. U.S. President Donald Trumps executive order of January 27 bans refugees from all countries from entering the United States for 120 days and bans Syrian refugees from entering indefinitely. At the same time, the executive order temporarily bans entry into the United States for people from seven predominantly Muslim countries -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen -- until more stringent vetting of visas is introduced. Here is who is affected by the order, titled Protecting The Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into The United States, which took immediate effect when it was issued. Citizens Of The Seven Blacklisted Countries Trumps order immediately bans for 90 days -- until April 27 -- aliens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen from entering the United States on any category of visa: immigrant or nonimmigrant. Visa categories for diplomats, including the United Nations, are excepted. There remains some confusion about what the executive order means by individuals "from" one of those blacklisted countries, as it is not more clearly defined in the text. A lawyer specializing in immigration law in Washington told RFE/RL that the order does not say whether "from" means holding the citizenship of that country, being born in that country, or both. The New York Times reports that U.S. Customs and Border Protection has instructed airlines to stop passengers from the blacklisted countries from boarding flights to the United States and to remove any passengers who do board. The newspaper says airline crew members from the blacklisted countries are also barred from the United States. There already has been controversy over the status of citizens of the blacklisted countries who arrived in the United States with visas issued before the executive order was announced. Although the executive order banned their entry, judges in four U.S. cities with major international airports ruled that those individuals could not be deported and they were allowed to enter the country. However, the judges' rulings appear to be limited to people who were already at the U.S. airports at the time of the bans announcement and so does not seem to suggest exceptions would be made for people arriving in the future with previously issued visas. The rulings did not challenge the legality of the executive order itself. Under U.S. law, the president has broad powers to control immigration and can suspend the entry of "all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants" if he considers their entry to be harmful to the national interest. The U.S. administration made clear that the 90-day provision does not mean that travel will automatically be reinstated after that period. During the 90 days, the U.S. government will decide how things will work after April 27. U.S. Green-Card Holders From The Seven Countries The order does not expressly spell out restrictions on travel for citizens of the seven countries who are also permanent residents of the United States (green-card holders). On January 29, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, John Kelly, said that he deems "the entry of lawful permanent residents to be in the national interest" of the United States. However, he and other U.S. officials have suggested that green-card holders from the blacklisted countries could face extra screening or questioning as they are admitted. Dual Nationals Of The Seven Blacklisted Countries Individuals from the blacklisted countries who also hold the citizenship of another country other than the United States are not permitted to enter the United States for 90 days. There is some question as to whether exceptions are being made for people whose dual nationality is with a country closely allied with the United States -- for example, Canada or Britain. The British foreign secretary has said Washington assured him the ban did not apply to anyone with dual British citizenship. Naturalized U.S. Citizens Born In The Seven Countries The executive order does not apply to U.S. citizens, whether that person is born in the United States or became a citizen through immigration to the United States. That includes people who were born in one of the blacklisted countries and are now naturalized U.S. citizens. U.S. Citizens Who Travel To The Seven Countries U.S. citizens who travel to the seven countries are likely to face additional questioning upon their return to the United States. The White House chief of staff, Reince Preibus, told the U.S. network NBC on January 29 that "I would suspect that if youre an American citizen traveling back and forth to Libya, youre likely to be subjected to further questioning when you come into an airport." Refugees From Syria The U.S. presidents order bars all refugees from Syria -- which has been embroiled in war since 2011, sending millions of refugees abroad -- from entering the United States indefinitely. However, the order says individuals may be admitted on a case-by-case basis when it is "in the national interest" of the United States, including "when the person is a religious minority in his country of nationality facing religious persecution." Trump has mentioned Christians in Syria as an example, raising the question of their status under the indefinite ban. All Non-Syrian Refugees The executive order suspends completely admission of all refugees from anywhere around the world for 120 days. Again, there is the possibility of case-by-case exceptions, including for persecuted religious minorities. The order also puts a ceiling of 50,000 on the number of refugees the United States will accept from around the world in 2017. That is slightly less than half the ceiling of 110,000 established by former President Barack Obama. Will Other Countries Be Added To The Blacklist In The Future? There is no way to know at this time. However, Priebus said the seven countries now blacklisted were chosen because Congress and the Obama administration had identified them previously "as the most watched countries harboring terrorists." He said others could be added but provided no details. Jordan's King Abdullah will travel to Washington on January 30 to meet with U.S. officials, although it remains uncertain if he will hold talks with President Donald Trump. Officials said Abdullah is scheduled to meet with Vice President Mike Pence on January 30 for a breakfast meeting at his Naval Observatory residence in Washington. The king will also meet congressional leaders, senators, and senior officials, including Defense Secretary James Mattis, according to officials and diplomats. One official said a meeting would likely be arranged with Trump, but there has been no formal confirmation. The fight against Islamic State (IS) militants and Russia's role in the Middle East are likely to be on the agenda, Jordanian officials said. "The king will seek a stepped-up campaign against [Islamic State] extremists and secure extra resources to help ensure the militants would not be allowed to move towards our borders," the Reuters news agency quoted one official as saying on condition of anonymity. Pro-Western Jordan has taken part in a U.S.-led air campaign against IS militants in Iraq and Syria, and it has experienced deadly IS attacks on its territory. Abdullah has a close personal relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin and went to Moscow last week, signaling Russia's growing role in the Middle East. "Without Russia, we will not be able to find solutions to not only the Syrian problem but other regional problems in the Middle East," Abdullah told reporters in Moscow, adding that he and Putin shared "the same vision of bringing stability to our region." Two officials told Reuters that the king was pleased that the new administration would focus on security, as opposed to the Obama administration's emphasis on political reforms, which was seen by many in Jordan as interference. The king, who turned 55 on January 29, will be the first Arab leader to meet with the new administration. He comes as the Trump administrations immigration clampdown, including a ban on visitors from seven Muslim-majority countries, has caused an uproar in the United States and abroad. Jordan isn't among the countries affected by Trump's immigration order. With reporting by Reuters and AP Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbaev, in what he called a "special statement," has outlined his new strategic plan for the Central Asian nation's economic development. In the televised statement on January 30, Nazarbaev described his plan as "the third stage" of Kazakhstan's economic development, covering the period until 2025. According to Nazarbaev, the new plan is driven by the need to introduce modern technologies into economic processes and to open up more opportunities for small and medium-sized businesses by decreasing state control over their operations and giving them greater liberty. The full text of Nazarbaev's plan will be carried by the print media on January 31. That is Nazarbaev's second televised statement to the nation in the last five days. On January 25, he proposed constitutional amendments on the transfer of some of his powers in the areas of social and economic development to the parliament and the government. Macedonia's conservative leader has failed to reach a deal with his traditional ethnic Albanian allies to form a new government as the midnight deadline expired on January 29. Early on January 30, former Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski's party, VMRO-DPMNE called for new elections and warned against any solution that would not include his party. The VRMO narrowly won early elections on December 11, capturing 51 of the 120 seats, two more than their rival, the Social Democratic Union of macedonia (SDSM). Under Macedonia's constitution, if the party that won the election fails to form a government, the president then gives the task to the second-largest party, in this case the SDSM. "A coalition agreement with the [ethnic Albanian Democratic Union for Integration] has not been reached ... The VMRO considers that holding new elections is the mature solution to overcome the crisis and set reform priorities," Gruevski's party said. "Any other solution would lead only to new conflicts ... in an already divided society," it added. The largest ethnic Albanian political party, the DUI, said it was unable to make a "clear decision" on a coalition with the conservatives. Ethnic Albanians make up about one-quarter of Macedonia's population. Based on reporting by AP and dpa 13 Afghan men who lost their limbs in land-mine blasts practice with their new prosthetic limbs at an International Committee of the Red Cross center in Herat. After almost three decades of war, the countless mines that remain buried in Afghanistan still kill or maim dozens of people every month. As well as being a place for treatment, the Herat center is a small factory where production lines churn out hundreds of prostheses every month. (epa/Jalil Rezayee) The regional police chief in the north of Kosovo has been suspended after he was accused of refusing to implement the government's policy on phasing out license plates issued by Serbia when Kosovo was still part of the country. Nenad Djuric was suspended after the Police Inspectorate of Kosovo announced on November 3 that he is suspected of criminal offenses related to his refusal to implement the plan. Minister of Internal Affairs Xhelal Svecla said that the refusal to implement the governments decisions represents a serious threat to the security and stability of Kosovo. The Kosovo police is one [force] and all its members should have the same mission: the rule of law and the creation of a safe environment for all citizens regardless of difference, Svecla said on Facebook. We will not allow any action that violates this mission, and together with the Kosovo Police we will continue its implementation. The main party representing Serbs in Kosovo, Serbian List, said that the decision to suspend Djuric was illegal. Goran Rakic, chairman of the party, said that the Serbs should "strengthen and build" their own institutions in northern Kosovo in cooperation with Serbia. Rakic said that he has called an extraordinary meeting of the Serbian List with the mayors of four municipalities in the north of Kosovo with Serbian majorities. The meeting will be held after the "illegal and anti-Serbian decision" to suspend Djuric, he said. Radic said he will call on Serbs to vacate institutions in the north, including judicial, police, and other institutions. Meanwhile, the head of the office for Kosovo in the Serbian government, Petar Petkovic, told a news conference on November 3 that Djuric was suspended because "he stood in defense of the Serbian people." He questioned what mistake Djuric had made by refusing to participate in the decisions of Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti, which are political." Djuric said on November 2 that the police in the north would not implement the government's decision to issue warnings to drivers who have cars with license plates issued by Serbia. Djuric was appointed regional police commander in the north in June 2013 after Kosovo and Serbia reached the first agreement on the normalization of relations in the dialogue mediated by the European Union. The agreement stated that the regional commander in the four municipalities with Serbian majority is to be appointed by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Kosovo. Kosovo has attempted several times this year to require its Serb minority to change their old car plates from before 1999 when Kosovo was still part of Serbia. Authorities began implementing the latest plan to phase out old vehicle license plates on November 1. Kurti announced the plan last week, saying drivers would first be given warnings during an initial three-week period starting on November 1. That is to be followed by a two-month period when 150 euro ($149) fines will be issued. There will then be another two-month period during which temporary license plates will be valid. If drivers do not change their plates by April 21, their vehicles will be confiscated, according to the government decree. Kosovo and Serbia fought a war in 1998-99, with Kosovo eventually declaring independence from Serbia in 2008. Ethnic Serbs in the north of Kosovo have been using car plates issued by Serbian institutions since the end of the war with the acronyms of Kosovar cities such as KM (Kosovska Mitrovica), PR (Pristina), or UR (Urosevac). The government in Kosovo regards the plates as illegal but until now has tolerated them in four northern municipalities with Serb majorities. Russias Federal Security Service (FSB) has filed extremism charges against a leading Crimean Tatar official in the annexed Ukrainian region of Crimea. Officials announced on January 30 that Ilma Umerov, deputy chairman of the Crimean Tatar Mejlis, the communitys top executive organ, has been charged with "actions aimed at violating the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation." Umerov is in Kyiv-controlled Ukraine. In March 2016, he made televised statements calling for Russia to return Crimea, which it annexed from Ukraine in 2014. Crimean Tatars have complained of human rights violations since the annexation. The Mejlis has been outlawed by the Russian authorities. On January 27, a Russian court in the Crimean city of Simferopol accepted charges of "disseminating extremist information" against rights lawyer Emil Kurbedinov, who has served as defense attorney in numerous cases involving Crimean Tatars. About 15 percent of the population of Crimea is Crimean Tatar. With reporting by Interfax and TASS Russia's No.2 oil producer, Lukoil, is seeking opportunities for growth in the Middle East as Iran opens its oil fields to international partners, a senior executive says. "Iran is our target area at the moment," Gati Al-Jebouri, Lukoil's head of upstream operations in the Middle East, told reporters in Dubai on January 29. Lukoil is in talks with state producer National Iranian Oil on taking part in the development of the Abe Timur and Mansuri oil fields, Jebouri said, expressing hope that the companies could agree on a common development program for the fields in the first half of the year. Iran outlined about 70 oil and natural gas fields that it said will be opened to foreign investors after international sanctions eased in January 2016. It also named 29 foreign companies, including Lukoil, that it says are allowed to bid for the projects. Lukoil is developing West Qurna Phase Two oilfield in Iraq, which is currently producing 400,000 barrels per day, Jebouri said, adding that the firm was "very interested in opportunities in other countries in the Middle East" such as Kuwait, Oman, and the United Arab Emirates. Based on reporting by Bloomberg and Reuters Russia's foreign minister is suggesting that U.S. President Donald Trump did not raise the issue of human rights with Russian President Vladimir Putin during their telephone conversation on January 28. In the past, Russian officials have often bristled at what they claim have been Western attempts to teach the Russian government how it should treat its citizens and how it should behave on the international stage. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that the first conversation between the two presidents since Trump's inauguration on January 20 was marked by "mutual respect" and a desire "to speak without moralizing, focusing on the national interests of each country." Trump has indicated he will seek improvements in Russian-U.S. relations, which are badly strained over Moscow's interference in Ukraine and alleged meddling in the U.S. election. Russia has blamed the tension on the previous U.S. administration. Trump and Putin have called for closer cooperation against terrorism and the extremist group Islamic State, and statements from the Kremlin and the White House indicated that was a main topic of discussion during the call. Lavrov said that Russia is ready "at any moment" for talks with the United States on counterterrorism efforts. Also on January 30, Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it is possible the two presidents will hold talks in person sometime before a summit of the Group of 20 (G20) nations in July. The Kremlin said after the phone call that Trump and Putin had ordered subordinates to discuss the date and place for a face-to-face meeting. With reporting by dpa, Reuters, TASS, and Interfax A former Russian presidential envoy to the Sakhalin region in the Far East, Vitaly Guly, has been detained in Moscow on extremism charges. Guly's lawyer, Dagir Khasavov, said on January 30 that his client was detained at Domodedovo airport in the capital on January 27. According to Khasavov, investigators say that his client expressed views inciting hatred in a 2015 book whose title translates as At The Foot Of The Russian Olympus. Sketches For A Modern Bureaucrat's Portrait. If tried and convicted, Guly, 64, could be sentenced to five years in prison. Guly served as President Boris Yeltsin's representative in the Sakhalin region in 1991-1993, and held various posts in the presidential administration through 2000, when Vladimir Putin was elected. He was deputy presidential envoy in the Far Eastern Federal Region in 2000-2001. A decision on his possible pretrial arrest is pending. Based on reporting by RIA, TASS, and Interfax HANLONTOWN Far less diesel fuel spilled from a broken pipeline near Hanlontown last week than the 138,600 gallons most recently thought, pipeline officials said Monday. Magellan Midstream Partners now says 1,115 barrels, or about 46,830 gallons, flowed from a break discovered at 8 a.m. Wednesday just north of 390th and Wheelerwood Road in rural Worth County. That's about a third of the company's estimate last week. Magellan spokesman Bruce Heine said the Tulsa, Oklahoma-based company arrived at Mondays lower estimate when it calculated how much diesel had to be pumped back into the pipeline to get it back on line. The 127-mile long, 12-inch-wide pipeline from Clear Lake to Rosemount, Minnesota, went back into service Saturday morning. "In the process of refilling the pipeline, we were able to determine the precise amount of product that was released, which was 1,115 barrels (46,830 gallons)," Heine said via email. "This volume has been reported to the appropriate agencies." The new number is closer to the first 63,000-gallon estimate the company released to the Globe Gazette Wednesday morning shortly after the leak was discovered. Officials significantly upped their estimate later Wednesday based on the snow-covered conditions they saw on scene, only to lower it again Monday morning. A wide swath of North Iowa received more than a foot of snow Tuesday and Wednesday. Some areas, including Mason City, received several inches more. "We would rather err on the side of being overly responsive than run the risk of not being capable of handling whatever situation might be encountered," Heine said. The new estimate has been reported to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, which along with the Environmental Protection Agency is monitoring the cleanup at the site. Magellans crews have sucked up the diesel that pooled over 1 to 1 acres on the edge of an acreage and neighboring farm. The company is now digging up diesel-soaked dirt from the site and will soon haul it to a landfill in Lake Mills, said Iowa DNR environmental specialist Carl Berg. He said the amount of seepage depended on soil conditions. It varies on the location, but its everywhere from a couple of inches down to six feet at the worst, said Berg, of the DNRs office in Mason City. The landfill in Lake Mills has an impermeable plastic liner, which will prevent diesel in the dirt from leaching into surrounding soil. Officials say the leak has not affected nearby Willow Creek or the Hanlontown Slough Waterfowl Production area. Tests have also not found any contamination in the well on the acreage next to the leak, Berg said. Over the past five years, Iranian officials and state media have touted the "indigenous" ingenuity in the Islamic republic's mass-produced Mohajer-6 combat drone, which Russia has deployed in its war against Ukraine. But a new investigation by Schemes, the investigative unit of RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service, has found that electronic components underpinning Tehran's production of the Mohajer-6 are far from homegrown. The Mohajer-6 drones contain components produced by companies from the United States and the European Union, both of which have sanctions restricting the export to Iran of such technology that can be used for both civilian and military purposes dual-use technology. The presence of these components in the Mohajer-6 does not mean their producers are in violation of U.S. or EU sanctions, and RFE/RL does not have evidence that this is the case. The investigation also found Mohajer-6 components produced in China, including a real-time mini-camera made by a Hong Kong firm that said it was "very sorry" that its products were being used in war. At least one major foreign-produced component of the Mohajer-6 has previously been identified by reporters in a Mohajer-6 recovered from the battlefield by the Ukrainian military: an engine made by the Austrian manufacturer BRP-Rotax GmbH & Co KG, a subsidiary of the Canadian company Bombardier Recreational Products. But Ukrainian intelligence assesses that the Iranian combat drone contains components from nearly three dozen different technology companies based in North America, the EU, Japan, and Taiwan, the Schemes investigation has found. A majority of these companies are based in the United States. A Schemes reporter who personally inspected the foreign-made drone parts identified components produced by at least 15 of these manufacturers. These include parts made by the U.S. technology firm Texas Instruments, which said in a statement that it does not sell into Russia or Iran and complies with applicable laws and regulations. To identify these components, Schemes reporters examined parts of the Mohajer-6 drone that the Ukrainian military shot down over the Black Sea near the Mykolayiv region coastal town of Ochakiv. They also reviewed Ukrainian intelligence records on the sources of these components. The drone also contains a microchip bearing the logo of a California technology company and a thermal-imaging camera that Ukrainian intelligence says may have been produced by a firm based in Oregon or China. Both Western officials and experts on illicit technology transfers say Iran has built a broad, global procurement network using front companies and other proxies in third countries to obtain dual-use technology from the United States and the EU. "Exporters will look at the request coming from the [United Arab Emirates] or another third country, and they'll think that they're selling to an end user based there, when really the end user is in Iran," Daniel Salisbury, a senior research fellow with the Department of War Studies at King's College London, told RFE/RL. In September, the U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions specifically targeting Iranian companies that Washington links to the production and transfer of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to Russia for deployment in its war on Ukraine. Fighting rages with no sign of an end more than eight months after Russian President Vladimir Putin launched an unprovoked invasion on February 24. "Non-Iranian, non-Russian entities should also exercise great caution to avoid supporting either the development of Iranian UAVs or their transfer, or sale of any military equipment to Russia for use against Ukraine," U.S. Undersecretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian Nelson said in a statement announcing the sanctions. Chinese Cameras, California Chips Development of the Mohajer-6, the latest model in a series of drones Tehran has used since the 1980s Iran-Iraq War, began in 2017, while mass production began the following year. During a ceremony commemorating the Islamic Revolution, then-Iranian Defense Minister Amir Hatami said that the new tactical drone could perform surveillance, reconnaissance, as well as help destroy targets. Hatami extolled what he described as the drones domestic design, a portrayal echoed in later reports by Iranian media. "The homegrown drone was made through cooperation among the army, Defense Ministry, and Quds Aviation Industries," the English-language Tehran Times quoted an Iranian military official as saying in July 2019. The dismantling of the Mohajer-6 drone recovered by the Ukrainian military shows that the UAV is packed with foreign components. One of these parts is a bright-orange real-time mini-camera produced by the Hong Kong-based company RunCam Technology. Documents seen by Schemes show that Ukrainian intelligence has also identified RunCam as the producer of the camera, which likely assists in remote guidance of the drone. Founded in 2013, RunCam is involved in the development and production of so-called "first-person-view" real-time cameras. "Our users are our friends," the company's website states. The site says that RunCam has two authorized Iranian dealers. Reached by Schemes for comment about the use of its camera in the Iranian drone deployed by Russia in its war on Ukraine, RunCam said in an e-mailed response: "We are very sorry to know that RunCam's products were used in warfare. RunCam is specialized in producing products for model aircraft hobby. We never contact any customer related to military." The provenance of the Mohajer-6 drone-s thermal-imaging camera is more difficult to determine. A Ukrainian intelligence assessment reviewed by Schemes indicates it could be the Ventus Hot model produced by Sierra-Olympic Technologies, based in the U.S. state of Oregon, but that it also resembles a cheaper analog available for sale by the Chinese company Qingdao Thundsea Marine Technology. Qingdao Thundsea Marine Technology said in an e-mailed statement that the company did not "have any business with Iran," because "it will affect our business." The company said it specializes in marine services and is not involved in manufacturing. It also said that it did not have a single successful order for its online advertisement of the thermal-imaging camera resembling the one recovered from the Iranian drone. Sierra-Olympic Technologies did not respond to a request for comment on the possible use of its thermal-imaging cameras in Iranian combat drones in time for publication. Microchips recovered from the drone also featured the logos of the California-based company Linear Technology Corporation and its parent company, the Massachusetts-based semiconductor company Analog Devices, Inc. (ADI). ADI did not respond to an e-mailed request for comment on the possible use of its technology in the Iranian combat drone. Schemes reporters also observed among the components of the Iranian drone a voltage step-down converter produced by Texas Instruments. The company said in an e-mailed statement that it "does not sell into Russia, Belarus, or Iran." "TI complies with applicable laws and regulations in the countries where we operate, and does not support or condone the use of our products in applications they weren't designed for," Texas Instruments said. Schemes reporters also saw several components produced by the California-based technology manufacturer Xilinx, whose parent company is the multinational semiconductor company Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), also based in California. According to Ukrainian intelligence, one of these Xilinx components was integrated into a video data-link module located in the wing of the Mohajer-6 that helped carry out attack missions. "This module transmits information from the board to the missile head. That is, guidance for the missile. With the help of this module, it was possible to guide the missile to the target," a Ukrainian military intelligence representative told Schemes. AMD did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication. 'No Authorization' Previous media reports about the components of the Mohajer-6 drone, including by CNN, have shown evidence that its engine was produced by the Austrian manufacturer BRP-Rotax GmbH & Co KG, whose parent company is the Quebec-based Bombardier Recreational Products (BRP). The Canadian company responded to the reports on October 21, saying in a statement that it "has not authorized and has not given any authorization to its distributors to supply military UAV manufacturers in Iran or Russia." "As soon as we were made aware of this situation, we started an investigation to determine the source of the engines," BRP said. . But Schemes reporters found that the authorized Rotax distributor listed on the Austrian manufacturer's website advertised itself as a Rotax aircraft engines distributor for Iran as recently as December 2020. The distributor, the Italian company Luciano Sorlini S.p.a., has posted multiple magazine advertisements on its websites in which it describes itself as a Rotax distributor for numerous countries. Prior to January 2021, Iran was listed among these countries. The Rotax website also lists a Tehran-based company -- MahtaWing -- as an official service center for its engines. The company, known in Persian as Mahtabal, conducts repairs of Rotax engines, including the Rotax 912 iS, the engine that was found in the Mohajer-6 combat drone recovered in Ukraine. BRP said in an e-mailed statement on November 4 that while Luciano Sorlini S.p.a. is the appointed distributor of Rotax aircraft engines in Iran, "since 2019, no Rotax engines have been sold in Iran, and we will not sell any engines to Iran moving forward." The Canadian company said it had "internal controls" that "significantly" restrict the sale of its products for military purposes. "For example, the sale of any BRP product to operators with any military activity in Iran, Turkey, and Russia is strictly prohibited," BRP said. "We conduct our business in compliance with all EU, Canadian, and U.S. applicable regulations." BRP described the Iranian company MahtaWing as a "local service center" that "offers maintenance services for previously sold aircraft engines." Shahriar Siami of RFE/RL's Radio Farda contributed to this report. VIDEO REPORTS Did Russia just implicitly admit that it hacked the United States? Tajikistan has half of Central Asias water reserves. But over 40 percent of its population doesnt have access to clean water. Mustafa lives in an old car with his uncle in a parking lot in Belgrade. The 13-year-old is one of thousands Afghans living rough in Serbia. OTHER NEWS Russia's No.2 oil producer, Lukoil, is seeking opportunities for growth in the Middle East as Iran opens its oil fields to international partners, a senior executive says. Russian media reports say Valeriy Bolotov, a former leader of Russia-backed separatists in Ukraine's Luhansk region, has died in Russia at the age of 46. More than 2,000 people rallied in St. Petersburg to protest a decision by the city administration to turn the landmark St. Isaac's Cathedral over to the Russian Orthodox Church. Authorities say two police officers and three alleged militants have been killed in Russia's volatile North Caucasus region of Chechnya. Ukraine says five of its soldiers have been killed and nine wounded in some of the worst fighting in eastern Ukraine in weeks. Colleagues of lawmaker Ihor Kononenko, a member of Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenkos parliamentary bloc, have repeated claims he was poisoned before the New Year, citing medical tests suggesting mercury in his body exceeding normal levels by a factor of 50. (Ukrainian Service) In an exclusive interview with RFE/RL, Zurab Abashidze, Georgias special envoy for relations with Russia, said the resumption of diplomatic relations between the two countries must be predicated upon the start of a process for a fair settlement of the conflicts in Abkhazia and South Ossetia." (Russian Service) Macedonia's conservative leader has failed to reach a deal with his traditional ethnic Albanian allies to form a new government as the midnight deadline expired on January 29. Hungarys foreign minister says economic sanctions imposed by the European Union against Russia have been "bad news for Europe," and welcomed the timing of President Vladimir Putin's planned trip to Budapest next week. Returning tigers to Central Asia would involve using the Amur tiger from the Russian Far East, a subspecies that is nearly identical genetically to the extinct Caspian tiger. At a recent ceremony, recipients of Russian state honors accepted the awards with slavish praise for President Vladimir Putin, prompting politician Nikolay Travkin to observe that the more adoration you show, the more budget money you will get. Journalist Artemiy Troitsky said such idolatry compares to that shown to Leonid Brezhnev, although today the situation is worse, since there is an impression that if not Putin, then everything will collapse. (over 60K views on Russian Service website) RFE/RL takes a closer look at what the readouts said -- and left unsaid -- about sanctions, Ukraine, Syria and terrorism. Diplomatic problems are coming at the same time economic problems are hammering Turkmenistan, as this tiff, one of several recent bilateral rows, shows. Avalanches triggered by warm weather following heavy snowfall have killed at least seven people in Tajikistan's mountainous south. A spokeswoman for Tajikistan's Emergencies Committee, Umeda Yusufova, told RFE/RL on January 30 that the death toll may rise as rescue teams continue working on the Dushanbe-Khujand highway and in the Gorno-Badakhshan region, where more than 40 major avalanches were registered over the weekend. Officials said some 500 people stranded in their cars after avalanches blocked the highway were rescued on January 28. Mountains cover 93 percent of the Central Asian nation, and avalanches and mudslides kill dozens of people every year. A youth activist in Russia's Tatarstan region is being tried on terror-related charges over a social-media post praising the killing of 49 people at a gay nightclub in Florida last year. The Volga Regional Military Court in the city of Samara started hearing Ramil Ibragimov's case on January 30. Ibragimov, the head of Tatarstan's Union of the Young Leaders of Innovations, was charged with "public calls for terrorism and justifying terrorist activities" over a June 14 Instagram post supporting the killing of people it referred to as "fags." In very vulgar language, the post expressed regret that dozens of injured people who survived the shooting "did not croak." The post came two days after Omar Mateen, an American with Afghan roots, fatally shot 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida. Mateen, who was killed by police at the scene, pledged allegiance to the extremist group Islamic State (IS) during the attack. In his Instagram post, Ibragimov called Mateen "a straight Afghan fella." Protests against U.S. President Donald Trump's temporary travel ban on citizens from mainly Muslim countries are growing louder outside the United States, with the world's largest body of Islamic nations expressing "grave concern" and German Chancellor Angela Merkel saying the move "runs contrary to the basic principles of international refugee help." Merkel made the comments on January 30, saying such bans are not justified by the effort to counter terrorism. She added that her government is in consultation with "European partners" on the matter. Vowing to protect the United States from "foreign terrorists," Trump signed an executive order on January 27 halting the entire U.S. refugee program for 120 days, indefinitely banning Syrian refugees, and suspending all immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries for 90 days. Such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists." The move led to protests and legal challenges in the United States, as well as wide criticism abroad. All seven countries involved in the order -- Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Sudan, and Yemen -- are member states of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), which said "many of those fleeing war and persecution have been adversely and unjustly affected" by the measure. "Such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists," the 57-nation organization said in a January 30 statement. In Iraq, lawmakers said they voted on January 30 to call on the government to enact a reciprocal travel ban on U.S. citizens if Washington does not rescind its decision to bar the entry of Iraqis. Meanwhile, the Iraqi Foreign Ministry called on the Trump administration to reconsider this wrong decision." Yemen's government also expressed its "dissatisfaction" over Trump's order, saying it is "likely to strengthen the position of extremists." "The only way to achieve victory in the fight against terrorism...is dialogue and not creating barriers," it added. To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban ... This is not about religion. This is about terror and keeping our country safe." Former U.S. President Barack Obama issued a statement on January 30 saying he "fundamentally disagrees" with any policy that discriminates on the basis of religion. He added that "American values are at stake" and said he was "heartened" by the engagement of U.S. citizens in protesting the policy. Trump stood firm over the ban, saying visas would once again be issued once "the most secure policies" were in place. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting," he said in a January 29 statement. "This is not about religion. This is about terror and keeping our country safe." On January 28, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif called Trump's decision "a great gift to extremists " and "a clear insult to the Islamic world." He said Trump's decision "only serves to provide a fertile ground for more terrorist recruitment by deepening the ruptures and fault lines which have been exploited by extremist demagogues to swell their ranks." Zarifs ministry earlier said it would reciprocate with a ban on Americans entering the country, though it will not apply to those who already have a valid visa. Meanwhile, the United Nations human rights chief Zeid bin Ra'ad Zeid al-Hussein described Trump's order as "mean-spirited." Zeid said in a tweet that "discrimination on nationality alone is forbidden under human rights law," adding that the U.S. ban "wastes resources needed for proper counterterrorism." With reporting by AFP, AP, and Reuters Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has cut short a working visit to Germany to oversee an emergency situation that has developed around the eastern Ukrainian town of Avdiivka. Officials said on January 30 that there was heavy shelling from Russia-supported militants in Avdiivka, near the city of Donetsk overnight. At least 12 people were reported killed, including three Ukrainian soldiers in the latest violence, despite the fact of an "indefinite" cease-fire was agreed last month. A spokesman for Poroshenko told Interfax that the situation around Avdiivka has become "an emergency situation verging on a humanitarian disaster." Earlier, Poroshenko met with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, telling her that the West should extend and strengthen sanctions against Russia if there is no progress in implementing the Minsk agreements on resolving the conflict. Poroshenko also discussed the conflict in eastern Ukraine with German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel The conflict between Ukrainian government forces and the separatists has killed more than 9,750 civilians and combatants in eastern Ukraine since April 2014. Based on reporting by BBC, RIA Novosti, and Interfax NOVOLUHANSKE, Ukraine -- The way Ukrainian commander Vyacheslav "Eagle-Owl" Vlasenko described it, his troops snuck into this rustic town of 4,000 people in broad daylight and took it -- and a valuable pig farm -- without firing a shot. Concealed in trucks that looked like those used by the pig farm, the troops' advance into Nuvoluhanske -- which had been part of the gray zone, a ravaged no-man's land between the warring sides -- took their Russia-backed separatist foes by surprise. "We used civilian trucks and a sort of maskirovka," Vlasenko, clad in fatigues, told RFE/RL at the command-and-control center of the Ukrainian Army's 46th battalion in nearby Zaitseve on January 23. It was a reference to a deception tactic widely credited to Russian military planners and employed by the Kremlin when it seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014. "It was 1 p.m." Vlasenko said. "They figured out what had happened at 8:45 p.m. and began firing artillery, striking near our defensive positions on the east side of the pig farm." Mounting Discontent Frustrated by the stalemate in this 33-month war of attrition, concerned that Western support is waning, and sensing that U.S. President Donald Trump could cut Kyiv out of any peace negotiations as he tries to improve fraught relations with Moscow, Ukrainian forces anxious to show their newfound strength have gone on what many here are calling a "creeping offensive." Observers say the Ukrainians appear to be trying to create new facts on the ground, while officials and commanders insist they are fighting to stop the flow of contraband into separatist-controlled territories and fending off attempts by separatist groups that call themselves the Donetsk and Luhansk "people's republics" to seize more territory. Whatever the case, since mid-December Ukraine's armed forces have edged farther into parts of the gray zone in or near the war-worn cities of Avdiivka, Debaltseve, Dokuchaievsk, Horlivka, and Mariupol, shrinking the space between them and the separatist fighters. In doing so, the pro-Kyiv troops have sparked bloody clashes with their enemy, which has reportedly made advances of its own -- or tried to -- in recent weeks. The Ukrainian military reported that 17 of its soldiers were killed in the December battles. At least 16 more have been killed in fighting this month, including seven on January 29-30. There are no reliable figures for the separatist side. In all, Europe's only active war has claimed the lives of more than 9,750 people and displaced some 1.7 million more since it began in April 2014, according to the United Nations. And all signs point to the conflict getting worse before it gets better. Fears Of Escalation Stalker, the nom de guerre of a commanding officer who declined to give his full name, showed RFE/RL through the 46th battalion's labyrinth of freshly dug trenches that keep the soldiers safe from artillery shells and sheltered from the biting winter. Within the stuffy confines of a bunker housing weapons, ammunition, rations, and half a dozen men and at least one woman, soldiers warmed themselves by a field stove, checked social media on their smartphones, and prepared borsch during a rare lull in fighting. They were the lucky ones. Three of their fellow troops had been wounded and evacuated since taking up the position, Stalker said. All that divides the two sides here is 350 meters and a cemetery smack in the middle of a snow-covered field -- a dark symbol that is not lost on the fighters. Soon, from a road over the hill came a convoy of European monitors who had been critical of the advances. They were there to inspect the new Novoluhanske positions. "The direct result of forward moves is escalation in tension, which often turns to violence," Alexander Hug, the principal deputy chief monitor of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe's Special Monitoring Mission (OSCE SMM) to Ukraine, had told RFE/RL prior to his visit. Hug said the soldiers had recently become more brazen. For much of the conflict, they have played a game of hide-and-seek with the OSCE, concealing their weapons from the international monitors' scrutinizing eyes. But, Hug said, they now position large-caliber artillery, including towed howitzers, main battle tanks, and multiple-launch rocket systems banned under the Minsk deal "in the open with impunity." Caught In The Cross Fire As the two sides push closer to each other, they risk not only their own lives but those of civilians. On January 27, Hug reported five civilians had been killed this month alone as a result of the clashes. He said 19 were killed in all of 2016, a year in which the OSCE recorded more than 300,000 cease-fire violations. At an elementary school in Novoluhanske a few hundred meters from the 46th battalion's new trenches, teacher Lyudmila Alekseyevna told RFE/RL while watching her fourth-graders slide down an icy mound that townspeople feel like "death is knocking on our doors." "We are ready for peace to return to us," she said, adding that she did not know why the military had come to Novoluhanske. Combating Lawlessness Pavlo Zhebrivskyy, the governor of the Donetsk region, told RFE/RL at his office in Kramatorsk that the Novoluhanske move to where there had been no police presence was necessary to stop smuggling. With supplies limited in the conflict zone, a lucrative black market has flourished. Kyiv estimates traffickers make millions sneaking coal, fuel, food, and more across the front line. In the past week, nationalist activists have blocked "indefinitely" a railway line they claim is used to trade illegal contraband with the separatists. "There was no law enforcement to stop criminal activity, [including] the illegal smuggling of Ukrainian goods...of pig meat," said commander Vlasenko. Novoluhanske's pig farm houses some 93,000 swine and produces up to 20 tons of meat per day, much of which soldiers claimed and journalists reported had been trafficked into separatist-controlled territory. Zhebrivskyy said that "98 percent of smuggling" around Novoluhanske ceased after the 46th battalion's arrival. Bumpy Road To Peace Hug said battlefield advances by both sides make implementing the 2015 peace deal, known as the Minsk agreement, "more difficult." Ukrainian authorities insist their moves do not endanger the peace process and are not in violation of the Minsk deal because they did not cross in separatist-controlled territory. "According to the Minsk agreement, there is a clear delineation of the contact line, and there were absolutely no violations by Ukraine in terms of the contact line, but there have been significant violations on the other side's part," Ukrainian Defense Minister Stepan Poltorak told RFE/RL in Kyiv on January 21. Put more simply, Stalker said, "It's our Ukrainian land. How can it ever be a violation?" Russians In Waiting There is also a haunting prospect of Ukraine's creeping offensive: the risk of provoking a military response from Russia, as Kyiv and Western officials say previous advances did. Ukraine suffered two devastating defeats -- in Ilovaisk in August 2014 and in Debaltseve in February 2015 -- that left hundreds of troops dead after Russia-backed forces encircled them and pounded their positions with heavy artillery. The battle changed the Ukrainians' calculus and gave the separatist side the clear upper hand. Poltorak noted that Russia has since constructed several military bases and camps close to Ukraine's border, which allows Russia to deploy thousands of its troops "within a matter of hours." Moreover, he claimed, 5,000 regular soldiers of the Russian armed forces are already on separatist-held territory, along with 40,000 Russian nationals fighting in separatist militias. In addition to personnel, Poltorak said, Russia has deployed to eastern Ukraine "more than 600 main battle tanks, more than 1,300 armored vehicles, more than 700 pieces of artillery, and more than 450 multiple-launch rocket systems." Russia denies sponsoring the separatists or deploying its forces to Ukrainian territory, despite overwhelming evidence of both. New Strength? Ukraine's army appears to feel emboldened almost three years after the start of the fighting, having undergone a crash course in warfare and modernized its military -- bold enough for some to say the occupied areas of eastern Ukraine could be "liberated" by the end of 2017. After increasing its defense budget to about $6 billion, Ukraine created a standing army of 250,000 soldiers -- up from only 5,000 to 6,000 combat-ready troops in April 2014, Poltorak said. That makes it among the largest armies in Europe. Meanwhile, its state arms maker has pumped out new military materiel, including an unmanned fighting vehicle, and it hopes to manufacture a new main battle tank to rival one made by Russia. Last month, Ukraine tested a new "high-precision" missile for Smerch multiple-launch rocket systems that has a range of 60 kilometers. Peace Through Power While leaders in Kyiv and Moscow say publicly the only way to solve the current conflict is through political means, neither has shown a willingness to do so, Hug said. Asked about the Ukrainian military's recent advances and weapons testing, Poltorak said a political solution is "only possible if Ukraine will have a powerful army." Otherwise, he said, its adversaries won't take it seriously. Back in Novoluhanske, the 46th battalion's Vlasenko boasted that if politicians couldn't bring an end to the war, his soldiers could recapture the occupied territories by force "and be at the border with Russia in around six months." But he added a caveat: "It would cost many civilian lives." DULLES INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, Virginia -- Travelers filing out of the international arrivals exit here on January 30 were greeted with smiles, signs, and songs on the third day of protests against President Donald Trumps temporary ban on foreign travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries. Dozens of demonstrators lined the corridor leading out of the international arrivals hall, holding up placards reading "We Are All Immigrants," "Welcome Home," and "Wont You Be My Neighbor?" throughout the day, occasionally breaking into songs like America The Beautiful and This Land Is Your Land. It was a pleasant sight for travelers arriving from all over the world, many of whom grinned and thanked the volunteer welcoming committee. One airline crew member passing the crowd thrust his thumb skyward in a sign of approval. Despite the show of support at the U.S. capitals main gateway for international travelers, rights activists and volunteer attorneys who have set up shop in the hall expressed frustration. They say they have been unable to obtain information about individuals who may have been detained by Customs and Border Protection officers acting on the executive order signed by Trump on January 27. That order has sparked chaos not just at Dulles but at airports around the United States, and the world, as travelers got mixed messages about who was affected, and border agents enforced the rules haphazardly. Adding to the chaos were a series of federal court rulings that suspended some parts of the executive order. The protests also sparked massive protests in U.S. cities and at a growing number of airports, as well. "Right now, our efforts are somewhat thwarted by the fact that Customs and Border Protection here at Washington Dulles has not been communicative about how many people are in deferred inspection, whether theyre refugees, or green-card holders, or special-immigrant visa holders," Nithya Nathan-Pineau of Capital Area Immigrants Rights Coalition told RFE/RL. Her group was manning one of two tables stocked with doughnuts, coffee, and granola bars set up by a small army of activists and volunteer attorneys working to identify relatives of travelers who may have been detained under the temporary ban on arrivals from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen. The Trump administration has defended the measure as critical to the nations security and has said it is not a "Muslim ban." Many of the protesters at Dulles on January 30 held anti-Trump placards, though the president had at least one voter among the crowd. Danny, a 33-year-old from Virginia who declined to give his last name, said he voted for Trump because he despised his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton. He told RFE/RL that he came out to protest because "America is built on civil liberties and the protection of our civil liberties, and any erosion of our civil liberties should be an issue for all members of a free, sentient, and educated society." "We dont classify people based on religion in this country, nor will we stand by and abide by it," Danny said. Volunteers, both young and old, remained throughout the afternoon, asking coordinators how they could pitch in. Kamyar Arsani, a 24-year-old teacher originally from Tehran, told RFE/RL that he had arrived for the third straight day to offer his assistance as a Persian translator. He said that so far he has interacted with two Iranian families, residents of Washington, who had difficulties crossing the border with their green cards, officially known as lawful permanent residency permits. "They were held for 24 hours, and their questioning was pretty much ridiculous questioning that had nothing to do with terrorist interactions or anything," Arsani said. "And after that they just released them." The White House has defended the order as a necessary way to protect American citizens. Spokesman Sean Spicer insisted to reporters on January 30 that its impact had been "blown way out of proportion and exaggerated." WATCH: U.S. Senator Tim Kaine speaks to the press at Dulles International Airport Senator Tim Kaine (Democrat-Virginia), who was Clinton's vice presidential nominee in the 2016 election, denounced the measure as a religion-based ban, "pure and simple." He said border officials told him that no one had been detained at Dulles since January 29. Kaine also said border officials explained to him how the policy applies to green-card holders from the countries listed in Trump's executive order. They will be allowed to board flights abroad, then will be questioned upon entry into the United States, with the expectation that they will then be allowed in, he said. Meanwhile, a growing number of Republican lawmakers have spoken out about the order, though many have focused on its confused roll-out rather than its legality or the specific groups it has targeted. Senators John McCain (Republican-Arizona) and Lindsey Graham (Republican-South Carolina) released a statement on January 29 that said the order could be a propaganda victory for Islamic extremists. Senators Marco Rubio (Republican-Florida) and Tim Scott (Republican-South Carolina) said in a joint statement that "the manner in which these measures were crafted and implemented have greatly contributed to the confusion, anxiety, and uncertainty of the last few days." Senator Pat Toomey (Republican-Pennsylvania) said he supported increased vetting for immigrants, but he said "unfortunately, the initial executive order was flawed -- it was too broad and poorly explained." Thousands of people took part in protests across the America following an executive order banning travel to the United States by nationals from seven mostly Muslim countries. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said the order may need to be extended to other countries, such as Pakistan. (AP/Reuters) MASON CITY | A Mason City man was given a deferred judgment Monday on a felony conviction of delivery of methamphetamine. Roger Nuehring, 56, was put on probation for five years. A $1,000 civil penalty was suspended but he was ordered to pay $350 restitution to the state, a $125 surcharge and court costs. If he successfully completes probation, the conviction will be stricken from his record. Mason City man charged with meth delivery MASON CITY | A Mason City man accused of delivering meth in April is in the Cerro Gordo Coun Nuehring delivered meth to an individual under the control of agents of the North Central Iowa Narcotics Task Force on April 21, according to court documents. He pleaded guilty in November. -- Mary Pieper During the 1928 election campaign in the United States, the Republican Party hailed the kind of prosperity that put a "chicken in every pot." It echoed a possibly apocryphal quote widely attributed to King Henry IV of France desiring a "chicken to eat, every Sunday" for every laborer. Uzbekistan's new president, Shavkat Mirziyaev, has gone a step further, ordering every rural household to keep chickens as a source of food and potential income for families. Mirziyaev made the comment during a recent visit to the poorest part of the country, the western Karakalpakstan Autonomous Region, made up mainly of desert and parts of which are an ecological disaster zone due to alkaline soil and wind-borne salt from the desiccating Aral Sea. The president's plan is for every rural household to have 100 chickens that would produce "at least" 50 eggs daily, 10 of which they could eat and the other 40 of which they could sell. RFE/RL's Uzbek Service, known locally as Ozodlik, produced a light-hearted video based on a clip of Mirziyaev's comments and graphics outlining the plan. As a program for low-income families, or as food security for remote areas, the plan has merit. On the other hand, if every household is keeping chickens, it is unclear to whom all those families will be able to sell their extra eggs. Ozodlik spoke with some residents of Uzbekistan who agreed, on condition of anonymity, to give their opinion of Mirziyaev's plan. One person explained that he knew nothing about keeping chickens except that they needed medicines sometimes, which would cost him money, and the effort needed to tend to 100 chickens would leave him little time for anything else. There is also the matter of chicken feed, which is not in huge supply in Uzbekistan and therefore might need to be purchased from other countries -- a matter made more difficult by the fact that the Uzbek national currency, the som, is not convertible. However, it is encouraging that Mirziyaev, who was sworn in in December to succeed the late Islam Karimov, is considering ways to improve the lives of Uzbekistan's people, even if this initial proposal is probably in need of some refining. Based on material from RFE/RL's Uzbek Service The views expressed in this blog post do not necessarily reflect the views of RFE/RL. Unable to resolve an innocence claim in a 1977 rape case because of a lack of information, the Virginia Supreme Court on Monday ordered Portsmouth Circuit Court to conduct an evidentiary hearing on the matter within 90 days. Roy L. Watford III, 57, filed a petition for a writ of actual innocence with the high court in August, citing DNA evidence that he contends shows he is innocent of the Sept. 14, 1977, rape of a 12-year-old girl in Portsmouth. Watford, 18 at the time, pleaded guilty to win a 10-year suspended sentence that allowed him to stay out of jail and remain in high school. He has no other criminal record. Two of Watfords brothers were initially charged but not convicted. While opposing Watfords petition, the Virginia Attorney Generals Office has acknowledged that the case is unsettling. Both Watfords lawyer, Jonathan Sheldon of Fairfax, and the Attorney Generals Office have complained there is missing and unknown information about the crime and trial, in part due to the age of the case and because Watford pleaded guilty instead of going to trial, where there would have been a full airing of the evidence. Mondays Supreme Court order directs the Portsmouth Circuit Court to forward its findings within 30 days of the hearing. There are two types of writs of actual innocence in Virginia, one involving non-biological/DNA evidence that is filed with the Virginia Court of Appeals and the other involving DNA evidence that goes to the Virginia Supreme Court. Lawyers contacted Monday who have worked on DNA-related writ petitions said this may be the first one in which an evidentiary hearing has been ordered. The victim said she was raped by Watford and his brothers on a mattress in a vacant home. One of the brothers was found not innocent in juvenile court, and charges were dropped against the third brother. Sheldon said the victim has been uncooperative with him and authorities. DNA testing as part of Virginias post-conviction DNA project identified the DNA of several males from semen found at the scene. The DNA did not belong to Watfords brothers. In 2010, Watford also was excluded, leading to his filing for a writ of actual innocence last year. Sheldon sent the court more information in November, including some of the records in the case file that had not been available when Watfords petition was filed. The records show that a man now serving life in prison for murder was called as a witness. That man has a brother recently released for a 1988 rape in Portsmouth. Among the 17 questions the justices want answered are: When, to whom and under what circumstances did the victim first report the assault? What description of the assailants did she give police immediately after the assault? How certain was she of her identification of the Watford brothers, and how well did she know them? Does the victim have any further testimony regarding the attack? Why was the man now in prison for murder asked to testify in the case and what, if any, relationship did that man have to the victim? Has the DNA of that man and his brothers been compared to the DNA profiles developed as evidence in the case? The Attorney Generals Office has told the Supreme Court that Watford may well have not pleaded guilty had he known of the DNA evidence in 1978, but that does not demonstrate actual innocence. The attorney generals office added that if two other offenders suggested as the real perpetrators by Sheldon had been involved, there was no cold hit when the DNA profiles were run through the states DNA databank. The state agrees that the victim was very upset and confused about what happened during her attack. That, however, does not exonerate Watford. The victim may have accurately identified Watford and been mistaken about his brothers. The Attorney Generals Office wrote to the high court in January, The commonwealth is sensitive to the complexity this case presents, but without a more complete record that places the test results in context, the commonwealth maintains that the evidence is equivocal. Sheldon said Monday that considering the Attorney Generals Office opposes the petition, having the court grant an evidentiary hearing is an important step, and Mr. Watford looks forward to the chance to prove that he is innocent. "We have been working to better understand the facts of these situations and, importantly, both the intent and impact of these events on members of our community," the provost says. HANLONTOWN | Crews on Friday had almost finished vacuuming up the diesel that pooled over 1-1.5 acres of farmland and an acreage after a pipeline break near Hanlontown, an official said. The task is the first step in cleaning up the effects of a 138,000-gallon spill that spewed from a broken pipeline north of 390th Street and Wheelerwood Road. Officials found the leak about 8 a.m. Wednesday in a 12-inch pipe owned by Magellan Midstream Partners. The company planned to vacuum up the diesel pooled on the surface before it digs up contaminated dirt underneath. "That's mostly been completed," said Jeff Vansteenburg, a field office supervisor for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. "They're hitting a few spots where there may be some puddles." The Iowa DNR and Environmental Protection Agency have been at the scene along with law-enforcement and Magellan's crews. This weekend, the company will begin scraping up the contaminated soil and staging it for transport, Vansteenburg said. It will be hauled away on Monday when the waste sites open. Its unclear how much dirt will need to be removed. Vansteenburg saw an area where diesel appeared to have soaked about two feet down, but it wasnt clear that was uniform across the contaminated area. He said Magellan is testing soil samples to determine the extent of contamination. Removing the dirt will likely continue into at least next week, Vansteenburg said. The broken pipe has been repaired. Officials are still investigating what caused the break. Check back at globegazette.com for updates on this developing story. Update: Pipeline repaired, cleanup continues 11:45 a.m. Update HANLONTOWN | Repairs have been completed on a ruptured pipeline that spilled 138,000 gallons of diesel near Hanlontown, a company spokesman said Friday. Diesel from the break covered roughly an acre of farmland and neighboring acreage north of 390th Street and Wheelerwood. The break was discovered Wednesday morning in a 12-inch line owned by Magellan Midstream Partners. The cause is still under investigation. Originally believed to involve about 63,000 gallons, the Tulsa, Okla.-based company revised that estimate to 3,300 barrels, or about 138,600 gallons. It's the sixth-largest petroleum spill in the United States in a decade. Magellan Spokesman Bruce Heine said the company and environmental specialists are continuing to make progress at the pipe. He wouldn't answer if all the diesel had been sucked up and hauled away, or if those efforts were still ongoing. The Iowa Department of Natural Resources says the company must remove the liquid and remove all the contaminated soil. "The diesel fuel is contained in the immediate area of the pipeline release and the fuel has not come into contact with any waterways," Heine said via e-mail. The company is working toward resuming operations. "However, we do not have an estimate when we pipeline operations will resume at this time," Heine said. "We do not expect this incident to disrupt supply of gasoline, diesel and other refined petroleum products in the region." Check back at globegazette.com for updates on this developing story. Our previous story: Clean-up continues at Hanlontown pipeline break HANLONTOWN | Crews continued for a third day on Friday to clean up 138,000 gallons of diesel that spilled from a broken pipeline near Hanlontown. The break was discovered about 8 a.m. a third of a mile north of 390th Street and Wheelerwood Road. That's about three miles north and a mile east of Hanlontown. The broken 12-inch pipe owned by Magellan Midstream Partners created a pool of diesel covering roughly an acre of farm ground and a neighboring acreage. The spill is not far from Willow Creek, which runs just east of Wheelerwood Road, and just northeast of the Hanlontown Waterfowl Production Area, a 939-acre wildlife area managed by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. The Iowa DNR is monitoring the two areas for impacts, but has so far not seen any contamination, officials said. Magellan has roughly 70 people on site to clean up the spill. The Iowa DNR says the company will suck up the diesel and contaminated snow, and then dig up and haul away the contaminated soil. The 3,300-barrel spill from the break is the largest diesel spill reported to the U.S. Department of Transportation since January 2010, according to the department's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration records. Officials from Tulsa, Okla.-based Magellan notified the Worth County Sheriffs Office early Wednesday there was a leak somewhere in a stretch of pipeline covering a broad area, including possibly in Worth County, said Worth County Sheriff Dan Fank. A Worth County sheriffs deputy helped look for the leak, which was found near Hanlontown about 8 a.m. The Worth County Sheriff's Office, like other counties in the area, has a map of the maze of pipelines that run underneath the surface of North Iowa. Pipeline companies hold trainings with local law-enforcement agencies and, in the case of Worth County, has told them what to look for in case of a leak. Youre looking if theres steam coming up anything thats out of the norm, Fank said. You might see spray coming out in the area (or) you might see discoloration. The Worth County Sheriffs Office has been on site around-the-clock since the leak was found. Deputies, as well as members of the departments reserve program, are manning an incident command center and maintaining road blocks to allow trucks and heavy equipment to get to the leak site. Theres a lot of trucks and a lot of machinery moving, Fank said. No injuries or evacuations were reported. Check back at globegazette.com for updates on this developing story. Police are conducting a death investigation after a fatal shooting in South Richmond. Shortly before 11 p.m. Sunday, officers were called to Chippenham Hospital, where a gunshot victim had arrived minutes earlier. The victim, identified as Mikequan Blakey, 21, of the 3200 block of Ransom Hills Road in Chesterfield County, died of his wounds shortly thereafter. Officers determined that Blakey had been shot in the 1000 block of Forestview School Drive, police said. Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to call major crimes detective Mark Godwin at (804) 646-5533 or contact Crime Stoppers at (804) 780-1000 or www.7801000.com. You can also submit tips about people who illegally possess a gun by texting Crime Stoppers at 274637, using the keyword GUN250 followed by the tip. Rewards of up to $250 are possible. RICHMOND From the floor of the House of Delegates, the only Muslim member of Virginias General Assembly spoke out Monday against President Donald Trumps executive order, which bans citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. Del. Sam Rasoul, D-Roanoke, called Trumps order a distraction, and said he is proud to protect the legacy of Founding Fathers James Madison and Thomas Jefferson champions of religious freedom. Americas founding fathers agreed that a republic without religious freedom was impossible, Rasoul said. Madison fought hard for religious minorities. He preached religious freedom at a time when Anglican Christians persecuted and imprisoned Baptists, Rasoul said. Last year, the House of Delegates reiterated the work of the countrys Founding Fathers when it passed a resolution commending religious freedom and doubling down on the states commitment to individual freedoms, personal liberty and the free exercise of religion. Protecting religious freedom is a core Virginia value and part of the Founding Fathers legacy, Rasoul said. All sides shouldnt just defend Muslims, women, refugees, Latinos, he said. We must defend our core American values. Rasoul was born in the United States. His family emigrated from the Palestinian territory. Trumps order bans citizens from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia from entering the country. The order also bars refugees from entering the country for 120 days. Del. Mark Levine, D-Alexandria, also criticized Trumps order from the House floor, saying he was horrified to hear about the ban and encouraged other delegates to speak out against Trumps actions. The Jewish legislator said Trumps action banning Syrian and other refugees reminded him of when the U.S. turned away Jewish refugees fleeing Europe prior to the Holocaust and World War II. A bill to legalize the possession of switchblades in Virginia for recreational and work use passed the House of Delegates Monday. The legislation sponsored by Del. R. Lee Ware Jr., R-Powhatan comes at the request of a Richmond-area switchblade enthusiast worried that he and his colleagues in the Greater Richmond Knife Club are breaking the law by taking knives from their collections to monthly club meetings. During floor debate last week, Ware said the bill would also help roofers and other workers who may need easy access to a blade that can be opened by a button or switch, without the use of two hands. Look past the shining but disconcerting name, switchblade, and look at the actual purpose and words of the legislation, Ware said. And join me in helping ordinary folks hobbyists and tradesmen by voting on this bill. Del. Alfonso H. Lopez, D-Arlington, called switchblades dangerous and deadly weapons and said lawmakers were opening the door to loosening rules on other weapons such as ballistic knives, which can be ejected a short distance. Lopez also noted that the Virginia Citizens Defense League, a gun-rights group, had voiced support for the bill as a self-defense measure. We are creating a minefield here, folks, Lopez said. The Virginia Sheriffs Association raised concerns with the bills original form, saying recreational purposes could mean just about any activity, not just hobby collecting. The bill was amended to say lawful recreational activity. A handful of Republicans joined House Democrats in opposition to House Bill 1432. Under current law, switchblades cannot be carried concealed. Anyone caught with a switchblade is automatically presumed to have the intent of selling it and could be found guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of up to $250. Donald Trump says torture works. Speculation suggests the administration might resume the practice and reopen so-called black site prisons that employ horrific tactics the U.S. would never resort to in official detention centers. Virginia Sen. Mark Warner differs. The ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee says that torture not only is bad policy but that it also violates the law. Many Republicans agree with him. Warners Democratic colleagues on the intelligence panel have joined him in calling on Trump administration officials to read the official 2014 report on detention and interrogation. Our thoughts turn to Gen. Dwight Eisenhower and World War II. As Allied armies swept across Europe, they liberated concentration camps. Eisenhower made a point of introducing nearby residents to the sites in part because he did not believe claims of ignorance. He also took Allied troops on tours of the facilities. The troops encountered horrors that cannot be described. We are told that the American soldier does not know what he is fighting for, Eisenhower explained. Now, at least, he will know what he is fighting against. Whatever happened to the Iran nuclear deal? It used to be a central issue in U.S. foreign policy. We talked about it all the time. We even argued over whether we should bomb Iran. In fact, it is now a done deal and all sides began implementation in early 2016 requiring severe limits and effective monitoring of Irans nuclear program. The new administration promised to tear it up. It may still do that which is why it is worth spending a few minutes considering that prospect. Lend me your eyes and your mind.... Today, we follow closely the next steps of our new administration and worry about Russian action in Syria, the test of a North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile, and new tensions with Europe and indeed China. We dont fret about an imminent Iranian nuclear threat, because there isnt one. Tough and principled American diplomacy removed that danger for nearly 15 years. Even if Iran decides to violate the agreement and build a bomb, it would take them at least a year. It is one less worry we must confront in 2017, a year that has barely begun but is already brimming with uncertainty and concerns. Iran faces a new election in the late spring with President Rouhani running as a possible winner. It is too early to predict we have now learned that but he and his team played a major role in getting us here. He supports pragmatic policies and a new approach to Iran as a member of the international community in reasonably good standing. He has fierce opponents who see Iran in deep danger and are willing to lash out to try to protect it and who oppose a Jewish state in the region and support a Shiite religious hegemony across an arc of the northern Middle East. But Iran has more choices now, as opposed to the past 35 years, and we welcome a more moderate Iran over the long term. Now, imagine there was no international agreement curtailing Irans nuclear program, no program of unprecedented inspections, no removal of thousands of centrifuges, no disablement of the plutonium-producing Arak reactor, no shipping out of 98 percent of Irans enriched uranium. Absent an agreement, Tehrans hard-liners will still try to take the next election to push forward with the nuclear program. But they cant, because Irans program is locked down under the most intrusive inspection system ever devised and supported by more than 100 other countries in the world who oppose nuclear proliferation in any form. Of course, the agreement isnt perfect; no agreement is. Irans leaders and particularly the hard-liners complain that the U.S. has not kept its side of the bargain on sanctions relief. The international community worries about Irans supply of arms to regional hot spots, but the core of the agreement which caps and reduces Irans nuclear activities has been a success. How do we know that? The International Atomic Energy Agency, with its 24/7 monitoring of nuclear facilities and wide access to them, has confirmed Irans compliance for more than three years. And where there have been differences, those have been quickly settled to our satisfaction under arrangements provided for in the agreement. If we violate the deal, Iran will be free to go for a bomb, or free to isolate us by keeping the deal and its declared policy not to become a nuclear weapons state. But many still just do not understand what the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action accomplished for U.S. security. They want to torpedo the agreement and start over, by either walking away outright or killing it by introducing new sanctions. If we do that, it will be the U.S. not Iran that will get the blame. Our allies have already made clear that, if we break the agreement, they will not join in new sanctions. And without new international sanctions, starting all over again is dead on arrival. If the agreement is not preserved by the United States, Irans hard-liners will be free to do whatever they want with their nuclear program. Instead, we should begin now to think about how we can make that deal a more permanent arrangement for Iran and the rest of the world. We should not throw away our own achievements and we should keep our word. At a time when new international dangers seem to emerge with each passing day, we should be thankful that Irans nuclear program is one less worry in what promises to be a very busy year. Monday morning's snowflakes should be the last for January, but another chance for wintry precipitation could appear in Virginia around the first weekend of February. Flurries made a couple of brief appearances in the Richmond metro area on Monday, and it was enough for a dusting of snow on the grass in many of the northern suburbs. Early morning snow showers coated much of Northern Virginia with 1 to 3 inches of snow, but mainly on grass and elevated surfaces instead of on the pavement. Looking ahead, a warm front on Tuesday and a cold front on Wednesday will probably pass through without much impact. But skies will feature a mix of clouds and sun on both days, and a sprinkle can't be ruled out on Wednesday evening. High pressure will return on Thursday, bringing seasonably cold weather that will last into the weekend. Low pressure may develop in North Carolina on Friday, but for now it looks like most of that rain will stay to the south of the Richmond metro. If it takes a more northerly position, it could spread some more snow showers or sprinkles our way. Like Monday's system, it would be weak and contain relatively little moisture. A better-developed system could head our way later in the weekend, but details are hard to pin down this far out. A low arriving from the west on Sunday will spread showers and warmer air on top of cold, dry air. In that kind of a situation, snow, ice and plain old rain - or a transition from snow to rain - are all possibilities. In a general sense, the chance for ice and snow would be higher in and near the mountains and lower to the southeast. Sunday's details will be the forecast challenge in the days ahead. Expect the automated forecasts on weather apps to fluctuate in the mean time. Even if a weather app icon just shows snow, the odds of an all-snow system are lower than the other possible outcomes: rain, a switch from snow to rain, or a wintry mix. FOREST CITY | A Texas man accused of receiving a FedEx package containing methamphetamine will serve probation. A prison sentence was suspended. Melvin Sims, 61, of Lubbock, Texas, pleaded guilty to felony possession with intent to deliver meth and failure to affix a drug tax stamp. Police say they found 12 grams of meth inside a package that was addressed to Sims at the Forest City Motel. The Hancock County police dog, K-9 Mach, alerted on the package, which the FexEx driver brought to the Forest City Police Department when he became suspicious, according to court documents. Officers say they arrested Sims after he picked up the package from the motel's front desk and took it to his room. Three glass pipes and a broken glass pipe were found inside his room, according to the complaint. Sims was sentenced last week to three years of probation and $1,750 in fines. He also was ordered to serve up to 10 years in prison, but those terms were suspended and he won't serve them if he successfully completes probation. -- Molly Montag A.P. Hill fifth-grader wins spelling bee in Petersburg PETERSBURG Destani Thorpe is Petersburg City Public Schools top speller. The A.P. Hill Elementary School fifth-grader won the districts spelling bee last week. Peabody Middle student Jennifer Starkes was the runner-up. The spelling bee began with a practice round before moving on to the actual competition. Destani and Jennifer were the only spellers left by round three after oracle, prosthetic and treatise eliminated three students. Moving into round four, Jennifer spelled charismatic, and Destani misspelled tremendous. Under bee rules, that meant that Jennifer needed to spell her round five word to win the bee, but she misspelled laburnums, which kept Destani in the competition. In round six, Jennifer misspelled venerable, and Destani correctly spelled antiquated. Destanis round seven word was resonate, which she spelled correctly to win the spelling bee. This is the second year Destani competed in the districtwide spelling bee as A.P. Hill Elementarys top speller. Destani will represent Petersburg City Public Schools in the regional spelling bee hosted by the Richmond Times-Dispatch in March. Goochland High earns financial literacy honor GOOCHLAND Goochland High School was awarded Blue Star School status for its performance on the W!SE Financial Literacy Certification test in 2016. The Blue Star School distinction is limited to schools where 75 percent of students pass the W!SE assessment with an average score of over 80 percent. The W!SE assessment is a cumulative test administered to students as part of the Virginia graduation requirement to complete a course in financial literacy. Only 283 high schools nationwide achieved Blue Star status, with only half of Virginia high schools achieving the distinction. The requirement that all Virginia high school graduates pass Economics and Personal Finance was implemented in 2009 by the Virginia General Assembly and Board of Education. Richmond seeking to fill Job Corps training classes RICHMOND Admissions staff are looking for students to fill career technical training classes at Job Corps. Job Corps is a tuition-free training and education program that connects eligible young people ages 16 through 24 with the skills and educational opportunities to establish careers. Students in the program work with an adviser to set career goals, devise a plan of action and work on job searching, interviewing and how to maintain employment. During training, Job Corps provides residential students with room, board, basic medical and dental services, and some spending money. Training programs take between eight months and two years to complete. Students can complete their training areas while studying for a high school diploma or equivalent. Job Corps offers training in several careers, including carpentry, certified nursing assistant, painting, electrical wiring and plumbing. Job Corps will hold information sessions in Richmond every Monday at 9:30 a.m. at the Job Corps Admissions Office, 3404 Hermitage Road. For more information, call Mark Gilles at (804) 340-5540. A Place for All Conservatives to Speak Their Mind. <&by1>By Luanne Rife 981-3209 Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine on Monday told students in Roanoke that he doesnt care whether its called replace, repair or reform, just as long as something immediately follows repeal of the Affordable Care Act and offers access to all. Kaine, a Democrat, was recently appointed to the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee and has been traveling Virginia to gather views of people who work in health care. On Monday, he toured labs at Jefferson College of Health Sciences and then met with a packed room of students to talk about the future of health care. The thing we are most engaged with right now in Congress is a battle about whether the Affordable Care Act will be repealed or whether it will be fixed. That is a massive debate. And the answer to that debate is going to shape all of your careers, Kaine said. He views his first task as convincing his Senate colleagues of the danger in repealing the Affordable Care Act without an immediate replacement. Basically, that was a jump-off-the-cliff-and-figure-out-how-to-land-in-midair plan, he said. In Congress, we shouldnt be creating uncertainty sadly we do that pretty well. We should try to create more certainty. Repeal without replacement would affect 30 million Americans, disrupt the insurance and health care industries and negatively affect the economy, Kaine said. Since passage of the Affordable Care Act in 2010 and throughout former President Barack Obamas terms, congressional Republicans repeatedly attempted to repeal it. Now with President Donald Trump also calling for quick repeal, the GOP is tasked with designing a replacement plan, but there appears to be little agreement. Republicans met last week for a retreat in Philadelphia, and a tape leaked to news outlets showed members unsure how to replace the act without clear direction from Trump, who has said no one will lose coverage or pay more. Folks are saying the replacement plans will not make us worse off. They will hopefully maintain coverage and make us better, Kaine said. Well have to put any plan they propose under a microscope to see if that is the case. Kaine said his idea is to bring patients, providers, insurers and hospital leaders to the table and have them propose changes that would make the Affordable Care Act better. Students offered a couple of suggestions. One said she found purchasing a plan through the marketplace exchanges to be arduous. I personally struggle and I have a lot of education. I can only guess how the marginalized population does, she said. The exchanges offer a way for people without workplace insurance to purchase plans; most qualify for government subsidies to help pay the premiums. But students without jobs or with low-paying ones cant take advantage of the exchanges because their income is too low. Many students are still covered under their parents plans, as the Affordable Care Act made it possible for young adults to stay on the plans through age 25. The ACA has been fantastic for coverage under our parents, said Mia McDonald, a second-year physician assistant student and president of the PA Class of 2017. But with many health care professions requiring masters and doctorate degrees, students are aging out of their parents plans before graduation. We have a very rigorous program, so many of us cant work. We dont qualify for the marketplace, she said. Kaine said one of his sons will face that situation next year. Kaine said he also knows what it is like to be turned down for insurance. After he left the governors office, he had to buy private insurance for his family and found that a pre-existing condition made it hard to find a plan to cover all of them. While attention is focused on redesigning a health care system, Kaine asked the students to shift their focus to health promotion and remember throughout their careers to be health educators. Heres the challenge we have in this country. We have a fantastic health care system for treating illnesses, accidents and injuries. We train the best professionals. But we dont have great health, he said. Theres no way youre going to create a health care system that youre going to like the outcomes, either the health outcomes or the cost, if a population is becoming less and less healthy. 059c8f6a-e726-11e6-8ec6-00163ec2aa7731580c03da824a2fd534c3406704dc49f3kaine 013117 varoanoke.local0 Valentines Day is quickly approaching and it is time to start thinking about the best and most creative way to make a lasting impression on your loved one. The Virginia Gentlemen A capella quartets are the answer! These gentlemen are gearing up to serenade lovers throughout the Roanoke Region in celebration of Valentines Day with their infamous Singing Valentines. Quartets are currently available on Monday, February 13th and Tuesday, February 14th. The delivery of a Valentine by tuxedo clad members of The Virginia Gentlemen Harmony Chorus will add love and romance to lovers in the Roanoke Region. If youre looking for an unusual and unique Valentines Day gift to say I love you, book your Singing Valentine today, says Dave Lloyd, president and long-time member of the organization. We are already receiving reservations and encourage those interested in this unique Valentines gift to call as soon as possible and secure a telegram. This is not a box of chocolates or bouquet of flowers, but a memorable surprise. This telegram style message of love offers a surprise visit to a loved one at home, school, a favorite restaurant or in their workplace, whether a spouse, girlfriend, teacher, family member or friend. A Singing Valentine quartet will serenade your sweetheart anywhere you choose in Roanoke, Salem, Vinton, and Botetourt County. The senders kind thoughtfulness will certainly make a statement as the quartet sings two love songs, presents the recipient with a personal message, along with a long-stemmed red rose. Additional roses may also be ordered for the delivery. The cost of a Singing Valentine is just $50 and orders are currently being taken by contacting Ed Burke at 540.977.0472. OR, if one prefers a female quartet instead, no worries. Call 540.466.4640 for Star City Sounds, an organization featuring female quartets. The Virginia Gentlemen is the Roanoke Valley Chapter of the Barbershop Harmony Society, a premier male A capella singing organization in Southwestern Virginia. The Chapters Virginia Gentlemen chorus appeals to men of all ages seeking to be part of a high quality vocal performing group known for its fun, fellowship and harmony. The organization is a 501(c) 3 and contributes a portion of its performance proceeds to the Virginia Gentlemen Scholarship Fund to aid local college-bound high school students and to The Harmony Foundation, providing grants promoting vocal music education in schools and communities. To learn more about The Virginia Gentlemen, visit www.roanokebarbershopharmony.org. Submitted by Lisa Soltis OSAGE Beneath a cloud-obscured full moon, 22 Mitchell County residents walked the trail outside of the Milton R. Owen Nature Center for the Owl Prowl" earlier this month. Led by naturalist Chelsea Rowcliffe, the group first spent time indoors looking at preserved specimens of local owls and learning about the different types of owls which make Iowa their home. According to Rowcliffe, there are 11 species of owls that visit Iowa throughout the year, with four of them -- the great horned owl, barn owl, screech owl and barred owl -- living in Iowa year-round. With feathers designed to camouflage them from predators, owls have been able to accomplish what no other bird of prey can, Rowcliffe said. They can hunt at night. They are gorgeous birds and very distinct, Rowcliffe said. From their ability to stand upright due to the length of their legs, to the tuffs of feathers which make it appear as if they have ears standing up on the tops of their heads, to the size of their eyes and their ability to turn their heads to see behind them, owls are difficult to mistake from other birds and are able to live in almost all climates from desert to mountains. The eyes of an owl allow more light through to let it see in the dark. Because of this adaptation, they cannot see in color. They also have a diminished sense of smell because their large eyes take up some of the space where their olfactory senses would be. There are 14 bones in their necks that allow them to turn their heads 270 degrees to see behind them. In comparison, the range of motion of the human neck is only 180 degrees as humans only have seven bones there. Owls have also adapted exceptional hearing, she said, with the position of their ears designed in a way to allow them to triangulate where sounds come from. That allows them to track a mouse burrowing through the snow without ever laying eyes on the mouse. In addition to their appearance, their sounds really stand out, said Rowcliffe, prior to demonstrating her own owl calls as well as recorded owl sounds. By calling to the birds and then falling silent, Rowcliffe was hopeful the group might prompt a response from an owl that evening and even be able to see one. Despite the clouds obstructing the moon, the trail was still light enough for shadows to register and for the group to proceed without the use of flashlights. The cold winds made lingering outdoors for longer than 20 minutes difficult, however, and while several attempts were made to call the birds, none were spotted though faint responses were heard by several members of the group. Now you can all go home and practice your owl calls, said Rowcliffe. It doesnt take much to go owling. You just have to stand still and listen. These trails are beautiful at night, but owls can be everywhere, especially out in the country. Try and see and hear, and I hope youll come back and share it with me some time. Owling can be such fun. RICHMOND Legislators attempts to reform the process by which felons regain the right to vote hit a dead end Monday. A General Assembly subcommittee killed a block of constitutional amendments, including House Joint Resolution 542 by Del. Greg Habeeb, R-Salem, that would explore new avenues for felons to regain their voting rights after serving prison time. In a 4-3 vote, a House privileges and elections subcommittee tabled five constitutional amendments that would alter the way felons regain their voting rights. The subcommittee also tabled rights restoration bills proposed by Democratic legislators from Fairfax and Richmond and by Del. Danny Marshall, R-Danville. In addition, the subcommittee sidelined another 20 proposed amendments covering a range of issues. Rights restoration became a hot-button issue after Gov. Terry McAuliffe issued an April executive order returning the right to vote to more than 200,000 people convicted of felonies. The Supreme Court of Virginia later struck down McAuliffes order, saying the governor could not restore rights en masse. With the presidential election on the horizon, McAuliffes executive order and the pursuant court ruling brought the restoration of felons voting rights to the forefront as a hotly debated point of contention between state Republicans and Democrats. When presenting his legislation last week, Habeeb challenged subcommittee members to rethink the rights restoration status quo. The real question for the subcommittee and folks interested in this issue is, do you want the status quo or do you want something different, and if you want something different, what can we possibly get passed? he said. If passed, Habeebs legislation would have differentiated rights restoration between violent and nonviolent ex-offenders, but would have allowed both to regain the right to vote either immediately or two years after fulfilling all court-mandated punishments. Habeeb has introduced bills addressing felons rights restoration nearly every year since he first took office in 2011. Unlike the legislation Habeeb filed in years past, the constitutional amendment he proposed this General Assembly session took a middle ground approach to restoring felons rights because it did not automatically restore the right to vote. In the meeting, Del. Joseph Lindsey, D-Norfolk, argued against voting on more than 20 constitutional amendments addressing felons rights restoration, redistricting and term limits in a single block because of their widely varying subject matter. Members of the subcommittee tabled the block of amendments on a recorded vote with no discussion on the substance of the proposed legislation. After a psychiatric crisis, Alexandra Kedrocks son was once released from a hospital at 3 a.m. without his house key, his identification, a phone or money. Chad, 48, didnt want to wake his mother, so he wandered through the streets of Norfolk until he thought she might be awake. Another time, a hospital worker in Hopewell sent Chad away in a taxi cab with little more than a bus ticket, she said. He made it as far as Richmond before a friend of Kedrocks drove up to find him huddled and delusional in a corner of the bus station. After 26 years of battling schizophrenia by Chads side, Kedrock has had an intimate look at how Virginias mental health system helps people with mental illness and the myriad ways in which it doesnt. Twice in the past few weeks, shes traveled from her new home in Charlottesville to Richmond to ask lawmakers to stop studying the behavioral health system and instead invest money in programs that are known to work. She was among about 150 people who descended on the Capitol on Wednesday to push for mental health reform, and she spoke at a budget hearing a few weeks ago. Kedrock, a clinical social worker, and others specifically question Gov. Terry McAuliffes $4.5 million budget proposal for a study and redesign of the structure of the behavioral health system that would be contracted out to consultants. The proposal was one of many intended to improve mental health services in Virginia. Sen. Deeds has a commission already studying this, so [McAuliffes study] is really redundant, Kedrock said, referring to state Sen. Creigh Deeds Joint Subcommittee Studying Mental Health Services in the Commonwealth in the 21st Century. I think the money needs to be spent on many things, but my priority would be taking mental illness out of the dark ages. Bruce Harlow, the father of a son diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, agreed with Kedrock as they waited to talk to Deeds, D-Bath, on Wednesday. The studies have been done, said Harlow, a resident of Virginia Beach, whose son violently attacked him in July. That money needs to be spent on programs that work. n n n Brian Coy, spokesman for McAuliffe, said the $4.5 million would fund far more than a study. It would pay for a blueprint of a complete overhaul of the mental health system from the 40 Community Services Boards on the front lines to the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services at the top. Its not redundant, Coy said. What the Deeds commission is doing is an important first step in terms of identifying challenges within the mental health system. What the governor has proposed is a wholesale top-to-bottom redesign of the states mental health system. Deeds joint subcommittee has been toiling with ways to incrementally improve the system, but the group hasnt gotten as far as redesigning it. The Dec. 1, 2017, deadline for finishing its work was recently extended by two years. One of the biggest proposals that came out of the committee this year involves increasing the amount of money spent on supportive housing for people with mental illness by $10.2 million a proposal Kedrock strongly supports because it has helped her son. Another would require same-day screening at Community Services Boards; only a handful of the 40 offer so-called same-day access now. McAuliffes proposed budget did not include any money for supportive housing this year. Suzanne Gore, senior policy advisor for healthcare for McAuliffe, said the governor selected programs he thought would be the best use of resources. I think that the governors budget is really in line with the work of the Deeds commission, Gore said. There are somewhat different priorities, but the governors job is to run the government, and running the government sometimes means you need to invest in a business plan. The $4.5 million proposed for a plan for overhauling the system pales in comparison to the hundreds of millions spent by the government each year, Gore said. Several million dollars for a very complex system serving individuals with complex needs is frankly a drop in the bucket, Gore said. n n n Aside from supportive housing, Kedrock said, her son Chad has been stabilized by a PACT team, which stands for Program of Assertive Community Treatment. The people on the team keep in constant contact with him and intervene immediately if his symptoms flare up. Kedrock would like to see the states money pay for an expansion of PACT programs across the state because the one in Charlottesville has been so effective at keeping her son out of crisis. Chad has been battling schizophrenia since he was first diagnosed at 22 while he was studying aerospace engineering at Virginia Tech. He had no signs of developing schizophrenia as he grew up, Kedrock said. His disease has worsened over time. I often say that he was abducted by the schizophrenic patrol, and they hold him hostage and torture him in front of me, and I cant get him free, Kedrock said. He has been hospitalized at least 15 times, Kedrock said, but the programs hes been enrolled in have kept him out of hospitals since November 2015. (She asked that his last name not be used to protect his privacy.) A PACT team member visits him every day and gives him the medicine hes supposed to take, which has led to a remarkable improvement, Kedrock said. When he was trying to take medicine on his own, he often confused days of the week and at times he took all his medicine at once instead of one set of pills at a time. The team also helps him pay his bills and shop for groceries. A psychiatrist, who is part of the team, keeps a close eye on him. As soon as his symptoms start increasing, they work to stabilize him before he reaches a point of crisis. Last fiscal year, 1,807 people received PACT services through 22 full-size teams and three smaller teams, said Maria Reppas, spokeswoman for the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services. The state spent about $16.7 million on PACT services and the federal government contributed $668,000. A previously approved budget allowed for the creation of two new teams in the current fiscal year at $850,000 apiece, but there isnt any money in the budget proposals in front of the 2017 General Assembly for additional PACT teams in the future. Reppas said the state does not keep waiting lists of people in need of PACT services. Mira Signer, executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness in Virginia, who has been involved as an outside expert with Deeds subcommittee, said PACT teams still are a priority, but the state needed time to absorb the additional teams that were funded in the past before asking for more this year. The major push this year is supportive housing for a group of Virginians who have the most chronic mental illnesses. Though McAuliffes budget didnt include funding for housing, lawmakers on Deeds subcommittee have proposed spending about $10.2 million to fund housing for about 660 people of the 5,080 in need of housing. Signer said it would only be a bite out of the problem, but it would save Virginia between $2.2 million and $6.8 million in hospitalizations and other services for people in crisis. Kedrock said supportive housing has been instrumental in keeping her son safe. Until the last two years, his psychiatric treatment has been less than adequate and at times hurtful, Kedrock said recently. But, for the first time in 25 years, he has comprehensive services with competent, informed and caring people, she wrote to Deeds in March 2016. For the first time, I can relax that he is safe. CONCORD Donkeys usually are known for their stubbornness, but if you ask Kimberly Clark, they are cuddly animals just looking for a hug. As the founder and CEO of the Concord-based Virginia Donkey Rescue, she has made it her full-time mission for the past year to rescue as many neglected, abused and unwanted donkeys from across the mid-Atlantic region as possible. She currently has about 50 donkeys on her 22-acre farm, and is working to find good homes for most of them. Her love for donkeys began five years ago, when she rescued a sick donkey and nursed him back to health. Donkeys are like big, cuddly dogs. When people ask me why donkeys, I say, Why not? Although in the same family as horses, donkeys are their own distinct species and have vastly different needs from their equine relatives. Their build is stockier, and they have tall ears and coarser fur than horses. Donkeys are made to live in dry, desert conditions instead of lush plains, where horses thrive. In arid climates, there isnt much to eat and anywhere to run, so these guys are designed to live on any stick, twig or dry piece of grass they can find, Clark said. They also have a reputation for being stubborn, but that comes from, in the desert, you dont have anywhere to run, so your best defense is freezing and staying put. They really arent stubborn; theyre very smart and good at preserving themselves. A majority of the donkeys she rescues come from people surrendering them. Donkeys are popular among cattle farmers, who adopt them because of a widely believed myth they make good guardians for livestock against predators like coyotes. But according to Reynolds, this is not true. People frequently return the donkeys after learning they can be destructive. In the wild, donkeys pair up with other donkeys of the same gender to protect one another. While one donkey stands guard, the other sleeps. When youve got a single donkey, it never gets its deep sleep, so its just like a human, where you end up with a grouchy and unpredictable animal, and its only source of outlet is attacking calves, she said. A lot of people turn them in because people think theyre a bad donkey, but theyre actually just being donkeys. Donkeys are also often put with horses and cattle in rich pastures. The overabundance of rich grass is bad for the animals and causes them to be overweight and unhealthy. Typically our pastures in Virginia are much too rich for them, Clark said. A lot of people will keep their donkeys in a dry lot, where theres nothing growing. The other option is to always keep hay out because thats more like what they would get in nature. On the farm, Clark has the donkeys in a variety of pens and stalls depending on their needs. Some that require special medical attention live in a barn, but others live in dry pens where they have access to large piles of hay to graze on throughout the day. Another problem with donkeys as livestock guardians is that male donkeys called jacks get aggressive if they are not castrated. When they get to full puberty, about 4 or 5 [years old], they start attacking the calves, she said. They will actually pick up a calf or a baby goat and shake it to death. In order to care for incoming donkeys, Clark has each animal vaccinated, dewormed and micro-chipped and has its hooves trimmed by a farrier. All male donkeys are castrated to prevent aggressive behavior and mating. According to Katrina Fleener, president of the American Donkey Association, donkey rescues are important organizations due to a decline of the donkey population worldwide. The drop in numbers of donkeys, she said, is due to the expanding illegal trade of donkey hides from Africa to Asia. In the African countries, the donkey population is going down significantly because the Chinese are importing donkey hides for use in traditional remedies, she said. Its important we maintain the population and make sure that doesnt start happening in the U.S. A lot of these animals, if they arent rescued, will go to the slaughterhouses. Earlier this month, Virginia Donkey Rescue took in a herd of 12 donkeys from Tennessee after Clark learned of them through a private rescue. The herd had been living largely untended along the side of a cliff, she said. Clark typically only rescues donkeys within a days drive, but the herd needed care. They were a little outside of our territory, but I felt bad for the man who owned them, she said. They didnt get the jacks fixed, and he just got too old and couldnt take care of them anymore. I felt like it was a good reason to go help them out. In order to transport them from Tennessee, Clark and a volunteer used two large trailers to bring the donkeys to Virginia. All 12 of the newly rescued donkeys will go to foster homes until they are adopted, so they can be more socialized with humans after limited contact with people. The nonprofit has between five and 10 foster locations but is always is looking for more farms to take care of animals temporarily. The great thing about fosters is that [the donkeys] get the individual attention, she said. Within a few weeks, these guys will be eating out of your hand and letting you hug and kiss on them. As a 501c3, VDR is sustained solely by donations. Clark has about five regular volunteers who help out on the farm and an extensive foster network, but vet bills and costs for hay mount up quickly. It costs $50 per month to take care of each donkey, including feed and vet costs. Castrations for jacks cost the rescue $300 each. We were really lucky last year and had really great donors that stepped up, she said. Were really going to need some help to keep going this year. To pick up all of those donkeys in Tennessee, Clark had help from Beth Reynolds, one of the groups four board members. A regular volunteer at the rescue and long-time friend of Clark, Reynolds has helped with the rescue since Clark began taking in donkeys five years ago. [Clark] volunteered me to help, Reynolds said, laughing. I rescued a donkey and fell in love with them. Now I help out however I can. In addition to being on the farm and the fundraising board for the rescue, she also donates 10 percent of the profits from her business Long Ears Herbs, where she grows fresh herbs and makes them into essential oils and beauty products. In order to bring awareness to the rescue, Virginia Donkey Rescue held its first Donktober Fest at Bold Rock Hard Cider in Nelson County last October. The event had more than 1,000 attendees for a day of quality time with some of the organizations donkeys, live music and food and beverage vendors. Donktober Fest will return this year on Oct. 2, and the nonprofit also will hold the Donkey Dash 5K run on the first of October for the nonprofits two-legged supporters. Additionally, the rescue hosts Hee-Haw Hikes, where participants can go on a hike with donkeys, beginning in the spring. Many people havent been around donkeys so they dont know how lovable they are, Clark said. We want people to know about our organization as well as donkeys themselves. SANTA FE, N.M. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto has a new diplomatic invitation to visit the United States after canceling a trip to Washington in response to President Donald Trumps plans to build a border wall this time from a trio of Democratic lawmakers in the heavily Hispanic state of New Mexico. Democratic state Rep. Javier Martinez of Albuquerque said Sunday that Trumps insistence on making Mexico pay for a border wall extension is a threat to centuries-old economic and cultural ties between Mexico and the state of New Mexico, including recent investments by taxpayers in the Santa Teresa-San Jeronimo border crossing that have spurred trade. Martinez, with state Reps. Bill McCamley of Mesilla Park and Angelica Rubio of Las Cruces, sent a letter Friday inviting Pena Nieto to address the New Mexico House Chamber during the current legislative session. If you look at the way Trump has spoken out against the Mexican president, the country of Mexico, his position to build this very expensive wall across the border and then his suggestions that it be paid for with a 20 percent tariff on imports those are all statements and actions that can only be detrimental to the state of New Mexico, said Martinez, an attorney and El Paso native who spent part of his childhood in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. Theres no word yet if Mexicos president will accept the invitation. The decision by Pena Nieto to scrap a planned Jan. 31 meeting with Trump in Washington has boosted the Mexican presidents lagging popularity as he struggles to contain rising crime, a sluggish economy and a series of corruption scandals in his party. Republican New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez has avoided criticizing Trump on his executive action pushing a border wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. A spokesman for Gov. Martinez said Friday that she supports strengthening our border and giving the federal government a variety of tools to protect residents, while declining to comment specifically on the border wall. HAMILTON, BERMUDA, January 29, 2017 - DHT Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: DHT) today announced that it has received a non-binding, highly conditional proposal from Frontline Ltd. (NYSE/OSE: FRO) to acquire all of the outstanding shares of common stock of DHT in a stock-for-stock transaction. Frontline has proposed a ratio of 0.725 of a Frontline share for each share of DHT, which represents an implied price of $5.09 per DHT share, based on the closing price of Frontline shares of common stock on January 27, 2017. In the proposal letter delivered to DHT's Board of Directors on January 27, 2017, Frontline also disclosed that it has acquired more than 15 million shares of DHT, or approximately 16% of DHT's outstanding common stock. Consistent with its fiduciary duties, DHT's Board will evaluate the proposal from Frontline and respond accordingly in due course. In light of the developments, the Board has unanimously adopted a one-year shareholder rights plan and declared a dividend of one preferred share purchase right for each share of DHT common stock outstanding at the close of business on February 9, 2017. Initially, these rights will not be exercisable and will trade with the shares of DHT's common stock. The Board adopted the rights plan in response to Frontline's acquisition of a significant amount of outstanding common stock. The plan is intended to give the Board and DHT time to properly consider the non-binding proposal and to prevent any bidder or shareholder from acquiring control of DHT in a manner which would be inconsistent with the best interests of DHT and its shareholders. Under the rights plan, the rights will generally become exercisable only if a person or group acquires beneficial ownership of 10 percent or more of DHT's common stock (15 percent or more in the case of passive institutional investors). In that situation, each holder of a right will be entitled to purchase, at the then-current exercise price, additional shares of common stock (or equivalents) having a value of twice the exercise price of the right. In addition, if after a person or group acquires 10 percent or more of DHT's common stock (15 percent or more in the case of passive institutional investors ), DHT merges into another company, an acquiring entity merges into DHT or DHT sells or transfers more than 50% of its consolidated assets or earning power, then each right will entitle its holder to purchase, for the exercise price, a number of shares of common stock (or equivalents) of the person engaging in the transaction having a then-current market value of twice the exercise price. Any person or group that already owns 10 percent or more of DHT's common stock (15 percent or more in the case of passive institutional investors) on January 29, 2017, including Frontline, will not trigger the rights as described above, however, unless that person or group subsequently acquires additional shares of common stock. In all cases, rights held by any person or group whose actions trigger the rights plan would become void and not be exercisable. Details about the rights plan will be contained in a Form 6-K to be filed by DHT with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Lazard is serving as financial advisor to DHT, and Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP is serving as legal counsel. About DHT Holdings, Inc. DHT is an independent crude oil tanker company. Our fleet trades internationally and consists of crude oil tankers in the VLCC and Aframax segments. We operate through our integrated management companies in Oslo, Norway and Singapore. You shall recognize us by our business approach with an experienced organization with focus on first rate operations and customer service, quality ships built at quality shipyards, prudent capital structure with robust cash break even levels to accommodate staying power through the business cycles, a combination of market exposure and fixed income contracts for our fleet and a transparent corporate structure maintaining a high level of integrity and good governance. For further information: www.dhtankers.com. Media Contacts Svein Moxnes Harfjeld, Co-CEO: +47 23115080 Trygve P. Munthe, Co-CEO: +47 23115080 Brunswick Group Steve Lipin/Darren McDermott: +1 212-333-3810 Morgantown, West Virginia, Jan. 30, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Majestic Oil & Gas Inc. (OTC PINK: MJOG) (Majestic or the Company) an oil and natural gas developmental company, announces today that it has entered into a letter of intent to acquire a Bakken Acquisitions and Investment Corp., which holds the rights to an exclusive global license for a patented remediation product. Majestic is also pleased to announce the appointment of Phillip Malkemes as its President and member of the Board of Directors. Mr. Malkemes has been a successful business development manager for well over twenty years and is looking forward to bringing Majestic into a new era involving hydrocarbon contaminated groundwater remediation processes. Mr. Malkemes has negotiated a letter of intent for the acquisition by the Company through a share exchange agreement of Bakken Acquisitions and Investment Corp., a private Nevada corporation (Bakken), resulting in Bakken becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of the Company. Bakken holds the right, title and interest in and to an exclusive global license regarding a patented remediation product to cleanup hydrocarbon-contaminated groundwater. The letter of intent involves a remediation product known as Dissolved Oxygen Releasing Agent (DORA). Mr. Malkemes believes that DORA product is significantly less expensive and just as effective as the leading competing products in the U.S. $25 billion bioremediation market. Mr. Malkemes stated that this presents a great opportunity for the Company in the U.S. market alone. The licensing of the DORA product is sure to help bring hydrocarbon remediation as Majestics operational focus and provide a format for positive financial results and good things to come". Mr. Malkemes further stated that DORA has been lab tested against Regenesis's ORC and the lab results were very encouraging. Majestic intends to move forward into the phase of acquiring white paper studies to further enhance its capabilities. The EPA has already mandated the cleanup of two types of primarily hydrocarbon-contaminated sites. The EPA has first identified approximately 74,000 Leaking Underground Storage Tanks (LUST) with a potential market opportunity for DORA of $2 billion. Additionally, the EPA has identified approximately 225,000 Brownfields sites that are likely impacted by petroleum hydrocarbon contaminates from oil field waste, above-ground storage tanks, refineries or pipelines with a potential market opportunity for DORA of $24 billion. Management is working to complete a binding definitive agreement regarding the acquisition of Bakken into Majestic, which result with Bakken as its wholly owned subsidiary. Forward-Looking Statements Except for historical information contained herein, the matters set forth above may include forward-looking statements that involve certain risks and uncertainties. Words such as "may", "could", "anticipate", "believe", "estimate", "expect", "intend", "plan", and similar expressions are used to identify forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are based on the current beliefs of management, as well as assumptions made by and information currently available to management. Actual results could differ materially from those contemplated by the forward-looking statements. Majestic does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements and cautions investors to consider all other risks and uncertainties, including those disclosed in Majestics filings with OTC Markets. SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 30, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Vendini, the company that makes the business of live events simple with industry leading software and services, has amplified its commitment to its employees and company culture with the appointment of Susan Hollingshead as the companys first Chief People Officer (CPO). A photo accompanying this announcement is available at http://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/f70ed773-2395-4c03-88ff-53bb777b39b4 "Vendinis success is owed to our kick-ass employees and our infectious culture. Susan will play a vital role as we continue to grow, recruit new talent and ensure that Vendinis core values resonate with everyone on our team, said Mark Tacchi, CEO at Vendini. Since it was founded in 2002, Vendini has experienced steady growth, as leadership focused on building a passionate team and thriving company culture. After raising $20 million in the companys first Series A funding in 2016, Vendini now looks to jumpstart 2017 with continued progress under Susans leadership. As Vendini grows, I want to ensure that its culture thrives, providing a rich environment for employee development and commitment. A skilled and dedicated workforce will amplify Vendinis commitment to outstanding customer experience, said Susan. Through developing a comprehensive HR and shared services function, employees will be more energized and our members will continue to flourish. Formerly of Sungevity, Inc., Susan oversaw the companys growth from 50 people to more than 1000 in a six year period. In that role, she was responsible for human resources including talent acquisition, organizational development, compensation, benefits, payroll, corporate training and more. Prior to that, Susan spent 14 years in the brownfield redevelopment and environmental insurance business first as a cofounder of Landbank, Inc., the nations first brownfield redevelopment firm, and then as cofounder and Managing Principal of Renova Partners. Susan was also a founder of Working for Good which supported businesses engaged in social enterprise through Cause Alliance Marketing programs. Susan holds a Bachelor of Arts in Behavioral Psychology from Mount Holyoke College. About Vendini At Vendini, our mission is to make the business of live events simple. We designed our all-in-one system to help organizations easily promote events, deepen experiences with their audiences, and ultimately sell more tickets. Vendini is based in San Francisco, CA, with offices in Petaluma, CA; Los Angeles, CA; Boston, MA; New York, NY; Knoxville, TN; Vancouver, BC and Gualdo Tadino, Italy. To learn more about what the Vendini solution can do for your live event organization, please visit: https://www.vendini.com/ SOLON EIENDOM ASA STOCK EXCHANGE ANNOUNCEMENT NOT FOR RELEASE, PUBLICATION OR DISTRIBUTION, IN WHOLE OR IN PART DIRECTLY OR INDIRECTLY, IN AUSTRALIA, CANADA, JAPAN, HONG KONG, SWITZERLAND OR THE UNITED STATES Solon Eiendom ASA - Final result of the Subsequent Offering (Oslo, Norway, 30 January 2017) Reference is made to previous stock exchange announcements and the prospectus (the "Prospectus") dated 12 January 2017 concerning, inter alia, the subsequent offering (the "Subsequent Offering") of 666,666,666 new shares at a subscription price of NOK 0.15 per share in Solon Eiendom ASA ("Solon" or the "Company", ticker "SOLON"). The subscription period for the Subsequent Offering expired on 27 January 2017 at 16:30 CET. At the end of the subscription period, the Company had received subscriptions for a total of 116,304,309 new shares. This implies that the underwriting consortium for the Subsequent Offering has subscribed for the remaining 550,362,357 shares available in the Subsequent Offering. Thus, the Subsequent Offering is fully subscribed. The allocation of 666,666,666 new shares in the Subsequent Offering was approved by the Company's board of directors on 30 January 2017 in accordance with the allocation criteria set out in the Prospectus. A total of 91,647,267 new shares have been allocated to subscribers on the basis of exercised subscription rights and 24,657,042 new shares have been allocated to holders of subscription rights as a result of oversubscription. 575,019,399 new shares have been allocated to subscribers without subscription rights, this includes new shares allocated to the underwriting consortium for the Subsequent Offering. The Subsequent Offering raised gross proceeds of NOK 100 million. Cipriano AS, a company wholly owned by Einar J. Greve, vice chairman of the Company's board of directors was allocated 34,397,647 shares in the Subsequent Offering at a subscription price of NOK 0.15 per share, under the underwriting agreement entered into in connection with the Subsequent Offering. Following issuance of the new shares in the Subsequent Offering Cipriano AS holds a total of 151,064,314 shares in the Company, equalling approximately 1.6% of the issued share capital. Letters of allocation will be distributed to investors today, which will give notification of allocated new shares and the corresponding amount to be paid by each subscriber. Payment for the allocated shares falls due on 2 February 2017. DNB Markets, a part of DNB Bank ASA, Arctic Securities AS and SpareBank 1 Markets are engaged as managers for the Subsequent Offering. This information is subject to the disclosure requirements pursuant to section 5-12 of the Norwegian Securities Trading Act. Further information Simen Thorsen Chairman of the Board, Solon Eiendom ASA E-mail: st@soloneiendom.no Cell Phone: +47 918 86 886 Andreas Martinussen Chief Executive Officer, Solon Eiendom ASA E-mail: am@soloneiendom.no Cell Phone: +47 400 00 405 About Solon Eiendom Solon Eiendom is a Norwegian residential real estate development company focusing on the Oslo and Akershus region. Solon Eiendom was established in 2006 by founder Simen Thorsen and investor Tore Aksel Voldberg. The company has since its incorporation delivered 570 units with a corresponding sales value of close to NOK ~3 billion and sold more than 800 units with a total sales price of more than NOK ~4 billion. Solon is listed on Oslo Brs (OSE:SOLON). More information about Solon is available at www.soloneiendom.no. Important Information The release is not for publication or distribution, in whole or in part directly or indirectly, in or into Australia, Canada, Japan, Hong Kong or the United States (including its territories and possessions, any state of the United States and the District of Columbia). This information is subject of the disclosure requirements pursuant to section 5-12 of the Norwegian Securities Trading Act. It is issued for information purposes only, and does not constitute or form part of any offer or solicitation to purchase or subscribe for securities, in the United States or in any other jurisdiction. The securities mentioned herein have not been, and will not be, registered under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "Securities Act"). The securities may not be offered or sold in the United States except pursuant to an exemption from the registration requirements of the Securities Act. The Company does not intend to register any portion of the offering of the securities in the United States or to conduct a public offering of the securities in the United States. Copies of this announcement are not being made and may not be distributed or sent into Australia Canada, Japan, Hong Kong or the United States. The issue, exercise, purchase or sale of subscription rights and the subscription or purchase of shares in the Company are subject to specific legal or regulatory restrictions in certain jurisdictions. Neither the Company, DNB Markets, Arctic Securities nor SpareBank1 Markets assumes any responsibility in the event there is a violation by any person of such restrictions. The distribution of this release may in certain jurisdictions be restricted by law. Persons into whose possession this release comes should inform themselves about and observe any such restrictions. Any failure to comply with these restrictions may constitute a violation of the securities laws of any such jurisdiction. Terms and conditions Regional Media Ltd are regulated by IPSO the Independent Press Standards Organisation. If you have a complaint about a Regional Media Ltd in print or online, you should, in the first instance, contact the publication concerned, email: editor@rotherhamadvertiser.co.uk, or telephone: 01709 768000. If it is not resolved to your satisfaction, you should contact IPSO by telephone: 0300 123 2220, or visit its website: www.ipso.co.uk. Members of the public are welcome to contact IPSO at any time if they are not sure how to proceed, or need advice on how to frame a complaint. Terms and conditions Our standard terms and conditions of Advertising and Payment are set out below and are applicable to all advertising booked in any of the Companys newspapers, other publications and internet sites or with regard to any other business transacted. General In these terms and conditions The Company means Regional Media Ltd, Brookfields Way, Manvers, Wath-upon-Dearne, Rotherham, S63 5DL; and The Advertiser means any person or company placing with the Company an order for the publication of an advertisement in any of the Companys newspapers, other publications or internet sites, or any person or company placing with the Company an order for the distribution or insertion of leaflets in any publication. Acceptance of Conditions In placing an order for the publication of an advertisement, the Advertiser accepts these terms and conditions. These terms and conditions shall be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of England and Wales. If any provision in these terms and conditions is held to be invalid or unenforceable in whole or in part the remainder of them shall continue to apply. The Company reserves the right at any time to change in whole or in part these terms and conditions. CONDITIONS OF ACCEPTANCE OF ADVERTISEMENTS Advertisers Warranty and Indemnity i. The Advertiser warrants: (a) that the advertisement is legal, decent, honest and truthful and that it complies with the British Codes of Advertising and Sales Promotion, with any relevant codes of practice and with all requirements of current legislation; (b) that nothing in the advertisement is defamatory or constitutes a malicious falsehood; (c) that the publication of the advertisement will not infringe copyright or any other rights vested in a third party; and (d) that the Advertiser has secured all necessary authorities and consents in respect of the use in the advertisement of any pictorial representations or other representations of (or purporting to be of) living persons and of references to any words attributed to living persons. ii. The Advertiser will indemnify the Company in respect of all costs, damages or other charges arising as a result of the publication of their advertisement or incurred in connection with any actions or claims brought against the Company arising from a breach by the Advertiser of the warranties in this paragraph 1 or otherwise from the publication of the advertisement. Refusing or Amending Advertisements i. The Company reserves the right to refuse to publish any advertisement whether or not the advertisement has been accepted or previously published. ii. The Company may require any alteration it considers necessary or desirable in an advertisement as a prior condition of its publication, whether or not such advertisement has been accepted or previously published. iii. The Company will permit only standard abbreviations and no hyperlinks or metatags may be included in any advertisements save with the prior consent of the Company. Placement of Adverts i. Whilst the Company will endeavour to comply with reasonable requests from Advertisers, the Company does not guarantee the publication of any advertisement or its publication on any particular date or in any particular position. The Company has at its absolute discretion the right to decide the classification, if relevant, for any advertisement. Cancellation i. The Company may cancel the Advertisers order at any time and shall give notice of the cancellation before the next due date of publication of the advertisement if practicable. ii. In no event can orders be cancelled once the Company has commenced to carry out the order in accordance with the first publication date requested by the Advertiser. In other cases notice of cancellation must be received by the Company prior to the relevant current deadline. iii. All cancellations must be notified in writing by post or fax. E-mail notice of cancellation is not acceptable. Copyright i. Copyright of all artwork, copy or other material created, reworked or contributed to by the Company shall vest in the Company. ii. The Advertiser authorises the Company to record, reproduce, publish, distribute and broadcast (or to permit the same) all advertisements (including but not limited to text, artwork and photographs) and to include and make them available in any information service, electronic or otherwise. Advertisers Property All artwork, photographs, leaflets, film or other property delivered by the Advertiser to the Company is held by the Company at the Advertisers risk and the Advertiser should insure all such property against loss or damage from whatsoever cause. The Company reserves the right to destroy without notice all such material after the date of its last use in connection with the publication of an advertisement, unless the Advertiser has given written instructions to the contrary. Box Numbers i. The Company will endeavour to forward all replies to a box number, to the Advertiser, as soon as possible after receipt, but the Company accepts no liability in respect of any loss or damage alleged to have arisen through delay in forwarding or omitting to forward such replies, howsoever caused. Box addresses must not be used for sending goods or materials of any value. The Advertiser authorises the Company to examine material passing through boxes and hereby authorises the Company to return to its originator or destroy any communication, which, in the opinion of the Company, should not be delivered to the Advertiser. ii. Advertisements from dealers are not accepted under a box number, nor may a box number be used for the distribution of trade canvassing material. Disclosing Information i. All advertisements must be accompanied by the Advertisers full name and address and the Company may require evidence of authenticity of any advertisement. All trade advertisements must contain a trading name. ii. The Company reserves the right to refuse an advertisement containing only a mobile telephone number unless the Advertiser discloses to them a BT land line number (or similar). iii. The Company reserves the right to disclose the name and address of Advertisers if required by law or any regulatory or government authority or to other third parties where the Company, in its sole discretion, deems it reasonable. Limitation of Companys Liability i. The Advertiser shall check the advertisement and notify the Company immediately in writing of any errors. The Company assumes no responsibility and shall not be liable for the repetition of errors in a series of advertisements unless it has received reasonable written notice from the Advertiser. ii. In the event of any error, misprint or omission in the printing of an advertisement or part of an advertisement (however caused) the Company will either re-insert the advertisement or relevant part thereof, or make a reasonable refund or adjustment to the cost. No re-insertion, refund or adjustment will be made where the error, misprint or omission does not materially detract from the advertisement. iii. In no circumstances shall the Companys total liability (including consequential liability) in respect of any error, misprint or omission exceed either the amount of a full refund of any price paid to the Company for the advertisement in connection with which liability arose, or the cost of a further or corrective advertisement of a type and standard reasonably comparable to that in connection with which liability arose. iv. Save as set out in this paragraph 9, the Company accepts no liability in respect of any loss or damage occasioned directly or indirectly as a result of the publication of any advertisement or any loss or damage occasioned directly or indirectly by any total or partial failure (however caused) of the publication of any advertisement in any of the Companys newspapers, other publications or internet sites in which the advertisement is scheduled to appear. Assignment i. The Company shall be entitled to assign its contract with the Advertiser or any of its rights or benefits thereunder. ii. The Advertiser may not assign, transfer, sub contract, charge or in any other way deal with any of its rights or obligations under this Agreement without the Companys prior written consent. Data Protection Act i. The Company will hold information it obtains in its dealings with customers to administer the Advertisers account, for statistical purposes, for debt collection and for fraud and crime prevention. If the Advertiser does not wish its information to be used for marketing purposes, it should inform the Company in writing. ii. (ii) Telephone calls to the Company may be monitored or recorded for staff training purposes. Advertising Agencies i. An advertising agency, whether recognised or not, submitting an advertisement shall conform to the conditions laid down by the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising regarding observance of the provisions of the British Code of Advertising Practice and to the Standard Conditions for transactions of business between newspapers and advertising agencies as agreed between the Newspaper Society and the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising. ii. The terms of the Recognition Agreement between the Newspaper Society or between the Newspaper Society and the Newspaper Proprietors Association and recognised advertising agencies are deemed to be incorporated in these conditions of acceptance for the publication and transmission of all advertisements accepted from a recognised agency. Without prejudice to the foregoing, these conditions of acceptance specifically extend to any personal guarantee given by the directors of or any other person on behalf of a recognised agency in respect of any unsatisfied liabilities of the agency in the event of the agencys liquidation or insolvency. Such guarantee is part of these conditions of acceptance. Leaflets: For the purpose of these terms and conditions, any leaflet or other publication or material distributed with any of the Companys newspapers or magazines is deemed to be an advertisement, and references to the publication of such advertisements is deemed to be the distribution or insertion of such leaflet or other publication or material. PAYMENT TERMS FOR ADVERTISERS Orders for the insertion of advertisements are accepted subject to the following payment terms: Rates i. The Company reserves the right at any time to change the scale of advertising rates and to apply such rates to advertisements (series or otherwise) accepted and not wholly executed at the time of any such change. ii. (ii) It is the responsibility of the Advertiser to bring to the Companys attention at the time of booking any discount, allowance or exemption from Value Added Tax to which entitlement is claimed. iii. All gross advertising rates (except classified lineage and semi display) are subject to the Advertising Standards Board of Finance levy from time to time (currently 0.1%) payable by the Advertiser to help finance the self-regulatory system. iv. All rates and prices quoted by the Company are exclusive of Value Added Tax. Advertising Agencies i. Commission will only be granted to agencies formally recognised by the Newspaper Society or the Company at the time of placing the order. The rate of commission payable will be determined by the Company and may be carried or withdrawn at the Companys discretion at any time, subject to giving the advertising agency seven days written notice thereof. ii. (ii) All advertising agencies claiming commission must quote order numbers for every booking made. Time of Payment i. Unless credit terms have been agreed, pre-payment for any advertisement must be made in full no later than the relevant deadline. ii. In the event that credit terms are approved, payment shall be made for each advertisement no later than thirty days from the date of the invoice for such advertisement. Should the Advertiser be in breach of these terms, or of any contract with the Company, then the full amount in respect of all advertising published and all other amounts accruing from the Advertiser shall become due and payable. iii. The Company reserves the right to withdraw credit facilities from any Advertiser at the Companys discretion. iv. Payments by post must be by cheque or postal order made payable to the Company and crossed. All payments must be accompanied by the relevant invoice, statement or remittance advice issued by the Company. v. Any query in respect of an invoice must be brought to the attention of the Company within seven days of its issue. The existence of a query on any individual item on an account shall not affect the due date of payment of any balance of such account. Late Payments i. The Company shall be entitled to charge interest on all sums due at a rate of 8% above the base rate for the time being of Barclays Bank plc until payment is received, after as well as before any judgment is obtained, together with compensation for late payment under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998 and regulations made thereunder. ii. The Company shall be entitled to add to any sums due any reasonable costs and expenses (including administrative costs) incurred by the Company in obtaining payment thereof on an indemnity basis. iii. The Company shall be entitled to charge the Advertiser 15.00 in respect of any cheque tendered which is not met upon presentation (and to vary this charge at any time without notice). iv. The Company reserves the right to exercise a lien over any documents or other property of the Advertiser in its possession if the Companys charges are not paid in accordance with these terms and the Companys rate card from time to time. Comments and forums. These House Rules have been developed so that everyone can get the best out of contributing to the Site. They aim to protect anyone who reads or contributes to the Forums and to help everyone to have an enjoyable and safe time. By participating you agree to abide by these House Rules. The Publisher reserves the right to change these House Rules at any time by posting these changes online. You are responsible for regularly reviewing information posted online to obtain notice of such changes. Your continuing use of the service once these changes are posted constitutes your acceptance of these House Rules as modified by the posted changes. * Please be warned that if any content breaks the rules below it may be removed by the moderators of the Website. Rules for Contributing to the web site and principles that you must accept. Adding Comments. To add your comment, click the "Add Your Comment" (or similar) button on the bottom of the article. 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By participating, you also agree to abide by this Swear Word Policy. The Publisher reserves the right to change this Swear Word Policy at any time by posting these changes online. You are responsible for regularly reviewing information posted online to obtain notice of such changes. Your continuing use of the Forums once these changes are posted constitutes your acceptance of this Swear Word Policy as modified by the posted changes. * Please be warned that if any content breaks the rules below it may be removed by the moderators of the Website. If you see one of the swear words listed below within a posting or an article we'd like you to bring it to the attention of the site moderator by using the link provided. The moderator will then remove the offending word. If you see a word that you personally find offensive, but is not included in this list, please bring it to the attention of the moderator, who will make a decision as to its suitability in the given context. This page is a guide only; if other words offend, or are used in an offensive way they may be removed. The Publisher would like to point out that it would prefer you not to use swear words at all. The Forum attracts a wide range of readers and members, in terms of age, culture, nationality and personal attitude and many people are genuinely offended by swear words that others consider perfectly acceptable. If you feel you must use swear words within a posting please star out the word yourself (see examples below). Please note though that the starring out of swear words is not a means to get around the House Rules. If your posting breaks the House Rules (i.e. it is obscene, profane, abusive, racially offensive etc.) it will be removed regardless of whether the words have been starred out or not. Swear words on the banned list that have been deliberately or accidentally mis-spelt will also be removed. Swear Words: The Banned List. This is a selection of some of the words on the Banned List. Please note that all derivatives of the following words are also currently included on the banned word list: b*****k(s) testicle c**t vagina f**k to have sex j*sm ejaculated semen (also spelt j*zm) t**t another word for vagina w**k masturbate Words with Dual Meanings. These are a number of words which have both acceptable and unacceptable meanings. b*****d illegitimate person (forbidden in the context of an insult, allowed as a term for an illegitimate person) p**s urinate (banned in the context of urination and insult, but allowed as a slang term for being angry or drunk) p***k a penis, a pricking feeling (not to be used as a substitute for penis nor as an insult, allowable in the context of pins) Minority Groups. Some words are banned not because they are profane or swearing, but because they may offend members of any minority, religious or ethnic group. The list below is not definitive; any posting or article using a slang word that may be seen to be offensive to any group of people will be removed and the posting may result in the termination of your account. c**n black person, possibly from raccoon. You are allowed to use 'coon as a slang term for raccoons, but the word must be proceeded by an apostrophe to indicate the shortened word. n****r another term for black person s*****c a term which used to be used to describe a person with cerebral palsy y*d short for Yiddish Clipper Club Membership Terms and Conditions Please note the terms and conditions were amended on 05/04/2018 Benefits: Membership is FREE, there is no purchase necessary. The opportunity to enter exclusive Clipper Club competitions and reader offers. A birthday card each year. By completing and submitting a membership form you agree to the following terms and conditions: You are the parent or guardian of the child. The membership is eligible to children over the age of and under the age of . Your data along with the childs will be kept on membership database until the childs 11 th birthday. birthday. All information suppl is correct and up to date. You agree to notify us of any changes to personal information. The information we hold will be subject to the Regional Media Ltd privacy policy as amended from time to time in accordance with its terms. You have the right to request to be deleted from the Clipper Club at any point by telephoning 01709571111 or by email captainjack@rotherhamadvertiser.co.uk Complaints If you wish to make a complaint about how your personal data is being processed please contact us in order that we can look into the issue and respond. If you do not get a response within 30 days you can complain to the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) which enforces data protection laws. For further information on your rights and how to complain to the ICO, please refer to the ICO website. Contact us GDPR Officers, Regional Media, Brookfields Way, Manvers, Wath-upon-Dearne, Rotherham, S63 5DL. Telephone: 01709 768000 A state senator from Massachusetts is requesting the Trump Administration to include a proposed high-speed rail line between Boston and Springfield on future infrastructure priority lists. State Sen. Eric Lesser (D- 1st Hampden & Hampshire) sent a letter to the White House urging the president to include the high-speed line as a priority following reports that the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority Green Line was included on a list of priority infrastructure projects. Upgrading our existing tracks to accommodate high-speed rail, and building the trains to travel them, would create thousands of high-paying manufacturing jobs across the Commonwealth of Massachusetts the very jobs you promised on the campaign trail you would bring back to the United States, Sen. Lessers letter reads, in part. In the letter, Lesser points to the fact that bringing back manufacturing jobs was a core tenet of Trumps campaign for president, and notes that Western Massachusetts is a region which has a lot in common with the regions of Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Wisconsin that delivered [Trumps] victory. Lesser has reintroduced a bill to pass a feasibility study of east-west rail in the Massachusetts State Senate after the same bill passed the legislature but was vetoed by Gov. Charlie Baker in 2016. Swiss watch exports registered one of its shallowest falls of last year in December, yet marking a decline for the whole of 2016, figures from the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry showed Thursday. Watch exports declined 4.6 percent year-on-year in December to CHF 1.7 billion. Exports for the whole year tumbled 9.9 percent to CHF 19.4 billion. The trend of Swiss watch industry exports continued to recover in December while remaining negative, the group said. Overall volumes rose slightly for the first time in 18 months. Among the main , demand from the U.S., China, Japan and the U.K. improved, while exports to Hong Kong, Singapore, the UAE, main European markets and South Korea declined in December. For comments and feedback contact: editorial@rttnews.com Economic News What parts of the world are seeing the best (and worst) economic performances lately? Click here to check out our Econ Scorecard and find out! See up-to-the-moment rankings for the best and worst performers in GDP, unemployment rate, inflation and much more. The United Nations, the African Union or AU and regional partners reiterated their call for an immediate cessation of hostilities in South Sudan and urged the parties to ensure an inclusive political process, both in the proposed National Dialogue and in the implementation of the 2015 peace agreement. Meeting in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, on the margins of the 28th African Union Summit, the AU, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), and the UN, held a joint consultative meeting on South Sudan. According to a joint press statement issued after the meeting, the participants expressed their deep concerns over the continuing spread of fighting, and risk of inter-communal violence escalating into mass atrocities, and the dire humanitarian situation in South Sudan. As such, they reaffirmed their continued and collective commitment in the search for lasting peace, security and stability in the country. Stating that there can only be a political solution to the conflict, within the framework of the 2015 Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (ARCSS), the AU, IGAD and UN reiterated their call for an immediate cessation of hostilities and urged the parties to ensure an inclusive political process, both in the proposed National Dialogue and in the implementation of the peace deal. The AU, IGAD and the UN reaffirmed their commitment and determination to further enhance their cooperation in support of the South Sudan peace process Further to the press statement, the participants commended the important work performed by the Chairperson of the Joint Ministering and Evaluation Commission (JMEC) - responsible for monitoring and overseeing the implementation of the Agreement - and encouraged the AU High Representative for South Sudan to undertake active shuttle diplomacy towards ensuring the inclusivity of the National Dialogue and the implementation of the peace accord, in close consultation with the JMEC Chairperson, the UN and IGAD. The AU, IGAD and the UN reaffirmed their commitment and determination to further enhance their cooperation in support of the South Sudan peace process, the statement added.South Sudan has faced ongoing challenges since a political face-off between President Salva Kiir and his then former Vice-President Riek Machar erupted into full blown conflict in December 2013. The crisis has produced one of the world's worst displacement situations with immense suffering for civilians. Despite the August 2015 peace agreement that formally ended the war, conflict and instability have also spread to previously unaffected areas in the Greater Equatoria and Greater Bahr-El-Ghazal regions of South Sudan. For comments and feedback contact: editorial@rttnews.com Business News Indian shares followed Asian peers lower on Monday and the rupee opened marginally lower at 68.06 per dollar as investors digested U.S. President Donald Trump's immigration action and looked forward to an investor-friendly budget. The benchmark BSE Sensex was marginally lower at 27,879 in opening deals after climbing over 3 percent to post its biggest weekly gain in eight months last week. The broader Nifty index was down 8 points or 0.10 percent at 8,632, with BPCL, BHEL, Tata Steel, Hindalco and Wipro losing 1-2 percent. Sundaram Finance was marginally lower despite reporting a 35 percent increase in Q3 net profit. HPCL fell over 1 percent and GAIL edged down marginally after they signed a pact with Andhra Pradesh government for setting up a Rs. 40,000 crore petrochemical project. Balrampur Chini slid half a percent. The company is selling its entire stake in unit Indo Gulf Industries. Idea Cellular soared over 8 percent on growing speculation over a possible merger with Vodafone India. Kalindee Rail Nirman jumped 4 percent on winning a Rs 197 crore order from Dedicated Freight Corridor Corp of India. Larsen & Toubro rose 0.7 percent even as the engineering and construction giant slashed its growth guidance for order inflow and revenue for FY17, citing delays in ordering activity and other execution headwinds following demonetization. ITC gained 0.6 percent on reports that it is considering foraying into the healthcare sector. For comments and feedback contact: editorial@rttnews.com HgCapital, the Manager of HgCapital Trust plc (HGT.L), announced it has agreed the sale of Zenith, an independent vehicle leasing in the UK, to Bridgepoint in a transaction totalling 750 million pounds. The Trust will realise cash proceeds of approximately 59.0 million pounds on completion of the deal. HgCapital initially invested in Leasedrive in December 2013, subsequently completing the merger with Zenith in February 2014, and the business has operated as a single entity since March 2014. Zenith provides end-to-end automotive solutions focused on contract hire, salary sacrifice, fleet management and short-term hire services to customers across the UK. For comments and feedback contact: editorial@rttnews.com Business News BRENTWOOD, Tenn., Jan. 30, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Delek US Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:DK) and Delek Logistics Partners, LP (NYSE:DKL) (collectively with Delek US Holdings, Inc., Delek) announced that Kevin Kremke is joining the companies as Executive Vice President, effective April 1, 2017. Mr. Kremke will serve in this role until June 1, 2017 at which point he will be named as EVP and chief financial officer of the companies. As planned, Assi Ginzburgs resignation of his role as EVP and chief financial officer will be effective June 1, 2017. Mr. Ginzburg will continue to work as vice president overseeing the business development and strategic planning of Delek and will remain a member of the board of directors of Delek Logistics GP, LLC, the general partner of Delek Logistics Partners, LP. Uzi Yemin, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Delek US Holdings, Inc. and Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the general partner of Delek Logistics Partners, LP said I am excited to have someone of Kevins caliber join our team, and his start date in early April will provide time for Kevin and Assi to work together until June 1 to provide a smooth transition to the CFO role. Kevins financial experience in the energy markets and with MLPs will benefit our organization as we continue to grow through completion of the acquisition of Alon USA and the integration of the companies. I look forward to working with Kevin to achieve our growth strategies in the future. I am joining Delek at an exciting time as it continues to grow, said Kremke. I look forward to working with Uzi and the management team to support these efforts and explore additional opportunities to drive shareholder value. Mr. Kremke has nearly 20 years of financial experience in the energy sector. Most recently he served as chief financial officer for Ciner Resources Corporation and Ciner Resources Partners LP (NYSE:CINR) where he was responsible for the overall accounting and finance functions, strategy/corporate development and investor relations for the organization. Prior to joining Ciner Resources in 2014, he worked at Cheniere Energy, Inc as vice president of Finance and Strategic Planning. He also has experience in the energy sector through senior roles held at Spark Energy, Inc. and Reliant Energy, Inc. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Marketing from Ball State University and a Master of Business Administration in Finance and Strategic Management from the University of Chicagos Booth School of Business. He and his family will be relocating to the Nashville, Tennessee area. About Delek US Holdings, Inc. Delek US Holdings, Inc. is a diversified downstream energy company with assets in petroleum refining and logistics. The refining segment consists of refineries operated in Tyler, Texas and El Dorado, Arkansas with a combined nameplate production capacity of 155,000 barrels per day. Delek US Holdings, Inc. and its affiliates also own approximately 62 percent (including the 2 percent general partner interest) of Delek Logistics Partners, LP. Delek Logistics Partners, LP (NYSE:DKL) is a growth-oriented master limited partnership focused on owning and operating midstream energy infrastructure assets. Delek US Holdings, Inc. currently owns approximately 47 percent of the outstanding common stock of Alon USA Energy, Inc. (NYSE:ALJ). About Delek Logistics Partners, LP Delek Logistics Partners, LP, headquartered in Brentwood, Tennessee, was formed by Delek US Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:DK) to own, operate, acquire and construct crude oil and refined products logistics and marketing assets. Safe Harbor Provisions Regarding Forward-Looking Statements This press release contains forward-looking statements that are based upon current expectations and involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Statements concerning current estimates, expectations and projections about future results, performance, prospects, opportunities, plans, actions and events and other statements, concerns, or matters that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements, as that term is defined under the federal securities laws. These forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements regarding the proposed merger with Alon, integration and transition plans, synergies, opportunities, anticipated future performance and financial position, and other factors. Investors are cautioned that the following important factors, among others, may affect these forward-looking statements. These factors include but are not limited to: risks and uncertainties related to the expected timing and likelihood of completion of the proposed merger, including the timing, receipt and terms and conditions of any required governmental and regulatory approvals of the proposed merger that could reduce anticipated benefits or cause the parties to abandon the transaction, the ability to successfully integrate the businesses, the occurrence of any event, change or other circumstances that could give rise to the termination of the merger agreement, the possibility that stockholders of Delek US may not approve the issuance of new shares of common stock in the merger or that stockholders of Alon may not approve the merger agreement, the risk that the parties may not be able to satisfy the conditions to the proposed transaction in a timely manner or at all, risks related to disruption of management time from ongoing business operations due to the proposed transaction, the risk that any announcements relating to the proposed transaction could have adverse effects on the market price of Delek US' common stock or Alon's common stock, the risk that the proposed transaction and its announcement could have an adverse effect on the ability of Delek US and Alon to retain customers and retain and hire key personnel and maintain relationships with their suppliers and customers and on their operating results and businesses generally, the risk that problems may arise in successfully integrating the businesses of the companies, which may result in the combined company not operating as effectively and efficiently as expected, the risk that the combined company may be unable to achieve cost-cutting synergies or it may take longer than expected to achieve those synergies, uncertainty related to timing and amount of future share repurchases and dividend payments, risks and uncertainties with respect to the quantities and costs of crude oil we are able to obtain and the price of the refined petroleum products we ultimately sell; gains and losses from derivative instruments; management's ability to execute its strategy of growth through acquisitions and the transactional risks associated with acquisitions and dispositions; acquired assets may suffer a diminishment in fair value as a result of which we may need to record a write-down or impairment in carrying value of the asset; changes in the scope, costs, and/or timing of capital and maintenance projects; operating hazards inherent in transporting, storing and processing crude oil and intermediate and finished petroleum products; our competitive position and the effects of competition; the projected growth of the industries in which we operate; general economic and business conditions affecting the southern United States; and other risks contained in Delek US, Delek Logistics and Alons filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. Forward-looking statements should not be read as a guarantee of future performance or results and will not be accurate indications of the times at or by which such performance or results will be achieved. Forward-looking information is based on information available at the time and/or management's good faith belief with respect to future events, and is subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual performance or results to differ materially from those expressed in the statements. Delek US and Delek Logistics undertakes no obligation to update or revise any such forward-looking statements, except as required by applicable law or regulation. US President Donald Trump, in an effort to cool down the national and international anger over his order to halt immigration from seven Middle Eastern countries, said it is "not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting." Citing security concerns, Trump had Friday suspended the entire U.S. refugee program for four months and banned for 90 days entry into the U.S. of nationals from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somali, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, which are predominantly Muslim countries. A day after, two judges temporarily blocked the Trump administration from enforcing parts of his executive order. In a statement Sunday, Trump compared his policy to what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months. The seven countries named in the Executive Order are the same countries previously identified by the Obama administration as sources of terror, according to Trump. "To be clear, this is not a Muslim ban, as the media is falsely reporting. This is not about religion - this is about terror and keeping our country safe," Trump said. He noted that there are over 40 different countries worldwide that are majority Muslim that are not affected by this order. He made it clear that the State Department will again be issuing visas to all countries once the Government reviewed and implemented the most secure policies over the next 90 days. "I have tremendous feeling for the people involved in this horrific humanitarian crisis in Syria. My first priority will always be to protect and serve our country, but as President I will find ways to help all those who are suffering," Trump added. For comments and feedback contact: editorial@rttnews.com Political News LAFAYETTE, Calif., Jan. 30, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- California Bank of Commerce (OTCQX:CABC), a San Francisco Bay Area business bank, today announced that Terry A. Peterson, President and CEO will attend the FIG Partners 8th Annual West Coast Bank CEO Forum at the Omni Hotel in Los Angeles on February 1 and 2 2017. For more information on the conference, or to schedule a one-on-one meeting, please contact your FIG representative, or Cathy Jeff at 404-601-7200. On January 23, California Bank of Commerce reported record 2016 profits, which grew 129% to $5.2 million from $2.3 million in 2015. Profitability was fueled by strong organic loan and deposit growth, contributions from its 2015 acquisition of Pan Pacific Bank, above average net interest margin, and improving operating efficiencies. About FIG Partners FIG Partners LLC is an employee-owned broker/dealer specializing in financial institutions. Its expertise includes independent research on more than 120 public bank stocks and the industry at large. FIG has advised on more than $2.6 billion of M&A transaction value since 2007 and provides OTC market-making for 750 banks nationwide. About California Bank of Commerce California Bank of Commerce offers a broad range of commercial banking services to closely held businesses and professionals located throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. The stock trades on the OTCQX marketplace under the symbol CABC. For more information on California Bank of Commerce, call us at (510) 457-3751, or visit us at www.californiabankofcommerce.com. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Sunday predicted more than 300 seats in the assembly election to the Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance which Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi likened to the "Ganga-Yamuna milan". Addressing a joint press conference with Gandhi, Akhilesh Yadav said the people of Uttar Pradesh had made up their mind and were backing the newly-forged alliance to the hilt. Asked why he had tied up with the Congress if his claims of work done in his five-year tenure were true, the 43-year-old Chief Minister said the new alliance was needed to "take ahead the good work". "We were and are sure of crossing the majority mark on our own. But now with the 'hand' joining the 'cycle', we are confident of crossing the 300 seats mark," he added. Gandhi said the Congress and Samajwadi Party were akin to the two wheels of a cycle which was moving ahead in complete harmony. The Congress leader endorsed Akhilesh Yadav's prediction of winning over 300 of the 403 seats and said the two parties would now on work together to defeat communal forces and the "politics of anger". Later, Gandhi and Akhilesh Yadav took out a joint road show in Lucknow. Amidst cheering by party workers, the two leaders stood atop a specially improvised 'rath'. Congress activists were clearly outnumbered by Samajwadi Party supporters as they raised slogans like "Jai Akhilesh, Phir se Akhilesh." The 12-km road show began from Hazratganj and took the two leaders to various parts of Lucknow. Earlier, Rahul Gandhi said his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was an asset to the Congress. Asked if Priyanka Gandhi will campaign in the staggered Uttar Pradesh election, Gandhi said: "Priyanka has been of tremendous help to me and I have been to her. Whether she campaigns or not is her choice. She is an asset to Congress." Asked if Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav will campaign, he said: "Campaign strategy will not be divulged now." Talking about Bahujan Samajwadi Party chief Mayawati, the Congress leader said: "I personally respect Mayawatiji. BSP ruled the state and made a few mistakes but my respect is intact for her. "There are a lot of differences between Mayawatiji and BJP," he added. "The BJP spreads anger and makes people fight. There is a threat to the nation from their (BJP) ideology. There is no threat to the nation from Mayawati's ideology. There is no comparison between the two." Rahul Gandhi also said the Samajwadi-Congress alliance was like the "Ganga-Yamuna milan". "Ek tarah se yahan Ganga-Yamuna ka milan ho raha hai, progress ki Saraswati isme se niklegi. (This alliance is the coming together of Ganga-Yamuna. The Saraswati of progress will emerge from this). "This is an alliance of three Ps -- Progress, Prosperity and Peace -- to fight the politics of anger, creating divide and making false promises." Gandhi said the alliance would "fight fascist forces" such as the Bharatiya Janata Party and its ideological parent, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. Adding one more "P" to the Ps mentioned by Gandhi, Akhilesh Yadav said: "Let me add the fourth P. This will be People's alliance." Both leaders said their personal and political relations had got better after the alliance was forged to fight the seven-phase election beginning on February 11. "Our alliance will make Uttar Pradesh stronger," Gandhi said. Hours after Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi ' title=' Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi '>Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav took out a joint road show here on Sunday, Samajwadi Party (SP) patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav trashed the alliance and said he would not campaign for it. Noting he had advised his son against entering into an electoral alliance with the Congress, Mulayam Singh said it was most unfortunate that Akhilesh Yadav had done so in his quest to grab power. He also announced that he will not campaign for the alliance in the state assembly elections. "Where will the workers who have worked hard in the past go for the next five years," he said while expressing his regret once again that SP had chosen to this course of action. "The 2012 election was fought on my face and we got a majority. I was to become the Chief Minister but I opted for Akhilesh and look what he has done," he rued. Earlier in the day, at a joint press conference, Akhilesh Yadav and Rahul Gandhi, asked if they would take along leaders like Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Mulayam Singh with them during campaigning, had side-stepped it. While Akhilesh Yadav had responded by saying that he would prefer having their blessings while Gandhi said that he would not like to discuss operational matters in public. The decision of Mulayam Singh is likely to impact on the alliance as he is still a very important name in state politics. UP goes to polls between February 11 and March 8 in a seven-phased election. US President Donald Trump's Chief of Staff Reince Priebus has opened the possibility of the administration extending to Pakistan the temporary visa ban and "extreme vetting" of travellers imposed on seven countries. Speaking on Sunday during "Face the Nation" programme on CBS, he said in the passing that Pakistan may be among countries considered for adding to the enhanced temporary restrictions on travel to the US because of terrorism risks. The temporary ban covers only Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Later in the programme, "Face the Nation" host John Dickerson pointed out that the woman involved in the 2015 San Bernardino terrorist attack came to the US from Pakistan on a visa given to fiances. He tried to pin down Priebus and get a more definitive answer by asking if the country she came from was among the seven covered by the four-month ban and "extreme vetting" of visa applicants because of the terrorism risks cited by the Trump administration. Priebus would not directly answer the question, but only hinted at the possibility that the restrictions could be extended to Pakistan, saying: "May be we can expand the programme." The Trump administration has been treating Pakistan with care because it is a nuclear-armed nation that can impact the future of Afghanistan and the war on terrorism. Moreover, the number of Pakistani Americans and Pakistani permanent residents number into hundreds of thousands. The San Bernardino attack that killed 22 people was carried out by Syed Rizwan Farook, a US-born Pakistani American, and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, a Pakistani who came to the US on a fiance visa and married him. At least six people were killed in an attack on a mosque in Canada's Quebec city, while two suspects have been arrested, police said. A police spokesperson said that eight others were also injured in the attack on Sunday night on the Islamic Cultural Centre of Quebec, media reported. According to centre officials, said the attack occurred around 8 p.m., hen dozens of people were gathered in the mosque. The La Presse daily said about an hour later, a suspect was located by police on one of the city's bridges. Canadian broadcaster CBC reported that three suspects had taken part in the attack and two have been arrested. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the attack saying: "Tonight, Canadians grieve for those killed in a cowardly attack on a mosque in Quebec city. My thoughts are with victims and their families." The mosque previously experienced acts of vandalism and xenophobic messages. Last June, during the month of Ramadan, someone left a pig's head with a note saying "Bon Appetit" on the door of the mosque. This year is the first time Samoa Events is putting on the New Zealand Swim to mark Waitangi Day in Samoa. The race will be held at Taumeasina Island Resort on Saturday, 4th February two days ahead of the 177th anniversary of the signing of the historical Treaty at Waitangi in 1840 (Feb 6) the treaty of two peoples, Tangata Whenua Maori and British Pakeha. Upon this partnership the makeup of the new country was formed its laws, education, governance and government. Te Kiwi Swim (The Kiwi Swim) follows the hugely successful Aussie Swim on Australia Day last week in celebration of Australias national Day. Waitangi Day being on a Monday this year, Te Kiwi Swim will instead run on Saturday at midday. The races will kick off from the white sandy beach of Taumeasina at midday. The 2.2km swim is first at 12pm followed by the 1.2km swim fifteen minutes later. There is also a 100m swim for the little ones. Once the individual swims are out of the way then the fun stuff takes place, the relays and the costume individual swim (200m). At the end of all that swimmers and spectators will be settle in for some kiwi food, I heard a rumour of a hangi at Taumeasina, and some kiwi sounds throughout the afternoon. As a Samoan living in Aotearoa New Zealand, I came to embrace and understand the importance of my place in the country. That involved understanding its history and what is important to the wairua or soul of the country. I attended Waitangi for several years including the 150th year of the anniversary of the Treaty in 1990. It was the same week super Cyclone Ofa did massive damage to Samoa. I also attended a large number of Dawn Ceremonies on Anzac Day. These two national events are significantly important in order to understand what it means to be a New Zealander. My understanding is that not many, and very few Pacific Islanders have made the journey to Waitangi on Waitangi Day. There are quite a few now attending dawn ceremonies on Anzac Day. Proximity to celebrations is the key here. Still, a pilgrimage to Waitangi on Waitangi Day is important in the journey to be immersed in the wairua of the country. Te Kiwi Swim is therefore my own contribution to the memory of that event in 1840, and right here in Samoa where I was born and now live. Not only that, it is to celebrate the amazing contribution of many New Zealanders who travel to Samoa to participate in the many events held by Samoa Events. The celebration at Taumeasina on Saturday is open to everyone. Samoa Events actually holds two events that morning. The first is the Apia Harbour 10KM Run at 7.30AM from the car park across the road from the A.N.Z. This is the second of the Run Series. Then at 11.30am, registration is open for the swims at the Taumeasina Island Resort. An innovative competition backed by partnerships and dreamed up by the owner of Traders Mecca $amoa has eased the burden for a young student getting ready for the school year. Savaelina Posii Iulai of the St Joan of Arc Primary School won $100 cash and a $100 voucher to spend at Business Systems Limited through the online competition initiated by the Traders Mecca $amoa called Back to School with T.M.$. Owner of T.M.$. Junior Niupulusu said the competition was all about giving back to the community. I know school starts back next week (this week) and I thought this would be a great chance for the community especially the parents to get some help, he said. And so I came up with the idea to initiate a competition so that we can help the parents financially and also provide childrens school products. Towards the end of December I initiated a competition called Back to School with T.M.$. where a parent or a guardian takes a photo of a children with a paper that says Back to School with T.S.M. then posts it on our page on Facebook. Whoever received the most likes on their photo would win $100cash and $100 voucher to spend at Business systems Limited. So today we revealed the winner and it was a Year 4 student of St. Joan of Arc Primary School Savelina Posii Iulai who received more than 200 likes on her photo. We are very happy that we are able to help her and her parents. Mr. Niupulusu went on to say that Traders Mecca $amoa is an online trade group that sells anything for free. Mr. Niupulusu said he doesnt get anything from it except being able to help the people of Samoa who want to sell their products on line. The first thing I want people to know is that T.M.$. is not a business but its all about helping the community, he said. However, I can now see that I have a huge chance of becoming a businessman to build a business using T.M.$. because of the growth by the followers of the group. It hasnt been a year since the group was established but I am looking forward to the first anniversary so we can do something for the community and the many supporters of the group. I dont get anything out of it but for me I just did it to help out the community and Im definitely not a millionaire but I am happy because I am helping people. Even with the competitions that we initiate, the prizes are from our own pockets but Im still happy. For the Back to School competition we worked together with NETVO Samoa and also Pams Auto Shop in Australia who donated the $100cash and Na Folasa from Radio Polynesian with the voucher. I have people who are helping the group and that is what I am thankful for because I now have people to support me and especially my wife Diana Niupulusu and Joyetter Feagaimalii of the Samoa News. So this is such a great initiative and whoever wants to sell their things online, visit our page Traders Mecca $amoa, its free of charge. In this day and age, it is imperative that kids are computer literate if they are looking to break in to top industries. Last week Digicel officially kicked off the first Coder Dojo class for 2017. CoderDojo is a programme targeted at young children to introduce them to the world of technology and show them the endless opportunities afforded in this exciting industry. The class is back by popular demand. With a successful launch last year, many parents and kids are raring to enroll kids in this programme. Coder Dojo mentor is Eugene Barker, who is an I.T. specialist who has worked with some of the best computer companies across America. He journeyed here in 2005 and has called Samoa his home ever since. With his experience in I.T., Mr. Barker is giving back to the place he calls home by helping raise a generation of computer-literate Samoans who will shape the future of Samoa in the Information Age. He said this field is important because its a critical skill for todays programming and being able to leverage technology is a critical skill. It makes a huge difference in kids lives. If you want them to compete and win, they better know technology. Todays top leaders in all industries are leaders who know how to leverage technology. Personally, I have kids and I want my kids to compete and have better grades and better scholarships and better job opportunities and better paychecks. Mr. Barker has been with the programme from the beginning and has seen the instantaneous growth of these kids right before his very eyes. Theyre very smart and pick up so fast its incredible. Just today, kids whove never been here before, were on level 7 or 8 and they just had a few minutes on the computer. Mr. Barker is backed by the leader of introducing cutting edge to Samoa, Sam Saili, Director of Skyeye. There is also Digicels Technical Engineer, Yoko Potifara, I.T. Systems Technician, Rosemary Thew, Sponsorship Director, Chloe Faaiuaso and Digicel Scholar , Margaret Sootaga, who have enthusiastically volunteered their time on Saturday mornings to see the programme flourish. Coder Dojo is an international renowned movement aimed at targeting children aged 6-12 years old. The classes saw a handful of eager and willing participants and parents attending the first session. We value achievements. That much is undeniable. You see they are the stuff that motivates us. Its what keeps us going when the going gets tough and when we simply dont feel like we want to continue. At the start of another school year, thinking of those sweet achievements might be the best thing to do to try and take our minds away and cushion the blows of the cost of sending our children back to school. The reality is that there is not a parent in Samoa who would not be feeling the pinch over the next couple of weeks as our loved ones begin another school year. Its an exciting time. But its also one of the most difficult times for many of us. What with school fees, stationery, lunch money on top of many other obligations, its a tough act trying to budget in days like this. But in the end, if we truly believe that education is the key to a bright future for our children, we say all the headaches are worth it. All this pain will pale in comparison when we celebrate sweet achievements in another 10 months from now. Speaking of successes, not so long ago, we celebrated the sweet academic achievements of our sons and daughters here and abroad. At the end of the academic year last year, this newspaper had profiled the success stories of students who had excelled at different schools, universities and learning centres right across the country. By publishing the stories of their triumphs, our readers were invited to share in their joy and achievements. There is no doubt that it was a wonderful time of celebration, not only for the students but for their parents, families, friends and peers. It was a time when all the hardships and challenges were forgotten as tears of joy flowed freely and buried amongst the layers of garlands that reached up all the way to the students ears. It was not a time to remember all the money that went into their school fees, stationeries, bus fares, lunches, fundraisings and a myriad of other things. Rather it was an opportunity to breathe a sigh of relief and gratefully acknowledge that it was all worth it. Why are we talking about this again? Well its simple, sometimes we need to remember those sweet moments. We need to find those happy memories to allow us to persevere. Indeed, those success stories are a wonderful reminder that there is much satisfaction and success to be achieved if we dont give up. In this life, when the going gets tough, the battle is all in the mind. Our bodies will naturally want to give up. It will always remind us about our limitations and what we cant do. But our minds and strong will is what allows us to keep moving forward one glorious day at a time. Coupled by an insatiable passion to see our children succeed, it is what drives us to work harder. We know this is not an easy time, especially for parents whose income generating abilities are severely restricted. But as parents, we have a responsibility. We have a role to ensure our childrens education comes first. In days like these, sometimes its okay to say no to the occasional faalavelave to prioritise our childrens education. It will not hurt anyone to miss the faifeaus alofa (offering) if you have to spend money to send the children back to school. As parents, we are responsible for our children and we are accountable to God about how we performed our role to look after his gifts to us. So put them first. There will always be funerals, faalavelaves and you can always give another alofa next month if you cant afford one this week. But lets make sure our childrens education needs become our priority. Have a wonderful Tuesday Samoa, God bless! Dear Editor, Re: Top lawyer to prosecute Justice can never be served in a corrupt environment when someone that serves the capacity of the Police Commissioner was trying his best to clean the Police Force that was littered with dishonest people. Fuiavailili was very effective in the drug war and setting the precedence of proper protocol for the Police department to follow only to be ridiculed by the good old boys club of corrupt cops. Thats why they filed those false charges against him so that they can get rid of him. There is a ring of corrupt politicians that are in cahoots with the Police to get rid of Fuiava so that they can enjoy their positive cash flow from the most lucrative business of making money from drugs, make no mistake about that. Politicians all over the world are doing it and it is well documented. Wars were fought all over the world to protect the drug trade and no institutions are exempt from this corruption. What makes you think the reason why the U.S. politicians dont want a wall between the U.S. and Mexico? Why are they so anti-Trump and the wall that he wanted to build between the border with Mexico? See, they used their media to push the false narrative about Trump being a racist and all that but the underlying reason they dont want the public to know is that it will cut the flow of drugs coming from Mexico to the U.S. What about the Vietnam war and the Afghanistan war. The financier that profit hugely from these activities are the same suspects, the international bankers that launder money between banks around the world using fake companies that was exposed by Mosac Fonseca. So if Samoa was implicated by that scandal, the buck stops right there end of story. Leituala Roger B Train up a child in the way he should go, and when they are older they will not turn away from it. Yesterday, parents, guardians, nanas and papas accompanied their loved ones for their first day back to school. For parents of young children this can be a distressing but exciting time. The Village Voice caught up with 53-year-old woman, Avau Sakaio from Nuu- Fou who shared the joys of seeing her grandchildren off to school. Today is the first day of school for the children and I am more than happy to come this morning and take them to register, she said. She was flanked by her excited grandchildren who will be attending Aele Primary School. For Ms. Sakaio, education is critical. I know that education is the way to success for my children, she said. The same challenge that I gave to my children when they were in school while they young, the same one I give to my grandchildren. And that is go to school and learn as much as they can, if they dont, theyll suffer in the future. I know everyone has different talents, but those talents need to start from home especially in classrooms. Simple as that. She understands that it is never too early to cultivate the minds of young children. They need to learn how to read, write, understand how important to know and understand the value of family, she said. Even though these kids minds are still young , I keep on pushing them to school, teach them if they want to do well in life, they have to go to school. She has high hopes for her grandchildrens future, and there is no time like the present to set her grandchildren on the path to success. Who knows one of them may become prime minister, pastor or farmer in the future...and thats why they need to go to school, she said. They need to learn. Now more experienced in raising children, she encourages parents to be more proactive in their childs life at home to instill the basic Samoan mannerisms such as respect, obedience. Thus, those mannerisms will be carried outside of the home and create a better and safer environment for the greater society. Its all about working together, she said. Education is not only in classrooms but families as well. Parents should not wait until their children go to school to learn these values. They need to raise their children in a way that any Samoan child need to grow up with they need to teach of how to listen, obey, how to respect others...I mean everything. To me , I think that is one of the problems of today, parents wait on teachers to teach their children but thats not what teachers are for. We all understand, and I think that is one of the reasons for the increasing numbers of violence and crimes in our youth today. Parents are not doing their duties. Family planning has been blamed for the slow increase of Samoas population. So says Prime Minister, Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi. I encourage our people to do their part to increase the population, he said. People especially couples are prioritizing their work rather than making babies to increase our population. Especially the young couples. They shouldnt delay the process. Tuilaepa believes a higher population will lead to more opportunities. As of today, the countrys population remains well below 200,000. But the Prime Minister said this should change. For example, if you married in your early twenties, then you should have at least ten children, he said. But the thing is, they are going at a slow pace in making babies. Having many children has a lot of benefits. This is very useful, so that when you are old and crippled, at least you will have a lot of children to give you your cigarette and massage you. Tuilaepa said family planning is wrong. I wonder who the idiot who came up with this idea? You know doctors; most of them have more children than most of us. There is that saying that goes like, Do as I say and not as I do. I dont know who came up with the idea to start family planning. So now we are struggling to find tall, fast and strong boys for Manu Samoa because of family planning. This is not the first time Tuilaepa has raised this issue. Earlier this month, Tuilaepa also commented on this issue blaming the roles reversal in married couples. Said Tuilaepa, because women now have better paid career jobs than men, the population of Samoa is growing slowly. Im sad to see that the population growth in Samoa is not increasing. The fact of the matter is that, most of the Universities graduates we have now are women. Therefore, they have better jobs and high salaries than men. This has resulted in women going to work while men stay at home and take care of the children. The Supreme Court has set a date for the hearing of the latest development in the longstanding business dispute between two senior H.R.P.P members, Peseta Vaifou Tevaga and Laauli Leuatea Polata'ivao, and other associates. Chief Justice, His Honour Patu Tiavaasue Falefatu Sapolu, set the week beginning on 5 June 2017 as the date for the hearing. The decision was delivered yesterday when the matter was called. His Honour Patu notified defense counsel Semi Leung Wai that Justice Lesatele Rapi Vaai had left a note for them to meet in Chamber on Wednesday, 1 February 2017. I see that Justice Vaai has a note for counsels to meet with him in Chambers on the 1st of February, said Chief Justice. The week commencing the 5th of June is set for the hearing of the matter. Last week, Pesetas lawyer, Leuluaialii Olinda Woodroffe, asked the Court to remove a Court-appointed Manager for Local Partners and Associates Company. Peseta, the Associate Minister of Prime Minister and Cabinet is up against Laauli, the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, and Apulu Lance Polu and Martin Schwalger. Leuluaialii argued that interim Manager, Tagaloa Faafouina Sua, should be removed for reasons he has not done anything to develop the company financially since his appointment by Court on December 2015. But Mr. Leung Wai opposed the motion. Tagaloa wrote twice to the Court to explain the financial situation of the company, he told the Court. In December last year, lawyer Lealiifano Iopu Tanielu who was representing Leuluaialii at the time met with Semi and Lesa to discuss the appointed Court managers letter in regards to the financial situation of the company. Therefore give Tagaloa a chance to respond because as I understood Tagaloa has not been served with the letter discussed by Leuluaialii. But Leauluaialii wants her client, Peseta, to take over as Interim Manager. According to a sworn affidavit by Peseta, he argues that the Court-appointed Manager has acted in breach of his duties and has failed to act in the best interests of the company. The plaintiff submits that the Court-appointed manager has failed to exercise the care, diligence and skills of a reasonable Court-appointed Manager. The Court-appointed manager has failed to act in the best interest of the company local partners The plaintiff submits that the Court-appointed Manager has contributed to Local Partners and Associates, bleeding financially but his failure to act in good faith, failure to act in the best interest of the Company, and by his failure to act independently of Apulu Polu and Hon Laaulimalietoa Leautea Schmidt. Mr. Leung Wai objected to the appointment of Peseta as an Interim Manager. Chief Justice, His Honour Patu Tiavaasue Falefatu Sapolu, has given two weeks to the prosecutor representing the Attorney Generals Office to prepare a written submission of all evidence for their appeal filed against suspended Director of the National Prosecution Office (N.P.O.), Mauga Precious Chang. The decision delivered yesterday followed a request by New Zealand-based independent prosecutor for the A.Gs Office, Satiu Simativa Perese. Last year, District Court Judge, Fepuleai Ameperosa Roma, found Mauga not guilty of three traffic-related charges. The charges include negligent driving causing bodily injuries, an alternative charge of dangerous driving and failure to stop to ascertain whether anyone was injured at the scene. But the Attorney Generals Office has decided to pursue the matter through an appeal. Yesterday, Chief Justice Patu gave them two weeks to come up with a transcript of evidence so he can set a date for written submissions to be submitted. The matter has been adjourned until Monday 13 February 2017. Outside Court, Satiu said they needed to prepare a transcript of all the evidence, Court records and exhibits to present before the Court. All of the evidence needs to come before the hub of the Supreme Court. So thats what we are preparing at the moment. Once its done, a date of the hearing will be set, said Satiu. What theyve asked from us are copies of our submissions. And Ive already started writing my submissions. The appeal was lodged by the A.Gs office through Satiu against the decision by the District Court to find suspended Director of the N.P.O, not. Earlier this month, the matter was taken off the Court list following the non-appearance of both counsels involved in the matter. Satiu is representing the A.G.s office and former Attorney General, Aumua Ming Leung Wai is representing Mauga. The Chief Justice at the time said the absence of both lawyers for the matter was disrespectful. The no appearance by any of the counsels in the matter means this is taken off the list. This is rather disrespectful to the Court to file an appeal and then the counsel filing the appeal does not appear. Satiu later denied that he was disrespectful saying he was not aware about the matter being called. Parliament has been urged to stand by Israel in the face of growing hostility against Gods people from other countries in the world. The call comes from the Member of Parliament for Anoamaa East, Alaiasa Sepulona Moananu. He was speaking in Parliament during the Constitutional Amendment Bill (No.2) 2016 tabled by Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi. The bill aims to insert in the Constitution that Samoa is a Christian nation to declare the dominance of Christianity in Samoa. Alaiasa supports the amendment. The God we believe in is the God of the Bible, the God of Israel, he said. I strongly urge our government that whatever happens to Israel, we should always support that government. We have to. The God upon whom Samoa is founded is the God of the Bible. If we go back to theology, He is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and from them come Jesus Christ whom we believe. Alaiasa congratulated Prime Minister Tuilaepa for the amendment, saying it might be brief but is "very meaty." This is the first step. The other issues that members of the house are concerned about, we can build on those later. He reminded about the book of Deuteronomy 28 where Gods blessings for the nation that trusts him are highlighted. There are a lot of wonderful blessings, he said. It says you are the head not the tail, you are blessed when you enter and when you leave, your wallet will be blessed. But there is the other side of the coin if you neglect God. You are cursed in the city and the country thats what happens to a country who turns its back on God. This is why this amendment is very important to me. This is our declaration that there is one God upon whom Samoa is founded. But the Member of Parliament also cautioned Parliament over what he described as a curse. There is only one curse I can see and that is also in Deuteronomy, he said. It says you will live with a foreigner but in the end you will borrow from a foreigner. The foreigner comes and rules over you. Please consider this, I can see this coming. Foreigners are trying to rule our nation. We are borrowing from them. But I believe that when our ship is redirected to God (through this amendment), the blessings will flow to us again. During the second reading on the bill in Parliament, Tuilaepa said the Constitutions reference to Christianity as it stands is only in the Preamble. The discussion of this bill is not new as it was introduced in our last Parliament sitting. And from that discussion, we saw how inadequate the Constitution was at the time. Inadequate in terms of how Samoa as a Christian State is not included in the body of the Constitution. Instead it is in the cover and the preamble of the Constitution, not within the body of the Constitution. This shows that it is not part of the Constitution. This does not stand in Court as it is not included in the body of the Constitution. Tuilaepa said he understood the main reason it wasnt included in the body of the Constitution then was because there were no religious wars in Samoa when the Constitution was initially written. But times have changed. The bill was widely supported. But the M.P. for Falealili East, Fuimaono Teo, cautioned Parliament against restricting religious freedom. If we are to restrict religions, it means we are limiting a persons human right as guaranteed in the Constitution to be free to worship whatever he/she chooses to believe, Fuimaono said. Ive heard different opinions being expressed about the issue. My concern is that not everyone shares the same beliefs in relation to the trinity. There are people who believe only in Jesus Christ, and yet it is in the amendment it talks about God and his son. There are people who also dont believe in the trinity, of God the father, the son and holy spirit but they believe in God, as Jesus Christ. As you know, Jehovahs Witnesses only believe in Jesus Christ, Bahai believe in the glory of God. So if we begin to limit the freedom for these different beliefs, their rights will be violated and yet they all believe in the same thing. Fuimaono pointed out that there are no frictions in Samoa because of religions. There are no wars in Samoa because of religions, he said. For the M.P., the most important rule in the Bible is about love. If there is love in Parliament, that is the most important thing, he said. The bill has been referred to the Standing Orders, Electoral, Petitions and Constitutional Offices Committee. BAGHDAD (AP) Iraqi lawmakers Monday called for banning Americans from entering the country after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order suspending immigration from Iraq and citizens of six other Muslim majority nations. The vote is not binding on the Iraqi government, but it still could strain relations between Baghdad and Washington amid the military operation to retake Mosul from the Islamic State group. The vote was described as "a recommendation," by deputy speaker of parliament, Sheik Humam Hamoudi, and called for the U.S. Congress to "pressure the American administration to reconsider that decision regarding Iraq." The Foreign Ministry also spoke out against Trump's order, saying it "regrets such a decision" against a country that the U.S. considers "an ally and a strategic partner." "It is a surprise that Iraq is covered with this order because it is not among the countries that export terrorists or Takfiri ideology," the statement added, using an Arabic term that refers to Sunni extremists. "The Iraqi community inside the U.S. enjoys a good reputation and its members have not involved in any terrorist act." The ministry described Trump's decision as "wrong" and called for him to reconsider it. The 90-day travel ban affects citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The Pentagon is compiling a list of Iraqis who have supported U.S. and coalition personnel to help exempt them from Trump's ban, said Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman. The list will include those who have tangibly demonstrated their commitment to supporting U.S. forces, such as translators, drivers and Iraqi forces who may be training in the U.S., he said. Trump's ban and the Iraqi parliament decision came as Iraqi forces are more than three months into the fight to dislodge IS militants from Mosul. Iraqi forces control about half of Iraq's second-largest city. The Mosul operation is the largest in Iraq since 2003 and one in which Iraqis are more dependent than ever on U.S. support. American forces withdrew in 2011. The Pentagon says there are more than 5,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. Small numbers of U.S. forces have operated inside Mosul and from the air. The U.S.-led coalition said it has dropped more than 9,900 munitions in and around the city since the operation began in October. Iraqi forces are largely dependent on coalition airpower to retake and hold territory. Iraqi officers leading the Mosul battle say they doubt that politics will hurt the military effort against IS. Brig. Gen. Haider Fadhil said he believes U.S. support for Iraq will increase, since Trump has pledged to hasten the pace of the fight against the militants. The measure, a copy of which was obtained by AP, calls for a reciprocal measure "in the event the American side will not retreat from that order to maintain the state prestige and the dignity of the Iraqi people." That language suggests it would deny entry to Americans holding valid Iraqi visas. It also called for the U.S. Congress to pressure the Trump administration to reconsider its ban. The decision did not detail when it would be enacted or to whom specifically it would apply: U.S. military personnel, aid workers, oil companies or other Americans in Iraq. "Parliament absolutely lacks the authority to originate legislation of any kind regulating anything the executive branch does," said Kirk Sowell, a political and legal analyst focused on Iraq and publisher of the Inside Iraqi Politics newsletter. The prime minister's office said the government "is waiting to receive the decision officially and it will take care of it and follow up with the American administration to discuss what is needed to ensure the respect of agreement," according to government spokesman Saad al-Hadithi. Since taking office in 2014, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has struggled to balance his government's dependence on both the U.S. and Iran in the fight against IS. Iraq is reliant not only on coalition airstrikes that have helped its forces retake nearly all the territory IS once held, but also on U.S. financial aid. Earlier this month, Baghdad signed a $1 billion sovereign loan guarantee with the U.S. aimed at financially supporting Iraq during its economic crisis. Iraq continues to be dominated by powerful political blocs with close ties to Iran, another key ally. Al-Abadi's political opponents former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and influential Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr regularly highlight his close relationship with the U.S. in seeking to portray him as weak. The U.S. Embassy offered only a brief statement, saying "we have seen the reports of the parliament vote and are reviewing its details. We refer you to the government of Iraq for further clarification." Even if the government were to take up the parliament's call and implement the ban on Americans entering Iraq, it is not certain that the semi-autonomous northern Iraqi Kurdistan region which has equally strong tie with Washington would abide by it. The Kurdistan region has its own immigration policies and largely controls its own borders. Mount Helix Park is hosting the first of a two-part Nature/Sustainable Living lecture series on Saturday. The free event will be from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. at the parks historic amphitheater, 4905 Mount Helix Drive. California native plant expert Ed Piffard will discuss the process and purpose of habitat restoration as it applies to Mount Helix Park and the unincorporated area of La Mesa region in general. Advertisement The presentation will include a walk along Yawkey Trail on Mount Helix, plus a hands-on demonstration of weed abatement. Planting techniques will also be shared. A second lecture in June is being planned, featuring several speakers in a few locations throughout the park, said Peggy Junker, assistant executive director of Mount Helix Park. Tentative topics include pollinators and edible and medicinal California native plants, she said. Phil Lambert of the Audubon Society will be one of the speakers, Junker said. The lectures came about to fill in a void after East County Earth Day was discontinued after 2013. Lectures touch on ecological and conservation topics such as habitat restoration, bird/wildlife preservation, composting and California native plants. The hope is to give the public information that will help them make informed, responsible decisions about how they landscape, manage waste, and treat the environment in general, Junker said. Parking at the amphitheater is limited. There is a lower parking lot near the San Miguel Fire Station at Vivera and Mount Helix drives, and it is a 10- to 15-minute walk to the top, Junker said. On Dec. 27, five billboards went up simultaneously around San Diego promoting the need for living kidney donations. And pictured on every billboard are the women of WELD. WELD is an acronym for Women Encouraging Living Donation, an 18-month-old group of 28 local women who hope through sharing their donation-related experiences to demystify the procedure and expand the pool of living donors. WELD is the brainchild of Diane Brockington, a retired college English professor who has spent the past 15 years of her life dedicated to supporting people with kidney disease and promoting organ donation. Advertisement Her life took an unexpected detour in 2001, when she learned that her good friend, retired Green Bay Packers running back John Brockington, needed a kidney. At 54, she donated one of her own kidneys and the following year, they launched the John Brockington Foundation, which over the years has raised more than $500,000 for patient support and donor-related programs. Along the way, they fell in love and married in 2003. WELD, a program under the foundations umbrella, was born in July 2015 after Brockington realized it was mathematically impossible for deceased donors to meet the needs of patients on kidney waiting lists. In San Diego, there are 1,900 people awaiting kidneys (100,000 nationwide), but last year 51 local residents on the list died and another 88 were removed from the list because of deteriorating health. The median life expectancy for a patient on dialysis is just five years, she said. WELD is the result of a perfect storm of need and solution, Brockington said. The best solution is living donation because these kidneys work better and last longer than kidneys from deceased donors. WELD member Lillian Thompson of La Mesa spent 14 months on dialysis before she received a kidney from her sister in August 2015. She said it was hard requesting something so precious, even from a family member. I didnt want to ask, she said, but most kidney recipients have been sick forever. Tammy Wright, living donor transplant coordinator at Sharp Memorial Hospital, said Thompsons sentiment is common but short-sighted. Theyd rather wait for a deceased donor but recipients have a very limited life span, said Wright, a WELD member. From 12 to 18 people die every day waiting for a deceased donor kidney. Diane Brockington, center, at a meeting of WELD (Women Encouraging Living Donation) at her Mission Hills home. At right, is her husband, former NFL running back John Brockington, who she donated a kidney to in 2001. (Nancee E. Lewis /San Diego Union-Tribune) The women of WELD come from all sectors of the kidney transplant world. There are donors and recipients, surgeons, nephrologists, transplant coordinators, a dialysis social worker and transplant advocates. Dr. Liz Ingulli, medical director of the kidney transplant program at Rady Childrens Hospital, said she was excited to join WELD because she has seen the benefits of living donation. I see changed lives, Ingulli said. These kidneys work beautifully from the get-go. It truly is a gift of life. WELDs goal is to educate through billboards, a new website and blog (weldsd.org), a Facebook page (WELD: Women Encouraging Living Donation), television interviews and public speaking engagements. The point of WELD is to make the subject of living donation dinner conversation, said Dr. Lieuko Nguyen, pediatric transplant nephrologist at Rady. People have a lot of concerns about donating and often their worry results from not understanding the process. People can make the right decisions for themselves if they have the right information. That information has changed dramatically over the past 20 years. Kidney donors dont need to be the same sex, ethnicity or age as their recipient, they can donate into their 80s, the surgery leaves only tiny scars and it requires just a few days of recovery time. And now, thanks to the National Kidney Registry, donors whose blood type doesnt match their recipient can do a one-for-one exchange with someone in the registry. Kidney donation has a 99 percent success rate, but an equally impressive statistic is that 97 percent of past donors say they would do it again. One of them is WELD member Camille Yoder, 26, of Linda Vista. Yoder learned about kidney donation from a National Public Radio report in 2015 and registered to donate right after she moved last year to San Diego, where she runs a homeless housing services nonprofit. Her donation was nondirected, meaning she doesnt know the woman who received her kidney six months ago. It was amazing and definitely worth it, Yoder said. It was the worst pain of my life, the weakest I ever felt and also the greatest experience Ive ever had. Yoders altruistic donation is not typical. Most donors know their recipient, like WELD members Linda Gandy of Carmel Mountain Ranch, who gave a kidney to her son in 2004; Vista resident Nanci Sarino, who donated to her brother in Chicago in 2013; and Dina Macdonald of Tierrasanta, a Rady transplant coordinator who gave a kidney to her husband. Just like the membership of WELD, the kidney transplant field (including most donors) is almost entirely women. Many of these donors are professionals in the nephrology field, who have seen the impact a new kidney can make in a patients life, like Lorena Rodriguez, who donated a kidney after 19 years as a medical assistant in Balboa Naval Medical Centers nephrology department. I saw how the doctors cared for the patients and wanted to step up to the plate, said Rodriguez, a Chula Vista resident. She said the entire transplant community owes a debt to Brockington for her leadership and creation of the foundation and WELD. Dianes amazing and has so many ideas, Rodriguez said. Shes nonstop fiercely dedicated to helping patients on dialysis and getting people ready for transplant. Not everyone who wants to donate is approved. Patients at risk of diabetes or hypertension (the leading causes of kidney disease) are not accepted. WELD member Jenine Lewis of Granite Hills wanted to donate but discovered that her kidney function was too low to safely donate, so instead she has become an advocate for living donation. Once a month, at the home Brockington shares with her husband in Mission Hills, WELD members meet to discuss their information roll-out. Over pulled-pork sliders and brownies last Tuesday, Brockington led a discussion on upcoming presentations and how to fine-tune their message. One thing they talked about was avoiding the use of the word hero for donors because it might deter potential donors who dont see themselves as particularly heroic. Among the 16 women at Tuesdays meeting was newest member Jan Wirtz, a retired nurse from Lakeside, who made a nondirected kidney donation two months ago. She was inspired to donate after a friend of hers did it. It feels very good, Wirtz said of her experience. When my friend gave her kidney, her recipient said now I have a life. Being able to help someone like that is really something special. pam.kragen@sduniontribune.com For San Diegans with friends and family who may now be banned from the U.S., quick courtroom victories can only provide so much comfort. That was the takeaway at the East African Center in City Heights on Sunday, where extra chairs were needed to seat around 150 immigrants, advocates and lawyers meeting to absorb President Donald Trumps travel and immigration ban. The group loudly applauded a federal judges ruling that blocked part of the ban. But plenty of fears remain about the executive action, which indefinitely barred U.S. entry to anyone fleeing Syria and imposed a 90-day ban on those looking to enter the country from seven majority Muslim countries Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen until more extreme vetting can be figured out. Advertisement Ismahan Abdullahi, an event organizer who fled war-torn Somalia with her family in 1992, pulled no punches in describing the effort as a Muslim ban. We are not afraid to stand up as a community and fight, Abdullah said. The Muslim ban is unconstitutional, unethical, immoral and unjust. We condemn it in the strongest possible terms. We are saying today that we will not stay silent in the face of such injustice. A Saturday ruling from U.S. District Court Judge Ann M. Donnelly prevented federal authorities from deporting refugees and others held under the order at U.S. airports. It also stopped short of allowing those detainees into the country, leaving an unknown number of would-be arrivals in legal limbo and prompting a nagging question posed by several attendees at Sundays town hall-style meeting. Who, exactly, is allowed to enter and exit the U.S.? The answer, provided by a pair of attorneys, was not always reassuring to members of the largely Muslim audience. I imagine Im going to be getting a lot of calls from my Syrian clients tomorrow, said San Diego immigration attorney Ginger Jacobs. I would seriously advise them to be thinking about other countries where they might be able to resettle. I dont want to be discouraging, I dont want to be depressing, but I think we all have to be realistic here. Jacobs said those waiting to reunite with a family member holding a non-immigrant visa faced similarly bleak reentry prospects. She advised those with loved ones in countries besides Syria to consider getting them home as soon as possible, so as to thwart any federal government attempts to prevent reentry on the basis of an abandoned residency status. Jacobs added that even those with green cards ought to avoid overseas travel and steer clear of run-ins with the police. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus on Sunday told NBCs Meet the Press that green card holders from the newly banned countries would not be barred from returning to the U.S. moving forward. Administration officials had said one day earlier those individuals who are authorized to live and work in the U.S. would need a case-by-case waiver for such trips. Some reports have put the number of permanent residents from the affected countries as high as half a million. Given the mixed messages, ACLU staff attorney Jonathan Markovitz, urged caution to the City Heights crowd.. If the Trump administration hasnt already appealed (Donnellys ruling), I suspect theyre going to soon, he said. Markovitz went on to tell audience members that those who hold dual citizenship status will be affected by the travel ban, as will those with a student visa. He said he wasnt aware of any refugees or others subject to the ban that had been detained at San Diego International Airport, though he said his office had put out a call for notifications about any such cases. Apparently ending an ongoing feud with Lockheed Martin, President Donald Trump told White House reporters on Monday that the defense contractor will shave $600 million off the cost of the controversial F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter program. I appreciate Lockheed Martin for being so responsive, he said. Advertisement Irked by long delays and cost overruns in the $1.5 trillion program, Trump had sparred with Lockheed Martin executives on the social media platform Twitter and in private meetings before and after he took the oath of office. Trump had threatened to shift purchases to rival contractor Boeing, which makes the non-stealthy and less technologically advanced F-18 E/F Super Hornet, and on Friday the Pentagon announced that it was exploring ways to trim costs. The Pentagon memo and the meetings with Trump came after months of negotiations between the Department of Defenses F-35 Joint Program Office and Lockheed Martin. Top officials had predicted the final deal would result in cost reductions of between 6 and 7 percent for each fighter in the next block buy of 90 jets. And thats about where the deal announced by Trump ended up a reduction of just under 7 percent for each F-35 in the next order. The deal includes two F-35C jets designed to deploy from carriers for the Navy, a dozen F-35B vertically-launched fighters for the Marines and allied nations, plus 76 F-35A jets that use conventional runways and are bound for the Air Force and allies. In July, the Pentagon announced similar savings in a bulk buy from Pratt & Whitney of 99 F-135 propulsion systems the engines that go into the F-35 fighters. The Navys F-35C in particular has faced numerous technological problems, including an inability to safely catapult from an aircraft carrier. Tests are slated in New Jersey in February to see if engineers have solved the launch problems, but Lockheed Martin officials told The Union-Tribune on Saturday that most other major glitches had been fixed -- including redesigning the fighters wing so that it can fire anti-aircraft missiles. Military Videos On Now D-Day paratrooper from Coronado jumps again in France at age 96 On Now Remembering war's fallen, one name at a time On Now In Ramona, an airplane and an aviator provide living lessons on World War II 1:43 On Now Video: Navy's newest vessel sails into San Diego and a new future in surface warfare On Now Video: U.S. Navy files homicide charges over warship collisions On Now Stopping Marine hazing On Now Video: U.S. Navy Air Crew Grounded After Creating Vulgar Sky Drawing On Now Navy says Asia Pacific ship collisions were avoidable On Now Hundreds of recruits get sick at Marine boot camp On Now Cutler Dawson Talks Navy Federal cprine@sduniontribune.com A decorated Navy SEAL from the Virginia-based elite unit known as SEAL Team 6 was killed during an unusual nighttime raid that put U.S. troops on the ground against al Qaeda leaders in the middle of war-torn Yemen. The fallen sailor is Chief Special Warfare Operator William Ryan Owens, 36, of Peoria, Illinois. Advertisement Trump to SEALs widow: We will never forget Ryan Owens was twice awarded the Bronze Star medal with V for valor in combat. He was stationed at a Coronado-based SEAL team from 2003 to 2007 before transferring to the East Coast. Owens did his initial SEAL training in Coronado from 2001 to 2002. Three other Americans were wounded in the raid and an MV-22 Osprey had to be destroyed after the aircraft suffered a hard landing and couldnt fly. Another U.S. service member was injured in that crash. U.S. warplanes were first seen in the sky above the area at 9 p.m. Saturday in Yemen and the raid began at 2 a.m. on Sunday, with 16 missiles hitting three houses, a news service linked to al Qaeda reported. A two-hour gun battle ensued after American service members landed on the ground. Some of the al Qaeda fighters were women, and they were among the casualties, the Pentagon said. The admiral in charge of the nations Navy SEALs described Owens as an experienced warrior and respected teammate who had served several combat deployments. His family has sacrificed much for his service. Our thoughts and prayers are with them, said Rear Adm. Tim Szymanski, who leads Coronados Naval Special Warfare Command, in a released statement. His death reminds us all of the constant dangers of our profession, and the very real threats to our nation. For NSW, Ryans legacy strengthens our own resolve and commitment to this crucial fight. Welcome to The Intel, a blog examining the hot military news of the day The attack in rural Yemen has been described as an effort to target the al-Dhahab family, who is considered an al Qaeda ally. Three members of that family Abdul-Raouf al-Dhahab, Sultan al-Dhahab, and Seif al-Nims were killed Sunday. Fourteen other people described by the U.S. as militants were also killed. Al Qaeda has claimed that 30 civilians are also dead, including an 8-year-old girl who was the daughter of now-dead imam Anwar al-Awlaki, an American al Qaeda devotee who recruited in the United States and once taught at a mosque in San Diego. Al-Awlaki was killed in a 2011 CIA drone strike in Yemen. Sundays American casualty marks the first U.S. combat death of the Trump presidency. The president was reported to have approved the mission, though the planning of the raid started during the Obama administration. The target was the terrorist branch known as Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, a group that has used the unrest in Yemen to set up a home base there. The goal of the mission, in addition to killing al Qaeda leaders, was apparently to gather intelligence. The SEALs took information from the site that will likely provide insight into the planning of future terror plots, according to a statement from U.S. Central Command. This is one in a series of aggressive moves against terrorist planners in Yemen and worldwide. Similar operations have produced intelligence on al Qaeda logistics, recruiting and financing efforts, the Centcom statement said. The United States remains concerned about al Qaeda because of its involvement in inciting terrorist attacks. A Pentagon spokesman on Monday said Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has claimed responsibility for or has been linked to the January 2015 attack on the French newspaper Charlie Hebdo, the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing and the attempted underwear bombing aboard Northwest Flight 253 on Christmas 2009. American drones have targeted al Qaedas Yemen operations on multiple occasions in recent years, including a three-day barrage earlier this month. Why send in troops this time? Chris Harmer of the Institute for the Study of War said it was likely to capture a high-value target alive or seize a trove of materials such as hard drives and cell phones. If the goal is just to kill a guy, you use a drone or a plane or a cruise missile strike, Harmer said. Al Qaeda has become geographically split in recent years, with one arm building strength in Yemen and the other hunkered down in the Afghanistan-Pakistan borderlands. The Arabian Peninsula branch has become embroiled in fighting the Shia Houthi rebels waging the civil war in Yemen. So, in the short term, its routine is not directly conducting terrorist attacks outside Yemen, but they coordinate, they finance, they support, Harmer said. Also, its a strategic location for them, and its a difficult place for us to keep our eye on, he said. But, Its an important place for us to keep an eye on them, and in this case, conduct direct action. Military Videos On Now D-Day paratrooper from Coronado jumps again in France at age 96 On Now Remembering war's fallen, one name at a time On Now In Ramona, an airplane and an aviator provide living lessons on World War II 1:43 On Now Video: Navy's newest vessel sails into San Diego and a new future in surface warfare On Now Video: U.S. Navy files homicide charges over warship collisions On Now Stopping Marine hazing On Now Video: U.S. Navy Air Crew Grounded After Creating Vulgar Sky Drawing On Now Navy says Asia Pacific ship collisions were avoidable On Now Hundreds of recruits get sick at Marine boot camp On Now Cutler Dawson Talks Navy Federal jen.steele@sduniontribune.com Facebook: U-T Military Twitter: @jensteeley A day after Baja California Gov. Francisco Kiko Vega de Lamadrid and other top officials were forced to flee an angry mob outside state offices in Mexicali, protesters continued on Sunday to block access to the government building in the citys Civic Center. A video of Saturdays incident showed the governor accompanied by aides and bodyguards struggling through a crowd that shouted Fuera Kiko Out with Kiko. The governors group was able to push the governor through the mob into the passenger seat of a white panel truck that drove the governor away as protesters pounded on the truck. The governor, a member of Mexicos National Action Party, had come to the states main office building to negotiate with protesters who have been blocking access since Jan. 15, the day that a crowd of more than 40,000 demonstrators converged at Mexicalis Civic Center. Advertisement The protests have been directed against Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto for a recent nationwide hike in gasoline prices. But the governor also has been the target of anger following the passage of a state water law in December that opened the door for the private sectors involvement in functions such as water distribution and sewage services. The governor has since moved to annul the water law, but protesters are pressing a series of other demands, including lower salaries for government officials. Late Saturday, the governors office released a video in which Vega stated that he had consented to the demand by protesters that he personally attend the negotiating sessions. As he walked out of the building to deliver a response, the violent outburst prevented any possibility of dialogue, the governor said. He said militants of leftist parties were among those participating in the blockade. sandra.dibble@sduniontribune.com @sandradibble A blockade of Baja California government offices in the state capital of Mexicali was lifted early Monday after demonstrators were persuaded to permit access to the buildings for the first time in two weeks. Protesters in the Plaza de los Tres Poderes reached an accord with state government negotiators after they came backed by a force of several hundred police, Mexicali media reported. The blockade had effectively shut down the states main state government building since Jan. 15. The blockade was lifted peacefully and without incident, according to a statement from Gov. Francisco Vega de Lamadrids administration. Both the main office building and another state building that had been shut down were reopened for business as usual, the statement said. Advertisement The states second highest-ranking official, Francisco Rueda Gomez, said that use of force had not been necessary, and that talks with the demonstrators would continue, according to the statement. The blockade has come as protests have erupted across Mexico in recent weeks against President Enrique Pena Nietos administration over a gasoline price hike. Protesters have also voiced a series of other grievances against the government and political parties in Mexico, calling for social justice and an end to violence and corruption. Demonstrations across Baja California have also focused anger against Gov. Vegas administration over a series of state issues including the passage of an unpopular state water law late last year that has since been reversed. The Mexicali protesters are continuing to press for additional concessions, including the governors resignation, the reversal of the states public-private partnership law and continued subsidies for electricity costs. The lifting of the blockade has come two days after the governor and other state officials were forced to flee a mob outside the state government offices. A video showed the officials and their bodyguards on Saturday struggling to reach a white panel truck, which eventually drove the governor to safety. sandra.dibble@sduniontribune.com @sandradibble For the fourth Sunday in a row, drivers heading southbound on Interstates 5 and 805 toward Tijuana found themselves diverted to Otay Mesa for several hours. Starting at about 2 p.m., California Highway Patrol officers began directing drivers away from Mexicos El Chaparral Port of Entry following a request from Mexican authorities. The port was re-opened by 5:30 p.m., a Tijuana city official said. In past weeks, protesters have swarmed the vehicle inspection lanes at the El Chaparral facility, allowing all traffic through as out-numbered inspectors walked away from their posts. But the Tijuana city official said that this time protesters did not show up at the El Chaparral. Rather, they ended their march at Tijuana City Hall. Advertisement On Sunday afternoon, U.S. Customs and Border Protection said in a statement that traffic was diverted at the request of Mexican officials in response to protesters disruption of their inbound operations. Though initially sparked by a sharp rise in Mexicos gasoline prices, Baja California protests in recent weeks have also focused on a series of additional issues, with anger directed both toward Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto and Baja California Gov. Francisco Vega de Lamadrid. This story was updated to reflect the re-opening of the El Chaparral port of entry. sandra.dibble@sduniontribune.com @sandradibble Marzieh Moosavizadeh and her grandson follow a routine when she visits almost every year from Iran. The 75-year-old, who travels in a wheelchair and speaks little English, struggles to find direct flights to Phoenix, where he and his family live. So they meet in Los Angeles and he escorts her on the last leg of her trip. This time was different. Advertisement Moosavizadeh landed at Los Angeles International Airport a day after President Trump signed an executive order banning citizens from seven predominantly Muslim countries, including Iran, from entering the United States. Marzieh Moosavizadeh and her grandson Siavosh Naji-Talakar leave their hotel room in El Segundo after she was detained at LAX. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) Moosavizadehs plans to catch her last flight were upended when she said she was held at LAX for nine hours with dozens of other passengers who, like her, had no idea whether they would be released or sent back to their native country. Sitting there for eight hours, for somebody who has arthritis, is very, very hard, Moosavizadeh said while recounting her detention in an interview with The Times in Persian while her son translated by phone. Please, tell Mr. Trump when they make these kind of decisions, think it all the way through. For Moosavizadeh, who her grandson said has held a green card since 1997, the anxiety set in when she landed shortly after 4 p.m. on Saturday. Customs officers scanned her passport, held it up next to her head and told her to wait. Then, they ushered her to a room where she said a couple dozen passengers Iranians, Africans and Asians were being held. She sat there for two hours before officers led her, along with a handful of others passengers from her flight, to another room filled with travelers from Iran. She spent the next several hours there. Siavosh Naji-Talakar, left, helps his grandmother Marzieh Moosavizadeh, 75, pack at their hotel near LAX in El Segundo. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) At about 6 p.m., Moosavizadehs wheelchair attendant offered her a cellphone to call her grandson. She told him to go eat and rest she heard shed be held for a few more hours. He told her to stay calm, he wasnt going anywhere. Every hour or so, Moosavizadeh said, officers would come by to escort passengers to the bathroom or drop off 8-ounce water bottles. The English-speakers implored them for answers. Its out of our hands, the officers said. Their fate was up to their superiors. Passengers were afraid to talk to one another, Moosavizadeh said. No one knew whether theyd be released or sent back to Iran. Most of them, they thought they were going to get deported, she said, through her son. A hand made sign in Siavosh Naji-Talakar, held this sign as his greeted his grandmother Marzieh Moosavizadeh at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) At one point, she was taken elsewhere for questioning. Customs officers asked her when she last visited the U.S., who she lives with in Iran and where she gets her income. When she returned, she snacked on almonds shed packed in her purse. Thank God I put them in my purse, otherwise I didnt have anything on me, she said. Meanwhile, in Phoenix, her sons frantically refreshed news articles and peppered her grandson, Siavosh Naji-Talakar, with questions he couldnt answer. Huddled among throngs of boisterous protesters demanding the detainees be released, Naji-Talakar could do little but wait. Over and over, they chanted, Let them in! They said they wouldnt leave otherwise. Some offered Naji-Talakar food and a couch for the night, others money for a hotel room. Nearby, the detainees heard the cries, faintly. They had no idea, though, if those who had gathered were there to support or decry them. A customs officer, Moosavizadeh said, told the group that it wasnt safe for them to let them go. Eventually, officers began calling passengers one by one. Detainees were taken away, alone or in pairs, while those left behind wondered if they were being released or deported. We all thought they were going to give us hard time first and then send us back, Moosavizadeh said. She added that she wants Trump to know that Muslims condemn Islamic State. They might be Muslim, but theyre not a part of us, she said. We are all brothers and sisters and we dont believe in their values at all. 1 / 62 Supporters of President Trump rally in favor of his immigration ban executive order Saturday at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 62 Protesters rallying against the first travel ban signed by President Trump march around Los Angeles International Airport in February. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 62 Trump supporters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 62 Muhaned El Hindi protests the immigration ban Saturday during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 62 Mathew Woods, a supporter of President Trump, voices support for an immigration ban during a rally at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 62 Passengers stand in the doorway of a baggage claim area to take pictures and video of marchers protesting the immigration ban of President Trump at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 62 Supporters of President Trumps travel ban stand across the street from the #NoBanNoWall protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 62 Cooper Chvotkin, 6, gets a turn to voice his opinion on the megaphone with other protesters at LAX on Saturday. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 62 Protesters march through the Tom Bradley International terminal at LAX on Saturday to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 62 Abeer Abdelrahman, left, hugs her sister Areej Ali at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday after Ali, who has a green card, was able to come through the arrivals area with the help of an attorney after being detained and questioned. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 62 Noor Hindi, left, and Sham Najjar, right, join the protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport on Monday. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 12 / 62 Attorneys crowd a small table at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 62 Immigration Attorney Monica Glicken, left, listens to Mohamed, right, as she tries to find travelers to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Monday to assist travelers who require help due to President Trumps travel restrictions. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 62 Hundreds of people protested President Trumps original travel ban at LAX in January. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 15 / 62 Protesters block traffic at LAX, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 62 Demonstrators take a pizza break while blocking traffic on the upper level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal while police monitor the rally. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 17 / 62 A pro-Trump supporter argues with protesters about the presidents travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Patrick T. Fallon / For The Times) 18 / 62 Hundreds sit in on the arrival level of LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal, blocking traffic to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 62 Airport police plead with protesters to get off the pavement in order to let stranded motorists exit. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 62 Protesters block traffic, stranding motorists at the Tom Bradley International Terminal of LAX. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 21 / 62 Muslims pray as hundreds stand in support on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during a protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 22 / 62 Police position themselves as a man takes photos on the on the departure level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal during protests to President Donald Trumps new immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 23 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 24 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest against President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 25 / 62 A police officer watches protesters at the lower deck of the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 26 / 62 People gather at the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 27 / 62 Assmaa Kalm, left, and Rosanna Sounbl, right, protest President Trumps travel ban at Los Angeles International Airport on Jan. 29, 2017. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 28 / 62 Hundreds block traffic on the arrival level of the Tom Bradley International Terminal to protest President Trumps immigration order. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 29 / 62 Police keep an eye on people who continue to protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 30 / 62 Hundreds take part in an impromptu sit-in at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 31 / 62 People hang a banner in support of immigrants on a parking structure across the street from the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 32 / 62 Meg Heatherly, 27, of Los Angeles holds a Shame sign during a protest at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Jan. 29, 2017. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 33 / 62 Attorney Lisa Smith joins people at LAX who continue to protest President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 34 / 62 A lone supporter of President Trump and Vice President Pence is protected by police while a large group of people continue to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 35 / 62 Chella, from Sherman Oaks, holds the U.S. flag with words from the tablet on the Statue of Liberty. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 36 / 62 Hundreds of people gather at Los Angeles International Airport to continue protesting President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 37 / 62 Donald Trump supporters hold signs across the road from protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 38 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 39 / 62 Brothers Adam, left, and Noah Reich show their support of immigrants as they join opponents of Donald Trumps new immigration order at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 40 / 62 A traveler tries to get by protesters at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 41 / 62 A protester holds up sign at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times) 42 / 62 Hassan Al Garaawi, of San Diego, right, looks for his mother-in-law Gish Alsaeedi who has been detained at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Sunday. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 43 / 62 Passengers arrive at LAX as protests continue Sunday over President Trumps travel ban. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 44 / 62 Izzy Berdan, of Boston wears an American flag as he chants slogans with other demonstrators Sunday during a rally against President Trumps order that restricts travel to the U.S. by people from seven majority-Muslim nations. (Steven Senne / Associated Press) 45 / 62 People gather in Bostons Copley Square to protest the travel ban enacted by President Trump. (Darren McCollester / Getty Images) 46 / 62 Demonstrators gather Sunday near the White House to protest President Donald Trumps travel ban. (Zach Gibson / Getty Images) 47 / 62 People continue to protest President Trumps travel ban on Sunday at Los Angeles International Airport. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles TImes) 48 / 62 Attorney Dana Clausen waits on Sunday to help at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX as people continue to protest President Trumps executive order that led to travelers from several majority-Muslim countries being detained upon arrival. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 49 / 62 Kamryn Taghizadeh, 18, holds up a sign Saturday night as she waits for grandfather Reza Taghizadeh, 78, a minimalist painter who was detained as he arrived at Tom Bradley International Terminal from Iran. The artist and green-card holder was later released. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 50 / 62 Reza Taghizadeh, 78, an artist from Iran who holds a U.S. green card, is released after being detained at Tom Bradley International Terminal. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 51 / 62 Seattle police use pepper spray and push the last group of protesters out of a Seattle-Tacoma International Airport terminal after giving a final dispersal order at about 2 a.m Sunday. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 52 / 62 Saffiya Hrahsheh, center, is helped away from police by Liz Bates, left, and others after being pepper sprayed by officers breaking up protests early Sunday at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. (Genna Martin / Associated Press) 53 / 62 Siavosh Naji-Talakar greets his grandmother, Marzieh Moosavizadeh, 75, at LAXs Tom Bradley International Terminal. She was detained upon arriving from Iran. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 54 / 62 People arrive and LAPD officers stand by at Tom Bradley International Airport at LAX as the protest continues peacefully. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times) 55 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to oppose President Trumps refugee ban. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 56 / 62 Saudia Airlines flight attendants wait to pass through a securioty checkpoint at the Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 57 / 62 Protesters rally against Trumps refugee crackdown at at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX on Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 58 / 62 Protesters gather at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX to speak out against President Trumps refugee policy Saturday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 59 / 62 Protesters march through Tom Bradley International Terminal to voice opposition to President Trumps refugee policy. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 60 / 62 Protesters rally against the new immigration order at Tom Bradley International Terminal at LAX. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 61 / 62 Protesters hold signs during a protest against Trumps immigration executive order at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City. (Stephanie Keith / Getty Images) 62 / 62 Protesters assemble at John F. Kennedy International Airport after two Iraqis were detained while trying to enter the country. (Craig Ruttle / Associated Press) Moosavizadehs name was among the last ones called, at about 1 a.m. Finally, she said, she was released from prison. When she spotted her grandson in the crowd, she felt like she was flying. He saw her too, and bolted. I pushed people out of the way, I was like, Get out of my way, Naji-Talakar said. I ran up to her and gave a big old hug. Thats when the cheering and chanting started again. Over and over, We got grandma! alene.tchekmedyian@latimes.com Twitter: @alenetchek ALSO Thousands protest at LAX against Trump travel ban When Muslims got blocked at American airports, U.S. veterans rushed to help Live updates on protests against Trumps executive order and reaction in Washington In the not-so-dark recesses of the Internet exists evidence of a company known as Efficient Pickup, which purports to teach men how to seduce women. The idea, apparently, isnt to find The One, or even a special one among many conquests. This is a numbers game, with the word game and all its connotations being the operative term. The goal is to sleep with as many women as possible. Our method is based on that kind of ruthless, very straightforward, very easy to assimilate method thats going to give you consistent results with high-quality women, says one of the companys operators in a video posted on YouTube in 2015. Advertisement But it was no game for a woman in San Diego who was raped while she was passed out at an apartment in 2013. Although she reported the crime immediately, she also took it upon herself to find and identify her attackers. She found them through an Internet search that led her to a website for Efficient Pickup, and blog entries in which the men bragged about the night she was sexually assaulted. Two of the men Alexander Markham Smith, 27, and Jonas Dick, 28 were identified as Efficient Pickup instructors. Each was convicted of rape charges and sentenced last year to eight years in prison. A third man, Jason Berlin, was a student of the others. The 28-year-old is scheduled to be sentenced Friday in San Diego Superior Court in front of the same judge who ordered prison terms for the other two defendants. Last month, Judge Jeffrey Fraser had harsh words for Smith, also known as Beryl. The fact is, the defendant did treat the victim in this case not as a human being but as simply an object, Fraser said, according to a court transcript. And I got to tell you, having sat up here for 18 years, theres a lot of people that have sat in that chair murderers, rapists, kidnappers go down the list. The judge noted that the crime was committed with a level of criminal sophistication not usually seen in sex cases. He said the defendant had his own school, apartment and terminology, all used to teach men not to interact with women, but to rape them. In order to protect society, you need to be put away, the judge told Smith. The crime occurred in October 2013, after a 31-year-old woman and her girlfriend left a bar about 2 a.m. As they waited for a taxi, the women were approached by two men identified later as Smith and Dick, who invited them to an apartment, according to court documents. When they arrived, a third man, Berlin, was asleep on the couch in the living room. The woman was raped while she was passed out inside one of the apartments bedrooms. After her friend found her and she had regained consciousness, she said she had been raped and wanted to call police. Officers went to the apartment and knocked on the door, according to court documents, but no one answered. Surveillance video showed Smith, Dick, the victim and her friend entering the apartment complex. The victim appeared to be staggering, and she was still staggering when she left the complex about an hour later. Her blood-alcohol content measured 0.15 around 5 a.m. Biological evidence was collected from her body for DNA testing, some of which was compared later to Smiths. It was a match. But the real break in this case came from the victims own investigation. The friend who was with her that night remembered Dicks name, which led the woman to a website for Efficient Pickup that listed Dick and Smith as instructors. The website appears to have been taken down, but a link to an archived version of that instructor page shows Dicks photo along with a bio. A listing under the name Beryl says he began running weekly boot camps teaching the Efficient Pickup method of seducing women starting in 2012 after the San Diego pickup community took notice of his skills. Beryl knows what it is like to have [bad] instruction and pushes his students hard to make sure they get results, the bio reads. The website also featured a blog called Tales of a Sex-Addicted Narcissistic Player, in which the writer implied that the apartment the victim was taken to was rented for the sole purpose of seducing women. One blog post by Berlin contained a vivid description of the October 2013 incident, according to court records. Another was posted by Smith about an hour after the sexual assault occurred. Under state law, a person who is intoxicated, asleep or unconscious cannot give legal consent to a sex act. Prosecutor Lisa Fox said its common for the district attorneys office to receive reports from investigators alleging rape of an intoxicated person. But this case differs from most, Fox said, because the perpetrators were an organized group that taught others how to pick up women usually at bars and clubs and bring them home. Then they wrote about their conquests on the Internet. Theyre bragging about it online so that others can see how successful they are, Fox said. In at least one online video, a man who claims to have started Efficient Pickup tells viewers that by using his method, any average guy can seduce the women he wants. He tells potential students that being a man is enough for a woman to be attracted to you, and warns that although alcohol is an effective means to cloud a womans rational mind, doing so is downright creepy and wrong, not to mention illegal. In this case, the victim told San Diego police about the website she found. At Smiths sentencing last month, the judge said the woman deserved an award for her investigative work on the case. But for you, he wouldnt be here and the others wouldnt be here. Nobody would be held accountable, Fraser said. In fact, worse than that, things would have gone on and there would be other victims, and it is quite possible we would have never learned about this. Smith was arrested in January 2014. At the end of a Superior Court trial, he was convicted of rape of an intoxicated person and rape of an unconscious person, both felonies. In an interview with a probation officer, he maintained that he did have sex with the woman, but he did not rape her. Smith has filed an appeal. Dick and Berlin were arrested in March 2015. Each pleaded guilty to rape charges. Defense attorney Vikas Bajaj said he plans to ask the judge at the sentencing hearing to consider placing Berlin on probation. He said Berlin fell into a web spun by Dick and Smith. He is a very naive individual, who leans on people who he believes to be experts in areas that he is deficient in, Bajaj said. Littlefield writes for the San Diego Union-Tribune. To read the article in Spanish, click here ALSO Californias extreme weather slammed Monterey Bay and this towns iconic ship was among the victims Im not going to do it. Police arent eager to help Trump enforce immigration laws Protesters block LAX traffic, face off with police as they rally against Trumps travel ban Conducting a nationwide search for a new police chief, analyzing traffic stops to discourage racial profiling and enforcing San Diegos minimum wage law are among the City Councils spending priorities for the upcoming fiscal year. Other priorities included in council budget memos are hiring more police officers, expanding several programs that combat homelessness, boosting a summer internship program for young people and funding implementation of the citys ambitious climate action plan. The memos, which Mayor Kevin Faulconer and his staff will use to craft a proposed budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1, also include many infrastructure projects such as new parks and fire stations. Advertisement Because San Diego is facing a projected deficit for the first time in several years, primarily because of a spike in the citys pension payment, the memos are less ambitious than they have been since Faulconer took office in early 2014. But council members stopped short of proposing significant budget cuts, instead opting to recommend the city cover the projected deficit of roughly $50 million with money from several reserve funds and $12.6 million the Chargers must pay to break their Qualcomm Stadium lease. RELATED: San Diego facing deeper budget cuts than expected Some also suggested suspending a requirement from last Junes voter-approved Proposition H that half of all new revenue growth be spent on infrastructure. The council could free that projected $17 million up for other priorities with a two-thirds vote. The projected deficit also prompted Faulconer last fall to request 3.5 percent in proposed cuts from every city department before the mayor unveils his proposed budget for the new fiscal year in mid-April. In the memos, a majority of the council asks Faulconer to conduct a nationwide search to replace Police Chief Shelley Zimmerman when she is forced to retire in spring 2018, instead of promoting a replacement from within the Police Department. They also requested the mayor hold town hall meetings in each of the citys nine council districts to get feedback on the search, and to have the police Citizens Advisory Board participate in the process. It is important that the search for a new police chief commence soon and we must ensure that it is an open and transparent process, Council members David Alvarez, Chris Ward and Georgette Gomez said in a joint budget memo, estimating the search would cost $50,000. Council President Myrtle Cole said a nationwide search would ensure the city gets the best possible candidate. While there are outstanding internal candidates for the position, a nationwide search provides the opportunity to ensure the mayor is selecting from a comprehensive pool of the best and brightest law enforcement has to offer, Cole said in her memo. San Diego has hired a new chief from outside the department only once in the last 50 years, when former San Jose Police Chief Bill Lansdowne, Zimmermans predecessor, was chosen after a nationwide search in 2003. Zimmerman must retire in March 2018 because she entered the citys deferred retirement option program in 2013, one year before becoming chief. The program allows city workers to simultaneously collect a salary and pension for up to five years near the end of their careers. A majority of the council also urged the mayor to comply with a new state law, AB 953, that requires police departments to track and analyze traffic stops for possible evidence of racial profiling. An analysis by San Diego State that the city released in November showed evidence of racial profiling by San Diego police. RELATED: Black and Hispanic drivers more likely to be searched when stopped by San Diego police City officials say they can comply with the new state law by implementing the Police Departments new computer-aided dispatch system at a cost of $783,000. A majority of the council also urged Faulconer to prioritize fully funding the citys compliance with the earned sick leave and minimum wage ordinance voters approved last June. There is a gap between what was budgeted in the current fiscal year and the projected cost of enforcement. The councils budget priorities are scheduled to be discussed at 9 a.m. Thursday during a meeting of the councils Budget and Government Efficiency Committee. david.garrick@sduniontribune.com (619) 269-8906 Twitter:@UTDavidGarrick For the second day in a row, crowds flooded the San Diego International Airport to protest President Donald Trumps recent travel ban. On Sunday, more than 1,000 demonstrators, many holding protest signs or American flags, lined both sides of the street outside Terminal 2 beginning around 5 p.m. Advertisement Hundreds shouted no ban, no wall, sanctuary for all, while a drumbeat from a nearby group of Aztec dancers filled the air. Around 8:20 p.m., protesters streamed into the baggage claim area and started chanting DHS, set them free. On Friday, President Trump signed an order that indefinitely blocked Syrian refugees from entering the United States, banned refugees from other countries for 120 days and imposed a 90-day ban on entry to the U.S from seven majority Muslim countries Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen until more extreme vetting can be figured out. In its wake, protests broke out at airports across the country where people affected by the order were being taken into custody. Officials said no travelers in San Diego had been detained since the order. More than 1,000 San Diegans protest at Lindbergh Field after President Donald Trumps recent travel ban. This is the second night of the protest. (Nancee Lewis / San Diego Union-Tribune) Organizers of Sundays demonstration said it was an opportunity for San Diegans to come together to show support for Muslims and other oppressed groups. It is refreshing and warms my heart to see so many people coming out and getting involved to tell Donald Trump that this ban is unconstitutional and unjust, said 22-year-old Mohamed Abdallah, who helped organize Sundays gathering. In Sundays crowd, dressed in a black headscarf, was Asha Mohamed, who emigrated from Somalia to the United States when she was 3 years old. She heard about the protest on Facebook and decided to attend with her sisters and friends. The group was carrying a poster that read, No hate, no bigotry, no Muslim registry. She said her parents worked multiple jobs to put her and her sisters through college. She said Sundays protest felt like history in the making. This country was built on immigrants, she said. How is it OK to ban people when all they want is a better life and to create a better life for their families. She said when she looked out at the sea of people who came to protest young and old and of many different backgrounds she sees the America she came to as a child. Twitter: @LAWinkley (619) 293-1546 lyndsay.winkley@sduniontribune.com A man found suffering from multiple stab wounds in City Heights later died Sunday night, and detectives are investigating the death as suspicious. Police went to an apartment on Towle Court near Landis Street after someone called 911 about a possible assault with a deadly weapon about 8:40 p.m., San Diego police Lt. Ray Valentin said. Advertisement When officers arrived, they found a man in his 50s suffering from stab wounds to the upper torso. He was rushed to a hospital, but died soon after, Valentin said. Its unclear why detectives dubbed the death suspicious. The mans identity is known, but will not be released until his family has been notified. The Medical Examiners Office will determine his cause of death. Twitter: @LAWinkley (619) 293-1546 lyndsay.winkley@sduniontribune.com President Donald Trumps executive order temporarily closing the U.S. to travelers and refugees from seven Middle Eastern countries is shameful, said San Diego Bishop Robert McElroy in a written statement. This week, wrote the bishop, head of the Roman Catholic Diocese of San Diego, the Statue of Liberty lowered its torch in a presidential action which repudiates our national heritage and ignores the reality that Our Lord and the Holy Family were themselves Middle Eastern refugees fleeing government oppression. We cannot and will not stand silent. Advertisement Trumps executive order blocked for 90 days the issuance of visas to people from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, Sudan and Yemen. All of those nations have predominantly Muslim populations. The order also calls for extreme vetting of all immigrants and visitors to the U.S. Trump signed the order Friday. Over the weekend, protesters gathered at airports around the world including San Diego International to oppose the White Houses action. McElroy responded with a statement Sunday evening, noting the United States historic identity as a haven for refugees. The presidents executive order, he wrote, is rooted in xenophobia and religious prejudice instead of a careful consideration of national security. This week is just such a shameful moment of abandonment for the United States, he wrote. The local diocese includes roughly 1.3 million Catholics and 98 parishes in San Diego and Imperial counties. Attorneys for the City of Lancaster have applied to state utility regulators to join the new settlement discussions related to the $4.7 billion San Onofre nuclear plant closure. In a filing Friday the same day the first round of negotiations got under way Lancaster applied to the California Public Utilities Commission to become a recognized party in the proceeding. Advertisement Lancaster said in its filing that the city in 2015 took advantage of community choice aggregation, a program that allows municipalities to purchase electricity in bulk from sources they prefer, such as renewable energy. The San Onofre closure affected the entity buying power on behalf of its 160,000 residents and the city should be a party to the new negotiations, said the filing from Lancaster, about 60 miles north of Los Angeles. Since Lancaster was previously a party to the refund settlement agreement, Lancaster has a material interest in the outcome of the renegotiated settlement, the filing states. Thus, Lancaster wishes to participate in the meet and confer matters and otherwise participate in this proceeding. The plant closed in 2012 after newly installed replacement steam generators failed unexpectedly. Two years later, regulators approved an agreement that assigned 70 percent of the $4.7 billion in premature closure costs to ratepayers rather than shareholders of the plant owners, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric. In 2015, Edison acknowledged that its executives had participated in discussions about dividing the closure costs, outside the public process. The commission fined the utility almost $17 million and later ordered a new round of negotiations. The first such meeting was held last week in San Francisco. Another discussion is scheduled late next month. The commission is expected to consider any new agreement between utility officials and ratepayer advocates later this year. Watchdog Videos On Now Sexual misconduct accusers worry deputy is being protected 6:16 On Now City funded $2-million waterfront bathroom 1:26 On Now Public water district charges customer for legal work, response to records request On Now Video: Tiny homes won't be reused amid housing, homeless crisis On Now Attorney General seeks documentation for Miss Middle East On Now Rep. Hunter probe covers possible fraud On Now Video: SDG&E delaying solar credit for some low-income housing tenants On Now Video: Former San Diego Junior Theatre teacher sentenced for sex with teen girl 0:24 On Now Video: Shelter volunteers believe they were fired for finding a dog a home 0:49 On Now McKamey Manor is leaving San Diego 3:35 jeff.mcdonald@sduniontribune.com (619) 293-1708 @sdutMcDonald The University of California has been a source of intense pride for many and intense frustration for some. Instead of responding to the states 2007-2011 revenue crisis with belt-tightening, UC chose to admit far more out-of-state students who paid much heavier tuition, at the expense of qualified in-state students. UC has been subject of seven audits since 2012. A 2015 report by legislative staffers found UC finances murky and hard to follow. Yet UC President Janet Napolitano has been dismissive of calls for transparency and frugality. Now theres evidence that Napolitanos not the only UC official who is indifferent to criticism. In voting 16-4 for a 2.5 percent tuition hike last week, not a single UC regent sided with state Auditor Elaine Howle on the need for more UC accountability. The four no votes came from regents who thought tuition hikes would hurt struggling students or signal to lawmakers that UC didnt need more funding. Advertisement Thats not proper oversight of an institution with a $29 billion budget. That should be frustrating to more people than it is. Twitter: @sdutIdeas Facebook: UTOpinion As President Donald Trump s executive order on immigration took affect across the country over the weekend, some of Americas businesses and corporations began making their opinions known with their words and their actions. The tech industry especially got involved, with many responding with statements on the importance of foreign engineers and experts to their success. Heres a look at what businesses have done and said over the past few days in response to the news. Uber and Lyft As protests broke out at airports nationwide, Uber found itself in hot water for two reasons. First, taxis drivers in New York went on strike in response to the action. Uber drivers didnt join them, and said they would be dropping their typical surge pricing, which backfired when many saw the move as capitalizing financially on the fact that taxis werent in service that night. Then, on Twitter, the hashtag #DeleteUber took off as people linked the New York Uber decision to the fact that company CEO Travis Kalanick is a member of President Trumps economic advisory group to their frustration. Kalanick did speak out against the ban, sending an email to his employees saying the company would offer its affected employees pro bono support and defending his position on the advisory team and saying hed discuss the matter with Trump at a meeting this week. Sunday morning, Lyft emailed its users a letter condemning Trump and made this announcement: Starbucks The coffee giant announced it will hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years. In a letter to employees Sunday, CEO Howard Schultz said the hiring would focus on immigrants who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel. He also took the opportunity to outline a few other actions the company is taking, including supporting Dreamers and those involved with the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program and continued access to health insurance for workers who are eligible in light of efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Google Google announced a $2 million crisis fund for the American Civil Liberties Union, Immigrant Legal Resource, International Rescue Committee and the U.N. Refugee Agency. The $2 million starting amount can also be matched with up to $2 million in donations from the companys own employees. One such employee is director of product management Sanaz Ahari who was born in Iran. The company said in a statement that its concerned about the affect it will have on its employees and their families. Google co-founder Sergey Brin also participated in protests at San Francisco International Airport over the weekend. Airbnb This company used its services directly when CEO Brian Chesky offered free housing to those affected. The free housing offer applies to "refugees or anyone else who needs it in the event they are denied the ability to board a U.S.-bound flight and are not in your city/country of residence." The company also launched an immigrant support page for people who want to open their homes to refugees and other affected by the ban. Chesky condemned the ban, saying we must stand with those who are affected. Goldman Sachs While Goldman Sachs isnt necessarily doing anything to take action, its worth noting that at least one Wall Street leader is condemning the travel ban. Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein left a voicemail to employees Sunday saying this is not a policy we support, and I would note that it has already been challenged in federal court, and some of the order has been enjoined at least temporarily, according to Reuters. Reaction? These are just a few of the many companies taking action after the order by Trump. Well continue updating this page with any major announcements. Do these moves change how you feel about any of these companies? Heres an example of someone who isnt happy to see a company like Starbucks getting involved. Email: abby.hamblin@sduniontribune.com Twitter: @abbyhamblin Some of Americas closest allies in the fight against terrorism have joined the public outcry against an executive order from President Donald Trump that temporarily bars all refugees and immigrants from seven nations from entering the U.S. The order has been sharply criticized as an un-American religious test because it targets immigrants from largely Muslim countries Syria, Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Libya, Somalia and Sudan that have been the scene of deadly conflicts. As the ban went into effect over the weekend, travelers from those countries entering the U.S. were detained, questioned and even turned away at international airports. Trumps order quickly proved to be unpopular abroad where leaders took to social media to publicly condemn it and reiterate their support for refugees. Great Britain In a tweet, British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson called the ban divisive and wrong. Following her meeting with Trump in the U.S., Prime Minister Theresa May issued a statement saying the country did not agree with this kind of approach but that the matter of immigration policy in the United States is a matter for the government of the United States. Germany German Chancellor Angela Merkel said through a spokesman that she regrets the U.S. governments entry ban against refugees and the citizens of certain countries. France French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said in a tweet the reception of refugees is a duty of solidarity and that terrorism has no nationality discrimination is not the answer. Turkey Also in a tweet, Turkeys deputy prime minister, Mehmet Simsek, touted the country as the worlds largest refugee hosting country and that the country would happily welcome global talent not allowed back into the #USA. Canada Seeing people being turned away at U.S. airports, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also took to Twitter to say Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Leaders from those countries affected by the ban also publicly criticized the order and issued their own restrictions on U.S. citizens entering their countries. Iraq On Monday, Iraqi lawmakers adopted a reciprocity measure to apply to Americans entering the country but details about the measure remained unclear. The countrys Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it regrets such a decision against an ally of the U.S. in the fight against ISIS in Iraq. "It is a surprise that Iraq is covered under this order because it is not among the countries that export terrorists," the statement said. "The Iraqi community inside the U.S. enjoys a good reputation and its members have not been involved in any terrorist acts." Iran The Iranian government described Trumps ban of immigrants and refugees from those countries as a big gift to extremists and their supporters and said it would take reciprocal measures on Americans traveling to Iran until the U.S. lifted the order on Iranian nationals. Foreign Minister Javad Zarif went on Twitter to reiterate those reports and add that the countrys decision is not retroactive. "The U.S. decision to restrict travel for Muslims to the U.S., even if for a temporary period of three months, is an obvious insult to the Islamic world and in particular to the great nation of Iran," Irans Foreign Affairs Ministry said in a statement. "Despite the claims of combating terrorism and keeping American people safe, it will be recorded in history as a big gift to extremists and their supporters. Yemen Yemens deputy prime minister, Abdulmalik Abduljalil Al-Mekhlafi, criticized the ban in a series of tweets, saying that the decision to ban Yemenis from the U.S. are not justified. Despite the widespread condemnation from world leaders, Trumps ban was welcomed and cheered by leaders of the far-right movement in Europe. Nigel Farage, one of the most prominent advocates of the Brexit movement in Great Britain, welcomed Trumps decision because thats one of the issues the Republican president campaigned on. "He is fully entitled to do this, and as far as we are concerned in this country, yes, I would like to see extreme vetting," Farage told the BBC. He was elected to get tough, he was elected to say he will do everything within his power to protect America from infiltration by ISIS terrorists. In the Netherlands, Dutch politician Geert Wilders agreed with Trumps view of immigrants from Muslim countries, adding in a tweet that Islam and freedom are incompatible. Email: luis.gomez@sduniontribune.com Twitter: @RunGomez EL CAJON - Eight people who were arrested during an undercoveoperation face prostitution-related charges today, police said. The El Cajon Police Department conducted a sting operation thattargeted men who were soliciting sex acts from prostitutes, saidpolice Lt. Tim Henton. The location was not disclosed. Advertisement Eight people were arrested during Thursdays six-hour stingoperation, according to Henton. The sex of those arrested were notimmediately available and not obvious from their names. Arrested were: - Joel Blanchard, 31, of Santa Maria, Calif., on suspicion ofpandering. - Ravshan Alieyv, 21, of El Cajon, on suspicion of soliciting anact of prostitution. - Armando Cisneros, 35, of El Cajon, on suspicion of solicitingan act of prostitution. - Youhanna Gurgees, 28, of El Cajon, on suspicion of solicitingan act of prostitution. - Hali Matti, 22, of El Cajon, on suspicion of soliciting an actof prostitution. - Jack McMorran, 32, of El Cajon, on suspicion of soliciting anact of prostitution. - Roberto Ruiz, 26, of El Cajon, on suspicion of soliciting anact of prostitution. - Karem Zeato, 21, of El Cajon, on suspicion of soliciting anact of prostitution. The San Diego County Sheriffs Department and the San DiegoState University Police Department assisted in the operation.Henton said the police department plans on continuing undercoverstings aimed at pimps, prostitutes and their customers. We rely on your support to make local news available to all Make your contribution now and help Gothamist thrive in 2022. Donate today Update below Police arrested an off-duty correction officer early on Sunday morning after they say he tried to skip out on a bill at a Midtown nightclub, then smashed up the place and punched a manager in the face when confronted. Scott Baxter, 36, allegedly racked up a tab at Lavo, on East 58th Street near Madison Avenue, and when the manager told him he had to pay at around 1:20 a.m., he allegedly threw a chair and glasses, and socked the manager. Cops cuffed Baxter an hour later, according to an NYPD announcement, and prosecutors have charged him with assault, criminal mischief, theft of services, and harassment. In all, Baxter faces five misdemeanor charges that carry as much as a year imprisonment each, one that carries a maximum sentence of three months, and one violation, which carries a max of 15 days. Baxter was arraigned on Sunday and released without bail, according to a Manhattan District Attorney's Office spokesman. In 2016, he made $136,700 on a base salary of $80,700, according to payroll records. A jury dismissed a 2012 lawsuit accusing him of violating a Rikers Island inmate's civil rights in a beating that the man said left him with a chipped tooth. Baxter's lawyer did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A woman who answered the phone at the restaurant side of Lavo declined to comment. Update 3:15 p.m.: In a statement, Department of Correction spokesman Peter Thorne wrote, The vast majority of Department of Correction staff perform their duties with the highest level of integrity and Commissioner [Joseph] Ponte has zero tolerance for those who dont." The department has not suspended Baxter. New York, NY -- (SBWIRE) -- 01/30/2017 -- Widely recommended and one of the most popular gym Anytime Fitness gym publishes its membership prices and details on the highly trust fitness website, Gym Membership Fees. "Publishing our membership details and prices on a worldwide popular website like Gym Membership Fees is as big of an honor for us as it is for them. Because now fitness fans would be able to find us on Gym Membership Fees and we would easily be able to communicate our updated memberships prices and details with fitness fans. And the good thing is that fitness fans would now be able to compare and understand how Anytime Fitness is different, better than other fitness clubs. So, do visit Gym Membership Fees' website and check out our membership prices and the amazing offers that we have published. We are sure that you will love our prices and offers", stated the spokesperson of Anytime Fitness Co. The best thing is that Anytime Fitness gym has published comprehensive details about the perks of being an Anytime Fitness member and what additional benefits does Anytime Fitness offers with its membership that other fitness clubs usually do not offer. "Anytime Fitness has become popular because they provide a friendly atmosphere and offers new members full support", as stated by Anytime Fitness on Gym Membership Fees. Anytime Fitness has published monthly membership price details for a single person and for two adults, as well as comprehensive annual membership price details. So, one can choose the best package according to their affordability. For complete membership details and prices, please check https://www.gymmembershipfees.com/anytime-fitness-prices/ About Anytime Fitness Co The Anytime Fitness gym was founded in 1983 in San Leandro, California by Dave Mortensen, Chuck Runyon and Jeff Klinger. It currently has 1,935 clubs in the United States and 474 more around the world. With more than a million members, Fitness operates in several countries, including Canada, Japan, Australia, the UK, Qatar, New Zealand, Spain and many other countries. For more information, please go to https://www.anytimefitness.com/ About Gym Membership Fees Gym Membership Fees is one of the most recommended gym info websites, which is popular for publishing comprehensive details about gyms, their membership details, and their charges. Gym Membership Fees is also well known for its amazing fitness related articles. Some of it popular articles include Can Yoga Or Pilates Help People with Vertigo?, Study Smashes Belief About Level of Sweating, and Five of the Best Gym Equipment for Acquiring Six-Pack Abs. For more information, please visit https://www.gymmembershipfees.com/ New York, NY -- (SBWIRE) -- 01/30/2017 -- Cable Cars and Ropeways Market: Introduction A cable car, ropeway or aerial tram can be defined as a type of aerial lift which uses one or two fixed (uniform and stationary) ropes or cables for supporting the transporting vehicles, trolleys, tram, pallets etc. and a third moving rope or cable for proper propulsion. By getting this lift, the grip of an aerial cable car or ropeways is fixed onto the rope or the cable and cannot be decoupled from it during the operating conditions. Cable car is a simple, cost effective and a powerful technology. Relatively easy and quick to set up and construct, operate and disassemble again. It has been the most effective form of transportation of goods and people in the past, it has been also a very important means of transportation across hills and cliffs, such rivers, snow covered areas, mountains and unequal terrains lands etc. The common materials used for construction of cable cars and ropeways earlier was wood/fiber but steel has emerged as a common choice. The advancement of technology has allowed introduction of electric motors and steel cables which provides increased efficiency. The various industry sectors where cable trays are used includes mining, urban transportation, tourism industry and material handling industries. TOC of this report is available upon request @ http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/11974 Cable Cars and Ropeways Market: Dynamics: Cable cars and ropeways industries has emerged as preferred choice in tourism and winter regions. But the transformation to the urban public transport has not yielded the same rewards. It is definitely true that the cable cars and ropeway market has witnessed increase in sales to the urban industries but there is still a debate that cable cars and ropeways are underutilized in urban transportation industry due to performance and cost constraints and the relatively unending demands and solutions for transportation sectors worldwide. In tourism and winter regions the cable cars and ropeways have served well and are the only desirable options that can be used. But the cable cars and ropeway market has remained insignificant when urban transportation industry is considered. This is particularly due to various obstacles such as small market size, new technologies, public sectors, various customer expectations and many more. Another factor restraining the growth of the market is the strict safety norms and regulations, as cable cars and ropeways operate under critical conditions and hence the designing and manufacturing of such transport vehicles are done under strict supervision of safety officers to avoid mishaps. Moreover, the cable car and ropeway market is expected to witness moderate growth in demand owing to steady growth of material handling industry across the globe. Cable Cars and Ropeways Market: Segmentation: Cable cars and ropeways market can be segmented by type of industry, sales channel and types. By type of industry, they can be segmented as: -Tourism -Material handling -Public transportation -Mining industries By sales channel, they can be segmented as: -OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) -Aftermarket By types, they can be segmented as: -Fixed grip installations Drag lifts Fixed grip chairlifts Pulsed gondola ropeways -Detachable installations Detachable chairlifts Mono cable detachable gondola lifts Telemix: combined detachable chairlift and gondola lift Bicable (2S) & Tricable (3S) Gondola lifts -Aerial tramway -Funicular Cable Cars and Ropeways Market: Regional Outlook The global cable cars and ropeways market can be divided into seven different geographical regions/divisions such as North America, Latin America, Western and Eastern Europe, Asia-Pacific Excluding Japan (APEJ), Japan, Middle East and Africa. It is expected that the urban public transportation market will be influenced by the cable cars and ropeways market in the future. Significant demand for cable cars and ropeways is generated from alpine countries which includes Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein, Monaco, Slovenia and Switzerland. Most of the developing countries in Asia-Pacific have also started using cable cars and ropeways in winter and tourism regions. Many cable cars and ropeways are in operation in the U.S., Algeria, Spain, China and Brazil for urban transportation. Urban cities have started to realize the potential for cable cars and ropeways as a solution to mobility needs, thus boosting the growth of cable cars and ropeway market. Cable Cars and Ropeways: Key Players -Doppelmayr Garaventa Group -Vergokan -Kreischberg: Cableways -Dubrovnik cable cars -Kropivnik Cableways Pvt. Ltd. -Damodar ropeways -Bullwheel international cable car corp The research report presents a comprehensive assessment of the market and contains thoughtful insights, facts, historical data, and statistically supported and industry-validated market data. It also contains projections using a suitable set of assumptions and methodologies. The research report provides analysis and information according to categories such as market segments, geographies, types and applications. The report covers exhaustive analysis on: -Market Segments -Market Dynamics -Market Size -Supply & Demand -Current Trends/Issues/Challenges -Competition & Companies involved -Value Chain Regional analysis includes: -North America -Latin America -Asia Pacific -Japan -Western Europe -Eastern Europe -Middle East & Africa The report is a compilation of first-hand information, qualitative and quantitative assessment by industry analysts, inputs from industry experts, and industry participants across the value chain. The report provides an in-depth analysis of parent market trends, macroeconomic indicators and governing factors, along with market attractiveness within the segments. The report also maps the qualitative impact of various market factors on market segments and various geographies. Sample of this report is available upon request @ http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/11974 Report highlights: -Detailed overview of parent market -Changing market dynamics in the industry -In-depth market segmentation -Historical, current and projected market size in terms of volume and value -Recent industry trends and developments -Competitive landscape -Strategies of key players and products offered -Potential and niche segments, geographical regions exhibiting promising growth -A neutral perspective on market performance -Must-have information for market players to sustain and enhance their market footprint About Persistence Market Research Persistence Market Research (PMR) is a full-service market intelligence firm specializing in syndicated research, custom research, and consulting services. PMR boasts market research expertise across the Healthcare, Chemicals and Materials, Technology and Media, Energy and Mining, Food and Beverages, Semiconductor and Electronics, Consumer Goods, and Shipping and Transportation industries. The company draws from its multi-disciplinary capabilities and high-pedigree team of analysts to share data that precisely corresponds to clients' business needs. PMR stands committed to bringing more accuracy and speed to clients' business decisions. From ready-to-purchase market research reports to customized research solutions, PMR's engagement models are highly flexible without compromising on its deep-seated research values. Philadelphia, PA -- (SBWIRE) -- 01/30/2017 -- C.R. Thompson Roofing is pleased to announce that they are continuing to take new customers in need of roofing repair or installation service throughout winter 2017. This Philadelphia, PA-based company works with various types of roofing materials such as asphalt, slate, tile and many others. Therefore, those who need any roofing material repaired, installed or even replaced are encouraged to get in touch with the company by giving them a call at 215-375-7904 or filling out a contact form on their website at https://www.crthompsonroofing.com/. Aside from installing, repairing and replacing roofs, C.R. Thompson Roofing would also like to remind customers that they offer emergency roofing services. In fact, one of the things that the company takes pride in is their ability to have their roofing specialists out to a customer's property soon after a severe storm or other natural disaster occurs. The company can be contacted at any time of the day or night for emergency roofing services, and customers can rest assured that their roofers can help with any emergency situation and perform any needed repairs shortly after they arrive at their properties. In addition to roofing services, C.R. Thompson Roofing also has specialists on staff who can both install and repair windows or siding. Furthermore, those who are trying to find reliable gutter cleaning service anytime throughout the winter season can also get in touch with the company. Any residential or commercial property owner in Philadelphia who is searching for a company that can work with slate roofing or other materials can look no further than C.R. Thompson Roofing. Interested parties can learn more about C.R. Thompson Roofing, their services and the areas that they serve by visiting their website. About C.R. Thompson Roofing C.R. Thompson Roofing is a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania-based roofing company that serves home and commercial property owners in and around Philadelphia and South Jersey. The company can install and repair shingle roofs, slate roofs, rubber roofs, and many others. C.R. Thompson Roofing not only offers roofing services but can also install and repair siding and windows, perform brick pointing, clean gutters, and much more. To learn more about this top-rated, family-owned and operated roofing company located in Philadelphia, please visit http://www.crthompsonroofing.com/. Blue Bell, PA -- (SBWIRE) -- 01/30/2017 -- Expungement in PA can be a very complicated system that confuses most who are trying to figure out if they are eligible for expungement. Because of this, Edwin L. Guyer and his experienced law office makes themselves available for assistance with this issue. When it comes to juvenile records, expungement can hold even more importance than in other instances. Teenagers are just starting their lives out, and a record with one mistake should not prevent them from starting over. Edwin L. Guyer is an experienced lawyer that wants to give those with criminal records the chance to have a clean slate. Juveniles in particular, and in some cases, are alleviated of their record so it does not follow them everywhere. Once they reach a certain age (usually 17 or 18), juvenile records are destroyed or "sealed", meaning they are hidden from the public. This allows a minor who has committed a criminal offense to be able to enter adulthood with a fresh start. It is important to check the laws in PA or to talk to Edwin L. Guyer to determine the status or eligibility for expungement of a criminal or juvenile record. Sometimes records are automatically expunged for juveniles, but it is important to talk to a seasoned attorney for further details with the specific case. Edwin L. Guyer is also a talented DUI lawyer in Worcester, helping close many cases successfully. Don't wait to reach out to him today by calling him at: 215-542-9333, or emailing him at: eggylaw@gmail.com. About Edwin L. Guyer For over 30 years, Edwin L. Guyer has been establishing himself with a reputation to help drivers keep their licenses. He has been guarding the potential for their future after being charged with a DUI, underage drinking, or any other criminal offense in Pennsylvania. Since 1975, the law offices of Edwin L. Guyer have become confident in their aggressive and skillful approach to insure the futures of those charged, so that they may turn over a new leaf. Learn more by visiting: http://www.paduilawyer.com/ New York, NY -- (SBWIRE) -- 01/30/2017 -- Silver amalgam is a mixture of mercury, silver, tin and copper and used for dental applications. Amalgams are generally crystalline in structure with the exception of those with high mercury content which are liquid. Some of the important characteristics of an amalgam are dimensional change, compression strength, flow and creep. The dimensional change characteristics deal with an amalgams ability to expand and contract depending on its use. The compression strength characteristic is the ability of amalgams to resist fracture which is an important prerequisite for any restorative materials. The strength of silver amalgam depends on the composition of the alloy. A sample of this report is available upon request @ http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/4604 Silver amalgams alloys are also known as dental amalgams and are used for dental fillings. Silver amalgams are popular dental restorative material because of their low cost, strength, durability and ease of application. They are long lasting, have a better performance than other fillings, applicable for broad range of clinical performance and are of better quality. However, its popularity is diminishing today because of concerns of mercury toxicity, allergic potential and inferior aesthetics quality. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has recommended labeling of dental amalgam products, which includes a warning against using the product in patients who have an allergy to mercury. In addition, it has a warning that dental professionals follow a proper protocol while handling dental amalgams and a statement mentioning the risks and benefits of dental amalgam so that patients and dentist can make informed decisions. The continued use of silver amalgam in dental applications will be a major driving factor for silver amalgam industry. The FDI World Dental Federation has reaffirmed the safety of use of silver amalgams in dentistry and hence it is used by dentists all around the world. Majority of dental restorations depend on silver amalgams and hence it has a significant market. However, development of viable substitutes, growth of dental composites market and lack of awareness could hamper the growth of this market. The market for silver amalgam is worldwide as it is recommended by FDI World Dental Federation for use in its dental applications. The use of silver amalgams is quite popular in Asia Pacific, especially the emerging markets such as China and India due to its low cost and wide availability. The American Dental Association has also approved the use of silver amalgam for dental restorative procedures and hence it is used by majority of dentists in the U.S. However, the use of silver amalgam is declining in Europe with Sweden, Norway, Germany, Denmark, Austria and Finland reducing the use of silver amalgam for dental applications. Request to view Table of content @ http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/4604 Some of the key players in this market are DPM limited, Sirona, Nobel Biocare, Straumann, Astra Tech, Megagen, Osstem Implant Co. Ltd, Avinent Implant Systems, Zimmer Holdings, Inc, MIS Implants Technologies Ltd, Intra-Lock International and CAMLOG Implant Systems among others. Straumann and Nobel Biocare are leading players in this market with significant global market share. Straumann, headquartered in Basel, Switzerland, has collaborated with multiple research institutes, universities and clinics to develop a broad range of dental implant products. The company has presence in major markets of Asia Pacific, South America, Europe and North America. Nobel Biocare, headquartered in Kloten, Switzerland has manufacturing plants for dental implants in Sweden, U.S. and Israel. It offers innovative dental implants and dental prosthetics to its clients and is listed at the SIX Swiss Exchange. About Persistence Market Research Persistence Market Research (PMR) is a third-platform research firm. Our research model is a unique collaboration of data analytics and market research methodology to help businesses achieve optimal performance. To support companies in overcoming complex business challenges, we follow a multi-disciplinary approach. At PMR, we unite various data streams from multi-dimensional sources. By deploying real-time data collection, big data, and customer experience analytics, we deliver business intelligence for organizations of all sizes. New York, NY -- (SBWIRE) -- 01/30/2017 -- Talc is a mineral composed of hydrated magnesium silicate and is an important industrial and commercial mineral. It has broad applications as an industrial mineral due to its resistance to heat, electricity and acids and oil and grease adsorption. Talc has extensive commercial use because of its luster, softness, purity, fragrance retention, softness and whiteness. It is the softest known mineral and has a rating of 1 on the Mohs hardness scale. It can be scratched by a fingernail and is also sectile that means it can be cut by a knife. It has a specific gravity of 2.5 -2.8 and has clear luster. Talc is slightly soluble in dilute mineral acids and insoluble in water. It is a metamorphic mineral and occurs due to metamorphism of magnesium minerals such as olivine, amphibole, serpentine and pyroxene in presence of water and carbon dioxide. Talc is a tri-octahedral layered mineral and has a similar structure to that of pyrophyllite. A sample of this report is available upon request @ http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/4609 Talc can be used as an ingredient in paints, roofing materials, ceramics, insecticides, rubber, talcum powder and insecticides among others. It is also used by the cosmetics industry, pulp and paper industry and food industry. Talc is often used to manufacture laboratory countertops and electrical switchboards due to its resistance to heat, acids and electricity. It is used by the cosmetic industry as a lubricant and as a filler by the pulp and paper industry. Talc is extensively used to make astringent baby powders that prevent rashes covered by a diaper. Talc is used by the pharmaceutical industry as a glidant (a substance that is added to powder to improve its flow ability) and by the food industry as an additive. In the European Union the additive number is E553b. In medicine, talc is used as a pluerodesis agent to prevent pneumothorax or recurrent pleural effusion. Talc is also an effective dispersing agent and anti caking agent and helps fertilizer plants and animal feeds to function efficiently and can be used for fertilizers. The paper and pulp industry remains the largest global end market for talc and is the key driving factor for the talc Industry. The automotive industry, ceramics industry and the paint and coatings industry are the other major consumers of talc. The use of talc as a filler in the paper industry is declining today but the use of talc for the manufacture of under the hood automotive parts is substantially increasing that has further lead to surge in demand for talc by the automotive industry. Asia Pacific is the largest market for talc with China, India, Japan, Bhutan, and South Korea being the key markets in this region. The Indian talc industry is the world's third largest and continues to grow due to increase in domestic consumption. North America and Europe are other regions with a substantial market share of talc. Austria, Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Macedonia, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Sweden and United Kingdom are the major consumers of talc in Europe. Request to view Table of content @ http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/4609 Some of the major companies dominating the talc market are Imerys talc, Mondo Minerals, Golcha Group, American Talc, IMI FABI, Nippon Talc, Minerals Technologies Inc, the Jai Group, Aihai Talc, Behai Talc, Shuiquan Talc, Xin Talc, Haumei Talc, Guiguang Talc and Xin Talc among others. Imerys talc is the world's leading producer of talc followed by Mondo Minerals. About Persistence Market Research Persistence Market Research (PMR) is a third-platform research firm. Our research model is a unique collaboration of data analytics and market research methodology to help businesses achieve optimal performance. To support companies in overcoming complex business challenges, we follow a multi-disciplinary approach. At PMR, we unite various data streams from multi-dimensional sources. By deploying real-time data collection, big data, and customer experience analytics, we deliver business intelligence for organizations of all sizes. Vienna, Austria -- (SBWIRE) -- 01/30/2017 -- The IFDAQ is excited to announce the appointment of Frederic Godart, Professor of Organizational Behavior at INSEAD, to its Advisory Board. The startup, which is home to a pioneering real-time industry monitoring system that provides the first real Fashion Intelligence Unit, continues its strategy to build a strong team with outstanding personalities from science and the fashion industry. Godart, who holds a PhD from Columbia University in the City of New York, brings a vast wealth of experience from his research on the structure and culture of the fashion industry. As an internationally renowned scientist, he will advise the company on the global dynamics of the fashion industry to achieve competitive intelligence. Prior to joining INSEAD as a full-time tenure-track faculty, Godart worked for three years with McKinsey & Company, where he developed his practical knowledge in competitive intelligence and social network analysis. As an author of books and peer-reviewed articles on fashion and the creative industries, he has received several prestigious awards such as the Academy of Management OB Division's 2012 Best Paper Award. "I am very proud that Frederic Godart has decided to join IFDAQ's Advisory Board and believes in this exciting project," said Daryl de Jori, Founder and CEO of IFDAQ. "His strong background, deep expertise in Fashion and wide range of competencies will surely increase IFDAQ's position and understanding of the market." de Jori added. Godart, who also holds a professorship at the University of Bologna, adds his fashion expertise to the industry core team that includes Head of Research, Iva Mirbach. "IFDAQ has a critical role to play in fashion. As a groundbreaking and unique analysis tool for the industry it can help leading fashion stakeholders to spot the next big name," said Godart. "IFDAQ stands to become a breakthrough in intelligent quantification systems, notably to predict careers and performance of fashion professionals. This is a huge unknown, currently, for which we have no consistent methods of evaluation, and yet it can make or break the success of any fashion entity." About IFDAQ IFDAQ is a powerful AI-system that provides infinite insight into the real market and benchmark value of the fashion industry and its professionals. With a unique combination of the most advanced techniques in Artificial Intelligence, Big Data and Scientific Quantification, the IFDAQ introduces a new era of highly intelligent data processing by breaking down one of the world's largest industry to the absolute smallest quantifiable unit. Unprecedented scientific in-depth analytics quantify the market value, power and influence of everything that counts in fashion: from the fashion model to the fashion magazine, from the brand to the fashion work right down to the value of a single editorial image or a single catwalk run. For more information, visit: http://www.ifdaq.com/ Contact: Eric Mayer Chief Communications Officer IFDAQ press@ifdaq.com www.ifdaq.com Laurenzerberg P.85 A-1011 Vienna, AT Tel. 917-267-7978 Valley Cottage, NY -- (SBWIRE) -- 01/30/2017 -- Medical tourism is one of the most dynamically growing industries today. Considered to be the direct impact of globalisation of healthcare, medical tourism certainly exhibits strong growth potential globally. However, based on FMI's research, the market of medical tourism is expected to concentrate within most of the emerging economies of the world. As developing nations are increasingly heading toward technological advancement and quality services in the medical and healthcare sector, the global medical tourism market is anticipated to witness robust growth over 2014-2020, predominantly in Asian countries. The top treatments people travel abroad for, include cancer therapy, cardiovascular surgeries, orthopaedic treatments, dentistry, cosmetic surgeries, reproductive treatments, weight loss therapies, health screenings, and medical tests and scans. In severe cases, a sizeable patient population also seeks second opinion from specialist doctors out of their countries. Request Free Report Sample@ http://www.futuremarketinsights.com/reports/sample/rep-gb-249 Key Drivers High treatment costs and lengthy waiting times for medical procedures, being the two major factors in driving medical tourism, are also supported by easier and cheaper international travel. While the U.K.'s population prefers to travel abroad for bypassing long waits, patients from the U.S. travel outside for availing of treatments at cheaper costs. Medical excellence along with international accreditation are the key factors fuelling a majority of international patient flow, eventually boosting international medical tourism. Currently, over 600 medical departments and hospitals all over the globe are accredited by the U.S. Joint Commission International (JCI). The number of accredited facilities is projected to increase almost by 20% each year. This is another important driver associated with the market growth. Developing countries, with ever-evolving innovation and demonstrable achievements in medical research are estimated to accelerate the approaching medical tourist flow over the forecast period. Growing healthcare investments by various government and private sectors are also anticipated to further bolster the market growth. Key Restraints However, medical tourists are highly prone to a wide variety of health risks after they return. The conditions may include TB, paratyphoid, amoebic dysentery, deep vein thrombosis, and more; usually caused due to poor post-operative care and inadequate rest. This could affect the market to some extent. Stringent documentation processes, issues related to visa approval, and limited insurance coverage are reportedly some of the most deterring factors for the global market. Global Medical Tourism Market: Segmentation FMI's research on the global medical tourism market offers a six-year forecast, segmenting the market on the basis of type of medical treatment and geography. On the basis of the type of treatment, the market is segmented into cosmetic treatment, cardiovascular treatment, fertility treatment, dental treatment, orthopaedic treatment, and other general treatments. On the basis of geography, the market is segmented into Asia pacific, Eastern Europe, Western Europe, North America, and South America. Regional Outlook Some of the prominent medical tourism centres across the globe include Thailand, India, South Korea, Taiwan, Costa Rica, Israel, Brazil, Turkey, the Philippines, Dubai, Singapore, Malaysia, Mexico, Poland, Canada, and the U.S. According to Patients Beyond Borders, the global medical tourism market is currently growing at an impressive rate between 15% and 25%, and the flow of patients seeking cross-border treatment options will be the highest in Mexico. South and Southeast Asia are expected to dominate the global market in the near future. Based on MTA's recently released Medical Tourism Index, there are 41 countries participating in the global medical tourism market. While India broadly secures #1, Israel ranks #1 in the quality of services and facilities. India is renowned for specialist cardiac surgeries, while Singapore is a popular medical tourism destination owing to the expertise in complicated surgical procedures. Thailand has been a popular destination for medical tourism and millions of patients have travelled to Thailand since 2006. It is also the top cosmetic surgery centre globally. Malaysia offers state-of-the-art medical infrastructure and treatments by highly skilled medical professionals, making it another sought after centre among medical tourists. With economically affordable treatment options and favourable government initiatives, Malaysia is anticipated to acquire one of the top market positions in the global medical tourism market, during the forecast period. Request For TOC@ http://www.futuremarketinsights.com/toc/rep-gb-249 Key Players: Global Medical Tourism Market Some of the top key players in the medical tourism industry include Asian Heart Institute (India), Apollo Hospitals (India), Prince Court Medical Centre (Malaysia), Gleneagles Hospital (Singapore), Min-Sheng General Hospital (Taiwan), Samitivej Sukhumvit Hospital (Bangkok), Raffles Medical Group (Singapore), Clemenceau Medical Centre (Lebanon), Bangkok Hospital (Thailand), Bumrungrad International Hospital (Thailand), Fortis Healthcare Ltd. (India), Wooridul Spine Hospital (Korea), KPJ Healthcare Berhad (Malaysia), Anadolu Medical Centre (Turkey), and Asklepios Klinik Barmbek (Germany). While these players rank amongst they compete on the basis of exceptional service quality, optimum patient comfort, and relatively reasonable costs for various treatments. Several facilities are also undergoing mergers, acquisitions, affiliations, and joint ventures for delivering enhanced medical care, thereby strengthening their market positions. A few prominent examples of highly productive collaborations include the collaboration between Bumrungrad International Hospital (Bangkok) and IBM Watson for better cancer care, and the collaboration of Anadolu Medical Centre (Turkey) with Johns Hopkins Medicine (U.S.). New York, NY -- (SBWIRE) -- 01/30/2017 -- Trimellitates are additives that increase the plasticity or fluidity of a material. Trimellitates have applications in automobile industry and are used in automobile interiors where resistance to high temperature is required. Trimellitates are colorless to slightly yellow liquids with high boiling points and low vapor pressures; these properties contribute to their high physical stability. In addition, trimellitates have extremely low volatility. Trimellitates are soluble in numerous organic solvents and miscible with ether, alcohol and oils, but essentially insoluble in water. Because of the similarity in structure as well as physicochemical properties, the trimellitates are grouped into a single category containing four substances with carboxylic side chain ester groups ranging from C8-ClO. Trimellitates are manufactured by esterification of trimellitic anhydride (TMA). The basic structure is an aromatic ring with side chains in the 1,2 and 4 positions. Some examples of trimellitates are n-octyl trimellitate, tri-(2-ethylhexyl) trimellitate, tri-(n-octyl,n-decyl) trimellitate, trimethyl trimellitate, and tri-(heptyl,nonyl) trimellitate among others. A sample of this report is available upon request @ http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/4610 Majority of trimellitates are manufactured for flexible PVC applications. Trimellitates have low volatility and blend with the highest-molecular-weight phthalates and are typically used in high-specification electrical cable insulation and sheathing. Trimelliates have advantage over other plasticizers due to their superior chemical properties and high permanence which increase the shelf life of PVC compounds subjected to elevated temperatures. In addition, trimellitates have applications in construction materials, food packaging, toys, medical devices and automobile industry. The growth in the end user industries is expected to be a major driving factor for the consumption of trimellitates. The growth in wire and cable industry is expected to increase the consumption of trimellitates. Demand for trimellitates is also influenced by general economic conditions. Hence, demand for trimellitates follows the patterns of the major world economies. In addition, rising consumption in emerging economies is expected to boost the consumption of trimellitates. However, availability of substitutes could hamper the growth of this market. Asia Pacific is currently the largest market for trimellites, followed by Europe, North America and rest of the world. The growth of trimelliates market was slow in Asia Pacific due to economic recession but has quickly recovered. India, china, Mongolia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Philippines, Pakistan, Republic of Korea and Japan are the major markets in Asia Pacific. China has moved towards self sufficiency in manufacture of trimellites but the industry remains highly fragmented. Demand for trimellitates in North America is expected to grow at a moderate rate while demand in Europe is expected to grow at comparatively higher rate. Request to view Table of content @ http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/4610 Some of the key players in this market are Exxon Mobil Chemical(U.S.), Shell Chemicals ( U.S), BASF (Germany), Dow Chemical (U.S.), E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company (U.S.), Mitsubishi Chemical (Japan), LG Chem (South Korea), AkzoNobel (Netherlands), Sumitomo Chemical (Japan), Mitsui Chemicals (Japan), Toray Industries (Japan), Eastman Chemical Company(U.S.), and Evonik Industries (Germany) among others. Exxon Mobil Chemical manufactures trimellitate plasticizers under the brand name Jayflex. Jayflex trimellitate plasticizers have applications in wire and cable industry that require resistance to high temperatures over long durations and in automobile interiors. BASF manufactures trimellitate plasticizers under the brand name Palatinol. Palatinol TOTM (tri octyl trimellitate) provides desirable properties in vinyl applications which require low volatility, good plasticizer compatibility, resistance to extraction by soapy water and good electrical properties. Palatinol tri octyl trimellitate is suitable for interior automotive applications and wire insulation. About Persistence Market Research Persistence Market Research (PMR) is a third-platform research firm. Our research model is a unique collaboration of data analytics and market research methodology to help businesses achieve optimal performance. To support companies in overcoming complex business challenges, we follow a multi-disciplinary approach. At PMR, we unite various data streams from multi-dimensional sources. By deploying real-time data collection, big data, and customer experience analytics, we deliver business intelligence for organizations of all sizes. A long-lost medieval kingdom known as the Kingdom of Rheged was unearthed in the excavation in Dumfries and Galloway in southern Scotland. On the other hand, its actual location seems to be a mystery. Ronan Toolis, who led the excavation for GUARD Archaeology, told Fox News that what they have found has all the hallmarks of an early medieval royal site. He further said that there are lots of evidence of wealth and power. A Long-Lost Dark Age Kingdom has been FOUND in Scotland https://t.co/xAMtA6VdnA.. pic.twitter.com/NfsKGzUZkH Maestroviejo (@maestroviejoes) January 28, 2017 The excavation site is known as Trusty's Hill Fort, in which they excavated since 2012. The archaeologists uncovered a complex type of fort dated around A.D. 600. There was wooden and stone rampart that had been built around the summit of the hill to protect the site. This was referred to other high-status settlements of the early medieval period in Scotland, according to History. They also found imported pottery from western France, crucibles and bowls with traces of gold, silver and bronzes and slingshots. Toolis said that the crucibles and bowls were for metalworking. They theorized that the entranceway, with the two Pictish symbols flanking it, was the location for royal inauguration ceremonies that took place at the fort complex. The Kingdom of Rheged was one of the kingdoms of Hen Ogledd or known as "Old North," which is now the Brittonic-speaking region of northern England and southern Scotland. The kingdom is associated with King Urien Rheged and his family. The historians thought that the Kingdom of Rheged was situated in the modern city of Carlisle in northern England. On the other hand, the recent finds in Trusty's Hill Fort could have questioned that hypothesis. Toolis said that the discovery that includes archaeological evidence indicates that Galloway may have been the heart of the lost Dark Age Kingdom of Rheged. He described it as a kingdom that was in the late sixth century pre-eminent amongst the kingdoms of the north. I don't want to judge too hastily. Something good might come of President Donald Trump's offer to "send in the Feds" if Chicago authorities can't curb the city's homicide crisis. Something good might result from a Trumpian White House intervention, either because of it or in spite of it. But I might be more inclined to think that sending in "the Feds" was a promising idea if I knew which "Feds" he's talking about. His offer came via Twitter, like so many of our new president's other policy views. On Tuesday, the fifth night of his presidency, he tweeted, "If Chicago doesn't fix the horrible 'carnage' going on, 228 shootings in 2017 with 42 killings (up 24 percent from 2016), I will send in the Feds!" Three things were striking about this tweet. One, Chicago has a lot of feds in town already, whether the president knows it or not. Chicago police have been working for years with the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Agency and other top federal crime-fighters. Together, they've gone after gunrunners, drug dealers, gangbangers and others who have driven shootings and homicide numbers up. The city also receives millions in federal grants to assist police and support anti-violence social programs. Two, Trump's tweet was notable in that, unlike most of his little missives, it actually contained data, hard numbers that suggest our tweeter-in-chief actually might have done some research. Trump, normally a man of few words that he repeats a lot, usually prefers to wing it, typing whatever springs out of his head. A clue to that little mystery popped up later that evening as eagle-eyed reporters noticed how closely his data matched the numbers in a commentary earlier that evening by host Bill O'Reilly on his Fox News program, "The O'Reilly Factor." "(Can) President Trump override Chicago and Illinois authorities," O'Reilly asked, "and stop the murder?" Trump apparently thinks so. Or, at least, he has good reason to expect his conservative base of supporters to think so. And, three, to Trump's conservative following, I am sure his mention of "the Feds" was interpreted as code for martial law, which is the sort of draconian measure that often is favored by people who don't actually live in the affected neighborhoods. Hardly a week goes by that I don't hear from a concerned reader who wants to know why martial law has not been imposed to retake violence-plagued streets on the city's South and West sides. It's not that kind of crisis, I tell them. Chicago's South and West sides are not Aleppo or Mosul, although on a noisy night they can sound like it. Armed troops are useful in quelling riots or guerrilla uprisings. Chicago's recent violence tends to come from domestic quarrels or petty beefs between small neighborhood cliques that turn violent, experts say, and lead to retaliatory shootings. The city had 762 homicides last year, higher than New York and Los Angeles combined. But morale is so low in the department, according to the Chicago Tribune, police street stops have fallen by 82 percent over the previous year. That's one of the messages in a year-long review that the U. S. Department of Justice recently released. It describes long-standing patterns and practices of excessive force, civil liberties violations and poor training of officers. Result: toxic relations between police and the communities they serve. Witnesses don't cooperate, crimes don't get solved and police officers are further endangered. National Guard can assist police in some situations, but most of them are not trained to be police. Putting them on the streets could invite more abuses that make police community relations even worse. The Trump administration could help Chicago buy more equipment, hire personnel and beef up community policing training programs to gain more neighborhood cooperation. Mayor Rahm Emanuel welcomes White House help. The city's too broke for him to afford to say anything else. Unfortunately, Trump said back in August that Chicago's crime problems could be solved by "being very much tougher." Why? He says he was told by "very top police" that a tougher stance could end the city's violence problem in a week. Right. If that were true, it would have happened long ago. The elections are over. It's time for Chicago and the White House to drop the politics and pick up some practical solutions. Email Clarence Page at cpage@chicagotribune.com. For years, Rep. Carolyn Maloney (who represents eastern Manhattan & the Bronx as well as parts of north-central Queens and Brooklyn) and various locals pols have been fighting tooth and bamboo nail to try to bring pandas to the city, sadly to no avail. Every hopeful report seems to get shot down by the harsh economic reality of paying for the pandas. But recently, former mayoral candidate and Gristedes founder John Catsimatidis has gotten involved with the panda push, and he's now apparently made a Hail Mary move to bring the pandas here by getting the Trumps involved. The Post reports that Catsimatidis has spoken to a representative from the Trump Organization about Donald Jr. and Eric Trump joining the push to import two breedable pandas from China. He apparently is trying to use flattery, but comparing the move to when Donald Trump rehabilitated Wolfman Rink in the 1980s: "What Id say to Eric is, 'Youd be doing for the panda project what your father did with the Wollman Rink. Can you build a panda facility that follows in the footsteps of your father?'" Catsimatidis said. "Maybe the Trump Organization will build it for half the price, the way Donald did the Wollman Rink for half the price." (The rink was completed under budget, but not half the price.) Of course, considering that Catsimatidis is the guy who was spreading those Hillary Clinton-is-running-for-mayor rumors in the NY Post, maybe we should take his whole Trump/panda appeal thing with a giant grain of salt. And even if it IS true, the Trump kids will probably just end up opening NYC's first immersive hunting zoo. Those fluffy panda butts come with a pesky $1 million/year price tag, and that's only to borrow them from China (The city would then have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars more to actually care for the pandas). Catsimatidis, who has a net worth around $3.4 billion, is forging ahead with other fundraising plans in the meantime. That includes starting his own corporation for the venture, The Pandas Are Coming To NYC Inc, and hosting the Black & White Panda Ball in February. The black tie dinner will take place at the Waldrof Astoria on February 8th, and is cosponsored by former AIG chief Maurice R. Greenberg, Chinese-American business woman Yue-Sai Kan & Maloney. Here's their press release on it: The Pandas Are Coming to NYC, is a registered non-profit which is hosting the Black & White Panda Ball. The mission is to raise funds to bring two breed-able pandas to NYC and to build a freestanding Panda Pavilion. This will be beneficial on both a social and political level, as well as act as an economic spark plug for the neighborhood that houses the panda pavilion. Congresswoman Maloney, always a forward thinking leader of New York City, was ahead of her time when she fought for funds to complete the 2nd Avenue Subway in order to best serve her constituency. She now aims to break ground on this elaborate cultural and political event that involves privately funding a brand new Panda Pavilion in NYC, to house the Citys first ever breed-able panda couple. The greatest city on earth deserves to be the home to such iconic creatures. The Gala will be a renewal of Truman Capotes classic Black & White Ball but with a panda twist! - Cong. Maloney Tickets for the ball range between $1,000 and $50,000 so you probably won't be going, but they are expecting to raise between $500,000 and $4 million toward the effort. It will comprise a distribution centre, a container yard and a 15-acre warehouse. The facility is expected to be operational by early June 2017 and the distribution centre by February 2018. GAC said the logistics facility will be equipped with the latest reach stackers and will consist of a modern container terminal with a capacity of 6,000 teu made up of seven high container stacking and a warehousing and distribution centre offering third party logistics services. Other features include a two-way approach to stacks in the container depot and a dual in and out gate that operates independently. The distribution centre will consist of 22,000 pallet positions with both ambient and temperature-controlled facilities. Mahesh Kurukulasuriya, managing director of GAC Sri Lanka said this new venture was a significant step forward for the company. GAC in Sri Lanka has come a long way. From an eight-man outfit operating from Colombo in 1991, we have grown into one of the countrys leaders in the provision of key specialised support services today with more than 260 employees, he commented. This integrated logistics facility is a testament of our unyielding commitment towards meeting our customers ever-changing needs through constant innovation. Kasturi Chellaraja Wilson, managing director of Hemas Integrated Logistics said: Through this joint venture, we aspire to provide total solutions to the Sri Lankas exporters and importers whilst adding value to the national economy and making Sri Lanka the maritime and logistics hub in Asia. The United Arab Emirates-based shipyard will continue to construct new-build steel and aluminium vessels as well as providing ship repair services to its marine and oil and gas customers in the Middle East. As part of the move, Albwardy Damen will construct a new office and workshop facility in Dubai Maritime City. This expansion will enable Albwardy Damen to offer its ship repair services to customers in Dubai Maritime City and will also integrate with the existing business units in Al Jadaf, Sharjah and Fujairah. Bringing both brands together is a logical next step for us, said Lars Seistrup, managing director of Albwardy Damen. We aim to be the best regional shipyard for building and repairing niche tonnage, and with our expansion in Dubai we are positioning ourselves in the best possible way to serve our clients in the region during these challenging times. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 2017-38 The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced that Marc Wyatt, Director of the Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations, will leave the agency next month to return to the private sector. Mr. Wyatt joined the SEC in December 2012 as a senior specialized examiner and co-founded the Private Fund Unit within OCIE. He was named Deputy Director in October 2014 and served as Acting Director in April 2015 before being named Director in November 2015. OCIE has benefited greatly from Marcs leadership and vision, said SEC Acting Chairman Michael Piwowar. His efforts on enhancing our risk based exam program and the organizational changes he has put in place will leave a lasting mark on the Commission. It has been an honor to serve alongside the outstanding OCIE team who work tirelessly to improve compliance, prevent fraud, monitor risk, and inform policy, said Mr. Wyatt. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to work with the Commissioners and staff across the SEC to execute on our mission. Mr. Wyatt worked with OCIE leadership and staff on a number of initiatives and accomplishments during his tenure, including: In each year, Commission staff significantly increased its examinations, including over 2,400 examinations in fiscal year 2016, a 20 percent increase over fiscal year 2015 and a seven year high in examinations conducted. By the end of fiscal year 2016, OCIE completed a reallocation of resources within the examination program that, along with focused hiring, resulted in increasing the size of the investment adviser and investment company examination staff by more than 20 percent as compared to the prior year in response to rapid industry growth. OCIE created the Office of Risk and Strategy which combined the various quantitative teams and risk professionals across OCIE into one unit to significantly increase technology-based approaches to identify risks among SEC registrant populations. OCIE formed the FINRA and Securities Industry Oversight Team, or FSIO, to enhance oversight of a key industry self-regulatory organization. OCIE established the Technology Controls Program, or TCP, and its Cyberwatch unit to monitor for significant events and outages related to Regulation Systems Compliance and Integrity. Before coming to the SEC, Mr. Wyatt was a principal and senior portfolio manager of a global multi-strategy hedge fund. Prior to that, he was a senior investment banker in the U.S. and U.K. Mr. Wyatt is a Chartered Financial Analyst. He graduated from the University of Delaware with a B.S. in economics and holds an M.B.A. from Duke Universitys Fuqua School of Business. Upon Mr. Wyatts departure, Pete Driscoll, OCIEs Chief Risk and Strategy Officer, will become the acting director. Mr. Driscoll was previously OCIEs managing executive from 2013 through early 2016. He joined the Agency in 2001 as a staff attorney in the Division of Enforcement in the Chicago Regional Office and was later a Branch Chief and Assistant Regional Director in OCIE. Prior to the Agency, Mr. Driscoll began his career with Ernst & Young LLP and held several accounting positions in private industry. He received his B.S. in Accounting and law degree from St. Louis University. He is licensed as a certified public accountant and is a member of the Missouri Bar Association. When a photo showing an estimated 80 falcons flying in the cabin of an airliner was shared via Reddit recently, many viewers questioned if the image was legit. But it turns out that money can indeed lead to a cabin full of feathered passengers, and not only in the Middle East, where the falcons appear to have originated. Pet owners with charges not normally allowed on regular commercial flights can use their own airplane, book a private jet or charter a commercial airliner flight to transport their animals. The latter appears to have been what the prince did. The plane looks to be a commercial airline Boeing 767, according to Jordan Oates, a flight manager at PrivateFly, which among other special services can make all arrangements for pet owners who wish to travel with their pets in an aircraft cabin. RELATED: Crackdown Likely for 'Comfort' Pets on Planes "We've had clients fly with their micropigs, full blown pigs, birds and many other animals," Oates said. He quickly added, "No elephants, though." Here in the states and in Europe, the pets are predictably most often dogs and cats. Eleven dogs, for example, recently received the VIP treatment on a flight from the U.K. to Belgium. An entire jet was booked to transport a single cat from Edinburgh to Paris. In the case of the falcons, Reddit user "lolalollipopp" commented that such birds are commonly seen on planes in the Middle East, given the popularity of falconry there. "I would assume that these falcons are on their way to a hunting meet, as typically a member of a royal family would have the falcons transported on seat backs and not on flat tables," the person wrote. "If ever a flat piece of wood is fashioned as a perch for falcons to sit on, then a rug is used for grip and then discarded after the flight." RELATED: The Real Reason Birds Fly in a 'V' Formation Presumably the rug and wood could catch any stray feathers, not to mention bird waste. Oates mentioned that private jets transporting pets are kept spotless, and that another round of cleaning takes place if the furred or feathered passenger soils any part of the aircraft. WATCH: How Tiny Bugs Can Slow Down an Airplane An extremely rare cross between a tiger and a lion has been born in a travelling zoo in southern Russia, one of only a few dozen of the animals believed to exist. Named Tsar, the two-month-old "liger" cub is the offspring of a tigress Princess and lion Caesar, zoo director Erik Airapetyan told AFP. "They have lived together for a long time and know each other well. When the tigress was on heat, she didn't have any other choice," he said. The cub has the beige fur of a lion and the stripes of a tiger and is currently being fed on milk from one of the zoo's goats. Ligers can grow to be the biggest cat in the animal kingdom, weighing more than 400 kilograms (882 pounds). A liger called Hercules in the United States is currently listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the biggest feline in the world, at a weight of 418 kilograms (922 pounds) and length of 3.33 meters (11 feet). U.S. zoos do not generally cross-breed big cats, as there is thought to be no purpose to breeding an animal that does not exist in the wild. Instead, they put their energies toward conservation of existing species. "In terms of conservation," a U.S. lion expert told National Geographic in 2012, "it's so far away from anything, it's kind of pointless to even say it's irrelevant." In the case with Tsar: "The mother [tiger] was in heat but there were no tigers, and we saw that she was suffering [without a male tiger] so we decided to put her together with a lion. Because they lived next to each other for a long time before, it worked," Airapetyan told Deutsche Welle. Earlier notions that all ligers are sterile have not proved accurate, as shown by the birth in 2012 of "liliger" Kiara - born to a liger mother and a lion father. AFP contributed to this report. Scientists have a new theory for how early Mars managed to stay warm enough for liquid surface water, a condition that is believed to be essential for life. An armada of orbiters, landers and rovers studying Mars have returned overwhelming evidence that the dry, cold planet of today was far different three- to four billion years ago when rivers and lakes periodically flowed across its surface. But at that time, Mars should have been too cold for water to remain liquid. Newly published research shows Mars' atmosphere may have had periods of warming due to greenhouse gases spurred largely by the release of methane. "The early Mars climate problem has been around for a long time," lead researcher Robin Wordsworth, with Harvard University's School of Engineering and Applied Science, told Seeker. "All the previously proposed explanations just didn't work. We couldn't get the climate warm enough or wet enough for long." RELATED: On Mars, Life Could Be Hiding Under the Rocks The new study, published in last week's Geophysical Research Letters, shows that interactions between methane, carbon dioxide and hydrogen in Mars' atmosphere could have absorbed enough solar radiation to spike surface temperatures high enough for water to stay liquid. Blankets of greenhouse gases could have kept Mars warm for spans of time lasting tens of thousands of years, but not hundreds of millions of years, Wordsworth noted, a finding that matches the evidence of the periodic presence of water coming from NASA's Curiosity rover and other spacecraft at Mars. Wordsworth said he got the idea about methane bursts from looking at Titan, the largest moon of Saturn and the only body in the solar system besides Earth that has a substantial atmosphere. Titan is loaded with methane, as well as other hydrocarbons. "It's an analog for how Mars might have been," Wordsworth said. The scientists expect data from NASA's ongoing MAVEN mission, which is monitoring how Mars' atmosphere is bleeding away into space, will flesh out their models of the planet's past climate. RELATED: Mars Water: Follow the Toxic Stream to Find Alien Life "MAVEN is an important mission. I think it is going to give us much better constraints on the evolution of the atmosphere backwards in time," Wordsworth said. The finding also has implications for looking for life beyond the solar system, the authors note. "Our results also suggest that inhabited exoplanets could retain surface liquid water at significant distances from their host stars," the paper said. WATCH VIDEO: Here's Why We Can't Live Stream From Mars Living on Mars would be tough by any measure - so tough, that there's considerable debate about whether even the hardiest of microbes could survive. The atmosphere is thin, the surface is baked with radiation and the planet itself is mostly arid, dusty and wind-swept. But there could be niches where life thrived in the distant past, when Mars had a thicker atmosphere and a wetter surface. So when Red Planet scientist Janice Bishop was invited to look at carbonate rocks in the Mojave Desert a few years ago, she immediately saw implications for Mars. Bishop had already published a 2006 International Journal of Astrobiology paper calling iron oxides an "ultraviolet sunscreen" for ancient photosynthesis on Earth. The result of the newer study, published in 2011 in the same journal showed that the Mojave rocks collected also had iron oxide coatings, under which carbonates were hiding. "They were all hiding under this red mineral at the top, called hematite," Bishop told Seeker in an interview. Hematite is also a common mineral on Mars. RELATED: Mars Water: Follow the Toxic Stream to Find Alien Life Besides being senior research scientist and chair of the astrobiology group at the SETI Institute, Bishop is known for her work with a Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter instrument called CRISM (Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer). The spacecraft has been taking high-resolution pictures and spectroscopic images of Mars for more than a decade, providing reams of information on how the surface looks like today and how it may have evolved. And Bishop is one of several scientists working on the "sunscreen" idea. The University of Maryland's Gozen Ertem, for example, is looking at how well biomolecules can hide from ultraviolet radiation in different mixtures. She will present on her research at the American Association for the Advancement of Science Conference next month. (Ertem did not respond to requests for an interview.) It's unclear how well Martian microbes (if they existed) would have fared in their environment, but at the least the studies on iron oxides are yielding valuable information about how life evolved on Earth. This could help scientists better understand the possibility of life in other environments across the solar system, or even exoplanetary systems. Dan Millis will never forget the day when he saw a deer family - a doe and two fawns - cautiously approach the US-Mexico border wall in the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area in Arizona. The mother deer kept looking at the wall and smelling it, trotting repeatedly and anxiously back and forth in search of what was once open land. Eventually she gave up attempting to cross, and warily led her fawns back the way that they had come. "To me it was living proof that wildlife is being impacted in ways that we don't yet fully understand," Millis, director of the Sierra Club Grand Canyon Chapter Borderlands and Beyond Coal Campaigns, told Seeker. "A rancher who lives near that spot told me he has not seen the large deer herds on his land anymore, not since the wall went up." Now there is to be even more wall, given President Trump's executive order on January 25 that calls for securing "the southern border of the United States through the immediate construction of a physical wall on the southern border, monitored and supported by adequate personnel so as to prevent illegal immigration, drug and human trafficking, and acts of terrorism." The order clarifies that the "wall" will be a "contiguous, physical wall or other similarly secure contiguous, and impassable physical barrier." President Trump and the Department of Homeland Security are waived from environmental regulations when building "security" infrastructure, per Section 102 of the Real ID Act passed in 2005 under the George W. Bush administration. Congress would need to repeal or change the Section to allow for environmental regulations around the ordered additional "1000 miles of wall" called for by Trump. (The border between the U.S. and Mexico is 1,954 miles long, with walls already built along approximately 350 of those miles, and low-level vehicle barriers currently along 300 miles.) Camera trap data from Arizona found that the wall did not prevent illegal immigrants from crossing into the United States, but wholly stopped wildlife movement. "Humans are good at building big, deep tunnels with electricity, and are good at building big ladders, catapults - not a joke - and using drones and more. Animals are not," Jesse Lasky, a Penn State biologist, told Seeker. Millis agrees. "Taller walls would only mean taller ladders," he said. RELATED: Is Mexico Framing Migrants for Its Human Trafficking Problem? Even many U.S. Border Patrol agents, who have been on the front lines of the problem for years, support better surveillance over more construction. Some have advocated using aerial drones, for example, over building more wall, according to a Reuters report. "I have yet to hear from anyone directly involved in interdiction and border security endorse building a sold concrete wall," Ecologist Tim Keitt at the University of Texas told Seeker. Region 'Under Siege' Bryan Bird, director of the Southwest Program for Defenders of Wildlife, told Seeker that beginning in the early 1990s, the U.S. Border Patrol dramatically increased its immigration enforcement efforts in heavily populated border areas, essentially shifting undocumented immigration, drug trafficking and other illegal activities from urban areas to remote, sensitive borderlands. Enforcement-related road and wall construction, lighting projects and off-road vehicle and low-flying helicopter patrols proliferated. "As a result, this pristine region - much of it on public lands set aside to protect rare and imperiled wildlife and sensitive habitat - is under siege," Bird said. Environmental concerns, as outlined in the 2005 Border Ecological Symposium, include trampling of vegetation and other direct damage to wildlife and habitat, fragmentation of habitat and wildlife corridors, introduction of exotic species, air and water pollution, wildlife mortality and displacement, modifications of wildlife behavior in response to disturbances. The document also says the construction exerts added pressure on threatened and endangered species and presents obstacles to restoring these animals' habitats. Impacts on Wildlife Countless species, including many that are rare and endangered, have already been impacted by the existing wall and will be threatened further by its expansion and increased human patrols, Bird and several others told Seeker. According to the IUCN Red List of Endangered Species, the jaguar - the largest cat of the Americas - disappeared from the southwestern U.S. portion of its range by the mid-1900s, due to deforestation, hunting, trapping and other human activities. Anti-fur campaigns and other conservation efforts led to a slow comeback, "but fencing and road projects proposed by the Border Patrol threaten to cut off the cross-border corridors they use," Bird said. The Trump order could devastate the Mexican gray wolf population in the region, he and others said. In 1998, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released captive-bred Mexican gray wolves into Southeast Arizona. In 2011 Mexican gray wolves were also released into the Mexican state of Sonora about 30 miles from the U.S. border. Currently there are about 100 wolves north of the border and 35 south of the border. "The wolves are at risk of inbreeding resulting in a genetic 'bottleneck,'" Bird said. "They need to freely cross the international border to improve their genetic pool." He added that the Sonoran pronghorn antelope faces a similar fate, with a "serious possibility of extinction in the wild" due to the expected genetic bottleneck. Then there is the cactus ferruginous pygmy owl, a tiny owl critical to desert ecosystems that rarely flies above five feet above the ground. The wall puts the owl at risk of local extinctions in Sonora as well as Arizona. Still other species threatened by the past and planned border activities, according to conservationists, include the ocelot, jaguarundi, desert tortoise, black bear, cougar, desert mule deer, American bison, southwestern willow flycatcher, black-tailed prairie dog, yellow-billed cuckoo, and several plant and fish species. Threats to Human Health Concrete, one of the most-used construction materials in the world, releases pollutants during its production and is a known contributor to global greenhouse gases. According to a Bloomberg report, engineers at New York University and University College London recently concluded that a 1,000-mile wall would require 275 million cubic feet of concrete, and would release well over 2 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. "Beyond carbon dioxide, concrete production generates other pollutants that are highly toxic," Keitt said. "This would largely impact communities located near concrete plants along both sides of the border." He believes the estimate of pollutants could be vastly understated, given that "no one really knows yet what it will entail to build a wall over mountain ranges in the region." Another consequence of a longer wall is loss of land. Keitt pointed out that any border barrier cannot always be built directly on the border, and so could be placed far away from that location. "Land at and behind a wall becomes inaccessible to owners and managers or may be taken using eminent domain laws or by other means," he explained. "It is a big deal in Texas because most of the border lands are privately owned." Undoing 100 Years of Conservation Concern over protecting wildlife with ranges that go beyond the borders of any given country is nothing new. Clinton Epps, an associate professor of wildlife at Oregon State University, explained that "that since the U.S. entered the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918, we've acknowledged the importance of protecting wildlife that moves across international borders." President Woodrow Wilson, who led the nation through World War I, signed the Act before the war had even ended. It is still the primary U.S. legislation used to conserve migratory birds. RELATED: U.S.-Mexico Border Wall Could Be Made from Shipping Containers Aaron Flesch, a University of Arizona research scientist says that conservation efforts in the Mexico border region date to around that time too. "If the government (now) wishes to mitigate the adverse effects of border development on wildlife and maintain the integrity of 100 years of conservation and management efforts in the region, they need to protect habitat, bolster the quality of that habitat, and take measures such as assisted migration or translocations that bolster connectivity for the species most likely to be affected," he told Seeker. Alternatives to the Solid Wall Defenders of Wildlife argues that a wide range of high-tech monitoring devices are now available that would provide security while minimizing the impact on wildlife. They include prioritizing usage of "virtual" high-tech fencing options - such as unmanned aerial vehicles, motion-sensors, laser barriers and infrared cameras - and using wildlife-friendly vehicle barriers in conjunction with virtual fencing in areas where hard infrastructure is necessary and appropriate. Bird said that "fencing should be implemented only as a last resort." A microscopic bag-like sea creature dating to 540 million years ago is the earliest known ancestor of humans, research on the newly discovered species finds. The ultra-tiny animal, named Saccorhytus coronarius, is now thought to be the first known "deuterostome" and is described in the journal Nature. Deuterostome refers to a broad biological group of animals that encompasses a number of sub-groups, including vertebrates, which are all animals with a backbone or spinal column. "Humans are deuterostomes and so too are other vertebrates, as well as animals like sea-squirts and starfish," co-author Simon Conway Morris of the University of Cambridge told Seeker. "What we want to know is what the common ancestor of all these animals looked like. In our opinion, Saccorhytus is the best candidate." To the naked eye, the creature resembles a black speck of dust. When magnified, however, "the preservation of detail in this (and the other) microscopic fossils is extraordinary," he said. RELATED: Adam Gave Up His Penis Bone for Eve Conway Morris, lead author Jian Han and their international team of researchers analyzed the remains of Saccorhytus. They believe it lived in a shallow sea ecosystem with primitive mollusks, early representatives of arrow worms (nearly transparent worm-like marine predators) and other water-dwelling species. There was not much to the animal, by the looks of it. The body was a rounded sack covered with a thin and flexible skin. A relatively large mouth was at the top, with small openings called "body cones" around the primary orifice. "It could have slithered between the sediment grains, and the mouth seems to have been capable of considerable dilation and so, for its size, (it could) have swallowed relatively large prey with the excess water being discharged via the openings," Conway Morris said. RELATED: Our Connection to Hobbits, Neanderthals and Other Ancient Humans Deepened in 2016 "We have not observed an anus," he added, explaining that waste material could have left through the mouth. The openings that are on the body were likely the precursors of gill slits that later evolved in fish and other marine life, the researchers believe. Gills were lost once the ancestors of humans and other related animals became terrestrial. The discovery of Saccorhytus is just the latest major find from Conway Morris and his colleagues. "Our team has notched up some important discoveries in the past, including the earliest fish and a remarkable variety of other early deuterostomes," said co-author Degan Shu from Northwest University." Saccorhytus now gives us remarkable insights into the very first stages of the evolution of a group that led to the fish, and ultimately, to us." Image: Artist's reconstruction of Saccorhytus coronarius, based on the original fossil finds. The actual creature was probably no more than a millimeter in size. Credit: S Conway Morris/Jian Han President Trump is likely to pull out of the Paris Climate Deal, according to his former adviser on the Environmental Protection Agency, Myron Ebell. The action could come by executive order in a matter of days, reported the Independent, which would be his sixth since officially becoming president. The Paris Climate Deal pledged to bring all nations together for the first time with the shared goal of combating climate change and adapting to its effects, and to assist developing countries in doing the same. So far 197 countries have signed on, including the United States. While at a briefing in London, Ebell said Trump was intent on undoing Obama's policies that call for restrictions on greenhouse gases. "I expect Donald Trump to be very assiduous in keeping his promises, despite all of the flack he is going to get from his opponents," Ebell said at the briefing. "He could do it by executive order tomorrow, or he could wait and do it as part of a larger package. There are multiple ways and I have no idea of the timing." Ebell's comments come at a time when Trump is embroiled in ongoing tensions with the Prince of Whales regarding climate change. The president is scheduled to meet with Prince Charles when he visits Britain in June, but Trump's team is concerned that their contradicting views on the environment will make for an awkward encounter. RELATED: The Paris Climate Deal Will Be Law Before Election Day The president's representatives have told UK officials that Charles should not push him on climate issues, reported the The Times of London, warning that Trump may "erupt" in response. The White House is said to have suggested that Prince William and Prince Harry meet with Trump instead. Prince Charles has been a champion of environmental protection for more than 40 years, launching various sustainability projects, such as the Prince's Rainforest Project and the International Sustainability Unit. In contrast, Trump has called climate change a "hoax" invented by the Chinese in order to damage the American manufacturing industry. During his recent Senate hearing, Trump's new secretary of state, former ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson, acknowledged that climate change does exist and acknowledged the benefits of remaining in the Paris deal. "I think it's 190 countries have signed on," Tillerson said of the pact. "We're better served by being at that table than by leaving that table." But according to Ebell, any effort made by Tillerson to keep the United States in the deal will be pointless. "His mandate is pretty clear," Ebell said of Trump, who secured the presidency in the Electoral College after losing the popular vote to Hillary Clinton by nearly three million votes, "and he knows who he got it from. If Rex Tillerson disagrees with the president, who is going to win that debate?" Since leaving Trump's transition team, Ebell has gone back to his role at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, an anti-regulation group who has received money from ExxonMobil in the past. "The environmental movement is, in my view, the greatest threat to freedom and prosperity in the modern world," Ebell also stated in London. RELATED: Trump's EPA Nominee Rejects Scientific Consensus on Climate Change Trump officials are primarily concerned with heavy media scrutiny if the success of his initial meeting with the Royal Family is thwarted by Prince Charles. "Their paranoia of the media means that anything that goes slightly off-pitch will be hammered back home as him not getting a good reception from the future king of England and thousands of people protesting on the streets," a senior government source told The Times. That said, it would be "a major breach of protocol" for Trump to try and exclude Charles from the meeting, a royal source told The Times. "We are very clear the prince will carry out his role in a state visit as always, and his views on climate change would not and should not affect his ability to do that." The president's first UK visit is planned for June, but there's a chance it could be much later in the year. After UK Prime Minister Theresa May spoke to the Republican congressional leadership last week, Trump may be invited to speak at the Conservative Party conference in Manchester in October. WATCH: Donald Trump: An American Crony Capitalist? Many Americans take water for granted. Throughout most of the country it's readily accessible from the faucet, from a drinking fountain in the park, or in a bottle at the store. According to a new study conducted as part of a project with the Urban Water Innovation Network, water might become unaffordable for a third of American households within the next five years. Currently, the average household water bill in America is $120 for 12,000 gallons per month. Michigan State University researchers project that number will rise $49 by 2022. The cost of water has already been steadily rising in most of the country. Between 2010 and 2015, 30 major U.S. cities saw their water bill jump by 41 percent. In Detroit, 50,000 people have lost water access since 2014. In Philadelphia, 40 percent of water bills are overdue. If water prices continue to rise at the same rate they have for the past five years, 40 million American households will likely lose access to water. Michigan State University researchers looked at water utility reports, as well as surveys from the American Water Works Association across the U.S. and found that when water prices rise above 4.5 percent of a household's income, they are forced to reallocate funds from elsewhere to their water bill. RELATED: Fracking Can Contaminate Water Says EPA To stay below that benchmark a household must earn a minimum of $32,000 a year, which is challenging for many Americans, considering 51 percent of the population makes less than $30,000 a year. "Infrastructure is the main contributor to water price surges," Elizabeth Mack, a geography professor at MSU and the lead study author, told Seeker. While Flint, Mich., is the most notable example of failing water infrastructure, other U.S. cities could soon face a similar problem. Washington, D.C. has a water system of that dates back to the Civil War, while other cities still use wooden pipes that haven't been updated since the mid-1800s. Lack of precipitation is also a major concern. Recent heavy rainfall in California, has temporarily relieved the drought in nearly half the state, but Gov. Jerry Brown's drought emergency declaration remains in effect. According to Mack, while failing infrastructure currently poses the biggest threat to water price surges, but without learning to save and reuse water, scarcity will contribute to higher prices in the future as well. "Right now water is not priced as a scarce resource," Mack told Seeker. "Pricing for scarcity has not yet entered the conversation on a broad scale unfortunately, nor have widespread efforts to help households adopt water saving fixtures and appliances." RELATED: How Much Water Does The Body Really Need? But pricing water as a scarcity is on the minds of some including Dr. Michael Burry. Burry is among the four investors who predicted, and therefore profited from, the U.S. housing crisis depicted in the 2015 movie The Big Short. Burry must have a knack for capitalizing on crisis because he now focuses all of his investments on water. Since water is not a tradable commodity this might seem odd, but according to Vintage Value Living, there are several ways to invest in water. Due to the factors mentioned in Mack's study - such as aging infrastructure and water scarcity - there's a growing demand for available freshwater, both in the U.S. and globally. And where there's demand there's opportunity for profit. Investing in the future of water can be done in a number of ways. Investors purchase water rights for later sale or rent the water source to others. Water-rich agricultural land is purchased for raising crops and is then sold to countries with water scarcity. Others invest in water utility companies, in areas that are likely to privatize their water systems. But privatization of water utilities is a controversial issue. James Olson, an environmental, water and public interest lawyer who founded the organization For Love of Water, which seeks to protect the Great Lakes, has been focusing on water privatization for years. "The financial principal for municipal water service is non-profit, it's cost-based," Olson told Seeker. "[But] if a private company takes over and they charge the same rates, how are they going to make a profit? The profit has to come from somewhere." Olson warns that privatized water utilities would hit low-income households hardest because private companies generally don't offer affordability plans. Every household would be expected to pay the same rate. RELATED: Scientists Just Discovered A New State of Water Referring to the estimated cost of fixing the entire country's outdated water infrastructure Olson said, "If it's a trillion dollars added to the current cost of struggling municipal water systems it's gonna hit the pocketbook of the poor." This is in line with what Mack and her team found when they looked at areas that are at a high risk of water-price surges. States in the southern U.S. are currently most susceptible, with Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama topping the list. To maintain access to water, according to Mack, they must find a way to improve their infrastructure without passing on the cost to consumers. "National affordability guidelines need to be established as well as protections that prevent water shutoffs for vulnerable populations - children, the elderly, disabled and pregnant women," Mack said. "Some states have protections for customers so they will not have services terminated due to delinquent payments, [but] this is not something in place across all states." Olson agrees that our government needs to ensure public access to water. "Isn't water a human right? It's the federal government's responsibility to assist the states to deliver on this fundamental, constitutional question of access to water," he told Seeker. "It's the relationship of people to government and water to people that you have to think about here," Olson added. "[Water] is not, by its nature, a private enterprise. Some things are fundamentally public - and water is one of them." WATCH: Are We Really running Out of Drinking Water? Bam lauds PNP's move to shift focus from anti-drug ops to 'internal cleansing' Sen. Bam Aquino lauded Philippine National Police (PNP) chief Ronald Dela Rosa's order to cease all anti-illegal drug operations nationwide to focus on "internal cleansing", saying it will help restore the public's trust in the organization. "This is a step in the right direction for the PNP as it works on regaining the public trust after several controversial incidents involving bad elements within the organization," said Sen. Bam. "Sa hakbang na ito, umaasa tayo na mawawala na sa hanay ng PNP ang mga tiwaling pulis na sumisira sa imahe ng mga nagpapatupad ng batas sa bansa," he added. On Monday, the PNP chief ordered all police units to stop anti-illegal drug operations nationwide as the organization focuses on getting rid of bad eggs among its ranks. Dela Rosa's announcement came after President Duterte ordered the dismantling of all PNP anti-illegal drug units after several policemen were involved in the kidnapping and murder of a South Korean businessman inside Camp Crame in October 2016. Jee Ick Joo was abducted from his home in Angeles City in October 18, 2016 and murdered right inside Camp Crame on the same day. Earlier, Sen. Bam pointed out that rogue elements are capitalizing on the government's war against illegal drugs for their personal gains. "Humihina ang giyera ng pamahalaan kontra droga dahil sa ilang masasamang element sa PNP na nagsasamantala sa sitwasyon para sa pansariling kapakanan," the senator said. During the Senate committee on public order and illegal drugs hearing on the South Korean kidnap-slay last Thursday, Sen. Bam urged Dela Rosa to also focus on removing bad elements within the organization. "Self defeating kung hindi natin maaksyunan, malilinis at matatanggal ang mga ganitong klaseng gawain, parang humihina po iyong kalakasan natin dito sa war on drugs," Sen. Bam told Dela Rosa. Dela Rosa, for his part, informed the committee that the PNP has 893 pending administrative cases against erring policemen while 228 were already resolved. Furthermore, Sen. Bam stressed that punishing those involved in the kidnapping and murder of the South Korean will help restore the public trust on the PNP. "Sa kasong ito, malinaw na ang mga personalities involved. Ang kailangan na lang alamin ay ang accountabilities at actions. Baka kahit papano, with a speedy resolution, mabalik nang kaunti ang tiwala," Sen. Bam emphasized. Press Release January 30, 2017 STATEMENT OF SEN. LEILA M. DE LIMA ON PRESIDENT DUTERTE'S EXTENSION OF HIS WAR ON DRUGS WITH ACKNOWLEDGMENT THAT 40% OF THE POLICE ARE "CORRUPT TO THE CORE" This is why I continue to worry about the state of the President's mental health. He displays signs of cognitive dissonance not only in his carefree monologues but worse, also in his official pronouncements. This latest incongruance between his factual assertion of a rotten police force on the one hand and his reliance on them to continue prosecuting his drug war as official government policy has dire consequences, which means more killings by corrupt and criminal policemen. And, as the kidnapping of the Korean shows, these criminal acts won't be limited to drugs, as we have predicted, but will definitely expand to other police "cottage industries" like kidnap-for-ransom and business shakedowns. The moment Duterte has turned the PNP into a vigilante death squad, its transformation into an organized criminal syndicate has been completed. The PNP under Duterte can now be considered as the most organized criminal group in the country. When you speak of organized crime in the Philippines, you speak of the PNP under Duterte. Aside from this, we hear contradicting pronouncements from his PNP Chief, Bato dela Rosa, who called for a halt to the drug war pending an internal cleansing in the police force. This can be all part of their media obfuscation strategy. We can no longer distinguish between the truth and the lies when this government speaks from the podium. All of this of course is part of the so-called "gaslighting" strategy of feeding the population with lies they want to believe while exerting control over the people through more lies. In the meantime, the country continues to burn amidst all the administration-sanctioned killings and corruption perpetrated by none other than his most trusted police and DOJ officials. Press Release January 30, 2017 Hontiveros to Gov't: End "corrupt war on drugs" PERMANENTLY "Kung ano ang puno, siya rin ang bunga. Kung korap ang nagpapatupad, korap din ang kampanya. The Duterte government is guilty of implementing a corrupt war on drugs. It is but right for them to heed the people's demands to stop it." This was Akbayan Senator Risa Hontiveros' reaction to Philippine National Police (PNP) Chief Ronaldo dela Rosa's order to stop the war on drugs as the police force focuses on "internal cleansing." Dela Rosa issued this statement following President Rodrigo Duterte's admission that 40 percent of the police force is corrupt at a midnight press conference on Monday. "Ako ay nagagalak at tumugon ang PNP Chief sa aking panawagan na itigil ang abusadong war on drugs na bumibiktima sa maraming inosenteng mamamayan at sumisira sa imahe ng PNP," Hontiveros said. "With this move, the PNP owns up to its abuses and confirms that indeed the war on drugs operates on similarly corrupt foundations," Hontiveros added. Public health approach and rules-based law enforcement Hontiveros said that there is absolutely no need for the government to resume the abusive war on drugs, amid conflicting pronouncements of the PNP to stop it and Duterte's pronouncement that he will extend the drug war until the last day of his term in 2022. As an alternative, the senator proposes a strong public health framework to respond to the drug problem together with a regular and rules-based law enforcement approach to drug-related crimes. 72,000 deaths until 2022 "This should spell the end of the flawed anti-drug campaign. Internal cleansing will only restore moral authority to the PNP if the war on drugs, the unwarranted killings, is stopped permanently. As it is, the government's war claims an average of 1,000 lives a month. To continue with this human rights-deficient anti-drug campaign until 2022, we will be looking at 72,000 deaths. This means creating the Philippines' very own 'killing fields'," Hontiveros remarked. PNP worth saving Hontiveros said that the PNP is not beyond redemption but warned that Duterte's statement on police corruption might pave the way for the creation of a "Metrocom-style" police force which will further undermine human rights. "I am wary that the government, in the guise of internal cleansing to address police corruption, might create a new narco police force that is far deadlier than what some abusive officers and personnel have made the PNP today, to amplify the authoritarian tendencies of the Executive," Hontiveros said. "I believe that many in the police force are honest. The PNP as an institution is worth saving. What we need are deep-cutting reforms such as stricter requirements at the recruitment level, better police benefits, capacity enhancement and infrastructure modernization. Through a professional and corrupt-free police institution, we strengthen our judicial institutions, we protect our citizens and foreign guests, and we keep our streets safe," Hontiveros ended. Press Release January 30, 2017 Bill allowing PNP chief, CIDG director, deputy director to issue subpoena gets Senate nod The Senate approved today on third and final reading a bill which seeks to allow the Philippine National Police (PNP) chief, the PNP- Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) director and the CIDG deputy director to issue subpoenas on cases under investigation. Senate Bill No. 1239 was approved with 20 affirmative votes and one negative vote by Senate Minority Leader Ralph Recto. The measure is authored and sponsored by Senator Panfilo M. Lacson, chairman of the Senate Committee on Public Order and Dangerous Drugs. Lacson said that when the Philippine Constabulary and the Integrated National Police were merged to establish the current PNP under Republic Act No. 6975, otherwise known as the "DILG Act of 1990," most of the powers due the agency were carried over except for the subpoena powers. "It seems absurd that the Criminal Investigation Unit (CIU), now known as the CIDG, with a mandate to undertake monitoring, investigation and prosecution of all crimes of such magnitude and extent as to indicate their commission by highly-placed or professional syndicates and organization, has lost its subpoena powers," Lacson said in his sponsorship speech. Lacson, a former PNP chief, said it would be difficult for the PNP's investigative arm to complete a thorough investigation with the removal of its subpoena powers. Without the subpoena powers, he pointed out, investigations would be incomplete and government resources would be wasted. Senate President Pro-Tempore Franklin Drilon explained that that there is "every reason to grant such authority to the PNP Chief who has control and supervision over lower-ranked officials, like the director and the deputy director of the CIDG." Lacson and Drilon agreed that the subpoena powers should be limited only to the PNP Chief, the CIDG director and deputy director and that the said powers may not be delegated to other officers. Aside from the courts, the Office of the Ombudsman, the Department of Justice, National Bureau of Investigation, Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, National Police Commission, Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Cybercrime Operation Center of the Cybercrime Investigation Coordination Center are authorized to issue subpoenas. (Olivia Caunan) I get emails all the time from fans asking me to recommend books for them to read "while I am waiting for your next one."I can't possibly reply to all my emails, of course. But I do reply to some, when the mood strikes me. And I am always glad to recommend good books. There is so many of them out there that do not get half the attention that they deserve.For some readers I like to draw attention to the classics of our genre. It never ceases to amaze me to discover that some of my own fans have never heard of all the great fantasists who came before me, without whom A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE could never have been written... without whom, in truth, there might not be a fantasy genre at all. If you have enjoyed my own fantasy novels, you owe it to yourself to read J.R.R. Tolkien (LORD OF THE RINGS), Robert E. Howard (Conan the Cimmerian, Kull of Atlantis, Solomon Kane), C.L. Moore (Jirel of Joiry), Jack Vance (THE DYING EARTH, Lyonesse, Cugel the Clever, and so much more), Fritz Leiber (Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser), Richard Adams (WATERSHIP DOWN, SHARDIK, MAIA), Ursula K. Le Guin (Earthsea, the original trilogy), Mervyn Peake (GORMENGHAST), T.H. White (THE ONCE AND FUTURE KING), Rosemary Sutcliffe, Alan Garner, H.P. Lovecraft (more horror than fantasy, admittedly), Clark Ashton Smith, and... well, the list is long. But those writers should keep you busy for quite a while. You won't like all of them, perhaps... some wrote quite a long time ago, and neither their prose nor their attitudes are tailored for modern attention spans and sensibilities... but they were all important, and each, in his or her own way, was a great storyteller who helped make fantasy what it is today.Maybe you've read all the fantasy classics, however. I have lots of readers for whom that is true as well. Those I like to point at some of my contemporaries. As great as Tolkien, Leiber, Vance, REH, and those others were, THIS is the golden age of epic fantasy. There have never been as many terrific writers working in the genre as there are right now. Actually, there has never been so much epic fantasy published than right now, which means a lot of mediocre and downright terrible books as well, since Sturgeon's Law still applies. But I prefer to talk about the good stuff, and there's a lot of that. Just for starts, check out Daniel Abraham (THE LONG PRICE QUARTET, THE DAGGER AND THE COIN, Scott Lynch (the Locke Lamora series), Patrick Rothfuss, Joe Abercrombie (especially BEST SERVED COLD and THE HEROES)... they will keep you turning pages for a good long while, I promise...Fantasies are not the only books I recommend to my readers, however. It has always been my belief that epic fantasy and historical fiction are sisters under the skin, as I have said in many an interview. A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE draws as much on the traditions of historical fiction as it does on those of fantasy, and there are many great historical novelists, past and present, whose work helped inspire my own. Sir Walter Scott is hard going for many modern readers, I realize, but there's still great stuff to be found in IVANHOE and his other novels, as there is in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's WHITE COMPANY (he write more than just Sherlock Holmes). Thomas B. Costain (THE BLACK ROSE, THE SILVER CHALICE) is another writer worth checking out, along with Howard Pyle, Frank Yerby, Rosemary Hawley Jarman. Nigel Tranter lived well into his 90s, writing all the while, and turning out an astonishing number of novels about Scottish medieval history (his Bruce and Wallace novels are the best, maybe because they are the only ones where his heroes actually win, but I found the lesser known lords and kings equally fascinating). Thanks to George McDonald Fraser, that cad and bounder Harry Flashman swashed and buckled in every major and minor war of the Victorian era. Sharon Kay Penman, Steven Pressfield, Cecelia Holland, David Anthony Durham, David Ball, and the incomparable Bernard Cornwell are writing and publishing firstrate historical fiction right now, novels that I think any fan of A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE would find easy to enjoy.And then there is Maurice Druon. Which is actually why I called you all here today, boys and girls.Look, if you love A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE, and want "something like it" to read while you are waiting (and waiting, and waiting) for me to finish THE WINDS OF WINTER, you really need to check out Maurice Druon and THE ACCURSED KINGS.I never met Druon, alas (he died only a few years ago, and I regret that I never had the chance to shake his hand), but from all reports he was an extraordinary man. He was French, highly distinguished, a resistance fighter against the Nazis, a historian, a member of the French Academy... well, you can read about his life on Wikipedia, and it makes quite a story in itself. He wrote short stories, contemporary novels, a history of Paris... and an amazing seven-volume series about King Philip IV of France, his sons and daughters, the curse of the Templars, the fall of the Capetian dynasty, the roots of the Hundred Years War. The books were a huge success in France. So huge than they have twice formed the basis for television shows (neither version is available dubbed or subtitled in English, to my annoyance), series that one sometimes hears referred to as "the French I, CLAUDIUS." The English translations... well, the seventh volume has never been translated into English at all, and the first six are long out of print, available only in dusty hardcovers and tattered paperbacks from rare book dealers found on ABE.But that's about to change, thanks to my own British publisher, HarperCollins, who are bringing THE ACCURSED KINGS back into print at long last in a series of handsome new hardbacks. The first volume, THE IRON KING, has just been published... with a brand new introduction by some guy named George R.R. Martin.At the moment, alas, there's no plan for American editions, but readers in the US (and around the world) can order the Druon novels from their favorite online bookseller through the wonders of the internet.The best news... at least for me... is the HarperCollins not only intends to release new English editions of the first six novels of THE ACCURSED KINGS, but also... finally!!!... translate the seventh and concluding volume. (Talk about waiting a long time for a book).Anyway... whether you want something else to occupy your time while waiting for THE WINDS OF WINTER, or you're just looking for a good read... you won't go wrong with Maurice Druon, France's best historical novelist since Dumas Pere. A month into her tenure as Oaklands new czar of race and equity, Darlene Flynn got thrown into a maelstrom. Her first assignment: to conduct an analysis of the citys cannabis industry as the City Council fights over whether to pass laws that would allow scads of underground businesses to operate legally. Flynn, who came to Oakland from Seattle, where she worked at another race and equity program, said in a recent interview that she had little knowledge of the cannabis trade. In Seattle, Flynn said, her office conducted a similar analysis on the race and equity impacts of a proposal to shut down hookah bars. Her Oakland report, due in February, will look at the effect of the cannabis market on unemployment, poverty, and arrest rates for various race and ethnic groups in Oakland. It will include recommendations to the council as it decides what to require of pot businesses in the city. But it remains to be seen whether Flynns recommendations will help resolve the councils months-long battle over how to ensure that African Americans and Latino people arent left behind as the pot industry becomes legitimate. Critics are wary, seeing Flynns one-person Department of Race and Equity office as yet another roadblock for pot entrepreneurs seeking permits. Weve already taken too much time on this issue, said veteran cannabis attorney Robert Raich, who worries that the race and equity report could become a distraction if it doesnt produce viable laws. Whatever they do has to get under way soon or cannabis businesses will continue their migration out of Oakland. Daniel Grace, who heads the East Oakland cultivation facility Dark Heart Nursery, shares those concerns. People are looking at Richmond, Santa Rosa, and Monterey County, he said. Theyre looking at jurisdictions that have a clearer path to legitimacy. Others see the study as necessary, even if it slows down the legislative process. Yes, it slows things down, creates uncertainty, and may cause certain people to lose money, said Lanese Martin, who co-chairs the Oakland Diversity and Equity Cannabis Coalition an advocacy group that looks out for women, immigrants, and people of color working in the marijuana industry. But in the long term we will get what we want, which is that more entrepreneurs of color become legal. Oaklands pot battle erupted in May, after the council approved its current permit system, which immediately drew criticism from business owners, lawyers and even State Assemblyman Rob Bonta, who suggested that the system ran afoul of state laws. The permit system, pushed by Councilwoman Desley Brooks, reserves half of the citys cannabis permits for people who were either jailed on marijuana convictions in Oakland within the past decade, or who have lived for at least two years in a designated East Oakland neighborhood that had high marijuana arrests in 2013. Brooks said her equity permit program will help right the perceived wrongs of the federal War on Drugs, which critics say disproportionately harmed black and brown people. Half of the equity neighborhoods are in Brooks district, and the others are in those of an ally, Councilman Larry Reid. Many cannabis insiders have decried the program, saying the narrow criteria will choke off Oaklands pot trade, putting at risk the scores of jobs and millions of dollars in tax revenue it could generate. Before we got into this process I was getting calls every day from people who were interested in opening cannabis businesses in Oakland, Grace said. Since the equity permit program passed, those calls have completely stopped. With the clock ticking on a January 2018 state deadline for cities to craft local pot regulations, council members have bickered for months, offering new proposals only to see them shot down by colleagues. City Hall, meanwhile, has delayed handing out applications to pot businesses that want to apply for licenses, pending the councils action. A message on the citys website tells readers to keep checking back. If theres any sense of urgency, however, its not being expressed at council meetings. Were not in a rush, Brooks said at the meeting on Nov. 14, at which Flynn laid out the basic structure for her report. Brooks, who has resisted her colleagues attempts to amend the equity permit program, also conceived the idea for the Department of Race and Equity. We need to get it right, Brooks said. Thats the rush we ought to be in the rush to get it right. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. Flynns analysis will look broadly at Oaklands cannabis industry, but not at the potential effects of Brooks equity permit program or of a proposal by council members Dan Kalb, Annie Campbell Washington and Abel Guillen. Their plan calls for loans and other assistance to low-income African Americans and Latinos, without reserving half the citys permits for a small group of people. Flynn said she will not provide the council with new legislation, but rather a set of tools to enact equitable policy. Flynn also said her analysis will not include an economic component, which raises concerns for cannabis insiders who fear the council has forgotten the main point of having regulations: to generate tax revenue for a city that desperately needs the money. I dont believe theres been an industry in recent memory that had so much potential to help cities with their deficits, said Robert Selna, an attorney who is helping clients with permit applications in Oakland and other cities. Selna and others worry that the council is allowing its cannabis industry to be a test case for a race and equity process that no one in the city seems to understand. Most Oakland residents support racial justice, Selna said. But theres a glaring lack of clarity about the objectives of this study, or how its outcomes will be measured. Brooks did not return phone calls seeking comment for this article. During an interview at her spare 11th-floor office, Flynn defended the merits of the report she plans to deliver in February, and rejected criticism that it is holding up the legislation. People said the same thing about environmental impact reports, she said. There were people running around saying wed never build anything again, growth was going to grind to a halt, life as we knew it was over. And of course none of that is true. In the case of cannabis, she said, We will easily meet the states deadline. City officials have ordered the San Francisco Roman Catholic Archdiocese to pay nearly $3 million in health care costs for more than 1,000 employees after finding that it failed to make years of payments required by a pioneering local health care law. San Francisco has also assessed the archdiocese $113,000 in penalties. Its important for us to ensure that workers are made whole, said Pat Mulligan, director of San Franciscos Office of Labor Standards Enforcement. The law, known as the Health Care Security Ordinance, requires businesses with more than 20 employees who work at least eight hours a week in San Francisco to make payments toward the workers health coverage, either by providing insurance or by paying into a health care savings plan. But a city audit of archdiocese records from October 2009 through June 2016 found that the religious organization had failed to make payments for a majority of its 1,722 employees covered by the law. The archdiocese, which oversees Catholic institutions in San Francisco, Marin and San Mateo counties, disputes the citys findings that it violated the law, spokesman Mike Brown said. Among other things, he said, the archdiocese contends at least some of the 1,086 employees did not work in San Francisco and therefore were not covered by the ordinance. While we dont concede we are in violation, we also dont believe that the numbers are correct, and we are working in good faith with the city to find the right figures, Brown said. Mulligan said the Office of Labor Standards Enforcement first notified the archdiocese of a potential violation of the law in 2012 and spent nearly four years making continuous efforts to obtain complete, reliable data from the religious organization. After a series of incomplete responses, the archdiocese finally supplied new workforce data on Nov. 23, the labor office said. Based on those figures, the office told the archdiocese on Jan. 18 that it must pay $2.932 million to the 1,086 past and present employees by Feb. 21, and must pay the city an additional $113,000 in penalties for the violations. The archdiocese could appeal the decision to the city controllers office and, if unsuccessful, go to court. The Health Care Security Ordinance, the first of its kind in the nation, has survived court challenges and could become a crucial source of insurance coverage in San Francisco if Congress and the Trump administration slash health funding to California and other states by repealing former President Barack Obamas signature law. Most of the archdioceses employees work at Catholic churches and schools. Out of 3,904 employees during the period covered by the audit, the citys notice of violation said, 1,722 worked enough hours in San Francisco to be covered by the health care ordinance, and the archdiocese had made the legally required payments for only 636 of them. The city also rejected the archdioceses assertion that 202 of its employees had waived health care coverage in 2012. The ordinance excuses an employer from providing coverage for employees who are already covered by their spouse, parents or another employer and voluntarily waive coverage. But the city said the archdiocese distributed a form telling employees they were exempt from the local ordinance if they were covered elsewhere, and failed to request a voluntary, signed waiver. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. Policies of the archdiocese have been hotly debated since the 2012 papal appointment of Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, an outspoken conservative, to lead the institution in one of the nations most liberal regions. None of the previous disputes has involved the city. But City Attorney Dennis Herrera, speaking as a private citizen and church member, wrote an article in the National Catholic Reporter in 2015 denouncing Cordileones attempt to add a morality clause forbidding homosexuality, fornication and other church-disapproved sexual conduct to the rules governing Catholic high school teachers. Cordileone dropped the proposal before teachers approved their next labor contract. Bob Egelko is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: begelko@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @egelko Despite all the current hype about the rise of voice-assisted devices using Alexa and Siri, linguistics researcher Rachael Tatman found people complaining on social media that the technology still doesnt understand them. Thats especially true with regional accents of people who live in the South or are from countries like New Zealand, Tatman said last week during a conference in San Francisco. So this is the whatever the opposite of delight is as a user experience, she said. People are so upset that theyre going on Twitter and yelling about it. Tatman, a doctoral candidate with the University of Washingtons linguistics department, was one of the speakers at a two-day Virtual Assistant Summit, which wrapped up Friday at the Park Central Hotel. The conference, and an adjacent Deep Learning Summit, drew about 600 people representing companies that are working on advancing artificial intelligence, machine learning and robotics. Lots of people are already using those technologies in programs like Apples Siri. They are moving beyond mobile phones and into smart-home devices like Amazons Echo. Other fast-changing technologies include artificial intelligence and consumer robotics, especially with self-driving cars on the horizon. But theres still work to be done in each of those areas, speakers said. For example, artificial speech recognition technologies still fall short of the way humans can quickly learn and discern speech patterns from each other in as little as two sentences, Tatman said. But thats because humans take into account other factors, such as the gender of person talking or whether theyve previously met someone from the the same region, she said. Tatman examined YouTubes automatic captioning program, which can translate spoken words into text in several languages. She found that more errors showed up in translations from speakers who had a Southern accent than from people who lived in California. The South is the largest demographic region in the United States, she said. If youre using a voice-based virtual assistant and you cant deal with Southern speech, youre going to have problems reaching this market. For businesses trying to serve those markets, speech recognition technology could be crucial to future revenue, said Stephen Scarr, CEO of search services Info.com and eContext. With 20 percent of all searches already done through voice, this is really important, this is No. 1 on your radar, Scarr told the developers. As an example of the challenge, a recent YouTube video showed Amazons Alexa misunderstanding a young boys request to play a song, and instead offering to play an audio porn channel. Air Quality Tracker Check levels down to the neighborhood Ratings for the Bay Area and California, updated every 10 minutes The conference touched on more than just speech technologies. Alonso Martinez, a Pixar Animation Studios technical director, said robot developers could take cues from the ways animators create deep emotional connections with audiences. When youre thinking about a robot, dont think about it as a generic, faceless thing, said Martinez, who developed characters in Up and Inside Out, two of the Emeryville companys hit movies. You need to ask what makes them admirable. What are the values that they have that I wish that I had in myself? Elena Corina Grigore of Yale Universitys Social Robotics Lab said robots now used in manufacturing can work by themselves because they are easily trained to perform specialized, repetitive tasks. But robots are not well-equipped to collaborate with humans, she said. Thats slowly changing with advances in artificial intelligence. As an example, Grigore played a video of a robot trained to help a person with what can be a complex and maddening task assembling a chair from Ikea. Still, Grigore said, Were not getting replaced by robots anytime soon. Were not at a point where the robots have the intelligence or the physical capabilities necessary to perform all of these actions on their own. Anything that is related to common sense or creativity or types of thinking that require on-the-spot flexibility in a dynamic and changing environment is still very hard to achieve for us. Benny Evangelista is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: bevangelista@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @ChronicleBenny This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Ryan Panchadsaram had a degree from UC Berkeley, an internship at Salesforce and a stint at Microsoft under his belt. His next step was diving into startups. Then the White House asked Could he help fix HealthCare.gov? He said yes, he would work on the website for the Affordable Care Act. His digital health care startup might have benefited some scant thousands of people before it found success. But in government, his work could touch millions of lives. Panchadsaram, who is now back in San Francisco, was part of a flow of talent that shuttled between the Bay Area and Washington during the Obama administration. The exchange of people benefited both sides: Software engineers and product managers helped modernize the governments inner workings, while former politicos left the capital to bring their government knowledge and connections to tech companies such as Facebook, Airbnb and Google. The hypothesis in Silicon Valley was go to to D.C., serve a short tour of duty, and come back, Panchadsaram, who spent two years as Barack Obamas deputy chief technology officer and is now a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, a venture capital firm. But after eight years of a comfortable relationship between the two worlds, many worry whether the flow of talent will continue under President Trump, a man whose extreme-right policies and rhetoric unmoored from facts clash with the liberal and analytical values of Silicon Valley. For years, Google, Facebook, Airbnb and Uber have eagerly staffed their policy and communications teams with former politicos, mostly Democrats who found friendly audiences on the West Coast. And the White House has employed former top executives from Google and Twitter, as well as others with technical backgrounds like Panchadsarams. Now these companies are trying to figure out how theyll get their calls answered in a suddenly conservative Washington. Some former Obama staffers, as well as campaign operatives who worked on Hillary Clintons failed presidential bid, worry theres no place for them on either coast. And those considering stints in government worry that Trumps policies, like Fridays travel ban affecting primarily Muslim countries, could taint their resumes, even if their roles are nonpartisan. Given that Republicans control the presidency as well as both houses of Congress, companies will probably look to hire people with more conservative connections, said Brian Miller, a strategic adviser for Public Sphere, a political consulting firm that serves businesses. Any company looking to influence public policy in D.C. is going to first and foremost consider people that have proprietary connections to the current administration that means Republicans that can at least get their phone calls and emails responded to. Google and Facebook, which have built up large lobbying operations, already have Republican and Democratic representation in the capital. But after the election, both of these companies have made moves to forge deeper conservative connections. Shortly after the election, Google posted a job opening for a conservative outreach manager. Google whose parent company Alphabets employees collectively gave $1.3 million to Hillary Clintons presidential campaign and stood falsely accused of tweaking search algorithms to favor her candidacy is now scrambling to create ties with Trumps administration. The Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative, led by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and wife Priscilla Chan, hired Ken Mehlman, a former campaign manager for George W. Bush and Republican National Committee chairman, to lead the groups board. The organization also hired David Plouffe, a former senior adviser to Obama before he became an executive and board member at Uber. If theres a pioneer of the Washington-to-Silicon Valley trail, its Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg, who joined a little startup called Google in 2002 after working as chief of staff for Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers during the Clinton administration. Years later, Chris Lehane, a former top aide to President Bill Clinton, joined Airbnb as its head of global policy and public affairs. The company attracted so many former Obama staffers that its policy office became known as the Obama White House West. In the years to come, as tech companies continue to find themselves at the center of policy discussions in Washington, Lehane said those looking to make the switch from government need to be able to transcend partisan politics. The conversations starting in 2017, Lehane said, are going to go beyond just the role of technology (and cover) questions like, Is it displacing and replacing the roles of humans? It is not just a Republican or Democratic issue. After the election, many outgoing White House staffers were expecting to move to the Bay Area, a place where the cultural environment overlaps with what they experienced in Obamas White House. But some, like Mira Patel a former Clinton aide who worked in her Senate office and on her presidential campaign, have found themselves flat-footed after the election. If you are trying to leave (Washington) now, there are no jobs, Patel said. The problem: Government affairs jobs want you to bring in your relationships but as a Clinton or Obama staffer, you wont be able to bring that, she said. Air Quality Tracker Check levels down to the neighborhood Ratings for the Bay Area and California, updated every 10 minutes Its also unclear how a Trump administration will recruit the likes of Panchadsaram, an eager entrepreneur in his 20s who hoped to build tools for the government that aligned with his values, like increasing access to health care. Already, theres a brain drain as political appointees leave their posts. Still, some of Obamas overtures to tech may remain, like the U. S. Digital Service, which Panchadsaram helped start as an outgrowth of his and others work on HealthCare.gov. Last week, Gerrit Lansing, Trumps newly appointed chief digital officer, tweeted that the service, which helps improve government software, is here to stay in the new administration. Period. Kushner, now a senior adviser to Trump, also signaled his support in an email he sent to former Obama special assistant Todd Park, who had presented Trumps transition team with a report on efforts to modernize government technology. Jen Pahlka, the founder of Code for America, a nonprofit organization that places technical workers in fellowships designed to improve government technology, said she has fielded many concerns from people who were discouraged by the idea of leaving Silicon Valley posts to serve under a new administration whose goals and rhetoric they didnt agree with. She has not seen a drop in interest, though. If anything, she said, there has been an increase. I think there are concerns about the government serving the American people, but you have people in tech saying, Perhaps the best way for me to guard against that is to be part of the government, she said. In the waning hours of his presidency, Obama signed the Tested Ability to Leverage Exceptional National Talent Act, which codified the Presidential Innovation Fellows program, making it a fixture of the government that seeks to encourage successful entrepreneurs, executives, and innovators to join the government, according to the laws language. For Panchadsaram, who is now a technical adviser to Kleiner Perkins Chairman John Doerr, this was a symbolic gesture. It solidified the relationship between two different worlds a partnership that contributed to saving and maintaining HealthCare.gov. No matter what, you take the politics aside, and government needs the best from Silicon Valley and Silicon Valley needs the best from the government, he said. Bloomberg News and the New York Times contributed to this report. Trisha Thadani is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: tthadani@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @TrishaThadani Staffers at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco were gratified when IFLScience a site dedicated to the lighter side of science (IFL stands for I f love) wrote a story about the museums forthcoming exhibition, Tomb Treasures: New Discoveries From Chinas Han Dynasty. The exhibition opens Feb. 17. This was such good publicity that the museum social-media people placed a link to the story on its Facebook page. Their effort to use that link in a Facebook ad which would make it possible for people who dont follow the museum to see it was thwarted, however, by Facebook robots that determined that the story, headlined Bronze Dildos and Jade Butt Plugs Show Life and Death in Ancient China, was unfit for the platform. Facebook ads, read a notice the museum received, cant promote sexual or adult products or services. Exhibition curator Fan Zhang explained to IFL science that embalmers had used the plugs to prevent the loss of vital essences from the body, so it wasnt even that those items were used for sex. The dildos? Another story. The objects were unearthed between 1995 and 2011, from the tombs of aristocrats. Everyday objects included vessels and ceramics, urinals and loofahs, too. For an excursion to Whole Foods in Mill Valley, Jerry Slick wore his wifes pink pussy chapeau, which, he says, spurred many great hat compliments from fellow shoppers. CBS News headline last week: Badlands National Park Twitter account goes rogue, starts tweeting scientific facts. And now we take you back to the days of yesteryear, 1981, to be specific, when the San Francisco Mime Troupe first put on FactWino, the plot of which is described in its archives: In a once great nation fearful of its future, ignorance has triumphed at the polls. ... Responding to the distress call of a frightened Librarian, the Spirit of Information makes an emergency visit to Earth. In the middle of recent inaugural protests, Bill Prucha of Walnut Creek was happy that a group of men and women gathered on an Interstate 680 overpass there to unfurl their banner: Thank you, President Obama. In response to last weeks focus on alternative facts, Matt Regan cites H.G. Wells description of Mussolini: He beat at the knees of Mother Reality like an unteachable child. Meanwhile, Gary Hanauer wishes to tell his Republican friends that he is not criticizing the new president. Its alternate praise. And Tom Cohen suggests that as President Trump starts his major investigation into voter fraud, he should hire the investigators O.J. (Simpson) used to find his ex-wifes killer. Thanks for Ralph Seligman for sending a link to Los Angeles Times art critic Christopher Knights essay: The ginned-up contest between Los Angeles and San Francisco to lure filmmaker George Lucas and his long aborning Lucas Museum of Narrative Art is done. Los Angeles lost by winning. ... The museum is a terrible idea. Knight writes that a billion dollars is about to be wasted on a project whose dubious artistic mission could have been turned into something useful. Knight would be in favor of Lucas collection pop culture material being absorbed by one of L.A.s already existing museums. Narrative art is a made-up category, he writes, calling it a puffed-up euphemism for illustration. Knight writes that a competition between San Francisco and Los Angeles was cranked up to shift discussion away from whether there should be a museum at all. The real story the museum tells, writes Knight, is about one wildly successful mass-culture filmmaker whose deep desire is to be publicly recognized as an artist. Cultural news you can use, or perhaps not: According to someone hawking the procedure: Over the past 15 years, lip implants have increased by 48 percent. (I think that figure refers to the number of implant procedures, not the size of the implants.) And Ozy reports that Winston Churchill was so fond of Gorgonzola cheese that he marked the eponymous town where it is made with a red off-limits circle to prevent the Allies from bombing it. Furthermore, after visiting Madagascar, Mark Buell observes, in his new book of poems, Mark My Words: For want of a longer tibia and femur/ You too could climb like your cousin the lemur. And furthermore and more, if the drought is over, asks Dr. J., do we have to start taking showers by ourselves? Leah Garchik is open for business in San Francisco, (415) 777-8426. Email: lgarchik@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @leahgarchik Public Eavesdropping Technically, it was nude modeling. The cast of Hidden Figures rocketed to the Screen Actors Guild top award at a fiery, protest-laden ceremony that was dominated by defiance over President Trumps sweeping immigration ban. An uplifting drama about African American mathematicians who aided NASAs 1960s space race, Hidden Figures was the surprise best-ensemble winner Sunday at Los Angeles Shrine Auditorium. With the Oscar front-runner, La La Land, not nominated in the category, most expected a contest between Moonlight or Manchester by the Sea. This story is about unity, said Taraji P. Henson, who stars alongside Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monae in Hidden Figures. This story is about what happens when we put our differences aside and we come together as a human race. We win. Love wins. Every time. From the first remarks by presenter Ashton Kutcher, the ceremony was peppered with speeches that argued passionately for inclusion. In a very well-dressed version of the demonstrations sparked nationwide over the weekend, most award winners spoke in some way either through personal anecdote or a call to arms against Trumps halting of immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim nations. Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who added another honor for her performance on the political satire Veep, said she was the daughter of an immigrant who fled religious persecution in Nazi-occupied France. Because I love this country, I am horrified by its blemishes, Louis-Dreyfus said. And this immigrant ban is a blemish, and it is un-American. Perhaps the most moving speech came from Mahershala Ali, who won best supporting actor for his acclaimed performance in Barry Jenkins coming-of-age portrait, Moonlight. Ali said he saw lessons for today in Moonlight, in which he plays a character who makes a difference in a shy, gay Miami boys hard life. We see what happens when you persecute people, Ali said. They fold into themselves. Ali was among the several Oscar favorites who cemented their front-runner status, including best-actress winner Emma Stone for La La Land and best-supporting actress winner Viola Davis for Fences. But best actor went to Davis co-star (and director), Denzel Washington, for his performance in the August Wilson adaptation. Most expected the award to go to Casey Affleck. Lily Tomlin was the lifetime achievement honoree Sunday. The 77-year-old actress gave a warm, rollicking speech that dispensed both drinking advice and regret over wasting a lot of time being ambitious about the wrong things. Jake Coyle is an Associated Press writer. To hear him tell it, he had the largest inauguration audience. Ever. And he wouldve won the popular vote if not for voter fraud a claim hes peddling without evidence. It makes you wonder why the president of the United States is so obsessed with popularity. And size. Wait, wasnt it a woman who first said size doesnt matter? Now try this on for size: Womens March on Jan. 21 may have been the largest demonstration in this countrys history. And the tens of thousands who marched in Oakland were part of maybe the largest protest in the citys history. And it was peaceful, powerful and positive. If youre looking for girl power to combat the clownish takeover of the presidency, Oakland is ground zero. Just take a look at whos running the show in the city that recently hired Anne Kirkpatrick, the first woman to lead the Oakland Police Department. Women are 51 percent of the population, but, according to a 2014 report published by the International City/County Management Association, only 14.4 percent of chief administrative positions were held by women. Santiago Mejia/The Chronicle In Oakland, women elected to office include Mayor Libby Schaaf, City Attorney Barbara Parker, City Auditor Brenda Roberts and half of the City Council Annie Campbell-Washington, Lynette Gibson McElhaney, Desley Brooks and Rebecca Kaplan. Teresa Deloach Reed is the Oakland fire chief, and the city administrator is Sabrina Landreth. Her two assistant city administrators are Christine Daniel and Claudia Cappio, and the deputy city administrator is Stephanie Hom. In fact, according to Karen Boyd, the citys communications director, 15 of 22 department heads in Oakland are women. The list includes Brooke Levin, director of public works; Michele Byrd, director of housing and community development; Sara Bedford, director of human services; and Venus Johnson, director of public safety. Paul Chinn/The Chronicle When the city created the Department of Race and Equity to address social equity, it hired Darlene Flynn. And when Oakland was reeling in the days after the Dec. 2 Ghost Ship fire that killed 36 people, it was Officer Johnna Watson, the citys police spokeswoman, who provided a stalwart voice while providing details to the media and the public. Nancy OMalley is Alameda Countys district attorney. In Washington, Californias two U.S. senators are Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris. Harris won the seat vacated by Barbara Boxers retirement. And Barbara Lee is our representative in Congress. Whats more, female-owned businesses like Oaklandish, Show & Tell, Urban Stitch and Darlings Elixirs are propelling downtown Oaklands cultural renaissance. Remember that while the most powerful man in the world is having fits over sizes, just more of the same distracting drivel coming out of his whatever, there are dozens of women in our backyard who are in the trenches trying to make life smoother for people. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. We need them, because the road into the future is veering toward a cliff. On Friday, a week into his term, the president signed an executive order that barred Syrian refugees from entering the country, suspended entry for all refugees for 120 days and flat-out blocked entry for citizens from seven Muslim countries. Green-card holders were detained at airports, including San Franciscos, where hundreds turned up to protest. The travel ban was challenged in courts. Id like to welcome you to the New Great America, the land of the confined and the home of the afraid. Here in Oakland, we have our own problems. We have our own decrepit roads that need to be paved, but at least we know diversity is embraced and encouraged. So let me say thank you to the city for the daily reminder that a person should be measured by what they do and not by what they say. Because thats the size that matters most. San Francisco Chronicle columnist Otis R. Taylor Jr. appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Email: otaylor@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @otisrtaylorjr SQUAW VALLEY, Placer County The morning of Jan. 24 at Squaw Valley Ski Resort was the most spectacular in recent memory. After years of drought, three recent snowstorms had blanketed Squaws legendary slopes with layers of dry, crystalline powder, making them the stuff of skiers dreams and an avalanche hazard. Along with the rest of his Squaw Valley Ski Patrol team, Joe Zuiches headed up into the resorts most rugged terrain, carrying with him dozens of explosive sticks, called hand charges, to mitigate the danger. By 8:35 a.m., Zuiches stood on a blasting route on Gold Coast Ridge, peaks of the snowbound Sierra Crest spreading north and south around him. Patrollers work a delicate dance of action and communication to trigger controlled avalanches in unstable terrain. The snow must be released from places where it builds up from wind and storms, becoming unstable enough to topple onto ski runs. This day, something went terribly wrong. Zuiches, 42, was killed when a hand charge exploded while he was using it. He left behind his wife, Mikki, and 10-month-old son, Cannon, as well as many shocked and grieving peers. Federal and state agencies are investigating the accident. A Squaw Valley resort spokesperson said the company cannot comment on the incident until the investigation is completed. The incident points to the tremendous impact of major storms on ski resort operations. A massive avalanche in 1982 at Squaw Valleys sister resort, Alpine Meadows, haunts the memories of longtime Tahoe residents. That snow cascade covered the ski area base and took seven lives. By Jan. 23 this year, Squaw Valley had received 100 inches of snow in a week, triggering echoes of the 1982 tragedy. According to snow forecaster Bryan Allegretto, Lake Tahoe received 282 inches in the month. Weather researchers everywhere were comparing data. January was the second snowiest month in history, and the snowiest January ever, said Randall Osterhuber, researcher with the UC Berkeley Central Snow Laboratory at Donner Summit. December and January in combination delivered an unusual pattern of heavy rainstorms intermixed with heavy snowstorms, he said. Some of Lake Tahoes resorts closed during the stormiest days. With skiers pressing for access to the pristine powder, patrollers worked hard to make the slopes safe. Detonation with hand charges is the primary way to release hazardous snow in hard-to-reach areas, according to snow and ski safety consultant Larry Heywood. Managing the snowpack in all types of weather up to 100-mile-an-hour winds over ridges at times is a dangerous job, one that Zuiches and his peers faced regularly. A professional mountain guide from Pullman, Wash., Zuiches had climbed Mount Rainier and Mount Baker in Washington, Mount Hood in Oregon, and Villarrica volcano in Chile, and summited Mount Shasta in Siskiyou County 50 times. Hed been involved in ski patrol at Squaw and earlier at Winter Park Resort in Colorado for 17 years. Our guides remember him as a strong, quiet, reliable. hardworking team member, and he will be sorely missed, said Paul Koubek, program manager for Alpine Ascents International in Seattle, where Zuiches was a guide. He was just about to work his first season on Denali for us, and was very excited about the opportunity. According to Geraldine Link, director of public policy at the National Ski Areas Association, using hand-thrown charges in resort avalanche mitigation is a common practice. The blasting creates a controlled slide before it can become a hazard. In addition to the hand charges, resort patrollers release unstable snow with explosives projected from military artillery and air-powered cannons called avalaunchers. They also ski patterns across areas likely to slide, a practice called ski cutting. The lighting and throwing of hand charges is unique to the avalanche industry because of the unique circumstances in which we operate, Link said. A lot of state departments of transportation do avalanche control work. They use other methods like avalaunchers and military artillery. Two people have been killed before by exploding hand charges, according to the NSAA patroller Marvin Critton at Mammoth Mountain (Madera and Mono counties) in 1973 and patroller Erika Pankow at Big Sky Ski and Summer Resort in Montana in 1996. After Pankows death, the association formed an explosives committee and created the guidelines. States and individual resorts, including Squaw Valley, have created additional regulations. JOSH EDELSON/JOSH EDELSON / SAN FRANCISCO CHR Hand charges can trigger snow in areas that artillery cant hit, according to Heywood, who was ski patrol director at Alpine Meadows Resort for 17 years. Given its steep terrain and at times intense snowfall and wind, Squaw has one of the largest and most complex hand-charge programs of ski areas in the country, he said. The artillery cant hit every nook and cranny. You can get to all of those spots on skis. Patrollers travel established routes to position themselves properly, Heywood said. Squaw, site of the 1960 Winter Olympics, has 60 full- and part-time professional patrollers who handle thousands of rounds of ammunition each year at the resort. Hand charges are cylinders, 2 inches wide and about 12 inches long, weighing 2 pounds, Heywood said. Theyre filled with ammonium nitrate and wrapped in heavy paper. An 18-inch fuse is attached, enough length to allow 90 seconds to pass between ignition and detonation as required by Cal/OSHA. Drought Map Track water shortages and restrictions across Bay Area Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Areas largest water districts. Within 10 seconds, the charges are supposed to be out of their hands, said Heywood, who helped write the NSAA guidelines. Most of the time you are throwing it downhill, so it can travel a good distance. Youre supposed to then get behind a barrier sometimes a terrain barrier like a ridgeline. Patrollers take years of classes and do apprenticeships with experts before they become, like Zuiches, a team leader. Ski areas send patrollers to national avalanche school, Heywood said. California requires they apprentice for three years under the supervision of a licensed blaster before they can take an avalanche blasting test administered by Cal/OSHA. Even with the extensive training, its not impossible for something to go wrong. Sometimes you think its lit and its not, and someone throws a shot out that doesnt explode, said Bill Williamson, operations director at Schweitzer Mountain Resort in Idaho and an NSAA explosives committee member. That happens on very few occasions. To verify ignition, patrollers can hold the charge next to the snow and see if the lit fuse leaves a black mark there. You can smell the fuse burning and you can see the smoke, Williamson said. After an incident like this, avalanche control experts share data quickly. Theyll test all the fuses and the caps and make sure theres no irregularity, and theyll review all the procedures, Williamson said. Resorts have used more than 4 million since the 1950s, and probably 3.5 million since the first incident that occurred in the mid-70s, he said. On Friday, ski patrol members from around the West traveled to Squaw Valley for a memorial for Zuiches. Link emphasized that safety requirements and avalanche mitigation programs are inseparable. Unfortunately, avalanche work can be dangerous, she said. That goes without saying. But three incidents over 43 years it is just such a rare occurrence. A Joe Zuiches Memorial Fund has raised more than $200,000 at https://www.gofundme.com/squaw-patrol-funeral-fund. Laura Read is a Tahoe City freelance writer. Washington DC This is a town where conspiracies real and imagined abound. Today at the Kennedy Center (whose name is this countrys surname most laden with conspiracy theories), the towns inhabitants fully related to and appreciated the schemes, deceit, and treachery that the glamorous witchy-bitchy Odile was calculating in Act III of Swan Lake. The folks in the seats could identify with Odile's dishonesty and were charmed by it. She began her Black Swan variation with: (triple en dehors pirouette + double attitude turn en dehors + stopped on a dime in plie on one leg) x 2 For those who cant interpret that equation, dont fret; its advanced balleculus. It may be easier to envision her tornadic blast of 32 fouettes that included 16 counts of multiple revolutions, her stunning balances that reminded one of the stillness of a cobra before it strikes, or her teasing smile. In only her second performance of the role, Devon Teuscher made quite a statement about what it means to be a Petipa-qualified ballerina in Swan Lake. She is the first new one that ABT has introduced in a dozen years who possessed the technical, stylistic, and artistic qualifications for the dual role. That little description of her Odileness in the paragraph above was just a teaser. The soul of her Odette was the real story today. Her character's emotional depth was revealed with fine detailing via the use of the head, neck, eyes, and of course her beautiful port de bras. Her swan arms were not the fussy type that we see commonly today. Rather, they seemed to be part of her character's breathing mechanism. She told her story with urgency but was never rushed. And, oh, the mime at the lakeside was so heartfelt and clear - from the hand gestures that sculpted the waves of the lake water to Odette telling us about her mothers tears and showing us how they rained from the tips of her fingers. There were times during the afternoon when it seemed Devons swans had been imprinted with Nina Ananiashvili, especially her Odile in the way she threw an evil glance over her shoulder while walking away or in the way she teased Siegfried with her eyes. At bows, it was tempting to start bellowing Deeeevon Assoluuuuuta! if you will recall Ninas fan who did that for her at nearly every performance. Of course, and we all know this Devons performance was as much Marcelo Gomes as it was her own. The two had great chemistry, especially as Siegfried and Odile and clearly enjoyed the give and take of the Act III drama (she gave him a load of BS, and he took it lock, stock & barrel). Marcelo has returned to his youth - at least today it seemed so. That 37-year-old arabesque was looking mighty 90 degrees-y. His battements even went beyond that. Do you remember that sweltering summer of 2011 when Marcelo owned the town with his magnificent performances as Siegfried, Armand, Albrecht, Prince Charming, and literally stole the limelight from Derek Jeter and his 3,000th hit? Well, that is how well he danced today. Devon could not have had a more perfect partner who selflessly did everything he possibly could to ensure that she gave her best performance. His effort started long before today, however. Last year he invited Devon to join a small group of dancers who performed in his home town in Brazil. Among them, Gillian Murphy and Stella Abrera. Marcelo assigned Devon the Black Swan PdD to perform several nights in a row opposite a talented ABT corpsman. It was in this low spotlighted environment that Devon was able to put her Odile on the stage for the first time. She probably never thought that it would excite people the way it did when video clips of her time in Brazil surfaced. But we suspect that was Marcelo's plan all along. Unfortunately, it doesnt appear that New York will get the Devon/Marcelo pairing in Swan Lake this spring at the Met. Devon will dance very well opposite Alex Hammoudi instead, but Alex will have to work nonstop from now until June to come even close to Marcelos theatrical performance. Lets hope he does, and lets hope that someone knocks some sense into Kevin McKenzies head about the Met scheduling which rewards the underpowered, over-ballyhooed celebrina two performances of every ballet when she shouldnt even have one. She was humiliated this week by her own lack of skill which was further highlighted by Devons remarkable performances, and the celebrina ultimately cancelled her second performance after claiming an injury. Ego bruises are serious injuries, too, we guess. Wed like to be able to see this Devon/Marcelo matchup on the Met stage, and there should now be an opening created for it just like there should be Kitri openings created for Cassandra Trenary and Skylar Brandt, and above all, a Giselle opening created for Abrera and Hallberg. This business of feeding double performances to the celebrina who cant do the job is nonsense. Stupid nonsense. Debuting at this Sunday performance as the purple-clad, handsome von Rothbart who escorted Odile around the ballroom was Calvin Royal, III. He got an excellent start on the role. His long legs made strong impressions with the grand sissonnes during his variation. He couldnt do much with the balance in which the working leg raises to arabesque, but he covered it fairly well. In recent years, we have missed seeing the von Rothbarts throw the torso contractions the way Vladimir Malakhov did as he made his final pass around the crowd in the ballroom. That was exciting. We could also use a reminder of what Hallberg did with this role. That would be nice to see this spring at the Met. He was insane as von Rothbart - eyes bulging, fingers ready to kill, hair seemingly electrified. Loved it. A few notes on other performances: Tom Forster was ferocious as the swamp creature. Excellent job. Blaine Hoven as Benno has truly become Siegfried in Waiting. We dont want to see him as Benno ever again; it is way past time for his Siegfried to be revealed. His two partners in the Pas de Trois, Zhong-Jing Fang and Stephanie Williams were a stylistic mismatch. Zhong-Jings hyper-accenting has mellowed quite a bit; she was quite lovely in her variation. Stephanie has always been a bit too mellow in her dancing and was so today. More dynamic is needed along with better entrechats. Todays beats were generally not good throughout the corps. The Cygnettes (Rachel Richardson, Betsy McBride, Nicole Graniero, and Gemma Bond) nailed their two-minute dance. The Two Big Swans modified their jumps so that they were only at about 90-110 degree angles. The swan corps was well-drilled but without poetry. There are un-swan-y physiques in the corps that should be culled. What in the world is McKenzie waiting for as far as advancing Marshall Whiteley into more meaningful roles? Given his size and capabilities, he should be doing much more. Yes, there can be improvements in his arms which today sometimes looked a little martial arts-like when they finished, but he is a fine dancer - much better than the vast majority of the corps men. Speaking of the corps men (and some corps women, too), what is this business of placing the hands like a tent overhead when doing pirouettes instead of using a classical fifth position? Where is this coming from? It looks dreadful. Also, this habit of bringing the sides of the wrists together to touch while the palms face downward when moving the arms from second position to first is awful. We even saw it in a preparation for a pirouette. Why are dancers suddenly touching themselves with their port de bras? Does it feel good? Is it stimulating? Well, it looks terrible. In closing, of course the H.H. Pump Bump Award is bestowed upon Devon Teuscher. She gave a truly incredible performance today, and we were very happy to see her and Marcelo dance so well together. President Trumps executive order Friday dimmed the beacon of democracy that America has been since its founding. The order, which prevented people from seven Muslim majority nations from entering the United States and specifically blocked refugees from Syria, caused chaos at airports, anguish for families trying to reunite with loved ones, and dismay among American business leaders. By Saturday evening, several federal judges had barred the government from enforcing the order. As they should: The order is appalling. America was founded by immigrants seeking political refuge and religious freedom. The presidents order strikes at the heart of the very idea of America. Because it wasnt clear what the executive order meant, and because those who would have to enforce it had not been briefed, airports were thrown into turmoil. A number of arriving passengers were detained, U.S. citizens with family overseas were terrified, and travelers waiting to board planes to the U.S. had no idea why their visas suddenly were invalid. On Sunday afternoon, the White House appeared to reverse the portion of the order that applied to green card and visa holders, but uncertainty remained. Trump had called for a Muslim ban during the campaign to protect national security. But individuals with ancestry from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen are responsible for exactly zero deaths from terrorist attacks on American soil. It is worth noting that the Trump Organization does not have business agreements in those seven nations, but does have operations in the Muslim-majority nations of Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and Indonesia. The Trump administration said on Sunday the order simply lists countries already named by Congress as terrorist concerns. But the presidents earlier statement on Friday, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, undermines that. The Holocaust was launched against a religious group, yet the White House remembrance statement contained no reference to those massacred by the Third Reich Jews. Human rights organizations organized protests Saturday, a few travelers filed suit, and Democratic leaders denounced the order. Shockingly, few congressional Republicans opposed the ban; most remained silent. Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, R-Wis., tried to tell the American people they werent seeing what they were seeing. This is not a religious test, this is not a ban on people of any religion. This order is poorly conceived and constitutionally suspect and does nothing to protect Americans. If anything, it could backfire against national security. The American people must tell President Trump in no uncertain terms that he cannot erase what America is about and that we will loudly and persistently refute his efforts to do so. Its clear that Labor Secretary nominee Andrew Puzder disdains the mission of the nearly 104-year-old agency he is nominated to run. As the steward of workers rights, the Department of Labor is charged with ensuring that workers are paid fairly and that their rights to a safe and healthy workplace free of harassment are secure. Puzder fiercely opposes raising the federal minimum wage, despite the growing income gap and the fact that millions of working families live in poverty. And during his tenure as CEO of CKE Restaurants Holdings Inc., the fast-food empire has racked up an abysmal record of wage violations and sexual harassment. It is no wonder he says he would prefer robots to people on his payroll. His appointment betrays the trust of those who voted for Trump based on the repeated promise at the heart of his campaign: to help workers who have been left behind. But it gets worse. On Inauguration Day, the White House blocked access to basic public information on the Department of Labors website, including a database of enforcement actions, the departments stock in trade. For good measure, it also removed or obscured basic information on workplace rights. And Trump has promised to roll back the new federal rule requiring overtime pay for anyone who works more than 40 hours in a week and earns $47,476 or less. These actions cannot be excused as shifts in policies. In our democratic society, we rely on public information from our government about our rights. Only the newly minted notion of alternative facts, which means no facts at all, can explain what the White House has done at the Department of Labor and other agencies. The administration is deliberately undermining the transparency of our federal government and the essential dissemination of laws and information. The Trump administrations apparent stance against workers and low-wage workers in particular cuts across immigrants, women, people of color, disabled people, the LGBTQ community, and other groups. It threatens all working people nationwide. We await with great concern the announcements of nominees to the National Labor Relations Board and the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice. We urge the Senates Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee to vote against Puzders confirmation. We call on Trump to fulfill his promise to help working people by nominating a labor secretary who supports raising the minimum wage and will enforce workers rights instead of denigrating them. And we urge the president to reverse his administrations dangerous stance on public records and public information. Workers are in harms way, but nationally there is a ray of hope in California. Our state has active public agencies that vigorously enforce its labor and employment laws, and we have a rich network of strong nonprofit organizations that advocate for workers and expanded workplace protections. Mindful of the threats posed by a Trump administration, our Legislature has retained former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to provide counsel on resisting any attempts to curtail Californias laws. Our new state attorney general, Xavier Becerra, has promised to fight any attempt by the Trump administration to undercut Californias policies on civil and workplace rights, the environment, and immigration. San Franciscos Mayor Ed Lee responded to Wednesdays news that Trump will cut most federal funding for sanctuary cities by promising to stand by his citys undocumented residents. And we are proud to support our governor, Jerry Brown, who has a long record of standing by the workers of our state. In California, workers have a fighting chance. Joan M. Graff is president of Legal Aid at Work, formerly the Legal Aid Society-Employment Law Center: www.legalaidatwork.org. Concerned? Get involved Voters should call or write to committee members listed on the Senates website (www.help.senate.gov/about/members) here before Puzders confirmation hearing, now set for Feb. 7. QUEBEC CITY Six people were killed and eight were injured in a shooting at a Quebec City mosque during evening prayers. Authorities reported two arrests in what Canadas prime minister called an act of terrorism. Quebec provincial police spokeswoman Christine Coulombe said early Monday that some of the wounded were gravely injured. She said the deceased were approximately 35 to 70 years of age. Thirty-nine people were unharmed. More than 50 were at the mosque at the time of the attack. One suspect was arrested at the scene and another nearby in dOrleans, Quebec. Police did release their names. Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center President Mohamed Yangui said the shooting in the provincial capital happened in the mens section of the mosque. He said he wasnt at the center when the attack occurred, but he got some details from people on the scene. We are sad for the families, he said. Both Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard characterized the attack as a terrorist act, which came amid heightened tensions worldwide over U.S. President Trumps travel ban on certain Muslim countries. We condemn this terrorist attack on Muslims in a centre of worship and refuge, Trudeau said in a statement. It is heart-wrenching to see such senseless violence. Diversity is our strength, and religious tolerance is a value that we, as Canadians, hold dear. Trudeau said on Twitter that he spoke to Quebecs premier and was being briefed by officials. The prime minister said the government had offered any & all assistance needed. Trudeau had earlier reacted to Trumps visa ban for people from certain Muslim-majority countries by tweeting Saturday: To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada. Canada is generally very welcoming toward immigrants and all religions, but its less so in the French-speaking province of Quebec. In the summer of 2016 a pigs head was left on the doorstep of the Quebec Islamic Cultural Centre. The incident occurred in the middle of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset. Practicing Muslims do not eat pork. This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate BART may have gained a few fans over the weekend, after the Twitter account for the public transportation system seemed to invite people to join airport protests. "You can take BART to all kinds of weekend events - also, direct service to SFO is running great right now." The tweet went out just after a number of protests around the country erupted in response to immigrants being detained at airports across the country. San Francisco Airport was also affected by protests, as local families were caught in the middle of an executive order issued by President Trump to ban people from some majority-Muslim countries from entering the U.S. BART's tweet was liked by more than 8,600 users and retweeted by more than 3,000 people. Many responded with applause and tweets professing their love for BART. Documentary filmmaker and political activist Michael Moore even addressed the public agency's tweet on his own account, writing, "BART in SF subtly encourages people to come join the protest at SFO Airport. One rider tweets many on train have brought 'crafts supplies.'" In contrast, the AirTrain at New York's John F. Kennedy airport turned away protesters Saturday. During Saturday's protests, the large turnout led the Port Authority to restrict use of AirTrain service to only ticketed passengers and airport employees, CNN reported. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo later directed Port Authority to restart service to the airport to allow anybody to ride. "I have ordered the Port Authority to reverse its decision regarding the JFK AirTrain," Cuomo said in a tweet. "The people of New York will have their voices heard." Cuomo attached a photo of a longer statement to that tweet, which reads in part: "One of the fundamental rights that is granted the people of this country is the right to peacefully protest. ... I have also directed the MTA and the New York State Police to assist with transportation and security needs to ensure the safety of all those participating." Another BART tweet Saturday read "All races, colors, religions, genders, ages, disabled, veterans, orientations, sexes & those of foreign national origin are welcome on BART." When a Twitter user attacked BART for sending out "propaganda tweets," the account replied with a number of tweets defending its response, stating, "We reserve the right to post our nondiscrimination policy as often as we like, at any time we please-especially when riders feel vulnerable." The spokesperson who has been identified in the past as BART's social media manager is Taylor Huckaby. On his personal account Saturday, Huckaby wrote, "Far beyond any kind of PR best practice, I have never been more proud of what I did today both behind the scenes and publicly." A 55-year-old man was arrested after he flew his drone near a California Highway Patrol helicopter involved in the rescue of a man who had fallen off a cliff in Pacifica, police said Monday. The drone owner, Gerald Destremps of Pacifica, was arrested Friday night on suspicion of impeding first responders at the scene of an emergency, a misdemeanor, according to police. He has since been released with a citation. Firefighters and police arrived at the scene around 10:15 p.m., after getting reports that a man had plummeted off a cliff. They lowered a medic to check on his condition, and called in a CHP helicopter crew to assist in the rescue. Shortly after the CHP crew arrived, first responders noticed the drone hovering near the helicopter, forcing the helicopter crew to suspend the rescue and fly to a higher altitude to avoid to crashing into the drone, officials said. Police were able to quickly track down the drone operator, Destremps, and arrest him, official said. Because of the difficulties, firefighters ultimately opted to hoist the man up the cliffside using a basket, without the help of the helicopter, said to Capt. Joe Spanheimer of the Pacifica Police Department. The rescued man, whose name was not released, was transported to a local hospital with moderate injuries, he said. Spanheimer urged the public to use caution with drones and be aware of relevant regulations. Theyre fun, sure, but because were in the San Francisco International Airport airspace, there are actually very very few spots in Pacifica that you can legally fly a drone, said Spanheimer. The rescue operation occurred in the 300 block of Esplanade Avenue, where cliff erosion has been a major problem. An apartment building at the the site was demolished last year because it was crumbling into the ocean. A second condemned apartment building in the same eroding cliff was demolished by the city Monday morning. Drones have interfered with emergency response efforts in dozens of fires in recent years, including one at Sharp Park in Pacifica in July 2015. Drones have become such a problem, the U.S. Forest Service officials launched an awareness campaign urging people to keep drones grounded near fires, warning hobbyists, if you fly, we cant. Gov. Jerry Brown has vetoed legislation regulating drone usage on at least four occasions, but last year he sign a bill protecting emergency responders from liability should they damage a drone in their work. Filipa Ioannou is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: fioannou@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @obioannoukenobi The lives of countless people in this country and abroad were immediately upended by President Donald Trump's executive order banning entry to the United States by migrants, refugees, students and others from seven predominately Muslim countries in the Middle East. Here is one of their stories: Hamid Kargaran was pacing in his San Francisco living room Sunday, not watching the news, trying to stay positive, waiting for his wife to call from Iran. She was due to leave for the airport within the hour, hoping that this time she wouldn't be prevented from boarding a plane back home. "We're not letting ourselves even think that we won't see each other again," said Kargaran, 33. "I just can't believe this is happening in America." Kargaran is a U.S. citizen, and a successful one. He owns a Bay Area marketing company that works with Google, as well as another that consults with medical practices, and he teaches at two local universities. His wife of two years, Elaheh Iranfard, 28, is a painter studying at the San Francisco Academy of Art. They both embrace California and U.S. culture with gusto. "Her favorite is nude figures, which she couldn't even do if she'd stayed in Iran," Kargaran said. Iranfard, who goes by Ellie, has had legal permanent residency for two years, but her green card didn't help her Friday when she tried to get on a flight, any flight, to the United States. She had been back home for a short visit with her family, a trip she had planned after her parents were unable to obtain a visa to enter the United States. But in the hours after Trump signed his executive order, the door slammed shut. Agents at multiple airlines told her she couldn't board, legal U.S. resident or not. UPDATE: Hamid Karagan told SFGATE that his wife, Elaheh Iranfard, is in Germany to board a flight to San Francisco as of Monday morning. For two sleepless days, Kargaran said, he has tried desperately to get information from airlines, government officials, friends and family. At one point, he staked out a part of San Francisco International Airport where Customs and Border Protection officers take their break. Three of them gave him different answers to the same questions; one of them told him that "Iranians are not our friends." It's been a shock to a man who joined pro-American demonstrations in Tehran after terrorists struck the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. What he was hearing now, as friends advised him to scrub from his phone any social-media posts that suggested that he disagreed with Trump, reminded him of the Iranian repression that drove him from the country. "I never thought when I moved here and made this country my home that this would happen," he said. "I employ people, I pay taxes. We love this country. But I feel like the hard work has been meaningless. We're second-class citizens." Now he was waiting, and he knew there would be no relief until his wife actually walked into the sun in San Francisco. In three hours, she would find out whether Lufthansa agents in Tehran would let her onto a plane. In Germany, she would learn whether officials there would let her transit to California. At home, she still had to pass through U.S. passport control. "I don't know," Kargaran said. "We've tried to do everything right. Doesn't that matter?" This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Moonraker Brewing's Dan Powell is a little bit awestruck. Powell, who co-founded the Auburn brewery with his wife Karen, has just collected medals for winning Best New California Brewery and ninth Best New Brewery in the World at the RateBeer Best, a competition and beer fest held annually in Santa Rosa, California. The honors seem more meaningful than those of a classic brew competition (though Moonraker has medals for those, too). Unlike some of RateBeer Best's competition contemporaries, the day's winners aren't selected by a secretive coterie of judges, they're chosen by the people namely, the people who have scored and reviewed beers on RateBeer.com over the last year. Joe Tucker, who runs RateBeer, says eight million reviews have been logged on the site since it launched in 2000. "[The win] is little bit surreal because we just started," Powell says. "We're only nine months old. We just wanted to make great beer. To find ourselves in this company is crazy." So awesome. Some amazing medals: Best New Beer of the year Yojo, Top nine best new brewer in the world and best new brewery in region @juicemaster_3000 @kyle_leddy #medals #socool #amazingbeer A photo posted by Moonraker Brewing Co. (@moonrakerbrewing) on Jan 29, 2017 at 1:32pm PST The "company" Powell is referring to is a group of modern brewing all-stars that were invited to the awards ceremony and associated festival, including Missouri's Side Project Brewing, the U.K.'s Cloudwater Brew Co., Sweden's Omnipollo, Massachusetts' Trillium Brewing, Brazil's Cervejaria Dogma, and Tennessee's Blackberry Farm, whose brewers call the previous day's event "one of the best-curated fests" they'd ever attended. Medford Howell, a bartender at Russian River Brewing Company, says he felt "pretty humbled" to be present to watch the Santa Rosa brewery win a medal for being the Best Taproom in the U.S., saying that all the breweries present during the weekend were extraordinary. "This [fest] lineup is the best all-around," he says. "[The U.K.'s] Cloudwater was amazing, [Brazil's] Way Beer, too you just can't get those beers here in the U.S." Thanks to @ratebeer and those who rate for honoring us with some medals and again naming us one of the Top 100 Brewers in the World! Woohoo! A photo posted by Cellarmaker (@cellarmakerbrewing) on Jan 29, 2017 at 5:36pm PST In addition to Russian River, a number of other Northern California breweries won medals for being rated among the top 100 brewers in the world on RateBeer.com, including Capitola's Sante Adairius Rustic Ales, San Francisco's Almanac Beer Company and Cellarmaker Brewing Company, Chico's Sierra Nevada, Petaluma's Lagunitas Brewing Company, and San Leandro's Drake's Brewing. And though the event is a friendly competition, it's also a chance for brewers to meet and discuss future projects and collaborations with each other and show off their best and upcoming offerings. "It's also a fun party," Howell adds. "[Brewing] is a tight community." RateBeer Best Awards Northern California breweries ranked in RateBeer's top 100 best: Almanac Beer Co. (San Francisco) Cellarmaker Brewing Company (San Francisco) Drake's Brewing (San Leandro) Lagunitas Brewing Company (Petaluma) Russian River Brewing Company (Santa Rosa) Sante Adairius Rustic Ales (Capitola) Sierra Nevada Brewing Company (Chico) Best New Breweries in the World: #9. Moonraker Brewing Company (Auburn) Best New Brewery in California: Moonraker Brewing Company (Auburn) Best Taproom in United States: Russian River Brewing Company (Santa Rosa) Best New Beers for 2016: Moonraker Brewing Company Yojo IPA Best Beers in the World for 2016: Russian River Russian River Brewing Company Pliny the Younger Triple IPA Russian River Russian River Brewing Company Pliny the Elder Double IPA Russian River Russian River Brewing Company Supplication Wild Ale More results will be added as they are released. Miss France took her first walk as Miss Universe 2016 as she was announced the winner by host Steve Harvey at Mall of Asia Arena in Philippines. Indias Roshmitha Harimurthy couldnt even make it to the top 15. Miss Universe 2015 Pia Wurtzbach crowned the 23-year-old Iris Mittenaere who was born in northern French town of Lille. Mittenaere has kept herself busy the last five years by pursuing her degree in Dental Surgery. Mittenaere has also been always fond of extreme sports, travelling the world and cooking new French dishes. Miss Haiti was announced the first runner-up while Miss Columbia was named the second runner-up. The last time an Indian won the Miss Universe crown was Lara Dutta in 2000. Other Indians who won the title in the past includes Sushmita Sen in the year 1994, who was also the part of judging panel in the current edition. Two men were killed in unrelated homicides in the Bayview and the Excelsior neighborhoods of San Francisco on Sunday, police say. The first slaying happened at Mission Street and Excelsior Avenue in the Excelsior district just after 9 am. President Trump's decision to ban immigrants from seven countries has mobilized protesters across the country who disagreed with the action. A number of celebrities took to Twitter to express their outrage at the ban. Some reacted with shame, others condemned Trump's actions, and some shared personal stories. Spring break is traditionally a popular time for students to migrate to beaches to enjoy a week off from school. But for spring breakers not fond of sand or crowds, there are still plenty of places to celebrate the beginning of the warmer season. GET DOWN BACK THEN: Vintage photos show spring break hasn't changed much ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. The Rev. Rene Robert devoted his life to helping societys most troubled, working with drug addicts and criminals and even signing a Declaration of Life that called for his killer to be spared execution in the event of his murder. More than two decades after filing that document, his wish will be tested. Roberts body shot multiple times was found in the Georgia woods last year after a manhunt led to the arrest of Steven Murray, a repeat offender Robert had been trying to help for months. Police said Murray asked the 71-year-old priest for a ride in Jacksonville, then kidnapped him and drove him across the state line. Days later, Murray led officers to the priests body, police said. Prosecutors plan to seek the death penalty if Murray is convicted of murder, citing the slayings aggravated nature. That decision was based on the facts alone, said Augusta Judicial Circuit District Attorney Ashley Wright. We dont look at whether the victim is a priest, a nun, a philanthropist, a drug dealer or something else, she said. But Catholic officials from Georgia and Florida plan to protest Tuesday on the courthouse steps in Augusta, citing Roberts own words opposing capital punishment. I request that the person found guilty of homicide for my killing not be subject to or put in jeopardy of the death penalty under any circumstances, no matter how heinous their crime or how much I may have suffered, states the document Robert signed in 1995, notarized and witnessed by an attorney, that he insisted be kept in his personnel file. Prosecutors frequently dont have access to the wishes of a murder suspects victim when making such decisions, let alone a statement so clearly opposed to capital punishment. Even so, its one of many factors, and the choice ultimately is the prosecutors, said Georgia State University law professor Lauren Sudeall Lucas. Theres not a lot of legal precedent for this having any real impact, she said. Ultimately the district attorney represents the state, not the victim, she added. Murrays attorney, Ryan Swingle, has been a public defender for 15 years, working exclusively on capital cases for the last four. Hes inspired by people like Robert, he said. It is both my personal and professional hope that his sincere wishes based on his faith will be honored, Swingle said. Hes not sure what weight Roberts declaration will be given by the state, court or jury, but said it should be considered thoughtfully by everyone involved. Murray smiled and waved at TV cameras during his initial court appearance but has waffled between sorrow and defiance in public. Im very sorry and if anybody really loves Father Rene, theyll forgive me because he was a man of God and forgiveness is forgiveness, he said after a hearing in April. I have mental problems, and I lost control of myself, and I apologize. Murray struck a harsh tone after another hearing in September: Tell the world I say f--- em, he told reporters. Asked about his clients statements, Swingle said I think hes expressed sincere remorse and has done so publicly, and I think that speaks for itself. Kate Brumback and Jason Dearen are Associated Press writers. FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. One by one, a judge detailed the 22 charges against an Alaska man accused of killing five people and wounding six others in a Florida airport shooting spree. Esteban Santiago pleaded not guilty. Santiago, 26, stood in chains Monday in a red max custody inmate jumpsuit as U.S. Magistrate Judge Barry Seltzer took the unusual step of reading the entire 17-page indictment aloud in court with repeated emphasis on the victims names. After each count, Santiago said he understood and was asked if he realized he could get the death penalty if convicted. Yes, I do, he replied. HOUSTON Former President George H.W. Bush was released Monday from Houston Methodist Hospital where he received treatment for pneumonia for more than two weeks. Bush, 92, was experiencing breathing difficulties when he was admitted Jan. 14. During his treatment, which included a stay in intensive care, doctors inserted a breathing tube and connected him to a ventilator. He is thankful for the many prayers and kind messages he received during his stay, as well as the world-class care that both his doctors and nurses provided, Bush spokesman Jim McGrath said. Bush has been allowed to return to his Houston home, McGrath said. The nations 41st president was joined at the hospital by his 91-year-old wife, Barbara, who spent five days there for treatment of bronchitis until her release a week ago. The couples 72-year marriage is the longest of any presidential couple in U.S. history, and the former first lady was with her husband during much of his stay, including when she was hospitalized for her own treatment. They were essentially therapy for each other, Dr. Clint Doerr, a physician treating Bush, said last week. Bush, who served as president from 1989 to 1993, has a form of Parkinsons disease and uses a motorized scooter or a wheelchair for mobility. He was hospitalized in 2015 in Maine after falling at his summer home and breaking a bone in his neck. He was also hospitalized in Houston the previous December for about a week for shortness of breath. He spent Christmas 2012 in intensive care for a bronchitis-related cough and other issues. Despite his loss of mobility, Bush celebrated his 90th birthday by making a tandem parachute jump in Kennebunkport, Maine. Last summer, Bush led a group of 40 wounded warriors on a fishing trip at the helm of his speedboat, three days after his 92nd birthday celebration. George Herbert Walker Bush, born June 12, 1924, in Milton, Mass., also served as a congressman, CIA director and Ronald Reagans vice president. Michael Graczyk is an Associated Press writer. Donald Trumps surprise win in November lit a fire under Carolyn Clow, a county purchasing agent in Madison, Wis. On Saturday, she attended her first in a series of classes on how to run for office. If we learn anything as a liberal community, Id hope that its time to stop thinking Id like to do something, and time to take that action, said Clow, 43, who is running for the village board in her town outside of Madison in the April election with the help of an organization that recruits Democratic women candidates. Its fun and exciting to march and its boring to go down to village hall to vote, but we have to learn to do both, she said. Trumps election has sparked what liberal groups say is unprecedented activism. The most visible manifestation of that were protest marches the day after Trumps inaugural, which drew millions to Washington, D.C., and other locations across the country and overseas. Those were followed by demonstrations at airports over the weekend against Trumps executive order prohibiting entry into the U.S. by people from seven countries and also limiting refugees. Much of the discussion since the marches has revolved around how to turn that energy into an effective movement, especially through electoral politics. Democrats have been decimated in elections at the state and local level during the past eight years, and have their best chance to stymie Trump if they can seize control of the House of Representatives in the 2018 elections. While the organizers of last weekends Womens Marches havent announced future demonstrations, there are already plans in the works for scientists to march in protest of Trump, and for nationwide protests on April 15 demanding the president release his tax returns. In cities around the country, people are marching on congressional offices, joining liberal organizations and lobbying their local representatives. Theres a battle raging on multiple fronts and you have the feeling of being surrounded, said Chris Newman, legal director of the National Day Laborers Organizing Network. The most important thing is to focus on whatever hill you have and hold your hill. Newmans group focuses on immigrant rights and has been co-hosting community meetings where nervous immigrants and eager, mobilized new volunteers can learn the basics of immigration law and how to protect their rights. Nicholas Riccardi is an Associated Press writer. WASHINGTON The Trump administration defended on Sunday a reorganization of the National Security Council that elevates the presidents chief strategist, Steve Bannon a political adviser with no direct national security role to full membership and downgrades the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The alteration was contained in a memorandum issued late Saturday defining the organization of the National Security Council and the Homeland Security Council, the top decision-making bodies inside the White House on everything from diplomacy to counterterrorism, crisis management, nuclear policy and cyberpolicy. Trumps document drew from organizational precedents in Barack Obamas and George W. Bushs administrations. But the ascension of Bannon, who until last year was the head of Breitbart News, and the diminishment of the presidents top intelligence and military advisers took Democrats and Republicans by surprise. The new memo said the intelligence director and the Joint Chiefs chairman would attend the principals meetings the meeting of Cabinet-level officials only when issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed. Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, said Sunday that Bannons past service as a U.S. Navy officer merited his attendance at all meetings, as part of a streamlining of decision-making. He did not explain the downgrading of the four-star general who heads the Joint Chiefs, Joseph Dunford, who rose through the Marine Corps and served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Well, he is a former naval officer, Spicer said of Bannon on ABCs This Week. Hes got a tremendous understanding of the world and the geopolitical landscape that we have now. When pressed on Dunfords role, Spicer said, The president gets plenty of information from the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Current and former military officials said they suspected that the decision, in part, was prompted by the national security adviser, Michael Flynn, who retired as a three-star general after he was dismissed during the Obama administration as the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency. It was the previous director of national intelligence, James Clapper, who delivered the news to Flynn that he was being removed from his post. Throughout the transition, Flynn was reportedly hesitant to place many people around the National Security Council table who had outranked him in the military. Nonetheless, there are two in the Cabinet: Defense Secretary James Mattis, who retired as a four-star general, and the secretary of homeland security, John Kelly, a retired four-star Marine Corps general who served for 45 years, ending his military career as the commander of U.S. Southern Command. Both men remain principals on the council. The CIA director, Mike Pompeo, is not mentioned at all in the reorganization order. A week ago, Trump went to CIA headquarters to assure officers there that he had their backs and valued their contributions. But Pompeos predecessor, John Brennan, was also not a formal member of the council, though he often attended meetings to provide intelligence assessments. Susan Rice, Flynns predecessor as national security adviser, denounced the downgrading of the intelligence director and the Joint Chiefs chairman. This is stone cold crazy, she wrote on Twitter. John Bellinger, who was the counsel to the National Security Council during Bushs administration, noted in a commentary on the Lawfare blog that Bannons role was highly unusual, because the NSC function usually does not include participants from the political side of the White House. He noted that Karl Rove, Bushs top political strategist, did not attend council meetings. David E. Sanger is a New York Times writer. After a week of anti-Trump protests conservatives are looking to get in on the action. And so, once again, they turn to Starbucks. Starbucks chairman and CEO Howard Schultz released a statement over the weekend announcing that the Seattle-based coffee chain would commit to a new agenda, which included a promise to hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years. The policy came as a direct response to President Trumps executive order over the weekend, which bans immigrants and refugees from seven select Muslim countries. There are more than 65 million citizens of the world recognized as refugees by the United Nations, and we are developing plans to hire 10,000 of them over five years in the 75 countries around the world where Starbucks does business," Schultz wrote. "And we will start this effort here in the U.S. by making the initial focus of our hiring efforts on those individuals who have served with U.S. troops as interpreters and support personnel in the various countries where our military has asked for such support." Many Trump supporters werent on board, quickly taking to social media to voice their concerns under the hashtag #BoycottStarbucks: This is not the first time Schultz has made large hiring commitments like this. In 2013, Starbucks committed to hiring at least 10,000 veterans and military spouses by the end of 2018 a goal which theyre almost meeting, with 8,000 already hired under the program. Schultzs program also called for supporting the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which was part of Obamas immigration reform; standing in support and investing in the Mexican market, as part of a campaign to build bridges, not walls with the country; and ensuring that anyone who is benefits eligible has access to quality health insurance through Starbucks. The #BoycottStarbucks hashtag is already overwhelmed with supporters eager to buy two frappuccinos instead of one, so no doubt Starbucks will be ok. Still, only time will tell if this protest hurts them more than the last conservative Starbucks boycott did, when they ordered coffee with Trumps name on it in defiance of the perceived treatment of Trump supporters. Former president Barack Obama rejected the idea Monday that President Donald Trump had based his immigration executive order on a policy adopted by his own administration, and endorsed the protests that have been taking place across the country in response to the new restrictions. Trump has said that his move to ban the entry of migrants from seven Muslim-majority countries into the U.S., and to suspend temporarily the admission of refugees, was based in part by a decision in 2011 by then-President Obama to ban the admission of Iraqis to the U.S. after evidence surfaced that two Iraqis seeking resettlement had been linked to terrorist activity in their home country. Former Obama administration officials have denied that there was ever a halt to the awarding of visas to Iraqis, though the processing of these applications slowed after they were subject to more intense scrutiny. Former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani said President Donald Trump wanted a "Muslim ban" and requested he assemble a commission to show him "the right way to do it legally." Giuliani, an early Trump supporter who once had been rumored for a cabinet position in the new administration, appeared on Fox News late Saturday night to describe how Trump's executive order temporarily banning refugees came together. Trump on Friday signed orders not only to suspend admission of all refugees into the United States for 120 days but also to implement "new vetting measures" to screen out "radical Islamic terrorists." Refugee entry from Syria, however, would be suspended indefinitely, and all travel from Syria and six other nations - Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen - are suspended for 90 days. Trump also said he would give priority to Christian refugees over those of other religions, according to the Christian Broadcasting Network. Fox News host Jeanine Pirro asked Giuliani if the ban had anything to do with religion. "How did the president decide the seven countries?" she asked. "OK, talk to me." "I'll tell you the whole history of it," Giuliani responded eagerly. "So when (Trump) first announced it, he said, 'Muslim ban.' He called me up. He said, 'Put a commission together. Show me the right way to do it legally.'" Giuliani continued, saying he assembled a "whole group of other very expert lawyers on this," including former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey, Rep. Mike McCaul, R-Texas, and Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y. "And what we did was, we focused on, instead of religion, danger - the areas of the world that create danger for us," Giuliani told Pirro. "Which is a factual basis, not a religious basis. Perfectly legal, perfectly sensible. And that's what the ban is based on. It's not based on religion. It's based on places where there are substantial evidence that people are sending terrorists into our country." It was unclear when the above-mentioned phone call took place and when the commission began working. An email to the White House press office was not immediately returned Sunday. More for you McConnell: We don't have religious tests in this country Clips of the exchange between Giuliani and Pirro quickly went viral Saturday night, with some claiming that Giuliani's statement amounted to admitting Trump's intent had been to institute a ban based on religion. Others, including Trump senior adviser Kellyanne Conway and White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, have insisted it is not a ban on Muslims, but rather one based on countries from which travel was already restricted under the Obama administration. Priebus appeared on CBS' "Face the Nation" Sunday morning to say it was possible Trump would expand the list of countries included in the travel ban. "You can point to other countries that have similar problems, like Pakistan and others," Priebus told host John Dickerson. "Perhaps we need to take it further." Priebus also said there had been weeks of work and "plenty of communication" between the White House, the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security regarding the ban. "We didn't just type this thing up in an office and sign up," he told Dickerson. Later on the same program, Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., called out Giuliani's interview with Pirro from the night before. "They can't deny that this is a Muslim ban," Ellison told Dickerson. "On the campaign trail, (Trump) said he wanted a Muslim ban. ... Rudy Giuliani who helped him write it said that they started out with the intention of a Muslim ban and then they sort of 'languaged' it up so to try to avoid that label, but it is a religiously based ban." Senate Democrats vowed to draft legislation to block the travel ban. "We're demanding the president reverse these executive orders that go against what we are, everything we have always stood for," Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer. D-N.Y., said in a news conference Sunday morning, noting later that his middle name, Ellis, was originally inspired by Ellis Island. "It was implemented in a way that created chaos and confusion across the country, and it will only serve to embolden and inspire those around the globe those that will do us harm," Schumer added. "It must be reversed immediately." Trump's executive order caused mayhem and sparked massive protests at airports around the country Friday and Saturday, as reports surfaced that dozens of travelers from the affected countries, including green-card holders, were being detained. The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit Saturday morning challenging Trump's order after two Iraqi men with immigrant visas were barred from entering the United States at John F. Kennedy International Airport. As Giuliani was speaking, Fox News simultaneously aired an alert that noted federal judge Ann M. Donnelly had issued a stay to stop the deportations nationwide. Donnelly wrote that there was a strong likelihood the order had violated the petitioners' rights to due process and equal protection by the Constitution. "There is imminent danger that, absent the stay of removal, there will be substantial and irreparable injury to refugees, visa-holders, and other individuals from nations subject to the January 27, 2017 Executive Order," Donnelly wrote. The ACLU hailed the victory. "Clearly the judge understood the possibility for irreparable harm to hundreds of immigrants and lawful visitors to this country," ACLU executive director Anthony D. Romero said in a statement. "Our courts today worked as they should as bulwarks against government abuse or unconstitutional policies and orders. On week one, Donald Trump suffered his first loss in court." On Sunday, the Department of Homeland Security issued a statement saying it did not plan to back off enforcing Trump's orders. "President Trump's Executive Orders remain in place-prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety," the statement read. "President Trump's Executive Order affects a minor portion of international travelers, and is a first step towards reestablishing control over America's borders and national security." The department said that less than one percent of daily international air travelers to the United States had been "inconvenienced" on Saturday. Matthew Kolken, an immigration attorney based in Buffalo, said there has been "a systemic bias against individuals from Muslim countries in the U.S. immigration departments" for years, including under the Obama administration. "This isn't unprecedented," Kolken told The Washington Post by phone Sunday. "The unfortunate reality is the executive branch does have vast discretionary authority to determine who they are going (allow in or not)." That said, Kolken believes "Trump has gone a step further without a doubt" in including even people who are lawful permanent residents and suspending all immigration applications from people from the seven countries on the banned list. If there was evidence of disparate treatment of individuals from the same country - if there were anecdotal evidence of, for example, a Syrian family of one religious background allowed to enter over that of another religious background - then that is where lawsuits could "come to play," he said. "The question becomes whether they're trying to do an end-around by couching the ban as a country-specific ban based on a security-related issues when in reality it's a religious ban," Kolken said. OAKLAND (BCN) Education activists from across the Bay Area are scheduled to rally Tuesday in Oakland to oppose the confirmation of Betsy DeVos as the new U.S. Secretary of Education. On Tuesday, DeVos is up for a vote by the Senate's Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee. On the same day, teachers, students and parents will gather at the Oakland Federal Building plaza at 1301 Clay St. at noon to protest the vote. During her confirmation hearing in Washington D.C. last week, DeVos faced intense scrutiny and questioning from members of Congress, including Vermont Senator and former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders. Organizers of Tuesday's rally said they believed DeVos' performance during her confirmation hearing revealed her lack of knowledge about public education. They also said that DeVos, a billionaire businesswoman from Michigan, has many conflicts of interest that should disqualify her from consideration for the position. Tuesday's rally is part of a series of actions taking place across the country to protest President Trump's cabinet nominations. The event is being organized by the group Bay Resistance, a network of activist groups. SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT (BCN) The fifth and final person who had been detained at San Francisco International Airport under President Donald Trump's Executive Order has been released, airport officials said this afternoon, citing U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials. Four others were also detained were released earlier this afternoon, according to airport officials. Dozens of non U.S. citizens were reportedly being held over the weekend at airports across the country after Trump issued an Executive Order Friday, banning citizens from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from entering the country and blocking any refugees from entering for 120 days. Additionally, refugees from Syria are blocked indefinitely, according to the order. The detainees were being supported by thousands of protestors and dozens of lawyers willing to offer them legal advice, who have gathered at the airport since Saturday. "We appreciate all those who have so passionately expressed their concerns over the President's Executive Order relating to immigration. We share these concerns deeply, as our highest obligation is to the millions of people from around the world whom we serve. Although Customs and Border Protection services are strictly federal and operate outside the jurisdiction of the U.S. airports, including SFO, we have requested a full briefing from this agency to ensure our customers remain the top priority," SFO officials said in a statement this morning. "We are also making supplies available to travelers affected by this Executive Order, as well as to the members of the public who have bravely taken a stand against this action by speaking publicly in our facilities," according to the airport's statement. An emergency stay was granted Saturday evening by a federal judge in New York, blocking deportations after the American Civil Liberties Union took legal action on behalf of two individuals detained in New York under the order. This morning the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said it would continue to enforce all of the president's orders but that it would also comply with judicial orders. "President Trump's Executive Orders remain in place-prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for the national security or public safety. President Trump's Executive order affects a minor portion of international travelers and is a first step towards reestablishing control over America's border and national security," the department's statement read. "No foreign national in a foreign land, without ties to the United States, has any unfettered right to demand entry into the United States or to demand immigration benefits in the United States. The Department of Homeland Security will comply with judicial orders; faithfully enforce our immigration laws, and implement Presidents Trump's Executive Orders to ensure that those entering the United States do not pose a threat to our country or the American people," according to the department's statement. For All U of U Health Patients & Visitors BIRMINGHAM, Ala. A U.S. citizen from Yemen says he and his 12-year-old daughter are stuck in the African nation of Djibouti because of President Trump's executive order. Thirty-eight-year-old Ahmed Ali says he, his wife and two of his three daughters are all U.S. citizens. They live in Los Banos in Central California. Ali says his third daughter was born in Yemen and the family has been trying to get her to the U.S. since 2011. On Thursday her visa was approved and they were supposed to fly on Saturday too late to make it before Trump's order. Ali says it's too dangerous to return his daughter to Yemen and he's not going to leave without her. The family's San Francisco attorneys are working to get a waiver for the girl. Without it, Ali says he doesn't know what he'll do. ___ 4 p.m.: Many Trump voters across the U.S. say they are pleased with his executive order temporarily banning refugees and immigrants from seven mostly Muslim countries. And they say he's doing exactly what he promised to do if elected. Barbara Van Syckel of Sterling Heights, Michigan says Trump is "going to do what he says and says what he does." The 66-year-old says "that's a little frightening for some people." Some Trump backers say they might do things a little differently than the president, but their overall reaction is positive. Jim Buterbaugh, the head of custodial work and maintenance at a public school in the western Montana town of White Hall, was frustrated that Trump's moratorium did not include countries such as Saudi Arabia, where most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from. The executive order also did not include the creation of safe zones for refugees, which he favors. ___ 4 p.m.: Don't talk about airport protests in Trump Country. In the states that propelled Donald Trump to the White House, his fans couldn't be much happier with his executive order temporarily banning refugees and immigrants from seven mostly Muslim countries. Trump supporters say he promised to put America first during the campaign, and he's doing it. That includes securing the nation's borders and doing everything possible to prevent terrorists from entering the U.S. In their view, Democrats and soft-hearted do-gooders just need to calm down. Trump is being Trump. Judith Wilkenroh is a retired social-services worker from Frederick, Maryland. She says Trump is "just going ahead like a locomotive" and that she likes him more and more every time he does something. ___ 1:45 p.m.: Some legal U.S. residents and visitors from the nations affected by the Trump administration's ban on travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries are wondering whether it is safe to leave the country. Somali-born freelance journalist Ismail Einashe, who holds British citizenship, lives in New York. He says British officials gave assurances that returning won't be a problem for someone like him who holds a British passport and a 10-year multiple-entry visa. But he's not sure he believes them. He says with all the confusion, he's afraid if he leaves the U.S. he may not be able to get back in the country. The 31-year-old Einashe arrived in New York earlier this month on a fellowship and is taking part in a graduate seminar at the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma at Columbia University. ___ 1:45 p.m.: Attorneys and federal judges are working to clear a path for some of those turned away at U.S. airports under the Trump administration's ban on travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries. One was Sahar Algonaimi, a Syrian-born schoolteacher from Saudi Arabia, who arrived at Chicago's O'Hare Airport on Saturday on her way to Indiana to care for her elderly, cancer-stricken mother. Although she had a visa and had visited the U.S. numerous times before, the 58-year-old woman was put on a plane back to Saudi Arabia after authorities persuaded her to give up her visa. An hour after she left, a judge blocked Trump's order, an act her family's attorney said would have allowed her to stay. ___ 9:05 p.m.: The United Nations says it has received assurances from the United States that the Trump administration's ban on travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries will not affect U.N. diplomats and staff members from those countries. U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Monday, "We have no confirmed cases where any U.N. staff member was affected by the new policies." Earlier, he had said a handful of staff members were kept from boarding planes over the weekend. Dujarric said the U.N. was in contact with U.S. authorities over the weekend "and has been assured" that diplomats with G-2 visas and U.N. staff with G-4 visas "are exempted from the executive order" and their travel will not be affected. Dujarric reiterated that the U.N. "very much hopes that the measures put in place regarding refugees are temporary," saying "the U.S. has been a critical partner of the United Nations organization ... in resettling refugees." ___ 6:50 p.m.: The head of the U.N. refugee agency estimates that some 20,000 people could have been resettled in the United States during President Donald Trump's 120-day suspension on admitting refugees. The office of U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi says he is "deeply worried by the uncertainty" faced by thousands of refugees in the process of being resettled in the U.S. UNHCR said in a statement Monday that it estimates that 800 refugees were set to travel this week alone, but have been barred from entry following Trump's executive order signed Friday. The Geneva-based agency says it came up with the estimate for a total of 20,000 people who might have been resettled during the 120-day suspension based on average monthly figures from the past 15 years. ___ 6:35 p.m.: Hundreds of people are protesting in the British university town of Oxford against U.S. President Donald Trump's immigration ban. The protest on Monday night also targeted Conservative U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May, who many in the crowd felt did not react strongly or quickly "This is what democracy looks like!" The crowd chanted. They carried signs reading "No to racism, no to Trump!" As speakers vowed to press to get the government to revoke the state visit invitation to the American president, the crowd chanted: "Theresa May, hear us shout: Muslims in, sexists out!" ___ 6:10 p.m.: The United Nations says it has received assurances that the Trump administration's ban on travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries will not affect U.N. staff members from those countries. U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said a handful of U.N. staff members traveling on G-4 visas which allow non-diplomats to work at U.N. headquarters in New York were kept from boarding planes over the weekend. But Dujarric said he was informed Monday that "all issues had been ironed out and we got the needed assurances from the U.S. Mission" that staff from the seven countries with valid G-4 visas can return to work at the United Nations. Dujarric reiterated that the U.N. "very much hopes that the measures put in place regarding refugees are temporary," saying "the U.S. has been a critical partner of the United Nations organization ... in resettling refugees." ___ 6 p.m.: Entrepreneur Richard Branson has registered his opposition to President Donald Trump's travel ban in a blog post, promising to donate to the American Civil Liberties Union and the International Rescue Committee and urging the public to donate to worthy causes. The founder of the Virgin empire said in his post Monday there were many reasons to be worried about the order, which bars people from seven countries in the Middle East and Africa from entering the United States and suspends refugee immigration for 120 days. Branson says he applauds "the thousands who have taken to the streets and the airwaves in solidarity across the U.S." and others donating their time "on behalf of those caught up in this mess." The company did not immediately disclose the size of the donations. ___ 5:40 p.m.: A Somali refugee says more than 200 refugees with flights to the U.S. have been told they cannot travel because of President Donald Trump's orders temporarily suspending entry by citizens from seven majority-Muslim countries. Suleiman Yusuf, a teacher, said Monday that the 200 left a refugee camp in eastern Kenya last week, but were told by the International Organization for Migration that their Monday flights were canceled "because of Trump's orders." Yvonne Ndege, a spokeswoman for the United Nations refugee agency, says about 13,000 Somali refugees who had been interviewed and approved for resettlement by the United States Citizen and Immigration Services have been affected by the order. ___ 4:45 p.m.: British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson says he has been assured by American officials that "all British passport holders remain welcome" in the United States, even if they are also nationals of seven countries temporarily barred by President Donald Trump. Johnson has told lawmakers in the House of Commons that Trump's executive order "will make no difference to any British passport holder, irrespective of their country of birth or whether they hold another passport." Confusion has reigned about whether dual nationals are affected by the 90-day ban on citizens of Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya . Johnson said the U.K. had told the Americans of "our anxiety about measures that discriminate on grounds of nationality." He said "this is something that we do not support." Opposition lawmakers are demanding the government condemn the ban even more strongly and cancel a state visit to Britain by Trump planned for later this year. ___ 4:40 p.m.: French and U.S. travelers at Paris' largest airport Charles de Gaulle reacted with shock to President Donald Trump's decision to ban citizens from a number of largely Muslim countries. National carrier Air France announced 15 people from the countries listed in the executive order had been blocked before boarding their flight to the U.S. Ross Anderson, a U.S. tourist heading back home to the Washington area, said that he was afraid he might probably witness firsthand the effects of Trump's decision with "protests and maybe people being detained or blocked." Travelers at Charles-de-Gaulle's 2E Terminal were mainly critical of the measure. French U.S.-bound tourist Bernadette Taglia-Zackarin called the decision with respect to members of targeted countries Iran and Iraq "extremely dangerous." ___ 3:15 p.m.: The foreign minister of Qatar says his country is against President Donald Trump's blanket banning of refugees and travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries. Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani said in Serbia on Monday he hopes U.S. authorities will further assess the move and "we hope that they are going to do the right thing" about it. Several of those stopped at U.S. airports since Friday are believed to have traveled on flights from Qatar. The foreign minister says: "When it comes to be addressed in a Muslim framework, I think this is something we will stand against." The 90-day ban, imposed on Friday, affects travel to the United States by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. ___ 2:45 p.m.: The president of the American University of Beirut has criticized President Donald Trump's executive order to indefinitely bar refugees from Syria and keep individuals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. for 90 days. Fadlo Khuri, a dual Lebanese-American citizen, said in a statement released Monday that the AUB community has watched the fallout at America's airports with "growing concern" in the last 72 hours. The university is one of the oldest and most prestigious educational institutions in the Middle East. Khuri says: "We find this action and its implications to be in conflict with the enduring values of liberty and justice for all, which the original framers of the US constitution fought to protect." Founded in 1866, AUB enrolls around 8,500 students from all over the world. ___ 2:20 p.m.: Turkey's national airline says it will reimburse passengers who were unable to fly to the United States due to the U.S. ban on travelers from seven Muslim-majority nations. Turkish Airlines said Monday that customers who could not board their flights would be fully reimbursed and not charged any fines. The carrier did not say how many Turkish Airlines passengers were affected by the ban. A company official did not immediately respond to questions from the Associated Press. The 90-day ban, issued by President Donald Trump on Friday, halts travel to the United States by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. ___ 2:15 p.m.: German Chancellor Angela Merkel is renewing her criticism of President Donald Trump's order suspending entry to the U.S. for people from seven Muslim-majority countries and halting refugee admissions. Merkel said Monday that "the necessary and determined fight against terrorism in no way justifies a general suspicion against people of a certain faith in this case against people of Muslim faith or people with a certain origin." She added that she believes the U.S. action also "contradicts the basic concept of international help for refugees and international cooperation." Merkel's words echoed similar comments by her spokesman Sunday, the day after the German leader voiced her regret at the decision during a telephone with Trump. ___ 1:55 p.m.: Pakistan's interior minister says President Donald Trump's action banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States will hurt "global unity against terrorism" and could backfire and "help terrorists achieve their goals." The minister, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, also said on Monday that the U.S. administration's measure will "add to the miseries" for the victims of terrorism world over as Muslim countries were the ones most hit by terrorism. Khan says linking terrorism with Islam is not justifiable since only a few hundred misguided people turn to militancy and defy the message of Islam out of the world's 1.5 billion Muslims. ___ 2:05 p.m.: An Iraqi lawmaker says the parliament's decision calling for a "reciprocity measure" in response to U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order is non-binding for the Iraqi government. The deputy parliament speaker, Sheik Humam Hamoudi, says the vote approved in the Iraqi parliament on Monday was "a recommendation" and did not move as a "law." Hamoudi's statement is echoed by Kirk Sowell, a political and legal analyst focused on Iraq and publisher of the newsletter "Inside Iraqi Politics." Sowell says that the Iraqi "parliament absolutely lacks the authority to originate legislation of any kind regulating anything the executive branch does." ___ 12:40 p.m.: The European Union has vowed it will not discriminate against refugees based on nationality, race or religion and will never choose for isolation and inequality. EU Commission spokesman Margaritis Schinas said that the 28-nation bloc is carefully studying the decision of U.S. President Donald Trump to impose a travel ban on refugees to see how much it will impact EU citizens. Schinas also quoted from a Sunday interview of Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker in which he said: "We have to make choices about the world we want to live in. We must choose between isolationism, inequality and national egotism on the one hand. And openness, social equality and strength through solidarity on the other." In an interview with the German Die Welt, Juncker said that "it is by standing for opening, social equality and solidarity that Europe can credibly act on the world stage to find common forward looking solutions." ___ 12:15 p.m.: Doctors Without Borders says U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order suspending entry for refugees from Syria into the United States is putting lives in danger. The Paris-based advocacy group says Trump's order "will effectively keep people trapped in war zones, directly endangering their lives." Doctors Without Borders, also known by its French-language acronym MSF, called Trump's order "an inhumane act against people fleeing war zones." It called on the U.S. government to lift the ban, end the exclusion from specific countries, and to restart the resettlement of refugees. ___ 12:10 p.m.: The U.S. Embassies in London and Berlin have advised people from the seven countries affected by President Donald Trump's travel ban not to seek a visa, or schedule an appointment even if they are a dual nationals. The statement posted on the London embassy's website on Monday issued the guidance to "aliens from the countries of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen." It says, "if you are a national, or dual national, of one of these countries, please do not schedule a visa appointment or pay any visa fees at this time." There has been widespread confusion about whether the ban applied to dual nationals. The embassy did not immediately respond to requests for comment. ___ 11:55 a.m.: Two lawmakers say that the Iraqi parliament has approved a "reciprocity measure" after U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order temporarily banning citizens from Iraq and six other Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. The measure, adopted by lawmakers at a Monday session of parliament, is to apply to Americans entering Iraq. Lawmakers Kamil al-Ghrairi and Mohammed Saadoun told The Associated Press that decision is binding for the government. Both say the decision was passed by a majority votes in favor but couldn't offer specific numbers. No further details were available on the wording of the parliament decision. It was also not immediately clear who the ban will apply to American military personnel, non-government and aid workers, oil companies and other Americans doing business in Iraq. It was also not known if and how the Iraqi measure would affect cooperation in the fight against the Islamic State group in Mosul. Trump's order includes a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program. ___ 11:20 a.m.: A spokesman for the German foreign ministry says "tens of thousands" of people are likely to be affected by the recent U.S. travel ban. An executive order issued Friday by U.S. President Donald Trump temporarily restricts entry to America of people from seven majority-Muslim countries. Foreign ministry spokesman Martin Schaefer says Germany is trying to understand the practical implications for its citizens who also hold a passport from one of the affected countries. He told reporters in Berlin on Monday that Germany hoped to receive further "clarity" from Washington in the coming hours. Chancellor Angela Merkel had expressed regret Sunday about Trump's decision, but refrained from condemning it. Her spokesman, Steffen Seibert, said Monday that Merkel intended to "work for a good German-American relationship." ___ 11:00 a.m.: British Prime Minister Theresa May's office says that a state visit to Britain by U.S. President Donald Trump later this year will go ahead, despite increasing calls for it to be canceled over his temporary ban on residents of seven majority-Muslim countries entering the U.S. Her office says "an invitation has been extended and accepted." No date has been announced for the state visit, which involves lavish pomp and ceremony, often with a stay at Buckingham Palace hosted by Queen Elizabeth II. An online petition on a government website has attracted more than 1 million signatures opposing the trip. Protests against the travel ban are planned Monday in London and other British cities. ___ 10:50 a.m.: Iran's senior vice president is calling President Trump's executive order on travel and visa process ban "illegal, inhumane and against human rights." The official IRNA news agency Monday quotes Ishaq Jahangiri as saying the order should be reviewed at the international level. Jahangiri says: "We will definitely take stance against this illegal, inhumane and anti-human-rights activity in international bodies. And once again (we) will review and explore American human rights in international bodies in order to let the world to know what a system they are facing." He did not elaborate. The executive order suspended issuing visas for people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria or Yemen for at least 90 days. ___ 10:40 a.m.: The world's largest body of Islamic nations has told The Associated Press that it has "grave concern" over U.S. President Donald Trump's order banning travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries. The 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation issued a statement Monday to the AP warning that "such selective and discriminatory acts will only serve to embolden the radical narratives of extremists and will provide further fuel to the advocates of violence and terrorism." It called upon the U.S. to "reconsider this blanket statement and maintain its moral obligation to provide leadership and hope at a time of great uncertainty and unrest in the world." The 90-day ban, imposed Friday, affects travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. All are OIC members. ___ 10:30 a.m.: Air France has blocked 15 passengers from Muslim countries from traveling to the U.S. because they would have been refused entry under President Donald Trump's new immigration ban. Air France said in a statement it was informed Saturday by the U.S. government of the new restrictions, and had no choice but to stop the passengers from boarding U.S.-bound flights. An airline spokeswoman said Monday that the passengers were taken back to their point of departure or otherwise taken care of. She would not provide the passengers' names, nationalities or other details. The passengers were from seven Muslim-majority countries affected by the three-month immigration ban: Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The Electoral College (EC, for short) is one of the most undemocratic institutions to disserve our Country. For years a substantial majority of Americans has consistently, and rightly, supported the ideal that our president should be elected according to the popular vote. Yet, in 1824, 1876, 1888, 2000, and 2016 the person elected president was not the candidate who the majority of people voted for. Indeed, in 2000, the winning candidate, George W. Bush, lost the popular election by nearly 540,000 votes. And in 2016, Donald Trump lost the popular election by over 3 million votes yet, he was declared the winner because of the EC votes. The EC is embodied in Article II, Sections 2-4 of the federal Constitution: Each State shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress... and, a lengthy process for utilizing the EC then follows. Electors controlled by the State Legislatures might have had merit at the founding of the Country when the only people allowed to vote were white, male property owners. In theory, the EC was adopted to reconcile divergent state and federal interests, provide less populous states political leverage, ensure some degree of popular election, guarantee a presidency independent of Congress and save the election process from political manipulation. The EC never did fulfill its lofty purposes, though. Worse, this institution continues to frustrate the ideal of a popularly elected president -- as happened twice in the last 16 years. The EC requires candidates to devote disproportionate resources in pivotal swing states and ignore the rest (like Montana). The EC tends to decrease voter turnout. In non-swing states (like Montana), voters, anticipating the probable outcome of an election, simply dont bother to vote they know that even if they vote with the popular majority, the EC may nullify their vote (as happened in 2016). In short, the EC is a historical artifact, antithetical to democracy. Is it realistic to expect Congress or the State Legislatures to amend the Constitution to repeal the Electoral College? No. But there is another avenue to effectively accomplish the same result. The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC) is an agreement among States and the District of Columbia to award their electoral votes to the candidate who wins the most popular votes in the 50 states and D.C. The Compact comes into effect only when it will guarantee that result. As of January 2017, 10 States (California, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington) and D.C. have joined the Compact. These signatories have 165 electoral votes (presently, 61.1 percent of the 270 EC votes needed to give the Compact legal force). A bill (SB290) was offered in Montanas 2007 legislative session to join the Compact, but the proposed legislation failed. Is it realistic to expect that Montanas Legislature might reconsider, and join the Compact? No. For Montana voters who demand change, there is another viable approach, however. Article III, Section 4 of Montanas Constitution permits the people to enact laws or amend our State Constitution by way of a citizen initiative (CI). In other words, if a CI to join the NPVIC was enacted by the people, Montana would become a member of the Compact by statute or constitutional amendment; its three EC votes would then be cast for whichever candidate won the popular vote. With the NPVIC in effect nationwide, each Montana vote would have the same power as each New York, California, and Ohio vote. No Montanans vote would be nullified by a federal constitutional relic. America would elect its president in the most direct and democratic way possible by the popular vote of the people. We the People need the NPVIC; we need to finally say to the EC: Youre fired! James C. Nelson of Helena is a retired Montana Supreme Court Justice. MISSOULA -- Since Amer Alsaiari moved from Saudi Arabia to the United States nine years ago, the 17-year-old said he, like most Muslims, has experienced acts of hatred because of his faith in Islam. It hasnt always been easy, but Alsaiari said hes noticed something else, too: There are a lot of people fighting for his rights. Alsaiari was one of several hundred protesters at the Missoula Peace March on Sunday, where community members walked in solidarity with the Muslim, refugee and immigrant population in Montana and the nation. The march came after a day of confusion and protests at the nation's airports, as already vetted refugees were prevented from entering the country because of an executive order signed Friday by President Trump that banned entry for refugees and immigrants from seven mostly Muslim countries. The ban does not include Saudi Arabia, where Alsaiari is originally from. But while it doesn't directly affect him, Alsaiari said he would fight to educate those round him. When someone is anti-Muslim, Alsaiari said, its typically because theyve been misinformed about the religion and its followers. I try to ask what they know about Islam and what I can do to change their opinions, Alsaiari said before he joined the march on North Higgins Avenue. Sometimes, Alsaiari said he is able to sway a persons judgments of Muslim culture. Other times, the prejudice remains. But my parents always tell me to just believe in myself, so Im proud to be different, Alsaiari said. We should all be OK with our differences. No matter what your religions are, youre one of us. Missoulians have been marching for peace almost every weekend since Election Day. But organizer Ilana McCloud teamed up with Standing Alongside Americas Muslims, SALAM, after several Montanans testified in favor of a bill proposed last week in Helena that McCloud called racist, unjust and unprecedented.'' Senate Bill 97 would ban the application of foreign law in state courts, including Sharia law, a term used to describe the religious governance followed by those who practice Islam. Courts all over the U.S. consider provisions of religious laws, including Jewish and Roman Catholic canon law, so long as they dont violate the Constitution. McCloud said she heard about the bill and immediately contacted SALAM, a Missoula organization dedicated to supporting local Muslims through education, understanding and informed, respectful discussion. Then Trumps executive order was issued Friday, sparking protests around the country. As a result, hundreds more than normal turned out for Sunday's march here. At the height of the march, McCloud estimated the size at 1,000 participants. The timing was unbelievable, McCloud said, adding that while it feels nice to march, more must come in the future. Were having a Missoula Rises meeting at Imagine Nation Brewing, where well be writing to legislators and teaching people how to be heard,'' she said. That meeting, also known to many as a civic work party, will be held at 6 p.m. on February 1. Eamon Ormseth, a SALAM organizer and Arabic teacher, was shocked when he heard about the bans on entry to the United States. Missoula is home to 56 refugees, half from countries with significant Muslim populations, Ormseth said, and it was planning to take more. This executive order is unconstitutional, Ormseth said as he walked down North Higgins Avenue. As the group flooded the sidewalks, chants broke out and cars honked in support. People inside coffee shops and restaurants ran outside to cheer. One man smoking a cigarette outside turned to a friend and said, So these people dont have jobs, huh? Got nothing better to do? Among the protesters were those against Trumps plan to build a wall along the border with Mexico. Protesters chanted, No hate, no wall, Missoula is home to all. Ormseth said the anti-Muslim sentiment in America typically stems from a deep fear of terrorism, and it can be challenging to debate those who are fearful. Ormseth said finding common ground during a disagreement can be helpful. American values, for example, include the freedom to practice any religion, and the similarities between Islam and Christianity are significant. Ormseth said rather than lecturing people who disagree, the best way to support Muslims, refugees and immigrants in the community is to get educated. He suggested reading up on Islam and current events. The next step, he said, is to flood legislators' phone lines and push against anything that is prejudice. I dont think this is a partisan issue, Ormseth said. I think this is blatant discrimination. U.S. Sen. Steve Daines disagrees, and said the safety of U.S. citizens should be prioritized while existing programs are examined to ensure terrorists arent entering the nation. We are at war with Islamic terrorists, Daines said, and anything less than 100 percent verification of these refugees backgrounds puts our national security at risk. The Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, said foreigners from the seven banned countries have killed no Americans in terrorist attacks in the U.S. since well before 9/11. Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda were born in Saudi Arabia, which was one of the countries not included in the ban. Ninety-five percent of the Muslim world is against ISIS and terrorism and were alienating them, Ormseth said. Its an Arab-Muslim ban on countries Trump isnt doing business with. A handful of Idowu Bamigbaye's fellow international classmates at the University of Montana are from Saudi Arabia, and he said Monday they're worried about traveling because of President Trump's executive order concerning immigrants and refugees. "A few people from Saudi, I don't think they will be traveling home again," said Bamigbaye, a master's student in psychology. Friday, President Donald Trump signed the order banning nationals from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States for at least 90 days -- even if they hold visas and green cards. Sunday evening, though, the Department of Homeland Security said waivers had been granted to many with green cards that give people lawful permanent residency status. "It's really unfair," said Bamigbaye, from Nigeria. "Those people might be established here. They might have children and families here. They'll be badly affected." UM counts 11 students from those countries -- Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Yemen, Somalia and Syria, the last affected indefinitely. Saudi Arabia isn't one of the countries affected, but Bamigbaye knows the order has unsettled those students regardless. "They're still nervous," he said. The 11 students affected by the order are in Missoula, and none was stranded at an airport, said Effie Koehn, interim director of the Global Engagement Office at UM. However, she said she did not know if any of their family members were stopped in travel as a result of the order. Monday, Koehn was in the process of setting up a time to meet with students this week to address their concerns. "We are trying there to give the support and guidance to the students as best as we can, and we are looking forward to the same support and understanding from the Missoula community," Koehn said. She said UM provides the immigration status of students only to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Otherwise, she said UM does not share their status. "This is private information, confidential," Koehn said. Monday afternoon, a UM spokeswoman did not have the number of faculty and staff affected by the ban. However, Mehrdad Kia, a professor of history and director of the Central and Southwest Asian Studies Center, said UM does have some faculty and staff from those countries, and he's talked with colleagues who are dismayed. "They feel humiliated," Kia said. "They feel frightened. And they feel targeted." They are also confused, he said. Can they leave the country to care for an ailing family member? Will they be allowed to return? What is their legal status if they leave? "They don't understand why they have been targeted other than the fact that they have been labeled as Muslims," said Kia, who directs them to attorneys. Trump also has banned all refugees from entering the United States for 120 days, and campuses have pushed back against his dictates. UM is among the universities asking that the temporary ban be "promptly reconsidered" given the hardship it imposes on students, faculty, and staff, and the values of fairness in the nation. Monday, UM President Sheila Stearns emailed the campus community a statement from the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities and said she supported its sentiments. "Public research universities are deeply concerned about the administration's new policy preventing visa and green card holders of seven countries from returning to the U.S. for 90 days," said the statement from the association, citing 17,000 students from the seven countries in the United States last school year. "The consequences of this action, along with the ban on refugees, reverberate far beyond the higher education community and are worthy of everyone's attention." Some students are stranded and unable to return to their research and work, and some faculty may not be able to return to teach, the statement said. Some are separated from their families. "But the impact of this decision goes beyond those immediately impacted," the statement said. "Our nation's universities are enriched and strengthened by the talent, insight, and culture that international students, faculty, researchers and staff bring. "With appropriate and effective vetting, international students from all countries and of all religions have long been a core part of our campus communities and that should continue uninterrupted." In the email, Stearns said UM is a member of the APLU, and the statement reflects her "immediate thoughts on the matter." "I realize that the executive order, the court responses, and the ensuing challenges and changes to policy brings many questions and concerns from those both directly and indirectly affected at the University of Montana," she said. "Please know that we are following this matter closely and working to clearly define our responsibilities and how best to address the needs and concerns of our campus community members." In response to the ban, the School of Journalism was circulating a petition in front of Don Anderson Hall on Monday and offering hot cocoa and coffee to show support for foreign students. "We the undersigned strongly support the presence of foreign students and scholars from all countries and all faiths at UM," read the petition. "We applaud the University of Montana for its efforts to welcome visitors from outside the United States, and we oppose the White House ban." Dean Larry Abramson said the School of Journalism teaches its students to be citizens of the world, and interacting with people from different places, such as Somalia, Iraq, and Iran, shows the truths about those countries. How else will people who have concerns address them? UM's journalism students study abroad -- to Germany last summer to cover the refugee crisis, and Japan this spring to cover the lingering effects of the radiation leaks from the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant -- and he said universities in the United States need to welcome others the same way. "I don't know that any other sector of society is as directly affected," Abramson said of campuses. Kia, who has lectured about Islam and the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia, said the response from Main Hall was inadequate, a "carefully worded memo." "I feel very strongly that the so-called populist discourse of demonizing a certain group of people because of their religion and faith has really crossed the line here," Kia said. For one, he said, the facts don't match the ostensible threat. Kia wanted to know the number of U.S. citizens hurt or killed by citizens of those seven countries in the U.S. The Cato Institute, promoting conservative public policy, posted an answer on its website: "Foreigners from those seven nations have killed zero Americans in terrorist attacks on U.S. soil between 1975 and the end of 2015," according to the Cato post. "Six Iranians, six Sudanese, two Somalis, two Iraqis, and one Yemeni have been convicted of attempting or carrying out terrorist attacks on U.S. soil. Zero Libyans or Syrians have been convicted of planning a terrorist attack on U.S. soil during that time period." Kia wondered why Saudi Arabia, which sent terrorists in the 9/11 attack, and Egypt, given that one of the 9/11 pilots was Egyptian, weren't on the list. "Some have concluded that any country which has had any Trump tower building or hotel has been excluded from the list," he said. White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said Sunday in an NBC broadcast that the list comprises "countries of concern" already identified under the Obama administration and disputed that Trump's business ties influenced the order. President Donald Trump's immigration order sowed more chaos and outrage across the country Sunday, with travelers detained at airports, panicked families searching for relatives and protesters registering opposition to the sweeping measure that was blocked by several federal courts. Muslims in Decatur reacted with shock and dismay at Trump's actions banning travel to the U.S from seven predominantly Muslim countries. It's against the core values of the United States and what we all stand for, said Dr. Rana Mahmood, president of the administration of the Greater Decatur Islamic Center, speaking after prayers Sunday. He said penalizing people already granted refugee status or are holders of green cards and valid travel documents, and had already passed security screening, made no sense. Mahmood, a neurologist, said America's golden reputation as a beacon of freedom for all mankind is being sullied needlessly. He said a nation founded on immigration has always welcomed those who came here lawfully from all ethnic and religious backgrounds and are willing to work hard to build their lives and enhance their adopted homeland. This country is based on that, added Mahmood, 50. But if we start dividing people on the basis of race, ethnicity and religion, it is going to tarnish the image of the U.S all over the world. Mahmood and other Muslim leaders are advising Muslims not to leave the country, even if they have valid residency permits or even U.S. passports. He said with Trump firing off executive orders left and right, it's too unpredictable to know who will end up on some new list of banned travelers. Across the country, attorneys struggled to determine how many people had been affected so far by the rules, which Trump said Saturday were "working out very nicely." But critics described widespread confusion, with an untold number of travelers being held in legal limbo because of ill-defined procedures. Lawyers manned tables at New York's Kennedy Airport to offer help to families whose loved ones had been detained, and some 150 Chicago-area lawyers showed up at O'Hare Airport after getting an email asking for legal assistance on behalf of travelers. Advocates for travelers say the chaos is likely to continue. The executive director of the National Immigration Law Center, Marielena Hincapie, said, "this is just the beginning." Meanwhile, protests continued across the country Sunday. Demonstrations first erupted Saturday, a day after Trump signed the order banning travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen. The president also suspended the U.S. refugee program for four months. A federal judge in New York issued an order Saturday temporarily blocking the government from deporting people with valid visas who arrived after Trump's travel ban took effect. But confusion remained about who could stay and who will be kept out of the country. Federal courts in Virginia, Massachusetts and Washington state took similar action. A more decisive ruling on the legality of the Trump action by U.S. District Judge Ann M. Donnelly will probably take at least several weeks. In the meantime, Muslim families in Decatur are watching the unfolding drama and say it's creating a festering climate of fear that is even affecting their children who are only traveling as far as their local schools. Dr. Mohammed Rahman, a Decatur-based neurosurgeon who was praying at the Greater Decatur Islamic Center on Sunday with his family, says that fear kicked in as soon as the presidential election results were known. My kids woke up and said 'Should we go to school today?' he recalled. The sense of unease has only increased amid Trump's escalating immigration crackdown, which Rahman's four children, age 11 and under, say their classmates and others are all talking about. How is a 5-year-old afraid to go to school make sense? he added. How is that American? And yet, on the other hand, many local Muslims say the good news is the sense of love and caring they get from other people in Central Illinois and other organizations, such as Christian churches. A bouquet of flowers was delivered to the Islamic Center recently from anonymous well-wishers, and Muslims have been pleased to receive calls and offers of support from a local community that has always been welcoming. Mahmood said he and his fellow Muslims in turn welcome visitors from outside their faith and want to promote a climate of peace and understanding. Decatur people are good people, he added. But as the firestorm of controversy over Trump's actions gathered momentum, others took a more nuanced view. U.S. Rep Rodney Davis, R-Taylorville, said this is not a blanket Muslim travel ban and many countries are unaffected. Davis also said America has been left vulnerable to terrorist attack because of previous failures to vet refugees. As the Trump administration works to develop better processes that strengthen national security, I hope cases involving visas are resolved quickly to reduce the burden on those who do not pose a threat to our country, Davis said. We are a proud nation of immigrant heritage and my office continues to help people go through the process to come here safely and legally. As for the new Trump administration, it showed no signs of heeding calls to moderate its approach to Muslim immigration. The Department Of Homeland Security said Sunday that "prohibited travel will remain prohibited." An official with Homeland Security, briefing reporters by phone Saturday, said 109 people who were in transit on airplanes had been denied entry and 173 had not been allowed to get on their planes overseas. Herald & Review Digital Editor Allison Petty contributed to this story. DECATUR Some of the first pieces of construction for a long-anticipated highway transportation project in the northeast portion of Decatur could be started this year. Decatur and Macon County officials are working on securing funding for a portion of the Macon County Beltway project. Still, as will be presented during a study session today during the Decatur City Council meeting, the first noticeable construction is about ready to proceed in the meantime. We want to focus on moving this first leg ahead and take it from there, Decatur Mayor Julie Moore Wolfe said. Construction of the beltway, that has been discussed for more than a decade, is seen as a way to provide jobs and a boost to the local economy as it aids economic development efforts. The northeastern portion of the beltway would provide 6.2 miles of four-lane road between Illinois 48 near Interstate 72 and Illinois 105, or William Street Road. A project is being planned to realign Brush College Road north of Mound Road, Macon County Highway Engineer Bruce Bird said. It is one piece of the work that could affect travel connections,, and Bird said work could get started later in the year. Bird said the county has $6 million in state grants secured so work can begin in that area. Among the changes is adjusting the intersection of Brush College and Illinois 48, where Bird said the beltway will start. Traffic on Brush College will be rerouted just to the south so it doesn't come directly together with users of the beltway, which he said will be routed behind Richland Community College to connect with Reas Bridge Road. As a result of the reconfiguration, a new intersection connecting Brush College with Illinois 48 will be created, Bird said. In addition, Bird said work needs to begin on rebuilding the bridge over Lake Decatur on Reas Bridge Road. It will eventually be part of the four-lane beltway, although Bird said it can be reconstructed two lanes at a time to keep traffic flowing. A detour would be burdensome because of the amount of traffic on that route, Bird said. We'd like to stay away from that, Bird said. He said the bridge needs repairs, and a weight limit was imposed last year to keep it operational for the short term. Both pieces of work show the beltway project is becoming closer than ever to becoming reality, said Ann Schneider, a former Illinois Department of Transportation secretary who was hired last year to serve as a consultant to coordinate work between the city and county on transportation projects. It's much farther along than the other pieces, Schneider said. The proposed bypass, which could take up to two decades to complete, would continue south while widening existing roads as much as possible and stretch around Mount Zion before connecting with U.S. 51 in Elwin, enabling truck traffic to be routed around the city rather than through it. It will provide connectivity, Bird said. That's exactly what the road is going to do. Schneider said $140 million is needed for work in the northeast corridor using a mix of federal, state DOT grants and public-private partnerships. About $84 million of federal grant money has been requested in an attempt to move the next portions in the first phases of work east of Decatur forward, Schneider said. A similar application last year was unsuccessful but a second round of the FASTLANE program with information submitted Dec. 15 has enabled changes to be made in hopes of securing the needed funding. The FASTLANE program has $850 million allocated that can be awarded to government entities around the country. Much of the money is required to go toward projects in rural areas. The odds are very good, Bird said. We scored very well the first time. Schneider said the project has the support from members of the Illinois congressional delegation. With the change in administration, she said when a decision on the application will be made is uncertain. We feel it's in a good place, Schneider said. It's critically important to creating a freer flow of traffic and movement on the east side of Decatur. Development of the beltway could open up business opportunities, particularly related to the Midwest Inland Port. The work has the support of Archer Daniels Midland Co. with its intermodal rail facility as the central piece of the inland port concept. ADM supports the Macon County Beltway project because it will provide more direct routes for truck traffic in and out of our facility to the interstate, said Greg Webb, ADM vice president of state government relations. It will also enhance safety for rail, truck and vehicular traffic around our complex. We are pleased the city and county are pursuing this project and making important strides to help make it a reality. The inland port wasn't even thought of when the beltway was first proposed, so Bird said it's beneficial that plans don't need to be substantially altered in order for both to fit together. The city is interested in the progress of the beltway as it continues to consider options for an overpass to alleviate concerns in the area of Brush College and Faries Parkway, City Manager Tim Gleason said. He said that project remains under consideration, but the work more directly related to the beltway is the top priority at this point. NEOGA -- A fire was sparked Friday evening in a fuel-laden pickup truck that was being driven on the shoulder of Interstate 57 without a passenger side front tire or rim. Assistant Chief Alan Baker of the Neoga Fire Protection District said the driver was unharmed by the fire, but the blaze destroyed the truck and temporarily closed both southbound lanes of I-57 south of Neoga. The sight of sparks shooting out from the truck's empty wheel led to several motorists calling 911 Friday evening, Baker said. Neoga firefighters were called to the scene at approximately 9:40 p.m. after the fire started and the truck came to a rest, he said. Baker said the fire was triggered by the truck's engine being severely damaged while this vehicle was being driven without a passenger front tire or rim. He said the flames were fueled by the truck bed containing a supplemental diesel fuel tank and two propane tanks. "It made a pretty big fire," Baker said. "The fire was so big it was shooting across both (southbound) lanes." Baker said the two southbound lanes were closed for a time and one of them was later reopened to traffic while firefighters were still on the scene. He said the firefighters sprayed 750 gallons of water onto the blazing truck and ultimately used a fire extinguisher to douse the supplemental diesel fuel tank. Firefighters cleared the scene by approximately 12:30 a.m. Saturday after Illinois Department of Transportation crews spread out sand to prevent the water and diesel fuel-covered roadway from becoming slick, Baker said. Illinois State Police and Neoga Police Department officers helped with traffic control at the scene. The accident is being investigated by the state police. If you click on the Google Doodle today, you'll be taken to a search page for Fred Korematsu, the Oakland man who took his battle against internment to the Supreme Court. When Executive Order 9066 was signed in 1942 the presidential order that forcibly removed all Japanese and Japanese-Americans from the West Coast Korematsu went into hiding instead of reporting for the camps. He was arrested in San Leandro, jailed and eventually sent to Topaz. MANILA Philippine air strikes have killed 15 Muslim militants linked to the Islamic State group, including a suspected Indonesian militant, while one of Southeast Asias top terror suspects was seriously wounded in the countrys south, the military chief said Sunday. Military Chief of Staff Gen. Eduardo Ano said the body of the suspected Indonesian militant, known by his nom de guerre Mohisen, was recovered by troops along with three dead Filipino followers of militant leader Isnilon Hapilon, who was seriously wounded on the outskirts of Butig town in Lanao del Sur province. Eleven other militants were reportedly killed, Ano said, citing intelligence. Hapilon was wounded in the arm and was losing blood after air force aircraft, including FA50 supersonic fighter jets, dropped six 500-pound bombs Wednesday night and Thursday on a militant camp in an ongoing offensive, Ano said. It was the first time that the FA50s, which were acquired from South Korea in late 2015 as the militarys only fighter jets, were deployed in a combat mission. Hapilon was being moved around by his men on a makeshift stretcher but could not escape from Lanao, about 520 miles south of Manila, because artillery-backed troops have blocked possible exits, Ano said. The military will ask Indonesian authorities for help in confirming the identity and background of Mohisen, who was not among the foreigners previously monitored as having joined Filipino militant groups in the south. Hapilon reportedly was designated to lead an Islamic State group branch in Southeast Asia and is on the U.S. Department of Justice list of most-wanted terrorists worldwide with a reward of up to $5 million for his capture. He moved to Butig from his stronghold on southern Basilan island a month ago with about 30 fighters to look for a base, Ano said. Islamic State commanders apparently wanted Hapilon to set up a base in Lanao, a vast region that offers more security than his mountain base on Basilan island, so foreign militants could have a springboard to expand their influence, he said. President Rodrigo Duterte has repeatedly warned the emergence of Islamic State-influenced militant groups is fast looming as a major national security threat. Jim Gomez is an Associated Press writer. BERLIN Reflecting mounting European anger and astonishment at President Trump, several countries on Sunday rejected sometimes in blunt terms his ban on all refugees and the citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries entering the United States. The spokesman for Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany said there was no justification not even the fight against terrorism for refusing to admit refugees fleeing war. Prime Minister Theresa May of Britain revised her stance on the U.S. directive to take a harder line, while Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni of Italy said Trumps approach ran counter to basic European principles. Steffen Seibert, a spokesman for Merkel, said in a statement that she had reminded Trump during their telephone conversation Saturday that the Geneva Convention on refugees obliges all member states to take in people fleeing war. The chancellor is convinced that the resolute fight against terrorism does not justify blanket suspicion on grounds of origin or belief, Seibert said, a day after Merkel and Trump talked at length for the first time since his inauguration Jan. 20. In London, after Mays response to a question about the issue Saturday at a news conference in Turkey prompted sharp criticism of her unwillingness to criticize Trump, her spokesman said that the British government did not agree with this kind of approach, and it is not one we will be taking. Gentilioni, whose country took in more than 180,000 migrants last year, did not mention Trump or the United States by name in a post on Twitter, but there seemed little doubt about what he was referring to. Italy is anchored in its values, he wrote Sunday. Open society, pluralism, no discrimination. They are the pillars of Europe. The comments came a day after President Francois Hollande of France, who unlike Merkel is not running for re-election this year, said he had reminded Trump of his conviction that the ongoing fight to defend our democracy will be effective only if we sign up to respect to the founding principles and, in particular, the welcoming of refugees. Seibert said Merkel had explained her stance to Trump, even though statements released in Washington and Berlin hours after their conversation made no mention of Merkels views on the executive order that the president signed Friday. Merkel reacted coolly to Trumps election in November, offering close cooperation only on the basis of shared values such as equal treatment for all, with no discrimination on the basis of faith, political views, sexual orientation or ethnic origin. Her stance on Trumps executive order was in line with that approach. Merkel, who grew up in Communist East Germany and is the daughter of a Lutheran pastor, has invoked that background in justifying her decision to allow more than 1 million asylum seekers, many of them Muslims, into Germany since 2015. In his interview with Germanys Bild newspaper and the Times of London, Trump was strongly critical of Merkels refugee policy. I think she made one very catastrophic mistake, and that was taking all of these illegals, you know, taking all of the people from wherever they come from, he said. And nobody even knows where they come from. The influx of refugees has hurt the chancellor politically and helped the rise of a far-right party that has ridden antirefugee and anti-Muslim sentiment to capture seats in 10 of Germanys 16 state legislatures. The party, Alternative for Germany, seems certain to enter the federal parliament after the Sept. 24 elections, which will follow crucial votes in the Netherlands and France this spring and help determine whether a weakened Europe can maintain its unity. A spokesman for May, who was not identified by name under traditional ground rules, said that if Trumps policy affects British citizens, as it will for people who are citizens of two countries, then clearly we will make representations to the U.S. government about that. The comments followed a backlash from politicians and on social media, after comments from May in a news conference in Ankara, the Turkish capital, where she had flown after becoming the first foreign leader to meet with the new U.S. president. After meeting Turkish leaders, she was asked several times by British journalists about her reaction to the executive order. She refused to condemn the policy and finally said after reporters shouted, Answer the question! that the United States is responsible for the United States policy on refugees. The United Kingdom is responsible for the United Kingdoms policy on refugees. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson took a harder line in a Twitter post Sunday. We will protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals home and abroad, he wrote. Divisive and wrong to stigmatize because of nationality. Alison Smale is a New York Times writer. BAGHDAD Iraqi lawmakers Monday called for banning Americans from entering the country after President Trump signed an executive order suspending immigration from Iraq and citizens of six other Muslim-majority nations. The vote is not binding on the Iraqi government, but it could strain relations between Baghdad and Washington amid the military operation to retake Mosul from the Islamic State group. The vote was described as a recommendation, by deputy speaker of parliament, Sheikh Humam Hamoudi, and called for the U.S. Congress to pressure the American administration to reconsider that decision regarding Iraq. The Foreign Ministry also spoke out against Trumps order, saying it regrets such a decision against a country that the U.S. considers an ally and a strategic partner. It is a surprise that Iraq is covered with this order because it is not among the countries that export terrorists or Takfiri ideology, the statement added, using an Arabic term that refers to Sunni extremists. The Iraqi community inside the U.S. enjoys a good reputation and its members have not been involved in any terrorist act. The ministry described Trumps decision as wrong and called for him to reconsider it. The 90-day travel ban affects citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. The Pentagon is compiling a list of Iraqis who have supported U.S. and coalition personnel to help exempt them from Trumps ban, said Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman. The list will include those who have demonstrated their commitment to supporting U.S. forces, such as translators, drivers and Iraqi forces who may be training in the U.S. Trumps ban and the Iraqi parliament decision came as Iraqi forces are more than three months into the fight to dislodge Islamic State militants from Mosul. Iraqi forces control about half of Iraqs second-largest city. The Mosul operation is the largest in Iraq since 2003 and one in which Iraqis are more dependent than ever on U.S. support. The U.S.-led coalition said it has dropped more than 9,900 munitions in and around the city since the operation began in October. Iraqi forces are largely dependent on coalition air power to retake and hold territory. Iraqi officers leading the Mosul battle say they doubt that politics will hurt the military effort. Brig. Gen. Haider Fadhil said he believes U.S. support for Iraq will increase, since Trump has pledged to hasten the pace of the fight against the militants. The Iraq bill calls for a reciprocal measure in the event the American side will not retreat from that order to maintain the state prestige and the dignity of the Iraqi people. Qassim Abdul-Zahra and Muhanad Al-Saleh are Associated Press writers. JERUSALEM Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that the U.S. Embassy in Israel should be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, injecting himself once again into a charged campaign trail promise of U.S. President Trump. Netanyahus comments at his weekly Cabinet meeting appeared aimed at countering reports that Israel was concerned about the fallout of such a move, which is vehemently opposed by the Palestinians and has sparked fears of a renewed outbreak of violence. It comes a day after Netanyahu unilaterally endorsed Trumps call to build a wall along the Mexican border, saying the Israeli model along its border with Egypt has proven successful I would like to clarify unequivocally that our view has always been, and continues to be, that the United States embassy should be here in Jerusalem, Netanyahu said. Jerusalem is the capital of Israel and it is appropriate that not only the American embassy will be here but that all embassies will move here and I believe that in due course most will come here, to Jerusalem. Currently, nearly all foreign embassies are located in the coastal city of Tel Aviv because their countries have refrained from recognizing Jerusalem as Israels capital until its status is resolved in future peace talks. Israel has long called for the embassies to be relocated but hasnt pushed hard for it given the widespread international opposition. But Trumps rise has emboldened Israels nationalists. His campaign platform made no mention of a Palestinian state, a cornerstone of two decades of international diplomacy in the region, and he has signaled that he will be far more tolerant of Israeli settlement construction than his predecessors. Both his designated ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, now a top aide and Mideast envoy, have deep ties to the settler movement. Friedman and Kushners family foundation have both been generous contributors to the Beit El settlement, and a delegation of settler representatives was invited to Trumps inauguration. The Palestinians want the West Bank and east Jerusalem areas captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war for their hoped-for state. Former President Barack Obama, like the rest of the international community, considered the building of settlements an obstacle to peace and frequently criticized their construction. Aron Heller is an Associated Press writer. LONDON President Trumps order barring U.S. entry to people from seven majority-Muslim nations is divisive, discriminatory and wrong, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said Monday. But he rebuffed calls for the government to cancel Trumps planned state visit to the United Kingdom because of the temporary ban. Johnson said he had told American officials that its wrong to promulgate policies that stigmatize people on the basis of their nationality. He told lawmakers in the House of Commons that the Trump administration had assured him that all British passport holders remain welcome to travel to the U.S., even if they are also citizens of one of the seven countries. Confusion has reigned about whether dual nationals are affected by the 90-day ban on citizens of Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya. Britains three biggest opposition parties have all called on the government to revoke Trumps state visit, planned for later this year, and an online petition opposing the trip has more than 1.3 million signatures. Any petition with more than 100,000 signatures must be considered for a debate in Parliament, though not a binding vote. State visits involve lavish ceremony, generally with a stay at Buckingham Palace as the guest of Queen Elizabeth II. Johnson echoed Prime Minister Theresa Mays Downing Street office in saying that the visit should go ahead. Labor lawmaker Yvette Cooper was one of several legislators to accuse the government of a weak response. Noting that Trumps order had been signed on Holocaust Memorial Day, she told Johnson: For the sake of history, for heavens sake have the guts to speak out. Jill Lawless is an Associated Press writer. SANAA, Yemen A U.S. military service member was killed Sunday during a raid against al Qaeda militants in central Yemen that also left nearly 30 others dead, including women and children. The loss of the service member is the first-known combat death of a member of the U.S. military under President Trump. Americans are saddened this morning with news that a life of a heroic service member has been taken in our fight against the evil of radical Islamic terrorism, Trump said in a statement. The U.S. has been striking al Qaeda in Yemen from the air for more than 15 years, mostly using drones, and Sundays surprise pre-dawn raid could signal a new escalation against extremist groups in the Arab worlds poorest but strategically located country. An al Qaeda official and an online news service linked to the terror group said the raid left about 30 people dead. Among the children killed was Anwaar, the 8-year-old daughter of Anwar al-Awlaki, a radical Yemeni-American cleric killed in a U.S. air strike in Yemen in 2011, according to the girls grandfather. Nasser al-Awlaki told the Associated Press that Anwaar was visiting her mother when the raid took place. She was shot in the neck and bled for two hours before she died, he said. U.S. Central Command said in a statement that three service members were wounded in the raid and that a fourth one was injured in a hard landing in a nearby location. The aircraft was unable to fly afterward and was intentionally destroyed, it added. It said 14 militants from al Qaedas branch in Yemen, formally known as al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, were killed in the assault and that U.S. service members taking part in the raid captured information that will likely provide insight into the planning of future terror plots. A U.S. defense official said the raid was approved by Trump. President Barack Obama had been briefed on it before he left office on Jan. 20, but for operational reasons it was not ready to be executed before he departed, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The news service linked to al Qaeda in Yemen likened the raid to a massacre against Muslims and said U.S. warplanes were first seen in the sky above the area at 9 p.m. Saturday and that the raid began at 2 a.m. Sunday, with 16 missiles hitting three houses near Yakla village in Radaa district. A two-hour gun battle ensued after American service members landed on the ground, it said. Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, long seen by Washington as among the most dangerous branches of the global terror network, has exploited the chaos of Yemens civil war, seizing territory in the south and east. Ahmed Al-Haj and Maggie Michael are Associated Press writers. Immigration Protests in Albuquerque Our weekend began with President Trump (still real) signing an executive order temporarily banning immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. By Sunday night, hundreds and possibly thousands in Albuquerque had joined with hundreds of thousands across the country to protest the move. The group gathered by UNM and marched to the Sunport. How Milo can you go? Breitbart writer and right-wing Milo Yiannopoulos as planned on Friday night. The event was packed with both those who wanted to hear what he had to say and those who wished he wouldn't have opened his mouth in the first place. New Mexico's the best! Who's with me? Uh... One of the weekend's more fascinating reads was a into New Mexico's declining population. Taking into account the fact that our state should naturally have gained residents, New Mexico has seen a net population drop. The primary reason, experts say, is that we just don't have the jobs to attract people. Martinez mum on wall critique Gov. Susana Martinez withheld comment on Donald Trump's border wall plan. The Associated Press on Friday. Through a spokesman, the governor expressed support for putting more agents on the border and giving the federal government "a variety of tools" to protect the border. Is a wall a tool? Ask her if you see her, because the AP couldn't get the governor's office to say. State Ponders Plans for Garrett's Desert Inn After acquiring the property underneath the iconic downtown Santa Fe motor inn, the State Land Commissioner is about what to do with it. The current lease fetches only about $20,000 annually, a number that could rise maybe 15 times over, the state estimates. The motel might stay, get modified or the whole property off Old Santa Fe Trail could become senior apartments. No word on what would happen to the Bobcat...er, Santa Fe Bite. We Find It To Be a Fascinating Play Between Light and Dark Nope, not Rogue One and not whatever you sipped box wine in front of at Friday's gallery opening. It's state Sen. Cliff Pirtle's to set New Mexico permanently on daylight saving time. Pirtle, whose betrays a deep-seated desire to craft bespoke riding britches or hand-hammered farm implements, has stood by the effort to keep us from having to spring forward or fall back or wonder if our phone is displaying the proper time. The Winner, After a Spell In an event that lasted three and a half hours, fifth grader Akansha Nanda rocked "lamprey" to take the title of champion speller of Santa Fe County. It was apparently , replete with audience controversy including coughing fits and inappropriate cell phone use. Councilor Wants to Change Alcohol Rule on City Property A Santa Fe city councilor wants to update the city's process for serving alcohol at special events on city property. The rules to allow more reasonable sizes of high-alcohol beers like craft brews. It also would allow hard cider to be served. Still no booze, and the Plaza is off limits. Subscribe to the Morning Word at Thanks for reading! The Word's bringing donuts today, but it's the quick-pick dozen. You get what you get!Subscribe to the Morning Word at sfreporter.com/signup Santa Fe Reporter The Labour and Green parties fired the opening salvo in their election year bid to present a united front committed to changing what both its leaders described as a "tired government" that was out of ideas after three terms in office. A combined crowd of Labour and Green party supporters filled the Mt Albert community hall to overflowing for a carefully choreographed 'state of the nation' event in the heart of an electorate where the two parties are contesting a by-election to replace former Labour MP David Shearer, and which the National and NZ First parties have decided not to contest. Little's pitch was a combination of highlighting Labour's policies to build 10,000 new houses a year, shore up health spending and invest in education, an appeal to Labour and the Greens as standard-bearers for tolerant, progressive politics at a time when global politics is swinging to harsher prescriptions, and attacks on newly appointed Prime Minister Bill English for failures of leadership. "The places that used to light world with their progressive thinking - their lights shine more dimly now," said Little, referring to the US under president Donald Trump and the rise of far right politicians in Europe. "We can set the standard for cooperation, for tolerance, for a government that governs with compassion." Both his and Green co-leader Metiria Turei's speech were short on specifics of new economic policy, made no mention of immigration policy beyond Turei promising to double New Zealand's refugee quota. However, Little did commit Labour to running surpluses and paying down government debt, and told journalists after the event that the two parties were working on a set of principles to govern economic management. "You can expect to see some time soon a shared commitment to a set of principles and guidelines that will govern us in terms of economic management," Little said. New Zealanders will get a very clear understanding on what constraints were putting on what were doing and what they can expect from a Labour-Greens government." Both Little and Turei hammered English for failing to attend Waitangi Day celebrations at Waitangi, declining to contest Mt Albert, and not firing "the failed Housing Minister, his friend Nick Smith. "Here's the truth: National is out of ideas and out of touch. They've got nothing new to offer. Bill English said it this week. He said: 'we've reached the limits of what government can do'. "Bill English is a competent bean-counter but he's showing he's not a leader." Turei aimed her comments at women voters, honouring "fierce women" who stood up for their beliefs and accusing male National MPs of using "rape as a political weapon" in an incident at Palriament in 2015, when female Green and Labour MPs walked out en masse in response to comments by then Prime Minister John Key. BusinessDesk.co.nz 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: SKC - ADDITIONAL US PRIVATE PLACEMENT FUNDING SECURED Spark New Zealand Limited's Annual Meeting Results 2022 Fonterra Australia settles class action proceedings PFI - Q3 Dividend, Development and Divestment Update November 4th Morning Report FPH to announce half year results on 29 November 2022 ATM - FDA approval to supply infant milk formula to United States Steel & Tube - Adopts ESG World Platform BGP - 3rd Quarter Sales to 30 October 2022 GEO - Quarterly Operating Update New Zealand saw record numbers of tourists and immigrants in 2016 with more migrants coming in on work visas and more holidaymakers than ever before, and economists expect migrant inflows to keep rising. Annual net migration hit 70,600 in December 2016, with the biggest net migrant gains from China, India, the UK and the Philippines. Migrant arrivals rose 4 percent to 127,300 in the year, also a new record, while migrant departures dipped 0.5 percent to 56,700. Short-term visitor arrivals, which includes tourists, people visiting family and friends and people travelling for work, reached 3.5 million in the year ended Dec. 31, up 12 percent from the year earlier, Statistics New Zealand said. New Zealand has imposed tougher criteria for skilled migrants and cracked down on applications for student visas over increased concerns about the level of immigration. At the same time, the government has extolled the benefits of immigration, with a swelling population stoking more activity and record inflows of tourists underpinning an economy growing at a rapid pace. At the same time, a rising population has posed problems for policymakers by fuelling demand for an already-stretched housing market in Auckland, while restraining wage growth. Today's data show the most popular country of origin for permanent and long-term arrivals was Australia, with some 26,000 migrants coming to New Zealand in the year, but this was offset by about 24,000 long-term or permanent departures across the Tasman in the course of the year. A net 10,310 migrants arrived from China in 2016, a 16 percent lift on 2015, while a net 8,900 came from India, a drop of 33 percent on the year earlier. There was a 54 percent jump in net migration from the UK to 5,600. "The past year has seen a marked lift in arrivals from the UK (up nearly 2000 people on last years levels) and China. The increase in arrivals is mainly due to more people coming on work or residency visa, which has offset a decline in the number of international students," Satish Ranchhod, senior economist at Westpac, said in a note. "Second, the level of departures of NZ citizens is currently at very low levels, while the number of New Zealanders returning from offshore has risen steadily. "These trends are expected to continue to some time, with NZs positive economic story, including its labour market, making it a very attractive destination. We expect net migration inflows to remain strong for some time," Ranchhod said. Of the new migrants who arrived in the year, a net 33,900, or 48 percent, settled in Auckland, followed by a net 9.6 percent who moved to Canterbury, net 5.2 percent going to Wellington and net 3.9 percent settling in Waikato. There was a 10 percent lift in work visas given out in 2016 to 41,600, with that category of visa accounting for the most migrant arrivals in the year, ahead of New Zealand and Australian citizens at 37,700. Student visas dropped 12 percent to 24,600, while residence visas increased 18 percent to 16,500. Today's data show a 16.2 percent uplift in the number of visitors holidaying in New Zealand in the year to 1.8 million, with most holidaymakers from Australia, China or the US. On an annual basis, Australians made up 562,000 of the 1.8 million holidaymakers, while China was the second-biggest pool at 311,000. Business visitors rose 1.4 percent in December from the same month a year earlier to 17,800, and increased 5.2 percent on an annual basis to 289,000, about two-thirds of whom came from across the Tasman. BusinessDesk.co.nz 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: SKC - ADDITIONAL US PRIVATE PLACEMENT FUNDING SECURED Spark New Zealand Limited's Annual Meeting Results 2022 Fonterra Australia settles class action proceedings PFI - Q3 Dividend, Development and Divestment Update November 4th Morning Report FPH to announce half year results on 29 November 2022 ATM - FDA approval to supply infant milk formula to United States Steel & Tube - Adopts ESG World Platform BGP - 3rd Quarter Sales to 30 October 2022 GEO - Quarterly Operating Update New Zealand shares dropped, led by Chorus and Fisher & Paykel Healthcare on continued Trump concerns, while Heartland Bank and Air New Zealand rose. The S&P/NZX 50 Index fell 48.7 points, or 0.7 percent, to 7,085.56. Within the index, 27 stocks dropped, 12 were unchanged and 11 rose. Turnover was $70 million. "We are very slow today, there's no catalyst at the moment to drive anything," said Peter McIntyre, investment adviser at Craigs Investment Partners. "The market's grinding to a standstill today, until we get some decent corporate news flow - it's not surprising when you have Auckland anniversary that volumes are so light." Chorus led the index lower, dropping 3.7 percent to $4.07. Along with Northpower, Ultrafast Fibre, and Enable, it has been awarded contracts to extend the nationwide ultrafast fibre network to 151 extra towns. Separately, Chorus said it will extend UFB to a further 169 regions, adding more than 200,000 households and businesses to its network. "I think there are doubts in the market that it's going to have a negative impact on their copper network, which is still quite a good earner for them. Some analysts still have a bit of doubt whether that's going to be good in the long run," McIntyre said. Fisher & Paykel Healthcare dropped 1.9 percent to $8.70, extending its losses from last week after US President Donald Trump announced his plan to impose a 20 percent import tariff on Mexican goods to pay for the wall he wants to build. Fisher & Paykel manufactures goods for the American market in the Mexican town of Tijuana. "Again it's concern about what's happening with regards to the state of play with imports into the US from Mexico. It's had a good run over the past three or four years, so some investors are taking some money off the top, admittedly on low volumes," McIntyre said. Argosy Property shed 1.9 percent to $1.025, Spark New Zealand dropped 1.7 percent to $3.535, and Metlifecare declined 1.6 percent to $5.51. Heartland Bank was the best performer, up 1.3 percent to $1.56, while Air New Zealand gained 1.2 percent to $2.16 and Stride Property rose 1.1 percent to $1.79. NZX was unchanged at $1.11. The shares have been reiterated as 'outperform' by brokerage First NZ Capital, which raised its earnings forecasts for 2017 and 2018 primarily to reflect the market operator's sale of the unprofitable Clear Grain Exchange. First NZ analyst Greg Main raised his target price for NZX to $1.17 from $1.12 in the report. Outside the benchmark index, Hellaby Holdings was unchanged at $3.58. ASX-listed auto firm Bapcor edged closer to its takeover of Hellaby, lifting its holding to just below the 90 percent level that will allow it to compulsorily acquire the remaining shares. Bapcor has already declared its $3.60-per-share offer, which closes on Feb. 7, unconditional. G3 Group was unchanged at 62 cents. The NXT-listed mail operations and document manager was ahead of its annual margin targets in the third quarter of its financial year, though it remains behind on its inventory turnover target. BusinessDesk.co.nz 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: SKC - ADDITIONAL US PRIVATE PLACEMENT FUNDING SECURED Spark New Zealand Limited's Annual Meeting Results 2022 Fonterra Australia settles class action proceedings PFI - Q3 Dividend, Development and Divestment Update November 4th Morning Report FPH to announce half year results on 29 November 2022 ATM - FDA approval to supply infant milk formula to United States Steel & Tube - Adopts ESG World Platform BGP - 3rd Quarter Sales to 30 October 2022 GEO - Quarterly Operating Update EPPING, N.H. (AP) Police say two employees at a New Hampshire Burger King have been arrested on drug charges after authorities were tipped off that drive-thru customers who asked for extra crispy fries got marijuana with their meal. NH1 reports Epping Police Chief Mike Wallace said 20-year-old Garrett Norris was arrested Saturday after police conducted a sting operation. Also arrested was 19-year-old Meagan Dearborn, the shift manager. Wallace said drive-thru buyers would ask for "Nasty Boy," then for extra crispy fries. Wallace said the drugs weren't put in the food; they were sold in a separate container. He said the operation didn't involve the franchise owners. Norris and Dearborn are scheduled for arraignment Feb. 28. It wasn't known if they had lawyers and phone numbers couldn't be found for them. Former Shaw University president immortalized in hometown A Roanoke Rapids native who was president of two universities, received the Presidential Medal of Freedom and was Secretary of Education to the U.S. Virgin Islands will be immortalized locally in February. The Roanoke Rapids City Council has unanimously voted for a resolution in honor of the late James E. Cheek Sr. Although voted on January 17, the Council agreed to hold the resolution at its first February meeting, coinciding with Black History Month. To champion Cheeks achievements and petition the City Council was Rodney D. Pierce, a sixth-grade social studies teacher at William R. Davie Middle School in Roanoke Rapids. Cheek, born on December 4, 1932, attended John Armstrong Chaloner School when it served as the K-12 school for blacks during segregation. In his youth, he became a minister at the age of 13 before becoming licensed at 17. Although Cheek suffered from severe cataracts, Pierce said that didnt stop him. Despite his optical setback, Cheek was an honors student at Dudley High School where he was also the editor-in-chief of the school newspaper and captain of the debate team, Pierce said. After finishing his secondary education at Lutheran College High School, he served in the U.S. Air Force from 1950-51 during the Korean War and was honorably discharged. He obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in history and sociology from Shaw University in Raleigh. He also received three fellowships while completing his Master of Divinity degree (with honors) from Colgate Rochester Divinity School and his doctorate from Drew University, Pierce added. Cheek went on to eventually serve as president of Shaw and at Howard University in Washington. Cheek had an arduous task when he inherited Shaw, as the school was on the verge of bankruptcy, its student population was below 600 and its accreditation was in jeopardy. In his six-year tenure, he established remedial courses to help students graduate and implemented a $22 million renaissance program that rescued the school from financial insolvency, Pierce said. Shaws annual budget went from $700,000 to $5.9 million and its assets increased from $2.6 million in 1963 to $10 million by 1969. Student enrollment doubled and faculty and staff received pay raises as teacher salaries went above the national average. There was also a student-operated FM-radio outlet with a TV station planned for the future. President Ronald Reagan was the one who presented Cheek with the Medal of Freedom. After President Bill Clinton took office, Cheek became Secretary of Education to the U.S. Virgin Islands and served in that capacity from 1995-97. President George H.W. Bush had also offered Cheek a similar role. When the elder Bush became president, Cheek, his status was considered so high he was considered a candidate for Secretary of Education. He actually turned down President Bush in 1989 when he wanted him to become the new ambassador to the Republic of Cameroons in Africa, Pierce said. Pierce said he began work on the Cheek recognition in October 2015, when he reached out to Cheeks son, James Cheek Jr. Dr. Cheek was quoted in an interview as saying, In order to have influence, you have to have access. My hope is that the access youve granted me this evening will allow my words to influence you to adopt a resolution or proclamation recognizing the life of this exemplary man. Thank you, Pierce said to the City Council. This story originally appeared on www.rrdailyherald.com on January 26, 2017. Reporting by Khai Hoang. Armenias Special Investigative Service (SIS) is refusing to provide Hetq a copy of its decision to drop a criminal investigation into the offshore business interests of Mihran Poghosyan, a former head of the countrys Compulsory Enforcement Service. Hetq asked that the SIS forward a copy of the decision as well as copies of the applications the SIS sent to Switzerland and Panama requesting legal assistance in the Poghosyan matter. The SIS, quoting Article 262, Part 1, of Armenias Criminal Procedure Code, says that copies of a decision to drop or halt criminal proceedings is sent to the suspect, the accused, the defense lawyer, the injured party or their representative, the civil plaintiff/defendant, or their representative. According to the law, a copy is also sent to an individual or legal entity upon whose statement the criminal investigation was launched in the first place. The SIS goes on to argue that Hetq cannot be provided a copy of the decision since the news outlet is none of the above. We should note that the criminal investigation was launched based on the research done by Hetq into the Panama Papers and Poghosyans links to offshore businesses. Moreover, in the past, Hetq has been sent copies of decisions to drop criminal proceedings that were launched based on Hetq articles. Hetq wrote about the Poghosyans (Armenias former Chief Compulsory Officer) shady financial dealings in Panama and his Swiss banks accounts in April 2016, after data was uncovered in the Panama Papers. The data was obtained by the German newspaper SuddeutscheZeitung and shared by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) with the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and more than 110 media partners from 82countries, including Hetq. On January 11, 2017, Armenias SIS said that it had received a notice from Switzerlands Federal Department of Justice and Police, saying that it couldnt offer legal assistance in the offshore business case of Mihran Poghosyan. On January 25, 2017, the SIS announced that it had dropped the investigation of Poghosyan after Swiss and Panamanian authorities refused to help the probe into Panama Papers revelations. However, the Swiss Federal Department of Justice told the Organized Crime and Corruption Project (OCCRP) in an email that they turned down the Armenian request for legal assistance on November 8, 2016 because the requirements of the request were not properly fulfilled. Italian ex-Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi will stand trial again after prosecutors accused him of bribing witnesses to lie about previous accusations he paid for sex with an underage prostitute. A Milan judge indicted 80 year-old Berlusconi on Saturday for corruption and ordered the trial to start on April 5. Prosecutors claim he gave 20 young women 10 million (US$ 10.6 million) and expensive gifts in return for their silence in the landmark Rubygate case, local media reported. In 2013 Berlusconi was convicted for having sex with 17-year-old Moroccan prostitute, Karima El Mahroug, better known by her stage name Ruby the Heartstealer, during his so-called bunga-bunga parties at his villa. He appealed and was acquitted the following year, but prosecutors now claim thats because he paid off the witnesses. During the trial Berlusconi said he did pay at least 2,500 (US$ 2,659) a month to several girls because he felt responsible because they have committed the only crime of accepting an invitation to dinner at the home of the prime minister. El Mahrough alone allegedly received 7 million (US$ 7.4 million), according to Reuters. She and 22 others, including the women who attended Berlusconis so-called bunga-bunga parties, her former lawyer Luca Giuliante, journalist Carlo Rossella and Senator Mariarosaria Rossi, are already being tried for corruption and perjury. Berlusconis case is being handled separately because he was unable to attend the pretrial hearings held last October for health reasons. Berlusconis lawyer, Federico Cecconi, admits that Berlusconi helped the women financially. Cecconi insists that Berlusconi did not bribe the women and remarked that the former Prime Minister is on trial for the offense of generosity. Silvio Berlusconi in May 2010 (Photo: alessio85 CC BY 2.0) occrp.org " " Members of the Black Panther Party demonstrate outside the Criminal Courts Building one month after 21 Panthers were charged with plotting to dynamite city stores, a police station and a railroad right-of-way, New York City. Jack Manning/New York Times Co./Getty Images "[Huey Newton said], 'You know, the nature of a panther I looked it up... If you push it into a corner that panther is going to try to move left or right to get you to get out of the way. But if you keep pushing it back into that corner sooner or later that panther is going to come out of that corner and try to wipe out who keeps oppressing it in that corner.' I says, 'Wow, Huey, That's just like black people we're pushed in a corner.'" That's how Black Panther co-founder Bobby Seale described how the Black Panther Party got its name [source: Oakland Museum of California]. Advertisement The Black Panther Party was founded in 1966 by Merritt College students Bobby Seale and Huey Newton in Oakland, California [source: Duncan]. The pair was frustrated by persisting racial inequalities in police treatment, housing, education, health care and other fundamental areas. But a big part of their platform was self-defense defending themselves (and other African Americans) from the police and other people who might want to hurt them. Newton and Seale thought the non-violent civil rights movement championed by Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. was moving too slowly, and they identified instead with the more radical ideologies put forth by leaders like Malcolm X. Indeed, the original name of the group was the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense [source: Oakland Museum of California]. The organization eventually spread to chapters in 48 states and a number of other countries, including South Africa, Japan and England [source: Duncan]. Party leaders developed a specific Ten Point Program that outlined the organization's concerns and demands. Equal opportunity for employment at a fair wage, financial reparations for the enslavement of millions of African Americans, and access to decent housing, education and health care were among the issues listed. They also called for the release of Black and oppressed prison inmates because, in the words of the program manifesto, "We believe that the many Black and poor oppressed people now held in United States prisons and jails have not received fair and impartial trials under a racist and fascist judicial system and should be free from incarceration." The party began to elicit attention by conducting armed patrols of Oakland's poor neighborhoods, which was perfectly legal thanks to a loophole Newton discovered in state law that permitted loaded weapons to be carried openly. So, Panthers walked the streets, witnessing arrests and other police interactions in an effort to discourage brutality [source: Blake]. Not surprisingly, this tactic inspired fearful politicians to change the law, post haste, all the while driving more attention to the Panthers and their cause. What happens in the parlor affects cows at that moment and throughout their lactation. Thats why efforts to pinpoint the goldilocks level of milkout have become increasingly important on dairies The term overmilking applies to any time that the milking unit remains on the cow when milk flow to the teat cistern is lower than the flow out of the teat canal, shared Penn States Amber Yutzy. Overmilking quite literally opens the teat cistern to bacterial infection from the reverse pressure gradients. Yutzy explained in a recent Penn State Dairy Digest article that the mouthpiece chamber vacuum of a milking unit goes up during overmilking. At the same time, the fluctuation of the chamber vacuum elevates. The combination puts added pressure on the teat end and opens the door to bacterial infection. Oftentimes that pressure to the teat results in hyperkeratosis, the thickening of the skin that lines the teat canal and the skin directly outside the opening to the teat. The combination of hyperkeratosis and higher vacuum levels increases the susceptibility of cows to bacterial infection, high somatic cell counts, and mastitis. Yutzy recommends conducting a simple strip test to pinpoint milkout level on the farm. Immediately after milking, she said, hand strip each quarter for 15 seconds and collect any milk in a container. That leftover milk should amount to around one cup. The test can also be conducted by putting the milking unit back on within 30 seconds of it detaching and applying downward pressure. After 15 seconds, remove the unit and check the milking meter. Yutzy explained that once again about a cup of milk should be collected. Any more or less, and Yutzy suggests checking equipment for issues. If automatic detachers are used, they should be maintained for timely removal of the milking unit. Employees must be well-informed about what the proper time for take off is as well, particularly in the case of manual removal of units. It is important to look at your overall milking routine and have timely unit attachment and proper let-down, quiet cow handling and timely unit adjustment, and proper alignment, Yutzy concluded. The proper amount of scrutiny given to routinely performing strip tests and regularly checking teat end health allows farms to stay ahead of over or under milking concerns. HELSINKI: Finnish telecommunications giant Nokia has created a customised digital assistant "MIKA" that will improve telecom operators' efficiency by providing engineers faster access to critical information. MIKA that stands for 'Multi-purpose Intuitive Knowledge Assistant' is the first digital assistant trained specifically for the telecom industry, designed to provide automated assistance that saves time and frees highly skilled workers to focus on critical tasks. "MIKA taps into the power of the Nokia AVA platform to provide quick and accurate answers, avoiding time wasted on fruitless searches. It is customised to support the specific needs of telecoms, and can deliver recommendations based on experience from networks around the world," said Igor Leprince, Head of Global Services at Nokia, in a statement. MIKA combines augmented intelligence with automated learning to provide access to an extensive range of tools, documents and data sources. These include the Nokia AVA knowledge library, a repository of best practices gathered from Nokia projects around the world. Using the knowledge library MIKA can provide recommendations based on similar issues seen in other networks. MIKA is available via a web interface and mobile agent so that engineers can tap into its knowledge base, wherever they are. In addition to launching MIKA, Nokia introduces 'Predictive Repair', a service that will enable operators to reduce costs and improve network quality by moving away from break-fix approaches to hardware maintenance. "The care service can predict hardware failures and recommend replacements up to 14 days in advance, with up to 95% accuracy," the company said. Read Also: Ultrafast Camera Images 'Sonic Boom' Of Light For First Time Micromax Launches New 'Vdeo Range' Smartphones NEW DELHI: Taking the imaging experience a notch higher, Sony India on Monday launched Cyber-shot HX350 camera with 50x zoom at 28,990. The HX350 is loaded with a 20.4MP, high-resolution back-illuminated Exmor R CMOS sensor and a "BIONZ X" imaging processor for effective and accurate image processing. "Equipped with the Carl ZEISS Vario-Sonnar T* coating lens, it offers 50x optical zoom range, corresponding from 24mm wide angle to 1,200mm super telephoto (equivalent in 35mm format). The Clear Image Zoom feature on the camera brings distant buildings, people and animals jaw-droppingly close," the company said in a statement. The camera also packs "Optical SteadyShot" feature that cuts handheld wobbles and camera shakes to attain crisp stills, offering full-HD video recording. The camera's high-contrast electronic viewfinder is as accurate as one expects on a DSLR which can also be switched to manually tiltable 7.5cm LCD with 921k dot resolution, the company said. Read Also: ASUS Zenfone 3S Max: Super Android Experience, Good For Heavy Usage Nokia Unveils Digital Assistant 'MIKA' For Telecom Operators Sensationalist website Daily Info Box reported the 'breaking' news that a woman was beheaded by a muslim in Oklahoma and promises gullible readers that there is video of the incident (there isn't). The story opens like this: An Oklahoma woman, Colleen Hufford, was beheaded at Vaughan Foods, her place of employment by a Muslim who had repeatedly been attempting to convert co-workers to Islam, once again suggesting the problems with identifying radical Islam as a "religion of peace." Alton Alexander Nolen, the Islamist who killed Hufford on Sept. 25, 2014, had recently been fired from the business. He was shot by an off-duty police officer during the attack on Hufford and another co-worker, but was hospitalized and survived. Spot the problem? A story from September 25th 2014 can hardly be considered 'breaking' news anymore in 2017, can it? It seems like the story was copied verbatim from Conservative Tribune (which ran the story in 2016), who seem to have gotten it from an old article at The Blaze who finally reference this story from CNN. It seems the entire article was just a blatant attempt at cashing in on anti-muslim hysteria in the wake of President Trump's recent executive orders concerning immigration and the terrorist attack in Canada yesterday by spreading false rumors and pretending an attrocity that happened two years ago happened just now, all just to earn some money from advertising. So far, it seems to be working as this graph created using Trendolizer shows: VISAKHAPATNAM: Thirteen companies have signed memoranda of understanding (MOUs) with Sri City to invest 600 crore in the integrated business city in Andhra Pradesh. The MoUs were signed at the CII Partnership Summit, which concluded here on Saturday. The agreements are expected to create employment for about 2,000 people. The 13 companies which inked the agreements with Sri City are from different sectors. They are: Windar Renewables (Energy); Mahabal Metals and Proto D (Engineering); MCNS (Industrial Chemicals); IRMRA (R&D); Blue Star (Consumer durables); TCI and Snowman Logistics (Logistics Solutions); Manpasand Beverages, Mabalam Iyers, Sri Lakshmi Agro, Shrisym Technologies and Premium Ingredients (all in food processing sector). While Manpasand Beverages will invest 150 crore, Windar Renewables, a Spanish company proposes to invest 130 crore. MCNS is from South Korea while Premium Ingredients is also from Spain. The remaining companies are Indian. "In line with 'Make in AP' policy, Sri City emerges as one of the most preferred investment destinations, boosting local manufacturing which, in turn, will give a fillip to creation of jobs and get the economy of state and region on a fast track," said Ravindranath Sannareddy, founder & managing director, Sri City. Read Also: Tata Steel To Take 51 Pct Stake Of Creative Port Development PSA Joins Hands With CK Birla Group To Re-Enter India VISAKHAPATNAM: Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL), a company under the Ministry of Power, has signed multiple MoUs with the government of Andhra Pradesh entailing investment of 24,700 crore for energy efficiency and solar projects in the state. The execution of the projects will help the state reduce consumption of power and add over 80,000 jobs in the state. Through a memorandum of understanding signed at the Partnership Summit here on Saturday, the EESL will distribute energy-efficient domestic appliances like LED bulbs and tubelights and 5-star rated fans under the 'Unnat Jeevan by Affordable LEDs and Appliances for All (UJALA) scheme. Andhra Pradesh was the first state to execute the UJALA programme for LED bulbs in 2015. The EESL will continue to execute the programme in the state for three years, the company said in a statement. The EESL will also install a 50,000 Solar Photo-Voltaic (PV) grid connected to agricultural pump sets in each DISCOM area. It is acknowledged that irrigation needs are intermittent, between 200 to 250 days in a year, leaving most of the days with additional power available. Solar PV grid- connected pump sets will bridge the gap and the surplus power may be fed back to the grid. Several other projects will be executed by the EESL for the state government, including conversion of 500 government-owned buildings into energy-efficient buildings over three years; installation and maintenance of energy efficient LED street lights in 1000 gram panchayats over 10 years; and replacement of over 10 lakh inefficient agricultural pump sets with energy efficient ones in three years. Read Also: Alibaba's Ant Financial Buys MoneyGram 4 Common Mistakes a Business Traveler Makes WASHINGTON: The green card holders who travelled to countries placed under a temporary travel ban by President Donald Trump, will not be automatically allowed to enter US. Instead, those travellers will have to apply for a waiver to the executive order that instituted the ban, informed sources told CNN on Saturday. The countries targeted by US President Donald Trump's executive order include the Muslim-majority nations of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Sudan and Yemen. Green card holders already overseas seeking to return to their homes in the US will be processed through a waiver authority that has already been established. One official said there is a case-by-case admissions process and another said it is being done "expeditiously." People from the seven countries who have green cards -- a government document granting permanent residence in the US -- should not leave the country because they may not be allowed back in the US, one source familiar with the matter said. There's been significant confusion over the precise terms of Trump's executive order since he signed it on Friday, particularly over how it pertained to visa holders who are travelling and if any different treatment was afforded to green card holders. Exemptions will be at the discretion of the Department of Homeland Security and the State Department, and criteria for exemptions include refugee status for religious minorities facing persecution, if denying admission would cause undue hardship or if not doing so would not pose a risk to the security or welfare of the US. Those travelling without a green card who landed in the United States after the order was signed would be detained and put back on a flight to their country of citizenship, an administration official told CNN. Separately, Department of Homeland Security officials acknowledged people who were in the air would be detained upon arrival and put back on a plane to their home country. Read Also: Movement Towards Digital Transactions To Continue: Modi Trump's Executive Order Prompts Google To Recall Staff VISAKHAPATNAM: As many as 665 pacts worth about 10.5 lakh crore, spanning across sectors such as oil & gas, healthcare and mining, were signed during the two day Andhra Pradesh investment summit. Addressing investors at the end of the summit today, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu promised "transparent and corruption free" administration as he invited industries to invest in the state. He said as many as 665 memoranda of understanding (MoUs) worth 10.5 lakh crore were signed during the summit which has a potential to generate 22 lakh new jobs. The investment commitments were double the 4.67 lakh crore that had come in through 320 MoUs at last year's summit. "After you have signed the MoUs, it is no longer your business, it is our business. All clearances will be given within 14 days... I will offer you transparent and corruption free administration," Naidu told investors. He said the oil and gas industry has signed MoUs worth 1.43 lakh crore and the state can become a hub of hydrocarbons and petrochemicals. During the summit, ONGC has signed a 78,000 crore MoU, while HPCL and GAIL has signed Rs 40,000 crore worth MoU with the state government. Inviting businesses to invest in sectors like minerals, infrastructure and railways, Naidu said the state aspires to make it to the list of top 10 states in global rankings for ease of doing business. Andhra Pradesh was bifurcated with the creation of a separate state of Telangana in June 2014. As per the World Bank and DIPP report released in October 2016, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana had jointly dislodged Gujarat to emerge as the best states to do business in the country. In 2015 Index, Gujarat featured at the top, with Andhra Pradesh grabbing the second position and Telangana 13th. Naidu said he is also networking with international universities on imparting knowledge for overall development of the state. Read Also: Donald Trump's Immigration Ban: Green Card Holders Aren't Spared Too Govt May Make Aadhaar Must For Rail Concession In Budget 2017 WASHINGTON: Google has recalled its travelling staff members back to the US after an executive order from President Donald Trump restricting entry for nationals of seven Muslim-majority countries, the media reported. Syrian refugees are banned from entry until further notice. Visas for nationals of six countries, including Iran and Iraq, will not be issued for the next three months. Google said it is concerned about the order and any measures which could block great talent from the US, reported the BBC on Saturday. Trump's order means that thousands of citizens from Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Somalia and Libya may not be allowed to board flights bound for the US - even if they hold "green card" (permanent residents' permit). Trump said the measure would "keep radical Islamic terrorists out of the US". But rights groups said there is no link between Syrian refugees in the US and terrorism, according to the report. According to the BBC, there were already reports of travellers from the countries targeted being turned away as they tried to board flights to the US. Some Republicans welcomed Trump's announcement, including the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Paul Ryan, who said it was "time to re-evaluate and strengthen the visa vetting process". Read Also: EY, Microsoft To Deliver Intelligence Services In India UAE Important Partner In India's Growth Story: Modi WASHINGTON: Indian-American Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal today vowed to fight the "ill-conceived and unconstitutional" executive order by US President Donald Trump banning immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries. The remark from the Seattle Democratic Representative came after two immigrants held by Customs and Border Protection at the Seattle airport as a result of the order were released. "President Trumps barbaric executive orders have thrown our nations ports into turmoil and struck fear into the hearts of Muslims across the country," Jayapal said. "The release of the two immigrants held by CBP is a small victory in our fight against the presidents inhumane policies," she said in a statement and thanked American Civil Liberties Union of Washington and Northwest Immigrants Rights Project for taking swift legal action for their release. "President Trump should know that this is not over. This is only the beginning of our resistance. We will fight his ill-conceived and unconstitutional executive orders until the very end," Jayapal vowed. Jorge Baron, executive director of the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, joined Jayapal in welcoming the release. "Were pleased to see the release of individuals held by CBP." "While our work is far from over, this victory proves that we are on the right side of the law. We appreciate our political and community leaders who took swift action and help make this release possible. We pledge to use every resource available to bring relief to individuals suffering as a result of these executive orders," Baron said. Trump has caused outrage at home and abroad after he signed the executive order on Friday suspending refugee arrivals and barring visas for travellers from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen for at least 90 days. The two individuals were released this morning at the airport. One of them is on his way to Las Vegas to a convention he was planning to attend. The other is with his family who were already here visiting other relatives. One of them is a Sudanese citizen who has lived in the UAE for more than twenty years and the other is a Yemeni citizen born in Saudi Arabia. They were both arriving on visitors visas. Read Also: India-U.S. Defence Cooperation Greatest Ever: Top U.S. General Trump Appoints Indian-American Lawyer As Special Assistant Source: PTI STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- The Stapleton man who, authorities said, was decked out in a dress and silver high-heeled shoes while holding up a bank in his community six months ago, won't need the formal attire where he's headed. Jordan Wise has pleaded guilty in Brooklyn federal court to bank robbery, stemming from the July 25 heist at a Santander bank. According to a criminal complaint, Wise, 25, entered the bank branch at 81 Water St. garbed in a dress, heels, a large hat and sunglasses. He walked up to a teller, displayed a silver handgun and said, "Give me the money," "Put it in a bag," and "Hurry up" before exiting the bank with $780, the complaint said. Wise scooted into a nearby bodega on Water Street, King Deli of the Island, and changed in the middle of an aisle, said authorities. "He looked like a woman, he got like a woman's dress," a deli employee previously told the Advance. "When he first came in I thought he was like a woman." The worker said the man claimed he had had an argument with his girlfriend and tried to run into the deli bathroom to change his clothes. The employee refused to let him use the restroom, so the man shimmied out of the dress between the aisles. He then left the store in jean shorts, white sneakers and no shirt, the complaint said. Police said the defendant put the women's clothing in a black bag and dumped it in a public garbage can. Cops later found the bag that contained a black-sequined hat, silver heels, black dress, sunglasses and white brassiere. Six days later, on July 31, Wise surrendered at the 120th Precinct stationhouse in St. George and admitted to the bank robbery, according to court documents. Wise, the complaint said, told police the weapon was a water gun. He also identified himself in photos taken from video surveillance footage at the bank and the bodega on the day of the crime, said the complaint. The defendant potentially faces up to 20 years in prison when sentenced. A date has not been set. Wise's lawyer, Douglas G. Morris, declined comment on the case. Assistant U.S. Attorney Alicia Washington is handling the case for Brooklyn federal prosecutors. Hakim New York City Transit President Veronique "Ronnie" Hakim speaks during a award ceremony in June 2016. (Photo credit: Marc A. Hermann / MTA New York City Transit.) STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- MTA Chairman and CEO Tom Prendergast will retire Tuesday, and will be replaced by Veronique "Ronnie" Hakim, president of New York City Transit, as interim executive director, and by MTA Vice Chairman Fernando Ferrer as acting chairman. A seven-person committee will conduct a nationwide search for a permanent chair and CEO. The search committee will review and recommend candidates to Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who will appoint a permanent replacement for Prendergast, who announced his retirement about a month ago after 25 years at the MTA. Prendergast will sit on the search committee, and will be joined by fellow former MTA chair and CEO Joe Lhota. Ferrer, the acting chairman will also be on the committee. Other members are: Kathryn Wylde, president/CEO of Partnership for NYC; Scott Rechler, chairman of Regional Planning Association and former vice chair of the Port Authority; John Samuelsen, executive VP of the Transport Workers Union; and Rodney Slater, former U.S. Secretary of Transportation. "Ronnie Hakim is ready to embrace the challenge of running the nation's largest transportation network during this transition," Cuomo said. "She is a true transportation professional who has dedicated her life to improving the commute for millions of New Yorkers and I am confident that in this new role she will continue doing that as we reimagine and modernize the MTA for the 21st century. "Under the leadership of Tom Prendergast, the MTA has made dramatic progress - most recently with the successful opening of the long-awaited Second Avenue Subway - and I have directed the search committee to identify candidates who will build on his record of accomplishments. I look forward to receiving their recommendations." I am person who is uncompromisingly black and unapologetically gay. Deal with it. I am person who is uncompromisingly black and unapologetically gay. Deal with it. Alvin McEwen [image: 652208 origin 1]Published by BANG Showbiz English Jimmy Kimmel has lost half [his] fanbase over his jibes at Donald Trump. The 54-year-old star t... The cannon of Black horror films is limited. The cannon of horror films featuring Black queer characters, even more so. It's a sobering reality that Black ... Michael Luciano @ Mediaite: Kari Lake Says If She Were Governor, Arizona Police Would Arrest FBI Agents Enforcing a Policy That Doesnt Even Exist. Zacha... [image: Cincinnati Pride] Power! Pride! Pro Wrestling! | Cincinnati Pride Cincinnati Pride is getting into the LGBTQ wrestling spirit. One of the LGBTQ p... There is nothing that Donald Trump hates more than being held accountable for his notoriously bad behavior, whether personally immoral or publicly criminal... The Hollywood Reporter reports: HBO has switched off Westworld. The network has decided to cancel the sci-fi drama after its recent fourth season. Its a... NWS LEAD The DOE has released lab results which show elevated levels of lead in 53 of the 150 samples of water taken and tested from outlets inside Prall Intermediate School in West Brighton. (Shutterstock Photo) STATEN ISLAND, N.Y -- Water from various fixtures in Prall Intermediate School (I.S. 27) had elevated levels of lead in a test performed in December, according to the city. A letter from the city Department of Education (DOE) that went home last week informed parents of elevated levels of lead at the West Brighton school. The Jan. 25 letter -- addressed to families and staff -- showed that "every potential source of water for drinking or preparing food at I.S. 27" was tested for lead on Dec. 23, 2016. The laboratory results, according to the DOE, showed "elevated levels of lead in 53 of the 150 samples of water taken and tested from outlets in the building."' The New York State Department of Health requires that schools take actions to reduce the exposure to lead if found in any water outlet at levels above 15 parts per billion (ppb), which is equal to 15 micrograms per liter. According to the letter sent home to parents, "in any building where lead test results show even one water outlet above the action level of 15 parts per billion (ppb), the "DOE will implement its standard response protocol." Schools are required to collect a sample of water after the water has been sitting in the plumbing system for a certain period of time. This "first draw" sample, according to the DOE, is likely to show higher levels of lead for that outlet than what would be found if a sample was taken after using the water continuously. However, even if the first draw sample does not reflect what would be seen with continuous usage, it is still important because it can identify outlets that have elevated lead levels, according to the DOE. The results at I.S. 27 showed varying amounts of lead, in some cases much higher than the 15 ppb action level. For example, a cold water faucet in the teacher's cafeteria showed a level of 3,280 ppb. A water fountain in the third-floor hallway showed 2,260 ppb. A faucet in the classroom on the third floor of the building showed 9,950 ppb. Another faucet in a third-floor classroom showed 32,500 ppb. DOE PROTOCOL The DOE protocol for any water outlet above 15 ppb includes removing any such outlet from service, flushing all parts of the system to eliminate water sitting in pipes overnight and replacing equipment. After the equipment is replaced, it is then re-tested. "Parents can rest assured that water in New York City is of the highest quality in the world and we have stringent protocols and robust procedures in place to ensure that water in school buildings is safe for students and staff," said Toya Holness, spokeswoman for the DOE. "This is standard protocol and there is no reason for alarm: we are continuing to provide students and staff with safe drinking water." According to the DOE, each of the affected fixtures at I.S. 27 will remain out of service until remediation work is completed and future testing shows that the water does not have an elevated level of lead. The custodial staff will also continue to flush the school's water systems on Monday mornings before school starts in order to "eliminate water that has been stagnant in pipes over the weekend and to ensure safe drinking water is available for students and staff." LACK OF AVAILABLE FOUNTAINS One Westerleigh parent whose daughter attends the school said most kids depend on the water fountains to stay hydrated during they day. "I'm very mad. If my daughter forgets a water bottle in the morning, she doesn't drink anything until she gets home," she said. "I would think this would be a high-priority problem that should be fixed as soon as possible." CITYWIDE TESTING All public schools built before the 1986 ban on lead in plumbing have been tested at least once since 2002. The city recently increased the frequency of water sampling. A spokesperson from the DOE stated that all city school buildings are being tested for lead this winter, and families will be receiving detailed letters with the results in the coming weeks. Testing results and historical data for all public school buildings can be searched by name or address at schools.nyc.gov/AboutUs/schools/watersafety.